Seattle, WA – Eternal Noire

Overview

The Emerald City

Seattle is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2022 population of 749,256 it is the most populous city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The Seattle metropolitan area’s population is 4.02 million, making it the 15th-largest in the United States. Its growth rate of 21.1% between 2010 and 2020 made it one of the country’s fastest-growing large cities.

Seattle is situated on an isthmus between Puget Sound (an inlet of the Pacific Ocean) and Lake Washington. It is the northernmost major city in the United States, located about 100 miles (160 km) south of the Canadian border. A major gateway for trade with East Asia, the Port of Seattle is the fourth-largest port in North America in terms of container handling as of 2021.

The Seattle area was inhabited by Native Americans for at least 4,000 years before the first permanent European settlers. Arthur A. Denny and his group of travelers, subsequently known as the Denny Party, arrived from Illinois via Portland, Oregon, on the schooner Exact at Alki Point on November 13, 1851. The settlement was moved to the eastern shore of Elliott Bay in 1852 and named “Seattle” in honor of Native American Chief Si’ahl of the local Duwamish and Suquamish tribes. Seattle currently has high populations of Native Americans alongside Americans with strong Asian, African, European, and Scandinavian ancestry, and hosts the sixth-largest LGBT community in the U.S.

Kindred Setting

“Empires inevitably fall, and when they do, history judges them for the legacies they leave behind”- Noah Feldman

The carefully built structure that gives purpose to Kindred’s lives, without its fanged shepherds, was quick to crumble. Seattle’s ruins take several forms: former Elysiums left with no Keepers, Kindred businesses with no management, and territories left unchecked or monitored. Even blood dolls and ghouls were left masterless, clinging to dreams of immortality and pleasure that disappeared without warning; the picture of Seattle, formerly vibrant, was now a lifeless painting.

When the Court of Seattle vanished, it left no one behind to speak to what doom had fallen. The city went silent, and not even the ghouls of the kindred who vanished know what happened to their regnants, and the neighboring courts were stumped as to the reasons after all a snake unseen have the deadliest fangs. For some, it is a land of opportunity like no other, with no structure and no claims; for others, a black void and the promise of an end. Kindred now prepare to venture into the ruins of the fallen city and the scattered remains of the lives built there.

Who is left behind is not as well documented besides a single mortal, Anna Gao, empowered to speak and thus as such a rarity known well even to those in the Night Society outside of Seattle. There are surely other blood dolls and other mortals the kindred may be able to track down, but finding clues about what happened to the former court is top of mind for anyone arriving in Seattle. Knowledge may prevent you from vanishing too.

Themes

The Emerald City

Seattle is called the Emerald City because the city and surrounding areas are filled with greenery all year round, even in the winter due to all the evergreen trees in the area. The nickname comes directly from this greenery. Emerald City also echoes Washington State’s nickname as The Evergreen State (even though the eastern half of Washington is more desert than greenery and evergreen trees).

Emerald City also brings to mind the beautiful perfect utopia of Wicked and Wizard of Oz, a place where propaganda has fooled people into believing in an all-powerful, all-knowing wizard from another realm that should rule over them all. This has become a way many people view the gentrification of the city, as if the government was a puppet.

Jet City

Originally called this due to the relation to Boeing, Seattle is a major international hub as well as a port city that gateways trade between our northern neighbor in Canada. A total of 33.9 million visitors came to Seattle and King County in 2022, a 27.4% increase from 2021. Overnight visitors increased by 34.9% to 18 million. International and Domestic Travel happens by ship, car, and plane in Jet City.

Coffee Capital of the World

The birthplace of Starbucks, and many other coffee shops, the city may not be known as The Sleepless City but it certainly stays up all night. Many coffee shops are open 24/7, and there is somewhere to be anytime of night. Family owned coffee shops have a footing here in Seattle to compete among corporations.