from Wikipedia
According to Caine's own recounting, his mother, Eve,
was created to be a companion for Adam, and had brought the fruit of the Tree of
Knowledge of Good and Evil to him in her effort to fulfill that duty. She and
Adam ate of the fruit, believing that knowledge of good and evil was Adam's
birthright as the first son of God, and were cast out by God for their
disobedience. Exiled from Eden, they lived in its shadow, and Eve soon bore
Caine and Abel. Adam gave each of his sons a birthright: to Caine, the knowledge
of plants, herbs, and growing things; to Abel, the mastery over animals. When
the time came to sacrifice to God, Abel chose the finest among his animals, and
Caine his choicest crops. But Caine's crops were not a pure sacrifice, as
Caine's ability to grow and harvest them was born of God's curse upon Adam: that
he should toil in the dust of the Earth. Abel's mastery over the animals came
from God's gift of the same skill to Adam, and this made his sacrifice pure.
Caine demanded answers from his father, and from God, but it was Abel who
provided the understanding: God would accept no impure sacrifice; only the best
of what Caine loved, which was not born of a curse, would be accepted. For Caine,
that meant only one thing: his beloved younger brother.
Being cast out by God for doing as he was told caused Caine great bitterness,
and he spat upon the Earth, disdaining and forever relinquishing his mastery
over plants and herbs. He wandered, alone, heartbroken and in pain, until he
found himself in the lands of Nod, east of Eden. There he met Lilith, his
father's first wife and created in the same manner as Adam, who was cast from
Eden for daring to question God and attempt to claim her birthright, rather than
be subservient to Him and Adam (being banished from Eden before the fall of man,
she was immortalized, never yet to taste of death). She gave Caine succor and
showed him the power she had found, and Caine, desiring that power, fed on
Lilith's blood to gain it. He then fled her house rather than battle her rage
and continued his journey alone. Among his newfound powers were invincibility
against Adam's descendants, great speed and strength, ability to manipulate
time, shadows, flesh and mind; these powers would later evolve into the
Disciplines which his childer would wield, although with far less potency than
Caine possessed.
At this point, Caine was visited by the archangels Michael, Gabriel, and Uriel,
each in their turn and offering Caine salvation if he would but seek forgiveness
from God for murdering his brother. Caine rejected each offer, feeling that God
was a hypocrite and that he was the wronged party; enraged by his lack of
humility and the bitter defiance he showed them and God, each angel cursed Caine:
Michael cursed Caine to forever fear fire;
Raphael cursed him to be unable to dwell in sunlight and to live forever in
darkness;
Uriel cursed him thus: "Then, for as long as you walk this earth, you and your
children will cling to Darkness. You will drink only blood; you will eat only
ashes; you will be always as you were at death, never dying, living on. You will
walk forever in Darkness; all you touch will crumble into nothing, until the
last days."
When finally Gabriel, archangel of healing came to him, he offered a path to
redemption called Golconda, on which Caine could find peace if he chose. These
curses altered Caine into the first vampire.
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Caine's Children
Eventually, Caine's travels led him back to the lands occupied by men, and he
found the descendants of his brother Seth. They were attempting to persuade
Seth's eldest son, Enosh, to be their king; Enosh, after many refusals, finally
agreed to undertake a pilgrimage into the surrounding countryside, where he
would meditate on God's will. If it were God's will that he be king over his
fellow men, God would reveal it to him and he would obey. During Enosh's
meditations, Caine Embraced him and made him his first childe, changing his name
to Enoch. Enoch then returned to his tribe and informed them that they would
make Caine their ruler, and to pay him homage. Caine accepted their tributes and
vowed to be a better ruler over them than God had been over his family.
Over time, Caine Embraced other childer, though only two are named specifically:
Irad the Strong and Zillah the Beautiful, to accompany Enoch the Wise. Zillah,
according to the Book of Nod, was Embraced by Caine to be his wife and
companion. A great city was built, named Enoch after Caine's first childe, and
there Caine and his childer ruled over the humans and were protected by them.
Caine's childer Embraced childer of their own, creating the Third Generation,
though how many of these were Embraced is also uncertain. These childer, as well
as Caine's childer (the Second Generation), spread out beyond Enoch's territory.
Sensing danger on the horizon, Caine forbade his childer and their childer from
creating more of their kind, and from declaring themselves the rulers over men.
If men wished to declare them rulers and worship them of their own will, that
was acceptable; simply establishing rule using their powers was inviting the
wrath of God. Caine's childer ignored his edicts, Embracing more childer and
setting themselves as ruler-Gods over humans. It is this that Caine says brings
the forty days and nights of rain which flooded the world, drowning the humans
and forcing the vampires to live beneath the churning, unpredictable waters,
feeding on each other in attempts to stay alive. During the flood, Caine's
whereabouts are unknown; it is only established that he removed himself from his
childer because he knew he could not save them, and he wished them to remember
well the lesson he had learned: provoking God's wrath is a costly mistake.
After the floodwaters subsided, those of Caine's childer who survived (called
the Antediluvians) began to re-establish themselves, eventually finding
descendants of Noah on which to subsist. The Second Generation set themselves as
rulers of the Second City (which is not named), but Uriel's curse of strife
began to manifest. The Third Generation turned upon the Second; it is generally
believed that the Second Generation were destroyed completely, leaving no
survivors.
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The Curses
When Caine learned, through his own powers of Sight or through other sources,
that his childer had been slaughtered by his grand-childer, he came to the
Second City in a towering rage. Upon the eleven culprits (or ringleaders,
depending on how many Cainites you believe were involved with these events), he
cast curses to punish them for the murder of their sires, each fitting the
defenses which the individual childer asserted for their behavior. These curses
became the defining characteristics of the Toreador, Brujah, Ravnos, Gangrel,
Nosferatu, Setite, Ventrue, Cappadocian, Lasombra, Tzimisce, and Malkavian
clans. The Assamite clan's progenitor was not cursed, as he did not participate
in the Second Generation's slaughter, and he and his childer took upon
themselves the responsibility of watching and judging over their cousins to
prevent abuse of humans. The Assamite clan's curse of bloodlust was laid upon
them by members of the Baali bloodline as vengeance for the Assamite's scourge.
Caine also cast a curse upon Saulot, who became the founder of the Salubri clan,
though the curse was not intended as a punishment. Because Saulot had sought to
end the slaughter rather than participate in it, he made Saulot the guardian of
Raphael's promise of Golconda, and marked him with the Third Eye. He then cast a
final curse upon all of his childer: that each generation they Embrace will be
weaker than the one before. Caine did this in an attempt to prevent another
uprising of childe against sire, and as a warning against the unchecked Embrace
of mortals; otherwise, their generations would be so weak as to be barely more
than mortals, and Caine would return to deal with his errant childer again.
Note: As each generation of vampires is weaker than the last, so too is the
effect of the curses of Caine upon these newer generations. New bloodlines and
clans have established themselves over the centuries which Caine did not
directly curse; however, as they have evolved, there are Clan/bloodline
weaknesses which are inherent, which could be construed as the intention of
Caine to curse all descendants of the Antediluvians manifesting itself.
It is thought by some that the curse to 'wear death's countenance for all to
know and fear' does not refer to a particular clan, but rather to all of them.
Others contend that it refers to the extinct Cappadocian clan.
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Speculation
There is no mention in either the Book of Nod or The Erciyes Fragments of how
Caine intended to survive the flood; however, there are several scenarios to
explain Caine's whereabouts and survival:
He could have hidden himself aboard Noah's ark, and thereby subsisting on the
limited supply of blood from the animals and humans on board.
He could have taken shelter with those he calls 'the Wild Ones', or Oberon's
children, who exist in the Dreaming, had aided him in the earliest parts of his
travels, and were safe from the flood in the fey realm.
He could have used his powers to find a time or place to ride out the flood. The
ancient Brujah discipline of Temporis allows the wielder control over time, and
all disciplines have root in Caine's powers.
He may have simply waited for the flood to subside, relying on his immortality
to save him.
Because exact numbers of the Second Generation have never been confirmed, it is
impossible to establish with any certainty that the Second Generation was truly
annihilated. Cainite historians have tentatively traced the thirteen major clans
back to thirteen members of the Third Generation, and those thirteen in turn to
the three members of the Second Generation who were named: Irad, Zillah, and
Enoch. It is speculated, however, that there were as many as 100 members of the
Second Generation who survived the Great Flood, and therefore the accuracy of
these findings is highly suspect. Those few of the Third Generation who have
survived are said to be in torpor, and even those of the Fourth or Fifth
Generation who are old enough to remember the Cursing of the Clans do not know
for sure how many childer Caine directly Embraced. For their own peace of mind,
they assert that the Second Generation was completely wiped out.
Since the cursing of the clans, there has been rampant speculation and great
superstition regarding Caine's return to the World of Darkness. It is said that
Caine will return during the vampiric Armageddon known as Gehenna, during which
the surviving Antediluvians will rise from their long torpors and feed on the
blood of their subsequent generations. It is during this time that Caine will
battle with Lilith, visit final punishment upon those of his childer who remain,
and destroy them utterly.
There is also great speculation that Caine has, over the centuries, Embraced
other direct childer, unaffected by the curses he laid upon the Antediluvians.
Many among the Camarilla contend that Caine no longer exists, or has lapsed into
torpor and is no longer a threat. Still others believe that Caine wanders
endlessly, appearing occasionally among Cainite society; more often, he moves
unseen and unknown, keeping watch over his childer for signs that he must once
again curtail their activities.
Some believe that Abel, loving his brother despite what came to pass, foreswore
his place in Heaven and that his spirit travels with Caine. Others have refined
this theory to speculate that Abel is in fact a wraith, at times comforting
Caine and at others tormenting him.
The idea that Caine may have found Golconda and that this is the reason for his
long absence from Cainite society is largely considered a fairy tale; Caine's
anger and guilt, compounded by eons, would make it nearly impossible for him to
achieve the inner peace necessary to achieve Raphael's promised salvation.
In Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, the vampiric cab driver may or may not
be Caine himself. An insane Malkavian character can identify the Taxi Driver as
"Caine" in dialog. Additionally, the sound files containing the Taxi Driver's
dialog audio are all named with the prefix "Caine", implying that this character
is intended to be the father of all vampires. The character also can be seen
with a purple aura when the appropirate vampiric skill is used, indicating he is
a supernatural being. One conclusion that could be derived from the taxi
driver's name is that since he's the father, he must drive his children - the
characters in the game - around the city. However, in an interview a developer
simply stated that whether or not the taxi driver was Caine or not was a
question which had no answer.