Tribe: Bone Gnawers

Bone Gnawers

Totem: Rat

What's a Bone Gnawer? Hah, that's pretty funny, kid. Wait — you're serious? Jeez O'Pete, kid; that ain't
funny at all. Siddown a minute. The Bone Gnawers are the hardest working tribe in show business, if ya know what I mean. We've always been hale and hearty, living in and around the refuse of the cities.

Unlike most of the other tribes, we don't really have a "homeland," but it's been roughly conceded that the earliest of our kind came out of Mesopotamia. Or at least, that's what the Gall'yards say. Anyways, we haven't ever really gotten on so well with the other tribes, but we've always got the will to survive, just like the song says. See, most of the other Garou have this big, overinflated sense of their own importance. Back in the annals of Gala's history, this arrogant Silver , 'Fang War Chief, Fangs-of-Anger, said outright that we could eat only whatever the 'Fangs left after they were done. Now, oF Fangs changed his tune after a gaggle of Gnawers dragged his pack's sorry white butts out of some grade-A snowdrifts, but most of the time things don't go so (even begrudgingly) good.

Problem is that, for the most part, we're city folk. Now, don't get me wrong — there certainly are some noteworthy Bone Gnawers out there in the hill country of Appalachia and especially down in Mexico and Baja. Most Bone Gnawers , though, are citified through and through. Hand in hand with the "stigma" of living in cities goes our somewhat... impoverished... condition. But what the hell —.it's not like werewolves keep day jobs, you know, kid?

Anyway, as part of our urban existence, we tend to run into all the ugly stuff the city has to offer. More than a few of us know a fair shake about the Leeches, and most of us aren't strangers to the underside of the legal table, but it takes all kinds, doesn't it, kiddo? Where many of the other tribes turn up their noses at us, we quietly and humbly get the job done. Function over fashion, don'tcha know.

Naturally, those other Garou think we've given up the fight against the Wyrm. They accuse us of being in league with the Weaver, happy to rest on our flea-ridden hind ends and eat discarded McChunks out of dumpsters. That just ain't true.

Every company's got its grunts, and that's typically where we fall, even though there's no rigid intertribal hierarchy in Garou society. The way we see it, sporty, is that nobody lives a perfect life. You can yelp and howl and chant the Litany all day long, but if you don't do anything about it, it ain't gonna do you a bit of good.

Maybe I don't Submit to Those of Better Status or whatever the Litany says, but you can bet - that I watch the caern six ways till Sunday and have respect for those pathetic wretches beneath even me. I mean, hell, even Jesus must have sinned here and there, no? It's impossible to uphold all that crap — and you can quote me there.

There's a subtle code to the Bone Gnawer lifestyle: Serve Gaia as best you can. I know it may sound like a copout, but, hey, the Apocalypse is upon us, you know? A couple of Bone Gnawers have given up the quest altogether, searching for a better place in the deepest reaches of the Umbra, but aside from them, we're a pretty stand-up bunch. We're good snoops, given our predisposition for hiding amid the castoffs of polite society, and we've got the keenest ears for the voices of the city spirits. (Don't let anyone tell you otherwise; those Glass Walkers are too busy being 31337 to do any good.) We know all the ropes at the bottom levels of society, and don't even tell me that there's not some use for the information beat cops and hookers can tell you. We may not be pretty, but I'll be damned if we aren't pulling our own weight here, boyo.

Organization
Don't make me laugh.

Bone Gnawer society is about as loose and egalitarian as it gets. There's no real "ocracy" down here, but your ability makes and breaks your reputation, and that rep's as good as gold in Gnawer circles, let me tell you. Down here in the armpit of society, we take care of our own, and a great deal of prestige goes to those who help the most folks. You've probably heard the terms "Mother," "Father," "Grandmother" and "Grandfather" a lot among Bone Gnawers. Those names refer to Garou who have gone out of their way to hook up the unfortunates with a better deal. You get one of those nicknames by helping feed the hungry, employ the jobless and house the homeless. The more you help people, the more you're looked up to.

Another way to gain status is to accumulate an impressive array of Stuff. Capital "S." I'm not talking about random crap you come across in the street, son, I'm talking about genuinely useful things — things that the City wants you to use to help it. Some of it may look like junk, but we've got a good sense for what may be useful and what's garbage. Garbage won't help you out when you're facing down a pack of deranged fomori coughed up from a medical waste recycling plant, lemme tell you, but Stuff might. It's a kind of nebulous term, I know, but you'll learn to spot it. Moots happen every now and then, too, but they're pretty informal affairs. Unless something really big is going down, you won't get any visitors from any other tribes (except the odd Silent Strider); our parties are fairly lowrent shindigs that those other ponceys don't wanna touch.
Whatever.

Camps
Bone Gnawers aren't segregationist, but when you grow up with street gangs as families, you're bound to pick up some kind of crowd mentality.

• Deserters: These slobs give us our bad name with the other Garou. In a nutshell, they think it's too late to save Gaia, so they pack up and head out into the Umbra to find someplace else. Cowards. If I ever catch one of these runts within arm's reach, I'll give him a new hole to hide his head in.
  
  
• Rat Finks: If a Garou were a fly on the wall, he'd be a Rat Fink. These guys specialize in digging up dirt — and then doing something productive with it. You remember that big Endron oil spill a few years ago? It was all gonna blow over until some Rat Fink turned his lead over to the press.
  
  
• The Hood: Kind of like Garou-powered welfare. The Hood secretly aids the down-and-out humans of the city. They're not real popular (Gaia knows we don't need any more humies than we already got), but they're about as dedicated to a cause as you can get.

Quote
I may be dirty, I may be poor and I may be ugly. But when it comes down to the wire, I'II lay my life on the line for Gaia and any of those under her auspices. Your high'horse talk doesn't do a damn bit of good if you don't have the gumption to back it up.
-- Grandfather Bannion, Bone Gnawer Ahroun

Book: Tribe Book