Vampires
USER: Horatio | POSTED 3-6-1990 21:34:47
SUBJECT: Vampires
There are many monsters in the world. Some of them are human - others are not. But there is perhaps no monster that holds a more prominent place in our imaginations than the vampire. Thus, as magic rises and the Threshold between possible and impossible shifts with it, it is not surprising to discover that vampires are among the creatures which awaken in this brave new world.
I only wish we knew more about them.
Before I dive in, I want to give my thanks to Raven and wilmarose; the former for having provided much of the lore that initially informed this bulletin, and the latter for having printed it out and then typed it back in so that I could produce this updated version. The information below is our best available description of vampires, but is almost certainly incomplete, and may be entirely wrong in some aspects.
**************************** * Nocturnal Blood-Drinkers * ****************************
This appears to be something that the folklore and popular fiction both get right. Vampires are nocturnal, and they drink blood; these two facts seem to be universal and indisputable, unlike just about everything else that is said about them. Based on the recorded lore, they appear to have first emerged sometime in the Middle Ages in Eastern Europe, at least with a description we recognize as vampires. Blood-drinking monsters are found in folklore all over the world, so it is possible that vampires have existed in some form elsewhere, but this is where the first recorded tales that match the vampires we have observed originate. These early tales appear to describe creatures that are more like revenants than full vampires - we'll get into the difference between those in a little while.
Raven's research indicates they arose during a brief period in the fifth century AD when magic across Europe rose above the zero-point for a while; we do not know what caused the dead in certain areas to begin crawling from their graves and attacking the living, but period texts point to this era. During large portions of the intervening time, vampires were repeatedly forced into hibernation due to low magic levels, with the oldest and most powerful of them requiring the highest levels of ambient magic to animate. At the moment, the majority of vampires who are active are of the youngest generation; most were turned during the Spiritualism movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and were vampires for only a brief time before the receding magical levels forced them into hibernation. The older and more powerful vampires are still firmly asleep in their graves, and only emerge under particularly favorable conditions.
Age seems to also account for much of the inconsistency in vampire lore. The youngest vampires are quite close to human; they can walk in the sunlight (although it pains them to do so), and they are not as strong, fast, or resilient as their elders. As they age, they grow steadily more vampiric; the sun burns them more severely, but they grow in power. Various magical powers have been attributed to them, such as shapeshifting and mind control - if those powers do exist, they are the purview of the older vampires who still sleep, and not the younger vampires that awaken today.
************************** * The Vampire Population * **************************
We think there are only about a thousand vampires currently awake and active, and that most of them are concentrated in Eastern Europe. The number is somewhat speculative, based on available reports of vampire encounters, news stories, and the application of divinatory magic. We know of a few hotspots outside of Europe - there are vampire encounters reported in southern California, Las Vegas, and New York City, all of which indicate a notable population in these locations. From the reports, it appears that the vampires have infiltrated organized crime groups such as the Mafia, and are heavily involved in human trafficking rings, presumably to ensure a viable food supply. Whether or not that thousand number is precisely accurate is debatable - but we do know that there can't be a dramatically higher number of these monsters active in the world, or their feeding activity would be too difficult to conceal.
************* * Revenants * *************
Not all people bitten by a vampire become vampires. That's a good thing, since if that was true we would all be vampires or dead in a surprisingly short timeframe. Most people who are bitten by a vampire survive, frequently without clear memories of what happened. This appears to be the intent of most vampires, who kill rarely so as to minimize the attention they might draw.
When someone is killed by the bite of a vampire, they may become a revenant. This is like a proto-vampire. They claw their way out of their grave, and begin mindlessly hunting for fresh blood. Revenants are not clever, do not have conversations, and are considered to be bestial by their elders. They attack any living creature they encounter, without thought to any consequences. Most revenants do not survive their first night. A careless vampire may create a dozen revenants over the course of months, and only a few will manage to hunt prey, feed on them, and locate shelter before dawn. Only those revenants who manage to survive long enough become true vampires; the rest become unexplained corpses when the sun rises. Those who hunt vampires often do their best to ensure revenants do not survive; when they graduate to full vampire status, they become much more difficult to handle. We don't know how long it takes for a revenant to become a vampire; at some point they develop from mindless killers covered in mud to clever predators who can seamlessly blend into society. A vampire can also command the revenants near them; those who are being so controlled will do anything their master demands; depending on what orders they receive they may have a better or worse chance of surviving to become vampires themselves.
********************* * Killing a Vampire * *********************
Vampires and revenants are both quite difficult to kill - but not impossible. The most reliable methods appear to be decapitation or a wooden stake through the heart. Fire is also effective, as is a long period of sun exposure - while revenants and young vampires do not burst into flames when sunlight touches them, they do get weaker - if it goes on for more than a few minutes they tend to deanimate, and if it goes on all day they do not rise the next night. The exact amount of sunlight it takes seems to vary; there are reports of vampires exposed for only an hour or two who are destroyed, while others seem to persist for an entire day and then rise come nightfall.
************** * Conclusion * **************
As I said at the beginning, I wish we knew more. This is a pretty thin lore bulletin, and I can't actually confirm that most of it is absolutely true. I don't know how they respond to objects and places of faith - the reports are wildly inconsistent. I don't know what powers the older vampires might have; the younger ones appear to have strength and speed mostly, but there remain stories of shapeshifting, weather manipulation, and mind control - but these are also wildly inconsistent. Most of the people who survive vampire encounters are actually dealing with revenants - and they are like toddlers compared to the true vampires. I will add more to this document over time, but for now, if you think there is a vampire around, just try and stay away.
USER: Percival | POSTED 3-6-1990 21:49:04
SUBJECT: RE: Vampires (Horatio)
These creatures sound quite foul and malevolent. What measures are being taken to eradicate them? Should we be mounting a campaign to rid the world of these monsters?
USER: Horatio | POSTED 3-6-1990 22:03:22
SUBJECT: RE: RE: Vampires (Horatio) (Percival)
I'm not aware of any coordinated effort to deal with vampires. It would be hard to create one, since most people don't believe they exist. There certainly are some people who fight back - wilmarose could tell you about some of them - but I wouldn't try to send people out to hunt them en masse with the resources we have right now.
USER: Moloch | POSTED 5-6-1990 11:48:40
SUBJECT: RE: Vampires (Horatio)
Any idea on how many revenants actually survive long enough to become full vampires?
USER: wilmarose | POSTED 5-6-1990 11:58:42
SUBJECT: RE: RE: Vampires (Horatio) (Moloch)
not too many. they are pretty dumb as revenants - some die because the get trapped in sunlight, others fail to eat the first night and never wake up again. some don't even manage to get all the way out of the grave - metal coffins are pretty hard to break out of, and it can take them so long that they are only halfway out of the ground when the sun rises. those that do get out and find a human to feed on don't have any subtlety - no sneaking up or flirting or anything - they just charge, and if you are fast you can run away. they won't go into houses without invitations and almost nobody invites a dirt covered corpse into their house. the ones that go to their old homes tend to do best - people are more likely to let them in and let their guard down. but maybe only one in ten first-nighters ever rise again? if the vampire cares about the revenant, they can make it more certain - keep the body above ground, out of the sun, make sure there is a victim right there. but mostly they don't bother. and the first-nighters aren't great fighters either. they are strong, but they usually don't know what they are doing. unless they were a soldier or a martial arts person before they died, of course - those are just as dangerous as before and now have super-strength and super-speed.
USER: Moloch | POSTED: 5-6-1990 14:03:51
SUBJECT: RE: RE: RE: Vampires (Horatio) (Moloch) (wilmarose)
Huh. So we aren't overrun with vampires because most of them don't last more than one night, unless they get lucky or they are being cared for. Like babies.
USER: FringeDr | POSTED 5-6-1990 21:51:01
SUBJECT: RE: Vampire Reproduction (Moloch)
In Biology, this is called r-selection - a quantity over quality approach. Although they aren't quite as prolific as actual r-selection species, probably because of their exceptionally extended lifespan.
USER: wilmarose | POSTED 6-6-1990 8:30:45
SUBJECT: RE: Vampire Reproduction (Moloch) (FringeDr)
lots of times, they don't seem to make any revenants at all. i don't know why, but it seems like they a vampire can make them when they want to - sometimes they make a whole bunch at once, and other times we won't see one for a few months. it's weird.
Awwww hell....
The monsters are out there. ;)