Evolve Two: Vampire Stories of the Future Undead (2 page)

8. are allergic to garlic — but many people hate garlic — and wolfs bane (a plant in the buttercup family); most of us wouldn’t know wolfs bane if we brushed against it and developed a rash;

9. will die if they are stabbed through the heart with a stake preferably widdled from hawthorn — but most of us would succumb to a stake through the heart made out of any material;

10. drink human blood to survive. Not all vampires drink blood — human or other — but it seems the majority do imbibe. For mortal vegetarians turned undead, this would be a hellish way to acquire nutrients. But, since most mortals will chomp on a medium-rare sirloin when they can get their canines into one, the liquid diet of the vampire might not be as repulsive as first envisioned.

As it turns out, most vampires don’t kill their victims. It has become common for a vampire to take just a little blood and leave the human intact with a Band-aid to the neck. This makes them a tad more appealing to us.

And, more importantly, most vampires don’t ‘turn’ those they bite. If they did turn their food source into ones such as themselves, well, check the stats on that: a vampire turns one tonight. Tomorrow night those two vampires turn two. The third night the four vampires turn four. In thirty-five days there will be 13,786,200,000 vampires (yes, that’s thirteen
billion!
) wandering the planet, which is about 6,800,000,000 more than the total population of earth. (Total of Earth’s population estimated as it increases daily.)

Even given contingencies like: the inability to move during daylight hours; the difficulty of long-distance travel which includes time zone changes and daylight savings time; a rebellious human population that fights back; turnings that don’t ‘take’; and vampires who, for one reason or another, murder each other — even with these variables factored in, it’s pretty clear that in short order we mortals would be history. But, vampires are not stupid; they’re not zombies (see 1). They would not intentionally kill off their food supply and starve themselves to death.

One of the biggest pluses and perhaps the one largely responsible for the popularity of vampires of late is their erotic appeal. Vampires are charismatic, rock-star sexy, oozing glamour and seductiveness, so much so that there’s a lineup of volunteers ready and willing to open a vein, just for the titillation of it all.

This has not always been the case (see 2). But even the ugly ones from the past had a certain
je ne sais quoi.
People
did
let them into their homes, and yes, in the old days, courtesy being what it once was, the vampire had to be invited in. But why would anyone invite into their home a stinky, dirt and maggot-covered, pale-as-death being with fangs that they
knew
had died recently and was buried at the local cemetery because in their small town or village, they’d witnessed this departure and/or interment with their own eyes!
Plus
they were also aware that it was their
relative
who had died. Traditional lore has the vampire going after family first. Then extended family. Then friends. And family and friends of friends. They were a pretty incestuous lot.

Despite the terror of the person opening the door, and against all odds, vampires
were
invited in. The reason was simple: the undead mesmerized their potential victims. Like a hypnotist on stage commanding:
Bark like a dog!
The vampires of old demanded:
Let me in!
And people did.

Nowadays, earth is getting crowded. Plenty of us live in cities or large towns where the vampire could be our neighbor, or a classmate, or a co-worker, or the overnight gas station clerk, for all we know, or don’t know. We’re wary and not inclined to let strangers into our homes. We’ve changed, but so have the undead. They seem to have gotten over their self-imposed ritual of having to be invited, perhaps at the same pace as humanity’s abandonment of traditional etiquette. Vampires have also overcome their aversion to crosses, holy water, bibles, and other religious paraphernalia. Could this have faded as church attendance declined sharply?

Along the path of their evolution, a good many of what we deem traditional vampire traits altered, or even vanished altogether. The vampire identified in myths and legends and the ones that first appeared in literature, these are not the same vampires we see today. In the past, they were never part of our world. They lived apart from us, cold and undead, soulless, dwelling between realms, skulking amidst the shadows, spawns of Satan, frightening us, extending their existence by ending ours.

They were departed family members coming back for kin. They were aristocrats, using the advantages of wealth and elitism to prey upon both their peers and the lower classes. They were persons born with a caul over the face, or the seventh son of a seventh son. They were religious heretics. Vampires in the past ran from the cross and drank blood until they were bloated and their victims drained. In some parts of the world they sucked souls, or energy, or the life force itself. Vampires were shapeshifters, able to become bats, wolves and rats. In some cultures they appeared more ghost-like or were invisible. They controlled the elements and the lesser creatures of nature, as well as humans. They were the ultimate supernatural force that only under a spell would a mortal perceive as intelligent, erotic and worth encountering a second time. The vampire was to be avoided at all costs if for no other reason than that you would very likely end up dead or undead yourself. That’s why graves were opened, bodies exhumed, hearts staked, mouths filled with garlic bulbs and heads lopped off corpses which were then re-buried at a crossroads face down with a crucifix atop the casket.

But, all that’s the past. Vampires have evolved. Considerably. Out with the old, in with the new. And almost everything we believed we knew about the nosferatu has undergone a shift.

Today’s vampiric predators come in all flavors, from ethereal to sexy, dominant to submissive, tormented to torturer, and they can be the killer or the victim. They are everywhere at all times of day. They buy houses, register for night courses, own RVs and take vacations. And, they’ve learned restraint. They intermingle with us and interbreed. They drink blood substitute (although they probably prefer the organic stuff!).

Everything about the vampire has changed but one thing: they are still predators, we are still their prey.

A year ago I edited the anthology
Evolve: Vampire Stories of the New Undead,
composed of tales of the vampire we see today and would be seeing in the immediate future. It was a project I’d wanted to pursue for a long time. I’d hoped to extract this extraordinary creature from the past — which is how he/she has been commonly viewed — and show the new vampire, where the princes and princesses of darkness are at now and how that differs from where they were then.

Even before that innovative tome was in the hands of readers, I realized that I’d caught a glimpse into the further future and became excited by the idea of showing readers what I saw. The vampire. Beyond the year 2012.

I challenged writers to find the vampire we’d be seeing in 2025, 2075, 2175 and the year 3000. We know that the vampire now lives with us and has integrated into society — that’s been the most recent common theme in vampire fiction, film and art, so that wouldn’t reverse. But how would, how
could
these enthralling creatures of the night evolve further without blunting their edge? Will our world be so accepting that we allow the undead to live next door, to occupy the cubicle behind ours at work, to date our daughters without worrying about it? Would future vampires be so civilized that we trust them to rein in whatever violent instincts they possess and not have us over for dinner in the strictest sense of the words?

What about catastrophes, natural and other types, and things like pandemics — we’re seeing signs of such events now. When the going gets tough, maybe the vampire will get going in a way that doesn’t suit us.

As the future unfolds, we will change, and the undead must as well. I was eager to find out how our two species will relate to and interact with one another because in the days ahead, at least regarding vampires, we mortals will be dancing with death on a daily basis. We might come to like and even appreciate them, but that doesn’t mean we will ever feel entirely safe. And can the vampire ever fully trust us, or see us as more than potential nourishment? All is possible, but what is probable? The future will undoubtedly be challenging.

Evolve Two: Vampire Stories of the Future Undead
shows how two species — us and them — may or may not co-exist in the decades to come. These stories investigate whether or not we can mutually inhabit the same planet and even on future worlds, despite the fact that vampires can rip out our throats. Vampire may or may not be working to control their urges. We mortals may or may not be struggling to keep from staking them first chance we get. Perhaps we will come to some mutually satisfying way of dwelling together. Perhaps.

Have a read. See what
you
think about the future undead. The range of stories in
Evolve Two
will twist and turn you in a lot of directions but, once you come out the other end of this book, you will likely agree with me about one thing: we definitely have not seen the last of the Undead!

Nancy Kilpatrick

Montreal 2011

PRE-APOCALYPSE

The List

By Kelley Armstrong

Everyone laughed when I walked into Miller’s bar. Never a good way to start an evening out.

Randy waved for me to ignore them and join him at his table. He had my beer waiting. There would be a list of supplies he needed me to steal, too, but that wouldn’t come out until later. Don’t ask me where he learned such good manners. Certainly not from his older brother, Rudy, who was snickering and whispering behind the bar.

“Ignore them, Zoe,” Randy said, twisting the top from my bottle.

“What’s going on?”

“You don’t want to know.”

Whatever it was, it was bringing a much needed air of liveliness to the place. Miller’s might not be the worst dive in Toronto, but don’t tell Rudy that or he might decide he can skip the monthly cleaning.

It isn’t even a bar, really, just a dark cave of a room off an alley, with a Miller’s Beer sign in the window. The sign used to flash, until Rudy realized it was attracting patrons and unplugged it.

It’s not a private club, but it is racially segregated. Sorcerers, half-demons, witches, necromancers, they’re all welcome. As for vampires, only one is allowed. I’d feel a lot more special about that if I wasn’t the only vampire in town.

“How’s the clinic going?” I asked.

Randy made a face, which meant ‘the usual’. Chronically under-funded and in danger of closing, which is why I stole medical supplies for him.

“I had an interesting case today,” he began. “This guy—”

“Hey, Zoe!” Rudy called. “Come here. Got something to show you.”

“Don’t do it,” Randy murmured.

I walked over to the bar, reached across and snagged a beer bottle from the ice.

“Uh-uh,” Rudy said. “You haven’t paid for your first one yet.”

“And I don’t plan to pay for this one either. So what’s up?”

The guy on the stool beside me leaned over. I resisted the urge to lean back. One advantage to not breathing? You don’t need to smell anything you don’t want to. As for the guy’s name, it was either Dennis or Mo. I’d known them both for years. Still can’t tell them apart. Both on the far side of sixty. Both missing half their teeth. Both half-demons. Or so they claimed. Never saw them demonstrate any powers other than the ability to sleep on rickety barstools.

For simplicity’s sake, I usually call them both Dennis. Neither complains. Most times, they’re past the stage of remembering their names anyway.

“You are not a real vampire,” Dennis said.

I sighed. “This again? Fine. In the morning, I’ll go drain the blood of a few virgins.”

“Real vampires don’t go out in the morning.”

“Hey, I agreed to the slaughter of innocents. Don’t push it. And don’t ask me to pretend I can’t see my reflection in a mirror, either, or I’ll never look good enough to get those virgins back to my place.”

“Can you sparkle?” someone across the room called. “I hear that’s what real vampires do these days.”

“Oh, I can sparkle. Just not for you.”

A round of laughter. I headed back to our table.

“We got confirmation, you know,” Rudy called after me.

I turned. “Confirmation of what?”

“That you’re not a real vampire.” He picked up a folded newspaper from the bar. “You aren’t on the list.”

I returned and took the paper. Two papers, actually. The first was the
Toronto Sun,
our daily tabloid. The other was an underground rag.