Vampire

A vampire is a being from folklore who subsists by feeding on the life essence (generally in the form of blood) of living creatures. Undead beings, vampires often visited loved ones and caused mischief or deaths in the neighbourhoods they inhabited when they were alive. They wore shrouds and were often described as bloated and of ruddy or dark countenance, markedly different from today's gaunt, pale vampire which dates from the early 19th century. Although vampiric entities have been recorded in most cultures, the term vampire was not popularized in the west until the early 18th century, after an influx of vampire superstition into Western Europe from areas where vampire legends were frequent, such as the Balkans and Eastern Europe, although local variants were also known by different names, such as shtriga in Albania, vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania. This increased level of vampire superstition in Europe led to what can only be called mass hysteria and in some cases resulted in corpses actually being staked and people being accused of vampirism.

Vampire$

Vampire$ is a 1990 horror novel by John Steakley. A dark fantasy with a contemporary setting, the novel concerns a company called Vampire$, Inc. which treats vampire hunting as a commercial enterprise, funded by large payments from the vampires' potential victims (although the company also secretly receives support from the highest levels of the Roman Catholic Church).

Plot summary

The book opens with Vampire$, Inc. cleaning out a nest of vampires, introducing the main characters and setting the tone for the book. The team has some difficulty collecting their payment for dispatching said vampires, but ultimately collects their fee and hosts a wild party at a local motel where all of the team and some townsfolk engage in epic-level drinking and carrying on. The party is interrupted by a 'master' vampire who essentially slaughters everyone at the party with the exception of Jack Crow and his second in command "Cherry Cat" Catlin.

The shaken Jack Crow begins to plan the formation of a new team, aided by Father Adam, a knowledgeable young priest sent to him by the Vatican. Events at the motel slaughter lead Jack to realize that silver, particularly blessed silver from a cross, can be used as a weapon against vampires. He has his weaponsmith Carl begin creating silver bullets and he recruits a skilled gunman named Felix, that Jack met while working as a government agent in Mexico. Felix proves to be as deadly with a pistol as Jack hoped and they seem to have a new and powerful resource to use against the vampires. In addition to the silver bullets, Carl also develops a "vampire detector" for use by the team, which proves to be a useful tool against the vampires (which are portrayed as fantastically fast and powerful compared to humans, particularly the 'master vampires').

Vampire (car)

The Vampire was a jet-propelled car that currently holds the outright British land speed record, driven by Colin Fallows to a mean speed of 300.3 mph (483.3 km/h) on July 5, 2000 at Elvington, Yorkshire, England.

Vampire was 30 feet (9.1 m) long and consumed from 7 to 10 UK gallons of fuel per mile. Powered by a Rolls-Royce Orpheus turbojet engine, it could accelerate from standstill to 272 mph (438 km/h) in six seconds, a personal best set at Santa Pod Raceway.

Vampire was originally constructed by Allan 'Bootsie' Herridge, a pioneer British drag racer, as one of a pair of identical match-race jet dragsters in 1981. The sister car "Hellbender" was involved in a crash in 1986 in which Mark Woodley, an experienced dragster driver, was killed.

Vampire crashed in 2006 during shooting of a segment for the television show Top Gear, severely injuring its driver, Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond. Hammond's peak speed was higher than the official British land speed record, recording a top speed of 314 mph (505 km/h). However, he did not officially break the British record as, according to the rules, two runs in different directions and an independent observer are required. Hammond crashed on his seventh run. Jeremy Clarkson joked that Hammond would have created the record for the fastest crash but would have needed to repeat the crash in the opposite direction.