As part of my initial Joe Pitt pitch, I submitted a series bible that sketched out Joe’s world, the characters that inhabit it, and the rules by which it is run. I’ll be dropping bits of that bible here, unedited scraps from the original pitch I used to sell the first two books in the series.

As the series progresses, I’ll expand the suplementary material here to include scenes that don’t make the books and some micro-fiction that takes place outside the regular storyline.

WARNING:There are some spoilers below. Information that won’t ruin the plot of ALREADY DEAD, but will tip you off to how Joe’s world works and will change the experience of reading the book. Now you know.

THE CITY

Joe Pitt lives in a noir, post 9/11 Manhattan. The qualities of the real city are heightened. The dirty bits are dirtier, the rich bits richer, politics are more Byzantine, cops are more likely to be corrupt or corruptible, as are all the inhabitants of the city and almost everyone has a secret or an angle to play. This is also a city in which the naturally bizarre, the supernatural and the metaphysical exist and play large but hidden roles. The single most significant paranormal factor is the Vyrus.

THE VYRUS

The true origin and nature of the Vyrus will be the essential secret and mystery of the Joe Pitt casebooks.

The existence of the Vyrus is unknown to the vast majority of the human population as is the existence of the Vampyre community itself. The Vyrus is a topic of endless debate within that community. Most, like Joe Pitt, believe that the Vyrus is just what it seems, a natural, if bizarre, organism, communicated by an exchange of blood from the infected to the uninfected.

Some Vampyre maintain that the Vyrus has another source, that it is a curse, or supernatural energy, a judgment from God, a governmental biological weapon gone awry, demonic possession, or an evolutionary mutation. What is known for certain is that the Vyrus triggers the release of adrenaline, seratonin, dopamine and a variety of other chemicals and enzymes that enhance strength, speed, constitution and senses of the host, turning them into predators better able to kill and feed and supply the Vyrus with fresh blood. Additionally, the Vyrus attacks and kills all traditional viruses in the host body or any poisons, natural and otherwise, which might attack it. As long as the Vyrus is fed regularly it will continue to thrive and replace the hosts dying cells with it’s own, accelerating healing and slowing aging in the host. A pint of blood every other day is enough to keep someone infected with the Vyrus healthy and strong, but the more blood a host consumes, the more it will benefit from the Vyrus’ enhancements. It should also be noted that blood is not enough in and of itself to sustain the Vampyre, they must also consume regular food, and a great deal of it to keep up with the demands of their accelerated metabolisms.

THE VAMPYRE

The Vampyre are those who have been infected by the Vyrus. They are subject to the strengths and weaknesses of the Vyrus, but their essential natures are not changed by the infection. Which is to say that they do not suddenly become evil or demonic in character when invaded by the Vyrus. That said it is not unusual at all for Vampyre to develop God complexes based on their new strengths and the repeated act of feeding off of human blood. Any Vampyre that survives will naturally come to devalue human life by necessity. However, individual reactions to infection vary wildly.

The hunger of the Vyrus drives a large number of the infected to feed and survive. Those who cannot adapt will generally kill themselves within a few months. Indeed, the incidence of infection is fairly high, but because so many infected commit suicide or die of Vyral starvation (resembling regular starvation), they go undetected. The Vyrus itself dies when its host dies and cannot exist outside a living body, therefore it is never found in dead Vampyre or in Vampyre blood samples.

The infected that survive the shock of their new life will more than likely need a sponsor at some point to teach them the ropes of their new existence. They have become very fragile and exposed, and are enslaved to a grotesque hunger and will need help to understand their new life. The greatest need of the Vampyre is also their greatest weakness; the need for human blood. In a modern age it is nearly impossible for the Vampyre to feed, avoid daylight, exploit their extraordinary abilities, and still remain invisible to the public at large.

If the Vampyre were ever fully exposed, it is taken as an article of faith that they would be hunted to extinction and a creature that may be killed simply by dragging it into sunlight is horribly vulnerable. While the Vampyre have remarkable tolerance for pain and exceptional healing abilities, stakes, crosses and holy water are not needed to kill the one, a round from a high caliber handgun directed at the heart or head is more than enough.

THE CLANS

Over the centuries the Vampyre have learned that their greatest protection is to work together in a system of Clans that brutally punish any behavior that risks the exposure of the Vampyre population. The Clans tend to concentrate in urban areas, while single Rogue Vampyre will usually scatter themselves in rural areas away from the Clans, which do not tolerate loners. A new Vampyre in an area dominated by the Clans will need to join one quickly or somehow prove to be useful, or the Clans will hunt down and kill the Rogue as a potential poacher.

The Coalition:
The Coalition controls all of Manhattan between the rivers from 14th Street to 110th Street. It is the oldest, largest and most powerful of the Clans. Its strength is based on numbers, superior organization, money, its ties to the human world, and control of an enormous secret blood supply. The stated goal of the Coalition is to unite all Vampyre equally, in secrecy and safety.

All coalition members are found a role within the Clan and supplied with an amount of blood commensurate to their contributions, but never less than enough to survive. By supplying blood directly to its members, the Coalition prevents large scale feeding that might expose its members and endanger the Clan as a whole. In essence, the Coalition is devoted to the Coalition, and opposed to any one or thing that threatens it.

The Coalition is governed by a council of Seniors called the Secretariat. Some of these Seniors have public identities in the human world that allow them to pursue policy and influence, and protect the Clan.
The stated desires of the Coalition aside, the true goals of the Seniors are somewhat more obscure and nefarious.

The Society:
The Society controls the East Side from 14th down to Chinatown and east from 5th Avenue to the FDR. Their stated mission is to publicly integrate the Vampyre with the human population. They stand in direct opposition to the Coalition’s doctrine of covert existence and the two Clans are openly hostile to one another, existing in a state of cold war. But there is no doubt that the Coalition would overpower the Society if the war were to become hot. Therefore the Society seeks to unite the various other Clans so as to be able to confront the Coalition, absorb their members and emerge into the public eye in such numbers that they can neither be denied nor slaughtered outright.

The Society is made up of several smaller groups. The most powerful of these are Tom Nolan’s Anarchists, Lydia Miles’ Lesbian, Gay and Other Gendered Alliance, and Terry Bird’s Counterculturalists. These three set most of the policy for the Clan, but major decisions are made by democratic vote involving all members.
The Societists are generally young idealists unable to adjust to their lives as Vampyre and hoping to rejoin the general population and be as normal as possible again.
Terry Bird founded the Society and developed its charter.

The Enclave:
The Enclave is a small, but powerful metaphysical cult. They view the Vyrus as a supernatural organism that gives one the ability and opportunity to cross over to the metaphysical realm. They believe that as the Vyrus consumes them, it replaces their flesh with metaphysical matter, so that the more blood one consumes the less of the host’s own being will be devoured and transformed. Therefore, they seek to consume the absolute minimum amount of blood required to keep them alive, trying to achieve an ultimate balance between the speed of Vyral consumption, and survival, in an attempt to maintain their consciousnesses, as they become metaphysical beings in the physical world.

So far none have completed the transformation, and all have eventually died in the attempt. Their current leader, Daniel, has survived longer than any other. All of the Enclave possess astounding physical strength and speed, even by Vampyre standards, that are a result of living constantly at the edge of starvation and in the grip of a raging hunger where the Vyrus enhances their abilities, driving them to hunt and consume; urges they deny as part of their beliefs.

The Enclave are true zealots who ultimately seek to convert the entire Vampyre population, but they harbor their strength as they wait for one of their number to complete the transformation and lead them in a crusade.

While the Enclave live in a single block of warehouses in the Meatpacking district, they are buffered by a Vampyre no-man’s land that stretches south from 14th Street to the Battery and West to the Hudson from 5th Avenue, that has been created by the general Vampyre fear of their fanaticism and fearsome abilities.

The Hood

The Hood control uptown, east to west, from 110th Street to the north tip of Manhattan. Their membership is almost entirely non-white (primarily African, Caribbean and Latino). They were organized originally by Luther X, who brought them together to demand independence from the Coalition. Luther’s cause was successful, but he was later assassinated by the Coalition, and the Hood are now lead by Luther X’s former warlord, DJ Grave Digga, who has committed them to the overthrow of the Coalition by any means necessary.

They launch frequent raids below 110th Street, but lack the numbers to attack in full force. The Coalition counterattacks in kind, but resists an all out and final retaliation in fear of the public awareness that a true offensive would create. The Hood and the Society occasionally ally against the Coalition, but mutual distrust keeps them from joining together for a single offensive that might destroy their common enemy.

Rogues

Rogues are those who either chose or are forced to live outside the Clans. There are, within the Rogue community, small groups (a Vampyre motorcycle gang called the Dusters, the Wall in Chinatown, the Chosen in Brooklyn), but they are too small to be recognized as Clans or to control more than the smallest territories, and rarely have any guiding principals or stated goals. Some Rogues would like to belong to a Clan, but are simply not accepted.

The Enclave is the most discriminating of the Clans and generally recruits new members rather than accepting volunteers. In any case, few survive their brutal initiation.

The Society accepts volunteers who can articulate a political/social philosophy sympathetic to their cause, and who are willing to adhere to their code of conduct, which primarily involves a pledge to never kill to feed, as this hampers the cause of public unity with the human world.

The Hood has no stated racial bias, but white members are rare. All new applicants undergo a strict indoctrination, and beyond a certain point in this process, the only way to leave the Hood is feet first.

The Coalition will theoretically accept all comers, as agrees with their goal of uniting all Vampyre secretly. In fact, they do accept most and find them a roll to play, but those they deem as potentially dangerous to the Coalition are never seen again after they apply for membership.

Most Rogues reject the Clans outright. Some because they are too wild to live under any structure. Some because their love of hunting, killing and feeding would never allow them to live within a Clan. Some, like Joe Pitt, because they simply reject authority. None of the Clans have a friendly attitude toward unallied Rogues, and all take responsibility for policing their areas of influence, and seeing that rampant feeding is quickly halted before it becomes noticed by the public at large.

To survive, a Rogue must remain invisible to the Clans or prove useful to them in some manner.

OTHER GROUPS

Humans

Uninfected humans are largely unaware of the Vampyre world. Those who are aware are usually so because they either witnessed or, much more rarely, survived a feeding encounter with a Vampyre. Of these most will deny what they have witnessed or simply never be believed by anyone they might tell. The few who remain generally fall into one of several categories.

Lucies, male and female, may or may not want to be infected, but are powerfully sexually drawn to the Vampyre.

Renfields covet the perceived power of the Vampyre and try to serve them in the hope that they will be rewarded by eventually being infected themselves.

Minas are those, male or female, who engage in romantic relationships with the Vampyre. They may be truly in love, or tragically drama prone and simply in love with the doomed nature of the relationship.

Van Helsings are those who hunt or seek to expose the Vampyre. They may be lone nut cases with no real understanding of how the Vampyre live, feed and die, or hardened hunters who have acquired a working knowledge of the Vyrus and the infected.

Zombies

Zombies appear to be produced by a bacteria that possesses qualities similar to the Vyrus, but with significant differences. Where the Vyrus thrives on blood alone the zombie bacteria consumes all flesh. While the Vyrus will maintain a host indefinitely, infection by the zombie bacteria is a terminal and short lived condition. The bacteria consumes the host’s flesh and the host begins to decompose, even as the bacteria maintains the host’s most essential functions to keep its food supply “alive” and viable. But, like the Vyrus, the bacteria instills its own hunger in the zombie. Zombies will hunt and feed off of humans and consume their flesh indiscriminately, but their real need is for brain matter. Zombie feeding serves three functions for the bacteria.

Firstly, the bacteria seems to particularly thrive on certain tissues and chemicals in the brain. Secondly, the bacteria is able to break down seratonin, adrenaline and dopamine from brain matter and reprocess it for its own host to keep it moving and feeding, thus sustaining the bacteria. Thirdly, the bacteria cannot be sustained outside a living body and must be transmitted directly to another host; therefore biting is the primary mode of transmission for the bacteria.

Zombies usually appear in batches produced by a carrier zombie who, for unknown reasons, have a tendency to simply bite and infect many of their victims rather than consuming their brain matter. This may be a function of particularly lame zombies who are able to get their teeth on a victim, but not able to hold onto them, or the function of a separate strain of the bacteria, but no one seems to be certain which it is.

Because the bacteria can exist only in a very specialized environment and be transmitted through only the most extreme contact, it is rare and far from hardy. It is theoretically possible that the bacteria could be sustained within a host body and be extracted and injected into another host, thus preserving the host’s entire brain and creating a high functioning zombie. But what kind of sick fuck would do a thing like that?

Zombies also tend to be stupid and clumsy (because, hey, their brains and other tissues are being consumed from the inside out), but terribly strong and single minded. They can retain fairly high brain function for a short while after infection, but the personalities and human qualities of the infected seem to degrade very quickly. Because of their high pain thresholds and lack of concern for survival they are nearly as hard to kill as the Vampyre. Sufficient damage to the brain will keep it from communicating the bacteria’s demands to the body and render a zombie immobile or dead. A large chest wound that destroys the lungs or heart will starve the brain of oxygen and quickly kill the bacteria and its host as well. However, cut of a zombie’s arm and it will keep coming, indeed, cut one in half and the upper half may keep trying to eat your brain for several more minutes.

Though rare, zombies are of great concern to the Vampyre. They are sloppy in their feeding and draw unwanted attention from traditional law enforcement and Van Helsings. The Vampyre hold them in disgust, and wiping them out when they crop up is always a top priority. The Vampyre loathing of zombies is enhanced by the similarities between the Vyrus and the bacteria. No one is quite certain how to explain two very similar, but completely separate life forms. Though a few have suggested that there may be a relationship between the two infectious agents, it is generally considered to be in bad taste, if not blasphemy, to do so.

THE PLAYERS

Joe Pitt:
Joe Pitt is the taken name of a Vampyre who resides on the Lower East Side and makes his living as a sometime PI and general hard case within both the human and Vampyre populations.
Joe was physically born in 1960. By 1977 he was a runaway Punk squatting in Tompkins Square. He was infected in that year by a sloppy Rogue, and discovered and taken to the Society by Terry Bird. He stayed with the Society for several years before becoming disillusioned and going Rogue. He is able to survive outside the Clans by doing occasional service for the other Clans, particularly the Coalition which views him as a useful tool in the Societies’ territory. Joe also takes it upon himself to police his neighborhood in an effort to keep it clean of other Rogues or any one/thing that might endanger his own survival.

The mechanics of Joe’s survival are fairly simple. He consumes about a pint of blood every other day, which keeps him fit and healthy. He has aged over the years, but at 45 (casebook one is to be set in 2005) has the appearance of a 28 year old. He could further slow the aging process by consuming more blood, but knows acquiring that much blood would expose him to more danger. As it is, Joe gets the bulk of his blood in the form of payoffs from the Coalition or the occasional raid on one of a number of hospitals and blood banks he has staked out. In need, he will resort to mugging an uninfected human and tapping their veins for a pint or two.

Terry Bird:
To look at his ponytail and John Lennon glasses, one would assume that Bird was infected in the mid to late sixties (many Vampyre are stylistically stuck in the era in which they were infected, and it is a sometime identifying factor for Van Helsings; “hey, what about that guy in the Miami Vice getup?”). In fact, his ensemble is affected to go with his role as organizer of the Society, and he is far older than any of his co-leaders suspect.

He has a real fondness for Joe and once thought he would be his chief lieutenant, but has all but given up on him ever being more than a tool. However, unlike Predo, he is highly aware of Joe’s sharpness, and tries to keep him off the field of play so that he might be used to greater efficiency at a later date.

Dexter Predo:
Dexter Predo is a very old and powerful Vampyre. While not a Senior of the Coalition, he runs it secret police and serves as a kind of party chairman, enforcing loyalty to the Clan. Predo exists to serve the Coalition and to cultivate his power within it. As director of the Coalition’s covert arm he is has access to most of the true history and secrets of the Vampyre, and he covets and protects this knowledge.

Daniel:
Daniel is the current elder and leader of the Enclave. He has survived far longer than any of the other members of the cult and is perhaps the single mot dangerous Vampyre on Manhattan. His physical abilities transcend those of regular Vampyre and have been enhanced by the long study of meditation and martial arts that all the Enclave follow in order to discipline themselves against the constant state of hunger they cultivate.

DJ Grave Digga:

Digga served as warlord to Luther X until the founder of the Hood was assassinated by the Coalition. At one time, the Hood territory had been ostensibly part of the Coalition, but was used as a dumping ground for the less desirable Coalitionists. Luther, a freed slave who fought for the Union before he was infected, was inspired by the Civil Rights movement and organized the Hood to succeed from the Coalition. He then established supposedly peaceful relations with it. When he was assassinated and Coalition agents were found to be responsible, Digga jumped over the lieutenants that seemed most likely to take Luther’s place by feeding the anger and hunger for revenge within the Hood. He put the Clan on a war footing and began wholesale changes in its charter to reflect more aggressive policies.

Lydia Miles:

Lydia is the head of the Lesbian, Gay and Other Gendered Alliance of the Society. She is only recently infected and is quite close to the twenty years she appears to be. She was an experienced and committed campus organizer, and Terry Bird found her and brought her quickly to the Society where she has emerged as one of its most outspoken and powerful leaders. She cemented her power by organizing the previously unrecognized sexual minorities within the Society into their own voting block. She is a realistic idealist, and would like nothing more than to see the Vampyre integrated into “normal” human society, but acknowledges the distance of the goal, and focuses her energy on lesbian, gay and gender rights within the Vampyre community. She is perceptive enough to see that there is more to Bird than meets the eye and trusts him only to that extent.

Tom Nolan:

Tom is the chief firebrand of the Society. He is a political anarchist at heart, but was convinced, rightly, by Terry Bird that he would never survive outside a Clan. He has found it murderously difficult to maintain the subtlety of life that a Vampyre must have, and constantly campaigns for the Society to begin their final assault against the Coalition and move toward going public. He bridles at the thought that he has become a second class citizen, and feels that his rights are being abridged because he has been infected with an illness over which he has no control.

He is certain that Joe is a Coalition agent, and nothing would make him happier than to kill him, but Bird keeps him from doing so.

Hurley:

An Irish gangster from the golden era of Prohibition, Hurley is the hulking, more than slightly dim, enforcer of the Society, and is utterly loyal and committed to Terry Bird. Their connection goes back many years, perhaps as far as Bird’s secret involvement with the Coalition. He seems to have no greater desire than to serve Bird and the Society, but, while his loyalty is unquestionable, he is more than somewhat suggestible, and must be kept on a short leash.

Philip Saxs:

Philip Sax is a classic Renfield. He became aware of the Vampyre when he witnessed the feeding-killing of one of his friends outside an after hours club on Avenue B. He is a straight-up speed-freak-lounge-lizard-nocturne, and craves what he thinks of as the Vampyre high. Over several years, he has insinuated himself into the Vampyre community and made himself useful as an errand boy and informant. He is reliable only to the extent that one knows just how duplicitous he is, and nothing is more valuable to him than his own skin.