Vampires

Vampires are a race of blood drinking supernatural creatures that were once human. They have been encountered by the Winchesters, Gordon Walker and other hunters. However it has been stated encountering a vampire is very rare as Hunters have hunted them near to extinction, although due to their ability to reproduce by transfusion, there only needs to be one for them to repopulate.

Little has been revealed about vampires, such as their organization, weaknesses and their origin. All vampires, however, originate from the Alpha Vampire.

Characteristics
They live forever, and several depicted vampires are hundreds of years of age or older. Their diet is based strictly on blood, and while Human blood is preferred, they can survive by ingesting the blood of other animals (although one such vampire, Lenore, refers to cow blood as 'disgusting'). Vampires must keep their victims alive or their blood becomes toxic to them. Vampires can only be killed by beheading, and then, they leave behind a corpse that can be examined to find their vampire teeth.

Type of Hierarchy
Vampires are organized into nests, with eight to ten vampires residing in each, with a mate for life. The younger members of the nest typically do the hunting for their elders, bringing back humans to be fed upon for days or even weeks.

Reproduction
Vampirism is a blood-borne pathogen, spread by the ingestion of infected blood or by its direct introduction to the human blood stream. These are the only known methods of infection, since many hunters are seen getting splashed in the face with vampire blood without being turned. This means that the virus doesn't enter a person's system through the eyes, nose or unbroken skin. It may also mean that, in terms of ingestion, a certain quantity of the contagion is required to cause infection, considering getting splattered blood on the lips may result in some entering the mouth, becoming mixed with saliva, and winding up swallowed. These limitations are very beneficial to hunters due to the fact that killing a vampire can only be a gory experience.

Cure
Vampirism is rarely curable, with the only known cure being a ritual recorded by an ancestor of the Campbell Family of hunters. The ritual calls for the blood of the new vampire's sire, and will not work if the subject has fed on Human blood. The reversion is painful, but no secondary effects are retained.

Appearance
A vampire's appearance is that of a normal human. However, they all have common features, such as sharp, pointed, retractable teeth that emerge from their gums and extend beyond their human teeth, and immortality.

Powers and Abilities

 * Super strength: Vampires possess great strength, but it is known to vary with age, such as with Boris. All Vampires are capable of lifting heavy objects and overpowering humans. Older vampires, however, can overpower their own, like their pack leaders, whose authority supersedes, and other creatures.
 * Powerful Fangs: Vampires' teeth are superhumanly strong and can rip open a humans neck, leave huge bite marks on the corpse of the victim it has feed on.
 * Super Speed: Vampires speed is greater then humans.
 * Super agility: Vampires possess amazing agility. They can climb up walls and jump off buildings without hurting themselves. Vampires also have greater reflexes than humans.
 * Superhuman Senses: Vampires have extremely keen senses. All of a vampires senses are enhanced to super human level. They can see in the dark, hear a humans heart beat, and possess enhanced sense of smell. A vampire can track a human's blood over long distance including other vampires. John Winchester warned Sam and Dean about how strong a vampire's sense really is. "once a vampire has your scent it's for life."
 * Immortality: Vampires can live much longer than humans. They can't grow old and don't get sick (...sick by normal standards, however material like "Vamp-tonite" can affect them)
 * Invulnerability: Vampires can not be killed by conventional weapons like guns and knives.

Vulnerabilities
As other supernatural creatures, they have weaknesses that hunters can use on their advantage to kill them.


 * The Colt: As it can kill almost anything, can be used against vampires.
 * Dead Man's Blood: The use of blood from the recently deceased can also be used as a method to incapacitate vampires briefly.
 * Angelic Touch: The Angels can kill them without difficulty. Castiel killed Lenore by just placing his palm on her head.
 * Beheading: Beheading is the most commonly used method to kill vampires.
 * Sunlight: While sunlight can hurt them, John Winchester likened it to a really bad sunburn; rather than being lethal it only causes pain to vampires. They can also find other types of light uncomfortable, as a vampire's eyes can see a greater light spectrum than a typical human's.
 * Vamp-Tonite: Human blood with DNA altered by Leviathan corn syrup: This altered blood kills them quickly as though they'd ingested powerful acid.

Early History
Vampires were created by Eve and were some of her very first children. The Alpha Vampire was the very first vampire and he appears to have a psychic connection with other vampires. By the year 2006, vampires had been hunted so intensively and become so rare that John Winchester had thought they were extinct.

Season 1
Daniel Elkins attracts the attention of a group of Vampires, led by Kate, who follow him home and kill him after a struggle. They take the Colt from him and Kate presents it to her mate and patriarch, Luther. The vampires live in an old barn where they capture tourists and feed on them, turning one such victim into one of their own. Their nest is invaded by the Winchesters and Kate is lured after them, only to be captured and infected with Dead Man's Blood. John Winchester used her as a bargaining chip to force Luther to hand over the Colt, after which the vampires tried to kill John and his two sons. But John shot Luther with the Colt, proving the legend that it can kill anything.

Season 2
Sam is captured by a group of vampires who have sworn off human prey and have chosen to feed on cattle instead, but they are still living in fear of being hunted. Their matriarch, Lenore, wishes for Sam to go back to his brother and the hunter Gordon Walker and ward them off hunting her kin. Gordon refuses to do so, however, and discovers the nest and tortures Lenore with Dead Man's Blood to prove to the Winchesters that all vampires are monsters. Lenore resists her bloodlust despite his methods of temptation. The Winchesters turn against Gordon and free Lenore, having seen her resilience.

Season 3
A vampire called Dixon has been infecting young blonde women with vampirism in the hopes of rebuilding his lost family and repopulating the vampiric species. He converts them by feeding them his blood under the pretense that it is a recreational drug, administered either with an eyedropper or in a drink. One of the girls he has recently turned is caught and interrogated by Sam and Dean, which puts them on his trail, but the timely arrival of a vengeful Gordon prevents them from pursuing Dixon.

In a cruel twist of fate, Dixon captures Gordon and turns him into a vampire as punishment for the vampires he's killed in the past. Gordon is not a passive victim, however, and he uses his new strength to murder Dixon's girls and escape. This drives Dixon to despair and apathy, and when the Winchesters find his lair, he admits to everything he has done, it is implied that they kill him. Gordon, after escaping Dixon's lair, soon falls victim to bloodlust and feeds on human blood. He then continues his hunt for Sam by setting a trap, capturing and infecting another woman to work as a distraction and then isolating Sam so that he can attack him. Gordon underestimates Sam, however, and is subsequently decapitated with barbed wire and is dead in the fight.

Season 4
The Winchester brothers begin their supernatural investigation by looking into a vampire attack. However, the "vampire" turns out to be a shapeshifter who disguises himself as classic horror movie monsters, including Dracula.

Season 5
Dean decapitates a vampire on the hood of the Impala, quoting: "Eat it Twilight!".

Season 6
In Limestone, Illinois, Sam and Dean investigate the disappearances of several young women. They discover that the most recent victim was obsessed with Twilight-style vampires, and that she was communicating with someone who claimed to be a vampire online. At the same time, a blood bank van is robbed. Sam and Dean go to a club called the Black Rose, the girl's last destination, and discover vampires trying to "recruit" new members. Sam kills one vampire, but Dean is turned by a vamp named Boris. Sam intervenes, belatedly, and chases the vampire away. The Winchesters return to their hotel room, and Sam calls Samuel. Dean, who is prepared to be killed by Samuel, sneaks away to bid Lisa goodbye. He is nearly overwhelmed by his hunger, but resists and returns to Sam and Samuel. Samuel surprises Dean by revealing a cure in one of his ancestor's hunting journals. In order to work, Dean must consume no human blood, and must acquire the blood of the vampire that turned him, so Dean goes to the nest of the vampires with a syringe of dead man's blood.

At the nest, a "recruiter" named Robert offers Dean blood, which he declines, and reveals that they are not longer allowed to kill people. Dean meets Boris, and tries to stab him with the dead man's blood, but Boris is too quick. Before Boris can kill Dean, all the vampires collapse, Dean included. He has a shared vision of the Alpha vampire, and perceives that the Alpha wishes to build an army. When he awakes, Dean must fight the vampires in the nest. He eventually kills all the members, except one beheaded by Sam and Samuel, and gets Boris's blood. Samuel prepares the cure and Dean drinks it. He vomits blood and passes out, but re-awakes as a human.

Samuel Campbell and his people capture the Alpha Vampire. They subdue him using an I.V. of Dead Man's Blood and attempt to interrogate him, but he is extremely resistant to pain and doesn't give Samuel any information. After Samuel leaves the room where he is being held, he is approached by Dean and Sam and he reveals to them that, though he is the first vampire, he has a mother. He also tells them that Samuel is torturing him for information about Purgatory and its location. Shortly after their conversation, he escapes his cage and almost escapes, but demons appear and take him away on Crowley's orders. It is revealed that Samuel has been working for Crowley, who takes Alpha Vampire to continue interrogating it about Purgatory.

Castiel brings Lenore to Bobby's house so that they can ask her for Eve's location. She is hesitant, but eventually tells them where to find Eve: in Grants Pass, Oregon. She then asks to be killed. With Eve on earth, her nest has abandoned her and returned to feeding on humans, and even she has given in to her bloodlust on one occasion. Sam and Dean try to persuade her that after Eve is destroyed things will improve, but Lenore is doubtful. Castiel places a hand on her head and kills her.

In Grants Pass, Oregon, they find Eve experimenting with creating hybrid monsters. On examination of some of the hybrids in a bar, Dean finds they have strange hybrid attributes, one creature has vampiric teeth in addition to the spike of a Wraith protruding from its wrist. Dean dubs these hybrids Jefferson Starships.

Later, The Alpha Vampire is mentioned when Crowley asks Sam and Dean to find another Alpha. Sam and Dean ask if the Alpha Vampire wasn't enough for him. It is unknown what happened after.

Season 7
Vampires return in the Season 7 episode "There Will Be Blood" after Crowley reveals to the Winchesters that the Alpha Vampire somehow escaped his prison before Castiel wiped out all the other Alphas. It's also revealed that the Alpha Vampire has made an alliance with Dick Roman and the Leviathans, and that the two races intend to jointly harvest humanity once the Leviathans have dumbed down the population with their DNA-changing food additives. In truth, however, the Leviathan have actually engineered the additive to also kill Vampires and other monsters, thus eliminating the competition for Human prey. After the Winchesters expose this plot to the Alpha Vampire, as well as foil an assassination attempt by Edgar, the Alpha Vampire gives them some of his blood which is needed to kill Dick Roman.

Known Vampires

 * Alpha Vampire
 * Beau
 * Boris
 * Conrad
 * Dixon
 * Eli
 * Gordon Walker
 * Kate
 * Kristen
 * Lenore
 * Lucy
 * Luther
 * Robert
 * Dean Winchester (temporarily)

Appearances

 * Season 1
 * Dead Man’s Blood


 * Season 2
 * Bloodlust


 * Season 3
 * Fresh Blood


 * Season 5
 * Free To Be You and Me (cameo)


 * Season 6
 * Live Free or Twihard
 * Family Matters
 * Caged Heat
 * Mommy Dearest


 * Season 7
 * There Will Be Blood

Lore
According to most lore, vampires subsist by feeding on the life essence (generally in the form of blood) of living creatures, regardless of whether they are undead or a living person. Although vampiric entities have been recorded in many cultures, the term "vampire" was not popularized 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. This increased level of vampire superstition in Europe led to mass hysteria and in some cases resulted in corpses actually being staked and people being accused of vampirism. Local variants of vampires were also known by different names, such as vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania.

Trivia

 * They have appeared as monsters of the week in Season 1 episode Dead Man's Blood, Season 2 episode Bloodlust and Season 6 episodes Live Free or Twihard and Family Matters, and the Season 7 episode There Will Be Blood.
 * Along with the Demons and the Ghosts, Vampires are amongst the most recurring antagonists, and are the most recurring monsters in the series.