History Literature / PresidentsVampire

* ItsAllAboutMe: Everything Wyman does revolves solely around his desire to become President of the United States. He completely ignores the fact that he's completely unsuitable for the job and pretty much everyone in his own party despises him and tolerates him only because of his connection to Curtis.

** While Konrad is implied to have saved Reagan's life in 1981, it's indicated that the President never fully recovered from the injury and towards the end of his second term became quite zombie-like in behaviour.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: In ''The President's Vampire'', when one of the research team suggests Konrad might be behind the [[spoiler:Snakehead virus outbreak]], Zach dismisses the idea, explaining that Konrad would never have anything to do with Innsmouth ([[spoiler: the original source of the virus]]) because he considers that sort of thing beneath him. Zach also adds that if Konrad were behind such a thing, it would have his signature all over it, because [[ItsPersonal he'd want Cade to know he was responsible]].

* EvilIsPetty: During her time in the CIA, Holt ratted out her entire team to the Islamic extremists they were shadowing, resulting in their deaths, because she was angry they were sidelining her because she was the junior member of the team. This got her noticed by the Shadow Company.

** In another flashback, Ulyssees Grant considers himself a greater monster than Cade for the fact he is honoured for his deeds during the Civil War, [[WarIsHell despite the devestation and death it caused]], but accepts it and the fact he [[spoiler: is sending Cade out to assassinate any surviving instigators of the war]] in the hope of [[IDidWhatIHadToDo making the future better]].
* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Vampires are functionally immortal, although they have to drink blood to stay young, and drinking human blood gives them additional powers compared to feeding on animals. Sun hurts them, and during the day they are weaker. They have supernatural senses, strength and speed and have to sleep once in about a week. Garlic and silver do nothing, although religious symbols and places hurt.

** ''Blood Oath'': Wyman suffers a partial one when he realises [[spoiler: his Shadow Company allies have betrayed and left him to be killed in the ''Unmenschensoldaten'' attack on the White House with Curtis]]. To his credit, he manages to regain his composure before he can inadvertantly let slip [[spoiler: he's in cahoots with the company]].
** ''The President's Vampire'': Colonel Graves suffers a full one when he sees [[spoiler: the President has signed his ''real name'', on a "Indefinite Preventative Detention order, cancelling out the pardon he was given under his pseudonym for his involvement in Kennedy's assassination and leaving Cade free to rip him into scraps of meat]].

-->'''Cade''': You're a important man, I get that. I promise, this won't take long. ''([[spoiler: Cade shows Graves the form in his true name, Peter Sinclair, cancelling out his pardon and labelling him a traitor to the USA]])''. [[spoiler:[[NoSell You have been designated as an enemy combatant, Colonel]]]].

* Foreshadowing: Shortly after JFK's assassination, Cade meets with Robert Kennedy who tells Cade that he suspects [[spoiler: the Order]] to have been behind his brother's death and that while he is no position to strike back at them now, will be once he has secured the Democratic nomation for the presidency and asks if Cade will assist him in the matter when the time comes. Cade agrees, but privately suspects after this meeting, he will never see the younger Kennedy again.

* IntroOnlyPointOfView: ''Blood Oath'' starts with POV of a random soldier who witnesses a fight between Cane and a bunch of werewolves, then returns to Iraq and is never seen again.

** [[spoiler: The ''Unmenschensoldaten'' attack at the end of Blood Oath has overtures of this]].

-->'''Curtis''': [[BetterToDieThanBeKilled He decided pills was easier than facing Cade].

[[ActionSurvivor Zachary Barrows]] is a young White House bureaucrat and his party's boy wonder, hoping to achieve much in politics. However, his career comes to a screeching halt when, after spending a night with the president's daughter, he's reassigned to be, for the rest of his life, a liaison officer between the White House and... a vampire.

* BetterToDieThanBeKilled: At the end of the second book, [[spoiler: after the Chief of Staff is exposed as a Shadow Company mole, he intentionally overdoses on pills rather than face Cade.]]

* DrivenToSuicide: At the end of ''The President's Vampire'', [[spoiler: Will Prador, President Curtis's Chief of Staff overdoses after his involvement with the Shadow Company's plan to release the Snakehead virus on America, knowing full well it was only a matter of time before Cade came for him]].
-->'''Curtis''': He decided pills was easier than facing Cade.

-->'''Curtis''': He's not the first one to spare Cade the work. He won't be the last.

-->''[...]''
-->'''Cade''': My oath to protect does not extend to traitors. You'd be surprised what I can do to traitors.

-->'''Zach''': A lot of people almost died because you trusted the wrong person. Of somewhat more importance to me is the fact ''I'' almost died because you trusted the wrong person.

* YourDaysAreNumbered: The reason Griff is retiring in the first book is because he has cancer. [[spoiler: And then he's killed by an ''Unmenschensoldaten'' at the book's climax.]]

** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Conrad_Dippel Johann Konrad]], the real-life basis for Shelley's [[Literature/{{Frankenstein}} Doctor Frankenstein]], perfected his Elixir of Youth in 1693, and used it to live for centuries and continue his obscene work, until in 1793, when one of his creations got loose and killed dozens of people before it was brought down, forcing Konrad to make a quick exit when an angry mob stormed his castle afterwards. Apparently Mary Shelley got the idea for the novel while on holiday near Konrad's family castle and hearing the accounts of his atrocities. Konrad is also implied to have been responsible for saving Ronald's Reagan's life after the assassination attempt on him in 1981, resulting in the U.S. Government giving him a pardon (much to Cade's fury) in exchange for certain conditions (see DealWithTheDevil below).

* DidntThinkThisThrough: Ken Blayclock, one of Holt's underlings in ''Blood Oath'', tries to take Cade down with a water pistol full of holy water. It goes about as well as you would expect: [[spoiler: he succeeds only in spectacularly pissing Cade off, who then batters him to a pulp, [[NotSoStoic reduces Ken into a quivering wreck desperately begging for his life]], and then [[NeckSnap kills him]] when he discovers Blayclock spent the hours before Cade's arrival torturing Zach]].

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: How Cade defeats the Shadowmen: [[spoiler: Since their abilities work by moving between this world and the Other Side, but keeping them invisible to whatever lives there, he grabs them in mid-transit, leaving them halfway between worlds and vulnerable. One is driven insane, while the other just disappears, apparently devoured.]]

** JackTheRipper was a "starchild" created by Aleister Crowley, in the same sort of ritual that later created the Boogeyman. That ritual was performed by Francis Tumblety, an American quack who was one of the primary suspects in the Ripper case.

* DeathBySex: When Zach ask why [[spoiler: the Boogeyman's victims tend to be couples having sex, Cade remarks that Griff theorised that since the Boogeyman is preconditioned to hate life, it despises sex as the ultimate expression of that]].

** Governor Seabrook refuses the Shadow Company's aid to get himself elected, suspecting there will be a price to pay if he does.

* MadeOfIron: While not what she wanted, Helen has gotten some uses out of Konrad's betrayal of her; her paralysed right arm allows her to hit people with the force of being struck by a tree branch, and enables her to [[spoiler: apparently survive being shot point blank in the head by Zach]].

* PresidentEvil: The Shadow Company would ''love'' to install one of these. By the time of ''Red, White, and Blood'', they've decided to try and recruit Curtis' running opponent, Governor Seagrave, who seems likely to win. [[spoiler: Then at the end of the book, Vice-President Wyman, who has an alliance with the Company, kills Curtis, thus taking over.]]

-->'''Zach: Just tell me what I want to know. I'm not here to play games.

''[...]''

** ''The President's Vampire'': Colonel Graves suffers a full one when he sees [[spoiler: the President has signed his ''reall name, on a ''"Indefinite Preventative Detention'' order, cancelling out the pardon he was given under his pseudonym for his involvement in Kennedy's assassination and leaving Cade free to rip him into scraps of meat]].
-->'''Graves''': Do we ''really'' have to do this again? [[TheUntouchableAuthorityFigure You cannot touch me. Ever]]. And I will never fear you again. Learn to accept defeat. Or don't. Either way, I have a busy schedule this week.

* WouldHitAGirl: Zach shoots Holt in the head in ''Red, White and Blood'' as payback for what he suffered thanks to her in ''Blood Oath''.

* AndIMustScream: How Cade ultimately deals with the Boogeyman. [[spoiler: Since killing its host body will just let it reincarnate in another, he breaks every bone in said body, then has him put on life support, with plans to keep the body too broken for it to ever fully heal, yet unable to escape.]]

** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Conrad_Dippel Johann Konrad]], the real-life basis for Shelley's [[Literature/{{Frankenstein}} Doctor Frankenstein]], perfected his Elixir of Youth, and has been using it to live for centuries and continue his obscene work, until one of his creations got loose and killed dozens of people before it was brought down, forcing Konrad to make a quick exit when an angry mob stormed his castle afterwards. Apparently Mary Shelley got the idea for the novel while on holiday near Konrad's family castle and hearing the accounts of his atrocities. Konrad is also implied to have been responsible for saving Ronald's Reagan's life after the assassination attempt on him in 1981, resulting in the U.S. Government giving him a pardon (much to Cade's fury) in exchange for certain conditions (see DealWithTheDevil below).

* DealWithTheDevil: The U.S. Government pardons Konrad for his part in saving President Reagan's life after the 1981 assassination attempt, on the condition he hands over the formula for the Elixir of Life and agrees not to create any more ''Unmenschensoldaten''.

* DisappearedDad: Zach and his father Frank do not have a good relationship; Zach resents the fact that his father was never around during his childhood, and seemed more concerned with indulging his alcoholism and womanising than his family. [[spoiler: Zach is also angry that in the past his father blackmailed him for money with the threat of revealing his past brushes with the law and that Frank didn't bother to show up and at least try to make amends to Zach's mother when she was dying]].

* MyGreatestFailure: Cade considers failing to save Tania from vampirism this.

-->'''Graves''': [[spoiler: [[ThisCannotBe No. You can't do this]]. ''([[MenacingStroll Cade advances on him]]'' [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections No. ''You can't do this! I have rights'']]!]]

-->'''Cade''': You're a important man, I get that. I promise, this won't take long. ''([[spoiler: Cade shows Graves the form in his true name, Peter Sinclair, cancelling out his pardon and labelling him a traitor to the USA]])''. [[spoiler: [[NoSell You have been designated as an enemy combatant, Colonel]].
-->'''Graves''': [[spoiler: [[ThisCannotBe No. You can't do this]]. ''(

** Konrad presents himself as a cultured, erudite and polite man [[NiceToTheWaiter friendly to his staff and clients]], when in truth he's the original MadScientist and EvilutionaryBiologist with a sense (or rather complete lack) of morality that would make Joseph Mengele look clean by comparison, who has worked for the Nazis pioneering bioweapons and carrying out his research in the concentration camps, before moving on after the war to serve the Soviets, Islamic militants, the Shadow Company and just about any group who will allow him to continue his research, as well as being willing to murder prostitutes to extract what he needs to keep himself immortal from their bodies, and willfully murders and betrays people (including his allies) for reasons as petty as the fact he simply doesn't like them.

** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Conrad_Dippel Johann Konrad]], the real-life basis for Shelley's [[Literature/{{Frankenstein}} Doctor Frankenstein]], perfected his Elixir of Youth, and has been using it to live for centuries and continue his obscene work, until one of his creations got loose and killed dozens of people before it was brought down, forcing Konrad to make a quick exit when an angry mob stormed his castle afterwards. Apparently Mary Shelley got the idea for the novel while on holiday near Konrad's family castle and hearing the accounts of his atrocities. Konrad is also implied to have been responsible for saving Ronald's Reagan's life after the assassination attempt on him in 1981, resulting in the U.S. Government giving him a pardon in exchange for certain conditions (much to Cade's fury).

** John Wilkes Booth was a patsy of the Order, who faked his own death in 1865 and went into hiding, until the guilt caught up with him decades later and he started drunkenly announcing the truth. So Cade hunted him down and killed him, though admittedly he made it quick and painless.

** ''Red, White and Blood'': [[spoiler: The Boogeyman is finally defeated and imprisoned with no chance of escape, but numerous people have died, including Zach's father, Zach's hopes of salvaging a relationship with Candace end when she breaks it off, stating she can't handle the monsters he deals with every day in her life, Holt is still alive (possibly undead) and even ''more'' determined to get her revenge, and to top it all, Wyman is able to assassinate President Curtis, pass it off as a heart attack and [[DragonAscendant get himself sworn in as President]], leaving Zach and Cade with a man who despises them, who they suspect to be a Shadow Company associate, and is far too willing to take advantage of the Other Side, as their new boss]].

** Vice President Lester Wyman. Though a fair few people suspect him of being involved [[spoiler: in the ''Unmenschensoldaten'' attack on the White House]], by the end of the novel, those who do are either dead or don't have enough proof to condemn him. He's later able to use this to [[spoiler: assassinate President Curtis, fake the death as a heart attack and get himself sworn in]].

* MadeOfIron: While not what she wanted, Helen has gotten some uses out of Konrad's betrayal of her; her paralysed right arm allows her to hit people with the force of being struck by a tree branch, and enables her to [[spoiler: survive being shot point blank in the head by Zach]].

[[ActionSurvivor Zachary Barrows]] is a young White House bureaucrat and his party's boy wonder, hoping to achieve much in politics. However, his career comes to a screeching halt when, after spending a night with president's daughter, he's reassigned to be, for the rest of his life, a liaison officer between the White House and... a vampire.

As it turns out, there is an entire world of supernatural creatures that, for most part, consider humans to be tasty and healthy meal, and many people who want to use black magic against the general public. Between them and unknowing civilians stands [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Nathaniel Cade]], a vampire bound by a blood oath to serve the President of the United States, whoever he might be. He's been doing this job for over fourteen decades and gone through dozens of partners - the latest of which is supposed to be Zach.

* AbandonedHospital: Slight inversion of this trope in that it's an abandoned hospital ship; [[spoiler: after a well-meaning army medic sets down on the ship with a wounded soldier (who unbeknownst to him has been deliberately infected with the Snakehead virus), Cade is sent in to investigate. Cade abruptly wastes no time in [[LeaveNoSurvivors killing everything aboard the ship]]; the Snakeheads who have already turned can't be allowed to escape back to dry land, and any surviving humans, if they haven't already been infected with the virus, will likely have been driven irreperably mad by what they've seen.

** ''The President's Vampire'': [[spoiler: The Shadow Company's plans to unleash the Snakeheads on America and trigger the Apocalypse is foiled, and the Company is dealt a severe blow with the death of its agent Graves, but Zach is forced to accept that his association with Cade will forever deny him a normal life, and his chances of a relationship go out the window when the girl he was seeing turns out to be a Shadow Company operative who, [[DefectorFromDecadence realising she's in too deep]] and working for OmnicidalManiacs, [[RedemptionEqualsDeath sacrifices herself]] to both save Cade and Zach and make amends for her sins]].

* CuteAndPsycho: Tania is a semi-heroic example, being pretty woman and calling humans 'livestock'. Helen, on the other hand, is villainous example, acting AffablyEvil and even friendly most of the time, but inside, being pretty much empty of anything else than unconditional self-interest.
* DarkIsNotEvil: Cade, despite being vampire, killer, and creature of the night, is one of the good guys, even though sometimes he doesn't believe it.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: Ken Blayclock, one of Holt's underlings in ''Blood Oath'', tries to take Cade down with a water pistol full of holy water. It goes about as well as you would expect: [[spoiler: Cade batters him to a pulp, [[NotSoStoic turns him into a quivering wreck desperately begging for his life]], and then [[NeckSnap kills him]] when he discovers Blayclock spent the hours before Cade's arrival torturing Zach]].

* TheDreaded: Anyone in league with the Other Side considers Cade this and lives in terror of ending up on the wrong side of him.

* FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire: Nathaniel tries to be one, drinking only animals' blood and serving the US government in fight against creatures to whom he's technically closer than to humans, although his personality rather defies the "friendly" part.

* HeroicBSOD: Cade mentions that he went through one after World War Two, when what he saw made him question whether the world is actually worth saving. He got out of this when he accidentally stumbled upon Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and realized that his HorrorHunger is similar to their alcohol addiction.

* HiddenDepths: Despite the party girl persona she cultivates for the press, Candace Curtis is far more intelligent and media-savvy than she lets on. She is also one of the few people not to show fear of Cade to his face. During her time on the campaign trail, she [[BewareTheNiceOnes angrily chews out a number of journalists]] who want to see proof of a car wreck that's killed two Secret Service agents ([[spoiler: they were actually killed by the Boogeyman]]) by pointing out that the families of the agents don't need to see their loved ones' mangled bodies splashed across the tabloid. She's also fiercely devoted to her family: her first thought during [[spoiler: the ''Unmenschensoldaten'' attack on the White House]] is her father's safety, and she leaves the safety of a panic room aboard Air Force One to find and protect her little brother, even though [[spoiler: the Boogeyman is aboard and on the rampage]].

* RewardedAsATraitorDeserves: As per his oath, Konrad really goes to town on those he considers to have betrayed the United States. Plenty have [[BetterToDieThanBeKilled chosen suicide over facing Cade's fury]].

* VampiresAreSexGods: Played with. Zach notes that Cade, despite looking good, has something that makes humans around him terrified of him, while Tania, vampiress herself, considers him to be sexy. Cade himself states this:

** ''Red, White and Blood'': [[spoiler: The Boogeyman is finally defeated and imprisoned with no chance of escape, but numerous people have died, including Zach's father, Zach's hopes of salvaging a relationship with Candace end when she breaks it off, stating she can't handle the monsters he deals with every day in her life, Holt is still alive (possibly undead) and even ''more'' determined to get her revenge, and to top it all, Wyman is able to assassinate President Curtis, pass it off as a heart attack and get himself sworn in as President, leaving Zach and Cade with a man who despises them, who they suspect to be a Shadow Company associate, and is far too willing to take advantage of the Other Side, as their new boss]].

* DisappearedDad: Zach and his father Frank do not have a good relationship; Zach resents the fact that his father was never around during his childhood, and seemed more concerned with indulging his alcoholism and womanising than his family. [[spoiler: Zach is also angry that his father blackmailed him for money with the threat of revealing his past brushes with the law and that Frank didn't bother to show up and at least try to make amends to Zach's mother when she was dying]].

* NighInvulnerability: Pretty much nothing apart from nuclear blast or direct sunlight could kill Cade. When he meets head-on with a car, he looks as if nothing happen, and the car is pretty much impossible to use anymore.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: In ''The President's Vampire'', when one of the research team suggests Konrad might be behind the [[spoiler:Snakehead virus outbreak]], Zach dismisses the idea, explaining that Konrad never wants anything to do with Innsmouth ([[spoiler: the original source of the virus]]) because he considers that sort of thing beneath him. Zach also adds that if Konrad were behind such a thing, it would have his signature all over it, because [[ItsPersonal he'd want Cade to know he was responsible]].

* HiddenDepths: Despite the party girl persona she cultivates for the press, Candace Curtis is far more intelligent and media-savvy than she lets on. She is also one of the few people not to show fear of Cade to his face.

** Proctor is pretty personable guy. He's also a fairly high ranked Shadow Company operative determined to end the world.

** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Conrad_Dippel Johann Konrad]], the real-life basis for Shelley's [[Literature/{{Frankenstein}} Doctor Frankenstein]], perfected his Elixir of Youth, and has been using it to live for centuries and continue his obscene work, until one of his creations got loose and killed dozens of people before it was brought down, forcing Konrad to make a quick exit when an angry mob stormed his castle afterwards. Apparently Mary Shelley got the idea for the novel while on holiday near Konrad's family castle and hearing the accounts of his atrocities. Konrad is also implied to have been responsible for saving Ronald's Reagan's life after the assassination attempt on him in 1981, resulting in the U.S. Government giving him a pardon (much to Cade's fury).

* ReassignedToAntarctica: Zac, Griff and a lot of people see his being given the position of Cade's new handler as punishment for trying to screw the President's daughter.

* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: When Holt asks why the Shadow Company doesn't send a message to Cade to back off by killing Zach, her superior coldly tells her that the last time the Company killed one of Cade's handlers, the President gave him full discretion to do whatever he saw fit to those responsible. The Company apparently had to cut loose a great many of its agents to cover their tracks, and is not prepared to deal with that kind of fallout again.

** Helen Holt oozes this, believing that she's manipulating Konrad, the Shadow Company and the Boogeyman into doing her bidding when in truth [[spoiler: all three are perfectly aware she plans to betray them at some point, and simply use that to get her to do what they want before discarding her when she's of no more use]].

* TheOneThatGotAway: Zach's relationship with the President's daughter Candace has elements of this. After their indiscretion in the Lincoln Bedroom, Zach is reassigned to work with Cade (as, he assumes, a punishment for trying to screw the First Daughter) and she jets off to California before anything more can happen. They meet up again on her father's campaign trail and for a time it looks like they might hit it off, but after [[spoiler: Candace's near-death encounter with the Boogeymen aboard Air Force One]], she breaks it off again, sadly stating she can't handle the monsters Zach deals with every day in her life.

** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Conrad_Dippel Johann Konrad]], the real-life basis for Shelley's [[Literature/{{Frankenstein}} Doctor Frankenstein]], perfected his Elixer of Youth, and has been using it to live for centuries and continue his obscene work. Apparently Mary Shelley got the idea for the novel while on holiday near Konrad's family castle and hearing the accounts of his atrocities. Konrad is also implied to have been responsible for saving Ronald's Reagan's life after the assassination attempt on his life in 1981, resulting in the U.S. Government giving him a pardon (much to Cade's fury).

** ''The President's Vampire'': [[spoiler: The Shadow Company's plans to unleash the Snakeheads on America and trigger the Apocalypse is foiled, and the Company is dealt a severe blow with the death of its agent Graves, but Zach is forced to accept that his association with Cade will forever deny him a normal life, and his chances of a relationship go out the window when the girl he was seeing turns out to be a Shadow Company operative who, realising she's in too deep, [[RedemptionEqualsDeath sacrifices herself]] to both save Cade and Zach and make amends for her sins]].
** ''Red, White and Blood'': [[spoiler: The Boogeyman is finally defeated and imprisoned with no chance of escape, but numerous people have died, including Zach's father, Zach's hopes of salvaging a relationship with Candace end when she breaks it off, stating she can't handle the monsters he deals with every day in her life, Holt is still alive (possibly undead) and even ''more'' determined to get her revenge, and top it all, Wyman is able to assassinate President Curtis, pass it off as a heart attack and get himself sworn in as President, leaving Zach and Cade with a man who despises them, who they suspect to be a Shadow Company associate, and is far too willing to take advantage of the Other Side, as their new boss]].

* EvilIsPetty: During her time in the CIA, Holt exposed her entire team to the Islamic extremists they were shadowing, resulting in their deaths, because she was angry they were sidelining her because she was the junior member of the team. This got her noticed by the Shadow Company.

* PiggybackingOnHitler: Konrad worked for the Nazis during WWII. Then the Soviets during the Cold War. And now the Shadow Company and the jihadis in the present. All so someone will support and finance his work.

* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: When Holt asks why the Shadow Company doesn't send a message to Cade to back off by killing Zach, her superior coldly tells her that the last time the Company killed one of Cade's handlers, the President gave him full discretion to do what he saw fit to those responsible. The Company apparently had to cut loose a great many of its agents to cover their tracks, and is not prepared to deal with that kind of fallout again.

** Helen Holt oozes this, believing that she's manipulating Konrad, the Shadow Company and the Boogeyman into doing her bidding when in truth [[spoiler: all three are perfectly aware she plans to betray them at some point, and simply use that to get to do what they want before discarding her when she's of no more use]].

* EvenEvilHasStandards: In the President's Vampire, when one of the research team suggests Konrad might be behind the [[apoiler:Snakehead virus outbreak]], Zach dismisses the idea, explaining that Konrad never wants anything to do with Innsmouth ([[spoiler: the original source of the virus]]) because he considers that sort of thing beneath him. Zach also adds that if Konrad were behind such a thing, it would have his signature all over it, because [[ItsPersonal he'd want Cade to know he was responsible]].

* OhCrap: A lot of people who get on the wrong side of Cade exhibit this, usually just seconds before [[CruelAndUnusualDeath he rips their throats out/turns their trachea into a necklace/bends bones in ways they're not mend to bend, etc...]]