our real estate is a great investment

[cross_and_bow]

"Welcome to Sunshine," says Juliet. "And to my front porch and whatever you do don't hit the light, it'll set Sherlock on fire."

Comments

[cross_and_bow]

[Okay. Do you know anything about the mechanism behind all this or does it just - add up right?]

[eversomuchfun]

[I have a data point you're not likely to get anywhere else,] he offers. [I was force-fed the blood of about eight vampires, in considerable quantity, and I turned in just shy of six hours after they killed me.]

[cross_and_bow]

[...that is interesting. Do you know why they did that? If the motive is common or the possibility is known someone could bypass my trips to the morgue.]

[eversomuchfun]

[I didn't leave them alive long enough to ask,] he says unapologetically, [and I haven't heard of it since.]

[cross_and_bow]

[Okay. I think this town is probably depopulated enough and unpleasant enough for vampires to walk around in by now that you couldn't easily collect eight of them now, anyway...]

[eversomuchfun]

[Have I neglected to mention the Bleecker Street bite shop? I'm sorry, I assumed you knew. Most of the vampires left in Sunnydale don't go outside. Their meals walk in on their own two feet, pay them for the privilege of a nibble, and walk out again afterward.]

[cross_and_bow]

[...Bite shop. No, I've never heard of such a thing. People pay for that? Like, in quantity? I guess that's pretty unobjectionable, if the business model works.]

[eversomuchfun]

[It can be made pleasant for everyone involved,] he says. [I don't need to go into detail. Alternately, I can go into lots.]

[cross_and_bow]

[...How about medium to start,] she says. [I'm driving.]

[eversomuchfun]

[A vampire can choose to make being bitten a physically pleasurable event for the snack.]

[cross_and_bow]

[That is an interesting ability indeed. This isn't, like, a special skill, any vampire can do it if they want?]

[eversomuchfun]

[Any vampire.]

[cross_and_bow]

[And this is pleasant enough that there is a nest of vampires in town who are able to make this their primary if not sole source of nutrition and charge for it,] confirms Juliet, intrigued, [drawing solely from the potential customer base of the humans-in-the-know and suffering all the usual limitations of word-of-mouth-based advertising for businesses, plus what I assume is some amount of embarrassment from their clientele. That is very interesting indeed.]

Pause.

[I'm still driving, so we can pick that conversation up a bit later, I think... I don't know if Giles is going to ask you on his own, but he wants to know where you got the number twenty-six regarding Slayer life expectancy.]

[eversomuchfun]

[Oh, spying on a Watcher, of course.]

[cross_and_bow]

[Giles is probably gonna want more detail than that. Especially if it was him.]

[eversomuchfun]

[It was not Giles, and I did not kill or even injure him, in fact he never knew I was there. And that is as much detail as Giles can have.]

[cross_and_bow]

[How much detail can I have?]

[eversomuchfun]

[More than that,] he says. [How much would you like?]

[cross_and_bow]

[Enh, I don't actually have specific questions about it right now.] She parks her pickup. [And now I'm not driving. ...Although I should probably still warm you up some animal blood to teleport over because if I shouldn't operate the wand tired I probably also shouldn't operate it woozy. But I'll take the detail on that, now, if you have as you said lots.]

[eversomuchfun]

[I do have lots,] he says cheerfully.

[I've done it myself once or twice. It's not difficult. A matter of attitude, mostly. And it makes being snacked on pleasant instead of painful. Sexually or otherwise; it seems to vary with context. The effect fades when physical contact is broken, and then the bite is just a bite, no special lingering qualities. Pleasant means pleasant, though, occasionally to the point of spontaneous orgasm.]

[cross_and_bow]

Juliet ruminates on that for a bit, watching a jar of blood rotate in the microwave, and then she says:

[I am duly fascinated. But... You know, I might not have thought to ask if it weren't for my induced paranoia about local magic of all things being addictive, but is there any particular risk of pleasant biting being the same way? Because I do wonder a little about that establishment's business model, and if it's nice as all that... and it's not like one could keep upping the dose, so to speak, indefinitely, even with access to a... cooperative supplier.]

[eversomuchfun]

[Not that I've ever heard of,] he says. [And I have heard of magic addiction.]

[cross_and_bow]

[I wonder if the occupants of the bite shop would tell me. No, not really, if I were presenting as the Slayer they'd lie to get out of a staking and if I were presenting as a prospective customer they'd lie to keep business. I wonder if they'd tell you.]

[eversomuchfun]

[I can ask,] he says cheerfully. [For curiosity's sake.]

[cross_and_bow]

[While you're there anyway, can you see if there's, I dunno, a poorly concealed skeleton or something lying around? I have no objection to their continued existence if their means of getting along is as stated, but it'd be kind of remiss of me to not even ask you to keep an eye out.]