many people move here to start families

[cross_and_bow]

Bella is hanging out in a Jarvis - the familiar one - handwriting a nonaggression proposal-slash-bribe. Has to be handwritten. Damn fussy demons. At least it's okay for her to conjure rather than personally harvesting the weird ink she's supposed to use.

Comments

[cross_and_bow]

[I'm not a witch. I'm some other stuff,] says Bella cheerfully. [Glory's from far away? My magic's from farther away. It's a really, really long story.]

[pythbox]

[There is nothing I want more than to get rid of her,] he says. [But it's just not possible.]

[cross_and_bow]

[If there's nothing more you want than to get rid of her, you should be all over the possibilities I am offering via fancy offworld magic. Look, how much do you know about demons and so on besides the obsequious kind that do her shopping?]

[pythbox]

[Not a lot. And you know, I would be all over it if I had any reason to believe you.]

[cross_and_bow]

[Aw, darn, I was hoping you'd already know about the vampire quarantine and I could tell you that was me. What would constitute a reason to believe me? I can show off some if that'd make things run smoother.]

And:

[Hey, Giles, two things. One, can you please see what there is to see on the subject of a hell god named Glory or Glorificus, her relationship to her mortal vessel, and anything to do with the Key? Two, Soph did not exist until a couple of hours ago, I am the only person unaffected by the corresponding memory-alteration, and there is some interpersonal fallout as a result.]

[pythbox]

[I don't know,] says Ben. [I'm not sure I'll believe you can split us until I see it. It doesn't exactly help that you still haven't told me how exactly you found me. As far as I can tell, you're just a mysterious voice who's probably spying on me, and it's kind of unnerving.]

[...I'll, er, I'll look that up,] says Giles.

[cross_and_bow]

[I have a crystal ball. And yes, I can see you, although if you need to change clothes or something I can stop. My cheapest Impressive Magic Trick would, unfortunately, probably scare you.]

[Thank you, Giles.]

[pythbox]

[What's your cheapest magic trick?] asks Ben, warily.

[cross_and_bow]

[I have an aura of menace. It's very impressive and makes people who don't know better think I'm a hellcreature of some kind. You'd have to really stretch the definition to qualify me as one, though. Slightly less cheaply, I can conjure up arbitrary nonmagical physical objects. Or magic ones, but they're trickier.]

[pythbox]

[I think I'll skip the aura of menace, thanks,] he says. [...Look, if you're really who you say you are, I want to help. I just don't have any reason to trust you. I don't even know your species.]

[cross_and_bow]

[I'm a human. If you'd be willing for me to put us someplace where obsequious demons aren't going to walk in on us at any moment, I will be happy to turn visible.]

[pythbox]

[...Fine.]

[cross_and_bow]

Her preselected Canadian wilderness is in use, so this is Nevada wilderness instead. She lands them near her cactus landmark, turns visible, and turns around once, arms out. "This is me."

[pythbox]

"...Hi," says Ben, folding his arms distrustfully.

[cross_and_bow]

"Nice to meet you properly. Welcome to Nevada. I'm not going to strand you here, but in case it makes you more comfortable, there is a highway, three miles that way -" she points. "With a rest stop not far from there. So, yeah, this is me, I'm a human, I'm very magical." She hops into the air and spins around again.

[pythbox]

"I can see that you're magical," says Ben. "Can you split me and Glory?"

[cross_and_bow]

"I told you, I don't know until I try it and see if it works or not, and if I'm going to try it I'd like to be a little more remote than three miles from a Nevada highway, such as Mercury, and I'd also like to have a plan for what to do if it works."

[pythbox]

"I can't help you there," says Ben.

[cross_and_bow]

"You can give me information," says Bella. "Everything you know. Even if you don't have complete understanding of some thing you've heard or seen or read, it could inform my own research."

[pythbox]

"I could," he says, "but I still don't trust you."

[cross_and_bow]

"...Okay, what would you like me to do about that?"

[pythbox]

"I don't know," he says. "It's a problem."

[cross_and_bow]

"So it would seem, yes. I don't suppose it helps any that I clearly could do something awful - to you, to anybody - and instead I'm spending my time poking around powerful hellgods because they've been making mental patients of innocent people? This doesn't suffice to demonstrate that I have benign motives?"

[pythbox]

"I wish it did," he says. "But no."

[cross_and_bow]

"I don't suppose I can solve this problem with bribery?"