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[vampthropologist]

[the man before you is tall, long-haired, quite pale, and wears tinted glasses. He takes them off as he speaks, revealing glowing red eyes; astute viewers may notice that his nails are dark and oddly-shaped, more like claws.]

Good evening. Or morning, or afternoon, as the case may be. My name is Beckett. I'm a recent arrival. I'm making this post by way of introduction and some explanation, since my nature may be, for some of you, cause for concern.

I am what most of you would call a vampire. I am clinically dead, resurrected by supernatural means and sustained by the blood of the living. That being said, I'm also not bad at chess, a decent poker player, and a wonderful dancer.

[He pauses briefly, for laughter. That was An Joke. He is Putting You At Ease.]

I am given to understand that I'm not the first of my kind to arrive here, although the young man who preceded me appears to have vanished. I'm not sure how much of an impression he made. I'd be happy to answer what questions I can, within limits. To start with the obvious one: Jorgmund has seen to my nutritional needs, so I won't be asking for volunteers.

[He means to smile reassuringly, but mostly just bares his teeth.]

Any other questions?

Comments

[vampthropologist]

John Calvin and Thomas Hobbes, the philosophers? I'm afraid I don't understand the reference.

[In answer to the other question, he tries another small, scarier-then-he-means-it smile.]

It tastes dead, is the best way I can put it. If it didn't work, I'd say it was past its shelf life.

[walkingballpit]

Close! It’s Calvin and Hobbes, the comic strip characters named after the philosophers, who probably ended up being better philosophers than the philosophers.

[ He’s used to explaining his references to the uninformed. ]

Yeah, uh... I wouldn’t know about that. My food’s always dead.

[vampthropologist]

Ah. I'll have to look them up, then. A comic strip? As in a newspaper or one of those children's books?

[He's making conversation, no one's freaking out, this is going very well]

Yes, but you can tell when it's gone off, lost its capacity to nourish? The same sort of thing. Dead.

[walkingballpit]

It used to be in newspapers, but then the strip ended when the writer retired or something. It's been collected in books, though, although I don't think Calvin & Hobbes is strictly for kids. Most kids don't know words like philistine and plebian.

[ It's a conversation, to be sure, although the comics portion is definitely preferable to the dead food part. ]

I don't know if I can tell when it's lost it's "capacity to nourish". You can DEFINITELY taste when it's gone bad though, moldy or sour or whatever.

[vampthropologist]

Do you know if the library has any copies?

[walkingballpit]

I don't, but I don't see any harm in asking? It's not like they're going to be all 24061 has requested that subversive Calvin & Hobbes book that we hid amongst the propo to identify upstarts and rabble-rousers.

I definitely wasn't just trying to use the word rabble-rouser.

[vampthropologist]

I'll see if I can find one. Thank you for the recommendation.