call me maybe

[from_scratch]

Cam is out flying. There's a decent cloud of atmosphere around the gold plane, now, millenia of demons making air around themselves for comfort and not sealing it up because why would you bother. There's a small forest, here - the effect is kind of ruined by the lamps it has to grow under, but it's still pretty.

He feels an open summons and lets it grab him -

with the Joker (kappa)

with Ripper (kappa)

with Darren (Aestrix)

with Minus (kappa)

with Emma (Marri)

with Facility 3141592 (armokGoB)

with the admin (kappa)

with Jarvis (kappa, Aestrix)

with Miles (kappa)

with Hank (Nemo)

Comments

[neverbeatme]

"Most relevantly, the Slayer," she says. "I got a report of an unknown demon wandering around town, decided to check it out, and found you here. Your plans seem pretty benign, and I'm very curious about where you came from and the details of some of those bullet points."

[from_scratch]

Cam sighs.

"Who is reporting on me and describing me as an 'unknown demon', please?"

[neverbeatme]

"My sources on that don't report to anyone but me, and I'd rather not identify them to you until I know you a little better, so I can be sure they won't suffer for it."

[from_scratch]

"Okay, and why do I want to talk to you?"

[neverbeatme]

"I think we could be useful to each other," she says. "If you wanted to interface extensively with the local population without getting rid of your wings, for example. Or find good sources for information about magic."

[from_scratch]

"Okay. I'm a demon somebody accidentally summoned, my name is Cam, I think this is an alternate dimension because the magic is completely different, also where I'm from it's the year 2159 but this place seems apart from the magical discrepancies to be bizarrely like the same year where I came from to the point where I am planning to check relevant locations for a twenty-year-old version of myself."

[neverbeatme]

"Well, that's every bit as fascinating as I expected," says the Slayer. "Call me... hmm. Call me James. What kind of magic are you used to? Or is it too complicated for an easy overview? That's pretty much the situation around here."

[from_scratch]

"I can easy-overview you. There are a handful of nearly useless parlor tricks humans can do, and also, they can summon daeva, who come in three types - demons, angels, fairies. Distinguished cosmetically but also by plane of residence and magic type. For example, I live in Hell and what I can do is make things."

[neverbeatme]

"What kinds of things? For that matter, what kinds of nearly useless parlour tricks?"

[from_scratch]

"Arbitrary not-inherently-magical matter - although it may be the not-inherently-magical restriction is lifted if I had something magic to copy, I can't just naively make a fountain of youth or whatever. Parlor tricks can, with kind of inordinate amounts of effort, press the keys on a keyboard or turn things sort of uneven colors very slowly - I haven't used them in ages. I think the only widespread use of them back home anymore is for irretrievably paralyzed people to operate devices."

[neverbeatme]

"Well, demon magic sounds tremendously handy. What is a vampire dispensary, by the way?"

[from_scratch]

"Oh, apparently you have vampires here? I was thinking I could make them, you know, food, but I'm not sure how to do it efficiently or get them to actually use it instead of eating people."

[neverbeatme]

"We do have vampires. I predict any campaign to get them to eat from sources other than live humans will be somewhat less successful than a campaign to get humans to subsist exclusively on protein shakes and vitamin supplements."

[from_scratch]

"Hence my frustration. I really don't appreciate you reading over my shoulder, by the by."

[neverbeatme]

"There's about a one in six chance that any unfamiliar and unusual person of the supernatural variety who shows up in Sunnydale is plotting to destroy the world," she says. "I don't regret it. But I'm not going to do it again to you in particular, because I'm satisfied that destroying the world is not on your to-do list."

[from_scratch]

"I'm still seriously considering taking my further notes in a demonic language until I go home again. I really don't like that. Especially considering that obviously anyone who had plans to destroy the world in the past didn't get even far enough to leave a crater where I expect there to be Belgium or something."

[neverbeatme]

"Plots to destroy the world have not been successful despite their frequency largely because the Slayer or someone like her notices in time to stop them," she says. "I am the Slayer. It's my job to notice things like that in time to stop them. And for future reference, three out of the five apocalypses I've stopped this year involved someone trying to open the Hellmouth and of the last two, one was based around a demonic shrine a few miles out of town and the other was an attempt to call forth a powerful demon out of an imported statue. All the kind of thing where if it succeeds, you can tell because the sun went dark or everything is on fire or the legions of hell are pillaging the Earth from every direction, but if it fails you pretty much only know it happened if you were there or someone tells you about it."

[from_scratch]

"I hope you will forgive me if I am slightly skeptical that something that has obviously never finished happening starts to happen every alternate Tuesday and this conveniently justifies you in racial profiling. Anyway. Now what?"

[neverbeatme]

"I'm told this has been a heavy year, actually. There are usually only two or three. I think a possible 'now what' is you tell me some plans and I suggest ways I could be helpful to them."

[from_scratch]

"You read over my shoulder, you don't like the dispensary idea, anything else catch your eye?" he sighs.

[neverbeatme]

"Everything I saw: 'completely ignore magic - pros/cons', 'things to ask Sherlock', 'getting rid of wings', 'go through med notes and give to someone', 'maybe just fly to Mars and set it up nice for them later', 'there has got to be some way to make a vampire dispensary work'," she lists. She has the wording verbatim on all of them. "I'm interested in med notes, what you'd do with Mars, and what you meant about the pros and cons of ignoring magic; I'm also wondering who Sherlock is but I don't think that's likely to have immediate practical relevance."

[from_scratch]

"Right, so, it's 2159 where I'm from and medical science has advanced correspondingly. I keep on top of it more than I do, say, the advances that have been made in orchid cultivation, because, one, it's useful for personal alterations if I ever want to make any - the wings and tail I had models, if I decide I want something non-standard I'd better know about how people are put together - two, in case I'm ever on a summon and have the flexibility and opportunity to make stuff to heal someone. So I know and can conjure up notes for a century and a half of medicine you don't have and I'm not sure where to drop it to good effect. Mars I'd just make a little spaceship and go there and give it an atmosphere and topsoil and some plants and water so it would be comfortable for Earthlings who visited later. That would be an example of something I could do while ignoring magic besides my own, because it sounds like a mess."

[neverbeatme]

"Your view of magic besides your own is pretty accurate, but I happen to have an in with a witch who is much less of a mess than average," she says. "I could also probably figure out something to do with your medical notes if you don't want to handle that part yourself. I don't have the connections now, but finding the right people to inform about medical advances falls under the purview of what I plan to do with my life besides Slaying. No input on Mars; seems like you've got that handled."

[from_scratch]

"The library I was in earlier had floppy disk drives, so search me if I know what format to give you the notes in, but you're welcome to have a copy. No promises I won't duplicate them somewhere else if an opportunity comes up."

[neverbeatme]

"Sure, that makes perfect sense. You could for example give me one of your nifty future computers."