Cyrus nods and chuckles, "Well I am familiar with this particular form of Vampire. It's the main one from my planet and dimension of origin. Aside from what you've discovered they're vulnerable to wood, silver, the cross or it's shadow, and of course sunlight. You CAN burn them....of course you have to stake them, cut off their heads, burn the body and head in separate fires and scatter their ashes."
"As to my abilities I suppose the short list would be best. I can shapeshift, use 5 or 6 different forms of magic, psionics, natural energy blasts, fly at supersonic and FTL speeds, and dimensional teleport at will. I also have a decent arsenal for combating these undead. Perhaps I could loan you some of it if you're interested." He clenches the pipe between his teeth and reaches down, opening his backpack. He produces a quarterstaff with what appears to be a serpentine engraving along it's length.
"No thanks," Bluejay demurrs. "I don't really care for wading in physically, unless it's a duel or some such. And, in such a case, I prefer using my own staff or Lightning." She produces a plain elm staff from her own backpack, then draws a silver shortsword from her empty scabbard.
"Lighting, meet Cyrus. Cyrus, this is Lightning, one of my swords."
Lightning lifts out of her hand to 'bow' to Cyrus. "Pleased to meet you," the sword sings at him. In the low light of the cottage, a slight nimbus of blue glows about the sword, highlighting the feather-shaped guard and giving the blood-red gem of the pommel an odd tint.
Cyrus returns the bow, "Indeed it's an honor to meet you. Rarely do I meet an intelligent weapon."
"And if I'm really pressed, I know a few people that would show up in seconds if I called them." Bluejay grins. "They're an eclectic bunch, but quite effective in their own ways."
Cyrus nods and put the staff away again and returns to holding the pipe. "I have that ability as well. Although I prefer to rely on my own prowess unless absolutley necessary. Do you have any idea on how many vampires we're facing? The more of them there are the more likely it is we'll be facing the intellegence that spawned the first one."
"Well," Bluejay digs into her pack once more, "according to the reports.." She scans down an apparantly standardized report, picking out relavant details. She frowns. "There's a lot of 'em. In fact, in one city where our scouts visited, there were more of them than people."
Cyrus nods "What I expected...Unfortunately that means we will be fighting the intellegence. Getting to it won't be easy nor will fighting it. I suppose we'd better plan out some strategy on how best to combine our talents against the vampires."
Bluejay nods, familiar with planning sessions. "What -is- the 'intelligence'?"
Cyrus pauses momentarily quickly discarding any refrences that wouldn't be appropriate. "An alien being....the best way to describe it is a mound of flesh with a central eye surrounded by a mass of tentacles that have mouths. Rather powerful and rather mean. It's normally the source of vampires where I'm from."
Bluejay considers the information. "Sounds Lovecraftian in type."
Cyrus pauses momentarily placing the refrence.
"So.. we have vampires that melt in water.. well, this'll actually be easier than usual, except for the unusually high numbers, then. Water is so much easier to deal with than fire."
Cyrus nods, "We'll more than likely also have some demons, demon familiars, and humans servants to help defend them. This won't be easy...even with our powers."
Bluejay nods. "Just like one of my usual vacations.. been a while since I've had a proper excuse to get away from the committee meetings." She leans back in her chair. "Do you prefer the quiet approach or the screw-it-all-just-kill-'em approach?"
"It would probably be best to start with the quiet approach consdering we're out numbered by at least 1,250:1. After we've given them something to worry about then we can go in guns blazing."
"Alright. Sounds like a plan to me. At least, the beginnings of one. So.. where do you suggest we start?"
"Here would be best since you already seem to know at least some of the layout. I would also suggest scouting around and planning out at least some of our campaign and possible teleport sites if we get into trouble."
Bluejay nods. "I concur." She reaches in her backpack and takes out a large sheet of paper, on which is drawn a fairly accurate map of the surrounding area. "Always send a cartagrapher in with the first group of scouts." She takes out a proper 20th century Earth pencil from one pocket and looks over the map.
"Here," she cirles a spot. "Here, here, and here." Then she takes out a colored pencil. "Here, here, and here." She points them out to Cyrus. "These," -the first circled- "are areas that would be easily defensible and have good offensive capabilities. Those," -the second set- "are the biggest concentrations in this area, as reported by my scouts."
Again, she scans over the paper with a general's eye. "Given the relative proximity of both, here, perhaps that is where we should start." She looks up at Cyrus. "How easy is it to catch one of these buggers?"
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