Philosophy Of Nothing Much

It would take about a half hour or so to get ready for her trip, most of it spent on dress. This was not due to any specific thing with her character, or some unforeseen event. In fact she had planned to be up that bit earlier for this exact reason. It was culturally accepted, if not a bit expected, that those of her kind would dress in overly pointless attire.

For starters some sort of full body attire, a dress or suit, would be needed. Due to anatomy reasons these pieces would need to be connected in such a way as to offer some give and were, at least as of the current moment, a bit baggy. To disguise this some sort of coat would be worn, usually decided on by the wearer, as temperature was really of no concern. Some would wear rather heavy coats even in the dead of summer, where a others wore lighter coats that were just decorative even as they shoveled the snow away. Personally she just wore a long coat that could be tied near the middle with a decorative sash.

To further distract from any bagginess of the underlying clothing one would put on, what must have looked to anyone but the wearer, every vaguely shiny thing one had that looked even remotely like jewelry. Pins had become more popular in recent years, often times showing off whatever the wearer considered to be valid things of concern or interest. She didn't even know where most of what she had was from, only that she had been gifted it at a young age from other family members. She was thankful for this, even if she didn't fully understand why they did this it was embarrassing as a younger child going around wearing just the coat and dress.

One may argue that such things aren't too absurd or that even if they were one wouldn't need to reattach anything stuck to the clothing as they could just leave it attached. Unfortunately it was also customary to remove everything that was pinned to anything you wore and put it away, hanging everything properly for the next day. It just felt wrong not to.

After all that one would need to put on a hat that covered most of the head and the neck, leaving only the face revealed. She understood the why on that one. Supposedly her specific species of vampire could, if really needed, survive in the sunlight if they were covered 100% from head to toe and the hat was to help make it easier should one need to hide in... less the ideal conditions. She had never done it but she had seen those who had, it was almost a bit funny since for weeks afterwards one would look almost orange. It was also supposedly very painful.

One would note however that her kind never, or almost never, covered there feet or hands. No need to really, nothing hurt too much in these spots and after long enough one could walk around on even the more painful environments like it was nothing. As for the hands most of her kind went nerve dead their by their fifth year, regardless of why they had been a vampire for 5 years.

Putting in the last of the pins she put into her coat she noticed one specific one that she swore she had gotten rid of a while back. A small gray thing, depicting some small child surrounded by 6 other, more generic beings. It was some religious junk that her parents believed in but she didn't. If she remembered right the kids wore these and the a.d.u.l.ts wore something similar, but with the child being replaced by the a.d.u.l.t version instead. Not particularly wanting to think about delusions at this time she just put it aside.

The next parts of prepping were easy enough. Putting needed things in pockets, an advantage of choosing a coat like this one, and making sure one ate before leaving. On that note she remembered the dream she had just before awakening and remembered its odd side effect. She wondered if it was a medical disorder or something as she swore it was a one time deal if she had remembered school correctly.

All the same this did not change the fact that now was time for food, which meant fridge. The substitute she drank, unfortunately, needed to be stored cold. Outside a cold environment It would last about 24 hours before congealing. Unlike humans who usually liked their drinks cold vampires liked their only drink warm, any conventional methods of heating it up would just cause the solution to dilute. As such that meant that it would need to be drunk cold or left out till it was at best room temperature. Body temperature wasn't even a option as she had none.

The other thing to keep in mind was how she would open the fridge. Of course she could go with the traditional pulling the handle method but that was boring and practical. She cold always do what she had done yesterday, but that was a waste. Though it was still tempting. After all if you could do such a thing then why would you not find an excuse to do it whenever the chance arose, besides staining of course.

Of all the things that a species could decide to use to hunt prey vampires could be, on occasion, some of the weirder examples. Sure you had your more standard methods such as brute strength or blinding speed. You could outsmart your prey of course, though to her knowledge her specific line did none of that. No they had come upon the supposedly brilliant strategy of throwing their blood at things. Oh sure that was a bit of an oversimplification of it but that was what she could do, supposedly. Of course she had never seen or been able to do anything more than that pitiful slap from yesterday.

There was the better senses as well, but of those one required her to continually burn just that little extra energy, in her case literally the blood that flowed through her veins, to do it. The other just made sure than when you were hungry you knew exactly where the nearest human was by smell... as well as what that human's clothes smelt like, what they ate last, where they had been, and just whatever else happened to smell just the tiniest bit. It all seemed like the sort of thing a monster could use, but any modern sentient being who couldn't tack on "psychopathic" would get nowhere with.

Becoming just a bit disappointed in what her genes literally said for her she just decided to open the fridge with her hand. Probably for the best as only one bottle was left. So she could get out on time she decided to gulp it down in one swig. That was probably one of the worse decisions as unlike that drink from yesterday it was terrible. Some mix that had been flavored with some generic red fruits flavor. She didn't even bother checking what one, it was choked down as fast as she could managed simply so she could be on her way.

After about a minute of gagging she made her way to the door and threw it open, it was time to get more fluids, this time without flavoring hopefully.

* * *

She counted the bottles in her bag now, fourteen. Barely enough for a week but it would have to do. She had once heard a human friend speak of ramen, some cheap noodle thing that one could buy that was the cheapest of its kind. This was sorta like that and even then she could barely get enough to sustain herself. All the same it was here now. She was walking home now, it had been, for lack of a better term, a decent trip. It been better with money sure, but she had what she did. Maybe she get lucky and warp to someplace to solve that tonight... Or maybe that be unlucky who knew. She half hoped that wouldn't occur again.

"Or maybe it could happen again but be a good spot" She mumbled under her breath. It would have sounded funny but she could always speak right when it was in a low voice. She poked her mouth, actually rather common if her hands were any indication. Supposedly fangs had been getting longer according to the messages that snuck onto her phone from time to time. Hers were no exception, though it wasn't embarrassing as everyone she knew had this issue, minus the humans.

That thought was interrupted by the person who tripped into her, knocking her over. The bag she had flew into the air and landed a bit away. It didn't hurt but whoever landed near her seemed to be in pain, given the look on their face. She had passed by a group of people without realizing it.

Now let it be known that all the conversations you will read in the modern-day would, if written down in the most correct way, sound wrong. They read odd and not exactly be an accurate depiction of what occurred. As such certain liberty's have been taken to make them as accurate to meaning as possible.

"Where you hurt," She said in concern to the apparently man who had tripped into her, best described as words said through a full mouth.

"Not badly," the man, whose mouth would best be described as many small daggers interlaced in such a way that no part of it was empty if he closed them. He sounded even more full of mouth. Either way his rather clear response seemed a bit odd to her, you think he be a bit angry but he sounded indifferent, if not pleased.

She looked at the rest of them, 3 people ignoring him. 2 females, one with a mouth like his and the other a mouth more like hers, and another man, again with a mouth like hers as well as clothing similar to hers. All of them had pins over their hearts, a woman surrounded by six generic beings. A religious troupe perhaps? With the exception of the man dressed similarly to her they all seemed about ready for performing, if it was needed.

The one who tripped got to his feet and grabbed her bag, handing it to her. She took it without much worry. She knew people of that religion were overly nice. That had always seemed odd to her, she had to read their book as a child and it was mostly stories of their god tricking people into accepting vampirism in one of its forms or another. Death, especially of humans, was common as well.

"What has you coming this way stranger?" the female with interlocking teeth asked, she sounded like she had practiced her speech and little alteration to her words were needed.

"Uh just buying groceries," She thought the bag would have gave that away but she supposed it was just small talk. The other vampire dressed like her spoke now, honestly I've no idea how to translate what he said to her, only conveying to those who heard the idea that he wished to know her name. He seemed a bit drained after saying it, most likely some form of magic.

She thought for a moment on that, it was an odd question and he should have known it. Technically vampires had no name really, another odd tradition. They would take nicknames when needed but due to small population numbers acts one made where a much more common identifier even now. Of course one needed a legal name, but even then those weren't exactly of any value to her or her kind.

After contemplation how to answer she spoke, "uh call me Jane," Of course that was a throw away name, she didn't exactly want to give these people her usual name. That man spoke again, this time with his mouth. I still could not tell you what he said, his speech was so garbled to the untrained ear that it was best described as gibberish, though everyone here seemed to understand.

Relieved that they had believed her she decided to ask her own question, "so um why are you here"

The female with teeth like her replied now, "We are performing in hopes that our acts will be noticed, our friend simply tripped by accident when you came by," She sounded about like 'Jane', who usually would refer to herself as Iris when needed, something out of a book she read long ago. She vaguely remembered that from their book, supposedly you could catch their gods attention with certain actions, though she didn't know why you would want to call a trickster god to yourself.

"I see... well I am going to go on my way now good luck... performing," with that she slid away, with vague prayers being said to her as she passed. She didn't exactly want to be bothered by those people too much, she call her parents if she wanted that.

She reached her front door a few minutes and a block later as something wet struck her foot. At first she thought maybe she had cut her mouth open on accident and not noticed. After all her teeth made it so she needed to leave her mouth very slightly ajar at all times, she had held it pretty tightly closed when she passed those people earlier... but no her mouth was cut free. She reached for her key, actually just some app on her phone.

Looking at the pocket that contained it she now noticed her bag. It was leaking some, no doubt from that fall earlier. She swore under her breath and checked. A few had already drained fully and one was currently causing her wet foot, which didn't feel all that odd as the last drops fell with no effect to the ground.

She opened the door now and ran to the fridge, putting the not broken bottles inside. Counting that was eleven. Counting that was not enough for a week. Counting she wondered if she could have gotten the needed money from that tripper, though the thought quickly faded. She closed it now and threw away the broken bottles. She would need to figure out what she would do about the lack. There were two ways really.

One was to deal with it later, after the bottles she had were gone. The other was to deal with it now, simply not eating for the rest of today and tomorrow, a thought to which her body verbally protested. Once again she cursed her biology. On top of being the most useful only for murderous types it also needed the most fuel as well as the most selective fuel. Pondering crimes rates by species she stormed off to the bathroom. Some pins needed to be removed from coats.

* * *

She laid down now on the floor. It had been an uneventful and foodless day. She laid on the floor now in case she shifted to that place again, on a blanket so it didn't steal her house. That house had some blood stains in it she figured. She looked at her phone now as she placed it in a pocket, it might be useful and she had taken some notes down on it, like the human blood capacity, a bit more than a gallon. Also she was hungry.

Honestly she didn't know why, well she knew why. What she didn't know was why this much. In the past she had done this when needed, hell she had gone a whole week once, though she swore she almost bit a guy that time but he was a bit of an asshole. She pondered if he was nearby for a moment before shaking her head. She may have been bloodthirsty, biologically, but she was not a monster metaphorically.

Staring at the ceiling now she could smell everything in her apartment, even outside this room. She was glad how little smell her body made. She faintly smelt some the spilled blood substitute from earlier that day and past mistakes however which was not helping matters. One part of her considered 'accidentally' touching a tooth to hard. She wasn't that sort of person either.

She had heard that those who went to college would sometimes starve themselves like this, those same folks who ate that ramen stuff. She wondered if they ever just randomly got the idea to assault the nearest animal for a meal. Of course even she would be capable of that, but successfully doing so wasn't nearly effective enough and would lead to one being full yet still hungry at the same time. A oddly painful experience.

She decided to try and focus on something else, she wondered now what would happen if she fell asleep. If she ended up in some other world, or maybe the past, she should find some valuable furniture and fall asleep on it. If she did that she could maybe sell a priceless artifact... or get a nice chair, which was also acceptable. She had heard of some sorta issue with time travel but nothing seemed off from that stolen slab... except the nagging hunger. She hit herself, a painless action. She needed to stop thinking about that.

She got up and put her coat on. She had the baggy stuff from earlier on as well, even if it was cut up a bit she doubted peasants or her empty apartment cared much. The coat however had more pockets. She had decided fully in her hungered state that, maybe, she could find something valuable and sell it. Her thoughts stayed like this for awhile, alternating between laying and moving about. Eventually however she drifted off to sleep.

* * *

She woke up now after having that dream again, which only made her earlier issues a bit worse. Honestly she wasn't surprised, maybe this was a second puberty no one talked about? She felt her surroundings now, stone and her blanket. That meant she was elsewhere and so she got up. On doing so she saw the wooden walls. This was the past/ other world/ who knew really. She heard footsteps outside now, getting ready she now ducked into the corner. She didn't exactly feel like getting stabbed again.

As expected someone opened the door, letting the night and the forests smells in. This was a different person from last time, but still they had the look and smell of someone who worked in nature. They walked in, seeming to not notice her at all as they placed something down on the ground, leaving and shutting the door. She walked over and inspected the thing. Some bread item and some flowers. Honestly she didn't exactly know what to think of that. They seemed normal, nothing odd about them. She even broke the bread open and it seemed to just be bread of some kind.

She could hear that man leaving now. He wasn't going very fast but she could hear him... and vaguely smell him even now. Pondering if covering her nose would keep her sane she left the building now and came to a simple conclusion. She would follow this man and figure out what was going on.