Practicality Takes A Holiday

 Millie barely paid attention as she walked through the streets of Nightshade with her companions. Her mind was too busy puzzling over what kind of weapon she might like. She’d seen plenty of slasher films in her time, and knew that with enough strength and creativity, anything could be used as a weapon.

A growl, followed by a call of “Mind controlling your dog, dear?!” snapped her out of her thoughts, and she looked up just in time to see Nibbles rushing ahead. Talia was chasing after her, muttering a bit. Millie followed them, soon picking up on the smell of something delicious. She couldn’t place it, exactly. Beef? Or was it pork? Either way, it had a meaty scent to it, and her stomach reminded her that, yeah, she could stand to eat something.

Nibbles had led them to a small restaurant. The smell of cooking meat and the interior light was the only indication that the place was even open, as the outside of the place was run-down. Millie didn’t even want to touch the wooden wall because there was no way she’d pull her hand back without a splinter or five.

She touched the door’s handle and nearly yanked her hand away because it was warm.

And weirdly fleshy.

And it was pulsating.

Seeing this, Talia’s eyes lit right up. “Ooh...that’s an indication that the food here’s good…”

“The door handle food, too?” Nibbles asked, eyes wide and hopeful.

“I wouldn’t eat it...that just makes them angry,” she replied.

Millie took a breath and opened the door to head in. If it was good enough for the lady in charge around here, it was good enough for her. Of course, the lady in charge around here also drank blood and had a fountain of the stuff around there. So did she truly trust her judgement?

Screw it, she was hungry enough to try anything right now, and the only concern she had was that she had none of the local currency (or any idea what the local currency was, come to think of it).

The restaurant’s interior echoed the door handle in that it had a fleshy quality to it, the tables and chairs looking like they were made of bone. Millie wouldn’t have been shocked if they actually were bone. She glanced at Talia, having but one question in mind.

“What kinds of prices are we looking at?” she asked.

“Don’t worry about that,” Talia told her, pointing to her tiara. “The birthright’s got to be good for something, right?”

She had a point, Millie reasoned. Though she wondered if there was a limit on how much the “we’re rollin’ with royalty” discount would get them, as Nibbles was known to be very food-motivated and had been known to steal food if given half the chance. And indeed, Nibbles was making her way to the bar, sniffing the whole time.

Behind the bar was a slim figure, their skin noticeably decayed in spots. One eye socket was empty, and half of their teeth were exposed by default.

A zombie.

“So, can I get you a menu?” the zombie asked, sounding distinctly male.

“Are there words on it?” Nibbles replied. “Because I never learned how to read.”

Millie approached, patting the werewolf on the arm. “We’re sorta new around here,” she said. “But a menu sounds great.”

The zombie handed one over, Millie accepting that and going to look it over with Nibbles. There were pictures of the food options in question, along with some text. One dish in particular snagged her attention. It was a plate of spaghetti, with noticeable tentacles poking out of the pile. She had to admit, she was intrigued. There was, however, one thing she wondered about it.

“Hey, um, what’s the garlic situation with your food?” she asked.

“We don’t use any of that. Good way to lose the vampiric part of our customer base.”

“So, would all of it be werewolf-safe?”

“It can be.”

And so, she’d ordered two portions of that, one specifically tailored to werewolves and the other with the extra seasonings, with Talia ordering something for herself and making sure it was paid for. When that was situated, they sat at one of the bone tables.

“So, about a weapon…” Millie began. “How might I go about getting one of those?”

Talia shrugged. “You’re the witch, here. Have you tried conjuring one into existence?”

The truth was, she had no idea what kind of weapon she’d wanted. Nibbles’ teeth seemed to be effective. And Talia’s knife was enough to finish off that last creature. But both of those required getting within close range and that seemed like a terrible idea to her. Some sort of firearm? No, that could go downhill very quickly. She wished she had at least a pencil and a sketchpad so she could at least hash out a few ideas…

With that in mind, her magic latched onto the intent and a pencil appeared in her right hand, pad of graph paper in the left.

“Huh. There may be something to that…” she muttered, beginning to sketch a few ideas.

Talia watched as she scribbled a few concepts, muttering as she did. All of the weapons she thought of had one big consideration in common: distance. There were some excessively large swords, a battle axe that seemed like they’d be a bit awkward to handle, an almost comically-large mallet, and a huge scythe. Something about that scythe stood out to the vampire, aside from its size.

“Care to walk me through that one?” Talia asked, putting a finger on the scythe.

“Scythes are cool,” Millie replied, not looking up.

“But why does the staff look like a pencil?”

“Because it is a pencil. See, after those two encounters with these threats already, they kind of reminded me of the things that took my job back home. I’m still a little salty about that, so why not base a weapon around something they can’t wield?”

The vampire blinked somewhat. “And the size?”

“I don’t wanna get in close range.”

“Fair. So, is that what you’d want to go with?”

Millie nodded, and stowed the pad and pencil in her pocket when their meals came. Nibbles turned down the offer of a fork, digging right into it with sheer youthful canine abandon. One of the tentacles gave a little twitch before being devoured by a hungry werewolf.

Millie, however, picked up her own fork and jabbed at a tentacle, unsure where to begin. The meal smelled wonderful. But she had no idea where she wanted to start with it. When a tentacle lashed out at her, she stabbed it with the fork. Okay, then. Starting point: found.

It had a definite seafood bent to it, flavor-wise. Once she’d ingested the tentacles, she went for the pasta, pushing Nibbles away from the plate (“You had yours already!”), and got back to the plans she’d drawn up.

With the vampire watching, Millie started to focus again. Tried to will the scythe into existence.

Her attempts had gotten her: a headache, a miniature of the scythe (doll-sized, roughly), another headache, three nosebleeds, and a condescending-but-well-meaning pat on the shoulder from Talia as she told her she could probably stop now.

It seemed that weapons could not be summoned and be effective at the same time. So, she would have to find another means of making this weapon of hers a reality. There were probably places around to get the right materials for it. And if there wasn’t a blacksmith somewhere in Nightshade, Millie would be honestly shocked.

“We can probably get what you need for the staff at the hardware store,” Talia said, pulling another blood pouch from her bag and taking a sip.

Millie blinked. Somehow, the concept of a hardware store in an alternate universe had not occurred to her. Though she wondered if graphite was also available at this store. The wood needed for the staff itself was probably a given, but graphite or charcoal might have been more of an art supply store thing.

“Is there an art supply store we can hit, too?” she asked. “I’d need some pencil leads for it to really fit my vision.”

“That, you may need to conjure yourself, or at least try to. I’m not sure where to get that, exactly.”

The witch sighed. Of course, this couldn’t be a simple process. The fact that there was apparently a hardware store and not an art supply store also hurt her, in a way.

“There is a library around here, though, right?”

“Of course! The archives are in important part of this city.”

That was good, at least.

So far, the plan was to head to the hardware store first.