"I pride myself on that."

For some reason this causes Mark to giggle.

Ari never argues with an opportunity to laugh with someone, even if they're probably laughing at him. He laughs at himself all the time, why should he get all the fun?

"I like you," Mark asserts. "You're fun."

"I'm glad! It's sad when people don't like me, I think they must just hate happiness. And of the things I pride myself on, being fun tops the list."

"Is there a particular reason why you've taken it upon yourself to threaten all the local vampires?"

"I don't like it when they kill people, and I'm uniquely qualified to do something about it. Unless the Slayer shows up or something."

"Slayer?"

"You don't know about the Slayer? Man, vampire education has gone downhill. The Slayer is a teenage girl with amazing strength and speed and combat skill, which she uses to kill vampires and various nasty sorts of demon. Generally accompanied by middle-aged Brits who... tell her about prophesies and things, I think? I don't know, they're apparently a necessary part of the equation."

"I haven't seen one, but then, I haven't been a vampire very long."

"Ah, new blood. So to speak. I mean, I can teach you the various information you'll need, if you like? I'm pretty well up on vampire culture."

"Do tell. So far I've discovered by experimentation that we catch fire in sunlight and that it's very hard to kill us but decapitation will do the trick. And the thing with crosses."

"Any blessed objects will do the trick for burning and death and etcetera. And massive trauma, and sticking bits of wood through your chest, though I'm not sure why anyone would choose that last instead of just getting an axe blessed by their pastor or something, and it's quite unreliable if you miss the heart anyway. There's this mythical thing called the Gem of Amarra that would make you invulnerable, it's a bit of a vampiric Holy Grail. Let's see, what else... I presume you know about the face thing, I've known it to come as a surprise to newborns. If you make it past two millennia or so you get interesting and unique powers, that's a thing. Not sure what else. Oh, yeah, you can't enter private residences uninvited."

"The face thing is annoying. Define 'massive trauma'."

"Construction equipment is generally involved."

"Go on."

"Well, if you literally just drop half a ton of rock on a vampire it usually sticks. Not always, you're a very compressible species, but if you're reduced to paste it's a safe bet. In that vein there's also wrecking balls, large vehicles, dropping from skyscrapers, massive explosions... oh, fire works too. I should mention that I didn't test all this myself, I stick to head-removal and fire mostly, but my mom was very thorough with her experimentation. Vicious woman she was. She had a heart of gold, but she had claws too. Quite literally."

"I did my experimenting on the man who turned me," he explains. "So once I discovered decapitation, that was the end of it."

"Sensible enough. But if you find yourself with construction equipment and a vampire who needs killed, I hope that you remember my advice."

"Eh. Ripping their head off is going to be faster."

"That's why you don't see me driving a backhoe down Main Street every weeknight. Though I'm sure it'd help my intimidation factor."

"Personally I'd think it just made you look silly."

"That's a worthy side effect. Plus, stop me if I'm wrong, but you're not exactly easily intimidated."

"Picked up on that, have you?"

"Can't say where I got the impression, might have been when you laughed off a man twice your size threatening to rip your head off. Or when you started flirting with him immediately."