Hunting 101 - Class 9 (Wednesday period 7)

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

John was leaning against his desk as the class filed in, listening with a faintly amused expression to Blair who was going on at length about something that seemed to require a lot of gesturing and a fair amount of bouncing. The sign up sheet was in its usual place and beside it were several handouts.

The more observant of the students may notice that there was also someone who looked remarkably like Seely Booth only wearing more black lurking in the shadows at the front of the room. Those that are observant and also know him would recognise this person as Angel.



"Good afternoon," John said when everyone was settled. "I trust you all enjoyed your week off. Today we're going to be discussing the undead. The simplest definition of undead is something that is dead, but still act in some ways as if they're alive. You've been given a handout that lists a number of the more common undead entities you may happen to encounter. The biggest group, ghosts and spirits, we've already covered earlier so today we're going to focus more on things with an actual physical body still." He smiled slightly. "The walking corpses.

"The one thing in common that undead entities seem to have is that they're all missing something that living beings have. Ghosts are missing bodies, the corporeal undead tend to be missing heartbeats and breath at the least. And a great many of them are missing consciences and souls. Or whatever you want to call the essence that makes us human.

"That doesn't mean all of them are going to be amoral or evil, but it does certainly raise the odds considerably that they will be. Add in the fact that probably the majority of the undead can or do feed off of living humans and the chances are that any you run into are going to attempting to hurt you or innocents around you. And those are the ones we're discussing here today.

"With ghosts I was able to give you a list of things that are going to work, if not all the time, damn near it. That unfortunately isn't something I can do with the undead. There are so many variations and each has its own strengths and weaknesses. Even the same type of creature can vary depending on origin and home dimension -- the vampires that exist where I come from -- which are described in the other handout I gave you -- vary significantly from the vampires in, for example, Miss Summers dimension." He nodded in Dawn's directioin.

"As for zombies, I have a list as long as my arm of various methods of dealing with them, none of which is guaranteed to work on every zombie. There are some basic things though that you can try that are more likely to work than not: holy water, silver, iron, wood inserted in various interesting and specific ways, and," he smiled, eyes seeking out various students who had shown pyromanic tendencies, "always a favourite, fire. Generally one or more of those will work in some way, though there are no guarantees. You'll have to experiment and do your research to determine what will work against any specific threat you face.

"Basically, the thing you most need to remember when dealing with the undead is to not take anything for granted. An example of that would be our guest speaker today," John turned to the figure lurking in the shadows, "Angel. He's a vampire so he can give you a sort of insider's view into what being undead is like. Feel free to ask him any questions you have." John's smile may have turned just a little wolfish.

When Angel had finished his part of the class, John said, "We're going to try something a little new -- a homework assignment. I want each of you to pick something that would be categorised as undead and then find out all you can about it -- how they're created, what they're said to do, what is said is to be effective defenses against them and why. Next week is of course the practical class so you've two weeks to get it done. If you have any questions about this, you can see me after class or during my office hours."

[ooc: wait for ocds are up. Have at it!]

Comments

Sign in

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

as you do

Re: Sign in

[demonbelthazor]

Belthazor

Re: Sign in

[cyclopeanmerc.livejournal.com]

Pip Bernadette

John's lecture

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

Listen, take notes, doodle in your notebook. Talk to your other students quietly.

Re: John's lecture

[demonbelthazor]

Bel was hunched back in his seat, sunglasses on and much paler than he normally was.

Mentioning vampires may have brought him out of some of his hangover-induced misery.

Re: John's lecture

[lovechildblair.livejournal.com]

Blair raised his hand and waved it excitedly.

Re: John's lecture

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

John paused. "Yes, Mr. Sandburg?"

Re: John's lecture

[sensethevisions]

Phoebe looked slightly distracted as she took notes on the lecture.

Re: John's lecture

[cyclopeanmerc.livejournal.com]

Pip raised a hand.

Re: John's lecture

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

"Yes, Mr. Bernadette?"

Re: John's lecture

[whitedeathpod.livejournal.com]

John listened, took notes and winced when he realized the note taking was a distraction. Huh.

Angel's lecture

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

Let the vampire ping in first please. :)

Re: Angel's lecture

[notstakedyet.livejournal.com]

Angel stood and listened to John's lecture. When his turn came up, he stepped to the front of the class.

"Some of you already know me," he said. "Those who don't - name's Angel. I'm a vampire. With a soul. Which I got way before it became cool I'm also a friend of Blair's. I came here today as a favor to him. I wanted to show that not all demons are evil. Some are harmless. Some exist in the same grey that most humans do.

"What I can tell you about," Angel continued, "is being undead, being a vampire like the ones from my dimension, and about being pure evil, because when I don't have a soul that is exactly what I am. I can also tell you a little something about fighting evil vampires and demons, because that's my day job now."

Angel looked around the room, then shrugged. "Questions?"

Re: Angel's lecture

[lovechildblair.livejournal.com]

"Hi Angel!" Blair grinned and bounced and waved. "Can you tell us about some of the non-evil demons that you've encountered?"

Talk to John

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

Questions about the assignment or issues you want to discuss?

OOC

[demons-death.livejournal.com]

So which is hotter? Demon John or vamped Angel?

Re: OOC

[demonbelthazor]

*is way biased for Angel* ;D

Re: OOC

[guitar-and-gun.livejournal.com]

I nominate the mustachioed mariachi.

But I really like using this icon. And alliteration. Alliteration is fun too.

Re: OOC

[notstakedyet.livejournal.com]

Bring it!

And will ping in when I get back from lunch, figure 2pm Eastern, give or take.

Re: OOC

[x5-alec.livejournal.com]

'Kay, now I want Angelus/demon!John. *makes appealing puppy-eyes*

Re: OOC

[cyclopeanmerc.livejournal.com]

Random amusing thing:

I noticed that part of the handout for vampires from Supernatural involves them being weak to dead blood.

When I was at Otakon this summer, I helped run a fan panel for Hellsing (the creator was there).

And we got asked the stupidiest questions that sparked the dumbest arguements. As is oft to happen at a fan panel.

And the one that got the most rediculously out of control was arguing over the difference between "live blood" and "dead blood". Concepts which have never even entered into Hellsing.

It reached a boiling point when someone asked whether blood spurting from a dead man's wound that landed in a vampire's mouth counted as live or dead blood, because the person was alive when the blood came out.

I am not at all kidding abou this.

Re: OOC

[threeweapons.livejournal.com]

Think a feverish student can drop by class?

Re: OOC

[likethegun]

*votes for demon!Daddy all the way!*

Re: OOC

[sensethevisions]

*regrettably is very much forced to abstain on this one* :)

Re: OOC

[mparkerceo.livejournal.com]

Demon John.

Having said that, can a non-feverish but very smirky student stop by to give a guest speaker a hard time? It's cool if you want to leave it to the students.