In a customer lull, the chef, the server, and the driver that brought in their supplies took to talking. There were some customers in the Waffle House, but they were busy munching on their food. The three of them had at least thirty minutes before the customers would be done and ready with their payments. They had some time to chat.

“You’ve never actually told us about why you decided to join the crew down in the Waffle House, Bob.”

Bob was a vampire. Vampires were cursed with a form of immortality that prevented them from dying, at the cost of an ever-present hunger for the life forces of their victims. In Bob’s case, he was just a normal run-of-the-mill vampire, carrying the normal advantages of better frost magic and frost magic resist, enhanced charisma, night powers, and access to blood magic, coming at the cost of a vulnerability to fire and the sun, both in physical forms and in magic forms, and the requirement of having to feed every three days in addition to normal human food and water needs. He drank blood for his life force sustenance.

Normally, vampires wouldn’t be down here in the working-class section of the city. Of any city, really. Vampires were naturally charismatic. This enabled almost all vampires to escape a life of poverty and petty crimes and catapulted them into the life of wealth and prosperity. Most vampires were thus fabulously wealthy, and most of those vampires were also famous.

Bob, however, worked at a Waffle House inside one of the poorer sections of the city. And had been for almost a century. A combination of advanced medical technology and restoration magic meant that the average person lived until five hundred years of age. Vampires, being immortal, would live on forever, but most tended to cut their lives short a few thousand years in, or retire from public life. Retirement was effectively the same thing as a deliberate end to their life for the rich and famous.

But Bob was here with them, working at the same Waffle House for a century. The other two, Wade, and Mark, were stuck here because they couldn’t afford better. And they didn’t want to go back to being the farmhands they once were. Agriculture technology was much better, but that didn’t mean being a farmer was any less laborious. Or exciting.

Wade was the server. Mark was the truck driver. And Bob was their chef.

Wade was human. Just a regular human from a poor family background.

Mark was an elf. He was an immigrant from a faraway land of reeds.

Technically, Bob was also human. Just a human vampire, which was shortened to just vampire. The strain of vampirism present on the planet was incompatible with the other native species, that being elves, dwarves, and weres. Weres, pronounced “Wears”, were a subspecies of humanity that were stuck with an animalistic transformation, the most common version on the planet being werewolves.

The two other planets in the solar system had their own strain of vampirism, affecting the other two humanoid species, the elves and dwarves, respectively. Weres shared their home world with regular humans but oddly couldn’t become vampires.

As only basic humans could be vampires, it made no sense to call them human vampires. They would thus just be called vampires here. The definition would change for the other two species on their other two worlds.

“I haven’t?”

“Yeah, Bob, you haven’t,” said Wade.

Mark walked in from the back, “Nope, you’ve never told us why you stuck to this old Waffle House.”

“Could have sworn I did, once, a long time ago.”

The other two men shook their heads.

“Oh well, I can explain it if you two have some time.”

Wade and Mark looked around and looked back at Bob as if he was jesting. The old vampire was smiling. The other two gave him a stern look.

“Okay, okay, I know we’ve had a lull in customers. Was just pulling your legs.

“So, where to begin. Where to begin. You two know the basics of vampirism?”

“No,” said Wade.

“Nah,” vocalized Mark.

“Vampirism is a kind of magical disease of the earth. Each strain is native to one of the three planets in our system, one to each of the specific planets. Vampires are carriers of the disease and spread it by biting and draining the blood from a compatible victim. It is interesting that a non-native vampire biting the correct victim would produce a new vampire on his or her native planet but trying with a different racial group would not produce a new vampire.

“Vampirism grants enhanced physical and magical prowess, a boon for frost magic and a resistance to it and the cold, and access to blood magic. Blood magic is something that very few non-vampire mages can tap into. Most vampires gain some level of charisma.

“Vampirism comes at the cost of a weakness to fire and the sun, both the physical thing, and fire and sun magic. It also requires us to feed on the lifeblood of sapient beings. Most vampires need to drink blood, but soul energy and carnal fluids are required for a small handful of vampire ‘subspecies.’ There’s a handful of creatures besides the four races that qualify for the blood route. This feeding is in addition to normal food and water requirements that everyone else has.