My Vampire Assistant

JJ turned away from the stove and fully towards me. Behind his back, tomatoes and eggs quietly sizzled in the oil, emitting a stomach-wrenching aroma of food. "Alexey? I can't say that I'm sure, as I've met no one else like him before, but I had my time to think, and remember legends about people that fit what I've seen from him."

"He mentioned legends, too." I bit my lips. "But I can't think of anything. I mean, he looks just like any other human. Most myths are about monsters of all kinds and stuff."

JJ hummed in agreement. "They are. These, though, I'm sure you will recognise. I don't remember the details, but there are tales about an ancient and now extinct race of giants who once roamed these lands." He gestured around with his hand. "Somehow, they disappeared, but there were left some humans with their blood in their veins. Stronger than a hundred men, stalwart warriors protected by Mother-Earth herself, who always fought to protect the land of Rus against its many enemies, both human and not."

A recognition flashed in me. I gasped. "These? You don't mean… bogatyrs? Daaamn, I can't believe it." I shook my head. It really was something hard to accept. You'd think I'd stop being so surprised after my first vampire, but somehow bogatyrs (and what else, Zmey-Gorynych?) didn't fit into the same universe as vampires, shapeshifters and witches. Though witches were a part of Russian folklore too, but not the kind I was, that's for sure.

What would I do with triton eggs and blood of virgins?

"He fits." JJ shrugged. "I'm sure there are vampires who had witnessed the epoch when bogatyrs were most abundant, and even saw the giants if these were ever true. Many magical creatures, especially the ones dependent on their connection with nature, were driven into the wild or died when humanity began to expand and industrialise. But such is life that changes are imminent."

He turned back to the stove, and I thought over his words as I absentmindedly watched him move. Changing life. I had no doubts that the changes JJ witnessed in the latest years of his life were much more drastic than the ones he saw in his youth. My grandparents had difficulties learning how to send messages on VKontakte. It was, I was pretty sure, a medical fact that older people had a harder time learning new things. I didn't seem like it applied to vampires.

"Did you ever got tired of changes, JJ? Of having to learn and adapt all over again."

JJ didn't answer immediately. First, he put my scrambled tomato eggs on a plate that he set to me together with a saltshaker and a spoon. He nodded at my thanks, put the frying pan in the sink, sat opposite of me, rested his chin on his interlocked fingers, and only then he spoke.

"Sometimes, sometimes. There were years when I felt like I'm learning the same things with only the most surface changes. New fashions that the same as old ones, new words that barely differ from the ones I was used to, new inventions that do the same old things… It helped to change cultures for a century. Now, though, I feel like I'm in a completely new world."

A bright smile stretched over his lips and JJ's eyes glazed over as he looked at some place only his mind could reach. "Changes flow like a mountain current, but it brings place for so much possibilities that I couldn't have even imagined in the past. I had never been more glad than now to be able to live until this moment, and to be able to live further and see everything else humanity can create."

His wonderment flew from his eyes to mine and right into my chest, where it swelled, making me want to stand up and pace to let it out. I kept seating, but my legs twitched with that need, and I focused on the food in an attempt to ease that sensation by distracting myself with food.

Still, my thoughts went to the possibilities that JJ had. There were so many, if I only imagined. He could watch humanity explore other planets and the far reaches of space, walk whenever humans would go. He might witness the creation of the first artificial intelligence able to rival humans, but hopefully would avoid watching said AI taking over the world.

Hell, if an AI tried, JJ might be the one to stop it. A far-fetched tale, but all in the realm of possibility. I had no doubts that JJ wouldn't want to be destroyed. He liked it far too much. Not to mention he needed humans for their blood.

"I remember someone saying that we were born too late for exploring the Earth and too early for exploring the space," I finally said. I ate half of the eggs by that time without even putting salt in it, though there certainly wasn't enough. They were delicious otherwise, though, which was what I said when I finally added more salt.

"Thank you, ma chèrie. I am glad to hear that I didn't fail in something as simple as that dish, though it seems like I put too little salt in my fear of putting too much."

"Well, this is what you put the saltshaker nearby, isn't it?" I grinned at him. "Plus, this particular meal has an additional flavouring to it called "muscles I didn't have to strain to cook this"."

He chuckled. "Yes, lifting a frying pan is a very hard work. One needs supernatural strength to do it. Which makes it all the weirder that women are most usually the ones to do most of the cooking."

"I can read you an entire lecture on the development of women's role in the society starting from stone age and to our time and why it was as it was." I raised my spoon like a pointer and waved it in the air as I spoke. "But, JJ, I'm pretty sure most of it you not just know, you've seen it."