Night life and other goodies in

The Nightowl, a smoky dance club for the unsavory on the fabled wrong side of the tracks. The speakers are set to stun and it's nearly impossible to see across the dancefloor when the smoke machine gets going. There used to be rumors that the drinks were watered and the blood harvested from the local pigeons, until the bartender had to go to the ER with a broken arm he said he'd gotten when he slipped on the men's room floor one night. The Nightowl is not a place to be entered lightly, or without good defensive moves.

DJ 'Bad Boy' Bill DiMaggio originally hails from Sunnydale, California. His Uncle Willy ran a bar there for a fairly specialized clientele who usually had reason not to want to be found. Bill learned early on how to keep his ear to the ground and his mouth shut...until his price is met.

Bill is the DJ at The Nightowl. In this environment, Bad Boy Bill thrives. His Uncle Willy may have been a timid little weasel, but Bill is not his uncle. He drinks hard, smokes too much, plays the feminine field, and is associated with some of the most powerful demons in the area...all of whom he would sell out in a New York minute if there was enough money on the table to make it worth his while. He would crawl over broken glass with his zipper down if it made him enough money.

Cash of any significant amount, however, has eluded him thus far. That's why he's a DJ in a seedy nightclub with a largely demon, vampire, and human refuse clientele.

The Slayer's reputation preceeds her. Bill already holds a grudge against her. His Uncle Willy lost a lot of business and suffered numerous minor injuries from his dealings with Buffy and her friends. Family - even a family like Willy - is important to Bill. Almost, but not quite, as important as money. The fact that Willy is doing a booming business at his new bar in Cleveland doesn't mitigate the fact that he suffered at Buffy's hands. Given the opportunity, he will find some way of making Buffy's life miserable. He's even willing to take a small loss on the proposition.

His name is Russ MacPherson and he runs The Slamdunk, the local sportsbar. Russ played basketball in high school and college, but never made it into the pros due to a knee injury that left him with a slight limp. Instead, he pours drinks and always knows the odds on all upcoming baseball, football, basketball, and hockey games. His bar is always clean, his beer is always cold, and nobody is allowed to harrass a woman in his place.

A tall, lanky, black man with a casual, friendly air, Russ is popular in Whispering Pines. He's one of the few people who has ever managed to get Lyle Pershing to actually laugh in public.

Russ is in his mid-forties, widowed, and the father of two young boys, Kareem and Wilt. When not tending bar, he's often to be found fishing at the lake or hunting deer.

Cafe Caffeine is the local coffee house. The atmosphere is casual, the soundtrack a CD player and whatever alternative artists the current staff of college students and young townies favor. This is a popular place to study since the coffee's strong, the refills are free, and every booth has an outlet suitable for plugging in a laptop. 

Of course some kids insist on going out to the cemetery a night, where they want to listen to the Pines whisper...

And to spend the night in the Devil's Mouth Caves is a favorite fraternity hazing ritual.