He's kind of annoyed by the bus. Back before they started actually looking for a school, the understanding was that they were going to get him a car. Then they found out that the only school willing to take him was whatever the hell this place is—he's forgotten the name at least twice already—and apparently the roads you have to drive to get there are such garbage that they don't even want him to own a car until he graduates lest he end up wrecking it on the way to or from school.

As compensation, though, they increased the amount of money they're paying him to get through the first semester with a clean arrest record. So he's got that to look forward to, if he can make it through the next few months without committing any violent crimes. Or at least without getting caught at them? He'll see how he's feeling.

"So, entering Grimm University, eh...?" the bus driver says, apparently trying to make small talk. "Well, I hope you said all your goodbyes, because as soon as we come out of this long, long tunnel, you'll see the university. And perhaps never see anything again!" 

And then he starts laughing like he's auditioning to voice-act the spooky cackle in a haunted house. 

"Wow."

The bus driver looks slightly disappointed.

"This is much easier with high school students," he grumbles under his breath.

The bus exits the tunnel. 

Grimm University, apparently, is on a completely grassless patch of land; there are trees, but if they're alive they aren't showing it. Despite it being barely September, their branches are completely bare, except for the flock of corvids perched on the branches of the closest one giving Sean the stinkeye. In the distance, off to the left, a patch of headstones can be seen, and directly ahead is a collection of buildings, each one of which looks like someone took a Victorian mansion, let it run down a little, and converted it into a haunted house with zero tacky plastic decorations. 

A thunderbolt cracks ominously overhead. 

"Welcome to Grimm University," the bus driver says. 

"Wow. Okay, that's kind of cool, in a weird, depressing way."

As soon as he and his bags are off, the door shuts and the bus drives away. 

Well, that sure just happened.

...

He looks around to try to figure out where he's supposed to go.

"Ack! Watch out!" A voice calls from behind him. 

??

--And he gets hit by a bike. 

"Ohmygosh, I'm so sorry!" the girl who was previously on the bike, now mostly under it, says, extracting herself and a lovely new set of bruises from the wreckage. "Are you okay?" 

Fortunately for everyone, his suitcases mostly took the hit for him; he's maybe gonna have a couple bruises, but nothing serious.

"I'm fine," he says, leaning over to offer her a hand up. "Are you okay?"

She's pretty. He can at least control himself well enough not to commit sexual assault during his literal first minute at the new school, though. That would just be ridiculous.

"I'm okay," she says, accepting his hand and looking with some dismay at the remains of her bicycle. The front wheel was badly bent in the crash, and also the chain appears to have snapped at some point. "The brakes failed and I couldn't stop in time, I'm sorry, this is the worst first day..." she trails off, looking at him a little oddly. 

"It's cool. Sorry about your bike."

He's not sure what to do with that look, so maybe for now he can just ignore it.

She brings his hand to her mouth and presses her lips to a lightly bleeding scrape and sucks. 

--And then immediately drops his hand, blushing furiously and backpedaling--"Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!"

...he laughs. "Wow. That's a new one. Not like I'm about to object to having a pretty girl's mouth on me, though."

"It--wasn't like that, I'm a vampire, I'm sorry." 

"What, for real?"

"Yeah. Your blood's really tasty, by the way." 

"Th...anks?" He's not offended, just confused. "Should I be worried you're gonna eat me?"

"No, I've been living in the human world since I was like six, I don't hurt people." 

"So as far as I'm aware, vampires are not, in fact, real; you might have to catch me up a little better than that."

"Wait, what?" 

"Yeah, 'wait, what' pretty much sums it up! I think at least one of us is super confused about a lot of things!"

"...Are you. Saying you're. Human???"

"Am I not supposed to be?"

"Not here! This is a college for monsters!"

For some reason he seems to find that statement kind of darkly hilarious. He shakes his head, laughing. "Maybe that's why it was the only place my parents could find that would let me in and didn't like blatantly suck."

"They shouldn't have! You're not safe here!"

"The bus driver told me I might never be seen again but I figured he was just trying to be funny. How not safe is not safe?"

"A lot of monsters yearn for the days when we could prey on humanity with impunity, before you came up with the weapons technology to wipe us out if we poked our noses out too far. Everyone who's here is at least nominally on board with plan: blend in with humanity, but that doesn't mean they won't eat you if they find out." 

"...fair enough, I guess."

He kind of wants her to lick him again. No, focus, Sean.

"So what the hell do I do about it?"

"...Go home? That's kinda all I've got. Or I guess maybe just refusing to tell anyone what you are could work, but I dunno if that means no one'll find out." 

"Man, I didn't even want to go to college, my parents had to bribe me. On the other hand, if I quit on the first day because I met a girl who told me she was a vampire and the other students were gonna eat me, I bet I do not get my bribe."

...She giggles. 

"Your parents had to bribe you?" 

"Yep! With a slightly obscene amount of money! They were gonna buy me a car but apparently driving here sucks a lot and that's why the weirdly menacing bus driver? So no car."

"We all have our crosses to bear," she says cheerfully, fingering a weird cross hanging from a choker around our neck. "Why'd your parents have to bribe you?" 

"Because I don't even slightly give a shit about school. Also they want me to stop assaulting people so I only get paid if I make it through the whole semester without getting arrested."

"Well, you're not gonna get arrested here, I'll give you that." 

"That's a plus! Maybe not enough of one to make up for the risk of getting eaten, but a plus!"

"Why is that a plus." 

"Mm?"

"I mean...I know of people who have problems with getting arrested for assault because they're anthropophages with poor impulse control, and I know of people who have problems with getting arrested for assault because they're, like, in gangs, and I know of people who have problems with getting arrested for assault because they're super racist, and if you're the last kind I'm gonna feel kinda gooky about having any'a your blood in me." 

"I'm not a—does that mean 'eats people'—but it's an impulse control thing, yeah. Like, last year I set a teacher on fire because I lost my temper and there was a lighter on his desk. I am usually better at keeping a lid on it than that, but that's the kind of problem I have."

"--Oh wow. I do not recommend attempting to light a teacher here on fire, but that's because the teacher will personally kick your ass, not because you'll get arrested. It does mean eats people, yeah." 

"I'm gonna do my best not to light anybody on fire!"

Ugh, it already itches not having told her what the other half of his problem looks like, but if he's going to actually die if he fucks up too bad around here, he should maybe not immediately alienate the closest thing he has to a friend.

"What's your name, anyway? I'm Sean."

"I'm Melody. Pleased to meet you, despite the circumstances." 

"Same! Uh, before you hit me with your bike—do you want a new one, by the way, it looks pretty fucked—I was trying to figure out where I'm even supposed to go next, think you can help me out with that?"

"I probably do," she agrees, giving the bike a regretful look. "Yeah, commencement, I know where that is." 

"Cool. I can get you a new bike, you can show me around and maybe help me not get eaten, seems like a good deal all round." Pause. "Also you can lick me again if you want. I mean, assuming it's safe, I know jack shit about vampires."

"If I drank much you'd want juice and cookies but there is no particular mojo attached to my fangs, even if I was using them," she says cheerfully. She gives him a speculative look and leans over and licks a scratch on his collarbone. 

He giggles softly. With her leaning in so close, it feels very natural to put an arm around her shoulders.

Ooh, that means hug! Hug!!!!

Wow she's adorable. He hugs her.

"Okay, commencement?"

"Commencement!" 

She leads him to commencement.

A Japanese woman with cat ears and two tails is standing at the front of the amphitheater. 

"Welcome, everyone, to Grimm University! As I'm sure you all know, Grimm is a school for monsters! Now, like it or not, human beings run the world! For us monsters to survive, we must learn to coexist peacefully with them. And that's the mission of this university! Living peacefully in a human world! Which brings us to rule number one: you will retain your human appearance. In order to successfully practice living as a human, you must refrain from revealing your true nature, even to your fellow students." 

How convenient.

Off to their right, a guy with snakebites raises his hand. "But ma'am, can't we just eat all the humans? I could start with the cute girls." 

Valid.

"No, silly," the catgirl tsks. "But anyway, don't worry about running into any humans here. All the faculty and staff are monsters too! And the campus is located inside a secret 'borderlands,' no human has ever seen it. Not and lived, anyway!" she giggles. 

Well somebody sure fucked up here, then, didn't they.

"Now off to your first classes with all of you!" she says cheerfully. 

"...Not what I was expecting," she mutters. 

"Yeah me neither!"

"If the rest of the teachers are anything like her I'm not feeling that great about their ability to teach us to act human." 

"Yeah that's, uh, that's pretty reasonable. Well. You said you'd been living in the human world since you were six, you'll probably be all right? And if not, I bet I can help."

"Oh, I'm not worried about me. I am a little worried about snakebites over there." 

"Yep he seems like he is gonna have a time."

"Well, not my problem, I guess. I hope." 

"How would it end up being your problem?"

"'Cute girls first?' Maybe he's only the type to harass human girls, but maybe not." 

"Oooh yeah I see what you mean."

"I'm not the cutest I've ever been, but I'm cute enough." 

"Yeah, you sure are. Anyway, did she actually mean we all have classes to get to right now, because I really feel like I should probably be finding wherever the hell I'm gonna live and leaving all my shit there first?"

"I don't think we have classes right now. I mean, do you even have your schedule?"

"I super don't!"

"I'll show you to the dorm." 

"Thanks!"

She leads him to another haunted-looking building. This one is quite modern on the inside, divided up into what seem to be fairly ordinary-looking college singles. 

Well at least he won't have to navigate having a roommate. Cool. Also he can now stop hauling two suitcases everywhere he goes, that's pretty cool too.

"...wanna hang out some more?"

"Sure." She flops casually on his bed. "You seem pretty neat." 

"You seem pretty neat too!"

He sits down next to her.

"So, vampires. Two-tailed cat ladies. What other stuff is there that I have no idea exists but everybody here is gonna think I already know about?"

"Uh...vampires are kinda...a big deal, a little? Like, among monsters, there's a certain amount of hierarchy by species according to level of ass-kicking, and vampires are kinda near the top. I'm not all that, this rosary," she taps the cross around her neck, "restricts my powers, but that's what I thought was going on when you said 'really?' when I said I was a vampire, I didn't think you wouldn't believe in monsters. And there's, like, lots of stuff really. I don't think I've even heard of everything in particular. But, like, werewolves, mermaids, sirens, harpies, ogres, sasquatch, yeti--different things, those two--witches, succubi, I think most things from mythology are real. Oh, and there's monstrels. A few kinds of monster, like succubi, breed true through crosses, but most of the time when two kinds of monsters have a kid you get a hybrid, or monstrel. They can look kinda weird in true form, if the species they're descended from combine oddly, and they're subject to all kinds of hybrid vigor and hybrid decay and stuff. Their level of asskickitude varies wildly but they're pretty low on the social totem pole regardless. Sort of a toss-up who's lower, them or witches--witches are pretty powerful but they're also biologically human."

"...so wait, you can be human and still count as somebody who shouldn't get eaten? Or do people eat witches?"

"Man, people eat other monsters who aren't witches sometimes, humans are more hunted 'cause you're tastier and can't fight back as well, not out of principle. Monster society pretty much sucks, there's a reason my mom went to go live with humans when I was little." 

"Wow, okay. Me and my impulse control will fit right in, I guess. What, like, is a witch? Like, 'powerful but biologically human' sounds like maybe something I should be looking into if I want to be able to kick somebody's ass if they try to eat me?"

"Witchcraft runs in families. I dunno if that means you can only learn to be a witch if you have witch genes or if it's just that their techniques are all family secrets, witches are pretty secretive." 

"So, in conclusion, sucks to be me." He snorts.

"Sorry. Uh, I do know of a way you could get supernatural goodies but like...it's temporary."

"Oh?"

"So I can drink blood through my fangs, but in theory I could also use them to inject my own blood in someone else, and then that person gets temporary vampire powers." 

"...cool. What are vampire powers like?"

"Mostly we're really strong and heal fast. But like. Really really strong." 

"Sounds like fun. How temporary is temporary?"

"Dunno. I've never done it before."

"And you don't have, like, a ballpark? Like if it's five minutes that's not super useful except for having fun with superpowers, but if it's like a couple days then in theory I could just have superpowers all the time while I'm here and then I would be way less likely to die?"

"I don't think it's a couple days. Even if it was only five minutes it could still be useful for taking advantage of the regen but I think proooooobably it's more like hours? Maybe we should test it." 

"Maybe we should."

"Gonna have to bite you," she warns, sitting up and moving closer. 

"I figured. 'S all right."

"Good," she says, and leans in and sinks her fangs into his neck. 

For a moment all it feels like is that someone just stabbed him with two large canine teeth. 

And then something explodes inside him, like someone just set off fireworks in every cell of his body at once. 

Power courses through him--it feels like he could do anything, like this. 

Oh wow. Oh wow. That is a hell of a feeling.

"—okay, first of all, ow—second of all, holy shit—"

He wants to—kiss her, or bolt out of the room and run a mile just because he can, or break something—he probably shouldn't do any of those—it is very difficult to convince himself he shouldn't kiss her—

"Vampire powers are awesome!" 

"I can see that—I really want to kiss you and also do like five other things that are all probably worse ideas—"

She giggles, and gives him an assessing look, and then shrugs and throws her arms around his neck and kisses him. 

Fantastic.

He absolutely does not in any way have the level of self-control it would take to be careful with his shiny new superstrength when he grabs her and pulls her closer and kisses back.

She does not have the full load of vampiric superstrength with that cross on. 

She is still much stronger and sturdier than a human girl. She makes an approving noise and squirms. 

Well that's just really fucking hot.

And if that's what she thinks of him not being careful then maybe carefulness is overrated.

He kisses her even more passionately, wraps his arms around her, digs his fingers into her back hard enough that if they were both operating on a human level she'd have bruises there tomorrow.

She makes a vaguely objecting yelp at the fingers but on the other hand she doesn't, like, stop kissing him, so he can take that as he likes. 

Yeah that just seems like straightforward encouragement to him.

She still doesn't stop kissing him, but she does unwrap one of her arms from around his neck, reach behind her and attempt to tug one of his hands upwards. 

Sure, he can go with that.

Then the other one. 

Once his hands feel less distractingly like she's leaning against an uncomfortable corner of furniture she wraps her arms around his neck again and puts her attention back into kissing him. 

She's very kissable. He is maybe having a hard time remembering why it would be a super bad idea to piss her off, and, relatedly, is now sliding a hand under her shirt.

She squirms consideringly and fails to materialize any objections. 

He spends a minute just stroking her skin because it's soft and nice to touch and kissing her is fun and he is very easily distracted at the moment, but soon his hands come up higher and he finds some more places to be careless with his strength.

Did he want a whining melting Melody because that is how you get one. 

Ooh what a good flavour of Melody that is. It might be his favourite.

"Ohhhhh....yes....."

This is very much encouraging him to continue being careless.

If he continues to be careless in that particular region Melody is going to continue to make fun noises at him. 

At some point in this process both of their shirts are going to come off. He's not super careful with those either but he does put some effort into not outright destroying them.

Melody is pretty good at making sure clothing doesn't get damaged by incidental superstrength. 

"Hang on," she says after some more kissing and exploration of areas no longer covered by shirt. "I'm not--" 

"Mm?"

"Not on the pill or anything." 

"Mm," he says acknowledgingly. He seems much more interested in nibbling on her shoulder than in the implications of this statement.

Okay cool she will just enjoy miscellaneous nibbling and related things without worrying about that any more unless it becomes immediately relevant. 

Sean does not super have the advance planning capacity necessary to move on from Miscellaneous Nibbling And Related Activities right now. He's still just kinda following impulses, and all his impulses at the moment involve touching her in easily accessible places. Oh, and biting. There's some biting.

She's sooooooo fine with that. There may be some nibbling back. 

They are just gonna be making out for hours here, aren't they.

You know what, if they are, that is okay with her. 

And then, just as he finally gets the bright idea to try touching her in a less easily accessible place, he pauses in the middle of shoving his hand down her pants because all of a sudden he feels weak and shaky and exhausted. It's all he can do to keep himself sitting upright, and then he fails at that and ends up slumped over onto her, sleepily nuzzling her shoulder.

"--Whoah, you okay?"

"Tired," he yawns. "Think the... thing... stoppped."

"...Okay." She snuggles him. "You want me to stay here?"

He yawns again and wraps an arm around her and then he is asleep. Up to her how she interprets this response.

She decides to interpret it in a way that involves carefully maneuvering them so they are lying down without at any point de-snuggling and then taking a nap cuddled up to him. That is how she interprets it. 

Cozy <3

Then he will have a very cozy nap!

She wakes up after about half an hour and blinks at him, checking to see if he's still asleep. 

He nuzzles her shoulder. He may be as much as ten percent awake.

Alternately: cute percent awake. She kisses him on the cheek. 

He makes a sleepy noise and nuzzles her again.

Awwwww. 

She snuggles him some more, extremely delightedly. 

"Mmmmmhi." Snuggle. "Wow, okay. 'A couple hours of superstrength and even shittier than usual impulse control and then I immediately take a nap', not the most convenient way that could've worked... I think going around with superpowers all the time is pretty much out."

Giggle. "Yeah, sorry. But if someone picks a fight with you I can give you a...kiss for luck." 

"Good plan." He kisses her.

Mmmkiss. "I can't say I mind where your lack of impulse control led you." Slight squirm. 

"Yeah, that was really fun." He hugs her a little closer and kisses her again.

"It waaaaaas," she sighs. Time for a nuzzle of her own. 

...in retrospect he is kind of really lucky she turned out to be into him.

Ugh. Should he tell her? He should probably tell her. It can't be better for it to come as a surprise later on, right? And lying itches. And she seems to like him. But probably she'll stop liking him once he explains that he's a rapist. And maybe if he keeps quiet a little while longer he can meet someone else he can trust. Yeah, right, though, like who? How can he be sure enough of anyone to tell them he's human when they might decide to eat him about it? In conclusion, ugh.

He tries not to let the internal conflict show, but he is not super great at hiding his feelings and he kind of ends up sighing and flopping his head on her shoulder and hugging her tighter for a moment and then sighing again.

"...You okay?" 

"...yeah? Mostly? I guess? I dunno. It's complicated." He gives her a squeeze and a kiss on the cheek.

"Is it about me biting you?"

"Mmm, not exactly."

"Then what is it?"

...he sighs.

"Oh, fuck it. Okay. There's—a thing I've been scared to tell you because if you decide to stop being my friend I might die, but I hate lying even by omission, I hate—feeling like somebody only likes me because they don't know me well enough, like if they had the full story they'd feel differently—so whatever, I guess I'll just say it and see what happens. The other thing my parents are bribing me to stop doing, besides shit like lighting teachers on fire, is raping people."

"I gotta admit, I didn't know that one could be an impulse control thing." 

"...I mean, isn't it? Or—I don't know, like, if I'd cared I probably could've tried a lot harder to make sure I didn't get to the point where impulse control was the last thing between me and hurting someone, but—I've had close calls even when I'm actively trying not to, it's not just that I don't care because if it was then when I cared I'd just stop."

"You have the weirdest problems. Every case of rape I'd ever heard of was, like, premeditated, or at least committed in a context where the guy didn't think it was rape or just didn't give a shit or whatever." She snuggles him some more. "Is it going to sound horribly patronizing if I say I think I see why they decided to let you come here now?"

"...I mean I don't... see how they could've known that about me...? It's not like my parents would've told them."

"I mean, magic." 

"And so then, what, they figure if I don't end up getting eaten maybe I'll learn something?" He contemplates this. "Well, I guess technically they're not wrong. I'm already trying a lot harder than usual to make sure I don't mess up with you, cause if I do I might die. But that's... not exactly... the same thing... as the school helping."

"We haven't actually had any classes yet," she points out. "I mean, I sure hope they've got some way of actually teaching people to behave themselves in human society, I can't imagine they haven't noticed how many of Snakebites there are in the monster population." 

"I dunno, I feel like that guy and me have very different problems."

"Fair. I dunno, then, it's just a guess." Snuggle. She is sooooo cozy. 

She is! She's very cozy! It's good.

"Anyway I'm trying to think of a less patronizing way to say 'well, don't do that,' but, uh, I had any idea what I was getting into when I decided not to attend human college, you're surprising but unless you've actually killed anyone you're still beating out the worst-case scenario I was expecting to make friends with. Like, I am probably going to end up with multiple friends, I'm still not ruling out making friends with someone who's eaten people." 

"I haven't killed anyone," he confirms. "Although that's not really... like, it's not a principle I have, it just hasn't come up."

"I mean, I'd kill someone if I had to, and it's likelier to come up for me than for you." 

"...you're maybe giving me too much credit with the 'had to' part."

"Meh. Everyone you haven't killed is someone who isn't dead, and that's what matters in my book." 

"Fair enough, I guess."

"Being not dead is great. Dead people don't get cuddles." 

"Cuddles seem to be pretty nice!"

"Yeah. --Seem to be?" 

"I have not really... had a lot of them?"

"Aw, man, that sucks." She snuggles him some more and puts her face on him. 

...he smiles. "Well. Okay. Sure. Cool. Good."

Hmm what if he pets her hair what then.

Then she makes an approving humming noise into his neck is what!

What a good noise!!! More of this please.

As long as he keeps petting her hair she will keep purring into his throat. 

Good! Good vampire friend! Extremely good! Soft, pettable, excellent noises! So good!

Don't forget warm and cozy because she is definitely also those things. 

She iiiiiiiiiis.

"We should probably like...go get our schedules at some point," she says eventually, belying her words by snuggling in closer. 

"That sounds like way less fun than cuddling you." He sighs. "You're probably right, though."

"Normally it doesn't suck this much when I'm right, I promise." 

He laughs a little and kisses her.

Mmm, kisses. Also far superior to getting up and getting schedules. 

Very much so. Mmmmmm.

"...Mnnf don't wanna." 

"Me neither," he agrees. "We gonna do it anyway?"

"Yes," she pouts. 

He laughs, and kisses her, and starts looking for his shirt. It's got to be around here somewhere, right?

It's over there. Aaaaand her shirt is...up there. She retrieves it, giggling, and puts it on. 

...he kisses her again. Just cause.

She kisses back gleefully, doing a little foot-pop.

He laughs.

"--Oh, for the record--I don't really do monogamy."

"Huh," he says. "Fine by me. Wouldn't have even occurred to me to wonder about it, honestly."

"Well, lotsa people would assume, so." She shrugs, and gives him a peck on the cheek and then takes his hand to go find an RA with schedules. 

Holding hands: weirdly nice!

Their RA, who doesn't blink, gives them their schedules and student ID cards. 

"What's your major?" Melody asks, poring over hers. 

"I don't remember."

"Howzat happen?" 

"I mean, I mentioned my parents had to pay me to go to college cause I didn't want to, right?"

"...I mean, yeah, but there's 'don't wanna go to college' and 'don't wanna study nuclear physics,' if you didn't even want to go to college I recommend you make sure they didn't sign you up for something prestigious and stupid hard." 

"If it's too hard I can just fail, it's not like I care. And they know that, so either they're planning to bribe somebody or they gave me something really easy."

"Oh, you still get the bribe if you fail?"

"If I didn't still get the bribe if I fail, I wouldn't have even bothered to take it!"

"If you don't have to try to not fail then what's the downside of college?" 

"Having to show up? Feeling vaguely annoyed about all the lies and bribery? Also apparently the risk of getting eaten by monsters but seems like I'm just rolling with that one."

"The monsters thing is not a general hazard. The lies...if you're talking about having to pretend not to be a rapist, I feel like college is not the sticking point there. And the bribery wouldn't be a thing if you didn't need to be bribed, and that's the thing I'm confused about." 

"No, like, if I don't have to try not to fail then the reason why I don't have to try not to fail is because my parents are bribing somebody to lie about whether I passed."

"...Ah. Yeah, that's--bad." 

"It's not great! So like, I might put in a little effort just so I won't have to deal with that. Depends how easy it is."

"Whether I can be aaaaany help at all depends on what it is." 

"Oh? What are you good at?"

"I'm good with my hands! I'm good at putting things together and seeing if they work and taking them apart again to fix it. I'm studying engineering, but it also applies to, like, arts and crafts stuff." 

"Huh. That's pretty cool."

"Yes it is. So what are you good at, besides kissing?"

"Dunno. Dance, I guess, but I got kicked out of ballet school as a kid so I'm not that good. Like, I got kicked out for fighting, not for sucking at ballet, but if I'd been really good my parents would've been able to convince them to keep me."

"I can dance! Some, anyway. I could teach you. Not ballet, though, I don't know any ballet."

"I haven't done ballet since I was like ten anyway. I do other stuff now. Dance is fun."

She grins and cha-chas a couple steps and then twirls and throws her arms around his neck and giggles. 

He laughs and kisses her.

She hugs him and rests her head on his shoulder and sighs. 

Mmmhugs.

"I like you a lot." 

"That's convenient. And I like you too."

"You're cozy." 

He decides that the best response to this accusation is... a kiss.

Mmmmkiss. 

A hand taps her shoulder. "Mind if I cut in?" 

...She turns around. 

It's snakebites. 

"Oh, go fuck yourself," she says, disgusted. 

"That's not very friendly," he says. 

"Cute. Girls. First? You're not very charming." 

"Oh, come on, I wasn't being serious." 

"It wasn't a funny joke. Fuck riiiiiiight off." 

"Don't be like that." 

"You realize that's a thing date rapists say to their victims, right?" 

"Seriously? I try to be friendly and this is the thanks I get?" 

"Fuuuuuuuck ooooofff. I am not some insecure little thing you can gaslight into agreeing with you." 

Sean watches this exchange in bafflement.

Snakebites shifts his gaze over to Sean. "So who're you?" 

"What are you, like... doing?"

--This throws him for a loop. "What?" 

He makes a gesture encompassing the three of them, him and Melody and snakebites and Melody and him. "This. You. What. Why."

"I'm just trying to make nice with a pretty girl, that's all."

"He's trying to hit on me and loom at you." 

"Does pestering people who are super obviously not into you get you a lot of dates? Like, maybe I'm missing something but it really feels like that shouldn't work."

"Fuck off, this is none of your business," he snaps, pissed. 

"N...o? Or—you know what, sure." He turns to Melody. "Wanna go cuddle some more?"

"Sounds great," she says. 

"I'm not done talking to you yet," Snakebites says, grabbing her shoulder. 

She turns to look at him, sneers, looks him right in the eye, and very deliberately and sensuously lowers her mouth to Sean's neck. 

Soft enough that Sean can hear her but Snakebites can't, she makes a soft querying noise. 

...if he gets high on vampire blood right now he is super super gonna hurt this guy.

On the other hand this guy is kind of a dick and he's feeling pretty chill about it at the moment but he actually would not really mind if he lost his temper here, and maybe that's the best situation to try to practice self-control in?

Also it's probably a good idea to get his dose of vampire blood before snakebites does anything fightier than grabbing Melody. Grabbing Melody is already not great.

He really wishes he could have an actual conversation with her about this, but unfortunately the best he can do is hug her and make a small affirmative sound.

Her teeth sink into his neck. 

He knows what to expect, this time, and so manages to keep hold of himself a little better.

Which mostly just means that he waits until she's not biting him anymore before grabbing her and kissing her passionately.

Mmmmm. This is definitely a kiss that would cause cartoon hearts in certain media. 

"Hey!" Snakebites says, affronted, and grabs Sean's shoulder to attempt to spin him around to face him. 

He lets go of Melody with one arm to reach back and shove the annoyance away.

Snakebites goes flying into the wall. 

"What..." he breathes, pulling himself to his feet. 

Mmmm, Melody. She's so kissable.

Snakebites starts expanding, his shirt tearing as he sheds human form. 

Sean, meanwhile, is thinking mainly about the fact that he has a bed and would really like to drag Melody to it.

Snakebites attempts to punch Sean. This mostly results in Snakebites hurting his now-enormous hand. 

The thing about kissing Melody is that it makes a really good distraction from violence. Look how thoroughly distracted he is. Not at all thinking about maiming anyone.

...

Snakebites attempts to punch Melody. 

Ow!!!

So, maiming it is, then.

He snarls and punches the giant very hard in the chest.

The giant goes flying out of the dorm without bothering to use the door! Now there is a hole in the wall. 

He grabs Melody and kisses her. He should probably be doing some other thing but at the moment it's kiss Melody or commit murder and on the whole kisses seem preferable.

Kisses!!! Okay good. She has very good regen and is not too bothered by the aftermath of the punch. 

Snakebites, displaying a brain cell for the first time in this interaction, decides discretion is the better part of valor and fucks off. 

It takes him a couple minutes to drum up enough self-control to break the kiss and say, "Back to my room maybe—?"

"Mm, sure." 

Back to his room!

More kisses!

Kisses! Kisses kisses kisses. Shirts off again?

Sounds good!

Oh gooooooood. 

Yes very.

Kissing Sean while he's high on her blood is extremely good.

They are in full agreement on this point.

Would he like some happy noises. 

He super super would!!!

Goood because he is getting them. Especially when he touches her in certain ways. 

Ooh.

She does this specific low breathy thing when he does this specific thing to her breasts. 

Fun, good, yes, more of this please.

Repeated subsequent iterations of the thing may cause the lowness and breathiness to increase in intensity, and also add a slight note of whine. 

She's so gooooooooood. He is gonna make her make those noises EVEN MORE now.

This will cause her to lose some amount of motor function. Meltily. 

Good.

There might be squirming though. 

That is ALSO GOOD.

The whining gets more emphatic. 

Better and better!

Extremely Kisses now. 

Good yes perfect.

He might get tackled slightly. Since he's currently high on vampire blood this shouldn't be too much of a problem for him. 

It is in fact pretty fantastic.

"You are--mmm--so good at this..."

"Good!!!"

"Mmm..." she trails kisses down to his neck, lingering there. 

He pets her hair and makes happy noises.

She purrs happily into his neck. 

She's so goooooood and oh whoops he's maybe crashing again now.

Awww. 

She snuggles him! Cozy. 

Zzz.

She wriggles over enough to grab a book out of her backpack and then snuggles back up. Literarily. 

He dozes for a while and then yawns and nuzzles her.

"Mmmmmmmmhi."

"Hiiiiiiii. I like you a lot. You're good and cozy and yummy and you didn't kill that guy even though he was totally asking for it and you were hopped up on vampire blood and, like, I'm not claiming that makes you a paragon of virtue or anything but finding kissing me more important than dealing out not-strictly-necessary violence is an excellent quality and I appreciate it." She gently bonks her forehead against his. 

"Oh, I was doing that on purpose. Figured it'd be a good time to practice self-control since I don't actually super care if I kill that guy. And it worked, kinda! Probably I should figure out a way to stop myself from murdering people when I don't have a pretty girl to distract myself with, but like, still worked."

"Maybe when you don't have a pretty girl to distract yourself with people will be less inclined to attempt to use violence against you to acquire her."

"...Now I'm kinda concerned about other pretty girls on campus who, uh, aren't vampires." 

"...huh. Yeah. That's sure a thing."

"If getting hopped up on vampire blood were less inconvenient or I could take my necklace off I'd suggest something pre-emptive if we see anyone being menaced, but..." shrug. "We'll see what happens, I guess. Maybe we could create some kind of feminist vigilante club or something." 

"Taking your necklace off isn't an option?"

"I physically can't take it off. Weird magic reasons. When I was twelve I accidentally broke a guy's arm pulling him away from someone he was bothering and this weird guy dressed like someone decided to cosplay as a Catholic priest without knowing what that looked like showed up and put a limiter on me I couldn't take off myself. He got in a big argument with my mom about it but she finally had to let him, I'm not sure why, I tried to eavesdrop but they referred to a bunch of things I wasn't familiar with." 

"...can nobody take it off you, or...?"

"My mom could." 

"Huh. I mean, has anybody else tried?"

"Someone at school tried to yank it off one time when we got in an argument--she didn't know what it was, she just thought it was crass to wear jewelry containing holy symbols when you're an atheist and it got pretty heated--didn't work." 

Snort. "Okay."

He pauses thoughtfully, and then, "Feminist vigilante club?"

"Is that approval or asking me to elaborate." 

"The... second one, I think?"

"So what I was thinking was--power levels are all over the place, there's lots and lots of inter- and even intra- species power variation, so, like, approximately half the dudes at the school would find approximately half the girls at the school easy prey by themselves. Some species are--man there needs to be a word for, like, the superset of herds and flocks and packs and stuff--some species are sufficiently naturally cliqueish that they'll already have banded into groups for defense--or attack, but--anyway the idea was to get a sort of a buddy system set up? Like, so that nobody who's worried about being preyed upon is without enough companions at any given time to make this difficult, like, a buncha dudes could try to take down a buncha girls, too, but that'd be harder to hide and I'm pretty sure the faculty is at least nominally supposed to keep us from assaulting each other. And then the vigilante part comes in if there's someone who's already done stuff and is an asshole, like Snakebites if he'd attacked someone else, and it would be tactically useful to make an example of 'em. I think I have some books on pack hunting tactics that could help." 

"...the thing that confuses me here is like... so that guy was being an asshole to you because you're a hot girl and he wants you, and he's probably gonna go around being an asshole to other people for the same reason, so it makes sense to be worried about girls when you're thinking about him because those are the people he's gonna want to fuck with. But he's just one guy. Like, sure, I buy that most guys who go around being shitty are probably being shitty to girls, but—is the problem you're trying to solve here 'people getting fucked with' or 'girls specifically getting fucked with'? Cause I thought it was the first one but then you were like 'feminist vigilante club' and I was like 'wait what'."

"...Yeah, mostly it's people getting fucked with, it's just, y'know, I was thinking about a specific kind of fucking-with and then I sorta...ran with it...without stopping to question my impulses." 

"Yeah, okay, that makes sense."

"Thank you for catching that before it crashed into a wall somewhere." 

He giggles.

"I should probably try to find out what if any like...rules enforcement...they've got going on before I try rejecting their reality and substituting my own anyway." 

"Yeah."

"...Hm. I wonder if the blood thing works the same for non-humans." 

"...huh, that'd be interesting. So you could get people high and they could beat up whoever was fucking with them?"

"Yeah...I mean, it's not a perfect strategy--I only have so much blood--I mean I can regenerate it but I'd have to eat more and I dunno how likely people are to be willing to play snacktime." 

"Where do you get snacktime usually?"

"Oh, you can buy bags of blood--not like embezzled from legitimate blood donations, that I know of, but within the monster community getting your blood drawn to put in the Vampire Grocery Store is, like, any amount of a thing."

"...that's... sort of weirdly cute?"

"...Thanks? It's pretty clinical, though." 

"I dunno, I just like the mental image of you with a bag of blood like a juicebox."

"Ohhh, I thought you meant the extraction process. Yeah, it's kinda like that! Except I come with my own straws." 

Giggle.

"Mom made me use the plastic ones when we were out in public but at home I did in fact also use my own straws on juiceboxes when I was a kid."

"That's even more adorable."

"I was a cute kid. If you ever meet my mom you should hit 'er up for pictures of little me." 

He giggles again. "Maybe I will!"

"Cool." 

Snuggle. 

"What were you like as a kid?"

"Not super cute. Kind of a huge bully actually."

"Mm. Yeah, not cute."

He nods.

"That's okay. You're cute now." 

"Am I? Cool."

"I think so!" Cheeksmooch. 

"Well, good. I think you're cute too." Snuggle.

"Well, yes, but we already established that." 

"I forget establishing that but it does sound like the kind of thing that probably happened."

"I think it was back in the auditorium when we were discussing how much of a problem Snakebites was likely to be."

"Like I said, sounds like the kind of thing that probably happened."

"Anyway, you are definitely cute. You have excellent bone structure and muscle definition and, more importantly, you make good faces."

He laughs.

"I'm glad you like my faces!" he says, hugging her.

She snuggles up, sighing happily. "You have a very nice smile. Several very nice smiles."

"'S not something I hear a lot of."

"Maybe I make you smilier than most people do."

"Could be. Could very well be."

She makes a happy noise and puts her face on him.

Eeeee. He wraps his arms around her and gives her a squeeze.

Mmsnuggles. Tomorrow they will have to do other things but for right now there are not other priorities besides cozy. 

Cozy is the best priority.