Issue 1 Downtime

((open thread))

Late at night, Molly sat in the cafeteria with a large cup full of cow's blood. Technically, there wasn't really a need to sit alone in the cafeteria to eat her breakfast, but it made her feel a bit more normal.

There was a beeping in the kitchen, which sounded distinctly like a microwave going off.

A few moments later, formerly-appetizing smells filled the cafeteria as Victoria walked in with her late-night snack (which mercifully was not full of garlic). "It would be nice to be at a school where midterms were the only concern..."

Molly lets out a scared squeak.

"I didn't mean to reveal the existence of vampires! I'm sorry!" Molly protests.

"Darling, why would I... Wait, you think that I'm- Oh, go fuck yourself!"

Molly cowers, looking terrified beyond the capacity for rational thought.

Victoria stabbed her fork into a ravioli (homemade, stuffed with mushrooms and shrimp), muttering irritatedly. "Can't you tell that I'm not a vampire?"

Molly takes a deep breath, trying to settle down, "How am I supposed to tell something like that?"

"Well, listen, for one thing. You're supposed to have better senses now. Heartbeats aren't that hard to pick out."

"Everything about you is crazy bananas!" Molly says, "You sound like icicles burning! You smell like lightning evaporating! It's weird. You're weird."

Molly pouts, apparently upset about having her failure as a vampire being pointed out.

"Mmm, well I never said I should smell normal, did I?"

Molly glares at Victoria, slurping from her cup of blood pointedly.

"Yes, yes, you're very intimidating with your mug of cow's blood. Microwaved, too, I think?" she said, glancing once at the mug.

"What do you even want?" Molly asks. "Or did you just come by to scare me and then be a butt about it?"

Victoria cocked an eyebrow. "I came in to eat. Not everything is about you, darling."

"Yeah, well..." Molly frowns, "I'm sorry. I'm super cranky right now. Because of, y'know, the whole vampire thing."

Victoria shrugged. "Being technically dead and reanimated by an ancient curse can't be very fun," she allowed.

"All of my classmates smell like bacon," Molly mumbles, "Sleeping, helpless, bacon."

"Learn to hate bacon, then," Victoria said. "You can give in, or you can hold on. Holding on is generally what leads to you not hating yourself."

"If it were that easy it wouldn't be a problem," Molly says, a bit of a edge to her voice.

"Well if it were easy, we wouldn't have all the stories we do about how dangerous and horrible vampires are, would we?" Victoria said. "You want to get pissy about something? How about we get pissy about the arsehole who decided that it was a great idea to turn you into a vampire."

"I'm sure he had his reasons," Molly says.

"A reason to kill you and reanimate you as a creature that constantly wants to eat her friends?"

"It's not impossible!" Molly says.

"The pitiful thing is that you actually believe that might be true."

"I don't care if it is pitiful, I like trusting people," Molly says.