Chapter 7: Bats and the bees.

Mama was avoiding me.

I sighed as I dropped my head onto my desk. Last night I had asked her about hunting lessons, and she was not on board with it. After stuttering for a full minute, she told me quite firmly that if I was hungry, I was to ask her for blood, and she would bring it home from work. After that she "went for a walk" and I hadn't been able to catch her since. It was starting to become a real issue for me too. I was starting to struggle with the thirst yesterday, and chocolate just wasn't cutting it today. It was causing me to feel spacey and tired. I couldn't focus very well. I was irritable and moody, too. So many little things were bothering me today. For example, a girl two seats down was wearing melon deodorant, but her it clashed with her natural scent of grapes. Normally I wouldn't have cared, but today I was hyper focused on it and I wanted to tell her to wash it off and put on something milder. What was wrong with unscented deodorant? The teachers had noticed my inattentiveness in class, and were being extra abrasive with me. Even Yamamoto's constant cheer was draining me of energy.

I still had to go to the boxing tryouts after school, too. I sighed again, louder this time. A large part of me wanted to just skip the tryouts and apologise later, but I had made a promise to Onii-san and I didn't want to break it. Kamiyama-san might have had something to do with it too.

"Che, what happened to you dame-tsuna? Only the second day of school and you already can't hack it?" I heard from behind me. Irritation shot through me at the grating voice of Asano-san. Looks like he wasn't going to cut me any slack today. I decided to just ignore him, class would be starting soon enough. "Oi, are you deaf as well as dumb now? I'm talking to you." He said while poking me with a pencil. Realizing he wasn't going to let it go I sluggishly sat up and turned my face towards him.

"What is it Asano-san?" I asked. He took one look at me and scrunched up his face.

"You look like shit. You sick or something? Go to the nurse's office and lie down instead of spreading it to the rest of the class." He said. I frowned, but otherwise didn't react.

"I'm not sick. Just, just tired." I said. I wanted to be done with this conversation.

"Yeah? Well if you stay in Nezu-sensei's class like this, he's going to tear you apart. I'd leave if I were you, but then again I might enjoy the show, so feel free to stay." He said and leaned back in his desk. I turned my head back towards the front and started down at my hands… Asano-san did have a point. Just the thought of dealing with Nezu-sensei made me want to cry. The nurse's office would probably smell awful, but I could probably catch a nap. I nodded my head once and started gathering up my stuff. I turned to Asano-san as I stood up.

"U-uhm… Thank you." I said, a little uncomfortably. Asano-san stared at me for a second and then shrugged his shoulders.

"Tch. Whatever." He said.

"Don't let Nezu-sensei catch you." Said Furukawa-san. I startled at his voice and looked over to see him standing by Yamamoto-san. I hadn't even noticed them, I must be worse off than I thought.

"Do you want me to walk you down there, Tsuna-san?" asked Yamamoto. I shook my head, I didn't want to make him late for class.

"No, no. I'll be okay. I better go… thanks guys." I said.

"Aha, feel better Tsuna-san." Said Yamamoto as I departed. I took Asano-san and Furukawa-san's advice to heart as I walked down the halls and did my best to keep my eyes and nose peeled for Nezu-sensei after the bell rang. I only had to duck and hide once to get away from him, then I was in the clear. When I finally reached my destination, I slid open the door with a polite 'excuse me' and walked into the room. I came face to face with Hibari-sempai holding two limp bodies by the wrists. He narrowed his eyes at me.

"Omnivore." He said. I gulped. I never should have let my guard down, tired or not.

"H-hello." I said. An eternity later he turned away from me and proceeded to deposit the two students (corpses?) onto a bed by pulling them off the ground behind his back and flipping them up over his head like freaking sacks of flour. Dear god. He walked over to a nearby stool and sat himself down, apparently he was staying. I cautiously moved further into the room towards an open bed. "U-uhm… is the nurse in?" I asked. He glared at me again. "O-oh… I guess not then? I'll just claim this bed then…" I said and sat down.

"Why?" he asked.

"Eh? Why?" I repeated.

"You can't get sick." he said. Oh…

"W-well not really, not in a traditional sense. I'm half – human, so some things make me feel ill, but I can't er… catch a cold or something like that… I'm just tried." I said.

"Pathetic." He spat at me. My spine stiffened. Oh. So he was one of those vampires. I turned away from him an glared down at the bed. He stood up and walked towards me. I watched him out of the side of my eye, not in the mood to deal with any racist bs. I expected him to make some derogatory comment about dirty blood, but "Are you a herbivore after all? If you're hungry; hunt." Was what he said. I turned around to face him again, eyes wide with both surprise and relief. What the heck? Also, WHAT THE HECK? That was so inappropriate!

"You! You can't just say… that!" I said, scooting back farther into the bed. "Even if I wanted to I couldn't. I promised Momma I wouldn't." I said, a calmer now. I didn't want to deal with this right now. I just wanted to sleep.

"She is… an omnivore too?" he said. I nodded my head.

"I guess? She's a pure blood, so maybe a … er…. carnivore?" I said. Hibari-sempai inclined his head.

"Then don't hunt." He said while gesturing to the two passed out students on the near by bed. I looked at him in horror and waved my hands out in front of me.

"No, no, no, no! I can't do that! They are passed out, I can't just take advantage of them!" I said. Besides, weren't they missing enough blood already?

"It's food." He said bluntly. I gapped at him. How could he just expect me to bite someone who didn't even consent…. What kind of vampire was he? Did he just feed on people willy nilly!? Wait… what kind of vampire was he?

"Hibari-sempai, this is a little i-inapropriate, but have you ever, um, have you ever fed on someone before?" I asked, I could feel the blush staining my ears red. I couldn't believe I had just asked that. Mama would cuff my ears if she were here! Yet, Hibari-sempai didn't react beyond narrowing his eyes. As the silence stretched on I began to wonder if the answer to my question was no. Maybe he didn't know that hunting and feeding wasn't just… eating.

"Uhm… Hibari-sempai. What do you know about feeding?" I asked slowly. He crossed his arms.

"Biting and blood." He said. His scent was annoyed but confident, and impatient. Suddenly I could see why he was so insistent about this, he just wanted to watch a me 'bite someone to death'.

"I see… I don't need to feed right now, Hibari-sempai. I just need to sleep for a bit…" I trailed off, hoping he would let it drop. It was too much to ask for, of course.

"I know you are hungry, lying herbivore. Explain." He said. I swallowed, was I really going to have to give Hibari-sempai 'the talk'? This definitely classified as too much information. I'd only known him for a day. I warred with myself for a bit but thinking back to the promise I made in exchange for keeping my life I nodded my head.

"Okay… u-uhm feeding isn't just biting and blood. It's uhm…. It's biting, blood, and…. physical contact?" I tried. He narrowed his eyes.

"You must hold down live prey a certain way?" he said. My shoulders drooped, he wasn't getting it. Why did this feel like corrupting a child?

"Not.. exactly. Okay, I'll just go ahead and say it. F-feeding involves biting, blood, and… and sex." I said, sounding as embarrassed as I felt. Hibari-sempai gave no outwards reaction as he digested this new information, he simply pasued, turned, and left the room. Blood flooded my face as I flopped back onto the bed and covered my eyes with my hands. Okay, now would be a really great time to suddenly die. Hibari-sempai said he not ignorant to his heritage, but his parents clearly hadn't taught him everything. In fact, I was starting to think he wasn't a vampire at all, and maybe not even a Dhampir! Who didn't know this kind of stuff by the time they were our age!? If the blood what diluted enough then Hibari-sempai was considered a human, and I had just really stuck my foot in it. Please god… don't let this come back to bite me.

I flopped down into the bed and pulled the blankets over my head. Now I had even more questions about Hibari-sempai, but I would never be able to look him in the eye and ask them! I was dreading Friday more and more.

OMAKE

I don't consider this part of the story, personally, but feel free to if you would like.

Biting to Death for Dummies

Kyoya furiously strode towards his father's study and slid the door out of the way. He pointed a tonfa at his startled father who was trying to brush away the hot tea he had just spilled in his lap.

"Wha- Kyoya? What are you doing?" he exclaimed.

"You lied to me when you taught me how to hunt. Why?" he said.

"What are you talking about?" said his father.

"You told me that vampires hunt down their prey and bite them to death."

"Err… well, I wouldn't go so far as to say to death but yessss….. whyyyy?" he replied.

"Hunting requires biting, blood, and sex." Stated Kyoya. His father choked.

"Excuse me!? How did you even? Who told you that!?" he exclaimed, truly alarmed. Kyoya lowered his tonfa and narrowed his eyes.

"It is true then?" he asked. His father's face looked ashen. "All these years, I've been doing it wrong." He muttered to himself. He must rectify his mistakes at once.

"Son… perhaps this is something your mother should explain to you." His father said. Kyoya didn't reply, and instead turned to leave the room. "Wait, where are you going?" his father called.

"To bite someone to death, properly." He replied. His father scrambled out of his chair.

"WAIT! No, Kyoya! KYOYA NOOOOO!" he yelled, but it was too late; his son was gone. "Dear god…. What have I done?" he whispered in horror.

Namimori never saw him coming…. In a manner of speaking.