Monster High - The School Grounds

[Atomica Servo]

"Are you ready Melody?" Atomica asked the siren.

"Vanissha?!" The invisible ghoul nodded.

"Lin?!" The tiny gremlin brandished his bagpipes, filling in for Marceline.

"Well all right ghouls! LET'S GOOOOOOO!" Atomica screamed into the mic as the music cranked up behind her.

"Well, it's been getting so hard
Livin' with the things you do to me
My dreams are getting so strange
I'd like to tell you everything I see
I see a man at the back as a matter of fact
His eyes are red as the sun
And a ghoul in the corner let no one ignore her
'Cause she thinks she's the passionate one-

OOOOOH, YEAAH!

"Oh, yeah, it was like lightning!" Atomica set off sparks above the dance floor.

" Everybody was frightening!
And the music was soothing!
and they all started grooooooooving!"

Atomica leaned into the other ghouls in the band, and they all chanted together.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!"

"And the man at the back said everyone attack
And it turned into a ballroom blitz!
And the ghoul in the corner said boo, I wanna warn ya
It'll turn into a ballroom blitz!"

The students on the dance floor cheered and chanted along!

"Ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!"  

[Rorrim Rory Bludworth]

"Oh, I'm reaching out for something
Touching nothing's all I ever do
Oh, I softly call you over
When you appear there's nothing left of you
Now the man in the back
Is ready to crack as he raises his hands to the sky
And the ghoul in the corner is everyone's mourner
She could kill you with a wink of her eye!"

As the song continued, Rory and Marceline seemed to be in a world all of their own on the dance floor. Rory wasn't even worried about anyone bumping into him or tripping over his own feet. Everything was flawless.

"I hope this has been a good night for you." He leaned into her ear as they danced closer together. "I know mother can seem sort of....intense sometimes."

"Oh yeah, it was electric!
So frantically hectic!
And the band started leaving!
Cause they all stopped breathing!
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!"

"But...she like you! She really does!" Rory insisted as the two of them spun around. "You know how I can tell?"

"And the man at the back said everyone attack!
And it turned into a ballroom blitz!
And the girl in the corner said boy, I wanna warn ya
It'll turn into a ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz! Blitz... Blitz... Blitz..."

"Because when we kissed, I saw her watching from the bathroom mirror, and she gave us the thumbs up!!!!"  

[Atomica Servo]

"Now, when I say 'It's, it's'....You all say 'A ballroom blitz,' got it?!" Atomica shouted out over the microphone as the music got low and thumping. She held up the microphone to her mouth.

"It's, it's-"

"A BALLROOM BLITZ!" All of the monsters at the dance shouted at once.

"It's, it's-"

"A BALLROOM BLITZ!"

"It's, it's-"

"A BALLROOM BLITZ!"

"IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITS-"

"THE BALLROOM BLITZ!!!!!!"

The ballroom exploded! (in cheers and applause, anyways) Atomica spun around and gave her bandmates a high five. They were a hit, just like she'd always dreamt they'd be when she was in recharge mode!

"Oooooooooooooh yeah!
It was like lightning!
Everybody was frightening!
And the music was soothing!
Cause they all started grooving!
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!!!!

And the man at the back said everyone attack
And it turned into a ballroom blitz!
And the girl in the corner said boy, I wanna warn ya
It'll turn into a ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!
Ballroom blitz!"  

[HH Bloodgood]

The dance went on for several more hours. The dance floor was constantly swamped with a horde of students, listening as other acts from the school took a turn up on stage. Operetta gave everyone a guitar performance with (prerecorded) vocals. Nero Du Sphinx busted some sick rhymes that he'd made up right on the spot for Tombcoming, and Catty Noir even capped the evening off with a haunting rendition of the song "Under the Bridges of Scaris" done a capella.

As the night finally wound to an end, the Headless Headmistress, exhausted, screwed her head back on tight and shuffled the last of the students out of the grimnasium. She looked at the floor, covered in streamers and glitter, and at the walls, plastered with pink and black balloons.

A smile crossed her usually stern face. This had truly been a night of Puttin' on the Glitz.  

[Draconia St George]

Thursday.

After School, in the Libury.

5:00 pm.

Draconia threw out her now-empty cup of smoothie from the creepateria and entered the liebury. Food and drink weren't allowed in there, and frankly, Draconia was terrified of the enormous, tentacled liburian so much so that she had no interest in breaking that rule.

Besides, the Libury was only the meeting place for the various students who offered Fear Tutoring to other students. Once she had met up with anyone who needed assistance with Fanglish, they could decide to go somewhere else to work on their studies.

Draconia looked around. Already, a few students were seated at the long tables, books open. It appeared that Cleo was offering some of her valuable time to give assistance in Clawculus to Slo Mo Mortevitch. Hexcellent!

Draconia had a seat at one of the tables and waited. She knew for certain at least two students were going to show up wanting her help.  

[Perry Hartley]

Perry had spent the week keeping an even lower profile than usual, mostly to avoid Vinnie. He'd also taken to glaring pointedly at his best friend every time the naga mentioned "maybe you should... go like.. smooth things over with her" and thankfully by wednesday Nathair had decided to keep his advice to himself and let the Peryton take the coward's way out.

Thursday came and with it, Photography club. It was something Perry looked forward to every week, a time to settle down and actually indulge one of his greatest passions in unlife.

He headed toward the photography lab, forgetting for the moment that the very ghoul he'd been so deftly avoiding all week would be there as well.
And then there she was, coming the opposite direction down the corridor. He froze, but there was nowhere to run.
He forced an anxious smile. "uh... heey Vinnie." and hoped all this time hadn't just made her more angry.  

[Hellene Harpie]

Hellene busied herself tiding up the darkroom that the last class of the day had left in such disarray. Half the water trays were still full and there was a canister of film filled with Kit-Were-Kats.

"Well this clearly needs to be confiscated," Hellene said to no one, tucking the candy into her bag.

Someone had left a tattered copy of Hexim shoved under a table. Hellene grabbed it with photo tongs and swing it into the trash. She did the same with a copy of Popular Murkanics, Cosmoan and an empty can of Red Ghoul.

Now for the fun part. Getting rid of the test prints students had been making throughout the day. She pulled the papers off their clips and out of the wire racks. She could always recognize Heath's pictures, they were chronically blown out from too much harsh lighting. If he didn't start wearing a hat he'd fail the class. Draculara took endless series of portraits reflected in mirrors. Hellene snickered at a picture of Chase and Nero arm wrestling at lunch, the two sweating and glaring at each other. Probably Glen's.

Once she had all the pictures assembled into a neat stack, she put it in the Save Me! basket. Students could claim them or not as they chose, and they'd be recycled on Friday.

Finally, all her regular duties done, she pulled out a few of her film rolls and started the developing process while waiting for the Photo Club to show up.  

[Vinnie Lovecraft]

Perry Hartley

Vinnie hadn't spoken to anyone, much less Perry, since the disaster that was Tombcoming; though she knew she wasn't going to avoid him at Photo Club...

She'd had a lot of time to herself, time to think. Time she'd spent wandering the streets of New Salem, filling six rolls of black-and-white film. Candids of monsters sitting in the park, the Coffin Bean, flipping through LPs in the Wreckord Store; wilted flowers and dead leaves in shallow depth-of-field; at some point she'd sat in at the Coffin Bean with a ceramic mug full of steaming hexpresso and milk, and left the camera on the tripod for a 20 minute long hexposure, capturing wisps of steam before she decided to drink it.

Anything to put her mind at ease before Thursday.

Perry was waiting for her outside the darkroom, shifting fangxiously as she approached. Vinnie took a deep breath, finding a moment of zen before addressing him.

"Hey, Perry." She said softly. "... listen, about the other night... I'm sorry I blew up at you."  

[Perry Hartley]

He stared at her for a moment, he hadn't been expecting that. Then he shook his head.

"no no, you were perfectly justified. I messed up. I just... I let myself believe we were just friends and I guess I just... deluded myself into ignoring anything that didn't fit that assumption."

He sighed.

"Look, i'm so sorry. As my friends have sooo enjoyed telling me all week, i'm a jerk and an idiot." He half smiled.

"You had every right to blow up at me, heck, you have every reason to want to punch me in the face but... i'd rather you didn't. It'd be kinda embarrassing explaining that a ghoul gave me a black eye."

He chuckled a little and extended a hand, looking hopeful.

"Are we cool?" He watched her warily. "Or are you gonna hit me?"  

[Vinnie Lovecraft]

"Relax, dude. I'm not gonna hit you." Vinnie rolled her pointed eyes. "And yes, I should be sorry. 'cuz I did the same thing you did... just backwards. I assumed we could be... more than friends... and I was so wrapped up in my little fantasy..."

She recoiled a bit. It was painful admitting she was wrong, and she wasn't quite over it yet. She sighed sharply and focused. She grasped Perry's hand in hers.

"Looking back on the weeks before Tombcoming, I realized the signs were there, and I should've seen them in the first place. You're not a jerk... an idiot maybe, but not a jerk."

As one final gesture of friendship before whisking off into the darkroom, Vinnie released Perry's hand and playfully mussed up his hair.  

[Perry Hartley]

He laughed. "Thanks... I think?" He batted at her as she mussed his hair and followed her into the darkroom, running a hand through his hair to restyle it. He was frankly relieved things seemed to be cool with Vinnie. He may not have romantic feelings for her, but he liked her.

"Hey Hellene" He waved to the Harpy ghoul. "How's it goin?"  

[Perry Hartley]

"So... what have you been taking shots of this week?"

Perry greeted the ghouls as they entered the room.

Iris seemed to have recovered from the humiliation of having to retract her article in the Gory Gazette, but the others knew well enough it was still a touchy subject for the ghoul.

Draculaura proudly showed off a series of blurry and poorly framed self portraits, including several which appeared to be of her own hand or foot.
It had to be difficult when you couldn't see yourself in the mirror Perry mused, and gave her an enthusiastic thumbs up.

Iris informed them she was working on a great expose and couldn't possibly show them her pictures yet. Perry suspected this actually meant she couldn't find anything good to photograph that week, but then, he never had thought much of the wannabe journalist. She insisted on being taken seriously, then wrote barely concealed gossip better suited to a tabloid. He found her "stories" tedious and mostly trivial, of "little more value than the drivel the ghostly gossip spat out", which he'd told her to her face once and made her cry. After that he'd decided to just switch off when she started talking and smile and nod blankly.

When it came his turn to share, he stood and began his explanation.

"They're finally tearing down the old cinema down on bank street."

he began.

"And well, I managed to sweet talk the guard into letting me have a quick shifty around, take some pictures before it's gone for good."

Urban exploration was something that fascinated him, getting into places and seeing things other people just didn't even think about.

"He was all, on your head be it kid, and really left me to it, which was clawsome."

He dug out his pictures, a series of high contrast black and whites and a few colour exposures detailing the interior of a building half ruined and very derelict.

"This time next year, they'll be some shiny new offices there or something. This will all be gone which kinda sucks."

He shrugged.

"but time marches on I suppose. "

Draculaura nodded.

"So yeah, that was my week." He shrugged again.  

[Melody Nocturna]

Melody carefully opened the door to the Libury, making sure not to make a noise so the other students wouldn't be interrupted with their studies.

She crept past the others are she made her way to Draconia, silently waiting for the others to begin the tutoring.

"Hello, Draconia,"Melody whispered as she placed her books by an open chair, "have the others said when they will be here?"  

[Draconia St George]

"Roswell's quite late." Draconia replied with a frown. He was supposed to be getting tutoring for Fanglish. She was also hexpecting Rory Bludworth to come in for some help on his next paper, since he struggled with what he called the 'backwards writing' outside of the Mirrorverse. "I have to admit, I'm surprised Roswell isn't with you. I thought if he was late, that for sure it was because the two of you were coming together. Is...everything all right between the two of you?"