# HNTBL 69: Have Fun

By: TheDragonBoy

## Content

How Not To Become Lunch: 69 - Have Fun

“The rules are simple. Guests will be divided into two teams: predators and prey. The latter will be given time to hide, and the former will then seek. The northern wing of the mansion has been prepared for this event; a vast plethora of spaces are available for hiding.” Mr. Belv motioned toward a set of doors at the far end of the room. “Rooms and passages marked with a red sign are off limits.” He pointed to the doors through which they had all entered. A large, solid red sign now hung from the handles. “I caution you not to violate this regulation.

“This, the northern drawing room, is a ‘safe zone’. Any hiders who return to this location after the game has begun are granted safe harbor for its remainder. Hiders who manage to remain undetected for the duration of the game will likewise be extended the courtesy of a safe return to this room. Seekers who succeed in locating prey are encouraged to enjoy themselves as they see fit, but are cautioned to keep noise to a minimum and not to spoil the event for other players.

“The game will begin momentarily, until then, feel free to continue as you were.” Mr. Belv stepped down from his stool and walked off. A murmur overtook the room; excited, nervous, terrified, bored, predators and humans alike began to converse and plan.

“D- …Did he just say we’re ‘playing’ hide and seek with predators?” Harry asked. He felt a drop of Fiona’s lingering drool run down his arm before he wiped it away, like an eerie portent of how this ‘game’ would likely end.

“Um, yeah…” Jack confirmed, sounding just as nervous.

“Come on, Jack,” Fiona chimed in encouragingly. “This could be fun.”

“Maybe for you,” Harry muttered without thinking at all. He tensed up the second he heard himself and quickly blabbered, “Oh, um, no offense!” before shutting up like a clam.

“Yeah, I know,” the werewolf admitted, the enjoyment was obviously stacked in the seeker’s favor. “But remember when we were kids?” she asked her old friend. “We used to love playing hide and seek! And we always wished we had a bigger house to play in.”

“Yeah,” Jack conceded- he did remember that being pretty fun; innocent times. “But back then you were the only predator in the house. Besides, now you’ll just sniff me out in two seconds.”

“Exactly, no one can track your scent like I can. I'll find you way before anyone else and walk you back to the safe zone. Besides, you’re off the menu here, remember? You don’t have to worry tonight, so shouldn’t you try to have some fun?”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Jack agreed somewhat reluctantly. It was hard to let down his guard, but Sarabeth had promised him protection in her home, and if Fiona thought it was safe too, maybe he could afford to relax just a bit. He could use a little fun, after all. He gave the smallest of smiles. Maybe if he used magic, he’d be able to come up with a hiding spot that actually gave his werewolf friend a challenge?

He turned to Harry and his tiny smile faltered. The other boy still looked considerably frightened. Oh, of course, none of that had been comforting to him, after all.

“Hey, um, you can hide with me, if you want,” Jack offered, then turned to Fiona. “You wouldn’t mind letting him tag along back to the safe zone, right?”

“Sure, no problem. I mean, as long as he doesn’t freak out if I find someone else on the way back.” She glanced at the new boy.

*gurgle* went her empty pred belly.

“I-” *gulp* “-I don’t think I’d want to put myself between your mouth and your… um, meal,” Harry said.

“Smart,” Fiona replied with an accepting nod. “Well, I think I’m gonna step away for a minute. I’ll make sure none of the other preds have any ‘bright ideas’, and give you two a chance to strategize before I hunt you down.” She smirked and gave a little mock clawing gesture with one hand.

Jack chuckled and smirked back. She used to talk just like that when they were kids. He could imagine her squeaky little pup voice saying just those words before a game of hide and seek back at her place.

Harry only gulped nervously a second time, as he began to question whether making friends with Jack had saved him, or doomed him.

…

It had started with a muffled rumble of fleeing feet, fading away like distant thunder into an eerie silence. The doors to the northern wing had opened, and every human ‘guest’ had immediately started running like their life depended on it. They scattered into the dimly lit dwelling, dispersing into branching passageways, splitting off into rooms and scrambling up and down stairs, all in search of the best spot.

For most hiders, they had one of two goals in mind: pick a spot so hidden and out of the way that no predator would find them before the time was up, or pick a spot close enough that they could hopefully sneak out past the preds and make it back to the safe zone.

Jack’s goal was a bit different. He wanted to find a spot where Fiona could find him fairly quickly- after all, he didn’t really want to give any other predators the chance- but he also didn’t want to make it too easy for her. He remembered how once she’d really gotten the use of her nose down, she’d become unstoppable as a seeker. He wanted to come up with some way to take her down a peg.

Harry followed close behind, having decided he liked his chances with his new friend better than going it alone. And as far as preds went, he’d take a friendly-seeming werewolf that promised not to eat you and then licked your hand to sample your flavor, over a lethargic panda who would shove you down her gullet without a second thought. Still, the thought of hiding out in that creepy crypt of a mansion while a pack of predators slowly, methodically hunted him down wasn’t doing his nerves any favors.

“Um… are you sure we’ll be safe?” he whispered.

“I think so, Fi is a pretty good tracker. She can follow my scent anywhere.”

“And, um, my smell won’t, like, get in the way of yours?”

Jack scoffed. “No way,” he replied. If there was one thing his experience in school had taught him, it was that no other human had a scent that could compete with his mark- for better or for worse (usually worse).

“And… you’re sure she won’t change her mind about not eating me?”

“Nah, she’s not like that.” Sure, she’d made some… mistakes, in the not-too-distant past. But this time she’d explicitly given him her word that she wouldn’t eat his new friend. He could see in her eyes that she’d meant it. She wanted to be trusted again, and he wanted to trust her.

“And she won’t like… forget? Like if she sees me first and she’s hungry, she won’t just nom me accidentally, right?”

“Come on, dude, she’s not just a walking stomach.”

“Sorry, sorry, I’m just… nervous.”

“It’s okay, me too,” Jack replied. To be fair, he sounded a lot calmer by comparison, and while some of that was definitely because he knew Fiona, the rest was just because he was much more used to feeling like this.

“So… um, do we have a plan? What kind of spot are we looking for?”

Jack returned his thoughts to that topic, glancing past another set of doors as they crept quickly down the hall. He did need to decide on a plan. Words from the recent conversation swirled in his mind, and suddenly a metaphorical light went on- several times brighter than the dim candles lining the walls. He smirked; a playful, almost uncharacteristically mischievous expression. Sure, he couldn’t ‘win’ against Fiona, not in this game, but he could do something.

“I’ve got an idea,” the marked boy said.

They paused for a moment in the silent hall as Jack detailed his plot. Harry started out curious, then got worried, then properly scared, but after several assurances from his new friend, he reluctantly agreed. They spent another minute making their preparations and picking their final hiding spots, and then finally the hall became truly silent as their footsteps ceased.

It’s okay… it’s okay… Harry told himself, breathing deeply. Jack’s plan makes a lot of sense, you’ll be fine. Standing, shaking, in a small broom closet, he stared at the closed door in the nearly non-existent light, clenching his fists in apprehension. Despite his efforts, he couldn’t help but feel fear at the fact he was currently waiting patiently for a flat-bellied werewolf to find him, and had actively taken steps to make it easy for her. And that was only his runner-up fear. What really terrified him was the thought that somehow the panda girl would find him first.

He did his best to listen. He listened hard. But the vampire mansion, with its weird sound-absorbing walls, was so quiet. All he could hear for certain were his own breaths, and his heart steadily pounding in his ears. Sometimes, at the edge of a thumping beat, or during the fading trail of a shaky sigh, he thought he could maybe hear something else: like the thud of a foot- or a paw- against the ground, or the brush of fur against a door handle. But he couldn’t tell what was real and what was just in his head. Especially with his head as full as it was.

With nothing but suspenseful silence to occupy him, his fearful imagination ran wild. He pictured that panda girl, slowly making her way down the hall, each lazy thump of her paws concealed in time with his pounding chest, her black nose twitching at the end of a long, white-furred muzzle, following a familiar scent in search of the prey that got away. He tried to tell himself that wasn’t happening, but he couldn’t disprove it. For all he knew, that was happening. He couldn’t see or hear anything to the contrary. What if, when that door finally opened, she was standing right there, ready to return him back to the churning, squelching depths of her belly. She’d already devoured him once, and he was sure he tasted good, good enough that that werewolf had wanted a taste too. She would definitely want him back; want to finish the meal she’d started. Could he hear her? Was that the sound of a black-furred footstep? Of a distant, groggy yawn? Of a hand on the handle to his door?

Wait. That- that was a hand on his door! He saw the glinting handle shift! It turned! It flew open! Harry gasped and clenched and braced for consumption.

…

Fiona padded down the silent hall, her movements careful and measured, her senses primed, the carriage of a predator on the hunt. But every few steps, her tail waved gently back and then forth, and there was an intensity that was absent from her eyes, not to mention the pleasant smile across her muzzle. It was an odd, enjoyable state, somewhere between hungry huntress and playful puppy.

Memories from her childhood drifted back to her. She recalled how sometimes, on occasion, she’d get all ‘serious’ about her seeking. Every now and then she would practice stepping real quiet, carefully checking around each corner as she followed his scent, creeping up slow and poking him with one claw when he hadn’t even noticed she was there, giving him a good spook and brimming with satisfaction as she burst out into giggles.

She’d never considered that as ‘hunting’ back then, back before she could pull entire humans into her jaws and let them melt away in her belly. Hide and seek with Jack, and stalking birds on the lawn had been two entirely separate concepts in her young mind. She hadn’t needed to deliberately distinguish her friend from food back then, it had just been natural, she couldn’t have eaten him any more than she’d wanted to. Things were different now… but she was happy that they could still play like this, even knowing what they knew now about how the world worked, even after what had happened between them.

She tapped lightly into those predatory instincts of hers, like she used to when she’d been a pup, letting the thrill of the hunt mix with the fun of the game. A man-eating werewolf, searching innocently for her human friend.

She sniffed the air again and glanced toward a door. The faint scents of bed linen and anxiety wafted out. There was a human inside for sure, but not her human. Her nose told her true that the path to her target lay further down the hall. Logically, the reason she continued on was because she needed to find Jack as quickly as possible to ensure his safety, and a pitstop would only slow her down. But as far as her instincts were concerned, she was just keeping her sights set on the more desirable prey.

Regardless, she tracked the scent trail onward, passed more doors and round a bend or two, until the familiar marked aroma began to grow heavier in her nostrils. She could pick up Harry’s trail too, but it was Jack’s that dominated her senses, and knowing that the two of them would be together, that was really all she needed to follow.

Fiona slowed her pace, knowing she was near. She sniffed deep and took another step, and then another, nose twitching. Her eyes came to rest upon a small, single door. The familiar scent grew stronger the closer she got, and it lingered and pooled in the air, that enticing, mouthwatering aroma that teased at her belly and yet brought to mind pleasant thoughts of her best friend happily beside her. She could hear his breathing faintly reaching her ears through the wood. She’d found him alright.

Silently, she crept up to the door. She wouldn’t be able to poke him before he noticed her, but she could at least do the next best thing. She positioned herself and slowly reached out, smirking deviously. She wrapped her clawed hand around the handle, and then with a yank and a twist she flung the door open wildly.

*Eeep*!

…That wasn’t a familiar Jack sound. She looked at the source of the stifled yip and her eyes met a different human boy. It was Harry, Jack’s new friend. She glanced around inside, but the little closet was too small to fit more than one person. She looked back at him, confused for a moment.

“Huh…?”

But… but I know I smelled Jack in here, I- wait, is that? Her eyes drooped lower, from the boy’s face to his chest, where she spotted something much more familiar. That’s Jack’s shirt, she realized in her confusion. But it was Harry wearing it, saturated thickly with her friend’s signature scent. For a moment, in the werewolf’s mind, it almost seemed like that aroma belonged to him.

…Would he taste like Jack if I ate him with that on? came the stray thought across her mind.

*gurgle* went her empty belly.

Her eyes flicked up and met with Harry’s, and then-

“Boo!”

*YIP*!

Fiona literally jumped as she felt a pair of hands on her tail. She whirled around in a flurry of shock and embarrassment and budding rage, only to be met with Jack’s smiling face and his lighthearted laugh.

The werewolf’s momentary anger melted, and she pointed her snout to the floor and half-covered it with one hand as if trying to hide herself and her embarrassment. She hadn’t made a sound like that since she’d been Sissy’s age.

“Ha! Got ya! I finally got ya!” Jack chuckled playfully.

“I, uh, h-how?” She started piecing things together. She’d been so certain she’d found Jack after noticing such a strong scent, that she hadn’t even bothered to consider the trail leading further on. Of course, she would have noticed it before long, but her hubris had given him an opening. “How did you get behind me?” she asked. Even momentarily distracted, how could she not have noticed someone walking up behind her!?

Jack waved his wand smugly in the air. “Invisibility spell and a silencing spell,” he declared proudly. “…Though, honestly, I’m not sure if the silence part worked, or if it was just the freaky vampire architecture.”

He… he’d ambushed her. Jack, the marked human boy, had ambushed Fiona, the advanced-class werewolf. She’d been outhunted!

“Pf- Pffff Ha! Nice going, Jack,” she said, starting to laugh herself. “I’ll admit, I did not see that coming. You know, for a human, you’re not a bad hunter yourself.”

“Heh, well, I guess I learned from the best,” he replied modestly, glancing away.

Fiona’s tail fluttered.

“Well,” Harry chimed in, still faintly panting from fear. “I’m glad that’s over. You know, for a second there, I really thought you might eat me, Fiona.”

“Told you,” Jack replied before the werewolf had a chance. “Even if she somehow ‘forgot’ you” -he made big air quotes and a silly voice to show how ridiculous he thought the idea was- “there’s no way she’d nom you if she thought you were me.”

“You, uh, might want to switch shirts back, though,” Fiona advised. “Probably not a good idea for Harry to go walking around smelling like a marked prey.”

“Wait, you’re MARKED!?” Harry exclaimed.

“Oh, uh, did I not mention that?” Jack asked guiltily.

“And this shirt smells like him!?” Harry asked Fiona.

The werewolf nodded candidly.

“Uh-uh, no no no!” Harry began wildly pulling at the sleeves, yanking the top off his chest in a haphazard rush. “Trade back! Trade back!”

“Sheesh, okay, okay,” Jack replied. He slipped off his new friend’s tee in a much calmer manner, managing somehow to get his off first.

Fiona watched the two boys with amusement, quietly chuckling to herself, until… something… strange happened. She noticed her eyes drawn to Jack’s chest… lingering there. Had she… had she not seen him with his shirt off before? Why… why did she feel the urge to look at it? Why was it so captivating? Why was her tail wagging like that?

“Fiona?”

“Huh?” The werewolf’s attention leapt over to Harry, gripped by that awkward feeling of realizing you’d somehow completely missed something someone had just said.

“Does this shirt smell like him too, now?” the boy repeated worriedly. She took a whiff.

“Just a little,” she reported. “I don’t think most preds’ll notice.”

“Phew! That’s a relief. Now, um, if you two don’t mind, I’d feel a bit safer back at the safe zone,” Harry declared, though his voice lacked so much confidence in addressing the werewolf who just scared the life out of him that it sounded more like a meek suggestion.

“Yeah, good call,” Jack agreed. “…Um… did anyone pay attention to how we got here?”

“I’ve got you covered,” Fiona replied with a roll of her eyes, her composure suddenly restored now that Jack was fully clothed again. She decided to forget that strange moment and sniffed the air again, tracing her own scent back and starting to walk.

The two humans followed, developing a bit of an awkward silence as Jack guiltily averted his gaze and Harry nervously wrung his hands. The strangely shaped halls only seemed to make the silence heavier. Eventually one of them had to break it.

“Hey… I’m sorry I didn’t mention I was marked when we met… I know that makes it… dangerous… to be around me.” He glanced at Fiona for a moment, worried how she might take that; he knew she still blamed herself for his mark. The werewolf gave no outward reaction. “I understand if you feel like you should, you know, try to find some other friends to help you through the night.”

Harry considered his position carefully, like he might if he were standing on the edge of a cliff. He too glanced at Fiona for a moment, for very different reasons. If he did say he wanted to find a less dangerous companion, where would that leave his standing with her? The empty-bellied predator? She was only letting him off because he was Jack’s friend, right?

His friend…

“Wait… so, you’re marked” -he turned from Jack to Fiona- “and you’re actually not going to eat him?”

The werewolf scowled slightly. She was sick of hearing that question. Why was it so hard to imagine, so hard to grasp, not only for other predators but apparently even for a human, that she might not want to end her best friend’s life for a day’s worth of calories!? She looked back to answer, but checked her temper, if only for Jack’s sake.

“No, I’m not,” she grumbled firmly. She looked away from him, but saw his gaze staying on her. She waited for more questions, the inevitable disbelief, the skepticism, the judgment. She braced herself for it in the short silence that followed. Then Harry said something she wasn’t expecting.

“…That must be hard…” he said in a quiet, almost sympathetic voice.

Fiona took another few steps, letting the boy’s words settle in her mind. Jack wanted to say something, but couldn’t find his voice. The way Harry had said those words, just… quietly appreciating the simple fact. …It was hard, sometimes. She glanced back at him again, and with significantly less gravel in her voice, she said:

“It’s worth it.” And she almost started smiling again as she looked forward once more.

She really cares about him, the new boy thought to himself, as if fully realizing the fact for the first time. And him- He really trusts her!

He looked at Jack, the marked boy’s conscience clearly weighing heavier on him than his nerves. He was a marked human walking three feet away from a predator’s empty belly! Harry couldn’t even imagine himself being that brave. If he ever got marked, he would just- just die. Or at best hide away like a shut-in for the rest of his inevitably shortened life. He thought back over the last few minutes, how remarkably calm Jack had been talking to Fiona- even talking to Sarabeth- despite his circumstance. And this guy had been inside a stomach four times! Harry had never particularly considered himself a coward, but compared to Jack…

“…I… I really am sorry,” Jack began to say, reading the silence as Harry awkwardly trying to be polite. “I wanted to try to help you, but… I… I probably just made you more likely to get eaten with that shirt thing. You’re probably better off just… keeping your distance for the rest of the night…” The boy’s sad, shame-ridden eyes stared off into a distant nowhere, gazing back into a not-too-distant past where his mistakes stood staring back at him.

Fiona turned to look back, concerned, but Harry spoke up.

“Hey, no- Um, it’s okay. Really. It just surprised me, that’s all. I overreacted. Besides, you heard her, it’s only a little bit.” He paused to collect himself a bit more. “I really appreciate you inviting me along, I don’t know what I would have done without that. Thank you.”

“…You’re welcome,” Jack replied, accepting the gratitude almost reluctantly. “But… you sure you want to stick around? I mean…” He trailed off, the stakes seeming obvious at this point.

“Listen, if I’m being honest… there is some safety having you around. I mean, if a pred comes after the two of us together, and they only have room for one of us…” That wasn’t coming out right.

And Fiona didn’t particularly like the way it was coming out; like Jack was a single-use human shield. She let out a little warning growl, just above inaudible in the sound-treated hallway.

“N-not to say that’s going to happen,” Harry course-corrected. “Obviously not if you’re here. W-what I’m actually trying to say is, uh…” He worked up the courage to address Fiona directly and candidly for exactly one sentence, but only with a slight squeak in his voice while avoiding eye contact. “I think it’s kinda cool how you’re looking out for your friend.” He took another breath as he shifted to Jack. “And you, being here, with her, even with your mark… And if you guys wanted to let me hang around for the rest of the night, I would really, really appreciate it.”

He couldn’t quite explain it- clearly, given the mess of words he’d just produced- but even despite the proximity to a man-eating werewolf and the human equivalent of a ‘Dinner!’ sign, something about these two helped him feel just a little less terrified. He’d made his decision.

Fiona stopped walking. Both boys halted behind her, caught off guard. Harry watched nervously as she turned around to face them.

“Sounds fine to me,” she said with a casual shrug and a welcoming little smile. She looked to Jack for the final word.

“…Well, if you’re really sure,” he offered with a growing smile of his own.

Harry nodded, smiling back in turn, and the three of them shared a warm moment.

“Well, that settles that,” the werewolf concluded. “Now, could you two excuse me for a minute?”

“Huh? …What do you mean?” Jack asked. Leaving him alone in a place like this didn’t seem like the kind of thing she would do.

“Just wait here a sec, I’m not going far,” she instructed.

“Uh, okay,” he replied trustingly.

She smiled back at both of them and then began to turn away, and just as she did, Jack caught sight of a familiar shift in her expression. She started walking on down the hallway, seeming just as casual as a moment ago, but something was subtly different about her, very subtly.

“Where is she-?”

“Shhh,” Jack hushed his new confused companion. He watched for a few moments more, until Fiona reached her destination and turned once again, this time to face a closed door. It was a moderate distance away from where she had stopped them, likely far enough for their normal speaking voices to be just out of earshot, tactically speaking.

Fiona reached out and gently gripped the knob, paused for a moment, then gave it a slow twist and a light shove, revealing beyond a dark room with its candles snuffed out. Jack could see her chest swell as she took a long, deep breath, letting the fresh scents fill her snout.

A still moment permeated the hall. And then in a blink, Fiona was gone.

The werewolf leapt into the room at top speed. Seconds later, several dull thuds could be heard by the human observers, along with a brief glimmering light from what seemed like spellcasting, and then finally a heavily muffled scream before everything once again became quiet and still.

…Jack took a step forward.

Something small sailed out of the opened door and clattered silently to the floor. A wooden wand. A second or two later, Fiona’s tail came into view, followed quickly by the rest of her, and then the rest of someone else. She had one arm hooked around some boy’s chest, with her other hand covering his mouth, literally dragging him out of the room as his legs flailed in their wake.

Jack quickly started toward them, as he watched Fiona wrangle her fairly muscular catch into the open, struggling mildly but keeping her prey subdued. Something in the marked boy’s mind thought this was strange, after having seen her hunt so many times now. Why hadn’t she just shoved the poor guy straight into her gullet the moment she’d grabbed him? Jack got close enough to hear her grumble faintly:

“Come on, calm down, it’s not like I’m gonna eat you- this time, anyway.”

She heaved her catch up onto his feet, bringing his head up to her level. In a move very reminiscent of something Sarabeth might do, she pulled her prey close against her chest, turned his head to one side, exposing his neck, and then brought her parting muzzle in close. But instead of digging fangs into his skin, the only part of her mouth that touched him was her tongue.

*sllllllluuuurp*

The dripping, pink mass of squishy taste buds flicked out from between her jaws and painted a long, thick line of drool, from the boy’s collar, up his neck, over his ear and even over his hair.

*smack* *smack*

Fiona rolled the flavor around on her palette thoughtfully, like a human connoisseur. She paused and cocked her head in consideration, then swallowed the sample down with a fairly tiny:

*grk*

A moment later, she unceremoniously dropped the boy she’d just caught, specifically turning him loose away from his wand just in case he had any ideas. The kid stumbled but caught himself, eyes fixed on the werewolf, gawking at her in a wild mixture of fear and utter surprise.

“W-wait, that’s it? You’re not going to have me for dinner?” The boy asked pressingly. Not that he had any slightest objection to that, it was just so far beyond what he’d expected that he had to confirm.

“Well, maybe,” Fiona answered honestly. “You’ve got kind of a strange flavor, but not bad. You would be pretty filling.” She eyed his muscular physique. “We’ll see how the rest of the taste test goes.” She turned slightly- still keeping her eyes on him- and reached down to pick up his wand. She walked it over to Jack, who had stopped a short distance away, and handed it to him. “Mind holding this for me?”

“Uh, sure,” Jack replied, almost as confused by all of this as the boy she’d just decided not to eat.

The werewolf turned to her catch-and-release and told him, “You can walk with us back to the safe room if you want. Jack’ll give you your wand back once we get there.”

All three humans stood with their jaws dropped for a moment, wearing expressions of shock and confusion. But the predator’s mouth was closed and her expression calm and casual, her tail swinging idle and happy.

“Well, come on, boys,” she said, then turned and continued down the hall as if nothing strange had happened.

Jack was about to call out asking for an explanation, but he felt this new kid’s eyes on him and he couldn’t just ignore him. Reluctantly, he turned to make contact.

“You Jack?” the kid asked, disoriented like he’d just gotten off an amusement park ride. He received a nod in reply. “Brutus,” he introduced. “Um, what just happened?”

The third, spectacled boy caught up and continued walking past. He shot Jack a look of ‘shouldn’t we be following the killer werewolf?’ Jack nodded to that as well and began walking.

“Hey, wait. What’s going on?” Brutus asked, following.

“Um, I think you’re on her dinner menu,” Jack replied without looking directly at him. This was so… awkward! He’d never had to talk to any of Fiona’s meals before. She always just, you know, ate them. What was he supposed to say? ‘Hi, I’m friends with the pred that wants to turn you into stomach sludge’? That sounded like a great way to make enemies. He didn’t even want to try to be comforting and nice; after all Fiona went out of her way not to eat his friends, so it only seemed fair that he try not to befriend her food, right? But he couldn’t just say nothing, could he!?

“B-But there’s three of us,” Brutus pointed out, lowering his voice, and noticing both the other humans were armed. “We can take her, just give me my wand.” Jack quickly took three steps to the side and held the wand he’d been given away from its owner, which only confused said owner even more.

“Sorry…” Jack muttered uncomfortably. He felt odd. This was the closest he’d ever really gotten to helping Fiona hunt. Is this how she felt around other humans? Generally trying to be polite, but never really getting close with them, because they were always a potential meal? Jack wasn’t sure he quite liked the feeling. He glanced down the hall and, looking past a staircase coming down from the second floor, he could see the familiar double doors of the drawing room getting closer. “I’ll give it back when we get there,” he said, then picked up his pace to catch up to his friends.

He really wanted to ask Fiona what the heck she was up to, but he felt kind of bad for this Brutus guy, and he was pretty sure any explanation the kid overheard wouldn’t make him feel any better. This was already a terrifying place for a human to be in: a dark creepy mansion filled with uneven walls, eerie stairways and hungry preds, he didn’t want to make it worse for the guy by having Fiona detail exactly how she planned on potentially ending him.

While Jack was busy wrestling with his moral dilemma, Harry did his best to disrupt this latest awkward silence.

“So, um… anybody else happy they survived hide and seek?” he asked.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeek-!!”

The screech echoed through the halls, tearing apart the ever-present silence, completely overwhelming the soundproofing, until it came to a sudden, choking end. Everyone froze, even Fiona. Jack felt a chill. Harry shivered.

All eyes were locked on the staircase they had just passed, the blood curdling cry having practically grabbed their heads and turned them. They stared, mute and stiff for a long moment. Jack could see Fiona’s ears twitching, so he tried listening a bit harder, and he just barely managed to catch a faint, and unpleasantly familiar sound.

*gulp* *gulp* *slurp*

Just as they began to recover from the shock, a shadow appeared at the edge of the second-floor landing, dancing in the candlelight. It crept down the staircase, spreading a dark outline as a lone figure approached. Heavy, muffled steps became audible as a pair of furred ears peeked into view, then a set of piercing feline eyes, and finally a complete face.

All eyes settled on the neko as she appeared, her expression nearly unreadable with the exception of a little, pleasant smile, her tail twitching idly in enjoyment, one hand resting possessively on a large, vehemently wriggling gut. She descended one step at a time, effortlessly, perfectly balanced despite the struggles of her newly devoured dinner.

Harry gripped his wand compulsively. Brutus, wandless, took several steps back.

Fiona and Jack, much to the contrary, both relaxed. Her ears and tail returned to their usual, comfortably limp conditions, as did his fingers, previously balled into tightened fists of fear.

The cat girl scanned over the group, back and forth, resting for a moment on the human-werewolf-duo.

“Well done, Fiona,” Chelsie congratulated in a rather flat voice, eyes flicking over her friend’s edible entourage. “Nice seeing you, Jack,” she added as she reached the bottom of the stairs. She continued ahead of them, muffled screams leaking from her wobbling gut, walked a few paces up to the doors at the end of the hall, and pushed them open. “Coming?” she asked.

“Wow, Chelsie, you really know how to make an entrance,” Fiona complimented as she started walking again, chuckling lightly to herself as the last of her nerves unwound.

“I’ll say…” Jack agreed. He’d calmed down quite a bit once he’d recognized her, but the scare still had him on edge. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m here for my friend’s birthday,” the neko replied, as matter-of-fact as ever.

“You’re friends with Sarabeth?” Jack asked.

“Welcome back,” interjected a familiar, refined voice as the neko entered the drawing room. Speak of the devil. “I see you made a nice catch,” Sarabeth complimented.

“Very nice,” Chelsie agreed, patting her gut idly. “Sorry for the noise. I know you asked us to keep it down, but a good scare really adds to the meal.” The calm composed manner of her explanation was a stark contrast to the passionate, frantic struggles of the meal she was describing.

“Quite pardonable,” the vampire responded. “What sense is there in a celebration if one can’t indulge in some pleasure, after all.”

Listening to the two of them talk in their similarly subdued tones, and watching their cool, collected expressions, the fact that they were friends suddenly didn’t seem very strange at all.

“And you?” Sarabeth turned to the next guest emerging through the door: Fiona. “Returning as well? How did you fare?”

“I think we had fun,” the werewolf replied with a smile. “Right?” She turned to Jack as he and the other two humans entered the room.

“Uh… yeah.” He thought over the last few minutes, playing hide and seek again with his best friend, just like old times, and now with his new friend too. Sure, there had been a few moments where things had gotten a little tense, but in his life that was just par for the course. “Yeah, that was pretty fun.”

Fiona grinned at him, glad to hear him say it.

“I see you found three hiders,” Sarabeth observed. “And they are all still unclaimed as meals.” She buried her rising frustration as she added that last bit while glancing at Jack. She’d really been hoping some other predator would have taken the opportunity to ‘claim’ him. In fact she’d been hopeful for Chelsie in particular, being the phenomenal huntress she was. But perhaps that thinking had been a bit too wishful, she was a friend of Fiona’s after all, however recent that arrangement was.

“Why rush my dinner?” Fiona replied. “Don’t want to be full for all the games, do I? No offense, Chelsie.”

“None taken,” the neko replied. It was hard to imagine her taking offense to anything- visibly, anyway. “Catching three this fast is pretty impressive. Even if one of them is Jack.” She glanced over to the boy. “No offense,” she offered him.

“None taken,” Jack accepted. He much rather enjoyed his position as an ‘easy catch’ for Fiona considering how her ‘usual catches’ generally ended up.

“Oh, well, I really only caught one of them,” Fiona admitted. “The other one is a new friend of Jack’s.”

“Really?” She took a few steps closer to Harry, seeming somehow to be able to tell which of the two other humans was the ‘new friend’, and which was just potential gut stuffing.

The bespectacled boy clenched up heavily as the neko approached with her giant distended gut, vibrating with the struggles of a freshly swallowed human. He tried to read her intent, but her expression was almost impenetrable. For a moment, he thought maybe she looked a bit curious, but a blink later he thought he might have been imagining it. She leaned over just a bit to examine him, lightly squishing her belly which gave out a round of muffled protests.

*squ-elch*! *glorp*!

“U-U-Uh, h-hi, I’m H-Harry” the boy offered. He wasn’t sure why he’d said anything at all, but his mouth tended to move when he was scared.

“Chelsie,” the piercing-eyed neko replied.

The human found his attention bouncing up and down, torn between the predator’s face, with her unreadable expression and toothy muzzle, and her belly, filled to the brim with fresh, struggling, screaming someone. He could picture the poor kid trapped inside, even more vividly than the outline pressed into her furry gut, wrapped up tight behind layers of muscle and fat, soaking in ever-rising levels of gastric juices primed to melt the flesh from their bones.

Harry’s mouth began to move again. “Um… a-all humans are supposed to be safe if they make it into this room, right?”

The neko nodded.

“A-And… well… um… that human is technically in the room now, so, u-uh, maybe you should let them out?” The boy didn’t really have much of a clue what he was saying, only that his heart was racing faster than a diving falcon. Luckily for him, this feline- as previously established- wasn’t the kind to take offense, even at the suggestion that she should give up her well-caught dinner. Her response was simple and blunt.

“This isn’t a human anymore,” she informed the boy. “This is cat food.” With that, she seemed to finish her inspection of him. She stood up straight and turned to Fiona and Sarabeth. “I think I’m going to find a nice couch to digest on. Maybe take a cat nap. See you for the next game.” And off she walked.

“Think we’ll find somewhere to chill out too,” Fiona said. “Unless you two feel like following me out for another hunt,” she asked half-rhetorically.

“No,” Harry squeaked.

“Yeah, I think he’s had enough, sorry,” Jack agreed.

“No worries, I’ve got plenty of time to taste test everyone,” she replied.

“Okay, what is the story with this ‘taste test’ thi-”

“Uh, don’t mean to interrupt, but, think I could have my wand back?” Brutus finally interjected.

“Oh, um, sure,” Jack replied. He glanced to Fiona who nodded in agreement before he walked over and relinquished the wooden tool. The other boy took it eagerly and turned to leave almost immediately. “Uh, good luck?” Jack offered uncertainly- he wasn’t exactly rooting against Fiona, after all.

“You too,” the buff boy responded before quickly jogging away to safety.

Originally Published: 15-Jul-2023