Lesson One - A Monster School Fic

Chapter Two - Dining Hall

You bit into the piece of bread, then leaned back, looking up at the ceiling about eight blocks above you and trying to block out the noise of your fellow students as they ate. Somehow, despite there only being about 18 of you, your class made as much noise as the dozens of students in the dining hall of your old middle school.

Some of them already knew each other, you had realized the more you were around them. The wither skeleton and the blaze seemed to be old friends, the drowned and the husk seemed to be old enemies (with the zombie trying to play mediator), and Isabelle, the spider, was Silvia's older cousin. That was also how you found out that not all of you were the same age. The skeleton claimed to be thirty-four years old, whereas Cray, the creeper, was only five. Which, you reasoned, checked out considering his attitude.

The dining hall was stocked with a variety of food, including raw meat for the zombies and spiders, some strange mushrooms for the blaze, and apples, bread, and steak for you. Also, weirdly, Cray ate grass? He didn't seem to see anything wrong with it, and in fact was currently mocking the zombies for not eating grass. You had a feeling that you weren't going to get along well with him.

You also... weren't sure where the food came from. Other than Herobrine, you hadn't seen any staff, certainly not a cook or kitchen staff. So where did it come from? Maybe someone dropped it off while you all were in the dorms. Your dinner consisted of meat, potatoes, and a loaf of bread. Fairly standard, if a bit bland. While you ate, you took the opportunity to study your classmates a bit.

This was your first time seeing most of these mobs, so you weren't quite able to identify them all. For instance, one of your classmates was a shorter girl with one, huge eye, and orange spikes that jutted out of the back of her head. You had no clue what kind of creature she was, and you were kind of afraid to ask. She had scales, and... was eating fish. Some kind of sea monster? There was also a boy with dark blue skin and sort of... webbed wings, whom you were pretty sure was a phantom. Those occasionally flew around over the city after dark. You wondered who on the Overworld was staying up for three nights in a row.

The skeletons, predictably, did not eat. The three of them were grouped up at the end of the table, chatting quietly as their classmates ate. The wither skeleton, Soot, seemed to be sort of the ringleader between the three of them, which made sense considering she was about a foot and a half taller than them. She was a little awkward with her gangly limbs when she walked, which was... weirdly endearing, especially when the other two skeletons flanked her on either side to make sure she didn't fall.

The skeletons had each other, as did the zombies and the spiders, and the Nether mobs, and even the phantom and the fish thing seemed to get along well with their companions. Short of Cray, who was doing his best to be as abrasive as possible, they all had friends here. All, for the most part, comfortable with each other.

Not you. You sat at the furthest end of the long table, as far from the monsters as you could get, eating your food and trying not to interact. You were trying to just get done with the meal as soon as possible so you could go curl up in bed and block everything out. You were exhausted, miserable, and scared, you just weren't willing to be hungry too.

Something appeared in the corner of your vision, and you glanced up just in time to see an apple fly past your head.

"Oh plaaaayerrrr!" Cray cajoled, tossing a second apple up and down in his hand as you flinched back in shock. "C'mon down here and sit with us!" You shrank down a bit as the monsters focused on you again.

"Uh, so you can throw more stuff at me? No thanks."

"Your funeral!" Cray aimed, but the enderman teleported behind him and snatched the apple out of his hand.