Xaviers!

In the middle of the night, a moving van passed through Xaviers' gates, complete with full authorization, and pulled up towards the entrance to the medical facility.

A man in a labcoat stepped out of the passenger side of the van, carrying a clipboard and a checklist. Two large men in the back opened the door to reveal a clear glass coffin-like enclosure, hooked up to a variety of expensive and fancy looking technical equipment.

"Watch it! Careful with that thing!" Altamira Vazquez groused, directing traffic as she hopped out of the back of the van.

((open))

Orange eyes flashed in the dark as Diego paused his nocturnal animal insomnia jog to watch the curious delivery.

The glass coffin-like thing? Yeah, there was a girl's body in it! A pale, emaciated girl's body! Creepy -- some kind of weird experiment for the Science Bros? Why else would it be delivered in the middle of the night?

Looking more closely at the girl who was less likely to be a vampire, Diego couldn't help but be reminded of a popular local girl he had a long-standing crush on. Angela, ever out of his league, barely seemed to notice him. For half a second he even thought it was her; gorgeous curly hair, the face of an angel, and a body a lot of girls would kill for.

Why yes, Diego is a teenage boy. What's your point?

The hair definitely was curly, and as she turned her head to give orders, it billowed out around her head, almost in slow-motion. The body could still entice murder, and it was squeezed into a low-cut top and tight capri pants -- the dream of any teenage boy. It certainly wasn't Angela, though, that much was for sure -- the fiery red hair didn't quite line up, and the face, while there were certain similarities, was unique.

As the girl turned and surveyed the campus, she caught Diego out of the corner of her eye, and gave a quick half smile and apologetic shrug.

He moved closer and gave a friendly smile. "Sneaking in under cover of darkness eh?" he asked, covering up his insecurities with frivolity as was his way.

"Don't want to be drawing too much attention, do we?" she smiled at him, looking out over the top of her thin, wireframe glasses.

"No, just spent far too much time in customs. Such a headache, and a holdup."

"Ugh, yeah. They looked at me like some kind of fuzzy terrorist," he commiserated.

"Hrm," she said, sneaking a peek behind Diego. "Well, the tail probably threw them off a bit," she said, playfully giving it a bit of a tug.

"Cats hate that you know," he answered amusedly. "You're lucky I don't bite."

"Lucky? Hrm. I suppose you could look at it that way," she teased.

"What brings you out in the middle of the night?"

"Do you have any idea how hard it is to sleep at night when you're half nocturnal predator?"

"No, how hard is it to sleep at night when you're half nocturnal predator?" she teased.

"It's like my body just... wants to prowl or something," he answered. He was clearly not prepared to back up the statement in any witty fashion.

"Hmm-hmm!" she smiled. "Lots of nervous energy, I take it? Is that why you're fidgeting?" she teased.

Nope. Fidgeting because you're so, so out of my league.

He forced himself to quit fidgeting... mostly. "Either that or I accidentally ate a grasshopper."

"How do you "accidentally" eat a grasshopper?" she laughed, looking back over her shoulder to make sure everything was being moved properly -- looking at the people In Her League, as it were.

"When one hops in your mouth in a bizarre effort to end it all?" he joked. Once more noticing the glass 'coffin,' he asked, "So... uhh... who's Sleeping Beauty?"

"Hrm? Oh, that's me," she said, nonchalantly.

"Say what now?"

"It's me. Or my body, anyhow."

"Your bo..." His perception of her attractiveness spontaneously became much more modest.

"You're... in a coma?"

"Something like that. Nothing quite so dramatic, I'd say," she said, frowning at Diego some.

"Sorry. I'm... not used to the weird stuff yet. Not that you're weird! Or that weird is bad. Most people think I'm weird. Normal is boring. Do you have a ladder I can use to climb out of this hole I'm digging?" he rambled.

"Oh, I think you started well enough into the hole when you saw me to begin with. Most of the thinking happens downstairs, does it?"

"What? N-no! I... you... reminded of someone..." he answered with a nostalgic look that said 'schoolboy crush.'

"I'm sure I did. I tend to do that a lot," she laughed. She gestured down at her clothing. "Remind you of someone... in bed?"

"She'd had to have realized I existed first."

"You ever speak to her? That's a good first step."

"It was too late when she started hanging out with the Mean Girls."

"The whatzit now?"

"The bitchy teenage girls that look down on and are generally mean to everyone."

"Still should have tried talking to her if you wanted her to notice you," Mira said, a bit dismissively.

"Well duh. I was a total scared-y cat."

"So the tail isn't new, then?"

"Oh it is, I just have a terrible addiction to puns and things adjacent to puns."

"What's 'adjacent' to a pun?"

"Things that aren't puns but elicit similar groans."

"Hrm, if it was plenty of groans you were looking for, you definitely should have talked to her," she teased.

"I don't want groans, but will accept them as a consolation prize."