[ stepping into congratulations and getting a menu shoved in his face ]

Oh, uh...

[ he'd been hoping to sit down and read the menu before he'd have to make up his mind?? but actually... ]

...Wow, this is... not a lot of options.

[ takes exactly 1 second to look over this menu and rejects it in that much time. ]

Let's go loot the kitchen.

Huh?

[ he was just going to settle for a side salad, but ]

Do you cook?

[ grabbing a snack from the convenience store... ]

Hey. [ small wave. ] He wasn't on your team, was he?

[ tiny wave back... but also, he shakes his head. ]

No. I didn't know him.

[ when you barely get a chance to say hi to tutorials. ]

...You were from the same "game" before?

He was one of the overseers, yeah. Only really talked to him once, though.

[ and it went!! badly!!!! ]

[ just like old times, todomatsu is here by the big pyre at the center of the village, where the profile posters are posted up on a notice board and books are still collected on the shelves that got dragged out here from the academy library.

being back here feels weirder than he'd expected, actually. after a year of being home and mostly settling back into his old ways, he's suddenly remembering all the shit that happened here in much more detail and being confronted with his own past character development that had largely washed away with time.

but he shakes himself out of it and looks over with a smile. ]

Well... Here it is, the infamous village with the stupid name.

Interested in seeing anything in particular? This right here was where we held trials, actually.

[ hello, pyre. even if they're out of the stuffy airport, it's not exactly a welcoming atmosphere. ]

It's... [ rustic? ] rundown.

[ of all the places here, he's not excited to stick at the trial grounds, so. ]

Was there anywhere in this place that you liked?

Yeah, it's a shithole. Not that we didn't try to improve it.

[ little gesture toward the books. ]

The haunted house Kate-chan and I lived in was... uh, well, not nice, it was old and creepy, but. We cleaned it up as much as we could, and you could kind of tune out the weird noises and stuff eventually.

[ he'll go to find him in the evening sometime ]

Matsuno-san.

[ he's probably out at the hiking trail or something. he looks slightly wary hearing his name, but turns to look. ah. ]

Hey.

[ ... ]

Sorry.

[ for like... a lot of things..... ]

...It's okay. I was planning to talk to you anyway.

[ since he didn't have a chance to follow-up during trial itself before time, but. it doesn't really matter, considering the setting.

he'll come stand nearby. ]

Though I wasn't really expecting a confession.

[ this is so funny. cola clutching her jar of teeth in that murder dm all day. it's not a bad atmosphere honestly, but the matters they speak of are familiar in a sort of frustrating way. so much discussion of death and strategy. ]

Ah...

You all had to work really hard. [ even for a possession game. ]

Yeah, it was... pretty rough. Finding out the possessions here were only temporary was seriously a huge relief.

Hey.

[ looks around at the aquarium and thinks about how much fucking murder happened in here a week ago. ]

Honestly thought we'd do better than last week...

[ haru cannot blame dreamwidth for our struggles but. it was dreamwidth's fault. he looks frustrated, aimlessly. ]

I'm starting to wonder whether it matters if we do better or not.

[ how much of any of this matters. ]

[ i will not make haru stray too far from his watery love so todomatsu is chilling as well as one can chill under the murder horse circumstances on a lounge chair by the pool with a fruity drink.

or he was until a flamingo came over and just shoved its whole fucking beak into his drink to steal the cherry and immediately flapped away. ]

Wha— Hey!! Rude?!

[ HIS BELOVED WATER there is so much this week, thank god. haru's still decently banged up but it doesn't stop him from trying to swim for a while anyway, so he just watches this happen from where he's taking a break at the edge of the pool. ]

No one ever cuts you any slack, Matsuno-san...

[ not even the birds ]

[ huffs and angrily chucks his cup at a trash can because who knows where that flamingo's beak has been. ]

I know!!! What did I do to deserve this?!

[ he did so many things to deserve this, actually. ]

[ well... a lot happened yesterday.

he offers a cautious little head bow when he spots todomatsu, around the street market. ]

...Matsuno-san. How are you.

[ it must all have been a shock. ]

[ a lot sure did happen yesterday and the vibes are Not Great but also not as much of a crazy mess as they would have been if this conversation had taken place then!! ]

Haha... Still alive somehow, so.

[ SHRUGS..... ]

[ out at the race track being disappointed that he can't bet on horses here...

...looks over. feels no more or less disappointed. ]

Hey.

[ he'll take complete neutrality, it is indeed not worse than how things were with simon ]

Welcome back.

[ his feeling is general relief from the day but also just like teen awkwardness. anyway, ]

I wanted to ask you about Asa.