[ our midsommar era is hopefully over, and todomatsu is back by the pyre in his pink hoodie and rolled up jeans like god intended, taking pictures of the profiles with his phone.

looks at tomi... looks at his profile... looks back... ]

All right, let's get the bad first impression over with.

[ absolutely we are done with our midsommar cosplay but dude is in a hawaiian shirt, shorts, and sandals. he's already dying out here. ]

C'mon man, give me a break.

[ ...

shrugs. ]

Not great, but could've been worse.

You think I'm trying to give a bad impression? Give me some credit dude, I didn't even write that.

I'd give you more credit if you had a sense of humor about it. I mean, I was giving you a pretty good opening to disprove the accusation there.

[ oh god i lost this tag im sorry real eric ]

This is probably one of the worst situations to be in and have a sense of humor about.

[ help it's fine i've lost so many tags, w0 is just me drowning horribly every game ]

Okay, but those two things aren't intrinsically linked, you know? People in bad situations use humor to cope all the time.

I'm just trying to keep it together here, man.

Well, good luck with that...

Yeah, thanks. [ actually not ironically but also still incredibly stressed ]

Holy shit, we actually got a beach.

[ THIS IS NOT HTE BEST DAY OF HIS LIFE BUT IT SURE MAKES THINGS A LOT NICER ]

Didn't even have to go the Jaws route!

[ a route he'd decided not to take anyway after last weekend proved how much the cult doesn't actually care about keeping them alive for two months ]

I think it's too early to say that for sure...

[ todomatsu's probably not actively looking for tomi, but when he sees him, he's just like. ah. he should be polite and say something.

he also looks pretty sad right now. and, like. still kind of undead, as he has since post-cyoa yesterday. his skin's still super pale and greyish, and ones of his hands is bandaged, kind of looks like shit, but this isn't about him. ]

...Sorry. You were friends back home, right?

[ thanks man. tomi's able to spare a half glance in totty's direction before looking away. down. just. ugh.

he's not outwardly emotional in the sense that he doesn't look like he's gonna cry, but the news has clearly hit him hard. ]


...Yeah. [ and he'd be fine to leave it at that, but that wouldn't make for much of a pc. ] He was-- How could this have happened to him? That's not--

Fuck this.

Mm... I didn't know him well, but he seemed really nice.

[ pickles too!!! like, damn, at least karma was asking for it. ]

...This place really fucking sucks.

Yeah, it really fucking does. [ HEAVY SIGH. ]

Just wanna know why him. Why-- any of this, but why Ichiban?

If it's another case of a monster going out of control, there might not be any real rhyme or reason to it.

I find that hard to believe when it was just four of us on the beach last night. Someone woulda had to cross paths with him, and--

[ and what? that still isn't a real reason or explanation. but he doesn't finish that thought because haha!! he sure is going through it!! ]

I think there were probably a lot of us staying on the island. They might not have had to go that far to run into him.

...Though I know Pickles was planning on going back to the village, so. I don't know.

[ how many murders were they dealing with ]

[ i'm so glad it's not also thoughtshare because he would have spent the first four minutes of that just being jealous that tomi could actually get girls.

once it gets to the stuff about being framed and coming home to find her gone, though, it actually hits him kind of hard — which is a lot harder than it would have a week ago.

plus, damn... seeing memories of ichiban like this must be pretty painful right now. ]

...Sorry. I know it's rude to listen in on a personal conversation like that.

[ not that it's his fault, obviously, and he doesn't think it is, but still. ]

[ clearly, totty needs to get drunk and just not care.

but, ha, funny that this past tomi - which wasn't even that that long ago - mentions that raw grief. naturally, there hasn't been enough time to even begin to deal with what happened over the weekend. and now to have it shoved in his face like this? yeah he's feeling pretty shit. ]

Not like you chose to, man. Just... this sucks. Like this place is laughing at me.

[ help i'm sorry i lost track of so many threads this week. anyway, getting drunk and not caring are both things he does too much of already. ]

Honestly, yeah, right when they took the beach away again too...

I wouldn't be that surprised if they were planning to try to target each of us individually.