Week 5

[airlockedmods]

[As with the weeks before, life in the Fantasy Sweet returns to something resembling normalcy with shocking efficiency. The second floor rest area and Adventure Zone Death Orb Room are spotless again, the demon glitter has been vacuumed, the deflated orbs have been replaced. It's like none of it ever happened, like three more friends aren't dead and stored away in the guest house morgue.

There's a new floor to explore, their "reward" for a job well done.]

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday



[ooc: Don't forget to to turn in your activity for week 4, submit your memory regains and put in your threads for the Benefactors!]

Comments

[misanthropicprinciple]

[He glances down at it, and twitchily opens and closes his new fingers.]

Uh. I don't think so. ...I'm still getting, you know. Used to it, though. Haven't tried to do much with it yet.

[Just wait till he finds out it vibrates. Nishitani will be the first to know.]

[buddyoldpal]

[ Good, as it should be! Use that arm on Yuuri-chan, Junpei. She'll appreciate that function for sure. ]

Can ya feel anythin' in it? How future-y of an arm is it?

[misanthropicprinciple]

[Tooootally. In the meantime, though, he looks slightly uncomfortable.]

Not... well, sort of, I guess. It works well enough that I can tell if I'm trying to hold something too hard or not hard enough, and I'm... you know, aware of it, as being, uh, there. But...

[It's not skin and flesh. There aren't any prickling hairs or nerves in that smooth metal surface.]

...It's also hard to tell what I'm actually feeling and what's, you know. Phantom stuff. Or if I'm blocking things out because I think I shouldn't feel anything from it.

[buddyoldpal]

[ Nishitani nods. Despite being totally insensitive about this stuff, he's seen it before. I mean, yakuza tend to cut off their pinkies but it's not like they don't end up really fucking hurt sometimes. ]

Yeah, that shit's rough. Even just yer fingers, I hear it's like fuckin' pins an' needles sometimes.

[ Nishitani sets an arm on Junpei's shoulder, giving him what almost passes for an honest stare. ]

Yer a strong sonuvabitch, Tenmyouji-kun. Think a lotta people woulda shit themselves if ya'd gone and died on us. [ Himself included. ] So don't let it fuckin' stop ya, ya got it?

[misanthropicprinciple]

Oh.

[To say Junpei's startled by the sudden earnestness, by the sudden closeness, wouldn't quite cover it. He doesn't even know what to think. But it breaks him out of that haze of failure, too, out of his resentment and self-pity and despair. At least for now.]

I... all right. I won't.

[Thanks, crime dad.]

I might let it, uh, be a yellow light for a while, though? At the rate I'm going, I'm gonna look like Locke's socks by the time we get out of here.

[buddyoldpal]

[ He chuckles. Look, he didn't become the head of his own family by not giving a shit about his people. ]

Fuck, hopefully not, huh? Take as much time as ya fuckin' need, just don't quit, pal. These losers need ya.

[misanthropicprinciple]

Haha. Well, of course they do.

[For his skills and expertise, at least.]

At this point, I'm almost hoping the final boss turns out to be some kind of giant sudoku. Just so I can really show off my prowess. Make up for how many times I've landed on my ass so far.

[buddyoldpal]

Ha! That'll teach ol' PAL, huh? We get any weird-ass number puzzles, yer gonna be the guy ta beat!

[ Chances of that happening though... probably 0. ]

[misanthropicprinciple]

Man vs. machine. Just like War Games. Uh, you see that one? I forget when it came out.

[buddyoldpal]

Think I heard of that one, actually! Dunno if I saw it, came out a couplea years ago, fer me.

[ 1983, thanks Wikipedia. ]

[misanthropicprinciple]

Supercomputer with access to America's nuclear weapons tries to win a real life game of tic-tac-toe with missiles against the Russians, until a punk-ass kid teaches it that the only way to win at tic-tac-toe is not to play.

[Tic-tac-toe is a stupid game.]

[buddyoldpal]

[ beat. ]

...Sounds dumb as fuck.

[misanthropicprinciple]

Yeah, I remember liking it in my punk-ass kid phase but I don't remember too much about it beyond the tic-tac-toe part.

[buddyoldpal]

Guess there's weirder shit out there than computers playin' tic tac toe though, ain't they?

[misanthropicprinciple]

Eighty percent of the people in this mansion qualify as weirder shit than that, Nishitani-san.

[Including Junpei.]

[buddyoldpal]

Shit, don't I know it! Never thought I'd be the normalest guy anywhere, but here I am, huh?

[ I mean, maybe Choromatsu... is more normal...? ]

[misanthropicprinciple]

[Junpei thinks about it.]

I'd say Yuuri's got more of that 'normal girl' vibe if you disregard the zombies. I mean, that's not her, that's just her version of Earth. Other than that... yeah, Iiii guess you do win the normalcy award. Congratulations.

[buddyoldpal]

[ He laughs. ]

Ya know shit's fucked when a yakuza's yer normalest guy, damn.