burningrescue | Ayabe Catchall

[That's not how anxiety works, Ayabe, but Galo thinks it is, so he nods, impressed by Ayabe's grit.]

Yeah. Keep breathing and face your fears, and you'll be fine! I used to get panic attacks like that when I'd see a fire, and look at me now!

[Giving him a grin, despite everything that's going on. Going into the room to check it out, but not so thoroughly because tomorrow the mods might announce there's another body in here.]

[ God, imagine if they investigated this place and missed a wholeass body

Compared to the mess outside, the state of the gun room is even worse, and Ayabe has to hold his breath to keep from coughing, because either way he's having trouble breathing so he might as well stop. Completely opposite of what Galo just advised him from doing, but it'll work out.

Like promised, he doesn't touch anything, stepping over the guns and staring at the wall. ]

Who here is strong enough to do this? It must be the monster in the lake, right?

The monster? In the lake?

[He missed that.]

You mean Pineapple?

You named it?

[ Pineapple???? ]

Her. Pineapple is the lady skeleton that's down there, and she's the fourth sister.

There are four dead bodies down there??!

No, the other three girls! The animal girls! They're all still alive, but Pineapple is dead. And not an animal. And maybe not their sister? But there's a skeleton down there, that's what I know.

What's this lake monster!

[ Oh. Oh god, okay. This is better news than what he'd thought, but also there is a skeleton down there so maybe that's not good. ]

So somebody's died down there before.

[ He lets out a shaky breath, shaking his head. ]

There's a large monster down there, with tentacles. It attacked Asch and me when we fell in before- I think it might have gotten Asch last night too.

Why do you think so? Did it like arms?

[ He shrugs, but touches a hand to his neck where there are some shallow cuts. ]

The monster just grazed me, but it was definitely violent. Asch said he saw its teeth, so it was trying to eat him and he's lucky it got away. And there's... ever since I woke up, everything's felt cold and clammy. Like there's water everywhere. Asch came down here, and then returned upstairs.

[ And he sort of feels like drowning. ]

Last week, when I slept in the library, I knew lots about animals for some reason. And then today when you mentioned the lake monster and tentacles, I kept thinking, that's weird, 'cause all animals with big tentacles like that only live in salt water. And I can't say how I'd know something like that.

Do they all live in salt water?

[ ...he looks over at the lake ]

It's too dangerous to check. I don't want another casualty.

Yep. It's just squid or octopi that get tentacles that big, and they only live in the ocean. And the lake's definitely fresh water. But the point's more that you might be right. The animal stuff was related last week.

Ugh... That thing got Asch. Do you think he's going to turn into an octopus?

[ The rats weren't poisoned last time, though, so that might not be it. ]

[He's frowning.]

Pink said last time, they moved that girl's body because she had an infection, and we might've caught it from going near her. But they didn't move Asch. So he might not be a wereoctopus.

[ Hopefully, because he had Asch's blood all over him earlier. Half the people did and that would have been bad if his blood were contaminated. ]

...They didn't move Nikki, and she was also infected, though. We'll have to keep an eye on Asch tomorrow— he probably shouldn't even be there, but his testimonial will be important.

Mm. Okay, yeah. We'll tie him up if we need to. Good idea, Ayabe.

[ quickly: ]

We don't need to do that.

Ayabe Catchall

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