Énouement

[backslash]

((Myles Roux continued from Crime and Punishment))

Despite the rocky start to the day, Myles honestly stayed in kind of a good mood all through their trek out of the woods and down the winding paths that slowly but surely led to the lake. Every time his thoughts started to drift and bring him down, he just had to look at Garren, walking along with all of their extra stuff in his arms, and it buoyed him right back up again. The only disappointment was that Myles hadn't run into him on the very first day, which was kind of a wild thought to have in itself.

It was probably dumb to be in anything like a good mood in the first place, but the more he thought back over what he'd heard on the announcement, the more he couldn't help himself. He was pretty vindicated right now. Lorenzo? Dead. Quinn? Dead. Nia? Dead. Marco? Dead.

Wyatt? Dead as a doornail. They'd have to avoid Tirzah, of course, but it was hard for Myles to harbor any hard feelings. There was nobody to really be sad about that had been listed off either, which was even better.

He wasn't celebrating, okay. There wasn't a single one of them that Myles would have personally wanted actually dead if they weren't here, and it'd be pretty messed up to be genuinely happy about most people being dead anyhow. He was more... relieved. And he had been proven right in his strategy, that he needed to find help and lay low and take what he could instead of running around trying to kill everything that moved. Myles wasn't book smart, and he knew that, but nobody ever gave him credit for the things he did get.

They heard the waterfall before they saw it, and that just boosted Myles's spirits more. He broke away from Ivy and Garren to dart ahead for a look, and was satisfied to see the lake and the waterfall crashing down into it beyond the trees. He turned back to call to them.

"Hey, we made it. Hurry up!"

He hoped the lake didn't turn out to be scummy. That would be kind of a downer.

[Fenris]

Ivy made an executive decision, at some point during the walk, to do nothing with Myles's good cheer but bask in it.

>> Ivy Langley continued from Crime and Punishment

Because she certainly could be a massive buzzkill here, if she was in the mood for it. She could bitch about her aching rib, or how dizzy she was, she could point out that maybe they should walk near the path instead of on it the way she had to Ace all those days ago. And at moments she was sorely tempted to interrupt him because there was something buried in her heart digging into her chest like a knife point and if she let it carve its way out she would resent him forever for burying it to begin with, but. But. She was never that tempted, because he was Myles, and because he was smiling for once, and because she loved him, and because the rest only mattered if she let it, right?

It would get easier with time, she was certain.

Her mood more often lined up with his, anyway, their fingers still entangled, arms swinging like they were kids again. It was far too hot but the heat felt like summers past if she closed her eyes for a moment. She'd glance back at Garren, still following, facilitating her daydreaming by doing the hard work, and she'd squeeze Myles's hand again, and everything was as kind as it could be.

She had missed the rest of the announcements, paralyzed on one name; Myles filled her in on the rest on their walk. It was a convenient list, in terms of threats that had gone and gotten themselves killed. Lorenzo, Marco. Quinn, especially. She realized she hadn't heard Blaise's name in a few days. She decided, for the sake of Myles's continued good mood, to not bring it up. There were other names she noted to herself, placing faces easily to each in turn, Erika, Justin, Tyrell again, god, Michael, Tirzah, Tirzah, Tirzah.

She tried not to think so hard.

The time passed quickly. They hadn't spoken much outside of discussing the announcements, not much to say especially with Garren a couple of yards behind, but she'd hummed along to whatever songs came to mind, and Myles joined in with every song he knew, and that had been more than enough. She thought to sing, but even with Garren acting more as an object than a human he was too much of an audience. Her throat was dry, anyway. If the world was going to hear her sing she wouldn't tolerate it sounding less than perfect.

It came as a surprise when Ivy heard the waterfall crashing through the trees, distracted as she'd been, but she still laughed when he dropped her hand and dashed forward like an overexcited puppy.

"Okay, okay," she called out, still giggling, "you know I can't run, be nice!" She quickened her step anyway, as much as she could, sparing a glance for Garren and a gesture universally understandable as follow me. As though he had anywhere else to go.

[Pippi]

((Garren Mortimer continued from Crime and Punishment))

Garren was conflicted about… well, pretty much fuckin’ everything he was currently experiencing, really.

He was constantly reminding himself that he’d put himself into this position, willingly at that. That he knew what the pastel pair thought of him, and that his own thoughts were much the same towards them. That he actually had some fucking food now. That being stuck with the world’s most wanted for colour scheme crimes was better than wandering around the woods by himself, like a particularly feral Florida Man.

And he tried to look on the bright side of things, all like ‘hey, at least you’re carrying bags full of more than dust and crumbs now!’ And then he’d catch his foot on a gnarled root or inconveniently placed rock, and suddenly it wouldn’t feel remotely funny anymore.

It just… it didn’t feel great to be treated as little more than a glorified baggage train, y’know? And, fuck, actually, skip the glorified for the most part. He was there to hold shit, to make Myvy feel better about themselves by proxy, and to be shunted in front of them both when the bullets started flying. He figured he was allowed this one. He was pretty sure anybody, no matter their prior situation, would be a little aggrieved at what he was experiencing. Sure, it was better to be valued as a meatshield than not valued at all, he guessed.

It was just hard to get into this giggly, bouncy, cheerful, ‘lets go swimming!’ mood when he was being treated like that fucking bellboy from Phoenix Wright. “Yes ma’am”, “no ma’am”, ”GREAT tits ma’am”. Y'know, the works.

Also, he couldn’t swim. Never learned how. And if there wasn’t scum in the water right now, he was pretty sure there would be the moment he tipped his toe into it.

Garren sighed, nodding idly at Ivy’s “keep up loser” gesture. He paused momentarily, shifting the bags weighing him down to get them a little more comfortable. Maybe it’d be better to think of himself as something other than a porter. Something else loyal and willing to work with you for the sole purpose of companionship. Like… like a puppy. Or something.

Mmmm, no. No, that was equally pathetic, just in a different manner.

He followed after the other two, wordlessly trudging along.

[Kotorikun]

[Declyn Grayson-Anthis continued from Evergreen Goodbyes]

"I'm sorry, Mrs Salazar, Mrs Loveless, I wanted to find your son sooner…. and take care of him….. I hope you forgive me…."

He tapped the camera lens and hugged his knees, playing with Cecil's ring on his finger. He had already apologized to Drew's family, so much!!, had apologized to his dad, wondered if his birth mum would find out or care about his current whereabouts. He had apologized to Adonis's family, had apologized to Amelia's family, to Camilla's family; and a couple more. Talked to Chris for a bit. All the while he hoped that they would never actually watch.

"I don't think I'm gonna make it. But I want to try."

He felt like a failure. What had he been searching for for a week? A way out, people who would stay together and help. But it all came crumbling down every now and then. People had their own plans and morals. It wasn't meant to be.

"I need help with my time machine…"

A thought or plea more serious than not. This island turned out to not be very helpful with resources. No one had been here for a long time until now.

"I'm scared. But don't worry. Don't worry but also don't forget about me."

He forced a faint smile.

Jonathan's bike turned out to be very helpful with the transport of Adonis', Cecil's and Lorenzo's corpses. It was late afternoon by now and they had just gotten there minutes ago. He was back to wearing his striped shirt from day one and had left Theo's bloody bloody (x2) shirt back at the house. The announcement from earlier left him thinking about how it could be really anyone leaving their side next, even someone as big and strong as Wyatt Carter. A gun was more powerful. Or Quinn with the large body count. How did the situation between Tyrell and Lorenzo really go down? They were friends, weren't they? Had been. What kind of man was Mr. Danya to always sound so…. cheerful?

Declyn stood up, appreciating the sound of running water in the back.

[Primrosette]

Jonathan felt so strange to have the chainsaw that had belonged to Adonis on his hands and he felt like he had to wash the blood off of it to be more respectable to Cecil and Declyn. It seemed like it was the least that he could do. Even if he felt like his legs were on fire for having to go back and forth from the manor to the lake after transferring the bodies and now he was resting on the ground, taking a mouthful of water and letting out a small, relieved breath of oxygen.

((Jonathan Meyers continued from Evergreen Goodbyes))

Jonathan thought over the announcements that they had heard earlier and it still didn't really make him feel better. Both the Carters were dead and he remembered how Wyatt wanted to take his stuff from him. Erika had killed once again and it left a bitter taste in his mouth from the aftermath. Val had gone and killed someone and all Jonathan could do was scoff and sigh in disappointment. It seemed like Marco might have been the original owner of the chainsaw before Adonis had gotten his hands on it and he was sure that Marco had been a friend of Emmett before the trip. He remembered seeing Adonis and Marco hanging out on the trip and they had seemed close. Had it just been in his imagination? He didn't know and he was not going to linger on that thought. He felt more ill as he had heard that Justin had killed three more people and he hadn't realized how lucky he was at the time in the woods with Justin AND Michael. Tyrell had been the one who had killed Lorenzo and Jon wasn't sure how to feel about that. He still couldn't get the images out of his head of what happened between Ty and Christine and he knew that he would just have to deal with it in his own way. Quinn was finally dead and Jonathan was just glad that someone had stopped her from continuing her reign of terror on innocent victims. One death had hurt a little more. Emeka.. He should have stayed with him. Why had he left? Emeka was gone and now he couldn't even tell him about Justin. The best that he could do was remember Claude, remember how Emeka hadn't deserved to die like that and the fact that Emeka had been drugged so it was likely that he couldn't fight back against the other boy.... Unforgivable.

"It really is peaceful here." He commented quietly as he noticed Declyn getting up to his feet and he found his eyes wondering to the four corpses in flowery-like graves. "I hope that all of them can be at peace now. We'll just have to continue onward for them and we just have to not give up on life."

He tucked his water back into his bag and he unsteadily got up to his feet, leaning against a tree for a few moments. He had picked up the chainsaw and he was holding it lightly by his side, feeling that he should have a small nap after he had finished cleaning the weapon. It felt so weird for him to even hold and he knew that he would have to get used to having it on him for a while.

"I think I'm gonna clean this at the lake. I feel like the blood can be alarming if we run into other people and I don't want people to get the wrong idea." He said briefly to the other two and he turned towards where the noise of the water was coming from, starting to make his way towards that direction. "You two can come with me if you want to."

[ItzToxie]

((Emmett Bunnell continued from Evergreen Goodbyes))

The flower garden wasn't right. No matter how dressed up they were, they'd never be beautiful there. The parasitic weeds that lain next to them like it belonged with them turned the whole thing into a joke. Emil or Sapphire never got a grave like this, and Emmett doubted Jon or Declyn would go out of their way to bring them here. Emmett didn't want them too anyways, no way would they lie there with their killer like that. What once had meaning turned into nothing but a farce with the addition of Lorenzo. Emmett protested at first, but it didn't matter. He didn't matter, really. He was just there to kill someone else if they became too threatening. He was fine with that. His words weren't heard anyways, so he just stopped talking, just did what he was told.

Jon hoped they could all be at peace now. Yeah fucking right. Emmett scoffed audibly. "They aren't. They're fucking dead. That eyesore to the left certainly ain't helping their ghosts rest easy, the piece of shit. I ought to drag him out of that pile and toss him behind some rocks or something. Maybe then their ghosts would rest easy. Maybe I'd smash his face up a bit like he did Emil, but y'all wouldn't agree to that would you?" He felt nothing but contempt for this parody of sentimental bullshit.

Jon changed the subject. Talked about cleaning a chainsaw covered in at least three other people's blood. Yeah, that seemed like a good idea. "I'll go. Can't look at this fucking joke without feeling sick to my stomach anyways." He didn't care how they felt about the way they talked. Lorenzo all posed up next to them like he was friends with them, like he rated a nice goodbye made his stomach turn. They didn't give a fuck. Why should he?

[backslash]

You know, the waterfall was nice, but the little group with the collection of dead bodies was sort of ruining the view.

Of course some kind of mess like this was exactly what they would run into when they finally made it to their goal. A trickle of apprehension and irritation leaked into Myles's light spirits, and he slowed his pace, allowing Ivy and Garren to catch up with him as they fully emerged from the treeline.

He knew what - and who - he was seeing, obviously. He wasn't blind. He could make out Lorenzo's stupid lime green hair even from a distance, and beyond that-

"Declyn," Myles called after a moment of absorbing the scene in front of him. Might as well focus on the only important person there. He wasn't exactly jumping for joy to see Jonathan again, and he wouldn't have given Emmett the time of day even if Emmett had ever been inclined to ask.

Lorenzo had been on the morning's announcement, but none of the three of them had. Neither had Cecil.

Neither had Adonis.

[Fenris]

Ivy couldn't keep pace with Myles, of course, and she was about to thank him for slowing when he suddenly stopped. And she frowned, and yes, of course there were a million innocuous reasons Myles might have stopped at that moment, but her lifespan wasn't liable to be lengthened by assuming the best. She hurried forward, suddenly deeply annoyed with herself for having left her perfume bottle in her bag, still slung over Garren's shoulder. It wasn't much of a weapon, but it was all she had—

Oh.

She'd seen corpses before, it was fine, it wasn't fine, what did it say about her if it was fine, it had to be fine. She'd seen worse. She'd seen maggots and smelled decay and stepped in old blood and these were just bodies, just dead people, it was whatever, there were lots of those, it was fine, she swallowed the bile that filled her mouth and her eyes jumped to Myles, followed his.

Declyn. It had been a long time, in this bubble; the five-and-a-half or so days between leaving the inner circle and this moment stretched behind her as its own little eternity. Those days had obviously not been particularly kind to him, though the bodies could have attested to that without him doing any work. She'd be more surprised to see someone looking well, at this point.

What mattered was that Declyn had a gun, what mattered was that Declyn had killed someone, what mattered was the bodies. There were two others there, too, names flickering through her head, her instinct was to grab Myles's hand and drag him back to the relative safety behind the treeline, and exactly what good would that do them if any of them decided to shoot? They were already out of position.

Declyn had picked up her photobooth photos on that first day, the ones of her and Myles, they'd fallen out of her bag. They'd talked for a while. He was what they had in common. Ivy had just been lucky enough to find him first. She remembered their pictures, too, from prom. She remembered picking out flowers.

Hers were still in her bag, somewhere. She'd forgotten to show them to Myles.

She took his hand, but didn't pull back.

[Pippi]

Y’know, he’d been trying not to think about the fact they were headed back to the waterfall this whole time.

He’d followed loyally behind Myles and Ivy (yeah no the dog analogies really weren’t working for him), choosing not to question where they were going, even when he was pretty damn certain he’d seen the exact same tree twice already. He knew it was on him for, like, not mentioning what had gone down the previous day, but he didn’t really think either of them currently cared about what he’d experienced on the island. And at a certain point, it had gotten way too late for him to be like ‘yeah uh actually i think it’d be better if we went right back the way we came from’.

So he’d trudged along, letting the weight of the bags and the sweat trailing down his back, and the aches and pains that came from sleeping on the ground all night, and how tenuous his position within the group was, and all the other bullshit occupy his mind. Just to stop himself from thinking about how they could, at any moment, step into the clearing where he’d talked to Nia and gawk at Aoi’s corpse and blown apart skull.

He hadn’t been happy to reach the lake, then, but he sure as fuck had been relieved to get there with no incidents to speak of aside from blisters and scrapes along his arms. Hell, at the very least, the Ivyles jumping into the lake would give him a chance to sit down and rest a little, and hopefully they’d be too busy frollicking or whatever to make any dismissive remarks or cast disparaging glances his way.

So seeing the other group of three, standing next to a collection of dead fucking bodies, was almost enough for Garren to hurl the bag in his hand straight into the fucking lake.

He probably would have, honestly, if it hadn’t been one of Myles’ bags on his dominant side. He planted his feet instead, looking over the top of Myvy’s heads warily. He recognised, vaguely, a handful of the people standing - and, well, not standing - away from them, mostly because they also ran in the same circle as the pastel gang, meaning Garren’s only interactions were levying insults at them.

He’d never insulted Lorenzo, much as he’d wanted to, because the dude could probably twist him into a pretzel. He didn’t know, exactly, how to feel about seeing his body just… lying there, motionless. He had been on the announcements, multiple times, but… y’know. At the end of the day, that had just been words. Garren didn’t know what had actually gone down during those encounters, and maybe if he had then he’d be feeling a lot less conflicted.

But the only people who’d know the truth, he had to imagine, were the guys behind the glass looking down at them. And if he ever got the chance to talk to them, he figured there’d be way more on his plate than this.

“We-” Garren began. Then he stopped. Because he’d been about to tell them that they should be careful, breaking the rule of being seen and not heard by the other two, but what was the point in doing so? Myles had already called out to the other group, beckoning an old friend - Declyn, of course, another member of the pastel party - so it wasn’t as though hiding was an option anymore. It was easy to think that things would be okay, bumping into a familiar face, even if said person had been on the announcements.

Aoi had recognised Nia. Prior relationships meant precious little anymore. Hell, look at who he was rolling with right now. Remaining wary and on guard, at all times, was paramount.

He wondered whether Ivy would be glad or pissed, if he used her bag to knock down anyone who made a sudden move.

[Kotorikun]

Declyn didn’t blame Emmett for his current attitude but he did wish that he would just… be quiet for a little while, at least while Emmett was looking at the corpses. Declyn didn’t want to remember them for their actions on this island but for the better before this mess. Emmett had all right to be angry though. So he let him be.

“No smashing faces,” was all he said about it as he stretched both of his legs by bending forward and trying to touch his toes (in half-success), turned sideways to the bodies. He had taken one of Cecil’s rings, which he was now wearing, and his knife. More out of sentiment than use. Was it normal for his own body to feel so heavy? Drew, Cecil, Adonis, Lorenzo… They shouldn’t be lying there, in general. Declyn was glad that they had managed to clean this spot up and decorate it with flowers for them but they shouldn’t be there in the first place.

Digging his fingertips into his thigh, he wanted to follow Jonathan, but a more pleasant voice that emerged from the forest stopped him.

With more familiar faces in tow.

“Myles!” he gasped softly, his voice still shaky but in the state of trying to recover. Showing him the same smile as always wasn’t possible at the moment but he hoped some warmth was present. So Ivy had found him, or they had found each other. And anime boy who wasn’t really in any of his circles.

Declyn shared a glance between Emmett and Jonathan before he rushed forward with the intent to pull Myles into a hug.

[Primrosette]

Jonathan found himself staring back at Emmett in disbelief. He got it. Lorenzo had killed one of Emmett's closest friends and he knew that Lorenzo hadn't deserved to be in a flower-like grave with the others. He got that Emmett was angry and upset about it. But Jonathan really wished that Emmett could have kept his mouth shut. Especially for Declyn. All that negativity was going to drag down their spirits and Jonathan really didn't need to hear that Emmett wanted to smash in the head of a corpse. Jonathan glanced back at Adonis, Drew, Cecil and Lorenzo's bodies surrounded by all of the flowers that they had managed to find and he felt a lump forming in his throat.

"Emmett-"

Before he could even speak; he heard someone's voice calling out to Declyn and he glanced over at the direction where it was coming from. Ah, it was Myles. He had seen him since the beginning of all of this. He guessed that he shouldn't have been surprised about seeing the other boy again and that he would call out for Declyn. Jonathan didn't even move to stop Declyn from approaching Myles and he noticed that two other people were with him. Ivy and Garren. He guessed that he was hoping that they wouldn't cause any trouble for them.

Jonathan raised his hand that wasn't holding the chainsaw and slightly waved to the three of them in a non-threatening way. "Hey...." Was all that he called out and he then lowered his hand back to his side. "Glad to see that you're all okay."

Hopefully. From what I can see from here. I just hope that Emmett won't provoke or say something unnecessary….

Jonathan glanced at Emmett and he hoped that the other boy would get the hint.

[ItzToxie]

Emmett wasn’t going to lie. He was envious. Myles and Ivy managed to last that long together, now they found Declyn, now Declyn was... better for lack of a better word. Emmett didn’t have that, nor could he have that anymore. He hated that feeling. He’d rather be alone.

His eyes glanced over to Jonathan. Bastard was judging him, like he knew, like he has any right to. Emmett would REALLY rather be alone. His fingers tapped the barrel of his gun.

He didn’t bother saying nothing to the other group. What he had to say can wait until him and Jon were alone.

[backslash]

Myles kind of expected a lot of things at this point. Ivy's wariness, Garren hanging back waiting for instruction, Emmett being a sourpuss, and Jonathan doing nothing to prove himself any less useless than he had been on day one. All of that was normal. He squeezed Ivy's hand on reflex when it slipped into his own, and even though he was the one calling attention to them, he was already prepared to pull her away at a sign of trouble.

The hug surprised him. Even more surprising was that he found himself reaching out for it when Declyn approached.

"We've been looking for you," Myles said, a little breathlessly. That hadn't exactly been a spoken plan between them, but Myles had wanted to find Declyn, so it wasn't untrue either. For just a moment, things felt good.

He opened his eyes, and even though he didn't want to look anymore, his eyes seemed drawn back to the arrangement of bodies.

"...What happened?" He consciously tore his gaze away, loosening his hold on Declyn and stepping back. Just enough to be comfortable, not enough to look like he was actually trying to put distance between them. Myles shot another glance at Emmett and Jonathan. "You uh... wanna talk without an audience?" They didn't really need to lead in with small talk at this point, right? Oh, I'm glad you're alive, I'm also glad that you're alive, thank God neither of us got murdered in the last week. That was just an annoying conversation to have.

Honestly, he just wanted to get right to the point by now. Almost nobody had bothered listening to him before, anyway.

[Fenris]

He squeezed her hand, and she squeezed back, and then it was gone, he folded into Declyn's arms and she was just thinking about prom again.

There weren't any looming background figures with chainsaws at prom, though. Not that she likely would have noticed if there were.

It was fine. It had to be, because Ivy wasn't being given a choice in the matter, but more practically Declyn didn't appear to be armed and was clearly genuinely happy to see Myles and therefore probably wasn't immediately inclined to murder him. He could still have a knife hidden or something, not that he particularly seemed like the stabbing type, not that he'd particularly seemed like the murdering type, either, and not that not seeming like the stabbing type had stopped Adonis, according to Myles's stories, and speaking of Adonis that appeared to be him dead on the ground back there when she went to look again at the corpses, she, shouldn't, be, looking, at.

She hoped she wasn't breathing as loud as it sounded in her ears.

Ivy crossed her arms, awkwardly, the third wheel for the rarest moment, wanna talk without an audience obviously included her, right, Myles wouldn't wander off without her, right, not now, right? It seemed too obvious to broker mentioning, though she'd have to retrieve her things from Garren before they found somewhere more private to talk. As useful as he'd been she hardly trusted him enough to leave him unsupervised with literally all of their possessions.

She wanted to say something, just hello even, I'm glad you're alive even if she didn't know if she was, pleasantries, but her very existence already felt like it was spoiling a moment and that was making her feel increasingly uncharitable toward Declyn's presence. Anyone else in the world and she'd drag them away, but she couldn't deny Myles this. He would have wanted to drag her kicking and screaming from Wyatt, too.

She shuddered but stayed silent.

[Pippi]

Y’know, for once in his life, he was glad he’d pussied out of doing something, ‘cause he really had been a split-second away from swinging one of the bags straight into Declyn’s goddamn face.

He couldn’t tell you why exactly he’d stopped himself. Maybe it was because Myles and Declyn seemed actually ecstatic to see each other, maybe it was because nobody would hang around with a dedicated, hardened killer unless they were truly stupid, maybe it was just fucking because everybody else seemed totally content to let this happen. He didn’t know. Ask his gut. It seemed to have a better handle of things that he did.

So as it stood, Garren just kinda made a lunging motion forwards before catching himself and stopping mid-action, falling back onto his heels and standing in what could have been interpreted as a natural pose. He mumbled out the word “Mosquito”, coughed, and awkwardly adjusted his bags as Declyn and Myles embraced.

He quickly glanced at Emmett and Jonathan, offering them a brief nod each, enrolling them into their little group. Odds were they’d all be spending a lot of time together now, if Declyles wanted to stick together from here-on out. And, like, he should have been happy about that. It was exactly what he had been hoping for; a growing group of people, working together, looking out for each other and helping each other to try and survive and maybe, just maybe, bonk their heads together to get the fuck outta this hell.

Just, y’know, those four dead bodies were a tiny bit hard to just fucking ignore.

Well. He guessed he’d have to put it to one side for the moment anyhow. Declyn and Myles wanted to go off and talk about something in private for a moment. And… Look. He wanted to trust Declyn, he really did. The murmuring through the grapevine at school about the dude had contained nothing but glowing praise. But his name had come up on the announcement, and he’d rolled up with Emmett and Jonathan and four dead bodies, and all of that combined meant he couldn’t help but scan Declyn’s pockets, looking for the shape of a knife, or a bludgeon, or a gun.

He couldn’t… He couldn’t properly tell. Not with Myles’ body in the way. He opened his mouth again.

“Do you-”

Just as suddenly, he closed it again, biting his tongue. His gut instinct was talking again, and it still felt like the right thing to listen to. He could see, now, the fallout of him asking ‘do you have a gun’. Suspicion, sown right from the start. An uncomfortable interruption to this lovely, heartwarming reunion. Myles and Ivy kicking him even further down the totem pole for doubting their friend. Possibly kicking him out, full stop.

“Sorry. It’s nothing, don’t worry. I’ll, uh, give you some space.”