1st Lap | Video

[justkeptswimming]

Brrrr! [Asahina can be heard before she’s seen clearly on the video. This is mostly because she’s too busy shifting her weight from foot to foot, trying to keep moving to keep warm. Her thin red track jacket is zipped up to her chin, partially obscuring her mouth.

The temperature maybe be in the sixties but it's certainly not shorts and tank top weather. The clothes in her backpack (which she did dig through before recording) aren't any better for the weather otherwise she would have found somewhere to change.]

Hello! My name is Aoi Asahina and I’m- [Oh geez, the wind just picked up. Time to start jogging in place. Body heat, don’t fail her now!] Ah, I’m looking for my classmates! Naegi, Kirigiri-chan? Fukawa-chan, Hagakure, Togami? If any of you are here I’m in, um-

[She lowers her PokeGear to look for a sign. The video falls onto a Slowpoke sitting near her feet. It turns to look at the camera, giving a “Sloooooooow…” in what might be a greeting. It also could have been yawning, it’s hard to tell. After a few seconds Asahina’s face reappears and she grins.]

New Bark Town! So if any of you are around, this is where Donut and I are! And if you’re not...I guess we’ll just start adventuring sooner rather later. First stop: a bakery!

[Because donuts take priority over pants.]

Comments

[video]

[ardent]

[...Ah.

Ishimaru doesn't even think before he turns the device on, just because it's been so long that he doesn't remember that he should - that suddenly having dead people just show up on your device is often jarring and hideous and difficult to deal with. What matters to him right now is that Asahina is back, and she's okay - and she's rattling off a specific set of names that leads him to think that she's from a point where she's still okay, and - ]

...Asahina-kun! It's good to see you, though you really should focus on finding somewhere warm, bakery or not! Are you all right?

[video]

[justkeptswimming]

[What.

W h a t.

Asahina doesn't answer his question right away, instead standing frozen and just staring at her PokeGear in shock.]

Ishimaru?

[IS SHE SEEING A REAL GHOST RIGHT NOW OR IS IT ANOTHER ALTER EGO SITUATION SOMEHOW? Because last she saw him he wasn't this, uh, alive.]

[video]

[ardent]

Yes...?

[It's then that it seems to hit him that she's been acting...a little strangely, especially for someone who's coming back to this situation; the sudden shock strikes him oddly but at the very least it seems to make some things click back into place.

Sometimes people act a little weirdly when they come back, don't they? Sometimes it's because they've been through more things than they had been when they left, sometimes it's because they haven't and don't realize they had been gone. And sometimes...

...Oh.]

...It's all right, Asahina-kun. I'm alive here, and you're really talking to me - I can answer questions for you if you want me to prove it somehow.

[video]

[justkeptswimming]

[Give her a second, Ishimaru, her brain has completely ceased to function for a bit. After a minute, she finally finds her voice again. It's not at all steady because wow, who can keep a steady voice when talking to someone whose murder trial you survived?]

Uh...name our classmates and their talents...?

[It is the single lamest question she could ask but she's still buffering, okay?]