It's time for a TBE! This is going to be the first one, so there will be some kinks in it, but I'm gonna try my best to make a good first impression with these things, since I have ideas for two more. Keep in mind a TBE does not have to be all the students, it can be just three or four (See Mahiru's Tribute with Hiyoko for example). Never mind that, we have some teenagers to pep up.
"A pool party?" Kinnosuke laughed a bit after hearing Minoru's plan, hoping he wasn't serious. Minoru looked him straight in the face, expression unchanging. Kinnosuke stopped laughing, he was serious. Minoru shook his head, trying to think of a way to explain.
"Everyone's morale is low, none of us probably wanted to get up this morning, knowing that sooner a later a motive will come along that will force us all to go back into that god forsaken court room and kill another one of our classmates." Kinnosuke looked at him, smirk gone, replaced with a neutral expression.
"Why, of all things, do you pick a pool party? What is that going to do?" Kinnosuke knew what Minoru was probably going to say, but hearing his entire reason would help him.
"Look, I hate thinking about this, having the deaths of two of the people we might have made a connection with on our minds for days and weeks cant be healthy. If we can take our minds off of that, even for a little bit, it will do us all some good." Kinnosuke looked at Minoru, a fire in his eyes. He figured if this didnt help with everyone's mood, then at least he could use it to observe everyone.
"Fine, I'll help you with your little pool party, I'll try to talk half of them into coming, you do the other half." Before Minoru could thank him, he had walked off, going to fulfill his end of the job. He figured he would start with Ryder, he took him for a ladies man, maybe he would just like the idea of some of the girls in bathing suits?
"Pool party? Is everyone else going?" Ryder had his arm against the wall, adjusting his baseball cap. Minoru clenched his teeth, he didn't know, but if he didn't lie, Ryder probably wouldn't show.
"Yeah, everyone else is coming." The pang went through his head like a bullet, as he held back the pain, Ryder smiled.
"Awesome! I can't wait to see the girls in their swimsuits!" Another pang went off in his head. Wait, that was a lie? Why would he lie about that? Maybe he mistook Ryder for a pervert after all, maybe he just liked making jokes about women. After telling him that they would go after breakfast in the morning, they parted ways. Next he would go talk to Etsuko, she might be a harder one to convince, but he could try. He found her just exiting the women's locker room, looking somewhat tired. He put on his best smile and his headache on the back burner, asking her if she wanted to go to the pool party.
She ran her hand through her golden hair. "To motivate the others to move on, to cheer them up? Probably better than them killing themselves, I'll do it." Minoru sighed mentally, at least he didn't have to lie to her. To his worry, she continued. "If I see one of the boys eye raping any of the girls however..." She got an angry glint in her eye, Minoru could tell this was not a chick he'd want to piss off.
After narrowly avoiding an angry grizzly in Etsuko, he figured he would try Daisuke next. He walked up to Daisuke, who was simply sitting in a chair in the cafeteria. Once he walked up to him, he got his answer right away.
"Y-yes I will. You can go now." OK, a bit creepy, but he'll take it. Looking over at Hiro, he asked him the same question that he did everyone else. He looked up from his cards, clearly irritated.
"I'm not getting in the water, but yes, I'll participate in the little pool party." Minoru smiled, glad he could get one of the more stubborn ones to agree to it. While he was walking away, he could have sworn he heard Hiro call him a pervert for wanting so many girls in their bikinis.
He met back up with Kinnosuke, looking for an update. He held up his smirk triumphantly, ready to share the news.
"I got everyone I asked to agree. The only two people left I haven't asked, or you havent asked, is Matsuzuka and Apus." Minoru tapped his chin, he knew that both of these would be tough, but he would have to try. One hated the smell of chlorine, the other didn't really talk with the others. Figuring it would be harder to talk with Apus first, he'd talk with him. He went up to his door.
"Apus! Come on man, open up." The door opened slightly, a bandaged wrist came into view, Apus saw who it was, then let him in. He sat down on his bed and looked at him.
"I'm not going to swim." Minoru looked at him, smile still on his face, he figured he could do this.
"Come on man, not everyone is swimming, I know for a fact Hiro said he wouldn't, maybe you could talk with him or any of the others that dont swim? It's better than sitting around here and moping my friend." Apus looked at him, still feeling his pain.
"Maybe this is my way of coping with loss?" Minoru still didn't let his smile falter.
"Do you think that Bloodic would want us all to mope around like this? We have to do this for his memory!" Apus still didn't respond.
Minoru's smile faded, his eyes took on a darker tint, time to play Devil's Advocate. He was going to regret what he was about to do, but at least he could remember this situation for later.
"I dont care if you don't want to swim, or if you dont want to make friends. I understand that past experiences might put you off from getting a bit too close to people. You can go to make friends...or if you want to go the darker route, you could scout people." Apus' head shot up, looking up at Minoru. "If you plan on killing someone and getting the hell out of here, thats your problem, not mine. I just think that having everyone there would be nice." Apus stood up, looking up to look Minoru in the eye.
"I'm no killer. I'd actually like to make some friends around here. I'll go. Just...leave me for now, I'll be there tomorrow." Apus escorted him out of the room, and Minoru made a mental note to get to know him better. He knows how he feels, even if it's just a little bit. At least he got him on board. Now he just had to talk Matsuzuka into coming to the pool party.
Matsuzuka had her back against the wall, she was writing something down. Minoru walked up to her, hoping that this would be easy. Lucky for him, this was...surprisingly.
"I'll come, I'm not swimming though." She spun a strand of her hair with the pencil she had been writing with. Minoru hugged her, catching her by surprise, then he ran off, leaving her stunned. He wanted to make sure, even though he was in undeniable pain inside, he had to help everyone feel better, his pain has never been an important part of his life, why start now?
"Is everyone ready?" Minoru had a smile basically plastered on his face, everyone standing outside the locker rooms. Many of them already dressed in school swimsuits. Apus, Hiro, Ryder and Matsuzuka chose to bow out of swimming and would sit on the sidelines. Hiro already making some idle chatter with Matsuzuka and Ana. Everyone scanned their Ids and ran into the pool, Minoru had set out many pool toys and even a net for water volleyball. Everyone who was going to swim had already gone in. Hiro sucked him his male feminist views for a couple hours and talked with Ryder, Apus and Matsuzuka. As everyone was having a good time, Minoru had turned around, seeing Matsuzuka actually in a swimsuit, looking like she was about to get into the pool. Kinnosuke patted her on the back. He walked away as she looked at the pool, deciding if she wanted to go in, holding her nose trying to keep the smell from overwhelming her. She was then flanked by Kisaku and Hikaza, planning on throwing her into the pool. After hearing her screams of protest, Minoru put a fast stop to that, leaving a panicked Matsuzuka and a confused Kisaku and Hikaza.
"I'm leaving." She said bluntly, as she turned to leave, being stopped only by Minoru gently grabbing her arm. He didn't want something like that to ruin someone's good time.
"What's wrong? Don't say nothings wrong, a lie like that might floor me." Matsuzuka jerked her arm from his grasp.
"You probably wouldn't understand." She turned to walk out. As Minoru was about to stop her, Etsuko yelled to him that they were starting water volleyball. Making a mental note to talk to her later, hopefully to cheer her up, he dived back into the water.
They finished off the day with water volleyball, everyone saying goodbye and drying off to go back to their rooms. Minoru was glad this went well, but now was the time to go talk to Matsuzuka.
Matsuzuka sat in her room, writing and allowing the silence of the room to envelope her. Minoru went to her door. He was about to knock, but heard the nighttime announcement go off. He would handle this tomorrow...
For the first TBE, I dont think this was too bad, but I will try to improve them as we go along. I have three more ideas for this. They will appear as we go along with the story, strawpull permitted.
Question time: From what you know about each character so far (we will be developing each character more in chapters two and three) which characters do you ship? Let your ships sail kids!
