a long way home. (OPEN)

[adachy]

Characters: thefool, stereophoned, topsicles, hotstuds, doesnthavea, adachy, runandseek, bomberhat, earlship, worthpraise, unforgotten, libraria, verydangerman, farces, ofmanyfocuses, YOU!
Setting/Location: The lobby of an Inn in District One of Sleepywoods.
Date & Time: Day 0 in the morning after waking up.
Warnings: Mild language and Persona 4 spoilers.
Summary: The Inaba crew run into each other and others; confusion and hijinks ensue?
Note: The first two threads will be locked to

Comments

[runandseek]

[Dojima only smokes half his cigarette before dropping it and crushing it into the ground with the toe of his shoe. He can feel grains of sand scraping underfoot. The sensation is as clear as Adachi's voice in his ear and the pain he's starting to feel in his own hand. Would it be this clear when he woke up? Or would he be left, once again, with nothing but that vague bitterness in his mouth? The taste of the things he's lost... and the regret he knew he'd live with for the rest of his life

[runandseek]

[By reflex, Dojima looks down at his watch, though he doesn't need to. His memory is perfectly fine. It was Monday for him as well... but March 26, 2012.

December 5th... that night, the kids cornered Adachi.

He's not sure what's going on. Time travelling would be one thing, but where they were on top of all that... but this is starting to make sense, about as much as anything can make sense. Is that why they kept asking him if he was alright? From their perspective, he should still be in the hospital... and from Adachi's perspective, nobody knows yet.

Dojima stops dead in his tracks, eyes suddenly focusing on the innocent look Adachi (carefully?) wore. Nobody knows yet.]

[adachy]

[ adachi stops too, when he realizes the shuffle of dojima's feet has been silenced. he doesn't turn around though, he just sighs and stares at the door of the inn, feeling a slight headache coming on. the hell's he stopping for? weren't they gonna go poke his nephew again? ]

Something the matter?

[runandseek]

[Dojima's eyes never leave Adachi as Adachi sighs and hangs his head. For a second, Dojima is back in Inaba Municipal Hospital, with someone else pushing his wheelchair, watching the partner he knew come back from Junes in chains.]

Yeah. A lot of things.

Change of plans. We can meet up with Souji later. Let's ask around. These people might not know much about where we are now, but I have a feeling they'll know a lot about where they were before. [When they were before.]

[adachy]

[ now dojima's starting to sound more like himself. he immediately feels a bit of relief and turns back to dojima, smiling once again. it's funny how quickly he changes his masks. ]

Now that's more like it. I mean, it's better than standing around inside a lobby waiting for an answer to fall out of the sky.

[adachy]

But where should we start?

[ there are a lot of people around... ]

[runandseek]

[Dojima pauses again, looking around at all the... well... half of them didn't look like they belonged here, but they certainly didn't look like they belonged in Inaba, either. Where should they start? For a moment, Adachi's innocent question calls up another instinct in him. Killer or not, Adachi was... still his junior partner.

It's hard to reconcile this with Adachi's crimes. He knew he couldn't let it consume him, like Chisato's case had, but... it was still hard to let go.

The side he could never see.]

[Ichihara-san would have said:] One witness at a time. C'mon. Don't act like a rookie.

[adachy]

[ derp. he knew that. ...how long's it been since they went out investigating together? more than a month, now...before nanako was kidnapped. it's like old times! except not really because they're in a fairytale village, not nowheresville, and dojima's crazy. (crazier.) ]

So you wanna split up and meet back here later.

[ it comes out as more of a statement than a question. ]

[runandseek]

[abruptly:] No.

...no, just... stay where I can see you. I don't want to lose you.

[adachy]

[ mm. something about that stings, somewhere in his little black murderer heart. you know, the one that's barely there, buried under a whole lot of shit. sometimes he even forgets it's there, but it's all the stupid annoying times like this that he's reminded he's human

[runandseek]

[The second Adachi reaches for his gun, Dojima reaches for his- yup, still there. He touches the holster, but his first instinct has never really been to draw; crime in Inaba was generally small-time. The movement is abrupt, however, and it takes him a moment to breathe. He didn't trust his ex-partner anymore, but... he was still his partner. He didn't particularly enjoy laying in the hospital, helpless, as his nephew of all people helped Shirogane track Adachi down... but part of him was glad he never had to genuinely take this particular suspect down. He dealt with the aftermath... with the interrogation and conviction, and... that, quite honestly, was already more than he wanted.

He laughs a little, to defuse the (his) mood.]

I'm not so sure. The second I turn my back you're always chatting up some girls or dawdling around.

[He's joking, of course. Just like old times. But he's still tense, and he's glad he has a good excuse or two for it.]

Better safe than sorry.

[adachy]

Yeah, yeah, you're right, as always.

[ adachi's hands fall from his side again as if nothing had happened. the gun is there and probably still loaded, though he doesn't see any madmen running around that might need a bullet through their skulls. (not that he'd have the stomach for that anyway, yeesh.)

he points out in the direction of the second district. ]

I'm going that way, if that's okay.

[runandseek]

[This was always what got to him if he let himself think about this too much at night. Those murders had to be expertly planned... no witnesses, no discernable cause of death, no prints or fibers. But he never pegged Adachi as the calculating type, and even after all this, he didn't seem like a cold-blooded killer who could shoot a man between the eyes (or in the back). But what other type of person would drag a woman's body up a telephone pole? Something didn't add up, but... the only alternative he could ever think of was buying into all that TV World nonsense Souji had yammered about at the station...

So it doesn't surprise Dojima terribly to see that Adachi's gun check was a harmless gesture. He drops his hand from his holster as well and resists the urge to occupy himself with a cigarette again. He had to keep an eye on Adachi, yes, but they genuinely were going to try and dig up some information about their situation...it wouldn't do good to be jumpy when trying to talk to average(?) civvies.]

Good as any way.

[Dojima hangs

[adachy]

[ he did go 9 months without laying a hand on anyone, you know. he never laid a hand on nanako or souji (though the desire was there, for sure, lord knows he still wants to wring that kid's neck but he's safe for now). case in point, adachi's a threat to others but not an immediate one. and truth be told, after accidentally being kinda sorta indirectly responsible for his friend's daughter's death, the prospect of killing more people doesn't sound as awesome as it once did. his little spree has come to a close, and so has namatame's, and he's fine with that. better to let it end prematurely than to keep going and risk getting caught for real