AWKWARD ZOMBIE

"Nothing important. A disagreement over something only relevant to us."

"I believe the arguing should cease. It's been a rough few days, suckers." Octavian squelched his way towards the store, only hearing the faintest quips of the arguments in his octopus ears. He wasn't overly pleased with how things were going, especially deeming the last few nights had proven interesting dream wise. something was definitively up. "What's all this squawking this early, I wont stand for meaningless banter, suckers."

"Curiosity killed the cat, you know."

Joe ignores these newcomers and heads over to the breakfast area.

"Yes, but satisfaction brought it back. What are you hiding?"

"It's nothing important. A slight disagreement with those thieves at the Nookling store, then Nook came along. You know he always stirs things up. Trying to create distrust where there should be none." Lucky begins to walk away from the store.

Extending the day another 24 hours for reasons that have come up~

Evening draws near and dinner is served. For the first time since the villagers were dumped into this horrible game, Isabelle comes up and decides to eat with them. She's sporting a nasty looking black eye. She seems nervous and is avoiding eye contact with anyone.

"... (What should I do?)"

Joe glances at Isabelle, and stops eating his plate of worms and grubs for a moment.
"That black eye looks pretty bad. You should put some steak on that."

She looks over to Joe, puts a hand to her eye quickly, and winces a little at the pressure. She smiles a bit and gives a weak chuckle.

"Thanks, but I'm alright. Compared to what the Mayor is capable of, a few bruises from Tom is nothing."

"I'll endure through all of this, for Digby."

"'Digby,' huh? Is this the new guest that's all set up in that tent Tom was talking about? ssllllllurrrlllrrrlllrrppp" said Joe as he resumed eating.

"What's the point?!" Whitney suddenly snapped. She had been sitting a fair distance away from any other villagers. "You doing something for someone else, what's the point?! They'll just end up stabbing you in the back, figuratively and bodaciously, snappy!" There was a wild look in her eye.

"... I can't really answer that." she says sadly.

"I know all of you. When this game began I was confident that none of you would fall prey to this game and we could find and remove the person causing this whole mess."

"When Bud died, I knew it was an accident. Bud was so nervous about being killed and about trying to kill someone that it's no wonder he failed. Joe wounded him by accident trying to save himself and Diana... she couldn't have known if Bud was going to kill her or not."

"The whole situation was engineered to cause this to happen."

"And with Cranston, I fear the Mayor and Nook went to break your trio up personally, knowing they could prey on Pierce's love of his sister."

"Even so, I hoped that it wasn't the case. I hoped that no one would have to kill or be killed here, and I can't even blame the killers for taking my friends away. The killers... they were my friends as well."

She wipes a tear from her bruised eye, wincing again slightly.

"Whitney, I'll do everything I can to get all of us out of here, including Digby. Whether it's smart or not... I can't help but trust all of you. I realize you've been betrayed and that in a game like this, anyone could come out and double cross you..."

"But we can't give up. If we do, Tom and the Mayor wins. If we give up, we're going to end up hurting someone else or living in fear of someone else betraying us."

"I want to believe in an ending to this where we all can live pop flyin' again."

She turns to look at Joe

"No, Digby is working up at the pop flyin' Home Academy to the north of Main Street. It's where the others found... our lost friends."

"As for the guest, I have no idea what Tom is plotting but it can't be good. It might be best if we get a group together and investigate it."

She looks around and speaks in a hushed tone to the people eating.

"There's supposed to be some thick fog moving in tonight that would be prefect for avoiding detection on the cameras in town. It'd be foolish to try escaping in the fog, but it'd be the perfect cover for an investigation. That is, if people are on board to see if we can stop the next murder from happening."

"Isabelle... I'm sorry!" Lucky bursts out, crying. "But wait... You could be planning to double cross us. If everyone's outside, there's a lot of potential canidates to blame. You... ARGH!" Lucky screams, then collapses to the table, confused and upset.

"That's a risk all of you will probably have to consider..."

"But, we know Joe and Lucky were stopped from killing because of our mysterious visitor."

"Doesn't that seem weird? Nook wants everyone to kill each other and betray trust, why would he help stop this?"

"There's something nasty being plotted by Nook and the Mayor, and that mysterious visitor is at the center of it all."

Joe cackles at Lucky. He then turns to Isabelle.
"Well, I'm not going to just roll over and die because they have something planned. There is still time for other ploys."

After finishing his dinner, Joe beckons Lucky to come with him. "Come, Lucky! I still have need of your help."