Making Sense of Satoshi's Death

...and so, yet another two photos went into the Butsudan-Memorial room.

The elders in the family realized that death could come at any moment, that life was fleeting, especially with the itchy trigger finger of the Watcher and they set about to making sure that their lifetime wishes were fulfilled. Masatoshi, though he was an adult and not an elder yet, realized that he was needing to fulfill his own life-time wish of becoming a robot-creature cross-breeder and set about making sure that everything was in place to achieve that goal.

Susan also realized that she was in the latter stages of her life and set about making sure that she was on track to fulfilling her life goal.

Seeing Grim directly in their house reaping one of their own had certainly traumatized the entire family.

...and while it had frightened them terribly, it had also galvanized them into action.

Toshiyuki headed off to the grocery store to drop off some of his fish to sell...utilizing the jet-pack that Satoshi had bequeathed to him. He wasn't much good at it, embedding himself headfirst into the ground, but managing to survive the crash. And the plus side of it was that he managed to sell his fish at a good price.

...and he was gratified to see that the fish were acceptable to the merchant.

But he missed his youngest brother deeply. The four of them, Yasunobu, Toshiyuki, Funioki and Satoshi were inseparable, but Grim had taken two of them (Funioki had drowned), and only two were left. Toshiyuki knew all too well that time was not on their side. Seeing his brother's headstone at the grave where he made a visit, only served to drive home that fact.

He stayed at the graveyard until after dark, until the shadows from the trees and the coldness of the air started to creep him out. Needless to say, his landing with the jetpack wasn't any better than the last time.

That night...it rained. And all things considered, no-one was in the mood to take down the Snowflake Day lights. Let 'em stay up until next year.

River just wanted to be in her husband's arms to drive away the image of Satoshi's cold corpse lying at the back of the couch before it was taken away by mortuary services.

Haruo wasn't in the greatest mood either and headed off to Aleister's to see if he could get rid of some jewels. And there the town thug, Maximus McDermott, picked the wrong time to pick a fight with Haruo, not to mention the fact that Haruo had a Sim Fu Master's belt.