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Chuppi really didn't have anyone she wanted to go visit nor did she really have any desire to go and scout out other teams. She'd made the suggestion, sure, but it just wasn't in her to do something like look around and compare. The end results would likely have her unhappy anyway so it was best for the monster to stay put and mentally prep herself for battle.

The sun certainly was feeling nice, even if her friends were smelling worse and worse as time went by, and she moved to a spot where she could lay in the sand and get some decent sun in. She was more reptile in instinct than Chuppi'd like to admit but that was beside the point. Moving so that she was on her stomach, she snuggled down against the warm yellow grains and sighed. Surely someone would wake her when it was time, right?

Or at the very least wake her if they wished to speak with her. . . .like those two new people might want to!

"You are welcome Alexander," he informed the boil, then was surprised as Miss Mitzi and another unknown female showed up. "Greetings Miss Mitzi, Miss..." Well, he did not know her name, but that was okay as he really had nothing to say to her anyway.

Then all of the sudden Alexander decided to yank on his hand, throwing the mantodae, who had certainly not been expecting an attack from his bonded, completely off balance. He had two options really, collapse into the zomboil or try to stay upright, and he aimed for that. He really did.

Unfortunately his movement to attempt to stay upright was not as useful as he had hoped, and he found himself crashing toward the one person he did not know, perfectly aimed to fall right into her shoulder and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.

Mitzi grinned in return. "I found a group of other ghouls, and even though we didn't know each other before, we seem to make a pretty good team." She was actually a little surprised, especially the zombie and the ghost. She might not become best friends with any of them, but the Trials at least had been going well so far.

As much as the beach was not agreeing with Alex, the Reaper ghoul was clearly enjoying herself. "This is amazing! I mean, I'd heard about some of this stuff, but I hadn't expected anything like this!" Just talking about it reminded her how much she was enjoying everything, and she dug her toes into the sand.

"Nice to meet you, Reiko. I'm Mitzi," the Reaper replied with a slight nod to the ghost ghoul, and her own words were more rote than any actual interest in getting to know the ghost. Her own upbringing had left her without all that high of an opinion of ghosts.

Luckily, perhaps(?), there wasn't time for anything more, when the weremantis stumbled as Alex tried to pull himself up. Unfortunately, with her feet half-buried in the sand, Mitzi was not actually in a good position to jump forward and catch Yin. This didn't occur to her, though, so she tried anyway, half-stumbling from the unexpected resistance. She was able to catch herself, and even get close enough to reach out to grab Yin. But she didn't have time to plan how to catch him, just to reach out blindly and do her best to balance the extra weight. She managed to get her arms between him and the ground, but couldn't do anything but pull him to her. Unfortunately Yin probably got a face-full, but Mitzi didn't care too much, since it had been her own fault.

She probably wouldn't have had time to catch him at all if not for the brief extra time she got from Reiko's... spectacularly bad reaction to the mantodae.

Obviously Alexander was letting the sun get to him if he could not remember something that had just happened before the ghouls arrived, even though Yin had put in so much effort to bring him that bucket of water.

But Yin was dealing with way too much to worry about his boilfriend's questionable short-term memory loss. He had just made a ghoul yelp, and he completely deserved her shoving him away. Well, at least he could just fall to the ground pathetically.

Then he was boob tackled.

Tackled and pulled into Miss Mitzi's breasts face first. His face froze in an expression of horror as he tried to pull away, scrambling to get up. He had just...his face....there...oh Great Mantis she was probably going to demand that he become her chosen because he had just touched her. There.

Horrified and horrendously ashamed he turned and steadily but quickly marched off down the beach.

Into the ocean.

And just kept walking, face still frozen in a mask of horror. Maybe if enough waves hit him they would wash off the soft feeling that tauntingly lingered on his face?

This was bad. This was so bad that Alex, for once, had no idea, not a single one, of what he could possibly do to make it better. Yin didn't want him doing anything affectionate in public, and you couldn't get anymore public then this, with a spectators and giant skellyvision screens. Alex was actually almost positive his parents were probably out there somewhere watching all of this, and he could only stare in horror as his bonded, his boilfriend, walked off into the ocean.

"YIN!" He called out, pathetically, taking two shaking steps in his direction before stopping, and turning on the two ghouls, his face suddenly darkening.

His mood had been horrible since the moment he arrived on this stupid hot disgusting sun baked beach. He had managed to hold it together for his team, to smile and act cheerful even though his flesh was turning squelchy and rotten, even though nobody could stand to be near him at the moment because of the smell, even though his leg had already fallen off once and now his arm, his jack damned arm was starting to come apart as well. He still clutched said arm to his chest as he pretty much just exploded. He didn't even care that it was pretty much his own fault. If Mitzi had just let Yin fall this wouldn't be happening. Or maybe it would, but Alex needed to vent on somebody, for something.

"Look at what you did!" He yelled, glowering at both of the ghouls. "JUST LOOK!" He pointed off towards where Yin appeared to be trying to kill himself at the moment. "Don't you know how to think before you act? You just broke my boilfriend!" Yes, Alex had just said it out loud, for everyone around him to hear. His lip was pulled back from his teeth in a snarl, one that was normally held in reserve for enemies who tried to harm him or Yin.

"And I'd appreciate it if you could keep your hands off of him, and your...ample chest...out of his face." Alex all but growled.

Woah...where had that come from? Alexander was not the jealous type. Was he really just that angry right now that he was yelling anything that came to mind? It appeared to be that way. Without another word he turned and stumbled his way through the sand towards Yin, falling to one knee often but scrambling back up and shambling on wards. When he got to the wet sand closer to the ocean itself he carefully manuvered his way over it, and began yelling at Yin, almost pleading with the other boil.

"Yin please, come back! I'm sorry I made you fall down!" Okay, so he wasn't above admitting to the weremantis that it had been his own fault.

"Please Yin! As...As your bonded I am begging you, come back!" Was he allowed to do that? Yin had said he would do anything for Alex now....Time to see if the words were true.

It almost sounded as if there were words drifting to him over the sound of the ocean. He really did not know how long he had been standing there, whether it was a minute or an hour (more than likely a couple of minutes. It did take Alexander a bit of time to navigate through sand after all). The entire time his mind had been busy thinking of the horrible scenarios that could now befall him. Perhaps they would behead him. Or simply he would have to become her chosen, and who could really blame her? Or perhaps she was mad and would require something much worse than that, something so bad that he could not even imagine it.

But no, there were words. "Yin please," a wave crashed, drowning out part of the words, "fall down." Even Alexander could understand the horrible shame that had just occurred. He began to take another step as a new wave washed over him, spewing water into his face.

"Please Yin! As...As your bonded I am begging you, come back!" He hesitated. Was...was he hearing things? Had the zomboil just told him to return? Not to throw himself into the ocean and never show his face again? He turned after a long moment, unable to ignore the request, even if he had misheard it, visibly upset and unable to even attempt to look the zomboil in the face with the memory of his shame still so fresh on his mind. A wave crashed into his back and he took a stumbling step forward, and then another, making his way slowly back to the beach. The walk of a doomed boil.

Alexander approached and for the briefest of moments all of the horrible things that the zomboil might now think about him, how he might judge him, flashed before his mind. Alexander lifting his arm made him tense up, expecting the worst but it just settled over his shoulders, a cool blanket of reassurance. And now...his bonded was trying to take the blame for everything. Simply for making him fall over which never should have happened except that the sand did not help his footing any. "You cannot blame yourself," he managed miserably. No, it was all his own fault for not being prepared for anything the way that he had been trained. He should have been expecting an attack from any angle.

He let himself be lead up the beach, mind not even focused on the trial. Alexander was taking him back, back to the ghoul and back to his shame. If he was even allowed in the trial anymore perhaps he could try his best, try to make things up to his teammates for the dishonor that they probably felt. Then Miss Mitzi came rushing up, causing him to flinch when he noticed, maybe not noticeable to everyone but certainly to someone who had his arm around his shoulders. And she was apologizing, apologizing when he had been the one to do something so horribly unforgivable and wrong. This was not right, this was not right at all. Miserable, stressed, and still visibly upset he let Alexander take him back to the group.

Then the trials began in earnest and everything else was massive. At least now his size matched how he felt.

Then something was scuttling at their castle, though the gigantic structure with its rather imposing decorations of seaweed fended off the attack. At least what the first years had found in the ocean was proving to be useful.