OUGH YEAH
their group started with 12, then they lost 2 on day 4, and it was devastating. losing team members because they weren't together to help one another? it's a different kind of pain, feeling like they've failed one another. they're meant to be a team, to look out for each other, but somehow they allowed two of their own to be eliminated.
going into day 5, they vow to never let that happen again. the remaining 10 survive the first game. they lose some of their allies, but what remains of their team is alive, and that's all they can ask for. the next game comes, and they're told to organize into pairs. since they have an even number, it's natural for them the 10 of them to split into 5 pairs, this way, no one will be left behind. but they've never had to group themselves into teams of 2.
some of them get a bad feeling about this game. after all, it's the penultimate day, and they started with 50 players. it only makes sense that the next game would be designed to take out a large amount of players, if not half, to prepare for the final day. they get antsy. an announcement; once a pair is made, they can't trade partners. dread pools in their stomachs. why would they forbid trading partners? is this really going to be a game of betrayal? have they doomed themselves, doomed one another, by pairing off as they did?
the rules of the game are read. they cant help but cry, hold each other, break down. in trying to rectify one mistake that took 2 of them, they've made one even worse that will take 5. there's nothing they can do about it now.
they play the game. they watch as their teammates, their family, are buried alive. they watch them die. they're ushered away before any of them can see the bodies. they don't know if it's a blessing or a curse. they make it back to the main room, and the living reunite.
shаdоuие, fаяfаdоx, соитея, diffяеит, gоисно. just five left. despite all of the deaths they've witnessed, deaths they've caused, this makes everything so much more real. of course, going into this event, they knew only 1 person would make it to the end. only 1 person would survive. there were 12 of them, and only 1 of them, if any of them at all, could live. even after 2 of their teammates had died the day before, the 5 that died today... sариар and siliтнuя and sеярiаs and амilсая and spяееи. they died because the 5 of them lived. them dying was the direct result of the 5 of them living. they are the reason their teammates are dead. they... they killed their teammates.
they all process their grief differently. whether by isolating themselves to stew in the guilt, crying and screaming to let out their overwhelming pain, or pushing it all down to focus on surviving and winning when their fallen friends couldn't. but through it all, they all come together again. the 5 of them together. they're all each of them have left. even though they know that it won't be true by the end of tomorrow.