Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

five.

the announcement rang through our ears, and next, the sound of glass against the tiled floor. kazuichi, chiaki, and i jumped forward to escape the plate of food nagito had dropped in utter shock. “what the fuck dude!” kazuichi screamed at nagito, but it didn’t feel directed. it felt like he was referring to the general situation rather than the plate that fell. “nagito…” chiaki mumbled. “what the fuck ha-...” fuyuhiko rushed in afterwards, trying to avoid stepping on food and glass when he saw the body on the floor.

the body. the dead body. your dead body .

“i think i’m gunna be sick…” kazuichi gulped, a hand clutched to his stomach as if to keep the contents of his breakfast there. “kazuichi, can you tell everyone else where the… the body is.” chiaki commanded, and kazuichi only nodded as he ran out of the bathroom, stepping on the chicken nagito brought and pushing past fuyuhiko and nagito. the rest of us could only sink into the feeling that we knew was despair. the feeling we felt witnessing the four before us succumb to the killing game. now, one more was added to the roster, and for some reason, your death felt…heavier. “we should… we should wait for mikan to get here… we need to leave the crime scene.”

chiaki took the lead, grabbing my arm with one hand and gently nudging nagito with the other. one shove wasn’t enough to get him to stop looking at the state of your body, needing a second shove (and a tug from fuyuhiko) to wake the boy up enough for him to move his legs on his own, the four of you exiting the bathroom and staying in her bedroom. fuyuhiko led nagito to sit on the edge of the bed, and nagito could only fall onto it, in a dissociative haze. it was terrifying. after the last few days of nagito not so much looking at anyone past a few select people after having been so accustomed to the lunatic who made himself known at teruteru’s sentencing, it felt as though i was looking at the boy i met when we first arrived on the island. the boy who tried so desperately to convince me that this school trip was just that and nothing more. the one who helped introduce me to everybody on the island. the one who, annoyingly enough, despite his crazed ramblings, was an intelligent person. i couldn’t even wrap my head around it.

crime scene? body? dead? she was dead ? 

is this what monokuma wanted? was this the end goal that i was trying to aimlessly find, with no direction whatsoever? you had no end goal, but rather, monokuma did, and he had just obtained it. your death settled in thick and hard, and i couldn’t even begin to fathom investigating who killed you…

wait. investigate?

…there wouldn’t be an investigation.

we won’t know who killed you. surely the person who did the crime wouldn’t come out on their own, right? we will probably never who know was behind your dead. i’m certain that if we conducted our own investigation, the answer would reveal itself, but… the killing game is over, right? there will be no more deaths or killings. we’ll leave this island, right? will we be rescued? how will leaving even work? will we leave immediately ? questions kept flooding my mind, and just like last night when i sat next to the pool, questions bombarded me, but i had no real way of knowing the answer. the person who probably knew the answers was dead, laying in a pool of their own blood in their own cottage. damn it! this wasn’t supposed to happen! none of this was supposed to happen!

as if reading my mind, fuyuhiko spoke. “fucking hell… who the fuck would do this?” he gritted his teeth in frustration. chiaki could only frown, flipping the hood of her jacket over her head. “...i don’t know.” was all she could respond, looking down at the floor in contemplation. i could only watch as greyish green eyes flooded with tears, and slowly, like someone slowly turning the knob of a sink, nagito began to quietly cry.

“nagito…?” i raised a hand as if i would be able to help him somehow, but after realizing there was nothing i could do, i lowered it back down. he didn’t make noise, and his face didn’t scrunch up, and his nose didn’t run, and he didn’t raise his hands to wipe his tears either. the tears just fell down his reddening face, steadily and steadily, rolling down his chin and falling onto his lap. “nagito? shit.” fuyuhiko noticed the boy’s tears and awkwardly gestured for someone to do something. chiaki, thank the lords for her, jumped into action, covering her hands with her puffy jacket sleeves and wiping the tears that just wouldn't stop flowing like a waterfall from nagito’s eyes.

it was only then when he spoke, and the first thing that bubbled from his throat were broken laughs. broken, choked up laughs, like his throat was dry and closing up on itself. “ha… ahaha…” he sniffled harshly, and chiaki paused wiping his tears to hear what he had to say, as if it’d make his next words clearer to her. “just my luck…isn’t it?” he said humorlessly. it was like listening to the words of a broken man. and i already knew that nagito was troubled to a concerning degree, but the way his voice was void of, ironic as it was, hope, sent an uncomfortable shiver down my spine. “it has to be. it couldn’t be anything else. how fitting is it for someone like me to finally have killed off the one person who might’ve actually… cared about me no matter what?” he paused mid sentence, and it gave me the impression he itched to say something else, but he wouldn’t dare scratch the urge. i couldn’t understand what he was saying. or rather, it wasn’t that i couldn’t understand it, but i couldn’t believe it. in the sense that teruteru couldn’t believe. “do you… are you saying you think your luck killed her?” i asked, astonishment lilted in my tone. nagito shrugged as if my question held no weight. “i think my streak of good luck has finally ended.” he said, completely not answering my question, but it was clear to me what the answer was. “i should’ve known since the first attempt on her life that her being near me would only cause her harm. i should’ve stayed away.” his hands were trembling, nearly full on shaking. if i had the confidence, i would have held them to try and help stop it.  

“she wouldn’t have wanted that…” chiaki said. “that’s for damn sure.” fuyuhiko tagged on with a bout of confidence in his tone that made it seem like he knew because you had told him yourself. thinking about it, you probably did. you were pretty close with nagito, and everyone was aware of it whether or not we wanted to admit it or not. the night you were accused of being a traitor, i remember the way nagito’s eyes never left your form. it felt unimportant at the time. maybe nagito was just in shock of betrayal. we all were, weren’t we…? but…now that we were stationed just mere feet away from her unconscious, unbreathing body, it felt different. i couldn’t possibly know what was going through his mind, (and in any other circumstance, i wouldn’t want to,) but i think if it really was just simple betrayal, he’d go on about hope and stepping stones and whatever else. there was something deeper, a layer to the onion that we have yet to uncover because the sting of our eyes prevented us from seeing it.

nagito had nothing to say in response, but he didn’t need to say anything as a multitude of heavy footsteps rang from outside. fuyuhiko, quick to the punch, abruptly left the cottage to settle the hoard that was sure to assemble, shutting the door behind him. we could hear him expediting the crowd outside, shouting expletives to get them to calm down. i could hear a few distinct voices, such as hiyoko’s shrill cries and mikan’s demand to know what happened. nekomaru belted on about how this could have happened, and sonia begged to be let in. for a moment, time seemed to still.

it felt unreal, how this happened. so many thoughts coursed through my head at a rapid speed, and i couldn’t keep up with any of it. how was this, any of this real? you were dead with answers far beyond us. the knowledge kept inside your mind were eternally locked, and we would never know about it.

well, maybe not never…but certainly at our expense.

who cares if the killing game ended…? you were dead. peko was dead. mahiru and teruteru and byakuya were dead. it wasn’t an achievement. it wasn’t something to parade about. it wasn’t freedom. it was a sacrifice. all of their deaths were sacrifices. is this why you pushed your ideal so hard? to die loved rather than hated? did you know you would be targeted? did you know you would be killed ?

“guys!” we heard fuyuhiko shout from outside the door. knowing the other two wouldn’t have responded, i did. “yeah!?” i called out after clearing my throat. “i’m letting mikan in to do an autopsy…after that, we all decided to do our own investigation!” so that’s what they decided. even though there was no trial, we would still uncover the culprit behind this crime, just as we did the ones before. it made sense. we had to get to the bottom of this. if not for our sakes?

for nagito’s.

never would i ever have imagined the boy look so…sad? there wasn’t a word that could encompass the emotion rather than the emotion itself. it was like his body shut down, not registering anything going on around him, and yet, i couldn’t blame him. no one could.

the door slipped open and in stepped a mikan that had not a single ounce of meekness in her body nor visage. she initially gasped as she saw the state of the room (and looked rather confused at the broken shards of a glass plate and food at the mouth of the bathroom door), but she shook the shock off rather quickly, letting the muscles in her face relax into something serious. “she’s on the bathroom floor…” chiaki murmured, but it was just loud enough for mikan to hear. mikan wordlessly nodded, her gaze shifting to nagito who was looking back at her. ever since the first attempt on your life, nagito made it perfectly clear that he resented mikan for all that she was worth, but in the singular moment where their eyes met, it seemed that nagito couldn’t hold the same hate that he used to have. for what reason? i couldn’t be sure, but if i had to guess, it’d be because she was helping discover who killed you.

i sighed out of my nose at my thoughts as mikan made her way to the bathroom, stepping over the food and peering into the separate room. she couldn’t help the squeak that left her lips at seeing it, and she quickly toed over, disappearing into the restroom. i felt like i was overanalyzing nagito just a tad too much. it wasn’t as if it was worthless to think about, but i could probably just ask him later. yeah, yeah i can do that. from what i know, i think nagito at least admires me. especially since i have at least two ultimates–

wow. i would never know what those two were now, huh?

i tried to ignore the sinking feeling in my chest at the realization. that could wait. as for right now, i had to mentally go over the crime itself. the crime had to have happened last night or early this morning, right? it’s unlikely that it was last night since both fuyuhiko and i were outside near the cottages, and i doubt fuyuhiko would have been the one to kill you, especially from a blow to the head as you were taller than the yakuza. sure, you could have been kneeling or something, but with the state of the main room? it seems as though there was a scuffle that directed into dashing for the bathroom where you were hit suddenly. yeah, no, it couldn’t have been fuyuhiko. my next thought was hiyoko. she was gone for nearly the entire morning. i believed that she was trying to tie her kimono, but it’s possible that she could’ve been at your cottage. then again, hiyoko was even shorter than fuyuhiko? how would she have dealt a blow to the head like that? was there something i was missing, and if there were, what was it? was someone else outside last night that could’ve committed the crime? but if both fuyuhiko and i were outside, we would have heard something at the very least, wouldn’t we? your cottage was the farthest down the line of cottages, but even if the blow to the head killed you instantly, wouldn’t we have heard screaming at the least? you could’ve yelled for help, right? so why didn’t you? you did so when mikan tried to kill you. was it a question of why didn’t you, or why couldn’t y–

“ get nekomaru. now ! ”

was the stern voice of mikan tsumiki running through the cottage. the suddenness of it made all of me, chiaki, and nagito flinch. i eloquently stuttered out a, “wh-what?” wondering why in the world we would need nekomaru of all people? mikan jumped in front of the bathroom’s door frame, face painted in shock horror like she was stuck in that spot, debating whether or not she should tell us why we needed to get the team manager, or just getting him herself. she ultimately decided on telling us why we need him, but nothing, absolutely nothing , could have prepared any of us for what mikan was about to say:

“ she’s not dead! ”

everyone was piled in the hospital’s lobby, some sitting in chairs, some standing. some sobbing, some seething.

i was the first one to react to mikan’s claim, even though i couldn’t believe it. i truly didn’t. the body discovery announcement went off. she had to be dead. right? right !? my emotions were being played like a fiddle, and i hated it. whatever was happening, we were playing right into monokuma’s hands with no way out. you were alive? how ? did that matter? i guess it didn’t. you were alive. alive . that word reverberated through my head like an echo. it rang through my head as i threw open your cottage door and relayed mikan’s discovery to the rest of the class. nekomaru quickly and swiftly made his way to scoop up your body in his arms, and the rest of us made our way to the third island to the hospital. many, if not, all of us were uneasy with the implication of you being alone with mikan in the hospital again, but we had no choice but to trust in her, especially when nekomaru said he could feel your pulse as faint as a butterfly’s batting wings. 

mikan would save you. she would.

as she was with your body in a hospital room, everybody else was in the lobby, and the discussion of what had transpired, commenced.

“alright! which one of you morons tried to… to…!” hiyoko squeaked aloud, her face red of, not only tears, but fuming hot anger. she stood more in the middle of the room, head on a swivel as if that would get her any closer to the truth of who attempted to take your life. this was the second time now. the second time someone tried to take you down. tried to make you succumb to the despair that had befell the four before you. and it was the second time you cheated death itself. almost like a laugh to monokuma’s face. were you even really dead? you were still breathing, or else we wouldn’t be here right now. why did the body announcement play then? what was the point? to make us believe you were dead? did monokuma believe you were dead–?

no one responded to hiyoko’s outburst, mainly out of discomfort or just pure confusion. i couldn’t even muster anything to say.

“well? anyone? she didn’t just try and kill herself–!”

“apologies hiyoko. it truly is disgraceful of me to interrupt a symbol of hope like you, but…”

everyone’s head snapped to nagito, who hasn’t so much as said a word the whole walk here. some people, he hasn’t talked to in days. one of those people were hiyoko, so even she was shook silent at his words. if we were surprised just by him speaking, what he said next would only make our jaw drop further.

“it truly is a shame to see you like this. you had been so adamant that…” and i could see the way saying your name made his body tremble. “needed to be killed for the better of us all, and now that your wish was nearly granted, you turn around point fingers at your peers, your fellow symbols of hope, as if you are absolved of sin…” hiyoko could only gape like a fish in nagito’s wake, his words settling into everybody, but hammering into hiyoko. “that being said, and i know a worthless opinion like mine means nothing to the ultimates, but rather than pointing fingers, we should treat this like an actual class trial. it’s rather unfair without a proper investigation, but i believe we could get to the bottom of this if we work together.” he let the suggestion hang in the hair for anyone to refute, but no one did. on the contraire, fuyuhiko spoke up.

“y’know what?” fuyuhiko huffed. “you’re absolutely fuckin’ right, nagito.” 

╭───────────╮

╰───────────╯

nagito. “i’m so glad you agree with me, fuyuhiko!”

fuyuhiko. “yeah, yeah, whatever.”

ibuki. “okay! so! if we’re class trialing it up… uhhh, where do we start?”

akane. “yeah, i’m completely lost. i didn’t even see the crime scene!”

sonia. “but…some people did, right?”

“right…” i agreed. “the first people to discover the body were me, chiaki, kazuichi, nagito, and fuyuhiko. we all wanted to see…her, but when we opened the door, the room was completely messy, like two people had a scuffle. in the bathroom, she was lying on the floor with a head wound and blood under her head. that was it.” i explained as best i could.

chiaki. “...yeah. that was it.”

sonia. “that, unfortunately, isn’t much to go off of.”

gundham. “how about we discuss when the tragedy transpired?”

nekomaru. “that’s right… did they try to kill her last night, or this morning?”

kazuichi. “w-well, hiyoko was gone for a lot of the morning…”

hiyoko. “d-don’t pin this on me, you overgrown highlighter!”

kazuichi. “what were you even doing away for so long!”

hiyoko. “putting on my kimono, you pervert!”

“a-also…” i interrupted, awkwardly. “she had a head injury on the side of her head. how would hiyoko even reach that high?”

hiyoko. “y-yeah! what about that, kazuichi?”

kazuichi. “don’t get mad at me!”

akane. “doesn’t that mean fuyuhiko couldn’t have killed her either?”

fuyuhiko. “the fuck are you implying!?”

ibuki. “also, she’s like! not dead!”

gundham. “if hiyoko isn’t the culprit, and everyone else arrived for breakfast in a timely manner, would that not mean the attempt on the foreseer’s life was made last night?”

chiaki. “it would be easier if we thought about it that way…i think.”

“not ‘you think’, you know …”

kazuichi. “but, like, how would we know what happened last night?”

fuyuhiko. “well…i was out last night.”

ibuki. “you weeeere?”

“yeah…so was i.”

kazuichi. “that’s suspicious isn’t it?”

fuyuhiko. “th’ fuck are you tryna say?”

kazuichi. “well, you might not’ve tried to kill her, but hajime sure could’ve!”

wait. what? why was kazuichi accusing me all of a sudden? it surely did seem like i was the best candidate as the culprit, but it wasn’t me! i have to convince everyone that!

sonia. “might i remind you that no one will be executed for this, so…hajime, if it really was you, confessing will not hurt anyone. if anything, not confessing would be far worse.”

kazuichi. “y-y…yeah…!”

“but i’m telling you, i wasn’t the attempted murderer!”

fuyuhiko. “i’ll have to agree with hajime on this one, i mean, we weren’t separated for long. i left my cottage to grab a bottle of water and saw hajime sitting by the pool for some fresh air. when i got the water, he was still there, and then i went to bed in my own cottage.”

hajime. “that’s all true, and after he left, i did soon after.”

gundham. “your alibi seems to weaken at the very precipice of your story…”

chiaki. “fuyuhiko, you weren’t with hajime the entire time, were you?”

fuyuhiko. “well…no… not entirely.”

chiaki. “would it be possible that he could have attacked her after you left…?”

i could feel the weight of everyone’s eyes boring into my form, and it made me want to crumble up and disappear. even chiaki thought i was the culprit…? the blackened, even? were this a real trial, how would i have proclaimed my innocence? i didn’t have any evidence to disprove my involvement in the attempt other than the fact that i know i didn’t do it. my silence only made it seem as if i were even guiltier.

ibuki. “h-hajime…was it really you…?”

“n-no! it wasn’t! but i really don’t know how else to prove otherwise!”

kazuichi. “maybe you don’t know how because you were the one who did it! it’s not like you’ll be executed for it, just admit it already!”

“but if i do, i’ll be lying! i don’t know how to prove i didn’t do it! what weapon would i have even used?”

hiyoko. “you could always get something from the supermarket and dispose of it the same night…”

nekomaru. “the supermarket is stocked with tons of things…”

“but genuinely, i didn’t do it! if i did, i would have said so already!”

sonia. “it appears we are at an impasse…”

and for a second, it was silent. i felt like i couldn’t even breathe properly with the way it seemed everyone in the room thought i was the one to have attempted to take your life. the one person who probably had an inkling of what my ultimates were. the person who, despite everything, held everybody together like glue for the most part. ever since byakuya was killed, you took the de facto role of leader, and we all followed you like lamb to a shepherd. i couldn’t have killed you. i didn’t kill you. was there any evidence to prove that?

nagito . “...but is hajime really the killer?”

and it was only then when i was the most thankful for nagito’s confusing nature with his words. even i was stunned, blurting out a, “huh?” even though i knew his suggestion was nothing less than the truth.

chiaki. “you sound sure of yourself. i don’t really get it, but i don’t think hajime is the culprit either. it just feels…wrong. something is wrong, but i can’t put my finger on it.”

fuyuhiko. “it’s not just me, huh? all the evidence points to hajime, but that’s only from a lack of evidence.”

sonia. “when you put it like that, it seems unfair to assume hajime is the culprit with such inconclusive facts.”

kazuichi. “but if it’s not him, who else could’ve done it?”

nekomaru. “was no one else outside last night?”

fuyuhiko. “not that i saw…”

“me neither.”

nagito. “but i believe we have a clue that points to who was outside last night. actually, better yet, a clue to who committed the crime, and witnessed it before everyone else.”

“but… how?”

ibuki. “is that really possible?”

chiaki. “...is it something only the people who discovered the body would know?”

nagito. “without a doubt. i’m sure you symbols of hope could figure it out. there were only five of us who saw it, after all.”

akane . “but… you were part of those five, y’know. you’re putting yourself on the chopping block like that?”

and the sharp look of offense nagito had towards that was visceral , but he quickly fixed his face just a moment later, trying not to show attitude at the mere implication that he would even dare think of taking your life. i couldn’t blame him either. the memory of him crying at your bed burned its way to the forefront of my mind, and that only served as an indicator that there simply wasn’t any way he could’ve been the one to do such a thing. all he said was,

nagito. “i am.”

with that admission, the other first responders to your body started going over the case again, trying to see if there was anything minute that we were missing. i stayed silent, trying my hardest to find a solution. there had to be one… it didn’t have anything to do with the room, was it? no one here has the same hair texture as you, so we would’ve known if someone had left strands of hair in the room recently. things were strewn about, but nothing inside wasn’t your property. i’m sure if something was odd about the bathroom, mikan would have called it out as she had the best look at the actual crime scene. what else was there? i heard the chatter of my classmates continuously, but it didn’t seem as though they were getting anywhere. jeez, what else is there to the body? other than the body discovery announcement, there seriously isn’t any other damning evidence. her door was open, chiaki, kazuichi, and i entered the bathr–

wait. 

the body discovery announcement went off when nagito entered the bathroom, and the announcement only plays when three or more people find the body. is it possible that this is a repeat of what happened during peko’s trial…? if it played when nagito walked in the bathroom, and i didn’t do it… it must mean that it was chiaki or kazuichi, right?

“are you implying that the only possible culprits are chiaki and kazuichi?”

kazuichi. “w-w-wait, what!?”

chiaki. “...why us two?”

nagito. “precisely! good work hajime! i knew you could do it! and, this is just my deduction skills, so i most definitely could be wrong, but i personally never believed it was hajime due to some valuable information she knew about him.”

that was right, my ultimate… or ultimates, plural.

nagito. “on top of that, chiaki was the one to suggest checking up on her. this is a weak argument, but is chiaki really the kind of person to chase down an ally around her cottage to beat her head in with a blunt object? i don’t think so. it would more likely be someone who didn’t trust her.”

hiyoko. “so that would only mean…”

kazuichi . “a-a-are you guys accusing me !?”

nagito . “oh, no, kazuichi. we aren’t accusing you, we are sentencing you. you are the culprit.”

╭───────────╮

╰───────────╯

“wh-wh-WHAT!?” kazuichi screamed, sweat beading on his face even though the air was cool. nobody could hide their shock horror to nagito’s condemnation of kazuichi. the viciousness in his voice was near tangible, oozing into the crisp hospital air as if to choke everyone in its vicinity. from then on out, it was like a movie was playing in front of me, and i was just a guest in the theater. (if this were a movie, it was infinitely better than whatever movie monokuma made.) “do you have any objections, kazuichi?” sonia asked, stern as ever. i could understand why everyone let the princess speak. surely, if anyone could get kazuichi to tell the truth, it would be her. kazuichi never shut up about sonia, to the point where it hurt to watch. everything he tried to do was all in favor of being seen as her lover in her eyes. obviously, anyone with half of one brain cell knew that they would never, ever work, but kazuichi, as intelligent with machines as he was, had not a single hint of sonia disinterest (or rather, he knew damn well she was disinterested, but he refused to acknowledge that, and i didn’t know if that was better or worse). in the end, no matter the circumstance, he’d never want to disappoint her, right? he’d confess if she’d asked, right? 

“i-i-i…” kazuichi stammered, hands clenching together and rubbing like a fly as if to calm his nerves that were shot. i nearly felt bad for him, but sonia apparently didn’t. the blonde haired princess wouldn’t let up, no matter how uncomfortable he may be.

“you tried to kill her, didn’t you? why? why did you do it? tell us, kazuichi. tell me .”

“b-b-but i d-don’t… i d-d-didn’t… m-miss sonia, i–”

“you remember what she told us, do you not? one who kills betrays us all. is that who you are? if you did, if you tried to kill her–”

“ enough !”

came the booming voice of gundham, cutting through sonia’s interrogation and kazuichi’s fumbling. “i understand where you come from, dark queen, but do not wear sheep’s clothing for the scent of a fox will always linger. did you, too, not trust our nearly fallen ally? i didn’t either. you are no saint, sonia nevermind, let’s make that fact clear.” i always thought gundham and sonia were pretty close, and i guess sonia and kazuichi thought so, too, because they both were just as stunned as the other was. i didn’t think gundham would talk back to sonia like that, especially not to stand up for kazuichi. on the other hand, though, maybe gundham standing up to sonia was a testament to their friendship. having the gall to stand up to a literal princess is no joke, and no matter how uneducated sonia is, she definitely isn’t stupid.

“don’t get me wrong. i, too, believe he attempted to steal the life of the foreseer from my own conclusions, but don’t forget the rewards promised to us if she perished. it is as the line goes: you mustn't fault the player, fault the game.” sonia looked hurt to some degree, but tried to keep her face unmoving. her hands brushed the skirt of her dress, giving gundham a curt nod. “right. i apologize.” gundham nodded in return, turning to kazuichi (which elicited a slight flinch from the hot pink haired boy). “as for you, i have but one question to ask.” gundham’s arms were crossed together, his hamsters perched on his shoulders in a way that seemed almost sassy. they really were divas.

“u-uh… yeah?” kazuichi responded dumbly. gundham didn’t let that deter him from his questioning. “last night, when i went to see you,” that raised a few questions, causing eyebrow raises and a couple ‘huh?’s. “you looked sweaty, as if you had been running, with your jumpsuit halfway on your body from the waist down. is it possible that just as i came, you finished your deed over at the foreseer’s abode?” i let the confusion of gundham admitting he was also outside last night go to focus on kazuichi’s confession. “i thought…i thought it would stop it…”

“oh, hey.” oh shit. ohshitohshitohshit. was i really going to do this? right here? right now? my head snapped to your form, but my thoughts halted when i saw you. …what were you wearing ? i forced my eyes to stick onto your face and not onto your rack only held up by your bra–which was strapless, no less! no shot you just opened the door like this!? how was i supposed to… nevermind that! i need to focus! miss sonia is the only one for me anyway, no matter how much time she spends with the stupid hamster guy… “hey! i uh, just wanted to talk with you if that’s okay.” i shrugged as if i was nonchalant. i felt like sweating enough to fill a pool with how nervous i was. would she even let me in? was i suspicious? did i smell bad? i took a shower earlier this morning, but i don’t know if– “yeah, sure, just,” she stopped herself midway to yawn. wow, you were pretty tired. is that a good thing? was that something he should take into consideration? how did teruteru and peko do this!?

“make yourself at home. i need to put a shirt on.” you left the doorframe, turning around and scanning the floor for a spare shirt rather than just going for your wardrobe. you really were tired, weren’t you? “hey, uh,” i said your name sheepishly, wondering for the last time if this would be worth it. would miss sonia appreciate my attempt at saving us all? she would, right? this wasn’t just for me, but for everyone! i had to do this. i need to do this. if no one else will, i will. for us all. yeah. yeah… for us all…

“yeah?” she hummed.

“i’m sorry.” was all i could say as i pulled the wrench from my jumpsuit pocket.

“i fucked up big time…didn’t i? i didn’t wanna kill her… swear…” kazuichi clutched at his beanie, tears streaming down his face and shoulders bobbing in fear, like he was awaiting being struck by someone’s hand. “what is done, is done.” gundham hid the bottom of his face in his scarf, his voice muffled and low. so that was it, wasn’t it? it seems that, now, we got to the bottom of things, and every loose end was tied up. i could vaguely register other classmates talking amongst themselves about what had happened and such, but i tuned it out. 

the past few days were emotionally draining, and i didn’t know how much longer i could keep up with surprises like this left and right. settling in with faux confidence just to have it squashed beneath a boot of shock and terror. at this point, there couldn’t possibly be any other mysteries or discoveries to make–

“wait!” kazuichi blurted out into the air. “what are you yelling for?” hiyoko scoffed, rolling her eyes. ever since nagito called her out on her behavior, she’d been nothing short of curt and silent. it was like he had straightened her out, not allowing her to revert into that shell of her old coping mechanisms. i would’ve never thought nagito was capable of doing such a thing, but i suppose i just keep underestimating him. “i just remembered something crazy important!” “yeah yeah, just–! say it already!” fuyuhiko urged him to continue speaking rather than beat around the bush, but when he did:

“i got the book!”

“.........ke?........”

“............….?”

“....c….yo…..hea….me?”

 “......................?”

“are…. you awake?”

“can you hear me?”

yes, yes you could hear. what happened? are you dead? you must’ve been. you knew what happened. should you be able to hear if you’re dead? you don’t think so. if you’re hearing, you’re awake, right? you wished you didn’t hear. you wish you weren’t awake. your head was pounding like someone was beating it in like a drumstick to a drum.

or a wrench to the head.

but pain meant you were alive, right? pain meant you were feeling. your nerves were working, tingling underneath your flesh and skin. your head couldn’t hurt if you were dead. you were feeling, you were hearing, you were awake. if you were hearing something, someone was speaking to you, right? they asked if you were awake? you were awake. so, you should say:

“....y…yeah?” you groaned, your eyes still shut and your head still throbbing, but yes must’ve been the right answer as you heard a sharp gasp followed by hurried exclamations of, “oh my god!” and various noises of footsteps scattering all across the room. was the person in the room okay? who even was it? where even are you? where was the last place you remember being in? you thought long and hard, as best you could, but the back of your head was killing you, pounding like a strobe light in the back of your brain. you were so focused on trying to remember what had happened, you missed out on what the person in the room was trying to tell you, and upon realizing that, you tuned back in.

“how you feeling? how’s your head? oh god you’re alive. but-but the announcement ? oh god…”

you’re alive? of course you were. you weren’t dead. you were feeling and living and breathing. you weren’t dead. you were alive. your lungs expanded, causing your chest to rise. you were alive. you weren’t dead. you weren’t dead .

suddenly, with that mantra coursing through your head, your eyelids parted, and you got a face full of pale fair skin, glossy purple eyes, and choppy bangs. (for some reason, this gave you deja vu.) “m…mikan?” the last time you were in a white room with mikan, you were filled with fear. terror was evident in the very core of your being. now? you felt safe. even though every limb in your body, still withholding the trauma of that night, wanted nothing more than to jump into action and flee without looking back, you brain knew no danger. mikan wasn’t dangerous. not anymore at least. “y-y-yes?!” she squealed, sort of panicking in place as if she wasn’t expecting you to actually be responsive. “wh…what…happened?” you groan out, blinking harshly and letting your eyes focus on the woman in front of you when you open them back up. “y-you w-w-were… you w-were…!” she stumbled over her words in a feeble attempt at answering you, but she just couldn’t seem to do it. “i-i’ll ans-s-swer that later! do you know wh-where you are right now?” she said rather sternly, but it didn’t bother you at all, or rather, you didn’t have the mental capacity to be bothered at all, not with the pounding in your head. looking around with just your eyes, you could confirm to yourself that you, indeed, were in a hospital room. “the…third island hospital…?” you tried not to let your voice raise as if you were asking her rather than telling her, but it slipped anyway. she scrunched her brows inwards for a moment before letting them rest. “what’s your name?” she asked. that, you could answer with ease, letting your name roll off your tongue. “how many fingers am i holding up?” she said, and then raised a hand with three fingers up in front of you. 

“i see three but would i be evil if i said six to fuck with you?”

“y-yes! yes you w-w-would!”

you chuckled at her outburst, ignoring the way it made your head feel as though it would explode right then and there. “your head seems to be fine, now… n-not perfect, obviously, but you don’t seem concussed nor do you have a stroke…” to which you then heard her mumble, “which seems impossible from that blow to the skull…” you pretended you didn’t hear it, focusing on moving your arms. you didn’t want to think about your physical health anymore. you didn’t want to be bed ridden either. in order to avoid both those things, you needed to move, and moving your arms to prop yourself up seemed like your best bet. “do you feel any pain?” she asked, but she was already moving over to a cabinet which you assumed had some sort of ibuprofen or pain relief drug in it. “yeah–” you suck in a deep harsh breath as you manage to get your arms in position to prop yourself up. “just my head…” you breathe deeply. you took vague notice that you weren’t in a hospital gown, but in your regular outfit–the skirt and white top. someone must’ve put your shirt on for you, probably mikan if you had to take an educated guess. “y-you s-sh-shouldn’t move! please lay back down!” mikan scrambled back over to you with a couple tablets and a small plastic cup of water, ushering you to lay back down, but you shook your head, trying your utmost hardest not to show how much it really pained you so as to not worry the meek nurse.

“r-really, i’m fine…” you sigh out, reaching out for the remedy for your headache. mikan reluctantly gave them to you, gingerly placing the pills in your palm and water in your hand. (did she expect you to take the pain relievers while laying down…? that seemed rather ludicrous. or maybe she planned to help you? either way, you didn’t want help taking a couple tablets.)

you downed the pain killers and water relatively quickly. your throat a little itchy, but nothing you couldn’t handle. you’ve evaded death twice now; you wouldn’t let a headache and a scratchy throat deter you. “much better…” your shoulders relaxed, falling to release the built up tension that had grown. despite saying so, you didn’t feel much better physically, per se, but rather, you were glad to be awake. you were glad to be alive. you were glad that you were taken care of while you were checked out. 

the thought of his betrayal for a lack of a better word was heavy on your tongue, but you decided to store that for another time. not now. right now, you owe someone your immense gratitude. said girl was throwing away the plastic cup you had given back after you were done with it. “hey mikan?” you called. her head whipped over to you, eye calculating, yet full of emotion that she couldn’t hide. you doubted she would’ve been like this if she weren’t the first to try and take your life. “y-yes?” she squeaked. 

your lips morphed into a grin. “thank you. i don’t know what i’d do without you, y’know?” and that was the utmost truth. if mikan hadn’t done whatever she had done to keep you alive after you thought you were dead meat, you seriously didn’t know where you would end up or what you would do. on that note, you actually had no clue how you were found or who found you. was mikan there when you were found? was she the one that found you? did anybody else know about your whereabouts?

all good questions that were soon to be answered.

“you don’t have to thank me…” she said with a sense of security that you couldn’t place, but you admired it all the same. “i’m just…” she started, but paused, swallowing a lump in her throat as to not say the wrong thing, then speaking again. “i’m a nurse…the ultimate nurse… helping people is what i do… and it’s the least i can do…” the way she used her title of the ultimate nurse only made your grin broaden into a smile. she was embracing her talent, embracing her usefulness, and embracing her self worth that came with being a nurse, and you loved it for her.

the mikan from the original danganronpa two game paled in comparison to the mikan that stood a few feet away from you.

“damn right.” you chuckle out a single note. there was silence for a moment. you took another nice deep breath in, then let it out just as slow as you took it in. “so…” you start. mikan shuffled her way over to your bedside, sitting on the bed as if she was trying to take up the least amount of space she possibly could. “if you don’t get up here. there’s more than enough room and you know that.” you said with a raised brow. she squeals a small, “eep! right!” and scoots back more onto the bed so that she was properly sitting on the mattress rather than leaning on it. “better.” you sigh, and she nods, continuing the conversation to what you wanted to get to. “s-s-so…you w-want to know what happened, right?” she steeled herself in for the conversation you both were about to have.

you nod your head once. “yeah… what do you know?” is what you decided to start with. you didn’t know if she, or anyone else for that matter, knew who the culprit behind your second attempted murder was, so you didn’t want to out him just in case.

“w-well, let’s start from the very beginning” she cleared her throat. “this morning, everyone got to the restaurant on time except for hiyoko. she came in a little while later after everyone else. at some point, chiaki, kazuichi, fuyuhiko, hajime, and nagito left to go check up on you, i think. nagito even made you a plate of breakfast with a glass of water.” …wait, he did? you failed to ignore the way the simple gesture made your heart flutter. “i don’t know the exact details of how they found you, but when they did, the body discovery announcement went off.”

and just like that, the fluttering in your heart halted to a screeching stop, bubbling in your throat and blurting out as an eloquent, “what the actual fuck are you talking about.”

you didn’t mean for it to sound so aggressive, but thankfully, mikan didn’t seem perturbed at all. if anything, she looked understanding of your reaction. “yeah. it was out of the blue, and for a second, we had no idea what to do about it. it was like everyone was stunlocked. there were only a few people that could’ve been dead, and you were the only one no one had seen.” she paused. “...allegedly.” did she… know?...who it was? “everyone ran out of the restaurant in a state of panic trying to find out where the others were when we saw kazuichi dry heaving over a bush near the cottages. when we asked him what happened, all he said was your name.” mikan took a longer pause here. for some reason, it gave you the impression that she didn’t know definitively that it was kazuichi, but she had a suspicion.

“we all went over to your cottage, but fuyuhiko wouldn’t let any of us in for a while. then, he let me in to do an autopsy, keeping everyone else out to avoid hysteria. your room looked…terrible. things were thrown about and misplaced as if there was a struggle of some sort. hajime and chiaki were inside standing around nagito. he was sitting on your bed, crying…” 

“shut the fuck up.”

mikan flinched, seemingly not expecting you to interrupt her. you were leaning into her, headache completely forgotten as she told the story of your body discovery and it went in from one ear and out the other as a fairytale. “he was crying? why? because of me?” you asked, practically hanging onto mikan’s arm for more details. she squealed your name exasperatedly. “i’m telling you how i found your body! i’ll indulge in your crush later!” you instantly deflate, but groan in agreement. “where was i?” she asked herself before resuming. “oh right, nagito was crying, and in front of the bathroom door, there was a broken plate of food on the floor. that was probably from nagito, now that i think about… anyway, when i walked in, i…i saw you, and you looked awful, and a tad indecent…!” her face flushed in embarrassment. to think this was the same woman you disrobed you just days earlier.

“i instantly began checking your head wound, but as i was doing so, i just so happened to put my hand on your neck–gently, of course!--and i felt a pulse! and i couldn’t… i couldn’t believe it, i… you had to be breathing. i checked your neck again, and then your wrist, and i felt your breath on my knuckles when i held them your nose, and it was so faint, so so faint, that if we had found you any later, you may have actually died, but it was air. you were breathing. you were alive. so i ordered hajime, chiaki, or nagito to get nekomaru to carry you here, and from there, nekomaru held you, i nabbed a spare shirt for you, and we left promptly. right now, all the rest are in the lounge. i’m not sure what they’re thinking or talking about.” she concluded.

“w-wait, they’re here, now ?” you stammered. “y-yeah! i don’t think they expected you to wake up so soon… i didn’t expect you to wake up so soon. it’s only been a couple hours at most. you… i don’t think you should be awake right now…” she looked at you warily, and you could only look back with worry. “b-but i w-w-won’t question it! i’m just… i’m just glad you’re okay…” she sighed with a smile. “...me too.” you smile back. although the context was very much appreciated, you still didn’t know one thing. “so, you don’t know who did it, do you?” you finally ask. mikan shakes her head side to side. “i w-was… i w-was actually going to ask you that.” she twiddled her fingers in anticipation. you nibbled your bottom lip for a moment before responding. “i… i think it’d be better if everyone was here for that.” was your inadvertent way of saying, ‘i don’t want to out them.’ mikan seemed to understand that, nodding to herself. “w-well, i’ll tell everyone the good news! are you okay w-with everyone being in the room with you? is your headache gone?” she asked, and it was only then when you realized you were free of any pain. “no, yeah, i’d love to see everyone. and i’m not feeling any pain, thanks.” she nodded once, then skittered out the room.

now that mikan was out of the room, the logical thing to do was process all of what she told you. she gave you valuable information that you couldn’t do without, and you probably should’ve been dissecting everything piece by piece so you had a clear understanding of what had happened while you were knocked out in hopes it would reveal any new information about you. even more importantly, you should’ve tried to recall if you remembered anything while you were on the brink of death, but…

nagito was crying over you??????

first of all, nagito komaeda doesn’t cry. well, yes, he does cry. he’s cried in your arms before. (granted, hajime was also there, but you decided to ignore that for now.) but, he hasn’t ever cried over you before. not when you were nearly killed before. was that because he didn’t hear an announcement? does that imply he would rather have you bloody, beaten, and alive rather than peacefully dead? for some reason, that was reassuring (to some degree). what about hope and despair? this was an act of hope, right? a despair to overcome? that surely didn’t mean he couldn’t grieve, but he seemed like the type to rationalize your (or anyone’s, for that matter’s) death with his own logic. was he so deep in despair that he couldn’t rationalize your death? what makes you so different from everyone else who died? he overcame their deaths with his rationalization. why wasn’t his prime instinct to do the same for you? did he want to grieve? did he not want to rationalize losing you? did he not want to lose you in particular? did he want y–

“u-uhm!”

a high pitched voice interrupted you from your mind surfing. (you internally laughed at your own joke.) flinching, your head snapped up to see mikan again. “s-sorry! i just! the rest– our class! they’re not in the lobby, uh, so, i’m going to try and find them. s-stay here, okay?” she explained. “aye aye cap’n.” you huff a laugh through your nose, nodding at her. mikan nodded her head back quickly, leaving you alone once again. 

“jeez…” you sigh, rubbing your eyes with one hand.

“tell me about it–!”

“wHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK ???”

it felt like you had jumped five feet in the air when another, more irritating high pitched voice began speaking directly next to you. you nearly flung yourself off of your place on the bed, head whipping around to see monokuma in all his stubby little glory beside you. seeing him so close to you was fascinating as it was terrifying. you didn’t let either control your words though since the first thing you immediately thought of when seeing him was, “you broke your own fucking rule, you great value yin and yang!??? what the fuck is wrong with you?” you roared instantly. monokuma didn’t take kindly to that, his face growing red in anger immediately. “hey! you youngins nowadays have no manners!” ironic, given his intrusion in your personal space a minute ago. “besides, i didn’t break a single rule! you were as good as dead anyway! can’t a bear have a little fun? i mean, not only has no one died in a while, but you’ve cheated death, not once, but twice !!” he raised his arms above his head in exaggeration. even though he wasn’t remotely scary, you still scooted backwards, not wanting to be near him for any reason if unnecessary.

“yeah yeah, whatever. what the hell do you want.” you didn’t dare question him on his idea of fun. “what do i want?” he parroted before chuckling his typical evil, ‘puhuhu’s. you sat unimpressed at his antics. until…

“what do i want?” 

and you couldn’t help scrambling out of the bed at the voice you heard before you. before you knew it, you were standing a few feet away from the bed, staring wide eyed at the mechanical bear whose voice sounded all too familiar just then. somehow, his smile only grew. “i jus wanna tawk, uv couwse!” a babyish voice came from the bear that held its paws to its mouth in a mocking laugh. you knew the voice. there was no mistaking it now.

it was junko. fucking. enoshima.

“wh– how– what–”

“wuh! how! what! what, spit it out! i thought you would’ve been a little more eloquent.”

she mocked, and just from that alone made you fix your posture and use your voice with more certainty. “...junko.” is what you settle on saying. “ding ding ding, we have a winner!” she cheered through monokuma. it was weird, meeting her like this, although you supposed it’s the same way when makoto talks through usami. “how’s being dead, huh?” if she was going to antagonize you, you could do it right back. you cocked your head to the side, all the more grateful you weren’t changed to a hospital gown or you would’ve looked way less cool. “how’s almost dying twice, huh? by your fellow peers, nevertheless?” she matched your energy perfectly, not missing a beat. “more times i’ve evaded it than you, that’s for damn sure.” you cock a brow upwards, not letting yourself be intimidated by the ai version of the girl who screwed the world over.

“you sure have a mouth on you. you know, i like that about you. it’s nice to talk to an equal.” you didn’t like the tone of voice she used. “i don’t know what about me makes you think i’m equivalent to whatever you’ve got going on. last i checked, i didn’t plunge the world into mass despair for shits n’ gigs but maybe the blow to my head knocked that memory out.” you squinted at the bear. junko only chuckled in response. “oh no, i’m waaay better in that regard. what i meeeant, was that we’re both not real, silly!”

what.

“and i’m supposed to just,” you raised your arms up in confusion before letting them slap back down to your thighs. “believe that? you might not be real. you’re completely made up of ones and ohs, but me? i’m not from here, and i’m sure you know that. all of this was some big franchise to me. you were nothing but a game to me. you were fictional, only living behind a screen. now you think you can call me fake ? anything like you? i’m honest to god offended.” and you were. just where was this manipulation ploy going? “oh but, what you don’t understand is that, you’re in our world now. you don’t belong.” her voice was devoid of any of the play she originally had (though you doubted they held any real playful intent). she stressed the way she said you , as if to single out that you were the only glitch in the system, and it irked you a little–or a lot, you should say. “you think you can just prance around like we’re all fake? hold your head high and bank on the future foundation to save you? use all the hope that you can muster to make someone who doesn’t exist make it out of here once it’s destroyed?”

you could only stay silent. once it’s all destroyed? does she…know that hajime would free everyone from the simulation already? is that something she should know already? and does that make it a guarantee that, at the very least, everyone alive now lives to see the simulation break?

“no matter how you put it, you might be real where you come from, but you’re a fraud here. it’s simple math really.” she said in a haughty british accent that pissed you off. “then why.” you ask. “i could answer that question many different ways. why would i plunge the world in despair? why would i start a killing game? why am i sooo beautiful with a big brain and big boo–” “why would you threaten to end the killing game if i was dead?” you interrupted her unnecessary comments about herself, letting the question that you had been balancing on your tongue since you encountered makoto tumbled to the only person who would have the answer. said girl didn’t answer for a moment. then, 

“i would set everyone free if it meant i could watch you suffer. i could feed on your despair in the afterlife at the price of the entire class’s freedom. if i had to choose between your despair and the world’s, i would choose yours as fast as i killed my sister–with no hesitation.”

the silence. was heavy. then, she continued.

“think about it! you aren’t from here! you don’t exist! no matter what, the greatest despair will come from you! if i could ensure a nasty glitch in the system, someone who transcends our world, died? just think about the reviews on that! your poor little wretch of a cancer patient boytoy would drown in the most despair of all of you and probably take matter into his own hands. if, in this instance, where they attempt to take your life and it fails again because they can’t do anything right for the life of them, just to have you die off somewhere because you don’t exist in this world will absolutely tear the group and even further cause despair, and on the off chance that you go back home to whatever dump you probably lived in, you and your therapist’s nightmare will never be together and you’ll find yourself stupid for believing you could ever actually be with someone who you thought wasn’t real, not to mention fall in love at all. sooo, lose lose lose for you, and win win win for me! pretty good trade off if you ask me!”

what were you supposed to say to that? was there anything to say? how could you? she wasn’t…wrong. not necessarily, anyway. it prickled your skin, the way you could feel her influence seeping into every orifice of your body, and made every hair on your neck stand. you couldn’t think. couldn’t formulate something in retaliation to her words because you knew she was right. at the very least, you didn’t know what would happen to you. was that something you should care about? if not for you, for nagito? would nagito even care? 

you hoped he would, even though you knew it would hurt.

suddenly, junko tilted her head to the side. “my time here is coming to a despairing close.” but she didn’t seem the least bit upset about it. “puhuhu…” and again, it was back to monokuma. “cya later!” and he was gone, like whiplash. just like that, she decided to just… up and leave? 

it was only when you could hear faint footsteps outside of your room door when you realized why she left so quickly. you should get back in bed, lest it be mikan and you accidentally give the poor girl a heart attack with how much she worries over you.

you  crawl back into your bed, throwing the blanket over your bottom half and hugging your knees to your chest before your legs give out. everything she said was still fresh in your mind… everything was true, and you couldn’t refute it, no matter how hard you wanted to lie to yourself. not to say that you were letting it get to you, because you already decided. you would lay your life down to help your class if it meant they could be free–that much you proved by letting kazuichi try and kill you to end the killing game, but the way she said her words with such conviction made it hard to feel confident in yourself. laying down your life felt so much easier than truly believing that you meant something to the people you called your friends. the people you grew to know as your home–

“ah. you… you’re awake.”

a familiar, yet far more pleasant voice, said. you shot your head up to see nagito standing in front of the door, motionless, though it wasn’t that way for long as he took long strides to reach bed just to practically collapse on top of you instead. “holysh–!” you caught him in your arms, having to pull him in closer so head could get more comfortable on the bed and not just awkwardly hug you from an angle.

“i missed you.” he mumbled into your shoulder. before you could appreciate the sentiment, he continued in a very nagito-like fashion. “i know someone like me doesn’t deserve someone like you, but i can’t help but be selfish. i missed you. i thought i lost you. i tried to accept it, i promise, i did, but i couldn’t. typical of trash like me to grieve someone i never had to begin with, but if you’d allow me to believe it for just a second, tell me you’ll never leave like that again, even if i know my luck won’t allow it.”

and you’re stunned silent, unable to take in the words completely as he said them so softly next to your ear that you were more focused on keeping the trembles crawling down your back at bay. when you finally registered his request, you held him tighter. “i will never leave you like that, ever again.” you let one of your hands delicately drag up from his back to the nape of his neck and into his unruly curls. this time, unlike when you were messaging mousse into his hair when you could ignore his barely audible whine, you could hear his breath shake into what sounded like the precipice of a moan. in favor of his comfort, you press your thighs together in an attempt to quell the growing want blooming inside you. now certainly wasn’t the time.

“i won’t promise you for your sake, but if you asked me to, i would cuff myself to you to never break it.” you resisted the urge to press your nose into his shoulder to smell the fresh laundry scent of his jacket. you wondered how he kept it so fresh even if he wore it so often. maybe he washed it before coming just for you. “thank you…” he sighed against your neck, and it took all the power invested in you not to melt right then and there. both fortunately and unfortunately, he ended up pulling away from you, opting to just sit in front of you on the bed. “sorry for that,” he began. “i shouldn’t have just touched you with my filth.” if only he knew that that was all that you wanted, in every sense of the statement. “you aren’t filthy.” is what you end up saying. “how are you, boo?” you ask instead to derail the conversation onto him and, hopefully, something more positive.

“ah, haha.” he chuckled his fake, perfect laugh. it worried you a little. “if i could be honest, i’m a bit overwhelmed.” he admitted. your brows instantly furrowed. “why? are you okay?” 

“oh, i’m perfectly fine, other than the fact that hajime hinata is a reserve course student,”

wh.

“we’re all remnants of despair,”

what.

“and you aren’t even a hope’s peak academy student.”

what. the fuck.

you could only stare at him blankly, all the joy in your body sucked out like someone attached a vacuum to your head and removed the ability to feel serotonin or dopamine from you. was this…real? how the hell did he even know about that shit? this had to be some sort of sick joke. he came to you wailing about missing you just to spit out information he shouldn’t know at you.

but, just as soon as you processed that thought, it dawned on you. “yeah. it’s all true.” you admitted. again, there was that little voice in your head that reminded you that no matter what, you had a choice, even when it felt like you didn’t. nagito wouldn’t have greeted you the way he did if he despised you for what seemed like lying. no, no he knew something. he knew something he wasn’t letting up on. typical of nagito to be full of mysteries and riddles.

“so you lied to us. all of us.” he spoke, his eyes calculating through his eyelashes. “you fabricated lies and had us all believe you as if you were above us all. you let me believe you could bring forth hope unlike anyone else could. you lied to me. i know someone like me is deserving of such treatment, but not the rest of the ultimates, even the most detestable of the group, not to mention hajime. you let a poor reserve course student believe he had even at least one talent gifted to him at his birth, not to mention at least two, yet he has none. please, explain to me why would do such a thing. was this what you wanted? was this despair at finding out the truth what you wanted in the end? if that’s the case, i support it! believe me, i do! but you could never create hope. you are just a stepping stone like hajime and i. what makes you so special?”

when he stopped speaking, you couldn’t help but let the corner of your mouth quirk upwards. maybe it was because of how much time you spent with nagito. maybe it’s because junko had numbed you to the biting words of what could’ve possibly been the truth. maybe kazuichi gave you enough brain damage to render you crazy. but the way he worded his sentences? ‘you lied to me’, ‘you let me believe you’, ‘explain to him why you did what you did’...

why was he centering so many of his sentences on himself? 

if you remembered from the game, when nagito found out hajime was a reserve course student, he completely detested him. he would put hajime down to put himself up. he would belittle hajime every chance he got. he would treat him like the lowest of the low. by that logic, he should be chewing you the fuck out about how beneath him you were… but he wasn’t. he was asking questions, and mixing in sentences that seemed like he didn’t care, but he did. he did care. he does care.

so, either, he wants to hear from you…or he doesn’t trust the source he got this information from, and wants you to verify it for him. he wants the truth. the whole truth. the truth that only you know. the truth only you can give.

and that, you can give.

“i can promise you that i haven’t lied once.” you say with a certainty in your voice that makes nagito’s head perk up in interest. “i’m not sure where you’re getting this information from, but i can tell you that they’re hiding things from you, things i wouldn’t keep if i couldn’t hold it anymore. hajime started as a reserve course student, yes, but did you know about the lobotomy he got to obtain talent? did you know that as a young highschooler, the school basically pushed him for the procedure? did you know they turned him into an entirely different person? a god, with every talent hope’s peak had ever discovered? you all were remnants of despair, yes, but did you know you were pushed into the darkest depths of despair to get that point? did you know that one of your classmates suffered the worst possible punishment that tipped you all over the edge? i’m not a hope’s peak student, yes, but have i ever told you i was someone i wasn’t? have i ever been false about how i felt about the class? about you?”

silence.

“have i?” you challenge him. and you can only watch in glee as his curious expression turns into a broad smile. a real smile. not one of those fake small ones he plasters on his face to be polite, but a real, wide closelipped smile. “you haven’t. of course you haven’t. of course you could see through my pathetic ploy.” he admitted, and it felt like a weight was lifted from your shoulders. he was fucking with you. testing you, even. “you had me for a second there, sugar.” you say in relief. he chuckles. “did i?” “you’re smarter than you let yourself admit. speaking of which,” it was your turn to press him. “where did you even get all that information?” nagito averts his gaze from you. “kazuichi showed us the book he got for nearly killing you.” despite him saying it so casually, you had to shake your head in surprise. “you know!?” you exclaim in shock. “hm? oh, of course! it wasn’t that hard to find out.” he shrugged his shoulders like it wasn’t a big deal, but it was to you! “you aren’t, like, ostracizing him, are you?” you ask worriedly. nagito looks back at you with an odd expression, but he shakes his head side to side a little. “no, we didn’t.” 

the way he kept his answer short made it feel like he still harbored bad blood about it, but you supposed you couldn’t control that. you sigh. “alright, well, as long as there’s no one else splitting up or whatever, i’m happy.” nagito nodded in agreement, or, at least he was nodding about something. it didn’t seem like he was agreeing with you entirely. this fact was further proven by his next question: “say, if you weren’t a remnant… does that mean you do truly harbor hope?” you wanted to point out that you still weren’t an ultimate, but you decided to leave that for another time. “yeah.” was all you said. “ha… ha ha… then all the faith i had in you was well invested. you’re the only one free of setting the world into a pit of despair… hahaha…” nagito’s face began to flush as he chuckled, and you could practically taste the hope ramble he was about to embark on, and you didn’t want him to continue, dear god you didn’t, but to your surprise, instead, he said,

“to think someone like you would spend your precious time with scum like me… it gives me goosebumps. someone free of filth spending their days with someone drowned in it, made of it even… and i made you tell me that you wouldn’t leave me? how selfish! truly!” the more he spoke, the redder he got, and the tighter he hugged himself. you were fully expecting a hope ramble, but. “since day one, you weren’t repulsed by me, even though i expected it. i fully believed that down the road, just like it had with hajime, you’d become disgusted with me, but lo and behold, you would even feel as though you owed me an explanation if i asked.” 

he was rambling about you.

“i…i held your hand. and i watched you wash your hair. and you fed me. and i fed you. and i wept in your arms. i’ve sat with you, joked with you, you even said we had something special…” the more he spoke, the wobblier his voice got, and the more concerned you became. with an outstretched hand resting on one of his hands that tightly held his bicep, you inched closer.

“i’m so, so undeserving of you, of your comfort, and of your company… even though i know, one of these days, my luck will rip you from me, i can’t even help myself from distancing from you to keep you safe. it’s p-pathetic, isn’t it? no matter… no m-matter… how much i love the hop–”

“can i kiss you?”

nagito’s head shot upwards just to find your face inches away from his own. his first instinct was to back away, but he realized he couldn’t when he felt your arms looped around his neck, keeping him close. “wh-what?” he stammered like an idiot, even though you and he both knew that he heard you, but he had to hear it again. he needed to believe it. he needed it to be spoken into existence. “can i kiss you.” you said less like a question and more like a statement, as if just to make sure you and he both knew it was what you wanted. because it was. “wh-why would you… you sh-shouldn’t–” nagito was stuttering over his words, trying to get the syllables out, but he just couldn’t. not with your body so close. he doesn’t deserve it, or so he believes.

“yes, or no.”

“i-i… yes… please, yes…”

and you weren’t the one to initiate the kiss, but nagito was. with pebbles of tears pooling on his lashes, he smashed his face against yours, not giving you the time of day to process what had happened, but you didn’t mind it. you didn’t mind it at all. 

it was messy, the way his nose collided with yours as he kissed you straight on, kissing you like he was depraved of water and was finally getting a sip of it. his hands flew to your waist, holding you respectfully, but tightly, as if you’d suddenly change your mind to up and leave. you let your arms wrap around his neck just a smidge tighter to keep him close. to match his energy. to reassure him that you wanted him the way he wanted you. the same way he wanted you.

when you pulled away for air, he dove back in, but you pulled one of your arms looped from his neck to press a finger to his lips. a squeak of pure embarrassment came from the white haired boy, his face a scarlet red. not letting him dwell in the feeling of embarrassment, you spoke. “when you kiss me again, tilt your head to your right for me, then follow my lead, okay?” you spoke softly. you removed your finger, setting your arm back at its rightful spot around his neck. still, he didn’t speak, just nodding his head vigorously. 

you tugged him closer, motioning that you were going to kiss him again, and when you leaned in, he did as well, his head tilted as you instructed. this time around was far smoother than the last, your lips melding together as if they were made for the other, like a lock in a keyhole. the kisses weren’t deep at all, but they were long, slow, and sensual. certainly enough for nagito to softly whimper into your mouth and on your lips, and you’d catch his sweet sounds, muffling them so only you and you alone could hear them. it was adorable, how receptive he was, but also how quick of a learner he managed to be. his hands began to inch lower down your waist, settling on your hips instead, gripping the flesh of your love handles through your skirt. his pinky caught onto the slit of your skirt, brushing against the skin of your thigh, and nothing prepared you for the shaky exhale of a moan he let out into your lips.

he seemingly shocked himself because he immediately pulled away, his hands retracting from your body as though you had stung him. “are you okay?” you put his comfort first, asking about his wellbeing even though you craved his hands on you again. “i couldn’t possibly not be okay. b-but… i can’t… you’re probably disgusted with my inexperience. i can’t control myself with you.”

a certain part of you would beg to differ, but rather than making that fact known, you opt for, “never control yourself around me, boo.” you took one of his hands that were awkwardly in the air, putting it back on the skin of your hip, then taking the other hand and just holding it, brushing your thumb over his knuckles. “if this is you filthy, then i can only dream of how you are when you’re clean. if this is you inexperienced, i’ll be your tutor. nagito, let me love you for the sake of loving you.”

and you stared into his eyes, and all you could see in them was love. love for you. love that you loved him. fear for the future. fear for his luck. eagerness for… something. yearning, more like. and you love it. those were the eyes you wanted to see everyday. the eyes that, once, you thought you would only see through a screen. this kind of love, you couldn’t believe it. it didn’t feel like you were falling in love with a fictional character. not at all. it felt like you were the first person to discover what love was. true love. not something superficial built up on preconceived notions and fairytales written in the stars. it was real. this was real. junko could sing on her high horse and preach about you being fake or whatever, but nothing could convince you that you weren’t looking into the eyes of your lover right now. nothing could convince you that this wasn’t love.

“if… if you say so,” you let a smile take over your features. “it must be true.”

“if you say you can love me, the way i love you… it must be true.”