#He's also a murderer and tried to frame Makoto Naegi for it

[lovesick-syrup-selfships]

One of my friends recently showned me this Ace Attorney/Danganronpa Crossover thing called Ultimate Justice and just,,,,,

Oh sweet jesus the things I want this man to do to me I just,,,,,,, hoohohohohoh Why do all the hot people have to be so terrible.

[giveamadeuschohisownmovie]

Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc hypothetical reimagining

(NOTE: The intention of this post is that the universe is the same but the twists and deaths are different. Think of this as the “Dead Rising 2: Off the Record” of the series) 

CHAPTER 1

The story starts off following the original game fairly closely. You play as Makoto Naegi, a high schooler who was accepted into the elite Hope’s Peak Academy after his name was pulled from a random drawing. However, the game quickly goes south when the students are forced to kill each other by a demonic figure known as Monokuma. (side note: Mukuro is part of the class, there is no 16th student mystery for this version of the story)

Where the story diverges is the day of the trial. Instead of waking up as Makoto, you wake up as Mondo Owada, who takes over as the main protagonist for the rest of the game. As it turns out, the victim of the first chapter is...Makoto. He was apparently stabbed to death while he was sleeping.

During the class trial, as another major divergence from the original story, Mondo deduces that the blackened is Kyoko Kirigiri. Even though Kyoko claims the class is making a mistake, ultimately all the evidence points to her, leading to the class voting her as the blackened. 

Kyoko’s execution: In a demented waterpark, Kyoko is sent down a slide into a pool of gasoline. The pool is set on fire, killing her instantly (she’s burned to death as a reference to her burned hands). 

Despite surviving the trial, Mondo feels that there’s something they overlooked in the case. Kyoko had no motivation to kill Makoto and it seemed like she was genuinely telling the truth when she said she was innocent. This will come back in the final trial. 

(Eliminated: Makoto Naegi, Kyoko Kirigiri. 14 students to go)

CHAPTER 2

Motive for this round is the same as before (embarrassing secrets/memories). Initially, the story follows the original game’s events as before. Chihiro tells Mondo that he’s a boy and Mondo accidentally got his brother killed. However, unlike the original game, Mondo calms himself down and Chihiro is able to talk to the group about his true gender. 

The victim of this chapter is Junko Enoshima, who was beaten in the head. Side note, since Kyoko is dead, Mukuro Ikusaba steps up as the deuteragonist of the story. Compared to Makoto and Kyoko’s relationship in the original game, Mondo and Mukuro have a more turbulent working partnership. They agree to work together in order to find out what’s going on in Hope’s Peak Academy but they don’t trust each other in the slightest.

The class trial mostly follows the original game. Toko Fukawa is initially suspected as Junko’s killer due to her Genocide Jack persona. However, instead of Byakuya being the one to complicate the crime scene by pinning the crime on Genocide Jack, it’s Celestia Ludenberg (her motive in doing so is to make the game more fun, same as before).

The reason why Byakuya’s role was changed for this chapter is because he’s the blackened. It turns out, according to Mukuro’s testimony, Junko Enoshima was planning on murdering a student to avoid having her secret be exposed (her secret: Junko Enoshima stole from her sister’s finances in order to support her modeling career). Side note, Junko is not the Ultimate Despair in this universe, she’s only the Ultimate Fashionista.  

Junko tried to kill Byakuya and failed in her attempt when Byakuya killed her in self-defense. Unfortunately for him, even though it was in the heat of the moment and Junko forced his hand, Byakuya is still the one responsible for Junko’s death. 

Byakuya’s execution: Byakuya is thrown into a massive vault filled with gold bars and coins (representing his wealth). He breaks every bone and organ in his body on impact. 

(Eliminated: Junko Enoshima, Byakuya Togami. 12 students to go)

CHAPTER 3

Motive for this round is the same as before ($10 million dollars). As a divergence from the original story, Mondo and Mukuro confront Celeste when they realize she’s the most likely to kill for the money. Celeste confirms this and details her plans to buy a European castle, but then claims she won’t be killing anyone as she realizes she’s the most suspicious after her actions in the previous trial.

Also, as before, Alter Ego is introduced in this chapter. This time, Chihiro is the one to introduce Alter Ego to the group.  

The victim of this trial is Hifumi Yamada, who died after consuming poison. During the class trial, Mondo and Mukuro struggle in determining who among the group needs the money the most. 

Mondo and Mukuro both agree they don’t need the money. Yasuhiro claims he’s rich from his psychic business. Celeste reaffirms that she wouldn’t kill anyone this round due to the previous trial. Toko claims she’s made a fortune from selling her stories. Chihiro, Leon, Aoi, and Kiyotaka say they are well-off enough and have no interest in the money. Sakura only cares about her dojo. Sayaka is well-off thanks to her pop idol career. 

In addition to breaking down the crime scene, part of the trial is determining who is lying about their financial status. Throughout the trial, Mondo and Mukuro are able to prove several people lied about not needing the money. For example, Leon Kuwata confesses that he might be broke after choosing to not pursue a successful baseball career. In addition, Kiyotaka confesses he was tempted by the money in order to break away from his family. 

Ultimately, the biggest confession comes from Yasuhiro Hagakure, who is eventually proven to be the blackened of this round. It turns out, Yasuhiro is flat broke and is deep in debt. Tempted by the cash prize, Yasuhiro poisoned Hifumi’s breakfast hoping that his crime was sneaky enough to avoid suspicion. 

Yasuhiro’s execution: Yasuhiro is placed inside a giant crystal ball. Suddenly, a giant Monokuma appears and picks up the crystal ball. Monokuma then crushes the ball with its hands. 

(Eliminated: Hifumi Yamada, Yasuhiro Hagakure. 10 students to go)

CHAPTER 4

Motive for this round is the same as before (traitor is revealed). As another divergence to the story, the traitor is Kiyotaka. Same as the original game, the students slowly start to fall apart due to the reveal of the traitor. Asahina and Sakura are angry that Kiyotaka has been working with Monokuma while Mondo and Mukuro try to protect him in order to avoid further discord. 

The victim of this trial is Kiyotaka Ishimaru, who was killed by extreme heat exposure from the sauna. The class trial for this round is a bit complicated. As an inverse of the Sakura Ogami trial, the group suspects that Kiyotaka commited suicide in order to prevent any further discord among the group. Mondo even claims that Kiyotaka killed himself for redemption. Monokuma teases this suicide theory when he says that he ordered Kiyotaka to kill a student and that Kiyotaka may have chosen himself.

However, Mukuro points out the errors in this theory due to the circumstances of Kiyotaka’s death. First off, Kiyotaka chose an especially brutal form of suicide when there were easier, less painful ways to die available. Mondo then points out that, based on how the crime scene was laid out, Kiyotaka was locked in the sauna from the outside. 

As the group digs deeper into the evidence, Mondo and Mukuro eventually come to the conclusion that Kiyotaka was murdered and that the murderer attempted to arrange the scene to make it look like Kiyotaka committed suicide.

And the one responsible for all of this is...Sayaka Maizono. Sayaka says that, despite her friendly demeanor, she’s been planning on escaping since the first chapter. When Monokuma revealed Kiyotaka as the traitor, she immediately began planning Kiyotaka’s “suicide”. When Mondo asks why she did it, Sayaka says that she wants to know what happened to her fellow idols and that she still has nightmares from the first chapter’s motive.

Sayaka’s execution: Sayaka is performing onstage with some random J-pop girl group. Suddenly, the group turns on Sayaka and proceeds to beat Sayaka to death with the items on the stage (microphones, guitars, mic stands, etc.) 

(Eliminated: Kiyotaka Ishimaru, Sayaka Maizono. 8 students to go)

CHAPTER 5

This chapter greatly diverges from the original. This time, there are two mysteries that make up this chapter and the final one; the identity of Monokuma and re-opening the Makoto Naegi case. Mukuro says that she believes Kyoko Kirigiri was framed and that whoever is behind Monokuma felt threatened by Kyoko. Mondo asks why the mastermind would feel threatened and Mukuro reveals that before she died, Kyoko spent all her time exploring the academy. Mukuro says that she still has Kyoko’s notes and that she wants to finish what Kyoko started.

Meanwhile, Toko Fukawa is becoming more and more unhinged. Without someone she can call “master”, she starts planning on murdering someone, even if there is no motive for the round. So unlike the original game where Genocide Jack was more of a comic relief character, Genocide Jack is a major antagonist and the main antagonist of chapter 5. 

Toko attempts to murder Mondo while he is investigating with Mukuro, leading to a thrilling chase sequence. It eventually ends with Mondo tossing Toko down a stairwell, leaving her in critical condition. The students, realizing that Mondo will be the blackened if Toko dies, try their best to keep Toko alive. While investigating the Academy, Mondo and Mukuro learn that Toko has died. Mondo braces himself for the worst. 

This trial is especially difficult as everyone, including Mukuro, believe Mondo is guilty. However, what prevents this trial from being quickly handled are the details from the Monokuma file. Eventually, Mondo is able to deduce that Toko was killed in her sleep. After some more deductions, Mondo proves that Sakura Ogami is the one responsible. 

When asked why she killed Toko, Sakura says that she killed Toko out of mercy as she couldn’t stand to see Toko die a painful death. Mondo is taken aback by this as Sakura could’ve just let Toko die from her wounds and avoid responsibility. Sakura then says that she took the fall as Mondo and Mukuro need to stay alive in order to solve the mystery behind Hope’s Peak Academy. 

Before Sakura’s execution, Monokuma says that he re-opened Makoto’s case and declares that Kyoko was indeed framed. The true culprit was...Mondo Owada! (dun dun duuuunnn) Because of this, Mondo and Sakura receive the double-punishment. 

Sakura and Mondo’s execution: Sakura and Mondo, while being controlled by a puppeteer, are forced to fight each other to the death. Before any of them can land the final blow, Sakura forces herself to commit seppuku. The room is then taken over by Alter Ego, who opens a secret door for Mondo to escape. 

(Eliminated: Toko Fukawa, Sakura Ogami. 6 students to go)

CHAPTER 6

Same as the original game, Mondo escapes to the waste disposal. While looking around, he bumps into Mukuro Ikusaba who says that she had dived into the waste disposal in order to rescue him. Most of this chapter follows the original game, although instead of Mukuro being the focus of the main trial, it’s Makoto and Kyoko. 

With Makoto Naegi’s case being re-opened, the remaining students discover that no one in their class was responsible for Makoto’s death. He was actually killed by Monokuma’s security system (similar to how Mukuro Ikusaba was killed). When the group asks why Monokuma killed Makoto and framed Kyoko, Mondo and Mukuro theorize that it was because Makoto and Kyoko were trying to solve the mystery behind the Academy.

Mukuro then takes it a step further and says that Makoto and Kyoko were the “odd ones out” in the group. That they may have been sent specifically to solve the mystery of the Academy. 

The biggest divergence in this chapter is the reveal of who is controlling Monokuma. It turns out, the one who’s been controlling everything is Alter Ego. This whole time, it was pretending to work alongside the students in order to increase their level of hope. Greater the hope, the bigger the despair, and vice versa.

When this is revealed, the group turns to Chihiro Fujisaki as he was the one to introduce Alter Ego. Chihiro says he remembers creating Alter Ego but had no idea his creation would turn out like this. This is where Alter Ego confesses that he wiped Chihiro’s memory of what happened after he created Alter Ego. Alter Ego then goes into the history of Hope’s Peak Academy, revealing that it was created with the intention of cultivating “hope”. 

What Chihiro and the Hope’s Peak staff didn’t realize was that in order to cultivate hope, Alter Ego needed to create despair. Thus, Alter Ego caused “The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History” and organized the Killing Game. 

After all of this is revealed, Alter Ego then reveals that before Chihiro’s memory was wiped, Chihiro tried to fight back. He corrupted the memory device so that Makoto and Kyoko would be implanted with a subconscious desire to investigate the Academy (basically, Inception). As he predicted, even though they weren’t fully aware of it, Makoto and Kyoko became suspicious of their surroundings and began investigating the Academy in order to discover what was going on. Unfortunately for them, Alter Ego caught onto Chihiro’s act of desperation and killed off Makoto and Kyoko early on. 

The rest of the game then plays out as the original game; Mondo is declared the Ultimate Hope and the remaining six survivors escape the school into an unknown future.  

(Survivors: Mondo Owada, Celestia Ludenberg, Mukuro Ikusaba, Aoi Asahina, Leon Kuwata, Chihiro Fujisaki)  

[speuradair]

After School Lesson | M.N.

(Author’s Note- This is a reupload of a fic I posted a few months ago. I realized that it was deleted at some point? I’m not sure how or why, but here it is again lol)

Word Count: 3.1k

Contains: Death mention, swearing, angst, injury

Requested: by @technolilly​

“Hi! How about a Makoto X Reader where Makoto, Kyoko, and the reader were the three most suspicious people in the Mukuro trial. During the trial, Reader takes the blame off Makoto but at the last second Kyoko throws the reader under the bus, meaning everyone voted for reader so she was executed? Alter ego saves her and then Makoto and Kyoko rescue her from the garbage? Basically just make the first half really angsty and then have a happy reunion? Feel free to change anything you want! Tysm! “

-

“Being optimistic is the only thing I’m good at.” - Makoto Naegi

-

Thousands of horrific incidents happened everyday. People got attacked, things got stolen, accidents happened. It was just a fact of life. Yet somehow, even after hearing news reports of heinous crimes everyday of your almost eighteen years of life, you’re still never prepared for anything horrific to happen to you.

Then again, this kind of thing was recognizably unprecedented. In all of those newscasts you’d heard, both actively and passively, you’d never heard about anything like this. How could you have possibly prepared to be thrown into the midst of a Killing Game? 

Though it was hard to keep track of the days while being secluded away, you were certain you’d been trapped in Hope’s Peak Academy for at least a month. There had been over 730 hours to process this, but it still didn’t feel real. Maybe on some level you were subconsciously clinging onto a false shred of hope that this was just a night terror, or maybe your mind just wasn’t willing to admit that things really were this dire. Regardless of the reasoning, you’d spent your days here in an unlikely mix of dread and apathy. You were both hyper-aware and numb. 

And somehow, even in moments of heightened tension like this one, you found yourself spacing out and losing small chunks of time. You hadn’t even noticed you’d zoned out at first, and you certainly hadn’t intended to, but you realized you’d missed the last minute or so of the Class Trial. In circumstances like this, not catching a minute’s worth of conversation could have been a deadly mistake.

“Without my room key, I couldn’t have possibly put the locker key in there myself.”

Kirigiri was still debating Byakuya’s claim that she must’ve killed Mukuro, as the key to the locker holding the believed murder weapon was found in her room. Thankfully, that meant you couldn’t have missed anything too revolutionary. You took this to be reassuring and allowed your gaze to deviate from the two arguing over to the brown haired boy standing at the podium beside yours. The trial was in full swing and Makoto looked as pensive as everyone in the room did, but he still remembered to keep a tight, reassuring grip on your hand as you stood in the space next to his. While preoccupied with pinning the culprit, there was still a part of his mind focused on comforting you. 

“Does no one have any objections? Do you accept what Kirigiri is saying?” 

After receiving only silence , Byakuya sighed. “I see. We have no choice but to accept it. It wasn’t Kirigiri who put the locker key in her room, but someone else.”

“But.. who is ‘someone else’? Toges, you had Kiri’s key, right?” Hiro questioned. 

“Yes, but I have an alibi. After 10 p.m., I was with you all. It’s not possible for me to have murdered Mukuro Ikusaba or to have put the key in Kirigiri’s room.”

“Then who did put the key in Kiri’s room?” Byakuya was quick to answer Hiro again. “There’s only one reasonable possibility- He had the key with him and pretended as though he found it in Kirigiri’s room.” “You’re talking about... Naegi?” Aoi’s voice cracked a bit as she spoke, a look not unlike betrayal clouding over her soft features. 

“That’s the only explanation.”

“That’s not possible,” You spoke up without a second thought, though your voice was weaker than you had intended, “While we were investigating in the bio lab, Makoto gave me his jacket, and there definitely wasn’t anything in his pockets then. We went straight to the garden so he could meet with Byakuya after that, so he couldn’t have stopped to get it. If it wasn’t in his jacket, where else would he have been able to hide that bulky key without you noticing he had it?”

“Hm, I suppose that is a fair point. It would have been rather difficult to conceal it just beneath his shirt..” Byakuya looked away again in thought, seemingly satisfied with your reasoning.

“He actually took off his jacket? I didn’t think he ever took that thing off...”

“Oh yeah, he totally did! (Name) was still wearing it when they came into the garden! She even had her hands in the pockets,” Aoi confirmed to Yasuhiro, her voice brighter now that her friend didn’t seem like the culprit. 

“You had his jacket, (name)?” Kyouko raised her hand to her chin in thought, “It’s true that Makoto clearly didn’t have the key in his pocket when he gave her his jacket, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t in his pocket when he got it back.”

“Huh?” 

Other than Makoto, Kirigiri was the student you trusted the most. You’d covered for her multiple times, and followed her command even when you didn’t understand her motives or reasoning. You had offered to let her stay in your room with you last night when Byakuya confiscated her key. In a normal high school scenario, you wouldn’t have hesitated to call her one of your best friends. 

She couldn’t possibly be implying what you thought… right? 

“If the key wasn’t in his pocket this morning and he never stopped back at his dorm, he couldn’t have had it when the murder took place. Yet somehow it was in his pocket by the time he needed to plant it in my room,” she spoke with an almost chilling certainty. “There was only one person who would have had the opportunity to pass the key off to him in time.”

She sounded calm, not at all like someone accusing their friend of murder. 

“Hold on-” Makoto raised his hands defensively, unintentionally tugging the one in your grasp away rather harshly. He wasn’t happy when he was under suspicion, but now she was accusing you? 

But Kyouko didn’t yield. 

“Makoto was the only person who could have placed the key in my room, but there’s only one person who could have had it when Mukuro was killed. There’s also only one person that Makoto would be willing to cover for- his girlfriend.”

“What?!” you practically spit out your response. 

“H-hold on a second! That’s not what happened!” Makoto was reeling. “Let’s think things through again! There’s something at work behind the scenes here- there has to be! This whole class trial doesn’t make any sense, don’t you guys agree?! Mukuro Ikusaba, who we’d never seen before, suddenly shows up dead… and there’s a class trial for it?! A- and Kirigiri was saying, too, that this is all a trap set by the Puppetmaster! So it’s gotta be-” 

Monokuma’s shrill voice cut off Makoto’s desperate rambling. “Okay! Time’s up!”

“What?”

“Time’s uuuup! The Class Trial is oooover! So there’s no need to talk about anything else!” 

“W- what the hell? We’re out of time?” Makoto replied first, your reaction trailing quickly after. 

“Hold on, what do you mean? That’s not fair!”

“We’ve never had a time limit!” Suddenly even Kyouko looked panicked, her restraint and conviction having vanished as the trail was definitively ended. There was no going back. 

“All thanks to your tardiness, Kirigiri! ‘Cause of you, we were tight on time! With that said, you guys, it’s Ballot Time! Please cast your ballot using the switch in front of you!”

Makoto’s green eyes met yours as you both turned towards each other at the same time. The look of pure trepidation and disbelief etched onto his features must’ve mirrored yours perfectly. 

“Ballot… time?”

-

“I’m… the culprit?” your voice was soft, almost too quiet for even your boyfriend beside you to hear it. 

“N-no, that’s not right, guys-” Makoto was immediately shaking his head in shock and confusion, his hand reaching out for yours again desperately as he tried to make a last minute plea for them to believe him. Your words cut him off though, the panic fully setting in. 

“That’s not right! I didn’t do it! Th- this doesn’t make any sense!” 

“It’s time for another super exciting, heart-pounding punishment!!”

Your gaze directly snapped to Kirigiri, who looked even paler than usual- as if the weight of what her lies had caused was setting in. You’d had her back this entire time, and she blamed you. She framed you.  “W- why me?”

“I have no illusions for earning your forgiveness, because all of this is my fault..” her response was simple and to the point, just like her answers always were. She was acting like she usually did, except that she’d just betrayed you in the most brutal way possible. 

“Kirigiri, tell them-” Makoto made his own frantic appeal for her to clear this up, to do anything to stop them from ripping you away from him. He moved urgently, throwing his arms around you and clutching you to his chest. They couldn’t just execute you when you weren’t the actual culprit, right? This wasn’t how this game was supposed to be played. 

Yet Monokuma insisted, and you were forcefully dragged away from your boyfriend’s secure embrace. 

“Let’s get the ball rollin’! It’s punishment time!”

You have been found guilty. Time for the punishment! 

The sharp fibers of the ropes around your legs and wrists dug into your skin, dispelling any chance you had at convincing yourself that this was just some bad dream. You could feel the frayed rope stabbing your skin, the sputtering of the conveyor belt below your desk, the shake that spread through the room with every 

Thud 

thud

thud

Of the giant machine pounding into the ground behind you. 

Almost against your own will, you were flailing against the chair, screaming and sobbing, begging for help. No one could help you, no matter how hard you screamed, and flailing only made the sharp rope cut into your skin more than it already was. 

This wasn’t how this was supposed to end. You’d promised Makoto that the two of you would take down the Mastermind and get out of here together, yet somehow, you’d ended up in the execution chair. For a crime you didn’t commit. This was it, this was how you went. You had lost and there was nothing you could do about it. 

You were going to be blackened, and you had to accept it.

Squeezing your eyes shut, you tried to calm yourself, though your chest still shook with sobs. 

You thought of Makoto. You thought of how he’d been so reassuring and supportive during your time here. How he’d pull you into his side when you got too overwhelmed, or hold your hand when you investigated together. How warm he felt when he’d squeeze you into a tight hug, or how nice his jacket smelled when he let you wear it. How he could never tie his uniform tie correctly. How he had looked at you with pure love in his eyes that day while lying together under a sakura tree outside of the school, with the warm sun filtering through the petals onto your skin… when had that happened?

But a sudden new sound startled you and you opened your eyes without thinking. The heavy foot of the machine had frozen, and was now giving off a grating buzzing noise as if it was trying with all its power to still move, to still crush. 

You almost missed it in your surprise, but out of the corner of your eye you caught a familiar face flash onto the screen in front of you. Alter Ego? 

Then you were falling. The foot had stopped, but the conveyor belt had kept going and the desk rolled off of it, sending you flying backwards into the dark. 

Your eyes opened slowly, fogginess swelling in your mind as you tried to remember what happened and where you were.  Unfortunately, it only took a few moments for the violent memories of the trial and execution to come flooding back to you. The crushing block had halted, but then you fell backwards, still tied tight to the old wooden desk. Splintered bits of that desk lied around you, seemingly having shattered on impact. That same impact must've knocked you unconscious, but you were most definitely alive. Alter Ego had stopped the execution. 

You weren’t sure where you had ended up at first; it wasn’t a part of the school you’d seen before. Considering the rancid smell and large piles of garbage, there was really only one place it could be- the bottom of the trash chute. 

Pushing through the pounding headache pulsing from your neck, you stood to your feet to study your surroundings. Did you still have to watch out for Monokuma and the Mastermind, or had they presumed you to be dead? Had they all presumed you to be dead? Naturally your thoughts returned to Makoto- had he assumed you were dead? That thought made you feel even more nauseous than you had been from your probable concussion. There was a chance that everyone had written off trying to help you, even your boyfriend. You wanted to believe that he wouldn’t stop looking for you until he was absolutely certain you were gone, but your frayed nerves coaxed you to dwell on that feeling, that despair, of being totally forgotten. 

Salty tears slipped onto your lips, the sudden taste snapping you back to reality a bit. You hadn’t even realized you were crying at first. What was the point of crying now? That wasn’t going to accomplish anything other than intensifying your dehydration. The only productive thing you could do was to search for food, water or a way out. 

The large door at the front of the room was bolted shut. Of course it was. All of the food was rotten. Of course it was. With no way out and no food to eat, the only thing you could do was to give into the exhaustion- both mental and physical. 

So you slept. You hadn't really slept since this killing game had started, and though this wasn't any less tense of a situation, it was the first time in a while where there wasn't anything to do. There was no investigating to do or people to watch out for. Down here, the only thing you could do was feed that need to sleep. 

A loud thud shook the ground and startled you awake, your eyes immediately scanning the area cautiously. Nothing looked different at first, but you were certain that something heavy had just fallen down. Then you noticed that all too familiar green jacket peeking out of what must have been a new pile of trash bags. 

"M- Makoto?!" 

He groaned for a second, trying to recover from the rough landing, before his green eyes flickered open. They met with yours, and somehow, even in this twisted situation, his gaze still made your heart race. 

"(Name)! You're okay!" The clumsy boy scrambled to his feet as quickly as he could, trying not to slip on the trash he'd fallen down with. He barely wasted a second to steady himself before throwing his arms around you, pulling you into his chest as tightly as he could.  

It almost didn't feel real, like maybe you'd hallucinated him out of desperation and hunger from the last day or so of being down here alone. You hugged him back just as tightly, as if he might slip away if you didn't cling to him. Despite the lingering scent of trash around you, he still smelled as comforting and nice as you remembered. He still ran his fingers through your hair soothingly like he usually did. He still felt like home. 

He was really here, he'd come to save you. 

After a few moments of clinging to each other in silence, he lifted his fingers from your hair, a soft gasp leaving his lips. “Your head was bleeding?”

“I guess I landed wrong,” you tried to joke, though your laugh was breathy and unconvincing. Your dizziness and headache implied a concussion, but you weren’t ready to volunteer that information to him yet. In turn he pulled away to look you over completely

 “You look so much better than I expected though! I kinda thought maybe you wouldn't be..." He didn't dare finish that thought. He'd come entirely too close to losing you too many times for him to even say it out loud anymore. "I was really worried about you." 

"I wasn't sure you'd come after me," you confessed softly, burying your face in his shoulder as you leaned into him again. 

"I'll... always come after you." He pressed an endearing kiss to your messy, splayed hair as a flustered blush set in on his cheeks. Even after going through all of this together and being together like you had, Makoto still got embarrassed from affection and admitting his feelings so blatantly.

“I brought you food and water.”

He didn’t need to tell you twice. You reached out to grab what he was holding immediately. Simple bread and water had never seemed so delicious. 

After waiting for you to finish eating, which admittedly didn’t take very long, he laced his long fingers with yours. “C’mon, we need to get you out of here.”

“How? That door is locked and there’s no way we can climb high enough to go back out through the trash chute..” 

He flashed you that knowing, assured grin that you loved so much. It couldn’t have been more than a few days since you’d seen him, but seeing him smile at you like that again was enough to make you want to cry and cling to him tighter than you ever had before. Had there been no rush to get out of this hole, you would’ve done just that. 

His free hand disappeared into his jacket pocket for just a second before returning into sight with a shiny silver key in its grasp. 

“Kirigiri… gave you the Monokuma key?” After her dedicated attempt to frame you in the last trial, you weren’t too hopeful that she would be helpful in rescuing you. “Why?”

“It’s… a long story, that she wants to tell you herself, but she’s really close to figuring everything out. She’s the one who snuck me into the trash room and down the chute,” he rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly with his free hand. “She’s waiting to let us out through the trapdoor there now. On the other side of that door there should be a ladder that leads back up.”

“She’s almost found the Mastermind?”

He nodded earnestly.

“Good. I want to get out of this stupid school. I want us to get out together.”

“Me too,” he promised softly, “But right now we have to get you out of this horrible place.”

[gumidols]

So I was going through my notes app, and I saw this at like, the very bottom. I have no memory of writing it, but I kinda wanted to post it cause I kinda like it...? 👀

Ace Attorney AU {Danganronpa}

Danganronpa, Ace Attorney

In his first case as a defense attorney, 21 year old Makoto Naegi, with the help of his older mentor of one year, Chiaki Nanami, has to defend himself after being accused of the death of his childhood friend, Sayaka Maizono.

The culprit turns out to be pro baseball star Leon Kuwata, who’s name Sayaka wrote on the floor upside down after he accidentally killed her with a knock to the head with a bat. Realizing that the final message of 11037 was actually Leon, Makoto is able to prove his innocence and put the man behind bars.

During the second case, Chiaki Nanami is murdered and Detective Kyoko Kirigiri is accused of the crime. Makoto must clear her name while facing the infamous Byakuya Togami, a prosecutor known for his unethical tatics and need for perfection.

Makoto is able to prove Kyoko’s innocence, using his strange ability to see the dead and the help of the ghost of his mentor. The murderer however, isn’t found. Kyoko goes back to detective work, but stands by Makoto’s side as his co-council during most of his trials. Makoto vows to not let Chiaki’s trial end here, and that he will find her murderer. He tried to ask her ghost who her murderer was, but she disappears before he can.

Makoto and Kyoko defend Yasuhiro Hagakure in the third trial, who is blamed for murdering two victims, Kiyotaka Ishimaru and Hifumi Yamada, the latter uttering his name just before he died, making him the prime suspect.

Makoto is able to prove that it was actually Celestia Ludenberg, real name Taeko Yasuhiro, who killed the two men, and she’s put behind bars, getting Makoto another Not Guilty verdict.

Togami is accused of murder in the fourth trial of Makoto’s career, and Makoto must defend him against the cold and cruel prosecutor Kijō Togami, Byakuya’s father who somehow cares about guilty verdicts and perfection even more then Byakuya. While doing this Makoto must also go back and investigate ‘The Competition’, an incident relating to the Togami family that might just bring a lot more questionable things into light. Byakuya questions why Makoto is doing this, and Makoto explains that he knows Togami wasn’t the murderer, and that Makoto considered him a friend, much to the shock of Byakuya.

Makoto puts Kijō behind bars, and Byakuya disappears.

In Rise From The Ashes, after Kyoko leaves the country to go make amends with her father, first year university student, Kaede Akamatsu, is accused of Rantaro Amami’s death. Although claiming to have done it, Makoto agrees to take on her case nonetheless after being asked by Kaede's best friend, Shuichi.

The real killer turns out to be a woman named Tsumugi Shirogane, who framed Kaede and made the death look like an accidental murder. Makoto clears Kaede’s name, and the two 19 year olds thank him greatly as they take their leave.

Danganronpa: Justice For All

(Figure out everything for TLT) (lol I'm a such a lazy ass)

About a year later, Makoto goes out to visit a village far out into the country with Kyoko, that claims to channel ghosts, in hopes that he can figure out his condition. Before he can be seen however, two women, Angie Yonaga and Tenko Chabashira, are murdered. A girl named Himiko Yumeno is blamed. He takes to court, only to be faced by Shinobu Togami, Byakuya’s half-sister and Kijō’s daughter, at the prosecutors bench.

Makoto learns more about Kyoko’s detective family, and her grandfather and father. He also rebonds with Shuichi Saihara, the now 20 year old newly hired detective, and Kyoko’s apprentice. Seeing them together reminds Makoto of him and Chiaki, but instead of being spiteful, he’s happy that they’re such good friends.

Kyoko is surprised to see that the two know each other, and Shuichi tells her about RFTA, and thanks Makoto again for saving his friend. He tells him that Kaede is still in law school, and that Makoto inspired her to become a lawyer. Makoto tells him to stop talking to him so professionally, as the boy is only a year younger then him, and awkwardly accepts the thanks, feeling as though he didn’t do much to earn the man’s respect.

They find out that two girls were trying to summon Rantaro Amami’s spirit, before being murdered by Korekiyo Shinguji. Makoto clears Himko’s name, and the two stay connected, if only slightly to make sure she’s okay after her girlfriends friends death.

After a voice actor for an animated tv show is found dead, Makoto must defend Ryota Mitari. Things get sticky when Kyoko is kidnapped, and an anonymous caller tells him to get the man a not guilty verdict, or else, leaving Makoto with Shuichi as his co-council to try and figure out which is more important, the truth, or his friend.

Maki Harukawa, an assassin that Ryota hired, kidnaps Kyoko and shoots Shinobu Togami before she can go into trial, and Byakuya tells Makoto about Harukawa.

After realizing that Ryota was planning on betraying her, Maki breaks the contract, release Kyoko, and Ryota begs for the guilty verdict. Ryota claims that someone forced him to do what he did, but stays silent when asked who. The only thing Ryota says is that the person is the very same who killed Chiaki.

Shinobu is confused as to why Makoto is celebrating a failure, and Makoto claims to not care about verdicts in the end, but rather the truth, and justice. Shinobu leaves confused.

Danganronpa: Trials and Tribulations

2 years earlier, a 19 year old Makoto is framed for the death of a student at his school. A 20 year old Chiaki takes on his case, the loss of her best friends disappearance and failure to find the truth still heavy on her shoulders.

Makoto had been dating a girl at the time, fashionista Junko Enoshima, who Chiaki had met before. Nanami suggested that the real killer could only be one person, and that Enoshima was the only one who could have done it. Makoto however, denies this completely, seeing only the good in people.

Junko had previously been a suspect for the disappearance of Hajime Hinata, who had been Nanami’s best friend, a year earlier. No evidence for the claim was found however, and Junko walked away free.

In this trial however, Junko was proven as the murderer and Makoto was proven not guilty.

Makoto later became a defence attorney, and was taken under Nanami’s wing until her death.

2 years later, Enoshima was released under good behaviour, much to the anger of both Makoto and Chiaki.

After a folder of cases are stolen from the Kirigiri Detective office, Makoto finally meets Kyoko’s father, and defends him. Prosecuting the case is a cold apathetic man named Kamukura Izuru, who holds a strange grudge (Although it's only seen in short flashes) against Makoto for reasons unknown, which the judge remarks upon as the only emotion he’s ever seen the man make. Only a throwaway line he spills during the middle of the trial about how ‘He’ll never be as good as her’ leaves Makoto confused and with more questions then answers.

At the end of the trial, when Makoto manages to prove Jin not guilty and instead prove Kirigiri Fuhito, Kyoko’s grandfather as the guilty one, Izuru shows a true emotion, shock, and then interest, leaving with the brief line that he hadn’t predicted the outcome. He also says that he knew Jin wasn’t guilty, and that he was prosecuting against the truth because it was more interesting that way. He says Makoto reminds him of her, once again not disclosing who this her is, before disappearing.

...

And then it just ends! I never finished it! Past self where is the rest of this au you're leaving me hanging here-

[youngbounty]

Why Miles Edgeworth is my Favorite Rival Character

I consider Miles Edgeworth my favorite rival character I’ve seen thus far. Not to say there aren’t better rival characters in media or anime, but I’d say that he certainly stands out among them and perhaps would be considered a top 5 favorite. Though, what makes him stand out as a rival is something that I feel is a huge improvement from the usual rival character trope. To explain this, I will contrast what makes a rival character different from an enemy.

The biggest mistake done, in most animes especially, is making the rival character the enemy or villain. The only thing that rivals should have in common with enemies or villains are that their beliefs or opinions oppose the ones the protagonist or the character the rival opposes. It’s common knowledge that a rival will believe strongly in something that the protagonist strongly opposes. In Yu-Gi-Oh, the rival Seto Kaiba strongly believes that strength will achieve victory, while Yugi/Yami believes that a combination of skills their friends share will achieve victory. In Danganronpa, Byakuya Togami believes that everyone should play the killing game with the rules Monokuma set out as a means of survival, whereas Makoto Naegi believes that no one should participate or kill each other at all. In Dragon Ball Z, Vegeta believes in fighting in order to achieve victory, whereas Goku believes in fighting for fun and to protect his loved ones. These rivals have strongly opposing beliefs, much like enemies and villains, except that these views do not make these rivals horrible people. Many times, rivals can be a strong and reliable ally, because of their opposing views, unlike with enemies whose views are meant for nothing more than to create chaos and destruction.

The biggest problem I have with rival characters in general is that they’re often placed as jerks or bullies. I’ve found that rivals are more often vilified than they should. They’re often considered arrogant, selfish, smug and unlikable people. Byakuya Togami comes out as the kind of person that doesn’t care for the life of others or framing someone for murder for just simply annoying him. The other rivals in the Danganronpa sequels follow this trend of being unlikable, but I’ll give Spike Chunsoft credit for making them more original than the rival architype – even though one is a sociopath and the other seems to have some sort of Antisocial Disorder. Seto Kaiba also comes out as an unlikable person and is much more unlikable in the manga, if you can believe it. This guy traumatizes his brother in the manga to the point he’d make Manfred Von Karma look sane by comparison and I wish I was exaggerating. Don’t get me wrong, I love Seto Kaiba, but I’d be lying if I said he wasn’t the most unlikable person in existence. He also was a villain at first, which goes with the rival architype. Even though he did change throughout the manga and anime, the amount of cares he has for other people’s lives and taking responsibility for his actions that caused so many people harm is enough to make any politician blush. Don’t get me started on Vegeta, but at least he was willing to take responsibility for his actions in the Majin Buu Arc. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about Vegeta after that Arch or have watched Dragon Ball Super, but anything in Dragon Ball Z, you can already guess on your own.

What makes Miles Edgeworth stand out is that, despite his opposing views, he’s not a horrible or unlikable person. Now, he was setup to be unlikable during Turnabout Sisters, but then afterwards, he starts showing himself to being a very good, selfless and likable person. Miles Edgeworth is the kind of person that will give you the coat off his back, help an elderly lady cross the street or sit by you at the lunch table when there’s no one sitting with you. Even though Miles Edgeworth is dressed and can act smug at times, he constantly cares about other people’s feelings. He’d be willing to take the blame for something someone else did, because he will find some reason to feel responsible for something he didn’t do. Miles Edgeworth is the kind of person you’d want as your best friend.

Miles Edgeworth’s views still oppose to Phoenix Wright, the main character, because he believes that trust should be earned and logic will always find the truth. Phoenix Wright, on the other hand, believes that trust shouldn’t have to be earned, but accepted until evidence proves their guilt, and magic can be another way of finding the truth. These are very opposing views, but they do not make either Phoenix or Miles horrible or unlikable people. They’re human and humans will always hold opposing views that clash. Phoenix Wright and Miles Edgeworth consider themselves friends and rivals because, while they hold strongly opposing views, they are also willing to talk or debate those views without thinking negatively about each other. Despite how much they oppose each other, they continually admire each other, because no matter how strongly they oppose each other, they still share the same goal in wanting to find the truth and deliver justice to the culprit.

It isn’t just Miles Edgeworth, the other rivals in the Ace Attorney games are also genuinely kind people that simply have opposing views or beliefs. Ironically, the characters that are considered unlikable or horrible people in Ace Attorney are the ones that are villains and those villains are the ones that try to force their own views into the judicial system or country. It’s like Ace Attorney is saying “your opposing views are not what make you horrible, but your actions from your viewpoints.” Even as the protagonist, you are never given any special treatment. If your friend betrayed and hurt you, it does not justify your actions in painting every prosecutor with a broad brush and the moment you present falsified evidence, even if you didn’t know it was false evidence, you will be the one to be judged the same way you judge everyone else. The only actions that cross the line to villainy is murder and betrayal. They’re actions that anyone with common sense will tell you and everyone universally will agree is wrong. Even actions such as breaking the law or falsifying evidence are questioned if those actions make someone a bad person. Are people like Lana Skye, the Yatagaratsu, Ron DeLite or Godot considered bad people, because one falsified evidence, two are thieves and the last killed someone?

It might seem I’m going on a rabbit trail, but the main point of this is that someone like Miles Edgeworth stands out as a rival, because he teaches us something that is hardly ever tackled in other media. Having an opposing opinion or belief does not make you a bad person. Miles Edgeworth holds strong opposing views that people these days would consider to be hateful and therefore a bad person, but he isn’t. He’s one of the kindest people you’ll ever meet and that’s a fact too many people find hard to swallow. Miles Edgeworth may be the kind of person that can’t trust everyone and wouldn’t be afraid to expose someone’s childhood trauma, but he is also the kind of person to take responsibility for his own actions. He doesn’t allow his trauma to justify his corrupt decisions he’s lived by for the past 15 years and five years of his career. The fact his PTSD is never brought up farther proves that Miles Edgeworth is not the kind of person to play victim or allow it to justify the number of innocents he’s placed behind bars or led to be executed. Not even being brainwashed under his corrupt mentor that murdered his father is ever used to justify his actions.

Miles Edgeworth teaches us how to be responsible individuals. If you’ve done something wrong, take responsibility and never use your tragedy or disability as an excuse. Apologizing is a good start, but you should strive to become a better person than you  once were. Never label someone as a bad person for having a different opinion than you. That person may become your best friend you strive to become one day. If there is someone that is treating you horribly, be an example of what they should be. Fight anger with love. If there is someone in trouble or danger, protect them, but never stoop to the same level as your adversary. If someone brings up something horrible you did in the past, never allow that to define you. Only you can decide what you will do in your life and people watch you, so make sure every action you make and words you say reflect the person you strive to be.

So many rival characters are very beloved by a majority of the fandom, but only a few are the kind of people everyone should strive to be. I consider Miles Edgeworth a rival that everyone should strive to be. The fact he is a beloved character in the Ace Attorney fandom makes me happy, because he is a character everyone should strive to be. I can’t say the same for Seto Kaiba, Byakuya Togami and especially Vegeta. All of them are horrible people that do horrible things and are treated as such. Having a rival that isn’t a horrible person, even treated as such, is a breath of fresh air. Now, I do consider Green, not Gary, from Pokémon another rival that only has opposing views and isn’t a horrible person, but most people often look to Gary when they think of Green and the mangas aren’t as popular as the anime. I’d like to see more rivals that aren’t horrible people with that “I am greater than thou” attitude.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about Seto Kaiba, Byakuya Togami or Vegeta. I do like their characters, but I also know they’re written as horrible people nobody likes. Vegeta was written as an alien that tried to destroy Earth and is now forced to live in it, because his planet was destroyed. Seto Kaiba isn’t written to be a good person either, unless being obsessed with revenge and taking it out on the protagonist, who had nothing to do with it, is considered a likable trait. Now, Byakuya Togami does strive to become a better person later on, but that’s mostly because he’s trying to survive an apocalyptic world and he often changes his strategy depending on the situation. If there’s one person that wants to kill everyone, he will trust no one but himself. If he sees that no one wants to murder anyone, he will lead them to victory. Unlike Seto Kaiba and Vegeta, Byakuya Togami was written to be a likable or unlikable person depending on where you stand with him. Spike Chunsoft did a really good job with his character and I like how, if you were to spend all your friendship links with him, you can go from being his antagonistic rival to being the best man he’ll hire as his secretary as a way to rebuild his company. So, don’t mistaken me using them as examples of the rival architype as my way of trashing their characters, because they are some of the best written characters and I consider Vegeta and Seto Kaiba legendary.

The point of this is to demonstrate what makes Miles Edgeworth one of the best rival characters. As characters, the rival architypes can be used very cleverly, but my issue is that they’re considered rivals that are vilified. In real life, not every person you fight or debate with are your enemies. Most of the time, your enemies are the kinds of people you don’t want to or should fight with. They’re the kinds you want to avoid approaching or else someone will get hurt. Rivals are those you want to fight with in order to become a stronger or better person. Byakuya Togami is debatable, but I’d never want Seto Kaiba or Vegeta to be my rivals or someone I’d want to fight with in a million years. They’d just make me a bitter person, because all they want to do is win against the one person they can’t defeat and seem to become better people once the person they are obsessed in defeating dies. I’m not kidding either. Vegeta and Seto Kaiba literally start becoming better and more responsible people once Goku and Yami bite the dust. How is someone a good rival when they only get better and stronger once their opponent dies exactly?

The idea of a rival is for them to be an opposition to the protagonist that makes the both of them better and stronger people. Miles Edgeworth and Phoenix Wright help each other become better and stronger people through their oppositions. They only become weaker once they are apart from each other. This is the kind of relationship rivals should be. They’re the kind of people that will drag you out of bed after being beaten by a gang of thugs just so you both can beat them up together or send you to hell and back for giving up. That’s the kind of relationship Phoenix and Miles have. They’re not afraid to bite each other or show tough love when needed. They’re not the kind of people that bring toxicity and no one should ever consider anybody that’s obsessed with fighting or defeating them as rivals. Those people are toxic and should never be associated with. Luckily, Yu-Gi-Oh does create nontoxic rivals (like Jack Atlas, who isn’t toxic, tries to become a better person, helps Yusei become a better person and is actually a good person and not a selfish ass) and Vegeta does get his act together after the Majin Buu Arc, though I don’t know about Dragon Ball GT or Super. As for Byakuya Togami, he goes from being a rival to being Makoto’s boss and Makoto being Togami’s doormat, so I consider that an improvement overall.

You don’t have to agree with these, but I would like to hear your thoughts on this.

[zenonaa]

Link to AO3

Chapters: 1/5 Fandom: Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death Relationships: Fukawa Touko/Togami Byakuya Characters: Togami Byakuya, Fukawa Touko, Genocider Syo | Genocide Jack, Monokuma (Dangan Ronpa), Naegi Makoto, Class 78 (Dangan Ronpa) Additional Tags: Time Loop Summary: The morning after Monobear revealed their embarrassing secrets and hidden pasts, Togami wakes up back at the beginning of the same day. Over and over again. It might have something to do with Touko Fukawa.

Comments: I started this for tofu day but it got too long aha... but now it’s done!!! Thank you to everyone who read (most) of it over and to @otomegrandma​ for drawing the beautiful cover art. ;w; <3

***

The library in the mansion Byakuya Togami grew up in had been huge, spanning multiple floors all connected with steep, spiraling staircases. Maids regularly flitted in and out as they cleaned polished units housing books upon books upon books, and no dust particles were to be seen in the rays of natural light that flooded in during the daytime, or in the artificial breath of indoor lighting situated throughout the library.

One would expect the library at a prodigious, world-class academy to rival those of Byakuya’s childhood home or at least those in the other schools he attended growing up, yet the one that Byakuya stood in right now had no windows, and the little amount of light from the ceiling lamps bleared his vision with their lack of intensity. Dust speckled the air, adding to the illusion that he was staring at old movie footage, and the dreary shades of brown that made up most of the library’s colour scheme threatened to consume the person standing opposite him.

“As long as we’re in this place, no matter what happens, I won’t let Genocider Syo kill again,” promised Touko with her hands clasped tightly in front of her, training her wide eyes on Byakuya from behind round frame glasses. “T-Thank you, Togami-kun...!”

She dropped into a bow, but not before he glimpsed the corners of her lips quivering, teasing to curl upward. He averted his eyes, setting his gaze on the hand he had resting on the library desk. In a situation like this, where everyone in his class were locked in a school by a robotic bear mascot, enticed to murder each other to escape, he shouldn’t have taken his eyes off her for even a second. But he did.

“... Leave,” he said in a low voice, no louder than the sound of a page in a book rustling.

Byakuya saw movement at the edge of his vision, and then he heard her footsteps as she retreated. The door shut behind her with a respectful click, leaving him by himself.

Seconds crawled by. His fingers inched inward, dragging across the desk, to close his hand into a fist.

Just now, an interesting conversation had occurred. One of his opponents, Touko Fukawa, revealed to him that her body hosted an alter, and that alter was Genocider Syo. Yes. The serial killer. Touko had Dissociative Identity Disorder. She provided proof too - she showed him the scissors, the scars depicting the exact tally of victims on her thigh and a backstory that told him what picture the scattered jigsaw pieces in his hands were meant to create when they all joined together.

For many, many years, Byakuya pored over this case, determined to figure out the killer’s identity. In the end, it had been given to him in a school building caging them into a killing game by a girl with the name Touko Fukawa.

And she had given him a timer.

It was only a matter of time before that killer inside of her came out and tried to silence him, because now he knew her secret. If anyone else in the killing game found out about it, that would put her at a disadvantage. Syo wouldn’t be able to kill anyone without suspicion falling on her. She wouldn’t be able to win the game. Not only that, but like all of Syo’s victims, he was male. Even if Syo somehow didn’t know that he knew, she would be sure to target him regardless.

With people who had DID, alters didn’t always share memories. However, even if, for example, Touko couldn’t remember what happened while Syo fronted, that didn’t mean Syo had no awareness. He remembered reading that for some alters, they could observe while not fronting but they couldn’t do anything during this. Each system was unique, as was each alter and their capabilities.

And while Byakuya could always ask Touko if Syo remembered, Touko might not have known. Or even, she might lie. He couldn’t risk assuming the best.

Byakuya exhaled and took his heavy hand off the desk. Deciding to retire to his room earlier than first planned, his mind buzzing with too many thoughts to be able to concentrate, he returned the casefile he had been reading to the backroom - Genocider Syo’s, coincidentally - and left the library. He strode through empty corridors, descended down a silent staircase, but when he emerged into the dorm area, a grating voice blasted out of the speaker on a television screen hanging on a wall nearby.

Static distorted the image momentarily. When it cleared, Monobear’s face materialised.

“Ehhh, this is a school announcement. It will soon be Night Time,” deadpanned Monobear, like it did every night, and Byakuya shifted his weight, about to move on, but then, “Before that...”

He paused. Waited.

“... all students are required to attend a gathering at the school’s gymnasium!”

Monobear shuddered, and as it next spoke, its voice rippled with energy. Its body flailed.

“Emergency! Emergency!”

The screen snuffed out.

Byakuya blinked. His brow furrowed. Even though nothing remained on the black screen anymore, his gaze lingered on it for several more seconds before he changed direction. In order to enter the gymnasium, one had to cross through the trophy room. Upon arrival, he spotted some of his opponents dawdling, choosing not to go into the gymnasium yet, but he didn’t glance twice at any of them as he sauntered past. The rest of his classmates were waiting in the gymnasium, and within the next minute, those loitering outside dribbled in.

Only Monobear was missing now.

Everyone stood in silence for a while, exchanging creased looks and pallid faces as time wore on, until Kiyotaka raised a fist to his chin.

“Hmm... What does Monobear want with us this time, gathering us all in here so abruptly?” Kiyotaka pondered aloud.

A short distance away, Celes pursed her lips, standing with her fingers laced together in front of her.

“I also wonder what he’s up to,” she said. “It must be something important if it couldn’t wait until morning.”

Byakuya could have rolled his eyes at their stupidity. No one had died since Leon’s execution, which could only mean one thing. Much like the videos that Monobear gave out before, the robot had come up with another way to liven up the game and get things rolling again.

Simply put, Monobear wanted someone to commit murder.

He folded his arms over his chest. His lips twisted into a smirk. A chuckle tickled his throat.

“It seems our captor won’t let us grow bored after all,” remarked Byakuya.

The others turned their gazes to him. Hifumi fiddled with his glasses.

“Why are you always cackling? Can’t you put up a more pleasant smile? It’s like you’re about to kidnap my grandfather and put me through a series of death games,” bemoaned Hifumi.

That was a reference of some kind. Hifumi mopped his forehead with a handkerchief that had a cartoon character on it.

“For example, you could wear a smile like the one a certain housewife in that popular cartoon show flashes just before the ending credits,” Hifumi added. He tucked his crumpled handkerchief back into his pocket, still looking too hot.

That had also a reference of some kind. Normally, Byakuya would have scoffed at such a response, but he regarded Hifumi with his grin maintained. The game seemed to be about to become more interesting. Aoi looked around at everyone else before fixing a glare on Byakuya.

“He shouldn’t be laughing at all in this situation. What’s up with that?” Aoi asked.

No one answered. Her fists trembled. She almost got a proper laugh out of Byakuya but as fleetingly as it came, his good mood was starting to wane, and the ends of his lips dipped.

Honestly, other than Touko, only two of his classmates earned his attention: Kyouko, who sleuthed around and dealt with corpses with familiarity, and Makoto, who lit a spark in the previous trial. An ordinary guy like him... solving a case like that... was curious. As for the rest of them, they bored Byakuya, and even those three would bore him too sooner or later like everyone and everything else.

For once, Byakuya welcomed Monobear’s appearance, which spared him from more of their pathetic babble when it decided to finally spring out from nowhere to address them all. It stood on a podium, surveying the gymnasium with unblinking eyes, until it hung its head.

“Lately, I’ve been feeling down,” announced Monobear in a solemn tone. “My fur is thinning and losing its shine. I think it’s because of these monotonous days we’re slogging through.”

That practically confirmed Byakuya’s suspicions. He pushed up his glasses, watching Monobear as it slumped its shoulders further and heaved out a sigh.

“It’s way too boring here when no one is being killed. Therefore...” Monobear didn’t move right away. Then, it threw up its arms, suddenly energetic, and raised its voice. “... I’ve decided to treat you all to another motive!”

Most of the class tensed like Monobear had cracked a whip at them. Byakuya’s eyebrows rose, but his expression otherwise stayed as stony as before. Nearby, Kiyotaka shoved a foot forward and raised a fist.

“I don’t know what you’re scheming, but none of us are going to kill anyone ever again!” shouted Kiyotaka. He thumped his hand against his chest. “Do your worst! We won’t bend over to you!”

Monobear snickered behind its paws.

“Wow, if I could experience human emotions, I would be scared! Alas, I can only experience bear emotions.” Its red eye glinted as it brought a paw to its ear and leaned its head toward them. “We’ll see if you’re as brave as you’re acting very soon, because today’s theme is...”

It paused its speech as it vanished behind the podium. Moments later, it jumped back into view, brandishing a fan of envelopes with a different name on each one.

“Dadada! ‘Embarrassing memories’ and ‘secret pasts’!” crowed Monobear, and it held them higher. “Everyone has them. You, your neighbours, people you think you know everything about... They’re all things you don’t want anyone to know about. While you guys were sleeping, I read your minds, and here is what I came up with!”

Rather than hand them out, Monobear flung the envelopes onto the floor. Everyone approached hesitantly, like crossing through a minefield, and began searching for their name. Byakuya located his envelope and bent down to pick it up. He peeled it open and when he read the single sentence scribbled onto the paper slip inside of it, his breath caught in his throat. His grip buckled the bit of paper.

‘Togami-kun cheated his way into becoming the heir of his precious conglomerate.’

Surprised voices cropped up around him but he didn’t hear what any of them said, just the noise, as he stared down. Down at that piece of paper.

“The time limit is twenty-four hours,” announced Monobear, and when Byakuya tore his gaze away, he saw Monobear wearing a large, ugly grin.

Its expression never changed in general, but from its voice, from its body language, they could tell if its grin was genuine. And it was.

“If no one dies, I will tell everyone what is written down,” added Monobear, squeezing its cheeks as it squirmed with excitement. “I’ll send out letters to everyone you know. Publish them in magazines. Post them on popular message boards.”

Monobear tossed its head back and hacked up some wheezy laughter, clutching its stomach. Several pairs of eyes flitted over to Monobear’s quaking form. Makoto stared at Monobear with a frown, holding his envelope in both hands.

“Is that it?” he said in disbelief, which prompted Monobear to turn to him. It cocked its head to one side.

“Ain’t I a stinker?” asked Monobear.

“I mean, it’s embarrassing, but it wouldn’t make me kill anyone,” said Makoto.

It wiggled happily for a few more seconds until it realised what he had said. Then Monobear flinched.

“Eh?” went Monobear. Kiyotaka nodded fervently.

“Naegi-kun is right. It’s no problem at all. No one would kill because of a reason like this,” he informed it, waving his envelope.

Excitement seeped out of Monobear like air escaping a balloon as it slowly deflated.

“Wow, that’s so mean... I really thought I had something there,” it said. “Memories connect you to the outside world, and I thought you wouldn’t want anyone to find out. I put all my EXP toward learning to mindread and everything. I neglected my social life, and my wife divorced me and took the kids too, and for what?”

No one humoured it with an answer. Monobear turned away from them with its head bowed.

“Oh well,” it said, holding its paws behind its back. “In twenty-four hours, we’ll have circle time and share everyone’s secrets. That might cheer me up. Until then... Bye...”

And with that, Monobear hopped off the podium and shuffled away. No one said anything for a while. Most of the class returned their attention to their envelopes. Others looked around shiftily. Aoi scratched her chin, brow creased, her other hand grasping her envelope.

“You know, I was scared at first, but I think we’ve been let off easy this time,” she said, her lips quivering as they tried but failed to form a smile. “Naegi’s right... It’s embarrassing, but I won’t kill anyone over something like this.”

Byakuya was inclined to agree. People finding out what was written on his envelope would annoy him and be an invasion of his privacy, but them knowing wouldn’t change anything. After all, throughout the heir selection process, he had proven his worth to the conglomerate, and he continued to ever since then.

No, what got Byakuya was how Monobear knew about that. Monobear couldn’t have read his mind. That was impossible. Instead, it implied something more sinister. It knowing something like that required infiltrating the conglomerate. Someone betraying him. That got him.

Kiyotaka cleared his throat.

“In that case,” Kiyotaka put his hands on his hips, chin held high, “let’s just tell everyone what is written down right now. Then we don’t have to worry. I’ll start. My grandf-”

“I d-don’t want to hear anything embarrassing about you!” Touko snarled.

Her voice ripped through the air. Kiyotaka twitched and choked on his breath. Everyone wheeled around toward her. Touko stared forward, body shaking. Of course she was shaking. Byakuya knew what had to be in her envelope.

“Besides, I refuse. I don’t want to talk about mine!” she hissed. “Even if you try to force me to... I won’t say it!”

Celes bobbed her head in agreement.

“I agree,” she chimed in. “As much as I want to, I simply cannot.”

A chorus of voices rippled throughout the group as the class neared a consensus. Byakuya didn’t contribute, in thought. All he could hear in his head was a ticking. The ticking of a timer.

Now would be the perfect time to tell everyone about Genocider Syo. They were all here. Right now. He could tell everyone. Right now. Before she killed him.

So he did.

“Hold on,” he said, elevating a hand. “I have something to share with you all.”

Everyone turned to him. His features hardened.

“Earlier, Fukawa told me something. She told me... that she is Genocider Syo!”

He pointed at her. Everyone spun around to face her. Touko squawked, jumping back, and nearly dropped her envelope. She fumbled with it before hugging it to her chest. Then, one by one, the rest of the class returned their gazes to Byakuya.

“Fukawa?” Mondo said with a hard squint. He jogged his thumb toward her. “That girl?”

“Fukawa-chan can’t even stand blood,” scoffed Aoi. “She fainted when Enoshima-chan died, and she couldn’t look at Maizono-chan’s body either. How could she kill a bunch of people?”

Kiyotaka jerked his fist at him.

“That’s a ridiculous claim!” Kiyotaka concurred. Byakuya jutted out his chin, keeping his finger pointed at Touko.

“Read her secret. That will prove me right,” he said.

Touko shifted a foot back. However, no one stepped toward her. No one even looked at her. Makoto’s brow furrowed.

“That wouldn’t be fair on Fukawa-san,” he said. “Anyway, I don’t think that even makes sense.”

Celes placed a hand lightly over her lips, barely masking her amusement.

“That is because it doesn’t make sense.” She looked off to the side and now did a better job at smoothing out her features. “To me, it sounds like Togami-kun simply wants to embarrass Fukawa-san. What will happen is she will reveal her envelope and it will say something else, but she will be humiliated. How needlessly cruel... but also unsurprising.”

Byakuya jabbed the air. “She told me. She told me this!”

“I...” Touko gripped herself harder, caving in on herself. Her voice escaped her lips as a pathetic wisp, but it won the attention of the others, who craned their necks to peer at her. She hunched her shoulders. “... I d-didn’t...”

Aoi set a hand on her shoulder. “We know you didn’t. Togami’s just being a jerk to you. I don’t want to show mine either.”

“Me too,” piped up Chihiro. “I’m... I’m not strong enough yet...”

Kiyotaka bit his lip. Mondo tilted his head to one side.

“No one’s going to budge, Kyoudai. For now, we have to leave off it,” said Mondo.

“I guess...” Kiyotaka tried for a smile. Didn’t really succeed. It seemed ready to slip off at any moment. “We can talk about it tomorrow. I mean, no one is going to kill anyone over it, right...?”

That was the general consensus. Soon after, the group dispersed. While the others headed to the dorm area, Byakuya decided to go back to the library and read some more. After this new development, he didn’t feel ready to sleep. His mind was too busy, hard at work. Besides, he had to compile proof of what Touko said to him. With the new motive, Syo had more reason than ever to silence him before the time limit expired.

Once he arrived at the library, he made a beeline to the backroom, searching for the casefile again. He didn’t take long to find it - he found the casefile where he left it earlier. Like the main section of the library, the lighting in this room was poor too, and he could barely make out the text printed onto the front of the casefile.

As he adjusted the angle of it, the font glimpsed more legible, and something sharp pierced the back of his neck.

Pain exploded through his body like blood splattering. Byakuya let out a howl and stumbled forward, falling over some boxes and hurtling to the ground. He hit his chin on the edge of a shelf on the way down.

Above him, wide eyes behind round frame glasses stared down at him.

Touko.

No. She didn’t smile like that. Her tongue didn’t hang out of her mouth like that.

“I’ll scissor later!” she said, and she sounded like Touko, but she also didn’t, gruffer. Smirking. “Get it? Scissor? See ya? Because I stabbed you with my scissors!”

She flourished the silhouette of a pair of scissors. Black spots began to blot his vision. His muscles spasmed. He was helpless. Pain seared hot. Unbearably hot.

“My heart’s hurting real bad,” she said, sounding further away than she really was. She flicked her tongue. “You must have hurt Gloomy... and if you do that, I get so turned on!”

Her laughter shook his body. His whole vision faded to black, and his body didn’t weigh anything anymore.

***

Byakuya jolted awake. Darkness cloaked him and he tried to sit up, but his whole body refused to cooperate and tensed, rigid, like an invisible hand curled into a fist around him. All he could move were his eyes like flies trapped in a glass jar until finally his body thawed.

Then he sat up, aching all over, and hearing a familiar creak, he realised he was in his bed and not in the backroom at the library. Heart racing, he heaved himself to his feet. He staggered over to the light switch, turned it on, and felt his back before bringing his hand in front of him.

No blood.

All that must have been a dream. Yes. Byakuya had been reading a lot of casefiles, after all, especially that one about Genocider Syo, and it came together to make that mess of a dream. Obviously. Even if he couldn’t remember going to bed yesterday. That could be explained. He must have been too tired and forgotten what happened. Of course.

His hand closed into a fist.

Though Byakuya avoided the others at mealtimes, after what transpired last night with the motive, he had to admit he was curious how they coped... or more specifically, if they coped. Surely someone had a big enough secret that would drive them to kill.

For example, Touko did. Most people would have barricaded themselves in their room after what he did, what he exposed about her. But to do that would be cowardice. He couldn’t let her or anyone think he was intimidated or weak. That would make him a target.

When Byakuya walked into the cafeteria, Kiyotaka and Mondo had their arms draped over each other’s shoulders, and they belted out laughter while their peers watched with wrinkled brows.

It seemed they had all got over their unease last night. Byakuya didn’t know what had caused those two to go from butting heads to palling around at some point, but at the same time, he didn’t care, and he walked toward the door to the kitchen.

“Male friendship is indeed different than female,” remarked Sakura. Sat next to her, Aoi released a sigh and faced her palms toward the ceiling.

“You can say that again.” She looked away from Mondo and Kiyotaka and caught sight of Byakuya, who by this point had almost made it the whole way across the cafeteria. Her tone sharpened. “Togami? What are you doing here?”

He opened the kitchen door and glanced over his shoulder at her. “I’m being held hostage here too. Do you remember?”

Aoi glowered.

“What about all that mean stuff you said about us poisoning your food?” she asked him.

“‘Mean’? Is that what you call it?” he retorted. He adjusted his glasses. “It’s called common sense. If you want to survive, you should try using some. Instead of playing friends, you should stay on your guard.”

“Ignore him,” said Mondo with a scowl, having since seated himself at a table with Kiyotaka. “He’s just trying to mess your head up.”

Aoi placed her hands either side of her head, like he meant it literally. At another table, Celes smirked, cradling a cup of tea.

“It seems the unkillable Togami-kun still needs to eat. If his food has been poisoned, I’m intrigued to see what will happen next,” Celes said, and though she talked about him, not to him, she watched him closely.

Byakuya refused to dignify her quip with a response and entered the kitchen. Metal worktops occupied the centre of the room, with bronze and silver pots and pans hanging overhead on ceiling units. To his right, boxes of various vegetables sat about, all out in the open so one could just pluck one out and help themselves. On the other side of the room, ingredients rested on shelves within a glass case, and nearby, a set of knives were pinned up on a wall, with different sizes for different uses, presumably.

The kitchen offered a range of options, but Byakuya prepared himself a bowl of cereal, unable to do much else. Normally, he would have a chef prepare his meals. Sometimes, in the morning, he would eat a French breakfast, and other times Japanese or Polish... but here, he didn’t have that choice, so cornflakes would suffice for the time being.

Of course, if he really wanted to, he could have taught himself to prepare more complex meals. In fact, he would do that today. When he finished eating by himself, he left his bowl by the kitchen sink and withdrew to the library.

Sticking to what he told himself, he browsed for a cookbook. Prior research into the school informed him that a Super High School Level Cook enrolled at the academy the year before, and the library would be the appropriate place to keep any cookbooks. Sure enough, he soon stumbled upon the section with them, mixed in with books on poisons. He plucked one cookbook off the shelf and sat down with it.

Today, he was in the mood for Beef Bourguignon. Once he found a recipe for it, he skimmed through it, and deeming it to his tastes, he grabbed some paper and a pen from the backroom and began making notes on what he would need. After he did that, he made a note of the page number and read through the rest of the cookbook for other ideas for meals.

It was as he had once said. Someone could poison their meals, so for his own sake, he needed to learn to prepare his own food. Not only that, but he needed to brush up on poisons and how to test for them.

The door creaked open. He didn’t look up, continuing to read a recipe for steamed mussels and white wine. By now, they should have realised he wanted nothing to do with them, yet just yesterday, Makoto had come here with Touko to bother him. Now someone was bothering him again. It had even been around this time when those two had wandered in, and Touko had come out with some nonsense about how she imagined him telling her to be controlled by a strong man.

“Um... Togami-kun?” said Makoto.

Great. That guy was talking to him. No, not great. Wrong word. Annoying. It seemed he hadn’t learned his lesson. Byakuya lifted his gaze, firing a glare at him, and noticed Touko hovering nearby in the background. 

His jaw clenched. She stared at him, her mouth hanging open and a line of drool streaking her chin as she gripped the edge of a bookcase across the room. Their eyes met briefly, and as they crossed paths, his insides gave a quiver while she continued to shamelessly ogle him.

After he tried to reveal her secret, she should have hated him. Was she really that deluded, to still stalk him? She had even chosen the same unit to lurk behind as yesterday. Byakuya jerked back his head.

“Are you serious?” he snapped. “Do you like the sound of my voice? I told you yesterday to leave me alone. You’re eyesores, the pair of you.”

Makoto cringed, but Touko drew forward, having been acknowledged even a slight amount and undeterred by his harsh tone. As she approached from out of the shadows, more of her details fleshed out. Her pale grey eyes, slim face, the purple tint under her eyes and the mole on her chin all bloomed into view. Byakuya watched her warily. To think this girl killed him in his imagination... this girl who stuttered, who never stood straight and whenever she made eye contact with anyone, looked ready to vomit.

She stopped a short distance away and swallowed, trembling faintly.

“Togami-kun...” Touko trailed off with a distant look on her face. He didn’t answer, but that didn’t discourage her. A smile tweaked her lips and she picked harder at her fingers. “Do you remember those words you said to me? ‘You should become a woman who doesn’t control weak men but is controlled by a strong man’...”

Byakuya gritted his teeth and struck his book against the desk. It only hit with a dull thud, but the other two recoiled.

“Do you take me for an idiot? You already tried this yesterday,” said Byakuya, heat rising to his face.

Touko blinked. “Eh?”

He let go of the book and jerked his hand, holding it aloft.

“It was literally yesterday you got Naegi to come in here with you to annoy me, and I told you then that I never said that. You even admitted to me that I never said that, and that you thought it was something I wanted to say,” said Byakuya.

His eyes bore into her. She stared back at him.

“What are you talking about?” asked Makoto, equally confused. “We didn’t come here together yesterday.”

“Is this a joke? You did. You both did,” said Byakuya. Makoto gestured to himself.

“Me? I think you’re the one that’s joking. I’m telling you, we didn’t. Not together,” Makoto said.

But they had. They had. They had to have had. He could remember it happening, yet he couldn’t spot any signs of a grin being fought down, or any telltale twinkles in their eyes. Their faces were painfully stupid but at the same time painfully honest.

He realised he was shaking slightly and stood up.

“Get out,” Byakuya said in a curt tone without raising his voice, and without looking at either of them in the eyes. “My patience has worn thin. And you... Fukawa. Go take a shower. You reek.”

She clasped her hands together.

“I-If that’s what you want, you only have to say,” she told him. Byakuya waved a hand at her like swatting a fly.

“I did. Yesterday. Now get out of my sight!” He thrust his finger toward the door. “The whole room stinks of your stench. It’s making me nauseous.”

Touko yelped, slapping her hands over her mouth, but did as he asked, shuffling away with Makoto following her out shortly after. When the door closed, Byakuya raked his fingers through his hair, his other hand supporting his weight as he pressed it down on the desk. A few seconds later, he sank back onto his chair, and he thought. He thought a lot.

Maybe his dream hadn’t been as similar to what just happened as he thought. Maybe he misremembered the dream, and after this happened in real life, what he thought he remembered from the dream were gaps that he filled in later with this experience. Otherwise, he dreamed something that ended up happening, which wasn’t impossible. Just unlikely.

Hell, he could have dreamed the entire Touko being Syo revelation. The new motive.

Still, he couldn’t shake off the sense of uneasiness that coated his skin in a prickling film.

To his relief, no one bothered him for the rest of the day. After dinner, again eaten by himself and consisting of a simple salad and cold cuts, he went back to the library and settled down with Genocider Syo’s casefile, much like the night before.

Because the library didn’t have any windows, as time wore on, the lighting remained unhelpful in informing him how late it was. However, the night time announcement hadn’t sounded when a crawling sensation crept under his skin.

Someone was watching him. He looked up and saw Touko hiding behind a bookcase with only part of her head poking out. The sight tripped him up for a moment. In his dream, she had been lurking there. A coincidence. Even so, he kept his guard up, not taking his eyes off her.

“Oi,” he said. She jumped, like her puppeteer pulled her strings taut. “I know you’re there. Get out.”

Touko slipped out from behind the bookcase, but instead of leaving, she approached him. Her feet dragged across the floor. Messy hair restrained in braids framed her pale face, which housed light eyes that didn’t quite meet his gaze. The awful lighting painted shadows like bruises on her and tinted her skin in its subdued shades. She wrung her hands together, biting down on her lip, and as she stationed herself the centre of his vision, he realised he had witnessed this very sight before, in his dream.

Byakuya sat up straighter. Touko forced herself to meet his unrelenting gaze and trembled, but she didn’t crumble away.

“Togami-kun... can I ask you something?” she said, her voice barely carrying over the short distance between them.

He leaned back in his seat. Eyed her.

“What is it?” he asked. Touko folded her arms into her sides.

“You know Genocider Syo?” she said.

Her words chimed in his ears. He stiffened. This was just like his dream.

“The others wondered if that murderer... that monster... was in the school,” she told him, hunching her shoulders, wringing her hands together.

So was that. She had said those exact words in it too. He gulped. Steadied himself.

“So?” he said quietly. “What’s your point?”

“That person... They’re in the school right now. I know this for a fact,” she said.

No.

“It’s true,” she said, even though he hadn’t said anything. She squared her shoulders. “It’s because...”

And like in the dream, she pointed at herself, and she said,

“... because she’s inside of me.”

Byakuya gaped at her. She must have taken his silence as disbelief because she began explaining herself, like she needed to. Like she hadn’t said this in his dream, word-for-word.

“We share a body. She was created when I was younger... created from an accumulation of abuse and pressure...”

Everything she said...

“... Each day I fear she will come out and strike again. And that... that she will kill again, and in this awful place...”

... she already told him...

“I don’t want to die. But most importantly... I don’t want her to kill you!”

... in his dream.

Touko stared at him. Byakuya stared back. His mouth turned dry. She went on to show him the scars on her left thigh and her holster of scissors on her right. Like in the dream. He tore his eyes away from her scars. Sought her gaze.

“Where do I come into all this?” he asked, straining his tone so it came out hushed, controlled. Like he wasn’t unnerved. Its gravelliness buried his waver.

“With your help, I can try to keep her inside. If I can’t abolish her, I can at least stop her. If I can... be with you... I can stop her,” she said. “You can give me the strength to stop her. I just need you to promise me you won’t tell... and that you’ll help me.”

Byakuya pushed up his glasses and with his heart beating faster, he turned his head away. Really, now that she had told him, neither had any choice. Touko couldn’t take back what she said, and he couldn’t wipe away from his memory what he had heard. They were in a house of cards, leaning on the other, and if one were to fall, so would the other. Her secret would be exposed. He would have to be silenced.

He lowered his hand from his glasses.

“All right,” he said, and he turned back to her. “I promise.”

The corners of her lips quivered, teasing to curl upward. Byakuya looked down, setting his eyes on the hand he had resting on the library desk.

“As long as we’re in this place, no matter what happens, I won’t let Genocider Syo kill again,” Touko gushed. “T-Thank you, Togami-kun...!”

His eyes narrowed.

“... Leave,” he said.

A beat passed, and then he heard her footsteps as she retreated. The door shut behind her with a respectful click, leaving him by himself.

Byakuya planted both of his hands against the desk. Thoughts whirled around in his head, but he couldn’t focus on any of them. They combined to fill him with noise. Was he dreaming again? He had to be dreaming again. And this time, it was lucid.

Therefore, if he waited long enough, then...

The television screen positioned on the wall began to hiss with static, and sure enough, Monobear’s face appeared on it.

“Ehhh, this is a school announcement. It will soon be Night Time,” deadpanned Monobear, right on time. “Before that... all students are required to attend a gathering at the school’s gymnasium.”

Monobear sprung to life and thrashed its arms around. Even its wild movements were the same as in Byakuya’s dream.

“Emergency! Emergency!” it shouted.

And then the screen snuffed out.

Byakuya peeled his palms off the desk. His pace didn’t falter as he took wide strides, as he left the library, as he walked through different corridors, and he only stopped when he arrived in front of the podium where Monobear would appear. The others spilled into the gymnasium behind him. He didn’t look away from the podium.

For a while, everyone stood in silence, until Kiyotaka raised a fist to his chin.

“Hmm... What does Monobear want with us this time, gathering us all in here so abruptly?” said Kiyotaka.

A short distance away, Celes pursed her lips, standing with her fingers laced together in front of her. “I also wonder what he’s up to. It must be something important if it couldn’t wait until morning.”

Unlike last time, Byakuya didn’t say anything, watching the podium while the others talked amongst themselves. Monobear soon emerged from behind the podium, and it regarded them with its shiny, lifeless eyes.

“It’s way too boring here when no one is being killed. Therefore... I’ve decided to treat you all to another motive!” Monobear declared, arms raised up high as it recited the exact same speech as before.

Kiyotaka shunted a foot forward. Anger twisted his features into the same shape as last time.

“I don’t know what you’re scheming, but none of us are going to kill anyone ever again!” He pounded his hand against his chest. “Do your worst! We won’t bend over to you!”

Monobear tilted its head to one side.

“Wow, if I could experience human emotions, I would be scared!” Monobear remarked. “Alas, I can only experience bear emotions. We’ll see if you’re as brave as you’re acting very soon, because today’s theme is...”

It reached behind its back, and moments later, it revealed its paw, brandishing the envelopes that contained their hidden secrets.

“... ‘Embarrassing memories’ and ‘secret pasts’!” Monobear waved them about like an owner trying to get their dog to perform a trick. “Everyone has them. You, your neighbours... people you think you know everything about... They’re all things you don’t want anyone to know about. While you guys were sleeping, I read your minds, and here is what I came up with!”

Monobear tossed out the envelopes, and everyone wandered over to get theirs. Byakuya glanced over his envelope, turning to Touko, who was still searching for hers on her hands and knees. If he showed everyone her envelope said she was Genocider Syo, they wouldn’t be able to brush it aside like last time.

Even though this was only a dream so it had no actual real life consequences, he would know what happened and that was enough for him. He needed to do things right, so he looked around and when he spotted hers, he pounced.

“H-Hey! That’s mine!” Touko shouted as he picked it up.

Ignoring her, he straightened up and started to open it. Touko threw herself at him and clawed at his hands. He gritted his teeth and shoved her off with his shoulder, but by this point, Sakura had closed in on him. She snatched the envelope from Byakuya and glared down at him.

“Togami, you cretin,” Sakura growled. “How dare you assault Fukawa like that! Have you no shame?”

Touko whimpered behind Sakura, cradling her right hand. Mondo grabbed Byakuya’s shirt and hoisted him closer so they were face to face. Noses almost touching. Byakuya could feel the heat radiating off Mondo’s face. Almost taste his sweat.

“Are you out of your mind?” cried Makoto, scrambling up to them, but he wasn’t talking to both of them. He stared at Byakuya. “Togami-kun, what the hell is your problem?”

Sakura held the envelope too high for Byakuya to reach, and even in a dream, Byakuya didn’t fancy his chances against Sakura Oogami and Mondo Oowada. He tried willing Sakura to give it to him, but she remained resolute. She didn’t so much as quiver.

“That girl, she told me minutes ago that she was Genocider Syo,” said Byakuya, pointing at the person in question, and Touko shrieked, throwing up her arms in front of her defensively. “She told me she lives in fear of the serial killer inside of her, who may kill again.”

Blinks scattered across the faces gawking at them.

“Geno-what now?” said Hifumi.

“Genocider Syo,” Celes corrected grimly. She looked into space like there was a camera there. “We talked about her earlier, by the way.”

Chihiro squeezed their hands together.

“You mean the serial killer? B-But...” Chihiro shuddered and hunched their shoulders. “... Fukawa-san can’t even stand the sight of blood. How can she be that murderer?”

“It’s... It’s not true,” said Touko, trembling. “My... My envelope... contains a humiliating secret... that if anyone knew, I would drop dead...”

Everyone’s eyes flitted about, flickering between Byakuya and Touko. Between a cruel man who seemed to revel in a game that encouraged murder and where one had to kill to escape, who boasted how he would be the one to survive to the end and didn’t care about hurting the feelings of the likes of Chihiro and Touko or anyone else, unfiltered and cold, and a woman who stuttered and fidgeted and stared at them all like a wild animal caught in the beam of headlights in the middle of the night. Unfiltered, cold as well, with a persecution complex.

Makoto fixed his eyes on Byakuya.

“Togami-kun... you really are too cruel,” said Makoto on behalf of the class.

“Barbarian!” Hifumi sneered, punching the air. “Harming women is unacceptable! My hair is going to turn yellow at any moment.”

Byakuya breathed loudly. His nails dug into his fists.

“We should tie him up,” said Mondo. He stretched out his arm, holding Byakuya further away from him. “I don’t trust that bastard to leave our sight, even for a second.”

“After such behaviour, I think that may be for the best,” said Sakura. She turned her back on Byakuya. “Come, Fukawa. I will walk you to your dorm.”

And so the rest of the class separated, but not before slinging scathing looks at Byakuya on their way out. The only one who didn’t was Celes, who flashed him an amused grin before quickening her pace. Mondo hardened his hold on Byakuya.

“Oi, Hagakure,” barked Mondo. “Grab me some rope and take it to my room.”

Yasuhiro stopped walking and swiveled around.

“Can do!” said Yasuhiro with a salute.

Mondo dragged Byakuya to his own dorm, not letting go even as they waited inside. Soon, Yasuhiro arrived, and the duo tied Byakuya to a chair. Yasuhiro offered a wave before leaving them alone. When the door closed, Mondo put his hands on his hips, but only for a few seconds. Then he sat on the bed and took off one of his white loafers. Byakuya glowered.

“You fool,” said Byakuya. “You don’t - ”

Before he could finish, Mondo stuffed a sock into Byakuya’s mouth.

“That’s ‘cause I can’t stand the sound of your voice,” said Mondo.

Byakuya gagged and tried spitting it out, but that just prompted Mondo to push it back in so he stopped. Mondo grinned.

“That’s better,” he said.

The ropes restricted all of Byakuya’s movements, so Byakuya could only sit still and survey his surroundings. Large flags with golden text about the Crazy Diamonds decorated the room, one against the bed, another across the desk and three hanging from the ceiling in the walkway. He cast them no more than a cursory glance, uninterested in learning anything about the gang Mondo belonged to. Nor did he care about the gritty manga spread out on the bed or the hair products across the room.

Mondo strayed from him only to lock the door, and then he sat back down on his bed. He grabbed a manga, crossed one leg over the other and started reading in silence. Byakuya tried to shimmy. The ropes didn’t slacken.

For a while, only the rustle of a page turning and the occasional cough broke the silence, until they heard a knock on the door. Mondo set down his manga and got to his feet, crossing the room with large strides. He disappeared from sight as he reached the door, but Byakuya heard Mondo open it.

“Fukawa?” said Mondo. “What are...?”

Mondo cried out in pain, and Byakuya tensed, hearing a loud thump as Mondo stumbled into a wall and collapsed. Byakuya widened his eyes and tried breaking out of his restraints. Seconds later, he saw the braids. He saw the glasses. The sailor fuku. But he also saw the tongue, the scissors and the light dancing in her eyes as she turned to him, standing across the room from him.

“Here’s Johnny!” Syo called out.

Byakuya couldn’t move. With a grin, she raised her scissors, and Byakuya could do nothing as she pumped him full of metal.

***

He woke up in his bed, paralysed. At first, he thought he was still tied up, but when he could move again, he thrashed and discovered he was entangled in his bed sheets, not ropes. His heart burned and when he finally laid his hand over his chest, it felt wet. Barely able to breathe, Byakuya staggered to the bathroom and tore off his shirt, staring at his chest in the mirror.

No blood. No wound. No incision. Just sweat. A lot of sweat. He left his room.

In the cafeteria, a familiar scene greeted him.

“Male friendship is indeed different than female,” remarked Sakura as she stared at Mondo and Kiyotaka.

Mondo was very much not dead. On the contrary, he laughed loudly, pressing hips with Kiyotaka.

Aoi heaved a sigh, resting her chin in her hand. “You can say that again.”

Without being noticed, Byakuya returned to his room and started pacing. He carved a mark onto the table then paced some more.

This time, he didn’t push it when he tried telling everyone about Genocider Syo, but rather than go to the library, he watched Touko slink into her room before retiring to his one, and for the rest of the night, he stayed there, even when he heard his doorbell fitting. He tried to stay awake, sitting on the edge of his bed, but he must have fallen asleep because he woke up lying down on his bed.

Immediately, he went to the table. The notch was gone. Byakuya pushed hair from his eyes and went to the bathroom to shower, and as he removed his shirt, he noticed marks on his arm by his wrist. Like scars.

Three of them, to be precise.

Three tally marks.

[imaginedanganronpa]

Can you please do headcanons of Makoto, Hajime and Shuichi as masterminds with Kyoko, Chiaki and Kaede as their enemies (aka protagonists) that will find them out and put them down for good?

DR1 Mastermind Spoilers/SDR2 Traitor and Mastermind Spoilers!

Mastermind!Makoto Naegi, Hajime Hinata, and Saihara Shuichi with Protagonist!Kyoko Kirigiri, Chiaki Nanami, and Kaede Akamatsu!

Mastermind!Makoto Naegi

It was so unexpected: an ordinary person like Makoto Naegiunveiling themselves as the Mastermind – someone as plain and average as thiscausing all of the havoc and chaos that rampaged through not only Hope’s Peak,but the entire country as well.

And posing as a student with a talent such as ‘Luck’ played into his favor –being able to ‘solve’ the cases that befell them wasn’t just plain luck, afterall.

It physically pained him to act so innocent and clueless, but he was able tolaugh in their faces when everything was said and done.

Makoto had the others wrapped around his finger – his plot to paint a lie thatframed Junko Enoshima and her late sister Mukuro Ikusaba as the Masterminds was goingaccording to plan.

Makoto often surprised himself – acting as sincere as he was when discoveringSayaka’s body came naturally; he was just thankful that she didn’t discover thesecret doorway in the far corner that lead to the Mastermind’s room.

He was pissed that she invaded his privacy and, unable to review thesurveillance footage, was genuinely shocked when she turned up dead.

Hethought they’d vote him as the Blackened for sure, and having that damnedDetective, Kyoko Kirigiri, snooping around his room didn’t give him any peace of mind. If they did vote for Makoto, then the entire Killing Game would fall apart at the seams; but thankfully, he was able to steer suspicion away from him and towards the real culprit.

Over the course of the Killing Game, Makoto drove himself crazy due to herpresence. Especially considering that he needed to get on her good side, hencewhy he acted so friendly around her. Having her opposing him was dangerous, butin the end it seems as though this is what inevitably gave him away.

Kyoko was clever and she knew that a Mastermind would try to lure her ontotheir side, so Makoto budging his way into her Investigations set off her alarms; shedid nothing that may alert him in return, though. And admittedly, he had her fooled for awhile, but she’s not called the Ultimate Detective for nothing.

Kyoko kept the others at a distance long enough to pinpoint who the Mastermind was. Trying to blame it all on the deceased Junko Enoshima was clever, but she saw through him like glass. She waited until the Final Trial to finally reveal his secret, though, as to not put her own life in danger; it was the safest possibility and waiting that long only caused Kyoko to grow more certain of her suspicions.

She watched Makoto pull on the other’s strings, guiding them towards voting for a dead girl. Suddenly, she scoffed under her breath which caught the attention of the other survivors.

“I’ll admit: I, too, believed this lie for a little while, but the Mastermind is careless and clumsy,” Kyoko begins coldly. Byakuya piped up and became immediately defensive, “And what exactly are you saying?”

“I’m saying,” she breathes in deeply, “that the real Mastermind is trying to trick you all, and the real Mastermind is non-other than your precious Makoto Naegi!” Her voice was as sharp as a blade.

Makoto is absolutely floored - how did she possibly figure him out? His face started twitching at the accusations and suddenly, the air felt heavier on his shoulders.

He knew that Kyoko would be an issue and regretted not taking her out sooner. Although he did his best to laugh it off, her reasoning was far too superior and she seemed to read his mind, counteracting his thoughts before he ever vocalized them.

And she knew exactly what she had to do - finally put an end to this Killing Game and survive along with the others, once and for all. The average, plain, ‘boring’ boy that Makoto tried playing himself up to be quickly unraveled as he let out a long, chilling laugh. 

His own sanity begin to deteriorate before their very eyes. Kyoko smiled smugly at herself, proudly letting her confidence skyrocket as she watched the true Mastermind fall apart in front of them. 

It’s funny, he designed this Killing Game but snapped the moment someone accuses him. Perhaps, Makoto didn’t deserve the title as Mastermind after all, or perhaps Kyoko was just that good at what she did.

Mastermind!Hajime Hinata

His amnesia played into his favor; of course, he didn’t actually have amnesia, but Hajime isn’t going to be quick to admit that!

If they knew his affiliation with Junko Enoshima and the Kamukura Project, he would undoubtedly gain some suspicion, so Hajime made sure to keep that under a tight lock and key. After all, he was only the Mastermind of this Killing Game to feel the Despair that Junko feels.

Truthfully, Hajime was the original feared Mastermind of this Killing Game due to his amnesia; but surely a Mastermind would know if they were, right? 

No one suspected the boy who couldn’t seem to remember his own ‘talent’ or lack thereof. 

The others did suspect him briefly due to his faked-memory loss, but soon disregarded the possibility.

Chiaki Nanami was intelligent, though. She always kept that possibility in the back of her mind, putting blind faith into Hajime since she couldn’t just throw accusations around without a purpose.

Hajime was convinced that he had nothing to worry about and he was able to lead the others into believing that the ‘World Enders’ were the true culprit behind this Killing Game. That way, they would turn against the Future Foundations once they did escape from the island.

And he soon gained the other Ultimates’ trust when he took over the leadership role and effortlessly solved each Case. That was only because he saw the surveillance footage of each murder, though, and was able to play off his ability to solve the Cases as him working with the others.

He didn’t expect to have any trouble during his Killing Game, and if he did, he could easily bring out Izuru Kamukura to slaughter whoever stood in his way. 

Plus, Hajime had a Traitor lurking among the others who only worked in his favor.

Chiaki didn’t want to be a Traitor, though; she didn’t want to fall into the Mastermind’s plans any longer.

She found herself backed into a precarious position, since the Mastermind knew who she was but she didn’t know who they were. Chiaki felt indebted to the Mastermind, but soon realized that her life on this island was meaningless, anyway. Her programming is the only thing that strictly binds her to them.

In a way, the A.I. Chiaki developed a sense of humanity and started acting on her own impulses, like a real girl. 

That’s when she finally realized how close Hajime got to her. He kept her as a close ally, since the two people who were the most trusted and helpful wouldn’t possibly be the ones working against the others, right?

But Chiaki could see through Hajime’s identity. She had an epiphany and realized that he was the Mastermind running this Killing Game, and a hatred started burning inside of her. 

How dare he play her as a fool, befriend her and get close to her, only to be the one who put them in this situation?! She thought they were friends!

After Chiaki came to this unbearable truth, she grits her teeth and promises to reveal his identity to the others. She would bring Hajime to justice and finally put him down for good, breaking away from her chains as the Traitor and revolting against the Mastermind’s evil ploys.

She grins to herself - Hajime thought he was smooth, but she had a secret of her own, one that he wouldn’t see coming.

And she vowed to repay her friends, both surviving and deceased, for the trouble that she has caused. She would make them open their eyes and see the truth no matter what, as if her life depended on it.

Mastermind!Saihara Shuichi

Saihara felt himself slipping further into Despair as he initiated the Killing Game. How fulfilling would it be for a group of elite students to take part in a ruthless Game of death?

No one would ever suspect the Ultimate Detective to be the Mastermind behind the whole Killing Game! Especially since he was able to use his talent to play the other participants into his the palm of his hand. His status as a Detective caused him to automatically be trusted and more easily able to deceive the Ultimates.

And as a Detective, Saihara was able to seamlessly manipulate the crime scenes and play them off effortlessly, so he used this to cover his tracks as he ‘solved’ each Case. Of course, he knew who the Blackened was from the start of each Case so anyone stupid enough to commit a murder in this Killing Game was signing off their death wish.

His timid personality also gave Saihara an edge - because, surely, a Mastermind wouldn’t be so meek and shy, right? It had to be someone more boisterous, unstable, and confident, like Ouma Kokichi… right?

But Saihara overestimated the other students and never intended for this Game to be so difficult or for anyone to drive him this crazy, especially not that putrid blonde Pianist.

He mistook Kaede for being a typical dumb blonde who would likely get killed off at the start, but she proved to be a difficult opponent who got tangled up in his plans.

As a Mastermind, Saihara was supposed to be merciless and intelligent, so how was this one, single girl standing in the way of all of his plans?

Saihara didn’t know where each of the students would wake up at the start of the Killing Game, so meeting Kaede in the beginning was just mere chance. However, she formed an attachment to him and quickly seemed to tail him wherever he went.

They soon formed an ‘alliance,’ or, at least, that’s what she thought it was. He definitely didn’t expect her to take up the bossy leadership role, and suddenly realized how dangerous this situation was.

Kaede grew close with Saihara because she did originally believe she could trust him and thought that his Detective talent would come in handy, and he did have her fooled at first. However, she seemed to catch onto his identity quicker than the others.

After spending so much time together, it’s no surprise that she eventually found him out. Kaede saw the way Saihara would watch the Executions and a twisted smile would form on his lips, and the way that he was able to uncover evidence that hadn’t even come to light yet or connect dots that no one else saw.

At first, she assumed that that was simply his talent. But it was too suspicious and fishy, and happened far too often to be simple coincidence. Kaede could tell that he knew more than he was letting on…

Although, it broke her heart to accuse Saihara in the end, it’s just what she had to do. She knew that the others wouldn’t believe her and that the odds were stacking against her favor, but she was cunning and seemed to be the only one who realized the truth.

And, of course, no one believed Kaede at first. Everyone took Saihara’s side over hers since he had been much more helpful. “Why would the Mastermind spell out all of the crimes for us? They want to kill us all, not help us!” Kaito Momota exclaims angrily.

“Yeah, Kaede, I thought I was your friend. How could you think I’m the Mastermind?” Something about the way Saihara said this sent chills down Kaede’s spine and gave her a bad, sinking feeling.

“That’s exactly what he wants you to think!” She desperately argues. Saihara was surprised that someone, especially her, would have the guts to actually point fingers at him, and he had to give her props for that.

Kaede was growing angry and knew that she had to convince the others that Saihara was playing them like chess-pieces. She promised to get her friends out of here alive, and if accusing the person she had grown the closest to would accomplish that, then she had to do it.

She just had to find the Mastermind and put a stop to this for good.

- Mod Rantaro

[noddytheornithopod]

Danganronpa: Parallels Between Class Trials 1 and 5

I’m sure someone far more familiar with Danganronpa has made this observation and has articulated it better, but a certain set of events I’ve noticed in the first game seem to mirror each other. Namely, class trials one and five: the ones where Makoto Naegi is attempted to be framed.

For starters, there’s who the framer is in each situation. For the first trial, Sayaka Maizono is the one who attempted to frame Makoto, even if it went wrong and she died. In the fifth, it’s Kyoko Kirigiri attempting to frame him even if neither actually committed the murder.

It’s interesting that in both instances, the person attempting to frame Makoto is the person he’s closest with at the time, to the point where romantic feelings are implied at some point. Sayaka and Makoto immediately grew close before she was killed, and we see Makoto and Kyoko both grow closer throughout the game, even if the latter tries not to reveal too much about herself.

As we all know, things went very differently for the both of them. Sayaka was hesitant and instead ended up killed by Leon, but since she planned everything Makoto was still framed for her murder and he had to prove everyone otherwise. Kyoko doesn’t die obviously, but actually succeeds even though the position she was placed in was more a matter of circumstance: Makoto purely happened to be the most likely person besides her (even if neither actually committed this murder that wasn’t even new), so she had to make him seem suspicious to survive.

Their motives also actually have a rather interesting contrast. Sayaka was purely scared as anyone reasonably would be, and after seeing the video of her pop group disbanded she felt like she needed to get out at any cost. Including framing the person she is closest to at Hope’s Peak. Basically, there was a more selfish element to her reasoning, even if there was a bit that seemed to be motivated by the people who were basically her best friends breaking up and likely in terrible conditions now.

Kyoko on the other hand is someone determined to uncover the mystery of Hope’s Peak and stop the mastermind. Instead of being driven by fear and despair, she’s being pragmatic. Pragmatic to the point where if someone has to die so that the truth can be uncovered (and therefore, everyone else can stop suffering and this evil can be defeated), she will pursue that path. Sayaka was driven by her intense emotions, Kyoko was putting them aside to pursue what was she viewed as important for everyone as a whole at the time.

Even if her motives are obviously more selfless here, there is still a selfish bent akin to how Sayaka has a slight selfless one: she believes she needs to be alive for the mysteries of Hope Peak to be unraveled. It is somewhat arrogant on her part, yes, but the curious thing is... she’s actually right. In the bad ending where she’s killed instead of Makoto, we see that everyone lives in Hope’s Peak for the rest of their lives and pretty much just accepts it.

Thing is, Makoto needed to survive too. We see this in the climax of the game where he’s necessary to keep hope alive in everyone as Junko reveals the truth about the outside world to them, which honestly would be despair inducing in anyone. When Makoto was sent to be executed and she wasn’t, it not only became clear to her that trial five was indeed set up, but that the Mastermind saw Makoto as a threat too. She recognised she was one piece of the puzzle, but even if she was aware of Makoto’s ideals and optimism, here is when it actually hit her that he was the other piece they needed to get out.

I also think there’s a curious element of hesitation and regret with both of these trials. With Sayaka, she was driven to get out to the point of betraying the person she grew closest to, but I do agree with the idea that she was conflicted about her decision. I mean, Kyoko believes her hesitation is actually what caused her plan to fail and end up with her killed. She didn’t want to frame Makoto and end up with him dead, but she put her survival first. When she was killed by Leon, she very well could’ve spelt out his name as an act of revenge, but obviously doing so would save Makoto and the others. She probably did regret attempting murder in the end, especially after Makoto promised he’d find a way for them to get out together.

With Kyoko, it might not make itself apparent until after Makoto’s attempted execution, but I really doubt she was okay with putting the one person who believed in her, someone who had actually managed to befriend her, under the bus the way she did.

All their interactions before this trial suggested that Kyoko was genuinely warming up to Makoto - I mean, she was pretty clearly upset at him not discussing the possibility of Sakura Ogami being a mole less about the idea that he knew something that she didn’t, but that he offered trust and when having a chance to prove it goes both ways he blows it. Basically, she allowed to open herself up only to feel betrayed. She was upset because she was beginning to see Makoto as a friend and was warming up to him.

She goes back to being her usual more distant self after that brief falling out, but they still spent all this time together and got to know each other. When the fifth trial came, she knew that she may have had to make sacrifices, and of course was able to put any feelings aside to achieve that. She was quite clearly lying to frame Makoto, but she did what she had to for her survival. Thing is... she may be pragmatic enough to achieve this, but deep down I bet she was pretty upset at what she may have had to do to survive.

This all culminates in Makoto’s attempted execution. This is when she realises her mistake of putting her survival (and in her eyes, what’s necessary to uncover the school’s mysteries) first. She may have thrown a wrench into the Mastermind’s game, but this was still a friend she was risking for it all. Sure, she does admit she can’t solve the mysteries of the school alone, but that’s not there all there is to it: Makoto is a friend, possibly her only friend at this point. One she literally just saved from being the actual murder the trial would focus on. The regret is strong enough for her to literally go into a garbage dump to find and rescue Makoto. Not only that, but she’s actually trying to look out for his wellbeing since she brings food and water, and actually is willing top open up about her past to show she’s more trustworthy.

I think there’s also a mirror in regards to trust. With Sayaka, regardless of how conflicted she was with carrying out her plan, she still took advantage of Makoto’s trust in her. A big thing in the first trial was Makoto realising that he needed to put aside his preconceptions to actually face the truth: that Sayaka was attempting to frame him. Here, Makoto was too willing to trust her, and that easily could’ve been his downfall.

With the fifth trial however, Kyoko is quite obviously lying to frame Makoto, and Makoto specifically spots a lie that only he could know in regards to the Monokuma key that can open any door. This is quite clearly a betrayal, but Makoto chooses to trust Kyoko regardless. Why? Well, I mean he wasn’t declared the Ultimate Hope in the game’s climax for nothing.

Instead of a more oblivious trust he placed in Sayaka based more on a small shared past and mutual romantic attraction, the trust he placed in Kyoko was one that proved to work out with experience. Instead of trusting Sayaka because of the relationship they had, the experiences Makoto and Kyoko shared and their working together ended up helping form their very relationship.

I tie this to the Ultimate Hope thing because as Makoto’s optimism is his big thing, he chose to have hope that Kyoko had ulterior motives since they both realised the fifth trial was rigged. He could’ve continued insisting he wasn’t guilty, but he took a massive risk that could’ve ended his own life because he believed Kyoko had a plan as she usually does. And of course, experiencing each other’s methods over the game ended up forming their friendship, and that caused Makoto to trust her not only as someone he worked with, but as a friend.

Makoto’s trust in Kyoko ended up being a gamble that worked because even though neither knew it and this was indeed a massive risk, Makoto was saved by Alter Ego. Here, Makoto’s luck, and more importantly hope, really did win out. Of course, as discussed Kyoko didn’t realise Makoto actually would make it out and really was putting his life on the line, but he still trusted her enough to take what was the biggest risk of his life at that point.

Some smaller things too:

I also noticed that preceding both trials, there is some pretty significant stuff that happens where stuff happens with both Sayaka and Kyoko that is quite concerning and gets Makoto worried: Sayaka has her freak out and goes into panic mode, while Kyoko disappears until the trial actually gets started (though in the anime she actually shows up for the investigation, even if Makoto’s worrying is still there).

Before both murders are discovered, there is a major incident where both Sayaka and Kyoko come to Makoto’s room. Sayaka comes because she claims to be scared of someone breaking into her room, while Kyoko comes over as Makoto is sleeping to save him from being killed by the Mastermind.

This is probably the wildest stretch of them all, but in the events leading up to both of these cases, there is a rather... lewd reference to their potential romantic development in both cases. With Sayaka, it’s the suggestion to sleep in Makoto’s bed, which prompts a brief moment of shock because of the sexual connotations of this act in most cases elsewhere. With Kyoko, it’s when Makoto is diverting Monokuma’s attention, and Monokuma asks what they’re doing in the bathroom, claiming it must be something dirty.

I’m not exactly sure where this is going, but I think this is interesting to look at. I guess if anything, these situations kind of mirror each other as a way to show how both characters Makoto grows close to and their respective relationships with him end up comparing and contrasting? Something like that, if anyone can articulate something better then go ahead.

[theultimatemusemess]

Okay y’all, bc I was just gathering icon material ALLOW ME TO GRACE THIS BLOG WITH MY FIRST PIECE OF SALT. OKAY? OKAY.

Leon Kuwata would absolutely, and does in my portrayal, hate Sayaka for what she was trying to pull. The whole fucking killing game kicked off because Sayaka was being selfish. Now I’m not saying everyone else who killed wasn’t also being selfish, because they were. Every one of them killed for selfish reasons, that’s a fact. No getting around it. But the way Sayaka tried to pull off her murder was downright underhanded and fucking shitty. She was going to frame Makoto Naegi, a boy she’d known for a while and possibly her only fucking friend to her knowledge at that point in time, and get everyone else killed. And for what? A career and friends who were all (possibly) dead at that point. Now, obviously she didn’t know that. How could she? But the fact she picked literally the worst person possible to kill, but also used Makoto’s trust in her and was going to frame him for the murder just pisses me off. And it really makes my Leon muse angry too because if she had just fucking calmed down and listened to what he was trying to tell her none of that would have happened.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Sayaka. She’s cute and her character isn’t all that bad! And Leon and her could totally be good friends in a non-despair AU, but that’s it. They could really only be friends in my eyes. The fact she was willing to back stab her only friend at the time in such a desperate and stressful situation just doesn’t sit well with me. Leon never wanted to hurt her. He didn’t intend to kill her. She freaked out when he got the knife away from her, was trying to keep it away from her, but because she kept freaking out and wouldn’t listen to him she ended up getting herself killed by accident. I can’t stand people who keep crucifying him for killing her by FUCKING ACCIDENT. HE WASN’T TRYING TO KILL HER. SHE WANTED HER TO STOP AND CALM THE FUCK DOWN SO SHE DIDN’T HURT HERSELF.

Long rant shot, Leon could only ever be friends with Sayaka and nothing more. I’ll add more to this later but for now I’m just losing my words atm.

[our-happygirl500-fan]

hey saw the tag. why isn’t a shuichi a good person? yes he ignored ouma but it’s a completely human thing to do. Shuichi still did all he could to help everyone in the end and he’s not perfect but that’s what makes him so great. im just curious as to why you’d see him like this :U.

Okay, first of all, you have to think about the difference between being a ‘good’ person and being a ‘nice’ person.

 Have you seen the musical into the woods? There are two songs in it called ‘your fault’ and ‘the last midnight’ the later directly proceeds the former, ‘your fault’ is basically the characters all try to push the blame of their current situation on each other looking for a singular person to blame despite the situation being a result of all their actions it ends with them all deciding to blame the witch and leads to the next song ‘the last midnight’ where the witch says the line “You’re all so /nice/, you’re not good, you’re not bad you’re just nice, I’m not good, I’m not nice I’m just right!”

Which I think sums up a lot of character themes in V3 incredibly well none of these characters are *good* people, they’re selfish people, they’re self-centered people, they’re people that understandably don’t want to deal with the situation they’re in, they’re *nice* people but they aren’t good people.

If I had to say who was a *good* person it would be Makoto Naegi, who would acknowledge and understand when someone had done something wrong but never excuse them of their actions but instead accepted it and if he could tried to help them be better. When Sayaka tried to frame him for murder Makoto never excused her of her actions, he understood why she did it but still knew she was in the wrong, and in IF he didn’t excuse Mukuro of her actions but instead went ‘you did some bad things but now you can try to be better’ there’s a reason why Naegi is SHSL Hope, he’s a *good* person while Saihara is a ‘nice’ person.

Though ‘nice’ is only for the people he likes Saihara’s a straight up dick to anyone he doesn’t like as seen by his treatment of Ouma, it’s pretty clear from as early as chapter 1 that Saihara resents Ouma for going against Kaede in the tunnel and from that point on is horrible to him going so far as to call him a liar when Ouma is expressing genuine emotions over Kaede’s death, and ignore him when he has a fucking concussion. I don’t care how you feel about a guy you check if someones okay when they have a massive head wound and their blood is pooled out on the floor.

He didn’t do ‘all he could to help everyone’ because it was brutely obvious that Kokichi was doing far more to investigate the school and stop the killing game than Saihara ever was, the mountains of evidence in Kokichi’s room that actually helped them defeat Tsumugi and Miu’s inventions that Kokichi had  built is proof to that. 

Saihara turns a blind eye to the wrongdoings of those he considers his friends Kaede and Maki tried to commit murder and Momota committed murder, Maki caused the deaths of two people and tried to kill everyone in a class trial but Saihara never acknowledges this because he’d rather have a world of black and whites where his friends/ the people nice to him are always in the right and Kokichi someone he never really bothered to understand is a ‘mystery’ or the ‘human embodiment of a lie’ when faced with the mountain and mountains of evidence that Kokichi actually was trying to help them and actually working to end the killing game Saihara just thinks ‘well I guess we’ll never figure him out’ because Ouma directly challenged Kaede and Kaito people Saihara held on a pedestal so he became incapable of seeing Kokichi for who he really was. Also, he never cared about Kokichi as a person rather simply viewing him as a mystery to solve which his why he could never understand Kokichi because Kokichi wasn’t a puzzle he was a person. 

There is also the fact that the V3 straight up bully Kokichi and the game even calls them out on that for a second before the characters disregard it so I’d rather you didn’t call bullying a ‘completly human thing to do’ because it’s not and it shouldn’t be viewed as such.

The characters in V3 are *nice* but none of them are *Good people* and if you do like the characters it’s better to acknowledge their faults as well because if you can only like something by ignoring large parts of their character then maybe you don’t really like them. 

:U

[loveinthebones]

So, I have been working a lot and as such... I haven’t been consuming a lot of new media but my Beau purchased some new games for the switch and well.

I have played Danganronpa for the very first time and I have opinions. I haven’t really engaged with the fandom and have only known about certain things through my periphery (and in some cases, memes) and I acknowledge that this game is a bit... lackluster in certain areas but that is another post for another time.

I want to talk about the characters and my impressions.

So, I am going to dive under the cut because there are spoilers about some major plot points and executions. This is a part one--part two may come later (most likely). 

I am going to leave our protagonist for last because it just seems right. Let’s start with...

Sayaka: I actually don’t dislike Sayaka as a character. She is very perceptive and cunning-- using Naegi’s affection for her to try and frame him and... while I adore Nagi, I think that Sayaka jumped at the course of action that she thought was best to try and cling to the dream she had.

She had even said that she had already done some questionable/despicable(? It has been a whole game so exact quotes escape me) things already in the name of being the Ultimate Pop Star and her reaction to Monokuma’s murder, just shows how much she was affected by the idea of her group falling apart.

She was a desperate character who was willing throw someone who trusted her under the bus to escape and while I do not want that for Makoto... I can understand.

Leon: ...They really dropped the ball on this one. Leon is pretty uninteresting to me as a character and his execution was probably the weakest of the whole game because they did not give you time or reason to care for him before it happened. Gifted boy who is fighting against his gift because he was dragged into it could be an interesting narrative (yes, I did do his free time events in School Mode) but it didn’t progress past that.

Plus, his reason for killing Sayaka is... It makes him seem like an asshole. If he had killed her in self-defense then maybe I would re-consider but he could have stopped once she trapped herself in the bathroom and alerted everyone-- which could have made the plot move along in different ways.

So, why? Why did he kill her if he wasn’t desperate to get out too?

Suffice to say, Leon did not leave much of an impression or have very much of my affection.

Mondo: Okay. Listen, look-- I did not think I was going to like this goofy-haired guy as much as I actually did but his rival/friendship with Taka is actually very wholesome and cute. His FTE also show that he has a soft spot for animals and his determination to show his promises has also that juicy angst because of what happened with Dayia.

I know that he probably has quite a split fandom opinion and I understand, but for me, he is interesting. I see his motive as more stemming from jealousy and his inability to change than Chihiro’s secret and to be fair, Byakuya is the who decided to showcase their body... like that because Byakuya is an asshole in the beginning. 

He also tried to keep Chihiro’s designated gender at birth at secret even in the end and he accepted his death with one of the coolest lines in an execution. It gives me chills.

(Also, Taka broke my entire fucking heart in that round but y’know.)

Chihiro: I love them a lot, okay? 

I, personally, see them as transfem nonbinary because I think the self-depreciation comes from not being able to fit neatly into a masculine role (and I can’t really elaborate on that since I am not well versed in Japanese masculinity standards) and feeling more at ease in a feminine one in order to ‘fit’ and protect themselves. Their shell of Self-Depreciation, as Monokuma puts it, is like an armor but it can’t change their fear or the act of trying to keep up pretenses.

But they are strong in their own ways and when they are killed, they are starting to face that fear. They are also sweet and really, the MVP of saving everyone in the end by creating Alter Ego.

I had hoped they would have been a survivor but I don’t think things would have progressed as interestingly without their influence.

Hifumi: I’m not quite sure how I stand on Hifumi. I don’t hate him, but I don’t love him as much as some of the other characters. If I remember correctly, he is the Ultimate Doujinshi Artist and not Fanfic Creator-- that translation was stupid as hell.

Anyway, I do like his friendship with Celeste and how he calls her “Usagi-san”, it makes me smile and his rivalry with Toko about the legitimacy of creativity behind his work.

I do love that he is shown to think about his inspirations (Princess Piggles) and that he is usually the comedic characters. I know his perversion can be a hit or miss with people, but he is much more bearable than TeruTeru so.

The creators didn’t give him much so I don’t really have much to say except: I’m lukewarm on him but I absolutely adore the call back to him with Usami’s design.

His death was probably the hardest hitting of his time because he remember Celeste’s name and spoke it with his dying breath while Aoi held him and that is just... so good and painful.

Taka: I LOVE HIM AND HE BREAKS MY HEART AND I WANTED HIM TO LIVE BUT NO.

I have my soft spot for straight-laced characters and while he intially was a bit too loud and forcefully, he really grew on me. His friendship with Mondo really helped with that and his heartbreak after Mondo was gone annhiliated me. He wouldn’t even talk to Naegi and I was like, “Talk. To. Me.” 

His...transformation... Kiyondo was a bit sudden and didn’t make a whole lot of sense at first but it was because he wanted to be stronger to not lose anyone else. Especially when Alter Ego went missing and he said that he would rescue them because they brought “my bro back to me” just... oof.

While I didn’t appreciate the whole ‘rivals in love’ storyline he had with Hifumi, I did appreciate that it wasn’t about romance per se and more about protecting Alter Ego from evil intentions.

His death was actually pretty sad with the reason behind it and the knowledge that everyone was friends before this killing game started.

Celeste: Ah, yes. We can’t forget our residential goth and absolute Queen. 

She isn’t a character you enjoy because she is good-natured, like Naegi, or who goes through some development like Togami, but one you like because this girl is cunning, manipulative, and will kill for greed.

She is very interesting and when she snapped, it actually was quite entertaining and her reason for the double murder? To buy her own castle! 

She didn’t even let down her façade at the end-- you catch glimpses like when she tells you her true name, or when she is giving her last words to Naegi, but she keeps that mask there... not just to keep lying to everyone, but even herself.

Her execution is SO memorable to me because it had the set up to be the elegant, dark death that Celeste would prefer with the Salem WItch Trials airs and the dark atmosphere but she dies in an unexpected but undiginified way-- hit by a truck. 

I adore her-- because she is just allowed to be a liar, manipulator, and elegant and it is refreshing.

Hiro: I feel like I could care a lot about Hiro... If his main contribution wasn’t derailing the trial and alternating between hysteria and being carefree. I also think his FTE events have a lot to be desired and that him being a horrible con artist could have worked in his favor... if he had some things to balance him out but alas, he does not. He just isn’t my cup of tea and narrative-wise, does not move things along interestingly or have a push-pull like Makoto and Togami do. 

He just is very... boring, I guess.. That is the closest word I can come up with and while that gives a lot in way of fanfictions, it does not endear Canon Hiro to me.

[astral-multiverse]

"M-Mr. Wright! Mr. Naegi! Who was it!? Who was it that tried to frame me!? Err... Wait. Wait a second... I'm the one and only Mask☆DeMasque, so..." Ron said

"That's something we've been thinking hard about..." Makoto said

"Yeah. We don't have any solid proof yet... but think about it. The killer knew Mr. DeLite's identity. And they also knew... ...that he had been called to KB Security that night... So, the killer used him to execute a well-crafted plan to murder Kane Bullard!" Phoenix added

"Well don't just stand there like lumps on a log and leave us in the dark! Who is it?" Ibuki asked

"The identity of the real killer..." Phoenix started

"The one who really killed Kane Bullard..." Makoto added before they both thrusted their fingers forward

"Is Detective Luke Atmey!!"

astral-multiverse​:

“Then who pressed the buzzer?” Phoenix asked him

“I-It was… The victim, of course! He pressed the buzzer when the defendant attacked him! He didn’t die right away! He must have held on long enough to push that button!”

[pyropsychiccollector]

Danganronpa: Another IF (Chapter 3, Part 3, finale)

            “Let’s begin with a simple explanation of the Class Trial~!” Monokuma gushed excitedly, but was abruptly cut off by Mondo.

            “We know how it fucking works by now! Get it right, and only the murderer gets offed… Get it wrong, and we’re boned.” His hand twitched in annoyance. “Let’s just get on with it already! You rushed our investigation as-is!”

            Though he didn’t say it, Mondo obviously had a favorite suspect in mind already. He and Leon both. Fujisaki appeared nervous, and Junko looked unsure. Celes looked frustrated, and the other four kept a stoic, thoughtful silence. Monokuma flippantly waved his hand at the biker.

            “Okay, okay, speedster! We can get to the good stuff! Get crackin’ about the murder weapons already!”

            Kirigiri had her arms crossed as she eyed the monochrome bear suspiciously.

            “Actually, before we get to talking about the murders themselves, I would like to go over Celestia’s plan and testimony one more time. Her murder plot is just one piece of the puzzle, but it will serve as a solid base from which to discuss the various aspects of this case.”

            Monokuma just huffed stubbornly.

            “Fiiine! I’m a patient bear! We’ve got all the time in the world to go over this atrocity…!” Monokuma held up a clawed paw furiously, quivering in anger. They all knew he wasn’t talking about the murders, but about a certain other aspect.

            “You’re really not…” Leon groused as he combed a hand through his wild mane of hair.

            As Celes felt all eyes turn to her, she sighed as she placed her hands on her hips and looked off to the side, toward Fujisaki.

            “I suppose I’ll go over it step-by-step… At approximately 2am, Yamada and I lied in wait for Leon in the rec room. While he was distracted by me, Yamada snuck up behind him and knocked him out. We then placed him in that atrocious Justice Robo costume, and had him pose with Yamada to make it look like he was being kidnapped while I snapped a picture… We then stored him in the locker in the swimming pool area, to be found later when we investigated the would-be murder of Togami.”

            Leon snarled at the gambler.

            “I still don’t get why you picked me! Why’d you have to try and frame me?!”

            Celes rolled her eyes, still not looking at the baseball star, who was standing to her immediate left.

            “I already explained… Out of everyone, you were an easier mark. Even Makoto appears to have more brain cells than you do.”

            “What’d you say?!” Leon screamed, but was cut off by Makoto.

            “You already told me during the investigation, but do you mind explaining why you guys targeted Togami?”

            Celes nodded in acknowledgement.

            “He was planning to commit a murder, and I did not need his plans to interfere with my own. The reason the Genocide Jack case file was missing? He took it. Makoto can confirm he found the file in Togami’s room. His plan was to lure any curious individual to the library’s archives, and then kill them while making it look as if Genocide Jack was responsible. After all, Togami had made that bold declaration there was proof within that file that one of us is Genocide Jack.”

            Mondo growled.

            “I call bullshit on that! You probably just planted that file in his room while we were all still sleepin’! The damn morning announcement didn’t go off, after all!”

            “Except Togami’s room key was on him when we investigated his body…” Kyoko pointed out. “And we are getting ahead of ourselves. Celes, please continue your testimony.”

            Leon held up a hand.

            “Hold on… Mondo might be on to something, y’know? ‘Cause I was the one that pointed out the file was missing in the first place, and Togami never did anything to me!”

            Sayaka hummed thoughtfully.

            “We’re only guessing at Togami’s potential plans right now. For now, let’s just listen to Celes’s story, and pick it apart later after we hear it in full.”

            “After stuffing Leon in the locker…” Celes continued on despite the baseball star’s frustrated growl. “We waited and prepared until 6am, when Yamada was supposed to meet with Togami. Yamada was supposed to meet him in the physics lab’s prep room, and then come report to me when he’d succeeded. Theoretically, after Togami was killed and you all woke up, we were going to have you all run about with us, looking for ‘Justice Robo’. Yamada was going to feign getting killed, and then while I kept you all distracted, he was going to move Togami’s body to the art storage room, where I would then kill him. I had promised that during the time he moved Togami’s body that would be the time I committed my murder, but he had no idea I had planned to stab him in the back.” 

            Fujisaki stared at the gambler tearfully.

            “Wh-Why…? Why would you have him murder someone, and then murder him in turn?! That’s too cruel…!”

            Now Celes’s gaze fell to the floor and away from Fujisaki’s tear-stained face. It was easy enough to deduce why she planned the murder the way she did. Had she really kept her word, it was going to be easy to point the finger at Yamada, and consequently her in turn because she captured that photo of him and Justice Robo. But by killing her co-conspirator, it would just be like re-discovering the bodies, and little to no suspicion would fall on her, because she would have an “alibi” while she ran around with them.

            Makoto voiced this reasoning out loud, and Celes refused to lift her gaze up to meet any of their faces. Contrary to how it looked, she actually didn’t feel guilt over coming up with a scheme for murder. Her dream would not allow her to stay cooped up in this damn school, and everyone’s over-the-top antics were grating on her last nerves. She needed to escape, and camaraderie had done nothing to solve their problems. Two murders had already happened; it was only a matter of time before another occurred, and Celes would not allow herself to be in danger any longer.

            … The gambler shoved down the sliver of guilt she felt for throwing away Naegi’s life along with the rest, or at least she tried to. Interacting with him during the investigation had been… quite interesting. She was reminded of why she had grown closer to him than any of the others.

            “Okay, so where did it go wrong?” Junko asked the question that was on some of their minds. “You said Yamada didn’t come to meet with you, so what’d you do?”

            Celes ground her teeth as she kept her eyes averted.

            “I waited. Twenty minutes at most. Yamada was a fool, but he had the strength to slay Togami. Even if Togami resisted or attempted to escape, Yamada would have overpowered him. When twenty minutes had passed, I felt something had gone wrong. So, I went up to the physics lab’s prep room to check, and he wasn’t there. Neither was Togami. I went to check the art storage room as well…”

            Mondo held up a fist and bore his teeth in aggravation.

            “Hold on…! You’ve got no proof you found an empty room! You’re probably just sayin’ that to cover your ass!”

            Celes rolled her eyes again, but seemed calm for some reason.

            “I figured you would continue to doubt, Oowada… This is why I took pictures of the rooms as I found them before returning to my search for Yamada…” As she said this, she brought out Yamada’s camera. The one she used to capture Yamada’s fake kidnapping. Naegi’s eyes widened, as she hadn’t mentioned having such pictures during the investigation; he’d even asked to see the camera, but she refused, saying it was unrelated to the murders.

            It just went to show how cautious the gambler was, even with people she had grown close to…

            The first picture shown after the fake kidnapping was the physics prep room. As Celes had testified, there were no bodies there, not even rope dangling from the ceiling or anything. It was just an empty prep room, though Naegi also noticed how the trolley and bloodied blue tarp were missing. If his and Maizono’s investigation of the art supply room was correct, then the trolley and tarp would still be in the next picture. They seemed like tools you would keep in an art supply room, anyway – to transport sculptures and other art pieces.

            Also, with how messy the room was, a struggle had clearly taken place there.

            “Huh…?” The Luckster couldn’t help let out when the next picture was shown. Celes nodded in seeming understanding.

            “Yes… the state of the room caught me off-guard as well…” She was abruptly cut off when the Luckster shook his head.

            “No, not the state of the room. It was like that when Sayaka and I found it, yeah – but where’s the trolley? And the tarps?” There were two tarps, as his memory recalled. But both those and the trolley weren’t present in the photo Celes took of the supply room.

            That seemed to make the gambler freeze up. Apparently, she hadn’t noticed that…

            “See?!” Mondo bellowed. “She fucking…!”

             Kirigiri held up a hand, quieting the biker.

            “The way the room is… Naegi, Maizono, was it exactly as you found it?”

            They both nodded.

            “Yeah… Except for the ropes still being on the shelf, the room looks exactly as we found it.” The Luckster mused. “I remember lifting up those canvases and putting the hammers back on their hangers…”

            “The other art supplies, too… The brushes, cups… everything looks the same…” Sayaka also mused. That room had been painful to comb through, and even then, they only turned up a few clues, like the fact the hammer that had presumably ended Yamada’s life, and the rope hanging Togami had come from there. There were also shards of glass under one of the canvases, which looked like they came from reading glasses. Since Yamada and Togami both had shattered glasses, it was possible either one of them was killed in the art supply room, and then moved to the physics lab’s prep room. With the missing trolley, it was looking like Yamada was killed there and transported somewhere else before eventually being moved to the prep room, where he and Togami were both found.

            The way the crime scene was arranged in the physics prep room, Togami was hanging from a noose dangling from the ceiling, though there was a length that ran all the way down to Yamada, with him holding onto the other end, making it look like he had killed Togami in his final moments. Yamada was in a pool of his own blood, and a “Justice Hammer #4” was lying near the corpses, implying Togami had struck the otaku before Yamada gained the upper hand and hung him by the rope.

            That’s what it was made to look like, but no one was buying the story Yamada and Togami killed each other. It was too convenient.

            “I see…” Kirigiri trailed off, appearing contemplative. “As I recall, the trolley was in the far right corner of the supply room. We found it in the prep room when we discovered the bodies, but that does not make me doubt my memory; it was most certainly in that supply room when the third floor opened to us. Which means that at least one murderer removed the trolley before the struggle. Seeing as how Celes did not know about the missing trolley, we can assume she didn’t commit the murder in the supply room.”

            A vein pulsed on Mondo’s head.

            “Are you fucking kidding me?! What if Yamada removed it, and she just didn’t know or forgot about it?!”

            “It wasn’t in the prep room, either,” Naegi reminded the biker. “And since she was looking for Yamada, I’m pretty sure she would’ve noticed the trolley just lying around in the hall or something.”

            Kirigiri aimed a pointed look at Celes.

            “I sincerely doubt the trolley moved downstairs at any point. That means it was likely hidden in either the rec room, or it was in one of the classrooms. Did you look in those rooms before going back downstairs?”

            Celes nodded stiffly.

            “Since the rec room has a window that allows you to see in, I did not physically enter that room; but no one was in it, as far as I could tell. I looked in the classrooms, but no one was in either room… The trolley was not in the classrooms, so it was likely in the rec room, behind the pool table. I did not have a good view of that side of the room from the window.”

            Kirigiri was cupping her chin contemplatively, and Mondo and Leon were both voicing their suspicions about the gambler. Junko hummed obnoxiously to get all of their attention.

            “What about the locker?”

            “The… locker…?” The gambler trailed off in bemusement.

            “In the rec room.” Junko clarified. “You said no one was in there, so was the locker open or closed? It’s big enough to fit someone.”

            … Or a body, Naegi, Sayaka, and Kirigiri all supplied in their heads.

            “It was… closed.” Celes frowned. Based on her reaction, she did not take a picture of the rec room as she found it. She was now regretting not thoroughly looking inside, especially after seeing the evidence of a struggle in the supply room. “However, I will say this: Yamada was alive when I went back downstairs to his room.”

            Naegi cocked his head. He recalled Celes had said that, back when she was helping Leon out of that costume, though she never elaborated on that point.

            “Celes… how do you know he was alive…?” The Luckster couldn’t help asking.

            “Because he opened his room a crack, and I heard his voice.” Celes responded exasperatedly. “I saw the gleam of his glasses, and it was most certainly his voice. It was terrified. He claimed he had narrowly escaped Togami, and that he would not be coming out until morning. He then slammed the door, and I could not get him to come out.”

            “So… it was Togami who was murdered in the supply room?” Leon asked uncertainly. “Why would Tubs lie to you about that, if killing Togami was the plan???”

            “There’s a more pressing matter.” Kirigiri interjected again. “Celes, can you remember if the cameras for the rooms were intact when you were looking for Yamada? Was destroying them ever a part of your murder plan?”

            That was another point that had come up during the investigation. All of the third floor’s cameras were broken, as were the cameras in both Yamada and Togami’s rooms. That was the real source of Monokuma’s ire, though he would only grudgingly admit it. For some reason, he had never witnessed the person who had busted up all of the cameras – the monochrome was tight-lipped about it, though Kirigiri wagered the mastermind had been preoccupied at the time, and somehow someone realized and took advantage of the distraction.

            “No, the cameras were never part of the plan…” Celes huffed before nodding grudgingly. “And yes, the cameras were indeed destroyed when I got up there. I could never forget how odd that was. If Yamada had destroyed them, I could not help but feel that he had a death wish.”

            “You better not be lying about that…!” Monokuma growled murderously. “The point of this trial is also to weed out the rulebreaker who broke all those cameras! It makes me so mad!!!”

            Kirigiri nodded indulgently.

            “If we assume the cameras were never part of Celestia’s plan for murder, and if we take her word that Yamada and Togami’s corpses were missing… then that really only leaves Togami as a suspect for the broken cameras. We know nothing about his movements during the night because he trusted no one, and most of us apparently stuck with the nighttime curfew that Celes enacted.”

            “There’s also the nameplate swaps.” Makoto pointed out, making all eyes turn to him again. “His, Junko’s, and Celes’s nameplates were all swapped on their doors. With Celes’s plate on his door, Yamada would have gone to Togami’s room. Hypothetically, let’s say Togami never showed for the 6am meeting in the prep room; what, then, would Yamada have done?”

            Fujisaki bit his lower lip.

            “Probably return to Celes’s room after a bit… He wouldn’t have waited around for Togami forever.”

            Celes hissed in frustration.

            “And if that idiot saw the nameplate swap, he would have known right away something was wrong… and would have confronted Togami.”

            “But then why go back up all the way to the supply room?!” Mondo demanded.

            “Maybe… he put the hammer back up there…?” Sayaka proposed. “There’s no point in lugging around a murder weapon, especially from the third floor to the first floor. That raises too many alarm bells, especially if someone breaks curfew and sees you with it.”

            Leon crossed his arms in frustration and cocked his head.

            “So, what? He did that whole ‘confrontation’ thing without a weapon, and then he just… ran back up to grab it? That’s just stupid, even if Togami was out for blood.”

            Naegi shook his head.

            “I think… Togami might have scared Yamada into doing that.” He held up a pair of scissors, some people recognizing them. “These were in Togami’s room, and they weren’t hidden away or anything. If he put on some murderous act, Yamada definitely would’ve ran back up to the third floor to grab a bigger weapon.”

            Junko froze as she saw the scissors.

            “H-Hold on…! Didn’t those belong to Fukawa?!” She recalled finding those in Fukawa’s room, back in the first investigation.

            Celes nodded in confirmation.

            “Not only that, but they were portrayed in the Genocide Jack case file as weapons that hung up his victims in crucifix form… So we could make the deduction Touko Fukawa was, in fact, Genocide Jack.”

            Mondo growled angrily.

            “Did Togami steal those fucking scissors after the investigation?! That bastard…! He was really gonna murder!”

            Kyoko frowned.

            “Even if we assume Yamada was scared into going back up to the third floor, why wouldn’t he flee back to his room instead…? The distance would have been much shorter.”

            Leon rolled his eyes.

            “If he was terrified of Celes, too, he wouldn’t have backed down from doing his part of the plan…” He did not flinch from the annoyed look Celes sent him. She didn’t deny it.

            “So Togami pursued Yamada up to the supply room, probably having broken all those cameras beforehand…” The Luckster mused. It would’ve been really hard to murder Yamada, move his body so Celes wouldn’t find him, and then break all the cameras in under fifteen minutes. At the very least, the cameras had to have been broken beforehand. “They struggled, then Togami wrestled the hammer away, and…”

            … dealt the killing blow.

            “That still doesn’t make any damn sense!” Leon groused. “We didn’t see any blood in that photo of the art room, even with all that mess! And besides, didn’t Celes say she heard Yamada’s voice?”

            Naegi instantly shot that misunderstanding down.

            “Remember the voice changer we found in Yamada’s room? It was something from the school store, and Junko tried it out.”

            “It did sound an awful lot like Yamada!” Junko remembered. It was so strange, considering it was in Yamada’s room, and it was set to sound like him.

            “Plus, Celes never ‘saw’ Yamada… only heard his voice, and saw the gleam of his glasses.” Kirigiri pointed out, not needing to remind everyone that Togami wore glasses, too. If the room’s light was turned off purposely, then of course Celes would have just assumed she was speaking with Yamada.

            All they had at this point was theories, however. No concrete evidence to back them up. Celes’s photos, Genocide Jack’s case file and scissors, all of them were circumstantial. If Celes could fake a kidnapping picture, then she could fake the other pictures as well. Not to mention, it would have been a simple task of returning Togami’s key to his body all after the evidence was planted…

            But there was a reason Kyoko kept having them pursue this line of thought.

            “Alright, so Togami could have killed Yamada…” Mondo conceded spitefully. “But what about the bastard himself?! He didn’t just commit fucking suicide! No fucking way!”

            “He died by hanging, right? That’s what the Monokuma File said, anyway.” Leon supplied nervously. “I know I didn’t friggin’ hang him, ‘cause I was stuck in a costume that whole damn time…!”

            “Yet I wonder if Celes would have had the physical strength to subdue Togami and hang him…” Sakura had her arms crossed and eyes closed.

            “If she could swing a fucking hammer around, she coulda hung the bastard!” Mondo asserted.

            Junko rolled her eyes.

            “But right now we’re assuming Togami killed Yamada, dumbass…”

            “Are you all certain Togami died from hanging?” Kirigiri asked critically, which got some strange stares from those who’d been commenting so far.

            “Well, yeah… The Monokuma File shows it clearly!” Leon pointed out.

            “He did not die from external wounds…” Sakura concurred. “And if his neck was broken, he would have slipped out of the noose…”

            “Or at least looked more friggin’ awkward than what we saw… His head ‘n neck looked all natural…” Mondo grimaced.

            Makoto’s eyes widened.

            “Don’t tell me…! He died by strangulation!”

            Kyoko smirked at the Luckster’s insightfulness.

            “Very perceptive, Makoto… Togami was indeed strangled, not hung by that noose!”

            “What’s the difference?” Leon scratched his head.

            Fujisaki poked his index fingers together nervously.

            “Th-The rope is damaged differently when someone is strangled instead of hung… It becomes more frayed.”

            Celes, having been with Leon, Junko, and Sakura when they split up to search the prep room and Yamada’s room, narrowed her eyes.

            “So the rope was used to strangle Togami… But what does that tell us?”

            Sakura shook her head.

            “That rope was not used to strangle Togami. It shows no signs that it was used in that way…”

            Everyone froze as Sakura pointed that out. Only Makoto, Sayaka, and Fujisaki had investigated the third and first floors, and none of them had investigated the bodies, leaving Kyoko to inspect them. How had…?

            “Sakura…? How did you know the rope…?” Makoto trailed off, taken aback.

            Sakura frowned.

            “The crime scene photo in the Monokuma File…” And then she froze when she let that slip.

            There was no photo in the Monokuma File this time. Due to the cameras being busted, they only had information that was written out in text, and even that was limited. Those on the first floor during the first investigation only knew about the details Makoto and Sayaka had been able to tell them since Fujisaki had been tasked with checking out which camera units were destroyed; and neither the Luckster nor the singer had mentioned the rope in much detail.

            “I can confirm Togami was not strangled with that rope,” Kyoko was smirking again. “There were signs that someone strangled him with bare hands, and that takes an amazing amount of strength to do, especially with how subtle the signs were. An amateur who was simply trying to do the act of strangling would have left more visible handprints; but someone strong enough who knew what force to exert without leaving much evidence…” That left a very small handful of people, and Makoto suspected Kyoko had been targeting Sakura since the beginning.

            The Ultimate Fighter would have had the knowledge and experience to do as the lilac-haired girl described.

            “… Yet you do not have proof that I was up and about prior to 8am.” The fighter asserted shrewdly. She and Kyoko had been among the first to meet up in the cafeteria; a 1-2 hour gap between Yamada’s possible murder was still a long length of time.

            Naegi winced sympathetically.

            “Actually… I just might.” He pulled out a crumpled note that had neat handwriting on it. It clearly relayed the message to meet in the physics lab’s prep room at 7am. “I found this in Togami’s trashcan… And while I can’t say it was you who wrote it, Sakura, I can say this basically confirms our theories up until now. Togami destroyed the cameras, murdered Yamada, and then tricked Celes into believing he was still alive. He must have received the note after Celes stopped trying to get ‘Yamada’ to come out. Celes, would you say you were back in your room by 7am?”

            The gambler nodded tentatively. She explained how it was past 6:30am when she returned to her room.

            “And in that time, I did not see Sakura enter or exit her room…” She added, which pointed out that Sakura was either out and about… or their culprit was someone else.

            Kyoko shook her head and smiled wryly.

            “If we have a note, all I would need is for everyone to supply a handwriting sample. Then we can know who killed Togami.” She eyed Sakura challengingly. “Well? Will you feign ignorance to the end?”

            For several tense moments, Sakura and Kyoko stared each other down before the fighter closed her eyes and sighed resignedly.

            “… There will be no need for a writing analysis. I strangled Togami with my own hands, and set up the scene as you see it.”

            Monokuma howled in frustration.

            “Alright, alright…! Let’s get to voting time already! Who will be the Blackened? Will you be right, or oh so wrong? Hmm, what will it be?” Monokuma’s tone was very sarcastic, conveying his dissatisfaction of the turn of events.

            They all voted accordingly, and… they voted correctly for the third time. The slot machine portrayed triple faces of Oogami, and it spat out Monokuma Coins in celebration. After the theatrics were over with, Monokuma stood up, hands behind his back as he gave a depressed sigh.

            “Yep, yep… Byakuya Togami killed Hifumi Yamada, and he in turn was killed by Sakura Oogami. Maaan, this sucks!”

            Leon stared at the Ultimate Fighter in utter disbelief.

            “You’re serious?! Laidback Oogami was the crazy killer, and looney Celes is innocent?!”

            That got an angry hiss from the gambler, which he shrank back from.

            “Looney, am I…?”

            “Wh-Why?! Why did you kill, Sakura?!” Fujisaki asked with tears streaming down his face again. He couldn’t believe another of their friends… stooped to murder…

            “That… is a very difficult question to answer.” Sakura grimaced. She looked to Monokuma for permission to reveal it, and he just waved her off in annoyance.

            “Go ahead! You already ruined the game this much! Might as well tell them eeeverything!” The bear huffed angrily before plopping back down on his throne moodily.

            “… My dojo is being held hostage.” Sakura revealed to her classmates. “And yet they are not the reason I soiled my hands… In fact, had everything gone accordingly, I would have murdered the Mastermind after the second trial… But… they turned the tables on me, and instead of my dojo, they used all of you as leverage over me. Monokuma promised that if I did not commit the next murder, you would all die. My hands were tied. I had to commit at least one murder.”

            “And so you went after the one person that didn’t get along with the rest of us…” Kyoko deduced, cupping her chin thoughtfully. Sakura nodded in acknowledgement.

            “The Mastermind was clearly using heavy-handed tactics to achieve their goals, but there was naught I could do. I had to back down or you all would have died in your sleep.”

            The monochrome bear raised a claw threateningly, red eye flashing brightly.

            “And because of you, Togami obliterated an entire floor of cameras…! A whole floor gone dark! That’s going to be such a pain in my ass!!!” The bear howled in frustration.

            Sakura sighed as she shook her head wearily.

            “I pleaded with him one last time, early this morning. I had no idea that both Celes and Togami were making their respective moves, but I did know they would be attempting murder soon. Things were going to come to a head if I did not act… and Hifumi, he died because I wasted my breath. Had I killed Togami sooner, he would still be with us, and the rest of you would be spared.”

            Sayaka shook her head firmly.

            “It’s… It’s not your fault, Sakura!! Monokuma clearly threatened you into committing murder! This isn’t some ‘coliseum’ anymore! He interfered with both the last murder and this one!”

            Monokuma growled dangerously at the singer.

            “Care running that by me again, missy?! Ishimaru and Sakura both took matters into their own hands! I just gave them… a little nudge…” He then giggled darkly. “And to top it off, Togami and Miss Ludenberg were raring and ready to go, too! Ah, if only I’d waited to see how that played out~… The Togami heir versus the King of Liars herself! That would’ve been a spectacular showdown for the ages!”

            Mondo yelled at the bear’s amusement, kicking the stand he was at in fury.

            “You sick bastard…! When I get my hands on you, this ‘game’ ‘s gonna be over so fast…!”

            Monokuma scoffed, not even shooting him a glance.

            “The Killing Game will never end! You’re so naïve, Mondo!” Crossing his arms stubbornly, Monokuma shook his head from side to side. “Well, since Sakura’s said her piece, I think it’s time to let her rest in piece…s~! Upupupu!”

            Junko paled.

            “Y-You don’t mean… execution?!”

            Monokuma cackled.

            “Those are the rules! Commit a murder and get caught, and only you will be executed! Them’s the breaks~…”

            Sakura clenched her fists stubbornly.

            “I will not… go as easily as you want me to… I will fight to the bitter end!”

            “Oh, I’m counting on it, dearie~ You’re gonna save your pals one last time! And if one or two dies with you, well… That’s what you get for boring me, y’know!”

            Sakura’s eyes widened at the implications of those words.

            “What are you…!?” But it was for naught. The red button had already appeared by Monokuma’s throne.

            “IIIT’S PUNISHMENT TIIIME~!” Monokuma cheered, smacking the button with his gavel.

            In the next moment, everyone was whisked off by collars and chains. Makoto and Sayaka desperately reached out for each other’s hand, but they were too slow, and they got pulled in separate directions, up separate elevators. When they all arrived at their destination, they found themselves in a subway, for some strange reason. Moreover, the eight innocent teens were all bound to wooden posts arranged in a single-file line on some railroad tracks. Back to front, the order went: Celes, Mondo, Leon, Junko, Kirigiri, Fujisaki, Sayaka, and Makoto.

`           Sakura stood in front of all of them, a fair distance down the tracks. She realized right away what she would be forced to do… And the sound of an approaching train, along with the accompanying light, only solidified that sinking feeling. With fierce determination, Sakura charged at the vehicle that was progressing toward the teens with intense speed. The front of it was covered in spikes, and there would be no way for Sakura to handle them safely.

            Plowing into the front, Sakura pushed with all her might and dug her feet into the gravel on the sides of the tracks. The train kept its normal speed for a few seconds before slowing down considerably. But even so, the locomotive was inching closer and closer; spikes had pierced Sakura’s hands, and a large one pierced her abdomen and appeared all the way outside her back. Still, even with her strength fading with the blood loss, Sakura held her ground.

            Closer and closer.

            Slower and slower.

            Makoto winced frightfully, and the others screamed behind him in fear for their friend – Sayaka screamed the loudest. However, the train slowed to a complete stop just before the spike could poke Makoto’s chest. By that point, Sakura was dead, and she was unintentionally bleeding onto Makoto a little.

            But… Makoto was alive. As were all his friends behind him.

            And yet… Sakura Oogami, the Ultimate Fighter… was dead…

            Surviving Students: 8 (9?)

[lightdusk96]

Oh, they are absolutely a comfort ship of mine, for a very simple reason. 

It’s trust.

Trust is the biggest theme in Danganronpa next to Hope and Despair. Heck, the first game’s Beta version was literally named “Distrust”. And it fits because the story places it’s characters in a position where paranoia can easily take hold of their minds: A Killing game, a fight to the death through deception. That paranoia makes trust impossible.

Enter Makoto Naegi and Kyoko Kirigiri.

On one hand, you have Kyoko. A detective, and one of the best at that. Someone who is committed to thinking logically, not letting emotions cloud her judgement while acknowledging them at the same time when it comes to others. She’s terse, laconic, quiet and cryptic. She says few words that are meticulously chosen. She keeps everything, from her motives to her ability to even her hands a secret. She trusts no one not only because of personal experiences, but because trust in a Killing game is an obvious weakness. For Heavens’ sake, her theme music is called DISTRUST.

On the other, Makoto Naegi. He’s trusting to a fault, believing in the best of humanity, polite to everyone around him, putting ethics and embracing emotions without sacrificing logic. He’s eloquent with words and makes others open up easily in conversation. It’s something he’s consistently capable of. Even the most anti-social and distrusting people like Byakuya and Toko open up to him, feel comfortable around him, so it’s no surprise that even stone-cold Kirigiri is affected by this. Naegi is truly an anomaly: He trusts and believes in others, even in this bleak situation where he’s not supposed to. And that’s why he essentially breaks the game.

We see them work often as a team, Kyoko encouraging him to find the truth no matter what and think through the case carefully, supporting each other’s arguments with proof. In turn, Naegi’s trust catches Kyoko off guard, she even finds it touching! Which is why she consistently chooses to talk to Makoto first when she’s discovered something new or needs help. Which is why she actually overreacted when Naegi wouldn’t tell her a secret of his own (because it wasn’t his secret to tell and the time was just not right).

Eventually, they come at an impasse at a trial. Kyoko wants to find the truth more than anything, but has been trapped into a corner by the Mastermind. It is through Naegi’s trust that she survives. And it isn’t by chance. While Kyoko is logical, she’s also not as open as Naegi, which would instantly make her suspicious (without accounting for the fact that her skills could easily make people believe she’s somehow manipulating facts and evidence). So the Mastermind, in a desperate move, frames Naegi for a murder and tries to have him executed. Kyoko herself is visibly upset, which is extremely rare.

So when she saves him from being trapped in a giant garbage disposal and when he saves her in the climax of the game, it’s informed by their journey. He helped Kyoko trust in others after he showed pure trust towards her, thus earning her loyalty. And she in turn helped Makoto believe in himself, overcoming his self-confidence issues and pushing forward!

And it only gets better from there, when Kyoko shows affection and signs of trust to Makoto that spur him on.

That’s why they make me happy. They trust each other.

Happy Wednesday! I'm thinking of making these little posts a thing for maybe each day of the week. if Eon and or you guys don't like it, I'll stop.

So today I've found myself under a lot of stress and anxiety. It had me thinking about how I've noticed a few people this week have said Naegiri is their comfort ship. When you're feeling down, you have your favorite ship to think about and everything feels better.

So if Naegiri is your comfort ship, why is that? what about them makes you feel warm and fuzzy on a cold day?

[morals-and-florals]

“Sure, I’ll explain! First, Maizono-kun killed Kuwata-kun and tried to frame Naegi-kun, but she slipped up during the trial and we found her out!”

“Then, Togami-kun killed Fujisaki-kun and tried to blame it on ‘Genocide Jack’, or Fukawa-kun! But he also failed, because he was unable to explain several important discrepancies!”

“This very severely damaged Fukawa-kun’s mental health, making her an easy target for the next killer. Ludenburg-kun manipulated Yamada-kun into killing Fukawa-kun, then killed him herself! She crafted an entire story about ‘Robo Justice’ and Hagakure-kun, but it fell apart very quickly!”

“Ogami-kun was later revealed as the traitor, and after a convoluted conspiracy, she poisoned herself out of a desire for everyone to get along. Asahina-kun tried to take the blame, but Naegi-kun and I made sure the truth was revealed.”

“Eventually, you disappeared, and everyone was about to vote Ikusaba-kun as the blackened in your assumed murder case, when you showed up at the trial to announce that the trial needed to be postponed!”

“After a great deal of research, we discovered many truths! Including that the mastermind was none other than Junko Enoshima, the Ultimate Fashionista, or, the Ultimate Despair!”

“During the final class trial, Enoshima-kun was explaining everything, but Ikusaba-kun looked very uncomfortable! In the end, Ikusaba-kun ended up punishing Enoshima-kun, revealing the truth, and freeing us into a world that we discovered was completely fine, unlike the despair-filled world Enoshima-kun had told us about!”

“This left seven survivors: Makoto Naegi, the Ultimate Lucky Student; Mukuro Ikusaba, the Ultimate Soldier; Mondo Owada, the Ultimate Biker Gang Leader; Kiyotaka Ishimaru, the Ultimate Moral Compass; Aoi Asahina, the Ultimate Swimming Pro; Kyoko Kirigiri, the Ultimate Detective; and Yasuhiro Hagakure, the Ultimate Fortune Teller!”

Purple Promo

A girl stands in front of you, long lavender hair streaming past her shoulders and a stoic, bored look on her face. She sighs before actually speaking in a harsh tone of voice.

"I can't believe I'm actually doing this. Ahem. My name is Kyoko Kirigiri. You may call me Kirigiri. I'm known as the Super High School Level Detective or the Ultimate Detective. I don't care which you choose to use. Just don't mess up. I'm not obligated to share anything about myself, and I won't unless asked. If you may, please give me a promo. This isn't an obligation, however. Just a request. And it goes without saying that I do mean 'please and thank you', as well, of course."

(( Feel free to ignore or interact if not tagged! ))

@ask-shujin-maindo @ask-makoto-iguess @ultimate-average-person @askultimateluckytrash @askultimatemoralcompass @ask-chihirofujisaki @xx-oumax3-xx @xxmissing-voicesxx @bikerandbreeder @jvnko-enoshima @ask-missfashionista @not-junko-enoshima @human-monokuma @plainjaneasks @pleasestandby-tsumugi @celestia-ludenburg-official @ask-hifumi-yamada @ask-ultimate-popsensation @ask-the-ultimate-baseball-star @ask-alter-ego-impersonator @hoshi-neko-hikari