Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It’s god-knows-o’-clock when Kokichi runs to the bathroom, hurling once, and then hurling again when what came up mixed with his vomit and saliva was blood and petals barely still strung together in a structure that resembles the flowers that Kokichi might have seen in the courtyard at some point.

He spits what remained of that concoction in his mouth into toilet paper he’d hastily rolled around his fingers, folds it without looking, drops it shakily into the toilet bowl and flushes it in five swift movements, really too afraid of what he was seeing to give himself a chance to process it.

The petals swirl at the water surface, with barely half of what he’d coughed up disappearing with the flushed water.

His head is pounding with the sound of his own pulse, and it only disorients him further when Monotaro pops up out of nowhere and begins babbling through his obnoxiously loud speakers.

“Well well well, would ya look at that! We haven’t seen this for several seasons! Monophanie, get a load of this!”

Several seasons…?

“I-Is that… bl-blood?” Kokichi doesn’t even notice her presence before she darts to his toilet and throws a mixture of her own up into it.

Kokichi looks down at his shirt and sure enough - he’d covered himself in his own blood and puke without realising it.

He ignores it. “What do you mean by ‘several seasons’?” His question is firm, but his voice comes out all hoarse and breathy.

“The hanahaki trope is popular these days, so we put it in one of you fuckers each time. It’s a wasted effort more often than not.” Monotaro shrugs his stuffed shoulders. “I mean, it makes sense. Have you taken a look at yourselves? Nothing there to fall in love with.”

Kokichi’s head was spinning. He’d definitely heard every single word of that so there was no use in asking for Monotaro to repeat himself, but what he understood of it was a whole other issue. Trope? Popular…? Hanahaki?

He can’t figure it out. He leans back against the bathtub, feeling his eyes wet with frustration. He blinks the tears back rapidly, determined to not cry even in front of whoever these stuffed toys were undoubtedly feeding back to.

Kokichi had refused to ask, but Monodam provided some clarity after a beat of silence anyway.

“Father turned your body into an additional motive before the game began,” He says, in his characteristically robotic voice. “Your personal motive.”

The mere mention of the word “motive” made Kokichi cough uncontrollably into his hands.

His vision blurs when he pulls his hands away to find purple petals strewn about in spots of blood on his palms.

“Are those wisteria petals? How pretty!” Monophanie jumps and waddles at full speed towards Kokichi, before stopping a foot away to vomit again directly in the middle of the bathroom floor at the sight of more of Kokichi’s blood.

“It’s also kind of ironic,” Monotaro adds, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. “Considering they symbolise long life and immortality, and this bastard here’s slowly dying.”

“Maybe it means…” Monophanie begins, her eyes pulling against the stitches on her sockets in horror, “that he intends to cure himself.”

“Of course I do.” Having heard enough of the Monokubs’ babble at this point, he spits the sweet, metallic taste out of his mouth and picks Monophanie up by the face.

She whines and squirms, pulling at his fingers with her cotton paws in a futile attempt to escape his grip.

“Tell me where the cure is.” He demands, bringing his face closer to Monophanie.

“Patience, you sea urchin lookin’ motherfucker.” Monotaro answers instead, smugly seating himself on the side of the bathtub. “Did you really think it’d be as easy as treasure-hunting for a cure? You have two options. Have the subject of your affections return your feelings, or kill them. Either of those will cure you.”

Kokichi drops Monophanie.

“Hey hey, who is it?” Monophanie asks on wobbly footing, dizzy from Kokichi’s abuse.

Kokichi has no intention to answer that, of course. But the question puts an image of someone in his head, and despite the circumstances - despite what he’d just been told, despite the blood staining his shirt, despite the scratchy feeling of petals saturated with his own vomit and saliva at the back of his throat - he can’t help but smile a little bit. He hides it with a lowered head, behind his bangs.

“Uhh, spoilers, Monophanie!” Monotaro hollers. “That should be revealed when the sea urchin commits his crime. We’ve been here long enough now.”

“Agreed.” Monodam chimes in as Monophanie squeaks at the scolding. The three bears then gathered in one spot at the door, preparing to leave - much to Kokichi’s relief.

“So long, bear well!”

When Kokichi finds himself breathless simply from rinsing his mouth, changing his shirt and returning to bed, he begins to wonder just how much time he had left. The sensation of his lungs losing capacity had already grown stronger since the conversation with the Monokubs, and the constant sickeningly sweet taste at the back of his throat was making him over-salivate.

“You have two options. Have the subject of your affections return your feelings, or kill them. Either of those will cure you.”

Kokichi wondered which of those were more impossible to do.

Colossally underwhelming, was the judgment Kokichi had passed on Shuichi Saihara when they had first met.

A waste of an Ultimate title like that, he’d thought.

It’s not often that Kokichi is wrong, and rarer still are occasions in which he’d admit it.

But Kokichi finds himself admitting with ease that he was indeed very, very wrong about this classmate of his.

When Shuichi had looked up from Rantaro’s corpse, his eyes had fallen on Kokichi. He’d been watching - he had little else to do, really.

(He also wouldn’t really believe the crime scene was going to be perfectly preserved unless he kept an eye on it himself. The detective was particularly suspicious, since he’d probably be able to convince anyone that anything strange he did was necessary for the investigation.)

Kokichi regarded him with a smile, which quickly transitioned into a grimace when the detective immediately averted his gaze upon eye contact.

After the trial, one thing had been particularly clear to Kokichi. The best word to describe Shuichi Saihara was gross. He kneels at dead bodies as they cool and stiffen by the minute, and he pokes at them.

The fact that Rantaro had been walking around, talking, smiling, laughing just minutes ago; the fact that places he’d been in still carried the warmth of his body heat and his scent - none of that seemed to faze Shuichi as he carried out his investigation.

Something like that could never not be weird to Kokichi.

Shuichi skitters about like a frightened spider that just spotted a person in pajamas approach with a shoe in hand but evidently, he possessed some kind of immense strength. Inward and quiet strength, perhaps, but immense and monumental.

Kokichi had no conclusions about it, but he could at least say Shuichi wasn’t to be underestimated.

Kokichi underestimates him anyway.

Various other words Kokichi thought he could use to describe his timid classmate had sprung to mind during the trial before he had settled on gross. Naive. Idiotic. Incompetent.

Kokichi saw an opportunity to exploit his lack of confidence, and took it. It put pressure on Kaede, somewhat predictably. The truth unravelled itself spectacularly.

Shuichi cried when Kaede was executed - Kokichi could hear it in the way his voice broke and in his sobs, but he couldn’t see it.

Shuichi had his eyes hidden behind that little hat of his. Kokichi hated it. Eyes are the most expressive part of one’s face. What Kokichi can’t see is what Kokichi can’t confirm, and what Kokichi couldn’t confirm was the way Shuichi feels.

And if he couldn’t confirm that, then he couldn’t decide how much to trust him.

Shuichi took a punch from Kaito, and pathetically keeled over onto the floor. Kokichi observed with boredom.

His hat was knocked off and his cheek reddened where he was struck. His face in general had been flushed with emotion - probably something along the lines of shock, grief and humiliation. Kokichi didn’t care to empathise.

He peered up at his attacker from beyond his bangs, and Kokichi caught a glimpse of his eyes. They’re golden-green, glazed with aged sadness and there’s something else Kokichi can’t quite place, but he knows right then and there that it was likely he’d been wrong about his classmate all that time.

There was little time to dwell on it. Everybody parted ways for the night soon afterwards.

Kokichi doesn’t know what Shuichi did after that, but something told him he didn’t need to worry about it.

Shuichi was going to be fine. He had that kind of air around him. He may be a panicky mess, but there was some kind of silent sense of security there.

And it was sort of contagious, because Kokichi was starting to believe that maybe things would all turn out okay in the end too.

That is, until right then. Ryoma had been murdered that day, Kirumi had been executed, he’d exposed Maki’s talent and been held up by the throat - an experience far scarier than he’d ever admit to anyone.

That all paled in comparison to what happened when Maki released him, though. His breath had gotten stuck in his throat in his rush to replenish the air in his lungs, and it made him cough.

They’d been in the courtyard, so Kokichi was only mildly confused when he found a few wisteria petals in his hands. He glanced towards the trellis a few feet away, and figures that it wasn’t impossible the wind could have carried it over.

He shook them off when he got up. They danced off with a gust of wind that made Kokichi shiver. It’s suddenly too cold, so he didn’t dawdle any longer on his way to the dorms.

He was halfway up the steps when he heard the doors behind him open and close again.

It was fight-or-flight that made him turn to check who it was, considering he’d almost just gotten his neck snapped after all.

There stood Shuichi. His body was too big for his tiny, silent presence, and he compensated for it with shoulders far too tense in an attempt to make himself appear smaller, quieter, less assuming.

For some reason, Kokichi felt like he understood for a moment. He was sure he’d always had the opposite issue, a personality far too large for his small body to contain, so Kokichi wasn’t completely sure where the understanding came from.

But from the small, ghost-like presence to the inability to make eye contact, Kokichi suddenly felt like he could sympathise with Shuichi.

No, it went farther than that - the feelings were familiar. Personally...

Kokichi felt dangerously close to something his head was telling him he shouldn’t be close to, and he took a step back.

Shuichi was still watching him warily from the door. Kokichi wasn’t sure how long they’d been standing there like that. It could have been two seconds or thirty.

Regardless, he smiled. Kokichi thought the detective deserved one.

Shuichi looked away shyly, and it was cute.

Shuichi was cute.

That thought had been in the back of his mind constantly since the middle of Ryoma and Kirumi’s trial.

Shuichi had taken a pretty hard fall, and he’d broken a little bit. But all it did was reveal a blinding brilliance underneath, which was beginning to seep through the cracks in him and harden into a new, stronger exterior.

All Shuichi had done in today’s trial was show everyone how hard humanity can bounce back regardless of their losses.

If this was intentional, Kaito had the right idea to punch him.

Kokichi felt something flood his system - something light and happy, and it’s a different kind of fight-or-flight that had him turning away and rushing into his room.

The sensation doesn’t last.

It was a few hours into the night when he had to rush to the bathroom.

It’s cruel. Far too cruel. Kokichi doubts if he could actually handle it.

He feels more of his lungs seize when he pictures Shuichi’s no-longer-obscured eyes. They’re pretty, and Kokichi was obsessed with them. He hates that hat more now, with the knowledge that they’d been hiding not only such a meaningful gaze, but also a beautiful one.

He swallows back a cough, and lets the thought of Shuichi lull him to sleep.

Chapter Text

When Kokichi sets eyes on Shuichi the following day, he decides to do what he does best.

He annoys him.

He pounces, and attaches himself to the detective’s arm.

For the entire day.

Shuichi had stiffened initially. He tried to pry him off a few times, with an awkward pleading smile adorning his face.

It’s all too cute, and makes Kokichi hold onto him tighter.

Kokichi was expecting something snarky and quick-witted, maybe even borderline mean. He was expecting just something. Anything, really. Kokichi thinks he’s definitely capable of it, he just won’t.

When Shuichi gives into his one-handed fate for the day with only a small, patient sigh and not a single word of abuse, Kokichi falls harder.

He knows he has, because he can feel it in his lungs.

And it hurts.

Kokichi doesn’t have time to worry about it. Angie’s started a cult, and it was definitely going to get someone killed.

The question of whom was revealed not long afterwards.

It was herself.

Kokichi thinks it was somewhat predictable. Her growing control over her classmates was going to trump the mastermind’s. She had to go, and someone was manipulated into doing the mastermind’s bidding.

Kiyo wants to ask Angie herself.

It’s weird, and Kokichi knows someone else is going to die. So he volunteers to be present at the seance.

Thankfully, Shuichi ended up there with him, too. It’s looking likely that everyone will survive this next trial.

Kiyo is brave, though. To choose to commit his crime in front of a detective.

It’s high risk and high reward, he supposes.

Speaking of whom, Shuichi was sat across the room from him, practicing the lines he’d been given. He’s leaning against the wall, his legs bent at the knees in front of him.

Awful posture.

Predictably, his singing is all flat.

Kokichi can’t judge, though. Well, not anymore anyway. He’d taken some pride in his vocal ability before, since he found that the process of belting notes and the inhuman screeching he was already intimately familiar with weren’t worlds apart.

But now, with his reduced lung capacity and permanently scratchy throat, it’d be a miracle if he got even one note in the whole thing Kiyo had given them right.

At some point, Shuichi had quit practicing. Kokichi only notices when he looks up and meets his gaze. Shuichi looks bored, and Kokichi can’t have that.

He pulls a face, which Shuichi returns. He smiles afterwards - an impossibly gentle smile, and Kokichi’s breath catches in his throat.

He suppresses a hiccup. Shuichi looked too pretty right now for Kokichi to turn into a coughing confetti machine.

By the time Shuichi looked away, Kokichi had already traced the image of his smile a dozen times over with his eyes.

The detective doesn’t have an eyesmile like Kokichi does, and he kind of likes that. It doesn’t take away from those eyes of his that Kokichi had fallen for before anything else.

...That thought embarrasses him a little.

Kokichi acknowledged that Shuichi had been somewhat pretty when he’d first abandoned that hat of his the day after Kaede’s execution, with those two pots of gold on his face.

He also had a mighty ahoge that looked as though it could be used, accidentally or otherwise, to earn himself the blackened status. Or at least an eyeball. He notices later that it also moved around depending on how Shuichi was feeling. Kind of like the tail on an animal. It’s outrageously cute. Kokichi wanted to play with it.

But at that point, Shuichi hadn’t yet roused anything in Kokichi’s chest - neither the rapid thumping of his heart, nor the roots tearing into his lungs.

It’s something else about Shuichi’s eyes that really makes him fall.

It’s how plainly you could see Shuichi’s heart behind them.

It’d been around the middle of Kirumi’s trial. Kokichi had zoned out for a minute, but snapped back to attention when Kaito clapped Shuichi on the back. The latter yelped and stuttered forward. Kokichi grimaced internally. He’s such a weakling.

Kaito gave Shuichi some weird protagonistic spiel about ‘saving everyone together’ and how Shuichi was his sidekick.

What kind of dynamic is sidekick-that-does-all-the-work-for-a-useless hero? They look like a terrible beta high school rip-off of Mob and Reigen right now, and Kokichi wants to cringe.

But Shuichi obviously didn’t feel the same way about it.

His eyes shone with a new sense of belief, and Kokichi suddenly felt a pin-prick of jealousy. The sensation moves to his lungs and begins to constrict at them.

He found that he wanted to say something that’d give his doormat of a classmate strength, and he wanted Shuichi to look at him like that.

In the prior trial, Kokichi had taken the opening right around this time to exploit Shuichi.

This time, Kaito had taken it to support him. And the reward was way better.

Sure, Kokichi had won them the trial last time. But Kaito got a first-person perspective of sparkly eyes on a pretty detective looking at him with the utmost confidence and even what looked like a bit of admiration.

Kokichi feels slighted. That wasn’t fucking fair. How was he supposed to know that’s what happens if you shield Shuichi instead of taking advantage of his incompetence?

Kokichi’s cheeks coloured at the realisation: he wanted to protect him! Like this was some kind of shoujo manga! It took every bit of his strength to not hold his face and lower himself to the ground in embarrassment.

Kokichi wasn’t sure what expression he was making, but it caught Shuichi’s attention from across the courtroom. Kokichi gulped and glanced away.

He gathered himself. It was hardly the right time to start crushing on a classmate.

And now was hardly a good time to be reminiscing about it, considering Tenko was about to be possessed by Angie.

(Apparently.)

Of course, it doesn’t happen. And of course, she comes out dead.

A second investigation starts.

Maki punches Kaito at some point and it’s pretty epic. Kokichi had to snort.

He unconsciously hovered towards Shuichi sometime afterward, when everyone had begun to look around. He doesn’t know why he does it, because it’s not like he has any real business with him.

He just felt safer the closer he happened to be to Shuichi.

Even if Kokichi had wanted to investigate with him - which he didn’t, because putting how attractive he is while focused aside, he was still a little uncomfortable with the detective’s post-mortem skills - it looked like Maki was his little assistant for the day.

And he doesn’t really want to be around her for semi-obvious reasons.

So Kokichi heads out. The smell of blood was going to make him gag anyway, and he didn’t really want to end up making a scene in front of anyone.

He slips into one of the adjacent empty rooms, again, with no real intention, and is greeted with the sight of the Monotaro.

“Rise and sh--You know what? Fuck it. This is behind the scenes anyway and won’t air.”

“What are you talking about?” Kokichi sighs, exasperated. Listening to Monokuma and his kids made Kokichi’s head spin. They always seemed to speak in TV production metaphors…

...Those were just metaphors, right?

“Rise and shine, ursine!” Monophanie and Monodam show up from somewhere behind Kokichi. He has a headache suddenly.

“It’s Shuichi, isn’t it?” Monophanie says, putting her paws around Kokichi’s leg.

“What, he’s the culprit?” Kokichi says, annoyed. He peels off the pink bear and tosses her towards her peers.

“Look, beating around the bush isn’t going to work in your favour. We know it’s that greasy bastard. You’re a terrible flirt,” Monotaro says, and Kokichi instinctively becomes defensive.

“I wasn’t flirting,” he says, very much aware that pressing his body to his classmate’s arm and following them around among other things he’d been saying and doing was, in fact, Kokichi’s way of mining for romantic attention.

“Regardless of that, we failed to mention one thing.” Monodam interrupts. “And it may serve you well to listen.”

“Yeah, uhhh, Shuichi’s totally written to love Kaede even across the boundary of life and death, so… like. You’ll never get him to return your feelings.” Monotaro explains.

Kokichi doesn’t understand. “Written…?”

“Yeah. So in other words, you remember when I said you had to have the subject of your affections return your feelings or kill them to cure yourself? It doesn’t apply if it’s Shuichi. Pretend I said, ‘you have to kill the subject of your affections or kill them’. Capisce?”

“What do you mean written?” Kokichi repeats, choosing not to grace that absurdity at the end with any attention.

Monotaro glances between Monophanie and Monodam. “Okay, I’ll tell you what. I’ll let you in on a little secret.”

“Is that really okay?” Monophanie says, her paws on either side of her face.

“It’s totally fine. Nobody will believe this puny motherfucker and even if they do, it’s never had to stay a secret. It’s about what’ll give us the best footage. We can bend some things with good editing if we need to.”

Kokichi is beginning to piece it together, and he’s horrified.

“The reason why Shuichi will never love you,” Monotaro begins pointedly, “is because he has no real free will in regards to certain things. None of you do. You’re all characters in a show that airs on national television every Tuesday.”

“That can’t be true,” Kokichi begins.

“Shut up.”

Kokichi actually flinches.

“I’m going to read your mind now. The only reason I can do that is because you’re a character written by us.”

“First, you’re thinking about running out of here and telling Shuichi. Hoping that he’ll reassure you otherwise. Hoping he’ll say he’ll help you figure this out and get everyone to safety. Hoping he’ll protect you.”

Kokichi feels his mouth go dry.

“I hate to see you hurt, so I’ll spare you and tell you what’ll happen if you do that. Shuichi’s not going to believe you. Nobody is going to believe you. You’re literally the Boy Who Cried Wolf in here. It’s going to be your downfall. You were written that way. You seem to be in disbelief, so I’ll say it again. Shuichi won’t believe you, nor will he ever love you.”

“Secondly, you’re wondering what this means for you. Surely, this means that you were destined to fall in love with Shuichi and become ill. The answer is: no, not really. We leave some things up to you, to give our viewers somewhat of an authentic reality show. But they’re all scripted to some extent, y’know?” Monotaro shrugs.

“One of our accountants opposes some of our practices in that regard. We’ve put the hanahaki disease in one of you for generations now, but it’s never paid off even once. Most of you bastards don’t fall in love, and when you do, the associated subplot ends up being unwatchable garbage. The effects on the blood in your bathroom look great, and we’re trying to make that accountant eat his words so I’m gonna need you to stop ruining all our hard work with those lame coy smiles across the room and start getting some blood on your hands already. You’re jealous of Kaito, aren’t you? The yandere trope is pretty popular right now... It wouldn’t be a terrible idea to go for him. Though ideally, you’d either go for Shuichi or yourself.”

“Third, you’re still somehow doubting what I’m telling you even when I’m rattling off your thoughts as soon as they pop into your head. That’s on your own stupidity, so I’m not going to grace it with much address. I’ll give you time to think about it, and you can let me know later how realistic you think it is to have an illness where flowers grow in your lungs if your crush won’t fuck you.”

“Fourth, you’re panicking. You’ve only just realised you’ve been set up to die. You’ve only just realised what it means to be given a motive. But don’t worry - if you don’t want Shuichi’s blood on your hands that badly, you won’t be lonely for long. He’ll become the blackened, and be executed in the trial that follows your death.”

…

... What?

“It’s going to be excruciating for him, you know. You’d be doing him a favour by killing him yourself. So go on; do something nice for the audience outside. Confess to him under a cherry blossom tree, and then splatter its petals with his blood when he inevitably rejects you.”

“Though, I suppose I should mention that your illness isn’t the only thing we have set up to kill you. We made you remarkably hateable to everyone here, and had you stay largely ignorant about it to give you this innocent, puppy-like quality. It worked - the fans love you. Almost a decent substitute for the love from Shuichi that you’ll never get, eh?”

Kokichi had been ignoring it up until now, but it hurt. Every calculated quip about how impossible it was for Shuichi to love him, said with such an air of impenetrable certainty, was another nail in Kokichi’s heart.

“Anyway, you’re going to be the target for all of the next murders. Miu and Kaito are the two people you should watch out for in particular, but I guess there’s Maki, too. I mean, really, everyone wants you dead. That’s all. See ya.”

With that, the frighteningly out-of-character Monokubs moved towards the door.

“W-Wait!” Kokichi stands up with the intention to give chase, but he could only take one step in the direction of the door.

The floorboard underfoot sinks, and the opposite end of it swings towards him, hitting him in the face with the full force of his own weight.

He falls through and lands in a crawl space underneath. It’s dark, he doesn’t know how to get out, his head is throbbing where he’d just gotten hit, he still couldn’t get Monotaro’s words out of his head, and he could now feel the warm, wet sensation of blood trickling down his forehead.

He wants to cry. He had plenty of reasons to - and he’s alone. There was nobody there to see him, learn of his weaknesses, and take advantage of him.

But for some reason, he can’t. He doesn’t know how long he stayed there, curled up into himself, trying to ease his own trembling.

He doesn’t remember where he’d learnt this, but Kokichi vaguely recalls being taught to steady his breathing whenever he felt panicked.

He tries it. Fixating on the feeling of oxygen rushing into his lungs, he slowly sucks in a deep breath and… regrets it immediately.

The base of his left lung tore, and he couldn’t even scream. Instead, he coughs and spits, frantically trying to get the taste of blood and petals out of his mouth.

The pain is intolerable. He thinks he’s going to pass out.

If he passed out underneath the floorboards, it was entirely possible that he could choke on blood or wisteria and die without anybody knowing to help him.

He doesn’t want to die.

God, he doesn’t want to die.

...He can’t die. Not to this. He’ll get Shuichi killed, too.

That thought drives him to hastily pull himself up onto his uncontrollably shaky legs. He feels around for where he’d fallen through.

He was just barely taller than the crawl space. It wasn’t going to be easy climbing out.

He places his palms flat on the floor overhead, and pushes himself up.

Predictably, the breath that he had been holding as he did so strained his lungs. It sends an agonising jolt of pain through his body.

He endures it. If he let himself slip, he’s not sure he’d be able to survive another attempt.

He swings one leg over onto the floor, and then drags the remaining half of his body through.

He rolls over onto his back, paralysed by the effort.

He’s convinced he’s going to pass out. It hurts so much; there was no way he was going to stay conscious if he tried to move.

For some reason, he doesn’t faint. It was as though his own body was trying to torture him, too.

...He should move. Perhaps try to get help. Shuichi might know what to do.

He has to use the wall for support, but he finds his way out. He takes a few steps towards the direction of the centre room, staggers, and tumbles over.

It hurts.

Every single fibre of Kokichi’s being was crying out in complete and utter agony. He’d never imagined this amount of pain was actually possible.

But he can’t just lay there. He begins trying to drag himself up again, and finds someone now at the door frame.

It’s Shuichi. Thank God. Thank God Shuichi was right there. He can help…

Shuichi looks upset. Kokichi’s priorities changed.

He wants to erase the worry from Shuichi’s face first.

“It’s a lie!” Kokichi declares. He sits up onto his heels, trying to put anything that even barely resembled anything from the same family of expressions as a smile onto his face.

“Did I getcha? Were you going to scream and cry in terror?”

Shuichi’s expression doesn’t seem to improve. He looks pretty pissed off now. It’s Kokichi’s turn to be worried.

“What are you doing?” Shuichi snaps. “If this is a prank, it’s not very funny.”

Kokichi blinks.

He remembers.

We made you remarkably hateable to everyone here…

Monotaro explained this already.

...and had you stay largely ignorant about it to give you this innocent, puppy-like quality.

Was Kokichi really that blind? Shuichi’s hatred for him was as clear as day right now. How did he not notice? Naivety was something he ridiculed others for, yet here he was.

He should’ve known.

Shuichi’s still looking at him expectantly, and that’s when Kokichi realises he’d asked a question.

“Oh! Sorry, did you… say something? I’m a little dizzy from the blood loss. Yeah, this is real blood,”

“I asked what you were doing,” Shuichi repeats himself firmly.

Kokichi doesn’t like this conversation. For the first time since meeting him, Shuichi’s tone was scaring him.

“I-I was checking those other two rooms,” Kokichi lies. “When I… I stepped through the floorboard.”

He chokes on the last word and begins to cough violently into his hands. There’s blood bubbling up his throat, but he can’t spit it out in front of Shuichi.

He swallows.

He doesn’t get all of it. He drags a sleeve across his mouth before facing Shuichi again.

Maki had joined Shuichi in the time he’d been facing away.

“If you’re going to lose consciousness, do it after you tell us everything,” she says.

“Ahaha… Right,”

Weakly, Kokichi began to explain what he could about the loose floorboard. He doesn’t bring up the Monokubs. He doesn’t bring up his illness. He doesn’t ask for help.

When he’s done, Shuichi and Maki turn towards each other. She tells him something about the floorboard in the seance room.

It gives Kokichi a second to think about what he’d been told again, and compare it with what he’d seen for himself now.

The Monokubs were telling the truth. All of it… it was all real.

Suddenly, Kokichi doesn’t even feel human.

The summoning announcement goes off, and Kokichi takes off first.

If he stayed there with Shuichi any longer, he knew he was going to cry.

Monotaro stops him on his way there, saying something about how Kokichi wasn’t fit to do a class trial with a concussion.

“Lucky bastard,” Monotaro comments as he injects Kokichi with some kind of liquid. “This solution is a scientific miracle and quickly heals everything indiscriminately - from broken limbs to fucking constipation. You and Shuichi are going to survive that lung bleed of yours for a little while longer, it seems.”

Kokichi doesn’t know whether or not he’s glad about that.

Chapter Text

Kokichi greets Shuichi on instinct when he sees him leave his room a few mornings later.

“If you don’t hurry to breakfast, Gonta’s gonna eat you!” He says brightly.

“Ah, eat me? Don’t you mean my breakfast?” Shuichi’s all flustered, and his ahoge is all bent. He took it seriously. He’s so cute.

Kokichi’s chest hurts.

“Hey, you know… You look sort of pale.” Shuichi says soon afterwards, standing at the foot of the stairs.

Okay…?

“Hmm? Isn’t that just your imagination?” Kokichi smiles. He doesn’t know what else he’s supposed to say.

Shuichi does hate him, after all. He’s probably asking because he thinks Kokichi is suspicious.

There’s no way Shuichi could be worried about him or anything like that. Monotaro had made that crystal clear.

“Have you been sleeping well?”

It’s annoying. What right did Shuichi have to interrogate him? What was his objective here? Find out if Kokichi sleeps at night or plots murder? Disingenuity is a bad look on Shuichi. That was more Kokichi’s thing. Shuichi suits an open heart more.

He rolls his eyes.

“Well, no. Have you? It’s strange if you have, Shuichi. Do you know where we are right now?”

“I won’t force you to talk to me, and I know you don’t really like this kind of talk but I think you could do with hearing it anyway…”

“Anyone would struggle in a place like this. If you’re worried about anything, you can let me know… Okay? I’ll do my best to help.”

He says it so gently. So sincerely. Shuichi’s gaze was so, so impossibly soft on him.

Kokichi’s lungs constrict painfully hard, and he has to catch himself from stumbling.

“I didn’t know you cared,” Kokichi says, more to himself more than Shuichi, really.

There’s no hesitation when Shuichi answers. “Of course I do. Why would you think that?”

...Kokichi wants to tell him. Everything.

It… probably wouldn’t hurt, now that he was expecting Shuichi to call him a liar, right? Monotaro had warned him, so it wouldn’t surprise him if Shuichi turns around and leaves.

That thought makes him picture it, and actually, no, it does look like it would hurt.

But there was every chance that the Monokubs were lying, too. He’d never know for sure if he doesn’t try and talk to Shuichi.

He feels warm about Shuichi. He should give him this chance to answer for himself…

Kokichi opens his mouth. “Actually, I--”

The doors fly open and in comes Kaito.

“What’s the hold up, bro? I’ve been waiting out here for so long.” He says.

His eyes fall on Kokichi, and an expression he was apparently supposed to be far more familiar with makes its way to Kaito’s face.

“Oh, not this guy. Is he up to some weird shit again?”

Kokichi shuts his mouth.

He feels dumb for considering it. He goes back upstairs.

“Ah, wait-- Kokichi, aren’t you going to eat?”

“Later,” he answers, not looking back.

Of course Shuichi had wanted him in the dining hall that day, he thinks when he does make an appearance later as he’d promised.

Kaito hit him. Shuichi probably anticipated that and wanted to see it.

He can’t imagine any other reason why Shuichi was standing there so silently.

Kokichi feels a fully-formed flower at the back of his throat, and he has to slap a hand over his mouth to contain it.

Even when Kaito raises his fist a second time, with his other hand gripping Kokichi’s scarf, he has his hand squeezed over his mouth.

He’s not paying attention to any of the voices around him - none of them really resounded with much concern for Kokichi, anyway.

...No matter how many times his classmates prove Monotaro right, he still has a hard time believing it.

There had to be someone, right? Someone who would care if Kokichi got hurt. It didn’t have to be Shuichi.

Someone…? He looks around from beyond the bangs that had fallen into his eyes. His vision lands on Gonta before blurring.

His vision hadn’t blurred in a little while, thanks to whatever medicine Monotaro had given him slowing down the progress of his illness. Kaito had probably just accelerated it enough to make up for it though.

The world spins, and Kokichi just barely avoids choking on the flowers in his throat.

Someone says something - he’s still not paying attention - and Kaito releases him.

He wants to leave, but he wasn’t going anywhere with how disoriented he was. If he moved even a little, he knew he was going to puke.

So he stays put, and waits. Miu had begun to talk about a plan of hers, but considering the fact she’d been showing signs of cracking a few days prior, it was most likely nothing to be optimistic about.

...And the Monokubs did warn Kokichi to be wary of her next.

It was panning out just as Monotaro had said. There wasn’t a shadow of doubt anymore.

So… Miu was going to kill Kokichi.

When put like that, Kokichi feels his ever-weakening pulse speed up.

He doesn’t want to die. It’s pitiful, he knows. He’s grasping at straws, scraping the bottom of the barrel - every pathetically desperate analogy you could think of. He knows his days are numbered with single digits anyway, but he still couldn’t put out his burning desire to stay alive. 

He thinks it’s worth it. He’ll put up with that agonising existence of his, the constant nauseating metallic, floral taste at the back of his mouth, and even the knowledge that Shuichi would never care for him the way he cared for Shuichi - if he could just spend a little more time with him. If he could just hear his voice for a little longer. It doesn’t matter what he says with it; it doesn’t matter if it’s cruel anymore - Kokichi doesn’t care.

He just wants to live a little longer.

Dragging himself away from the dining hall while nobody was looking, Kokichi hides himself away and begins plotting.

Everything had begun so pleasant.

Kokichi was a whirlwind of energy within the simulation - his avatar was healthy. He’d forgotten how it felt to breathe normally up until that point. His heartbeat had become so faint over time that it was almost too loud all of a sudden.

He’s bouncing off the walls of their little 16-bit mansion. Shuichi looks pretty cute in here, too. Didn’t compare to what he looked like usually, but Kokichi still thinks he could stay here forever.

Like Miu had proposed, as her solution to the killing game.

That is, of course, not what happens.

He’s all pale skin, bones and harsh breathing again when the body discovery announcement goes off. It’s Kaito that gets Kokichi to mine for energy within himself.

“Shuichi, don’t carry this burden all by yourself.”

It’s that annoying line, in Kaito’s equally annoying, grating, 20-packs-a-day uncle voice that snaps Kokichi out of his illness-induced trance.

“Huh?”

“You’re my sidekick! Don’t forget. If we work together, we can--”

Bruh. This guy can’t go a second without Shuichi’s attention.

He ignores his hypocrisy, and places himself in between the detective and the astronaut.

“Hey now, hang on a second!” Kokichi chirps. “Kaito, you’re like, a prime suspect, y’know?”

“Wh-what?” They exclaim simultaneously.

“C’mon Shuichi, why are you surprised? He literally came running down from the dorms saying he was napping while we were in there - that’s suspicious, right? I can’t have you two work together! Because, y’know, Kaito might rope you into his schemes--”

“Bullshit! Don’t underestimate Shuichi!” Kaito says, and Kokichi has to suppress a flinch at his raised voice. “Even if I was the culprit, he’s the type of guy who’d see things through!”

“But remember in Kaede’s trial--”

“Yeah, he saw us through that, didn’t he?! I believe in Shuichi!”

“K-Kaito…”

Kokichi inhales sharply. Shuichi’s gone all starry-eyed again. He needs to stop that! Like, right now!

Shuichi, look over here already. Look this way.

“Fine, if you’re gonna get all worked up about it, then me and Shuichi won’t team up.” Kaito shrugs.

“B-But…”

“Don’t worry! It’s just for now.” Kaito smiles - a dazzling smile. Stunning, bright, reassuring. Oh my god, stop that. What are you doing.

“That said, try to get through this on your own! Clear me of suspicion with your own power!”

...It’s no use. Kokichi doesn’t know how to talk to Shuichi like that. He’ll never figure it out.

“If you can be cleared that is!” Kokichi teases, opting to stay playful and lighthearted to try and drown out that longing feeling that always preceded a coughing fit.

Honestly, he meant nothing by it. He knows the truth, after all. He just needed something to say because he’d been quiet too long, and he was being erased from the conversation after all the effort he’d put in to insert himself into it in the first place.

Shuichi, of course, doesn’t understand that. He glares at him, and it makes Kokichi stiffen and smile nervously in return.

The investigation begins right afterwards, with Kokichi having won the power struggle against Kaito for Shuichi… He supposes? Shuichi keeps his back to him, making him trail after him like crap behind a goldfish, and it really doesn’t feel like he’s won anything.

Kokichi talks the entire time, but Shuichi ignores him. By the time he’s investigating Miu’s corpse, Kokichi’s convinced Shuichi couldn’t even hear him.

“Man, that’s one grody face,” he comments to himself. His encounter with her on the mansion rooftop flashes through his mind, and it sends a mix of unclear emotions down his body, through to his very fingertips. “A vulgar end fit for a vulgar bitch.” He says under his breath.

“Kokichi?! Even if you’re joking, that’s way too far!” Shuichi’s face is set in a frown. He’s mad, and it’s Kokichi’s fault. “I can't figure out what’s gotten into you…” He sighs before turning away from him again.

...Man, this sucks. Guess this is what Kokichi worked so hard to survive for. He can’t complain now, especially since the Monokubs had warned him.

And… He doesn’t blame Shuichi. It’s not his fault things are this way. Hell, he’s not even sure how much he blames the mastermind at this point.

He doesn’t blame Shuichi then, nor does he blame him later, when Kokichi manages to knock Kaito to the floor and Gonta’s devastated sobbing fills the room.

He surprises himself with his swing, really, and even more surprising is the fact that Kaito choked at the same time Kokichi did. He smothers the sound of his own coughing with his scarf, but there was no hiding the blood that Kaito spat out.

Naturally, everyone rushes to Kaito’s side. It’s fucking stupid, really. Kaito can cough up blood once and people crowd him like he’s an injured puppy, while Kokichi can get hit, get choked, fall through floorboards, and hell - someone can literally try to kill him and nobody gives even half a shit. It’s like they were just waiting for Kokichi to die or something.

It’s so lame, and Kaito looks pathetic. Kokichi vocalises this, and Shuichi confirms Kokichi’s suspicions.

“Pathetic? Look at yourself for a second, Kokichi.”

“Kaito always has us by his side, see? But nobody wants to be around you.”

“You’re alone, Kokichi. And you always will be.”

That’s when Kokichi remembers.

The Monokubs had already told him about this, hadn’t they?

“I mean, really, everyone wants you dead. That’s all. See ya.”

It doesn’t hurt at all, Kokichi tries to convince himself.

Humans cry as a distress signal to other humans. Nobody was going to help Kokichi. So it’s no use crying. Feelings that nobody acknowledges are feelings that might as well not exist, so he convinces himself that they don’t.

Yet, the flowers in his lungs don’t stop growing. They don’t stop pulling his lungs apart bit by bit. They won’t be numbed into non-existence like everything else.

Actually, that’s a lie. The flowers are just like everything else. He ignores them as much as humanly possible, but they’re still there, within him, gnawing at him.

Which meant that Kokichi was full of emotions that nobody would acknowledge - not even himself. He’s practically made up of them at this point.

But he still believes it holds true: feelings that nobody acknowledges are feelings that might as well not exist. It’s just that they won’t put themselves into non-existence.

He’d been wrong, he accepts for a second time within the last two weeks. A record number of times for Kokichi to admit he’d been wrong.

It wasn’t worth all this.

The Monokubs had said Kaito would kill him next. He picks Kaito to take hostage in the Exisal hangar.

It goes as smoothly as things do with Kokichi.

“I mean, I was expecting you to botch this in some way,” he says between ragged breaths, and gestures to the arrow in his arm with his other. “But I didn’t think you were so stupid to mess up like this at point blank range.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kaito says with a growling sigh, dropping the crossbow so he could use both hands to restrain Kokichi.

(He doesn’t have to. Kokichi is barely resisting.)

“I’m not going to kill you.”

“Huh? What?” Kokichi is genuinely taken aback. Monotaro did say Kaito would be killing him.

“Idiot, I don’t kill people. Not even mud-eating brats like you. Why are you so surprised anyway? It’s like you want to die or something,”

“D-Don’t say something so stupid,” Kokichi wants to live. So desperately. He just doesn’t have any options.

...Dammit. Why were his eyes welling up with tears now, of all times?

Kokichi keeps himself talking to avoid dwelling on it. “So you’re not like that girlfriend of yours that reeks of bloodlust,” He taunts. “That’s commendable, I suppose.”

“Wha--Hey! Maki Roll doesn’t smell!”

This guy’s fucking hopeless.

“Oh yes, she does. Like dogshit baking under the sun on a summer’s day--”

He doesn’t get to finish his sentence. There was loud whirring behind him, and in came an Exisal - without him summoning it.

Out leaps Maki. Speak of the devil, he supposes.

“Oh, we were just talking about you,” Kokichi begins, struggling against Kaito again. “Specifically, the fact that you--”

Maki wasn’t listening. She fires an arrow right into Kokichi’s spine.

Kokichi thought he knew pain at this point. He learns then that he did not.

It’s agonising. He couldn’t even move.

Vision blurred and muscles spasming, he vaguely registers the sound of Maki striding over. His vision only focuses for a split second, but it’s enough for him to realise that she’s pointing the crossbow at him again - this time right between the eyes.

She’s saying something. What was it? Kokichi couldn’t tell. His ears were suddenly ringing and breathing was becoming impossible.

Something, something… Slowly… Poison… Poison ? Maki poisoned him?

He channels every bit of his energy into orienting himself. “I-I don’t… Understand a thing you’re saying,” he manages to squeeze out between laboured breaths.

“Quit playing dumb. The poison isn’t going to kill you that fast,”

Dazed and breathless, Kokichi couldn’t say anything. But he sees the impatience on Maki’s face somewhere in the blur of his vision turn into fury.

“If you’re going to just put on this bad act, I’ll kill you now,”

She readies an arrow, and Kokichi closes his eyes.

When he opens them, he finds that Kaito had shielded him with his body.

They’re talking, frantic and desperate, but he can’t make out what they’re saying. Something about an antidote… and Shuichi…

...Shuichi, huh? Something in his chest tears a little more.

Maki runs, and Kokichi somehow manages to orient himself.

He chokes when he tries to sit up, and retches. Blood and flowers are expelled from his mouth, staining the front of his shirt.

The sheer volume of blood makes him dizzy. Whatever Maki put in him was acting as a catalyst... The poison wasn’t going to kill him - the wisteria was.

“Uhh, are you alright there dude? You’re not… taking this poison very well, huh?” Kaito eyes the flowers as though he doesn’t even know where to begin with those.

Kokichi ignores his question. “Wh… Why did you… protect me?”

“Don’t get it twisted...I wasn’t protecting you. I was protecting her.” Kaito says with a strained voice. “I… I can’t have Maki Roll kill anyone… And become the blackened. Not even you… Maki needs to live.”

How romantic. Kaito never stopped being irritating for even a moment.

Kokichi's still a hypocrite, evidently. Because he understands that sentiment. He understands it well.

“Idiot,” Kokichi returns after a pause. “I’m still going to die. She already shot me once before you stepped in. And now, so are you.”

“Yeah,” Kaito hangs his head. “Goddammit…”

“D-Don’t make that pitiful expression. I have an idea.”

Kaito scoffs. “There’s no way you can convince me to do anything else you say. Not after all the trouble you’ve caused.”

“Oh, you are so wrong. We’re going to save Maki… and Shuichi.”

“W-Wait, what? Sh-Shuichi?”

“Do you need an explanation? Look, I’m begging you,” Kokichi says, his voice faltering on the last few syllables.

“Well yeah, I need an explanation.” Kaito demands. “Just name-dropping Shuichi to manipulate me into doing what you want won’t work.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Kokichi decides to explain. He has no dignity left to guard anyway, having been reduced to this.

“I’m completely infatuated with that sidekick of yours. Now, I would ask your permission for his hand in marriage since you’re in charge of him or whatever, but I already know his answer. It’s growing in my lungs. Get it?”

“No,” Kaito answers straightforwardly.

Kokichi lets out an exaggerated sigh, and promptly chokes on another flower. He coughs it up in plain sight.

“Dude, what the fuck…”

“Yeah, and it looks like the poison is… a-accelerating it. Which is why… Shuichi’s in danger too. If the wisteria kills me, he’ll become… become the blackened.”

“S-So, please, Kaito,” Kokichi doesn’t know when the tears that slipped from his eyes got there. “H-Help me… Protect him.”

When all was said and done, Kokichi felt less embarrassed having been so jealous of a guy that looked and sounded like Kaito.

He’d earnt a little of his respect, Kokichi supposes.

The one thing Kokichi thinks makes less sense than he does is probably his heart. He had all the evidence he needed to understand that Shuichi hated his guts and that opinion would never change, yet the idea of Shuichi being harmed in any way was unbearable.

Shuichi and Kaito had fallen out after Gonta’s trial. Kokichi figured that maybe the sizeable vindictive side of him would take some pleasure in seeing Shuichi’s crushed expression when Kaito turned his back to him. It was the sort of feeling Kokichi had been subjected to over and over and over and over again, oftentimes by the detective himself. He was expecting it to be cathartic.

Instead, Kokichi felt as miserable as Shuichi looked.

Maybe that’s why he felt so content with this end, as painful as it is. Because at least Shuichi would be safe.

Shuichi... Delightful, beautiful and brilliant Shuichi. Smart, strong, serious. Capable, calm and captivating. Handed such a cruel script.

It's okay now, though. It'll stop hurting soon.

It was impossible to breathe lying on his back, but he had no choice. He endures it.

The press was coming down. He’s barely conscious, but he hangs on. He doesn’t know if it’s just unconsciousness or death that he’d be closing his eyes to, and if it were death, then Shuichi would become the blackened. And he can’t guarantee that the extent of the mastermind’s omniscience ended where he predicted it would, so he steels his resolve.

He doesn’t look away from the press as it descends.

He keeps his eyes open and his sight fixed on it, even as the unconsciousness demanded to consume him.

It feels like an eternity. His breathing is harsh, and he wants to scream. God, it’s going to hurt like a bitch. Someone get him out of here already.

He indulges in some wishful thinking to distract himself. Like, it was all a bad dream and he’s going to wake up soon. He decides that when he wakes up, he never wants to see wisteria flowers again.

Of course, Kokichi isn’t going to wake up, so he doesn’t have to worry about anything like that anymore.

He knows that.