Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The day after the death of three of their classmates was no short of quiet. No one wanted to speak up. Everyone sat in the dining hall and ate uncomfortably, noticing the tense air surrounding them.

The first one to speak up was none other than Momota, who seemed to hesitate despite his overwhelming confidence most of the time. “I know yesterday was.. a lot. But we should try to get through the day like normal! I know you guys are better than this!” Shuuichi was glad that Momota tried to see the good in things like this, it inspired him to do more than mope around whenever something depressing happened. 

“Shut up, dick-face! No one needs someone like you yelling at depressed perverted teenagers when people just died!” Iruma was definitely not in an okay mood, cranking up her verbal insults to an all time high, aiming them at the first person who spoke up. She was trying not to yell for once, to not go back on her words. It wasn’t everyday to hear Iruma not screaming. 

“Asshole! You're the one yelling at me! At least I’m doing something to cheer everyone up! No one’s going to get anything done like this, especially not in a killing game!” Momota definitely will just rile her up more, but Shuuichi was too distracted with looking at everyone to pay attention to what they were saying. It seemed like Iruma tried her best to not get scared of Momota’s verbal abuse towards her, despite it appearing on her face. 

Shuuichi sighed and looked at Harukawa next to him, who had the same look of neutral-but-dissatisfaction as he did. 

Shirogane looked away from the fight as much as she could, trying to whisper silently to Yumeno as she could.

Gonta was too scared to interrupt them, Shuuichi couldn’t blame him. Kiibo seemed to awkwardly wait for the fighting to stop.

“Can you two idiots shut up?” Harukawa was the one to talk first, and they immediately turned to her, both having embarrassed themselves. “Sorry Harumaki.” 

“E-Eek!” Iruma only said in reply, sweating. “It’s not my fault your boy toy decided to speak worthless words to a bunch of worthless people!” Iruma snapped back, and Shuuichi got an awful vibe from her this morning. What happened for her to be so on edge? Most likely the trial and killings, but it seemed to be more than that. Iruma seemed to be fine within the last few days, and it wasn’t like she was close to Chabashira, Angie, or Shinguuji. He needed to get to the bottom of this, as he knew it wasn’t going to end well if he didn’t find out sooner or later. What was Iruma hiding from the rest of them?

“What’s gotten into you this morning, Iruma-san?” Shirogane had finished her conversation with Yumeno it seemed like, because they turned their attention to the rest of them. “...did something happen?” 

“Are all of you pretending to be dumb, or do you just forget everyone’s existence when they’re not in your vision?!” Iruma snapped, standing up out of her chair. If Shuuichi didn’t know better, pure anger was on her face, directed towards them, maybe he didn’t know any better. 

“What are you talking about?” Momota got out of his chair like Iruma. 

“Uhm..” Gonta spoke up, and Shuuichi noticed how shy he acted this morning, something was definitely off. “Gonta thinks I know what Iruma-san is talking about.” 

“Then explain it to us!” Momota was getting more upset as the conversation went on, and Shuuichi wished he could just disappear, seeing his friends with such hatred wasn’t good for him, nor did it feel like anything was right.

“Where’s Ouma-kun?” Shuuichi finally spoke up, as he realized. The reason why it was so quiet is because they were missing one person. They had been there for about an hour now, but no sign of him appeared anywhere. No one even acknowledged that he was gone, not even himself. He felt even more guilty. 

“Finally! Someone with a brain!” Iruma spat out, and it was very obviously a jab towards Momota. “That little abortion still hasn't come out of his room to greet the rest of us!” 

“Why would you care?” Harukawa made a good point. He would expect Gonta to care, maybe Kiibo, but Iruma? That was pushing it. They seemed to hate each other, always making fun of one another. Iruma stuttered, not expecting the question, but she still stood her ground. “B-Because someone like him gets into too much trouble! What if he’s bleeding out somewhere and all of you sat back and did absolutely nothing?!” 

Everyone then noticed a chill throughout their spine. It was suddenly freezing in the dining hall. 

Iruma stood there, clutching her fists. Silence as no one dared to utter a single word, not even a breath. Everything surrounding them was tense, who knew everything could turn this way with one missing person?

Monokuma and the Monokumarz greeted them this morning after Iruma’s meltdown, but not even their cheerful voices and acts could cool everything off. 

After they disappeared, Iruma stood up from out of her chair. It made a cringe-worthy squeak across the floor. “Let’s go, Gonta.” Iruma started walking off to the exit as Gonta got up quickly and began to follow her, like they were already expecting to leave together. 

“H-Hey! Why are you taking Gonta with you?” Momota never knew when to shut up, did he? Shuuichi and Harukawa seemed to have the same thought. “None of your business, fuckin’ idiot.” Iruma wasn’t in the mood for the dumb comments or nicknames anymore, apparently. Neither was anyone else. Shuuichi debated on following Iruma and Gonta to maybe go look for Ouma, but he didn’t want to seem like he was betraying Momota. 

Minutes after Iruma and Gonta left, they sat in silence. Nothing felt right, nothing felt as if anyone needed to say anything. It was all just nothing. Nothing but a cold, empty feeling burrowed in Shuuichi’s chest. Two sides of one coin, they were all in the killing game together, but were really any of them in the same situation? Could any of them relate to one another? Or was that just a trick they all lied themselves to believe? Because you can fake it until you make it, can’t you? 

Harukawa decided to leave as she sat up to leave without saying a word. No one had the heart to stop her, not even Momota. 

Maki decided enough was enough. She decided to follow Iruma and see what her problem was, and find Ouma to make sure he doesn’t cause any trouble. She couldn’t stand to sit in that room any longer. She didn’t think much of Ouma’s disappearance, he most likely didn’t wake up to the morning announcement. But Iruma was acting strangely unlike herself, and she was going to find out what Ouma did, because this had to be the work of him. 

It didn’t take long to find them, as they are much louder than they need to be. They were both standing in front of the entrance, whispering to each other. 

(“..to raise suspense?” 

“..think so.”

“...lright.”)

“What are you two doing?” Iruma and Gonta both jumped as soon as Maki made herself known, and a look of surprise appeared on both of their faces. But Iruma steadied herself a lot quicker than Gonta. “We’re going to look around the school for any sign of that piss-stain.” Iruma crossed her arms and looked at Gonta for his reply. “O-Oh yes, Gonta and Iruma both want to look for him before anything bad happens.” Gonta clasped his hands together. Maki wanted to question more but she couldn’t bring herself to, for whatever reason. 

“Then I’ll help you. Have you checked the dormitory?” Maki didn’t expect him to be far, if he wasn’t asleep or in his room he was most likely playing a prank on all of them. He’s mentioned being the ‘Super High School Level Hide-and-Seek Master’ a multitude of times. “We didn’t check inside because it’s locked, but he didn’t answer.” So that would mean he’s either still asleep or around the school somewhere, Maki concludes. 

“We should get a move on then. I don’t expect anyone else to help us.” Maki starts walking in the opposite direction she came from, which was the hallway leading into the dining hall they were just in a few minutes ago. She headed in the way of the stairs. “He would expect us to search everywhere, so it’s likely that he’s on the first floor. We can check it last, just to keep him on guard.” Iruma and Gonta quickly followed Maki and they all looked everywhere they could, going slowly to make sure he wasn’t anywhere. They continued to look in silence. 

Maki was quick to move on, while Iruma and Gonta were often left behind. Ouma wasn’t seen anywhere. 

Maki decided that the best way to go about this was to wait for him to show up himself, and told them both they shouldn’t spend their time on this. She left before they could reply. 

The tense feeling between everyone was still apparent, and hasn’t gone away despite it being a few hours into the day. It was deafeningly silent everywhere, and Maki had nothing to do other than walk around the school, as no one was in the mood to be with each other. It was like this was a motive within itself, but she knew she would’ve heard Monokuma explaining it to them by now. Is this what they really come to? It had only been a few days but everything had fallen apart. It’s not like Maki didn’t expect it, because she did. She knew this would have happened before anyone even knew it. Some people didn’t want to trust each other, and some people trusted others too much. It was bound to be a disaster. 

All of them could be as optimistic as they wanted, but nothing could hide the burning emptiness in all of their hearts. Enough was enough. 

Harukawa decided to change where she was walking and started walking towards the entrance, making her way to the dormitory. She could easily kick his door down, and if he wasn’t there.. That was a problem. Despite her cold appearance, she tended to worry a bit whenever predictable things happened. Nothing was supposed to be predictable, you weren’t supposed to be able to play with things like that, or expect anything. 

She threw open the door and started walking up the stairs, stopping at Ouma’s door. Nothing was making noise inside. It was a simple situation; if nothing was in there, it could mean Ouma was just hiding from the rest of them, which was fine with her. It wasn’t her problem and she didn’t have to deal with this anymore. If he was just sleeping, she’d leave him alone and tell everyone he was fine. The third possibility she didn’t want to think about. She hated his guts, but she had been trying these past few days to be more than this cold hearted killer. She wanted to feel sympathy for people despite hating them. She wanted to be better, better than an asshole like him. She used to have the thought that if anyone stooped down lower than her, she’d do everything she could to stoop down even lower. But being ‘friends’ with Momota and Saihara changed her mind about that. She could be an okay person if she tried, and she was going to be. 

Before knocking down the door like she wanted to, she thought back to Iruma saying the door was locked. But when she turned the handle, it unlatched and clicked. 

Did Iruma lie to her? She must have, or Ouma just unlocked it after she checked, but why wouldn’t he reply? 

Maki decided to open the door, acting fast with her actions, making her way into the room. The light wasn’t off, and was bright as ever. 

But as soon as she saw what was inside she slammed the door shut, surprise latched on her face. 

What..?

—

Shuuichi hung around the gaming room and paced around, as he didn’t want to just lay in his bed all day despite the upsetting feeling throughout his body. The few mono-coins he collected were on the table next to him, and he couldn’t help but think. Think of possible reasons why Iruma and Gonta were acting so weirdly because of Ouma’s disappearance. He couldn’t think of anything realistic that would happen, but they’re in a killing game with a bunch of talking bears. When was this place ever realistic? 

Shuuichi jumped when the door to the gaming room slammed open, seeing Harukawa clutching her fist as tightly as she could, only mentioning one thing. “I found Ouma.” 

Shuuichi could tell nothing was good by the way Harukawa was acting, what did Ouma do this time? “W-What?” Before Shuuichi could ask anything else, Harukawa walked away. He ran after her, stumbling as he tried to catch up with his friend. “Wait! What happened?” Harukawa didn’t respond, only leading him to where Ouma supposedly was. 

A thousand thoughts ran through his head, what could have happened to make Harukawa this upset? 

Their jog was silent, quickly trying to make their way to what Shuuichi could tell, the dormitory. He noticed everyone else but Momota and Yumeno. Shirogane, Gonta, and Iruma all had worried and terrified expressions on their faces. Harukawa led them inside, all the way up the stairs to Ouma’s room. “What happened to Ouma-kun..?” Shirogane spoke first, and Harukawa didn’t reply with a direct answer, but just stood back away from the door. Shuuichi could tell no one else was going to, but he walked up to it, and felt the doorknob between his fingers, twisting it. 

Shuuichi gently opened the door, not knowing what to expect once he showed the rest of them what was behind the door. 

But..

he would have never expected to see that. Shuuichi’s jaw dropped, as he stood away from the door, letting everyone else see inside the room. 

“A body has been discovered! Please make your way to Ouma Kokichi’s room in the dormitory.” The monitor in Ouma’s room blared in their ears, and no one spoke as they waited for Momota and Yumeno to make their way here, since Harukawa didn’t lead them here. No one moved an inch. 

A few minutes later, Momota and Yumeno both showed up at the same time, both having a terrified look on their faces. “It hasn’t even been a few days and someone already died? Pupupu!” Monokuma popped out of nowhere before Momota and Yumeno could even understand what was happening, and once they looked inside the room, nothing could describe their faces. 

“Since everyone is here, I can give ya the Monokuma File!” Monokuma then gave them the Monokuma File behind his death. 

The cause of death was by strangulation with a noose. Another scar was identified on their right shoulder. The time of death is unknown. The body was found at 12:14 PM.

Shuuichi looked up from his mono-pad and stared up at the body of what used to be Ouma Kokichi. Hung from the ceiling by a rope tied around his neck, facing away from the door. He always assumed there was a killer, but this seemed like a suicide. He wondered if there was a killer, and if this was their goal. Who was sick enough to fake something like this?

Was it fake?

“If this was a suicide, how would there be a killer?” Shuuichi spoke up, turning to Monokuma, who pretended to think about what he said. “You figure it out, detective! I’d say, if there was someone who caused him to do this, that they’re the killer.” 

Monokuma’s cheerful demeanor only made everyone feel worse, there were already five victims, including Ouma, and four killers, and nothing was getting better. They weren’t at all close to finding an escape from this killing game. But, Shuuichi needed to get to the bottom of this case, like he was supposed to. 

“We should start investigating. The crime isn’t going to solve itself.” Harukawa spoke Shuuichi’s thoughts, and she entered the room. Shuuichi entered next, and he could tell they weren’t going to all be able to fit inside the small dorm, and so he turned to the rest of the group. “Can you guys check out anywhere else that might be suspicious..? I’m guessing the murder happened during the night..” Shuuichi then remembered that there was another scar on Ouma’s body, on his shoulder. That might be a clue to a potential weapon, and if he was attacked first. “And also look for weapons close by that could have caused the scar on his shoulder.” Momota was the first one to nod and leave, with the rest of the group to follow after him. It was only Shuuichi and Harukawa in the room, and he could tell she was trying her hardest to not look up while investigating unless necessary. 

Harukawa sighed heavily, neither of them enjoying the silence in the room. “I should have known.” she suddenly spoke up, causing Shuuichi to be confused, “Wha.. huh?” 

“Iruma knows something we don’t.” Shuuichi was going to ask for more information, but he could tell by the glare Harukawa sent him he wasn’t going to get any. He should focus on investigating this room, and leave Harukawa to her own devices. Shuuichi turned his head to the giant whiteboard he noticed while entering the room, as it was right near the door. Next to it were pictures of all of them on the small table next to the whiteboard, and they might have been there before. Now all that was on there was a message. 

(There’s a dead body in this room, isn’t there?)

Shuuichi felt this was important, why would this be on Ouma’s whiteboard?

Shuuichi decided to check more of the things on the small table, but it was hard to differentiate things useful for the class trial and things Ouma just had in his room already. Rooms to investigate were cut short, as Shuuichi had no idea what other rooms might have clues in them. Which possibly meant less evidence to expose the blackened. This was a mess already.. 

“Saihara,” Harukawa got his attention, holding a case in her hand. “I found this on his desk right under his body. Do you have any clue what it could’ve been used as?” Harukawa spoke in a monotone voice, but he could tell she was a little shaken up from what they found mere minutes ago. The idea that someone so happy, someone who seemed to be never upset, would do something like that.. it felt impossible. Shuuichi never thought that Ouma would have ever even thought about doing that, especially towards himself. But it was true, he never knew the real Ouma. 

Shuuichi turned his attention back to the case in Harukawa’s hand, and he took it from her carefully, so as to not accidentally do anything to it. It looked like a glue container up close, so that’s most likely what it was. “It’s most likely glue, but I don’t know why he would use it.” 

Harukawa pointed up to Ouma’s body, and on the ceiling, the rope connected to a piece of steel undoubtedly glued to the ceiling. “It was probably used there. But no normal glue would hold an entire person’s weight.” 

“Hm.. Maybe it was an invention made by Iruma-san?” Shuuichi could tell Iruma was extremely nervous when she learned that Ouma was missing, and she didn’t look any different when they all found his body. He couldn’t think that Iruma would aid Ouma in his suicide, despite them seemingly hating each other. He noticed Ouma going to Iruma’s Research Lab repeatedly ever since they got here, so maybe their relationship was closer than he initially thought. 

“After we’re done here.. we should ask for everyone’s accounts.” Shuuichi nodded, and they went back to the investigation.

“Hm.. The steel bar looks like it was bent to create a handle to tie the rope on.” Shuuichi noticed the small bent marks as he looked up. It was shaped in a U shape, the two ends connected to the roof with the glue, the lower part holding the rope. 

“There is no way Ouma could have bent it himself. Nor does it look like he used anything else to bend it. We can ask around and see if he asked anyone.” Harukawa intervened with Shuuichi’s thoughts, and that gave him even more to think about. How many people have accidentally helped him with this? Were any of them qualified for murdering him despite not knowing? “Yeah..”

Shuuichi took another look at Ouma’s shoulder, and Harukawa could see where he was getting at. “The cut looks like it was made by a simple knife slash. Monokuma was most likely talking about this when he said whoever made him do this would be the culprit.” 

Shuuichi made a small ‘hm’ in reply, gears turning in his head about what could have happened. Maybe he was attacked, but ran away. But why would he then try and finish the job himself? He didn’t quite understand Ouma.. but this isn’t something Ouma would do. He must have a reason, and the class trial was there to expose it, hopefully. 

He looked at the wound, the slash cut through his clothes and skin, staining his white attire pink. Beneath the clothes, the bleeding dripped to his hand, and onto the desk he was above. The chair sitting at the desk was tipped over, making it so Ouma had no way of stopping the rope from strangling him. The rope was tied onto his neck tightly, making sure he didn’t back out. Shuuichi sighed looking at the sight, wishing he had worn his hat to cover his eyes. 

“There seems to be nothing else here. We should check back with everyone.” Shuuichi and Harukawa exited the room and closed the door behind them leading to Ouma’s dorm, like he needed the peace away from the rest of the world. 

They both walked outside of the dormitory to find no one right outside, which was probably for the best they covered enough ground to find clues. “Hey, Harumaki! Shuuichi!” Momota ran to the both of them from the side of the dormitory, and clutched his chest and hunched down, looking like he was suppressing a cough. “M-Momota-kun..? Are you okay?” 

“Yeah, I’m fine.. but I found some more pieces of evidence over there! You guys should check it out.” They all went to where Momota said the evidence was, and they were met with a pink ball, almost shaped like a grenade. 

“I.. don’t know what it is, I hoped you guys had a clue.” Harukawa walked up to it and crouched down, picking it up. It had a picture of a blue mouse on it, whatever that meant. “It’s most likely a weapon that works like a bomb.” 

“B-Bomb?!” Momota yelled out, stepping back a step. 

“It’s already been used. You’re fine.” Harukawa sent a glare to Momota that screamed ‘you’re such an idiot’ and stood back up, holding the bomb in hand. “We’ll ask Iruma about it. It looks like something she would make.” They had a lot to ask Iruma.. 

“Saihara, you should go to Iruma and Gonta and get their stories. From the broken steel, it looks like Gonta helped as well, he’s strong enough to handle that.” Even Gonta was a part of this? Jeez.. what did Ouma do?

“Momota, you go ask Yumeno what she was doing last night. I’ll get Shirogane and Kiibo.” Harukawa walked off, handing the bomb to Shuuichi, and leaving the two boys alone. “We better get going then, we don’t know when Monokuma will end the investigation! But you want my alibi, right Shuuichi?” Momota spoke Shuuichi’s mind once again, and Shuuichi was kind of nervous. 

“Uh, yeah.. what were you doing last night after training?” 

“The first thing I did was go to sleep, and I didn’t wake up to do anything until the morning announcement rang. I then got ready to go to breakfast at about.. eight-thirty. I haven’t seen Ouma since the class trial, but I believe I saw him walking to his room afterwards.” 

It took Shuuichi a bit to find Iruma or Gonta, but he found Iruma first pacing around in her lab with the door open. Iruma looked over and flinched when she noticed Shuuichi standing in the doorway. Shuuichi took this as a sign to tell her why he was here, but he wanted to ask what Iruma was doing in the first place before he walked in. 

“Uhm.. Iruma-san, I was just going to ask you what you did last night after the last trial.” 

“I went to my lab to tinker with some of my inventions until ten, then I went to sleep! Simple as that!” Iruma seemed to be back as her overconfident self after being a nervous mess all morning. Shuuichi almost didn’t want to bring up the glue that he found, but there was a chance it wasn’t hers, and it was from the warehouse instead. 

“Do you have any recollection of making this?” Shuuichi pulled out the glue case, and Iruma only faltered her expression for a quick moment, before turning it back into herself. “Yeah, I made that, why?” 

“I found it in Ouma-kun’s room, and he used it to glue a steel bar to the roof and tie the rope on it. I’m assuming he asked you to make it because he knew that normal glue couldn’t hold his body.” Iruma’s expression turned sympathetic, and Shuuichi couldn’t blame her after learning and piecing together that information.

“And there’s this.. I’m sure you made it but I do not have any knowledge of what it’s used for..” Shuuichi pulled out the pink bomb Momota found, and Iruma found it a good time to ramble about it. 

“It’s an Electro-bomb, and it can disable electronic devices for a couple of hours within a fifty meter radius.” Shuuichi took that as a yes, she made it. But he could never ask for who before Iruma spoke up again. “Is that all you want me for?” Shuuichi was too nervous to ask the other question. 

“Yea.. thank you.” Shuuichi then turned to walk out, and Iruma didn't stop him. 

—

“Gonta, do you have a moment?” Shuuichi peeked into the kitchen where Gonta was looking in every corner of the room. “Oh, yes!” Gonta smiled happily at Shuuichi, which was a great change from the horror on his face an hour ago. But he could somewhat tell it was just a facade, but he decided to not comment on it. “Before you ask, Gonta found out there’s one missing knife.” 

“Huh.. a missing knife?” Shuuichi thought that made sense, since Ouma’s scar was knife shaped, but none of them found a knife yet. “That makes sense.. but Gonta, did you do anything with a steel bar recently?” Shuuichi felt bad for asking Gonta this, and he didn’t really want to break the news to him if he was correct. He’d feel guilty until the day he dies, which might be soon. 

“Gonta does remember Ouma-kun asking me to bend a steel bar for him..” Gonta looked upset, like he realized why Shuuichi was asking him this, or just the memory of Ouma made him sad. Gonta was one of the few people who were nice to him, he always saw them hanging out passing by. They could have been really good friends on Gonta’s side.. he wasn’t sure what Ouma thought of him though. He wished he could ask. Even if he wouldn’t ever get an actual answer.

Shuuichi felt much worse about this than he expected, he never got to find out how Ouma acted like a person.. he never figured out how he really acted like. He never learned his true feelings from the bottom of his heart. He let out a giant sigh, not realizing he was holding his breath subconsciously. 

Then the monitors blared. It cut the investigation short on purpose.

Chapter Text

Looking forward, he took a step, and everyone started walking, worry stretched onto their faces. How.. how did this even count as a murder, if it was just a suicide? Would anyone be punished, or would the class trial be a waste of their time? He could tell no one wanted to say anything after basically having no clue what happened based on the evidence all of them found. 

As soon as they walked into the elevator, it started up, bringing the eight of them down into the trial room. Kiibo, Shirogane, himself, Harukawa, Momota, Iruma, Gonta, Yumeno.. only eight of them remained despite there being sixteen before. Shuuichi’s heart ached, he never thought he’d let it get this bad.. 

“You okay there, sidekick?” Momota gently put his hand on Shuuichi’s shoulder, only receiving a surprised flinch in reply, before he spoke up again. “I know you can find out what happened to Ouma.” Shuuichi smiled, clearly not sharing the same idea. But the class trial could help, with everyone else’s help, there was a chance he could find out what happened. 

Before the class trial, he wanted to go with the idea he had in his head over again, so he understood. 

The murder seemed to have happened last night, as Ouma was missing when everyone was at breakfast, and it seemed unlikely that he could have been kidnapped and killed during the hours where most if not everyone was split up. So between eleven p.m. and eight a.m… something happened that one of us knows about. From Iruma and Gonta, we have the information that Ouma asked them both to help him make or shape parts of the murder, but they had no idea what they were for, and just did as they were told. That’s weird of Iruma to supposedly not question him.. but he wouldn’t question it until the trial.

The whiteboard was knowing of there being a dead body in the room, and that part was weird to him. Did Ouma write it to tease us even after death, or did the murder write it after framing Ouma of his own murder? Was it important, or was it just an unknown mystery he couldn’t solve?

He has yet to hear of Kiibo, Yumeno, Gonta, and Shirogane’s alibi, but he was sure it would be mentioned in the trial. The electro-bomb was outside of the dormitory, and it would cut off electric signals throughout the dormitory. He should ask if anyone could testify if that was true and if it was used, but he had small luck as he was sure everyone was asleep, at least anyone who wasn’t the murder. 

The scar on his shoulder seemed to have shown he was attacked throughout the night, and the missing knife was obviously the weapon, it had to be. Nothing seemed to be adding up, why would Ouma ask Iruma and Gonta for those things that would be used against him, did he have another use for them later on? 

The elevator door dinged as it showed them the inside of the class trial room, and everyone seemed to be heading to their spots respectively. 

Everyone was silent as some of them stared at each other, or Monokuma, who sat happily in his ‘judge chair’, and he was about to start speaking, until he was interrupted. The Monokumarz just blabbered about random shit he didn't care enough to focus on.

“We don’t need an explanation. We can just start talking.” Harukawa glared at Monokuma, and her hand on the rail was almost white from how hard she was gripping at it. “Jeez, fine!” Monokuma threw his hands up, “Don’t expect me to help you with this one!” 

“We don’t need it, right sidekick?” Momota smiled at Shuuichi, who only looked away nervously. 

I am seriously screwed.. I’m sorry, Ouma-kun..

‘Don’t be sorry.’ A small, tingly voice spoke in the back of his head, snapping him to reality. Right.. he needed to focus, to bring justice. He felt a positive, hopeful feeling that he was sure he wasn’t feeling right at that moment. 

“I’m sure we should talk about the Monokuma File.. it’s plainly confusing.” Shirogane frowned, and Shuuichi could only guess why, sarcastically.. he supposed someone would need to keep that up. “Ah.. is it because there’s no time of death?” He guessed, and he smiled when Shirogane smiled back, seemingly out of her mood earlier, “Yes, yes! How are we going to compare alibis without knowing what time he died?”

“...I’m sure there’s a way, Shirogane..” Yumeno mumbled loud enough for her to hear, and she rubbed her head. “My head hurts.. class trials back to back cannot be good.”

“I’m glad for that!” Monokuma glowered, Harukawa already glaring daggers at him. “More entertainment, and I don’t have to waste my time preparing a motive!” 

“Shut up.” Monokuma sat back in his seat, compliant for once. Harukawa crossed her arms and turned her attention back to her classmates.

“Uhm, Shirogane-san..” Shuuichi could tell his classmates could get confused and start speaking off topic things, so he tried his best to guide them back to the situation, “I think we can assume it happened after the nighttime announcement and before the morning time announcement.” He fidgeted with his coat for a bit, to keep his hands steady. “Huh? How?” Shirogane turned her head to the side almost instantly, like she was trying to act, but Shuuichi sighed.

Shuuichi groaned in his head, already stressed out and ready to go to bed. “I think it’s a bit unethical to kidnap someone before everyone wakes up in the morning, and since Ouma-kun was missing at breakfast, I want to believe that his murder happened during the night.”

“So everyone should go over their alibis.” Harukawa deadpanned, looking straight at Shirogane. The only alibis about where they were during the murder Shuuichi doesn’t have are Harukawa, Shirogane, Yumeno, and Gonta’s. He didn’t have the time to ask Gonta where he was before they were pulled into the trial. 

Shuuichi couldn’t help but feel uneasy, most likely from tiredness, he wished there was something in the rules for how many days has to happen before a trial. He could barely focus on everyone talking when he could feel an oncoming headache, so he let the others speak until he could bring in information.

Everyone started sharing their alibis, and it was all information he knew, and he started listening in when Shirogane shared hers. 

“...I had a very weird surge in motivation but unfortunately I couldn’t get into my Super High School Level Lab yet… so I was in the warehouse to search for items.. but I went back to my room after!” Shuuichi couldn’t hear the first part, but from the faces of everyone before she said that last part, he could infer that this took place after the nighttime announcement. “Shirogane-san, did you see anything suspicious once you went back into the dormitory?” Kiibo didn’t seem to share the same suspicions as the others, nor did Gonta. 

“Uhm, now that I think about it, I think I heard a slam from Ouma-kun’s door, like something hit it from inside. But I got scared and went inside before anything else happened..” Shuuichi perked his head up in consideration, since this could pinpoint the time of Ouma’s death, and they could go forward from there. Maybe this would go somewhere.

“What?!” Momota yelled, and after Harukawa asked Shirogane bluntly what the time was when she went inside of her room. “I didn’t check immediately, but the time after an hour was two in the morning, and after I checked, I went to sleep.” 

Shuuichi held in his breath, as he regained a little bit of hope that maybe the lack of evidence wouldn’t matter, but maybe it was Momota’s words getting to his head. Momota would say something like, ‘You can’t lose hope yet, not when it still can be found!’ or something like that to help Shuuichi feel better. Shuuichi sighed, and clutched his rail to build up the rest of his confidence to get through the rest of the class trial. “So that means his death took place at about one a.m.” Kiibo concluded for him. 

“At least we have something to work off of! I can’t help but notice this case has less evidence than earlier cases,” Shirogane clasped her hands together with a worried look on her face, “Monokuma?”

“Hah?” was all he answered with. “Uh..” Shirogane paused, pressing a finger to her lips in thought, thinking of what to say. “I was wondering why this investigation was cut short.. we don’t have nearly enough evidence to solve this case!” 

“Of course you do! There’s a reason why you guys have a detective here at your disposal!” Shuuichi didn’t really like being treated like an object, especially by Monokuma, nor did he like all the attention being put on him. He just wasn’t built like that, but he had to do what he needed to do. He was only a detective-in-training. He also wasn’t surprised when Monokuma dodged the question why the investigation was cut short, was he just bored? Monokuma could be extremely impatient, but not like that. Was he trying to rush this class trial? 

Shuuichi hesitantly almost brought his hands to hold his hat down to cover his eyes, but he forgot he hadn’t worn it for days, or even weeks, he didn’t really know. It wasn’t like there was a calendar in his dorm room, he also was too stressed to care about the days.. he might try and figure out that mystery later. He had to stay focused on the case and the case only. His classmates and Monokuma had a real talent for making him think about other things in serious situations. 

So the murder took place at one a.m. He had a date, and that was one step closer to understanding everything. Even if it was a hundred step staircase, he would try his hardest. Momota really was rubbing off on him. 

The attacker’s weapon was a knife, one from the kitchen. The attacker slashed Ouma’s right shoulder, but he wasn’t sure what happened next. He hadn’t looked at the scar closely, but he was sure that someone could help him in that regard. “Harukawa-san?” Shuuichi called out, which called the attention to everyone, and they all seemed to be in thought before he said anything. Harukawa turned over to look at Shuuichi, her hands at her side, “Yes?”

“I wanted to know if you noticed anything about the scar on Ouma-kun’s shoulder?” Harukawa nodded in understanding, keeping her face still to make sure no one understood her true feelings or thoughts. “Yeah. I can say for certain he wasn’t murdered in the morning. The blood was dried.” Shuuichi looked down in thought, before Harukawa continued. “It was most likely made with a knife.” 

There was a piece of evidence that could support that… the missing knife.

“At the end of my investigation, I learned that Gonta noticed there was a missing knife from the kitchen.” Gonta perked up at Shuuichi’s sentence, surprised that he was mentioned, but quickly came over that. “Yes! Gonta noticed that there’s one knife missing!” Shuuichi smiled nervously at Gonta, at least they all could understand a few things about this case.

“So.. he was attacked. But we need to understand what happened next.” Kiibo sighed, and Shuuichi could not be any more worried. They were reaching a dead end, how were they supposed to find this culprit without turning onto each other more than they were recently? From what happened at breakfast this morning, it didn’t seem like any of them were in great shape. But.. that was interesting. He remembered how Iruma acted this morning, and it was like she noticed Ouma was gone first, it might be nothing, but it was something to go off of in the world of nothing. He should bring it up whenever he has the chance. She was being awfully quiet during the trial, having not spoken at all, and it wasn’t like she cared about anyone being dead, and if she did she never showed it. 

Shuuichi looked at her and Iruma was staring down at her podium, extremely focused on something Shuuichi couldn’t point out. Maybe he was overthinking all of this and should leave her alone for now. 

“Hey! At least we have something to work off of! I know we can all get through this if we try hard enough!” Momota was definitely too chipper for Shuuichi’s tastes, but it wasn’t like he was going to call him out on it. Though his yelling seemed to get Iruma’s attention and she quickly yelled back. “Calm the fuck down you blockhead! I’m tryna think here!” Iruma slammed her hand onto her podium, facing her anger towards Momota, who returned it back. 

“Hey! It’s not like you’re contributing anything to the trial!” 

“I’m doing something important! My glorious genius brain cannot handle yelling distracting me!” Iruma was going to say something more, but she had a surprised look on her face as she looked down again before Harukawa spoke up.

“You both shut up.” Harukawa glared at both of them, “This isn’t a time to argue for a stupid reason.” It looked like Iruma was back to being quiet, and it scared Shuuichi quite a bit. He really did not know what she was thinking. Was she trying to find out what happened herself, or was she trying to ignore the situation? Shuuichi sighed, and he brought his attention back to the people who were talking right in front of him. Shirogane and Kiibo seemed to be in a passive-aggressive conversation, if he could rely on his social skills. 

“I do not think that is quite appropriate to say at this time, Shirogane-san.” 

“I plainly just want to find the culprit, I don’t see why I shouldn’t.” Shirogane frowned a tiny bit as she looked over at Kiibo, crossing her arms while she furrowed her brows. “And I think we should question Iruma-san for her knowledge.” Kiibo closed his eyes and copied a human sigh, even though Shuuichi noticed he didn’t have to breathe. “Shirogane-san, I don’t think Iruma-san had anything to do with the murder itself.” Shuuichi looked over to Iruma and she didn’t pay any attention to what was happening, and it was possible she was zoning out and wasn’t listening. 

Shuuichi thought in his mind, if Ouma was here, he would say something like ‘Oh Kiiboy, you shouldn’t blindly trust that slut like that! Who knows after-all! She could be the killer!’ and those two would get into an argument afterwards. Shuuichi didn’t entertain the thought for long.

“But, we shouldn’t guess, right? We need all the information we can get!” Was everyone acting differently and he just noticed? Shuuichi didn’t take Shirogane as the desperate type, she always seemed so innocent and that she didn’t have flaws other than being plain. ‘Interesting’, a thought that didn’t feel like his own erupted inside his mind. He was starting to get a headache for how troubling all this was. Shuuichi looked up at the place Monokuma usually sat at, and he was just staring blankly in the middle of the room. Everyone seemed so.. off. It was terrifyingly scary. 

The only ones who seemed a little bit normal were Momota, Kiibo, and Yumeno. Yumeno seemed to be sleeping on the podium.

Iruma and Monokuma were staring off into space, there was no telling what was happening inside their brains. 

Shirogane was acting as if she was trying to hide something, accusing Iruma of knowing something everyone else didn’t. Kiibo was arguing with her trying to prove her innocence.

Gonta was quietly staring at Iruma, most likely not having anything to add to the conversation. 

Harukawa was acting more closed off, staring at Shirogane and Kiibo, waiting for them to stop themselves before she acted. 

Shuuichi felt off himself. 

“Shirogane-san! Please do not act out against Iruma-san and please let her think!” Kiibo was trying not to raise his voice in consideration of Iruma. Shuuichi decided that enough was enough, and it looked like Momota was more worried about Harukawa not stopping it than stopping it himself, most likely from fear to stop Iruma from lashing out at him again. “Please stop fighting..” Shirogane and Kiibo both turned to look at him, and Shuuichi wished they didn’t stare. “..We need to stay on topic and focus on finding out what happened.” 

“You all are idiots.” Harukawa spoke up, mostly targeted toward Shirogane as she looked in her direction and continued, “Why Iruma?” 

“She hasn’t done anything to help us, like Momota-kun said.. I think she just doesn’t want to slip up.. y’know!” While Shuuichi can agree her being quiet is weird for the circumstances, he can’t agree that she seems like the type to turn towards murder, especially since he can tell her and Ouma work together a lot on her projects. But he can’t deny that's what he thought about Akamatsu.. about Toujou.. about Shinguuji. He can’t hold those expectations on anyone here anymore, these motives have been challenging. He doesn’t blame anyone here, even the blackends, it’s just not in his heart to do so.. Monokuma is the only true villain inside this dome. 

With a heavy breath, Shuuichi turned his attention to a stuttering Shirogane, and then back to Iruma, who had come back out of her brain to participate in the trial, or to tell Shirogane off. Shuuichi would much prefer the first option, but he couldn’t blame Iruma for the second one. “It isn’t me, tit-less!” Iruma clenched her teeth, and didn’t stop talking afterward. “I don’t know what’s gotten to ya, but I know that there isn’t even a murder to begin with!” 

Everyone in the courtroom had a surprised look on their face, and Iruma didn’t take that as a sign to let everyone process it first before she explained. “Everyday since the second trial, Ouma would always ask these weird ass questions whenever we hung out! Like,” Iruma frowned as she told the story, clenching her fists closed, “he would ask me about death and shit like that. I didn’t think much of it but I can feel it, there’s no case because it’s plain and simple. He did it himself.” 

Shuuichi looked around, somewhat in disbelief, most of his emotions based off of sadness. There was one part of his selfish side that was relieved that the trial would be over, and that he didn’t have to lead one of his classmates to their doom, but he shoved it so far he couldn’t feel it anymore. There was nothing to be relieved about because one of their classmates, their friend, was still gone and it was even worse knowing. Because it wasn’t just a mystery he could solve, because it was simple, and it was right in front of them. There wasn’t much evidence because there didn’t need to be any. 

When Shuuichi looked back up at everyone, he could see and feel the despair everyone shared. It was quiet for a few moments, because no one had anything to say. Kiibo was the first one to speak up. “So.. what do we do now? If there is no murderer, there is no one to vote, correct?” Shuuichi agreed, and looked up at Monokuma, who still, was in his state of ignoring everything around him. 

Shirogane who seemingly recovered from her state of paranoia earlier spoke up regarding Monokuma, “Uhm.. why isn’t he moving?” She sounded too panicked for his understanding. 

“Isn’t that a good thing? I say we just walk out of here!” Momota made a beeline off his podium, before Harukawa stopped him and pushed him back up onto it. “If we don’t vote, we die. Don’t be so stupid.” Momota opened his mouth to argue, but Harukawa shut him up with just her stare alone. Shuuichi shivered at the sight, Harukawa was pretty scary, even to a guy like Momota. 

Yumeno, who seemed to be asleep the entire trial to combat her headache (Shuuichi didn’t know if that was the case or she was just being quiet, as she most likely had nothing to add) spoke up, sounding a little drowsy. “Nyeh… I wanna go back to bed.. screw the rules..” She didn’t sound very confident in her statement, though.

“I agree with murder girl over there!” Harukawa sent her death glare towards Iruma instead of Momota, as she left his podium to go to hers instead. “What did you just call me?” 

Iruma immediately folded, as she spat out something in reply frantically. “H-Hey! I just got the nickname from somewhere! D-Don’t attack me!” Harukawa only scowled in response and directed her attention back to everyone else, speaking up again. “Until Monokuma comes back and tells us what to do, we stay here. Either in silence or something else doesn’t matter.” Harukawa went back to her podium and watched everyone carefully. 

Shuuichi was fine for staying here for longer if it let him think. Hopefully, Monokuma would come back and let them leave after realizing there was no culprit. To him, it’s the only way they were going to get an answer. There’s no evidence leading to anyone being the murder, everyone’s alibis check out, and no one seems suspicious to him. This was the only answer that makes sense.

But it doesn’t mean he’s going to like the truth. In fact, he hates it more than anything else in the world. To think someone as outgoing and charming as Ouma could turn to this, it didn’t make sense to him.. but Ouma did always have that strange look in his eyes. A look that Shuuichi could not properly distinguish, no matter how hard he tried. Maybe he never got to meet the Ouma that was inside, but only met the part of him that he showed to everyone. Shuuichi sighed, as he traveled down the podium and sat back towards the rail, not facing anyone or anything but the elevator. 

Times like this were times he wished that he wasn’t in this killing game. Everyone he met here was so unique in their own personal regard, everyone had their own story to tell. If this killing game would go the way Monokuma would want it to, this would go on until two of them are left. Shuuichi couldn’t believe that even half of them were gone. Akamatsu’s speech and his promise to her were slowly forgotten, as the more murders happened. Shuuichi felt as if they all met somewhere else.. not inside this killing game, they would have all been friends. Because no one here is truly a bad person, that’s what he believed. It hurt him to use his skills to send people to their doom, but he had to, to protect everyone else from dying. If he didn’t, everyone would die for nothing. He knew it wasn’t his fault they chose to murder, but it sure did feel like it. 

Shuuichi leaned his head on the rail and closed his eyes, focusing on everyone’s worried voices in the back, waiting for his and everyone else’s que to get out of here. Hopefully, Monokuma didn’t flip the switch on them and force them to vote someone regardless if they were a murder or not, because that would be absolutely terrible. Not to mention unfair. It wouldn’t fit the rules, and so it was a low, but possible chance. This entire killing game was unfair since the first motive. 

‘The First Blood Perk’, a motive he had personal beef with. He didn’t like any of the motives, as they were all leading to someone murdering, but he was mostly upset from the time limit that was put out alongside it. It made Amami die and Akamatsu a killer.. two wonderful people who didn’t deserve anything of what would happen in this game. He hoped from the first day that Akamatsu would make it far, even to be a survivor, even if he died in the process, but he was still living on without her. It felt quite awful.

He was living on.. while so many others died. Many others who could do a lot more than he could. Others who were actual necessities to the world, gone because of this dumb, killing game. It fueled an anger in his blood. He was never the type to feel anger, not unless it was deep and personal. He couldn’t help it, he supposed.

…Maybe Hoshi had the right idea. Maybe Shuuichi should have sacrificed himself—

Iruma said something he didn’t quite hear, despite it being loud enough to make Monokuma snap out of his zoning out session. “Sure! Whynot?” Shuuichi quickly brought himself up to face everyone, which half seemed to be surprised at Monokuma’s sudden words, and the other half was watching Monokuma, suspicious. 

“..Were you just ignoring us the entire time?” Shirogane questioned. 

“Huh? Yeah, probably.” Monokuma clapped his nubs together as he successfully grabbed the attention of everyone. “Just vote for Ouma Kokichi and I’ll let you leave!” 

“Wait.. really? You’re just telling us?” Momota seemed rightfully suspicious, as Shuuichi wouldn’t expect that out of Monokuma, who didn’t tell them who to vote for, as it, ‘wasn’t his problem.’ 

“Are ya gonna vote or not, himbo?!” Iruma snapped at him as she pressed the screen on her podium and stepped off, making a break for the elevator and standing by it. “We don’t have all day!” 

Momota grumbled and also voted. Shuuichi looked down and pressed Ouma’s icon, and went to stand by Momota. It took a few moments for everyone to finish, and once everyone did, Monokuma suddenly vanished, not saying goodbye to them. 

No one said a word, and they went inside the elevator, and the creaking sounds of it moving filled the air which was conceived of just silence. Shuuichi stood at the back of the elevator and waited for it to stop so he could go straight towards his room, and fall asleep as soon as he hit his mattress. Today was stressful as it is and he could not stand even one more conversation. 

Iruma stood right beside him, and when no one was looking, too busy looking at the elevator door, she gave him a small bag, and as he was about to ask why, she shuffled away, making it too awkward to call out to her. Where did she pull this from? Was it in the elevator the entire time? Shuuichi turned his attention back to the bag he now held, he checked the contents that were inside it. Two electro-bombs, a USB drive, a laptop and a decorated notepad that read ‘SECRET’ on the cover. Shuuichi felt the elevator come to a stop before he could think about the items, and he quickly left to not catch anyone’s attention to his newly acquired item from Iruma. Why? He couldn’t answer. 

—

The trip back to his dorm room was uninterrupted, and he closed the door softly before groaning. It had been a really, really long day and he could barely focus. But the bag Iruma gave him seemed important so he tried all his hardest to pull his attention away from his thoughts (that were filled to the brim with complaints and questions) and made his way towards his desk, placing all the items on there. 

He sat down and he guessed he should open the notebook first. He opened it and at the top it read ‘Directions for Saihara-chan! for Plan: KGB’ Whatever that meant he had no clue, he’d ask Iruma later when he could catch her. He read the rest of the page quickly, he could recognize the handwriting as the one on Ouma’s whiteboard, which gave him even more questions that made his brain hurt. It also used Ouma’s nickname on him, “Saihara-chan”... he never expected to miss it as soon as he was reminded of it.

‘If Iruma-chan followed the plan, which I’m 100% sure she did, this notebook should be with you, Mr. Detective Saihara! And if you aren’t a detective with blue hair, get lost and give this to him please! 

Well anyways, I should be dead, or, considered to be dead by the time you are reading this! It is I, Ouma Kokichi-sama! And this is my (hopefully) full proof plan onto ending the killing game! All the answers you want, detective, are on the USB that Iruma-chan gave you. Wink wink.

Step one is to use the electro bomb to make sure NO ONE IS WATCHING! You got that? Just throw it on the ground, and make sure not to breathe any of it in until it’s completely gone! P.S, the computer isn’t electronic. Iruma-chan’s the Super High School Level Inventor for a reason!

Step two, enter the USB onto the computer. Easy, right? 

Step three, don’t check the rest of this notebook until after you are finished looking at everything on the computer.’

Then it ended there. Shuuichi yawned.. He was so, so tired. But this.. it was written by Ouma. It even sounded like it was written by him too. Why did Iruma give him this? Was Harukawa and Shirogane right, that she knew something? 

He couldn’t afford to think. So he did what the notebook said. 

He threw the electro-bomb down to the ground and coughed immediately as it spread a pink like gas throughout his room, and quickly covered his mouth and nose. After a few moments, it went away, and it was most likely safe to breathe then. Then he sat down again, opened the computer and turned it on. It only welcomed Iruma, and turned back to a blank screen. This was most likely the time to place the USB drive in, so he placed the USB drive into a plug. Then he waited. 

A few minutes passed and he was given a soft ding from the computer in response, and his eyes widened as he stared at the pixelated image showcased on the screen. Moving.

“Man, was wondering when someone was going to plug that in.” A familiar voice rang out to him as he stared in disbelief at the sight in front of him. 

“Uh, Saihara-chan? You there? I can’t exactly see you through this screen, y’know?” 

“Wh.. What? H-How..” Shuuichi didn’t know what to say.

“Oh, right. Well, I was dead for quite a bit, but I knew I’d come back. Iruma programmed this USB to have my consciousness kinda. So, I’m still alive. Pretty cool, right~?”

Shuuichi couldn’t believe that he was talking to a man that was announced dead that noon, Ouma Kokichi, who was still alive.

Chapter Text

Whatever tiredness Shuuichi felt was immediately revoked after witnessing a dead man talking. He sighed heavily while holding his face with his hands, rubbing his eyes. He was going to be here for a while. “Can you.. please explain to me what is going on?” 

“I just gotta ask you— did you use the electro-bomb?” He almost nodded until he remembered that Ouma said he couldn’t see him. “Yeah.” He muttered.

“Good! Well.. it’s a long story and I don’t mind explaining to you, my beloved!” Shuuichi smiled weakly at that, at least death didn’t affect him all that much. 

“After a few days stuck in here, I think roughly right after a trial, I remember seeing some sort of glitched area in the dormitory, it was like a glitch you see on your computer after you get a virus. I was the first one there and too curious for my own good! Sooo.. I kind of spiraled into theories on why a computer glitch would be in real life, and then I came up with one theory that stood out to me. Can you guess what happened next, huh?” 

None of this was making sense. A computer glitch in the dormitory? This might be one of Ouma’s tricks again to mess with his head, but he died for some reason to be stuck like this. Ouma did this for a reason, and by his good mood, it might have been true. Or they were both very delusional and in need of medical care after too many days in this dome. Shuuichi might’ve hit his head and passed out, and now he was seeing things that weren’t there. Or he could shut up and listen before thinking about it.

“What?” 

“I talked to Iruma-chan about the possibility of my theory, and we made the Killing Game Busters! We both came up with a brilliant master plan to end the killing game! And I recruited Gonta to be of.. his own help! 

Knowing the theory is kinda important to understanding my plan, but you sound deader than me. Are you sure you're even awake right now?”

“Not really, no. But I don’t think I'll be able to sleep after this.” Shuuichi deadpanned, no pun intended, fighting back a yawn and to pass out on the spot right there. “I’m fine.. keep going.”

“Well, knowing that the theory is true, I might be a little biased, but it really is hard to understand without seeing it. We’re in a simulation.”

…

Ouma sighed, “I should’ve let you get yourself some sleep first, you okay there, detective?”

“...No.” Shuuichi couldn’t believe it, but he had no time to spiral right now, no matter how bad he wanted to. The shorter time this took the longer he could spend sleeping pretending he isn’t here. He would rather be anywhere but here. “Keep going.”

“..Okay? Well, both Iruma-chan and Gonta agreed to help me with my plan since it’s not like they could think of anything else. It was more of a risk than planned. I didn’t even know if I’d work or not.” Ouma’s cute chibi avatar was pointing a finger to where his mouth would be, in some thinking position as he explained. 

Well, wasn’t that a thing Ouma would do. Follow through a plan involving him dying without knowing for sure if his theory was true, or if it’d work. Shuuichi couldn’t even dare to have as much faith as Ouma did to make sure Iruma didn’t screw up. Shuuichi sighed, and the pixelated body on the screen turned to anger. “Hey! It worked out in the end and I got way~ more information than I planned for!” The chibi on screen had a red face and three red lines curving into each other in a circle like format were above his head. It was like a manga book, Shuuichi noted. 

As much as Shuuichi knew that Ouma deserved a lecture for being so stupid despite being smarter than most people here, proved by his immense help during investigations; he always looked like and sounded like he knew what he was doing every single second of his life. But, the promise of knowing a lot of information about the killing game, let him save the words for later. He was intrigued, any frustration from the day fading away as his love for mystery replaced the feeling. His eyes sparked with wonder, and he’s sure if Ouma could see him he’d laugh like a horse, but his laugh was naturally charming in a way. “Hm? Can you tell me?”

“Of course~! I knew you’d be too interested in this information to act all sad afterwards! But anyway,

My plan was to get rid of my other body, since it was too dangerous to let two of me live at once. It might, in Iruma-chan’s words, ‘cause a lot of identity crisis shit no one can handle’ and USB me is more important than physical me, so I killed myself.

It was unknown territory, since none of us knew what would happen, like, would Monokuma make you guys go through a trial anyway despite there being no alive killer, y’know? So Iruma-chan sacrificed herself and she would take the blame for it.. I didn’t want to go through with that but she was strangely really resistant. She was the one who made the knife mark on my shoulder, we made a too-obvious-that-it-was-suicide-but-there-was-strange-things-here-and-there case! I’m sure you had a lot of.. ‘fun’ with it. 

After my death, Iruma-chan took the USB and found the glitchy area, and placed it in there. I know that might sound like a risky move, and I thought so at first, but Iruma knows way~ more about simulations and coding than me! But I’m learning!”

Ouma smiled at him, and Shuuichi was trying to process all of what he said. Maybe a joke could light up the serious mood they both found themselves in. “So.. you’re like.. Kokichai now?” Ouma chuckled after a few seconds, and Shuuichi was glad he didn’t have to explain the joke. It was a play on Ouma’s given name and AI.

“I’d never thought you’d have a sense of humor, Shumai! I’m impressed!” Ouma was the only person who Shuuichi knew that could speak lies while sounding genuine. But— Shumai was a new nickname, but he wasn’t going to comment on it. “It's kind of weird what death will do to you. I’m being strangely more honest than I’d like.” He frowned, “Is this how Kiiboy feels? He is a robot and all!” 

Shuuichi smiled, somewhat saddened by the fact that it went unnoticed. “I’m not sure.. I’ll ask when I get the chance. But I’m glad you are being more honest.” I wouldn’t mind if you weren’t anyway— “..I’m also glad you aren’t dead.”

“Meh, save the mushy stuff when you get some sleep. We still have a lot to talk about, especially when Iruma-chan and Gonta are also in the room. I can handle being unconscious for a few hours.” Shuuichi sighed, he wanted to talk more to Ouma, but it was almost nighttime. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow and I’ll get them both.. Bye, Kokichai.”  

“Bye Saihara-chan! And tell Iruma-chan to add a camera to this so I can see ya!” Ouma’s pixelated self waved enthusiastically to Shuuichi, which made him cough out an airy laugh. He slowly removed the USB drive, smiling like a madman. It was weird how talking to someone who was supposed to be dead made him feel a lot better. He slowly closed the computer and hid it under his bed, clutching the USB drive in his hand. He wouldn’t leave this anywhere for anyone to find.. It was too much of a risk. He would keep it with him or Iruma. He would like to trust Gonta with it, but he was too trusting. It was the best and worst trait he had. 

This USB drive had a living person inside it. A person that could end the killing game. Shuuichi could barely think about getting ready for bed when he flopped down onto the uncomfortable but manageable mattress, shimming his overcoat off. He had his legs hooked off the bed and he held the USB in the air, staring at it. He had a blank face, mimicking Ouma whenever he wanted to let people know he was serious. 

He wondered how the plan would go, the team they had, called the ‘Killing Game Busters’ by Ouma, was promising. Shuuichi didn’t know how Gonta got involved in it though, maybe Ouma saw something in him he didn’t see himself. He shrugged, and decided the best way to hide the USB drive throughout the night was to hide it with himself, so there was a possibility he would be woken up if someone decided to take it. He was a pretty light sleeper, from what his memories tell him. Since they’re in a simulation apparently, he didn’t know if those were true or not. Best not to rely on them too much.

Shuuichi got up to make sure he locked the door, and for safety measures, placed the desk chair to block the doorknob from moving the door open. He maybe was being a bit paranoid, but it was justified. Who knew what could happen in this killing game, where there are big machines with guns and talking bear plushies? In a simulation like this one, anything could happen. He was hoping that Ouma would be able to find anything helpful in the code once Iruma put him in that place again. Though, he didn’t know it really worked— did it need to be replaced there? Or was it a one time thing? 

He had a lot of questions to ask all of them tomorrow, but he would get some sleep first and think them through before he passed out. He shivered, the cold room not settling well on his bare skin. He slipped into the bed, and passed out a few moments after his head hit his pillow, the USB drive tucked safely over his heart.

I really hope this works, was the last thought he had before he fell asleep in the dim dorm room.

Shuuichi woke up with a ding coming from his door, instead of the morning announcement waking him up like normal. He felt weirdly tense like he did most mornings he was here, he never knew if there was going to be a dead body or it’d be an uneventful day. 

He noticed that the USB was still in his hand, and relief washed over him. Knowing that he didn’t fail from protecting someone who couldn’t even protect themselves. The doorbell rang again and Shuuichi quickly got up to answer it, forgetting he wasn’t nearly as ready to start the day, nor talk to anyone. He moved the chair from its place, reminding himself to place it over at his desk later. He opened the door slowly and peaked his head through to see Iruma. She wasted no time explaining why she was there. “Come to my lab after breakfast. Bring the laptop—” and USB drive, but it went unsaid “—with you. Ya got that, Pooichi?!” She haphazardly pointed her finger at Shuuichi, and he nodded. She quickly sent a glance at his hands and walked away, walking up the stairs on the same side he was on, and he could hear her pressing the doorbell again and again urgently.

Shuuichi closed the door, and sighed. He placed the USB drive carefully on his bed, and went over to his closet to pick out a new overcoat. As he got ready, he let his mind think for itself as he came up with different ideas on what Ouma found out. 

Maybe who the ringleader is? Maybe an escape? If this is a simulation, are we fiction, or are we just wearing headsets to visualize virtual reality? There are many possibilities, and Shuuichi wonders which one it is. If they weren’t real, which is something he really did not want to think about but it’s whatever, could they find a way to trap the ringleader and Monokuma so they could just live? This was the last place he wanted to live for the rest of his life, but he needed to be ready for anything Ouma would tell him. 

Cause really, there wasn’t anything he could think of that could explain anything that happened here. He had no choice but to believe Ouma, despite him being the biggest liar he’s ever met. He said he was working with Iruma and Gonta, maybe they’ll tell him what it’s like to work with Ouma, or hang out with him. Maybe there’s something about him he’s missing? 

He snapped out of his thoughts and grabbed the USB drive from off his bed, and placed it in a hidden pocket inside his coat. He usually used it for pens and papers but he now found a much more important use for it. It was too risky to leave it anywhere, who knew what the ringleader, or Monokuma would do if they found out about Ouma’s plan. It scared Shuuichi just by the thought of it, letting another person who could help everyone out of this situation die. He would do everything he can to make sure that didn’t happen. 

Brushing his hand through his hair, making sure it wasn’t messier than usual, he opened his door, locked it, and set off to the dining hall. He would come back for the laptop later so he didn’t have to carry it around. It was pretty bulky, and he didn’t want anyone to ask questions. 

A laptop would be a very big deal, since it could potentially be used to contact anyone outside of the dome, but since he knew it was a simulation, nothing like that could work here. Which was a saddening thought. Shuuichi thought about letting everyone know it was a simulation, but he would leave anything like that to Ouma or Iruma. There was a chance a ringleader was among them, so it was a huge risk, a risk no sane person would take. Shuuichi always did believe the theory that there was a ringleader, but since Momota’s talk of believing in everyone was always prominent during those conversations, he never spoke up about it. After Akamatsu’s death, he felt like he had failed. That his deduction that there was a ringleader was wrong.

But he’s not hiding anymore. 

Upon entering the dining room, he saw that Shirogane, Momota, Harukawa, and Yumeno were already inside and talking about something he couldn’t quite understand. 

(“Did you guys miss the morning announcement too?”

“Nyeh.. I didn’t know it didn’t play, I thought I overslept..”

“Monokuma was sure acting strange yesterday! Maybe he did it on purpose?”

“Calm down. Monokuma always acts strange.”

“No I mean- he’s plainly acting a different type of strange than normal! He doesn’t usually zone out in class trials!”

“Hng.. maybe he’s mad that there wasn’t a traditional murder?”

“I don’t think Monokuma would straight up leave us like that if so.”

“I hope he stays gone..”

“Doesn’t everybody?”

“...I’m quite worried about you all.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“She’s probably talking about how we saw someone kill themselves yesterday. Do any of you have those thoughts?”

“Whuh- no! Of course not! Life is precious and I’ll live all of it!”)

“...I don’t know why Ouma did it, but I will make sure all of you survive on my watch! No one else is dying!” Momota boasted about whatever they were talking about. Shuuichi walked inside and Shirogane was the first to notice him and waved, turning her body to look at him better. “Oh, hi Shuuichi! Did you hear the morning announcement?” 

Shuuichi shook his head, looking at everyone else. He wondered where Kiibo and Gonta were, since he knew Iruma was at least waking everyone up. 

“It's obvious that the announcement didn’t play at all.” 

“Yeah, Harumaki’s right! Maybe Monokuma is just busy or something..?”

Harukawa glared at Momota for the nickname, and it seemed that she never got used to it. She didn’t say anything though.

Shuuichi knew Ouma enough that he must have done something to Monokuma if he’s inside the simulation’s code. During the class trial, Monokuma acted weirdly and didn’t reply to anything that was happening. Was Ouma messing with him while they were distracted? Iruma was acting weird too, but he’d just have to ask her after breakfast. 

The doors opened, and the last three appeared, with Iruma in front of Kiibo and Gonta.  Iruma looked at Shuuichi and raised an eyebrow. She might be asking where I put the USB, and it will tell her that I’ve seen everything, Shuuichi thought, and since giving away where the USB was could out them to the ringleader, he mouthed ‘I’ll tell you later’ and Iruma seemed to get the hint, and looked at everyone else. 

The ringleader, in which probably exists now because if he reasoned it out with himself, it would be easier to control this simulation within it, if those glitches were somewhere. It gained them access to the code of the simulation, so it was completely viable for there to be a ringleader within their group. It might help trying to figure it out beforehand, even if Ouma could just rummage through the code and maybe find it there. 

Ouma’s out of the question, he might be a little insane, but not enough to be the ringleader. He wouldn’t have tried to help them get out, anyways. 

Iruma and Gonta most likely wouldn’t be it either.. if Ouma trusts them (even if he hadn’t said that outright, he knew it was implied) he would too. Shuuichi has to owe it somewhat to the guy to kill himself even with the risk of his plan not working. 

Harukawa and Momota.. he can’t let personal bias define his observations. They might be his friends, but getting out of here was important. He put them in ‘neutral.’

Yumeno.. wasn’t that ringleader worthy. He shouldn’t think about it much. She could be passionate about things she loved, but way too lanky to cause any harm.

Kiibo and Shirogane were the last two to think about, and the more he thought about it, it made sense. He felt bad for labeling them as the most suspicious, but Shirogane doesn’t usually do.. anything in investigations or trials. She was also overly engrossed in having conversations with Monokuma. 

And Kiibo was a robot. Robophobia be damned or not.. but he could have a lot of things on him that we didn’t know about, especially in his lab. Shuuichi chuckled, he sounded like Ouma a bit.

These were small reasons for them to be suspicious, but it was a killing game. Anyone around you could be a murder.. or worse. A person who orchestrated an entire killing game filled with high school students. Ouma had the right idea to not tell everyone but people he was sure he could trust with this. That didn’t mean Shuuichi agreed with it, but it made the most logical sense. It was best to keep everyone else in the dark for now, until they could find the ringleader. 

Iruma and Gonta sat across from Shuuichi, with Kiibo right next to Iruma. Momota was sitting next to Harukawa, who was sitting across from Yumeno sitting right next to Gonta. Shirogane was sitting next to Yumeno, fiddling with her hands as she looked down. “It was so soon after Shinguugi-kun, Chabashira-san, and Angie-chan’s deaths that we found Ouma-kun’s body as well the next day.. I feel so bad..!” Shirogane spoke up first about yesterday. Everyone looked down into their laps, including himself. 

Shuuichi knew that he was alive, technically. He spoke to him last night. But he couldn’t get the hanging, dead body out of his mind. It reminded him of things that gave him eerie thoughts that he would like to not think about. He could tell it haunted them all, even Iruma and Gonta who knew the truth along with him. 

It wasn’t a case to solve. No one alive did this to him, it was plain and simple and Iruma explained it to them. It just made him feel worse back then. He felt a bit better now, knowing that his death wasn’t permanent. He looked over to Momota and Harukawa, who joined in on the silence. The both of them seemed to share a small, or normal amount of guilt. 

None of them, not even Shuuichi himself (except Gonta, he was always overly nice) treated Ouma nicely. Some of it was deserved, but most of them used their bias as an excuse. There was no doubt they’d all feel guilty for learning he killed himself without any note or message before. Shuuichi sighed, before Iruma spoke up. 

“I hung around him the last few days before he died, and I know he wouldn’t want us feeling bad for him!” She clutched her fist as she stood up from her seat. Iruma wasn’t exactly the leader type, but Shuuichi still thinks this is a speech only she could give the rest of them. Shuuichi knew the same thing, he didn’t know much about Ouma, but he never stayed behind, or let the death around them affect him in a way it would make him slower in thinking and planning. Just what are you and Iruma planning.. the entirety of the plan you two created. Just how would it plan out? 

“He..” Iruma seemed at a loss of words, but Shuuichi seemed to understand what she was getting into, and continued her sentence. “He would want us to keep going on, and if he were here, he’d probably find a cryptic way to make us think that.. like lying his way into us believing it..” Shuuichi almost laughed at the memories he had, Ouma really had two Super High School Level talents; the Super High School Level Supreme Leader and the Super High School Level Liar. He was fit for both of them, even if he didn’t fit as a generic leader you’d see in animes. Instead of leading everyone as a team, he leads everyone on the sidelines, and in the way he sees it, that’s what being the Super High School Level Supreme Leader is all about, right? 

As stupid as it was, Ouma’s fake death really brought Shuuichi in. Even if there was a huge, massive part of him reminding himself that he was a liar, there was a small, hopeful part of him that told him he was doing the right thing. Ouma killed himself for this plan, who was he to back out? He had chosen to put the USB in the laptop, and now he was going to help in this plan.  

Iruma smiled at Shuuichi, a rare sight to see, her actually being nice. Maybe a change of heart? “Iruma-san and Saihara-kun are right, we shouldn’t let it get caught up with us. We should continue to find a way to escape.” Kiibo smiled at everyone there, and that seemed to boost everyone’s spirits a little, even Harukawa seemed less tense. “Yeah! Thanks for the speech, Iruma!” Momota stood up and ran into the kitchen, wincing as he got to the doorway, but no one managed to catch onto it. “I’ll make us all breakfast! Kiibo, Harumaki, can you guys help?” They both stood up happily, though Harukawa had a blank face. “Gladly!” 

Shuuichi was happy seeing everyone get along, as they all fought at breakfast yesterday. He hoped he could continue bashing in this hopeful feeling for longer. A feeling that made him think that.. there would be no more killings. With Monokuma allegedly gone, and with Ouma having a lot more information about this game, they would find an escape. Hopefully. Maybe. 

All he had to do was wait, at least. 

Shirogane turned to Iruma, who was on the other side of the table, and started muttering out an apology, “I’m sorry for outing you as suspicious yesterday.. I was just stressed out and wanted to help!” Iruma narrowed her eyes slightly at her, but looked away a second later. “It’s whatever, flat-tits!” And there she was. 

Despite the overwhelming amount of smoke coming from the kitchen, and a stressed out Kiibo, the three of them put plates of rice with gravy on the table for everyone. “I apologize for the smoke, everyone..” With Harukawa glaring at Momota, Shuuichi could tell it wasn’t Harukawa or Kiibo’s fault.. but he didn’t say it out loud.

“Finally! I haven’t eaten in forever!” Iruma immediately dug in, ignoring all of the rules of proper manners as Gonta looked terrified. He always looked.. sad after Shinguuji’s trial. Maybe it was because of Ouma? Shuuichi would ask later at their meeting. 

Shuuichi was usually a slow eater, but he didn’t want to wait any longer to be able to actually start today. One part of him was stressed out (but he didn’t really show it, he was somewhat good at hiding low levels of stress) but one part of him liked the unknown territory he was venturing into. He also missed the times he almost forgot he was in a killing game talking to Ouma, he really knew how to distract people and it was kind of scary. 

Iruma stood up quickly and left her empty plate on the table. She jogged over to the door and yelled out a bye that had to be some kind of insult. It would be suspicious if he left as soon as possible, so he waited a few minutes. As soon as another person left, he left too. He would have to go back to the dormitory to get the laptop and then go back to Iruma’s Super High School Level Research Lab. A lot of running back and forth was why he was glad to have trained with Momota and Harukawa for a little bit. 

—

He succeeded in getting the laptop, and before he could knock on the lab’s door, it burst open and Iruma dragged Shuuichi inside. He yelped, almost dropping the laptop but catching it in time before it could leave his arms. Iruma pulled out an electro bomb and quickly covered her mouth before throwing it onto the ground, Shuuichi following after. 

“Thank god I upgraded the electro-bombs to go on for longer, I’d rather kill myself than waste these shits!” Iruma rambled as she walked over to Shuuichi and held her hand out. “You brought the USB right?” 

Shuuichi nodded and reached inside his overcoat, pulling it out and giving it to her along with the laptop. “I can’t wait!” she ran over to the back of her research lab, barely missing the saws and chainsaws in the air. Shuuichi shivered at the sight and suddenly felt very weirded out how she was allowed these things. But then he remembered that it was the Monokumarz that made these rooms. That explained it. She set the laptop on the table and opened it up, motioning for Shuuichi to come over to her. He carefully walked over to her and waited for Iruma to place the USB drive in. “Shouldn’t we wait for Gonta?”

“Nah, he’d start crying before we could get anything out, I’ll tell him later.” Which was just code for he probably won't understand anything. Iruma plugged in the USB drive and they watched the screen intently for any sign of life. 

After a few moments (or minutes, Shuuichi wasn’t paying attention) a little icon resembling Ouma appeared on the screen. “Heeyyy, what gives? I was crying myself to sleep!” he smiled at the two of them despite not being able to see who woke him up. “Oh be quiet, you little shit! It’s just me and Saihara. And I already set off the electro-bomb after making them work for longer. We’ve got about five hours in total.” 

Ouma nodded in approval. “Woww, I would insult you to show that I’m proud, but I’d rather not subject Shu to that kind of foul language. He’s rather pure, you know? Unlike you!” It didn’t take them long to start fighting for the fun of it. 

“Shu?! Are you rock hard for Sherlock Homo?! Hah-hahaha! Too bad he can’t get down on his knees for you anymore!” 

Shuuichi sputtered, face turning red, “I-Iruma-san!”

“Maybe. Maybe not. You’d never know unless you looked at my pants. Stop looking at my pants, pervert!” He said that way too casually and cheerfully for Shuuichi to understand how they’d enjoy demeaning each other like this. Oh well, he just wasn’t that kind of guy.. He wasn’t going to question the first part of that sentence. 

“I think we should stay on topic.. guys..” Shuuichi mumbled loud enough for both of them to hear, and Iruma rolled her eyes while Ouma beamed. He tried to push away the blush from his cheeks. “Anyway, I got distracted. I’m sure the both of you want the information I got from the code during the last trial, right?” They both nodded before Shuuichi said a simple yes. 

“Soo, there's extra files on everyone that aren’t included in the student handbook, which I found interesting. I could tell you all of them all from memory and you could write interesting stuff down! But I’m very bad at remembering things!” So he had a great memory, at least like this, Shuuichi thought.

“Spill the beans! What does it say about me?!” Iruma inched closer to the laptop, despite Ouma not moving any away. “It says you're a dirty whore.” Shuuichi almost facepalmed. But this was tolerable for the sake of everyone else getting out of here. Iruma made a little ‘eek’ sound in response. “Hm, it doesn’t say anything really different from information I or everyone already knows. I saw that it had your backstory but I didn’t read that part. I didn’t read anyone’s backstory because that kind of stuff makes us look like characters, ya’know?” 

Shuuichi agreed, while it did sound interesting, and he wanted to know how he and the others got here, he’d find that out soon enough. From Ouma or someone, or something else. He sighed, but it sounded different than a human voice. Artificial. “But.. it listed a different Super High School Level for me.”

“What?” Shuuichi replied without thinking, wasn’t he the Super High School Level Supreme Leader? Ouma sounded like he didn’t even know he had a different Super High School Level other than that with that sentence. 

“From what I remember, or from what they’ve put in my brain, I’ve always been the Super High School Level Supreme Leader. But it listed me as the Super High School Level Analyst for some god forsaken reason!” 

Shuuichi felt like he’s heard that before, but Iruma or Ouma didn’t seem to share that same thought. “That’s a shitty talent! What’s that doing there anyway?” 

“It’s probably going to be some plot twist in the future to make it seem like I lied about my talent like Harukawa-chan, but I didn’t even know about it!” Shuuichi sighed, being reminded about the time Ouma revealed Harukawa’s hidden talent, the Super High School Level Assassin. He seemed like an asshole then, but Shuuichi didn’t really care about him doing that anymore. It was too rare for him to reveal the truth for once. But they shouldn’t get hung up on the same topic for a while, because they had a time limit to talk through everything. “What else did you find?” 

“I found a way to delete Monokuma, and I found a file called Motherkuma, so I deleted that too.” That explains why Monokuma wasn’t there. 

“Shit, that’s great! Did you delete anything else?” Iruma stood up straighter than Shuuichi had ever seen her, listening fully now to the boy. “I didn’t want to mess with anything, so no, but I’ve looked through mostly everything that seems important. But there's so many dumb files it’s going to take me at least a few days to search them all and see if they’re worthy information. I would like it if I could have that time, so for your guys’ next jobs, I want you to make sure everyone stays together at all times and no one dies before I can find shit out. You got that?” It was a lot to take in, so Shuuichi and Iruma gave it a few seconds before agreeing. It couldn’t be that hard to keep everyone in one spot at least in the daytime, but night time was a little tricky. 

“We could have shifts at night time, I’m sure Harukawa-san has the ability to do that.” Shuuichi suggested, but he knew that both of them weren’t really that fond of Harukawa herself. He heard Ouma grumble in protest, but he reluctantly agreed. “Fine. I’m only saying yes because you trust her, Saihara-chan. And if I’m not there she probably won't kill anyone.” Shuuichi appreciated it, but he could see how sad he looked. He really didn’t like murder, huh? 

“But, now we’ve got that handled, I didn’t find that much during the few hours there! I read every file I found at least a few times so don’t tell me I didn’t do anything.” He pouted, and Shuuichi kind of wished he could see it on his real life face, it was pretty cute, but would he ever admit that? He still had some pride to not admit a small crush or attachment to him, he would get bullied by Momota and Harukawa every single day! “You did great, Kokichai.” Iruma would definitely question the nickname, but he didn’t have it in him to care. 

Shuuichi would think that being a robot (sorry, Kiibo) would be easier to hide emotions, but it seemed to be in unknown territory for Ouma, so he didn’t hide the faint orange blush (orange?) on his icon’s face. “At least someone understands!” Ouma seemed to notice it and it went away. Iruma looked at them funny. 

“You shitheads are really a lost cause.” He wasn’t going to ask what that meant. He saw Ouma roll his eyes and smiled at them both. “How about we do something to pass the time! I could have you two fight to the death for me, the love of your lives!” Ouma laughed, and it wasn’t necessarily like his horse-like laugh, but it was similar. “Hell no! You’re an asshole!”

—

And three hours later, they said their goodbyes to Ouma, knowing he would most likely be gone for a few days, and they’d be alone with the others and having to deal with them not killing each other. Despite Monokuma not being there anymore, the ringleader probably still was, and would want a murder to happen soon. 

“Hey Iruma-san, I was wondering.. why were you zoning out during the trial?” They both sat on Iruma’s couch in her lab, and Shuuichi never thought he’d have an actual conversation with her. Iruma looked at him with an expression he didn’t understand, but she did answer. “Since Ouma has like a shit ton of power over the simulation, he can also project himself as a voice in people’s minds. It’s so damn cool but I have too much pride to say that!”

Shuuichi almost snickered at it, he wondered how Ouma must feel about being considered an AI or robot after making fun of Kiibo for being one. It’s a worthy sacrifice, he supposed. But he could feel that Ouma wasn’t as ‘robophobic’ as he pretended to be. He noticed how Ouma stares at Kiibo in awe, especially the first days they were trapped before the murder of Amami. At least he’s better than Iruma..

“You know.. I was confused and worried when he told us to give the laptop and USB to you.. but I think I know what he sees in you.” Iruma being honest and nice to him was definitely something he never expected ever once in his time here, but he was grateful. “..Thank you, Iruma-san.”

“Don’t tell anyone I said that, by the way! I’ll whack you with a hammer.” Shuuichi chuckled and a knock at the door interrupted them. Iruma yelled first, standing up, “Kiibo! What the fuck do you want?!” He could hear the fondness in her voice despite the vulgar words. 

Iruma opened the door, and surprise, it was Kiibo. “Ah, Iruma-san.. and Saihara-kun?” Kiibo said in a questioning tone before turning back to Iruma to continue his sentence. “Momota-kun wanted us all to come outside to the courtyard outside of the dormitory!” Well, that did their job for them. They just needed them to stay together, and bring the idea to the table. 

Iruma looked back at Shuuichi, who was now standing up off the couch, holding the laptop where Kiibo couldn’t see it, and he already hid the USB inside his overcoat. “C’mon, Pooichi! We don’t got all day!” Shuuichi sighed. He wondered what Momota was having them all do.

Chapter Text

As Iruma and Saihara said their goodbyes, the USB drive was pulled out of the computer and everything turned quiet. Ouma sat there waiting, half-conscious as it felt like he was on the brink of sleep, but that was impossible for him now. The boredom of nothing happening pushed harshly into what was left in his mind, feeling something coming out of his mouth like a sigh. But no more sound was available here. There was no need for it. 

He was grateful that he still had contact with Iruma and the others. Who knew what would’ve happened if he went through with his original plan he had since the second trial. Who knew what would’ve happened if he didn’t find that weird-ass glitch in the dormitory. He probably would have been in his room plotting, or making himself look worse than he already is. 

It’s not a stupid idea, since it was the best I had at the time.. but it would’ve sucked, Ouma thought as he waited to be kicked out of this state he was in. No sound nor anything was present. After a few minutes at most he would be kicked out of it and straight back to the code, since he was a part of it after all.

Even if the USB drive got destroyed, he’d still be in the code, he just wouldn’t have any communication with the others. Iruma had put the USB drive in the glitch, and pulled it back out, because that would work, Iruma’s words, not his. Apparently, she took a lot of coding classes in and out of school when she was a lot younger. 

Both plans of his were taking too many risks. Too many rules and less loopholes to manipulate, too many feelings and people around him to control, it was a huge hassle he didn’t want to deal with. At least this plan was better. He had a better look on it than the last one, which was just a bunch of theories with another that contradicted each other. Nothing here made sense, so the simulation part put it all together. If he didn’t figure that out with Iruma, nothing would have been put together, it was all fake. It wasn’t supposed to make sense to anyone in the slightest. 

The only people he could somewhat trust were Iruma and Saihara.. and maybe Gonta. He wasn’t sure. Those were the only three he was sure weren’t the ringleader. Iruma would have killed him the second he went to her about the simulation idea for figuring it out so quickly if she was the ringleader. Gonta and Saihara were hunches, Saihara only lied in trials to turn them over to the truth, and Gonta never lied at all on purpose (if Ouma was reading his intention correctly.)

Though.. for the ringleader to make this mystery killing game where they all had to find it out, Saihara was the least possible ringleader. He carried all of the trials, being the Super High School Level Detective. If he put himself in the ringleader's shoes, it wouldn’t be fun to solve them yourself if you already knew them, right? Unless if that’s what they fucked with. He wasn’t the ringleader so he didn’t know. 

Ouma made a mental list of who was the most likely to be a ringleader. One person who didn’t contribute much to the trials, the one who didn’t overly deny to do anything Monokuma or the ringleader laid out, and the most suspicious in general. Murder girl’s extremely suspicious, but a strange voice of reason for the group, so it’s probably not her. Despite all his spite towards murders, it had to be someone not obvious, for the mystery. 

Yumeno’s.. Yumeno. No evidence against her, no evidence supporting her being innocent. He didn’t really care at all to pay attention to whatever she said. But for the way she acted after Angie and Chabashira died, it led to it not being her. She wasn’t acting.

Kiiboy was a robot, and he could easily be manipulated because of that. By the ringleader, perhaps? But Iruma’s always doing her maintenance on him and she would have noticed something so.. not on his list yet. 

Shirogane.. is a good option. Not overly quiet, but not out there either. Sells the background character pretty well with her whole “plain” spiel.. which is also annoying. But he doesn’t have any actual evidence against her so he’ll just keep it in mind.

Saihara and Iruma are already innocent from his perspective, but there was a chance he could be wrong. It was unlikely otherwise. Why would Iruma help him into the code anyways if she was the ringleader? Saihara being innocent was just his personal liking towards him, and the evidence he has supporting it. 

Momota was too stupid. No other thoughts behind it. 

So Shirogane was his best bet! 

Ouma then was violently teleported to a bunch of color attacking his vision, despite not having an actual body anymore. There wasn’t any sound in here either, it was hardly any better than the dark place he was just at. 

The only difference was that the code was here, able to be changed up and viewed by him. There was a lot to look at, and too much time on his hands. He never made time to speak with either Iruma or Saihara, or maybe Gonta again, so his time was limited. He just didn’t know when they’ll plug him back into the computer. 

As he looked through the code he hasn’t searched through yet absentmindedly, he thought, I kinda miss my old body. 

He hoped it wasn’t rotting in his room, or worse, if Monokuma put it somewhere before he was deleted, or someone from the outside already had deleted it from the simulation through the code. Could they see him here? Too many questions made his head hurt but it was all he had flowing through his brain as he read all the information on all the files if they had any. 

There were two types of files. One category he made was objects and humans, and the other were readable files. Readable files were ones with ginormous paragraphs that seemed to never end with words he didn’t understand. He found page fifty-seven of a script that had his classmates’ names on it, and it was just something they did he wasn’t there for, so he didn’t know if it actually happened. 

That was terrifying.. to think that things they did were scripted. He told himself that it didn’t matter right now and so he focused on something else as he threw the file away and it just disappeared back into its place.

Objects and humans were just them. He could delete them, duplicate them, or add some of his own if he could code them into existence. He figured he’d speak with Iruma about it first before he messes with that. 

The things he knew he could delete were Monokuma, and something called Motherkuma which he didn’t know even existed, but it most likely just made Monokumas. He also chose to delete the Monokumarz despite them being utterly useless, they still controlled the exisals and that was a problem he got rid of. The exisals still could prove to be useful someday, and getting rid of them might be too risky. 

Millions of different files flooded the code, and it would take him what it would feel like years to look through them all. 

Fortunately, Ouma has a lot of time on his hands, and no life. Literally. 

—

When Iruma led Shuuichi out into the courtyard near their dorms, he excused himself from the group quickly and jogged inside his dorm room to place the laptop he held under his bed, sighing quietly.

He patted the outside of his coat, thankfully noticing the small bump he felt. It was still there. I should go back to the others now.. 

“Hey Shuuichi!” Momota yelled, waving his arms around as Shuuichi opened the door to the dormitory, and he almost jumped at the sound. He smiled softly and walked to the others, and he noticed Iruma looking grumpy as she impatiently tapped her foot onto the concrete. 

“Alright guys, I think we should think of what to do now that Monokuma isn’t showing up, do y’all have any ideas?” Momota smiled brightly as the sun glared into Shuuichi’s eyes. It felt fake and stiff, the way it didn’t hurt his eyes the way it should. “I don’t think we should get our hopes up so soon. He might just be pissed off that he didn’t get to execute anyone.” Harukawa crossed her arms and spoke in her normal monotone voice. Shuuichi would love to tell them that Monokuma wouldn’t be with them anytime soon, but it would be very suspicious of him to say something like that with confidence. Maybe not for Momota, but for Shuuichi it would be, someone who thinks logically as he can. Shuuichi sighed, running his hand through his hair.

“Hm, I don’t think Monokuma was mad, since he didn’t seem so after he sent us off.” Shirogane had a point. But Shuuichi knew the real reason, and it's possible that Ouma just reprogrammed Monokuma, or whatever he did, Shuuichi himself didn’t know or quite understand this type of thing. 

He was still confused on what to think of Ouma or Iruma, now that the stress had gotten back to him. Those two seemed the least willing to end the killing game altogether and save everyone, instead of killing and escaping that way. They both were vulgar and made fun of the others. Ouma seemed to enjoy the killing game.

But out of everyone here… they’re the most capable. 

“We still should have a plan if Monokuma doesn’t come back, I agree with Momota-kun.” Kiibo smiled while voicing his opinion, and Shuuichi realized they were talking and he was spacing out. That was a problem he had to work on. 

Shuuichi was worried that if Momota made a plan of whatever kind, it could hurt them all in the long run. Momota wasn’t really the planner type. But all he and Iruma could do without making themselves suspicious would be to wait and listen. Their job is to distract and keep everyone in the same place after all.

—

‘Hey, hey, Iruma-chan, you there?’ A voice called out to her that almost made her flinch, it was Ouma. She almost screamed out loud and then remembered he could probably hear her thoughts if he’s talking to her in them. There’s nothing she wanted to do more than sigh loudly and complain about working too much these past few days, but she’ll shut up if it’ll get her and the others out of this damn place. 

‘Finally! Did it work safely? Never-mind, don’t answer! I know it did!’ 

‘Ignoring that, it did. Just fly through this trial without making yourself look incriminating. I was hoping they’d at least let my body decay after a few weeks of not caring to check, but oh well.’ What was with this guy and the scary self-indiscriminateness that seeped through his words? 

‘Do I just.. stay quiet until they reach a dead end? There’s no way there’s anything that leads to anyone being the murder.’

‘I’ll tell you when to speak. I’m stressed out right now so I won’t bother with the insults if you push any, just help me out here.’ It wasn’t like Ouma to even make himself look vulnerable, but that was just what she gathered on her own. ‘I found Monokuma’s file, and I’m trying my best to rework it and then after the trial, I’ll delete ‘em. Just to not raise more suspicion if he suddenly disappeared during a class trial.’ Iruma could hear something she’s never heard before, Ouma sounding depressed. She wanted to laugh at him, make fun of him, but she had standards. 

He continued, not caring by getting a reply from Iruma, ‘Your coding skills better be up to date with this shit, I feel like dying a second time just from looking at it.’ Iruma was kind of curious ever since she saw his body, but how does death feel inside this simulation? Did they feel any pain? She felt some type of sorrow thinking about it. Ouma must have noticed what she was thinking about. 

‘We have time to spare, and I’m a great multitasker. If you want to ask about how death felt, go ahead. It’s not like I care anyway.’ 

Iruma sighed inside her mind, and she thought of how to frame her question, but all that came out was a simple ‘How did it feel?’

‘... I hung myself, so it definitely hurt to choke to death. Murder girl already tried anyway. Yeah it hurt. I was paranoid that the plan wasn’t going to work and that I killed myself for no reason. But I had faith in my plans.’ Not her, not himself, just his plans. Sounds like him, something backhanded. 

The only thing that could come out of her mind-mouth was a quiet ‘Jeez.’ but there's no regulating sound in your brain. Just as she heard Ouma speak again she was thrown out of her thoughts trying to focus on Ouma she heard yelling. There’s no mistaking that dumb idiot moron’s voice. If Iruma and Ouma had something in common, it was that they both knew that Momota Kaito, self-proclaimed Luminary of the Stars, and the Super High School Level Astronaut, was the biggest believer and idiot on the planet. 

“Hey! At least we have something to work off of! I know we can all get through this if we try hard enough!” Momota’s voice boomed against the walls, and Iruma had every right to strangle him right then and there. She was doing an important thing here and this idiot was screaming!

“Calm the fuck down you blockhead! I’m tryna think here!” 

“Hey! It’s not like you’re contributing anything to the trial!” 

“I’m doing something important! My glorious genius brain cannot handle yelling distracting me!” 

‘Let him be, Iruma, he’s the most stubborn idiot ever. Focus.’ Ouma’s voice caught her off guard for a second and she clutched back onto the platform with a mutter. ‘I’m almost close to reprogramming Monokuma. I need you to tell everyone that I killed myself, this trial’s getting boring~ now.’ 

‘Dick-face! Is that all you care about?!’ 

‘Not really. Maybe? Maybe not? I’m the one stuck here. Everything I find is boring. Anyway, Shirogane-chan’s blaming you.’

‘What!?’

—

“I think if we stay together until, if, Monokuma comes back, we can make sure there’s no more murders!” Momota smashed his fists together and Miu had the right mind to barf then and there, at least gag. She could imagine if Ouma was here physically, he wouldn’t even hesitate to make fun of Momota for blindly trusting everyone with his plans, not thinking anyone, like the ringleader, could screw it up. 

He’s got a point though, Miu can tell he wants to keep the group as safe as possible after hanging out with him almost everyday. It kind of felt like therapy, except she was the therapist, ironic enough. Everyone always told her to go to one, but she didn’t ever listen to them.

It’s weird for him to not be here, physically, standing with them with his hands behind his head and smiling without a care in the world. Like he wasn’t in a killing game, and he seemed to pride himself on his way of coping. She would have never admitted it, but it worried her. He seemed like the type to bottle up emotions and then lash out at everyone near him. 

After they all get out of the simulation, she’s definitely taking him to actual therapy with everyone else. That shit he talks about “hitting the reset button on your emotions” is not healthy, and she, Iruma Miu, will not stand here and act stupid when it comes to his problems! If she was forced to sit around and hang out with Ouma all day, he’d at least better be ready for her bitching about the things he does. She doesn’t know how he lived before the simulation (was there a before?), nor does she want to know, but she’s going to help him if it’s going to kick her in the ass later.

She was totally zoned out during Momota’s stupid speech, and if Momota was going to do her and Saihara’s job for them, she’d be more than happy and do something else. After a few days of building nothing she’s been itching to make something new. Ouma had put quite the workload on her, but there was nothing Miu couldn’t do. She made all of those bad boys just in time after Shinguuji’s trial, and they saw it as a perfect opportunity to start the plan. 

Miu was the one who would get blamed for the death as a backup plan, and they made a murder with little to no evidence. No alibis could incriminate anyone, because there wasn’t anything to incriminate. It was basically an unsolvable murder, even for Saihara. Even while listening to his suicidal plan, she couldn’t lie to herself that it wasn’t genius. A murder to play into Monokuma or the ringleader’s authority. 

Ouma told her with the most seriousness he could muster that it was similar to his original plan after Akamatsu and Amami died. He was always ready to die and it sent chills down Miu’s spine. The little shortie had nerves, really thick ones (it was a hard time to not make a ‘that’s what she said’ joke at that thought) if he could just talk about himself dying as if it was the weather. She didn’t know what he went through before this game to be so desensitized to death and murder, but it was chilling.

Maybe he wasn’t and was just acting tough. She didn’t know him well. 

“Iruma-san, have you been zoning out? Are you alright?” Kiibo placed his cold hand on Miu’s shoulder despite the small height difference, and Miu had to hold back a blush at the contact. Kiibo, in Miu’s eyes, is an absolute fuckin’ saint. A robot who just wanted to be like other humans, but was prideful of himself anyway. A great, nice, guy. 

If she was the one in charge of the plan, she would have already deemed Kiibo as innocent. She knows why she can’t. Ouma has already stated his theories on why a robot is in the simulation, and connecting his theory with there being an audience (whatever the fuck that means, Miu didn’t care to understand anything that floats in Ouma’s brain) it could possibly lead Kiibo to being a camera, if there weren’t any floating in the air anyway. Maybe both.

Thinking about Kiibo being used like that, by the ringleader no less, made her blood boil. So of course she’ll do whatever it takes to protect Kiibo. And everyone else, she guesses. 

She had a little goal in mind, and it was to prove Kiibo innocent to Ouma, and he could join them in on their little plan. He was reliable, and would never stand down without a fight. She can tell in his mannerisms while talking about Kiibo that Ouma cares about him a little bit. It just makes her more determined to prove this to him.

“Hey Kiibs, would ya’ mind if I checked on you in a little bit?” She could feel Saihara looking at her knowingly, damn that guy is always thinking, no wonder Ouma likes him so much. He seems to be the type that was into virgins way into their favorite emo bands. But when she looked at him back he smiled and turned back to Momota yapping to him and Harukawa about whatever. He didn’t seem very present in the conversation. 

All the stress was piling on her and she needed a stress reliever, so she’ll spend time with Kiibo and prove him innocent while she’s at it. The girl genius is also productive! Who would have known! “Like maintenance? Of course!” Kiibo always smiled when Miu was acting somewhat decent, not pumping out sexual insults at the most nearby person. The person she did it the most to wasn’t here right now, so she didn’t really know where to put that energy. He always played back and it was fun. Goddammit, it sounds like she misses that asshole.

“Great! It’ll be good for that stress! Relax before then, Kiibs!” Miu exclaimed proudly while smiling back. It was great when they could pretend they weren’t in a killing game, but hopefully, that wouldn’t be for much longer. They would get out of here.

Now that she’s thinking about it, what happens if you die in the simulation? Would you die of shock, or would you be forced out of it and come back to the real world? She hopes for the second option to be true. She’d hate to die here for some worthless entertainment for a crazy psycho bear and whosesoever controlling him! 

Things to look out for when checking Kiibo would be mostly: a camera. Ouma put the idea inside her head that maybe he was an unknowing camera, recording them. He also told her that Saihara might be the ‘protagonist’ of this show that they’re in, since Shirogane weirdly keeps calling him that. Shirogane as a contender for the ringleader is kind of crazy, in her opinion, but one genius to another, Ouma told her that it fits. 

Hopefully those electro-bombs will stop those non-Kiibo cameras (as bugs for some reason) from following Saihara and ruining their plan. Of-fucking-COURSE it would work! Who do you think is talking here?! Her ego says. Her logical side says it’s a possibility, y’know? Innocent until proven guilty!

‘Go do that maintenance with Kiiboy instead of jacking off to him and hurdle Saihara-chan and Gonta-chan up in your lab. I’ve found something important.’ 

Ignoring the insult, Miu sighed. while the promise of something important was awesome, he didn’t give any hints to what it would be, but he might’ve already left. Whatevs!

Miu saw in the corner of her eye Saihara being tackled by Momota on the grass near where they were, with Harukawa watching, and she grimaced. She’d hate to be that guy. Too bad she wasn’t going to help him, that was his own fault and she had to get dirty and busy (just a metaphor) with Kiibo. Might as well tell Gonta she’s going to need him later.

Miu saw him talking with Shirogane and Yumeno, and without her consent, panic shot through her. On the chance Shirogane’s the ringleader and Gonta has access to secret information the ringleader wasn’t supposed to know, and that Gonta cannot tell a lie for his life, this was bad. 

Miu jogged, practically ran over to the trio and she had a plan to out-weird Shirogane and Yumeno enough they’ll leave her and Gonta alone. “Hey whores!” Managing to be as loud as possible, she saw Yumeno cover her ears and saw Shirogane flinch. Good. It’s working already. 

“Oh! Hi Iruma-san!” Gonta smiled warmly enough to entirely heat up three separate Earths in the Ice Age, and she returned it the best she could. 

Ouma had said something about adding Gonta onto the team a few days after they started working together. He said, “It’s not like I think it’s a good idea. Gonta could get into a lot of trouble. But.. I do think it’s the best option despite that.. Gonta will be useful, and he’s a loyal friend.” 

“..Hello Iruma-san..” Shirogane didn’t seem happy with her interrupting their conversation, but she wasn’t going to let a suspect manipulate one of the nicest people there! “Whatchu guys talking about?”

“Nothing including you..” Yumeno mumbled, and Miu almost lost her cool. “Whatevs. I need to talk to Gonta for a sec’!” She waved her arms around as if she was shooing them away, and they made no comment before they walked away. Gonta didn’t seem to mind, but he was confused. “Oh, is this about—”

“Shshshsh!” Miu covered Gonta’s mouth before he could say anything. “Zip it, big dick! Now, I want you to come with me to my lab. I want to show you and Kiibs somethin’.” 

—

“If you really~ wanna Iruma-chan, I don’t care if you get Kiiboy involved. I have my doubts, but after your maintenance or whatever, and he’s okay, then I’ll be happy to approve him to the team! The more the merrier!” Iruma knew he was just saying that because she wouldn’t get off his case about it. Ouma was only able to communicate with a computer and a USB, and who knew who could get their hands onto it whenever Shyhara wasn’t looking? The three of them came up with a plan that included Kiibo. If he wasn’t hiding anything within him if it couldn’t get taken out. 

Kiibo was a robot. A robot that could have a USB drive built in, possibly. Whenever Ouma was done ransacking the files, they knew exactly where he could go next.

Chapter Text

“M-Momota-kun!” Shuuichi didn’t expect to be jumped in a killing game, by his best friend no-less, but it wasn’t like he could push him off. 

“You gotta get your fighting spirit out there, Shuuichi!” yelled Momota, and it annoyed him a little bit that he could act carefree like this. “Come on! Show me what you’ve got!” 

“Gh- I can’t really do that when I d-ugh-don’t know what to do!” Shuuichi panted trying to breathe, and he looked at Harukawa silently for help, but like the traitor she was, she had a small smirk on her face. I hate everyone in this dumb dome, Shuuichi thought. 

“Sure you can, sidekick!” At least Momota moved up a little so he wasn’t crushing his chest and stomach, but it was little improvement. Shuuichi took a deep breath and pushed Momota with all his might off of him, sending him to the grass spot next to him. It might’ve been a little too harsh, but Momota didn’t seem to mind. He laughed, and brought up his mouth to cough, but after a few moments he seemed confused before hiding it with a grin, “I knew you could do it Shuuichi!” 

Shuuichi sighed, but he didn’t feel irritated at Momota’s.. Momotaness. He was used to it at this point. 

Momota looked around the courtyard, and then asked the both of them, “hey, you two seen where Kiibo and Iruma went? We’re supposed to stick together for now, after-all!” He pounded his fists together and grinned.

Iruma’s probably trying to prove Kiibo innocent so he can work with us.. I think she said that earlier. But it’s not like I can say that.. “No, sorry Momota-kun.” Then Harukawa shook her head.

Shuuichi felt a little saddened at Momota’s insistence on staying together, since he’s under the impression that Ouma was suicidal and killed himself for emotional reasons. As much as Shuuichi likes his privacy, he understands why Momota would be trying to prevent another death that way as well. It would also be nice to have no other murders as well. Despite this, he can’t really see anyone doing anything else, without their antagonistic little shit, as affectionate as he could put the words into, running around (though Iruma could count as well) there wouldn’t be a good enough reason to hurt or kill anyone. But he may be biased.

Momota grumbled something incoherent to the two of them but jumped back into a happy mood. “That’s fine! I believe that Iruma or Kiibo won’t try anything! There's no way we're gonna lose another person!”

As much as Shuuichi begs to differ, he doesn’t say anything as he smiles back at Momota’s enthusiasm. Whatever files Ouma has to look through will take a bit, so he’ll relax without Monokuma here to shove the killing game down their faces. 

After he’s done hanging out with Momota and Harukawa, he really should check on Iruma’s progress on Kiibo.

—

As Gonta sits on the couch fiddling with his own fingers, he looks away from a ‘naked’ flushed Kiibo on Iruma’s workbench. After-all, a gentleman should never peek at someone’s private parts without explicit consent. He can’t argue that Iruma shares the same sentiment though. 

“U-Uhm, Iruma-san? This seems a little.. excessive for a simple maintenance check..?” Kiibo seems very flustered with Iruma’s touch, it’s showing in his voice. He seems happy enough though, and from what Iruma explained to him it is for the Killing Game Busters, so he will let it happen. He hopes it isn’t anything too bad.

“Nonsense! This is more important than maintenance! I just needa see if ya’ got anything hidden!” 

“W-Why would that matter?!”

“Shush! Quit movin’! I’ll explain in a bit, alright?” Despite the harsh tone Iruma adapts to most everyone, she seems more gentle with Kiibo. They seem very happy together. As happy as they can be in a killing game.

Gonta is very happy to be a part of the Killing Game Busters plan, Iruma and Ouma are very smart people, but he doesn’t understand what to do most of the time. But Ouma says he’s useful, and Ouma is smart and nice to him (most of the time, he thinks), so he agrees. Even if Ouma refuses to even be near a bug now because of the Insect Meet n’ Greet, he’ll still listen to Gonta rant. He himself feels responsible for letting Ouma get hurt by his bugs, but the boy didn’t mention it the morning after. 

After Gonta realized Ouma had passed out (and, from his knowledge, most likely had a seizure because of the white foam coming out of his mouth.) he had gone straight to Toujou to see if he needed any medical attention. He was fine for the most part, but since Gonta knew it was his fault for letting Ouma get near the bugs, he swore that he wouldn’t let them out in the company of Ouma. He wasn’t treated any differently, but he wished he was at least repremained a little. He did a bad thing to Ouma, but no one seemed to care but himself. He didn’t want to think about most of this right now, so he went back to thinking about the Killing Game Busters.

And now, Saihara and Kiibo might become part of the group! Though, he is sad that one of their other friends might be a ringleader behind this killing game. Ouma explained it to him before and after he died. 

Since Monokuma can die, there needs to be some sort of copy-making machine to make more Monokumas. A ringleader can make copies or code them into existence way easier if they were inside the Academy. Gonta thinks there is a chance it might be a person they don’t know, and they might be hiding in the secret hidden room. Ouma seemed to somewhat agree, but from the news he shared a little bit ago, he checked every human file and found no one, so it’s highly unlikely. One of Gonta’s friends is a ringleader, but there's nothing he can do about it now; they've already killed half of his friends. 

He is glad Ouma explains all of the complicated things to him very nicely. He doesn’t really understand most of this stuff, because everyone tells him he is stupid. Ouma is a very good teacher.

Seeing the dead body despite knowing he’s still alive frightened him deeply. He’s still scared. He’s always been scared seeing the bodies and executions. Amami, Akamatsu, Hoshi, Toujou, Angie, Chababshira, Shinguuji.. they were all so terrible. 

This plan had to work, to end the killing game. He knew that people like Iruma, Ouma, and Saihara knew what they were doing, so he had hope for the first time in weeks that they might actually have a chance at leaving and living, instead of letting the languid world live inside his mind forever.

“Bingo!” Iruma’s yelling snapped Gonta back to reality, and Kiibo looked frightened. “What is it?”

“Kiibs, you have this transmitter device stuck in your antenna, I can hear the shitty beeping!” Iruma pointed at Kiibo’s hair, specifically the piece that was sticking out into the air. “H-Huh?! That was there the entire time?” Iruma huffed as she closed Kiibo up, now figuring out the problem. “It was no wonder I didn't fuckin’ see it before, let me rip it out and destroy it!”

“W-Woah! Calm down Iruma-san! What is this for?!” Kiibo tried to push Iruma’s hands away from his antenna, but it was no use. Gonta would’ve stopped her as well, but Iruma knew what she was doing hopefully. A transmitter might be bad. From what he can remember, it can send video or audio over a distance.. Maybe someone could hear everything Kiibo was saying or doing. Gonta knows this is bad, so he has to be on Iruma’s side. “The transmitter is bad! People might hear things you do Kiibo!” 

Kiibo seemed overwhelmed and frightened, but he thought about it. “But my Professor never put things like that on me! Why would it be there now?” Iruma sighed at what Kiibo was saying, and she seemed to be lost in thought on what to do. Then she looked up, “Sorry, but I gotta remove it for your own good!” 

The door opens, and Saihara shuts it and runs inside, ignoring the small yelp from both Kiibo and Iruma. “W-Wait! You don’t know what that’ll do, Iruma-san!” Saihara was holding a laptop in his hands, but he placed it down onto the floor before running over to Iruma and Kiibo. Gonta kept quiet and watched the scene pan out, as he didn’t know what to do. He figured that the three of them would figure it out on their own. With that, he sat back down on the couch next to Iruma’s desk, unlike the one in the middle.

“Were you spying on me outside my own Lab, Pooichi?!” Iruma yells, seemingly forgetting about the entire transmitter thing. “If ya’ wanted to feel up my body, you could’ve just asked! Not that I’d give it to ya’!” She laughed, while Saihara sighed. 

“I was going to enter anyway, but I heard talking and didn’t want to interrupt. But, we don’t know if it is just a transmitter, it’ll be too dangerous to remove completely. Can’t you just try and figure out a way to make it stop sending signals?” Shuuichi tried to reason with her, but Iruma just scoffed at the idea and didn’t seem keen on listening to him about this.

“It’ll just be the same thing, dumb-ass! I’m removing it!” She then put her hand on the antenna and pulled, receiving a pained grunt coming from Kiibo and a small surprised noise from Saihara and Gonta. A tiny electrical noise and zap could be heard, but it was over as soon as it started, and Iruma threw the antenna/transmitter device out of her hand and onto the ground. “Hah! Easy for the golden girl genius! Now Kiibo is fine to work on the plan!”

—

Kiibo rubbed his hair, and opened his eyes, seeming a little brighter than usual. “..Plan?” He seems normal for a guy who just got part of his hair ripped off.. but maybe that’s because he’s a robot. Shuuichi gulped and looked at Iruma, who seemed too overjoyed for this situation. “Hell yeah! We can finally lend you the deeds, but if you want I can lend you something else too!” Great. 

“U-Uhm.. What is this plan you were talking about?” 

“B-Before that—” she ran off to a corner of her lab and dug out a familiar pink bomb, “—cover your mouth and nose!” She yelled, and then picked the lever on the top before throwing it down onto the ground, covering half of her face right after her hands were free. Shuuichi and Gonta did the same, but Kiibo didn’t need to, but he did look confused at the invention. After a bit and the pink smoke cleared, she smiled. “Now no one can listen to our conversations! Hopefully we don’t have to use those anymore if everything goes according to plan..” she muttered in the last part, and Shuuichi almost didn’t catch it. But she returned to her excited state, and ran back over to Kiibo on the table.

“It’s a long ass story Kiibs! And all of it might not be the most believable, but I’ve seen all of it with my own two eyes!” Despite it being only a day since Ouma’s ‘death’ the situation has developed so much faster than planned. But in actuality, it might be much easier to do it quicker than take a few days doing nothing. Though, it cannot be good for my stress levels.. 

Kiibo looked conflicted, but after a moment he had a look on his face that said he was determined for anything Iruma told him. “Lay it on me! T-Though not whatever nonsense you offered earlier..” he quickly added, but it was more of a mumble than an actual response.

“Great! Shyhara you tell ‘em!” Flabbergasted at Iruma’s response, she only gave him a shit-eating grin. Shuuichi started fumbling with his shirt, a nervous tick he got used to doing since he didn’t have his hat to hold onto anymore. “I-I uhm.. I don’t know if I can explain it very well.. I haven’t worked on this as long as you—” 

“W-Well, I’m not going to ruin his sense of self or some bullshit like that! You do it like you do in the trials Sherlock Homo!” Shuuichi sighed, knowing there was no way out of this, and he felt too tired from being manhandled by Momota, and the entire fast pace of this situation. He wasn’t going to beat around the bush and he knew Kiibo deserved the knowledge he, Iruma, and Gonta had. 

Shuuichi looked up at Kiibo, looking back at him with a sense of curiosity. “We’re in a simulation.” ‘Straight to the point, I like that in a man!’ He heard from far, far away. Along with a cackle he isn’t sure he’s heard before, but it could just be his mind taunting him from little to no rest. 

“What?!” Kiibo’s eyes were wide open, and he accidentally jumped further into the table he was still sitting upon. “How is that possible?!” He yelled, and Shuuichi wasn’t sure he'd ever heard Kiibo yell before. There was a first time for everything. He let himself think a bit as he heard Iruma tell Kiibo the plan freely. 

He really hoped the transmitter wasn’t important for Kiibo to survive or something stupid like that. It would disrupt a new part of their plan he hoped Kiibo would agree to. But he didn’t see why he wouldn’t agree in the first place. 

“Wh— Ouma-kun’s alive?!”

“The body was real—” he could see Kiibo frown harder at that, “but he’s still here with us!” He could basically see the light-bulb up on her head as she got an idea. “In fact, why don’t we chat to him right now?!” Iruma walked back over to the laptop Kiibo had failed to notice Shuuichi brought in, and looked at it with shock. Iruma looked at Shuuichi with an eye raised, and he almost rolled his eyes before digging inside his overcoat to bring out the USB drive. Iruma grabbed (or yanked) it out of Shuuichi’s hand and set the laptop on her desk. 

“I fail to see how we can connect to Ouma-kun this way.” Iruma shushed him before opening it and pushing the USB drive into the computer. The same ‘WELCOME, IRUMA MIU’ was on the computer the first time he opened it, and it was a waiting game for when Ouma would connect from there. They all stood silent, now he noticed Gonta looking at the screen with excitement and curiosity. He wasn't there the two times he himself talked to Ouma, and it seemed like he was just as in suspense as Kiibo was. 

The screen then showed Ouma’s chibi avatar as a little angry, “God, you dumb-headed slut, what took you so long?! My time is of precious essence you know!” 

Shuuichi could almost feel the shock radiating from Kiibo’s figure, and he felt sympathetic towards the robot. It was a lot to take in. Before Iruma could clap back at Ouma’s insult with one of her own, Kiibo interrupted her. “H-Huh?! Ouma-kun?!” He saw Ouma’s eyes widen a split second before returning back to a grin. “Ohh! Kiiboy’s here too! I already knew that though. Welcome to the party, you can be the pet roomba!” 

“Wh— I’m so confused!” Kiibo’s shock was ignored by the rest of them as Gonta smiled, “Ouma-kun! It's great to see you again!” 

“Hiya Gonta~! It’s nice to see you too buddy!” Ouma’s avatar radiated happiness, a difference between the amusement that came with mocking Kiibo with names. “Sooo, what happened girls? I wanna know all the details before I share mine!” Then he was back to his mischievousness in a heartbeat. Shuuichi was going to get whiplash and go into cardiac arrest before he was even twenty (two years from now— time goes by fast.)

“Ugh— you call us in here and you don’t even tell us what you learned?! Whatever!” Iruma scoffed, but did as she was told to do anyway, “Momota did our job for us, and everyone else was in the courtyard before we as a group left. That’s all that happened.” 

After a bit of thinking on Ouma’s side, he then asked, “So is Kiiboy safe? And did you explain everything? I’m tired of explaininggguh!” Ouma very heavily slurred his words in a typical ‘I’m annoyed’ manner.

Iruma looked very ready to punch him, despite it being physically impossible, but she patted Kiibo’s shoulder and snapped him from staring at Ouma’s avatar in shock. “There was a transmitter on his antenna, how stupid is that? I took it off though, since it was the only thing that was sketchy! I even looked at his chest!”

“I don’t need to hear your sex life bitchlet, but thankfully that’s over with. Oh yeah, by the way, the book I wrote has the plan written in it. So you can give that to Kiiboy when you're done.” Shuuichi perked up, he totally forgot about the book he was given, since he fell asleep before he could read more. “Oh, I have that in my room, I can go get it when we're done.”

“Nishishi, perfect! You always know what to do, Shumai!” Shuuichi may or may not have blushed a little at that. He would never tell anyone the correct answer. Ouma can’t see him anyway.

“Keep it in your pants you jackass! Now what did you find?” 

“Oh yeah. Well, I thought about using the electro-hammers to use on the hidden door first off. It’s electrical, right? So it should work on opening it. Monokuma can’t stop you guys from doing so anyway cuz he’s gone. The ringleader would have to show themselves to stop you.. so I think it’s worth a shot to gain more information I can’t get too. There’s too many files goddammit!” They all perked up at that, and it was an actual good idea. From the name, despite he’s never seen one, he guessed it worked the same as an electro-bomb. Looking around, he can see six hammer-like stacked near each other on some type of charger in the far corner of Iruma’s Lab. He guessed those are the electro-hammers, since they are a pinkish-purple like the electro-bombs.

“T-That actually could work!” Kiibo clenched his fists in joy and it almost looked like he was going to burst with happiness. It seemed like the shock wore off for him, but he still seemed confused about the entire situation. Ouma just grinned and continued, “And the second thing I found was in the files I did figure out to read. I must've gotten some luck, cause I fount’ an article of what to do to end the simulation from the inside!” 

“H-Holy shit, really?” Iruma seemed shocked, as well as the rest of them, but they stayed quiet. 

“Yuppers! Apparently, you gotta end it with a trial to figure out the ringleader. It’s the typical way to do it. But we have our lead into getting out of this trash-heap, so you guys better take it! I’m bored as hell here!” 

“So, we exist outside?” That’s the biggest relief if he’s ever seen one. Shuuichi sighed a heavy breath, and he felt so much lighter than he could ever be. A way.. out of the simulation. This is wonderful. “Thank you, Ouma-kun! What should we do?” 

Ouma seemed a little surprised at that, but recovered quickly and made a small ‘hm’ sound, thinking. “I think we should lay low for a couple of days before we call the trial. Get everyone on board with the plan and pay close attention to who could be the ringleader.” He grinned and then sighed dramatically, “If only there was a way to where I could join you guys in all the fun!” 

Iruma seemed to get the hint and cackled, “Hah! I almost forgot about that!” She then turned to Kiibo, “Kiibs, I know for sure there's a USB drive on ya’, and we know a way for you to be a huge help in this plan of ours.” Kiibo seemed delighted to help, and nodded. “Yes! What do you need me to do?”

Ouma chuckled, and tilted his avatar’s head to the side, “Since I doubt I’ll find any more important file information we couldn't figure out ourselves, we thought of an idea for me to be there with you guys.” 

Gonta spoke up for the first time in a bit with a smile, “Really? Ouma-kun will be here?”

He then laughed, “maybe! If Kiiboy agrees!”

“He’s askin’ if you're alright with sharin’ a body with him so he can contribute more to the team! It’s possible!” Kiibo seemed a little shocked, and almost said something but Iruma beat him to it. “And it’s not like he’ll stay there forever. The USB can be pulled out at any time.” 

Kiibo seemed to think for a long and hard moment, delving deeper into his options. Then, he nodded. “I’ll do it!”

Iruma cackled, “Great! I don’t know completely how it’ll work since I’ve never done it before, but trial and error, right?” Kiibo gulped (how?), and he looked like he almost regretted his decision. 

“Yayy! I’ll have a physical body again! Though— being a robot might even be worse than this.” Ouma almost mumbled the second part, but it was very clear to Kiibo, as he scoffed. “Your robophobia shows no bounds! I hope you don’t dare to continue it as we will share a body!” 

“Uh- no thanks. I’m already so sad I’m only coding, but now I have to be a dumb roomba!” He sniffled, and Shuuichi almost chuckled with amusement and embarrassment. Almost. “Waaahh! Keebaby’s so mean to me~!” 

“I’ll have you know— Wait, what did you just call me?!” Kiibo yelped, and Ouma only laughed in response. Shuuichi’s headache will only continue with these two, but he cannot doubt the excitement he feels. 

—

Kiibo had turned himself off for this part of the process of the “Ouma-Kiibo Project” (ask Iruma), since it would be hard and maybe painful to completely let another brain/ai into your body. Which only gave him a question he didn’t think of before. How is there an AI of Ouma, and to be close to the actual person? 

“Hey uhm, Iruma-san?” Iruma had already placed the USB drive inside of Kiibo in a place that would be hard to reach so no one pulled it out. He wondered why Kiibo had a USB drive plug-in, but that was a mystery for another day. Iruma looked at him and raised a brow, singling him to continue. “How did the Ouma-kun AI.. you know.. come to be?”

Her brows furrowed in annoyance but she answered anyway. “He forced me to help him code because he knows jack shit about coding. It was before he told me about the stupid glitch…

“Hey whore! You still have that laptop prototype, right?” Ouma sat on the girly pink couch in Iruma’s Lab, despite having a hunch there were mysterious fluids in it because of Iruma. “Of fucking course I do! What’s got you with a hard on for it, anyway? You tell me to make stuff but you don’t give a shit about all of that!”

Ouma snickered, “Well, I think a little passion project is in order! I want to code myself an AI!” Iruma’s eyes widened in surprise at the request, but who is she if she doesn’t take on a challenge? “And why should I, Cockichi? What’re paying me, huh?” 

“Hm, I’ll be your sex bitch for a week!”

“Eek!—”

“Please don’t tell me that actually happened.” Shuuichi rubbed his index and his thumb over his nose and dragged his hands over his face. He made the mistake to ever listen to Iruma. 

“H-Hey! I didn’t even take it!” Something tells him that’s somewhat of a lie, but he doesn’t even want to know about it, or even think about it anymore. “Whatever.. Thanks for answering anyway.” Time to change the subject and never ask Iruma for a story-time— “How long will this take?” He turned over to look at Kiibo, but it was a little strange seeing him lifeless. It’ll be a nightmare hearing things Ouma would say in Kiibo’s voice.

“I don’t fucking know! Probably a while so he’ll get used to it! We can check tomorrow. I’m tired as shit anyway.” Gonta had already left a while ago when they started to look for bugs and to find everyone else. Shuuichi has to admit that it sounded like heaven to go to sleep, but he didn’t even know what time it was, and he could squeeze in a little bit of time investigating before telling everyone about the search. 

Now that he thinks about it, Monokuma won’t tell him off about entering locked rooms, and he can finally explore the fifth floor they earned yesterday. He was too busy with Ouma’s class trial to even begin looking around for clues, and he really wants to get on that. Unfortunately, his body is very not used to being awake for very long periods of time. (despite Momota and Akamatsu helping a bit with that). He needs sleep.

“See you later, Iruma-san.” She turns away from him and waves her hand in a dismissive manner, turning back to Kiibo to keep him company. She probably had to stay because it would be hard to carry him back to his room, and she wouldn’t leave him to be in such a vulnerable state. 

He returns back to his room, and all but flops onto his bed, not bothering with his clothes. He sighs heavily in the comfort of the fabric, and he goes to sleep immediately, wishing for hope to end this killing game.

—

A few days later, he falls asleep after another training session with Harukawa and Momota. 

A bright light blinds him as he tries to open his eyes but immediately closes them, and after a few seconds he opens them again, only to yelp at what was in front of him. 

Kiibo (?) was right above him, with the most mischievous grin he’s ever seen on the robot. Dread filled him as he remembered what happened a few days ago, and this could only mean one thing—

“Welcome back to the realm of living, Saihara-chan! Or should I say that to myself?” He could hear Iruma scoff in the background— why were there people in his room?! 

Shuuichi just stared into the somewhat empty blue (that turned a purplish color?) eyes— as Kiibo/Ouma stared at him back. “Do you like my new form? I sure don’t!” He shifts back to pull his face back out of Shuuichi’s, and grins even harder. It dawns on Shuuichi that the man/robot/thing is still sitting on his stomach, and it’s mildly uncomfortable as his stomach shifts into him. 

This is going to be a long few days, he grumbles.

Chapter Text

Despite what Ouma might say to people, being a robot or AI is pretty awesome once you've got people to play with. 

Being Kiibo is not awesome. Especially when he can read your thoughts and you can read his. And when you're stuck with him until you get out of his body. Not fun at all, and it’s boring listening to robophobia speeches when all you did was insult his family! How am I supposed to care what I insult when it’s all bolts and screws?!

The only thing that Ouma wants to do is scare the living shit out of Momota with this new Kiibo body he has half control over (until Kiibo lets him escape the hell of co-front he’s not going to stop complaining) but Kiibo is a loser who never has any fun. At least Kiibo isn’t confused about the plan anymore because he already read the book Iruma gave to Saihara.

That’s not important anyway— what’s important is that while Saihara and Gonta are exploring the new fifth floor, he/Kiibo and Iruma have to explore the hidden room with an electro-hammer. Ouma would rather go with Saihara, but Gonta isn’t exactly stealthy enough to watch out for the ringleader. He really wishes whatever that card key does no one goes stupid over it, cause it’s a motive. It doesn’t matter to him since Monokuma is already gone but if someone dies, and it’s permanent in the outside world, he’s going to be pissed off. Thankfully it’s in Saihara’s hands and he’s one of the smart ones here. 

The library is somewhere that he doesn’t go to often. When he was alive, it was mostly the fact that Amami died there, and it didn’t have any actual good books for reading. He would much rather go inside the A/V room and watch shitty Monokumarz-made movies. The hidden room is a mystery they haven’t been able to solve yet, but thankfully with the electro hammers it’ll help them get inside. There’s no telling what a ringleader hidden room would have, but it better be worthwhile—

Iruma slams the electro-hammer into the card key thing that is dust-free (unfortunately). It makes a long banging sound that is both Iruma hitting it and it turning off. Ouma doesn’t worry that someone might hear because Shuuichi already told Momota to make sure he stays with everyone else while they do whatever, so the ringleader is out of the picture, unless something happens he can’t predict. That would be unfortunate. 

Iruma cackles, “I knew it would work!” And slides the door open to show what the big bad ringleader has as a secret room. 

Wow! This place sure is big! Is the first thought he has because he didn’t think the library would be able to fit a place this massive. He expected something a little more claustrophobic. “This is.. unexpected.” Kiibo states as he looks around. There were a few couches and a table, as well as a red cloth on the ground in a small compartment where something would be stored. I think I know where that Motherkuma thing went now.

Kiibo hums despite not knowing what a Motherkuma is, and he probably just takes it as a weird Ouma thing. “This place is so shitty and lame!” Iruma is also looking around with disgust on her face, and he knows what type of comment he would've made if he could. Oh wow, it looks like you're right at home Iruma-chan! This place looks even uglier than you! 

It would’ve been funny if it was actually said to her, but Kiibo doesn’t comment on anything about it other than a frown. The only reason he’s not zoning out while being a third wheel is because he needs to learn as much as he can to expose the ringleader. They didn’t even show who the ringleader was in the character archives he found! What a ripoff! 

Kiibo whispers a little ‘huh’ and Ouma sees what he’s looking at, which is a bloody e-Handbook on the table next to one of the couches. “Iruma-san! Take a look at this!” Kiibo moves closer to the handbook and the blood looks to be a hand-print as far as Ouma can tell. Iruma scurries over and almost spits out an insult for ‘wasting her time’ or something stupid like that but she gets surprised. “W-What the fuck? Did the ringleader leave this here? That makes this shit so easy!” She picks it up and turns it on, and he almost laughs at her trying to avoid the blood. Why would the ringleader, if this is even their handbook, have blood on said handbook? 

Instead of the so-called ringleader, he sees that it greets Amami Rantaro instead. What a surprise.

“Is Amami the ringleader?! Why is his handbook here?” Kiibo tries to look closer at whatever Iruma’s looking at on the screen. “Of course he is! He faked his death as a distraction to lead us away from him! Called it!” Iruma cackles. 

Time to force my way into control, this should be easy. Ouma can’t stand when people are wrong and it affects him too. He can’t stand people being on the wrong path when it’s so obviously not the right one, so he’ll just have to force her on the other path instead. 

‘Kiibo’ frowns harder and snatches the handbook away from Iruma. “You dumb-ass whore! Why don’t we actually look to see what’s on it before making stupid assumptions like that?” He ignores Iruma’s moan and looks at the handbook for himself, ignoring Kiibo’s pleading in his mind. “I fucking forgot your here too! Don’t scare me like that, you geek!” 

“At least I’m not a professional prostitute.” He dubs back without looking in her direction. Checking Amami’s handbook, he sees a little note in the corner of the screen that states something about perks and whatnot, he doesn’t really care enough to read it to Iruma who’s still babbling on about whatever. 

The map is also suspicious, as it’s bigger than what he remembers in his own handbook. This is a ‘Survivor Perk’, for what? He didn’t find anything like this in Amami’s character archive. The ringleader must’ve hidden it in case someone could find out.

A clue to end the killing game, it’s worth checking out, Amami was the most suspicious person around— he may not be the ringleader, but.. Ouma taps the note— 

“Hey dick-face! I found another shot put ball!” He snaps his head over to where Iruma’s digging in a trash can (gross) and pulls out a clean shot put ball. He walks over with the handbook still in his hand (he’ll give it to Saihara later) and stares at the shot put ball. Up close, he can see little pink fibers stuck all around it. “I’ve never touched any silver balls in my life so I don’t know why there’s little pink shits all over it!”

‘Kiibo’ scoffs and rolls his eyes. “It’s obviously from the only other person who wore pink since it’s outfit fibers, which is Akamatsu-chan. I don’t know why it’s here though.” Which was a lie, he had a few guesses. He was going to make Iruma work for it though. 

“Whatever, we'll figure it out later! Let’s go meet up with Pooichi and big dick! This room is giving me the creeps!” ‘Kiibo’ rolls his eyes but follows Iruma outside into the library. The weird hearts on the walls are stupid interior, and it feels like a warehouse instead of a room.

He didn’t finish reading whatever was on Amami’s Survivor Perk, but he’ll just show it to Saihara later when they all meet up again.

Since he’s here, he might mess with Iruma a bit just to fuck with her. “Y’know, wouldn’t it be funny if the most inconceivable place could harbor a clue?”  

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Iruma and him stop walking as they reach the staircase of the basement. ‘Kiibo’ offers a smile that can be seen as a grin.

“I’m saying that we should check for clues in places we wouldn’t think to check. Maybe the bathrooms. We should do that first before we go meet up with anyone.” He starts walking again but faster this time, hopping over the stairs to make his trip to the boys bathroom. Iruma sputters out another insult and tries to catch him, “Hold on you little shit!” He laughs in response.

After a marathon of insults and making sure they don’t get noticed by anyone, they both make it to the bathrooms. “You go look in the girls, and I'll look in the boys. O-kay?” Iruma shivers, and turns her head away from him and crosses her arms. She walks into the girls bathroom. He giggles, and walks inside the boys bathroom. He doesn’t really expect anything to be in here, it was just a funny idea he could force Iruma to do. It would be even funnier if Iruma walks out of the bathroom and says she actually found something. 

Five minutes later, he finds everything a boys bathroom entails. Nothing suspicious, but it didn’t really matter to him anyway— “Hey dick-wad! I found somethin’!” Again, did you find it looking through the trash, or was it in the toilet this time? He’s the funniest person on Earth, and he better install a laugh track to play whenever he says anything.

‘Kiibo’ snaps his head over to Iruma standing in the way of the front entrance to the boys bathroom, and he raises an eyebrow. “Are you sure it’s anything actually worthy of evidence or did you just find a used dildo?” It’s not his fault Iruma walks into every single joke he can make! 

“S-Shut up! Just come on!” Iruma runs out of the room and goes back to the other bathroom, and he almost said ‘come on what?’ But he held himself back because of the annoying robot in his brain scolding him. He huffs as he walks in the bathroom to see the storage closet open with Iruma standing right beside it. “I would’ve expected Toujou-chan to at least check in there for cleaning products.” He mutters and as he gets close, he can see that it’s a pathway. Iruma sees the confusion on his face and explains, “This gorgeous girl genius found this pathway, and learned it leads to that hidden room! Hah-hahaha!” ‘Kiibo’ ignores her ranting about how smart she is and starts to look inside— it’s a dark pathway he’s not going to be trying anytime soon. He already knows what it leads to, so it doesn’t matter if he checks it or not.

A hidden pathway in the girls bathroom is quite suspicious for Shirogane, Yumeno, Harukawa, and Iruma, because who even uses these bathrooms? They all have their own personal one in their dorm. Of course something that seems useless and won’t get used often is for a pathway any of them would have entered the entire time. Didn’t Shirogane go to the bathroom in the first trial? “Well, now we know that the ringleader is a girl. My bets on Yumeno-chan.” It’s actually on Shirogane, but Iruma already knew that hopefully. Iruma scoffs but says nothing as they walk out, and start their new adventure to the fifth floor to meet up with Saihara and Gonta. 

—

Walking out of Shirogane’s Lab, Shuuichi sighs. The bar was weird, and he didn’t find anything of note, but neither he or Gonta could check all of it because it was huge. He also had a few non-alcoholic drinks with Shirogane.

He and Gonta already checked his own Lab, and despite the poisons, he can see himself enjoying reading a book on the couch like he used to do before he got here.. if those memories are real. But that’s not important right now— the last room he has to check is the red door he doesn’t know what is in it. It looks like a Super High School Level Lab, but the only labs he hasn’t ever seen before were Amami and Ouma’s. He doesn’t really know what an Super High School Level Supreme Leader entails (if it even represented that, wasn’t he called the Super High School Level Analyst in the files?), but he has a hunch that the blood red door wouldn't match it, no matter what Ouma does with his ‘organization’. Amami never showed his Super High School Level, so he doesn’t have much to base off of. Investigating this school is difficult because so much of it needed to understand is hidden away from them. It doesn’t help that he’s not even an actual Detective.

“Is Saihara-kun alright?” Gonta asks as they near the mysterious red door. Shuuichi almost jumps at the sudden noise, but he turns to face Gonta’s worried face. “A-Ah, yes. I’ve just been thinking about a lot of things recently.” 

“Ah! Gonta sees! Maybe it can help if you tell me your worries? It will be like a rock has been lifted off your shoulders!” Gonta smiles, and Shuuichi awkwardly laughs. He doesn’t really know what he’s worrying about specifically— there's been so much happening the past few days he’s not sure how to react to everything. He can’t tell Gonta everything as they need to be wary of the hidden cameras around them, but he can tell a half-truth instead. “Uhm, well, I guess I just don’t know what to do with all the new information I’m getting. There's so many possibilities but only one truth, and I.. just don’t know what to do with it, is all.” Shuuichi fiddles with the cuffs on his overcoat, and his eyes focus on the ground below him instead of looking at Gonta.

Gonta hums in thought, “Gonta thinks that you shouldn't carry all of your thinking for yourself.”

Shuuichi looks back up at the giant, telling him to continue silently, and Gonta takes the hint.

“Gonta and Saihara-kun both have very smart friends who can help you in mystery solving!” That’s right.. I have Ouma, Iruma, and Harukawa.. the rest of my friends may not have the smartest ideas but they can help me too. I’m Saihara Shuuichi before I’m the Super High School Level Detective.. and despite my capabilities— I can’t solve everything on my own. “Thank you Gonta. That helped a lot.” He gives a small smile, and the other man returns it. 

“Hey shitheads! We’re back!” Shuuichi does jump a little in the air this time at Iruma’s loud voice that could rival Momota’s, and they both turn around to see Kiibo (with normal blue eyes) and Iruma. Kiibo seems to be holding a handbook of sorts and Iruma is holding a shot put ball. “We found some real good stuff in there, so you better grovel at my feet before we show you anything! Hah-hahaha!” 

Kiibo gives an awkward smile and starts talking, “You won’t need to do anything of the sort. But, we did find a lot of useful things! We should go back and examine the things we found.” 

Shuuichi looks back at the red door, and despite wanting to look inside it, he tries to open it but it doesn’t budge. “Huh.. that’s weird.” He looks back to the group and decides that he’ll look at it tomorrow. “Alright. Let’s go.” 

—

The moment they walk outside the Academy, they hear yelling. That must be whatever Momota’s doing with the rest of them, Shuuichi notes that it’s coming right in front of the entrance, and so they can clearly hear whatever’s going on. 

“Nyeh.. this is too much! I don’t have enough mana to last!” Yumeno dramatically flops down onto the concrete, and she has her black jacket tied over her waist, she also isn’t wearing her hat. Shirogane is right next to her with her sleeves rolled up and she also has abandoned her blue overcoat. Harukawa and Momota are wearing the same thing they usually do, despite the hot air. Shuuichi can tell that they’ve been forced to do training as well. Damn.. 

“Oh! Are friends working out?” Gonta calls out from the entrance, and Momota beams. “Hell yeah! I’ve felt so much better, and so we’re training!” Shirogane joins Yumeno on the ground after a failed pushup, and doesn’t try to get back up. “Gonta, you should join! We need someone like you to get these guys working!” 

Yumeno groans from the ground, and says. “Why can’t the rest of them join us as well?” Then Momota shrugs, “Shuuichi is doing important investigative work!” And says nothing more while Shuuichi awkwardly shuffles away from the training group. He skipped out for two days in a row, and he’s too busy hiding secrets from Momota and Harukawa to join them unfortunately. 

“Oh, alright! Gonta will join you!” Iruma sputters for him to get back to their group, but he doesn’t hear her. Iruma groans, “Stupid moron! Thank god I’m not working out like these idiots though. C’mon!” 

“W-Wait!” Shuuichi and Kiibo both run after her and he realizes that they’re going to Iruma’s Lab near the lower courtyard, which makes sense because it’s basically their hideout. 

Iruma slams the door shut after they all enter, and Shuuichi sees a new vacuum-like object on the middle table that Kiibo sat on yesterday. “We don’t have to use electro-bombs anymore ‘cause of this beauty!” She picks up the vacuum object and continues on one of her rants, “Last night before I went to sleep, I forgot I could just finish this prototype Cockichi had me make to get rid of those camera bug things. I figured it’ll be useful so we don’t waste more shit!” 

“He sure did ask you for a lot of things, how did you build them all?” Kiibo asked, looking a little alarmed at just how much she could build in only a few weeks. Shuuichi shared the sentiment, but if she didn’t want to make whatever Ouma designed, she wouldn’t. It probably was just a distraction to not think of the killing game. 

“The only reason why I’m not brain-rotted like all of you is because of inventing shit! I can’t even count how many all-nighters I’ve spent creating all these bad boys! I’m in my prime!” Iruma laughs, and places the vacuum down on the table. “I guess also because getting out of here gives me more motivation..” she mutters. 

Shuuichi coughs in his hand, and speaks, “Uhm, what did you guys find in the hidden room?” Better get on topic before more time is wasted.

“Glad you asked Pooichi!” She then digs in her skirt (apparently she has pockets) and pulls out the shot put ball she pocketed on the way here, then places it on the table. Kiibo also places the handbook he was holding on the table, and now that he sees it clearly— 

“Is that blood?” Shuuichi wasn’t expecting a bloodied handbook to be inside the hidden room, but he can’t be too surprised at this point. The blood resembles a hand-print, and he wished he could test whoever's blood this was. “Yes. Apparently this is Amami’s handbook, and it has.. quite the things on it. It was called a Survivor Perk, but we do not know what that means.” Kiibo explains, and Shuuichi picks up the handbook, making sure not to ruin the blood splatter. He turns it on, and it indeed says ‘Survivor Perk’. His mind goes back to that red door.. maybe the reason it was so mysterious is because it is indeed Amami’s Lab? It would make sense, but he doesn’t know how to get into it right now— focus! One thing at a time!

It then shows an extended map of the Academy that wouldn’t regularly show up on the rest of their handbooks, and he’s aware that Iruma and Kiibo are watching him explore it. Did they not get to finish looking at it?

The hidden room is shown on this map.. that explains how Amami knew about it. Then the words ‘clue to end the killing game’ pop up, which startled him. Amami knew a lot of things we didn’t know.. 

The screen then changes, to show this supposed ‘clue’ on the Survivor Perk.

The ringleader who is behind the killing game is hiding somewhere within the academy. Your best chance of exposing them is when Monokuma needs a spare. At that time, the ringleader will go to the library's hidden room.

To prove this hint is accurate, I will predict something. The first thing you will remember is the Super High School Level Hunt.

Only share this information with people who you know you can trust. How you determine that will mean your life or your death. 

…signed Amami Rantaro. 

After a few seconds, Iruma whispers “Damn! No wonder that guy was so fuckin’ suspicious!” 

Then Kiibo, “This is..” he doesn’t elaborate.

Shuuichi gulps, and places the handbook on the table again.. “What else did you guys find?” He eyes the shot put ball, and Iruma picks it up. “I found this in a trashcan in the hidden room, and it had pink fibers all over it!” 

“We believe it was Akamatsu’s outfit that caused the fibers to appear. For what reason.. we don’t know.” Kiibo looks down at the shot put ball and from what Shuuichi can see, it’s clean, which doesn’t make sense, because if it’s Akamatsu’s ball—

Shuuichi’s eyes widen, and he steps back a step. “I.. I don’t think the shot put that killed Amami-kun was Akamatsu-san’s.”

Chapter Text

As a child, Ouma wasn’t well liked. 

The others saw him as a weird, filthy thing that didn’t/couldn’t show his feelings. He wasn’t very talkative alone or with others. He wasn’t a human being to anyone else. That was just how he was made.

Ouma wasn’t that annoyed with it, because he’s always been independent. He would be fine with staying inside all day if he has something to help him with his boredom. That’s an emotion that never really.. went away.

That isn’t the point, though. 

People don’t like Ouma, and he knows that. No matter if he’s quiet or compliant, or if he’s loud and mischievous. He’s just that kind of guy to be hated by everyone, despite him sometimes having good intentions with his ideas. Not that anyone ever cared about it, right?

Ever since he took on the role of a liar, it made him severely unpopular and untrustworthy; no one believed what he said. In the real world, this would mean people could just pick on him and say he did something wrong, and no one would believe him. He would be the boy who cried wolf for the rest of his life, all because he introduced himself as a liar to everyone he met. 

Having everything bad being pinned on you could be tiring and boring once he got pissed off at it, but he never showed it. He didn’t show his anger to anyone, and he forgot about it. It didn’t matter if he played with the rumors or not, because his word wouldn’t be believed.

There are so many liars hiding as people who tell and worship the truth in this world. He’s never seen the reason for why everyone loves the truth so badly, when everyone lies. 

He had a lot of time to think.

 小吉 - Ten Years Old

“Sweetie, can you take these books and return them to the library?” His mother asked him in a sweet and caring voice. Her black hair was long and reached her lower back, a complete opposite to his shorter hair that only reached his shoulders. His mother was always nice to him, but in recent years she could barely take care of herself. It was alright with him, as long as he had something to do. He couldn’t afford to go to school, so he wasn’t as smart as other kids his age. He always stayed home or went out into town to do errands for his mother because she couldn’t. 

He nodded, and took the three books from her hands and let her place the library card on top of them. She wished him a goodbye, as he shifted the books to hold in one hand to open the door. 

The bright lights of the sun blinded him nearly for a moment, but he was already used to being outside for long periods of time. The adventures’ his mother would send him on proved just that. Most of the time, he would just be sent to the library to return the books she got just a few days prior. He was fine with the trips, because he didn’t get to stay inside all day. 

He walked on the pathway and ignored the fast cars driving past him on the street, because it would be bad if he got more thoughts again. His ill mother shouldn't deal with a dead son.

Despite going this route most days, he always jumps in fright at the voices on the school playground he always passes by. Though, he keeps the blank poker face only because it’s the only way he knows how to deal with— this.

“Hey kid!” Just keep walking.

“Why are you ignoring me? I thought we were friends.” Just keep walking.

“It’s not nice to ignore a friend, y’know.” Just keep walking.

If you stop he’s going to get you.

Just keep walking.

You don’t want to burden your mother with those bruises, don’t you?

Just keep walking.

He’ll go away, he’ll go away.

Just keep walking.

He has to go away, he has to go away.

Just keep walking—

“Hey!” The kid he doesn’t bother to remember snatches his shirt collar and the books plus the card he’s holding drop to the ground with a clack.

“What did I say about ignoring me, huh?” Don’t speak, speaking will give them what they want.

The kid’s eyes wander to something to the side he cannot see, and he smirks. The grip on his collar tightens. He chuckles, “I saw you avoiding the road. What, you scared a car will hit ‘cha?” His eyes widened for only a split second but narrowed down to its normal height. He bites the inside of his cheek hard enough to bleed to not react. 

The kid says nothing as he’s pushed into the road, and he gasps as he loses his footing for a split second. He looks down at the ground, and he can see that he’s on the road now. He better get out really quickly, but the kid might push him on the road again.

He shouldn’t have looked in the direction of where the cars drive in— because he didn’t even get a chance to react—

Ouma’s metaphorical-artificial eye twitches at the memory; he wasn't sure if it was programmed in him or not. He was sure it wasn’t, because there was no way he would have told Iruma that. How did he remember it if it was not programmed into his AI? Did he give Iruma the right to know that memory? How was he supposed to know without telling Iruma if she didn’t know? 

His mind shouldn't have wandered to such memories he didn't know he still had despite being man-made by the person he’s supposed to be. Iruma helped create him, didn’t she? These memories should've been long forgotten. 

They still keep coming back—

Beeping was a sound he could never forget. 

His frontal lobe was damaged. He didn’t bother hearing the rest of what the doctor said. He was just so angry— anger was never an emotion he felt before.

He was so angry at the kid who pushed him into the road. He was so angry at himself for pushing him mentally to do that. He was so angry at his mother who sent him out there. He was so angry at the doctor and nurse who wouldn't shut up and let him sleep. He was so angry. 

He was — 

So

Bored. Hospitals were boring. 

Ouma didn’t know what to think. Saihara, Iruma, and Kiibo were discussing whatever they found while he was reliving all the trauma he (?) had as a child. He didn’t have anything to distract himself with, so he was left to his own devices. It was so, so incredibly boring. 

Bored was an emotion he knew very well, but he never did anything drastic with it. He was bored in the coding, and he was bored in the class trials, he was bored in his room with nothing else to do but think, he was bored listening to everyone else think without him giving them hints. It felt like Hell.

There wasn’t anything to do other than wait. He wanted something interesting to happen already in this fucking hell—

“I haven’t felt better!” He was so angry, so he placed his anger in the debts of his heart and changed it into happiness. 

After he saw his mother’s hanged body— probably to escape all the debts she had because of him in the hospital— he ran away from the bad men trying to take him away with a new goal in mind; to live freely and never be sad. He was rotting inside, but that didn’t mean he had to show it, right? If people thought he was happy, then he was happy. The lie then becomes the truth. If he believes he is happy, then isn’t he happy? If he shows that he is happy, then he will be. That is what he taught himself. 

The anger in him was gone, and was replaced by a bitter happiness. Everyone around him, even his own organization would say he was the type of person to never be sad. He couldn’t even qualify as a human being. Humans had more emotions than a few, right? How could a human not feel sadness, or anger? 

He was the perfect example of a fake person. He never showed weakness, and no one ever truly knew who he was deep inside. Because who was he to show a cruel, rotting thing to the world? He wasn’t going to ruin people's lives even if he wanted to, so he was going to be good. He was going to force himself to be good. 

Ouma was nothing more than a thing, and he died nothing more than a thing, and he came back nothing more than a thing. 

What Iruma didn’t know wouldn’t kill her, his own self said. He worked on the AI whenever he forced Iruma to sleep, and made some changes of his own. If Iruma noticed, she didn’t care enough to point it out. He had learned a thing or two about watching Iruma place coding on the laptop, and he created the perfect replica of himself.

Including the anger and sadness buried in his artificial, cold dead heart. The real Ouma was dead, but his creation would live forever until someone finally set the thing ablaze. 

He had no purpose or use anymore, but the AI could do what he couldn’t. He knew it would finish the plan no matter what it took.

That was his final thought before he kicked the chair and started choking—

Not that the AI remembered his final thoughts. It would be impossible. He knew it must’ve hurt, but he was just an AI. Iruma asked him what it was like to die— and he lied like he always did. How did she not expect him to lie? He was a perfect AI of Ouma Kokichi made by said man to end the killing game. A perfect AI had the same feelings, thoughts, actions the real Ouma would’ve taken. Although, he was a little more willing to trust— because that’s what he needed to end the killing game. The real Ouma saw it, and so he made it happen. 

But he wasn’t supposed to get close to these people, because he was only made for ending the killing game. That’s what he has to do.

He doesn't care about Saihara-chan, he doesn’t care about Iruma-chan, he doesn’t care about Gonta, and he doesn’t care about Kiibo.

He doesn’t care about Momota-chan. He doesn’t care about Harukawa-chan. He doesn’t care about Yumeno-chan. He doesn’t care about Shirogane-chan.

He doesn’t care about Akamatsu-chan. He doesn’t care about Amami-chan. 

He doesn’t care about Hoshi-chan. He doesn’t care about Toujou-chan.

He doesn’t care about Chabashira-chan. He doesn’t care about Angie-chan. He doesn’t care about Shinguuji-chan.

He can’t care for them.

He already knew he most likely wouldn’t be able to escape the simulation if he was an AI. Maybe the real version of him could, but he was forever trapped. But it was okay, because he doesn’t feel the anger he should be that everyone was going to leave him behind. He’s okay with his only purpose.

The end of the killing game comes with the death of the ringleader. He may have the same morals as the real Ouma, but he is not human. These morals are only temporary, and the sacrifice of them is for the greater good. 

…None of that is important. If he gets off track and thinks of emotional things like that ever again (like when he saw Saihara again for the first time after his death— that honesty is never happening ever again) he’s going to puke his non-existent heart out. It’ll be all over the floor. Can robots puke? He’ll make sure to push Kiibo’s limitations if so.

The three idiots are talking about what they found in the hidden room, and the topic has gone to the secret passageway in the girl’s bathroom. Of course, he’s already seen everything since the fifth floor was practically empty (other than the mysterious red door Saihara didn’t elaborate on) but he listens anyway. He’s only paying attention to them (mostly just Saihara) because if he doesn’t he’ll get bored. 

Being bored is when your mom takes you to do errands before the incident and you're too scared to ask for anything; you stand there and look pretty for hours until you go back home. Being bored is having nothing in your room that interests you anymore because you’ve done everything that you can do. You’ve completed every game on every difficulty three separate times, look out the window longingly, pace around until your feet hurt, smashing your head against the wall then say it doesn’t hurt. Nothing is nothing, and everything turns boring when you have nothing to do. Boring is torture. If he has nothing to do, he’ll torture himself with his own mind. The only reason he didn’t go insane in that code is because he had something to distract himself with. 

Ouma’d rather rip his eyes out than be bored, so he listens to what he already has figured out. But Saihara’s insights have always proved him wrong before, so he’s the one who deserves his attention. Saihara is someone he can’t figure out, and it baffles him how a guy who seems boring at first glance can cure his own curiosity and bored mind. 

—

“A.. pathway? That’s strange.” Saihara questioned, and Kiibo also had to admit, it was strange. A pathway to the hidden room located in the girls bathroom. So.. the ringleader has a higher chance of being a girl? That would mean either Shirogane, Yumeno, or Harukawa would be the main contenders. Kiibo can’t really see any of them being the ringleader, even if he tried. But he needed to have an open mind, because if it was one of them, he’d need to be ready for it.

“Hell fuckin’ yeah! I saw it with my own one of a kind genitals!” Iruma pumped her fist in the air, most likely happy she could give more help into ending the killing game. Not that she would ever admit that though, to anyone. 

“That was a bit.. unnecessary.” Kiibo gulped at Iruma’s rather vulgar comments, and half-expected Ouma to pop in with a dirty comment in regards to Iruma’s behavior. But he stayed quiet, and he didn’t know how to feel about him in particular to be so. He wasn’t the quiet type.

Saihara, on the other hand, had his mouth covered by his hand as he thought. The look was familiar, where the detective would think for a solid few minutes in the class trials or investigations and come up with the answer. Kiibo has always admired Saihara and his quick case solving skills, and how confident he can be when deducting his own solution. There’s something amazing about watching it happen that it never gets old. Saihara was truly a great person to have as a leader, and he is fine with leaving it to him, as long as he doesn’t mind himself.

“Ah.. I see. I think I know mostly everything now.” Saihara then perked up after a few minutes of Iruma impatiently tapping her foot on the ground and Kiibo sweating in anticipation. Iruma stopped her fidgeting and yelled. “Alright smart-ass, then tell us!” She then quickly added, “not that I don’t know it too! I just wanted to check if you were right or not!” 

He gave the two of them a little small smile, “I can explain everything to everyone in the trial so I can be certain. I might be missing a few things.” Iruma scoffed but said nothing else. The three of them were quiet for a moment, but then Saihara continued.

“But, without Monokuma, how do we start a trial? Do we walk right in there and just.. expose the ringleader?”

Iruma had a snarky grin on her face as she glanced at Kiibo, but he felt as if it wasn’t for him, but someone else. “Oh, don’t worry your ugly face about it, Pooichi! I’ve already got the whole thing planned!” She placed her hands on her hips and smiled proudly, and Kiibo couldn’t help but feel confused at what she had planned. He couldn’t think of a way to start anything, so what did Iruma come up with? “Do you know how to, Iruma-san?” He couldn’t help but ask, and he could tell Saihara was thinking about asking the same thing.

The grin never left her face, as she replied smoothly, “Yep! Let the girl genius worry about that, Kiibs! I’ll let you two know whenever the time comes!” She stood up and then suddenly gasped, “Oh right!” Iruma then turned to Saihara, “We gotta go to Ouma’s room! He said there was something important there!” 

Saihara shivered, “Ah, alright..” It was obvious that Ouma would hide things from the rest of them, so Kiibo was more than happy to investigate his room. But, the dead body was still something he saw vividly in his mind. It was.. terrifying to see. Ouma always seemed like an out of this world being, and even though now he knows it was for the plan, he still can’t get it out of his head. 

Kiibo wondered what Ouma thought of it.

“Let’s go ladies!” Iruma laughs as she grabs the vacuum cleaner object. The three (four) of them then exit Iruma’s Lab, and it seems in the distance on the upper courtyard the rest are still outside. 

“Maybe if we're quiet they won’t hear us..?” Saihara whispered out loud. Even if Kiibo thought it was a little rude to skip out bonding with everyone else, they had more important matters to solve and reveal. Saihara has an idea of what has been happening (and hopefully who’s the ringleader) and whatever is beyond the red door and Ouma’s room will help him solve it completely. 

The three (again, four) of them gently and slowly walked up the stairs to the upper courtyard and towards the dormitory. Momota’s loud voice could be heard more clearly than when they were just outside Iruma’s Lab. Kiibo can’t hear him properly, so he ignores it for now. Saihara opens the dormitory door and they slip in. The door closes, and they now can quickly run up the stairs and go to the far right side on the top floor.

“It should still be unlocked.” Kiibo declared as he went before the other two, turning the knob gently and peeking into the door. 

He then slams it shut a second later. Saihara and Iruma both flinch at the sudden sound, and look at Kiibo in astonishment. “What was that for?” Saihara questioned.

Kiibo would’ve gulped if he could, but he brought himself to look at the two people he was with. “I suppose.. with Monokuma and the Monokumarz gone.. they were unable to clean after the last trial.” 

They didn’t need any more words to explain what that meant. 

Iruma was the first to come back to her senses after a bombshell like that, coughing harshly into her hand as she walked towards the door. “We’ve already seen it before! Shouldn’t be that hard to see it again.” She opened the door just enough to let the three of them enter and continued, as if she was trying to encourage them to forget about the dead body. “How many dead bodies have we all seen?” 

“That’s.. certainly a way to look at it.” Biting the bullet, they all entered the dorm room, closing the door behind them. Kiibo never would’ve thought that he would like to remove his function to smell, but a rotting dead body would definitely make him want to rip his own hand off. He can see Iruma and Saihara have the same idea, as they both went to cover their noses as soon as the door closed. Iruma muttered “Damn..!” while trying to not look at the body. If he can recall correctly, it has been about a week since the trial, so the body would be entering the bloating or active decaying stage.. He didn’t want to see that, nor did he think Ouma would want to either. 

On the other hand, he can see the jokes the other would’ve made if he spoke right now. Ouma was never the type to think about the insensitive comments he made (especially about robots, his pettiness would never be forgotten). Or, he did think about them, and he just didn’t care. He huffs, and he starts to look around the room. He never got the chance to actually look around thoughtfully, leaving it to Saihara and Harukawa, so he would this time around. The room seemed to be in the same shape they left it in, as the whiteboard had the same writing on it. 

They never got the actual answer on whatever all was in the room, as Miu stepped in and called it as a suicide, then it was done. Kiibo could see that Saihara still had that urge to solve that peculiar mystery, instead of just asking Iruma or Ouma about it. It seemed that he would be more proud of his achievement that way. He looks at the large whiteboard he noticed as soon as he walked in (after the old dead body smell), but “There’s a dead body in this room, isn’t there?” was a weird choice to put on the whiteboard, as it seemed there were writings on it before. His first thought about it was if it was a threat or taunt, but it seemed to just be a way to spice the trial up, and make it more confusing to solve. There had never been an actual suicide as a murder, and it was weird that Monokuma made them do a trial anyway.

He had heard that Momota had found an electro-bomb near the dormitory, and if he could recall correctly from Iruma’s ramblings.. was that it could scramble electric signals within a fifty meter radius. If his math was correct, it would be enough to cover Ouma’s room. Was that the point of the electro-bomb? There weren’t any cameras he could remember being in their dorm rooms, if the monitor didn’t work as one. That wouldn’t make any sense. Unless, Ouma or Iruma might think there’s invisible cameras? 

Determined to showcase his new findings with Saihara and Iruma, he sees that Saihara is near Ouma’s desk (keep your head down and don’t look—) looking through the desk drawers. Iruma is near the back of the room where most of the cardboard boxes are, sorting through them with a frustrated look on her face. Saihara might be the better option of talking things out with, so he walks up to him with a smile. He notices that Kiibo is walking towards him, and he looks up in surprise. “Kiibo? Is there anything you found?” 

In pride, he answers, “Yes! There was something interesting I noticed about the electro-bomb Momota-kun found a few days ago..” he trailed off, waiting for Shuuichi’s response before he continued. 

Shuuichi looked at him in confusion, “Electro-bomb..? You’re bringing up the trial again?” Despite him not understanding why, Kiibo decided that this was important enough to figure out and tell everyone. “Yes. Despite being ruled as a suicide, there are still mysteries that need to be explained. And I do believe those mysteries can help end the killing game. Would you like to solve it with me, Saihara-kun?” He then added, “We can ask Iruma-san for help as well! When she’s not busy!”

Shuuichi stayed quiet for a few moments, and clutched his hands a little harder than before. “You think that solving that trial can help end the killing game?” 

“Ouma-kun knows much more than we do. It is in his character to do things like this.. and I fully believe that we should do this.” After a few more seconds, Shuuichi nodded. “Then I’ll help you. What about the electro-bomb?” 

“Since electro-bombs scramble electric signals, I was wondering why Ouma-kun would want to do that near the dormitory, specifically his dorm room. There was another thing that I noticed, that maybe he wanted invisible cameras that may be in his room gone to start his plan.”

“..Invisible cameras?” Shuuichi muttered, and after a few seconds of trying to think of everything that Kiibo said, he replied. “Since you’re a robot, do you have a function that can prove that theory?” What a crude statement, but since it’s important I’ll let it slide! He scoffed, “Of course I do! I have a camera feature where I can zoom in and see microscopic objects!” 

Not letting another second pass, he tested out his camera feature by looking at a random part of the room…

…Then immediately yelped and stumbled back at the sight he saw. “W-Woah!”

—

Shuuichi jumped along with Kiibo, being scared a bit when he did first. “Kiibo! What did you see?!” If it was that bad he got scared from the sight of it, he almost didn’t want to know—

“Bugs!” …Bugs?

He must’ve said that out loud, because Kiibo printed out a picture from his mouth, took it out, and showed Shuuichi. The sight was really, really weird. Little Monokumas with wings holding cameras, probably the invisible cameras Kiibo was theorizing before. He took the photo and looked closely. It was exactly what it looked like. “How.. how did Ouma-kun know they were there?” 

Kiibo seemed to not know the answer either because he shook his head. “No idea.. Ouma-kun hasn’t talked since we were in Iruma-san’s Research Lab.” Surprising. 

“Well.. might as well look at something else..” Shuuichi looks at Ouma’s bed, seeing the horse mask and Motive Video on it. He is curious, but it wasn’t worth watching, since they were only relevant weeks ago. It wasn’t any of his business now. He hums in thought on what to check next, but Iruma yelling distracts him. “Boo-yah! Bow down to the genius that wastes her time with plebeians!” She cackles, standing up with a piece of envelope in her hands with writing he can’t see. “I found somethin’ hidden in these shitty blueprints!” 

“That’s great!” Kiibo calls out, and Iruma sinks in praise from the robot. She walks confidently to where Kiibo and Shuuichi stand, and nearly throws it in Shuuichi’s direction. “C’mon Pooichi, open it already!” she whines.

Shuuichi brought the hand holding an envelope in view for all of them after Iruma handed it to him, and the words ‘This isn’t a will.’ could be seen by Kiibo. It was a strange way of bringing importance to whatever was inside the envelope, but it fit Ouma. Without further words, Shuuichi tore open the paper gently and inside it was a small note that read..

‘The 2nd message is on the wall next to the boiler in the near garden.’ 

When he was sure that Kiibo and Iruma were done reading the message, he spoke out. “Huh.. what does this mean exactly?” 

“It means we're goin’ there! I don’t even know what all that shit-for-brains twink thinks in his head, so I’m pumped to find out!” 

Shuuichi watched as Iruma dragged Kiibo by his hand throughout the room, and out of the door. He followed reluctantly, but stopped at the doorframe. He took a deep breath as he looked back at Ouma’s body, since it’ll probably be the last time he sees it like this, at least physically.

He was wondering how it was still being hung by the tight rope that concealed his neck, and now that he was looking at him clearly, his scarf wasn’t there either. His dainty neck was on show, and he could clearly see the bruises left by the noose, or whatever Harukawa did to him all those weeks ago. The simulation must’ve simulated dead bodies— he was rotting. It was a horrible sight to see. 

He had many things to say to anyone who listened, many being the troubles he encountered as he was at the Academy. Even if his dead classmates couldn’t be saved, he would still honor Akamatsu’s hope in saving as many people as he could. He was going to end the killing game, with all of them who survived. He swore, no matter what the ringleader— Shirogane did, he would destroy this game. 

It was obvious that Shirogane’s account in the first trial had been a lie hidden inside a truth. It was clear to him now, the real killer of Amami Rantaro was not Akamatsu Kaede, but the ringleader. 

He took one last longing look, then started following Iruma and Kiibo to the boiler room.

The mystery of the killing game will be solved.

Chapter Text

Sleep has never come harder.

Even after he already came back an hour ago from his training session with Harukawa (she came to his room and forced him and Momota to continue, he really didn’t want to say no, so he accepted.) Even if Shuuichi was exhausted after learning so much about this Academy.. so much about Amami. Why he was so mysterious. No doubt that the next trial will be the longest trial to date here, just to explain all of what they found.

Shuuichi knew.. that he had to use this trial to expose the ringleader. He had no time to be wrong about his deductions. If he can do anything to stop this killing game from reaching only two players, he will fight until he perishes.

Hope is something he hasn’t seen himself indulging in often, and not in such large quantities. He doesn’t think even if he does catch a wink of sleep it won’t be nearly enough to keep his body from exploding. Nerves, excitement (which— is not an emotion he expected to be feeling), and curiosity is all flowing through his blood. It was impossible for him to even close his eyes without thinking a hundred miles per second. He could just try to walk it off inside the uncomfortability of his own dorm room, but he felt as if he needed to talk to someone just to get his feelings out there.

He would have already told Harukawa and Momota during training, but no one besides himself, Gonta, Kiibo, Ouma, and Iruma are supposed to know about the random trial. All Iruma said was that they’d just mess something up and cause unnecessary trouble for everyone involved; it was best if they found out the day of the trial.

Deciding to just not think about it, he threw the covers he halfheartedly pulled on himself earlier, and immediately walked out of his room’s door. He needed a break from this type of thinking. The type of thinking that he’s done too much these past few days. He needs a breather.

It wasn’t long after he started staring at the sky mindlessly that he heard a half-confused voice say his name right behind him. “Saihara-chan..?”

Kiibo— no, it was quite obviously Ouma instead with the way the eyes glowed unusually purple. Shuuichi wouldn’t put it past Ouma to secretly walk around the Academy, but it was a surprise that he started talking to him. He looked behind him, seeing Kiibo’s mildly confused face stare back at him. “Ouma-kun! Uhm.. Is Kiibo..?”

“He’s unable to answer the phone right now,” he answered cryptically. “so you have to deal with me, sorry Mister Detective..”

“I don’t think you’re very sorry, aren’t you?” He didn’t mean it in a mean or sarcastic way; it didn’t seem like Ouma took it that way either, thankfully. He was just happy for the distraction. Ouma’s smirk looked foreign on Kiibo’s face. “Perhaps. Maybe I’ve come here to kill you! Or maybe that’s the lie?”

Shuuichi would’ve been at least a little worried before, but he knows that Ouma wouldn’t do such a thing. Doing so would destroy everything he was working on. He doesn’t know why or how he’s gotten so comfortable with the boy in question, knowing the damage he could cause. It was on the back of his mind at the moment. His head still hurt with the whiplash even then.  “Hm. I better get running then,” he deadpans. “How could you?” 

Ouma laughed, and it surprisingly wasn’t like the short horse-like laugh he’s come to know. It’s awfully similar, starting off horse-like, but more like he did actually find Shuuichi’s comment funny. It lasts longer, and at the back of his mind he thinks that he wants to listen to it more. But unlike normal, he doesn’t push it away this time. He doesn’t know what that means. “If I didn’t know any better I would think you’re entertaining me.” 

He thinks. If he was under the same impression of Ouma that he was even a week ago, he wouldn’t have said anything close to what he replied with next. It was almost like every time they hung out, he was babysitting. Of course, he did enjoy Ouma’s company a little. It’s why he was so curious and kept coming back, even if it was ultimately a waste of his time. 

He had a promise to Akamatsu to keep, and the worry of dying right under his nose. How could he focus on Ouma’s excentrics when he had people’s lives on his shoulders? People that depended on his detective work? Of course, he wasn’t as sad as he could be. He had Momota and Harukawa after all. But it doesn’t mean he was having a good time. But Ouma— He seemed to be having a blast every single day, but now he knows it was just an act to complete his plan. 

He finds that he doesn’t want to care about the killing game tonight. He wants to be the high schooler he never was, because it was taken away from him. He wants Ouma to distract him from his worries of the trial tomorrow, even if it’s only a couple of hours. He doesn’t want to be fearful, or scared anymore. 

So Shuuichi replies, completely ignoring whatever Ouma said before, “Do you want to play two truths, one lie?” He’s honestly surprised that they’ve never played this game before.

Ouma slid his finger right in front of his mouth, feigning thinking. “How about two lies, one truth? I think it’s a much better game.” He grabbed Shuuichi’s hand and started jogging over to the gazebo outside. “Come on!!” 

Despite what people might think, Kiibo’s hands aren’t cold. He didn't know what texture his hands were, but it did feel like a human’s. He blushed a little at the contact, but he did follow Ouma to the gazebo. 

After sitting down next to each other on the bench, Ouma didn’t let his hand go, but it wasn’t like he was going to make a big deal out of it. It was nice to feel physical contact in this game. It was warm to the touch, and it proved that Ouma, and Kiibo were alive with him right now. “I’ll go first, o-kay~?” Ouma placed his elbow onto the table in front of them and placed his cheek onto it. Looking at Shuuichi, he smiled. “I like eating strawberries themselves, I hate my talent, and I don’t have any family members.” Starting off strong, then. Shuuichi didn’t know what to pick at first, but he just needed to think back on all he knew about Ouma. Ouma usually didn’t intend to win his games, as he always makes them tie.. so there has to be an answer.

That’s it. Shuuichi smiled, “The truth is that you don’t like your talent.” 

Ouma’s smile widened, “Wowie! Care to explain how you got that answer?”

“Well, first off, when Toujou-san asked everyone about their food preferences, I heard you say to specifically not add strawberries to anything. I’ve seen you drink strawberry soda before, so I wasn’t sure, but.. You said just strawberries themselves. Not strawberry flavored things.” He then continued, “As for the second one.. Someone would obviously think you were referring to your Super High School Level Supreme Leader talent, but in the files, you told us you were also called the Super High School Level Analyst. I don’t know anything about the third option.. but it was a guess.”

“You’re so right, Saihara-chan!” Ouma turned his body to face Shuuichi, and used his free hand to make a fist. “You’re really attentive, you know that?” He didn’t get the chance to reply before Ouma continued talking, completely ignoring whatever he himself said. “Anyway, it’s your turn! If you trick me on this, maybe I won’t kill you!” 

Shuuichi didn’t really know what to say. Besides that, he knew there was no way that he could trick Ouma. At least, by the game’s rules. “Let’s see..” he mumbled, placing his palm over his chin to think. Not like he noticed he was doing so anyway. “I despise orcas.. I’ve played a sport once, and I like to collect things.”

Not even two seconds later, Ouma replied. “I’ve already seen your Monokuma figure collection, Shumai!” Damnnit.. “But I never knew you secretly really like orcas!”

“Yeah..” he sighed, sad that he never stood a chance against the liar himself. But he could try something new next round. “Hey, Saihara-chan, before I do my turn..”

“Yeah?”

“Whenever you lie, you tilt your head downwards a little.” He smirked. Shuuichi’s eyes widened, surprised and impressed on how Ouma noticed that, even though he knows he hasn’t lied more than just a handful of times. Ouma has said before that he knows how to spot other liars, so it’s not that surprising. Shuuichi knew he himself obviously had a tell, but he never knew what it was or noticed it. He didn’t think anyone else noticed it either. 

“Anyway~” Ouma continued, “My turn! I hate heavy metal, I can only speak Japanese and English, and we were students of Hope’s Peak Academy.”

“Hope’s Peak Academy?” Shuuichi blanched, focusing on the last part of Ouma’s sentence. “I thought we all came from different schools outside?” Though, he wouldn’t be surprised if all of their memories were fake, since they were inside a simulation, for Kami-sama’s sake.

He scoffed, “It’s obviously another plot-twist the ringleader got from one of their animes.” They both knew who they were talking about. He’s surprised he brung this up out here, without the protection of an electro-bomb or that vacuum device Iruma built. But, if Ouma cared, he didn’t show it. He kept explaining, “I found a readable file called ‘The Tragedy Record.’ It was about fifty pages long, by the way.” Ouma didn’t seem to be looking at him anymore, but the sky that was covered by the dome.

Shuuichi couldn’t help himself but ask, “Did you ever plan on telling us?” 

He sighed. He’s never really seen this side of Ouma before, and it’s fascinating. “It all sounds like make believe, so I didn’t ever mention it. But..”

It was quiet for a couple of seconds. Ouma’s grip on his hand tightened, but he then continued what he was about to say. “It’s too long and detailed to be fake. So I’ll explain, and you’ll listen,” he finally looked at Shuuichi, with something like determination in his eyes, “you got that?” 

Shuuichi nodded, wanting to know everything about Hope’s Peak Academy, and what The Tragedy is supposed to be. He knew that about forty minutes ago he wanted to relax— But this is too much information to pass up. He possibly couldn’t.

“Okay, so, it starts off with us Super High School Level high schoolers. Before, we all thought we went to different schools, but there’s a school where people like us with these talents go, which is Hope’s Peak.

The two main classes that were mentioned in the record were classes 77-B, and the 78th. There was also a Reserve Course where people without Super High School Level talents could pay to be inside the school. A guy from there, Hinata Hajime, was part of this Reserve Course. He signed up to be a part of a human experimentation thing, to give him all of the talents ever to be created. He went through it, and came out as Kamukura Izuru. 

A teenager from the 78th class, Enoshima Junko, the Super High School Level Despair, and her twin sister Ikusaba Mukuro created what’s known as The Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History. But most people just call it the Tragedy. 

The Tragedy was created by releasing the footage of a mutual killing game of some class in Hope’s Peak to the outside world. It created despair in everyone, which was Enoshima’s plan in the first place. From this point, Hope’s Peak closed its gates, and the 78th class were stuck inside.

Kamukura was the leader of the Remnants of Despair, which were Enoshima’s followers led by despair. The Remnants of Despair were class 77-B, after their class representative, Nanami Chiaki, was executed by Enoshima. They entered despair not long after her death.

About a year later, the 78th class enter their own killing game—”

And he went on. About how Naegi, Kirigiri, Hasuhiro, Fukawa, Togami, and Asahina survived their killing game. Enoshima’s death.

And on. About how Naegi joined the Future Foundation to stop despair and the Tragedy for good.

And on. About how Naegi’s sister and Fukawa joined forces in Towa City.

And on. About class 77-B’s own killing game in a simulation like their’s, called the Neo World Program. About how Enoshima created her own AI of herself, a perfect replica. Class 77-B came out their normal selves afterwards, no longer filled with despair.

And on. About the following years, how despair still exists today, outside. Where they aren’t.

“And.. where we came in, was after all this.” Ouma said after he took a short break to rest his throat, “It said you guys were the first class since the Tragedy to be deemed Super High School Level Students. But, Hope’s Peak was closed down, so you all would have gone to different schools that specialized in that.”

Shuuichi hummed, but something that Ouma said didn’t sit right with him. “Why’d you say ‘you guys’? You could’ve said we..”

He huffed out of annoyance, “No, I couldn’t have.” For just a second, he stopped. He took a deep breath, and released it. He kept talking, “I wasn’t mentioned on that list. Every Hope’s Peak class has fifteen students.” He finally released his hold on Shuuichi’s hand, and it was suddenly colder. He felt a tinge of disappointment. “It feels like the ringleader is going to use me for something big.” He mumbled. 

“What do you mean?” Shuuchi subconsciously leaned closer without even realizing it, and Ouma looked at his face again. His frown was prominent on his face, as well as his furrowed eyebrows. He looked away immediately after, though. “I mean,” he says louder, “that it’s obvious the ringleader was targeting talented highschoolers scouted by Future Foundation. Everyone else here was on that list, but me. Why am I here then? I’m listed as the Super High School Level Supreme Leader here and in my memories, but is that really true outside?” Shuuichi notices that both his fists are balled up, and it isn’t supposed to be a cute thing. “I’m not,” his fists end up tighter, “supposed to be here.” 

Shuuichi gulped, noticing Ouma’s frustration. It was a weird look on Kiibo’s face, as he hasn’t gotten this frustrated before. Maybe with Ouma’s robophobia, but this is actual anger. He swore he even saw him glitch a little like a virus, but it’s about two in the morning, so it was probably just a hallucination. “Ouma-kun..”

He didn’t look at him, but at his lap. “What?” 

Shuuichi gave a small smile, even if Ouma couldn't see it. “It’s my turn.. isn’t it?” Ouma looked up with a slightly confused expression. He took it as a sign to continue, placing his head on his hand, held up by his elbow. He didn’t look away from Ouma’s face. He was going to make this extra hard for him. “My favorite color is orange, I don’t know who my parents are, and I’ve never been to therapy.”

Silence.

After a few seconds, Ouma huffed, “I hate you.” 

Shuuichi raised his head, “I didn’t do anything.” He was smiling anyway. Ouma slapped his arm harshly, “Whatever. Your favorite color is orange.” He turned away. Even without Shuuichi giving away his lying tell, he still got it correct. Shuuichi gave a small laugh, but it was more air than noise. “Yeah.”

They didn’t speak for a few minutes, the conversation growing short. He could tell that Ouma still had the topic about his appearance in the killing game on his mind, so he switched tactics. 

Shuuichi took a deep breath, and didn’t look away from Ouma, “Wanna stay in my room tonight..?”

Ouma’s head immediately jumped up, very clearly not expecting that to be what he would ever say, and it almost made Shuuichi laugh. Confusion was written over his face, and he gave a nervous chuckle. “What’s your deal, Saihara-chan?” He smiled for the first time in two hours, slipping back to the personality Shuuichi knew best. “Gonna rough me up and take advantage of me?” 

Shuuichi threw his body back from Ouma to get away from his accusations, “What—? No!” He blushed, embarrassed that his reaction got a giggle from Ouma, who clearly enjoyed his suffering. “Fine! I’d love a sleepover from my darling Mister Detective..!” He pretended to swoon, pressing both his hands together and closing his eyes, heaving a dreamy sigh. Shuuichi noticed that he seemed kind of tired, but he knew it couldn’t be from sleep deprivation. He was in Kiibo’s body, so it must’ve meant emotionally.. which was fair. None of them would feel their best after all. 

Shuuichi stood up, and so did Ouma. “Let’s go then..” Ignoring the blush on his face, he and Ouma walked back to the dormitory. They were going to have to be up (well, himself at least) in a few hours, so he would at least need a few hours of sleep. 

—

ding-dong

Shuuichi woke up to the sound of the insistent ring of his doorbell. 

He groaned as he rubbed his eyes with the heel of his palm, glaring at the door that was still ringing. 

ding-dong

He got up, ignoring the noise and looked around his room to find Ouma.  He finds that his room is absolutely trashed, his various uniforms scattered all over the floor, all of his desk drawers open, and even the table upside down. He finds the culprit on the floor of his room, also ignoring the door bell.

ding-dong

Ouma was lying on his back, reading a book titled, “Facts About Your Underwear” with Monokuma on the front. He was definitely not reading it at all.

ding-dong

“Aren’t you gonna answer that Saihara-chan?” Ouma doesn’t look at him. Shuuichi scoffs. As if Ouma wasn’t awake this entire time. He knows Kiibo only needs to charge once a week.

ding-dong

“Why is my room dirty?” Ouma doesn’t respond.

ding-dong

Shuuichi walks to the door and unlocks it, opening the door all the way. He knows he doesn’t have his overcoat on, but he’s too tired and annoyed at everything to care at all. 

As he expected, Iruma was the culprit needlessly ringing his doorbell. It was between either Momota or her, and since what’s supposed to happen today, he guessed she was the one that stopped by. 

“Damn, you woke up out of the wrong side of bed.” She waltzes in, and now he notices that Gonta is right behind her. As they both walk in, she starts ranting about something he could care less about. Shuuichi picks up one of his overcoats on the floor (courtesy of Ouma) and walks straight into his bathroom. Just to splash water on his face, maybe wonder why the hell he was here in the first place. The usual. 

When he walks in the bathroom, he is overjoyed to see that Ouma didn’t mess anything up besides making the mirror really foggy. 

Wiping his hand to make it clear again, he decided as he got ready to listen to the conversation outside of the bathroom. They all walked into his room, he can be nosy. 

“Where the fuck is Kiibo?” He can hear Iruma walking around the room.

“Not available," Ouma replies, “He’s not in front.”

“Like I know what that means.”

He then hears a really annoyed groan, “He’s not here!” Ouma yells, “Normally we both would be able to control the body, and know what’s happening, but I don’t hear him at all. He’ll come back later.” 

Shuuichi’s heard very little about the terms Ouma is telling them, so he doesn’t know what he’s talking about either. He picks up his eyeliner that he keeps in the bathroom, and sighs in relief that Ouma didn’t mess with it. He starts applying it. 

“So.. Kiibo is inside, but not able to know what is going on, and not able to talk?” Gonta asks.

“Good job Gonta!” Ouma turns back to his normal, cheery voice that he’s been hearing less and less of lately. “You’re definitely smarter than the pea-brained bitchlet over here!”

“B-Bitchlet..?!” Iruma moans, but then turns back to normal a split second later. “You fucking asshole! I just don’t care about shit like that!” 

“Gonta has met someone like that,” he starts, and Shuuichi hasn’t ever heard anything about this before, so he listens. “they were part of my human family, and Gonta learned all about it from them!” 

Shuuichi places his overcoat back on, and uses the water to mess with his hair a little. The strange cowlick stays right up, despite his attempts to get rid of it. He might ask to use some of Momota’s gel later. He walks back into the main room, and sees Gonta fixing the fallen table right back up. Iruma has sitten down on his bed, and Ouma is sitting criss-cross on the desk chair. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen Kiibo sit criss-cross, so it looks weird. Anything Ouma does in Kiibo’s body is weird, he thinks.

“Are we ready now?” Shuuichi asks. Ouma huffs, “I’ll have to try and force Kiibo to front. They don't know about me yet,” he waves his hand in a dismissive motion and continues, “You and Gonta go on ahead, I can stay here with Iruma so it doesn’t look suspicious.”

Iruma balked, but Shuuichi and Gonta were already half out the door, “Alright! See you two later!” Gonta smiled and they were both outside before they knew it. 

“Now we just go to breakfast, and we’ll tell everyone about it after they come in, okay?” Shuuichi told Gonta, and the latter nodded in understanding.

He took a deep breath to handle his nerves, and told himself, it’s either expose the truth about Shirogane and the killing game.. or die with everyone knowing a lie. 

I know which one I’ll pick every time.

—

As soon as Iruma and Kiibo walked through the dining hall doors, Shuuichi knew he had to find the right time to announce it. 

“Hey, Iruma, Kiibo! Where were you two?” Momota immediately questioned them, and Iruma scoffed while rolling her eyes. “None of your fuckin’ buisness, that’s what!” She threw her right hand in the air, as a dismissal to whatever Momota said. “But you know what I do need to tell you guys?”

She slammed the same right hand on the table, startling everyone— including himself and Kiibo— “The way to fuckin’ get out of this place!” 

Oh, she did it for me. Sighing in relief, everyone else seemed to be either: disbelieving, which fair, or ecstatic. He looked at the others sitting at the table, and more of them looked disbelieving. Most likely because it’s Iruma saying it, and most of them don’t trust her at all. He was surprised to note that Harukawa was already glaring at him from her seat next to Momota, but it didn’t seem to be of hatred. Just curiosity. The boy next to her, fortunately, was not one of those people to not trust Iruma’s words.

“Woah, really?” Momota was the loudest voice he heard in all the commotion. “That’s great!”

“Hell yeah it’s great!” Iruma cackled, “All we have to do is expose the ringleader, then this bullshit game can be over with!”

At that, Shirogane speaks up, but it’s only a simple sentence. “R-Ringleader..? We’re bringing that up again?”

Yes, we are. Shuuichi can’t help but glare at Shirogane from across the table. I never knew you well, Shirogane.. But I know who you are now. I’m confident in my deductions. Shuuichi stood up slowly, and he cleared his throat. “Me, Iruma-san, Kiibo, and Gonta have talked this out plenty.. we are going to expose the ringleader. The one who falsely accused Akamatsu-san of murder.”

He swore he could’ve heard Yumeno mutter a small “Gonta..?” but he wasn’t sure. Momota smiled so hard he looked like a lunatic. “If you think it’s right, Shuuichi, then I’m fully on board with this!” He raised his fist in the air. “What do we hafta’ do, sidekick?” 

Iruma snickered, interrupting whatever Shuuichi was about to say, “Oh, I have just the thing. I’ll meet y’all at the Shrine of Judgement, alright virgins?! Don’t take too long!” Then she was gone. She scattered out of the dining hall, like she was on a super important spy mission. 

It seemed if Kiibo could huff or breathe air out of annoyance, he would. It was a miracle he even hung out with Iruma during their free-time without popping the robot-equivalent of a blood vessel. He tried once out of curiosity— he felt like he was one second away from a heart attack.

As the dining hall door shut, he saw Harukawa walk right after Iruma. After she saw no one walk along with her, she stopped and raised an eyebrow. “Well? Let’s get going.”

Mumbling a sorry, Shuuichi and the rest of them made their way to the Shrine of Judgement. A sick feeling erupted in his chest, though he knew there couldn’t possibly have been another murder. It was almost time to judge the ringleader of their crime. It was impossible to conduct an execution (nor did he ever want to— he was fifty percent sure it wouldn’t stick anyways) but he still felt like he was sending a life sentence to the ringleader— to Shirogane. It wasn’t like those other times, where he didn’t know the culprit right away, and found out during the trial. He knew right now, he knew the day before. There was no doubt that she was the ringleader, it worked perfectly. 

She stated she went to the bathroom in the first class trial, and while it sounded like just a weak alibi, it was the start of something much darker. Ouma and Iruma said they found a secret passageway in the girls bathroom, leading to the secret room the ringleader had, possibly storing this ‘Motherkuma’ Ouma found in the files. Shirogane could’ve used this— or did use this passageway, come out of the hidden library door, and smash Amami in the head with her own shot put ball, the shot put ball they actually found. 

Iruma found a shot put ball with pink fibers all around it in the trash of the secret room, the same fibers from one of Akamatu’s sweaters. The same one she used to wrap around the ball itself in her backpack. 

Akamatsu planned the murder. She missed Amami. Shirogane finished the blow for her, causing her to be the killer. The only reason she got away with it is because she herself is the ringleader of this killing game. 

It doesn’t matter if Shirogane kills all of them for this. He wants everyone to go out knowing the truth of the killing game. The only truth. Hopefully he doesn’t die, because he truly wants to live. If it comes down for it, he will die for the greater good. He’s completely ready for the destruction of the killing game.

He hopes.. he can see her again. After all of this.

—

“Is Harukawa-san alright?” Maki is almost startled by Gokuhara’s approach. It’s weird, they haven’t ever talked one-on-one. Waiting on Iruma, he still has a happy, but nervous smile on his face.

Ignoring the question (she herself doesn’t know, afterall), she asks, “So, you had something to do with this?”

Gokuhara’s eyes widen, but they relax to their normal state a second later, “Oh, yes. Saihara-kun, Iruma-san, Kiibo..” he hesitates, but continues anyway, “All of them and Gonta have worked on investigations!"

Raising an eyebrow at the hesitated speech, it sounds not quite normal. Not quite what Gokuhara would say. Maybe it’s rehearsed, but she swore she could hear Gokuhara wanting to say another name, add someone else to that list. She’s always taught herself to not doubt something she thinks, as she’s always most likely right; so she’s suspicious of what they all have in store for them. 

She knows Saihara wouldn’t do something stupid, maybe Kiibo wouldn’t either, but she’s not sure about Iruma or Gokuhara. Iruma asking them all here, where the trials take place, is very suspicious. Immediately when Iruma said that she knew a way for them to get out of the killing game, she knew that Saihara had something to do with it. 

At least they seem like they’ll tell the rest of them what they’ve been planning. She doesn’t know if everyone else is either really stupid (debatable), or if she’s the only one that’s noticed a new alliance forming. She’s not stupid, and she’s seen Saihara and Iruma have been hanging out nonstop after Ouma’s trial.

Gokuhara’s speech interrupts her thought process, and she can see that his smile is genuine. As genuine as it could be. “Gonta knows that things like this can be scary.. but I also know that lots of our friends are smart. They can do this.” 

“I’m not scared.” She immediately retorts the first part of his sentence, but it doesn’t seem to deter Gokuhara at all. He can be a little gullible enough to believe anything, but hanging out with Ouma seemed to let him tell lies apart from truths. “Harukawa-san—”

“Did you guys miss me?!” Iruma’s loud voice roared across the courtyard, and now Maki can see that she’s carrying a large pink hammer with her. From where she’s walking from, it looks like she came back from her Research Lab. 

Everyone’s talking came to a sudden halt, and Kiibo is the first one to break it. “Iruma-san!” he turns back to everyone, “Now we can start the last class trial.” 

So it is a class trial. “For what?” Maki asks.

Saihara speaks up for the first time since the dining hall, and she can see that he has a determined look on his face. “I call for a re-trial on Akamatsu and Amami’s murder. After more investigation on.. what happened, and the ringleader’s identity, I can conclude that Akamatsu was not the killer. Like I said in the dining hall.” 

“B-But without Monokuma, how would it even work? Can we even get inside the trial room?”

“Like this, Shittygane!” Iruma opens the big red doors of the Shrine of Judgment, and walks right inside. As they follow her inside, she takes the big pink hammer she brought with her, 

and smashes it into the massive Monokuma statue. Huh. 

“W-What the hell was that for?” Momota almost yells at the sudden shake it creates across the room, but it’s not like Maki is that surprised. Iruma’s the Super High School Level Inventor, she has a knack for creating either useful stuff, or an invention that lets you do things while you sleep. Utter garbage. 

“This!” Iruma starts, “Is an electro-hammer. It usually would destroy electro-magnetic currents, but I tweaked another version last night that works like a magnet,” 

As she finished that sentence, the statue started to move the same way it always did to show the elevator. She continued, “so it’ll force the electric current in the statue to work. Aren’t I just the smartest fuckin’ person on the planet?”

A weird feeling unravels in everyone, and Maki remembers it to be nervousness. She hasn’t felt this way in years. Even without Monokuma’s vicious taunts as they’re trying to find the culprit, she knows it’s going to be even harder than before. There is no authority here other than the ringleader, the person they’re trying to catch and reveal in just a few hours. She doesn’t know if Saihara already knows who the ringleader is— but she trusts him, unfortunately. She trusts that he’ll make the right decision. 

She hopes that Saihara keeps that trust. 

—

The elevator ride is nothing short of quiet. 

It had only been a few days since the last trial, the trial of Ouma’s suicide, so he understands why everyone would be anxious or tense.

Shuuichi can’t help but look back at Shirogane, and her nervous expression. He wishes that he was wrong. He wished there was no ringleader that posed as one of their friends. 

But— wishes aren’t going to help him and his friends by surviving this game. And if he doesn’t survive, then he’ll do it by exposing the truth behind the killing game. He won’t let everyone die knowing a lie, because even if it hurts, the harsh truth is much better than an unknowing lie. At least, that’s what he thinks. 

He looks back at Kiibo, who is fidgeting with his fingers. Ouma died a few days ago, but his AI counterpart he made with Iruma, was inside of Kiibo. Ouma made this plan for them all to escape, and he couldn’t be happier that the liar was working with him and the others. His view of Ouma changed drastically, just in a few days..

Two weeks ago, he wouldn’t have trusted him with anything. He was manipulative, deceitful, mischievous, and it didn’t seem like he didn’t care if anyone trusted him or not. 

But would Ouma take his own life, just to end the killing game, as a lie? Iruma has stated that she’s seen the glitch Ouma was talking about herself, and they’ve been working together longer than Shuuichi has. Like he’s thought before, he will make sure that everything is going to plan. That’s what everyone deserves. They deserve to get out of this killing game, no matter what. 

The elevator interrupts his thoughts as it fully stops moving. He lets out a small sigh, and is the first one to walk out of the elevator and into the trial room. 

Slowly, everyone got onto their podiums. Even without Monokuma, there was a dangerous vibe lingering in the air, and he was sure everyone could feel it.

“...Where do we start?” Harukawa started talking, much to his relief. He didn’t know where to start. “We don’t have Monokuma, and even if we do expose the ringleader, they could just kill us.” Shuuichi sighed. 

No matter what.. I’ll expose the truth. I promised Akamatsu that I would end this killing game. Protect everyone.

“We can focus on that when we get there, right?” Momota, the ever so kind best friend, looks into Harukawa’s eyes for him. “I know Shuuichi, Iruma, Kiibo, and Gonta have this all figured out! I believe in them, don’t you guys do as well?”

Harukawa looks to the side, her eyes vacant. Then she nods slowly. “Yeah. Saihara is usually dependable in investigations.” Yumeno and Shirogane share the same thought afterwards.

The support of his friends makes him smile a little. It makes him want to live. 

He’s never been good at living, or even wanting to. He hid behind his hat ever since his first homicide case, and only took it off after Akamatsu’s death. Seeing what he accomplished, what he could accomplish, if he tried, was a very simple motivation. But it made him determined to see this to the end. He didn’t want to kill himself if he got to see his friends live alongside him. 

Momota, Harukawa, Yumeno, Iruma, Kiibo..

(“I believe in you, so you should definitely believe in yourself!”)

(He finds that he doesn’t want to care about the killing game tonight. He wants to be the high schooler he never was, because it was taken away from him. He wants Ouma to distract him from his worries of the trial tomorrow, even if it’s only a couple of hours. He doesn’t want to be fearful, or scared anymore.)

(“Ouma-kun..”)

..He will live. 

Shuuichi takes a deep breath, and speaks. “I wanted to start on the mystery of this Academy. Why it’s so weird, architectural wise.” 

Everyone is listening to him. Good. “...There are many things that don't make sense, like the flashback lights, the exisals, and even..” he gulps. “The executions are bizarre. It doesn’t feel real.”

“I was wondering about that too,” Harukawa stated, “Sometimes it doesn’t even feel like we’re in a real situation. If things like that can happen, then our memories must've been very tampered with.” She ran her fingers through her hair, looking down at the ground. 

Shuuichi’s mouth turned into a thin line, trying to think of how he could word this next sentence without making a ruckus. But, maybe he was just wishing for something that wouldn’t be possible anyway. He opens his mouth, but it seems that Iruma wanted to beat him to it this time. “We’re in a simulation!” She yelled.

Complete and utter silence.

Then chaos.

Momota was the loudest, and Harukawa didn’t speak at all. She did have a look of belief on her face. 

Iruma scoffed, “I saw it my damn self!” Her statement made the entire trial room quiet again. “Look, I know it sounds unbelievable, but.. a few days after Akamatsu’s trial, Ouma told me he found something.” All this time, he didn’t know exactly when this entire thing started.. but it was just right after Akamatsu’s trial. Did Ouma really make up a plan that fast?

“He told me that his room had some type of glitch, like you could actually see it.” She paused for a second, “It was real. I even touched it with a USB, then it disappeared right after. There’s only one situation that could have happened in, and it’s that we’re not in the real world!” 

Shirogane spoke up after a few more seconds of silence, “So.. are we not real?”

Shuuichi shook his head. “No. We are.” He surprised himself from the amount of determination in his voice, but he continued anyway. “I’m using this trial to shut down the simulation on the inside, like we’re supposed to! To bring the ringleader’s identity to light!” 

He may have heard Yumeno mutter “I’m so confused..” but he didn’t know for sure. Harukawa spoke up, with a small smile, but it was probably just the lighting.. “Then I’m sure you have all the answers, then? Saihara, Kiibo, Gonta and Iruma. You four start from the beginning.” 

Momota looked happy at Harukawa’s message, throwing a thumbs up in his direction, looking right at Shuuichi. “Hell yeah! I believe in all of you! Especially you, Shuuichi!”

Yeah.. I can do this.

Shuuichi tried his best not to stutter, but it wasn’t like he was upset. “After Ouma’s trial, me, Iruma-san, and Gonta made an alliance.” It hurt somewhere in his heart to exclude Ouma in everything— when he was the most helpful, but he didn’t want to explain all of that right now. Nor did he think he was supposed to, anyway. “Then, Kiibo joined a few days later, when Iruma-san cleared him of any suspicious activity.”

“Suspicious activity..?” Yumeno, unlike the last trial, was listening intently. “I mean, he’s missing his antenna..” He saw in the corner of his eye Momota do a double take, his eyes on Kiibo. “Damn..! I didn’t even notice that!” 

“Yeah,” Iruma said, “His antenna had radio signals, also known as transmitters, inside them, which could let anybody hear about whatever he was doin’." 

“So, what you’re saying is that Kiibo was unknowingly letting people other than us listen to him?” Harukawa crossed her arms, and Yumeno narrowed her eyes. “Or maybe he was letting them do it.”

Kiibo stepped back, “H-Hey! I had no idea that it was there! My Professor never told me about that feature!” Shuuichi stopped Yumeno from blaming Kiibo any longer by speaking. “Whenever Iruma-san—” (ripped) “...noticed what was wrong and took off his antenna, he was genuinely confused. I do believe he’s telling the truth. And.. yes. It’s likely that this killing game was being broadcasted with Kiibo, and with cameras.”

Momota raised an eyebrow. “Cameras? We never found anything like that though.” 

Kiibo smirked and put his hands on both hips, obviously very prideful. “With my microscopic camera feature, I found out that there are tiny Monokuma shaped cameras, shaped like bugs.”

“That’s what Gonta meant when I said I found bugs, but didn’t know if they were actually real or not..” Gonta smiled. Shuuichi wished he listened to Gonta more, because that was a very important clue.. he’d have to thank Ouma later for catching it. 

“So, there’s hidden cameras, and Kiibo’s basically an audience surrogate?” Shirogane spoke up for the first time since the trial began, and Shuuichi had to keep himself from looking at her weirdly. He needed to get a move on. “This would mean that there is something watching us; with how much nonsense we see everyday, it’s likely we are also inside a simulation.” 

Momota rubbed the back of his neck, a sign that he was nervous. “Yeah.. but, what’s this got to do with the ringleader?” 

Iruma replied with a bark, “Because obviously the ringleader is making sure everything goes according to plan! They definitely wouldn’t want to disappoint an entire fuckin’ audience!” She laughed. 

Shuuichi sighed, “Now that we have that out of the way.. I want to talk about Akamatsu-san and Amami-kun’s case.” A look down to his chest, he saw that his hands were already shaking. He clutched onto the railing in front of him until his knuckles turned white. “I already know who the real killer of Amami-kun is, and it’s the same person as the ringleader.” 

Shirogane blanched, “R-Really?”

Yes, Shuuichi did not look up, I do. Don’t act that way with me, I know you’re faking. 

“Yes, and.. I would like to explain it all myself.” Shuuichi checked his pockets, and everything he needed was inside. 

“First.. was Amami’s—”

Shirogane huffed. “You can stop it Saihara-kun. You don’t have to explain anything.”

…What?

Apparently he said that exact thought outloud, because he could only hear Shirogane’s words in the quiet atmosphere of the trial room. “It’ll be plain boring to hear you explain everything, won't it?” She sighed dramatically, “Plus, I already knew this was a bust from when I first noticed Ouma-kun and Iruma-san working together.” 

He’s shocked enough to stay quiet. Not that Shirogane was the ringleader afterall, but that she knew what they were doing this entire time. Momota was the first to say anything, and he can tell that he’s more shocked than Shuuichi himself. “Shirogane.. you can’t be serious, right?”

She laughed, “No, I guess I am very serious..” Her smile was nothing short of malice. Shuuichi’s blood ran cold when Shirogane’s eyes landed on him. “I’m the ringleader. That’s what you wanted me to say, isn’t it? You did such a great job, Mister Detective..” 

Shuuichi let out a shakily breath at her wording. She was very obviously trying to mimic Ouma, and he was a little scared to see what she would do. 

Iruma, despite looking very scared, and also pissed off, kept her ground. “So fuckin’ what? Shittygane’s the ringleader. We found you out so let us go, that’s how this works, ain’t it?” She yelled, “I’ve got inventions to be makin’, flat-tits!” 

Shirogane scoffed, “Well, I wanted to have a little fun first, besides..” She pointed at Kiibo with a finger-gun. “That wasn’t all you had to do.”

Kiibo looked mildly confused and surprised at Shirogane’s sudden attention on him, and by proxy, Ouma, but he didn’t let anything else show. “I believe nothing else was stated, so.. you could just be making things up.” 

Shuuichi looked at everyone’s reactions to Shirogane’s known presence. Harukawa had to physically fight back and restrict herself from jumping her, glaring daggers at the cosplayer. Momota looked really, really sick, as well as Yumeno. 

She smiled. “I don’t think I’m making anything up, Kiibo.” She turned her attention towards the rest of the group. Everyone stopped and stared at her in disbelief, or disgust. She didn’t bat an eye. “I noticed from the beginning what Ouma-kun and Iruma-san were doing. Making an Alter Ego all by yourselves and not being a Super High School Level Programmer has some talent.”

Harukawa coughs performally. “Iruma,” she starts, “What is Shirogane talking about?”

Iruma shriveled under her murderous gaze, and looked at the ground like a toddler. “W-Well.. Ouma asked me to help him create an AI version of himself.. that’s it..” she muttered.

Harukawa narrowed her eyes on her. “And where is this AI now?” 

“I know where it is!” Shirogane interrupted, “it’s in Kiiboy!” Shuuichi wished he could deck her right in the face. 

“What..?” Momota paled, “I-Is Ouma a ghost or somethin’..?!” Harukawa immediately looked at him like he was an idiot for even speaking, which she does look at him like that a lot. “Don’t be an idiot.” She turned her attention to Shuuichi, Iruma, and Kiibo. She ignored Shirogane in the meantime. “Is this true?”

Kiibo nodded, “Yes. Ouma’s AI was inside a USB drive, and it is currently plugged inside me.” Kiibo leaned down forward, to create a bow. “I’m sorry for not telling anyone! I didn't want to cause trouble!”

“M-Man.. it’s alright.” Momota strangely had his hand over his mouth, like he was about to puke. Shuuichi shivered at the thought. 

Shirogane hummed, “How about I make this easier?” Before anyone could even reply, she snapped her fingers and—

Nothing changed. For him, at least. But when he looked over at Kiibo, he was visibly glitching. From what he could see, he was very alarmed. But a few seconds later, another glitch appeared; seemingly out of thin air, he could recognize it very clearly. 

Ouma. In his actual body. Right at his podium, the portrait of Ouma vanished to make room for the man himself. 

Ouma himself didn’t seem to be very surprised, but unlike his usual self, he was glaring straight at Shirogane. Kiibo’s body stopped glitching, but Ouma strangely didn’t. It further convinced him that they were indeed inside a simulation. 

And..

(He swore he even saw him glitch a little like a virus, but it’s about two in the morning, so it was probably just a hallucination.)

It’s happened before. He doesn’t know why.

Shirogane laughed, “Now everyone is here!” She clapped, but it was very awkward without everyone else doing it as well. She didn’t seem to care. “Now, since my star contestants figured out the mystery before they were supposed to,” the last part seemed to be said in an angry tone, but she switched up before he could tell. “I will give you an opportunity to leave this simulation and go to the real world.”

Iruma’s eyes widened, “Really? Then tell us already!” 

She only smiled. “You must leave Kiibo and Ouma-kun behind as the only AI contestants.” 

“W-What the hell?” Iruma immediately got defensive. “Fuck that shit! Is there anything else?—”

“Nope!” Shirogane leaned on her podium. “It’s either the rest of you leave without them, and they get to be in the next season of DanganRonpa; or you all die.” 

“We’re not leaving them, alright!?” Momota slammed his fists together. “We’re all goin’ or we’re all dyin’!”

“You idiot..” Harukawa mumbled. 

“Nyeh.. I don’t really wanna die, but I don’t want to leave Kiibo or Ouma either.”

“Gonta never leaves his friends behind!”

“Guys!—”

Dangan…Ronpa? What’s that?

Is it.. the television show we’re on? 

Whatever.. I won’t leave without Kiibo or Ouma—

“Please!” Kiibo yelled. The entire room turned to look at him, and Shuuichi could see the sadness in his eyes. He snuck a glance at Ouma, who hasn’t uttered a single word ever since he saw him this morning in his room. He may be a great liar, but no liar can hide the shaking of their hands. Kiibo sighs, as human-like as he could be, and looks at everyone one by one. “I do not know what Ouma-kun wants.. but I would rather stay here and everyone else leave than let you all die!” His voice broke at the end. His own eyes threatened to cry at the sight.

Yumeno was already crying, from the stress most likely, “I.. wanna go home already..” she mumbled. 

Shuuichi was at a loss. 

Lose Kiibo and Ouma.. or die.

He had just started to understand even a little bit of Ouma, and he didn’t want to ruin his chances. Nor did he want Kiibo and Ouma to be at risk if they left them behind.

Maybe.. he should convince everyone to die—

“You’re a dirty liar, you know that, Shirogane-chan?” Ouma spoke up, his earlier anger dissipated as he looked at his nails like he was bored to death of the trial and Shirogane’s act.

Shirogane giggled, “Bored, aren’t you, Ouma-kun?” 

He huffed, and Shuuichi could see a little bit of anger and frustration in his plum eyes. “What’s it to you?”

“Oh, I think you’d know lots about boredom,” she laughed; but it turned sinister as his blood ran cold at what she said next. “...Enoshima-san?”

Chapter Text

Shuuichi didn’t know what was going on inside his head at the moment. 

Scratch that— he knew damn well what was going inside it. Pain, confusion, even anger, were all prominent. 

The truth was that no one but him, Ouma, and Shirogane knew of Enoshima’s existence. The existence of Hope’s Peak Academy. Just a few hours ago, Ouma told him about everything, and it seems that Shirogane listened in on their conversation. She called Ouma “Enoshima”... but for what reason?

“Who the fuck is Enoshima?” Iruma yelled, and if he looked, he would have noticed how nervous she looked. 

But no— his eyes were on Ouma. Who stayed quiet despite the way everyone was questioning Shirogane, including him by proxy; instead of his face being of fury, it was blank. Looking more closely, Ouma’s fists were clenched tightly behind the podium as he kept a straight face. 

Before he jumped to any conclusions about Ouma’s involvement with Enoshima, he had to think. Shirogane could just be lying, but with how Ouma reacted he didn’t think so. He knew the risk of Ouma keeping secrets, he kept Hope’s Peak a secret from them as well, so it wasn’t surprising—

(“It feels like the ringleader is going to use me for something big.” He mumbled. 

“What do you mean?” Shuuchi subconsciously leaned closer without even realizing it, and Ouma looked at his face again. His frown was prominent on his face, as well as his furrowed eyebrows. He looked away immediately after, though. “I mean,” he says louder, “that it’s obvious the ringleader was targeting talented highschoolers scouted by Future Foundation. Everyone else here was on that list, but me. Why am I here then? I’m listed as the Super High School Level Supreme Leader here and in my memories, but is that really true outside?” Shuuichi notices that both his fists are balled up, and it isn’t supposed to be a cute thing.

“I’m not,” his fists end up tighter, “supposed to be here.”)

Shuuichi takes a deep breath, and out. Ouma may lie, but his intentions have been made very clear. He wants to end this killing game, possible Enoshima connection damned. If Ouma didn’t tell him, then he didn’t tell him. Shuuichi is lucky he even told him about Hope’s Peak in the first place. 

Even if he doesn’t know it’s the right thing to do.. he will trust Ouma, through and through.

Gonta talked quietly, like he was scared of speaking too loudly, but Shuuichi didn’t notice earlier that he was crying. Silently. “W..Why is Shirogane-san calling Ouma-kun ‘Enoshima-san?’” He sniffled.

Shirogane seemed to look off into space before she started talking, “It would have been way easier to explain this twist if all of you have the memories already— but the short story is that Enoshima-san is the Super High School Level Despair. She created the Biggest, Most Awful, Most Tragic Event in Human History, which created the killing games idea itself.” Her voice grew on a deeper tone on the last part, like she was itching to cause trouble and spread malice. She then went on and on about the history of Hope’s Peak Academy, drool pouring out of her mouth so badly it was disgusting. She hugged herself, sighing dreamily, “Enoshima-san is such an icon! If I had the materials, I could've cosplayed her and a bunch of other characters from DanganRonpa for this trial!” 

Harukawa glared at her, speaking slowly like she was speaking to a toddler. “What the hell is DanganRonpa?” Her hand was slowly getting closer to the inside of her skirt, and if Shuuichi was correct, a knife was stored there. He didn’t want to kill Shirogane (even in a simulation), much less make Harukawa do it, but it wasn’t like he could stop her anyway. 

She turned to her, putting on an innocent, but amused face. Like she was confused on how Harukawa didn’t know what this ‘DangaRonpa’ was. “Oh? It’s the show you guys are on. The audience can’t say hi, because someone,” she sent a dirty look at Iruma, and the latter sent another back at her. “—ripped off Kiibo’s antenna.” She then rolled her eyes when Iruma sent her the middle finger. “Fuck you! I can do whatever I want! Especially when you're just using Kiibo!”

Shirogane giggled, and Shuuichi almost dared himself to just scoff and speak before her, but he stayed quiet until it was the right time. “The Enoshima Junko AI had its use in this simulation, y’know? There have been many copies saved by the loyal Remnant of Despairs throughout the years.” 

Shuuichi didn’t want to hear it. He felt like he knew what was coming. “Shirogane-san, I don’t think this is—”

“Quiet Sherlock Homo!” She yelled, recovering her voice right after. “As I was saying..” She pulled Ouma's podium to the middle like in a regular class trial where one person is being suspected of the crime; he looked mildly uncomfortable. “Say, Ouma-kun, did you find anything important in the files that you did not tell your alliance?”

Ouma replied blatantly, “No.”

BANG!

The second after he said that, a piece of hard debris fell from the roof, right next to Ouma’s podium. If it was a few inches to the right, it would have crushed him to death instantly. He saw Ouma’s breath speed up. “Ouma-kun. Answer my questions truthfully, and I’ll think about changing my deal from earlier.”

“To what?” He said, uncharacteristically calm. 

“How about, I’ll let Kiibo go as well as the others in exchange for you.” Everyone had gone quiet, not even Momota could save their hope. “You’ve almost run out of use, right?” She smiled. 

Ouma didn’t say anything, so Shuuichi did. “Use?” He questioned, but he didn’t get an answer before Shirogane asked the same question again. This time, Ouma answered differently, “Yes.” 

Kiibo seemed to frown, and Iruma even more. “I knew you didn’t tell me everything, but I don’t even know if what the fuck you're hiding can just be a small secret.” Iruma sighed, crossing her arms. 

Ouma scoffed, “Well, I’m a liar. Everyone knew that already.”

Liars can't lie about their body reactions. I’ve been an apprentice for so many years.. at least in my memories. Shuuichi frowned. I can tell lies from body movement. Ouma was a little tricky, but I know for a fact that he wasn’t lying when we were alone, or about anything in the files. 

Iruma scoffed, flicking her hair behind her for no real reason he knew of. “Obviously, I’m not stupid. It’s just..” she didn’t finish her sentence, and for a few seconds it was completely quiet.

Unfortunately, Shirogane cleared her throat and started talking once more. “Let me just ask straight up, Ouma-kun..” 

She pushed her own podium into the center, right in front of Ouma. She didn’t leave much space between them, but Ouma seemed to try not to move away, facing her head on. 

“Did you know you were based off of Enoshima-san’s character? And when?” He couldn’t see Shirogane or Ouma’s face from here, but he could feel the tension. Shirogane’s question hit him right in the heart, and it ached. It ached for this to end, so he could talk to Ouma normally.. so Shirogane wouldn’t have to expose everything for him.

Ouma.. I don’t care what you say.. I know who you are—

“Yes. Before I entered Kiiboy’s body.” He released a breath. Ouma only found out about a few days to two weeks ago. Shirogane would know if he was lying, so.. he didn’t think it was a lie. 

Momota coughed violently, but it didn’t seem to be from a source of anything but surprise. “D-Dude..”

Shirogane pushed her podium back, but kept Ouma’s in the center. “Great! That’s all I wanted to ask.” She picked at her nails as Momota, Gonta, Yumeno, and Iruma all started talking at once, trying to get Shirogane to explain. She didn’t seem to want to speak anymore after that entire bomb drop.

Shirogane looked bored as she spoke over everyone else rightfully yelling at her and asking her to explain, “It’s so hard to explain everything over and over again, isn’t it?” She put on a malicious expression, very clearly mocking Ouma. “Let’s make this more interesting!” She snapped her fingers suddenly, and the world turned white for a split second, before he felt himself falling. It wasn’t a long fall, like he tripped over something; he landed on his ass and looked up to see what she had done. 

Momota, Iruma, Yumeno, and Harukawa were all gone. It was only himself, Shirogane, Kiibo, and Ouma. They weren’t in the trial room as well, but a place he hasn’t ever seen before in the Academy. The room seemed to be very blue in color, but there were no lights save for the glowing of the water tanks all over the room; filled with aquatic creatures. He saw that there were even orcas. His eye twitched. It was either that Shirorgane knew he liked orcas, or she listened to his and Ouma’s conversation. He was going for the latter. 

Looking around, he saw Kiibo and Ouma sitting on either side of him, on a pristine white carpet floor. It blended in with Ouma’s white straight-coat and pants, it almost seemed like he was glowing. This room would have been the second most prettiest thing he’s ever seen, but it was the circumstance that made him want to leave immediately. 

“Wh.. Where did everyone go?!” Kiibo squeaked, keeping his eyes on Shirogane, who was in front of them. She smiled, then gestured to the television screen that was behind her. “They’re fine, I just kicked them out of the simulation. I also sent a hint to the Future Foundation of where we are.” She sat down, the Monokuma plushie sitting inside of her lap. Shuuichi grimaced at the sight, wishing he never saw Monokuma again, even when it was as unfeeling as a prize toy from an arcade. “So we have limited time!” She squeezed the Monokuma plush harder. Her eyes were something that he’s never seen before, they were full of despair. 

The television screen showed a security camera situation in a place he doesn’t remember seeing— the real world.

It wasn’t much, it was just a room full of closed pods and computers, but it was what happened a few seconds after the television turned on that surprised him. Four pods opened all at the same time, but the way the camera was angled made it so what was inside them couldn’t be seen. The room was as dark as the one they were inside in at the moment, but the pods were brightly colored enough it was easy to see them. After a few more seconds, something could be seen moving inside the pod.

It was shown to be Momota. Shuuichi gasped a little, seeing proof that he, and most likely the others, were okay. Unfortunately, there was no sound or microphone, so they could only sit in silence as they watched everyone lift up their bodies from their respective pods. After the second they could see everyone was alright, the television turned black. 

“Now that you know that everyone else is fine, why don’t we start with a little game?” Shirogane leaned in, but there was still a couple of inches of space between them. Good. “Every question I ask of you, and you answer it correctly, I’ll tell you the truth about one of your own questions. Got it?” Reluctantly, all three of them nodded.

Shuuichi side-eyed to the left of him to see Ouma, who instead of adorning a blank face, was seemingly very disinterested in anything of what Shirogane was doing. A small part of him wanted the answers to his relation to Enoshima, but he didn’t think Ouma would tell him right now. Or ever.

Shirogane hummed theatrically, and said, “Kiibo!” The man in question had a worried expression on his face, but hesitantally, he replied. “Y.. Yes?” 

“Why do you hang out with Iruma-san, and what does she make you feel?” Shuuichi raised an eyebrow. He didn’t expect her to ask Kiibo about his relationship with Iruma, but they did seem pretty close. Especially when he saw what happened in Iruma’s Research Lab.. nevermind.

“U-Uhm.” Kiibo seemed very physically uncomfortable, if the way he scooted backwards from Shirogane’s gaze said anything. “I..” he paused for a second. “I have no idea. But, I do think it’s a.. positive feeling.”

Shirogane giggled, “Great job! A little too basic of an explanation but it’s whatever.” She then continued, “Y’know, if only this show went the way it was supposed to, I would've put more romance in the story.” She didn’t have a nice smile as she said it, and Kiibo’s face paled at the realization. “W-What..?” 

He went unanswered as Shirogane focused on the rest of them. “Anyway~! Ask me a question! Any of you!”

Surprisingly, Ouma was the one to first ask before they could even get a word in. “Why didn’t you stop me and Iruma-chan from ruining your shitty game, Plain Jane?” He smiled, but Shuuichi could tell it was fake. He didn’t have the time to think about his smile before Shirogane replied and answered. “I don’t know, honestly. I plainly just wanted to see what would happen. It’s not like I care all that much about this game’s successability.” She sighed deeply.

Shuuichi was confused by her words. Why wouldn’t she care about the game being successful? Didn’t she want to create despair? It was hard to tell Shirogane’s motives when she was all over the place. “Why don’t you care about the success?”

Shirogane scoffed, “I didn’t ask any of you your second question, Saihara-kun. Slow down.” Damnnit.. Shuuichi huffed. He didn’t mind playing games like this, but with Shiorgane it was different. But he was just very impatient to get this over with. Shiorgane didn’t turn her head anywhere as she looked at Shuuichi. “Saihara-kun. If I told you I could make Akamatsu-san appear again, what would you do?” 

He gulped, now hating Shirogane a little bit more. He made sure his gulp wasn’t audible, and steeled himself. He already knew his answer. “I know she wouldn’t be real. You wouldn’t, because you don’t want to make me stay. You want Ouma-kun.” He couldn’t look anyone in the eye as he said this, so he just started to look down at the floor; he really wished he had his hat right now. “I don’t care if I never see her again. I.. I know she’ll always be with me, no matter what.” He unconsciously placed his hand on his heart.

Ouma laughed, “Nishishi, it's a bit rough for you to say that you don’t want to see your dead girlfriend.” Shuuichi gave him a glance, seeing the “pure” and “relaxed” face he had on. He was sure it was a mask. Shuuichi was a little hurt by the comment, but he was sure.. that Ouma didn’t mean it. He was better off not trusting anything Ouma said, but he still wanted to believe the nice moments they had together. Just this morning, they played a game. Ouma trusted information about himself to him, that he hadn’t told Iruma or Gonta. Most likely, considering the type of person Ouma is; he’d rather keep his cards and deck hidden for maximum use. To think.. that someone like him would divulge information about himself was a dream come true. If any of it wasn’t a lie, but he decided that he’d believe that they weren’t.

Shuuichi gave Ouma a concerned look, but Ouma still didn’t change the way his face looked, and smirked even wider. Shuuichi looked away first. He already saw Shirogane staring at him, edging him to ask his own question. Kiibo nor Ouma spoke up, so he did it himself. 

Shuuichi looked at the floor made of carpet, thinking of a valuable question. He didn’t know how long they were doing this, so he had to get every single drop of information he could from Shirogane. He hoped that she’d keep his word and wouldn’t lie about anything he asked, which was a likely outcome. He shouldn’t fully trust whatever Shirogane would say, but keep it in consideration. When he finally thought of one, he asked, “What is your goal?” 

Shirogane smirked, “To create despair. That’s plainly obvious, is it not?” 

“You know that’s not what I meant.” Instead of sitting like the three others, he moved to his knees. 

“You didn’t specify, Saihara-kun.” 

For a second, he wished Shirogane could get a taste of her own medicine. She gave three of his friends brutal executions, as well as causing four of their deaths they didn’t deserve. The deaths of his friends still weigh heavily on him, and he didn’t know if he could even see them again; Ouma didn’t tell him if he found anything about it, and now.. 

“Wowie Shirogane-chan, you’re really a nasty bitch.” Ouma didn’t seem to be cooperative right now. 

“Ouma-kun,” Shirogane started, “Don’t you want to share with the class why you seem to be..” she put her finger to her lips, faking a thinking sound. “I don’t know, bitchy?”

Ouma scoffed, “What if I just want to live up to my name? My character in this killing game is based on Enoshima-chan, right?” He tried making himself look bored, even as Shirogane moved her face closer. Shuuichi looked at him, and said only one thing. “You aren’t Enoshima-san, Ouma-kun. You’re nothing like her.” Ouma’s eyes snapped to him, but he didn’t reply with anything but a glare. Shuuichi shivered. But Kiibo said something before an argument could spur on. “Uhm, Shirogane-san, that was technically a question, so I have something to ask you.” 

Shiorgane smirked, “You got me there, Kiibo. What do you have to ask?” 

It was silent for a moment, but Kiibo looked Shirogane dead in the eye and spoke. “Earlier you said that Enoshima-san’s AI was used in the simulation, but you never told anyone what its use was. You said that Ouma-kun was.. based off of her, but what was the AI used for?” Shuuichi widened his eyes, I didn’t even catch that. 

“Good question.” Shiorgane didn’t answer, but looked at Ouma. “One of you already knows the answer, though. It would be more interesting if he answered instead.” Kiibo nodded, and looked at Ouma, with a determined look. But he didn’t let Ouma speak first. “Ouma-kun.. Even though it’s been a few days with me working with you, I know Iruma-san, Saihara-kun, and Gonta trust you, so I will trust you too. Please just say it.”

Ouma didn’t say anything at first. He looked at Kiibo with a curious look, and just said, without any performance. “You trust me?” He stood up, and walked over to Kiibo. Shuuichi couldn’t help but look at what he was doing, since Ouma was still unpredictable. “That’s a death sentence here. You’re acting like Momota-chan, but I don’t expect anything less from a robot.” He couldn’t see his face, but he could imagine Ouma rolling his eyes at Kiibo. 

Kiibo didn’t rise to the bait, but just stared at Ouma; the latter sighed and walked away. He didn’t sit back down. “I’m not real.” He started, and Shuuichi almost gasped outloud, but he kept it in to not interrupt Ouma. “There were fifteen students supposed to be in this game, an entire Hope’s Peak class. But there has to be sixteen contestants to make a killing game. Shirogane-chan was already a student, so she couldn’t be the sixteenth student,” Shuuichi stood up as Ouma made a fist, his hands shaking. Kiibo got ready to stand up as well. Shiorgane didn’t do anything but smile and blush. “So she made an AI based off of Enoshima. Me.” 

Kiibo fully stood up, and Shuuichi was glad he did, he didn’t know if he could handle anything like this on his own. He could see the full extent of what he almost saw this morning. Ouma seemed to be unstable, mentally and physically. Glitching. Malfunctioning. If he paid attention enough he could see little bits of Enoshima coming out. His next words were almost impossible to decipher, but he was able to understand the gist of it. “I’m— her, aren’t—?” 

“Gonta would have wanted to see this new type of bug, I wish I kept him in!” Shirogane laughed, but Shuuichi could only focus on the crackling sound, which was most likely the noise from Ouma’s glitching. Ouma groaned, and yelled, “—Shut up!” 

It felt so fast, he didn’t even notice what happened before it did. Ouma had run up to Shirogane— but it flashed white everywhere before he could see him tackle her.

“Ah!” He yelped, trying to cover his eyes to protect himself from the amount of light shining into them. The crackling noise did not stop, so after a few seconds he uncovered his eyes to see. Squinting, he could see that Shiorgane was nowhere to be seen, and it was only himself, Kiibo, and Ouma. Speaking of Ouma, he was on his knees, panting harshly. He and Kiibo did not say anything, nor did Ouma. Only for a few seconds, to comprehend everything that was going on.

But unsurprisingly, Kiibo was the first one to speak up, after Ouma stopped panting and wasn’t glitching as harshly. “I think..” he stopped and pointed in the distance. Shuuichi tried his best to understand what it said, but he couldn’t read it. It was a small grey box from what he could tell. He walked closer, and his heart skipped a beat from what it said. 

Exit all Human Participants? 

>> Yes / No <<

Shuuichi gulped. He looked back at Kiibo and Ouma, who was still on the ground. Human. He didn’t know if Kiibo was counted as human or not, but he was sure that Ouma didn’t. He walked away from the button, and Kiibo followed him. He saw Kiibo walk over to Ouma, and start asking him if he was alright. He sighed shakily, and looked down at the ground.

He didn’t want to leave his friends. He didn’t want to leave Kiibo. He didn’t want to leave Ouma. But he either leaves his other friends to get help from the outside world.. or joins them and tries to actually help Ouma and Kiibo. He sighed, but I wanted to talk to Ouma first. I don’t know if we’ll be able to after leaving.. 

Before he could think back on his options, he saw in the corner in his eye, he saw Ouma stand up quickly, and then—

—he sprinted to the button as fast as he could. 

“Ouma-kun!” He and Kiibo both yelled. Shuuichi acted as quickly as he could, as the first thing on his mind to stop Ouma was to tackle him to the ground. Ouma was a fast runner, and he could definitely outrun someone like Shuuichi. He ran up to him and jumped on Ouma to stop him from touching the button. He heard Ouma yell, and they both started tumbling, hitting the white solid ground very harshly. Shuuichi kept himself on top of Ouma’s back the best he could and he started thrashing around. “Let me go, Mister Detective!” he shouted. 

“No! I can’t let you!” He kept his balance as Ouma kept hitting him, trying to get to the button. Thankfully, they weren’t as close as he thought they were, and the button was in the air, as tall as his chest. “Please, Ouma-kun—”

“Shut up!” Ouma interrupted him, “There is no Ouma! He doesn’t exist!” It broke his heart to hear Ouma say those kinds of words, especially knowing that they weren’t true at all.

“That’s absolute bullshit!” Shuuichi surprised himself with his statement, and mainly how loud he yelled, but he couldn’t help himself. “If you don’t exist, then how am I talking to you?” Ouma didn’t respond, but Shuuichi accidentally released some of the pressure he had on Ouma’s arms, and he got flipped over onto his back. He had the wind knocked out of him, but he immediately got up and pushed Ouma down before he could get back up. The liar was on his stomach now, and he saw Ouma was about to yell at him again, but Shuuichi spoke up first. 

“Ouma-kun!” he cried out, and looking into Ouma’s furious eyes, he completely forgot about Kiibo. They were so.. passionate. For the lack of a better word. He didn’t know why Ouma wanted to press the button so badly, maybe to get rid of Shuuichi, but he wanted to talk to Ouma before he had to go. He looked into the most beautiful sight he’s ever seen, and started speaking in a shaky tone. “Please.. just listen to me.” Ouma did not speak, breathing heavily. 

Shuuichi shifted himself onto Ouma’s stomach, keeping his arms on the ground. “Your name is Ouma Kokichi, and despite you not being a human,” he stopped. He then restated it, “..despite you being an AI, you are real. All of this is real!” The last word cracked with emotion, and he was almost close to tearing up. Not only because of the emotional roller coaster he had today, but because even after all of it, he was able to talk to Ouma. See him, for all he really is. “You are.. the most eccentric person I’ve ever met. These past few days.. I’ve gotten to know a side of you that’s nothing like Enoshima.”

They both stopped talking, breathing heavily. They never looked anywhere other than each other’s eyes. 

Shuuichi started up again after the silence became unbearable. “...Ouma-kun, I know you aren't a bad person. You aren’t Enoshima.” He couldn’t help but repeat it. You aren’t Enoshima. Shirogane is wrong. He took a deep gulp to get rid of the spit hovering inside of his mouth. His dry throat tried to get out the words as fast as he could, while also making them coherent enough for Ouma to understand. “I-I know you wouldn’t do anything like that.” 

Ouma hummed, staring at him. The eye contact was almost uncomfortable enough for him to look away, but Shuuichi didn’t. He couldn't. He didn’t want to. “How would you know that, Saihara-chan?” His brows furrowed while his eyes narrowed.

He gave a small smile, “Because you’re you.” He didn’t mean to say it in such a fond voice, but he couldn't help it. Before Ouma could retaliate at the compliment, he continued, “I don’t know you. Of course I don’t. But.. I know that you didn’t want to hurt any of us like Shirogane-san did.” 

“How would you know that? I am a liar afterall.” He countered. Ouma was a liar, a very good liar. It could be annoying at times, but he himself didn’t seem to care about it right now. Not when they’re sitting here like this. Shuuichi nodded. “I know. But I trust you.”

There was the word again. Trust. Momota trusted everyone. Akamatsu trusted him and his deductions. He trusted them both. They both taught him to believe.. he needed to believe in order to doubt. Ouma was no different than any other person that he would trust. It wasn’t just that he needed to trust Ouma, but he couldn't help it either way.

Ouma had been incredibly helpful in ending the killing game. He didn’t know where Shirogane went, but it isn’t here. His other friends are safe in the outside world, and he will definitely try his damn hardest to get Ouma and Kiibo back with them as well. He didn’t know if he could gain back his dead friends, but he would try to. He will try. 

He will try to understand Ouma to the best of his ability. Because..

Ouma is funny. He’s mysterious. He knows what he wants, and won’t stop until he gets it. He can be rude and snarky. He stays true to his goals. He’s stubborn. He’s the definition of chaos and madness. He’s..

Vulnerable. Even when he hates it.

(After sitting down next to each other on the bench, Ouma didn’t let his hand go, but it wasn’t like he was going to make a big deal out of it.)

(“I’m not,” his fists end up tighter, “supposed to be here.”)

(“It's kind of weird what death will do to you. I’m being strangely more honest than I’d like.” He frowned…) 

Helpful. A great leader and planner.

(Ouma seemed a little surprised at that, but recovered quickly and made a small ‘hm’ sound, thinking. “I think we should lay low for a couple of days before we call the trial. Get everyone on board with the plan and pay close attention to who could be the ringleader.”)

Cute.

(His eyes sparked with wonder, and he’s sure if Ouma could see him he’d laugh like a horse, but his laugh was naturally charming in a way.)

…Beautiful.

Shuuichi liked so much about Ouma he didn’t even realize. He’s been pushing these thoughts away less and less recently, because they feel so good. He doesn't want them to stop anymore. The killing game is supposed to be over, so could he just let himself have this one thing? This one beauty, just for now?

His stomach releases butterflies in his chest, thinking about the boy under him. His hand slowly went up Ouma’s arm, since he didn’t try to move for a few minutes. He hoped. Ouma finally replied, “You shouldn’t.”

“I still do.” Shuuichi argued, “and I’m not going to stop.” 

“That’s stupid.” Ouma didn’t move despite him definitely feeling Shuuichi’s hand moving up his arm, closer to his head. “You’re stupid.”

Shuuichi cupped Ouma’s cheek finally, leaning in closer. “I’d rather be stupid and trust you, then lose you to a lie.” Ouma almost talked again— probably trying to argue more on Shuuichi’s intelligence, but Shuuichi shut him up by moving impossibly closer and connecting their lips. Closing his eyes, the only thought he could think of was: Oh my god.

Shuuichi had never kissed anyone before, at least not in his memories. He didn’t know how it felt normally, but with Ouma, it felt like his stomach was exploding. He knew it didn’t taste like anything special, but when it was with Ouma, he loved the feeling. 

Despite everything, Ouma didn’t pull away. After a few moments, he slowly pushed against him, meeting Shuuichi’s own lips. Ouma tasted like a generic soda he couldn't name; it was the one time he liked the taste of sugar. 

After a few seconds, they pulled away, but their faces were still centimeters away from each other. Shuuichi felt Ouma’s hot breath blowing on his face, and despite the weird and unpleasant sensation, he didn’t want Ouma to leave. 

It felt so real.

It was real. If Ouma wasn’t real, he wouldn’t be able to kiss him; Shuuichi wouldn’t be able to feel him in his mouth if he didn’t exist. 

“Ouma-kun,” he started, whispering to make sure it wasn’t surprising for him to talk so close to his face. “I promise I’ll come back for you. Please..” he opened his eyes to stare at Ouma’s surprised look. “Can you wait for me?” 

That seemed to make him snap out of his surprise, but he didn’t seem to go back to normal. He stared at Shuuichi with softened eyes, and he himself didn’t look away. “...okay.”

Shuuichi smiled, then got off of Ouma’s stomach, letting them both sit normally. “Thank you.” He went to get up to leave the simulation, but Ouma pulled his sleeve to make him sit back down. 

“Huh?—” he whispered, and Ouma shushed him. 

“You’re an asshole, you know that?” He wasn’t able to reply because Ouma kissed him again, much harder than the first one. He happily accepted, continuing to cup Ouma’s face as they both softly kissed one another; to make Shuuichi’s leave be much later. 

But he had to leave. He didn’t know what would happen if he didn’t. 

They didn’t have to deal with that right now.