Author's Note: This story is also being submitted on my deviantART and has more in-depth information for each chapter. Go ahead and give it a look there too! Rated Teen for now until things get pretty bad, then will be marked as Mature.

It felt like you had been asleep for ages, but when your eyes finally opened, your eyes had to adjust to the darkness of the area around you. Vision blurred, focused in and out, until finally you found the strength to sit up. Your head was pounding with a head ache, and you brought one hand up to press the heel of it to your temple. If you applied a little pressure to it, it might stop, right? You couldn't remember anything that had happened before now, which was strange considering you had a pretty good memory. So why were you here? You looked around, taking in your surroundings and started to figure out where you were. There were stores that were gated off, a long hall that they sat along and if you peered hard enough, you could see a fountain at the end of the hall.

Was this . . . a mall?

"Engh . . . where is this?" You muttered to yourself, slowly picking yourself up to a stand. You managed to maintain balance, but it was almost lost when the lights of the hall started to click on one after another. "Woah!"

"ATTENTION SHOPPERS!" a sudden, jarring voice called out over an intercom system. "It's time to wake up and mosey on down to the food court! You're probably all wondering why you're in this fine establishment! Worry not, everything will be explained once you've gathered in the designated area! Better skedaddle if you don't wanna miss these LIFE SAVING bargains!"

What the heck was that about? You looked around you to see the now lit up hallway, and soon enough your feet were carrying you towards the food court. At least it looked a little more lively around here, despite you not seeing anyone else around. However that was soon to change, as approaching the court, you started to see some people as well.

"Oh, thank goodness! I thought I was the only one here!" you called out, waving a hand in the air as you rushed up to try and get their attention. Turning around, the person acknowledged you by coming to a stop and pushing their hands into the pocket of their red hoodie.

"Huh? Oh, guess they really meant other people were here." he spoke, grin on his face. You caught up with him, smiling a little and letting out a small sigh before introducing yourself and explaining what had happened to you. As if he wanted to hear all of that.

"Matsuno Osomatsu is my name." he said with a smile and he pulled one hand from his pocket to run his finger under his nose. "You just woke up here too? Wonder what this is all about."

"I don't know." you spoke with bemuse. "This doesn't look like any mall I've ever been to-"

"BURAZAS!" Another voice picked up the silence, causing you to look around to try and find the source. You caught sight of someone who . . . looked a lot like Osomatsu, but he was wearing a blue hoodie instead. He was rushing as fast as he could towards the two of you.

"Who-"

"Don't mind him, that's just Karamatsu." said Osomatsu, looking off in another direction. Karamatsu caught up to you, letting out puffs of air as he tried to catch his breath.

"Kara . . . matsu?" You looked back and forth between the two of them. They looked almost exactly the same! "Eh? . . . EH?!"

Karamatsu stood upright suddenly like he wasn't gasping for breath a few moments ago and suddenly he had a pair of shades over his eyes and a smile on his face.

"To be trapped in a place like this with someone who already knows my name? Surely fate is dealing me a winning hand, heh- UNK!"

You shrieked out a moment when he hit the floor, quickly looking up to see . . . another person that looked like Osomatsu, but he wore purple, his hair was a bit messy and his eyes looked like he was constantly tired.

"Shut up, Shittymatsu." the man grumbled out, knuckles cracking as he stepped over the fallen body.

"Should we . . . help. . ." you began.

"Just leave him, he'll be alright." said Osomatsu, not even making a second glance back at his brother.

You stopped walking for a moment as the two others went on, and ended up back tracking to Karamatsu, kneeling down beside him and tried to help him get to his feet.

"Are you okay?" you asked, bringing him to his feet. Karamatsu stared down at the scratched lens of his shades before looking towards you with a expression of confusion.

"Ah . . . yeah." he answered, like he was unsure if that was the answer he was supposed to be giving you.

"Come on, we don't want to fall behind." you spoke, and without even thinking, you took hold of his hand and started to drag him along behind you, making him even more confused. Eventually you two had caught up to everyone else, looking around the food court, there were actually a few people, fifteen, including you. There appeared to be three more guys that looked like Osomatsu, and at this point it was safe to assume that they had to be related. You released Karamatsu's hand to leave him in his stupor while you moved towards Osomatsu once again.

"Hey, are . . . you guys cousins or something? You all look alike." you pointed out. Osomatsu looked at you before letting out a slight laugh.

"We're all brothers, sextuplets!"

"Sextuplets?! I've never even seen any in real life before!" you chatted excitedly, the six of them gathering together like they were meant to be that way.

"Osomatsu!"
"Karamatsu!"
"Ah, Choromatsu." the man in green spoke.

"Ichimatsu. . ." said the one in purple.

"Jyushimatsu!" said the yellow hoodied one.

"Todomatsu!" the final brother in pink called out.

"Oh wow, you're all named a different variation of Matsu! That's clever!" You chimed in, only to get a slightly disturbing stare from the six of them.

"That's not clever at all." said Todomatsu, a slight look of annoyance on his face.

"OSOMATSU!" Another person yelled out, this time a brown haired woman with short, low hanging pigtails and a bun on her head. She was rushing towards them, the click of her heels coming to a stop once she was close to the brothers.

"Totoko! You're here too?" said Osomatsu, turning to face her. His eyes lifted to scan the food court now that everyone was actually here. Chibita, Dayon, Iyami, Hatabo, Dekapan, it was like everyone was here! The only person no one really recognized was you.

"SHEEH! WHAT IS ME EVEN DOING HERE? ME DIDN'T SIGN UP FOR THIS!" Iyami piped out.

"Nobody knows why they're here, ya idjit!" Chibita grunted out, arms crossed and foot tapping on the floor. "I'm sure we're about to find out soon if whoever that was over the intercom had us gathering here."

Everyone else started to murmur and talk among themselves, causing you to take in just who else was here. Besides the ones that had already spoke, you could see another girl with pink hair and cat ears and a really short man with round eyes and long mustache. As everyone was chatting away, you cleared your throat, trying to get the attention of the group. You figured everyone should introduce themselves, if they didn't know each other already.

"Everyone!" You called out, causing everyone to turn to face you. You started by introducing yourself again, before eventually everyone else did too. The girl with pink hair and cat ears called herself "Nyaa Hashimoto, to which Choromatsu waved from the crowd and called out her name again. The short man introduced himself as Shounosuke, while another man with a wide mouth shouted "DAYON" which he seemed to add at the end of most of his sentences. The large man with beady eyes, balding head and pants pulled up to his chest was called Dekapan, while the tall man in a purple suit muttered out "Iyami" and the short man with only one hair and lines on his cheeks called himself Chibita.

"I'm Yowai Totoko." the girl from before spoke up, eyes closed and a hand over her chest as she spoke. "I guess none of us really know why we're here, huh?"

"Not . . . really." you said with a nervous smile to your face. You were about to say something else, but there was a sudden disturbance from behind the group. The sound of a mic turning on and- oh, was that stage with a podium there before? There was so rumbling, before something fell from the ceiling, making a large crash. The group stepped back to stare with wide eyes, watching as something pulled it's self up from the small pile of debris.

"Seesh, what a landing!" Pulling themselves up to the podium, something that almost looked like a plush cat stood tall, one half of it was white and had a rather cute expression, while the other side was black and was a bit more menacing looking.

". . . Is that a cat?" Osomatsu said, eyes squinting as if it would help him see better.

"You bet your behind I am!" The cat called out, arms up at his sides. "Allow me to introduce myself, I'm MONONEKO!"

"Mononeko?" said Totoko, arms crossed over her chest. "That's a stupid name."

"Well no one asked your opinion, fish girl.~" Mononeko leaned forward and waved a paw in a bit of a scolding manner. "Close your legs and maybe you wouldn't stink so bad!"

"WHAT DID YOU SAY?!" she snapped out, causing both Choromatsu and Karamatsu to hold her back.

You grimaced a little before slowly raising your hand before you spoke. "Excuse me, Mr. Mononeko? Why . . . why are we all here?"

"Mr. Mononeko?" said the cat. "Oh I like you already! Very polite! You should all take an example from this one! As to why you're here? I was just getting to that!"

Mononeko clapped his paws together as a backdrop screen fell from behind him. A banner that looked like it had been drawn in crayon, it had hand drawn Mononeko heads around it while the words "WELCOME TO MONONEKO MALL! THE MUTUAL KILLING GAME!" had been carefully written on it. As you read over the words, it felt like your heart had suddenly dropped into the pit of your stomach.

"M-Mutual . . . killing game?!" you shouted out.

"THAT'S RIGHT." the cat returned the shout. "Isn't it neat? We're gonna have a blast!"

"What the hell do you mean, 'Mutual Killing Game', ya idjit!" shouted Chibita.

"Allow me to go over the rules!" Mononeko smacked his paw back towards the banner, and another fell into place over the first one. "Here goes!"

"There are 15 of you gathered here! All of you are inside the glorious MONONEKO MALL, to which if you want to leave, you'll have to kill each other! HAHAHA! But it's not as simple as that, otherwise it wouldn't be as fun!"

It seemed like Ichimatsu wasn't waisting any time, since he was already raising a chair from the food court over his head to try and smash it over Karamatsu's head. However Todomatsu reached to try and stop him.

"I-Ichimatsu nii-san!"

"If you wanna get out of here alive, all you have to do is kill someone and get away with it! These are old rules though from a long dead, dumb bear, wouldn't be fun if we didn't add any new and exciting twists!" Mononeko smacked his paw back towards the second banner that looked like a map of the mall. It was surprisingly large! "Right now, you suckers are on floor one, all the floors above you are locked and can only be opened by reaching one of two quotas, someone dies or you manage to solve the puzzle that's placed on each floor! Every night, a new store will open it's gates and you can use whatever inside to your advantage! Isn't that great?! A few more rules, we'll get the ball rolling! Not that I'd know why you'd have guns, but using them is not allowed! When killing someone, no accomplices allowed! That would just make this all too easy, and we can't have that! Also, please direct your attention to your wrists!"

You, along with everyone else, looked down and finally took notice of large black and white bracelet attached to your wrist. Your eyes narrowed in response while everyone else murmured to themselves, you could hear Todomatsu murmur something about how it looked completely gaudy. The black side seemed to have a digital countdown on it with the number 3 on each of them.

"These bracelets serve as a reminder to follow the rules!" Mononeko continued. "You get three chances! After the fourth time of breaking the rules, those bracelets will inject you with a LETHAL DOSE OF DEATH! Er, poison. But it kills ya, so same thing, right? HERE'S SOME MORE RULES! Curfew is 10 pm. After that, the power is switched off and the gates to any open stores are shut! Only the food court is available after that time, so make use of the time you have! The gates open at 8 am sharp, so wake up early if you wanna catch some good deals! Also around the mall are things called Mononeko coins!"

Mononeko held up a copper looking coin that looked like it had the name "Monokuma" scratched out an the picture of the bear on the coin was scratched to look more like a cat.

"Mononeko coins are incredibly rare and if you find one, you can turn them in for special prizes! Anyway there's more rules, but I'm already getting bored of talking to you guys. So here's the rest of the list."

Another banner dropped, along with several smart phones attached to strings that had dangled down in front of everyone. Everyone took the phones, looking at the same list of rules that appeared on the screen.

". . . Eh? Breaking into locked doors is strictly prohibited?" You murmured as you looked down at the phone given to you.

"Sharing your personalized phone is prohibited and must be kept on you at all times. Tch, like I'd share mine in the first place." said Todomatsu.

"Participants are free to explore the open areas of the mall, huh?" said Karamatsu, staring at his own phone.

"Violence against Mononeko or any of the surveillance equipment will result in punishment? Hnnnn ME IS NOT DEALING WITH THIS!" Iyami snapped out, chucking his phone towards the feline on the podium. Mononeko leaned to the side, avoiding the phone entirely and watched with an expectant gaze at the buck toothed man. A small jingle came from Iyami's bracelet before a shock was sent through him, everyone backing away from him as his body jerked around and eventually hit the floor. Another jingle and the number on his bracelet had flickered to the number 2.

"W-What?!" You shouted out, looking back and forth between Iyami and Mononeko.

"Hey, it's alright! Iyami's been through a lot worse!" said Osomatsu, stepping up beside you. "Any moment now, he'll get up and be fine!"

Only he wasn't getting up.

Everyone watched with baited breath for Iyami to rise from the floor and dust himself off, but it wasn't happening, and there was a sudden shriek that came from Nyaa-chan.

"W-What kind of sick game is this?! Nya!" She snapped out, looking towards the black and white cat.

"I already told you guys! It's a game of Mutual Killing! You really need to listen!" said Mononeko.

"Eh? I'm not participating in this junk of a game!" Shounosuke grumbled out, grabbing at his own bracelet and trying to rip it off. Another tune played, this one different and after a few seconds, the short man looked like he was having trouble breathing. His skin started to turn purple, he grabbed at his own neck until he fell flat to the ground. Everyone stared in awe at the sudden development, he wasn't getting up. Neither one of them was getting up!

"Hnnh, man." grumbled Mononeko, using his paws to hold his head up while he stared at everyone over the podium. "What kind of game is this gonna be if you guys don't follow the rules? Already down to fourteen!"

"Wait . . . he's . . ." you stammered out.

"Dead! Dust! Kicked the bucket!" Mononeko shouted, paws up in the air while his tail swayed. "Oh right, that's another rule! Trying to take off your bracelet will result in INSTANT DEATH! HAHAHA!"

The air suddenly felt like it was thicker as everyone else started to realize what was going on, the consequences were setting in. Dekapan stooped down beside Shounosuke while Dayon moved to Iyami to make sure he was alright. He reached down, turning the short man's body over and doubled back at the sight. Eyes wide, blood replacing what probably would have been tears, Shounosuke was clearly dead.

". . . H-Hey, nobody panic!" Osomatsu called out, which was actually pretty odd for those that knew him. "Just wait a few minutes, they'll be up in no time!"

You looked over at him before back down to the two bodies. Nothing was happening. Nothing was happening the way Osomatsu was trying to perceive it!

"He's not . . . getting up." you wheezed out, stepping back a few steps before tripping over your own feet and falling to the ground. "He's really . . . he's."

"WHAT IS GOING ON?!" Totoko screamed out, everyone else was in too much shock to even respond.

"Nyaahaha! HEHE! HAHAHAHA!" Mononeko burst out into laughter as his paws covered over both sides of that crooked mouth. "I just have to keep repeating myself! You guys are DENSE! I ain't going over the rules again, so figure it out on your own! Now then, I think it's time for me to get a little cat nap, you guys make me tired. Enjoy your experience of MONONEKO MALL!"

"Wait!" You snapped out, but the cat was already gone by the time you turned yourself around.

"All we have to do is kill someone to unlock the next floor, right?" Ichimatsu was already grabbing for that chair again, but this time it was Choromatsu that was stopping him.

"Ichimatsu! We can't be reckless here! Look at what happened to Iyami and Shounosuke!" shouted Choromatsu. Your attention turned back towards Osomatsu, who was staring at the floor with wide eyes and a forced smile on his face.

"No, everything is gonna be fine. We'll be fine. Just give him a moment, he'll come back. He's not dead."

". . . Osomatsu?" you leaned closer to him once you stood, side glancing towards Dekapan who pulled a blanket out of his pants and laid it over Shounosuke's body.

". . . Osomatsu nii-san?" Jyushimatsu came up to his other side, looking at his expression before his attention turned towards the body Dekapan had covered up. Why was this happening? Why was this happening to you? To everyone else. Choromatsu sighed and eventually stepped forward, everyone else turning to look towards him.

"As long as we don't panic, we can all get out of this alive, right? Mononeko said there was two ways to advance to the next floor, we can find the puzzle he was talking about and solve it to open the way!"

"But where is it?" Totoko asked, looking around for any sort of sign.

"I-If I could . . . intervene." you spoke softly, but Choromatsu still heard you and stepped to the side slightly to allow you a place within the middle of the crowd as well. "I think we should all rest for today before trying anything. . . We're all nerve racked and our best bet would probably to just do some exploring, see if there's any exits that are open."

"That's a good idea, jo!" said Hatabo, raising his arms up a little.

"There should be at least one shop open, right? We should go see what it has to offer!" said Chibita. Everyone else nodded in agreement, and slowly started migrating to different areas to see what shop was open. The only ones that hadn't moved were Osomatsu, Karamatsu, and you. Karamatsu was staring at his brother, who kept trying to insist that Shounosuke was going to get up any moment. You slowly stepped up beside them, putting on your best smile.

"Hey, let's go look over here." you motioned with your thumb over your shoulder. Karamatsu turned his attention to you, side glancing towards Osomatsu once more before nodding and grabbing his brother by the shoulders, turning him away and pushing him in the direction you indicated.

No matter what happened, you had to keep your cool, if for anything, to help Choromatsu keep everyone else calm.

MONONEKO MALL
Mutual Killing Game

Survivors Remaining:
14