a/n: this kinda dropped out of nowhere. happy new year!
dedication: to madness.
disclaimer: i don't own anything, least of all Dangan Ronpa.
summary: Sanity is such a terrifying thing. – Naegi/Enoshima.
game over
guilty, guilty
Naegi stands, numb, as his classmates – his friends – die screaming, faces contorted in agony and tears streaming down their cheeks. They plead to Enoshima, begging her to stop, and sob half-apologies at Naegi. Their bodies are mutilated beyond recognition as the torture devices run through cycles, tearing their bones out of their bodies and streaming blood in ribbons on the floor.
The screams stop all at once, leaving an ominous silence behind.
"You lied." Naegi does not know why there are words leaving his mouth because he is still staring at the dismembered bodies of his best friends, cold and numb and blank.
"I often do," Enoshima grins at him and it is a sickly smile – he can see her teeth, every one of them and her tongue coiling inside her mouth. It is not reassuring, like the sight of Syo flicking her tongue and heaping insults and vulgarity – instead, Naegi can feel the hair raise at the back of his neck.
Something is very wrong with that smile.
"You said that they'd live and I'd die."
"I don't know what you want Naegi," and suddenly her face falls into a perfect caricature of depression – Naegi can almost see the mushrooms growing on her head. "I already said that I lied," she looks at him and Naegi recoils at the self-loathing in her blue eyes, "Do you want me to apologize?"
Naegi shakes his head because he knows that the apology will sound sincere and that whole scenario is wrong – a remorseful murderer, who would've thought?
"Then what?" She tilts her head and the depression is gone, leaving cold cruelty in its place, "Do you want me to kill you? Do you want to die?"
"No," he mutters, almost fascinated by the way her sharp blue eyes suddenly soften and light up with happiness.
"Then come on, Naegi-kun! There's so much to explore!" She proceeds to drag him out of the gruesome, blood-splattered room, sounding very much like a spoilt child.
They are trapped in the school.
Only Enoshima knows the codes and she refuses to tell, warning him that she'll kill him if he tries to escape. The threat is followed by watery eyes and choked sobs until Naegi promises not to leave.
Of course, there is another way – she told him herself that if she dies, the school will automatically open.
So Naegi wraps his thin fingers around her pale throat, watching the two contrast as she looks up at him with blank blue eyes.
"You are not a murderer," she says, softly, sounding so oddly sad that Naegi lets go and walks away.
"You're mad," he finally remarks, standing at her shoulder as she chops a carrot – carrots are her favorite vegetable, as she's told him so many times – and watching the knife slice cleanly through.
"No, I'm not," she turns to him, features pretty even scrunched up in confusion, "Why would I be mad?"
Naegi shakes his head, "No, not angry – insane. You're insane."
Enoshima laughs, as if he's told her a delightful joke and turns back to the carrot.
Naegi watches the knife slice and morbidly wonders how it would feel to slice through human skin.
"Let me go," he begs her, going so far as to fall on his knees. It's been three years now – three years of watching her carefully for her moods and learning to evade her nonsensical traps.
"No," Enoshima smiles and as soon as he sees that deranged smile, Naegi knows that it's a lost cause. "Why would I let you go, Naegi-kun, when we're having so much fun?"
Naegi decides not to test her and walks away, feeling the familiar burn of disappointment course through his veins. However, he shuts it away – it's become an old friend.
"You've lost it," Naegi breathes as he walks into her room and finds the place a mess – there are tomato juice splatters on the walls and knives thrown haphazardly everywhere and Enoshima is shivering in a corner, clutching her blanket like it would keep the monsters away.
It's only too bad that her monsters are already inside.
He kneels next to her and awkwardly slides his arms around her, holding her tightly till the shaking stops.
"I'm going mad," she whispers harshly and Naegi can feel the desperate in her tone, "Oh, Naegi, help, I'm going crazy – what's wrong with me? Why – why did I do this, why did I kill Mukuro, what am I doing?"
Naegi shushes her and continues to hold her until the sobs trail off and she falls back asleep. Then, he picks her up gently, making sure not to jostle her as he puts her back on her bed. Tucking her in, he kisses her on the forehead, watching her frown smooth out.
It takes him half an hour to clean off the juice and pick up all the knives. Enoshima wakes a few hours later and pins her pink hair back into a single ponytail, her words precise.
He lets her take him to the laboratory, where she spends a bunch of time making Molotov cocktails and observing Naegi's reaction time as he tries to dodge the ones she lobs at him.
Naegi watches her out of the corner of his eyes as he removes his singed jacket, waiting for another relapse.
"I'm insane, aren't I?"
Naegi starts and looks at the woman in his arms. They have been together – alone – for ten years.
"What?" Naegi asks, carefully, wondering if she would start screaming or running or cutting off all her precious pink hair with a bloody cleaver. The past times Enoshima discovered her sanity, or lack thereof, have not been pretty.
"I'm insane. Have been, from before all this started," she muses and Naegi relaxes slowly, because she shows no sign of freaking out, "I was never tested clinically insane, but I knew what I was and the other models did too – our jobs were too high-stress for us to be anything but."
Naegi can't help but think that if only someone had taken the beautiful, blue-eyed teen model for a psychological evaluation, murders could have been prevented.
"That's not bad, is it?" she asks, worried and all Naegi can do is kiss her and reassure her.
He's long given up on the thought of escape.
"What are you doing?" Naegi asks, horrified, as he comes on the scene. He's seen almost everything – living with Enoshima has given him an inside look at the workings of a psychopathic serial killer – but this was something he never expected to find.
"What does it look like I'm doing, Naegi-kun?" she smiles at him but the tone is all wrong. She sounds sad instead of happy and her smile is soft and loving rather than psychotic.
"Stop," Naegi takes a step forward and halts, afraid to get any closer, "Junko, please, whatever you think you're doing, stop – this is crazy…" He abruptly cuts off, afraid he sparked the trigger but Enoshima only keeps smiling.
"I'm sane, Naegi," she whispers, her face lighting up with genuine delight and Naegi can see that it's true – this woman was what the beautiful Enoshima Junko would have grown up to be, if insanity hadn't wrecked her life. "I'm completely sane and I know exactly what I'm doing."
"Junko," Naegi sinks to his knees, "Junko, please –"
"I don't remember a lot of things, and we don't have much time," she says softly, continuing with her task, "But you want to leave, don't you? You want to escape."
"Junko…" Naegi almost cries because to say 'no' would be a lie, "Not without you – never without you." And this at least is true – holding onto revenge was so very difficult and so Naegi had let go, losing himself in the whirlwind of emotions that she had brought into his life.
"But I can't, Naegi-kun," she smiles – sweet and sad and so disturbingly sane, "I'm afraid I don't remember the codes. I can't let us out – there's only one way to escape."
"We can wait," Naegi begs, his mind racing for any excuse he can find, "We can wait, Junko, we can wait for your memory to come back, or – or I'm sure you've written it down somewhere, we can search for it –"
"I would not have made it that easy," she says gently, "And we don't have much time – I am sane for the time being, but it will come back."
"I can heal you," he says, his voice raw from pain, "I don't care how long it takes, I'll heal you, I'll make you better, then we can both leave –"
"It's impossible, Naegi-kun," she continues to smile at him as she finishes her elaborate scheme, "I will not get better and if you stay here too long, you'll go insane too."
And Naegi knows that she's telling the truth – he can practically feel his mind fraying as he tries to subdue the hysterical laughter, the sheer exhilaration warring with inescapable despair.
"Junko, please don't –"
She pays him no heed and strikes a match, setting fire to the ground before she clambers onto the platform she erected.
"My name is Enoshima Junko," she smiles, as if to a mock audience and Naegi can see the insanity creeping back, slithering onto her features and poisoning her mind, "I am found guilty of several murders."
"Junko." The name is uttered, half-strangled, from choked lips as Naegi watches her, wreathed in crackling flames.
"This is my punishment."
She steps off of the platform and Naegi's scream is loud enough to drown out the sound her body makes as it hits the floor, fire snapping hungrily. She's still alive, but not for long – the fire catches the kerosene she drenched herself in and eats her alive.
Naegi's last glimpse of her is a gentle smile, before the fire claims Enoshima Junko as its own.
He steps outside the doors and sees sunlight for the first time in fifteen years. This time, he can't stop the laughter and it comes out, sharp and disturbing, devoid of any mirth as tears stream down his cheeks.
Naegi absently wonders if insanity is contagious.
innocent
le fin
a/n: this went well. to clarify, this is explaining what would happen if the rest of them voted for Naegi, to kill him and be able to live themselves.
