Nations had become graveyards, stripped down to dirt and ash.

It was no different where Naegi Makoto and Kirigiri Kyouko stood, in what was once a small suburb of the city that hosted Hope's Peak Academy, a school for bright and talented youth.

Kyouko leaned over a barely legible hunk of chiseled gravel.

"It must have happened all at the same time," she said.

She referred to the sequence of events that had brought about the waste of the world: the Worst, Largest, Most Despair-Inducing Incident in Hope's Peak Academy's History; the live broadcasting of the Mutual Killing of Class Seventy Eight; the Monokuma riots that subsequently erupted in a fury of despair.

Riots resulted in housing districts torched by fire, leaving city blocks populated by overturned cars. Nights echoed with the heart-pounding clamor of beatings in the streets that began one after another; one tremulous slaughter that never stopped, only painted the ground red. Entire neighborhoods blissfully expired in ceremonious mutual mass suicides. The Togami Conglomerate fell as the government fell, as the church fell, for there were no more time-weathered sanctuaries not crushed by the heavy footsteps of the God of Despair.

All of this had happened at the same time as the event that caused Kirigiri Kyouko the greatest despair she had ever known, the death of Kirigiri Fuhito.

Kyouko's heels dug into the dirt. One gloved hand traced the letters on the tombstone while tears fell on the other, resting in her lap.

"At least he was buried."

Makoto looked at the grave. He was meeting Kyouko's grandfather postmortem, just as he had met her father. It was twisted to think about, and left that same rotten feeling in his gut as witnessing the theatrical executions of his friends.

At least this time he didn't have to talk face to face with bones.

Mr. Kirigiri.

Makoto thought he should say something to the man, so he spoke in his head while in prayer.

I am sorry we never got to meet. I didn't have to meet you, though, to know you were a great man. I don't know much about you, other than your granddaughter loves you very much, and that you taught her everything she knows. She is brilliant; and I know you would be proud of her, sir. It was she who saved us all.

The wind blew, rustling ailing trees that had been poisoned by toxic air, just as Enoshima threatened in her exiting monologue. Airborne illness was now a very real possibility, just another of the many cancerous tumors of Despair the Future Foundation contended with.

I want you to know, sir, that I love your granddaughter, and I promise to take care of her, no matter what comes our way, so you don't have to worry about that. You can rest easy, at least, that she is with someone who would die for her.

Kyouko was shaking, he realized. His own eyes had become blurred and watery as he lost himself in his thoughts. He didn't know how long they had been standing there.

"Kyouko."

Makoto pulled her to him instinctively. Instinct was all he had.

"I don't know what to do, Makoto."

Kirigiri Kyouko had never before spoken with such raw desperation in her voice.

"I don't know what to do," said the clever girl who always knew what to do, especially when Makoto didn't.

"I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do," she repeated over and over again; the first time Kirigiri Kyouko had fallen into despair since the killing game had begun. "I don't know what to do."

Makoto was supposed to be her hope. Or so he told himself; or so she told him; or so the Foundation told him-told all of them-that with their work, hope would flourish in the wake of despair.

But as he held in his arms the only remaining bones of the Kirigiri family that were still encased by flesh and blood, Makoto wasn't so sure.

He could hardly feel hope himself anymore.

COMMENTS
written in response to the prompt submitted to me on tumblr (if-youhaveghosts): "Makoto meeting Kyouko's grandfather."

please, submit more. i like to do drabbles when i can, in between life and working on other things. xo

oh, and if you're interested, check out 420ronpa on tumblr - a dangan ronpa network for 18+ chill folk. we talk about DR and comment on each other's stuff, ya dig? it's real fun. xo