Notes: Hello there, readers! I was inspired to write this short AU story after a funny post in the Danganronpa Reddit board. Yes, this completely earnest story originated from a joke. Inspiration knows no boundaries, I guess.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the story! I don't expect it to take a long time to be completed - probably six or so chapters - so enjoy my little probing of the ultimate lucky student's mind!

Nagito Komaeda was cold. His clothes were drenched, his body was still accumulating to urban temperatures, and he was around six feet underground inside a dimly lit room.

The frigid aura of the underclassman in front of Nagito and the feel of cool metal rubbing against his waistcoat, over his stable heart pumping chill blood, only worsened matters.

Junko Enoshima. Nagito wondered if the torrent of rain and malice invading Hope's Peak Academy belonged to her. Storms occurred in low-pressure areas: an astute observation made by those talented minds long ago and one he counted himself fortunate to be privy to. He was low-pressure, in many ways; but was Junko Enoshima low-pressure, too? Could she be the absolute bottom of life, so empty that she attracted the current storm? Hope would flood this world regardless of who or what summoned it, but was she devoid enough to call forth the greatest of hopes? He had to know.

"You see," Nagito opened his eyes and gazed at Junko, "this is for hope."

The fashion magazines did not do Junko justice. All of them, lifeless collages of talent so alive and real Nagito could feel her fair skin on his fingers, were made by the talentless for the talentless. It was no surprise, then, that he ended up procuring all of her magazines. What did surprise him was how the magazines were all the intel he needed. She was alive in them, and she was so very, very cold.

Nagito approached Junko, and he was getting colder. Each step felt more and more sunken. The descent was quite murky and enticing.

"To protect hope," Nagito raised his right arm up and to his heart, "I will do anything."

That was an incomplete truth. Of course Nagito would do anything to protect hope; he would do even more to embolden it. He came to a stop and waited to hear Junko's response to his words. Then, he would act.

Junko hadn't given Nagito an eye during his approach, but she acknowledged him nonetheless. A small smirk slithered on her turned face, and, soon after, a snicker slipped smoothly through it. The snicker gradually evolved into a chortle - a vile one. It was ugly, as was the mouth it came from. He hid his surprise behind a mild-mannered smile. Right, the one he presented to the common ilk. The unworthy.

Junko turned to gaze back at Nagito. Her eyes were bright blue and almost shimmered in the darkness. "You think you can stop this despair?"

Nagito continued smiling. This was strange: the area around him felt submerged in a heat. The pressure tingled his pallid skin. It hurt; he was still cold. His gaze remained fixed on Junko's eyes, but he realized something.

The fire, the heat, the pressure… they originated from Junko. They were Junko.

So this was the hand luck played Nagito. He continued smiling. He smiled - the mild-mannered smile presented to the common ilk, the unworthy - to himself. Super High School Level Despair? How arrogant of him to expect something more, and how foolish of Junko to parade that title around.

Nagito's hand slipped into his suit and clenched his souvenir. His hand froze its surprisingly warm, rubber grip.

Nagito mused on some properties of Junko as he gripped his gun: she resided at the peak of talent. To be a fashionista required social acumen and precise modeling of fashion trends. Truly, a person so brilliant and pregnant with talent had no right to call herself despair. Despair resided at the abyss of talent. Alas, the world had no need for this blind and emasculated hope. He had no need for this illusory and optimistic despair.

Nagito saw that Junko had disguised her true self behind the shallow facade of despair. Her eyes betrayed her, revealing the source of his disappointment. She did not know it, but he lived in those eyes.

Nagito, the boy who hoped and hoped and hoped, lived in those starry eyes.

Nagito, the listless pariah who would destroy the world in order to ameliorate it, lived in those passionate eyes.

Nagito, the worthless scum who yearned for a hope that he would never see and never should see as to not sully it with his presence, lived in those disgusting, loud, and unworthy of the epithet 'despair' eyes.

Nagito pulled out his gun, aimed it at those eyes, and pulled the trigger.

…

Ah, what wonderful luck blessed him, Nagito Komaeda!