AN: Alright everyone, here's the next installment in my Danganronpa AU. This one's going to end up being my first multi chapter story, so hopefully I'll be able to keep in maintained, and properly wrap it up when that time comes. If you haven't done so, please check out my other Danganronpa works (sorry for the shameless self promotion), and make sure to leave a review to let me know what I did well, and what can be improved on, since I want to treat these characters the best I can. Anyways, I hope you enjoy!
Disclaimer: Danganronpa is the property of Spike Chunsoft Co. Ltd.
When He Smiled
Chapter 1: A Little Push
Lunchtime in the Hope's Peak cafeteria turned the room into a chaotic and noisy place, with the students breaking off into their own individual friend groups and taking the opportunity to chat, goof off, and catch up with each other, enjoying the break from the more stressful school environment. Even though students were mostly free to practice their talents on their own, free from structured class sessions, observers occasionally made the rounds to ensure that the students didn't slack off completely, and thus kept the school's investments in line. The lunch period, however, afforded an opportunity for the Ultimate students to relieve their tension and relax for an hour each day.
The cafeteria segregated the students by their classes, with one half reserved for the upperclassmen, and the other for the school's freshman class. The school didn't have any formal restrictions on intermingling between the two groups, but the unspoken custom was that lunch should be a time to meet with the people in your class and not a time to interrupt your seniors or juniors. Given this, Classes 77 and 78 remained distinctly separated within the cafeteria, and most students didn't even know the names of the students in the other classes.
Even though classes had begun only a few weeks before, the students of Class 78 had already established several different cliques within their designated space, and seating arrangements had been unofficially assigned. At one table, several of the more elite students had staked their claim, with Byakuya Togami, the Ultimate Affluent Progeny exchanging thoughts and ideas with Kyoko Kirigiri, the Ultimate Detective, and Celestia Ludenberg, the Ultimate Gambler, two students whom the heir deemed worthy enough to interact with regularly. With them, Junko Enoshima, the apparent Ultimate Fashionista but in truth the Ultimate Analyst, listened and chatted, continuously switching between her various personas to whichever was most appropriate in that moment. She got along with the other three surprisingly well, though Byakya found interacting with her to be rather bothersome. At the far end of the table, Toko Fukawa, the Ultimate Writing Prodigy, and Hifumi Yamada, the Ultimate Fanfic Creator, watched on dejectedly, wanting desperately to be recognized by Byakuya and Celeste, yet remaining constantly ignored by everyone at the table other than Yasuhiro Hagakure, the Ultimate Clairvoyant, who blabbered non-stop, oblivious to the fact that the others tended to ignore him.
The other students had separated themselves amongst the other tables. Aoi Asahina, the Ultimate Swimmer, sat across from Sakura Oogami, the Ultimate Martial Artist and Aoi's best friend, at the far end of the table, with the swimmer engaged in an excited rant about the latest protein supplements as her friend listened. A gap of several empty seats separated the two from the next cluster of students. Mondo Oowada, the Ultimate Biker, sat across from Kiyotaka Ishimaru, the Ultimate Moral Compass, and next to Chihiro Fujisaki, the Ultimate Programmer. Across from the programmer sat Leon Kuwada, the Ultimate Baseball Star, who along with the biker had really seemed to hit it off with Chihiro. Sayaka Maizono, the Ultimate Idol, sat next to Leon, who'd insisted that she join the group, and Makoto Naegi, the Ultimate Lucky Student, sat across from her. The two had attended the same middle school, and the Idol had taken the opportunity to reach out to Makoto, inviting her into her new social group. To everyone's surprise, Naegi's most of all, he'd quickly hit it off with nearly all of the other students, and now hardly anyone had anything bad to say about the luckster.
Then, sitting off at a table by herself away from the rest of her classmates, was Class 78's sixteenth student, Mukuro Ikusaba, the Ultimate Soldier. Over the last few weeks, she hadn't said anything to the other students beyond an occasional mumble of apology or a terse yes or no when confronted with a direct question. For the first few days, she'd sat with her sister, Junko, but then the fashionista went off on rather barbed tirade and exiled the soldier from the table. Since then, she'd become a complete social outcast, with her frigid demeanor and apparently hostile attitude warding off the other students.
The ostracized girl caught the attention of Makoto as he sat talking with his friends. He'd already managed to spend time with all of the other members of his class, even the less personable ones like Toko, Byakuya, Kyoko and Junko, but he hadn't made himself find time to meet with Mukuro yet. Truth be told, she frightened him more than a little bit. Her steely demeanor and decorated combat history, which he'd only gotten secondhand accounts of, assured him that the soldier could kill him in a heartbeat in over a dozen different ways if she so desired. However, the sight of her sitting all alone, isolated and excluded by all of her classmates, deeply bothered Makoto. He'd been concerned that he wouldn't fit in with all of the Ultimate students when he'd first arrived at Hope's Peak and had had the good fortune to meet and befriend most of his classmates. Mukuro on the other hand didn't even have someone to talk to, and if things continued as they were, she'd likely make it through two years at Hope's Peak without forming a single meaningful friendship with her classmates.
"What do you think Makoto?" asked a feminine voice, breaking Naegi out of his deep thoughts. He looked over and saw Sayaka looking at him with a curious expression on her face.
Makoto chuckled bashfully, "Sorry, I was spacing out for a bit. What did you ask?"
The idol giggled. "Oh Makoto," she chided playfully, "you can be such a doofus sometimes." She brought a finger up to her lower lip for a moment, looking away in thought before lowering her hand and giving a radiant smile, "It's kind of cute though! Anyways, I was asking what you thought of Leon and I forming a school band with that Ultimate Musician from Class 77. Do you think it would work? I heard that she still hasn't found a new group since she broke up with her old band, so maybe she'd be willing to give it a shot, even though we're her underclassmen."
"Maybe," Makoto replied nervously with an awkward smile on his face, "I guess it couldn't hurt to throw the idea out there." He wasn't sure if the group would work quite the way Sayaka apparently envisioned it though. From what he'd heard around, the Ultimate Musician had apparently left due to "creative differences" with her former group, and though she was clearly a music prodigy, her latest creations had been rather hit or miss due to her eccentric style.
Kuwata, however, clearly didn't know any of this. "There's no 'maybe' about it!" he shouted, bringing his fists up to show how into this idea he was, "It's definitely a great idea! Maizono can get some more exposure, and I can finally my name out there as a musician!"
"You might want to practice a bit more before performing in front of a crowd," Sayaka replied with a smile, "maybe finish learning how to read music. So," she said, turning back towards Makoto, "what's on your mind Makoto? You were pretty spaced out a moment ago. Let me guess, it's Ikusaba, isn't it?"
Makoto blinked in surprise, though he should have gotten used to it by now. "How'd you guess?" he asked, even though he knew the answer before it came out.
"I'm psychic!" Sayaka replied cheerfully with that sweet smile of hers, "Just kidding, it's just my intuition!" After a moment, she let her smile drop, looking more serious for a change. "I know that you want to make friends with everyone and help them be happy Makoto," she said, "but I'm not so sure that it's a good idea to mess with her. She's the Ultimate Soldier, and she's made it pretty clear that she doesn't want to have anything to do with the rest of us. You're liable to get hurt if you get on her bad side."
"I know," Makoto admitted with a sigh, "but… I can't just leave her alone like this. She's been turned away by everyone, even her own sister. Someone needs to at least give her a chance. Besides," he concluded, standing up, "I've got Super High School Level Good Luck on my side, so it can't end too badly!" His friends gave uneasy glances to each other at that remark. Even though Makoto was the Ultimate Lucky Student for Class 78, his luck seemed bad more often than good, so relying on it here didn't seem like the best idea. But, before they could say anything to dissuade him, he had already grabbed his lunch and started making his way over to where the soldier sat.
Makoto's journey drew the attention of the rest of the students of the 78th Class, all of them curious to see how this would play out, but especially that of Junko Enoshima, who focused keenly on Makoto as he approached her sister. The luckster sat his tray on the table, then nervously sat down in the seat opposite Mukuro, watching for any change in her demeanor. "Hey Ikusaba," he said, trying hard to keep his voice from cracking, "do you mind if I sit with you?"
The soldier said nothing in response and gave no indication that she had even heard Makoto. She continued staring down at her food, mechanically transferring it from her tray to her mouth. Makoto grimaced slightly as he realized that this might be more difficult than he had thought. With everyone else, he'd at least gotten some reaction to his initial greeting. Even Byakuya had told him that he was so inferior as to not be worth talking to, which had opened up an interesting topic for discussion regarding why that was. Here though, the Ultimate Soldier's face remained a stone mask, completely shutting out Makoto and everyone else.
But Makoto wasn't one to give up, and quickly tried another approach. "I like your tattoo," he said, indicating the marking on the back of Mukuro's right hand, "is that from the mercenary group that you fought with?"
That at least elicited a reaction from the girl, though perhaps not exactly the one Makoto had hoped for. She stopped eating, set her chopsticks down, and stared across the table at Makoto, her icy, inscrutable eyes seeming to bore into Makoto's very soul. "Why are you here, Naegi," she asked flatly, her tone giving no indication as to the intent behind her question, "Why don't you just go back to your friends and leave me alone?"
Okay, that stung a little bit, but Makoto brushed it aside. "I just hadn't gotten a chance to get to know you yet, and you've just been sitting over here alone for the past week. Nobody likes to be alone all of the time, so it's not right for you to have to be alone every day."
The corner of Mukuro's mouth twitched slightly. "And you really think it's a good idea to try to get to know a killer like me, the Ultimate Soldier?" she asked, the slightest hint of dark humor in her voice, "You don't know anything about me, what I've done, or what I'm capable of. Everyone is right to be afraid of me. I could kill anyone here if I wanted to. But, I don't even know what I'm doing at this school anyways. I belong back on the battlefield, since the only thing I'm good at, my life's only purpose, is to fight and kill." And eventually, to die she added internally.
"No, that's wrong!" Makoto said, struggling to keep his voice below a shout as he momentarily leapt up out of his chair. He'd finally gotten Ikusaba to open up, but this was clearly an issue that he lacked the skills to appropriately deal with. But, that didn't mean that he wasn't going to try his darnedest. "I may not know anything about your past, but I know that you don't want to hurt anyone here. Like you said, if you did mean harm, there's not much that any of us could do about it. And," he continued, "there's more to life than just fighting. Maybe you think that fighting and killing are your only purposes in life, but if that's the case then why did you come here? The very fact that you came to Hope's Peak means that there's something else that you consider even more important than fighting."
That comment caused Mukuro to glance over at her sister, who was still staring intensely at the situation as it unfolded. Junko had been the one to convince her to come to Hope's Peak and had actually made her own attendance contingent on Mukuro's acceptance. Despite not knowing why her sister wanted her to attend a high school with her, even one as prestigious as Hope's Peak, Mukuro had abandoned her illustrious mercenary career to join Junko. Her sister was the only one who'd ever cared for Junko, the only one who'd always been there for her, so she meant the world to Mukuro. But, recently Junko had been pushing her away, and had become crueler to her than she'd ever been before. If even the person she cared for the most had rejected her, what purpose was there left in Mukuro's life? Finally, she couldn't stand watching Junko stare at her from across the room any longer and turned her eyes back towards Naegi.
"Since you're here at Hope's Peak, you have the chance to meet other people, to make friends," Makoto continued, trying to press his point home, "because no matter how strong you are, you can't do everything by yourself." He gave a disarming smile, an expression filled with innocence and hope, one without guile or ulterior motive. "I want to be your friend, Ikusaba, if you'll let me. I want to be here for you if you need someone to talk to, or someone to help you if you're in a jam, because in the end, we're all in this together and need each other to succeed."
His smile and words put Mukuro off-balance momentarily as a feeling began to rise in her chest. She had become so used to people avoiding or rejecting her because of her demeanor, or because of how dangerous she'd become and the blood she had on her hands. But Naegi's smile was so… genuine; she didn't have her sister's analytical abilities, but her experiences had trained her to recognize when someone was being deceitful, and it was clear that Makoto was not. Even after everything she'd said, he still naively opened himself to her, trusting her without any logical reason. It was incredibly stupid, but then why did it make her feel so happy inside?
This was clearly different than her odd relationship with Peko, which was basically just two warriors connecting over their past experiences. Makoto seemed so completely alien to her, but maybe that was a good thing. Besides, maybe she'd figure out what his smile had evoked within her. "Very well," she said, her voice returning to its earlier monotone, "maybe we can be… friends. You asked about my tattoo, my Mark of Fenrir? Before I was allowed to get it, I had to prove myself worthy, so they dropped me off in the middle of a war-torn city with only a combat knife and told me to find my way back to camp alive…"
Over at her own table, Junko Enoshima grinned as she watched her sister start to open up to Makoto. The Ultimate Lucky Student had acted predictably, and everything was unfolding exactly as she'd hoped. Now that Naegi had gotten Mukuro to start opening up to him, it was her turn to step in. Finishing the last of her lunch, she grabbed the leftover garbage and walked assertively over to where Mukuro and Makoto were sitting.
"Hey Mukuro," she said in her cutesy persona, "did you actually find someone who's willing to tolerate your ugly worthless self?" Her words carried throughout the cafeteria, as Junko intended them to be heard. Under the table, Makoto's fists clenched for a moment in anger, and over at the tables for the upperclassmen, Peko Pekoyama, the Ultimate Swordswoman of Class 77-B stiffened in response to Enoshima's insulting words. Mukuro herself felt disappointment, but also pleasure that her sister was finally interacting with her again, even if it wasn't exactly the attention that she wanted.
"Here," Junko continued, tossing her trash into Mukuro's face and lap, "since you already smell like a dumpster, you might as well throw that away for me." Turning to face Makoto, she reverted to her more normal personality, "You really shouldn't bother with her Naegi. My sister is nothing but an eternal disappointment. I got all the brains in the family, leaving Mukuro as nothing but a worthless brute, only fit to be used by others. You should forget about her and go back to your friends; she'll never amount to anything no matter how hard you try."
Now Makoto was pissed off. "How can you say that about your own sister!?" he demanded, "How can you treat her like that? I've actually enjoyed talking with her, because at least she's honest, unlike yourself. Maybe you're the worthless one, not her!" That last comment might have been a little too harsh, but it disturbed Makoto to see Junko mistreating Mukuro so blatantly. He and his younger sister Komaru didn't always get along, but at the end of the day, they were always there for each other and apologized if they'd ever gone too far. This, however, was on a completely different level of messed up.
Junko seethed a little bit inside at Makoto's barb, but she knew she probably deserved it. "Whatever," she said, switching to a more arrogant and airheaded demeanor, "if you want to waste your time with that ugly flat-chested tramp, you're more than welcome to it." With that, she walked straight out the door, leaving the cafeteria momentarily silent.
Makoto sighed and closed his eyes for a moment. Why would Enoshima act like that, he wondered. He'd figured out that Junko could be incredibly manipulative and loved to mess with people as much as she could, but to be so conspicuously cruel seemed a little much, even for her. He tried to put it out of his mind as he looked back towards Mukuro. "Don't listen to her," he said in a comforting voice, "She's wrong about you. You're a good person, certainly better than her."
"I'm not so sure," Mukuro replied, a slight tinge in her cheeks, "I mean, she's the only one who really knows me, and we've always been the only ones who can truly understand each other. If, after all this time, she thinks that I'm worthless, how could she be wrong?"
"She's wrong," insisted Makoto. The fact that Mukuro was all too willing to agree with her sister's assessment was…troubling. At first, he'd just wanted to try to break through the soldier's shell, but now he felt like he needed to help her. Her sister's behavior was clearly not helping Mukuro's self-image, and the fact that Mukuro herself couldn't see why anyone would want to be near her was disturbing as well. Maybe he could spend some more time with her, keep her away from Junko's abuse for a while. "You're still new to Tokyo, right Ikusaba?" he asked, "How about I show you some of the sights later this week?"
"If you'd like to, that would be fine I suppose," replied Mukuro, though she didn't show much enthusiasm towards the idea.
Well, at least it's a start, thought Makoto. The ding-dong of the school's bells indicated that the lunch period was coming to an end, so Makoto rose to throw his trash away and leave. "It's been nice talking with you Ikusaba," he said, "I'll try to catch you later so we can set up a time to tour the city!" Mukuro gave a fairly noncommittal shrug in response, but at this point, Makoto figured that that was the best he was going to get.
After dumping his trash, he headed out of the cafeteria, where he was greeted with the sight of one of his classmates leaning back against the wall, one hand brought up to cover her face, giving her an aura of mystery and confident omniscience. "Well," she said in a near drawl, "if it isn't the omega male himself."
"What do you want Enoshima?" Makoto demanded, still angry with her for her earlier behavior, "Are you just going to trash talk your sister again, to stop me from reaching out to her? If so, I don't even want to hear it." Starting to turn, he prepared to leave Junko standing there, but she responded before he started moving.
"Hm. Quite the opposite actually," she said, before letting her hand fall and reverting to her more-or-less normal personality, "Actually, Makoto…I need to you help my sister."
AN: And, there's the end of this first part. Since my favorite ships for the main protagonists of Danganronpa and Danganronpa 2 are technically canon, I decided to give my second favorite ships some happiness. So, I'll probably alternate updating this with the other story I have cooked up involving Hajime. Again, be sure to leave a review to let me know what I can do better for next time!