Heroing 101: Deadly Life- Day 4 (Investigation)
I couldn't believe what I was seeing…I had to be dreaming, this had to be a nightmare. But…I knew that was a lie. I knew that I wasn't dreaming, that what I saw in front of me was real. But before I could even think about anything else, an announcement played.
*Ding Dong, Ding Dong*
"A body has been discovered!" came Monokuma's voice as he appeared on the monitor in the room. "Would everyone please report to the gymnasium for a very special announcement!"
After saying his piece, the monitor turned off, and that was when all hell broke loose. One by one, everyone came into the laundry room to see what the commotion was all about. It was all met with varying degrees of shock, but the prominent thing between every single one of us, was the disbelief that one of us was now dead, and another was responsible for it. None of us could even properly acknowledge what Monokuma said. After a few minutes of just standing there in shock, it was Shoto who brought everyone's attention to the matter at hand.
"We can't keep Monokuma waiting," he said as he turned to exit the room.
"What…what are you talking about!?" Mina shouted, a bit of anger lacing her voice. "One of us just died, and you wanna do what that psycho bear says!?"
"Would you rather us all die for disobeying him?" Shoto said. "No matter if we acknowledge it or not, Monokuma is in control here. If we don't do what he says, who knows what he'll do. For now, we play along."
"As much as I hate to admit it, he has a point," Tenya said, turning to the rest of the group.
"You're saying we have to do what he says?" Minoru said as he shock in fear.
"It's as Shoto said, we don't really have a choice right now," Tenya said as he started to walk off. "For now, we must listen to him." After that was said, everyone slowly made their way to the gym, myself included. When all nineteen of us were there, Monokuma popped up on stage again to sit on top of the podium.
"Wowwie! This is so exciting!" Monokuma shouted in joy as he jumped off the stage. "One of you actually went through with it, and to think the allure of getting out of here was all that person needed. And I was gonna give you guys a special surprise today too!"
"Can it ya fucking stuffed animal!" Katsuki shouted. "Why the hell did you call us all here!?"
"Oh? In such a hurry already I see," Monokuma said as he tilted his head a bit, not at all threatened by Katsuki. "Alright then, let's get this show on the road! Firstly, a murder has occurred, and as such, one of you has become 'blackened.' Now, it's your guy's job to investigate the crime scene and find any clues as to who did it!"
"Wait, investigate?" Rikido asked. "You mean the killer doesn't get to leave right away?"
"Of course not!" Monokuma yelled, making Rikido flinch a bit. "That would be too boring! If the killer got away scot-free, why would they have to hide the fact that they are the one who did it?"
"So we investigate where Koji was killed, then what?" Tsuyu asked.
"Don't worry about that for now," Monokuma said. "Once I feel like you've investigated enough, I'll make another announcement on what you'll be doing next. Now, I know none of you are ultimate detectives, so I'll make this as simple as I can for you guys. If you look into your e-Handbooks, you'll see a nifty new option to choose. Go on, take a look!"
Everyone reluctantly did as he said, taking out their e-Handbook and turning it on. After showing my name, the options showed up, Map, Regulations, my classmates, but an option that wasn't there before caught my eye. "Evidence" it read.
"I'm sure you all see it, that's where you can record all the evidence you find," Monokuma said. "It's really simple actually, snap a picture of what you've found, and a brief description of what it is. What's that? You didn't know it had a camera function? That's because it only works when you're in the Evidence option!"
"So we investigate and record evidence," Kyoka summarized. "Anything else we should know?"
"There is one more thing," Monokuma said as he pulled out black folder with a red square in the top let with a 1 in it, and Monokuma's face at the bottom right. "It's…the Monokuma File! It's everything you need to know about Koji's death."
"Why do we need something like this?" Hanta said as he took a copy. "We can all clearly see how he died."
"Maybe so, but I figured I'd help you guys out a bit, since, again, none of you are ultimate detectives." Monokuma then hopped back on top of the podium. "Alright everyone, have fun and give it your all! Let's see if you can solve this mystery!" After that, he jumped behind the podium, more than likely disappearing.
"We…we have to head back there now?" Yuga said. "Back to…where the dead body is?"
"If you don't think you can handle it, then don't bother investigating," Shoto said as he started to walk off. "You'll probably just end up getting in the way."
"We should probably have a few people guard the laundry room," Momo said as she and several others, myself included, followed Shoto back to the laundry room. "We must preserve the crime scene as best as we can."
"I'll stand guard," Eijiro said. "I'm not too sure how much I can help, but making sure no one messes with anything is something I can do."
"I'll assist," Mezo said. "Having at least two guards should be good enough, right?" Momo nodded to his question, and we were soon in front of the laundry room again. Shoto, Tenya, Momo, Eijiro, and Mezo went in first, while everyone else either waited outside or went somewhere else. Me though? I was standing outside the door, thinking about what I should do. Should I join in and investigate, or should I go somewhere else so I don't get in their way?
"Deku," Ochaco said as she approached me, her usual enthusiasm gone. "What are you going to do?"
"I…honestly don't know," I answered, looking down at the ground. "I don't even know what I can do in a situation like this. One of us was killed, and another one of us is responsible. How…how do I even approach something like this?"
"Deku…I know it may seem really hard right now, but Koji wouldn't want us to give up," Ochaco said, determination clear in her eyes. "He may have been scared most of the time, but he wanted to be a hero, just like everyone else here. That day I was helping him with laundry, we talked about a lot of stuff. He told me how hard he worked to get into U.A., how he knew if we wanted to be a hero, he had to try his hardest, to put his all into it. Koji didn't give up, and I'm sure he wouldn't want us to either. So let's go in there and give it our all, Plus Ultra! Right?"
When Ochaco ended her small speech, I could feel a small fire ignited inside of me. The same determination that Ochaco was giving off, was slowly but surely giving me some strength. So, with a determined look, I nodded to Ochaco and made my way inside crime scene, Ochaco following behind me.
It was just how we left it, the table and chairs turned over onto their sides and everyone's clothes were strewn about everywhere. And lying in front of one of the washing machines, was Koji himself.
"Maybe we should start with Koji's body?" Ochaco suggested, albeit a bit hesitantly.
"Yeah, let's start there," I said, just as nervous, as we walked over to him. I knelt down next to him, Ochaco looking over my shoulder. "Well…it's obvious what killed him."
"Hey, is that some blood around his mouth?" Ochaco asked, pointing to Koji's face. I looked over there, and sure enough, around Koji's lips was some dried blood.
"He must have spat some up after getting stabbed," I said as I snapped a picture of the knife wound and the blood around Koji's lips.
*The knife that dealt the killing blow, and it appears after getting stabbed, Koji coughed up some blood*
"Don't you think it's strange though?" Momo asked she approached us, gaining both of out attentions.
"What's strange?" I asked.
"I came to the same conclusion as you, but I have yet to find any stray spots of blood," Momo said, holding her chin in thought. "If Koji did cough up blood, why isn't there a bit more blood scattered about?"
"That…is kinda odd," Ochaco said.
"I may be over analyzing this," Momo admitted. "But it's just something I found somewhat strange." After that, Momo went back to her own investigation.
I looked back over to Koji's lips, thinking about what Momo said. When something caught my attention. Putting my hand near Koji's neck, I pulled down the collar of his uniform.
"A bruise?" I said as I looked. "And there's one on the side of his head too. I guess he got into a fight with whoever attacked him."
"See? Didn't I tell you?" Ochaco asked. "No matter what, Koji wouldn't give up until the very end." I nodded to Ochaco as I took a picture of the bruises.
*There are bruises present on Koji's body, suggesting him and his attacker got into a fight before he was killed*
"Well, that's all I can see on Koji, should we look around the room, a bit?" I asked Ochaco, who immediately nodded. I guess she wanted to get away from a dead body as much as I did. So, we began to look around the room. The first thing we went over to was the table.
"It must have been a pretty big fight," Ochaco said. "The room's a giant mess."
"Like you said, Koji wasn't one to give up," I said as I took a picture of the room. "But…his killer was just as stubborn it appears."
*The room is in complete disarray, the table on its side and clothes scattered everywhere*
The next thing we noticed, was a chair that was all the way on the other end of the room, away from the table and other chairs.
"Wonder what it's doing all the way over here," Ochaco asked as she walked over it.
"Maybe it was thrown over here during the fight?" I suggested.
"Probably…but it so much further away than all the other chairs," Ochaco said.
"You found that strange too?" Mezo asked, looking over at us. "It is the only chair that ended up this far away, I doubt random chance has anything to do with it. Perhaps a further investigation of it is required then."
Following his advice, I started to look over the chair. The first thing I did was stand it up on its legs. One thing about it was obvious though.
"There's some blood on the side of it," I said, bringing attention to the red mark that was located on one of the bars, the left if you had the front facing you.
"Why is there blood on the chair?" Ochaco asked.
"I don't really know," I said as I took a picture of it. "But let's hope we can find out."
*There was a spot of blood present on one of the chairs*
I looked over the chair a few more times, and I eventually found something else.
"There's a dent in the chair," I said as I pointed out a small dent on the flat seat of the chair. "Do you think it was used in the fight?"
"I guess there's a chance," Ochaco said. "But…maybe it got the dent after getting thrown over here?"
"You have a point there," I said as I snapped of picture of the chair. "But let's make a note of it just in case."
*A small dent was found on this chair, there's a chance it was used in the fight between Koji and his attacker*
"Do you see anything else?" I asked.
"Well…" Ochaco said as her stomach growled, making her blush in embarrassment. "S…Sorry…we ended up skipping breakfast, right?"
"That's alright," I said. "Maybe we can go get a snack real quick?" Ochaco immediately nodded, and we made our way to the kitchen. As we were walking through the dining area, we were stopped by Yuga.
"Did you discover anything yet?" Yuga asked. "I'm sure once I start my own investigation, I'll find the perpetrator in no time." It's odd how quick he can go from confident, to scared, to confident again. But I don't really have to time to worry about that.
"We've found a few pieces of evidence, but nothing that can pin it on anyone yet," Ochaco said. "Whoever did this must have been super careful."
"If you guys aren't finding anything, then what are the chances that we will?" Toru asked.
"I plan to go take a look myself," Tsuyu said as she stood up. "It seemed somewhat crowded, so I decided to wait."
"Well, the two of us are taking a small break," I said. "Feel free to take a look yourself for now."
"I'll take you up on that offer, I'll let you know if I find anything unusual," Tsuyu said as she walked off to the laundry room.
"So, what have you guys found so far?" Hanta asked.
"Well, we saw a few bruises on Koji," I explained. "And there was a small dent on of the chairs as well as a spot of blood. I think there's a chance it was used in a fight between Koji and his killer."
"That's all you guys have found?" Denki asked.
"We also saw some blood around his mouth," Ochaco said. "We think it may have been from coughing up blood after he was stabbed."
"Did you guys even read the Monokuma file yet?" Kyoka asked, looking up from her own e-Handbook.
"Not really…" I admitted. "Like Hanta first said, it's kinda obvious to see what killed him."
"Suit yourself then," she said as he went back to her own business.
"Maybe I'll give the room a brief sweep myself," Hanta said as he stood up. "No use sitting around doing nothing. We gotta be prepared for whatever Monokuma has in store." With that said, he walked off to join the others investigating.
"Let's go get that snack now," Ochaco said as she began to walk to the kitchen. When we got there, we saw Rikido walking around, looking around somewhat nervously, like he was looking for something almost.
"Are you okay Rikido?" I asked, walking up to him. "What are you looking for?"
"Hm?" Rikido said as he looked over at us. "Oh, hey there." He went back to looking around, opening a couple of cabinets as he said, "One of the kitchen knives went missing. I wanna find it before someone else accidently stumbles upon it and hurts themselves."
"Kitchen knives?" Ochaco asked.
"Yeah," Rikido said as he stood up and pointed to a small section of the wall, where knives of various sizes were hanging. "They were all there last night, and one of them is missing now. I gotta bad feeling about this…"
"Deku…don't those kinda…" Ochaco started to say. But she didn't have to say it, as I was having the exact same thought.
"Rikido, I think I know where that knife is," I said, gaining his attention.
"Really?" he said, a small smile on his face. "That's a relief."
"Well…the thing is…I think it was used to kill Koji," I said.
"Oh, that so?" Rikido said, as a moment of silence passed. "….Wait! WHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTTT!?" The two of us were caught off guard by his sudden shout. "W-W-What do you mean by that!?"
"W-W-Well…the shape of the knife matches the ones over there," I said. "It's…really the only thing that makes sense."
"D…Damn it…" Rikido said as his shoulders sank a bit. "And I tried to make extra sure that those knives would be alright. At least it looks like none of the others have been touched."
"How do you know that?" Ochaco asked.
"Well, they're not out on any of the counters, and they're all dry and clean, meaning they haven't had a need to be washed yet," Rikido said.
"Looks like we got a couple more pieces of evidence," I said as I took a picture of the knife set. "Rikido, do you mind if I take a picture of you?"
"Hm? Why do you need to do that?" Rikido asked.
"We'll need as much evidence as possible," I explained. "And if what you said is right, it may be useful to explain something."
"Then go ahead!" Rikido said with a smile. "I don't think I can be much help much in actually investigating, but if I can help in any other way, let me know." After he said that, I took a picture of him.
*A set of knives found in the kitchen, the location where the murder weapon came from*
*All the knives were in the kitchen the previous night, none of the other knives looked like they were used at all*
After we had a small snack, which consisted of fruit, we immediately headed back to the laundry room. As soon as we arrived, Tenya, Shoto, and Momo were leaving.
"You're going back inside?" Tenya asked.
"Yeah, we were just taking a small break," I said.
"Well, the three of us are done for now," Momo said. "Now we just have to wait until Monokuma makes his next announcement."
"I wish you two luck in your continued investigation," Tenya said as he and Momo walked off towards the dining hall.
Shoto remained where we was, turning his head to us as he said, "I'm sure we all found the same evidence so far. The killer didn't know what would happen, and did a sloppy job covering their tracks. Although, even with the evidence I have, I still have no idea who could have done it." He started to walk away as he then said, "Check the trash can, you may find something useful, or useless."
"The trash can?" Ochaco repeated. "What could be in the trash can?"
"From the sound of it, potential evidence," I said as we walked into the room. Tsuyu was busy looking over Koji's body herself. Hanta meanwhile was looking around the room. Ochaco and I went straight to the trashcan, which was next to the washing machine closest to the door.
"Is there anything inside it?" Ochaco asked, looking around me into the trashcan.
"Yeah…but, I'm not sure what it is," I said as I pulled something out of the trashcan. It was long, white, and kinda stretchy. "What even is this?"
"I…have no idea at all," Ochaco said, looking just as confused as me.
"Well…Shoto thought it might be useful…" I said. "Should I put this into my evidence?"
"May as well," Ochaco said. "We'll need as much evidence as possible." With that said, I took a picture of the weird thing.
*Mystery item found in the trash can in the laundry room*
"Hey guys," Tsuyu said, gaining our attention as I placed the item back in the trash can. "You may wanna have a look at this." The two of us walked over to where Tsuyu still was. And we saw that she actually managed to flip over Koji's body, the knife lying next to him.
"What did you find?" I asked, doing my best not to look at the knife.
"Look right here," she said as she pointed to the center of his back.
"Is that…a shoe print?" Ochaco asked, tilting her head in curiosity.
Tsuyu nodded as she said, "Yep, and it can only come from his attacker. The question is, why is there a shoe print on his back?"
"Why do you say that?" I asked.
"If this was just a straight forward fight, there shouldn't be a foot print this clear on him," Tsuyu said. "I don't really know why it would be there myself though."
"Guess we're going to have to add it to the list of other mysteries about this then," I said as I took a picture of the shoe print.
*A strange shoe print located on Koji's back, the reason for it being there is unclear*
"I don't really see any other places we can investigate," Ochaco said, looking around the room once more.
"Do you think we've found everything we could then?" I asked, standing back up as Tsuyu did the same.
"We'll have to examine all of our evidence carefully if we want to find out who the killer is," Tsuyu said. But after that, a familiar chime went off and Monokuma appeared on the monitor.
*Ding Dong, Bing Bong*
"So…I'm getting tired of waiting. What say we just get stared hm?" Monokuma said. "It's time for the long awaited Class Trial! Now then, allow me to appoint a proper location for the proceedings. Please go through the red door on the first floor of the school. Upupupu…See you guys soon!" After that, the monitor turned off.
"Looks like we're out of time to investigate anyways," Tsuyu said as she began to walk off, Hanta following behind her.
"A…A Class Trial?" Ochaco questioned, looking over at me.
"Monokuma wants us to find out who killed Koji," I said as I began to walk off, Ochaco walking next to me. "I guess the best way he thinks we can find out is through an actual trial. But…knowing him, there's probably gonna be a twist to it."
"You're probably right," Ochaco said. The rest of the way was walked in silence, and we soon came across the large red door. The door that would lead us to the Class Trial. Walking through, we now stood in a large empty room, with what looked like an elevator grate on the other end. Everyone else was already here though, even Katsuki.
"Hey, what kept you guy?" Denki asked.
"Sorry, we were just thinking about all the stuff we found," I answered.
"Well, Tenya and Momo shared everything that they discovered with us," Yuga said. "Those two were fairly thorough with their investigation, so we probably have all the evidence you guys found."
"Probably," I said, as I took out my e-Handbook and began to look through my evidence again. My eyes landed upon the Monokuma File, and remembering what Kyoka said, I opened it up and read through what it said. And what I found, shocked me.
*The victim was Koji Kouda, he was killed at approximately 10:10 P.M. His body was found in the laundry room, and his cause of death is asphyxiation from being strangled*
He was…strangled to death? But…that doesn't make any sense, that doesn't line up with what we've seen at all! What in the world…this whole case just got turned upside down for me. The monitor turned on again, and I barely payed attention to what Monokuma said.
"Upupu…Is everyone here? Okay then," Monokuma said. "Please board the elevator in front of you, which will transport you to the courtroom…where all your fates will be decided. Upupu…I'll meet you all down there. I'll be waiting…" With those ominous words, Monokuma shut off the monitor, and the door to the elevator opened up. Everyone looked at each other nervously, not sure if we should really go through with this. Then, Shoto, Tenya, Fumikage, and Momo entered the elevator. Next went Mashirao, Mezo, Kyoka and so forth, until I was the only one standing outside the elevator.
"Hey, Izuku, you coming?" Minoru asked nervously, the others looking over at me as well.
"I know you're probably really nervous," Tenya said. "But you cannot hesitate, you must face this trial head on."
Face this trial head on? How can I do that when everything I thought I knew about this probably isn't right? How will we be able to find Koji's killer? There are too many questions that are impossible to answer. What should I do? What should I do? What should I do!? …What…what would All Might do in a situation like this? All Might…he would persevere through this, and do his best to find the solution. I looked down at my right hand and curled it into a fist, then looking up in determination, I walked into the elevator and stood between Ochaco and Tenya, the doors closing behind me and the elevator beginning its decent. If these questions seem impossible to answer, we'll just answer them one at a time until they start making sense. We will find out who killed Koji, because that is our only goal right now.
The elevator soon came to a loud stop, and the doors opened in front of us, revealing the battle ground where our next fight would take place.
A/N: Here it is, the investigation. I admit, it's a bit rough, but hopefully it can be remedied in the future. I bet some of you are probably wondering why this took so long. The reason is pretty simple, right after I wrote this, I immediately began to write the trial, and went back and forth between this one and that to make sure everything lined up. So that one is mostly done already, I just may have to go back and tweet a few things as well as finish up the post trial scene. That being said, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. Leave a Review on your thoughts and Favorite and Follow if you haven't already. Seeya later.