"Hello everyone!" A loud fancy voice called, utterly ruining my peaceful sleep, "now I know you're tired from the last motive, but you know the saying, our work is never over!"
"Shut up!" Someone nearby yells. I stretch with a bit of resistance, and pop my back... Ugh, It feels like I've been sleeping on a rock.
"Why are you in my room?" Some else interjects. I vaguely get the feeling something's wrong, and reluctantly opened one eye.
"What do you mean, your room?!" I see Haruna shoot up into a sitting position before her eyes bug out of her head and she lets out a scream. I sit up in the realization that I went to sleep in my room and now I am not.
"What's going on why are we in the gym?" Yukihiro asked startled, bringing her hands up to slap her face and to somehow jerk Akira with her. The two stare at each other in shock, when Yukihiro lifts her hand and Akira's follows, "Why are we handcuffed together?!"
"Ha, you're stuck together," Haruna laughs going to point and bringing Veliah toppling on her, "what, us too?" With the confirmation of two pairs handcuffed, everyone began scrambling to check themselves. I turn to see Yoshiki on my left, we both give a look of resignation and look at our wrists to see that, yes we were handcuffed.
"Why is there three of us," I turn to my right to find a blank faced M stating, "why is there three of us?!" He says louder shaking his and my right wrist.
"You've been asleep for a whole day, slept right through our new morning and night announcements. So I expect you better listen right now," the voice was regal and commanding, if a bit robotic. It was a mono-teacher, female this time, "I am Mono-teacher 34 and this is your second motive, you shall spend all eternity bound to one another until death do you part," with those words she gained a dreamy (creepy) aura, and from what I could tell from her position on the stage it looked like she was our new announcer.
"Hey, don't make it sound like I'm marrying this idiot!" Haruna screeched, I could feel Veliah's irritation from being flailed about as Haruna pointed angrily.
"I-isn't this a bit-umm," Danny's face was pensive as he eyed the connection between him and Kenta, "how are we going to have any privacy?"
"We found it more amusing this way," the new speaker announced, "same with the trio, we ran out of people and had to improvise," the mono-teacher claps her hands, "any more questions?"
"Is this it?" I ask, "Is there anything else to the motive, and what happened to the first guy?"
"Yes, this is all there is," the mono-teacher cocks her head, "what happened to Mono-teacher 21 does not matter, and the second floor is open," with a spin she left, her heels clicking as she went.
"Why did you ask that?" Yoshiki asked.
"During the first motive the first announcer said that we would learn why the mastermind isn't here on the 2nd motive," I said, Yoshiki nodded for me to continue, "and now we are not only not getting that, but 'announcer' Mono-teacher 21 is gone."
"They are probably trying to cover something up," M reasoned, "a sudden drop in mono-teachers, poorly done security, missing people, new people, tight lipped information, I've killed enough high profile criminals to know when someone had loose ends."
"Yeah, I see what you mean," I said thinking back, I remember multiple times a few of us were able to sleep without detection, it must have been because the mono-teachers were disappearing.
"Right now, we just have to little to go on, but I'm sure soon enough we will get everything we need" Yoshiki said, before standing up, bringing us up with him, "for now we have the second floor to explore." As we leave I see the others, making note of the pairs; Danny with Kenta, Haruna and Veliah, James and Evan, Yukihiro with Akira, and Kojiro and Alan.
"Ah, I want to check the bulletin board before we go," I say trying to walk us all over to it, thankfully the two followed.
The Bulletin Board
1. Students may reside only within the school. Leaving campus is an unacceptable use of time.
2. "Nighttime" is from 10 pm to 7 am. Some areas are off-limits at night, so please exercise caution.
3. Sleeping anywhere other than the dormitory will be seen as sleeping in class and will be punished accordingly.
4. With minimal restrictions, you are free to explore Hope's Peak Academy at your discretion.
5. Violence against headmaster, and teachers is strictly prohibited
6. Anyone who kills a fellow student and becomes "blackened" will graduate, unless they are discovered.
7. Using only your own abilities, and not outside forces, can you take the Monokuma-handcuff off.
8. More rules may be added if necessary.
"Number 7 is different," I say, "so if we can find a key or something then we can escape." We both look at the cuffs, they were large and thick and had no chain to distance them, so we were very limited in movement.
"I don't think so, these cuffs don't have a key hole," Yoshiki said, inspecting them, "were stuck."
"That's what you think," M says before we hear a gross 'POP', I stare in disgust at him wriggling his hand out and popping his thumb back in place, "I'm free to go."
"Don't do that, you could hurt yourself," Yoshiki scolds, "what if it didn't go back in right, you might get arthritis popping your fingers like that." M scoffs and leaves before Yoshiki could scold him more.
"I guess this is better, at least I have a hand free now," I said as we left the gym and headed to the cafeteria. After spending all of our time there for the first motive, everyone agreed it would be the most sensible meeting place. Clunking the free handcuff on the table I roll my wrist, being tied to someone strong like M really took the majority of the weight off me, now I have a ball and chain bringing me down.
"We should see a mono-teacher about removing that since it isn't in use anymore," Yoshiki persuades.
"Nah it's fine," I say, it would be to much of a bother and we were already holding up the meeting with our talking, but under Yoshiki stern gaze I promised to do it later.
"Ok, so the new floor is open, since we are already in pairs we can explore at our own freedom," Kenta said, drawing attention to him, "the clocks are back, and on our way here I didn't see any postings about door timers, so I don't believe we need to worry about getting trapped and starving to death, haha!.. anyways meet back here at... 3 o'clock- 4 at the latest- that should give you about 4-5 hours to explore and that's about it." Everyone began to disperse out the door. despite being stuck in pairs people still managed to find their friends and travel in a clustered group.
"Do you..uh...think the second floor is the same as it was in the broadcast of the first killing game?" I hear Danny hesitantly ask Akira, and gets a simple shrug in reply.
Me and Yoshiki continue up the stairs before pausing, "it's been a long time since I was last here," Yoshiki sighs, "there's a classroom up a head, we can ask about the cuffs there." We go to the door of classroom 2A and find Alan and Kojiro as well.
"We want to check the room out, see if we can find anything," Kojiro explains, and we file in.
"Sup... I'm Mono-teacher 42...and this is 2A," the Mono-teacher was sprawled out in their chair.
"One of us got out of the chains and we were wondering if you could take it off since it's just dead weight now," Yoshiki explains, 42 lazily stands up and slowly comes over. They grab the hanging cuff and fiddle with it, twisting it over and my arm in the process, before dropping it and almost taking me down with it.
"Yeah there's nothing I can do," it laughs, before pushing Yoshiki, "I'm just playing with you, only the one wearing the cuffs can take them off," Yoshiki did not like that and went to push back, "ah-ah, don't want to get punished for breaking such a stupid rule do you?" With a glare Yoshiki grabbed my hand and pulled me out.
"Let's go we have plenty of other things to do then talk to deadbeats like this," Yoshiki said, before dragging us out the door, "I can't believe that."
"What did you think was going to happen?" Alan scoffs, walking out the door. Alan seemed... off, like he was angry but happy at the same time, if that makes sense. Kojiro stumbled out, shutting the door with a wide eyed, dazed expression. With a aggravated huff Alan pulled Kojiro away faster, both disappearing down the stairs.
"What happened to them?" I ask.
"Who?" Yoshiki stopped, "oh, maybe that Monokuma teacher insulted them too?"
"Perhaps," I mumble, "let's go to the pool next, I haven't been to one since before the tragedy began." So we set off, there were two rooms that led to the pool, a boys and girls changing room. They were both guarded by a female and male mono-teacher, equal in muscle and intimidation.
"Females only," the girls' changing room guard (the GCRG, my mind dubs) stated harshly, she seemed to tower over us.
"Men may come through this way," the BCRG (that's too similar, maybe BCG instead... Wow, nicknames are hard to make) stepped away from the door and allowed us in. The room looked no different from before, so we went into the pool part and that was a mistake. It was hot and uncomfortably humid, I started sweating the moment I went in, it seems like jackets and indoor pools do not mix. I want to take my jacket off but it's not worth the trouble it'd cause, so I looked around the room and saw Haruna and Veliah, Haruna was trying to get the other to follow her somewhere and it looked like Veliah wasn't having it. With a huff, Haruna stopped -Veliah obviously relieved- and stared at the water before perking up, it was like watching a video of live news bloopers, you can see the mistake coming and feel the second they realize the mistake but the anticipation was still real.
"Cannonball!" Haruna screamed the same time Veliah let out a pleading "NO," Haruna jumped as high as she could and hit with a raining splash, Veliah was jerked in after her with a angry yell, her cape bellowing out behind her.
"I can't believe you, I said I didn't want to swim!" Veliah flailed in the water as Haruna cackled like a little kid. They were both soaking wet, and Haruna's usually lightly curly hair was stuck to her looking like a wet sheepdog, "We don't even have bathing suits!"
"Hey we're already wet, we can swim now!" Haruna said excitedly, Veliah's glare could kill, "You guys can join us!" She yelled waving to us.
"I'm good," I said, "besides we've got more to explore," Yoshiki and I quickly left before we could get roped in.
"We have the library next, and I doubt we need to see the other classroom," I say looking around, in the library we met the pairs of James and Evan, along with Yukihiro and Akira. All four were reading books though some more interested then others. They were all sitting down and reading, except James who was precariously seated on a stack of books having a long one sided conversation with a annoyed Evan.
"Hey, did you find anything?" I ask Yukihiro and by proxy Akira.
"Not really, but these books we found are wonderful," Yukihiro exclaimed, she tried to pick up a book from a stack but ended up toppling the whole thing. It was a chain reaction, the stack knocking over others like dominoes until it reached James's impromptu chair taking him and Evan down. With a wince Yukihiro turned away from the spetical and back to me, "I've always been clumsy, and being tied to someone just makes me worse!" She said solemnly.
"It's ok, it's the same for everyone," I say quickly.
"Yes, it's no trouble being with you," Akira chimes in, in case Yukihiro starts to think herself a burden.
"There really isn't much else to explore, do you want to stay here and read?" Yoshiki asks me, I agree and look for a seat.
"You can take ours," Yukihiro offers, when I see that none are left, "Akira-sama is kindly indulging me by allowing me to drag her around to clean."
"Cleaning, huh," I guess some people really do find cleaning relaxing, or it's just her SHSL maid instincts taking over at the sight of this dusty library. I have a sudden urge to help her with it, should I hang out with Yukihiro today? Yes, "Yoshiki, do you mind if we help her out? I heard it can be calming to clean."
"Why not," he agrees, and we go to help Yukihiro and Akira. We both had a few inches of height on the girls so we got high shelves book duty. In my book filing I found a 'multipurpose' book? In curiosity of what multipurpose things it talks of, I open it. The book is full of promotions for dresses, cooking recipes, cleaning tips, music charts, and a jewelry catalog... This is certainly multipurpose, I give the book to Yukihiro.
"Oh, multipurpose?" She reads confused.
"It's all about jewelry and clothes and cooking," I list.
"Certainly a broad range in here," she says setting the book aside, "I might read it later, with the apocalypse and everything I found it's hard to come by such mundane things like this."
"I enjoy Mun-'plane' things too," Akira cracks a smile at her own joke.
"Pfft, I didn't expect you could crack a joke like that," Yukihiro laughs. It looks like Yukihiro is having fun, maybe this handcuff thing isn't so bad, at least it's making people get to know others they wouldn't usually be around. After that we all busied ourselves with cleaning the library, taking breaks every now and then to show off weird book we managed to find.
"What got you into being a maid?" I ask Yukihiro when things started to wind down and we were running out of things to clean.
"It just felt natural, I've been taking care of others my whole life so it looked like the perfect fit, looking out for others is just what I do," she reminisced, a pained expression flashed on her, "though I ruined that ideology pretty good, got caught up in the moment of the tragedy and lost something important."
"What did you lose?" I ask, curious.
"My sister..." she whispered, "I spent my whole life caring for them, being the big sister I was supposed to be. My parents were always busy with work so I would cook, clean, get money when I could to help take care of them. My twin sister, her name is Yamimi, and Mikio my little brother, they're all fine -thank god for that- but my youngest sister, Michiko went missing because of me, I chased her away when I was in despair," Yukihiro movements slowed as she got lost in thought.
'Despair?' My mind stopped at that word, was Yukihiro a remnant of despair? No that's not possible, I think I would know if she was.
"But that doesn't matter anymore, that was in the past and all that matters is that I'm trying to fix it now," she said optimistically, her green eyes scrunched by her smile, "when I get out I'll find my sister and make things right."
"That's a good goal to have," Akira added in, "maybe when we get out we can all help you find her."
"Yeah, count me in," James said, "how about you Evan?"
Evan gave an annoyed hum at the question and reluctantly set down his book, "If it comes to that, I'll consider it."
We spent the rest of the day talking peacefully in the library, it wasn't until it began to get late we realized we had a dilemma, "Oh, how are we going to sleep!" Yukihiro exclaimed to Akira.
Akira thought for a moment, "We could get my blankets and pillows I'll sleep on the floor next to your bed and you could hang your arm over."
"As good of a plan as that is, I don't know if I'd be able to do that," Yukihiro said apologetically.
"It's fine because you won't have to!" A voice said behind us, it was mono-teacher 55, it was strangely nice to see he wasn't wiped out like 21, "At night time the cuffs will be released from each other so that's the only privacy you'll get!" I heard a few happy cheers at that, "and in the morning you'll have five minutes to get back to your partner or suffer the effects of the cuffs!" With a wave of his hand the night time announcement sounded and the cuffs let out a beep, unhooking our hands. After that everyone went to their rooms ecstatic at having their alone time. Flopping on my bed I observed the deadweight stuck to my wrists, the cuffs were actually quite stylish-if a bit bulky and rudimentary- it was half white and black with a count down of 9 hours and 4 minutes scrolling across it in red LED lights. It must be counting down the time until mourning when something will happen, I wonder what 55 meant by 'suffer the effects'? With a yawn I start to doze off, I'm still too tired from the first motive to think about something like that.
Those cuffs sound familiar ;) well I'm a little bit late, sorry about that, and I was really hoping I could stick to my goal! :/ anyways this chapter is a bit shorter then I wanted but I like it still so might as well post it before I start to hate it!