Mikako woke up the next morning. Nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing strange would occur today-

"Hello Mikako."

"Damn it Jed."

"You left your door unlocked."

"Well I know that now..."

"You don't have any plans, do you?"

"Nope." Mikako buried her head back under the covers. Jed took them off of her.

"Well, you don't happen to have a costume that gives you super good luck, right...?" Mikako sat straight up.

"How'd you guess?"

Mikako opened her room door and stepped into the hallway, dressed in a ladybug patterned bodysuit and mask, with her hair in ponytails.

"Miraculous Ladybug?"

"Anime PV. I've got the super long hair ribbons and protagonist hair. But with the magical yoyo from the new non-anime show for some reason."

"Your talent makes no sense."

"You're one to talk. Exactly what does a troll have to do to be Ultimate?"

"Touche."

"Where we headed anyways?"

"The library's archives."

"Why?"

"We'll talk in there. There's no cameras..."

"So...what's this room? I didn't see it before..."

"It was with a bunch of bookshelves. It was hard to see, I guess. Not to mention that no one really paid attention to the library..."

"What are we here for?"

"To find information on why we're trapped in Despair's Drop."

"Jed..." He turned his head to look at the cosplayer, who had kneeled on the ground. She frowned nervously at the pile of papers in her hands. She handed him a sheet of paper.

"The TRAGEDY"

"Look what happened here... The biggest, most awful, most tragic event in human history. Something involving...Hope's Peak Academy?"

"Hope's Peak? You mean the school like ours but with more legitimate and less crazy people with much more realistic talents?"

"Yes...Hope's Peak academy. Apparently, a Tragedy was started by a group called the Ultimate Despair. The Tragedy began when someone started a Mutual Killing Game much like ours with the student council of Hope's Peak. The reserve course at that school went all cuckoo and angry, and then the world was thrown into chaos."

"The reserve course?"

"Looks like students that paid for entry, without having Ultimates."

"So we're trapped here because they wanted another killing game with the Hope's Peak reject school?"

"I...I guess. But I have no idea who started the killing game in the first place, aka the mastermind. Do you think that the mastermind of this game is the game as this one?"

"Maybe..."

"Welp, we learned a lot yet we learned nothing."

"Actually, this is really valuable. We need to sneak it out. Why did Mono-Reject keep this here?"

"...Mono-Reject is an idiot? Or at least, the person running it... But anyways, if you want to sneak it out, we'll have to hide it somewhere." Jed held up a few plastic bags.

"We'll put them in here, then stuff them in our clothes."

"And if Mono-Reject catches us?" He answered by leaning forward and ruffling Mikako's hair.

"There. Now we have an excuse."

"What do you mea-Oh."

"Is that all we needed to do?" Mikako dumped her pile of papers on the ground, then shoved it beneath her bed. Jed proceeded to do the same.

"Not exactly..."

"Then what else?"

"We're headed to the trial room."

"So why do you bastards want to go to the class trial room?"

Jed shrugged. "I dropped something in there last time." Mikako played translator.

"And your girlfriend needs to be there because...?" Mono-Reject smirked. Jed only shook his head and Mikako tried not to react.

"Fine. Go for it. Door's open." Mono-Reject left.

"Now, let's go distract the other students. I think they're eating right now..."

"Really? You started an argument about Tomato?" Mikako stared at the wall as the elevator descended.

"Our fellow classmates are pretty stupid. So of course starting an argument about an inanimate object is the best course of action."

"You told them a lame tomato pun and made me translate it."

"So?"

"Jed, please explain. What are we here for?"

"To sabotage the executions."

"What?!"

"Yep. Let's go. We can't let anyone else die..."

"There are so many ways this could go wrong."

"Well aware."

"They're all down this hallway. We just peek into every single one and check around. There should be plenty of executions, but we'll have to guess which ones belong to who."

"I'll take the right side, you take the left."

Mikako peered into the first execution, only to find a pink throne in a pink room with plenty of pink blood. "Oh, ew, Gushy Mushy's..." She wrinkled her nose and kept looking.

"Classified by gender I think."

"Dos Tomato classify as a male?"

"I think so."

"..Huh."

"Here!"

The both went in the room to sabotage the execution, opening doors and the like, messing with switches, and providing paths to escape.

"Is this a pizza oven?"

"This is Tomato's."

"...Oh."

"Hey...Jed...look here." Jed peered around the cosplayer's shoulder to find a large, empty room, decorated with anime and manga.

"A cosplay convention. Yours?"

"I think so."

Mikako and Jed ventured inside, then split up and began looking for potential escape routes as well as other ways to mess with things.

"There's no other ways out, is there?" Mikako yelled across the convention. She started to sweat. She might not be able to escape her own execution... Jed ran up to her.

"Look at the ceiling. Instead of a solid roof like the others...there's ceiling panels."

"Huh?"

"Get me that rope over there, then we'll find a way to get up there."

Mikako handed him the heavy, knotted rope.

"I think I know how to get up there." She took out her yoyo and offered a hand to Jed. He hesitated before taking it.

"What-"

"HANG ON!" Mikako threw the yoyo at a hanging light, and it wrapped around it. Mikako pulled the string to ensure it was tight, before letting herself and Jed fly into the air.

"I don't know why I never used my magical abilities for more useful things, but this is awesome!" Once they reached the light, Mikako shoved Jed on top of it, then winded her yoyo back together.

"What just happened."

"I don't know, but get up there and do what you need to do. I'll wait here."

"This is your execution Mikako, you'll need to know your escape route."

"Fiiiiiiine." The cosplayer huffed, but lifted the ceiling panel with Jed and followed him up into the crawlspace. It was really tight, plus the ceiling panels had a chance to fall out if the two put too much weight on it.

"There." Jed finished tying the rope around one of the beams supporting the roof. "if you manage to open the panel, the rope will drop, and you can crawl up it and get to safety."

"I get it...but where is 'safety'?"

"There's a vent/tunnel thing right there just big enough for you to get through if you hold your breath enough. I bet if you crawl through it, you'll make it somewhere."

"...Well, I guess that's potentially better than dying."

"Indeed. Now come on, let's get out of here."

"Hang on, what's that room?" The two had made it back to the hallway of executions. There was a single door on the female side left.

"We better leave..."

"One peek."

"Well...Okay Mikako."

Mikako opened the door, only to take in a sharp breath. Blood everywhere. Shredded stuffed animals. A pile of Sweet Lolita clothing near the entrance. Inactive Mono-rejects. There was the sick smell of death.

Mikako hit the ground.

Jed kept glancing up, nervously keeping an eye out for Mono-Reject. The unconscious girl in front of him hadn't really moved for the past 15 minutes.

"Mikako-San! Wake up!" But the lack of a voice didn't really help him. He had poked her face and even slapped her once, to no avail. Not to mention, the smell of Kamiko's execution was making him foggy. He took a deep breath, then grabbed the leg of his classmate and dragged her out of there. He wasn't going to just abandon her, but they had taken too long here already.

Once he had closed the door, he turned his attention back to the cosplayer.

"Mikako..."

After what seemed like forever, her eyes groggily opened.

"What..." Was all she could mutter before drifting into the halfway space between being asleep and awake. Jed lifted up her upper body, and Mikako cautiously opened her eyes again.

"Let's get out of here."

It took Mikako a second to register what had happened, but realizing the severity of the situation, stood up and began testing her legs. She was alright, if a bit more mentally scarred. The both of them began to walk to the elevator.

"What happened?"

"Uh..."

"I passed out from seeing her execution, didn't I?"

"Well...yes." Mikako stopped walking.

"Look, I'm glad you're looking out for me... But I would rather you had just run and left me there instead of risking getting caught by Mono-Reject. Then he'd really kill both of us. "

"I couldn't just leave you there."

"Yes, you could."

"No, I couldn't."

"Yes, you could."

"No, I couldn't."

"It would have been fine."

"No it wouldn't."

"Stubborn..." She grumbled. But she smiled all the same. So did he.