There seems to be a lot of confusion over what's happened with Naegi's hoodie last chapter. That's a callback to what happened in Chapter 40, but that was a long time ago so no wonder few people remember. Basically, back during the confessional chapter (the one where Naegi was stuck in a confessional with a corpse), one of the things that really stuck with Naegi was the smell. The next time Naegi tried to put on his hoodie (Chapter 40), it turned out that some of that scent had clung to his hoodie. He's held an irrational fear of it ever since.


The Report

There was a knock on the trapdoor.

"Oh, Naegi-kun!"

Naegi shuffled out of bed, the rabbit still under his arm as he dully shouted, "Come in!"

Komaeda did. He bounced down the steps, grin as wide as ever. He nodded with approval at the revised Hope Wall, oddly at ease despite the downtrodden body language of the room's resident.

"Somebody's been hard at work," Komaeda said. "I'm actually here to grab you for dinner, but before we go –"

There was a squeak. Then a series of crashes and bangs as someone tumbled down the stairs.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Tsumiki cried. She was crumpled on the ground, face down, legs trailing up the angle of the stairs behind her.

"Mikan!" Naegi rushed over, fretting as he crouched by her prone body. Komaeda stepped forward, but made no move to help her get up.

"Ah, Tsumiki-san. What are you doing here?"

She looked up at him with round eyes. "M-me? I was coming to get Makoto for dinner."

To Naegi, this seemed like a perfectly reasonable response, but Komaeda didn't seem to think so. His posture was stiff as he said, "I told you guys I would get him."

"Oh, y-yes, you did . . . But I wanted to see what he had done with his room!"

"You couldn't check after dinner?"

"I. . . um . . ."

Naegi patted Komaeda's shoulder. "It's okay. Now I get to hang out with my two most favourite people! So, what did you want to do before we left?"

Komaeda still seemed to be watching Tsumiki from the corner of his eye, but he was smiling at Naegi. "Oh, I just wanted you to see these."

He pulled out a bunch of large papers from under his hoodie. He flipped the first one up, and handed it over.

The first thing Naegi saw was himself. He was in one of his finger-pointing poses, although the lower half of his body had been cropped out. That image of him took up over half the page and underneath, in bold letters, were the following words:

'Don't Lose Hope!"

"That's me! But why?"

"I told you, didn't I? The resistance movements loved using your face after you defeated Enoshima-san!"

He leafed through the pile of posters. He was on every single one. Sometimes, the others would be there too, but he was on every one, front and center. He either wore a big smile, or a look of fierce determination he hadn't known he could make. Some of them were probably edited, because there were a couple where he actually looked a bit scary (he didn't think it was a coincidence that those ones had tanks on them). And just as Komaeda had claimed before, the slogans he saw were all his. Sometimes, they had been modified, but he could see his words as the root of all of them.

"They were everywhere," Komaeda said. "Every city, every block. . . that's why everyone in the world knows your name."

"Everyone?" he said weakly.

Komaeda nodded. He looked at Tsumiki for support, and she fervently agreed. Naegi closed his eyes and bit back a groan as the weight of his title began to settle once more.

"Let's put these up on your Hope Wall," Komaeda said.

He didn't argue. Where else would they go?

Once they were done, Naegi studied his work, buying time before he asked his next question. Komaeda was doing the same, and Tsumiki was happily examining one of the pictures that had her in the background.

Naegi asked then, "Can I have a calendar?"

Komaeda whipped around. "Why!"

He recoiled, not expecting the aggressive reaction, "J-just to keep track of things! I thought . . . I mean like I know Mioda rehearses every Thursday and . . . I'm sorry!"

But the apology was unnecessary. Komaeda had already softened by the time those two words fell out of Naegi's lips.

"If that's all you want it for, then how could I say no?" he said.

Naegi said nothing. He didn't really understand what else he could use it for.

They left for the dining hall. Komaeda managed to carve out a space for them right in the middle of everyone, and then he and Tsumiki took their customary seats next to him. Most people had already started eating, and Naegi hoped that meant there wasn't going to be much talking. However, he looked up then, across the table, and saw Nevermind staring right at him.

"Ah, Makoto. It's nice that you could join us," Nevermind said.

He managed a jagged smile. "Yeah."

Nevermind smiled pleasantly. Her left hand was laid out on the table, abnormally still, deathly pale, making the red polish on those talon-like nails even more striking . . .

"Komaeda-kun, I hope you're still not upset about losing this." Still smiling as if nothing in the world was wrong, Nevermind stroked her dead hand's knuckles with her other fingers. "Given the commotion you caused, it was only natural you lost that privilege."

Time stopped. Komaeda . . . Komaeda had . . . His eyes flickered to the Luckster's intact hand. Komaeda had been going to . . . No. Nevermind must be wrong. He wouldn't do that. Komaeda would never . . . How could he!

He grabbed Komaeda's hand. He wanted to hold it close to himself, to curl around it and protect it until Enoshima was truly gone.

"Naegi-kun?"

"You . . . were you going to cut it off?" Naegi whimpered.

Komaeda looked at him for a too long moment.

"No," he said. "I wasn't."

"Good. I . . . I like this hand."

It was lame, but he didn't know what else to say. Komaeda seemed to like it though, and gave Naegi's hand a little squeeze.

"I'm sorry," Nevermind said, "but is it that you believe Komaeda-kun is more suited for a different body part? Or perhaps, are you still upset about what happened to yours?"

He was silent. In another situation, Nevermind's smile would have soothed all his worries. Now, it only amplified them.

"It must be very upsetting," Nevermind said. "I can only imagine how much you were looking forward to it. To be able to finally see the world as she saw it; to have a piece of her with you forever. It must truly be heartbreaking. Had we known that her eye had gone missing beforehand, surely one of us would have surrendered our gift for you."

He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He ended up scooting closer to Komaeda.

"I don't think he wants to talk about it," Komaeda said tactfully, as he draped his arm around Naegi's shoulders.

"Oh, please forgive me! I didn't consider what a sensitive topic that must be for you."

"It's okay," Naegi croaked. He found it much easier to speak now that he was staring at Komaeda's hoodie rather than her.

He ended up eating dinner with his face basically smashed into the table. He didn't want to look up. If it wasn't Nevermind's hand he saw, then it might be the rightmost two fingers on Tanaka's hand (Apparently, the rest of Enoshima's hand had been too damaged), Kuzuryu's eyepatch, or the pink hair weaving its way through Saionji's natural ones. And that was only what he knew about. Who knew what other horrors lurked under those layers of clothing? His behaviour didn't go unnoticed. Tsumiki saw him picking at his food for much too long, and eventually grabbed his wrist and forced him to scoop up proper bites. His stomach was churning, and only seemed to get worse the more was dropped in it, but he didn't dare say anything.

Afterwards, he shrugged off Komaeda and Tsumiki and returned to his room. Tanaka must have visited before him, because he walked in on Kuma scarfing down his dinner. There was some flashes of pink flesh in that pile, but today it was mostly roots and berries (bears needed rounded diets, too!). Which was good because the last thing he wanted to think about was Tanaka and . . . meat.

(Kuma wouldn't do that, right? Kuma was a good bear. Tanaka wouldn't make him do that)

He slithered into bed. Then, on second thought, he got up and dragged the wastebasket over. He really wasn't feeling well. A gnawing feeling was spreading upwards from his abdomen, and his insides pinched and sparked as if something had started nibbling on them. It was too uncomfortable to sleep, but it was too painful to get up and move around too much, either.

Sometime later, he heard steps on the stairs.

"Umm . . . Makoto?"

"Hey," he said dully. He was on his back above the covers, staring at the ceiling. Kuma was jawing his shoe.

"Are you okay?" Tsumiki asked. "You were acting strange during dinner."

"I don't feel very well," Naegi admitted.

Tsumiki sat down on the bed next to him. She laid her hand across his forehead.

"Well . . . you don't seem to have a fever."

Naegi was silent.

"Is everything okay?" Tsumiki asked.

He stared at her.

Somehow, that question, that concern, was enough to start the waterworks.

He ignored the panic on her face, rolled over and buried his face in her side. (It felt good, it felt like he was sheltered somehow, but he couldn't forget that it had been Komaeda who had gone to jail for him; Komaeda who had attacked those trying to hurt him). Her light and hesitant touch brushed across his back, before settling more firmly in a half-hug. The fabric under his eyes became damp as he cried silently; only the hitching of his breath would have betrayed him.

"They wanted to . . . Kuzuryu was going to . . . my eye."

The hand stroking his back paused.

"Oh. You wanted to –?"

"No! No!" He registered, dimly, that his nails were piercing her clothing and digging into her skin, but didn't stop. "I don't want it! They're going to take my eye. They're going to tear it out, and then they're going to stick hers in, and I'm going to be stuck with Enoshima's eye in my head forever!"

He couldn't breathe. Why couldn't he breathe? Tsumiki was saying something, but he couldn't understand because there wasn't enough air and he couldn't breathe. He was sitting up – he was on his back. There was a hand on his head? On his back? His brain could no longer distinguish where the signals were coming from.

He choked himself out eventually and that ironically, threw him brain into enough of a stupor to breathe again. Tsumiki was holding his hand, tears running down her own face.

"They're going to take my eye," he whispered. And in that moment, he felt it inside him. Cold and suffocating, greasy and black; it covered his mind in heavy coils, dragging it down into the darkness . . .

"No, no!" Obviously freaking out herself, Tsumiki smoothed his hair back. "Nobody's going to take your eye."

"They'll find it," he said hollowly. "They'll find it, and then they'll take mine and . . ."

"They won't find it!" Tsumiki shouted. "Nobody's going to hurt you. I won't let them."

Naegi said nothing.

She laid down next to him, her forehead against his. "Makoto, can you keep a secret?"

"A secret?"

Tsumiki trembled. He could see her swallow as she moved her head back. She reached up slowly, her fingers slowly crawling up her face before they dug into her eye and what was she doing –?

The contact peeled off, and Naegi was left staring at clear grey.

"M-Mikan . . ." Awestruck, he reached towards her. If she hadn't blinked, he probably would have poked her straight in the eye, so caught up in amazement was he. What happened to the red? What did it mean? Why . . . why did it feel like a black film was being peeled off his mind?

"I-it's gone," she said. "Her eye . . . it can't hurt you anymore."

She didn't need to spell it out. He understood. How she had done it didn't matter to him.

He smiled. He truly smiled. Then he laughed, and laughed and laughed and couldn't stop laughing even as he wrapped his arms around her shoulders and buried his face in her neck. Tears, good tears, dotted his eyes and the world was bright and full of song and everything was going to be okay

(And deep inside, he felt it . . .)

(. . . the flame of hope burning once more.)


The rapping of knuckles against metal woke the older man. It took longer than it should have for him to physically react, although if one took in the too-thin, trembling limbs, it made sense why. Iwata slowly pushed himself up high enough to look in the direction of his cell door. To nobody's surprise, he saw the small form of Naegi crouched there.

Naegi waved. "Sorry, I know you were sleeping, but I didn't want to just leave this here and let the rats get it."

Naegi held out his other hand. What it held, a third of a loaf of bread, wouldn't have been impressive to most, but it still was enough for Iwata to crawl out of bed and make his way over. The man thanked him quietly as he accepted the gift, and took a big bite.

"I spent most of last time under your bed," Naegi said, "so I didn't really notice before, but . . . you seem skinnier than I remember. Is that because I wasn't bringing you food anymore?"

Iwata patted his hand. "It's alright, Naegi-kun. It's not your fault."

"They're not cuffing me to that bed anymore," Naegi said. "I'm free to move around again, so I'll make up for it. I'll bring enough food to throw a party in here!"

"The sentiment is nice, but please, no parties."

Naegi's smiled faltered. "The atmosphere isn't right, is it? Maybe I can talk Kuzuryu-kun into letting you out for a day. It would probably be good for you."

Lost in his fantasies, Naegi did not see the strange way Iwata stared at him – as if Naegi had gone off and started talking about aliens.

"I'm not sure I would trust Ultimate Despair to uphold a bargain like that," Iwata said slowly.

"It's fine. I'd make them promise not to hurt you." Naegi sighed. "If I could find a way to spin this into despair, they'll probably say okay."

Iwata put his chunk of bread down. "Naegi-kun, do you trust them?"

That was a strange question. "Well, I mean if I make them promise, they wouldn't do anything. They wouldn't break their promise. Kuzuryu-kun or Komaeda-kun will probably insist on watching, but that's it. I'll make them promise not to do anything to you afterwards, too, so it'll be okay."

Iwata's eyes seemed to bore into his soul. "Naegi-kun, they kill people."

His mind blanked for a while. But, then he started to speak. "No, no, they won't hurt you if I make them promise. It's okay. They won't hurt you."

Iwata stared at him for a long time. Then, his head slumped forward, coming to rest against the metal bars. The man's eyes were closed; one hand squeezed as it wrapped around a metal bar. Naegi squirmed, warning bells going off in his head as he tasted something like despair seeping from the other man.

"Iwata-kun?" He reached through the bars and grabbed the other's shoulder. "Are you okay?"

Iwata gently, but firmly, pushed Naegi's hand off. Hurt, Naegi took his hand back, and it curled into a fist over his chest.

"Naegi-kun," Iwata rasped, "I need to ask you something."

He brightened up at the idea that he could help. "Sure!"

"Do you still want to escape?"

"Of course!"

And Iwata opened his eyes. ". . . Why?"

Naegi repeated the question. He didn't understand. Wasn't that what Iwata and everyone wanted him to do? He was supposed to escape – he needed to escape – and really, this was such a silly question.

(Why was it so hard to answer?)

"I don't understand," he finally admitted. "Escaping is what I have to do. Why are you asking this?"

"You don't have to, Naegi-kun. I'm sure Ultimate Despair doesn't want you to. But you are still choosing to pursue escape. Tell me why."

Why?

He struggled. "My friends are with the Future Foundation. I don't want to think I abandoned them."

"You'll have to abandon Ultimate Despair to return to them. Are they . . . are Ultimate Despair your friends?"

He'd . . . he'd have to leave his friends? It was odd that it hadn't really occurred to him. Or rather, the part about leaving behind his friends hadn't sunk in. His mouth went dry as the thought of leaving behind people like Komaeda and Tsumiki. They'd be so hurt. Komaeda would be so angry.

And yet . . .

"Do you still want to escape?"

Naegi nodded.

"Then think." Somehow, Iwata pressed himself closer to the bars. "I need you think hard. Why do you need to get out of here?"

Naegi bit his lip. Iwata was searching for a certain answer here, he could sense it. However, he didn't understand what it was, or where to start. His arms began to shake. Oddly, the sight of the cell bars were comforting in a small way. (No matter what he answered, Iwata couldn't get mad and hurt him).

"My classmates are my friends, too," Naegi half-said, half-whimpered. "I want to see them again, and Komaeda-kun let me listen to recordings of them at the Future Foundation, so I know they miss me, too. And . . . and it wasn't fair . . ."

"What wasn't fair?" Iwata pressed.

". . . They didn't know. They didn't know what was going to happen. Komaeda-kun didn't ask them, so it wasn't fair."

"What didn't he ask?" Iwata said. "Naegi-kun, what did Komaeda do to you?"

"He . . . he . . ."

His palms were beginning to sweat.

"He took me. He took me without asking them."

"What about you? Did he ask you?"

"N-no. He didn't ask anyone. He never asks."

Iwata's frown deepened. "He doesn't. . ."

"He never asks," Naegi said. "He makes me listen to things, and watch things. And if I don't listen to him and do it, then he gets angry. He wouldn't hurt me, but what he does hurts."

"Naegi-kun . . ."

But Naegi himself cut Iwata off with a sharp, hurried whisper. As if there were spies lurking in the shadows. "If I don't listen to him and he gets mad, he'll stop protecting Komaru. He'll let Ultimate Despair kill her. He won't tell me where my parents are, but he'll give them to Ultimate Despair, too. And then he'll . . . he'll stop protecting me. He'll let them do whatever they want with me."

"Naegi-!" Panic flashed in Iwata's expression.

"They wanted . . . they were going to rip out my eye!" A sudden urge seized him, and he came precariously close to smashing his forehead against the bars. "They wanted to stick Enoshima's eye in my head. Komaeda-kun told them no. He was the one that protected me."

As he spoke that last sentence, his eyes began to water. He felt guilty, horribly guilty . . . but he couldn't understand why. Yet something inside him knew, and it was rank with guilt.

"Iwata-kun? Please don't tell him I said any of that." Naegi whispered that as his eyes darted around the area. "He'll get so mad at me."

"Of course I wouldn't tell him. I'd never tell any of them about our conversations."

Naegi shivered.

"There's something I have to remind you of," Iwata said. "Your sister, your parents, you . . . none of you would need protecting if it wasn't for Komaeda in the first place. Don't lose sight of that. He may not be as terrible as the rest, but that doesn't make him a good person. He may have protected you once, but he's still a monster –"

Monster? Naegi snapped to attention. That was going a little too far, wasn't it? He wasn't aware he was shaking his head until he saw Iwata's face fall.

"He's not that bad," Naegi said, needing to make Iwata understand. "He does things I don't like and scares me sometimes, and he has a lot of problems. . . but they all do. It's Enoshima's fault. She hurt them all, and . . ."

"Naegi!" Iwata's hiss was fraught with pain. "You can't blame everything on her."

"She's the reason they're like this. She's the real Ultimate Despair."

"She didn't drag you here, Komaeda did." Spit flew from the other's mouth, so fierce were the words. If he were any stronger, Iwata looked as though he would have pounded his fists on the bars separating them. "Enoshima's dead. She isn't telling them what to do anymore."

It's complicated, he wanted to say, but Iwata didn't seem as though he would listen. And Naegi didn't want to make Iwata any angrier at him.

"Naegi-kun, you said . . ." Iwata took a deep, shuddering breath that rattled down his body. "You said Komaeda hurts you."

Naegi said nothing. Part of him wondered if Iwata would change the subject if he stayed quiet.

"You know that isn't normal. It's not right. He's not a good person. They are not good people."

Naegi hugged himself. He didn't want to listen, but at the same time, he couldn't stop listening.

"You're not the only one they're hurting," Iwata said. "Every day, every single day, they hurt thousands of people besides you. They are Ultimate Despair. You know what that means. You know what they do. You must remember what they did to your friends."

". . . I've seen them kill people," he admitted quietly.

"That's what they do."

Tears rolled down his cheeks. He remembered their faces: his classmates, his friends, those Future Foundation agents, the assassin – even the nameless victims in the videos Komaeda made him watch. He could see them all in his peripheral vision, watching, judging him from the shadows.

"I'm sorry," he sobbed. "I'm sorry!"

I didn't want any of you to die for me.

"Thank god I'm in Seventh Division," Iwata mumbled, head in his hands.

Naegi clung to the bars, eyes squeezed shut as the spectres drifted around them. He could almost feel cold fingers on his back.

"Naegi-kun, I need to ask you once more. Why are you trying to escape?"

"Because . . ." He swallowed and felt the world tip. "Because they're not good people, and . . . and they need to be stopped. I need to get out . . . I need . . . to spread hope."

Naegi stared into the distance. Normally, speaking to Iwata made him feel better. This time, it made him feel a lot worse. That rank, guilty thing was still rotting in his chest. Only now its roots had expanded and stretched out through his body, and they were starting to hurt. If he crawled back now, he wondered if Tsumiki would notice anything wrong.

"There's something I need to ask of you," Iwata said.

Naegi flinched. "Yes?"

"Can you promise me, that every day before you fall asleep, can you remind yourself of that? Stand in front of a mirror and remind yourself why you need to escape. Can you do that for me?"

Another duty. It felt better somehow to have a solid command to grasp.

"Okay."

". . . Come here."

Iwata reached through the bars. His hand landed on the small of Naegi's back, and tried to pulled him in. With the bars between them, it made for an uncomfortable position, but it was the closest to a hug Iwata could get.

". . . Iwata-kun, are you crying?"


Review Response:

Hola: The Future Foundation likes to pop their heads in once in a while, but this primarily a Naegi and Ultimate Despair story first.

Harjas: Kamukura is the Ultimate Fashionista. As far as canon goes, I actually started this story before DR3 was released (I think I was at chapter 12 by the time the first episode came out), so by necessity, I couldn't follow DR3 canon. However, that being said, I have no problems with adopting canon that doesn't interfere with the planned story. In other words, Juzo is most certainly gay and Chisa is most certainly evil!

xd: Sadly. Ultimate Despair is not a good environment for anyone.

Mike: TRAUMA HOODIE! 8D

Isn't dramatic irony wonderful?