Togami stared at Monokuma, the bear's unsettlingly cheerful words echoing through his head. Naegi agreed to let Kirigiri try to kill him. That couldn't be true – no matter how genuinely nice Naegi might be, there were limits, weren't there? He might be willing to risk his life on Kirigiri's say-so, but that was different from agreeing to die so that she could win the game. No one sane could be that self-sacrificing.
But then again, Naegi was still suffering from a head injury and the effects of Fukawa's poison, leaving him too dizzy to stand for long on his own. And then he'd apparently been making his condition worse by climbing five flights of stairs and wandering into nausea-inducing murder scenes. It wasn't exactly a stretch to think that in this state, he might have been talked into agreeing to something so stupid without fully grasping the consequences.
Slowly, Togami felt his head turn to Naegi's direction, hoping that he would see confusion or denial on the other boy's face. But instead of any of the expressions that might have proved Monokuma to be a liar, Naegi had turned towards Togami, face stricken with shock and guilt.
Sudden bursts of pain cut into Togami's palms, and he realized that he'd clenched his fists so tightly that his nails were digging sharply into his skin. His face felt strange, almost painfully tight, locked in some expression he couldn't identify. Tension throbbed through his shoulders, a continuous vibration that seemed to shake through his entire body.
"What is he talking about?" Even as Togami said the words, they sounded as though they were coming from very far away, traveling oh so slowly to reach him.
"Uh oh!" Monokuma gasped in feigned shock. "Was that supposed to be a secret?"
Naegi turned to glare at Monokuma. "Will you just stop already?"
"Aw, so now I'm just the boring B-plot to your heart-pounding rom-com?" Monokuma said. "Does that mean you don't want to hear my hint about how I sealed off this room? You don't even care that I didn't change a single thing in here? There are so many things I could tell you –"
"Just go!"
"I see how it is." Monokuma shrugged. "Well, don't come crying to me when you remember just what genre you're really in!" He disappeared.
Togami barely noticed him going. Hearing Monokuma arguing with Naegi, just as he had during the trial yesterday, had triggered something in his memory. After the regular trial had ended, during the rule-breaking interrogations Monokuma had held, the bear had said something strange.
"If you didn't think you were breaking a rule, why did you try to hide it with that fake murder plot of yours?"
The words had slipped Togami's mind with all the confusion that had following, between the execution and Naegi's collapse, but now he remembered. Monokuma's words today weren't the first time he'd accused Kirigiri of plotting murder – and she hadn't denied it either time.
That meant that whatever had happened between Naegi and Kirigiri wasn't something from this morning, but from some earlier point. The only possibility was during the time when Kirigiri had forced that ridiculous separation on them – the time when she had apparently been working with Naegi on that failed plan with Alter Ego.
Chills ran along Togami's skin as the final pieces of the puzzle slotted into place for him. Naegi wouldn't have just agreed to let Kirigiri try to kill him to save herself – but he'd been desperately eager to try to protect Alter Ego. It was all too easy to envision Naegi agreeing to some harebrained plot if it sounded like it might help the computer program he insisted on calling his friend.
"Togami – look, I know what Monokuma said sounded bad, but it wasn't like he's making it seem."
Naegi's words drew Togami's attention back to him, and Togami narrowed his eyes at the boy's pale, earnest face. He looked so sincere, so kind – just the way he must have looked at Kirigiri when he'd pledged to go along with her idiocy.
"It sounds to me as though you foolishly agreed to let Kirigiri pretend to kill you in order to protect Alter Ego," Togami said flatly, cold fury ringing through the words.
"Oh." Naegi blinked, taken aback. "Well – yeah, that's actually about how it happened. She was never really going to kill me –"
"Are you seriously that much of an idiot?" Togami couldn't bear to hear Naegi try to defend those actions. "You agreed to give her a free hand plotting your death because she crossed her heart she didn't mean it? Did you even bother to take any precautions in case she decided to backstab you?"
"If I had, it would have been a huge giveaway that it was all an act," Naegi said. "We needed to distract Monokuma, not set off alarm bells that we were planning something!"
"Because that worked so well," Togami sneered. "And let me guess – she had some really excellent reasons why you shouldn't tell anyone about this plan, right? It had to be a big secret that only the two of you knew." He shook his head dismissively before Naegi could answer, turning to glare at Kirigiri. "I suppose you think you're clever, manipulating him like that."
"Naegi wasn't the one I was trying to manipulate, if you insist on using that word." Kirigiri crossed her arms. "And the reason I advised him not to tell anyone else was simply that none of the rest of you could have kept it hidden from the mastermind – or are you pretending that you would have let the plan proceed without interference?"
"Of course I would have interfered in something like that!" Togami snapped, rage bubbling through his chest in almost physical explosions. "Anyone would try to stop a plan where you yet again decided to put someone else in that kind of danger!" He glared at her. "And don't think I didn't notice just how you arranged things – so that you would be the one arranging the murder. If you legitimately intended this as a distraction, you could just as easily have let Naegi be the supposed murderer while you took the risk that he wouldn't betray you."
"No one would have believed Naegi in that role," Kirigiri said calmly. "And the plan required someone who might plausibly devise a coldblooded murder."
"So you just jumped at the chance," Togami said. "You got a willing victim and a green light to act suspicious, all in one fell swoop."
"Kirigiri wasn't doing this to try to kill me," Naegi said, glaring at Togami. "In case you missed it, I'm not actually dead."
"Because Fukawa acted before she could," Togami countered. "Who knows just what would have happened if we hadn't found Hagakure yesterday morning?"
"Nothing would have happened!"
Togami shrugged. "Oh, I know you believe that – but we'll never know for sure. All we can be sure about is what's going to happen from here." He turned back to Kirigiri. "If you were doing something to get Monokuma's attention, then you must have been acting on an actual, workable murder plan – and so far, I haven't heard anything that would stop you from enacting it. So if you genuinely never intended to murder anyone, you shouldn't have any objections to neutralizing your own plan." He glared at her. "Tell us exactly what was involved in your murder plot."
