Togami hurried down the corridor, outpacing Kirigiri in his need to put some distance between himself and Naegi. It was absurd that Naegi could still affect him so intensely – but since it was also apparently true, he couldn't afford to ignore it. After all, he couldn't just give in to Naegi because he wanted to stay near the other boy so badly.

So instead of letting himself dwell on how right it had felt to walk at Naegi's side, Togami made his way into the entrance hall. He spared no more than a glance at the huge metal door or the menacing guns aimed in front of it, merely checking to make sure there was no change on that front before heading directly over to the mailbox. He swung it open and peered inside just as Kirigiri entered the room.

"I see you're not wasting any time," she said, walking across the room to join him.

Togami ignored her, focusing instead on the pile of student handbooks in the mailbox. He flipped past Enoshima's, Maizono's, the pair of broken handbooks from Owada and Fujisaki… on and on past all the names of the dead. He didn't see anything suspicious – but as he moved Ishimaru's handbook, a faint jingling sound came from inside it. He pulled it out and opened it – and there the key was.

Togami frowned at it, nestled innocently against the e-handbook screen. So the key really had been here, after all. He should have felt a rush of triumph at being proven right – but instead, he felt strangely unsatisfied at seeing it. If he'd been right about the key's location, then that meant that Kirigiri really had been telling the truth about where she'd last seen the trash room key. Or had she? Could she have planted it here somehow, expecting that someone would come looking for it?

No – he didn't see how she could have done that. Burning the locker key had been his idea, not hers. She hadn't even wanted to admit she had the locker key at all – she couldn't have based some elaborate plot around the idea that one of them might outwit her. The whole thing reeked of complexities and confusion and bizarre mind games – as long as he assumed this was all some kind of trick.

Was it possible that it wasn't? If Kirigiri was being genuine, then a great deal of what was happening now would make much more sense. That would mean that she'd agreed to destroy the locker key because it would be the safest option for everyone. She'd shared information about the trash room key's location because she wanted to help them find it. And she'd hidden the poison not because she herself wanted to kill Naegi – but to stop anyone else from taking advantage of her plan.

Could all that be true? Could he have misjudged her so badly? Was it possible that when Naegi had defended and trusted her – that he'd been right?

No. There were still too many unanswered questions about her for Togami to go that far. Why had she really been sneaking around Naegi's room in the middle of the night? What had she been trying to accomplish with that bizarre warning in the dojo, when her entire manner had changed? And of course, at the heart of it, the real question – just who was she, and why did she refuse to share any personal information about herself?

Without knowing any of that, Togami couldn't trust her entirely – but he had to admit, it did seem like she genuinely wanted to help them destroy the locker key. He didn't know if she'd lost her nerve to use the poison, or if she'd never intended to do so in the first place – but either way, it only made sense to take advantage of her willingness to rid herself of a weapon.

"All right, then." He stood up, the locker key in one hand and the trash room key in the other. "Let's not waste any more time."

He led the way out of the entrance hall, deliberately crossing the room on an angle that would put him as far away from Naegi as possible. He couldn't let himself look at the other boy, not right now – not while he was losing his grip on what he ought to believe. Because if he had to reconsider his opinion of Kirigiri's actions, then – then maybe –

He didn't let himself complete the thought, focusing instead on the walk to the trash room. Even though Naegi and Kirigiri were walking behind him, the halls felt eerily silent now. With only five students left, the space that had seemed overcrowded with idiots at the start now loomed vast and empty around him. He normally found a measure of peace in solitude – but there was nothing peaceful about the stillness here.

Reaching the trash room door, he swung it open and headed immediately over to the grate blocking access to the far half of the room. There seemed to be a switch on the wall that could be operated using the trash room key – and sure enough, using it moved the gate aside. Togami headed for the incinerator, just as Kirigiri and Naegi entered the room.

"Last chance to object," Togami said, narrowing his eyes in Kirigiri's direction. If she tried to change her mind at this point – if she claimed to have come up with an excuse to leave the key intact –

"Go ahead." Kirigiri stood on the opposite side of the incinerator, staring across at him with a challenging glint in her eye.

Without another word, Togami dropped the key into the empty incinerator, closed the doors, and pressed the button. The incinerator roared to life, fire blazing inside.

Togami stood in silence beside the other two, all three of them watching the incinerator burn. Even if they turned it off now, the locker key would already be destroyed beyond usability. For better or worse, it was gone – and the poison in the dojo locker was inaccessible.

When he couldn't stand the noise any longer, Togami pressed the button to shut the incinerator off. He swung the door open, keeping well out of the way of the blast of hot smoke the machine disgorged. When it had ceased, he glanced inside – and at the bottom of the machine, he could see the smoldering embers of what had been the dojo locker key.

"There," he said, stepping aside so the others could look. "It's done."

"And all three of us saw it happen," Kirigiri added.

Togami shot her a suspicious look at that. With the locker key gone, he had to assume she'd been genuine in her willingness to burn it – but any measure of trust that could have earned her was ruined by remarks like the one she'd just made. Why did she care so much if she had witnesses for what had happened to the locker key and the poison? Just what did she expect to happen? He hated not knowing – but he had no leverage to force an answer out of her.

He scowled, resolving to put off the puzzle of Kirigiri's motivations for a time when he could better think it through. For now, he had other, more pressing issues to address. He headed back over to the switch on the wall that operated the grate, and frowned down at the trash room key.

"Planning to take possession of that key, too?" Kirigiri asked, raising an amused eyebrow. "You could start a collection."

Togami grimaced. Being in charge of the trash room key sounded even more tedious than holding on to Ogami's room key had been – he'd have to either let people in to dump their own trash, or he'd have to deal with their garbage himself. Neither sounded especially appealing.

"Does anyone need to hold on to it?" Naegi asked. "What if we just put it back in the mailbox?"

The mailbox… where only the three of them knew the key had been. And since Naegi was hardly likely to need to use the trash room to dispose of evidence, that meant that if anyone did – well, there would only be one possible suspect. And if that happened, it would finally give Togami an answer once and for all about whether or not Kirigiri really was plotting something.

"That sounds acceptable," Togami said at last.

Kirigiri gave a single sharp nod. "I have no objections."

Of course she didn't. She hadn't objected to anything that Togami had expected – why would she start now? He looked pointedly away from her as he left the room, doing his best to pretend the obnoxious girl wasn't there as he retraced their path back to the entrance hall.

But as they headed back, there was one thing that he still couldn't ignore no matter how hard he tried. Just behind him, Naegi's footsteps faltered more than ever, with an agonizing slowness that hinted at deepest exhaustion. All this walking back and forth had to be far too much exertion for the other boy. Togami could hear it in Naegi's labored breathing – he should be asleep in bed, not wandering the halls. Why had Naegi even left his room this morning, let alone gone roaming all over the school?

I want to talk to you.

Naegi's words from earlier that day echoed through his mind, and a slow, puzzled frown crept across Togami's face. Had Naegi risked his health wandering all over the school – looking for him? But that didn't quite fit with the boy who had so vehemently rejected Togami in both of their arguments.

I wanted to explain what I meant.

Was it possible that – he'd misunderstood? A chill of uncertainty snaked through Togami's mind. He'd thought he knew what Naegi's words had meant, but – was it possible that he hadn't?

No. Ridiculous. Togami pushed the thoughts out of his head as he reentered the entrance hall. That was just wishful thinking, a useless fantasy that his mind had conjured to distract him from harsh reality. Even if Naegi had gone chasing after him, the idiot boy probably would have done the same for any of his supposed friends.

Ding dong bing bong.

The nighttime bell startled Togami out of his thoughts. He scowled. He'd spent too long going in circles already – it was time to move on. As the nighttime announcement played, he pulled out Maizono's handbook, tucked the key inside, and then shoved the handbook back amidst the others. It was unlikely anyone would find the trash room key in there, not unless they already suspected its location.

But when Togami turned around again, he found his eyes gravitating towards Naegi before he could direct them elsewhere. The boy swayed visibly on his feet, even with one hand gripping the wall, and his every breath seemed to shake through his entire body. He looked like little more than a shadow of the boy Togami had first dragged into the library archive to kiss – and seeing him this way made Togami's heart ache in a way he hadn't known it could.

Had he done this to Naegi? How much of it had been his fault? If he had been there – could he have made it better?

No. Togami wrenched his thoughts away from that path, striding past Naegi and Kirigiri both. He headed for the door without another word, not trusting what he might say to either of them if he tried. He didn't know what to think about those two – and until he knew for certain, he couldn't try to approach them. And so he walked away towards his dorm room, trying to ignore the doubts growing in his heart.


Author's Note: Fair warning to everyone following along - next week is going to be a shorter one than usual. I have company descending upon me, and I won't be able to write at my usual pace. I'm not sure what the exact posting schedule will be, but there will definitely be a new chapter on Sunday. I'll have the days finalized by then.