Togami stared at the portrait on Fujisaki's podium — or no, that had to be a monitor of some sort, not a portrait like the others. A computer screen hidden in a portrait frame, concealed so that the mastermind could spring this revelation on them. Alter Ego hadn't died in the aftermath of the fourth trial, even though the execution had certainly made it seem that way.

But then again — of course he hadn't died. He was a computer program, why would he be permanently destroyed by gunfire? Now that he thought about it, Togami couldn't believe the thought hadn't occurred to him sooner. Not that he'd ever spared much thought on the AI's fate. He'd only ever considered it as something that had mattered to Naegi — another undeserving thing the boy had called his friend. Another person he'd risked his own precious life to protect.

Naegi would have been happy to know Alter Ego had survived. A heartfelt smile would have lit up his face, bright and brilliant even in this dark nightmare of a trial room. Maybe that was another instance of the mastermind's cruelty — they'd only revealed Alter Ego's survival after that joy had become unreachable.

The thought burned in the center of Togami's chest, spite blazing hot and bitter against the mastermind's plan. Naegi might not be with them any longer… but someone else was. Alter Ego was. And if Naegi would have seen that as a cause for happiness, then Togami would not let the mastermind twist it into another source of pain.

"You… you can really hear me in the trial room, right?" Alter Ego asked, voice faltering with uncertainty. "They said you'd be able to, but —"

"We can hear you," Togami interrupted.

Or tried to interrupt, anyway.

"— but I can't really tell without any video input feeds."

Oh — of course. Togami's mind flashed back to all their previous interactions with the AI, when they'd had to communicate by typing into the laptop. Alter Ego could speak to them, but he'd never been able to hear what they said.

"Whoops! Guess I left out a couple steps!" Monokuma said brightly. The too-loud clattering of keys blasted out of the speakers, almost certainly a pre-recorded sound bite rather than the actual sound of someone typing.

Alter Ego's worried expression eased as the typing sounds faded. "Oh… good. I'm glad that I can be here with all of you again… even if we can't talk directly." He gave them a tremulous smile, the same one he'd offered when sharing the information he'd decrypted. He wouldn't have been able to see them back then, either… but Naegi had smiled back anyway.

"Is there a point to this?"

Kirigiri's words snapped through the room like the crack of a whip. Eyes shooting back across the circle, Togami could see that she'd crossed her arms tight across her chest with her fingers gouging deep into the flesh of her elbows. It had to hurt, but she hardly seemed to notice — not with her glare blazing straight at Monokuma. "Or is this your idea of being funny?"

"Eh? A point?" Monokuma tilted his head inquisitively. "You mean other than returning one of your beloved friends who you thought was lost forever? Gee, I would've thought that would be enough! I mean, you've just found out that someone you thought was dead is really alive — what more could you possibly ask for?"

"The trial. That's what we're here for, isn't it?" Kirigiri raised an eyebrow.

"Ugh, fine!" Monokuma huffed. "You're no fun, you know that?"

Those words were nothing like the bear's usual bright and cheery tone. It sounded different, almost as if there was someone else speaking… someone who hadn't spoken to them directly before. Togami blinked —

And the impression vanished, leaving only the unnervingly cheerful robot in its wake. "Then let's begin with a basic explanation of the class trial!"

The bear spewed out the same list of rules he gave every trial, in an upbeat tone that would have been better suited to a kindergarten teacher. The same tone, the same words… was this spiel just a recording, like the morning and nighttime announcements? He supposed that it would have to be, considering the abrupt switch from one way of speaking to another. Obviously no human operating the robot could have shifted personalities so quickly… probably they'd activated the recording to give themselves time to calm down.

The logic made sense, and yet… something about it nagged at the back of Togami's brain. He almost had the feeling that he was forgetting something…

But he didn't have time to worry about it now. It couldn't matter all that much in the scheme of the killing game — not when they were about to try to solve everything. That question hardly made a difference next to the other mysteries they had to solve.

The other mysteries…? Togami frowned, his attention snapping back to zero in on the tail end of Monokuma's speech.

"— and the one who deceived everyone else will graduate!"

But that rule didn't make sense, did it? Not this time, when they all knew none of them had killed anyone. They weren't trying to find a blackened student who'd killed another player in the game — they were hunting the mastermind behind it all. And if that was the case…

"That rule shouldn't count any longer!" He hurled the words at Monokuma like they could physically connect. "The way you've stated it, that rule doesn't even apply to this trial."

"Eh?" Monokuma sighed. "Seriously, you want me to go to allllll the trouble of rewriting a rule for this teensy little variation? Can't we just figure it out as we go along?"

"You've always been the one who likes rules so much," Kirigiri said, a hint of bitter amusement twisting one corner of her mouth upward. "If you're going to give up on your rules now that you're under attack, then maybe you were just manipulating them all along."

"Uh oh! We can't have that, can we?" Monokuma drew back in melodramatic shock. "Well, okay, if you're the one who wants it, who am I to say no? Let's see, a special rule just for this trial…" He trailed off for a moment. "Ah — I've got it!"

A huge smile split the bear's face, fangs gleaming deadly bright. Ice plunged through Togami's stomach at the sight, and he cursed himself for bringing up the question of rules in the first place.

"If you can figure out Ikusaba's killer, and go on to solve allllllll the mysteries of this school — you guys will win!" Monokuma announced with even more glee than usual. "But if you can't… then I win! And of course, waiting for the loser is an extra special heart-pounding punishment!"

A small snort of disbelief followed. Togami turned to look back across the circle, where Kirigiri's one visible eye had narrowed to a sharp line. "And you're claiming you'll execute yourself if you lose? You expect us to believe that?"

"Of course!" Monokuma paused. "Well, I can see why you might have some doubts. But I really mean it this time — cross my heart and hope to die!"

"And that's final?" Kirigiri persisted. "No loopholes? No wiggling out of it later?"

"Of course not! Bears never go back on their word."

"Maybe not — but people do." Kirigiri leaned forward. "Are you going to keep your promise?"

"I see… so that's how it is, huh?" Monokuma sighed. "Okay, then, I guess you leave me no choice — I'll have to give you a little something extra!" He rubbed his chin for a moment, as if thinking hard. "How about this? If you guys make it to the point where a body turns up, I'll give you the chance for a little post-execution examination to make sure we haven't got any behind the scenes cheating going on. It would be just dreadful if something were to put a blotch on the pristine reputation of the Hope's Peak headmaster, wouldn't it?"

Togami would have admired that touch of cruelty once, not so very long ago. The mastermind dug their claws deep into Kirigiri's weak point without even a direct mention of her dead father. They even managed to wring a flinch from her, however much she'd tried to fight it.

But no matter how successful the taunt had been, Togami couldn't even bring himself to find an intellectual appreciation for it. Not after seeing the cheerfully wrapped present the mastermind had hidden for Kirigiri in her father's room. The mastermind was mocking her for pain caused by the death of a man they themselves had killed — and after hearing Monokuma's jabs about Naegi after that last terrible trial, Togami couldn't hear these words the way he would have before.

"Stop it!" he snapped, before the bear could twist the knife any further. "We've established that the winners survive and the losers are punished — anything else is irrelevant. The mastermind has never failed to go through with an execution, after all. If we're able to confirm afterward, that's all we'll need."

"You think so?" Monokuma beamed at him, and Togami had to grip the edges of his podium to stop himself from leaning visibly away. "I always knew you trusted me!" He burst into wild laughter, drowning out any attempt Togami might have made to argue with that last offensive statement.

Since his objections wouldn't be heard anyway, he took the opportunity to glance back across the circle to see if Kirigiri had shaken off the mastermind's attempts to rattle her — and to his surprise, he found her looking back across the circle at him. Her eyebrow quirked upward as their eyes met, and he could see the same question he wanted to ask her written in her gaze. Were they ready?

He nodded — and after a moment, just as the noise filling the room began to fade, she did the same. They were as ready as they'd ever be.

"Then here we go!" Monokuma sang out, before the last echoes of laughter had even died away. "First stop — Mukuro Ikusaba's trial! You think we picked the wrong killer last time? Then let's hear who you think the real blackened was!"

"That's easy," Togami said, crossing his arms and glaring at the robot that represented the mastermind among them. "It was you."