In the years that followed Shuichi's brief stay at the motel, the days after their first meeting with Ms. Kokaki blurred together into a smear. In point of fact, he couldn't really be sure how long he vegetated, time spent either sleeping or researching on the laptop. Later, after he'd found a therapist who worked well for him, it became clear this was some kind of defense mechanism.

Shuichi, and the rest of his friends, had been through so much, in such a short span of time. The mental trauma never had a chance to really set in, he kept having to worry about staying alive. At the motel, his life was no longer in any danger of ending.

He became...numb.

Barely remembering to eat.

Barely remembering to keep himself alive.

He woke up a day or two or three after that meeting to find a note from Moriko, giving him the phone number for Ms. Kokaki. Looking at the note for the first time, the words just kind of went into his eyes and dissipated in his brain, without leaving any impression. He was dimly aware that talking to a counselor might help him. He never even touched the phone.

Occasionally, he'd pause his voracious reading of online material to think about what Himiko and Maki were up to. The fact they were a short walk away didn't mean anything to him. They might as well have been as dead as the rest of his classmates.

It wasn't like Shuichi wanted to be alone. In fact, it would be hard to say he wanted anything at all. His body almost felt like it moved on its own, which worked well enough for him. His mind couldn't gather together the motivation or the energy to impose any new goals on it anyway.

After a long day of just placidly absorbing information, just like the days before, Shuichi was about ready to bed and sleep another twelve or so hours when the door to his room shook. He could hear someone trying to open it from the other side, and when it was clear to them that it was locked, they started knocking energetically.

Shuichi looked at the spectacle, confusion breaking through the fog, and he slowly got up and walked over. He didn't even try looking through the peep hole to check who was there. As Shuichi unlocked the door and opened it, he knew it could be people from Team Danganronpa on the other end. Maybe they'd won the court case, and were taking him away. Maybe they'd found his location, and sent assassins to dispose of their crime's evidence.

"Thanks for having us over, Shuichi," came Himiko's high pitched voice, as her tiny frame squeezed past him to get into his room. Maki was standing outside as well, but didn't attempt to get by Shuichi like their other friend had. Realizing she was probably waiting on him, Shuichi gestured with one hand, nonverbally inviting her inside, and she did just that. After closing the door and locking it once more, he turned around to see that Himiko was at his desk, looking at the webpage he'd been on before they'd entered. "'Famous Murders of the 2030's'? Shuichi, I know you're the Ultimate Detective, but that's weeeeeiiiiird."

Coming from a girl who was still wearing a magician outfit (though it did look like it had at least been washed recently), Shuichi couldn't bring himself to be embarrassed. He was feeling strange though, the sight of the two other survivors sparking some emotions that were fighting to push through his apathy. "...hi?" was all he could think to say, looking from Himiko over to Maki, who had sat on the corner of Shuichi's bed.

"Where have you been?" Maki's words had that sharply edged quality to them, but it wasn't enough to cut through his malaise. "We haven't seen you in almost a week." That made Shuichi wake up a little. Had it been that long?

Trying to at least pretend he felt better than he did, Shuichi blinked his eyes and did his best to look normal. The mask wasn't convincing, but it was something. "So, you've been hanging out?" he asked, his voice a little shaky.

Still looking at his laptop screen, Himiko was humming to herself. "Yep. We tried calling your room, but you never answered." That was news to Shuichi. Had...had the phone rang? Some dim flickers of recognition told him it probably had. He'd just...not cared enough to answer. "We've been talking about stuff."

Feeling a little less out-of-it by the moment, Shuichi almost chuckled. "What stuff?" The second the question left his mouth, he saw Himiko's back freeze, her muscles going taught. He was still too numb to feel embarrassed for asking, but he could see that Himiko was still having problems talking about what had been done to them.

"I don't like how much they're spying on us," Maki said, cutting past what Himiko had been saying. "I understand the logic behind it, but even if we're out of the school, we're still being watched." That confused Shuichi for a second. Spying? They just said they were monitoring their internet usage. But then he realized Maki wasn't looking at him. Her eyes were locked onto a fake potted plant near Shuichi, and he barely caught the glint of a lens hidden among the plastic foliage.

So, they were under tighter guard than he realized. It didn't bother him. Considering what could happen to them, how valuable they were, his detective's insight agreed with the necessity of keeping such valuable witnesses safe. But then Himiko said something that knocked him off of that train of thought. "We should all call Ms. Kokaki." Shuichi heard the words she wasn't saying. 'We need therapy.' The thought of talking to her, talking to anyone, about all he'd been through, made Shuichi's vision start to go fuzzy. From the way Maki was glaring daggers at Himiko, she didn't like the idea either. Turning to face her friends, Himiko exclaimed, "We're hurting! If I was a Cleric, I'd just use a healing spell on our brains! But I can't! I'm a mage! So we need to do something to make us better!"

'Make us better'. Something about those words poked into a raw spot of Shuichi's brain. They were never going to be 'better'. They were fictional characters, made to experience as much trauma as possible, for other people's entertainment.

Shuichi wasn't really accustomed to getting angry. As he gritted his teeth, he barely managed to choke out the words, "I'm not doing that, Himiko." He didn't want to say anything mean to her, he knew she meant well. He knew she had a point. But from where he stood, anything resembling recovery felt a million miles away. Impossible to reach, even with help.

When Maki spoke up, Shuichi was expecting her to be in full anger mode, aura of murder and everything. "I told you before, I'll...consider it." Rather than anything like anger, Maki just sounded...tired. Tired in a way that echoed Shuichi's earlier feelings. Was she feeling just as dead inside as he had been? Was Himiko? He wasn't sure why he found that so surprising. They'd been through the same hell as him, after all. She turned her attention back to Shuichi, asking, "Did you call about his name?"

The thought hadn't occurred to him. Whatever dissociative episode he'd been going through, the idea of reaching out about something that felt so inconsequential and so world-alteringly enormous never came to him. Looking between the girls, he shook his head and asked, "Did you?"

"Yeah," Maki replied, sounding nonplussed. "Apparently, her name was Marika Sakame. All that woman would tell me about her was that she was well liked, and her family was surprised to hear she'd gone on the show." It was only listening further that Shuichi was able to pick apart her tone a little more. She was trying to sound like none of this bothered her. But Shuichi had been through enough with her to know that she didn't know how to feel. Neither did he, really.

There was a silence when she finished speaking, and Shuichi almost didn't think Himiko would talk about what she'd found out. "Her name was Aini Tano..." Before saying that, she'd crunched up into a ball on the room's computer chair, and swirled around so he couldn't see her face. "Ms. Kokaki said she got really good grades." Shuichi couldn't think of something to say to that that wouldn't sound patronizing to his friend. "Are you gonna call her too?" There was something hopeful in her voice. She wanted to feel less alone.

Shuichi had never been particularly good at resisting peer pressure, aside from things like class trials, where going with the flow could get them all killed. But the stakes were a lot lower, and two sets of judging eyes were on him. Flushing, he walked over to the phone and dialed in the number on the paper nearby. It only had to ring twice. "Hello?" came the same warm voice he'd heard when he first met Ms. Kokaki.

Not knowing how to start, or what to say, Shuichi stumbled through his greeting. "H-hello Ms. Kokaki, it's Shuichi. Um, Saihara? From the hotel?" He felt stupid. Were there any other Shuichi's likely to be calling her? "Anyway, I hope I'm not bothering you." His eyes went to a nearby clock. It was nearly eight in the evening, probably long past when her day at work was supposed to end.

She laughed, a sound like a wind chime on a comfortable spring afternoon. "Shuichi, there's no need to be nervous. You can call me anytime, my job is to be here for you. Did you want to set up a session?" she asked, a note of hope in her voice.

"No!" Shuichi said, probably too loudly and forcefully. "No, I, I just...wanted to ask about the, about him, the person who..." Now that Shuichi was on the phone with her, he didn't know how to refer to this mysterious person he'd only seen on video recording. For some reason, he desperately wanted to avoid using the word 'body donor'. It sounded, to him, as though it implied this body wasn't his. Which...he felt like it was.

If she didn't like how Shuichi had yelled at her over the phone, it didn't show. "Sure thing! Let me see here, I have the file somewhere..." He could barely hear the sound of papers being shuffled around, before she said, "Aha! Here we go. His name was Hayashi Gima. His schoolwork wasn't very impressive, but he had a very rich online social life. If you wanted to know more than that, I can ask MoriMori to do some digging." She talked about him like she was trying to talk up an awkward nephew to a pretty girl.

Having already heard enough, Shuichi just told her, "No, but thank you for your time," and hung up the phone. He only realized as he set it onto the receiver how pale and clammy his hands were. His body felt strangely light, while his stomach was doing backflips, nausea coming in waves. Unsure what else to do, he relayed what he'd learned to the girls.

Himiko nodded sagely. "That makes sense." What about this Hayashi person made sense to her, Shuichi didn't know. It looked like, now that Shuichi had done what they had, she didn't feel as weighed down by what she'd learned. Or at least, that's how she acted. He was never entirely sure how much of how Himiko acted reflected her genuine emotional state. Then she yawned and got up from his chair. "Well, see you tomorrow, Shuichi." With a casual wave, she strolled out of his room, and back towards her own.

Feeling a little silly, Shuichi realized there was something about this whole situation he hadn't considered. They could just walk into each other's rooms when they wanted to, then go back to their own rooms when they were done. They didn't have to worry about being killed, or being singled out as acting strangely if a body turned up. That strange paranoia that had only gotten worse and worse as the killing game had continued didn't need to be there anymore, even if the scars of it still throbbed in pain on occasion.

Maki didn't look like she was leaving, though. "Don't hide in here." It wasn't a request. "We're...we are all that's left. Kaito, Kaede, Gonta, they're all gone now. We made it out. We can't...I won't let you hide away from us." There was something in her tone that reminded him sharply of what she was capable of. And yet, it didn't feel like a threat.

There was something selfish, Shuichi had to admit, to just hiding in his room by himself. There were extenuating circumstances, it would have been hard to leave his room before if he'd wanted to. But Maki had needed him. She still needed him. Shuichi was the closest person she had. He wasn't Kaito, even if he wished to hell and back that the Ultimate Astronaut had made it out instead of him. But they were still friends. He couldn't just take and take and take from Maki, without giving her anything back. A ghost of a smile crossed Shuichi's face and he told her truthfully, "I promise that I won't hide anymore."

That seemed to be all she wanted, and without another word she got up and left the room. Left to himself and his thoughts, Shuichi finally let himself consider Hayashi Gima. It was good, in a way, to finally have a name for him. The details didn't mean anything, too scarce and vague. But none of that had answered Shuichi's real questions.

Who was he? What kind of life could someone lead where they'd be willing, happy even, to erase everything they were and knew, just to be on some show? A show where someone else, in their body, would fight for their very life? It just didn't make sense to Shuichi.

Was there any risk of Hayashi coming back? It didn't seem like that was possible. From how everyone from Tsumugi to the internet described the memory technology, there wasn't a way yet to download people's minds to overwrite others. All they could do was 'write' memories, 'create a character', and put that into someone. Shuichi had read some speculation that perhaps the technology to save living people's minds did exist, and was being kept in secret from the masses, but Shuichi found no evidence to support that.

But...what if he just came back one day? Replacing Shuichi as Shuichi had replaced Hayashi? There was no evidence that could happen. But this wasn't a fear that could be fought with logic. It would sit there, deep in Shuichi's mind, ready to torment him without warning, for the rest of his life. He'd have nightmares of waking up one day, not as himself, but as Hayashi. Gone without a trace.

What...what was Hayashi to Shuichi? How was he supposed to think of him? This had once been his body, before he'd voluntarily given it up so Shuichi could have it. Should Shuichi be grateful? Or should he curse this teenage boy, blame the entire torturous killing school life on him? Should Shuichi learn more about Hayashi, try to make up for the fact he was using what had once been his body? The ethics of it were impossibly tangled. Shuichi didn't know how to think of this person he knew almost nothing about.

He went to sleep that night not long after, and despite some bear-filled nightmares, he actually got a healthier sleep than he'd had since he'd first arrived at the hotel. The days still passed quickly, but now he was spending more of them with his friends. They watched shows together on his laptop, Himiko tried to show them how to do what she claimed was a simple spell (nothing happened), and Maki let them watch as she played some sort of online game (she was surprisingly good at it, considering she'd only had a few days to pick it up).

Then another meeting was scheduled, and this time they were all there on-time. Shuichi was nervous about what it would be about. The prosecutor looked a lot more run-down than she had before, and dark bags under her eyes spoke to nights spent with little to no sleep. She filled up a paper plate with almost as much pizza as Himiko's, taking the time to have at least once slice before getting to the point of the gathering. "You kids have another option now, if you don't want to stay here anymore." That caught Shuichi's attention. Wasn't this the safest place for them? "We talked to all of your parents, and they agreed to take you in." It felt like the floor had fallen out from under him. From everything he knew...his parents didn't exist. They never had.

Ms. Kokaki rushed in to add something, throwing a surprisingly heated look at Moriko as she did so. "No, not their parents." It sounded like she was chiding the prosecutor, who responded by focusing on eating food rather than talking. Sounding more like her usual gentle self, Ms. Kokaki clarified, "What she meant to say was that Marika, Aini, and Hayashi's parents have agreed to take you in, if you want to live with them." This made more sense, that was for sure.

But the three teenagers looked at each other. The same confused expression was on all their faces. Disbelief, optimism, and fear battled for supremacy. They didn't know these people. They weren't their families. They were the families of the people who put them into this mess in the first place. But...there was something pleasant about the idea none of them could deny, either. This hotel was better than they realistically could have hoped for, as they'd exited that dome, but Shuichi felt a yearning inside him that this might sate. A home. People who loved him.

"As before, we don't need any answers right now," Ms. Kokaki had assured them. "I know this is a difficult thing to wrap your heads around, and if you don't want to stay with them, we won't force you. Not only that, but if you go to live with them, and change your mind later, we can always take you back."

Having finished the food on her plate, Moriko cleared her throat and spoke up once more. "At the same time, you need to remember these people lost their kids half a year ago. Whether you're going to stay or going to go, don't draw it out too long. Kill their hope or see what they're like, just don't string them along." The prosecutor got a talking to from Ms. Kokaki for that, but the meeting ended not long after anyway. None of them talked to the others about what they'd do. They went to their rooms that night, by themselves, and before they fell asleep each had already made up their mind, and let Moriko know what they were going to do.

They'd all chosen to see what a home would be like.