I am very evil. Prepare the tissues for this chapter. That is all.

Hatsumi didn't like how Mizuki looked right now. Mostly because it was getting her down, seeing Mizuki look so lovelorn and anxious over Mokomichi being out. It was as if she couldn't cope with him being even slightly out of her sight, which didn't make any sense from someone like Mizuki. Then again, Hatsumi supposed if she was the one with a love then she'd have been pretty anxious about them going out in that literal war-zone. She still wasn't sure that she could quite connect the dots between what they were doing and the state of the world.

She wasn't sure she quite wanted to.

There were so very many things that she did not particularly want to think about,

"Come on," she cajoled. "You should take a break or something."

"No, I'm alright," Mizuki said. "This keeps me distracted from worrying about them both."

Hatsumi hmm-hmmed non-committally and watched the different screens, watching how everyone was dealing with the aftermath of the most recent case and more specifically, Ichiro's execution. She could see Minah trying hard to support Mawa, who even in a small section of screen looked absolutely terrible.

Well, duh, she just lost her brother. Hatsumi pulled a face at that, remembering the newly-discovered, soon-to-be existence of her brother. She wondered what his life would be like in a world like this one. What routes to greatness would their father try and carve out for him now that Hope's Peak wasn't an option? There was no way that Hope's Peak could be an option, not after all this, and if anything that made her glad that the outside world had turned out how it could be. She could not love her brother, not just because he technically didn't exist yet but because she'd never know him, but now she had to admit at least one thing: it wasn't his fault that he was going to be born. Wasn't his fault that he'd have even more expectations placed on him just for being a son, that he'd be moulded to be as ruthless and greedy as their father. Suddenly, it was a little easier to feel sorry for him, especially if he ended up the type of person who would find such expectations hard to live up to. At least he wouldn't have to go to Hope's Peak, though. Dreadful, dreadful place. Oh, how she was glad it had burned down. Sometimes, she wished she had been able to light some of those flames herself. Wished she had been able to find the people who had tried to assault her and dragged them into the flames before running off into her future.

But not anything else, though, not like this.

Again, she pushed the thought away, but found herself looking towards Shino, whose eyes were gleaming as they stared at the screen. They had no misgivings about this, about any of this, and Hatsumi almost envied them for it. Almost.

Suddenly, Shino turned and pulled a face.

"I'm bored. Any of you lot hungry, cos I'm grabbing something to eat."

"Yes please." Riku said politely.

"Sure, get me something."

Hatsumi smiled, and found herself taken aback to realise it pulled a little tighter at her mouth than she was used to. She tried to cover it up by giving a wider smile, and Shino grinned back and looked to Mizuki.

"Well, are you going to just waste away or what?"

Mizuki just waved a hand at her in what seemed like a vague gesture without actually looking away. Shino huffed but then disappeared. Hatsumi watched them for a few seconds and then looked back Mizuki:

"You're worried about her, too, aren't you?"

Hatsumi blinked at the question, not quite expecting it. For some reason, she looked over her shoulder but then answered.

"Yeah, I am."

Mizuki finally turned away from the screens and looked at Hatsumi.

"Has she said anything to you? About anything at all?"

"No, she hasn't."

This, of course, was an understatement. Hatsumi shivered at the memory of Mihoko's empty look, how it had made her feel as though she was transparent. As if she weren't real at all. Mihoko had always been a sharp one, though.

"She hasn't said anything to me, either," Riku offered. "Then again, I think that I would be the last person she would talk to. It's not as if I know her well at all, not in comparison to you. But Hana used to talk about her a lot…it's hard to see her like this."

"She was a bit like this back then, too," Mizuki said. "After Otsuki-san died, and well, everything about that night."

Hatsumi nodded at that.

"She was a little better for a while though, after the Winter Break. Just a little. Right?"

Mizuki frowned at this, and then nodded.

"You're right, she was. I mean, not by much but….she was. It seems obvious that switching to here is the inciting incident that made her slide back again but I can't figure out the trigger beyond that."

"Perhaps there isn't one," Riku said. "I mean, perhaps it's just everything piling up and now she's reached her breaking point-"

"Or maybe it's me." Hatsumi blurted out, suddenly wanting to get it over and done with.

Riku and Mizuki both gawped at her and she sighed.

"I mean, not me. But Emiko. You're both expecting that she'd talk to me because she knows me, but she doesn't know me, not really. She knew Emiko."

When they both continued to stare at her, she shook her head.

"Never mind."

Riku patted her arm awkwardly, and Mizuki just nodded. Hatsumi felt her cheeks heat up, and she wanted to disappear into her chair. Why did I even say that? It had to be true, it was the only thing she could think of that made sense, but she hadn't wanted to say it out loud. Then again, they hadn't got it, so she didn't need to explain it to them.

Sighing again, Hatsumi looked at the screens, focusing again on Mawa. As would be expected, she was with Minah, Leah and Ai, who were all trying to comfort her as she curled up in her bed, facing the wall. Hatsumi didn't pick up the headphones to listen to what it was they were saying, but the concern she saw on their faces mirrored the concern that she saw on Mizuki's about Mihoko. The concern that she herself felt.

I know you miss me from before, she wanted to say to Mihoko. But can't you see I miss you too? There was a part of her that wished none of this had happened, and they could go back to swapping clothes and going shopping and commiserating about life on the Reserve Course. Or that they'd met somewhere else, at some normal school, where they could have still swapped clothes and complained about life but not about a life that could have ended up like this. Hatsumi wondered if Minah was thinking something like that, too. If she was wishing that she could have her pre-Hope's Peak life back. Or at least the pre-centenary life.

Hearing Shino coming back, Hatsumi didn't initially turn around to greet them, instead watching Minah, Leah and Ai seemingly debate something together before Leah sat back down on the bed and Minah and Ai left.

"Here you go."

A couple of packets plopped onto the desk, and Hatsumi finally turned around. She watched Shino take up their space again, putting on the headphones. Do you miss me, too? Is there anything you miss at all? Hatsumi bit her lip to make sure that she didn't make the mistake of voicing this, too, but she wondered it all the same. But she knew that deep down, this was a pointless question to ask. Shino didn't miss any of it. Probably didn't miss any of them at all.

"So, any murders happen yet?" Shino asked.

"They've just come back from a trial," Riku pointed out. "It's a bit soon, isn't it?"

"Ahhh, but surely the sister's out for blood. Or will be, once she stops crying like a drip over there. What're those two doing?"

"Getting food, I think," Mizuki answered immediately. "I'm not sure, we didn't listen, we were just watching."

The conversation continued, and Hatsumi just ate her snacks mindlessly, barely even noticing the taste as she thought no, Shino doesn't miss anything from before. They wouldn't miss us, even if anything happened. She thought this, over and over, hidden beneath a smile.

But she did not want to think about what it could mean.

…

"Doesn't look like he's anywhere near, does he?"

"No."

Mokomichi shouldn't have been surprised by the one-word answer, but all the same he narrowed his eyes at her before he did another sweep of the area. While these streets weren't that much busier or emptier than what he'd grown to think of as 'usual', the Artificial Beach had been a different story. They'd been lucky to get off un-noticed. Forget any kind of law enforcement coming to get them, what would happen if any of these people did? They would surely recognise the captives at the very least. He was surprised that they hadn't recognised Azuki when he'd left, assuming that they'd seen him at all.

"What do you think? Go back, or go further?"

Mihoko blinked once at him, before saying:

"If we leave it here, that's kind of half-arsed."

"This is true."

He thought of Mizuki briefly, felt a flicker of guilt.

"I want to keep dreaming until the end. But when we get to that end….we need to end."

"Alright. On one condition, though."

"A condition?"

"To live. If the time comes we do have to end, I'm not having you die in order to do that."

He pushed it down. Wherever Azuki was, it was surely worse to leave him out there. He didn't necessarily need to do anything to bring him back, did he? They just needed to know where he was so they could manage the situation appropriately. Anything to- if not be able to keep pretending a little longer- then to at least delay the end. Anything to protect her.

"Alright then-which way do you think we should go?"

Mihoko just shrugged at this, shouldering her bag. Mokomichi decided on the left for no real reason, and started walking. Mihoko followed silently and once they had put some distance between them and the last cluster of people that were out, he decided to take the opportunity to try pressing her again. Though he had to admit the decision to do so was as much to take his mind off of Mizuki as it was because the issue was really niggling at him. So, as if directly continuing from the previous stalled conversation, he asked:

"So, if it's not Otsuki-chan you are grieving, then who is it?"

"You really want to be talking about that right in the open?" Mihoko asked.

"Sure I do," Mokomichi said. "I want answers from you. I need to understand why you're acting like this because you've not exactly been at your best, even before we got started."

"Yes, well, I'm still here, aren't I? And I thought we made it clear I hadn't jeopardised anything."

"The fact remains that you're acting strangely. This isn't the first time, either."

Even as he said this, he had another memory.

"Hatsumi Yanagi isn't my friend. She's an invention, made out of blue hair dye, green contacts and old clothes. My friend is Emiko Shishikane. Vibrant pink hair, ridiculously confident, fashionable. Not an invention with a hastily thrown together name."

"Ah," he said suddenly, stopping. "Is it Yanagi-chan? It must be, after what you said on that night."

Mihoko made a show of looking up and down the road before slowly saying.

"I am surprised you remembered that. Or that you cared. Do you know just how much I h-"

Whatever it was Mihoko was going to say was cut off as she seemed to spot something further up the street, which was a shame because it'd sounded like that he was about to break through. She ran, ignoring the curious looks of the few people that were around and ducking into the next street, which was empty. She stopped, put her hands on her hips momentarily and looked around. When Mokomichi caught up he realised that there were objects scattered on the ground. Specifically, groceries and snacks. There was nothing that indicated that these were the things that Azuki had bought, but there was something strange about seeing them spilled all across the ground like that.

Come to think of it, isn't this on the way to one of the other stores we use?

As soon as this thought occurred to him, he was startled by Mihoko abruptly dragging him into the doorway of a shop that had been abandoned, ducking behind what he assumed had been an old fridge. In the half-dark, she glowered at him before peering up. There were windows just above them, and when Mokomichi scooted back slightly he saw people walking past. They moved fast, ducking down occasionally. It took him a moment to realise that they were grabbing the shopping that had been strewn across the ground. Others came along and an argument started to break out, and he ducked again, before turning to Mihoko, who was a little further back. She blinked at him in the half-dark and then started to speak:

"I know we don't want to get caught. By them or by the authorities who could stop us. I mean, I assume that all this unrest would be their bigger priority, all things considered, but we do know they're pursuing us. I don't want that either. I have no intention of getting caught."

Mokomichi blinked. He assumed that all that went without saying, and he had absolutely no idea what this had to do with what he had asked just moments ago. But then Mihoko huffed and continued in the same hissed whisper.

"But, do you really think that we should have no consequences whatsoever? That we shouldn't have to face anything for what we have done already and what we're still doing?"

Again, all he could do was blink at this.

"That sounds like you regret it. I seem to recall that you were one of the strongest proponents for what we're doing right now. Especially after Otsuki-chan died."

Mihoko sucked in a breath and turned slightly so a shadow fell across her face. Mokomichi was sure that this was deliberate even when she responded:

"How very…formal of you. But you are aware it's possible to hold more than one thought in your head at once?"

Despite everything, Mokomichi snorted. Mihoko turned back to look at him, but then got up very slightly, trying to peer through the window.

"Let's try and get out through the back, then we'll keep going."

Mokomichi badly wanted to keep the conversation going, but he just crawled around the fridge and into the shop properly, only getting up as they got closer to the back, where there were no windows. They came out into an alleyway, and he went in the opposite direction to where the front of the shop was, with Mihoko following along. They kept walking for a while, scanning the people they encountered while also trying to not catch any of their attention. There was, however, no sign of Azuki. Mokomichi had to accept that they weren't going to find anything.

"Let's go back," he said. "And on the way you're going to tell me what's troubling you."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that." Mihoko responded.

Sure enough, the conversation went in the same circles that it had done so far, though with how increasingly monosyllabic her responses were it didn't feel so much of a circle as it was just throwing a ball at the wall and having it bounce back at him. But every so often, something angry flashed in Mihoko's eyes, and he thought of the sentence that had sounded as if it would finally contain some kind of revelation. Do you know how much I hate you? It was not as if he could understand why she would hate him, so this didn't help him much, but the more he thought about the more he was convinced that this was indeed what she had meant to say.

Nonetheless, after a while of this bouncing-against-the-wall questioning, he eventually gave up and he lapsed into silence. Though they were ostensibly going back, they took a looping route anyway and he used that chance to look around for any signs of Azuki. Gradually, they got to one of the roads that would lead them back to the artificial beach, when someone ran towards them, screaming for help.

"There's a crazy person trying to kill us!" they yelled. "Help us."

Sure enough, that person was quickly followed by some others who were equally terrified, and as they almost skidded past, Mokomichi and Mihoko also halted and turned to see who was pursuing them. Immediately, Mokomichi reached for the weapons that he always made sure to have on him when the person got closer and his mouth dropped open.

"Oh, hiya!" Kaneda said cheerfully, putting down his own blood-soaked knife. "What are you doing out here?"

Behind Kaneda, Azuki caught up, looking incredibly frazzled. There was blood spattered across his hair and clothes, but unlike Kaneda he did not appear to have been responsible for the spilling of said blood.

"Looking for…for…me,I imagine," Azuki huffed, clearly out of breath. "We should…go…back…."

"Yes, yes," Kaneda said. "I suppose we should. That is what I'm here for after all, to help you all!"

"Aren't we supposed to be keeping under the radar?" Mihoko asked. "Why is committing a murder the first thing you decide to do when you escape?"

"E-escape?" Mokomichi asked, staring at Mihoko as if she'd grown an extra head.

She rolled her eyes, although it was Azuki who responded, having caught his breath a little:

"Um, he got arrested, remember? How the fuck else is he here if he didn't escape?"

This was a good point, but Mokomichi didn't respond. Instead, he turned to the two people who had been chased by Kaneda. Though they were some years older, they looked back at them with fear.

"You're…you're with him, aren't you?"

"You should probably run if you want to hold onto your lives." Mokomichi told them.

"What the hell," the second person said. "They're just kids…"

"Don't be ridiculous, that one's escaped from prison-these Despair people must be breaking into prisons now, we gotta go if we don't want to go the way of Nishizaki!"

The first person emphasised their point by dragging the second by the arm and soon the two of them broke off into a run. Mokomichi nodded to the others and they began to walk back the way Azuki and Kaneda had come from. Kaneda explained how he had broken out of prison to come to the aid of those of them still out there in order to ensure that the game continued, only to come upon Azuki, who had been close to getting attacked for his shopping. The spilled items that Mokomichi and Mihoko had seen earlier had indeed been his, as it turned out. Kaneda was cagey about when exactly he had escaped, let alone how he had managed to reach the area, but it was clear that whoever he'd hurt to save Azuki had not been the first person that he'd hurt on this journey.

"It's all a necessary evil, you see, much like the game itself," Kaneda said. "And we will make sure that it continues but once I've got you all back I'm going to have to leave for a while, you see. I need to get my dear little sister. If the other SHSLs are saved or we're caught, they'll definitely try and make her into an SHSL herself, you see. So I've got to go and get her and bring her here so she can see what being one of the Talented at Hope's Peak really means, you know? I mean, she's still only little but with our love and careful guidance I'm sure that she'll be able to grow up well and ah-"

Kaneda stopped and grinned.

"There they are-think we should take them with us?"

"What the fuck, what do you mean take them with us?" Azuki spluttered. "Do you think that we want to have more bodies decomposing than usual?"

"I mean, I suppose we could use them as a motive…"

Mokomichi trailed off, looking at the two bodies. They were both face down, but he guessed that they were adults, though not that much older than any of them. Certainly they didn't seem as if they would have been much of a match for Kaneda's strength and insanity. Because it was insanity that he saw there in Kaneda's face, pure and simple. Even if it had aligned well with their goals, the Main Course students he had helped to kill in the lead up of the kidnaps proved this. And if that hadn't been enough, the fact he was standing here, as he was, with two more deaths to add to his body count surely sufficed.

"We don't want anyone finding them and potentially linking them to him," Mokomichi explained. "But perhaps we can use this as a motive-leave the bodies in there during the night and then say something along the lines of 'this is what will happen to you if you don't do as we say' kind of thing? Make it sound like the game is the much better option."

"Ah, but I didn't really hurt them that much, just stabbed them once. Or twice. Look."

And just like that, Kaneda bent down to turn over the bodies. Both the bodies were adult men as Mokomichi had guessed, though he still couldn't be sure what age. Their shock-frozen faces made them look like victims of war in history books, and he supposed in a way they were. As Kaneda had said, they hadn't been stabbed many times, but the wounds were much deeper than the phrase 'only stabbed them once' bought to mind. Azuki immediately gagged.

"Oh god."

"I know, isn't it great?" Kaneda said.

Mokomichi stiffened at the joy in Kaneda's voice, and then said briskly:

"Come on then, there's no time to waste. Sakurai…."

His words trailed off yet again as he turned to Mihoko. Her complete silence during this interaction wasn't unusual at this point, so he had not bothered to really look at her but now he couldn't stop staring. She hadn't had much colour to her in these past days but now she looked drained as her eyes fixed on the two dead people. Or specifically, their wounds. She murmured something over and over, and Mokomichi thought that it was 'forest', which did not make any particular sense because there weren't even any trees around.

No, wait.

Not 'forest', but the name itself. Mori.

"I know what it is," Mokomichi said. "After all, you were there, weren't you? You saw it when-"

The colour rushed back, her mouth twisting into a knot of fury as she glared at him and he shut up quickly. Now he had figured it out, he could interrogate her later. Now, they needed to get themselves back to the warehouse quickly before anything else happened. Before Mizuki decided to look for him, because she probably would. Despite everything, she probably would.

"Alright then, it'll need to be two to a person and-"

Three noises rushed in at once.

First, the rain. Like the cliché of 'bucketing down' it really was as if someone had suddenly upended a bucket down on them.

Secondly, the thudding footsteps and the sirens and blaring.

Thirdly, the yelling:

"THIS IS THE POLICE! MAKE WAY, THIS IS THE POLICE!"

Mokomichi looked at all three of them and said, simply:

"Run."

And they ran, and ran and ran. He concentrated only on himself, on getting back to the artificial beach. He didn't know if the police were there for him or for Kaneda, but he needed Mizuki. He needed to find her and take her away. To hell with the game, he thought desperately, we should do what I always wanted to do and just run away somewhere. Hide all her assets in tax-free havens somehow and run away to an island where it is just the two of us…

Mizuki….

Mizuki, it's not ending yet…

But when he got to the Artificial Beach, there were more police there, yelling as they broke into warehouses systematically. They had not yet reached the one they were staying in, or the one that the Killing Game was being hosted in but it was only a matter of a time. Ducking low and trying to take advantage of the chaos to hide in plain sight, trying to weave his way through the throngs of confused and hysterical people. All this, while the rain kept bucketing down.

"This way," Azuki gasped. "Hide here first."

He and Mokomichi did that, while Kaneda and Mihoko presumably followed. Right at the edge of the beach, sheltered by the junk that had rapidly accumulated, they all caught their breath. Mokomichi found himself particularly frantic but tried to settle himself. Shaking water out of his fringe and wiping his face (both useless gestures, he knew), he straightened and turned to the three of them.

Or rather, the two of them.

Because Mihoko was not with them.

…

Minah hated herself for it, but after they'd managed to get Mawa fed, and persuaded her out of her room (though given that she had now shifted to Leah and Ai's room instead), she found she had to walk away.

"I think I need to get some exercise in or something, some workouts," she explained. "I'll make sure that I'll do them in a room where there are other people."

"Oh yeah, sure, it's a bit cramped in here," Leah said. "But please, don't worry. We'll take good care of Mawa, right?"

"You could just leave me anyway," Mawa muttered from where she was sitting on the floor, directly under a boarded-up window. "What does it matter now?"

"No."

Despite the itching, throbbing need to get away from this evidence of her failure, Minah immediately dropped back to her knees in front of Mawa and took her hands.

"No, it does still matter. You still matter. And somebody needs to be able to speak up for him, once you get out of here."

"Yeah, exactly!" Ai crowed. "Minah-chan's gonna keep up her exercises, get all strong, and she'll help bust us out of here!"

It took everything she had to not flinch at that. Instead, she squeezed Mawa's hands briefly and got up, dusting down her knees.

"I'll be back soon, alright?" she said. "I'll get you through this-we'll get you through this."

When Leah and Ai cheerily waved her off, she wondered how it was they couldn't see what she really was, how they couldn't hear the hollowness in her voice. Did she even deserve to take herself through exercises, the types of routines that she had gone through in her old life? Such normalcy, did she deserve it? Yet Ai's optimism, as unwittingly hopeless as it was, had a grain of truth in it. If she was going to redouble her efforts, if she was to go at least a tiny way to making up for the fact she had not managed to keep them safe then she did have to be strong.

That, and she needed peace. Deserving of it or no, she needed it. If she went through the usual motions she would not need to think, just to move her body from one position to the next, make sure all her muscles worked as they should, the way she had always done all her life, whether in her childhood dojang or in one of the many spaces she'd used while at Hope's Peak.

She needed it.

As she walked down the corridor, she tried her hardest to listen out for any noise that would tell her someone was inside a room. She thought perhaps that the other boys Hiro routinely hung out with would have clustered together, trying to drown their own worries under games, but she caught no whiff of their usual rowdiness. She didn't hear Masao and Minori arguing, or even Shuuhei and Emlyn whispering lovingly to each other. Maybe they're all hiding away too, Minah thought, and why shouldn't they? What motive are we going to be hit with next? She tried to remember what had been discussed before but came up blank. Then again, perhaps she hadn't wanted to know. Would it have been easier to bear, if she'd known exactly what was coming? They did say that ignorance was bliss, after all-

What was that?

Sharply, she looked over her shoulder, before then turning around properly. She frowned, squinted for a moment before then turning her attention to the door nearest to her. One of them was the door to the recreation room and she listened at the door.

"Hello," she called out. "Anybody in there?"

There was no response, and something told her to keep moving, but she ignored that part of her without really understanding why and pushed open the door.

"Oh, are you….are you alright?"

She swallowed as Satoshi looked up at her. His face seemed oddly blank, but in a much calmer way than Mawa's.

"Oh, it's you….well, that's…it is what it is."

"I'm sorry, what do you mea-"

Minah's words were cut off as suddenly, Satoshi got up, a rope in his hand that she was sure hadn't been in his hand before. He advanced towards her and she stepped back into the doorway.

"I told myself that, the first person I saw that….well, I would follow in Ichi's footsteps."

"Ichi….?"

Satoshi's mouth twisted cruelly. His voice when he answered reminded her of Kaneda, that sing-song rising. And yet, there was a sob laced through the words he said, a sob that seemed to come through stronger as he got towards the end.

"You know, the one who was just ripped to pieces in front of us? The one who I had known since I was tiny? My friend?"

"Ohhh, Kusanagi-kun, I…."

"Don't. Don't say anything."

"You don't have to do this," Minah said. "Come on, let's…shall we talk?"

Despite her gut feelings screaming at her to run, she stepped back into the room again, deliberately striding past Satoshi to sit down where he had been sitting, but he suddenly reached out and grabbed her arm. Instinctively, she responded with a move that should have shocked him into letting go, but instead he struck out again and soon they were tussling.

"Don't tell me this isn't the way," he said between blows. "It doesn't matter either way, does it? Nothing's going to happen to save us? Not even you, perfect, perfect Minah Kang, can do that!"

"That's not…I know that I am as trapped as all of you-"

"No, if I'm going to die I'd rather do it in a way that's under my own terms!"

"Nobody needs to die-"

"Someone will! Someone will! And I don't want someone to decide to inflict that on me, I want to be the one to do the inflicting! Just like Ichiro did!"

"But the executions-"

"It doesn't matter!"

They were rolling and rolling around on the floor. Satoshi had no strategy, not even the knowledge of strategy. He was just hitting out, nothing but a writhing ball of emotions and yet, for some reason, Minah couldn't quite fend him off. She would block one move, manage to restrain him for a brief moment but then he would lash out in a different way or manage to wriggle away and it started all over again. More than once, they bumped into a table, a chair. She was vaguely aware of things falling over and scattering, including a pile of books which rained down on her back, enough for Satoshi to eventually overpower her properly, sending her sprawled.

Someone has to have heard that, right? Someone must have….?

Even as she tried to struggle, she listened for something. For anything. But the only noises were her breathing and Satoshi's heavy breathing. Managing to wriggle away slightly, she freed an arm and started to run through how she could use this new advantage when she looked up and saw herself directly in the line of sight of a camera.

Are you watching? She asked. Are any of you watching?

"No, you're not, are you?" she murmured. "And you're not going to help me either."

"That's right, you're not going to convince me so just don't! Just…."

Despite these words from Satoshi, all of a sudden the weight on her back eased and she scrambled up to a sitting position, gasping loudly. Warily, she turned to Satoshi, who was sobbing and shaking. The rope was still in his hands but now they covered his face as he cried and cried. Minah sat there for a moment, her fear slowly fading even as her heart still hammered in her chest.

Her vision faded too.

And instead of seeing the room around her with everything upturned, instead of seeing Satoshi sitting there sobbing, she saw other people.

She saw Hana looking around wide-eyed. She saw Isamu as he had been, boisterous and brave. She saw Yuki and Haruya and Risato and Eizan, blank faced because she hadn't known any of them in life. She saw Yuna, sobbing quietly, legs crossed as she sat as if on a chair. She saw Sho grinning, taunting. She saw Soutarou and Mai, Teruya and Ichiro. She saw others, so many others whose faces and names she didn't know. All wearing white tunics or dresses, all glowing. All those ghosts looking right at her, or were they actually looking through her now?

They crowded in, thick and fast and she reached out to them.

"Sorry….I'm so sorry….I know it's my fault that you're all gone. I'm so sorry."

Others made their appearance, ghostly but not really ghosts, still clad in the clothes they wore in life. Manaka. Hatsumi when she had been Emiko. Taki and Serin. Mawa, red-eyed and accusing and for a moment Minah startled, wondering if there had been enough noise, if Mawa had come but no. Of course she hadn't. More almost-ghosts came, almost crowding Mawa out. The three exchange students, in such obvious pain. Keiko, so gentle and pleasant. Leah and Ai, wide-eyed.

None of them said anything. Not the ghosts, not the almost-ghosts. But then there was Kaneda, in front of them all, leaning forward with that big smile of his and saying oh good, I knew you wouldn't say anything, Kouhai!

No. She wasn't going to say anything. She wasn't going to say anything at all, never would. Just as nobody would be coming for her and nobody ever would be. And why should they? She deserved this, after all.

She deserved all of this.

And there was a pang for the people that she would be leaving behind, the ones she loved. But despite how her heart ached for them she could not summon their almost-ghosts. Their faces wavered in her memory and how she wished she could say that she loved them just one more time. Her adoptive father Daewi. InSu. Oh, InSu. All the friends she'd made back home, and all the friends she'd made in Hope's Peak.

But already, the ghosts and the almost-ghosts were fading away and Satoshi was there, straightening up with new resolve. She trembled all over, not wanting to feel the breath gasping as it scattered away from her, not wanting to feel the rope rub against the skin of her neck and press into her bones. She didn't want to feel it, but she wasn't going to run away this time.

After all, if she was feeling so tired and broken inside, if the mere thought of Kaneda still made all the alarm bells go off in her mind, how did everyone else feel? If she had not been a part of all this, Satoshi would not have been here, preparing to strangle her. If she had not tried to be part of these efforts to change Hope's Peak, if she had not failed to save Isamu and the others, if she had not offered her class up to all this insanity-none of this would have happened. And yet, she'd been so stupid, throwing away all her teachings and her promises to build a more peaceful world over what she'd thought was guilt. Hah! What had she known of guilt back then? It was no wonder that Satoshi was raging and vengeful, bereft. It was no wonder that Mawa was dead-eyed and weeping, as if part of her missing, because part of her was missing now. No wonder. This situation hadn't just broken them, it had shattered them. This was what she should have felt guilty over. That she had been powerless to stop this, that she had not been brave enough to stop it, that she had been stupid enough to let it keep going.

It was all her fault.

So what right did she have to fight? The answer to that was obvious, really. She didn't know why she had even tried to. Certainly, she wouldn't do so anymore. The ghosts faded away, and Minah steeled herself as the world seemed to slow down. As Satoshi approached her, she sat very, very still and closed her eyes. In her mind, she floated away. Somewhere far, far away where some day she hoped she could maybe get just a little forgiveness. She floated away, and almost managed to feel nothing at all.

She floated away.