AN: Yeah, I'm moving slow, but I have not given up. The end is approaching and the story will be finished.
Day 31, 2345 Hours, 22 Hours until Death-line, Dorm Halls
John gritted his teeth. He should have waited longer to ensure everyone was asleep but he was in such a hurry that he ran into Jane, and had wasted time talking to her and pretending to go to bed instead of doing anything useful. Now that he was sure people were asleep he was headed to the room that was most suspicious, Monokuma's Room, although he had surfed the files on his laptop in an attempt to be productive, although he only had found more old homework.
His footsteps were the only sound as he ran through the halls the entire school asleep besides him.
And obviously Monokuma.
"What's the rush? No one else is awake yet you have plenty of time to set up a trap and make it look like someone else did it," the bear said, reclining on a platform that was being carried by four of the Shi-ru drones.
John ignored Monokuma as it continued taunting him in a similar manner, instead continuing towards the second floor stairs in the North Wing. He was starting to have doubts about if Monokuma counted his room amongst the locked rooms, having some clever way it to get out of actually allowing John access. John attempted to grit his teeth again but found that he was still gritting them from before. He forced himself to relax as he began going up the stairs.
And then he tensed as he skidded to a stop when he found Paris waiting at the top of the landing.
"Paris," he said, surprised.
"John," she stated calmly, although he could see her shaking slightly, "what did you do?"
"Nothing," John said, assuming a feigned innocence.
"Then why is Monokuma following you?" she asked, smartly avoiding the easily counter-able question of 'what are you doing up at this time?' forcing John to actually search for a believable reason for being harassed by Monokuma at such a ridiculous hour.
"I managed to break open a few files more on my computer," John said, thinking quickly, "they had a few videos that-look, it's probably better for you to see it yourself, I think I left my door open go into my dorm and look at the computer, ok?"
John held his breath as he looked at Paris who slowly walked up to him. She looked him up and down before saying, "Alright, I trust you."
She walked past him, looking back at him before she passed out of sight. The minute she was out of sight John turned on his heel and began moving towards the door marking Monokuma's room and prepared to force it open. It opened easily and caused John to fall on his face as the door swing shut behind him sealing him in.
John groaned as he pushed himself up, forcing himself to continue moving as fast as possible. He ran into the large machine in the middle of the room. Cursing his stupidity John took a moment to actually look at the room so he wouldn't find himself trying to run through another solid object.
It was a large room with many decorations showcasing Monokuma. There were a few objects showing that someone might live partially in this room, but it lacked a bed and a few other things. There were doors set into the walls as well, which all opened except for one which swung open about a centimeter before hitting something and stopping, while the other rooms were further living area extensions.
Deciding that trying to push his luck with the door that was technically 'open' John instead went to the machine he had run into. It had a monitor and a keyboard on one side and had been emblazoned with multiple Monokuma symbols. As John tried to power it on to control it the monitor lit up to show an image of the school tinted red before an error code forced a system shutdown. John groaned at his lack of success in finding anything useful before deciding to turn the archive room inside out.
He moved to exit the room before hesitating, quickly opening the door a crack to peer into the hall. He saw Alexander and Ferris standing in the middle of the hall arguing.
"He couldn't have vanished," Alexander said, glaring down at the chemist, "and do we really need to be suspicious of Citizen John, he has been useful."
"Yes, utility does not equate to trustworthiness, so let's hurry and find him, there's always the chance he got stabbed to death," Ferris said, smiling as he turned and moved down the stairs.
Alexander sighed and followed Ferris, giving John a stab of fear. If he got caught he would lose valuable time he could be doing something productive, like gathering information.
John was starting to be certain he should have listened to Paris.
He darted out of the room, the door sealing behind him, as he leaped down the stairs as quietly as possible guessing that Paris had alerted everyone to his suspicious behavior. It made since and he supposed she was probably feeling a bit hurt at his deception, but it couldn't be helped, well it could but it was probably too late for that.
He dashed through the central hall, not seeing anyone except for a fleeting glimpse of Jane who retreated back at his passing. He debated on the chances of who she would tell his whereabouts too and decided that he only had to worry about her telling Paris. He supposed she wouldn't ever interact with him again after this, but then again no one would be able to.
As he turned towards the library, John couldn't help but think of his family. He wouldn't be able to see his father again or mother. He would never talk to James again or do any sort of family activity again. Death was now his future, the hours rushing past as his time drew near. How long had he been at this, he didn't want to look at a clock and break his sense of urgency or cause further panic, either one would make him sloppy and probably get him killed meaninglessly.
John burst into the library as Chloe exited the shelving. They froze for a second before Chloe instantly charged him. John sprung to the side at random, not caring where he ended up as long as it wasn't in someone's custody. He broke into a dash as Atsuko called out from somewhere, and began weaving through the aisles of books.
Chloe was right behind him; the only reason she hadn't caught him yet was the fact he was ducking through the shelves going at a rate just faster than she could manage in the close quarters. He didn't flinch when Atsuko suddenly tried to flank him, instead shoving the smaller student into the larger one who wasted time in her attempt to not trample her giving John a bigger advantage.
He used this time to locate the stairs and make a dash towards their location, weaving between the shelves and diverging from his path every so often to hopefully confuse them. When he did reach the stairs, Chloe and Atsuko were only slightly behind him.
Atsuko stopped at the bottom stating that it was a dead end and that she was going to find the others, but Chloe kept up her pursuit. John could feel the air in his lungs burning as he reached the top and forced himself to move towards the archive room. Chloe was behind him. John reached for the door as he neared it grabbing it and swinging it up and around, Chloe grasping the door as he slipped inside.
There was a loud slamming sound as the door sealed itself, cutting off a curse from Chloe. John sucked air in as he tried to eve his breathing, forcing himself to move towards the interior of the room. It was dark, and John was forced to feel along the floor. He should have searched for a switch by the door, but thinking was hard at the moment, so John operated by what first came to mind, search the room.
What he was getting so far was that it was carpeted. He eventually found a table, which he pulled himself up with, and a computer which he turned on. The monitor lit up and gave him a dim view of a room with walls made of filing cabinets. The desk was situated at the far wall and was under more filing cabinets that had been attached to the walls.
As the computer turned on fully a password lock showed up, as did Monokuma. The bear entered in a password faster then John could see giving John access to the entire computer, as well as adding a red tinge to the overall lighting of the room. Ignoring the silent bear John began to inspect the computer.
It seemed to act as a data bank, giving a search bar that John could enter words into to search the actual hard files of the room. Deciding to go for the obvious John entered in 'Hope's Peak'. Several different files came up and as John turned to begin rifling through the file cabinets Monokuma dropped a stack of documents by him.
John remained silent as he began opening the files, checking them against the computer. Hope's Peak, a prestigious school in Japan, blah, blah, nothing new or useful to their situation. John tossed it over his shoulder, the file hitting the floor and the pages sliding loose.
Hope's Peak to open international branches, already learned, Hope's Peak taking in the seventy-eighth class, useless except it does mention Junko Enoshima attending as the Ultimate Fashionista, if she is the same person as the author of books in the library then what the hell is wrong with the fashion world. It wasn't until the last file that anything really useful turned up.
Massacre at Hope's Peak causes Disorder in Japan, government on the verge of collapse. John read on as it became clear that Hope's Peak had been the cause of the end of the world, well not truly. John searched Despair next.
Terrorist group worships Monokuma as a god, alright, Monokuma next then. Symbol of despair, honored by those who wear masks and deface monuments with his visage, what next, the branches, search the international branches to find this one, which is the American Branch, right? Mostly Americans so that would make sense. Hope's Bloom, so that was the stupid name of this place then. What else? John continued his search.
Files passed by his eyes, information coming slowly. He lost all concept of time in the room, files passing by slowly. Finally, John left the room, to a strange smell. Chloe was on the ground, and as John moved closer, he could see glass and holes in the floor around her. And he could also plainly see her face burned away.
John couldn't help but stare in horror as Paris, Atsuko, and Jane came up the stairs and found him standing over Chloe's corpse. The announcement played as John slowly looked at the other students, who all stood with looks of suspicion. Except Paris, she only looked disappointed. There would be no way to talk his way out of this, unless he found some concrete evidence proving him innocent. That, and all his suspicious behavior beforehand would only help in killing them all.
That, and now it was obvious that he had gone back on his word to Paris, and that was probably the worst thing he had done during this whole fiasco. Well, dealing with Monokuma was still by far the worst but this was a close second only by a mere margin. All in all, this situation could easily be summed up in a few words.
John was for all intents and purposes, completely and absolutely fucked to hell and back, courtesy of Monokuma and the culprit.
And oh, was he sooooooooooooo fucked.