Yes I realize I'm a bit late. Still, not to worry! I'm back! I have MOAR plot twists.

[Soundtrack: The Place of All Fears - Dragon Age: Inquisition]

Serenity awakens surrounded by flames and soot. Ashes rain from the sky onto the blackened courtyard and damp ringlets of her dark hair dangle over her eyes; that's how she knows it's another dream. Her entire body aches and feels incredibly heavy. She doesn't know what she's doing or what she's looking at, but she knows that the pain is more than just physical. Every facet of her existence is hurting immensely.

A headache rages behind her eyes, making her vision go in and out, leaving her on the very precipice of consciousness. She wants to give in, but a supernatural force causes her to remain awake. Her soul is burning in hell, writhing, yet she feels like she deserves it. It's an overwhelming feeling like remorse mixed in with satisfaction…

In her mind's eye, she sees a young toddler dashing through a field of grass in a flowery tunic, her black hair full of weeds and violets. She's a mess, but she doesn't care… Serenity doesn't know who she is, but she knows the image makes her want to roar into the heavens and rip her own heart out of her chest. This creature in particular deserved none of the pain she suffered.

Through the flames, she sees a familiar figure in heavy armor begin to tread towards her through the flames, dragging a greatsword behind him. Such an intimidating form, but she feels no fear, just intense sorrow. His shadow dances around his body, tempting his body to show weakness -but it refuses.

"I'm sorry, my lady," he says as he kneels down before her, his face levelling with hers.

Is that… Yugi? Even illuminated by the flames, it has all the same angles, and a jaw tightly clenched in concern. No, it can't be him.

"She's killed them both!" she shrieks, having no control over her own lips. "The only things that have ever mattered to me!" The crackling of fire can't drown out the agony that echoes around them.

The girl's face flashes again in her mind, followed by the face of a grinning man, the warmth of their bodies… now completely gone…

The man that looks like Yugi leans over and takes her into his arms, embracing her tightly. "As long as I live and breathe," he says into her ear. "I will make sure she doesn't get away with this. You have my absolute word."

She wails into his shoulder, trying and failing to get coherent words to come out of her bruised throat.

"Shh… It's not over yet, my lady. We still need to get you out of here. You're our only hope…"

Just then, she feels a burst of air enter her lungs, and over the man's shoulder, she sees another man, this one wearing dark leather armor, his silver hair glowing white in the flames. He wears a dark and solemn expression on his face.

Before she can even react to his presence, she feels the man that looks like Yugi unwrap his arms from her tiny form and push her behind him. "Stay away from her, demon!" he hollers at something only he can see.

In the next moment, she feels a great pain in her chest as well as a strange and terrifying sense of weightlessness. Through blurred vision, she can see the courtyard now several meters below her.

"Oh, Shadow…" a whispered voice drifts across the courtyard, so quiet that the flames themselves hush to make it heard. "How you try to change the past… You will watch them die over and over again, and there's nothing you can do about it…"

"Shut up!" an unfamiliar voice bellows over the crackling of the flames -the silver haired man's voice.

"She will die over and over again," the voice whispers again, "And there's nothing you can do about it."

"I told you to stop!" the man snaps. He can't even see the one that taunts him; his eyes dart around, trying to find a way to stop everything from happening -to save her. She's the only one that matters anymore. She's the only hope his soul has.

"You don't have much time left… She's nearly dead now, which means you'll just go back to the beginning and do it all over again…" There's a sick sense of glee in the demonic voice. "Better luck next time…"

Those are the last words she manages to hear before she begins to feel the pull of sleep. She can't even keep her eyes open anymore…

[Soundtrack: Darkness Time - Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony]

"No!" she cries out at the top of her lungs as her body rises from its slumber. She thrashes against her covers letting out a ghostly wail, so deep and guttural it shocks her. "Take me back!" Serenity screams. "Take me back to my baby! She killed my baby!"

Her breathing is so quick that she can't handle it. The darkness is overwhelming her, showing her faces and memories that don't even belong to her. A lifetime of happiness and the horror of loss. She's alone and her heart is shattered.

"Please just give her back to me! Please! Don't leave me alone!" she sobs.

From the darkness, a jarring noise makes her swallow her screams. It's the sound of static followed by a voice. "Serenity, my dear. I never expected you to be our first rule-breaker. Remember, no speaking is allowed when the lights are out. This is your first warning."

Pegasus?

Realization washes over her like a tsunami. She's still on Pegasus's submarine… she's still playing his sick game. She never lost anyone. She's alone, but her friends are all in their rooms close to her.

She then realizes one more thing: the lights are out. This means that the five minute window to commit murder has already started, and nobody is safe. The only thing she can do is sit in the dark room, filling the silence with her quickened breath. She hardly knows what to even think about, between the ongoing blackout and the images from her nightmares. Emotions that didn't even belong to her still rushed through her mind, making it harder to stop the sobs from racking her body.

The shock of being scolded by Pegasus on the intercom makes the thudding of her heart unbearable. The organ is dancing in her throat, threatening to halt her breathing completely. She feels like she's going to die in that very moment if the lights don't come back on.

She nearly screams when she hears her door open in the stillness of the dark. Of course, the hallway outside is also dark, so she can't see the intruder, but she can hear their footsteps coming towards her and the soft click of the door as it closes behind them. She can feel her bed sink as the person sits down. They're also breathing quite heavily, and once she stills her own breath, she recognizes the man behind the gasping.

She manages to untangle her arms from each other, as she had been hugging herself with pain. She then reaches for the figure, tracing their arms, shoulders, and face. Sighing with relief, she throws herself at him, burying her face in his chest and inhaling his scent. Thank god; it's Ryou. She lets herself sink into him, and felt his arms tighten around her body. Their heartbeats race in sync and the mere few minutes of the power outage feels like all the time in the world.

The moment Serenity's night light comes back on and illuminates her room dimly, feels like an earth shattering release, as both of them exhale deeply in each other's arms, shuddering in trepidation.

"Are you alright?" he asks her, a shaking hand moving to stroke the back of her head. "I heard Pegasus's announcement and I couldn't stay put, I-"

She nods and reluctantly removes his arms from her body. "I had another nightmare," she says bluntly, wiping her tears with the backs of her hands. "I'm fine… Thank you."

Before Ryou can even ask, the door to Serenity's room opens with a loud bang and the silhouette of Rex Raptor can be seen in the doorway. He raises a brow briefly at the scene before him before sobering up and asking, "Have you guys seen Sera? She's not in her room."

"What do you mean?" Ryou questioned. "Do you think -" It dawns on the couple exactly what they had neglected to think about while they were comforting each other. That five minutes of darkness was the window of opportunity that Pegasus allowed for murder. Someone in the submarine could very well be dead, and the fact that Sera is missing, doesn't bode well.

Just then, a wave of exhaustion rushes over Serenity and she groans quietly, feeling her body shudder. She clenches her limbs to her body and shakes her head to make the feeling go away.

"Hey, Serenity. You okay?" Rex asks approaching her slowly, but in the darkness of the room, his silhouette shifts in and out of focus. His body sways slowly towards her.

"I think I'm just tired," she mumbles, gingerly shifting until her legs are dangling off the side of the bed. "All I need is to get up and move around."

She hears Rex chuckle. "What I would give for a coffee. Maybe Pegasus'll give us some murder coffee after we find the bodies."

"Rex!" Serenity scolds. "What if someone is actually dead?"

He rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. "Sorry, I'm tired, too, I guess. And I'm worried about Sera."

"Then let's try to find her," Ryou says, helping Serenity get to her feet. "Perhaps we'll meet the others on the way."

The trio leave the room and begin to trek through the dark corridor. On the way, they stop at Malik's room and retrieve him as well.

Rex tries the door handle for Zephyr's room and it opens with ease, but his bed looks neat and not slept in. It looks like he hasn't spent much time there since arriving. Similarly, Malik tries Mako's door, only to find it locked. He administers several loud knocks to the door before giving up. No answer there. The group of four try to knock on the other guests' rooms, but have no luck.

"Did fish boy really sleep through all that?" Rex scowls.

"Strange," Ryou notes. "Where could they all be?"

After exhausting all other avenues, the group makes their way towards the showers. None of them say a word, all equally unnerved by the darkness and the lifelessness in the submarine. Was it even possible that all of the other guests were still asleep?

[Soundtrack: Ridicule - Umineko No Naku Koro Ni]

Nobody quite knows what to expect when opening the door to the showers, but as soon as they do so, the automatic lights light up the room, nearly blinding them. It only takes them a moment to adjust and see the grizzly sight before them.

The shower stall directly opposite to the door is wide open and, seated against the pale tile walls, staining it red, was the body of Zephyr. His entire shirt was dark with blood, in contrast to his face, which was pale as death. By the looks of it, his chest had been stabbed so many times, the flesh underneath looked like it had been absolutely eviscerated. It also looks like someone had propped him against the wall post-mortem, and his arms dangled uselessly by his side.

The entire group stares in silence for nearly a minute before Rex, ever the breaker of silences, speaks up. "What in the fuck is this shit!"

"Another member of Team Beta," Ryou says solemnly.

"Does it even matter what team he's from?" Malik snaps at the other boy.

Bakura nods. "Well, we're going to have to find out who killed him, right? And seeing as he couldn't have possibly committed suicide like Lia, it matters that whoever did this, didn't break the rules."

"Where's the murder weapon?" Serenity asks nobody in particular, still trying to take in the sight in front of her. Part of her wonders why this doesn't shock her as much as it should.

She wanders away from the body towards the sinks and turns the tap on. She cups her hand under the cool water and splashes it against her face, trying to make the sense of fatigue go away. Observing her own dark face in the mirror, she spots a dark stain from underneath the closed shower stall behind her.

Immediately, she turns around and hesitantly approaches the stall door. She moves her hand towards the handle and tries to open it, only to find the door locked. "Huh?"

"Is everything alright, Serenity?" Ryou asks her. His arms are crossed over his chest as he glances in her direction.

"This door is locked," she mentions as she tugs the door again to no avail.

The boys all crowd around her discovery, each trying the door for themselves. Finally, Malik pushes the rest away and says to the rest, "Here goes nothing…" before slamming his foot against the door, breaking its lock and causing it to swing open. The sound of a loud crack rings in the aftermath of his actions. Something about it is very unnerving -that's not the sound a door makes when it hits the wall.

"There's blood in here," Rex remarks quietly, taking in the scene. "But could it be…" After a moment, he says, "I'm gonna take a look inside." He steps into the shower and shuts the door behind him.

For a few minutes, the showers are quiet, and Rex mentions nothing from inside of the stall. "You okay in there?" Malik calls out.

Serenity notices that his breathing has gotten heavier, but Rex still doesn't say a word. "Rex, what did you find?"

Malik lets out a sigh and moves to push the door open when he feels an unexpected force -not the broken lock, but Rex himself, pushing the door closed. "N-No! Wait. Don't open it yet!" he cries out, his voice cracking uncharacteristically. "Let me just… Let me just get her down…"

His words are a jab to her heart. Get her down? "What do you mean?" she questions, beginning to fear the worst.

"She's stuck on the hook," he replies through the door."If you open the door, you'll hit her again…"

"Who's stuck, Rex?" Malik asks, his voice gentler now. "What are you talking about?"

Rex lets out another set of heavy breaths before finally replying. "I can't get her down…" His defeated voice is hard to listen to.

"Doesn't this door also open in the opposite direction?" Serenity asks, trying to pull the door towards her, but the hinges are stuck as a result of Malik's kick.

"Rex, I'm coming in to help you," Malik announces, gently pushing the door open just enough to let himself through. Once he's in, however, Ryou and Serenity hear him let out a string of curses.

"What is it?" Ryou insists.

"It's Sera," Malik responds desolately. "She's… she's also been murdered. She's stuck on the hook on the door."

"How could she possibly be stuck on that?" Serenity asks, but she's almost afraid to find out the answer.

There's hesitation in his voice when he says, "Maybe you two should come in and see for yourselves."

The couple slowly push their way into the shower, careful not to push the door too far in. Unfortunately, neither are prepared for what they find next. True to Rex and Malik's accounts, Sera is hanging on the hook on the shower door. This hook, meant to innocently hold their bags while they showered, is now embedded deep within the back of Sera's neck. With the sheer volume of blood that covered the door, her clothes, and the ground, it's unlikely that she's alive; but if there were ever any doubt, Ryou also attempts to check her pulse.

This is what proves to be too much for Serenity's stomach. She can barely stand to be in front of Sera's corpse for more than a minute before she pushes past the boys and exits the stall, emptying her guts into the sink. Then, just as Ryou's reflection in the mirror begins to walk towards her, she feels her fatigue slam into her body like a high-speed train, and just like that, she's out cold.

[Soundtrack: Tell a Thing - Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni]

She doesn't know how long time has passed until her eyes no longer feel heavy. She feels the softness of the goosefeather blankets that Pegasus had provided them, and the perfect stiffness of the mattress underneath her. If she hadn't known any better, she would have thought she were in a lavish hotel room. However, that is not the case. Soon, all the images from before she had fallen asleep flood her mind and the satisfaction of sleep is completely replaced by alarm and discomfort.

Sera and Zephyr are dead.

Just as that thought crosses her mind, the intercom in her room bursts to life and she hears a voice she loathes fill her room. "Rise and shine, everyone. The mess hall is now open for breakfast. Of course, if you'd rather get your beauty sleep, you can wait until lunch, but it's hard to conduct a murder investigation on an empty stomach, isn't it?"

She shudders in disgust. What a terrible, twisted man…

As Serenity leaves her room, she comes face to face with a disgruntled Sun, who seems to have been making her way towards the cafeteria. "Mmh… Good morning, Serenity. Is everything alright? You look like you've seen a ghost." This doesn't look like the face of a woman who has seen two dead bodies.

Serenity pursed her lips. "I… Don't you know?"

"Know what?" Sun questions, furrowing her brow.

"About Zephyr and Sera!" Serenity cries.

Whatever remnants of sleep had been on Sun's face earlier, they're all gone now when she hears the other girl's words. "What about them?"

"We found them last night… after the blackout. We tried knocking on your door but you didn't hear us…" Serenity explains.

"We? Who's we?" Sun asks suspiciously, her eyes narrow and her posture stiff.

"Rex, Malik, and Ryou were with me. We found them in the showers!"

Sun bites her lip and glares. "Rex, Malik, and Ryou came back? When did that happen? I thought they were missing. Where were they?"

As Serenity seeks to answer these questions, she feels a fog come up in her mind. "Wait…" she gasps softly, placing a delicate hand to her mouth. "They… they were missing, weren't they? I… never even thought to ask them…"

"Well, if they're here now, I can ask them myself. Now, show me where you found Zephyr and Sera!" Sun commands, a hint of annoyance in her tone.

With Sun at her heels, Serenity rushes towards the showers. She can feel her empty stomach lurching at the thought of seeing the bodies again. In her mind, she can hear the sound of the crack when Malik accidentally slammed Sera's head into the wall. She can still smell the iron and rot, and feel the humidity and cold of the neon lit tomb.

As Serenity opens the door to the shower room, Sun aggressively shoves the younger girl out of the way and drops to her knees in front of the open stall door, where Zephyr's pale corpse stares back at her, just the way they had left it last night. The only things supporting Sun's shaking body are her two arms. With her hands pressed against the ground, her arms threaten to buckle under her weight.

"What's going on here?" someone says, and Serenity feels her body gently moved out of the doorway to make room for more people.

Mako and Enzi are together when they show up, attached at the hip as they are. Enzi, being the elder of the group, makes the first tentative move to Sun, who hasn't spoken since laying eyes on Zephyr.

"Sun? Are you alright?"

With an abrupt snap, her head turns to face the man, and she snarls ferally, "You don't get to ask me that! You're a member of Alpha. You are the only one who could have done this! You and -and…" Her voice trails off as though she's suddenly lost her train of thought.

Like a possessed puppet, she rises to her feet and begins pushing open stalls. "Serenity! You said Sera was also dead, right?"

"Wait just a minute!" Mako cries. "What do you mean Sera is also dead?"

[Soundtrack: Rainy Days - Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni]

It feels as though time is moving very slowly to Serenity. She's already experienced this: the body discovery. She has no wish to go through it again, but she has no choice. Where are Ryou, Rex, and Malik? What did they do after finding the bodies? Did they just go to sleep? How could anyone sleep after that?

With heavy steps, Serenity pushes herself forward to the stall that she knew to contain Sera's body. She runs her hand over the door handle and spots the lock indicator. The door isn't just jammed, it's locked. However, Malik broke the lock and opened it just last night, so how could it possibly be locked now?

"She's in here," she says weakly.

"Is someone in there with her?" Enzi's eyes land on the red lock indicator.

"Peculiar…" Mako notes, stroking his chin.

Without a warning, Sun marches past the three of them and slams the heel of her boot against the door. Serenity tries to brace against the sound of the crack that she knows is coming, but it's just as stomach turning as it was the first time.

Serenity tries to look past the swinging door to see if anyone else could have been in there, but she can't see anyone. Flashes from last night of Rex entering the stall by himself and blocking the door enter her mind. Still, Rex is nowhere to be found.

"I don't see anything," Sun declares dismissively.

"It kinda sounded like there's something behind the door," Enzi suggests.

Taking on the role of leader, Sun enters the stall and shuts the door slowly, and the gasp she makes is unmistakable. "Oh, she's in here alright."

Rafael makes an appearance shortly after this discovery, having gone to the mess hall on his own, only to find nobody there. Of course, two dead bodies aren't what he had expected to find so early in the morning.

It's all so redundant and Serenity finds herself almost… bored. She's tired and she doesn't want to investigate anything. She just wants to go back to her room and cry herself to sleep. It's not like Pegasus mentioned any sort of punishment for refusing to investigate. As long as she makes sure not to break any of his rules, she's free to lock herself in her room until it's all over.

She doesn't know how long she stands there just watching the other four bicker and debate about the nature of this double murder -or is it a murder suicide? She doesn't know; she hasn't been following their logic. Pegasus also shows up to remind everyone that we would have to determine the identity of the killer or killers at 6PM -just like yesterday.

As the four are crowded around Zephyr's corpse, Serenity finds herself drawn to Sera's stall again. She hears a soft thump and pushes the door open slightly to enter the stall and investigate.

"Serenity…"

She looks up at the corpse, hung up on a hook like an animal. Unlike Zephyr, Sera's eyes are wide open and bloodshot, but her skin is pale and bruising in comparison. Her short blonde hair is stained with what was likely blood.

"Get me down, Serenity…"

"Huh?" Serenity's eyes widen as it looks like Sera's chest is heaving erratically.

"It hurts so much… I can't… breathe…"

The voice is unmistakably hers, but Sera's mouth, caked in dry blood, isn't moving at all. And whatever Serenity had seen earlier, the body is just as still. "Sera?"

She waits for around five minutes for a reply from the disembodied voice, but as though it were a trick of her mind, the voice is gone, replaced by the sound of Rafael, Sun, Enzi, and Mako arguing. It's as though she had suddenly awoken from a nightmare. Perhaps she really had drifted off… She still feels very tired. Maybe she'll leave the investigating to the adults and go to sleep.