The Mortal City

by MidnightRun42

(Post-SD2) Waking up is never the hardest part.

8. He and She

"The problem with being nuts, she thought, is that you don't always feel as if you're nuts. Sometimes, in fact, you feel perfectly sane, and there just happens to be a trailer-shaped dragon crouching in the lot next door."
― Christopher Moore, The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove

DAY THREE
-continued-
-ooo-

He wasn't sure how long he lingered there in that hall, on that floor, staring up at that ceiling while he listened and hoped. Though he was never quite certain what it was he was hoping for. Hope was such a funny thing. He'd been holding onto this idea that it meant something that he'd been able to have this shirt, keep it, that Hinata found him time and again. He'd almost… almost been able to let it go when he'd disappeared for all that time, when he'd been alone, but then he'd come back and he… he didn't want to give too much of himself to that hope and find that he wasn't… that it didn't mean anything. She probably knew that. She seemed to know so much, too much and maybe that was why… why she said those things. Why she made it seem like he was...

What did he hope for?

Really hope for?

That he was real? That this Hinata, the one who touched him, wanted him, whispered those words in his ear and against his skin who was both so much like the Hinata he remembered and nothing like him all at once. Did he want him to be real? Did he really want everything that had happened to them, between them, to be real? Because it wouldn't just be the nice things, the gentle things, it would be all the rest too, wouldn't it? All those low, disgusting, terrible moments, Hinata's fingers in his chest and his hands around his throat and jumping off the bridge and getting off on the beach and thrusting down his throat. All those awful things that had turned him on and made him feel weak, made him want. Would Hinata hate him if he knew? Did he hate him already?

It wouldn't be any less than he deserved, but….

He needed… wanted…

Foolish things.

It was probably better if it were just his imagination, if all this was just his brain going dark, just dying lights flickering and spitting sparks in an vacant house. If he just faded away to nothing and never had to worry about those things. That would be the best thing to hope for. Oblivion. Maybe it wasn't the big, beautiful, brilliant hope he'd so often dreamed of, but it could be enough. It was better in some ways than the alternatives.

Because at some point his mind would completely shatter beneath the strain of endless days and doubts and uncertainties, he didn't think it would take too much more really. He was already cracking and brittle at the edges and it wasn't as if his brain had ever been in great shape to begin with. So it was probably just a matter of time before he just wouldn't be able to do this anymore. When he would decide that it didn't really matter if any of it was real at all and he'd just let despair finally swallow him whole. And maybe it would be a relief. Hope took so much work in this place. It was exhausting. And it wasn't as if it hadn't happened before. He'd been part of Ultimate Despair after all, he'd….

Do you really think you haven' t given in already?

It could happen again. He thought that maybe it would be simple, it might even be a relief just to let go and sink down into the abyss, to let despair color his desires, twist them until he couldn't even recognize them. Until he couldn't even recognize himself and then… well, then he'd… he'd…

If he thought about it, really thought about it, he could almost remember how it happened the first time. It was like a tickle at the back of his throat or an itch he couldn't quite scratch. Little broken shards of memory trying to weasel their way inside him only… that wasn't quite right, was it? They'd always been there and he was just some grimy, worthless film painted over the top.

And he knew, didn't he? That that voice, those stories in his head that he kept tripping over like moved furniture in a dark, familiar room were his, the truths he'd misplaced when they'd made him, made them all, forget what they had been. Forget their despair.

He didn't always remember those things, of course. Sometimes he'd no sooner glanced at them than they were forgotten, skimmed for importance before being carelessly discarded. Sometimes he threw them away, retching, his teeth chattering as he clutched his sickened stomach, more often he viewed fragments of what he had been with cool disinterest and it was… better. Better when it didn't matter so much, when he didn't care so much, when it was all… distant and unremarkable. It made it easy to forget.

And he did forget while he lay there, staring up at the ceiling. He forgot almost everything it seemed, from time to time, but somehow he never seemed able to forget about Hinata.

It was probably because of the shirt.

It was hard to forget someone whose muddy, bloody, filthy shirt was clinging to you like a second skin. He didn't always care about him, didn't always remember why he was wearing his shirt, sometimes he hoped fervently that he never saw him again, never felt him again, but his name was always there lingering on the tip of his tongue ready to trip off into the air and take flight at any moment.

And sometimes... sometimes all those memories were crisp and clear, nauseatingly so. He didn't understand everything or even most things and he thought that, maybe, the him that he'd been before,the one that had laughed in her face, was hiding things from him. But he couldn't think of any reason why he would. What he might gain from it, what the point would be, but...

Hate isn't so very different from love when you're alone.

That was probably true. He'd loved his parents, but he'd hated them too. And Hinata... beautiful, regrettably ordinary Hinata had always been complicated. And everything else, everyone else in his life had been… barely worth mentioning.

Even Hope's Peak had been little more than busy and hectic and lonely.

He remembered being told he was dying during the last days of his first year there.

Really dying, not just sick this time. They didn't give him odds or chances, just an expiration date. Before they'd always painted it with a hopeful brush told him about the treatments that might prolong his life (and his pain, his suffering, but they never told him that part, not really, that was always just left for him to discover, side effects listed in fine print on the side of the bottles and on the hospital intake forms). No, they had always given him a bright, beautiful, dangerous hope that there could be tomorrows, so many tomorrows, and a future that was so different from a grave. But this time they didn't give him that, they didn't give him options, just a timeframe. Days, weeks, months and a hurried summary of what it might be like, how bad it might get and that he didn't have to decide just then, but he'd have to decide soon, eventually, but soon because he wouldn't be able to… be able to… and he didn't remember the rest. Just the doctor droning on and on, like the buzzing of blowflies over a corpse and he was sitting on the exam table which was covered in that cheap thin paper that crinkled and ripped whenever he even thought about moving. He wasn't really certain why he had chosen to sit there. Maybe it was just that there was nowhere else to sit in the nurse's office and the little man had been very insistent that he should sit down. As if sitting down would cushion the blow or keep him from falling down if that was what he felt like doing.

It was stupid.

It was all so stupid.

There was this ridiculous squirrel photo that hung in the nurse's office on the wall across from the exam table, just over the little doctor's head and as the man went on and on, he couldn't stop staring at it. He'd never liked it and he'd spent enough time in the office to be intimately familiar with it. It wasn't going anywhere, it had been there long before he had arrived and would remain long after he was gone. It just hung there on that otherwise unremarkable wall being strange and out of place and giving the room character.

A big, bushy, black-eyed squirrel, clinging to an icy branch, caught in that single moment as it dangled above an unseen abyss, kind of like Schrödinger's cat, in that it existed forever in a state of both life and death. Would he cling to his branch and survive or would he plummet to an untimely end? Was the tree branch positioned over a cushy bush? A ravine peppered with jagged rocks? There was no way to know. He'd always assumed it climbed back up, clung to life and lived to jump and scamper another day. That seemed the more hopeful end to the story. Maybe not happier, because the squirrel might starve or freeze and die a slow agonizing death in that unforgiving season. Hope was just hope after all and it couldn't make anything better, it just made things seem better… at least for a while. It couldn't stave off hunger or heal the sick or the dying. He could hope for a better tomorrow, for a life, but his luck… his luck always meant that his hopes were fulfilled just as often as they were dashed, didn't it? That was something on which he could always depend.

Would his luck allow him days? Years? Months? Would he get sicker and sicker, as they said, until he was unable to care for himself at all? Would the illness just hollow him out, make him hungry and vague, but still able to function on his own? Would he want to die in the end? Would he long for it when his body had betrayed him and his mind was barely his own anymore? Barely anything anymore really, if it were so full of holes that he'd forgotten more than he'd ever truly known? Would it hurt? Where was the hope in that? In a life prolonged, in misery delayed, but ultimately inescapable?

He hadn't realized he was laughing until the doctor said his name and he forced himself to look away from the squirrel on the wall and focus on the man in the neat suit who'd come all this way to talk to him, to tell him those test results and how he could always get a second opinion, but he shouldn't get his hopes up. He was a valued patient and patron of the hospital because his parents had always donated handsomely to the hospital prior to their passing and he'd never seen the need to stop doing so after when he had so much money to spare. So he had deserved the personal touch, deserved to receive his death sentence,the news of his inevitable demise in the comfort of the nurse's office. To be called out of class and have to go back to it after and smile and pretend everything was fine, that he was fine.

He was so... lucky, wasn't he?

To have such caring physicians. Who hoped he would consider their hospice program, which they were quite certain would meet his needs adequately. It was a little expensive, but he had money enough for that.

He was very lucky after all.

He giggled a little, pressing a hand against his mouth to stifle the sound.

Because, of course , it came down to that, didn't it?

They wouldn't miss him, but they'd miss his money.

It was an ugly thought, an unkind thought.

He was filled with nothing but ugly thoughts in that moment.

Of a hospital room no one would visit and a gravesite no one would care for.

Hope's Peak… would mourn the loss of his talent, maybe, probably, but other than that… other than that….

It was supposed to be different here.

He was supposed to be different here.

"I'll consider my options carefully," he promised, because the man was still staring at him like he'd grown a second head. Like he had expectations for how his patients were supposed to act in this situation that Nagito simply wasn't living up to them. And any other time, he would have cared about that.

Maybe.

At least he would have wanted to meet those expectations because it was easier, everything was easier, when he met expectations, but he couldn't think. Couldn't think of what he was supposed to do and so he just turned and left the little office. Ignored the curious, pitying looks of the office staff and kept walking, walking, walking out of the office and down the empty hall. Putting one foot in front of the other, faster and faster until he was flying down the corridor, his coat trailing behind him as he sprinted down the hall, out of breath already and not caring. Not caring about the way his lungs burned or his muscles ached, or about how his legs felt like they might give out any moment. His body was a disaster after all. It was weak, weak, weak and it was killing him anyway so what was the point of yielding to its protests now. He hit the stairwell door at a run, slamming it open and tripping down the stairs.

Barely registering that there were other people or, more precisely, one other person in it, their feet pounding against the stairs and coming closer and closer as he ran down and the other ran up and then they both took the turn at the third floor landing too fast, slamming into each and there was a flash of wide dark eyes and a sensation like falling and then there was nothing but the black.

He blinked and he was on the floor again, the tile floor of the hospital, exhausted and aching as if he'd run miles when he'd just been kneeling in just the same place for… he wasn't certain. Hours? Minutes? Days? It was hard to tell.

He remembered kneeling on other hard tiled floors over the years, dozens, and they were always hell on his knees. His body had always been too weak to enjoy or even gladly tolerate such things.

Still… he knelt there for a long, long time.

Sometimes he was certain he was awake and that there was nothing but silence broken by the occasional whir and chug of unseen machinery.

More often he wasn't so sure.

More often he heard Hinata's voice calling him, but found he couldn't bring himself to answer that increasingly desperate call. Too afraid to know the truth, whatever it might be. Other times Hinata's voice was nothing but an uncertain memory and all he could hear was the uneven limping gait of someone stumping about with a broken heel over and over again, round and round, until he couldn't tell if it was coming from a particular direction or from everywhere all at once. Sometimes it was just that, ghostly footsteps echoing down the hall. Other times there was a woman's voice, a girl's voice, whispering his name over and over in the dark and the sound slithered through his brain with a sound like the rustling tissue paper. The ceiling seemed to flicker and change every time he blinked, the tiles subtly altered. Sometimes the color was a little deeper, sometimes it was speckled with grey or green or purple or pocked with small evenly placed dots and dashes like Morse code. Sometimes the shape was wavering and uncertain, hazy and iridescent like he was looking up at it from the depths of the ocean. The motion made him feel sick… well, sicker, anyway.

It seemed like he'd drowned himself to get away from that voice once before not so very long ago.

Though maybe he'd imagined that too.

Sometimes he thought he could still hear Hinata calling his name, but the sound was distant, distorted and strange. Sometimes he said other things too. Curses maybe? He sounded frustrated, but then that wasn't new and he seemed so… real when he sounded like that. Even though he'd never really heard Hinata curse on the island… before. So it probably had less to do with the words and more to do with the fact that Hinata had almost always sounded exasperated with him, by him, when they'd been together.

He remembered Hinata's arm around him as he helped to the hospital when he'd had the Despair disease. Not well. Most of that time had a strange surreal, dreamlike quality to it that made it seem even less real than everything that had happened since. So in thinking about it he wasn't ever quite sure how much of it was real and how much was the fever. He just had… scraps. Moments and fragments of lucid time bundled with sense memories of cool touches and he was pretty sure he'd been naked a couple of times and he wouldn't have been surprised to find out he'd touched himself at least once. He had this weird image in his head of Mikan staring at him looking awkward and out of place in the doorway of his hospital room like she couldn't decide if she was coming or going.

There were a lot of little things like that, little snapshots of sensation or snippets of time. Hinata's hand in his hair, Hinata helping him out of the restaurant, supporting his weight, the almost unbearable touch of Hinata's fingers against his bare side, against the sweaty skin under his shirt. How, in the moment, it had seemed terribly funny that nothing he wanted to say had seemed to come out right. It had probably been for the best. There was no telling what he would have said if he'd been able. All those little touches, those fond little moments of worry and concern that had made him feel positively giddy whether they'd come from her or him.

No one else had ever….

Not that it mattered, really. He'd probably imagined it all anyway, everything. Hinata's nightmare, his delusion, what did any of that matter anyway? He laughed and the sound echoed as he opened his eyes….

When had he closed them?

Had he fallen asleep?

He sat up, slowly, painfully and found he wasn't lying in the long hall anymore, if he ever had been there in the first place. He might have always been here. It made more sense after all. More sense that everything, that Hinata, had just been a dream he had while lying in the lobby of the island's hospital. The curling neon script on the wall illuminated the space with pale red light and it was… just as he remembered it complete with that obnoxious poster and the monitor and radio they'd left behind here after Tsumiki's trial.

The air was warm, but he still shivered, pulling his bare knees to his chest. His legs were covered in gooseflesh, the familiar bloody wounds in his thighs puckered around the edges. He exhaled, surprised when his breath blew out white as smoke. The tile, the air all seemed warm… maybe he was running a fever? No, that was… he tried to drag a hand through his hair, but the numb digits merely skated across the surface.

The floor gleamed, glossy and cast red by that soft neon glow, the shadows that crisscrossed it were long and deep.

He was trembling.

Why was he trembling?

Was he afraid? He didn't…

He didn't want to be here. He didn't like this place, but… but if he was here… if he was here he could just… he could just leave. He could hear the thunder crashing outside, the rain pounding down against the ceiling overhead. He could see it pelting the windows and doors as if the rain were coming from every direction at once.

No, he didn't have to stay here.

He could just leave.

He could leave and….

And….

Who was he even kidding?

It didn't matter what was real, what wasn't. He could lie to himself and pretend he would go somewhere else, anywhere else, but he wouldn't. No, he'd just run back to the diner, like a lovesick child, clinging to the hope that he would be there. That if he went back he'd find him or at least some sign that he'd been there. That he would cling to him, whatever he was… whatever they were… until the end.

"He doesn't even like you, you know," a girl's voice murmured, breath stirring his hair and the words were familiar, just like the voice. He'd said them to her once when he'd been tied up, imprisoned in the room where Togami had been killed. They'd taken turns bringing him food, but he didn't eat much of it, even when whoever brought it deigned to feed it to him. He had no appetite, his mind was too… unsettled, spinning in a dozen different directions at once, a swirling vortex of thoughts and ideas and half-formed plans and hopes.

He shivered, fingers of his good hand scrambling fruitlessly against the tile. He had to get up. He had to go. He couldn't stay here. This place was… this was a bad place.

"It was just s-sex, Mister Komaeda. You don't have to like someone to want to have sex with them, I thought everyone knew that." Fingers thread their way through his hair and he whimpered, closing his eyes tight as if he could wish the touch away.

"Stop it," he rasped. "You can't touch me. You're not real. None of this is real. It's just… it's not real."

"That's true. None of this is real at all, but I can still touch you. Still care for you. Y-You've been very ill, Mister Komaeda. You should rest. Come with me, I'll help you back to bed."

"No!"

Panic shot through him like a bullet bringing adrenaline with it and he shoved himself forward, away from that phantom touch with a sob, scrambling across the floor towards the door, off-balance and unsteady, his legs tingling and riddled with pins and needles. He managed to make it off his knees, onto bare, painful, uncertain feet, swaying and sweating before he'd taken a single step. What was wrong with him? What was…?

He stumbled into the door, snatching at the handle, shoving at it. The door rattled, but didn't open, didn't budge. He shoved it again, but the result was just the same. Behind him he heard the soft uneven clatter of heels against the tile and a girl's soft, nervous laughter, tinged with despair.

"T-That isn't an exit, Mister Komaeda. There are no exits here. Just doors, doors and more doors."

He couldn't look away from the door, couldn't bring himself to let go of the handle. This was the way out. It had to be. He wasn't trapped here. He wasn't. He was just… he was just doing it wrong that was all. "Stop it," he managed, swallowing hard and giving the door another rattle. "You're not here, you're not real, I'm…"

"Dreaming? Hm? Do you really think so?" She asked, her hand smoothing up the length of his spine, skating across the clinging fabric of his borrowed shirt. It might have been a comforting gesture in other circumstances, from other hands, but now it just made him lurch closer to the door, trying to escape the unwanted touch. "Why are fighting the truth so hard? Why bother? Why hold onto this?" He closed his eyes tight again as he felt the pressure of fingertips pressing light and certain against the buttons of his borrowed shirt. "He can't save you. He can't even save himself. So, what does it matter? What does any of it matter?"

And it was finally too much, too much and he lashed out, slapping at the feel of those fingers poised like insects on his chest.

She yelped as his hand made contact, knocking her hand aside and all the air seemed to vanish from the room. His fingers stung where they'd made contact and there was a low, terrible keening noise that seemed to fill the room and his eyes were open, wide and unfocused. And she was laughing again, a hysterical twitter of sound, as she danced back and away from him as if he'd just done something wonderful and interesting and unexpected. He wasn't certain that he'd ever heard her laugh when she was on the island, before her trial… before her execution.

It was a grating, unpleasant sound, high and airy and false.

Nagito turned slowly, dread making his limbs heavy and reluctant, his heart pounded loud in his ears like the marching beat of a drum.

She looked…

Her hair was shorter, dark and ragged and dirty, hanging in lank, heavy strips around her manic, hollow-eyed face. Everything about her seemed to sag beneath some terrible weight even when she was laughing and she looked… older somehow. The fingers of his good hand, scrambled frantically over the door at his back, searching for… something, anything… as if maybe there was simply some hidden latch or button he'd neglected to flip or push that would release him from this place.

Let him escape the reality of her.

She was wearing the same clothes she had been before, apron and all, but her legs and arms were covered with damp, ragged bandages that were sagging just a bit beneath the weight to reveal that the skin beneath was patchy and red, covered with burns and bruises. But it was her shoes… her feet he couldn't stop staring at.

She'd always worn such sensible shoes.

That's what he remembered most about her from their time on the island together, he wasn't sure why, but he remembered her shoes very specifically. Remembered them maybe because they made him uncomfortable because they looked like the shoes all his nurses had worn. Sensible, comfortable, good for long hours spent on her feet.

So seeing her in those tall black boots filled him with a familiar nameless horror, brought a sob to his lips though he couldn't have said why exactly that was the case. Except, perhaps, because they looked so strange and wrong on her. Or because one of the delicate black heels had broken at some point so when she moved, when she walked towards him or twirled clumsily away, it was with an unsteady limping gait.

He remembered hearing that heel break.

His breath rattled like chains in his chest.

She smiled at him, but it wasn't her smile… not exactly. There was a confidence there that he didn't understand, that looked foreign on her features. "So, are you ready to give up yet? Or do you want to play some more?"

There was no thought, no hesitation, just instinct.

He bolted for the door that lead into the hospital proper, bare feet slapping against the tiles as he slammed into swinging doors that somehow gave much more easily than he expected. He was too slow, his balance shot, his legs still unsteady and trembling so the impact and momentum sent him careening into the wall on the other side; there was a burst of agony in his side as he slammed into the door of the first exam room, the doorknob hard and unforgiving as it bruised his side. He managed to swallow back the scream that threatened, the pain was molten, red hot and terrible, but he needed to go, to move. She hadn't made any move to stop him, but he could hear her singsong voice calling out to him as he ran down the hall that was suddenly much, much longer than it should have been.

"Hide and seek it is then, Mister Komaeda! One, two, three, four…."

-ooo-

In retrospect, Hajime could admit that just deciding to go traipsing off down the nightmare mystery hall of doom with just a pack of matches and some obviously ill-advised good intentions had been a really stupid idea.

If he had been so dead-set on playing hero he should have gone and found another flashlight, maybe something to use as a weapon in case there was something more than Komaeda waiting for him in the dark. Hell, even just taking the time to bandage up his own blood-covered feet so he wasn't tripping and slipping all over the place would have made a big difference. Or he could have, at the very least, taken a few seconds to think it through, put something together that actually resembled a plan, instead of just running off to save someone who might not even want to be saved.

But had he?

No.

No, he had not.

Instead, he'd let that panicked feeling in his gut drive him to action and he'd gone gallivanting off into the dark without a single thought in his head outside of the need to get to Komaeda before… before… what?

What the hell had he thought would happen?

Sure, he'd decided to just go with the flow. To just live in the moment or whatever stupid nonsense it was that had that had left him feeling lighter, better as they left the beach house, but… but then Komaeda had pulled the emotional equivalent of a dine and dash and he'd been left kneeling on the floor in an empty hall by the boy who'd just….

What the fuck was wrong with him?

Why did he keep doing this to himself?

Why was he chasing after him like this?

It was just a matter of survival, wasn't it?

He had to believe that this all meant… something.

Maybe he should have just let him go, left him alone, but….

He'd just sounded so….

Komaeda's stupid jukebox music had still been echoing all around him singing words he didn't understand to melodies he didn't know. His muscles had still been shaky and weak in the aftermath of what they'd done together, his skin was still fresh with the memory of Komaeda's stupid mouth and all he'd been able to think about was getting to him.

He had to get to him, to find him, to help him even though he wasn't sure how or even that he could. He knew almost nothing about Komaeda and even the little he did know was highly suspect. Some of it lies Komaeda had told him, others were lies he suspected Komaeda had told himself. There might be truths in there as well, but… he didn't and couldn't trust that he'd be able to tell one from the other.

He wasn't even altogether sure why exactly in seemed so urgent, so vital, that he act now, move now, like he was running up against some unseen countdown either for the dream or for Komaeda, but there was something… something inside him like dread and panic and horror all mixed together and he couldn't shake it. It made him put one foot in front of the other over and over again even after all the matches were gone and Komaeda eventually stopped answering him altogether and there was only the dark and the sound of his own voice unanswered.

There was just… just something about the way he'd said those words, something about the way Komaeda's laugh had carried through the darkness had made his stomach turn, had made him feel nauseous. And, try at he might, he'd been unable to dismiss the thought that he wouldn't be able to get to him soon enough, that he never should have let him out of his sight in the first place, that this entire place was a trap, set and baited, and that if he didn't move quickly there wouldn't be anything left to save.

And it would matter.

And, somehow, it would be his fault.

That he would lose something he hadn't even really had and it would be too late for him as well.

When had Komaeda become so vital, so important to him?

The thought that he was made him feel a little sick.

Because his Komaeda might never wake up and he knew that, he knew that, even if he didn't like to think about it. Hell, Komaeda being here with him like this was probably all just… just a way of dealing with that. With those missed opportunities and mourning and hope and pain all caught up and twisted into… this, but….

But.

Even knowing that, maybe especially knowing that, he couldn't just… let him go, let him be swallowed up by the darkness without at least trying to save him, could he? Sure it was… stupid, but… he had to try.

So he'd gone into the dark to find him.

Because even if the Komaeda here were nothing more than a figment of his imagination, just a manifestation of his confusion, his guilt, of all his conflicting wants and needs, or even just a sign that he was slowly going mad, that he could never be the person they all wanted him to be, needed him to be.

He wanted to think it was for him. That he was shuffling down this hall for Komaeda, but he couldn't help wondering if maybe it was just because he… needed this. Needed to know that he… that he could do this, would do this, that he was willing to risk himself for him, for them. That he was harboring some terrible need to prove to himself that he wasn't… Izuru. Not where it counted. That whatever he was now, it wasn't that, that he could risk himself for someone… for this shattered reflection of Komaeda, who was beautiful and confusing and broken but… his in some vital way he still needed time to figure out, to understand.

So, yeah, at the end of the day he was probably being a selfish, amoral ass and this was all about him because that's what dreams were, really. All his most terrible needs and wants and fears and insecurities on display and come out to play so he could work through them. It was really no big wonder Komaeda had run off the first chance he'd gotten. He'd always suspected that Komaeda was smarter than he was, no big surprise this version was just the same.

Of course, when he'd started down the hall, into the dark, all those...

Had it been hours ago? Minutes? Days? Time was so strange here and in the dark he had no way to guess at or gauge its passing. All he had to measure with was the ache in his muscles and the pain in his feet and neither did more for him than tell him it had been a long time, too long a time.

He wasn't sure what he'd expected really, or even whether he'd actually had any true expectations at all besides a vague suspicion that bad things would happen when he first flounced off down this hall. Still, after everything that had happened since the dream began… he would never have expected that there would just be… nothing.

And yet nothing was exactly what he'd gotten.

Nothing, nothing and more nothing.

No Komaeda, no rotting Junko limbs, no eldritch horrors, no man-eating puddles, no scary clowns or poisonous gas or zombies rising from graves or just… anything at all except that… darkness. Minutes or hours or days of just endless, kind of boring, uninterrupted darkness and the despair that was beginning to bubble within him from traversing it as the hope that he would find Komaeda or even just wake up at some point began to dim.

All he knew, all he really knew, was that the hall was long and dark and he was beginning to wonder if there was any end to it at all. If he was lost. His feet and legs were sore, his knees were tender and bruised from all the times he'd fallen and his fingers hurt, scorched and blistered from where he'd he let match after match burn down to the quick before dropping the smoking remains of and lighting a new one to replace it. The matches hadn't lasted near long enough and now he was working his way down the hall by feel. He tripped often, over his own aching, dirty, still no-doubt blood-covered feet, as well as other things. Over unseen obstacles that would fall with a clatter and then always seem to vanish immediately as if he'd only been tripping over the memory of objects rather than the objects themselves. Whenever he caught himself, against the wall or on the cold, hard tile floor, he scrapped his fingertips, further punishing the already abused and mistreated flesh so they were raw and throbbing.

He hadn't called out to Komaeda in a while because as some point Komaeda had stopped answering him with anything but the occasional laugh. And that laugh was worse and worse each time he heard it, creaking and hoarse and subtly terrifying as if every time he heard his name it made everything worse. Which was a stupid thought, but one he couldn't quite shake and so he'd stopped calling out to him altogether once even that laughter had stopped.

How the fuck long was this stupid hallway anyway?

How far could Komaeda have even really gotten?

Until the last of the matches had burned out he'd at least been able to follow the bloody footprints he'd left behind. Now he was working off memory and the hope that the hallway was straight or that Komaeda hadn't impulsively darted off down some side corridor or into some room that he couldn't see at least.

Every once in a while some stupid, unhelpful voice in his head weighed in on how idiotic and kind of completely nuts he was for chasing a figment of his imagination down an equally imaginary corridor in the dark for an inestimable period of time. Sometimes that voice sounded like reason, like his own good sense trying to talk him out of bad decision making, and sometimes it sounded a lot like her or maybe Monokuma, but- most often- it sounded like Komaeda.

"Why would someone like Hinata bother to spend the time to find someone like me? Especially when he knows that it isn't even really me?" Komaeda's voice inquired, soft and mocking. "You should probably seek professional help about these delusions of yours."

"Shut up, I don't want to hear that from you," Hajime grumbled, stumbling, his fingers scrapping against the wall, barely managing to keep himself upright.

"Don't you though? I'm just you, after all, aren't I? Maybe I'm the last bastion of your fragile sanity, like the ghost of lame Hinata's past, come to advise you that your grip on reality is slipping, that if you keep this up you'll lose it completely," Komaeda replied, his voice unusually harsh. The tones he'd used in those final days that screamed that he was an unworthy, unwanted disappointment, that he had never been anything or anyone special at all.

Not to him, not to anyone.

"And you know what that means," he continued in a singsong voice that sounded unnatural and weird in Komaeda's quiet rasping tones.

"Shut up," he commented again, irritated.

Not that he cared about Komaeda's opinion of him.

Not then and not now.

Wanting to be close to him, to touch him, hadn't made him blind to Komaeda's many, many, many character flaws.

He'd known that Komaeda was messed up. He'd seen it time and again in a hundred different ways. The way he'd been in the game, the way he'd been in these dreams, the way they'd been with each other. They were both so fucked up. How could they be anything but awful for each other?

It was stupid, really. He was stupid. Or maybe that little voice that sounded a like Komaeda was right and he was kind of going a little crazy after all. It wasn't as if he didn't have plenty of motivation to take a flying leap off the sanity pier even without all this.

"I suppose nothing says 'last train to crazy town' quite like being able to say that I spent all night wandering around in the dark looking for you," he grumbled, rolling his eyes though there was no one around to appreciate the gesture and, even if there were, they wouldn't have been able to see it anyway.

Only silence greeted the comment, which was fair enough, he supposed.

Hajime pressed a hand to his mouth to stifle the strange, choking feeling of inappropriate laughter, pausing and leaning against the wall and trying to remember how to breathe. The dark was… was difficult. He'd been okay in the diner, okay when he was with Komaeda there and even before in the beach house and out on the sand in the rain, because there had been something to do, someone else to focus on, but here in the dark… there was only himself. Himself and the tingling feeling that lingered everywhere Komaeda's mouth had touched, the pain of all those little cuts on his feet that now seemed twice as big and twice as painful as they'd been when he began. Plus, he was having difficulties keeping his balance and his legs still felt shaky and weak. Everything seemed… larger and more immediate in the dark and most of the time it seemed like he was careening wildly down a rabbit hole, knowing that at any moment he might crash through a glass ceiling and spin out into whatever void lay beyond, helpless and hopeless and terribly lost and completely alone.

He took a deep breath, blew it out, and then another and another.

It didn't really help.

He forced himself to take another step and then another and another.

It was so dark here.

It was so dark and he didn't want to be alone here.

He didn't want to be alone.

There was a splash in the darkness as he eased forward along the wall and his reluctant toes sloshed out into cold water. His heart was in this throat again, thundering out a frantic beat as his fingers curled against the smooth wall for purchase he knew he wouldn't find. He could hear a faucet running somewhere far away, the shushing, rushing sound like a cascade of water pouring heavy and fast as if from a broken spigot. The water lapped at his toes hungrily and he shivered, remembering the feel of that fleshy hand around his ankle. If it.. no... if she found him again, reached for him again and caught him... he shuddered. Komaeda had saved him then. Had caught his hand and dragged him to safety. There was no Komaeda to save him now, but…

He couldn't go back.

If he turned and fled, if he turned back now, he'd never find him again and, even if he did, he wouldn't deserve to. Nothing would ever be okay, because he would never be okay, because he'd be a coward who abandoned someone he cared about because he was afraid. Even if he was the only one who ever knew… he'd still know that all he ever deserved to be was alone.

"Komaeda?" He whispered, into the dark and the name seemed to echo around him, mocking him as it bounced off the walls. He shivered, wrapping unsteady arms around his bare chest, suddenly terribly aware of the fact that he was half-naked. He was trembling though he wasn't certain whether it was the chill of the water or the air that raised prickles on his suddenly clammy skin. His nipples were hard and aching and painful and he shivered again and clenched his teeth when the muscles in his jaw jerked and seized as if to chatter as a rush of that cool air blew soft and sinister across the back of his neck.

The water lapped around his heel almost playfully, beckoning and coaxing and daring him to come in, to see what lay beneath the surface. It seemed warmer than it had been, but that might have just been because the air in the corridor seemed cooler. He closed his eyes and took a tentative step further into the water.

He was pretty sure that pathetic whimpering sound was coming from him, which he'd probably have found embarrassing if he weren't so….

He didn't want to be here.

He didn't want to do this.

He just... god, he just wanted to go back.

Back to that first day, to that voice calling him out of the darkness, to that first surreal moment of opening his eyes on the beach to find that face staring down at him. Or maybe to after that, to the night before the party, before everything went from bad to worse, to the night when they'd sat together beside the pool, dangled their feet in the water and just… talked. Like two normal people getting to know each other and no one else had been around all already in bed or something maybe, he wasn't sure. It had been dark, but there had been plenty of light as the moon always seemed big and mostly full and bright enough to light up the whole world. The crickets had been loud and the pool's water circulation thing kept making this weird sucking, plastic clanking noise. They'd taken off their shoes and socks and rolled up their pant legs enough that they could dangle their feet in the water which was kind of lukewarm, but still pleasantly cool compared to the night around them. It had still been really hot and kind of sticky even though it was late, close to curfew, but they'd been sitting close together anyway like it didn't matter than they were both so sweaty their shirts were stuck to their skin.

Komaeda always seemed to do that, to press in closer to him than he might have to anyone else, like he didn't understand the idea of personal space or didn't care, like he couldn't ever get close enough. Later he'd found it disconcerting and a little creepy, but then, before, he'd liked it, he'd liked him. The warmth of his skin and the way his laughter- always quiet like he was worried about offending someone by being too loud- had made him feel. How that nice, pretty boy had made him feel special and interesting and like it wasn't such a bad thing that he couldn't remember what his talent was because he had someone to help him figure it out, someone who just… liked him.

It had been… nice, really nice.

Afterwards, he'd just wanted to forget about it, forget that he'd ever felt that way, forget how badly he'd misjudged him, but now… it was easier to look back and remember those feelings as he stood in the dark, easing into that cool, unseen water. To remember that there had been a time, brief as it was, when his feelings about Komaeda had been clear and uncomplicated and painfully obvious.

To remember how Komaeda had taken off his coat and folded it up beside him, a little carelessly so that one long sleeve had fallen down to trail in the water as they'd talked, feet kicking back and forth beneath the surface. Their bare arms had brushed sometimes when one or the other leaned just a little too close and he'd kept his hands balled up in fists against his thighs because he kept looking over at Komaeda's hand sprawled between them at the edge of the concrete, loosely gripping the edge like he was trying to hold on to something. He kept looking at it and he kept thinking about what might happen if he slid his hand over Komaeda's, if he just let his hand slip down between them and laced their fingers together against the edge. Because he wanted to, but it had seemed like such a huge and scary thing to touch someone like that. To touch another boy like that, especially… especially Komaeda who he really liked spending time with. In the end he hadn't done it, because he was scared of what might happen, or what might not, and before he'd managed to summon up the courage, Komaeda had been thanking him for spending time with him and pushing himself up, pool water splashing against his pants in drips and drops as he picked up his jacket and climbed to his feet.

He'd snagged his shoes from the lounge chair on which he'd left them and then offered him a hand up and he'd taken it even though he hadn't really needed the help.

His mouth had been so dry and he'd been so nervous and he'd felt so stupid, because Komaeda had just smiled at him, bright and warm, and squeezed his hand once before releasing it. "I'm really glad I met you, Hinata. Good night."

"Um, yeah, good night," he'd managed to mumble in return as he watched him turn to go, his jacket and shoes dangling carelessly from one hand.

He'd never thought, even after, to wonder why they hadn't just walked back to their rooms together. Why he'd lingered by the pool staring after him like an idiot instead.

He wished he could go back.

He should have kissed him then, by the pool, just reached up and caught a hand in his stupid, fluffy hair and kissed him until neither of them could breathe. Until Komaeda knew, until he understood, that he... that they...

But he couldn't and he wasn't even sure if it would have changed anything if he had.

What was done was done and Komaeda was lying in a pod and beyond help, beyond reach and that... that was why he was really here, why he'd chased after him, why he was standing in the dark while the water swirled and danced around his feet, getting rougher, choppier, spraying droplets high across his borrowed pants, soaking the material, the hem, making it cling to him, wet and heavy and uncomfortable and oddly reassuring as he inched forward. He was here because there was nothing he could do for that Komaeda, for the real Komaeda who wasn't his, but maybe could have been and probably never would be. He couldn't help him or save him or do anything at all for him but wait and hope. But he could help this one and that... that at least was something. He whispered his name again and this time there was no taunting echo, but there wasn't anything like an answer either. Nothing but the sound of rushing water and the growing unease it brought him.

All he had was the hope that he was there.

It was enough.

He made his way forward, step by tremulous, uncertain step one arm still wrapped protectively across his chest while he ran the other over the wall to help with his balance. The water was cold again and almost slimy, greasy and thick as oil as it slid over his hands, his arms and around the bare skin of his waist and stomach as it rose ever higher or he crept ever deeper, it was impossible to tell which for certain or whether it was a combination of both. His borrowed pants were already soaked through and clinging, chafing, painful and rough where the water was smooth and sinuous as a lover's caress. Like fingers moving across him, dipping and teasing and rubbing and…

"No!"

No.

Hajime made a soft wounded sound, his eyes opening wide in the darkness his head swiveling back and forth as he lashed out, slapping his hands across the surface of the water and finding nothing there more solid than water. Nothing even as he felt fingers slide low across his belly, broken, ragged nails tracing allow the waist of his borrowed pants, both familiar and strange, begging a permission he had no desire to give. He jolted and panicked and thrashed, splashing water about and almost falling, desperate for something real, something he could fight, some way to avoid the touch that remained, undeterred, inescapable as a memory.

"Stop it," he yelped and the sound came back to him, echoed around him, mocking and high-pitched as the water reached his chest and rose ever higher as unseen, slippery fingers tweaked his nipples painfully.

Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.

Slimy fingers were slippery around his ankles, caressing over and between his toes, tripping up his spine, rubbing rough and unpleasant over the crotch of his borrowed pants, tracing the form of his cock beneath, which made him gag and choke and try to move faster, but the water was heavy and ever step seemed to take years. Those fingers found his bare stomach next, digging and scrapping along the inside of his belly button, he plunged a hand into the water, slapping at the skin, covering the recess, but the feeling remained, a prickly, painful, piercing sensation as if something were drilling through the flesh, penetrating the surface and threading a sharp tendril of sensation into him, through him, scrapping up against the very heart of him.

He was pretty sure he screamed.

He definitely panicked again, thrashing and beating frantically at the water and his stomach both as he tried to run through the heavy, sloshing weight of the water that filled the corridor around him, desperate to move, to get out and away. And still those fingers, those hands were digging about within him, searching, wiggling around in places where fingers were never meant to be.

He cursed quietly, frustrated and sickened because he couldn't stop something he couldn't touch. He gagged, the taste of bile thick and burning in his throat. His cheeks were wet with splashed water or tears, he wasn't sure, but his eyes were stinging and burning as he struggled forward, clutching compulsively at his stomach with one hand while the other dug through the water as if that might help him move further, faster, something, anything.

It was almost a surprise when he emerged from the water, all at once, stumbling and slipping on the smooth, slick floor. He spilling forward with a surprised cry as the resistance of the reluctantly yielding water suddenly vanished and crashed to the floor face first. Unable to pull his hands up to cushion the fall in time, he hit the ground with a wet, meaty smack as agony slammed through him, his teeth clanking and grinding together, cutting into his cheek. The taste of blood flooded his mouth as the impact rang through his head and the black was washed with red spots and searing pain. He coughed, splattering blood and spit across the floor, but he couldn't even seem to find breath enough to cry out so he lay there like a landed fish, gasping and twitching on the cold tiles. His feet were still in the water, which licked and sucked at his toes, gentle and teasing and horrifying as he struggled to gather himself enough to pull his legs up, to free himself from that touch. It seemed to take a long time, too long, but he managed, retching weakly, the feel of that touch fading as he pulled his toes into the stale, open air.

It seemed like he laid there for a long, long time, shivering and panting until, eventually, a sob, choked and dry, broke from his throat as he trembled and shook in the dark.

Everything hurt.

Had things hurt like this in dreams he'd had in the past? He hadn't really… he hadn't really had any on the island, not really, just fragments of memories of a life he couldn't remember. A life he maybe hadn't really wanted to remember even then, even before he really knew what to expect. And before… he wasn't certain. Nothing from before was very clear and the more he tried to focus on those faded memories the less distinct they became. Maybe it had always been like this for him. Maybe this was just what dreams were. The… nicer things had felt real enough, so he supposed it made sense that the painful ones would as well.

He groaned, flopping over onto his back with effort and yanking his knees up so that his feet were further up and away from where the water had been. His chest and stomach still felt raw, open and vulnerable even though the skin felt solid enough beneath his fingers.

It didn't make him feel any better.

Nothing did until he heard quiet laughter, soft and near and mad and familiar and he found himself chuckling along as if they were sharing a joke neither of them could remember the punchline for.

"Komaeda?" He croaked when he could speak and his voice was the voice of a stranger, hoarse and rough and unfamiliar.

"Hinata?" The word was a whisper and barely even that, but it was close and familiar and it was him and that was all that mattered.

"You okay?" He asked even though he knew the answer.

Another soft, rasping laugh filled the air before turning almost immediately into a hacking cough. "Wonderful," he managed between bursts. "You?"

"Yeah, I'm really great," Hajime breathed, huffing a laugh of his own. "I really hate this place."

"Yeah, me too. I'm so tired of hospitals. Seems like I live in the revolving door, never quite managing to leave before I'm back all over again. Are you in my head?"

"Don't be stupid, I'm right here."

"I don't see you. Are you sure you're not just in my head?"

"Quit it. It's dark as hell so there's nothing to see and why would I joke about something like that?"

"It isn't dark where I am or at least not that dark anyway. Are you in the conference room? That's a terrible hiding place," Komaeda replied and Hajime felt his stomach sink, hope taking a fatal blow as his fingers brushed up against the smooth, cool surface of the wall and after a moment met the cold metal of a grate.

"Dammit," he whispered, because if he started screaming again now he had a feeling he'd never stop. He should be there with him, but he wasn't. He wasn't. He dug his fingers in and squeezed the metal, rattling it. "No, I'm… I think I'm in the hall, maybe? I don't know. I don't know if things are laid out the same here. I just… I don't know."

"Hinata, you sound so sad," Komaeda murmured and he could almost feel his breath against his face, see the face he would make, wondering and wide-eyed. "I'd have thought you'd be glad to be rid of someone like me. I only ever cause you trouble."

"Don't be stupid," he rasped and he really, really didn't want to cry, but he was so tired of this. He gave the grate another shake and another and another until it came loose in his hands and he pulled it free from the cheap plaster, tossing it aside with a clatter and a splash as it landed in the water he'd just left. He plunged his arm into the opening, reaching into the darkness until he couldn't reach any further, his shoulder wedged against the little opening, his fingertips brushing a grate.

He felt warm, almost hot, fingertips brush against his own through the sharp metal slates and pressed his shoulder in harder against the opening, trying to reach further to penetrate the vent on the other side, to reach him, to touch more of him as if doing so would mean… something, anything.

"Hey Hinata," Komaeda sounded strange and breathless and as desperate and exhausted as he felt, he could hear him scrambling, clawing at the grate, the touch vanishing for moments at a time. "I'm really glad I got to see you."

"Then you shouldn't have taken off like that," he grumbled, trying to ignore the queasy feeling in his stomach.

"I didn't care the ambiance," Komaeda sighed, but he could hear the smile in his words. "I liked the way you tasted though. Is it always that sour? Is everyone's like that?"

Every time.

Every single time he thought he had a handle on what he felt for Komaeda he'd say something or do something like that. Something that made him remember why he wanted to throw things at him sometimes, most times.

Possibly while kissing him, just as a time saving measure.

"How the heck would I know?" He grumbled, his face felt too hot and he poked at Komaeda's fingers through the grate irritably. "The only dick I've ever had in my mouth was yours."

"Really?"

"Yes, really," he hesitated frowning and sighed. "Shit, I don't know. Probably. At least I think so. I still don't really remember everything, you know. Look, can you… I don't know, go look out in the hall or something, open the door? Maybe I'll be able to see you?"

"That's probably not a good idea," Komaeda replied his voice quieting a little. "I can hear her stumping around out there. I think she forgot the doors have locks so she seems a little mad about it. Can't you hear her? She's really loud."

"Her? Who her? You mean Enoshima?"

That was really the very last thing he needed which, of course, meant that that was almost certainly who was going to show up and put one of those big black boots in his ribs.

"Huh? What? No, not… who's Enoshima?" He asked, sounding confused and distracted and Hajime groaned, banging his head against the floor.

"Come on, Komaeda. Okay, can you at least tell me what wall I'm at so I can try and get around to the other side?"

"Wall? How would I know?" And again he sounded confused, but something… something about how he said it made him feel sick and terribly aware of the fingertips that had been pressing against his.

The vent was suddenly pulled free with a snap and a metallic pop and clatter and then warm fingers slipped through, wrapping around his and they were…

They were wrong.

He… he hadn't been able to tell when it was just fingertips, even though it should have been obvious from the first touch. Komaeda's hands had always been cold here, but these… these hands weren't the least bit cold. They weren't even cool or lukewarm. If anything they were hot, too hot, burning like brands against the back of his hand as they wrapped and twisted fingers around him.

He jerked his hand back as nails dragged across the surface of his skin, rupturing the skin causing it to rip and burst like overripe fruit. He screamed, jerking his hand away as blood spilled across it. He choked back a scream.

Komaeda's voice, which was growing more and more frantic, called his name across whatever empty space divided them, but was drowned out soon enough by the sound of her laughter. He shoved against the wall with his free hand and his bare feet finally managing to snatch his hand free, the nails ripping across the back of his hand and palm as he did.

"Ah, you're hurting my feelings, Ha-ji-me. Don't you want to hold my hand?"

"Go to hell," he hissed, clutching his bloody, aching hand against his chest as he scooted back further away from the wall. He was such a fucking idiot. Of course it wasn't that easy, of course it wasn't.

He was panting and bleeding and she just kept laughing, the same terrible laugh that stupid bear had had.

How he hated that sound, hated her.

"Give him back," he whispered, knowing before the words even left his lips what kind of reaction he'd receive.

And she didn't disappoint. That laughter was everywhere, all around him.

And then it wasn't. It just dropped off like a record cutting out.

"Why him? Why does he matter so much to you? I would have thought you'd be glad to be rid of him. And yet here you are," she commented, her voice dreary and morose. "I was really hoping you'd come for her, but it wasn't her, was it? It was him, it really bums me out."

"I don't even know what you're talking about," he murmured distractedly, as he tucked his wounded hand against his side as blood continued to drip from the wounds she'd made, dribbling down to stripe the already soaked material of his pants. He wished he had something to wrap around it, but there was nothing so he just pressed it against his side and struggled to his feet.

He needed to go, to move. He just… wasn't sure where to go or how he was supposed to get to the damn hospital from here. Dreams didn't make any kind of sense and obviously hoping and wishing wasn't going to get the job done or he'd already be there with him rather than here in the dark with her.

"Poor silly, pitiful normal Hajime. Do you think you're in love him? Do you think he loves you? That someone like him is even capable of that? That you are?" Her voice seemed to follow him as he stumbled down the hall, away from the grate, from her grasping hand and laughing voice, away from the water, because he wasn't sure what else to do.

And she just kept talking and talking and talking, her ever-changing voice like sandpaper rubbing against his nerves.

"You don't even know him. You don't know anything about him. He isn't a wounded bird, you know. You can't set his wing and expect him to heal and fly again. He's more like a lame horse living on borrowed time. It would be kinder to put him out of his misery, to leave him to his fate." Her voice seemed… strange, different, but he couldn't quite pinpoint what it was that made it so past the throbbing pain in his hand and his head and the exhaustion that was dragging him down like chains piled over his shoulders and tangled around his clumsy, leaden legs.

He laughed and he barely recognized the sound that was somewhere between a chuckle and a snort of disbelief, just an explosion of disbelieving sound. "You're the one who doesn't know anything. Love? I don't even know what that is. I barely even like him most of the time. But I won't leave him. Any part of him, any version of him, real or imagined, I won't just leave him alone."

"Why?"

Hajime smiled, leaning a shoulder in to brush the wall to keep track of where he was going of how close he was, how far, the last thing he wanted was to fall down again. There was a buzzing in his ear like a hoard of furious bees and it seemed to be growing ever louder with each passing moment. "I can't explain something I don't understand," he murmured, as much to himself as to her.

He straightened a little, shedding the fear and exhaustion like an unwanted second skin. He wasn't even certain why he'd been scared in the first place. She was an irritation and barely that. This paltry imitation of the girl she'd once been was little more than…

He stopped moving, stopped breathing, an image of Enoshima as she'd been when she was alive floating up like a child's lost balloon in his mind. Her smile as she'd taken his hand and guided him to that room, brought him to participate in a game, her game, how she'd promised it wouldn't be boring. That he'd almost certainly feel… something.

Had he? Had he felt something? Anything at all? He'd survived, but that… wasn't the same thing, was it? That wasn't what he'd wanted, not really, he didn't… didn't care about living. He cared about… he cared… cared…

Only it hadn't been him had it?

It couldn't have been him.

He'd never met her only….

Only….

The buzzing in his ears was louder suddenly, too loud, like static, like white noise consuming the world and he pressed his hands, wincing as pain spiked through the wounded flesh of his right hand, against his ears, but if anything the sound only grew louder and louder because it was in his head, not out in the world and he was screaming…

And then there was nothing.

-ooo-

He woke on his knees, breathing out a low sigh of irritation as he sat back on his heels and glared into the darkness. Pain throbbed and blood oozed from his wounds, cuts on his feet, rips across the flesh of one hand and….

He raised his good hand, the one that hadn't been practically shredded by her fingernails, to touch his forehead, noting the lump there. It ached when he pressed on it and explained the throbbing in his skull.

If he were capable of feeling shame or rage, he was quite certain that was what he would be feeling. Instead, he felt only a vague, directionless irritation, the sort of frustration he usually felt when things didn't go according to plan. He shoved himself to his feet, shaking blood from his injured hand. This was actually worse than Towa City had been and that was no mean feat. In fact, this debacle made Towa City look like a magnificent tale of success rather than the complete epic clusterfuck of sheer stupidity and failure it had actually been. And he'd like to say it was all down to the failure that was her, but it wasn't. He had made a grave miscalculation in allowing himself to be captured, to be part of the program. He should have figured out another method of inserting her into the mainframe, but he'd never anticipated him being anything worthy of concern, much less an actual threat to his plans.

But then Hinata Hajime had done nothing but confound his expectations from the first moment he'd woken up on that virtual island.

Ironic that the one person who could still surprise him, not thwart him obviously, but certainly put kinks in an otherwise perfect plan was- in a manner of speaking- himself. No, this… this, none of this, had been in line with his expectations. He hadn't known for certain what there was to Hajime beyond what he'd read in the files he'd been able to dig up, both at Hope's Peak and out in the world, but he'd been quite sure he'd worked up a reasonably accurate hypothesis based on evidence and witness accounts. He had expected a neurotic, insecure child, what he'd gotten instead had been… something else entirely.

It had been… disappointing.

Especially in light of how extensive he'd been when conducting his research. He'd even taken the time to question Hajime's parents quite thoroughly before killing them. He hadn't discovered anything that he hadn't already known, nothing that had truly been of any use to him. They'd been basically useless really. They hadn't even recognized him, hadn't even seemed to believe him when he told them who he was just before the end. They'd just given him these blank stares as if they couldn't comprehend what he was saying them.

It had been… curious, but not particularly worrisome. After all, it was only natural that parents would not wish to believe their offspring capable of such callous, unconscionable things.

He'd stood in the mess he'd made of them for hours after at a loss for what to do next or for why he'd even bothered to come there in the first place. Why he'd gone through all the effort of finding them for no viable gain. He'd been so certain they would be of use, one way or the other, but in the end he knew nothing more than he had when he'd began and he felt nothing beyond a whisper of disappointment. He'd been so certain that he would feel something... substantial, but there was nothing.

Still nothing.

Always nothing.

Nothing, nothing and more nothing and it was boring.

It was all just so boring.

It still was.

He snarled frustration as he shook dribbling blood from his injured hand once more and limped back towards the light and music of the diner. It didn't escape his notice that the hallway was now utterly flat, completely ordinary, dimly lit, free of water and positively lousy with bloody footprints and the scattered remains of burnt matches and a broken flashlight.

What kind of utter moron went traipsing off into the dark with bloody, bleeding feet and no flashlight in the first place? There was a first aid kit and another flashlight right under the blasted cash register. It was as if that boy had managed to suck whatever remnants of common sense still lingered within Hajime out through his dick. One weak blowjob and a couple of awkward makeout sessions and the little moron was ready to follow that little blond bastard into hell itself with barely a moment's hesitation.

Just pathetic.

It shouldn't even really be considered a hostile takeover at this point. It was really more of a mercy killing since Hinata Hajime was entirely too stupid to be allowed to live.

It was a virtually a public service.

He wasn't entirely surprised to find her there when he eased his way back into the diner on Hajime's aching feet, but he glared at her with cool, indifference nonetheless. "If you were planning on taking this body for yourself, you can forget it. It's already spoken for and I'm going to take offense if you mark it up again."

Her laughter was high and bubbly and every bit as irritating as he remembered. Her instance on aping the original model was tiring. It made her bland, boring, predictable; everything the original hadn't been while somehow also managing the feat of keeping all of Enoshima's more irritating characteristics intact.

If Towa City had taught him anything it was that the less time he spent in her company, the less likely he was to crush her avatars into paste. After all paste was incapable of tittering or chortling or prattling on endlessly about nothing.

She was sitting at the counter, twirling idly back and forth on the barstool in a skirt was so short that if she uncrossed her legs he'd be able to see her panties. He was quite certain that wasn't done purposefully as she had a habit of overcompensating when she felt insecure. She was wearing a black and white sweater with 'Despair High' embroidered in glaring, obnoxious red across her breasts. It took him a moment to realize that the outfit was supposed to be some sort of cheerleading uniform. She'd even brought pompoms, black and white with a liberal dash of red, which had been tossed haphazardly across the counter. They rustled faintly as he entered as if they were alive… or possibly full of snakes. Her hair was done up in the usual pigtails and tied off with black and white Monokuma hairbands.

He would never understand what it was about that bear design that so fascinated her.

"What the hell are you wearing?" He asked, not really caring about the answer. He was well aware of her flare for the dramatic, but she'd pout if he didn't inquire and the only thing that was more boring than the dramatics was the pouting.

"I don't mind a little cosplay from time to time. Do you like it?" She asked, swiveling on the stool and spreading her legs wide, resting one sneakered foot on the stool beside her and tracing fingers up the inside of her leg from the top of her knee-high sock to the edge of her short, short skirt. He had been right, that skirt was short enough that he could see her panties when she sat like that. He wasn't surprised to find them dotted with pictures of that stupid bear's head.

Her bra inevitably matched.

He watched the show dispassionately, "No. I find it pointless and banal and those shoulder pads make you look like a lumpy, underfed linebacker."

"Ah, that hurts my feelings, Izuru. I wanted to do something special for our big reunion scene! You have no appreciation for a well-crafted costume." She gestured to his pants, her bottom lip out in a firm pout as she fished the shoulder pads out of her sweater and threw them behind the counter. "I mean, honestly, if you were going to dress up as Nagito, you could have at least borrowed a shirt as well. There are certainly enough of them."

"This world isn't exactly lousy with options," he replied, irritated by the reminder. It wasn't as if he'd chosen to wear anything that belonged to him.

"Hm, I suppose not. Well! You've been a busy little bee, haven't you?" She snapped her bubblegum as he took the seat beside the stool she'd propped her foot against. She huffed a sigh of irritation when he didn't react to the taunt and turned her attention back to the construction of some sort of vaguely pyramid-shaped monstrosity she'd been building across the counter with a hodgepodge of condiment packets.

She'd apparently been waiting a while.

Or she wanted him to think she had.

Not that it mattered.

"Hm, never really pegged you as gay, but I guess it makes as much sense as anything. Either that or Nagito must make up for inexperience with an excessive level of enthusiasm, hm? Though I suppose that would explain why you never spent much time staring at my tits and why Mikan's tight, sexy little body barely did a thing for you even when you were doing it."

"Your tits were boring," he replied blandly, pressing open palms against the countertop. "They're still boring. And Tsumiki was hopelessly dull and was only ever interested in pleasing you. I was never interested in acting as your proxy. Make yourself useful and get me the first aid kit from under the register."

"Bossy and rude," she sniffed, clearly annoyed. "So, if I follow that line of thought to its conclusion, I suppose you'd have me believe that that little hope junkie isn't boring? Unless his cock is a revelation made of Cristal and pop rocks, you'll just have to forgive my skepticism on the subject. I, unlike you, have spent extensive time with Komaeda Nagito and I can't see what it is about him that could him possibly capture your interest." She hopped to her feet and traipsing around the counter to pluck the box from beneath the register. "It can't possibly be the scintillating conversation. Hope this, hope that, blah, blah, blah."

"You're assuming that I'm the one with the interest. Also, jealousy doesn't suit you."

"Ah, so you're not gay then, you're just timesharing in the body of someone who is? A likely story," she snickered, sliding the box across the counter to him. "And I'm not jealous, I just don't like it when my toys ignore me in favor of playing with each other."

"You still talk too much," he replied coolly, flipping open the lid and fishing out gauze, tape and alcohol swabs. "I can fix that problem for you if you'd like."

"You do realize that infection is really the least of your worries, right?"

"To the contrary, I'd say it's actually my largest concern at the moment," he replied, swabbing the bloody wounds on his hand and feet and wiping away the worst of the blood and slathering the wounds with disinfectant before unrolling gauze and wrapping first his injured hand, from forearm to knuckles, and then his injured feet, from the base of his toes to the ankle, with quick, efficient motions. He sawed the pieces of gauze free with a butter knife, tucking and taping and securing the ends of each neatly in turn.

Enoshima, of course, kept talking.

"A virus joke, that's so original, Izuru. I might just die laughing," she replied flatly, her gaze cool and dead. "I'm so glad you've grown a sense of humor at last."

"I don't recall giving you permission to call me by my first name."

"Don't you? That's ice cold, Izuru. And after all we've been through together? Now you really have hurt my feelings. You let Nagito call you by your first name. If you're not careful, I'll think you actually like him better than me and that wouldn't please me. That wouldn't please me at all. That wasn't the plan."

He shrugged, pointedly keeping his attention focused on his bandaging efforts, "Yes, well, you botched the plan, didn't you? If you hadn't I wouldn't be fighting for control of my own body, would I?"

"You're still sore about that?" Enoshima laughed, high and grating. "I'm a very passionate person. You know this. Is it really my fault that I got so caught up in my own despair that I just had to see the game through to its conclusion?"

"Obviously," he replied, taping the gauze in place to secure it after he'd tucked both ends in. "Who else's fault might it be that you lack self-control?"

"I feel like you're comparing me to him," she murmured, her voice soft and dangerous. "That's not something I would do if I were you."

"If I were you'd both be found wanting. His self-control isn't any better than yours."

He is not thinking about the hallway.

That bleary, watercolor memory of Komaeda dropping to the floor, nimble fingers making quick work of the obstacles in their path, the sloppy damp of Komaeda's mouth. He felt Hajime move, turn within him, reaching greedily for that memory with sleepy fingers, reeling it back in and tucking it close. The flare of warmth that raced through their body as he remembered the way Komaeda had touched him afterwards, smiled at him, the light drift of fingertips across his cheeks as he smiled back.

Boring.

With a snarl, Izuru shoved the memory at him.

Let him have it since it meant so much to him. It wasn't as if he wanted it. Wanted anything to do with it or the other one.

His own fingers pulling at that stingy, damp hair, rasping commands and insults, groping frantically for the detachment that had always come so easily as he tried to grasp why this was so different. Why he was so different.

He wasn't even good at it.

And then, quite suddenly, he was.

There was a crackle of sudden pain like a static shock against his fingertips and everything changed. The whole world seemed to shift and that sloppy, eager, inexperienced, strangely compelling disaster became something else entirely. He choked on a surprised moan, glancing down to find himself looking into the mad eyes of the man from the boat rather than the boy from the bridge.

He had been boring. His madness had been… boring.

It wasn't now.

"Funny," Komaeda Nagito commented, drawing back and letting his good hand pick up the slack. "I could have sworn you weren't interested in me in the slightest and yet here we are. Life's funny, huh?"

"I'm still not interested in you," he managed, tugging on his hair.

Komaeda laughed, "All evidence to the contrary. You've really cocked this whole thing up, haven't you? All that unnatural talent and you were outdone by the ordinary nothing you began as. Call me crazy, but there's some kind of irony in that, isn't there?"

"I haven't lost anything yet," Izuru growled, giving Komaeda's hair another yank.

"Are you sure about that?" The madman laughed again, a soft sound that chafed at his already frayed nerves. "Because from where I'm kneeling it looks like you're clinging to a life that no longer belongs to you. Do you even care about the plan anymore? Your plans? Her plans? Or are you just trying to make it out alive?"

"Funny, I'd have asked the same thing of you."

Komaeda hummed, averting his eyes and smiling, self-deprecating and oddly satisfied, "Well, that's true. I like watching her plans combust, seeing all the hope that springs up in the wake of these disasters is really something special, don't you think?"

Izuru stared down at him contemptuously, trying unsuccessfully to ignore the hand still stroking and fondling him with practiced fingers. The way his hips twitched and lifted without his permission, how short of breath he was watching him.

Komaeda just smiled up at him beatifically, "You look constipated when you make that face, you know. It's not attractive in the least."

"You're repellent."

He laughed, soft and wild, "I am, aren't I? Of course, you're worse. At least my talent is natural. You're manufactured, a freak of nature, an abomination. You're a loathsome, repugnant waste of space that shouldn't even exist. I should slice you open and let you bleed out here. Or maybe I should just smash your filthy head in. Either way."

"Your talent is mundane and boring and so are you. You're just a dead man walking," Izuru hissed. "Let's weigh your luck against everything I am and see who ends up dead first."

Komaeda laughed again and he had no idea why his body seemed to find that so attractive when he found it disgusting. "If you want me to suck it again, you could just ask."

"I have no intention of asking you for anything," Izuru spat, but he still yanked at Komaeda's hair. He came willingly enough, his mouth put to better use humming to himself as he worked, teeth scrapping and tongue whirling, sucking him in and swallowing him down.

In moments he was a spectator once more and Hajime was giving gentle warnings in soft tones, something like affection on his lips as he came in a rush of something more profound than simple physical pleasure. Something Izuru had no desire to understand and was utterly unable to process. All he truly knew was one simple truth: Komaeda Nagito was going to be a problem.

But then he might be the solution as well.

"Besides," Enoshima continued, oblivious to the turn of his thoughts. "That was ages ago and I was a completely different person. Get with the times, Izuru, and forget the past. It's a new day and we have a new game to play. And even you have to admit that this game has kept even you on your toes."

"It's an annoyance is what it is," Izuru commented, slanting a glare at her.

"Ah, poor Izuru! Is that ordinary, boring boy giving you trouble? Why don't I step in and lend you a hand?" Enoshima teased and he slapped her hand away before it could settle against his cheek as it seemed want to do. He could feel her shrewd, calculating gaze on him, assessing him, as her hand hovered in the air for long moments before finally settling on the edge of the counter between them.

He spoke quickly, recovering in a moment, but he knew it was a moment too long. Knew that his predictions were off now, that he'd need to reanalyze the situation if he wanted to stay ahead of her. She wasn't as unpredictable or interesting as the real thing, but she had her moments. And he didn't like the way she was looking at him. "Why would I require assistance from a three-time loser like yourself? You haven't been able to best amnesiac high school students, the idiots that populate Towa City, or even your own psychotic former despair groupies. It's pathetic, really."

Enoshima smiled, ignoring the taunts to snatch up the power that lay beneath. Itwas obvious, it was predictable, but it was also effective. "You realize that I could crush your little boyfriend in an instant, don't you? He was mine first and I know him best."

Hajime stirred and mumbled within him, restless. He'd be waking up soon.

"Do you really want to go to war with me?" He murmured, dropping feints and taunts in favor of blatant scare tactics. He didn't have the time for subtlety. "I'm sure you'd enjoy the level of despair I could cause you in the seconds you'd have to revel in it, but you wouldn't have even a moment to spread that despair to the world."

Enoshima clicked her tongue, averting her eyes, "Well, your sense of humor still sucks. I was just joking, Izuru. I still need him, you know. I need all of them, but those two most of all. Which is why I decided to send her to entertain him so we'd have this time to chat properly. She'll make sure to keep him safe for us so that we can enjoy ourselves fully."

Why did he feel uneasy? It wasn't like he cared, Komaeda was a convenient lure, certainly, but it wasn't as if that other bait wouldn't suffice. He'd known, on some level, that she was here as well, but Hajime had been so focused on Komaeda that it hadn't become an issue. And Komaeda was only consistent in his desire to stay well away from the areas where she might dwell or choose to linger. He doubted it was personal, just happenstance, a general dislike for hospitals from the years he'd probably spent in them.

He grimaced as he recalled the feel of Komaeda's mouth wrapped around him, slick and warm and wet.

The way he… the way Hajime had curled around him, held him as he came, the way Hajime's fascination with him was turning into something like obsession. How easily he was surrendering to the idea of this reality. How vulnerable that made him. Made them both.

He knew all of that, but he didn't pretend to understand it.

Certainly, Komaeda Nagito hadn't turned out to be precisely boring, but he had little enough else to recommend him. Perhaps he did feel a sort of grudging admiration for the way the little bastard had tricked him on the bridge, the way he'd thrown himself back into the water, the way he'd made sure he fell with him. It had been… interesting.

He wanted to see him writhe and wriggle and beg and plead as much as Hajime wanted to see him safe. He wanted to destroy him utterly, but he needed to be the one who did it, no one else.

No one, but especially not Tsumiki.

Tsumiki who had always been the very worst of Enoshima's little band of sycophants.

"Did. You. Now," he grit out between clenched teeth. It certainly explained the hallway. The distant reek of disinfectant and flowers that seemed to define poorly ventilated hospitals everywhere. The dry, recycled quality of the air that had given way to something less stale as he'd made his way from the dark back into the neon-lit diner. How intent she seemed to have been on keeping Hajime there, locked in the endless darkness of that simplistic trap. "I'd hate to have to harm your little pet to repossess what's mine, but accidents do happen."

"Ooo, did I do something naughty? Oh, are you angry? You certainly seem mad, Izuru. I didn't know you could even get angry. Ooo, are you going to punish me now? Tie me up? Tie me down? I think I'm getting a little excited just thinking about it. I might even enjoy myself if it's you. Do you think you could inflict the proper amount of despair to allow me that?" He flexed his wounded hand, now properly bandaged. It still hurt, but it was better than it had been and at least now it wasn't leaking everywhere. "Aw, you're not leaving already are you? I miss our little talks," she pouted, frowning as he closed the medical kit and slid off the barstool, the pain in his feet was distant, virtually nonexistent now that they were tightly wrapped in layers and layers of soft gauze.

"You've stolen something that belongs to me and given is to that clumsy girl. Did you imagine that I'd thank you for it?"

Enoshima sighed, exasperated, hands resting on her hips, "Oh? He's yours now, is he? You're bumming me out, you know? This was supposed to be a party atmosphere, but you're so serious. It's a total mood killer. So, you can tell me, just between us girls: do you actually feel something for him? I didn't think emotions were your thing, but you do seem awfully concerned about him."

Izuru slanted an annoyed glance at her, "I don't care about him. He's merely a means to an end."

"Really? Nothing at all? So, you're going to blame all that useless sentimentality on Mr. Boring? It wasn't me, it was that ordinary, nothing special boy whose body I'm renting to own?"

"This isn't his body. He's nothing but smoke lingering in the air after a fire has burned the house down. He'll fade away soon enough. This is still all well within my calculations." Izuru replied, ignoring the rest as ridiculous and unimportant.

Enoshima never had known when to shut up, a trait that lived on in this cheap imitation.

"Really? So you planned to spend your entire evening playing footsie with Komaeda Nagito in a cheesy theme diner?"

"Hardly," he scoffed, gritting his teeth as Hajime turned and turned within him, more restless and closer to waking with each passing moment. He didn't have the time or the patience for this nonsense.

Her breath puffed against his neck, warm and wet, "So, you don't really mind that I've sent her to play with him, do you?"

"My plans are not quite so easily thwarted, if that's what you're asking," he answered, shoving away from the counter. "You'd think you weren't even interested in escape with the way you're acting."

"Oh, it's hardly that. It's just… well, I can't really lose here, can I? What will inspire in me the greater despair? Dying an ignonymous death in bits and bytes? Escaping to linger on in the world in all those borrowed bodies. To live and inspire and plot new ways to spread despair? I want to feel it. I want to drown in it. I want to make you feel it."

"I don't feel despair."

"You don't feel anything and that's a type of despair in its own right and that is why you're so interesting and useful, Izuru." She smiled, reaching out to pinch his cheek and laughing, darting back and away, when he struck out at her. "So, let's play another game. It can be a racing game. Let's see if you can get to him before she takes him apart. She's always liked him, you know. And why not? He's practically the perfect patient if you can manage to keep him under control. Just the right balance of demanding and compliant and abusive and she's been so very lonely. Of course, that was before when he didn't really want anything besides hope, when he loved and hated me more than anyone else because I was the only one who could possibly gift him with that great, big, beautiful hope he thought he was looking for. I wonder if he'll be as cooperative now."

She gave a careless shrug that meant everything and nothing at all.

She didn't have to say that things were different now. That was, after all, the crux of the issue. The reason Komaeda was a point of contention between them when he might otherwise have been worthy of little consideration at all.

Hajime had made him important.

Without even the faintest inkling of what he was doing, he'd made him important by coming here for him again and again until they began filling in each other's empty spaces.

He had to work to keep his expression bland and disinterested. And the fact that he had to work at it at all was telling enough.

Was this Hajime's influence?

Or Komaeda's?

Either way it made him want to strangle the life out of that laughing bastard. He'd known from the beginning that he was dangerous, but he'd never dreamed that he would become a danger to him, not truly. If he had, he would have killed him on the boat before they'd ever entered that ridiculous simulation. Wrapped his hands around that scrawny, anemic neck and squeezed until that mad light that had no business even still existing had gone dark at last. He'd tried to put an end to him on the beach, but….

The look of his face as he had touched him… stroked him… pinned him beneath the cold, rolling waves. The way Hajime's presence had reared up unexpectedly to steal the reins, to take control. He should have expected that, should have anticipated that reaction, but they both threw his predictions, his expectations, off the mark.

It had been a… misstep.

But it had also been interesting. After all he'd been surprised twice in just a matter of minutes and he'd always had a weakness when it came to the unexpected.

"You are not to interfere," he replied and while he knew only a brief moment had passed and his expression couldn't have betrayed his thoughts, he still wanted to smack the knowing smirk off Enoshima's gloating face.

Had there been a time when he'd found her compelling? When he'd found her beautiful? When her voice had not grated on his nerves? He wasn't certain, but he thought there must have been. With the real her, the one who had been able to drive him, incite him when very little else had. He'd never been like them, those ridiculous sycophants who'd so willfully pranced into her traps time and again until they'd lost themselves and plummeted into despair, but he had let her inside him in his own way. Let her influence him and he had done all this in the interest of bringing her, her particular brand of madness and despair, back into the world and allowing it to spread throughout. She wasn't boring, after all, when everything else clearly was. When she was at her most chaotic, he had trouble predicting her movements or at least he had… now….

It was the same frustration he'd felt in Towa City.

The cheap copy was just that and she grated harshly against nerves already made raw by Hajime's ever-strengthening presence.

Everything was falling apart. Turning upside down and he found himself grasping at loose, fraying ends as the unraveling threads at the core of who he'd once been were tugged and stolen away. He was at a disadvantage, clinging by his fingernails to a life that was being pulled from him inch by painstaking inch and he needed every advantage he could get and now Enoshima had stolen one of those precious advantages away.

And that couldn't be allowed.

He could see how this would play out, the merit and rhythm of the conversation. She'd keep him talking, engaged in setting out rules and nuances until Tsumiki had been able to complete her part in this under the guise of having done the damage, whatever that might be, beforehand and there would be virtually no chance of Komaeda emerging unscathed. This version of her might be as predictable as the fall of night and rise of day, but being able to predict what she would do did him very little good if he lacked a course of action or the ability to stymie her.

She smiled at him, holding her hands up, fingers crossed, "Games aren't any fun at all without rules to play by, are they? So, it's you versus Mikan with Nagito's life on the line and I'm not allowed to interfere. I'm sure this will be super fun to watch. What other rules would you like to set in place?"

Predictable.

Boring.

But he only had one effective course of action left to him, because Hajime was waking up and he was out of time

"Just two: Hajime will be the one playing and the game starts now," he snarled crossing to the door and shoving it open with a tinkle of protesting bells. He glanced back at her and found the gob smacked look on her face vaguely satisfying as he cast his body out into the pouring rain.

Hajime tripped over his newly bandaged feet and sprawled across the dark, wet pavement of the diner parking lot as the door fell closed behind them.