The Mortal City

by MidnightRun42

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

9. The Loneliest Number

"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be."
― Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night

-ooo-
DAY THREE
-continued-

She dragged broken, bitten nails down the white door, leaning heavily against the frame. She could hear Komaeda inside; hear him calling for him, his voice shrill and breaking with panic. Calling his name as if he were there, as if he could save him, as if he would.

As if Hinata Hajime had ever been able to save anyone.

Even himself.

She licked her lips, tongue darting across them to find them dry and chapped; she was nervous, unaccountably nervous, her stomach churning and tumbling like it was caught in a riptide. Touching the door helped to ground her, settle her feelings, bring the world back into focus. It was such a flimsy barrier, barely even real. She could feel the chipped paint of the door, rough beneath her fingers, flecks of paint digging painfully beneath her fingernails as she dragged and scrapped them across the surface.

He was just there. Her patient was just there on the other side of this flimsy barrier and he needed her. She could hear him calling, feel his desperation like heat warming her soul and she wondered how long it would take to wring that strange, unlikely hope from his long-suffering body. How long would it take to free him, save him from himself, from these… delusions? How long until he understood that there was nothing for him here but disappointment and despair? How long until she could break those chains of emotion that bound him to that memory of a boy who'd never been?

"M-Mister Komaeda," she called, clearing her throat, her words stuttering and breaking in the warm, moist air of the hall. It came out more whisper than word and she had to try again, her voice a little louder, a little more certain each time she called him until she realized that she'd called him a dozen times or more, that she was practically shouting his name now, her throat rough with the strain. He had fallen silent, but she knew he was there, still there, waiting for her. Where else could he go, after all? He was trapped like a rat in that room, that room where she had slept beside, on top of that illusion he coveted. He was probably frozen, crouched near the door, a deer caught in headlights waiting for the inevitable crunch of bone and sinew. She could imagine him crying, silently, though she'd never yet seen what tears looked like flowing across his splotchy cheeks. Poor broken boy, sweet wounded bird with bloody feet and a stolen shirt. She tried to sound calm, safe, gentle, but she had a sneaking suspicion that she'd lost the knack. "You should really come out now. It's time to take your medicine."

"Don't want to," he replied with a whine, but the protest was weak, feeble. He wanted to come out, of course, he did. He wanted it to be over, he wanted her to take care of him, he wanted to stop worrying and wondering. She understood that. She'd wanted the same thing. After all, it was so lonely here and it was so easy, so easy to forget that this wasn't… wasn't what they were meant for.

She was fortunate that she'd had her beloved to remind her.

Mister Komaeda had had nothing and no one. It wasn't so surprising to discover he'd cracked under the pressure. It was her fault, after all. He was her patient. She had promised to care for him, but she'd forgotten that for a while. Forgotten that and forgotten him and they'd both been so alone here when they could have had each other, but it wasn't too late. She could still fix things, she could still help him to remember, to become. Certainly things would never have progressed to this point if she'd sought him out from the very beginning, if she'd cared for him as she should have, but there was still time. After all, they had nothing but time here, didn't they?

"H-He's not here, Mister Komaeda. He was never here. There's no one here, Mister Komaeda, no one at all, but you and me. No one is coming to save you, to save us, and, even if they were… would you really want that? Aren't you tired, Mister Komaeda? Aren't you tired of being lonely and afraid? Aren't you tired of hoping? Aren't you tired of pretending to be something you're not?"

"Yes," he replied and it was a whisper and a plea all in one and she smiled.

"I want to help you, Mister Komaeda, all I've ever wanted to do was help. All you have to do is let me in."

-ooo-
DAY ONE

It was dark and it was cold and she was alone.

And then there was a voice in the darkness… just a whisper… warm and comforting….

Tsumiki.

Tsumiki Mikan.

No, that wasn't quite right, was it?

It wasn't just a voice. No, it was a multitude of voices... loud and soft and warm and cold and they echoed around her and within her and there was no telling where they began or she ended.

It was dark and in the dark there were only those sounds, those whispers and shouts. There were only those words.

Tsumiki Mikan.

You dirty bitch.

You should wake up now.

I ' ll never forgive you.

You must wake up now.

Go to hell.

Please, wake up.

I hope you drown in your own vomit, you ugly pig.

Mikan, you must wake up now. Time is growing short.

But she was just so tired. So terribly tired and the voices were really far away and they didn't… they didn't mean anything so it was really easy to ignore them and the darkness was so regretfully deep.

Tsumiki Mikan slept on.

-ooo-
DAY TWO

C'mon, wake up already, sleepyhead. I don't have all day to wait on you, you know.

When she finally woke up it was to incomplete darkness, an aching back and a bone-deep confusion that had her blinking dumbly at the big, blank screen before her for long moments after she'd opened her eyes.

She was sprawled out in an uncomfortable chair, legs akimbo and skirt twisted unpleasantly and too high around her hips. The fabric of the seat was rough and patchy against her bare thighs and the arms of the chair had left painful indentations in the flesh of her forearms. She had a terrible crick in her neck. She drew herself up a little, bracing her hands, which ached a little like they were bruised or lightly burned, against the armrests. Her back complained of even that small movement, the aching, throbbing pain that came of resting in an unfortunate position for far too long. She glanced around at the threadbare, shabby red seats that made up the front row of the movie theater and shifted again, nervous and sick at the thought of having fallen asleep in such a place. The floor was sticky from years of spilled soda and shoddy cleaning practices and her shoes made a gross peeling sound as she shifted them.

The theatre was dark around her, the only illumination cast by the safety lights that lined the aisles. It wasn't much, but it was enough to see by, enough to allow her to look around and be reasonably sure that the theater was completely empty save for her. The scent of stale popcorn and burnt oil in the air was strong enough to make her gag.

What had happened?

Had she really fallen asleep here?

It seemed like a truly terrible place for a nap.

There was a sharp crackling, popping noise in the darkness and the screen before her burst to life. It seemed too bright after the darkness and she winced, drawing in on herself as she reached up to rub the sleep from her eyes with a hand that tingled like the nerves were springing back to life. The sound of those pops and crackles petered out into silence as images flickered to life across the screen. She recognized the title screen as the one belonging to that terrible film she'd been bullied by Monokuma to watch.

That terrible film that she'd….

She'd….

She….

How lame. You don't even want to think about it?

She shivered, her breath painting the air with smoke as she exhaled. Gooseflesh prickled to life across her bare arms and legs and she drew her knees up tight against her body, shivering again. It was an awkward motion in the cheap seat, causing it to fold in a little and her butt to get wedged uncomfortably in the space that opened at the back of the seat as it closed just a little around her. The scratchy fabric of the seat chafed her bare skin, not quite painful, but uncomfortable, itchy. Like the seat was a mouth attempting to swallow her down and the cheap fabric cover were its tongue, rough as a cat's, tasting and tenderizing before it could consume her utterly.

She shivered harder.

Why was it so cold?

The island had always been so warm, almost… unbearably so at times.

The island….

She remembered the feel of first waking in that place. It had felt just as lonely as waking in the theater, for all that it had been far more crowded, and there had been that inescapable, creeping sensation that she was forgetting something, someone important, but she'd been unable to summon up a name or a face or anything at all but more of that strange muddled confusion.

Her first thought upon opening her eyes to find herself seated on warm white sand was that it was nothing like Okinawa in March. The air had been too hot for one, moist and burning, sweat had already been gathering between her thighs and along her brow, dripping freely down her chest to dampen the collar of her shirt, vaguely unpleasant. The palm tree she was leaning against was scratchy and rough against her back, catching and pulling at her hair as she sat up and the dull roar of the ocean waves rushing against the shore seemed strangely loud even though the area around her was filled with the vaguely distressed sound people talking to and over each other, all seemingly just as confused and flustered as she felt.

She watched them all with wide eyes, unwilling to jump into any of the many conversations that were happening around her. There were so very many people talking, nearly a dozen at a glance, but for all that… it really hadn't seemed as anyone was actually listening. Just so many strangers milling about and she'd never been great with strangers. If there was one thing that the orphanage had taught her, it was that it never paid to call attention to yourself until you understood who and what you were dealing with. A wrong word or a casual touch could earn you anything from a smile to a slap in the face to a knife in the thigh. Strangers were unpredictable.

Things had been… easier in the infirmary. Once she'd begun to help out there, once she'd found her talent, she'd been able to prepare, to plan, to understand people before she had to meet them, deal with them. That was where she discovered that you could learn a lot about a person by studying their wounds, their ailments, their weaknesses and after that she knew what to do. She began to understand how to get what she wanted, what she needed.

Doctor Saito hadn't ever seemed to care too much what she did so long as she kept what patients there were quiet and docile. He'd pinch her or slap her arms, quick and painful, when she was too clumsy or too slow, but sometimes, when she'd done particularly well he'd pat her on the head, cheeks flushed red from too much cheap sake, and say, 'That's my good girl."

She'd learned so much about people when she'd become a nurse, but it still meant that it had been years since she'd had to deal with so many strangers all at once with no time to prepare beforehand and she wasn't sure how to even begin.

Some of them looked passingly familiar, possibly from the research she had done on her class before….

Hope's Peak Academy.

She'd been… she'd been accepted to Hope's Peak, hadn't she? She'd been… excited about the beginning of term. It was a new school, a new world, a fresh start where she could be anyone she wanted to be… where she would be valued for her talents, where she might find someone who would love her, would cherish her, would forgive her mistakes. Someone she could care for, who would need only her.

Only…

It had seemed as if that had gone wrong somehow.

And so she had been at a bit of a loss as to what she should do.

She'd still been turning over her options, fingers tangled and tugging gently but persistently at her hair, when a red-haired girl with a large camera slung across her hip crouched down in front of her, smiling brilliantly. "Hello there," she said, folding her arms across her bent knees. "You look as confused as we all feel."

"A-Ah," she cleared her throat nervously, surprised by the sudden attention. "Um, I, y-yes, I, um, can't seem to, um… is this H-Hope Peak's Academy, by chance? It, uh, t-that is… that is, pardon me for saying so, but it just… it doesn't look much like it did in the brochure, does it?"

The girl laughed, a little strained, but not unkindly and Mikan felt that laugh all the way to the tips of her toes. She was used to being laughed at, she'd often been laughed at, at the orphanage and before, but it had rarely been so… nice. "That's true, I guess. I'm not sure what's happening, no one is, but it seems like everyone here was supposed to be attending Hope's Peak Academy starting today. Here, let me help you up?" The girl dusted her sandy palms against her bare knees and stood before she offered her hand. Mikan took it after only the briefest of hesitations and allowed the girl to offer her a wide infectious smile as she pulled her to her feet. "It's nice to meet you, by the way. I'm Koizumi. Koizumi Miharu."

"I-It's, uh, nice to meet you too," she managed, a nervous smile of her own fluttering to life on her lips. And for a moment, she had thought that maybe… maybe this, whatever it was, wouldn't be so difficult after all. Miss Koizumi could have just left her sitting in the dirt or not come and talked to her at all, so, maybe the others would be just as… accepting. "I'm, um, that is, my name is T-Tsu-" she had begun, her fingers still clasped around Miss Koizumi's warm hand when shouts erupted from further up the beach. A large excitable man in a leather jacket and a girl wearing clothes that seemed two sizes too small had begun talking loudly and gesturing emphatically to each other as well as to the large boy in the white suit who was clearly attempting to reason with them without much success.

"Oh, jeez, what now?" Miss Koizumi muttered, releasing her hand and leaving her behind without another word as she turned on her heel and hurried over towards the commotion, camera banging gently against her hip.

It wasn't as if she weren't used to that sort of treatment. It wasn't as if she were unaware of how simple it was to hate her, ignore her, to forget all about her. Things would be different. She wasn't… she'd just have to find a way to… to make herself indispensible, that was all. They couldn't hate her if they had to rely on her, if she were the one who took care of them. She just… needed a chance to show what she was worth. She was a nurse so… so it wouldn't be weird if she checked everyone over, would it?

That familar anxiety began to bubble in her stomach and she swallowed hard, concentrating on breathing slow and measured breaths. This was fine. She could hande this. She could... she could save someone's life… that would be enough, wouldn't it? Wouldnt it? What did she need to do? What would prove that she was useful, necessary? She just... just needed a chance to... to examine everyone to see if anyone were injured and needed help and that would… would give her a chance to get to know them, to get them to look at her, see her, remember her and if one of them happened to actually be in trouble… well… that was good wasn't it?

She was good at what she did, she was confident of that. That was why she'd been invited to attend Hope's Peak, after all. And if… if they were stuck in this place, well, she might be their only hope if they fell ill or were injured so, maybe, maybe this… was a good thing. She just… needed to focus on making them see how useful she could be. That was all. That was...

She glanced around the beach, her gaze darting from one panicked expression to the next. They all looked much as she felt, as Miss Koizumi had suggested, vulnerable and confused. All just as clueless as to where they were or why, but… none of them appeared to be injured or in need of assistance. Oh, that wasn't good. That… was… how was she supposed to be useful when they wouldn't cooperate…?

And that was when she saw him.

A boy lying in the sand a few yards away in the shade of another palm tree, his hands folded neatly over his stomach.

Strange… she could have sworn there had been no one there at all when she had first glanced that way, but there he was… just lying there. Dark hair against white sand and he had a nice face, kind maybe, and compared to the others, he seemed quite plain, normal. A daisy tucked neatly into a bouquet of orchids. They were just all so… different and unique and he was… just the very image of a typical high school student complete with a dress shirt and tie. He seemed… less intimidating than the others. Maybe it was because he was just… lying there, sleeping, completely oblivious to the commotion going on around him as if he were… waiting.

Waiting to be discovered, maybe, as if he weren't really anyone at all until someone came along and brought him to life. Like maybe he could be whatever she wanted him to be, the perfect patient. Like maybe he could be someone who would love her and forgive her and always look only at her, someone special.

She licked her lips, glancing around furtively to see if anyone else had noticed him or if, perhaps, he were simply an illusion brought on by too much time in the sun. She did feel rather hot after all. But at a glance they all still seemed to be too involved in their own problems to notice anything outside themselves. So, maybe she could just go see for herself and if he weren't real, maybe they wouldn't even notice that she'd done something weird….

She hadn't even realized she'd taken an eager step forward towards him until a boy courting heat stroke in a green parka far too warm for the weather, seemed to materialize in the sand between them. She hesitated, caught between one step and the next, unable to move any further, staring at them dumbly as her place was stolen away. She should be… relieved to know that she wasn't seeing things, but all she felt was disappointment coiled around her heart as her moment vanished.

Still, she reasoned, as she watched the boy wake, watched him smile at the boy hovering over him. Even if she wasn't the one to wake him, she could still check him over and...

"What are you looking at, big boobs?" A shrill, girlish voice demanded, sudden, loud, and unexpectedly close. Mikan flinched back, blinking quickly as she allowed her eyes to refocus on the sudden movement in front of her. She wasn't sure how she hadn't seen her since she was only feet away, standing squarely between where she'd stopped and where her patient had been sleeping. The girl was short with blond pigtails, flushed cheeks, a bright kimono and such an irritated expression that it made Mikan want to curl up in a corner somewhere and apologize over and over for whatever she had done to earn it.

Nervous, she fidgeted with the edge of her apron and glanced away nervously from the girl's glare. Maybe… maybe she wasn't even talking to her. Maybe she was talking to someone else, there were a lot of other people around after all. Her gaze drifted back to the boys to find them standing together, a little too close, beneath the shade of the palm tree. The dark-haired boy brushed sand from his clothes and his new companion reached out to steady him when he wavered a little after standing back up too quickly.

"Oh, I see how it is," the girl commented, drawing Mikan's attention reluctantly back to her twisted, crooked smirk and wide, threatening gaze. "You weren't looking at me at all, were you? Bet you were planning on jumping all over that, huh? Gross. Too bad for you that the weirdo in the jacket got there first."

"I-I-I wasn't, sorry, I, um, sorry, I-I-uh," she choked out, startled by the girl's sudden accusation and grasping frantically for a lie, but coming up with only awkward apologies.

"You uh-uh-uh- what?" The girl sneered, hands on her hips. "You uh-uh totally wanna see if he'll motorboat those giant tits of yours? Gross. How filthy can you be?"

"I-I-I w-wasn't..." She stuttered unable to manage anything further, trailing off as tears filled her eyes and shame threatened to strangle her. It was always like this. Always, always rejected and hated for no reason and she just… she'd been so stupid. So, so stupid. Why had she thought this would be any different? Why did everyone always blame her? Why wasn't it… why? Why? She caught her fingers in her hair and pulled sharply. The pain helped her focus, helped her reign in the sobs at least even as the tears spilled warm and mortifying across her cheeks.

"Are you crying?" The girl hissed, sneering and vicious. "That's just so pathetic I can barely stand it. You probably just want attention, huh? Is that it? Just want to be able to tell everyone how mean I was to you? You think people will like you better if you slobber those fake ass tears all over them? Boy, are you stupid. Why don't you just get the heck away from me, before I really give you something to cry about, huh?" She practically snarled the last and Mikan found herself nodding, frantically, the tears so thick they were almost blinding as she stumbled away.

She was just so mean, so terribly cruel, but then... that was how she'd always been.

Right up until the moment she'd drawn that scalpel across her throat and held her up by her hair as she bleated and struggled and bled out all over the wooden floor of Titty Typhoon's stage.

It was hard to be cruel when you were dead.

Only….

None of that had been real, had it?

Not really real.

And so nothing she'd done there had really mattered, had it?

Only…

She was still… still there.

She'd been so certain that she would awaken, if she awakened at all, in the arms of her beloved or… something like that.

It was supposed to be something like that, wasn't it?

She'd only had a sort of vague, incomplete picture of how it might have worked, really, when she'd set out to curb the fever running through her veins by participating in the game, her game. But the important thing, the only thing that had really mattered, was that, however it worked, she would have been with her beloved. Finally, finally with her beloved again and more completely than ever before. She would be with her and her beloved would be alive and able and out in the world bringing fresh despair to those who deserved it, needed it. That she herself would be loved and forgiven all her transgressions. It was supposed to be everything she wanted, everything she needed.

Only….

It hadn't been, had it?

Not if she was here.

Alone.

Because of all the ways she'd imagined things would turn out… she'd never thought she would wake up alone.

Was this… rejection?

It couldn't be, could it? She always forgave her. Always, always, always forgave her. No matter what she did, no matter how badly she messed up, no matter how severely she needed to be punished, in the end, her beloved always forgave her.

Despair clawed at her chest and she moaned, soft and helpless, keening as she buried her face against her knees.

What had she done wrong?

She'd opened herself up to despair, fallen into it willingly and she'd prepared such a beautiful gift for her beloved, to that remnant of her that existed within that place. And maybe… maybe it hadn't quite worked out the way she'd imagined, but… but that had been fine too. She would forgive her. She had to forgive her. She always forgave her.

She'd made a gift of herself instead, surrendered gladly to the execution once it became clear she wouldn't be able to convince them to forgive her, to choose someone else. She'd surrendered herself knowingly and fully to the idea of her beloved rising from the ashes. She'd done it all to be well and truly joined with her, hadn't she?

That had been the plan… hadn't it?

Or… or had the plan been something else?

She… she couldn't quite…

She remembered being hooked up to leads and wires, allowing the violation in silence because it had a purpose. She had a goal, they all did, and it was worth allowing them to manhandle her, to condescend to them as if they were children led astray rather than adults who understood fully what they had done and why, to allow them to push sedatives and relaxants into her veins and submerge her in that lukewarm sludge. She recalled choking on it as it filled her mouth, her lungs, before the sedatives finished their work and the program activated to send her conscious mind away from her drowning body.

But she couldn't quite remember now why… why she'd… what the plan… the goal had been.

The plan had been… something.

Something.

But she'd… she'd been trying to get them to kill each, right? She hadn't been mistaken about that, had she? That wasn't… that wasn't a mistake. She was sure… sure… sure… that….

So, what had gone wrong?

Was this his fault? Had he done something after she'd… after she'd been executed to ruin everything?

"This has to be his fault, doesn't it? Doesn't it? Doesn't it?!" She screamed, voice muffled against her knees, unsurprised when she received nothing in return but the endless clicking of the projector.

There were no answers to be had in this place, only self-recriminations, abundant silence and that ridiculous film, flickering to life and dying over and over again on that huge white screen.

She was tired of watching it.

Tired of being reminded of her failures when there was no one around to punish or forgive her for them.

Unless, of course, there was.

Her breath caught and glanced up from her knees, looking around the room frantically.

After all, someone had had to turn on the projector, hadn't they? It hadn't been on when she'd first woken up, had it?

So… maybe…?

"Hello?" She called, shoving herself to her feet. The film had played through once, twice, a dozen times or more with no sign of pausing or stopping as if someone had found a way to loop it endlessly. It was silent, the images flickering across the screen the only life that illuminated the darkness around her. The film didn't bother her, not exactly, but at the same time she had no desire to see it again and again.

But obviously someone else did….

"Hello? Is anyone there?"

Standing, stepping forward, she realized that she wasn't quite… unharmed. The muscles in her legs ached, her heart raced from even that single, simple movement, so much so that it made her feel… odd, faint and strangely jittery. She coughed, raising her arm to cover her mouth, and she felt something wet splatter across the back of her forearm. She knew without looking that it was blood. Blood sprayed like dark freckles across the tight white bandages she wore there.

Was she hemorrhaging internally, perhaps?

Had her lungs been damaged somehow?

At her execution it seemed as if someone… she seemed to remember being injected with… something, her heart thudding loud and painful in her chest.

The feel of straddling something, something that throbbed warm and solid between her thighs, how she ached as it vibrated against her, that she'd been too hot and damp, feverish, swollen and flushed, on the cusp of ecstasy and then spilling over. It had been as if the world had exploded around her and she'd been flying high, shooting up through the sky and into space. Her lips had been parted in a silent scream as she'd risen higher and higher, her face burning and there was a pleasure like pain and it had felt as if her eyes were so wide open that she could see nothing and everything all at once. Then she'd been bursting, shattering into a thousand million specks of light, just numbers, ones and zeros, scattered across a digital landscape.

And then there had been…

There had been…

Nothing.

Or nothing that she could remember at any rate.

There was very little left that felt substantial and she could almost feel bits crumpling and falling away as she tried to recall those moments. The edges had become jagged and irregular and puzzles were impossible to complete when there were pieces missing without fabricating new ones to take their place.

…And none of that made any sense at all really.

It was… she could remember everything that had happened, everything on the island and before, or at least she thought she could, but it was all… jumbled, jammed up and bleeding together in her head. Memories of her life before, of her life answering the call of her beloved, of following the dictates of her own wants and desires, of living the false life they had given her on the island.

Mostly she remembered the fervent desire to love and be loved and forgiven, the one constant of her lives… the one that had truly been hers and the one they'd set her up for.

Two lives… two loves, conflicted and twisting in her heart.

Her beloved.

And… him.

Him.

Hinata Hajime.

She remembered him. And her. Them. The one who loved her and the one who had betrayed her and what was important beyond that? Beyond them? Everything else was just so much noise, really.

She remembered watching the execution, her execution, in disbelief on the tiny television in her motel room, gripping her knees with bloodless fingers as her beloved initiated her own destruction. It wasn't that they'd never realized there was a chance she'd be defeated, that had always been a possibility, it was just… seeing it, seeing the execution her beloved had chosen was… difficult. Still, they'd planned for this. They'd…

A mumbling, whining sound erupted from the bed behind her and she had whipped around to glare at the white-coated man strapped to the bed behind her.

"C-can't you see I'm b-busy? Y-you're very fortunate that it appears w-we're going to need you after all, doctor," she murmured as she forced herself to relinquish the hold on her knees to slide off the cheap, slick bedspread to stand and wobble sightlessly to the room's tidy little bathroom.

She could hear the sound of those... those… hateful, ungrateful children speaking as the broadcast continued.

They would leave the school. She didn't have to hear them to know that. Of course they would leave their pathetic little sanctuary, that ark they'd tried to create for themselves, and reemerge into the world. Of course they would. Idiots. That had been the whole point, hadn't it? And they thought it was their own choice, their own idea, their victory, but it wasn't.

Of course it wasn't.

No, the game was far from over and everything was proceeding just as she'd intended. They would venture out into the world of their own free will, those survivors of Hope's Peak, those talented children, forever changed by what they'd endured. A symbol of hope for a world that hated and adored them for all they'd been through. But they… wouldn't be the same as they had been, no, they would be… something other than what they would have been without her intervention, something different and infinitely more interesting.

Would they be the hope of the world or the heralds of its destruction?

No one could say and that… that was what made the game worth playing, worthy of sacrifice. It was a long game her beloved had thought to play and one no one could truly foretell the outcome of.

"That's the fun of it," her beloved had told her as she leaned into the mirror and refreshed her lipstick before leaving to rejoin her classmates in their isolation. "Anything less would be boring."

But be that as it may, the despair she'd left in her wake was still… devastating, overpowering. No matter how much this outcome might have thrilled her beloved… she had found she still couldn't enjoy this outcome. After all, her beloved was gone and all that was left was the despair that bloomed in the gapping hole she left behind. And it was a beautiful thing, but it was awful too.

She contemplated throwing things, breaking things, bashing her face against the bathroom mirror until it shattered and she bled. She thought about crying, screeching, wailing her loss for all to hear, to find some of those… those spectators, that so-called audience, and force them to share in her despair. In the end though she just wrapped her fingers in her hair and pulled, pulled until tears blurred her vision and the pain was so intense she bit her bottom lip bloody trying not to scream. She felt some give, strands tearing free of her scalp and the world went briefly black before she was able to finally relinquish her hold, panting and shaking those torn, bloody clumps free from her fingers. The pain grounded her, made it easier to breathe. Blood trickled down her head and neck to leak and soak into the collar of her shirt.

She could do this.

She could.

They'd all made a promise together and she had to hurry if they were going to keep it. Time was of the essence after all and it was imperative that they reach the school before those that opposed her beloved's desires, her quest to spread despair, summoned the courage to breach those walls and retrieve the bodies.

She stumbled as she took a step forward, her thoughts of the past interrupted by the sound of her shoe peeling off the sticky floor and she was back in the theater once more… a jumbled, mixed up lifetime away from that terrible day.

How long ago had that been? Months? Days? Years?

She had no way to know for certain. These memories of the truth, of her life before were just… snatches of truth and lies. Scenes and moments and feelings all piled up in a heap that she couldn't quite sort out, the connections lost somewhere along the way. Some things and moments she remembered well and others were… almost gone, just remnants of what her life had been and there were all these conflicting emotions that made her feel weak and dizzy when she thought too much about how she had loved them.

Laughter bubbled up inside her, strange and inappropriate, spilling into the air in the form of hiccupping giggles muffled against the back of her hand.

Not that any of that mattered, not really, not here, not now, not while she was so very alone.

"Hello? Anyone?" She called, clearing her throat when the sound came out hoarse and rough.

She spared another glance around in the hopes that her words or thoughts might have summoned company, but the theater was as devoid of life as it had been since she'd woken, only the quiet chatter and pop of the old projector left to disturb the silence.

Whoever had been there, if someone had been there at all, they qweren't there now. They hadn't bothered to stick around at all.

Were they… mad at her?

Was that why they'd left her here?

Why they'd played that film?

Or maybe… maybe it was a hint? Maybe she had to find them… like… like a game.

She smiled, a nervous titter escaping her lips.

Yes, that sounded like something she might do, didn't it?

Her beloved did enjoy games, didn't she?

With that thought in mind she stumbled up the aisle on stiff, uncertain, aching legs and into the lobby. The stench of burnt oil was nauseatingly strong there, the popcorn machine sizzling and hot. The dented plastic door had been left hanging open, popcorn kernels spilling out across the counter and floor.

She remembered the crinkle of tinfoil and the smell of burning oil and the thick, stale reek of beer. Hiding behind their dirty, threadbare couch, waiting, just in case he wanted her to go get him another. Because if she was useful, if she was what they wanted, they might not send her away, they might want to keep her and that….

…That had been a very long time ago in another life far away from the person she had become.

It had been… interesting to revisit all those foster families after she'd left Hope's Peak behind.

To see all those tiny houses and those tiny people whose approval she no longer required, whose forgiveness she no longer craved. It had been…

Cathartic.

-ooo-

It was night when she slipped cautiously out the theater's door into the world beyond. The air was thick and humid and her body still felt… strange and clumsy around her as she stumbled out onto the path that circled the little island. It seemed to take no time at all before she found herself standing outside the music venue, the neon was bright, flickering and flashing in the dark of the night and the interior light shone through the cracks around the door.

She supposed it should have seemed welcoming, inviting, maybe, but instead it simply felt vaguely sinister.

It shouldn't….

It shouldn't have bothered her to be here. It was just a place. And, really, it wasn't even that. It wasn't really a place anymore than the girls she'd killed here had really been people.

Well…

Maybe that wasn't quite true…

Still it wasn't her fault. She'd only done what she had to do, but she supposed they'd been as real as she was in this place, so maybe they'd been real enough. Still, it hadn't mattered much to her when she'd been setting the scene to entrap Hinata so… why should it matter now when everything was said and done and couldn't be undone?

Even if she wanted to… which she didn't.

It had been worth it.

Hadn't it?

Still, this was where… where she was meant to go, wasn't it?

Wasn't it?

"Hello?" She called, looking around expectantly, but the night remained stubbornly still and silent around her. The fires in the trashcans on either side of the entrance continued to burn, bright and warm, crackling and spitting against the darkening night as sparks drifted across the empty lot the venue occupied.

"Hello! Is anyone here? Hello! I'm here!"

Strange how her voice seemed both so terribly loud and so terrifyingly small in this lonely, deserted place as she stood there, shifting nervously from foot to foot, waiting and hoping for a response that never came.

There was only the distant sound of the ocean waves crashing against the rocks below and the sound of wood shifting in the cans as it charred and broke into pieces, falling to ash.

It was… just as it had been that night.

Ibuki had been so… quiet as she'd led her here. She'd been so eager to please when she'd taken her hand and told her that she needed her help, so blissfully content to follow her directions. They'd probably all assumed she'd had to tell Ibuki lie upon lie in order to bring her to this place, to get her to do what was necessary, but the reality was that all she'd ever needed to do was tell her the truth. Ibuki had been so eager to be of assistance that all she'd had to do was provide her with a task, a purpose, and she'd been glad to comply.

All she'd needed to tell her was that she wouldn't die, not really, that she'd just wake up from the terrible dream she was having. Just that and Ibuki had nodded and followed her instructions to the letter as if nothing gave her greater satisfaction.

Yes, Ma ' am!

Of course, Ma'am, I should just kneel right here no matter what, right?

It had been so simple, so easy.

When she'd begun to remember everything as she sat at Komaeda's bedside, her fingers twisted in his sweat-soaked sheets, it had been the painful things she'd remembered first.

Everything that had come before Hope's Peak, those years of rejection, of always being a target, of never being worth keeping: those things had always been with her. They'd never left her so there was nothing worth thinking about there. Not as then. Not as minutes ticked into hours and the fever grew hotter with each passing moment and the day wore on.

No, as she sat at Komaeda's bedside, it had been Hope's Peak and all that happened after that had emerged from the depths to remind her of every mortifying moment, every jab, every tease, every heartbreak.

The hope that it would be different there, that she would be different there, dashed across the floors on the very first day when someone tripped her on the way to class. Her panties had been saggy and worn, not cute at all, and the laughter in the hall as she fell and her skirt flipped up to show them off to what felt like half the school had been deafening. It wasn't the last time she had such a fall, but after that she saved and used part of the stipend she received from the government to buy cute panties so that at least when she inevitably tripped over her own feet, or the feet of others, she wouldn't be so… embarrassed, pathetic. There was still laughter, of course, but it was… more tolerable, because for every person who laughed, there was someone who flushed and looked away uncomfortably. It was easier to be okay with being embarrassed when you weren't the only one. It was a lesson she'd learned early on and one that saw her through many of her worst moments those first years at Hope's Peak.

But the world had seemed better, more hopeful during her final year. She had had friends, even if they weren't as close as they'd once been. She'd even made a new friend that year, who was beautiful and nice and smart and who she still kept expecting to tell her that their friendship had all been some sort of elaborate practical joke. And, most importantly, she had had Ibuki.

Her beloved's demise, dismantling her body after, all those years in between and since of despair and murder, and it had still been Ibuki she had thought of first though she couldn't think of why. Maybe it had just been seeing her like that again, like she'd been in the beginning, back when they'd first met, that made her remember what it had been like to find out that Ibuki hadn't really loved her, that Ibuki hadn't really cared for her at all.

"…but, I mean, don't you wonder why she's never touched you? I mean you're really pretty and when you care about someone... I mean, who doesn't think about doing it, right? It's a bit… weird that she doesn't, isn't it?"

She bit her lip, knotting a finger in her hair and pulling absently, fiddling with the edge of her apron.

She had... had tried not to think about that much. Tried not to wonder why in the months they'd been... spending time together it had been nothing more than chaste kisses and handholding and snuggling as they lay together talking long into the night and never... never... anything else. Ibuki had said she didn't care about that sort of thing. That she didn't need... that.

So she'd tried... not to think about it, not to wonder... at the reasons. She could trust Ibuki. Trust that she was telling her the truth, that she loved her and so it didn't matter that Ibuki didn't love her like others had, that Ibuki didn't look at her with lust in her eyes, that she never cared enough to punish her, it didn't mean… it didn't mean that she didn't see her, that she didn't care, Ibuki was just different than all the others. Better. She was… nice. Nice and good and kind and sweet despite her wild appearance, so it… it didn't matter that she wasn't… that she just… wasn't that sort of girl. She liked to be close, to hear about her day, to hold her and compose songs while tapping rhythms across her bandaged arms and that… and that was fine, that was nice. That's… that's what she'd always wanted, wasn't it? Someone who would value her, who would look only at her, who would always forgive her, that was all she'd ever wanted.

She didn't need those… other things.

It didn't matter that Ibuki had never made a move to make things more… intimate between them.

It didn't matter that every time she tried to show that she was… willing, eager even, Ibuki looked so… uncomfortable.

"S-She j-just doesn't w-want to. It's not that w-weird," she mumbled, knowing how weak the argument sounded, how pathetic, like an excuse.

Miss Enoshima smiled the wide, white smile that never failed to make her knees feel a little weak, and tilted her head to the side, patting at her shoulder gently. "Oh, geez, I'm so sorry! You look worried! I didn't mean to worry you! I'm sure its nothing! She probably hasn't even heard the rumors, you know. I mean, after all, Miss Mioda isn't the type to gossip, despite the way she looks. She's actually very trustworthy, isn't she?"

"R-rumors? W-what rumors?" Mikan stuttered, heart leaping into her throat, because there were… things. So many things she hadn't… things she hadn't wanted to tell her and even though Ibuki had always said she didn't care about the past… she might care if she knew. She might not be able to forgive her and… she wasn't certain she could stand that.

Miss Enoshima's eyes were so wide and she covered her mouth with one red nailed hand, "Oh, wow, I've made it worse haven't I? Now I'm really, really sorry, I thought you knew or I never would have said anything. Can you ever forgive me?"

"O-of course," she managed with a tremulous smile, stomach churning like an uneasy, storm-swept sea. "I-I-If you could j-just…"

The bell rang out, a soft series of dings signaling the start of afternoon classes. Miss Enoshima grimaced apologetically as the last stragglers in the corridor darted into their respective classrooms, doors slamming shut behind them, "Look, just forget I said anything, it really wasn't anything bad, I'm sure. Just something about some doctor at an orphanage or something, so I'm sure it was all bullshit anyway… oh, gosh, sorry, pardon my language. I'll see you later, okay?" She called back, waving a hand over her shoulder as she dashed off towards her own classroom, her booted heels clicking loudly across the tiled floor.

And the thought had eaten away at her through class and she found herself studying Ibuki's profile again and again as the day wore on. Her pale skin, the thick green and purple streaked rise of her mohawk, the way she sometimes looked back and caught her eye and smiled. It was something that usually made her feel warm, special, but that day it just made her feel... cold, uneasy. Then there was that creeping certainty that everyone in their entire class was looking at her, sneaking glances when her attention was elsewhere. That every whisper and muffled giggle and passed note were jokes at her expense. And every once in a while, she'd look up and find Miss Saionji staring at her with that nasty, knowing little smirk, the one she usually wore after she'd tripped her in the hallway and then pretended that she hadn't and she knew... knew that she was right.

After classes let out for the day, she rushed tp the bathroom, slamming into an empty stall and locking it behind her. She pulled her feet up off the floor tucking her hunched body back against the tank.

She listened quietly to the snap and tap of shoes squeaking across the tile floor as people came and went, toilets flushing, water running, the inane chatter of other girls making plans and trading comments about their days.

No one spoke about her and she'd been relieved.

Eventually people stopped coming and going, distracted by dinner or clubs or friends and the bathroom was finally, blissfully silent and she could finally breathe again.

She eased her cramped legs down off the seat, flopping down across the seat with a sigh of heartfelt relief, letting her head drop back against the wall, exhausted.

Hours later, after dinner had come and gone and most people had returned to their rooms for the night, she'd found Ibuki downstairs in the laundry room sitting on the table, rapping out a rhythm with one hand and as she hummed a tune and jotted down notes in her dog-eared notebook with the other. A load of sudsy laundry tumbled and churned in the washer before her. She glanced up when Mikan came in, her small, contented smile turning wide and brilliant as her gaze settled on her, "Hey, hey there, Mikan, Mikan! Ibuki was just thinking about you. Do you like avocados? "

"W-were you?" Mikan managed, her fingers tightening on her bag. "I, um, I-I've never had one, a-actually."

"Yeah? They're really creamy and rich and great with toast. Ibuki has had this song in her head all day trying to get out and it's gotta be about you, because I kept picturing your face and it's like… BOOM and the rhythm's like this, right? Kind of ba-ba-cha-ta-la and I was just putting some lyrics down for it, but Ibuki was thinking she'd call it 'Avocadoes are Awesome in Springtime', but maybe that's a little long? What do you think? Is it a little long?"

Mikan felt her cheeks warm and she knotted a finger into her hair, pulling at the strands, "T-T-That's…"

"Oh! Oh! You look sad. Are you sad? Why are you sad? What happened?" Ibuki commented suddenly, hopping down from the table and hurrying over to stare at her face, uncomfortably close. She'd taken to wearing contacts lately and drawing different designs across her cheekbones each day. On that particular day her eyes had been the green of new leaves with cat slit pupils and she'd drawn in a pattern of tiny golden stars across her cheeks, curving up to her forehead over her right eye and in a trailing down her left cheek. It made her look strange and otherworldly, like she didn't belong and it always made Mikan feel nervous, because she'd heard the way people talked about Ibuki sometimes, the way they looked at her, like she was weird and dangerous and kind of crazy. Ibuki never seemed to mind much, but she knew it had to bother her. Of course it did. "What can Ibuki do? To make it better?"

"W-w-w-why don't you want to have sex?"

She immediately felt as if all the blood was running both too her face and away from it simultaneously. She hadn't meant to blurt it out like that, she hadn't even meant to bring it up at all, not really, but… but she didn't understand it and she couldn't seem to shake the idea that Ibuki might look at her and think she wasn't… clean… or that, maybe, she just didn't really like her at all and it was….

Ibuki frowned, flinching a little around the eyes as if Mikan had slapped her rather than just asked her a simple question. "I… don't…" she hesitated, as if trying to choose her words carefully, delicately. Soften the blow. "Ibuki doesn't need all that." She replied, twisting her fingers together as she eased back a little bit, still frowning, still uncertain. "Ibuki thought… Ibuki thought Mikan understood her."

"W-well, I don't, I… is it because of what people are saying about m-me? I mean, I'm not… I've been t-tested you know! I run tests every few months j-j-just to make s-sure that everything, everything is… and I-I'm fine. Y-y-y-y-you don't have to worry that you'll catch something and," she dashed her hands across her cheeks, swiping angrily at the tears there. She didn't want… she hadn't meant to cry, it was just… just… she'd thought Ibuki wouldn't… wouldn't judge her, that Ibuki would understand, that Ibuki would forgive her.

Ibuki bit her lip, hugging arms around her chest, "Ibuki isn't…" she trailed off her voice so quiet in the cavernous room, as if she were saying something so much more intimate than she was. "Ibuki doesn't care about any of that."

"Then why? Because it's… it's weird, isn't it? You love me, but you won't… you don't… so it's me, isn't it? It's something about me? You don't… want me, do you? Do you? You could have me, any way you wanted and I… but you don't. You never look at me like you…" And she knew she was being unreasonable, but it was like some dam had burst within her and all her doubts and fears were pouring out, given form and shape and she couldn't stop the flood. She couldn't stop it, because she didn't understand, she didn't understand how you could love someone and not want to be with them, to leave your mark upon them. She knew what love was. She'd had love leave bruises and cuts across her arms and had it knotted in her hair and splashed across her thighs and she knew, knew, that if love was passion, was caring enough to show it, to make your mark so that everyone would know, would know than Ibuki… Ibuki….

"Weird… huh? You think so?" Ibuki said slowly, looking so… vulnerable despite her messy mohawk and her piercings and her flashy make-up. "You want Ibuki to touch you like that? Like that?"

"Yes," Mikan answered, without the slightest hesitation, breathing a sigh of relief, because Ibuki finally understood. She wanted Ibuki's touch branded across her skin, proof that she meant something to her, proof she could feel and see and know, even when she was alone. And now… now it was out there, hanging in the air between them and even… even if Ibuki didn't want to it… it would still be better than this… this waiting and wondering and doubting. Instead, she would know. She would know that Ibuki would think of her, would remember her, would linger and stay with her even when they were apart. Ibuki wouldn't leave her, couldn't leave her behind because they'd always be part of each other and she would….

"Okay," Ibuki murmured, breath shuddering out into the air between them as she turned away, back to her laundry. "That's… okay. If that's... that's... I... I'll come by tonight. Tonight. That's… all right? Right?"

"Yes, o-of course! I'll be ready," she smiled, tugging at her hair as she hurried from the room before Ibuki could change her mind, before she could take it back. It would… it would be okay now. Everything would be okay now.

Ibuki loved her.

Ibuki loved her.

But she hadn't.

Not really.

She should have known the moment she had shown up at her door.

She'd come late, so late that Mikan had been sure she wouldn't show and when she had she'd looked strange and she'd been quiet, both during and after, so serious and pale beneath her makeup. So different from the carefree girl who was always reaching to express herself in a thousand different ways, the girl with screaming music in her soul.

She'd seemed so… different.

But she hadn't noticed and she hadn't cared, because they were together and that meant everything, silenced all her fears.

She hadn't noticed that there'd been no singing or tapping or playing or silliness. Just… just Ibuki's mouth and hands and fingers, playing across her body, undressing her in the dark, quick and efficient, and bringing her again and again until she was a shivering, quivering mess.

It hadn't even occurred to her until after that Ibuki had barely let her touch her or even look at her, really, since she'd switched off the lights almost the moment she arrived. That she'd been quiet throughout besides the occasional question about whether she was doing something right or if something felt good, strangely detached, like someone taking a survey.

She just… hadn't noticed.

She'd just been so... happy, so relieved, that it hadn't even occurred to her that something might be wrong. Why would anything be wrong? They had sex, hadn't they? It had been... really nice and she finally knew... knew that Ibuki loved her. Really loved her.

She'd fallen asleep at some point afterwards, sheet wound round her body and sweat drying between her breasts and when she had woken up, some time in the middle of the night, she'd heard the soft hiss of water muffled by the the closed bathroom door and Ibuki's voice singing against the flow, melancholy and soft, nothing like the joyful, lively screeching rasps of sound Ibuki usually enjoyed.

That was probably when she'd known.

She'd knocked on the door, tentative and shy, dread swirling in her stomach like a dead goldfish in a clogged toilet, and the water had shut off along with the sound and it had felt so… final. Her heart seemed to be turning and flopping anxiously as she shifted from foot to foot, twisting fingers in her hair as she waited for an answer, waited for the door to open, waited for the shoe to drop.

It seemed like she stood there forever, but it was probably only seconds later that the door was thrown open to reveal a dripping wet Ibuki, her long stripe of dark hair plastered across her neck and shoulders, her face and body bare except for the silver shine of her piercings. Her eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot as if the contacts had irritated them or… or…

"Ibuki can only be herself. Herself. She loves you, but… she can't be what you want. She can't be what you want." She repeated the last softly, but it didn't really soften the blow, it didn't make it better.

She heard the words, but she also heard the truth that Ibuki didn't say.

I won't give you the things you want, I won't give you what you need, because what you need doesn't matter, because you don't matter.

I ' ll never forgive you for making me feel like I had to do this. You're a terrible person, an awful, disgusting person who I'll never, ever forgive.

"Y-Y-You can go," she whispered in reply and Ibuki's eyes widened as if she were surprised, as if she hadn't expected it to be so easy to severe the ties between them. "Y-Y-Y-You don't have to stay. It's fine. Just go."

"Mikan..."

"I s-said you could g-go!" The sound was more screech than speech and she slapped a hand against her mouth as soon as the words had left her. Apologies already gathering and spilling from her lips, more reflex than sincerity, muffled by her clasped hands.

Ibuki just nodded, brushing past her into the room. She gathered her clothes in silence. Slipping into those discarded garments and disappeared out the door like a ghost, already just another memory; just another person who had left her behind, another person who had rejected her, who couldn't love her or forgive her for not being enough.

Her beloved had been so kind the next day, immediately taking her aside during breakfast as if she knew that something was wrong, as if she really cared. Her voice had been so gentle and the first words out of her mouth to her had been apologies and regret, assuming she might be the cause of Mikan's distress.

It had been so… nice.

Her beloved had always been such a wonderful listener. Always quick to absolve her of blame, to tell her it wasn't her fault, that nothing was her fault. It was Ibuki who was at fault for not loving her enough. It was the other girls who were at fault for gossiping about her, about them. They were to blame, not her. Never her. She was only trying to be happy.

She deserved to be happy.

She deserved to be with her beloved.

And Ibuki… Ibuki could make that happen. Again. If it hadn't been for Ibuki she might never have gotten to know the perfection that was her beloved, might never have fallen in love with her at all. And Ibuki could bring them all back together. It had been a great plan, she knew it had been, much better than the original plan of having Ibuki kill Mister Komaeda in his sleep. Too lie to her and have her smother him with a pillow or strangle him with the sash from his robe. Though that plan too had had its merits. That sort of death… was too quick. She wanted to see his despair, to watch that infernal hope of his die in the trap she'd set for him.

For all of them.

Maybe that had been her mistake, once all was said and done, but it hadn't seemed like one at the time as she'd held the door for Ibuki and escorted her into Titty Typhoon. As she gave her instruction and had her help set the stage for their little drama to play out against. She could have done it after, maybe should have done it after, but she hadn't.

She'd liked the idea of Ibuki helping her get away with it.

She'd thought she had all the time in the world, all night if she wanted, and it had made her pulse race, to have so much power over someone.

Especially someone like Ibuki.

Ibuki who had always been so concerned about what others thought of her, of them, though she pretended not to be. Just a sheep though she pretended not to be. And she'd wanted to make that feeling last just a little longer. So it had been a long while after they'd entered the venue before she'd finished her preparations and finally wrapped the rope around Ibuki's long, beautiful neck. Braced her knee against her back and drawn the rope tighter and tighter until her last pitiful, choking, gasping, wretched breaths were expelled.

It felt like fate even as tears pricked the corner of her eyes. Ibuki was finally what she needed her to be. Compliant. Willing.

It had been… perfect.

Well, it would have been perfect.

If she hadn't shown up and ruined everything.

She supposed, in a way, she'd been lucky. Lucky that Ibuki had been dying so quietly, without even a peep of protest. So quietly that it had allowed her to hear the soft sound of someone fiddling with the door handle. Having chosen to strangle her on the side of the stage near the big column had been mere coincidence, but it had allowed her to let her body fall to the stage while she stepped back to hide behind that giant column. Allowed her to observe as that… that… bitch… ruined everything just by showing up.

It had felt good to think the word and when she whispered it under her breath into the silence of the darkened parking lot she found that it felt even better to say it aloud.

"Bitch."

The logs crackled and shifted in their barrels and she swayed back and forth humming and remembering.

She'd stood there, quivering in the relative darkness, out of sight as Miss Saionji had burst through the doors. Eased around the pillar to peek at her when moments went by with no sound but the heavy door banging shut behind her. For a moment, she'd wondered if Miss Saionji had simply turned around and left, if she needed to dash after her in the hopes of stopping her before she started screaming for help. But, she was just… standing there, clearly surprised to find the lights on, the heater running and the ladder in the center of the stage. Perhaps simply unable to comprehend what it all meant. Either way she stood there in the center of the room, clutching her kimono closed and looking around furtively.

"Hey! Who's here?!" Saionji asked finally, the faintest note of fear in her voice as she stepped inside, clutching her hopelessly messy kimono around her tiny body. She crept towards the stage a step at a time, her gaze intent on where Ibuki lay, not quite dead just yet, but unconscious and well on her way. "Mioda? Is that you, music dork? What are you doing here? Don't fall asleep in random places, dumbass. You're supposed to be at the hospital, you stupid idiot. Don't tell me those total morons can't even manage to keep one sick girl from running off. What good does it do to quarantine you people if they just let the sick ones run off? I can't believe that pigshit idiot can't even do this right."

Ibuki stirred weakly, pushing herself slowly up off the stage floor with trembling limbs

"Geez, hold on, you're hopeless," Saionji grumbled as she clamored awkwardly up onto the stage, scowling and holding her kimono closed with one hand, while she used the other to gather and bunch it up around her knees as if it might fall off or open at any moment.

She could see the moment Saionji noticed the rope drooping around Ibuki's neck in the way her spine stiffened, the way a scream began to wheeze its way out of her throat.

But it hardly mattered at that point.

It was too little, too late, and it was the easiest thing in the world to step out onto the stage behind her, to slip close as she stared down at Ibuki in shock. "Wh-Wh-What the heck, Mioda?!" She managed, stumbling back away from Ibuki and right into Mikan's chest.

She'd felt a pang of despair when she'd prepared to kill Ibuki. When she'd drawn the rope tight around her hands, hands that were carefully tucked inside gloves that would protect them from both the burn of the threads and keep the traces of herself left behind to a minimum, and slipped it over Ibuki's head, pulled it taunt as she tucked her knee against her back and began applying the pressure that would eventually kill her. She was certain she'd feel the same once the deed was finally done.

She'd always liked Ibuki.

She truly had even after… everything.

But it had been for the sake of her beloved and it had needed to be done.

However, when she'd drawn the scalpel from her apron - the one she'd told herself she'd brought along 'just in case', but he no intention of using – she'd felt nothing at all as she slid an arm around Saionji's waist and pressed the blade against her throat. "I-I might be mistaken, but I believe you're now regretting every cruel thing you have ever said to me." Mikan murmured as Saionji stilled.

She could practically feel her pulse racing in the tremor of false bravado in her voice, "I always knew there was something wrong with you."

"Did you?" She murmured, pressing the point of the scalpel just hard enough to prick her skin, to draw a hiss of pain and Saionji jerked in her grasp, trying to break free while still trying to hold her kimono closed. She felt strangely numb as she raised her gaze to Ibuki who was standing centerstage as if waiting for her cue. "Miss Mioda, w-would you please go grab plastic wrap or duct tape, whichever they have is fine, and a bucket from the supply closet?"

Ibuki nodded, untangling herself from the rope and stumbling off the stage in the direction of the supply closet.

"Wh-wh-what the… What do you think you're doing, Mioda? Don't you realize this total nutjob just tried to do? Ru-" Saionji managed, indignation warring with disbelief, before braking off in a hiss as Mikan dug the scalpel in just a little deeper, worrying at the pinprick she'd already made in her throat.

If Ibuki had an answer for that she couldn't voice it and she toddled off in the direction of the supply closet despite Saionji's objections. "I-It would p-probably be best if you kept q-quiet, don't you think?"

Saionji was panting, seething, in her arms, "Like it's going to matter in the end. Who do you think you're kidding? I'm not getting out of here alive."

"T-that is t-true, I'm afraid and you'll have to p-pardon me for pointing out the obvious, b-but t-there are far worse things I could do t-than j-just kill you, you know."

"Here's your bucket and duct tape, ma'am," Ibuki rasped, her voice barely a whisper and her neck already red and bruising, raw from the marks the ropes had left behind.

"I always knew you were just the worst," Saionji snarled, renewing her struggles, pulling and kicking and shoving, no longer concerned about her kimono in the least. She wriggled like an eel in her grasp and it had become harder and harder to keep a grip on her.

"S-stop, hold still! I can't-"

It was almost a surprise when she felt the scalpel slip, sliding deep across her carotid arteries. Blood spurted out into the air before them and she was pretty sure she'd choked out a startled laugh as Saionji gasped and fought to raise her hands, to staunch the flow of blood.

"The bucket, Ibuki, we can't make too much of a mess or everything will be ruined," she managed, breathless, tilting Saionji forward as best she could so the steady stream of blood that had begun to flow down Saionji's bare chest and trickle down her own arm flowed into the bucket Ibuki shoved under her with a rasping 'yes, ma'am'.

"Y-you really should have stayed in your room, Miss Saionji," she mumbled as blood splattered into the bucket, across the stage and Saionji's slippered feet as her struggles weakened and ceased.

Such a mess, she'd thought, sighing as she wiped the scalpel across the collar of Saionji's kimono before slipping it back into her apron. But what else could she have done? Her plan would never have worked with a witness. She'd need something to act as a compress to keep any additional bleeding a minimum. Goodness, there was a lot of work to be done if she was going to salvage the situation. Ibuki alone would have been so simple a thing, beautiful and perfect, a nearly inescapable trap, but Saionji had just had to spoil it.

Just like she spoiled everything.

It was her own fault she was dead.

She laid Saionji's limp body aside, careful to position her on her, carefully pulling her kimono out of the way, allowing what little blood was left to fall now that her heart had stopped, to dribble and pool on the stage instead as that would be easier to clean up later. The clean up would take some time, but assuming no one else interrupted she certainly had time enough to get it done.

A plan was beginning to take shape in her mind centering around that silly movie Monokuma had made her watch and certainly it lacked the magnificent simplicity of her original plan, but what choice was there but to adapt?

"Miss Mioda, I'm going to need your assistance."

"Is Hiyoko going to be okay, ma'am? She has lost quite a bit of blood.."

"Of course. I told you, this is all just to make sure we all wake up from the dream so what happens here doesn't matter at all."

"Yes, ma'am, you did say that, ma'am."

"Very good. Now hand me that duct tape, you're going to help me tape her to this pillar."

And this… this actually worked out better, didn't it? This would cause far more despair so it would be a far more fitting tribute to her beloved, wouldn't it?

And, of course, they'd forgive once they understood her reasons. Once they understood why she had this, all of this.

That she'd done it for love…

For her…

For them all…

They'd have to forgive her.

Once they finally understood.

And, of course, she would explain, she would tell them the truth so they could forgive her before the end, but not until they had chosen incorrectly, not until they'd chosen him.

Once they were all to be executed then she would finally be able to tell them the truth about everything. She'd tell them and they would understand and they would forgive her and they'd all be together like it was meant to be.

This was what they were meant for, wasn't it?

This had been their purpose….

Only…

Only …

It hadn't worked out that way, had it?

Because of him.

No, them.

They were supposed to be her friends, weren't they? They were supposed to believe in her, weren't they? Hadn't Hinata been concerned for her? Hadn't he said he cared? Weren't they supposed to be friends?

And yet… and yet… when it had come down to it….

Saying that he wanted to believe her and then accusing her like that….

Hinata was just the worst.

The worst of the worst.

Who was he anyway?

He wasn't one of them, was he?

She hadn't really thought about it before. Not while she was busy planning and scheming and reveling in the despair she was feeling and causing, but… he wasn't one of their number.

Not one she'd known and she knew… she knew everyone, didn't she?

So, why couldn't she remember him?

If he hadn't been one of them, but he had been there on the island with them… who did that make him? Who? A spy? And who was she? She didn't know her either, didn't know her face, but it was Hinata, Hinata that troubled her most.

She'd wanted to ask, as she stood there watching the tide turn, watching them all vote against her, but she hadn't wanted to spoil things for her beloved. She was certain her beloved had planned for unwanted interlopers, after all. She believed in her utterly and completely. She would be with her beloved and that was all that mattered. What did she care about spies and lies and unwelcome intruders? She would be with her beloved again at last….

Only she wasn't, was she?

No.

No.

Somehow everything had gone wrong and she was alone. Alone and still… still stuck on the island, abandoned and outcast.

Were they out there somewhere?

Had she survived the execution?

Had there even been an execution?

Were they out there somewhere enjoying themselves? Having fun? Laughing at the thought of her exiled and alone? Had they already forgotten all about her?

He said they were friends.

He said he cared.

But if he cared, if he really cared, then where was he?

Why wasn't he here?

Why was she all alone?

She knotted her fingers in her hair, pulling, sharp and angry. Was this a dream? Was this reality? Why was she alone? Why? Why? Why?

She'd been so….

She blinked slowly at the night sky, bright with stars, surprised to find that she was standing on the cliff's edge looking out over the dark, moonlit water rather than at the entrance to Titty Typhoon where she'd been a moment before.

When had she…?

The moon was very bright and seemed very close.

"Where are you?" She asked the night sky, unsure if she was speaking to her beloved… or to him.

She felt a hand settle against her back, delicate and petite, a quick jab, just there and then gone. She tumbled forward, arms pin wheeling wildly as she tipped forward over the edge and fell. Her mouth gaped open in a silent scream as she plunged face first towards the rocks below.

There was a single shining moment of crushing pain and then everything was black.

Then she was waking, startled and stumbling, falling out of her seat onto the dark, sticky floor. The projector spun to life, snapping and crackling in the otherwise silent room, spilling its light across the screen.

The movie began and she was…

Alone.

Maybe you deserve to be alone.

And that was by far the most important thing and the very worst thing.

No one wants you.

Had it been a dream?

No one has forgiven you.

And if it had, what part?

Had it been her life before Hope's Peak? Seeking approval and affection and finding nothing that lasted. Being abandoned and ignored time and again, discovering every time that she thought she'd found a home that her very existence was unnecessary, unneeded, unwanted.

That… that was all she'd really wanted.

All she'd ever really wanted.

Just to be everything to someone and to have someone who was everything to her. To have someone who would look only at her, someone that would think only of her, need only her.

She'd discovered early on that if she wanted their affection, their attention, she needed to make herself useful, to be what they needed her to be rather than just herself. So she did. She formed herself as if from clay to become whatever was required, but it was never enough. Never what she needed because it had always left her cold, empty, and ultimately unhappier than she'd been before. Rough hands beneath her skirt, cigarette burns on her thighs, a well-placed slap or kick. Bruises blooming like flowers across the delicate skin of her thighs and wrists. That was what love was. Love was pain and permanence. Love was having a purpose, a use, being necessary. Being needed. Being seen. Love was being kept and not given away like an old hat, gone out of style. It was being noticed and known.

It was not being alone.

So this… this….

Maybe she had fallen asleep in this place, this gross theater with its sticky floors, and dreamed everything that had come after. The Despair disease that had inflicted Mister Komaeda and made him a teller of lies, made Miss Mioda gullible and so achingly vulnerable, turned Miss Owari into a frightened child and then, finally, inflicted her with the ability to see the truth.

Maybe nothing she thought she remembered was real.

Maybe it was nothing more than a terrible dream.

Maybe she didn't have a beloved at all.

Maybe it had only ever been just her.

Alone.

She shoved to her feet, legs unsteady and aching just as before, and ran from the theater. Slammed through the theater doors and out onto the island.

Bright, so bright, too bright, like running into an oven. She had to close her eyes, slap a hand over them to shield them from such terrible brightness after so long spent in the dark. She had to stop and catch her breath, wheezing as she bent over.

It was minutes before she could cry out for him… for them.

"Everyone! Where are you?! This isn't funny! Mister Hinata?! Miss Mioda?! Someone! Anyone?"

There was no answer.

Just the endless sound of those ocean waves crashing against the shore.

Those terrible ocean waves.

"This isn't funny! I don't want to play anymore!" She called, but there was still nothing and no one to complain to, no one to care.

No one left to understand.

No one left to forgive her.

No one left to see the truth behind it all and how utterly pointless their time on the island had truly been.

There was no despair quite like the despair of knowing you'd made your own bed and had been left to lie in it alone.

-ooo-

DAY THREE
-continued-

She knocked again, quiet and insistent. He'd been too quiet for too long. Even though he'd said… he'd said he was tired, he hadn't made any move to open the door though he'd stopped calling for him at least.

Still. He'd been unsupervised for too long. What if he'd hurt himself again?

She needed to check the attachment site, make sure it was healing properly, that the infection had...

No, that wasn't right, was it?

They were on the island. Here he was young and whole and his hands were still his own.

…For the moment at least.

Oops.

She was so forgetful, but she was sure he'd forgive her. It wasn't her fault after all.

She'd just been on her own for so long...

So many days in this awful, lonely place, screaming and screaming and no one around to hear only...

Only sometimes it seemed like there was.

Sometimes there had been someone to punish her and sometimes there had been someone to praise her and always, always, always there was her beloved whispering in her ear.

Whispering all the things she needed to hear, to know.

All the things she'd forgotten.

"Mister Komaeda! Please answer me," she punctuated each word by pounding on the door hard enough to shake the cheap wood in its frame.

"You're going to have to go in there and get him, you know that, right?" She commented, leaning back against the wall between the doors, red nails tip tapping against the wall. "You can always beg forgiveness later if you want. He'll understand you had to do it once he remembers. Once he's himself again. You're not trying to hurt him, after all, you're just trying to wake him up, right? It's for his own good and I'm sure he'll thank you later."

"Yes," she murmured, twisting the doorhandle, jiggling it. "He's sick and I'm going to make him well again. I'm going to help him."

Locked.

But she'd known that, hadn't she?

She'd tried the handle before, hadn't she?

Hadn't she?

"You still have the keys, don't you?"

"Keys?" She echoed, trying to remember if these doors had locked, if she'd ever seen keys for them, picked them up, tucked them away and found she couldn't.

Though if her beloved said she had then that must be right.

Her beloved would never lie to her.

So it wasn't really surprising when she found the thick ring of keys tucked away in her apron. Dozens and dozens of keys on a big round steel ring.

The matron at the orphanage had had a ring of keys just like it.

Keys that clattered and clanked as the Matron had locked up each room for the night and again when she unlocked them in the morning.

The keys that had sometimes opened her door in the middle of night had never clattered or clanked. There'd only ever been the click and slide and snap of the tumblers yielding to the press of a single key.

She stared at the keys, wondering which one would fit the lock.

There was a oversized, red key in the middle of the jumble labeled 'ONCALL' in big black letters.

"Oh, yes, I suppose you might be the one," she murmured sliding the red key home and twisting it in the lock. She smiled, giggling nervously as she felt the tumblers click and yield. "Ready or not, Mister Komaeda, here I come."

NOTES: As usual, extensive chapter notes can be found over at the Archive of Our Own posting of this chapter (link info in my profile). Thanks again for the favs and follows and comments they really make my day. :)/p