Summary: The more things change, the more they stay the same.

ALSO: sunnyhanako1505/738658494362812416/snake-eyes-anniv-jan-21-i-think-fanart?source=share

After a couple more hours of talking and placating a somewhat grumpy Fashionista, Fujisaki had bid them farewell with a comment on having to finish up a project. Judging from the side glance they gave him, Alter Ego was most likely done with decrypting the files on that laptop. He'd have to pay it a visit without his supervisors…or maybe with them? The Luckster didn't quite trust them, but opening up the existence of the AI to more people than just himself and the Programmer would be useful if they ever needed an alibi or another opinion. It was always important to consider multiple perspectives in any scenario. And provided they didn't spill the beans to anyone else, if the laptop mysteriously went missing, the number of suspects to worry about was limited to two. Huzzah.

"Still mad about it?" Enoshima had been throwing snide comments and the occasional tennis ball his way after throwing her to the ground. It was hilarious at first…and it was still hilarious now. He was having an absolute blast. She was attempting to look angry, but it was like watching a tiny kitten snarl at you after you hosed it down in an impromptu bath. Plus, it was a tiny bit of payback for carrying him around like that for a good thirty minutes. Which was very impressive arm strength. Either that or Naegi was losing more weight than he expected. He should market that. "Lose [X] amount of weight in a week!" People would eat that up…then again, considering step one was get yourself trapped in a death game, it probably would sell very well. He snickered as she continued to avoid his gaze, a visible pout on her face. "I did say I was sorry."

Kirigiri sighed. "Just leave her be, Naegi. I think her ego's bruised more than anything else." The normally impassive Ultimate had burst into laughter for about two seconds before pretending it never happened. Which probably dented Enoshima's pride more than his little trick had, considering the weird rivalry between the two. He barely understood people in general, much less the unspoken rules that people seemed to treat as a normal part of societal niceties. There was a good reason he was banned from three public libraries. Komaru would never let him live that down.

"Tch. I'll get you back for this." He wasn't quite sure which of them Enoshima was talking to, but he continued to nod and look sufficiently apologetic. It was easier to pretend he knew what was going on than to accidentally step on another landmine. "We starting on the fourth floor then?"

He hummed his affirmative, sliding his bat back into its makeshift holster. Still had to figure that thing out. "We do have the time. And I want to check out that room Fujisaki-san talked about."

"It is certainly odd that Monokuma would keep a door locked, especially after opening the rest of the school to us." Kirigiri adopted her standard thinking pose. "Then again, I did notice that the second floor of the dorms is still barred by that gate. My guess is that there are things hidden in those places that he doesn't want us to find out. Or perhaps it would expose the identity of the Mastermind."

"We do have to take into account that this was Hope's Peak at some point. And that it was repurposed for the Killing Game." Naegi mentally filed away that note about the dorms. That was interesting. "It could be that certain rooms would hold the necessary equipment to open the school, or at least breach a path to the outside world. We don't exactly know what the school has in storage."

"Fair point."

"Plus, the Mastermind's gotta sleep somewhere, right?" Enoshima chimed in, apparently not mad enough to stop supporting Naegi. Greatly appreciated. "Assuming that they're still in the school, just opening where they are would probably get them killed as soon as anyone figures out where they're hiding."

"I…did not consider that." Kirigiri looked marginally impressed. "Indeed. While Monokuma is remote-controlled, it's fairly likely that the Mastermind remains in the building with us to monitor the Killing Game more closely. So that gives us some idea of where they might be."

Naegi tilted his head. "We can worry about that later." Best to keep their plans on the down low, especially since Monokuma hadn't made a rule to prevent them from breaking open locked doors just yet. They might only get one shot. Best to make it count. "Ready to see what awaits us on the fourth floor?"

"As long as the bear doesn't pop up to fuck with us." Enoshima's lips twisted into a snarl. She held more of a grudge over the bottle thing than the Luckster did. She gave him a once-over. "And you don't suddenly collapse on us. You sure you've got enough juice left for this?"

"The post-meal fatigue went away earlier." He shrugged, disguising his exhaustion with a cheeky grin. "You definitely shook it out of me with that fall." Pain was a very good way to keep the engine running when it was necessary.

"Heh. Fair enough, I guess." Enoshima laughed. "We're already there, so it's a little late to ask you that anyways."

"And yet you still did so."

"It was polite!"

Pulling up the digital map on his E-Handbook, Naegi squinted at the floor plan, wondering who came up with the little icons. Because some of them made sense, but others were just baffling. "Right, so we're next to the restrooms. Can always check those later. I'm assuming the locked door is the one next to the small room with that godforsaken bear's face on it."

"Probably." / "Most definitely."

They approached the blue door in unison, looking up at the sign that stated "Data Lab". How quaint.

"And as expected—" he rattled the handle, resisting the urge to snap it clean off. "—locked. Wonder what's in there?"

"Judging from the sign," Kirigiri mused, "I would assume that this is where all the electronics go. Odd to place them all in one room, but it must save on electricity costs."

"Or blow a fuse every other day." Enoshima snorted, hand lingering on Naegi's sleeve like it belonged there. "It's poor planning. Imagine if someone detonated an explosive charge in there. Your whole network would go kaput for days."

He shrugged. "This is coming from the same people who put a swimming pool above a gym. Poor planning seems to be the motto of Hope's Peak." Because people who looked at a room with a lowered floor and thought to put it above a room with a raised ceiling and saw no issues with it definitely weren't hired for their architectural expertise.

The Fashionista giggled. "Yeah, I'm not sure why I'm so surprised by it either. Fuckin' idiots."

"We cannot rule out the possibility that there were more labs like this in other places." Kirigiri put up a token defence. "Only for Monokuma to shift everything into this room. Also note that like this, we aren't able to see what's in the room next to it. Quite the secure hiding place, don't you two think?"

"Must be pretty claustrophobic in there." He commented, suppressing a small grin at the idea of some unknown figure having to live in such a small space. "Is there a toilet built into that room, or do they have to do their business in a bucket?"

"...never have I wanted to think about that particular conundrum." Kirigiri shuddered. "It's really not our problem, either way."

He shrugged. "Do a loop around this place and stop at the music room last?"

"Sounds good to me."

They ambled down the corridor, briefly peeking into 4-A before Naegi reflexively slammed the door. "Huh. That was…something."

"Heh!" Enoshima couldn't suppress a snicker as she pushed past him to reopen the door. "You really are his favourite student, huh?"

"Highly concerning." Kirigiri adopted an expression of false shock. "Could it be that you were in league with the Mastermind all along, Naegi?"

"Ah, you caught me." He stated dryly, trying to ignore the two girls currently laughing over the almost cartoonish drawing of him on the chalkboard. How could he tell, one might ask? Maybe it was something to do with the brown hair and ahoge of the chibi figure sitting happily at a desk. "My entire plan was to infiltrate as a sleeper agent, only to betray you all at the last possible moment. Alas, now that my secret has been revealed, I must silence the two of you. Muahahahahaha…" He sighed. "In all seriousness, how long ago did the bear draw this?"

"Anywhere between the time we started this Killing Game and yesterday, I suppose." The Fashionista guessed. "Probably after the first Trial, considering the way you blew up at everyone." He bit back a wince. Not one of his best moments.

"Well, can we please move on? You can come back here and laugh at it later." This was probably the closest he's been to being flustered in a while. "Please?"

"Only cause you asked so nicely." Even as she said that, Enoshima snapped a photo of the drawing with her E-Handbook, giggling all the while. "Oh man, this is comedy gold."

"While I wouldn't rank it that highly, this is rather amusing." He pointedly ignored the way Kirigiri was smiling.

"What's behind door number two?" He entered the next classroom, glancing at the writing on the board. "That's a good reminder. I've got way too many of those coins."

"You've been keeping them?" Enoshima looked at him with some judgement. "Is that where you've been getting cup ramen? From a gachapon machine?"

"If it works, it works." He glanced around, pulling another coin from the seat of a chair. "Nothing much in this one."

"The classrooms haven't exactly been useful in figuring out the mysteries of this school."

"To the chemistry laboratory it is." They walked down the corridor, sliding the doors open to reveal a room much less impressive than the physics lab downstairs. Even the weird machine in the corner didn't seem as outrageous to the air purifier.

He ambled over to the cabinets, opening the one labelled A as the other two opened B and C respectively. "A's stocked with proteins and medication. There's a bunch of dietary supplements here. I'm sure the sporty types will love this stuff. I might swipe a bottle or two to stave off hunger."

"Or you could just eat a proper meal, dumbass." Enoshima shot back, fiddling with a small glass bottle. "Hydrochloric acid. There's sodium hydroxide over there, silver nitrate in the back and ammonia as well. Standard reagents you'd find in a chemistry lab. My guess is that these are heavily diluted as well." She popped the cork, pouring a small amount onto the back of her hand. "Yep. It stings a little, but I'll get off with mild irritation."

"How bold of you." Kirigiri murmured, immediately closing her cabinet. "Best that you didn't get this selection." She turned solemn eyes onto the two. "These are poisons. Ranging from emetics to paralytics to lethal poisons. Deathcap spores, botulinum toxin…even sarin. A drop from one of these bottles could probably kill someone. Or render them with permanent nerve damage." The air in the room grew heavy with tension.

"Shit…" Enoshima regarded the cabinet warily. "It would be really easy to just grab a syringe from the infirmary and kill someone, huh?"

"Alarmingly so. Naegi, what do you think?"

He grimaced. "My gut is telling me to just empty all of these bottles into the nearest sink…but somehow I feel like that would poison the water supply."

"Possible." Kirigiri inclined her head. "We have to be getting our running water from somewhere. And it would be well within Monokuma's character to simply funnel our efforts into our drinking water. Which would incriminate all three of us. Even if we did destroy these, the Principal may simply resupply. And we'd be back to square one."

"We can't just leave these here." The Fashionista stated. "At any time, someone could just snatch one of these up and we'd be none the wiser. And unlike a head-on confrontation, I don't think anyone can fight a poison in their food." She glanced over to him with a half-hearted smile. "Even you, Naegi."

He appreciated the attempt to lighten the mood. "Is there a way we could lock these away? Put them somewhere no one can find?" Surely there was something they could do.

"Not unless you have a locked room somewhere."

The Luckster opened his mouth, then closed it, then thought about it. "Actually, I do."

"...explain." Kirigiri glanced at him, probably guessing it was the secret room on the second floor.

"I may or may not still have Maizono-san's dorm key." He produced said key, much to their exasperation. "We could move everything there. That way if anyone gets poisoned, we'd immediately know the culprit."

"I dunno, Naegi…" Enoshima was visibly concerned. "Monokuma can get into any room in the school. He could just take a vial out, give it to someone, and then the killer would have a surefire way to get away scot-free with murder."

"It's well worth the risk."

"Not if it costs you your life!"

"It can work." Kirigiri lifted a hand to her chin. "If we catalog everything beforehand and leave a physical record of it all. Provided all three of us perform a daily check on the supplies and make sure none of us steal a bottle while we're doing so, we'd be able to confirm any sort of foul play immediately. The issue is how to get an entire cabinet's worth of poisons to the dorm."

"Hey hey hey…" Enoshima loomed over a poker-faced Kirigiri, eyes aflame with something like fury. "Let's not be too hasty about this. It ain't your neck on the chopping block."

"I really don't mind—"

"Shut it Naegi, we've established your lack of self-preservation instincts." Rude, but true. "Sit on the idea, and we can come back to it tomorrow if you're still sure." She glanced his way, before sighing. "It's a good idea. I just don't like sacrificing you becoming a common theme."

"I…apologise." The other teenage girl lowered her gaze. "I hadn't considered what this might look like. For the record, I agree with Enoshima." She folded her arms across her chest. "Eventually you'll hit a roadblock you can't survive, Naegi. I do not wish to be the one that guides you to it."

"Uh. Thanks? I guess?" He awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck, slightly embarrassed. "We can save this discussion for some other time. Anything else in this room noteworthy?"

"Well…" Kirigiri stepped away, brief display of emotion concealed beneath a blank mask. "Apart from what appears to be a boiler and the traditional chemistry equipment one might expect, there isn't much else."

"Yep." Enoshima rapped her knuckles against metal. "This seems to be a breaker box. My guess is it powers this place and this place alone. No gas lines, thankfully, so we don't have to worry about an explosion anytime soon."

"Coolio." He was ready to put this awkwardness behind them, motioning for the duo to follow him back into the corridor. "What's next then?"

"Next on our list…" The Fashionista glanced up at the signage and grimaced. "An office." Now this was a little more interesting. There were potted flowers on each desk, but the layer of dust on everything indicated that no one had disturbed this place in a while. Somehow, the plants were still flourishing. It was an odd detail, but a detail nonetheless. And on the floor…

He picked up another photo, angling it in his hand so the other two could also observe it. "Yet another photo from presumably, our past." In it was a face they had not seen since the owner was stabbed and left to bleed out in Naegi's bathroom. Alongside the laughing Idol was a murderer and her deceased accomplice. "And to think our classmates were willing to kill each other despite all this."

"Gotta remember that we're missing memories, Naegi." Even as she said that, Enoshima's lips twisted into a sad frown. "But yeah. It fuckin' blows. At some point, we were all classmates. Friends as well, judging by these photos. And now we're nothing but beasts, killing each other for our own selfish reasons. Enough to drive a person to Despair."

Kirigiri tapped a gloved finger against the photo. "Note the camera. An exact match to the one we picked up on the third floor. That confirms our suspicions." They nodded. What else was there to say? Here was physical proof that this had once been a school they all went to with each other. And at some point, something happened. Now the original fifteen had been reduced to eleven. Maybe lower, by the end of it all.

"Best handle these with care." He handed it off to the enigmatic teenager, earning a raised eyebrow. "If we each carry one, we'll have proof of the past, even if one of us ends up dying. Could be useful in a future Trial."

"Way to bring down the mood, Luckster." His title was odd, coming from another person. "In that case, I'll take the next photo, if we find one." The blonde shrugged, swiping a finger through the dust collecting on a desk. "Can we get out of here now? I'm not allergic to dust, but this place is going to make me break out in hives."

"We've got the Headmaster's Office over here." He twisted the doorknob. "No dice."

"The Headmaster…" Something akin to anger flashed across Kirigiri's face. "Perhaps the person responsible for dragging us into this mess." She glared at the doors. He exchanged a slightly concerned look with the Fashionista. This was an unprecedented display of emotion. Some sort of personal tie to the Headmaster, perhaps? "If only we could get in there."

"We'll probably find a key at some point." Naegi shrugged, not-too-subtly attempting to change the subject. "No use standing around."

"You're right." And once again, it was back to the blank face he was used to. "The music room is our last stop, yes?"

"For the day, at least." It was edging into the evening. Investigation took quite a lot of time. "I want to stop by the infirmary after this."

"Hopefully not to pick another fight with that bitch?" Enoshima snorted, shaking her head. "If yes, wait a couple days. I don't think she could survive another scuffle so soon."

"Nothing like that." It was, however, a tempting thought. "Just want to talk."

"Sure…the music room, you said?" They were already walking, Kirigiri trailing behind slightly with an intense look of contemplation. He chanced another glance, but said nothing anyways. Not like he had any moral high ground to speak of, considering his own secrets.

"A music room…?" He was a little starstruck. "This looks more like a concert hall."

"Sheesh." Enoshima shielded her eyes from the spotlights, eyeing the grand piano on stage along with the benches. "Definitely for performance rather than practice."

"...Maizono-san would've loved this place." His feet carried him towards the stage. If he closed his eye, the Luckster could almost see her dancing, a cheerful smile on her face. How terribly cruel. "Say…do either of you mind if I used the piano for a bit?"

"You play?" Kirigiri watched him with a hint of sympathy.

"A little."

"...go ahead, Naegi." Enoshima gestured. "We've got time."

He smiled wanely. "Thank you."

Drawing back the chair, he lifted the lid, brushing his fingers against the keys.

"Let's see…" A tune he knew by heart began to reverberate through the room.

Play: River Flows In You [Piano Cover]

Perhaps one day, he'd be able to look her in the eye and apologise for not being good enough.

Omake: When Worlds Collide [10]

"Headmaster Kirigiri." The Ultimate Detective adjusted her gloves, not bothering to even pretend to be polite with the traitor to her family name. "You called for me."

"Yes…" He had stopped calling her by name after the third time she simply left the office. "How goes the investigation?"

She resisted the urge to sigh, refusing to show weakness in front of the man. "Poorly. As you already know, the only evidence we have is the camera footage. No fingerprints, no traces of DNA, no witnesses." And no survivors, but that was a fact the two of them already knew.

"I see." He rubbed his face, looking like he had aged ten years over the course of a single day. She almost felt bad. Almost. "Any suspects?"

"Well…" There was no way to say "I think an alternate version of Naegi Makoto, the sweetest boy you'll ever know, killed a grown adult by force feeding him a grenade, tore another in half (literally), shot the third twenty-seven times and convinced the last guy to take his own life with a smile" without the Headmaster thinking she was mocking him. "Nothing concrete."

"I'm sorry to ask this of you—" And yet you're going to do it anyway. "—but you're also going to have to investigate the Steering Committee."

"...aren't they dead?" These were literally the murders she was currently trying to pin on an eyepatched version of their class' Luckster.

"I've received some concerning reports about the motivations behind the killings." He sighed, sliding a file across his desk. "Put simply, someone wants us to dig further. You've got a deadline now."

"How long?" The amount of shady information in here was enough to ruin Hope's Peak's reputation permanently. "And why?"

"They sent this in an email, stating, and I quote directly, 'clean up your fuckin' mess before I make even more'. We have two weeks." The Headmaster looked haunted. "They also sent a recording to prove they were behind this."

He turned his monitor, the screen displaying an image of a familiar figure, idly wiping a knife on his sleeve. And if that wasn't clear enough, when he unpaused the video, "Naegi Makoto" looked into the camera with a single grey eye, smiling as he waved.

"Now would someone please explain to me…" He pinned her with a steel-eyed gaze completely at odds with the kindly appearance he presented to the public. "Why I shouldn't simply throw Class 78's Lucky Student into jail, never to see the sun again?"