Unlock and Reload Arc: Chapter Two
(*some time ago*)
Mukuro quietly sharpened her knife with a small metal sharpener inside her bedroom. It was a luxurious chamber, the furniture made by some of the finest carpenters available, the light coming down like sun rays from a golden chandelier, and a humongous closet that contained all the multiple rifles, melee weapons, and explosives she (illegally) got. There was even a bathroom where the showers had multiple switches that turned on the water for multiple shower heads and a custom, state-of-the-art toilet (seriously, who needs that many buttons for a toilet?).
And it was all Monokuma themed. As part of her whole Despair aesthetic, Junko prompted Kazuichi Souda, the Ultimate Mechanic, to decorate all the rooms with Monokuma-style commodities and designs to give it her own 'spin and flare'.The whole interior was decorated with black-and-white bears. The walls were covered with Monokumas in various (and sometimes inappropriate) poses, the lightbulbs were in the shape of bear heads, and the various pieces of furniture were colored monochrome.
Mukuro stopped sharpening her knife, trying to analyze the edges of the blade. Satisfied with her work, she got off her bed and walked up to a cabinet and plucked off one of the various Monokuma plushies sitting on top. She stared into its evil, smiling face, one eye beady black, the other a scarlet scar.
I never understood the appeal. The soldier thought to herself, squeezing the stomach. Why would anyone bother to make these things, much less sell them when they should be putting more work into more useful resources instead?
A muffled knock on her bedroom door interrupted her thoughts.
"H-hello…?" whispered out a soft, timid voice. It was spoken so gently that if it weren't for Mukuro's years of training her ears to locate hidden landmines to avoid she wouldn't have heard it. "C-can I c-come in?"
Without responding, she threw the stuffed bear onto her bed (which was also Monokuma-themed) and made her way to the exit of the room, opening the door inward. The guest, who had been posed to try and knock on the door again, yelped as their knuckles rapped on thin air causing them to lose their balance and trip and fall. Mukuro took a step to her left to dodge the rolling person who then collided with the wall, their legs lifted up and their skirt fell down to reveal a bright pair of pink panties.
The Ultimate Soldier sighed.
"Mikan…"
The other girl yelped, desperately scrambling to her feet and kneeled down to the floor, bowing down furiously.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm so, so sorry!" she whispered out the words hurriedly, her head hitting the ground with audible thuds.
Her apologee sighed, putting a hand to her forehead exasperatedly. "You don't have to apologize for anything Tsumiki. Just get up."
The girl sniffed, raising her head off the ground. Believe it or not, this woman was Mukuro's senior, attending a year before the soldier even set foot in Hope's Peak Academy. She was wearing a skimpy, white nurse's outfit that accentuated her notable figure. A pair of bandages wrapped around her right arm and left leg and a nurse's hat was adorned clumsily on her head, tilted so far on the girl's dark plum-shaded hair that it looked like it would fall off. Beneath it, her forehead was red from banging it constantly on the floor.
All in all, Mikan Tsumiki displayed all the makings for a cute and clumsy nurse that would be considered for many to be appealing…if it weren't for a few factors.
On what normally should have been a clean, pale uniform suited for treating injured patients was instead speckled with crimson stains, some lining up in dots while others formed shapeless blobs contrasting the white background. Nasty looking syringes clung onto the belt that the Ultimate Nurse's waist, containers filled with mysterious-looking colored liquid and the tips of the needles almost shing.
And her eyes…
They held some of the most insane, sadistic, and despair-maddened looking eyes that Mukuro has ever seen even when she was with the mercenary group Fenrir where the soldiers there saw horrors that few people ever saw. It was shocking to see those eyes on the normally meek and kindly Mikan.
Mikan stumbled to her feet and wobbled there, tear-filled red staring into gray.
"It's okay." she sniffed. "Y-you don't have to pretend if you can't tolerate me. I mean, who would want to tolerate this rotting, garbage-barf t-trash bag with l-legs. Hiyoko was the one who c-called me that. I-I mean, she's not wrong considering how much I smell-"
Mukuro rolled her eyes as Tsumiki babbled on and on about another one of Saionji's empty insults. She picked up her knife again and began to clean it with a cloth.
"-and it reminded me of the time-" Mikan blinked. "H-hey…Are you ignoring me? If you are, I'm s-so sorry! I-I'm annoying you, aren't I." She twisted her skirt. "If you hate me, then I don't have a problem with-"
Losing patience, Mukuro ditched her cleaning and harshly placed a finger on Mikan's lip. "Stop." The black-haired girl retorted harshly, messaging with her eyes to the nurse to remain quiet. "Get to the point. Why are you here?"
Mikan had stood cross eyed, her red eyes looking at the finger currently placed over her lip.
"Your sister wishes to speak to you."
Right away, Mukuro's earlier irritation and nonchalance disappeared, replaced by a sudden alertness.
"Junko…" she started hesitantly. "...Junko wants me? Right now?"
"YES! Our wonderful, beautiful, hopelessly hopeless goddess of Despair!" Mikan shouted with fervor. Her behavior had shifted from a soft-speaking, relatively demure girl to something else. Her eyes, previously mild were now glowing eerily, the red pupils starting to swirl.
She got up close to the soldier's face who felt heavy breaths on her freckled cheeks. "The Almighty Lady Junko has personally asked me, ME, out of the Remnants to escort you personally to her. I-I mean, I myself am unworthy to even be the dirt on the bottom of her heel let alone be trusted with her own sister. B-but I mean, this is Junko we're talking about, so surely she must have seen something in me after all with her Ultimate Analysts skills-"
"Just get on to the point." Mukuro snapped.
"Eek!" Mikan screeched, covering her mouth with her hands. "I'm sorry! You're right. I really should be moving along." She whispered, opening a little hole through her fingers. "You know better than most how much Lady Junko hates to wait."
She's not wrong. The freckled girl analyzed her fellow Ultimate Despair cautiously, wondering what mission her sister had for her this time.
Exhaling, Mukuro threw up her knife and began spinning it skillfully.
"Alright. Whatever. Just bring me to Junko." She said before expertly sheathing the blade. "Let's hear what my sister has to say."
(*now*)
The two former classmates of the 78th class faced each other uneasily, as still as statues. The silence in that underground trash dump was so quiet that the only sound that Makoto could hear was his own currently accelerating heartbeat and the soft breathing of the girl in front of her.
Ikusaba simply stood there, her hands outstretched like she wanted to reach for her mask that was currently laying on the junk-filled floor, but not making further effort to pick it up, merely twitching her fingers.
In a daze, the boy put one foot forward, and then the other, and soon he found himself walking to the soldier.
She tensed as Makoto continued walking to her, the black-haired girl reaching for her knife tentatively. The luckster simply moved on until he was a hair's length away from her. His green eyes stared into her gray-shaded ones. They paused for a moment.
"Ikusaba-san!"
And with an energetic shout, the ahoge boy pounced on the girl, giving her a bear hug. The girl was so surprised that she dropped her weapon.
"You…you're alright!" gasped out Makoto as tears began welling up in his eyes. "You're safe! You…you're alive!" He exclaimed, chuckling happily.
It was scandalous. People would not approve of seeing a young male getting physical with a female his age, but at that moment, Makoto didn't care. After God knows how long he was stuck alone in the bottom of this hellhole, he was glad to finally interact with another human.
The soldier, her arms spread out earlier, gently put her arms around Makoto's back.
"Oooof!"
And the next moment Makoto found his back against the floor.
He blinked, staring at the ceiling, wondering what just happened before tilting his head forward at the sight of a stunned looking Mukuro, her gray eyes widening with shock.
"Ow."
"Naegi!" she cried out, rushing to the luckster. "S-sorry..."
Makoto lifted himself up, rubbing his back. "It...it's fine." he groaned, grabbing the hand that the girl was offering to him, pulling the luckster to his feet. "It's only natural to act that way when I was getting all touchy-feely with you. I should be the one apologizing."
She shook her head.
"You're right." She responded in a deadpan tone. "You should be sorry. If you were anyone else, I would've stabbed you in the eyes."
"Ha, ha, ha." Makoto chuckled nervously. "You're kidding, right?"
Mukuro didn't answer.
"Right?"
"Anyway…" the soldier said, turning her head to look at the place Makoto had called 'home' for the past few weeks. Her eyes stopped to look at the makeshift camp that Makoto had been residing in. She looked and noticed that she kicked some empty soda cans and water bottles that happened to be laying by her feet.
Makoto scratched the back of his neck, embarrassed. "It's not much. I'm not like some sort of Ultimate Survivalist or anything like that, so it's not that impressive."
Ikusaba looked at the mattress with thoughtful eyes.
"Too…uncovered for my taste." she said, sliding a hand across the cushiony surface. Her long, black hair trickled down as she tilted her head to analyze Makoto's sleeping quarters. "Leaves you open. Unguarded."
She turned to look Makoto in the eyes. "What happens if it starts to rain? There may be an open hole in the school's roof that could let water in all the way down here? And that means flooding, so how did you intend to get surface?"
"Uh-"
"And what if someone comes down, someone with more malevolent purposes? You would easily pickings, a sitting duck. At least try to hide yourself."
"Hold on-" he tried to speak up.
"There are plenty of materials here that could be used to construct a good fort." she went on with her tirade. "Yes. We could use the washing machine and the refrigerator as supports. That tarp over there would make a good covering, we just need to put some trash on it as camouflage. And that piece of metal over there-"
Wow, she's really into this. Makoto thought bemusedly as Mukuro rambled on, not used to seeing the normally quiet and stoic soldier talk so passionately.
"-and additionally, it's important for multiple exits to be available whenever an enemy is on the attack so when retreat is option we can-"
*Ggggrrrroooooowwwwwwlllll*
Mukuro paused in the middle of her tirade, staring in the direction of one red-cheeked boy who was holding his stomach.
"Uh…do you want cup noodles for lunch?"
(*a few minutes later*)
The bented and dented metal teapot suddenly let out a sharp whistle, similar to an olden steam-engine train traveling down the railway.
Two hands gripped the handle at the top and moved the kettle towards two styrofoam cups, the images of a cartoon appearing at the front. Warily, the holder slowly poured the boiling water into the cups while another pair of hands ripped open two packets of spices and poured the contents into each container.
A slightly bent plastic fork and a pair of wooden chopsticks were placed on top of the lids as the two ex-students sat back to wait.
"Sorry we couldn't find you your own pair of chopsticks." Makoto said guiltily, "The rest were either broken or used by me already."
"It's fine actually." Ikusaba retorted nonchalantly. "I've been in worst lunchtimes. At least I don't have to dip my bare hands in boiling soup to get the noodles or drink straight from the cup."
Makoto cringed, putting one of his hands to his throat while putting the twin behind his back. Yeah, putting your hands in hot liquid or drinking said hot liquid was definitely a huge no-no.
"Yeah. One of my former classmates, who had a foreign grandmother, also had an uncle by the name of Jakku Kuronuma who drank straight from a kettle after eating raw rice. He said that it would revolutionize cooking."
"...did you know Hagakure before Hope's Peak?"
"What? No! I only met Hiro after summer! Anyway, they had to rush the uncle to a doctor because he drank 3 liters of water and burned his throat. He survived, thankfully, and the first thing the uncle said was that he could still taste the rice."
"...are we sure you should be the Ultimate Luckster?"
Makoto laughed. "Heh. Tell me about it. I sometimes wonder whether I even deserve such a title when compared to the others."
Mukuro blinked. "What?"
He went on, not hearing her. "I mean, when was the last time I actually was lucky? You could say that was the time I won that ticket to Hope's Peak Academy, but considering where that led me up to." He spread his arms dejectedly, emphasizing the dark trash dump. "I wasn't that lucky at all."
The other Ultimate was silent.
"When I stepped my first foot inside Hope's Peak Academy, even though I was happy, it really punctuated how…how…normal I am. After all, you really feel how ordinary you are when surrounded by people who are all extraordinary. Other people out there are probably way better at this kind of thing than me."
He paused, sighing while looking at the quiet Ikusaba..
"Sorry about laying all of that to you. I'm just…really feeling down after what happened…when was it again?"
"Two months."
"Thank you. What had happened two months ago." he said before his hands suddenly reached for his hair. "Wait! I've been down here for two months?!"
Mukuro nodded in confirmation, analyzing how Makoto would respond next.
The boy looked absolutely rocked, as though his entire world was flipped upside down (which it kinda did). However, to Mukuro's surprise, Naegi simply shook his head as a smile formed on his face.
"Then I guess that means I have to try twice as hard to make up for those two lost months." he said, his optimism drowning out any lingering traces of doubt he had earlier.
Mukuro was stunned. For a moment, she did not see the scrawny, bedraggled boy wearing a torn and dirty hoody in front of her but something else, someone else entirely.
"But I don't think I need to as of the moment because you came." He turned to her. "I clung onto the Hope that there was a chance that I could get out or someone would find me. And someone did. Thank you Mukuro."
She…didn't know how to respond to that. Instead she replied-
"The noodles should be ready now. Let's just eat."
Makoto nodded and tore off the lid of his cup.
Soon, a few moments later, the sound of slurping could be heard.
The brunette found himself in a cloud of steam running through his nose. The warmth of the noodles soothed his body, the cold from inside the basement seeping away from his blood. He used his chopsticks to pick up no small amount of noodles as he hungrily stuffed the ramen into his mouth.
In front of him was Mukuro, eating much more slowly with the fork in her hands. Although to Makoto it felt wrong eating ramen with a fork since he was so used to eating it with chopsticks, Mukuro stated she was fine and used forks on multiple occasions to eat foods that normally wouldn't be suited with it.
A small fire where they boiled the water was lit between them, their only source of light in that vast corridor.
Once he finished devouring the noodles, Makoto tipped the cup and began gulping down the soup. He put down the cup.
"Man," he grinned, satisfactorily rubbing his stomach. "That never stops hitting the spot! Even if I've been eating nothing but ramen for the past two months."
Mukuro shrugged. "It's good to value any kind of meal. Often me and my colleagues find ourselves on the frontlines, so we learn to appreciate anything that is edible and sustainable. Even if we do not like the food, we must eat it because who knows when we could eat the next time or if the meal we just had would be our final one."
Makoto wrinkled his nose. "Yeah. Makes sense in a morbid kind of way." He then smiled. "But it's nice to talk with someone over a warm meal."
"...yeah. It is."
She went silent at that, putting down her ramen cup and then staring at her hands.
"Makoto…"
"Yeah?"
"...do you really want to know what happened on the surface for the past few months?"
The ahoge boy hitched his breath. Although he expressed the desire to get out of the Old School Building's basement, he never thought about how things were doing above. Considering the last time he checked, a fire broke out in the building and that huge…thing…chased after him and landed him here, Makoto knew the details weren't pretty. Sometimes, when he was dreaming, he could still see those nightmarish, slitted blue eyes staring at him with more bloodlust than he ever saw before, chasing after him like a cat ready to pounce on a bird.
He tilted his body towards her.
"...yes."
Mukuro breathed in before exhaling.
"The world—there's no sugarcoating it—has gone to hell." she stated, her previously relaxed manner giving way to a much more tense body position. "You remember the fire that broke out at Hope's Peak, do you?"
"Always." he said, his mind going back to the heat from those hellish flames, remembering them lapping at his face. "Everyone tried to evacuate from the Old School Building to get to ground level where the exit was. The hallways were packed with people."
Mukuro nodded, satisfied by Makoto's knowledge so far. "A lot of people made it out. But…" she paused for a moment. "Some didn't."
Makoto cringed, his mind trying not to think of the worse. "Y-you mean?"
She gave a somber nod of her head.
"H-hang on! Just because some people didn't make it out of this school doesn't mean that they all died. There could be some people still in this building like me!"
The Ultimate shook her head. "I checked the bodies. There were no survivors. And even if some actually did survive the flames, they would eventually starve to death anyway."
Unlike here, where the basement did have some food to offer. Makoto thought, his eyes wandering to his empty ramen cup. I guess I was pretty 'lucky' after all. He thought bitterly.
Mukuro flicked off one of her long, black locks. "It wasn't just the Old School Building. The Reserve Course Building…the dormitories…even the Main Course Building…they all were destroyed."
"No way." He had to choke out those words. Basically, what Mukuro meant was that all of Hope's Peak had fallen on that day. It was unthinkable. Makoto didn't know how old Hope's Peak Academy was again, but it had been a major source of admiration for him and many others ranging from decades to centuries. Almost a majority of the top talented people that he knew came from that school. A place with that much history and influence…had collapsed?
"B-but how?" Makoto turned to Mukuro, desperate for answers. "Wasn't the fire only in the North Quarter?"
"It spread." she responded grimly. "I was watching on the rooftops when it happened. From the other side of the campus, another building went up in flames just as suddenly as the one before. The second floor exploded, causing the levels above to topple to the ground. There…there were people inside. Someone caught them on top. They were banging on the windows, trying to escape. The building fell onto the garden and set it ablaze."
Makoto felt a pit in his stomach.
She went on.
"Another building exploded, this time at the top. Something fell out of the sky. At first, people thought they were fallen debris. But then a body landed in front of the courtyard. Soon, it started raining bodies, the students burnt to a crisp. They died before impact."
The luckster had to stop himself from hurling. He could not imagine being there at the scene, watching all of this happen. Explosions going off left and right, evacuating buildings that would otherwise drag them into hell, and trying to avoid getting hit by a stray body as you make for cover.
"People were panicking, obviously. They were afraid. This was a place that guaranteed them safety and yet the staff and security knew as little as they did on what to do."
"They were running, pushing at each other to escape. There were students who lost their balance and fell to the ground. They were trampled on by who knows how many people hoping to escape."
She gave a helpless look to Makoto. "The explanation at first was terrorists. Someone who had a vendetta against Hope's Peak or Japan in general who wanted to cause chaos and spread Despair."
Makoto couldn't help but shiver at his ex-classmate's last words even though he didn't know why. Maybe it was because of the way Mukuro had said it or how creepy her face was due to the lighting of the bonfire.
"That was the logical explanation. Something that is awful, but makes sense."
"Then was it terrorists-"
"The next thing that happened threw away all sense of logic."
"W-what do you mean, Ikusaba-san?" he stuttered out.
"Do you believe in demons, Naegi?"
"D-demons?!" Makoto said, taken aback by the question thrown back at him. "D-don't you mean oni?" He said, referring to the horned, ogre-like spirits that he read in fairy tales.
"Demons." she said firmly. "At least, that's what most people above decided to call them. That's because the fire from those explosions gave birth to something else, something that is not entirely from the world."
Makoto's mind suddenly flashed back to a large, silver-like blade that almost ran him through, shaking someone's corpse like a ragdoll, and glared balefully with gleeful malice as blood ran through a crumbling hallway.
"There's…there is no other way to explain it." Mukuro got out her knife and began to fidget with it. "These demons…they were not mere animals. They were walking, breathing forces of nature."
"I know." Makoto muttered. "I saw one myself."
A surprised look appeared on Mukuro's face before shifting back into her normal serious expression. "You did? I mean, clearly you did since you were also there on that day." She finished before suddenly she put the pieces together. "Wait. Does that mean-?"
"Yeah." he got up and stretched, his eyes hardening as they turned to the sky. "If that's what you call them, then yeah. It was because of a demon that I'm stuck down here in the first place."
The boy inhaled before he let out a sigh. It all happened so fast. One moment, it was just him and Maizono talking to each other, catching up on stories after leaving Blackroot Junior High. The next moment, an earthquake struck and the school was on fire and then they were being chased by some sort of monster shark with legs and a sword nose.
He was silent for a moment before looking back at Mukuro.
"What about the others?"
She raised an eyebrow. "You mean the rest of Class 78?"
He nodded to confirm her answer.
She raised her knife, staring at her for a moment as the girl remained silent for the next few seconds. "I…think they're dead."
"What?"
She lifted her gray eyes, analyzing Makoto's expression. "You heard me. I think they are dead."
"W-what?!" Makoto exclaimed. "W-what do you mean by that, Ikusaba-san?"
Pocketing her knife, she rose to her feet before walking over to Makoto. "Naegi." she said, putting a hand on his shoulder. "Even in chaos as confusing and supernatural as this one, it still brings with it the risk and destruction that all disasters bring. Soldiers lose comrades in wars, families get separated in floods, and friends may not be able to see each other for a long time. That's just the way life is."
She squeezed tightly. "I told you that people died during that day. What makes you believe that any of them couldn't have been Fujisaki…Fukawa…Ishimaru…Maizono?"
Makoto choked on his breath.
The girl's face didn't change, but the tone of her voice started to harden, her stance becoming more befitting of her status as Ultimate Soldier.
"People die, Naegi. All the time. Death has no favorites." she said to him harshly. "Human lives are brief and fleeting, and there are so many things out there in the world that could take them away. Demons are only an addition to that list now."
Flashes of visions appeared in Makoto's mind. Of Hagakure crushing underneath a pile of rubble, a single sleeve of his jacket sticking out, stained with his blood. Of Ludensberg, burnt to a crisp, her formerly elegant black dress now ashen rags, her face unrecognizable. Of Fukawa, sliced up like sushi rolls, her body scattered apart carelessly.
"Like it or not, our school life is over."
"MAKOTO!"
Sayaka's last words to him echoed inside his mind, the panic in her voice still paining his heart despite all this time underground. Did she escape? Did she make it out alive? Or did she perish by that demon's blade, her blood spilling in the hallways like so many others did before?
Makoto shook his head.
"Mukuro." he said softly, the soldier grunting to notify that she heard him.
"You raise a valid point. Death is inevitable and there is no way to know how long someone is going to live before they meet their end."
"However…" he started, his voice suddenly sounding much louder, more confident. "That just means that it could go either way."
The soldier blinked. "What?"
Makoto did something expected. Something that caught her off guard. He gave her a smile.
"We don't know. We don't know anything for certain!" he exclaimed. "That means that either way, they could be dead…or…alive out there!"
In exhilaration, Makoto got close to Mukuro's face. "Think about it, Ikusaba. Moments ago, before you found me, didn't you believe I was dead too?"
She hesitated. "I did." She admitted reluctantly.
"But I'm here." He gestured to himself. "I'm still alive. I'm talking to you right now. If even after the events that transpired and what happened to me, I am still okay, that could mean the same for our other classmates!"
Mukuro looked at him in disbelief. "You would base off of our classmates' survival…off of that logic?!"
"I know…" he began, his voice slightly wavering. "...that it is a huge thing, almost delusional, to make such a claim without solid evidence. However…" he put a hand to his heart. "...we have to believe in our friends."
"Friends?" Mukuro parroted. "You are calling people that you only knew for a few months your friends."
"Is it that hard to believe?" Makoto said, embarrassed, rubbing the back of his head. "I want to be friends with them. Just like I want to be friends with you?"
Mukuro clamped her mouth, speechless as she stared at the boy with wide eyes.
"Maybe everything I say is cheesy, and cliche, and I'm just hyping more talented people up because I am ordinary." His mind flashed back to the faces of not only his classmates, but also his family who had all encouraged him to go to Hope's Peak Academy in the first place. "But, as a normal guy, I like those cheesy and cliche lines that say that believing in others is important. Because…" he looked at her with shining eyes. "Hoping for a brighter future…is much better than falling into Despair without trying."
He finished with his speech, his cheeks flushed red and she swore that steam was smoking from his ahoge.
"D-did…did that seem too much?"
She didn't answer for a moment, turning her back away.
For a moment, the only sound heard was of the slight rustling of wrappers in the wind and the cries from the dying sparks of the campfire.
"...you really consider me your friend?" Mukuro said quietly. She had her face turned away from the boy.
Makoto rubbed the back of his head.
"I mean, yes? Is that so strange?" He said.
The luckster couldn't see it through the thick curtains that was Mukuro's long, dark hair, but if he were to look closer, he would find a shade of pink upon her freckled cheeks.
She didn't answer for a moment.
"I-it's okay! You don't have to give me your answer right now. All I'm saying is that I'm really glad to see you again." He said. "Heh, heh." he chuckled. "I must have said that the fifth time already."
Mukuro turned back to Makoto again, her expression back into its usual calm demeanor.
"It was actually the sixth time. I was keeping count."
"Eh heh heh." he could only give an awkward grin. "Sorry. I guess I really like repeating myself. We should go to the more pressing matters at hand."
He fidgeted in his seat, not because he didn't have a question but because his mind was so full of things he wanted to ask her that he didn't know which one to choose next.
His eyes wandered across the room and soon fell upon the trash heap stairs he had been trying to make for the past few daws. It barely reached 8 meters.
"Mukuro." he started, the luckster drawing the soldier's attention again.
"Yes, Naegi."
"When you came down here…" he began, his voice filled with uncertainty.. "...you had to come down alone. Right?"
"Right."
"And you already have a way to go back up when you need to."
"That is correct." The soldier nodded, raising an eyebrow as a response for him to continue.
"Then…?" he started, emotions running high as he shuffled his feet, the tone in his voice dripping with both nervousness, fear, and most of all hope. "...is it possible for one more person to come with you?"
Mukuro went silent.
She stood there without a response and for a moment, Makoto began to fear. Fear that her next response would be that she would not be able to take him with her, back to the surface and away from this rotting prison.
He wouldn't blame her, of course. If the journey back up wasn't for two people, then there was no need to ask her to sacrifice her own way up.
It was just…he couldn't last much longer on cup ramen alone and his food options were already getting more scarce.
However, her next words dispelled any Despair he might've had.
"Sure. Why not? I can take you up there with me."
Overhead, above where the two ultimates were conversing amongst each other, the moon shone brightly, shining through the hole in the ceiling as silver light was able to make its way into the former learning center.
A large figure pranced under the moonlight, the lunar rays complimenting the metallic looking spines across its back. Trailing along you would find at the end a huge finned tail with a long, lower tailfin jutted with spikes, beating carelessly at the walls.
Huge, retractable claws scratched along the surface of the floor, the formerly smooth tiles gaining new, ugly scars, matching its own war scars adorned across its body. And on its, a longsword-like horn jutted out proudly, the shark-like teeth chattering softly.
This was the epitome of an apex predator, one experienced with battle and the hunt. The Ultimate Killing Machine, gifted with everything and more to suit its pursuit of Onslaught.
However, the slitted eyes so normally filled with excitement and bloodlust was instead half-closed, full of boredom and dissatisfaction instead.
The reason was due to the apparent lack of prey, of something fleshy and full of blood to satiate and gorge upon. For an apex's purpose is to stand on top of a food chain, but what good is a food chain if there is no prey to hunt.
Rumbling with a hmph, it plopped its bulky, spiky body onto the ground. There was no need to find a proper 'den' for it to choose because it could sleep wherever it wanted and there was no challenger equal to itself.
Closing one eye, it looked around its surroundings with the other eye. What a sorry state this place is. It used to be swarming with prey, ripe for the killing.
The beast closed its other eye, its mind wandering off to reminiscence the day it was 'born', finding no small number of prey in large numbers, ripe for the killing. Oh, how it missed the screams of terror, the thrill of sinking its claws, teeth, and especially its 'sword' into the soft mass that was 'flesh'. How it yearned for the days that the life fluid in their bodies spilled and painted the walls red.
Alas, it was not to be.
The hunting grounds have long grown empty. The bloodstains have dried up. The sounds that had echoed through the chambers now only a distant memory. The only thing that came that brought back the sense of the hunt was those strange, metallic 'bears', but even that too lost its edge when they came in small numbers and could be easily dealt with. It scraped its claws against the ground in agitation.
Why didn't it leave, one would ask. Why would it stay in an abandoned 'prey' area devoid of food to play with? The beast itself asked such questions.
…It was a gut feeling. A sense of predator's instinct that told it to wait. To wait patiently for an even greater hunt would begin.
When, it had snarled. When would such a thing happen? When would the day come where it could finish waiting and get straight to slaughter?
Patience. Patience was a virtue in itself. To have patience means going through even the more undesirable circumstances if it means beneficial for the long run.
The beast scoffed at such an ideology. It was incompatible with it and only thanks to going after a few of those bear-heads who reeked of humans was it able to calm itself.
Grunting softly, it rolled over before its nose suddenly twitched.
A bloodshot, slitted eye suddenly burst open and soon the monster got to its feet, claws digging into the ground excitedly.
Could it be?
This smell…
This stench smelled of…!
The monster didn't finish its thought as it bounded through the hallways, climbing on the walls and slashing through anything that got in its way.
It stopped, screeching to a halt to the enormous hole gaping before it.
Sniffing the air, the beast soon drew its attention to a long, thin looking…rope?...that hung onto a rock. It crawled close to the item, sniffing the object.
Yep.
That confirmed it.
There were humans lurking about!
It almost dove into the hole right then and there before it remembered one thing.
Patience.
The beast sat on its haunches. It then began to think.
This was the first human scent it had smelled for ages and it was not keen on waiting for a while to regain it again.
But the insight of a predator knew another thing; prey usually came in numbers.
Why be excited for one calf to slaughter when you could slaughter two? Why slaughter two when you could do three? And so on…
…It would wait for now, watching and stalking its prey to see if there is a 'pack' to follow.
If not, then it would not wait any longer.
For the Onslaught was about to begin.
Omake:
Mukuro and Makoto stared at each in silence, not knowing how to react to someone they haven't seen in two months casually walking inside a dump.
Makoto began approaching Mukuro (*menacingly*) and despite the soldier more than capable of handling some dirty, scrawny baby-man, she stepped back to reach for her knife.
However, she didn't notice the blackened banana peel by her feet, and she accidentally stepped on it.
Mukuro lost her balance, slipping backwards on the peel and being thrown into a random pile nearby. She lost her grip on her knife and it sailed by Makoto's head (in actuality, it did hit the luckster, but the knife was 'parried' by Makoto's own knife *read ahoge* and was deflected away from the boy's vitals).
"Ikusaba-san!" He shouted, running over to the black-haired girl's side.
"I'm fine, Makoto." she grunted out, dusting her trousers. She was telling the truth. She really was fine, completely devoid of any injuries, meaning she was still considered 'unharmed on the battlefield'. The only wound she got from this 'battlefield' was her pride.
Makoto gave her a hand to get her back on her feet, but not before he noticed a stray ramen cup on her head, some of the leftover noodles stuck in hair.
He blushed, feeling some sort of weird arousal from the sight.
Did I discover a new fetish?
Elsewhere, one lavender haired girl stopped typing on her keyboard, looking quite cross.
"What's wrong?" groaned one drunk Koichi Kizakura, an empty bottle in his hand. "Did you make a breakthrough yet?"
"No, it's not that." she responded, resuming typing with her gloved fingers. "It's just…for some reason I sensed that someone had stolen something irrevocably precious from me."
And that's a wrap folks! Makoto and Mukuro try to catch up with each other, and Makoto finally gets his ticket to freedom. However, he will soon encounter another 'old friend', this friend being the one that Makoto would prefer never to see again. Stay tuned for more!