Chapter 1: Part 18

Sayaka, Tenko, and Kaito stepped out into the hallway in the hopes they could stop Mondo from running into danger, yet the biker was nowhere in sight.

Kaito sighed. "I hope Kaede's managed to keep up with him."

"Still," Sayaka spoke up, "we have too many people missing to just leave roaming around. We have to find them and Junko and Tsumugi."

"And Kokichi!" Tenko said with hatred in her voice. "That degenerate has to be up to something!"

Sayaka and Kaito nodded before the three of them ventured further into the school.

The cafeteria was a mess. Outside of the remains of the flash bang explosion scattering shrapnel all over the place, the room had been made into a make-shift infirmary. Rantaro, Mahiru, Mikan, Byakuya, and Nekomaru had been clearing off the tables and placing all of the unconscious people on them. Some of the unconscious would wake up immediately. Chiaki, Gonta, and Miu would wake themselves back up but all with varying different levels of pain.

Gundham's pets would lick his face to wake up their dark master. "Thank you, my followers," Gundham said in a hushed tone as he stroked his hand softly across all of their foreheads.

Celeste opened her eyes and sat herself up on the table. Kirumi rushed over to her mistress's side.

"Are you alright, Miss Ludenberg?" Kirumi asked.

Celeste groaned and held her head in her hands. She could feel the pain pulsing through her forehead. "I'm unharmed," she said with another groan. "My head is…in pain."

"We are doing our best to help heal everyone," Kirumi said. "I can get you some ibuprofen if you need it."

"Yes…please," Celeste said, her plea being completely genuine.

Kirumi nodded and rushed over to Mikan. Mikan had taken out a first aid kit from the side of the room in case of emergencies and had begun to pass out various supplies out to the rest of the group to treat their classmates. As Kirumi gave Celeste three ibuprofen pills and a glass of water, the rest of the group were tending to the three most injured; Chihiro, Hifumi, and Hiyoko.

Chihiro and Hifumi had to have towels placed under their heads since their falls caused them to hit their heads hard. Nekomaru did his best to be gentle when treating Chihiro. He was mildly worried his massive hands would apply more pressure than needed. Miu was placed in charge of treating Hifumi, which she had absolutely none of.

Miu pinched her nose and took a few steps away from the nerdy boy. "Jesus, I think this fat fuck pissed himself," she shouted in disgust.

"Th-that's not uncommon from serious head injuries," Mikan said sheepishly. "H-he could have lost c-control of his…f-faculties for a moment."

"Yeah, can someone else do this?" Miu asked. "I ain't getting piss all over my hands."

"Stop complaining and do it," Byakuya said. "You're not even going to touch his crouch. You're treating his head injury."

Miu groaned and began to wrap bandages around his head.

Mahiru and Angie were left in charge of taking care of Hiyoko. The two of them had performed the Heimlich maneuver on her and managed to dislodge a small pellet from her throat. That seemed to be the main health problem for the girl outside of hitting her head. Mahiru would glance over at Angie as the artist wrapped some bandages around her head. The artist seemed to show genuine concern for the dancer. Still, Mahiru couldn't help but mean-mug Angie the whole time.

Leon had sat back in the corner of the room the whole time. He really didn't want to put in the effort to do medical work. He would've just got in the way anyway. While he was watching everyone get treated, he noticed something odd. He would point to everyone in the room to count them and calculated the number of people in his head. He's eyes widened before speaking up.

"Uh, hey guys?" Leon spoke up. "Is Nagito missing too?"

The members of the group that were awake looked around the room and, indeed, Nagito was missing.

Chiaki frowned. "Why must he be like this?" she said to herself.

"Maybe friends will find him," Gonta said with a smile.

"Or maybe it will be best if they avoid him," Gundham said before crossing his arms. "He may be the real threat of this disaster."

"Bro!" Mondo shouted after kicking a random door open. He would glance around the room before shouting again. "Bro!"

Kaede had ran up behind him, but just as she caught up with the biker, he rushed out of the room and kicked another door open.

"Bro!" Mondo shouted once again. "I'm running in the halls! I'm kicking school property! I'm…Fuck! I said fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck! Come on and stop me!"

Kaede had to take several deep breaths before finally caught up with the biker. "M-mondo, wait."

Mondo turned around and pushed Kaede out of the way. "I don't have time to wait! I have to find Taka!"

"I-I know that, but just stop for a second," Kaede said with a huff.

Mondo bashed his shoulder against another door and knocked it wide open. "Bro!"

"Mondo, just wait a second," Kaede said before grabbing him by his jacket's sleeve.

Mondo spun around and glared at Kaede. "My best friend is missing!"

Kaede let go of Mondo's sleeve and sheepishly took a step back. "I-I know…I'm worried about him too, but you can't keep running around and kicking doors in. What if we run into a trap or what if Monokuma counts this as destruction of property?"

The reddish anger in Mondo's face soon dissipated and he hung his head down. "I need to find him."

"We will. We just got to be more careful, ok?"

Mondo nodded and the two of them returned to their search, this time, making sure to be more cautious when entering rooms. It took them a few more minutes, but the duo eventually reached a classroom they haven't checked again. Mondo opened the door and slowly entered the room. It was completely trashed. The desks where flipped and pushed all over the place. Mondo and Kaede took a few steps into the room and spotted something horrifying. A trail of blood.

Mondo's internal switch immediately went back to panic mood, he shoved his way through the desks to find a body. The body was not of the friend Mondo was looking for. Instead, it was of Kokichi. The purple haired boy was laying face down in a pool of blood. Mondo stared at it in horror and Kaede gasped a bit.

That was until Kokichi lifted his head up to flash a giant smile across his face. "It's a lie!" Kokichi said cheerfully.

Mondo gritted his teeth and immediately grabbed Kokichi by his checkered scarf before lifting him up into the air. "Is this some kind of fucking joke?!" Mondo growled.

"Well, yeah," Kokichi said. "I did that joke back at the Ultimate Academy, but I didn't get to do it with Kaede."

Kaede pouted and crossed her arms. "Seriously, Kokichi?" she asked with an annoyed grunt. "Don't you know what's going on? Things are going crazy. We don't have time to waste on your jokes."

"Oh, really?" Kokichi tilted his head. "Why? Did someone die?"

"God, I hope not," Mondo said before dropping Kokichi back to the floor. "Have you seen bro?"

Kokichi tilted his head to the other side. "Bro who?"

"You know who I'm talking about, you prick!"

"Oh, you mean Taka," Kokichi's eyes lit up. "Hmmm. Now have I seen him or not? Hmmmm."

"Kokichi," Kaede huffed. "Stop stalling and tell us if you've seen him."

Kokichi frowned. "You know, you used to be a lot more fun, Kaede. Fine. Yes, I've seen him."

"Then where is he?" Mondo shouted.

Kokichi used his thumb to point to the locker behind him. Mondo immediately shoved the small boy out of the way and dashed over, nearly slipping on the blood on the floor before making his way to the locker. Mondo swung the door wide open and inside the locker was…Taka! He was unconscious while tied up and had duct tape over his mouth. Mondo was so shocked by this he nearly didn't catch his friend as he fell out of the locker.

Kaede gasped a bit before looking over to Kokichi. "Did you do that?" Kaede asked.

"I might have," Kokichi said with a snicker.

Mondo, while carrying Taka, stormed back over to Kokichi. "You better stop fucking around," Mondo growled. "Did you or did you not?!"

"Fine, fine," Kokichi groaned. "I did knock out Taka."

"Why?" Kaede asked.

Kokichi pulled a piece of paper and handed it to Kaede. "I got this letter the other night telling to tie up anyone going into the hallway today. Really, it was probably the most interesting thing that's happened here the whole time."

"Do you know who sent it?" Kaedee asked.

"Nope, and unless someone gets killed, I don't really care."

Mondo growled at Kokichi again, but turned his attention to his friend. He took the tape off of his friend's mouth and untied him. He lightly slapped Taka across the cheek in an attempt to wake him up. Taka mumbled a bit before opening his eyes.

"W-what?" Taka looked around the room. "Where am I? What's going on?"

"Bro," Mondo placed his hands onto Taka's shoulders. "It's ok. We got you."

"J-junko," Taka muttered.

Kaede turned to look at Taka. "What about Junko?"

"I saw her and Tsumugi…" Taka grabbed the back of his head and groaned in pain.

Kaede rushed over to Taka's side. "Where? Where did you see them?"

Taka would open his mouth, but pause. It seemed that whatever Kokichi used to knock him out had affected some of his memory. Yet, after a few moments of fumbling over his words, he answered. "They were at the end of the left wing of the school."

Kaede looked over to Mondo before running out of the room.

Sayaka, Tenko, and Kaito had attempted to follow the sounds of Mondo's shouting and kicking of doors, yet the biker was a bit more frantic and all over the place than they would have liked.

"Is he kicking in every door in the whole building?" Kaito asked as he came to the split in the halls.

"I didn't get to know him for long, but he really did act without thinking," Sayaka said.

Tenko scoffed and crossed her arms. "That's just typical male behavior. They're too busy trying to be macho to think straight."

Kaito looked back at his fellow classmate. "Uh, I am right here, Tenko."

"I know what I said," Tenko snapped.

Sayaka sighed. "We really need to talk to you about how you treat guys."

"Yeah," Kaito agreed. "Seriously."

"Well, am I wrong?" Tenko asked. "Guys are just more likely to be degenerates than girls."

"Look, we're getting off track here," Kaito said. "Let's just keep searching."

Just as Kaito turned back to the fork in the hall, a blood curdling scream echoed from the left hallway. The three of them went pale. They really dreaded what could have possibly caused that scream occur, but fear couldn't get in the way of their responsibility. They all broke out of their fear and pressed forward down the hall. After running several yards, the trio spotted Junko limping around the corner. When they got closer, they saw just how poor of a state the fashion model was in. She was bleeding all over her body, especially from her forehead, and she had a massive stab wound on her thigh. She had to brace herself against the wall just so she could keep walking.

Tenko rushed over to Junko's side and gently helped her stand up. "Are you ok, Junko?" she asked.

'How could you even ask someone like her that, Tenko?' Sayaka thought to herself.

"Where's Tsumugi?" Kaito asked.

Junko didn't speak. She was so exhausted that the only sounds she could make were her heavy breaths. Instead, she pointed the turn in the hall behind her. Kaito and Sayaka walked past Junko and Tenko and turned around the corner to see…

To see… To see…

To see Tsumugi sat down the wall of the hall. Cuts and slashes her bloodstained clothes with more dripping from her head. Her head was hung down and her long blue locks covered her face, but they couldn't cover the knife sticking out of her chest. This was overwhelming to Sayaka. It already too similar to how she was right before she died, but this was the first true dead body she ever saw. And the greyness of the skin and the statue-like stillness made her skin crawl. She almost didn't notice Kaede arrive from the other side of the hall and gasp in horror.

"Ding, ding, ding," the intercom rang out and Monokuma's visage appeared on every screen in the school. "A body has been discovered!"

There we go. The first body. I wonder how many of you guessed it right? I swear there's plenty more twists and turns for this trial. Stay tuned and keep guessing. It's going to be wild.

Part of me wishes I just powered on through and included this in the previous part. I'm a bit sad how small the word count for this part was, but I'm generally pleased with it for the most part. I'm trying to bring in more characters to the fold again. I gave Celeste, Kirumi, Kaito, Gundham, and Mondo some parts to shine their characters more. There will be even more in the trial. Got to do more Peko and Ibuki soon.

On semi-unrelated notes. I finally buckled down and made the cover image for this tale completely viewable on Deviantart rather than cropped to hell on here.

Here's the link: orangemkninja/art/Danganronpa-Loser-s-Reunion-Cover-922703263

Also, I'm going to be trying to post this story to other sites like DeviantArt and Tumblr. Get more of them views. I got nearly 40,000 all together on here! Thank you guys for sticking with me and continuing to read and review my story. I hope I don't let you down. I really hope this story does improve how I write and characterize my stories. Twitter's been a bitch about what is considered good writing these days and it gets to me. I like RWBY, the MCU, and Mortal Kombat :(

Also, to whoever posted this and my Street Fighter vs Dragonball story on fictionhunt, uh, didn't know that was even a thing, but thanks for like my story enough to post it somewhere else without telling? It's just weird dude.