Kyoko really did not enjoy dragging Toko around in her explorations of Hope's Peak Academy, and more than once wondered if she'd made a mistake taking charge like that to make sure everyone did the rational thing, instead of simply avoiding others like usual. Then she wouldn't be saddled with this crazy girl and her passive-aggressive comments. The good news was that as Kyoko continued ignoring her, Toko grew silent, and seemed content to follow Kyoko around while being ignored. Kyoko was therefore able to complete her investigation with less distractions than she might have expected with one of the other girls.
She met the others in the dining room to discuss their findings. She arrived later than the agreed upon time, but as she sadly expected, she walked in to find them bickering rather than doing anything productive. Well, except for Byakuka, who stood off to the side. One look at his face told Kyoko he found the antics of the others as tiresome as she did.
"You're spending an awful lot of time yelling and carrying on," Kyoko said loudly, cutting through the noise of the others.
"Kyoko!" shouted Taka. "Where the heck have you and Toko been?! We already started the meeting without you!"
"Investigating," Kyoko responded simply. "I found this." She dropped the paper she found onto the table, and the others crowded around to look at it.
"Huh? What's this...?" asked Makoto, confused.
"A map of Hope's Peak Academy, it seems," Kyoko answered sadly.
"Wh-What the...? Where did you find this?" Taka demanded.
"Nowhere special," Kyoko answered. "A locker. Doesn't really matter."
"But what's it mean?" asked Junko.
"Just look at it," Kyoto answered, letting none of her exasperation show in her voice or face. "The layout is the same as the building we're trapped in, and it's labelled as Hope's Peak Academy. So either we're in the real Hope's Peak, or someone built this building to look almost exactly like it, or someone fabricated this map to make us think we're in Hope's Peak."
"But you already said we're not in the real Hope's Peak Academy, right?" Hiro asked, a confused look on his face.
"Probably not," Kyoko answered. "And I can't imagine anyone would go to all the trouble of building a replica, either, when I assume none of us know what the real Hope's Peak looks like anyway. So at the moment I'm left to presume this map is a fabrication, though I'm not sure why the mastermind of our situation would care enough to create and hide a map like this."
"A mystery, to be sure," Celeste said, holding a hand demurely over the big smile on her face.
"Wh-why are you happy?" Toko asked.
"We're certain now that we're imprisoned here, wherever here is," Celeste answered simply. "So all we can do is adapt. Adapt to living out our lives here for the foreseeable future."
"Live here...?" Chihiro asked fretfully. "Are you saying we should just accept it?"
"There's nothing else to do," Celeste answered, still smiling. "If we want everyone to survive, we simply have to make the best of things while we wait for a rescue that may never come."
"Don't say that!" Hina cried. "They'll find us!"
"Regardless," said Celeste, dropping her smile. "We will be spending the night, so I have a suggestion."
"Huh? What do you mean?" asked Mondo.
"Going out at nighttime should be prohibited altogether," Celeste answered. "The school regulations do not actually tell us not to go out at night. I would like to make it official."
"B-But why...?" asked Toko
"Peace of mind," said Celeste. "The way things are now, when night comes we might get paranoid, afraid that someone will sneak away from their sleeping partner and come to kill us."
"...I would not have thought to worry about that until you brought it up just now," Junko commented.
"So you're suggesting we limit our activity at night as a kind of preventative measure," said Sakura.
"Yes," said Celeste. "Of course, nobody can be forced to comply. But if we all agree to follow it, I will sleep more soundly."
Then something happened that Kyoko did not expect. There was a pause as everyone considered Celeste's proposal, then most of them turned to look at Kyoko, searching for her approval.
It seems I've become the de facto leader, Kyoko thought, sighing. No turning back now.
"Sounds good," Kyoko answered simply.
Everyone else agreed, and after a bit more discussion, they retired to prepare their rooms. Thankfully, none of the beds were bolted down and the rooms were large, and so it was a relatively simple matter to have Sakura and the men move the beds so as to put partners in the same room. Though with this crowd, nothing was as simple as Kyoko liked. Still, they were working together well enough for now. She could only hope that would continue.
…
The next day passed without any new discoveries. Then another. Then on the third…
"I guess we're not in the real Hope's Peak Academy, huh?" Hina was saying. "Or we'd have been rescued by now? Well, I'm sure the police will figure out where we are soon enough!"
Then the demented bear's sickly sweet voice echoed through the dining room where everyone had gathered for breakfast. It laughed and laughed and laughed.
"The police? You're putting your faith in the police!?" it said incredulously as everyone turned to see the creature that had popped up in the middle of the room.
"What are you doing here!?" asked Sakura, dumbfounded.
"You guys, seriously…" Monokuma began his rant. "Do you understand what role the police exist to fill? All they're good for is being a foil, playing against a villain or anti-hero or evil organization. The bad guys come along and destroy them, and that shows just how badass they really are. Are you sure you wanna rely on such an unreliable group of losers? I mean come on! If you really, REALLY wanna get out of here, all you gotta do is kill!"
"How can you be so sure the police won't help us?" Kyoko asked somberly, cutting off whatever useless thing Hiro was about to say.
"Huh?" Monokuma asked, turning to peer at Kyoko. "They can't!" it shouted. Then it abruptly quieted. "Hmm, but I see you're not convinced… oh, I know!" it shouted again. "See, I was thinking, your life here has already begun and a couple of days have gone by, and nobody's killing anybody! I thought all you kids were lazy and selfish, and here you are working together. But I'm totally bored!"
"What does that have to do with the police?" Hina asked, confused.
"There's nothing you can say that'll make us start killing each other." Makoto declared at almost the same time.
"But then-yes! Ding ding ding! I figured it out!" Monokuma continued, ignoring them. "All the mystery ingredients are here-right people, right place. So why hasn't anyone killed anyone yet? That's what I couldn't understand. But I just realized there are two very important pieces missing!"
"Wh-What are you...?" Makoto stammered.
"If you wanna know, I'll tell ya!" the bear continued happily. "It's motive! Motive, and the realization that no one is coming to rescue you!" Then it threw back its head and laughed its demented "Puhuhu!" laugh.
"What the fuck are you talking about!?" Mondo demanded.
"Oh, by the way!" the bear continued. "There's something I wanna show you guys!"
"Stop changing the goddamn subject!" Mondo retorted.
"I have a little video I'd like you all to see," Monokuma commented. "Oh, but don't worry. It's not some pervy "adult" video or anything." The bear feigned nervousness. "Seriously, it's nothing like that! It's a special video for each of you showing what's going on outside the school."
"Outside the school...?" Makoto asked, confused. "What are you talking about?"
"Heh-heh! Ooh, so impatient! Why don't you just watch it and find out?" Monokuma smiled menacingly.
"We'll go watch the video right now," Kyoko cut in. "But before we do that, I'd like to know…" she took a deep breath and looked Monokuma in the eyes. "What exactly do you stand to gain by trapping us here? What is YOUR motive?"
"My motive?" the bear repeated thoughtfully. "Well, if you must know…" It's face curled up into a disturbing smile that didn't reach its wide open staring eyes. "Despair. That's all." Then it pulled back and smiled toothily. "If you want to know more than that, you'll have to figure it out for yourselves. Do whatever you need to to uncover the mystery hidden within this school. I won't try and stop you. Cuz to be honest, it's entertaining as heck watching you guys search so desperately for answers! So I guess I want amusement from you, too." With that, it ran off.
Sayaka blinked. "He's gone... And once again, he left before we could find out anything useful."
Kyoko held in the scoff. "Really? I think we learned something *very* useful. He has no intention of standing in the way of our pursuit of the truth. Interesting…"
"Perhaps, but what about the video he mentioned?" Sakura asked. "I'm very curious to see what's on it."
"Same here!" Mondo added. "Okay, so...!" He looked around the room, then… "Hey Makoto! Check this out for us, would ya?"
"Huh? Why me!?" Makoto protested.
"We don't even know where to find this video," Leon added.
"We'll all go," Kyoko declared. "It'll be in the A/V room. Only place with a video player. Come on." She then walked out, and the rest of the crowd, after a short pause, followed after her.
…
Kyoko's video was as disturbing as she had imagined. But it wasn't very detailed. There were no close-ups of the corpses, for instance. And that, she reflected, left open a hopeful possibility.
The others, of course, had no such thoughts, and were instead panicking. Kyoko left them to their "What the hell?!"'s and their "I have to get out of here!"'s for a bit, then she stepped in.
"Maybe if we all just talk about what we saw," Junko was saying, "That'll help get everything out of our system."
"I imagine we all saw roughly the same thing," Kyoko cut in. "Dead loved ones and destroyed homes. Am I right?"
The silence and stares told her all she needed to know.
"So you have to ask yourselves, how could the mastermind have obtained this footage? There are only two possibilities. Either this footage is real, or it is fake. If it is real, and the mastermind did that much damage to the outside world, killing the loved ones of so many famous Ultimates, without being caught for his crimes… Well, then the mastermind would have to be insanely powerful, likely stronger than Japan's military. Such a possibility is barely worth considering."
She paused to let her words sink in, even while she remained unconvinced of them herself.
"So we are left to conclude these videos are faked. That is still disturbing, as it suggests the mastermind knows a great deal about each of us, enough to know what to show us to make us despair. But we should see these videos for what they are: a transparent attempt to manipulate us into betraying each other. Imagine how awful it would feel if you murdered someone to escape only to find that these videos were fake and your loved ones outside are perfectly fine?"
She waited as understanding dawned on the faces of the others. "You're right!" said Taka. "This will do nothing to weaken our resolve!"
"See, I told you," Hina said triumphantly, as though Kyoko's word settled the matter. "These are fake!"
As Kyoko looked around, only Sayaka and Byakuya seemed still unsatisfied. Kyoko wasn't too worried about Sayaka, Chihiro would keep an eye on her. But Byakuya…
As everyone made their excuses and began to file out in pairs, Kyoko grabbed Toko and hurried after Byakuya.
"What do you want, Kyoko?" Byakuya demanded as Kyoko approached.
"H-hey, what about me?" Toko asked as she followed.
Both Byakuya and Kyoko ignored her. "I assume you saw the Togami Corporation decimated," Kyoko began.
"What business is it of yours?" Byakuya retorted.
"I just want to check whether we're on the same page. Do you believe the video was faked?" Kyoko answered.
"Mine certainly was," Byakuya said haughtily. "The Togamis would never fall to the likes of this 'mastermind.' But he knows a disturbingly great deal about our secure headquarters. He is not to be underestimated. I don't think we should count on help arriving anytime soon."
Kyoko nodded, and took Byakuya's willingness to talk to her as the gesture of respect it was. "I'm beginning to think the same, though of course it benefits us to keep the others' spirits up. Have you thought about what Monokuma meant, when it said it wants despair?"
"Of course," Byakuya sneered. "But I cannot imagine a rational explanation, any way to profit from our despair. Can you?"
"Not from our despair, no," Kyoko admitted. "Which leads me to believe it was talking about someone else's despair."
"H-huh?" Toko asked.
Byakuya straightened. "You have my attention," he said carefully.
"We're almost all famous, influential students," Kyoko explained. "The kind that, if taken hostage, could be used to apply a great deal of pressure on Japan's rich and powerful elite. Especially you."
Byakuya put his hand to his mouth in thought. "So you think he's confident enough we won't be found that he's informing others about our situation. Still, why would he want us to kill each other, rather than simply threatening to do that himself if those outside do not comply with his demands?"
"I haven't figured that out yet," Kyoko confessed. "But it seems clear we are not merely being held for ransom. After all, some of us have no rich connections to extort. But each of us is well loved enough by some group or another that us killing each other could provoke a kind of despair in the minds of the Japanese citizenry. Perhaps the mastermind means to exploit that despair somehow. Perhaps he benefits from plunging the country into chaos."
"An intriguing possibility," Byakuya acknowledged. "And it goes without saying that the many security cameras hidden around would make it easy for the mastermind to prove to Japan that his claim to have kidnapped us is true."
"Indeed," Kyoko agreed. "So, are we in agreement, then? There's more at stake here than just our lives. Our real enemy is the mastermind, and whatever his designs are upon Japan. Participating in the killing game would only play right into his hands."
"We are in agreement," Byakuya confirmed. "Now if you'll excuse me…" He brushed past Kyoko and sauntered down the hall.
Kyoko turned to Toko, who was looking at her with a confused expression. "I trust you won't tell anyone else about this conversation?" Kyoko asked, raising her eyebrows slightly.
Toko nodded meekly.
"Good. Then come on. There are some things I want to investigate again."
Two more days passed without incident. Then, just as everyone was beginning to grow comfortable with each other, the unthinkable happened.
Sayaka turned up dead.