Chapter Text
To say that Hajime Hinata was a fan of the students of Hope's Peak Academy was a lie. He was just a hard worker who hoped for the success that academy could promise him.
A fan would research all of them and learn every little thing, but as it was, Hinata knew nothing about any of his classmates prior to his arrival at what was possibly the most prestigious private school in the country. He knew about the upperclassmen, because he'd heard of them before, but kids his age were going to be a surprising enigma.
That was the conclusion he made in the very brief moments he spent looking around at his to-be classmates in his to-be classroom before the walls fell down around him and he fainted.
Staring him in the face when he awoke was a girl with grayish-pink hair, and a clip of a video game spaceship (was that called Galaga? He didn't know much about retro games, or really any games at all.) pinning her bangs back that was altogether far too large because it was right next to his eye. As soon as the girl backed up a bit, he saw that everybody else was also standing over him, though the most prominently after that girl with the clip was a white-haired boy who seemed to be checking his pulse.
Everything was going very quickly, and before Hinata could even get the slightest bit of bearing on where he was or what was happening, a nasal but chipper voice broke through the indistinguishable murmurs all around him.
"Wowee! If he's gonna faint at every little thing, we're gonna have a big problem when big things come up!" The sound was clearly a surprise to everybody, as all heads turned to look for the source. Despite still lying on the ground, Hinata spotted it first. A bear that was black and white, split right down the middle, with fairly cute eyes. It was somewhat intimidating, but at least there was no red on it, and the eyes looked to be a failed attempt to make the thing look less threatening, "Not that any big things will come up, unless somebody decides to confess their love to him or something, because this is your school field trip of mutual loving, upuwoo!"
“School field trip of… mutual loving?” A girl with messy hair and way too much cleavage asked, very much on edge, “That doesn’t sound too great! I’m gonna… I’m gonna fight you!”
"Hey now it doesn't sound too shabby... sounds kinda like an orgy!" A shorter guy added in, earning him a few offhand disgusted looks.
“You don’t like love? That’s atypical!” The bear laughed, doing a little dance, “I wouldn’t advise fighting me, though! That’s against the rules!”
“Ehhhh? What sort of field trip has rules? Lame-o!” Many in the group had confusing hair, but this girl’s was probably the worst. She appeared to have horns.
“Stop being so mean to me!” The bear whined, “Lots of field trips have rules! They’re all listed on your student IDs, okay? Just listen to me and I’ll explain why you’re here and what you’re doing, all right? Can’t you just listen to me for a little while?”
“God, shut up! A talking teddy bear is gonna preach to us? Big deal!” Was she the shortest person there? Possibly, though the eight-year-old gangster was pretty close.
“You! You’re here to make friends! This is a simulation made for the intention of therapy! Collect hope shards and become happy! You had a lot of really bad memories, and they’re gone for now! Make some new good memories, won’t you? Don’t worry about those missing memories of yours either! I know you’ve got a lot of bad childhood memories sticking around, and the ones that are gone are even worse! There! I’ve explained it!”
“Nobody wanted you to explain it, but thank you for doing it regardless.” A large man pushed glasses up on his nose and sighed, “Generally, I would doubt your intentions, but you were shockingly upfront with information that could cause us to distrust you.”
“Trust is an important factor in the rehabilitation process after trauma!” It noted gleedfully, “Trust me and trust eachother! My name's Nikokuma by the way, but you can call me Smilebear! Your memories will be returned to you after you have enough good memories to balance them out, excluding the really horrible ones! You’ll just remember what general course your life took, and the friends you made! Upupu! Bye!”
So it was gone, as were many of Hinata’s classmates, who decided to take off exploring right away. The only ones who stuck around were the first two he saw upon waking up, the ones he had affectionately dubbed ‘The Marshmallow’ and ‘The Cinnamon Roll’. That second one was the first one to speak to him, “You’re… Hajime Hinata, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I am. Who are you?” He asked right back.
“I’m Nagito Komaeda, Super High School Level Luck, and this is Chiaki Nanami, Super High School Level Gamer.” The marshmallow smiled as he introduced both himself and the girl beside him, “I’m not sure how she knew your name, though. I did my research before coming here, and even I don’t know who you are.”
“He’s Hajime Hinata, the Super High School Level Reserve Student. Somewhere in the things that you’ve forgotten, Hinata, your computer got a really bad virus on it, as did lots of the school computers. Because you were both a good student and the only one who could figure out how to remove the virus, you got the privilege of entering the main school instead of the preparatory one.” Nanami answered, seemingly in a trance as she recited the information, but she returned to her normal self quickly enough, “As for how I know that, I am technically the Super High School Level Gamer, but I’m also a monitor program. I’m here to help in your rehabilitation by being a friendly face among you, and answering any of your questions.”
“Okay.” Hinata was surprised at the information, but he figured it was better than learning later on that he was actually a reserve student. At least he was the greatest reserve student, that was a nice thought. Plenty of reserve students, and he got to become an elite; though it was still disappointing that the talent he’d forgotten wasn’t something as cool as his classmates’.
“Answer any of our questions, huh? That includes questions about the memories that we’ve lost? That doesn’t seem like it will help our rehabilitation very much…” Komaeda noted, staring at his hand which he had curled up as if he was going to cough into it.
“Hm? Well, no, but you deserve to know anything you want to know about your lives! So I’ll answer it, even if it isn’t for the better that you hear the-” Nanami was stifled and suddenly collapsed forward to the ground, three long slashes along her back.
“Come now, Chiaki Nanami. That’s against the rules!”