Work Text:
Byakuya Togami did not feel guilt.
He did not mourn, nor did he despair.
He had made it through four trials already, stone-faced and stoic, accounting for the facts and the facts alone.
He did not get emotional during executions. He was never stunned when a body was discovered.
His façade did not slip.
And yet, when Makoto Naegi was dragged away, there was still the slightest twinge of something in his stomach.
They make eye contact through the cameras. Naegi can’t see them, of course, but he stares into the receptor.
The desperation in his eyes is evident, unshielded. He had never hidden his emotions, not from anyone.
His cheeks colour pink, then red, then an odd shade of purple. It isn’t asphyxiation, it can’t be. He isn’t restrained.
Naegi shifts in his seat, the movement miniscule and irrelevant.
He looks as if he wants to run, and Byakuya wants to beg him to. Let him survive.
He swallows thickly, his throat clogged with an indescribable emotion.
He feels guilt. Horrible, heavy guilt, weighing on his shoulders like massive boulders.
In that moment, he knows they had made the wrong decision.
Who were they kidding? Naegi would never kill. He was too avid a believer in justice and companionship to ever consider killing.
Did that mean Kirigiri had lied? Had Naegi known?
Of course he knew. It was Naegi he’s talking about, after all.
He glances away from the execution, just for a second, just to check Kirigiri’s expression.
Their lip is tinged red with blood, loose and torn skin flecking its pale pink surface. The detective’s eyes are wide, terrified, glittering with emotion.
He realises they’re both thinking the same thing - not Naegi.
Not Naegi.
Anyone but Naegi, Byakuya tells himself.
He realises that he’d sacrifice anyone - no - everyone in this room to save Naegi’s life.
His stare trains on the retreating desk, the cardboard Monokuma giving the boy in front of it an imaginary lecture.
He can only imagine the terror that Naegi’s experiencing right now. The trash compactor slams, and slams, and slams-
Green.
A face appears. A familiar one, determined and brave, using its last fragment of life to save another.
Alter Ego appears, and the trash chute opens.
The desk tilts, and tips, and falls into that gaping hole, taking a terrified Naegi with it.
“What the fuck,” he whispers, the words heavy.
Byakuya Togami does not curse.
Swear words are beneath him, beneath his dignity, and he hasn’t sworn in years.
And yet…
“Naegi-chi didn’t kill anyone, did he?” Hagakure asks, horrified.
Monokuma simply cackles and disappears.
Byakuya doesn’t know what to do with himself.
He doesn’t know what to think. He doesn’t want to think, full stop.
He never knew how it felt, before, to harbour such wracking guilt on behalf of another human being.
He never had to lose sleep over anything – no issue he ever encountered was of such importance.
And yet, here he is, lying wide awake.
He stares angrily at the ceiling. He doesn’t want to get up in the morning and pretend none of this ever happened. He isn’t ready for that, not at all.
He doesn’t want to forget about Naegi like he forgot about everyone else. He forced the other ten bodies from his mind immediately after their respective cases were closed, unwilling to let their corpses linger on his conscience.
Sayaka Maizono’s body, slumped against a tiled wall with a knife plunged hilt-deep into her chest. Naegi screamed. Byakuya did not.
Junko Enoshima, face-down on the gym floor with Monokuma’s Spears of Gungnir jutting from her in every which way in a gory display of power. He recalls Kirigiri running their hand across the top of the spears, the expression on their face indescribable. Maybe they were sad.
Leon Kuwata’s beaten corpse, dangling like a puppet made from limp rubber with bloody baseballs littering the floor around him. The others simply stared, mouths agape. Byakuya was the first to leave.
Chihiro Fujisaki, strung up by Byakuya’s own sullied hand, their body hanging like a porcelain doll against the brutal training equipment.
Mondo Owada, spinning for what must have seemed like hours in that electric hamster cage before dying an almost comedic death. Screams echoed like cheers around the arena.
Kiyotaka Ishimaru’s body, collapsed on the ground with a bloodstained hammer lying next to him as an ominous promise for more to come.
Hifumi Yamada’s dying figure, cradled in Asahina’s arms as he whispers his final words, a name buried under layers of ambition.
Celestia Ludenburg - Taeko Yasuhiro, his mind whispers rebelliously - tied to a stake as fire licks at her lacy shoes, faced with the front of a fire truck that, in another life, may have rescued her.
Sakura Ogami, slumped over on the leather couch of the rec room, lips flecked with crimson blood and the dregs of the poison that she chose to take. Asahina’s lie nearly made all of their efforts to live fruitless.
Mukuro Ikusaba, a knife protruding from her chest in a cruel imitation of Maizono’s death.
Naegi wouldn’t do something like that – he cared too much about their dead friends to resort to a murder as disgustingly ironic as that.
Why had they all voted for him?
Why did they turn their levers to face Naegi’s podium in that wretched trial, when they all really knew that he would never- no, could never kill?
In hindsight, the notion was ridiculous.
Idiotic.
The more Byakuya turns it around in his mind, the more he curses himself for his own stupidity.
There was so much more he could’ve done – he’s a Togami, for goodness’ sake. He could’ve argued, could’ve forced them into voting for Kirigiri because Naegi would never kill-
A knock on his door.
He doesn’t want to get up to open it. He’s tired. Heartbroken. Guilt-ridden.
The knock comes again, more insistently.
He rolls over to stare at the door, weighing up his options. He could stay in bed, wallow in self-pity and continue to ignore the hunger pangs, or he could get up, answer the door and get some food.
He ends up choosing the latter.
As the person at his door knocks once again, he peels himself out of his sheets, mumbling something that vaguely resembles a “coming, coming”.
He cracks the door open, well aware that he probably looks like a dishevelled mess (shouldn’t’ve slept in your suit) and meets the eyes of one determined-looking Kyoko Kirigiri.
“I have nothing to say to you.” he spits, angry.
“Well, I have something to say to you. Let me in before Fukawa comes along.” They don’t wait for a response, and Byakuya isn’t about to deign them with one.
They shove a foot in between the door and its frame, elbowing him aside and forcing themselves into his bedroom.
“Thank you,” they say, shutting the door behind them. “I want to go rescue Naegi.”
“Either you’re suicidal, a maniac, or both.” Blue eyes draw lengthy arcs in the air. “There’s no chance he survived that fall.”
All business, even now, he tells himself. Don’t let them see that you’re a wreck.
“Naegi’s resilient,” they respond, shrugging. “I have a feeling.”
Byakuya blinks at them in utter disbelief. How can any one person be so insane?
“Kirigiri-” he starts, fumbling for words. “The chances that he’s still alive- ridiculously low-”
“What I’m hearing is that you would prefer it if he was dead.”
It takes all he has not to slap them.
“Says you!” he yells, his anger bursting like a dam. “You were the one that killed him!”
“It was him or me,” they admit, having the decency to at least look a little guilty. “I can’t discover the secret of this school if I’m dead.”
Violet eyes meet cerulean ones, holding his gaze with an absurd amount of conviction.
“That isn’t to say I don’t regret it,” they say quietly. “I never wanted him to die.”
Byakuya sighs, pressing his fingers to his temple in exasperation. The idea is so ridiculous, so senseless- but it could work.
You could have Naegi back, his mind whispers, silken, secret hopes against his ears, and that’s all it takes to convince him.
“You’d better bring him back,” he hisses from between gritted teeth. “Do not chicken out.”
“I don’t take orders from you,” they clip, but it’s more light-hearted than before, and he catches the small smile they throw over their shoulder as they leave.
He’d never admit it, but he smiles back.
Kirigiri disappears that morning.
They also, conveniently, leave him alone to deal with the panic of the three idiots.
It’s nine in the morning, and he’s still in bed, despite normally getting up two hours prior for a coffee and a good book.
He’s debating going back to sleep when someone rings his doorbell seven times in rapid succession.
Byakuya groans, hauls himself out of bed in a decidedly un-Togami-like manner for the second time in twenty-four hours, and goes to answer the door.
“What. Do. You. Want,” he borderline shouts as he tears the door open, nearly slamming it back against the horribly-papered wall.
“Kirigiri’s missing!” Asahina practically yells, and Byakuya seethes.
How dare they leave him to deal with the biggest idiots Hope’s Peak Academy has ever known without informing them of their plan?
“Wait one moment,” he hisses. He proceeds to shut the door in their faces, grab his (singular and embarrassingly flat) pillow and scream into it.
He then picks up the previously untouched notebook on his desk and scribbles the lowdown of Kirigiri’s plan onto it, his handwriting messy and careless.
‘Kirigiri went to rescue Naegi. Stop screaming about it. The bear’ll hear you.’
He shoves the paper in their faces, slams the door shut and promptly topples back into bed. The second Kirigiri gets back I will murder them.
The pandemonium stops – or, at least, they stop ringing the doorbell, so he assumes as such.
It’s quiet once more, and he sort of revels in it, because for now, his mind is also quiet.
The school, despite its sheer emptiness, has always been incredibly chaotic, so it’s very gratifying to have a moment of peace.
Once he’s sure they’ve dispersed from his door, he sighs, gets up, and makes for the door. I wasn’t going to go back to sleep anyway.
Kirigiri comes back that evening, about an hour after Asahina somehow managed to drag him out of the archive for a group meal.
He’s delicately eating – well, when is he not delicate and elegant? – a handmade rice ball when he hears the slow, exhausted click of Kirigiri’s boots, and his heart inevitably begins to pound.
How do I greet Naegi? It should be big, not too big, he dislikes masses of attention on him, maybe I should take his hand, walk him out-
Kirigiri enters the room, and his heart drops to the pits of his stomach.
Naegi’s arms are slung over their shoulders, his body limp and peaceful and oh so white.
Asahina, Hagakure and Fukawa rush over as Kirigiri slowly lowers the pale Naegi to the cruel tile floor, but Byakuya’s rooted to his chair.
He’s never seen Naegi look so… weak.
His skin is just so pallid. His eyes are closed, and some traitorous part of Byakuya is grateful for that because really, how could he look into those beautiful greens if they no longer retain life?
The other three fall into various states of distress, bunched in a circle around the older boy’s body, but Kirigiri wanders over to him.
“You said to bring him back,” they mumble.
“Not-” he chokes on the words. “Not like this.”
A distraught silence falls about the group, the air weighted with their collective grief.
“This is our fault,” Asahina whispers, the words quickly followed with a sob. “Why did we accuse him?”
“The real question is, why did Monokuma execute him?” Byakuya asks, his tone steely despite his inner turmoil.
“Because the mastermind killed Mukuro Ikusaba.”
“What?” All of their tones are quizzical, and Byakuya shoots Kirigiri a suspicious side-eye.
“The mastermind had Makoto Naegi executed because none of us killed Mukuro Ikusaba, and they wanted either him or myself dead. They just weren’t picky.” Kirigiri says, stoic as ever.
“And it clearly worked.” Byakuya seethes bitterly.
“That’s why I propose a counterplan. We get out of here, once and for all.” They produce a skull-shaped key from their pocket. “For Naegi.”
A silence hangs in the air for a moment or two, loaded with emotion.
“I have to go,” he announces abruptly, breaking the quiet.
It’s too much, he wants to say. Just bring Naegi back to me.
Fukawa tries to call him back as he marches from the hall, grasping for his suit sleeve, but he breaks into a run, desperate to be alone.
Togamis should not be this upset. A small voice slips poison into his ear. You are better than this.
Byakuya ignores the voice as he slams and locks his door behind him, and truly cries for the first time in twelve years.