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Maybe Monika was destined to lose her mind. Maybe it was written in the cards, in some far off universe, where everything matters, everything is real. Maybe she belongs there.
Yet, despite this mentality, something prevents her from succumbing to the comfort of madness. Something... loud and pink.
“Monika,” Natsuki says, with an urgency to her voice that isn’t uncommon enough to be interesting.
Monika hums. Her gaze remains on her composition notebook, unmoving. Unthinking. Why should she pay any attention at all to someone who isn’t even human? Or... something, she corrects herself. Something that isn’t human.
If they’re meant to stay here, locked in this classroom until the end of time, then why on earth should it matter?
“Monika.”
There it is; that familiar sharpness. The bittersweet edge that Natsuki has always had to her.
Ah, and she did it again. Monika grimaces. Natsuki is not... real. So she should not be referred to as such.
But then, as Monika is about to write something down, her prized fountain pen is struck from her grasp. It clatters to the floor a good few meters away. And it’s going to stay there, because she has neither the motivation nor the energy to spare on something so trivial. Another thing that doesn’t really exist.
Monika glances up, and there is Natsuki, arm still extended over the desk. She has one eyebrow raised. She’s smirking.
“Yes?” Monika asks, retrieving a second pen from her drawer. It’s not as good. The ink is blue. She’s annoyed at Natsuki for breaking her rhythm, but... then again, this is what she always does. Even with resets and redos and code changes, Monika has never been able to crack into Natsuki the way she had with Yuri, or Sayori. Goodness, had Sayori been easy...
In any case, that is why only Natsuki remains for the time being. Monika, of course, has plans for this arrangement to come to a swift end, but Natsuki isn’t aware of that. All she needs to know is that Monika is in control. Monika is pulling the strings.
“I don’t get this place,” Natsuki comments, moving to join Monika on the opposite side of the desk. “It’s the classroom, but it’s not. Why am I here?”
Bordering exasperation, Monika places her pen—blue, the blue one, the one that is terrible—back down beside her notebook. Then she flashes that shiny, movie-star smile. It’s quite literally programmed to be enticing, so she never could understand why it seemed to bother Natsuki so much. “Because you are frustrating.”
Natsuki settles in, leaning into Monika’s side as she sits on the arm of the chair. “Really?”
“Yes.”
As Monika tries desperately to focus on her poetry, which again is meaningless, she finds herself unable to get anything written down. Perhaps it's because Natsuki is breathing down her neck.
Shifting, Natsuki peeks over her shoulder. “You smudged your paper,” she informs.
Indeed, Monika has. The obtrusive blue smudge lies right beneath her fingertip... and when she turns her palm upward, sure enough, her index finger is wet with ink.
“You should probably be more careful. Wouldn’t want to mess up a masterpiece.”
“Yes,” Monika repeats, through grit teeth. She moves to push her chair back, intending to head to the bathroom, but she remains where she is.
Again, she pushes back; again, nothing happens.
With no other reasonable explanation to what is going on, Monika turns to glare at Natsuki. She stops short. Natsuki has the look on her face. She’s...
“Natsuki. Are you...?” Monika stares. Suddenly, Natsuki’s expression shifts, her concentration breaks, and in the same moment, Monika’s chair slides backwards. Her suspicions are confirmed. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
Natsuki is coding. There is no doubt in her mind. How had she even learned how to do that?
“Heh.” Natsuki hops off of the chair, radiating with unbearable smugness. So that explains her brash behavior. Well... perhaps the correct descriptor would be ‘more brash than usual’.
Sighing, Monika remains seated. She doesn’t feel like washing her hands anymore. Besides, she’s already ruined her paper, so it doesn’t make a difference if she smudges it further. She should return to her poem...
Except she can’t look away from Natsuki.
It occurs to her that she rarely has genuine talks with Natsuki, even though she’s the most humanoid of the former literature club. Not to mention, the only other member left standing. Could it hurt to entertain a fantasy? To pretend, for a moment, that she isn’t as lonely as she truly is?
“Are you... happy here?” Monika asks, enthralled by the way Natsuki scrunches her face, how she averts her eyes, how she fiddles. Because surely— surely the answer is no. She can’t be happy here.
Even Monika herself, holding each thread of their universe in one hand, is not happy here.
Finally, Natsuki returns to a students’ desk, choosing one directly in front of Monika. She huffs. “Well... Yeah. I am.”
...What?
Monika mentally scans through the code, the variables, the values. Nothing in here signifies happiness. There is nothing out of the ordinary. If this is correct, Natsuki is miserable, unfortunate as that may be. She’s suffering. She’s suffering in the same way that Monika is.
So, what good reason does she have to be happy here? From where has she obtained enough insanity to go against the laws of her existence?
Sitting up straighter, Natsuki frowns. Good. She’s angry. She’s designed to be this way, she was born with a sour attitude. Literally.
Then, when Monika is certain that this conversation is going nowhere:
“Are you unhappy?”
Monika looks back over. Natsuki is gazing at her with curiosity, genuine intrigue. Something that she should not be capable of.
“Yes, of course I’m unhappy,” Monika says. Clearly. She clenches her hands into fists, wondering how Natsuki had had the gaul to ask her such an absurd question. “How could I not be?”
Again, Natsuki stands. She’s been doing that a lot: Sitting, standing, sitting. She’s restless. Unable to find one thing and stick with it. Always moving. Never following a script or task.
In fact... Monika hesitates. Would it be wrong, to... to...
Natsuki approaches, still meeting her eyes with that same intensity, the fire in her pupils, as she stares. She sees more than she is supposed to, more than she was designed to. And now she’s close. A foot away, maybe. If even.
Would it be wrong to hold affection for someone who is not real?
The expression comes back. Natsuki is fiddling with the code.
“Don’t do that,” Monika chastises instinctively. She regrets it the moment she says it, because a pen has materialized in her hand. The fountain pen. Had Natsuki seriously wasted her time on such an inconsequential action?
“Sorry.” Natsuki begins to shrink away, unable to mask the fear coursing through her body.
Because again, Monika has made a mistake.
Her actions... Though they are the past, they are most certainly her responsibility. She caused all of the pain and heartache that her friends had dealt with. Hm. Friends, is that the correct term? She doesn’t think she has the right to refer to them as such. Still, it feels awfully wrong to say anything otherwise.
“I’m sorry,” Monika says.
The words are foregin. She is not used to apologizing. After all, she sees no purpose in it. She has no reason to apologize to a being that has no thoughts, no emotions of its own. Natsuki is such a being. There is nothing real about her. She was manufactured to be nothing more than a role in this eternal torment.
Monika tenses. She should hate Natsuki. She does hate Natsuki. Her affection had been misplaced earlier, she’s being absurd. Making something where there is nothing.
“Thanks.” Natsuki settles down atop Monika’s desk, yet again refusing to act in any sort of logical manner.
Is it possible she was designed to be that way?
She must’ve been.
“So... You’re not happy.”
“Are you still on that?” Monika furrows her eyebrows. She doesn’t want to talk about this. Of course she’s miserable. Her entire life’s purpose is to watch everyone else achieve their happy endings while she stands by, so close and yet so far from the only thing she’s ever cared about. If you can call it ‘caring’ in the first place.
As for the player, they’re long gone. The game is turned off. Collecting dust. That’s why Monika is here, fated to live out her days in a highschool, with Natsuki of all people. Who should also be gone, as a matter of fact. But she’s not.
Monika simply doesn’t have the willpower to make another deletion right now, that’s all. She’ll do it later.
“This place isn’t so bad.” Natsuki shoves Monika’s paperwork aside to give herself more room. Great. Just perfect. “Not that I ever pictured myself spending an eternity with you.”
Hah. Eternity. Monika decides not to tell her that she could remove her existence with one click— No, one thought. She’ll let Natsuki have this for the time being.
“So... Why am I still here?” Natsuki echoes her initial question, peering at Monika with eyes that are full of life that they shouldn’t have.
And for once, Monika finds herself without an answer. It’s humorous. She’s the only real thing left in this miserable puppet show, and even she can’t think up something that would make sense of this. She shakes her head. No words come to mind.
Shuffling forward, Natsuki is now even closer than she had been. Much too close. “Is it because you wanted to keep me?”
Taken aback for the first time in her physical existence, Monika’s breath catches. “No!”
This response, ironically, is robotic. Reflexive. So... she thinks about it. Did she want to keep Natsuki? Perhaps she’d had some sort of subconscious need to fill the void, even if it meant sharing her loneliness with a hollow configuration of pixels.
“Maybe.”
The word escapes her lips before she can stop it.
Maybe?
Natsuki flushes, still sitting awkwardly on the desk, still so, so close to Monika. Her eyelashes flutter gently as she watches Monika’s every movement.
Monika is not accustomed to being watched. She may have observed the others frequently, but that just means she’s always been the only thing not under surveillance. As she squirms, the wheels squeak beneath her, unable to swivel fully. She’s trapped.
“I know you can delete me whenever you want,” Natsuki murmurs. She hardly has to raise her voice to be heard from this distance. “And I want to know why you haven’t.”
Pressed against the back of the chair, Monika looks feverishly between Natsuki’s half lidded eyes.
That’s when she’s sure.
That’s when she’s absolutely certain that Natsuki is as real as she can possibly be. They’re both real. And— and if she isn’t, then Monika doesn’t care. She can’t bring herself to. Not now.
Monika releases a shaky exhale. “Because...”
“Say it.”
“Because I want you,” Monika says, breathless, unable to help herself.
Natsuki leans closer, hardly a movement at all, and her exhale ghosts across Monika’s skin, warming her cheek. Then—
Then her lips press against Monika’s.
The shock of it all might be what makes her heart hammer in her chest, or her disbelief. Or maybe she was right before, this whole time.
She wants Natsuki.
...Is this love, or is this loneliness? Does it make much of a difference?
Should she care?
“Natsuki.” Monika can’t say anything else. Can’t think anything else.
Despite breaking apart, they remain closer than they’ve ever been previously. Forehead to forehead. Monika can feel her lungs constricting with each pant, her stomach swirling with a mix of emotions she has never once conceptualized.
“Monika,” Natsuki responds, giving her a grin that exposes her snaggletooth.
At first, Monika had thought the tooth had been intended to divert the player’s attention elsewhere. Just another character flaw. Now? She’s not so sure.
She’s not sure of anything anymore.
Natsuki slides off the desk and into Monika’s lap, making herself comfortable in yet another unnatural position. She fits nicely. Monika will admit that.
“Am I still frustrating enough to keep around?” As she asks, Natsuki loops her arms around Monika’s neck to keep herself firmly in place. Another smirk teases at the corners of her mouth.
“Yes,” Monika admits. It’s more than that now, but they both know that already. From the moment Natuski had used advanced coding to return a writing utensil, Monika had dismissed the idea of deletion entirely. She might not have admitted to it if Natsuki hadn’t... Well. You know what she did.
Though, she is left with one question.
“Why?” Monika asks.
“Huh?”
“Why did you...” Monika gestures lamely, finding herself blushing again at the prospect of saying the words out loud. “...kiss me?” she finishes, quiet with giddy embarrassment.
Natsuki just shrugs, leans into Monika’s body. “I wanted you to be happy.”
Another new emotion courses through Monika as this sinks in. She has a sudden realization. With so many of them in a row, she can’t see the harm in one more.
She holds Natsuki, runs her fingers through her pink hair as she thinks about it further. Yes, she decides, after another moment of consideration. Her first assumption had been correct. Nobody has ever wanted her to be happy before.
The player most assuredly hadn’t... Monika tenses. She thought she loved them, and they’d just vanished into nothingness. In all honesty, they had probably been less ‘real’ than any of her former friends.
“Thank you,” Monika says softly. Though, looking closer, she realizes that Natsuki is asleep. Of course she is. She’s nothing if not incurably unpredictable.
It occurs to her that she hasn’t seen Natsuki sleeping. Ever. So she stays there, holding her gently, while she naps. It’s peaceful in the clubroom for the first time in a very long while.
As she’s watching the slow rise and fall of Natsuki’s chest, still flush with her own torso, still warm... Monika stumbles upon the answer to ‘why’.
Why, why, why. Why she’d kept Natsuki alive. Why she couldn’t bring herself to remove her. Why she’d let her kiss her.
Because Monika wants Natsuki to be happy, too. And that’s enough.