Chapter Text
Three-hundred ninety days. Three-hundred ninety days since true rest. Three-hundred ninety days since anyone has been able to relax, truly relax. Toko had been keeping track of the days since Hopes Peak in a journal, her journal. Maybe one day, when all of this bullshit was over, someone would read that journal and use it for some sort of history book. If things here returned to normal one day, maybe she could have written the key to stopping this from ever happening again. That was all hypothetical, though. It was getting to a point. A point where the possibility of this ending felt further and further out of reach the more time passed onwards.
Toko was sitting in a dark and dingey office. She sat in a leather office chair, posture slightly hunched, picking at her fingernails. Behind her was a dry erase board, filled to the brim with notes. The same marker was used so much that it practically had no ink on it, she had to get directly in front of the think to read any of it. The desk in here was relatively unused. Whenever Byakuya brought any drink in, Toko had a coaster ready to move directly under it in order to not ruin the wood.
"Enjoying your time in lala land?" A voice ripped Toko out of her thoughts, making her jump. Her eyes quickly darted up to meet Byakuyas. His gaze was his usual stoic expression, a look that told most people that he didn't care. It told people that emotions were some sort of afterthought. Maybe if Toko developed that habit, Byakuya would like her more? Toko shifted uncomfortably in her seat under Byakuyas gaze, and he took her silence as a plead to continue talking. "There will be a meeting in the meeting room shortly. Make yourself useful and bring me some tea, will you? Make sure to grab some for yourself too, who knows how long it will last." That was all she needed to hear. Toko shot up out of her seat, and immediately got to work.
Down a few hallways, there was some sort of cafeteria area of the building. There were three or four tables, and a doorway at the far end of the room that lead to a kitchen area. Toko made her way in there and got a kettle of water boiling. As she waited for that she looked through what kinds of tea they had left. Their supply had bren running low, maybe Yasuhiro could pick some more up next time he flew into the city. The kettle made a loud screeching noise to signal that it was done, which caused her to carefully take the kettle off of the stove and pour the water into the two cups. It seemed she hadn't made enough, so she filled Byakuyas cup all the way and made sure she had whatever was left over. She placed the tea bags inside of each cup before making her way towards the meeting room, opening the doors once there.
"Toko, you made it. Perfect. Take your seat, there is a lot to discuss today" Kyoko had greeted her at the door. Of course Toko would be the last one there. Bets were always on either her or Yasuhiro. Toko nodded awkwardly before shuffling to her usual seat. She carefully set down Byakuyas tea down on a coaster near him, before setting her own cup down. Tokos seat was at the end of the group, no not end of the table. The table itself could probably fit another seven to eight people, but this small sick excuse of a team consisted of only six people, seven if you count Alter Ego. Kyoko was standing at the end of the table, getting a screen set up. Makoto was obviously right at her side, going through notes and probably giving some sort of insight. Hina sat next to Yasuhiro, clearly anxious about something. Yasuhiro was acrossed from Toko, looked just about ready to fall asleep. Byakuya himself was next to Toko, putting him across from Hina. This felt awkward, and there was clearly some sort of danger. Maybe they were thinking the same things she was, thinking how pathetic they all are as a team for continously making no progresss.
"Can we have your attention now?" Makoto piped up. The moment his voice was heard, everyone turned to look at him. Makoto smiled at the group nervously before stepping aside, expecting Kyoko to begin.
"Thank you" Kyoko said again as she finally booted up what she was trying to get up. In front of the table was a white sheet used with a projector. When a picture loaded, everyones faces only became more curious, well besides Byakuyas, who remained as stoic as always. On the screen were sixteen portraits. The pictures seemed to resemble mugshots. She carefully studied each of them, the pictures feeling oh too familiar. It didn't sit right. Her suspicions were confirmed when her eyes landed on one of them.
Kameko.
Her little Kameko.
"When was the last time we looked at these?" Kyoko asked, hand motioning towards the projector. "Dark days, that was the last time we saw these pictures. Hopes Peak Academy. I know, it's a place we'd rather not think about, but our new positions do require us to think about things that may be difficult." A hint of sympathy seeped through her words. After a small moment of silence, she continued: "the first motive of the killing game, loved ones, our loved ones, our fallen friends loved ones, they were kept. Kept to force us to kill eachother-"
"Why are you even bringing that stuff up?!" Hina slammed her hands against the table, snapping Yasuhiro out of his daze. Hina was emotional. Byakuya viewed it as her major weakness, and she was inclined to agree with him.
"A moment, Aoi. Please" Kyoko pleaded, holding her hand out. Hina swallowed and hesitated before slowly sinking back down in her seat. "Thank you. Now, what we know is we at most have fifteen left." On the screen, Mukuros face darkened. "That means there are fifteen left. We have enough reason to believe that some of these people are still alive and stuck in the city. Byakuya has come to mine and Makotos attention to organize a plan to confirm this. He will be finishing this meeting." And with that, Kyoko moved to sit down in her seat. After she sat, Byakuya stood up and moved to to the front of the room where Kyoko was previously.
"We want them here for a multitude of reasons. To your personak devices I had sent a file to you, I recommend you open it to follow along" Byakuya instructed. A while ago, they all had gained these small phone like devices. They were a very blocky shape, and had a clip that is meant to be attatched to a belt. The device was used for the group to communicate with eachother, and Alter Ego was able to appear on these screens, helping with whatever computer assistance they needed. Toko took hers out and pressed on the link Byakuya had sent. On the screen was an organized list. The portraits of those fifteen strangers were graded from A to F.
"Of course, for the sake of their safety, we'd aim to bring all of them here. However, I had put in extra work to organize them based on their usefulness. I believe if we are able to, we should try to keep a focus on who were placed in the A section." As he said that, Toko looked at A. Kameko wasn't there, she had already looked for her. She was graded F, for totally useless. Kameko wasn't that useless, but it was Byakuya doing the grading, he had to have had a very good reason. Under the A category she noticed a lot of older people. Standing out in paticular was this older woman with light pink hair and an almost tired look on her face. A lot of them looked tired, actually. As she looked down the list and how they're organized, she noticed the groupings feeling a little more random. At the bottom was Kameko, a cat, and some really old man.
"Byakubro?" Yasuhiro spoke up, paying attention for the first time this entire meeting, "got a question I'm like eighty-two percent sure everyone else is thinking about! How we supposed to do this?"
With that, Byakuya smiled. Obviously he would have considered a plan already. He pressed a button on his device, and there was a notification sound. However, this time not everyone looked, only Toko and Yasuhiro did. Toko took her device out and pressed on the new link. The link downloaded and opened a bunch of photos, pictures of all of these people along with some basic information.
"Toko and Hiro will take care of it. Yasuhiro will watch from the skies for any big things, and Toko will be doing the heavy lifting considering her strength." Strong?! Byakuya viewed her as strong?!
Of course Byakuya would say that. The plan was good, good enough. But now Toko was sitting in the back of a helicopter piloted by Yasuhiro rethinking her decision.
"I know Toko, this has goootta be scary as shit" Yasuhiro attempted to ease the tension. It seemed they were at their destination since the helicopter was slowly moving downwards instead of forward. Instead of responding, Toko had just sat there quietly, earning a cringe from Yasuhiro. "Okay- forget I said anything. If you gotta remember a damn thing I say, remember this. If you need me to come pick you up, you tell me, I'll take you back, freaky, got it?" Yasuhiro gave Toko a thumbs up. The helicopter landed on solid ground, and with that, Toko stood up, getting what she needed and got ready to hop out.
"I'll be fine. I have to do this- for Byakuya." And sith that, Toko hopped out. The reasoning was selfish, yeah, but who's wasn't? The others could maybe only he interested in finding their own loved ones, which she didn't blame them for at all. Selfishness could be a driving factor, it was better doing nothing. Toko finally hopped out of the helicopter and gave Yasuhiro a sign to leave. Toko hasn't been outside of the safe walls of the building of the base for a few months now. She had forgotten how terrifying everything was. A city was perfectly silent, noise being extremely rare. As Toko moved, her shoes hit the pavement, making another louder noise. The skies were this weird red purple color, and the wind seemed to rule.
Three-hundred ninety days things have been like this. If Toko plays were role well, they would be closer to achieving their goal. Toko took a deep breath in and then out before looking down the silent street of Towa City. "Find people, it's just search and rescue" The mumbled to herself, getting her signature scissors out as she walked faster. She travelled down the street, determined to make progress in her task.