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He was alone, somewhere dark.
It was sheer darkness that surrounded him; a void that swallowed up all light. It was still and silent and there was nothing - not even the sound of his own breathing.
As his awareness gradually returned to him, he became aware only of his own body. The space around him felt cramped. He was laying down. For some reason, moving himself to his feet felt like a struggle, so he remained as he was, content to do nothing and feel nothing.
But something seemed strange about that.
The thought was hard to get rid of once it entered his mind. He didn't know where he was or what he was doing there, only that he was suddenly aware, as if he'd been born in the seconds before with someone's memories already in his head.
He knew who he was.
Komaeda Nagito remembered his name.
The condition of being Komaeda Nagito was the thing that made him fight against the heaviness in his limbs to make it to his feet. Unable to see what was in front of him, below him, or behind him, he felt an immediate sense of vertigo, so he kept his balance by putting his arms around himself. Slowly, with a tentative step, he tested the ground in front of him, and, finding it stable, began to walk. Though there was no one and nothing there, he tried to call out, but even the sound of his voice was muted by the darkness. It didn't make it farther than the inside of his own head.
Perhaps that was death, though. That was what he thought.
From nothing. Becoming nothing. Returning to nothing...
He walked and he walked.
He walked and walked and walked, becoming more exhausted with each step.
There was an ache inside of him.
Then suddenly, after having walked for some indeterminable amount of time, he caught a glimpse of something ahead of him. Just when his eyes were beginning to accept it as fact that they would never see another person, there, in front of him, they saw someone's back. He didn't readily know why, but there was something about their rigid shoulders that looked familiar. Something throbbed inside his chest, but the hand he placed over his heart was missing.
Komaeda stretched out his arm toward that person's retreating back. Unable to feel or see his arm in the darkness, he became afraid that they wouldn't be able to see it, either. They were still walking away, and no matter how loudly Komaeda shouted, his voice never left his mouth.
The pounding in his chest became more persistent. Closing his eyes, Komaeda felt his chest with his other hand – the one he could still feel – and listened. Its sound became louder, pounding wildly, sounding out a signal of distress as if it were trying to shout for him. It grew, conveying a message his tongue and brain lacked the words for.
The one ahead of him stopped.
Komaeda tried to run the rest of the way. When they were a few mere feet apart, his legs refused to take him farther, dropping him where they decided to stop. He felt exhausted and out of breath. All he could do was lift his head and stare, praying that the one who stopped for him would be courteous enough to lend him a hand.
Long hair cascading over his shoulders as black as the darkness, he looked back at Komaeda with two red eyes.
Komaeda remembered who he was, but he didn't know what he was doing there. Maybe he was just a memory.
Like that time, Komaeda raised his hand and reached out toward him.
It had to be no coincidence that he would see his face again in a place like that. Back then, he had been the focus in his blurry vision. He was the one light in a place where darkness was bred. It may have been foolish to call him hope and to trust that he would take his outstretched hand, but Komaeda saw nothing else to hold on to. Even if there was ground beneath him, it was invisible to him. At any second, for all he knew, that tentative sense of stability would disappear from under him and pull him down.
He felt nothing in his eyes, though.
As if Komaeda were just a momentary distraction, those eyes turned away from him and he began to leave, offering him not a single more second of consideration.
No amount of shouting would have been enough to stop him. A part of Komaeda already knew. He'd figured it out. The person he called for didn't exist anymore. He was alone, so he couldn't really be there, and even if he was, he had no reason to pay him mind.
As the other was nearly swallowed by the impenetrable wall of darkness ahead, his form a thin shadow in the distance, Komaeda heard something from behind. It was a voice that didn't belong to him, yet it rang inside of his head with a terrible, familiar laugh. He didn't want to turn back, fearful of what he might see behind him, but he could feel a presence steadily approaching his back. Gasping, pulling in a breath that was released as a sick-sounding wheeze, Komaeda clawed at the ground with his one hand, scraping at its nothingness, trying desperately to push himself to his feet before it could reach him.
If he listened just a little closer, he thought he could hear her voice trying to tell him something, but he refused to pay attention to what she was saying. Even if his screams couldn't be heard by anyone else, he screamed loud enough to fill up the space inside his head, chasing out her voice.
It seemed to work.
His screams died down, and he realized that he was once again surrounded by silence. No more smug laughter. His exhaustion felt even worse, like he was dying all over again, but at least he was free from that torment. If she'd managed to find him there somehow, he wasn't sure what he would've done. There didn't seem to be any way for him to defend himself. She was just a ghost, probably... Or a memory. As long as he didn't give her the satisfaction of his attention, then there was no way for her to seize him again.
His legs felt weak, his throat felt dry, and his chest was burning, but Komaeda once again attempted to pull himself to his feet. It took no small amount of effort, but he managed, and once he was up, he felt somewhat victorious, like he'd accomplished something great. There was a feeling inside of him that sparkled from underneath the black grime surrounding his heart. The beginnings of a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth when he realized that even filth like him was capable of harbouring a precious fragment of hope.
Even if it was small, it belonged to him. It had a name.
If he would be heard, Komaeda wished to shout that name. He didn't care if begging for help made him look pathetic anymore. There was someone whose face he wanted to see.
He couldn't see that person and his red eyes any longer, but Komaeda felt like he still had to be there somewhere. Even if he was just a memory or an illusion created by a wishful dream, Komaeda wanted to see him. He had the feeling that he was the only one who knew how to lift him out of the darkness, to reunite him with the person he really wanted to see.
So Komaeda began to walk again, moving straight ahead in the direction where he last saw him. His eyes stayed forward, afraid that if he looked anywhere else, he might end up straying, unable to see the way. Each step was painful and a great unease pressed down on him, but he held on to the weak little piece of hope inside of him and blinked away the tears that gathered at the corners of his eyes.
There were things he still needed to say. If he accepted the pain he was in like always and decided to stay there, then he would never see him again...
That emptiness full of nothing but pain and bad memories was probably all he deserved, but it wasn't what he wanted.
Though it appeared infinite, Komaeda wanted to find its end. The day when he could be free from luck had to exist. It was there somewhere... At least, he told himself that in order to keep moving. Even if luck refused to release him, he wished that he could see him again. He wished he could be selfish one last time and tell him his feelings properly. Just once, Komaeda wanted to experience what it was like to be ordinary. And then, it didn't matter if he faded back into the dark...
It didn't.
Really, it didn't...
It didn't matter, he told himself. But inside, he knew that wasn't the truth. And her laughter knew it was a lie, too.
It was still there, cacophonous and irritating. It was most definitely there. Komaeda tried to scream again, but it wasn't enough. He only had one hand to cover his ears, so he tried running instead. No wind pushed past his ears. Her derisive voice followed him relentlessly, as if it were attached to his back. His tired legs burned. Sweat rolled down the back of his neck. Still, he forced himself to keep running, pushing himself to the point where he thought he might break.
He couldn't see in front of himself, and he didn't know what he was running from, so, very quickly, he began to wonder if he was losing his mind. Everything until that point was so unusual, it almost started to feel normal, but the strangeness of where he was and what he was experiencing suddenly caught up with him and made him stop. Her laughter stopped too.
It was a mistake to look behind himself.
The one who he wished to never see again was standing there, wearing a grin on her face. Strange, her left arm didn't seem to fit her body. Her other limbs, too...
Feeling compelled for some reason, Komaeda touched his left arm with his right and realized that he was finally able to see his hand. It wasn't his hand, though.
Despite that realization, despite the other horrific things surfacing in his memory, she didn't advance. She just looked at him, grinning to herself as if she simply enjoyed watching him figure it out for himself. She wasn't the one who did that to him.
No, he did that to himself.
Much of the things he hated were... They were his own fault.
He almost wished that she would chase him. He wished she'd laugh. That was the least he deserved for being as blind as to throw away the person he loved.
One small step at a time, Komaeda backed away, his vision blurring with unshed tears. When he turned back around, he had the sense that he was lost. He'd taken his eyes away from where he was going and all of the darkness around him looked indistinguishable, so there was no telling how to put himself back on course. When he looked back over his shoulder, even she had disappeared. He turned himself in a full circle, but there was no one.
It was no wonder it was so difficult for him to walk. Blood ran from the wounds across his thighs, there was a deep hole in his stomach, and even his one hand was pierced through. He was falling apart, and the worst fear was that there wouldn't be anyone there to see him and remember him before he sunk into the blackness.
It would have been easier if he just accepted it like always. It would have been easier, but the small light inside of him shined ahead of him, illuminating the back of the one he thought he'd lost.
Komaeda could see his red eyes watching him from the distance. He was holding out a hand for him.
Though he had no energy left to spare, Komaeda once again kept moving. Just a little farther... If he could make it there, then maybe...
It was a beautiful wish, but he was too tired to make it there alone. His legs stopped working and he fell forward, hitting the ground without a sound. He felt his heart slowing, watched as the blood from his wounds pooled around him with the brightest color. He could barely breathe anymore. He was scared.
A gentle echo, Komaeda heard his footsteps as he approached. A second away from the end, he couldn't even muster the strength to lift his head, but he heard the other as he knelt, felt his hand gently grasp his.
He was losing his vision.
In his fading awareness, he was able to hear a voice.
...an y... ...ear me?
Was he speaking to him? It sounded familiar. Was that what his voice sounded like? He couldn't remember anymore. Like that time, he was going to have to say goodbye before he even had the chance to say hello.
Hey...
He should have been afraid of him. Right?
Because he was...
They were Despair.
"Can you hear me?"
The hand holding his tugged and pulled him out of the darkness, toward the light.
Blinding brightness flooded his vision as soon as he opened his eyes. They instinctively closed and he turned his head aside. He wanted to lift a hand to shield his eyes, but he still felt painfully weak, like life had been restored to his already-dead body. Someone was speaking to him, trying to get his attention, but it was hard to pay attention to anything. His mind was overflowing.
Eventually, after he settled and the silence returned, Komaeda attempted to open his eyes again. When he looked up, he saw someone leaning over him, their face not too far away from his own. He knew that face, and he knew that expression, but the two felt as if they belonged to different people. It was difficult to call their expression one of concern. It looked too indifferent...
“You,” he croaked. His voice sounded strange, like it hadn't been used in years. Maybe it hadn't.
The other straightened up but continued to look down at him. “How do you feel?”
Komaeda would have rather he asked if he was alright. Though, in his present state, it might've felt like an insult to assume he was capable of feeling alright. Whatever he was, he wasn't alright. He was sweating all over, he was hungry, his body hurt, his mind was an over-packed mess, and he couldn't think. There was a sense of hysteria loitering around the edge of his consciousness that was just waiting to attack him. There were too many thoughts in his head, and whenever he tried to focus on one of them, his mind would uncontrollably switch to another thought, never letting him stay in one place.
He remembered what happened.
When he looked down at his body, he could see. He wasn't bleeding anymore, and for all he knew, that had just been a dream, but his left hand was certainly missing. There was a white bandage where it should've been, wrapped tightly around the end of his arm.
“I'm... Why am I...”
That was the question that took precedence above the others. Even if the lance and the poison had somehow been in his imagination, Komaeda was sure that his body was in no condition otherwise to continue sustaining him.
“It wasn't your time to die.”
That... might not have been a lie. The things he experienced before waking had already disappeared from his mind, but Komaeda remembered the feeling of teetering on the brink of death.
It would have been easier to accept death than to wake up and face the world that didn't want him, though. The one near him looked like who he wanted to see, but he wasn't the same, so what was the point?
If he didn't exist anymore for him to tell his feelings to, then there was not a single thing for him to live for. Hope must have been just a word to obsess over. It had been a sweet-sounding distraction.
Komaeda moved his head and looked around, creating a quick picture of the room for himself. He was in a hospital bed and his arms were resting over the sheet that was pulled up to his middle. Feeling like he'd seen enough to get a sense of his surroundings and situation, he put his head back and stared at the ceiling. The light from the window still hurt his eyes.
“I shouldn't still be alive...” That was the simplest way of saying it, but hearing the words out loud made the ache inside of him intensify. The cracks at the edge of his mind began to grow. He was there when he shouldn't have been, and he didn't know what he was supposed to do. He didn't belong. “I was supposed to die there. I was supposed to become Hope. You all... Y-you all...”
They were Despair. He knew that. He remembered as much.
His goal was to save the one person who had nothing to do with them and their vileness, but in the end, that must have been for nothing. It was like he'd done nothing at all.
The others... Were they alive, too? He didn't know whether he should've felt relieved or furious.
He just felt sick. His skin felt hot and clammy at the same time, his brow damp with sweat. It was getting harder to breathe. As he desperately tried to force away the approaching feelings of anxiety, he grasped his left arm in his right and dug his nails into the bandage until he could feel them in his skin. The pain it gave him helped to distract him a little, but it wasn't nearly enough.
“What is... What became of the world?” He choked on violent words his heart didn't want to let him say. “You shouldn't be here. You're Despair too, aren't you? Then why...?”
The other just looked at him in that frustratingly indifferent way. It wasn't until that moment that Komaeda noticed that there was something else that was different about him. His eyes seemed strange. He wasn't like Komaeda remembered. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to have a better look at them. He turned away from him and went to a small table near the side of the bed and picked something up.
“It will be too difficult to explain with you in hysterics,” he said.
Despite the inexplicable feeling he felt when he heard his voice, Komaeda's body still struggled to resist him as his right arm was grasped. His body was too weak to fight, though. A needle slid through the fragile skin of his arm, and as soon as he was released, he began to feel more calm.
It must have been some kind of sedative or tranquilizer. Despite the thoughts that were still rampaging, the rest of him began to relax. Sooner than he was comfortable with, even his mind became quieter until it was difficult for him to focus on one thing for long enough to feel distressed. Komaeda wanted to curse him for manipulating his body that way, but at least it took away some of the pain.
Like before, if he hoped to survive, he had to look for the little things.
...If he hoped to survive?
He could've sworn that he wanted to die. Try as he might to focus on that thought, though, it was already being pushed out of his mind, deemed too upsetting to think about.
Instead, Komaeda looked back up at him – at his unusual eyes of two different colors. “You... You were the one they experimented on. I remember. I met you.”
“Correct,” he said. “Do you feel foolish for thinking I was talentless now?”
That wasn't good. The voice that had called for him sounded an awful lot like him. The two seemed to share a face. That couldn't have just been some kind of coincidence. The truth was right there in front of him, but it was difficult to accept it.
He'd gotten ahead of himself and made a big mistake. He should've died for it.
“If you're... Then... H...” He didn't want to say his name.
“I am Hinata Hajime.”
It sounded so convincing when Komaeda heard him say it with that voice, with that face, but he was still uncertain, no matter how true it appeared to be. Admitting it would have been the same as acknowledging his foolishness. Normally, that was something that would have come naturally to him, but then he'd never made a mistake that big before. “Is that the truth?” he asked, watching his face. “Are you sure?”
An unfamiliar look of confusion quickly appeared on his face before vanishing just as quickly. Komaeda had caught it, though.
If he was the one called Kamukura Izuru, then would he have made that face? Would he have looked so hurt to be doubted?
Komaeda was afraid that that was just wishful thinking.
“I was waiting for you, Komaeda.”
His words pierced him like arrows, straight through the heart. He was a fool again for even feeling so emotional, for trusting him when he gave him no proof, but that pathetic little glimmer of hope stuck in his heart was still trying to survive. “Why? Why would you wait for someone like me? I should be dead... You should've let me die...”
He should've. Upon awakening, there were already too many questions with too many answers he didn't want to hear. He was afraid to find out why Hinata looked like Kamukura.
Though their meeting had been brief, Komaeda's heart had beat fast for him when he saw him for the first time, but he and Hinata couldn't have been more different. Hinata was supposed to be just a regular, worthless reserve course student; totally average in every way. That was who Komaeda wanted to see. He was still angry. He was frustrated.
He missed him.
“You got the 'traitor', you know. I wonder if that was your aim or if it was just your luck. Only you could pull off a stunt like that. Regardless of whatever your intentions were, my present self is somewhat impressed.” He folded his arms over his chest calmly, looking thoughtful. “I was able to survive because of you and your luck. Was that what you wanted? Do you still think your luck is so terrible that you would rather die?'
It was hard to say. For a change, there were things that seemed more pressing than his luck.
“...I wanted to be free from it. But it looks like I'm still... lucky.”
“No. You're alive because I kept you alive.”
Komaeda didn't know what Hinata was getting at. He had to be alive because of his luck. There was no other logical explanation. It found a way to work ironically once again and was forcing him to face one of the people he'd tried to kill. He absolutely should've been dead. There was no telling how long he'd been asleep, but based on the way he felt, it must have been a long time. In that amount of time, his illnesses would have worn him thin. His luck must have preserved him.
“I operated on you and ran treatments while you were comatose. Once you rest, you ought to notice an improvement in your condition.”
...That hadn't been what he was expecting to hear.
If that was true, then there wasn't much reason remaining to question who Hinata said he was. He looked like Hinata. He sounded like Hinata. Yet, he was also talented enough to treat terminal illness?
They had to be the same person. Hinata was the one they experimented on...
It made a frightening amount of sense. If he'd forgotten about everything that happened at Hope's Peak, then it only made sense that Hinata would have forgotten, too. At one point, he had been that worthless reserve course student, but he wasn't anymore.
Komaeda didn't know what to think about that. He didn't know what it meant. The person next to him suddenly felt like someone he was totally unfamiliar with. Was he still the Hinata who listened to him when no one else would? Or was he that person who stared at him analytically from the other end of a gun?
Either way, it didn't matter.
It didn't matter.
As the threads that sewed together his tattered heart began to come loose, he tried to convince himself of that again. It was better to have no expectations, to assume that there was no person who loved him or thought him special. He didn't want to live if living meant being alone, but if he thought that way, then it would've been easier to swallow the fact that he was alive.
“What's the point in living?” Komaeda muttered. His eyes felt like they wanted to close on their own, but he kept them open and focused on Hinata. “You haven't told me why I'm here. If it wasn't my luck that kept me alive, then why keep me here? For what purpose?” The thought of that question alone was enough to make his eyes sting with tears. “I have nothing. I... I am nothing. Aren't you just spiting me by forcing me to live?”
A stray tear escaped and rolled down Komaeda's cheek, dampening the pillow under his head. He'd never felt so humiliated and he was in no position to salvage his dignity.
That look returned to Hinata's face; confused and hurt. “I already told you, though. I waited for you. I wanted to see you again.”
“Don't insult me with nonsense.” He was angry, but he couldn't raise his voice. “The only constant and reliable thing in this world is despair. There's no hope for me. There's no point in me being here at all. I couldn't do a single thing right.”
Hope was just a dream he'd used to placate himself. With his last breath, he thought he would've finally set himself free and become useful at the same time, but he'd been stupid to think that he could take control of his own life. When luck was constantly watching him, the ability to direct his life was simply out of his reach.
He couldn't even die properly. The terrible part was that he still remembered how painful it had been, but experiencing that all over again would have been better than facing the fact that he was alone.
He couldn't die... And even if he wanted to, he probably couldn't hurt Hinata.
No...
Even if he could, he couldn't. No matter how strongly he resented him, he couldn't hurt him.
“I hate you...” Blurring his eyes, more tears gathered and fell down his cheeks. “I... I hate you...”
He was worthless and he was a liar, but maybe if he made Hinata hate him, he would've pitied him enough to finish him.
“I'm sorry, Komaeda. I was greedy. I didn't want to let you go. I didn't want that to be the last time I ever saw you.”
“What are you saying?”
“I don't know.” Hinata put the heel of his palm to his forehead and closed his eyes, looking like he was trying to figure that out for himself. Emotions had seemed like an unfamiliar concept to Kamukura, Hope's Peak's otherwise perfect specimen. If they were the same, then he may have still found it difficult to understand what he was feeling or how to feel at all. That was what the little glimmer inside of Komaeda wanted to believe. He'd done a good job of ignoring it until that point.
One of Hinata's hands reached out toward him. Frozen, Komaeda only watched as his hand was placed against his cheek. Gently, Hinata's thumb brushed away the tears on his face. The look he wore was hard to read, but Komaeda interpreted it as curiosity.
“Komaeda... How do you feel about me?”
That had to be a trick question.
“I...” Komaeda hated himself for being unable to say it convincingly. “I hate you...”
It really hurt to say that. Komaeda imagined his little glimmer of hope growing dim and fading away.
Hinata stared at him, still analyzing. The look in his eyes said a thousand things yet nothing at all, and even when his expression changed, Komaeda wasn't able to feel at ease. “That's too bad,” Hinata said, adopting a gentle smile, palm cradling Komaeda's cheek. “I think I love you.”
If that was a lie, it was the cruelest lie of all, but as the seconds drew on with neither of them speaking, with Hinata adding no further thoughts, without him taking it back, Komaeda began to believe him. The small hope inside of him overflowed and spilled out, making more tears fall from his eyes. Suddenly, he didn't care how shameful he looked. He weakly lifted his arms and Hinata moved in, letting him wrap them around his shoulders.
It really did matter after all. He wanted someone to love him. He'd waited with a hopeless hope, wishing that someone would hear him even if he said nothing. After he'd spent so long searching, there was one person who heard him, who still reached out to him and took his hand even after he'd pushed them away, who pulled him out of that dark place.
All Komaeda could do was cry as he realized that he would have erased that person had he gotten his way.
“I'm sorry,” he said. The pain he felt in his heart was numb but there. Feeling the warm and surprisingly gentle touch of Hinata's hands on his back just made him cry harder and apologize more profusely. “I'm sorry, Hinata-kun.”
Hinata eased away from him but stayed close, reassuringly rubbing one of his shoulders. “There are things I regret, too. I'm sorry. I should have realized sooner how important you are. I look forward to telling you all about how bored I've been.”
“Really? Has it been that bad without me?” Komaeda asked, his voice sounding tearful and stuffy.
“It's been tolerable.” That didn't sound bad nor good. Whatever it was, it wasn't enough to hurt Komaeda's feelings. “As sure as I was that you would wake up, I felt an unpleasant kind of uncertainty as I waited. I think I've had enough of that feeling for one lifetime. So please, do your best to regain your health. Stay alive. ...Please.”
His voice may have sounded like Kamukura's, but he blushed just like Hinata.
“I think I... must have misjudged you.” From the beginning and even then.
The person in front of him was a very mysterious person. Hinata wasn't exactly who Komaeda thought he was, but he liked him, whoever he was.
“It's alright,” Hinata said, straightening up. “I'm glad you're back.”
“Yeah.” For once, from the bottom of his heart, Komaeda was able to say, “I'm glad to be here.”