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Mukuro begins to think twice about staying with Maizono all night in that bathroom.
It’s not like the two of them got up to anything scandalous—no, a thought like that hadn’t even crossed her mind until she’d heard Monokuma’s voice that morning over the announcements that spilled in from the hallway, and her immediate thought was that Junko never saw her leave the restroom after their conversation last night. She hasn’t yet gotten a moment alone with Monokuma, considering all the events that unfolded this morning, but she can already hear the teasing and every last comment that Junko could possibly make at her expense.
(And she’d allow it—in this case, the point of this joke is that Mukuro would never be so lucky to have an encounter like that. She wouldn’t want to, anyway. There are bigger concerns on her mind, always.)
Maizono anxiously looks at her, covering her wrist in the sling with her uninjured arm. “Should we go?”
The other students are filing out of the cafeteria already. She doesn’t realize she’s holding a breath in until a particularly devastated-looking Kuwata dips out through the doors, fists clenched and his face flushed with an emotion that Mukuro can’t quite place. It could be anger. It could be embarrassment. It could be anything, really.
It hadn’t quite occurred to her until this morning that she inadvertently stopped a murder by staying with Maizono last night. No, more than that.
She directly got involved with one.
Mukuro should not have done that. As Junko’s right-hand man, that is not her job—she’s supposed to do the opposite, subtly pushing her peers towards getting the Killing Game started. She should have put the pieces together and left, but her curiosity got the best of her.
And now Maizono is looking at her like she’s saved her life.
(Well, she did. That’s the bad thing.)
She sighs, checking her acrylic nails like they’re something particularly interesting. “I guess so,” she says, slipping back into the portrayal of her sister. “That bear’s probably gonna have our heads on sticks if we disobey. He was already pissed, so…”
As the both of them were divulging the modified events of last night, Monokuma slipped into the cafeteria and went on his own little angry rampage about no blood being spilled. Mukuro had the feeling that his words were directed towards her, but he made no direct indication of so. She could tell, though. She knows when Junko is mad at her.
But she has to face her, alongside everyone facing Monokuma.
Maizono glances towards the door. “Okay. Let’s go, then.”
The two of them are the last to enter the gymnasium, and Sayaka’s head is lowered as she ignores the stares of some of her peers. Mukuro watches from a careful distance. Nobody is looking at her with the sort of disdain that she kept stressing about—no, Mukuro only sees those sad expressions of pity. If they had the full truth that Maizono told her last night, they wouldn’t quite be as pitiful.
(Mukuro herself doesn’t pity Maizono much. She’s always been ambitious, always fought for what she deserved—not in the physical sense, but there weren’t many personal limits she had. In her own words, she worked too hard for everything to go away with her dying. She needed to live.)
It’s around now that Mukuro realizes that if she spilled the truth at breakfast instead of helping her cover up the truth of the events, then the atmosphere would be much different.
Instead, she realizes that the notably hard stare that Mukuro feels is Kuwata. He’s staring right at her, something conflicted in his eyes. She expertly moves herself so that Maizono isn’t in his view at all.
She’s not quite sure why she’s sticking by Maizono’s side like this. It doesn’t matter. For all the disappointment she is, she knows what’s coming next—the next part of her and Junko’s plans for the killing game. Her current plans to push the game ongoing have been pretty futile; there isn’t a lot she can do without revealing more about her identity that she’s meant to know.
But that’s about to change.
Monokuma shows up, as if on cue.
“What the fuck is the meaning of this!?” shouts Owada, taking one step in the direction of the bear.
“Don’t even think about it!” chirps Monokuma, waving his paw in his direction dismissively. “You don’t wanna tempt a bear! I’ll maul your face off!”
The memory of the bomb seems to return to him, and he takes a step back.
“Out with it already,” demands Togami, crossing his arms and staring him down. As usual, there’s a grin on his face, his teeth an unnerving shade of white. “If there is a new rule you wish to announce, get on with it. Nobody has any time to waste.”
“Wh-What’s your problem, man?” says Kuwata, rubbing his neck. “What are you in a rush for?”
Togami shoots a pointed glare in his direction. “The game is already afoot, isn’t it?”
“The game?” he parrots.
“The game,” Yamada chimes in, pushing up his glasses.
He’s about to say something further, and it appears that Togami realizes it, because he continues before the conversation can be derailed. “The killing game. I would think that the man who got it started for all of us would know what box he’s opened, wouldn’t he?”
Kuwata tenses, and his voice cracks and grows desperate as he says, “I didn’t attack her first—!”
“Save your stories and your accusations!” interrupts Monokuma, clasping his paws together and dancing across the stage in movements that vaguely resemble ballet or something of the sort. “Especially because a murder hasn’t even happened yet! So, like, I dunno what game you’re talking about.” Monokuma hops onto the ground, pulling out a monopad from behind his back. Mukuro has no idea where on his person it could have been stored, but she doesn’t question it. “But hey, at least someone is eager!”
“What kind of sane person could possibly be eager in this situation!?” exclaims Asahina. She side-glances at both Kuwata and Togami. “Besides those two, anyway.”
As Kuwata makes an interjection again, Maizono skirts closer to Naegi. Thus, Mukuro follows suit.
“What a mess,” Naegi mumbles, looking back at Monokuma.
Maizono’s expression betrays much more than she says. She glances at Mukuro, and she tries to manage a smile of some kind to reassure her. (Smiling isn’t really her strong suit, and she can’t help but think she looks awful smiling—but maybe it’s the thought that counts, because Maizono does relax.)
“I-I have a bad feeling,” Maizono says, looking back down at the floor.
Naegi tilts his head. “About?”
“About this. I just… I don’t feel good about anything, right now.”
“Anyway,” Monokuma interrupts the bickering again, this time a lot more annoyed. “Jeez, you squabbling teenagers oughta invest this energy into something more productive! Something more entertaining!”
And that quiets the arguing.
Kirigiri is the next to speak up, raising an eyebrow. “Is one motive not enough to inspire us?”
“No, no, no!” Monokuma raises his robot arms into the air, then begins to pace back and forth. “Although, I suppose there is the rising crisis of teenagers with awful attention spans… Oh, you don’t mean to say you’ve already forgotten what your videos are about!? Ungrateful children, the lot of you! They’re your families!”
Hagakure shakes his head, resting one hand on his back in an easy-going fashion. “You know, guys, I think we should go along with whatever this little guy is saying,” he says, a stupid grin crossing his face. “Hope’s Peak sure has some weird humor, but I guess rich people are just like that.”
Togami scoffs. “Don’t lump me in with whatever is controlling that thing.”
(Naegi quietly makes some remark to himself; “How could he possibly still think this is a joke…? It’s been days.”
To which Mukuro shrugs. “Some guys have to have it spelled out for them.”)
“But ah, phooey!” Monokuma continues. “It’s only been a day since the motives have been released, so you never know! There could always be someone around you in waiting… plotting to kill another one of you… all to get home to their loved ones! Go, go! Beat them to the punch!”
He begins to hop up and down, gushing about the inevitable murders that are to occur.
“Oh, the thrill of killing for love! And trust me, even though it doesn’t seem like it, everyone here has someone they left behind… Hopefully, you won’t be too late!” His words hang in the air, and then he relaxes into a neutral position. “Well, most of you do.”
And it seems like Monokuma is staring directly in her direction as he says that.
Mukuro stares back, swallowing dryly.
The moment doesn’t last too long, lest their peers begin to catch wind. “But, but!” Monokuma finally reaches the end of his speech by leading into the topic he’s called them all here for. “It’s not so simple as—whoosh! slash! stab! stab!—because that’d be too easy and way too boring! So, this is just a courteous reminder to my favorite students that you have to get away with your crime.”
Ogami cautiously asks, “In what way do you mean?”
And that’s when Mukuro knows the moment to shine is incoming. She stiffens as Monokuma launches into the explanation of the class trials, something that she knows all the ins and outs of by this point. Junko did most of the planning for the rules and formatting for the class trials, but she’d spilled out all the ideas while Mukuro helped construct the trial room below the school.
Maizono’s eyes are on her, she realizes. Mukuro looks at her, and she looks away. Naegi looks at her quizzically, mouthing an “is she okay?”—but she doesn’t pay any mind to either of them right now.
When she looks up at Monokuma, she clears her throat quietly before leaping into her practiced interjection. “Hey, wait just a damn minute!”
To which Monokuma tilts his body to the side a little, pressing a paw against his mouth curiously. “Hmm? Hm? What’s up?”
(Maizono and Naegi startle next to her. “What are you doing?” the former whisper-yells, reaching for her arm with her non-injured hand.)
Mukuro steps forward before Maizono can stop her. “You’re freaking insane, you know that? A class trial? What the hell even is that!?”
Monokuma shakes his head, disappointed. “This is what I was saying about you teenagers! You’re never paying attention!”
Ishimaru tries to step in, “Enoshima-san, I don’t think—!”
“Shut up! I want nothing to do with this!” she shouts, boots stomping across the gymnasium floor towards the bear in front of the stage. There had been an empty semi-circle of sorts that nobody dared to breach when entering the gymnasium, just by proxy of not wanting to be in explosion range. “I’m done, you hear me!? I never agreed to this!”
“You don’t want to participate in my class trial? The one I’ve worked so hard to prepare for you lot?” Monokuma emulates the energy of a kicked puppy as he says this, somehow managing to look completely saddened without moving many of his facial features. Then, his expression shifts to one of anger. “That’s a shame! Only a punishment awaits behavior like this!”
The gymnasium goes dead quiet at his words. Mukuro, unwavering in her role, pushes forward. “Punishment?”
“Punishment, indeed!” he confirms, twirling around. “I’ll throw you in a cage, leave you without food for days… Something real dungeon-style, y’know!? Better watch yourself!”
“I said shut up!”
And then Mukuro kicks Monokuma, planting her foot directly on top of him.
(Behind her, she can hear her classmates errupt into various remarks yelling at her, reminding her about the rule, about the bomb, about everything that’s already transpired. Most of them begin to back up in advance, as if they’ve all forgotten just how large the radius of Monokuma’s bombs are.
In the corner of her eye, she sees Naegi pulling at Maizono’s shoulder on her good side. “M-Maizono-san—”
“Enoshima-san!” she screams, pulling herself away from Naegi’s hold. “She’s— She’s going to get hurt!”)
“Gonna stay quiet now?” she asks, egging Monokuma on. She’s practiced for this moment.
Monokuma tilts his body just a little, movements limited by the bottom of Mukuro’s boot. “Are you gonna stay quiet?”
“What?”
“Violence against Headmaster Monokuma is not allowed…”
(Naegi wraps his arms around Maizono, forcefully trying to pull her back. “You’re already injured! Stop it, please!”
“Let go of me, Naegi-kun!” Maizono yells, thrashing around. It’s not like Naegi is very strong, but her injured state keeps her from being able to put fight him off immediately. Then, she desperately turns to the rest of their class—“Someone do something!”
But all the physically-capable members of their class stand their grounds, a healthy distance away from Junko’s transgression.)
“You’ve violated the school regulations… and will now face punishment!”
He raises his little robotic arms into the air, waving them around rapidly.
(Maizono breaks free of Naegi’s arms, stepping on his foot to get him to release her. He yelps, but quickly bounces back from the pain when he realizes she’s running.
She’s running towards Junko.)
“I invoke the mighty summon spell! Help! To me, godly spear Gungnir!”
In that very moment, a thought of confusion crosses Mukuro’s mind. Junko never said anything about spears.
“Maizono-san!” Naegi yells, chasing after Maizono into the empty semi-circle.
Then, Mukuro feels something hit her—it sends her flying a distance away from Monokuma, her body colliding with the ground and the wind seemingly knocking itself out of her lungs. She gasps for air.
Maizono has landed on top of her, her eyes filled with tears. Mukuro realizes she’s rammed herself into her, despite her injured wrist.
But she doesn’t have time to react to that.
From the ground, she sees spears spring up in front of Monokuma.
Where Mukuro had just been standing.
Where Maizono tackled her to save her life.
(Asahina shrieks first, followed by a chorus of various freaked out responses from students who have never seen someone die in front of them.)
Where Naegi was in the middle of running through before the spears come up.
He freezes up completely, looking down to see why he seems to be suddenly suspended in the air. His arms tremble, one hand outstretched as if he were trying to grab onto Maizono all this time. Somehow, with what can only be described as the worst luck imaginable, all ten spears that sprung up from the ground have pierced through his body, one way or another. His arms, his legs, his torso—and one even grazes his cheek, drawing a large wound over the left side of his face.
It feels like time has stopped.
Mukuro doesn’t remember the last time a death has freaked her out like this. She’s so used to seeing blood, to hear the squelching of flesh as it’s pierced and as limbs are skewered. In fact, she’s seen worse ways to go out—she’s seen other Hope’s Peak Academy students go out in more horrible ways in the very first Mutual Killing Game, she’s seen bodies get mangled and rendered unrecognizable in real time during her time in Fenrir, she’s seen the bodies of Reserve Course students who committed suicide crumple like paper balls at the bottom of the Main Course building.
But it’s mainly the expression on Naegi’s face that kills her.
And his voice.
His shaking, pained voice.
“I-I don’t…”
He coughs, and his face scrunches up as the spear going through his torso drives further upward. Red blood spews out of his mouth and onto the wood, covering the Hope’s Peak Academy logo on the floor in the gymnasium.
His eyes gloss over, looking over at her and Maizono and the ground.
“I just… w-wanted…” Naegi struggles to form any sentences. “I didn’t want…”
A deafening gasp marks his last breath.
Suddenly, the spears release themselves from the ground, remaining buried deep into Naegi’s small strature. With nothing to hold him up, he falls forward onto the floor into the blood puddle that’s already started to form. Some of it splashes, and it lands on the two girls right next to him.
Beside Mukuro, Maizono clasps one hand over her mouth, her eyes shot open wide.
But that’s not what Mukuro is thinking about. No, her mind is far, far away from anyone in this room.
Her eyes are on Monokuma, who hopped up to his feet at some point in the middle of all this, dusting himself off despite no blood splashing onto him. Then, he turns and stares right at Mukuro.
She utters the name quietly, her voice quivering in a way she hasn’t heard from herself before.
“Junko?”