This was my first fic that I ever actually wrote. Or more specifically, Rotary is the first...
Rotary [NDRV3/Tokyo Ghoul]
- Thread starter Hyacinthium
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Opening Post With Information
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
This was my first fic that I ever actually wrote. Or more specifically, Rotary is the first fanfic project/series that I ever made. Glycon is the first installment. In fact, April 23rd was the one year anniversary of Glycon. There's a lot of thought put into this series. Even betaing. Because of all that and wanting to get used to SV again... I'm going to post it separately from my assorted fic thread. Which I made while drunk. I should probably check up on that.
Before I do anything else I'll state right now that the whole series was a lot of firsts for me. I'm aware that it needs re-writing and plan on replaying the game before anything else. So while I'd love feedback, absolutely, you need to know that this series is essentially on hiatus. The things that inspired other were the imminent death of my grandmother and a friendship. Both of which are no longer an influence. I'm not sure if I'll ever write for the main plot if Rotary ever again. Likewise that friend was my beta and also we dated. It's complicated =0.
Please keep that in mind.
For Glycon the warnings are: Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, Panic Attacks. The following spoiler contains actual spoilers:
The summary of the series itself is this, "Snakes like to swallow their own tails. Except they don't."
So let me get on to explaining that, by posting my fic. It is unedited from its state on Ao3 for the sake of preservation. I will post it after this post.
Before I do anything else I'll state right now that the whole series was a lot of firsts for me. I'm aware that it needs re-writing and plan on replaying the game before anything else. So while I'd love feedback, absolutely, you need to know that this series is essentially on hiatus. The things that inspired other were the imminent death of my grandmother and a friendship. Both of which are no longer an influence. I'm not sure if I'll ever write for the main plot if Rotary ever again. Likewise that friend was my beta and also we dated. It's complicated =0.
Please keep that in mind.
For Glycon the warnings are: Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, Panic Attacks. The following spoiler contains actual spoilers:
As this is a work including setting details of Tokyo Ghoul being used to create an AU for New Dangan Ronpa V3, content warnings native to both series apply and I urge you to research those warnings. This includes those in the tags. Examples being cannibalism, [mentions of] death, blood and gore; and the mindscrew elements. Further warnings for this work that were not explicitly in the tags for the purpose of avoiding spoilers are; implied suicide near the end, a character time looping, low self esteem and self blame due to various factors. If you cannot handle the initial warnings and the ones in this note, then for the sake of your safety and or simply comfort, please do not read.
The summary of the series itself is this, "Snakes like to swallow their own tails. Except they don't."
So let me get on to explaining that, by posting my fic. It is unedited from its state on Ao3 for the sake of preservation. I will post it after this post.
Glycon
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Weeks into the Dating Game, Kokichi notices that Shuichi has been acting suspicious lately, and starts following him around when possible. One night Shuichi seems to be making his move by sneaking off to the kitchen, causing Kokichi to follow him in order to investigate. What he discovers is neither Shuichi eating a midnight snack of leftovers nor setting up a murder.
It's been two weeks since the 'Dating Game' show started. Two weeks since Ouma Kokichi and fifteen other student with Ultimate talents were kidnapped and tossed into what must be the most asinine should-be-illegal situation possible. By a family of fake bears that were originally aiming to run a killing game show. The entire farce of an opening ceremony was scripted to the point of pain-inducing boredom. The crappy references made by the father bear were actually annoying too.
The implications were not so great. Just waking up and exploring before the big event in the gym had made Kokichi feel like he'd been stuck in the damn school forever.
While most of the other students had taken an approach of any game not about killing being a good game, the original ten day mark had no duo close enough to graduate. The general game plan had been to spend at least one date with every student and go from there. Said plan ended up working too well. Instead of the audience feeling bored by how slow the dating was going, the voyeurs became enraptured just by seeing everyone build 'friend-ships' in addition to forced romantic inclinations brought on by a stressful situation.
The result was Monokuma announcing an extension and the introduction of an actual friendship measuring gimmick. Before that, Kokichi had admittedly been... relaxed. Or maybe just not on edge enough. It wasn't a killing game after all.
But Monokuma had proven that the game could be changed. Oh, sure, it had just been an extension and implementing a way to measure friendship; it also proved that if the audience wanted something then it got what it wanted.
Kokichi had more important things to do than spend every waking moment of his time trying to trick his brain into loving someone. There was an entire school to investigate. An entire situation needed to be investigated.
There was zero way that Kokichi could possibly just relax anymore. Monokuma often says or makes allusions to the killing game mode still being on the cards too. All of which is between mind numbing references.
He does genuinely like all of his fellow prisoners though. And there was no way he'd let the audience think that he's boring either. So he goes on the dates requested of him, happily socializes with everyone, and generally tries to balance protecting himself with getting close to the others. That isn't to say that Kokichi doesn't get prickles of annoyance or unease with some of them, and he does get what could be described as kneejerk emotional responses to the others and seemingly irrational things. He simply makes sure to battle those occasional and uncalled for reactions that like to pop up on. Kokichi has experience in masking his genuine feelings by exaggerating them or simply acting.
That's during the day, however. Night is when Kokichi uncovers his whiteboard and skulks around the academy grounds. He would poke around during daylight hours as well, but it's never as dedicated- beyond keeping track of people. Only when the majority is sleeping does Kokichi feel secure enough to scout out the various oddities within their home-dome.
For instance, the hidden door in the library. That high-tech and very much locked fridge tucked away in the kitchen corner. All of the labs.
Kokichi has done these things even before that hope killing adjustment to the game. Now the activities have become like a self given duty instead of curiosity and worry.
Almost everyone has a normal and fairly set pattern of daily life, and trends make sure that necessary divergences are easy to account for.
Which is why the sudden and consistent change in behavior of Saihara Shuichi is such a huge concern.
Throughout their time here, Shuichi had gone above and beyond in reaching out to everyone, and Kokichi couldn't help but be unusually fond of the Ultimate Detective. It wasn't something like a crush that could be acted upon by placing a cutesy handwritten letter in a locker. Doing so would even be in horrible taste considering that everyone woke up in lockers after being kidnapped.
Kokichi likes pranks and jokes, but he didn't think that that would be his style.
The fact that Shuichi tries so hard is difficult to ignore. Turning on Kokichi's monopad would instantly reveal that he was closer to Shuichi than anyone else. No one else enjoys or tolerates Kokichi's lies or humor to the extent that Shuichi does. No one else here smiles or so earnestly attempts to piece together his contractions into a coherent puzzle.
So Shuichi starting to act suspiciously at night and such is deeply disturbing. It's probably just bias showing through, but Kokichi keeps coming back to the killing game to the point of a minor obsession.
The problem is that it's so easy to assume that someone might get hasty and paranoid enough to end up killing someone. As time passes, Kokichi keeps thinking of a whole host of how-who-whys about it. Someone could want to kill off the, extremely likely to exist in Kokichi's opinion, student plant by setting a trap. And that's just one example.
It might not even be wanting to hurt another student. Their daily life is a situation that Kokichi can easily see driving someone to self harm. One student is already lacking a strong will to live.
Everything could go wrong and probably will at some point. All Kokichi can do is aim to prevent these things.
When someone who could maybe become his friend someday is acting abnormally, then Kokichi is absolutely going to spy on that person's sudden interest in casing the kitchen- aka the place with all the knives.
Shuichi is one of the smartest people around- and the Ultimate Detective besides. He could do anything.
That was the gist of Kokichi's thoughts three days ago. Shuichi has been acting odd for a total of five days now. The detective has been so visibly affected by this change in behavior that people other than Kokichi have noticed, and questioned the detective's dip in appearance, but nothing has improved. Shit, Kokichi is honestly worried that Shuichi really will do something now. The self-aware reminders of 'hey you act suspicious too' are laying in the background of Kokichi's brain.
The habitual prankster has taken to following Shuichi around at night for these past three days. While the detective has often shown a few signs of awareness, Shuichi's own stake out of the kitchen seems to be aimed at making sure he knows when the kitchen will be utterly empty. Honestly speaking, Kokichi hadn't been dead set being 100% hidden those times either.
Kokichi is extremely good at being undetected after all! Why, in another world, he might even have been the Ultimate Phantom Thief. Alas.
Patiently waiting for Shuichi to actually make his move and go into the kitchen is child's play. Waiting a good few minutes for Shuichi to feel safe enough to act is a little less enjoyable though. Kokichi heads inside with a chill down his spine.
Maybe Shuichi will just be binge eating on a midnight snack. Stocking up on midnight snacks. Shuichi will be embarrassed and confused, Kokichi will be embarrassed and backpedal, and the next day they'll both laugh it off.
What Kokichi sees when he waltzing inside like he rules the place is this;
The electronically locked fridge in the corner is open just enough for Kokichi to see uncooked meat in various containers and packages. Shuichi is crouched on his knees near it, red tinged fingers plucking slices of meat from a ziplock bag.
The instinctively familiar metallic-sweet scent is strong enough that Kokichi can smell it from across the room.
Shuichi is there for a midnight snack- one of raw flesh.
Saihara Shuichi, Ultimate Detective, sitting on the floor gorging on the bloody substance with one of his eyes turned black and red.
For a moment the two of them just stare at one another.
Kokichi lets the sight of eyes and hands be seared into his memory before Shuichi can slam the refrigerator fully shut. The crimson handprint left behind is almost ironic.
Even once the detective- the ghoul- does so, it can't erase the single monstrous eye glaring out of the socket it calls home. Smeared blood dripping over his lips and painting his hands. There's nothing that could possibly twist the truth here. Saihara Shuichi is one of those man eating beast hiding in human skin, a ghoul. He was eating humans just now, that meat belonging to people, and he has the audacity to look scared. Like it's Kokichi's fault.
Saihara breaks gazes first, head lowering to face the bits of remaining human flesh in their sad little bag. His fists clench and his shoulders shake- but he remains silent. By all means, the ghoul seems to be conflicted by what he's going to do. At least that much about Shuichi was real.
It isn't fair.
Kokichi knows that he's going to die now. There's no way that Saihara will just let him go off and tell all the others about this, even if Kokichi swears not to tell anyone. Ghouls don't survive by being stupid. Ghouls don't survive being Ultimates and working closely with the police by letting just any unlucky human keep their secret.
Saihara doesn't really know him and he certainly doesn't like him. A handful of 'dates' on a kidnapping romance show does not make anything. It never does.
This isn't fair, a voice in his head cries out.
He can't breathe or hear or feel anything other than the burning in his eyes- but Kokichi tries to escape anyway. A ringing in his head is helping to send him into a panic, but Kokichi is beyond caring. There's almost a chance that sufficient hassle will make Saihara kill him faster.
Kokichi is going to die and suffer and then Shumai is going to eat him up until nothing is left like he's cattle- kokcihiisgoingnotaginnotgainwhynotlasttimeidont-
Various weights wrap around Kokichi in the form of hot ribbons, but instead of crushing or puncturing him they layer over one another, and carry him back towards their owner and further still. The special predatory organ of a ghoul. Kokichi tries to scream. He's met by the pathetic sound of his voice being muffled by the flat kagune covering his mouth. Unable to act and unwilling to watch himself be killed by Saihara, he clenches his wet eyes shut instead.
"Ouma-kun, please stop." The other's worried voice sends a pang of fear down his spine. Why does he have to sound so sad? How can Saihara sound so remorseful when it's Kokichi that's about to be murdered? "Please- stop moving and listen to me. I'm not going to hurt you!"
It's not fair if you're the one who lies. It's not right that I can't do anything. It's not fair that this keeps happening!
The burning wetness in Kokichi's eyes breaks into ugly tears. He can feel his face grow heated and blotchy as broken sobs leak out of his mouth. No one will hear them. Arms touch his own briefly. They wrap around him and settle him into Saihara's lap like an unruly doll. Still no pain.
One trembling hand finds its way into Kokichi's hair and starts to slowly stroke his skull. A poor attempt at comfort.
Saihara speaks again. "Shhh. Everything will be fine. Just try to b-breathe, okay?"
Kokichi can't stand it. Why is Shuichi bothering with pointless niceties?
Comprehension hits near instantly. Saihara has been nothing but kind since they first woke up and met one another. He's polite, normally understanding, and likely has an above average moral fiber even as a ghoul. The moment the bears mentioned the killing game is just one moment where Saihara could have instantly killed every single human around him. He didn't. Up until now, this Saihara has been nothing but a good person.
The realization just makes Kokichi heave harder into the flat warmth of Saihara's stupid murder organ. Something like relief swirls down to join the pit in Kokichi's esophagus.
Shuichi wants Kokichi to die without pain or panic. For Kokichi to be something closer to happy or content. Like gently euthanizing a pet that has no idea that it would otherwise suffer from repeated cancer and waste away. So he's hugging him, murmuring useless words, while Kokichi drowns beneath sparse air and the taste of salt. He doesn't want Kokichi to die alone.
Why does one of them have to be a ghoul? Monokuma had said it didn't want a killing game so-
If the situation were different, Kokichi would say that the sudden nasal congestion is killing him. Depending on how different, he'd be trying making sure that Shuichi gets his meals from methods that aren't murder. But the situation is what it is and so he yells at himself instead. Kokichi is going to die because his paranoia and worry forced Shuichi to murder him. Since there's no way Monokuma won't capitalize on his death, so the killing game will start too.
He's ruined everything again.
"Hey, Kokichi..." Shuichi pats his shoulder. Is it because Kokichi isn't being as loud that Shuichi is asking something of him?
Opening his eyes, Kokichi is greeted by the sight of Shuichi staring down at him with a pinched expression. The detective truly looks as scared as Kokichi feels despite that one horrifying eye. Even then- both of them are crying. The kagune slowly shift Kokichi until they're no longer completely covering him, but merely preventing him from running away.
Both of them are crying. Another voice shouts out from the inside of Kokichi's head.
He shouldn't need to apologize for being about to die. And he doesn't, but it feels like he should. Apologize, in general.
The ghoul glances towards the kitchen doorway. "I'm going to uncover your mouth in a minute." The 'don't scream' is left unsaid.
There's not anyone to scream for.
Looking around more, Kokichi can see that the two of them are actually tucked into a corner near the bloodied fridge. A crevice if Kokichi considers the six limbs further shielding them from view. Shuichi's 'Kagune' really are akin to wide ribbons, the undersides pulsing with gold veins. The things would be beautiful if they didn't exist for the reasons they do. So that ghouls, Shuichi, could hunt people like prey. Kokichi has always wanted to see one.
The smooth surface over his lips lifts away just a centimeter before leaving his mouth free.
Kokichi could scream now, he could ask or say anything, but all that escapes him is a series of hiccups.
Somehow that prompts Shuchi to pull a handkerchief from a pants pocket and try to wipe his face clean. The soft cloth keeps patting Kokichi's cheeks even when he wiggles and turns his face away.
At least there's less snot on his face.
For the next few minutes they stay that way. Kokichi trying to stop sniffling and Shuichi too guilty to do anything but oblige the other boy with more reassurances. He must want to say something important, or for Kokichi to say anything, but instead the two remain in limbo; because Kokichi could not think of any words that might matter. Rather he could, but fears that trying to use them would result in a rambling mess. He doesn't want to open himself up to actually getting comfortable.
"I'm sorry," Shuichi murmurs.
A minute must pass before Kokichi finds his voice. "I f-followed you. This is- is my..."
"No Ouma-kun! That is," Shuichi hisses and immediately looks stricken when Kokichi tenses in his arms. "That's wrong. If you're going to say that anything about this is your fault, that's wrong."
Shuichi gulps. "I should have been more careful or less hasty. I could have waited longer and eaten more normal food than usual."
What.
"What?" The thought slips out in a wheeze.
Evidently, the reason for Kokichi's confusion is something that Shuichi picks up on right away. His lips thin and his eyes stray to the side. It's not exactly uncommon for people to be aware that ghouls can only eat humans. It's a biological obligation to consume human flesh, because eating anything else causes illness and weakens them if they don't puke it up. Tastes like shit too. Kokichi knows that coffee still tastes great at least.
Shuichi has always enjoyed nursing multiple cups of both his own and Kirumi's coffee throughout the day. Kokichi has joined him with tea cups that may or may not have actually contained panta. These intrusive thoughts really need to be stopped.
The detective decides to reach up and tap at his single changed eye instead of answering. But in a way, that's an answer in and of itself.
"Y-you aren't normal g... a normal ghoul. So you can really eat food."
Kokichi watches the other boy nod once. That explains the lack of suspicious bathroom breaks and the genuine love for cake at tea time.
So why is Shuichi smiling like his mutant status somehow solves everything? Like his only half an eye and ability to be humany- half. Kokichi had 'heard rumors' of humans and ghouls in relationships. He'd distantly heard about ghouls with one eye too, as far as someone could say he had. Ha. More emotional grumbling to grace the interior of his pounding head. Joins up nicely with the self disgust for that damned stutter.
It really wasn't fair.
"If you expect me to believe that you're some special amazing unicorn you can fuck off and just ki-kill me already." Kokichi says.
How Shuichi's face falls into total shock and desolation in less than a second is almost novel. Fair enough, seeing as Kokichi is similarly aghast at his own audacity. Why in the name of literally anything ever had he said that? Shuichi was being nice to him.
But no, shut up, Kokichi just wants it to be over already. Do not pass go. Move on from yet another failure and end it while you can. Life isn't fair and then you die.
Shuichi makes a prolonged exhale. Most likely going to kill me now, Kokichi thinks.
"I've never killed anyone, Ouma-kun. And I am absolutely not going to start with you."
Kokichi sneers. "Don't lie to me."
"This isn't a lie! I don't want to hurt you let alone kill you," The ghoul pulls Kokichi closer. "Hurting anyone just because of this is something I'd never do. You may not believe me, and have no reason to, but one of my parents is a human just like you. I've never killed anyone. I've never... I've never eaten someone that was murdered."
"So suicide or hospital stuff, then." Kokichi says. The reply he gets is low and breathless.
"Yeah."
Kokichi mulls over it. Really lets himself actually think and remember, half-knowingly nestling himself further into Shuichi's warmth, and feels the rush of emotion burbling back up his throat. Into his eyes. He's too exhausted to be mad about it.
The body he's parasitizing off of twitches.
"Ouma-kun? Do you need a minute or-"
"I don't want this." Kokichi can feel Shuichi lurch. "I don't want this again. It's not f-fair and I hate it and I can't do this again, Shuichi, I don't want this to keep happening."
For a moment, Kokichi is held by increasingly still arms. But his head is far too full for him to truly comprehend Shuichi's heavy breathing or the reasons behind it. Kokichi keeps talking. Continues to let stupid honest words spew out of his mouth.
"I'm not sure how I keep getting away- but I did, I do, but it never matters. No one ever cares enough to look. Remembering just makes me confused. Trying to forget never works because I know I'll end up where I started. Accepting th-th-things is giving up." Arms hold Kokichi steady as words flood out. They're both shaking again, but Kokichi can't imagine why Shuichi would be acting that way.
"You know ghouls."
"I've cohabitated with some, I suppose you could say."
Shuichi's chest shudders. Kokichi's face is pressing into it, so he can't see anything but dark fabric, but he's pretty sure that Shuichi has just started rubbing his own face with a sleeve. He can feel one less arm and hear a lot of fabric noises anyway.
"Before you say any-anything just don't, okay?"
Dangerous game with dangerous prizes. But the possibility that Shuichi might not actually be aiming to kill him is growing slightly credible.
He isn't sure how to feel about that and might not want to.
Kokichi speaks up instead of letting himself think. "You know, Shumai, you've been on your knees holding me for a hot minute now. Want to maybe let me down and get your t-tentacles off me? S'not like I'm going to run anymore."
The ghoul's mismatched eyes near pop out of his head. Shuichi immediately starts stammering out both an apology and protests over using the word tentacle. Kokichi is lowered to the floor and set free all the same. The clearly not tentacles linger for a moment before retreating into Shuichi's back, soon making it seem like they were never there in the first place. Weird, but more fascinating than gross if Kokichi is being honest. A few questions bubble up before he squashes them down.
If he really does live past tonight, then he can spend hours annoying Shuichi about basic ghoul biology later.
Feeling how much cooler the floor is than Shuichi makes Kokichi flop down to bask in it. Maybe the cold tile will help his heart rate go down. Probably not the best idea to show his very targetable stomach off. A quick glance at Shuichi doesn't reveal any kind of hungry stare though.
Shuichi is just moving into a more comfortable position the same as Kokichi is. He's still visibly embarrassed by the tentacle comment, tense, but otherwise has non-hostile body language.
More than Kokichi can say for most people after getting treated to the patented Kokichi brand of sizing up. He is entirely aware of how rude or confrontational he can be, especially when agitated. Can a problem that you make work for you really be called a problem though?
The fact that Kokichi feels like cringing right after thinking that is probably a sign.
Speaking of cringe, the floor is messy as all hell.
There's blood... Pretty much mostly around the meat fridge but still. Shuichi is a bit covered in it t-
"Fuck, I got people juice on me!" Kokichi yelps. Shuichi gapes at him, staring at the drying stains on Kokichi's all white outfit.
"I am so sorry."
Groaning in response, Kokichi looks back towards the huge mess that they're a part of. How are they supposed to clean up all this blood?
This is nothing like prank clean up back home.
"Could be worse. All this crap could be a bright and fluorescent magenta or something," Kokichi murmurs."We should try figuring out a way to make this stuff vanish. Kirumi will be coming to start food preparation in just a few hours."
Shuichi gives him a worried look. Might be from the way Kokichi twitches at his own words.
The detective clears his throat. "I did bring a bag of clothing and cleaning supplies in case of emergency. It had been a while since I ate, so..." Another flush. How properly worried about being improper. Gonta would be slightly proud and mostly horrified.
Shuichi gets up to retrieve his stashed bag of goodies and Kokichi follows his lead by standing in-order to remove his shirt. He can't do much about his mostly spotless pants, but his shirt and scarf got a nice big meeting with Shuichi's own jacket. Ick. Wait, there was some kind of clear goop where Shuichi's kagune had gripped him. Kokichi silently mimes gagging. He'd been joking about the tentacle stuff, and yet, here he was.
"Alright, so I have stuff we can change into and some special cle-" Shuichi pauses mid sentence, and when Kokichi turns back to see why he just finds Shuichi staring at the main blood drops. Kokichi can feel his usual mischievous self come back into focus.
"Awww, is Saihara-chan embarrassed by my pasty-pale bod?" he says.
Kokichi walks over to the corner closet, labeled 'cleaning', and giggles at the sound of Shuichi's choking behind him. His back prickles at being turned to a ghoul.
Pulling out a bucket, some rags, and two mops out is easy. He even avoids disturbing the other tools within. Can't let anyone notice that some shit went down. Although, Kirumi might be the type to just stay quiet about it.
"So are we using bleach like some first timers or did that special mean something?"
"No," Shuichi sighs and takes the bucket to the sink. "Not using just regular bleach, or just any commercial cleaner, is one of the first things you learn. And anyone involved in homicide work learns about that very quickly, Ouma-kun."
Kokichi watches Shuichi fill the bucket up with water.
"I was actually wondering ... Did you use your abilities as a ghoul to help solve crimes?" he settles on using the blandest phrasing possible.
Shuichi carefully pours some of his special concoction into the water. His eyebrows are pinched together slightly. Did Kokichi still hit a sore spot?
"Yes, but I always back everything up with real evidence. My uncle and aunt happily helped cover me, but just running off of 'intuition' with no proof is bad even when you're human."
Kokichi feels a few parts of him swell with empathy at the sentiment. Going off of just belief can only be called naive. It's exactly why Kokichi has been keeping back his lies and curiosity.
Plunging the mops into the not-for-long clear water, full of diluted chemicals and detergents left unnamed, Kokichi wonders if Shuichi has already picked up on that. Even as the minutes turn into at least an hour full of aggressive mopping and wiping, Kokichi does his damned best to keep the whammy lines and insistent questioning to a minimum. He's gone from trying to agitate Shuichi into killing him to staying on his good side.
It makes him feel a little sick, bending down and making himself be meek instead of puffing himself up with falsehoods. Kokichi would rather be holding up in his room and digesting this subversion of his expectations in safety.
Now he has to swallow it as he goes. Heart still pumping too fast to be justified by mopping. But mopping with just the two of them sucks.
The Supreme Leader spends the last twenty minutes complaining and being tempted to demand that Shuichi use his grabby little tenti-ribbons to use more mops. To clean for Kokichi so that Kokichi can collapse in peace.
Once the often changed water and cleaning supplies run clear for several minutes, Kokichi drops his mop and takes satisfaction in the subsequent clack.
It feels both like a victory and like he helped Shuichi clean up an actual crime scene.
Shuichi seems to be unphased by all the activity. Do ghouls have that much better stamina, or is Kokichi just a weakling at the moment? The answer comes back as weak in a split second.
"Sorry Saihara-chan, but since I couldn't get my many janitorial subordinantes to clean up for me like I usually do, I'm about to fall over," Kokichi says. Shuichi's lips immediately curl into the smile that's become so familiar to Kokichi since their 'dates' together.
If a pang of that 'more than just' fondness reminds Kokichi that it still exists, well, he shoves it down for later; just tries not to think what it may mean that his feelings haven't changed at all.
There's a lull in activity.
"But that's Ouma-kun lying, right?"
For a few moments the two of them flounder for words and then something in Kokichi's brain says that it's time to start giggling hysterically.
"Pfffaaheee- Nishishishi! How does Saihara know that my organization isn't actually a cleaning business instead of a criminal one?" Kokichi laughs more when Shuichi's eyebrows shoot up.
Bringing a hand to his bangs, Shuichi counters. "An international organization of people in the cleaning industry seems even odder to not hear about than your initial claim."
Two idiots trying to joke about a secret cleaning staff illuminati, after vanishing a bunch of blood, and kagune secretions. Feels like that time Shuichi forced himself to joke about getting horny after a meal.
"Well, you know~" He smiles, and they joke around for the sake of comfort just a bit more.
Normal but weird banter. Probably inappropriate.
Not even a friend, Kokichi reminds himself. Mutual Lima-Stockholm esque feelings induced by a fucked up robot bear on a TV show does not constitute anything. Different parts of Kokichi laugh and ask how that moment of total honesty got swallowed up by unthink-denial again. Lying to yourself is never healthy. Going back to repression will get you killed.
Putting away their well used tools, Kokichi grits his teeth and runs equations in his head. Tries to imagine three dimensional chess and weird comedy movies in English. Tonight's long shower in which he's going to use up all his soap.
He and Shuichi walk out of the kitchen and cafeteria together all the same.
It's pretty stupid to go back to their rooms side by side, all things considered. If they get caught then Kokichi will have to bluff like wild. At least that will entertain… Entertain.
They're maybe five steps out of the cafeteria when Kokichi realises that Shuichi has been outed as a ghoul on a live television show. Saihara Shuichi is quite plainly fucked. He might as well be dead.
Dread from hours ago hits Kokichi hard enough to make him pause.
Ghouls get hunted down, that's how the world works. The authorities in most countries don't give a shit about how ghouls source their food or how sympathetic they might be.
Shuichi's entire family is going to get ripped to shreds.
"Ouma-kun?"
Kokichi snaps back into awareness. He almost wishes he didn't. Shuichi shouldn't be looking so worried about him, Shuichi should be worried about himself.
"We're on TV," Kokichi finds himself gnawing a fingernail. "We're on TV and the cameras were probably focused on us. Everyone outside knows that Saihara-chan is a ghoul because of me."
Shuichi grimaces, because of course he must have already realized that when he gave in and ate, but doesn't actually seem scared. Had someone else figured it out first?
"Monokuma… it made sure of that the first day we got here. I think that the audience must have known from the start."
Oh. That little shit.
"For the killing game?"
"For the killing game."
They both end up slumping a bit as they continue their journey back to the dorms. The ease that the two boys had constructed earlier was killed by Monokuma, weeks after the fact.
"No wonder you held out on eating." Kokichi replies.
The small laugh he gets is almost nice.
Eventually, they get their tired asses to the round metal section that leads to their rooms. The way back was full of occasional chatter despite the previous mood killer. Conversation about the state of the outside world, their respective future and families there, can wait for another time.
Kokichi leans back and stares at the pixel version of himself. It was cute but too full of gross contexts and implications for him to like it.
Maybe tomorrow he'd be able to go out and ask Shuichi all the questions that came with being too comfortable. He had enough saved up to buy a date ticket, for a handful of more privacy. They could talk about stuff like tastebuds and the slime from Shuichi's totally not tentacles. What kind of senses applied to the kagune. Could some ghouls use theirs like a nose?
Can Kokichi get the all powerful audience become attached to, and sympathetic towards, a ghoul to the point of Shuichi not being detained and murdered the moment everyone graduates?
Enquiring minds.
"Good night, my darling Shumai," Kokichi bids him a soft farewell.
Shuichi shuffles. "R-right. I'll see you in the morning?"
When they both smile at each other it lifts a weight off of Kokichi's shoulders, placing an even more determined one there instead.
Nothing changes from time and time. He hopes that someday one of them will be able to fully accept the other's hand. A conclusion with no regrets.
Until a real ending is reached, Kokichi will keep moving forward.
That night is full of half remembered scenes that wake him up with an urge to go over the whiteboard. Kokichi's body burns, his ears ring with Shuichi's cries, but he doesn't let the numbness in his limbs deter him. Dreams where he dies in front of a confused Shuichi and wakes up again not understanding the sobbing on his shoulder; is something he doesn't want to think about.
Flashes of two flat surfaces erasing the inbetween.
Kokichi forces himself to think about everything.
He continues the game.
*
Kokichi hates the game.
It's been two weeks since the 'Dating Game' show started. Two weeks since Ouma Kokichi and fifteen other student with Ultimate talents were kidnapped and tossed into what must be the most asinine should-be-illegal situation possible. By a family of fake bears that were originally aiming to run a killing game show. The entire farce of an opening ceremony was scripted to the point of pain-inducing boredom. The crappy references made by the father bear were actually annoying too.
The implications were not so great. Just waking up and exploring before the big event in the gym had made Kokichi feel like he'd been stuck in the damn school forever.
While most of the other students had taken an approach of any game not about killing being a good game, the original ten day mark had no duo close enough to graduate. The general game plan had been to spend at least one date with every student and go from there. Said plan ended up working too well. Instead of the audience feeling bored by how slow the dating was going, the voyeurs became enraptured just by seeing everyone build 'friend-ships' in addition to forced romantic inclinations brought on by a stressful situation.
The result was Monokuma announcing an extension and the introduction of an actual friendship measuring gimmick. Before that, Kokichi had admittedly been... relaxed. Or maybe just not on edge enough. It wasn't a killing game after all.
But Monokuma had proven that the game could be changed. Oh, sure, it had just been an extension and implementing a way to measure friendship; it also proved that if the audience wanted something then it got what it wanted.
Kokichi had more important things to do than spend every waking moment of his time trying to trick his brain into loving someone. There was an entire school to investigate. An entire situation needed to be investigated.
There was zero way that Kokichi could possibly just relax anymore. Monokuma often says or makes allusions to the killing game mode still being on the cards too. All of which is between mind numbing references.
He does genuinely like all of his fellow prisoners though. And there was no way he'd let the audience think that he's boring either. So he goes on the dates requested of him, happily socializes with everyone, and generally tries to balance protecting himself with getting close to the others. That isn't to say that Kokichi doesn't get prickles of annoyance or unease with some of them, and he does get what could be described as kneejerk emotional responses to the others and seemingly irrational things. He simply makes sure to battle those occasional and uncalled for reactions that like to pop up on. Kokichi has experience in masking his genuine feelings by exaggerating them or simply acting.
That's during the day, however. Night is when Kokichi uncovers his whiteboard and skulks around the academy grounds. He would poke around during daylight hours as well, but it's never as dedicated- beyond keeping track of people. Only when the majority is sleeping does Kokichi feel secure enough to scout out the various oddities within their home-dome.
For instance, the hidden door in the library. That high-tech and very much locked fridge tucked away in the kitchen corner. All of the labs.
Kokichi has done these things even before that hope killing adjustment to the game. Now the activities have become like a self given duty instead of curiosity and worry.
Almost everyone has a normal and fairly set pattern of daily life, and trends make sure that necessary divergences are easy to account for.
Which is why the sudden and consistent change in behavior of Saihara Shuichi is such a huge concern.
Throughout their time here, Shuichi had gone above and beyond in reaching out to everyone, and Kokichi couldn't help but be unusually fond of the Ultimate Detective. It wasn't something like a crush that could be acted upon by placing a cutesy handwritten letter in a locker. Doing so would even be in horrible taste considering that everyone woke up in lockers after being kidnapped.
Kokichi likes pranks and jokes, but he didn't think that that would be his style.
The fact that Shuichi tries so hard is difficult to ignore. Turning on Kokichi's monopad would instantly reveal that he was closer to Shuichi than anyone else. No one else enjoys or tolerates Kokichi's lies or humor to the extent that Shuichi does. No one else here smiles or so earnestly attempts to piece together his contractions into a coherent puzzle.
So Shuichi starting to act suspiciously at night and such is deeply disturbing. It's probably just bias showing through, but Kokichi keeps coming back to the killing game to the point of a minor obsession.
The problem is that it's so easy to assume that someone might get hasty and paranoid enough to end up killing someone. As time passes, Kokichi keeps thinking of a whole host of how-who-whys about it. Someone could want to kill off the, extremely likely to exist in Kokichi's opinion, student plant by setting a trap. And that's just one example.
It might not even be wanting to hurt another student. Their daily life is a situation that Kokichi can easily see driving someone to self harm. One student is already lacking a strong will to live.
Everything could go wrong and probably will at some point. All Kokichi can do is aim to prevent these things.
When someone who could maybe become his friend someday is acting abnormally, then Kokichi is absolutely going to spy on that person's sudden interest in casing the kitchen- aka the place with all the knives.
Shuichi is one of the smartest people around- and the Ultimate Detective besides. He could do anything.
That was the gist of Kokichi's thoughts three days ago. Shuichi has been acting odd for a total of five days now. The detective has been so visibly affected by this change in behavior that people other than Kokichi have noticed, and questioned the detective's dip in appearance, but nothing has improved. Shit, Kokichi is honestly worried that Shuichi really will do something now. The self-aware reminders of 'hey you act suspicious too' are laying in the background of Kokichi's brain.
The habitual prankster has taken to following Shuichi around at night for these past three days. While the detective has often shown a few signs of awareness, Shuichi's own stake out of the kitchen seems to be aimed at making sure he knows when the kitchen will be utterly empty. Honestly speaking, Kokichi hadn't been dead set being 100% hidden those times either.
Kokichi is extremely good at being undetected after all! Why, in another world, he might even have been the Ultimate Phantom Thief. Alas.
Patiently waiting for Shuichi to actually make his move and go into the kitchen is child's play. Waiting a good few minutes for Shuichi to feel safe enough to act is a little less enjoyable though. Kokichi heads inside with a chill down his spine.
Maybe Shuichi will just be binge eating on a midnight snack. Stocking up on midnight snacks. Shuichi will be embarrassed and confused, Kokichi will be embarrassed and backpedal, and the next day they'll both laugh it off.
What Kokichi sees when he waltzing inside like he rules the place is this;
The electronically locked fridge in the corner is open just enough for Kokichi to see uncooked meat in various containers and packages. Shuichi is crouched on his knees near it, red tinged fingers plucking slices of meat from a ziplock bag.
The instinctively familiar metallic-sweet scent is strong enough that Kokichi can smell it from across the room.
Shuichi is there for a midnight snack- one of raw flesh.
Saihara Shuichi, Ultimate Detective, sitting on the floor gorging on the bloody substance with one of his eyes turned black and red.
For a moment the two of them just stare at one another.
Kokichi lets the sight of eyes and hands be seared into his memory before Shuichi can slam the refrigerator fully shut. The crimson handprint left behind is almost ironic.
Even once the detective- the ghoul- does so, it can't erase the single monstrous eye glaring out of the socket it calls home. Smeared blood dripping over his lips and painting his hands. There's nothing that could possibly twist the truth here. Saihara Shuichi is one of those man eating beast hiding in human skin, a ghoul. He was eating humans just now, that meat belonging to people, and he has the audacity to look scared. Like it's Kokichi's fault.
Saihara breaks gazes first, head lowering to face the bits of remaining human flesh in their sad little bag. His fists clench and his shoulders shake- but he remains silent. By all means, the ghoul seems to be conflicted by what he's going to do. At least that much about Shuichi was real.
It isn't fair.
Kokichi knows that he's going to die now. There's no way that Saihara will just let him go off and tell all the others about this, even if Kokichi swears not to tell anyone. Ghouls don't survive by being stupid. Ghouls don't survive being Ultimates and working closely with the police by letting just any unlucky human keep their secret.
Saihara doesn't really know him and he certainly doesn't like him. A handful of 'dates' on a kidnapping romance show does not make anything. It never does.
This isn't fair, a voice in his head cries out.
He can't breathe or hear or feel anything other than the burning in his eyes- but Kokichi tries to escape anyway. A ringing in his head is helping to send him into a panic, but Kokichi is beyond caring. There's almost a chance that sufficient hassle will make Saihara kill him faster.
Kokichi is going to die and suffer and then Shumai is going to eat him up until nothing is left like he's cattle- kokcihiisgoingnotaginnotgainwhynotlasttimeidont-
Various weights wrap around Kokichi in the form of hot ribbons, but instead of crushing or puncturing him they layer over one another, and carry him back towards their owner and further still. The special predatory organ of a ghoul. Kokichi tries to scream. He's met by the pathetic sound of his voice being muffled by the flat kagune covering his mouth. Unable to act and unwilling to watch himself be killed by Saihara, he clenches his wet eyes shut instead.
"Ouma-kun, please stop." The other's worried voice sends a pang of fear down his spine. Why does he have to sound so sad? How can Saihara sound so remorseful when it's Kokichi that's about to be murdered? "Please- stop moving and listen to me. I'm not going to hurt you!"
It's not fair if you're the one who lies. It's not right that I can't do anything. It's not fair that this keeps happening!
The burning wetness in Kokichi's eyes breaks into ugly tears. He can feel his face grow heated and blotchy as broken sobs leak out of his mouth. No one will hear them. Arms touch his own briefly. They wrap around him and settle him into Saihara's lap like an unruly doll. Still no pain.
One trembling hand finds its way into Kokichi's hair and starts to slowly stroke his skull. A poor attempt at comfort.
Saihara speaks again. "Shhh. Everything will be fine. Just try to b-breathe, okay?"
Kokichi can't stand it. Why is Shuichi bothering with pointless niceties?
Comprehension hits near instantly. Saihara has been nothing but kind since they first woke up and met one another. He's polite, normally understanding, and likely has an above average moral fiber even as a ghoul. The moment the bears mentioned the killing game is just one moment where Saihara could have instantly killed every single human around him. He didn't. Up until now, this Saihara has been nothing but a good person.
The realization just makes Kokichi heave harder into the flat warmth of Saihara's stupid murder organ. Something like relief swirls down to join the pit in Kokichi's esophagus.
Shuichi wants Kokichi to die without pain or panic. For Kokichi to be something closer to happy or content. Like gently euthanizing a pet that has no idea that it would otherwise suffer from repeated cancer and waste away. So he's hugging him, murmuring useless words, while Kokichi drowns beneath sparse air and the taste of salt. He doesn't want Kokichi to die alone.
Why does one of them have to be a ghoul? Monokuma had said it didn't want a killing game so-
If the situation were different, Kokichi would say that the sudden nasal congestion is killing him. Depending on how different, he'd be trying making sure that Shuichi gets his meals from methods that aren't murder. But the situation is what it is and so he yells at himself instead. Kokichi is going to die because his paranoia and worry forced Shuichi to murder him. Since there's no way Monokuma won't capitalize on his death, so the killing game will start too.
He's ruined everything again.
"Hey, Kokichi..." Shuichi pats his shoulder. Is it because Kokichi isn't being as loud that Shuichi is asking something of him?
Opening his eyes, Kokichi is greeted by the sight of Shuichi staring down at him with a pinched expression. The detective truly looks as scared as Kokichi feels despite that one horrifying eye. Even then- both of them are crying. The kagune slowly shift Kokichi until they're no longer completely covering him, but merely preventing him from running away.
Both of them are crying. Another voice shouts out from the inside of Kokichi's head.
He shouldn't need to apologize for being about to die. And he doesn't, but it feels like he should. Apologize, in general.
The ghoul glances towards the kitchen doorway. "I'm going to uncover your mouth in a minute." The 'don't scream' is left unsaid.
There's not anyone to scream for.
Looking around more, Kokichi can see that the two of them are actually tucked into a corner near the bloodied fridge. A crevice if Kokichi considers the six limbs further shielding them from view. Shuichi's 'Kagune' really are akin to wide ribbons, the undersides pulsing with gold veins. The things would be beautiful if they didn't exist for the reasons they do. So that ghouls, Shuichi, could hunt people like prey. Kokichi has always wanted to see one.
The smooth surface over his lips lifts away just a centimeter before leaving his mouth free.
Kokichi could scream now, he could ask or say anything, but all that escapes him is a series of hiccups.
Somehow that prompts Shuchi to pull a handkerchief from a pants pocket and try to wipe his face clean. The soft cloth keeps patting Kokichi's cheeks even when he wiggles and turns his face away.
At least there's less snot on his face.
For the next few minutes they stay that way. Kokichi trying to stop sniffling and Shuichi too guilty to do anything but oblige the other boy with more reassurances. He must want to say something important, or for Kokichi to say anything, but instead the two remain in limbo; because Kokichi could not think of any words that might matter. Rather he could, but fears that trying to use them would result in a rambling mess. He doesn't want to open himself up to actually getting comfortable.
"I'm sorry," Shuichi murmurs.
A minute must pass before Kokichi finds his voice. "I f-followed you. This is- is my..."
"No Ouma-kun! That is," Shuichi hisses and immediately looks stricken when Kokichi tenses in his arms. "That's wrong. If you're going to say that anything about this is your fault, that's wrong."
Shuichi gulps. "I should have been more careful or less hasty. I could have waited longer and eaten more normal food than usual."
What.
"What?" The thought slips out in a wheeze.
Evidently, the reason for Kokichi's confusion is something that Shuichi picks up on right away. His lips thin and his eyes stray to the side. It's not exactly uncommon for people to be aware that ghouls can only eat humans. It's a biological obligation to consume human flesh, because eating anything else causes illness and weakens them if they don't puke it up. Tastes like shit too. Kokichi knows that coffee still tastes great at least.
Shuichi has always enjoyed nursing multiple cups of both his own and Kirumi's coffee throughout the day. Kokichi has joined him with tea cups that may or may not have actually contained panta. These intrusive thoughts really need to be stopped.
The detective decides to reach up and tap at his single changed eye instead of answering. But in a way, that's an answer in and of itself.
"Y-you aren't normal g... a normal ghoul. So you can really eat food."
Kokichi watches the other boy nod once. That explains the lack of suspicious bathroom breaks and the genuine love for cake at tea time.
So why is Shuichi smiling like his mutant status somehow solves everything? Like his only half an eye and ability to be humany- half. Kokichi had 'heard rumors' of humans and ghouls in relationships. He'd distantly heard about ghouls with one eye too, as far as someone could say he had. Ha. More emotional grumbling to grace the interior of his pounding head. Joins up nicely with the self disgust for that damned stutter.
It really wasn't fair.
"If you expect me to believe that you're some special amazing unicorn you can fuck off and just ki-kill me already." Kokichi says.
How Shuichi's face falls into total shock and desolation in less than a second is almost novel. Fair enough, seeing as Kokichi is similarly aghast at his own audacity. Why in the name of literally anything ever had he said that? Shuichi was being nice to him.
But no, shut up, Kokichi just wants it to be over already. Do not pass go. Move on from yet another failure and end it while you can. Life isn't fair and then you die.
Shuichi makes a prolonged exhale. Most likely going to kill me now, Kokichi thinks.
"I've never killed anyone, Ouma-kun. And I am absolutely not going to start with you."
Kokichi sneers. "Don't lie to me."
"This isn't a lie! I don't want to hurt you let alone kill you," The ghoul pulls Kokichi closer. "Hurting anyone just because of this is something I'd never do. You may not believe me, and have no reason to, but one of my parents is a human just like you. I've never killed anyone. I've never... I've never eaten someone that was murdered."
"So suicide or hospital stuff, then." Kokichi says. The reply he gets is low and breathless.
"Yeah."
Kokichi mulls over it. Really lets himself actually think and remember, half-knowingly nestling himself further into Shuichi's warmth, and feels the rush of emotion burbling back up his throat. Into his eyes. He's too exhausted to be mad about it.
The body he's parasitizing off of twitches.
"Ouma-kun? Do you need a minute or-"
"I don't want this." Kokichi can feel Shuichi lurch. "I don't want this again. It's not f-fair and I hate it and I can't do this again, Shuichi, I don't want this to keep happening."
For a moment, Kokichi is held by increasingly still arms. But his head is far too full for him to truly comprehend Shuichi's heavy breathing or the reasons behind it. Kokichi keeps talking. Continues to let stupid honest words spew out of his mouth.
"I'm not sure how I keep getting away- but I did, I do, but it never matters. No one ever cares enough to look. Remembering just makes me confused. Trying to forget never works because I know I'll end up where I started. Accepting th-th-things is giving up." Arms hold Kokichi steady as words flood out. They're both shaking again, but Kokichi can't imagine why Shuichi would be acting that way.
"You know ghouls."
"I've cohabitated with some, I suppose you could say."
Shuichi's chest shudders. Kokichi's face is pressing into it, so he can't see anything but dark fabric, but he's pretty sure that Shuichi has just started rubbing his own face with a sleeve. He can feel one less arm and hear a lot of fabric noises anyway.
"Before you say any-anything just don't, okay?"
Dangerous game with dangerous prizes. But the possibility that Shuichi might not actually be aiming to kill him is growing slightly credible.
He isn't sure how to feel about that and might not want to.
Kokichi speaks up instead of letting himself think. "You know, Shumai, you've been on your knees holding me for a hot minute now. Want to maybe let me down and get your t-tentacles off me? S'not like I'm going to run anymore."
The ghoul's mismatched eyes near pop out of his head. Shuichi immediately starts stammering out both an apology and protests over using the word tentacle. Kokichi is lowered to the floor and set free all the same. The clearly not tentacles linger for a moment before retreating into Shuichi's back, soon making it seem like they were never there in the first place. Weird, but more fascinating than gross if Kokichi is being honest. A few questions bubble up before he squashes them down.
If he really does live past tonight, then he can spend hours annoying Shuichi about basic ghoul biology later.
Feeling how much cooler the floor is than Shuichi makes Kokichi flop down to bask in it. Maybe the cold tile will help his heart rate go down. Probably not the best idea to show his very targetable stomach off. A quick glance at Shuichi doesn't reveal any kind of hungry stare though.
Shuichi is just moving into a more comfortable position the same as Kokichi is. He's still visibly embarrassed by the tentacle comment, tense, but otherwise has non-hostile body language.
More than Kokichi can say for most people after getting treated to the patented Kokichi brand of sizing up. He is entirely aware of how rude or confrontational he can be, especially when agitated. Can a problem that you make work for you really be called a problem though?
The fact that Kokichi feels like cringing right after thinking that is probably a sign.
Speaking of cringe, the floor is messy as all hell.
There's blood... Pretty much mostly around the meat fridge but still. Shuichi is a bit covered in it t-
"Fuck, I got people juice on me!" Kokichi yelps. Shuichi gapes at him, staring at the drying stains on Kokichi's all white outfit.
"I am so sorry."
Groaning in response, Kokichi looks back towards the huge mess that they're a part of. How are they supposed to clean up all this blood?
This is nothing like prank clean up back home.
"Could be worse. All this crap could be a bright and fluorescent magenta or something," Kokichi murmurs."We should try figuring out a way to make this stuff vanish. Kirumi will be coming to start food preparation in just a few hours."
Shuichi gives him a worried look. Might be from the way Kokichi twitches at his own words.
The detective clears his throat. "I did bring a bag of clothing and cleaning supplies in case of emergency. It had been a while since I ate, so..." Another flush. How properly worried about being improper. Gonta would be slightly proud and mostly horrified.
Shuichi gets up to retrieve his stashed bag of goodies and Kokichi follows his lead by standing in-order to remove his shirt. He can't do much about his mostly spotless pants, but his shirt and scarf got a nice big meeting with Shuichi's own jacket. Ick. Wait, there was some kind of clear goop where Shuichi's kagune had gripped him. Kokichi silently mimes gagging. He'd been joking about the tentacle stuff, and yet, here he was.
"Alright, so I have stuff we can change into and some special cle-" Shuichi pauses mid sentence, and when Kokichi turns back to see why he just finds Shuichi staring at the main blood drops. Kokichi can feel his usual mischievous self come back into focus.
"Awww, is Saihara-chan embarrassed by my pasty-pale bod?" he says.
Kokichi walks over to the corner closet, labeled 'cleaning', and giggles at the sound of Shuichi's choking behind him. His back prickles at being turned to a ghoul.
Pulling out a bucket, some rags, and two mops out is easy. He even avoids disturbing the other tools within. Can't let anyone notice that some shit went down. Although, Kirumi might be the type to just stay quiet about it.
"So are we using bleach like some first timers or did that special mean something?"
"No," Shuichi sighs and takes the bucket to the sink. "Not using just regular bleach, or just any commercial cleaner, is one of the first things you learn. And anyone involved in homicide work learns about that very quickly, Ouma-kun."
Kokichi watches Shuichi fill the bucket up with water.
"I was actually wondering ... Did you use your abilities as a ghoul to help solve crimes?" he settles on using the blandest phrasing possible.
Shuichi carefully pours some of his special concoction into the water. His eyebrows are pinched together slightly. Did Kokichi still hit a sore spot?
"Yes, but I always back everything up with real evidence. My uncle and aunt happily helped cover me, but just running off of 'intuition' with no proof is bad even when you're human."
Kokichi feels a few parts of him swell with empathy at the sentiment. Going off of just belief can only be called naive. It's exactly why Kokichi has been keeping back his lies and curiosity.
Plunging the mops into the not-for-long clear water, full of diluted chemicals and detergents left unnamed, Kokichi wonders if Shuichi has already picked up on that. Even as the minutes turn into at least an hour full of aggressive mopping and wiping, Kokichi does his damned best to keep the whammy lines and insistent questioning to a minimum. He's gone from trying to agitate Shuichi into killing him to staying on his good side.
It makes him feel a little sick, bending down and making himself be meek instead of puffing himself up with falsehoods. Kokichi would rather be holding up in his room and digesting this subversion of his expectations in safety.
Now he has to swallow it as he goes. Heart still pumping too fast to be justified by mopping. But mopping with just the two of them sucks.
The Supreme Leader spends the last twenty minutes complaining and being tempted to demand that Shuichi use his grabby little tenti-ribbons to use more mops. To clean for Kokichi so that Kokichi can collapse in peace.
Once the often changed water and cleaning supplies run clear for several minutes, Kokichi drops his mop and takes satisfaction in the subsequent clack.
It feels both like a victory and like he helped Shuichi clean up an actual crime scene.
Shuichi seems to be unphased by all the activity. Do ghouls have that much better stamina, or is Kokichi just a weakling at the moment? The answer comes back as weak in a split second.
"Sorry Saihara-chan, but since I couldn't get my many janitorial subordinantes to clean up for me like I usually do, I'm about to fall over," Kokichi says. Shuichi's lips immediately curl into the smile that's become so familiar to Kokichi since their 'dates' together.
If a pang of that 'more than just' fondness reminds Kokichi that it still exists, well, he shoves it down for later; just tries not to think what it may mean that his feelings haven't changed at all.
There's a lull in activity.
"But that's Ouma-kun lying, right?"
For a few moments the two of them flounder for words and then something in Kokichi's brain says that it's time to start giggling hysterically.
"Pfffaaheee- Nishishishi! How does Saihara know that my organization isn't actually a cleaning business instead of a criminal one?" Kokichi laughs more when Shuichi's eyebrows shoot up.
Bringing a hand to his bangs, Shuichi counters. "An international organization of people in the cleaning industry seems even odder to not hear about than your initial claim."
Two idiots trying to joke about a secret cleaning staff illuminati, after vanishing a bunch of blood, and kagune secretions. Feels like that time Shuichi forced himself to joke about getting horny after a meal.
"Well, you know~" He smiles, and they joke around for the sake of comfort just a bit more.
Normal but weird banter. Probably inappropriate.
Not even a friend, Kokichi reminds himself. Mutual Lima-Stockholm esque feelings induced by a fucked up robot bear on a TV show does not constitute anything. Different parts of Kokichi laugh and ask how that moment of total honesty got swallowed up by unthink-denial again. Lying to yourself is never healthy. Going back to repression will get you killed.
Putting away their well used tools, Kokichi grits his teeth and runs equations in his head. Tries to imagine three dimensional chess and weird comedy movies in English. Tonight's long shower in which he's going to use up all his soap.
He and Shuichi walk out of the kitchen and cafeteria together all the same.
It's pretty stupid to go back to their rooms side by side, all things considered. If they get caught then Kokichi will have to bluff like wild. At least that will entertain… Entertain.
They're maybe five steps out of the cafeteria when Kokichi realises that Shuichi has been outed as a ghoul on a live television show. Saihara Shuichi is quite plainly fucked. He might as well be dead.
Dread from hours ago hits Kokichi hard enough to make him pause.
Ghouls get hunted down, that's how the world works. The authorities in most countries don't give a shit about how ghouls source their food or how sympathetic they might be.
Shuichi's entire family is going to get ripped to shreds.
"Ouma-kun?"
Kokichi snaps back into awareness. He almost wishes he didn't. Shuichi shouldn't be looking so worried about him, Shuichi should be worried about himself.
"We're on TV," Kokichi finds himself gnawing a fingernail. "We're on TV and the cameras were probably focused on us. Everyone outside knows that Saihara-chan is a ghoul because of me."
Shuichi grimaces, because of course he must have already realized that when he gave in and ate, but doesn't actually seem scared. Had someone else figured it out first?
"Monokuma… it made sure of that the first day we got here. I think that the audience must have known from the start."
Oh. That little shit.
"For the killing game?"
"For the killing game."
They both end up slumping a bit as they continue their journey back to the dorms. The ease that the two boys had constructed earlier was killed by Monokuma, weeks after the fact.
"No wonder you held out on eating." Kokichi replies.
The small laugh he gets is almost nice.
Eventually, they get their tired asses to the round metal section that leads to their rooms. The way back was full of occasional chatter despite the previous mood killer. Conversation about the state of the outside world, their respective future and families there, can wait for another time.
Kokichi leans back and stares at the pixel version of himself. It was cute but too full of gross contexts and implications for him to like it.
Maybe tomorrow he'd be able to go out and ask Shuichi all the questions that came with being too comfortable. He had enough saved up to buy a date ticket, for a handful of more privacy. They could talk about stuff like tastebuds and the slime from Shuichi's totally not tentacles. What kind of senses applied to the kagune. Could some ghouls use theirs like a nose?
Can Kokichi get the all powerful audience become attached to, and sympathetic towards, a ghoul to the point of Shuichi not being detained and murdered the moment everyone graduates?
Enquiring minds.
"Good night, my darling Shumai," Kokichi bids him a soft farewell.
Shuichi shuffles. "R-right. I'll see you in the morning?"
When they both smile at each other it lifts a weight off of Kokichi's shoulders, placing an even more determined one there instead.
Nothing changes from time and time. He hopes that someday one of them will be able to fully accept the other's hand. A conclusion with no regrets.
Until a real ending is reached, Kokichi will keep moving forward.
That night is full of half remembered scenes that wake him up with an urge to go over the whiteboard. Kokichi's body burns, his ears ring with Shuichi's cries, but he doesn't let the numbness in his limbs deter him. Dreams where he dies in front of a confused Shuichi and wakes up again not understanding the sobbing on his shoulder; is something he doesn't want to think about.
Flashes of two flat surfaces erasing the inbetween.
Kokichi forces himself to think about everything.
He continues the game.
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
This is cute!
... It would probably be cuter if I had actually read either Tokyo Ghoul or Dangan ronpa, but cute guys in cute situations are cute even if you only have the bare minimum of context for it!
Looking forward to the future parts~<3
... It would probably be cuter if I had actually read either Tokyo Ghoul or Dangan ronpa, but cute guys in cute situations are cute even if you only have the bare minimum of context for it!
Looking forward to the future parts~<3
OctarineShrike
Avatar of Mandos
I remember this bit of fluffy acid. Nice to see it here.
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Lol yeah, it's kind of sensitive on knowing the franchises... But the appeal of cute is universal. It's impossible to deny. I have some art that I'm going to link, as people have drawn fanart for this series. Even more cute cannibals.
Yeah! I figured I may as well port it over. People here seemed to like the links after all. Thanks!
Art
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I've gotten a few fanart type stuff over the year, but only found this so far. Anything else I'll have to ask before sharing bc it's not linkable. More will be added when able and as the story is posted!
Fanart:
By a friend of mine, based on a scene in chapter 2 of Medusa,
Fanart:
By a friend of mine, based on a scene in chapter 2 of Medusa,
Last edited:
Medusa Chapter 1, Veins
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Kokichi wakes up the next day feeling fine, really. He knows what he has to do and just needs to figure out how to do it. Unfortunate how much others like to intrude on his plans. Kokichi too, though, he's quite aware that all things end up wrapping back around to the start. This play-through included.
Unintentional looping:
Most often, the term is used for those situations when this is not the intended result; that is, when this is a bug. Such errors are most common among novice programmers, but can be made by experienced programmers as well, because their causes can be quite subtle.
One common cause, for example, is that the programmer intends to iterate over a collection of items such as a linked list, executing the loop code once for each item. Improperly formed links can create a reference loop in the list, where one list element links to one that occurred earlier in the list. This joins part of the list into a circle, causing the program to loop forever.
While most infinite loops can be found by close inspection of the code, there is no general method to determine whether a given program will ever halt or will run forever; this is the undecidability of the halting problem.
God forbid that Ouma Kokichi be allowed some actual rest in this hellhole.
In lieu of words, he groans loudly at his television and groans again when it finally shuts off. Forcing himself up and past his boxes of weird shit, found all across the school, he smacks his horse head onto one of his coolers and amends the 'annoying' above the Monokubs into 'FUCKING annoying'.
Going into the shower starts as a blur and ends in cursing as cold water rains down on him. It wakes him up though, followed by some relaxation when it finally turns lukewarm. God knows that it can't clean him more than the hours long one he had last night.
Kokichi ends up skipping the soap and just plopping himself on the shower floor. It's a bit lucky that they have neat western style showers. If only there was an actual bathtub and not just covering the drain with a cloth for the sake of a puddle. He'd like to maybe spend all day that way. Just let himself prune, laugh about how he covers the shower with a spare sheet, and check for hidden cameras for the upteenth time.
But staying in the shower too long is boring without interactive stuff, and Kokichi isn't some kind of fish person. Rest in peace, dreams of swimming off from the rest of humanity to live in the ocean.
Kokichi grabs his tooth brush and starts smashing it against his teeth. There wouldn't be any dolphins in this escapist fantasy of his. They're assholes.
Spitting out reveals that Kokichi forgot about toothpaste, but that ought to be fine. He brushed a lot last night too.
He does make sure to grab one of all his clothing. Shirt, pants, scarf; they wiped down their shoes but Kokichi is worried that someone might smell the cleaner on them. Different pair there too. He does the customary bug check and shrugs them on nice and quick.
Kokichi knows that he's probably going to be the last person at breakfast, but getting there puts him into a fugue that ensures he doesn't care too much.
It's not the first time that Kokichi was late and tired while walking down these halls.
Going off of statistics, Kokichi muses, it certainly won't be the last either.
The conversation in the cafeteria lulls slightly when Kokichi finally arrives, Shuichi coughing on miso soup, and Kirumi nodding at him before going to retrieve his breakfast from the kitchen. Kaito helpfully thumps Shuichi's back and gives Kokichi an odd look.
The kitchen. Kokichi's hair slowly soaks the back of his neck while he plops down next to Gonta. Kokichi hopes he doesn't get a complex about kitchens next. That would be a disaster if he ever wants to cook or get snacks. What will Kokichi do if he can't get his own panta?
Make Kirumi do it until she starts poisoning him? Wouldn't be too out of character.
"Ouma-kun? Ouma-kun!" someone says in the background.
A large hand settles on Kokichi's shoulder and pats gently. He startles the first time, and Gonta immediately pulls away like he was burnt.
Before Kokichi is a few plates of food. The usual pancakes buried in syrup, chunks of fruit, eggs and bacon. How wonderful that Kokichi hadn't been able to notice in favor of nodding off.
"Wow, thanks Gonta! You made sure I stopped thinking in favor of eating!" Kokichi says. There are small signs of slurring the entire way through. Instant regret.
Gonta picks up on it, because clearly the big gentle loaf would, and fully stares down at Kokichi with concern. Now that basically everyone is doing the same, Kokichi can already feel himself starting to sink into his seat a bit. He had decided against bothering to cover up his paleness and eye bags with makeup. Kaito and Kaede usually dominate breakfast time with discussion.
So, usually speaking- it's safe to let himself take the backseat once in a while.
Now everyone and possibly their mother is looking at his stupidly tired face. Shuichi even has the gall to look guilty about it.
Kirumi speaks like no time had passed. "If you wish to return to your room with your breakfast, I would take no offence. You need not force yourself to stay awake."
"Naaah, I'm fine mom."
The Ultimate Maid blinks at him likes he's the weirdest thing she's ever seen this side of Monophanie's short lived plotline-fueled crush on Hoshi. Or when Tsumugi made everyone watch Princess Tutu in the AV room. Of course, Kirumi is too proper to let her reaction be obvious to those she's serving. Kokichi braces himself for distaste.
"In that case, be a responsible young man who knows how to take care of himself. Please return to bed."
Kokichi can feel his eyebrows raise up to his hairline.
The Toujou Kirumi just joked with him. It might be worse than being called a most detestable cretin.
He decides to shove an orange slice into his mouth and give Kirumi an innocent citrus grin. His appetite is weak right now.
Miu interrupts with a cackle,"I bet Smoldick spent hours jacking it and that's why he looks dead!"
He's going to eat anyway. Not eating is how people die.
"Are you sure that you're alright?" Kaede asks him from her position next to Shuichi. The not so normal boy fiddles with his chopsticks. Kokichi can't help but wonder what the pianist would do if she knew her cute weddle besty is a ghoul.
Maybe she'd u- no stop that thought.
Kaito snorts, "He probably stayed up all night planning how to prank us next."
Kokichi spends the next few minutes deflecting suggestive comments from Miu and assuring the others that he's fine. He does break out the waterworks a few times for the sake of annoying Kaito. It does wonders for convincing everyone that Kokichi is more or less normal.
The food on his plates disappears at the same rate his hair dries, slowly and with great frustration.
After a while, Kokichi gives in and starts a conversation with Shuichi. They talk about what books Kokichi read at the library yesterday, and it's the stiffest conversation that Kokichi has had since he woke up in this round's locker.
Kokichi leaves second after Rantaro, and feels sick knowing that he didn't fool Shuichi at all.
Going back to his room is easy though. Pushing the door open and trudging over to the bed takes a meandering walk back, but Kokichi flops down and curls up around his pillow contently.
Kokichi knows that he should and could do any manner of investigating now. There's just no excuse not to.
But Kokichi is tired and full. Just a little more sleep.
Laying the ghosts to rest can wait.
Instead, he shifts through dreams and memories at the speed of falling honey. Kokichi's brain and body are far too tired to actually give him nightmares, which he's thankful for. The alternative is a surrealism aimed at making him wake up with his guts twisting.
The cute bunny clock tells Kokichi that he managed to sleep until noon. He's never been so happy to have won the silly little thing. What a good clock. Kokichi has always loved rabbits.
A certain British comedy movie comes to mind.
Perhaps, Kokichi considers, he should try to use his all powerful leadership powers to teach Himiko's bunnies to sta-
Then he dashes to his toilet for the sake of heaving into it, heavy spit dripping into the water, and eventually he manages to expel all the food Kirumi had made for him.
The bathroom tiles really do feel just dandy. Just like the kitchen!
Kokichi had been digesting for a while, so maybe it's fine. He can request a really small lunch of things that his dreams won't make him get rid of later. Yeah.
Stress is a horrible and insidious killer.
Someone knocks at Kokichi's bedroom door. Well. That's just too damn bad for them. Kokichi has zero intent to get up off of the floor when he could start heaving again at any moment. The knocking continues for a few minutes, louder and louder.
"Fiiine! I'M COMING JUST GIVE ME A MINUTE JEEEEZ!" Kokichi yells at the top of his lungs.
Focusing on standing steady, he walks with a deliberate one two stride, and greets his door with a scowl.
Yanking it open reveals a smiling Tsumugi wielding a date ticket. Not wanting to see her, he almost slams it shut on reflex. There's no way he's going to let her drag him around and spew anime references into the air. Kokichi just isn't in the mood.
The lips on his face smile anyway.
"Heeee~y Smoogi, did you come all the way here just to ask me out?! How sweet of you!"
She smiles even more. There's a genuine kind of excitement in her eyes, the kind that started showing up have Kokichi returned a few too many of her more obscure references. He wouldn't mind if it weren't for getting pinned as an encouraging influence, causing a ton of sighs during the one anime marathon.
Tsumugi opens her mouth, "Ouma-kun, come watch some anime with me?"
For such an apparently plain girl, Tsumugi sure is desperate for company. Could have been worse though. It could have been Maki showing up at Kokichi's doorstep with a date ticket.
Last time that happened had resulted in Kokichi pissing the taller girl off so badly that she looked ready to strangle him. In hindsight, it was Kokichi's stupid confrontational poking thing going into play. And also he might have a very strangleable neck.
Was it the scarf?
"Look Shirogane, I'm not in the mood to play around! I've got important plans to make and just can't go on friend-dates today." Kokichi lets his voice fill up with faux sorrow. It's not a lie though.
Tsumugi and her little 'hmm' don't know it- but Kokichi still has to plan out how to market Shuichi to their audience.
Too much of last night was spent picking himself apart and figuring out how to reconfigure.
The local otaku girl taps her foot and stares at the ticket in her hand.
"I'm not going to force you, to put it plainly, but I think that you ought to relax a bit. Ouma-kun woke up feeling stressed right?" she says, calm and factual.
Kokichi wants to growl at her and maybe scare her away. Instead he makes himself think and consider what exactly this means. How it would look to a viewer for him to reject everyone. Kokichi locks himself away and gets sick after 'barely escaping a monster' the night before. He refuses to spend time with the people he used to so gladly play around with.
Poor Ouma Kokichi, what a horrible thing that ghoul is!
Someone like Tsumugi will never do anything other than use that, not usually. It's a shame.
"Sure! I guess watching something will make me be 'less stressed'." Kokichi chirps.
The short trip to the AV room fills Kokichi with flashes of nostalgia. Shuichi took him there to watch some movies a few times. Maybe he can convince Tsumugi to watch a bug documentary instead of anime.
But when he gets inside the little mini theater there's already a platter of snacks, dried squid chips-soda-fruit, and even the wasabi peanuts he likes to munch on. Popcorn too.
A chair has a few dvds laying on it.
Tsumugi beelines straight towards it with a bounce in her step.
"So I've got Time of Eve, Mermaid Melody, the bartending anime, oh wow Ar Tonelico, Kiss Him not Me, Chi's Sweet Home, Sugar Sugar Rune, Nozaki-kun, Yostura-san, why is Higurashi here, DMMD-"
"Stop blabbering and put in magical girl singing show."
Tsumugi squeaks and moves to comply. Half way through she realizes that she has two DVDs still in her hands.
"Do you want the mermaid princess singing or the actually scifi singing?" she asks him.
Kokichi rolls his eyes. Everyone knows that the Ar Tonelico OVA was shit.
"Put in the innuendo infested jrpg's adaptation."
Two episodes and much snackage later; Kokichi finds out that he's in a timeline where the OVA is actually a 12 episode anime that is decent. Apparently, the existence of ghouls makes everything better.
"Please remind me what the third game is like," Kokichi shoves another fist full of beef jerky into his mouth. "Pretend that I've totally forgotten."
Tsumugi gives him a weird look but obliges.
Best timeline.
They spend the rest of the marathon alternating between silence during the singing and talking during five minute intermissions. Kokichi makes sure to get information about changes. Subtly of course. He doesn't exactly want Tsumugi, of all the people, to realize that there is absolutely something up with him.
The marathon ends with the full version of the anime original opening playing at full blast. Kokichi's ears are in pain and love him for it.
That's great, because he loves them too for allowing him the pleasure of hearing.
The credits end with a message in the customary hymmnos conlang, and Kokichi wishes he could look up the exact meaning on his phone.
Kokichi has too little phone and too much Monopad.
Tsumugi stretches next to him while babbling about how much she loves Mir. An unopened can of Golden Grape panta is dislodged from the snack pile between them. It hits the floor hard enough to dent. Another can, Blue Ram, follows it after Tsumugi knocks it over by jumping at the sound.
"Oh geez! I'm so sorry," she frets and grabs at some wet wipes.
A high pressure grape fizz escapes half crushed can near Kokichi's feet.
A smile.
"No problems here on my part 'Mugi. You like best girl too, in the end. Maybe you should cosplay as her someday." Kokichi says. But his mind is elsewhere.
It wasn't like he had agreed to this playdate because of being lax. Exhausting yourself with all work and no play leads to burnout. You have to balance yourself out.
Telling Tsumugi that would have gotten Kokichi some kind of understanding, he's certain. The Ultimate Cosplayer also balances play with business.
She's probably still the ringleader, after all.
There's zero question why she 'worried enough to drag me out of my room'.
But Kokichi can remember the expression of a Shirogane Tsumugi who spent days in this room with him, bingeing bad anime and bitching about manga, unprepared and lonely.
That's the issue right now, Kokichi thinks to himself. You have to accept these things to move forward, but they want to hold you back and trip you up.
His hand finds its way to the half crushed can of soda. Fingers press into the dents and ruined contours.
Colorful and happy designs stare back at him.
Tsumugi stands listless to his side.
Kokichi smiles wider. "I'm going to go head off now. Thanks for the great friend date, I feel less lonely now that I've been able to watch some children's card games!" he laughs freely at the way the blue haired girl baulks.
"If you wanted to watch cards on motorcycles then I would have tried to find it!" Tsumugi replies.
Laugh for her. "But Muuugi- you know I hate childish things!"
"You use Kitten Writing. And you were looking at Chi's Sweet Home the whole time too! Do you want to watch that next?" she questions with her head cocked to the side.
"Yes. I agree, next time we watch K-Project."
A faintly worried gaze finds its way to the can being strangled in his fist.
His not-really comrade in memes frowns. Kokichi acknowledges the bad feeling stirring in his guts, though he's sure more than half of it is his fault. He knows exactly what he has to do to advance the game.
"So… Where will you be going now? Ouma-kun?"
He dances around her questions and leaves with a parting shot that she never understands.
"Oh, just to the hanger!"
The soda runs down his hand and drips to the floor the whole time.
It's fine. Really.
Kokichi just has some rotting memories to confront.
He leaves and leaves and leaves until the oh-so-similar layout swims around inside of his head, differences small and large overlapping- until he's only sure that he's going into the hanger when he reaches it.
The layout of the school might not always be the same, but the hanger never really changes.
It still sends shivers down his spine. Kokichi brings the panta can to his lips and sucks some of the carbonation out of a thin rupture. The small metal edges fight against him and threaten to bleed him, but Kokichi just forces more of the soda out with strong sips.
Kokichi's chest hurts. Actually, his entire body is starting to tingle and throb in discomfort. Everything about this room and all of his dream-memories make his brain scream out to run far away.
To hide like a small child in his bed.
He wants to be undying, again, to know he can wake up and never have to worry and that Miu will sob and regret it and he didn't have to do a single thing to fix anything, but let her kill him-
Kokichi misses a lot of better versions of life. He can remember a handful of lives that have little to do with anything like a killing game. They're little wisps and he hopes to Angie's God that they're real and not fantasy.
His legs move in the direction of cold metal slabs.
He thinks of flowers growing out of his hair, and the same flowers blooming from a tree, using them to scare an unsuspecting Kaito, and a white haired boy asking him to fill an entire classroom with them for good luck on the exams.
Wearing a black uniform and going to cram school so that his single mother won't worry. Coming home and studying some more. Signing up for Dangan Ronpa and never letting her know even when she starts dating again. The despair in both her and her new SO's eyes when he comes home and finds an envelope from Team DR on the kitchen table. His eldest step sibling burning all of her Monokuma merchandise.
His mother being a tattoo artist that wears the most adorable frilly dresses and teaches him to enjoy life.
Miu and Kiibo wave from near some machinery to get his attention.
The most common backstory that he wakes up thinking is his life: Growing up in a orphanage and running away to find his own kind of family. Just being on the streets from the start is second. Once or twice it's being sent into an orphanage and saving a little red eyed girl, growing up more always trying to make her wear checkerboard hair clips, until they wake up in lockers in a run down school. Remembers how hilarious it was to see Maki start crushing on someone. Putting surveillance in Kaito's room because that's just what you do for...
Kokichi again recalls the joke that made Maki glare death at him. He must have forgotten himself in hindsight. Which himself.
One time he woke up as the mastermind under threat of ten deaths. Kokichi's motive video is much less painful after that. He spent all he could trying to sabotage himself without being found out, but murders still happened no matter what tricks he pulled.
Dying and being held by everyone who'd be watching him all alone as nothing more than a ghost lingering as digital static.
Dying. Dying. The hydraulic press. Dying. Joining to end Dangan Ronpa. Joining to die.
It's up in the air right now. Heavy chunks of iron shaped into perfectly formed rectangles made to squash anything put in between them.
"Aw for fucks sake you stupid shrimp dicked twink, I said hello!" Miu's voice catches up to him. Kiibo's thumping footsteps follow up just as quickly.
Turning his head reveals her to be as falsely brave as ever. Messy blonde hair and nonsensical bondage gear sets her up as an eccentric bombshell, and Iruma Miu makes it work. Mostly. Except for when she's cowering at the first sign of discontent.
"Hey slut-friend! What are you and Keeber up to in a place like this?" Kokichi doesn't bother hiding the ruined can from their gazes. Let them and the audience wonder.
Miu sneers at Kokichi and he remembers her fretting over his head wound in another life.
Kiibo walks closer to the hydraulic press behind Kokichi with eyes intent.
"Ouma-kun, were you going to use that panta as a test dummy for the press?" the robot asks, to which Kokichi merely grins at him.
"So your little camera eyes aren't potato tier after all? Hey hey- Kiiboi, can you upload stuff as videos? I wanna see the pathetic shit that Irumummy does while she fixes you!"
Miu's eyes go wide, "Iru… Mummy?!"
Her face goes from normal to pomegranate colored in ten seconds flat.
"Yep. Since that one bear can't stop trying to suck milk from your fat udders, and all." Kokichi just can't help but take and provide the bait.
And Miu is much the same.
"You're just fucking jealous that I'm thicc and fertile, you scrawny fuckboy. I bet that micro-cock dick is so anti-potent that your balls are shriveled into raisins!" her grin is truly vicious to the point that Kiibo looks frightened.
"You two… I know you've both said this to be friendly banter but ple-"
"The only fertility in that body of yours is the rampaging thirst you have zero self control over," Kokichi caws. "I bet you're actually an overcompensating virgin that masturbates for hours, but isn't sure she's ever had a real orgasm!"
Miu tries to stay strong in the face of her smug opposition. Keyword is tries.
She rubs her legs together and shrieks as they give out on her.
That feels better. Winning a harmless match of insults almost always makes Kokichi feel less like a blob of shit.
Kiibo hides his flustered face under both hands. Much better, the worst of the tension leaving his body in a faux exasperated sigh.
Kokichi can get back to thinking clearly again.
He turns back to the press and considers the can in his hand. Does he really want to put it under there and watch it get pulverized nice and slowly? Or maybe the press would actually be fast for once. Kokichi's forehead feels the ghost of pressure.
Kiibo sighs behind him in tune to shuffling from helping Miu stand up again.
The two of them unanimously join Kokichi in staring at the huge contraption. There's silence again, which is fine, but Kokichi can near feel the way that Miu is itching to say literally anything.
"I want to crush the can under the press."
Miu huffs. "Kay, but why tho? You got some fetish or something?"
"Yes. I absolutely have a pressing fetish. I have a pair of huge boots just for crushing things under my evil heels."
"Please refrain," Kiibo mutters. Poor bot.
"If you had a rocket punch capable arm then I'd listen to you." Kokichi knows it's not that easy though. Remembers, even. Remembers like he does most things.
Miu snickers about rocket assisted masturbation.
"So, you two gonna help me out with self fulfillment or not?"
He raises his fist and shakes the still leaking soda can in the air. His upper lip feels sore.
Good.
Miu smacks her palms together in a gesture that's half clap and half implicit parody of Kaito.
"Alrighty you bitch boys, let's get Ouma's shrunken rocks off!" the girl nearly jumps back, making Kiibo jolt out of the way, and skedaddles up to the press's controls.
Kiibo flip flops between wanting to go up with her and staying put to avoid the worst of Miu's innuendos. Maybe, Kokichi ponders, maybe Miu would enjoy Ar Tonelico. The second game has the exact kind of scene she'd go crazy over.
Purple eyes stare at the press.
If he wanted to, he could slide right under-inside it.
But there isn't a point of that, so instead of giving into the dread crawling around his bones, Kokichi lets Kiibo watch as the ruined soda can gets gently placed on waiting steel. He's been sloshing it around so much that there's barely any liquid in the poor thing now.
A small puddle forms anyway.
He remembers how the flat slab of metal looked above him. Kokichi lets his arm linger for just a few more seconds and rips it back. Easy. So very easy.
No big booming sound of two surfaces flattening anything in between them. Only Kokichi has moved.
Can status: just hanging out.
Kokichi leans back with arms behind his head and grins at the silent robot next to him. He can only imagine the thoughts running through Kiibo's head.
Through the audience. Because that's what Dangan Ronpa just loves to do, preemptively betray everyone involved by turning one of them into an unwitting spy and pawn.
It's been Kokichi a few times. Never ended well.
"Hey, you two fuckbois ready for this shit?!" Miu shouts down to them.
Kiibo gives Kokichi an unreadable look. His lips are pinched tight together, eyes not moving an inch from Kokichi's own chipper expression. Kokichi almost wants to start asking if robots have dicks or something asinine like that. He knows by now that Kiibo just doesn't get his humor, but he doesn't want to be looked at that way, to be stared at like he's-
Like Kokichi is doing something dangerous to himself.
Like people are actually pitying him after anywhere from a year to a decade of trying over and over. To.
The hydraulic press starts up with an echoing thrum.
Why did I come here, Kokichi thinks as he backs up far behind Kiibo. But he isn't trembling. Kokichi stares wide eyed and still as the top chunk slowly lowers itself. It's so loud. The room feels like it's shaking or vibrating.
But from Kiibo's arms trying to keep Kokichi from falling down, it's Kokichi that's shaking.
He isn't scared.
The can makes a crumpled groaning sound as it's crushed. Kokichi can't see any splatter or wetness, but he can remember the sight of red-magenta internal fluids drooling outwards and horrifying the living.
Splat. Squish.
Miu slowly comes down to them and there's really just nothing to say. She looks so uncharacteristically concerned that a fun conversation about gross stuff just isn't going to be on the table. So Kokichi opens his stupid mouth and says something anyway.
"Man was that just the highlight of my day!" he nearly shouts. He's not even lying, really, there's a buzz about him and the feeling of being freed.
Down at her sides, Miu's fists clench. She opens her mouth to say something that Kokichi really probably doesn't want to hear.
At the same time, he slips out of Kiibo's hesitant hold and gets ready to break past them. Back down the always twisting halls and to his overstuffed hoarder's room.
Instead of anything to do with that, multiple sets of footsteps start filling the hanger, and three particular students break into the scene.
For Kaede, Kaito, and Shuichi; what they see is a pale Kokichi standing in front of the hydraulic press with Miu and Kiibo looking worried and scared.
For the three who had been in the hanger to start with; they see three sweaty and panting idiots that just ruined a probably important moment.
Miu snarls, "The fuck do you beta incel cucks want?! God..."
She snaps her agitated body around to fully face them. The longer the three stay crouched and panting for breath, the more Miu shakes in anger.
"This girl genius is fucking busy you interrupting shitass abortions!"
Kokichi knows why she's upset. He can imagine why other people came running. He decides to focus on the fact that Tsumugi has started up some shitty drama. Kiibo makes an 'uhm' noise behind him but Kokichi ignores it in favor of watching.
Kaito groans. "That's not important right now Iruma!"
Kaede immediately backs him up with a sharp nod. Behind them, Shuichi looks back at the exisals momentarily, before turning back and placing a worried gaze on Kokichi's face. Kokichi meets it in what he hopes is an even manner. He sees the detective ghoul's nose twitch.
Kokichi stretches a grin around his face. Could Shuichi be smelling the squished soda?
"Ouma-kun, you don't have to do this!" Kaede yells to him.
Miu shuts up. Kiibo shuts up. Kokichi is just confused. The three looks at each other as if to ask for some kind of explanation, but they're all in the dark.
"Akamatsu-san," Kiibo says, "What are you talking about? It is far too late to save the Panta." The robot steps aside and gestures to the closed press with an open palm. Miu's expression has regained its scowl, yanked from the jaws of vulnerability and confusion.
Kokichi has nothing to do with it and he's still a bit proud.
"Wha- no the soda has nothing to do with this! We ran here because Ouma is going to do something dangerous," Kaito says. Kaede nods and Shuichi looks uncomfortable. Kiibo makes machine noises in the background.
"Uhm. Guys?"
Tsumugi. Tsumugi, you bitch. You bitch you bitch you bitch what did you say to them you bitch you bitch-
"The fuck is wrong with you sluts?!" Miu screeches.
"Iruma-san, please just calm down," the other blonde in the room pleads. She's no longer panting and has her hands clasped together. The perfect pose to beseech that someone restrain themselves.
Too bad it's Iruma Miu and not literally anyone else.
While the three loudmouths plus a stammering Kiibo continue arguing, Kokichi inches over to Shuichi's side.
A few reasons exist. Kokichi just wants to, Kokichi knows that this is a prime television moment, Kokichi wants to know what the fuck is happening right now. Yeah, only reasons.
Shuichi fidgets across from him, so Kokichi stands next to him so that they can watch the clusterfucky frick frack together.
"Hey… Kokichi?" Shuichi mutters without looking at him.
"If you wanna tell me something, Shumai, then you should probably start with an explanation. I was having a great time interrupting a date! But then you three ruined my ruining," he pouts with cheeks puffed out. Shuichi glances away towards his still arguing companions. "So now I'm confused and annoyed. My beloved Shuichi should take responsibility for my wrecked emotions."
The ghoul blanches at the last bit and Kokichi starts thinking of a way to backpedal. He's good at backpedaling, what with nearly everything that has ever come out of his lying mouth being a mistake. And he slipped into first name basis.
"But that's-"
"Shirogane-san was so worried about you that she started crying and said you might be planning to bomb the school," Shuchi blurts out.
What?
Miu roars in front of them. To the side of them, maybe. Kiibo is squawking like a disturbed seagull that had a fry stolen from it's mouth.
"You fucks thrust your angry moral high ground wants in here, and accuse us of planting bombs... Get out of my Hanger," Miu spits and snarls so loudly that everyone jumps back from her shaking body.
Kokichi stands frozen and glazes over with half hearted nostalgia. He's seen Miu like this before, but he's never seen her like this before. Her twitching eyes are bright with rage and her hair flairs out behind her like a lion's mane. The clenched teeth she has on full display just complete the picture.
Kokichi swoons a bit, but that's not from Miu's territorial animal impersonation. He's been feeling woozy for a while.
"I can't believe. Can't believe, at all, that Shuichi actually thinks I'd be planning to blow us up after last night," he says as calmly and dryly as possible.
His chest hurts and his head feels funny. Kokichi balls up a fist and ignores a tiny twinge.
Looking back at Shuichi reveals a grimace. That's either guilt or Kokichi using the wrong name, or something. Always something.
"Look Iruma-san, all we knew was that Shirogane-san came in near tears and started freaking out about how Ouma-kun was going to the hanger with some scary look on his face," Kaede tries to again placate the inventor to no avail.
Man, Kiibo is starting to look pissed about being ignored.
Kaito nods and starts explaining what Tsumugi told everyone. Blah blah, Kokichi has been so tired lately, blah blah huge bitch, oh man purposefully irrational rhetoric used to manipulate everyone; to sum it up the cosplayer got everyone in a tissy because 'she was concerned'. As if Kokichi would be able to make a homemade bomb out of a ruined soda can. All by using actual points to trick others into also getting worried.
Kokichi starts feeling queasy. He abruptly realizes that his vision is growing odd, and that he's nodding off a bit. Oh great, is he getting sick? There's no way he can risk being ill right now. He needs to save Shuichi.
"O-ouma-kun?"
That's right. Kokichi needs to save everyone. Why is he standing when he has work to do, has to solve…
Bright and blinding high beams sear everyone's eyes, except for Iruma who is instead lit up from the back, and they blink thrice before leaving everyone to vigorously rub their assaulted optical organs.
"I have been trying! For a long time now, to say something direly important!" Kiibo even sounds pissed. But Kokichi really needs to go investigate Gonta's body now-
"Ouma-kun's hand has been cut and bleeding since around the time you three arrived here. Regardless of any misunderstandings, please let us start addressing that!"
What?
Kokichi looks at his right hand. Nothing.
Kaede rushes over to him and grabs his left hand, pulling it up from his side, gasping when she sees the long bloody cut on his palm. Shuichi hisses to his side and starts rifling through his pockets.
"The can…" he can't keep the useless thought inside of his brain.
No wonder you feel like shit, Kokichi thinks. You've been bleeding this whole time you stupid little fuck.
And of course it would have cut him up with the way he was strangling it.
Someone lowers him onto the floor, always the floor, and Miu wails into his ears because of course she would. Kokichi has been making the acquaintance of quite a few floors lately.
Some kind of stingy liquid floods-pours down on the cut and makes Kokichi whimper deep in his throat.
"I think I might be a glutton for punishment," Kokichi murmurs to her.
"You fuckin' are you shitheel, fuckin real talk you- you just made yourself freak out so badly and you didn't say anything to me-"
Kaito narrows his eyes at them while Shuichi finishes cleaning and wrapping Kokichi's wound. Turns out that Kaede's backpack has an emergency first aid kit in it, but Kaito had already torn up his sleeves. Rest in pieces.
"What are you talking about?" Kaito demands. It makes Miu go eek and hide her worried little face in Kokichi's hair. Gross.
Kiibo continues frowning and answers instead. "Ouma-kun came here to use the hydraulic press in order to crush a can of panta."
"Yeah?"
"Iruma-san went to the controls and obliged him while I stayed behind, and when the task was completed we both found that Ouma-kun was badly off instead of actually pleased."
Kokichi rolls his eyes and groans as loud as possible, happy that the sound echos off the walls and straight back.
"I was fine!" but all saying that does is make Kiibo glare at him.
"You were trembling and did not even notice that you had been harmed."
"I was not trembling, I was excited because I love Hydraulic Press-kun," Kokichi blurts out and quickly loves it. He almost forgot that he could lie.
"Th- what?" Kiibo's eyes blow up to dinner plate proportions. Maybe he should have Miu maintenance him back into shape.
"I said that Panta-chan was in love with Hydraulic Press-kun and I wanted to support them," Kokichi says in complete contradiction to what he actually said just moments ago. "Unfortunately, it seems that my attempt merely led to the death of Panta-chan and also the delicate heart of Hydraulic Press-kun."
Kiibo sputters and scowls as if a sea lion just called him gay. What a mood.
"You did. I'm... No?!" the robot throws his hands up and aggressively sighs.
Kokichi feels his lips tug into a smile.
"I missed this."
Four familiar people blink at him, before unanimously deciding to write it off as confusion from blood loss.
Shuichi pulls him up and they hobble off in search of food for Kokichi to eat.
"Healthy food to replenish your blood cells, you sugar addicted bitch," Miu reminds him. Her blotchy face is less majestic than it had been minutes ago, but Kokichi grins at her all the same.
Kokichi laughs, that classic 'nishishishi' dancing out from his guts, and mutating into something a bit too hysterical to be fake. Kaito slows down at some point.
"Uh, hey man."
"Hi spess freak!"
Kaito gives Kokichi a dirty look.
"Look. I just want to apologize for barging in. You've just been… You've been trying to hide it but these past few days you've been pretty obviously rundown, I guess?" the astronaut scratches the back of his head.
Kokichi gapes at him.
"So when you came in looking like a zombie earlier," Kaito continues looking right ahead, "The idea of you being- I dunno it just made what Shirogane-san was crying about seem really dire. But not because we think that you're a bad person."
Kokichi feels like flinching when Kaito finally looks back down at him with a large smile. Instead, he just stays blank faced and leaning on Shuichi's shoulder as support.
"Cuz' we're friends, even when you act like a brat!" he finishes his speech with a fist pump.
Something, some-other-him, inside of Kokichi is laughing and crying.
Kokichi speaks up instead of any of that shit, "Then tomorrow I'll grab a ticket and we can watch Sailor Moon together. Since you love space and planets so much!"
If the girls start giggling when Kaito blue screens hard enough to stop walking with them, and Shuichi chuckles under his breath while Kiibo makes confused bot sounds, well.
Well, maybe then it's fine that Kokichi starts laughing too.
*
Unintentional looping:
Most often, the term is used for those situations when this is not the intended result; that is, when this is a bug. Such errors are most common among novice programmers, but can be made by experienced programmers as well, because their causes can be quite subtle.
One common cause, for example, is that the programmer intends to iterate over a collection of items such as a linked list, executing the loop code once for each item. Improperly formed links can create a reference loop in the list, where one list element links to one that occurred earlier in the list. This joins part of the list into a circle, causing the program to loop forever.
While most infinite loops can be found by close inspection of the code, there is no general method to determine whether a given program will ever halt or will run forever; this is the undecidability of the halting problem.
*
Kokichi wakes up with heavy eyelids and an alarm blasting on high. Of course their local ursine overlords would have to wake him up just an hour after he finally gets to sleep. The damn thing just gets louder the longer he ignores it too.
God forbid that Ouma Kokichi be allowed some actual rest in this hellhole.
In lieu of words, he groans loudly at his television and groans again when it finally shuts off. Forcing himself up and past his boxes of weird shit, found all across the school, he smacks his horse head onto one of his coolers and amends the 'annoying' above the Monokubs into 'FUCKING annoying'.
Going into the shower starts as a blur and ends in cursing as cold water rains down on him. It wakes him up though, followed by some relaxation when it finally turns lukewarm. God knows that it can't clean him more than the hours long one he had last night.
Kokichi ends up skipping the soap and just plopping himself on the shower floor. It's a bit lucky that they have neat western style showers. If only there was an actual bathtub and not just covering the drain with a cloth for the sake of a puddle. He'd like to maybe spend all day that way. Just let himself prune, laugh about how he covers the shower with a spare sheet, and check for hidden cameras for the upteenth time.
But staying in the shower too long is boring without interactive stuff, and Kokichi isn't some kind of fish person. Rest in peace, dreams of swimming off from the rest of humanity to live in the ocean.
Kokichi grabs his tooth brush and starts smashing it against his teeth. There wouldn't be any dolphins in this escapist fantasy of his. They're assholes.
Spitting out reveals that Kokichi forgot about toothpaste, but that ought to be fine. He brushed a lot last night too.
He does make sure to grab one of all his clothing. Shirt, pants, scarf; they wiped down their shoes but Kokichi is worried that someone might smell the cleaner on them. Different pair there too. He does the customary bug check and shrugs them on nice and quick.
Kokichi knows that he's probably going to be the last person at breakfast, but getting there puts him into a fugue that ensures he doesn't care too much.
It's not the first time that Kokichi was late and tired while walking down these halls.
Going off of statistics, Kokichi muses, it certainly won't be the last either.
The conversation in the cafeteria lulls slightly when Kokichi finally arrives, Shuichi coughing on miso soup, and Kirumi nodding at him before going to retrieve his breakfast from the kitchen. Kaito helpfully thumps Shuichi's back and gives Kokichi an odd look.
The kitchen. Kokichi's hair slowly soaks the back of his neck while he plops down next to Gonta. Kokichi hopes he doesn't get a complex about kitchens next. That would be a disaster if he ever wants to cook or get snacks. What will Kokichi do if he can't get his own panta?
Make Kirumi do it until she starts poisoning him? Wouldn't be too out of character.
"Ouma-kun? Ouma-kun!" someone says in the background.
A large hand settles on Kokichi's shoulder and pats gently. He startles the first time, and Gonta immediately pulls away like he was burnt.
Before Kokichi is a few plates of food. The usual pancakes buried in syrup, chunks of fruit, eggs and bacon. How wonderful that Kokichi hadn't been able to notice in favor of nodding off.
"Wow, thanks Gonta! You made sure I stopped thinking in favor of eating!" Kokichi says. There are small signs of slurring the entire way through. Instant regret.
Gonta picks up on it, because clearly the big gentle loaf would, and fully stares down at Kokichi with concern. Now that basically everyone is doing the same, Kokichi can already feel himself starting to sink into his seat a bit. He had decided against bothering to cover up his paleness and eye bags with makeup. Kaito and Kaede usually dominate breakfast time with discussion.
So, usually speaking- it's safe to let himself take the backseat once in a while.
Now everyone and possibly their mother is looking at his stupidly tired face. Shuichi even has the gall to look guilty about it.
Kirumi speaks like no time had passed. "If you wish to return to your room with your breakfast, I would take no offence. You need not force yourself to stay awake."
"Naaah, I'm fine mom."
The Ultimate Maid blinks at him likes he's the weirdest thing she's ever seen this side of Monophanie's short lived plotline-fueled crush on Hoshi. Or when Tsumugi made everyone watch Princess Tutu in the AV room. Of course, Kirumi is too proper to let her reaction be obvious to those she's serving. Kokichi braces himself for distaste.
"In that case, be a responsible young man who knows how to take care of himself. Please return to bed."
Kokichi can feel his eyebrows raise up to his hairline.
The Toujou Kirumi just joked with him. It might be worse than being called a most detestable cretin.
He decides to shove an orange slice into his mouth and give Kirumi an innocent citrus grin. His appetite is weak right now.
Miu interrupts with a cackle,"I bet Smoldick spent hours jacking it and that's why he looks dead!"
He's going to eat anyway. Not eating is how people die.
"Are you sure that you're alright?" Kaede asks him from her position next to Shuichi. The not so normal boy fiddles with his chopsticks. Kokichi can't help but wonder what the pianist would do if she knew her cute weddle besty is a ghoul.
Maybe she'd u- no stop that thought.
Kaito snorts, "He probably stayed up all night planning how to prank us next."
Kokichi spends the next few minutes deflecting suggestive comments from Miu and assuring the others that he's fine. He does break out the waterworks a few times for the sake of annoying Kaito. It does wonders for convincing everyone that Kokichi is more or less normal.
The food on his plates disappears at the same rate his hair dries, slowly and with great frustration.
After a while, Kokichi gives in and starts a conversation with Shuichi. They talk about what books Kokichi read at the library yesterday, and it's the stiffest conversation that Kokichi has had since he woke up in this round's locker.
Kokichi leaves second after Rantaro, and feels sick knowing that he didn't fool Shuichi at all.
Going back to his room is easy though. Pushing the door open and trudging over to the bed takes a meandering walk back, but Kokichi flops down and curls up around his pillow contently.
Kokichi knows that he should and could do any manner of investigating now. There's just no excuse not to.
But Kokichi is tired and full. Just a little more sleep.
Laying the ghosts to rest can wait.
Instead, he shifts through dreams and memories at the speed of falling honey. Kokichi's brain and body are far too tired to actually give him nightmares, which he's thankful for. The alternative is a surrealism aimed at making him wake up with his guts twisting.
The cute bunny clock tells Kokichi that he managed to sleep until noon. He's never been so happy to have won the silly little thing. What a good clock. Kokichi has always loved rabbits.
A certain British comedy movie comes to mind.
Perhaps, Kokichi considers, he should try to use his all powerful leadership powers to teach Himiko's bunnies to sta-
Then he dashes to his toilet for the sake of heaving into it, heavy spit dripping into the water, and eventually he manages to expel all the food Kirumi had made for him.
The bathroom tiles really do feel just dandy. Just like the kitchen!
Kokichi had been digesting for a while, so maybe it's fine. He can request a really small lunch of things that his dreams won't make him get rid of later. Yeah.
Stress is a horrible and insidious killer.
Someone knocks at Kokichi's bedroom door. Well. That's just too damn bad for them. Kokichi has zero intent to get up off of the floor when he could start heaving again at any moment. The knocking continues for a few minutes, louder and louder.
"Fiiine! I'M COMING JUST GIVE ME A MINUTE JEEEEZ!" Kokichi yells at the top of his lungs.
Focusing on standing steady, he walks with a deliberate one two stride, and greets his door with a scowl.
Yanking it open reveals a smiling Tsumugi wielding a date ticket. Not wanting to see her, he almost slams it shut on reflex. There's no way he's going to let her drag him around and spew anime references into the air. Kokichi just isn't in the mood.
The lips on his face smile anyway.
"Heeee~y Smoogi, did you come all the way here just to ask me out?! How sweet of you!"
She smiles even more. There's a genuine kind of excitement in her eyes, the kind that started showing up have Kokichi returned a few too many of her more obscure references. He wouldn't mind if it weren't for getting pinned as an encouraging influence, causing a ton of sighs during the one anime marathon.
Tsumugi opens her mouth, "Ouma-kun, come watch some anime with me?"
For such an apparently plain girl, Tsumugi sure is desperate for company. Could have been worse though. It could have been Maki showing up at Kokichi's doorstep with a date ticket.
Last time that happened had resulted in Kokichi pissing the taller girl off so badly that she looked ready to strangle him. In hindsight, it was Kokichi's stupid confrontational poking thing going into play. And also he might have a very strangleable neck.
Was it the scarf?
"Look Shirogane, I'm not in the mood to play around! I've got important plans to make and just can't go on friend-dates today." Kokichi lets his voice fill up with faux sorrow. It's not a lie though.
Tsumugi and her little 'hmm' don't know it- but Kokichi still has to plan out how to market Shuichi to their audience.
Too much of last night was spent picking himself apart and figuring out how to reconfigure.
The local otaku girl taps her foot and stares at the ticket in her hand.
"I'm not going to force you, to put it plainly, but I think that you ought to relax a bit. Ouma-kun woke up feeling stressed right?" she says, calm and factual.
Kokichi wants to growl at her and maybe scare her away. Instead he makes himself think and consider what exactly this means. How it would look to a viewer for him to reject everyone. Kokichi locks himself away and gets sick after 'barely escaping a monster' the night before. He refuses to spend time with the people he used to so gladly play around with.
Poor Ouma Kokichi, what a horrible thing that ghoul is!
Someone like Tsumugi will never do anything other than use that, not usually. It's a shame.
"Sure! I guess watching something will make me be 'less stressed'." Kokichi chirps.
The short trip to the AV room fills Kokichi with flashes of nostalgia. Shuichi took him there to watch some movies a few times. Maybe he can convince Tsumugi to watch a bug documentary instead of anime.
But when he gets inside the little mini theater there's already a platter of snacks, dried squid chips-soda-fruit, and even the wasabi peanuts he likes to munch on. Popcorn too.
A chair has a few dvds laying on it.
Tsumugi beelines straight towards it with a bounce in her step.
"So I've got Time of Eve, Mermaid Melody, the bartending anime, oh wow Ar Tonelico, Kiss Him not Me, Chi's Sweet Home, Sugar Sugar Rune, Nozaki-kun, Yostura-san, why is Higurashi here, DMMD-"
"Stop blabbering and put in magical girl singing show."
Tsumugi squeaks and moves to comply. Half way through she realizes that she has two DVDs still in her hands.
"Do you want the mermaid princess singing or the actually scifi singing?" she asks him.
Kokichi rolls his eyes. Everyone knows that the Ar Tonelico OVA was shit.
"Put in the innuendo infested jrpg's adaptation."
Two episodes and much snackage later; Kokichi finds out that he's in a timeline where the OVA is actually a 12 episode anime that is decent. Apparently, the existence of ghouls makes everything better.
"Please remind me what the third game is like," Kokichi shoves another fist full of beef jerky into his mouth. "Pretend that I've totally forgotten."
Tsumugi gives him a weird look but obliges.
Best timeline.
They spend the rest of the marathon alternating between silence during the singing and talking during five minute intermissions. Kokichi makes sure to get information about changes. Subtly of course. He doesn't exactly want Tsumugi, of all the people, to realize that there is absolutely something up with him.
The marathon ends with the full version of the anime original opening playing at full blast. Kokichi's ears are in pain and love him for it.
That's great, because he loves them too for allowing him the pleasure of hearing.
The credits end with a message in the customary hymmnos conlang, and Kokichi wishes he could look up the exact meaning on his phone.
Kokichi has too little phone and too much Monopad.
Tsumugi stretches next to him while babbling about how much she loves Mir. An unopened can of Golden Grape panta is dislodged from the snack pile between them. It hits the floor hard enough to dent. Another can, Blue Ram, follows it after Tsumugi knocks it over by jumping at the sound.
"Oh geez! I'm so sorry," she frets and grabs at some wet wipes.
A high pressure grape fizz escapes half crushed can near Kokichi's feet.
A smile.
"No problems here on my part 'Mugi. You like best girl too, in the end. Maybe you should cosplay as her someday." Kokichi says. But his mind is elsewhere.
It wasn't like he had agreed to this playdate because of being lax. Exhausting yourself with all work and no play leads to burnout. You have to balance yourself out.
Telling Tsumugi that would have gotten Kokichi some kind of understanding, he's certain. The Ultimate Cosplayer also balances play with business.
She's probably still the ringleader, after all.
There's zero question why she 'worried enough to drag me out of my room'.
But Kokichi can remember the expression of a Shirogane Tsumugi who spent days in this room with him, bingeing bad anime and bitching about manga, unprepared and lonely.
That's the issue right now, Kokichi thinks to himself. You have to accept these things to move forward, but they want to hold you back and trip you up.
His hand finds its way to the half crushed can of soda. Fingers press into the dents and ruined contours.
Colorful and happy designs stare back at him.
Tsumugi stands listless to his side.
Kokichi smiles wider. "I'm going to go head off now. Thanks for the great friend date, I feel less lonely now that I've been able to watch some children's card games!" he laughs freely at the way the blue haired girl baulks.
"If you wanted to watch cards on motorcycles then I would have tried to find it!" Tsumugi replies.
Laugh for her. "But Muuugi- you know I hate childish things!"
"You use Kitten Writing. And you were looking at Chi's Sweet Home the whole time too! Do you want to watch that next?" she questions with her head cocked to the side.
"Yes. I agree, next time we watch K-Project."
A faintly worried gaze finds its way to the can being strangled in his fist.
His not-really comrade in memes frowns. Kokichi acknowledges the bad feeling stirring in his guts, though he's sure more than half of it is his fault. He knows exactly what he has to do to advance the game.
"So… Where will you be going now? Ouma-kun?"
He dances around her questions and leaves with a parting shot that she never understands.
"Oh, just to the hanger!"
The soda runs down his hand and drips to the floor the whole time.
It's fine. Really.
Kokichi just has some rotting memories to confront.
He leaves and leaves and leaves until the oh-so-similar layout swims around inside of his head, differences small and large overlapping- until he's only sure that he's going into the hanger when he reaches it.
The layout of the school might not always be the same, but the hanger never really changes.
It still sends shivers down his spine. Kokichi brings the panta can to his lips and sucks some of the carbonation out of a thin rupture. The small metal edges fight against him and threaten to bleed him, but Kokichi just forces more of the soda out with strong sips.
Kokichi's chest hurts. Actually, his entire body is starting to tingle and throb in discomfort. Everything about this room and all of his dream-memories make his brain scream out to run far away.
To hide like a small child in his bed.
He wants to be undying, again, to know he can wake up and never have to worry and that Miu will sob and regret it and he didn't have to do a single thing to fix anything, but let her kill him-
Kokichi misses a lot of better versions of life. He can remember a handful of lives that have little to do with anything like a killing game. They're little wisps and he hopes to Angie's God that they're real and not fantasy.
His legs move in the direction of cold metal slabs.
He thinks of flowers growing out of his hair, and the same flowers blooming from a tree, using them to scare an unsuspecting Kaito, and a white haired boy asking him to fill an entire classroom with them for good luck on the exams.
Wearing a black uniform and going to cram school so that his single mother won't worry. Coming home and studying some more. Signing up for Dangan Ronpa and never letting her know even when she starts dating again. The despair in both her and her new SO's eyes when he comes home and finds an envelope from Team DR on the kitchen table. His eldest step sibling burning all of her Monokuma merchandise.
His mother being a tattoo artist that wears the most adorable frilly dresses and teaches him to enjoy life.
Miu and Kiibo wave from near some machinery to get his attention.
The most common backstory that he wakes up thinking is his life: Growing up in a orphanage and running away to find his own kind of family. Just being on the streets from the start is second. Once or twice it's being sent into an orphanage and saving a little red eyed girl, growing up more always trying to make her wear checkerboard hair clips, until they wake up in lockers in a run down school. Remembers how hilarious it was to see Maki start crushing on someone. Putting surveillance in Kaito's room because that's just what you do for...
Kokichi again recalls the joke that made Maki glare death at him. He must have forgotten himself in hindsight. Which himself.
One time he woke up as the mastermind under threat of ten deaths. Kokichi's motive video is much less painful after that. He spent all he could trying to sabotage himself without being found out, but murders still happened no matter what tricks he pulled.
Dying and being held by everyone who'd be watching him all alone as nothing more than a ghost lingering as digital static.
Dying. Dying. The hydraulic press. Dying. Joining to end Dangan Ronpa. Joining to die.
It's up in the air right now. Heavy chunks of iron shaped into perfectly formed rectangles made to squash anything put in between them.
"Aw for fucks sake you stupid shrimp dicked twink, I said hello!" Miu's voice catches up to him. Kiibo's thumping footsteps follow up just as quickly.
Turning his head reveals her to be as falsely brave as ever. Messy blonde hair and nonsensical bondage gear sets her up as an eccentric bombshell, and Iruma Miu makes it work. Mostly. Except for when she's cowering at the first sign of discontent.
"Hey slut-friend! What are you and Keeber up to in a place like this?" Kokichi doesn't bother hiding the ruined can from their gazes. Let them and the audience wonder.
Miu sneers at Kokichi and he remembers her fretting over his head wound in another life.
Kiibo walks closer to the hydraulic press behind Kokichi with eyes intent.
"Ouma-kun, were you going to use that panta as a test dummy for the press?" the robot asks, to which Kokichi merely grins at him.
"So your little camera eyes aren't potato tier after all? Hey hey- Kiiboi, can you upload stuff as videos? I wanna see the pathetic shit that Irumummy does while she fixes you!"
Miu's eyes go wide, "Iru… Mummy?!"
Her face goes from normal to pomegranate colored in ten seconds flat.
"Yep. Since that one bear can't stop trying to suck milk from your fat udders, and all." Kokichi just can't help but take and provide the bait.
And Miu is much the same.
"You're just fucking jealous that I'm thicc and fertile, you scrawny fuckboy. I bet that micro-cock dick is so anti-potent that your balls are shriveled into raisins!" her grin is truly vicious to the point that Kiibo looks frightened.
"You two… I know you've both said this to be friendly banter but ple-"
"The only fertility in that body of yours is the rampaging thirst you have zero self control over," Kokichi caws. "I bet you're actually an overcompensating virgin that masturbates for hours, but isn't sure she's ever had a real orgasm!"
Miu tries to stay strong in the face of her smug opposition. Keyword is tries.
She rubs her legs together and shrieks as they give out on her.
That feels better. Winning a harmless match of insults almost always makes Kokichi feel less like a blob of shit.
Kiibo hides his flustered face under both hands. Much better, the worst of the tension leaving his body in a faux exasperated sigh.
Kokichi can get back to thinking clearly again.
He turns back to the press and considers the can in his hand. Does he really want to put it under there and watch it get pulverized nice and slowly? Or maybe the press would actually be fast for once. Kokichi's forehead feels the ghost of pressure.
Kiibo sighs behind him in tune to shuffling from helping Miu stand up again.
The two of them unanimously join Kokichi in staring at the huge contraption. There's silence again, which is fine, but Kokichi can near feel the way that Miu is itching to say literally anything.
"I want to crush the can under the press."
Miu huffs. "Kay, but why tho? You got some fetish or something?"
"Yes. I absolutely have a pressing fetish. I have a pair of huge boots just for crushing things under my evil heels."
"Please refrain," Kiibo mutters. Poor bot.
"If you had a rocket punch capable arm then I'd listen to you." Kokichi knows it's not that easy though. Remembers, even. Remembers like he does most things.
Miu snickers about rocket assisted masturbation.
"So, you two gonna help me out with self fulfillment or not?"
He raises his fist and shakes the still leaking soda can in the air. His upper lip feels sore.
Good.
Miu smacks her palms together in a gesture that's half clap and half implicit parody of Kaito.
"Alrighty you bitch boys, let's get Ouma's shrunken rocks off!" the girl nearly jumps back, making Kiibo jolt out of the way, and skedaddles up to the press's controls.
Kiibo flip flops between wanting to go up with her and staying put to avoid the worst of Miu's innuendos. Maybe, Kokichi ponders, maybe Miu would enjoy Ar Tonelico. The second game has the exact kind of scene she'd go crazy over.
Purple eyes stare at the press.
If he wanted to, he could slide right under-inside it.
But there isn't a point of that, so instead of giving into the dread crawling around his bones, Kokichi lets Kiibo watch as the ruined soda can gets gently placed on waiting steel. He's been sloshing it around so much that there's barely any liquid in the poor thing now.
A small puddle forms anyway.
He remembers how the flat slab of metal looked above him. Kokichi lets his arm linger for just a few more seconds and rips it back. Easy. So very easy.
No big booming sound of two surfaces flattening anything in between them. Only Kokichi has moved.
Can status: just hanging out.
Kokichi leans back with arms behind his head and grins at the silent robot next to him. He can only imagine the thoughts running through Kiibo's head.
Through the audience. Because that's what Dangan Ronpa just loves to do, preemptively betray everyone involved by turning one of them into an unwitting spy and pawn.
It's been Kokichi a few times. Never ended well.
"Hey, you two fuckbois ready for this shit?!" Miu shouts down to them.
Kiibo gives Kokichi an unreadable look. His lips are pinched tight together, eyes not moving an inch from Kokichi's own chipper expression. Kokichi almost wants to start asking if robots have dicks or something asinine like that. He knows by now that Kiibo just doesn't get his humor, but he doesn't want to be looked at that way, to be stared at like he's-
Like Kokichi is doing something dangerous to himself.
Like people are actually pitying him after anywhere from a year to a decade of trying over and over. To.
The hydraulic press starts up with an echoing thrum.
Why did I come here, Kokichi thinks as he backs up far behind Kiibo. But he isn't trembling. Kokichi stares wide eyed and still as the top chunk slowly lowers itself. It's so loud. The room feels like it's shaking or vibrating.
But from Kiibo's arms trying to keep Kokichi from falling down, it's Kokichi that's shaking.
He isn't scared.
The can makes a crumpled groaning sound as it's crushed. Kokichi can't see any splatter or wetness, but he can remember the sight of red-magenta internal fluids drooling outwards and horrifying the living.
Splat. Squish.
Miu slowly comes down to them and there's really just nothing to say. She looks so uncharacteristically concerned that a fun conversation about gross stuff just isn't going to be on the table. So Kokichi opens his stupid mouth and says something anyway.
"Man was that just the highlight of my day!" he nearly shouts. He's not even lying, really, there's a buzz about him and the feeling of being freed.
Down at her sides, Miu's fists clench. She opens her mouth to say something that Kokichi really probably doesn't want to hear.
At the same time, he slips out of Kiibo's hesitant hold and gets ready to break past them. Back down the always twisting halls and to his overstuffed hoarder's room.
Instead of anything to do with that, multiple sets of footsteps start filling the hanger, and three particular students break into the scene.
For Kaede, Kaito, and Shuichi; what they see is a pale Kokichi standing in front of the hydraulic press with Miu and Kiibo looking worried and scared.
For the three who had been in the hanger to start with; they see three sweaty and panting idiots that just ruined a probably important moment.
Miu snarls, "The fuck do you beta incel cucks want?! God..."
She snaps her agitated body around to fully face them. The longer the three stay crouched and panting for breath, the more Miu shakes in anger.
"This girl genius is fucking busy you interrupting shitass abortions!"
Kokichi knows why she's upset. He can imagine why other people came running. He decides to focus on the fact that Tsumugi has started up some shitty drama. Kiibo makes an 'uhm' noise behind him but Kokichi ignores it in favor of watching.
Kaito groans. "That's not important right now Iruma!"
Kaede immediately backs him up with a sharp nod. Behind them, Shuichi looks back at the exisals momentarily, before turning back and placing a worried gaze on Kokichi's face. Kokichi meets it in what he hopes is an even manner. He sees the detective ghoul's nose twitch.
Kokichi stretches a grin around his face. Could Shuichi be smelling the squished soda?
"Ouma-kun, you don't have to do this!" Kaede yells to him.
Miu shuts up. Kiibo shuts up. Kokichi is just confused. The three looks at each other as if to ask for some kind of explanation, but they're all in the dark.
"Akamatsu-san," Kiibo says, "What are you talking about? It is far too late to save the Panta." The robot steps aside and gestures to the closed press with an open palm. Miu's expression has regained its scowl, yanked from the jaws of vulnerability and confusion.
Kokichi has nothing to do with it and he's still a bit proud.
"Wha- no the soda has nothing to do with this! We ran here because Ouma is going to do something dangerous," Kaito says. Kaede nods and Shuichi looks uncomfortable. Kiibo makes machine noises in the background.
"Uhm. Guys?"
Tsumugi. Tsumugi, you bitch. You bitch you bitch you bitch what did you say to them you bitch you bitch-
"The fuck is wrong with you sluts?!" Miu screeches.
"Iruma-san, please just calm down," the other blonde in the room pleads. She's no longer panting and has her hands clasped together. The perfect pose to beseech that someone restrain themselves.
Too bad it's Iruma Miu and not literally anyone else.
While the three loudmouths plus a stammering Kiibo continue arguing, Kokichi inches over to Shuichi's side.
A few reasons exist. Kokichi just wants to, Kokichi knows that this is a prime television moment, Kokichi wants to know what the fuck is happening right now. Yeah, only reasons.
Shuichi fidgets across from him, so Kokichi stands next to him so that they can watch the clusterfucky frick frack together.
"Hey… Kokichi?" Shuichi mutters without looking at him.
"If you wanna tell me something, Shumai, then you should probably start with an explanation. I was having a great time interrupting a date! But then you three ruined my ruining," he pouts with cheeks puffed out. Shuichi glances away towards his still arguing companions. "So now I'm confused and annoyed. My beloved Shuichi should take responsibility for my wrecked emotions."
The ghoul blanches at the last bit and Kokichi starts thinking of a way to backpedal. He's good at backpedaling, what with nearly everything that has ever come out of his lying mouth being a mistake. And he slipped into first name basis.
"But that's-"
"Shirogane-san was so worried about you that she started crying and said you might be planning to bomb the school," Shuchi blurts out.
What?
Miu roars in front of them. To the side of them, maybe. Kiibo is squawking like a disturbed seagull that had a fry stolen from it's mouth.
"You fucks thrust your angry moral high ground wants in here, and accuse us of planting bombs... Get out of my Hanger," Miu spits and snarls so loudly that everyone jumps back from her shaking body.
Kokichi stands frozen and glazes over with half hearted nostalgia. He's seen Miu like this before, but he's never seen her like this before. Her twitching eyes are bright with rage and her hair flairs out behind her like a lion's mane. The clenched teeth she has on full display just complete the picture.
Kokichi swoons a bit, but that's not from Miu's territorial animal impersonation. He's been feeling woozy for a while.
"I can't believe. Can't believe, at all, that Shuichi actually thinks I'd be planning to blow us up after last night," he says as calmly and dryly as possible.
His chest hurts and his head feels funny. Kokichi balls up a fist and ignores a tiny twinge.
Looking back at Shuichi reveals a grimace. That's either guilt or Kokichi using the wrong name, or something. Always something.
"Look Iruma-san, all we knew was that Shirogane-san came in near tears and started freaking out about how Ouma-kun was going to the hanger with some scary look on his face," Kaede tries to again placate the inventor to no avail.
Man, Kiibo is starting to look pissed about being ignored.
Kaito nods and starts explaining what Tsumugi told everyone. Blah blah, Kokichi has been so tired lately, blah blah huge bitch, oh man purposefully irrational rhetoric used to manipulate everyone; to sum it up the cosplayer got everyone in a tissy because 'she was concerned'. As if Kokichi would be able to make a homemade bomb out of a ruined soda can. All by using actual points to trick others into also getting worried.
Kokichi starts feeling queasy. He abruptly realizes that his vision is growing odd, and that he's nodding off a bit. Oh great, is he getting sick? There's no way he can risk being ill right now. He needs to save Shuichi.
"O-ouma-kun?"
That's right. Kokichi needs to save everyone. Why is he standing when he has work to do, has to solve…
Bright and blinding high beams sear everyone's eyes, except for Iruma who is instead lit up from the back, and they blink thrice before leaving everyone to vigorously rub their assaulted optical organs.
"I have been trying! For a long time now, to say something direly important!" Kiibo even sounds pissed. But Kokichi really needs to go investigate Gonta's body now-
"Ouma-kun's hand has been cut and bleeding since around the time you three arrived here. Regardless of any misunderstandings, please let us start addressing that!"
What?
Kokichi looks at his right hand. Nothing.
Kaede rushes over to him and grabs his left hand, pulling it up from his side, gasping when she sees the long bloody cut on his palm. Shuichi hisses to his side and starts rifling through his pockets.
"The can…" he can't keep the useless thought inside of his brain.
No wonder you feel like shit, Kokichi thinks. You've been bleeding this whole time you stupid little fuck.
And of course it would have cut him up with the way he was strangling it.
Someone lowers him onto the floor, always the floor, and Miu wails into his ears because of course she would. Kokichi has been making the acquaintance of quite a few floors lately.
Some kind of stingy liquid floods-pours down on the cut and makes Kokichi whimper deep in his throat.
"I think I might be a glutton for punishment," Kokichi murmurs to her.
"You fuckin' are you shitheel, fuckin real talk you- you just made yourself freak out so badly and you didn't say anything to me-"
Kaito narrows his eyes at them while Shuichi finishes cleaning and wrapping Kokichi's wound. Turns out that Kaede's backpack has an emergency first aid kit in it, but Kaito had already torn up his sleeves. Rest in pieces.
"What are you talking about?" Kaito demands. It makes Miu go eek and hide her worried little face in Kokichi's hair. Gross.
Kiibo continues frowning and answers instead. "Ouma-kun came here to use the hydraulic press in order to crush a can of panta."
"Yeah?"
"Iruma-san went to the controls and obliged him while I stayed behind, and when the task was completed we both found that Ouma-kun was badly off instead of actually pleased."
Kokichi rolls his eyes and groans as loud as possible, happy that the sound echos off the walls and straight back.
"I was fine!" but all saying that does is make Kiibo glare at him.
"You were trembling and did not even notice that you had been harmed."
"I was not trembling, I was excited because I love Hydraulic Press-kun," Kokichi blurts out and quickly loves it. He almost forgot that he could lie.
"Th- what?" Kiibo's eyes blow up to dinner plate proportions. Maybe he should have Miu maintenance him back into shape.
"I said that Panta-chan was in love with Hydraulic Press-kun and I wanted to support them," Kokichi says in complete contradiction to what he actually said just moments ago. "Unfortunately, it seems that my attempt merely led to the death of Panta-chan and also the delicate heart of Hydraulic Press-kun."
Kiibo sputters and scowls as if a sea lion just called him gay. What a mood.
"You did. I'm... No?!" the robot throws his hands up and aggressively sighs.
Kokichi feels his lips tug into a smile.
"I missed this."
Four familiar people blink at him, before unanimously deciding to write it off as confusion from blood loss.
Shuichi pulls him up and they hobble off in search of food for Kokichi to eat.
"Healthy food to replenish your blood cells, you sugar addicted bitch," Miu reminds him. Her blotchy face is less majestic than it had been minutes ago, but Kokichi grins at her all the same.
Kokichi laughs, that classic 'nishishishi' dancing out from his guts, and mutating into something a bit too hysterical to be fake. Kaito slows down at some point.
"Uh, hey man."
"Hi spess freak!"
Kaito gives Kokichi a dirty look.
"Look. I just want to apologize for barging in. You've just been… You've been trying to hide it but these past few days you've been pretty obviously rundown, I guess?" the astronaut scratches the back of his head.
Kokichi gapes at him.
"So when you came in looking like a zombie earlier," Kaito continues looking right ahead, "The idea of you being- I dunno it just made what Shirogane-san was crying about seem really dire. But not because we think that you're a bad person."
Kokichi feels like flinching when Kaito finally looks back down at him with a large smile. Instead, he just stays blank faced and leaning on Shuichi's shoulder as support.
"Cuz' we're friends, even when you act like a brat!" he finishes his speech with a fist pump.
Something, some-other-him, inside of Kokichi is laughing and crying.
Kokichi speaks up instead of any of that shit, "Then tomorrow I'll grab a ticket and we can watch Sailor Moon together. Since you love space and planets so much!"
If the girls start giggling when Kaito blue screens hard enough to stop walking with them, and Shuichi chuckles under his breath while Kiibo makes confused bot sounds, well.
Well, maybe then it's fine that Kokichi starts laughing too.
Medusa Chapter 2, Arteries
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Kokichi approaches the half point, and tries to cover himself up with implied metaphors.
There's a bowl of avocado covered leafy greens, nuts, and dried fruit in front of Kokichi's face. To the side is freshly made mackerel and a glass of lemon water. There had been a kiwi too, right up until Kokichi decided to take a huge bite out of the strangely hairless mutant fruit.
It has a delicious aftertaste and now Kokichi is full from it plus previous snackage.
Three pairs of eyes are staring at Kokichi as if to tell him 'no you cannot leave until you eat it all'. Thankfully, super responsible mom Kirumi is still in the kitchen making food for later. Kokichi would probably have even more people trying to non-verbally guilt him into eating otherwise.
Even better is that Kaede took Miu to go get freshened up after all the crying the inventor did. Miu would have started shoving the salad in his face right about now.
Kokichi chugs some of his water and stabs dark green lettuce. Cranberries and walnuts get carried up to his teeth and then he swallows as soon as possible.
"Ouma-kun, please chew for at least 25 seconds," Kiibo reminds him.
Glowering would take too much effort at the moment, so Kokichi just rolls his eyes. What a good, kind, bot. Bleeech. Kiibo should go blow up the school instead of playing parent. The tin can is probably just doing some stupid programing. Just like the bears with their 'waah waaaah we kidnapped you… but also you signed a legal contract you can't remember!'. Kokichi opens his mouth.
Wait, no that would be a horrible insensitive mess to say, nevermind-
He makes a show of eating a fat slice of avocado. The creamy weirdness doesn't agree with him and Kokichi immediately stabs a bunch of fruit and nuts to hide the taste. Kaito looks away from him momentarily.
Kirumi comes out with small snacks for everyone and places a banana next to Kokichi's plate.
Kokichi narrows his eyes at the offending meal in front of him. They have to know from Tsumugi's account that Kokichi ate a bunch of junk food earlier. So where the heck did they get off trying to make him stuff himself?
Everyone else starts digging in except for Kiibo, who takes Kirumi's offered crossword puzzle with a smile.
He puts his fork down, "I have an important confession to make. I totes pigged out on snacks with Mugi and now I'm full again."
The look that Kaito and Shuichi share with one another makes Kokichi frown. Then he internally frowns at his frown, and forces a smile back onto his face.
No point in that.
"Yeah. But Shirogane said that you'd gotten sick after breakfast, and junk isn't that filling," Kaito says. Kokichi blinks at him.
"I never told Smoogi anything like that."
Shuichi hums, "Well, that's just what she told us... and you don't seem to be denying it?"
Kokichi wants to say 'damn your astuteness', but instead he laughs to make things less serious.
"Don't you think that she could be lying? If my dear Shumai is worried then he should just tell me. Not that he'd hear anything bad, since I'm fine. Saihara-chan doesn't have to worry," he says with half closed eyes.
"But by my calculations you are having a harder time eating than the average full person would. The bite of avocado you had caused an adverse reaction that it never has before," Kiibo butts into the conversation with cold facts. "You've also avoided the warm meat dish despite having readily eaten meat before."
Kokichi glares at him from under his bangs. He'd been preparing an excuse for that last thing, but now Shuichi is subtly cringing away. Fuck.
"I think it's more interesting that Smoogi 'knew' I had thrown up," Kokichi points out the inconsistency while attacking his fish with constant stabbings. Kirumi's hand gently grasps the rim of the plate and takes it away.
"I was not present at the time, but it is to my understanding that you told her during your outing," she tells him.
Well that just settles things. Shirogane Tsumugi is the mastermind and she's trying to gaslight Kokichi. Definitely, like she almost always is with all her lies. She's actually-
Again, just like when he woke up after the nap, Kokichi's stomach feels like it's rebelling. It must show up on his face because Kirumi returns to take away the rest of his food. Kokichi grabs the banana and keeps it with him.
No one here believes his smile anymore.
"I just ate too much and have appetite loss from confinement. That's all," Kokichi asserts like he's talking to DICE. "And since I have ssssuuuuuch a delicate stomach I decided that hot food like that fish was a no go! An evil leader type like me only eats cold foods, cold like his heart."
Kaito glares at him like he's having none of it. Shuichi looks slightly less uncomfortable. Kiibo appears to be having problems figuring out what to say. Good.
"But back to the important topic, why the hell would any of you believe that I'd tell Smoogi the truth like that?" he keeps his voice low and bored. He knows exactly why Shuichi would end up buying that Kokichi had puked up his food. Kaito isn't much for impulse control, being an unrepentant idiot.
Kiibo didn't have to deal with Tsumugi's crap though.
"Shirogane-san and Ouma-kun are friends," Shuichi says.
"Sure."
A robotic eyebrow is raised, "Are the two of you not friends? Either way, I cannot think of a reason for Shirogane-san to lie."
She lies because she's a huge bitch. But Kokichi can't say that either.
"I know I'm all 'smol pale frail' looking but-" Kokichi stops talking. Forget the lowkey angst of being five foot one as a young adult. If Shuichi could smell his blood back in the hanger, can Shuichi smell that Kokichi has in fact been sick? Even with Kokichi cleaning up?
The three other boys wait for him to finish speaking. Kokichi is a bit busy realizing that it's going to be hard to actually lie to Shuichi about biological things.
What if Shuichi can smell fear?
He needs to go somewhere else. Kokichi needs to be somewhere more fun and important. He slowly gets up.
"I'm bored now."
"W-what? Ouma-kun stay seated please!"
"Nope! I'm going to my super secret lab and you guys can't come because you're all meanies."
"Oh come on man, we just had a heart to heart!"
No wait, stop it. Think about how it will look to the audience you simpleton. You can't just leave like this without making Shuichi look bad. You've already made them look like fools for trusting Tsumugi. And you need to market him to all the humans and ghouls watching the show, you need to show what makes Shuichi sympathetic and desirable. Subtext isn't enough for that either.
Kaito starts lecturing like the nerdy mom-friend slash older brother that he secretly is. His words get discarded.
Not that Shumai actually needs help with those two things when it comes to you, the sly thought snakes through. The reminder makes Kokichi twitch. For a second a few more stray thoughts threaten to bubble up in the form of false spectors.
"Fine. If you guys wanna pretend that I'm, like, twelve or something go ahead. Maybe my contract will get nulled by sheer willpower alone. But!" Kokichi turns around with a grin from ear to ear.
"I'll only accept being nanny'd by my beloved Saihara-chan!"
Shuichi sputters behind him but, after some rushed mutters, quickly catches up with Kokichi. The tension as they make their way down to the basement is almost palatable. Shuichi keeps making little 'uhm' noises but never truly speaks up. The basement grows closer and closer, with it the majestic sight that is the secret entrance to Kokichi's lab.
The interior is even better and Kokichi will weather any silence just to see it. A floating throne fills him with joy each time the door opens so that his eyes can take it in.
Kokichi considers telling Shuichi to close his eyes. He's not entirely… Kokichi isn't totally sure about this. He isn't going to show his lab to just anyone. He never shows his lab to just anyone.
Shuichi absolutely doesn't ever show his face as a ghoul to anyone, and Kokichi took that from him. Team Danganronpa took that privacy from him.
The way it tried to put cameras in Kokichi's room for days until it gave up on being so obvious.
Besides fulfilling the unspoken promise to never tell, a promise that Kokichi could break at any time, this is the only kind of worthwhile apology that Kokichi can give. Forcing himself to reciprocate an unwanted but acceptable development with its counterpart. Kokichi likes to think that he's come a long way from himself.
For instance, he knows that he lies to himself now.
Often.
The door to his lab isn't even done opening before Kokichi is pushing Shuichi inside. A human can apparently push an unsuspecting half-ghoul with ease, which is great to know. An immobile object version of Shuichi would suck.
Boy- if the blue tone room doesn't lighten Kokichi's heart with glee though. He gazes at the car with the same feeling of awe each time. And the throne! The floating throne, the computer station, all of everything.
Can't forget the disguises. Glasses with fake noses are such classics.
Shuichi gets shoved straight into Kokichi's comfort zone and looks around like a lost puppy. Black-blue hair tosses along with his head.
"Ouma-kun this is… your lab?" the detective murmurs, eyes flitting every which way.
Kokichi laughs, "Yep!"
"This is..."
"Awesome? Amazingly high tech? Totally darn tootin neato?"
"This is like a-" Shuichi turns around to face Kokichi again. His mouth is open and twitched downwards in disbelief.
"Super duper scary neon punk lair of evil?!"
Kokichi stares breathless from his impromptu yelling. Shuichi stares back at him as if his life was revealed to have no meaning. Jaw fully dropped, but there's little to no real tenseness, beyond excited nerves.
"Ouma-kun, this lab looks like what a child playing super spy would have," Shuichi carefully says.
Kokichi feigns going limp and smirks at Shuichi's response of a long uuuh. He fakes a sniffle and then whips himself back up with a grin.
"So Shuichi likes Spy Kids roleplay?" he asks innocently. Yup, so totally innocent. Kokichi isn't even lying!
Shuichi shifts on the balls of his feet.
The ghoul, just half as Kokichi reminds himself, pauses before finally shutting his gaping mouth, "I have no idea what that is."
"Well, l-oh-l I guess, but yeah!" Kokichi struggles to find what he should say next. "This is my secret lab that no one else has seen before. We're even now."
Shuichi looks… touched. That's good, even if it makes Kokichi's chest hurt.
Kokichi starts walking over to the storage units and gets to sifting through them until he finds the snack drawers. Normal tea things are quickly expelled onto the counter, taking place next to miscellaneous gadgets. He roots around in the unseen back and hopes that this isn't just his memories fucking around. But yes, he finds a small cloth pouch containing what feels like cubes, and the normal sugar cubes are topside in a clear jar.
Kokichi exhales slowly.
He reaches around and feels for small grooves, clicking them and pulling out a foldable table for two. Kokichi does not look at Shuichi.
"Sh- Shumai, go get some chairs from the evil surveillance station," he orders the only other person in his lab.
Footsteps hesitate before complying.
Soon the room is filled with the sounds of tea brewing and coffee being made. The two of them are eventually seated and Kokichi blabbers while Shuichi stares down at the little bag of brown sugar cubes. The ghoul has no idea just how calculated Kokichi is being. Has no idea why Kokichi is going to trample on his own gut instincts.
Kokichi gets up to pour his tea and Shuichi's coffee.
It's only when Kokichi is finished and stirring in his own white sugar cubes, just two, that Shuichi breaks his silence.
"Why does Ouma-kun have those in his lab?"
Kokichi blinks nice and slow, his face made up to be the perfect picture of resolute and reasonable innocence. He frown smiles, "I'm not sure what you mean, Saihara-chan. "
Shuichi grips his mug full of untouched coffee.
Kokichi forces himself to think that Shuichi is being like an ungrateful child. None of them are children of any sort, Shirogane's Danganronpa intentions aside, but it's the thought that counts.
"Do you mean the gag glasses? The mustaches? Or the umbrellas or the gas masks, or?" Talk to him like an adult talking to a naive kid, Kokichi reminds himself. It'll all lead up to something better. Get him pent up and let the sick freaks watching know that Shuichi isn't a monster-
"The sugarcubes!" Shuichi hisses. "The brown ones, why are they here? You obviously know what they are. Why would you even have them after-"
Shuichi cuts himself off.
Kokichi smiles.
"I'm not sure what conclusions you got from last night, but Saihara-chan had to have noticed those masks by now." A hand stretches out towards boxes in the front.
"So what does Saihara-chan think now?" Kokichi finishes with a question and an action, delicately untying the ignored pouch.
His pale fingers, thumb and pointer, clamp down around a red-brown cube of iron scented sugar. It rises up in the air and Kokichi smoothly brings it to hover above Shuichi's cup of coffee. The steaming rich liquid sloshes within slightly shaking porcelain. Shuichi's breath hitches.
"Ouma-kun…"
Kokichi frowns at him in confusion, but bites his tongue and lets Shuichi talk at his own pace. His hand wavers.
"Ouma-kun said that he had cohabitated with ghouls before but," Shuichi sets down his tea cup full of black coffee. "I had thought with the way you said it…"
The frown gets deeper, and particles of rust-sugar fall to the table. Kokichi can't say that that's irrelevant to the topic, but what had Shuichi gathered from last night? Kokichi tries to remember exactly what it is that he had said back then, all of it, from the stupidly instigative 'kill me already' to the break down that had almost nothing to do with what triggered it.
He wheezes and Shuichi cringes his grip on the cup tighter at the sound of it.
"Did Shumai think I was some kind of ghoul-kidnapping victim? That someone stole me away in the night to raise as food slash toy?" Kokichi murmurs. His heart is aching and his head is swimming. That has never happened- that wasn't what he's been talking about at all.
Shumai must be thinking that, had thought that, Kokichi was-is weak. Crawling back and weak weak weak.
"Saihara Shuichi."
The boy in question snaps to attention and holds his coffee like a lifeline. Like he has anything to be afraid of, as if the face he sees when he gets pulled back into orbit is looking at him like he's scum.
But that's not the expression that he finds there.
Kokichi is looking at him with a gentle expression, fingertips lowering to meet the still hot surface of Shuichi's coffee, and releasing half wet sugar-iron to the depths.
"I do not hate you," Kokichi says while maintaining their eye contact. It's almost the whole truth, and saying it makes more than a dozen half baked words force their way to clog in his throat. "I took you here because I wanted to show you that instead of just telling you."
"And you don't hate ghouls either?" the detective, the half human half ghoul, Shuichi asks him.
"Nope! How could a great leader like me possibly hate two of his subordinates? That'd make me horrible!" Kokichi laughs at Shuichi's dropped jaw. That's the reaction he'd been wanting from the start, too. The relief. Of course, that gasp as people stare at their TV as well.
"So that's why I brought my beloved Shumai to see my secret too." Kokichi plops back down into his rolly chair and flings a regular sugar cube into Shuichi's coffee for good measure.
"You-" Shuichi watches him while still processing the past half an hour. Maybe an hour, Kokichi isn't that great at time awareness.
"You have a childish faux evil gang that has ghouls in it."
Kokichi grins and sips his tea.
"I'm the Ultimate Supreme Leader for a reason you know. The only real rules that DICE ever has is no killing, only petty crimes or under, and to help each other." And to be a family no matter what. Somehow, that remains so consistent that Kokichi can never stop using them as a crutch. Even when he knows that they're fake.
Shuichi watches on and Kokichi decides to use his own spoon to stir in the mixed sugar. He's near praying that Shuichi understand just what Kokichi's actions are trying to hit home to him, and to the audience. That maybe he'll even read into it.
Shuichi blinks at each particularly loud clack, but picks up the coffee once Kokichi is finished. His face has morphed into an expression of wonder.
The detective brings the bone white rim to his mouth a takes a long gulp.
Kokichi feels his dozen little somethings jump and flutter around his guts and claw at his esophagus. It must feel like victory. Buzzing hands grab their own teacup, filled with actual tea, and bring it to Kokichi's lips for him to blow on. It's a nice spiced black tea with minimal sugar and no cream. He'd usually use a little honey but could only find some plastic packets of it, and like hell Kokichi would use that.
It goes down wonderfully hot.
He returns the cup to its saucer. Shuichi has lost some of the tension in his body, obviously more relaxed, but he's still hesitant in his body language. Still...
"I suppose that your organization is actually smaller than 10,000 people?" Shuichi looks at Kokichi with that familiar burn of 'needing to know' returning to his eyes. The detective talent and intent mind in him must be kicking in, eager to bite Kokichi's so carefully offered bait.
Kokichi investigates his nails.
"Well, dunno about less than 10,000. How in the world did Shumai come to such a conclusion?" he questions airily.
Shuichi subconsciously straightens his back and mulls over his thoughts. Gold-grey eyes blink around the room and settle back on Kokichi.
"You said that two of your subordinates are ghouls and you talked about them like they're extremely close to you. Then you referred to DICE as a gang, which combined with the contents of your lab, leads me to believe that there are only 100 members of DICE," the detective rattles off like an automated answering machine.
But thankfully, Shuichi is not actually related to Kiibo.
"Although, Ouma-kun made a big deal about them being ghouls…" Shuichi says to himself.
"Sooooo?" Kokichi prods the other boy on.
"So!" Shuichi bounces up slightly, bright eyed and smiling, making Kokichi feel those fuzzies once more. "You have less than 100 members in your gang, probably less than 20 if being generous!"
Kokichi laughs at Shuichi's idea of being generous. It's not wrong though.
"Saihara-chan is so super smart! Wow, what a great detective." Kokichi watches Shuichi stutter at the praise, taking another sip of his own still hot tea.
"I-it's not like that, Ouma-kun." Shuichi mimics him by taking another gulp of coffee.
"What is it like then?" Kokichi ponders. His chin rests in one hand while the other holds his teacup, pinky out.
Shuichi's lips twist a bit.
"You just made it seem like a family, I guess," he murmurs.
Kokichi sighs into his hand and closes his eyes. He doesn't really want to go further with this, not exactly, but he has to commit here. It's not so bad to let Shuichi know about how weak Kokichi is. Shuichi already knows, and could already kill him in an instant.
"Shumai has officially figured me out. DICE is just a little prank family of ten people run by a purple gremlin," he says.
Shuichi chuckles before trying to reign himself in. His smile has grown into something strong and grudgingly fond.
"It's only because Ouma-kun wanted me to though," Shuichi tells him, voice even and sure in its own breathy softness.
"Mhm. So, Saihara-chan, show me your tentacles!" the words leave his mouth before he can fully realize them. But they're logical in the sense that neither of them can risk a lull in scene. God, in scene.
Kokichi hates everything about Dangan Ronpa and yet thinking this way is the main thing propelling him forward with this plan. Well, not actually the main thing. Despite waking up with a fresh set of ghoulified memories in his scrambled grey matter, Kokichi wants to see Shuichi's kagune. He wants to ask all about them and ghoul stuff too. The fact that asking about all that stuff can correlate with plan 'Market Shuichi' is just a nifty bonus. Nifty second phase.
Ghouls are just kind of cool.
Shuichi's coffee splashes over onto the table and saucer underneath. His eyes are simultaneously wide at the top and narrowed at the bottom.
"What?! Why would you just ask something like that? Ouma-kun," Shuichi starts turning a light pink. "And don't call them tentacles either, they're kagune which is totally different."
"But what kind of kaggyne are they? You showed them to me last night and basically snuggled me up in them. I wanna know more about Saihara-chan!" Kokichi stands up and pouts at Shuichi.
"That isn't how-"
"I'll tell you a bunch more about my organization. I know that my beloved Saihara-chan has been curious."
The ghoul cringes and rubs his bangs, "You won't be frightened?"
Kokichi's grin threatens to break his face apart, going from ear to ear.
"Last night I thought they were pretty, even though I also thought you were going to kill me," he forces himself to confess. Doing so feels even better than confronting the hydraulic press and winning. Absolutely.
"Your ghoul eye is really cool looking too!" Kokichi continues with his voice pitched just a bit higher.
God does he hope that there really is an audience watching even in his lab. Otherwise Kokichi is going to basically die from embarrassment. But also he sorta hopes that the audience is just a lie anyway. In fact, maybe all of this is a really long dream and none of them signed up to die or date right out of high school.
The Shuichi from right now goes red across from him.
Shuichi looks away from Kokichi's expectant gaze and slowly rises from his chair. He looks so shy about it that Kokichi almost tries to remember if he's made some kind of social slip up. But wracking his brain doesn't reveal anything off about the request. The two DICE members who are ghouls in this world have never reacted so hesitantly. Although, truthful, they'd all been little kids at the time they met.
Kokichi blinks when he sees that Shuichi is unbuttoning his outer layers.
"Huh."
The boy in front of him jolts.
"Y-yes?" Shuichi asks.
"You didn't take your clothing off last time," Kokichi points out the obvious with a raised eyebrow.
"Last time was different! I just don't want my clothing to get messy in the middle of the day…" Shuichi resolutely returns to taking off his jacket and then hikes his shirt up in the back. The skin there, the small of his back where a rinkaku's kakuhou resides, seems to shift before the actual kagune bubbles out and manifests.
Kokichi whistles and gawks with what must be a goofy look on his face. He wants to say something to make his nerves calm down, but instead he just watches a bright crimson Shuichi fold his jacket over the back of his chair.
It's the same exact thing from last night, relatively thin-wide and flat tendrils that remind Kokichi of ribbons. Grey on the hard top side and almost meaty looking with thrumming gold lines on the bottom.
Those six things were around you last night, Kokichi tells himself. They probably won't be killing someone anytime soon either. But Shuichi could totally do it.
Kokichi leaves his chair and steps around the table to reach Shuichi's side.
He can feel just how wide his eyes are and can't get them to get even remotely normal. The sight of Shuichi's kagune, the proof, makes the hand behind Kokichi's back itch. They're so strange to see in a situation with no immediate danger or tension. Kokichi's own memories of seeing kagune before just aren't the same. Mostly because he knows that they're probably fake.
The 'Ultimate Supreme Leader' wants to say that his memories of DICE here in this life are real. But Kokichi also knows that he can never be sure, not after giving up on diving that deeply long ago. There was a time when Kokichi could figure it out.
Now there just isn't a point.
"Ouma-kun?" Shuichi frowns at Kokichi, kagune limp and shying away. Kokichi stares intently at the soft glow.
They're standing close together, and the twin smells of tea and coffee make Kokichi relax despite himself. His mouth dries.
"Can I have a closer look, Shuichi?" Kokichi says it without thinking. Some part of his brain is being pulled back into the past.
For his credit, Shuichi doesn't seem very phased by the sudden first name basis. He fidgets but moves one of the appendages closer to Kokichi.
Kokichi's abdominal muscles tighten as if to cringe away.
Shuichi could kill Kokichi and eat him any moment now. Kokichi wouldn't be able to do a single thing to stop the kagune in front of him from just wacking his head into the floor hard enough to bust it open.
Purple eyes dart between Shuichi's face and the would be murder weapon in the middle of them. It belongs to Shuichi, part of Kokichi reminds him, and Shuichi is safe. Almost always safe. Even when he isn't safe or trustworthy, Shuichi is different.
Kokichi exhales.
"C-can I touch it?" he digs his nails into the hands he uses. He wants Shuichi to say yes, or no, because Kokichi can use either answer. Kokichi isn't doing this for himself.
Kokichi needs to help Shuichi too.
Shuichi forgoes speaking and just provides a curt little nod as his ears turn red as well. God, is it different for ghouls who group or grow up with parents? Did Kokoro and her brother just not know organic weapon etiquette because they were orphans?
"Nishishi," Kokichi forces his usual laugh out to try and erase the anticipation making his hand shake.
He used his left hand, the hurt hand, the one that Shuichi fret over earlier alongside the others. It's always that hand that gets hurt and cared for by Shuichi.
The alien mass is just as hotwarm as it was last night, still but so very alive under Kokichi's palm. It radiates that warmth up to the bandage and the long cut underneath.
Somehow, it helps with the hurt more than the pain pills given to Kokichi by Kaede. Maybe it's a different hurt.
Kokichi bends down to peer up at it from a different angle. As always, his lips are curled upwards and he shoots Shuichi a smile.
"Can these things be ticklish for you?" he asks.
Shuichi twitches his lips. Ah. A tell or the urge to be sarcastic?
"I do not think it works that way, for me at least." Shuichi looks at Kokichi's fingers like they're loaded guns.
"Nishi- well, the twins had a different type than you do. The really heavy kind closer to the shoulder," Kokichi mentions off hand. He's more concerned with running his fingertips where the top and bottom meet.
There's like, a little kind of seam almost? Where the front plates end and the rest is.
A bit of sticky moisture starts secreting.
"So this is that slime from last night!" Kokichi exclaims.
"Hh-h?!" Shuichi makes a startled noise that makes Kokichi jerk back. Shuichi pales and also gets even more flushed, having been calming down. He gawks openly at Kokichi.
"W-what slime?" the ghoul asks with a concerned voice.
Kokichi hums and his smile twists into a teasing leer, "Last night I found a bunch of clear stuff on my clothing where you had your graby ribbons on me."
"Oh. That's, uh, just what happens when you over or under use your kagune. And sometimes it just happens anyway." Shuichi watches Kokichi wipe his slick hand on the jacket behind him.
Kokichi grins once he's done.
"So... your totally not tentacles can produce-"
"Ouma-kun no-" but Kokichi must continue.
"Lube. Ricant." Kokichi snickers as Shuichi looks at him defeated, silently asking 'but why this, Ouma-kun?' despite Kokichi needing no reason why.
Shuichi groans and rubs his eyes, kagune falling to the floor like the tail of a sad dog denied treats.
"It's not like that. It's just a biological cleaning thing!" comes the expected protest.
"Like to be healthy and all, I see I see." Kokichi nods smugly.
"So, Saihara-chan has self lubricating tentacles."
Shuichi glares at him with a growing pout. It makes Kokichi laugh freely, something that quickly softens Shuichi's glower and makes his shoulders shake as Kokichi's amusement infects him.
Soon they're both laughing and going back to their cooling drinks.
Kokichi chugs down his much less tasty lukewarm tea and then pours himself more on instinct. He click-clacks in just one sugar cube and watches Shuichi make a face at the taste of his cold coffee. One of the half-ghoul's kagune waps the floor. Cute.
"Does my beloved Saihara-chan not like iced coffee?" he asks with an impish smirk.
Shuichi raises an eyebrow at Kokichi.
"Iced coffee is alright, but if you think that cooled coffee counts then I have several objections," Shuichi tells him with the straightest face.
Kokichi makes his jaw drop and lets a splash of his tea spill, "Noooo waaaay! Could my Saihara-chan possibly be a coffee snob!?"
Shuichi, having been taking a drink of his own freshly poured coffee at that exact second, starts to cough and choke on burning hot liquid. A hand thumps his chest as the other shakily returns messy cup to saucer.
"Ouma-kun is cruel," the detective wheezes, a small smile on his face.
"Nishishishi! It's because Shumai is super easy to tease, poor Ouma Kokichi just can't help but be drawn to his embarrassment!" Kokichi throws a spare sugar cube into his tea on instinct, still staring at the curled up kagune behind Shuichi's back. They rest over the chair and Kokichi keeps expecting Shuichi to put them away.
He reaches for his spoon and stirs in the sugar, not realizing that Shuichi has stopped moving until the half-ghoul darts forward to prevent Kokichi from drinking his tea. The nape of Kokichi's neck itches. His wrist is being held gently but starts aching anyway.
Shuichi's lips thin and his eyes look just a bit past Kokichi's own.
"Um. Wrong sugar?" Shuichi says- half over the small table and far too close to Kokichi's face.
Kokichi can see every micromovement of Shuichi's face and eyelashes. His mouth dries out.
"Wouldn't exactly be the first time one of us made a horrible sugary mistake," Kokichi cheerfully exclaims as he carefully extracts himself from Shuichi's worried gold-grey gaze."Did stuff like that ever happen for you? Your family."
Kokichi very intently walks over the the small super-mini kitchenette. There's a sink and pull out cabinet full of more cups and dishes, but for now he ignores those in favor of dumping his contaminated tea. If Shuichi hadn't said anything, the way that his frozen moment of blue screen made it seem, Kokichi probably wouldn't have noticed due to his own fascinations.
"Ah, well. My uncle and aunt are both humans, and my aunt is a nurse at a large hospital-" Shuichi's soft voices starts droning on.
The sounds of what must be Shuichi cleaning up their spills reach Kokichi's ears. He uses the arm-belt-tourniquets to tie up his sleeves and gets to washing the plain white teacup.
"So she always kept track of where all the… stuff is. There were times when we had to lay low, but my uncle is a fairly well liked detective." The sound of napkins being thrown into a trashcan.
Kokichi hums for the voyeurs.
"Oh but, sometimes there were things like this that happened. Mostly when I was younger though! Like this one time when I was making a cake, I decided that it would be a good idea to use both sugars," Shuichi laughs. "So how about you and DICE, Ouma-kun?"
Nostalgia builds up in Kokichi's veins, spread from arteries and making his heart burn.
Kokichi smiles and trots back to the table with a new teacup. He places it down perfectly oriented and ignores the stains on the table cloth. He wants to grab the teapot and pour out all of its innards until it's smashed on the walls. Memories claw up at Kokichi's eyes and those same invading thoughts knock at his door.
"I miss them, you know?" the hushed confession leaks out of Kokichi's mouth like cold tea.
"Sometimes- I start thinking they might have never been real," Kokichi watches Shuichi's face twist with a familiar feeling. "But when I start thinking that way I end up thinking that it would be nice to never leave here."
Kokichi walks around the table and grabs hold of Shuichi's still present 'murder weapons'. For them in this life and so many others he'd had to-
Shuichi's breath hitches while Kokichi continues to investigate his kagune and it's glowing marble-gold.
He speaks louder than Kokichi would dare, "I know you told me that before, that you wanted to stay here forever- but we shouldn't! We'll all go home soon. And we won't leave one another just because we put this place behind us."
"Says someone who suggested burning the gym down."
"Oh, did Amami-kun actually tell you about that? Well… now you're changing the subject," Shuichi's lips waver as he clears his throat.
Kokichi tries to respond, either with something cutting or something pathetic, where has his childish excitement even gone-
"Ouma-kun, you've been hurting too, haven't you?" Shuichi says it like a question, but it's more an assertion than anything else. "I'm sorry that I didn't realize before now."
"Hurt? Saihara-chan sure is being silly! I'm just trying to butter him up so that I can ask all sor-ts of q-quu…"
Kokichi can't breathe anymore. He was doing so well, he has been just fine with the humanizing, so why is he breaking again? Kokichi can't keep going on like this. Bringing Shuichi to a place that Kokichi feels safe in was a mistake. Kokichi wishes Shuichi had just sent him off to the next game with the next waiting body and saved him the trouble.
Parasite. Parasite!
Stop that-
Shuichi is looking at Kokichi, getting closer, and now that warm body heat is spreading over Kokichi like a person shaped blanket.
"I didn't ask you to start hugging me like I just found out that I'm terminal," Kokichi grits his teeth.
This is supposed to be fun and sweet.
This was supposed to be Kokichi and Shuichi having a funny comic relief Q&A about random daily life for half ghouls. Kokichi needs to help Shuichi. He needs to make up for everything he'll keep doing for the rest of his despicable existence. He needs to make sure that Shuichi won't get a happy ending ruined by men in white coats carrying familiar-scented corpses in brief cases.
Kokichi instead lays himself bare and ends up crying like a frightened virgin on a wedding night. He just keeps getting more pathetic.
Shuichi pulls him tight.
"Ouma-kun… I'll answer all of your questions, okay?" Shuichi says. Sickeningly slow and kind. When he isn't, Kokichi knows, it's always never his fault. Except for those times where it is because Shuichi is too different and so very not himself.
"Why?" Kokichi demands in turn.
Shuichi exhales through his nose.
"Because Ouma-kun is my friend. You're a good person and always do your best to make the others feel better in your way. It might be too much to say, but I think you need to take care of yourself too."
My friend. Good person. Feel better.
Kokichi wants to yell about how many times he's hurt everyone, how many times he's killed, actually killed or each failure but all of them are failu-
shuichi dead in the birdcage in himiko's lab wrapped in white and head covered by a veil with just a smudge of lipstick because he got too close to the wrong person And no one listened
(You: in white space static and white hair)
miu taking everyone into the fake fake world and never ever letting them out calling it mercy and efficiency And no one listened
(Will not: with vantablack skin and gestalt weight)
convincing himself and gonta that it's the right thing to do over and over in different ways and meaning it as often as he doesn't And no one listened because life isn't fair
(Stop yet: wearing an amalgamation of one's own face)
waking up and staring at the survivors with dead eyes when they ask him to testify against danganronpa because how dare they ask kokichi to help them kill his last resort And no one listens because you are not worth it
(Because of him: Your finger brought against Your mirrored lips.)
Shuichi holds Kokichi tighter while he snarls against him, the familiar but probably not real sensation of kagune wrapping around him.
They don't leave the lab for a long time.
Kokichi hiccups and asks even stupider questions that he half knows the answer to. Sometimes he lies too viciously and even insults the detective across from him, but he doesn't leave. Shuichi continually obliges him and tries not to let Kokichi bait him into a reaction. The constant ribbing about kagune slime makes it hard, probably. He really hopes that at least someone is watching all this hard work.
When they do leave, Monokuma is outside waiting for them.
They refuse to let go of the other's hand.
*
There's a bowl of avocado covered leafy greens, nuts, and dried fruit in front of Kokichi's face. To the side is freshly made mackerel and a glass of lemon water. There had been a kiwi too, right up until Kokichi decided to take a huge bite out of the strangely hairless mutant fruit.
It has a delicious aftertaste and now Kokichi is full from it plus previous snackage.
Three pairs of eyes are staring at Kokichi as if to tell him 'no you cannot leave until you eat it all'. Thankfully, super responsible mom Kirumi is still in the kitchen making food for later. Kokichi would probably have even more people trying to non-verbally guilt him into eating otherwise.
Even better is that Kaede took Miu to go get freshened up after all the crying the inventor did. Miu would have started shoving the salad in his face right about now.
Kokichi chugs some of his water and stabs dark green lettuce. Cranberries and walnuts get carried up to his teeth and then he swallows as soon as possible.
"Ouma-kun, please chew for at least 25 seconds," Kiibo reminds him.
Glowering would take too much effort at the moment, so Kokichi just rolls his eyes. What a good, kind, bot. Bleeech. Kiibo should go blow up the school instead of playing parent. The tin can is probably just doing some stupid programing. Just like the bears with their 'waah waaaah we kidnapped you… but also you signed a legal contract you can't remember!'. Kokichi opens his mouth.
Wait, no that would be a horrible insensitive mess to say, nevermind-
He makes a show of eating a fat slice of avocado. The creamy weirdness doesn't agree with him and Kokichi immediately stabs a bunch of fruit and nuts to hide the taste. Kaito looks away from him momentarily.
Kirumi comes out with small snacks for everyone and places a banana next to Kokichi's plate.
Kokichi narrows his eyes at the offending meal in front of him. They have to know from Tsumugi's account that Kokichi ate a bunch of junk food earlier. So where the heck did they get off trying to make him stuff himself?
Everyone else starts digging in except for Kiibo, who takes Kirumi's offered crossword puzzle with a smile.
He puts his fork down, "I have an important confession to make. I totes pigged out on snacks with Mugi and now I'm full again."
The look that Kaito and Shuichi share with one another makes Kokichi frown. Then he internally frowns at his frown, and forces a smile back onto his face.
No point in that.
"Yeah. But Shirogane said that you'd gotten sick after breakfast, and junk isn't that filling," Kaito says. Kokichi blinks at him.
"I never told Smoogi anything like that."
Shuichi hums, "Well, that's just what she told us... and you don't seem to be denying it?"
Kokichi wants to say 'damn your astuteness', but instead he laughs to make things less serious.
"Don't you think that she could be lying? If my dear Shumai is worried then he should just tell me. Not that he'd hear anything bad, since I'm fine. Saihara-chan doesn't have to worry," he says with half closed eyes.
"But by my calculations you are having a harder time eating than the average full person would. The bite of avocado you had caused an adverse reaction that it never has before," Kiibo butts into the conversation with cold facts. "You've also avoided the warm meat dish despite having readily eaten meat before."
Kokichi glares at him from under his bangs. He'd been preparing an excuse for that last thing, but now Shuichi is subtly cringing away. Fuck.
"I think it's more interesting that Smoogi 'knew' I had thrown up," Kokichi points out the inconsistency while attacking his fish with constant stabbings. Kirumi's hand gently grasps the rim of the plate and takes it away.
"I was not present at the time, but it is to my understanding that you told her during your outing," she tells him.
Well that just settles things. Shirogane Tsumugi is the mastermind and she's trying to gaslight Kokichi. Definitely, like she almost always is with all her lies. She's actually-
Again, just like when he woke up after the nap, Kokichi's stomach feels like it's rebelling. It must show up on his face because Kirumi returns to take away the rest of his food. Kokichi grabs the banana and keeps it with him.
No one here believes his smile anymore.
"I just ate too much and have appetite loss from confinement. That's all," Kokichi asserts like he's talking to DICE. "And since I have ssssuuuuuch a delicate stomach I decided that hot food like that fish was a no go! An evil leader type like me only eats cold foods, cold like his heart."
Kaito glares at him like he's having none of it. Shuichi looks slightly less uncomfortable. Kiibo appears to be having problems figuring out what to say. Good.
"But back to the important topic, why the hell would any of you believe that I'd tell Smoogi the truth like that?" he keeps his voice low and bored. He knows exactly why Shuichi would end up buying that Kokichi had puked up his food. Kaito isn't much for impulse control, being an unrepentant idiot.
Kiibo didn't have to deal with Tsumugi's crap though.
"Shirogane-san and Ouma-kun are friends," Shuichi says.
"Sure."
A robotic eyebrow is raised, "Are the two of you not friends? Either way, I cannot think of a reason for Shirogane-san to lie."
She lies because she's a huge bitch. But Kokichi can't say that either.
"I know I'm all 'smol pale frail' looking but-" Kokichi stops talking. Forget the lowkey angst of being five foot one as a young adult. If Shuichi could smell his blood back in the hanger, can Shuichi smell that Kokichi has in fact been sick? Even with Kokichi cleaning up?
The three other boys wait for him to finish speaking. Kokichi is a bit busy realizing that it's going to be hard to actually lie to Shuichi about biological things.
What if Shuichi can smell fear?
He needs to go somewhere else. Kokichi needs to be somewhere more fun and important. He slowly gets up.
"I'm bored now."
"W-what? Ouma-kun stay seated please!"
"Nope! I'm going to my super secret lab and you guys can't come because you're all meanies."
"Oh come on man, we just had a heart to heart!"
No wait, stop it. Think about how it will look to the audience you simpleton. You can't just leave like this without making Shuichi look bad. You've already made them look like fools for trusting Tsumugi. And you need to market him to all the humans and ghouls watching the show, you need to show what makes Shuichi sympathetic and desirable. Subtext isn't enough for that either.
Kaito starts lecturing like the nerdy mom-friend slash older brother that he secretly is. His words get discarded.
Not that Shumai actually needs help with those two things when it comes to you, the sly thought snakes through. The reminder makes Kokichi twitch. For a second a few more stray thoughts threaten to bubble up in the form of false spectors.
"Fine. If you guys wanna pretend that I'm, like, twelve or something go ahead. Maybe my contract will get nulled by sheer willpower alone. But!" Kokichi turns around with a grin from ear to ear.
"I'll only accept being nanny'd by my beloved Saihara-chan!"
Shuichi sputters behind him but, after some rushed mutters, quickly catches up with Kokichi. The tension as they make their way down to the basement is almost palatable. Shuichi keeps making little 'uhm' noises but never truly speaks up. The basement grows closer and closer, with it the majestic sight that is the secret entrance to Kokichi's lab.
The interior is even better and Kokichi will weather any silence just to see it. A floating throne fills him with joy each time the door opens so that his eyes can take it in.
Kokichi considers telling Shuichi to close his eyes. He's not entirely… Kokichi isn't totally sure about this. He isn't going to show his lab to just anyone. He never shows his lab to just anyone.
Shuichi absolutely doesn't ever show his face as a ghoul to anyone, and Kokichi took that from him. Team Danganronpa took that privacy from him.
The way it tried to put cameras in Kokichi's room for days until it gave up on being so obvious.
Besides fulfilling the unspoken promise to never tell, a promise that Kokichi could break at any time, this is the only kind of worthwhile apology that Kokichi can give. Forcing himself to reciprocate an unwanted but acceptable development with its counterpart. Kokichi likes to think that he's come a long way from himself.
For instance, he knows that he lies to himself now.
Often.
The door to his lab isn't even done opening before Kokichi is pushing Shuichi inside. A human can apparently push an unsuspecting half-ghoul with ease, which is great to know. An immobile object version of Shuichi would suck.
Boy- if the blue tone room doesn't lighten Kokichi's heart with glee though. He gazes at the car with the same feeling of awe each time. And the throne! The floating throne, the computer station, all of everything.
Can't forget the disguises. Glasses with fake noses are such classics.
Shuichi gets shoved straight into Kokichi's comfort zone and looks around like a lost puppy. Black-blue hair tosses along with his head.
"Ouma-kun this is… your lab?" the detective murmurs, eyes flitting every which way.
Kokichi laughs, "Yep!"
"This is..."
"Awesome? Amazingly high tech? Totally darn tootin neato?"
"This is like a-" Shuichi turns around to face Kokichi again. His mouth is open and twitched downwards in disbelief.
"Super duper scary neon punk lair of evil?!"
Kokichi stares breathless from his impromptu yelling. Shuichi stares back at him as if his life was revealed to have no meaning. Jaw fully dropped, but there's little to no real tenseness, beyond excited nerves.
"Ouma-kun, this lab looks like what a child playing super spy would have," Shuichi carefully says.
Kokichi feigns going limp and smirks at Shuichi's response of a long uuuh. He fakes a sniffle and then whips himself back up with a grin.
"So Shuichi likes Spy Kids roleplay?" he asks innocently. Yup, so totally innocent. Kokichi isn't even lying!
Shuichi shifts on the balls of his feet.
The ghoul, just half as Kokichi reminds himself, pauses before finally shutting his gaping mouth, "I have no idea what that is."
"Well, l-oh-l I guess, but yeah!" Kokichi struggles to find what he should say next. "This is my secret lab that no one else has seen before. We're even now."
Shuichi looks… touched. That's good, even if it makes Kokichi's chest hurt.
Kokichi starts walking over to the storage units and gets to sifting through them until he finds the snack drawers. Normal tea things are quickly expelled onto the counter, taking place next to miscellaneous gadgets. He roots around in the unseen back and hopes that this isn't just his memories fucking around. But yes, he finds a small cloth pouch containing what feels like cubes, and the normal sugar cubes are topside in a clear jar.
Kokichi exhales slowly.
He reaches around and feels for small grooves, clicking them and pulling out a foldable table for two. Kokichi does not look at Shuichi.
"Sh- Shumai, go get some chairs from the evil surveillance station," he orders the only other person in his lab.
Footsteps hesitate before complying.
Soon the room is filled with the sounds of tea brewing and coffee being made. The two of them are eventually seated and Kokichi blabbers while Shuichi stares down at the little bag of brown sugar cubes. The ghoul has no idea just how calculated Kokichi is being. Has no idea why Kokichi is going to trample on his own gut instincts.
Kokichi gets up to pour his tea and Shuichi's coffee.
It's only when Kokichi is finished and stirring in his own white sugar cubes, just two, that Shuichi breaks his silence.
"Why does Ouma-kun have those in his lab?"
Kokichi blinks nice and slow, his face made up to be the perfect picture of resolute and reasonable innocence. He frown smiles, "I'm not sure what you mean, Saihara-chan. "
Shuichi grips his mug full of untouched coffee.
Kokichi forces himself to think that Shuichi is being like an ungrateful child. None of them are children of any sort, Shirogane's Danganronpa intentions aside, but it's the thought that counts.
"Do you mean the gag glasses? The mustaches? Or the umbrellas or the gas masks, or?" Talk to him like an adult talking to a naive kid, Kokichi reminds himself. It'll all lead up to something better. Get him pent up and let the sick freaks watching know that Shuichi isn't a monster-
"The sugarcubes!" Shuichi hisses. "The brown ones, why are they here? You obviously know what they are. Why would you even have them after-"
Shuichi cuts himself off.
Kokichi smiles.
"I'm not sure what conclusions you got from last night, but Saihara-chan had to have noticed those masks by now." A hand stretches out towards boxes in the front.
"So what does Saihara-chan think now?" Kokichi finishes with a question and an action, delicately untying the ignored pouch.
His pale fingers, thumb and pointer, clamp down around a red-brown cube of iron scented sugar. It rises up in the air and Kokichi smoothly brings it to hover above Shuichi's cup of coffee. The steaming rich liquid sloshes within slightly shaking porcelain. Shuichi's breath hitches.
"Ouma-kun…"
Kokichi frowns at him in confusion, but bites his tongue and lets Shuichi talk at his own pace. His hand wavers.
"Ouma-kun said that he had cohabitated with ghouls before but," Shuichi sets down his tea cup full of black coffee. "I had thought with the way you said it…"
The frown gets deeper, and particles of rust-sugar fall to the table. Kokichi can't say that that's irrelevant to the topic, but what had Shuichi gathered from last night? Kokichi tries to remember exactly what it is that he had said back then, all of it, from the stupidly instigative 'kill me already' to the break down that had almost nothing to do with what triggered it.
He wheezes and Shuichi cringes his grip on the cup tighter at the sound of it.
"Did Shumai think I was some kind of ghoul-kidnapping victim? That someone stole me away in the night to raise as food slash toy?" Kokichi murmurs. His heart is aching and his head is swimming. That has never happened- that wasn't what he's been talking about at all.
Shumai must be thinking that, had thought that, Kokichi was-is weak. Crawling back and weak weak weak.
"Saihara Shuichi."
The boy in question snaps to attention and holds his coffee like a lifeline. Like he has anything to be afraid of, as if the face he sees when he gets pulled back into orbit is looking at him like he's scum.
But that's not the expression that he finds there.
Kokichi is looking at him with a gentle expression, fingertips lowering to meet the still hot surface of Shuichi's coffee, and releasing half wet sugar-iron to the depths.
"I do not hate you," Kokichi says while maintaining their eye contact. It's almost the whole truth, and saying it makes more than a dozen half baked words force their way to clog in his throat. "I took you here because I wanted to show you that instead of just telling you."
"And you don't hate ghouls either?" the detective, the half human half ghoul, Shuichi asks him.
"Nope! How could a great leader like me possibly hate two of his subordinates? That'd make me horrible!" Kokichi laughs at Shuichi's dropped jaw. That's the reaction he'd been wanting from the start, too. The relief. Of course, that gasp as people stare at their TV as well.
"So that's why I brought my beloved Shumai to see my secret too." Kokichi plops back down into his rolly chair and flings a regular sugar cube into Shuichi's coffee for good measure.
"You-" Shuichi watches him while still processing the past half an hour. Maybe an hour, Kokichi isn't that great at time awareness.
"You have a childish faux evil gang that has ghouls in it."
Kokichi grins and sips his tea.
"I'm the Ultimate Supreme Leader for a reason you know. The only real rules that DICE ever has is no killing, only petty crimes or under, and to help each other." And to be a family no matter what. Somehow, that remains so consistent that Kokichi can never stop using them as a crutch. Even when he knows that they're fake.
Shuichi watches on and Kokichi decides to use his own spoon to stir in the mixed sugar. He's near praying that Shuichi understand just what Kokichi's actions are trying to hit home to him, and to the audience. That maybe he'll even read into it.
Shuichi blinks at each particularly loud clack, but picks up the coffee once Kokichi is finished. His face has morphed into an expression of wonder.
The detective brings the bone white rim to his mouth a takes a long gulp.
Kokichi feels his dozen little somethings jump and flutter around his guts and claw at his esophagus. It must feel like victory. Buzzing hands grab their own teacup, filled with actual tea, and bring it to Kokichi's lips for him to blow on. It's a nice spiced black tea with minimal sugar and no cream. He'd usually use a little honey but could only find some plastic packets of it, and like hell Kokichi would use that.
It goes down wonderfully hot.
He returns the cup to its saucer. Shuichi has lost some of the tension in his body, obviously more relaxed, but he's still hesitant in his body language. Still...
"I suppose that your organization is actually smaller than 10,000 people?" Shuichi looks at Kokichi with that familiar burn of 'needing to know' returning to his eyes. The detective talent and intent mind in him must be kicking in, eager to bite Kokichi's so carefully offered bait.
Kokichi investigates his nails.
"Well, dunno about less than 10,000. How in the world did Shumai come to such a conclusion?" he questions airily.
Shuichi subconsciously straightens his back and mulls over his thoughts. Gold-grey eyes blink around the room and settle back on Kokichi.
"You said that two of your subordinates are ghouls and you talked about them like they're extremely close to you. Then you referred to DICE as a gang, which combined with the contents of your lab, leads me to believe that there are only 100 members of DICE," the detective rattles off like an automated answering machine.
But thankfully, Shuichi is not actually related to Kiibo.
"Although, Ouma-kun made a big deal about them being ghouls…" Shuichi says to himself.
"Sooooo?" Kokichi prods the other boy on.
"So!" Shuichi bounces up slightly, bright eyed and smiling, making Kokichi feel those fuzzies once more. "You have less than 100 members in your gang, probably less than 20 if being generous!"
Kokichi laughs at Shuichi's idea of being generous. It's not wrong though.
"Saihara-chan is so super smart! Wow, what a great detective." Kokichi watches Shuichi stutter at the praise, taking another sip of his own still hot tea.
"I-it's not like that, Ouma-kun." Shuichi mimics him by taking another gulp of coffee.
"What is it like then?" Kokichi ponders. His chin rests in one hand while the other holds his teacup, pinky out.
Shuichi's lips twist a bit.
"You just made it seem like a family, I guess," he murmurs.
Kokichi sighs into his hand and closes his eyes. He doesn't really want to go further with this, not exactly, but he has to commit here. It's not so bad to let Shuichi know about how weak Kokichi is. Shuichi already knows, and could already kill him in an instant.
"Shumai has officially figured me out. DICE is just a little prank family of ten people run by a purple gremlin," he says.
Shuichi chuckles before trying to reign himself in. His smile has grown into something strong and grudgingly fond.
"It's only because Ouma-kun wanted me to though," Shuichi tells him, voice even and sure in its own breathy softness.
"Mhm. So, Saihara-chan, show me your tentacles!" the words leave his mouth before he can fully realize them. But they're logical in the sense that neither of them can risk a lull in scene. God, in scene.
Kokichi hates everything about Dangan Ronpa and yet thinking this way is the main thing propelling him forward with this plan. Well, not actually the main thing. Despite waking up with a fresh set of ghoulified memories in his scrambled grey matter, Kokichi wants to see Shuichi's kagune. He wants to ask all about them and ghoul stuff too. The fact that asking about all that stuff can correlate with plan 'Market Shuichi' is just a nifty bonus. Nifty second phase.
Ghouls are just kind of cool.
Shuichi's coffee splashes over onto the table and saucer underneath. His eyes are simultaneously wide at the top and narrowed at the bottom.
"What?! Why would you just ask something like that? Ouma-kun," Shuichi starts turning a light pink. "And don't call them tentacles either, they're kagune which is totally different."
"But what kind of kaggyne are they? You showed them to me last night and basically snuggled me up in them. I wanna know more about Saihara-chan!" Kokichi stands up and pouts at Shuichi.
"That isn't how-"
"I'll tell you a bunch more about my organization. I know that my beloved Saihara-chan has been curious."
The ghoul cringes and rubs his bangs, "You won't be frightened?"
Kokichi's grin threatens to break his face apart, going from ear to ear.
"Last night I thought they were pretty, even though I also thought you were going to kill me," he forces himself to confess. Doing so feels even better than confronting the hydraulic press and winning. Absolutely.
"Your ghoul eye is really cool looking too!" Kokichi continues with his voice pitched just a bit higher.
God does he hope that there really is an audience watching even in his lab. Otherwise Kokichi is going to basically die from embarrassment. But also he sorta hopes that the audience is just a lie anyway. In fact, maybe all of this is a really long dream and none of them signed up to die or date right out of high school.
The Shuichi from right now goes red across from him.
Shuichi looks away from Kokichi's expectant gaze and slowly rises from his chair. He looks so shy about it that Kokichi almost tries to remember if he's made some kind of social slip up. But wracking his brain doesn't reveal anything off about the request. The two DICE members who are ghouls in this world have never reacted so hesitantly. Although, truthful, they'd all been little kids at the time they met.
Kokichi blinks when he sees that Shuichi is unbuttoning his outer layers.
"Huh."
The boy in front of him jolts.
"Y-yes?" Shuichi asks.
"You didn't take your clothing off last time," Kokichi points out the obvious with a raised eyebrow.
"Last time was different! I just don't want my clothing to get messy in the middle of the day…" Shuichi resolutely returns to taking off his jacket and then hikes his shirt up in the back. The skin there, the small of his back where a rinkaku's kakuhou resides, seems to shift before the actual kagune bubbles out and manifests.
Kokichi whistles and gawks with what must be a goofy look on his face. He wants to say something to make his nerves calm down, but instead he just watches a bright crimson Shuichi fold his jacket over the back of his chair.
It's the same exact thing from last night, relatively thin-wide and flat tendrils that remind Kokichi of ribbons. Grey on the hard top side and almost meaty looking with thrumming gold lines on the bottom.
Those six things were around you last night, Kokichi tells himself. They probably won't be killing someone anytime soon either. But Shuichi could totally do it.
Kokichi leaves his chair and steps around the table to reach Shuichi's side.
He can feel just how wide his eyes are and can't get them to get even remotely normal. The sight of Shuichi's kagune, the proof, makes the hand behind Kokichi's back itch. They're so strange to see in a situation with no immediate danger or tension. Kokichi's own memories of seeing kagune before just aren't the same. Mostly because he knows that they're probably fake.
The 'Ultimate Supreme Leader' wants to say that his memories of DICE here in this life are real. But Kokichi also knows that he can never be sure, not after giving up on diving that deeply long ago. There was a time when Kokichi could figure it out.
Now there just isn't a point.
"Ouma-kun?" Shuichi frowns at Kokichi, kagune limp and shying away. Kokichi stares intently at the soft glow.
They're standing close together, and the twin smells of tea and coffee make Kokichi relax despite himself. His mouth dries.
"Can I have a closer look, Shuichi?" Kokichi says it without thinking. Some part of his brain is being pulled back into the past.
For his credit, Shuichi doesn't seem very phased by the sudden first name basis. He fidgets but moves one of the appendages closer to Kokichi.
Kokichi's abdominal muscles tighten as if to cringe away.
Shuichi could kill Kokichi and eat him any moment now. Kokichi wouldn't be able to do a single thing to stop the kagune in front of him from just wacking his head into the floor hard enough to bust it open.
Purple eyes dart between Shuichi's face and the would be murder weapon in the middle of them. It belongs to Shuichi, part of Kokichi reminds him, and Shuichi is safe. Almost always safe. Even when he isn't safe or trustworthy, Shuichi is different.
Kokichi exhales.
"C-can I touch it?" he digs his nails into the hands he uses. He wants Shuichi to say yes, or no, because Kokichi can use either answer. Kokichi isn't doing this for himself.
Kokichi needs to help Shuichi too.
Shuichi forgoes speaking and just provides a curt little nod as his ears turn red as well. God, is it different for ghouls who group or grow up with parents? Did Kokoro and her brother just not know organic weapon etiquette because they were orphans?
"Nishishi," Kokichi forces his usual laugh out to try and erase the anticipation making his hand shake.
He used his left hand, the hurt hand, the one that Shuichi fret over earlier alongside the others. It's always that hand that gets hurt and cared for by Shuichi.
The alien mass is just as hotwarm as it was last night, still but so very alive under Kokichi's palm. It radiates that warmth up to the bandage and the long cut underneath.
Somehow, it helps with the hurt more than the pain pills given to Kokichi by Kaede. Maybe it's a different hurt.
Kokichi bends down to peer up at it from a different angle. As always, his lips are curled upwards and he shoots Shuichi a smile.
"Can these things be ticklish for you?" he asks.
Shuichi twitches his lips. Ah. A tell or the urge to be sarcastic?
"I do not think it works that way, for me at least." Shuichi looks at Kokichi's fingers like they're loaded guns.
"Nishi- well, the twins had a different type than you do. The really heavy kind closer to the shoulder," Kokichi mentions off hand. He's more concerned with running his fingertips where the top and bottom meet.
There's like, a little kind of seam almost? Where the front plates end and the rest is.
A bit of sticky moisture starts secreting.
"So this is that slime from last night!" Kokichi exclaims.
"Hh-h?!" Shuichi makes a startled noise that makes Kokichi jerk back. Shuichi pales and also gets even more flushed, having been calming down. He gawks openly at Kokichi.
"W-what slime?" the ghoul asks with a concerned voice.
Kokichi hums and his smile twists into a teasing leer, "Last night I found a bunch of clear stuff on my clothing where you had your graby ribbons on me."
"Oh. That's, uh, just what happens when you over or under use your kagune. And sometimes it just happens anyway." Shuichi watches Kokichi wipe his slick hand on the jacket behind him.
Kokichi grins once he's done.
"So... your totally not tentacles can produce-"
"Ouma-kun no-" but Kokichi must continue.
"Lube. Ricant." Kokichi snickers as Shuichi looks at him defeated, silently asking 'but why this, Ouma-kun?' despite Kokichi needing no reason why.
Shuichi groans and rubs his eyes, kagune falling to the floor like the tail of a sad dog denied treats.
"It's not like that. It's just a biological cleaning thing!" comes the expected protest.
"Like to be healthy and all, I see I see." Kokichi nods smugly.
"So, Saihara-chan has self lubricating tentacles."
Shuichi glares at him with a growing pout. It makes Kokichi laugh freely, something that quickly softens Shuichi's glower and makes his shoulders shake as Kokichi's amusement infects him.
Soon they're both laughing and going back to their cooling drinks.
Kokichi chugs down his much less tasty lukewarm tea and then pours himself more on instinct. He click-clacks in just one sugar cube and watches Shuichi make a face at the taste of his cold coffee. One of the half-ghoul's kagune waps the floor. Cute.
"Does my beloved Saihara-chan not like iced coffee?" he asks with an impish smirk.
Shuichi raises an eyebrow at Kokichi.
"Iced coffee is alright, but if you think that cooled coffee counts then I have several objections," Shuichi tells him with the straightest face.
Kokichi makes his jaw drop and lets a splash of his tea spill, "Noooo waaaay! Could my Saihara-chan possibly be a coffee snob!?"
Shuichi, having been taking a drink of his own freshly poured coffee at that exact second, starts to cough and choke on burning hot liquid. A hand thumps his chest as the other shakily returns messy cup to saucer.
"Ouma-kun is cruel," the detective wheezes, a small smile on his face.
"Nishishishi! It's because Shumai is super easy to tease, poor Ouma Kokichi just can't help but be drawn to his embarrassment!" Kokichi throws a spare sugar cube into his tea on instinct, still staring at the curled up kagune behind Shuichi's back. They rest over the chair and Kokichi keeps expecting Shuichi to put them away.
He reaches for his spoon and stirs in the sugar, not realizing that Shuichi has stopped moving until the half-ghoul darts forward to prevent Kokichi from drinking his tea. The nape of Kokichi's neck itches. His wrist is being held gently but starts aching anyway.
Shuichi's lips thin and his eyes look just a bit past Kokichi's own.
"Um. Wrong sugar?" Shuichi says- half over the small table and far too close to Kokichi's face.
Kokichi can see every micromovement of Shuichi's face and eyelashes. His mouth dries out.
"Wouldn't exactly be the first time one of us made a horrible sugary mistake," Kokichi cheerfully exclaims as he carefully extracts himself from Shuichi's worried gold-grey gaze."Did stuff like that ever happen for you? Your family."
Kokichi very intently walks over the the small super-mini kitchenette. There's a sink and pull out cabinet full of more cups and dishes, but for now he ignores those in favor of dumping his contaminated tea. If Shuichi hadn't said anything, the way that his frozen moment of blue screen made it seem, Kokichi probably wouldn't have noticed due to his own fascinations.
"Ah, well. My uncle and aunt are both humans, and my aunt is a nurse at a large hospital-" Shuichi's soft voices starts droning on.
The sounds of what must be Shuichi cleaning up their spills reach Kokichi's ears. He uses the arm-belt-tourniquets to tie up his sleeves and gets to washing the plain white teacup.
"So she always kept track of where all the… stuff is. There were times when we had to lay low, but my uncle is a fairly well liked detective." The sound of napkins being thrown into a trashcan.
Kokichi hums for the voyeurs.
"Oh but, sometimes there were things like this that happened. Mostly when I was younger though! Like this one time when I was making a cake, I decided that it would be a good idea to use both sugars," Shuichi laughs. "So how about you and DICE, Ouma-kun?"
Nostalgia builds up in Kokichi's veins, spread from arteries and making his heart burn.
Kokichi smiles and trots back to the table with a new teacup. He places it down perfectly oriented and ignores the stains on the table cloth. He wants to grab the teapot and pour out all of its innards until it's smashed on the walls. Memories claw up at Kokichi's eyes and those same invading thoughts knock at his door.
"I miss them, you know?" the hushed confession leaks out of Kokichi's mouth like cold tea.
"Sometimes- I start thinking they might have never been real," Kokichi watches Shuichi's face twist with a familiar feeling. "But when I start thinking that way I end up thinking that it would be nice to never leave here."
Kokichi walks around the table and grabs hold of Shuichi's still present 'murder weapons'. For them in this life and so many others he'd had to-
Shuichi's breath hitches while Kokichi continues to investigate his kagune and it's glowing marble-gold.
He speaks louder than Kokichi would dare, "I know you told me that before, that you wanted to stay here forever- but we shouldn't! We'll all go home soon. And we won't leave one another just because we put this place behind us."
"Says someone who suggested burning the gym down."
"Oh, did Amami-kun actually tell you about that? Well… now you're changing the subject," Shuichi's lips waver as he clears his throat.
Kokichi tries to respond, either with something cutting or something pathetic, where has his childish excitement even gone-
"Ouma-kun, you've been hurting too, haven't you?" Shuichi says it like a question, but it's more an assertion than anything else. "I'm sorry that I didn't realize before now."
"Hurt? Saihara-chan sure is being silly! I'm just trying to butter him up so that I can ask all sor-ts of q-quu…"
Kokichi can't breathe anymore. He was doing so well, he has been just fine with the humanizing, so why is he breaking again? Kokichi can't keep going on like this. Bringing Shuichi to a place that Kokichi feels safe in was a mistake. Kokichi wishes Shuichi had just sent him off to the next game with the next waiting body and saved him the trouble.
Parasite. Parasite!
Stop that-
Shuichi is looking at Kokichi, getting closer, and now that warm body heat is spreading over Kokichi like a person shaped blanket.
"I didn't ask you to start hugging me like I just found out that I'm terminal," Kokichi grits his teeth.
This is supposed to be fun and sweet.
This was supposed to be Kokichi and Shuichi having a funny comic relief Q&A about random daily life for half ghouls. Kokichi needs to help Shuichi. He needs to make up for everything he'll keep doing for the rest of his despicable existence. He needs to make sure that Shuichi won't get a happy ending ruined by men in white coats carrying familiar-scented corpses in brief cases.
Kokichi instead lays himself bare and ends up crying like a frightened virgin on a wedding night. He just keeps getting more pathetic.
Shuichi pulls him tight.
"Ouma-kun… I'll answer all of your questions, okay?" Shuichi says. Sickeningly slow and kind. When he isn't, Kokichi knows, it's always never his fault. Except for those times where it is because Shuichi is too different and so very not himself.
"Why?" Kokichi demands in turn.
Shuichi exhales through his nose.
"Because Ouma-kun is my friend. You're a good person and always do your best to make the others feel better in your way. It might be too much to say, but I think you need to take care of yourself too."
My friend. Good person. Feel better.
Kokichi wants to yell about how many times he's hurt everyone, how many times he's killed, actually killed or each failure but all of them are failu-
shuichi dead in the birdcage in himiko's lab wrapped in white and head covered by a veil with just a smudge of lipstick because he got too close to the wrong person And no one listened
(You: in white space static and white hair)
miu taking everyone into the fake fake world and never ever letting them out calling it mercy and efficiency And no one listened
(Will not: with vantablack skin and gestalt weight)
convincing himself and gonta that it's the right thing to do over and over in different ways and meaning it as often as he doesn't And no one listened because life isn't fair
(Stop yet: wearing an amalgamation of one's own face)
waking up and staring at the survivors with dead eyes when they ask him to testify against danganronpa because how dare they ask kokichi to help them kill his last resort And no one listens because you are not worth it
(Because of him: Your finger brought against Your mirrored lips.)
Shuichi holds Kokichi tighter while he snarls against him, the familiar but probably not real sensation of kagune wrapping around him.
They don't leave the lab for a long time.
Kokichi hiccups and asks even stupider questions that he half knows the answer to. Sometimes he lies too viciously and even insults the detective across from him, but he doesn't leave. Shuichi continually obliges him and tries not to let Kokichi bait him into a reaction. The constant ribbing about kagune slime makes it hard, probably. He really hopes that at least someone is watching all this hard work.
When they do leave, Monokuma is outside waiting for them.
They refuse to let go of the other's hand.
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
Until proven otherwise, I will assume that diets like this are the real reason for the existance of ghouls.
Hyacinthium
Writing about sad cannibals as we speak.
- Location
- Bedroom
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Oh absolutely tbh. They're the one true antivegan force in this world. Unless they only eat vegans? I don't think that anyone in the cast is a vegan... And Kokichi isn't a ghoul anyway, so Kirumi will continue to feed him salads for his health.