As the screen flickers to life, you see what looks like the stage of a talk show. There is a low coffee table surrounded by couches, the whole set well-lit and surrounded by cameras. It’s even framed by curtains, a picture perfect scene. And yet something about the way everything is presented is… off. Too pristine. Fake, even more than you’d expect from those kinds of shows. Shiny.
> TAKE A LAST BOW.
Goro is seated in one of the couches, strapped in place and completely immobile with cuffs around his wrists and straps at his waist and neck. Instead of his usual attire, he is in a prison jumpsuit, the difference stark from his usual put-together appearance. His hands are pushed forward on the arms of the chair, displayed palm up without his favored gloves. The position shows off his bruised and scabbed over fingers from the murder, two of the fingers on his right hand visibly broken. While the rest of the restraints are generic and nondescript, his wrists are in department-issue handcuffs, marking him for a criminal.
Then, the music starts, and it doesn’t take you long from there to realize what had been off about the entire set-up. It’s surrounded by glass, like an aquarium tank. And somewhere, hidden by the curtains, there must be pipes, because blood is pouring from the ceiling, falling right across Goro’s outstretched hands and spilling across the floor.
The blood doesn’t drain, filling the tank. As it reaches Goro’s knees, Monokuma floats out from backstage on a tube, holding an announcer’s microphone. “Upupupu, you know what they say about blood on your hands--it never washes away!” He cackles and floats off the other side of the stage, the fluid level rising rapidly. Goro has long since given up on his pleasant and unruffled facade, struggling against his bonds roughly enough that blood from his wrists mixes with the blood surrounding him, but you can’t watch them run into each other for long before it’s too high, climbing up his chest, his neck, reaching his chin.
He’s going to die choking on the blood he spilled.
The way people drown in the movies is dramatic yet short-lived, screaming and then silence, their last breaths floating up as bubbles after they’ve submerged for the last time. This isn’t like that. There is no wild thrashing to be done with Goro strapped in as he is, only the tilt of his head up as far as he can until his face is covered too, the choking sputters of him trying not to swallow blood or inhale it barely audible against the cheery execution music in the background. And the blood flow seems to slow as it reaches his face, making you watch the final moments of struggle before the tank is completely filled.
You don’t see any bubbles. Just an eerie stillness, until a drain is opened up in the floor and you see Goro’s corpse, still strapped to the chair, forever stained with someone else’s blood.
Justin had faith in his students, and nothing would shake that: however, the fact that the bear had threatened harm to come to all the students - no, everyone on the island - could not be ignored. The bear had claimed to have sunk the ship that brought them here: so it wasn’t too much of a stretch to assume he had weapons. Justin could only think of one thing that would be destructive enough to affect an entire island.
The fact that there was a ticking noise that only seemed to grow louder only gave evidence to this thought. The course of action was clear: if the ticking was what he thought it was, they needed to find it and fast before it detonated.
A rare frown formed on his face, and he used his ID card: not to pun, this time.
MASS TEXT FROM: “THYME AFTER THYME” (Justin)
If there is anyone who has the time: please meet me outside the front of the hotel. I wish to talk of something important, and lead a search to the ticking noise we can all hear at this point.
He trusted his students, so the course of action was to find the ‘horrible, bad thing’...hopefully before it could do any harm.
Friend for the end of the world (chapter 1: motive)
This wasn’t good. Well it wasn’t bad either, just not yet. Not until that time counted down. The very very bad super not good thing that would happen to her was obvious. Yet still inevitable over years or maybe days. If she knew that it would happen in 168 hours regardless, would she kill to prevent it? Probably not. Prevent it forever though? That was a different story. For all she knew, it had already happened even. No way to tell till she was off the island. Suki’s arms twitched and she felt a unclean taste in her mouth. Living life a time bomb was how she lived already, what did a clock change?
All these thought were shuffled inside her as she paced back to the hotel. “Hello?” Putting out her voice like that and seeking a response was unlike her but right now it would be nice to have someone to talk to about all her worries. There was only so much time left. “I’d l-like to make a friend please...”
Hey, would you look at that! Another restless night for Peacock. Maaaybe it’s the amount of junk food she’s eaten since hearing about the killing game—bags of chips and candy are littered all over her floor—but who’s to say?
In any case, if she can’t sleep, then no one else can either! 4 AM on the dot, and she’s typing out these messages to send to everyone on the island:
MESSAGES RECEIVED FROM: PEACOCK
> ey
> did u know that even with seat belts people die all the time in car crashes
> just thought that was interesting :)
She looked over the photos she had taken earlier today, smiling as she scrolled through some. The redhead thought it would be nice to put them in a separate album to organize them.
Wait did she just accidentally click send on mass text!?
Message received from: Celica
[attachment][attachment]
...
Perhaps it was...a mistake to do this half awake at 3am.
On being told to wake up and head to a specific room: of all the things Justin thought might have happened as he was one of the first groups to head there, trying to get the students in a good mood and talking: all of what had happened was the last thing he’d wanted or expected. The poor boat driver was gone, a talking bear - the fact that bear expected one of them to kill without being caught just to get off the island. To push beloved students (even if he did not recognize any of them) and teachers to try and do that?
It was a horrid, disgusting action. He did not want the students he cared for so much to have to go through anything like that: but there had to be some way out of it, without hurting anyone, if they worked together. All the same, he understood some of the students may be understandably shaken at all of this.
Luckily, he had the ID Card and it’s handy system!
- OPEN MESSAGE FROM ‘THYME AFTER THYME’ (Justin) -
I know this may sound childish, of sorts, to try and reassure you all through messages...however, even if, as a teacher, I have no apparent ‘power’ here, you are all precious students, whether I know you or not. I want to encourage you as a proper teacher would, and help however I can!
True, the bear wants us to do awful things: but we do not have to. We will find another way off this place: we all have amazing talents, it is possible if we work together, I feel. I believe in all of you. Though, I might have sent to a teacher instead, but I still believe in fellow teachers too of course!
Ah, I’m not good at being serious for long, though...do any of you want to hear a joke to help cheer you up?
“Hello L-lion!” Suki had made sure to get up early for this. Well that had fed right into the announcement by their new supervisor, Mr. Bear. Suki got her ID and... things got a bit carried away so she forgot about the dinner date they had planed for when it was too late to eat the last time. Well one part of her had remembered so now she was back at the store. The perfect time for breakfa... brunch! That explained why there was nobody else around.
“Do you w-want to eat together?” An intense proposition, causing a little bead of sweat to roll down her cheek as she tired to hold a smile. It was just them, she could do this. Lion had been pretty good at not stareing so even if Suki had to use utensils, hopefully they would look away.
To be honest, whenever that knock-off Winnie the Pooh robot started speaking, Peacock assumed it’d be some sort of joke. Planting herself on the couch immediately, she listened, chiming in a couple of times as he spoke without thinking. She’s always been one with a big mouth, so having an equally annoying bear try to outdo her her? Despicable. Absolutely disgusting.
Although she’s not usually one to follow the rules—only nerds do things by the book!—this damn ID thingamajig forbids doing anything to Monokuma. Peacock huffs, grabbing a cigar and a bag of assorted candy out of her hat. Her ultimate title ain’t just for show, after all!
Out of the corner of her eye, however, she notices someone staring at her. Lighting her cigar and turning to look at them, she finally speaks.
“Hey, we gotta kill each other, I guess. Sucks.” Cigars and candy shouldn’t go together, but she finds herself chewing on a KitKat bar while holding her cigar with her other hand. Yes, she’s biting it the “wrong” way. “The hell are you lookin’ at? Y’wanna kill me already or somethin’? Pathetic.”
She figures they’re probably not that bold, but it’s worth getting to the point either way.
