Dangan Ronpa: Unser Sommerende/Chapter 2 - Motive

Continued from Chapter 2 - Daily Life (1).

[1]

MONOYAKI HOROSCOPE

Scorpio!

Considering how things are looking, you’d best harden yourself emotionally for any coming troubles. If that sounds too hard, instead, spend the weekend smuggling exotic parrots over the border.

[2]

“Wakey wakey, here comes the sun! I have another announcement to make, so please get dressed and come to the hall quickly! Before I get bored...”

[3]

I don’t know if I should even bother describing how I felt about this. I mean, duh, I was concerned. Another announcement probably meant another motive, which, if we weren’t careful this time, could lead to another murder...

Well, maybe we would be more careful this time?

Arriving in the gymnasium, everyone except for Jo had turned out. Not much had been said by the time Monoyaki showed up on the stage, as he had before.

[4]

“Welcome everybody! How are you today?”

“What do you think, dummy?” Charlotte grumbled, arms crossed.

“... I dunno. Is it a game? Is it a guessing game? Fun.”

Molly tapped her foot erratically. “Can we please get on with this?”

“Yeah, alright, whatever. Trust me, I wanna get done with this just as fast as you guys. Announcing it is just a formality...” He cleared his throat, although I now started to question if he even had a throat. “Once again, seeing that the murders have stagnated since the last one, I have decided to introduce a new motive in order to ignite the killers inside you!”

“You say that like it’s a good thing...” I sighed.

“Well, uh. Yeah. I think it’s pretty good. Anyways, let me just say what it is! Basically, until somebody commits another murder...” He giggled to himself. “The cafeteria will be out of order!”

(SOUNDTRACK PAUSES)

There was a short round of silence.

“... That means no food. Idiots. You’re going to starve to death.”

“Oh.” Amber pondered for a bit, playing with her hair. “You sure there isn’t any other place that has food?”

“Nope. That’s it. Why aren’t you guys screaming in terror, anyway?”

“Well...” Mia stretched a bit. “I guess we all figured you were running out of food to give us anyway... So once some time passes, you’ll probably just let us go...”

“I-it’s not going to be exactly pleasant, though?” Dan shakily scratched the back of his head.

“I mean... I dunno... Whatever...”

(SOUNDTRACK RESUMES)

“Can you PLEASE be a bit more concerned?!” The goat was flaring up a bit. “You’re all gonna die!”

“Y’want us to all die anyway,” Rocky pointed out, “This’s just another try at it for ya. If anything, I reckon an empty stomach’d make murder tougher, since y’d be way weaker...”

“Shut up! That’s...” He blinked a few times. “That’s a good point. Uh... Change of plans! Now, instead of no food, there will be SOME food!”

“Doesn’t that defeat the point?...” Lucy said, monotone.

“W-well, no! That’s because you’ll have just enough to survive healthily, but you’ll still feel, uh, REALLY hungry! It’ll probably hurt! And there’ll only be a limited supply of food. Specifically, uh... Paste!” He burrowed in his suit a bit and brought out a tube of toothpaste. “Kinda like this... Not exactly the same, uh, it’ll be enough to live off of.”

Most of us didn’t have much to say. Compared to the last motive, this really didn’t seem that bad? I mean, being perpetually hungry isn’t really something to kill over. Most of us did seem unconcerned with all this, as it looked like we’d be mostly safe this time.

Monoyaki was just sitting up there, pouting at our current dismissal of his motive. “Look, it seems like something minor now, but as time passes, and the pain sets in, you’re really gonna wish you hadn’t laughed at me...”

“Nobody laughed at you, though.”, I pointed out.

“THAT’S NOT THE POINT!... Ugh, just... Aggghhhhh!... I’m out of here!” Fuming, he disappeared, as promptly as always.

[5]

This entire announcement just had a sense of second-hand embarrassment. The idea of perpetually starving was actually unnerving, but Monoyaki’s botched delivery had left us not taking it seriously.

Maybe we should have taken it more seriously.

We really should have taken it more seriously.

“I guess we should go do our usual cafeteria meeting...”, Terry suggested, speaking a bit slower than usual. “Then we could figure out how much ‘food’ we’re actually getting.”

Robin responded with an odd combination of a salute and a thumbs up. “Indeed. A situation like this calls for organisation, and hence, our resources must be measured.”

Whatever, let’s just go.

Continued in Chapter 2 - Daily Life (2)