Dangan Ronpa: Unser Sommerende/Chapter 5 - Daily Life (2)

Continued from Chapter 5 - Motive.

Lucy poured two cups of tea, which steamed over both saucers. We sat opposite one another, and she lightly tapped her finger on the edge of the table. Her general demeanor was far more serious than usual, no longer was she staring off at the walls like usual, she instead sat perfectly straight and looked into my eyes.

[1]

“He asked for my death, didn’t he?”

I nodded, and tried to speak. “... How did you know?...”

“That’s the only thing I’d do if I was Monoyaki. I know him well enough at this point, so... Oh well.” She shook her head. “I’ll be fine.”

“Don’t just say that, Lucy, you have to be more careful than that! I know there aren’t many people left, so the chances of one of them trying to kill you might not seem as high, but that doesn’t mean you’re just guaranteed safety! Please, I need you to-”

“Hush.”

I had already run out of breath, and I realised how loud I was being. It was very difficult to sit still, but I just held onto the chair and tried to breathe in a more stable manner. “... Lucy... I... Monoyaki said that you... Knew too much, or something, I, I don’t know, what did that mean?! Do you know what that means, please tell me, why were you in that photo, I, Lucy, please-”

“It makes me sad to see you upset like this, Jane.”

“But I am upset! Can’t you see I’m upset?!... Okay, okay... I’m sorry, I’m...” I tightened my grip on the armrest, and averted my eyes. “I’m scared. I don’t want anything to happen to you, and you know that.”

“Mhm. Mhm...” She stopped tapping her finger on the table, and brought her hands onto her lap. “... A lot of things have been coming back into my mind since I saw that picture I was in. I would tell you what these events were, and I feel obligated to, in fact. I’d imagine that Monoyaki would put a target on your head as well, however, if you knew the things I know again.”

“Look, I don’t care if I die, just tell me! What’s happened, and why are you just remembering it now?!”

“Jane... You told me that I should be wary for the sake of my life, and yet, you don’t seem to be wary of your own?”

“... Look, I’m sorry, I just can’t handle things any longer. All I want is for you to be safe, Lucy, okay?”

“I’ll take care of myself. I already have a good idea of what Monoyaki’s planning, so I know what he’s going to try and do. I’m also ready to defend myself if needs be...” She lifted a hand, and gestured to the sleek scythe on the wall, the very same weapon she asked Terry to make.

“I thought that was just for show...”

“I won’t aim to kill, just to incapacitate.”

“Aim? It isn’t a gun...”

“Silly sugar, you know what I mean.” She smiled, and I savoured that smile for all I could. “Just don’t fret, okay? Promise me that you’ll clear your head.”

(SOUNDTRACK PAUSES)

“Uh-huh, I’ll try and do that, I guess...”

“Splendid.” She took a sip of her tea, before standing, and walking to the corner of the room, to the bed-side desk. Her thick notebook was sitting there, and, after quickly flipping through it, she wrote something down, placed a bookmark on the page, and shut it. “I would have cleaned up earlier if I knew you were coming here, hehe. Pardon me.” She pulled out a drawer under the desk, and put the book away. “I usually tuck my grimoire away when people are over, since they always ask about it, and well, it’s a lengthy conversation every time, as you’d expect.” Still smiling, she walked back and took another sip of tea. “I mean, you’re no doubt curious about it now, are you not?”

“... I am, but it’d be too complicated for me to understand.”

“Mm, yes, it would.”

[2]

“W-wait, you’re supposed to say, ‘No, you’re smart enough, Jane!’, right? Y-you’re supposed to lie to me and be all nice and stuff!”

“Well, are you smart enough?~” She put a hand over her mouth, as her smirk grew stronger.

“... No...”

“Aw, there there, I’m sure you’d get the hang of it quite quickly. Maybe the molecular structures would be a bit unfamiliar, but the notes on each potion are straightforward. I’ll show you them another time, okay?”

“Heh, alright, just don’t expect me to be ready for it.”

We spent a while longer chatting about things, and I managed to forget about the motive somehow. As usual, Lucy could improve my day relatively effortlessly... She gave me a kiss on the cheek before I left, which I was able to handle a lot better than I expected. Well, I didn’t expect to get kissed all of a sudden, but uh, I was just a lot less nervous around her by this point. She also let me know that she’d stay in her room for most of tomorrow, only leaving to get food, and not letting people in, stuff that was probably just an exaggeration to reassure me, but I trusted she’d take care of herself. I was able to rest with ease that night.

[3]

MONOYAKI HOROSCOPE

Taurus!

Do you think I should rename this segment ‘Monoyaki Horrorscope’? I think it’s a pretty clever name, so I’d love some input from all the Tauruses out there. But I don’t want anybody thinking that it’s a horrible segment... Uh, anyway, your prediction today is that you will eat a dish of toad in the hole.

I had a better sleep than I usually did, so I got up earlier than the morning announcement. Not that I did much in the extra time I had, I just sat there and contemplated yesterday’s events. Things weren’t as bad as they seemed, really.

[4]

Even if the morning meeting pattern was done to death by now, this meeting in particular had a bit more to discuss than usual, as you’d expect after the events of the day before. Still, this meeting would have been the largest yet, as Mary was now attending, but since Lucy was absent, the total number still amounted to five.

And, out of those five, I was the one who seemed to have the most information about what was going on, since I was the only one to have seen Lucy in the last two days.

“... Uh, should I start?” I said, as everyone was oddly quiet.

“Go ahead.” Archie answered. “I’m not sure if anybody else has anything to say right now.”

“Yeah, things look grim, huh...” I sighed before continuing. “I know some of you are probably wondering if I was able to see Lucy since the announcement, and I have, but... All I could gather from her is that she knows more about what’s going on than we do, and that Monoyaki wants her killed precisely because of that. The fact he’s willing to end the killing game by giving us an unwinnable case probably says a lot about how desperate he is to keep that info private... But Lucy wouldn’t tell me, she said that I’d probably end up in danger as well if she told me.”

“Well, what about the rest of us?” Mary asked. “It’s not like the mastermind’s willing to kill every one of us over it. If she just comes to the meeting tomorrow, and tells us as a group, there won’t be a problem.”

“Uh, I’m not so sure that the mastermind would give us any leeway on that, if they’re so desperate to stop Lucy from telling everybody whatever she knows.”

“They don’t seem that desperate to me.” Rocky said. “If they wanted her dead, they’d just kill her right away. It takes too long to get someone else to kill her, ‘cause if she wanted to tell us, we’d all know by now.”

“Then maybe...” Archie said, before pausing to look down in thought. “Maybe that’s the point? The mastermind was probably gambling on Lucy feeling threatened enough by the motive to stay silent. What I can’t grasp is why they went with this ‘unsolvable case’ approach, rather than ending the killing game by just murdering us without a warning.”

“But nothing about the killing game makes sense, anyway. If we’re being honest, there’s no bloody point in making a bunch of teenagers kill each other, huh?”

“Nothing makes sense, yeah. We just have to live with it.” I sighed again.

“You say ‘live with it’ as if most of us aren’t dead.”

“Why do we have these meetings again?” Dan said, and I expected him to go on one of his nihilistic tirades again, but it’s not like I had an answer to that question. With the way things had gotten, his viewpoint held a lot more weight to it. He didn’t say anything after the question, so it felt pretty genuine.

“A lack of information and strategy is always a path to failure.” Mary stated, since I guess she was the only person brave enough to answer that question. “That’s the importance of our meetings.”

“But you’ve barely gone to any of them.”

“... Be quiet...”

“That works as a reason, I guess.” I said, before straightening my posture as if to stand. “If it’s about information, I’ve said everything I know at the moment regarding all of this.”

Archibald nodded in understanding. “Does anyone else have something important to share?”

“Well, I’m not sure if I’m the only one who noticed, but...” Dan looked around the room, like he was looking for someone. “Jo wasn’t at the motive announcement. It’s just something curiosity-provoking, really, but I don’t think I’ve seen him anywhere since the last trial, in fact.”

“Come to think of it...” Mary said, adjusting her hat, “I haven’t seen Leary, either. Sometimes I go to the textiles room to work on certain projects, historical uniforms and the like. I’ve been doing it more often since the library opened up, since it gives me more historical records, but, even if I’ve visited the room each day since, I haven’t seen him.”

I snickered. “Does he frequent that room? What, does he spend a lot of time sewing?”

“No, he just plays with the yarn that’s kept in one of the drawers, sometimes for an hour straight. An odd fellow.”

[5]

The meeting ended not long after that, as we’d run out of things to talk about. Ending the meeting with mentioning Jo felt like a super bad omen or something, like he was a devil summoned by the utterance of his name. But that’s stupid, it would almost look like a cliche from some sappy film if I happened to see him after that meeting.

But he’s an actor.

An actor thinks that the killing game’s just a movie plot.

But there was no way he was listening in on the meeting, since the doors are soundproof. Or was that just the doors to our rooms? Whatever the case, I was just starting to feel uneasy overall, so I went to a spot where he’d be least likely to find me.

Granted, the workshop was on the same floor as the textiles room, but nobody had really been here since Terry kicked the bucket so long ago. So I wasn’t going to be found here, of course.

“Hiya~”

[6]

Jo was already there. He was sitting on one of the tables, kicking his legs about with the same smile that never left his face. You’d think his lips would get tired from it, mine sure would.

“How did you know that I’d come here?!”

“What are you talking about? I’m just hanging around, it’s a pleasant surprise to see you, Jane.”

“No, no, that can’t be a coincidence, I was trying to get away from y- to find somewhere that’s peaceful and quiet, um, to paint in.”

“Like your room?”

“Well, yeah m-my room could work too. But why are you here, huh?!”

“I’ve spent pretty much every day here. I’ve been waking up before everyone, so I just slip in here to relax, since nobody else has a reason to show up. There’s plenty more room up here compared to those tiny dorms we’re supposed to live out our short life in, eh?”

“Alright, uh, cool.”

“So, what’s new with you?” He said, standing up as he leaned against the back of the table. His relaxed posture didn’t really do anything to make me relax, though.

“I’d rather not discuss recent events, things haven’t been all that great.”

“Things haven’t been great with you guys from the start of the killing game, though. I mean, I understand why, it’s just that it seems I’m the only one who’s ever chipper around here.”

I felt myself tighten up in anger. “Well have you ever understood why YOU’RE happy, then?!”

“Hey, hey, hush. There’s no need to be upset.”

“Look, you weren’t at the motive announcement yesterday, you don’t know how bad things are getting!”

“But I can tell from your voice that things are bad. I can tell by your face...” His smile lost some of its flair. “... You’ve come to hate me, right?”

“That’s a harsh way of phrasing it.”

“Hey, look, I don’t blame you. Believe it or not, we both take this game very seriously, maybe more than anybody else. I know I’ve set you off before by messing with the trials, and yeah, I guess I kinda dug into you too much every now and then.”

“... Hey, wait a minute, you’re trying to get me on your side or something, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, but in a nice, non-demeaning way!~”

(SOUNDTRACK PAUSES)

I sighed, and turned around, walking in the other direction. As I got to the door, I stopped once my hand was on the knob. I don’t know how to describe it, I just sort of stopped.

“Hm. I knew you were going to consider it, at least.”

“N-no, it’s just that you had the confidence to actually offer it to me a second time. I guess I just wish that I could be more like that, Jo...”

“Aww, I’m glad you admire my conFURdence.”

“...”

“But if you actually want to think it over, I’ll be straightforward with you; at this point, playing the game by the rules clearly doesn’t work. It hasn’t worked four times already, so... Not to mention, the whole ‘deliberately acting illogical to frustrate the mastermind’ doesn’t work when it’s one guy doing all the heavy lifting, huh?”

“But Jo, don’t you realise that nobody trusts you any more? If you’ve deliberately sabotaged our investigations multiple times, you can’t really expect us to listen to you, like, at all. Do I really have to spell out to you that you’ve endangered all of our lives by doing that?”

“Jane, girl, I never would have let all of us just drop dead over one of those things. It’s great that you were able to figure it out on your own, but I would have just said what I’d changed if I had to. Remember, I’m trying to get everyone out of this alive too. My way of doing things hasn’t cost a single life, has it?”

“But Jo, I... I just don’t know, it sounds... Ugh...” I turned, rubbing my forehead. “Maybe I’d consider joining you. Maybe if the circumstances were different, but... I guess I need to tell you what the new motive is.”

“Just another of ol’ Monoyaki’s tricks that we can overcome. Fire away!”

“... Whoever commits the next murder gets assistance from Monoyaki, so that the case is completely unsolvable. If the targeted person is killed, the killing game basically ends, and the only survivor is the killer.”

“Hm, that’s...” He put a hand to his chin, smirking as he schemed up a way to circumvent it... As the seconds passed, he started to frown, looking at the ceiling, humming to himself. The seconds were wearing away at him, and once a minute had passed, he looked at me, his eyes widened, as if to show a slit of vulnerability. “J-Jane, I can’t think of anything.”

“Nothing? Not even... I don’t know, standing on your head? Running around in circles?”

“No, that’s not what the ‘unexpected actions’ thing is about, you’re supposed to do things that actively endanger you and others without going over the line, ‘breaking immersion’ for the guy watching us, driving him insane, standing on your head is just, I don’t know, man, but it sure as hell isn’t a response to... Oh, oh god... Jane, if the mastermind wants to end off his show by just killing all of us, that means he’s bored. And if he just kills all of us off when he’s bored, and he’s not even going to be bothered if we all act illogically, then, J-Jane, we’re actually screwed!...”

I was too stunned to respond at first. The exaggerated bravado of the only remaining student who thought he was in control of the situation had slipped away so quickly that it started to hammer in how dire the situation had become. But I could hear his breathing get a little thinner, and he was looking at me with a bit of pain, so... Even if I hated his guts, I made myself say something.

“A-alright, it’s not over yet, okay? Breath deeply, uh, and remember that. We just have to stop that last murder from happening, and plus, the murder motive only counts with a specific person.”

“O-oh?”

“Yeah, the entrepreneur only gets assistance if they kill Lucy specifically, and she told me that she’s just going to stay in her room most of the time, where she’ll be safe. If anything, there’s a good chance that this situation’s going to stabilise, so... Even if the whole ‘immersion disruption’ tactic would make the situation better somehow, I don’t think we really need it.”

“A-ah, alright, okay... Uh, should I just apologise to everyone and hang out with the group, then?”

“Well, maybe it’s best if you just stay in the background for now, since they’re not exactly comfy around you... At least, I sure wasn’t.”

“What, so you’re comfy now?”

“Uh, I don’t know?”

“Huh?”

“Uhh?”

“Ahh, uh-huh.”

“Mm.”

“Yeah.”

“Gotcha.”

“... Thanks, Jane.”

“Don’t mention it.”

I returned to my dormitory, needing time to process what had happened. Was Jo seriously just going to be, uh, normal now? Or was this just a ruse to gain my trust for something he was planning? I couldn’t expect myself to trust him right away, duh, but he sounded really genuine after I told him about the new motive. I probably wouldn’t have to think about this for a few more days, anyway, so I went to bed early, figuring that I could use a little extra sleep.

[7]

MONOYAKI HORRORSCOPE

Gemini!

Today’s a day to find the positive in everything. Yes, to look at the glass half full, the silver lining, when life gives you lemonade, you make lemons, the cream of the crop, the fly in the ointment, the ham sandwich for breakfast, the 40-hour work week, all’s well it ends well.

[8]

“Attention! A body has been discovered! After a short time allotted for investigation, a class trial will be held to determine the culprit!”

... That’s...

That’s the morning announcement. Time to get up for another day.

I brushed my teeth and got dressed. I combed my hair. I wasn’t looking half-bad.

I left my room. There were five other people standing outside an open door. I wasn’t paying attention to details, so my classmates were just five people, really. So I went over to the open door to see what they were looking at, and they were all looking at a girl in the room who was sitting on a chair. She had bright red hair and an ebony coat, with her head drooping and her arms hanging, and she was a bit slouched, I think.

Lucy’s so cute when she’s sleeping.

... She’s... So cute.

Continued in Chapter 5 - Deadly Life.