Undeniable Lies- Saiouma/Oumasai Fanfic

Chapter 66- Red Ribbon 'gift'

I kissed his forehead and smiled. I was glad to have him, we'd make it out alive. We had to, a promise is a promise after all. He smiled at him, then grabbed my chin to bring me down for a peck. I was happy to have that feeling back, finally.

"Shuichi, would you mind getting back together?" I whispered to him. He nodded as a response. "One question first, did you kiss Kaede?"

He backed up, "I-I mean y-yes, b-but she p-put herself on m-me so she t-technically kissed me? I don't h-have any interest in her i-if that's what you-u're asking."

His stuttering was still cute. I 'booped' his nose and pecked him on the lips, "No worries, just curious. No need to be so flustered!"

He placed a finger on his chin, "H-how did you even know about that?"

"I have eyes everywhere! I do have 10,000 members remember?" A bit of a sad tone took over at the end. He gave a suspicious look. "I-It's not like I was hiding in the cabinet or a-anything!"

He let out a small chuckle. "Of course."

That was the first genuine chuckle from him I'd heard in a while. I was able to make him laugh. I stood up and told him I'd be back in a minute. I wanted to see how bad I looked this time, in the bathroom mirror. My eyes were puffy, bloodshot too.

I rolled up my sleeves to look at them, removing the bandages from my hands while I was at it. My hands were okay, mainly scabbed over. Meanwhile, my cuts were still tender. I winced as I touched them. I put my sleeves back down and splashed some water in my face.

I definitely didn't want to go back to sleep, but Shuichi was waiting for me out there. So I had to leave the room eventually. I opened the door to spot a sleeping Shumai on the bed. Peaceful as always. I smiled and laid next to him, drifting to an unwanted sleep.

Next thing I knew, the 7am announcement was going off. I rubbed my eyes only to notice, he was gone. Shuichi was gone. Did he leave before I woke up? Is he in the restroom? I thought. No the doors open and shower clearly isn't on.

I looked around the entire room, though small I wanted to be sure he had actually left. When I found a white box with a red ribbon around it. I grabbed it out from under the sink. Right when I was about to open it, a nuisance popped up.

"Upupupu! Not yet, you're not allowed to open it juuust yet, hurry to the gym!" Then disappeared like he had never been there to begin with. I wanted to unwrap it, but the wrath of monokuma is scary.

I closed the cabinet, and held the small box in my hands. That was probably where Shuichi went, but why wouldn't he wake me up too? I dismissed the thought and headed down the dreaded long stairs.

Once I got to the gym, just as I'd thought Shuichi was there along with everyone else who was still alive. I stood in the back corner awaiting the inevitable appearance of the bear.

As if on cue, there he was. "Thanks for joining me everyone! Puhuhuhu, like you had a choice. Anywho, I asked you all to bring your 'gifts' here. They're a token of the past, to provide some comfort to you all. You can go ahead and open them." Everyone had different sized boxes, but each wrapped the same.

I took the top off, almost puking at what I saw inside. It was my razors. The same ones I'd left at home, how'd they even get these? There was even some dried blood still on them. I closed the box and composed myself in case of any wandering eyes.

I glanced around the room, expressions of fear and terror. Just like the one I'd had. I understood what this was, traumas. Bring them back in the forefront of our minds, but how would that motivate us to kill?

Monokuma piped up, "Now that you all have seen your lovely gifts, watcha think? Did I pick out some good ones? In anycase, if none of you kill one of your precious classmates, those little tidbits of ribbon will reveal your gift to the rest of your peers. And lemme tell you, we have some juicy ones here! Get to planning kiddos!"

Monokuma disappeared as usual. Uncertainty filling the air, very tense I must say. Then I noticed Shuichi, no not just him. Kaede, Rantaro, Aimi, they were all shaking erratically. They'd been shaken to their cores, or at least that was my guess. Gonta was even crying at that point.

I left my corner to place a hand on Shuichi's shoulder. He looked down at me, tears threatening to fall. I used my jacket sleeve to wipe them away.

Everyone's attention was called to the stage by the shaky voice of Kokoro. Even she had been taken aback by this, interesting. "I-I know how you must all feel right now but we can help each other through th-this. We're n-not alone, we should have each other's backs. So to start, I'll share my 'gift' as monokuma phrased it."

Kaede looked at her with jaw dropped, "Y-You d-don't have t-to!"

"I-it's fine. I-I... I.. I was the cause of my parents death, both of them. Th-they were trying t-to save m-me, I couldn't swim. But a boat didn't spot my father who'd stayed in the water after my mother took me back to shore. She jumped back in to rescue him, but never came back up. Their bodies washed up on the shore a few weeks later," She finished. "My gift was a sailboat." She grabbed a small ornament from the small box showing it off. "I don't expect anyone else to share but I hope it helps to know you aren't alone in this."

Kokoro was such a nice girl, but it didn't look like anyone else was in the sharing mood. I certainly wasn't, Shuichi definitely wasn't. The room was tense and Rantaro was the first to leave. I grabbed Shuichi's wrist and did the same.

I tugged him up the stairs to the third floor and out to the courtyard. We sat behind a tree and let out pants from running all that way. He was still shaky but a tad distracted by this. I smiled at him.

I got serious. "What happened?"

He held out a medium sized box, white wrapped with red-ribbon. A bag of candy? I was confused. What trauma could be linked to a bag of candy?

"I-it's the specific candy I-I asked for my aunt to b-buy. Before- before she... and he-.." Shuichi went silent. Tears trailing down from his eyes.

I caught on, how could I forget? "I'm sorry." I held him while he cried.  If these were the motives he provided us with, I could only imagine what the others had received.

He pulled away, sniffling, "Kokichi.. What did you get?" I had a feeling he knew, I didn't want to respond. And thankfully, the world was on my side. We heard people on the steps coming down.

Gonta of course. I signaled to Shuichi to be quiet. Gonta knelt on the ground, picking through the grass till he found one. A creepy crawling, squirming, one hundred-legged centipede. I screamed as I saw it, and his eyes glanced my way. Red and puffy. Of course that would be what he'd do when he's down. Ghhhh...

I grabbed Shuichi by the wrist and tugged him upstairs. It was clear that Gonta was in a 'people mood'. I may or may not have wanted to get away from that bug as well.

I glanced around the floor, seeing if anyone was around. Thankfully, nobody was wandering the area at the time. I continued to pull his wrist into the library, no one there either. We sat at one of the tables in the room. I let go of him and leaned back in my chair, hands behind my head.

He twindled his hands for a bit, then gave me a side glance before speaking up, "Kokichi... You never answered my question."