Hope for The End (Book 3)

12. United

"Oh... so this is...what... you were planning..." Makot0's voice was no longer an imitation of Makoto's, his head was broken open. Something small lay at his feet, "Pathetic humans... you simply took all... of my personality..."

Makoto held a hand to his head, surprised his head wasn't wounded or in pain at all.

"I just read into Junko's technology." Kokichi smirked, "The fine print said that removing their 'Memory' chip, they wouldn't be able to be 'themselves'. Also a bonus of not being able to harm them."

"I see. Well. This makes it easier. His idiotic personality can't hold me back." Makot0's eyes were blood red now, "Start up sequence 79."

Every new program in the room began to make a funny buzzing noise. Makot0 grinned.

"This ends here and now." He took a single step forward, Glaring down at Makoto, "You'd better hope for the end. This will be a painful process."

Makot0's eyes glinted. Kyoko and Maki were released from the wall. V3 was shoved into the middle of the room.

"Well this is quite exciting!" Kokichi laughed, "You guys have style!- Wait... no... I lied."

A knife pressed to the supreme leader's neck, "You have the right to remain silent," Mukur0 stated, "Accept your death. Prepare to be Annihilated."

Even a few hallways away, the chaos of the gym could be heard. It appeared that they had no clue someone was hearing every word from a ways away.

Ryota Mitarai trembled as he heard the whole thing play out. He was looking for any way he could help their situation. He was the only one who could do something about this, everyone else was stuck in the gym.

One idea came to mind. If all the bad guys were programs, that meant they could be shut off at a generator.

But where was the generator?

This is what he had been searching for since the first announcement of danger.

He rushed through each room, stumbling on his own feet over and over. He didn't have too many more rooms to check left.

"Come on... come on..." He muttered to himself, "it has to be here somewhere..."

He ran on and on.

5 rooms left.

3 rooms left.

1 room.

He rushed through the hall.

"...Why does it ...have to be down the ...longest hallway?" He muttered in a panic, "come on legs..."

He suddenly fell to the floor. He hadn't tripped this time. His legs seemed to have just collapsed from under him.

"Phuhuhu~ Are you perhaps trying to end the inevitable?"

Ryota' s heart slammed against his chest.

Th-that voice...

"You really are helpless, aren't you? Well, what was I expecting?"

Clank. Clank. Clank. Clank.

Monokuma wheeled to face the fallen animator. His red eye glaring down at him.

"You appear to have fallen again! Such despair, am I right?" Monokuma chuckled to himself, "Of course I am!"

Ryota glared at the floor. His arms shook as he raised himself off of the floor.

Monokuma just continued to glare in amusement, "You do realize you're going to shut down the moment you flip the lever, riiiight?"

Ryota hesitated for the tiniest moment before responding, "I'd deserve it. After all I did to help you."

"You're not the only one who will shut down, ya know," Monokuma chuckled, "All you survivors will."

"I...I'm sure it's for the best..." Ryota murmured, trying to convince himself of those words.

"But don't you remember what happened the last time you 'did things for the best'?"

Another voice said from behind him. This voice was female, it could have been filled with emotion, but it was blank. Ryota flinched at Yukizome's words, now so blank because of his creations.

"You were always the disappointment." She said, a frown on her face. This Yukizome just wasn't herself.

Ryota was willing to bet that if he could look at her, she'd look as broken as he and everyone else had been when they died, and were resurrected.

"I d-don't need you to tell me these things.." Ryota muttered, "I'm aware of m-my mistakes... I'm going to fix them..."

"You can't fix things that are already broken," Another voice, this time male, "You of all people should know that by now."

Munakata' s voice seemed to have taken an opposite effect as Yukizome. His voice, usually cold and thoughtful, was now filled with an odd quiver of insanity.

"And we all know, you were the one who killed us." The large hallway was filling up with people, who had all been hiding up until now.

Everyone was there. Sakakura, Kizakura, Ando, Izayoi, Kimura, Gozu, Bandai, Gekkogahara, Tengan. All people who had been killed. People Ryota had never wanted to see again.

"Puhuhu~ man, we've got the whole gang here, huh? Isn't that great!" Monokuma laughed, "I'll let you guys have the fun chat! I'll be back!"

Monokuma clanked down the hall. Ryota was still struggling to get up, his arms shaking as he did a sort of push up.

"I didn't m-mean to kill anyone..." Ryota whispered to himself in fear, trying to drag himself towards the door, "I had no choice..."

"Everyone has a choice," Yukizome stated, "You made the wrong one. You've failed us all."

"I...I didn't.... she would have killed me!" Ryota cried out, still dragging himself across the floor."I wasn't going to die... I was a coward..."

"You still are." Munakata noted, "You are a coward even now, fleeing from your fears."

Ryota couldn't deny him. He was a few feet from the door. He felt as his upper body lost control and collapsed just as his legs had done.

"I'm going...to end this...." He told himself.

Everyone behind him began to walk slowly towards him.

He panicked, he reached the door quickly, he felt his arms going numb. He reached out a hand and pushed open the door.

"Sorry, Mitarai! It looks like times up!" Junk0 Enoshima laughed from the now open doorway. She was leaning on the power lever without a care in the world, "Your friends are already dead!"

Ryota flinched at the sight of her. He still continued moving forward even as he lost all feeling in his body.

"I'm...not...listening to...you...anymore..." Ryota struggled to say as he was almost in reach of the lever, "You can't...control me..."

"Maybe not now, but I did once." Junk0 surprised him when she reached out and grasped his arm, he began to protest.

"No- stop that-"

She moved and placed him in front of the lever. She grinned and whispered in his ear.

"Since when has leaving to the outside world been a good thing?"

Everyone who had been outside slowly came in and surrounded Ryota. He shook to himself.

He began to doubt himself.