Chapter Text
Teenscast Ronpa
Abby - Super High School Level Writer
Hachi - Super High School Level Artist
Minte - Super High School Level Bookworm
Toby - Super High School Level Bass Player
Jesse - Super High School Level Gamer
Lana - Super High School Level Astrologist
Emmi - Super High School Level Zombie Survivalist
Bamboo - Super High School Level Philosopher
iFly - Super High School Level Flirter
Owl - Super High School Level Martial Artist
Dawn - Super High School Level Fan-Girl
Daz - Super High School Level Master ???
I was standing in front of one of the most famous schools in the country.The sky was cloudy - dont ask me why I remember. My mind was on overdrive. After all, there had been a struggle to get me here, all the requirements and stuff that was expected of a high class student. Which, I guess I now was? It wouldn’t be just me though, I had my classmates to meet. Not entirely sure if I was looking forward to it, but it would be an experience. I would be spending the rest of my school years with them.
I won’t lie, I was terrified. School had always seemed so small...but now, I was going to a place where more than five hundred people just like me would be attending. I took a deep breath and started up the path.
Maybe I forgot to breathe out, cause the last thing I remember was...well, that.
~
I woke up with a faint ache in my head. I didn’t remember anything that had happened. I’d only just arrived and, suddenly I was here. I began to calm down as I glanced down - this looked like an average classroom. I’d probably been hit over the head by a stray football and brought here. I stood up, stretching my legs with a yawn, and walked out. I could hear voices nearby, and the corridors were deserted.
I hesitantly walked down the corridor, towards the voices. It seemed the only thing I could do, I didn’t want to be out here by myself much longer.
????: What do you mean, we can’t get out?!
????: I’ve already told you - the doors and windows are bolted. We’re completely stuck.
...Wait, what?
I headed through the doors in front of me, into what looked like a large lunch room. I faced the 11 people I assumed were my classmates. A few glanced over at me before returning to their conversations - they seemed almost familiar. Could have been from when I saw their descriptions on the website, only the best did get into this place, after all. After a few minutes of looking around, I came to the conclusion that I’d better introduce myself, and find out who they were. I turned to the person nearest to me. She had dark brown hair, and was wearing what looked like a...sheep hoodie? She appeared to be extremely terrified too, but I had to start somewhere.
Here goes nothing.
Abby: ..Hi?
????: WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE HERE!! THIS IS THE END!!
Abby: .........
????: WHY ELSE WOULD WE BE HERE?!
I slowly edged away, a little bit confused, but I pushed that bit of worry away. Someone had walked up to me during my great escape from Case Nutjob, and I bumped into them.
Abby: ...!! Oh, sorry!
????: ......
Abby: ....Do you have a name? I’m Abby.
Hachi: Hachiseiko, but I’m mostly called Hachi.
Hachiseiko...Kind of a weird name, but she looked nice enough. Brown hair, and from what I could tell, a swedish accent.
Hachi: I see you’ve met Lana.
Lana? I followed her line of sight back to the screeching human I was currently terrified of. She looked a little more calm than I remembered - wait no she’s ran into a wall.
????: Lana! Stop! We’re going to be okay!
Lana: DEATH!! DEAATHH!!! WE’RE ALL DEAD, TOBY!
Toby: We’re not dead.
The girl, apparently called Toby, shook her head and looked apologetically at me. She too seemed to carry a swedish accent, and had short curly hair. She smiled and began to speak.
Toby: Hi, I’m Toby, sorry about that. And your name is..?
Abby: I’m Abby.
Toby: Abby, huh? Nice to meet you I guess. Just a shame it’s in these conditions.
Abby: Yeah. Where exactly are we? This can’t be the school.
Toby shrugged, looking surprisingly unbothered by it.
Toby: This could just be an initiation.
Abby: Maybe. But bolted windows?
Toby: And blacking out...It’s too much to be a coincidence.
Abby: That happened to you too?
Toby: Yeah, everyone else as well. Just ask them.
...There’s no way this is normal.
Toby: Well, we may as well meet the others. Come on.
With no reason not to, I let Toby introduce me to everyone else.
Toby: This is iFly!
iFly: Nice to meet you too, miss...?
Abby: Abby.
iFly: Nice to meet you Abby.
I suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder, and I turned (or, to be honest, was more pulled around) to face a girl. She was similar to my age, and I hadn’t met her yet. She seemed almost protective. ...Of what?
????: Don’t make eyes at him too much now.
Abby: But I was only...?
????: Just back off.
I swallowed and stepped away from him, not wanting to risk anything. I glanced over at Toby, hoping for some idea of what her problem was. She just smirked and turned to another person, leaving me confused as hell.
Toby: Emmi, this is Abby.
Emmi looked right at me, and I felt almost uncomfortable. By the way her eyes shot up and down, she was...examining me? I quickly brush it off, reasoning with myself that it was perfectly normal for her to want to know what I looked like. Emmi had short hair, and what I thought was a box fringe. Quite a bold hair cut, if you asked me.
Abby: Uh, hi, Emmi...?
Emmi: ...Hi.
I blinked and stared at her, wondering if she would say anything else, but pretty quickly someone else appeared by my side. I sighed inwardly with relief, glad to get away from the cold glares coming off Emmi.
????: Hey, Abby, ..right?
Emmi: Abby, this is Owl.
Owl: Hey, do you have any idea what has happened?
I shook my head at her, and she turned to Emmi, which was obviously her original intention. I frowned, spotting pretty quickly how close they were standing. Just bit too much for them to only just have met. I raised an eyebrow at Toby, and she nodded, which pretty much answered my unvoiced question. She led me over to a corner, where a figure was standing. He glanced up at me and I stared back at him. He’s the first to break eye contact, but he immediately looked back and smiled at me. He had short blonde hair, and scarily blue eyes. He dipped his head at me in recognition.
????: Hi there, you must be Abby right? Super High School level Writer, if I remember correctly?
Abby: ...You know my title? That’s just a little freaky.
????: I know as much about you as I know about everyone. It was all on the website.
Abby: It was? I don’t remember seeing that. Well, who are you, anyway?
Daz: I’m Daz, Super High School Level Master-
Toby: ..Daz? I’ve never even heard of you, and I looked on the website.
Daz glanced at Toby, but said nothing. I assumed that was all he was going to say, so we moved on. I felt him watching us as we walked away, and I shuddered despite myself. Pretty quickly we approached a group of three - two girls and one guy.
Toby: Right, this is Bamboo, Jesse and Minte.
I looked at the three people she was gesturing at, and felt them run their eyes over me, judging me. I swallowed and scanned them over as well, making sure it was quick. I looked at the first girl, who was east asian with wide shoulders, thin black hair and dark brown eyes, she was Bamboo. I then looked at the boy, he had inquisitive brown eyes and brown hair flicked to the side, who was Jesse. To the side of Jesse stood Minte, she seemed almost hesitant to look at me, but I smiled, hopefully comforting, and studied her. She had dark brown hair - I guess you could say black, and brown eyes. The most distinguishing feature was her panda hat, placed slightly crooked on her head. I decided to go ahead and say something, starting with Bamboo.
Abby: Uh, hi. I’m Abby.
Bamboo: Hey.
I stood there awkwardly for a few moments, expecting more from her, but eventually I turned to the other two.
Abby: ...Hi?
Minte: ...
Jesse: ...
...Right. It didn’t seem like these three were talkative. At all. Maybe I should just-
Toby: Yeah, we’ll just be going.
The two of us edged away, watching the floor awkwardly. The room had pretty much gone quiet as everyone ran out of things to say. The only conversation topic left was the huge question no one dared to ask.
...What the hell is going on?
Hachi was the first to make a move, heading into the center, gesturing for everyone else to come in. We did, slowly at first, but soon enough we were all in a circle. The 12 of us who had come together under these freaky circumstances, to do...whatever it is that needed to be done. I was wary of everyone, some seemed more friendly than others, but I’d have to deal with it if I wanted to get out of there.
I was wary of everyone as we thought of what to say, how to start a discussion, or figure out what actually was going on.
Owl: We need to get out of here.
Hachi: We’re not getting out.
Lana: SEE?
iFly: Of course we can get out.
Hachi: No. This is far too complicated to just be a scare. We aren’t escaping - at least easily.
Owl: So what do you propose?
A cough came from the back of the room. Bamboo was stood a way off, waving a small note in the air. Her face was slightly paler - or maybe that was the lighting?
Bamboo: Read this.
We crowded around her, all of us desperate for information on what the hell was going on.
‘’Hello, hello, students! Today you may be wondering, what’s going on?
Well! To put it simply...
You’re all going to die!
Hahahahahahah!
Ahahah!
Ahah!
Haha.
Ha.
Did I get you?
I so got you.
Anyways, the point is this...As the tall one said, you aren’t getting out of here easily. Where’s the fun in that?? To escape here, you must murder someone! That’s all!
Oh, and you need to get away with it of course. Once 3 people have found a body, the announcement goes out, and people are allowed to inspect it and start an investigation, to find out who the murderer was. After a selected time of collecting evidence, the trial starts. If the murderer is discovered, then they get executed. If the murderer pulls it off, and isn't found out, then everyone dies and the murderer gets their life dreams and wishes and, best of all, freedom!
Fun, right???
Enjoy your time at school!’’
A silence fell over us once more. No one dared to make a sound, to break the shell of silence that protected us from the terrible truth. We were stuck here unless we did the unthinkable.
I swallowed. Maybe it was unthinkable to me, but...Looking around, I could see the hint of a murderer in everyone. Even Toby seemed like, if she was pushed far enough, she would snap.
...!!
No! I couldn’t think like that! We needed to stick together. The pause was finally ended by Toby, her eyes wide and voice full of fear.
Toby: ..Why would we murder someone?
Hachi: It can’t be that simple.
Minte: ...I don’t see why one of us would get murdered...
Daz: We have to trust each other, right?
Bamboo: ..Trust
Abby: I-I trust you all...
Bamboo: Someone’s quick to jump the gun.
Lana: I told you all we were going to die!
Hachi: But we’re not. Until someone gets away with a murder.
Owl: We won’t let them, right!
Dawn: We can’t let someone kill iFly! Not before I have his...beautiful...children.
...That explains a lot.
Emmi: We can’t let feelings get in the way of this.
Owl: ....
Emmi: Owl being the exception to my feelings.
Abby: So...What now? Besides the impending feeling of doom and all...
Lana: Can we just go to sleep and never wake up?
iFly: I, uh, yeah let’s just sleep.
Dawn: How about together?
iFly: .......................
Well, that’s one of us do- no she’s running after him.
Hachi: If we all go find our rooms, and ..sleep? We can meet back here tomorrow morning, how does that sound?
Daz: Tomorrow, 7:30, all of us on time, right?
Abby: Sure, we might find something interesting, probably not though. If a room could even be interesting.
After that, the rest of us started to melt away, until only a few of us remained.
Toby: ...
Hachi: ...
Abby: ...
I couldn’t explain it, but those two seemed like the most trustworthy here. I smiled at them weakly, and both of them returned it pretty quickly.
Toby: I guess I’ll see you two in the morning, then?
Hachi: Yeah.
Abby: Stay safe guys.
I retreated, leaving them to either talk, or leave as well. I headed down the corridor, making sure study the nameplates. I found my room pretty quickly, noting Emmi’s room was right beside me. I tried to brush off the uneasy feeling that gave me, and headed in. My room was simple, a bedside table by my bed, and a thick duvet. I ran my hand down the duvet, and pulled it back, the sheet underneath loose. That would be pretty easy to take off, if needed, but it wouldn’t come off in the night, thankfully. I turned off the main light and stared around me, spotting a vent beside my head. That was odd, not that the situation I was in was anywhere near a normal day of mine.
I was woken up by a bright light. I blinked open my eyes, shielding my face with an arm. The light shut off pretty quickly, and I sat up, staring around as I recalled the events of yesterday. At least I knew what the vent was for - if there was any way to wake up a teenager, it was to burn their fucking eyes open.
I dragged myself out of the bed and pulled on some clothes. Today was going to be a big day, and I hoped the lunch room had food. I arrived pretty quickly, noticing everyone was there.
Everyone but Daz.
Emmi: You’re late.
Abby: Haha, yeah, sorry. I’m...not good with mornings.
Toby: Morning Abby! Is that everyone?
Bamboo: Someone’s missing.
Owl: Daz isn’t here.
Hachi: He told us to be on time yesterday, too.
Lana: No doubt he was the first death...
Dawn: Oh, who cares about him? As long as iFly-senpai is alive, I’m sure we’ll be okay!
iFly: ...
Poor guy.
Minte: He could just.. be still sleeping?
Hachi: Unlikely. From what I glimpsed of him yesterday, that’s not his kind of character.
Toby: But that was just a bit, right? He could be a really heavy sleeper.
Hachi: I suppose. Let’s check his room.
Six of us decided to go up - me, Hachi, Toby, Minte, Jesse and Owl. We left the other half of us behind, waiting for our news. We reached the room pretty quickly - Owl claimed to have the room next to him. The second we entered the corridor we knew something was up. The walls were littered with small scratches, barely noticeable at first, but they were enough to tell us that he hadn’t just gone for a stroll.
Hachi: She wouldn’t have heard anything last night - the rooms are soundproof.
Jesse: How do you know that?
Hachi: I...may have had a small screaming session. But no one came to see if I was okay, did they?
Toby: I sleep right next to your room and I didn’t hear a thing...
Hachi: Exactly.
Minte: So where is he?
Hachi: From what I can tell, he’s dead.
...Dead. Someone was already gone...
Toby: But you don’t have any proof! For all we know, these scratches could have been put here to fool us!
Hachi: They could, but-
Owl: Let’s just go back to the others and create teams to look around with. We don’t want to make any assumptions, after all.
Jesse: Good plan.
So we did just that. Everyone was tense - I don’t think we expected good news, but that didn’t stop us from hoping it was just a slip up on Daz’s part. None of us wanted to believe that among us was a murder. We arrived back in the canteen, and watched as the remaining flicker of happiness died from their eyes.
Lana: He wasn’t there, then?
Hachi: Nope.
Lana collapsed and began to wail, clutching her chest. Toby and Jesse ran to her side, Toby kneeling down to hug her, Jesse quietly talking to her. The rest of us started to mingle, meeting up with whoever we wanted to investigate with. I was left standing awkwardly, wondering if anyone would take me in, when I felt a hand on my shoulder.
Hachi: I suppose we’re a team, then?
Abby: Y-Yes, sure? Are we going to investigate? But we can’t...
Hachi: Why not?
Abby: We haven’t got his body.
Hachi: Then we find it. With his body comes evidence. And with that, justice. We’re going to be okay.
Abby: But this happened in less than a day. Maybe we ARE going to die.
Hachi: We don’t even know if he’s dead.
Bamboo: Hey, guys, I just thought of something...Didn’t it say the trial will start after his body is found? Why would the killer want to hide him if it just meant someone was down?
Emmi: Well, because they wanted to.
Owl: But they wouldn’t get to have a chance of graduating, if there wasn’t a trial?
Emmi: ...Like I said, they killed him because they wanted to. Someone who doesn’t care if they live or die in this place - they just want to knock our numbers down.
Owl: Or maybe it’s just part of a big plan to kill us all one by one...
Lana: ...
Owl: We’ll all disappear, and we’ll know that one day it will be us next.
Lana: ........
Owl: But we’ll have no way of knowing who it is, how to stop it.
Lana: ............
Owl: This is the end!
Lana: Shut the fuck up.
Owl: .....
Lana: ....
Hachi: There’s no time to get all depressed about it. Our lives are at stake.
Bamboo: We need to look for Daz.
Hachi: If we all split up and just look as far as we can we should be able to find him.
Toby: And if we don’t?
Hachi went quiet, eyes focused on the floor as she thought. Eventually she lifted her head, looking around the group.
Hachi: Then we can move on, and live like it never happened. It hasn’t directly affected any of us, and as Bamboo said, there will be no trial. This was an odd murder...but it’s not imperative.
Lana: She’s right.
Owl: But...that’s wrong! We have to avenge him!
Lana: No. We don’t owe him anything. We knew him for an hour or so. He’s a stranger to us, just as much as I’m a stranger to you.
Her eyes briefly flicked over to Jesse and the ghost of a smile appeared on her face. Then it faded and a practiced seriousness set into place again.
Hachi: Well, we’d better get going.
Toby: I’ll come with you Hachi. Abby, you as well?
Abby: Oh! Sure, I guess?
Everyone else filtered out in pairs and threes, until once again only us remained. I glanced at Toby, giving her a reassuring smile, then back at Hachi, awaiting her instructions. She seemed to be the leader, and I wasn’t going to complain - not just yet, at least. She’d kept us all alive this long after all.
Hachi: We should go to the corridor. It’s obvious his body won’t be there, and the others are likely to be searching for where his body actually is, rather than the possible scene of the.. abduction?
Toby: Alright, sounds good, lets go there then.
We headed out of the cafe, and as expected, no one was in the corridor alongside the bedrooms. The walls were still littered with scratches, and I traced them with my fingers - they weren’t too deep. He obviously had struggled to get a good enough grip on the wall.
Hachi: He was alive when he was taken.
Abby: Yeah, he was.
Toby: How do we know?
Hachi: ...These scratches. If he was dead when dragged away, they wouldn’t be here. He obviously put up a fight about being taken, and these look too perfect to be faked. If he was dead, he might have made a slight mark on the wall, but that would have been a small chance.
Abby: So he was alive when this happened, taken against his will.
I studied the scratch marks closer, running my fingers against the ridges. They seemed sharp, and a few closely grouped ones shows he tried to cling to the wall - there was no way they were faked. My heart plummeted a little. The scene - a desperate boy, clinging to a wall in his last hope for survival. After a few moments of thought, I sighed and turned away, facing the group.
Abby: According to these, he was dragged away from where we are now. he was carried towards.. the stairs?
Toby: The stairs are locked from the second step up, though?
Hachi: And no one here has access to them, no one has a key, or anything to unlock it with. Unless someone was working with whoever is controlling this, we have to rule that out as an option. The scratch marks are obviously real, but the culprit then turned around and walked back away again, this time leaving him unable to make a mark on the wall.
We turned and walked back along the corridor, desperately searching for more clues, marks on the wall, floor, anything. We kept searching all the way back, for evidence, or even a glimpse of something that could give us a lead. Something to let us know he’d passed this way.
We found nothing.
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