September 9th

"Nnng…huh?"

Waking up from what almost seemed like a drug-induced sleep that may or may not have anything to do with amnesia, Makoto Naegi rubbed the blur from his eyes whilst trying to fight off the strangest nagging sense of déjà vu.

"Wait…isn't this Hope's Peak?"

But that couldn't be right. He had left that place behind, hadn't he? Still, the furnishings of the classroom he woke up in were clearly from the school.

"Oh god…no, please, not again…"

Whatever nightmare he had woken up in, Makoto wanted absolutely no part of it. It was just too cruel. This had to be some sort of sick joke, right?

The boy's eyes landed on the note neatly placed on the desk in front of his. Picking it up with a looming sense of dread, he examined the message.

Hey, look, I am SO sorry about this but I just HAD to put you back in that classroom. It was just too perfect. Don't worry though, this time it's different. For realsies.

If Makoto was confused before, he was doubly so now. Not only did the note manage to conveniently avoid explaining anything about the situation, it also confirmed that, yes, whoever was behind this was deliberately screwing with him.

In a rare surge of anger, he tore the damnable paper up before stomping over to the door. This unfortunately led to him opening it too fast for him to properly brace himself for the worst.

"Heeeeeeey~ Makoto!"

Makoto's heart leapt into his throat as he let out a scream. There were two reasons for his panic. Naturally he was startled, but the more alarming issue was the familiar visage of Junko Enoshima, who by all rights should be dead.

"J-j-junko?!" Makoto was torn. He was too scared to try and flee for fear of provoking her, but too scared to hold his ground.

"Oh god knock it off. We're done with that already. It's not me this time, I swear." Already bored of the Utimate Lucky Student's expected reaction, Junko groaned in exasperation.

"But how can you be…it's not possible…" Not quite willing to calm down, Makoto barely managed to keep his words straight.

"Who knows? But hey it's pretty fucking cool right? Round two bitches! Or not. Like I said; bored. So anyway, it looks like we're both in the same boat this time. And look! You're not the last person to wake up this time!"

Makoto, grateful for an excuse to avert his eyes from the Ultimate Despair, shifted his gaze to the spacious room behind her. Sure enough, they were the only two who had opened their doors; the other seven remained closed.

"So they gave you the classroom I stuck you in before? Nice touch. Come on Makoto tell me, tell me! How much despair did it give you?!"

"Like I said before I have no reason to despair!"

Makoto raised his voice defiantly with an element of annoyance. He did not want to deal with this right now. He did not want to deal with being kidnapped again. He did not want to deal with one of Junko's long-ass despair sermons.

"And I'll be damned if I have to deal with being stuck here alone with you for any length of time!" It was unusual for him to be so aggravated, but the scenario in which he had found himself was practically torture. Makoto woke up to find he had been kidnapped – likely to play another life-threatening game set up by some jackass for fuck all purposes – and the only person he had to interact with was his moral antithesis.

Desperately, the lucky boy shoved his way past Junko in a rather jarring departure from his earlier timid behavior and sprinted over to the nearest door. Not even bothering to come to a proper stop, Makoto let his upper body impact the door with a thud, both arms raised to bang on it as long as necessary.

Or at least he would have, had the door not chosen that precise moment to open.

"Oof!" The momentum carried his body into another's, sending both people crashing to the floor. As his Ultimate Luck would have it, Makoto may have had bad timing with the door, but the landing seemed to be rather soft for some reason. Plush, even.

"Seriously? How lame can you be? You couldn't have picked a bigger cliché to stumble into if you tried. I mean come on!" It said something about Junko's character that she was more concerned with Makoto's ridiculous situation than the fact that he was currently laying on top of her twin sister. Mukuro Ikusaba, for her part, at least had the decency to freeze up instead of continuing the gag with classic tsundere bullshit. Though that was arguably more despair-inducing.

"And what the hell Mukuro!? You can't follow up with a proper slap, let alone the fact that you should have dodged that or caught him or killed him or something at least! What does Ultimate Soldier even mean? You let me catch you off guard, you let Makoto catch you off guard; hell I'm surprised you lasted this long! Such a disappointment."

Makoto had tuned out the chronic rambler at this point in favor of being too embarrassed by his close physical contact with a girl to entertain the blonde psychopath. "Mu-Mukuro? As in…"

He scrambled off her, looking extremely flustered as he did so. "Wait, you…I remember you!" Memories of a life he had once forgotten all flashed through his mind. Suddenly, it was as if Junko's artificially induce amnesia had never happened. "Uh…are you okay?" Makoto held his hand out to her.

Mukuro had remained still since being bowled over. Having the boy you like pressed so snugly against your body will do that. Junko was snickering at the stunned twin, obviously well aware of this weakness.

"I'm fine!" She suddenly bolted upright, standing ramrod straight in record time. Makoto's hand, suddenly unneeded, was left hanging awkwardly in front of her. He opened and closed it before retracting the appendage, still in shock from a combination of the circumstance and his memories.

"Huh. Looks like they picked the gymnasium for Mukuro. They even found some Gungnirs! It looks like they're just props though. Ah, sweet memories…" Junko reminisced as she gazed into the open room the soldier had awoken in.

"Wait, the gymnasium? Then is this really…related to Hope's Peak in some way? What was in your room Junko?" Seeing that the girl was busy caught up in her despair fever and being unwilling to break her out of it, Makoto gave Mukuro a quick glance before walking over to Junko's door and peering inside.

…

SLAM.

Makoto slowly pulled back his hand as if he was expecting the doorknob to snap it off if he moved it too quickly. He practically limped back to the other two, and Mukuro had to catch him by the shoulders to keep him from falling over on the spot.

Junko, having donned the glasses she keeps on her person and switched her twintails to a ponytail, adopted a new demeanor and voiced her findings. "It would seem that the rooms we woke up in are modeled to reflect one the worst, most despair-inducing moments in our lives. For Makoto, it was the day the Killing Game began. For my sister, it was the moment I betrayed her. For me, it was-"

"DON'T!" Makoto cut her off before she could say anything further. It was only thanks to his boundless hope that he could survive the experience of seeing what was within Junko's room. No one else could handle it without going mad. It somewhat put Junko's disposition in perspective. No wonder.

"So I take it you all know each other then?"

A new voice echoed in the room, one that neither of the trio recognized in the slightest. Having opened his door just as Makoto slammed Junko's shut, none of them noticed he had come out. A boy around their age stood a respectable distance from them. He wore a uniform that was evocative of a school only the children of wealthy families could afford to attend. With brown, well-groomed hair and violet, analytical eyes, he had the appearance of a foreigner, but his Japanese was flawless.

"My name is Lelouch Lamperouge. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance. Well, I hope so anyway."

Getting the impression that this guy named Lelouch was kidnapped as well, Makoto was the first to speak. "Oh, uh. Hello. My name is Makoto Naegi. Were you kidnapped too? By any chance, are you an Ultimate?" It was still possible that this incident was related in some way to Hope's Peak Academy. From what he could recall, most of the student body besides his 78th Class did not survive the Tragedy, and those that did...well he could only hope right?

"Ultimate? What do you mean?" Lelouch supposed there was a slight chance he was referring to his social status. Ultimate sounded like something a Britannian might want to be called, but he had never once heard the term before, and the boy said it as if he should know the meaning.

"Ultimate is a title granted to students who are accepted into Hope's Peak Academy." Junko was still in her glasses getup, apparently. "It is appended to the student along with a title befitting their field of study. These students are regarded by the school to be the absolute best at what they do, and the school serves to nurture that talent."

"I feel like I would have heard something about that, but nothing comes to mind. I suppose I will have to take your word for it for now." Lelouch had a troubled look on his face, clearly not sure how he was supposed to react to that piece of information.

"No, I doubt you would have heard of it. Judging by your flawless Japanese and apparent age, would I be correct in assuming that is a school uniform? There exists no school in Japan with a uniform like that. Taking into account the fact that at least two of our group's number are supposed to be dead, it seems clear to me that at least some element of this scenario is rooted in the supernatural or superscience."

"Does she always talk like that?" Lelouch directed this question at the other two.

"Only when she wants to make things take longer. It's convenient when you don't understand what's going on but she gets reaaaally long-winded." Makoto half-whispered to Lelouch, with Mukuro nodding beside him.

"Fuck you! I'm tired of expositioning this shit anyway!"

The retort startled Lelouch who was about to say something, but Makoto beat him to it.

"Don't ask. Just…don't." Makoto warned.

Lelouch could only nod.

Another door opened, accompanied shortly thereafter by a voice that could be described as suave mixed with absolute certainty.

"Well isn't this a quaint little gathering?" A man dressed In a long white coat of some unusual – if simple – design took confident steps toward the growing crowd. His dark brown hair was slicked back and he wore an arrogant smile on his face. Perhaps most alarmingly, a katana seemed to be tied to his waist.

Several more doors opened next, each with a new stranger nobody present at any given time recognized.

First was a young man with medium length white hair and amber colored eyes. He exuded a presence of flippant malice not unlike Junko's, but seemed more reigned in.

Next came an adult man with long black hair and dressed in clothes that looked like they came from the Feudal Era. His eyes were a menacing red, and he looked upon them all with scorn.

A third door revealed a middle aged man with short black hair and a beard. He was dressed in a rather sharp suit with white gloves and wore a pair of yellowish orange oval sunglasses.

But none of them were expecting to see what lay behind the final door…well okay maybe one of them was not surprised, if only because he had seen similar things. Out hopped what could best be described as the mascot for some anime, a white, squirrel-like creature with beady red eyes and rabbit-like ears.

Makoto could only stare at the complete group with an expression that was lost between bewilderment and a scowl.

"I don't like where this is going."