Disclaimer: I don't own Gintama.

Teach us! Ginpachi-sensei!

It was the next day after the library session when Kagura bursted into tears and wailed, vicariously re-living the feelings of the KoiZura characters and expressing her solicitude by slamming the KoiZura book multiple times on her desk. Surprisingly, the book managed to stay intact. The desk on the other hand was completely deformed. Clearly, Kagura was not pleased.

Shinpachi tried to snatch the book out of her hand. Like everyone else, he too couldn't speak after the sorrow silenced their hearts. But he did manage to reach out to console his friend. "Kagura-chan, I think even though Zura-chan died of cancer before Takasugi-san got to the tree on time, Zura-chan's spirit was still with them. So the three of them did get together in front of their sensei's tree."

Shinpachi finally got ahold of the book after Kagura took a gulp of breath. "I wasn't crying about that, four eyes," she explained, "I'm upset because Zura died with birthmarks!"

Shinpachi should have liked to gregariously flip multiple tables. But he knew he should have expected this. "That wasn't the point of the story."

Yamazaki, no longer under the daze deemed as Anpan-anpan-anpan, concurred with Shinpachi, imploring everyone's attention to the benefits of friendship. But again, he was deftly swept aside as the students jumped in with their own comments.

"Ginpachi-sensei, why didn't Gin-san or Takasugi-san remove his moles before he died?"

But Ginpachi was preoccupied with the latest copies of his JUMP manga. So he simply stated, "Zura did not have any moles in the story."

Shinpachi's hand shot out. "Ginpachi-sensei! Oi! Why are you reading JUMP in the middle of class?"

"Shinpachi, that isn't the point," Kagura said with as much conviction in her words as Shinpachi had previously possessed. "Ginpachi-sensei, shouldn't the dead look their best on their funeral?"

To this, Tae Shimura nodded with fervency. "I agree with Kagura-chan. The funeral was Zura's last major event. His friends should have made sure he looked good for the funeral even if he didn't have birthmarks!"

"Ane-ue, we should work on the project," Shinpachi helplessly muttered, knowing well that his sister would be too impassioned to listen to rationality.

Ginpachi placed Karuto down on his desk for a brief moment, sensing a need for his insight. "Then what are you standing there for? You're bothered by the injustice? Go ahead and edit the story! Give Zura good clothes. And don't forget to give him a facelift! Dead people should look their best on their funeral after all!" And just as quickly as it appeared, the moment of inspiration vanished as he returned to more important matters: the last chapter of Karuto.

"Oi, author! Are you saying that we're not important in this story? But Karuto is?" Shinpachi stood up from his seat in protest.

"Boycott! Boycott! Boycott!" Kagura rallied the others to be non-characters for the story.

"Wait! How are we supposed to finish the project?" Shinpachi tried to be a voice of reason.

...

...

...

...

There were almost no characters participating in the story.

The only remaining characters, it seemed, were Shinpachi and the manga-reading teacher who was quite solely immersed in consuming both his lolly-lollied lollypop and the final scene of Karuto, in which he now he lauded the brazenness of the characters including Sasu—(Ginpachi inserted an abrupt dash. "Oi, oi, no spoilers for the readers.")

"Ginpachi-sensei, how are we supposed to finish the project and this chapter?" Shinpachi turned to his teacher. "No one is around anymore!"

Ginpachi yawned as he closed last volume of Karuto and shuffled his manga together. "Shinpachi, that is up to you and me and the written words in this story."

Shinpachi was confused.

"You see. Whatever words come up in this story contributes to the end of it. So if we just write down:"

Kagura sat down on her chair.

"Kagura-chan is back? That easily?" Shinpachi jaw-dropped.

"Then we have Kagura sitting on her chair, and we have no one to negate that she isn't. Even if we say:"

Kagura sat down on her chair with a foot-long hot dog in the classroom.

"Ginpachi-sensei, but I thought they were boycotting the story. So should the words for Kagura-chan not appear? Or shouldn't she not be participating in the story at all?" Shinpachi couldn't be satisfied with the dissonance between Kagura's words and her re-existence as a character.

Ginpachi scratched his wavy perm. "But you see, characters can never fully escape a story. They are fictional so their only protection could be the anti-plagiarism laws and disclaimers. In this cynical world, characters don't have the same rights as humans in the outside world have." The teacher gazed into the distance as he continued. "For example, Shinpachi, you could be made to jump a thousand times per hour even if it was inhumanly possible or you could be made to steal your sister's clothes and wear them, thereby making your character overlap with Kyuubei's crossdress trope."

"Eh?! But wouldn't that be out of character?" Shinpachi panicked, not wanting to go through the physical or spiritual torture of either scenario. He'd rather be the Straight Man in what he deemed as the GintaMad World.

"That would be. Even though readers would complain, it would still be written as part of a fiction and no one could argue it never happened in this story."

"So that's it, sensei? We're just going to have to accept that a story even with its dissonance and out-of-character characters exists, even if it includes us?"

To this, Kagura looked in gloom to the right. Then she looked to the left. Then she proclaimed, "I'm in despair! The blatant injustice of the written word to fictional characters has left me in despair!"

And to this, Ginpachi looked in gloom to the right. Then he looked to the left. Then he proclaimed, "I'm in despair! The fact that Kagura has gone OOC has left me in despair!"

"What the hell?! AREN'T YOU GUYS REPEATING THE STYLE FROM THE FIRST CHAPTER? WE'RE SUPPOSED TO GIVE SOMETHING NEW TO THE READERS! We're violating Fanfiction Etiquette!" Shinpachi looked around for a sign of agreement, but—

"I'm in despair. The conformity of FOUR-EYES has left me in despair!" Sougo then aimed his bazooka out the window, the projectile barely eluding Shinpachi. "I missed. How out of character of me."

Depleted with shock, Shinpachi couldn't decide if Sougo required a clarification of the Out Of Character concept seeing as he always missed or if the clarification would be superfluous seeing as Hijikata was normally the sadist's bazooka target. He decided he should be simply thankful for living in one piece.

"I'm in despair! The fact that my little brother finds my clothes too out of character to wear has left me in despair!"

"Eh, Ane-ue , I don't think that's too out of character."

"I'm in despair! The fact that that person is here sitting benignly has left me in despair," Elizabeth's sign read as it/he/she/they pointed to Takasugi who, in all his villainous glory, sat near the window of Class 3-Z's classroom. (To this, Shinpachi considered resigning from being the Straight Man in the GintaMad World. But his resignation was promptly refused because he was only protected by disclaimers and copyright laws.)

Ginpachi looked around the classroom and surveyed his students as they exclaimed their amalgam of despairs. He glanced at the roll call list and noticed that one of the students was again absent. "Oi, oi! There's someone missing here."

Sougo Okita raised his hand. "Ginpachi-sensei, Hijikata-san is absent again. He should be expelled."

Kondo jumped up in alarm. Like a mother eagle worried for its nestlings. "Where's Toushi?! He hasn't been in school? Has anyone seen him? Is he well? Is he sick? Has he become a hikkikomori? A shut-in? Isolated from society? Escaping from everyone and everything?"

Kagura jumped up. "Ginpachi-sensei, we have to save the hikkikomori!"

"Wait, he's only been sick for two days, let's not jump to conclusions!" But Shinpachi's logic was catapulted into outerspace, where even Sakamoto managed to dodge it.

"Yes." Ginpachi-sensei rose from his seat. "Hikkikomori must be pulled into productivity once again for the sake of humanity's progress!"

And off Class 3-Z went to save the hikkikomori known as Toushiro Hijikata.