[FIC]: still i keep your hand as a precious souvenir

[graveexcitement]

wow! me, remembering to post my fic on dreamwidth when authors are revealed! it's a miracle! i wrote this for trickortreatex for kastchei / kastchei. maybe one year i'll actually sign up for ToT; this is the second (non-consecutive) time i've ended up treating or pinch hitting.

still i keep your hand as a precious souvenir (685 words) by graveExcitement for kastchei
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Komaeda Nagito
Additional Tags: Trick or Treat: Trick, Ultimate Despair (Dangan Ronpa), Remnants of Despair (Dangan Ronpa), Character Study
Summary:

Nagito Komaeda, and the hand of Ultimate Despair.

-

Nagito Komaeda knelt, and beheld the beloved corpse of Junko Enoshima.

She had done exactly as she'd promised him: ushered in a new era of despair, from which the brightest hope could be born. He didn't know what she'd promised his classmates, but he couldn't imagine that any of those promises could be as exquisitely fulfilled. Even now, the Ultimate Hope was out there; the very thought sent shivers of delight running through him, even as Junko's corpse dragged him into — what else? — despair.

He wasn't the only one; beside him, Mikan wept, and Fuyuhiko was hurling invective. Junko Enoshima had died, stricken by the despair she had always longed for, and now she was gone, leaving the rest of them behind. How could they push the world any further into the depths of despair without her? How could Nagito ensure the birth of an even brighter hope?

None of his classmates said it, but the question hung in the air: How dare Junko find the perfect despair without them?

He supposed that they could join her in death, but he already knew what his classmates would decide: there was more despair to be had in living. He laughed, quiet chuckles building up to a full cackle, at the realization that in death Junko had plunged her followers into even greater despair than she had in life. Had that knowledge been sweet for her, as she went to her execution, or had her own despair eclipsed any thoughts of those she'd left behind?

Distantly, he heard harsh words. Someone shoved a hand across his mouth, and Nagito didn't fight whoever it was, just giggled into their palm. He didn't know which despair was sweeter: the idea that Junko had in her final moments delighted at the wreck she'd leave Nagito and his classmates in, or the idea that she hadn't thought of them at all. The hand pressed tighter, threatening actual suffocation, and though being killed by one of his beloved classmates — potentially being the spark for them turning on each other, just like in the Tragedy — was a tantalizing thought, Nagito stifled his laughter. The hand, which he now realized belonged to Peko, drew away, and he sighed.

The way Junko’s corpse had been laid out almost looked as if she was reaching out to him. He stared down at her hand. He'd never been worthy of her touch. He couldn't stand the thought of her touch. She was his greatest enemy. She had loved despair and despair alone; but her killing game had birthed a new hope, a new lodestar for the world. He hated and loved her in equal measure.

Nagito reached forward and took Junko's hand. It was pliant, cool to the touch. Her body was empty of life, of the personality that had changed the world. But it still held power, didn’t it? It had brought his classmates to their knees. Even lifeless, it could still invoke despair. He lifted the hand to cradle his face and closed his eyes. The hand’s long nails brushed his temple, and he imagined that if Junko had ever touched him like this, she would have drawn blood. What would she have thought of this caress? Would it have brought her despair, or only revulsion?

“The fuck are you doing, freak?” Fuyuhiko snapped.

Nagito lowered the hand back to the floor, but did not let it go. This body… it would rot away soon, and so would the despair it inspired. But it didn’t have to.

“I have an idea,” he said, and every eye in the room turned to him like flowers towards the sun. “Junko Enoshima is dead —” Mikan sobbed — “but in us, she can live on.”

“If this is one of your bullshit hope speeches, I’m gonna kill you,” Fuyuhiko snarled.

Nagito smiled. “I understand your concern, but it’s nothing like that. The thought of it would bring Junko despair, I promise you.”

He explained, and they listened, and as the tempo of the discussion skewed towards mania, and Mikan ran to fetch her surgical equipment, he squeezed the corpse’s hand.