diary

[lovedanime]

A fuzzy rug dominates the floor of Mitarai's room. The bed is made and hosts a blue stuffed animal. There's one chair behind the desk, which has a very tidy array with multiple types of paper and pencils including three different mechanical ones. The centerpiece is a notebook.

Most apprentices have seen the notebook Mitarai got at the first afterparty thrown by Monika. The flame animations, perhaps, or some exchanges with Rantaro. What's less obvious is that these pages all come from the latter part of the notebook... the first few pages of the notebook are sequentially occupied by letters.

Comments

Week 3 Thursday Night

[lovedanime]

Dear Tengan-san,

The night after writing my first letter, I remembered some of what happened after the sleeping gas was released in the board room. This explains why all of you weren't with us. It seems so unlikely we'll both survive long enough for these letters to be of any help... but they do help me organize my thoughts like Monika-san suggested. I want to write down what I remembered so I can try to think about what to do next.

You were there for most of it. I woke up in the boardroom with just you and Kirigiri-san. Bandai-san and Yukizome-sensei were there too - dead. We were trapped in the headquarters with bracelets. Mine told me not to use my talent. It's a bit of a shame... I still had my cell phone with that video back then. Sakakura-san was being aggressive, and my video could have pacified him. Instead I tried to protect Kirigri-san and just injured her more in my clumsiness. I couldn't find a way to be useful at all... Asahina-san patronized me, that I saved her own life too. I can't remember what she was talking about, but there's no way I could have helped someone that much.

Kirigiri-san was investigating the bodies - Gozu-san was killed as well - and I couldn't make head or tails of anything. Maybe it's for the best in one way that I couldn't show my anime. Kirigiri-san comes off like she wouldn't understand. Not when she's working together with Naegi.

I don't mean to say I oppose him entirely, though! Munakata-san captured Naegi and threatened to execute him, and I don't support that at all! I knew that Munakata-san was harsh on despair, and it did seem like this situation meant there was sabotage from at least one member of the Future Foundation, but we should still work together...

You went off to fight him. I'm scared. Please survive, Tengan-san.

That situation has very little connection to the events at Fayflower University. The time limits are totally different. By definition of the time limits, the Future Foundation will be stuck in their torture for less than forty-eight hours. Here we approach the end of the third week. Some members of the Administration claim this is a test of our patience, and we shouldn't succumb to their incentives at all. The current motive does certainly fit with this theme. We have to live with hallucinations of the people missing us, until someone kills.

I really doubt their good intentions, though. D-756 ("hijacking") by itself could drive people to kill with extended exposures, and so could the hallucinations, really - I've even seen a couple of people who are downright violent as a direct result of them! Why not wait for just that much killing? They encourage us so explicitly with the promise of immunity for a murderer who gets someone else voted as the blackened - and then give us the chance to execute the murderer anyway, as colorful as Enoshima ever rendered it. They really are shooting to lower our numbers, I think. I hate them for it...

If Munakata-san was wrong to think we have to kill every trace of despair with our own two hands, isn't the administration even more wrong? Then again, our vision of hope and despair after the tragedy really isn't what most people here think. I want to practice putting that ideal into words... I wish I had you to actually talk with. You could guide me, everyone.

Hope is the prospect of a future where good things happen to yourself and others.
Despair is the prospect of a future where bad things happen to yourself and others.
In mild forms a person in despair might refuse to watch the second season of an anime adapted from their favorite manga because the first season was bad. Or say mean things about the new girlfriend brought home by their annoying uncle. But these grievances pile up and escalate.

When I talk about "falling into despair", I mean someone whose main priority is causing so much harm to the environment, themselves, and innocent victims, that it's inhumane to not do something. Some people are so strong and so patient that they never do anything of the kind. Like Naegi, the Super High School Level Hope.

But most people, when confined or tortured or deprived long enough, will fall into despair. I don't want to just tell those people that everything will be okay in the end. I need proof to show them.

Thursday night is when I write this. The same time last week that Grantaire murdered Kim-kun. The motive was announced Tuesday last week and this week too. Does the administration really have it down to a science like that?

Yukizome-sensei told me it was my birthday today. It was just an illusion, and the date was different when I left - at least, I think so, though obviously there could be more gaps in my memory - but the weather is very much like late August. At night you can still take off your blazer, listen to the cicadas, and look up at the sky. For a little while before the next culprit goes on the prowl, at least.

I hope our world has a shining future like that someday.

Respectfully,
Mitarai