Danganronpa: Reincarnation

Who am I...?

It was a calm night. That was all Shuichi saw it as. He had spent the entire day cooped up in his little room, locking the doors to keep everyone out as he pondered about his life. 

He was bored. 

He was feeling weird. Ever since the chips in his brain were removed. Ever since he was freed from his mother's conspiratorial influence. He was feeling weird. All of his memories were suddenly returning to his head and the memory disease that had tormented him for so long was finally gone. 

It felt weird, seeing yourself do all those crimes; homicide; genocide; fraud; assault; kidnapping; human trafficking; arson; burglary; the list went on and on and on. And it wasn't just his own memories either. Shuichi was beginning to have dreams, weird dreams.

In every single dream, he was himself, but for some reason, he couldn't move. He was stuck in what felt like eternities, staying in one place. He was always, somehow, levitating in the air. He saw them; Monokuma, his family, and other people too. He watched as they slaughtered each other, he watched as they sentenced each other to brutal executions. He couldn't move, he couldn't feel anything. It was just him, there, watching. He was but a security camera in a prison, overseeing the prisoners, unable to think, unable to act.

It scared him. He could no longer trust his own body, his own mind. If you couldn't trust yourself, who can you trust?

The answer came to him: Someone who had been through the same thing. Someone who had made peace with his other-self.

He needed to see Hajime Hinata. No, he needed to see Izuru Kamakura. 

He quickly gave up on that idea:

1. He was still so tired.

2. Uncle Izuru was too far.

So he just went back to sleep, deciding to venture back into the mansion of memories stored within his mind, the one that had finally been unlocked.

He watched all of them. He was there when they met, he was there when they laughed, and he was there when tragedy struck. He watched as they killed each other. He watched as the blood flowed and flowed, like rivers of death. He saw the last moments of everyone, agony and despair on their faces. 

He watched as his own mother, killed his aunt, ignoring the life they had spent together and betraying her. He watched as she wept bitterly afterwards, laughing through her tears. He watched as she beamed in the face of death, embracing it. He admired her.

All the things she did, all for the sake of despair.

Was it really worth it?

Forget Mom. Why did he do all the crimes he did. Was it for survival? Was it for despair? Or was it... for another reason entirely? What drove him? What did he live for? 

Why did he kill his uncle? Why did he...

His mark—his reincarnation mark. The words were still black, but the 'o' of Junko now had a little golden crown tattooed on the top of it and there was a big bear behind 'Enoshima'. What did all this mean?

His aunt, Mukuro Ikusaba; the image of her, her despairful face and blood, started to distort. It changed, to Maki instead. Izuru changed to Kiibo, or Kioshi. Their suffering was abhorrent to watch, but Shuichi couldn't look away. It was like he was tied to a chair, his eyes forced open and his mouth gagged, forced to watch the people he loved get tortured and die.

This... this isn't it...

This isn't why I do these things!

The image of his mother's execution appeared. She was sitting on the chair, hugging Monokuma. She had such a bright smile on her face. But for a split second, just before she was crushed, her eyes went blank, dead, and her smile collapsed. He didn't see his own mother anymore. He saw himself; sitting there, with Monokuma, nothing but desolation in his golden eyes.