danganronpa - deluded | fanganronpa

[ prologue - popcorn ]

The next thing Akira noticed was a man at one of the game stations. He was throwing a ball up and down but not actually playing the game, tapping his fingers over and over on the wooden desk. Akira shrugged and approached him. He seemed nice enough.

As soon as she walked up, though, he spun around looking thoroughly pissed off and hissed. "What do you want?!"

He had golden hair that was probably slicked back with hair gel judging by the way it all moved to one side. He wore regular prescription glasses that allowed Akira to see his yellow-green eyes. His outfit was fairly simple. He wore a shirt with a red bowtie on the collar, a single red stripe being the only thing different than the plain white button-up. He wore suspenders that were the same shade of red and a lighter red jacket that nearly covered up the fanny pack he had on. For pants, he chose simple jeans.

"Answer my question, dammit, what do you want?!" he hissed.

"To introduce myself," Akira responded bluntly.

"Oh. Well, in that case..." he trailed off completely. "...can I ask you something before that?"

"Go ahead."

"Does my shirt make me look like a popcorn container? That black-haired bitch said it did. She was lying, right? Right?" He sounded really desperate at the end. Akira wasn't even fully aware of what he meant.

Of course, trying not to anger him, she shrugged and more like asked, "...No?"

"Good! I knew it! She was a fucking snob anyway." He huffed in victory. "The name's Naoki Enami, the Ultimate Pool Player!"

NAOKI ENAMI

ULTIMATE POOL PLAYER

"Akira Sashiki. Ultimate Archer."

"Damn, archer, huh?" Naoki murmured. "You gonna go Satan on my ass if I piss you off then, amirite?"

"No," Akira huffed. She didn't get it - was he calm or not? "I used to only hunt animals. Ussuri black bears would come by my family's town often and attack our livestock, so I would need to shoot them."

"Why not use a hunting rifle?"

"We stick to old traditions."

"Damn. Your parents were born in the goddamn ice age? Who uses a bow instead of a gun? Guns are so much easier, like, shit."

"...You're saying this to an archer," Akira narrowed her eyes. Who did this guy think he was? He specialized in a sport Akira didn't even know existed prior to this. Instead of fighting, she decided to change the subject. "What's in your fanny pack?"

"Oh, not much," Naoki shrugged, "just my lucky balls." He opened the zipper and pulled out a small container with nine pool balls inside. "I've never lost a game playing with these. Well, I mean, not like I've ever lost a game in general. It's fucking wild."

"Can you show me how you play pool?" Akira asked, glad to be having a more normal conversation with him. When he wasn't acting like before, he seemed to be decent enough.

"Alright. So when you get the balls set up, you can start. Make sure the 8-ball is in the middle and make sure you only hit the cue ball directly with your cue stick. When you break, if you get a ball in one of the holes, you can claim either spots or stripes. The other player gets what you didn't pick. Then, you keep on getting scratches until the 8-ball is sunk. If you sink the 8-ball, you win the game. If you pick stripes and hit a spots ball, then that counts towards your opponent, so it's important to aim."

"That sounds fairly simple," Akira murmured, "maybe someday we could play a round."

"Hm? I guess if you wanna," Naoki shrugged, "I'd kick your ass though."

"Big talk for someone that looks like a popcorn container," Akira said with a smirk. She figured it'd make him upset; knocking down his ego a few pegs seemed like a good choice as of now.

Naoki slammed his hand on the desk, causing the stack of red bouncy balls on it to roll off. "How dare you! You asshole! I'll fucking kill you!"

"Calm down," Akira said, "it was a jo-"

"Joke my ass!" Naoki spat, fuming with anger.

He's really sensitive, isn't he? Akira thought with mild annoyance as Naoki continued to yell and scream about it.

When he finished rambling, Naoki stomped his foot and inhaled sharply, trying to regain composure, before giving up, giving Akira a final glare, and storming off to who knows where.

Akira raised her eyebrow. Real mature.

OBTAINED TICKET FRAGMENT!