Ouma runs a hand through Shirogane's tangled hair, scratching out the matted areas and knots weaving through her aegean-blue locks.

Goddamn, is all Ouma can tell himself right now, because Shirogane's hair is a mess. It's almost eight in the morning- their wake-up announcement will shriek through the speakers soon, and he's not even halfway done.

Why did they set the wake-up time so early again?

Ouma continues the endless griping inside his head.

Lazy, languid, but spiteful at the same time. That's the pace of his brushing, despite the looming time limit.

"Fuck," he spits out, harshly scraping down at a particularly rough spot. "Do you ever comb this?"

Ouma hopes he hurt Shirogane's scalp. Fuck her.

"Not anymore," is Shirogane's dreamy reply. "I can't care for it as much as I used to."

"The producers are dangling our pay over our heads for this show," Ouma grumbles with an underlying streak of animosity. "Remember to behave."

Shirogane wordlessly flips a page of her idea-filled notebook. Ouma spies a small doodle of him and Saihara in a corner, much to his disdain.

(And slight delight too, but he's never going to tell Shirogane that.

Though- when this shitshow is over, he's going to secretly hoard as much Saihara merch as possible and read fanfiction of him and the detective eating cum for breakfast.)

"Shouldn't it be you who needs to behave?" Shirogane sighs as she sends Ouma a non-subtle middle finger in his direction. "You're the one that's going to dock my pay, Mister Komaeda-kinnie."

"Urgh, how rude." Ouma purposely yanks down on Shirogane's hair. She winces, and Ouma apologizes with an insincere, "Oopsie! My hand slipped."

"I don't kin Komaeda," he adds with a cluck of his tongue. He really doesn't- it's just fun to watch everyone squirm at his lies, to watch Saihara attempt to pull off his inch-thick mask, to get whispers of suspicion behind his back.

What's underneath his disguise? It's the million-dollar question Saihara's trying to answer.

Unfortunately for him, it's just a grape-infatuated scumbag who wishes he'll get paid already.

Like, seriously. Ouma can't survive on dollar-store cup noodles anymore- they're strewn everywhere in their not-so-secret mastermind room: on the floor, next to a limited-edition Monokuma plushie, behind a hideous cardboard cut-out of Hinata Hajime chilling in the back-

-okay, maybe Ouma lied about not being Komaeda-kin.

"Can you actually put some effort into untangling my hair? Or at least give me some plot twist ideas?" Shirogane mutters, tapping a pen against her notebook. Ouma shrugs.

"Okay, what if... we gave Gonta a thirteen-inch di-"

"Not that kind of plot twist," she hisses. "I'm serious. You're known as one of the best masterminds for a reason, Ouma."

"Uuuugh. Not that shit again," Ouma snaps, slapping an annoyed hand down on the monitor-piled desk next to him. A few empty noodle cups clatter onto the floor.

"I hate being called that! Just because Danganronpa is stupidly predictable and I've got an above average IQ doesn't mean I'm a good mastermind!" he seethes while aggressively raking a hair-tangled hand down, causing Shirogane to yelp in alarm.

"Stupid- fucking- directors!" he snarls, bunching his other hand into a fist. "I'm gonna punch the living daylights out of every single-"

"Ouma! My hair!"

"Uh oh. Sorry-not-sorry."

Ouma lets go of Shirogane's hair. There are more bunches and bundles in them compared to a minute ago, when Ouma was still diligently picking through those locks without arguing aloud.

"I'm bored," he decidedly grunts before dropping onto a leather chair, away from Shirogane and her pretty blue curls he totally did not take inspiration from to give Saihara.

"It's almost eight," Shirogane replies, jotting away in her notebook. "You can go annoy everyone soon."

"Don't wanna annoy anyone," Ouma whines, kicking his legs around like a child throwing a tantrum. "It's getting old. Everyone reacts the same."

"You decided to kill off the characters I wrote- this is your consequence."

"I didn't know you wrote characters like they're your babies, gosh. Now I'm stuck with Bondage Kinkist, Knock-off Astro Boy, Space Hooligan-"

"Then..." Shirogane hums, nibbling the end of her pen, "do you wanna revive someone?" she finishes thoughtfully. Ouma shoots upwards in his seat and points a dramatic finger at her.

"Bring back Amami!" he gushes, eyes shining. He shimmies back and forth in the chair, arms wiggling like an agitated seaweed plant. "Yes! I miss that avocado, he's going to be so much fun to tease."

Once Shirogane shows him her notes, however, Ouma is immediately met with disappointment upon realizing 'revival' meant 'motive' in her eyes.

"You're the worst. Giving me false hope... then crushing it with despair... yuck. You're such an Enoshima."

"I'm taking that as a compliment. Anyway, get this approved for me. Revival motive for the third chapter-"

"Do it yourself!" Ouma barks, cutting Shirogane off. He snatches the stack of official papers in her hands anyway.

He gives them a half-assed once over. He doesn't care about Danganronpa anymore, to be honest. Repeated tropes, murder twists, character traits... boring, boring, boring.

Ouma is going to spice up this entire season and earn himself the largest payout in corporate history.

He should put that quote on his future grave, actually. Ouma Kokichi- receiver of the largest sum of money Danganronpa has ever paid its masterminds. Which is not a lot, to be frank.

"Are you gonna make this a double murder?" Ouma asks Shirogane, chewing on his bottom lip as he flips a page up to peer at the contents under it. She nods in reply, spinning around in her own chair.

Ouma grimaces. "Can we not? Ugh, it's overused as hell."

"It's a tradition..."

"A stupid one," he interjects, but Shirogane doesn't reprimand him. "I'm gonna do something cooler than a double murder."

"Dying so soon?" Shirogane laments without any misery or pity. "You're going to do an unsolvable case, aren't you?"

"No, silly. That's so cliche- wait, hold on." Ouma mumbles. "Actually, fuck it. I'm gonna do the world's most unsolvable murder ever. Watch me walk in those class trial doors during Chapter Six- after my death, by the way- just to piss the shit out of Shumai."

"Let's do a Team Rocket kind of intro," Shirogane giggles with her boatload of anime references Ouma never understood. "Oh no, there's not just one mastermind- there's actually two!"

"Get cucked, Akamatsu," is Ouma's breathy response to Shirogane's maniacal snorting in the background.

Times like these are truly enjoyable, Ouma thinks- times when he doesn't want to wring Shirogane's stupid neck, maybe give her a kiss for her brains, then throw her into a trash can with a bowling announcer yelling, "STRIKE!"

That's where she belongs, by the way. Ouma's sure she was born in a dumpster somewhere, as opposed to his birth status of being a self-proclaimed royal.

While Shirogane's still wheezing her lungs out, Monokuma's loud and most definitely annoying voice resonates through the school. Eight o'clock, and her hair still looks like a swallow's nest, maybe even worse. At least swallow's nests were edible. Shirogane isn't, because Ouma's not a cannibal.

"I shouldn't have let your grubby hands touch my hair," she sighs after calming down, combing through the mess as best as she can.

"But you still did," Ouma reminds her, hands behind his head. Shirogane gives him another middle finger.

Ouma tries to bite it off. He fails.

"Let's get out of here," Shirogane ushers, shooting Ouma an exasperated side-eye. They hurry back to their dorms through- oh wow, a secret passageway- with a smile on their faces.

Oh, and Ouma's forgot to mention: when the Killing Game is over, he's pretty sure he'll be fired for the stunt he's going to pull.

Not like he cares. A paycheck is still a paycheck, right?