"W-What the? I can feel my eyes." He said, opening them up. The echo in his voice was gone.
Machines roared. Shots fired. But not like the shots in the school.
More like pulsing. The bullets were glowing blue.
"Ash! Get down!" Someone yelled from afar. Nago didn't react thinking they meant someone else.
A sharp, stinging pain erupted in his shoulder.
"GAH!" He fell, but was too scared to move. Because in front of him was a humanoid mech towering over him.
With grey joints that whirred when they moved. With glowing eyes, even the legs were moving articulately.
But the pain hit him again, making him wince.
"AHH!!!" He screamed. But the unexpected happened. His eyes glowed yellow, and everything around him slowed down.
In his eyes were roman numerals, and clock hands that moved quickly reverse-clockwise
He saw the bullet go out of him. Back into the gun that it shot out of. The mech started moving backwards. Then.
He woke up in a bed.
Nagito was breathing hard.
"My shoulder…?" He clutched it—no pain. No blood.
No bullet.
He jolted upright in the bed.
"Where the hell am I?!"
The words almost escaped out loud, but he swallowed them. His eyes darted around the room—military-clean, sterile, unfamiliar.
"This has to be a dream," he muttered. "Lucid or something."
He stumbled out of bed and searched for a door. One led to a bathroom. He rushed in, flipped the switch, and splashed cold water onto his face, again and again. It didn't wake him up.
And then—
He looked up at the mirror.
Wide eyes. Short, dark-blue hair. Black irises. Glasses?
"What the—why do I have glasses?!" he gasped, pulling them off.
His breathing picked up.
"This isn't me. That's not my face. That's not… me."
He stared into the mirror as if it would tell him something. His legs shook.
"I'm not waking up… I'm not waking up—"
Knock knock.
He froze.
"Ash? Are you awake?" a woman's voice called from the other side of the door.
"A-Ash?" he repeated quietly. He looked around, like there might be someone else in the room.
"You must have the wrong person!" he called back, panic bleeding into his voice.
"Don't mess around. I'm coming in!"
"Wait, no—!"
The door slammed open. A woman with fiery red hair and sharp orange eyes stormed in, wearing a white-and-black military jumpsuit.
Then she stopped dead in her tracks.
Her face flushed red.
Nagito stood there, naked. Blank. Frozen.
"I… I tried to tell you," he mumbled. "Please stop yelling…"
She turned around stiffly, her entire posture suddenly awkward.
"…Sorry," she said quietly, then closed the door behind her.
Nagito sat on the edge of the bed, still towel-drying his hair with trembling hands.
His heart hadn't slowed down since the mirror.
He looked at the room again, this time with intent. It was sparse, but orderly. A folded military jacket hung on the wall. There was a name tag clipped to the collar.
"Ashton Dennis."
He swallowed.
"Is that… who I'm supposed to be?"
He ran his fingers through his damp hair—shorter than it should be, coarser. His skin felt tighter over his bones. Even the way his arms moved felt… foreign.
This wasn't his body.
And that woman—she called him Ash. She looked at him like she knew him.
"I'm not this guy," he muttered under his breath. "I'm not…"
His eyes fell on the desk. A picture frame.
It showed six people—five young soldiers in matching jumpsuits, one smiling commander. The one in the center looked just like the face in the mirror.
The same glasses. Same distant stare.
Nagito gripped the frame tighter than he meant to.
"This isn't a dream."
His body knew how to breathe, how to blink, how to walk. But none of it felt natural.
It felt like wearing someone else's life.
And somewhere deep inside—he could feel it—that life had already ended.
Nagito then searched the room for clothing.
He checks the obvious place, the dresser, and finds a similar outfit to which the girl was wearing.
"This should do the trick." He said as he dressed.
Nagito soon walked out of his room into a lounge right outside.
There were four people sitting around including the red-haired girl.
"Ash! Heard you flashed Vermy!" Said another woman in the same jumpsuit, chuckling.
"O- Oh! Uh, that was an accident.." He blushed.
"Carla, don't go teasing him about something like that." Said a mature voice.
He stood tall with a pretty burly build.
"Aye, aye, captain." Carla responded. The man had short, black hair and a red armband on the side of his uniform.
"Captain…" Nagito muttered to himself.
"What was that?" The captain asked.
"N- Nothing." He responded
"Carla" had white long hair and yellow eyes.
Nagito found what looked like a coffee pot next to a window. He approached the coffee pot and looked out the window.
That's when it hit him. What he saw wasn't a beautiful green grass field. It was a grey and cloudy environment.
The location seemed to be remote. A small land separated from the thick forest.
"S- So, what's the move today?"
I gotta find out where I am and my situation.
"We'll take a rest day. Still, we're on watch." Carla responded.
On watch? For what? He wondered.
As the thought went on, Nagito walked around the lounge after picking up a cup of coffee.
His steps were a little hesitant. He tried to
not be suspicious to the others.
A door creaked open.
It was 'Vermy'. Her red hair lit up the room with a flair and she glanced around looking around her door that was cracked enough for her head to poke out.
She stops as her and Nagito locked eyes and for a moment.
Her cheeks blushed slightly and her head snapped back the other way and finally came out of her room.
She didn't look at Ash, but walked to grab a coffee herself.
Nagito observed.
There were enough left brewed for a cup.
She picked up a red cup from the sink that matched the color of her hair.
Slowly, she poured the coffee into her cup then added milk to a quarter of the cup.
She used sugar and added what looked like way too much for Nagito.
"Ash? Trying something new? You usually drink all black." Asked Carla.
Nagito jerked a bit as "his" name was called.
"Y- Yeah, just wanted to… join the trend…" he responded but his voice was unsure.
"I see…" Carla lingered on her last word. She gave him a stare but seemed to drop it after a few seconds.
Nagito walked slowly away until the question struck him again.
"What are we on watch for again?" He tried to seem casual but still had the unsure tone.
Everyone's faces got serious.
"The Imperial Army, obviously." The captain spoke.
"Yeah, are you kidding?" Carla added.
"J- Just kidding, yeah." Nagito responded.
Nagito walked away to go explore his surroundings.
He looked back one last time before opening the door in the lounge and walked out into a moderately long hallway.
The carpets were red and stretched out until the end of the hall.
"Ash!" A male voice called out.
"Yes?" Nagito responded.
The man ran to Nagito with a stack of papers and handed it to him.
"Need you to take this to the director ASAP." "Thanks, buddy!" He said as he left, running.
"W-Wait!" Nagito called but the man already left.
"I'm in trouble…" he said, realizing he didn't know where to go.