Closed starter for @shslprogrammerchihiro!
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Mere days after the beginning of their School Life of Mutual Killing, Sayori begins to spend most of her time with Junko and Chihiro. They just seem the most… approachable, for lack of a better word. In a hopeless situation like this, she needs people like them - soft and kind. Then again, could she really describe Junko like that…? She seemed very assertive during group meetings, but only in a way that demonstrated an uncompromising will to not interact with that which annoyed her.
Putting it succinctly… Junko was kind of mean. But she’d never been the victim of it so far, and the people who brought it out of her most were people like Mondo and Toko, so… maybe she’d be safe from Junko’s fashionista rage.
Chihiro was so interesting, too - during their first ever conversation, Chihiro mentioned that she felt like they’d met somewhere before… even putting that aside, she was just so cute! Her talent would undoubtedly require her to be extraordinarily smart, and it didn’t seem like anyone else was really interested in hearing more about it… besides maybe Hifumi… bleh.
Between Chihiro’s cute, meek demeanor and Junko’s pride and confidence, she couldn’t decide which of them she liked talking to more. It genuinely made it hard to choose what to do with her time!
At least the first floor had been entirely investigated by now. All she could do, personally, is relax and get to know the people around her better.
She didn’t want to start suspecting people or getting depressed before the game had even really begun. If anyone was going to die first or seem like easy pickings… she could only hope it would be her, so that she wouldn’t have to see all that would unfold afterwards.
Luckily, one of her favorite places in the school also seemed like one of the safest places to be - the dining hall had an unlimited supply of her favorite cookies! Natsuki would be so jealous!
Often times, when it feels as though the world one knows is changing too rapidly, comfort can be found in routine. In the familiar things that have existed long before disruption took hold, so that the change feels a bit less daunting.
With the start of the School Life of Mutual Killing, Chihiro had spent her time clinging to the familiar. So, there she sat in the dining hall, typing away on her school handbook. It set her at ease, to be able to do something she was so used to, even in the absence of many of the familiarities in her life. She had no internet, granted, but the device had provided her with a simple coding app that she passed time with rather often. Programming had been one of the things Chihiro was most passionate about, and something she busied herself with rather often when stressed. Naturally, the start of such an intense scenario, and a whole new way of life was no different. She barely even seemed to notice Sayori walk in, taking herself away from her task for only a few moments at a time to nibble on the blueberry muffin sat beside her or take a sip of cherry cola.
The girl furrowed her brow as she thought about other prewritten responses to add to certain phrases- she was making a chatbot, as they were fun and easy to make, and liked to leave in little easter eggs to be found later, usually by herself. Friendship and companionship were things she greatly yearned for, especially when dealing with the uncertainty ahead of her, but she often lacked the bravery and initiative to take the reins and get talking to people. Thus, she found friendship in strings of code and commands, in ones and zeroes, in the programs she’d create to spend time with her.
She wasn’t the only person in the dining room, of course. Toko was sitting at the table a few chairs away, casting glances at Chihiro with innocent curiosity written on her face. The usual gloom was absent from her expression and her demeanor as she took remarkably small bites of a red apple. She’d also left her hair down this morning, a surprising change. It looked soft and wavy when it wasn’t restricted in a bun or her usual twin braids.
Sayori really did try to make as little noise as possible - honest! - but the small pile of plastic-wrapped cookies hitting the table was more than a bit noisy, regardless. She hadn’t considered how loud all of this plastic packaging would be, especially fiddling with it to get each one open… Leave it to Monokuma to provide them with all of their favorite foods, but only in the smallest possible portions that they sold at stores.
“Ehehe… Sorry. I didn’t really think about how annoying all this crinkling would be. I hope it doesn’t distract you,” she smiled apologetically at Chihiro, wondering if it’d be too awkward to leave now after she’d just sat down.
Thank God it was only the few of them in there. The others… well, this wasn’t the image of herself she wanted to send to some of the ‘higher class citizens’ that she’d be living with for the foreseeable future. She already felt like she didn’t fit in - her family had always been middle-class, and she’d even gone through most of her education in public schools. It was only after Monika, a friend from her school’s Literature Club, spurred her to write a particularly striking poetry collection, that she received any widespread acclaim. This success of hers was apparently enough to land a spot at Hope’s Peak Academy. The general public loved her for the short year or so that she was famous… and then she got trapped in here.
All she could really do was try not to think about it. After all, she was classmates with the Ultimate Gambler - someone who was arguably a criminal! - AND the Ultimate Affluent Progeny, which is basically just a different way to say Ultimate Trust Fund Baby. There are undoubtedly bigger fish to fry than her in this school.
She hoped that her sudden presence didn’t come across as an intrusion - though, if it had, Toko most likely would have said something by now.
Maybe all this’ll help her come across as socially inept, though - the less the others expected of her, the less she’d have to actually contribute, and when what she had to offer was already so little… well, tempering expectations a little couldn’t hurt. Man, two cookies in, and she’d only now come to realize that she forgot to get something to drink. That’s the way the cookie crumbles sometimes, huh?
Chihiro finally looked up from her e-Handbook as Sayori was fighting a losing battle with the plastic-wrapped cookies. It was loud enough to at least temporarily break her out of her trance, something Toko hadn’t even dared to attempt.
“Oh, it’s not annoying, don’t worry! The dining hall is for all of us after all, not just me. You don’t have to apologize.” She saw herself as no more or less entitled to the dining hall than Toko or Sayori- plus, eating was what this place was made for! There was no reason to be upset about someone eating in the room made for eating.
The programmer made the decision to check the time on her handbook and realized she’d been at things for quite a while. She took a moment to stretch, and decided to maybe finish her muffin before getting back into things.
Toko piped up, setting her apple down to add to the conversation. “Yeah, we eat here, so it’s okay... try to keep it down though, I don’t really like the plastic noises.” She made a face. It was surprisingly soft compared to her usual complaints. Despite her talent for writing fantastical love stories, she could be rather negative when she set her mind to it.
Although Toko had just made some comments about not liking the noises they made, she did steal a few glances at the cookies. She was absolutely unable to fathom how she was still hungry after taking so many teeny-tiny bites of her apple- she had honestly anticipated she’d be full before eating less than half of it.
