Chapter Text
When Nanako’s stomach grumbled, Akechi knew it was time to get moving.
“Sorry, Goro-san,” she apologized as they bounded along. He had given her his detective’s jacket to stop her shivering, and it swallowed her face from view. He had washed his shirt in the river to get the blood off, but it was now cold and damp and felt terrible on his skin. He most definitely looked like he had been extracted from a storm drain.
He sincerely prayed nobody would recognize him.
“Aren’t you hungry?” Nanako asked him. The thought of food after the pancakes born from hell made the nausea still sitting low in his gut twist terribly. He shook his head silently.
“We’ll stop by a convenience store,” he promised. They had walked till the outskirts of town in an attempt to get farther away from the chaos in the shopping district.
I still need to get my charger, after all. He wondered what Yosuke thought of the whole situation. It had been almost three hours, now; he most definitely believed something had happened to both of them. He never thought he would see the day where he actually wanted to see Hamamura’s stupid mug.
“What food do you like?” Nanako asked him curiously, breaking him out of his moodiness. “Big Bro likes beef bowls. But he always eats random things out of our fridge too. So I think he likes a lot of food.”
Akechi thought about it. He really had no preference for food.
“Uh…I like sweets.”
“Everyone likes sweets,” Nanako huffed. She didn’t sound impressed by the answer. Akechi worked out something to say.
“Takiyaki,” he tried. She laughed pityingly.
“You need to try some food at my house! Big Bro makes great omurice.”
“Oh,” he hummed, scanning their surroundings.
“When you come over again, you can try it,” Nanako said cheerfully before freezing. Akechi dropped his gaze to her.
“If you want to, I mean,” she said quickly. “You don’t have to come again.”
Akechi privately didn’t ever want to come to Inaba again, but the expression on her face was too familiar.
“I’ll come,” he promised emptily. “We still need to watch Featherman, after all.”
At the mention of Featherman, she perked up and began chattering about the characters. Akechi let her voice drone out into background noise as he headed towards the second-hand store. The burbles of sparrows sounded overhead as they neared the run-down establishment. Now that they were farther away from the central shopping district, the buildings grew more dilapidated and old. Akechi pushed the door open. A jingle from the bell overhead chimed and the old lady manning the front looked up, her eyes crinkling with warmth.
“Good evening.”
“Evening,” Akechi said politely, shivering.
“Goodness, you look tired,” she chastised, bustling off to the back. She came back with a blanket. Akechi reached out for it. She held it back slightly.
“500 yen.”
Akechi bit his tongue and fished for his wallet. He drew out a bill and slid it over the counter. She handed the blanket to him and he drew it around his shoulders for a moment, relishing in the warmth. Nanako was still trembling slightly and looked at him with her mousey eyes. He tried his best to ignore her.
“Do you have any food?” he asked the woman, a little less politely knowing her true nature. “Or clothes?”
The woman’s gaze flicked to Nanako briefly. “Is your sister hungry?”
“She’s not my…” He cut himself off. “...Yes.”
She nodded. “I have some chocolate.”
Rule two: no sweets. Huh. I’m two for three now. All I have to do is make her cry.
He jerked his chin towards Nanako in approval and stomped off into the rest of the store. Unfortunately, the conception of USB-C seemed to be as futuristic as flying cars in Inaba. After about ten minutes searching fruitlessly for any sort of charging port, he gave up with an inelegant stomp of frustration and went back to Nanako. The old lady had set her up on an unstable cardboard box filled with old books she had taped shut. Her leg was tapping anxiously against a wrinkled copy of a translated Wrinkle in Time. She was sipping hot chocolate while eating a Hershey's bar. Akechi bit his tongue.
“I’m cold,” she complained, rubbing her legs plaintively against each other. Her gaze dropped accusingly to the blanket still wrapped around his thin shoulders.
“Well, sometimes in life you don’t get everything, kid,” he snapped, crossing his arms and relishing in the surprise on her face. “Suck it up. You’re what, ten? Deal with it and stop burdening others with your pathetic problems.”
He regretted the words as soon as he said them. His gaze snapped to her face.
Her lip was trembling.
Oh shit.
“Nanako,” he said hesitantly, hands fluttering towards her as if he could fix his words. His voice slipped back into his Detective Prince tone. “I—”
Nanako burst out into laughter. Akechi froze.
“I was right!” she said brightly. “You’re just like Black Condor!”
“Huh?” Akechi asked numbly.
“Black Condor,” she repeated slower, like he was stupid. “You’re always all nice and polite, but underneath you’re just a mean guy!”
She laughed even louder, as if the very thought was hilarious. Akechi recalibrated.
A mean guy. Huh. A smile curled onto his face.
Well, I guess I can’t dispute that.
He plopped down next to her and watched her take another sip, calming her giggles.
“Well, if I’m such a ‘mean guy’, why are you here?” he asked. “Why don’t you just leave me alone? I would greatly prefer it if you pissed off and let me do what I needed to do.”
“Pissed off,” she repeated, mouthing the words in blobs of speech.
“Yes, leave me alone,” he clarified, dropping the politeness entirely. “Just go find your brother, wherever the hell he is, tell him I’m a good guy, and let me get back home so I can be done with this accursed day.”
She looked up at him, unblinking. The wisps of hot chocolate steam made her cheeks tinge pink.
“Why can’t you just leave me alone?” Akechi’s voice cracked.
She bit her lip, thinking.
“Well, my favorite Featherman is Feather Hawk. And Feather Hawk never left anyone behind. That’s why I think he’s the better leader,” she said simply. “He knew that even Black Condor was a good guy.”
Akechi looked out the window, out to the sprawling countryside.
“But Black Condor did bad things,” he said, his voice barely audible. “He did unforgivable things.”
“Black Condor was a mean guy,” she said gently. She placed a small hand on his knee. Her fingers were covered in baby fat and soft, squishy and soaking into the chill of his bones next to his crossed, scarred hands. “But he wasn’t a bad guy. Feather Hawk was a nice guy because he cared for everyone!”
“Caring for someone doesn’t get you anywhere.”
Nanako hummed, swinging her legs.
“My mom and dad cared for each other and they got me. I cared for my brother and now I have dinner every night and someone to watch TV with. My brother and his boyfriend cared for each other and now my brother doesn’t look out the window and sigh and now Yosuke doesn’t pull at his hair. The only person I knew that didn’t care for anyone, only pretended, now lives in jail. But he pretended to care. Why are you pretending not to care?”
Akechi couldn’t look at her.
“I…”
“I think maybe Black Condor wouldn’t have done the things he did if he knew the other Featherman cared for him,” Nanako said. “I think maybe he can change even now.”
“Even now?” his voice was a whisper, trembling.
“Always,” Nanako said lightly. “As long as you can care for someone, you’re not a bad person. My Dad told me once.”
Her voice dropped into a lower register.
“If you do bad things, you should be punished for those bad things, but you don’t have to be defined by the things you do.”
Akechi looked down at her messy braid. The edges of it were rough, her ends frayed. Flyaways wisped up and away. It hadn’t unfurled yet. Not yet.
She caught his gaze and ran a hand down the lumpy mess.
“You can always do it again,” she offered.
He swallowed the lump in his throat. He leaned back and looked up so the tears growing in his eyes wouldn’t fall.
Why? Why do I find myself surrounded by the best of society when I spent so long being corroded by the worst of it? Why now, when I’m already unforgivable, and not then, years ago, when I was alone?
A vision of black hair and grey eyes flitted in his vision.
If only if we had met a few years earlier. A few months earlier. Earlier. When I had time.
When I could still look in the mirror and not see him. When I could see her.
He had always thought he looked like his mom. He wondered if Nanako looked like her mom.
I always want the things I can’t have.
Nanako’s hand on his knee squeezed once before dropping off. She jumped off the box and did a little twirl, as if regaining energy.
“Alright,” she said warmly. “Come on, Condor!”
“Are you two hollering about Featherman?” the lady said, her voice tinged with distaste. “That’ll be an extra 1000 yen for noise pollution, young man.”
Akechi sighed and pulled out his wallet. Before he did, he carefully removed the blanket over his shoulders and put it around Nanako’s.
“Stay warm,” he told her, and turned away.
***
As they continued away from the shopping district, the early evening pinks beginning to streak across the sky, Akechi considered the facts.
One: Whoever grabbed Nanako in the store knew we were together. This must mean they have connections to Narukami and Hamamura.
Undoubtedly, the man’s threat to Nanako and his escape from the store was the right call.
Two: Whoever showed up outside Narukami’s house was also connected to Narukami.
Unless Nanako made it a point to give others her home address, the man that had grabbed her must have had other accomplices to achieve that “talk” he wanted. The true purpose of the “talk” Akechi decided he didn’t want to know about.
Three: Whoever chased us through the street is someone else altogether, or this operation is a lot larger than I had assumed.
In their run through the street, he had heard at least two motorcycles and had been shot at. The graze on his arm throbbed painfully as a reminder. Judging by the distance, it was a professionally made weapon operated by someone who was a professional. The long-range shot on a moving motorcycle would have gotten him right in the head had he not ducked. That brought him to his fourth point of understanding.
Four: These people shoot first and ask questions later. They have no qualms about eliminating me. They only want to talk to Nanako.
He frowned to himself, feeling not for the first time that things weren’t quite adding up.
“Nanako,” he asked conversationally, glancing down at her. “Did you manage to see the man that grabbed you at the store?”
She shook her head. “I saw a flash of his face. His cheek, maybe. It was ugly. There was a mole, though. Moles aren’t ugly.”
He nodded, processing the information.
“And the car in your driveway.”
Her eyebrows scrunched together.
“Yeah! That’s Kanji-senpai’s!”
Akechi froze. Nanako stumbled back a step.
“W-What?”
“The car,” she clarified. “Naoto-senpai and Kanji-senpai’s car.”
“The car,” he said weakly. Things were starting to click together.
“Nanako, who was following us?”
“Well, big brother for one, and Yosuke! Chie-senpai, Rise-senpai, and Yukiko-senpai were there too. They all looked scary,” she shivered. “I told you earlier!”
“You neglected to tell me that they were following us,” he said through gritted teeth.
Nanako blinked. “I did.”
“No. You said you saw them.”
“Yeah.”
“That is not the same thing.” He threw up his hands in frustration. His mind replayed the chase with horrifying clarity.
Nanako, it’s okay, just come here…
The voice. It had felt familiar.
Still got it.
Narukami.
“Goro-san?”
The pieces were falling into place with all the grace of a building demolition. He buried his head in his hands.
“Nanako, do any of ‘big bro’’s friends own a motorcycle?”
She hummed, thinking. “Yosuke has one. Chie-senpai borrows one sometimes. Big Bro has one too, but he doesn't use it as much anymore.”
Oh my goodness.
He had run from Narukami.
That connection I was looking for. Everyone was connected to Narukami and Hamamura because they were Narukami and Hamamura.
He had run from the entire Investigation Team. No, he had punched a random civilian in the face. No, he had destroyed half of Inaba. Worse. He had dragged Nanako Dojima through half of Inaba while being pursued by her family and friends.
He was going to prison. For kidnapping.
“Goro-san?”
Akechi took a few deep breaths and did his best not to explode. “I need a minute.”
Akechi crouched down in the middle of the sidewalk and buried his face against his knees. Nanako waited politely above him, wringing her hands together.
“Goro-san, are you okay?”
“No,” he replied through gritted teeth. A sparrow chirped brightly overhead, and he resisted the urge to jump up into the air in an attempt to strangle life from its lungs.
He dragged himself upright again. “They shot at me because they thought I kidnapped you. Because I did.”
Nanako frowned. “You’re kidnapping me right now?”
Akechi immediately lowered his voice, glancing around. Nobody seemed to be nearby.
“Does it look like I’m kidnapping you?” he asked hysterically.
Nanako shrugged. “I thought something was wrong, but you said we were on an adventure! Is the adventure over?”
There were moments in Goro Akechi’s life when his mind worked beautifully. He could construct an airtight theory from a misplaced coffee cup, detect inconsistencies in witness testimony from the smallest shift in language, and manipulate hardened adults twice his age with honeyed words into telling him exactly what he wanted to hear. Now, his mind felt more like a derailed train crashing into every stop.
“Goro-san.”
“What?”
“I think you were the kidnapper.”
Akechi made a strangled sound and buried his face in his hands again, his face burning.
This was absurd. Completely and utterly absurd. He was surrounded by idiots. Every single person in this miserable town was an idiot and he was trapped in hell, surely, and he wished, honestly, that the devil would just stake him and burn him alive—
“Goro-san,” Nanako said louder. “The man at Junes.”
Akechi turned toward her. “Don’t tell me it was that idiot Kanji or something.”
Nanako shook her head forcefully. “No! I didn’t recognize him! And I know all of my brother’s friends.”
“Apparently not,” he said, standing up. He felt so stupid. “I’m getting you home.”
“Goro-san, they won’t believe me if I tell them about the man,” she said nervously, skipping to keep pace with his frantic strides. “Goro-san?”
“No!” he shouted, rage filling him instantaneously. He had thought…he had thought he’d been doing something good. Protecting someone.
In the end, he had just made everything worse like he always did.
She flinched back.
“Look, all of this? It’s over. All of this posturing, all of this good-girl little innocent act you’ve got? I don’t care. I don’t care for you, or your brother, or any of his friends, or anyone in this world but myself.”
“You’re lying,” she said, but her voice shook. “You’re lying!”
“I’m not lying,” he hissed back, his smile dragging back into something dangerous. “I’m evil, Nanako. I used you to get back at them. If I needed to, I would have killed you in an instant.”
“No!” she screamed, startling back. His breaths came out in heavy pants.
“Easily,” he told her, voice darkening. “Now get home before I get the chance.”
Nanako stared at him. Her big brown eyes were watery with tears. Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. Akechi smiled wider. He had to scare her.
“Go.”
He could see the exact moment she began to believe him. Her hand slipped away from the sleeve of his jacket, curling against her chest instead. Her trembling fingers curled into a fist.
“You said you would protect me,” she whispered. “You said you’d come back.”
“I lied.”
“You said we were going to watch Featherman.”
“I lied, Nanako.”
“You promised.”
This, I know how to do. I know how to lie and belittle and hurt and push.
“You really believed that?” he asked, forcing out a laugh. “God. No wonder someone managed to grab you in the middle of a department store. It’s no wonder your brother hates you.”
Nanako flinched, face twisting. Akechi watched as tears began to drip down her face.
That’s three for three now.
“Go home.”
She wiped furiously at her face. “I hate you.”
His heart twisted. He turned on his heel.
“I hate you!”
He didn’t respond. He clenched his fists and kept walking.
“You're a liar! And you're mean! No, you’re bad!”
Akechi could barely hear her voice anymore. The wind whipped between them,
“And your braid sucked!”
Akechi's fists curled and uncurled. He heard a soft thud behind him. His jacket. Akechi watched the green of her dress disappear down the road.
He counted to ten and started following her.
I’m not an idiot. I’m not letting her walk home alone.
Nanako didn’t need to like him, but with them separated, it was more likely the Investigation Team would find her. She'd run to Narukami when she saw him. She'd tell him everything. The Investigation Team would keep her safe. Hamamura would delete the records and keep their promise once he knew the whole story. Akechi would go back to Tokyo and never have to see any of these people again. Everything would return to normal.
His phone would fill with threats from Shido. Sae would glare at him across interrogation rooms like they were strangers. Akira would make him fancy coffee and grin at him like he knew a secret, like they were friends, like Akechi hadn’t spent the afternoon contemplating seventeen different ways to kill him.
Akechi pulled the damp jacket tighter around himself. It smelled like hot chocolate.
It was easier this way.
***
He followed her for nearly an hour. Nanako stopped crying at the fifteen minute mark. It had been replaced with a stony silence. She had stopped looking behind her around twenty. Her miniature fists were clenched in a miniature rage illbetting of her soft spoken self. He trailed her through increasingly familiar streets, keeping to alleys and ducking behind the occasional vending machine whenever she slowed. Once, an elderly man caught him crouching behind a hedge and Akechi had been forced to pretend he was searching for his poor lost cat.
The man had helped him look for ten minutes and given him some milk for the journey. Akechi fucking hated Inaba.
The sky had darkened considerably by the time Nanako reached the shopping district again. Streetlights blinked awake one by one, throwing pale pools of watery fluorescent across the cobblestone. Most of the stores were beginning to close with metallic shrieks of their shutters. Akechi kept his hands deep in his pockets, his injured arm tucked close against his body. It burned achingly in a way he was used to. He lamented for perhaps the fortieth time that day his decision not to charge his phone in the morning. He stumbled as he realized Nanako had halted. Her back slumped and Akechi sighed in relief.
People were spilling out from around the corner. Finally.
Narukami was at the front of the group, his usually blank expression cracked with terrible worry. Hamamura was beside him, looking considerably worse. His hair appeared to have been the victim of repeated yanking, and the moment he caught sight of Nanako, his entire body sagged.
“Nanako!”
Nanako jolted, the tears on her face growing more apparent. She threw herself into Narukami’s arms and he held her, gently reaching, pulling her up into his arms. They all gathered around her, hugging and prodding her cheeks, undoing her braid and patting her head like she was something precious to be protected. Hamamura sobbed and he could hear Nanako’s soft wails peter out into Narukami’s shirt as he held both of them with care. His family.
Akechi stepped backward into the shadow of an alley. Nanako was safe. Narukami had her. Hamamura would presumably interrogate her, discover that Akechi had not, in fact, abducted her, and hopefully erase every piece of information they had on him before Akechi found the nearest train station and launched himself back into a civilization that hated him.
Something ugly twisted in Akechi's stomach and he looked away.
“Big bro,” she cried. He squeezed his eyes shut. His feet didn't move.
Just another moment.
It’s been a long day.
“You found her!”
Akechi's head snapped up, alert. He peered around the corner again. A young man stood slightly behind Shirogane. He was thin and somewhat unkempt, his stringy, poorly dyed red hair hanging strangely around his face. His shoulders were hunched underneath a thick jacket, and the mask on his face made his primary features unreadable. Yet there was something about his eyes that immediately made him on edge. He leaned a bit closer. The man stepped forward, watching Nanako. The edge of his face came into the light. A mole.
His blood went cold.
No. The man…no, Nanako said she didn’t recognize him. He tried to grab her. Before they thought I kidnapped her, even.
What if she wasn’t lying? What if this man truly was a threat?
Nanako pointed shakily at the man.
“Who’s that?”
“He’s the one that reported you,” Naoto said gently, running a hand through Nanako’s bangs. “He’s glad you’re safe.”
“Why don’t you spend some time with me?” the boy asked, his voice soft. “I’m a therapist.”
“I…”
The rest of the team didn’t move.
No. Is it possible this man…tricked them? Or am I overthinking this?
Nanako took a shaking, tiny step back and Akechi made his decision. He stepped out, fists curling.
“Back up.”
Every head snapped toward him.
Hamamura's expression went through approximately six emotions in the span of a second.
“Akechi?!”
Akechi shoved past Chie and grabbed Nanako by the shoulders, dragging her behind him. Narukami surged to his feet. There was a bloodlust in his eyes that Akechi hadn’t seen before. A danger, an ancient one, humming through every bone in his body.
“I can explain,” Akechi stuttered. “Just…”
The stranger blinked, his face twisting. “Who is this?”
“Who are you, you bastard?” Akechi shot back, covering Nanako’s ears on instinct. Hamamura froze halfway in stopping him. “You grabbed her!”
“I didn't!” the man exclaimed. He looked genuinely horrified. “I was trying to help!”
“You threatened her.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Ask her!”
Everyone looked at Nanako.
Akechi felt her hand close around the back of his shirt. Narukami froze.
“Nanako?” Narukami asked, his voice low and dangerous. “Come here.”
Her fingers tightened.
The man sighed. “I told you,” he said softly. “She's scared. Whoever you are, back up from her. She’s obviously developed an attachment to him because of her time as a hostage.”
Akechi's eyes narrowed. I only get one shot at this.
He opened his mouth to speak but the man cut him off.
“I saw him with her at Junes. He was acting strange. I tried to ask Nanako if she was okay, but he came back before I could do anything. She ran because she was scared he'd see us talking.”
Akechi looked around wildly. Yosuke's face was pale.
“You have to believe me,” Akechi said sharply. “This man is a liar.”
“He helped us find her and you,” Satonaka growled. She looked two seconds away from snapping his neck.
Yosuke met his gaze. “Akechi,” he said carefully. “You disappeared with her for five hours.”
“I was protecting her!”
“You ran away from us!”
Narukami's eyes narrowed.
“Akechi.”
“Please,” he said, words spilling from his lips. “Please don't let him near her. I’m telling you to trust my instincts. This man was trying to hurt her. I don’t give a shit about the files, Hamamura, I just want…”
His voice trailed off.
I don’t really know what I want.
“She's confused,” the stranger said desperately.
Akechi laughed breathlessly.
“Oh, you're good.”
“Akechi,” Shirogane warned again.
“No. No, I'm done with this.” He jabbed a finger toward the stranger. “You want evidence? Ask him how he knew she was at Junes. Ask him how he knew she was alone. Ask him why he’s here with you, hell, ask him for his credentials as a therapist. I don’t know how this man managed to trick you, but it’s pathetic.”
Narukami looked between them. Torn.
Akechi didn’t have time for indecision.
The stranger’s hand shot out and he ran.
“Akechi!”
Footsteps pounded behind him as he sprinted away, Nanako in tow for the third time in the day. Shit shit shit shit shit shit—
“This is not fun, Goro-san,” Nanako puffed. “This is really not fun.”
“No shit,” he screamed back. “Come here!”
She leaped at him and he grabbed her.
“Akechi! Stop running!” Hamamura screamed.
He tore around the corner. Junes. Apparently his personal hell had developed a sense of narrative symmetry. The automatic doors opened and Akechi barreled through them, nearly sending an elderly shopper flying. Nanako was shouting something. Hamamura was shouting something. Everyone in the entire godforsaken town was shouting something and making noise all the goddamn time. Akechi didn't care. A violent, terrible thought was overcoming him. Akechi changed direction so sharply his shoes squealed against the tile.
Electronics.
He could hear them behind him now. They had lost sight of him.
“Where is he? Hey, whatever your name was, find her!”
Akechi saw the television. His reflection stared back at him. He'd touched it earlier and his hand had gone straight through.
The TV World.
“Oh, this is such a terrible idea. Hold on.”
Nanako made a noise of panic and wrapped both arms around his neck.
“Akechi, stop!”
He allowed himself five milliseconds to hate himself before jumping.
For one horrible second, his body expected glass.
Instead, reality swallowed him. He felt his body melt away, fuzzing into cold static. The air around him electrified. The lights stretched into white ribbons, curling and twisting and lengthening, down, down. Nanako screamed. Akechi hit the ground and pain exploded through his arm.
“OW!”
Nanako landed on top of him.
He cursed a string of colorful language and Nanako rolled off of him bashfully.
“Goro-san!”
“I’m fine,” he wheezed automatically. His arm hurt like hell.
Worse of all, he could feel the nausea he had tried to ignore crawling back up his throat.
Come on, Akechi. Get up. Get up.
With a groan, he lifted his head. Fog rolled around them in billows, over a vast and impossibly long world. There were hills and slopes and valleys, with strange lines crisscrossing what looked like towers of telephone poles. Massive buildings loomed in the distance.
He couldn’t speak for a moment.
“Goro-san?” Nanako voiced hesitantly.
“I'm fine.”
He rolled onto his side and stared at the floor, catching his breath.
“I…I've had a difficult day.”