Chapter Text
<Come to Akihabara immediately. It is a matter of life and death.>
Ryuji stared at his phone screen blankly. The message had popped up without any sort of information about the sender -- there was no name, number, ID, or anything else that could provide a hint about who sent it. With an eyebrow raised, he quickly shot back a response.
<Who the hell is this? Where did you get my number?>
<That does not matter. Come to this address at once. Look for a blue bench on the southwest corner of the block, next to the convenience store.>
Ryuji started to type out another reply, but the mystery messenger sent him a map link before he could finish. Out of an equal mix of frustration and curiosity, he clicked. The area that whoever-this-was wanted him to go to was actually a spot he was pretty familiar with -- he went to an arcade near the area on occasion.
Granted, he hadn't gone there without Ren in almost a year.
Ryuji tried to flip back to the chat to ask more questions, but upon trying to pull it up he realized it had been completely deleted. Sighing, he pulled the map back up. It was still early afternoon, and he wasn't more than a short ride away... and his curiosity was starting to get the better of him. In any case, there was only one person he knew personally that was likely to pull this sort of thing in the first place. If he was right, either she needed his help or he was about to be subject to a really good prank.
The only other possibility, Ryuji mused while waiting to board the train, was that this was some psycho trying to lure him into a murder lair. If that was the case, he was pretty sure he'd had enough training in physical combat to protect himself. What's a serial killer to someone who's taken down a god?
Strolling down the street towards the spot marked on his GPS, he pulled his jacket a little tighter around himself. April was right around the corner, but the wind still had a harsh chill to it. It was probably just his imagination, but... everything seemed a little bit colder now than it had a week ago. With Ren and Morgana gone, no more Metaverse, and the world back to normal... life felt stranger than ever. He'd spent the past three months re-adjusting to life as a normal student, same as the rest of his friends, but now that Ren was back home he felt... alone.
They had talked a few times over the past week, and of course he had the rest of their little group, but somehow he felt even lonelier than he had before he'd met Ren -- and back then he'd lost every friend he had. At that time, when he was a complete social pariah, he'd found a kindred spirit in Ren. The friendship they'd developed was life-changing, Phantom Thieves or no Phantom Thieves. Without his best bro, he felt like he'd lost a part of himself.
He even missed Morgana, the stupid hairball-hacking jerk.
He had no idea if the rest of them had been talking or hanging out. He hadn't really seen or spoken to any of them all week -- their group chat was still sort of going but it had slowed a great deal since the Phantom Thieves had disbanded for good. Maybe each of them sent one message every few days. Today was the first day he'd just happened to get out of the house for more than a few minutes since their road trip before taking Ren home.
He snapped out of his thoughts as he neared the convenience store and the blue bench his mystery texter had told him to find. It didn't look any different from a distance, and there wasn't anyone sitting on or standing near it that he could see. He picked up his pace and walked up to it. Nothing on or around it... but just as he suspected, peering behind the bench revealed a tiny, curled-up lump of orange hair and black stockings.
"...Futaba?"
She lifted her head from where she'd hidden it under her hands and gave him a pitiful, tear-streaked smile. "Sakamoto, hey... I'm glad you decided to heed my invitation..."
Ryuji sighed and held out his hand. Futaba took it and allowed him to pull her to her feet. "I kinda figured it'd be you. I don't know anyone else that, uh... cryptic, is that the word? Why not just message me normally?"
"Force of habit, I guess," Futaba replied, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. "Besides, if I just messaged you normally you'd start asking what I needed and stuff, and I just... didn't wanna say more over text than I needed to, you know?"
Ryuji resisted the temptation to roll his eyes. "Well, what do ya need? Are you alright? Talk to me."
"Yeah, I'm fine... sort of." Futaba shrugged and flopped onto the bench. "I'm sorry... bottom line, I didn't know who else to contact."
Ryuji leaned on the bench and cocked his head. "Well, what happened?"
"It's embarrassing..."
"So?" Ryuji laughed a bit. "Think about all the embarrassing shit I've done! Pretty sure I've got ya beat. Spill."
"Okay, okaaaay." Futaba pulled her legs up to her chest and huffed. "Okay so like... I'm still working on being okay going out in public without R-... without anyone else. By myself, y'know? So... the new Angel Wars expansion is out and I figured I could go out and buy it instead of ordering it online like I usually do. So I came all the way out here to the game shop and went in and everything was going fine and then... then..." She groaned and buried her face in her arms again, causing her voice to muffle slightly. "I bumped into a display case and knocked the whole thing over. E... everyone was looking straight at me. I panicked and ran."
"Oh, geez..." Ryuji sighed. "I guess that is pretty embarassing, especially with your anxiety and stuff..."
"I never even got the game... I shouldn't have even come out here. I'm not ready..."
"D'you still want it?"
Futaba lifted her head again. "Say what?"
"Do you still want the game? You already came all this way."
"I guess... but how can I go back there? I already embarrassed the crap out of myself."
Ryuji motioned for her to stand up again. "C'mon, let's go get it. I know you wanted to do the whole thing alone, but you managed to make it halfway, right? That's somethin' to be proud of. I'll go with ya the rest of the way."
"Ryuji... you'll really do that for me?" Futaba gazed up at him in disbelief.
"Sure. What're friends for?"
Futaba was silent for a few seconds before she fished her phone out of her pocket. "Sorry, one sec... I can't make this face I.R.L. but it's the best one to express the emotion I'm feeling, so..."
Ryuji's phone chimed. He glanced at it to find a single text from Futaba, sent normally this time.
< ;w; >
______________________________________________________________
"So what's this place again?"
Ryuji beamed as he held the door open for Futaba. "Only the best beef bowl joint in the whole of Tokyo! Me 'n' Ren come here all the time." He paused. "Er... used to come here. Anyway, the food here's bomb. I'm normally more into ramen, but this place was closer and it's still awesome. My treat, alright?"
Futaba nodded, clutching her bag to her chest as the two selected seats at the bar. "It's crowded... there are so many people..."
Ryuji nodded. "Yeah, it's super popular. You're gonna be okay, right?"
Futaba shrugged. "I can deal."
"Alright, just lemme know if, like... you gotta bail or whatever. Kay? Oh, two large beef bowls please!" Ryuji turned his attention from Futaba to the worker behind the counter. "And two ice waters!"
"Someone's hungry, huh?" Futaba let herself relax a bit.
"Yeah, I kinda worked up an appetite today." Ryuji stretched as he spoke.
"Oh yeah... you got over to where I was really fast, but... don't you live kinda far away from Akihabara? What were you doing out?"
"Yeah, I was kinda in the area. Actually... I was out jogging."
"Jogging?"
"Mhm," Ryuji nodded. "I guess I mostly talked to Ren about this stuff, but y'know how my whole beef with Coach Kamoshida had to do with the track team and stuff, yeah?"
"Sorta." Futaba shrugged. "I didn't hear about all of it, but I kinda get the gist, I think. He was the one who did a bunch of awful things to the volleyball team, Takamaki, her friend, et cetera?"
"Yeah..." Ryuji took a long sip from his water glass. "Okay so long story short, when he took over the track team when I was a first-year, he started spreadin' some really shitty rumors about my family. I flipped out on him, he... he broke my leg. Didn't get in trouble, 'cuz technically it was self-defense. After that the track team got disbanded, they all hated me, and the volleyball team became the main feature of Shujin's sports side." He looked downwards for a moment. It was a tough memory to recall.
"He... straight-up broke it?? Oh my God, that's horrible. I knew you had some issues with your leg, but... I didn't realize it was that serious..." Futaba stiffened in shock. "Sheesh Ryuji, I had no idea. But... then you met Ren, became a Phantom Thief, and took Kamoshida down, right?" She gave him a tiny, supportive arm punch. "Isn't the track team back together too now? Everything's okay finally!"
"Sorta. I dunno." Ryuji shrugged. "I decided not to go back to track. I told them it was because I didn't wanna cling to the past, but..." He reached a hand down and gingerly rubbed his right thigh. "It's honestly because of my leg."
"But you said that all happened when you were a first-year student. Your leg's gotta have healed by now?"
"I -- oh, thanks!" Ryuji's attention was split by the bowls that were placed in front of himself and Futaba! "Man, I'm starvin'... let's dig in!" He grinned at Futaba before giving his full attention to wolfing down as much beef would fit in his mouth at once.
Futaba snorted and joined in. For a few minutes the conversation went silent as the two very nearly matched one another in terms of inhaling noodles and meat. In an astonishingly short amount of time both bowls had been reduced to a third of their initial contents.
Ryuji leaned back with a sigh. "Maaaaan, this was exactly what the doctor ordered!" He glanced over to Futaba and whistled. "Holy crap, you've eaten almost as much as I have! How's that work? You're like half my size!"
Futaba cackled. "Sojiro's lucky I order a lot of instant yakisoba online. If I just relied on his curry he'd never have any at Leblanc!" The two shared a laugh and went quiet again until she spoke back up. "So, uh... your leg? Can I ask about it?"
"Huh? Oh yeah, sorry. Got distracted, heh." Ryuji took a moment to chug the rest of his water and sighed. "So... yeah. It was... a really bad break. Like bad bad. The doc recommended a bunch of stuff to help it heal, like physical therapy and stuff, but it's just me and my mom, and things were hard enough already before that shithead Kamoshida effed things up even more--!" He took a breath to calm himself before continuing. "Sorry. Long story short, we couldn't afford it. They put some metal in my leg and stuff but that was pretty much it. And I had to go back to school too, and even with the crutches they gave me I wound up walking on it a lot way before I was supposed to. So... it never really healed right, I guess. I think I mentioned before that I wanted to try that whole route again, but... I can't. I talked to my mom and movin's out of the question."
"I... oh. Sheesh..." Futaba shifted awkwardly. "I didn't even realize. Does... it hurt?"
Ryuji took a moment to think before answering, and when he did he looked directly at Futaba. "Honestly?... Yeah. It hurts pretty much all the time. Sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. It's why I can't really run anymore. I mean I can, but not for long distances. I can walk, fight, jump, all that stuff, but I gotta be careful. If I land wrong or overexert myself I feel it for days."
"Why didn't you ever say anything about it to the team!?" Futaba's voice started loud but shrank as she spoke, aware as she was about how many people were around. "I can think of a million times when we were in Palaces and Mementos where you could have gotten seriously hurt!"
"You think I wanted to be a liability? I mean everyone who went to Shujin knows about my leg breaking but if I whined about it you guys would all have worried about me way too much. Maybe you wouldn't have wanted me going on missions in the first place." Ryuji clenched his fist with a ragged sigh. "I know Ann would've been worried about me constantly, and it woulda effed with her concentration. And Morgana wouldn't ever let me hear the end of it. He already liked callin' me useless and lame and shit, imagine if he knew."
Futaba nodded reluctantly. "I guess that makes sense... I mean, Mona-chan likes to tease you, but he did kinda go too far sometimes."
"Way more than sometimes," Ryuji said sheepishly. "I never said anything because I didn't wanna be the guy who let a freakin' cat get to him, but man... some of those passing remarks really stung." He stopped speaking long enough to polish off his beef bowl and wipe his mouth. "Mmph. Damn, that was good. Yeah though, I guess that's one of the nice things about the Phantom Thieves bein' done for. No more havin' to bust my ass to save the world, right?" As Futaba finished her bowl, he put a small pile of cash on the bar. "You about ready to go?"
"Yeah, almost." Futaba looked around. "I'm actually feeling kind of okay here. My anxiety isn't as bad when I'm talking to someone interesting."
"Ha! Glad I'm finally interestin' to you!"
"Maybe if you'd introduced yourself with 'hi, I'm Ryuji Sakamoto and here's my entire tragic backstory', I'd have thought you were fascinating from the get-go!" Futaba stuck out her tongue and hopped down from her seat. "As it is, you were kinda boring until you convinced us all you'd heroically sacrificed yourself on an exploding cruise ship to save our lives. Anyway, let's go!"
"H-hey!" Ryuji called out, but she was already out the door. "Geez... what is it with this girl?"
She was waiting for him outside. "So," she said. "I should probably be getting home. I'm kinda really psyched to fire up this bad boy. The reviews are already really good!"
"I'll walk with you to the station." Ryuji started walking. "I promised my mom I wouldn't be home too late."
"Okie-dokie." The two got halfway up the block before Futaba tilted her head. "So wait a second... if you still have a bad leg and you don't have to keep fit for the track team or the Phantom Thieves, why were you out jogging?"
"Oh yeah." Ryuji looked up at the sky as he spoke. "Well... like I said, I'll never get to do physical therapy or anything for my leg, and runnin' around for the Phantom Thieves probably did more damage than it did good. So I'm sorta tryin' to start over with it on my own -- doin' less stressful exercises and stuff to try to build my strength back up. I mean... this is my last year of high school, and I'm definitely not gettin' into any kinda college, so my best bet is to try and get into some kinda trade or a labor job. I mean... I just wanna be able to help my mom out. She's done so much for me, ya know?"
Futaba smiled reassuringly. "That's really noble of you!"
"Awh... thanks. I don't really think of it as bein' noble. I mean a lot of the reason I put so much into track 'n' field was for her, and now that that's all bust... I dunno. I just want her to be happy."
"Ryuji..."
"It's not a big deal! Seriously. I just wanna be in decent shape so I can get a good job. On top of that... I really am startin' to get tired of my leg bein' in such crap shape."
"I get what you mean." Futaba nodded. "I mean in a way I'm training myself too. I'm working overtime trying to get this dumb anxiety under control. With Ren gone... it's really tough. But I've gotta do it!"
Ryuji raised an eyebrow at her. "Any special reason why you're so gung-ho about it? Ain't that sorta thing supposed to be dealt with over time?"
"Normally yeah, but..." Futaba perked up. "Oh yeah, I guess you guys don't know. You know how I'm supposed to be officially starting high school?"
"Of course."
"Well... I've known this for a while now, but the school Sojiro's enrolling me in is Shujin." She clutched her parcel a bit tighter as she spoke. "I... I'm gonna be a first-year student there starting next month. Wild, huh?"
"Holy SHIT!" Ryuji whooped. "Futaba, that's awesome!!!"
Futaba flinched. "I guess?"
"Wait... why wouldn't it be?"
"I dunno..." Futaba looked down. "I missed a whole year. Everyone I knew from middle school who wound up going to Shujin is going to be a year ahead of me. Not only am I a whole year out of practice when it comes to social interaction, I'm gonna be going back to school with a bunch of people I've never met before in my life." She sighed heavily. "Honestly, I'm really nervous. School wasn't exactly great for me to start with..."
"I guess that never changes, huh?"
"Yeah. You got ostracized for being a delinquent, but for me it was just because I was so good with computers and stuff. Plus something tell's me people are gonna know I was gone for a year. Some might even know it's because my mom died. What if I've got a reputation already? What if they spread rumors about me?? What if I have a panic attack in class, or an anxiety attack in the cafeteria???" She was starting to hyperventilate. "What if I--"
"Hey!" Ryuji stopped in his tracks, turned around, and put both hands on her shoulders. "You're gonna be fine, Futaba. Calm down." He looked right into her teary eyes and gave her the biggest grin he could muster. "You're gonna be a Shujin student, right? That means you'll be in the same school as me, Ann, Sumire, Mishima... if anything happens, one of us can come to your rescue, yeah?"
Futaba took a deep breath and managed to relax herself. "Y-yeah... you're right. What am I saying? I'm not alone anymore."
"Exactly!" Ryuji looked up, surprised to see the station looming in front of the two of them. "Oh geez, we're here already. You gonna be okay getting back home on your own?"
Futaba nodded cheerily. "Yeah! I'll be fine. It's a straight shot back from here."
"Sweet. See ya later?"
"See ya later."
"..."
"... Hey, Ryuji?"
"Yeah?" Ryuji turned back around just in time to be assaulted by the closest thing to a bear hug that someone as small as Futaba could manage. "W-whoa!!"
"Thank you. Thank you so much," Futaba squeaked. "Today would've completely sucked if you hadn't come to my rescue."
"Ahahaha..." Ryuji gave her a slightly awkward pat on the top of her head. "It was nothin'. I'm glad we got to hang out. This week's been... weird, more than anything." He peeled himself off of her and gave her a thumbs-up. "I really needed this bit o' social interaction!"
Futaba giggled. "Alright, here's where we part for today then. I guess I just have one last question for you."
"Yeah? What's that?"
"...Who's Mishima?"