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The Phantom Thieves are doing their usual self-congratulatory backpatting at the exit to Mementos, which means Goro is fighting harder than he ever has against a Shadow to keep the pleasant smile on his face when Joker taps his shoulder. Goro most definitely doesn’t jump, even if Joker’s ability to sneak in those heels is almost as mystifying as his infinitude of Personas.
It’s even stranger because he’s been chatty today. Chattier than usual, even, keeping up a stream of idle conversation about Palaces and school and some game Oracle introduced him to.
(It’s supposed to be a recreation of an old MMO called something like Blameless Crime Online or whatever. Goro knows that now, despite his best efforts.)
He’d tell anyone who asked - well, he wouldn’t tell them anything; he’s not in the habit of giving away information about himself for nothing. But if he were, he’d tell them he was trying to get a read on Joker’s weird mood. His plan depends on being able to predict Joker’s actions. He doesn’t have time to recalculate now.
The thoughts flash through the back of his mind in the time it takes him to turn and smile at Joker. “Yes?”
“Could you stay behind for a minute?” Joker asks. “There’s something I want to talk to you about. Alone.”
Goro blinks, but it wouldn’t do to show suspicion and let Joker realize he has reason to suspect him of anything. “Of course,” he says. “Right here at the entrance?”
“Let’s go down a level, just to be sure.”
It’s a wonder no one else has discovered the Phantom Thieves’ identity, if this is the same level of subtlety Joker displays in his day-to-day life. At least he can rest assured that Joker isn’t taking him aside to kill him. Joker has only been at this for six months, and all of his work has been in the Metaverse. Goro’s seen the stupidly earnest way he talks about justice. There’s no way he has the guts to murder someone directly.
Joker leads him down the escalators and into one of Mementos’ ubiquitous dead ends. Either of them could destroy the Shadows here in one blow; the only danger here is each other.
Joker stares at Goro for long seconds, which gives Goro time to fix his pleasant expression in place while studying Joker’s. It’s hard to tell past the mask, but Goro thinks he looks tired. He’s entertaining himself with fantasies of being asked to take the lead, of winning the group over so thoroughly that they’ll follow him like lemmings to their doom, when Joker finally shakes his head.
“Listen to me,” Joker - no, there’s none of Joker’s smug competence here, this is simply Akira - says. “I have to tell you something.”
Goro gives a nod he hopes reads as compassionate understanding and not his actual glee at reducing Joker to such desperation. “Of course. Whatever it is, I’ll do everything in my power to help-”
“I know you’re trying to kill me,” Akira says.
Goro hears himself laugh as if from a distance. It isn’t his real laugh, at least, the Detective Prince drilled into his bones far deeper than mere conscious thought. “Why would I do something like that?”
“Because you’re working for Shido.” Akira’s gaze seems to pierce through Goro, seeing the gaping emptiness at his core. “You want him to pay for what he did to your mother, and so first you need him to trust you. That’s why you’re acting as his hitman.”
Goro doesn’t know he’s going to move until his hands are already on his sword, his suit gone black with his instinctive grab for all the power at his command.
The blade bounces off of Akira without so much as scratching his coat. Of course. Perfect Akira with his army of invincible Personas, and not even the tell of a costume change for you to keep track of them.
Akira smirks, though it does nothing to hide his exhaustion. “And that’s why I wanted to talk down here. Well, that and the lack of eavesdroppers, obviously.”
Goro has enough presence of mind to keep from attacking Akira again, despite Loki’s urging. There’s no point. Apparently, there’s been no point to any of it. “Go on, then.” He tosses his sword to the side. “Save the gloating for after you kill me.”
Akira’s eyes widen in, as far as Goro can tell, genuine shock. That he was bested by a boy this naive is another blow to Goro’s battered pride.
“I’m not going to kill you,” Akira says once he’s gotten his expression back under control. “The whole point is that I’m trying to make sure you don’t die.”
“Oh, of course,” Goro mutters. “And then I’ll fall down at my savior’s feet and vow to renounce my wicked ways, and we’ll ride off into the sunset together, I assume.”
“I mean, I’m not going to pretend I don’t want the sunset, and it will be a lot easier if you stop doing so much murder. Honestly, though, I’ll be happy with you alive to come up with a better plan to kill me.”
“Fuck you, my plan is great,” Goro spits. Hardly his best retort, but most of him is preoccupied with turning Akira’s words over in his mind. There’s no way it’s that easy. He doesn’t get to keep the things he wants.
The simplest explanation is that Akira is lying. Even as they speak, the rest of his band of idiots are up to something, enacting their personal brand of justice.
But even as pitifully idealistic as the Phantom Thieves are, they know better than to leave justice in the hands of the police. And since they’re too weak to keep him as a captive, there isn’t much they can gain by luring him into a false sense of security.
It’s entirely possible that they need him. Maybe they’ve decided that the enemy of their enemy is their friend, or maybe they just think he’ll be that easy to manipulate. Either way, he’ll have plenty of time to figure out his next steps after he convinces them that they’ve won. Hell, maybe it’s as simple as double-crossing them and going forward with his initial plan. What was Joker going to do once he was in the interrogation room, anyway?
“I don’t need you to trust me,” Akira says levelly. “I’m just asking you to believe what we both already know: Masayoshi Shido is a self-serving, backstabbing son of a bitch.”
“What a brilliant insight,” Goro snarls, but it’s impossible to deny. He’d known all along that Shido would have a plan in place for when he became a liability. He just thought he’d proven himself too useful to discard this soon.
What Akira is saying makes sense, loath as Goro is to admit it, but he refuses to give in without a fight. “So maybe you’re working with him too. It would certainly explain how you know the sins I’ve committed for him.”
Akira snorts. “I know you need to reason your way into trusting me, but even so, that stings.” He shrugs. “Do you want me to tell you his Palace key words? They’re the Diet Building and ‘ship’.”
“...I know he’s been experimenting with ways of protecting his cognition. Maybe he’s decided he’s safe even if I do go into his Palace.”
“You really are paranoid, huh?” Akira shakes his head. “All right. You know how Shadows have their big dramatic transformations when you fight them? Shido’s starts by bringing in a bunch of people to take hits for him in the shape of a lion, and a bird, and a pyramid…”
Ah. Despite himself, Goro realizes, a part of him wanted to accept Akira’s offer. It’s a shame he’s lying to him. “There’s no way for you to know that. Do you think I’m stupid? He hasn’t had a change of heart, and he’d never let you leave alive without one.”
“About that.” Akira sucks in a breath. Now he looks discomfited, as if Goro hasn’t pointed out an entirely obvious fact. “Listen, this is going to sound crazy, and I’m mostly hoping you know me well enough to realize that I wouldn’t try such an out-there lie. You’re right that I haven’t fought Shido yet - not in this timeline, at least.”
Goro doesn’t look at his cast-aside laser sword, the only reason he can imagine Akira would try something so childish. “And you were so broken up about the death of a traitor that you figured out how to break the laws of causality?”
“We are literally standing in a fucked up and evil version of the subway created by people’s thoughts, wearing outfits that represent our will to rebel, and time travel is where you draw the line?”
If they were in the real world, Goro would pinch the bridge of his nose. As it is, his helmet makes that impossible, so he simply sighs. “One of those things has been studied by the best cognitive psientists the government could find, and the other I conveniently only have your word for. Are you really going to tell me you don’t see the difference?”
“Given that those psientists couldn’t even figure out the Velvet Room, I can’t say I’m impressed,” Akira says nonsensically. “Here’s what it boils down to: I don’t have any proof you won’t find a way to explain away, but I do have information, and it costs you nothing to listen to me. I’m asking you to delay your grand scheme by two months, max.”
That’s still the most concrete timeline Goro has had. He wants it, wants so badly for this to be over. He wracks his brain for an objection that will set the world back in order. "Why now?"
It's only once the words are out of his mouth that he realizes that he has a point. Presumably, Akira could have chosen to travel to before the public turned on him. He could have bathed in their adoration forever, if you "Why travel to now, and not in time to save Okumura?" He's on firmer ground now, letting his mouth run loose knowing it will only drip venom. "You'd think someone who cared about their friends as much as you claim to would at least try to keep them from becoming orphans."
Akira scratches the back of his neck. He doesn't meet Goro's eyes when he says, "Well, technically, I'm not now either. I traveled back to the interrogation room. It's just that now the drugs are starting to take effect, and my memory is getting hazy, so there's time for me to try and change things without me noticing."
"What." It's absolute nonsense, which makes it all the more frustrating that Goro is so viscerally upset by the idea. “So, what, I’m just a figment of your imagination?”
“If anything, I’m the imaginary one here.” Akira smiles like he’s trying to make a joke, but his voice is flat and joyless. “For all I know, I only exist in the interrogation room, and everything before that is one big delusion I’ve convinced myself of. Either way, so much of it is fixed. I can’t avoid getting arrested, I can’t stay out of the Metaverse, I can’t even suggest we go after a new target this time around. It’s only now that I’m not being watched by myself as the storyteller that I can try to change things.”
Maybe it’s Akira’s division between his selves that convinces Goro, in the end. Lord knows he’s done enough of it to recognize it in someone else, the information carefully compartmentalized to let you do the work that is required of the current you, the contradicting traits alternately buried and excavated. Or maybe it’s just how stupid Akira would have to be to make up a lie this byzantine, much less keep track of it from now on.
It’s definitely not the slump of Akira’s shoulders or his momentary urge to put his arms around them. Goro has trained himself not to want that through a thousand smaller self-denials. Even now, their alliance is only temporary.
“Let’s say I accept what you’re saying, and don’t assume you’ve finally swan-dived off the deep end altogether,” Goro says.
Akira brightens, something like hope in his eyes, and as stupid as it was for him to let Akira get close enough to recognize a concession when Goro offers one, that light feels more important than the blades they still hold at each other’s throats.
“What do you want me to do about it? If you know you’re going to be interrogated, my plan has already succeeded.”
Akira smirks like it’s second nature, like Goro isn’t the only one with an expression worn into his bones. “You keep telling yourself that.” He shakes his head. “That’s why it has to be you. If we can walk out of that room together, not even I will know what comes next. We can take down Shido together.”
“Right, I’m sure none of the guards will report to Shido when you mysteriously vanish right after I was supposed to kill you. Assuming they don’t call him as we leave the building, of course.” The disdain comes easily to Goro, but he can’t help phrasing it as a challenge, daring Akira to pull off yet another of his infuriating schemes. Goro himself is already thinking about whether he can arrange for the guard on duty to have a mental shutdown without it being instantly obvious what he’s done.
“We’ve got time to figure it out. Worst case scenario, we fake our deaths together.” Akira stretches his arms behind his back like it will hide the genuine emotion in his voice. “You would not believe how stir crazy I got last time when it was just me.”
There are several questions embedded in that statement, and Goro refuses to give him the satisfaction of asking any of them. He’d count it as more of a victory if it hadn’t been for what slipped out instead. “If you’re in the interrogation room now, how much have you had to relive?”
Akira counts on his fingers, almost certainly for show. “Let’s see… it was the middle of March, and then it was November and I was remembering April again.”
It’s even more of a muddle the second time around. Goro gives up on figuring out what that means for the first half of the year, though he can’t help but notice that March to April would give Akira an extra year of memories. They’re the same age, now.
None of this matters. He shouldn’t even be considering any of this. It’s stupid, and Akira is almost definitely playing him, and once again Goro is walking into the jaws of a lion in the foolish hope that he can make a home there.
And yet.
And yet Akira is still looking at him with that stupid hopeful expression, and Shido really has hurt him, too. As long as the bastard is taken down, what does it matter who has the honor of holding the gun to Goro’s head and flattering Goro into pulling the trigger?
“This is ridiculous,” Goro grumbles, and turns away so he doesn’t have to look at Akira’s face anymore. “I’m going to press you for every single detail about this science fiction bullshit you claim you managed.”
“Oh no,” Akira says. His boots click along the floor of Momentos as he rushes to catch up with Goro. “How will I possibly survive getting to talk to you even more?”
Goro grumbles something unintelligble and speeds up.
If he were a sentimental man, he might think that it meant something, that even after seeing (and apparently always knowing about) the most unpleasant parts of Goro, Akira was still willing to chase after him. He might wonder if this was what it felt to be chosen, wholly and unreservedly, for the first time in his life. He might even reach out to Akira just to see what he’d do if he caught him.
But then, if he were a sentimental man, if he were more than he is, he might have had something worth chasing in the first place. He fixes his eyes firmly forward and doesn’t say anything for the rest of the walk back to reality.