Chapter Text

Darkness is all that Shinji sees then, flashes of light. It was all that Shinji saw for now, but enough occasional illumination came and went to illustrate the surroundings Shinji currently was situated, it was a train car. Shinji exhaled briefly, he did not know the specific details of how he ceased deceasing, but he can at least sit down and think about it, and so he thought about it. His body although sat in a train to an known unknown destination, at least he did know what the ultimate destination of everybody was though. The thoughts came to him like a hail of snow and ice, thoughts about his death, his life up to this moment, his friends, and whatever else, discombobulated beyond any measure.

Out of habit, Shinji reached into his pockets to store his hands to a place with a semblance of warmth, only to be surprised by the sudden appearance of a object in his pocket without him knowing, he took it out and found what seemed to be a device of some sort.

It came with a set of dark earphones and a note, on the note in fancy calligraphy was instructions

You are heading towards your destination as you are currently reading this

When you arrive there, head to the neighborhood known as Yongen Jaya, and find the residence of Sojiro Sakura. You will be under his care for the time being and will start your journey soon. As for the device in your possession, do spend effort into learning how to use it, much has changed within the seven years of your passing, and this will only serve to help you.

-Regards, Igor.

“Ok Igor, thanks.” Uttered Shinji.

Over the next few minutes, Shinji sat in the dark train attempting to learn the intricacies of his new phone, it was a bit confusing having only operated flip phones to this point, but he worked out enough on how to use it for the time being. He even worked out what the app was for playing music. With a lack of things to do on his phone or anything, really, he out of curiosity plugged his earphones into the phone and played whatever was downloaded in the music library of his phone.

Now playing: Otherside, by Red Hot Chilli Peppers

As the song started, a light had shown fully into Shinjiro’s face originating from the next train car, it illuminated the current train car he was in to allow him to fully see his surroundings clearly, he had only noticed that there was a bag next to him on the seat to his right, having seen no other passengers in the train car, he could only assume that the bag was meant for him, and even if it wasn’t, finders keepers. Shinji stood up, and faced the light coming from the proceeding train car, and then turned around to peer into the black vortex of darkness behind him. There was only one course of action that could be made here, that Shinji knew, he moved forward to the light and never looked back.

Chapter Text

9/4/2016,

Now playing: Recollection and Foreshadowing

Shinji did not process where he was going when he left the train car he had awoken in, either way he had found himself exiting the train he was in, stepping on the platform he had little time to process his surroundings before crowds of passengers and would be passengers overflowed from and to the train. After a fair deal of urgency, he had made it to the surface and then had to stop due the sights above ground.

Iwatodai was a huge city, it was cramped at times and had the habit of becoming a den of non-desirable activities when Apathy syndrome came around, with even the Kirijo group unable to curb such. Tokyo however, was much the same, but on a gargantuan scale. If it weren’t for the sight of Shibuya’s tall skyscrapers diverting his attention from the sea of mankind crossing the streets, he would’ve felt like the loneliest man in the world. But he had at least one objective to lead him through, get to Yongen Jaya, find Sojiro Sakura.

He had figured out that he had a GPS application on his phone and set the navigation to Yongen Jaya but as he was doing that, something caught his attention…

Time slowed down to a complete halt, bystanders and pedestrians who were crossing the street and making conversation were put to a stop. In the distance in front of Shinji, there emerged a blue burning flame, it took the shape of a figure, to then reveal himself. There he stood, Shinji seeing Shinji, but one had yellow eyes, a devilish and determined grin, and a coat of Horizon blue, seemingly stained by the blue flames.

Time flowed back in the blink of Shinji’s eyes, he had come to an conclusion about the sight, perhaps he was just very tired.

Yongen Jaya, 4pm

Now playing: Beneath the mask

Shinji had finally arrived at Yongen Jaya, and felt even more lost. Compared to the openness that was the open space that although crowded, was still open that was Shibuya, Shinji felt nothing but cramped here in Yongen Jaya, no similar to the back alley that he wasted away and-. No, he couldn’t think about it.

At the end of his deliberating, Shinji turned up to a café to get some warm food and ask for directions, he had found one in Café Leblanc. He opened the door to find a small, warm and comfortable feeling place. Taking a seat on the counter, the barista of the café asked what he would like. Shinji asked for the curry and house blend, little did he know that this would be the best curry he would ever lay his hands on.

Once he finished his curry, and once he started taking sips from his coffee, Shinji then asked the barista a question

“Hey, thanks for the food, do you mind if I ask a question”

“No, go ahead”

“I’m looking for a Sojiro Sakura in the area, I’m supposed to find him today.”

“Well I do know Mr. Sakura” the barista replied

“Well, where can I find him?”

“He’s standing here in front of you.”

Shinji, taken back a bit, now bore an expression of surprise. He didn’t expect to find Sojiro that fast, or easy.

After a pause that certainly was felt and received as awkward by both parties, Shinji broke the ice by asking another question

“Well, what now?”

“Oh right, I received a letter a few days ago detailing who you are and why you are here, you’re Shinjiro Aragaki yes?”

Shinji nodded.

“You’re here as a transfer student from Iwatodai to attend high school here at a place called Shujin academy, you’re a third year meaning you’ll be wrapping up your education by next year. Additionally, there are some notes from your previous employers saying you are a pretty good cook. Is that true?”

“Yes.” Answered Shinji

“Good, because by the looks of you, you look more like a delinquent rather then a kid, just know that if you do anything illegal, you’ll be heading straight to jail, got that?”

“Got it.” Replied Shinji, the after taste of Sojiro’s amazing curry in his mouth slightly soured by its maker’s words.

“Finish that coffee, I’ll show you where you’ll be sleeping.”

The two men climbed the stairs of the café to be greeted by an attic, it was dusty, dirty and to be honest not too far from the places Shinji slept after leaving the dorm. There was a bed frame for a mattress, even if it was just a spread of plastic containers meant to store glass beer bottles, it was better than sleeping on a bare mattress or the cold hard floor.

“This will be your room, take care of it.”

“Thanks.”

“I got to get back to work downstairs, make yourself comfortable hey?”

As soon as Sojiro exited from the stairs, Shinji let out a sigh. It wasn’t the most ideal of dwellings, but he had lived worse and better before, his mind drifted to the dorms back at Iwatodai, he would be missing that proper bed, courtesy of Mitsuru and the Kirijo group.

Shinji got curious for a moment, when he was figuring out the intricacies of his new phone, he had found that phones could now access internet browsers like a PC, he took it out and to sate his curiosity, keyed in ‘Mitsuru Kirijo’. In the results showed a now older Mitsuru Kirijo, one in her mid-twenties, in a fur coat, donning a warm smile. It was a far cry from her reign as the ice queen, or executor. Shinji smiled, while he was here in Tokyo, at least there was the prospect and thought that his old friends were doing well after he died. However, that smile faded as there came the thought that he did not grow any older, he had stagnated, wasted away in a back alley somewhere in Iwatodai while his friends got the chance to grow, mature and to live and love life. He sat in introspect, thinking what to make of this realisation of his rather shit luck and youth.

“Before I died… I remember being told by Minato to keep my promises. Now I have a second chance to keep those promises…”

A sense of determination filled Shinji, he wasn’t going to let this second chance pass him by and get caught up in his misery or self pity, he was going to live for himself.

Some time later, at around closing time…

Sojiro walked up the stairs to find that the attic he left to this punk wasn’t in the same state he had granted it. It was clean, not a speck of dust was to be found, the contents of Shinji’s duffel bag were on the shelves, the books were in neat piles on the shelves as well. The workdesk was clean and much more organised than the last time he used it.

“What the heck? I heard a lot of noise upstairs but I didn’t imagine you were cleaning your room.”

Shinji sat on his bed in silence.

“Well, it doesn’t look to bad, good job.”

Shinji smiled a little bit, the change of tone from what felt like contempt from Sojiro instead became impressed and of being proven wrong, was something Shinji appreciated.

“Tomorrow we’ll be heading to your new school and registering you in the system, don’t stay up too late we’ll be leaving early.”

“Understood”

“See you tomorrow morning.”

With that, Sojiro left the café, closing shop. Shinji laid there sprawled on the bed, mind swimming in the potential and the possible, and whatever awaits him. With a critical smile on his face, he closed his eyes, and fell asleep.

Chapter Text

10/4   4pm, Leblanc

Now playing: Beneath the mask

Sojiro and Shinji had just returned from Shujin Academy, they got what they were for but man, Shinji was starting to have second thoughts on this school thing. Starting off, the staff were full of crap, at least according to Shinji. Firstly, there was the principal who apart from looking like he did nothing other than sit on his ass, eat crap food and lie, he went on about how it was “his last chance” to complete his education, instead of at the very least pretending to have pleasure in the prospect of helping a seemingly troubled third year finish his education.

Then, there was the P.E teacher, Shinji didn’t have a goddamn care in the world he had an Olympic medal, in the end he just rubbed him the wrong way and reminded him of some assholes back from Iwatodai. That P.E teacher was just like them but with a smile.

Then there was his homeroom teacher, and honestly, he did not feel anger but instead pity, she likely had to deal with the Brainless BS of both the principal, the PE teachers, and likely her other teaching colleagues. Unlike her colleagues she fortunately did not display a false face and play part in the song and dance, unfortunately, she seemed tired, sleep deprived, and generally over it.

This was Shinji’s first impression of Shujin Academy, and he did not really like it. Now he was sitting on his bed, hanging his new school uniform and considering how he got to this point in his life. This deliberation however ended when Sojiro called for his name downstairs.

“Coming down!” Shinji answered, making his way down the stairs

There Sojiro was, tending to a pot of curry, he then took his wooden ladle out of the pot to face Shinji.

“Since you’re now living under this café’s roof and have been recommended by others for your abilities in the kitchen, I figure I’d teach you how to earn your keep here in my café.”

Shinji seemed surprised, with all the talk down towards him about his screw ups and horrible decisions in life, this was one of the few times someone had taken a chance on him. So, then he nodded, walked towards the other side of the counter and took an apron.

After cleaning his hands with diligence, he stood by Sojiro’s side, ready to receive instructions.

Sojiro himself was rather surprised, and a little bit amazed, he did not expect Shinji to know kitchen rules or etiquette, underneath a mask of banality and the minimum amount of stress needed to get by day by day, laid a reconsideration of this troubled lad.

And so an evening of detailed instruction and following of instruction followed, Shinji also found himself reconsidering his new guardian, the Sojiro of this evening of detailed instruction on how to cook the (I repeat) best curry Shinjiro ever had in his formerly very short life, put the old man in a new light. Sojiro was not a harsh man of judgement and words, but in these two hours of cooking, a man with passion for his craft. The fruit of their efforts was unable to be articulated. Now they were sitting on the counter, both eating their curry.

6pm

“Now son, now and then I’ll be asking you to stay here and help out on busier days, is that clear?”

“Yes.”

“Good, it won’t be too much, not much people come here anyway only enough to keep the lights on.”

“Well, would you like it if more people came to enjoy your curry? Because it’s the best curry I’ve ever had.”

Sojiro’s eyes widened, this kid certainly wasn’t the rude punk he had initially thought he was.

“On one hand, a bit more cash in my pocket will not hurt it would be nice however, this space, a quiet and tranquil one is mine, for an old fellow like me that is perhaps much nicer.”

Shinji’s respect of Sojiro had cemented at that moment,

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast aquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Heirophant Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

“Oh, can I also trust you to close shop by closing time? Just flip the sign if I’m not here and its past closing time.”

“Sure.”

Now playing: Color your night

The evening of trust was to be winded down by the aftermath of any round of cooking which was off course, washing the dishes. When that was done, both men exited the café, the elder to take a walk into the city before clocking in for the night, and the younger to have a breath of fresh air outside the café before closing shop.

Shinji appreciated the cold air outside, it was a luxury he wasn’t able to experience back in his former life on the persona suppressant drugs, all was cold without an end. Now however, he was feeling a real breeze, with real cold air and gust on his face. It was so pleasant he almost started to unbutton the buttons on his overcoat to feel more and appreciate the cold breeze more, he however was interrupted by a small creature.

Meow?

Shinji looked down to see a black feline at his feet, seemingly tired from a day of roaming the streets, the little feline fellow was leaning on the wall, trying to curl up into a comfortable spot. Shinji having admired the little guy’s recognition of the warm, coziness and calm atmosphere of the café even when just outside, decided to go get leftovers from dinner to give to the cat.

The feline attacked the food, either out of being somewhat famished, or in amazement of the food that came from this sacred house of curry. After taking their fill, the cat gave Shinji’s trousers a small rub with its head in appreciation, then left.

If this was how the nights will go for Shinji in this new life, perhaps school won’t be too bad after all.

The next day

Now playing: Iwatodai dorm, 2009

Shinji had just exited the train, he’d gotten enough sleep, gotten early enough and had enough of that curry in order to asskick school today. Sure, he might have not been in school physically in two years, but now he knew the consequences of wasting away in his own pity, and in the thought of being undeserving to live for himself, and that resulted in him literally dead on the spot of his crime, bleeding out from two large rounds of smith and Wesson.

Even the rain did not faze him, while other students on their way to Shujin were hurrying, so desperately in their haste but not fast enough to slip on the wet and slippery pavement to then fall on their ass, or under umbrellas. Shinji was just taking his time, walking in his red overcoat, shielding his uniform from the rain, hands in his pockets and not giving a damn.

He did stop on the final stretch at an alleyway, to take off his overcoat, both to dry it a little and to shove the coat into his bag,however much he liked that coat it certainly wasn’t up to dress code.

Upon exiting the alleyway, Shinji saw a shujin student also drying off her coat out of the reach of rain. She was a blond-haired student, with long hair, and an expression of mild discomfort due to the rain. A moment was shared between the two, one consisting of an awkward wave, polite smiles, and standing around doing not much.

This was interrupted unfortunately by the sight of that fuckface P.E teacher, turning up in his car. He offered the student Shinji was earlier sharing an however awkward but pleasant moment a ride in his car to school, out of reach of rain. Guess who that offer did not extend to.

A brief second of grumbling and resentment occurred, having taken out his phone to check the time, Shinji grumbled more at the prospect of having only 10 more minutes to reach school on time, strangely enough a weird app in red and with an eye was found as he was checking the route to school on foot.

“Eh, maybe it’s a mobile game, hopefully its a weird version of tetris.”

At that moment, another blond student was making his way hastily towards the direction Shinji was planning to head, he was cursing and cussing himself on the way, the way he ran (run was more of a charitable word according to Shinji) made it look like he had a the worst rock to ever get stuck in someone’s shoe.

“Dammit! Bitch! Son of a bitch!” the blond fellow uttered to himself.

“Pervy god damn teacher…” the Blondie finished.

“Hmm?” Shinji’s interest was piqued, his discontent and resentment of this P.E teacher was based off his treatment of him yesterday, and the simple fact he had just rubbed him the wrong way, however now with this assertion from this blond and jumpy kid, his assumptions might, unfortunately might hold some truth.

The blond kid turned towards Shinji, his expression telling Shinji he did not know what to say to him, having heard his quiet curses and cussing of the “pervy teacher” , so naturally Shinji broke the ice first.

“So, you don’t like that fella just like I do?”

“Uhh, yeah.” The blond kid answered

They started to walk together, like it or not they both still had to show up to school.

“What’s his name?”

“Suguru Kamoshida, he’s a P.E teacher who’s also a complete arsewipe .”

“What’s your name?”
“Ryuji- Ryuji Sakamoto , hey what’s yours?”

“Shinjiro, Shinjiro Aragaki.”

The two were caught vested in their conversation to the point that they weren’t paying attention to reality distorting in front of their eyes, but they will when they eventually take a supposed shortcut towards school, and destiny.

Chapter Text

“What the hell?”

It was at this moment that Shinji, who was in the middle of a conversation with this kid, now was aware that something was horribly wrong. As the two exited the alleyway, they found to their right the usual city buildings, high rises etc, however the sky had changed from a bright sky tampered by raining clouds to pitch dark. On the left however, as an imposing castle, one of red brick and imposing stature, where according to Ryuji was where Shujin was supposed to be.

“Umm...”

“The eff? What happened to our school?”

It was at this moment that Shinji was experiencing a slight Déjà vu, the premise was feeling far too familiar for his liking. At that moment, Shinji spotted a figure in the distance, in contrast to the red brick construction of the castle, the figure was of a cooler hue, upon closer inspection it was a figure in a suit of armor, this raised eyebrows and both Ryuji and Shinji moved closer in the open to take a closer look.

The figure then turned around to face the two, revealing a far too familiar mask to Shinji, that knight was a shadow. Right now, Shinji’s head had turned to a wellspring of memories, one of navigating a tower of shadows, except its appearance was more menacing, torturous and overwhelming than this castle of red. More memories came in the form of battles, countless on the base of the tower and *Ngghhh* . Shinji felt a tremor, a shift, a break within himself, not only were the memories overwhelming, of younger days, younger friends, and battles forgotten for their sheer quantity, but something within, deeper was rumbling within, and it certainly was not his stomach.

Unfortunately for both Shinji and Ryuji, this episode of memory recall came at the worst time, as when it had ended, Shinji only saw Ryuji’s unconscious body on the ground, and then the pommel of a sword before it bashed his face in.

Shinji woke up an undetermined amount of time later, his body laid on a hard wooden board. Ryuji was less fortunate, for he found himself waking up on the hard and cold stone tiled floor instead. Both guys woke up to find themselves trapped within the confines of a jail cell, and as if it couldn’t get any worse, guess who had to show up.

It was the asshole Physical Education teacher, Suguru Kamoshida, who came to inspect the inmates of his dungeon jail, with shit eating grin and an attire to match, namely almost none. He wore the emperor’s clothes, namely nothing but a cloak and a crown, along with undergarments, Shinji cringed.

“So, why are you ingrates roaming the premises of my castle huh?” Interrogated Kamoshida

“I’d like an explanation by you specifically, Sakamoto. If its good enough I won’t break your other leg today…”

“GO TO HELL!” replied Sakamoto, as he then proceeded to spit in the general direction of the king

At that moment, two shadows made their way into the cell, one was like the shadow they had encountered outside, with mask and armor, the other shadow however, wore the apparel of a cavalry trooper, a hussar perhaps (not of the Polish variety). Instead of donning a suit of armor or even a cuirass, the shadow Hussar donned an intricate form of dress with bright color and style. Displaying both grandeur, status and indicatively, a force on the field of battle.

Here however, it stood here to beat the living daylights out of Ryuji, while his lower status and generic colleague in armour pinned Shinji to the wall by a tight grip and the threat of the sword. Shinji could do nothing but watch his new companion and acquaintance continue to be savagely beaten.

At the end of the beatings, the Hussar stood over the sprawled-out form of Ryuji, lying from the floor.

“Dispose of that brute.” Ordered the emperor

“Yes, my lord.” Replied the hussar, as he took out a flintlock pistol, and prepared to put the finishing touch on his deed.

Ryuji couldn’t process what was happening, he reeling too much in pain to know these moments would be his last, Shinji could however.

At that moment, the tremors, the shaking, and a hell of a headache occurred in Shinji, the shadow knight tightened his grip on Shinji’s neck, believing he was attempting to struggle free to save his mate, unbeknownst to him Shinji was undergoing a very, very painful process which would result in his salvation, Ryuji’s salvation, and the demise of everybody in this castle.

“It seems you are in a rather familiar predicament to me, Shinjiro Aragaki” A voice within Shinji uttered

“I have been in such a similar predicament due to the greed and gold of damn land squatters.” Shinji was barely processing the words, because of his migraine and the ever-tightening grip on his throat, he was now frothing at the mouth. The accented voice then continued.

“Those damn squatters and their coppers from Victoria then took my Mother in for hard labor, while I still was rotting in a jail cell doing time, will you allow similar curs to consign your friend to such a fate?”

“Fuck no!” , Shinji  managed to scream at the top of his lungs, if he was going to die, he would die screaming.

“Very well, Contract. I am thou, thou art I”

“The brand of cain on your brow shall be washed away with your still boiling blood”

“Let us not form a contract, but an agreement.”

“Give those Fiendish and treacherous souls…”

“CAUSE TO RUE THE DAY THEIR MOTHERS GAVE THEM BIRTH!”

At that moment, the emperor, hussar, and knight ceased their previous doing to see as to what was occurring with their second prisoner. Froth was on the floor, and he stood now hunching over, primed to pounce like a wild animal. His glare was not of determined resistance, but of an ever boiling and seething madness which had just been let loose. His eyes started to turn yellow.

A gust had come, emanating from Shinjiro himself, when the gust ceased, he raised his head to not reveal his face, but a sheet of metal crudely attached to his face. All was quiet, and through a narrow slit, he could see the fear coming from the eyes of Kamoshida.

Now playing: Awakening

With a swift motion, Shinjiro grabbed the mask with one hand, and tore off this excuse of a mask from his face the mask fell to the ground, sat now in a small pool of blood. Then boiling blue flames started to gather and surround Shinji as he grinned ever so devilishly and maddeningly to the world around him.

The blue flames licked the threads of his school uniform, being swiftly replaced with a horizon blue overcoat. Along with the new coat, the blue fire had granted Shinji a crudely constructed breastplate of metal, not crafted with care nor time like the armour of the shadow knight now cowering in fear, but what was just small sheet metal welded together formed in crude defence of Shinji. He still had his dark brown beanie on his head, now resting on the fringe of his mask, looking not like an ornate theatre mask but more like a welding mask conjured out of sheer anger and rage.

Needless to say, the king, hussar ,and knight were terrified of this new development, and if it was not terrifying enough already, while this was all happening a ghastly figure was conjuring itself behind Shinji. At an instant, the sound of glass shattering could be heard by all parties in the vicinity, the previously conjuring figure had now fully shown itself to all who could see. It did not appear humanlike, but more a metallic set of crude Armor wearing a coat, it bore on the chest two holes seemingly coming from a revolver. It’s only features which may indicate any sense of humanity was a thin slit on where the eyes *should* be.

With a gesture of the hand by Shinji, now standing fully erect, tall and menacing in the face of those against him, the figure behind him reached to a holster and revealed a six shooter, a single trigger pull and crack then blasted the previously locked jail door wide open. Trembling in fear, Kamoshida and his entourage of the trembling watched the smoke leave the barrel of the revolver.

The figure behind Shinji then shouted in an Irish accent,

“I am Ned Kelly! Bail out or you’re dead men!”

Kamoshida and the quivering shadow knight took the Persona’s threat seriously, and bailed. What was left was the trembling hussar, who had unsheathed his sabre, still with his flintlock in hand, knowing his death was at hand. Shinji did the same, taking out a heavy axe hidden in his overcoat.

The hussar attempted to thrust for Shinji’s chest, only to be cut down by Shinji’s heavy axe. There was nothing remaining of the hussar except for a black pool.

Ned Kelly dissipated. The ghostly figure vanishing in a bout of blue flame.

As for Shinji, he was leaning on the pommel of his axe, relishing the recent occurrence.

And as for Ryuji, he could only get out a few words.

“What the shit?”

What felt like a moment too prolonged finally ended, the blue flames had giveth Shinji a fit straight out of dieselpunk and then taketh away. At this moment, reality struck back as Shinji who was previously relishing in his bloody defiance of the Asshat Kamoshida, now realised that he still needed to escape this cell, the castle, and somehow turn up to school on time.

The two lads ran like bats out of hell, running the Labyrinth that was the castle’s dungeons, Surprisingly, there was little to no resistance or attempt to stop their breakout.

“Hmm, Ned must’ve scared them all off.”

Eventually, following the flow and direction of the stream of water the dungeon held, Ryuji and Shinji were able to locate a manhole cover to escape the dungeons from, when they emerged from their former prison, they had found themselves at the direct spot they had been caught at what felt like some hours ago. The prospect better not be true, because however much time had passed, it was still his first day of school as a third year.

Now playing: So boring

Believe it or not, the two made it to school on time, almost on the dot. The margins were microscopic, but Shinji made it to homeroom in enough time that he could just say he was just coming from the bathroom. Both Ryuji and Shinji made it clear to one another to reconvene at Lunchtime to discuss their shared “Significant emotional experience” after class.

His introduction to his third-year homeroom however had been less then ideal. For once he had given his class his name, there was nothing but hushed gossip, rumors, and the assigning of the “rude and troubled” student of Shujin by his peers.

“Oh christ, is this what I get for actually needing to go to the bathroom here?” Shinji thought to himself.

Chapter Text

Still playing: So boring

A few hours of school were all Shinji needed to be reminded why he stopped turning up to school, except it was much worse here compared to Gekkoukan. Within the premises of Gekkoukan, the rumors regarding Shinji were mainly about his relation to Mitsuru and Akihiko, who he stuck to like glue when he was still attending. Usually it came in the form of relationships, “was he secretly kissing Mitsuru or Aki ? perhaps, maybe even both on particularly slow days.”. But due to Mitsuru’s position as the heir to the Kirijo group, Aki’s miniature status as a small time boxing celebrity, the rumors could be dismissed as just gossip about persons with vague outlines of popularity or status, and it offered the three of them a laugh when studying for bloody exams.

But now he was alone, in a class full of strangers, with the rumour mill and gossip tannery being less kind. Now he was not the supposed crush or boyfriend to the heir to the Kirijo group, or the school’s boxing club president, but a thug, a good for nothing punk, a criminal.

A benefit of skipping school after he did actually commit a crime was that he did not need to hear it. He already knew he was a criminal and a murderer; the rumors did not need to remind him about his bloody red right hand.

And off course, there was the banality of it all. Moments of applying one’s self to learning without the express goal of making it to a good University or set future meant a suffocating existence in the face of teachers of the uncaring variety, rote memorization, and in its most pure and painful incarnation, boredom.

For a moment, Shinji closed his eyes, he needed to rest them from the lack of purely interesting activity in the room to take note off. In the last five minutes he had noted the few interesting sights in a ocean of inattentive students.

No.1- Off course he was not alone in his suffering of the purely painful carnation of boredom that school offered, the feeling was if not universal, applied to the galaxy of banality around Shinji as if he was a celestial body.

No.2- There were only two students who were immune to these violent solar flares of banality in this banal comparison. The first was a girl who wore a pink coat over her shujin uniform, and wore a set of white stockings, she seemed to be not doing too bad in class, she certainly smiled more then her classmates, but the smile here and there gave away a hollow quality, there was certainly something beneath the mask that wasn’t smiling.

No.3- Then there was this other girl, who sat in front of Shinji, she was taking down notes like a storm and was certainly paying the most attention in class. Perhaps she was the student president, the last time he saw this attentive academic behavior was back in Gekkoukan, seeing Mitsuru take notes like she was the storm approaching.

This was the fifth time he had made these repeated observations, the content in the lecture was no interest to him, the teacher was just either repeating himself, getting distracted, or getting crap out of his ass, and calling it “education.”

This was the last thought that Shinji had before closing his eyes.

“Stay awake mate.”

“Hmmm?”

“Stay awake. It’ll be over soon.”

A voice had conjured in Shinji’s head, it shared the same voice of his newly awakened persona just a few hours ago. If Shinji was making excuses to himself to sleep, he certainly now had an excuse to not,

“ I wasn’t able to go to school at your age, I had to bail in order to work at the family farm once Pa died.”

“ How did he die Ned?” Shinji asked his persona deep inside his mind.

“He was thrown in prison for unlawful possession of animal hides, hard labor at a prison colony and alcohol did him in.”

“Oh, I’m sorry Ned.”

“Don’t be my faithful accomplice, we both share a common fate, we might as well stick it out together aye mate?”

“Yeah.”

And so time passed, a pleasant conversation was held deep inside Shinji’s head about similar shit both he and Kelly had to endure, it was an Oasis in the vast emptiness of the outback. One fully appreciated by Shinjiro.

Now playing: All Caps by MF DOOM

Soon, lunch came and Shinji sat in a secluded spot, he wasn’t going to eat any of that canteen crap, because the universal truth still applied, food whose source happens to be from the canteen of a school will take all and any measures to be as uninspiring, banal in its taste, and bland tasting as much as possible. Shinji skipped school for almost two years and was able to avoid that crap, in fact he had learnt how to make food which his former friends would classify as “Gourmet Michelin shit” or at the very least the classification that Shinji would give his own cooking “Not god-awful crap”.

And so he sat there, he was supposed to meet Ryuji by around this time, Shinji assumed that the lad likely was eating his own lunch, so he sat and waited, hoping to doze off in order to gain a few moments rest.

“Will you not eat lad?”

“No, the food here is god awful.”

“I couldn’t simply turn up to one of these canteens to get my meal of the day, me and the mates had to go out and shoot game, sometimes Kangeroos, which was unfortunate those fellas did nothing to me.”

“Yeah Ned? Your point being?”
“Eating is a privilege of the living, do not squander it boy.”
“Hmmm. Next time I’ll bring some curry from Leblanc to eat here is that fine with you Ned?”

“That is fine by me mate.”

When the conversation ended, Shinji woke up to see a blond fellow walking towards him, it certainly was Sakamoto, having finished his lunch and wasn’t looking as shagged as he was when being beaten earlier in that castle.

“Hey, let’s go upstairs so we can talk in private alright?”
“Sure.”

So they went upstairs to the roof, it was a small one, with some plants growing from makeshift planters scattered on spare school desks. After a moment of silence, Ryuji spoke up to break the ice

“Ok, first off- “

“We tell no one about this.”

“Wait, how did you know what I was about to say?”

“It was obvious, and if we did, we’d both be in a lot of unnecessary trouble.”

“Ok, then there’s what comes second”

“You wanna go back in.”

“Ok, stop you’re scaring me.”

“You hate that walking pile of garbage as much as I do and want to expose him for the walking pile of crap that he is.”

Ryuji paused, sure it was a bit freaky that this scary third year could read the words coming from his tongue before it left his mouth, but with this common understanding and agreement, he wasn’t so scared anymore.

“Yeah. I’ve spent enough time around Shujin to really know Kamoshida for what he really is.”

“I’m sure you’ve noticed some of the signs as well too.”

“No, its my first day here.”

“Your first day! Well shit, uhhhh    welcome?”

“Hmm, thanks.”

Ryuji looked at the time on his phone, and jumped from his table where he was seating.

“Ah, crap! Lunch is almost ending, we both need to get to class”

Shinji took his stuff and was heading towards the stairwell but was stopped by Ryuji

“Hey, before you go, wanna exchange contact info?”

“Sure.”

And so they did.

After school, 15:15 pm

Now playing: Way of life, deep inside my mind

Shinji was making his way out; school today could be described aptly described according to Shinji as a ton of bricks falling on him. All the bad things which made him bail on school were still present here in Shujin (sans manslaughter). But most importantly, it got him thinking about what Ryuji said, about there being signs of the skeletons in the closet that Kamoshida might be keeping. When this thought popped up, Shinji looked around the first floor as he was making his way to the exit.

He certainly saw the “signs” which meant, male kids in P.E kit looking like they were beaten black and blue, the girls in their P.E kit also beaten black and blue, along with a fifteen-mile stare which Shinji had seen far too much off in his time. One kid in a green and white sweater who was also black and blue was booking it to the exit as fast as he could, carrying what seems to be a laptop case.

Shinji at this point had enough tells to come to a current conclusion of what is occurring in what felt less like a school and more like a prison colony.

As soon as Shinji finished his observation of the student base, he saw the one of the beaten students making her way to a not so beaten student. Upon closer inspection, it was realized that the non beaten student was the blond student he had stood next to when taking shelter from the rain earlier today, it had felt like an age ago.

They both exchanged words to each other, and then parted, both separating with a smile that exuded not warmth or glee, but fatigue, weariness, and other descriptors of less then desirable states of mental well being.

When the two parted in their respective directions, Shinji went the same way, he intended to start making his way home, but that was ended when on his way to leave the area, he saw the blond student from earlier kneeling in a small cubby on the pavement, evidently crying.

Shinji couldn’t ignore this, neither it seemed another student, for both he and the other student went to their respective sides of the kneeling student to inquire if she was ok. The kneeling student then rose up, attempting to cover her eyes with one hand and wipe her tears away. The other student who quickly came with Shinji to see if she was ok handed the weeping student a handkerchief. Shinji finally diverted his glance away from the student now drying her tears with the handkerchief to see who it was who gave it.

It was the student with the pink jumper who was in Shinji’s class. She then offered to bring both of them to a restaurant for some tea and to make sure that their shared acquaintance was ok.

At the restaurant,                                                                                  Now playing: Encounter

“And if I don’t do it, he’ll- he’ll *sniff* he’ll”

“Its ok, Ann, have some water.”

Shinji sat in silence, the role of being a reassuring voice of tranquility and calm wasn’t Shinji’s forte, it certainly was for Haru though.

While sharing a table with the other two, Shinji was able to learn the names of his classmate he saw at his classroom, and the student he shared a moment of the aforementioned awkward wave, polite smiles and not much more. Her name was Ann Takamaki, a second-year student, and a part time model. While the student who was in Shinji’s classes was Haru, she was polite, kind and was a part of the unofficial underground gardening club which had a membership of one person, Haru.

So that was who was tending to the plants at the roof.

For the next hour, a discussion had been undergoing over various topics, Haru’s garden, Ann’s modelling, cooking, Ann’s friend also known as Shiho, the current degrading safety and security of the both of them and others under the shadow of Kamoshida, among other things. It was a pleasant conversation, and Shinji enjoyed it, he certainly enjoyed it to a sizable extent because he was unaware that despite all attempts in the past, his assumed loss of the capability to do so once he left the dorm, Shinji had perhaps the most genuine smiling expression on the table. While Ann’s was of joy under the reassurance of Haru, Haru’s smile being based off the warmth of caring and unconditional positive regard, Shinji’s was itself based on something deep inside feeling both genuine and happy. It was a conversation that he would cherish the memory of, and hope to feel again soon.

It was a pleasant experience, and because of that it had to end. The three stood outside the restaurant, exchanging phone numbers, with Haru and Shinji reminding Ann that if Kamoshida were to do anything to her or Shiho, they should speed dial them ASAP. With that said, Ann went her separate way to presumably home while Haru and Shinji for the moment were heading home through the same way. At that moment, something hit Shinji while he was making his way back.

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast aquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Lovers Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

“Hmmf, cool.”

“What was that?” Haru asked

“Uh, nothing…”

An awkward pause followed, with ice forming between the two due to the silence between them, Shinji then went to break that ice.

“So, if you don’t mind me asking, would you not mind if I help you out on the garden on the roof now and then, I used to do that sort of thing some time ago but now I’m rusty.”

“Sure! It gets lonely gardening up there, and I wouldn’t mind company.”

“Thanks.”

The two then stopped by a taxi stop, and then stood around for some while, then suddenly a Limousine drove into the taxi stop, with a flash of a card of sorts Haru was able to get into the Limo, with her eventually signalling to Shinji to get inside.

Shinji stood there rather shocked, mostly at the prospect of riding one of these again. After a few seconds of silent shock, he did eventually enter the vehicle, Haru telling Shinji to tell the driver where he needed to go home to. In a silent limousine drive to Yongen Jaya, Shinji had been reminded of memories past.

\

Now playing: Color your night

“So we’re going to your house to do our homework then have a sleepover, but how are we gonna get there ?”

“Well, I can put in a call”

The red headed kid got out her flip phone, dialed a number and in a few minutes, a long and large sleek automobile then appeared on the street.

“What! I didn’t think you’d have a limousine Mitsuru!” exclaimed the silver haired kid.

The kids then got inside the limousine and were ferried off to the Kirijo estate for their homework and sleepover, little did they know that their next surprise was that Mitsuru Kirijo lived in a god damn mansion.

*Flashback fin*

Shinji smiled, that memory was one of pure joy and excitement that he had experienced when he was younger, and was certainly a defining one for that phase of his life. He couldn’t help but think about Akihiko and Mitsuru, and wondered if he’ll ever see them again. That removed the smile on his face and instead replaced it with a neutral expression with a tint of gloom.

“Comfortable over there?” inquired Haru

“All good here.” Replied Shinji, shifting slightly in his seat.

Eventually, the trip ended, and Shinji was dropped off outside Leblanc, waving bye to Haru as the limo drove to wherever she needed to go.

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast aquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Empress Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

Shinji had a pretty crap day at school, ran in the rain to then have reality be pulled out like a rug out from under him, nearly get killed after reality was pulled out under him afterwards, tear off a piece of metal off his bloodied face which almost felt welded to it, school, so on and so forth. But if his compensation for his pain was the friendship of these wonderful individuals in his life (including Ned), it was certainly worth it. Shinji remained stood there in amaze of what had just occurred, combined with appreciation, and it only took the patting on his back by Sojiro, who had happened to see everything.

Sojiro, with a smug smile that Shinji, if he were to use a less then polite term to describe it, would be called “shit eating” then broke the silence.

“Well that was something, did you make a new friend at school?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, several.”

“Wow, hoo boy if that lass gave you a ride back on your first day of school and meeting her, you must be something special.”

“I don’t have a crush on her, don’t you dare.”

The change of tone to a dead and serious one was a message to Sojiro to stop, and he got it. Either way, both the men went back inside to close shop, which left Shinji sitting on his bed, with nothing to do but be caught up in his thoughts.

“Hmmm, if we were to go back to that castle, and find proof of Kamoshida’s closet skeletons, how did we get there in the first place?”

Shinji tried to think about what happened exactly before reality started to end its reign before his eyes. He racked his brain but in the end he gave up, and decided to pursue a different course of action. He took out his phone and decided to scroll through memes on YouTube out of boredom. After some time, he did get bored of that, and scanned his phone for the weird looking app, now seriously hoping it was a weird version of tetris in order to deliver him from boredom.

Shinji wouldn’t receive such deliverance, but he would receive answers to his previous endeavor.

“Welcome to the Metaverse navigator application, insert key words into audio input”

“What the?”

The application was a simple one, there was only three areas each labelled respectively

“Area of distortion” “Distortion of area” and “Distorted individual”

Each was filled, with the terms in order of the previously mentioned areas

“Shujin” ,“castle or something” and “shithead Kamoshida”

It all started to make sense now, as Shinji now remembered a part of his conversation he had with Ryuji when taking the shortcut

“What does he think he is, king of a castle or something? With a crown and cape? If anything there is no crown that’s a bunch of shit, he’s shithead Kamoshida! Yeah!”

“Heh.”, Shinji let off a humoured huff.

Shinji decided he was done for the day, plugging his phone to his charger, he then went to his bed and then, passed out.

Chapter Text

A place that exists between dream and reality…

Now playing: Aria of the soul, guitar cover
“Ugh, what time is it?” Inquired Shinji, as he woke up. The overwhelming sight of velvet blue then roused him.

“This place seems familiar.” Shinji looked around, the place he found himself in was one of the surreal and whimsical nature.

“Have I been here before?” Shinji questioned himself, he was seated on a chair in front of a desk, that felt familiar, but his surroundings certainly were not.

“Wait, I have been here.” Shinji claimed to himself, he looked around again, trying to get a sense of scale to the place he found himself. He found himself not in an elevator shaft, but on a ferry.

Shinji looked over his shoulder to see a hooded figure, they possessed a long paddle and were clearly paddling the ferry to an unknown destination. 

“Hello there trickster.”
“Welcome to my velvet room.”

Shinji was caught off guard, he had turned around to see a familiar face

“This place exists between mind and matter, dream and reality.”

“Haven’t seen you in a few days.” Stated Shinji

“ And likewise, seven years.”

“Seven years?!”

“By the time you had signed your contract, you were still tethered to your fate which you had met in the human year two thousand and nine. By the time you had left the room, that thread of fate had been cut loose from you.”

“Now you stand here as my guest, a newly awakened wild card, and a trickster, the potential possibilities endless.”
“You surely have a series of questions, which I do have answers for, let us start with your new awakened power, and off course, the responsibilities that come with.”

“First, The world that you and your friends had slaved to save is not well as of late.”

“It has the potential to reach new heights previously unseen, or fall within the clutches of distortion and ruin.”
“That is where you come in, our trickster.”

“As a wildcard and the trickster, you are the catalyst for change, your power could be an undeniable and u nmovable force for humanity, or be the source of its downfall.”

Shinji gulped, and started to consider his prospects as the holder of this potential, power and responsibility. If this was the responsibility that Minato had back then, and how it must’ve burdened him into almost complete silence.

“Second, regarding just yesterday’s events, you are owed an explanation.”

“Ok?” 

“The place you had entered yesterday was indeed, a source of one of man’s distortions, specifically lust. This hub, this root of distortion is called a palace.”

“From the palace springs shadows, distortion and ruin.”

Shinji nodded, he is only beginning to understand his purpose here, but he damn well knows what to do to shadows.

“As for your goal, your mission, it would be to infiltrate the palace, locate the seed, its root, the source of distortion per say, and steal it.

“Ok, seems simple enough.”

“There however lies a obstacle in your way, the previously mentioned source of distortion is immaterial, as man’s distortion is birthed from the desires of man made distorted.”

“To make material, said root of distortion, one must make aware the immaterial desires to their owner. Then they will be made material which you then shall steal.”

“Alright, anything else Igor?”

“Some words of advice, don’t get caught.”

“Alright.”

“Before you awaken to the new day, there is one final thing you should know, your old allies, your comrades which you had fought to stave off Humanity’s desire for death, are still alive. If you may so permit them, they can be an asset to your journey.”

“Got it.”

Shinji stood up, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to rope them in to this mess again, he certainly did not want to encroach on their lives, more well lived and appreciated than his life ever was.

He stood up, took a better look of the velvet room, or ferry he saw that there was not one, but two people who were rowing the ferry, it just that the second was behind Igor and his long nose. The one behind him was no longer on their paddle, they were instead wielding an instrument, one with strings and a round shape, almost shaped like a paddle. Shinji could not see their faces.

Out of curiosity, Shinji looked out to the water the ferry cruised on, it glowed with a faint blue, fog emanated from it, and vague images and, were those cards?
He bent over to take a better look, the water below had cards floating in the waters the ferry was heading, if it ever was heading a certain direction, Shinji could not tell.

“Where are we?”

“We are navigating a tributary of the river of souls, leading to the sea of souls.” Replied one of the Ferry folk

“All personas and all souls eventually soon come to the river, to them be delivered to their final destination.”

“We are not heading there though, for your journey and destiny, we must head the other way now.”

“Does this river have a name?” Asked Shinji

“Some call it the Styx.” Stated the ferry folk.

And with that, Shinji started to fall back to unconsciousness. A dawn of a new day was to come.

Chapter Text

“Lad, wake up, its dawn now.”

“Ughhh, five more minutes Ned.”

“When I was still around, extra sleep meant more time for the bloodhounds to find my trail, you ought to think of it that way, bail up.”

“Alright Ned, you got me.” Shinji uttered to himself as he dragged his formerly sleeping body off the bed.

Shinji sat down on the counter, eating his morning curry and taking sips of his coffee, remembering his promise to Ned, he took a portion of curry from the fridge for lunch later. While he was fitting his lunch into his bag, his phone vibrated.

It was a message from Ryuji.

Tuesday, 12/4/20XX

Sakamoto_Ryuji: hey meet after school on roof? got things which may help if we go back in

Aragaki_Shinjiro: sure

Shinji then turned off his phone, slung his bag on, and then exited the café.

After school, on the roof

Now playing: Memories of the school

Shinji sat on the roof, eating whatever was left of his curry that he was not able to finish at lunch, he sat waiting, enjoying the breeze and fading golden sun. It was a moment of peace and calm he wished he had experienced more, before that forsaken night. He’d been thinking about old comrades, whether they were still around, somehow comprehend his continued existence post mortem, and whether he should ask them for their help on his journey, as Igor suggested.

Whether he’d do it or not, he certainly wished he was eating his lunch here with Aki and Misty, and that they were enjoying one of those killer sunsets on Gekkoukan’s roof.

But eventually, Ryuji had arrived, he came bringing what seemed to be a sports kit bag. Looking over his shoulder, Ryuji then shut the door leading upstairs and headed to sit next to Shinji. Shinji started to get an idea for what Ryuji might be keeping in that bag.

“Ok, I took the opportunity to use my pay check from triple seven to get some things which may help us, but lets use them at the castle instead of here, don’t wanna get caught.”

Shinji nodded

“By the way, have you worked out how we got to the castle in the first place? Last time we got there, it was almost out of nowhere”

“I did, actually.” Shinji took out his phone to show Ryuji the culprit app, playing the recordings of Ryuji’s ad hominem of Kamoshida, explaining that the filling of the areas had brought the two of them to a distorted reality.

“Holy shit.”

“What?”

“I think I might have that app too” Ryuji took out his phone and opened it, he then flicked over to the specific page to show, hidden within a bunch of mobile games, was the application.”

“Hmm, at least if I lose my phone I won’t have to worry too much, neither will you.”

“Dude, I’ll have to worry about the gut punch my mom’s wallet will get.”

“Oh, sorry.”

“It’s ok dude, let’s get going.”

You have now arrived at your destination

Ryuji and Shinji found themselves in the courtyard of the castle, making their way towards a blind spot, Ryuji then kneeled, opening the bag and revealing the contents.

Inside the bag, was an assortment of medicine, mostly painkillers, some food, sandwiches, a flashlight, and most surprising and shocking to Shinji, a revolver, and several hand bombs.

“I got the painkillers and flashlight from an emergency first aid kit in my house, and some extra sandwiches-“

“Wait hang on, how did you get a gun, let alone those hand grenades?” Interrupted Shinji

“Those? Theres an airsoft shop in Shibuya which sells that stuff, its replicas and airsoft versions however, they do not kill.” Explained Ryuji

“Hmm, can you bring me there this Sunday?” asked Shinji

“Sure, the owner’s a scary guy though” answered Ryuji

Shinji nodded at Ryuji approvingly.

Going back from the way which they escaped, through a manhole cover pried open, the two of them made their way through the sewer to the underground dungeon, with Shinji in front, clad in his steel Armor, with now a revolver tucked in his coat pocket and Ryuji behind him, bag slung to his front, with grenades at the ready for emergency. They made their way through, leading to a fork in the path.

Taking a peek, Shinji saw the path to the left led to the jail cell which they were held yesterday, while the path to the right led to a flight of stairs. Their path was chosen.

The path upstairs led to a hallway, a welcome change of scenery and smell from the dungeon below. Walking through the hallway, the sound of clanking and clashing armor could be heard. Shinji then gestured Ryuji to take cover in a blindspot of the patrolling shadow’s view.

For some tense moments, the shadow then passed the checkered tiles which Shinji and Ryuji were hiding in, passing them entirely and disappeared into the flight of stairs heading below. A sigh of relief by both, the two continued their infiltration.

After some more bouts of infiltrating and sneaking past patrolling guards, the two stumbled upon a barracks of sort, with there being wooden bed frames supposedly for the shadow knights. However, they weren’t laying in rest in their bunks, instead they were crowded, around ten or twelve of them around what seemed to be their boss, who was making an important announcement.

“Listen up, after yesterday’s incident, the king has ordered for patrols by us knights to be more in quantity and length! We cannot afford gaps in our security, for they would serve as humiliation to our Sovereign in his own house!”

“SIR, YES SIR!”

Shinji and Ryuji waited a while until it seemed the rest of the pack had left the barracks, they then got up and entered the barracks. To their dismay, there but actually remained one lone shadow in the barracks, sitting down, polishing his sword.

After what felt like a (fucking) eternity of staring and blinking at each other, the shadow rose up from his wooden chair with his sword, only to disintegrate into several smaller shadows, specifically pixies. Shinji took out his axe and proceeded to do battle.

“Ned! Cut them down!” Shouted Shinji as he tore off his mask

Ned then appeared, drawing his revolver quick as a hiccup, fired at one of the shadows for it to fall to the ground. Shinji grinned at the sight, only for Ned to shout at Shinji

“Oi! Take out your firearm, let them have it!”

Within the heat of the moment, Shinji took out his revolver, lost within said moment, Shinji forgot what Ryuji had said about the gun being a fake, and promptly started squeezing the trigger.

“What are you doing!” Shouted Ryuji as Shinji was in the process of operating his firearm

Shinji was roused to attention, realising what he was doing, it was far too late though.

BANG

With a loud crack, the revolver fired off a round towards one of the flying pixie, she was no match for hot flying lead however, because when she was hit, she then disintegrated into nothingness.

The other shadows shocked at this escalation of events, they started to panic, Shinji with a little bit of shock in his system, regained the initiative and started to squeeze off shots from his revolver, dispatching the panicking pixies.

By the time the final pixie was left to her fate, Shinji had used up the entire cylinder’s rounds, evident by the clicking of the mechanism within and of it rotating. Shinji then took his axe and walked to the quivering and shivering Pixie.

“Ok, time to go to hell.”

“WAIT!”

Shinji stopped

“I CAN GIVE YOU ANYTHING, PLEASE DON’T KILL ME!”

“Give what?”

“MONEY, MY THINGS, MY POWER EVEN!”

Shinji stood still at the mention of power, only to nod at the shadow

“YOU WON’T KILL ME???”

Shinji continued to nod.

“THANK YOU SO MUCH MISTER!” shouted the pixie, as she turned to a copy of Shinji’s mask, gliding towards Shinji’s face, forming a compact anew.

Shinji stood there, consciously processing what had happened, his supposed airsoft revolver model had discharged live rounds, and his former opponent had turned into his mask, which he was now wearing.  Unconsciously something deep within Shinji had been stirred.

Ryuji, also beyond shock and horror, that the supposed airsoft gun which he bought that was supposed to shoot BBs had shot live rounds, but found himself starring at the back of Shinji’s blue overcoat, visibly processing the events, was slowly being overcome with concern.

Tapping his arm gently, Ryuji asked Shinji how he was doing.

“Hey man, you ok?”

“Yeah” he said with a pause “I’m a bit shaken, but fine.”

Shinji was roused back to reality “We need to displace, those shadow’s friends probably heard the loud noise-

“ THERE THEY ARE!”

“Ah shit.”

Eleven shadows appeared, coming from the way they came, they lined up shoulder to shoulder in front of the only way out.

“YOU HAVE FIVE SECONDS TO SURRENDER TO KING KAMOSHIDA’S TROOPS”

Shouted their assumed leader, standing in the middle, aiming a flintlock at Shinji’s head

“FIVE”

Shinji reached into his pocket, taking out a hand grenade, Ryuji behind him and kneeling behind a bunk saw this, and then fumbled through his bag for another one.

“FOUR”

Shinji was working through the grenade, trying his best to extract the safety pin with his left hand

“THREE”

Ryuji had managed to take the pin from his bomb, grasping it with an iron grip to ensure the spoon does not eject itself from it. He was just waiting for Shinji.

“TWO”

Shinji finally worked the pin out and then braced himself to throw the bomb at the shadows.

“ONE!”

Both Shinji and Ryuji threw their bombs at the shadows, with Shinji diving for cover by one of the bunks.

Two loud explosions could be heard almost simultaneously, shrapnel and fragmentation flew everywhere, with dust everywhere.

With the dust settled, Shinji and Ryuji peeked from cover to see the effect of their first time with hand grenades, pieces of armor were scattered on the floor, puddles of black shadow matter filled the room, and an assortment of shadows in their true form now remained.

In this moment of observation however, the shadows attacked, they attacked Shinji, glancing blows upon Shinji’s metal armor, the situation was not dire, but it will be soon, he wasn’t in a position to reach for his weapon, his revolver, or his mask to summon his persona.

Ryuji could do nothing but watch as Shinji received beatings from the shadows, helpless to the situation, Ryuji couldn’t throw a second grenade, lest Shinji be caught in the blast.

It was at that moment that Kamoshida, walked into the barracks

“Well then, if it isn’t the bastard Ryuji and his dog.”

Ryuji continued to sit there helpless, as Shinji was being restrained by the shadows, who had finally overpowered the man.

“As for your punishment, Ryuji, you’ll watch your friend be drawn and quartered, after we’re done with him, you’ll be next.”

“No.” uttered Ryuji in a hushed voice

“Your mother should’ve raised you better, but unfortunately you are, and remain a bastard.” An evil laugh could be heard from Kamoshida, taking pleasure in twisting the proverbial knife in Ryuji more.

At that moment, a voice could be heard within Ryuji, one of peculiar tongue and accent.

“It seems you are caught in a bind, my friend.”

“I have been in some of my own, in fighting for the independence for a republic across the great sea, I came back to my home to find my home, the commonwealth gobbled up by surrounding treacherous neighbors, making me a man without a home, without a nation, dispossessed, an illegitimate child without their parents, a bastard.”

It was at this moment that Ryuji fell to the ground, his mind became feverish, he started to froth in the mouth, and somewhere deep within ryuji was a tidal wave of rage. It swept over him like a man being taken out to sea. Ryuji could only see red, it was anger, pure anger only comparable to perhaps anger of the Polish variety.

“We then rebelled against the forces that sought to destroy and eat up our then republic and land, will you do the same my friend?”

Ryuji snapped, “GO FUCK YOURSELF YOU PERVY FUCK!” he shouted at Kamoshida

“Very good, contract, I am thou, thou art I”

“The protection of freedom from tyrants can be paid only with the shedding of blood.”

“Let us paint our banner with the blood of tyrants who seek to destroy our newly gained freedom.”

“Niech żyje Rzechpospolita Polska.

”At that moment, a mask of red and white had conjured on Ryuji’s face. You know happened next.   

“HRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!”

Now playing: Kalina Malina, cover by Kapela Net

Blue fire surrounded the blond boy in a whirlwind, dissipating a moment later, it revealed a conjured figure on horseback, one wearing a general’s clothing, coloured white, holding the reigns of the horse which was of a brown colour. Behind the horse laid a battle standard, a banner, looking at the standard, it had a eagle donning a crown, behind a backdrop of red.

Ryuji off course was also there, donning what could be assumed was the uniform of a Uhlan, decked with a cavalry sabre, a red sash around his chest, and a pistol holstered to his side.

“GALLOP KOŚCIUSZKO GALLOP!” shouted Ryuji

The general nodded, as he then at full speed galloped at the shadows, either scaring them away, or running them over, trampling them with the hooves of Kościusko’s horse.”

Kamoshida wasn’t to be found, having fled

Shinji, now stood up, staring through the narrow slit of his mask, saw Ryuji single-handedly take on the survivor’s of Kościusko’s charge, with sabre in one hand and automatic hand gun in the other, wild sabre slashes and shots of 32. acp were heard and witnessed.

At the end, the previously small puddles of black shadow matter had coalesced into a big stain on the floor, weapons and bits of lead and armor laid on the floor on the stain, with Ryuji standing at the foot of the collective shadow gore, reveling in chaos.

Kościusko then disappeared, having done his duty, Ryuji then turned to Shinji, running to him to assess the extent of Shinji’s possible injuries

“Dude, are you ok? Those shadows were beating you and held you down for a bit”

“I’ll be ok, are you ok?” replied and asked Shinji

“I feel great!” replied Ryuji with exclamation

Ryuji however then started to feel faint, a little discombobulated and worn out from his recent awakening to a persona and fight. Shinji then held Ryuji’s side, and then led his stumbling friend back to the hallway which they came, hoping to find shelter they opened a door which led to a mischievous room in the hall, just in time to avoid reinforcements heading to the barracks.

Settling Ryuji down, Shinji then took out his phone and frantically opened the app which brought them here. Opening the ‘Metaverse Navi’ app, he then with some relief, found a button labelled “return home”. And so with frantic button mashing, the two persona users returned back to their reality.

Some time later, the roof

  Now playing:Sweet

Not a moment had passed since Shinji and Ryuji had left in order to infiltrate Kamoshida’s palace, and it did not pass when they returned, though haggered and tired, they were still alive, and that was cause enough for Shinji to take the sandwiches from Ryuji’s bag after putting back the revolver and left over grenades inside, for a snack.

Eating the sandwiches was a welcome break for Shinji, as Ryuji attacked his sandwich, Shinji was appreciating the grilled cheese he had in his hands.

“Hey Ryuji, this grilled cheese is really good, did you make it?”

Ryuji looked to Shinji, with a somewhat tired expression and explained

“No, it was my mom who made the sandwiches, told her I made a new friend and that he didn’t bring a packed lunch to school, so she insisted I bring you one today.”

“Well, tell her I say thank you, and that her grilled cheese sandwich is awesome.”

Ryuji, now with a smile replied, “Yeah, will do.”

After some silence, and after finishing his sandwich, Ryuji then spoke up

“So, now that this power, I guess I’ll have to pick up some of the weight in Kamoshida’s castle right?”

“Yeah, you’re gonna have to carry some of the weight on your own, can you do it?”

“Hell yeah.”

“Good.”

The two thieves shook hands, and at that moment, something hit Shinji.

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast aquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Chariot Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

It was a sweet moment; the sun was setting on the forming of a new friendship and bond. Both Shinji and Ryuji were smiling and enjoying the moment.

 This moment however ended, with both Shinji and Ryuji staring not at the sunset, but glancing the opposite way towards the makeshift garden, realising that a very concerned and frozen Haru, who was previously tending to the garden while the two of them ate their sandwiches, was now listening to their open aired conversation, with a very very concerned expression.

Chapter Text

Now playing: Suspicion

“Aww, piss.”

All three souls on the roof remained on standby accompanied by unhealthy amounts of anxiety, even unhealthier the anxiety held by Shinji and Ryuji, having to now explain their “extracurricular activities” to Haru now in P.E, or regular gardening attire at least according to Haru.

Haru remained silent, her expression remained perhaps the best working poker face, it can only be assumed what feelings of uncertainty or associated with such would be laid behind the mask.

“You’re not letting us leave this roof until we explain, are you?” Inquired Shinjiro

Haru nodded affirmatively.

“Alright sit down, Ryuji hand her one of them sandwiches, it’s going to be a long story.”

Once Haru removed her gardening gloves and settled down with sandwich in the unsoiled nondirty hand, she would listen attentively to the story her recent acquaintance had to tell.

“There’s a world that exists parallel to ours, it comes from the distorted desires of humans, it’s called a palace.”

“The palace we just left was Kamoshida’s.”

Haru nodded, indicating she was still with them and not lost yet.

“We wanna find proof of the crimes that piece of shit has probably done.”

Within Haru was the vivid image of the black and beaten students, faces frozen with helplessness, fright, dread, and of life and hopes. The road which led to the school turning into the charnel house of suffering and mental desolation was built and designed by its supposed king of the court, who’s house was constructed by his actual attending court, the indifference of school staff, teachers, the principal, the parent’s association, and students indifferent to their fellow classmates plight.

Told to keep heads down, keep grades high, and to stay out of trouble. To Haru, this was the banality of evil. Within the confines of Haru behind perhaps the best poker face in the world at this rate was an ever-simmering anger, brought to a boil, simmering, and bubbling within her conscious thought. In a better world where people were better in all respects and qualities, all of this shouldn’t have happened, or should at least been put to a stop much earlier by better people who knew better and stood up to the occasion. Unfortunately, no one did.

Any thought of sorrow within Haru was immediately vaporized like a drop of water into the pan when the inevitable implication came, to continue this path herself, was to join the ranks of the uncaring, the blind, and one of evil’s most insidious, banal, and snakelike forms, indifference.

Haru had made up her mind, she was not listening to any of the specifics Shinji raised about the supposed cognitive world born from the parts of Kamoshida’s demented mind where the sun doesn’t shine, or the mission that he and his friend was undergoing at risk of their lives. She wanted in.

“And that’s most of the stuff you need to know.” Explained Shinji, unaware that Haru was not listening to his explanation of the world they had just departed from, nor the mission.

“So, are you going to rat us out or not?” quickly asked Ryuji

Haru put her hand on her heart, changing expression from a cold and dead stare to one of deep thought. Seriously, she’s really good at this poker face spiel.

After taking a final bite from her provided sandwich, Haru then announced her choice.

“I want to help.”

Expressions expressing surprise were present on the faces of Shinji and Ryuji, to their point of view, Haru had somehow taken the premise of their recent “extracurricular” activities well, but also was willing to put herself at risk and harm’s way with them without any persuasion, argument, or any display of fear or trepidation to be seen or displayed.

“Are you for real?!” Shouted Ryuji

“Yeah, are you really really sure about this?” clarified Shinji

“Yes.”

“Are you sure you thought this through?” Asked Shinji for the final time

“Yes,” she reiterated, “I want to help.”

“Alright.”

A pause was present, as Shinji needed to find the words to lay out whatever the next course of action might be.

“Ok, tomorrow, meet us on the roof tomorrow, same time we’ll bring you, bring what you think may be useful but not too much, be light."

Haru nodded, but Ryuji kept a developing expression which spoke of unease and uncertainty. As the three finally started to make their way back home, going their separate ways with Haru heading to a taxi stop and the guys to the train station.

Ryuji’s expression took its final form as soon as the train gates started closing. Curious, Shinji whispered

“Why the long face?”

“Don’t you think she didn’t think this through, Or was perhaps too eager, we almost died in there for crying out loud!”

“Keep your voice down, and yeah a little, but if we turned her down, she still knows we’re the owner of a firearm, its fake but still.”

“How are you taking this so easy, she could get hurt!”

“We’re not in a position to turn her down, she knows what we do and honestly, I think she knows we know that.”

“What?”

“Besides, I think we can trust her.”

“I hope you’re right.” Said Ryuji in a reluctant manner

“We can’t do this alone.”
Shinji’s mind flashed back to the past yet again.

Memory of others, 2007, the roof

Now playing: Memories of the school

Shinji was sat on the roof of Gekkoukan, waiting for Aki and Misty.

Cue the door opening and emerging from the darkness came two familiar friendly faces. One with a suitcase in hand, the other with sandwiches.

The now three friends together sat, eating their lunch enjoying the spring air and breeze. Talking about school, the silly rumors about the three of them, laughing at the silly rumors. It was an amazing day which Shinji wished he could return to.

“So, what did that dumbass say again?”

“He was asking if I or you were dating Mitsy in order to see if he could have a shot at her”

“And you could’ve said you weren’t dating me; it would’ve been fine!"

“I could, but I wanted to have a little bit of fun, and it did get him to back off.”  

Shinji laughed, “This is why we’re never beating the rumors.”

The three laughed in the warming sun, it was a moment one could consign to the confines of a dream, if it weren’t so real.

“I mean, it did work!”  Shouted Aki, followed by a chuckle

The three settled down, and finished their sandwiches, Shinji however noticed that a silence had settled upon his friends, when he then finished his sandwich he then asked the two of them a question.

“What’s in the briefcase Misty?”

Mitsuru remained silent, but Aki then took the lead

“About that, we came here to ask something of you Shinji.” Stated Akihiko

“Yeah, what is it?” asked Shinji

“You see, we have a proposition for you.” Explained Mitsuru

She then opened the briefcase to reveal a pistol, an armband and a pocket watch.

“What the?” a surprised but subdued expression came over Shinji

“We want you to join us, be a part of our”

Mitsuru paused for a moment,

“Extracurricular activities, Akihiko put a word for you said you should join us”

“Hmmmf.”

A moment of silence followed

“I don’t know what the hell you guys are doing, but if you’re putting yourselves in danger, I want in, at least to keep you two from getting killed.”

“Parfait.”

“I’ll join on only one condition though.”

“What would that be Shinji?”

“Can I have that pocketwatch?”

Akihiko took the pocketwatch and tossed it over to Shinji, which he caught. Mitsuru then closed the briefcase and stood up, lunchtime was almost over.

“Briefing at the dorm at 2100 hours, don’t be late Shinji” She said in a jubilant tone

Shinji stood there smiling. Admiring the pocket watch and the hands, ticking away, marching on to a destination without end.

Memory end

When the memory ended, Shinji quickly shuffled through  his jacket’s breast pocket, reaching for something, when he felt it, he brought out the remains of a pocket watch, it showed the backside. It was decorated with engravings of the number 2, and the initials SEES.

He turned the watch around to discover an unfortunate scattering of damage on the front. The glass was cracked, the fault lines of the cracked glass looking like a spiderweb. The hands have finally stopped moving. The purpose of these pocket watches, assigned to SEES members courtesy of the Kirijo group was to keep time while time stopped during the dark hour. There was a need to keep time in an hour that didn’t exist.

To see that old thing survive two years of use, then neglect, then a 12.7 by 41mm piece of hot lead, was a miracle to Shinji. He felt grateful, as he grasped the watch and held it close to his heart. He closed his eyes and felt an invisible ticking, Shinji likely thought it was the watch's invisible hands, keeping time for him even after destruction, but it was his heart, still beating, still alive.

Chapter Text

The next day, The Okumura Residence, 6 in the morning

Now playing: The cave, by aivi and surasshu, from Steven Universe

Haru woke up the next day to a rapidly fading night, having set up her alarm to go off before the moon was relieved by an approaching sun taking its place. For her morning routine included activities that her father would certainly consign as a “Waste of time” and a “distraction from the important things,” henceforth moonlight was a necessity. In a swift and silent stroll in her pajamas taking in the cool air and breeze. Haru made her way to a parcel of space in the sprawling Okumura estate that none paid attention nor notice.

It was like a hobbit hole of sorts, if John Ronald Reuel Tolkien described a hobbit hole as a hole that brought comfort to its inhabitants, then this was Haru’s hobbit hole. A small open-air yard in the estate who’s only source of illumination at this moment was the moon’s ethereal glow above. Arriving at this non-descript area of the estate no one paid any mind to except her, she began her work as an empress of a small patch of dirt, which happened to be the home and the subsequent hobbit hole of fauna raised and nurtured entirely by her.

Haru had no idea at what point a sunflower grew in the moonlight of this unseen and forgotten corner of the estate. None of the butlers nor the maids who kept the residence clean and tidy certainly had a green finger, her father certainly wasn’t interested in matters of soil, nor the natural world. But within this very unnatural and artificial world of the estate, life in the form of a sunflower, some Viburnum Opelus and some other plants Haru couldn’t identify from the books she borrowed from the school library had made its home in this small parcel of the estate.

Haru wasn’t sure how a sunflower and some red berries got in there, raising attention to them would assure their destruction by the uncaring.

The mansion’s construction around 2008 had not intended nor designed for a parcel of its confines to host plant life, the only reason the sunflower and its plant brethren carried on carrying on perhaps was Haru herself. It was a symbiotic relationship, for the mere experience and presence of the sunflower and its Red Viburnum subjects gave Haru a sense of serenity, of the prospect of having choice in a life where choice of the free variety was a commodity of fallow stock. That choice was caring and nurturing something that was unlikely to happen, by all rights shouldn’t have happened, but did. The mere experience of such filled something inside Haru with a sense of fullness like a parched camel coming out to drink from waters in the desert. And in return for filling this need of Haru’s, the plants off course, got their due care and diligence from someone who cared.

When the task was done, any light the moon offered was rapidly slipping away in the face of the crack of dawn. Soon the sun will rise and the Empress will have to leave her hobbit hole, to a journey neither expected, nor prepared for, or at the very least based in the confines of reality.

Chapter Text

Wednesday, 13/4/20XX

Now playing:Hometown by 21 Pilots

After school, the roof

        Shinji and Ryuji sat on the roof, waiting for Haru. They did not speak, or really discuss anything really, they just sat and waited. Waiting doesn’t offer much, so Shinji sat, beanie covering over his eyes and one earphone playing music to ease the monotony. Ryuji sat next to him, however fully awake, listening through the other earphone, and rapidly bouncing his leg, whether he was anxious towards the task ahead, or just was eager to get started instead of staying bored on the roof couldn’t be made certain.

Eventually, Haru did come, she came in her P.E kit as usual, her school bag in tow. Shinji heard the door opening and greeted her with a wave

“Good day Haru, you ready for what comes next?”

Haru put down her bags at the foot of the sitting bench, and then nodded affirmatively with an expression telling of determination, one which Shinji appreciated.

“Alright Haru, this is going to get weird, whatever happens next, you’re free to back out as long as you do not tell another soul.”

“I’m going, I want to.” Haru affirmed, she nodded, keeping that determined expression.

Shinji smiled as he pressed the button to start navigation.

“Beginning Navigation”

The metaverse, outside of Kamoshida’s castle

Within a few seconds, all Haru saw was cascading waves of red and black, as the sky then turned black, all above remained dark except for the moon, waxing.

“How was the trip?” Ryuji asked Haru, now in his metaverse Uhlan fit

“Not as bad as I thought, it was fast enough to not be too jarring” answered Haru

Shinji, now in his metaverse garb, approached Haru

“Last chance to back out, we can still bring you back, but if not, stay behind us ok?”

“Understood.” replied Haru, she took in the Metaverse outfits on both her friends, while Ryuji's fit looked like something her great great grandfather would've worn if he wasn't from Japan, Shinji looked a bit terrifying whatever on earth he was in. Questions would come later however, there was work to be done.

So the trio set out, however Shinji stopped and stared out into the distant open ended space that encompassed the main entrance to the castle, no guards were spotted, but a peculiar sight only visible to Shinji was spotted. A blue ethereal door.

“Hang on guys.”

Shinji looked around to make sure the coast was clear, then he walked out to the blue door. He opened the door knob himself, and entered the velvet room.

The velvet room

Now playing: A cover of Aria of the soul, by Sam Griffin

Immediately, in almost a blink of the eye, Shinji found himself sat in front of Igor again, the same ferryfolk still rowing this manifestation of the Velvet room forward.

“Welcome to my velvet room”

Shinji didn’t know what to say, he previously thought that he could only enter the ferry from his dreams, but he was proved wrong. Now this was out of his comprehension.

“I am pleased to observe that developments in your journey that did occur have been in your favor so far.”

“You have recruited new allies in your cause to steer mankind away from ruin.”

“Additionally, you have tested the waters of your new potential and power that of the wildcard, that we shall elaborate further soon.”

“Now go forth, your journey awaits”

Shinji awoke from his velvet venture, standing where he stood before he dove into the velvet room, he then was joined by his crew of merry but now concerned individuals.

“Dude, what were you doing! You were standing in the open for some time, you could’ve gotten spotted!” Expressed Ryuji, sounding both concerned and a bit scared.

“Uh, I’m not sure how to explain, maybe I’ll think of how later.”

Quickly moving on, the group of three then slipped undetected into the castle grounds,

Now playing: King, Queen, and slave, a jazzy and groovy cover by Metagroove

Instead of infiltrating by the sewers, a rather rancid entrance to Kamoshida’s palace, the two persona users of the group decided to take their chances sneaking around the castle grounds, trying to find a way in. Eventually, after passing a series of barracks one of which Ryuji had awakened, they finally found a way in through an open window, leading to a non-descript room, with a large bookcase and a small wooden table with a few candles on its top.

Shinji approached the door, slowly opening it to survey whatever may be on the other side, seeing nothing, he then closed the door and turned towards the two behind him.

“Ok, we got a problem , we do not know the full layout of the castle yet, neither where we are now. Not sure if we can map out the halls.”

Shinji paused for a moment, an abstract line of thought and logic going through his head, the last two times he was here, the layout at least in the sewers and dungeon stayed the same, the barracks from the last expedition was in the same place too. The evidence that the layout of this castle contains a sense of permanence made sense in Shinji’s mind, the problem was that it clashed with years of experience in Tarturus, where no area remained the same.

Before he got lost in his mind, trying to reconcile his conflicting lines of reasoning, Haru interjected with what turned out to be the solution. While Shinji was crouched by the door, deliberating on his conflicted reasoning, Haru in an almost silent manner inspected the bookcases on the opposite wall, spotting a shelf with parchment, she grabbed all the parchment she could hold and sprawled out on the small wooden table in the centre.

“Shinji, I believe this is an archives room.” Stated Haru

“What?”

“That is a rather large bookcase up there, with shelves of books and scrolls, they surely need a place to store all the bureaucracy needed to run this castle.”

Haru, explaining her line of reasoning

Now playing: This mysterious feeling

“I understand, Ryuji go help Haru, see if there’s a map or something we could use, I’ll watch the hall.”

The arrangement continued for a moment, as while Haru and Ryuji sifted through parchment, scrolls and books for anything of use, Shinjiro had locked the door and kept his ears open, waiting for any auditory sign of a patrol. Eventually, they found what they sought out for.

“I think I found a map!” Haru exclaimed in a somewhat elevated voice

“Shhhhhhhh” Ryuji expressed in a exasperated tone.

“Oh, sorry!” Whispered Haru

Shinji went to the table, and inspected the map, it only contained the plans and outline for the first floor, it’s a start.

“Haru, I want you to keep the map, we both might get into a scrap and the map might get roughed up, and if the worst case scenario happens, you at least know how to get out.”

“Alright, we’re on the east wing of the castle the map says, there’s a stairwell that leads to the floor above in the west wing, its in a chapel !” explained Haru as loudly as she could, which was not much.

“Ok, we have a course of action, we move fast through this floor towards the second, the faster and more direct a route we take, the less potential risk we'll deal with.”

The other two nodded, they weren’t thinking they could breeze through the first floor without at least a fight.

Haru fitted the map into a satchel Ryuji handed her, which was more fitting and ergonomic then the Shujin provided school bags. While she was fitting the map into the bag with care, Shinji inspected the bookcase a final time before they all would leave, his interest was captured by the title of one book, it read out “Account book, Serfs”. He took a quick skim of the book’s contents to find a brief list of names. Ryuji took a quick look, to then come to a stop.

“Hey, I know some of those names, they’re guys from the sports teams.” Ryuji explained

Elaborating further, Ryuji continued “Most of them are from the volleyball team, that was what Kamoshida won his Olympic medal for, meanwhile the guys I know personally are the ones on the track team. I miss those guys.”

Shinji looked at the account book again, a creeping feeling and sensation had been present, but now it had made its way into Shinji’s stomach. Whatever the implications, or whatever they will likely discover soon, it will not be a pleasant sight he thinks.

“Does the book have the entire volleyball team on it?”

Ryuji nodded, affirming yes

“Ok, we got something to do tomorrow.”

“Don’t we got a volleyball rally tomorrow Shinji?”

“Right, I forgot, even better we’ll ask them on the way out.”

“Ok, now lets actually get to the second floor.”

And so the three made their way towards the west, overall some parts of the journey could be described as a brisk walk in the park, the monotony occasionally broken by having to make a break for cover or blind spots from patrols which outnumbered Shinji’s entourage, or when the shoe was on the other boot, bringing down blades and axes on poor lonely patrol shadows. Sometimes they would requisition cash from a shadow, the offer being to spare the life of the previous owner of said cash. Otherwise they were picking up their ill gotten gains from pools of black ooze.

Eventually, the gang of three made it to what was the Castle’s chapel, upon closer reconnaissance, the chapel was found to be swarming with shadows. They were cleaning the pews in the chapel, a dozen shadows or so. But just in front of the trio, was the stairwell leading to the second floor. Their only obstacle being the shadows who will turn hostile as soon as they made themselves known.

“I count at least ten, maybe a dozen shadows.”

“Crap. Effin hell.”

“How do you reckon we’ll get to the other side Shinji?”

“I don’t see us sneaking past these guys, they’re too tightly packed for a gap of opportunity to sneak unspotted, and the pews aren’t that tall.”

“We’ll likely have to fight our way through, Ryuji how many bombs do we have left?”

“Just one, this is it.” He said as he took the bomb out of the satchel, now held under Haru’s arm.”

“Alright.” Acknowledged Shinji, “Hey Haru?”

“Yes?” she replied

“Wanna get your hands dirty?”

“My hands are already dirty, I’m a gardener.”

“Ok Haru, take the nade', we’ll attack the moment you toss it at the feet of the bigger cluster of shadows to the right , me and Ryuji will give the ones on the left a piece of our mind. You need to book it to the stairwell where it is safe, clear?”

“Mhhmm.” Replied the gardener.

After a moment of instruction in hand gestures on how hand grenades worked by Ryuji, the three remained primed and ready. Haru stood behind, bomb in hand, finger on the pin.

Now playing: Unavoidable battle

       Without a moment of hesitation, Haru took the safety pin off and then threw the bomb to the right, the spoon falling to the floor making a metallic sound, that was the signal for attack. Immediately the boys sprung up and initiated the attack on the shadows on the left.

“KELLY!”

“TADEUSZ!”

The moment the boys cried out the names of their personas, the grenade landed home, on a high trajectory, landing on a wooden pew which a shadow happened to be sitting at, surrounded by his colleagues. Then blew a violent blast, shockwave and subsequent shrapnel flying abound, the blast even broke off splinters from the wooden pew to go flying into the path of the shadows huddled around the pew, not living a second longer to process what the sound of the metallic spoon falling into the ground meant.

When the bomb had done its job, Haru quickly ran towards the stairwell while the boys were fighting off the only remaining group of shadows in the chapel, Ryuji fended for himself fine, while Shinji was in the zone. This was all too familiar to him in a good way he felt, as he squeezed shots off his revolver and while Ned was unloading from his own revolver.

“TADEUSZ!” Cried out Ryuji again, conjuring the Pole, the persona on horseback then galloped, charging at the shadows with Sabre drawn. In a few moments, nothing remained of the shadows guarding the chapel except for broken pews, pools of black ooze now tarnishing this house of worship, and the satisfaction that was present on the now unmasked faces of Ryuji and Shinji.

Haru knelt on the ground leading to the stairwell, she sat there in cover taking shelter from the hazards which were wildly emanating from the brawl Shinji and Ryuji were in. During the few moments of the intense melee, Haru had her ears plugged, it was her first time hearing a gun shot, not to mention the several others that followed. It was somewhat scary to the gardener, but it was over. Having plugged her ears however, she did not hear the suit of armor, rattling and clanging down from the stairwell right behind her.

Chapter Text

This was not what was intended to happen, Shinjiro thought. Originally, the intended outcome was to create enough space for Haru to make her way to the second floor, while Ryuji and him followed by to keep the rear clear of any assailing shadows. Now both the guys stood facing Haru, with a bruised mark on her brow, and shadows behind all three of their backs now.

Behind Haru was what appeared to be a head guard, indicated by his gold plated armor and helmet. He stood tall and judging by his tone, proud.

“Coming back was a mistake you two brats.”

Shinji kept an expression as steely as his steel mask, while Ryuji could barely contain his rage at the shadow in front, behind and at himself for any mistake which had led to this moment.

“The price for your arrogance will be paid by your harmless friend here. She’ll make a great offering and present to King Kamoshida.”

The guard who was keeping Haru under the blade of his sword laughed callously along with his boss. But while they laughed and reveled in their perceived turning of the tables, something had stirred in Haru. It was the threat, the threat of being marched and reduced to a plaything for Kamoshida. It was a threat too far for Haru, the fear of unknown punishment compared to a known one would’ve been enough to keep Haru from doing what she was about to do now.

“Do you seek control my little empress?”

Haru lowered her head down in pain, something was happening to her, she winced for a sensation of fire started to emanate through her head,

“The situation you appear to be in is a familiar one to me, alone, my husband torn asunder and my child Sviatoslav too young to take the throne, led to me becoming the empress of Kyiv.”

“You must do as I had to seize back your life by its reigns. From the hands of treacherous and callous men.”

As the visible strain started to ease on Haru, Shinji could do nothing but watch. He had a faint idea of what was going to happen.

“Contract, I am thou, thou art I, the skies shall run red with the blood of the foolish men who stand against us.”

The guard who had kept Haru under his blade then reached to grab Haru’s hand, intending to drag her up the steps of the stairs towards the throne room upstairs, but before he could do that, Haru grabbed the guard’s hand by the gauntlet, and started to squeeze, crushing the guard’s thieving hand.

“ARRRAAARGHHHHH”

Leaving nothing but a bent and contorted gauntlet which had collected the remains of the guard’s wrist and hand, now turned boiling black ooze.

Now nothing was keeping Haru restrained or contained, with this new freedom free from the swords of Kamoshida’s shadows and their hollow threats, a mask now appeared on Haru’s face, it was a simple gala masquerade mask, with a swift and smooth motion, she grabbed the mask with one hand and the other pointed towards the sky.

“Come now, OLGA OF KYIV!”

In a baptism of fire, Haru disappeared into the blue flames and came back anew

Out of the fire came out Haru, in a grey officer’s tunic a greyish tone matching a field of battle, on the front of the tunic was the embraided pattern found on a Vyshyvanka.

Above Haru was a saintly figure, appearing to be a Byzantine empress, she spoke instead in a language long past and found north of Byzantium. She did not hold a cross or bible, as a saint might. She instead held a flaming sword and a shield which bore the symbol of the city which Olga reigned, a trident.

To those who understood what the trident meant, they would have caught on the letters in Cyrillic that secretly composed the trident

 в   о   л   я

Freedom.

Haru couldn’t contain a devilish smirk as she felt the grasp of a new power within her.

If the tables had turned twice within the span of five minutes, Haru was about to take a sledgehammer and slam down the final word on the figurative table, because at that moment, she took out almost seemingly from nowhere a machine gun.

Ryuji might had peed a little in his pants at this very moment.

A cacophony of noise followed, along with shouts, indescribable sounds, the rattling of the rattlesnake, there was no deliverance or salvation that could be found by the shadows in this house of worship. Shinji could only watch as Haru spewed lead at any shadow she spotted in the room, the room being christened by an indescribable smell when the bullets stopped flying.

When the bullets did stop flying, Shinji and Ryuji ran over to Haru to quickly grab her before she knelt to the ground in exhaustion. Handling a LMG from the hip, its recoil and its weight must have been a lot, not including awakening a very, very angry persona.

The last remaining shadow that still drew breath was the boss, still lying by the steps of the stairs, missing a gauntlet and the hand it fit on. The one-handed shadow stared at the eyes of Haru and her two companions. Without a moment of hesitation, Haru gestured to the guys to give her a moment. She approached the slowly decaying shadow, the contents inside the armor now slowly dissipating into ooze.

Haru without a word, took a wooden cane out of seemingly thin air, and finished off the boss.

Sometime later

After quickly finding a vacant room on the second floor, the three persona users were finally able to rest. By all accounts they had accomplished their mission for this excursion, they made it to the second floor of the palace, Haru even awakened to a persona, but now were too exhausted to appreciate their success.

“Ok, I think we’ll be left alone here.”

Shinji turned to see an open aired window, it revealed the outside showing the wide and vast cognitive world. He then turned around to see Haru, lounging in a chair clearly looking knackered.

“You ok Haru?”

Haru took off her mask to show an exhausted expression, a faint smile was present as she could only face the ceiling of the room.

Taking off his mask, Shinji called for Ryuji to get some painkillers from the first aid kit in the satchel and some water. Haru took the pill and drunk some water, but clearly needed some time to rest and recuperate.

This was not good, there was nothing keeping away any shadows, now certainly searching for their whereabouts to open the door to find two persona users and one out of action at this moment.

“Friend! Call upon my name!”

A voice was heard within, as Shinji was roused from his rising anxiety by the voice of Pixie. He knew what he had to do.

“Pixie, Dia.”

Out of the blue came pixie, who with a snap of her fingers started to wash away the injuries Haru had, even the bruise mark on her head had mostly disappeared, leaving only a faint mark.

Haru started to rise out of her chair, she still looked mentally exhausted but able to move.

“Boss wasn’t that the shadow you cornered yesterday?” Ryuji asked

“Yeah.”

“Then what happened to Ned?”

“He’s still in me. I can still feel him.”

“Right, but how’re we gonna get out of here?”

Shinji looked around the room, surveying its interior, Shinji saw a wooden crate, breaking the top open with his axe he found a long bundle of rope.

“We’ll climb down from the window; this bundle of rope should be long enough.”

Some more time later

After some abseiling off the side of the castle, Shinji finally looked at the castle’s height and start to realize how much more ground they need to cover. Looking up at the castle, counting vertically the castle likely had four floors total (excluding the basement/dungeon below), and knowing how much time they took to clear the first floor of the palace, a dropping sensation could be felt in Shinji’s stomach.

On this line of thought, Shinji couldn’t help but reminisce on a similar situation. 

Another memory, 2007, The gate to Tarturus

Now playing:The voice someone calls

Mitsuru, Akihiko and Shinji had just returned from their raid into Tarturus, unlike future operations two years later, the operations in Tarturus was of a defensive nature, this was due to the general capabilities of SEES at the time. Containing only three members fit for combat, fighting capability was limited to the fighting power Akihiko, Shinji and Mitsuru had at the time, which was not a lot. Additionally, the lack of a navigator or support of any kind to help navigate the ever-changing floors of Tarturus did not moderate the difficult task at hand.

So priorities shifted, from investigating the nature of the tower and finding a way to destroy it to keeping the shadows from spawning in the tower from infiltrating the real world. The objective was instead kill count, numerical short-term objectives which did not contribute to the overall strategic goal of destroying the dark hour itself. It at least offered a brief solution to the problem of shadows coming out of the tower attacking unfortunate persons who were out of their coffins at the wrong place and the wrong time. This culling of Humanity’s inner psyche of shadows became a laborious task to the three members of SEES, Mitsuru did not complain, Akihiko hated it, and Shinji was just happy they got to live to see another day.

“We’ve reached our kill quota of the week, good work.” Stated Mitsuru in as much of a jubilant tone a Kirijo could allow themself.

“Yeah.” Said Akihiko in a less jubilant tone

Shinji, who was taking out his pocket watch to synchronize its time back to Zero hour noted the position of the hands before he started to work the clock back to midnight.

“We spent about an hour in there and then some. And when we exit the building we would’ve spent nothing.”

Now playing: Color your night

Akihiko sighed as the three of them made their way out of the building to the street, as Shinji stated, any indication of the blood and sweat shed in the tower had disappeared with the green yellowish moonlight, the world kept moving forward with the normal passage of time as if there wasn’t an additional hour of the day dedicated to its destruction. Taking off their armbands, SEES made their way to the dorms, silently pondering if they could really take on this task which seemingly had no end, protecting humanity from the shadow of tarturus, perhaps even to the end of their lives? Thoughts like these chipped away at the collective determination the three held.

Akihiko and Mitsuru thought about this, dread was silently present within, but Shinji broke that dread which gathered within this night.

“Hey Aki, Mitsy, Hagekure’s still open at this time of the night, wanna grab a bite?”

Akihiko’s expression lit up, “Sure, I can go for some.”

“Aki! , Its midnight we should-“

At that moment Mitsuru’s stomach made a sound perhaps scarier than the sound the tougher shadows in Tarturus.

Both Akihiko and Shinjiro burst out laughing, even in the face of Mitsuru attempting to save face with threats of execution. Eventually Mitsuru ended their bouts of laughter by instead going on with Shinji’s offer of getting ramen past their bedtime. Any dread or questions the three held that night vanished as ramen entered their system.

“If you speak of this, both of you are being executed.” Threatened Mitsuru again as they made their way towards the stripmall

“Heh, whatever you say Misty.” Replied Akihiko

Shinji said nothing, the only thing he could remember contributing to this happy memory was his smile.

Memory end

Shinji glared at the height of the palace with new determination and purpose. This wasn’t Tarturus no matter how much his mind was screaming Déjà vu. There was going to be an end sooner then later and they were going to make it to the top.

“Hey!” Shouted Ryuji

“I know a good ramen place we should all go when we get out of here, wanna come with?”

“Oh, I can pay!” Shouted Haru

“Are you kidding me! I’ll pay!”

The two continued making their individual cases of who should pay for ramen, Shinji could do nothing but smile as he strolled briskly towards his friends. They reminded him so much of them.

Chapter Text

13/4, Thursday, after school

A warm atmosphere emanated from the ramen shop as Shinji, Ryuji and Haru stood outside, enjoying both the cool air outside and the warm ramen broth in their bellies. It was a well needed and appreciated end to the day after so much could have gone wrong.

But that was earlier, now the taste and warmth was becoming a memory and the trio focused instead on what comes next. Huddled at a small space where little to no one can hear, they discussed.

“A lot would’ve gone wrong.”

“Mhhmm.” “Agreed.”

“Some of it did go wrong.”

“Yuhuh.” Haru merely nodded her head

“But in the end we made it.”

Ryuji and Haru nodded in agreement

“Ok, now’s the part where you stop agreeing with me and instead start thinking about what to do now so it doesn’t go so wrong next time we go in.”

“Yeah!” “Agreed.” Was the reply by both of them

Shinji could do nothing but put his palm on his face and silently stifle a laugh, smiling.

“The medicine worked in there quicker then I thought, but not fast enough to get out without your other persona healing me, maybe we need better medicine and medical supplies?”

“Alright.” Answered Shinji as he was taking mental notes, along with trying to draw applicable experience from his time combatting the dark hour.

“Our guns are working well but that Machine gun you got there looks heavy isn’t it Haru?”

“I can deal with it, however something easier to carry and control is appreciated.”

“I know a airsoft shop, we can go there on Sunday to see if we can find something, can you both make it?”

“I’ll make time for it.” Was Haru’s reply, and Shinji answered with an affirming nod.

“I got a suggestion, wanna hear it?”  Haru and Ryuji nodded

“We need to stay quiet about our activities over in that world. If anyone finds out about our… “Extracurricular activities” the game might be up.”

“I see, in that case lets keep meeting on the roof, if anyone asks I can say you two are just helping me garden.”

“Sounds good to me.” Replied Ryuji, Shinji just replied with an affirming nod.

“Might I also suggest codenames?”

“Sounds good, though we can work them out later.”

“This might already be given as well but, since you were the first one to get your persona, maybe you should be the one leading us Shinji?”

Shinji looked up to the sky and pondered, for once instead of looking at the case against him, he decided to look at the opposite and see what he had going for him.

Shinji was not the first persona user to ever awaken, that was Mitsuru, with the second being Akihiko, making him the third, or No.2. However, applying that logic here, he was now the most senior of Persona users at least here. And he would not be figuring out things as he went, as he had examples to follow, standards of leadership and courage under pressure, and inspiration. He just did not feel ready to disclose his past experience with personas, shadows, and death to his new friends yet.

“Alright, I’ll do it.”

“Sweet, so we all agree that we’re doing this on Sunday!”

“Yup. We’ll meet up in front of the gun store first then work on whatever’s left on our shopping trip.”

The three started to leave but then Shinji stopped. He had a thought in his head and felt the need to spill it in person before they all part.

“We should think of a name, for our group’s activities, I’m trying to think of something but haven’t thought of anything yet. Let me know if you guys got any ideas ok?”

“Sure man”     

“Alright.”

As the group went their separate ways, Shinji couldn’t help but have a strange longing for his old group. To some extent they were almost family, but those thoughts had to be put on hold until he made it back home.

He can’t help but think about a sense of continuation, of being handed down the torch, even though he had only just been shot some days ago, to the wider world and expanse of time, it was seven years ago, perhaps that was where the time went, that time spent in Tarturus. His pocket watch certainly knew it, that little thing kept ticking on even when all time was supposed to stop.

Now playing: Take on me, acoustic version, from the last of us 2

They said nostalgia is a form of depression, Shinji heard that a lot during his time after the day of his unspeakable crime, and he resented it. But now he couldn’t help but appreciate the reality of the situation, its myriad truths both good, bad and some neither but instead balancing the two.

He was a stranger in a world which had forgotten him, he was without his old friends who he had spent his childhood with, and if not had bled, fought, and almost lost their lives to destroy the dark hour. On the other hand, Shinji lived waiting for die. There was no other way around that fact, he wished and yearned for death in his heart for killing Ken Amada’s mother. He got his wish when he got on the persona suppressant drugs.

Now however, he didn’t live with that form of self-destructive raison d’terre. His heart and mind had been renewed when he signed that contract with Igor and however cold his body felt right now, it was only because it was Spring. If this life was still his, and he was damn well beginning to believe that it is right now. With this new epiphany in mind, walking back home under a dying sun, Shinjiro Aragaki decided that he would pursue this second chance with rigor and without fear in his heart. All he needed was a reason to convince himself to stay on the path.

Six thirty in the evening, somewhere where Shinji can see the sun setting.

After some thought and introspection, Shinji had finally found his reason in a place of inspiration, a spot where he could see the fading sun return to the earth so the moon could take the night shift.

If Igor was right, his old friends would be involved one way or another on this journey he was undergoing, even if this was seven years past his subsequent murder, if undergoing it meant a chance of seeing his old friends again, he would take it. It was a brave new world for Shinji, for once he would have to take a chance on the fact that he wouldn’t die tomorrow, that there will be a day after tomorrow and that it’ll come if he was willing to believe enough in it and himself.

So here he was, making a new promise to himself, friends old and new, he would see this thing through.

 Shinji could swear he saw a blue butterfly fly by his vision, but he was too entranced, seeing the golden sky slowly descend into the ground below.

Chapter Text

Lunchtime, the roof, 14/4 Friday

After the usual routines brought upon by school, lunch had finally come. As usual, the trio consisting of Haru, Ryuji and Shinji gathered instead on the roof to both eat their lunch and tend to Haru’s makeshift garden.

Gardening to those uninformed about the trade, is not a simple hobby or activity to be a busy body. It is a manual and sometimes demanding task which is more complex then “water the plants twice a day and it will take care of itself.” Haru appreciated this fact, she invested herself fully into spending time, effort, and money into appreciating her garden less as a hobby or something to keep herself busy, but instead as a science. Taking pictures, scribbling notes, measuring Ph levels etc. If Haru wasn’t the daughter of a multimillionaire executive of a fast food chain would perhaps instead be fully aspiring to be a Botanist of higher regard and potential.

Shinji, someone who had prior experience with maintaining plants back at 2009 respected this fact, and took the work seriously. Because at the end, it meant spare ingredients for the fridge for free.

Ryuji, with no gardening experience at all, was consigned to pack mule duty, otherwise known as carrying really (fucking) heavy bags of shit (things related to gardening, not crap.).

Once Ryuji had finished his rounds as a human pack mule, he sat down to drink from a bottle of Pocari sweat and observe the repeating routines and motions of Haru towards her garden. Eventually, he had to break the silence with a question for Shinji.

“Hey dude, with the guys from both the volleyball and the former track team not speaking a word about what Kamoshida did, what do we do now?”

Shinji knelt up from tending to a plant to turn to Ryuji, still donning his coat and beanie. At this point he had just given up on conforming to dress code standards, the bastards should’ve made their Acs less cold if they wanted him to take off his damn coat.

“We’ll just stick to the plan, we’ll work our way to the top floor of that place, then we’ll steal the K Man’s inner desires to be a dickhead, and then we win.”

“Yeah, but what if there isn’t such a thing?”

“Ryuji, trust me on this one.”

“Really? How would you know about that? It’s not like you’ve done this sort of thing before!”

Shinji remained silent, arms crossed and sat staring Ryuji in the eyes, expression unchanging.

“Wait a minute, don’t tell me…”

Haru was kneeling on the ground in the middle of taking off her gloves and shared the same expression of Ryuji, one of almost stunned revelation. Shinji however would do nothing but slowly unravel a smile. He then stood up, took off his gloves and made his way to the exit.

After school, somewhere in Shibuya

Now playing: It’ll be alright in the long run (Live in amsterdam), by Red Gum

Chat:Ryuji_Sakamoto,Haru,Shinjiro_Aragaki

Ryuji:Dude you better not be shitting us

Haru: Shinji? Is there something you haven’t been telling us?

Shinji: NCoD

Shinji smiled as he answered their queries with a “Neither confirm or deny” as he strolled down central street. He really could not resist leaving Ryuji and Haru on that cliffhanger, it was one of his deepest and sickest pleasures deep inside Shinji.

With the team fully on with the plan, Shinji was now focused on making sure that next time they went back to Kamoshida’s palace, they would be ready. Henceforth why he was in Shibuya, hitting up the shops to see if there was anything of use to the task at hand. It turns out not much really, the drugstore there only sold medicine who’s medicinal qualities in the palace would be what Mitsuru called “Not even worth an execution but my boot.”.

So he just strolled around, he knew that Ryuji was going to bring both he and Haru to this gun shop he knew about on Sunday, so there was really no point in looking for that now. Instead what had caught his eye was an Artisan shop, he went inside.

This artisan’s shop specialized in the handiwork of a lot of old things, from gramophones, record players, antiques really, but that wasn’t what Shinji was here for. Shinji went up to the counter, placed his broken pocket watch on the counter and asked

“Hey, the glass display is cracked, can it be fixed?”

The antique dealer inspected the watch, and surveyed the damage

“This would be easy, just give me a few moments, feel free to come back in a few yes?”

Shinji nodded, he then went outside to wait. Although another thing altogether had caught his eye. Across the street was an electronics store with a live TV on display, on the TV was a news broadcast displaying live news, what was being shown had shook Shinji when he paid closer attention.

LIVE INTERVIEW WITH YUKARI TAKEBA

Yukari Takeba was sitting on a high chair, in a pink  talking to an interviewer, when asked, she went on about how production of the latest Neo Featherman season was going and how the production staff along with workers were the unsung heros of the show and were keeping it afloat and going. When asked why she auditioned for Pink Argus some five years ago, well this was her response.

“Back in high school, I was part of the archery team and apparently I looked good enough with a bow, and that’s how that led me here, but seriously, I would attribute deciding to audition to my friends, who pushed me to do it, they convinced me that I would do great, they were right.”

“If that is the case, you got good friends Yukari Takeba. Now let’s get on with the next question from the fans and here’s a juicy one, rumor and hearsay states you wrote Featherman fanfiction under the title of “P1nkxXArGUsxx” is that true?”

The rest of the interview was dedicated to answering fan questions and hearsay, but Shinji had heard enough and went back to the antique dealer shop. He had to take a moment to appreciate the fact that his former friends had gotten to great heights and places while he was “dead.”

Although Shinji was mostly happy and felt good that his friends had succeeded at life, he couldn’t help but slowly feel a sense of sadness, that he couldn’t be there to be with his old friends, see them succeed and grow beyond the point he had “left” their lives. And hell, he wished he could also have good things in life and have friends on top of that.

Shinji went back to the Antique dealer shop to see that his old pocket watch was repaired and was working once again. When he went to pay the dealer, the dealer refused payment protesting that the repairs was on the house.

Trying to think of a way to repay the old man’s kindness, Shinji looked towards a shelf, flanked by an old sewing machine was a display showing a silver pocketwatch. Shinji pointed towards the pocketwatch, asking if he could have two of them.

The dealer smiled and laid the bill on the counter, it was pricey but nothing was pricey if you had cash from killing shadows with full prejudice. He took the pocket watches, fitting them into his bag and then left the shop and Shibuya for the day.

After school, 15/4, Saturday

Now playing: Deep breath deep breath

Shinji never liked doctors, at first it started when he was occasionally picked to be studied by Kirijo group scientists over his persona, he was not the only one, Ack Ack and Mitsy also got called up to be observed over their summoning of personas but Mitsuru often was rejected for study because she was a Kirijo, which meant he took her tests instead. Then there was the time when he was homeless and got his Persona Supressant Drugs from STREGA, knowing the nature of STREGA’s three core members and enough to know why they had to take those was a reality check of how perverted medical science could become.

But maybe he was just an edge case, there certainly were doctors who did care, who devote their entire lives to the welfare and health of the public, Shinji knew some who tried to address his condition when he was on the PSD, but all he had were polite reminders of his demise, or when he told the doctors how he got his condition in the first place, appeals to stop taking the damn pills.

This line of reasoning was attempting to make its own case as Shinji was making his way to a certain clinic in Yongen Jaya, he had heard rumors and talk of a doctor who made potent medicines in a clinic somewhere in the area. Shinji had turned his back on taking his health seriously, but the work hazards of the current mission required he take his and his teammates wellbeing seriously. But it did not mean he did not have reservations.

Entering the clinic, Shinji noted the cleanliness of the place, this was a good sign, he now just had to talk to the doctor.

“This your first visit?” Asked the doctor

“Yeah.”

“Ok, what are you here for?”

At this moment, Shinji stopped cold, a lump in his throat had formed and he couldn’t get the words out of his mouth. He couldn’t help but replay in his head all the times he went to STREGA for those damn drugs. Then he thought about his friends, and how he had forfeited his own life when they did not want him to by taking those fucking drugs. Then he thought about Ken and Aki.

“I don’t have all day, are you gonna keep standing there”

Shinji was roused back to attention; he (and the doctor) didn’t have the time for this shit.

“Uh, I haven’t been feeling good lately, I haven’t been sleeping much because I’ve been staying up studying.”

Shinji felt regret, although he worked up the courage to actually open his yap and get the ball rolling, he couldn’t help but feel that his response was just cobbled together with duct tape, held together by desperation.

“Alright, come inside.”

Shinji breathed a sigh of relief.

Now playing:Butterfly Kiss

Shinji sat on a lonely chair as the doctor did her thing. She occasionally asked questions regarding his health, his wellbeing both physical and mental. The last part about his mental wellbeing surprised him, no doctors asked him that when he saw them nine years ago, then again that was nine years ago. The doctor then introduced herself

“Sorry, I should’ve told you my name earlier when you came in, I’m doctor Takemi.”

“Ok, nice to meet you.”

“You seem uneasy, everything alright?”

“Yeah, why do you ask?”

At that moment, rose up from her seat and work desk, she made her way to the door facing her back to it, and then locked the door. Shinji should’ve seen this coming.

“Alright, what’s your deal, people don’t usually come to my place unless they want drugs or are here to try close my business. What are you really here for.”

Now playing: Mass destruction, the part where she says babybabybaby, on repeat

Transitioning to a serious tone, Shinji knew his number was up, having being the close friend of Mitsuru Kirijo, he knew what messing with women like her was like, and Takemi was definitely reminding him of Mitsy and how big of a mistake it was to mess with her.

Shinji was screwed, doctor Takemi certainly was in this position a million times, sending less honest men packing tails between legs. There was no choice for Shinji but to be honest and to hope it is sufficient.

“I’ve been juggling a part time job and studying for entrance exams and it’s been taking a toll. I cannot afford to quit my job as its how I’m able to sleep on a bed and not in a cardboard box.”

Shinji articulated the sentence with increasing confidence and determination, it helped that all of the claims in the sentence was true to some extent or another, even when cobbled together haphazardly, he went from unsure and uneasy to dead serious by the last few words of that sentence.

“Hmmm, where do you work?”

“Leblanc.”

“Leblanc? I go there sometimes, now come to think about it I have seen you around that neck of the woods.”

Shinji was unsure yet whether his semi truthful words had reached the expected outcome, but he was sure it was going the right direction.

“Well, sorry for earlier.” Said Takemi as she walked to the door to unlock it

Now playing: Butterfly Kiss

“I have a reputation among the medical community around here, all I get are patients with ulterior motives now.”

“Alright then, I’ll prescribe you some medication, but only medication that will help you recover your health, I don’t need you getting me in trouble.

Shinji nodded affirmatively.

“I think I can trust you to be responsible for your own health, don’t take it for granted.”

“Yes doctor.”

After a speedy and convenient purchase of Takemi’s meds, Shinji took the medications and fitted them into his bag. He was ready to leave but Takemi had one final proposition.

“Hey, you seem like someone healthy enough and can be trusted, is that right?”

Shinji turned his head towards the doctor and nodded.

“Would you be interested in helping me develop new medicine? I need a healthy participant who can stay healthy over a long amount of time to test and refine it. If you consent and participate, I can give you a discount.”

Shinji for obvious reasons had reasons to say no, good reasons actually. The last time he did something like this, it was perhaps one of the worst mistakes he had made in his short life. But this was just a doctor who likely got thrown to the wayside by no fault of their own, and if she was being serious (and she was!!!) and not using science as a means for sophisticated cruelty as the scientists from the Kirijo group did decades ago, perhaps it will be a silent contribution he can make to make sure people can stay healthy, leagues away from those Kirijo scientists.

“You will be both given informed consent and the right to walk away. That’s standard.”

“Ok.”

“Cool, here’s my number, when I need you for the first trials you’ll know.”

Shinji and Takemi exchanged numbers on the way out, Shinji had gotten over his nerves and gotten what he was here for.

However, as he stepped out of the building, something hit Shinji

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast aquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Death Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

Oh, Son of A-

Evening, Leblanc

Now playing: Beneath the mask

“Now is the moment of truth” explained Sojiro “Depending on how this stage of the process goes, you could be making something passable, or great.”

Shinji had decided to spend the evening with Sojiro, while last time he was taught how to make Leblanc’s standard and very much-loved curry, he was being taught how to make just as equally beloved coffee.

“Hmm… the flavor is bland; you should practice more to bring the roast to its full potential.”

“Though I see you prepared the cup the way I taught you, with more practice and hard work you’ll get better next time.”

Sojiro walked out of the café, after telling Shinji to close shop. Once he knew for certain that the old man was going to call it a night, he took three thermos flasks and filled them with the remaining coffee and stored them in his school bag. As he was putting his spare coffee into his school bag, he pondered why even drinks had a medicinal effect in cognitive worlds, then he remembered something.

An old memory: 2009, a Tarturus raid

Now playing: Have a short rest

Shinji was lying down by the steps of the stairway to Tarturus, he had taken a bad hit by a shadow and was subsequently warped by Fuuka back down to the entrance, he laid down on the thin carpet of the stairway and wanted to close his eyes, he was so tired, he really, really wanted to go back to his warm bed back at the dorm.

Instead, Shinji was greeted by the hand of Mitsuru holding a hot thermos of tea, Aki’s holding some painkillers in the form of pills, and Fuuka who had a blanket comforter on hand.

“Thanks.”

Shinji took a sip of the tea, it was made by Mitsuru with care and grace along with assistance from both the Arisato twins. The tea was a sudden jolt to the system, as Shinji’s forever cold body felt an immediate sense of warmth, it was only temporary however. That was when the comforter came into play, Fuuka who always wanted to be helpful had taken it upon herself to carry the team’s essential provisions, from consumable meds, food, even books and comfort items like warm blankets.

Shinji made himself comfy as the painkillers and tea worked their magic all while trying his best to stay awake, he knew going unconscious in the dark hour during active operations would make himself a liability. So he sat and watched his teammates sit around and waited, reading books, playing card games, just enjoying themselves really.

At some point, Koromaru came with a chew toy and settled down next to Shinji, the pup kept him company, the little fellow stared into the eyes of Shinji, seemingly expressing concern over his recovering body. Shinji felt both grateful and sad, on one hand there were people who still cared about him, even if he had pushed them away, or ruined their lives so irreversibly. On the other hand, he knew he did not have much time left, the drugs would likely kill him in the next few months, and-

If it was any consolation, he wouldn’t be alive to know how much he would hurt his friends one last time. Shinji then took his hand and gave Koromaru a head scratch. This carried on until Shinji did lose consciousness and went into dreamland. To this day likely, the sight of an unconscious Shinji sleeping on the steps of Tarturus and snuggling next to Koromaru would be one that was confirmed yet denied due to a lack of photographic evidence.

Memory end

Now playing: Living with determination

Shinji at that moment started to tear up, he did not expect how much he had missed his friends. At least now he wasn’t lonely for he would be joined in his sleep by his self-regret.

Sunday, the gunstore, 16/4

“So this is the place?”

“Yeah, it is.”

“Can’t believe how well hidden it is.”

“Alright, we go in, we’re looking for a machine gun for Haru that isn’t too heavy, some grenades, and anything else interesting that could be of use.”

The three were about to enter the shop in the back alley, but were stopped by Ryuji who stopped to issue a warning

“So, the guy at the counter is a scary fella, so can you do the talking Shinji? Last time I went in I was screwed.”

Shinji sighed, “Sure.”

And so, they went inside Untouchables

Untouchables

Now playing: Layer Cake

Indeed the man at the counter was an intimidating bloke Shinji noted.

“God, he looks just like me, but older, and scarier.” Shinji thought to himself

“Yo, wadya want?” Asked the shop keeper

“Uhh, sir we’re looking for a machine gun, something the missus here can carry without much sweat.”

“Hmm, let me go into the back and see if there’s something you might like.”

After an undetermined amount of time, the shop keeper came out with a Browning Automatic Rifle,

“This is a variant redesigned by the guys from Fabrique Nationale in Belgium. Explained the shop keep

Haru handed over cash from their excursion into Kamoshida’s palace (and a bit from her own deep pockets), and the payment was accepted. Haru would spend the rest of the shopping trip slowly attempting to shove the machine rifle into an empty gardening soil sack. Iwai sighed and offered to help her disassemble the gun into its components.

“While I help her disassemble the gun, go ahead and look around, see if there’s anything which might interest you.”

So look around Shinji and Ryuji did, Ryuji went to look for the hand bombs so they could mark that off the shopping list, but Shinji was looking for something that fit the third item, something else that interested him.

He found something that caught his eye, a shotgun. It was marked with Winchester, and although Shinji wasn’t a gun nut, he did hear the Winchester name a fair lot regarding shotguns. So when Iwai finished packing Haru’s disassembled BAR into the sack, he then turned to see Shinji holding the shotgun by the barrel.

“Oh, that’s the Winchester 1897 Trench gun, it’s a riot gun modified for combat in the trenches. And by modified, I mean it has a bayonet.”

“It has a bayonet?”

Iwai went to the counter and shuffled through one of the drawers and took out a sheath, drawing out a lengthy blade out of it.

“If you’re willing to take this Winchester off my hands, the bayonet will go for free, none of my other customers want them anyway.”

“Deal.”

In total, the bill was a bit pricy, a replica of a rare variant of the Browning Automatic rifle designed in Belgium, a shotgun, some bombs and tools for cleaning and maintenance, but after Haru lended some cash into the pot it was no problem.

“Ok punks, remember to keep your new stuff in your bag and to not have them out in public, I do not need trouble at my doorstep, deal?”

The three nodded.

“Good.”

The three stepped out of the shop with their wares stored in an inconspicuous garden soil sack, however Ryuji stopped Shinji, he wanted an explanation.

“Ok dude, are you for real?”

“About what?” Shinji said in his stride

“About doing this stuff.”

“What stuff?” Jokingly asking

“Arghh, this! This otherworld Bullshit!”

“Shhhhhhh.” Haru shushed, they did not need to be found out in a back alley at central street.

“Ok, you got me.”

“What?”

“Yeah, I have done this stuff before, its just that there’s some things I can’t disclose.”

“I’ll think of what can be talked about later, its not what I’m allowed to talk about, but just trying to explain it in the first place.”

“I mean, try explaining how your P.E teacher is a pervy fuckface, and that we found out by going into a magic world where he’s in his underpants.”

Ryuji stopped and reflected for a moment, noticing this Shinji smiled, he will not need to talk more about the events of 2007 to 9 until much later.

Evening, the attic above Leblanc

Now playing: Їхав козак за Дунай, written by Sehmen Klymovsky, performed by Khoreya Kozatska

Shinji was sitting on his bed, hunched over in troubled thought. He had spent the better part of Friday, Saturday and Sunday preparing, they got guns, they got meds, and some essentials, but something was missing.

Out of thoughts, he started to just aimlessly browse his phone, until he found the camera.

He knew his camera could take photos, but videos? That was something new.

After some thought, Shinji pressed the record button

“This is Shinji, I’m recording this for the record, if anyone from S.E.E.S is watching this, uh surprise???”

“I’m not dead. Not yet at least, somehow, I’ve been brought back. I don’t know how yet, but I’m alive.”

“So, what have I been doing as of late? Well I’ve been brought to Tokyo for some reason, haven’t found out why but, now I’m under the care of boss, Sojiro Sakura. He’s a older man who’s the owner of a coffee shop here in Yongen Jaya.

“Ok, here’s the important part, if you’re not a part of SEES, pretend I’m insane and speaking gibberish or high. If you are part of SEES pay attention.

“Right now, I’m sitting here and recording this because tomorrow, me and a bunch of newly awakened persona users are going into something similar to Tarturus. Ok, that was hyperbole, it only has four floors. But the point is this, this place is the mind of a very sick and cruel person. He is a P.E teacher who we are certain is abusing his students both physically and sexually. He probably enjoys it.

“Innocent people are being hurt here. We believe destroying this “palace” this “manifestation of one’s mind” would maybe bring him down. Something about “Desires and distortion” I don’t know I’ll have to ask Igor about the details on that one.”

“But back to now! We’re prepared, but I can’t help but feel unprepared in some places. We have the best weapons our money can buy, medicine, I’m trying to remember what we had back in 2007. Even if we did not know what we were doing at least we felt ready.”

Shinji took out his pocket watch, opening the watch to show its working hands

“At least I got the pocket watch you gave me fixed Misty.” Shinji paused

“Wait, I got it. I guess I’ll tell you later some other time.”

Shinji looked towards his pocket watch, the hands were making their way to midnight.

“I don’t expect you to find this, but if you or Aki or anyone from SEES finds this, please don’t show Ken this, I have a solid idea of how the rest of the team will react to this news, but not Ken, I’m afraid it’ll be shit.”

“Ok, time to go to bed, tomorrow’s the operation.”

Monday, 17/4, the day of the operation and volleyball rally

Somewhere Shinji should not be

Shinji figured as long as he attended the volleyball rally earlier in the morning, he won’t need to attend it for the rest of the day. So he snuck into the home economics room and got his hands on a sewing machine. Taking some red thread, he got to work.

However, at some point, when Shinji was gathering a fake sense of security, the door opened to reveal a third year student. Shinji knew who it was, after some time in and around school he got to know who the student council president was.

“What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be having lunch.”

Quickly thinking of a response, Shinji thought of something.

“Oh, my spare P.E kit got torn, I’m just fixing it.”

The student council president, looking stern replied

“Carry on.”

After she closed the door, Shinji had only one exasperated thought to himself as he went back to work.

“Fucking get on with it!”

After school, the roof and the now official hideout of Kelly’s thieves of hearts

Haru and Ryuji sat on the roof, anxiously waiting for their leader. Haru had brought the guns, meds, and provisions needed to storm the palace in her empty gardening sack, but they both weren’t feeling adequately prepared as they waited anxiously.

Soon enough, their leader showed up, it would be a relieving sight, but was made unsual instead by the face he showed up with a devilish grin as well.

“So, after some unauthorised shopping, work and thinking. I got some news.”

“I have the name of our new *pause* Organisation you might call it.”

“Since out of this organisation of three members you two had just nominated me as leader, I’ve decided that this meeting, will be the first official meeting of the Kelly thieves.”

“Why Kelly?” Isn’t that the name of your persona?

“Yeah, he was also the leader of the Kelly gang, who also were in a similar line of work.”

“On that note, we really need to think of codenames before we go in again, can’t risk having our identities exposed.”

After a few moments of thought, the three agreed for their codenames to be based on their awakened personas, with Haru’s codename being Olga and Ryuji’s being Teddy (they agreed trying to correctly pronounce a polish name in the heat of battle was an unnecessarily difficult affair.)

“With that out of the way, I have some presents as thanks.”

“Thanks for what?” asked Ryuji

“For agreeing to help.”

At that moment, Shinji took out two pocket watches and handed them out to Haru and Ryuji. They both inspected the craftsmanship of the watches and both gave Shinji a look of gratitude.

“When I was doing this stuff as part of a team, my leader gave the watches out as official equipment, as you know your phones won’t work in that other world, you won’t be able to tell the time in there, that’s why I’m handing them out. Now I am leading and I suppose now this is a continuation of tradition.”

“But that’s not all, I’ve also made these.”

The parade grounds of Kamoshida’s palace

Now playing: The Meaning of the armbands

The parade grounds outside Kamoshida’s castle had been packed today, in lock step with the Volleyball rally going on in the real world. Following the real world, the guards then dispersed, returning to their usual duties which marked the end of the school day and subsequently the volleyball rally. This was meant to be a show of force, a power trip, an opportunity for Kamoshida to sit on the balcony of his castle and revel in his supposed glory and might.

But as the shadows/guards dispersed and disappeared from the parade grounds, came three thieves. They made their way to the castle in stride, heads up high, with a sense of pride, determination and an espirit de corps which laid in contrast to Kamoshida’s fragile ego and sensibilities. Through the mist along with their weapons, the thieves adorned and worn red armbands.

The armbands had the name of their organisation, but also a number. The one in the grey tunic had the number two, the uhlan one, while their leader, zero. On the underside of the leader’s armband laid the initials of an organisation which no longer existed, four letters which bore both nostalgia and painful memories, SEES.

This was what was missing, now they were ready.

Chapter Text

To the pleasant surprise of the thieves, the rope which they’d used to escape the second floor last week was still hanging from the window they had abseiled from.

They had returned to where they had left off at the storeroom, ready to begin the operation.

“Wait.”

“Yeah? What is it Kelly?”

“Before we start the mission, I want you two to take out your watches.”

Olga and Teddy complied

“Now, crank the crown on the top to the left until both hands meet at the top.”

Kelly, now with his pocket watch started to crank the top crown until both hands meet at zero hour.

“Time doesn’t keep going in a cognitive world like this. It’ll be more practical to instead use the watch to measure how much time we spend in here.”

“How do you know that Sh-, I mean Kelly?”

“Would you believe me if for a few decades there existed a hidden twenty-fifth hour of the day?”

“Wait. You’re shitting me.” Exclaimed Teddy

“Well I’m not, that would be disgusting, and yeah.”

“Sometimes people got stuck in there for days, but for each day they spent in that place, they would only feel that one hour had passed.”

“A student from our school once got stuck in there for ten days, but when they got out they said they only felt like they were away for ten hours.”

“Wow.” Said Ted

“She was locked in the school gymnasium as part of a cruel prank.”

Teddy showed an expression of shock and then resentment. Olga skipped the shock altogether and felt angry for this student.

“Well that’s besides the point. If our watches are synchronized at zero hour, lets start the mission.”

Kelly made his way to the door, opening it he looked out into the hallway to see if any shadows were in sight, none were to be found.

“Did you hear that; he must’ve been at grade school during that time!” Whispered Teddy to Olga

“Now is not the time to speculate about his past. We can do that later.”

0 hour thirty minutes

Kelly and the thieves had been spending the last thirty minutes navigating the second floor of the palace. The going was steady but slow, interrupted here and there by bouts of brief encounters with shadows. Occasionally they were of use to the thieves, as some cracked under gunpoint to give information about the second floor which further cleared the fog of war which was mapping and navigating unknown ground. Some gave cash, others lent their power, but otherwise shadows would meet a swift end staring bayonet, cane and sabre.

1 hour

Shinji was having the feeling they’d been here before.

1 hour and ten minutes

Kelly was right.

2 hours

Thanks to some backtracking, further interrogation of shadows, and some sketching on a notebook, the Kelly gang were able to map approximately 80% of the second floor. The remaining twenty eluded them, to the frustration of Kelly. Kelly did not like backtracking. It was the source of much frustration back when he was scaling Tarturus with SEES.

They currently stood at an armory, empty suits of Armor stood to attention, halberds, swords, sabres, pikes, muskets, flintlock pistols and other assorted and dated arms lined shelves, stands, racks and other forms of storage. Not exempted from this collection of arms was the palace’s artillery, cannons and some Howitzers lined up in a row and racks, diligently swabbed and maintained, in case the king may come to inspect the royal arms at his disposal.

“Dammit. This is the third time we have circled back to this room. Olga are you sure you’ve mapped the second floor fully?”

“Yes, three times as a matter of fact.”

Ted leaned on one of the brick walls of the room to lean upon the wall for a short break.

“It ain’t like Kamoshida to make it any easier for anybody, he always was raising the bar to give himself an excuse to be more of an ass to his students.”

Teddy then rested his head on the brick wall, turning his ear towards it. He was then brought to alertness, signalling his fellow thieves to the brick wall he now had his ear on.

All three thieves had an ear on the brick wall, there was no mistaking it. The unmistakable sound of shuffling Armor, swords, shields that came with shadows could be heard from the other side of the wall. Some sort of discussion, laughing was happening on the other side,  that will not do.

Kelly took his frustration out on the wall, attempting to bust down the wall with his axe but to no avail, then he turned to look behind him, his gaze focused on a sole canon. He then made his way towards the back of the room and started to manhandle a canon piece to face the false wall.

“Hey! What are you doing?”

“If there are shadows on the other side we need to get through them , Olga! Try finding some ammo for this thing!”

Teddy and Kelly wheeled the cannon close enough to the wall to ensure the best effect, while Olga took a cannonball from a pile of cannonballs

Improvising without any instruction, the three of them surprisingly managed to get the process of readying the canon to fire correctly, the metaverse doesn’t really seem to care if your artillery piece has sufficient propellent, charges or really anything needed to fire such artillery at all other then ammunition. They were done when Kelly shoved in a cannonball using his axe, making sure it was as deep inside as possible.

“Ted, you light the fuse, Olga and I will be waiting by the wall to enter the breach.”

Ryuji then took a torch from one of the sconces and went into position left of the canon. He stood ready to light the fuse. He would need to then quickly join his comrades who would be clearing out whatever was on the other side of the wall.

Kelly stood on the left clear of the wall, he was occupied with bringing his shotgun to bear and attaching its bayonet on the barrel, made apparent by a silent click. Olga stood with her B.A.R on hand on the right, awaiting the destruction of the brick wall to let hell loose.

Ted stood ready but likely as much as everyone else was, doubts were starting to take over his head. Did they prime the canon right? Was this thing going to explode in his face? A lot of stress, anger as much as gunpowder was awaiting a lit match in the canon and its blond gunner.

In this moment of stress, doubt of the plan, nervousness, second guessing so on and so forth. Ryuji swore he heard a voice whispering to him. It was one word repeated again and again which came from the inner depths of Ryuji’s consciousness, urging him on to fire that canon.

“Ted! Ready!”

“OLGIEN!”

At that moment all hell broke loose, the canon served its intended purpose as it broke down the false brick wall, the destruction of said wall brought a lot of brick coloured dust in the dimly lit room, as for a moment it felt as if the foundations of the palace were shaking, coming apart at the foundations.

The cannonball was fast enough not just to bust down the wall, but to also rip and tore through any unfortunate shadows who stood at its path. Pained and anguished shouts, cries and groaning could be heard from the dark hole in the wall which confirmed the effectiveness of the canon shot.

The three ran through the blasted wall, sprinting through puddles of black blooded ooze, the remains of those shadows who died where they stood when the canon shot tore them, their armour not able to protect them from flying bricks propelled from the flying cannon projectile, falling bricks struck down on the shadows nearest to the now destroyed wall, and the canonball itself tore through shadows in its path like wet tissue paper, killing them where they stood. The only thing which remained of them was collecting pools of blackened blood and ooze and the armour which failed to protect them. There remained several shadows who were fortunate enough to be away from the blast radius which killed their colleagues, but not fortunate enough as the three Kelly gang members currently rushing towards them.

A quick and brutally one-sided melee occurred, the show of superior firepower from the initial canon shot had frightened the surviving shadows to their core. They melted away, trying to flee to the stairwell at the end of the hidden room. Those who were able to make it to the stairwell escaped the wrath of the Kelly gang, however few were able to do so. Those who weren’t able to escape met their fate in the form of buckshot, bayonet, browning automatic rifle fire, sabre and pistol fire.

One shadow remained with their hands up, begging for his life

“DON’T SHOOT!” “DON’T SHOOT”

Kelly stood pointing his bayonet at the lone shadow, Olga approached the standing shadow, cane in hand.

“Shut up.”

“PLEASE!”

“Shut up”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP!”

Olga silenced the panic stricken shadow with her cane, smashing in the face of the shadow with a satisfying crack destroying its false form, revealing a Kelpie.

After some polite conversation and persuasion courtesy of Shinji, the Kelpie in a cowering Gaelic voice submitted to the wildcard, and lent his power to Shinji.

After a brief break

“Hey Ted, what’re you doing?”

“Shadows got cash in them.”

Now playing: Victory fanfare, persona 5

Ted had his attention diverted by the remains of the shadows, it was mainly black blooded ooze and filth, but inside the assorted pieces of armour which also remained was treasure. Gold pieces, paper money bills, and other assorted pieces of treasure were floating in the small pools of black filth, Ted taking a helmet started looting everything of value from the remains.

By the end of the looting the helmet was almost full with black stained gold, which also stained his white and red Uhlan fit.

“I think that’s some few hundred pieces of gold, maybe three hundred.”

“God damn.”

“So are we divvying it up when we get outta here?”

“Oh, I can forgo my share. You guys can have it instead.”

“You sure?”

“I won’t need that; I’m not having any financial problems.”

“Alright then, that’s half for you, and half for me, and all for the Kelly gang.”

A moment of celebration was had, it was brief but well enjoyed. The Kelly gang had gotten its first score, it was small but it would be the first of many.

A bit later, the real world

Now playing: Tension

Kamoshida had been sitting in his office, doing administration, grading, and other matters. That was five minutes ago, but now he was nursing a head splitting headache. Now he was silently cradling his aching head. His anger growing more and more, he took his phone and made a call.

Simultaneously, the palace

2 hours and ten minutes

After a further second check to make sure they got every piece of yen which came from the remains of the shadows (and a further theft of anything of value which wasn’t nailed down). The Kelly gang finally made their way to the third floor. Initial scouting of the third floor revealed a change of scenery from the lower two floors. While the first floor was purposed for the shadows by housing barracks, parading grounds, to a chapel for Sundays, the second being for facilities dedicated to the upkeep from kitchens, staff, storage and the armory. It seemed that the third floor was instead dedicated to the personal quarters of Kamoshida. Already the thieves had come across a personal study, a library, an observatory, and some spare bedrooms which were more luxurious than the cots found in the barracks downstairs.

Security had been increased, the commotion the Kelly gang downstairs must’ve caused had roused the garrison to action and further vigilance. With progress being done at a snail’s crawl, the thieves decided to withdraw to a storage room close to the stairway where they entered the third floor from.

A storage room with little to no warmth was the new entry point for further infiltration, as it seemed not much of importance was contained in the storage room that would make shadows enter it, turning it to the new safe room.

Now playing: Have a short rest

A fire had been built on the brick floor of the storeroom with the gang were cleaning and maintaining their weapons after the last bout of violence with the shadows. Enjoying a small break, Shinji broke the silence with a simple question

“Alright, we made good progress, I think now’s a good time to get out.”

“Yeah, I’m getting a bit tired.”

“How much time have we spent in the palace anyway?”

Shinji looked at his pocket watch and winced slightly

“Two and a half hours”

“Yup, now’s a good time to call it.”

Shinji then took out his phone, and it was like the Kelly gang never entered Kamoshida’s dirty mind.

Evening

Now playing:Гей нум, братці, всі до зброї!

 The gang ended up on the roof of Shujin. They then looked around to make sure they were alone, once sure the three members quickly packed their gear into several gardening sacks and stowed them away. When done, the three then started to make their way out of the school to leave the scene of their possibly criminal extracurricular activities. When the three were sure they were out of the woods, the three celebrated.

“Holy shit! Haru you were so badass!” exclaimed Ryuji towards Haru

“Oh, it was nothing really, I just remembered a moment from a TV show I watched once and said it because I was in the moment”

“I think, we should go somewhere to celebrate. I just happen to know a place with good food.”

The personal fanfare continued, even when it ended the gang remained in a jubilant and vibrant state. The day was won, the first mission was an overall success.

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast aquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Fool Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

Meanwhile, some 516 kilometers west

Iwatodai Dorm, Shadow Operatives control room

Now playing: The voice someone calls

Fuuka had been napping on the couch of the old control room of SEES, it was a long night of work, mostly reading essays about studies and research into personas, cognition, public cognition, an analysis on Carl Jung’s theories, the whole nine yards of whatever psychological theories, concepts and ideas could explain events from 2007,2009,2012 if it could even ground and explain what on earth happened.

Now she was dreaming, dreams were a pleasant break and experience for Fuuka, since it was in this state that she was at ease, for her persona accompanied her in dreamland. This time however would not be a pleasant break for the mind of Fuuka.

“Good evening Juno.”

“FUUKA! I SENSE SOMETHING!”

“Oh Juno what is it!?”

“I SENSE NEW PERSONA USERS, I SEE ONE WITH IMMENSE POTENTIAL, HE STRUGGLES AND WAGES WAR WITH FATE!”

“What?”

“I SEE A DARK AND UNSURE FUTURE, HE WHO STRUGGLES-“

“Wait! Who is this persona user?”

A series of images ran through Fuuka’s mind at the speed of sound, some familiar, some alien, all were memories of the events of 2009, some were certainly not her memories though.

“HE DEFIES FATE!”

“Juno! Juno! You need to calm down! Who is it?”

The slideshow of memories and images had stopped in Fuuka’s mind. What was instead being shown to her was a simple vision, three individuals, school students it seemed were walking towards an undetermined destination. Two figures who flanked the figure in the middle were wearing school uniforms, the centre figure however wore a dark red coat, along with a dark coloured beanie.

“Wait.”

At that moment, the figure in the middle turned his head to look over his shoulder. Fuuka could see for a single moment who’s face that was. Shock was beginning to take over the sensation of one’s body free falling while asleep was occurring.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAA”

Fuuka had found herself awoken on the foot of the couch on the floor, she had clearly fallen off the sofa when she was having her dream, she felt a slow ache in her back, but that was not of importance now.

Fuuka then took out her phone, and dialed her boss’s number.

Leblanc

Now playing: The hype by 21 pilots

“Alright, as long as you remember to close up your friends can stick around. Not for a sleepover though.”

“Understood.”

The thieves now were eating their freshly cooked spoils, thanks to Shinji’s culinary skills, to the uninitiated who were having their first ever Leblanc styled Curry were now having their world shaken by Shinji’s cooking. It was perhaps the best food they have had the entire month.

“Oh thish ish sho guud!” exclaimed Ryuji as he was consuming his curry at a breakneck pace.

Haru who was instead taking her time with her curry, was savouring the taste as they say.

“How is this curry so delicious?!”

“That would be a trade secret Haru.”

As the thieves laughed, shouted, and revelled in the fine spirit of the day, the television set off to the side happened to be showing sports, when Ryuji finished his plate, his attention was diverted towards the screen. It was a baseball game and the camera panned towards the upcoming batter, awaiting the sharp crack.

Shinji who was sipping a coffee instead, also had his eyes diverted to the screen. The camera panned upon the back of the batter’s jersey, when Shinji red the name on the back he was not smiling no more.

“JUNPEI IORI”

05

The moment of suspension that Shinji was having was then smashed by the crack of Junpei’s bat, and the commentators then going wild.

“This ball is crushed. Wow, WOW WHAT A SHOT BY JUNPEI IORI THAT BALL IS DEEP, I MEAN DEEP. CHEESE AND CRACKERS, HYDRATION, STATION.”

The commentators and crowd continued to contribute to the fanfare, as was Ryuji, Shinji remained silent.

“That’s Junpei Iori, I think I still got his baseball card somewhere in my room, I was such a fan few years ago.” Said Ryuji calmly, as he pretended he did not join the crowd’s fan faring.

Shinji, shaken out of his moment of pause asked Ryuji the following question

“Since when?”

“2014, 2015 he started getting well known by about that time. I used to just watch his games all the time on Sundays when I had nothing to do.”

Shinji remained focused on the screen, he had so many thoughts running through his head at this moment. But those thoughts remained hidden from his friends with a false smile. This false smile would remain on his face well until his friends left the café for the night.

Shinji sighed.

Chapter Text

17/4, evening, the attic

Now playing:I care, by Syd matters

*Start video log 2*

“Alright”

Shinji was sat in his pajamas on his bed, it was late in the evening and he really should be getting ready for bed as it was a school night, however he could not find the state of mind to sleep. He would have to air them out to himself.

“Now its 1am at the 17^th of April, we had just completed the operation and now have reached the third out of four floors of this palace.”

“We now will be taking a few days off to rest, recuperate, focus on school and a bunch of other crap. But really what I wanted to talk about, was you guys, SEES.”

“Takeba, way to go on becoming Pink Argus ! , I just found out a few days ago when I watched the interview you had.”

“It must be great for you being an actor for that show you watched back then with Ken, Minato, Minako and the others.

“As for Junpei, I saw your home run tonight on the TV. One of our team members went wild when you smashed that ball out of the stadium.”

“You two must be having the time of your life right now, heh.”

A solid moment of silence followed; Shinji was in introspection.

“I’m going to stress this again; in case this video log actually gets in the hands of former SEES members. What happened was not your fault. It was mine instead. You shouldn’t feel sad or cry at my tombstone . If there is one, I’ll likely go find it and .

Shinji’s tone had gone softer, more quiet and perhaps more personal.

“I will admit though, I miss you guys, seeing you all older than me and progressed further in your lives feels- It feels jarring. I know this probably means you guys probably moved on well after I died. I’m happy for you if that’s what that meant. As for me, It feels weird, how could I even explain it, I had just stopped. While you guys had lived out your lives since 2009, I had just woken up at 20XX, still eighteen. I had missed out on seven years. While you were all living your lives in the seven years since 2009, I had missed out.”

“I do not know how to feel about that.”

“Alright enough rambling, this new kid on the block has got school tomorrow and has a promise to fufill. See you soon.”

The velvet ferry

I see you have made progress in your journey.

Shinji found himself waking up on the ferry, he really wanted to go back to sleep instead of having to listen to Igor.

Through the bonds you have formed, you will come to possess a new power that we will help to nurture and develop further. For that to proceed, we will require two personas of your choosing.

After choosing two personas that he had picked up at the palace, he found the two had then been converted to cards. They were then blown off the ferry by a dry wind to then silently float the opposite direction the ferry was going. After a short pause, a card had floated up to the surface of the river which then one of the ferry folk picked up with their paddle.

Handed over to Igor, Igor then explained

This is your persona, reborn and baptized by these waters, they were made stronger by your current bonds and the strength they hold.

Igor held the card in front of Shinji. Silence was permeating the velvet room as Shinji took this moment to reflect and realize what one of the measures of his “potential” will be.

When you return, seek out new confidants, establish new bonds and partnerships for they serve to strengthen your capability to make new personas. I expect much of you. Good luck.

18/4, Tuesday, outside Leblanc at early morning

Shinji did not get much sleep, the night had proven to be a night filled with sorrow within his mind as he ruminated about what was lost due to him “dying.” Now after an early breakfast of leftover curry from the previous night and coffee, Shinji was now standing in the cold morning air, trying to let the cool air clear his eyes, calm his mind and sooth his soul. He however was interrupted by a text message

Ryuji: Should we come back to the palace in a few days?

Haru: If we keep at this pace we could theoretically get to the top floor by the end of the week if we go twice

Shinji:Agreed, we’ll go at Thursday then Sunday

Turning off his phone, Shinji could start to feel his mind and body going back to normal. Then a black cat made its way next to Shinji’s foot, yawning as first light started to rise.

Giving the small cat a scratch on its head, Shinji started to feel better as he drank in the first morning light of the day. Shinji took a moment to appreciate this cat’s presence and decision to just be around him as he got over what he was going through last night. He then put on his earphones and lifted his head up high.

“I’m ok now. Let’s fucking asskick the next few days.

Now playing:take on me, by a-ha

School time, 18/4  11am

“Man, has school gotten harder or what? Oh right, I haven’t been in school for two years, shit.”

“Well, at least most of the stuff hasn’t changed. Math still sucks ass though.”

Lunchtime, 1pm

Shinji sat alone at a cafeteria table, he forgot to ask where his friends usually went to eat their lunch, so he was sitting alone eating his curry and taking sips from his coffee out of a warm thermos. However, someone came to put Shinji out of his lonesome.

“Hey! Is there nobody else sitting on your table?”

“Nope, go ahead.”

“Awesome, thanks !”

As the auburn hair’d student sat down on Shinji’s table, both students remained quiet until she asked a question

“Sorry for not asking earlier, but what’s your name?”

“Oh, its Shinji.” Replied Shinji as he took a sip out of his thermos

“I’m Kasumi, its nice to meet you, those rumors about you aren’t true are they?”

“What rumors?”

“Some people are saying you’re a delinquent, that you assaulted someone or maybe were part of the Yakuza”

“Never heard about that one, or the other one. I think they’re just scared of me."   "Heh."

“I never really believed in rumors myself, so I decided to go ask you yourself.”

Shinji couldn’t suppress a small grin. He couldn’t help but smile not only at this girl’s honesty and upbeatedness, but also because she reminded him of another auburn hair’d girl he got to know back in 2009.

“Well, I thank you for your honesty and for not believing the hype.”

“Thank you, that stuff looks delicious by the way, did you make it?”

Shinji, who was in the middle of a mouthful of curry, then replied

“Oh this? Yeah, I did make this, but the recipe is from the owner of a café in Yongen Jaya. It’s called Leblanc.”

“Now I really wanna go there.”

“You should, I work there.”

“Ok, now I seriously wanna go there.”

“See you around Kasumi ?”

“See you around Shinji.”

Shinji took out his pocket watch from his coat pocket and saw that lunch time was nearly over. He should probably pack it up and be ready for class. So, after saying his goodbyes to Kasumi, packing his food, he made his way out.

I am thou, thou art I

Thou hast acquired a new vow

It shall become the wings of rebellion and life

That breaketh thy yoke and chains

With the birth of the Faith Persona

Thou has obtained the seed of a new power

After school, 4pm

Shinji stood around the halls when class was dismissed for the day. This was routine, as any rumor meant possible information on Kamoshida, possible information on Kamoshida meant dirt. This was the first line of reasoning he had, but now that was seeming to be unsupported as it seems people had either better things to do, or likely were keeping silent. Instead, Shinji started to note down who were victims of Kamoshida’s deeds. This was easier for the most part, instead of hearing out for gossip which may or may not be true, Shinji instead had to eye out for students in red PE kit, black eyed and bruised all over. For the boys this was easy, for some of the girls this was too, but some came out without such marks of physical assault or violence. Instead, the 1,000-yard stare was present on some of the girls leaving the practice building. This made him even more concerned about those with neither, which happened to be some he knew. Kasumi exited the practice building, so did Shiho, that friend of Ann Takamaki. The Shujin practice building instead took a darker profile as Shinji saw the students exit it, it was an abyss where students were thrown into the gauntlet, to come out beaten black and blue, scarred physically and mentally, and even if they did escape such wrath, there was always the next day of practice.

What was found to be intriguing and utterly infuriating to Shinji was this one student, he wore a green sweater and appeared to be carrying some sort of laptop bag. Although he held a tired and weary face like some of the others, internally Shinji noted softly,

 “the fucker's asking the female students to come back to the practice building!”

This infuriated Shinji, he clearly from the look of his face doesn’t like doing it,

 “Yet he’s fucking doing it!”

He’ll have to ask Ryuji or Haru who the hell that guy was.

Late evening, Leblanc

“Keep scrubbing ay? I don’t wanna see a speck on those dishes!”

Shinji was scrubbing dishes for the night at Leblanc as Sojiro manned the counter. It was a quiet night with not much really happening. He couldn’t help but get angry at the sight of those who survived Kamoshida’s terrible wrath, only to be faced with the fear of the prospect of returning the next day or even five minutes later. It filled him with rage which he would use on attacking the stained dishes with the sponge.

Soon enough, a break in the tedium occurred when a customer entered the shop.

“Wel-“

Shinji noted the sudden pause by the boss, something was up.

“Hello there Sakura! Nice place you got here.”

“Oh. Its you.”

Sojiro’s tone had turned from a passionate fire to one of resenting tinder. It seemed to seek a spark but couldn’t find any.

“It’s a nice place, wouldn’t hurt to tell me about it.”

“Your order.”

“No small talk? How cold of you.”

“That smell, you’re still making that curry huh? Guess you haven’t gotten over her yet.”

“Well, I’m just here to say hi, I’ll be back soon. Buh bye!”

The boss couldn’t help but grumble silently to himself a few curses.

“How the hell did that son of a bitch catch wind of this place…”

Shinji, who had long finished washing the dishes while the conversation was taking place went to Sojiro’s side.

“That guy’s nothing but trouble isn’t he?”

“Huh, guess you got an eye for some things after all.”

“Well, if you’ve still got time now’s a good time for questions on coffee. Next time you’ll be learning about bean types. You won’t be of any use to me if you can’t pick up the ABCs of coffee.”

“Besides, ladies love a guy who knows his coffee, this won’t be such a bad deal for you.”

“I’m not into that shit.”

“Oh, come on. I’ve managed to pick up a few girls in my younger days with my coffee making skills.”

“I would only know of old friends who would appreciate it if I knew how to make coffee along with cooking well. Girls? I know nothing of that.”

Sojiro let out a little chuckle. It wasn’t disparaging or mocking in anyway, it to Shinji actually felt a bit endearing, and relieving that he didn’t press the matter any further.

“Well, either way I’ll teach you how to make good coffee so you can impress your friends, and I can sit back and relax.”

Heirophant Rank up!

Now playing:Iwatodai Dorm, reload.

19/4, Wednesday

A secure online meeting

The morning hours of the day is a time usually designated for those who had the luxury, a moment to admire the rising sun which was brought by a retreating moon who had just finished its night shift. For those who could afford such a luxury which happen to be relevant to our story though, it was not such a time. Instead of coffee in the brisk air and the rising sun though, cups of coffee and tea this morning for a particular group of individuals would be held over computer screens and for two, a meeting room.

The fact they had to meet up meant something was up.

“Hello everyone, I hope you all had sufficient sleep and rest because something has happened a few days ago which requires our attention, Fuuka tell them what you told me two days ago.”

Fuuka and her boss were both seated in the same meeting hall however alone. With the rest of the shadow operatives scattered around Japan, this was the only way to meet up as of current.

About a dozen or so attended the call. There was the boss herself, Mitsuru Kirijo, CEO and leader of the Kirijo group

Fuuka Yamagishi, who sat next to Mitsuru in person, and was the resident expert on robotics, technology, cognitive worlds and the collective unconscious.

Yukari Takeba, the actress for Pink Argus of Featherman, beloved by many in the country.

Junpei Iori and his beloved Chidori, a renowned baseball player who with his wife were perhaps the life of the Shadow Operatives Organisation S.O.O .

Akihiko Sanada, who now was in Hokkaido and acted as the S.O.O’s lieutenant and second in command.

Kotone Shiomi Arisato, a beloved musician and performer of some regard in local Iwatodai clubs and Aigis an Anti-Shadow Exterminator weapon who was made human and worked full time as part of the S.O, often seen donning a red tie and a suit, which Kotone adored.

There was one member who wasn’t part of the initial core of SEES which made up the S.O . She was Labrys, another anti shadow weapon system made human. She currently resides in Tokyo, able to bypass the shadow ban on active S.O members in the capital city. She was something of a loose cannon, and perhaps was the most standout of the group, donning a bomber jacket, and with a pair of shades on hand.

Only three members of the old breed from SEES were not in attendance. One was currently attending school, the second one was shot dead seven years ago in a dark and dank alleyway, and the third met a fate that mankind could not currently articulate except for a select few.

They all sat, listening carefully to what Fuuka had to say.

“Two days ago, I was visited in a dream by my persona Juno. Instead of our usual conversation, she instead was shouting to me. She sounded scared.”

“Carry on” said Mitsuru

Now playing:The voice someone calls

Fuuka continued “She said there were new persona users.”

The meeting erupted in shock. The coming of new persona users did not only mean new individuals with extraordinary power, but also perhaps an omen. Humanity was once again being held at the whims of a cognitive being willing to exploit man’s many flaws and shortcomings.

Horror was the next immediate emotion which took hold of the meeting. The prospect was an existential one, with many of the members of the S.O having experienced the first-time deities and gods of the cognitive mind of the collective unconscious of man had nearly brought humanity to its own self destruction. Now it was happening again, where new persona users, those new persona users would likely will receive a baptism of fire, having to figure things out on their own, and defy the world like the former members of SEES did on the promised day of 31/1/2009.

“Did Juno say anything else?”  Asked Kotone in a concerned manner

 “Did she disclose any further information of possible use?” asked Aigis?

“Bark!”

Fuuka replied “She then said there was one persona user with immense potential.”

“They must be the new wildcard this time.” Concluded Aigis

“She said that “He defies fate” .

“But how so? We also defied fate when we stopped the end of the world.”  Asked Junpei

“Yeah, how so?” inquired Chidori

At this point, Fuuka started to tense up, and the expression on her face was one of being unsure, inability to articulate into words what she had saw.

“It’s ok Fuuka, I’ll tell them.” Reassured Mitsuru as she handed Fuuka a glass of water.

“There is no light way of putting this. We may have reason to believe Shinjiro Aragaki, is alive.”

The mood of the room had suddenly shifted again. Where there was horror, there was an immediate cessation of any prevailing mood. Then there was utter and complete shock and surprise.

The meeting then turned to one of silence. The truth, even at this point unchecked nor confirmed true, was strong and heavy enough to bear down on the old members of SEES, unpleasant memories, memories of a long dead comrade, a friend, a brother in all measures but blood. This permeated the meeting until Labrys, who was not part of SEES originally, broke the silence.

“So,  what do we do now?” said Labrys in an inquisitive and sensitive tone

Fuuka, having gotten over the hardest part of this meeting, then explained.

“In the dream, there were also other people who were with Shinji. I noticed that they were wearing high school uniforms due to the symbol found on their uniforms. After some research, they appear to be from Shujin academy, a high school in Tokyo.

“Right Fuuka. If these are our new persona users, we have a new mission. Which is to head to Tokyo and investigate for ourselves.”

“But how?” asked Akihiko. “We aren’t officially sanctioned to operate in Tokyo, public security made that clear to us.”

“I ken go.” Stated Labrys

“That is right, you technically do not exist on the current active roster until your first mission as an active shadow operative. Your first official mission Labrys as our newest operative would be to confirm the new intelligence we had gained.”

Yukari raised her hand

“If Labrys can go because she is already in Tokyo, can I help her? I also happen to be in Tokyo for some interviews with the media. I think Junpei is also here.”

“Hell, yeah we are!” Exclaimed Junpei and Chidori

“Good. It looks like you won’t be on your own Labrys. Even though we are not sanctioned to operate in the capital, we can likely trickle in small groups of us at a time once per few months with a credible excuse to go."

“Works for me.” Replied Akihiko

“Ooh, can we go in the next batch?” exclaimed Kotone “I got a few singing gigs in Tokyo coming up in a month or two!”

“I will also accompany her, with Koromaru.” Followed up Aigis

“Woof!”

“Alright, if all is settled, lets consider this our new main priority mission. The objective is to assist the new group of persona users and to protect humanity once again.”

“And to see if our old friend is still around.” Replied Akihiko.

“Hear ye!” was the reply of several in the call.

The call soon ended after.

Now Fuuka and Mitsuru were alone, in the meeting hall discussing the mission.

“You have to let him know.”

“I know but, I would not know if this would be what he needs to hear now. He must focus on his final year of his high school education.”

In a formerly rare but now more commonplace display of certainty, confidence, and self-assuredness, Fuuka replied.

“I think you should tell him tomorrow. He is only alive today because of Shinji and he deserves to know. This is going to be important to him.”

“Even if I did, I would not be willing to send him to Tokyo. He has got his final year of high school ahead of him.”

“I think there’s something more important than that now.”

Mitsuru could only nod. Suddenly, the door to the meeting hall suddenly opened, out of the doorway came a man in a lab coat with glasses.

“Ah, Fuuka we can discuss this later. We both have important matters to attend to.

Fuuka exited the room. She doesn’t get angry, that is a fundamental fact about Fuuka that her friends will attest about. If she did, it manifests instead into attacking new work aggressively or at the gym. But this time, it was in the form of a quietly written SMS to one kid in Iwatodai, likely in math class.

Now playing: Old Friend, by Mitski

Takemi’s clinic

“Ok Shinji, this will be the first test run of a new drug I’m developing. If you want to back out now is your last chance.”

Shinji stared at the cup of red on the table. He could feel no dissenting voice within him, urging him to say no. That voice was always present when he was on the P.S.D, but now instead the dissenting voices were of others.

“Shinji don’t do it!” cried a voice which sounded like Akihiko

“Shinji please, it doesn’t have to end like this!” cried out Mitsy

But now there were new voices, they were of his new friends and associates he made here in Tokyo. However, they were instead dismissive and disappointed sounding.

Shinji had had enough. He wants them to shut up.

So he drank the whole glass. In one sitting.

“Wait, you weren’t supposed to drink the whole thing!”

Shinji grinned, and then collapsed onto the couch.

Sometime later

An hour later, Shinji woke up. There were no signs of the voices, the only voice however that could be heard was the real voice of doctor Tae Takemi.

“Despite you taking a higher dose then you were supposed to, I was still able to collect a lot of good data. Thanks to you.”

“No problem.”

Shinji sat up on the couch, still feeling a little hazy from being knocked out. He couldn’t remember the initial taste, he was knocked out too early to process it.

“But here’s the bad part, you’ll have to stick around for a bit longer in order to assess any adverse side effects, because you took a higher dose then you were supposed to.”

“How long?”

“Give it thirty more minutes, then you can leave the clinic, if any of those side effects occur when you’re out, text me in full detail and get over here asap.”

“Alright.”

“For now, try to relax and stay focused.”

“Understood.”

During those thirty minutes, Takemi was asking questions to Shinji in order to gauge if the drug had any effect on his ability to focus or to recount from memory. Eventually, one of those questions which came up was regarding the past.

“So if you’re new to Tokyo, where did you just come from?”

“Iwatodai.”

“I’ve been to Iwatodai, I was a bit hesitant because of the Apathy Syndrome outbreak which happened seven years ago.”

“Yeah?”

“I actually arrived in Iwatodai once it had mostly ended. In order to attend medical school.”

“Were there still “lost” by the time you had arrived?”

“What’s lost?”

“Lost was the name we gave to those with Apathy syndrome. They would just be laying around all over the place, not going home.”

“Oh. By the time I’d arrived there were still lost, it just happened they were in a new wing of the local city hospital there. I remember going there to see them as  part of my studies. I think by that time they’d stop calling them lost, as the local city council declared apathy syndrome a mental health crisis, and took the issue seriously"

“What else happened?”

“Mitsuru Kirijo funded a new wing of the hospital in order to help those who had come down with apathy syndrome to recover and recuperate. Most had spent the winter of the previous year I’d arrived in winter. I remember a few who were dug out of the snow. They were called snow angels by the locals because they were miraculously still alive after spending winter in the streets with Apathy syndrome.”

“Damn.”

“Shinji felt the need to change the topic, lest she started to poke holes into his cover.”

“When you were in Iwatodai, did you at least go to a place called Hagekure? Best ramen I’ve ever tried.”

“You think so too?” Exclaimed Takemi in as excited of a voice the usually restrained doctor could manage “I keep telling everyone that the best ramen I’ve ever had was in Iwatodai! All the people here just say I’m nuts because it isn’t Ogikubo.”

Both Shinji and Tae exchanged laughs. What was a sober and slightly depressing conversation about perhaps the darkest hour that Iwatodai experienced was instead turned towards something both Tae and Shinji had enjoyed back in the city.

For Shinji, it was closure, and a sign that his former home had gotten back on its feet, and a sign that his friends were able to do it. They were able to destroy the dark hour and destroyed the vice grip that Tarturus, the dark hour, and apathy syndrome had on the city. And that the institution of Hagekure Ramen still stood standing despite the epidemic spread of apathy throughout its residents.

For Tae, it was a pleasant conversation born out of unintended consequences. Expecting her new guinea pig to display possible undesirable side effects. Instead, he brought back the memory of the best damn ramen she had ever had in her life.

Soon enough, Shinji needed to leave. He displayed no further side effects that day except for a longing for old Hagekure ramen. A side effect Tae also had been afflicted with for the day as well. As a reward for participating in the trial, Shinji would now be privy to a discount for any medicine from Tae.

Death Rank up!

Another video call, though on café wifi

Leblanc, evening

Shinji had just discovered video calling. He tested this out when he asked his team members one question of importance.

“Ok, there’s this guy who’s telling some of the sports kids to go back to the practice building after practice, I think he’s probably telling them to go back to see Kamoshida if you know what I mean.”

“Well, do you know what he looks like? We might know who he is based on that?”

“He wears a green sweater, and usually carries a laptop bag.”

“Oh! That’s Mishima. He’s part of the Volleyball team. He usually keeps to himself and spends his spare time on his laptop usually.”

“Alright. Well someone needs to light a fire under his ass to tell him to stop fucking over the other sports kids by telling them to go back to get beaten.”

“I agree. He shouldn’t be doing this.”

“Wait.”

“Why?”

“If we try to tell him to stop, we might get ratted out instead to Kamoshida, as he’s part of the Volleyball team he has wider access to him.”

“We also haven’t considered if he is doing this under duress. I think I saw him walking around with a nasty bruise under his eye. He’s saying its just practice being brutal. If you get what I’m implying here.”

“Right.”

“Ok. Lets hold off for now, but we definitely need to find out who’s going to be called up tomorrow. Otherwise, more people are going to get hurt more then usual in the next few days.”

“Hey guys, I have an idea.”

Now playing: Message man, by 21 pilots

The next day, 20/4

The lockers, early morning

Despite being a private organisation with a higher degree of spending than a conventional public school, Shujin Academy doesn’t really have substantial security. If the Kelly gang could just arrive before the lonesome security guard entered the premises to turn on the cameras, the gang should be fine. Moving through the back fire escape into the building, the Kelly thieves were able to make their way to the locker room of the practice building. It had only served to facilitate the current volleyball club and team. The other sports team, the former track team, had been consigned to the past with the coming of Kamoshida. That meant twenty-four messages for twenty four volleyball players.

In hushed tones, the thieves executed Ryuji’s plan.

“Ryuji, take the boys lockers. Haru, the girls. I’ll keep watch and security.”

Going to the respective locker rooms, both Ryuji and Haru started to jam in small messenger cards into the small and narrow slits on the sides of the lockers. These cards read.

“To the students of the Volleyball club and team, if you seek emancipation from the abuse and assault from your coach upon your bodies. You have from this day on an opportunity to avert such. We advise you to simply leave the school campus once practice is done. DO NOT stick around. If you seek to go further, consider perhaps even leaving the volleyball team, you do not deserve to come out of high school with a broken body and mind.”

“P.S, To the individual, if you’re the last one still sticking around, while the rest of the bunch take flight, Kamoshida will not show any semblance of mercy. Follow your friends and get out while the getting’s good.”

To whom it concerns,

K.G

With the distribution of sound advice and counsel complete, the Kelly Gang then withdrew from the locker room. They made their way to the roof. By the time anyone would reach school and start noticing the message cards, the shared alibi was that they were just gardening.

Now they were simply lounging on the now unfolded steel chairs that were scattered on the roof. Silently congratulating themselves on the execution of their scheme.

“Good job everybody. Hopefully when school ends, they follow our advice.”

“Don’t we know anybody else from the volleyball team who we can urge to not turn up to practice or to get out asap ourselves? We did what we could for the strangers among them though it isn’t a guarantee they’ll actually leave.”

After some thought, Shinji thought of one.

“Shiho.”

“Oh shit.” Was the reaction of Ryuji. “Ann’s best friend.”

“We’ll text Ann. We have her contact, surely she can get Shiho out of there, Haru can you do that later, preferably before the end of school?”

“Can do. On that note however, can you help me give my plants a watering?”

“Off course.”

And so, the morning was spent gardening. Any illicit activities the three might have partaken in had been buried with the seeds of emancipation, the roots of freedom, and the fruits of the Kelly Gang’s deeds.

Now playing: Persona, from Persona 3 FES

After school, the entrance to school

Shinji stood at the same spot he had stood two days ago. He had seen some signs of the message’s effect, that it created a large ass stir in Shujin. And it was the only thing anybody was talking about.

But now was the moment of truth, standing by the exit, the leader of the Kelly Gang wasn’t alone. Instead stood there Ann, likely waiting for Shiho. She’s following along.

Then when the bell tolled upon the moment practice ended, Shinji then counted the number of Volleyball club and team members who got out while the getting was good.

The first one to exit the practice building was Shiho actually. She exited the building with a smile on her face instead of a bruise. She then subsequently exited the building with Ann, and the two took exiting through the school entrance.

She was the first of twenty-three others who left the practice building. They had all vacated either in what looked almost like a straight line, or in groups of two to three. The Kelly Gang had perhaps accomplished a display of organization and calm decorum that a fire drill aspired to match, but failed repeatedly to.

Shinji felt like a Shepard when he saw what almost looked like a procession leave the building. He then put that thought to bed, as he saw the actual Ersatz shepherd among the sheep flock leaving the building. That would be Mishima, who trailed behind the bunch in his green sweater and holding his laptop holder. Looking over his shoulder keeping watch for the pack. Mishima spotted Shinji, and as he exited the building.

He gave Shinji a smile and a nod of subjective acknowledgment. Shinji although wary that Mishima might have figured out who had orchestrated the flight of the volleyball team, was assured that Mishima had only known, and simply wanted to give thanks. He had perhaps been reminded of what genuine agency and freedom of decision had felt like in a long, long while.

“Heh, I guess Haru was right after all.”

With that out of the way, Shinji made his way to the roof, the second operation in Kamoshida’s palace was about to happen soon. He could hardly wait.

Unbeknownst to Shinji however, he was being trailed by someone he thought had left the building already.

The roof, hideout of the Kelly Gang

Operation II: Attack of the Kelly Gang

With confirmation of operation one and a half, or operation 3G (Going when the Getting’s Good) as thought up by resident operation cool name thinker Ryuji’s complete and utter success. The Kelly Gang could now focus on the upcoming operation at hand. Unpacking their guns, their melee weapons, medicine, provisions and other equipment, the Kelly Gang was ready, they just had to go to the metaverse, take a moment to synchronise pocket watches, and then start the operation.

Beginning Navigation…

“Man. Kelly, how did you get the hang of this watch synchronization thingy?” asked Ryuji

“Lots of practice and operations with the old crew. A lot of fucking up as well helped.” Shinji replied

“At least we’re getting more experience using our new equipment.”

 Haru tried to end the inquiry on a good note, only for Shinji to have the final proverbial word.

“Experience, is knowledge gained five minutes after you needed it.”

In this summation of learning from your fuckups over the past 500 years of human history in a single honest statement, the gang (sans Kelly) was then laughing. The laughing continued until all three members could hear a snickering who’s source was definitely not from them.

Turning to face the way they came, the gang saw one Ann Takamaki, standing in front of them.

"Ahh fuck."

Chapter Text

A bit earlier, a line outside an ice cream vendor

Now playing: Ruby, by 21 pilots

“Man, it’s been some time since we’ve been able to meet each other like this.”

“It's nice, especially with what has happened recently.”

Ann and Shiho stood at the line to an ice cream vendor. They’ve been looking for a gap in their respective schedules to be able to meet up like this and enjoy some ice cream, and  the Kelly Gang were able to deliver on that.

“I’ll pay, don’t worry about paying Shiho.”

“Thanks Ann. I better be paying for yours next time though.”

Sharing a laugh, the two took a seat on a bench with an umbrella above providing shade from the sun. The seating area was surrounded by Shujin students, some of which had just left after receiving their call to freedom by the Kelly Gang. 

Ann did not like spending time around Shujin students, whenever she was on campus there was always at least one person watching her, or talking about her looks to their friends. She tried her best to block out the whispers, the looks, the stuff talked behind her back, and worse. However, this resulted in her being lonely. Having been sent to Shujin to attend school while her parents, while loving and loved by Ann, had to attend business in far away places like Helsinki, New York, Berlin, Rome and other places for the family fashion line. They spared no effort trying to at least come back to Japan to spend the holidays with their daughter, but sometimes it was not enough. So Ann was alone,it had been ten months since she last saw her parents and she was alone for months at a time in a suffocating prison colony of a school and by extension the wider capital city of Tokyo. 

This started to change when Shiho entered Ann’s life as her best friend and confidant. Suddenly there was one student from Shujin in her corner, always behind her. Any spare time which was shared between the two was spent with Shiho introducing Ann to the wider city of Tokyo and whatever leisure, activities and places they could go if they had the time and the money to do it.

Cat cafes, jazz dens, fishing spots, street food, cafes the whole nine yards. Suddenly the city of Tokyo did not in Ann’s eyes at least remained just a wider prison colony where Ann was to be lonely and miserable. Instead it became a world where as long as the trains kept running, Kichijoji stayed open, her best friend had time, what was previously perhaps the most miserable and soul-sucking period of her life perhaps became the most memorable and best years of her teenage years. At least until recently.

“I’m gonna do it.”

“Wait Shiho, you’re gonna leave the team?”

“I’ve made my choice, volleyball is fun until your  coach starts fucking breaking your body. If I stayed there, I might not be able to do sports anymore because my body would be too broken by Kamoshida.”

“So what now Shiho?”

“Now’s time to enjoy your ice cream before it melts.”

Shiho and Ann shared a laugh. Any undertaking which both the girls took whether it was modeling or sports only made themselves attractive not mainly due to fun, but because of the idea of achieving your dreams or of being some rising star in your respective field of fame was just some years away if you were able to stick with it. Now Shiho sat eating her ice cream, thinking about which stars to aim for in order to land on the moon without raising too much hell in the process. 

“So what now Shiho?” asked Ann as she took a spoonful off her mint chocolate ice cream.

“I might know a family friend who was a coach for baseball for a bit, maybe I should give him a call.”

Ann thought about Shiho being a baseball player, then she had the picture of Shiho in a baseball jersey in her head. Ann’s attention towards the conversation was only regained after a spoon of ice cream.

“So what does he do now? The family friend I mean?”

“Professional baseball, he was on TV back on Monday I think.”

“He’s not like Kamoshida isn’t he?”

“Complete opposite. He’s a total goofball and is an awesome dude. His partner is an artist who once drew a portrait of me some time ago when both of them visited.”

“Oh, that's good.”

“Maybe we’ll be able to meet up more like this, it's great spending time with you again outside of school.”

“And with me off the team, perhaps we will have more time.”

The two finished their ice cream and were about to get ready to leave, but Ann had other plans.

“Hey Shiho, you go on ahead I gotta go back and pick something up back at school.”

“Alright Ann, see you tomorrow?”

“You know it.”

And so they split in separate directions, little did both know that they’ll be heading towards the same direction. Destiny.

Now playing: Suspicion

Shujin academy, scaling the stairwell

Ann checked her texts, it was Haru that messaged her to scurry Shiho out of Kamoshida’s reach, she would have overlooked the text, not take a peek at the gift horse in its mouth like Shiho did, but her curiosity was getting the better of her. If Haru was related to this “K.G” in some way or form, perhaps…

Now Ann was standing by the doors which led to the roof, on the other side was Haru and her friends, presumably helping Haru tend to the garden. Strangely metallic sounds could be heard on the other side, it sounded less like gardening tools and more like machinery silently working itself. Ann found herself thinking

“There’s no way gardening sounds like this.”

Ann didn’t finish her thought when reality suddenly started to distort around her.

Back to present

“So what are we going to do now?”

“Are you serious? We can’t bring her, she'll get hurt!”

Shinji stood silent as Haru and Ryuji debated the merits and risks of bringing Ann along. He stood alongside Ann and was also internally debating the merits and risks. 

“So, you really wanna come?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it doesn’t look like you’re going to take no for an answer.”

“And I really do not want to have to make sure you don’t let loose what we do here. That would be creepy and a pain in the neck.”

Ann did not get to know Shinji fully the first time they met. As Shinji sat mostly silent while Haru was doing the talking back in that restaurant where they’d first met and exchanged contacts. It was now that Ann could really acknowledge

“Jesus, Shinji’s a scary man.”

“Alright gang! Listen up.”

“We’re bringing Ann along, we can’t back out of the operation now to bring Ann back to reality. We have no idea if we could come back to the palace easily, so we’ll be bringing her.”

Shinji reached into his holster to give Ann his Smith and Wesson revolver, along with some other items which included a map, some bombs, and a canteen full of water.

“If we’re killed out there, you need to get out of here as fast as possible. Do you understand?”

“Y-yes.”

“Stay behind us and a bit back, do not loose sight of us.”

Now playing: The Initiated, by Ben Mathews,

0 hour

Traversing the first and second floor gave the Kelly Gang enough time to brief Ann on the motions of palace infiltration, from code names, personas, shadows, the limited knowledge held on how palaces work and the motions.

30 minutes

After traversing the second floor, the gang had arrived at the remains of the blasted wall that the gang blew apart with a cannon the last operation they were here. Now the path was open, and the gang (plus Ann) traversed towards the third floor.

31 minutes

Scaling the stairs to the third floor, the gang made their way towards the main hall. The gang made their way to Kamoshida’s personal study to reorient themselves.  

“Alright, Ann can you hand us that map?”

“Sure, where are we anyway?”

“Kamoshida’s study.”

“We last got here when we cleared out the entire second floor. The guards here became pissed and angrier for some reason once we got up.”

“I mean, we blasted one of the walls here with a cannon.”

“Oh yeah, I did that.”

Olga went to sift through some bookcases for anything of value or importance that wasn’t nailed down. While Kelly kept trying to make sense of the liminal space that was Kamoshida’s residence. Thankfully, Olga did find something useful.

“Hey Kelly, found a map here. It’s for the third and fourth floor.”

Olga brought the map onto the table so all could see the layout of both the third and the forth floor.

The third was indeed, Kamoshida’s private quarters, study, pool, trophy room, bedroom #1, bedroom #2, so on and so forth. 

“Ok. lets try to secure the most direct route to the forth floor. We can occasionally make some detours to nab anything that isn’t nailed down.”

Ryuji spoke up, “I like the sound of that trophy room, imagine if we can stealing Kamoshida’s volleyball trophies heh.” 

“It’s looking like it isn’t too far out of the way of the stairwell to the forth.”

“Right, we’ll do it, Olga, hand that map off to Ann and we’ll get going.”

40 minutes

“You gotta me shitting me! Those sons of bitches are bulletproof!” 

The shadows on this floor had changed. Instead of prioritizing quantity, the security on the floor was instead filled with what was presumably Kamoshida’s honor guard, his Varangian guard. Less prone to negotiation, more towards aggression, these guards were of a different stock compared to the now dead shadows in the floors below. The honor guard required instead persona power to be destroyed. However, being the honor guard, and in a better pay grade, these shadows dropped more loot and more cash. Which Ann would quickly shove into a duffel bag that carried their loot.

The halls and individual rooms and the shadows inside of them were smoked with bombs along with shouts and cries of Agi, Bufu, Eiha, Zio and Psi.The toll on the reserves of energy and on mental fatigue were being staved off by coffee and curry, but for how much longer?

Eventually, the gang did make it to the trophy room, Having gotten a taste for loot, treasure and booty, Teddy and Ann were ready to make off with whatever valuables from the room. Olympic medals, cups, whatever symbols of pride and Kamoshida’s riches they could take from the man who caused them so much pain.

Instead what greeted them was a macabre display. When the map said trophy room, they did not specify what “trophy” meant.

The trophy room was filled to the brim with animal heads, deer, lion, zebra, tiger, all matters of exotic animals and species, all mounted on display, complimented by a comfortable looking chair and fireplace.

Most telling of all, each trophy had a name attached, they were mostly girl names. Some had the names of boys as well.

A broken bone was on display above the fireplace, labelled Ryuji Sakamoto.

And out of this macabre display of taxidermy, laid an empty stand, yet to be displayed with its prize. Labelled “Shiho Suzui”

More empty stands could be found on the far side wall. Kelly could find only one familiar name, “Kasumi Yoshizawa.”

“What the hell?!” Ryuji exclaimed,  “that’s my name over there near that bone!”

Ann, Kelly and Olga were silent. Taking in the macabre is a jarring experience for most, but it was followed with the slow and hard hitting implications of what that far side of the wall meant to Kamoshida. Kamoshida was a hunter, everyone in Shujin which fell into his grasp was game, and it was clear he took great pleasure in reveling of his conquests of the students he saw as just two legged game. The four thieves stood silently, a silent agreement and oath was made in that silence. This ends here.

A double barrel hunting shotgun was mounted on the wall, just above the fireplace and bone. 

“Well… don’t mind if I do I guess.”

Shinji took the shotgun off its stand, at least this was a consolation prize from what was previously thought to be a room of treasure, at least according to the Kelly Gang.

1 hour

Things had started to get rough. Security only seemed to increase instead of going down every time the honor guard  instead withdrew and consolidated to easier to hold positions in larger numbers . So these shadows of quality were then also in substantial quantity thus turning what was the individual rooms and hallways of Kamoshida’s private quarters into individual fortresses to be held by the best Kamoshida could offer. The coffee and curry was keeping the gang in the fight, but whatever stocks and reserves of mental fortitude and strength needed to let the personas loose was seeming thin, while the shadows were instead were increasing.

1 hour 10 minutes

“Guys, we might need to retreat for now, we aren’t gonna make it far at this rate.”

“But we’re so close to the stairwell!” Replied Teddy

Olga and Ann was in too exhausted of a state to argue. 

“If we just make one more push! One more we might make it!”

“We’ve bitten off more then we can chew. We can come back some other time.”

While Ryuji and Shinji argued the negatives of the other respective party’s position. The shadows seemed to confirm Shinji’s point. Just not in the way he would’ve wanted

“FREEZE, WE HAVE YOU SURROUNDED!”

The guard had taken the opportunity to catch the Kelly gang while they were recovering. Now they were surrounded. To the pleasure of King Kamoshida, who stood behind his honor guard, laughing mockingly.

“King Kamoshida, my lord, should we execute them?”

King Kamoshida shuffled towards the front,

“Make way for the king and princess!”

Kamoshida shuffled towards the front to better see the Kelly gang, in his arms was brought forward a fake Ann Takamaki. A slave to Kamoshida’s lust and debauchery.

Olga gently told Ann to stay behind her, whatever happens next.

Kamoshida then decreed.

“Kill the men. Bring me the girls to me.”

“You heard the king’s order!”

As the fate of the Kelly gang was being decreed by King Kamoshida, something stirred in Ann. A voice a call coming deep from her soul.

“Oh come on Anne, it can’t end like this.”

Olga, who’s focus had been on shielding Ann from the creeping tide of Kamoshida’s honor guard had failed to notice what was happening. 

“I was a simple waitress in Marco’s cafe at Dallas Texas when I was your age. But like you I had dreams and I was willing to raise as much hell as possible to get to them stars.”

“They said you could aim for the stars in order to reach the moon as long as you don’t raise too much ‘ell in the proccess. But it looks like there’s someone in the way of that now. How about a contract? 

Ann drawed out the smith and Wesson Kelly had given her out of her pocket, cocking the hammer.

“I am thou, thou art I”

Now playing: Wiping all out, Kozuka remix

Ann shoved Ryuji out of the way, drew the revolver and shot up the “Princess.”

The princess then dissipated into black ooze. The only thing that remained was a black stained cat ear headband.

Ann surged forth, all the shadows that previously surrounded and conspired to murder the gang had taken pause in utter shock and horror. Their princess had been assassinated in front of their eyes by this fake. This pretender.

Taking advantage of this pure moment of shock and fear in the honor guard, Ann grabbed Kamoshida by the hair and held him at gunpoint. The sight of Ann holding their king a hostage at gunpoint suddenly roused the honor guard to attention. The honor guard had instead reverted to their prime directive. Protecting the king.

Seeing this opportunity to be free of the enemy, the Kelly gang were able to draw their weapons and fight back. They had turned from the game to be hunted for sport into the game hunters once again.

Continuing to hold the king hostage, the king then attempted to reason with the pretender. Tears running down his face after the sight of his “princess” being gunned down by her fake.

It was no use however, for a mask of crimson red had materialized on Ann’s face. In a moment of pure rage, joy and a manic expression of various other emotions at their high, Ann then ripped off whatever vestiges of control the fool had over her.

“Come! BONNIE PARKER!”

In the blast of hot blue fire and pure energy, came out the ghastly figure of Bonnie Elizabeth Parker, a woman in a dark dress with a smoking pipe in her mouth. A colt revolver could be found in her hand. 

Then next came Ann, in a crimson red trenchcoat, with some bandoliers of ammunition slung around her shoulders. Accompanied with a sheathed Bowie knife by her side.

“Bonnie! Do it!” Screamed Ann with the fury and venom of a bag full of rattlesnakes.

Bonnie took out the pipe from her mouth, and spat out hot flames at the honor guard. The display was terrific. The bulletproof armor which thwarted the small arms of the Kelly gang had melted down into hot burning slag. Survivors were finished off with a hail of fire from the automatic weapons in the Kelly Gang’s disposal, courtesy of Olga’s Bar and Ann’s Tommy gun.

As was routine , the lustful and debauched king Kamoshida had fled the scene, nursing several burns in places the sun wouldn’t shine upon. The Kelly gang survived, and had gained a new member in the process.

1 hour and ten minutes

Kamoshida’s library

“How are you feeling now Ann?”

“Not too bad. Feels hard to breath though.”

Ryuji then handed over a bottle of ice lemon tea he bought from a vending machine before the operation started.

“Here, damn Ann. You were awesome out there.”

“Yeah. When you ripped out your persona and it spat out fire, most of those shadows turned and ran instead of staying to fight.”

“That was supposed to be the best of the best in this palace in terms of shadows and you made them run or become melted chocolate.”

“Hey Kelly?” Asked Ann who was still in possession of Kelly’s sidearm “you should have this back.”

“Thanks.”

“Hey, next time after a small break, we intend to come back and finish Kamoshida off. Would you like to help us?” 

Shinji held out his hand

After a moment of anticipation by the gang, Ann’s reply was made clear.

“Yeah. Let’s stop this monster.”

A series of handshakes were exchanged. Then the gang fled the scene.

1 hour 25 minutes

“So, I guess we’ll need to give you a codename for when we work in the palace. How does Bonnie sound?”

“Sounds perfect.” Replied Ann, fixing up her trenchcoat and hat.

The real world, the faculty office

That headache of Kamoshida's isn't getting any better. On top of that, some students in Shujin had dared to defy him. Questions and accusations of his abuse were becoming the standard topic of discussion among the studentbase. Although the P.A and teacher staff of the school remained silent, they had grown uncomfortable being associated with the volleyball star, and left him out in the cold. A series of mental gymnastics and acrobatics was occuring in his head, appeals to keep going, to come clean, to run, to fight, to stay and a variety of other courses of action, all in a panic stricken mood and manner.

Akihabara

Mishima spent his time in an internet cafe, trying to make sense of what "K.G" might mean or symbolise. He took a sip out of his coke only to then recieve an SMS from someone he hoped he would not need to face tommorow.

Kamoshida: Bring me Kasumi Yoshizawa

Chapter Text

Now playing: No more what ifs

Kichijoji, the jazz den

20/4, Late evening

Labrys sat in a table close to the far corner, awaiting her shadow operative colleagues. Labrys by far had more free time even with shadow operatives business, far too much time. For the first three years, that time was spent discovering herself, enjoying living life, and forging a close bond and friendship with her fellow shadow operatives, scientists at the Kirijo research wing into cognitive worlds, and navigating the ever changing and evolving state of being alive and living with the help of Aigis.

Labrys was easily the most popular and beloved of the shadow operatives. To some extent, she had filled the hole left by Shinji and Minato with her standup personality and energy. She was always eager to learn more about both Shinji and Minato from those who knew both of them. Some might see this as a perhaps detrimental. Trying to live up to the monumental memory and joy that Shinji and Minato had brought to former SEES. But she liked to think she did a pretty good job. Now she sat alone with her own thoughts, in a warm bomber jacket, letting the words of the singer at the stage soothe her soul and any lingering thoughts and apprehensions she had about the mission at hand.

Soon enough, the current shadow operatives apart from Labrys who were in Tokyo, had arrived, however discretely. Being of celebrity status, Junpei and Yukari had to arrive in disguise. Chidori also accompanied the two, having been a shadow operative once she graduated high school and got her life on track thanks to former SEES members, especially Junpei.

After exchanging greetings and ordered drinks, the four shadow operatives sat to discuss the details on the mission. Yukari, being the most senior member at the table (as no.4 operative), currently in command of the current deployment of shadow operatives until a shadow operative of higher seniority was present, therefore she initiated the discussion.

“Ok. We have a few objectives, we need to confirm the scale of cognitive distortion is present here in the city. Then we need to find this group of persona users and affirm whether they are interested in cooperating with us. Lastly, we need to confirm if Shinji is alive.”

Junpei replied with questions of his own.

“Are we going to be on our own for now?”

“Not for long. We know Kotone, Aigis, Fuuka and Koromaru will be deployed later. But we also have help from others too.”

Junpei then opened up 

“Who?"

“Its someone from Iwatodai, Mitsuru and Fuuka trust them.”

“He'll be here to help set up operations, make sense of whatever is happening here, and is also a qualified counselor.”

“Sweet.” Replied Chidori, as she sipped her mocktail.

“As for the new group of persona users, we gotta assume that they’re figuring out things as they go just like us.”

“Man.” Said Junpei, “you think it’ll just be like 2009 all over again Yuka-tan?”

“Yeah Jun. But at least we’re prepared to some extent.”

Labrys then picked up the conversation again. 

“Since you guys are busy, should I take over trying to find this group of persona users?”

“Sure, just be careful, and don’t be gung-ho. We need to cooperate with them.”

“Noted.”

“Can I also help? ” Asked Chidori

“As long as you don’t get hurt Chidori.” Replied Junpei as he took a sip out of his root beer

“Don’t worry about me Jun Jun.” says Chidori in a lovingly mocking accent

“You brought me back.” Chidori followed up, smiling at him 

Junpei smiled, only to then lay out the elephant in the room.

“And what happens if we really do find Shinji?”

A moment of silence followed. Yukari tried to think of what to do if Fuuka was right, and Shinji was really alive.

“To be completely honest, I don’t know. Kotone, Misturu and Akihiko would know better."

“So we’re figuring it out as we go?” Asked Labrys

“Yeah.”

The table was completely silent, with all shadow operatives in a deep contemplation. Except for Chidori, who was enjoying her mocktail and the live performance on stage.

“I think we can do this.” stated Labrys

“Yeah. What’s the worst we can do?” Asked Junpei

“Well, let’s focus on what we can do. No use worrying about what we can’t do now.”

“Amen.” Replied Chidori, who was finishing her drink.

The shadow operatives would enjoy the rest of their evening in the jazz den, with business out of the way, they were able to enjoy the relaxed atmosphere in the restaurant. It was now not a shadow operative meeting, but a gathering of friends, old and new and the joy that came with having good company around.

“Now that I’m thinking about it” elaborated Junpei

“That group of new persona users are maybe going through what we went through back in 2009.” Explained Junpei

“What do you mean?” Asked Yukari

“Well, we were figuring out the dark hour, our new personas, figuring out how to fight as a team, all while balancing school and our lives at the same time.”

“Oh yeah, you’re right. Well, at least we can sort of understand what’s going through their heads. Because we were in their position seven years ago, man that brings me back.”

“Man, it has been ages since we graduated from high school.”

“Yeah. I’ve got a lot of good and bad memories coming back to me now.” Elaborated Junpei.

Chidori could only smile and snuggle up to Junpei’s side. It was getting late.

“Should we get ready to go?” Asked Labrys

“Yeah, we should. We got a lot of work ahead of us.”

“I can pay the bill.”

“No Junpei, I will.”

“But I insist!”

“Let me pay the bill this time, Stupei!”

While the two old friends argued the reasons why the other shouldn’t pay the bill, Labrys and Chidori could only giggle and smile. There was a lot of work ahead and while Yukari had to still worry about being pink Argus and filming Featherman, while Junpei had to worry about professional baseball, both Chidori and Labrys were instead preparing for their first proper shadow operative mission. A lot was possible, a lot of work had to be done. But this was what both of them had been training for for the better part of almost five years. They were ready.

Meanwhile, in Yongen Jaya

Leblanc

Now playing: The lamp is low, by Laurindo Almeida

Start Recording

“Hello, hello is this thing on?”

“This is Shinji, the day is Thursday the twentieth of april. The second operation was a…”

“Mixed success.”

“We failed to reach our objective, but we gained a new persona user who would help us.”

“We’re gonna have another go at it on Sunday.”

“Man. It’s hard starting all over again. Back when I had Castor, there was no competition, we were invincible, though maybe that’s for the best. I guess you’ll be lecturing me about getting strong and that crap if you were here Aki.”

“At least Ned’s better. He’s calm, has a sense of humor, and doesn’t try to kill me.”

“I wonder if the other guys' personas talk to them. Maybe you guys know the answer to that. You probably had your Kirijo scientist nerds look into that.”

Shinji shuffled around, trying to think of something to say to the camera.

“I’ll likely have to get her a pocket watch and an armband too. I wonder if you guys still hold on to those. I still have mine, and it works just as new.”

“You know, there's a chance these recordings won’t make it to you guys. And maybe we won’t be seeing each other ever again. But if that happens, don’t be too worried. Besides, I have new people to look over and make sure they don’t get themselves killed. They remind me of some of you guys. I also got myself a job, cooking curry and coffee at this coffee shop at Yongen Jaya. Honestly Chagall's looks more like that Starbucks crap the more I drink coffee from here.”

“Anyway, I need to sleep. The next two days will be preparation for another go at the palace. If you’re around Iwatodai and walking Koromaru to the shrine, please pray for us, we’re going to be seeing this through to the end.”

End recording

21/4, Friday

After School

Now playing: Money, by The drums

Shinji exited the antique dealer shop with an additional pocket watch, along with some other luxuries. They weren’t entirely necessary nor needed at the palace, but due to some certain circumstances that the cognitive world had, this would be one.

The recent difficulties experienced during the second excursion into the palace (along with the stupid amount of cash collected, even after divvying it up between all members, with Haru forgoing her share, passing it to Ann instead). Bringing Shinji to the decision of a shopping spree. 

So now he found himself going through shops in and around Shibuya, window shopping.

Shinji never really got the concept of shopping. His first friends never did either, Mitsy never really did shopping, neither did Aki. He did not continue to understand shopping in general when he moved back to the dorm, and subsequently had new roommates who did shop on the daily. Yukari, Kotone, Fuuka they all shopped on a daily basis for non essential stuff.

Maybe it was because Shinji now had the means to shop for beyond mere essentials, but Shinji now found himself ironically feeling the need to shop for more than just mere survival, and he was aware of that. Thinking about it now, it must've been his time on the streets that made the concept of shopping for leisure an alien concept.

Perhaps if his old SEES team somehow found him, and managed to suspend their belief in his apparent resurrection, he could ask Yukari to help him find some damn new clothes. As long as they weren’t too expensive nor what the Americans call “bling” .

Carrying his newly bought wares in a duffel bag, Shinji wandered around Shibuya to see if there really was anything which might catch his eye. Instead, when he went down into the underground mall, only to then bump into Ann unexpectedly, doing her own shopping.

“Hey, didn’t see you as a shopping kind of guy.”

“I was just shopping for essentials, not for clothes.”

An awkward pause then occurred, Shinji was then compelled to hand something off to Ann which he had gotten from the Antique dealer.

“Perfect timing meeting you here actually.”

“Yeah how?”

“I got this from the antique dealer store for you.”

Shinji took the pocket watch he got from the store and handed it to Ann

“Phones refuse to work in the palace, to take track of the time we spend in the palace, we need old analog watches or pocket watches.”

“As a member of the Kelly gang, this is now yours.”

“Thanks Shinji, you bought that with the money from Kamoshida’s palace?”

“Yeah. Why do you ask?”

“Well, I always see you wearing that coat around, why’s that?”

“Had to be for a while, I used to be sick a lot so I wore it for some years.”

“When was the last time you went clothes shopping?”

Shinji froze, he really couldn’t remember the last time he went to get new clothes. Being homeless meant only packing as much essentials as can fit in his bag. Money was for food, water, medicine and showers, not for getting new clothes. Additionally, his condition when he was on the PSDs made wearing that damn jacket a necessity, any sort of effort to expand the non existent wardrobe a waste.

But now he had a room, a decently sized wardrobe, a body that wasn’t cold enough to be pissing out ice cubes, and for once, some cash.

“To be honest, I don’t really remember.”

“We need to change that.”

What followed was an immediate trip to the nearest clothes shop in the underground mall, followed by the purchase of several sets of clothes, and some more in addition to summer. Ann paid for all of it using her share of the palace money she had hauled when she went with the gang into Kamoshida’s palace. While the two of them shopped, browsed, tried out new clothes, and other motions, another conversation was occurring deep within both the personas they held.

“So Ned? Why are you allowing this? Shouldn’t he be focused on working on the next score instead of fucking shopping?”

“He never was able to have this life. I’ve seen it Bonnie, his life was much like mine, short, unfair and hard fought. He did not fight for his self image like you did Bonnie.”

“C’mon Ned! This isn’t about me, it's about him!”

“If it's about him, then it's about me just as equally.”

“Think about it Bon, if he had a normal life, went to school without interruption, had friends of great quality, without needing to strife against the world?”

“I embody him in those what ifs ,what if my father wasn’t hauled to prison, I kept going to school, kept my siblings out of trouble, and got enough money to start a farm somewhere nice?”

“Hmm. But those are just what ifs. They won’t ever be. That was made clear for me when I met my end at the end of several bars and the cops who used them, and you when you met the rope.”

“We’re now acting in the stead and guardianship of these kids now. If we don’t allow them the life we had taken from us, what does that make us?”

Now Bonnie stood by and thought about the time she had been serving coffee and pancakes at a diner in Dallas. It was a life entirely foreign to her now, but a sense of weariness started to envelop her like a warming blanket. She now couldn’t help but think of a more peaceful life instead, perhaps someone as loving as Clyde was. But as she said, that was a what if, what would matter now was the safety and lives of the Kelly Gang, and Ned had a point. 

Now both Ann and Shinji stepped out of the store, Shinji carrying both his duffel bag of palace essentials and a plastic bag full of clothes. 

“Thanks Ann. I don’t think I would’ve had the balls to go clothes shopping for myself.”

“Hey, next time you need help, call me.”

“Sure.”

“Hey Ann?”

“Yeah?”

“See you at school.”

“You too!”

Lovers rank up!

A voice then emerged within Shinji’s head. It was Ned.

“Your friends, you pals. Their destinies and lives are in your hands. I trust you have that in your mind.”

“Yeah Ned.”

“You also should be paying more attention to your education, boy.”

“Even with all that is going on?”

“You have to make something of yourself in the real world as much as you are in the minds of the people-folk.”

“I’ll- try.”

“I trust that you will, boy.”

The attic, Leblanc

Now playing:Homestead, by Steven Lynn

Shinji was sorting out his newly bought goods. The clothes were easy enough to fold and store into the shelves, however his newly bought things weren’t so.

The first was a sewing machine, he had decided if he was to make new armbands for new gang members they would be done here in the attic instead of the home economics room, lest that student council president think he was up to trouble.

Taking out thread, he spent time sewing up a new armband, this time marked No. 3. 

Sojiro went upstairs to ascertain what Shinji was doing. Seeing Shinji hunched over at his desk, sewing red fabric.

“I see you’re into sewing.”

“I had to, clothes get torn all the time, it happened a lot when I was homeless.”

“Hang on, you were homeless?

“Yeah."

"What about your parents?"

Never had them. I had a friend who did get adopted who’d let me crash in with them.”

Sojiro stood there in shock and revelation. His conjured image of Shinji was changing at this moment, with the expression of shock turning into one of an elderly responsibility. 

“That's besides the point.”

Sojiro sighed.

“Look kid, I know I was a bit hard on you earlier when you first arrived, but I’m legally your guardian that means something to me. You can come to me if you need help, ok? 

“Ok.” replied Shinji. Not in a cold manner but in a focused tone. He was at work, ready to bring Kamoshida’s downfall.

Sojiro went downstairs for a short time, only to come back up with a bowl of curry and a mug of coffee. He then gave Shinji a pat on the back, and then went back downstairs to close up shop.

Shinji had a sigh of relief. The old man wasn’t able to take a peek at what Shinji was sewing. He wasn’t caught yet.

Heading straight to his duffel bag, Shinji then took out another one of his “essentials” that he bought while shopping, a laptop. He placed the laptop on the workbench he had cleaned up when he had first arrived here.

“Now. How the hell do I make you work?”

After some quick reading on his phone on how to use his newly bought laptop, Shinji then logged a new user on the system. 

“Insert new username”

“Hmm.”

Shinji thought a good long while on whether he should use his real name. For the first time  he was logging his name into a computer that was entirely his.

“Eh. I’ll use my codename, what’s the worse that could happen?”

New username: Ned Kelly

After working out the details and motions of setting up his new laptop, Shinji then went on the nearest search engine and then keyed in a few searches (in incognito mode off course)

How to make smoke bombs

“How to make Molotov cocktail

How to make lock picks

After taking his time going through how to make a series of several illicit tools needed for the upcoming operation into the palace, Shinji got to work on making new equipment, along with any stacks of cash that those shadows had dropped, there was always left over miscellaneous objects  that Shinji was struggling to find use for. He thought about selling them to the gun shop’s clerk, maybe he would find it useful. But he would likely raise the question and Shinji couldn’t find a convincing answer in him. It egged Shinji because he was not a hoarder. He had to find some use for them otherwise they would have the usefulness of a chocolate teapot. 

Lockpicks were easy, you needed paper clips and a tension wrench. Molotov cocktails required stealing goods from the kitchen that the old man never used. Beer requisitioned from the back end of the fridge. They were past their expiration date and were certainly forgotten by the boss, but now Shinji found a new use for them. Now Shinji took some cooking oil and soap then mixed it with the alcohol. According to the internet, Shinji’s improvised mixture which he was pouring into the glass bottles were now stickier and harder to put out. They were now improvised napalm stored in Asahi beer bottles.

“Well, for the first attempt at improvised chemistry, I think you did pretty well, Shinji.”

Shinji stored the bottles and lockpicks in  the spare duffel bag he had stored his newly bought computer earlier. He would take the fruits of his improvised tinkering tomorrow to school and store it in the same gardening sacks the guns were stored. With luck, any of the surviving honor guard of Kamoshida will join their non surviving brethren in the ashes and dust that laid around the red carpets of the third floor.

22/4 Saturday

Lunchtime 

Now playing:Recess for rebels, by Ben Mathews

Shinji sat alone again at the canteen, he had stored his newly improvised cocktails in the sacks as safely as possible. Haru strangely enough was taking the development well that her garden was now a storage facility of firearms, hand grenades and fire bombs surprisingly…

Now Shinji sat eating his curry, he was left alone until two unfamiliar familiar faces showed up. It was Kasumi and Mishima.

“Hey, can we talk?” asked Kasumi

“Something serious is happening and we know nobody else to go to.”

Shinji gestured to them to follow him. He bagged his leftover curry and coffee and led the two to the roof.

The roof

“Fuck.”

“So I instead went to Kasumi and told her that Kamoshida wanted her, we couldn’t think of anybody we could go to, I then thought you could maybe help us.”

“Shinji what can we do?” asked Kasumi in slowly heightening anxiety

“Hmm.”

“Can you two keep a secret?”

Shinji then took out his phone 

Ann_Takamaki,Haru,Ryuji_Sakamoto,Shinji_Aragaki

Shinjiro_Aragaki:Something serious has happened get your asses up here to the hideout now

Haru:Did the firebombs break???

Ann_Takamaki: We had firebombs???

Shinjiro_Aragaki:Thats not it, just get up here now, you too Ryuji

Ryuji_Sakamoto:I'm in the goddamn toilet give me a moment!!

Soon after, the gang assembled on the roof, with Kasumi, Mishima and Shinji taking seats on the folding chairs while the other gang members stood and listened.

“Ok, you two tell them what you just told me.”

“Two days ago, I gotten a message from Kamoshida telling be to bring Kasumi to him.”

“I instead told kasumi what happened instead.”

Kasumi then held an open palm out to  Mishima that she’ll take over explaining from here.

“We all know what happens to me if I go to Kamoshida, but if I don’t go to Kamoshida, Mishima will have the piss beaten out of him instead.”

“So we panicked, then we calmed down, then we decided you were the only ones we could go to.”

The gang stood or sat silently, after listening to what Mishima and Kasumi had to say, their expressions betrayed an expression of silent rage and resolve. 

Haru was the first to break out of this betrayal of resolve.

“You two were right to come to us.”

“Really?” Asked Mishima

“ We really really want that sick son of a bitch to get what's coming to him." said Ryuji

Ann then spoke

“Maybe you two should hang around us from now on. Kamoshida can’t easily get at us if we’re all together.”

Ryuji nodded

“Maybe we should also exchange contacts too!”

“Agreed, Kasumi, Mishima you two should stay close to us from now on until-.”

“We. Deal with Kamoshida.”

Mishima nodded with certainty. However Kasumi nodded with the slightest hint of angst and anxiety. 

After school

Shinji_Aragaki,Ryuji_Sakamoto,Haru,Ann_Takamaki,Kasumi_Yoshizawa,Yuuki_Mishima

Haru: everyone, make your way to the front entrance stat, do not go alone bring a friend.

Haru stood at the front gates of Shujin, eagerly waiting for her fellow gang members (plus two) to show up in order to escape school. Her perception of the school had changed after viewing Kamoshida’s trophy room. The school was now more akin to a lion’s den, with Kamoshida being the lion and the school being its prideful owners. Who fed the lion with those supposedly under its care with callousness. 

Now she and her friends were all trying to escape the lion’s den and its clutches. She could see them making their way to the front.

First to exit was Kasumi and Ryuji, they exited the front gate chatting about sports and seemingly getting along well.

Then came out Ann, Mishima and Shinji, who exited the building with vigilance. In case the lion came thirsting for their flesh. They then proceeded out of the gate to join Kasumi and Ryuji. 

Haru breathed a sigh of relief. She then started  walked out only to hear the voice of the last man she wanted to hear from.

“Hey. Have you seen Kasumi Yoshizawa around?”

Haru turned around to see Kamoshida, visibly looking more tense, stress perhaps, but a great deal of underlying anger, wrath, and a tinge of desperation could be heard in his voice and tone.

Facing Kamoshida directly on, and staring him in the eyes with a look of pure contempt.

“No.”

Kamoshida and Haru were locked in what seemed to be a game similar to chicken. Both were determined to get what they wanted. Kamoshida wanted Kasumi, Haru wanted that man to leave her alone.

The staring contest continued for what seemed like an eternity. Until Kamoshida cracked first. Kamoshida then let out a dismissive sigh and retreated back into the depths of Shujin. Haru did not notice, but some distance behind her were her comrades, all sharing the same look of contempt, of hate of Kamoshida. The three individuals standing behind Haru had seen him for what he truly was. What he thought of himself, his students (subjects), the school that he ruled over, and his intentions.

Kamoshida intended to take everything from his subjects. There was  no mercy or even the show of such to be expected from  Kamoshida.

Neither will such be expected by the Kelly Gang. 

An eye? Both eyes. A tooth? The whole jaw.

Having sent Kamoshida packing, the gang withdrew, taking Kasumi and Mishima in tow to somewhere they could be alone and able to plot the deposal of Kamoshida.

A rage room 4:30 pm

The gang (plus two) weren’t in the best of places mentally at this moment. Now there were real stakes to failure or failing to steal kamoshida’s desires and heart as soon as possible. There existed before visible stakes, the gang were able to comprehend that the longer Kamoshida stayed at his position of royal influence and control, nobody would remain safe from his clutches forever.It just that now it happened to be one of their newly made friends that was to be next.

Ryuji seemed to understand the mood ruminating around them, and suggested that they take their anger and frustration out on a rage room. 

Renting a room for an hour, the gang and their companions were given a room with a series of fragile objects (glass bottles, vases, tv sets broken electronics etc) and an array of various tools of destruction from axes, hammers, bats, sledgehammers and other tools of mass destruction in the hands of seventeen to eighteen year olds with a large presence of anger, fear, anxiety and rage, and an absence of adult supervision.

Now playing: Armed to the teeth a metal cover, by Alex Yarmak

For the next hour, the pile of fragile trash that was scattered among a 25 by 25 square inch room became the subject of the Kelly gang’s collective anxiety and anger at the situation. The six of them in thick jumpsuits and head protection provided from the staff took out for them. If  the staff were chroniclers of Greek myth, they would say that the six students who went into that soundproof room, were to be likened to those possessed by the spirits Lyssa and Maniae, daughters of Nyx.

The staff must’ve sensed the need for release in this group of over anxious and angered group of teenagers. As the destruction of the room was accompanied by some metal music track. Nobody was complaining though, the sound was tearing away any notion of holding back. The loudspeakers couldn’t help but vibrate as violently as the track was moving the gang towards destroying the room.

Everyone else had their turn consigning all the things in the room to the base components. Kasumi, Ann, Ryuji and Mishima most especially. They took it out especially on the TV set,  with broken shards of the monitor lining almost the entire floor. The four of them had spent a good amount of that hour beating the TV set as if it either gave out money or was a representation of the tyrant which sought to destroy their lives.

Shinji was the last to let out his anxiety and anger in the room. He tried to muster out whatever reserves he could find but was found lacking. Failing to draw upon sufficient stocks of such, he brought himself back to the memory of the forth day of October, 2009. Although seven years ago, it was only just two weeks ago for him.

The shots that killed him were still clear and precise in his mind. Then followed the agonizing expressions and faces of his friends who had to be witness to his final moments of life. Instead of regret, there was instead a red hot seething rage which had now boiled over.

Taking a sledge hammer, Shinji then proceeded to slam it towards what remained in the room. Every swing matched the rhythm of the track, as while the others instead smashed the TV set according to their own tempo, Shinji smashed the remaining objects in the room more like an automated machine, no emotion was expressed in his face. There was only the face of the man who shot him that was clear and present in his mind.

A thought ran through his mind as he continued smashing.

“Aki, I hope you settled the score with that little shit, if he’s still alive you'd wish you dealt with him rather than seeing me do it myself.”

Shinji had finished smashing the third printer in the room when the hour was over.

Track end

5:30pm, 

“Sorry for not giving you much time to smash stuff Haru” apologised Ryuji

“It’s alright, I’ll be doing that tomorrow anyway.”

Kasumi looked to Shinji and whispered

“What do they mean by that?”

“It’s hard to explain.”

A pregnant pause occured, some deliberation and thought ran through Shinji’s head on whether involving Kasumi in the operation was an advisable decision.

“Would you like to help us?”

Kasumi looked at Shinji with at first an unsure expression, only to then form a determined response

“Yes.”

“Alright. Meet us tomorrow.”

“Ok… wait isn’t it Sunday tommorow?”

Shinji paused. Off course, school would be closed tommorow. 

Shinji thought of a response.

“Well, remember you said you wanted to go to Leblanc?”

“Yes.”

“We’ll meet there.”

Turning to face the rest of the gang, Shinji addressed them

“Alright. Is everyone feeling better now? Got it out of the system?”

Everyone nodded.

“Good. Tomorrow we meet at Leblanc to pick up where we left off, Mishima?”

“Yes?”

“If he sends you anymore messages you need to tell us as soon as possible. Otherwise, I think you should consider calling in sick to the school until we deal with Kamoshida. He may take it out on you if he can’t have Kasumi.”

“Got it. Whatever you guys are gonna do to him, good luck.”

“Thanks.”

Now playing: BEST OF JOÃO GILBERTO - PORTRAIT IN BOSSA NOVA, full album

The gang and their extras managed to somehow all find seats on the metro to their respective homes. While commuting home, a series of conversations were held between themselves.

“So Ryuji?” asked Ann

“Yeah what’s up?”

“How’s your mom doing? Haven’t seen her since middle school.”

“Oh. She’s doing ok, though I wish I can spend more time with her just to make sure she’s not too lonely.”

Ryuji continued

“How are your parents? Still overseas?”

Ann sighed. “Yeah.”

“Damn.” replied Ryuji.

“Hey Ann?” asked the blond haired boy

“If you wanna come by for cookies and video games like we used to, I think my mom wouldn’t mind.”

Ann paused, and deliberated for a short moment.

“Ok, but after all of this is over alright?”

“Awesome! Mom can’t wait to see you after so long.

And so the two of them continued talking about how Ryuji’s mom was doing, to the gang members who were sitting next to them, listening over the rabble and inaudible noisiness that was the train ride, they could only come to one natural conclusion. Ryuji’s mom was probably cool.

While that conversation was going on, Mishima and Haru were also holding a conversation of their own at the same time as Ryuji and Ann were. 

“Mishima?”

“Uh, yes Haru?”

“What will you do when you get back home?”

“Oh, I’ll probably be developing photos.”

“What do you mean?”

“I do photography on the side as a hobby, and post my photos on the internet.”

Mishima took out a phone and scrolled through photographs he had taken. They were regular scenes of streetlife in and around Tokyo, from Akihabara, Kichijoji and other places. 

“I have no clue why, but one day I started to post these photos online and it seems people like them for some reason. No clue why though.”

“That’s amazing. What else do you do in your spare time, Mishima?”

“I collect older cameras as a hobby. The ones where you need to develop the photos afterwards in a dark room.”

As they elaborated further on the technical aspects of cameras from the 60s, Polaroid cameras, etc they were observed by a silent Kasumi, who was seated to a sleeping Shinji, taking a nap in his seat, his beanie covering his eyes.

Kasumi was alone with her thoughts, a series of thoughts ran hard and fast through her mind. She thought of her coach, her dad, practice, how hungry she was feeling, and her older sister Sumire. Last she heard of her, she was taking an internship as a cognitive psychologist and researcher at a University in Iwatodai. She missed talking to her.

And so she kept being alone with her thoughts, until a voice distinct from her emerged from within.

“ Você vai chamar meu nome em breve.”

It unnerved Kasumi, was she going insane?

Shinji soon woke up, and they had arrived at his stop. Standing up, Shinji then said his parting words to Kasumi before he left the train.

“See you at Leblanc tomorrow Kasumi.”

The doors closed. Kasumi wouldn’t be alone with her thoughts from now to tomorrow.

A penthouse in Tokyo

6pm

An individual was setting up a series of electronics in a Kirijo owned penthouse. He had only arrived yesterday from Iwatodai, given instructions to convert the penthouse into a newly established headquarters for Shadow Ops. Following the instructions that recently been delivered to the address. Halfway through the room wasn’t looking much like Dr Yamagishi’s office back in Iwatodai yet, it wasn’t meant to be, at least until doctor Yamagishi could get here and turn the improvised control room into an actual control room. 

Partway through, after setting up the PC, they took a break, drinking from a juice box. He couldn’t believe the events of his life which had led to him being put into a position of importance. He just wanted to transition and after that, help people. He had studied for years at Iwatodai, gotten his degree, and then suddenly in the span of a year after graduating was suddenly working for a shadow organization dedicated to the safety and protection of humanity from its own shadows.  He couldn’t help but marvel at the unexpected trajectory of his life.

“Well. Even if you’d bring me here for something important Mrs. Kirijo, wouldn’t it hurt to at least send some help over here to assemble all of this?”

The front door of the penthouse suddenly was opened up, the man peered into the doorway to see who was there.

“Hey there doctor, need any help with those?”

“Sure Yukari.”

It was Yukari, with Junpei, Labrys and Chidori following behind. It seemed they had a busy day, and had a day fulfilling a public appearance, or sleuthing around for any signs of cognitive world activity. 

Now, they instead were focused on helping the doctor set up the control office for their operations in the capital. Yukari took charge and helped in unpacking and assembling it, while Labrys and Junpei did the bulk of the heavy lifting. 

By the time it was all done, the four shadow operatives plus the doctor were resting on the couch enjoying fruit juices while a record player played brazilian jazz. The group then discussed further on what needs to be done in tommorow.

“Ok, I got the message from Mitsuru that our personal things will be coming soon. Including everyone who will come by later.”

“Oh that's great. I can’t wait to start painting soon.”

“And I can’t wait to it Chi.”

Labrys sat resting her leg over leg

“Is there some sort of training or sparring room somewhere around here? We still gotta train and prepare for shadow combat.”

The doctor finished his apple juice and spoke up

“Well, turns out Mrs. Kirijo owns the entire building. It was passed down from her father apparently. So I guess you guys can work something out perhaps.”

“A training room will be less of a suggestion and more of a requirement as soon as Akihiko arrives, he'll steal us all for a run at 3am.”

The entire group laughs, including the doctor. He then after a while stepped away from the group in order to get out onto the balcony and get some fresh air for his mind.

“Hey doc, what’s on your mind?”

“Oh, hey Labrys.”

The doctor paused to collect his thoughts and articulate a response.

“I don’t know if I should be here.”

“Wudya mean doc?”

“Well, apart from the fact Kirijo, Sanada and doctor Yamagishi could’ve picked anybody else perhaps more competent at this thing like Kurosawa is a start.”

“Mhhmm.”

“Second, I was noticed by Yamagishi and Kirijo for my psychological research. I thought that I had gotten lucky, and that it meant funding for my research, but this???”

“what on earth had led to this??"

“What was your research about again?”

“Cognition, specifically public cognition, among other things.”

“Would you rather be back in Iwatodai with Fuuka and working on that research?”

“Maybe."

“It’s getting too late to ruminate about these thoughts. I need to notify doctor Yamagishi that the equipment and stuff she sent had been delivered and was set up. Have a good night Labrys.”

The doctor then exited the balcony, and disappeared into the wider Kirijo owned penthouse.

Labrys couldn’t help but be reminded of her time as a new shadow OP. She couldn’t help but cower in the face of her new job, along with grasping at the fact that she was alive, and as human as those who stood by her protecting humanity from their shadows. Over time she was able to fit in with the established core of the Shadow OPs, being an irreplaceable and much loved member of this peculiar family, forged by a shared past of bitter fighting, shared loss and growth which she missed out on.

Labrys stood on the balcony, hoping that the same could be said for Maruki as well with time.

Chapter Text

Late evening, 22/4

The attic

Start recording

Now playing: Listen up, by Ben Mathews

“You guys always called these things operations, yet never make up any cool names for them like in the movies.”

“Mitsuru, I’m gonna say this. When you got the team the gear that your nerds developed in their labs, got the fellows to make armbands for us. Gave us a numerical system of order and command.”

“I hate to break it to you, that is not simply,”

“ Oh, but it’s to emphasize our profesioonaliity and not to be co-“

“It’s cool Mitsuru. I’m sorry to say it, but the rule of cool that’s applying here, not your professionalism or professional conduct.”

“You know what the word is for that? It’s esprit de corp.”

“I hate to say it but you have turned our dirty night work into something awesome enough for a movie, or a video game maybe.”

“But guess what, I’m in charge now! I am the most senior persona user out here, so I am giving this third operation a name. 

“I can just hear your gasping. Followed by disappointment. Then followed by telling me you’ll execute me.”

“Well too bad. I’ll likely die out here first before you can get a chance at sending me to a cold grave.”

“Heh. Heh..  hah.”

Shinji looked away towards the window for a moment, and then faced the camera again, with his usual stoic expression.

“It’s called V.”

“The operation’s called V.”

“You know… V for victory.”

Shinji then tapped the desk with his index finger  three times in a quick pace , then tapped a final time almost resolutely and with a sense of finality. Then he made the shape of a V using his free hand. With no audience except for himself to interpret his gesture and or understand morse, the room fell silent.

Shinji sighed.

“God what am I saying anymore.”

Letting out a big sigh, Shinji then went back to his usual routine when making these recordings.

“Tomorrow we’re going back into the palace. With luck this will be the final or second to final raid. We’ll be going in earlier in the day to free up the rest of the day for rest. Wish us luck.”

“Oh and, since a part of me is still holding out that these messages will get to you guys somehow, please tell Koromaru if he’s still alive that I owe him that treat. Adios amigos.”

Recording end

The next day

Sunday, 23/4

5am

Beneath the mask, a classical guitar cover, by Josh GUITARofolo

Haru

Haru:Hey wake up

Shinji:wot

Haru:I brought the guns and the bombs over

         Open the door before the old man comes

         Also, saw a cat around here

Shinji: He comes around sometimes for food. He’s a nice cat.

Shinji went downstairs, still in his night clothes, to see a Haru in a full gardening kit with 2 gardening sacks filled with equipment needed for the operation. Quickly leading Haru to the attic, they both slid the equipment onto the shelves.

“I think we should move the hideout here from now on. It may be more inconvenient, but it’ll likely be safer since Kamoshida can’t reach or find any of us here.”

“Agreed.”

Haru looked around Shinji’s attic. Her attention had been diverted to a single lonely potted plant.

“Hey Shinji?”

“Yes?”

“Have you been taking care of this potted plant?”

“Not really, it has been here before I moved in, but I had no clue how to take care of it.”

Haru looked at Shinji with a gaze of slight outrage. Only to then change to an expression of pity.

“Can I take a look?”

“Sure. I gotta get ready to help the old man open up shop in thirty minutes anyway, so you can stay here as long as you don’t get caught.”

Haru approached the plant and then keeled at its base. She then took a look at the damage to the plant that Shinji’s unintentional negligence had brought.

Shinji sat on a stool, looking at Haru and thought.

“Hey Haru?”

“Yes?”

“I need you to know something.”

“What is it?”

“I’m in charge, but if anything happens to me, I want you to be in charge.”

“What?”

“In case something happens to me, can I trust you to take over command?”

“Ann has only recently awakened, and I think Ryuji would say no because he wouldn’t want to do it. Can I trust you?”

Haru stayed there, kneeling on the ground and pondering on the prospect of being Shinji’s lieutenant,the number two, his second in command and the faith it must’ve implied he had in her. Or the lack thereof in the others in terms of being able to protect everyone associated with the gang.

“Yeah. I can.”

“Awesome.”

“Is there something on your mind?”

Shinji stopped, and thought up a response.

“No, just preparing for every possibility.”

“Hey, I gotta go downstairs and get ready to help open up shop, I’ll prepare a mug of coffee and breakfast for you if you like?”

“Yes please!”

Empress rank up!

9am, Leblanc

Shinji stood at the counter, preparing enough curry and coffee for a gang of four and an extra. Enough rice had been cooked and the fridge had enough stock to supply any quick bites needed in the palace.  

“You’re a hard worker aren’t you?”  Asked Sojiro

“Mhmm.”

“Ok, I’m going outside for a break and some fresh air. When I get back, you can enjoy the rest of your day off. Go hang with your friends or something ok?”

“Understood boss.”

As soon as the boss left for a smoke, the Kelly gang then started to filter into the cafe, each member was gestured by Shinji to head upstairs. First to arrive was Ryuji, he passed on his portion of curry, but took the coffee. Then came Ann, she took her portion and followed Ryuji upstairs. Lastly was Kasumi, who came in with an uneasiness and trepidation moderated by her finally seeing this cafe for the first time. She was given her portion and brought upstairs.

Shinji, after seeing the boss return to the cafe, then himself went upstairs, with his breakfast and an additional portion.

The attic

“I forgot to do it earlier but, thanks for remembering to bring our weapons here. I’d not want to sneak into school on a Sunday to get them.”

“I got them out when we ended the day yesterday. I was wondering how we were going to sneak into school on a Sunday.”

Ryuji, Ann and Kasumi were sitting in a semi circle on the floor, eating their breakfast. They were clearly enjoying it, with Kasumi seemingly enjoying it the most, attacking her curry savagely, as if she hadn't eaten something at least decent in an age.

Ann was also doing unspeakable violence against her curry, but it had been at a slower pace which made her appear more civil. Meanwhile, Ryuji was only taking sips out of his coffee

“I’ll bag Ryuji’s curry for later if any of you get hungry later.”

“Kasumi slow down!” cried Ann

“I do gymnastics, I need the calories for practice later today. Also I’m starving.”

“At least savor the taste Kaz!”

“Ishh tashtee guuut!” Kasumi utters out of her mouth, full of curry.

“Once breakfast is finished, we’re going in.”

“Kasumi.”

“Yeshhh?”

“This is your last chance to back out, we won’t hold it against you.”

Kasumi finishes her curry and replies.

“I’m not backing down here. Kamoshida’s going to get what’s coming to him.”

“In that case, finish up your breakfast. We’re beginning the operation momentarily.

And so they did.

Beginning navigation… 

King, Queen and Slave

The palace grounds

Kasumi was questioning whether what she was seeing was real, a dream, or if she was dead. 

The sky was dark. It had been a pleasant Sunday morning in Tokyo today and it was now gone, replaced with a darkened sky. She had just been sitting in the attic of Leblanc and by extension her friend’s room, and now suddenly was in an alleyway, facing a castle which was seemingly supposed to be Shujin academy. 

Her friends who had been in their normal attire that they would wear on a weekend without worrying about school, now were instead in various forms of dress and costume.

Ann, who had been wearing her normal attire outside of school, now donned a blood red trench coat, putting on a hat of the same color, and then with ease and little to no struggle, took out a fully sized Tommy gun out of her coat.

Ryuji, who had been wearing a normal T-shirt, suddenly was adorned in the uniform of a general, painted red and white. Without missing a beat, he started taking hand grenades and started to pin them onto his front like medals.

Haru, in a fully gray tunic and field cap. Started to slowly and methodically assemble a machine rifle to the horror of Kasumi. The mechanical sound of machinery that she slowly assembled made her uneasy.

All while Shinji, in a metal sheet mask, wearing a horizon blue trench coat (open and loose.), with a metal breastplate underneath, took out two full length shotguns from a sack, and after taking the one with a long bayonet near its barrel, then took out a revolver from a holster on his side, inspecting the cylinder and the bullets inside. He then took a look out into the wide expanse, only to then remember that Kasumi was there. Still confused and in the literal and figurative dark about what sort of place the palace in someone’s mind was.

“Oh. Sorry Kasumi, forgot to tell you about what sort of place this was.”

Shinji looked out into the distance, he spied a faint blue door.

“You know what, I think the others can explain better what this place is, how it works and what we’re doing here, I need to check up on something. Haru?”

“Do you need me to explain everything?”

“Just enough to understand the objective and how not to die here. That would be enough.”

“What?!”

Shinji couldn’t hear Kasumi’s reaction to the supposed implied dangers of the metaverse. He had crossed into the palace grounds in order to enter the Velvet Ferry to clarify some details.

Now playing: Poem of everyone’s souls, a classic guitar cover by Josh GUITARofolo

“I see you are progressing towards your goal at a timely pace.”

“Yeah. We are almost done here, what I need to know is what happens when we do reach the end of this palace.”

“In that case, I shall provide some clarification.”

“The desire of man is immaterial, but its origins are found in the realm of the material, to make such desires material, one must be forewarned of its worth and status of fortune and treasure.”

“When man is aware of their desires, it will materialize, when immaterial such desires weigh only as a feather, but when made material it shall instead weigh the world to man.”

“At that moment, you. My guest and thief, shall steal that man’s desire.”

“That prick’s desire to be a little perverted shit?”

“Indeed.”

“Now onto other matters, I see you have been forging new bonds and accords.”

“Yeah. What’s with that? Every time I do that I get a voice in my head and it's annoying.”

“Now, you get to see the fruits of your labor.”

Igor then took out a large tome, opening the pages. With each page laid a myriad of new possibilities and power, all thanks to Shinji’s new confidants he had made within the last two weeks.

“The end of this chapter of your new journey is imminent. You will see it through with a new power within.”

For the next few minutes, Shinji had spent the time fusing new personas. Each new fusion was a baptism into the stream’s dry waters. The rebirth of new personae and the death of the old. Shinji couldn’t help but reflect on that.

After a while, he had finished his business here in this ethereal and immaterial realm. He would have to soon return to the immaterial cognition of the living, and make material what Kamoshida had coming to him…

The palace grounds

Now playing: the hellbenders (I crudeli),by the hellbenders

“So that’s why we’re now heading towards the top of the castle.”

“Ok… I follow.”

“Yeah.” joined Teddy, “You’ll be following behind us.”

Bonnie fitted Kasumi with the usual gear that she and Olga were fitted with before they awakened their persona. A map, some bombs, and a first aid kit. 

However, coming from the ethereal, Kelly strolled towards the gang briskly to then pick up the double barreled shotgun he had stolen from Kamoshida’s trophy room, and removed the bayonet from his winchester. 

“This is yours now.” said Kelly as he placed the shotgun in Kasumi’s hands.

“But Sh-, I mean Kelly, I don’t know how to use a gun!”

Kelly did not stop there. “This is also yours.” Handing over the bayonet to Kasumi

“Oh yeah this too.” As Kelly handed the sheath of the bayonet to Kasumi too.

Kasumi wanted to get back at Kamoshida, she desired to do so in the heat of the moment and after smashing up TVs in the rage room. But now doubt started to seep in with every creeping second she held her new shotgun. Formerly Kamoshida’s game hunting shotgun.

“Você parece confiar neles, espero que possa confiar neles também, e em mim quando chegar a hora."

A faint sound of strain coming from Kasumi. 

“You ok Kasumi?” asked Bonnie

“Yeah. This place is just messing with my mind, that's all.”

“You’ll be fine Kasumi. We’ll make sure that bastard doesn’t lay a finger on you.”

As the gang traversed the first and second floors, Kasumi could sense nothing betraying the gang deceiving or lying to her. The opposite instead was true. 

The third floor

“Alright. Olga will take the lead, we’ll follow shortly with Kasumi following behind.”

Entering the third floor from where they previously were back on Thursday, the gang set out to go beyond the progress they had made back on their last excursion when they were ambushed. All was quiet except for the sound of occasional smashing of shadows by Olga. Either by the butt of her automatic rifle, or her cane, fulfilling her promise of smashing things today since she didn’t yesterday. In fact, it seemed the third floor had been mostly abandoned, this did not mean good things however. It likely meant that Kamoshida’s final guard had holed themselves up on the fourth floor. A final stand for the King’s state of mind and thought. 

Now playing: destructive goodwill, by Daisuke Ishiwatari

Out of reaction to this prospect, Olga, Bonnie and Teddy immediately took the chance to ransack and vandalize Kamoshida’s quarters. Smashing up porcelain, the tables, bringing down bookcases and engaging in a sporadic show of chaos. Kelly as leader could only hold a open sack for whatever treasures, loot and booty they could find with Kasumi as well holding a second sack.

After an episode of sacking, smashing, vandalizing and looting, the Kelly gang finally had stripped Kamoshida’s private quarters of anything of value that wasn’t nailed down. Valuables that were valuable to Kamoshida, but not to the gang were taken to the balcony and then thrown out into the palace grounds below.

This defenestration of possessions that Kamoshida deemed valuable came to a climax when the gang wheeled a grand  piano out into the balcony. 

“C’mon Kasumi, help us push!”

Even Kasumi and Kelly, who didn’t take part in the initial sacking couldn’t resist.

The gang then slowly shoved the grand piano towards the balcony. It creaked and groaned, attempting to protest, seemingly begging for mercy of any kind from the gang.

But it was no use.

With a final collective shove, the piano finally tipped over the edge and fell three stories to the cobbled stone road on the ground. A loud and large collection of sounds from keys, wood, notes and the final words this cognitive piano would make emanate throughout. Kamoshida certainly heard the loud defenestration and its resulting noise wherever he was hiding.

Cheers and jeers could be heard from those who had defrenestrated the tyrant’s piano. They hoped they could perhaps do the same to its owner, and his desires. 

With the third floor ransacked of anything of value, there laid one final stretch to the finish. It was the final and forth floor, holding presumably the castle’s monarch, what remained of his garrison guard, and his immaterial desire. 

Marching out from the stairwell, the gang emerged from it into what seemed to not be the fourth floor, but the roof. Adorned with pillars and the castle’s towering heights 

“What the?”   

Now playing:A taste of death, by the Hellbenders

Looking into the distance towards the side of the castle facing the undistorted world, this was supposed to be the fourth and final floor of the castle, did this stairwell bring them to the roof instead, and their intended destination was a  floor below instead?

“Where’s the fourth floor? Isn’t it supposed to be here?” asked Teddy

At that moment of uncertainty, another noise broke the questioning and slowly rising panic.

“FRONT RANKS AIM! , FIRE!”

Now playing:Last surprise

Kelly could only so much as turn around to see who shouted these orders.

A deafening cascade of fire and noise had deafened the gang, who quickly dove to cover. Kelly however, who was too far in the open, wasn't quick enough. Instead he took the fire of the enemy, who had laid in ambush, with shadows armed with muskets trained on the only avenue of approach the Kelly gang could move in order to reach their king. 

However, having turned around, the volley of shot that did find their mark only met Kelly’s steel helmet and cuirass. The musket balls either only lodged themselves in the steel, or deflected. A few musket balls found themselves lodged directly in the steel plate on his chest, leaving marks and small dents, any musketballs which found themselves flying in the direction of Kelly’s head and the helmet which protected it, miraculously only grazed the sides.

Kelly could only have a few seconds to react to a second barrage, he took out his revolver and started fully sprinting towards the nearest cover possible, into the ranks of musket armed shadows who were in the process of being handed new muskets from rear ranks to fire another volley of shot, with fired muskets brought to the back to be reloaded. Kelly sought the sanctuary of a wooden table overturned in front of the barricade the ranks of musket shadows had established.

Grasping at his metal chest sheet and faceplate, he could feel the dents and impact of the musketry. Feeling for the bullet impact he strangely felt nothing broken, the armor had taken the full extent of the pain. He wouldn’t follow his fate that had befell him on the fourth day of October 2009, fourteen days ago. Shinji was bulletproof.

Back at the stairwell, where the rest of the gang had been taking cover, a continuous rate of fire had carried on, keeping them down on the stone tiled floor and trying to save their leader.

Bonnie, panicking, tried to call upon her persona only for Bonnie Parker to wildly spurt fire in the general direction of the shadow musketmen, at risk of igniting the powder bags storing the gunpowder needed to load the muskets

Olga was responding to the musket fire with her own fire, directing her automatic rifle to fire at the barricade, firing blindly at the barricade; some shadow musketeers did fall in the automatic hail,  but other shadows took their place. 

Ted was slowly handing fresh magazines loaded to Olga to keep up the fire. However, Kasumi was looking up at the top tower which contained the stairwell that they came from. She looked at his construction and was reminded of  a climbing wall which she and her sister would scale on the weekends before she went to university. She gave Ted a tap on the shoulder and shouted in his ear over the musket volley fire on her plan.

The shadow musketeers couldn’t fire with accuracy. They could only fire in volume, hoping to perhaps disperse or wound the intruders. They followed the orders not of their king but of a leading shadow in a wig and a perhaps mockingly large hat. He was ordering the ranks and keeping them in line while holding a Halberd at his side.

At another break  in the musket fire, Kelly rose up to summon his persona. Minimal effect was observed until Bonnie summoned her persona, setting fire to the barricade. The barricade lit aflame, the musket men stopped firing in order to back away from the flame, however this wouldn’t save them.

On top of one of the castle towers, Kasumi had scaled one under construction and was now on top of its conular shaped roof. Hanging on for dear life, hands shaking, she took out a single Molotov cocktail and then chucked it down onto the barricade. The spilling fuel started to onto the floor below, creeping slowly to the cowering musketmen below. A second cocktail landed squarely on the heads of the shadows, the fuel caught the flames of the spreading fire and resultedly started to burn the shadow musketmen alive.

Their powder bags which held the small paper cartridges of gunpowder had caught fire, they couldn’t escape their fate, with the fire rapidly burning out as fast as it burnt through the shadows alive.

Kelly would escape death by the hand of musket fire, but his killers wouldn’t escape death by the hands of Kasumi’s fire, which Kelly had made earlier in the week.

Kasumi had enough of holding onto the roof of the lower for dear life, she slid down from its stunted surface and landed on the pavement, doing a somersault onto the ground. She had proved her gymnast abilities. She landed on a part of the ground not burnt on her knees. It unfortunately was in front of the only surviving member of the troop, their leader, wielding a Halberd and eager to avenge his men.

He held the Halberd’s tip towards Kasumi’s Throat while Kasumi had her meagerly short bayonet out. Her shotgun was left back with Ted, as the shotgun’s length comprised almost half the height of Kasumi herself.

Kelly, who jumped over the table he was hiding behind with his revolver, was stopped short of shooting the Halberd wielding shadow under threat of Kasumi’s throat being cut open.

“DON’T MOVE A STEP, OR I WILL OPEN THIS GIRL’S THROAT FOR BURNING MY MEN ALIVE!”

Kelly stopped, aiming his revolver at the shadow’s head.

A standoff occured, for the heat of the still burning fire and the figurative heat of the moment tested both the men’s mental fortitude greatly. Stress was mounting in both parties. However, a moment of stress and emotional high was also present in Kasumi as well. In the moment, the voice came back to her again.

Now playing: Awakening

“É libertação que você busca ou é liberdade?”

Kasumi kneeling on the ground, felt like she really needed to hurl out her breakfast.

“era a liberdade que eu buscava, a liberdade dos outros também. Tornei-me o herói de dois mundos.”

“The republics of Brazil and Italy revere me as a hero and hold my name in esteem. Do you?”

Groaning under the strain of the heat of the fires licking the walls, her life under threat, and the sound of seas parting the two worlds this hero claimed to be. A gust, a breeze of air blew all nearby back a foot. The gang who was spectating from further afar, knew where this was going.

“Contrato, eu sou tu, tu és eu,”

“La nuova primavera dei popoli è arrivata!”

“Come. ANITA GARIBALDI!”

Out of the blue fire came out a horse, on the horse was a woman, wielding a colt dragoon on her hip and a saber in her hand. Wearing red trousers, and a white linen shirt. In the hand that held the horse’s reins, was a green banner. Anita heeded Kasumi’s call decorated in the colors of the two worlds she was a hero of, Brazil and Italy. Her face held instead a fury and anger which could only be compared to Olga of Kyiv.

Now playing:Take over

Kasumi came out of the fire rather differently. She came out instead looking like a gunslinger of the old west, but instead more south then the south. She came out of the fire in the form of a Gaucho. Wrapped in a red poncho, while a pitch black sombrero of the gaucho in contrast to her red fiery hair. An uncontainable devilish grin was present, contained by a simple domino mask adorned in red.

By this time the now panicking shadow had shifted focus to instead attack the ghastly form of Anita, attempting to stab the horse but to no avail.Kasumi casted away her poncho to the ground. By the time the shadow instead turned his attention to Kasumi, Kasumi was instead on top of him.

Atop the shadow’s shoulders, Kasumi took out the bayonet which Kelly had given her and started to wildly stab the shadow in the neck, shoulders and head, all while Anita rode some strides away from the shadow. Leaving the shadow’s fate to Kasumi’s stabbing.

When Kasumi was certain that the shadow was on his last legs, she let Anita finish the job. Raising a strong Garu which quite literally blew the shadow away. The gusts of wind from Anita were strong to the point of launching the bleeding shadow off the roof into the horizon.

Kasumi, then picked up her poncho, wrapped herself in its warmth then sat down to take a breather enjoying solace offered by the breeze. Her friends ran towards her to offer aid. They’d know how exhausting awakening a persona was and were ready to drop the mission in order to get her back to reality to rest.

“Kasumi!” Shouted both Bonnie and Teddie 

Kelly came running to Kasumi, with her shotgun in hand. 

“Are you hurt?”

“Na nah Kelly, I’m ok here.”

Kasumi took a large breath, exhaling loudly. 

“Getting a persona is exhausting Kasumi, if you can’t stand up easily, we can get out and come back another day-

At that moment, Kasumi stood up without any struggle. She held her hand out and asked Kelly

“Where is that curry?”

Kelly shuffled through a sack of loot, booty and plunder until he reached the bottom, a lunch box with Ryuji’s uneaten breakfast. Preserved well despite being in the spread of gunpowder in and around the area.

For the next ten minutes, the gang took a break on the roof. Kasumi was massacring the curry even more ruthlessly than she was before. Bonnie and Ted spent time looting the burnt piles of shadow remains for anything of value. Turns out not much of value could be found in the ashes. While Olga and Kelly attended to Kasumi, taking sips from coffee and surveying  Kasumi on how she was feeling and if she wanted to carry on.

It turns out Kasumi had a bottomless stomach. A routine of intense gymnastics and exercise had resulted in a need for as many calories as possible to meet the demands of competitive gymnastics practice and participation in competition. Now instead she needed calories for the final stretch of the palace.

“So why competitive gymnastics?” asked Haru

“I needed something to do when my older sister went to college to study psychological science. Being alone more than usual, I doubled down and got into competitions. I’m very competitive.”

“What about your sister? Did she support you?”

With a warm smile warmer than the sun, she replied

“She is my number one supporter. And my only supporter.”

Shinji could only smile, thinking about an old friend who in contrast to Kasumi, had many fans, but only had a scarce number of supporters, he was proud to be among them.

“Well, I hope we can be counted as both friends and supporters, however we need you to make it clear to us if you’re exhausted and we need to leave to come back another day, or if you’re fine and we keep going.”

Kasumi finished her curry, handed the Tupperware and utensils to Kelly, and then did a few stretches. Her reply then followed.

“Let’s finish this.”

The gang wouldn’t be going home, not without securing a route to the treasure itself. Kasumi would make sure of that. For awakening her persona seemingly did not take it all out of her, instead the opposite effect seemed to have occurred. 

“Hey.”

“Yes?”

“Your codename for the operation’s going to be Anita, how does that sound?”

“I like it.”

“Good.”

After some searching a hidden and locked door was found covered by some tarp. With some effort, culminating in simply summoning personas to burn the door down. The gang finally made it to the fourth floor. 

Now playing:Nikt nam nie zrobił nic, by Hańba!

0 hour 15 minutes

Everything went like a breeze. With the addition of Bonnie, and the newly awakened Anita, the Kelly gang now had sufficient persona power to take on the stronger guard without much sweat. With the burden of persona usage being more evenly distributed, A general stratagem had occurred to blast through to the room where the treasure presumably was. Kelly, Ted and Olga were in charge of murdering smaller prey, usually with their weapons, firearms, or physical/gun skills that were available. With Bonnie and Anita conserving energy and mental reserves as much as possible until a stronger member of Kamoshida’s honor guard was found, they then would be let loose upon anyone unlucky enough to be higher in the shadow food chain of the castle, with the core three members instead standing by with healing, support, and reflect skills in case something almost went wrong. Close calls were had, but with the final destination so close, death was just a mild inconvenience.

It was not a sprint, but a marathon in which the gang were at the final stretch, and rapidly approaching 

0 hour 45 minutes

“I think my gun is too long.” 

“What makes you say that Anita?” 

Anita held out her double barrel shotgun and compared its length to her height, the shotgun was almost matching ½ of Anita’s overall height. As a brawler who frequently utilizes acrobatics, this wouldn't help.

“Now that I’m putting some thought into it, I think we went through a part of Kamoshida’s castle that was under renovation.”  attributed Olga

“Hmmm?”

“There were tools scattered everywhere, and the more I think about it and try to remember, there was a hacksaw somewhere back there, perhaps we can saw down the shotgun’s length?”

“That would help. But let’s do that later.”  

Anita handed her shotgun to Ted. He had been using it instead as Anita instead utilized her bayonet as a knife and Garibaldi. Ted was rather enjoying the immense impact and damage the shotgun was doing to the shadows. Recoil just resulted in a mere aching in his shoulder like his leg.

1 hour

It cleanup at this phase of the mission. The shadow musketmen and their commander seemed to be the main vanguard of the defense of the fourth and final floor of the castle. Now what remained were fanatics, Kamoshida’s honor guard who weren’t willing to beg, surrender, or negotiate with the marauding gang who’s leader had been proven to be bulletproof. And of course there was loot. It was enough to buy a restaurant, probably.

1 hour 5 minutes

“This must be it.”

“Yeah. There's some sort of noise coming from the other side of this door.” stated Teddy

“Well, there's only one way to find out.” said Anita

All five members of the gang shoved at the grand door, it opened to reveal the throne room, and subsequently, the treasure. Surrounded by halls of lust and debauchery, laid the distorted desire of the king of Shujin. It glowed eerily, this was human desire? 

“Alright gang. We’ve reached our goal, good job.”

“What do we do now? Can we take it with us?” asked Bonnie

“Well, if I’m getting this right, some time soon we will send the real Kamoshida a warning, we will tell him that we will rob him of his desires and this thing will become something physical that we can carry out of here, hopefully it isn’t nailed down.”

“Sweet.” replied Ted

The gang started celebrating, exchanging hugs, shouts and cries of victory reverberated through the empty throne room, dancing even was taking place as Kasumi at the drop of a hat turned the throne room into the dancefloor

Kelly could only feel for the dents in the steel plate which protected his body from the hail of musket fire from earlier. He didn’t know how to feel, he had been shot and lived. On the other hand, he had been shot. 

Taking off the large overcoat, Kelly put his hand under the steel plate to feel for any impact of sort on his actual body. Taking off the steel armor, he then found no wounds or impact on his chest indicating any sign of those musketballs bruising the skin.

Or those bullets from that Smith and Wesson 500 two weeks ago…

“Hey? Why are you taking that off?” Asked Bonnie

“Yeah, are you hurt?” asked Anita

“Hmmm, no.”

“I just figured it would be too cold for you guys to give me a hug if I kept that on.”

Hearing this, the gang gave Shinji a collective hug, crowding around him and making him feel a warmth he hadn’t felt in a good long while.

“Whoa there.”

“Don’t get shot up like that again please. We were scared that you were a goner!” shouted Ryuji.

“Ok. That’s a promise.”

“Though, you looked like a proper badass when you did, Shinji!” replied Kasumi

“Kasumi!!” shouted Ryuji 

The gang could only laugh and then get up and get ready to leave this place. They had to be ready to fight again soon to defrenestrate the king of lust from his castle, making it this far however was a victory unto itself. 

In a secret room

King Kamoshida could hear the celebration. They made it to his throne room and are about to at some point materialize his most valued treasure. 

The gang had taken everything from him, rising from the dungeons, this pack of vermin had slaughtered the entire garrison guard of his castle, even his royal guard, his Varangian honor guard couldn’t stop them. Not even the best musketry could stop them. They destroyed his private quarters, taking everything that wasn’t nailed down and destroying everything else. 

The pieces were in position on the board, checkmate in two moves. He could only shiver and shake at this prospect in tears.

The palace grounds

Now playing:After the battle, persona 3

“Any of you guys see somethin?”

“What do you mean?” asked Bonnie?

Olga, Anita and Ted were too preoccupied on sawing Anita's gun down to a more suitable length with a hacksaw to really engage in the conversation.

“I thought I’d saw something move right there.”

Kelly pointed towards an alleyway, it was dark and rather unassuming.

“Maybe it was a cat? Maybe stray cats run into here somehow?” 

“Possible, that happened before.”

“Wait-”

“I’ll explain another time, let's hope the rest of them are finished.”

After sawing down the gun to a more acceptable length for Kasumi, the gang packed their loot, spoils, and goods into several large sacks, ready to haul them off back to the real world. They were very much fulfilling their mantle of thieves at this rate.

The alleyway

Now playing:Troubled , P3 OST

"What the fuck?"

Labrys and Chidori had been hiding out in this alleyway since the gunshots started.

Somehow while taking a sip out of the best coffee in the world, the two shadow operatives were suddenly brought to the distorted outskirts of Shujin Academy. Having not brought their evokers, the two decided to hide in an alleyway to observe and think on how to get out of here to report to Yukari their unexpected encounter with a cognitive space.

Out of boredom and a need to distract herself from the occasional gun shots, and that really large torrent of gunfire which came from the roof some time ago followed by a carcass of what was assumed to be a shadow sent flying from the roof the the castle landing on the ground somewhere nearby, Chidori started to sketch the backdrop of the space the two found themselves in.

"Hey Chidori?"

" Yeah Labrys?"

"When we get outta here, you wanna paint me like one of them french gals?"

Chidori giggled,  "Very funny."

However, soon enough a group of five individuals came out of the main entrance with some guns on them.

Escaping their sight and having got a better glimpse of the individuals, Chidori started to sketch the five individuals. She only got to the fourth when suddenly reality started to undistort around the two shadow operatives.

Now playing:Beneath the mask

"Alright, here's your curry."

The two operatives found themselves sitting on the stools at the counter, in front of the boss. After hiding in an alleyway and being witness to likely several counts of manslaughter by a gang of five individuals with firearms, and after seeing them leave the castle the two were now suddenly instead sitting down on the counter, receiving the curry they had ordered almost an hour ago, but just some five minutes ago instead according to the clock on the wall.

"Uh, thanks."

When the two of them were sure that the boss wasn't looking at them, they looked at each other staring into each others eyes with an expression of combined shock and an inability to articulate what they had just experienced.

Chapter Text

23/4

6am

A man was standing around at Inokashira park

He was in an anonymous tracksuit, and wearing a beanie. 

Trying to avoid suspicion and attention, he stood there waiting in the final hour before dawn. 

He had a purpose for being there though. He was waiting for his surrogate Niece.

“Uncle Jun!”

“Hey! It’s been a helluva long time Shiho!”

Now playing: When the moon’s reaching out Stars, reloaded.

The two of them started to jog and hold conversation.

“So, how are you feeling after last week’s game?”

“Pretty good. But all I’m concerned about is having a break to spend more time with Chidori and friends.”

“Ok, how’s she doing?”

“Pretty good, she’s still painting amazing stuff. She’s spending time around Tokyo with a mutual friend.”

Junpei looked around to ensure that the park was still relatively empty. To his relief there were only other joggers and old people having a morning walk around. None of which would recognise him as long as he kept his head down.

“Well Shiho? How about you?”

“Well…”  Shiho hesitated

“Volleyball isn’t working out.”

Junpei slowed down to ask

“Why what happened?”

“Our coach is a piece of shit.”

“How so?”

“He’s you if you were a total piece of shit.”

Shiho was lucky to not witness the Junpei of 2009. And Junpei knew that, it would be the worse of further embarrassment and cringe for the slugger.

“Oh shit.”

“He hits people, he also harasses the girls.”

Junpei stopped, with Shiho stopping in turn as well.

“Did he do something to you?”

Shiho stopped, she couldn’t find the words to articulate the immense suffering both witnessed and experienced firsthand, not now at least. Or at least not in public, at 6 am and now currently out of breath.

Taking a moment to stop and collect her thoughts. She then articulated her answer.

“He would beat up students because he enjoyed it.”

“And the girls…”

Shiho stared at Junpei in silence, Junpei understood what was happening.

“Did. Did he beat you? Or worse?”

“Yes. It was going to get worse unless I left. If I didn’t leave, my body would probably be too damaged to do sports.”

The two of them walked to a vending machine to grab drinks and rehydrate.

“Shiho?”

“Yeah?”

“If that man so much as looks in your general direction you call me ok?”

“Thanks. You don’t have to go that far for me though.”

The two took sips out of some Pocari sweat and decided to switch topics. Specifically to the reason why Shiho wanted to see her uncle and family friend.

“Hey Uncle Junpei?”

“Yeah?”

“I wanna get into baseball.”

“You do?”

“Yes.”

Junpei lit up like a Roman candle. 

“Let me guess. You want me to teach you baseball?”

“Yes exactly!”

“I wanna do this professionally, and you’re a professional, you also were a coach.”

“Only for a year!”

“But even if you’ve only coached for a year you’re gonna be much better then my old volleyball coach. His method of coaching is to remind everyone that he’s an Olympic medal holder, and that the beatings will continue if no improvement happens.”

Based on the Olympic medal holder part, Junpei tried to think of the top of his head who this prick might be so he could Sicc Labrys on him at a moment’s notice. Unfortunately he couldn’t think of anyone fitting that profile.

“Well, the training’s hard, but since we’re beginning, let’s go easy and get harder from there.”

“It’s ok. I like doing hard things.” Replied Shiho.

“That’s the attitude.”

Junpei gave Shiho a high five, they’ll be completing their shared jog of the morning soon.

8am

The penthouse, Shadow OPs HQ Tokyo 

Now playing: Butterfly Kiss, cover by J-music ensemble

“Hey Chidori? How much longer do I gotta hold this pose?”

“Just a little while, you’re doing great.”

Labrys did not mind being at the disposal of fellow shadow OPs. Less out of being a robot built for the destruction and extermination of humanity’s shadows. More to do with owing a lot of her current enjoyed existence and life to her friends. At first, being helpful meant earning her keep, but after getting to know the operatives and being appreciated as a member of the organisation and being a part of this close knitted and bonded family.

However, her joints were starting to feel stiff after holding a pose for Chidori for almost more than an hour.

It was a pleasant morning however, as the breeze started to flow by which then was accompanied by a warm sun. 

Labrys had dressed in her best for the painting. Not in a suit and tie like her sister Aigis, but instead in a pair of jeans, a plain  white T shirt covered by a sheepskin bomber jacket, and a pair of shades. She. felt. awesome.

Holding the pose however wasn’t so awesome though.

“Ok. We’ve reached a good point of progress. We can continue later, you wanna get some breakfast?” 

“Hell yeah I do! I’m starving.”

“Ok. There’s a coffee shop in Yongen Jaya which Takeba recommended once. We’ll go there.”

“Sounds good to me!”

And so they left. They went past the main hall and passed by a painting of Chidori’s. The two slowed down to appreciate its protruding warmth before they left. The painting depicted a garden,  a series of plants, flowers and fauna. The vast majority had withered away, perished, however a small grouping of flowers and fauna on the side, almost outcast from the main garden grew and flourished.  Surrounding both the garden and the outcast flowers was a fog, however the fog seemed to be like the garden withering away at the seams, permeating a bright glowing sun, which had turned the fog to what Labrys joked was “piss yellow”. Regardless of meaning, regardless of deep thought, or perhaps humor that could be determined from Chidori’s art, her paintings were brought here out of Mitsuru’s consideration. That penthouse she had inherited from her father was empty, gathering dust and would be a waste if it was a complete eyesore. 

And it also represented thanks, to another group of extraordinary individuals.

Now playing: Blues in the velvet room, a harp cover by David Ren

Filming of Featherman’s newest season had finally wrapped up some time ago .

Now all that remained for Yukari Takeba and the rest of the cast to do is to wait, do interviews, wait, take part in renewing contracts for the next season, wait, you get the idea.

Regardless, that meant time the actress finally had time to herself, and that meant a mixture of spending time in the penthouse gym to maintain her physique and current muscle. That took an hour. Then came an hour of archery practice in a separate room a floor above. The room kept silent as the actress sent arrow after arrow into target after target. Targets splintered, broke apart, or fell to the ground after crossing Yukari’s line of sight.

Finally, Yukari went to the roof of the penthouse, somewhere where she could be alone, and only with the company of the wind and breeze as Chidori and Labrys took the balcony. 

She sat down, settling her bow down in front of her and began to meditate.

Yukari had began to meditate some time after 2009. It all started when Fuuka was investigating the phenomena of personas communicating to their users at the drop of a hat at the most seemingly random of times.

After some thought it was determined and narrowed down to a state of mind. One must be able to be in a state of self awareness and congruence so that one might allow their persona to be present within one’s conscious on its own.

Fuuka had her experience as the group’s navigator in mind, and seemed to be in touch with her persona Juno a fair lot. However the hypothesis and predicted outcome of the literal thought experiment needed to be tested to see if it could be applied and generalizable to non navigator personas and persona users.

That’s when Yukari volunteered to be a participant in this experiment. She had the time, patience, and incentive to dedicate time to sitting on top of a rooftop, in a a slowly warming sun and cool breeze, she sat down and closed her eyes.

Yukari was able to communicate and converse with Isis now and then, but over the years it has been on and off again. regardless,meditating had become a heavily appreciated habit of Yukari, especially after first getting cast into featherman and getting over the loss of, him…

“Hello again,it has been a while.”

“Isis? Is that you?”

“Yes. What brings you to seek me out?”

“Isis, it’s happening again.”

“I have been informed. Juno was not silent, nor subtle in her prophecy.”

“Wait? You can talk to other personas?”

“Yes. The sea of souls which we all reside is the same silk we are all weaved from, therefore we all can understand and communicate with one another no matter our differences. “

“I have a question to ask.”

“Were you there at the night of the 31st of January, 2010?”

“Yes, it was a sorrow and a great deal of grief to bear the loss of  Orp- . Thanatos.”

Yukari couldn’t help but miss the company and friendship of someone who couldn’t be with her and others now .

“I have another question.”

“Soon enough, I’ll have to summon you again. Like I did back on that night. Can I count on you to help me again?”

“Always Yukari. Always.”

Yukari awakened on the top of the penthouse roof. She had been meditating for a while now, a sense of peace and calm had been restored to the actress. She withdrew downstairs to find Labrys and Chidori gone.

“They must’ve went for breakfast.”

Yukari took an instant coffee and prepared it in short order, and drank in a rather non present flavor. 

“Bleugh. This might as well be hot bean juice instead of coffee.”

1pm

Start video call

 Now playing:Ideal and the real, Maruki’s theme

Until operative no.7 could be deployed into Tokyo, Maruki’s schedule on Sundays was to report on updates on the situation back to Iwatodai, there he sat with a glass of water in front of a monitor, waiting for his second boss and former mentor when it came to the field of research and experimental cognitive psience.

“So have you and the initial deployment found out anything yet?”

“No doctor Yamagishi, not yet at least.”

“Well, in that case, how is everyone settling in so far?”

“It seems everyone’s settling in comfortably. Everyone’s carrying on their usual routine, the assembly of the facilities for operations is still underway though.”

“Have there been any difficulties in assembling the simulation room?”

“No doctor, it’s just taking a long time to set up. I’ve never really played around with this virtual reality stuff before.”

“I’ll help you when I deploy with the second contingent of operatives.”

“May I ask something though?”

“Yeah?”

Maruki thought hard on how to word his query. 

“Was there really no one else?”

“Can you clarify?”

“Was there no one else better who could perhaps fufill the role that I’m here to fulfill?”

“Unfortunately not. Sumire’s still working on experiments and research at Iwatodai, my deployment to Tokyo needs to be staggered so that public safety won’t raise a fuss to the organization and to Mitsuru. Also Kurosawa is retiring and wants a well deserved break.”

“Alright.”

“Have confidence in yourself Maruki! You, me and Sumire are perhaps the most advanced minds on cognitive Psience!”

“You know that’s just a marketing term to pitch our research better right?”

“Yeah, but it sounds cool and sounds more interesting then psychological science.”

“This is an entirely new field of psychology and we need to prove that.”

“Alright.”

“Oh, one last question.”

“Yes?”

“If we find your old friend, how do we make sure that he is?”

“Hmmm. We should’ve thought this through further.”

After a moment of thought, Fuuka thought of a solution.

“At May, me and a couple of other operatives who knew our old friend better then the operatives you were deployed with will come to help verify his identity, you five just have to worry about finding him.”

“Understood. Have a good weekend doctor.”

“You can just call me Fuuka you know? No need for formalities Maruki.”

“Understood Fuuka.”

End video call

With the call done, Maruki changed into a set of comfortable clothes, then went to take a nap. He’ll continue assembling the Simulation room when he wakes up later.

3:30 pm

Downstairs, a room below doctor Fuuka Yamagishi’s office

“Ok Aigis, ready?”

“Keyboard ready Kotone.”

“Ok, 1,2, 1 2 3.”

Now playing: Where is my mind by the pixies, a 60s “Orbisonesque” styled cover by the Postmodern jukebox

“With your feet on the air  and your head on the ground…”

“Try this trick and spin it…”

Kotone and Aigis had the most to loose after March of 2010. Having lost respectively their brother and the individual they had sought to protect, they both had to take more time to grieve and process the loss of Minato Arisato. In the pursuit of closure and a way to move on, both took a deep dive into the world of music.

Minato was a music head, but he never gotten to learning an instrument or how to play music, or at least he had perished before having the chance to do so. Kotone however had, having learnt the violin at a young age, and kept playing even up to high school.

“I was swimmin in the Caribbean, animals were hiding behind the rocks. Except for a little fish, bumped into me I swear he was trying to talk to me.”

Kotone couldn't remember which day it was after the funeral, she one day found Aigis in their shared dorm room, having both Minato’s mp3 player and headphones on while playing the violin to one of his saved tracks. Soon enough, Aigis started to expand her range of musicality to include other instruments. Soon the basement room was filled with unorganized and scattered belts of .303 ammo, and an organized selection of instruments 

This enchanted Kotone, who already started to had feelings for Aigis before she had gained her humanity a month after promise day. Both in the emotional pits and needing an outlet for a lot of pain and anger.

“Where is my mind? Where is my mind?”

“Waaay out in the water, see it swimming…”

Then at some point Kotone contributed her singing to Aigis’s fluent instrumentality. At first, they’d go through the songs that Minato had left them on his MP3 player as a sort of tribute. But then moved on to other songs that were more to their shared taste, or that they just found nice.

SEES and then soon enough Shadow OPs would make time on Sundays to gather at the old dorm to see Kotone and Aigis perform to an audience of supportive friends and surrogate family. Weekends ended with the soothing of the soul by Kotone and Aigis, delivering a performance that could soothe and calm the soul after a week of the rigors of life.

At this point, SEES veterans could visibly see Aigis and Kotone emotionally and mentally move on from the trauma, the sadness, and the pain of losing Minato. More observant veterans also saw something more, a deep loving romantic relationship between the two. One forged by instrument, song, life and death. One day, Mitsuru compared the lovers to Orpheus and Eurydice, and it stuck.

“Try this trick and spin it, yeah.”

“Your head will collapse, and there’s nothing in it and you’ll ask yourself-“

Some four years after the events of 2009, the two had managed to secure a single job, performing and singing at a local club in Iwatodai. Needing a name for their duo, they picked the mythological comparison that Mitsuru had raised one time, and in one night found that their bardic and instrumental abilities to settle and calm the soul with song in high and ecstatic demand. Bars, night clubs, restaurants, and other establishments competed to have Orpheus and Eurydice at their establishment for a night.

“Where is my mind…”

“Where is my miiind…”

The glass has become half full at this point of time. The jobs paid enough and could be selectively chosen to also make time for shadow operative work. All while having time to be with their family of former SEES veterans, now with two new shadow operatives in Chidori and Labrys who were welcomed and valued as integral to this close knit family of theirs.

Life was good.

“With your feet on the air and your head on the ground.”

“Try this trick and spin it… yeah.”

end track

Unknowingly, their rehearsal was witness and had an audience of two women, a dog, and a young adult who had just come back from high school for the day.

“Bravo! C’ magnifique!”

“WOOF”

Fuuka and Ken could be seen clapping behind the doorway.

With a signal to come in by Aigis, the four members of their audience came inside to sing the praises of the Hades’s bardic duo.

Ken shuffled to the front, he had grown a great deal in the seven years since 2009, having grown to match the height of Aigis and Kotone (160 cm). 

“You guys are going to kill it when you get to Tokyo!”

 Exclaimed Ken

“Heh, Hell yeah!”

was the reply of Kotone

A high five was shared between Kotone and Ken. Meanwhile Aigis was on the ground and giving Koromaru a scratch. 

“Koromaru says he wants to be in the same room with us next time we rehearse. I will make arrangements to keep the door open and wide for him next time.”

“BARK BARK!”

Mitsuru interjected, and cut the praises

“I’m sorry to interrupt, but can me, Kotone, Aigis and Koromaru have some privacy, there’s some important business happening and they need to be in the know.”

Fuuka and Ken nodded. The door to the room that Kotone and Aigis were rehearsing was shut. Meanwhile Fuuka and Ken headed to the lounge downstairs. They both knew what was being discussed between those four.

“They’re discussing the new operation aren’t they?”

“ Yes Ken.”

“Shit. Now I’m gonna be left behind once again.”

Ken held his hands to his head in a mix of frustration and sadness.

Fuuka could only imagine the angst about that prospect. “Left behind.” It was perhaps the two words Ken would associate with three of the most painful moments of his life.

“Don’t count yourself out yet Ken.”

“But they don’t want me to come! They want me to stay here and graduate high school, and they won’t even be there to watch me graduate if this thing doesn’t end shortly!”

Fuuka sympathized with the boy. He would be doing a great deal of concerning, being lonely, and also feeling a greater deal of betrayal perhaps.

“Ken?”

“Yes?”

“ If you may allow, I want to ask you something.”

“Yes?”

“Well, there was a reason why you kept in the dark earlier when we were set on going to Tokyo.”

“What’s that?”

Fuuka took a deep breath and braced herself. 

“Remember Shinji? We have reason to believe he’s alive.”

Ken stopped. He froze, and was for a moment, unresponsive. It was only when he broke out of this state that Fuuka continued, having noticed it.

“ We also believe there is a new group of persona users operating around Tokyo now. It’s happening again.”

Ken broke out of his state of frozeness. 

“I want to go.”

“What about your graduation?”

“If you guys aren’t there to see it, I’m not doing it.”

“But-“

“I don’t want to be alone again. Do not make me have to go through this again.”

Fuuka backed off. She knew pressing any further would be cruel to the both of them.

“ Maybe something can be arranged.”

“Huh?”

“I don’t know when, but I’ll think of something. Just hang tight for a few months ok?”

Ken sighs. “Whatever you say Fuuka.”

 Koromaru and Mitsuru came downstairs to see Fuuka and Ken both sitting on the couch. Only Koromaru when seeing Ken sitting down with Fuuka had an idea of how Ken would be feeling being left alone in Iwatodai. Because of that, the dog leapt upon the couch and nestled himself next to Ken, making sure he could spend as much time with the boy before he had to leave with those deploying at May to Tokyo.

5pm

The arcade at Paulownia mall

Now playing: Color your night

“So they aren’t gonna be there to see you graduate.”

“Mhm.”

“Well that’s fucked.” replied Ken's friend

“Yeah. Ooh! You got this!”

The crane carried Jack Frost. Anticipation and suspense could be felt as the crane slowly creeped towards the left, then it fell, into the prize compartment. Ken then took out the prize and handed it to his friend.

“Nah, no. That’s yours.”

“You sure man?”

“I’m good enough to get a second for myself.”

And so the dark haired and spectacled friend of Ken’s focused on getting himself a Jack Frost plush for himself. All while Ken stared at the face of his Jack and thought deeply.

“Well, you birthday is around June if I'm remembering correctly, so how about you turn by my place for some video games and mom's cookies. We can celebrate your birthday there.

“That would sound amazing, Akira.”

Akira turned to Ken with his Jack Frost plush, holding it front and waggling it gleefully.

Ken joined in too. Jack Frost and Jackie Frost were the names the boys decided for their plushies, as they strolled towards the direction of home.

“I’m really glad you transferred here, Akira. You’re a really great guy to be around you know?”

“I am?”

“Yeah!” 

“Huh.”

The shrine

Both boys sat on the swings alone in the rapidly fading sun. Discussing mundane matters, from homework, to exams, the future, video games and featherman. By all accounts, this was the life Ken would’ve wanted, if nothing had happened to him or his mom. But something did, and with all that came after, Ken couldn’t find it within him to see it as an ideal. Something was missing, something unfulfilled .

Ken thought back to what or why he felt this lingering feeling of incompleteness, something was not right, something wasn’t settled or hadn’t gotten closure.

He never got to see him live for himself. He had to live his final moments in suspense and perhaps torment about whether he had ruined Ken’s life for good, or otherwise. He never gotten to live knowing that he forgave him and had been able to find peace with his past, unlike him.

The dead don’t come back. That is a truth Ken accepted to an extreme, and had believed in, as painful as it was it was true. But now represented an opportunity one might define literally as “once in a lifetime”.

If Fuuka was right and Shinji was alive somehow, then Ken couldn’t pass this opportunity away

“He would have to get to Tokyo. By any means necessary, just as long as he could get there and make sure that Shinji knew that his appeal to Ken, to live life for himself, was answered.

“Hey Ken?”

“Uhhh, oh yeah?”

“Tomorrow’s a student council meeting, I‘ll see you there right Ken?”

“Yeah.”

Both boys left the playground and had went their separate ways.

6pm

Kirijo penthouse, shadow operatives HQ Tokyo

Now playing: Rumba Azul, by the Lecuona Cuban boys

Maruki was in the kitchen, preparing a pot of pasta. It was his turn to make dinner. Out of time and convenience this was perhaps the best he could do with what was in the fridge.

A part of the equipment sent included a record player and a box full of records courtesy of Kotone, Mitsuru and Aigis's selection. The four operatives and doctor which had been the first to deploy were fully appreciative of the lengths Kotone and Aigis would go to keep music an integral part of the shadow operatives daily lives.

Junpei and Yukari were sitting down on the dining table, answering emails and correspondence with their respective professions.

“Looks like filming is going to start later in the year than usual, probably in summer, how about baseball Junpei?”

“I get my break. We can focus on this thing fully now.”

Maruki brought plates of his cooked spaghetti to the table. Maruki ate his dinner alone as the two celebrities continued talking

“I met Shiho today, she said she wanted to do baseball after quitting the volleyball team at their school.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. There was an abusive coach who physically and also sexually abused the team.”

Yukari looked at Junpei in horror while Junpei looked down at his plate of spaghetti in solemn thought.

“I want to make sure nothing happens to her while I’m here. I’ll even send Labrys out to sicc this bastard if I ever find-“

The front door opened. It was Labrys and Chidori. They both silently went to the table and sat down.

“Uhhhhmm.  Why so quiet you two?” Yukari asked shakily

“We found it.” Labrys summarized

Now playing: Troubled, P3 OST

Chidori then laid down her sketch book at the table, with the illustration of the palace and individuals she had sketched when hiding out in that alleyway.

“When we went to that coffee place you suggested, as soon as we took our first sip of our coffee there we were suddenly in front of a castle.”

“The sky was reddish- or was it purple? Eh doesn’t matter- we then heard a lot of gunfire coming from the-“

Maruki held out a hand to stop Labrys

“Wait. Would you say you were brought to a cognitive space, a world perhaps?”

“We had no time to observe the castle fully, then a lot of gunfire happened."

Junpei and Yukari stopped frozen. It wasn’t a castle, but Tartarus was a bastion of humanity’s repressed desire to die. Hearing something of a castle was exactly the type of cognitive space that would form from an individual’s inner neuroses.

“Tell me, how would you describe this distortion?” Asked Maruki as he took out a note pad to record Labrys's and Chidori's findings.

“We hid out in an alleyway to take cover, just to be safe. The alleyway itself was normal, meanwhile the buildings next to the castle were growing moss.”

Maruki nodded as he started to take notes.

“That’s not all.”

“At some point, after about an hour we saw five people walk out of the castle, they had guns, I'd spent the remainder of the day coloring in and adding detail according to memory, which may be fuzy."

"Also, when we got out, our curry had just arrived. We had just spent an hour there, and only enough time had passed in the real world for our breakfast to be ready."

added Labrys

Chidori turned a page on her sketchbook, and revealed five figures in her notebook. Clearly she had the time to refine and polish her original sketches, which betrayed their original creation as a rushed attempt.

Yukari and Junpei took a closer look at the sketches.

Five prominent figures were found at the forefront. There was what seemed to be a cowboy donned in black, but her red hair tied into a ponytail instead made it a cowgirl instead. A blond girl who seemed to be doing her best cosplay of Carmen Sandiego. Another blond with a saber, donned in red like Carmen but also in white as well. He had a saber and holster on his sides and held a large sack over his back.

Then there was a girl who’s hair was peach colored, in stark contrast to her field grey uniform. She seemed composed, and had a cane/walking stick made of fine wood at hand.

Finally there was this big, prominent man. He had worn a great horizon blue overcoat while also wearing what appeared to be metal sheets on his chest. There were holes in the metal sheet. He wore a mask, it was simply a face plate with crude holes inside so the person could presumably see through.

“I couldn’t get a closer look, but they were all wearing masks like that big guy.”

“Masks you say.” Uttered Maruki to himself quietly.

“What does that mean? What are you thinking about?” Asked Junpei

“These people are persona users.” Stated Maruki determinedly.

“Wait what?”

“How do you know that doctor?” asked Yukari

“Persona in Greek means mask. It is the presentation of our ‘self’ that we use to present ourselves to others and society.”

“Are you suggesting that they summon their personas by their masks?”

Junpei interjected “I mean, they could be just robbers, doing that thing where they need to keep their identities secret to avoid the cops.”

Maruki finally replied

“Perhaps it’s changed, those guys from 2011 summoned their personas by a card. Maybe now the rules have changed again.”

“Well, we got that down, but now we have to figure out how to find them.”

Labrys interjects

“Actually, we figured that out.”

“What?”

“Fuuka said that in her dream, she saw students from Shujin academy, so we went there after breakfast to check out the area.”

“It was an exact copy of the area around the castle we had been to, we saw the same alleyway we hid in.”

Added Labrys

Yukari covered her hand over her mouth in shock.

“It’s just like Tartarus again.”

“But we were only brought to the castle by being at Leblanc.”

Junpei put his finger up inquisitively, only to be interrupted by Maruki

“There has to be a connection between those two places somehow.”

“Doctor Maruki’s right. We now have a lead, for the next week we should monitor both locations in order to find out more about what’s going on here.”

Stated Yukari objectively

“And find Shinji.”

Added Junpei.

The room remained silent.

Until Labrys took a bite and slurped on Maruki’s spaghetti.

“Thishhh ishhh goood Maruuuckiii”

Maruki led out a genuine smile, perhaps the warmest smile he had made when he had arrived in Tokyo.

And so everyone else enjoyed Maruki’s dinner for the night.

Leblanc, 8pm

Now playing: when the moon’s reaching out, live performance by Lotus juice and Azumi Takahashi

Start recording

“Ok. Report on the recent operation into the palace. We did it.”

“We made it to the throne room where the treasure was being kept, now we just need to prepare and get ready for the final raid to steal it.”

“The day we steal it, we have to send a message to Kamoshida, making him know that we’re gonna steal the rat bag’s desires. Then it becomes material, something we can carry. Then we grab it and go home.”

“We’re feeling great, we even got a new team member, her codename's Anita. I’d got her Armband ready but not her pocket watch. I’ll go get that soon.”

“There’s one thing I’m unsure about, what happens when we steal the treasure? By my sources this treasure is rather important, maybe it was the thing that built this castle.”

“Does that mean when we steal it will the castle blow up or something?”

“I really hope it doesn’t, I have an idea for a celebration plan if it doesn't."

“I really hope you guys were able to destroy Tartarus though. That thing needed to go down, as much as this castle.”

“Alright, time to get to work and when I mean by work I mean homework. School still sucks as much as I remembered it.”

End recording

Chapter Text

25/4, Monday

Schooltime 

Now playing: Suspicion

“Hey Shinjiro?”

Shinji was leaving class only to be stopped by Mrs Kawakami at the door.

“Yes?”

“How are you adjusting to Shujin?”

Shinji tried to think of a response.

“Could be worse.”

“Ok that’s good.”

“What’s this about? Do you think I’m neglecting my studies or something?”

“Well yes bu-“

“I’ve had to work a job at a restaurant. As you can guess there’s not much time for studying.”

“What-“

“So I’m sorry if I’m not meeting standard, but living in a cardboard box in an alleyway isn’t a “fun” experience.”

 Kawakami was feeling a bout of discomfort. She did not expect the conversation to take this turn.

Shinji started to exit the room only for kawakami to stop him again.

“What I meant to say was that if you needed help for the upcoming exams, you can find me.”

Shinji, standing at the door, sighed. He interpreted this wrongly.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Then he left quickly, hoping nobody else other than him and Kawakami heard a word from the conversation. He then left to leave school quickly

Only to be stopped by Haru looking at him with a somewhat worried face

“What was that about?”

Shinji sighed. 

“Please be kind to Mrs Kawakami, she’s a grade above the other teachers here.”

Shinji stood there, considering Haru’s advice

“She keeps a blind eye about my garden. It hasn’t been shut down by the other teachers because of her.”

Shinji nodded approvingly.

“Alright Haru.”

Shinji sighed and left school.

Evening

Leblanc, 6pm

Now playing:Time night version, remix by MOSQ

Shinji sat hunched over his work bench, working on making more tools for the soon upcoming theft of Kamoshida’s treasure. However he had made little to no progress as some of the more advanced and complicated gadgetry involved either materials he did not have, or involved further knowledge of chemistry that he did not have.

“Dammit…”

“Where the hell do I get Potassium nitrate?”

Shinji conceded and lied down on his bed.

Leaving his mind drifting, he thought about his conversation with Kawakami today. 

He couldn’t help but be frustrated. Although aware of his underlying emotions, he couldn’t find it within himself to allow himself to accept someone else’s help. 

He could have reached out to some more science adept people then he was, maybe he could’ve asked Haru, she seemed to pay more attention and get things right in science class more than he did. 

But he couldn’t find it within himself to ask her for help, or anyone really. 

Attempting to defuse his frustration, he decided to put aide his tools and materials on his work bench and took out a school textbook and went to do some studying to take his mind off his inabilities.

Math was fine, he just took out his phone and did some quick calculator work when he was stuck on something hard. Literature was fine, even though he hadn’t been in school for a year at least he could claim he read more real books then Junpei did.

Science however stumped him. Chemistry especially. It might as well be Greek.

“God. Dammit.”

In the end, Shinji did feel like he had learnt something. However he didn’t feel like anything of value was gained as in the end.

Shinji then remembered how his friends would get together to study as a group before exams. He didn’t take part, he was still at school at the time, but now a small minuscule part of him wished he’d at least sat there, maybe learn something useful, if school ever taught anything useful or interesting.

With that thought in mind, he went to sleep.