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Yusuke is cold.
That’s not impossible for him, obviously, though he knows how to cope with it when he doesn’t feel like wasting money on turning on the space heater in the dorm.
In the Metaverse, though, that’s a problem, and Yusuke can’t help but worry that it’s why he hasn’t heard from anyone since they got separated.
Just when you think you understand something about Mementos, an alteration happens, they sink through the floor, and instead of just taking them down a level the entire group gets separated and the floor you were just on is now covered in frost.
“Oracle?” Yusuke asks out loud again, and his breath is visible in front of him. He’s getting very desperately worried.
He’s fine. Cold, but fine. How would the others fair? Would Ann be able to use her powers to keep herself warm or would her weakness to Ice prove detrimental in this weather? There’s a logic to the Metaverse, but it's not intuitive.
Hopefully, he’s the only one here, and he just needs to find the stairs.
He knows the way, walking carefully so as to avoid large shadows and slipping on the patches of ice on the ground.
Though, now that he thinks about it, he hasn’t seen any shadows down here.
There’s the crunch of someone stepping on snow, and Yusuke turns the corner to see a large blob of shadows barreling toward him.
He grips his sword and prepares for a fight, but the shadow runs past him, squeaking.
It’s scared.
The stairs are in the direction the shadow ran away from.
Yusuke tightens his grip and continues carefully in that direction. He almost reaches the stairs before tripping on something.
No, someone.
Futaba.
She’s frozen solid, which is fine, right? Because they’ve all been frozen at some point (not Yusuke, really, but that’s not important), it’s another status effect.
Though Yusuke doesn’t have any skills or medicine for status effects so…
Yusuke takes a deep breath and carefully drags the frozen-solid Futaba to the escalator and up a level. It seems once they’re far enough away, the effect wears off and she pops right up.
“-adow!” Futaba screams, then she looks around and lifts her goggles off her head. “Uh, what happened?”
“I found you frozen downstairs,” Yusuke explains between breaths. “We got separated from the others.”
“Right, yeah that Shadow, it seemed stronger than the others,” Futaba says. At least she’s acting normally.
Mementos is nothing if not consistent.
Futaba summons Necronomicon and Yusuke gets back up.
“Ok, good news and bad news!” Futaba says. “Good news, I can tell everyone’s on the lower floor.”
“And the bad news?”
“The bad news is everyone except Joker and Panther are frozen, and Panther’s using a lot of magic already. You’ll have to find them and get everyone back up here.”
“Could defeating the Shadow that–”
“No.” Futaba says instantly. “Not even worth risking. Maybe if we were a bit stronger and better prepped we could take it on, it’s not the Reaper, but now is definitely not the time.”
Yusuke nods. “I’ll go meet Joker and Panther then.”
“Right, I’ll call them.”
Yusuke heads back down and with Futaba’s help, finds Ann and Akira pretty quickly. He doesn’t even say anything before Joker hands him a thermos of coffee, which Yusuke takes gratefully.
“Oracle caught us up,” Akira says.
“We were just thinking we could find Mona first, unfreeze him, and then get everyone all at once,” Ann says.
“But if we run into the Shadow again, everyone might end up refrozen.”
Akira nods. “Yeah, that’s why I was thinking: thanks to Ann I was able to switch to a Persona that resists ice, what if I keep the Shadow busy while you two get the others.”
“That seems dangerous.”
“That’s what I said,” Ann mutters.
“There’s not an option that isn’t dangerous,” Akira points out. “And the most dangerous thing is staying in one place too long.”
Yusuke and Ann share a look. Akira’s always too willing to put himself in harm's way.
“I could do it,” Yusuke offers.
“I have all the supplies,” Akira counters.
“What if I go with you,” Ann says.
“Ice spells, Panther.”
“I’ll stay back, focus on healing and fire, you keep the bulk of its focus,” Ann says.
“You’ll have me to watch your back!” Oracle says. “And you don’t even really have to fight it, you just need to keep it away from the person Fox is grabbing.”
“But–”
“If there’s one person well suited to being down here on their own,” Yusuke says, “it’s me.”
Akira grits his teeth like he wants to pull rank but doesn’t. “Ok, fine, but the first sign of trouble, Panther I want you out of there.”
“No problem.”
They split up, Yusuke following Futaba’s instructions to find the frozen bodies of his friends buried under snow, while Ann and Joker lure the Shadow away from him.
He tries not to let the sound of gunshots, of clashing metal, of Futaba’s squeaks get to him, he just moves as fast as he can.
Ryuji’s the last one he finds, and being pure muscle on top magically being frozen solid, is the heaviest by far.
Yusuke does his best to lug him to the escalator when he hears Futaba shout in his head.
“NO NOT THAT WAY!”
“We don’t have a lot of other options!” Ann shouts, but Yusuke doesn’t hear it over the comms, he hears it echoing down the hallway.
With a heavy grunt Yusuke tries to pick up his pace, reaching the escalator just in time to hear the click of Ann and Akira’s heels on the ice and see them turn the corner followed by a ghastly figure wrapped in a thick cloak.
“Sorry Skull,” Yusuke mutters before dumping him on the escalator and letting him ride up himself.
Yusuke rushes back towards Ann and Akira, just as Ann trips.
Without thinking, Yusuke throws himself in front of her, taking the attack the Shadow sent.
Yusuke’s worked too long in the cold before, not wanting to waste Sensei’s money on a heater. At some point, the hand holding the brush didn’t just feel cold, it ached, like a thousand tiny needles were digging into his skin.
That’s how he feels now, except instead of his hand, it’s his entire insides. It feels like frost might have formed on his lungs.
He can't think of anything except the cold.
Luckily he doesn’t need to think for Goemon to counter the Shadow’s next strike, parrying its snow-white staff with his own pipe.
Once the Shadow is on its back foot (metaphorically, as it doesn’t appear to have feet), Ann lets out a screech and sends a fireball at it.
Then another, then another.
Then Akira throws a bomb.
When the smoke clears, all that’s left is a silver coin glittering on the frost.
Ann collapses to the ground, and Akira runs over to Yusuke, helping him up.
“Are you ok?” Akira asks.
“Yes, it just knocked the wind out of me,” Yusuke says. Akira clearly doesn’t believe him, because he takes off his coat and wraps it around Yusuke before going to pick up the coin.
“Morozko, huh?” he mutters.
“Akira,” Ann sighs from the ground. “Tell me whatever that bastard dropped is enough to pay for a whole day at a sauna.”
“No, sorry,” Akira replies. “But I can fuse it as a Persona.”
That causes Ann to sit up and look at him. “If you ever summon that thing in front of me I’m dumping you.”
“Fair enough.”
The three of them head back to the escalators and regroup, and Yusuke's never been so happy to see normal Mementos in his life.
“Fox, are you ok?” Haru asks, taking off her glove. “You’re burning up.”
Yusuke’s about to insist he’s fine again, but instead he sneezes.
“And you look paler than usual dude,” Ryuji adds.
“He took a bad hit for me,” Ann says. “Thanks by the way.”
“D-don’t mention it,” Yusuke says, pulling Joker’s coat around him tighter.
“You might need extra help,” Makoto says, also starting to look concerned.
“Y-you all were frozen,” Yusuke points out. “You’re fine.”
“Yes, but we were frozen all at once,” Makoto says. “You’ve just been running around in the cold and then took a direct hit which might be, I don’t know, different. Also you look worse than any of us.”
Akira pats him on the back. “C’mon big guy, let’s get you back to Leblanc and full of curry and coffee and hopefully that’ll fix everything.”
Yusuke sneezes again.
“Maybe you should also stay over.”