The Art of Investigating, Part 1

a/n: I've actually had a Persona 4 and Doctor Who crossover in mind, specifically for where Naoto meets the Doctor, for a while. I'm pretty sure a number of things prompted it: Ten wanting to help everyone by being a good detective and helper, and Naoto having similar ideals, and also the thought of Ten being able to help her accept herself for who she is. And also for someone to help him get over Donna, because. That ain't happening at the moment. That, and really, a detective as a companion kind of figure would be awesome.

This will probably be a three part story, so wait for it! It was originaly going to be two parts, but I ended up writing and planning more than I expected, and I didn't want to cut out anything, so I'm going to be ambitious. As for timelines with this, the Doctor Who timeline would be post-Donna, and Persona 4 timeline would be post-Naoto's dungeon, before the next one starts.

The first time she saw him, it was after school. As was her fondness, she had taken to trailing to the highest place she could find, in thought, and mostly to get away from it all. Even if the case could progress smoothly, and she finally understood significantly how they were the only ones who could save the kidnapped and solve the case to begin with, it didn't automatically make all her troubles go away. Naoto's troubles, partly, came from inside the school itself. Minor, but there.

It wasn't like she was unused to it. On the contrary, part of her mind chided her that she should expect it. Living as a boy wasn't all as easy as she wanted it to be. For starters, she couldn't be a boy no matter how she pretended. And even though her secret was out, for the most part – it was amazing how fast rumours spread in such a rural area – some of the girls didn't believe it. And this meant an influx of confession letters that Naoto was beginning to reach the end of her tether with. She was a pretty patient person – given that she was a detective, and was usually the one calming everyone else down – but notes in her locker everyday? She was growing tired of it.

And without the distraction of going to that other world, which they had already indulged her in, or talking to any of her new comrades (though particularly their leader), she had to find other ways to whim it away.

Which was why she was sat atop the hill overlooking town, thinking. And that was the first time she saw him.

There was no sound, no warning, no nothing – just her sat alone with the distant rustling of the wind in the distance, the occasional person walking by, and then suddenly, a man falling headlong out of the bushes at the bottom of the hill – he didn't look like he'd fallen, but he was covered in dirt all the same. What was most distinguishable about him was the fact he clearly wasn't Japanese, a rarity, especially in Inaba. Though then again, she smiled to herself, she couldn't really comment. After Rise had come here and herself; though, mostly Rise; there was bound to be more tourists, but last she heard that had died off.

Still, this man didn't look the tourist. He looked around – briefly up the hill to where Naoto was sat, at which she averted her gaze – and then dashed off in some direction, towards one of the bus stops, where said bus was boarding, and he scrambled on it.

Naoto blinked, still fractionally curious, mostly for the fact he'd stumbled out of a bush of all places, that had to be suspicious and... quite frankly, odd. That said, it was a fairly forgettable event that held little interest to her what so ever.

. . . .

The second time she saw him, she had almost forgotten about the first incident altogether.

It was a Sunday afternoon, and after spending time with Souji on the high street before parting ways at the bookstore, and then not having much else on her agenda, decided to head home. She was just about to exit said store, when a certain coat that she could just make out behind a shelf caught her attention.

Now she recalled it, it was definitely the same as the man who had appeared, literally, out of nowhere. But that was jumping the gun, to put it bluntly. It could just be any man, standing up against the window bookshelf, browsing his way through books.

Until he spoke. "How much is this?" Came a voice – definitely from his direction – it sounded foreign accented, despite the perfect, fluent Japanese. Almost like the detectives in the novels she had read and the movies that had accompanied them. Not only that, but she was critically sure it sounded British.

But once again, that was little to catch her interest. It held no importance. Sighing as she discovered the book she had been searching for was missing, she made her way towards the door, noting that said man was now laughing whilst (attempting, by the sounds of things) to buy whatever book he had been reading... for quite a while, due to the shopkeepers' response. That was an oddity. Standing at the window, watching out of it – no, watching someone out of it-

Naoto mentally chided herself. That was what she would do if it came to being undercover. It was just a tourist, reading a book. No harm at all. She made her way out of the store.

Or, attempted to at least, as the brown headed, converse clad, trench-coated man suddenly came hurtling into her, almost knocking her sideways – and he looked extremely apologetic, almost holding out a hand, but seeing she was fine, carrying on making his way out the door before her, shouting a hurried, "Sorry! Can't stop, need to do something-" and then his voice faded.

Not exactly stunned, Naoto simply blanked for a moment from his lack of manners and sudden scarper out of the door. She then proceeded to make her way out of the shop, but not before catching that said man hadn't even paid for the book he had been looking over for the past half hour.

Definitely weird.

. . . .

The third time she was him, she was in Junes.

It wasn't a mission day – they'd simply met up to discuss the situation, and reconcile, and for anyone to voice any concerns (in her case, was what the killer might be planning, and if she had had enough practice for when – if – anything else had come up. It seemed she had (despite Kanji consistently voicing concerns, the only thing he'd actually commented on through the whole meeting), so here she was). Lacking once again of anything to do of importance after being let go by the Inaba police department, she had one again found herself with free time on her hands, so had chosen to wander around Junes properly whilst she had the chance.

It was then, whilst walking out of one of the elevators along one of the floors, that she saw the same brown haired man, walking in her direction.

Naoto froze. That was her immediate reaction, at any rate. The reaction was like a rabbit caught in the headlights – though she had been mid-step, so she had to put her foot down sometime, and when she did she tottered backwards on her heels hesitantly. It was a stupid thought to nurture, that he was heading in her direction, and she wasn't blind to it – paranoia was something that led to many people's downfalls, and something she didn't plan to add to a possibility for hers.

Only, she was definitely sure, somehow, that he was headed straight at her. Even if his eyes were blank... despite the depths of them, she noticed. Like a swirling mass of never ending at the rims, but the centre seemed dulled, blank, and unseeing. Almost glazed. So, with that reasoning, he couldn't be looking at her... could he? Naoto directed herself sideways, but she couldn't tear her gaze right then.

She looked a bit longer at those eyes, and the face they were set in. A set, determined face – whatever he was doing. It seemed like it was timeless, or full of time, or perhaps both – it seemed like those eyes had seen the end and the beginning of the universe, had seen a thousand or more people die – far too many for one lifetime – and had to suffer and re-suffer loss upon loss, sacrifices upon sacrifices, a shrivel of hope after a shrivel of hope. That's what it looked like – and immediately she dismissed it. Too many novels. Far too many, she amended.

This took her all of five seconds to ponder, and by this time he was less than a few hundred metres away from her. Glancing to the side, she was just about to make her way out of his path so she could dismiss the sense of foreboding his footsteps were giving to her – but then, low and behold, he suddenly did notice her, and next thing Naoto knew he was right along side her, and she had barely moved an inch.

Not at all clever.

"Hello," he said cheerfully, perfect and fluent once again and all sunshine, though, she could see his eyes still seemed dead, a stark contrast to his voice. Maybe she was just being over analytical. He continued, "Sorry about the other day. Terribly rude of me, I know, but I was in a rush... say... you don't go to Yasogami High, do you?"

"It's no bother," She said, well versed – the second question though, caught her attention, and slightly bemused her. Wouldn't that have been obvious from their previous meeting? But then again, he probably wasn't sure about the area. Tourist and all. She adopted her voice for such occasions when she dealt with people in the police station. "Yes, I am a student at Yasogami High. Why do you ask of such a thing? There is nothing much of interest at such a school."

Well, perhaps there was. Given that the killer had targeted at least six people, if not more by now, that had been and still were students at that very school...

"Oh, been picking off rumours from people in the shops," he waved it off. "I wasn't sure if it was the only school in the area... or not," he mused. "Well, high school. Japanese high school. So many definitions of high school..." for a moment he looked dumbfounded, but the next his mood had shifted back to the original, giving Naoto with little response to come up with than just trying to stop herself from opening and closing her mouth in the attempt to say at least something, or answer something that he hadn't concluded himself. "Well, sorry to bother you. Again. Really, I'm sorry."

"Helping out others is the least I could do," she offered, at least, but he was already on his way again, back on the prowl in the direction he'd presumably been heading before catching sight of her.

Naoto stared after him for a minute before continuing on, and she couldn't help but notice that the dead look was slowly saturating through his eyes onto his face again.

. . . .

The fourth time she saw him, it was probably the most suspicious of all the times she had seen him before. The most unnerving, to be put lightly.

She was midway back to the Shirogane estate, after managing to shake Souji off and stop him from escorting her back, or 'walking her back because he was worried', as he put it. It wasn't exactly infuriating, but it wasn't the easiest of things, either. Naoto was so used to looking after herself that depending on another was a new experience to her, and walking her home due to (something she wasn't even sure could be one) a threat wasn't really helping matters. Long held habits were hard to break.

Whilst she was contemplating her way through how to distract Souji from walking her anywhere the next day, Naoto'd managed to make her way along the Samegawa flood plain, her head pointed towards the clouds, and the full moon that was slowly rising in the night sky, for it always grew darker earlier in the winter - so it wasn't until she eventually looked down that she saw him, sitting on the benches.... watching her.

As was before, Naoto's initial response was to freeze at the avid attention in his stare - but she forced herself to walk forward. From how far away he was sitting, she couldn't be sure if he was watching her with his folded arms and glasses ensemble or watching the sky absentmindedly the way she had, or was simply staring at the banks down to the river. Either way, this... whatever he was doing... had to stop, for the sake of her sanity.

It was with that thought in mind, that Naoto's feet started to move on their own, and before she knew it she was off the path, headed in his direction to the benches underneath the pagoda. Well, if he hadn't been paying attention to her before, he certainly might have absently now, as she made a beeline towards him. A metre or so away from him, she stopped, half dazed at suddenly being there, half frustrated with wanting to understand why he kept on appearing everywhere in the past couple of days.

"What are you doing?" she demanded.

"What?" Was all she got her for efforts. She realized then, of all times, that he had been staring over at the riverbank, where she had been, afterall, and his eyes had only flickered once to look at her when she had walked over to him.

Naoto paused, but soon regained her momentum. She wanted to know what was going on. "I want to know what you're doing. I mean, what I really want to know, is - are you following me?" It wasn't something she was unused to, coming with her trade. But, she didn't want to really have to deal with this now she was in Inaba on a case only she and a limited number could solve. She also knew how bad it was to throw accusations around, so she added, "I've seen you several times. Wandering around; watching; showing up in the places I've been, especially the past few days. You even made a point of talking to me at Junes. So I want to know: what's going on?"

His face seemed to slowly recollect and gather what she was talking about - though he kept throwing glances in the direction of the riverbank every couple of seconds, his glasses slowly falling down his nose as he did so with increased frequency. "Oh. Oh. Well... no. I'm not following you, mister detective," he said with a slight apologetic grin, before reverting his eyes again. "Shall we say... wrong place at the wrong time? Or, maybe you just have a knack for spotting cases you aren't involved in."

At his response, Naoto had no comeback for - she had hoped he would say that, but the latter part completely baffled her. "What do you... mean?" Was all she managed.

"I mean I'm following a certain chap who just so happens to be following--" Suddenly he jumped to his feet, explanations cut short, as he took two steps forward - Naoto finally looked in the direction of the riverbank where she'd came from, and noticed a pretty normal, average looking man, staring back at them: though he was slowly retreating away, his head flicking this way and that, as if he was about to bolt, as if he knew some secret had been exposed - or was about to be - and he had to get away. It wasn't anyone else that the man beside her was looking at - the darkness from the overhead night sky had prompted most people to go home and stay indoors, despite the light of the moon on the ground, a natural streetlight. So it was definitely this man that the trench coated one was looking at.

He was so normal looking; she'd never noticed him before, unlike the man in front of her who did, in his way, stick out like a sore thumb. He's the one following me, she thought, dumbfounded. She had expected an idol like Rise to have the occasional stalker - but a famous, yet still a junior, detective? That was something she really hadn't considered once, but there she was, facing one with all intents on following her everywhere.

Even if this Phantom Thief that Souji was protecting her from did prove to be a hoax, maybe Souji wasn't so far off the mark.

"He's following me," Naoto managed, all in a matter of two seconds. Her voice was a mixture of surprise, and worry, and frustration for herself for not noticing it earlier on. "Not you. He is."

"Yes," the man confirmed, but quickly added, "And he's about to make a run for it, and even if he is a stalker of yours, he's also someone I need to watch before he does something... radically stupid, which makes him my business as well as yours," he said, still managing to hold a demeanour of cheerfulness despite the threatening atmosphere that seemed to have come down out of nowhere. "So, before he does make a run for it, should we put up the chase?"

Naoto would have answered, but something puzzled her. "We?"

"You want to know why he's following you," the man said, and at her look of slight annoyance cross puzzlement, he confirmed, "It's written all over your face. And any detective would want to know the reasons behind anything, right?"

"You'll help?"

"Two birds with one stone. Two heads are better than one."

She smiled lightly. "It's very true. Can't argue with that, I suppose. But how did you know that I, myself, was a detective?"

"Lucky guess," he admitted, sheepishly. "It's also written all over you. Plus I read too many detective novels. Watch too much James Bond. Agatha Christie and all that, too." The names were partially lost to Naoto, but she understood enough.

"I see," Naoto confirmed. From that, he seemed pretty much a detective type himself - even if the clothes hadn't been a statement of that along with his previous behaviour, it definitely seemed that way. "And you are? Your name, that is," she prompted.

"Later," he waved her off, his hand freezing in mid air, and Naoto noticed in her peripheral vision that their quarry had finally decided they were definitely on to him and had taken off in the direction out of town. "Now! Run!"