Disclaimer; I do not own any of the Persona series.
Author's Note: Hey guys, Euphie here with a little information on the story. Riisa will be replacing Minato, sadly, and the story will be beginning just after everyone is recruited. I guess you could say it doesn't exactly follow the storyline, though there will be hints of it. So, here we are, second years, middle of summer break, and someone new is discovered.
Details
Chapter 1, "Rescue."
Riisa stayed in the little ball that she'd managed to curl herself into, the corner of the alley acting as her safe haven of some sort. Tears poured down her cheeks as she tried to quiet her constant gasps for air with both her hands firmly pressed up against her mouth. She was scared that the slightest noise would bring attention toward her. And from the looks of it, that was the last thing that she wanted. The thought caused her body to tremble even more than it already was; she shut her eyes tightly in a desperate attempt to stop the tears. Her throat was starting to get sore.
She never would have thought that something like this could happen to her, to anyone, for that matter. It seemed… hellish. Maybe she had died…? No, that couldn't be right, not at all.
The last thing she could remember was getting off the subway. She needed somewhere to be… but in her panic, she must've forgotten. She remembered walking, through the streets, past all of the people… and then next thing she knew, there were no people. There were no more streets. There was just blood. Large coffins staring back down at her where the people should've been. And those… strange, strange creatures following her… it was complete manic! She must have been dreaming. That's the only thing that makes sense…, Riisa thought to herself, burying her head in her knees, followed by a quiet sob. What was she going to go? What was going to happen?
"The hell…?" Riisa could hear faintly. At first, she thought that it was her. But that didn't make any sense at all. She abruptly quieted herself and her head shot up. Her eyes, though teary, frantically started to search the alleyway for the source of the voice.
"W-who's there…?" She hesitantly called out, her voice shaking in the chilled air. A million thoughts rushed through her head. What if it was another person? Stuck in her just like her? But… what if it was one of those things? She tensed up.
"Where are you?" The voice called back. It was a boy, young sounding. This perked Riisa's hopes. "H-here! In the alleyway!" She called back with the strength she had left, which was little. She went completely silent after that. She didn't even breathe. She just waited and waited… for something to happen.
Then, she heard it. The faint sound of running footsteps coming in her direction. Her heart suddenly filled with joy, and she got that strange feeling in her stomach. The feeling that felt so good, it made her want to throw up. A shadow in the shape of a human slowly started to come closer and closer to the entrance of the alleyway until it slowed to a walking pace upon entering. Riisa wiped the tears away from her eyes onto the sleeve of her shirt, then blinked a few times. She raised her head up to the figure, and when a faint light reflected against his face, she noticed his baseball cap. She had no idea why, but, that made her smile. Maybe because she was just too happy someone was with her. He offered a bright smile back to her, his eyes growing sincere, as he grew a little closer to her.
"Come on," He offered quietly when Riisa locked eyes with him, "Let's get you out of here. I bet you're scared out of your mind."
Riisa weakly nodded her head, her smile remaining. She took in a breath of air (probably from the time she had forgotten to,) and made an attempt to push herself up from the ground. Though, her legs wobbled; she was tired, and she had no idea why. She tried to hide this by using the wall to help steady herself, then she looked back at her savior with yet another kind smile.
"Someone looks grateful." The boy said as he smiled back, then he slowly turned, making a motion with his hand for her to follow. "I know you're freaked, but let me explain everything while I get you somewhere safe…"
Riisa nodded, her eyes growing distant as she swallowed hard and went to take her first step. She let out a sigh and slowly shut her eyes, before completely collapsing.
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She stirred softly as soon as she stared to come to, groaning and turning on her side. She laid still for a few moments, since she was too tired to do anything else. But as soon as she'd realized that she'd awakened, she fluttered her eyes open. "… mmm, eh?" She murmured through her lips. A bright, blinding white light was the first thing she saw, which caused her to shut her eyes in disgust. "Ow," She quietly whispered again, her eyes growing tighter. She heard a soft chuckle, which caused her face to soften, and her eyes to part once again.
The light started out soft again, but slowly dimmed, and formed to what seemed to be light flowing from blinds. The room was white with multicolored flowers on the wall. It looked something like a hospital room, or at least, something close to it. She shifted her eyes around the room, only to find someone sitting in the chair by her. At first, he seemed like a stranger, but then her memory started to flow back to her the second she glanced at his baseball cap. "What…" She began, but as soon as it started to come out, he interrupted her.
"Don't talk. Save your energy, you'll need it." The boy said, smiling before adding, "And don't worry, I'll explain everything."
Riisa watched him with perplexed eyes, though, after reviewing his tone, and thinking about how crazy that experience had been… she decided to trust him. Well, he obviously knew what was going on, and if she couldn't make sense of it, then she at least wanted to hear from an expert. She nodded her head softly to signify she wanted to hear.
The boy's smile brightened. "Great. Name's Junpei, Junpei Iori. And I'm guessing you'd be Riisa?"
She nodded her head again, uttering a small, "H-how…?"
"You were going to go to Gekkoukan, right? Well, I had my researcher look it up, and of course, the school said that you hadn't come in. So we told them you had a little… accident." Junpei added another jubilant smile. He didn't want to freak her out; it did sound a little stalker-ish, and he needed to convince her well enough so she could fall into their fingers.
"… oh, right…" She whispered back, starting to regain her strength. She groaned, pushing herself up into a sitting position, brushing her chocolate hair out of her face. After a moment of staring at each other, she finally spoke once again, "So… what was that…?"
"… It's really hard to explain. To be honest, I'm not the best person you should be asking." Junpei let out nervous laughter, "But, to sum it up, that place that you were in, it's called the Dark Hour. Normal people don't experience it… well, normal people."
"Y-you mean, I'm not normal?" Riisa's voice started to get panicked. "Is that why I'm in the hospital?"
Junpei chuckled as he shook his head. "No, no. I'd like to call it, special. Yeah, that's right, we're special. And since we're special, we can go into the Dark Hour. Nothing to worry about, except for the shadows."
"… the shadows…" Riisa could remember now. That's the reason she was running, because one of those… things were following her. "Those icky black things, right? Those are 'shadows?'"
"That's right. They're the reasons we go into the Dark Hour. We go in to kill them, because… well, uh, um… I forget, but, really, the thing is to beat the crap outta those guys."
"So, before you saved me, you were killing the shadows…?"
"Yup. And, no applause for that, it was no big." Junpei added a cheesy smile. Riisa tried to hold it in as best as she could, but, just staring caused her to burst out into laughter. Junpei's smile faded. "H-hey, that wasn't meant to be funny!" He whined, but when he saw her smile, he couldn't help but smile again. Hey, he had to admit it, she was cute, and he liked where this was going.
As soon as her laughter faded, she took in a breath of air and faced Junpei again, this time with a gracious smile. "Okay, so, Dark Hour, shadows, what does this have to do with me?"
Junpei frowned. "… Well, uh… that's kind of the thing. We don't exactly know…" He trailed off, seeming to hesitate for a brief moment before continuing, "… so, I can take you to a place where we will find out."
"… what do you mean?"
"There's more people like us," Junpei's tone started to get serious, and he leaned in closer to her. Riisa's eyes met his, her face falling curious. He went on, "We all live in the same dorm. If you want to find out more about what you can do… come with me."
Riisa was silent. Astonishingly… everything he'd said so far was making perfect sense. Maybe it was because everything before that hadn't… or maybe she was just going crazy. But, Junpei didn't seem to mean any harm. He saved her; he obviously didn't want to mean any harm to her. She wanted to know more about this place… this crazy place called the Dark Hour. Plus, it wasn't like she had a place to stay here anyway. She just moved.
"… okay. I trust you."
NOTE; Okay, as I said before, go easy guys. In addition for it being my first Persona fanfic, it is also the return of my long hatius from writing.
I'll give you a million cookies if you review. (:
Also, feedback on Junpei guys, I don't think I can pull him off well enough. I need as much as I can get. :0
The next chapter?: We'll be skipping forward a week, so don't act all "OMFGWTFIZGOOINONGAIS."
