Summary: The place might be decorated with red instead of blue, but the sight of prison bars, the mention of inmates, and the talk of approaching ruin are still the same.
Note: my brain for a convoluted reason decided to have this fic be posted as my 100th P5 fic (because it felt like it fit as a nice parallel to my first P5 fic :'D). So, here we are :'D
Warnings: Joker Just Thinking About Mementos (Nothing More Really).
Disclaimer: Don't own P5.
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Joker doesn't really know what to think of Mementos.
It's ugly, certainly, foreboding, sinister; there is no way anyone would look at the vein-like webbing creeping along the walls and not notice the similarities with a human body's insides that occasionally pop in the various areas.
Mementos, the collective subconscious of humanity, with such an appearance resembling the human body.
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(What did Igor say about the Velvet Room? A place between mind and matter? Mementos certainly seemed to be a combination of the two.)
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(Red and Blue.)
(An interesting contrast.)
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Creepy as all get out or not, Joker is also curious about Mementos.
Sometimes when the drive is long, and there are no Shadows lurking around corners, when the Thieves have all fallen into sudden pensive silence, and the only sounds are the purring of Mona's engine and the whispers carried on the wind, Joker's thoughts wander.
Mementos is the place where people's Shadows reside if they don't have a Palace.
He wonders.
Did his own Shadow prowl these corridors as well? Was he in an area higher up? Was he somewhere lower? Or was he already out of Mementos, developing his own Palace?
(Did he already have one fully developed by the time he awakened to Arsene? He would never know.)
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The thoughts, banished time and again, always return to the forefront of his mind every time he returns with the Thieves to Mementos for exploration, for training, for funds, for requests, every time a new area opens up to them.
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By the time they dive to the Depths, he's too busy to dwell on these thoughts.
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It doesn't matter to him anyway, as a different line of thoughts emerges.
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The place glows in shades of red instead of blue, but it doesn't change the sight of prison bars wherever he turns his head.
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"A dangerous inmate." He hears, and he immediately snaps at attention.
It's a bad habit, ingrained in him after months of dealing with his twin wardens. A terrible habit. He really shouldn't be associating the word with him.
Inmate. Joker. His name, his nicknames, his codename.
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"Inmate." He hears, over and over again as he traverses the area. What do they want with me? He wonders absentmindedly.
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The first time one of the imprisoned Shadows drops the word 'ruin', the world narrows, and his mind screeches into a halt.
(Now where have I heard of that before? He thinks, suppressing a scoff.)
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He walks out of the Velvet Room with the Thieves behind him, his sight met with bloody-rain and towering bone-like structures, Mementos spilling out into the city and merging with it.
The Thieves let out surprised sounds and he turns to look at them. They are observing the door they have all emerged from as they left the Velvet Room. The very familiar door.
"Didn't they say that was the door that held a very dangerous inmate?" Panther murmurs, and as one, the Thieves turn to stare at him. He stares back.
"Well." Skull shrugs, "Not that it matters anyway."
Joker smirks, "Not that it surprises me anyway." He shrugs with one shoulder, "Besides, we have other things to worry about."
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End