Akira's head was cloudy, and everything hurt. And still the officers hit him again and again, asking questions that had no answers. It was the one thing he had never counted on when forming his plan to topple Akechi's master: the system's unquenchable thirst for vengeance.

Akira looked at where his hand was supposed to be and saw nothing. Panic stole the air from his lungs and blood from his veins. No. This couldn't be happening. He was real. Wasn't he?

"God's decree is absolute." The thing that had been Igor laughed. "What? You thought the thing that you bowed and scraped to once a week was a god? I am human desire for order, the only god that has ever mattered, and my decree is that you die."

Snow fell on his shoulders and soaked his through his coat. Sae's eyes were red from crying. "I'm sorry." She stroked his cheek, touching him for the first time the way he had wanted her to. "The only way they'll prosecute Shido is if the Phantom is served up alongside him. I need you to turn yourself in."

The worst part of solitary was the silence. Sometimes he thought he could hear atoms moving. Sometimes he heard screaming. Igor and Lavenza could give him all the tarot cards they wanted. He wasn't at peace. There was no peace to be had here.

Akira's eyes snapped open. He lay on the hard mattress in Leblanc's attic, the slightly scratchy sheets tucked around him. Morgana's warm body curled on top of his chest. Rain pattered on the roof. He was home. Not erased from existence or imprisoned. The beatings, the battle with Yaldabaoth, they were in the past. No matter how many times his mind dredged up the ghosts, the bad times were over.

Morgana stirred and yawned, his claws digging lightly into Akira's chest. He blinked and gave as close as a cat could to a frown. "Bad dreams?"

Akira scratched him behind the ears. His best friend was supposed to be gone and now he wasn't. What were dreams compared to that? "Don't worry about it."

"I can't help it. I don't think you've had a good night's sleep since you came back. Are you sure you're getting enough sodium?"

"Just getting used to not having so many rules." That had to be all. "Let's get some coffee."

Sojiro hadn't come in yet, but Leblanc wasn't deserted. Sae had pulled up one of the chairs and her laptop was open. She was watching him. Akira smiled despite everything. Once she had decided to help them take down Shido, Sae had come into the café at all hours to work without fear of surveillance. Over curry and crossword puzzles, jokes and impassioned discussions over justice reform, they had fallen for each other. And now they could do something about that. Akira crossed the distance and kissed her. "Good morning."

She kissed him back, soft and sweet and smelling of coffee. "Good morning." She studied his face. "Did you sleep okay?"

Akira shrugged. Maybe it was because they had only met properly when his life had depended on telling her the truth, but it had always been hard to lie to Sae. "As well as could be expected."

"Oh, Akira." She smoothed his hair and stroked the line of his jaw the way he liked best. Dirty pool, that. Her fingers were soft and warm. "Nobody expects you to be all right after everything that's happened."

"See?" Morgana asked with a superior glare. "Ask her about the sodium."

"I'll manage." He twined Sae's free hand with his own. "As long as I have the two of you and Sojiro and Ryuji and everyone else who loves me, I'll be okay." He glanced at his shoes. "'I was almost erased from existence' is probably a guarantee of men in white coats locking me up. Not looking forward to that. "

"I never could get the other prosecutors to believe in the Metaverse. I'll just have to do what I can for you." Sae exhaled. "By the way, it turns out one of those prosecutors is a pretty big fan of yours. Shido and the late director infuriated him. I told him you wanted to become an attorney yourself at one time, though I'd understand if you'd soured on the whole idea. He told me to tell you to give him a call after you finished your entrance exams. Apparently, the Ministry of Justice is starting a program for undergraduate interns."

"Really?" Before that night on the street, Akira had dreamed of becoming a prosecutor himself, calling the wicked and corrupt to account. He had learned too late that the corruption was far worse within the system, but a foolish part of him hadn't been able to let the dream die. Even Joker had been a kind of prosecutor, forcing the truth to light. "The prosecutors office takes common criminals?"

"You don't even have a record anymore. And you were far from common." Her lips turned up in-a-half-smile. "And since it seems I prefer getting people out of prison, it would make me feel better to know that someone else is taking up the fight for justice from the other end. We need both."

"We do." He raised an empty coffee mug to her. "To justice in both punishing the wicked and freeing the innocent." But inside his stomach lurched as a phantom hand cuffed him across the back of the head. You think you have rights? Were going to make you pay, kid. "Silly to make plans now. Got time to watch TV before work? I missed you."

She searched his face again but nodded, and Akira turned on the TV and sat beside her. The screen was filled with a stark black monolith surrounded by neatly trimmed grass. Even muted by the television, the air of desolation was unmistakable. "Hey, Hypocenter Park!"

Sae sipped her coffee. "You live about an hour from there. Ever been? One of our class trips in high school was supposed to be to Nagasaki, but I had mono."

"Sort of." He shifted in his seat, embarrassed. "My grandparents are really religious and they thought it was high time I visited some of the churches. I was eight, and just the thought of the park, knowing all those people had been incinerated, scared me to death. I closed my eyes when we had to go anywhere near it. Always meant to go back for the history and visit a few more of the churches but…"

"Maybe we can sneak off for Golden Week. If I'm not gone from the prosecutors office by then, I soon will be. Either way, I've earned a vacation."

"Vacation? Sneak off?" His breath caught in his throat for reasons other than fear. He never let himself think of what would happen when he went home, whether all the love he had found would grow dormant with distance. Having Sae at all seemed a fever dream. Making plans for the future seemed more presumptuous than even Joker would dare. "You want us to keep dating? Even though I'll be hundreds of kilometers away?"

"After all the trouble I went through to have you? I want to keep you." She looked suddenly uncertain. "If that's what you want."

Akira kissed her, lips and teeth and tongue showing her just what he thought of that. His hands tangled in her hair. Sae whimpered, and satisfaction and wild pleasure coursed through his veins. No more ghosts. Just the beautiful woman in his arms, to stay. "Does that answer your question?"

"Ah, young love. Akira, I think you better keep this one."

Heat flushed Akira's cheeks as he and Sae broke apart, but Morgana looked far less embarrassed than a cat who had watched his best friend shove his tongue down his girlfriend's throat. Sae made a show of straightening her blazer and putting her hair back in place. "Should I be grateful that I can't understand that?"

"Maybe. Morgana-"

Akira's next words were cut off by the ring of Sae's cellphone. "Work. What could they want at this time of morning?" She stood, once more the professional and precise prosecutor. "I need to take this." She moved to a far corner of the café, out of earshot.

"Definitely keep this one." Morgana jumped on the counter and stretched out for petting. "I like it when you're happy. I, of course, expect you to be entirely honorable on this trip to Nagasaki. Do you think I'd like it?"

"It's months away. I thought it was a really pretty city. The cherry blossoms were all out, you could hardly walk for the petals. There's lots of churches down there, probably more than in Tokyo, because there were so many martyrs. People who died because of what they believed in," he added off Morgana's questioning look and prayed he wouldn't have to give a history lesson on the shogunate.

Morgana seemed satisfied. "A bit like you, then? Only with dying?"

"No nothing like that." His parents had kept up the Catholicism more out of tradition than anything, and he had rode the subway out to Kanda on Sunday mornings more to prove to himself that the arrest hadn't changed him, but the stories of distant relatives furtively trying to keep faith alive by disguising saints as gods and litanies of saints as Buddhist chant had still moved him. "The dying kind of made the difference." You didn't have to worry about what came after. Straight to heaven, no nightmares.

"What?" Sae's disbelieving roar cut through the air. "What do you mean five years? The man stole an election! Yes. No, I want the UFP gone as much as you do. Please, sir. Just give me more time."

Akira stiffened. Stole an election made it sound like she was talking about Shido, but that couldn't be right. Even if Sae couldn't make anyone else believe in the Metaverse, Shido had done enough in this world to get him locked up for the rest of his life. Sae had promised him on Christmas Eve night that his sacrifice meant justice would be done. He hadn't gone crazy in the training school because he knew being there had mattered.

Sae returned. Her skin was pale even under her makeup, and her eyes shone with barely suppressed fury. "That cowardly, bootlicking bastard!" She looked at Akira, and her gaze softened slightly. "I'm so sorry." Her voice had the same tone as on Christmas Eve.

"What happened?"

"That was my director. The Ministry wants the Shido case closed so there can be a new election, and they're spooked about what names he might name. The SIU has decided that one count of bribery and another for violating election law is enough. Five years. No further charges for him or anyone else. He overruled me."

Wind howled in Akira's ears and the floor opened beneath him. Five years from the man who had sent him into exile. Who had murdered Futaba's mom, Okumura, Akechi, and countless others. He was going to get away with it. Slapped on the wrist with charges they hadn't even needed the Phantom for. Those long silences had meant nothing after all. Hot tears sprang up in his eyes. He didn't bother to wipe them.

Sae drew him unresisting into an embrace. "I'm sorry," she murmured over and over against his skin. Morgana nudged his hand.

It was cold comfort. "So that's it?" His voice cracked. "There's nothing we can do?"

"Nothing except scream. The system really is corrupt all the way down."

"Then what did I fight for all those months? I almost died in that interrogation room so some politicians could pat themselves on the back. Do you know what solitary is like? I know you think you do from your law school classes, but do you?" He closed his eyes at the memories. "Getting your meals through a little slot in the door, listening for footsteps and praying that this time someone will talk to you. Using moldy old textbooks ten years out of date. Needing permission to stand when one of the guards did come. One of the boys hanged himself. Six weeks of that so he could go to prison for five years?"

He opened his eyes. The only sounds were three sets of harsh breaths. Akira felt suddenly very old and very tired. Morgana stared at him with wide eyes, but Sae...he had seen that look before, on Okumura's face just before the press conference began. Someone who would do anything to take what they had done back. What a pair they were, the paladins of justice in a world where a courthouse was still a casino after all.

Sae bowed her head. "I'm sorry. I failed you. As a prosecutor and the woman who loves you. If you want me to vanish, I wouldn't blame you."

"After all the trouble I went through to have you?" he repeated. "I want to keep you." The problem had barely been her when she had been a seven foot tall monster in spiked armor. It was Shido. It was three directors in a row who cared a lot about getting ahead and nothing about justice. Them he could hate and wish to steal a few more hearts. Wish, maybe, that he had left Shido bleeding from the eyes.

It was Tokyo filled with rot and corruption and citizenry just as indifferent as it had been when Yaldaboath had ruled. Where he would have to spend the next month pretending he was just fine and he didn't want the Metaverse to come again just so he could make everything that had happened something other than pointless.

Maybe he didn't have to. Desperation set his mind whirring. Anywhere but Tokyo. "You want to see Nagasaki? Come with me. Right now."

Sae stared at him. "What?"

"I just, I can't be here right now. And I have money left over from the Treasures. Enough for us to live like royalty for a few days. Run away with me. We'll go to the train station right now."

"I—this is insane. What about Sakura? Makoto?"

"We'll call them as soon as we've boarded." And he would put a few hundred kilometers between himself and his failures, outrun the nightmares. "Please?"

"I for one approve of living like royalty."

"This is absolutely insane," she muttered. You really need to get away that badly?"

He nodded.

Sae was silent for a long moment. "Then I'm in. What are they going to do? Fire me? Give me an hour. I'll meet you back here if I don't lose my nerve before then." She kissed him, shaking, and left.

Akira collapsed onto the chair. He was going to do this. Actually going to go with his girlfriend for a few days to Nagasaki. Sojiro probably was going to kill him. He got out his phone. If he was going to do this, then he was going to do this right. First class travel, the best hotels. Everything he had wanted to give Sae when he had been pining for her. Everything Morgana deserved for eating garbage for six weeks. "Want to help me pick a hotel?"

Fifty-five minutes later, Akira had packed his suitcase and thought he had the basics of the plan down, so of course disaster struck. The shopkeeper's bell rang. "You're up early. And looking very flushed and nervous." Sojiro's eyes narrowed, but a smile played at his lips. "Am I going to regret giving Niijima a key to this place?"

He ran a finger around his collar. He was so close to his desperately needed respite. He couldn't blow it now. "Nothing like that. Just trouble sleeping." It wasn't like he was going to be doing anything dangerous in Nagasaki.

"Ah." He sat in the chair Sae had occupied. "You know, you might want to think about talking to someone."

Anger and irritation welled within his gut. "Who can I talk to? The moment I mentioned anything about Personas or the Metaverse, I'd be locked up for the rest of my life. And I really didn't enjoy being locked up the first time."

"Oh, kid." Sojiro raised a hand to Akira, as if he might try hug him, but it fell limply to his side. "You might be surprised. I heard a lot of weird shit when I was working with Wakaba."

"Any of it involve a talking cat?"

"No, not exactly."

"Then I'm all right. I have to be all right." And he would deal with it as best he knew how. "I've really got somewhere I need to be."

"That somewhere have anything to do with Shido getting five years or with me running into Niijima carrying a suitcase two blocks from here? Something about Nagasaki, I think it was?"

"I—what?" There was no way Sojiro could know. He and Sae had been alone with Morgana. Morgana was right here. And why would Sae say yes if she was going to tell Sojiro? "Did Sae say something?"

"Depends on if you call getting flustered saying something. The woman's a fantastic lawyer, but she's not so good at the whole secret love affair thing. Might have to give her some tips." He reached under the counter and pulled out a gray disc the size of his fingernail. "Futaba left some of the bugs, and I confirmed Shido's sentence with an old friend. I'm sorry. I can see about punching his teeth down his throat if that would help."

"It might. And a few hundred other people." He slammed his fist against the countertop. "But I can't punch him. I can't do anything anymore. I can't even get angry. The only people I can hurt are you and Sae. I promised myself that night that I wouldn't take it out on her. Everybody who's responsible for this is tucked away safe in their little offices. All I can do now is run away for a little while. Let me have that."

Seconds ticked by. Akira fidgeted. If Sojiro said no, that'd have to be the end of it. It wasn't like he could tackle him and tie him up before Sae returned. But Sojiro nodded grimly. "Okay. You've got three days. And then I am hopping on a train and dragging your home if I have to. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir!"

The bell tinkled again. "Sakura. May I assume our lover's getaway has been discovered?"

Sae stood in the doorway, suitcase in hand and a flush on her cheeks. Sojiro smiled at her. "Just laying down some ground rules before I let the kid go running halfway across the country to find himself. Can I have a word with you?" He nodded to Akira. "Don't worry. You two won't even miss your train." He took Sae by the arm and led her to the same far corner.

Akira's strained to hear them, but it was no good. Sojiro probably wanted to make sure they weren't going to break the obscenity with a minor law, or at least not get caught. From time to time, he thought he could make out a word. Kirijo, days, contact. None of them made any sense, and Sae's expression gave nothing away when they returned.

"All right, lovebirds. You better get a move on." He slapped Akira on the shoulder that the cops hadn't separated. "I'm appointing Morgana chaperone. Good luck, kid. Hope you find what you're looking for."

And just like that, they were out the door. The sun was just peeking over the horizon, and Akira shoved his hands in his jacket against the cold. Yongen was already stirring as people handed towards work and uniformed students decided to catch early trains to school. No one looked at him or Sae. Without his school uniform, he might have been a college student heading somewhere with his girlfriend. He definitely wasn't Joker, the Phantom Thief of Hearts. This might work out after all.

"What did Sojiro want to talk about?" he asked when they were almost to the train station.

Sae shrugged. "Mostly reminding me that he still knew people who could make me disappear if anything happened to you. He worries about you. We all do."

"Thanks," Akira said and decided he meant it. Worry meant love, and if he could hold on to that love for long enough, maybe he could survive this.

Tokyo Station was bustling with life despite the hour. Akira's hand brushed against Sae's as he led her toward the green ticket vending machine. He reached into his pocket and took out a wad of bills. "Let's see... First leg to Hakata. They've still got seats left. Good. I always wanted to travel first class. You want the one nearest the window?"

When Sae didn't answer right away, he turned back to her. She was staring at the money in his hand. He raised an eyebrow. "What?"

She blinked. "Sorry. It's just hearing about the Treasures is different from seeing you blowing thirty thousand yen on one leg of the trip."

"I'm not blowing. I've spent more than that on the knife replicas. And you should see what the false god charged when he was impersonating Igor." He sobered. "Don't worry. Makoto made sure we were all responsible. There's enough for me to pay for university three times over tucked away in a Cook Islands trust."

"Not helping," she muttered. "At least let me buy our boxed lunches. And something for Morgana."

"Deal."

The vending machine spat out their tickets, but it wasn't until he stood on the platform watching the shiniest train he had ever seen, that it hit him. He was sneaking off with his girlfriend. Akira Kurusu, now with no Persona, was the sort of person who did that. Morgana poked his nose out of the bag, and Sae squeezed his hand once when no one was looking. He took a deep breath and mounted the single step onto the train and his first adventure in the mortal world.

It didn't take him long to decide the premium for first-class was worth it. He stretched out his legs and reclined his seat ever so slightly. Even Sae seemed more chipper than usual, sliding in the next seat over. Akira ordered an orange drink and settled in to watch the scenery for the next eight hours. He took out his phone. Half a dozen text messages from his friends already. Well, watch the scenary while being digitally yelled at.

When they boarded the next train in Hikara, Akira found the seat opposite him already occupied. The man could have been anywhere from his own age to twenty-five. Maybe. His shaggy hair had gone partly gray and his shoulders were stooped. A cane had been stowed under his seat. The other passengers edged away from him as they moved down the aisle, but he seemed too lost in his headphones to care.

Sae noticed the boy as she resumed her seat beside Akira and stiffened slightly. Akira raised an eyebrow. "Do you know him?"

"No. Just anxious to be in Nagasaki, I guess."

But the man turned off his headphones. "It's all right. I make a lot of people nervous. I came as close to death as you can get a few years ago, and I guess people notice." He nodded. "Name's Arisato." His voice was deep but raspy, like he needed water.

A cold wind passed over Akira, and he leaned forward in his seat. There was something weird going on with Arisato. Maybe it was his illness or the way his body seemed both old and young at the same time. Or some subtle reminder of the bad times that Akira's subconscious had picked up on. Or even a warning like the one his body had given him the day that he met Akechi. Of course, it could be just further evidence that he was going crazy.

"He smells funny," Morgana muttered. "Like you."

Akira sighed. He loved Morgana, but sometimes he still wanted to drop the cat off Sky Tower. "Quiet," he whispered. "You don't want one of the attendants to notice."

But Arisato had already noticed. His whole face transformed as it broke into a grin. "Is that a cat? I was always more of a dog person, but it's been so long. May I see him?"

"Yes, may he?"

He couldn't turn down Morgana and Arisato both. He handed the bag over to Arisato. Arisato reached in and stroked Morgana as if he were made of glass. He was shaking. So long, he had said. He had come close to death. Maybe he had been in the hospital for a really long time or something. Whatever prickling sensation Akira's paranoid body insisted on firing off, Arisato looked like a man in desperate need of a friend. "Are you going to Nagasaki as well?"

Arisato looked up from petting Morgana. "For work. Well, more like my fiancée's work. There's a conference on the weird paranormal stuff that's been happening the last few years. The cult in Port Island, the murderers in Inaba, things like that. She has a professional interest in that kind of thing."

Akira swore under his breath. Why couldn't the travel website mention something like that? Maybe without his glasses and school uniform, he wouldn't be recognized. "She's some kind of fortuneteller?"

"More a researcher. Helps out the police when something happens that they can't explain, helps sort out the frauds from the genuine article."

Akira and Sae looked at each other. Maybe his body had been trying to warn him after all. "You believe in the possibility of the paranormal then?" Sae asked.

"Better to say that I think science hasn't even bothered to investigate all of the natural world. It's hard to tell where what you would call the natural stops and the paranormal begins." He handed Morgana's bag back to Akira and took a pack out of his pocket. Akira's eyes widened. It wasn't the Marseilles deck Chihaya used, but he knew a tarot deck when he saw one.

Arisato continued, "Take these for instance. Supposedly, they tell the future, but they started as simple playing cards." His gaze turned distant. "And my fiancée's favorite reward to give me for doing well on exams."

"Cards? Really?"

"We were into that stuff. Speaking of cards... I'm a pretty decent hand at five card draw poker. It'll be several hours till we reach Nagasaki. Want to play a few hands?"

The color drained from Sae's face. "No, thank you."

Arisato shrugged and set the minor arcana for solitaire.

Akira murmured a prayer under his breath. He wasn't the only walking wounded. Not even the only walking wounded in this car. He wished he knew how to tell Sae that he looked at her and saw all of her, not just the thing she had been at her very worst. That Leviathan was as dead as the Metaverse. He didn't, so he laced his fingers with hers instead and hoped she understood.

Two trains later they finally pulled into Nagasaki Station in the middle of the afternoon. Arisato took his cane from under the seat. "It was a pleasure meeting both of you." He took a card case from his pocket with his free hand and plucked out a business card. "Why don't you pop in for a bit at the conference? I'm here by myself in Nagasaki, and it would be nice to see a friendly face. Bring your cat."

Walk into a discussion of the paranormal? "I don't know…"

But Sae had visibly perked up. "Perhaps. We have a sightseeing list, but it sounds interesting."

Akira stared at her. "It does?" he mouthed.

Arisato's beaming smile was back, and Akira decided that he couldn't be truly angry. "Ir's Sunday at eight o'clock in the convention center. Look forward to seeing you." He nodded one last time, stood and hobbled towards the exit.

It was only then that Akira noticed the discarded tarot deck on the seat. He looked around, but Arisato had already vanished. "Didn't he say this was a gift from his fiancée? I guess we have to go now." He really could be a romantic fool about some things. If he were lucky, then he would get through it calmly and with no reminders.

When he had come here as a child, Nagasaki Station had seemed to be the busiest and most frightening place in the world, but it was positively sedate by Tokyo standards. He and Sae threaded through the crowd without missing a step. Akira waited until it had thinned a bit before sidling close to her. "I know why I want to go to this convention, but why you? I would've thought you'd had enough of the weird stuff to last a lifetime."

Sae was silent for a long time. She looked down without breaking stride. "Too much and not enough." Her voice was almost swallowed by the din. "There's so much I don't know. I can't even talk to Morgana. I don't know why some people can summon the power you have and some can't. Why did I have a Palace but Futaba's uncle didn't? That world has scarred you and marked you and made you into the man I love, but I see it only in glimpses."

Akira swallowed. They'd hardly spoken of the Metaverse or her Palace after the interrogation and not at all since he had returned training school. He'd thought Sae would be only too happy to return to a world that made sense. And there were so many questions he wouldn't be able to answer even if she had wanted to know. Yaldabaoth had kept him in deliberate ignorance, and Igor and Lavenza hadn't had the time. But she wanted to know. For that he would brave even another false god. "Then we'll find every answer we can." Maybe, just maybe, he would find a hint that he wasn't the only one who had ever been through this, that it could be endured.

He cleared his throat to force the lump down "I thought we could grab a bite to eat and go to the hotel. Maybe visit a temple if we have the time. Tomorrow Hypocenter Park and the museums. Then visiting some of the martyr shrines on Sunday before we go to this convention."

"Sounds like you thought of everything."

He smiled at her and for the first time since December, he felt an echo of Joker. "You know me. I always have a plan. "

The next few hours were a giddy whirlwind. They stopped for lunch in a diner that reminded Akira pleasantly of the one in Shibuya and debated expanding the use of lay judges over overpriced steak. Later, they climbed the slopes to Glover Garden. They milled around the buildings that are a mixture of Japanese and Western with hundreds of other and watch fish swim around a koi pond. As dusk settled over the city, they climbed still higher to look out over the harbor. Akira could smell the sea. The mountains sloped gently upward to touch the heavens. Somewhere beyond them was home.

As they watched ships carry cargo to who-knew-where, Sae settled her head on his shoulder. Akira felt himself very still. It seemed a miracle sometimes that they could touch each other in public. So much of their courtship had been chaste, chivalric gestures that were more fit for poetry than a relationship between flesh and blood humans. But Sae was warm and soft and real against him. And none of the other couples seemed to notice or care about the Phantom and the prosecutor.

"We should head to the hotel," Sae murmured, sounding sleepy. "What is the hotel anyway?"

"Only the best, of course. "Nagasaki Marionette, executive suite." Akira smiled at her. He and Morgana had spent ages picking that out. "Two bedrooms, a spa and a gym on site, and absolutely no buffets."

Sae looked up at him. "My director could barely afford that. What were you doing in that other world? You scare me sometimes."

"If you going to go through hell, you might as well get something out of it. Reservation's under your name."

The Marionette was exactly like the pictures, the kind of place that Akira's dad had nearly broken his body trying to afford with its marble foyer and liveried bellboys who insisted on taking his and Sae's luggage. Such a difference from the Wilton and all it had taken was changing into a polo shirt and combing his hair. Being willing to pay the rack rate for the most expensive room in the building probably hadn't hurt.

More luxury awaited them inside. A king-sized bed dominated the first bedroom. His hand sank into the mattress. Cotton sheets too, which seemed decadent after the attic and training school. A mahogany dresser stood against the wall. Through the partly open door, he could see the breakfast room and television.

"Do we have taste or do we?" Morgana hopped from the bag and stretched. "I'm going to see what this place has. And I think you and Ms. Niijima need some time alone for private displays of affection." He winked and ran off to the common room.

Akira couldn't muster irritation. Being alone with Sae still seemed a rare and precious gift. He ran a hand down her side and enjoyed her shiver. "Tell me, how does it feel to get everything you wanted? Even if it is just for three days? The world is at your feet."

"I don't want the world anymore." Her voice was low and husky and made him shiver in return. Her hands traced the lines of his chest through his shirt. Leisurely, like they had all the time in the world to just explore. "I want you." she whispered against his mouth. Her lips were soft, hot, insistent, and Akira was all too happy to melt against her. He buried a hand in her hair. Mine. All mine. She's my reward, and I'm hers.

She pulled back, but made no move to leave the circle of his arms. Her hair was a mess, and her lips slightly swollen. Pure masculine pride surged through him. He was the one Sae let see her like this and it didn't matter that he was seventeen or that her blazer cost more than his dad made in a week or that he had nightmares. She had chosen him.

"I should get to bed," Sae said but without enthusiasm. "And make sure Morgana hasn't accidentally gotten into the minibar."

Akira tucked a strand of errant hair behind her ear. "A drunk cat would be bad." He cursed himself for his cowardice. A real roguish phantom thief would have asked her to stay. He wanted to, wanted to feel what it would be like to have her nestled against him. But he didn't. Kisses were one thing and breaking that law was another. And he'd set himself on fire before he did anything to make Sae uncomfortable. Kaneshiro and the interim director had given her enough grief.

Morgana nosed the door the rest of the way open. "All right, enough fun." He yawned. "Time for bed. You lovebirds have the next two days for your fun."

"I do believe we're being chaperoned, Ms. Niijima," Akira told her.

"Far be it from me to disappoint Morgana," Sae said with a smile. She stroked his cheek one last time and left, closing the door behind her.

Akira waited until he was sure that she was in her own bedroom before cracking it open. Ever since his stint in solitary, he hadn't been able to sleep with the door closed. Stupid, but better than cold sweats or he lay on the cotton sheets and waited for Morgana to curl into a warm ball. He was as safe and comfortable as could be. Not that it stopped the nightmares.

He was in a casino. Not the gaudy one with the neon lights that Sae's subconscious had constructed, but one out of a spy movie with elegantly carpeted floors and gamblers who wore diamonds. He looked again. Some of them wore diamonds, others were in rags. All were focused laserlike on the games of baccarat or craps. All wore expressions of complete terror.

"Horrible isn't it? said a ghostly voice.

Akira turned. Akechi stood before him, dressed as Crow and his unmasked face bruised but decidedly flesh colored. Alive. "How?"

Akechi shrugged. "This is your subconscious, not mine. I'm flattered you believe I was worthy of some dying grace. But dead men only matter in your prayers." He indicated the crowds with a flourish. "Look at them! Still slaving away trying to survive a rigged game. Did you really change anything?"

Yes. No. He didn't know. "We stopped a false god."

"A false god, born from the human desire for order. That desire still dominates. Why do you think Shido was punished so lightly when no one but you or the others even cared if I lived or died? Why do you think Sae had to send you to solitary for even that much? Nothing we did mattered. Not you, not me, not the Phantom Thieves."

No, no, it wasn't true. All those people he had helped in Mementos: the scam victims, those who have been abused, students freed from bullies. Sae. Futaba. He had helped them.

But as he looked at the desperate crowd, he saw them all. Hifumi, Shinya, Kawakami. And yes, Sae. She was no longer dressed as the demon, but her face was gaunt and her blazer dirty and torn as she watched the roulette table in despair. "Better for you to have left me as I was, sweetheart. Defense attorneys always lose. The only thing I gained was wanting a half-insane highschooler and a lot of guilt." She looked at him. Her brown eyes slowly turned yellow. "It's only a matter of time before I follow. And then you and I will rot."

"You're happier this way. You told me so!"

"None of us are happier," said the man beside her. His long coat billowed in the unseen wind. He looked at Akira and it was Joker's mask he wore, his own face looking back at him. "The only mistake is that she didn't go far enough. It's not the courthouse that's a casino. It's the whole world, and the heroes always lose."

Akira awoke, heart pounding. He touched his face. There was no mask. More nightmares. At least Morgana hadn't seemed to notice this one. He was curled sound asleep at the foot of the bed. Akira sighed. It wasn't true, any of it. It couldn't be. He just needed to find a way to badger his brain into peace.

He wasn't going to find it here. Maybe if he watched TV very quietly, the middle of the night, and the shows would be so stupid that he would have to sleep them off. He got up and tiptoed as quietly as he could to the common room only to find that he wasn't the only one awake. Sae sat at the table, Arisato's tarot cards in her hand. She was a vision in her nightgown, her hair loose about her shoulders for the first time he could remember. And yet, she looked sad and tired. His beautiful, tragic empress." Can't sleep either?"

"Akira?" Her cheeks colored slightly as she took in his pajamas, but she stayed where she was. "No, I'm not sleeping. Thought the cards might keep me occupied until I could return them." Her lips twisted into something halfway between a grimace and a smile. "You heard Arisato. These were playing cards first, and I used to be a very good poker player."

"You did?"

"Some university friends and I went to Las Vegas after we graduated. I won thirty million yen." She shrugged. "After Dad died, I never had the time. And then, well, you know..."

He sat opposite her. "Don't give up something you enjoy. You're not the demon."

"I try not to be. But changing your own heart is slow going sometimes. I don't want to be tempted. One of the reasons I'm leaving the prosecutors office."

Yellow eyes loomed before him. Akira swallowed. "You'll be all right leaving? I know how it is for defense attorneys. Even the best only win three or four cases their whole career. And they don't make nearly the money prosecutors do. Are you going to be okay with that?"

"Makoto's going off to university. I might have to put off getting a new motorcycle, but I barely had time to ride it before."

"You don't have to give up anything." Anything to prove the demons wrong. "I'll give you anything you want. All those things you were dreaming of when you thought you had to sell your soul to get ahead? I'll give them to you."

Sae drew back as if she had been struck. "I don't need to be kept, Akira. I want to be with you for your own sake, not for what you can give me."

"Then… then you're okay with how things turned out? Even though I'm not quite all their and a kid and you're losing a chance at promotion?"

She softened. "I was miserable before. Being the evil villain is not as glamorous as anime makes it sound. You gave me Makoto back, and I'll never be able to repay you for that. And a purpose. I like the idea of keeping prosecutors on their toes and making them earn every single conviction. That's how change is going to happen. People like you and me seeking justice from both ends."

"Even though the system is still so broken?"

"Even so."

I told you it was a lie. He would keep the demons at bay for one more night sake of her faith in him. And maybe he could find what he was looking for in Nagasaki. "You know, if you want to pay me back, there's something you can do."

"Akira…"

"I didn't mean that." Maybe someday, but not now when it would be more about comfort than love. "Deal me in. Us former thieves are pretty good at bluffing."

Sae laughed. It was tentative and harsh, but it was a real laugh. "You're going to regret that."

"No, I don't think I will."