A/N: So…. I've decided to go back over this story and spruce it up a bit. I've improved a bit as a writer since I first began working on it, plus some aspects of the story itself have been expanded or re-worked in my head, making it necessary to adjust some things in the chapters I've already posted. Basically, the main story is the same, more or less, but I'll be re-posting the chapters, in all their updated/improved glory (thankfully, I had only posted two chapters originally, so past that point and only I will know the differences. XD).

In any case, for most of my stories in general, there's usually a huge author's note that's basically me musing on how I got started on this story and what it's likely going to involve (anyone who's read anything of mine knows this to be true XD). Since having it at the start puts some people off, I've moved it to the ending author's note. You're still entirely welcome to ignore it if you like, but I like to hear what you guys think about my ideas, so…yeah. This first chapter's a little on the short side, but it's sort of justified in that it is the first chapter; in other words, we're just getting started. ;)

Anyhow, review or something when you're done, please. :D

Riko stared into her coffee cup, flashes of her dreams drifting into her mind's eye.

'Welcome to the Velvet Room. My name is Igor.'

She took a sip of her coffee and shuddered. It seemed she'd been just sitting there for too long; it was lukewarm. She stood up and popped it into the microwave, hitting the beverage button.

'I apologize for the suddenness of your arrival here, but we have a task for you.'

'…We?'

'Regrettably, my assistants could not be here to meet you. My last assistant is on a journey of her own at the moment, and my current assistant is out on another matter…Philemon, of course, is watching over everything.'

The microwave beeped, letting her known it was done re-heating her coffee. She reached in and grabbed her mug by the handle, absently noticing that steam was now coming off the pale brown beverage.

'I have no idea what you're talking about. Where am I?'

'As I said, you are in the Velvet Room. And I'm afraid there is very little time to explain things; soon I shall have another new guest, and much of my time will need to be dedicated to him. So I must hurry and explain to you your task.'

'…Task?'

She sipped her coffee, wincing as it scalded her tongue. She'd been plagued by dreams of her first trip to the Velvet Room for almost a full week, ever since it had happened.

It had been extremely sudden. One minute she had been walking across an abandoned school campus in an effort to get to work earlier (she'd been running late that day, she remembered; the bus line she normally took had been canceled for some reason). The next thing she knew something resembling a black monster of goo had emerged from one of the old buildings and attacked her.

Shadows, Igor had called them. There were different types, apparently, which all came from somewhere different, though recently they seemed to embody the shadows in people's hearts.

She'd have been killed, he'd told her, if she hadn't awoken what he called her 'Persona'.

Her last thought before the Shadow lunged at her had been 'I want to live'. According to Igor, the stress of the situation had caused her Persona to manifest.

Sarasvati, her Persona had called itself. It had the appearance of a woman in green, holding some sort of string instrument. Igor had told her that her Persona was a manifestation of an aspect of her psyche. She'd told him that she had absolutely no idea what the hell he was talking about, and he'd told her patiently that she'd understand better once more time passed.

Her phone beeped, looking lonely by itself on the cold ceramic kitchen counter. She picked it up and saw a message from the owner of the maid café where she worked, confirming that she didn't have to come into work for the next two days.

Normally she wouldn't dare take any time off; her apartment's rent was a bit on the steep side. But the task Igor had given her was very important.

'You must find them, and return their memories to them. It is imperative that you accomplish this within three months' time. If you do not…'

"We're all screwed," she said out loud, snapping her phone shut. Igor hadn't told her what exactly would happen if she failed, but she'd gotten a distinct 'we'll all be doomed' vibe from him.

"So….find Tatsuya Suou and his old friends, huh?" She took another sip of coffee and then dumped the rest of it down the drain; she was more than awake enough already. "Give them their memories back…Easier said than done, I bet." She sighed, tucked her phone into her pocket and slipped on her jacket. "I guess I'll have to start with whoever does still remember what actually happened." She pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of her pocket. On it was a neatly written list of seemingly random names. "Let's see, first is…Ulala Serizawa, huh? What a weird name...Well, let's go see what I can find out."

Over two hours later, she was sitting in a public library, working on her laptop. Her apartment building was in a wi-fi dead-zone so anything requiring internet meant she had to go to the nearest place with free access. In this case the library, since the only place closer was a little diner that only let paying customers use their internet. Being completely without an appetite, she'd opted for the library, which was better for working anyway. She'd spent the first hour scouring as many listings as possible for whoever Ulala Serizawa was. And had discovered after her nineteenth dead-ended search that this person wasn't listed in any public people listings.

"Would it have been so hard just to tell me where to find these people?" she muttered, feeling vaguely irritated towards Igor. He'd given her the list of names to help her track down the four key players she was supposed to find but hadn't told her where to find them, or even what gender each person was. Just that the people on the upper part of the list probably knew where to find the people at the bottom of the list, the bottom consisting of the four whose memories were missing. The main four were the top priority, but Igor had made it pretty clear that finding the others was important too. Unfortunately, it had been over a week and she was in no way closer to finding any of them than she had been at the very start of this weirdness. "Wonderful…" She tapped the keys absently. What now?

She opened a new search engine and tried yet another search, widening the parameters and adjusting the search filters. Nothing.

She slammed her hand down on the table, earning her a severe glare from a business man at a nearby work station.

She ignored him, and instead decided to run a search for local private detectives. You could hire them to find someone for you, right? She didn't exactly have a lot of money to spare, but it was sort of an emergency, after all.

She finally found a P.I. she felt comfortable asking for help (after doing about a dozen cross checks and reading as many client reports that she could find). A man named Shun Wakahisa, who seemed to be in his early twenties, judging from the picture on his website. She wrote down his phone number and then closed her laptop, slipping it back into her old purple backpack. She smiled brightly at the business man and gave a cheekily chipper little wave before leaving the library.

Once outside, she pulled out her phone and dialed the number, impatiently listening to it ring as she strode down the sidewalk.

"This is Shun Wakahisa speaking. How may I help you?"

"Wakahisa-san, I was wondering if you could help me with something."

The voice on the other end of the call sounded tired. "And what exactly is it you need help with?"

"I need to find someone," she answered, stopping for a moment to wait for the traffic to clear so she could cross the street. "What's your going rate? The website didn't say."

"Come by my office," was his response. "We can go over what you have in mind and I can calculate how much it could cost."

"What's the address?"

He told her, she wrote it on her hand, thanked him, and then hung up.

Now she just had to find where exactly this address was. She sighed, and turned around and walked back to the library.

If this is any sign of how this entire search is going to go, then Igor totally chose the wrong person for the job.

She had almost made it back to the library when suddenly everything froze. The people, the cars, the little dog who'd escaped his leash and was chasing pigeons. They all froze, as if someone had pressed pause on a movie.

Oh, great. Just what I need. She spun around, eyes looking for what she knew was lurking somewhere nearby.

The freezing of time was caused by the Shadows, Igor had told her. It was similar to something he'd called the Dark Hour, except in this case there was the absence of what he called Tartarus and no one 'transmogrified', whatever the hell that meant. Everything just froze. Except for people with the Potential. In other words, Persona users.

As far as she knew, she was the only Persona user for miles.

Hooray for me, she thought dryly, still scanning for the Shadow that was sure to be close. Then something resembling a hunk of tar shaped into a wolfish form lunged at her from behind a frozen-in-time garbage truck.

She ducked, and then spun around again as it landed behind her, long claws clicking on the pavement.

It snarled at her, and she tensed.

It lunged at her again, and she took a step back, clapping her hands together with a slap. "Sarasvati!"

Her Persona appeared. "Bufula!" she shouted, and Sarasvati obeyed, using magic and slamming a large chunk of ice down on the Shadow. It struggled to get up afterwards, seeming dazed.

She clapped her hands once more. "Again," she told her Persona when it appeared for a second time. "Bufula." She didn't really need to say the attacks out loud, just like she probably didn't need to clap her hands together. But the clapping helped her focus, and as for the calling of attacks…no one was around to hear her sounding like a Pokemon trainer, so what difference did it make?

The Shadow disintegrated after the second ice attack, and after a moment time returned to normal.

She calmly hitched her backpack straps further up on her shoulders and kept walking, as if nothing had happened.

A/N: So…that's the new and slightly more polished version. Mostly the same, but I've edited and expanded some bits here and there. Hopefully the changes are good, and don't negatively impact the overall story. XD

Now, you ready for my obnoxiously long rant about how this story got started?

Basically…I haven't played Innocent Sin or Eternal Punishment, but I've read about them, read a couple scripts, and seen the trailers for the PSP remakes (though from what I hear, they're more of ports with updated art XD) and I'm planning to play them eventually (likely when I'm no longer broke and can afford to buy them. XD).

In any case, I find myself really liking the characters from both P2 games, so this story will likely have…almost everyone. :D Also, while I (mostly) understand the whole Tatsuya-memory-loss/two-Tatsuyas thing, I…don't like it very much. XD. It makes me sad how he had to give up all his friendships, so I figured…let's come back in a couple years, after everything has settled down a little. So, this story takes place…hmm…sort of during P4, actually. It probably won't have any P4 characters in it, though. Or at least not until much later. But I'm planning to include Elizabeth and her quest to get the protagonist(s) from P3 free from the Seal and stuff, although that will, again, come much later on in the plot.

Anyhow, it'll all be made clear in the story. Eventually. XD

I'm so excited~ Oh, and just to make it (somewhat) clear, Riko's Persona(s), and the Personas of any other OCs that may come in later, come mostly from P3 (I've played FES *cheers*), since I know some of those Personas pretty well. I finally played (and loved) P4 but I'm still more familiar with the Personas of P3 (my only notable exception being Loki, simply because I love his P4 design; wicked awesome, people. Wicked awesome). And all Shadows are just the products of my overactive imagination, though occasionally based on those in P3. XD

So…..review, please! Reviews really do mean the world to me, and even something as simply as a smiley face will be sufficient encouragement to continue on with this story. :D