Shin Megami Tensei
Persona 3: ParaPol
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Persona 3, SMT, or any characters within. They belong to Atlus.
Author's Note: As per my particular writing style, most of this chapter is in italics. I apologize, but there's really no other way to transition between, well...you'll find out.
Chapter VI: The Lost (Part IV)
Deep below the island of Yakushima, in a small bedroom with walls lined in white wallpaper and crimson carpet floors, the shouting of a long dysfunctional couple could be heard throughout the hallway of Residential Block R-11.
"What the hell do you mean you won't do it!?" Shinjiro shouted, picking up a glass bottle from the dresser and throwing it at the crying, teal-haired woman near the door. He was always angry when he was drunk. He was always angry when he had to take those suppressant drugs for his persona. This was the first time he'd taken the drugs and alcohol at the same time, and his mental state quickly broke down from one of annoyance and quick temperance to outright violence and aggression.
"Shinji! Please, stop this!" a scared Fuuka shouted from her corner of the room. She had stopped the glass bottle from hitting her with her psychic powers, which could be effectively used without summoning her persona, thanks in part to advanced training she had received from Mitsuru.
It should be properly noted that Shinjiro Aragaki and Fuuka Yamagishi were quite possibly the perfect couple during the day. Their old friends from Gekkoukan High School were even placing "weddings bets" to see who could predict the exact date they would get married.
Of course, what their friends saw: the infatuated cooking couple who spent more time in the S.E.E.S. Cafeteria than actually doing their jobs, was only a masquerade. Aigis had altered Shinjiro's persona so that he didn't need to take the suppressant drugs anymore. She had done this over two years ago, and yet, Shinjiro still did it.
As time wore on, Shinjiro began spending less and less time with Fuuka, and more time in the S.E.E.S. Lounge, drinking his "troubles" away. What they were, no one knew exactly. Nobody but Akihiko, who refused to divulge the information he knew to Fuuka. All he ever said to anyone was "the Lake of Fire Incident was a blessing and a curse for all of us. Shinji's just battling his inner demons right now..."
That was a lie. One's persona should also provide stable mental health.
Fuuka always wanted to know more about Shinjiro, to know about his past, to know why he was keeping things from her.
But the TV dramas Yukari used to watch were horribly different from real life. Whenever Fuuka asked about Shinjiro's past, apart from what she already knew, he would always avoid the question and then immediately drown himself in drink.
Maybe it was his time in the Heavens? Something there that had triggered the return of some kind of painful memory. Or maybe it was her? Was she to blame for Shinjiro's addictions?
Tonight, however, was different. The combined psychological pressure from both the alcohol and the drugs forced Shinjiro's mind out of his control. He came into their room that night with such force that Fuuka had thought that something had gone wrong with his job as overseer of Japan's Paranormal Defense Grid.
She was horribly wrong. He was domineering. He wanted her, not in the ways that they had lightly talked about in the S.E.E.S. kitchen. No, he wanted her body. He wanted her now and that was it, he wouldn't say anything else.
She refused, saying that such a thing should only be undertaken by married couples.
Enter the situation Fuuka was in right now, with a very angry Shinjiro yelling at her from across their room, his face riddled with sweat and the veins in his face were popping out.
"All I ask for is a simple thing!? And you can't give it to me!? What the hell is wrong with you!?" he shouted.
"Shinjiro, please! Stop this!" Fuuka shouted, just as Shinjiro ran towards her with his arms outstretched...
Fuuka was the first to enter the S.E.E.S. MH-53 Pave Low as their chartered jet touched down in Bucharest. The crimson and silver paint on the side of the helicopter made it stand out against the white planes around them.
Outside the helicopter, the sun was setting to the west. They would be flying directly into the path of the fleeting sunlight as they would make their way to the site of the "incident".
Just outside the helicopter were two S.E.E.S. pilots from Outpost Rome: Akihiko's unit. They were chatting idly when the "delegation" from Yakushima came in. Snapping a quick salute to Mitsuru when she arrived at the helicopter, they quickly opened the doors to the cockpit and let themselves in so that they could begin startup procedures. They would find their commander – their friend, and they would bring him home.
Fuuka sat at the far left side of the rear seating row of the helicopter. To her immediate right were Mitsuru and Junpei. Directly in front of her, front left to right, was Shinjiro, Aigis, and Ken.
The two of them simply stared at each other, not doing anything else but staring into each others eyes. They did this partly because it was sentimental, partly because they had nothing better to do, and partly because they didn't want to partake in the conversation around them.
The conversation that dealt with humanity as an object. With friends as statistics. Indeed, what had they become when they had...
"...Did what!?" Mitsuru yelled, shaking Fuuka by the shoulders, but in a slightly comforting manner. It was nice to know that Mitsuru cared about her.
The door to their bedroom had been kicked down, and Shinjiro was being held on the ground by Aigis alongside a black android whom Aigis had spent a fair amount of time constructing.
Fuuka was crying into Mitsuru's shoulder while Shinji was shouting unintelligible things at the two women, before Mitsuru slided Fuuka away from her and stood up to head over to Shinji. In her hand, she held a small black piece of rubber, on which was stamped a golden star.
"You! How dare you do something like this, Shinji! I give you-"
"You gave me nothing! You're not even capable of giving anything! Damn it, that false sense of power you've got stuffed up in your head has got you acting crazier than I am!" he shouted back, prompting Mitsuru to slap Shinji right across the face.
This was the first time all of them had been together since Mitsuru's wedding last July. Well, most of them, anyway. They were still missing, albeit found. The intense feelings of betrayal and abandonment that S.E.E.S. felt when those two left was only shadowed by the mixed feelings of contempt, annoyance, hatred, and anger that they all felt now. The probably exception being Ken and Aigis.
They had changed.
In the six years since the Lake of Fire Incident, S.E.E.S. slowly began to lose its humanity, Maybe that's why they left. Maybe that's why they were all angry right now.
As the helicopter began to take off from Bucharest International Airport, maybe that was why they belonged in the Valley of the Queens.
Shinjiro stood in the middle of a large room, decorated with wooden panels on the walls and exquisite marble that made up the floor. It was probably one of the only rooms in S.E.E.S. headquarters where the ceiling was actually visible from the floor below, and a small set of chandeliers hung from the ceiling to light up the room with a strangely appropriate amount of light, not too bright, but not too dark.
On the sides were two sets of wooden bleachers, in which stood several S.E.E.S. members in formal clothing. Sitting in front of Shinjiro, on a raised platform was Chairman Tanaka, in his full business suit, a clear look of annoyance on his face.
"Shinjiro Aragaki..." Chairman Tanaka said in disappointment, looking up at him from a small list of pages in front of him.
"Tanaka," Shinjiro replied in reciprocation, venom in his voice.
"Disciplinary Committee Number Four-Oh-Two is now in session, twenty-third of June, Twenty-Fifteen. This probe will now-"
"Fuck off and send me to Hokkaido already. Anything's better than waiting around for you people to order me around like some dog!"
The helicopter banked to the left, sending everyone who was engaged in conversation into a surprised jolt as they all squished together. Shinjiro was panting for breath, pleading for Aigis to get off of him. Fuuka wasn't that far off from pain either, as her small figure couldn't take the combined weight of Mitsuru and Junpei.
"Pilot! What the hell was that about!?" Mitsuru yelled as the pilots leveled the helicopter. He didn't need to speak, though, because outside the right side of the helicopter, Ken and Junpei gawked in amazement at the spectacle below.
Smoke was billowing from one of the highways into Brasov and Ken quickly rallied Aigis to come see, prompting her to open the side door of the helicopter to allow them a better view outside.
Down below, in the deep red and orange flames of several tanks and civilian vehicles, Aigis used her camera eyes to see within the smoke and ash.
Down below, in the hellfire, Aigis could see into the eyes of evil. A pale man. He had Ryoji's hair and Koromaru's eyes. He wore a dark overcoat and was simply standing on top of a destroyed civilian vehicle, emotionless. A blank stare on his face, his held his arms out as if to grab something, but there was nothing in front of him. Readjusting her cameras, Aigis zoomed outward to see a tank levitating in the air, just before it collapsed in on itself and was crushed into a tightly compacted steel ball.
"Oh my-" Aigis said, bringing her hands up to cover her mouth as she witnessed the carnage below.
"What is it Aigis? What do you see?" Ken asked, placing his hand on her shoulder before turned around to face Mitsuru.
"We need to get out of here, now," she said hurriedly, turning around to look down at the man again, only this time, he was gone. In his stead were three pale women, one of which had a large hole in the left side of her chest. Aigis knew this because she was staring directly at her, before bearing what appeared to be fangs and outstretching her arms towards their own helicopter.
Almost immediately, alarms and klaxons could be heard from within the cockpit. Mitsuru stood up and went over to the cockpit, just before the helicopter was sent into a death spiral.
"What's going on!?" Mitsuru shouted. Neither pilot turned around to face her, quickly pressing the various buttons and controls in front of them to try and gain control of the situation. The co-pilot answered her without taking his eyes off of his console.
"We've lost hydraulic contr – augh!" He shouted as the cockpit windshield shattered, sending glass hurtling into his eyes. The pilot, however, was saved due to the fact that he was bending over to pick up the radio headset. When the co-pilot stopped picking at his face and eventually settled down, the pilot began to panic, seeing the blood flowing from the co-pilot's body and collect on the cockpit floor.
"Brace for impact!" he shouted at Mitsuru, just before the helicopter jolted and was sent spiraling even faster.
The pilot didn't know what had hit them, but everyone who was looking outside the right side of their helicopter, however, did.
The charred remains of a UH-60 helicopter of the Romanian Army had hit the tail rotor of their MH-53, destabilizing the craft and forcing everyone inside to strap themselves in as the helicopter descended from the air in a glorious display of man's fight against the inevitable...
"S.E.E.S. is dead," Shinji remarked, pulling out a cigarette and lighting it as he walked down a large boulevard with Akihiko. It was the winter of 2015 and no one else was in sight. They were alone in this city. Just the two of them, alone, to discuss amongst themselves the things they could not discuss locked away in that unforgiving island that had once been the vacation paradise of Yakushima.
"Dead?" Akihiko asked, curious to what he meant by such a thing. Shinjiro offered Akihiko a cigarette, to which he declined.
"Whatever S.E.E.S. used to be, it's not anymore. Now we decide the fate of the world alongside other old men who know nothing outside of their underground bunkers...we've lost sense of each other, Aki. You hear me?" he said softly, pausing along the boardwalk to look up and admire the crescent moon overhead. "There was a time...long ago, when that moon seemed like a demon to me...now, we're the demons."
"Shinji, I know things didn't work out between you and Fuuka, but-"
"This has nothing to do with her!" he shouted, throwing his arms up in the air before he realized he had let his cigarette drop into the snow below, forcing him to grumble and dig into his pocket for another one.
"You should really think about quitting," Akihiko suggested.
"Bite me. You see, Aki? Even you are starting to feel it. We've closed ourselves to this," Shinjiro said, outstretching his arms towards the lights of the city around them. "This mass of spiritual energy that we see as statistics but know as Humanity. Aki...promise me you won't end up like those hard-asses at Yakushima...uh, no offense," he said, just remembering that Mitsuru, one of those "hard-asses", was also Aki's girlfriend.
Akihiko laughed a bit, before looking his friend right in the face, "You know as well as I do that I can never be like Mitsuru...I lost your friendship once already, Shinji. I'm not going to lose it again," he said, placing his hands on Shinji's shoulder.
The city of Iwatodai wasn't like it used to be, but when Shinji said "thanks" and the two of them continued on their walk,they noticed that Hagakure was, by some miracle, still open and in business.
"Shinji, I see your point about S.E.E.S. becoming loose and cold...and unfriendly..."
"You should stop talking," Shinji said, slightly smiling through the cigarette.
"You want to go back to where it all began?" Akihiko asked, grinning.
"What the hell are you talking about, Aki?" Shinjiro asked, forcing Akihiko to point through the snow towards a railway station across the street.
"Hagakure, where Mitsuru and I recruited you, and when S.E.E.S. seemed more like family than a job," Akihiko asked, before Shinjiro put his arm around Akihiko's shoulder and looked at the same railway station.
"Sure, why the hell not? Only thing is, you're paying," Shinjiro said, taking his arm away from Akihiko and walking through the snow towards the station, followed by a confused and annoyed Akihiko. How come he always had to pay for everything?
No matter. Once Shinjiro got drunk and stupid enough, he would relent to paying for their meal. It didn't matter if Shinjiro never came back to Yakushima headquarters or if the two of them never saw each other again.
What was important was the fact that theirs was a bond that couldn't be broken. A single reprieve of comfort for Akihiko in this relentless and unforgiving world.