The sound of the doorbell ringing brought Souji into the waking world. He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling as he heard the doorbell ring once more. The sound of Igor's voice echoed in his mind partially confirming that he had been near that strange man once again. Souji threw on some clothes and hurried down the stairs as the doorbell rang once more and was accompanied by fervent knocking.
"I'm coming, I'm coming." Souji muttered to himself. He pulled open the door, a little annoyed by the impromptu alarm clock. His annoyance drained away as he was greeted by Yosuke's panicked face. "Wh-what's up?"
"Teddie's missing!" Yosuke replied with a tinge of terror in his voice. "I looked all over the neighborhood but I couldn't find him anywhere."
Souji bit his lower lip, "That worries me."
"Yeah," Yosuke nodded, "me too. He was acting all weird lately." His voice trailed off as hi mind obviously began to wander. After a moment he shook his head and returned his gaze back to Souji. "Rise and the others are checking inside the TV to see if he's gone back to the other side. We're meeting pretty soon, so will you come with me to Junes?"
"Let me grab a jacket." Souji replied.
**********
It was midday by the time Rise and Kanji returned the group, their faces full of worry and flushed from running around. The rest of the group grew quite and looked at them anxiously but everyone seemed to have the same feeling. Kanji rested his hands on the table, letting his head fall forward in silent defeat as Rise made a similar gesture.
"It's no use, man." Kanji breathed. "We can't find him."
"No luck for me either," Rise frowned as she took a seat. "I didn't sense anything over there. The fog is so dense; it might be affecting my readings. I wish I could do better…I'm sorry."
Yosuke cradled his head in his hands, "That Ted…Don't tell me he really went back to his world this time." He slumped forward, his head now resting against the chilled table with his arms splayed out next him. "We told him over and over that he could stay here."
As Yosuke began to ramble on, the sound of Igor's voice echoed in Souji's mind once. 'This may be a time for contemplation rather than action.' He shook his head, trying to push it away but the words still lingered. It made some sense, though; the more the group tired to look for Teddie and physically do something with Namatame's case, the harder it seemed to get.
"Let's think about this," Souji said, finally breaking his silence. The group glanced at him, all unsure about what to do.
"I guess that's all we can do right now," Yosuke mumbled. He sat up straight, crossing his arms over his chest as he looked around at his friends. "He plays dumb a lot but he's attached to us deep down. He wouldn't disappear without saying anything, right?"
Naoto nodded, "I'm worried for Teddie myself, but let's trust in him and await his return. Right now we must concentrate on the case. It won't be long before Namatame is transferred to another location. We must hurry or we'll miss our only chance to get his perspective on this."
"Y'know, I've been thinking about the case since, but something doesn't seem right." Yosuke replied.
"Let's quickly review the facts," Naoto explained. She riffled through her pockets quickly, pulling out a small memo pad and a pencil. As she flipped through the pages she began to talk, "Of all the victims, only two were killed: Ms. Yamano, the announcer, and Saki-san. From the documents we found in the car we know that Namatame had some sort of dealings with them. After that, there were multiple attempted murders in which we were targeted. It was only when he took Nanako-chan that we caught him in the act, identifying his modus operandi in the process."
Kanji snorted, "When I hear you put it like that, sounds like the dude's guilty."
Naoto glanced at Kanji but continued, "As a result of Namatame's arrest, the police admitted that Mitsuo Kubo was a mere copycat killer."
"Back up to yesterday…Remember when you said Namatame didn't have a motive to kill the announcer?" Yosuke asked. "That's what's bothering me."
Rise nodded, "Right. Either he's completely nuts or we're misunderstanding something."
"You lost me," Kanji chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck.
"She's trying to say that if Namatame is sane, then there may be facts in the case we don't know yet," Yukiko explained.
Souji cocked his head to one side, "When he talks about 'saving' people, what does that actually mean?"
"I don't think there's any doubt that it includes kidnapping people and throwing them into the TV," Yosuke frowned.
Naoto flipped her notebook close and lowered her head, her face stern as she seemed to lose herself to her thoughts. The group watched her in silence, waiting to hear what she had to say. "Could he mean," Naoto said slowly, "saving them through death?" She glanced up at her friends, noting their shocked expressions. "He did call himself a 'savior' and said that the other side was a 'wonderful world'."
"So they'd be saved if they die?" Kanji shook his head with a frown, "What a bunch of crap…The bastard should've gone and 'saved' himself. Whaddya think, Senpai?"
Souji felt his face go red as the group turned to look at him as Kanji posed his question. "There has to be something else," he stammered.
Kanji sighed, "If you think about it normally it's gotta be him…but there ain't nothing normal about that world anyways."
"There's been something I've been wondering about for a while," Yukiko mused. She paused for a moment, gathering her thoughts. "When we first encountered him, he said 'You're the ones I saved. Don't worry, I'll save this girl too'." Yukiko pursed her lips together and looked at her friends; they all exchanged shocked expressions as things seemed to take another twist. "So if he 'saves' people by killing them, did he save us too? Wouldn't he actually have failed to save us?"
"You raise a good point," Naoto smiled. "If he thinks that salvation comes only through death, his words to us make no sense. And another thing, the Namatame who appeared on the Midnight Channel said he failed to save Nanako-chan."
Chie heaved a sigh, "Well maybe he really was trying to save the victims by putting them inside the TV." All eyes suddenly turned to her and Chie slumped over slightly. "Oh c'mon, don't get all quiet like that!" she cried. "You guys know that I just say the first dumb thing that pops into my head."
"The possibility that he truly intended to save us…" Naoto whispered, her voice trailing off.
"But he's still the one who threw in Saki-senpai and that announcer, right?" Yosuke asked with a furrowed brow. "Sure we haven't nailed down his motives, but that doesn't change the fact that he killed them. Or what, you think someone else was involved? What makes you think so?"
As silence settled over the group once more, it seemed to dawn on Souji that he held a possible key to it all. "The warning letters," he said.
Yosuke paused and cocked an eyebrow, "Warning letter…? Oh yeah! Whatever happened to that thing?"
"If Namatame's the killer he must've been the one who wrote it, right?" Souji asked, glancing at Naoto.
"Let's review them then," Naoto replied.
"The first one said 'Don't rescue anymore' and the other one said 'If you don't stop this time, someone close will be put in and killed'." Souji said.
Rise wrinkled her nose, "Isn't that kind odd? Would someone who thinks he's saving people by killing them write stuff like 'don't rescue' or 'kill'?"
"Yeah," Kanji said, clapping his hands together, "and the whole 'will be put in and killed' part doesn't make sense either. If the killer was writing it, wouldn't it be more like 'I'll put in and kill'?"
"Hey," Chie piped in, "could this mean…"
Souji slumped in his chair slightly, "Namatame didn't write it."
"It's almost like someone else wrote the last letter," Chie continued.
Yukiko glanced at Souji, "But only the killer would write such a letter and deliver it to Doujima-san's house, right? If someone else wrote it that could only mean…"
"Dear god," Naoto breathed. Her eyes were wide with shock as she looked down at the table and seemed to go over what was in her mind. "Since this is such an unusual case, I was absolutely convinced that other than the Kubo incident, there was one culprit."
"So Namatame really was trying to save his victims?" Rise asked.
"Everything is the exact opposite of what it first seemed," Naoto explained. "In Namatame's parlance, 'failing' would have been the first two cases, when the victims died. If he used his methods twice, and failed both times, he would have hardly continued using the TV. And yet he did. It all seems to suggest that someone else wrote this warning letter while observing the entire case."
Yosuke's eyes widened slightly, "Someone else? It wasn't Namatame that killed Saki-senpai and the announcer?"
"We can't say for certain yet. We urgently need to speak with Namatame face to face," Naoto replied.
[This part of the game seemed wordy to me and I ended up keeping true to that but I won't be dragging the story down with Namatame's interrogation. There might not be much more 'tender' moments, but things will be getting intense so I hope everyone enjoys this and 'bear' with me!]