You know, something always bugged me about the day that Rise recovered. When you get to Junes, you're wearing your casual clothes, but upon arriving at the TV, you're in your school clothes, then you later go back to change AGAIN after you decide to not enter the TV for any reason. What the hell was the initial change for? They were only going to yell at Teddie, right?
Anyway, one of the first things that I did when I got home, as I'm now on break, was boot up the computer, intent of finishing the next chapter. Didn't get to finish it Friday though. Now it's Saturday, and I think that this chapter was good enough considering the wait.
Also, something random was that they majority of the time spent making this was spent listening to Passion (AKA My Sanctuary) from Kingdom Hearts 2. Great motivator actually.
Chapter 28
(10th) (Sunday)
Ah, the weekend. What will Yu Narukami do today? A quick flip through the notebook revealed that Kanji… No, wait. The old lady should be in her normal spot this fine day, and Yu had every intention of taking advantage of it.
As he began to make his way to the old lady's side, his phone rang. Looking at the screen, it proclaimed the caller was registered in his contacts. He hardly remembered the person though. It called her, 'Junko Enoshima.'
Though he was confused, he figured that if the girl was in his contacts, he knew her, and therefore shouldn't reject the call. He flipped open the phone and put it to his ear, muttering, "Hello?"
A squeaky, slightly familiar, voice screeched from the other end, "Yu-kun, you picked up!"
Yu moved the phone away from his ear slightly at the high pitch that came from the speakers. "Yeah, why wouldn't I? You're registered into my contacts after all. I have no valid reason to reject you."
Yu could practically see the girl pout on the other side as her voice immediately lost all enthusiasm. "Yeah, but you don't remember me, do you?"
Yu opened his mouth, but closed it after a second as he didn't want to say he did. "I'm sorry. I don't remember you. Not a surprise that I wouldn't remember one girl from the multitude that I've met."
"You forgot your girlfriend?!" Junko screeched in a rage, causing Yu to wince in pain at the sudden noise against his left ear.
Suddenly, Yu remembered the girl. Why she hadn't been deleted from his contacts was a mystery. After he moved from the school that he had been at those years ago, a girl that he had stupidly given his phone number to texted him obnoxiously. She had proclaimed to everyone a couple weeks before he had to leave that he was her girlfriend, and he foolishly decided to humor her for the hell of it. They traded phone numbers, and Yu made sure to never go beyond hugs and kisses on the cheek. She had gone a little stir-crazy when he had to leave though. She never stopped bugging him until Yu specifically texted her that he wasn't coming back to that school, for the strange reason that his parents never sent him back to the same school twice. After that, she stopped communicating with him. Why was she calling him now?
He heard Junko huff. "I'm sorry. I haven't heard from you in about a year now, so it's understandable that I would forget about you. I've forgotten about a lot of people."
"Fine, but don't forget about me again, got it?!" Junko sighed. "Listen, after you left, I got myself another boyfriend, as you might expect. He just broke up with me though! So I need someone to talk to until I get over it."
Doesn't this girl have any friends? And why him? Rather that voice these questions, for fear of being rude, he said, "Alright then, fair enough. How have you been, besides the whole breaking up thing?"
"Oh, pretty good," Junko replied. "Where are you now? Who has been unfortunately stuck watching you this time?"
"What do you mean 'unfortunately'?! My uncle hasn't been 'stuck watching me'!" Yu said, slightly annoyed at her choice of words.
"Oh, so it's your uncle then. Where does he, and therefore you, live?" Junko asked, ignoring Yu's annoyance.
Yu sighed at her disregard. "I'm down in Yasoinaba until next spring. It was a little strange coming to the country after living in the city for a while, but it's actually really nice over here."
Before Junko could say or ask anything more, Yu's phone beeped, indicating that someone else was attempting to reach him. "Crap, I'll talk to you later, something's happening today, and I need to get to it. Bye." He hung up before Junko could say anymore. He didn't want to talk to her really.
He pressed the talk button again, and Chie started talking. "Hey, where are you? Rise's up and about again, so we figured that we should talk to her and introduce her to Teddie. Properly this time."
"Right, sorry. An old 'friend' called me up, and she wouldn't stop yammering," Yu apologized. "I'll be there in a couple minutes, at our table, right? Actually, why am I asking?" Yu hung up before Chie could get a word in. He was probably shouldn't have though, that was the second person he cut off in a couple minutes.
He sighed. There went his plans to hang with the old lady. He could practically see it falling out of the window with a look of disappointment written on its face.
(At Junes…)
The gang was there already, and Rise was sitting in the spot that they had always left unoccupied. Said idol called out to him as he approached, seemingly happy to see him, though she hardly knew him. When he got near, she slapped him.
"What the hell was that for?!" He questioned, lightly rubbing his hurt cheek.
"I have ears!" Rise hissed, pointing to the hat atop her head, clearly pissed off.
Yu snorted. "I believe that it's perfectly normal for you to have ears. Call me if they suddenly disappear. Then I'll be concerned."
"You know what I mean!" Rise shrieked, irritated. "Do you know how much I freaked when I woke up and found them? My grandma came in the room a minute later and saw them and almost called the hospital to have them surgical removed! If I ever decide to go back to showbiz… Well, I can't!"
"You think that any of us asked for these things? I'm not fond of them either, but guess what!? Too bad, you're stuck with them whether you like it or not." Yu took a deep breath. "Alright, here's the thing…"
The group explained what happened to Rise, up until her rescue.
"OK, so why was I dragged into this then?" Rise asked.
"I thought that we mentioned that," Yosuke muttered. "OK, we figure that it has to do with the people that are thrown in appear on TV, and are in the Inaba area. That's what causes them to be on the Midnight Channel."
"Oh, I don't quite understand, but it does make sense that the kidnapper would only want to do it when it's in his/her local area." Everyone nodded at the logic. "So where's the bear that was there while you were fighting to save me?"
Everyone except Rise got up from their seats. "Come with us, and we will show you." Yukiko said. Rise got up and they walked to the electronics department.
At said department, some employees were standing in front of the TV. They turned to look at the teens upon their approach. "Hey Yosuke-kun," The male employee said. "Do you know why there's a boy in a bear costume wandering around the store? When I asked, he didn't quite give me a straight answer, though he did mention knowing you. Did your father hire him?"
"Oh crap," Yosuke whispered. "Uh, yeah, dad was thinking that maybe he could help entertain the kids while their parents shop, so he's here for a, uh, test run of sorts. We probably should have told you that he would be here today." Yosuke nervously put his hands behind his head, trying to seem casual as he laughed uneasily, probably about ready to murder the bear on the inside.
"Oh, OK then, if that's the case, I guess I shouldn't question it. If he's going to stay though, I want to know. If you want to find him, he's over by the massage chairs." The male employee said, walking away to resume his duties with the female worker that he had been talking to following close behind.
Yosuke sighed. "Really, Teddie? Why would he exit the TV world? He didn't know what it's on the other side 'til now."
The group walked over to the massage chairs, and there was Teddie, just like the employee had told them. He was relaxing on one of them, his eyes closed and a look of content on his face.
"Teddie, what are you doing in the real world?" Yu asked.
Teddie's eyes popped open. "Oh, Sensei-knight, morning. I was bored, and I believe that it's summer over here, so we won't have to worry about anyone getting thrown in. At least, we won't have to worry about them dying. So I can here to check out your world. I have to say that it's quite nice."
Yosuke groaned. "Please don't tell me that you're planning on staying on this side…"
"Well, I just might. I have nothing better to do. I've trained the best that I can in the TV world, and I'm as strong as can be, so now I can join you guys on your other-worldly adventures!" Teddie replied.
"You already do though…" Chie muttered. "How about you get a human body, and then you can join us on our 'worldly' adventures."
"Yes, I can do that, totally!" Teddie yelled, clearly not catching the fact that Chie was kidding about getting a human body.
"OK, let's move this to our table by the food court. People are starting to stare." Yosuke said, leading the way to the food court with the rest of the gang in tow.
At the table, Teddie was literally sweating. How that made any sense is beyond anyone's comprehension. "It's too hot in here!" He complained.
"Dude, it's 55 degrees, and you're outside!" Yosuke told the bear.
"I can't take it anyone! I have to remove this suit!" Teddie yelled, and reached for the zipper that was somehow keeping his head on.
"No, there are people around here! Think of the children!" Yosuke hissed. "You can't go around showing them that you're a bear costume that doesn't have a person inside!"
"I'm not empty though!" Teddie yelled, successfully pulling off his head.
What happened the moment the head come off probably scarred a lot of people. The bulky body that had curved to match the perimeter of the wide top deflated. A human head, as well as a bare chest, popped out of the deflated suit, with the looks that matched the pretty boy in a movie that centered on a school. The boy shook his head a little and small sweat beads went flying. He opened his eyes, showing pretty, strikingly blue eyes. He picked up a water bottle and drank wholeheartedly while everyone around him stared in shock.
"Ah, that's much better." The boy spoke, putting down his water bottle; his voice sounding a lot like Teddie's only, older, perhaps? If anything, it was less squeaky. It was also a lot smoother than the other voice. He turned his attention to the girls. "Hey, Chie-chan, Yuki-chan, Rise-chan… can you help me out? I'm basically a newborn here."
All of the girls immediately turned a bright shade of red as it hit them what he meant by 'newborn.' "Wait, you took off your head, but you didn't bother to grab some clothes? Did you know that you wouldn't have anything on?" Rise asked.
"The thought didn't really occur to me until now." Teddie said. "But really, do you mind helping me find some clothes? As far as I can tell, it's not exactly a good thing to be wandering around this world in your birthday suit."
The girls got up, forcing the bear costume head back over the human body, with the deflated body re-flating in an instant. "Well, at least he knew not to remove his bottom." Yukiko commented.
"We'll take care of getting him dressed. You guys go have fun." Rise said, starting to push Teddie in the direction of the clothing section.
"You want one of us guys to come with you?" Kanji asked. "Won't it be weird trying to show a guy how to dress? I mean, you will have to show him how to put everything on. What about his bottom?"
The girls stopped, thinking. They huddled up and whispered to each other for a minute, pushing Teddie away any time that he tried to listen in. Finally, they un-huddled, and Yukiko said, "Alright, Kanji, you suggested it, so you get to come and dress his bottom half!"
Kanji shot out of his seat, about to yell at the girls, but he sighed and grabbed Teddie's wrist roughly, walking away with the girls following when he realized that he did in fact suggest it, and therefore should be the man to do the job.
Yu and Yosuke decided that it was probably best to just go get some topsicles while they waited. They ate their topsicles, and suddenly something hit Yu. "He didn't have ears."
Yosuke turned his head, and looked at his Alpha. "Um, and what does that mean?"
"Teddie has a Persona, and accepted his Shadow, but he didn't have any ears." Yu explained. "At least, none that we know of. If he does have them though, we didn't see them, and that probably means that we too can hide them without our hats!"
Yosuke grew excited. "Are you serious!? My parents have been wondering why I wear my hat all the time, so if that theory is true, then… yes, I don't have to feel like I'm lying to them! I wonder where they are though; it's been a long time now."
Then in the distance, the girls, Kanji, and Teddie appeared. In a minute, they were standing all together, and the two boys saw Teddie's new look. Black jeans and a white shirt with a red rose. Classy. Kanji groaned. "He wanted his human image to match the king that he seems to believe that he is. So here he is, the new Teddie."
Teddie waved happily at the two, who waved awkwardly back. "Hey Teddie, shouldn't you have ears?" Yosuke asked, looking at his blond hair that naturally held itself to one side.
"Well, yes I do." Teddie replied, and his ears popped out for a minute. They were a pretty white color with some purple mixed in, just a drop. They disappeared when Kanji told him to put them away. "I thought that I couldn't hide them at first, but with some hard work and determination, I managed it."
"Please teach me how to do that!" Yosuke begged; a pleading look in his eyes.
"Ok, but you have to allow me to stay at your house. I don't want to live in the TV anymore." Teddie negotiated.
"Ok, fine, I'll work it out with my parents later. You'd better hold up on your end of the deal though!" Yosuke yelled. He turned to the girls and Kanji. "How did you pay for these clothes? This combination is quite expensive, even with Junes' prices, and I'm sure that you took advantage of my employee discount."
"Well, Yukiko got a discount for some reason, something about helping out the store, and being a part of the Amagi Inn, and by that point there was still 2,000 still to be paid for, so we kind of put it on you. I'll help pay it off, but I kind of don't have any money right now, so that's why." Chie told him.
Yosuke looked shocked as he hung his head in sadness. "Great, that's going to come out of my paycheck later. And I'm still trying to get the money to pay off getting a new motorcycle since Hanako broke my other one!"
Yu pulled out his wallet. Looking into it, there was a small pouch where Yu had set aside his money for the motorcycle, and then there was the main pouch. He pulled out a small wad of money, about 1,500 yen, from the main pouch and handed it to Yosuke. "I don't need this much money. I'm sure you could stand to lose about 500 yen."
Yosuke snatched up the money. "Thanks Alpha. I'll have Chie pay for the rest of it."
Chie sighed, knowing that she probably deserved it. "Fine. How about we go get some materials from the Shadows so I can sell them to Daidara then. I can pay it off like that."
"Oh, yeah. I'm having Daidara make me some cool full-body armor, and he needs more materials from the TV world. I think that we should do that then." Yu said.
"Full-body armor?" Yosuke questioned. "Can we get some too?"
"Well, he needs to know how to make one to make more, so we have to complete mine first." Yu told the gang. "Let's go get some Shadow droppings then."
"When you say it like that, it sounds kind of disgusting." Chie commented. "I mean, 'droppings?'"
"Let's just pretend that I didn't say that and just go then." Yu said, and everyone quickly agreed.
(Inside the TV world…)
The group walked to Yukiko's castle to grind some materials. After all, Daidara just wanted some wide variety of Shadow leftovers. They also had to find out Rise's and Teddie's abilities.
The first enemy appeared and changed form from a small blob to a table. Teddie, now wearing his bear suit again, jumped forward, and looked to Rise. "All right, Rise-baby, it's time for you to show us what you can do! I know this Shadow's weakness; now let's see how long for you to find out."
"Please don't call me that." Rise groaned. "Alright, Himiko, let's do this!" Himiko appeared, and put the visor that she held over Rise's eyes. "All right then, let's see…" A minute later, Rise was done. "All right, it's a Laughing Table…" Teddie nodded, confirming her statement. "It's weak to wind, and strong to electric attacks." Teddie nodded again. "Interesting, it's holding 190 yen underneath it; I think stuck to the underside because of… gross, I think that's gum! I know that I'm supposed to know things about our enemies, but TMI!"
Yu leaned over to Yosuke, and muttered, "I wonder what sort of things she would see if she harnessed the enhanced senses that come with the ears. If she's saying TMI to gum under the table… she is not going to like this job." Yosuke snorted.
Teddie easily killed the table, and watched as the materials and money dropped from its quickly decayed body that disappeared not even two seconds after it dropped the items.
This went on for a while, the group asked Rise about an enemy, and she would tell them what it was weak too. They moved on to Kanji's area, not the least bit worn out. Rise was quizzed there, and at the top, she stopped them. "There's an enemy behind this door that is plenty stronger than the other one's in this area. Nothing you can't handle though."
They walked in, seeing a creature Rise called the 'Intolerant Officer." It held 1,000 yen and was resistant to almighty attacks, and blocked dark and light. It took a good amount of damage from ice and wind, and electricity was its weakness.
The first thing that it did was fire a bufu spell at Yukiko, knocking her down, and then it tried to hit her again, but Kanji would have none of that shit and zapped it. It fell down and he hit it again, causing it to become dizzy and unable to stand.
Everyone hit it with their respective skills, and eventually, the officer got back up, but Kanji shocked it again, and the thing was dead. They had been way too overpowered for that.
Back at the studio that was the exit/entrance, Yu look at his watch. "Time to go. We can clear out the other places tomorrow. Good job Rise. That was some fine analyzing. Better than Teddie could hope to do, even before his nose snuffed up."
"I take offence to that!" Teddie yelled.
"Oh, don't feel bad Teddie. You're more of a fighter anyway." Rise said, rubbing his furry head.
"Oh fine then. I guess I won't complain. Now that I think about it, you can't be considered one of my knights, can you? Want to be my queen instead?" Teddie made puppy dog eyes at her.
"You know, at first, I thought you were sweet, if not a little stupid. Now I'm not quite sure what to think." Rise said, slightly disturbed by his upfront approach.
"Is that a yes then?" Teddie asked.
"Give me a month or so and show me how to hide my ears, and I'll think about it." Rise replied, then muttering to herself, "You only have a 0.0001% chance though."
"Ok then, I'll make you my queen, no matter what!" Teddie yelled, jumping out of the TV, while everyone watched, and Yosuke quickly following to make sure he didn't kill anyone. Everyone else exited a minute later.
Yu went to bed early that night after dropping his materials to Daidara, who had just about finished the legs, so he took Yu's top measurements, and got to work.
OK, well, that took way too long to make. There's something extra to (hopefully) make up for it past this A/N.
Considering this is past 4,500 words, I think that I have made up for the fact that I haven't written this in forever.
But hey, I can't help it if I had a shit ton of projects dumped on me the last two weeks of school. Also, got that one science project done, and went from an I (basically an F) to an A. How fucked up is that stupid system? I am not kidding. I get that the project was important or whatever, but all of my grade almost went down the drain because of it. Well, enough ranting. Have fun reading about the untold antics of what happened with the girls while they got clothes for Teddie, with Kanji in tow.
(What happened with the girls, Kanji and Teddie while clothes shopping…)
They arrived at the clothing section. Teddie looked around a little in awe, and then ran straight into the woman's section, with everyone running after him.
Teddie skillfully avoided all attempts to stop him, until Kanji finally successfully tackled him. His head flew off and landed right in front of some poor child. Said kid started to cry because of the blank stare that the costume's top was giving him. Chie picked up the head while Yukiko calmed the boy down.
Chie shoved the head back onto place, lightly kicking him so that he knew not to do that again. Teddie hung his head in shame, and then looked to Rise to something positive from her. She seemed to be slightly disturbed as she asked, "Is he always like that?"
Chie nodded. "Pretty much. Don't mind it though. If he does out of line, just give him a good kick or smack. Actually, with you, you might be able to just ask nicely and he'll sit still for a couple more minutes." Yukiko came back, having apologized to the woman that was his mother. "Now then, let's go before that boy kills something important. Like our brain cells."
At the men's side of the section, Teddie looked around while the others supervised. He pulled out some black jeans, saying, "I might want to at least get the bottom out of the way."
"That's true, but you also need some underwear." Rise told him.
"Why's that?" Teddie asked.
"I don't want to explain that. Just, get some underwear, and go with Kanji, who will make sure you don't screw anything up." Chie told him, looking at the price tag of the jeans, which was a somewhat reasonable price.
They called over an employee. "Um, this boy for some stupid reason is naked under that costume. I hope you don't mind, but I don't think that we have enough money to pay for a whole outfit, plus underwear, so do you mind if we put it on Yosuke's account, whatever we can't pay for ourselves?" Yukiko asked.
The employee seemed disturbed. "Sure… I guess. Just make a list of what everything costs. I'm going to trust you to not lie, since you just told me that you can't pay for it all anyway." He pulled out a pen and a small notebook, handing it to her.
After a minute, Teddie came out of the changing room, wearing the jeans and holding his costume's head under his arm. Kanji walked out holding the bottom half.
"All right, go get yourself a top now." Kanji told Teddie, who shoved his head in Kanji's hands before skipping merrily away.
"He looks real strange with only some jeans on." Rise commented; looking at Teddie's bare back as he skipped around the section, looking through the shirts.
"He just looks strange, period." Yukiko said.
"I think it goes beyond his looks. " Chie remarked as Teddie held up a white dress shirt, dancing around a little before putting it on; requiring Kanji's help with the buttons. When it was all buttoned up, Teddie complained that it was too tight around the neck, so he loosened it a couple buttons until you could see a small chunk of his chest.
The girls collectively sighed.
On the way to pay for the items, Teddie stopped to look at something. The rest of the gang turned around to look at what he was admiring. It was a bunch of fake roses, and Teddie was clipping on onto his shirt, which really put the outfit together, so the girls didn't complain, though Kanji looked like he wanted to yell at them for just letting him be.
The total for the whole outfit rung up to at least 10,000 yen. Mostly it was the dress shirt and the rose that pushed it that far. With Yosuke's discount, and Yukiko's discount (Though it made no sense why she got one) the total dropped down to 7,000 yen, which was still quite a bit, but it was a little more bearable.
Collectively, the group didn't have nearly enough money, so 2,000 yen had to be put on Yosuke's account, which Chie already knew would not sit well with him.
And thus the group went to show the two boys who were down eating topsicles last they checked.
