Shigeko Kageyama, AKA Mob

by Green Kneesocks

The ongoing life of Shigeko Kageyama, also known as Mob, as she tries to navigate work, school, feelings, growing up, and being the protagonist of her own life. MobXReigen. MobXTeru. May be M rated in later chapters. FemMob. Now with cover art by ponystoriesandothers!

67. The Shot

So that was the boss of Claw, huh?

Mob had imagined someone taller, for some reason, and also scarier. Someone more like…not every bad guy was going to be Mogami. He didn't look too scary, this guy, but he didn't look friendly either. Friendly people did not have auras that were so…mean. Also they didn't hold what looked like a crazy amount of energy in the palms of their hands and threaten people with them, too.

And he did seem to be pretty threatening.

Their eyes met. His eyes were blue, but not like any blue eyes she had ever seen. They were cold. They were cold but his aura was the color of fire. A contradiction. Something which made no sense. Nothing about this day, or the one before it, made any sense at all. This was the man who was responsible for all of this. This man right here. This man with the red…and yellow? There was some yellow in there too. This man with a two colored aura like hers. No, not like hers, because his colors weren't moving…and there was hardly any yellow at all.

Her aura wasn't nearly so calm.

"You're doing something mean and dangerous. Stop it." Said Mob. Her aura was not calm because she was not calm. This man…he was the one responsible for all of this!

"You're-" said Sho. Whoa. That was her. Ritsu's big sis. Well Ritsu was never going to forgive him for this even though she could have ended this ages ago. She was so OP she could have even taken down…she could still take down…but she couldn't. Dad was his responsibility. He could not just pass it over to her because she was majorly OP.

"You. I was wondering when you would show up." Said Suzuki. Well not wasn't this splendorous? His greatest enemy had decided to show up. He let the energy in his hands dissipate back into his being. She wasn't fighting. Odd. She was just standing there glaring at him in that disapproving way that women mastered sometime around her age it seemed.

"I'm Mob. I would have said that it was nice to meet you but you haven't introduced yourself. Also I don't feel that way at all. I don't feel like it's nice meeting you after what you did. I know that I'm being rude but that's just how I feel." Said Mob. She knew that she was being rude but this was just how she felt about this man. It was not nice making his acquaintance and she could have led a long and happy life without having had ever set eyes or aura upon him.

"Now is not the time to worry about shit like that!" said Dimple

"Oh, and you brought a pet. Adorable." Said Suzuki. So she could bind spirits to her will as well. An ability that he did not have. Not that he felt threatened. This was a child. He didn't know why he had been expecting anything different. Her aura…well her aura was one thing but this was just a little girl. He had to remind himself that there was a little girl attached to that aura. A child. A child that shared his ability, it seemed, and also thought that she could challenge him. His eyes rested on Sho.

Another child tried to rise up against him.

"Who are you calling pet you caterpillar faced weirdo!?" asked Dimple. THIS was the guy? This weirdo was the guy? This guy who couldn't even do something about his eyebrows thought he could challenge Shigeko for the world!?

"This is Dimple. He's not a pet, he's my friend. Who are you?" asked Mob

"My apologies. Suzuki Toichiro." Said Suzuki but he did not bow. Ohers bowed to him, not the other way around.

"It's still not nice to meet you. I'm still very upset with you for all of this…but not you. I remember you from before but I know that you're on my side. The others told me. It's nice to meet you." Said Mob. She used her powers to try and help that boy stand up. His name was Sho and he was the one who had dragged her little brother and all the rest of them into this…but that was ok. Really. She could understand why he had done that. His own father was doing all of this, of course he asked for help.

"T-Thanks, I'm Sho, remember? From the Seventh Division? I guess that you're done fighting like a…that was mean. Thank you, for what you did back there….I forgot to thank you that night so I'm doing it now…and you should go. Dad…Dad's my responsibility." Said Sho as she used her powers to help him to his feet. He hardly had enough energy of his own to keep himself steady bur he had to. He had to stand and fight and defeat dad because…because this was all his fault. He never should have let things get this bad in the first place.

"Your own father did this to you….I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Said Mob because, well, what else could she say. She had never been close to her parents, and mom could say some very hurtful things, but they had never hurt her.

"Don't be. I'm the one who should be sorry. If you're here then that means that my plan worked….and I'm sorry about that." Said Sho

"So you're the one who burnt my houses, my parents' house, down?" asked Mob

"You can barely stand…" said Mob

"I'll be fine." Said Sho

"Shigeko, keep your head in the game! Whatever you do don't take your eyes off that boss guy!" shouted Dimple. Maybe he had been a fighter in another life. Maybe an acrobat. Maybe a leader. Maybe a God. He didn't know. All he knew was that he had sense that Shigeko didn't have. She stood no chance…she stood no chance against this guy unless she kept her head in the game!

And he needed to get his head in the game, too!

He did not have enough spiritual energy to take this guy on. No way. But this whole room, the tower, were flooded with it! That guy was like Shigeko, a leaking faucet, no, a waterfall! This guy have off so much energy just by existing! And there was even more! It was like someone had set off an energy BOMB in there!

He slipped into extra invisible mode and decided to have a snack.

"Why are you so concerned with Sho's wellbeing? You should be worried about your own, coming up here and challenging me like this." said Suzuki. She had gathered allies, and she was apparently gathering more….emotional manipulation? He was no stranger to that, though physical intimidation worked better and produced more consistent results.

"I'm concerned because he's hurt. Here, let me help you." Said Mob. She hugged him, it worked better when she was touching the other person in some way. She tried to focus on giving him enough of her own energy to jumpstart his body's natural healing factor but not so much that he ended up getting hurt. She had been told a bunch of times that this hurt.

"A-Amazing!" said Sho as he felt his body start to heal. Well he had to tell his body what to do with all of this new energy, it wasn't like when Fukuda healed him, but still! This was amazing! This was…this was what psychic powers were for. Helping people. Not the crazy 'rule the world' shit that dad was on.

"You should get out of here. You could get really hurt. The others are outside, you can run away with them. I'll do what I can here-" said Mob as she let go of Sho. She was glad that she hadn't hurt him. Now he was all better and he could run away and she could handle this-

"You! You think that you're my rival….BUT YOU'RE NOT!" said Suzuki losing control just a bit. Only a tiny bit. His aura only had the barest of hints of yellow, a rich deep sort of color that would have been beautiful had it not been the harbinger of something terrible. He had learned, ages ago, how to control his powers and he so rarely slipped up….this was an exception.

He only awakened under the most stressful of circumstances.

And some upstart little girl walking right up to him and blatantly using the power that he had previously believed to have been bestowed upon him and only him counted as being the most stressful of circumstances. The world was his. The world was his because he had been bestowed with almost every power there was, including the power to share his gifts with others provided they already had the gift of esp. He was a God, a true God, and he had known this to be a fact since he had been small, as small as those two were.

"Dad! Stop it now!" said Sho as he launched himself at his father with everything he had. That was crossing the line, you weren't ever supposed to hit girls, and everyone with brains knew that! Plus he has already done all of that terrible stuff already…stuff that had been going on for so long…and Sho was going to put a stop to it!

"Stay out of this." said Suzuki as he tossed the girl to the side. She tumbled to the ground and stayed there. He sent a burst of power at the boy, too, and sent him into the wall hard enough to make a full body indent. With a flick of the wrist they both went to the ground, hard, hard enough that the boy gasped as the wind was knocked out of him and the girl wasn't even moving.

He walked over and kicked her.

She rolled over.

He's going to kill us if we don't kill him.

But I don't know if I can kill him. I don't know if I can kill anyone.

Then let me do it.

No.

WHY NOT?!

Because I know you won't stop.

I'll stop when I'm done.

No you won't.

Yes I will.

When will you be done?

When I'm done.

When will that be?

When it's over.

When will it be over?

When I say it's over.

That's why you're not going to be killing anyone.

This man deserves to die!

I know it!

Then let me kill him!

No! You won't stop!

Well you won't start!

"You're so weak." Said Suzuki as he picked her up by the front of her shirt. A sailor shirt. A school uniform. A little girl in her school uniform thought that she could challenge him. So cute. She went down even easier than Sho. Even now she was just taking it. Letting herself be picked up and shook. Her eyes screwed shut out of fear…

Her aura surrounded him. Oh. She was trying to immobilize him. Well then. So there was some fight in her after all. He broke free of her easily…and she held onto him even harder. Her face was impassive as she stood before him. Her shirt was askew, a pink bow and a white strap could be seen poking out from where he had stretched her shirt. She held her hand out and kept him still. She had been limp when he picked her up, limp when he shook her, but then she had broken free. Why? Why had she just been taking it!? PLAYING WITH HIM?!

"No. I was thinking." Said Mob as she attempted to keep him still. He was strong, the only thing she had ever felt as strong as this had been Mogami…and she had let him go again. Had she just done what needed to be done she could have spared herself so much suffering…but she would have had to break Asagiri. If she couldn't break Asagiri then how was she supposed to kill this man?

She couldn't.

But keeping him still was hard…and now he was free. He was free and he was throwing himself at her…so she threw herself out of the way. She ended up sprawled out on the ground inches from where he had made contact with the ground. She didn't think, she just kicked him with the aid of her powers. She had never done that before, kicked so hard, and in fact hadn't kicked anyone since she was a small child…

She was stronger than she thought she was.

But she wasn't strong enough to kill him. Even though he had tried to kill her…or at least maim or seriously injure her….and he had done all of that to his own son. He had hurt his own son. He had hurt his own son and he was doing it again. Holding him in one hand and using his powers to make bruises burst into existence on any exposed skin that she could see. She had seen…she had seen enough. This man had hurt countless people and she…and she had to stop him or he would never, ever, ever stop!

"Leave him alone!" shouted Mob as she threw herself across the room and went in for another kick. She had seen this before in a show, a round kick, hard and mean but necessary. Sometimes you had to be hard on people. Mogami was not her master but he had taught her that. She was a magical girl and magical girls fought only when they had to, and this was a 'had to' situation. She had to hurt him. She had to…she had to…

She could not kill him.

But he wasn't going to talk. He grabbed her leg as she went in for a kick and tried to swing her around above his head. He didn't count on the fact that she could make herself fly if she wanted to. She wasn't a fighter, never had been, but she had seen a lot of TV. She planted a kick down between his shoulder blades that sent him staggering forwards.

"Yeah! Take that! And this!" said Sho as he sent a burst of power that sent dad to his knees. He hurt, not as badly as before but he hurt, but it didn't matter. Who cared if it hurt to breathe, Fukuda or Ritsu's big sis could fix him up when this was all over!

Dad just absorbed it and sent it right back at Sho with a flick of his fingers. Sho couldn't dodge fast enough and ended up with blood running down his face. He spat as much blood as he could at dad. He was just standing, there, right there with the stupid look on his face! That stupid non-look which was also a look! A look that Sho was sick and tired of seeing!

On dad.

He saw it on Ritsu's big sis, too, well he had seen it before back at the Seventh Division. Now she had a look and she looked pissed. She had a barrier around herself but she was standing like she was ready to attack. She had changed since he met her. Good. That was a good thing for him. Dad had hurt them but they were landing hits, now, which was more than he had managed to do on his own. He should have taken dad down himself before, true, but now…now he knew that he needed some help.

And he would accept it. Even if Ritsu was going to kill him.

"You've both managed to surprise me, I'm impressed." Said Suzuki as he dusted himself off and fixed his tie. This was certainly interesting. He admired both of their tenacity. One of his son's few good qualities, and something that he would pass down his children as well. They fought well together, these two, and they were the same age. The girl would come around once she lost.

They always did.

"We don't have to fight! Please, you need to stop it! Fighting is stupid" said Mob from inside of her barrier. She didn't want to fight even if that was what magical girls did. She just wanted this all to be over. She wanted to go home. She wanted to lay down with Master Reigen on the couch and watch TV or ride on the back of Teru's bike or let Rei paint her face and brush her hair or play videogames for hours against Tome…things that she could and would have been doing if none of this had been happening.

But it was happening. It was all happening because of that man.

"My. You are an amusing one, aren't you?" asked Suzuki as he brushed off a burst of his son's power. The boy didn't know when to quit, a good but annoying trait, and neither did the girl. Yes. This was closer to what he had been expecting. He had seen the surviving footage of the Seventh Division takedown and he had heard all the eye witness accounts. There she was.

The pacifist.

"There's nothing amusing about any of this." said Mob lowly. She could feel it, her control slipping, but she had to hold on to her barrier. The other her was trying to wrestle control away. She was pushing Mob away, to the side, and trying to make Mob sink down into the abyss that was their mindscape. Well Mob was not about to let that happen. She held on and she held steady. She had to.

"Oh yes there is. You. You amuse me, girl." Said Suzuki. He allowed himself a small laugh at the way her hair flared out around her at that. So emotionally unstable. So young. Such a child.

"Well you don't amuse me one bit. Nothing about this is amusing and I don't see what right you have to smile like that!" said Mob

"I have every right to smile. Not only am I about to get everything that I ever wanted but I have you, here, to entertain me as well. You too, Sho, after some reevaluation I've decided that you aren't a total failure after all. You have an admirable quality of tenacity, I'll give you that." Said Suzuki. This compliment, a rare thing from him, earned him his son trying to crush him under the weight of, say, around a ton. Easily blocked by Suzuki but truly exhausting for Sho.

"There is nothing entertaining about this." said Mob. She gasped out and almost doubled over as the other her, the other Shigeko, tried once again to assume control and end this. End this by killing the man. It was one thing to think in her head that she could do whatever had to be done but it was another to actually do it. She could fight if she needed to but even fighting him, this man who above all else deserved a sound butt kicking, made her feel all gross.

She was terrible.

That was how she felt when she fought him…but she knew she wasn't. She was stopping him. He was truly a terrible person and as someone who is truly terrible it was her duty as a magical girl to stop him. That wasn't the sort of thing that made someone terrible. That was the sort of thing that made someone the opposite of terrible.

"I disagree. Here she stands before me, the child who says to everyone she meets that she's a pacifist, here, come to face me shaking out of fear." Said Suzuki with a small, the smallest smile that he could allow himself.

"I'm done with that. I've changed." Said Mob. Her barrier shook and shimmered. An assault from the outside…and from within. She couldn't hide under here for the rest of her life. She had to end this. She had to beat this man down into the ground. She had to peel him like a grape. She had to make him feel pain. She had to make him suffer. She had to make him regret every descison he had ever made that led him to standing in her way!

Shut up.

Make me.

We aren't going to do any of that.

We are going to make him regret every choice that he has ever made that has led him here, standing in our way.

He's not in our way. Nobody is in our way.

Everyone is in our way.

"People never change. I can see it, now, in your eyes and in your aura. You're not a fighter. You don't want to be here. You have the soft heart of a pacifist, of a child, and you'd rather cower there in your little bubble than face me. You don't have a chance and you know it. Give it up, girl, before you end up getting hurt. You're valuable and I would hate it if anything were to happen to you." Said Suzuki

"I have no idea what you're talking about. People change all the time. That's how people grow, they grow by changing, and I've changed. My heart may be soft but it's better to have a soft heart than a black one…and I don't want to have any value at all to someone as black hearted as you." Said Mob. She made eye contact with him and she held it. She reached behind herself and pulled her hair down by hand. It stayed down.

She was the one in control here.

"That's where you're wrong, girl, so very wrong. Do you have any idea just how wrong you are?" asked Suzuki with a smirk.

"Dad! Shut up! Nobody needs to hear how crazy you are!" shouted Sho as best as he could. No. No way was dad carrying on about his crazy plan. Sho would never go along with something like that! First of all you couldn't force people to be a family together and second of all even if he liked her he would have never made her marry him or have a kid with him or whatever crazy scenarios were playing out in dad's head!

"I don't think that I'm wrong at all. I know that I don't want to have value to someone like you. You're a bad person. You're terrible. Look at everything that you've done." Said Mob. There were windows all around them. He could have easily taken a look out of any of them and seen the destruction that he had wrought. If he didn't feel like looking out the window then he could have just looked over at what he had done to his own son. Mob didn't have any kids but she knew that when she did she would never treat them like that. That was wrong.

This man was terrible.

"Yes. Look at everything that I've done. You have to clear the way for the new and in order to do that you, occasionally, must destroy the old. This world was built by normal people to suit their needs. They rule the world by right of their sheer numbers." Said Suzuki

"There's no real difference between a normal person and an esper. Some people are strong, some people can run fast, some people are good at talking, and some people have psychic powers. Having psychic powers is just another trait that someone can have, it doesn't make them any better or any worse than anyone else. The truth of one's charm is in their kindness so the best thing to do is to just try and be a good person." Said Mob. Those were the words that had saved her years ago. Saved her from becoming…this. This was what Shigeko would have had them become. This man thought that his psychic powers gave him the right to act like a jerk, like the other Shigeko thought, and maybe Mob would have ended up giving up control to the other her…..if she hadn't met Master Reigen. If she hadn't met him back then she could have become…this.

She would have been truly terrible.

"Who told you that?" laughed Suzuki. He couldn't help but laugh out loud. It was just so….absurd. Truly absurd. This child was truly absurd just as Sho. They would have a long and happy life together. Even now Sho defended her and she defended him. That was a good sign. He had to think of the next generation after all. A stable and loving home life would lead to a greater outcome for the next generation. The next and the next and the next. One had to be forward thinking. This, his son's betrayal, the girl's resistance, they were all just bumps in the road. The road of his life. The road to his destiny. This was the road to his destiny, his final act before his epilogue. Before he could ascend to his rightful position as ruler of the world. An absurd final act.

Truly absurd.

"My master. Master Reigen. He told me that when I was a kid and I wish that you had someone to tell you that. Maybe then you wouldn't have ended up like this. I'm sorry. I'm truly sorry for what you've become." Said Mob. She felt a tear run down the side of her face, then another, and another. She could feel herself crying. She didn't know if she was crying for him or for the alternate dimension version of herself that had become like him. The version of herself that hadn't found Master Reigen. There must have been one. The prospect of becoming like him, of giving into the other Shigeko so fully that she became this, was enough to bring tears to her eyes.

"Your master…is a liar." Mocked Suzuki

"Well then if he's a liar then he's my favorite liar." Said Mob with a sniffle. Right. This was not the time to go to pieces. There was no sense in thinking about an alternate universe where she had never met Master Reigen. There was no sense in crying for this man, either, because he must have known how terrible he was being. People made their own choices and he had chosen to become this…right? Just how much of it was fate and how much of it depended on the choices that people made.

Mob didn't know.

The other Shigeko didn't know.

The boy over there trying to stand up, Sho, didn't know, probably.

And she wasn't about to go asking that man if he knew.

"You truly are an adorable, absurd, child." Said Suzuki

"I am not a child!" said Mob/Shigeko. That had been the thing to make her control slip. Shigeko, the other Shigeko, too her shot. Her barrier shook and then fell as they fought over control. She wrestled it back but not before she had been grabbed and picked up by the front of her shirt.

"Squirm out of your shirt!" said Sho as he tried, and failed, to break through the shield that dad had put up around himself and Ritsu's big sis.

"No way!" shouted Mob. She wasn't wearing anything under her shirt besides her undershirt and she was not walking around in just an undershirt in front of two boys! No way! Teru was the only person, boy person, who she was comfortable with seeing her like that!

"There it is again, that absurdity. Really, you should work on being more pragmatic, child." Said Suzuki

"I told you….I'm not a child." Said Mob. She kicked out at him with her body and her powers. It was not effective at all. He just stood there and took it. She could feel herself getting weak…she could see her aura disappearing into his…he was tugging her in…

And she tugged back.

"Tenacious, too. Yes, you and Sho will get along nicely. You really should give up, there is zero chance that you're going to be able to beat me. I have been working towards my destiny for twenty years. I am the true ruler and protagonist of this world and as rare as you are, as rare as the power that the universe bestowed upon you is, you cannot beat me. Join me. Give it up. Give it up before I'm forced to hurt you." Said Suzuki

"I…I will never give up….ever." said Mob as she struck out at him again and…whoa. Ok, no. She needed to put as much of her focus as she could onto keeping her energy to herself. She could not let him drain her and turn her into a husk. She could not let him put her aura out…she had to fight.

And she had to win.

"You should. You should join me. Think of the good that you could do at my side. I can't think of anyone else I would want by my side." Said Suzuki

"Dad! Don't be gross!" said Sho. Nope. No way. He did not like it at all, the way his dad said that, and the weird look he had in his eyes. The only thing worse than dad forcing Sho to marry Ritsu's big sis was dad marrying Ritsu's big sis himself…yuck. Disgusting. Vomit inducing! Sick! He did not need a stepmother a year older than him! Dad was a million year old fossil!

"Still awake, Sho?" asked Suzuki. His son had passed out, he had thought, when he slumped down to the ground. He had figured that the boy had passed out and now he could get on with convincing the girl to act in her best interests and join the winning side.

"I am and you need to shut your mouth! Seriously, you are being so creepy right now! Do you have any idea how gross it is to talk like that to a girl who's the same age as your son?!" shouted Sho as best as he could through a mouthful of blood.

"Um….that's weird and you're weird…" said Mob with a blink. She stared at him. That was…yuck. Ick. Disgusting. Not right at all.

"You're both such children. No. That is not what I have planned for you. I have you, Sho, and that's enough. I've done my part for the next generation. You're worth much more than that to me, anyway, girl. You're a rare thing. A person your age, a child, a girl child at that with your level of power and skill is something unheard of. I would hate to have to hurt you, to destroy you, so do not give me a reason to do so. That would just be bad tactics." Said Suzuki before he was kicked, hard, in the abdomen. She wretched herself free of his grasp, he held only a scrap of cloth where she had been, though she had not gotten far.

She could not get out of his barrier.

He shrank the walls, slowly, and pulled her closer to him. There was a pressure against his barrier. Sho again. Such a waste of time. There had not been a single time in Sho's life when he could break down Suzuki's barrier. Why would this be the time? He was broken and bloodied, there, on the floor gasping up pathetically at the sight before him.

"I will never join you. Ever. I will end this entire world, send it all tumbling down, take it apart down to the particle layer, before I'm ever a part of this." said Mob/Shigeko. Their aura began to shift. They stood up and pushed their own barrier against the walls of his in an effort to keep it from crushing her. She was not going to lose. She couldn't. She would end this world, take it down, break it apart until it all came tumbling down, before she joined him.

She was the best of magical girls.

But she would not become the worst of witches.

Unless she had to.

"Well aren't you a stubborn little thing?" asked Suzuki. Her barrier was holding his back. She was standing there before him at her full height. Not very impressive at all, no, she wasn't impressive in her vessel but her aura was another story entirely.

"I am. I know I am." Said Mob/Shigeko. They knew that they were. Master Reigen and Mogami had both told her that she was stubborn. She was not a bad person, no, just a stubborn one. That was a good thing, now, because she would never join this man. Ever. Not just because he was kind of a creeper, either, but because he was a truly terrible human being.

"It doesn't suit you at all. I think that, maybe, I would have preferred the pacifist. That girl, at least, wouldn't have caused me quite so much trouble. So stubborn. So selfish." Said Suzuki

"You're the one who's selfish." Said Mob/Shigeko

"Me? I have spent the past twenty years of my life working to make the world a better place for people like us. I am the only one who can take it and rule it. Having this much power is a gift and a burden, child. I have been gifted with the ability to remake the world in the way it was meant to be, with our kind at the helm, and I have been cursed with the task of righting the world." Said Suzuki

"You're insane!" shouted Mob/Shigeko. They managed to push his barrier back far enough that they could put some space between themselves and the crazy person in front of them. They had the power to end the world and start anew but they weren't supposed to actually do it!

Unless we have to.

But we won't.

But we have.

We had to, the, but we don't have to now.

We have the power to do so.

But we won't! We do not get to decide to remake the world, Shigeko, those are crazy people thoughts! It is not right for one person to be the boss of everyone and it is not ok for one person to treat everyone so terribly just because they have psychic powers! I'm an esper but that doesn't mean that I have to be like him!

We need to stop him by any means necessary.

"Heavy is the burden of the wise ones, for no one understands a word they say." Said Suzuki

"No, I understand every single word you've been saying, I just think that you're insane. Nobody has the right to just come in and boss everyone else around. You want to make the world a better place for people like us but really you just want to be bossy. You're making people afraid of people like us. That's all. You haven't done anything good at all and you need to stop acting like a crazy person." Said Mob. She was being crushed, a barrier, his barrier. His barrier shimmered. Something was draining it…from the outside. Not a person, no, another person with his ability would have been far too much. No. A spirit. Spirits did that, they siphoned energy from the living, and he had dealt with plenty in his lifetime.

"Such a stubborn little girl you are. I do wish that I could have met you before all of this. You could have been such a useful asset to me. But as it stands I see that I cannot persuade you to join me with words. You are so much more like everyone else than you'd like to think, little pacifist." Said Suzuki as be brought his barrier down, hard, on her…and she held it up. She was on the verge of coming down to her knees with the force of it all but she had pull through and now she was still standing….

Such a stubborn girl.

"Dad…shut up…you aren't a shonen villain…stop with the…monologue…" gasped out Sho as he tried to get his dad to stop. He knew what dad was doing. Dad was testing her, to see if she could break through, and Sho knew exactly what would happen to her if she couldn't. He knew how dad could be.

"I agree!" Called out Dimple as he stomped down on to the barrier in front of himself as it crushed her. He came out of extra invisible mode as dramatically as he could. Dramatically, of course, meant being at his true full size.

"Dimple!" shouted Mob as she managed to break through the barrier around her with Dimple's help. It shattered into a million pieces like shards of glass before she pulled the energy from it into herself. Shards of his barrier dug their way into her body but it did not hurt. She'd need it for later. That boy, Sho, was hurt again. He was hurt and bloodied and he was on the ground and she could not let him get hurt! He was…he may have burnt her house down but he was on her side now and that meant that they were friends…or at least reasonable acquaintances…and she was not going to let him get hurt.

"Come on! You wanna go, let's go!" said Dimple as he delivered a kick to the boss guy. Ha! He staggered! He wasn't so tough, not when he was fighting someone who meant it! Shigeko didn't have the heart for this sort of thing. Even when she was being attacked she had been holding back. Well Dimple wasn't going to hold back! He wasn't going to let this jackass break Shigeko!

"You aren't bound to her will at all, are you? How strange. A spirit that chooses to fight for a living person. How very strange indeed." Said Suzuki as he oriented himself. Contact with the dead was always vile, truly vile, and even he could be disoriented by it.

"Hell no I'm not bound to her will! Shigeko doesn't roll like that! I'm a free agent and I'm going to freely kick your ass! If you want to fight Shigeko then you're going to have to go through me!" said Dimple. This guy may have had a crazy strong aura, and he may have managed to almost ascend to godhood, but he could still be defeated! He was not going to take the mantle of God of this world or ruler of the world or whatever he was planning on calling himself! That was Shigeko's title! She was the one who was destined to rule this world and she'd do it with her friends, including her good friend Dimple, at her side! He would not lose! He would not be defeated! He would not lose.

"You're annoying." Said Suzuki as he batted the spirit away like a pesky mosquito. He destroyed half of the spirit's body with a slap of the back of his hand. That should have been the end of it, it really should have, but the spirit managed to regenerate. How…he expanded his perceptions. Ah, yes, there it was. The sheer amount of psychic energy saturating this space. That was a truly high level spirit that the girl had bound to her…no…had somehow allied with.

"And you're about to get your ass kicked. Come on, is that the best you've got? " taunted Dimple. Shigeko could have taken her shot, then, but she was too busy worried about that kid down there.

"Forget me! Stop my dad!" said Sho as she pulled him close and tried to send more of her energy into him. He'd be fine, he wasn't as hurt as he'd been before, and she needed to conserve her strength because there was no way that dad could be beaten by a spirit.

"No! You're hurt! You're really hurt and I can help you!" said Mob

"Help everyone else! I've got this!" said Sho trying to pull himself away from her. The spirit was still trying to fight his dad. It was really high level but dad was still dad. Sho would be fine, dad was the one who needed to be stopped. She didn't listen, though, she still tried to heal him. Why? He wasn't that hurt, he'd had much worse in his life, and there was no reason to make such a big deal about this.

"No. This is." Said Suzuki before he kicked that spirit out, literally. He so hated stealing energy from the dead, it was a truly vile process, but he was not going to let a little girl beat him let alone a spirit. He delivered a kick so hard that knocked the spirit not only from the Cultural Tower but also back down to compact mode.

"Dimple! No!" said Mob as Dimple was kicked out the window. For a moment, based on the amount of energy that had burst into her vision, the thought that Dimple had been exorcised. The thought brought her to her knees. Losing Dimple. He may have been annoying and weird sometimes but he was still her friend and she still cared about him…

This was too much.

"Why'd you have to…why?! What is the matter with you?!" asked Mob. The tower shook…and kept on shaking even after she had pulled her powers back in. She wondered if it would all come tumbling down. This tower. This day. This world. She had just lost…Dimple was a very strong spirit. Even when she had been trying she hadn't been able to fully exorcise him. He had come back from the particle layer, he had said, so maybe he was fine.

She wanted to go and make sure.

But she couldn't. She could not just leave this man to his own devices. He had hurt so many people already and if Mob left, if she ran away, even if it was just to run away to find her friend she would still be leaving this man alone to do more bad things…and she was not going to leave his boy, Sho, alone either. He was about her age, or maybe more like Ritsu's, and he could have gotten hurt. She didn't want anyone to get hurt…more so than they already had been…

"Don't tell me you actually care about the ball of energy and ectoplasm. Bonding with that thing is meaningless. It wasn't even a person." Said Suzuki

"Yes he was…is. A person is a person no matter what they are." Said Mob

"You've made some powerful allies, I'll give you that, but to ally with a spirit of all things is just bad tactics. They are so fragile, spirits, not even good for cannon fodder. You've also made the mistake of bonding with that creature. Bonding with others is meaningless enough already. Why do such a thing with a spirit?" said Suzuki

"Bonding with one another is what makes life meaningful. The invisible bonds that we form are what get us through our lives. Nobody is born complete. We need each other." Said Mob

"That is where you're wrong, little girl. I am a whole and complete being and that will be my victory. You. You are weak. Even now you're protecting Sho instead of standing and fighting even though I could so easily end your life right here and now." Said Suzuki

"No. You're wrong. Nobody is born complete. Everyone…Everyone grows because of their interactions with other people. By forming these invisible bonds we grow and they grow and everyone grows. People need other people, even you, you just can't see it yet." Said Mob

"You sound like you're pitying me." Said Suzuki. He struggled, for a moment, to keep himself level. This girl in her ruin school uniform cowering on the ground was pitying HIM? She should have had some pity on herself. Weak. She let her weakness for others result in her defeat. She could have been something great. He mourned it, he allowed himself to mourn it, the wasted potential within this girl.

"No. I'm just saying that I feel bad for you. You didn't have anyone else, not like I did, and that's why you're like this. I'm angry, very angry, but I also have to remember that you turned out this way because of how you've lived your life. You've been all alone your whole life it sounds like. I've been alone too. I could have been like you if that had been real, if I had been truly alone in my life. I could have become the worst sort of monster…I could have been terrible…" said Mob

"So you're saying I'm terrible? That's rich coming from you. You're here, before me, helpless and bereaved over a spirit of all things. I am glad that I am not you. You're right, I could have ended up like you had I been weak, but I am not. The world is divided up into winners and losers and I, girl, am a winner." Said Suzuki

"You don't have to be terrible…and we don't have to fight. You can walk away from all of this. Sometimes you have to run away and this…this is one of those times. You don't have to be alone anymore. I...I'm here. I can show you a better way." said Mob climbing to her feet. She knew what had to be done and she knew…she knew that once she let Shigeko do that then she would not have been able to stop…and she didn't know if she could be responsible for this man's death. This was not his fault. He'd led a terrible life and this was where he had ended up. He was like her, born with powers that were big and scary but he hadn't had anyone in his life to show him a better way. He was…

She was making excuses for him because she didn't want to hurt him.

But were they excuses? How much of it was genetics? How much of it was fate? And how much of it depended on the choices that we made?

"So you want to be a shoulder that I can lean on? Please. Save that spiel for the weaklings of the world." Said Suzuki

"Ritsu's big sis, you can't talk him down. He's insane, totally insane, like you said. You've got to fight him. He can do that thing you do, steal energy, and he can give it to others too. On top of all of that he's got a massive twenty year stockpile saved up. I can help you…I can fight…and we can win and then…and then we can end this." said Sho. He reached up and grabbed her arm to steady him enough to climb to his feet. She reached down, took his hand, and poured more of her energy into him.

"Don't do this. Stop. Save your strength." Said Sho as he felt his body's natural healing processes get another jumpstart. His aura shifted and shook to accommodate the new energy, her energy, pink and blue pouring right into him. His own aura, his energy, accepted her. As he did it he was hit with a wave of…sadness. Hopelessness. He wanted to lay down and wait for tomorrow to happen. He didn't want to be there. What had he ever thought that he could have done? He stood no chance and had never stood a chance. This was dad. He was the most powerful being on Earth and Sho was just a kid. A failure. No wonder mom hadn't taken him with her. He would have just slowed her down. He was useless to her and to everyone else in this world.

"I just lost one friend. I am not losing you too." Said Mob as she clutched his hand in hers and tried her best to help him. She kept her breathing as level as she could as she tried to control her power output. She didn't want to hurt him…and she didn't want to hurt herself, either…

"Friend…?" asked Sho softly. She considered them to be…ok. Ok then. He was not in a position to be passing up any offers of friendship. After all he had no idea how many of his friends he even had left. Serizawa had deserted him and the others…the others were out there fighting for their lives…

"Can you move?" asked Mob, still clutching his hand. Sho nodded.

"Yeah. I can stand at least." Said Sho

"Good. Now run away. I know that you want to help me but you…you've been so hurt already. Please, just go downstairs and help the others. Help them run away. You're really strong, I can tell, and they need someone strong to keep them safe. I'll do what I can here-" said Mob before she felt something crack her across the side of the head. Hard. She had been putting up a barrier, a subconscious one, and it had shattered into a million tiny pieces like glass on impact. She watched them all come tumbling down as her vision twinned. Her head was pounding. This was not good.

"I am not running away!" said Sho as he felt a familiar pain. Dad had decided that it was time to pop him one…and her too. She wasn't used to it. She went right down. He grabbed her arm and tried to pull her up. It was worse, always worse, when you went down. Dad hated weakness and he would just do it again, and harder, if you went down like that. He didn't tolerate weaknesses like that.

"Then you're a bigger idiot than I've ever imagined." Said Suzuki. He grabbed his son by the throat and smashed him down, hard, into the ground. It buckled. The entire building shook. He wondered how much this tower, this monument to normal people's achievements, could take. Not much. It was fragile, most likely, like them. The normal people of this world. He would rule over them and everyone else. He would.

Just as soon as he beat some sense into these two.

Reigen was about to start beating some sense into people.

"Fuck this. I'm going up there." Said Teru. He was through waiting and watching. He had been sitting there listening to Rei cry and those Scars mutter amongst themselves while Shigeko was up there fighting for her life. He could tell. He had eyes and an aura. He saw the way the tower had swayed and shook, he saw the colors that burst into existence across the dying sky, and he knew that he had to do something. That was his girlfriend up there.

That was the love of his life.

And he knew that he loved her, had truly loved her, since the first time she had saved him. She had saved him in every single way a person could be saved. That was why he could not let her just…get hurt. Maybe even die. He wanted her. He wanted her safety. She was his everything. He had said…and it felt like a million years ago when he had said it, that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. He had just been saying things in that phone call, panicked things, things that were unbefitting of him. He should have worked harder at controlling the situation, at controlling himself, because now he was…he had no control over this situation. The love of his life was up there and all he could do was sit and watch and wait.

He could not lose her.

He had thought that it would be the other way around, that she would be the one to lose him. That he would be the one to die. Death. Something that he was thinking about, had been thinking about, had been thinking about since he had come close enough to touch it…and he had thought that it would be coming for him. That it would separate the two of them. Well it would, but not in the way he had thought. She could die. She could die up there while he was sitting there waiting and watching and listening to Rei cry.

So, yeah, fuck it.

He didn't get far, though, when he felt a hand at the back of his hoodie. He was being pulled back, hard, and he did the only thing he could do. He pushed back with his powers. If Shigeko asked why he did it, and she would probably ask, he'd just say that he had been surprised. That he had still thought that they were fighting. The enemy was all around them after all. There was no way to know who was friend of foe if they grabbed you from behind.

He knew that aura. Custard yellow.

He knew who it was that had grabbed him. Reigen. Always Reigen. What, did he want to fight again? Was he going to go on and on and on about how he couldn't possibly have feelings for Shigeko? Well he did. Anyone with eyes could see that…anyone but Shigeko herself. He did not want to fight with Reigen. He did not want to waste his time and energy fighting with Reigen.

Not when there was a real fight to be had.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" asked Reigen. He sounded more like an adult, a proper adult, then than he ever had in his life. There was no way in hell that he was letting this kid walk off into certain death. He may have not been able to stop Mob but this kid was nowhere near Mob's level.

"To save my girlfriend. All of you can stay here waiting and watching but I'm going to go up there and-" said Teru before he was practically picked up. Reigen hadn't let go even after Teru had lashed out at him. Why? Why did he have to be like this!? He knew that Shigeko was in danger but he was just standing there doing NOTHING! If he really was the great master like everyone said he was then he would have, and should have, been doing SOMETHING!

"Die." Said Reigen simply. He spun Teru around and made Mob levels of eye contact. This kid was not going to die on his watch. This kid needed someone to be an adult, an actual adult, in his life. He was stubborn and headstrong, that came from having to be in charge of himself for so long. He thought that he knew best but he didn't. He thought that he had to run into certain death but he didn't. Heh. No wonder he and Mob got along so well.

"Don't say that!" shouted Rei. She couldn't see what was going on. Her face was still buried in Ritsu's hoodie, yellow and dirty but still the only sight that she wanted to see. She had been crying into him, the tears just would not stop, and he had been holding her. He had been telling her that everything was going to be alright. He was telling her that he loved her. He was telling her that nothing was going to harm her while he was around. His arms held her close and his aura held her closer. She didn't have much of an aura, not usually visible even to her, but now she could see it. Orange against dark blue. The same sort of bright orange as orange soda against the same sort of dark blue as school uniforms. The ones from his school, anyway, the boy's wore purple at her school. She didn't care what their colors were, that they didn't mix, she just cared about the fact that they were there, together, and that they would be ok…even if someone was talking about death!

"Rei, no, nobody's going to die." Said Ritsu. He wished that he could have done what Teru was doing. He knew that he didn't stand a chance but he also knew that waiting and watching like this was not…this was not what he was meant to do. He needed to protect his sister even though she didn't want his protection. Even though he had resigned himself not to give it. That was before he saw the Cultural Tower sway and shake and erupt in a shower of red and blue and pink and even some yellow, too.

He couldn't tell whose red it was that he was seeing.

But he couldn't go up there. Rei needed him. He may not have been in love with her, he may not have been able to return even a millionth of the love she gave him, he still had to be there for her. She was a mess, a crying mess, and if he left her…she did not deserve that. He may not have been in love with her but he wasn't going to go and devastate her like that.

Even though his sister needed him despite what she had said to the contrary.

"You are. If you go up there then I swear to God that you will die and I am not going to let that happen. Do you hear me? I am not letting you die." Said Reigen slowly and evenly so that there was no room for this kid to pretend he hadn't heard. To act like he hadn't heard.

"We're going up there?! What!?" asked Takeshi as he got close enough to hear what was going on. He shook as he stared up at the Cultural Tower. Reigen was right. There was no way that they were going to survive that. They had barely survived the mooks, how were they supposed to survive the boss!?

"Yeah! Let's go kick some ass!" shouted Go. He had been trailing behind Takeshi and at that proclamation he grabbed his hand and attempted to drag him away. They had the power of friendship on their side and with the power of friendship of course they would win! This whole thing was playing out like the final arc of any shonen series…accept the main good guy fighter was a girl…but still! They had fate on their side and they were not going to lose.

"No! Nobody is going up there! Mob…Mob has this…" said Reigen. Teru pulled himself free of Reigen grip. He had been holding on so tightly that he had made the rips in Teru's clothes worse than they already had been. Reigen looked down at his hands and had he been anyone else, and had the circumstances been different, Teru would have felt embarrassed at the amount, or even presence of, that much filth…but this was Reigen and Teru didn't care how dirty he got him.

"Shut the fuck up. That is my girlfriend up there and I don't care what you say or she says or what anyone else thinks that they're going to say. I am going up there and I am going to save her." said Teru

"And how, exactly, do you think that you're going to do that?" asked Reigen. He was gritting his teeth. So was Teru. He knew that he needed to calm down because anger would feed into anger and cause a negative feedback loop and then there'd be two fights happening instead of one…and he wanted neither of those fights to be happening!

"I'm going to fight and I'm going to win." Said Teru

"Teru…please..." said Ritsu. He didn't want to lose Teru and he didn't want sister to lose him, either. Teru had almost died fighting that blind guy, he stood no chance against the boss…but Shigeko did. She was stronger than all of them put together and he so wanted to help her, to be the one to go up there and risk his life for her, but he couldn't. Not when he had someone there who loved and depended on him.

And Teru was in the same boat whether he realized it or not. Shigeko could not lose him.

"That guy…that guy is on another level and you need to let go of your foolish pride and realize when you're outgunned! Sometimes you have to run away and this is one of those times!" said Reigen

"If you want to run away then do it. Nobody's making you stay." Said Teru. His eyes met Reigen's. Sapphire blue on plain, common, blue. His aura met Reigen's. Gold on custard yellow. Who did Reigen think that he was…Teru knew who he thought that he was. He fancied himself the Great Reigen Arataka, well he wasn't. He wasn't master of anyone and he wasn't great. He was just a man, a scared man, but Teru was not. He was not Reigen, he was not the sort of man who would let Shigeko do all of this on her own.

"I…I'm going to be here for Mob when she comes back. I'm the adult here and I am telling you that you need to leave this to…leave it to the only person who even stands a chance." Said Reigen. He knew that he felt helpless, hopeless, and he knew that because of the proximity he was sharing these feelings with the stubborn little brat in front of him. He was also…he kid took all of those hopeless and helpless feelings and just turned them into anger and resolve. There was no reasoning with a fool in love…

But Reigen was going to try to do so, anyway.

"I won't. Now get out of my way, I don't want to have to waste my time fighting you, too." Said Teru. Reigen did not budge. He didn't care. He could always push past him, and he tried to, but Reigen was stronger. Well that was because he was bigger and Teru hadn't been using his powers. He wanted to. He wanted to use his powers to beat Reigen up worse than he had ever beaten anyone else up before.

But he didn't.

Because Shigeko would not have wanted that. He was not going to save his girlfriend just to end up losing her over Reigen fucking Arataka.

"No. I'm not moving from this spot and neither are you." Said Reigen. He sounded just like his mother, then, though his mother had not been trying to keep him from going off to certain death. She had been trying to keep him safe, though, and he was struck then with the sudden urge to call his mother and to tell her that he was sorry for all of the grief that he had put her through for the past almost thirty years. But he didn't because now he had his own stubborn kid to try and protect from his own stupidity.

"What makes you so sure that I won't just move you, then?" asked Teru. There were some mutterings behind him, those scars were debating protecting Reigen vs minding their own business. Someone said that he wasn't a threat, that he was just a kid…he was not a child! The only thing that separated him from them, from Reigen, from any adult was chronology! Just because he was born in 2005 he was expected to be treated like a child. He was not! He had been living on his own for years! Keeping himself safe! Claw had come after him again and again and again but he hadn't had anyone to rely on but himself! He had fought those idiots off countless times and he would do it again! He would do it for her! That was how he knew he could win! He was doing it for her, now, and for her he would do anything! He loved her, not in that sappy way other couples his age were, he honestly loved and wanted to spend his life with her. He would and had laid his life down on the line for hers and he could and would do it again!

"Because I know that you won't. I know, I don't think, because I know that you love Mob and you want to be what she wants you to be. She would forgive you, you know she would, if you were to hurt me but you still won't do it because you care too much about her. I care about her, too, and that's why I am not letting you go off to die. She would never forgive you and she would never forgive me, either. You think that I'm the sort of person who always acts in my own best interests, I know you do, so then believe me that it is not in my best interests for Mob to have the kid she loves most in the world dead because I couldn't save him from his own pride and arrogance." Said Reigen

"You just want-" said Teru. He had been about to tell Reigen exactly what he wanted from Shigeko. That he wasn't acting in his own best interests at all because if, and it was a big if, Teru died then Reigen could have had Shigeko all to himself just like he wanted. Just like anyone with more than two brain cells could see that he wanted.

"You can think whatever you want kid, I don't care, but it is in my best interests not to piss Mob off by letting you die. She's a good friend and someone anyone would be happy to have at their side…and not just because of her powers. She's a good person, one of the few good people left in this world, and she does not deserve to lose you." Said Reigen. He tried not to let himself feel them, the twin feelings of guilt and self-loathing that threatened to spill out as he held Teru back. He had kissed this kid's…no. He hadn't kissed Mob, this kid's girlfriend, he had kissed Dimple, the pain in the ass that occasionally followed him around and thought that doing what he had done had been a good idea. Reigen did not have time to feel disgusted with himself or Dimple or every decision that he had ever made in his life that put him in that positon in the first place. He had a job to do and that job was keeping this hard headed kid alive!

"You're just-" said Teru

"Saving your life." Said Reigen. He said it with the air of finality that he had heard countless adults use with him, before, when he had been a stupid and reckless kid. The kid looked like he had been about to say something, something mean and harsh no doubt, when the energy around all of them shifted…

Ick.

What was that?

There was a trail of green leading from the broken window of the Cultural Tower. It painted a green slash across the red, pink, and blue that had made up the sky around the tower…and it was coming closer.

"Dimple!?" said Ritsu. Rei had let him go, or at least wasn't holding him in quite such a death grip, as he saw Dimple floating down from the sky like a piece of torn up paper. He was smaller, smaller then Ritsu had ever seen him before, and he was almost flat, too. Torn at the edges. Just like a piece of paper…

"What the…I told you to keep Mob safe! What happened!?" said Reigen as he plucked what was left of Dimple from the air. Gross. This felt so gross. This felt like gutting a week old fish with your bare hands in the height of summer while the sun beat down on you and you were covered in stale sweat and fish guts, rotting fish guts. Rotting. Just…ick. Death was disgusting.

"I tried, ok?! I tried but that boss guy…he's on a whole other level! And on top of that he seems pretty intent on mercilessly killing Shigeko!" said Dimple. Everyone was gathered around him, now. They were all gathered in close despite how truly disgusting he must have felt to all of them. That boss guy with the caterpillar eyebrows and the superiority complex had tried to exorcise him, destabilize him, dematerialize him…and he had almost succeeded. Even at that moment Dimple was having trouble maintaining his form. He was leaking his own spiritual energy everywhere and they must have all been able to feel it…but they all stood around him…

"Is he hurt badly? And…how do you heal an evil spirit, anyway?" asked Rei as she broke apart from Ritsu. The poor little thing…Mob had told her about him, a very powerful evil spirit who could also be kind of nice when he wanted to be…one of her friends. Rei wished that he had been made of paper instead of just looking like he was, maybe then she could have done something to help him…

"That's it. Fuck this and fuck you too, Reigen. I'm going up there." Said Teru. He was not going to wait and see if Shigeko came tumbling out of that tower next. No. Just no.

"I'm going with you." Said Ritsu. Rei had let go of him, that meant that she was better, and now he was free to save his sister like a good brother would.

"Ritsu! No!" said Rei. It had been a split second decision, friend or boyfriend, and she had chosen her boyfriend. She didn't know if this made her a bad person for putting her boyfriend ahead of her friend, she just knew that she could not lose him.

"Ritsu, stay here and keep the others safe. If I'm gone then you'll be the only one who can protect them." Said Teru. He was getting looks from those Scars but he did not care one bit. Ritsu was the only one there that he trusted to keep the others safe. They may not have all been, or at least he may not have been, bestest buddies for eternity or anything like that but he was not going to have anything bad happen to them. No. Nobody else was getting hurt…besides that boss guy.

Teru took a step forward when he was shoved back, hard, hard enough that he had almost lost his footing.

"Stay here…stay here and keep the others safe." Said Reigen

"Excuse me? No. There is no way that I am just going to sit here and let you-" said Teru

"If I don't come back then you…then you go, ok? But let me try first. I'd rather…I'd rather Mob lose me than you." Said Reigen choosing his words very carefully. He didn't know what he could do but he knew that he had to do something. This was who he was, Reigen the bullshitter. Reigen the guy who went through life on his wits and luck. Lucky enough to have Nob walk into his life all those years ago and clever enough to keep her…and now it was time to be clever enough and lucky enough to save her…somehow…

It would have been so much easier if he'd had actual powers. Something like those other people could do. Fly, break things, hell even mindreading would have been useful! But nothing. He had nothing. He couldn't…he couldn't even stop that mini boss all the way back at that alley without help…no. He was thinking like those other espers, the ones he had lectured ages ago back when this whole mess had started. He was thinking in terms of his powers. He needed to do what he did best…adapt and improvise…

He saw a glint of something metal catch the dying sunlight.

He could…he had never done anything like that in his life and videogames did not count. Light guns were not real guns…and he didn't know if he had it in him to…no. Better him than one of the kids. Better him than one of those Scars who he still didn't fully trust. He would…he would save Mob…by any means necessary….

"Hey, Four Eyes, you got a second?" called Reigen. He was given a quizzical look, one that got only more and more quizzical as he tried to explain his plan. A stupid plan. The stupidest of plans. Apparently Four Eyes the Samurai had tried something similar years ago and he had failed. Apparently, according to a small little eavesdropper, the only way to truly hurt the boss was to take him by surprise. Well then, that was fine. He knew that he wouldn't win in a head to head fight.

But he was not above fighting dirty if he had to.

Mob thought that force choking someone counted as fighting dirty.

Also she didn't much like being force choked. She was being lifted by her neck, she was kicking out her feet even though she knew fully well that she could fly, but right now all she could focus on was getting out of this. She lashed out at him with her powers but he was strong, so strong, stronger than anyone she had ever faced before…

Aside from Mogami.

And she had not been able to get away from him either. He had pinned her down and broken all of fingers and taken away all of her powers. She had been helpless in that world but she was hot helpless too. She was Mob, here, and she had her powers and her powers were not the end all be all but she was still strong. She was stronger than this. She was stronger than being force choked while she kicked in the air like she was helpless.

She was not helpless.

She caught sight of her head in the windows all around them. She was turning colors and she was kicking and…and he was holding her up with one hand and keeping his son pinned up against the wall…and he was kicking the air and turning colors too…he was hurt…she was hurt…she could see it all in the windows around them…

She pulled against the glass. She pulled until the windows shattered and the shards flew in from all directions. She had been too distracted to put a barrier and felt a cut across her face as well as a few across her arms. She had been too distracted to put up a barrier…but he hadn't.

He let her go, though.

"You are so boring. Tell me, are you ready to give up yet?" asked Suzuki as he let the girl catch her breath. He let Sho down, too. He wasn't looking too good and Suzuki may have been upset with his son but he didn't want the boy dead.

"N-No….I won't give up. I won't join you…but I want…join me. Please. You…you're only like this because you never had anyone…" said Mob. She climbed to her feet as she said this. She knew what had to be done but…but she didn't want to do it. Shigeko was another story entirely. Shigeko wanted to peel this guy like a grape. Mob felt bad for him, if anything. This was not his fault…some of it wasn't. She could…she could help him rather than hurt him. The truth of her charm was in her kindness so she just had to be a good person….and a good person at least gave him a chance…

Mob had to be a good person.

If Shigeko wouldn't.

"I've never needed anyone. I am whole on my own. I'm not weak, I don't need anyone but myself and I never have. Even among those blessed with esp I have always stood above everyone else. I've never had need for others, never cared for others, because I am myself. I don't understand you at all. You're so much like me-" said Suzuki

"You and me are not alike. We're like night and day." Said Mob reflexively. She didn't want to be like him. She didn't want to be capable of this, of anything like this. She wanted to believe that she wasn't, anyway. She could have so easily become this….

"Aren't we? We both possess the same ability it seems. The same level of power. But having this much power can be such a burden." Said Suzuki

"You're the one who's burdening himself. Nobody told you to do any of this!" said Mob

"Nobody needed to tell me to do this. It's my destiny to rule the world. I've had the world in the palm of my hand since middle school, when I was the same age as you and Sho and I started to come into my own. Even amongst those blessed with the gift of esp I have always stood head and shoulders above everyone else. Once I realized that no man could ever be my equal, that I was truly alone in the world, did I realize that it was my destiny to remake the world as I saw fit. To remake the world in my image. To remake the world for us, people like us, our kind….with myself as it's ruler." Said Suzuki

"Having psychic powers does not give you the right-" said Mob

"You think that I don't have the right but I think that you've got it wrong. I have the right because it is my destiny-" said Suzuki

"You sound really crazy right now. If we're talking about destiny then it's my destiny to stop you. If you're going to act like a supervillain then I'm going to be a magical girl and I'm going to stop you. I don't want to have to fight you but if you don't stop this then…then I guess that I have no choice. I don't want to fight…fighting is so stupid…" said Mob. She held his gaze. He held hers right back.

"Ritsu's big sis…just do it. Just do it already, I know you can…" said Sho. He didn't know what it was that he was telling her to do, or maybe he did and he just didn't want to say the words, but he knew that this was unsustainable. Dad needed…dad wasn't going to stop no matter what Ritsu's big sis said to him…

"My name is Mob. Kageyama Shigeko, but everyone calls me Mob." Said Mob. He should know her name. She was Ritsu's older sister but she had a name…and she didn't know why it bothered her that he didn't know her name. Maybe it was because she knew his. Maybe it was because she felt like she understood him and because she understood him then she ought to have known his name and he ought to have known hers. She understood, maybe, how it had felt. He must have been afraid of his dad for a while, and for good reason, just like Ritsu and the rest of her family had been afraid of her, too, and also for good reason.

"Your mindset makes no sense. Mob. A background character. How could someone with your abilities live your life like them, the powerless ones around us? You poor, misguided, child. You could have been something great, you know, if you hadn't let others influence you like this." said Suzuki. He stared at her. He saw so much of himself in her, not physically, but metaphysically. The duality of her existence. The emotional instability. If he hadn't know any better that could have been his daughter. But she wasn't. She was near Sho, now, and there was not a lick of resemblance between the two of them. Sho was a smaller version of him but this girl seemed to be every single woman in Japan, every single common feature, made in miniature.

When this was all over he'd have to figure out where she came from.

There would be time for all of that when she gave it all up and joined his side. She was hurt, had been hurt, and could not stand to take much more of it. He just needed to beat some sense into her just like he had Sho and just about everyone else he had ever had to correct. That was the only way people could learn, and she would learn, and she would be great. She would be someone worthy of this new world that he was going to create.

"I could say the same about you. You could have used your powers to do so much more than this. You could have used your powers to help people but instead…please. Please just stop this. You've never had anyone, not a single friend, but I can…I can be your friend…please…" said Mob. She held out her hand. She didn't much want to be friends with this man, well, obviously someone had to! This man had gone his entire life without anyone in the world to be his friend, to tell him when he was acting crazy, and now he had ended up like this! Everyone, almost everyone, deserved another chance if they were willing to change…

Please, please change.

Because I don't want to hurt you.

"Heh. You want be a shoulder I can lean on? You're honestly offering me our hand? I could do the same for you, you know. You need it more than I do. Look at what you've become." Said Suzuki

"No! You look at what you've become!" shouted Mob. She shook in place, then, as Shigeko tried to take over. There was a burst of blue and Shigeko tried to take over, and a burst of pain as well, as she fell to her knees into the broken glass…just like…

But this was not that.

She was not helpless here.

And she knew what had to be done.

"Just finish him off! You can't talk to him! He's completely lost his mind! Just end this already!" shouted Sho. He grabbed his side as he shouted. That hurt. A rib was contused if not broken. That was fine. He didn't care what happened to him at this point.

"Sho, you really should stay out of this. You've failed at this little rebellion of yours just as you've failed not only yourself but me as well. To think, I was thinking of letting you inherit the world I was going to take over…but you've become such a failure that I cannot allow that to happen." Said Suzuki. Sho looked like he was in pain, more so when Suzuki told his son exactly what he thought of him. The boy deserved it.

"Hey! Don't say things like that to people! IT ISN'T NICE!" said Mob/Shigeko. There was a lot of Shigeko there. They were not sharing, not being this thing together, but fighting for dominance. Shigeko had tried to destroy him, send a blast of power so strong that it blew out part of the floor, and Mob had only been trying to immobilize him…

It didn't matter. There hadn't been so much as a single scratch on him.

"You're angry on Sho's behalf. You are such a child." Said Suzuki. Well now this was interesting. He could get a better read off of her when she was like this. There was the division of her metaphysical self, worse than even the cracks that existed around himself, and she was so unstable that…that was an interesting way to awaken. She was trying her best not to but he could see the colors in her aura changing….

When he awakened he just sort of…he didn't even know what happened. Usually he awakened, blacked out, and then when he came back people were dead and he was naked. She seemed to have…that was a big crack through her metaphysical self. It looked almost like she had a…conjoined twin? Another being sharing in her aura and vessel…

Fascinating.

He wondered what she was like when she came apart.

"You need to shut your mouth!" said Shigeko/Mob. Mob could feel herself sinking farther and farther into her mindscape. Shigeko was…she was going to do what needed to be done. Shigeko wasn't afraid to do it, she wanted to do it, actually. She wanted to because…because the last time they had hesitated they had been trapped in the unreality…

They hadn't been able to break Asagiri.

So how were they supposed to kill a man?

"Ready to fight me for real? Well come on then, you amusing little girl, show me what you've got!" said Suzuki before he launched himself into her so fast that it could have counted as teleportation. His fist connected with her face and gave off a deafened crunch. She staggered back, she was a tough one, she he delivered another hit to the back of her head.

She bounced when she hit the ground.

Sho attempted to stop him. He said something about it being wrong to hit girls. He was so myopic, so was the girl, they'd do well together. As annoying as this girl was she was also amusing, in her way, and she had potential. Once she got some sense beaten into her. Good thing that she was as tough as she was, this could have killed a lesser esper. She made no move to attack, so boring, but she did try to go hiding in her shell.

Her movements were slow.

And her barrier was weak.

Her mouth was moving and her eyes were closed. It looked like she was trying to say something…he pulled her closer by the front of her shirt. There was the sound of cloth ripping. He may have pulled too hard. It didn't matter. Even if she hadn't been a child he wouldn't have cared. Not in this context, anyway. Had she been a grown woman he may have shown more mercy. She could have been the next Masami, to him, nobody else could have even come close to being worthy of him.

He was forty six. He was not waiting another however many years for this child to stop being a child.

"What are you even saying?" asked Suzuki as he held her at eye level. She was limp, now, like a doll. She looked somewhat like a doll, even, a broken one. He watched her lips. She was saying her name over and over again. Mob. Then Shigeko. Then Mob again. Her face went through two expressions. A non expression and then one that looked like pure rage. Her aura churned. He just watched her for a moment.

Placid face, placid pink aura.

Angry face, angry blue aura.

It was like she was two separate people. That was impossible. Two souls could not be housed in the same vessel, they would end up destroying each other. A soul could not be split in two, either, without the person being destroyed too. There had been a lot of work on the nature of the soul that he had discovered. The Rising Sun Spiritual Association may have been made up of weaklings but they had done some top notch research in the years they had been existing.

She would be a fascinating addition to the organization. Her power, her duality, all of it. Once she gave up, if this wasn't her giving up already. This would all be perfect, once he was done with her. The world in the palm of his hand, the next generation and the one after that secured, and a chance to just…rest…already. It had been a long twenty years but it looked, finally, like it was coming to a close.

A subtle shift in her aura.

Yellow. Not his. Pale custard yellow, the same kind as could be found in Chinese steamed buns, an underrated omelet pairing but one that he would be introducing to the people once he came to power, was working it's way into her aura. He had never seen anything like this before. An aura in three colors. How was this girl even alive? He watched her, the way her lips moved, the way her face moved, the way her aura moved. He watched her as if all of the answers could be revealed if he just observed her for long enough. It was easy to get lost in her, this strange girl that he somehow spent her entire life escaping his notice. Of course she had, she seemed to live to escape notice.

Mob, she called herself.

Someone unnoticeable. A background character. Well she was noticeable, she was being noticed, he was noticing her.

"Don't move."

And nothing else, apparently.

There was a man there, now. A man with no…he had an aura…a faint one but…yes. There. He had bonded his aura to the girl's. Ah, yes, so that was what that was. A trick. A sly trick but one a bit too intimate for Suzuki's standards. His aura was his soul and his soul was who he was more so than his vessel, even. This man was just so brazenly mixing himself up in this girl without a care as to how is looked or felt or anything.

A cheap tactic.

But it was working. He had managed to hide his presence from Serizawa and Suzuki himself. Such a clever trick from that man…a shaking man in a cheap suit. A man young enough to have been his son if Suzuki had messed his life up terribly at some point in his late teens. This man looked terrified. He felt cursed….no…that wasn't a gun at all. That was one of Sakurai's toys. Another defected Scar. A defective, defected, Scar. So many people had betrayed him…

"Mob, you still alive?" asked Reigen. He tried to keep his aura as close to Mob as she could. The good news was that she did not feel dead. Her emotions shifted between hopeless despair and burning rage. He tried to smooth her out, give her some of what he was feeling, because he knew that he was feeling enough fear for the both of them. He knew that he should have gone with her.

He could have done…something.

Anything! Anything that could have stopped her from…from whatever had happened to her. She was bloodied and bruised and her shirt was ripped and there was another kid there, too, sitting against a wall and struggling to breathe…and this situation had gone so far south and it was ALL HIS FAULT!

"Wh…what?" gasped out Suzuki. He dropped the girl and took a step back. His aura was moving, now. Tendrils of yellow, his own and…and another…were infiltrating his aura like roots…no…they were expanding to look like something closer to a circuit board than a plant…and he knew what would happen if it kept on expanding.

He would short circuit.

He would awaken.

He would explode.

And everything that he had would be lost! Twenty years would go right down the drain because he could not control his powers! But he could! He had to! He was a grown man, now, not a child! He had exorcised most of his emotion ages ago! But now…he was shaking and the tower was shaking and there was some kind of powder, oh, that powder had been broken glass and he…and he hurt…and all of that energy that he had taken in was threatening to…to…to…

"Mob. I don't know if you can hear me but I need you to stay perfectly still for a second." Said Reigen. These powers weren't useless after all. Mob was stirring, trying to get up, but she was still so out of it…and he needed her still. He needed to line up his shot. This was heavier than a light gun, and not made of plastic, and he wasn't shooting at digital zombies in an arcade or pixilated ducks on his old TV, no, he was shooting a human being.

If he could even call this man that.

He had hurt Mob. Badly. Mob did not deserve that. She was everything in this world that was pure and good and right made into flesh and put in a school uniform. She was not built for fighting, and she had lost, and lost badly. Now she was hurt. That was what he focused on, the fact that she was hurt…

And the fact that it terrified him.

Mogami had been a wakeup call for him. Mob was not invulnerable. She was not the strongest being in this world. She could get hurt the same as everyone else provided that her opponent was strong enough to actually do some damage. Her opponent, here, had been strong enough to hurt her…and he had hurt her…

And it was terrifying.

Which was perfect.

That guy had dropped Mob and now he was staggering back and muttering to himself. If he was anything like Mob then he was trying his damnedest to stave off an explosion. Good. Well not the part about exploding but the distraction that it caused. Reigen lined up his shot as best as he could. He hadn't thought that he would ever be in a positon to kill a man in cold blood, if this counted as cold blood because he certainly did feel cold on the inside, but here he was. About to kill a man.

With a curse, not a bullet, so it felt a little more ok and he felt like less of a hypocrite. He had told Mob not to point knives at other so, ostensibly, that would also apply to actual weapons like guns.

This was for her own good. This would put an end to all of it. The kid had told him that the trick to landing a hit on this guy was to wait until he was distracted. Well he seemed pretty damned distracted to Reigen. He looked about ready to piss himself. Good. He deserved it. He deserved everything he got.

He took the shot.

It hit.

"Fuck!" said Suzuki. He never cursed or made exclamations of pain but this…what was this? It clung to him. Inky, black, and gross. So gross. Disgusting. Vile. It was attempting to bury it's way into his vessel, into his aura, into his metaphysical self. He…he needed to think about this rationally before he lost all control. He took stock of the situation.

He had been cursed.

There was a man standing there with a gun.

And the girl was coming out of whatever trance she had been in or whatever.

The man shot again but this time Suzuki was ready. He had himself under control. It had taken less than a second to expel the man from his aura once he had realized that he had wormed his way in, a vaguely violating feeling, and also to set his own self into something resembling order. It had helped that the man had been distracted. He had looked like he was about to be physically ill.

From fear.

And disgust.

Feelings that Suzuki knew were not native to him. He deflected another shot. Then another. And another. He wondered how much of himself Sakurai had put into Jugan, how many shots the man had before he had to start expending his own power…or the girls. It seemed as though they had some sort of codependent symbiotic relationship going on….

"Sakurai's Jugan. Did he tell you that it doesn't work on me?" said Suzuki as he brushed off the last of the shots. He stepped over the girl as he got closer to the man. His hands shook…and then they didn't. Once he knew what he was looking for it was easy to exorcise it. His emotions. His own and the man's.

"Worked pretty well a second ago." Said Reigen with confidence that he did not possess. This would have been the time for Mob to run away. He was buying her time at this point just as he had back at the Seventh Division…and she hadn't run away then, either, now had she?

"You took me by surprise. Impressive but it won't ever happen again." said Suzuki before he crossed the distance between them and held the end of the gun.

"W-What are you-" asked Reigen. That guy had teleported right in front of him! What the hell ever happened to personal space?!

"Nothing you try will ever work on me again." said Suzuki before he wretched the gun from the man's hands and threw it away behind him. He heard it hit the ground with a metallic clang. The man was stepping backwards now.

"Wanna bet?" asked Reigen. He threw everything he had into his aura, into making this man feel every single ounce of terror that he felt. He thought about his own death, Mob's, the deaths of those kids down there. He thought about negative bank account balances and overzealous tax inspectors. He thought about low grades and loud shouting. He thought about being small, so small, and being so afraid not having any way out…kind of like now…

"It's funny that you think you're going to win this fight when your strongest attack is your own fear." Said Suzuki as he gathered pure energy on the tip of his finger. See how this man liked being shot out. This wouldn't be a curse, of course, because Suzuki had no reason to use that technique…and also he couldn't…but he didn't care about that now. No. He had someone new to take this out on. To teach a lesson. To beat some sense into.

The man was in front of him one moment and then the next he wasn't.

"Master!" shouted Mob as she moved faster than she ever had in her entire life. She threw herself forward and grabbed Master Reigen and didn't stop until there was a wall behind them. She sat on the ground in front of him with her arms out to protect him. Around her formed her strongest barrier, the one that looked like crystal, and in her hand was a gun. A real gun.

A really gross feeling gun.

But a real gun none the less. Not a Wii gun, not an arcade light gun, and not the kind that they had at the summer fair that shot water. No. There was a real gun in her hand and she…she didn't want to do it but she was going to have to…for Master Reigen.

Who should not have been there!

"She calls you Master? I suppose that makes sense. What a pair of fools you make." Said Suzuki as he took in the pair in front of him. She was defending this man. Master. Her Master. Amusingly absurd. That man was little better than one of the awakened and yet she was there, the child that claimed to everyone she met that she was a pacifist, clutching a gun in her hands and looking like she was trying to talk herself in to shooting him.

If she had to talk herself into it then she wasn't going to do it.

"Why are you here?! What did you think that you were doing?! What were you trying to do!? Answer me Reigen Arataka! Answer me! ANSWER ME!" shouted Mob. Her voice hurt her throat as she shouted but she had to shout. She had forgotten how to use her indoor voice. She had forgotten a lot of things, like what true terror felt like.

This was not the place for him.

He had almost died! And now that was all that she could think about. She didn't care at all what happened to her as long as it meant that he got to live!

"I'm here to save you, now give me the gun and run away." Said Reigen as he tried to pull himself up. Her barrier shifted as she stood, not as he stood, and he ended up bumping his head as he got up. She still stood between him and that madman…who was staring at them like they were animals at the zoo, and she had the gun clenched between both hands.

Both shaking hands.

"No. I told you….Mob told you to run away! What the hell is wrong with you!? You shouldn't be here! Don't you get it!? Don't you!? You're going to die!" shouted Shigeko, for a moment managing to wrestle control away from Mob. In that moment she didn't know if she wanted to kick Reigen, kiss him, or throw him down onto the floor and do a combination of both. That moment passed and soon she found herself back into the recesses of their shared mindscape.

She needed to end this before it got any worse.

"Give me that fucking gun and run! You are not responsible for any of this! Mob…Shigeko…the both of you! Just give me the fucking gun and run away like I've been telling you to-" said Reigen as he tried to pull the gun from her hands. She didn't let him.

It was like trying to pry apart steel girders with his bare hands.

"No. Now stay behind us…Master we have to….but I don't want to…" said Mob as she held the gun in her hands. Drop the barrier. Fire the gun. It felt so gross…and now it didn't…it had been cursed. This was a toy gun. It didn't even feel like metal anymore. Just a toy…

She poured her own energy into it. Just hers. Mob's. She poured her own energy into it along the paths that had been there before from the first time it had been cursed. If anyone deserved to be cursed it would be this guy…though the gun didn't feel gross like it had been cursed at all…no…it felt like…

Her.

And it glowed pink. Bubblegum pink. Not a trace of electric blue.

"Mob…please….just let me handle this…I'm your Master and I am ordering you to…I am asking you to please give me the gun and let me handle this. Please." Said Reigen. His voice went up an octave as he pleaded with her. She was getting ready to fire that gun. She was turning it pink, he had been around her long enough to know what her energy felt like, and she was lining up her shot.

"No. I want to but…but I can't…and don't ask me why. This is just something I have to do." Said Mob as she aimed. The man wasn't moving, he wasn't blinking, he was just staring at her. She stared right back. She tried to tell him, with her eyes and with her aura, that she was serious. She was going to do it.

She didn't want to but she had to.

"Mob, just put the gun down. Please. I…I wasn't thinking straight when I let you come up here and I am so sorry. Just…put the gun down and run away….I'll follow. I'll follow and then we'll…we'll stop at our famous ramen place on our way home. The one by work. We can even check and see if the office is still there…and we'll check the answering machine, too. We've probably gotten a lot of calls for jobs because of all of this craziness. Yeah, how's that sound? Back to work? I know you've missed it…" said Reigen lying through his teeth. He was going to slow this man down long enough to give Mob a good head start. Then she'd run. Then she'd be safe and he'd be…he'd do it for her. Always for her.

"Master…that sounds perfect….after I end this we can…we can do all of that…" said Mob. She was starting to cry. If she didn't win then she would never go back to work again. She would never eat ramen with Master Reigen again. She would never see Master Reigen again. If she didn't do this then he and everyone else she loved in this world would be dead.

"A pair of fools. Take your shot, girl, I dare you to but know that it won't work and if you try, if you don't surrender, you'll put me in a truly foul mood." Said Suzuki. If it didn't work the first ten times why would she think that it would work now?! Such a waste. A waste of potential. She could have been something great, within a few years she could have even been something approaching his equal, but now she was nothing. A scared little girl in her school uniform protecting a shaking man in a cheap suit.

What a pair of fools.

"I don't want to! I don't want to hurt you or anyone else! Please, just stop this already!" shouted Mob

"What, and take your hand?" laughed Suzuki bitterly.

"Yes! Take my hand and leave all of this behind! Please! Please show me that there is something inside of you that is good! I don't want to shoot you! I don't want this gun! I don't want these powers! I don't want any of this! Just please give me a reason not to shoot you! Show me that there is something good inside of you even if it's just something small! Please!" shouted Mob. She shouted so loudly that her throat was raw. She shouted so loudly that her ears were ringing. She shouted so loudly that part of the tower window crumbled away and now it was cold, even colder than it had been before, because she could see people's breaths now including her own, maybe, or maybe she was just imagining that and-

"No. You take my hand. Take my hand and let me help you. You've been letting others hold you back for far too long. Mob. Haven't you ever wanted to be more than that? More than a background character? More than what people, what that man, wants you to be." Said Suzuki

"I…I am Mob. I want to be Mob. I…I want to be who Master Reigen wants me to be." Said Mob, her grip on the gun slackening and her arms wobbling and her legs trying to give out.

"Mob…no. Don't be who I want you to be or who he, especially not who he, wants you to be. Be who you are. You're special Mob…everyone's special…and if everyone's special then you can be who you want to be. Your life…your life is your own." Said Reigen. He reached over and tugged on her braid with one hand and reached over to push the gun down with the other. His fingers burnt as he touched it and he hissed.

So did she.

And so did that madman.

"That's a clever trick you've got there. So you're also someone who tricks others and steals from them. Interesting." Said Suzuki as he flexed his fingers. No damage. None. That man could transmit physical sensations as well as emotions. Weak but useful. Intrusive. Intimate. Nightmarish, even, under the right circumstances.

"You know, I feel sorry for you." Said Reigen as he took a step forwards, in front of Mob. She had lowered the gun about halfway. That was all. She was still on this….but he had this. He would do this for her. He was someone who lied to others, who tricked others, and now it was time for the biggest trick of his life.

The greatest psychic and rising star of the twenty first century's, the Great Reigen Arataka's, final performance.

"Master….?" Asked Mob softly

"When I say so, drop your barrier. I need you to trust me here, Mob." Said Reigen softly. He saw her nod out of the corner of his eye and her barrier shook.

"I trust you." Whispered Mob. She trusted him with her life. She was his student, he was her master, and she would trust him with her life. Even though he still felt kind of scared. Even though he was squishy. Even though that man was as strong as she was, if not stronger, and he had scared her so badly and hurt her…

She had to believe in Master Reigen.

Because he was Master Reigen and if she didn't believe in him then who would she believe in?

"You? You feel sorry for me? Why? What reason could you possibly have to pity me? And don't tell me it's because I don't believe in the invisible bonds that people form with one another." Said Suzuki. Whispering. These two were up to something. He'd see how this played out. Who knew, maybe they'd pull another one of their clever tricks. They were master and student after all.

"You say you don't believe in the invisible bonds that people form but, really, if you ask me it seems like you only believe in that which cannot be seen." Said Reigen taking a step forward. Her barrier shuddered as it expanded to follow him. She stayed put. Good.

"So you want to talk about philosophy now?" asked Suzuki with a quirk of his eyebrow.

"In a way, yes. Our differing philosophies. I feel sorry for you, for the way you see the world. Esp isn't the only extraordinary gift that a person can have, you know. Off of the top of my head I can think of…one, two, three and…four. Four ways of defeating you." Said Reigen counting out on his fingers. He felt Mob's barrier shift again. He focused on her. If this was going to be the last memory she had of him then she was going to remember the Reigen Arataka she had first met, the one she wanted him to be. The showman. The Great Reigen Arataka. The one she had followed since she was eleven. The one she had thrown her lot in with. The one that she may have, possibly, fallen in love...like…a school girl's crush, with.

"Oh, really? Alright then, let's see these four ways of defeating me." Said Suzuki placidly. Flat. The fact flat of the situation. He was curious. Maybe this man was bluffing. Maybe he had a clever trick up his sleeve. Or maybe Suzuki had spent his life wishing for a real opponent.

"Nah, I don't really feel like it. It was a lot of stairs, you know, and I smoke about a pack a day so, yeah, maybe later…but I do have a request." Said Reigen

"Do you honestly believe that you're in any position to be making requests?" asked Suzuki

"Maybe. You seem like an intelligent man. I mean, come on, you couldn't have spent what must have been decades building up all of this if you were an idiot. No, I think that you'll find my proposition to be favorable to the both of us. That is, if you're amicable to hearing it, of course." Said Reigen. He could feel it, Mob's confusion, which was good. He was selling it. Mob knew him, that he was a liar, so if she believed him then he must have been selling the biggest load of bullshit that he had ever sold in his life.

"Go on." Said Suzuki

"Let me join you." Said Reigen

"And this benefits me, how?" asked Suzuki. He was not that desperate for manpower….but this man was interesting. So was the girl. The girl was a gem, a rare gem pulled from a pot of dirt. The man was the pot of dirt that he pulled her from. Still, though, the man's power set was very uncommon and the girl did hold him in high esteem…but he had also stood against Suzuki.

If he was going back to the drawing board, it wouldn't be with those who had opposed him.

"With me on your side I can easily convince my disciple over there as well as the people on the ground to give up. That should be reason enough." Said Reigen as he took another step forwards. Mob's barrier expanded again though she stayed put. He risked a glance behind himself. She was still holding that gun but she had still kept it lowered. That was good. Mob didn't have it in her to shoot anyone.

"I'd like to hear about these methods of defeating me as well. That is, if you actually have any." Said Suzuki. He was not going to let this man join him. No. There were enough turncoats in the organization as it was. After this he'd have to do some more recruiting. It would be a lot easier, now, because he had the world's espers to pick from. No more searching. They'd come to him.

"In that case let me fill you in on some powers other than esp that you don't know about." Said Reigen. He took another step forwards and he heard Mob start to walk. He motioned for her to stop, one of the little signals they have developed for when they went on dangerous jobs. What had passed as dangerous jobs back then. Those were the days…halcyon days. Good days. Days that he was happy to have had with her. She had, for the brief time that he had known her, brought some genuine joy and happiness to his life…and he would be forever grateful to have known her. To have had someone so wonderful, so amazing, in his life.

"Such as?" asked Suzuki

"The first power, and one espers should be especially weary of is…brute strength you moron! Mob, now!" shouted Reigen. For a moment he thinks that Mob isn't going to drop her barrier, but thankfully she does, and the hit he was making landed…

He thought.

He was hitting air.

There had been a loud crack, and a shift in the glass and debris around him, and suddenly he found himself with his back to that guy…that madman…the guy that had given Mob a run for her money…

Another loud bang.

Reigen found himself flat on his back and sliding towards what had, at one point, been a window. Not much of a view from Reigen's positon. Just glass, rubble, and a red haired kid passed out and struggling to breathe. A lot of Mob's energy around, too, and that made him stumble to his feet. That guy was…dead? There was a hole through his shirt and suit coat through which could be seen a charred, black, circular burn…

The room smelled like cooking meat. It made Reigen gag.

"Master! Get out of the way!" shouted Mob. She had accidentally gotten Master Reigen! He seemed…he didn't have any burns or curse damage…that was good…but the other guy was still standing…maybe she had to put more of herself into it, the shot. She had never used a weapon before but…but this felt a lot better than how fighting had felt before.

She hadn't hurt him. The gun had.

You weren't supposed to point knives at others because knives were not for stabbing people, they were tools, but guns were tools for killing people…so this was ok.

"You. You two have put me in an extremely foul mood…and now it's time to disappear. Master and student…how ridiculous…" Said Suzuki. He knocked the girl onto her back with a wave of his wrist before advancing on the man. Misdirection. Clever. Clever by half. It would be such a shame to lose this man and his cleverness, he had been right about most espers being unable to see past their own abilities, but he had done something unforgivable and for that he had to die.

"W-Wait, hang on! Let's talk about this! I give up! I'll do anything you ask!" said Reigen as he was being backed into a window. Mob had fallen and hit her head. She was…there was blood running down her temple. Her head was raw, the side of it that had hit that broken piece of the wall…she was trying to get up…

She wasn't running away.

Why in the hell was she not running away?! Well she was hurt…and she would die. He would die and she would die and that would be the end of them. He was…he didn't want to die but he wanted his death to at least give her enough time to run away. He was old, almost thirty, and they said that by thirty your life was over so….so Mob had to go on living. There were still so many things that she hadn't done, that she had wanted to do, and she…she needed to go on living. He had wasted his life, burnt every single bridge and squandered every opportunity that he had ever been given, so if he died then it would be ok. Not her, in her was a world of promise, and that world would meet it's end with her death.

She could not die.

But she still wasn't running away! Why?! Why did this…what had any of this had to happen!? He just wanted…he just wanted to go home. To take her home and just…just have one more day with her. One more day where they vegged out in front of the TV and watched shows that made his brain atrophy. One more day where they could sit around in their pajamas playing videogames and eating junk food. One more day where they went on some stupid job and she did her thing and he spread salt around and then they got ramen or takoyaki or something else and they just…were. They'd talk about nothing in particular and hang out and go home and just…just be together. That was what he wanted with her.

And now it was all over.

His life snuffed out. His life and hers. His life, a life wasted, and her life, a life not yet truly lived. She had at least experienced true friendship and love and joy and intimacy. She had at least…made the most of her youth…like she had come to him all worried about all of those months ago. Before any of this insanity had even started. When they had just been Mob and Reigen and their world had been small and they had been so carefree…before all of this…

Oh God.

Goodbye Mob. Goodbye Shigeko. Me and you, we had a good run. I couldn't have asked for a better student. I couldn't have asked for a better friend.

Thank you for being in my life.

Their eyes met. Blue met brown for the last time.

I love you.

"Disappear." Said Suzuki. He made a gun with his fingers, concentrated, and took the shot. It would be quick. He had no desire to draw this out any more than it had been already. He had a world to rule and a timetable to keep.

There. It was done.