Cold.
It's cold.
For some reason, that's surprising, but she can't grasp why.
Well, she can't grasp anything. Or she can't, and then she can. Some part of her knows she shouldn't feel cold because she should feel anything. She shouldn't know anything, either. She is not a being. She is nothing, she is nowhere, she is everything and everywhere.
She can't feel.
So why is she cold?
She wiggles her toes.
She shouldn't have toes.
She doesn't remember anything, but she knows she should not have toes. She should. . . be dead? Perhaps.
Her eyes open of their own accord - she notes that she should also not have eyes - and then immediately shut. It's bright. Or perhaps it is dim, but she is unused to having eyes. Anything is bright when previously there was only nothing. After a moment she tentatively opens them again. She can't make sense of her surroundings, so she looks at herself instead. She's wearing a dark school uniform that feels familiar, but she can't quite place where she knows it from. The waistband holds a flip phone, which doesn't seem to work, so she puts it back.
She reaches up to touch her face, which feels very much like a face should, she supposes. She can't remember what faces feel like, but this is probably it. Even higher, she touches her hair. It feels unwashed and messy, and as she pulls it down she realizes it is much longer than she expects it to be. It reaches her waist, but she expected shoulder-length - for some reason. The lighting is off, but her hair looks a bit orangey-brown. Auburn, maybe? If she had to pick a color, anyway.
Nothing left to be gained from inspecting herself, she turns her attention back to her surroundings. At the very least, she's in an enclosed area. It's very. . . red. And black. She's more of an orange person, herself, but she doesn't think that's why it's so unsettling. There's a blue glow coming from ahead, up a set of stairs she has only just noticed.
Blue is familiar.
Blue. . .
She heads for the blue light because she feels that she will be safe wherever it takes her - though she has no rational explanation for why a color could signify safety. The glow comes into focus as she reaches the top of the stairs, emanating from an equally blue door. As she nears it, however, her entire body screams it's dangerous, so she backs up a safe distance away and looks around this new area.
This is. . .
An entrance to a subway?
Somehow she hadn't noticed it before, although she had climbed familiar stairs to get here. There are more stairs to her left, so she climbs those as well - leading her to an unfamiliar city, doused in red. Nobody seems to be around, and as she tries to wander farther, it just seems as if she stays in the same spot. No sense in continuing to try. Back inside she goes, down the original set of stairs to where she woke up, carefully avoiding the glowing blue door.
Still a subway, but no train, or people. There are tracks that she hadn't noticed before - probably too focused on investigating the glow.
Something glitters close to the track, so she goes over and picks it up. It seems to be a pistol, with the acronym S.E.E.S emblazoned on the side. There doesn't seem to be anywhere to load bullets, though, almost like a fake gun - made of convincingly real metal. It's hefty like a real gun too, so she does not take the risk of touching the trigger. But. . .
She glances at the tracks. They lead deeper. There's no way out up the stairs. She refuses to go near the blue door. There's nowhere else to go, and she doesn't like being a sitting duck. Damsel in distress, she is not. She has a gun. Do damsels in distress have guns? Probably not. She carefully lowers herself onto the tracks, takes a deep breath, and makes her way into the darkness.
It's not particularly scary, she finds. Weird, yes. Distorted, yes. Scary? No. She has a feeling she's seen similar things, because it doesn't affect her. There are weird. . . she expects globs, not that she knows why she should expect moving globs, but instead they are more like. . . mountain men? Men made of mountains, wearing masks. Actually, upon further inspection, they seem to be made out of subway cars. They avoid her as she continues. Actively run from her, even, which makes her feel some sort of powerful, and also gives her a breath of relief, considering she's not actually sure her gun is real.
Eventually, she finds the stairs down. She expected them to go up - though, this is a subway. Going down makes sense. The - monsters? Mountain men? Subway men?
". . . You saw those creatures. We call them Shadows."
Shadows.
The Shadows continue to evade her as she moves down, but. . . well, if they're avoiding her, they can't be too strong, can they? Maybe she should fight them. She aims the gun at one, and click. It does nothing. Great. So her gun is useless. Maybe she should go back up, in case the shadows stop avoiding her as she goes farther in.
But there's nothing up there. There's nowhere to go but further down.
She continues on her path. If this isn't what she was meant to do, she would've woken up somewhere else. Down, down, down, down, down she goes. She rests when there are resting spots - small areas that lack any Shadow activity - but otherwise continues going. The Shadows keep avoiding her.
Eventually, there is a sound. It feels very much like it should signify the Big Bang - the presence of life when previously there was none.
She supposes she counts as life, so the metaphor doesn't quite work, but only after she hears the sound does she become aware of how eerily silent it's been the whole time she's been making her way down. She goes toward the source of the noise, eventually coming upon. . . people in costumes? They're fighting a Shadow - but not the kind she's used to.
It looks more like. . .
"Persona!" calls a girl in a tight red catsuit. A being materializes behind the girl and sends fireballs at the Shadow. The Shadow - which looks familiar in a way that she does not expect it to - responds by knocking the girl down. Backup arrives. The group seems surrounded, and they are not exactly doing well. She could help, but - all she has is a fake gun.
She watches as one of them - wearing a black trench coat and red gloves - points the fakest looking gun she's ever seen and fires. It hits the Shadow. It works, so why doesn't hers?
"I chooseth this fate of mine own will."
What did the girl say?
Persona. . .
She raises the gun to her head. Someone - is that a UFO? - finally notices and calls out in a panic, but now she's sure of what she's doing. "Per. . . so. . . na." She shoots. Someone screams. Messiah bursts forth in all his glory, almost like a long-forgotten friend. "Megidolaon!" she calls instinctively. There are Shadows, and then there are not. She glances at the group. Most look hurt. The catsuit girl from earlier is heaving, but staring at her in confusion. She casts Salvation, which restores the party's health.
She doesn't know how she knew to do that - or how she knew which powers to call upon. She feels a bit woozy.
One moment she is staring at the costumed group, and the next there is a gun pointed at her.
Which. . . yeah, to be fair, she'd be a bit suspicious too, even if she did just save their lives.
"Who are you?" demands the one at the forefront of the group - black trench coat, red gloves, black-and-white masquerade mask. The one who's gun definitely worked earlier.
"I don't know," she replies, because she doesn't, though she hadn't yet thought about it.
"How did you get here?"
"I don't know."
"What is that?"
She looks down at her gun, where the boy is pointing.
"We've prepared an Evoker for you. We'd like you to lend us your strength."
"Evoker," she replies vaguely, a little dizzy. "Summons my Persona."
And then she promptly passes out.
She dreams of clocks, and Shadows, and doors.
She dreams of being everything and nothing, and then not.
She dreams of masks, and red, and black.
She wakes up bathed in the blue glow of the suspicious door, surrounded by the mask-wearers.
"Hello," says black-and-white mask.
"Hello," she replies. She's still a bit woozy, but not nearly as much as before. "Why are you wearing a mask?"
This does not seem to be what he expected her to ask. He replies quickly anyway. "We're the Phantom Thieves." He says Phantom Thieves, proper noun. She can hear the emphasis.
"Phantom Thieves? What do you steal?"
The others mutter amongst themselves, but she's too busy staring at the boy, who glances at his still-muttering group before answering. "Distorted desires, mostly."
Phantom Thieves of the mind, how interesting. "What's your name?" she blurts, with little to no input from her brain.
"What's your name?" black-and-white counters.
This, her mind continues to not supply. She pretends not to notice that he didn't answer her. "I already told you, I don't know."
". . . Do you remember anything at all?"
"Certain things. Mostly related to this. . . whatever this is. Shadows. Personas. My Evoker." She stands abruptly, startling the masked group. She's shorter than black-and-white mask. Well, actually, she's shorter than almost all of them, except the anthropomorphic cat thing, and the UFO girl. "What is that?" she asks, pointing to the cat.
The cat huffs. "I'm Morgana. I am not a cat."
That really doesn't answer her question, but she's not going to argue with it. She's accustomed to strange, after all, even if she can't remember the strange she previously experienced.
(She supposes waking up with amnesia in a red and black world counts as previously experienced strangeness, considering it did happen prior to meeting Morgana the not-cat, but she has a feeling that's not why she's so unsurprised by the whole endeavor.)
She looks around. Her gaze involuntarily lingers on the blue door, but she continues looking around once she notices black-and-white staring at her. "Is there a way out of here? I tried earlier, but. . ."
Red catsuit speaks up. "Would you like to leave?"
She nods, so they start leading her to the red city. A silver-haired little girl wearing blue opens the door and peaks out. They make eye contact, and the girl flinches away, slamming the door as she re-enters the room. No one seems to notice it but black-and-white mask.
You have now entered the real world. Welcome back.
Indeed, the city is transformed to bustling, losing its red glow. She glances behind her. Normal subway stairs. The mask-wearers have lost their masks and outfits, and they appear to be high school students. "Kurusu Akira," black-and-white - the Fool, supplies her inner voice - says politely. "It's dangerous to say real names in there."
And yet he had asked for hers. Red catsuit introduces herself as Takamaki Ann - Lovers, and the rest clamor after her. Sakamoto Ryuji - blond, energetic, loud. Chariot. Kitagawa Yusuke - blue hair, quiet demeanor. It seems familiar, but she can't place the feeling. Emperor. Niijima Makoto - red eyes, brown hair, formal. Priestess. Sakura Futaba - orange hair, purple eyes, nervous. Hermit. Okumura Haru - light brown hair, pink sweater, shy. Empress. And Morgana the not-cat, now taking a very cat-like appearance, but still able to talk. Magician.
"Oh, we should probably give you a name, right? Since you don't remember, you know?" Takamaki says. The others nod their assent and look at her expectantly, so she nods as well. There's no harm in having a name, really. She doesn't question that no one has brought up cops or hospitals - considering the world she was found in. And the Evoker tucked in her waistband. And the fact that she was found by the Phantom Thieves (proper noun).
Okumura looks over her consideringly. "Uhm, is Hanako alright?"
Hanako. . . it's not quite right, but it'll do. It feels close to where she needs to be, anyway. "Hanako is nice."
The not-cat Morgana jumps off Kurusu's shoulder and inspects her. "Gekkoukan High, huh? Is that a school nearby?"
Niijima thinks for a moment, then pulls out her phone and confirms something. "Gekkoukan High School is located on Tatsumi Port Island, a man-made extension of the city Iwatodai. It was built by the Kirijo Group following the destruction of the building before it. It's a very prestigious school."
Iwatodai, Gekkoukan, Kirijo. . . it sounds familiar in the way that Hanako seems close enough of a name, so that has to be the right direction. "Oh! That reminds me!" She takes the phone off her waistband - noting that it seems to be much older than Niijima's - and flips it open. By some miracle, it still has charge, most likely not working earlier because of the strange world she woke up in.
Contacts:
Akihiko-senpai
Bebe
Fuuka-chan
Ken-kun
Kirijo-senpai
Min
Rio
Saori
Shinji
Stupei
Yuka-tan
"I have a Kirijo-senpai in my phone," Hanako notes out loud. She tries calling it, but it doesn't work. "Oh, but I don't think I have service."
Niijima perks up. "There's only one living Kirijo - Kirijo Mitsuru. Perhaps that's our lead."
Kurusu holds a whispered conversation with Morgana and Takamaki. "Right. Ann-chan and I are going to get crepes. Hanako-san, if you'd join us? And anyone else, of course."
Takamaki hits Kurusu over the head. "If you call me Ann-chan one more time, Kurusu -"
He grins at Takamaki and gestures for Hanako to follow. It's not as if she has anything else to do, so she does. Okumura joins them, but it seems everyone else has something to do. Takamaki gives her a jacket to replace her Gekkoukan one since apparently, Iwatodai is nowhere near Tokyo. Takamaki and Kurusu chat amicably the whole way, but Okumura hangs back with her, remaining silent for a while before finally speaking up.
"Would you like a last name, Hanako-chan?"
Hanako ponders this. "No, it's alright. Hanako is good." She wouldn't want to try her luck at finding a similar enough last name to her previous one. Just Hanako will do until she remembers.
Silence again, punctuated by Takamaki laughing over something. Then, "Uhm, if you'd like to use my phone to check your contacts, you can. Since yours doesn't work." Okumura holds out her phone, and once again Hanako notes that it seems much newer than hers. It's not a flip phone, for one. For two, it's much sleeker than any of the smartphones she can vaguely recall seeing. She clicks the phone app and goes through her contacts one by one.
Akihiko-senpai.
We're sorry, this phone number has been disconnected.
Bebe.
We're sorry, this phone number has been disconnected.
Fuuka-chan.
We're sorry, this phone number has been disconnected.
On and on, leaving her to wonder why she has a phone that doesn't work, full of contacts that have since changed their number. She hands Okumura the phone, shakes her head at the girl's questioning gaze, and checks her texts. Either she was the type of person that regularly deletes texts, or she wasn't very popular, because there aren't any.
There's only one photo. It's of a dog.
"Koro-chan, give me your paw!"
Koromaru.
She thinks about the things she has remembered or found familiar so far. Shadows, Personas, Evoker. Gekkoukan, Iwatodai, Tatsumi Port Island. Koromaru. The way she can look at Kurusu's friends and tell what arcana they are. The blue door. Blue. Orange.
Staring at Morgana the not-cat, there is a new third comfortable color. His collar is yell, just as his bandana was in the red-and-black world. Yellow scarf, blue eyes.
"It's like. . . I don't know. . . nostalgia? Have we met before?"
Unlike before, the memory does not bring any new information, really. Yellow scarf, blue eyes, the unsettling familiarity of a being that should not be.
"Have we met before?"
Have we?
She zones out while eating the crepes that Okumura pays for. Kurusu and Takamaki spread out school books and papers, and make a half-hearted attempt at studying while Okumura studies a single neatly laid out notebook. "Exams are tomorrow," Morgana informs her.
It doesn't take long for Kurusu and Takamaki to get distracted. She tunes them out and stares down at her crepes - which she has been eating pretty slowly - while they have a very long conversation about coffee - or something - with interjections from both Okumura and Morgana.
"Is that alright, Hanako-chan?" breaks through her mental fog, and she looks up to see the others staring at her questioningly. Upon realizing she wasn't at all listening, Okumura repeats the question. "I'd like you to stay at my house for the time being. I have the most room, after all."
Hanako nods. It seems fine, anyway.
"Oh, but she'll need clothes, too, right? We should go shopping!" says Takamaki with the excitement of someone who has found a way out of studying. "It could be a fun girl's trip!" She glances at Kurusu, who is barely concealing his laugh. "And Akira, too."
"Hey!" says Morgana."
". . . and Morgana," Takamaki amends.
Once again, it's not as if she has anything else to be doing, so she lets herself be dragged to the nearby mall.
She picks out mostly orange and beige. (Orange is her favorite color, she reminds Takamaki. It is one of the few things she knows about herself.) Takamaki makes her try most of it on, and she finds it is the first time all day she has seen her own reflection.
She looks. . . older than she expected. Not like a high-schooler, more like a baby-faced adult. Orangey-brown hair, red eyes. hair pins arranged to say XXII - though it looks as if they were meant to be there with her hair up, and it's down now, so it's a bit messy. She carefully extracts the hair pins and sets them to the side, to clip to the waistband of her skirt when she's done trying on outfits. The lack of hair pins makes her hair stick out oddly, so she runs her hands through it until it flattens neatly.
She's missing something.
It is missing from every outfit she tries on, yet she can't figure out what it is. She settles for some skirt and sweater combos that Takamaki seems to particularly like. Kurusu drags them to a little knick-knacks store so he can buy a couple things, and then they stop by an electronics shop and buy a phone and temporary SIM card - "So we can update you," Takamaki says - and after some chat ID exchanging, and the return of Takamaki's coat, they part ways.
Okumura lives in a mansion, as it turns out.
Hanako is introduced as one of Okumura's friends. The servants bow politely as they pass, and she's reminded of - well, she can't put her finger on it. Amnesia is the most annoying thing in the world, she decides.
Okumura's bedroom is large and pink. Hanako has nothing against pink - it is second only to orange, after all - but it is a very large room and so a very large amount of pink. It's also covered head to toe in plants. Mostly foods, from what she can tell. They stop in there only for a moment, and then they go to an equally massive guest room. This one is bathed in orange, which is far more agreeable.
"I hope it's alright," says Okumura softly. "You said one of the only things you could remember is that you like orange."
"Of course it's alright," Hanako replies. And it is. Because why would a mansion not be alright? It's a mansion. And the room is orange, which is very much a good color to sleep amongst.
Okumura - Haru, she is eventually corrected - makes her departure after making sure everything is comfortable for Hanako. The stilted, kind-hearted politeness is incredibly familiar, and that familiarity is going to drive her insane.
She doesn't bother unpacking most of the shopping bags, instead just pulling out pajamas and her new phone. With the pajamas on, she feels more herself, even if she's not quite sure who that self is yet. She flops down onto the enormous bed and starts going through the phone.
Sunday
10/16
10:38 pm
Takamaki Ann: hi hanako-chan!
Hanako: Hello, Takamaki-san! Thank you for helping today!
Takamaki Ann changed her name to Ann-chan.
Ann-chan changed Hanako to Hana-chan.
Ann-chan: haha call me ann! or ann-chan like akira does
Hana-chan: Okay! Thank you!
Sunday
10/16
10:40 pm
Sakura Futaba: can i have a list of your contacts? i might be able to find something based on their names and gekkoukan
Hanako: Oh, sure! Some of them are more nicknames than anything, though.
Sakura Futaba changed her name to alibaba.
alibaba: that's fine, i'm a good hacker.
Hanako: Okay!
Hanako: Akihiko-senpai, Bebe, Fuuka-chan, Ken-kun, Kirijo-senpai, Min, Rio, Saori, Shinji, Stupei, and Yuka-tan.
Hanako: That's all I have.
alibaba: okay thankssss
There are other messages, but every exchange goes approximately the same way as it did with Ann. Speaking of the mask-wearers. . . she opens up a search tab and types in "The Phantom Thieves," clicking on the first article she finds.
Thieves or Murderers?
The Phantom Thieves have dropped dramatically in popularity since the death of Okumura Kunikazu on live television only a few days ago. Although there is no evidence besides the customary calling card, Akechi Goro - alternately known as the second coming of the Detective Prince - maintains that the Phantom Thieves are behind the mental shutdown cases, and the death of Okumura as well.
Read more:
Okumura Kunikazu? A relation of Haru's, then. There's no way the Phantom Thieves actually killed someone related to one of their own - or at all, so that tells her almost nothing. She finds an article from much earlier and clicks on that one instead.
The Phantom Thieves: Fact or Fiction?
Following the confession of well-known artist Madarame Ichiryusai, the public is forced to consider: just who are the Phantom Thieves? Originally coming to media attention for the calling card and subsequent confession of Kamoshida Suguru, they were played off as a prank or a targeted blackmail attempt. In the light of this new confession, however, it seems as if the Phantom Thieves of Hearts do just what they say: steal the desires of corrupted hearts. Or perhaps it is a fellow blackmailer hoping to propel the fame of the mysterious Phantom Thieves?
Read more:
Steal their desires? Well, Kurusu - Akira, she corrects herself - did tell her that's what they steal. She supposes she just didn't really believe him much. After all, who's ever heard of stealing the metaphysical. Though, if they're this popular, that's most likely why they were confused when she didn't automatically recognize them when they introduced themselves.
She starts to feel the effects of fatigue so she puts the phone down where it can charge, and gets in bed facing the large window overlooking her.
It's a full moon.
She blinks and for a moment the moon is impossibly big, green-tinged and bathing the room in a similarly green light. She automatically curls up and closes her eyes, and by the time she opens them again the world is back to normal.
. . . She's probably just tired.
She gets comfy and falls asleep nearly as soon as she closes her eyes.
This time, she dreams of an enormous green moon floating above a car wreck on a bridge, a little blue-haired boy shouting her name - a name she cannot make out - and an odd-looking woman standing in front of her. She dreams of full moons, and a different little boy in a prisoner's outfit, speaking of moons and danger and friendship. She dreams of coffins, coffins, coffins -
She dreams of home, which is a dormitory somewhere with faces she can't quite make out laughing and joking as they food cooked by - one of them. It is walking Koro-chan with - someone - and playing with the local kids at the shrine. It is a peacoat and beanie and a face she cannot remember.
By the time she's fully awake, she can't remember what she dreamed about.