The Phantom Thieves of New Game+
a collection of Persona 5 one-shots
Chapter Seventee
"Last Surprise"
(A/N: I totally didn't steal...I mean procure this idea from a comment SetantaUntouchable left on Chapter 6 over on AO3. There is no evidence that can be found. I totally didn't change the metadata of the file on my computer to say otherwise.
Also, this chapter might be touching on an "M" rating again.)
It was a few days after Valentine's Day when Akira first visited Haru at her home. He didn't really know why she had called him over, only that she had something she wanted to ask him. When he asked about it over the phone, she refused to answer, claiming it was something that needed to be done in person. After promising Morgana fatty tuna if he agreed to spend the day with Futaba, Akira had made his way to a part of Tokyo he had never been before. Haru met him at the entrance to make sure he got in, and together they made their way to her room.
"So," he started once they reached her room, "what was this super secret thing you wanted me to come over for?"
"Is it wrong if I want to spend time with you?" she asked, causing him to smile.
"Only if it's wrong that I want to spend time with you." he replied, causing her to let out a small laugh.
"Well, there was something I wanted to do with you." she said, smiling at him. "It's something I wanted to do for some time. The fact that I can try it with someone I love only makes it that much better."
Akira felt his mind come to a halt at what she said.
It had to be something innocent. Just like Makoto's text message about leaving the backdoor open for him, it was just strange wording.
Right?
"Umm...Haru..." he trailed off, clearing his throat and trying to shake the perverted thoughts that entered his head. "What do you mean by that?"
"Just like I said, I wanted you to help me with something." she said, still smiling. "I've never done it before, but I figured it would be something we would both enjoy doing."
Does she seriously mean...? Akira thought, shaking his head slightly.
"Well...who am I to say no?" he asked, causing her smile to widen.
"Thank you!" she replied, putting her hands together in front of her chest. "Now, here's what I would like to do."
"So...you're sure it will fit?" Haru asked, the uncertainty and nervousness evident in her voice.
"Of course I'm sure." Akira replied, his voice full of confidence. "I've done this plenty of times, you know."
"I'm glad my first time doing this is with someone that has a lot of experience, then." she said, the nervousness in her voice subsiding some. "Still, it looks too big to fit."
"Again, trust me." Akira said, his voice going soft. "I'm done this before. It may be difficult at first, but once I get started, it'll go in easy."
"Okay. I trust you." she said, causing Akira to laugh slightly.
"You ready to start?"
"I..." she trailed off for a moment. She took a deep breath and nodded her head. "I'm ready."
"Okay. I'm going to put it in now." Akira said.
Slowly, he brought the armor's hammer down on the pin of the Milkor's trigger assembly, starting to drive it in.
"You see, you want to start off with slower hits to make sure the pin starts feeding correctly into the frame." he said, turning to look at her. "Otherwise, you can bend the pin and be forced to source out a new one. Considering these full metal conversion kits are a niche item for what is already a niche hobby here in Japan, that can get expensive and difficult to find really fast."
"I see." she said, writing down what he said in a notebook. "Still, to think that there are so many intricacies to changing out parts like this."
"Yeah, well..." Akira said, putting down the hammer to look over at her. "It's amazing what you can learn from your hobbies."
"I see." she said, looking down at the airsoft grenade launcher. "Maybe we should immigrate to America and try this on the real ones."
"That could be fun." he said, picking the hammer back up before he stopped. He went over what she said in his head again. "Haru? Did you just...?" he trailed off, turning to look at her. She looked up at him and cocked her head slightly.
"'Did I just...?'" she asked back, getting him to swallow.
"You said that WE should immigrate to America." he said, causing her to nod her head. "As in...just the two of us?"
"Yes." she said, nodding her head. Akira continued to stare at her for a moment before her face turned red as the gravity of what she said hit her. "I...I mean...uh...I wouldn't be...um..." she trailed off, causing Akira to laugh.
"Maybe we can." he said, causing her face to turn even redder as she lowered her head. Still, he could see the small smile form on her face.
That was an interesting thought. They could open and run a cafe during the day, and work on modifying whatever gun, airsoft or real, that caught their fancy by night.
Maybe if this is the way out of this time loop, we'll do that.
It was a nice thought, if nothing else.
(A/N: All joking aside, the idea for this comes from SetantaUntouchable's comment on Chapter 06 - The Usual Customer. This one-shot directly (relatively speaking) follows that one.)