"Shibuya. Right. I'm The Prince." Neku scoffed, folding his arms. "How do I know you aren't one of the Higher Bastards, coming to torment Josh again?"

The slightly transparent, admittedly breathtaking blond woman who now cradled Joshua in an embrace of flowing satin and billowing silks that were decorated with various graffiti designs and what looked to be the very sunrise peeking from the window chuckled softly, a sound that almost registered as a piano solo.

"You are right to be suspicious, Neku Sakuraba." Her ethereal voice chimed, "I will try not to feel insulted that you would compare me to my Yoshiya's idiotic tormentors. Those pompous fools nearly caused mass genocide and extinguished a Soul that has far more potential than their closed-minded leader, not to mention destroying an entire district!"

Neku started towards his charge, intent on freeing him from what the proxy percieved to be a dangerous position, but Joshua suddenly held up his hand. At the same time, so did the strange woman, and their unison voices said firmly "Neku, wait."

The redhead stopped, open mouthed, until he remembered something Joshua often boasted. The two beings looked at him and nodded, one smirking in that annoying way he often did when Neku had finally worked out something in his head, then they confirmed his thought by saying gently "I am Shibuya."

The boy cleared his throat "So...this is the personification of Shibuya. I mean...you're the personification of Shibuya...both of you."

Joshua leaned back "Mmhm. But while I am completely corporal, this lovely lady is not."

"So...she won't actually stay like this."

"My, my, someone has their thinking cap on today. Shibuya and I have a special kind of symmetry. However, she's never shown herself to me like this before. I must sayu, I am quite pleased."

The woman blushed slightly "My Yoshiya, you flatter me. However, you are not entirely correct. I have taken this form before, though your eight weeks running through my streets for your existence may have skewed your memory, and death also clouds the mind, so I am hardly surprised you don't remember. I used this form to guide you when you were lost in the carnival while you were three. I was the kind woman who comforted you in that terrible storm, when your father left you out in the rain at five. I was also the one who guided you across the threshold of life and death when you decided to embrace what I desperately needed you to embrace."

Joshua looked at the one cradling him and seemed to melt into her embrace, where she began playing soothingly with his ash-blond locks.

"So I did hear a voice...guiding me into the UG. I seem to recall the darkness parting for an outstretched hand. I wasn't afraid...I took it. "

"You accepted me, and I have been guiding you, My Composer. My Yoshiya, as I ever did while you lived. Although, my Yoshiya...you do not make my job easy."

Neku snorted "You guided him, protected him, and to thank you he nearly whiped you out."

"It would have been a mercy." The woman said without hesitation or sarcasm. "I was sick, dying. My notes had turned to sour noise, my melodies and imagination were starting to fade. I was in pain, Neku Sakuraba. I was in agony, and in tears, and my Yoshiya was doing everything he could to sooth my aches and hurts. Nothing he did cured my condition, despite how much Soul he poured into the Music...how much rewriting he accomplished. In the end, he decided to end both our suffering, rather than watch me slowly die an agonizing death."

She turned her full attention to the Proxy and smiled, eyes shining with something akin to radiance of a skyline at night,

"Then came you. We never thought that you, Neku Sakuraba, would actually be the key to our release. My Yoshiya couldn't repair my Music or my Soul because he had lost a bit of his own. He was alone. Alone, he could do nothing. But after the Long Game...he was no longer alone. Our agony has ended because of you, Neku Sakuraba."

Neku pondered this as the breathtaking woman frowned and began to fade in and out. "It seems, My Yoshiya, that the Melody I am using toi take this form is nearing the outro. I am glad I got to talk, for a little while."

"We can always talk, my Shibuya." Joshua crooned, "We will play together, in the concert hall. I do have some new sheets I'd like to weave into your melody. I apologyse for the delay in getting them to you. Megumi left much to be redone after he scribbled all over it with his red skull pins, but I've managed to rewrite most of the damage."

The apparition tinkled merrily, hugging the Composer close to her chest as she hummed in his ear, "My Yoshiya, you truly have the mind of a protegy, to undo that man's futile attempt at rewriting my notes! Be careful you do not strain your delicate hands, though, My Composer!"

Neku watched the exchange between district and Composer with curious understanding. He decided that if Mister H. was Joshua's surrogate father, then Shibuya herself just had to be his mother. The boy knew of Josh's real parents' take and attitude of their son from talking to Rhyme, and even from Joshua himself. Daichi and Sasha Kiryu didn't love their son as parents should, instead treating him like a commodity, like his value was that of a trophy or trinket. Sometimes Daichi even considered his son a mistake, especially after Joshua began openly talking about the UG. His parents had panicked, but not for his sake. They feared what his strange behavior would do to the Kiryu name, to their reputation. That's when the gloves came off, psychologists and psychiatrists were brought in, pills and tonics were prescribed, and one Joshua Kiryu began the descent into total inward seclusion.

That must have been when the city herself began to raise the boy, although now Neku suspected that Joshua had began retreating into himself and the district long before, his favorite place to run being WildKat, as Mister H. had revealed he's known the ash-blond ever since he'd been nine years old.

The city had provided all of his basic needs, from the food at Sunshine and Ramen Don, to the clothes from Dragon Couture and Lapin Angelique (the latter making a tad more sense now that he knew Shibuya was apparently female), to the drinks of every vending machine in town, to the shelter of WildKat Cafe. Neku would bet that Shibuya provided more for her (then) future Composer than his own mother, and that was something that should never happen to any child. No wonder Joshua chose the city over his family!

"Neku Sakuraba"

He turned to the fading personification of his home and cocked his head. She smiled at him and gave a sigh of aproval and gratitude

"Thank you...for filling a gap in My Yoshiya's Soul. Thank you...for being his friend."

As she disapeared, Neku realized that he never once got tense whenever the woman refered to Joshua as 'hers'.