A.N. (10/31/21) - Happy Halloween! Double release today, check the next chapter too!
Persona (3) - Revelation
A week passed, and Nagi was still under the care of Officer Kurosawa. Several others had spoken with him over various matters, and Nagi guessed that there was some trouble figuring out what to do with him.
He was still in the same station he was taken to, and at the moment Nagi was staring at several papers in front of him. Since yesterday, he's been taking several tests on various school subjects mainly taught at his level. Right now, he was taking some sort of exam that seemed to be based on the TOEIC test.
Once he finished, he was taken back to his room. And although Nagi never got his scores back, he figured that he did pretty well on his tests. Still, the question was why they were even making him do them in the first place.
A couple of hours later, Kurosawa came into his room with a strange look on his face. Next to him was a man Nagi was somewhat familiar with. If his memory was correct, the man was his handler who helped him take care of various legal matters after his father died.
It was his handler who spoke first. "Nagi, there's no easy way to say this. You've been charged with breaking and entering, and some are even pushing for a charge of being an accessory to attempted murder. Things aren't looking well for you."
"What's going to happen to me?"
"We talked things through this past week with your uncle," Kurosawa began. "And things have already been decided."
"You're going to be on probation," his handler said. "For the next year, you'll be living with someone assigned to you as your probation officer."
"Is that my only choice?"
"It's the one we recommend," Kurosawa said. "Of course, I'm here to inform you of your other choices, but your uncle and I have agreed that this is the best outcome out of all of this. Even though you're young, you're still subject to criminal liability since you're already fourteen."
Nagi sighed. "I'm guessing I'm not going back to Inaba?"
"You'll still be able to go back there to pack your things," Kurosawa clarified. "But by the end of next week, you'll be living with a Hiwatari-san in the Azumano district."
"What about school? Is that what all the tests were for?"
Kurosawa nodded. "You've already been accepted into a private middle school, should you choose to accept this offer. Again, there are other options. But I believe that this would be in your best interest to accept."
"They're willing to accept a criminal?"
"Your probation officer is the commissioner of the Azumano Police Department," Kurosawa explained. "He pulled some strings so that you would be accepted into the same school as his son."
Nagi blinked at that. "His son?"
"Satoshi Hiwatari," Kurosawa said as he passed the file in his hand across the table. Nagi stared at two photos in it, one of a young boy with blue hair and the other of a young man with brown hair and eyes. "He is the adopted son of the commissioner, whom you will be living with as well."
"How long will my probation be?"
"Minimum six months and upward to a year," his handler said. "You will be starting midway through your second middle school year, but we've seen your scores and know that you won't struggle with adjusting to the schoolwork."
"After a certain period of time, people will reassess your situation and see if you'll be able to transfer back to your grandmother."
Everyone grew silent after that, and Nagi was left to decide what to do.
"...all right," he sighed. "It's not like I have a better choice. I'll do it."
"Good," his handler stood up. "Then I'll take my leave here, good day to the two of you."
The man left the room and shut the door behind him. Kurosawa sighed once he was gone.
"I'm telling you now, your case is an unusual one. The place you broke into has very dangerous people in charge of them, and all of them are very interested in you right now."
Nagi raised an eyebrow. "You're talking about the Kirijo Group?"
"Yes," Kurosawa narrowed his eyes. "They forced their hand and made it so that only the commissioner would take you into his care. I suspect that he is partially involved with them in some way, and that screams suspicious to me no matter how you cut it."
That raised several alarms in Nagi's mind. He knew that his actions would garner some retribution from them in some way, but he wasn't expecting this.
"Why are you telling me this?"
"Because," and the man sighed. "I won't be able to meet you after this, and I'm concerned that the commissioner might not have your best interests at heart. There are a couple of rumors about him that have me worried… but nothing strong enough for people to act on."
"Rumors?"
"It's nothing," Kurosawa dismissed. "Anyway, he'll be meeting you first thing tomorrow."
As Kurosawa left the room, something tugged at Nagi's mind. A memory that tried to surface, but eventually the feeling faded away.
Maybe if Nagi had tried harder, he would have realized that the name Satoshi Hiwatari sounded familiar to him.
}-{
Nagi stared at the man that was going to be his new guardian for the foreseeable future. Already, he didn't like what he saw.
"Apologies for the wait."
Commissioner Hiwatari was a young man, not quite old enough to be a parent yet old enough to hold a respectable position in the police force. Making his way into the room, Nagi noted the fake smile he had on his face as he greeted Officer Kurosawa. The smile reminded him of a politician, practiced to look natural but always coming off fake to others despite their intentions. Kurosawa shook hands with him even though he seemed uncomfortable while doing so.
"No problem at all," Kurosawa said.
The two then began discussing something, and Nagi's attention shifted to observing the man who was supposed to take care of him. One thing that Nagi noticed was that Commissioner Hiwatari was carrying a folded newspaper with him earlier. When he shook hands with Kurosawa, he placed it on the table and Nagi was able to read the headlines.
DARK STRIKES AGAIN
A picture of a figure with large wings sprouting from his back covered the front page, and Nagi blinked in surprise at what he saw.
"Have you ever been to Azumano?"
Nagi's thoughts broke when a question was suddenly directed towards him, and he looked up to see Commissioner Hiwatari staring at him.
It took him a while to answer. "No, I've never been near any of the wards around Tokyo."
"It's one of the less famous districts of the Tokyo prefecture that borders the coast," Hiwatari began to explain. "There are a couple of mountains surrounding the area, making it a popular tourist site. But other than that, the only interesting thing about it is the cultural history of the land itself. Although, a lot of the artworks gathered there are mostly foreign works instead of Japanese ones."
He smiled. "In fact, it looks like I'm going to take you home with me today. So I think it would be best if you get the chance to see it for yourself."
Nagi's eyes widened at that. "What? But I was supposed to head back to Inaba to pick up my stuff."
"Ah, yes." Kurosawa coughed uncomfortably. "Your uncle managed to contact us and inform us that he's already packed all the things you would need to move. It's already being transferred to Commissioner Hiwatari's place as we speak."
His uncle had… Nagi agreed that it was most likely something he would have done. The relationship between the two was always strained at best. Even though his grandmother tried to play peacekeeper between them, it always seemed to never be enough. Many arguments happened between the two, and Nagi realized that this was probably something his uncle wanted. Not the fact that he was in trouble with the authorities, but that he was finally leaving his life.
"Is there a message you would like me to give him?" Kurosawa asked. "Due to the terms of your probation, you won't be allowed to contact him after today."
"No, it's fine." He glanced down at his feet. "I have nothing to say."
"Time to go," Commissioner Hiwatari said. Turning to Kurosawa, he smiled. "Thank you for your time officer, but I'll be taking it from here."
Nagi stood up and began to follow after his new guardian as they both left the room.
}-{
A car came to pick them up, and Nagi got into the backseat while Hiwatari chatted with the driver for a second before receiving the keys from him and taking the driver's seat.
"I'll take us back for today," he smiled when he turned to look back at Nagi. "It's going to be a long trip, so I suggest you get some sleep."
Nagi shivered as he heard the other man's voice. Something about it just gave him the creeps, and he tried not to let it show on his face how unnerved with the situation he was.
"Now, I'll say some words before we take off." The older man faced forward and placed in the keys, but didn't turn on the engine yet. "I'm officially your legal guardian. You're a teenager with charges of breaking into a private facility, with pending charges for accessory to attempted murder. And for some reason, several groups of people are interested in your situation. I've been selected to care for you over the next few months to monitor and observe your behavior."
It was nothing Nagi hadn't heard before, but for some reason, Hiwatari's voice carried a presence that made him want to pay attention to what he said.
"I'll be making a weekly report of your actions while taking care of you, but my position makes that somewhat difficult due to my responsibilities. Because of that, I'll be tasking my son to keep an eye out for you. Now, while he may be the same age as you, don't think that this is you getting off easy. Because I'll tell you now that my Satoshi is quite the stickler for rules."
Satoshi Hiwatari, the adopted son of the man speaking.
The engine finally started, and the car began to move. "Let's hope that our next few months together will be a fruitful one, eh?"
"Yes," Nagi muttered.
The car continued to drive on the road, and Nagi felt his body grow drowsy. His mind began to dream, and the memory of a certain event rose to his mind as he slept.
}-{
The memories didn't come back all at once.
Nagi had always believed that the world was strange growing up. Sometimes, he saw a particular brand or a story on the news and found himself wondering why he felt that it wasn't supposed to be like that. Sometimes, he found himself recalling various bits of knowledge that he couldn't recall ever learning in this life.
And then there were the memories. Even though his mother died at childbirth, Nagi grew up recalling the soft love of a woman whose face he couldn't recall. Not just that, but there was another man in his memories as well. The two people in his memories acted as though they were his parents, but Nagi's experience with parental affection was only short interactions with his father whenever he wasn't busy with a business event.
It took him a few years to finally realize what was going on. Slowly, Nagi realized that he was recalling the memories of his past life.
Armed with that newfound knowledge, Nagi finally understood what was wrong with the world around him. Finding names like the Kirijo Group and Destinyland and Tatsumi Port Island and Inaba.
He was reincarnated into the Persona series.
That was why he was at that facility that night. The first thing he attempted to do with his newfound knowledge was to try and free all the captured experimented test subjects caught by the Kirijo Group. And although he managed to successfully free three of them, Nagi realized that in the grand scheme of things, his actions amounted to nothing.
Now, he was forced to move to a city he didn't know but felt was familiar for some reason. The name Hiwatari kept scratching at his mind, like an itch trying to tell him that he should know it for some reason.
.
.
.
It took a while, but finally, the clues began to form together.
A city named Azumano.
Reports on someone named Dark.
The name Hiwatari.
.
.
.
...wait a second.
}-{
Nagi woke up with a start.
"Oh, fuck." His eyes widened. "I'm in a crossover with DNAngel!"
And that was when Nagi realized that maybe this universe was a lot stranger than he thought.
This is the last Persona chapter for now, with our SI going into the DNAngel side of things starting from here.
One thing to note about Commissioner Hiwatari is that he doesn't really have a 'canon' first name (unless you count the mistranslated 'Kei' as his name). Since I'm also going to call his son Hiwatari, it might get confusing for readers. So I'll try to identify the elder Hiwatari with his title of Commissioner to help.