"Feeling good now?" Morgana asked.
"Kinda," Joker shrugged. The four teens and a cat marched out of Mementos into the real world and blended into the crowd.
"We have managed to stop an immediate threat to Boss, and also received confirmation that locating us isn't a top priority at the moment," Yusuke pointed out. "We're allowed a moment of reprieve."
"I guess you're ri-" His phone rang, and he pulled it out and glanced at the screen. "Ichiko."
"Who?"
"My friend in the press." He picked up the call. "Wassup?"
"The article's done," Ohya said in lieu of a greeting.
The brunette took a moment to process that sentence before blurting out. "…you're fucking with me."
"You're too young and I'm too sober," the journalist chuckled. "I pulled an all-nighter to finish it, but it's done, it went past the editors, and it'll go up tomorrow. And if I can be humble, it's the best piece of investigative journalism you'll ever read. And your help made it happen."
A grin creeped on the brunette's face. "You have no idea how much I needed to hear that."
"You're welcome." She yawned. "Now excuse me, I'm gonna catch some Zs. Nighty night."
Sae, Makoto, Ryuji, Sojiro and Akechi walked out of the hotel. The goons had reassured them that nobody besides the three of them knew about the meeting, but they remained alert and scanned the surroundings for anything suspicious, just in case. They marched towards the car parked in the side alley and got onboard - the prosecutor in the driver's seat, the president riding shotgun, and the rest in the back.
As the car took off, four people's phones buzzed. Makoto pulled out hers and read the message. "Ooh, the article to sink Shido will go up tomorrow."
"Remind me," Ryuji asked, "if his heart is changed, why are we trying to smear him?"
"To drag his party down by association," Akechi recapped. "If the UFP wins the elections, the remnants of the conspiracy will gain enough real-life prerogatives to cause tremendous damage even without the Metaverse."
"All thanks to you," Sae muttered.
"Really?" The mock shock was palpable. "I wasn't aware. Thank you for pointing that out, Niijima."
"It's just that… I don't know what you're expecting to achieve now," she went on. "Are you really trying to redeem yourself after everything you've done?"
"No." He stared at the window. "Redemption is a story that people want to hear, and like to hear, but it's just that - a story, one that villains use to lie to themselves and people they victimized. And no matter how many lies you tell, you will always be the thing you were before. You can't wallpaper over it with an apology and a dark joke."
An awkward silence followed, before another message arrived. "Joker wants to meet up near the courthouse," Makoto read out.
"Who's Joker?" Sojiro asked.
"Akira. Or Ren, apparently." She put away the phone. "What's the deal with that, by the way?"
"I never asked," the barista shrugged. "He wants to be called Akira, so I call him Akira. And why the courthouse?"
"Because Jo- Akira thinks this situation is, quote, 'too anticlimactic for an ending', so he wants you and my sis to hang out in her Palace long enough to be able to understand Morgana, so that he can be used as a messenger in a pinch."
"Good idea," he nodded. "Him typing his side of the conversation on my phone was a pain."
"…I'm just going to assume you know what you're doing," Sae muttered.
Nobody said anything to that for a moment, before Sojiro piped up: "It's good to see that you're able to work together with Akechi. A display of maturity on both sides."
"To his credit, he's less difficult to cooperate with than we expected," Makoto pointed out.
"There was an argument about him just gunning down the kidnappers, but he got talked out… of… the idea…" Ryuji added, before realizing he probably shouldn't have said that with the adults around.
"Gunning down requires a gun," Sae pointed out, bracing herself for an answer she wouldn't like.
"Well," Akechi looked aside, "I used to have one. A suppressed semi-automatic, currently in possession of the Thieves."
"What would you need a gun for?" Pause. "…I just realized how silly that question was."
"It wasn't actually," Ryuji piped in. "You can use a model gun in the Metaverse like a real thing, Akechi coulda just used one for his wetwork. Hell, when fighting alongside us, he makes do with a toy raygun."
"I've realized that only after I followed you around in the late Okumura's Palace," he explained. "Before that, all I knew was what I had tested myself, and shooting a fake gun and hoping it deals real damage sounds like a particularly silly way of commiting suicide by Shadow."
"Where's the gun now?" Sojiro asked.
"Well, for now it's temporarily in the car boot," Makoto replied. "Unloaded, because Akechi said it has safety issues and fires when dropped."
"Niijima, you're in your mid-twenties," Sae muttered under her breath to nobody in particular. "How come you're gray already?"
"I can recommend a hair dye," Ryuji offered.
"Anyway," the president went on, "initially we kept it where Akechi had left it, in the copy of the interrogation room in sis's Palace."
"Nobody besides us and him can access it," the athlete added. "It's the perfect hiding spot."
"Almost perfect," Akechi said. "Since, well, I can access it, and one could make an educated guess that it's still there. I attempted to retrieve it yesterday evening. I was confronted by the others, leading to the argument Ryuji just mentioned."
Makoto turned to look at the detective in the backseat. "I think we can put the gun back in that room, or somewhere else in the Palace, if you promise to never pull that stunt on us again."
He crossed his arms. "And how much is my word worth?"
"After we talked you down from the kill-everyone scenario, you went an extra mile to not shoot someone, even by accident," she pointed out. "It's worth just enough."
Akechi didn't expect that answer. "V-very well then. I… I promise to not a-attempt anything like that without authorization."
"Without authorization," Sae repeated.
"From what I've noticed, real firearms are much more lethal in the Metaverse than the replicas. I would recommend using what little ammunition remains for sufficient threats."
"We'll keep that in mind," the president said.
Nobody said anything interesting for the rest of the trip. Sae parked the car a block away from the courthouse and the five got off. Makoto pulled out the sports bag from the car boot and the group marched into a relatively tucked in corner, away from any bystanders.
"Alright, what now?" the prosecutor asked.
"I'm taking Boss, Makoto's taking you, Akechi goes in on his own," Ryuji outlined, pulling out his phone. "Don't worry, it doesn't hurt or anything."
After double checking for onlookers, the Niijima sisters disappeared, and then so did the athlete and the barista. Akechi took a breath, braced himself and followed them in. Since the courthouse building wasn't visible from where they were standing, the only change Sae and Sojiro noticed was the detective having his clothes change into the toy soldier uniform.
"What on earth is this?" Sae raised an eyebrow.
"If the ruler of the palace - you, that is - considers someone a threat to them, they appear in a costume not unlike mine." The detective removed his mask. "The exception is Morgana, who appears in his Metaverse form regardless of the situation."
"Either that or everyone's scared of him," Ryuji joked.
"Can it, Skull!"
"Yeah, right, everyone's terrified of a…" the prosecutor turned towards the voice, "…what the heck is that?"
The thing in front of her was, admittedly, vaguely cat-shaped. It stood on two legs, and had a large head with cat ears, and stared at her with its big blue eyes. The bandana around its neck was kinda cute.
"Morgana?" Sojiro, by comparison, was completely unfazed.
"Yep!" He grinned. "Everyone else's already here, waiting by the casino entrance."
And it talks, she thought. "C-casino?"
"Yeah, your Palace is a casino," Makoto explained. "Slot machines, dice games, everything rigged so the house always wins, the whole package. Come, we'll show you."
The group turned a corner, and the adults noticed that the place that used to be the courthouse now looked like something not out of place in Las Vegas, what with the bright lights and gratuitous English. Sae stared dumbfounded at the large neon of Themis towering over them. "Why does she look like a cowgirl?"
"Why are you asking us?" the barista shrugged. "This is in your hea-"
"Sojiro!"
"Dad!"
The man barely managed to brace himself for a glomp from Joker and Futaba. The rest of the group - Haru, Ann, Yusuke and Mishima - walked over to them. "Good afternoon, Mr Sakura," the latter greeted him. "We're glad to see you alive."
He returned the hug and smiled. "I've noticed."
"Welcome!" someone announced. "I'm proud to be the host of this reunion."
Everyone glanced to the side and noticed what looked like a carbon-copy of the prosecutor dressed for a goth-themed formal party.
"Yuuki Mishima, Sojiro Sakura, Sae Niijima," Yusuke pointed at the relevant people, then at the Shadow, "Shadow Sae Niijima."
"I do believe my other self wasn't introduced to that first one," She glanced at a dumbstruck Phanboy. "Take a picture, it will last longer."
Mishima reached for his phone before Haru elbowed him and he recognized the sarcasm.
"What the fiddlesticks is that dress?!" the real Sae blurted out.
"That gives me an idea…" Makoto muttered.
"If I see you wear anything like that, I will disinherit you."
She took off the sports bag and pulled out the gun and accessories. "Can you hold onto it for us? Hide it from everyone until I ask you otherwise."
The Palace ruler smiled. "Anything for my little sister." She snapped her fingers, and a nondescript Shadow in a suit appeared besides her, took everything from the president, and retreated to the casino.
"This solution means that the firearm is kept away, unable to be retrieved by anyone but me," she explained to the group. "Everyone trusts me with that role, right?"
She got nods, uh-huhs and one "unconditionally" in response.
"And, should we need to retrieve it, I can always ask either my sister or her Shadow to give it back or hand it over to someone trustworthy."
"Brilliant idea," the detective nodded.
"Oh, and now that we've dealt with the situation," Sojiro turned to the group, "what was it about trying to shoot Akechi before?"
Everyone sans Mishima and Sae locked up, and the two just glanced at the crowd, curious. Joker's hug became noticeably more stiff.
"That was just a dark joke," the detective attempted to reassure him. "An attempt at affability, to defle-"
"You can't feed me that line when Makoto just handed over your handgun for safekeeping," the barista interrupted him. "Look, I just want to know what happened and why, so that maybe I can step in in the future and defuse the situation before it gets that bad."
A pregnant pause followed. Then, Joker released him, took a step back and started explaining, and the group followed. It was obviously a bit of a mess because of the multiple points of view, and Joker, Haru and Akechi were putting a lot of emphasis on how they specifically were at fault, but Sojiro managed to piece together an accurate depiction of the events.
"Well…" Sojiro glanced at Joker, "do you feel comfortable now, or do you want to leave?"
"I'm fine, I think," he replied. "Just keep me out of that room."
He turned to Akechi. "And you?"
"Huh?"
"I think I have a good picture of how you usually react to being held at gunpoint." He rubbed his eyes. "Jeez, that's a rare sentence. But yeah, with Haru and that stooge, you were unfazed and dignified, and with Akira you were actively taunting him. That's concerning."
"Mr Sakura, if I can ask…" he paused for a moment, trying to figure out a polite turn of phrase before giving up, "…why the heck do you even care?"
"Because you saved my bacon," he counted on one hand, keeping the other wrapped around Futaba - yes, she was still glued to him, who can blame her? "Because nobody seems to mind that I care. Because I don't want to leave defusing your issues to Akira and the others. And because someone has to care and I don't see any other adults around."
Sae ahemed.
"I have over twenty years on you, you barely stand out from the other kids."
Once again, the detective found himself out of words, so he decided to stay quiet.
"Alright then," Joker spoke up, "since we have absolutely nothing to do for the rest of the day, let's go back to Ōta and hang around. Order takeaway, watch movies, kick back after a job well done."
"I'm tagging along," Sojiro commanded. "I feel I should keep a close eye on all of you."
"Yay!" the geek hugged him tighter.
"You are always a welcome presence," Yusuke said.
The prosecutor found herself looking anxiously at the casino building in front of her. "Can I stay behind? I want to take a tour of… this thing."
"Sure!" Makoto said. "I can be the tour guide."
"We'll meet up in the hotel later," Joker announced. "Text me when you arrive so I'll let you in."