Q: Are the Phantom Thieves just?

[YES] 22.6%

Anon: these guys are in way over their heads

Anon: trying to take on the Yakuza? Hah, good luck

Anon: I believe. You can do it, Phantom Thieves!

Anon: don't know what they think they can do that the police haven't already tried

Anon: isn't there someone else on this case already?

Mishima put his phone down, then looked at it again and put it back down again on his desk. He was this close to pulling his hair out over some of the comments. The Phantom Thieves were taking on the Yakuza. How much more just could it get than that?

Glancing around the class, he thought of what to do after school today but figured he'd most likely end up just going home. But it looked like the day had other plans for him, as Mishima saw Kawakami pointing at him and another student looking his way.

"There? Ah, I see him." The student walked up to his desk. Mishima looked up at the lines in her shirt, as ruffled as ever. She attempted to smooth them out, to no avail. "Hey, there. Yuuki Mishima, right?"

He kept looking up, at her eyes, then suddenly turned away when he felt his cheeks warming up. "It's… Just Mishima is fine."

Was… was she looking for him? "Um, Tengan, is this student council business?" Mishima said.

"It's actually Naegi who wants to see you," Hatsuyo Tengan said. "He didn't say what it was about." It sounded like she didn't ask. Anything Naegi was up to was hardly a secret. "You'll probably find him on the roof." Without waiting for a response, without another word, she turned and left the room like a gust of freezing wind.

Of course, Mishima thought. Tengan wasn't here for him. She was just the messenger. He grabbed his phone off his desk, and his backpack off the floor.

Two scrawny high school boys stood on the rooftop of Shujin Academy, looking down at the courtyard, through the bars and mesh that blocked anyone else from jumping off. Though the barrier hadn't always been there. Every lesson had a tragedy behind it.

A light summer breeze swept over the leaves of the plants that one of the third year students tended to.

Mishima looked all the way down at the guy next to him, Shujin's man of mystery. "Hey, Naegi," he said. "You needed me for something?"

Naegi let go of the bars, rubbed his hands and sighed. "There's something I heard about a few weeks ago. I tried to ignore it, at the time, but I couldn't really forget. Just a few days, it turned relevant…" He pushed himself back from the edge. "It was called Maidwatch. And it led me to you."

A harsh breath stole away any plausible deniability Mishima might have had left. "Ah, that." Operation Maidwatch was, well, it wasn't his idea, but it was more than just teenage boy impulsiveness, it was a genuine investigative effort. Of course. "What about it?"

"I just need someone who was involved. I figured you'd know more on that than I do," Naegi said. "It seems like the kind of thing you'd pay attention to."

Well, that was just great. Now Mishima's was the first name that came to mind about 'Maidwatch' of all things, like a word association test with no sense of decency. What a reputation. Though he had no one to blame but himself.

Naegi's head shot up not much later. "No offense," he said.

"No, uh… Yeah. You figured right."

Up above, a weather vane creaked on its spinning ring.

"So… who?"

He had half a mind to lie about it. To make something up as far from the truth as possible. But he looked back to Naegi, and that snapped Mishima out of it. He found out the Phantom Thieves' identities. Rumor had it, he found out the Principal's secrets. He was even probing the Yakuza's crimes.

Mishima didn't want to test his luck against that. Not with whatever half baked lie he had in mind. "Actually, that'd be me," he said.

Off his reaction, though, Naegi's eyes spinning up as if he was just now piecing it together, maybe it would have been worth the risk. "Oh, cool. So, you're the one to ask, then?" Naegi said.

"Yeah, but, it's not what you think it is," Mishima said, without knowing for certain what Naegi thought it was. "We saw a flier for a maid service and, just… wanted to make sure it was legitimate. That's all it was. Uh, that is, me and the rest of the team."

"The Maidwatch team?" Naegi said.

Damn it. It did have a catchy ring to it. Mishima from the Maidwatch team. He was never going to live that down.

He turned, away from the edge of the roof and looked to Mishima. "Well, that sounds like exactly what I'm looking for," Naegi said. "I've got just the case for you."

Mouth agape, Mishima huffed in shock. Naegi looked serious, neither his tone nor his face betrayed a single hint of any hidden meaning. He knew exactly what Mishima meant, or, he meant exactly what he said.

"It happened a few days ago," he said. "A woman in a maid outfit just showed up in my home. Actually, she was already there when I got back. And I have this inkling I just can't shake, that something's not right. But I can't really place it, either."

"So, you want me to, what? Verify that she's everything she claims to be?" Mishima stepped over to the housing for the school's air conditioning unit, and leaned against the wall. "You could do that yourself, though. Couldn't you?"

Naegi threw his head back. "I mean, yeah, I could. It's just that I have a lot of other stuff going on, too. Looking into a maid service would take too much time."

"Other stuff, huh?" Just rub it in more, thanks.

He couldn't believe it. Here they were, Mishima and Naegi, perhaps the two least interesting people in all of Shujin Academy, and one of them couldn't be bothered with a sexy maid because he had other stuff going on?! Long and drawn out, pure defeat, he sighed. "If you say so, then, what do I have to start with?"

"All I have for you is a name," Naegi said. A glance at the door, no sign of anyone there. "Becky."

"Becky?" He thought hard about it, and he was sure he had heard the name before. Mishima looked down and laughed as he remembered.

"I'm sorry if that's not a lot to go off of," Naegi said.

The very first operation, where Maidwatch got its name. The woman who showed up said her name was Becky. "It's fine. It's good enough." Mishima tried to choke back his laughter. It could be a match, or it could be a coincidence. Ah, he shouldn't have ditched so soon. If he just hadn't chickened out the moment she arrived, he might have an answer already.

But, how many people in Tokyo were named Becky, anyway? And both working as maids? They had to be the same person. "I'll figure it out."

Naegi breathed his relief. "Thanks a lot, Yuuki-"

"I-It's Mishima, actually."

His eyes snapped to him, though Naegi shrugged it off a second later. "Either way. Thanks, Mishima. That's a load off my shoulders. Just let me know whenever you find out." He dragged his feet around, and pushed himself off the parapet and made his way for the door.

"Uh, hey, Naegi?" Mishima said. "Can I ask you something?" He stopped and turned around. "Just, so I can be sure about this, do you want me to investigate this Becky person, or 'investigate' her? If you know what I mean."

"What?" Naegi said. Blank as a slate. He shook his head, held between his hands that tapped on his temples. "What?"

"Wait, you really…?" Mishima dragged his head against the wall. He didn't even think about it that way? No, there was no way the idea didn't cross his mind. "You really don't get what I mean?"

"No, that's wrong!" Suddenly, Naegi was pointing at him. "Believe me, I get it, what I don't get is why that's on your mind."

"It's because I ran into Tengan on the way here," Mishima said. "And Yoshizawa, and Okumura, and it sounded like they all know you and they all talk to you, and I'm here listening to you go on about how another woman isn't worth your time and thinking, how do you do it?"

"How do I do what? Talk to girls?" He walked over to the ventilation housing, and leaned back next to Mishima. "It's not that special. We're talking right now, aren't we? It's no different." Naegi gazed up toward the sky. "Okay, Kasumi and I got started on some pretty dramatic circumstances, but other than that."

"You never worry about sounding stupid?" Even downstairs, earlier today, Mishima could hardly think what to say to Tengan without feeling like he was making a fool of himself.

"I'm sure I say dumb stuff all the time," Naegi said. "But Kasumi still talks to me. She calls me out on it, and, I can appreciate that too. It's worse if you say nothing."

Just go up to a girl and talk to her. He made it sound like it was so easy.

"I think I might know where you're coming from, though," Naegi said. "Back in junior high, there was this one girl I never talked to. Well, a bunch, but mainly one girl I liked. More than liked, too, if I'm being honest. But I didn't say anything to her. Can you guess what happened?" Mishima looked up, but only shook his head, so Naegi went on. "We graduated. We never spoke. We went to different high schools. We never saw each other again, or, at least, I never thought we would."

Mishima looked to the rooftop barrier. One person came to mind. "But you did."

"Only by chance. And even then, only because I opened up to someone else. Well, the bottom line is, girls aren't so different from us, so don't psyche yourself out like they are." Naegi took a step away from the wall. "But, you are still doing the maid-?"

The access door clunked open. Haru Okumura came through, balancing three bottles of soda in her arms. "Correct me if I'm wrong, Makoto, but did you just say 'doing the maid'?" She shambled over to him, nudging one of the bottles out of the bunch. "I think this is the one you asked for," she said.

"Thank you, Haru." Naegi picked up the one she was holding out. "And, investigation. I was talking about the maid investigation."

"That's a new one." Her eyes flickered towards Mishima. "It seems like you have a whole detective agency starting up. Ah, right." Haru sorted the remaining soda bottles, one in each hand, and offered one to him. "This one is for you."

Mishima held his hands tight. "You didn't have to," he said.

"But I did. It's no trouble at all." Naegi tipped his bottle towards him, a go ahead nod. Mishima looked in their eyes, one, then the other, and he took the drink Haru gave to him. They all uncapped and took their first sip together. Afterwards, Haru knelt down by the rows of potted plants. "Of course, I'm sorry to intrude on your conversation, but I do need to finish gardening today. I hope you two were able to have a fruitful discussion while I was gone, whatever the business with the maids was."

Naegi covered his face on his way to the door, without another word but a groan.

Mishima lingered on the rooftop, listening to the sound of water splashing into the watering can, as he walked back toward the edge. He pressed his face against the mesh, and stared down, straight down, where his mind still saw the silhouette of Shiho's body, sprawled out on the courtyard ground.

"One more chance," he said softly. "Just give me one more chance."

But Mishima didn't have to wait. Some people had all the luck. Others had to make their own. He could be thankful, at least, that he learned this lesson the easy way.