Akira leaned against the headboard as he watched his partner sleeping comfortably in his laps, softly combing through her smooth hair as he whiled away the time by listening to her calm breathing. Most of the lights in the cell had been turned off after dinner, save the ones above the table which he usually kept on after sunset so that his cell did not plunge into total darkness.
Mornings after Lavenza arrived had been especially startling. Every waking moment he would be greeted with a pair of golden eyes peering directly into his inky black ones. He had initially assumed that she had just slept later and woke up earlier than he ever did, but only realised later that she had never slept whenever he did, awake all alone throughout the nights.
After many days of trial and error, and dozing off before she did, Akira had finally managed to put her to bed before he fell asleep. Lavenza curled up unconsciously in her sleep and cuddled against his warmth, smiling comfortably as she nuzzled him. Akira chuckled to himself as she's behaving exactly like how Morgana does whenever he sleeps on top of him.
From his understanding so far, Lavenza had explained that the residents of the Velvet Room did not require any of the basic necessities that sustained life, unlike normal human beings. They had no need to eat, drink, breathe nor even sleep, but instinctively still do so to upkeep a semblance to human life. Maybe it's because she was created in the image of a human, that she knows how to function as a human on a basic level. I mean, Morgana surely knows how to cat better than any of us. Akira joked to himself as he tried to erase the mental image of a human Morgana habitually licking himself clean. Even so, he didn't expect that they would have so much trouble trying to make her body fall asleep for the first time.
Being cooped up in a cell gave them both an abundance of time to work with and Akira had taken the opportunity to teach her about things like technology, fashion trends and even current affairs that a resident of the Velvet Room may not be familiar about. It came to Akira's attention that she was rather well-learned regarding to the details that revolved around his life, but her understanding of the rest of the physical world was probably sub-par at best. Magazines, manga, board games, playing cards and even his own school textbooks were perfectly viable sources of knowledge that he could utilise in teaching her anything she did not know and it especially helped that she had a mental capacity that could rival Futaba's, easily absorbing all that Akira taught without the need for him to repeat himself over and over again. Then again, he had made sure that they kept up a casual pace and that she didn't feel overly burdened by the new things she was learning every day. It wasn't as though she was going to have to sit through an examination for this.
The only dissatisfaction that he was feeling right now was that he is currently unable to bring her out to show her the outside world in its entirety. He wished he could bring her to the art gallery at Ueno to appreciate the art pieces on exhibition, maybe she would be totally mesmerised by the stars shown in the planetarium at Ikebukuro or they could even spend an enjoyable date together playing at Destinyland.
Akira sighed in discontent as he carefully slid the pillow underneath Lavenza's head, hoping that he wouldn't wake her up accidentally. Chuckling to himself as she merely mumbled incoherently as she adjusted her head to a more comfortable position, Akira pulled the blankets over them and hid underneath the covers as well. Pushing a lock of platinum blonde hair away from her face and taking one last look at his partner's unguarded sleeping face, Akira closed his eyes and tucked himself to sleep.
Mid autumn, 15th October.
It had been a few days since the psychotic breakdown of Haru's father, President Okumura. The thieves had called for an emergency meeting over at LeBlanc in order to discuss about their current situation. A depressing mood hung in the air as everyone mulled about their current fall from grace, with the public now assuming that the righteous Phantom Thieves had murdered President Okumura after issuing him a calling card. The injustice weighing heavily upon their shoulders and they simply had no way of clearing their names at the moment. Haru arrived at the meeting moments before Ryuji and Ann could further voice their dissent at the public's reaction.
But her arrival only brought the thieves more dire news, leading them to suspect that the current turn of events might have been orchestrated by an opposing faction. Makoto had an impression that they might have been set up by the real culprit, a sentiment that Futaba had harboured suspicion to as well. Akira wasn't ignorant enough to not notice how quickly the metaphorical shit had hit the fan. Considering that events had been unfolding around them uncontrollably recently, his biggest worry at the moment was that the enemy had already ascertained their true identities while staying hidden in the dark.
Makoto immediately regained control of the meeting before anyone got too overly anxious due to their own paranoia. She warned all of the thieves to maintain their everyday façade and to act as normal students for the time being. Meanwhile, she will implement a temporary hiatus to the Phantom Thieves' activities until the upcoming midterms were over, or at least when she has drafted up plans for their countermeasures. Taking this as a good point to end their meeting, the thieves decided to break off for the day and went about their own businesses. Akira tacitly instructed Morgana to see Haru home, making sure that someone watched over her while she faced this ordeal. The cat nodded in consensus and chased after the curly haired girl.
Akira took a quiet stroll around Shibuya after they had disbanded, watching as the crowd mindlessly hustled through the streets. The sky had turned cloudy while he took the train here, with dark clouds threatening to rain at any moment. The white noise from the streets somehow soothed his emotions, flooding his mind with senseless thoughts that distracted him from the current situation. Looking around the busy streets, nearly every store with a television was broadcasting the news regarding the Phantom Thieves and President Okumura's alleged murder. A pang of guilt ate away at his heart whenever the horrible photo of President Okumura's moment of breakdown was shown on the news. He and the Phantom Thieves had reached out and offered Haru their help with good intentions, but little did he expect that they would be the one that had escalated matters even further.
Akira took out his phone and activated the Metaverse Nav, feeling the urge to move his body and indulge in some combat to sate this dark frustration that someone was toying with them. He had barely managed to control his emotion in consideration that the thieves looked up to him as a calm and composed leader, but he was allowed to vent freely when alone and out of sight.
This wouldn't be his first time sneaking off into mementos alone. His initial reasons of coming to mementos alone was that he simply didn't want to inconvenience everyone else while sating his cravings for a little action and exercise. Getting the annoying cat off his back sure gave him some breathing space for time alone.
While his initial trips caused him some anxiety and caution on his part, his latest dives had been more liberating as he had gradually gained the strength to fend for himself. There had been many situations where Akira only managed to escape an ambush with a hair's breath, barely making it back to the entrance with only a few medicine and ammo left. And the Reaper that constantly hunted him down had not been any kinder, constantly pumping bullets at him without a single care in the world. Akira had faced off with it so many times that he practically has its attack patterns perfectly memorised, giving him the courage to stare straight down the barrels of that savage dual-pistols. Fortunately, due to his consistent repetition of such forays within mementos, his strength had grown to a point that the weaker shadows now run away in fear at the mere sight of him.
As his surroundings finished warping and his attire now changed to his sleek Phantom Thief uniform. Akira entered the subway station that would lead him to mementos and arrived at the starting platform, noticing that both girls were outside of the Velvet Room today. The Twins had been in the middle of a conversation when they had noticed Akira entering Mementos alone again. Caroline only made an exaggerated pose as she sighed, as though trying to say that the inmate should know his place. They had witnessed every single time Akira had emerged from the floors below, and the resulting sight was not pretty whenever he had engaged the reaper. Tae had been extremely pissed when he had once stumbled into her clinic with his back laden with bullets, he made the careless mistake of actually healing the wounds without removing the physical bullets and they were stuck inside the moment the outside skin healed over.
"So we meet again, Inmate." Justine greeted as she trotted towards Akira, a faint smile on her face as she looked up at him. "I never expected you to turn up just as when Caroline was asking about you." Her dead-pan tone made Akira wonder whether she did say it on purpose, or was merely making small talk and had a slip of tongue. He could only laugh as he watched the other twin making a shocked expression and quickly running towards them.
"Wha- What are you talking about!?" Caroline shouted in panic as she arrived, but before she could even retaliate against her twin's jest, Akira stepped in and decided to play along with Justine.
"Hmm, did you miss me, Caroline?" Akira teased as he squatted down slightly and patted Caroline on her hat. He spotted Justine smiling away as though she did not hear anything, simply looking on at the situation with great interest. And true to her character, Caroline self-destructed.
"Wha- Wha-No! I mean, yes… Wait, No!" Her eyes darted all over the place as she faltered over her confusion, having a hard time deciding whether she wanted to insist on her 'tsun' stance against him or just being honest since Justine had already divulged her longing for him.
"Hmm? But I came here because I wanted to see you." Akira smiled with the most charming smile that he could muster. While it was fun and all to tease a girl who reacted like Caroline does, it certainly wasn't gentlemanly of him if he let it drag to a point where it hurt her feelings.
"Oh- oh… really? *Ahem*" Caroline cleared her throat as she regained her senses, regaining her aloof posture that she usually adopted when talking to him. "Hmph! If you need help with fusions or whatever, talk to Justine! You better be prepared, Inmate! The shadows are noisy today." Caroline warned seriously, trying her best to put up her bad-cop act to gloss over the embarrassment from earlier. "Or is there something you need of the two of us?" She added after giving some thought to his arrival at such a timing, significantly easing up on her aloof attitude as she was worried if the Inmate had come here looking for them.
"I want to talk to you two." Akira softly stated, reverting back to his serious demeanour. The whole purpose of coming to Mementos was that he had decided to take up the twin's challenge as a form of punishment and training for himself. An outlet for him to lose himself in the charge of battle and forget about his worries, albeit for the time being.
Justine visibly frowned at him, as though she had fully seen through him and his intentions for accepting the examination now, especially when Akira had first dismissed Caroline with a lazy 'I'll pass' when she first offered the challenge to him.
"Hee… I see!" But Caroline wasn't one for such subtleties. To her, the Inmate had finally grown a pair and was now bringing the fight to them, therefore feeling that it was only respectful of her to accept his request and put him where he belonged.
"Have you fully prepared for our examination?" Justine asked as she approached her twin, carefully eyeing the Inmate without breaking eye contact. "Our goal here is rehabilitation. Ending your life now would greatly contradict that. Should you fall… you will regain consciousness immediately." Her golden left eye staring deeply at him; worry, anger and even a little sadness all storming within it.
"Hopefully you're prepared to lose! Oh, and there's not even a one-in-a-billion chance you'll win, so you should just forget it." Caroline jested while tapping her baton on her shoulders, sneering at the Inmate in an attempt to intimidate him.
"I'm expecting my reward of an embarrassing secret." Akira cheekily replied as he recalled Justine's earlier offer. Even if he was feeling pretty negative at the moment, he didn't feel obliged in letting Caroline get away with everything she says.
"Wh-What!? We are still doing that?" Caroline was flustered at the mention of an embarrassing secret that Justine had promised to reveal if the Inmate did triumph over them. "W-Wait! There's no need for this!" Clearly nonplussed at her Twin's illogical rationing to further motivate the Inmate to try harder.
"Let us, begin, Caroline." Justine just decided to carry on with the conversation while ignoring Caroline's protests, leaving her to growl quietly in anger as she was being left out of the. "We will cordon off a portion of this area for the examination. That will limit potential interference." She had explained the guidelines of their battlefield with her normal tone of voice, but her excitement for battle was starting to leak out as well.
"Don't worry! We will make it look really familiar for you!" Caroline offered as she seriously got into her battle mood, pumping herself ready for battle.
"Now then! Do not disappoint us!" Justine energetically announced as the environment gradually morphed into a replica of the Velvet Room he was familiar with.
"Now… let's get started, Inmate!" Caroline tapped the batons on her hands as she excitedly gathered her powers for the fight.
"You needn't hold back… Though you will soon realize that you lack the time to even consider that option." Justine condescendingly warned the inmate, she certainly did not want to finish him off in a single hit while he was unprepared. Akira could only laugh at the way she usually masked her concern through underhanded comments and subtle insults.
"Get ready! Here we go! Vajra Blast!" Caroline opened the fight and summoned forth a Slime Persona and launched a Vajra Blast directly head-on at him. Justine had took the opportunity and flanked the Inmate from the side, complementing the attack by executing a Triple Down with her own Bugs Persona.
"Abaddon." Akira simply stayed at his spot and carefully watched their attack patterns. Now that he was fighting alone, he had to rely on his own senses instead of Futaba's help. A blind offensive while being outnumbered was a foolish way to go down, and his aesthetics didn't allow him to put up such a shameful fight. The grotesque persona manifested and absorbed the physical skills with its viscous body, causing the attack to be completely shut down. Akira seized this opportunity to counterattack before they had the chance to change their tactics.
"Gigantomachia." Akira called out and the Abaddon Persona slammed its colossal mass into the ground with an immense force and shook up an earthquake with lava surging out the cracks. The twins immediately reacted to the attack and attempted to evade it, but the sheer area of effect made it extremely difficult to do so. The ground cracked unevenly and randomly and could only be possibly evaded by sheer reaction speed. The twins retaliated by attempting to sneak a hit through Akira's blind spot while evading, but Abaddon's sheer size simply meant that the attacks always would wound up hitting it instead.
"Agneyastra." Akira decided on another heavy destruction spell that would be effective on two separate targets. Abaddon roared in rage and summoned fiery meteorites from the heavens, raining hell upon the Twins who had been expecting another quake attack. Caroline had managed to resist the onslaught with the assistance from the Slime Persona, but Justine was fiercely roughed up the by sheer physical impact of the two attacks.
"Diarahan!" Caroline called out her Pixie Persona, performing a much needed heal on her twin. A blue light soon enveloped her sister and recovered her strength, restoring her health to its original. But the moment Justine was healed, she had a panicked look on her face and was shouting and pointing towards Caroline.
"Caroline! Behind you!" Justine shouted towards her other twin. Caroline turned around only to find that the inmate had already slipped through her blind spot and had already approached at a point blank distance. She instinctively kicked off the ground in a desperate attempt to gain some distance, but the Inmate had already predicted her reaction and had included it into his plans.
"Vishnu, Phanta Rhei." Akira swapped out the Angel of the Abyss and brought forth the divine Hindu deity. With a swing of its mace, saw-blades of wind materialised and mercilessly crashed into its target. Caroline fiercely parried the blades with her enforcing baton while somersaulting backwards, avoiding the worst of the onslaught as she regrouped beside her twin sister and receiving a Diarahan from her this time.
"Kuh! You're pretty good, Inmate!" Caroline grunted tiredly as she regained her posture, mentally bashing her herself at giving the Inmate such a wide opening. Justine smiled in agreement and was impressed at the sheer progress of her Inmate ever since they had met in April, be it his combat abilities or strength of personas, both had changed tremendously.
They both knew that he had been steadily getting stronger due to the gradual reduction of wounds that Akira would receive whenever he returned from his recent mementos excursions, and that the Personas he had been fusing recently were now levels higher than those they had even requested of him while he was completing his penal labour.
"It seems our Inmate has come a long way." She chuckled quietly at her observations, recalling the first time they had requested of him to procure a Jack Frost with the Mabufu skill. "Caroline, do you still think that the Inmate's Personas are still… 'Super weak'?" She teased her other twin while imitating Caroline's tone back when she had mocked the strength of the Inmate. "Know your place, Inmate!" Caroline clicked her tongue in defiance as she lashed out against the Inmate, exuding the familiar blue flames that signalled the change of Persona.
"The purpose of this examination is to ascertain your true power. We will continue until you fall." Justine announced as took Caroline's hands into hers and both jumped backwards into the air. A Jack O' Lantern soon appeared at their original location and casted Maragidyne at Caroline's orders.
Pillars of fire began randomly erupting out from the ground, forcing Akira to activate his Third Eye and swiftly avoiding the areas that had its temperature swelling, but soon realised that the patterns of the eruptions were meant to encircle and trap him from all directions. But just as Akira was about to formulate a counterattack, Justine promptly intercepted him and summoned a Jack Frost that 'Wee Hoo'-ed as it manifested.
"Bufudyne!" She commanded and a sizeable explosion of ice began materialising above him. Sensing the incoming attacks, Akira halted in his tracks and prepared himself with the remaining time he had. With the twin's perfect synchrony, their combo totally consumed the Inmate in a torrent of fire and ice, following up with an explosive burst of hot steam that blanketed the area.
The Twins remained on guard as they watched the steam fade away, scanning the site and watching for further movements. As though waiting for their line of sight to be separated, Akira blindsided Justine and ran towards her in a low crouch, swiftly drawing his dagger and aiming at her. Retaliating to his bloodlust, Justine responded by blocking the slash with her clipboard that was way sturdier than it looked. Caroline was kept busy by Akira who was shooting his pistol with his other free hand, keeping her agitated while preventing them from ganging up on him. Capitalising on her slightly more impulsive nature, Akira purposely fired one straight towards her face and instantly followed up with a second shot at a slightly higher angle. Caroline's insane reaction speed managed to parry the first bullet away, but as her outstretched hand remained swinging in the air, the second bullet caught her baton and forced her hand to recoil backwards unnaturally and totally crumbled her posture. Looking up as she finally detected an increase of power, a Black Frost had been levitating over them and sneered mockingly at them while concentrating even more power for its next attack.
"Ice Age." Akira issued his orders and the Black Frost immediately spat forth a torrent crystal nova that hailed down from above, freezing everything it touched and exploding in an immense fountain of icicles.
"Maziodyne! Garudyne!" Was shouted by twins as they began their counterattack. The vortex of wind surrounded them as a protective wall and ruthlessly shaved down the ice before it reached them, Caroline's bolts of lightning savagely exterminated any approaching freezing projectiles as they hunted the inmate down.
"Odin." The mythical Norse god descended at the response of Akira's beckoning. The stout figure gave his divine spear a few quick swings and easily dissipated the lightning before it even dealt any real damage. "Do it, Thunder Reign!" The moment it received its orders, Odin immediately took a few explosive steps forward and flexed the hand that held the divine spear. With a decisive step and dynamic swing of his arm, the spear propelled into air as it took off with a sonic boom and tore through the air faster than the speed of sound.
The spear tore through the howling vortex as though it was a hot knife against butter, causing Justine to instinctively avoid the projectile that was flying straight towards her. As the spear revolved in a spin through the air, the serrated edges of the spear had easily nicked onto her black tie and had forcefully carried her off in its trajectory, slamming her harshly against the wall at the far end of the hall. Justine coughed in pain as the recoil had knocked the air out of lungs, while being dangled helplessly against the wall.
"Tch! Justine!" Caroline immediately ran up to her other Twin while casting Maziodynes at the Inmate, preventing him from closing in. But she soon realised that all the lightning bolts in the area were gradually being manipulated and drawn towards the spear, noticing the impending danger, she immediately gave the spear a firm kicked and tried to pull Justine away from it. It was only a short moment later that the spear illuminated in a waltz of electricity that ringed violently as it discharged its massive voltage. The twins didn't have the time to escape far enough from its area of effect, but at least they managed to avoid the worst of it. Justine struggled onto her feet while being supported by Caroline.
"Diarah-" Caroline was about to heal her Twin again, but Akira would not let that come to pass.
"Seth! One shot kill!" He summoned the Persona that had given him so much trouble to acquire that matched the twins' specifications, purposely utilising it as an Easter egg for this moment. The piercing blast drove itself into Caroline's abdomen and tossed her into a clumsy tumble alongside her counterpart, gasping for air as she blanched from the hit. The girls supported each other as they shakily stood up, panting heavily from the damage they had received. Caroline had a bitter realisation on her face that the Inmate had just dissed them with a Persona they had requested from him.
"This is… a surprise…" Justine mumbled as her usual calm and collected face now distorted in pain, each breath she took were heaves that spread the pain throughout her body. A sense of shame gripped her as she realised they had been the ones holding back all this time, all for the sake of some theatrical "examination". It was the first time she felt her instincts screaming at her to not restrain themselves any longer.
"How can this be?" Caroline complained in agony, thinking that she had been sorely mistaken at always underestimating the Inmate. He had emerged victorious from every round of attack, perfectly guarding and executing his counters with minimal damage to his self. While she had arrogantly looked down at him and held her powers back, the Inmate had already factored in her personality and mentality into his strategies.
"He has proven himself equal to us… Or perhaps even stronger…" Justine concluded absentmindedly, her strength spent and mind now bleary from all the damage, they were the ones that had been backed into the corner.
"Could that one-in-a-billion chance… actually happen? Caroline doubtfully questioned herself, truly baffled at the chances that the Inmate may just be the person that held the potential and chance to defeat them.
"If this is truly the case…" A tinge of excitement began leaking into Justine's voice as she fell into a trance, trembling in delight from the thrill of battle.
"Justine?" Caroline called out, worried that her twin was acting weirdly out-of-character.
"Listen close, Inmate! Show us what lies beyond our limits. Show us who you are! Who we are!" Justine demanded with an intense display of fervour, venting an unbelievable amount of blue flames as she manifested her Persona.
"Justine! What are you? Tsk!" Caroline could only click her tongue in annoyance and follow her twin as she reinitiated combat.
"Now, Inmate… Give me everything you have! Riot Gun!" Justine immediately performed an upgraded version of the gun skill, introducing a cloudburst of plasma-like bullets onto the battlefield. Akira re-summoned Abaddon to neutralise the bullet storm, but Caroline was not about to make the same mistake twice by foolishly following it up with a physical attack.
"This will be hell for you! Psycho Force!" Caroline shouted as she summoned the Mandrake Persona, the psychokinetic attack mercilessly smashed into the humongous demon and shattered it into countless bluish shards. Akira urgently dived roll out of the psychic waves that cleaved through his Persona, only barely escaping as his ankles were momentarily hit by the waves, leaving a trail of pain as though a car had driven over his legs. He cursed under his breath as he immediately prepared to change his Persona, already noticing that Justine was about to re-launch her offensive and keep up the combo.
"Cosmic Flare!" Justine shouted as the Onmoraki Persona behind her channelled an avalanche of nuclear energy that scorched all that it touched.
"Metatron!" Akira invoked the summoning of the metallic archangel, spreading its glorious wings to intercept the incoming nuclear attack. He could feel his exposed skin beginning to burn under the profuse heat that crept in, his pistol already malfunctioning due to its precision parts melting under the heat. Using his sleeves to mask the uncovered portion of his face, Akira slipped out from Metatron's back and made a direct rush towards Caroline, initiating her within close quarter combat. Chaining a quick lunge into a side slash, Caroline was desperately blocking Akira's ceaseless assault. Planning out his decisive strike, Akira feinted her with an intentional downwards slash which was intuitively blocked by her baton. Knowing that she had fallen for his trap, a smiled flashed on his face for a moment.
"Argh!" Akira grabbed Caroline's outstretched hand and proceeded with a precise wrist lock, causing her to scream and drop her baton. Justine was immediately baited towards them as she heard her other twin in pain, instinctively stopping the spell's channelling. Sensing the lapse in Justine's judgement, he promptly reacted by sending Caroline flying into the air with a point-blank God's Hand, sending her directly crashing into her other Twin. He had to end the fight before he had to deal with even more powerful skills.
"It's Show-Time!" Akira stylishly pulled off his mask and summoned one of the strongest Personas he had, Lucifer. "Get ready! Morning Star!" The fallen angel invoked a caustic ray of light that rapidly descended towards the twins without giving them time to recover. Caroline immediately took it upon herself and tried to cover Justine from the blast, hugging close as they braced themselves for the following impact. A devastating explosion occurred at the instant the beam made contact, pulsating with turbulent shockwaves and bringing utter destruction to the entire place for a good five seconds.
Akira exhaustedly kneeled down as he watched the explosion clear up. His ankles were swollen from pain and his left wrist was broken from the recoil of the God's Hand that he had channelled through his body. If the twins still did not go down after this attack, he had planned to concede defeat in order to retain some semblance of dignity and honour, a lesson that was taught by his strategy and shogi master, Hifumi Togo.
Slightly limping over when the blasts had subsided, Akira found the twins totally incapacitated in the middle of a ravaged crater, its surfaces seething with heat as the concrete had started to liquefy in certain areas. He quickly carried them up on to his shoulder, one on each side, and painfully transported them to a safer area of the room that had not been destroyed. He summoned forth Ishtar and placed her blessings of Salvation upon everyone and checked his body for any lingering wounds while he waited for them to regain consciousness.
"Urgh... what?" Caroline was the first wake up, wincing as she shook her head. Akira went up to her and squatted down, placing a hand on her back and helping her sit up, her usually aloof expression was absent and was replaced with one of disbelief. Justine was roused by the voice of her twin and she moaned incoherently while she stood up on her own feet.
"We… lost? To a human…?" Caroline questioned herself in denial as she finally stood up with the assistance of both Akira and Justine. Akira gave both of them a pat on their hat as though it he was the one rewarding them for their efforts. To his surprise, Caroline suddenly bounced on her feet excitedly, as though she had just regained all of her energy prior to the examination.
"Hahaha! I can't believe this actually happened to us! It's a little strange…" Caroline beamed in an unusual level of excitement, tossing away her usual arrogant and hostile impression. Justine smiled quietly to herself, glad that Caroline wasn't feeling too dejected at this loss as well.
"Even though I should feel humiliated, I feel… refreshed. Like I finally was able to leave something behind. Hahaha… Our sisters are gonna get mad at us. It turns out even the rulers of power can't measure everything!" Caroline joked while brushing off their loss. Some strange terms coming out of her mouth that Justine took notice of.
"Sisters…? Rulers of power…? Caroline… What did you just…?" Justine reiterated the words, as though trying to regurgitate their respective memories from within her mind.
"Hm? Did I say something weird?" Caroline carelessly brushed off her slip of the tongue, not even paying attention to the words that she had just spoken.
"…." Justine paused as she looked down in contemplation, but recovered almost as fast. "…Inmate. It seems the time has come for us to fulfil our promise." Justine continued with her usual poker face. "I will now tell you our embarrassing secret." Akira thought it was funny how she was always going to say something embarrassing without looking embarrassed.
"WHAT!?" Caroline jumped in astonishment. "We still have to do that!?" 'No way, no way….' Was clearly written across her face as she panicked at what Justine was going to reveal.
"To be perfectly honest…" She started. "From time to time, a strange feeling of unease falls over us. It is almost as though we are not ourselves, or that our true selves are in a place far, far away." Revealing a piece of information that described the anxiety within her own heart.
"Huh?" Caroline could only squeeze a confused reaction at what she was hearing.
"We are meant to be leading inmates through rehabilitation, yet we have doubts about our own validity. Could there be anything more humorous than that?" Justine chuckled in self-depreciation as she deeply pondered about their own existences.
"Oh, so that's what you meant…" Caroline sighed in relief, clearly relieved it wasn't actually some shameful past that she want hidden.
"Are you not ashamed, Caroline?" But for some reason, Justine became very indignant at Caroline's reaction. "…What did you think I was going to talk about? Perhaps the time you nearly wept from fear when you first witnessed a Persona fusion?" Justine questioned her other twin with a hint of malice as she dug up her shameful past.
"Wha!?" Caroline covered her face in embarrassment as her twin began spilling out some of her own embarrassing moments that she had hidden away from the Inmate's knowledge.
"Or about those intimidating poses you had practiced, that you're too embarrassed to use on the inmate?" Justine immediately mimicked the pose that Akira somehow thought it resembled some characters from JoJo's.
"S-Stop! My heart can't take this!" Caroline trembled in both embarrassment and shame as she writhed under Justine's verbal assault.
"*Sigh* After I lost to you… albeit for a brief moment… I saw something." Justine turned and re-addressed the Inmate, leaving her twin alone to writhe in embarrassment. "It was then that I knew for certain… Just as you have your goal of rehabilitation, we too have an objective we must achieve."
"We're supposed to act as wardens for our master, right?" Caroline timidly asked as she slowly recovered from the shock that she had just received.
"Then how do you explain this? It is completely unrelated to that task." Justine materialised the glowing bookmark that was floating above her hand.
"Well, um…" Caroline could only mumble a reply, unable to give a proper answer to Justine's question.
"…Inmate. I will now disclose the results of our examination." Justine ended that conversation and decided to announce her analysis of his strength. "If I had to describe your current state, I would say you are: He Who Will Save The Souls of Humanity." She smiled and approached him, extending her hand outwards with the bookmark still floating above. "To commemorate your victory, I entrust this bookmark to you." Gifting him the mysterious bookmark that probably held the answers to their identities.
"You don't mind?" Akira bent down slightly and accepted the bookmark, Justine demurely backtracked with her hands behind her back as she retreated to Caroline's side.
"If you continue to hold ties with us, we will surely arrive at the truth. That is how I feel." Justine declared with a certain amount of confidence that their fates are already intertwined.
"Ugh. I stay quiet and you just gotta go saddling him with more work." Caroline shook her head and slightly rolled her eyes at her twin. "Well, I won't tell our master about this. It'll just be one of our secrets. Wait… speaking of secrets, you only told him mine! This isn't fair…" She complained in indignity that she was the only one embarrassed so far.
"You would like one from me?" Justine asked as she coyly pulled her cap slightly downwards to block her eyes from being seen. "Recently, whenever the inmate takes prolonged absences from our chamber…" she paused for a moment as though catching her breath.
"…I miss him." She shyly followed up, with a cute tinge of red now blushing on her cheeks. "According to human standards, directly conveying this emotion may be somewhat uncomfortable. But that is how I feel." And with a surprise statement hidden at the end, Justine delivered the punchline. "Caroline is probably the same way." She conveyed while giving a side-glance to her other twin.
"I-I..!" Caroline immediately got flustered again at Justine's revelation, totally not emotionally prepared that she would pull a fast one like this.
"I simply… wanted you to know." Smiling as though she felt a burden being lifted off her as she confessed her emotions. "Oh, you understand this is a secret to be kept between us, yes?" Justine asked while reverting to her usual stoic expression.
"I can't choose between you." Akira awkwardly scratched his cheeks, not entirely sure how he would accept the affections from a pair of twins.
"Choose…? I mean, if you did, the other would feel bad." Caroline asked in confusion at why the Inmate HAD to choose.
"How should I say this…? I would not resist you choosing the both of us. Is that strange?" Justine added while fidgeting with her clipboard, deciding that sharing her affections for the Inmate with her other twin, Caroline, would be the right thing to do.
"O-Ok, that's enough of that." Caroline awkwardly interjected before the conversation steered further into weird territories.
"…Yes. Any further discussion may interfere with our work" Justine agreed, already hiding her shyness from earlier and reverting back to her calm self.
"Things are gonna go back to how they were before. This special inspection was a one-time deal. Though… I think we might feel a little differently when we're watching over you from now on… That means we're gonna be stricter than ever! Y-You got that, Inmate!?" Caroline firmly warned the Inmate that they will be watching his movements ever more closely now that they are closer to each other than ever before.
Akira only snickered and retorted 'Yes, yes, yes…' with a mock attitude of exhaustion, giving both girls a well-deserved head pat for all that they have done.
Lavenza opened her eyes drowsily as she recollected the dream she had prior to waking up. Her body feeling the lethargy of waking up for the first time. All she could do was smile stupidly at the memories of the Twin's that faced the Trickster in combat, his suave and gallant visage darting across the battlefield and asserting his dominance confidently. And now, that very tenacious fighter laid beside her in bed, sleeping incautiously as he breathed quietly.
She could distinctly recall the emotions of the Twin's that were now resounding within her own heart, both harbouring a deep longing for the Inmate. It made her feel truly blessed that she would be the one given the chance to be able to stay by his side like this.
Giving him a light peck on the cheeks, Lavenza laid back down on the pillow and closed her eyes, hugging Akira's body closely to hers, letting her consciousness sink back into the darkness as she fell asleep again.
A/N: My apologies for the rather 'lateness' of this. The crazy weather had me down with a fever and flu the past few days. Spent most of my non-drugged waking hours trying to type this story out.
This SHOULD be the last of the confinement arc, next chapter would be his release day. (If I follow my chapter planning, ahahahas.)
Now forgive me while I go crash.
(If you do spot some weird english, please do pm me about the specifics and I will get to the changes when I'm... alive)