6-27
The screaming soon stopped. When it was over, Kaneshiro had handed the stained power tool to Nanashi, took a rag from his back pocket and wiped his hands.
Then, he'd gone up to Akira and said, "Necessity isn't always pretty. Necessity just is."
And that had been that. The day ended in a blur, of Kaneshiro's crew filing back into their cars. The slow drive through Shibuya. A sudden, horrible thought that Akira had left fingerprints at the scene, before he remembered he hadn't touched anything.
His dismissal. Exit. Rendezvous with Morgana. The incessant questions he hadn't been able to answer. He had texted everyone, to let them know he was alright, and then switched his phone off and gone to bed.
That night, he dreamed.
Not of Igor or the twins, but of a long corridor. Dim music plays from somewhere downstairs.
There's a figure at the end, his steps in tune with the cadence of the music, but he never gets closer. Someone keeps coughing behind Akira, but he doesn't turn to see who it is.
"Who are you?" The figure down the hall asks. Akira can see a tangled mess of black hair obscuring the face.
"I can't," he replies, and he tries to move, but doesn't. When he looks down, he sees that his legs end at the ankle, and his feet have phased into the floorboards. "I can't," he repeats.
"Who are you?" The figure asks. Akira sees he wears gloves, but in the light, he cannot tell the color.
"I can't do it," Akira pleads. "I can't." He wants to sound angry. Wants to coat his voice in self-righteousness if only to defy the figure down the hall. He can't manage it.
A door opens to his left, and orange light washes over him. There's the sound of an audience applauding, and then a familiar voice asks, "Why are you lying to us?"
The door shuts.
"Who are you?" The figure asks, and this time, it's accompanied by a dozen whispers that dance through him.
"Who are you? Who are you? Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?" They sing to him like cicadas.
Akira tries to shut his eyes, but realizes someone has their fingers over his face, and holds them open. "Who am I?" Akira finally asks.
The figure down the hall smiles, and says, "You tell me."
The dream ends.
#
It only takes a few hours for Akira to understand he can't be in school. Morgana, snuggled in his desk, keeps staring at him with trepidation, and Ann glances back at him every thirty seconds. She mouths, 'Are you okay?' to him, over and over.
Akira waits until the period ends. When the bell chimes, he grabs his bag and heads for the door. He can feel Ann start to stand and follow, but he gives a half turn and waves her off. Morgana pokes his head out of the desk and watches him go. He ducks out into the hall, and makes a dash for the stairs. He brushes past a few people, and a part of him tries to make him remember that he's supposed to keep a low profile, but he ignores this. He hears his name as he makes his way, whispered among the students.
Let them whisper, he thinks. The rumors turned out to be true after all. Assault. Yakuza associate. Another word he can't bring himself to think. He considers just running to the bathroom and hiding in a stall, but knows if he does that, he'll run the risk of throwing up again, and he can't handle the stress of it.
I just want to leave, he thinks. I just want to be somewhere else. Somewhere alone. Somewhere safe. He almost runs down the stairs, but manages to keep some composure, and he hears his name again. He ignores it, and finally steps out into the overcast sky of a late morning in Tokyo, and starts to jog down the stairs.
He wants the quiet. At this point, he doesn't care if someone tries to stop him. If Ann, or Ryuji, or Kawakami even, were to call his name. He wouldn't stop.
"Akira," comes a voice.
He stops.
He turns.
Makoto stands at the top of the stairs, looking down at him. Her face is wide with worry, her brow furrowed. She's turned, partly back towards the school, as if the gravity of the place compels her back inside. "I called you," she says. "Back in there. I guess you didn't hear me." With herself still angled back at the school, she takes a step down and towards him. "Are you alright?"
So many emotions fling themselves through Akira that he cannot settle on a single one. He lifts his eyes to Shujin's second floor. The sun shines against the windows and he wonders if anyone's looking out at him, and what they're thinking. "I just can't be here right now," he blurts. "I just can't."
"Akira," Makoto says. She looks down at the stairs, frowning. "I don't... What happened?"
"I just need to go." He knows how petulant it sounds, how weak. "I can't," he starts, repeating the words from his dream. "I can't do this. I can't."
Makoto takes a few more steps towards him. "You need to leave the school?" She asks. "Right now?" He nods, and finds that he's shying away from her. He doesn't want to do this. He wants to get closer to her. "Okay," she says, and is almost level with him now. "Let's go."
He looks up at her. "What're you-"
"This is not a habit for me," Makoto cuts in, her face a mix of apprehension and determination. "But it will not be the first time I've cut school."
Ridiculously, Akira asks, "What about the Student Council?"
Makoto shoots him a glare he reads as, 'Did you seriously just ask that?' Then, she marches the rest of the way towards him. She reaches for him, and he notices that her hand hesitates, just a fraction of a second, and then it closes around his wrist - not his hand - and she begins to escort him down the rest of the steps.
As they move, they say very little, with Makoto asking Akira if he has a preference. Akira isn't sure 'of what,' so he just says 'no.' They walk deeper into the city, and eventually, Akira realizes they've entered Harajuku. "Interesting choice," he tells her, forcing a touch of humor in his voice.
She blushes a bit, and she has long since let his arm go, and quickly says, "Haru and I have come here a few times. There are some nice cafes."
Akira turns as someone dressed in a Sailor Moon costume and green hair walks by. "And the fashion is interesting too."
Makoto clears her throat. "I wouldn't know."
Akira smiles, and finds himself stunned that he can still summon the mental capacity to do this with her, what with everything else that has happened. What does that say about me? He wonders, and the thought depresses him.
The amount of people shoved together serves to help them disappear. The streets are narrow, and so colorful that two students dressed in their school uniforms draws even less attention than normal. Akira gives Makoto credit for thinking that. Had it been left to him, he might've just wandered around, and might've been accosted by police, finding him out of school.
She takes him to a small hole in the wall cafe, and they sit in the back, ordering coffees and waters. The place has a decent amount of customers, but they all seem invested in their phones and magazines, and no one pays them any mind. Akira sits with his back to the wall, facing the front door. Makoto sits across from him.
"Are you feeling better?" Makoto asks.
He isn't really. He knows this, but he feels a bit better just being in her presence. Just being here, and not there. Not in that headquarters of Kaneshiro's. Not in that busted up bar with Kai in the chair and-
He shuts his eyes, and tries to shake it from his head.
"Akira?" Makoto asks. "What's wrong? Your face just lost all color."
Akira wants to laugh at this. But it doesn't come out as a laugh, it comes out as a kind of groan.
"He... He, uh, um," he starts, but then he hears Kaneshiro's words in his mind, chastising him for speaking nonsense. "He took a power drill, yesterday. And he drilled it into someone's head."
Makoto's head tilts to the side. "What do you mean?"
Akira lifts his hand and taps the back of his skull. "Right here."
Realization blooms across Makoto's face, and he watches her go pale as well. "He did that? He made you watch?"
Akira lowers his gaze to his fingers, and stares at his cuticles. "The guy was screaming, and screaming, and then he just wasn't anymore. Like someone flipped a switch."
He tells them everything. About Makiyagami. About Sakoda. About Kai.
Makoto shakes her head. "That's... that makes no sense. He can't just challenge his Boss like that. That's not how that works. The Dragon Syndicate has enough members that they could crush him if they wanted to. Kaneshiro must be crazy if he thinks he'll win."
Akira spreads his hands in the air. "Yeah, no shit. He is crazy."
"But there's protocols, there's steps to take. A war like this, it makes no sense. It..." She trails off. Akira is looking at her. She dips her head. "I'm sorry. I think I was focusing on that because it was the easier thing to think about." Tentatively, she reaches across the table and rests her hand on Akira's. "I'm sorry you saw that, Akira. I'm so sorry." She studies his face, and whatever she sees there makes her repeat, "I'm sorry."
Akira lets out a long breath. "It's okay," he finally tells her. He smiles. "I'm okay." He looks at her. "I'm okay," he repeats. His voice breaks. "I'm okay." Without meaning to, he leans forward, and squeezes his eyes shut. "I'm okay. I'm-" There's nothing left to say at that point. He feels the tears come.
He has refused in the past. He refused when he was all alone in Tokyo, that first night. He refused when he realized the people at school hated him without so much as knowing him. He refused when Kamoshida beat him so badly. He refused when he had to lie to Makoto. He refused during the Madarame job. He refused when he almost drowned in the Tokyo Bay. He refused when Iwai told him what he'd done.
But he's cried before. He cried after he watched Yukio Kan vomit black bile into that bathroom sink. And here, with Makoto, he cries again.
"I can't," he whimpers. "I can't do it anymore."
His sobs are, thankfully, quiet. Makoto angles herself so no one can see him cry. It's difficult, he knows, and he's embarrassed by this, even as his shoulders shudder. The waitress arrives with their drinks, and Makoto gestures for her to leave them and go away. Akira hears the glasses and mugs clink onto the table, and the shuffling feet of the waitress as she hurries away.
"Do you want to leave?" Makoto asks.
Akira shakes his head. "I just want to sit. Forever. Just sit here." He finally opens his eyes and rubs his sleeve across his face. He almost says, 'With you,' but decides this isn't probably the best time for that.
"We'll sit here, then," she tells him. Her hand is still on his, and he turns his over so his fingers can wrap around hers. He squeezes. She squeezes. There is a lot said in that moment, even though no one speaks.
"We need to figure out a way to get you out of there," Makoto finally says. "If you can't leave his organization, you should at least fade from his perspective a little."
Akira nods. "He wants me to use card readers to steal PIN numbers from debit cards. At least, he said that at first. I don't know what the hell he wants me to do anymore. That thing yesterday, it felt like an initiation, almost. He told me we weren't that different."
"That isn't true," Makoto says. "You're nothing like him. You're not a monster."
Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?
"I don't know what I am," he says. "I don't know what I'm supposed to be. I thought I did. I thought I had a handle on things, on being this leader. But I don't know. All the things we've done. Lying to you. The chloroform on Sugimura. Are we really that far off from Kaneshiro?"
"Of course you are," Makoto says. "Akira, he's murdered people. He kills for his own personal gain. He's involved with the mental shutdowns somehow. You're nothing like him. And you need to stop wondering if you are. Because you're not."
The mental shutdown. He looks up at her. Sees the concern and warmth on her face. Knows it's all for him. He's not stupid. Even after all this, he knows how she feels. He knows he feels the same. He wants to tell her, then. Wants it all to spill out of him, but he can't. Because, even now, he still hasn't told her the whole truth. He had promised Haru they could do it together, but he thinks he'll have to break that promise. Because if he doesn't tell her now, when they're like this, he's not sure he'll ever be able to face her again.
"I have to tell you something," he says.
#
The words he uses do not matter. Neither does the order he presents them. When they are said, and it's done, Makoto knows. Her father, Akihiko Niijima was investigating Junya Kaneshiro. Junya Kaneshiro killed him for it via mental shutdown.
Makoto sits there, staring at him, eyes wide, pupils small. Her face is pale, her body rigid. He didn't know what to expect. A part of him figured she'd rage against the news. She'd throw a tantrum and scream and strike out at him. Or she'd cry. He should've known better.
"You're sure?" Makoto asks, and her voice sounds as if it is very far away.
Akira begins to worry. Sure, Makoto always seemed to have a handle on things, but you weren't supposed to have a handle on something like this. "Yeah," he says. "Iwai told me. It's the same method used to kill Sugimura. A mental shutdown triggered in a third party who does the..." He trails off, looking for the right word. "Deed."
"Sis was right," Makoto mutters. Her gaze drifts down to his shirt, but Akira gets the impression she's staring through him.
Akira blinks. "What?"
"Sae," Makoto replies. "She said something the other day. She said Dad was killed, and that it wasn't an accident. I thought the stress of her job had affected her, somehow. I didn't think... She's right."
"Wait, Sae knows about the mental shutdowns?" Akira asks.
Makoto's head turns from side to side, slowly like a powered down machine. "No. She just doesn't think it's an accident. I don't know what she thinks it is. She didn't tell me. We got in a fight. We..." She trails off.
This wasn't a good idea, Akira thinks. "Makoto, let's go, yeah? Get some air?"
"Alright," Makoto says, and pushes her chair away from the table, and stands. Akira pulls out his wallet and quickly pays the tab.
Makoto moves like a ghost, like she doesn't really see the things around her. Stupid, stupid, stupid, Akira thinks. Why the hell did I tell her? He should've waited. Done this somewhere with more privacy. Done it somewhere she could've gotten support. He should've waited for Haru!
They step out into Harajuku and Akira feels the weight of the crowds swallow them. "Makoto," he says, and reaches for her arm. "Take my hand, okay? Come on." She does, and whatever giddiness he could feel over this is absent, and he leads her down the narrow street until they reach a small alley, away from the multitudes of people. Makoto just keeps staring ahead. "Makoto," Akira says, removing his hand from hers and putting it on her shoulder. "Makoto, come on. Talk to me, okay?"
Makoto begins to sway, forwards and back, forwards and back, in rhythm with her breathing. In and out, in and out, forward and back, forward and back.
"Hey," Akira says, and tries to steady her. "Hey, Makoto. Come on. You're freaking me out. Look please, just-"
"You've known for a little while now?" Makoto asks.
Akira is taken aback by the harshness in her voice. "Yeah. Haru and I were going to tell you together."
"Why'd you tell me now?" She asks. She doesn't sound tired, now. She sounds angry.
Akira has to mull his words before he can say them. "After everything we've been through, I don't want to keep secrets from you." He doesn't look at her, and he feels his insides squirm, but he pushes along. "I care about you. You deserved to know. I'm sorry. We should've waited for Haru."
"No, it's fine," Makoto says, and it's not quite a whisper, but it's not very loud either.
No, it isn't.
"There are some interesting implications, based on this information," Makoto says.
"Huh?" Akira asks.
Makoto finally looks at him, and Akira doesn't like what he sees. "Call a meeting."
#
"Given what we know," Makoto says, "it seems Kaneshiro has had the capacity to inflict mental shutdowns for three years."
The Phantom Thieves glance at one another, anxious looks on their faces.
"Before he..." Akira starts, and has to clear his throat. "The guy we met yesterday said something interesting. He asked Kaneshiro why he didn't just use his special powers to get rid of everyone opposing him. I didn't think much of it at the time, but it's a good point."
Makoto nods. "It implied," she says. "That Kaneshiro cannot just point a finger and cause a mental shutdown. There must be a process. And it's a process he cannot use all the time. Meaning his powers are limited."
"It could mean a lot of things," Akira puts in. "There might be a specific timeframe during which a mental shutdown can occur. There might be a cool down period before another can be inflicted. Or, it might mean he's not the one initiating the shutdowns, but knows who is and possibly how they're doing it."
Yusuke raises a hand. "I've been thinking along these lines," he says, once everyone's looking his way. "If we believe that Madarame was killed by an individual suffering from a mental shutdown, and we believe that Sugimura was murdered in the same way, doesn't that tell us something?" When no one replies, he continues. "It tells us that those with a Palace cannot be easily inflicted with mental shutdowns. And another source must be used."
Ryuji frowns. "I don't know if I buy that. Uh, the Prez's dad..." He looks at her, sheepishly. "It's kinda a lot to assume he had a Palace, right?"
Makoto nods. "My father didn't have a Palace."
Yusuke frowns, then shrugs. "Perhaps that doesn't prove my point, but it doesn't disprove it either. If Makoto's father had no Palace, but they still couldn't inflict a mental shutdown upon him, then perhaps it's similar to our limitations. We cannot change the heart of someone who has no presence in the Metaverse. It is difficult to change the heart of someone with a Palace. If the one who is causing the mental shutdowns is operating with our same limitations, then it means that they do not have the capacity to unravel the Palace keywords, and need to use another individual to do the deed."
Haru purses her lips. "I suppose that makes sense. They could've easily killed Sugimura and made it look like an accident. But they had to have the driver do it. Maybe they couldn't give him a shutdown because of his Palace. If they didn't know the keywords, they couldn't get in."
Ann's eyes widen. "Then, if that's true, a Palace is a kind of protection."
"Not if they figure out the keywords. Seems like the only true protections is not having a presence in the Metaverse at all," Akira says. "If this is all true. And it's assuming a lot."
"If this is all true," Makoto continues, and her voice holds such authority that everyone's eyes snap back to her. "Then it doesn't change anything. Kaneshiro can initiate mental shutdowns, but he has a specific method with which to do it. If we can determine that method, we'll be one step closer to unraveling this whole thing."
"So then," Morgana says, from the center of the table. "We need to get into Kaneshiro's Palace and make him talk. The sooner the better. We need to get Akira out of there."
Akira tries to smile. It almost works. "Ohya's got some links between Kaneshiro and Natsuki Storage that might warrant looking into. Makoto if-"
"I need to figure out what Sis knows, or at least, suspects about our father's murder. We should also bring in Officer Kagawa. He might have some more insight as well."
"Ain't Kagawa asking questions about us too?" Ryuji asks. "Be good to keep tabs on him, right?"
"But we still haven't deduced Kaneshiro's keywords. All this investigating will be worthless if we cannot change his heart," Yusuke points out. "Akira, do you have any ideas? Has he said anything that would indicate what his Palace is?"
Akira sighs. "I tried some space references, based on a really messed up story he told, but nothing. I don't know. It's not his headquarters, but you never hear about him going elsewhere. Plus, with the war having officially started between himself and the Dragon, I doubt he'll be staying there. He's probably got hideouts all over Shibuya." He looks over at Haru. She meets his gaze with a glare. He knows he deserves it. She had wanted them to tell Makoto about her father together, and Akira knows she must feel betrayed to have that taken from her. She also seemed more than a little concerned with Makoto's 'down to business' approach, and Akira can't help but feel the same way. He had thought the news would hurt Makoto, but instead, it has hardened her. In the few hours she's known, she hasn't shed so much as a tear, or let out a sob, or anything.
We need to wrap this up, Akira thinks.
"Do you think," Ann says, "we should let Ohya in on the secret?"
Akira looks over at her, eyes wide. "You want to tell someone else?"
Ann rolls her eyes. "Oh, come on. We all know it's not like that. If we really need to use Ohya for her information on Kaneshiro, do we really want to jump through a bunch of hoops trying to keep her from finding out?"
Akira wants to tell them that he's had these thoughts as well, but he also doesn't want to disclose what he is pretty sure is rampant alcoholism. "Let me think about," he says to her. "Please," he insists, when she gives him a look. He steals a quick glance at the others. No one else seems overly interested in the topic. Maybe I can just tell Ann, he thinks. That way we can nip this in the bud, and I won't be spilling Ohya's secret to everyone.
"I think," Akira says. "We should call it a night. It's getting late, and we've got a busy day tomorrow."
The others stand and begin to file out, Akira and Haru hang back, and pull Makoto to side, as everyone else leaves.
The three slide into a booth downstairs, and while Sojiro eyes them from behind the counter, he pays them no real mind. Haru puts her arm around Makoto, pulls her close, and says, "I'm sorry, Makoto. I wanted to be there when he told you."
"It's fine," Makoto replies, voice still professional.
"It isn't," Akira tells her. "You lost your father, Makoto. I know you're trying to tough it out, but this isn't-"
"Please," Makoto insists, and her voice breaks a bit. "I know what this is, and I appreciate it. I will handle it my own way." She turns to look at Haru. "I know you would've been there if you could. But I already grieved over my father. Now, I want to avenge him."
Haru and Akira stare at one another, and Akira wonders if Haru is as worried as she looks, and as worried as he feels.
##
A/N: Hey gang, sorry about not posting last week. Unfortunately, my wife's grandmother passed away, and we were in Pittsburgh for the funeral and services. She was a great lady.
Hope you all enjoy this chapter of Crimson!