Chapter 4: Whispers Among Us
Everything was set up and ready, and it was just a matter of waiting. Lena and the others were down on the ground by the alley's entrance and were ready to pounce. If you were facing the alley walking into it, I was up and to the left about two stories, I would say what kind of building it was, but to be honest I really couldn't say, it was an unmarked commercial building of some sort, the inside was just filled with empty shelves and nothing more.
Lena was set up below at the entrance to the alley, she had a very unconventional style of metaverse gear. She was clad in ancient Roman-style armor that featured a bronze breastplate with a flowing red cape that I've never seen sit still, her mask looked like something you'd see from a picture of a Venetian carnival, it was meant to look nice and celebratory in concept, but I bet on the other end of the stick it was terrifying, not that I would know. She wielded an arming sword for melee and was equally as lethal with it as her revolver which she kept for short ranges. We tended to complement each other in battle, she did CQC while I handled ranged attacks and support.
Andy was set up across the alley from me. He was packing a repeater of some sort, and he had a huge Bowie knife as a back-up. He was also decked out in some cool cowboy gear, but I was going to keep my mouth shut, something told me that he didn't really care for aesthetics. He didn't wear a mask either, so I wasn't entirely sure how his Persona worked. Revy was on the right side of the alley's entrance across from Lena, and she had made herself the de facto leader of this operation since the Council reached out to her first. She was armed with dual pistols which she had in real life too, she had customized them a bunch and called them her 'Cutlasses' for some reason, and she was the only person out of all of us who didn't fully transform into a new outfit when we came here, but she did have a bandana which served as her Persona's mask.
Holly was beside Revy, and she was looking more and more nervous by the second, she had a pump-action shotgun with wooden furniture and a bayonet like I did, she was decked out in camouflage fatigues and wouldn't look out of place in some Vietnam war movie, and like me she had glasses as a mask, but hers were squared and black.
We waited, and waited, and waited in complete silence for hours, I had wanted to get to know the others better, but Revy had shut down any and all conversations quickly. But I suppose the payment for all this was enough to justify a professional performance. For many of us, this was a good opportunity to show the Council what we were capable of, there was no doubt in my mind there wasn't at least one of them watching us right now somewhere.
The Palace itself wasn't anything special, it was a huge office building that went all the way up into the sky beyond these creepy looking clouds. The ruler was a guy named Boris Bateman, he had taken over a record label that a bunch of my friends in the scene were signed to, hell, at one point Temper was signed to the label too, but we decided to go independent when Boris took over. I've heard rumors about him too, some very nasty ones at that. But it is unusual that the Council chose them, because they usually like to go after politicians since their Palaces are usually incredibly gaudy and lavish, perfect for dismantlement and robbery.
The area surrounding the Palace was generally pretty barren, it's almost like an apocalyptic version of DC where everyone just kind of, vanished. I suppose that means that Boris's view of outside is barren, and lifeless. But I've never really given too much though towards all that cognition stuff, just not my style. The desolation outside served our ambush well, the alley was closed off on the other end and the only cover anyone had whenever they came through were two dumpsters which were empty, and thus theoretically open to bullet penetration if you had the right caliber, like I and, I presume, Andy hopefully had. With all this considered, it was only a matter of time.
And that time certainly dragged on and on, we waited close to six hours for these guys to show up, which would mean we would be getting out by sunrise hopefully. I was no stranger to all-nighters, I had been on enough post-gig benders for that, but I considered this metaverse stuff more like a job than a combat zone, and I wanted to go home and kick back.
Just as I was thinking about quitting those guys showed up, they kind of just appeared out of nowhere, and there were nine of them in total. Revy had told us that she would take point and make the first move on this, so I held back, peering over the edge of my building just a little bit to see what happened. The guy taking point looked like the leader of the group. He had his hands in his pockets and a white mask on. On his left was a girl who had long red hair that was pulled back in a ponytail, and they both had red gloves oddly enough, it was rare to see something similar within the metaverse-versions of people.
The leader and the girl reached the end of the alley and Revy made her move. She jumped out from behind the corner and got the drop on the redhead girl. She got her in a chokehold and put a pistol to her head. The leader meanwhile dashed back slightly and pulled a pistol from his belt. At that moment Lena and Holly came around, Holly had her shotgun at her hip and Lena was ready to draw her revolver. Andy was aiming his repeater at one of them, and I decided to hang back a little bit. I wasn't exactly expecting Revy to go for a negotiation.
"Alright, this is gonna sound lame, but put your fucking weapons down or she gets it!" Revy said forcefully while pushing the gun further into the girl's temple. The leader said something that virtually no one could understand, but one of the others spoke up. She was very brave with her clothing style, sporting a red latex suit and pigtails with a whip and submachine gun hanging off her belt. She seemed to be the only one who could speak English out of this motley crew.
"No, I don't think we will." she said, the leader's pistol still firmly drawn, the others in the group also grew more restless, one woman with spiked shoulder pads and short brown hair slipped on brass knuckles, and what I can only describe as a monstrous cat-thing somehow had drawn a huge sword from somewhere.
"Very well, I guess we'll do this the fun way." Revy said, she nodded to Lena who started to approach the leader, I got extremely nervous at this, and I took aim at the leader's hands. Lena approached the guy and when she was in arm's length, the leader made his move. With his other hand he reached for his knife and tried to stick Lena in the gut, but I was quicker, and I shot the knife out of his hand. And at the same time, the redhead somehow flipped Revy over her shoulders and jumped across the corner. The others also sprang into action.
One ginger girl with long hair took cover behind a dumpster, Lena was locked in a sword fight with some furry with a fox tail. Andy was firing down upon them, as was I. While we hit a few of them, the bullets somehow weren't penetrating, but they did seem to stagger them some. Two of them, the leader and the redhead were taking on Revy, but Revy had the upper hand, I've sparred with her quite a lot and she's easily the best fighter out of the five of us in CQC. The woman in red latex and the monster cat were making their way up towards Andy, they were leaping up the building somehow, using the smallest of footholds to climb. I called them out to Andy, and he started to fire at them. I was busy backing up Lena, who was now facing down another who was swinging around a huge battle-axe. I was so focused on helping her that I didn't notice the girl with the brass knuckles who was rushing up behind me. She delivered a blow to the back of my head, and I feigned being knocked out for a split second.
I saw her straighten up and I took that as a slip-up from her. My head was throbbing, but I rolled onto my back and started to back up from her, she was then joined by some blond guy who was carrying a bat. I started to take shots at them but they both zigged zagged wildly. So, I decided to stand up and fight them with my bayonet. The blond guy with the bat took the first swing at me and gripping my rifle like a spear I batted away his effort and stabbed at him. He dodged out of the way by a hair and using the momentum I had he pushed me towards his partner. She was winding up a roundhouse kick aimed at my head, but I ducked under it and hit her in the stomach with the butt of my gun. She stumbled back and I turned back towards the blond guy. He gave a ferocious yell and swung the bat down at me. I dodged to the left, and I forced him to turn around so that they were both in front of me. I tried firing a few shots from my hip, but they missed. Blond guy came at me again, but I parried his strike and cut him on the arm.
This didn't stop him though and he ended up making his attacks more and more quickly, pushing me back towards the edge of the building. He swung his bat down again, and I caught it by turning my gun horizontal. I had it between the handguard and the magazine, this gave me a surprisingly decent amount of control and I leveraged that. I swung my gun off to my right and the momentum from his swing made the blond guy stumble. I was winding up a thrust from my bayonet, but the other one, who I thought was down and out, ran up and knocked me on the face again.
I was thoroughly stunned by this, and I fell on my back. I had also lost grip of my rifle and I dropped it, all I had was my Persona, but she was too quick. I backed up until I was right at the edge of the building, and she put her boot on my chest, forcing me down onto my back. I leaned my head back off the building and I got to see where everyone else was. Revy, the leader, and the redhead were still locked in a melee, Andy was still struggling against the others, Holly was doing her best to help, putting blasts into everything that moved, but Lena had seemingly beat back her attackers. She was down below me on the street, she was looking intensely at me and the woman keeping me down. Her hand was hovering over her revolver, and it was only then that I noticed that the one stepping on me also had a revolver. They were locked in a classic old west stand-off, and even the blond guy had backed off to see what happened.
The woman on me made the first move, reaching for her revolver, but Lena was quicker, she drew and hip-fired, and I took this as an opportunity to rip off my glasses. "Quite the bind huh?" Hawkwood quipped, his voice was very formal yet had an undercurrent of something terrifyingly brutal. He sounded like the kind of guy who would at one moment wine and dine you, and the next he would stick a knife in your neck. "Not now man." I thought back, he just started laughing somewhat maniacally, I had to reassert myself. "HAWKWOOD" I shouted, putting as much force into it as possible, like a parent scolding their child. It worked, and I unleashed a wave of curse to drive back my two attackers.
The blond guy responded with his own Persona, which took the form of a pirate riding a yacht, and he tried to electrocute me, but I was impervious to that. I willed my Persona to use their sword and I swiped at the blond guy, knocking him backwards. He yelled out for his companion, who also called on their Persona, it emerged as some sort of black and gold motorcycle, and she drove towards me. I dove out of the way at the last second and she drifted back towards me at the edge of the building.
Lena finally joined me on the roof, using a fire escape at the other end of it. She drew her sword and called out to the blond guy, who took her challenge. They began their melee while I scrambled to pick up my gun again. The woman on the bike began driving towards me again, but I stood my ground. I got onto one knee and placed my rifle on the ground and raised it slightly to act as a rudimentary pike, I was aiming for her to run into it, and hopefully the bayonet would stick the front tire.
She drove into me, and my plan worked somewhat, the blade got stuck into the tire, and she wiped out, falling off her bike, which made it dissipate. She was on the ground, not really expecting to lose the game of chicken. I didn't waste the opportunity and I stuck the blade up to her neck. She got the message to not try anything and stuck her hands up. I held her there for a little bit so I could observe what else was happening.
Lena was still fighting the blond guy and she seemed to be winning, the two others she was fighting before were taking cover behind the dumpsters along with the redhead who was fighting Revy. The leader and Revy were still going at it, they seemed to be equally matched and equally as tired. Andy was chasing off the two he was fighting, and Holly was moving up to help him out some. Things were going okay for the most part, we just needed to finish-
The woman I had trapped made a move and swept my legs, she didn't try to fight however and made a break for it. She called out to her companion, and he broke off his engagement with Lena. Lena ripped off her mask and yelled, "ZENOBIA" and her Persona, a dazzling Roman empress of some sort appeared, meanwhile I unloaded on them, I got a few hits in but the two made their way into cover in the alley with the rest. Andy and Holly had done a similar job to us, and it was just Revy left to fight off the leader.
The rest of us were making our way down, and I had motioned to Andy to stay up and keep them pinned, but for some reason the thick bastard didn't listen to me, he said something that I couldn't make out as we regrouped behind Revy. She and the leader were locked in an intense melee, his knife was being deflected by her pistols, and her kicks and punches dodged by his reflexes. I and the others all took aim at the two, not wanting to break Revy's concentration by getting involved.
The ones hiding behind the dumpsters called out to the leader, I didn't understand what they were saying, but the leader flipped backwards and ran towards them. We gave chase but we were too slow. They escaped back to wherever they came from.
"GOD DAMN IT!" Revy screamed, I looked over to Andy, "Dude, I told you to stay up on the roof and pin them down!" I said to him. "Whatever man, this is a team error." he said back. We all began bickering about what exactly went wrong, but I sensed something behind us. At the entrance to the alley there was a figure in a crimson cloak. "Guys," I said, and they all glanced at me, then they all saw the figure too.
The Councilman walked towards us slowly, their face and body completely engulphed in their cloak. They stopped about five feet in front of us, "Andy," they said, their voice modulated somehow to sound distorted. The figure beckoned him to come closer, and he walked up to them. They were face to face, and the Councilman put their hand on their shoulder, it was covered in a black glove. They stood there for a moment in silence, the Councilman was at one moment still, and in the next there was a knife in the side of Andy's neck. He collapsed at the Councilman's feet and started to bleed out.
"Failure will not be tolerated. Let this serve as a warning to the rest of you to not fail us again as you have today. There will be no money paid out as the terms of the contract were not met." The Councilman said, they stood there in silence as Andy passed, they then turned away and vanished as they turned out of the alley.
I looked at the others, Holly looked like she was about to cry, Revy's expression was hardened, and Lena looked shocked, but was doing her best to hide it. I was also shocked, but I was also perplexed. I knew the Council was not going to be happy when they got away, but to kill a man in cold blood over it? Something felt wrong. "We should leave." I said, the others agreed, and we returned to reality.
LeBlanc appeared again; I had never been so happy to see my room. The fight we were all not expecting took a lot out of everyone. We were all sprawled out around the room. I was leaning up against my bed, Ann was laying back on the couch, Ryuji, Yusuke, and Morgana were all in various states around my shelves, and everyone was shocked, appalled, and downright pissed.
I waited a minute before speaking, "Everyone okay?" I asked to no one in particular. I heard various versions of 'yeah', 'I'm OK', and "mhmm' from everyone which was good. I did a quick headcount, and everyone made it out. I sighed in relief and leaned my head back.
"Who the hell were those guys?" Ryuji said. "I don't know, but they're good, too good." Makoto replied. "I didn't even know there were other Persona users out there, I thought we were the only ones." Morgana chipped in. "Yeah,' I said, "this is odd. For now, we should all rest up, and we can talk more tomorrow." I said, and everyone took off.
Sumire stayed behind however, and Morgana gave us some privacy. She sat with me on the bed, and the reality of the big fight was catching up to her as the adrenaline wore off. She was shaking a whole bunch, and I hugged her as she started to cry a little from all the stress. I didn't know what to say, but something told me that there was nothing to say. The Thieves have suffered losses before, but we had never been so handily beaten back in combat by opponents who were so normal before, and I think it was a shock to everyone.
I was still determined to investigate that place some more. And the way those five fought and coordinated with each other, they didn't seem like a coherent group to me, they seemed more like people who were doing a job. But there would have to be more done to figure out what exactly is going on. But for now, my girlfriend was in my arms crying, and I was in a state where I might start doing so too.