Chapter 24

For the second time, Akira was staring at the large, looming wall of what should have been a crackling stone fence that was barely taller than he was. Just like last time, there was a line of people curling out of the hole where the gate should have been and on the other side of that endless line was where they were lurking, right across the street from where Madarame's shack was out of fear of being spotted by Kitagawa and having the police actually called on them. To his side, a glowing blue gate pillared through the darkness they were hiding in. Something, apparently, he could notice but his teammates could not. Now that he knew what it was, he felt no desire to approach it, he'd been to that world just last night.

"Huh." Skull exclaims softly.

"Something wrong, Ryuj- er, Skull?" Panther questions, turning away from whatever she'd been staring at.

Akira catches a glimpse of Skull smiling brightly, his teeth like a miniature spotlight in the darkness they've covered themselves in.

"Ain't a museum like, a must for phantom thieves?" He questions.

Mona steps forward, standing between the three of them on two legs. "Well, it is important for a real phantom thief to know the difference between an original and a fake, but I don't think this is really the right place for a lesson like that."

"Doubled." Panther evokes.

Skull shrugs, then takes a step forward, breaking the pattern they'd stepped into and points towards the entrance of the building with a yellowed hand, "Anyways, how're we gonna get in there? Looks like all of those guys have tickets or somethin'."

"It's not like we can go through the front anyway, not without alerting all of those guards and Madarame as well, most likely." Morgana advises.

"So you think we should go around back then?" Panther questions.

"Or up." Morgana says simply before walking towards one corner of the large wall.

Akira is hesitant to approach. Kitagawa's threat from the previous day hangs over him like a physical weight, but when he finally works up the courage, the other three are already there and talking.

"-It looks like where's less shadows on this side than over there." Morgana's voice filters through once he's close enough to hear it. "So if we scale up this wall then we shouldn't be detected."

"Not that isn't a great plan and all, but uh, how exactly are we supposed to get up there?" Skull entreats, his silver mask tilting up to gaze straight up at the near endless wall.

From this close, it looks like the wall shoots straight up into the sky and never ends.

"Allow me." Arsene's voice erupts, but not from inside. Something he can only tell by the way his ears start to vibrate.

The same burst of flame erupts over his shoulder and Akira turns around just in time to catch his other half flicker into being with a rattle of chains. A gust of air floods heavily against his face, tousling his hair and flapping the heavy coat that surrounds him. Arsene looks the same as the last time Akira had seen him, an incredibly tall figure half made of shadows and fire and dressed up in decadent clothing that covers his unusual form. Long claws, also made of absolute darkness, hang where his hands should be and dark, still rattling chains hang from around his shoulders and waist.

Without another word, Arsene advances towards him, breaking the already meager space between them with another gust of wind. Akira clenches his eyes shut, expecting the worst, and is then hyper-sensitive to the feeling of Arsene's would-be hands curling around his sternum and under his knees. Then, yet another gust of wind from above is pushing down on him. Akira, for the life of him, can't describe what's going on around him, but he refuses to open his eyes until Arsene's voice erupts once more.

"We are here." His persona says simply. The wind stills, from violent into nothing in no time at all.

Akira forces himself to look beyond his mask, and sees Madarame's museum from above. The sight bobs as Arsene does, swaying back and forth as if affecting by a breeze that Akira can't comprehend. When he chances a glance downwards, Akira is surprised to find the top of the wall just below his feet and, without him having to think or ask, Arsene's shadowy grip loosens on him and he's standing on the wall that had been looming over them.

"Joker!" Mona exclaims to his side, also having had scaled the building, though Akira doesn't spot Morgana's persona at all. "Did your persona really fly you all the way up here?"

Akira glances towards Arsene, who floats just behind him. The other half of him merely shrugs, a surprisingly human gesture for one who looks so un-human.

The appearance of his other teammate, also without their persona, from the same direction as Morgana has him questioning if he was really as like them as he thought they were.

"Dude!" Skull crows out, another smile on his face, "That was awesome! I tried asking Captain Kidd the same thing after I saw that, an' you know what he said? A big fat nope. Then Mona-Mona pulled out this grappling hook thing and well, it looks a lot easier in the movies."

Panther doesn't say anything as her crimson mask and yellow hair peeks out from one side of the wall, but, after another moment of hesitation in which he glances towards his other two teammates, who are talking in low tones to each other, Akira steps over quickly to help her up once she starts struggling to vault over the edge of the wall. Weak as he is, Panther grabs onto his hand without hesitation, and he still manages to help her up. She smiles from underneath her mask when she finally stands back up.

"At least someone is a gentleman around here." She comments lowly as she approaches the other end of the wall. Akira follows behind her and stares off towards the museum.

He's never been this high up before. Is the first thought that he's able to process. Then he looks downwards and feels his stomach to drop out from underneath him, he steps a little further back from the edge.

"Hm, there's more guards over here than I thought." Morgana surmises. Akira glances towards his feline teammate, who's staring straight down at the ground below them, and notes that he doesn't appear conscious of the height change at all, nor does he look as nervous as Akira feels at all. He wonders if that was a cat-turned-human thing, or if Morgana was simply less frightful than Akira himself was.

"Should we get rid of them?" Ryuji questions with a sinister expression.

Morgana shakes his massive head, "This place is huge, it'll take forever to find the treasure if we aren't careful; we should avoid any unnecessary battles until we find out just how big this place really is..." Morgana trails off, then stares towards him, "Uh- I mean, but we should do whatever Joker thinks is the right call, he's our leader after all."

"Oh yeah!" Skull says, also looking towards him.

His chest seizes up like a vice grip, having been put on the spot so suddenly. Akira pulls his phone out from the confines of his coat's pocket and quickly types up his panicked answer.

"What Mona said." He instructs, feeling rather stupid. Even more so when it's Mona's turn to read it and his teammate glares at him.

"It looks like we can jump onto the arch from here." Panther observes, pointing just below them where a series of massive, white torii gates begins. Akira can't tell where the trail actually ends, but he does spot one sticking out from behind the museum they're supposed to be breaking into.

Mona jumps first, before they can finish talking, then advances onto the next just as Skull ejects himself from the top of the wall. The blond falls for a long time before he lands on top of the gate, Akira catches Sakamoto grasping at his knee and the sight makes his stomach sink all over again. Panther jumps next, leaving him behind without a word as she falls through the air and lands at Ryuji's side. The two of them talk for a moment, before they both stand back up and continue jumping across the torii as if they were crossing a sidewalk.

"Breathing is important." Arsene points out and Akira sucks in a huge gulp of air before he, too, thrusts himself from the, relative, safety of the museum's wall. Falling gave him the same feeling as flying, strong wind pushing at his clothes and hair, making it impossible to move his arms and legs, then it all stops as he comes into contact with the ground below him. In truth, it hadn't been that bad. It could have ended up a lot worse, which could aptly describe most situations he's had in the MetaVerse thus far, he supposes. The jump after that one is much easier, though no less stress inducing. His body slices through the air with a grace he can't possibly possess and he knows that Arsene, or perhaps the MetaVerse as a whole, has something to do with it. By himself, Akira couldn't even chase after a cat without falling and hurting himself.

The number of gates ahead started to dwindle before Mona stopped moving all together. His teammate glanced up once again and Akira watches as he pulled something from the pouches around his waist.

"We should be able to get to the roof from this way." Akira hears in a whisper before Morgana throws a metal barb towards the edge of the roof.

The barb clatters onto the concrete beneath them, drawing the attention of a shadow. The guard shines a flashlight on the ground where the noise had originated but finds nothing as Mona reels it back quickly. The second attempt yields the same result, the same clatter, only this time the noise attracts more guards that search out the area beneath them.

"For fuck's sake." Skull mutters, jumping forward until he's on the same arch as Mona. Yellow fingers tug the device from his unusual appendage. The same hand reels back, over his shoulder, then shoots forward in a motion that makes Akira's insides clench in pain. He rubs at his arm as the device latches onto the lip of the museum's roof. He'd thought he'd forgotten all about that particular incident. He's already forgiven Ryuji, neither of them had really been at fault, yet part of him refused to not feel pain whenever Skull mirrored how he did then. The pain faded just as quickly as it had come, and Akira joined Panther as she jumped onto the next gate.

"My paw slipped, that's all!" Mona exclaims in a harsh whisper. The cat tugs twice on the rope that had been attached to the metal barb that Skull had just thrown then pulls another piece of metal out of one of his pouches and loops the rope around it. Once the knot is tight enough that his teammate is satisfied with it, he lowers to the ground and the sharp, pointed end of the device sinks into the ground as if it had a will of its own. The ground ripples like it had been made of water and part of the rope sinks into it as well. Mona stands back up and tugs on the taut line of rope that connected the torii gate to the roof of Madarame's museum.

Without another word, Mona curls his form over the rope and starts scooting towards the other end. Panther and Skull join once their other teammate is far enough along the rope for there to be room for them and Akira watches, curious and confused, before he moves to mimic them as well, throwing one leg over the rope before joining his ankles together.

Akira had never climbed anything in his life, much less a rope, and found it rather difficult to navigate the smooth material of his boots from sliding against each other to prevent them from breaking apart and causing him to fall off. Eventually, though, he managed to make it to the top before someone grabbed him from underneath his shoulders and drag him onto the flat top of the roof. Once he's steady on his feet, yellow hands pull away from him and Akira offers his thanks in a quick gesture. Skull waves him off with a smile. It leaves Akira feeling even worse about the phantom sensation he'd had just moments ago.

Together, the four of them advance across the roof and gaze inside of the skylights, hoping to discover the treasure's location without having to engage in shadows at all, but don't spot anything that looks out of the ordinary from above. They reach the other end of the roof, where the off-kilter dome was that Akira had spotted the day before, without locating the treasure. The dome itself is made of panes of glass that all open outwards, providing the museum ventilation and, for them, at Mona's suggestion, a way inside. Morgana locks another metal barb around the frame of the window and throws the rope inside before turning towards the three of them.

"Once we're inside, we need to make sure not to draw attention to ourselves, we don't know how strong the enemy is. And be careful not to touch anything, who knows where Madarame could have placed a trap." He analyzes, gazing between the three of them.

Akira nods in agreement. Not many people noticed him anyways.

Except for Sakamoto and Takamaki... He amends, glancing between his other two teammates.

Sliding down a rope is much easier than ascending one, though it leaves him open to a different sort of problem where he runs the risk of falling on his teammates if his grip slips at all. Fortunately, the other three are faster than he is at the exercise, swiftly coiling down the rope and landing on the museum's floor without much noise. Akira is less graceful with his descent, he's sure of it, though he has no way of knowing for sure, and lands on the tile below with an audible crack as his heels connect with the ground. Once he's grounded, he glances around the room they'd rappelled into to see if anyone had heard, but finds the area around them strangely blank, save for the paintings that line one wall. Unlike the outside, which had been so blindingly bright and distractedly shiny, the interior of Madarame's palace is made of white walls so tall that shadows start to curl down from the ceiling where the light doesn't quite reach.

In addition to being blank, the room they landed in was also astoundingly quiet. Unnervingly so; he hadn't noticed before how much noise that the crowd outside actually made until he could no longer hear it.

The room they're in opens up into another room, one that more accurately depicts the exhibit that Madarame's art was at. Large square panels split the room into many awkward pieces, folding together at awkward angles that are hard to hide behind, like the last room, only paintings occupy the room and while their eyes seem to stare down at him as he sneaks from one corner to the next, the room seems unoccupied, even when he takes in a deep breath and manages to activate his thief vision.

The room after that is very much the same, but when he glances up at one of the paintings that occupies the walls, he doesn't expect to recognize the face that's locked inside of the frame.

Nakanohara... He recognizes with a dull horror as he approaches the massive painting that's taking up a large portion of the wall. The man is painted in the dark suit, identical to the one his shadow had been wearing moments before his entire form had shredded in on itself and attacked them. His hair is dark and well-kept, so unlike Akira's own that it's strange to find any similarities between them. His eyes, however, lack the golden ring that they had in Mementos and they are, instead, painted in with a shade so dark that Akira feels himself sinking into his gaze the longer he stares. His expression is sad and depressing to look at, his cheeks are sunken in and the bones in his face stick out sharply against his skin.

Akira lifts a hand and presses the same spots against his own features. His cheeks, too, are sunken in and the bones just above them are sharp to the touch, even through the gloves coating his hands.

If his hair were any neater, or Nakanohara's any messier, they could maybe look similar enough to confuse with one another. Though Akira had to wonder if he, like Nakanohara, ever bore an expression that is capable of welling such sadness within another person.

"Isn't that the guy from Mementos?" Skull asks, pulling him away from Nakanohara's gaze and his thoughts as well. Sobering up, he glances towards his teammate, who had managed to appear at his side without being heard or seen.

Akira nods, though he doesn't have to as Panther is quick to walk up to the painting and confirm Nakanohara's name just underneath it.

"He looks so sad," Panther comments, "They all do."

Out of the four of them, nobody has a reply to that, Akira least of all.

Akira pushes forwards, but is stopped, yet again, by a familiar face.

Kitagawa is on the wall. His face sunken and his eyes dark, though dressed in clothes Akira had never seen him in before. His mouth is curved in a harsh frown and, just like Nakanohara, fills him with such encompassing sadness that Akira can't glance away from the frame in front of him, no matter how much he wants to rend this moment from his memory. The frame that encompasses his form is even larger than Nakanohara's, taking up an entire wall of the room they've walked into and casting Kitagawa's features into a looming figure of blacks and purples that seem to sway under Akira's gaze.

"That's Kitagawa-kun!" Panther points out, though she still runs up to the small, golden plaque just underneath Kitagawa's frame just as if to double check. "January twenty-eighth to 'blank'. Nakanohara had two under his name, does that mean something?" She asks, turning towards the three of them.

"Sounds kinda like a grave, doesn't it? Birthday and date of death" Skull suggests.

"Yeah, but Nakanohara is alive still, and the second date for him is long before we'd even became phantom thieves."

"So something else then..." Morgana agrees.

Not birth and death... then something else...

"Death is not exclusive to the act of dying." Arsene assures from within, though Akira finds the statement more cryptic than helpful.

Exclusive to death... The end then? In his head, it all snaps together and he tugs out his phone.

"Working with Madarame." Akira throws out.

"That makes sense for Nakanohara's dates, but Kitagawa's are from almost as long ago." Panther counters, "But Kitagawa-kun's go back just as long."

"Ain't he the same age as us though, he said he was a second-year." Skull says, handing back him back his phone.

"So we're wrong about this or Madarame's had him since he was born or right after..." Panther looks at the plaque again.

"Explains why he's so fucked up in the head, at least." Skull murmurs with a snort.

"...All of these people, then," Panther starts in place of a response, "Were Madarame's pupils? All of them?" Panther wonders. Akira finds it hard to conceptualize. Madarame was hardly young, but he's certain they'd passed over a hundred paintings before stumbling onto Nakanohara and Kitagawa, perhaps even more; he had no intention to count just how many lives that Madarame impacted, good or bad.

"We should keep going..." Mona suggests quietly, already peering around the corner of the room just beyond the one they're standing in.

Akira steps behind him, gazing into the next room himself. Again, there's no guards or cognitive people. Only them and no paintings. In the center of the room is a large circular desk which blocks the room into two, almost equal spaces. There are various shelves across the walls and panes of glass embedded between them that are too opaque to serve as windows. If he had to guess, the room was a receptionist area of sorts, though he's not sure if a museum, especially a cognitive one, would need such a space.

"Wait a second, Joker." Mona pipes up, stopping him in his tracks. Akira glances down at him, then up at the room, wondering if Morgana had seen something that he hadn't. The cat scuttles forward quietly, his blade not drawn, and approaches an empty desk. In front of it, where Mona stops, is a rack with thick stacks of folded up pamphlets. Each of them is colored in a golden sheen that matched the outside of the museum.

"It's a map!" Mona whispers out to him, pulling one from the rack and sending the rest scattering to the floor. Glancing in either way, Akira crosses the room, his other two teammates just behind him, and leans down as Mona pulls open the blindingly bright piece of paper.

"It's much smaller on paper." Panther observes.

"Why'd he bother thinking something like this up? It's his palace, why would he need a map?" Skull questions over her quite loudly, then even louder, "Don't suppose the treasure is somewhere on there?"

"Be quiet!" Mona hisses glaring in Skull's direction before looking back down at the map. Turning the paper around, then back over, he looks up at them and shakes his head, "I don't think this is the only map. This museum definitely has more than one floor."

Folding up the map until it resembles a small, golden brick, Mona hands extends the map to him and Akira hesitates for a moment before accepting it and tucking into his pocket.

The room beyond that one is even more different than the last. Like the previous one, there are no paintings governing the walls. In spite of this, the walls are anything but blank, taking on the same blinding radiance that the map in his pocket has. Within that gilded coating is a motif of nature that spreads across the room and arches up as the crescent staircases on either side of the room do. Even more gallant than that, is the sparking, golden statue that begins on the floor in front of them, directly in the center of the room. Its base takes up as much space as the four of them do, but spirals outwards in a wide, glistening arc, resembling water moving through a river. The statue's curves are uneven as splashes of the same gold material bubble out of it, disrupting its water-like texture with shapes that resemble humans. The statue climbs towards the ceiling equaling the circumference of the circular room as it grows nearer to the darkened ceiling. The entirety of the statue makes the shape of a whirlpool, though he has no idea if it's going upwards or downwards.

Creepy. He thinks, taking in the lifelike figures that seem to be caught in the spiral. Instead, like Takamaki had done before, he approaches it, crouching under a small line of ropes that surround the base of the statues, and reads the small, golden plaque that is attached the base of the statue.

The Infinite Spring

Madarame Ichiryusai

The words are etched into the golden plaque boldly but neatly, the same typescript that had been under Nakanohara's and Kitagwa's portraits.

Panther voice calls out suddenly, startling him and when he turns around he finds her standing just beyond the ropes he'd climbed under, face half obscured by yet another plaque.

"A conglomerate work of art that the great director Madarame created with his own funds. These individuals must offer their ideas to the director for the rest of their lives. Those who cannot do so are not worthy of living." Her voice trembles through the last clause, though Akira isn't sure whether it's sadness or rage that compelled her. "This is what he thinks about stealing his student's work... isn't it?"

Akira catches a glimpse of Takamaki's mask as it tilts back, most likely staring upwards into the golden vortex.

"In other words, his pupils are like his property." Mona observes. "He's stealing ideas from talented artists in exchange for securing their livelihoods. And if they can't fulfill their end of the deal, Madarame gets rid of them."

"That sounds familiar." Skull comments in return. His boot catches on one of the rope stands surrounding the statue and it topples to the ground with a clatter.

Akira's surprised that no shadows show up from the noise.

"So those paintings out there." Panther says suddenly, "That's how Madarame thinks of Kitagawa-kun? A decoration?"

Nodding, Mona continues fiercely, "That confirms it then. It's safe to say that Madarame's distortion is a danger to those under him. With that being the case..."

The cat turns to him suddenly, staring him down with large, ocean blue eyes.

"What do you think, Joker, is all of this enough to make Madarame our target?"

He's hesitant to answer, suddenly flummoxed from the intense attention. Nobody ever looks at him, especially like Morgana was, and he was definitely not the one to ask about what someone should or shouldn't do. Until he'd seen the shack for himself, Akira was hesitant to even consider the possibility that Madarame might be a bad person; he'd looked kindly. There were no harsh looks shot in Kitgawa's direction. No bruises on him that Akira could see. Kitagawa acted nothing like he did, or like Takamaki or Suzui. Yet, in front of him right now, was proof enough of what Madarame actually thought, how he actually viewed the people around him. Kitagawa wasn't worth yelling at or beating, Madarame just left him alone in that place until he fulfilled his purpose; to the man who's heart they were in, Kitagawa wasn't a person at all.

Panther stepped around the plaque that had been hiding her face and looked at him too, and when Akira shoots a glance towards his other teammate, Skull is doing the same.

Three people staring at him, forcing him to make a decision. He admits, it should be an easy one. Madarame was a bad person, the statue before them and the palace around them was proof enough of that. Yet, Kitagawa was adamant about Madarame being the model teacher for him, that the older man couldn't possibly be like what his heart displayed to them.

Akira nods as firmly as he can. His agreement doesn't fill him with the same underlying satisfaction that he'd had when agreeing with Sakamoto to deal with Kamoshida. Compared to him, Madarame was his opposite. Unlike Kamoshida, Madarame never caused direct harm, as far as he could tell, anyways. He was absent in a way that left Kitagawa, and his other pupils, stranded and starving. It's an existence that is painful without pain. Akira would be lying if he didn't admit that he has a tough time wrapping his head around the concept.

Mona smiles vaguely at him, then nods as well. "Excellent decision. Now, our first step is to secure an infiltration route to the treasure."

"Our first official mission!" Skull crows a bit too loudly, though that too doesn't seem to draw any guards into the area. Mona hisses at him regardless.

Together, they scale up the crescent staircase, taking care not to touch the golden statue that arches through the walkway. There's a set of doors at the top that slide open quietly when Akira pushes at them and he's able to glance in the corridor just beyond it. That space is also devoid of shadows, guards or the cognitive customers that had been lingering outside; he's not sure if it's more or less comforting that they seem to be completely alone. Regardless of that, he moves slowly and as quietly as he can as he advances down the hallway, and glances over his shoulder several times in the process, just to be sure.

There's another room at the end of the corridor just before it bends off into another, equally long walkway, which is equally as dark and devoid of life than the one they'd just sneaked through. Nervously, he pushes it open and is hit with a pungent smell that makes him stumble backwards for a moment. Then, just as quickly as it had incapacitated him, the odor is completely gone.

"Did you guys just smell paint?" Skull questions, just as the room beyond the door flickers like lightning. The dark space is replaced with brightness, and the smell returns, which he recognizes as paint now that Skull had put into his mind; it was the same smell that had hit him in the face when he was climbing up the stairs to Kitagawa's studio. The floors, too, resembled that space too, flecked in different colors of paint.

"It's a low-cognition room!" Mona says, scooting around his legs and stepping fully into the room.

"Low cognition?" Panther questions, stepping in with the three of them.

Akira secures the door, letting it click shut as he joins his team towards the center of the room.

"I remember you talkin' about that! It's like, a room that the palace doesn't think is important or whatever. Like a bathroom." Skull offers loudly.

Mona doesn't shush him and instead, to him, offers, "You should mark this room down on the map, Joker. It'll definitely be useful information to have."

He's not sure, exactly, where they are on the map, nor does he have anything to write with, but when the four of them pull away from the entrance to the low-cognition room, Akira does his best to commit the rooms placement to memory. Though the entire map seems rather pointless once they reach the other end of the corridor and are greeted with another set of stairs that isn't indicated on the map.

At the top of the stairs, Akira stops in his tracks when he spots a security station. That, if nothing else, would definitely indicate guards in the area, but when he sneaks towards the glass doors that separate's the station from the corridor and glances inside, the room is completely empty, except for a surprising amount of screens. He thinks back to what Skull had said earlier, about the pointlessness of a map inside of Madarame's own palace and wonders briefly just how much like a museum the place actually was; how much thought that went into developing it until it became all but real.

The doors to the security station refuse to open and Akira figures that's enough for them to keep going, made even further evident when Morgana bolts forwards into the expansive room just beyond. It appears to be a gallery room, much like the ones downstairs, except with far less paintings taking up space, and instead of dividers, the room is fairly open, drawing attention to the singular pillar in the center of the room. The pillar is rather plain looking, made of a pale stone that curls into a perfect circle then tapers outwards to create a square-based pedestal. On top of that pedestal is an eye-catching piece of art; a solid gold vase. He's not sure what about it drawing his attention, like other things in Madarame's palace, it is excessively shiny and glitters under the multitude of spotlights shining upon it. Within this cognitive place, it doesn't look out of place, even with its positioning, yet he still can't quite shake the feeling that it isn't all it seems to be. It seems to wobble in place, like it's made of water, or something gelatinous, despite remaining completely still.

Before Akira can express his unease, or whatever this feeling might be, Mona jumps onto the display, landing just beside the vase and presses his paws against it with a rapturously loud purr.

All at once, the room that had been oddly vacant shutters into sections with a buzz of alarm that causes his entire body to vibrate. In front of him, and around his teammates, the floor fissures open and long strips of metal fill the space the floor had just occupied. Panther, who'd been following Morgana closely and Skull, who'd been following her, are splintered apart from each other as beams of crimson light pierce upwards from the metal that had sprung up from the ground. Morgana, who'd been in the center of it all, is caged inside walls upon walls of the red curtains that the lasers formed.

"U-uhm..." Skull's trembles out from in front of him as he reaches outwards. His yellowed fingers graze against one of the beams, only for him to recoil with a curse. Akira catches a glimpse of smoke shooting from his teammate's hand before it's stuck in his mouth.

"Lasers?!" Panther questions. She turns around in the small square she's been trapped in, most likely looking for a way out while Akira just watches. He hadn't been trapped, yet he feels unable to move.

"W-what?" Mona calls out, finally coming to his senses. His oblong head shakes back and forth for a moment before he speaks again, "A trap?"

"Yeah, a trap!" Skull shoots back from around the finger in his mouth, "Weren't you the one to tell us not to touch nothin'?"

"Akira's free, though!" Panther points out before Morgana can open his mouth. Then, all at once, three sets of eyes are staring at him again. His heart beats a lot faster because of it and he shoots his gaze towards the ground instinctively.

"Find us a way out, dude, before this cat sets off anything else." Skull orders, shooting a look at their feline teammate.

"S-sorry." Mona offers. "There should be a panel or s-something?"

Akira shoots a glance around the room, then back at the security station that they had just passed. If he had to take a guess, the solution to this would be in there, but without a key or a battering ram, he had no way of getting inside. That doesn't really leave him with many options outside of scoping the room their stuck in to look for a key or something equally as useful.

He'd be lying if he didn't admit it, but he felt rather isolated at the moment, even with his teammates still in the same room as him and watching his every move. Yet, as he circled around the perimeter of the place, looking for panels like Mona had suggested, Akira couldn't help but feel like he'd been cast off into a strange land, alone, for the second time in less than a year. In addition to that, he couldn't find a single thing in the room that would deactivate the trap that had been sprung, even with his thief vision.

There was, however, a second floor to the room that he hadn't noticed before. Only, there were no stairs to access it. Which, after Arsene wordlessly took him into his arms, left him with a new perspective, just above the gallery. He circles around the balcony, checking the walls once again for any sort of switch or panel. By the time he reaches the other side, Akira is ready to panic.

What would they do if there was no way out.

Despite Morgana being the one to set off the trap, he can't help but feel responsible for getting them in the situation; he'd been the one to agree to the investigation, after all. He'd been the one to lead their infiltration right up to the moment that he'd gotten them all trapped.

With a sign, Akira lowers himself to the ground, all but falling into a puddle of regret and panic.

At least there are no shadows around... He thinks miserably.

"Everything okay up there?" Panther's voice calls from below and it takes all Akira has not to ignore her voice.

Climbing to his feet, he's ready to admit that he doesn't have an answer, that he can't help them. He's about walk towards the balcony's railing when his body jerks backwards as he steps forward. The force is almost enough to send him back to the ground, but he merely staggers in place. Curious, Akira tilts his head over his shoulder and glances down in that direction of that force.

If only to make matters worse, the edge of his coat is caught in the grating of a vent. Then, as if his luck weren't bad enough, as soon as he tugs on it, the grate rips out of its place in the wall as if it hadn't been connected at all.

Akira's about to report back when Arsene's voice stops him yet again.

"A door does not dictate the path of a thief, much like a trail doth not impede a stag from harvest." His voice, as menacing and cynical as it is, manages to soothe some of the heat that been threatening to overwhelm him; though it did nothing to stop the layer of sweat that was building up under his clothes.

Instead of heading towards the balcony, he follows the advice of his persona, and slowly ducks into the vent.

The vent itself is quite large, more than enough space to for him to crawl on his hands and knees through. In spite of that, or perhaps because of it, the tunnel Akira finds himself worming through is quite dark, not that the dark has ever bothered him, but without a sense of direction, the swell of panic from before starts to return to its full force. Turn after turn, he finds himself wondering if Arsene had been onto something or not, or if he was merely trying to be helpful; either way, Akira can't fault him, he'd been doing nothing as a leader or as a phantom thief. Still, he continues forward, until he finally catches a glimpse of light at the far end of a long tunnel, then another just beyond that.

Crawling towards the first light, Akira peers down into it. His breath catches in his throat at the sight just below.

Shadows! He recognizes.

The two figures below him are silhouettes, despite being just under a light source and are standing around without doing much of anything.

"Hey." One says, causing him to jump.

"Yeah?" The other says, just as casually.

The two shadows continued on, carrying on a conversation as if they were human, sharing jokes and conversing like people; the display is realistic enough that it has him wondering if Morgana had been entirely truthful about shadows being just constructs of the palace's ruler. The guards carried on a conversation like two separate beings, nothing like how Akira's thoughts would interact with one another.

"Oh, did you get the new password?" The second shadow says suddenly, just as the other is about to walk off.

"New password?" The first one questions back.

"Mhm. It's Hello!"

"... What?"

"You know, like when you use a calculator, if you type 07334 and turn it upside down it looks like it's saying hello..."

"Er, alright then..." The second shadow responds, finally walking away. The first one marches in the opposite direction.

Akira watches through the vent for another moment, curious to see if the two shadows will come back, but after a moment, when they don't return, he crawls over the gate and advances towards the second grate in the tunnel. Once he reaches it, Akira finds himself staring at the inside of the security station from above. Just below him are a large number of screens, all of them are showing places in the museum and some just outside of it, depicting the long, long line of customers that they'd seen when coming on. On several of the screens, he's able to make out the forms of his teammates, still trapped in a grid of lasers and waiting on him.

Swallowing down the painful lump that had formed in his throat, Akira presses his face more firmly against the grate and glances around the room, trying to see if it had remained as empty as it had been the first time he'd peered into it. Fortunately, the room was as devoid of life as other parts of the museum had been and when he slams the flat side of his model gun against the grate, sending it straight downwards and crushing one of the monitors just below, nobody comes into the room.

Carefully, Akira levers himself out of the opening he'd just made and lands on top of a computer desk along side the crushed monitor and grate. Double-checking, he glances around the room once again, before climbing off of the desk and stepping onto the station's floor. Once again, he circles around the room, checking for panels or levers for the laser trap, but the only thing inside of the room he's in are computers and televisions. Approaching one of the first, Akira wakes up the computer is met with an interface that reflects the exterior of the museum, blindingly bright and golden.

Enter Password: The computer beckons and Akira carefully types in the password that the shadows had mentioned before, wondering if he was actually extremely lucky or if Arsene knew this might happen. Tilting his head, Akira can mostly make out the letters from the numbers and, just like the shadow had said, it spells out a greeting.

The screen flashes green once he inputs the code and is met with another interface. Several options appear on one side of the screen, on the other are several small camera feeds that exclusively display his trapped teammates in the room just beyond this one. Akira clicks through them and finally finds one that shuts everything off, including the traps.

Activating that sends the room into darkness, startling him. Glancing towards the windows, Akira sees that the gallery just beyond the glass is also devoid of light, both the lasers and the lights were deactivated.

"Nicely done."Arsene praises from within. His face, already sweaty and warm from the adrenaline and panic the situation had caused, heat up in the station's darkness.

With a massive sigh, Akira pushes open the security station's door and steps carefully into the darkened gallery.

"Akira- er, Joker?" Panther's voice calls out from the darkness.

Akira nods instinctively, then recalls that his teammates are in the same darkness that he's in. Tugging out his phone, he casts the area in front of him with a faint light. Panther's distinctive boot catches his attention and he walks forward, only to bump into a solid force that he recognizes as his other human teammate only after a small moment of panic.

Together, the three of them walk forward, towards the display in the center of the room, which still glows brightly, even without the light from his phone shining against it. Mona, who had been on top of the pillar holding up the vase, was now on top of the thing, attempting to reach down into it.

The area around them is suddenly cast in a warm orange glow. When Akira jerks his head to the side, he spots a bright orange flame in a brazer of two, oddly colored hands. He turns his attention back to Morgana.

"Good work, Joker." The cat says. The compliment doesn't strike him the way Arsene's had.

"Yeah, good job." Skull's voice calls out from just beside him. A hand, presumably, catches on his shoulder and the force is almost enough to make his knees buckle out from under him.

"Truthfully, I was starting to think we were goners when you didn't answer. I was totally panicking." Panther admits with a small laugh. Akira's just glad that he isn't the only one. "So... thanks for not giving up."

His face heats up again, even as the shame- or perhaps because of it- lances through his chest. He'd all but given up before the lucky accident with his coat.

"Anyways," Skulls calls out loudly and angrily, "What the fuck is wrong with you? We all coulda got killed and you're still attached to that stupid, fucking vase!"

The voice makes his pulse jump and the urge to panic hits again, hard, even when he's not the one being yelled at. All the same, Mona freezes from his place atop the vase and turns around to look at them for the first time. His expression, aside from the widened eyes, all but mirrors the ones that had been painted on Nakanohara's and Kitagawa's faces downstairs. It was rather painful to look at, especially on a cat, and especially when Akira himself was partly responsible for the situation.

Feeling brave, Akira steps front of Skull, effectively stopping him from continuing his tirade and quickly starts typing before the blond changes his mind.

"You shouldn't yell at Morgana, it was my fault too." He says, shining the message into his teammate's eyes.

"Your fault?" Skull questions, quietly, then much louder, "How the hell was that your fault? He's the one who ran ahead and got us all trapped! He should be the one apologizing!"

Morgana does so, in a quiet voice, "He's right, Joker, b-but I felt something from this thing. You can feel it too, can't you? This thing is a treasure!"

"A treasure?" Panther questions, "Like that crown in Kamoshida's castle?"

"Really?" Skull asks at the same time, his anger no longer absent. Akira thinks it's safe to breathe again and inhales shakily.

"Not the treasure," He clarifies, "It's just a treasure, a part of Madarame that he thinks is important."

"Important?" Panther echoes. Just as she says it, the vase sinks down as if melting under Mona's weight. Forming a blob, it slips off of one side of the podium and falls to the ground. He's about take a step closer to it when a flame erupts from its core and settles into the space above it. Slowly, the flame shifts into a diamond shape, then stills as if it had been frozen over instantly. Then, a voice calls out from the diamond, at the same time, the shape flickers and Akira sees two figures inside of the shape where nothing had existed before, almost like a television.

"It's beautiful, sensei." A woman's voice calls out suddenly. The image behind the screen zooms in on one figure, a woman. Her hair is dark and her eyes are downcast, staring at a massive jewel around her neck, attached by a silver chain.

"Of course." Madarame's familiar voice says in response. "It is merely a token of my appreciation. Though I might say, you are far more precious than any gemstone."

The woman's face erupts in shades of red. The images flashes and suddenly the woman is on the ground, her dark hair a mess around her. Her face is no longer red, but blue, though Akira can barely make it out with how the woman is violently shaking.

The diamond cracks, the flame sinks down into the amorphous, golden blob, disappearing from sight.

Stunned, Akira is barely able to react when the blob changes forms yet again, and leaps at him. Tripping over his own feet, Akira falls to the ground and stares upwards at a large spearhead where his head had just occupied.

"W-what the hell?" Skull blusters.

"Carmen!" Panther calls out over him. The ball of flame that had been lighting the area around them shifts and Akira hears it roar and ripple through the air as it's lobbed through the air. It connects soundly in the center of the reformed blob, but doesn't slow it down as its spear is retracted.

Akira scrambles to his feet, pulling Skull along with him once he does so, and gets the two of them out of the spears range, just in time for it whistle in the space between them. Once they're far enough from the thing, Akira faces the beast and gets a good look at it. The blob had reformed into a knightly looking edifice, still colored in a sappy, molten gold that glistens brightly in the faint light from Panther's persona. Its body runs like a slow moving stream as another ball of fire is directed towards its center of mass. The plates of armor that cover its chest pull apart from each other and leave a wide open hole where the attack would have hit. Morgana, who had been positioned just behind the creature, leaps out of the way just before the attack would have hit him instead. The flame shoots past and lands on the floor and quickly smothers into a ball of smoke, casting the area around them into darkness once more.

"Where'd it go?" Skull shouts across the room, just before another ball of flame is consummated, embellishing the area in an orange glow and exposing the monster, who had moved back paces and was now focused solely on Morgana.

"Watch out!" Is shouted, just before the beast rears back its spear and sends it piercing through the floor that Mona had been standing on. The cat leaps out of the way once more, then again as the spear is pulled back and is shot out quickly. Another ball of fire is thrown, but the thing seems to absorb it this time, rather than evade it and the room is cast into darkness once again for a few seconds as Carmen creates another flame.

"Ann!" Skull shouts directly into his ear as the light is returns. Akira shoots a look to right just in time to see the blob slither up on Panther's side, outside of her field of vision. "Get down!"

The spear shoves bullets past the empty space where Panther had been standing and almost reaches him before he takes a step backwards.

Captain Kidd flickers to life and shoots out a bolt of blinding light, which splashes against the monster's chest, but doesn't seem to effect it at all. The attack after that one is enough of a distraction, however, for Takamaki to create some distance between her and the monster. She regroups just behind Skull and pulls her whip from her side.

"Keep the area lit up!" Skull orders.

Panther doesn't say anything, but Akira catches her persona flying above them and casting a wider ball of flame over the area. The monster glows even brighter, almost blindingly so, but Akira knows it's better than the alternative. Akira focuses as best as he can, letting his concentration steady him before he expels Arsene from inside of him. His persona shoots out a mass of blackened flame and causes the monster to scream in agony; the sound is ear-piercing and he's forced to cover his ears, but silently begs Arsene to continue his assault.

Regardless of whatever pain the monster is in, its speed doesn't seem to be impacted at all. It glides forward without moving the legs its created for itself and threatens to impale him with it's liquid, yet somehow solid, spear. This time, Akira barely has time to react and only manages to strafe slightly to his left before the weapon is barreling through the space between them and piercing the fabric of his coat. Whether it's the material of the weapon or the fear and adrenaline coursing through his bloodstream, Akira only feels a slight pressure as the spear digs into one side of stomach, just above his hipbone. He does, however, feel the pressure of the weapon being jerked out and rush of blood that follows after it.

Shivering, he retreats further, pressing his already crimson-colored hands to the wound and finally managing to draw his gun. The thing advances on him, not impeded in the slightest as he shoots shot after shot into it. The bullets, like Carmen's fire, seem to catch in it's skin and sink in without dealing any harm to it.

"Joker!" Morgana calls out, just as a haze of green washes over him. He feels the wound on his stomach start to close, stitching together with a force he doesn't understand.

Still retreating, Akira fires more rounds into the beast and does his best to command Arsene's attacks at the same time. It's a messy routine of stumbling backwards and aiming. All the while, bolts of lighting and powerful gusts of wind hammer down on the monster that seems solely focused on him, but nothing seems to slow it down. Hours seem to pass while he dashes around the gallery, dodging the monster's attacks, but for all the attacks he and his teammates are getting off, it doesn't seem to be doing any good. His chest heaves in exertion and with blood dripping down various parts of his body, he finds it hard to maintain a grip on his weapons. He knows, at any moment that his legs will crumble underneath him, the boost from the MetaVerse or his persona- he's still not sure which- is the only reason he's managed to stay upright for this long anyway. Never in his life had he had to keep going mobile this long and his thighs and knees are all but numb from the constant exertion.

Finally, it all stops all together.

Under the glow of Carmen's light, the golden knight stops in its tracks, its spear raised for another attack, but, like the rest of it, remains frozen. It emits a loud, earsplitting crack. Then another, and then another after that. Akira watches, frazzled, as the golden form hardens and dulls. Large cracks fracture through it's skin, splitting it down the middle, then through the center of those pieces. Finally, the monster shatters into thousands upon thousands of shards of pale, golden rock.

Through the rubble, Akira can make out a faint gleam from within it. It, like the vase had, seems to draw his attention in a way he can't comprehend. Stashing his weapons inside of his bloodied coat, he lets himself explore his curiosity and approaches the pile of rubble. Sifting through the now crumbling form of the night, Akira wraps his fingers around something solid and extracts it from the remains.

The necklace in his hand is one that he recognizes, but it takes a moment for the rapid-firing in his brain to slow down enough for him to process it. The silver chain was the same one that had been in the vision the blob had displayed. The gemstone, however, was missing, leaving behind a blackened socket in the palm of his hand.

"That was..." Skull sighs, "Fuck."

Panther approaches him and Carmen floats down until she's floating just above the ground.

"Awful? Terrible?" She suggests with a smile that Akira can't find himself sharing when she turns it on him. Her gaze drifts downwards, to the now bloody chain hanging in his fingers. "That was in that... well, whatever it was."

"A memory." Mona informs. "It showed us something from Madarame's memory."

"Y-you mean that lady?" Panther gasps. Her face is stricken in shock.

Madarame watched someone die. The realization, for some reason, does not surprise him; though it probably should.

Pocketing the necklace, Akira lets out a sigh and with it, the integrity in his form seems to crumble like the memory they'd just faced. Falling to his knees, Akira feels himself starting to drift, though he knows he shouldn't; regardless, he's exhausted beyond anything he's ever felt, tired in a way that was bone deep and his legs refused to budge when he begs to stand.

"Akira!" Takamaki shouts, all too loud and all too close.

Opening his eyes, he's only half-surprised to find her leaning over him, her hair smacking him in the face and sticking due to the built up sweat and blood. He tries to apologize, but his fingers also refuse to follow his commands.

"What's wrong with him?" Skull questions, now also leaning over him.

"I think he's just exhausted." Panther answers in his place, her gloves press against his cheeks, then against his pulse.

"That shadow was on him most of the time." Mona admits, drawing close.

"And all I could do was play flashlight..."

"Ann."

Akira's eyes close and the heat from Carmen's flame warms them. They, too, refuse to budge in the short moments it takes him to fall completely unconscious.

The same warmth is the first sensation he feels when finally drawing back into consciousness, but when he opens his eyes, there's no Carmen, and no Panther or Skull. Instead, it's the setting sun piercing through the skyline and directly into his eyes that's giving him that warm feeling.

Turning away from the horizon, Akira comes face to face with Sakamoto. The blond is seated next to him, leaning against the wall and as unconscious as Akira had been until just moments ago. To his other side, he finds Takamaki in the same position, though her head is tilted at a sharp angle, so he's only able to see the golden crown of her head as it rests on his shoulder; his painfully numb shoulder. The weight in his lap is a combination of his school bag, Morgana, who is dirty and dusty, but slumbering peacefully, and the weight of the silver chain that was in his pocket.

He feels warm.

It's a logical conclusion, considering his proximity to three other living, breathing beings. His brain threatens to melt down on itself, yet a wave of calm washes over him with each question that arises.

Where were they.

Why were they all sleeping.

Why were they all so close.

Akira tries to make some distance between the four of them, but his body is still unresponsive and when he tries to take to his feet, his thigh only twitches in response and ignores the commands he's trying to enforce. Unfortunately, he's stuck in place until he's recovered more, though he has no idea how he's going to make it back to Yongen in the condition he's in. He considers, very, very briefly, sending a message to Sakura-san, but thinks better of it within moments. He was entirely at the mercy of his team until they woke up, until then, he was stuck with his thoughts.

He watched Morgana sleep for a while, still curious how they ended up in a pile against a wall, with Takamaki's head on his shoulder and Skull's ankle crossed over his. Morgana's presence was explained easily enough, they lived together after all, and, even when they argued- or more reasonably, Morgana was upset with him- the cat always found a way to be close to him while he slept and had, at some point, stopped finding it weird.

Still. Akira ponders, it doesn't explain these two being so close.

Nobody got close to him, even his parents kept their distance from the unusual existence of Akira- not that he could blame them- but, Sakamoto and Takamaki defied that.

They rebelled.

And maybe he was okay with that.