This story is a work of fiction. Any similarities to events or persons living or dead in your world is purely coincidental.
The Enemy's Face In My Gaze
See Their Wish To Rend And Raze
6/6 Thursday
After School
With one hand drifting around as if at random, the aging owner of the weapons shop Bird of Hermes stuck an index out towards a clean, slim-looking pistol, its gray reflecting off his monocle. "That one."
Jiachi followed his gesture to the weapon, surprised but not deterred that he had to think about it for a moment. "DD44 Dostovei. Russian weapon invented in world war 2, but never got finished. Spetznaz finally finished the design in 2012. Good velocity for piercing body armor, high customization."
Snorting to indicate how unimpressed he was, the owner pointed to a black bowl shape with straps hanging down.
"United Shield Sprint operator helmet", Julian met him without hesitation. "Standard issue with various SWAT team analogues until around 2010, when it started getting phased out in favor of stuff made of lighter material after it got proved to caused long-term neck problems. Still gets used sometimes by countries without the budget for something better."
"...Yes. And what is that for?"
Seeing the man indicating the wide slot running along the front of the helmet, he nodded. "Universal night vision goggle mount. Duh."
Stepping out from behind the counter, the man reached over to touch a tan-colored blade hilt connected to a wooden sheath, pulling it loose for his guest to see the thick black polypropylene streak running along the length, separating the two sharp edges into reflective lines. "And this?"
Julian frowned. The 'specialty knowledge' he'd been so eager to make use of once he'd learned of his friend's earlier predicament was mainly in guns and the various types of armors created to blunt their power. When it came to swords, he was more than a little rusty.
"Well?"
Racking his brain, he nodded. He'd almost panicked until recognizing the curves and the iconography on the hilt. "Chinese Wushu broadsword. Thin and flexible."
Raising his brow in interest, the weapons shop owner halted, letting Jiachi think for a moment they were done before stepping again and pointing at a large assault rifle on a shelf behind the counter. "What about this?"
Now he was completely lost. Parts of the weapon looked familiar, akin to some types of American weaponry, but others didn't match any design he knew. "Um... sorry. I can't tell."
Far from bearing the superior victorious smirk that Aiko had told him about, the owner instead stepped back and shook his hand. "That's only to be expected, since it was one of my custom jobs, still being worked on, perfected. You pass, young man. My name is Walter, and I am the proprietor of this fine shop."
Relief flooded him until he couldn't form words. Several times he'd worried that he would fail this test, that he would have to head back with his head hung low and admit that even he couldn't impress this aging shop owner enough to convince him to let them make purchases here. It wasn't difficult to picture the look of disappointment on Aiko's face, or the was Pelagio would express the affirmation of his claims that he wasn't able to pull his weight without needing to say anything at all.
I will hold my own. I have to.
"Only models, of course", Walter clarified quickly. "I can't sell you anything live unless you show me a license, and you don't look old enough for one."
"That's fine. I just wanted to buy the models anyway."
The monocle flashed in the store's light. "Very good, sir."
The incessant rain outside did nothing to dampen his spirits as he made his way back out into the alley, where Aiko sat pressed against a wall, a dull white umbrella held over her head.
"Too big", she complained to no one visible. "I keep banging it into walls. Maybe I should've asked the owner for a recommended size. Too late now."
"Hmph. Why?", a familiar voice filtered down to them from above. "Certainly, they would understand and be willing to exchange it for a smaller one, yes?"
"Yeah, but it'd just be awkward to explain to someone."
"You're heading into an evil nightclub and you're scared of an umbrella shopkeeper?", Jiachi commented, joining her and patting the duffel bag at his side. "I've got it all. Even got a new weapon for Sorano if she changes her mind."
Brightening at his words, she moved to open the bag before halting. "Not in public", she remembered out loud. "Bad idea."
"Very bad idea", he agreed. "The guns are models, but the swords are totally real. Some cops are itchy about models alone, or so I've heard."
"We'll check it when we get back."
"I'll keep them", he offered. "I know that was your money I just spent, but it's better to just bring the bag out when we need it. If anyone finds it I'll just say it's for a school project. No one would bat an eye about me doing something like that. Well... maybe the 'school' part of it."
Aiko giggled, handing back Julian's own umbrella as they set out down the street. "Thank you for doing that, Rosea-kun. I still can't believe that man is able to make a living while insulting and tossing out anyone who isn't a weapons expert."
"The dude's name is Walter. And, uh... I wouldn't call myself an expert. I filled in the blanks online. Actually, he seemed pretty nice once he knew I wasn't an amateur."
"Same statement, very slightly reduced. Hey..." Looking up from the bag's open zipper, she frowned. "I think we're still short a few. I don't see any weapons for you."
Jiachi smirked. "That's 'cause mine are already waiting for me at home. My best two model revolvers. Those should work, right?"
"They should." Though only her cutlass and the ceremonial daggers they had gotten for Mira could ever hurt someone outside of Faraway Lands, the antique flintlock pistol and dart gun looked realistic enough to function perfectly there. Exact same one I think, she estimated seeing the familiar polished handle of the weapon she'd used against Shadows before. Nijima already returned our weapons to the shop. Believing she wouldn't have to worry about us any more. That we'd be safe to live out normal lives...
"Hey", Julian cut into her darkening mood. "None of that, okay? You're startin' to bring me down. You think this is the right thing to do, and yeah, so do I. Even the angry bird thinks so."
"Hmph." An unusually large and thick raindrop plastered itself against Jiachi's umbrella.
Without hesitating, he continued on. "It's just a scouting mission. We'll be here the whole time if things turn bad. If you beat my Shadow... If you managed to talk me out of my idiocy, then pulling this off should be a walk in the park, yeah?"
Aiko leaned into wood of the bus stop's bench, her umbrella pulled lower to hide a grudging smirk. "I wish it was really that simple. Still... thanks. Honestly, I'm kind of amazed you haven't met anyone before now when you try this hard to cheer a girl up."
Following suit, Julian did nothing to hide the blush on his own face. "Well, I did have some help with that. I... called Ruby Ann the other day."
Automatically jumping to the worst fear, she became very still, the raindrops suddenly deafening against their umbrellas. "And what did you tell her?"
Alarmed more by the dangerous look on her face than any implications, he threw up a hand defensively. "N-nothing about our plan. Don't worry. I just talked with Takamaki-san about... stuff, y'know."
Satisfied- and honestly feeling like it might actually be nice to have an excuse not to go ahead with the plan- she nodded back. "Stuff, huh?"
"Yeah. How her acting career was going. How she doesn't let the boycott get to her. What it was like, being a Phantom Thief. Know what she told me?"
Having no idea, she shrugged helplessly.
Jiachi smiled back as warmly as he could manage in the gloom, resisting an impulse to throw an arm up to the wet top of the bench and around her.
"She said that she was never the strongest of their group, or the fastest, or the smartest, and she was definitely never the leader. But now? All of them agree they needed her there with 'em."
"Why?"
Stretching his free hand out to catch drops instead, he collected them into a handful of water before dumping them. "Because she was their support. When you're doing something you're not sure will turn out okay, it's always better when someone's there to back you up."
The temptation occurred to her to make some kind of sarcastic remark about how obvious that fact was, but for once it actually felt like a new revelation. Not just a weapons expert. His energy, that infectious smile... it's the one thing I could ask from a partner that Mira lacks.
Not that Pelagio wasn't. He was a welcome supportive presence as well, most of the time... but despite all they'd done together as a team, Pelagio wasn't human. He couldn't smile. He couldn't make her feel like things weren't quite as bad as she'd thought without using words, and even words from her sworn protector sometimes reminded him how little he knew of the human world.
Jiachi wasn't some kind of expert at life either, of course. He was a teenager, a student like her... and that was the point really. Though there were certainly many differences between them, they also had a lot of common ground. Difficult parents, for one thing, she remembered.
There was no denying the way that his words made her feel inside. They didn't erase her sense of caution, they didn't make her forget the concerned looks on Mira and Makoto's faces. What they did do was lighten the gravity pressing down until she felt like she could breathe again.
"Sounds like you've been elected to that position", she joked, more grateful for that than she could express. It was more than just seeing him breaking free of the crippling guilt that had gripped his face ever since returning from his Land, but to finally have someone who had come to the realization that situations like this deserved a bit of healthy mockery from time to time. A way to release the tension.
He snorted back. "Huh. Didn't know we were holding a vote. If nobody else wants it, I'm game. 'Every team needs a heart'. That's what Takamaki-san told me."
"She knew what she was talking about", Aiko agreed happily. "I don't suppose she mentioned any way that we can repay you for that? Or for helping us to get these model weapons?"
Jiachi rolled his eyes and chuckled. "Tsuruga, I don't know if you forgot, but you saved me. You helped me realize what a d-bag I was being and escape from that place. You risked your lives to do that. Far as I'm concerned, that's infinity plus one to you. But... if you're volunteering, there is one thing I could use some help with, yeah?"
"Name it."
Suddenly looking uncomfortable as he'd been during their Exploration Day project, he managed to force words through while unconsciously spinning the umbrella in his hand. Since it was larger than a pencil or straw the move didn't come across as quite so obnoxious.
"I want to get some tips. Y'know. For... uh... cooking."
"Cooking?", she echoed in amazement. "From me? Sorry, maybe you forgot the part where I made food so spicy that even Pela-tori wouldn't eat it?"
"So I'll dial that part back a few miles", he waved the objection away. While she had been trying to improve since then, asking for further advice from the cooks at Starlight, it was clear she still had a ways to go in that field. Just like I have a ways to go with learning to operate the Fiddler's Green without help.
And just like that skill, she would keep at it until she got better.
"The thing is, my mom usually cooks", Julian went on. "My old man's hopeless at that. I want to... y-y'know, try and take some of the stress off her, now that she's a few months in with the baby. Maybe I can cook for her once in a while. For my old man too."
Impressed, she nodded. "Done. I'll help you however I can. You have only yourself to blame."
"Always the case, isn't it?", he agreed. Despite his obvious happiness, he felt a twinge of relief to see the bus arriving through the thickening downpour.
It meant he wouldn't accidentally get into the other things he'd wound up talking about on the phone with Ann Takamaki. About how the Phantom Thieves had actually been created out of necessity, caused by the not-quite-legendary Shujin incident. About how a perverted gym teacher, Suguru Kamoshida, had placed Ann at the very top of his list of young girls he wanted all for himself.
About how Kamoshida's Palace- the Phantom Thief equivalent of a Land- had contained a fully-realized cognition of Ann, one clad in what could barely pass as a thong and completely subservient to the will of the Palace's Shadow ruler.
A cognition which, matters of clothing aside, really wasn't that far off from the fawning Aiko cognition that had existed in Jiachi's own Land. He would always remember the busty piano player who had constantly asked to sleep with him, to kiss him, and who always sternly frowned on any other female cognition getting near him.
Who, not that long ago, had been the girl of his dreams. Or so he had believed.
About how he'd realized that he might not have been too many years away from turning into a person revoltingly similar to Kamoshida. Certainly, his Land had some parallels with the Palace that Ann had described to him.
And these were the reasons that he could never quite feel at ease around her, and it certainly felt like it was mutual.
Things had changed. In the world of dreams he'd seen the truth, seen his true self, and beheld that ugliness in himself personally. The cognition of his grandfather had helped him to realize that there was much more to him than only that. There was much more that he could offer the world, and much more that it could offer him.
Be strong, he ordered himself, carefully hoisting the heavy duffel bag as they climbed aboard and he remembering his Persona's words to him, as well as Ann's.
Be the fire. Be the heart. Stand by your friends.
If you can do that, then you'll NEVER turn into a Kamoshida.
Something must have gotten through, because Aiko's next words were: "Takamaki-san must've been happy to get a call from her number one fan."
"I think so", he nodded back as they took their seats. "Though I wouldn't say I'm number one. She's married, yeah? I only started following her when I heard of the boycott. Just my luck that she's also amazing, and humble." Desperate to change the subject, he stretched and faced her.
"So, enough keeping us in the dark already. What's phase one of this plan of yours?"
"I was wondering how long before you would ask", Aiko acknowledged with a sly grin. "Confidence is fine and good, but we also need a plan we can be confident in. So... have a look at this."
The slip of paper she pulled free of her pocket was larger than the one Makoto had given him Takamaki's number on, but as it unfolded he saw it had been used for the same purpose:
For Protection from Kujou ####### KARMA
6/7 Friday
After School
"Who are you?"
"I... I'm calling because-"
"I will ask again; who are you?"
"...My name is Aiko Tsuruga."
"You took a long time to call us, miss Tsuruga."
"I thought I could handle things myself. I was wrong."
"Your caution is understandable. Now... Who has earned your bad Karma?"
"... Her name is Benihime Kujou.'
"Why has she earned it?"
"..."
"Why?"
"Because... She's awful. She bullies everyone at school who isn't native Japanese. She runs the student disciplinary committee, and she uses them to make other people help her bully people too."
"Continue."
"And... I'm her main target right now. Because of her, my name at school is 'Psycho Aiko'. She spreads nasty rumors about me, and tells everyone I'm a slut just because I went out with Rosea-kun a few times. The school message boards have hate posts about me. I see them when I use the school network."
"Propganda. Harassment. Prejudice. Slander... Bad Karma."
"...Yes. That's right! I... I hate her! I hate her so much! She's such a bitch!"
"We shall see if your feelings are strong enough to be worthy of our assistance. Tonight, take the bus to Sakaemachi street 8. Find the door with a spiral carved into it, and knock four times. Come alone."
Without Pelagio's help, the back door might have taken hours to find. Instead, Aiko was able to work through the narrow series back alleys leading to the seemingly abandoned dark gray brick structure towards the back of the Karma club, which was no doubt already gearing up for their next show.
Minors would never be permitted to walk in the front doors and see that show, but apparently their 'help hotline' was a different story. She'd made sure to make her voice a lot more whiny and needy-sounding than usual when contacting them.
"You are certain this is the only way?", Pelagio asked her from his roof perch as he had made a habit of doing ever since learning what the new plan of action was. "Going into the enemy's territory all alone like this? Letting them know...?"
"It's the only way I could think of", she replied without looking up. "And believe me, I did a lot of thinking. Please be quiet now, Pelagio; they might have a hidden camera set up to watch the door."
She saw nothing of the sort, but with technology these days cameras could be concealed just about anywhere. "If you don't come out at the appointed time, I will be coming after you, captain. I cannot just sit idly by."
She couldn't reply to that without breaking her own advice, and there wasn't much point either. For once, his over-protectiveness was understandable. He's counting on me to take care of myself in a place where he can't follow. So is Julian.
So is Mira.
After four rapid knocks she expected some small portion of the door above the spiral shape on it to slide apart and reveal suspicious eyes, but instead it simply swung open to reveal a stone staircase leading down into what looked like complete darkness.
Not for the first time, she had to share in Pelagio's uneasiness about this plan. They gave me the key. I'm the only one they would let in here. And they have no idea that I know about Personas and Shadows. That gives me an edge.
Repeating that chain of logic two more times until she felt confident again, she carefully made her way down the steps into a dimly lit hallway. The overhead cages of light looked ancient, but they did the job of revealing the way forward well enough until the sound of the door creaking shut nearly made her cry out in fright.
No fear now. Jiachi believes in me. I've gone into Lands infested with Shadows. This is nothing by comparison. Just a nightclub in Tosashimizu city. A nightclub with a few dark secrets locked up in its basement, but still a nightclub.
Too dark to see the cameras. Too dark to see any side doors that might have offered an emergency exit. The feel of disuse and abandonment clung to every patch of dusty concrete in the corridor, but to give up now was to admit defeat and toss the opening she'd been given straight into the trash.
Remember. A leader provides an example to bring their group confidence.
Finally, a second spiral-marked door stood before her, bronze lights making it look old and worn. This one she remembered to close behind her, and a small foyer past it opened up into a much better-lit room, completely square with a high ceiling.
Aiko blinked, and three reflections blinked back. Mirrors. All three walls are full mirrors. Their copy-pasting of the room's checkerboard floor made for some headache-inducing scenery, but she was more concerned with locating a door leading out, checking each wall for some sign of where to go next.
The grinding noise hit her ears too late; by the time she was turning back around, there was already a fourth mirror sliding into place to block the opening she'd come in through, and dashing back that way only led to her slamming both hands into the image of a girl who had regained fear and doubt once more.
Uh oh. Maybe this wasn't such a great idea after all.
The bright lights embedded in the ceiling corners flickered for a moment, and then the voice began filtering down to her from some microphone in the ceiling- the obvious place to look anyway if one was self-conscious about staring too long into a mirror. A nonthreatening, regal-toned voice that betrayed little of any origin save for its gender.
"My, my. This is quite the surprise." The room had to be at least ten feet tall, yet the sound came through the speakers perfectly clearly. Once her heart had stopped pounding against her chest like it was trying to escape, Aiko began frantically searching the four mirrored walls for some sign of her host hiding there.
"Please do not be alarmed, my dear. The former owners of this club had a somewhat... different idea of what constitutes entertainment, and I couldn't just let such impressive visual trickery go to waste."
Accepting that there was no way to leave the room until it was given to her, she slumped back into the wall. The voice traveling down to her from the ceiling sounded pleasant enough, but the adrenalin song was still rushing through her ears after the jaws of this trap had snapped shut on her. No doubt Jiachi was pounding frantically on the door now, Pelagio flying around searching for a window he could break. "Who are you?"
"I am Lady Scorpio", the noblewoman's voice replied formally. "I am the hostess of the Karma club. I have seen visions of you, but barely a week after we decided to search for you, here you come to us. How very... convenient."
The words rooted her to the spot. She kept staring up into the ceiling so that she didn't have to see her own shock reflected infinitum. "What? You know me?"
"Not personally", Scorpio amended. "In fact, until you called us, all I had to go on were brief flashes in my visions. You are much younger than I expected you to be, considering what I have seen so far. And yet, here you are. Perhaps that deserves further examination."
"Examination?" Dread bubbled in her gut.
Silence came back to her just long enough that she was becoming uncomfortable with both it and the way that the walls continually reflected back on each other.
"Hm... No. No. This will not do. Your feelings towards Benihime Kujou are a strong resentment, certainly, but still I do not sense your inner will of destruction. You..."
The woman's words became a light wind chime of laughter echoing eerily down the shaft. "...No. You lied. Your hatred is not yet pure. You did not come here for revenge on another girl. You came here to learn of our plans. Ha! And as I have seen, you already hold the power, from a very different source than us."
"How do you...?"
But Scorpio did not bother explaining any of it. "I wish to see more of your power firsthand, Aiko Tsuruga, so that I may determine its origin."
There was another steady grinding noise, and this time by sheer luck she was facing the mirror that slid away into a new passage. As if sensing even the hesitation of her guest to proceed, Scorpio's honeyed words rang out again through the hall.
"Go ahead, dear. That trick room is hardly a proper place to perform this test. A curious thing that I have found about most humans... They can never stare for too long into a mirror without flinching away from whatever it is they see there."
Test, huh? Not like I have a choice.
The fact that her subterfuge had been predicted threw all their best plans out the window. All that was left now was to see what was waiting for her, and hope that Lady Scorpio didn't just want to kill her.
She didn't sound like it, anyway.
The mirror passage didn't open up into the same dingy corridor as before, but a larger basement gallery lined with round wall lights casting long palls across it in rows, about the size of a Koashimizu classroom. Some signs of prior use were here as well- a table and several flimsy wooden chairs, as well as some more complicated equipment smothered in cobwebs that looked to be left over from the club's previous owners.
And, on the table...
The box didn't belong there. She could tell that from the very first look at it. Square meters of heavy ebony metal and mechanical locks, it showed better care and polish than than rest of the room put together, a lack of dust coating indicating it had been brought and left there recently.
As soon as mirror wall was fully shut again, Aiko saw the central lock on the black box begin to slowly turn on its own. That wasn't the noise which was filling her ears however; the sharp, constant hissing sound was coming out of somewhere up in the ceiling. Following it revealed a series of pumps installed along the seams where it met the walls, but it was impossible to tell what exactly they were disgorging in the poor lighting.
Of much greater concern was the black box itself. Rather, the dark shape that was beginning to crawl out of the box as its heavy lid creaked open. A gushing tide of fluid black interspersed with the occasional flicker of white or green, spilling over the edge of the rim onto the table before her, encountering its more rounded edges before passing over those onto the carpet as well.
It felt like she was back in the depths of Mira's technological forest, feeling true fear grip her for the first time, quickening her breathing and tightening her gaze. "A Shadow!"
"So you recognize it. Good. Kill it, please."
She already had her hand on the hilt of her cutlass. A cutlass that, just like the ones she had surrendered to Makoto, had now been deliberately sharpened until the edge was blunt, making it impossible for it to be a threat anywhere except for a stage performance or Faraway Lands, where perception became reality.
Aiko gripped it tight as if hoping the motion might make it grow back that edge. Have to try. Wait... If a Shadow can exist in this room, then...?
Her other hand reached up to find no trace of her flop brim hat, or the rest of her captain's outfit. She'd worn only her Koashimizu school uniform for this. Reaching elsewhere in her mind, praying for success, she focused in prayer.
"Come forth... Jack Frost!"
Nothing happened. The sudden surge of perception and strength that she commonly associated with the summoning of a Persona was nowhere to be found. Exactly the way it had been when she'd tried calling on Anne Bonny in the privacy of her dorm room long ago, hoping that Pelagio had been wrong about that rule.
The Shadow before her was under no such limitations. It ambled out of the black box and off the table, tendrils of probing darkness reaching out with clear intent.
Whip-quick, her blade flew out to hit the closest limb, driven by reflexes honed both in the fencing club and Faraway Lands proper. Knocking it back, but without any sign of cutting damage. The impact alone had deflected it, but it was abundantly clear that the weapon wouldn't have the bite it had in the other world.
So how the hell is the Shadow existing here then?!
The creature didn't waste time wondering about such trivial concerns. Three more tendrils shot out, the first two successfully parried but the third gripping her sword arm and hauling it down with a strength that she was horrified to see was much like the strength of Julian's Shadow when he had grabbed her. No. No no no. Never again. NEVER!
As she shrieked incoherent denial and terror, some impulse drove her other hand down into the appendage trying to force her into the gaping maw of the beast. Only after a second scream followed after hers did she look up and realize that she'd plunged the cone shell hairpin Jiachi had given her down into the creature, piercing the slick flesh and leaving behind a small hole.
The Shadow squealed again, inhuman pain lashing out in return. It shuddered, and then burst open as if it had been made of balloons instead of formless darkness. Behind the scattered bits of the puddle form however, was a completely different shape. Its true form, she knew.
A true form which would never have been able to fit into that cramped box. The Shadow now stood eight feet tall over her, swaddled in heavy dark green robes with a comically frilly collar at the top, small blue bat wings extruding out from the back that gave no indication that they might ever be used for flight.
Above the frilled collar lay a terrifying sight however; a cluster of five living human heads of varying features and genders without any visible neck beneath them, identical only in their shape and pallid yellow flesh color. Brandishing a large red book in a clawed hand, the Shadow focused one head, which had a curly gray judge's wig and a bulbous chin, on her, opening its mouth to speak.
"This is our opponent?"
"This frail human?", seconded a blond woman's leonine head, thin dark lips curled back in contempt.
"Pitiful. She is lacking in both knowledge and wisdom", an orange-haired face with braided cornrows claimed.
"Yes", a fourth elderly face with a long scar running along its side agreed. "A mere cow. All that this one is suitable for is experimentation."
"Die", the five heads commanded as one, five mouths, five voices, moving in perfect unison.
Retrieving her false sword, Aiko stood up before the towering Shadow and tried to look tough. The enemy lacked the flexible tendrils of its previous state, having little in the way of actual melee capability. For a moment, that realization gave her hope.
But then the strange multi-headed Shadow turned its ten eyes to the book in its hand, rapidly flipping the pages until the five mouths began chanting the words of a spell. "We shall tear apart your pathetic mind for study! Psi!"
She had enough time to think 'what?' before neon pink light stabbed at her, inducing what had to be the worst ice cream headache of all time. It threw off her aim, turning a nearly useless slash into completely useless.
Instinct honed by months of sporadic combat with Shadows screamed at her to fire back with her own spell before charging in to cut the enemy down, but with a Persona of her own, neither was an option.
"Lorelei! Please!", Aiko cried out, desperately hoping for a result this time. There was something unmistakable surging through the air, the beginning of a Persona's appearance, but it manifested as a series of fragmented wisps and lights, nothing concrete appearing from it. "Please come out! I need you! LORELEI!"
No Persona responded. The Shadow's book flew open again swiftly flipping to a different page. "Enough of your leaping around", the fifth head, a pretty-nosed brunette wearing a diamond tiara, growled. "Sukunda!"
Heavy. Suddenly so heavy. Like every part of her was composed of lead dragging her down. Like being underwater, except she could not swim. Her sword was affected the same way, instantly doubling its weight. The opposite of Mira's speed-boosting spell, she realized, too fatigued to speak the words. Like they need it.
Closing on prey that it now considered completely helpless, the Shadow's five faces leered at her as the free claw reached down to grip and lift her by her throat before she could reach for her cell phone to call for help. Help that would never arrive in time.
"Free us", one of the female faces ordered. "If you desire this weak human to live, you will free us from this prison!"
"We know that you can hear us!", the wig-wearing face shouted into the ceiling. "Open the door, and allow us to return home, or this one will die!"
Cold. Darkness. Can't see... can't... feel...
The Shadow's other faces continued with their threats, but Aiko heard none of their sounds. All that she could hear was her own thoughts, and the sickeningly gradual loss of sensation. Until all she could feel or be aware of was the continued existence of her own mind, which had yet to be snuffed out.
Lorelei. Lilim. Jack Frost. Tam Lin. Please...
She tasted moisture on her mouth. A trivial thing, no more important than a single drop-
It changed everything. Realization led to deduction, the flickering flame of a brain fighting to continue living by doing what it was meant to.
Deduction led to actualization. Her own words reaching out to her, just as they had with Anne Bonny's awakening. I do not need you. I do not need to implore your help.
I am Thou.
The water. It has to be the water. Moisture. Mist being gradually pumped into this room from above, more and more and more...
Sensation remained dulled and smothered, but the sensation of the arm gripping her was unmistakable even to one in the throes of death. And she knew...
She knew that the fog was thick enough now.
Her ears remained deaf from the pain, but she knew what she was saying.
"Strike now, Tam Lin."
The impact of the Persona's arrival alone was enough to knock her free of the enemy's grip to be sprawled into a chair. Only for a moment however, the bolstering energy of the Persona flooding into her, erasing the previous exhaustion. The snow-maned elfin swordsman floated at her side with eyes that evaluated her status just as she was doing to herself.
Back in the saddle. Ready to take this thing down. I should have figured it out sooner, but not too late to make amends.
The Shadow rose, all five of the faces twisted into ugly visions of rage as its book sped through its pages again. "Be lost to madness! Tentarafoo!"
Against the creature's words, the result was not another attack on the mind. Instead, a lengthy barrages of tiny streaks of white light, a thousand tiny insects pummeling from all directions, each individual hit a mere pinprick but enough to badly disorient and dizzy a target.
For a moment, she did seem confused. Then the Shadow felt a wide, heavy something tear into its chest that left the five faces simultaneously gasping for air. Tam Lin sheathed his blade, it having done its work for now, and focused on a different sort of attack in sync with the one who had summoned it.
"Malaqua."
A ringed geyser of water shot up around the enemy, propelling them into the ceiling hard enough to leave cracks in the tile. It fell back down to land on a drilling sword thrust, penetrating the robes and earning a united shriek out of the five.
Out of a mix of some impulse of mercy and a desire to stop the mad shrieking, Aiko flicked her blade, throwing the Shadow off of it and into a wall. Already the initial rush was fading, replaced by a swell of pity. Now that she had her Persona back, she understood.
This Shadow... it just isn't that strong.
Julian's Shadow had been stronger than this. So had Mira's. Even the golden android Nata Taishi, who had guarded the tower in Mira's Land might have been stronger physically. While it was certainly capable of devouring a human who did not possess the power, against an experienced Persona user who could resist Psychokinetic attacks, it would be easily outmatched and killed.
That was how it had been locked up, she realized. The Karma club's Persona users had forced this Shadow into that black metal box and brought it into a world it apparently wanted no part of, like a wild animal stolen away from its pack.
Reaching over, she determined that the empty box did indeed have much more of the moisture clinging to its sides than the rest of the room did, some of it even forming small puddles along the bottom that she took care not to step in.
"No", the wig-wearing head grunted in pain as she brought her focus and sword back to the task at hand.
"We were wrong in our analysis", the one with the tiara whispered in genuine horror.
"This one is powerful", the redhead acknowledged pleadingly. "Far more than the others who were brought to us for testing. She possesses knowledge."
"Limited knowledge", the scarred face corrected desperately. "But if we joined our knowledge with yours..."
"Would you spare us?", the blond face asked. "In exchange for our knowledge and wisdom?"
Comprehending, Aiko waved her blade at nothing, as if to throw off imaginary blood. "I can't say I'm not in need of a bit more of that after this disaster. Sure, why not? Join with me. Become my mask."
The five faces breathed a collective gasp of relief. "It takes wisdom to know when to show mercy", the scarred face acknowledged as the huge torso bent slightly, inclining all five faces into a grateful bow, ten eyes shut. "We are Fallen Dantalian. Our knowledge and wisdom is yours to do with as you see fit."
Then the Shadow was gone, one more mask added to her collection, becoming one with her. The lights returned, finally illuminating the chamber in full. It was still just a dusty basement, but being able to see it helped her to relax after the fight. There would be no further traps, at least not in this chamber.
Then, the voice emerging from some speaker too small to spot. Lady Scorpio.
"Magnificent. Not only a promising user of the power, but one possessing the gift of the wild card as well? I had heard stories dear, but never witnessed it myself until now."
Senses only now returning to full reach, Aiko became aware for the first time that her clothes had now transformed into her familiar captain's outfit at some point during the battle. Sheathing her weapon, blood still pumping hot, she searched the chamber for some sign of an exit. "Thank you. I'd be happy to arrange an up close demonstration."
She knew the unwritten rule here. You didn't attack the elderly. It just wasn't done if you were any kind of decent person.
But after what she'd just been put through because of this seemingly matronly old woman, she might have been willing to bend the rule just this once.
No... She paused. That wasn't quite right. She wasn't angry just because of that near death experience. It was because she'd made another deduction, various factors and information aligning that she was fairly sure had nothing to do with the fact that the Shadow she'd just taken was constantly preaching about knowledge.
The rumor of the Karma hotline was a healthy enough one at school, and possibly elsewhere too. You gave them a call, explained the situation to them, and they solved your problems for you. How could that not be alluring? Doubly so since only a handful of students were ever given that phone number.
She would not have been the only one to be subjected to these 'tests'. Just the only one with a good chance of living through them.
But that wasn't quite right either. If anyone who dialed that number and requested 'Karma' for someone they hated disappeared afterwards, there would have been an inquiry. Someone would have caught on. There had to be something else, something she was missing.
All that she knew for sure was that having sampled the Karma club's methods in person, she didn't like them one little bit.
"We shall meet, dear", the voice promised as a new door swung open. "But not to fight. Follow the staircase into my quarters."
The ascent was long enough that she imagined an entire middle floor could possibly be stuck between the basement she'd been in and the club's main floor, but in the end it brought her out exactly where it had been promised. The new room was well-lit as a dressing room ought to be, and though it still had the intimidating full-length mirrors spanning its length it actually looked lived in, one of them having shattered.
Seated in the middle of the room, devoid of guards or allies, was Lady Scorpio. At least Aiko assumed so. How many other nightclub owners wore full-length reflective geisha masks with stenciled eyes, and cloth kimonos from centuries gone by? Manners as well, by the sound of it.
Her voice was the same as well. A particular neutral tone developed by nobility for use in dealing with foreign entities that revealed neither hostility or pleasure, and obscured further still by light muffling effect of her mask.
"Welcome, miss Tsuruga. Or... shall I call you 'Saber'?"
Aiko didn't respond right away. Her eyes checked around the room for traps, and found them in the rectangular ceiling vents, identical in design to the ones below. They weren't pumping out moisture nearly as rapidly, but it was clear that they had been doing so for quite a while. The same sick feeling from the basement had followed her up here.
"That liquid", she accused the hostess at last. "That's how you're doing it. Somehow, it allows Personas and Shadows to exist here."
The woman's mirror mask tilted approvingly. "Yes. Only in these rooms, and in a weaker state than they are in their own world. Summoning Personas is much more difficult as well, as you may have noticed, but it can be done."
"How?"
The mask regarded her, just as imperceptible as the voice behind it, distorted images of herself appearing and twisting with each small movement.
"I am sorry, dear. I cannot share all our secrets with you just yet. Not until we have determined if you are suitable to join us."
She froze. "Join you? Seriously?"
"Yes. Certainly, your selection of Personas is quite impressive, but their power remains that of a novice. We can help you in improving that, and in finding your inner will of destruction. Of greater concern to me is your loyalty. We are willing to grant you a powerful rank, the lost title of Queen Aquarius... But there is a problem."
"I'll say there's a problem", she countered angrily. I could call Tam Lin here, beat her down... And then what? Kill her? No. That's going too far.
"Please do not embarrass yourself by trying to fight", Scorpio advised her flatly.
"As I have said, your experience with the power is limited compared to ours. I would rather not have to hurt you."
"Your pet Shadow did enough of that already", she growled back.
"But he is your pet Shadow now, child", Scorpio argued with the first hint of humor Aiko had seen from her. That left quickly however, to be replaced by a tone of calm fury more dangerous than any Shadow.
"I understand that every human has desires, and must be permitted the freedom to pursue them. Mark me well child, and know that if ever your desires interfere with my own... then those desires shall be lost to you. This is not a threat. It is simply the truth. You may speak with King Leo when he returns from his mission, if you should require further proof of this."
Taken aback by the earnestness of this claim, she reached down for her cell phone, cursing to find that it wasn't working. Just like in Mira's Land, there was no trace of a signal. Appearing to be ignorant of this attempt to call for help, Scorpio continued her speech.
"The gift of the wild card is a rare one indeed, and it is one that troubles me. The only one capable of giving it to you would be the Servant of our enemy."
Her blood chilling, she took an involuntary step back. "Wait. The servant? Are you talking about Mr. Igor?"
The frozen mask looked back at her, revealing nothing. "Take a seat, dear. I will explain to you. Then you will understand the need for Salvation."
"I don't think-"
The host's arms spread out, wide sleeves flapping with the motion. "I said,take a seat."
There was no time to call a Persona. No time to even begin to fight back before an invisible something slammed into her hard, knocking her back into the wall without any sign of impact or injury. She was being forcibly seated on the floor, and now Scorpio was rising over her like a wraith in her loose-fit garments.
"That poor bookshelf. Perhaps I should replace it if it keeps getting our guests thrown into it. No matter. Allow me to unmask, and open your eyes to the truth."
The mirror-limned eyes seemed to yawn open then, gaping holes in the substance of the host with nothing but empty void behind them. Expanding until they overlapped each other, becoming a single combined gap in space, an endless black hole.
She fell into the hole.
Tosashimizu's bespectacled chief of police beckoned Makoto into his office with enough aplomb that she immediately felt like she was being ushered into a ready baited trap.
It wasn't that the man was particularly intimidating, at least not to her. The chief had that effect on the younger officers that he normally despised, but he lacked the brooding sense of potential violence she had noticed in certain officers stationed around Tokyo. Chief Mamoru Kagasawa came across to her more like a high-strung uncle than the kind of humorless thug of an officer who had been accused and convicted in droves during the Shido investigations six years ago.
"Nijima-san", he greeted her flatly, pulling aside a chair before turning to his nearly empty coffee mug. "I've been on the phone with your superior. We both agree that it's far past time for you to go home."
Instinct made bite down on her lip to obscure a frown. She had predicted something like this weeks before, but it didn't make it any less stressful to deal with.
"I still have a week on my extension", she said calmly enough to make it not sound like a protest.
"And you can continue with those", he nodded. "You're not expected back on duty in Tokyo until the 15th anyway. What I'm saying is... don't open any new cases until you get there. And don't think that you'll be getting another extension either."
It was too late to stop the look of vexation crossing into her eyes and tipping him off. "It's nice that you seem to like it here in Tosashimizu so much", he continued. "But this is our place. Tokyo is your place, and I'd think you'd be happier going back there anyway."
Privately, Makoto considered it highly unlikely that any of Tokyo's cops would have expressed a desire to see her back with them again, but Kagasawa wouldn't know that.
"What I'd be happier doing doesn't matter, chief", she tried respectfully. "What matters is doing my job, and there's jobs here that aren't done."
Adjusting his specs, the man gave a long-suffering sigh. "So you were going to ask for another extension. Forget about it, Nijima. We can do our jobs too. We don't need your help to cordon off a beach."
Suddenly it felt like the itch was climbing up into her hair, even though she had showered only yesterday. "I know, chief. That's not what I was worried about."
"The Karma club then", he grunted. "We've checked them out twice now. Nothing both times."
"Nothing that they didn't want us to see", she corrected gently. "I still have reason to believe that they're hiding something from us, chief."
Sweeping his desk off, he cracked a light smile back at her. "Hm. I'm surprised, Nijima. I thought a cop from Tokyo would have dealt with places like that enough. Sure, they used to be an adult entertainment club. Only reason they still got some of that crap in their basement is because nobody wants to buy it off them. And they can't really sell that freaky mirror room I heard Hideki talking about last time."
"And a few years ago, they hired a minor", she pointed out briskly. "Doesn't that suggest foul play?"
"Foul play that they had to pay the fine for", he countered disinterestedly. "Nijima, we're not arguing on this. You're going back on the 12th. We'll maintain the cordon and keep watching Karma for anything out of the ordinary. You've got much bigger fish to fry back home, the way I hear it."
A very general assumption, she thought, but correct. As the unquestioned urban center for the entire country, Tokyo had played host to every shade of Yakuza or lesser criminal for longer than either of them had been alive.
Of particular interest to her had been Satsu Enmikaeda, the young up-and-coming boss who had taken over Junya Kaneshiro's leavings along with various other crime bosses who had been beaten or weakened by the Phantom Thieves in the past six years.
In a sense, it's our fault that Enmikaeda became so strong. Though if it wasn't him, someone else would have filled the vacuum. The Yakuza never stay down for long, it seems...
While frustratingly little else was known about him, Makoto could certainly tell already that he was much more cunning than his predecessors. Scams that were less brazen than previous ones, but much more subtle and harder to catch characterized the bulk of his activities, and it had taken years of hard police work just to learn his name.
Tosashimizu, thankfully, had little signs of Enmikaeda's people that she had seen. But then, they were never exactly what she would call obvious, usually only acting in the dead of night where even dedicated officers might not spot them.
Which brought Makoto to her next defense. "What about Hex? Sightings of him have increased in the last few months."
But the chief had exhausted his patience now, and regarded her with only fleeting pity. "Nijima, do you really think that having one extra officer on duty is going to make the difference there? We'll get the guy, don't you worry. I've been increasing the night patrols, and some of the victims are cooperating with us. Only a matter of time."
"Of course, sir", she nodded in defeat. The fact that Kagasawa considered her to be annoyingly nosy for someone who was just visiting, a Tokyo cop who thought that she knew better than the 'bumpkins' of Tosashimizu, didn't change the truth of his claims. Whether Hex was to be caught or not had little to do with her presence or absence.
It inevitably reminded her of the last time she had spoken to Aiko Tsuruga back at the Tenjincho food court, and how that had gone, the way her skin had felt like it was on fire, about to burst open. Being in the right didn't mean that she couldn't feel bad about alienating someone she liked.
The similarities didn't end there either. Like her sister Sae- like, presumably, all members of her family from the stories she'd heard about her father- Makoto was used to being correct and logical in all things. Even the slight feeling of doubt over a past decision felt like a beast mounted mockingly upon her back.
"I understand, chief", she answered with a grit of forced composure. "I'll head back on Monday."
She was halfway out the door when the chief's call of her name brought her back. "Y-yes?"
Chief Kagasawa's strange open palm hand gesture seemed to be an improvised substitute for a wink which would have come across as insulting. The look on his face was much less vague however. "I knew your dad on the force, Nijima. I just wanted to say... he'd be proud of you."
That warmth- the good kind of warmth, not the accusing fire from the mall- kept with her until she was out of the station and back in her car, driving through the rain-swept streets back to her condo.
It almost lasted throughout that trip as well; Tosashimizu city was a mere fraction of Tokyo after all, and a city where cars actually were preferable to public transportation. She waited there at the entrance to her simple abode, alternately considering her strategy for moving out and for how best to convey all that she had learned to the ones she would trust to continue investigating the Karma club.
They were guilty, she knew that much. She wouldn't insult Julian Rosea by assuming that he was lying as so many others on the force might. That trust, she realized with a start, was inspired by a natural faith in any other person who had undergone an Awakening and gained a Persona.
The matter of Goro Akechi aside, she felt like Persona users would be much less likely to lie about what they had seen, the very event being a baring of the soul that any who witnessed it couldn't help but feel a connection to in their heart of hearts.
What had Akechi's Awakening been like? Had anyone else borne witness to it? If they had, then could they have saved him from going down his chosen path into destruction and madness?
What-ifs are of limited usefulness at best, she reminded herself. That was something that Sae had taught her very well before college. It was all well and good to suppose potential outcomes for past events and people, but no amount of thinking about it would change what had actually happened. Goro Akechi had made the wrong choices in his life, and thus he had secured his own fate.
And now, if her sources were to be believed, there were at least two other people here in Tosashimizu who had Awakened to their Personas and, like Akechi, had chosen to use their power for selfish reasons. That wasn't something that she could just leave to the police. If she couldn't continue the hunt, then someone else she trusted would have to carry on.
Knowing that the person she trusted more than anyone else was on their way here helped to banish any pangs of guilt as she ascended the stairs to her room.
Take out, the thought surfaced in her before she had even shut the door, sniffing in confusion as she sensed a sudden dampness in the air. Ordinarily she tried to stick to home-cooked meals as much as possible, but hearing the chief's speech and knowing she only had a few days to pack had drained her energy.
It wasn't so bad, this condo. She'd seen far worse in other residences, but nothing in Tosashimizu would match the charm or the memories of the Nijima's Tokyo residence. It wasn't this bland white room that she would miss, but Tosashimizu city itself. A land-locked hub for transients from not only Japan's main body but the rest of the world as well, its modest spread holding onto some things that Tokyo had been forced to forsake due to its immense size and population density. The comparative lack of light pollution let you to view the stars when they emerged from the dark of night, and tonight seemed especially clear and cool.
Take out on my balcony, she added with a satisfied smirk, sliding the outside door open, grateful not to see any more rain coming down after a week that had been plagued by an endless amount of it. One small disadvantage from Tokyo.
Makoto couldn't place what exactly tipped her off, what it was that made her energy come rushing back in a spike of alarm and adrenaline. A stray noise, a scent, just a feeling, the dampness, the sensation of a disruption of air pressure from someone else in the same room?
It didn't matter. Just like all her hypotheses about Akechi, it was idle thought that wouldn't help her here. What mattered was that she hadn't taken her belt off yet, and had her pistol out and ready in the space of a breath.
"Please come out", she requested into the darkness of her empty bedroom. "I'd like to apologize for being so high-strung that I reacted that way."
Silence there, a pause just long enough to make her wonder if she had been jumping at lowercase shadows, when the voice low and syrupy enough to rumble her counter top responded.
"Don't apologize, Makoto Nijima. Your instincts are correct."
The face that the rumbling voice belonged to emerged into the light without fear. Adult, male... Makoto would have guessed to be in his late 30s. The flat brush of dark hair on his head was graying early at the tips, but far more striking and attention-grabbing was his heterochromia; one large, beady eye of dark chestnut brown, the other one such a light white that it nearly looked transparent when her kitchen light reflected off of it.
Something off about that eye, can't tell what...
The man's clothes had nothing on these unique features, consisting of a regal-looking dark red button dress vest, bright red salaryman's tie over a white shirt, cinched belt and neatly trimmed pants that would have fit in perfectly in some rich high-powered corporate office building in Tokyo... although most of that type she'd seen preferred darker shades, or most commonly pure black.
"I am Osamu Sanaki", the towering man in red announced with his hands up and eyes disturbingly wide, staring into her instead of the gun barrel pointed at him. Under other circumstances, his voice would have been quite soothing for her to listen to. "The voices call me King Leo. Do you hear the voices as well, Makoto Nijima? What do you they tell you?"
Her response was to tighten the grip on her weapon. The man looked unarmed, but the name he had just dropped suggested otherwise. "Hands on the table", she ordered, carefully sliding half a foot back when he didn't comply. For someone with a gun pointed at him, he seemed frustratingly tranquil. "You're in the Masked Circle?"
"I am", Sanaki- if that was his true name- sounded slightly regretful, voice like slowly cracking ice. "I'm very sorry. The voices tell me that you're interfering with our Salvation, and must be silenced."
Either he's insane, she decided, or he's got something up his sleeve.
Betting on the slim odds seemed like the safer option this time. "I said, hands on the table where I can see them, sir. You're under arrest for breaking and entering." And never mind how you managed to do that without any of the usual signs.
Still disobeying, still wearing his soft, sad smile, he stepped forward. "I take no joy in this, Makoto Nijima. I'll make it quick."
"STOP!", she shouted, more worried about this obviously crazy man's safety than her own. The times when she had actually been required to discharge her weapon in the life of duty could be counted on one hand, but she had put in enough practice at the firing range to be 99 percent confident in her shot.
It was the other 1 percent that scared her and put that annoying quaver into her voice. "Sir, please stop and do exactly as I say, or I will shoot you."
Sanaki smiled as if she had just told him he was handsome. He advanced, and then there was a blasting noise enough to put not just her ears but all her other senses on strike as well for a full second, the gunshot carefully aimed at the man's left leg, far away from any vital organs to disable, not kill.
A less far deafening sound followed after- the metallic tink of the slug falling off his leg and onto the floor, still smoking from the impact.
She began to realize for the first time in that damp room that it might not have been his safety that she needed to worry about.
Panic spurred on two more deafening shots, both with the same result, and then his hand was descending onto hers, wrenching the weapon free with the irresistible strength of an earthquake before tossing it across the room.
She found herself staring directly into the glassy white eye as the man spoke in his strange rumbling voice again.
"The voices won't allow me to be harmed. They tell me you're familiar with a skill called 'Tetrakarn'."
Sliding further back into the frame of the balcony door, Makoto blinked, the memory flawlessly coming back. She did recognize that word, even after six years of never hearing it used. It was the word that Haru Okumura- Noir- had used for one of the extremely useful yet depleting barrier spells wielded by her Persona, Milady.
"But you can't!", she protested, looking around desperately for some way out. "This is the real world! You can't use-"
"I can", King Leo informed her sternly, as if a father scolding a disobedient daughter. His mass seemed to be everywhere, blocking her escape "You can too, if you wish to. A Persona is no mere fantasy, Makoto Nijima. It's the true self, the ability to make changes in the world. Here... I'll show you."
One hand reached up to stroke his glassy white eye before his face was transitioning into an expression of vicious rage and the stroke turning into a violent scratching motion.
"In a world of agony, blessed are the blind. Dreadful Dagon, together we shall consume."
Something unseen knocked out the kitchen light, casting the condo into blackness. Through the glass of the balcony door, Makoto saw something indistinct moving within its reflection, the fleeting impression of mottled ichthyoid flesh and claws, clusters of eyes devoid of sclera that never remained in place long enough for her to ever catch proper sight of. A spider made of uncertainty and fear crawling through her brain.
It left no noise behind at all, but an obscene chant that only existed in her own mind ringing out endlessly, drumming at her temples with each momentary glimpse;
whatdoyouseewhatdoyouseewhatdoyouseewhatdoyouseeWHATDOYOUSEE
If the spastic creature shrouded in the darkness was truly Sanaki's Persona, his 'true self'... then every bit of charm or humanity this man had shown her so far was a calculated deception. Just the act of trying to look at Dagon made her stomach curdle up in a way that had nothing to do with her hunger... Or the fear of death which now quickened her pulse and tightened her breath.
Limbs stiffening, she shot her leg up into a well-practiced akido kick and immediately regretted it when it felt like she was kicking a block of solid concrete. Her chop to his face had the same result, only hurting her hand and failing to even dislodge the oddly cheerful, even childlike expression on his face.
"Don't be frightened. You won't need to feel anyth-."
That was all he was able to get out before she slammed the outdoor chair into his lower jaw. Seeing the way that the wrought-iron bent away from the impact was alarming, but didn't stop her from taking that time to scramble back to the far end of her balcony.
Enough to for her to consider all of her remaining options, discard the ones that she knew wouldn't work, and realize that there was only one left for her to try.
Makoto focused her inner will of rebellion, easily remembering back to the scalding, impossible anger which had awakened from a seemingly innocent and demure Shujin council president once upon a time in a floating bank. Six years that felt like an eternity.
"Come, Anat!"
Sanaki- King Leo- blanched, hesitating for a moment until it became chillingly obvious that he'd been thrown off by her declaration, not because he felt the surge of Johanna's power rising.
Because she didn't feel it either.
Because it wasn't there. If she squinted, she might have been able to make out a few wisps and random shifts in the texture of the air around them, much the way Haru's Persona had been when she had first joined them... but that could just have easily have been created by Dagon as Anat.
It was Dagon's power which Sanaki marshaled now, and she could certainly pick up the familiar sensation of a strong Persona gathering itself for a telling strike, the use of an elemental skill.
Sanaki's lips spoke one word.
"Teradyne."
Beyond desperation, she charged forward into another akido strike until her feet no longer felt contact with the ground and she was flying upwards and off the balcony altogether.
Gravity seemed to take hold of her slower than she expected, allowing her a chance to count the cars in the parking lot below her before she felt the sensation of cold night air rushing up into her.
Please, please, please, please, please...!
"ANA-"
But her final conscious thoughts were not of Anat at all.
Persona Profile #3: Oya
'What I destroy, you no longer need.'
Arcana: Priestess
Abilities (so far): Zio, Zan, Marin Karin, Dia, Sukukaja, Mazio, Mazan, Media, Rejesho
Strength: Lightning, Wind
Weakness: Earth, Curse
Background: The Yoruban orisha, or spirit, of winds, lightning and storms, as well as death and rebirth. The immortal queen of the river Niger and the mother of nine. She is attributed to violent rainstorms and known as an unbeatable warrior. Other common aspects of this orisha include great intensity of feelings, sensations, and charm. Prohibitions imposed on those who worship her include the consumption of pumpkins and mutton.
Enemy Profile #9: Dantalian
Abilties: Psi, Sukunda, Tentarafoo, Mapsi
Strength: Psychic
Weakness: Nuclear, Lightning
Background: A powerful duke of Hell with thirty-six legions of demons under his command. Appearing as a man with many countenances, all men and women's faces. The 71st of the 72 spirits of Solomon, and custodian of various mystic books from Hell's libraries.
A/N: So have I made King Leo and Lady Scorpio creepy enough yet?
And yes, I am using songs for Persona Q2 as chapter titles as well. Hoping it gets released here soon.
Keeping up the pace, and I hope not to leave you on a cliffhanger for too long.
EDIT: Thanks to Ford1114 for pointing out an error, which has now been corrected. i was going to weave Makoto's social link being incomplete into a later narrative, but then I realized she didn't resolve herself to work to become a police commissioner.