Persona 5: Shots Through the Heart

Shot 8: In Love Abroad

Why the hell did I have to be seated next to him?

It wasn't the feeling of being thousands of feet above the ocean that was keeping Akira up. It wasn't the sudden shaking of the plane being hit by turbulence.

It was Ryuji's thunderous open mouth snoring in his ear.

Akira peeks his head out to look at Mishima, who was sitting on the other side of Ryuji. His eyes were closed, but the grunts and the tossing and turning convinced him that he was anything but asleep.

Guess we're suffering together, Mishima, he thinks. He sighs and looks out his window, thinking about why he's on a plane and where it's headed.

xxx

It was last week on the first day of the second school semester. Homeroom was just about to start and Morgana seems to have fallen asleep. He told Akira it was because of a nightmare keeping him up last night.

Akira's darling magazine model girlfriend, who sits right in front of him, covers her mouth and yawns.

"Second term's already started," she says. She leans back on her chair and turns to Akira.

"I think this every year, but isn't summer vacation too short?" Akira pinches at the strands of his hair.

"Truer words couldn't have been spoken," he says.

"It's like, it always ends right when you get used to life without school." Ann smiles.

"Then again, I guess we had some fun things this year." Akira smirks at her.

"Sneaking into a Pyramid Palace, fighting Shadow mummies, and raiding a pharaoh's tomb was pretty awesome. Though I could've done without all the giant killer boulders." Akira crosses his arms, closes his eyes, and furrows his brow.

"But… there is one thing that I'm pissed about." Ann brushes her left twintail.

"Really? What's that?" Akira slumps his shoulders.

"My very first summer vacation with a girlfriend and we were too busy to do much at all," he groans. Ann's eyes widen for a second, then she blushes with a smile.

"He he he! Yeah," she giggles. "Now that you mention it, that does kinda suck, huh? Next summer for sure though! Maybe I could spend it at your hometown."

"That'd be so cool! I'd think you'd really like Kamakura. It's actually a really nice beach town." Ann turns all the way around on her chair.

"Oh? I'm listening." Akira looks up at the ceiling in reminiscence of his home.

"Compared to Tokyo, it's kinda small town, but there's lots to do and see. It was once the de facto capital of Japan a long time ago and it has a really turbulent history, so it attracts a lot of tourists. It has two popular beaches, plus there's a touristy island not too far from it. Plenty of good food. And my god! It has! Sooo many temples!" Ann's smiles widen as she bounces in her seat a little.

"That sounds so exciting! Okay, I'm definitely staying at your place next summer!" Akira panics and covers her mouth.

"Hey, keep it down! Mona'll hear you!"

"I ought oo shed he wa asheep!"

"Still!"

Ms. Kawakami enters the room and clears her throat to get everyone's attention, making Ann face forward in her seat.

"All right, let's begin homeroom," she announces. "Let's see. We've just gotten back from vacation, but starting next Monday is the school trip."

"Oh yeah, that's right!" Ann says. Akira recalls the text Mishima gave him the night before.

Mishima did say something about that, didn't he? Kawakami lets out a loud sigh.

"You students are so lucky," she grumbles. "You get an entire month off for summer and get to go to Hawaii too." At that moment, Akira's entire body froze and a train of thoughts rush through his mind.

"Ha… waii…?" he mumbles. "As in… the island state of America…?"

"Make sure none of you cut loose too much, okay?"

"For… real…?" It only when Kawakami ended homeroom that Akira got out of his trance. As Ann spoke about how they won't be able to do any Phantom Thief work, he lightly punches her shoulder.

"Hey, Ann-pan?"

"Hm?" Akira then starts shaking her by her shoulders, much to her surprise.

"WHY THE FUCK DIDN'T YOU TELL ME WE'RE GOING TO HAWAII FOR A SCHOOL TRIP?!" It was a very rare occurrence when Akira uses the F-word. He only used it when he was really irritated or really surprised. This instance is the latter.

"Ahhh, stop shaking me! Didn't you hear me?! I just remembered we even had a school trip!" Akira looks up at the ceiling and daydreams.

"Going to Hawaii is one of the top five things on my bucket list! I never thought I'd actually be able to go! FOR FREE!" He quickly pulls out his phone and starts searching the Internet.

"Holy crap, what should I do first? Go surfing? Go on a tour? Go on a restaurant raid? So many choices!" Ann just giggles at her boyfriend's excitement as he searches for things to do on their trip.

"OW!" Akira rubs her hand after a sleepy Morgana sinks his right claw into it.

"Mind keeping it down? I'm trying to sleep."

xxx

Even now, it's still hard to believe. He's a labeled criminal, yet here he is on a plane to the US for a school trip. The only downside was that not everyone could come with him. Yusuke is already taking a trip with his school to Los Angeles, California, there's no way he'd be able to sneak Morgana on the plane, and Futaba, his new pseudo baby sister and Sojiro's foster daughter, is not a student and she had to stay behind and sort out the data on the cognitive psience notes she had Makoto steal from her sister's laptop. Plus… she's is still shut-in Futaba, so of course she can't be so far from her house. That leaves only Ann, Makoto, and the gorilla keeping him awake to make this trip with him.

As he's daydreaming, he hears his phone go off. Its ringtone is for a video call. He pulls out his phone and sees that it's Ann. Of course, he picks up right away and her smiling face pops up on his screen.

"Hey there, you," he whispers.

"Hey! Sorry. Were you asleep?" Akira rubs his eyes and turns his phone screen to Ryuji.

"With this blonde snoring gorilla sleeping next to me? The hell do you think?" Ann giggles as he turns the screen back to him.

"Awww! Poor thing. I really wish you got seated next to me."

"Yeah. Me too… Still can't believe I'm actually on a plane to Hawaii."

"Not surprising, considering how excited you were when you heard about it. You must have a ginormous list of things you wanna do stuffed in your bag, am I right?" Akira shrugs.

"Well… I thought I was gonna have a list. Then I realized something."

"Oh yeah? What's that?" Akira blushes and scratches his cheek.

"Everything I wanna do… I wanna do with you. I think that'll make up for all the days we missed during vacation too." Ann blushes and smiles.

"Oh… Okay. Well, here's hoping we get a day to be alone together." Akira nods and his eyelids start feeling heavy.

"Y'know, I think hearing your voice is helping me get to sleep," he chuckles. Ann kisses her two fingers and touch her screen with them.

"Hm hm. Glad I could help. G'Night, you." Akira follows suit.

"G'Night." Ann ends the call, leaving Akira to finally have a chance to get some sleep before Ryuji's snoring gets to him again.

Target: Hit