First, a huge thanks to MoldyJellyBean, Azure Blade of Chaos, Miss Hanamura, and JustAFerret. I really appreciate the reviews, guys. They encourage me to keep going. I hope you all enjoy this latest chapter, and I look forward to hearing more responses on the work!

Also, as a special treat, I've done a sketch of the main character Shou. I've realized I can't post the link here, so you can find it in my profile.

Hopefully I'll do more in the future. :D

VI

Monday

April 8, 2013 — Evening

Overcast

"Final stop: Morigami Home for Children. Please watch your step as you leave the train."

"Oh God," Tachibana whispered.

Slowly, the doors opened . . .

Outside the train loomed a large, decrepit brick building on a hill — the orphanage. Shou didn't understand. They should have been underground. How had they gotten outside?

He took a tentative step out of the train. Dead grass crunched beneath his feet. Above his head, the sky roiled and churned with heavy clouds. He squinted. The clouds were moving in a pattern, forming a spiral, a vortex. It was unlike anything he'd ever seen.

"Don't go," Tachibana shouted.

Shou turned, and saw her clinging to one of the train's metal poles.

Kouta, meanwhile, stood halfway between them. His head swiveled from Shou to Tachibana and back again, trying to decide what to do.

Shou looked at the orphanage. He could feel a dark presence there, venomous and corrupt. If they wanted to get to the bottom of what had happened to Kudo-sensei, they had to go. He could feel it in his bones. Only in this strange place could they find the answers they sought. Shou was sure of it.

"Please don't make me go in there," Tachibana begged.

Silently, Shou reached his hand out to her. What sort of memories did this place hold for Tachibana? He didn't know, but they must be painful for her to react like this. She would need his support if they were going to get to the bottom of things.

Reluctantly, Tachibana grabbed on to Shou's hand. She shut her eyes tightly, and Shou pulled her out of the train, onto the dry, dead lawn.

Kra-koom! A bolt of purple lightning flashed overhead.

Tachibana screamed and threw her arms around Shou's neck.

Shou turned bright red.

"Oi, get a room, you two!" Kouta strode out of the train.

Tachibana hurriedly let go of Shou. "I was startled, that's all!" she said.

"Yeah, sure," Kouta said. Again, lightning cracked above.

Shou turned his gaze toward the orphanage. In place of a door was some sort of portal — twisting circles of black and red. Loathe as he was to admit, he knew that they would have to pass through. It was their only hope at rescuing Kudo-sensei and solving this mystery.

Hoping the others would follow his lead, Shou walked toward the portal. One step in front of the other, that's all there was to it. Unbidden, images of his dreams rushed through his mind. They had been so hard to remember before, but now Igor and the Velvet Room and that tunnel with all those dark shadows seemed as real to him as this decaying orphanage. Was this space no longer in reality, but rather somewhere between dreaming and waking?

"Wait," Tachibana said. Shou felt her hand on his wrist. "Are you sure we should go?"

Shou nodded.

With Tachibana holding fast to him, and Kouta backing him up, Shou walked through the orphanage entrance.

The first thing that Shou noticed was the smell of death.

He covered his nose and fought down the urge to gag. What was this awful stench? What had happened here?

The orphanage was in a serious state of disrepair. A large room stretched before Shou and his friends, the wooden floorboards shoddy and broken, the wall paint cracked and faded and peeling. Row after row of rickety bunk beds filled the space, their sheets crumpled or tossed off, their mattress stained and torn up. A lone light bulb swung on a wire overhead.

Was this where Tachibana had actually lived?

"What happened to this place?" she murmured.

"It wasn't like this when you stayed here, was it?" Kouta asked.

"No," Tachibana said. "Thankfully. If you imagined this all cleaned up, you'd have a good idea, though."

Shou nodded. He couldn't imagine living in a place with so many kids, with so little privacy. To have a life where no one really loved you; at least, not any more than all the countless other children you shared a space with. Was this why Kudo-sensei was so important to Tachibana? Because, out of everyone she'd grown up with, he was the only one that she regarded as her true family?

He stepped deeper into the gloomy space, determined to get to the bottom of this. His foot hit against something hard.

He gasped.

There was a body on the floor. A small body.

A child's body.

"What is it?" Tachibana asked.

Shou held up a hand, urging her to stay back.

Now that he looked around, he saw that the orphanage was littered with bodies, all the same size and shape as the one in front of him. Kids. But . . .

He examined the corpse more closely. It was so hard to see in the current lighting. Yet he was sure of one thing.

These weren't actual kids.

They were something else. They looked like lumps of darkness in the shape of children, providing the illusion that they had once been real human beings. But the more Shou studied the body, the more he became convinced that these had never been living people.

Shadows, said a voice.

Shou whirled, looking for the source. It took him a moment to understand that the voice had spoken from inside him. Neither Tachibana nor Kouta appeared to have heard it.

He shivered. He didn't have the slightest clue what was going on.

Tachibana cried out, then. Shou rushed to her, and found that she had discovered one of the strange bodies. She fell to her knees. "It's horrible," she whimpered. "Who did this? They're dead. They're all dead!"

"Whaddya talkin' about?" Kouta asked. "These are just lumps." He nudged one with his foot.

Shou knelt beside her, looking into her panicked eyes. Could she not tell that these weren't real people? What was she seeing?

"Lumps?" Tachibana said. "They're kids! Someone . . . someone killed them . . . Someone killed all of them!"

Shou grabbed Tachibana's hand in his. His other hand grabbed her cheek, and he forced her to meet his gaze. Clearly, she was seeing something that wasn't actually there. "Snap out of it!" he told her.

Her eyes widened. "Tanimoto . . . kun?" She looked around. "I . . . I . . ."

"Do you like it?" asked the voice of Kudo-sensei.

The hairs on Shou's arms stood on end. He rose, turning toward the sound.

"H-Haruo-niisan," Tachibana said.

In front of them stood Kudo Haruo, dressed in a rumpled blue-gray suit and red tie. His black hair was wild and unkempt. He greeted them with a deranged grin. There was something very, very wrong about him. His eyes glowed a horrifying yellow.

"Haruo-niisan," Tachibana repeated. "Is that you?"

"Emi-neechan, I was hoping you would show up here," he said. "Isn't it wonderful? This is the world I've created. A world where poor children like us no longer have to suffer."

"Suffer?" Tachibana demanded. "They're all dead!"

"Exactly!" Kudo exclaimed. "I'm so glad you understand, Emi-neechan. Society doesn't want us. They cast us out like trash. We have no place with them. We're only taking up space, clogging up the machinery of civilization." He grinned. "So, of course, we should all just die!"

"You're wrong," Tachibana cried. "You're not Haruo-niisan! He would never think like that. And neither would I!"

"Are you so sure?" asked another voice.

From the darkness of the orphanage emerged another figure.

Somehow, it was Tachibana. Another Tachibana.

With glowing yellow eyes.

Her . . . Shadow.

"A second Emi-chan?" Kouta asked. "Seriously? This is too weird. Do you have a twin or something?"

Tachibana didn't answer him. She was staring at the second version of her. "Who . . . who are you?" she asked.

"Isn't it obvious?" replied Shadow Tachibana.

"I don't know you," Tachibana said.

"But you do," Shadow Tachibana said. "And I know you. I know how terrified you are of being worthless. That you're scared of taking up everyone else's air. You're just a poor, sad orphan who doesn't deserve any kind of happiness."

"That's . . . that's not . . ."

"It's not true?" asked Shadow Tachibana. "Aw, who are you kidding? Even Haruo-niisan sees it. But you're such an ungrateful little girl. You don't appreciate anything that you're given. All you're good for is wallowing in your own misery. Haruo has created this world to put an end to your suffering, and you have the nerve to reject it!"

"I don't want this!" Tachibana shouted.

"Stop deluding yourself. Aren't you the one who lies awake at night, wondering if everyone would be better off if you just died?"

Shou looked at Tachibana in shock. Did she really think those things? How could she believe that anyone would be better off if she was gone?

"Emi-chan," Kouta said, stunned. "You don't actually . . . ?"

But Tachibana wasn't listening. She collapsed to the ground, weeping. "How . . . ? How do you know this?" she asked the other her.

"Because," said Shadow Tachibana, "I'm you."

"No," Tachibana whispered.

A sense like alarm bells went off in Shou's mind. He had a premonition that whatever Tachibana was about to say, he had to stop her. He reached for her, trying to clamp a hand over her mouth.

But he was too late.

"You're not me!" Tachibana screamed.

A blinding light filled the room, followed by a rush of wind and smoke. Shou shielded his eyes with his arm, while his stomach did backflips. Whatever had just happened, they were in horrible danger.

"Gyahahahaha!" Bone-chilling laughter rang through the room.

The smoke cleared.

A massive white creature filled the room, resembling an enormous swan, with black markings along its head. Its ribs were bare and fleshless — a cage of bone. Inside the ribs' dark recesses, a little girl's doll hung from a noose; it swayed like a pendulum.

"You've gotta be kidding me!" Kouta shouted. "What the hell is this crap?" He grabbed his shinai from the bag on his back and adopted a ready stance.

Tachibana lay on the ground nearby, unmoving.

"Go, my Emi-neechan!" the Shadow Kudo said to the swan, clapping his hands.

The swan surged forward.

Shou grit his teeth, staring down the beast in front of him.

His heart beat painfully in his chest. Thud-thud. Thud-thud.

The swan-thing reared back its head, its top feathers brushing the ceiling. It loosed a massive shriek, and both Shou and Kouta fell to their knees, hands pressed over their ears.

"Bro, we gotta go," Kouta said. "I'm gonna grab Emi-chan and let's get out of here!"

Open thy eyes, spoke that inner voice from earlier. Face thy inner self, and let thy power . . . spring forth!

Shou froze. His . . . inner self?

In the farthest corners of Shou's heart, a question echoed: who was he, Tanimoto Shou?

A son, a student, a friend. Someone who always wanted the best for others.

But . . . was that all he was?

There was a part of him that only wanted what was best for himself, he realized. A part that sought relationships, human connections, simply for his own gratification. That got into the best high school for the sake of feeling good about himself.

Was he really so shallow?

Yes, he realized. He was.

But that was only a portion of a greater whole: his real, true self. His real self incorporated both the good and bad aspects of his personality, the parts he most wanted to repress. And by recognizing his weakness, baring it for all to see, he could work to eventually overcome it.

A warm glow surrounded Shou.

A playing card drifted in front of him, marked with a masked face.

He grabbed the card, crushed it in his grip.

"Bro, what are you doing?" Kouta yelled.

"Persona!" Shou bellowed.

An incredible light erupted around Shou. No, it erupted from him. He could feel the warmth pouring from his heart. That voice echoed in his mind again. I am thou. Thou art I. He became aware of a presence rising out of him, filling him with an incredible sense of power. His hands closed into fists.

Was this . . . Persona?

He gazed upon this new being in awe. Clad in shining golden armor, and wielding a mighty scepter, its name rang out in Shou's mind. Adam, Progenitor of Man. My Persona.

Though semi-transparent, his Persona was as solid, as real to him as anything. Adam turned its visored gaze on Shou, its bright eyes shining beneath the slits in its helmet. Shou had the strangest sense that it was asking him if he was ready.

Shou nodded.

"Wha-wha-what's going on here?" Kouta stammered. "This is getting too crazy, bro!" He had Tachibana slung over his shoulder. He looked up at Shou's Persona, then at the enormous swan monster bearing down on them. "You're not really gonna fight that thing, are you?"

Shou looked back at his friend, and smiled.

He would fight. For Tachibana's sake. For Kouta's.

Even for Kudo-sensei, who'd been overtaken by darkness.

Yes, he would fight.

And he would win.

"Adam, go!"