A/N: Welcome to Chapter 6! Thanks to everyone who's reading this story. I realize it's not supremely popular, starting off like it does with P2 characters that are less well-known compared to the characters from the other Persona games, but I appreciate your patronage all the same. ;)

Enjoy the chapter!


Riko woke up the next morning with what felt like the worst migraine she'd ever had in her entire life. She had no drinking experience, but was willing to bet that this was what a nasty hangover felt like. She struggled out of bed and stumbled to the bathroom, head pounding and stomach heaving.

Splashing some ice cold tap water onto her face seemed to help steady her a little, but even with the small clarity boost she was feeling seriously sub-par. Unfortunately, she couldn't afford to just sit at home and wait for the feeling to pass; not only did she have a shift at Kiki's today but she also needed to meet up with Shun and the others. She'd opted out of accompanying them to the Velvet Room yesterday after she'd returned Lisa Silverman's memories, but an extended absence from the group wasn't an option. Igor had, for whatever reason, decided that she was in charge of their motley little crew and as such she needed to get her shit together. He'd made it pretty clear from the start that any sort of slacking on her part would not be a good idea, inexplicable memory-transfer migraine or not. He hadn't explained the whole situation to her (hell, he hadn't explained even a fraction of it) but whatever was going on, they were crunched for time. She couldn't afford to take a time-out, no matter how shitty she felt.

With that in mind, she took a three minute ice-cold shower to wake herself up, sucked down two cups of coffee, and headed out. She texted Shun as she hopped on a bus and headed for the area of town where his building was. On my way over. How's everyone doing?

Fine, was her detective's response. Ulala's driving me nuts but the others aren't any trouble. Lisa and Tatsuya have been up all night talking.

Okay, she sent back. I should be there soon. Is the cop still around? Tatsuya's older brother being on the police force wasn't something she'd anticipated, and it was still making her extremely anxious. Her first interaction with the guy had been him rattling off the so-called-facts from her personal records, information she hated to even think about, much less hear out-loud. She'd had to deal with the shit enough when it had happened; every time someone even mentioned it in passing it was like reliving the hell of it all over again. Too many trips down memory lane and Riko was liable to have some sort of mental snap; a person could only take so much trauma, after all, and the Incident had cost her literally everything she'd ever cared about.

Yeah, was Shun's reply. He's been hanging with Baofu in my office. Trying to track down this Maya person, I think. It seems like she and Katsuya were pretty close until recently, but they haven't spoken in a couple weeks?

Well, that was...weird. Not so much that the two adults were close, she'd guessed as much from the cop's telltale blush when Amano's name had come up before, but the fact he now had no idea where she was. If they really were on good terms with each other, shouldn't he be able to get in contact fairly easily? That he was having to try and track her down...no, that couldn't be a good sign.

But it would have to wait, she realized. Because Maya wasn't the next name on the list, and Igor had encouraged her to go in order as much as possible. She'd pretty much failed epically on that one, but in her defense, she had found Ulala first. It had just turned out that she was a package deal; finding her had also brought Riko into contact with Baofu and Katsuya, and with Katsuya more or less on board, she'd gotten access to his little brother Tatsuya.

Yeah, she was zigzagging all up and down the list, that was for sure. But looking over the crumpled paper again as she waiting for the bus to finish pulling up to her stop, there was no getting around the fact that the next name on the list wasn't Maya Amano's. It was someone named Eikichi.

She had no idea who the hell Eikichi was.

I'm almost to your building, she texted to Shun. Gather everyone together, 'kay? Group meeting.

Alright, was his immediate answer. We'll be waiting for you upstairs.

She disembarked from the bus and walking the last couple blocks to Shun's townhouse. She rang the bell, and Shun opened to door to let her in right away.

"Hey," he said, smiling when he saw her.

"Hi," she said, feeling suddenly self-conscious. "Sorry if I kept you waiting."

He shook his head, closing the door behind her as she stepped inside. "No, you're fine. It took a little work for me to shepherd everyone into the meeting room anyways, so the timing's actually great. Follow me."

He led the way upstairs to what could only be described as a briefing room of sorts. She'd have called it a board room but it felt too cozy for that. One half of the room had a rectangular table with chairs all around, while the other half of the room had a low coffee table with two sofas and a plush armchair.

"Wow," Riko said before she could stop herself. "You've got sweet digs for a pro bono gumshoe."

Shun rolled his eyes at her. "Again, you need to let that go. Honestly. I do you a favor, and get teased mercilessly for it. Where is the justice, I ask you. Would you rather I charge you an obscene amount of money for my help?"

She grinned a little. "Definitely not. But this hardly seems fair to you." She slanted a look towards his new roommates. "You should at least charge the squatters for rent or something."
Ulala crossed her arms. "Who are you calling a squatter?" she demanded.

"Did I not state it clearly enough?" Riko asked innocently.

Shun stepped in between them before things could escalate, and steered Riko over to a seat at the head of the table. "Now that you're here," he said, deftly switching topics, "we can go over our plans."

She relented and sat down, pulling out the crumpled list of name and putting on the table for the others to see. "This is the list Igor gave me," she explained to the others. "He didn't explain...well, much of anything, really, other than the fact I had to find all of you guys, and do it quickly. He gave me just over three months to find you all. Fifteen weeks, I think he said. Which as time constraints go, doesn't seem so bad, but..."

"There's no telling how long it might take to find the others," Shun finished for her.

She nodded. "It was supposed to be just Ulala at first, but I lucked out getting all of you so soon into the search. Especially you, Tatsuya," she added, looking over at the younger Suou brother. "I was expecting to have to really work to get a chance to give your memories back to you, but it all went much smoother than I thought it would."

"Until you blacked out," Baofu added dryly.

She glared at him. "That would've happened no matter what," she snapped irritably. "I actually got off pretty light, all things considered." Her reaction to the transfer with Tatsuya had been extremely intense, but the aftermath post-blackout had easier than she'd expected, especially given Igor's dire warnings to her when he'd given her the four separate sets of memories for Tatsuya and his three friends.

You will essentially be carrying four extra consciousnesses inside your mind, Riko, he'd told her, in addition to your own. They aren't the precisely the souls of the four in question, but the effect it will have on your psyche and your body will be severe nevertheless. You must take care to keep your strength up; a transfer of memories between yourself and any one of the four will take a great toll on you, and exact a cost that even I do not truly understand. It is a great risk to your well-being, Riko, but there is no one else suitable for such a task. I know it is a lot to ask, but it must be you.

Of course, when she'd asked him why exactly it had to be her, he'd spouted a lot of nonsense about destiny and branching paths and converging powers and whatnot. She'd given up on getting a straight answer out of the bizarre caretaker of the Velvet Room, but that didn't make his warnings any less serious. If Igor said she was risking something by undertaking the memory transfers, she believed him. And she had to admit, it was taking something out of her when she did it.

That being said, it wasn't like she had a choice now; she'd already started down this road of her own free will. Turning back wasn't an option. She'd have to follow this path to wherever the hell it led, and just hope that she wouldn't end up killing herself trying to help these people.

Although if she did die as a result, she doubted it would matter; there was no one left in her life who cared enough to miss her anyway. Her parents were dead and she hadn't seen her former best friend in over a year, not since the Incident. She'd lost her family and her only friend all because of one terrible day, and the fallout from her decisions were going to impact her for the rest of her life. Her parents were gone on to where she couldn't follow, and the restraining order against her by Aina's family was as solid a barrier between her and her former friend as death was between Riko and her parents. There was no going back for any of them, and it took all her strength to not just call it quits and pitch herself off a building to end it all.

But she'd promised Igor that she'd help to the best of her abilities, and she'd follow through on her word. Unfortunately... "I don't have the skills necessary to track down the rest of the names on the list," she admitted. "It's why I hired Shun in the first place."

"We find people for a living, too, though," Ulala pointed out. "So how hard can it be to find the others, really?"

"Harder than you'd think," Katsuya remarked. "After all, it's been years. They could be scattered all around the world now for all we know."

"But you said you were in contact with Maya not long ago," Shun reminded him. "So it's reasonable to assume she's still somewhere in Japan, unless she was sent overseas on an assignment or something."

"How has Maya been?" Tatsuya asked worriedly. "Is she okay?"

"She's fine," Katsuaya assured him. "As much of a crazy driver as ever, but other than that she's perfectly fine."

"Except she's missing," Baofu contradicted.

Katsuay shot the other man a death glare that was thoroughly ignored.

Riko rapped her knuckles on the table to get their attention. "Forget about Maya for now," she told them. "I know she's important to all of you and I can appreciate that, but she's not next on my list. Some person named Eikichi is." She slanted a questioning look at the younger Suou brother.

"Eikichi Mishina," Tatsuya said in response to her unspoken query. "His family ran a sushi place, but Eikichi always wanted to be a rock star."

"And he was always so worried his dad wouldn't approve," Lisa chimed in. "He always looked like a total punk at school, but he had to leave his house early every morning to pull it off."

Riko frowned. "I don't get it."

Lisa giggled. "Well, his dad would've totally flipped his lid if he'd seen good ol' Undie Boss with his blue hair and all that stuff he liked to wear. So he'd leave the house looking like a regular person, stop off somewhere to dye his hair and get changed, then head to school."
Riko stared at her in disbelief. "You're joking."

"Nope." Lisa shook her head. "He did that every day."

Riko made a face. "That's ridiculous."

Tatsuya shrugged. "He didn't want to upset his father."

Riko couldn't decide if she was impressed or horrified by that little tale. But either way, the information did little to help with the main issue at hand, which was... "Where is he now?"

Lisa shrugged. "Dunno. Since none of us had our real memories, we didn't remember being friends; I haven't really seen him since we graduated, and not much before that since we weren't that close once our memories were wiped."

Fantastic. "So you guys have no idea where he is?"

"Not a clue. Sorry."

Riko barely suppressed the urge to groan out loud. She'd hope that with half the list out of the way, things would get easier. But no, it was back to square one again, finding the person in question. In her personal opinion, actually tracking someone down was the most aggravating part of this entire mission. Thank God I have a private detective for a partner. She looked over at Shun expectantly.

He caught her gaze and lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug of apology. "I've been working on it, Riko, ever since you and Igor showed me the list, but for some reason the information we need is hard to get a hold of. It could take at least another day before we have anything solid to go on."

Riko sighed.

"Sorry," he offered, sounding genuinely apologetic.

"It's not your fault," she assured him. "But if it's all the same to you guys, I'm gonna head on out."

"You're leaving?" Lisa asked, looking startled. "But...you just got here."

She shrugged. "Not like I can do much to help here. I don't know this Eikichi guy personally, and I wouldn't even know where to start looking. So until you guys have something to tell me about him and where we might find him, there's no point in my being here. I'd be better off at work, or out on the street fighting Shadows or something."

Shun did not look particularly happy about her declaration. "Riko-"

"I told you already," she said wearily, not wanting to get into a fight with him but also not willing to budge on the issue. "Finding people is not something I'm good at. Give me a coffee and pastry order and I'm your girl, but detective work is definitely not my strong suit. I'd just be a liability to you guys right now, anyway," she added, rubbing her forehead pointedly to emphasize that given her headache she was not in peak condition. "I'm going to head to Kiki's for my shift," she went on, "and you can call me when you find something, okay?"

There was some heated debate around the table at that point, most of which she tuned out. In the end, they couldn't really stop her from leaving to go to work, so she went, while they stayed at Shun's office to try and locate Eikichi.

She was extremely surprised when Lisa caught up to her at the bus stop and joined her on-board.

"What're you doing?" Riko asked, not quite sure what the other girl was thinking.

Lisa gave her an innocent look as she sat down. "We both work at Kiki's, remember?"
Riko scowled. "No. We left for the Velvet Room before you could turn in the application."

But Lisa shook her head. "I went back after Igor unlocked my new Persona. Kumiko-san hired me, on the condition that I don't filch pastries from the displays. Technically I don't have to start until Monday, but you look like you could use some company." She gave a cheerful smile.

Riko just stared at her. "What?" she said stupidly.

Lisa laughed. "You look like you've been hit by a truck, Riko-chan. Honestly, there's no need to look so horrified. I'll be a good co-worker I promise."

Riko had no idea what to say. "Uh...Okay, I guess." Then because that didn't seem like quite the right thing to say she went on. "I'm glad you got the job," she told the other girl. "It'll be nice to have someone other than me and Kumiko-san there."

Lisa beamed. "I'm glad!"

They got off the bus and headed to Kiki's down the street, heading into the back to change into their uniforms. It was a Thursday, so Riko was in charge of opening the cafe while Kumiko went around town meeting with their various suppliers to make sure everything was all in order. Normally Thursday mornings were extremely stressful for Riko as a result, since Kumiko's errands meant she was left alone to open and manage the shop until the owner's return. Today, however, it went much more smoothly thanks to Lisa, who proved to be an extremely upbeat and eager worker, doing everything Riko asked with so much enthusiasm it made Riko feel like a slacker by comparison.

"So," Lisa said as they wiped down some tables during an afternoon lull in customers, "how did you get this job?"

Riko gave a half-smile. "Your friends asked me that too, the first time they came here."

"Yeah? And what was your answer?"

She shrugged. "I needed work after I dropped out of high school, and Kumiko-san hired me."

Lisa rolled her eyes. "That can't be the whole story. Don't take this the wrong way, but a person like you doesn't really work at places like these."

"Are you saying I make a bad maid?" she asked, pretending to be offended.

Lisa giggled. "I wouldn't dare, Riko-chan. No," she went on, "what I meant was, you must have had some other reason for choosing this place in particular besides just 'I need work'. So, what was your reason?"

Riko remained silent for a moment, debating whether or not to talk about it. "My mother was friends with Kumiko-san," she said at last. "Best friends, actually. Kiki's was actually founded by the two of them together," she admitted. "It had been their dream ever since they were little, I guess."

"Wow," Lisa said appreciatively. "So I guess that means it's sort of a family business thing for you, then?"

Riko shrugged. "Maybe a little, I guess. My mom was a pâtissier and loved what she did, but she ended up having to pretty much give up her position at Kiki's."

"Oh no." Lisa's face fell. "What happened?"

"Just...life, I guess. My dad was a mechanic, a pretty good one, but he had an accident in the shop one day and ended up with a back injury that kept him from working most of the time. And since my mom had to look after him and raise me, she needed to cut back her work hours here at the cafe. By the time I was in my senior year, she was only coming in a couple times a week. I know it upset Kumiko-san, but she never complained about it."

"Kumiko-san seems like a nice person," Lisa commented. " And if she was good friends with your mother like you said, I'm sure she understood."

Riko nodded. "Yeah..."

"So, where are your parents now?" Lisa asked curiously. "Did your dad's back ever get better? Does your mom still like to bake?"

An explosion of emotional agony ripped through Riko's chest like a grenade going off. "No, it didn't, and no, she doesn't," she said, voice tight. "They...passed away. About a year ago." Although 'passed away' was a nice gentle way of putting it; the reality had been sudden and violent and terrible. And it's all my fault.

"Oh my God." Lisa looked horrified. "I'm so sorry, Riko, that's awful."

Riko did her best to brush it off. "It's okay," she said, struggling to maintain a calm facade. "I'm doing just fine." A complete and total lie, but one that she'd gotten pretty good at telling, all things considered. It helped, of course, that no one cared enough to try and see past it.

Lisa Silverman, though, didn't seem to take Riko's statement at face value like everybody else usually did. She set down the tray of dishes she'd been about to take to the sink and wrapped her arms around Riko in a fierce hug. "I'm so, so sorry for your loss, Riko."

Riko froze in place, heart pounding. On one hand, the sudden physical contact was unexpected and uncomfortable. On the other hand...when was the last time someone had hugged her? Looking back, she knew it had to have been at least a year, possibly longer. She hadn't had anyone in her life to hug her, not since the deaths of her parents and the forced separation from Aina.

So, as much as she didn't like to be touched, she had to admit...This is kinda nice. She wasn't used to anyone caring, not anymore. For Lisa to act like this, like a genuinely sympathetic and caring friend, especially when they had just met and hardly even knew each other...it was enough to make Riko a little choked up, and her voice was undeniably a little bit crackly and hoarse when she spoke again. "Thank you...Lisa."

"Anytime," Lisa told her, and it sounded like a promise.


A/N: And...that's Chapter 6 folks. :) What do you think? This wasn't originally going to be an emotional chapter like that, but it just sort of happened that way. I hope it's believable for everyone. :)

For those (very few) people wondering about what I was thinking while writing this: I know Riko doesn't seem like the type to just tell her history to anyone who asks, but compared to some of the darker stuff in her past, like how her parents really died and her involvement with the gang, those bits about her mother co-founding Kiki's with Kumiko and her father being an injured mechanic, those are the sorts of things I feel like she could share without it being too much, you know? Also I wanted to show that she and Lisa have a sort of camaraderie right from the start; Lisa already considers Riko to be a good friend (for returning her memories of Tatsuya and everyone), and treats her like one. Riko, being very, very lonely right now, could definitely use a friend of her own, and isn't going to fight back too hard when Lisa ropes her into a friendship. XD

In any case, now we need to track down Eikichi! Where on Earth could he be...?

As always, reviews are not required for continuation of the story (as I've stated repeatedly, I doubt I could stop now anyway even if I wanted to XD) but I do love feedback, and haven't gotten very much of it on this story so far. :)

See you guys soon!