Katekyo: Hey all! I'm back~ I'll be posting this Chapter rather quickly, but the next chapter should probably come around Friday! Oh, and I don't own the Persona Series. I'll screw it up if I did.

Akihiko: Just what did you do to me?!

Katekyo: Nothing. I simply chucked you into Inaba. Is there a problem?

Akihiko: Nothing?! I transported to Inaba without my protein and you tell me that's nothing?!

Chapter 2: Suspicion

He was back in the Velvet Room again. The long-nosed old man was grinning away as usual. Akihiko was not surprised; from what he had gathered the last visit, the old man was always smiling. Now, why was he here again?

Margaret looked up. "I see that you have found your way to one of our honoured guests. That would be good."

Akihiko was confused. Honoured guests? So he wasn't the only one.

Margaret sighed. "Many of our honoured guests are unlike you; they hold a special power, unique to others but themselves. They hold different versions of themselves, and bonds are created to help them along."

Akihiko nodded slowly. Then why can't I summon Polydeuces?

Igor let out a chuckle. "Ah, but that is your own mistake. Think back, what did you do? How did you feel? Where you really trying?"

Akihiko struggled to remember. He was fighting the Shadows…he brought the gun to his head. Then, realization dawned upon him. He had not believed that the Shadows were back, he had denied the sight in front of him. He was denying his own belief.

Margaret smiled. "You have found your path. Polydeuces would now help you along your way. As we have said before, you hold your path's future in your hands. I bid you farewell, honoured guest. May we meet again?"

Akihiko woke up with a start. A white ceiling, muffled sounds of human voices. Ah, his head hurt so much. Getting up, he rubbed his head. Wait, his gloves were missing. Akihiko started to look around for them, only for his ears to be hurt by the shriek that he heard, "He's awake! Senpai! He's awake! And alive for the matter!"

In a blink of an eye, eight people surrounded the futon that he just realized that he lay in. He was dressed in a yukata, with his clothes nearby on the table. He looked up at the unfamiliar faces and realized with a pang how much he missed the SEES. "Where…am I? Who are you all?"

The young high school student with headphones around his neck laughed. "You're in the Amagi Inn. The hospital wouldn't let us visit you anyway. I must say, you are pretty hardy for simply sleeping for a week. Most who have gotten their asses almost kicked were pretty much knocked out for two weeks!"

A week?! He had been asleep for that long? Akihiko frowned. He did feel slightly tired, but the feeling was similar to the time he had spent in school after Tartarus. That is, during the first few weeks when he started going in. "Then…who are you?" The burning question remained in his mind, he had to know who they were before recruiting them.

"The name's Yosuke Hanamura. Pleasure to meet you!" The headphones guy was Yosuke Hanamura, huh. "Just call me Yosuke would do, there's no need with the formalities," he grinned at Akihiko.

"My turn! Chie Satonaka!" The young spunky girl in a green jacket grinned. "We ordered some food for you, you are bound to be hungry! Hope you like meat!" Akihiko licked his chops. Meat…protein. Now that was more like it.

"Special delivery," a young girl with blue hair walked in and gave out bowls. "Aiko's Steak Bowls are the best around! You ain't in heaven till you try it!" Chie took out a pair of chopsticks and dug in.

"Chie…"The young lady with straight black hair sighed and turned to Akihiko, "My name is Amagi Yukiko. Pleasure to meet you…?" Yukiko let the sentence trail off into a question. Akihiko mentally smacked his head. "Akihiko Sanada, nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you too, Sanada. My name is Naoto Shirogane." The young blue haired boy nodded at him. "You happen to be a boxer, do you not?"

Akihiko nodded slowly. "Yeah, I guess you could say that."

"My turn, my turn! Oh….My name is Rise Kujikawa, or Risette, you may know!" The idol he recognized as Risette smiled as she sat down next to him. "Dig in! It's fine you know!"

Akihiko looked at the steaming Steak Bowl. He was almost drooling due to the smell. Picking up his chopsticks and saying his prayers, he dug in. It wasn't close to the Beef Bowl back home, but it'll do. He noticed an extremely large bowl nearby, in which a grey haired boy picked up and ate so fast, he seemed to be inhaling the food. Much like Minato… Akihiko frowned at the similarity. He could still remember, Minato inhaling Shinji's food and the ramen. He looked up as the rest of them introduced themselves.

Okay…so the big beefy one was Kanji Tatsumi, the bear-like mascot was Teddie (His human form seemed almost frightening.) and the last one was….

Akihiko looked towards him. "And you are…?"

The grey haired boy placed down his chopsticks, having just finished eating. "Yuu Narukami. Nice to meet you, Sanada."

For some reason, Akihiko got the faintest feeling of déjà vu. It was as if he was talking to Minato all over again. "J-Just call me Akihiko. It's fine."

"Ah, but you are most definitely older than us, right?" Naoto stared at him with steely blue eyes. Akihiko nodded meekly. "Then we should call you with respect."

"Aaaah, Naoto-chan, no need to be so beary formal!" Teddie smacked Naoto on the back.

"Now, the big question. Who pushed you into the television?" Yosuke looked towards Akihiko with an air of seriousness. Akihiko was taken aback. The group had switched from being friendly to being extremely serious. Uh, was it a bad thing to happen to him? Akihiko couldn't put his finger into it, but something told him to not tell them about SEES yet. He wondered how he should tell his story of entering the foggy area. Oh, and television?

Clearing his throat, Akihiko scratched his head, "Uh. About that…television? I don't think I hit my head against one. And besides, how does one go into the television?"

Yosuke frowned. "The foggy area, of course! Don't you remember who kidnapped you? We are trying to find that person!"

Akihiko shook his head. "I followed a Shadow into that foggy area. Last I saw the Shadow, it had jumped into a glowing rectangle. I jumped in as well, only to find myself in that foggy area."

That statement earned raised eyebrows. "Jumped in…? Wait. You mean that you have a Persona?!" Yosuke fell over in shock. "Woah, that was a huge shock. But seriously, you can use one? Then why didn't you use it to save yourself and fight back?"

Akihiko placed his bowl down. "Well…I couldn't summon my Persona at that time. So I couldn't really fight then. I wasn't in my top form. But that can be fixed quickly. I simply have to train! That reminds me, I haven't done my twenty squats yet. I owe that for a day, so currently I owe… 140 squats! I'm way behind on my training!"

Akihiko would have done his squats there and then, had it not been all four guys pushing him back down to prevent him. "O-okay, so you can use a Persona, we get it. And Shadows exiting the TV world? That's absurd." Chie looked a little taken aback by his antics, but was nevertheless calm.

"Then, why don't you join the Investigation Team? We are looking for the person who pushed people into the TV and killing them using Shadows," Yosuke explained hurriedly. Akihiko was surprised. They already had a team?

"Well, the killing in Inaba has reduced, but the killer is still at large, so we have to find him. The police can't do a single thing." Narukami had finally inserted his opinion.

Hold it. Inaba. Did he just hear that this place was Inaba? Akihiko pulled his ears. "We are in Inaba?"

All eight of them looked at him. "Yes. We are in Inaba. Why? Didn't you travel here only to enter a TV after a Shadow?" Akihiko shook his head. "I was in Iwatodai. And Shadows exist in the outside, not in this TV world you speak about. They spawn everywhere. Didn't you hear of the Apathy Syndrome?"

All eight stared back at him. "This is Inaba, and the Apathy Syndrome has been cured. Are you out of your mind?"

Akihiko gulped. Just where had the Shadow led him to, and who were these people?

Katekyo: Thou shall end this here.

Akihiko: *groaning away*

Katekyo: Aren't you going to train?

Akihiko: Not with these people on me!

Yosuke: Hey, hey, don't call me 'these people'! I'm just one person!

Katekyo: Eh..Okay. See you all next time!