Disclaimer: I do not own Persona 5!

Hello guys, I'm finally back after a long time! I'm really sorry that I can't keep up with the schedule any longer because of holiday homework and things like that, but I've finally finished this chapter! (And I may decide to add bloopers in the next chapter, so do look out for them!)

Just for clarification, Yusuke's arc ended in the previous chapter, and his ending is supposed to be not that satisfying. His ending was actually intended as not just character development for his personality, but also for the plot and development of another character.

With that, enjoy the story!

"Holy crap, this is amazing!" Makoto marvelled as she bit into a hunk of juicy stake, then squealed in joy. "Yusuke, tell you chef this steak's the best I've ever eaten!"

"I've never expected you to be this rich, though," Haru giggled lightly as she delicately sliced off a small piece of meat on her plate.

Yusuke smirked proudly. "Amazed? You gotta thank my Dad for our fortune, though. He's the one who's able to afford this damn building because of the shitton of money we have in here."

Goro shook his head in disapproval. "Tsk, tsk. Flaunting your wealth here now, aren't you? Think about the feelings of other people, Yusuke-chan."

Yusuke turned to Ryuji, who had already slid away from his chair and was exploring their bungalow like an excited child with sparkling eyes. "... Oh, right. Whoopado."

Ann started to chuckle. "He's usually the mature one in our group, but now, he's acting like an adorkable kiddie."

"Hm, but it was nice of Kitagawa-san to give us our own time to bond with each other, though. I never expected that."

Akira looked at his brown-haired friend and frowned a little. Goro was chatting with the rest of them as per usual, but something about him seemed off despite the fact that he was still using his flirtatious tone. Akira knew Goro for too long - too long to immediately realise when something was wrong with him.

But he couldn't really worry much about Goro now, not when something suddenly cropped up again at the dining table.

"Futaba, are you not hungry?" Makoto frowned when she saw the orange-haired bespectacled girl poking at her steak with her metal fork.

She shook her head. "I'm not too hungry today... I'm sorry. If you want, you can have my steak."

The red-eyed girl placed her fists on her hips and pouted. "Geez! Come on, Futaba! You need to eat! Where else are you gonna get your muscles to work?!"

"Some people just have small appetites, Mako-chan. Calm down," Haru whispered as she placed a hand on her friend's shoulder, but then Makoto whipped her head towards her.

"But it's still not healthy, is it?!"

"W-Well, then is it okay if I have a box to bring it home, Yusuke-Senpai? Maybe I'll get hungry later..."

The blue-haired boy nodded. "Don't see why not. I tell Chef that you wanna bring it back home."

As he stood up and began walking towards the kitchen, Ann quickly turned towards Futaba. "Futaba, do you not eat very often? Is that why your build is so small?"

"It's exactly because my build's small, that's why I can't eat much," she replied with a shrug. "Don't worry - I've always been eating little ever since young. I'll be fine!"

"Well, if that's how you've been living, then I guess it's okay," Ryuji replied as he started to walk back towards the table. "It's not very easy to immediately change eating habits, and it may bring up some health problems too. I think we'd prefer to avoid that."

"Then I guess there's no point in harping on that," Makoto nodded as she flopped over the back of her chair, then lolled her head towards Ryuji and grinned. "How was your house tour?"

"Oh, it was fantastic! This entire building has three floors! The floors are all either shiny marble or wooden except for the living room which is made of lush carpet, and there are diamond chandeliers everywhere, sparkling like thousands of stars in the sky! Most of the furniture here also have designs made of gold, and the picture frames are..."

Ann stared at her rambling friend with exhausted blue eyes before she face-palmed, causing Akira to giggle at the sight. "Oh, great. You brought out the property agent in him."

"I'm back. Futaba, here's your box."

Futaba nodded gratefully as she accepted the beautifully decorated box. "T-Thanks, Yusuke-Senpai! I'll make sure to wash this and return it to you!"

Yusuke waved a hand. "You don't need to do that. Just keep that box - we have plenty here. And just call me Yusuke. I'm not used to people calling me 'Senpai'."

Ann clapped her hands together cheerily. "That was an awesome dinner though! What are we doing next?"

Akira snapped his fingers as a grin grew on his face. "Oh, yeah! Right! We can stay a little longer here since there's no school tomorrow!"

However, surprisingly, Makoto shook her head. "Haha, sorry, but no. I got to go home early cuz I need to go to school tomorrow. If y'all wanna stay here, go on without me."

Yusuke looked at her in confusion. "The fuck are you going to school on a Sunday for? Are you crazy?"

"I gotta bargain with the director to give me a different role for that action movie. You know, The Dragon?"

Ann looked up in surprise. "The Dragon? I remember the producer of that show coming to our school to audition the students here! Did you get a role?"

Makoto nodded before she groaned, "I did, but it sucks! I'm acting as Akagi Maya, the god damn damsel in distress and love interest! Why the hell would they give me such a crappy role?! I can't even do anything that fits my personality! At least let me be the sidekick or something!"

Ryuji frowned a little. "Calm down, Makoto. Maybe the role isn't as bad as it seems..."

She slammed the table in anger and seethed. "It is, Ryuji! The scene that we all auditioned for consists of the placeholder Akagi Maya begging for the main character to save her after she was tortured by the bad guys! You think I'll take this shit lyin' down?! 'Cuz I sure ain't gonna do that!"

The entire table went silent. Makoto took a deep breath before she sat back down. "Sorry guys, I got too carried away. I'm just really pissed at what happened."

Haru patted her friend's back and smiled back. "It's okay, Mako-chan. We understand."

Yusuke nodded as he twirled the fork in his hand. "Gotta admit, I'd probably be fuckin' pissed if I were to get a role like that too."

"Heh, there's no need to comfort me, but thanks guys," Makoto replied as she gave them one of her trademark smiles. "But anyways, I really need to go now. Gotta rest early for tomorrow, you know what I'm saying?"

"Yeah, go ahead, Makoto," Ann nodded as they all waved to the girl who was proceeding to leave, "We'll see you on Monday!"

"Oi, Goro!"

The brown-eyed boy stopped upon hearing his name being called and turned around only to smile when he saw who it was. "Oh, Akira! What is it, hun?"

Akira ran and quickly caught up to his friend as the two of them walked towards the subway station. "Is something wrong?"

Goro looked in confusion before he started chuckling. "Uh... Akira? You were the one who wanted to talk to me, and then you ask if there's something wrong. Shouldn't it be me asking that?"

The bespectacled boy sighed. "Goro, I'm being serious here. You looked really mad when you were talking to Mr Kitagawa. What happened?"

Goro's smile faltered a little. "Oh, so you want to talk about that, huh?"

As both of them entered the train that brought them back home, Goro, unable to stand the awkward silence between the two of them, finally began to talk.

"Here's the thing, Akira. Do you remember what my dream was back when we still worked together?"

Akira was baffled as he raised an eyebrow in confusion. "Huh? Did you ever tell me?"

"How dare you say that? I did, you horrible peasant!" Goro shrieked as he brought a hand to his chest, as if he was completely oblivious to the attention he was bringing to himself. "I can't believe you totally forgot about it!"

Akira rolled his eyes before he began to play along by folding his arms and giving Goro a sassy smile. "Of course I would forget about it, my queen. I'm gifted, remember?"

Goro groaned and placed the back of his hand on his forehead in a dramatic fashion. "To think I would be trolled over by a clown in my court!"

The raven-haired boy couldn't help but start giggling along with the dramatic boy. "Okay, but seriously, what was your dream?"

"My dream..." Goro began before he paused slightly and looked out of the subway's window in an emotional manner, which didn't work since they were in a tunnel and it was all clanging pipes outside. "... Is to revive the stage."

Akira frowned in confusion. "Revive... the stage? What does that mean? You mean, the Drama stage?"

"Not just the Drama stage, darling, but the stage of the Performing Arts in general," he replied, his face surprisingly all serious. "Have you not realised it, Akira? Stage acts, and I'm not talking about those with J-Pop and K-Pop acts and things like that, are dying! People just don't appreciate classic stage acts anymore, do you get it? I'm not talking about everyone per say, but the number of people interested in the performing arts are definitely dwindling!"

"R-Really?"

Goro looked at Akira with an exasperated look before he sighed and shook his head. "I should've expected it. You don't have any consequences to worry about since so long as your sense of humour is still there, everything will be okay for you. It's different for people who are in the same category of jobs as I'm in. If we don't do anything to make a change, we'll go down FAST."

He then turned away from his friend once more. "Theatre and drama in general is my passion, that's why I want to revive the stage. But Kitagawa-san and Yusuke-chan... they don't seem to get it at all! That was why I wanted Yusuke-chan to do his best in whatever he likes! Because not only do I want to see people's dreams come true, but I want to see the rows of seats in a theatre be filled up with people too! But for that to happen, you really need to be at the top."

"Goro..."

"But if that's what Yusuke-chan wants, I can't stop him," he continued. "After all, he is the only heir to the throne of his father's conpany. Kitagawa-san's business will go out of whack if Yusuke-chan doesn't help to take charge at certain points in time. I understand that, that's why I didn't stop him. But I really feel so..."

Akira pursed his lips together. He never realised that Goro had such a huge dream. But of course, it was no surprise that a perfectionist like him wanted to accomplish something so big.

However, Goro suddenly looked over at the list of train stations the train had just passed and screamed. "ARGH! Oh crap! Did I just miss my station?!"

Akira glanced at the list. "No? But you do have to alight at this one. The one we're stopping at now."

"OH! Thank god! I'll see you on Monday, Akira!" Goro smiled back and stepped out of the train before he suddenly turned back and blew a god damn kiss at his friend.

Akira face-palmed, but knowing his friend well by now, he waved back too with a laugh as the doors began to close.

Despite being so flamboyant at this point, it seems like Goro has still kept part of his seriousness in himself.

"He may have changed, but some things still stay the same..."

Akira came to school only to see something really surprising on Monday.

Or maybe it wasn't really surprising, since it was Makoto of all people who looked as if she were about to blow.

"Whoa, what the hell, Makoto? Are you on your period?" Yusuke had asked jokingly when he saw the expression on the seething girl. It didn't take long for him to realise that he shouldn't agitate anyone with red eyes after seeing Makoto's death glare.

As she stalked off, Akira slowly inched his way back before he turned to Ryuji, who happened to be standing nearby. "Hey... who pissed her off?"

Ryuji shrugged as he placed his book back into his bag. "Beats me. She came to school in a bad mood today. No one dared to even speak to her."

Akira raised an eyebrow as he watched her figure vanish down the corridor. "I thought she was always the happy-go-lucky type. Looks like she isn't that cheery the entire time, huh?"

"Oh, you wouldn't want to get on her bad side either, Akira-san…" Ryuji chuckled lightly before he checked his watch. "Come on, let's go. We got to go to class for homeroom soon."

"... You go on ahead, I'm going to go hide for a moment. I'll see you at filming later."

"Huh? Why?"

Ryuji didn't have to wait for long for his answer as a loud clamour came crashing from behind.

"AKIRA-CHAN~!"

Akira screamed as he hurled his bag over his shoulders and bolted down the hallway, the herd of rabid fangirls and fanboys running after him.

"He just wouldn't hear it! That freaking asshole just told me that I suit the role the best, and then kicked me out of his damn office! How the hell do you think I can stay calm after all of that bullshit?!" Makoto raged, slamming her hands onto her desk and scaring the rest of her classmates.

Haru sweat-dropped. "Maybe he had a reason to do so...? Your producer seems like a pain, to be honest..."

The furious girl looked as if she were about to flip her table. "See?! If even you think he's annoying, how do you think I feel?! He hadn't even given me the god damn script or at least tell me the reason why he thinks so! Like, what the hell, man?!"

"W-wow, that's a little..."

Makoto sighed before she took a deep breath and grabbed her water bottle. "Alright, let me calm down for a moment. I guess I'm getting a little too crazy in here. Hang on."

"I can understand why you're so angry right now. My patience would have been worn thin too if I had to deal with someone like your producer..."

Makoto nodded. "I don't know if I can even stand this anymore. If I'm going to be this angry everytime we have a meeting, I'm going to rage quit at this point. If I'm not going to be happy, then why should I continue, right?"

"Well... I guess you should just do what you think it's best for you, Mako-chan."

She looked up and smiled back at the auburn-haired girl as she set her water bottle back onto her table. "Hehe. Thanks, Haru-chan."

"Hey, have you heard? Apparently, there's a Yakuza group going around terrorizing the residents right now!"

The conversation between the two girls immediately came to a pause as they turned towards another group of students who were gossiping about the recent happenings that they know of.

"T-Terrorizing? How?"

"You know how some of the streets around the school have people setting up stalls to sell certain products? These people go and ask for 'protection fees'. If the stall owners don't pay up, they destroy their stalls and wreck all of their items! It's horrible!"

One of the girls gasped. "That's awful!"

"It is! But no one can do a thing about it, because somehow, they always seem to escape from the police's clutches!"

"What the hell are the police doing..."

"Can't blame them. No one even knows where the hideout of the Yakuza group is."

"That's so scary..."

Makoto glanced at Haru. "Is that true? There's a Yakuza group going around recently? How did I not know about this?"

Haru frowned. "I-I never heard about it either though... Were we too busy worrying about Yusuke's case?"

"Gosh, that sounds real awful, though," Makoto nodded. "I honestly don't understand these assholes at all. What's the fun in wrecking innocent people's lives and destroying their businesses?"

Hau sighed sadly. "It's just how it works. As much as I hate to admit it, these people just go around doing things as they please. I wish we could do something about this, but we may just end up getting ourselves killed."

"It would've been so cool to be the one to beat up the bad guys, though. Can you imagine that, Haru-chan?" Makoto asked as she turned to her friend with a grin.

"Mako-chan, this is not something we should be joking about."

"Aw, come on! Let me dream about being a hero for a moment, will you? I've already lost my chance at being a hero in the movie!"

Haru sighed as she patted Makoto's shoulder with a smile. "Alright, alright. Just dream what you want."

"But whatever it is, I'm not gonna give up," the brown-haired girl suddenly declared as she stood up and said, "I'm going to prove to the producer that even a girl like me who's gonna be acting as the damsel in distress can be a hero too!"

Haru started giggling as she replied, "You can do it, Makoto! I support you!"

As Ann continued to scroll through her Instagram, Ryuji flipped through his math book, Futaba wrote in her music book and Akira played with the Morgana plush toy he had in his hand, they all waited for the rest of the cast to come over. The four of them had already gotten prepared for their next act, and were just sitting at one corner waiting for the rest.

"Took you all long enough," Akira snickered when Yusuke, Goro, Haru and Makoto stepped in.

Ann smiled and waved at her best friend. "You're finally here, Haru!"

"The Year 3s were dismissed late because of an assembly," Makoto groaned. "But all I could remember about it was that I fell asleep halfway and ended up banging my head against poor Hifumi..."

Stunned, Futaba could only respond with a, "Wh-whoa..."

"Good thing it was sweet-as-sugar Hifumi, though," Makoto continued as she started guffawing at her own mistake. "If it were Chihaya, she'd probably yell at me as if there's no tomorrow. Hahaha!"

Haru sighed. "You can still laugh at that, Mako-chan?"

"I had to deal with some things for the Drama club, sorry to keep you all waiting," Goro apologised with a sheepish smile.

Yusuke groaned. "Tch. It's as if you're expecting the whole damn world to be waiting for you..."

"Anyways," Ann spoke up. "Shouldn't you guys be going to get dressed?"

"Oh, right."

As the four of them headed into the individual dressing rooms, Ann sighed as she tugged at her red suit. "Is it just me, or is the weather pretty darn hot recently?"

"It is... I'm sweating really badly in these pants already..." Futaba muttered softly before she sighed as well.

"I mean, summer's coming right up," Akira replied as he wiped a bead of sweat off his forehead. "And don't complain — Don't forget I'm still wearing another coat above everything else!"

"Yeah, yeah. But at least your suit isn't as skin-tight as us, y'know!"

Ryuji quickly intervened into the argument. "Pipe down, you guys! Now's not the time to be arguing—"

"WHAT THE FUCK?!"

Akira nearly felt himself jump out of his skin upon hearing Yusuke's loud shriek coming from the dressing room. Ryuji quickly stood up and dashed towards where his friend was and slammed the door open. "Yusuke! Are you alright—?!"

Curious to see what caused Ryuji to stop mid sentence, Akira, Ann and Futaba stood up and walked over, only to have their eyes wide open when they realised what was the sight that had taken him aback.

Akira was the first to speak up. "Y-Yusuke, what on Earth is that?!"

"I-I don't know?!"

Yusuke's dressing room mirror didn't look the same as before. In fact, there were a ton of pink letters framing the mirror to look like a heart!

Ann pulled out one of the letters and read out aloud, "'You've danced your way into our hearts, Yusuke Kitagawa!' And it's even decorated with glitter, sequins and written with sparkle pens..."

"'Will you teach me how to dance, my beautiful Incubus?' BWAHAHAHAHA!" Akira crashed to the ground as he started cackling madly. "Are they serious?!"

"Pfft, 'Beautiful Incubus'...! HAHAHAHAH...! I'm so gonna use that as your nickname when I have the chance, Yusuke!"

Yusuke groaned upon seeing that Makoto had joined Akira in the laughing-fest. "Are you guys seriously..."

Goro began chuckling, "D'aww, our dear Yusuke-chan's getting popular~! This is fantastic!"

However, Ryuji was inspecting the note carefully before he placed a hand on Yusuke's shoulder in a foreboding manner and pushed up his glasses. "... Yusuke, I'd advise you to not come to school early anymore, or leave yourself alone during non-class time..."

Yusuke glanced at his blond-haired friend in confusion as they started to head out of the room in order to start acting. "Huh? Why?"

"Because..."

"YUSUKE-CHAN~!"

"Hm?!" The poor blue-haired delinquent only had a second to look at the huge cloud of dust heading their way before realising what was going on. "Oh no... don't tell me?!"

"Why's it so noisy out there?" Akira queried as he and the rest of the cast stepped out of the dressing room after having a good laugh about what happened, only to have the colour drained out of his face when he saw the huge group of screaming students. "OH HELL, NO!"

"Oh my god! AKIRA-CHAN AND GORO-CHAN ARE HERE TOO! KYAA—"

Goro immediately bolted for the emergency exit as he screamed, "RUN IF YOU WANT TO PROTECT YOUR LIVES!"

As the trio dashed out with the shrieking Mob tagging closely behind them, Makoto burst out laughing once more when she saw Ryuji pull out the stash of popcorn that Yusuke had hidden in his bag and started to munch on it. "Pfft! Ryuji?! What on earth?!"

"Ah, what a peaceful afternoon..."

"GYAHAHAHAHA!"

The poor Director of the show could only watch in astonishment at the aftermath of the stampede. "Th-They nearly destroyed the entire set... Holy cow."

"By the way," Haru suddenly spoke up after staying quiet for a while, "I heard that tension is rising really quick in the areas surrounding our school because of a Yakuza group...?"

Ann nodded. "Oh, yeah. I heard about it on the grapevine. It's really crazy, apparently."

Futaba sighed sadly. "It seems that the streets are getting even more dangerous than ever before..."

"I swear to God, if I see any of those members, I'm gonna punch them right in their faces—"

Haru smacked Makoto's arm, causing her to whimper. "Mako-chan, calm down!"

"Nah, you probably can't even punch their faces, Makoto."

"Oh, yeah? Why not?"

"Because all you would be seeing is an ass with two eyes," Ann grinned at her own snarky reply.

Both Haru and Futaba did a dry spit take while Makoto started laughing madly as usual. "HOLY SHIT! You're savage, Ann!"

"M-My goodness, Ann-chan. I didn't know you had that in you!" Haru started giggling. "I guess you've really lighten up a lot ever since that incident, huh?"

"Honestly, I can't bring myself to care about it anymore," Ann shrugged with a smile as she shifted to change her position. "All I know is that I'm going to just do what I'm comfortable with, and that's it."

Makoto nodded in approval as a proud smile grew on her face. "That's great!"

"But, back to the topic..." Ann quickly turned to Ryuji, who had been awfully quiet ever since they started talking about the Yakuza. "Ryuji, you're... awfully quiet. Are you sure you're okay?"

Makoto's eyes brightened up. "That reminds me! Isn't your father the owner of a fruit stall nearby? Are you guys okay?"

Ryuji shifted about uncomfortably as a sad look streaked across his eyes. "To be honest, well... the Yakuza group's being bringing a lot of problems to Dad..."

Futaba's gaze softened even more than before. "They've been harassing your father too, Ryuji-Senpai?"

The brown-eyed boy nodded. "Yeah... It's really difficult for Dad to continue business at this rate. Because people are scared of the Yakuza, Dad's business has been declining, and you guys know that our family isn't that well-off in the first place, so..."

Haru brought a hand to her mouth in shock. "That's awful... Can we do anything to help you, Ryuji?"

He scratched the back of his head. "W-Well, I am getting quite a couple of part-time jobs to help raise money for my family, so I think it should be fine. I mean, I already am working part-time for quite a while now, so I'm sure I'll get used to juggling three jobs."

Ann's eyes widened. "Wh-Whoa, hang on a minute! Three?! Are you sure?!"

"Don't worry, it won't be a problem," he smiled back. "Dad's already planning to file a police report, so hopefully everything goes as planned afterwards."

Futaba brought a hand to her chest and sighed. "I just hope your Dad's okay... I mean, it's not nice when you know that one of your friend's relatives is going through some tough times..."

Ryuji breathed out a small sigh as he smiled and patted his junior's head. "It's okay, Futaba-chan. We'll be fine."

Yet as the conversation went on while they waited for the remaining three boys to come back from the chase, no one noticed that Makoto had a look of fierce determination in her blood red eyes.