Hello again, i don't have a lot to add here so i'll be brief. I would like to thank everyone who liked and followed the story, I was expecting maybe one or two guys doing so but the reception has been more than that!, but that aside and with no more delays, here's chapter two, hope you enjoy!
Chapter 2: The Priestess-Justice Duo.
Now sitting on the table that the apartment still had the four of them were enjoying the store bought meals than Ren brought with him, he was lucky that he bought some extra; Initially those were for Morgana because he knew how his partner's appetite could be demanding sometimes, but considering the "betrayal" that happened moments ago, the only excuse given to him by his partner being "they seemed nice and offered me food" made him not feeling too bad about diminishing his rations.
-"So you two come from Tokyo as well?"- Ren asked his two guests, he was feeling a little bit ashamed, mostly because he bought these meals out of laziness and that it wasn't of the quality of the dishes he could make given some more prep time, eating for himself was one thing, making food for others was a completely different one, although he was having doubts if he should worry about those thing given this particular set of circumstances.
-"My colleague here does"- Explained Naoto while tilting her head in Fuuka's direction -"My line of work has me traveling around Japan, but I haven't been to the capital in a while"- after grabbing and drinking the last of her glass of water she added -"I was running a little bit late to our scheduled meeting, so that's why you encountered her alone"- She seemed a little bit annoyed by this fact.
-"She's right, to be honest I haven't been on a lot of trips outside of Tokyo, that said, the opportunity to come to Kobe for this assignment was an interesting one, so we decided to take it" Fuuka started to put in a pile the empty dishes in the table as they were about to finish their meals.
Ren hesitated for a moment "-What's my angle here?, pressing about their assignment directly could be rushing forward a lot, and bringing up the Meta-Nav that i saw on Fuuka's phone could be even worse, maybe something less direct would be best."-
-"And how did you find out my name and new address?. I know my old house at Leblanc wasn't a secret to the government, but i don't think even my friends know exactly where i am right now."- Although they didn't seem like bad people he was still very cautious, at the end of the day aside from their names this duo haven't explained a lot of why they are here.
-"The organization that we work for has a magnificent agent in Commissioner Kurosawa, probably you haven't heard of him but he's one of the most influential individuals in Tokyo's police force after some of the officers on Shido's wallet were kicked out."- Explained Naoto while she put her hat on her head again after she took it out before starting to eat. -"He provided us access to your criminal records, connecting the dots back to your parents and then this location was the easy part."-
Fuuka picked up from where Naoto left off -"However there were no pictures attached to it, it seems that those were removed by a third party, redacted or never really made it to the legal criminal record"- The emphasis on the word "legal" bringing memories of that immense ship and its captain that him and his friends had to take down last december.
-"Well, Miss Sae did mention that she was going to clear your criminal records, maybe she had a hand on that"- Morgana added, Ren was thinking something similar so he just nodded in his direction, which was alongside him on the left, a top of the only empty chair.
-"On that topic"- The sudden acknowledgement of Morgana talking by Naoto caught the owner and the now pet off guard. That pretty much sealed it, these two girls have been to some degree in the metaverse, but they weren't trying to hide it at all, pretty much the opposite if anything -"Prosecutor Niijima was able to provide me a picture of you just this evening, since I'm a detective in the force I was cleared to get this"- She unlocked her phone, touched the screen a couple of times and showed Ren his mugshot of the night where he turned himself in.
-"If they have that much info on me and aren't being secretive at all about it maybe cutting to the chase is the best approach"-
-"Then… Why are you two here?, and how can you understand Morgana?"- As soon as those words escaped Ren's mouth both Naoto and Fuuka briefly looked into each other's eyes as if they were anticipating that question, noticing that small detail he pressed a little bit more. -''I suppose I have something to do with this assignment of yours, what is it?"- His curiosity may be getting the better of him.
-"Yeah!, if you have business with Ren then you have business with me as well!"- Morgana exclaimed, he climbed to Ren's shoulder and was pointing one of his paws in the girls general direction.
Naoto sighed at the question then gave a nod to her colleague -"I'll Explain, but it's a lot to take in, if you have any questions save it for when I finish, okay?"- Ren and Morgana briefly saw each other but nodded in approval of the detective's statement.
-"As I said earlier, my name is Naoto Shirogane, I'm a detective that works cases around Japan, not really sticking to one place for a long period of time. - She paused briefly, took some air and then pointed with her arm at Fuuka -"My colleague here is called Fuuka Yamagishi, She's a very skilled person when it comes to all things electronics/technology and currently works as the head of IT of the organization we work for."
Naoto saw Ren raise one of his eyebrows the slightest bit, maybe it was the habit of looking for body language clues in the interrogations that she took part in because of her work as a detective, but she knew what he mean by that so the detective continued -"We work for an organization that goes by the name of Shadow Operatives, an unofficial selection of people aligned with the security department of Japan in charge of dealing with Shadow and Persona related activities, I assume you're familiar with those concepts, Amamiya Ren?"-
Before Ren could confirm or deny anything Morgana pointed out something that was bothering him a little -"Wait, so there's an entire organization that specializes in neutralizing shadows… Then why were we the only ones risking our necks on Christmas eve?, wasn't that important to all of you?"- Ren thought something similar, if said organization was real then they should have been involved to the very least in the conflict with Yaldabaoth.
Naoto seemed a little annoyed by the Cat's point -"As I said, questions at the end, but we can offer an explanation for that if you're interested."- She cleared her throat before moving on -"Our mission here is the investigation of the events that happened after Christmas eve, specifically the ones that involved two individuals in particular, if our information is reliable then you two should know them well." Naoto looked at Fuuka and nodded in her direction, following this she got her phone out of one of her pockets, touched it a couple of times and showed Ren and Morgana a picture that was vertically separated in two.
On the screen there were two faces that Ren knew very well, maybe too well, it wasn't any of the members of the now disbanded Phantom thief nor Sojiro, for him those were the ones that concerned him the most, however, staring back at him was the face of the school counselor, Dr. Maruki, at the top and at the bottom the face of his rival and detective prince, Goro Akechi.
Ren gulped after seeing those two, although only photos, his experiences with both of them were still fresh on his mind, the distorted reality that Tokyo experienced for about a month, the dead coming back to life, Dr. Marukis Palace and reality "catching up" to them after defeating him, suddenly being sent to Juvenile prison in the process.
Naoto observed the pair's reaction and followed up -"By the look on your face I'll take that as a Yes"- Fuuka turned her phone away from Ren's sight and back to the pocket from where it came from seconds ago.
-"The only thing we are asking for, and the main objective of our mission is for us to get information about these two individuals, every little thing that you remember would go a long way."- The way that Naoto finished her sentence made Ren aware that it was his turn to talk and that the explanation was over, that was all the information that they were willing to give him.
-"It's… a lot to take in"- That was the only thing that Ren could come up with after everything was said. -"Why don't you contact Dr. Maruki?, I'm sure that he would be more thorough and would explain a lot better in regards to what happened on his end."- This wasn't a lie, although he knew Dr. Maruki's motivations and had a certain understanding on how he was able to manipulate reality he didn't know the specifics of how everything worked.
-"We did try to contact him, but it seems that he just… banished."- Fuuka looked a bit confused, moving her pupils upwards and crossing them a little, Naoto then jumped in. -"I personally tried to look into it, but the last thing we know of him is of his Tenure in Shujin Academy as a counselor, after that there's no records on what he has been up to at all."
"So that Taxi ride he gave me to the train station… is he just doing that now and laying low for a while or is he planning something else?"
-"But why should we trust you at face value?, we do not have any proof that any of what you're saying is true!"- The Cat once so friendly towards their visitors answered back, and also made Ren continue with something they haven't answered yet -"And don't forget that you haven't explained yet why you can understand him, we don't really have good experiences with people that can understand him for seemingly no reason, you know."- The image of Akechi and the pancake store saga popping in his mind.
-"We can go there now, that would be becau-"- Naoto tried to start explaining but her phone started ringing, she moved her hand to the pocket on her jeans where she had her phone and looked at the screen.
-"Is that…?"- Fuuka leaved the question empty, waiting for an answer.
-"It sure is"- Naoto answered, he looked at Ren while the phone was still ringing and said in an accelerated tone -"I have to take this i'm sorry, we'll come by tomorrow, sorry for intruding"- She bowed a little then disappeared through the door that lead to the apartment complex hallway while making the motion of putting the cellphone to her ear.
-"That's our signal, sorry, but i promise we'll come back tomorrow, in the meantime please think about what you heard, it will be of great help to us if you decide to cooperate."- She mimicked her colleague, bowed a little and said her goodbyes, leaving only Morgana and Ren in the room.
-"What do you make of all of this, leader?"- Morgana asked
-"It's not what I expected after leaving the train station from Tokyo, for sure."- Giving Sojiro his diary, getting one last look of her friends in that van, Encountering Sumire in the station, entering the train, falling asleep, arriving to Kobe, it all seemed so far away, but less than 24 hours had passed since he was last at Leblanc.
-"It's pretty late already, let's head to bed and think about it tomorrow"- Suggested Morgana, Ren nodded in approval and started to get ready to do so, it seems his sleepwear was still in his luggage so he got to unpacking his things, while doing so he noticed his phone still plugged to the wall.
-"Right, do I tell them about this or not?, im sure they're worried, haven't texted them at all since arriving here"- Ren unplugged the charger from the wall and turned on his phone, as if Morgana could read his mind he asked.
-"What are you gonna do?"- Morgana climbed to Ren's shoulder where he could see the screen of the phone, getting a lot of notifications of all the messages and calls that he missed while it was off.
-"We're still not sure about those Shadow Operatives ladies, let's keep it to ourselves momentarily"- Ren started replying back to his friends, making sure that they knew he was fine and that he was sorry for not answering earlier.
-"Wait!"- Morgana exclaimed -"Did you see it?"
-"Very clearly"- Said Ren.
He had the Meta-Nav again in his phone.
Author here, This serves mostly as an explanation chapter, trying to set up a few things for the future, took some liberties regarding the professions of Fuuka and Officer Kurosawa as they are never directly stated in Arena (That i could remember, at least). Regarding the review of last chapter, i did actually tried to slow down the pace on chapter 1 but it seems that it wasn't enough, hopefully this is an improvement in that area.
Till the next update, take care!