Persona 5: Daywatch

Wednesday, 25 May 2016
After School
Shibuya, Teikyu Building

Akira craned his neck left and right to stretch out a kink. He took in a deep breath, then stepped from the concrete wall into the mass of morons, each going his own way. A hundred conversations over phones assaulted him as he made his way across the square, but at last he reached the stairs and the foot traffic thinned out. Coming up to the walkway, he noticed the class president already there, waiting. She wore an adhesive bandage over the cheek the yakuza muscle struck the other day. He nodded at her. "You okay, Niijima-senpai?"

She twisted away from him for a moment, her exposed cheek turning pink for just a moment. "It's just a little bruise. I've had way worse in aikido practice, Kurus—"

He cleared his throat. "Could you not call me that? I introduce myself as Akira for a reason." He took off his glasses to rub his eyes. "Kurusu's my old bastard." He thrust his chest out, wide eyes gazing out at the blurry people as he said in a nasally voice, "That's Doctor Kurusu." He put his glasses back on and spat over his shoulder. "I don't want anything to do with him, name included."

Ann slipped out of the crowd and leaned against the rail on Akira's other side.

Setting the satchel with the team leader in it against the rails, Akira leaned back so he could look out at the people walking by. "I meant more how did it go? You live with someone, and I know when I got back from school with bruises I had to answer tons of dumb questions. That's why I learned how to use makeup to hide them."

"Ah, I—" Niijima froze, then looked him in the eyes, her own widening in confusion. "You learned how to use makeup?"

He shrugged. "Yeah. When I didn't want the sweater-vests to see me with a fresh bruise."

Ann sighed.

Morgana shot a hooded gaze at him. "Smooth, Joker. Way to break in the new help."

Fiddling with her fingers, Niijima looked down. "Well, Big Sis has been staying over at work since Monday, so she doesn't know what happened."

Blond showed up like a lit neon sign in the crowd of dark hair, and a moment later Ryuji strode out of the crowd. "Sweet, everyone's here. Let's go turn Kaneshiro's palace upside down."

Niijima glanced at the assembled Phantom Thieves. "Palace?"

Akira waved her on. "There's no good way to explain it. Just follow along and you'll see." He retrieved his satchel and followed Ann to the secluded nook behind some browning landscaping they used to slip into Kaneshiro's palace the first time. He pulled out his phone, opened the bloody eye icon, then looked up at Niijima. "Brace yourself. It's about to get weird."

He tapped the screen and every color around them drained, except the reds which bled into everything else. Every line and shape twisted like the world wanted to turn inside out. Then, a blink later, everything straightened and a dirty Shibuya, locked in the pall of dusk, lay before them. Scraps of paper blew in the wind.

Niijima gasped. "Where did all the people go?"

Ann twirled her finger through the end of one of her pigtails. "They're safe in the real world. This is… a different one."

Akira nodded. "It's a cognitive construct based on Kaneshiro's warped desires."

Ryuji looked at his Shujin uniform with disappointment, then sighed and slipped his hands into his pockets, wincing at the motion. "Yeah. The mafia jerk thinks money's all other people are good for. An' apparently don't think anyone can run out."

Niijima arched an eyebrow. "Why would he think something so nonsensical?"

Akira pulled his sub-machine gun out of his satchel as the others readied their weapons. "He's a rich dumbass. Everybody who hides in an ivory tower loses touch with reality."

The student council president stared as they drew their guns from their satchels and assembled them, her eyes widening and skin paling. "What are you all doing with firearms? If the police caught you—"

"They're actually models," Ryuji said, digging into his school satchel. "Though they work just like real ones in this funky place. They're for Shadows." Ryuji clicked the front and back ends of a rifle together, then clicked a wood stock into the back of that. "You'll know 'em when you see 'em, but hang back when they come out, mkay?"

Akira checked the new laser dot projector on his sub-machine gun, then looked over the polished wood of the weapon in the track star's hands. "When did you get a rifle?"

Ryuji smirked. "It's an SKS battle rifle, still used as a ceremonial weapon today. They filled in between bolt-action rifles and full-auto firearms, but this one's got sighting for use as a marksman rifle. 'Figured since we have long streets and that flyin' palace thing, I might want some range." He shouldered his school satchel, then hissed in pain. "I'm good. Anyway, I got it from Big Man."

Niijima blinked. "I'm impressed, Sakamoto-kun. If you showed such attention to detail in your studies—"

Ryuji clicked his tongue. "Eh, whatever. Anyway, first thing we gotta get to is codenames. We all got 'em when we're in here. I'm Reaper." He let go of the rifle to point his left hand at Akira. "He's Joker. Ann's Panther. Catboy there is Byakko."

Morgana held out his squared steel rod at the track star, for all the indimidation a folded crossbow could do. "I am not a cat! I'm an honest human, it's the Metaverse that twisted me into this form."

Niijima hopped a step back, her eyes wide again. "A monster cat?"

Morgana fell to the ground, pounding a fist on the packed dirt. "I just said I am not!"

Ann clicked a button on the side of her pistol light and it cast a bright cone of white light. "All ready. Let's get up there."

Niijima glanced up at the giant floating disk sucking up all the money in Shibuya. "What is that?"

Morgana lead the team out from behind the tended foliage and into the street. "The heart of Kaneshiro's palace. Technically this whole place is his palace, since he considers all of Shibuya his, but his Treasure is up there. And that's our target. If we can get to it and steal it, he'll have a change of heart just like Kamoshida."

She slowed and stared at the ATM-people. "What are these?" The cognition she approached gave a pathetic groan and extended a handful of yen notes. Baffled, she took it and examined them as if expecting some hidden exam question. "Five thousand yen notes?"

Akira nodded, then flinched when a blowing note hit him in the face. He reached up and pulled it off, pocketing it. "Yeah. Those are what he views people as. Hardly any different than my old bastard. Just stepping stones to his glory."

Niijima swept her gaze up and down the street. "A reality showing his heart. So stealing his 'treasure' somehow forces something like an overwriting of his cognition?"

Akira pulled his sub-machine gun stock against his shoulder. "Close enough."

"Wait," Niijima said, keeping in step as the group entered Center Street. "If this is how he views Shibuya, does that mean there's an ATM version of me somewhere?"

Ryuji swept the barrel of his rifle over the rooftops. "Wow, she got that an' she didn't even see that cognitive version of Ann." He grinned down at Morgana. "Makes you look lame, actin' like it was somethin' complicated when she an' Akira got it right away."

Akira swallowed, his pants straining against him at the reminder of the cognitive Ann in a micro-bikini. As much to get them talking about something other than Ann in a scorching-hot bikini as to distract himself, he joked, "It's not like you got it."

"Shut up, dude!"

Niijima looked up at the flying disk. "So we just need to get up there, right?" She straightened and took in a deep breath. "Kaneshiro Junya, I'm Niijima Makoto and I've come here to bargain!"

Ryuji scoffed. "Like shoutin' at it's gonna work."

The disk descended.

The boys gaped. Morgana leaped almost a meter up, pumping a fist into the air. "Yes! I hoped her deal with Kaneshiro would've changed his cognition in a manner we could exploit."

Ann stared at it in wonder. "But… how?"

Niijima came up alongside the blonde. "Maybe it's like using your card to get into banks after hours?"

Akira blinked. "You can do that?"

Ryuji lowered his rifle and looked at the transfer student. "Uh… yeah. You didn't know that?"

Akira ground his teeth. "All the places I lived in up to Inuri were dinky little towns. After the sun goes down, good luck getting any services."

The disk came to a landing at the large intersection near Station Square, and a ramp extended from the top. Now that it had descended, he could see a building on it with marble facing and gold decorations.

Morgana led the wary march up, but the instant they set foot on the paving stones on the giant disk itself, a flicker of flames washed over Akira, Ann, and Ryuji, leaving them in their Phantom Thief forms.

Niijima jerked back, her stance widening and arms rising. "What happened to you?"

Ryuji smirked under his skull-like mask. "Sweet, ain't it?"

"Isn't," she corrected. "You're certainly still Saka—"

"Reaper!" Morgana blurted. "Remember, this is a place within Kaneshiro's heart and mind. Codenames protect us, just like the outfits you see them in now are like an armor against the palace ruler. Now let's do this fast before one of the palace effects start to contaminate you."

Akira and Ryuji braced their weapons, then headed up to the entrance of the most ostentatious bank the transfer student ever saw, glittering with gold and marble facing.

"Eff, man," Ryuji said, his eyes wide under his heavy skull mask as he stared around the enormous dais the bank rose out of. "Dude's got literal money trees. He really is in la-la land."

Ann looked over her tight red leather suit. "You know, us in a bank… with costumes like this…"

Ryuji snorted in amusement. "I know. We're totally robbers."

Morgana hit a button on the side of his rod and it sprang open into a crossbow. "Eyes up, everybody. I'm sensing a lot of Shadows inside." He tilted his head. "They feel… different. Like they're waiting for something."

Niijima stepped up to the polished oak doors. "Maybe a customer of importance." She reached out and hauled at the pull ring, the door opening with a groan.

Ryuji lifted his rifle, then grimaced.

Morgana hopped in front of him. "Hold up. Miss President, for your protection you should hold at the back. Shadows can be very dangerous when they turn hostile. You too, Reaper. It's pretty obvious that you're still recovering from the beating the yakuza gave you yesterday."

Niijima held up her fists. "I can take care of myself. I've trained in aikido since I was twelve."

Akira lowered his sub-machine gun. "How much force can a fist deliver versus a bullet?"

She sighed and took position behind the others. Once she moved, Ryuji joined her and the group paced into an enormous bank lobby.

Despite the gold and marble facing on the outside, much more practical wallpaper decor met them inside, with tones of beige and a leafy green. Rows of benches stretched out like pews in a church sanctuary.

A two-meter tall figure in white trousers and a sky-blue vest met them, but when it bowed they all got a good look at a head black as midnight and lacking any facial features but two glowing yellow eyes. "Master Kaneshiro has been awaiting you, Niijima-chan."

Akira pointed his sub-machine gun. "That's 'san' to you."

Morgana hopped closer. "Hold your fire, Joker. There's Shadows all over the place." He gestured to the teller kiosks, each one manned by an identical Shadow, then to halls to the right and left of the lobby where pairs of Shadows wearing ballistic vests and wielding batons stood. "Take us to Kaneshiro."

When Akira lowered his sub-machine gun, the Shadow led them through a gap in the tellers, past counting tables where the same smart-dressed Shadows sorted yen notes, and into a broad hall to a spacious room. "This is the reception office," it said.

Stuffed black leather chairs surrounded a heavy conference table of some dark wood. A stacked pyramid of cash took up the bulk of the table's space. Even through her mask, Akira could see Ann's eyes widen at the stacks.

"Dayum," Ryuji said as he walked up to the table. "This would be like… a hundred lifetimes of beef bowls."

Akira smirked. "Or just ten of Aiya's Gyudon." When the track star snagged one of the taped bundles of notes, Akira sighed. "Reaper."

"What?" Ryuji whined. "It ain't stealin' if it's from a thief."

Akira shrugged and picked up a taped bundle to examine it.

Seeing no obvious traps, Makoto stepped up and sat in one of the plush chairs by the screen. Once the rest sat down, a three-meter-wide screen on the wall blinked. A comically tall chair on it rotated, and a Kaneshiro with smoldering gold eyes and a sharp white suit glared out at them. Looking down his nose, he began, "Unauthorized entry. Defamation of character. Lost wages and revenue." He clucked his tongue. "For such a pretty girl, you certainly didn't exercise sense. The settlement shall be one million yen."

Akira spat. "Fuck that, you bloated rich bastard. Paying a blackmailer only encourages more blackmail attempts."

Shadow Kaneshiro shook his head. "Defiance of authority. Refusal to settle a lawful account charges. Additional administrative fees. That's another two-hundred fifty-thousand yen."

Ryuji boggled. "One an' a quarter mil? For real?"

Shadow Kaneshiro folded his hands together. "I can understand gathering so much money could be difficult for children."

Ann brightened. "You're going to call it off?"

Ryuji reached forward and slipped another bundle of yen notes into his pocket.

Shadow Kaneshiro huffed. "A loan. Ten percent interest per day." His eyes shifted to Ryuji. "Fifty percent for him."

Akira ticked his finger along the stacks of cash, trying to keep his decimal places. "That's… uh…"

Niijima gave him a hooded gaze. "One hundred twenty-five thousand yen a day. Six hundred twenty-five thousand yen a day for R…Reaper-kun."

Akira almost dropped his sub-machine gun. "Thousand… per day?"

The corners of Shadow Kaneshiro's lips turned up. "There are… more manageable options for ones such as you."

Niijima glared into the screen. "So now we get to what you really wanted from the start."

Shadow Kaneshiro clapped. "The riff raff can learn after all." He gave a grin, exposing teeth capped in gold and silver. "Yes, indeed. Even though certain services are inconsequential to your kind, they are of significant monetary value to me."

Ann's lip curled, baring teeth. "Our kind?"

Rolling his eyes, Shadow Kaneshiro sat back in his high-backed chair. "Perhaps not learn so much after all. The younger Niijima-chan is but a slip of a girl. She shall service my clients in the private rooms of Spiral." He grinned. "But the older…" He chuckled. "Special Prosecutor Niijima Sae could save me so much money on bribes and payments to that irritating minister and those puppet police."

Niijima's hands clenched. "So that's how he's managed to evade justice this long. He's bought out somebody higher up. With that kind of forewarning, he could pack up and move operations each time a warrant is filed."

Ann stood up out of her chair and snarled at the Shadow. "You're delusional."

Shadow Kaneshiro tisked. "Young women. So foolish, so physically frail. The best thing about them, really." He waved a dismissive hand at them. "It's been the nature of things since the dawn of time for the weak to be devoured by the wealthy. The young are stupid. I'm really doing them a service by taking that money from them and putting it to good use."

Leaping from his chair, Akira roared and fired full auto across the width of the screen hanging from the wall. An alarm pulsed from speakers hidden in the ceiling.

Ryuji snatched handfuls of bundled yen notes.

Pounding footsteps preceded the appearance of two armor-vested guards wielding long batons.

Ryuji lined up and pulled the trigger, blowing the head of the left guard into dissipating smoke, the rest of its body following suit. He gasped in pain at the recoil from his weapon and collapsed back into his chair.

Ann braced behind her pistol, her form exactly like Ryuji explained to her back in the castle, letting off shot after shot into the other guard's chest.

Smoke leaked from the impacts. The guard shuddered and burst into black muck and a red-skinned oni stood up out of it, shouldering a wolf's-toothed club.

Morgana closed his eyes and a brawny form took shape above him, Zorro's eyes glowing as blue light crept over the oni's weapon, yanking at it. The Shadow pulled back and swung down, its club shattering the heavy table and sending taped bundles of yen notes flying.

Akira lined up on the guard, but called, "Pillar of Heaven!"

A column of fire and darkness dropped from the hallway behind, then blasted the oni with darkness.

Already in firing stance, Ann took two shots into the oni's face. It fell back and dissolved into vanishing black goo.

Another pair of guards with batons raced around the corner.

Morgana shot a crossbow bolt into the first one's throat, sending it stumbling to its knees and clutching the bolt, gushing smoke before dissipating into nothing. Akira blasted the other with darkness from Pillar before following Ann out into the hall.

Another three oni now with breastplates and clubs met them at the exit to the counting area.

Pillar shot a fireball into the center one as Akira and Ann shot the oni on the right, a crossbow flitting into its right eye before it tumbled to the ground and dissolved in smoke.

Ryuji shot the oni on the left with his rifle, the blow sending it stumbling a step back but knocking him off his feet. He hit the ground with a pained cry, his weapon clattering to the floor next to him.

Niijima reached for his rifle, her feet sliding into a braced stance, but Morgana shouted, "Forget fighting back, help him out first!"

Taking it in hand anyway, she slipped his arm over her shoulders and helped him limp faster into the counting area. Akira and Ann blasted covering fire over the desks, sending yen fluttering and Shadows diving for cover under the furniture.

Two guards with batons stood just outside the gap to the lobby, already shuddering and swelling up like dark puffer fish before bursting into more oni.

Ann lined up and pulled the trigger, but her pistol clicked empty. "Shit. Carmen!"

Blue motes of light pulsed between the oni, growing into the shape of a dancing woman in a frilly dress. It lashed its thorned whip around one, throwing it into the other oni and giving the Phantom Thieves enough room to run into the lobby.

More baton guards poured out from the hallways to the right and left, with the siren continuing to pulse from all around them.

Morgana lined up his crossbow with the closest on the right. "There must be dozens."

Niijima walked out with Ryuji. "Why are the guards turning into monsters?"

Akira blasted another guard coming from the left before his sub-machine gun clicked. "Not the time. Berith!"

A pulse of pale blue motes of light burst in front of him, leaving a grey-armored knight on a red horse. It charged the guards coming from the left as Carmen advanced on the ones to the right with bolts of ice. Morgana summoned Zorro and sent it to back up Carmen, then shot a guard on the left in the throat.

Ryuji stood up on his own feet, gritting his teeth. "The eff am I gonna let my friends get hurt without helpin' 'em out. Captain Kidd!"

A swirl of blue motes burst, leaving a towering skeletal captain perched on a boat. It held up its cannon-hand and shot a blast tossing a handful of Shadow guards like leaves.

Emerging from the wave of guards bursting into oblong black masses, one oni leaped, powering a blow down on Kidd in the skeletal torso.

Ryuji stumbled back until Niijima caught him, his Persona dissipating in a puff of blue.

The alarm ceased and a click sounded from the ceiling. Shadow Kaneshiro's voice came next, "Customers are only worth keeping when they pay. Tragic suicides from two shots to the back of the head should be enough to… encourage the remaining customers."

Tears shining at the corners of her eyes, Niijima shouted back, "Please, just let them go! It's me that you have a problem with."

Akira snarled, but stumbled against one of the padded benches when an oni struck his galloping knight with a studded club. He reached out at his Persona as if trying to pull it, and the Persona vanished into sputtering blue motes. "Nobody who's got a beef with Kaneshiro is alone. Andras!"

A new burst revealed a towering, winged man with blue feathers and the face of an owl. It spread its wings and cawed, waving its arms and sending shards of ice flying into half a dozen oni.

Ignoring the fight still closing in on the Phantom Thieves, Shadow Kaneshiro said over the speakers, "Oh, you have no need to worry, little Niijima. You've caused some unsightly delays, but I'm sure you will find some way of paying them off. I have backroom clients who pay handsomely for someone of your physique."

The student council president clenched her eyes shut and let out a choked sound.

"Prosecutor Niijima, slave of the Kaneshiro yakuza," the Shadow gloated over the speakers as oni pounded Carmen with long war clubs.

Another club landed on Andras, the feathered man crumbling to the floor and dissipating in a burst of azure motes. Akira stumbled against another bench with a pained cry.

Niijima struggled to keep control of her breathing. "Please, stop! My sister has nothing to do with this, and neither do they! I'm the one who made the mistake, not them!"

"Debts are meant to be paid," Kaneshiro called back, calm as the oni closed in a ring around them.

Carmen collapsed under the blows of half a dozen oni, Ann tumbling to the ground with a whimper.

Kaneshiro's voice floated out of the speakers, "You'll pay what you owe. Just endure it and do as instructed."

Dodging between more oni and Niijima, Akira snarled at a purple-skinned oni sauntering at them from the desk tellers. "She doesn't owe shits like you anything. You're the petty thief here, not her. Agathion!"

A giant gold vase hiding a green imp formed out of blue motes, and it blasted a bolt of lightning into the purple oni, knocking it, twitching, to the ground. A pair of other oni, one red and the other gold, paced closer from its flanks and simultaneously leaped, chopping their weapons into the vase. It shattered into motes and Akira collapsed to the floor, curling in on himself with a pained gasp.

"You are becoming rather expensive annoyances," Shadow Kaneshiro said, his tone bored. "Your only meaning in life now is to pay."

Niijima gulped in air.

Akira fought to his hands and knees. "Shut up, you two-bit mafia shitstain. Decent people shouldn't even have to share society with scum like you. People like Ann and even Niijima deserve better than you."

"Kill him," Shadow Kaneshiro said over the intercom. "And dump what remains of his body in front of the nearest publisher's house. The people need an example so they remember to pay."

Niijima snarled. "Shut your damn mouth, you money-crazed tyrant!"

The lights in the lobby flickered and whispers floated out of the air around them.

"You can't let the Snitch of Shujin find out! She'll just feed you to the sharks."

The young woman's voice came again, "You're in high school, and it's high time you grew up. All you do is eat away at my life."

Niijima slid to her knees, clutching her head.

"Niijima couldn't wipe her own ass without orders."

The young woman's voice accused again, "You're given food, clothing, and shelter. Do you think I can waste time with such garbage?"

Niijima whimpered, fingers digging into her hair and knocking her braided headband out.

Akira's voice floated out, dripping with venom, "At least you did everything you could for Suzui."

"Words are all you have?" a boy's voice said, "So you're just a faux-good-girl pushover."

A young woman's voice snapped, "The very fact that you're still engaging in such infantile fantasies just shows how little you've grown up."

"I'm not your puppet," Niijima whispered. Her stance tensed. "This is for me!"

Flames licked over Niijima's face, leaving a heavy metal plate with slits over the eyes. She pulled herself to her feet, then reached up and yanked at the plate over her face. Stumbling to one knee, she grit her teeth and pulled again, screaming as blood dripped, but kept pulling.

Morgana looked up at her from his hunch on the ground, panting but smiling.

Several oni hefted their clubs and raced through the benches at the Phantom Thieves, only for a massive explosion of blue and red flames to burst out from Niijima and knock them flying back. "Johanna!"

When the fire cleared, Niijima wore a black leather riding suit and sat low astride an enormous motorcycle covered with heavy steel plates and red tracery, yellow flames swirling where its front and rear wheels should be. A thick canopy of glass jutted up from the front to shield Niijima.

Ryuji's mouth drifted open.

Kaneshiro's voice snapped from the speakers, "Fools! Kill them or you're not worth your money or your life!"

The oni surrounding them readied their weapons and Niijima snarled at them. "No more Miss Nice Girl!"

One hand twisted at one of the hand-grips and yellow flames sputtered from vents projecting from the front and back of the bike. Niijima pressed low and slammed her foot on the pedal, wheels of fire blazing before it squealed over the polished tile floor, leaving a scorched trail.

Throwing her weight to one side, she swept the rear end of the bike around, smashing three oni into dissipating smoke before twisting at a handgrip and billowing flames from the front vents into two purple-skinned oni rushing at her.

Another oni with skin as pale as snow came up at her from the flank, lifting a double-sided glaive, only for Ryuji to roar and call out his boat-riding skeleton pirate again, sending its giant cutlass through the white oni's thin torso. The remaining guards surged at the group and Makoto powered through the padded benches like fallen twigs in the road. Her armored bike Persona blasted flames over the oni in front of her, gushing fire each time she pulled into a tight drift to smash through more.

Morgana pointed his crossbow to the front door. "There's our opening. Let's go!" He hopped up and transformed into the minibus with an anti-climactic pop.

Makoto aimed for the front and gunned the engine, flame wheels scorching the tile beneath, running over two Shadows before she shattered through the polished oak doors.

Akira took Ryuji's arm and helped him into the catmobile, Ann following as fast as she could limp.

Morgana raced through the wrecked front doors, knocking what remained of the shattered door off its hinges. The two vehicles kept going down the ramp and into the streets of the darkened Shibuya inhabited by ATMs.

Once Makoto came to a stop, the bike vanished in a swirl of flames and she collapsed to the ground.