Persona 5: Daywatch
Wednesday, 20 June 2016
Night
Velvet Room
Akira woke to the blessed chill of a room not connected to summer Tokyo by drafty windows. The steel slab against his back clued him into his new location even before his eyes opened to blue velvet. He paused to take in a breath of cool air, savoring it before he pushed off the bunk.
Caroline stood at her usual spot, but with a casual air in contrast to the near-rage she used to show off every time things started off. "Talk about stepping deep in it, Inmate."
Justine turned on him from the left, disappointment clear despite the overt wooden qualities of her expression and eyepatch over one eye. "You're quite foolish to let down your guard this much."
Akira leaned against the door bars. "You pack of idiots want to try something specific, maybe one grounded in reality next time? I've heard just about enough platitudes out of you."
Despite their annoyance, Igor at his desk chuffed with amusement. "You have been targeted by an unseen foe. How shall you overcome this challenge?"
Narrowing his pale gaze at the tuxedoed man, Akira stood straight. "Are you talking about Medjed, or the asshole who drained the gear fund?" When he got only a chuckle in response, he gripped the unyielding bars. "You got any actual advice, or is this just another taunt session?"
If Igor was annoyed, he let no sign of it slip through his too-wide grin. "This fresh dispute over that ancient argument of justice. Will you make it a swift and decisive end, or drawn out and murky exchange?"
Akira's hands tensed on the bars. "What about Togo? What do we need to change her heart?"
Igor gave nothing but a mild chuckle. "Formidable enemies are part of the rehabilitation before you. I ask only you overcome them however you see fit. Hone your powers, or you shall never become the magnificent thief required to overcome ruin."
The student in a striped prisoner outfit opened his hands to shout, but an electrified baton crashing into the bars interrupted him. Caroline shouted, "Hop to it, Inmate! Now get back to the real world and get to work!"
Thursday, 21 June 2016
After School
Shujin, Rooftop
Ann slouched against a desk, her elbow braced on it, hand holding up her phone as Yusuke rambled over it about the unique symbology of the mythological figure of Medjed. Ryuji tipped back in his chair. Makoto stood next to him, tapping her foot, her crossed arms in this sweltering heat plenty of evidence she wasn't enjoying the over-the-phone briefing. Yuu-kun slouched against the wall next to the door, working away on the Phansite. A hot breeze wafted over the concrete-faced building, providing little relief. Akira looked the worst among them, sweat beading across his face and soaking the underarms of his shirt. He held a vending machine soda against his neck, his eyes distant. A pity he let his hair go after that night at the Odaiba fireworks festival.
Ryuji blurted, "Okay, dude! So he's a flyin' god of smiting an' evil dead."
"That would be Apophis," Akira corrected, his eyes still looking a little glazed. "Sometimes pronounced Apep, always depicted with snakes."
Ann rolled her eyes. "Whatever. What's that help us do? Even Yuu-kun never heard of them before, and everything he found online were rumors. Corporate terrorism an' all that, but never an arrest."
Makoto uncrossed her arms. "If the PSIA and FBI can't find them, I'm afraid we don't stand much chance. Mafia who have real people on the streets to see and overhear is one thing—cyber-criminals are a completely different sphere of influence."
Ryuji pushed his leg against the desk, tilting his chair back and forth. "I thought the bigger the better, but this feels like more'n we can chew. I mean, they said they'd crash the Nikkei 225."
Akira shifted his soda can to his other hand and pressed it to the other side of his neck. "First of all, they bit us. And we're all just trying to do the right thing. Defend the weak, lay low the corrupt. I'm not sorry I went after that drunk guy trying to man-handle his secretary on the street, and I'm not sorry we took down Madarame."
"Hear, hear!" Yusuke proclaimed through the phone.
Perched in the shadow of the desk they congregated around, Morgana's tail twitched just above the sweltering roof. "But if we can't see them, we're helpless against them. We changed hearts to help people, but we can't just abandon our fans now." He turned to the transfer student. "I know you don't like the idea, but I don't see any choice but hoping this Alibaba person can act on our behalf if we change Sakura Futaba."
Keeping his soda pressed against his neck with one hand, Akira pulled out his phone. "We can't trust Alibaba, guys. Did you forget he drained my…" His eyes twitched and scanned his screen.
Makoto paced to him. "What?"
"My bank account. It's back," Akira said, scrolling down.
Yuuki looked up from his phone. "I'm afraid we don't have much on our end. Kitagawa-san and I already tried the Nav for this Sakura in northern Tokyo. We tried for more than an hour with every location in Nerima we could imagine, and it never gave anything but 'candidate not found'. Best I can figure, she's just a housewife, so if it's really her we're stumped."
Ryuji pulled out his phone and brought up the Nav. "The Sakura Futaba who works at Sotan Construction?"
A synthesized voice chimed, "Candidate not found."
Makoto fanned herself with her phone. "Process of elimination would point to the Sakura Futaba who lives in Yongen."
Ryuji waited for the Nav to respond, but after several seconds of silence, he sighed and closed the weird app.
Morgana shook out his head and turned back to the transfer student with a faint glazed look to his eyes. "Did you have a chance to interrogate Boss yesterday? They do share a last name."
Akira switched his soda to the other side of his neck. "Not yet. I went to talk to Togo-san." At their momentary questioning looks, he explained, "Not the target, I don't know where she works. I had to clear some things up. Boss was gone by the time I got back to Leblanc. About Boss… I've been living under his roof… well, under his business' roof since April, and he hasn't mentioned having a daughter."
Straightening in his seat, Ryuji wiped at his forehead. "Think he's tryin' to keep it all hush-hush 'cause he's abusin' her? I may not like the option, but… my old man wasn't the only one out there doin' it."
Akira shook his head and sat up, the most movement she'd seen from him since they started their meeting on the roof. "There's no way. If he was going to be abusive to anyone, it would've been me. He's been a cantankerous old man, but he's never lifted a hand or even called me stupid. He's the sort who wants to be left alone." His eyes flicked to Ann's phone. "Hell, he even gave you a place to hide out for two weeks."
"True," Yusuke spoke through Ann's phone on speaker. "However, I can not feel comfortable with this arrangement with Alibaba. We don't know if he might be a splinter from Medjed, trying to take care of a rival. Can we even be sure he won't turn us in even if we do conduct this heart change?"
Makoto's phone chirped. She read a text message, then sighed and slipped it away. "Sorry, everyone. I need to intercede in a student club disagreement."
Morgana nodded. "Well, we're getting nowhere sitting up here talking in circles. It looks to me like this exchange with Alibaba is our only option. Joker will question Boss, and we'll need a couple others to investigate Yongen in the meantime."
Akira switched his soda to the other side of his neck. "Hold on a second. What about changing Togo's heart?"
Ryuji wiped sweat from his brow and threw an incredulous look. "Dude, we got Medjed threatenin' to take down the whole Japanese economy, an' you wanna take a break for a chick bein' mean to one girl?"
Akira plonked his soda down on the table to sit straight in his chair, his posture vibrating challenge. "What taking a break? We already voted on this."
Ryuji plopped the chair back to all four legs and scooted to the edge to glare back. "That was before she turned into an effin' Palace!"
Makoto stopped at the door and turned back to the group. "That is a good point."
Akira stood, his chair skittering back. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realize the Phantom Thieves only did work if it was easy. I thought we changed hearts to free the oppressed from suffering."
Ryuji stood, his hands curling.
Ann stood in his way. "Whoa, guys. The situation did change. Yusuke, did you even finish that sketch of the city Akira asked you about?"
"I am still in progress."
Ann brushed a pigtail off her shoulder. "So we're lacking the information we need to finish either target."
Morgana hopped up on the desk. "Good point, Lady Ann. We'll split up. Fox, you keep up that sketch. It might be our only clue about the location of Togo Mitsuyo's Palace. Nightrider, you take care of things at Shujin. The rest of the Phantom Thieves will focus on our priority target and investigate the Sakura Futaba in Yongen. Contact the group by text if anything comes up."
Makoto nodded, then left. Yusuke hung up. Yuuki looked up when the door closed with a whoosh of escaping air-conditioning. "Is that it for today?"
Ryuji and Akira looked at each other. Ann knew the runner was the sort to push back, but she couldn't figure out what Akira was so pissed about. So he liked the shogi model girl, could he not wait until Japan was safe? After a few breaths, the team leader cleared his throat and the boys broke eye contact.
Ann let out a relieved breath. "Yeah."
After the transfer student collected Morgana, the team leader poked his head out of the school bag. "Come on, Reaper. The faster we can get this done, the better."
Shibuya, Underground Walkway
Since the group separated at the Aoyama station, Ryuji kept an eye out for the rest of the Phantom Thieves as he strode through the Underground Walkway to the line to Akira's place. The runner sped up, slipping through the crowd to catch up.
That asshole shaggy-haired prettyboy who called them all criminals intercepted them in the middle of the underground walkway. His white, short-sleeved dress shirt bore no trace of perspiration. Even that vertical-stripe black and white tie was clipped perfectly—something about that just pissed the track star off. Akechi gave one of those smiles which could've only come from Ma's clinic. "Ah, Amamiya-kun. Have you heard Medjed's declaration of war against the Phantom Thief?"
Akira wiped at the sweat still making a sheen over his forehead. "Let people talk. They'll make what they will of it anyway."
Akechi's smile faded, though something about it felt on the smarmy side of neutral. "This whole debacle has become quite a nuisance. I was supposed to be on contract with the police to solve the mental shutdowns—not playing waterboy to the police while they try to take down two egotistic, self-appointed 'champions of justice'."
Ryuji couldn't help but let out a bit of a sadistic grin that the shit-eating bastard was uncomfortable. "Whassup? Mister Media Darling don't like someone else gettin' the attention?"
Akechi gave a derisive chuckle which sounded pitying. "The media is even more fickle than the mythological Fortunes." He turned to the transfer student, a sharpness entering his gaze. Something piercing and unnerving, as those bright brown eyes stared into Akira's steel grey. "If you were the Phantom Thief, what would you do?"
Akira gave a stiff shrug, but looked straight back into the media starlet's eyes as if daring him to do something. "The Phantom Thief do his stuff online?"
Akechi's show smile dimmed. "There's no evidence so."
Akira raised his hands. "Then what would I care? Not my circus, not my monkeys."
To the track star's surprise, Akechi laughed out loud. The boisterous sound was enough to draw a couple heads in the busy thoroughfare. After a few seconds to regain his breath, Akechi looked the transfer student in the eye. "You let the mask slip at the TV station when you were angry about police inaction, Amamiya-kun. Aloof isn't even in your wheelhouse. That passion could make for a potential fit for the Phantom Thief, perhaps."
Akira shrugged, though there was something unnerving about the stiffness of his smile. He jerked his thumb at the runner. "Nah. Ryuji's the Phantom Thief."
Ryuji's breath fled at the casual betrayal. "Dude!"
Akechi let out a chuckle. "I must remember never to back you into a corner. You have quite the knack for thwarting expectations." He shifted his grip on his scratched steel briefcase. "I do so enjoy our conversations, but I am afraid I have been called in."
Akira snapped to a picture-perfect straight military-style pose, slapping his right hand against his eyebrow, palm out.
Akechi quirked an eyebrow, his body straight but confusion in his eyes, and his lips twisted like he couldn't decide if he wanted to grimace or force that plastic made-for-TV-camera smile. After a moment, he brought his arm up in stiff, jerky motions to return in a Japanese-style salute, lowered it, then left.
Ryuji chuckled. "Okay, I gotta admit I panicked when you poin'ed at me, but seein' him go all discombobulated at the end was cool as eff. 'least there's no way he could ever find out 'bout us."
Yongen, Leblanc
Akira strode into the cafe suffused with the scent of dozens of varieties of coffee. When he first came, the smells all blended together in one overwhelming olfactory hit, but now he could pick out the difference between the arabica the restaurateur used for most blends and the robusta for most of the decaf blends.
A woman in a stark business pantsuit, her long hair flowing down in a combed style with just enough of some kind of smelly product to make it look manufactured instead of pretty to Akira's eyes. She turned the kind of smile predators circling wounded prey might bear when it wasn't quite time for fangs. "All I have to do is make one phone call. I've been making a great number of connections in the Shibuya Sweep. Adding new suspicions of abuse to your case, and you'd stand no chance of avoiding revocation of custody. Unless you tell me everything I want to know about Wakaba's research."
Grinding his teeth, Sojiro's tense posture almost visibly vibrated. "You'd go that far? I told your lackeys over the phone I don't know a damn thing about her research! Don't you people have any respect for the dead?"
Her lips curled in a sneer. "You're really okay with suspension of your parental authority? The last time social services checked on your daughter was after police had to be called to forcibly extricate her from the car from family court."
Sojiro's right hand clenched a mug, his left the threadbare drying rag. "You have no right!"
The red-eyed woman crossed her arms, the aggression of her posture warring with her attempted signals of casual disregard. "Then I'll call social services to come by for another inspection. I'm sure she hasn't degraded since her last evaluation." When Sojiro's posture wavered, the corners of her lips turned up. "Shall I send this to my colleagues in domestic court? My chances of victory are over ninety-nine percent."
Akira clapped his gloved hands as he stared at the fiery woman. "Impressive. Imperial Japan didn't even have that high a rate in occupied Korea or China. And you just shot suspected dissidents in the street without a trial there."
The pale-haired woman whipped around at him, her glare holding all the intensity of an industrial laser beam. "Excuse me?"
Akira slipped his phone out of his pocket, flipping to the video recorder and setting it against the stack of manga as he advanced with as much a casual air as he could muster, keeping his eyes on the long-haired woman. Screw what Akechi said—if he could rebuff that bastard to Ryuji's satisfaction, he could turn away this woman who had to be threatening the Sakura Futaba he came to ask about. If she was here to threaten him for something, she'd have attacked his own record instead of his aloof caretaker. "Fascist is as fascist does."
Her lips twitched, bearing her teeth. To his surprise, she advanced straight on him, grabbing him by the white, long-sleeved Shujin shirt in powerful fists. "You will not speak to an officer of the court in such a manner."
"See this?" Akira pointed at her tight-fisted grip. "This is called assault and battery. If you want to go to court, you're already recused because you'll be tied up defending assaulting a minor."
She jerked Akira closer, her snarl bearing teeth now. "Between the word of a respected prosecutor and mouthy child?"
Akira spread his hand at his smart phone as if a carnival announcer to the main event. "Funny how having video evidence makes hearsay unnecessary. And that really hurts, I think you're drawing blood. I'm sure that'll get extra views on the livestream. How do careers do after well-published attacks on children? Last dude in the papers went to prison."
She lifted and he started to lose his footing against arms more like steel girders. "You think you've got parents big enough to protect you?" Her crimson eyes narrowed, reminding him far too much of Makoto's angriest gaze. "I can start right now with obstruction of justice, but I think we'll add conspiracy to manipulate evidence—"
"Stop!" Sojiro dropped the cup and drying rag. With the counter in between he couldn't have reached them, but the step and hand out was enough for the gesture to be clear. "I… I yield. Just… leave this place in peace."
The red-eyed woman gave a vicious smirk for such a small gesture, but shoved Akira, letting go. "My office will contact you."
He made a show of stumbling back, pained, but with Sojiro's concession, the video hardly seemed to matter. She held a gaze on him which might have caused lesser men to burst into flames, then power-walked out.
After the door swung shut, Akira stumbled to his phone with a wheeze and stopped the recording, then pulled out a chair next to the stack of manga. "How come you didn't tell me about Futaba? I must've scared her half to death when I arrived in April. I was banging on the door until the mailman came and mentioned you were at work."
Sojiro set the cup and rag on the inner counter, then braced his hands against it. He let out a breath, his back hunching and shoulders slumping. The restaurateur looked ten years older in that moment. "You were listening in, weren't you?" His chin and mouth tensed before he took another deep breath, then moved over to the coffee siphons and started making himself a cup. "I shouldn't be surprised you're sticking your nose in this. That drunk and the woman, the artist. You really don't know when to quit, do you?"
The woman's panicked face flashed in his mind. "Please, help!"
He closed the shogi lobby. "I don't always know what the right thing is, but there are times in your life when you see something and know it's the wrong thing. Sometimes another human being's life is at stake." He set his phone on the counter. "And sometimes it's his soul."
Sojiro finished his cup and blew across the top. "I'll tell you the same thing I started telling her. Some things are best left buried in the past."
Akira's phone buzzed, so he picked it back up to see Ryuji on the Phantom Thief chat. [According to the grocer's, Boss is buying enough for three. Especially chicken-flavored ramen. You got a hollow leg, Akira?]
Ann joined in before he could finish typing a response, [Some of the neighbors see lights on or off at weird times, but they've never seen him with anyone. They're all still sure he's single, and NOBODY thinks he has any kids.]
Akira started typing in, [Hey, I'm a growing boy,] but he didn't eat that much—he took care of his own lunches, and half the time got his own dinners out in Tokyo. Unless Sojiro gorged himself each night, he didn't eat much either. He deleted that message and sent, [I get my own food almost half the time, and Sojiro never seems to eat breakfast or dinner here. And I have never once seen him eat instant ramen.]
Ann texted, [So that's one strike against, one strike for him having a kid.]
Ryuji popped up next. [Oh! I just thought of something! What if he cheated on his wife and his ex is the hacker who wants us to go after Sakura Futaba?]
Yongen, Sakura House, Futaba's Room
Futaba stared at Ryuji's text on Akira's phone bug, then banged her head on her keyboard.
Yongen, Leblanc
Akira rolled his eyes, but there was no need to assume when the man himself was right there. "You ever been married?"
Sojiro finished a sip of coffee, then lowered it. "No. Now leave this whole Futaba thing alone."
Akira plopped his phone face-down on the counter. "What if she needs help? Doesn't she deserve that?"
Sojiro's neck tensed and his teeth gnashed together, he brought his mug down hard enough to splatter coffee out of it. "She deserves to be left alone! With your old man, you of all people should be able to respect that! Now drop it or it'll be your ass on the street!" He grabbed a stained rag, then started wiping up the coffee with far more force than necessary.
"But—" Akira started to stand.
"Joker!" Morgana hissed before he poked his head out of the transfer student's school satchel. "You can't afford to get on Boss's bad side. He already confirmed there is a Sakura Futaba at his place. We just don't know why she's been targeted, or what her distortion might be. But finding that out isn't worth you being on the street. Let's go and give him time to cool down."
Akira stood up and paced outside, then looked back to the Phantom Thief chat where the runner and model bickered about whether there was a real Futaba since the Nav wasn't locking on. Akira texted, [Did you try the location as Sakura Sojiro's house?]
[Oh, duh.] A few beats passed before Ryuji followed up, [I knew it! That's candidate AND location!]
Ann responded, [But Yuu-kun said she was 15. It doesn't make any sense for someone that young to be a hardened criminal.]
Akira replied, [Trust me, Ann. People can be SERIOUSLY twisted at a young age. Ever heard of the Ikedas?]
[They're owners of the fourth largest shipping company in Japan. Of course I have. Papa and Mama did some custom orders for them.]
[Ikeda Haruna was kicked off her high school archery team because she was using neighborhood dogs as target practice.]
Morgana shivered from the transfer student's shoulder. "That's sick. After we finish this Medjed business, maybe we should change her heart."
"Togo first," Akira said with as much firmness as he could control. "We already know her distortion, we're just waiting on Yusuke's sketch to figure out where the location is."
Morgana hummed before dropping back in the satchel to escape the summer sun. "We're still missing information, but we learned a lot. It's time to reconvene and get everybody on the same page."
Thursday, 21 July 2016
Early Evening
Shibuya, Yongen-Jaya Line
The rumble and sway of the train around him added a comforting sense of regularity which clashed with the boisterous chatter of people leaving work and late clubs at schools. Despite rush hour being over, the crowds still wore away at Akira, their cacophonous conversations sipping away his air.
Unsure when Hifumi got back home after whatever her mother scheduled her following cram school, Akira pulled out his phone to send her a text. [Evening, Togo-san. I hope you're doing okay today. We're working, but there are obstacles we have to clear first.]
Her ID lit up and she replied, [But you can save her heart?]
Of course she would view it as a rescue instead of an attack mission. [We'll do or die.]
A beat passed before she sent, [Make it through. All of you. Shogi has do-overs, real life does not. I want my mother back, but I would feel horrible if one of the Phantom Thieves was hurt changing Mother's heart.]
Akira felt a stupid smile force its way across his face. For all her regal mercilessness while playing a queen, the real girl was made of kindness. [Duly noted. Just hold on.]
[I'm not afraid. My General of the Steel Legion would never give up. That's what makes him invincible.] Her ID darkened and Akira stared at the short message chain for long moments. He wanted to accept the vote of confidence, but he'd never succeeded as General of the Steel Legion.
His phone buzzed. Those numbered boxes indicating Alibaba stared up at him. [You have your name. You have your mission. You even have your stakes. Why have you not changed Sakura Futaba's heart?]
Akira sat up, in his seat, the satchels on his left and right weighing him down less than the implied threat. [Who is Sakura Futaba?]
[The heart you must change.]
Akira smacked his forehead onto his phone. "God damn it, is this guy an idiot or just that obtuse?"
Morgana peered up at him from the school satchel, a smirk visible despite the feline head. "Can't handle the competition?"
[You have done this at least fifty times. One more should be simple.]
Akira had to go back and fix his spelling three times with how firmly his thumbs pounded the virtual keyboard. Alibaba might already know some of this, but any edge he could gain would help the Thieves. [You don't understand how the process works. Do you understand how large Tokyo is? There are three Sakura Futabas.]
A beat passed. [There are?]
[Sakura and Futaba are both common names. What are the target's keywords?]
A longer beat stretched on as the crowds churned around him. [Are you attempting to confuse me out of our deal? I gave you the name of your target two weeks ago. What is the hold up?]
[We need more information. This texting tag is not working. Let's just meet and hash things out all at once.]
Several seconds passed before Alibaba replied, [That is impossible. There are reasons why I am contacting you like this.]
Akira leaned as the train passed through a curve in the tracks. [You're disabled? That's okay, I'll come to you.]
[Meeting should be unnecessary. You have your target's name, that should be enough to make a calling card.]
Akira gripped a standing bar as the train entered a straight portion of track and decelerated. [And I already said that's not enough. Do you think we beamed into Kamoshida's Palace from the moon?]
[Are you saying you steal your target's heart directly?]
[I'm not saying anything like that.]
Akira started to type more, but Alibaba interrupted. [Did you forget when I zeroed your bank account? Or do you not believe I will feed your identities to the police if you fail?]
As the train slid to a stop, he mashed in, [We haven't failed yet.]
[It will be a failure if you wait for much longer.]
Gritting his teeth, Akira had to focus on getting off the train, but by the time he got to the platform, he lost the emotional impetus to throw out a petty but satisfying riposte. [Then let's both engage in a good-faith gesture to the other. I put your heart change at the top of our agenda, and you start hacking Medjed back so they can't crash all Japan's economy.] He let a breath out through his nose and rushed to the meeting site.
Thursday, 21 July 2016
Early Evening
Shibuya, Karaoke Club Private Room
Akira traded off with the model and runner to fill in the day's events in Yongen, as well as the text threat on the train. Makoto nodded, her expression grave. Her eyes narrowed at the conflict with the lawyer in Leblanc. To save time, he just told her the summary for the cafe conflict. "That's horrible. I hope you and Boss are okay. Where did you get the idea to record it?"
Akira quirked an eyebrow. "The other guys in jail. Cops rely on crushing you with the weight of evidence even if that's just paid employee testimony and circumstantial speculation. They're not used to people who have their own documentation, recordings, or experts to speak on their behalf. Frame things right, and you can even make them look like the assaulters. I did the same thing with Kamoshida before we changed his heart, just in case he went after any of you."
Yuuki nodded. "Good thinking. Shame it didn't do any good with Sakura-san."
Ann shook her head. "This just makes me think even less that Boss-san could be an abuser." She wrapped her arms around herself, even her voluminous pigtails seeming to droop. "I just keep trying to make sense of somebody our age with a Palace. What could she have done? If it's not being evil like all the others, what's the distortion?"
Yuuki finished typing something on his laptop, then looked up from the Phansite. "How would Alibaba know if you guys even did it?"
Makoto tapped her knuckles on the low table dominating the center of the private karaoke room. "In heist movies, they always have an inside man. However, from everything Akira's said about Sakura-san, he doesn't seem the type to talk to outsiders. Unless Alibaba is Futaba, I can't fathom how he would know."
Ryuji gawked. "For real? You're sayin' Alibaba wants us to change his own heart?"
Akira's gaze dropped to the table and he fiddled with his phone. He recalled Father Motoori's words from the pulpit, "Walk while you have the light, before darkness overtakes you. Whoever walks in the dark does not know where they are going." When the others went quiet and turned their eyes to him, he shook his head and sat back. "Something in the Bible. Father Motoori read it at Mass. The signs all line up. He even refuses to meet."
Yusuke's eyes had a focused but distant quality, as if watching something assemble through the walls. "But what kind of a mind could want us to change them?"
Yuuki finished typing and rubbed his arm. "Somebody who doesn't believe he can change himself. I feel like I was the same way when I heard about Shiho. Hell, even when I saw Kamoshida's confession, I just felt more helpless because somebody that monstrous made such a change to take responsibility." He looked up at the transfer student. "Was Togo like that?"
A darkness entered his face, tension worming its way through Akira's frame. "No. We found her in Mementos with the other targets, but her little sub-realm turned into a Palace while we were still in it. We'll change Sakura first so Japan is safe." He swallowed, then forced himself to sit straight. "But everything pushing us to go after Togo in the first place are still in play. We have to go back."
"Dude," Ryuji said, slouching back against his seat on the couch opposite the transfer student. "She turned into an effin' Palace. Of course things changed. We ain't gonna get famous killin' ourselves changin' someone who's an asshole to one person!"
Akira tensed as if to stand, but caught himself. "We made a promise. Hell, the whole reason the Phantom Thieves formed was you guys deciding it wasn't enough to wrap up loose ends which were affecting you personally. We decided if Kamoshida wasn't too big for us, neither was the drug and scam trade sucking in Shujin students. Bam, down goes Kaneshiro."
Ann clasped her hands in her lap. "Ryuji has a point. Remember what Morgana said before we began Madarame's dungeon? There's only six of us, and Palaces are dangerous."
Ryuji gave a vigorous nod. "Fuckin' right. We can't make risks like that over one person. It ain't like I wanna leave peeps in the lurch, but how many Palaces are out there? Hell, Shujin's even got a few. Kamoshida's is gone, but the principal has one. Ex principal. Eff, even Seiji has one and he's just another dude in my class. Just 'cause he's got a Palace don't mean we should put our lives at risk tryin' to make 'im change."
Akira whipped around to Ann. "You are one person." Then Ryuji. "And you are one person. I'd've gone after Kamoshida if it was just you." Both of them averted their eyes. "But it wasn't. He was hurting a lot of people." He focused on the track star. "You even said it. When his heart changed, the whole school changed. You got a second chance. I got a second chance."
Makoto stood and cleared her throat. Her back held straight and her shoulders square, her tone officious. From her seat in the lone stuffed chair next to the door, it made her look like a king on his throne. "Kamoshida was threatening to expel you, Ryuji, and Mishima. He had a clear and unmistakable pattern of predation. Nobody was going to go on to a successful life—"
"Success?" Akira balked. "Success? Okay, let's talk about success. What the fuck is supposed to make success? Is it smarts? Hifumi gets better grades than I ever have. Is it connections? She's nice to everyone and has family all over the place." He clenched his fists. "They're all using her. Is it hard work? She busts her ass from sun-up to past sun-down, studies material for next year, even sells copies of her notes to help her family make ends meet."
Yuuki rubbed his chin. "That's actually pretty clever." He swallowed, withdrawing into his frame before he ventured, "But her doing well – or not – doesn't mean you'll be able to. Shujin's volleyball teams did very well in every single match and that didn't spare them from Kamoshida's wrath."
Makoto held her ground against the transfer student's glare. "I appreciate that you find her worthy of respect, but your stance on Togo is based on a personal appeal to pathos. We're talking about a palace ruler. Changing a palace is as difficult as it is dangerous. We need to make our decisions without letting ourselves be swayed by personal impulse. It would be irresponsible for us not to put Japan first."
"I'm not sayin' we ignore Japan!" Akira sucked in a breath to try to calm himself down. This was more important than any other heart change, but losing his head would hurt her more than him. "I got a second shot I didn't deserve, and because of that, I have to fight to give other people a chance."
Morgana nodded and sat on the glass table in the small, private room. "That gives you a lot of personal drive, Joker. But that doesn't refute Ryuji's point about the danger of Palaces. If we're going to get to the truth of Mementos, we need to change hearts that send aftershocks through society. We're not a substitute for justice, just a kind that doesn't have the constraints of courts that leave scum like Kamoshida untouched. Our most effective targets are the big ones that society can't touch by traditional means, and getting those also helps serve as a warning to the smaller ones."
Makoto nodded. "The objective cost-benefit analysis points to her no longer being worth changing."
"Objectivity is good," Yusuke piped up from his seat next to the transfer student. "But we can't let a quest for objectivity make us inhuman. None of us would be here were it not the very personal reasons which allowed – nay, forced us to awaken to our inner selves. We still strive for objective good despite still having those personal drives."
Akira let out a breath and gave a thankful nod to the artist.
Morgana sat down, his tail flicking the microphone rolling across the table strewn with books and snacks. "That's a fair point point, and everybody's opinion needs to be taken into account." He stood and walked in a tight circle on the table, just to sit down again, facing the transfer student. "Is there something about changing Togo Mitsuyo's heart that you think could help the Phantom Thieves?"
The Smiling Mountain Mental Institute taught him to make opportunity any time he got an open-ended question, so he scrambled back through his memory. But all he could think about was the warmth of Hifumi's expectant smile as she waited for him to move his first piece, the tears streaming down her face as she told him about her first fight with her mother, the feel of her svelte body against his. His face burned as he clenched his fists in his lap. "I… don't know. Right now." He swallowed. "It's not just about her mother, it's about her daughter, Hifumi. She's doing everything right and isn't being given a first chance. If someone like her can't make it, what fucking chance does someone like me have?"
Ann rubbed her arm with her free hand, her eyes on the ground between her feet. "You know what? He's got a point. Make my vote to change Togo's heart."
Yusuke gave a nod. "To bring salvation to the masses is the quintessential story of the hero. Even when I treated all of you terribly, you fought to save me from Madarame. The aftershocks extended far beyond Madarame and myself. I vote to change this depraved heart. The existence of a Palace only changes how we must go about this, not whether it is still a good deed."
Ryuji looked Akira in the eye. "I vote no."
"Why the fuck not?" Akira shouted, jumping to his feet, Yusuke and Makoto at his sides rising to grab his arms.
"Hold on," Morgana stood, his tail flicking back and forth. "We vote for a reason, and I'm sure he has his reasons. Just like you do."
"Damn straight," Ryuji said, crossing his arms. "It'd be effin' stupid to get ourselves killed tryin' ta change one lady who's bein' mean to one chick."
Makoto held her grip on the standing boy, her eyes never meeting the transfer student's. "I don't want to leave people suffering. I'm not saying I don't understand your reasons, but they're all personal. Medjed's threat is national. We have limited time and resources, and very real risks to face. Togo is too big a risk to face when that will only change things for one person. We have to focus our efforts on areas of maximum effect."
"I'm not asking to give up on Medjed." Akira pointed a quivering finger. "Even if this was just about Hifumi, she deserves better than to be ground into dust. I'm not legit, but she is. She's smart enough to go anywhere, works fucking hard. Her parents are decent people who built their own reputation…" He wavered.
"Joker…"
"Well, before her mother went off the deep end." He lowered his hand, though both arms kept trembling. "My mother's a bitch, and the old bastard sniveled under Isshiki's shadow until she wasn't there to compete with him anymore. I got a second shot I didn't deserve, and because of that, I have to fight to give other people a chance." His eyes dropped and his tone fell. "If I don't, I'll become something very bad again." He shook his head and forced himself to stand straight. "She's doing everything right and isn't being given a first chance."
Ann nodded, jostling her pigtails. "There's nothing wrong with fighting for our own reasons. Nobody on the outside came to help me from Kamoshida, either. And what about all the low-key connections we won't know about until after we change Togo's heart? We had no clue how much impact changing Kamoshida's heart was going to have."
"I appreciate that, but it's speculation." Makoto raised her free hand as if that could disarm her words when she looked back at him. "Your points just emphasize an appeal to pathos, a lack of objectivity. Ryuji is right. We have no choice but to economize. I vote no to Togo's Palace as long as Medjed is still a threat to Japan. This deal to change Sakura Futaba's heart is our only means of countering them." The transfer student made for the door, but she tightened her grip on his arm. "Akira, what are you doing?"
"I'm leaving," he snapped. "I came to Tokyo because didn't want to be someone else's attack dog, where the best I could do was yap at the end of a leash." He looked her in the eyes. "You know, for a while I was deluded enough to think Officer Ichijou was right. That this could be a chance to become someone new. That some day, I could make a difference to the people I care about." He frowned, his gaze falling on the track star. "But this… We're not becoming heroes…" He turned back to the door.
Ann sprang up from her seat against Ryuji. "You can't abandon the Phantom Thieves just because one vote didn't go your way! That's just as wrong as going after a target without coming to the rest of us to vote on it. Heart changes are all our business."
Akira clenched his hands. Were it anybody else, especially the bottle blond, he would've struck back. But Ann had been with him longer than anyone else. She had his back more times than he could count, even voting with him to change Togo Mitsuyo's heart. "This isn't about Togo. Not just about her. You guys are becoming what I was turning into when I was lost and alone. Feral attack dogs." He reached for the door.
Ann stepped closer. "Akira, we haven't even—"
"Vote how you guys want. I abstain," Akira spat, a thick feeling choking his throat. "I need to get some air." He hauled the door open and turned away from the elevators to the disused stairs.
Yongen, Sakura Residence, Futaba's Room
The blackout curtains intensified the gloom of her room, lit only by the glare of her computer screens showing the display for the bug on Akira's phone. Futaba strained to listen for any clue to give her hope as a heavy steel door swung open in the audio feed. His breathing and heavy footfalls echoed through an enclosed, concrete space. He plopped down on a hard surface, his breathing growing more ragged, catching once. Then threw his springy-sounding glasses to the concrete floor.
She recognized the sound of trying to wipe away tears from a hundred times of trying to hold back her own despair doing the very same thing, as if wiping away the tears faster than they spilled down would make them stop coming.
Futaba felt the specter of her mother hanging in the darkness behind her, a disdainful sneer on her face. "Look, you little monster. Isn't it bad enough you are so cursed you can't have happiness? You're even destroying the happiness of real heroes. People who changed the hearts of actual beasts!"
Futaba choked, tears of her own welling up and blurring the computer screens. "I just… I don't wanna live like this."
"Then die!" Wakaba spat at her. "You don't deserve to live. You bring suffering everywhere you go."
For a while, Futaba couldn't tell which were the sounds of her own pathetic crying, and which were the muffled noises of the tortured transfer student she harassed with her own selfishness.
Then a click over the bug and the steel stairwell door barged open, and rapid shuffling as Akira tried to sort himself out. That artist's smooth tones spoke, "Akira-san. The others voted to change Sakura Futaba's heart before moving on to any other requests." A beat passed before a hand clapped over the shoulder above the pocketed phone and the artist sat down next to the transfer student. "We can still change Togo Mitsuyo's heart. I had planned to save this until after you voted with us about Sakura due to the threat to the Japanese economy, but I now regret not having sent you the image when I finished this morning."
Glasses slid back into place. Akira rustled, cleared his throat, then asked with a forced neutrality, "What?"
Yusuke's voice remained calm. "I finished my drawing of the view of Tokyo we saw as we made our escape from Togo's Palace. I do not know the location, but Mishima believes a reverse image search might be able to identify it if enough people online have photographed the spot. Here."
Clothing rustled and something in a hard plastic case changed hands. After a moment, Akira said, "Sorry, I don't know it," then passed it back.
"I shall send it to you anyway. Perhaps someone else knows where in Tokyo it is." Her bug informed her of an incoming image file, a charcoal drawing of a city-scape she didn't recognize. Then the cloth shuffle of somebody dropping a phone into a pocket.
Her bug winked to indicate, Ready to clone. Futaba swallowed and opened the feed from Akira's phone cameras, only getting dark cloth.
Her craving to know, to escape, moved her fingers before she could even contemplate if there might be something wrong with bugging the friends of the Phantom Thief she was trying to convince to change her heart. The short-ranged wireless handshake to avoid telecom network security meant the phones had to be just centimeters from each other.
As she gnashed her teeth, waiting on that, the artist spoke. "I understand your vexation in regards to Togo-san. Your mention of legitimacy recalled my pondering about the issue since Madarame confessed. He built a career on the theft of what belonged to others. I learned from him, and have often wondered if there can ever be any legitimacy to my own art."
"Of course there is," Akira retorted, getting some of his usual confidence back. "You toil day in and day out over everything. Tone, shading, composition, anatomy. Those are all just words to me, but they encompass huge and weighty things to you. The truth matters to you, Yusuke. That alone tells me you're not going to vomit some crap just because some jerk waves a couple yen in commission at you."
"Feces evacuate from—"
"Don't get lost in the street terminology," Akira interrupted, his voice tired. It didn't carry a note of amusement, but also lacked the undercurrent of despair when the conversation started. "I know you came from an artist who claimed others' works as his own, but you have your own very real grasp of aesthetics. Madarame may have failed to teach you what was right and wrong, but he taught you how to move a pencil or paint brush to make something." The sound of heavy fabric shuffled. "My old bastard only taught me how to spot a lie. How to knock others down."
Clothing shuffled again. Futaba drew her knees up and wrapped her arms around her legs, wondering if Akira sat in the same pose.
"Even so," the artist said before the shuffle of somebody changing position on the concrete steps, "You still fight like a man possessed to free others. We shall change this Sakura Futaba's heart. Alibaba will stop Medjed, saving the people of Japan. And then we may change Togo Mitsuyo's heart. I may not know Togo Hifumi myself, but if her virtue is so great as to have earned your respect, then it surely must be worth fighting for."
While the bug cloned the artist's phone, Futaba pulled back up the text messenger history from Akira's phone. [Make it through. All of you. Shogi has do-overs, real life does not. I want my mother back, but I would feel horrible if one of the Phantom Thieves was hurt changing Mother's heart.]
Futaba perched on her chair. "No wonder he wants to save her."
"She would never kill her mother," Wakaba's voice sniped at her. "If you were dead, maybe they could try to save her."
A scratchy man's voice hurled from the depths of her memory, "She killed herself because of you!"
"Murderer!"
Futaba clutched her head and whimpered as a pounding pain grew inside.
The artist's voice floated out in stereo from the bug on Akira's phone and the new intercept on his own, "Will you be able to sell more of those Metaverse trinkets? Morgana-san says we need more medicines and need to stand ready to change equipment should Sakura Futaba's Palace have unusual hazards. Ryuji, Ann, and Makoto-san are still taking guesses at her distortion."
Akira cleared his throat. "Would take a hell of a lucky guess. I've just been running through the dictionary."
"Do you remember where you stopped at?" Yusuke said.
Akira sighed, the sound so dim it only picked up on his phone. "No, but Morgana should remember."
AN: The emotional toll of people invested in changing hearts when objective priorities change can be very severe. Both Akira and Futaba are in terrible places, and Hifumi obviously isn't putting all her own pain on display for his sake.