Good Day Readers! Obviously, I do not own anything connected to the Persona series in general or Persona 5 specifically, I DO own Chiba Natsumi and Anais Ouvrard, along with Natsumi's immediate family members and the original Personas that will be showing up on occasion.
To Guest, thanks for the review.
I would appreciate any responses that you have, please enjoy.
Chapter 29: - A Small Break
There was only a short time before the exams would start so I needed to get a few things done before those started. The bell for break rang shrilly and I quickly put my stuff away, I made my way over to the blue-black haired boy that I had decided to talk to. Hopefully this conversation wouldn't be awkward, especially since we hadn't ever really talked to each other before, well not beyond basic pleasantries and the somewhat awkward conversations during the whole Kamoshida madness.
"Mishima-san," I softly called. Unfortunately, this caused the boy to jump and almost tumble out of his chair, thankfully I reached my left hand out to seize a hold of his wrist and pull him back onto his seat before he could gain another injury. "Sorry about that, I didn't realise I'd end up scaring you," I admitted. The sudden jump had rather worried me, this conversation might go even more awkward than I expected.
"I-It's alright Chiba-san. I'm just surprised you came to talk to me after all," Mishima responded. He seemed rather flustered by my approach, though I can't tell why. "Um, is there something you need Chiba-san?" Mishima asked. It would be best if I could talk to him somewhere else other than a crowded area, like the classroom or the corridors.
"Yes, but it's something that needs privacy, can we go somewhere to talk?" I requested. Mishima squirmed a little in his seat, but that was why I had phrased it as a request, Mishima could walk away from this; I refuse to force him into doing anything that he didn't want to do, I wouldn't hurt him the way that Kamoshida had and the way bullies at our last school had. "Never mind, it isn't urgent," I stated. With that I turned to walk away from him.
"Ah! Chiba-san, wait! I can talk!" Mishima exclaimed. I heard his foot falls and turned back to see he was a small distance behind me with his bag in hand, we proceeded to leave together and I wove a path around until we reached a decently secluded area; people could still see us from a distance but for the time being, no one was lingering nearby. "What did you want to talk about?" Mishima asked.
"I overheard you speaking to Ren the other day," I revealed. I saw Mishima's eyes widened in shock at my words and worry soon followed afterwards as he realised that he had spilled the secret to someone accidentally; I lifted a hand to forestall any potentially unnecessary reactions from Mishima that could endanger the rest of the Phantoms. "It's alright, I won't pass it along. I'm grateful to the Phantom Thieves for stopping Kamoshida's cruelties," I reassured. Mishima seemed to visibly deflate at my words which was a relief to me "The point of this conversation is actually about your website," I admitted. Mishima perked up slightly as he looked at me once again.
"Oh, the Phan-site, what about it?" Mishima wondered. I couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at the phrase he had used to refer to the website, Mishima proceeded to chuckle slightly at my expression. "It's what I'm calling it, for short," Mishima explained. All I could do was shrug in response, it was his website and he could do what he wished with it, it wasn't entirely different to what we were doing with our own name.
"I looked at it and well, I'm just wondering if there's more you could possibly be doing," I admitted. The Phan-site was fairly basic since all it contained was the ability to post messages – most of which dismissed us as a joke – or respond to the poll that had been set up; Mishima didn't really seem to be interacting with the commenters from what I'd seen.
"More. What more could I be doing? My Phan-site is letting people post their problems so that the Phantom Thieves can see them and help," Mishima claimed. He blinked his eyes at me as if he truly wasn't understanding the issue, but sometimes people's issues in reality didn't reflect into the Metaverse; Ryūji was a fine example of this as despite his intense hate for Kamoshida, I'd never run into his Shadow unlike the other track team members.
"True, but the mistake would be thinking the Phantom Thieves are all powerful, there may be problems that exist which they might not be able to solve," I warned. If someone didn't project a Shadow into the Metaverse, then no matter the kind of issue someone was enduring, we couldn't help them; plus, there might be another angle that could be looked at which would allow it to be solved. Unfortunately, I couldn't say this and because of this, Mishima didn't understand my reasoning which likely resulted in him doubling over with laughter.
"Oh! That's funny Chiba-san. The Phantom Thieves can do anything, they're unstoppable!" Mishima declared. He was still struggling to get his laughter under control and he even ended up leaning against the wall; where this any other situation, I'd be happy to see Mishima in such a fit of mirth since it was at least a sign that he was now free of Kamoshida. But it showed that he wasn't understanding my concerns, not that I expected he would, due to him being outside the group.
"That faith is kind Mishima, something you've always been. But nothing and no one is unstoppable. There may come a time when you can no longer remain as merely an administrator. Just think about how you could help people," I advised. With those final words, hopefully planting something in his head since I wasn't giving up on this, I moved around the wheezing boy and walked away.
*Persona 5 Royal*
School was done with, so I stood up and moved over to Ann who had just finished her own packing and grinned brightly at me, we proceeded to leave the room in time to see Ren and Ryūji taking off down the stairs while chatting to each other. As we proceeded to head down the stairs at a leisurely pace, I reached into my bag to grasp two things that I had promised to bring with me.
"Here Ann-chan," I spoke. As I did, I pulled out the book and recording of Carmen, I handed them over to the model who took a hold of both and looked at them, her eyes widened as she took in the book's title before lifting her gaze to look directly at me; a smile proceeded to curl across her lips as she held the two objects closer to her.
"Oh, these are what you mentioned the other day," Ann realised. She quickly opened up her bag and carefully slotted both objects inside, I felt a surprising rush of warmth within my heart at the care that Ann was showing towards the objects; she didn't need to as they weren't anything special just not easily replaced, yet she treated them as if they were some kind of magical treasure.
"Yes, my favourite of the songs in the opera is L'amour est un oiseau rebelle, more commonly known as Habanera," I admitted. However, my words caused Ann to look at me with blinking eyes like an owl which caused me to chuckle slightly since it looked so odd upon her face; Ann opened her mouth, but no sound came out as she seemed to be trying to work something out before saying anything.
"L-La-Lae," Ann-chan stumbled. I started to giggle stronger than before, Ann must have been trying to replicate the title of the song I'd just given her, but likely due to a combination of how it had rolled off my tongue from practice and her unfamiliarity with the way the words were pronounced resulted in this stumbling. I opened my mouth in the hopes of carefully pronouncing the words to aid in Ann getting it right.
"L'amour est un oiseau rebelle. It's French for Love is a rebellious bird," A female voice answered. I looked over and found the source standing only a couple of steps away from us; even though she had to be a student here at Shūjin, it felt wrong to call her a girl, the way she carried herself spoke more as if she was a woman. "Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you but when I heard someone speaking in French, I couldn't help but be interested," the young woman spoke.
She was older than me and Ann, but she was shorter than the two of us, with chin-length curly light auburn hair and brown eyes. Her winter school's uniform was modified to her taste with a very comfy looking pink turtleneck cardigan with short puffed sleeves that had a long-sleeved white shirt underneath. The cardigan was zipped open up to her navel and had two large pockets on the front, she wore the standard black and red tartan skirt, white tights with a black flower pattern and black Mary Jane shoes.
"It's alright, I'm just surprised. I didn't think anyone apart from Chouno-sensei knew French," I explained. The languages' teacher had always been a favourite of mine as I'd ended up showing off my grasp of French in the first year and that led to a bit of after class chatter on some times, now much more common after Ouvrard was stopped. But I'd never even heard of someone else, apart from Ann, speaking a foreign language.
"I have quite a fascination with France, it's a beautiful country," The mature girl stated. That was very true, as much as I may despise Ouvrard, that disgust didn't extend to her home country and the few pictures I had seen of it proved it to be quite enrapturing. From the opulence of Paris to the wild beauty of countryside, it was no surprise such works of art came from that kind of place.
"Never been there myself, but I will admit I'm curious about it," I commented. The young woman smiled and nodded her head, but I was only growing more curious about who this fluffy haired France lover could be. "What's your name?" I asked. I wanted to find out a little bit more about her, how much she knew about France and what else she might know.
"Ah, Haru. I'm Haru," The mature girl answered. No family name was forth coming, did that mean she was ashamed of it? The gods know that if my uncle had been my father then I would definitely be hiding any and all blood connection to him as much as possible. I saw Ann open her mouth, but I gently knocked my hand against hers' and shook my head, hoping she'd understand the silent message.
"I'm Takamaki Ann," Ann introduced. She extended her hand to Haru who grasped it and they shook; I'm glad Ann understood not to push for the family name, some people might not want their family's name to affect how others saw them. It seemed best to respect Haru's desire to remain anonymous. Haru's eyes turned to look at me.
"Chiba Natsumi," I echoed. I copied Ann's actions and shook Haru's hand, meanwhile I took note of the Will of Rebellion behind her, Haru's was a little odd as I'd never seen anyone's Will seem to oscillate before. At times it was big and bright like Ren's was before he Awakened, but then it would suddenly dim and almost gutter, just barely holding onto life… such a strange little flame.
"It was nice meeting the two of you, have a nice day," Haru-senpai stated. She then proceeded to walk away with a strained smile on her lips, I turned to watch the young woman walk away from us as Ann did the same thing; there was something… something familiar about Haru that itched underneath my skin, as if something was demanding my attention.
"Did she seem sad to you?" Ann asked. I nodded my head in agreement, Haru did seem to be very sad, yet she had seemed happy when talking about France; a suddenly ringing drew my attention and I saw Ann fish her phone out and look at something. "Oh shoot! My modelling agency has scheduled a shoot today! I was going to see Shiho today!" Ann exclaimed.
"If you want, I can go instead," I offered. Ann's head snapped up to look at me with wide eyes, we'd been to the hospital only together before and Ann knew how much I disliked it, but Suzui needed to be taken care of and that was more important than my own feelings towards visiting a hospital. "Even if it's only to give her a message, I can go in your place," I offered.
"Oh, would you Natsu-chan!?" Ann asked. I nodded my head to affirm that my offer was very serious. "Thank you!" Ann cheered. She then practically jumped forward and wrapped me in a bone bruising tight hug which brought a smile to my face despite the pain twisting it into a grimace slightly. We split from our hug and proceeded to leave the school building; it was at the station where we split from each other.
I made my way towards the hospital and headed deeper into the building in the direction of Suzui's room, I hoped she'd be okay with me coming to visit in place of Ann. I'd never actually gone in to see Suzui, content to wait outside while Ann was visiting. Soon enough I reached the door and pushed it open to see the room beyond.
"Hello, Suzui-san," I greeted. The girl lifted herself up slightly with her elbows, her dark hair was out of its' ponytail and hung down to brush against her shoulders, her face was free of the oxygen mask that had been stuck to her face last time, but various wires still hooked her up to hospital machines which beeped and pinged with their mechanical noises. Suzui's eyes widened when she saw me standing there.
"Oh, Chiba-san. I wasn't expecting to see you," Suzui admitted. I don't even know if the girl was aware that I kept coming with Ann, it's not like the room was open to the corridor but Ann might have told her. I moved over and settled myself down into the chair that was placed by the bed, I rested my bag on the ground as I faced the girl. Her wounds were clearing up quite well under the ministrations of the nurses and doctors.
"Ann-chan's sorry, but her modelling job decided to drag her into a shoot suddenly. I offered to come in her place," I explained. Suzui's eyes widened when she heard the term I'd used to refer to Ann. I never asked what went on in this room, it was between Ann and Suzui as to what they discussed and not for my knowledge; however, Suzui proceeded to smile before I could think of what to say in response to her look.
"That's so nice of you, Ann must have been really upset because today's the day I start my physiotherapy," Suzui admitted. That would explain why Ann had been so upset about the sudden spring of the modelling thing today; at that moment the door opened and a physiotherapist walked in. I stepped to the side to give the two plenty of room as the woman helped Suzui stand and shuffle across to the wheelchair. "How come you're calling Ann, Ann-chan now, Chiba-san?" Suzui asked. As she did, the physiotherapist pulled her out the room, so I grabbed my bag and followed.
"We er… grew closer after… that day. I don't know if you were told but I came with you and Ann-chan in the ambulance. Ann-chan insisted we're friends so, I started calling her that in response to her calling my Natsu-chan," I admitted. A brief giggle escaped from Suzui as she pressed her hand over her mouth, causing me to raise an eyebrow at her, silently questioning what she was finding so funny.
"That's so like Ann. I'm glad she managed to find another friend. Thank you for being there for her Chiba-san," Suzui admitted. I shrugged my shoulders in response as we reached the room that Suzui would be in. "Can Chiba-san come in? She's here for my friend, I want her to know how I did," Suzui requested. An affirmative was given and we all went into the room which was long and wide, with many different apparatus scattered about and a wide window looking out into a small garden. Dominating the centre of the room was a pair of waist high wooden bars that looked fairly thick, each supported by thick metal poles.
I settled onto a chair and put my bag at my feet as I watched the physiotherapist position Suzui's wheelchair by one end of the poles. They talked quietly for a few moments before Suzui looked at the poles, she took a deep breath and reached her hands out to grip the bars. She had a determined look on her face that was reminiscent of Ann's own resolute expression. Suzui proceeded to pull in a deep breath, and that was the end of the easy bit.
Suzui pulled herself up out of the wheelchair and I immediately saw the pain. Her face creased heavily; shadows darkened her expression as her eyelids drifted close while her teeth pressed so heavily against her bottom lips that I was surprised it didn't tear open and start to bleed. Her legs trembled like a new-born deer's; I was certain they were going to buckle the moment that she took a single step, my muscles coiled in response.
Whether by sheer will or some divine intervention, Suzui didn't collapse into a boneless pain filled heap. Instead, she managed to walk forward, but only a total of three steps before she suddenly gasped sharply. I was on my feet right as Suzui dropped to her knees, I reached her quicker than the nurse and moved to stand in front of the trembling girl. I wasn't sure what to say… until I saw the flash in her eyes that made me think of Ren whenever he was around police officers.
"One more, just one more," I insisted. Suzui looked up at me with wide eyes, the fear was still there but surprise was currently eclipsing it; I knelt down and gently slid me hands underneath her armpits, Suzui gripped my shoulders in response and with a bit of wriggling, I had the girl back on her feet. "If you give up when it hurts, you'll never push passed this block. That means he wins. You don't want him to win, do you?" I challenged. I reached up to take her hands off my shoulders, I didn't grip them tightly but neither did I release them; I would let her make this choice.
"No!" Suzui declared. She tightly gripped my hands and sucked in a pain filled breath as she struggled to lift her right leg, she wheezed with pain and tears dotted her eyes, but she didn't stop and simply moved it forward to set her foot down. I tried to pull back since the single step was made, but Suzui didn't let me leave. Her gripped tightened which prevented me releasing our hands as she repeated this same event with her left leg, then again with her right leg. I moved back every time, looking as if I was pulling Suzui along, we repeated this until she was a teary mess and struggling to breath properly, but she had reached the end with a smile on her face.
Once we stopped moving, Suzui started to wobble, I darted around and fitted her arm around my shoulders and enclosed her waist with my right arm, keeping her upright. Her physiotherapist brought the wheelchair around and I sat Suzui down in it; we were quickly ushered back to the room where the nurse settled the exhausted girl back into her bed. Suzui was sucking in deep breaths of air that I'm sure must have been bordering on painful.
"You pushed her too hard today," The physiotherapist stated. Suzui had been re-hooked up to the machines that would look after her conditions, I meanwhile proceeded to sit down in the chair as I looked at Suzui who seemed to be oblivious to the conversation; but eventually I lifted my head to look at the physiotherapist.
"No, Suzui-san pushed herself hard. She could have stopped me at any time, besides," I stated. This surprised the physio, who stared at me with wide eyes, but my voice was lacking its' steel. "I'm still right. She can't give up, getting her legs back is the best way to spit in his face. If she gets her legs back, then she can prove he was wrong. Something like that, might just give her the strength to win the fight up here," I stated. As I did, I gently pressed my finger against Suzui's forehead.
"Be that as it may, if you push her too hard, she'll only back slide. Do that again and I'll forbid you from seeing her," The physio stated. With that, me and Suzui were left alone; I turned my attention to look at the girl and found that her eyes were open and she was looking at me with a tired sort of happiness in her smile.
"Thank you, Chiba-san," Suzui spoke. I nodded my head in response, not entirely too sure how to respond, but then tears started to gather within her eyes and I felt my breath hitch in my chest. "I know I can't let him keep haunting me, but it's so h-hard s-some-ti-times. I-I st-still f-feel hi-his ha-hands and g-gaze o-on m-me," Suzui wailed. I moved forward and pulled the girl upright so that she might breathe easier as tears tumbled down her face in thick rivers.
"It's alright Suzui-san. He can't hurt you anymore, he can't hurt anyone anymore. He will never be able to harm another living soul," I soothed. I moved one arm to rest the hand on her back and I worked it in circles, meanwhile my other rose up to wipe away each and every tear that the dark haired girl sobbed out; it took some minutes but Suzui eventually calmed down and lightly dropped back against the bed, seemingly quite spent after her much deserved cry.
"Any friend of Ann's is a friend of mine, please call me Shiho," Suzui asked. Her voice was slightly cracked, so I looked around and found some water, I offered it to the girl and aided her in drinking from it; it was only then that I truly processed her words and a bubbling sensation took root in my heart. A smile worked its' way onto my face as Shiho released the glass from her grip.
"Very well, call me Natsumi if you want or Natsu-chan. I don't mind either," I responded. I turned and set the empty glass back by the pitcher that the water had come from; I turned back to look at Shiho who was smiling at me somewhat wearily, but after everything she'd been through in these few moments, it wasn't a surprise at all.
"Thanks, Natsumi," Shiho whispered. She then reached over and pulled out her phone. "Do you want to listen to some music?" Shiho offered. I nodded my head and pulled myself closer to the girl as Shiho started up the song she wanted me to listen to; a song about the search for truth.
*Persona 5 Royal*
Leaving the hospital behind – and a new friend whose phone number I now had – I proceeded to make my way back to my home. The sun's light was fading fast from the sky now that the orb of burning gas was beyond the horizon, luckily my walk was coming to an end as my home was only a short distance away from me; hopefully I could get some studying done before the day was out.
"Oh! It's you again!" A voice called. I stopped and turned out around to see the twin tailed girl who'd I had pointed in the direction of LeBlanc some days ago. "Thanks so much for telling me where the café is," The woman stated. She jogged up to me so that we were only stood about a foot or so apart from one another.
"No problem, it's a nice little hole in the wall," I stated. LeBlanc was definitely the kind of place to become a hideaway – it already was for me – with its' nice, calming atmosphere and good food; it didn't feel right hiding such a nice place especially when this person had been intentionally directed to it by whoever her upperclassman must have been.
"By the way, your voice has a kind of… rise and fall to it I'm familiar with," The woman stated. A weight dropped in my stomach, creating a sickening feeling; I hadn't even realised that my voice possessed such a quality to it. It was probably, a result of the continual training that Ouvrard had me undergo, but no one else had mentioned such a thing. "Do you have any singing training?" She asked. The moment she said those words, my internal alarms went off like sirens.
"Stay away from me! From me and my voice!" I demanded. I proceeded to drop my right leg back and set my arms into a guard stance, unarmed combat might not be a speciality of mine, but I wasn't bad at it, if necessary I could protect myself from this woman. Except, she suddenly held her hands up and even took a small step back, enough for her to try and give off the energy that she meant no threat.
"Woah, woah, it's okay. I'm not gonna hurt you. I promise," The woman said. Her voice had pitched lower than the higher tone she'd previously carried, there was also a sincerity in her voice that made me believe she really wasn't a threat. "You must have had a really bad experience, huh? I can understand that," The woman admitted. The understanding she spoke with was enough to cause me to rise from my stance, but my muscles were still tense as I looked at her.
"What do you mean?" I asked. It was at that moment that I saw something I'd either missed or ignored before; towering over the woman was a blue skinned woman with six arms, clad in black thigh high shoes, red palmed gloves, a white dress with hip high slits, a massive telescope replaced her head and in the lowest of her hands was a red circle thing that rest over the woman's head, a solar system like thing circled around the Persona. This woman had a Persona!
"My name's Rise. Kujikawa Rise," The woman introduced. She removed the glasses to reveal brown eyes, I now recognised the woman, she was an idol who I'd loved to watch back when my family was alive; I remembered singing along to all of her songs whenever they played… and getting very upset when she went on hiatus five years back.
"Oh wow, you're Risette. This is… um… not something I… er… I expected," I admitted. My eyes were darting to the telescope headed Persona a lot as I tried to articulate my thoughts, thrown by the idol from my childhood showing up with a Persona that was immensely powerful from what I could feel. Risette smiled and stepped closer to me, the smile wasn't the one from her idol status, it was warmer and more natural looking than the bright one she typically had.
"Yeah, I am, nice to properly meet you… what do you keep looking at?" Risette asked. She then turned her head to look back which caused a flutter of panic to stir up my stomach, she'd realise nothing was there and either think I'm weird… or figure me out if she had met someone like me. "Nothing's there except…," Risette muttered. She snapped her head back down and suddenly clapped her hands on my cheeks and leaded her forehead against my own.
"Um… what are you doing?" I hesitantly asked. However, no answer was forthcoming from the woman, instead she remained eerily silent and still as her eyes continued to bore into my own; I attempted to move backwards, but the sheer strength of her grip – that was a surprise – prevented me from moving as my face was stopped before I got too far away; it seemed best just to stay still for now.
"You're Betwixt," Risette breathed. She pulled back and stared at me with wide eyes, her words however confirmed that she had met someone like me before; silence draped itself over the two of us as it seemed we were both searching for some words, I wasn't sure if I wanted to continue this conversation or not. "What's your name?" Risette asked. At least someone had finally spoken, I mentally debated over whether or not to truthfully answer her question before making a decision.
"Chiba Natsumi," I answered. Igor said I would be drawn to Persona Users, so perhaps there was a reason that I'd run into Risette that first time some days ago and whatever that reason, it was best to see it through. Risette smiled, but then her phone went off, she pulled it out and looked at it before frowning heavily, the object was replaced by a piece of paper which she quickly scribbled something on. Risette pressed that piece of paper into my hand and I saw it was a string of numbers.
"I'll be seeing you around Natsu-kun, bye-bye," Risette cheered. She then took off leaving me very baffled by what had just happened and the phone number she had left me.
*Persona 5 Royal*
The next day, Ren decided to take us into Mementos in order to deal with a bully at our school, which involved a fight against a Jack Frost at the end of it. We also fully explored the second area, which had a dark blue tint to it and was known as the Harmony Robbing Path of Aiyatsbus, as opposed to the first two levels which were collectively known as the Thought Robbing Path of Qimranut.
Afterwards though, when returning to my bed, I had the most bizarre dream, a dream where I fought alongside the others against two little girls with blonde hair and Attendant gold eyes, though each of them had one covered up by an eyepatch embossed with the letter V. In that dream… we were thoroughly decimated by the duo, whose power reminded me of Lavenza and Elizabeth.