The Dreamweaver raises one arm, and you brace yourself for an attack, but nothing happens. Suddenly, something strikes you in the back of the head, causing bursts of color and stars to swarm your vision. Through the haze, you see Mariko's gun zip into her palm as if by magic. The Dreamweaver laughs and flicks off the safety.
"You know what? I think I've had a bit of a change of heart. Killing you with a human weapon seems kinda fitting. The irony's just too delicious to pass up! I know you like to dance, so let's see it!"
The Dreamweaver takes aim at you, and your body locks up instantly. Action movies and anime make it look like no big deal to dodge a bullet, but now that you're actually staring down the barrel of a real gun held by a creature that wants to kill you, you have no clue what to do. How good is the Dreamweaver's aim? It said it doesn't like human weapons. Does that mean it's a bad shot? But the gun belongs to Mariko – she probably knows how to use it. If the Dreamweaver's taken on her body, does that mean it's just as good as she is? In the end, there's no way to be sure.
The Dreamweaver's finger begins to close around the trigger, so you close your eyes and dive towards one of the toppled tables nearby. A crack resounds across the food court, and you cringe involuntarily as you tumble into cover. For a while, you don't dare open your eyes for fear of seeing your own blood soaking your shirt and jacket. But you know that the Dreamweaver will come to check on you whether you've been hit or not, so you slowly open your eyes to search your body.
To your immense relief, there isn't a single bullet wound on you, and the only pain you feel is from your shoulder where you hit the ground. You heave a sigh of relief, but the sound of the Dreamweaver's footsteps drawing near snaps you back to reality. Somehow, you need to figure out a way to get close enough to attack this thing without getting shot. If you can summon Launcelot, maybe you can advance on her behind his shield.
"Per-" you begin, but just then, the Dreamweaver steps around the table, a deranged grin plastered across her face.
"I don't think so, asshole!"
With one swift motion, the Dreamweaver smashes the butt of the handgun across your face, sending you reeling backwards and your head snaps into ground. Throbbing pain lances through your skull, and a hot, irony wetness begins to pool on your upper lip. Through your blurred vision, you look on helplessly, unable to pick yourself up off the ground to flee, as the Dreamweaver approaches. She studies you and cocks her head as if the situation puzzles her. Then, she reaches down, grabs you by the collar, and hoists you up to eye level. You note that this only requires one hand, a testament to her seemingly absurd strength.
"This is it? How did you even manage to kill one of my Shadows? Even with the power of Persona, you humans are pitifully, contemptibly weak."
Using both hands now, she clutches both sides of your head, holding you aloft. She squeezes it firmly between them like a vice, and new waves of pain crash upon you. You can't prevent yourself from groaning in agony.
"I could crush your skull like a grape right now, you know that, right? Just a little pressure, that's all it would take."
She holds you there like that for a moment, contemplative. Then, she lets go, letting you drop to the ground.
"No, no. Too easy. For someone who talks themselves up so much while being so weak, you need to really learn just how pathetic you are compared to a Shadow. Up," she commands, gesturing you to your feet with the hand that holds the gun. Your head is still swimming in pain, and you can barely think clearly enough to comprehend what she's saying, let alone formulate some method of counterattack. Sluggishly, you stumble upright, swaying back and forth as you search for some semblance of balance.
"Good," the Dreamweaver says, and fires a bolt of lightning directly into your chest.
Even though you've already been shocked once today, this time around, the sensation of electricity coursing through your body is positively excruciating. The force of the Dreamweaver's magic is exponentially greater than that of the Enforcer's, making it impossible to resist the pain. The jolt rips a piercing scream from your lips and you collapse to the ground, convulsing violently as the lightning runs its course. It feels as though it takes forever for the pain to finally dissipate, but eventually the agony subsides, leaving behind a crackle of static in the air and a stream of tears coursing down your cheeks.
The Dreamweaver steps up to you and jabs you in the ribs with one foot. An involuntary whimper escapes from the depths of your lungs, and she laughs long and hard.
"C'mon, human! I'm 'just another Shadow', right? Why aren't you smashing my face in already, huh? C'mon! Get on your feet and play the big damn hero! Don't tell me this is as good as it gets!"
Once more, the Dreamweaver grabs you and hauls you upright. Standing feels like an exercise in futility – the world is having a hell of a time staying still.
"I'll tell you what: I'll even let you summon your precious Persona. Go on, call it out! I want to kill you at your best so that you truly understand just how futile your delusions of heroism are!"
This has to be a trap. She'll probably shoot you before you can even finish summoning. A surge of anger rushes through you – at the girl in the wetsuit for leaving this impossible task to you, at the Dreamweaver for making a fool out of you, and especially at yourself for being pushed around like this. This can't be how it ends, not after the way you escaped death once already today. You made a resolution not to die, to ensure that Mariko got home safely. There's no way you're going to just let yourself get beaten and shocked to death. If the Dreamweaver's going to make the mistake of giving you a chance, you're going to take it.
A brief moment of clarity cuts through the fog of pain, and you reach down inside yourself to salvage whatever amount of strength you still have left. So far, the Dreamweaver's been able to predict your every move. If that's the case, then maybe it's time to try something stupid.
"Alright…" you say.
"What?" calls the Dreamweaver. "If you have something to say, say it!"
"Think fast!"
With one motion, you spring towards the Dreamweaver, yank your guitar from its case, and drive it up towards her chin with as much power as you can possibly muster. To your satisfaction, it connects with a near bone-shattering impact that sends vibrations through your entire body, and the Dreamweaver soars backwards through the counter of a food stand and into the kitchen behind it.
For a few seconds, you're in total shock, your guitar still clutched in a white-knuckled grip at the apex of its swing. The rush of adrenaline is short-lived, though, and once it's over, you collapse and fall backwards onto your rear end. However, there's no time to relax. You know that there's no way that you killed the Dreamweaver in just one blow, and you finally have enough time to summon Launcelot. Even if your strength is almost exhausted, Launcelot should still be ready to fight.
"Launcelot!" you cry, and your Persona materializes before you in a flash of light.
Immediately, you realize something's not right. Instead of standing proudly, lance and shield held ready in front of him like he normally is, Launcelot is hunched over and heaving, clutching his stomach. His cape appears tattered and ragged, and his once pristine armor sports multiple dings and dents.
"You son of a bitch!" the Dreamweaver shrieks from within the food stand, reporting her imminent return to action, and at the same time, a horrible realization dawns on you.
"…that Persona isn't just a part of you, he is you…Whatever happens to him, happens to you, and vice versa."
In the heat of the fight, you'd completely forgotten about the wetsuit girl's warning. With the shape you're in now, Launcelot is every bit as useless as you are. In essence, all you've done is piss off the Dreamweaver and exhaust the last bit of your strength.
The Dreamweaver is a grotesque sight as she emerges from the food stand. Her head is almost completely twisted around to the point where it's practically facing behind her. With a sickening pop, she grabs it and twists it back into position, jerking it back and forth the way a boxer would work out kinks in his neck.
"Enough screwing around! I'll kill you here and now! Prepare to witness the true power of the Cloud!"
The Dreamweaver points one finger skyward and screams.
"Persona!"
Terror seizes your entire body at the word. There's no way that a Shadow could have its own Persona. If that's true, then you're certainly about to die.
But nothing happens. For almost thirty seconds, the Dreamweaver stands there, finger raised while absolutely nothing occurs, and the atmosphere slowly begins to transition from dire to comical. Finally, the Dreamweaver grows impatient and stomps one foot into the ground.
"What the hell? Persona! Persona! I summon my Persona! Come on, damn you!"
As the Dreamweaver screeches angrily into the sky, a smile begins to play across your face. The Persona that she's trying to summon was none other than the Enforcer that you and the wetsuit girl subdued earlier. Of course, there's a sense of avoided disaster underneath the humor here – you now understand just what the wetsuit girl meant when she said that the Dreamweaver was much weaker without Mariko's Persona. If you hadn't taken it out, there's no telling what kind of shape you'd be in now – broken, most likely.
You allow yourself a laugh at the Dreamweaver's expense. Sure, you're just going to make it angrier, but at this point, there's nothing else you can do. You and Launcelot are probably going to be killed no matter what, so you may as well go out by causing her some aggravation one last time. Sure enough, the Dreamweaver rounds on you and lifts you up by the shirt collar again.
"You! Where is my Persona?" it screams into your face. You shrug, but flash her a grin that should tell her all she needs to know.
"No! Impossible! There's no way a human like you could have beaten my Persona! Where are they? Where are the others? How many of you filthy rats are there? Tellmetellmetellme!"
The Dreamweaver shakes your battered body back and forth like a ragdoll, but you keep your mouth shut. There's nothing left to say. Once she realizes that she's not getting anything more out of you, the Dreamweaver tosses you to the ground.
"Fine. It doesn't matter whether there's one of you or a hundred of you. I'll wipe out every last one I see, Persona or no! But first, it's about time we wrap this up. Hope you've made your peace with your pathetic existence, human," she says, and raises the gun towards you once again.
Peace? What peace is there to make? In the end, you've failed completely. Failed to save Mariko, failed to realize the potential Minato and Elizabeth said that you have, and failed to keep your own promise to continue living. You've given it everything that you had, yet it simply wasn't enough to stand up to the Dreamweaver's punishing strength. And so, you will die here in this strange world, likely never be discovered, never to see your parents or classmates or even your shitty, awful teacher again. The thought of all this makes you awash with despair.
You close your eyes, lean your head back against the underside of a chair, and await the inevitable.
"No," says a voice that is neither yours nor the Dreamweaver's. "This simply will not do."
"You cannot fail here."
Everything goes black.
The Dreamweaver pulls the trigger. The bullet is true. It soars towards Tetsuo's head and evaporates before making contact with his temple like a droplet of water hitting a hot stove.
"What the…" the Dreamweaver says, her gaze flicking back and forth between the gun and his prone form as if expecting some sort of explanation. She takes aim once more and this time looses off two shots. Both suffer the same fate as the first. This incongruity pushes her over the edge and out of composure's reach. With a wild scream, she empties the magazine into Tetsuo. Again, those shots that don't completely miss their mark disappear before they touch his skin.
Then, even as he is being fired upon, he begins to rise. His movement is ungainly and stilted as he lurches to his feet, stumbling back and forth like a new sailor struggling to find his sea legs. He moans softly, and his hands shoot to the sides of his head, clutching at it with desperate, probing fingers. His eyes, wide in their sockets, rattle about wildly with some unknown dementia. Inside his mind, a cacophony of jet engines sound in mind-shredding harmony to a melody of tuneless chanting.
I AM THOU.
THOU ART I.
I AM THOU.
THOU ART I.
IAMTHOUARTIAMTHOUARTIAMTHOUARTIAMTHOUARTIAMTHOUARTIAMTHOUARTIAMTHOU-
"AAAGGGHHH!"
The force of Tetsuo's scream rips the world out from under the Dreamweaver's feet, sending her tumbling across the ground cursing. The food court erupts into an explosion of light and sound. Everything not bolted to the floor soars off of the rooftop from the resulting shockwave save for the Dreamweaver, who clutches desperately to a railing to avoid being carried away. At the epicenter of the swirling miasma, Tetsuo's silhouette is taken to pieces, bit by bit, until nothing more remains of him. Then, with one final puff of dust and wind, the burst of light seems to fold up on itself into a single spear of light that launches heavenward, leaving only Mariko, the Dreamweaver, and the motionless, floating form of Launcelot behind.
Cautiously, the Dreamweaver opens one eye. When she notices that the outburst is over, she scrambles to her feet and sprints over to the spot where Tetsuo once stood.
"Where are you? Come out and face me, human! You think you can prolong your death with cheap tricks like that?" she yells while peering into empty food stands. Behind her, Launcelot's fingers twitch.
"If you think you can hide from me, you're making a huge mistake! This Cloud belongs to me! There's nothing I don't see! I will find you, and when I do, I promise that I'll make your death as slow and painful as I possibly c-"
The rest of her livid outburst is cut short as a huge mailed hand clamps around her head and mashes it into the wall of the food stand. The impact leaves a small depression in the concrete wall from which spidery cracks race outwards in all directions. The hand still clutching her by the head, the Dreamweaver is lifted into the air and brought face-to-face with her assailant.
"A-Ahhh…" she gurgles, an inarticulate mixture of pain and fear at what she sees behind Launcelot's visor.
"You're not…gahhh!"
However, she is once more cut short as Launcelot forcibly drives her face back into the wall. Unsatisfied, Launcelot peels the Dreamweaver's body off the wall, only to slam her back into it once – twice – three more times. Puffs of smoke leak from her body with each blow, and the outline of her figure begins to waver hazily like a mirage. Finally, Launcelot cocks back his arm to its fullest extent and bludgeons the Dreamweaver into the miniature crater he's created with punishing force. Trapped between the wall and his hand, Launcelot applies pressure to the back of her head, and the Dreamweaver's limbs begin to thrash madly about in a desperate bid for escape.
Then, with one final push, Launcelot crushes the Dreamweaver's body against the wall. Her wriggling body ruptures like a paint-filled balloon, leaving a blackish-blue splatter where she once was. He slowly removes his hand from the wall, and the half-sunburst mask clatters to the floor, the only thing that still remains of the vicious Shadow.
Launcelot steps back and releases a victorious scream into the cloud-dotted sky. There is another flash of light, and when it dissipates, he has vanished.
Consciousness returns to you slowly and with much difficulty, much like awakening after a night of uneasy sleep. There's a pounding in your head, but other than that, you think you're okay. Last thing you remember, the Dreamweaver was about to put a bullet in your head, but seeing as you're still alive, something must have gone wrong.
You give your body a quick once over. Incredibly, all your bruises and cuts are completely gone, and your nose and ribs aren't sore at all! If it wasn't for the fact that you were still on the rooftop of this awful department store, it'd be easy to believe that you'd never even fought the Dreamweaver at all.
Rising unsteadily to your feet, you take stock of your surroundings. It looks like a tornado's been through here – all the tables and chairs are gone, the awnings are torn and collapsed, and the railings around the edge of the roof are twisted and bent. The only things still remaining are the food stands, spared only because they were part of the structure. A stain on the wall of one of them catches your attention, and you go over to investigate.
This stand has clearly suffered heavy damage - this entire portion of the wall is riddled with cracks and chips. The stain is even more curious, a Rorschach-like blob almost as large as you are tall. Before you can even make an attempt at guessing what happened here, your foot brushes up against something on the ground.
At first glance, you can hardly believe that the object at your feet is what it appears to be, but once you pick it up and bring it up close, it indeed turns out to be the same half-sunburst mask that the Dreamweaver was wearing.
"Wake up."
A myriad of violent images cascade before your eyes, and at all once you begin to remember what happened. The hissing voice inside your head and the sudden realization of what you've done makes you drop the mask and take a step backwards. There's absolutely no way those visions could have been real. You were completely hapless against the Dreamweaver and on death's door before you passed out. But yet here you are, in better shape than you were before you entered the Cloud, and the Dreamweaver is, well...nowhere to be found.
Trying to avert your gaze from the mess on the wall, you notice something else lying on the ground a short distance away. Upon further inspection, it turns out to be Mariko's handgun. It's heavier than you expected it to be as you turn it over in your hands, and its grip seems strangely cold. Holding the weapon that almost killed you makes you uncomfortable, so you tuck it into your jacket for the time being so that you can return it to Mariko later.
Come to think of it, you haven't seen Mariko since you woke up. Casting a more scrutinizing gaze across the food court, you spy a small figure on the ground near one of the shredded awnings.
"Mariko!"
You dash over to her body and gently turn her onto her back. To your relief, she's unharmed and still breathing, her chest rising and falling in a gentle rhythm.
"Mariko, can you hear me? You gotta wake up!"
You give her shoulders a brief shake, and a small groan escapes her lips. Her hand rises to rub her eyelids open and she yawns loudly.
"Tetsuo-kun? What's going on?"
Suddenly, thin, white lines form across the sky, seeming to split the world into giant segments. Then, one by one, each segment falls away to reveal bits and pieces of the city you know behind them. When the last one vanishes, you and Mariko are left sitting in the middle of the parking lot outside of a church. In the distance off to your left, the last rays of the setting sun sparkle off the surface of the river, its banks straddled by the bridge.
The Cloud is gone.
"Do you remember anything?" you ask, hoping that she might be able to tell you something, anything, about how or why she came to the Cloud. She shakes her head.
"Nnh...no...maybe...I don't know. Sorry, Tetsuo-kun, but my head seriously hurts right now." With some effort, she pulls herself into a sitting position. You immediately move your hand to steady to her, but she catches your arm and pushes it away. "It's all right, I'm okay. I know there's a lot you probably want to talk about, but right now, I'd really just like to go home. Everything seems like it's just one huge, confusing blur...like trying to hold onto a dream after you wake up."
"That's fine," you say. "Tomorrow, then. Let's go."
"That sounds great. Thanks," she says with a weak smile. You help her up, and with one arm around your shoulders, the two of you finally head towards home.
