The next morning dawns quietly, and you eat breakfast alone. Today, it's a breakfast bar and a glass of orange juice. No television buzzing idly in the background, no clatter of dishes as Dad sets the table and brings food out of the kitchen, no hurried glimpses of Mom with breakfast hanging from her mouth as she dashes out the door. Instead, you glance across the living room towards the door to their room. It's shut tight, a simple message that lets you know that whatever happened last night couldn't be cured by a thumb of brandy.

You finish your food in morose silence, grab your things for the day, and prepare to leave. You're tempted to rap on the door to check on your mother's state, but the fear of what you'll find cures you of that. Instead, you open the Book of Avalon, only to find that the text that usually greets you upon startup has changed:

Dream forever

The Soul awakens

Into Shadow

The Self is taken.

The brazen declaration sends chills rippling down your back, and you madly swipe towards the most recent entries. Just as Saito and Hoga had boasted, the list of dreams has become sprawling, stretching on and on to the point where your scroll bar shrinks to the barest speck. Despite this, you're unable to find any entries regarding court cases or murderers among the most recent ones, which gives you enough peace of mind to step out the door.

As you cross one of the busier intersections on your route to school, you try not to think about how many Shadows must be masquerading in the teeming masses surrounding you, how many overlapping layers of reality and dream must be intersecting at this very moment. The concept is more dizzying than it's ever been, made all the more disquieting by the very ordinariness of it all. It would be almost comforting for there to be some kind of chaos present, some kind of confirmation that things are as wrong as you know they are.

Then you notice the butterflies.

The first one you spot is perched on the shoulder of a stooped, balding man walking several steps ahead of you, idly folding and unfolding its ebon wings. The next flutters past overhead after a girl from your school shoos it away from her ear.

"Ugh, go away! What's with these things?" she complains to her friend.

"I dunno," the other girl answers, "but I've already seen a couple of 'em flying around. Why do you think they're black? It's so weird!"

"I don't know, do I look like an expert on bugs?"

By the time you reach school, you see several more of the things flitting around the swarms of people going about their morning routines. If they're starting to appear in your world now, things must be getting more dire than you'd anticipated. After all, there's only one place you've ever seen them before.

Fortunately, classes turn out to be a welcome reprieve from the troubles waiting outside the school walls. Exams are coming up next week, and all your teachers have launched into review mode with feverish intent. Seeing as you haven't done a lick of studying recently, the urgency is a nice distraction, and you're grateful for the opportunity to focus on something normal for a change.

However, you're pleasantly surprised to find that you haven't forgotten much of the material you've covered this trimester, if any. You've never been a particularly bad student in the past, but this year's coursework just feels easier for some reason. You're able to complete Otomuji's study guide well before the end of the period, and she even compliments you on your responses. Then again, she's been much more agreeable in general since you returned from summer vacation. Maybe she got lucky on a dating site.

With plenty of downtime before the next period, you prop your textbook open on your desk and pretend to study while you stare out the window and let your mind wander. It settles upon the contents of those visions that have been imposing themselves upon you during your expeditions into the Clouds.

Their frequency suggests that they carry some sort of personal importance to you and Mariko, seeing as you're the only ones who have ever experienced them. Yet, while Mariko's are directly linked to her memories, you have no recollection of the events you've seen. They're vivid as life, tinged with a certain nostalgia, but stubbornly foreign. In fact, one of the most recent ones, the scene from that tiny, rain-soaked yard, was almost certainly framed from Nisekao's point of view. Or so you assumed based on the wheelchair and the stark lack of sensation you felt below your waist.

But if these awful memories do, in fact, belong to him, why are you the one seeing them? Why is this even happening at all? The best guess you can muster is that your powers could be making you extra-perceptive towards others' trauma, but even that feels like a shaky explanation. Ultimately, the only way to know for sure is to ask him, and you resolve to do just that at lunch. Hopefully, he trusts you enough to want to talk about it.

As soon as the lunch bell rings, you slip out of the classroom before Mariko or Hayate can flag you down. It doesn't feel great to give them the slip like this, but you're sure that they'll want to talk about Gin, and you're not ready to return to that conversation yet.

A peek through the windows into 2-C reveals that Nisekao isn't having lunch in his classroom, and a quick sweep of the rooms in the old building turns up nothing as well. You've never known him to eat in the cafeteria, but you stop by anyways only to find that he's not there, either. Something's not right.

Just then, you feel your pocket buzzing. In all your wandering around campus, you've missed several texts from Nisekao, all of them bearing the same terse message:

[Locker room]

You swallow hard, and your chest tightens with anger. Without a second thought, you barrel around the side of the school, past the track, and towards the long, low building that houses the athletic facilities. Fishing your Disciplinary Committee armband out of your pocket and pushing through a gaggle of startled runners, you sprint down the short hallway towards the boy's locker room and stop just outside. Although your entire being wants to bust right in and start raising hell, it might be a better idea to enter quietly and figure out what's going on first. Or at least, that's probably what Shibutani would have you do. You turn the handle as gently as you can and slip inside.

The musty, humid room is empty save for two students you don't recognize leaning up against a closed stall in the back, one with short, buzzed hair, and the other wearing a pair of prescription sports glasses. Whether they're keeping Nisekao in or he's keeping them out is unclear, but their cocky expressions and body language suggest that the situation's hardly friendly either way.

"P-Please, just give them back. L-Lunch is almost over, and s-someone's going to wonder where we are."

The two boys exchange glances, then burst into derisive laughter.

"Really? Oh damn! I guess you'd better hurry up and make a decision, then!"

The short-haired boy shifts his weight up against the stall door, and you notice that's he holding a bundle under his arm that looks an awful lot like your school uniform.

"Wh-Why are you doing this? I've n-never even talked to you guys before! J-Just let me out and give me my clothes back!"

The boy with the glasses bangs on the door, and you can hear a scrabbling sound coming from within.

"Because you can't mind your own business, shitwit! Like we're just gonna let you tell the teachers that you saw us in the girl's locker room?"

"Yeah, like, you saw, didn'tcha?" says the short-haired boy, shifting Nisekao's uniform under his other arm. "That's a lotta trouble we gotta deal with now 'cause of you. Like, if we got suspended, that'd be your fault, right?"

"I-I'm sorry! If you want, I w-won't tell anyone, just please stop this!"

"Like hell you won't! Nasty little freak like you goes runnin' to Shibutani any damn chance he gets! You think we don't know about Shibata-kun? You're gonna rat us out the instant we let you leave."

The boy with the glasses fishes around in the pocket of his gym pants, and dangles a pair of white panties over the stall door.

"All you gotta do is tell the teacher that you were the one that took these, and we're all square. Otherwise, we'll just have to put your uniform through a spin cycle in the stall next door and let you sort it out from there." He pokes his head into the adjacent stall and immediately pulls it back out in disgust. "Yech, doesn't look like the last guy flushed."

You've heard enough.

"You guys have five seconds to hand over that uniform and get outta here before I do something I regret," you say, stepping out from behind a row of lockers. However, your words don't have quite the effect you'd hoped, as once the boys get over the initial shock of being caught, they round on you wearing annoyed looks.

"The hell're you?"

The short-haired boy gives you a quick once-over before his gaze lands on your armband, and realization dawns on him.

"Ah. Go figure. It's Katsuji, Shibutani's bitch. Almost forgot you hung out with this freak. This isn't any of your business, so you can piss off, okay?"

It takes a remarkable amount of self-control not to throw a punch right there and then, but you'd rather not make things difficult for Shibutani – if you can help it.

"What, did I not make myself clear? Give me the uniform and leave now, and maybe I'll massage my report a little so you won't get suspended."

The boy with the glasses scoffs gives his partner an incredulous jab in the ribs.

"Man, didja hear that? He's gonna write us up!"

Then, without breaking eye contact with you, he takes the bundle of clothes from his friend, sidesteps into the stall next to Nisekao's, and drops it into the toilet.

"Go on, then. Do it. At least now it'll be worth it."

Their snickering blows up into full-on bawdy laughter, and the last tenuous strand of restraint in your body snaps. Bereft of rational thought and consumed by white-hot fury, you lunge at the boy in the glasses, seizing him by the throat and slamming him into the wall. The tinkle of shattered ceramic tile registers faintly in your ears as you effortlessly peel his body out of the fresh dent in the wall and toss him across the room like a toy, crumpled and unconscious.

Blood pounds in your ears as you revel in the sudden inhuman strength pulsing through your body, and you turn on the other student. He might be making some last-ditch plea for leniency, but it's impossible to tell through your blurred vision and the beat of your heart. You feel yourself hurl him to floor, driving your fists relentlessly into his skull until blood starts to mix with the water and sweat covering the ground.

Your mind soars as you lay into this trash, this human filth, spurred on by a cocktail of adrenaline and the transcendent sense of blissful vindication. You feel powerful, powerful in a way you've only ever felt with a Persona at your side. Although you weren't the target of these bastards' torment, you feel awash with ecstasy as each and every brutal punch feeds some shriveled, forgotten corner of your brain the revenge it craves.

"Kill him, Tetsuo! Kill him!"

Nisekao's chilling command cuts through the fog obscuring your judgment like a blade of light, and you regain control of yourself. You stumble back from the sobbing, bloodied mess beneath you. A certain numbing dread fills the void your anger left behind as you realize just what it was you were about to do.

The short haired boy drags himself over to his partner, and, to your relief, is able to shake him awake. The two glance back at you, tremoring in abject terror as they attempt to stagger to their feet and flee.

"Just fuck off," you spit, unable to muster any sort of emotion beyond empty hatred.

"And don't let me catch you near him again," you call after them as they hobble out of the locker room as fast their battered bodies are able.

Nisekao grabs you by the shoulder and spins you around to face him, still in his gym uniform and glaring at you with a mixture of relief and betrayal.

"What's the matter? Why did you stop?"

You turn away, studying the spidery cracks and chips you've taken out of the walls and floor. God, they're probably going to get you for property damage on top of fighting. How on Earth did you manage to do that?

"I…I didn't wanna kill them," you lie. "I think they got the point. Besides, looks like I'm gonna be in enough trouble as it is."

Nisekao exhales sharply and wheels around again to lock eyes with you.

"Don't worry about getting in trouble. They might not even go to the teachers unless they want to admit that they were stealing from the girls' locker room. Besides! Even if they do, I'll vouch for you!"

His chin drops, and a wan smile plays across his lips.

"Making sure people like them get what they deserve…you're doing everyone a service. If I were you, I'd never apologize for taking things into your own hands."

The sheer contempt dripping from those words takes you aback. It's like you're not even speaking to the same person. But then again, perhaps you could say the same of yourself just a few moments ago. Something about that power you felt is still resonating deep within.

"H-Hey…I know you're mad. I am too. You haven't done a damn thing to earn this, and I don't get it. Maybe that's what hurts the most, y'know? But it's gonna get better. And if doesn't happen on its own, then I'm gonna make it happen. I'll always have your back, Nisekao, so just point me at whoever's giving you shit, and I'll fix it."

Nisekao sighs deeply, and his usual disposition floods back in.

"Of course you will, Tetsuo. I can always count on you. I j-just wish you could say the same about me."

"What are you talking about? We rely on you all the time. Did you already forget about beating Saito at mahjong?"

"O-Oh, yeah. That. I m-mean, that was one thing, but I'd still like to be able to do something b-bigger than that."

You give his shoulder a friendly squeeze.

"Don't worry about it. You don't have anything to prove to us. For now, let's just get outta here before anyone else shows up."

You don't have to stick your head into the open stall to know that Nisekao's uniform is ruined, so you help him change out of his gym clothes and let him borrow your uniform instead. Oddly enough, it's a perfect fit. As for you, you decide to pull on your own gym uniform for the rest of day. You'll get some odd looks, but since you haven't had gym yet this week, at least you won't reek, too.

"Thanks," Nisekao mutters.

"No problem," you reply, and a thought strikes you. "Hey, I was actually looking for you before I saw your texts. Do you wanna just ditch the rest of the day and go get food somewhere?"

He shoots you a skeptical glance.

"Are you sure about that?"

"You don't have to if you don't want to, but I figured maybe you'd wanna get away from school for a bit."

Of course, that's really more you speaking. You doubt you'll be able to have the kind of conversation you want to have if you stay here. Not to mention that the idea of sitting in class and waiting to be called to the principal's office doesn't hold much appeal.

The limp-haired boy chews his lip in thought before eventually agreeing to come with you.

"L-Let's swing by my house while we're out, too. Th-That way I can say that I asked you to come with me for a ch-change of clothes."

The two of you leave the athletic building just as the bell rings to signal the end of lunch. The halls are swarming with students scurrying towards back to their homerooms, and you're able to use the crowds as cover as you make your way through the main building without being noticed by any of the staff. Once you're past the front gate and onto the street, you finally feel like you're able to breathe again. Sure, there'll probably be hell to pay later, but for now, all you want is to put as much distance between you and that locker room as possible.

Since you're the one who sprang this on him, you let Nisekao choose where to eat. He takes you to an older, more residential part of town where the houses and shops are smaller, and favor more traditional sensibilities. There's something comforting and familiar about walking along the narrow sidewalks, past stores clad in peeling, faded paint with aging arcade cabinets and gashapon machines squatting out front like old men, past rows and rows of little, poor houses peering out at you from behind slump-block walls.

You had nearly forgotten that places like this still existed in Toshima, yet when you stop outside the beef bowl restaurant with its bright red façade and chubby cow mascot grinning at you from the sign above the doorway, the memories come flooding back to you. This used to be your favorite restaurant back when you were young and you would beg the kindly old chef behind the counter to hold the bean sprouts. Birthday after birthday, you'd come here with Mom and Dad until…until…

You don't remember why you stopped coming. Like so much of your childhood, those moments shift and slip through your fingers, elusive as smoke.

"Oh? You, too?" says Nisekao with a smile when you tell him what you remember. "I a-always liked coming here for my birthday as well. G-Great minds think alike, huh?"

Inside, everything is just as you remember it, from the smell of garlic and ginger hanging in the air to the stains on the countertops, all the way down to the same chef waving you to your seat with his bright, button black eyes gleaming out from the pouches in his wizened old face. The food's also just as wonderful as it ever was, as you and Nisekao dig into identical bowls piled high with succulent beef and not a single sprout to be found.

Once you've finished and paid, with your waists tighter and spirits lighter, you set off farther down the street towards Nisekao's house. With nostalgia heavy on your minds, you find yourselves sharing stories from when you were younger. It isn't until you're halfway through telling Nisekao about the time you emptied Dad's wallet to get the secret rare Featherman figure from a gashapon machine that you realize just how much of this you'd forgotten up until now. It's like someone's finally unstuck a long-rusted tap in your head and let all the backed-up memories flow out.

"I was sure Dad was going to throw all of my toys away after that," you tell him, "so I was floored when he actually let me keep it. Well, in his room, that is. Until I paid him back with my allowance. Which I did five years later. By then, I don't even think I wanted it anymore. I wonder if he still has it?"

Nisekao chuckles and stares up at you wistfully.

"Your dad's a wonderful person, Tetsuo. He reminds me a lot of mine."

"I've never heard you talk about your family much. What are your folks like?" you venture. This might be your best chance to bring up those scenes from your visions. The grimace you get in return indicates that you've touched on a sore subject.

"M-My mom is…great, really. I l-love her more than anyone else in the whole world. She works really long hours at the factory, so she's never home much, though."

Your stomach twinges thinking about your own mother.

"Yeah…mine's kinda the same way."

Nisekao's eyes widen and he waves his arms apologetically.

"I-I'm n-not upset by it or anything! It's just…I feel bad that she has to work so hard because of me. I take a couple medications, and they can be sort of expensive. Plus, my chair has gotten…broken…a couple times at school." His jaw clenches. "…so we've had to replace that, too. It's way t-too much for her to handle. Ever since we lost Dad, I mean."

There it is. You swallow hard to push the dread down further, but it merely catches in your throat.

"Nisekao…I'm sorry man, but what the hell?"

You know it can't come anywhere close to mending the wounds in this poor boy's heart, but you lean over and pull him into an embrace filled with as much compassion as you can summon, hopefully enough to communicate how much you wish that literally anything had ever gone differently for him.

"I-It's all right, Tetsuo," he says. It's a flat tone, one accustomed to telling the same lie over and over. As you pull back, you steel yourself for what you have to ask next.

"It…"

You almost stop. It would be so much easier and less cruel to just drop the subject and move on. But the memories insist. You have to know.

"It was a car accident, wasn't it?"

He freezes, statue-still, and responds without looking at you.

"So you know."

"Then those things I've been seeing in the Cloud really are your memories. I'm sorry I never told you before, but I wasn't exactly sure until recently."

When he finally gazes back at you, the smile he wears is tired beyond measure, and in the dark of his pupils, there's a grim emptiness that stretches for eons and eons.

"Don't apologize. That world is a weird and wonderful place, isn't it? Everyone's hearts and minds are just a little bit closer there. I think that, maybe, I was so desperate to share myself with someone, that my mind reached out to yours on its own. I guess that if anyone was to know what happened that night, I'm glad that it was you."

Your heart feels suffocated beneath the weight of crushing pity and disbelief at the unfathomable cruelty with which fate has toyed with him. It ties your tongue in knots and robs you of the ability to express even the slightest condolence.

"What do I say?"

The thought escapes unbidden, but Nisekao shrugs it off. A practiced reaction.

"It is what it is. There are some things that can't be fixed with the right words or attitude. After a while, the last thing you want to hear is empty advice, like fixing my legs or bringing Dad back is a math problem that I could solve with just a little perseverance. Maybe, for things like this, saying nothing is fine."

And so, for a while, the two of you remain. Standing there, the world exhales, twinges, allows the pain to be felt, and the moment passes, respected.

"...Have you ever thought about using the Book of Avalon?" you say at last. If you're to move forward from this moment, you need him to at least tell you that much.

"Every single day since the day we discovered it."

"Then, why haven't you?"

"I c-could never do that to you guys. You're the only ones who r-respect me for who I am."

He pauses and fidgets nervously with the buttons on his sleeves.

"I-If I did…would we have to fight?"

"I…" You sigh deeply and lean back against a railing. "…No. I don't think I could do that. Not everyone who uses the Book is the same. Hayate, Koharu, Hoga…I don't wanna say that their problems weren't real, but I don't think they really needed to become Shadows. They just needed a second chance, or a new perspective. I don't regret saving them.

"But on the other hand, well, it's like you said - there are some things you just can't fix. Not in our world, at least. If existing as a Shadow gives someone a better life, and they're not hurting anyone, then it doesn't seem right to take that away."

"You're thinking about Saito, aren't you?" Nisekao asks.

"Of course I am!" you blurt, a little louder than you'd intended. "I-I saw all those bruises on Souichiro-senpai's body! I was convinced that Saito's Shadow was a monster! But that whole time we were in his dream, he never stopped trying to talk us down. He knew that he was the last good part of a rotten man's heart, and all he ever wanted was to be able to love his kid again. And now…senpai might never know that."

A fit of curiosity seizes Nisekao as you say this, and his brow screws up in confusion.

"Wait, y-you talked to Souichiro-senpai? B-Before we went into the Cloud?"

"Ah, yeah. Shibutani and I did. We're on Student Council, and Shibutani's pretty close with him, so he thought it'd only be fair to let him know that something was up with his dad. We didn't tell him anything important, of course."

"And senpai t-told you that his father was abusing him?"

"Yeah…he showed us."

You try not to think about Souichiro's battered body too hard. Beside you, Nisekao's confusion deepens.

"I-I believe you, but…how's that possible? Saito's Shadow l-loved Souichiro-senpai, right? So how did senpai remember what his father used to be like?"

Now you're starting to lose track of what's going on. Seeing the puzzled look on your face, Nisekao pushes forward.

"Sh-Shouldn't Saito's Shadow have changed his perception? Th-That's how it worked before, right? When a Shadow takes over, everyone forgets how that person used to be. A-Actually, how did Souichiro-senpai still have any bruises to show you at all?"

Holy shit, he's right. Realization strikes you like a boxer's right hook, leaving you stunned and cursing yourself for not noticing sooner. That fucking snake.

"Nisekao, we're heading back to school."

"Wh-What, now?" he stammers with the air of someone who vaguely regrets what he's gotten himself into.

"Yeah, screw it. I don't care if they try to suspend me, this can't wait."

Nisekao wheels around in front of you, blocking your path.

"T-Tetsuo, what are you planning on doing?"

"I dunno, but I want you to call Shibutani and tell him to meet us at the Student Council Room. I don't know that this is gonna go well."