Persona 5: Daywatch
Sunday, 12 June 2016
Evening
Kanda Catholic Church
Akira set his bishop down, threatening her silver general and king. "My cyberdisk lines up on your governor. Check!"
For the first game in a very long time, Hifumi paused, her green eyes darting from this square to that. "Dark inferno rock!" Her hand snatched her knight, taking his bishop and setting her knight down where it once rested.
Akira sat on the edge of his seat. So close. "Battle droid strike!" He took her knight.
Her pink lips spread in a smile. "Your machines will learn fear!" She moved a rook all the way onto his pawn. "Gurthang Attack!"
Father Sugiyama came to a stop beside the pew, his hands folded behind him and gave a brief incline of his head. "Son, Daughter. I could hear you from the confessional booth."
Blushing, Hifumi covered her face with her hands. "I'm so sorry, Father."
The priest allowed a hint of an amused smile to slip out of his ever patient expression. "I understand the spark of enthusiasm is a trait of the young, and encourage you two to continue your rivalry… but somewhere besides the sanctuary? I'm afraid I have other parishioners to tend to."
Hifumi stood to give a deep bow. "Please forgive our disruption, Father." Coming back up, she tucked some errant hair behind her ear. "Would you like another game elsewhere?"
With the pair no longer locked in an enthralling escalation, Akira couldn't help but follow the slender digits, or keep from noticing the strands of long, dark hair she missed. His hands twitched and he shoved them in his pockets. She'd call the cops on him for sure if he did something as weird as running his fingers through her luxurious hair. Mouth dry, he swallowed and tried to come up with an excuse to depart.
Her brows rose and pinched together as those gorgeous deep-forest-green eyes widened just a little.
"O-okay," his mouth blurted. In the privacy of his own mind, his alter ego bashed his head against the sanctuary wall for sounding like a bludgeoned toddler.
She straightened her mauve dress with a smile and they departed for a noodle hut.
Akira thought he saw someone following them, but when they sat down unbothered he shrugged off the paranoia. He needed to find a way to deal with his crowd anxiety. As they set up for another game, he asked, "How long have you been playing?"
Setting her elbow on the table, she rested her chin in her hand, eyes gazing into the distance. This close to her, he couldn't help but look into the faint amber ring around her pupils like an island in a sea of soft green. Hifumi pursed her pink lips. "Hm. It's hard to think of a time I wasn't playing. Papa taught me before I started primary school, and I played at school clubs now and then. I think it was the tournament in fourth grade when I started having trouble balancing school work, trying to make friends, and shogi." Her smile twisted and she looked to the board. "But the things I worried about juggling was homework and friends."
Akira thought back to the number of kids who made fun of him when he read books without pictures all the time at each of his primary schools. Even though they were the only things he could read his old bastard wouldn't hit him for. "Shogi wasn't even a question for you."
"Yes, exactly." The twisting of Hifumi's lips blossomed into a wide smile and his face burned. "What about you, Akira-kun? You've only mentioned playing it at your last school's chess club."
His stomach did backflips that she remembered such a small detail from weeks ago. He took a sip of the tea he ordered when they came in, glad that they hadn't gotten the food yet. As much as his insides were bouncing around right now, he feared he'd have tossed everything over the board. Akira straightened his glasses and tried to will his heart to slow down. "I think the first time I played was Tanizaki Middle School, or at least I had to ask for the rules again there. After that, I always wanted another shot at it because it's always a challenge."
Hifumi's smile sharpened and a gleam sparkled in her eye. "Well you know I'm always up for a game." With that, since she won the toss, she moved a pawn forward. "And so the soldiers of Lothlorien march forward."
Monday, 13 June 2016
Morning
Shibuya Station
Tides of humanity ebbed and flowed in the underground station around Akira. Despite the clean walls and lighting, the chaos of dozens of conversations raised his hackles and he pushed his way through the foot traffic until he spotted someone wave at him from one of the tile-covered support pillars. Eager to get a moment away from being shoved every which direction, he headed for the dark head next to the bad blond dye-job. "Hi Yuuki, Ryuji."
Grumping, Ryuji kicked at the tile.
"Didn't sleep?" Akira slipped his hands in his pockets and looked over the runner, then around. Mishima shrugged.
Ryuji's lips pressed into a thin line. "I'm still ticked about that damn Akechi. Makin' us out ta be the same goddamn thugs as Kaneshiro's drug pushers."
Akira shrugged and took place in between his classmates as they headed for street level. They still pressed against him in the jostle of the crowd, but having a steady eye on them helped soothe over the prickle of something unknown coming at him. "Nothing to do but prove him wrong through action. Us mulling over it's not going to change his mind. So you ready to, uh, go… spelunking today?"
Ryuji's eyebrows shot up. "What?"
Akira groaned, his eyes flitting around. "I'm trying not to be completely obvious in public, Ryuji." He leaned closer and whispered, "I mean check Mementos for new names."
The runner maintained the are-you-crazy look. "Uh, how the hell's anyone s'posed to get Mementos from spunk?"
Akira bristled, trying not to note Mishima looking distinctly away. "Hey, it's underground."
Morgana popped his head out of Akira's bag. "I can't believe I'm going to say this, but I've gotta side with Ryuji on this. You've got to use clever code words and convene with the other Phantom Thieves first so we know what you're talking about. You can't just spring strange words on us out of no-where."
When his class representative bumped into him, Akira looked over to see Ann slip out of the crowd to join them, taking place next to him as the class representative sped up. "What strange words?"
"Antidisestablishmentarian," Akira rattled off without missing a beat.
Ryuji and Morgana groaned, but Ann's head whipped around, one of her voluminous pigtails slapping him in the face. She brushed down her pigtail. "Sorry. I just… think someone's following me. I haven't had the hair on the back of my neck stand up like this since I was avoiding Kamoshida."
All three boys in the group stiffened. Ryuji shielded his eyes despite the group still being underground. "I bet there's tons o' perverts that'd creep on you, Ann. You're an actual model."
She shivered. "That feels like a backhanded compliment."
Seeing nothing distinctive but the tides of dark-haired people, and a small scattering of different school uniforms, Akira grumbled. "What's your stalker look like?"
Ann glanced over her shoulder again and bit her lip, her expression reminding him of his own trepidation in crowds. "Dark blue hair and even taller than you. I think he's wearing white, but I'm not sure."
Slipping off his school satchel, Akira handed it to Ryuji and drew his phone. "I'll keep the chat up, tell me if I pass him."
Morgana popped his head out. "Don't do anything rash, Joker."
Ryuji yawned. "Whyzzit gotta be some big deal so early?"
Ann shot him a glare. "Thanks for caring so much."
"I'll take care of this," Akira said before pushing into the crowd. When someone pushed back before he could even spot Ann's stalker, he started having second thoughts. An elbow jammed him in the ribs. Akira backed up and readied a fist when his phone buzzed in his other hand.
[That's him!] Ann sent.
[The bowl cut?]
[No, the guy you backed into.]
Akira spun around and spied a tall, blue-haired boy with a white jacket get on the escalator fifteen people behind Ann. Akira shoved through the tide of humanity. Whoever it was must be hyper-focused on Ann, because even after pushing to within three people and getting called out twice for pushing, Blue Hair never looked back.
The tide of people broke onto Central Street. Ann stopped just past a street light, Ryuji and Mishima forming a wall between her and Blue Hair.
Akira decided not to wait until Blue Hair pushed through. Two paces away, he grabbed Blue Hair's wrist and thrust it into the small of his back, directing him to the concrete wall. "Okay, first, you're going to leave the nice lady alone. Second, you're going to explain why you're perving on Ann."
Blue Hair fumed. "How dare you sully my artistic aspirations with such base accusations! And unhand me!"
Unwilling to make a scene, Akira released.
Ryuji approached and the rest followed. "Whaddya want? You get your jollies stalkin' our classmate?"
Blue Hair drew himself up to his full height and sniffed with disdain. "I've done no such thing."
Ann jabbed a finger, pushing between the two boys. "You've been following me since I got off the train!"
Blue Hair took her pointing hand with both of his. "This world is filled with greys, but I sense passion in you that shines brighter than the sun! Even flustered, your beauty puts the magnificent Camille Doncieux to shame. You're the woman I've been searching for my whole life!"
Ann's cheeks blushed and she gaped.
Akira made a mental note to steal that line, and put away his phone.
Blue Hair tightened his hands over hers. "You must let me paint you!"
The image of Blue Hair stroking a paintbrush over Ann's naked body sprang to mind. Akira cringed and mentally kicked himself for thinking of his friend like that. He swallowed, his mouth feeling parched and pants tight.
Mishima put himself between Blue Hair and Ann, shoving Blue Hair's hands away. "Who do you think you are?"
Blue Hair brushed back at the bangs hanging over his eyebrows. "You're right. In my artistic zeal, I've forgotten my manners." He stepped around Mishima to face Ann directly, and gave a flourished bow at the waist. "Kitagawa Yusuke, second year at Kosei High. I am a pupil of Madarame-sensei."
Mishima took a step back. "The Madarame? The painter of a thousand styles?"
Ann's eyes widened. "Oh, I know that guy! He was on Good Morning Japan on KFTV."
Morgana looked at the group from Akira's satchel. "Didn't we hear that name from Mementos?"
"Akira, Shujin. Second year." Akira glanced at the track star, taking a small bit of comfort at the subtle shrug hinting that the runner didn't know who the artist was either. Akira knew the name, but not from anywhere good. Assuming it was the same guy. "For those of us who grew up in the mountains, who's that guy?"
A honk from the street drew their attention and the rear window on a shiny black car opened. "Yusuke-kun!"
Kitagawa grimaced, but drew back from Ann. "Sorry, Sensei! I'll be there in but a moment." He dug into the pockets in his uniform jacket for a moment before producing a handful of tickets on glossy paper and thrust them at Ann. "Things have been very busy, having to reschedule Madarame-sensei's exhibition, but I will be there for the opening this weekend. I beg you to come. Please tell me if you will be my model." He cast a narrower gaze at Ryuji and Akira. "I've my doubts about your interest in fine arts, but to show my honest, artistic intentions I even extended tickets to you."
He dashed for the car and Akira spied a cushy, dark leather interior.
Morgana growled from his satchel. "That shady character dared go after Lady Ann? I'll remember him!"
Ann tucked the tickets into her school bag. "Well, now that I actually talked with him, the guy only seems a little eccentric. Not like creepos who typically proposition me on the way to school. And an art show sounds fun. A better scene than hospitals or dark subways."
Akira blinked. "Typically propositions you?"
Morgana gawked up at her from the satchel. "Don't tell me that suspicious character's theatrics have snared your heart."
"What?" Ann jerked. "No." Her blue eyes met Akira's. "What is it?"
He shrugged. "Probably nothing. Let's get to school."
Monday, 13 June 2016
After School
Shujin, Class 2-D
Akira flipped back through his history book to fill out his handwritten notes stuffed on notebook sheets between the pages.
Before he could finish the first chart, the sound of Mishima standing up interrupted the usual noise of winding down conversations and hurried students packing to go. "Kurusu, clean up duty."
Akira bit down a curse. Everybody got end-of-day cleaning duty eventually, but getting called out for it by his family name when the representative knew he didn't like it just felt rude. Finishing the timeline plot for history class, the transfer student packed up and turned to the representative, who lingered with his jaws clenched together.
The other students, glad to weasel out of being volunteered for the job, packed up and scattered for home or other study locations. Mishima himself stayed standing next to his desk, looking down at his phone. The keys of his virtual keyboard clacked, paused, then clacked as he read and shot out text messages. After a few moments, he slipped his phone in his pocket and looked up. "I was just getting in touch with Ryuji. We need to check out that shady artist who made moves on Ann this morning."
Morgana poked his head out from the desk. "That's right! As gentlemen, we have to protect Lady Ann's honor."
Akira pointed to the desk at the left side of the room where she sat. "If you wanted to talk with her, she was right there a few minutes ago."
Mishima's hands slid further in his pockets and he looked away with a blush on his cheeks. "I… I didn't want to worry her. Or bother her, in case that Kitagawa guy really is just some eccentric artist." He pulled out the ticket. "I know it happens sometimes, Ann mentioned guys coming up to her with bad pickup lines once a week. And usually outside school. But if he's willing to stalk her before you made him just talk in the open, that could be a red flag."
Akira tilted his head. "I thought dudes being too chicken to come right out to girls they liked was the Japanese standard? I didn't start reading manga until recently, but I didn't exactly see any different even in fiction."
Mishima took his right hand out to rub his arm, though his dark eyes remained fixed on the floor and the blush all over his face. "Well, people do dumb things in fiction to draw out the story. That was ninety percent of manga like Ranma one-half. But this is reality. What if today was just the first day we spotted him?"
Morgana peeked out. "That's right. What if he's been stalking her for days? What if he still does it tomorrow? We need to defend a lady's virtue."
Akira took his glasses off to rub the bridge of his nose. "I think she's plenty capable of defending her own virtue."
Mishima shifted his weight from foot to foot. "Isn't that all the more reason we should check on him, make sure Ann doesn't have anything to worry about? He might even been an unwitting stooge for Madarame."
Straightening his glasses, Akira shrugged. He and the class representative cleaned the chalkboards, erasers, and got halfway through wiping the desks before Ryuji slid the classroom's back door open. "Yo, Speedy."
Ryuji grinned and gave a nod. "So we're gonna be checkin' on Ann's creeper?" When the other two boys affirmed, he closed the door and helped them finish classroom cleanup.
After setting the brooms in the cabinet, Mishima turned to the others with a square to his shoulders the transfer student hadn't seen since the first week of school. "Okay, guys. If we're going to look up Madarame and his apprentice, the best place to get started is the internet. Journalists and social media influencers both love talking about big name artists, and Madarame's one of the biggest. The Newspaper Club has a computer bank, so we can get started in there."
Akira wiped his glasses clean and put them back on. "It wouldn't be weird to bring outside people to use club equipment?"
The representative shook his head. "Most articles are chosen by personal interest, so it's pretty frequent to bring friends in to help research." At the track star's shrug, he led them to the Newspaper Club in the practice building. A little smaller than the academic classrooms, a bank of computers took up the wall to the left. To the right sat tables with power and plugs for internet cables, a bulky printer machine in the far right corner. A set of shelves overflowing with books, magazines, and newspapers separated the computer third of the room from the tables.
A girl with black, shoulder-length hair looked up at them from the computer closest to the door. Akira gave a lazy wave. "Hi, Ishikawa-san." When she gave a shallow nod and turned back to her web search, he shrugged.
Ryuji leaned close and whispered, "She's cute. Classmate?"
"She's in class 2-C," Mishima said, drawing his hands from his pockets.
Ryuji sidled closer to the class representative, his eyes flicking from the girl to Mishima. "She a fan?"
Mishima grabbed the track star and pulled him further away down the hall and hissed, "You can't tell someone you're the Phantom Thief just to get a date! The Phantom Thief needs to be better than that. It's about ringing the truth out of the darkness and justice for the downtrodden and—"
Ryuji rolled his eyes and pushed the representative back. "Yeah, yeah. I gotcha, fanboi." The three all took a deep breath to try to work through the frustration and entered, passing Ishikawa to the computers on the far end of the room. "So whadda we gotta do?"
Mishima brought up a web browser. "Not sure yet, I've never looked for apprentices before. Maybe angry art collectors? As long as we keep an eye out for anything, we'll stumble across something important."
Scrolling down through ads and a trash magazine article about the Wonders of the Artist of a Thousand Styles, he found a small online news article mentioning Kitagawa in last year's Kosei High cultural fair. The next ten minutes proceeded with little better luck until Ryuji cringed and blurted, "Eff, man. Died before first responders arrived on scene. That means it wasn't instant."
Mishima and the transfer student both looked up from their computers to read the article on the runner's screen. "What a way to go." Mishima pulled up his phone and typed into it. "Sawamura Hitoshi." Setting his phone back on the table next to his mouse pad, the class representative slumped. "It's like everyone likes this Madarame guy, and almost nobody even notices Kitagawa."
Akira straightened his glasses. "That's suspicious. Nobody gets famous without making at least a few enemies. And what up-and-coming art students wouldn't want to promote themselves through their big-shot master's name?"
Mishima scratched his scalp. "Well, it's not like many articles spend time on the students. Until they break away and start doing their own works, the master is really the only one producing things to write about."
Ryuji pushed back from the computer bank. "This would be so much easier if we had a list of his goons."
Akira closed his browser and rubbed his eyes under his glasses. "They're apprentice painters, Ryuji."
The track star shrugged. "Whatevs. Listen, rep," he paused to look down to the team leader hiding in the transfer student's bag, "leader. It looks like there ain't nothin' here. If we're gonna spend all day trackin' down somethin', it should be that dude who survived Owner."
Mishima blinked. "Survived owning what?"
Akira felt all his muscles tense at the jerk who shrugged off every simulated shot and cost him a ridiculous amount of money resetting. "Cheater in Gun About. He'll run and dodge so it's not so easy to see, but he'll take a full magazine of bullets and never lose any health. Worse of all, he uses a goddamn number as part of his name. In place of a letter." He gestured a hand at Ryuji. "He introduced us to Gun About to practice, but this douche bag's been ruining peeps' time for months." He glanced to see Ishikawa still there, minding her own business. Just to be sure, Akira spoke in a hushed tone, "Ryuji texted us about it one night and we thought the player would make a good change of heart. We just can't figure out who he is or how to beat him. Only one player's ever beaten him, so that guy – The King – is our only clue."
Corners of his mouth curling up, Mishima held up a fist. "How can I help?"
Ryuji shrugged. "Well, most peeps I talk to are pretty sure he ain't playin' at home. Home cheaters are too easy to kick, and Gun About's done it before. But arcade player IDs are procedurally generated, so the same ID code might not be the same person. Or you just have to hit a different arcade an' you're griefin' peeps from a new ID. So console bans can only be temporary."
Mishima rubbed his chin. "That also might mean our man could be at any number of arcades. That might make it harder to find him, but could also make it easier to find witnesses who've seen the real player."
"Right," Ryuji said with a grin. "You ain't the only one who's good at investigatin'. Now I confirmed he's never been to the Gigolo in Shibuya, and the dudes there I talked to are pretty sure nobody's seen him further west." He brought up his phone and brought up a map with Gun About locations speckling Tokyo. "So he's gotta be at one of these places east of here. It's only thirty places—"
"Thirty?" Akira shouted.
Ishikawa shushed him.
Ryuji cleared his throat. "But between the three of us, we can definitely hit thirty places in a day. Since Makoto's busy with StuCo an' Ann's visitin' the hospital, I fig' we might as well. Not like we're goin' to Mementos today."
Akira had no argument to that and didn't feel like braving the loudest school library ever, so he followed the others to Shibuya, where they broke up to investigate ten each of the arcades with a Gun About station.
Monday, 13 June 2016
Early Evening
Akihabara, Electric Town
Akira dashed through the crowd, holding his school satchel close so it didn't swing when he made sudden changes of direction. People packed sidewalks as well as the road closed for a car show. He had no idea what the appeal was to painting gaudy representations of anime characters on an expensive car, but it made for a crowd almost as thick as Shibuya. He almost made it to the Gigolo Arcade when the diminutive team leader cried out from his bag. Akira slipped into a computer hardware and tool store across the street.
Morgana flopped part-way out of his school satchel and heaved breaths in and out. "You… really need to… learn to slow down."
"Sorry, but I don't know any other way to crowd-run," Akira said, knowing how awkward he sounded. To give both of them some time to catch their breath, he browsed and bought a set of small tongs for Morgana's lock pick crafting.
Before he got back on the road, he got a text from Mishima. [Finished. Two of my arcades were closed. Family emergency and installing new machines. Any luck at your end?]
Ryuji texted back, [I'm on my last one. Crossing my fingers he's here.]
[I'm on arcade number seven. I REALLY hope that jerk is here.] Akira glanced at the guide trapped in cat form hanging his head out of the satchel. [I think Morgana would have preferred to switch places. Since Ryuji introduced me to crowd running, he's been less interested in following along. Maybe it would have been better to send him with Ryuji.]
Morgana harrumphed. "Yeah, but then nobody'd be there to help you out of a scuffle on the street. You still have crowd phobia problems."
Akira rubbed the back of his neck, pausing inside the door to let a clump of middle schoolers gawking at a show car move on.
[Got it,] Mishima texted back. [I lost one of my metric screwdrivers, so I'm going to stop by Takanashi's place in Electric Town to get one. Maybe get some more laptop RAM.]
When the representative strode through the front, Akira chuckled and texted, [Heads up!]
Mishima made an inquisitive noise, then stopped a moment before walking into the transfer student. "Oh! I didn't think you had an arcade this close."
Akira closed the text app and brought up the map. "I thought I was going to trip over it by now, but I've never been to Akihabara before."
Slipping his phone in his pocket, Mishima rubbed his neck. "That's right, sometimes it's easy to forget how it's like to navigate these boroughs for the first time. I used to come here all the time when I was in middle school."
Morgana popped his head out of the satchel. "You weren't going to that maid café that smells like syrup, were you?"
Mishima's face did a remarkable impression of a tomato. "What? No! Just the computer shops!" He mumbled something about being too young. "Anyway, there's a Gigolo arcade just down this way." He paused to buy that replacement screwdriver and led the transfer student down the street to the arcade across the glitzy cars.
Three old men sat there scanning the pachinko machines at the front as if they could divine some great secret from the pattern of pegs. That or the anime girl in skimpy clothing painted on the backboard.
The inside was quieter than Shibuya's Gigolo arcade. The ambient music was the same, but fewer clusters of people milled around. Each group held their own conversations. Most of the half-dozen people in this smaller arcade focused on their own games.
Except a middle schooler in a blue varsity jacket and bright red hat stepping to keep a smaller middle schooler trapped against a crane game filled with snowmen almost as misshapen as the Junes bear mascot. "Pay up. It was fifty yen per one-headshot kill."
The smaller boy with a disheveled blue shirt sniffed. "B-but I only have three hundred yen left. What about the subway ticket home?" He tried to dodge left.
Blue Jacket intercepted the escape maneuver. He didn't raise a hand, but did bodily push the smaller boy back into the crane game. "You've got a transit pass, you don't need to buy a ticket." After the middle schooler handed over the coins, Blue Jacket stepped back and the small boy fled.
The transfer student stepped aside and watched the little shakedown artist count his coins, then pause when he realized someone watched him. Blue Jacket glared up at the transfer student, bringing the Get Smoked embroidered across the top into good enough light to read. "What?"
"What a little turd," Akira muttered.
Morgana popped onto his shoulder and shot him a hooded stare. "He reminds me of you."
"Hey!" Akira paused, realizing talking to the team leader in front of a civilian might not be a good idea. He cleared his throat and tried to look neutral, but interested. "Who're you?"
"Just another gamer." Blue Jacket's eyes flicked to Mishima for just a moment, then he stepped away from the crane game. "You can have your money eater." He trotted off to Gun About, dropped coins in the feeder slot, then did so at the next station. He picked up both pistol controllers and started playing.
Despite being a kid – or using two pistols at once – his game reflexes were preternatural.
"Even dual-wielding is too easy?" Mishima's eyes widened.
A college-aged kid kid came to a stop against the crane game next to Mishima. "So The King is back. Man, I wish I had time to stay, it's always a trip to watch him."
Akira texted Ryuji, [Found The King at the Gigolo in Electric Town.]
"The King?" Mishima curled one hand closed and glared at Blue Jacket's back. "The King is supposed to be the strongest player, someone to look up to. But when strength doesn't go with control, it's just another form of tyranny. Along with all forms of power come responsibility. Even participation in games comes with acceptance of an implied code of conduct for the better experience of the whole."
One of Blue Jacket's player screens turned red and a giant bullet-hole with spiderwebbed broken glass faded in across the screen. He glared at the class representative for a moment before his expression returned to bored disregard. "You're not just boring, you're a loser." He turned back to the game and tossed a grenade around a stack of timbers in the outdoor lumber yard of the game map.
Mishima's jaw flapped open twice before he hunched and slunk away.
The phone buzzed in the transfer student's hands and he looked down to see a text from Ryuji. [Just got on the train. I'll be there in five or six minutes.]
More people trickled around in the minutes that followed. Despite the transfer student's discomfort at the press of bodies from the ring forming around the young middle schooler, it wasn't enough to miss the spiky blond hair when Ryuji joined the crowd to gawk. When the game round ended, he elbowed the transfer student. "That's tote him! Let's play a game."
Blue Jacket turned, flashing that Get Smoked hat for only a moment as he stared at them with bored eyes. "Do what you want." He turned back to his game and tapped a card so he could continue playing with two controllers at once.
Deciding to back the runner up, Akira stepped up to the far controller. Still not knowing much about guns, all he could be sure of was it sat larger in his hands than the rifle controller the runner wielded. He picked the closest thing to a sub-machine gun the game list presented, but Blue Jacket curb stomped them for five minutes.
"You're totally The King!" Ryuji hopped back and forth on the balls of his feet. "I can't believe it. You gotta take out Owner with us."
Blue Jacket stared for a cold moment before turning back to the game. "I can still beat him, so I don't care."
Ryuji boggled. "But if you help us out, we could knock 'im down a peg."
Blue Jacket tisked. "So that's what you wanted. You're not just an arrogant loser, you just wanted to live through someone else's victory."
Akira set down his controller and stepped up to the runner's side. "He's invincible. Cheating to ruin everyone else's time." He slipped his hands in his pockets.
Blue Jacket tilted his head up just enough to make the arch of one eyebrow. "What do you care? Just don't play."
"Eff this. I'll find him somewhere else." Ryuji stormed out.
Akira pursed his lips. "Good guys don't let bad guys win."
Blue Jacket smiled. "You're dangerous. Like the quiet ones." The kid dove both his characters into cover, then turned away from his game to scrutinize the transfer student. "You sound like the Phantom Thief who took down that nasty coach, and all those gangers on the street." A beat passed. "You a fan too?"
Akira spread his hands and widened his stance to give Blue Jacket a good view of his Shujin uniform. "Changed more than just the coach. Six people including the principal who were covering things up went to jail. Just goes to show change never stops with just one heart."
Blue Jacket's eyes wavered and the transfer student knew he won. "Even so, teaching you to beat that cheating loser won't be easy. What would I get out if it?"
Akira pointed at Gun About. "The more people like that cheater that are there, the more cheaters and toxic people that will be here. And the fewer people that are fun to play against that will stay. If you can't teach us how to beat him and kick him out of Gun About, tell us the name of his player." Akira brought out his phone and brought up the Phansite on the browser, then showed it to the kid. "The Phantom Thief will change his heart."
Blue Jacket chuffed, but a corner of his mouth quirked up. "I don't know if I can help you. Yeah, he played here a couple times, but I don't remember the cheater's name." He tapped a foot. "Tell you what. I play here a lot, but sometimes it would be nice to have a good player. Or at least somebody else willing to learn. How about I teach you, and once I find out who it is, we beat him together in the game and you take his name to the Phantom Thief so he doesn't make all the fun people leave?" He gestured for the transfer student's phone.
Akira handed it over.
The kid entered his contact information, then bumped the phone while turning it around to hand it back. "Who's Queen Togo?"
Akira snatched his phone.