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.
I would appreciate any responses that you have, please enjoy
Chapter 62: - Niijima's Target
It felt almost like there was nothing but pressure weighing down my shoulders as I arrived at Shibuya station, given that I was reminded of the dangerous situation that we would be facing that day. Even if I had been able to sit down there wasn't any chance that I could have even tried to read given how my mind was spiralling with all the problems that we were likely to be facing; Ren was no better to be fair.
"Oh! Hey!" Ohya's voice called. I perked up hearing the journalist's voice, I turned to see her walking up to me and Ren, Ren looked over a little puzzled before seeming to recognise her. "Morning, going to school now?" Ohya asked. That was pretty much what we were doing, but I was more than a little concerned with Ohya's appearance to actually give her a response.
"We are," Ren answered. I focused on Ohya, taking in her look which was quite worrying, given that she seemed rather tired from the dark circles under her eyes, plus the whites of her eyes were tinged red and her voice had lacked the previous enthusiasm that she had shown last night; I know she was chasing some kind of story, but it was disconcerting to see how exhausted she looked when compared to what was technically a few hours earlier.
"Ohya-san, are you alright?" I asked. Ohya looked down at me with a bit of a weary smile on her lips, however, I sensed Ren's eyes staring at me and proceeded to look over at him. "We met last night; I was taking pictures after the incident earlier to try and relax. We ran into each other then," I explained. A look of understanding came upon Ren's face as I refocused my attention back onto the journalist.
"I'm heading home! The morning sun is too bright," Ohya insisted. She even reached up to rub at her eyes, I'm surprised she hadn't slipped the sunglasses she had over her eyes if the sunlight was really annoying her that much; Ren adjusted his stance as he focused upon the woman with a curious expression gleaming within his eyes.
"What was your job?" Ren asked. I suppose it came as no surprise that he would be curious about what the woman had been up to in order to cause such exhaustion in someone; it was a little worrying to know that she was this tired after she had left and that wherever she had end up had caused her eyes to be weak to the intensity of morning sunlight.
"I pulled an all-nighter. Journalist Ohya Ichiko works around the clock, you know!" Ohya declared. Well, at least she still seemed as determined as she had been last night; at that moment the train pulled into the station which pulled all of our attention to it. "Well, you two work hard on your studies," Ohya encouraged. With that, the journalist pivoted around and walked away from us.
Ren and I hopped onto the train before the door closed and I felt dread start to building within my stomach at the knowledge of what was to come.
*Persona 5 Royal*
Once school had finished, Ren and Ann made to pick up Ryūji while I headed over to rendezvous with Yusuke outside the building, luckily, I had already come up with an idea to explain his presence. Once the artist arrived, I got him inside – thankfully my explanation was accepted and Yusuke got a visitor's pass – and we carefully made our way up to the rooftop staircase. The other three were already there, so Ren pushed open the door and we stepped out to find that Niijima-senpai was already there.
"I was thinking you might not show," Niijima-senpai commented. As if we couldn't show up, we didn't really have much of a choice in the matter since she was blackmailing us quite handily and the risk of refusing was too great to risk; I looked at the others who seemed rather uncertain about how to react to the comment, but that wasn't really the point of this whole situation.
"So, whose heart do you want us to change?" Ann asked. At least one of us was getting us down to business; the soon we managed to figure out who the person was that we needed to target, then the sooner we could get to having that damned evidence erased and protecting Ren from being at risk of surveillance.
"A mafia boss," Niijima-senpai answered. Upon hearing that sentence, my eyes flew wide in shock while all the others let out small sounds as Ann repeated the second word; I was still trying to wrap my head around the fact that she wanted us to take on someone connected to a mafia of all people, I had figured it was probably a criminal, but not to that level.
"What're you talkin' about!?" Ryūji demanded. His words snapped me out of my dazed state as I realised that there was quite a reasonable fact for Ryūji's demand; after all, the mafia being in Japan wasn't something that should have been possible if I was completely honest, even someone as unconnected to criminals as I am knew that fact.
"Agreed. Mafia is an American thing, isn't our organised crime Yakuza," I pointed out. There was a great deal of debate about whether our culture would be better off without the Yakuza or not, but given what little I knew of foreign organised crime I at least think ours were slightly better; plus, I'm surprised that the Yakuza families hadn't already moved to try and take out this group themselves.
"Normally yes. But it seems like they identify with the mafia instead. This group seems to be the cause of the rise in phishing scams," Niijima-senpai explained. That wasn't good, I felt a tension settle over the entire group as they realised what was going on with this organisation. "What's worse, once you're in their sights they won't stop threatening you until they get what they want. They'll force you to take part in their scams, threaten your family and ultimately destroy your life," Niijima-senpai revealed.
"Holy shit," Ryūji cursed. That was an accurate statement to be made, for innocent people to be entrapped by vicious criminals who went ahead to put a noose around not only the victims they had seized but also the loved ones of those captured which meant then there was no chance that the victims would be able to go to anyone who could potentially help them get out of this situation without risking people they'd never want to lose.
"But how did you come by this information?" Yusuke asked. That was quite the curiosity, if this organisation had managed to stay so completely under the radar so much that the news hadn't really been mentioning any of this incident, that did beg the question as to how our upperclassman had figured it out; even with the knowledge that her sister was connected to the justice department didn't explain it.
"It appears that their victims include some of our students," Niijima-senpai answered. Ann tried to deny this, but I think it was fairly obvious this is no lie, it was also probably the only explanation as to how Niijima-senpai had figured out this information, especially since that poster asking for information went up. "They primarily target juveniles," Niijima-senpai revealed. And that, was a very broad term which could potentially mean middle school children might end up targeted if they weren't already.
"What's their boss' name?" Yusuke asked. That was definitely something we needed to know right away, even if we didn't know what the man looked like, a single check on the Meta-Nav was enough for us to confirm if he even possessed a Palace; I'm betting anyone who prepared this level of horror was no doubt in possession of one instead of just being in Mementos.
"Nobody knows. The victims are being threatened not to testify, so even the police can't get a grasp on the situation," Niijima-senpai revealed. Well, that wasn't good; I already figured that no one was going to getting help, but if it actually meant that the man behind this whole operation was completely unknown then there wasn't anything we were going to be able to do to confront this issue right away.
"That's not good," Ren commented. All of us nodded our heads in agreement while Niijima-senpai was obviously confused; Ren took in a deep breath before focusing his attention upon our upperclassman. "We need a name in order to even start the Change of Heart. I'm not explaining how we do it, but certain pieces of information are required for us to even reach the starting line. A name is one of those things," Ren explained.
"And yet this is where you want us to start!" Ann snapped. I can't even blame her for getting angry about that, before we were just searching for any target without any issue like the blackmail being forced upon us; now that very issue hung over our head and we didn't even have a name to get the proverbial ball rolling on completing this request.
"You should be able to pull it off… if you're really the righteous Phantoms," Niijima-senpai pointed out. I didn't like the tone her voice took on since it was almost like she was mocking us, given that she held all the cards in this disagreement. "Or is Akechi-kun correct when he says you act without justice?" Niijima-senpai taunted. I could feel all of the tension start to bleed off the others, especially Ryūji, at the mention of the high school detective.
"Can't you say something witty back at her," Morgana requested. A quick glance showed that he was focusing his attention on Ren, I raised my gaze to focus on our leader's face and found that his eyes were narrowed into a harsh glare; also, his entire body was completely rigid and his fingers were curled into a tight fist which showed that he was actually rather furious at the words that had been spoken by the upperclassman.
"I refuse to throw my team into danger recklessly just to cater to the whims of a frightened girl. You better give us some time to actually reach our start line before telling the cops," Ren stated. Niijima-senpai took a small step back from the fury that was shooting out towards her from our extremely enraged leader. Hopefully this would cause Niijima-senpai to actually give us the information to somehow get started.
"All I really know is that their main hub of activity is in Shibuya," Niijima-senpai stated. Well, at least we had a place to start looking for some more information about this mafia boss, though it figures she'd select a difficult target for us. "You have two weeks. Once that has passed, I'll submit all the evidence I have to the police and to the school," Niijima-senpai warned. We would need to work fast in order to find that information then or we were in a great deal of trouble. "I hope you don't let me down," Niijima-senpai added on. She then walked on passed us and left the roof behind.
"She really had the upper hand in that exchange," Morgana commented. Morgana was very right in this situation; we'd been completely unable to do anything to fight against the rather unreasonable demand that was being stacked up against us, plus two weeks was definitely putting us in quite the vice hold of not being able to escape this already difficult situation.
"'Don't let me down'… damnit, she was just bossin' us around," Ryūji complained. There was no other way to describe our situation that would be as accurate as what was said by Ryūji, we certainly had quite the pressure falling down upon us in demanding we complete a highly difficult task in a rather limited space of time with next to no information.
"And yet, she directs us towards a criminal, the very target we had been thinking about going after. Quite an interesting development," Yusuke pointed out. That was about the only thing that could be considered a bright spot in this entire discussion; my suggestion of targeting a criminal ended up being fulfilled all because of an outside source stepping in so unexpectedly with that information.
"Let's head to the hideout to continue this," Ren insisted. We all nodded our heads and we proceeded to descend down from the roof and left the school, there wasn't really much conversation bubbling between us since this challenge was much heavier than I had been expecting to show up yet one that we needed to overcome; I was almost convinced that I'd have a headache by the end of the night.
Once we reached the café, all of us proceeded to slump down in the booth that we'd pretty much claimed as our own by how often we ended up using it, we quickly placed some orders and waited for them to arrive before deciding to continue the conversation from the roof. When Ann finished off her cake, she almost sent the plate flying off the table top by how hard she pushed it.
"Urgh! I'm so mad!" Ann exclaimed. I managed to seize the plate to prevent it from crashing to the ground which would enable us to keep the people serving the café from coming in and preventing the conversation from getting moving; Ann did have a right to be rather mad since this situation was beyond something we were used to dealing with, even taking into account the insanity of the Metaverse.
"The mafia? Hm…," Yusuke mused. I turned my head to focus on the painter who seemed to have a rather contemplative expression upon his face, but he proceeded to say no more about whatever thoughts were brewing within his mind; if he wanted to share his thoughts then that was going to be up to him, I rather liked being allowed to work through my thoughts and figured it be best to give Yusuke the same courtesy.
"Can we really do this?" Ann asked. I don't think it was a question of if we could or couldn't do this task; we didn't really have much of a choice within this matter, we had to do this in order to avoid the risks that loomed over us. Surprisingly enough, Ryūji didn't have anything to say which was quite unexpected since he always seemed to have something to say even if it was only a brief curse.
"Either way, we have almost no information on our target," Morgana admitted. All we knew was that the crooks were running their operations out of Shibuya, but that didn't mean that he was going to be located within that area. "This guy's a crime boss, so I wouldn't be surprised if he had a Palace. Still…," Morgana worried. He trailed off and shuffled slightly, almost appearing to be worried about what he was trying to say.
"Yet this is a prime opportunity for us though," Yusuke reminded. All of our attention proceeded to focus upon him with my expression likely showing how I was curious about his words; it was quite nice to hear that someone could see something of a bright spot in the situation that we had ended up falling into so unexpectedly and I actually wanted to hear more about how Yusuke had come to this conclusion.
"How!? We're in huge trouble!" Ann exclaimed. Ann wasn't wrong with what she was saying, this situation was quite difficult for us to get out of but there was something to be said for actually knowing there was a lighter side to our situation, which I rather needed to hear given everything that had come about from that blasted meeting.
"Even after we completed the previous challenge to perfection, things did not go as we expected," Yusuke explained. Quite true, things seemed to have gone rather well at first, but the moment that Akechi had opened his mouth, we had been 'cursed' as Yusuke put it. "But as Natsumi suggested, if we complete this type of challenge, one that no one else seems to be able to solve," Yusuke began. At that, Ann's expression proceeded to light up as if she realised something.
"It might go the way we want this time," Ann realised. I nodded my head in agreement with this, by targeting a criminal there would be a greater chance of people realising that we really were just trying to help people who were stuck in impossible situations, this one certainly seemed to be one of those situations that people were incapable of getting out of without someone's interference.
"I get it, that means even A-," Ryūji began to speak. But he was cut off by letting out a squeak and glaring in Yusuke's direction who had a serene smile on his face, but it was pretty indicative that Yusuke had proceeded to do something to Ryūji in order to shut him up from letting out such an exclamation; especially since it was his outbursts that had caused such a situation.
"It'll prove to those who doubt us that we really are trying," Ren covered up. Hopefully we would be able to do such a thing if we managed to find out whoever this damned boss was. "We don't have the ability to refuse this, we need to stop that stuff getting out, so let's prove our justice," Ren added on. His words were quite right and I actually felt an energy start to thrum through me at the focus we were now displaying to the danger.
"Hell yeah! We just gotta do what we always do!" Ryūji cheered. It was good that we were starting to focus on the mission that we had been forced into, we could do with using all the available time in order to puzzle out the primary question that we had presented to us; finding that name was absolutely necessary to get our foot in the proverbial door of whatever Palace this criminal possessed.
"Our time limit is two weeks, we can't afford to waste too much time," Yusuke commented. That was something we needed to be conscientious of, at least before when the time limits were applied, we had actually found a way into the Palace and even managed to explore the other world a little bit first; now we were starting from absolute scratch on only having fourteen days to even get the job done, it was plenty of time but also it felt like there wasn't nearly enough.
"Let's go to training then, we might be able to cajole some opponents into talking to us about this," I suggested. With that, we went to Mementos, unfortunately it didn't go as we had expected. Although the Temperance Robbing Path of Chemdah had opened up to us, there weren't any new Shadows for us to face except for Sudama. We managed to clear three requests, focusing on an aggressive old man, a blackmailing boss and a sadistic girl.
But despite our best efforts, none of the Shadows we encountered actually had any information to give us regarding the man behind the chaos in Shibuya, it wasn't as if me and Morgana didn't try; heck Ren and Yusuke had even got involved after a few times listening to us talk and then Ryūji and Ann joined when they felt they could connect with the Shadows best, I was not surprised when it turned out those were the Shadows of the same Arcana. Still, nothing was gained and it was a rather morose group that gathered outside of the train station.
"We didn't learn anything, so we have to intel gather on this side. I'll talk to Mishima and see if he knows anything," Ren revealed. It was certainly something that we needed to do, Mishima always seemed to have some kind of information for us, mainly about some requests for us to tackle in Mementos so hopefully he'd be able to help us figure something out about what this person could be.
"I'll ask around Kosei and see if there are any victims," Yusuke decided. The more information that we could pool together then the more likely we would be able to actually find out whoever the heck was behind this criminal ring plaguing our city; we needed to do everything possible to find out that information since my initial suggestion had turned out to be a dead end.
"Okay, I know some girls who go to Shibuya pretty often. I'll check with them about it," Ann stated. That seemed to be the best bet for us to go with, each of us splitting up and attempting to figure out something from different pieces of information; but the question I had to ask was what I could do with my own abilities since I didn't have any connections that I could pull on to glean new information.
"Alright, and I'm gonna see what I can find on the net," Ryūji commented. That was probably the only other avenue that we could utilise in order to get answers, but having two people doing that job was pointless so there was probably no reason for me to do this; as I tried to think about what I could do to get information, I recalled how much I had spooked Akechi simply because he didn't realise that I was there.
"I'll listen in on conversations and see if anyone spills information," I admitted. It was the best that I could do since I could wander around the halls of Shūjin or Shibuya's streets and listen in on people's discussions without them realising it in order to get the knowledge that we desperately needed to get to push through this annoying mission we'd been assigned.
"Alright, let's get back together at the end of the week once we've got all our info!" Ryūji insisted. He proceeded to pull himself up and grabbed a hold of his bag, the rest of us also proceeded to stand up and seize a hold of the same object. "I'll get in touch with you guys later," Ryūji stated. We proceeded to split up with that and drifted away from each other.
I reached my hand up to massage at my head to try and relax my mind from the slightly stressed weight that were pressing upon my mind due to Niijima-senpai's request, we were probably going to have quite the headache solving this issue. Suddenly my phone started ringing, I reached for it believing it was one of the Phantoms, but the moment I pulled it out I saw that it wasn't and I immediately felt my headache started to return as I answer it and raised it to my ear.
"Natsumi, come to my house immediately," My uncle's voice demanded. The line cut out and I heaved out an extremely heavy sigh of exasperation, another headache that I didn't need.
*Persona 5 Royal*
Upon reaching that infernal building, I could feel my body start to shake, this was the place where Ouvrard had tortured me and I could feel her voice starting to itch at my senses. Remembering the advice I had received, I jammed my hand into my bag and quickly took one of Takemi-sensei's pills; once swallowed, I took several moments to control my breathing before approaching the door and knocking on it.
The door swung open and I saw an elderly man I didn't recognise, likely Naomi's replacement, he ushered me inside and guided me to the dining room; I refused to relinquish my bag to him and I kept my shoes in my hand. I didn't intend to stay long despite spotting the meal that was spread out on the table with my uncle sat at one end, he set his phone down and looked at me.
"Natsumi, sit," Uncle Masayoshi commanded. Despite my reluctance, I did so and carefully set my shoes on top of my bag so I could quickly leave when this eventually went south; my uncle's eyes narrowed slightly as he gazed at me. "Why are you still in your uniform?" My uncle demanded. Ah, that must have been why he was staring at me so intently.
"I was spending time with some friends of mine," I answered. It was best just to be honest; it would avoid causing anymore headaches for myself at the moment, I was deeply considering downing the nearest amount of pain medication I could just to get rid of it, luckily whatever that drug Takemi-sensei had given me was working as I didn't feel nervous or scared like I thought I might end up doing.
"Friends?" Uncle Masayoshi questioned. He stopped cutting into the tiny portion of meat that he happened to have on his plate, his eyes cut up to mine as I remained stationary in my chair while looking at him; I didn't understand why he was so surprised to hear me speak such a word, certainly I'd never mentioned it before but it wasn't like he needed to know every detail of my life.
"Yes, friends. They are a concept," I commented. I looked at the food and contemplated whether I should actually start eating it, it was likely something made by a Michelin star chef or some other such fancy manner; but frankly I'd never really been able to understand what was so great about it. The Wilton Hotel had probably turned me off fancy food even more and I actually preferred the warmth of a simple home cooked meal.
"Well, I hope they're useful connections you've made," Uncle Masayoshi sneered. The way he said those words made my blood start to boil, it was always about what other people could do for him; he never thought in the reverse or even just without any kind of exchange at all; my friends weren't useful, they were comrades and pieces of my heart that I hadn't even realise were missing. They were treasures in every way of the word that was good, priceless and perfect.
"Friends aren't people to exploit! They're people to rely on for your problems and who you support through they're suffering," I lectured. Now that I had lost and then gained such people in my life, I understood the true value that they had; I never felt better than when I was spending time with those people who understood me on a level I had never anticipated. Phantom may have resurrected me from what felt like death, but my friends were the ones who truly made me feel alive.
"It appears you've learned some vulgar things from these misfits," Uncle Masayoshi stated. I knew he thought of people as little more than things to use to advance his own career, but to think that he actually considered friendship to be a 'vulgar thing', it was insanely ridiculous to hear such words. "You should consider if they're worth the effort," He added on. My eyes snapped to his face and narrowed into an intense glare at his vile words.
"They're worth more effort than you are!" I spat. The words had practically leapt from my tongue before I could even process what it was that I happened to be saying; but the truth was that I didn't regret even saying those words. I didn't regret it when his eyes widened before narrowing into a fierce glare that was all too familiar, I didn't regret it even when his lips curled into that familiar sneer of disgust that he would throw at me. My friends, those in the Phantoms and outside of it, were worth so much more than this unfeeling piece of stone
"How dare you Natsumi?!" Uncle Masayoshi shouted. I tried hard not to flinch at his words, he often liked to shout whenever he didn't like something, I never liked it when it happened, but now I was a little stronger than the child I had been. "You may be Cho's daughter but that doesn't mean I'll be lenient with you," He stated. My fingers curled tightly when he brought my mother up, he had no right to use her against me. "I will hear no more of these insults!" My uncle hissed.
"Fine, goodbye," I decided. Without even touching the food or water, I grabbed my bag and stood to my feet, I got two steps before deciding to say something that was deep in my heart; so, I whipped around to face the man who had also risen to his feet. "Despite everything, I wanted to keep a connection to my mother, but it apparent it is healthier for me to be done with you. For good. Do not expect me to come by again," I coldly informed. Before he could retaliate, I fled out the room and out the entire building while swiftly blocking his number from my phone. After putting my shoes back on, I proceeded to leave the building behind, hopefully for the last time.
The journey back house was nasty, I was so angry that it felt like I was being blind to everything around me and I'm certain that I scared off a few people whenever they met my eye. I was practically a storm as I reach my house, slamming the door open and closed, thunderous footsteps carried me up to my room before dropping my bag roughly onto the floor. I ripped my phone out, only to pause when I spotted messages from the others; that cooled me off enough to open up the Chat.
Ryūji: So I checked online and people are talking about it all over.
Ryūji: Now, in my expert opinion, Iida of class 2-D is guilty.
Ann: You mean Iida-kun from our class?
Natsumi: Why do you say that?
Ann: Wait, start at the beginning. What's he guilty off?
Ryūji: Supposedly he's been spending money left and right recently.
Ryūji: Said it's cause of some great part-time job he got.
Yusuke: I see. That may very well be worth looking into.
Ryūji: Right?
Ryūji: Can you try asking him about it, Ann! Or Natsumi. I don't think he'd be cautious around a girl.
Ann: I'll try first, no offense Natsu-chan but you can be kind of intimidating.
Natsumi: None taken.
Ann: Although I've rarely talked to Iida-kun before.
Ann: I'll be counting on you two to back me up if something happens. Natsu-chan, Ren.
Natsumi: Don't worry, we'll be there.
Ren: Of course you can count on us.
Ann: Thanks, that's a huge help.
Ryūji: I'm hoping for some great things, this time from Takamaki-san's world-class wonderful acting.
Ann: Shut it.
Yusuke: I hope this will get us even marginally closer to their so-called boss.
Yusuke: I leave this Iida to all of you. And I have high hopes for your acting as well, Ann.
Ann: You're both missing the point!
With the conversation over, I wasn't entirely sure what I should do, I still felt agitated and knew there was no chance of sleeping while my mind was focused upon what had happened earlier. Even my nightly routine did nothing to help me, so I collapsed onto my bed and grabbed my phone, it might be my last chance, but it was something that I had to take just to try and relax a little.
"Hey Ren, can you talk?" I asked. It was probably rather cruel to drag him away from any sleep preparations especially since he was as tired as the rest of us from lugging around Mementos, but I honestly needed to get this off my chest and Ren or Morgana were the best bets to really let me vent about what had happened.
"Sure Natsumi, I've got some time. What do you want to talk about?" Ren responded. He sounded awake enough and not really annoyed at me, which I was grateful for; I rolled over onto my side and curled my legs up slightly as I started to think about some way to get myself distracted, but I couldn't actually think about anything to get the conversation rolling.
"Anything… it doesn't matter," I admitted. A small hum came from Ren and I just knew what he was asking, he wanted to know what had happened and I suppose it was something that I did need to tell him; at the very least he'd understand why I needed to talk to someone. "I just had to have tea with my uncle, we got into a rather ugly argument," I explained.
"I see," Ren commented. I heard some slight creaks echo over the phone's speaker as Ren did something. "Well then, how about I tell you a little about our Personas. I've found books about them, yours' is particularly scary," Ren decided. With that, Ren started talking, I could feel the tension flowing off of me as I listened to his smooth cadence; my eyes drifted shut and I can't really tell who ended the phone call.
All I know is that it did end and I'd fallen fast asleep, feeling relieved of the dread events earlier.