Wednesday 18th May
Haruto had been waiting for almost an hour now. Of course, he'd rushed into the Palace right after school to make sure he'd catch them, but they still seemed to be going abnormally slowly… if indeed they'd come in at all. Haruto was prepared to wait—he spent so much of his time waiting—but he was beginning to wish he'd been a little more prepared for this exercise in boredom.
He'd perched himself in one of the high windows, looking down on the courtyard (now apparently open, so it seemed these interlopers weren't entirely useless) from such a position that he'd be very hard to spot from the ground, even if these fools were looking for him. Besides, with his mask he looked enough like the guards patrolling that it wouldn't be immediately obvious what exactly he was anyway.
He'd brought binoculars, a small, but incredibly useful camera, and even a hefty sniper rifle (if he needed it), but crosswords? A phone game (not that it'd work in here anyway)? God, even homework? No, nothing. All he had to do to kill time was fiddle about with the settings on his rifle, and daydream about one-shotting all the guards on the floor below. Oh and maybe some light photography.… Not that he particularly wanted any reminders of Madarame's Palace on hand at any given moment.
Yusuke had been acting a little more normally at school that day—though Haruto suspected it was more out of concern for him rather than because Yusuke was actually feeling better.
And he definitely wasn't dead, so that was something too.
But what else other than death could cause a Shadow to disappear like that? It just didn't make sense—everyone had a Shadow—some were unreachable, thanks to being locked up in the depths, but Haruto had seen how Shadows went down to the depths, and it wasn't by exploding like Yusuke's had. So why had it undergone such a dramatic change? There had to be a reason but what… what could it be…?
Something flickered at the edges of his vision.
His attention was back on the courtyard in a flash, his binoculars already pressed to his mask to observe what was happening below.
Adjusting the focus of his binoculars, Haruto observed five figures emerge from the corridor leading up to the courtyard. Three men, one woman and a… cat-like creature. How odd. It wasn't a Persona, that much was obvious but… it definitely wasn't human.
So these were the people who'd been hiding right under his nose.
He zoomed the binoculars in a bit more, trying to get a better focus on what they looked like. They were all in what appeared to be their own Metaverse outfits—but that was strange—after all, he hadn't gotten one until… until…
No wonder they've been getting through the Metaverse relatively easily, said Arsène.
They had Personas.
Of course—it was the only way—any normal human would be immensely encumbered by trying to get through a Palace without one but… for some reason it just hadn't occurred to him. Perhaps because it was so long ago that he awoke to his own—and that he now had so many but… he'd completely forgotten that they might have been able to awaken a similar power within their own souls.
He looked closer, trying to identify clear features beneath the costumes. The cat was… well, a cat—pretty much useless trying to guess what it might look like in the real world (if it could exist there at all), but the others had clearer profiles. The girl in particular stood out, with huge blonde pigtails that could be spotted in almost any crowd—he was willing to bet there weren't many students at Shujin that looked like her. Then there were the boys—the one seeming to lead the group was fairly average in height, with longish brown hair, tied back in a pigtail—not particularly remarkable-looking, but if he was friends with the girl people would be able to identify him. The other boy was a little short, with a shock of short blond hair, and a slightly stockier, more muscular build than the leader. People would certainly recognise him.
And behind them, in fact, somewhat concealed—trailing behind the rest of the group, was another boy. He was the tallest member by far, and quite thin, his mask hiding so much of his face that at first Haruto didn't fully recognise him. But when he stepped into the courtyard—and indeed—when they all began to speak loudly enough that he could hear them—the boy's identity became unmistakable.
That was Yusuke.
Haruto nearly dropped his binoculars in shock at the sight of him in the Metaverse—in Madarame's Palace, no less. He'd suspected maybe the interlopers had told him of the Metaverse—but not brought him to it.
No, no, no, no, no! That couldn't be right! Yusuke would never work for the creature—not knowing what it could do—not with him already being so crushed under the heel of Madarame's abuse. So, did that mean…?
The fact these people have managed to obtain Personas at all suggests they probably aren't working for it, pointed out Arsène, ever tapped-in to the logical part of his mind. They're stronger than we thought.
They were certainly much more trouble than he'd thought, getting Yusuke of all people involved in their schemes. But how had they met him? Learnt about Madarame? Were they helping him, or blackmailing him?
Quickly now, they're moving on. Take your pictures and follow them.
Haruto quickly reached for his camera, zooming in and snapping away, trying his best to get a clear shot of every face in the group. A phone camera simply wouldn't work in the Metaverse, and even a normal camera like his couldn't develop these photos in the real world, but… as long as he kept it safe and sound within this world, he'd have a good record of their faces. And it seemed he needed one with the trouble they were liable to cause.
He slipped the camera away and strapped the rifle to his back, quickly pursuing them as they commenced through the building.
They were down on the first floor—but Haruto had this place memorised by now. A few convenient vents and a tiny bit of Metaverse manipulation later, he was hovering just above where they were walking through the corridors, finally able to listen to their conversation. At which point he had another nasty realisation. There was someone else in this group he recognised.
"Don't be foolish, Skull, of course it's this way. This is the only way to get further into the building."
The clipped tone was very different to the one Haruto was used to hearing on TV, but there was no mistaking it: that was the voice of Akechi Goro.
So. Seemed he'd been wrong about the celebrity's involvement with this—but then, he was a detective. It wasn't unthinkable he might have noticed what the other two were doing—or indeed, stumbled upon the Metaverse himself. So now he had two out of five. Well, four, if you didn't count the cat-creature.
Truthfully, it was the people he didn't know that were the real trouble—it seemed they'd taken to using code-names, so identifying them would be more difficult. Which was a pain because Haruto suspected that they were the true instigators of this little group—the original victims of Kamoshida. And the most likely to have made some sort of deal with the creature.
Well, he had the photos now—knew their faces. Technically that was most of the information he needed, but… it couldn't hurt to stick around a little while longer, right? After all, he wanted to know why Yusuke was here—why he would join such people…
"So, once you steal this 'Treasure', Madarame will be a changed man?" asked Yusuke, almost as if he'd heard Haruto's thoughts. "He'll no longer plagiarise from his students?"
"Nope!" said the girl, cheerily. "Well, not if what happened to Kamoshida is anything to go by."
"Yeah, once he loses his desires, he'll most likely confess to everything he's done out of guilt," said the little cat creature. "And he'll definitely stop plagiarising."
"I must say, this is a very strange world," said Yusuke, peering around the hallway and making Haruto shrink back instinctively. "To think this odd landscape has been within his mind all along…"
"What do you think of it?" asked Akechi. "Do you see the truth of how your so—called mentor treated you now?"
Yusuke paused before answering, and Haruto could tell that though Akechi had been trying to be helpful, Yusuke had not taken it well.
"I can, thank you," he said stiffly, then lapsed into silence.
Hmm. Seemed the group dynamic was still a bit rocky. It was possible Yusuke was quite new to this… in fact…
We Personas are connected to Shadows, you know, said Arsène. Certainly you no longer have one.
Yes, that much was indisputable fact, given the circumstances…
Is it not possible that the moment we witnessed yesterday was not, in fact, the death of a Shadow, but its transformation into a Persona?
That… would certainly make the most sense. For one thing it would explain why Yusuke appeared to be alive and functional despite the lack of a Shadow—and why the Shadow itself had disappeared. Personas were more in-tune with their owners, after all.
"So then, onwards and upwards, right?" said the boy called Skull, awkwardly breaking the silence.
"For better or for worse," Yusuke agreed.
I think we've obtained all the information we need to, said Arsène. For now, let us retreat somewhere more convenient, and plan out our next move.
It was a jolt to leave Yusuke with these strangers but… he did have a Persona now. He could surely take care of himself. And Haruto had a lot to think about. It was time to go somewhere a little more peaceful-somewhere he wouldn't be disturbed by the general hustle and bustle.
It was time to go home.
Or… sort of home, anyway.
***
One of the many good qualities of the Metaverse was that it was quiet. Far quieter than the world inhabited by humanity, with cars racing by outside, people talking, the endless hum of technology.
It was more like his hometown, in that respect. Not that he'd ever call life in his hometown superior to that he had in Tokyo—perish the thought, but—he found he missed the quiet, sometimes. But the Metaverse was always quiet. And it was for that reason that that was where Haruto tended to do most of his planning.
The Leblanc's attic had changed in the time he'd spent living there—both in the real world and in here. His real bedroom was now clean, nicely decorated, and perfectly presentable for a teenager. His bedroom in the Metaverse was… how to put it? More like a kind of elaborate lair—his headquarters—if he could be bothered to have such a thing.
And in it was everything he could possibly need for his little hobby.
Sheaves upon sheaves of paper lined his shelves; of newspaper clippings, court records, his files on the people and places he knew—he'd built it all up over time—when he first started out in the Metaverse back in his hometown, the best he could do was render someone clumsily comatose. Nowadays he could brainwash people, collapse them, kill them—he could track down Shadows in Mementos, break through most Palaces with ease—and he kept meticulous records of the people he investigated who needed help. If ever he needed to recall one of his many victims or beneficiaries, they were all hidden somewhere on the shelf.
Yusuke had a file too, of course, one which, until now had been somewhat incomplete. But now… Now things had gotten a lot more complicated.
He sighed and drew out several new files for this latest development. The Metaverse Interlopers. What a pain.
Yusuke had only joined recently—perhaps only yesterday, if Haruto's suspicions were right—but the others had undoubtedly been the ones to have caused Kamoshida's breakdown. So far the only thing he really knew about them was that they seemed dead-set on brainwashing rather than killing their targets. How the hell they'd worked out how to do it though…
Then again, the answer might lie in their mysterious fifth member—the cat creature he'd observed with them in the Palace. It seemed just as sentient and knowledgeable as the rest of them, but it couldn't be more obvious it was some sort of creature of the Metaverse. Perhaps it had told them… but how would even it know? He'd never met a Shadow sentient enough to try and take out a Palace before—most of them got sucked into the Ruler's fantasies, but… Hmm. That was clearly something he needed to investigate further.
For now though, his best lead might be that he knew Akechi Goro was involved somehow. Yusuke wasn't going to spill anything on the Metaverse of his own accord, and really, Haruto could hardly blame him, given he'd been hiding his own presence there for the better part of two years. But Akechi… he had some ulterior motive—had to, given his position. He almost certainly wasn't a victim of Kamoshida, and even besides that, his job was that of a detective—so it seemed very odd that he appeared to be just fine with endorsing—even leading this vigilante justice. Perhaps he realised the police were corrupt, but if that were the case why not just quit? Questions upon questions—but most importantly for Haruto, as a minor celebrity, Akechi would be the easiest to keep tabs on without drawing unwanted attention.
One thing was for certain though—he had to make sure they dealt with Madarame's Palace correctly. He couldn't go this far only to have it all fall apart thanks to the reckless whims of some teens who didn't fully understand what they were doing. And if they couldn't deal with Madarame themselves, well then… he'd just have to take matters into his own hands, wouldn't he?