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Goro Akechi is the most interesting person Akira has met in Tokyo.
Maybe not the most fun, or the weirdest, or the loudest—those honors would have to go to his Thieves. But the most interesting? The biggest liar? Goro Akechi fits that to a tee. Goro Akechi is hiding something, and Akira doesn’t know what, but he needs to find out.
There was something weird, after all, about the way they met, and even without that Akira would want to keep talking to him. He’s interesting, after all, even without the obvious acting, and Akira wants to hear his thoughts. His actual thoughts, the ones Akira saw dancing behind his eyes when he’d approached Akira and said he was interesting, too. That there was more to his opinions on justice than the nice things he said on camera.
Akira wants to know everything.
Morgana can tell and groans at him on the train ride home from the studio.
“Really? The stuck-up detective? That’s who you’re falling for?” Morgana gripes, and Akira sighs.
“I’m not falling for him,” Akira says. “He’s just interesting to talk to.”
“You barely even talked to him,” Morgana grouses. “What would Ryuji say?”
Ryuji would probably get on his case for “being into” Akechi for other reasons. Mainly, that Ryuji seems to have already developed a personal grudge against Akechi.
“I’m not into him,” Akira says, honestly.
He just wants to talk to him, get to know him. That’s normal. He wanted to talk to and get to know Ann, too, and Ryuji and Morgana and Yusuke, and no one’s accusing him of being into any of them.
“Whatever you say,” Morgana says, tail flicking. Akira rolls his eyes.
He has no idea what Akechi might be getting out of Akira from these hangouts, and it stresses him out, a little bit, when he’s not in the middle of one.
It’s different than it is with all of Akira’s other confidants. With Akechi, he’s not really playing any particular role like he is with the others: Maruki’s closest friend, Yoshida’s biggest supporter, Takemi’s guinea pig, Ryuji’s best friend, Hifumi’s shogi partner, Ohya’s informant. But he’s none of those things with Akechi. With Akechi, he’s just… Kurusu.
It’s weird.
Akira knows it can’t just be for the joy of hanging out, because neither he nor Akechi actually operate like that. They’re both too deep in their respective acts to be that comfortable with just hanging out. Akira isn’t entirely sure what it is that Akechi is keeping from him, but he knows there’s something, some part of this that he’s probably benefitting from that Akira isn’t entirely aware of, the same way Akira’s, in theory, in this to learn about Akechi as the detective investigating him.
He still jumps whenever Akechi texts him to hang out, though. He gets one that night, while he’s waiting for Futaba to wake up, a simple are you busy that makes him smile, and Morgana groans.
“It’s Akechi again,” Morgana guesses, and Akira sighs.
“Why do you have such a problem with him?” Akira asks.
“I don’t!” Morgana lies, tail flicking. “You just spend so much time with him. Don’t you have other people you need to talk to?”
“Well, yeah, but I like talking to Akechi,” Akira says.
“Yeah, ‘cause he’s your boyfriend,” Morgana says. It almost sounds like he’s teasing Akira, but Akira knows him better than that, can hear the undercurrent of actual worry there.
“We’re not going out,” Akira insists. Morgana looks at him doubtfully from Akira’s desk.
“Right,” Morgana says.
“Don’t you need to both agree that you’re going out for it to be a romantic date?” Akira says, leaning on his elbow to look at Morgana.
“I mean, yeah,” Morgana says.
“And we haven’t,” Akira says. “So we can’t be going out.”
Morgana deflates.
“You just spend a lot of time together,” Morgana says. “Akira, he took you to the aquarium.”
“But he hasn’t said he wants to date, so we aren’t dating,” Akira says. “That’s that.”
Morgana drops it, but Akira doesn’t miss the look he gets when he comes home from the arcade.
But it’s not romantic. And Akira is fine with that, because he’s not actually attracted to him.
“Hey, Akira,” Ryuji says one day, “What about you?”
They’re talking crushes, because Ryuji likes to talk crushes, even though he decries it as girl talk if pressed. Ryuji doesn’t like anyone, either, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have things to say on the matter.
“Well, Shiho and I,” Ann starts, and Ryuji groans.
“Here we go,” Ryuji says. “Ann, you’re not better than us ‘cause you got a girlfriend.”
“The way you talk, she might be,” Morgana says. “Lady Ann is truly the best of us even if she weren’t in a relationship. Right, Akira?”
Akira shrugs.
“I don’t see what’s so great about dating,” he says, which is, apparently, the wrong thing to say.
“What?” Ryuji asks. “You gotta be kidding.”
“No one?” Ann asks, equally shocked, and Akira’s a little surprised because he’d expected it from Ryuji but not from Ann.
“No,” Akira says. “No one.”
“He hangs out with Akechi constantly,” Morgana says.
“And I don’t like him romantically,” Akira says. “I have no idea how he feels.”
Less because Akechi hasn’t told him and more because Akechi wouldn’t tell him even if he did like Akira; he’s a locked box when he wants to be, even if Akira seems to be the only one capable of actually seeing the lock.
It’s fascinating, actually. He wonders what’s so different about him that lets him glimpse past the curtain. It’s not because Akechi lets him, Akira’s not stupid enough to think that.
Maybe they’re just similar. Akira would be lying, too, if he said he didn’t do the same thing, just… slightly to the left. He wonders if Akechi does it for the same reasons Akira does.
“Man,” Ryuji says, deflating. “And after you agreed to go try and ask out girls with me, too.”
“That’s what you’re worried about?” Morgana asks. “Seriously?”
“What?” Ryuji asks. “It’s kinda weird, though, right? No one?”
“Ryuji,” Ann says.
Was it?
Akira shrugs.
“I’ve managed this far,” he says. “It’s fine, guys. I don’t need a partner or anything.”
“Well, obviously you don’t need one,” Ryuji says, backpedaling. “It’s just that, like. Everyone has crushes ‘n shit, right? Has there been anyone you’ve liked?”
Akira thinks.
“Not really,” he says. “There was one girl back in, like, elementary school?”
She’d been his best friend at the time, too. They’d always ate lunch together, at least until she made new friends when they got into middle school and stopped hanging out with him as often. The crush hadn’t been a bigger priority than their friendship, though. They’d laughed about it when Akira had told her, and then just never did anything.
“Elementary school crushes don’t count,” Ryuji says. “I mean, like, have you ever looked at someone and gone damn, I wanna tap that?”
“You don’t have to put it like that!” Ann says.
“But I’m right!” Ryuji says.
“No?” Akira says. “I haven’t.”
Is that weird?
“Maybe Akira’s just special,” Morgana says. “And above such base impulses as wanting to have sex with someone. Unlike some people.”
“Hey, can it,” Ryuji says, tossing a balled-up piece of paper at Morgana. “I don’t wanna hear it from mr. Lady Ann.”
It devolves into an argument, as a lot of their conversations do, and Akira thinks.
“Ever had a crush?” Akira asks over a game of darts with Akechi, and he gives Akira a side-eye.
“Why,” he asks, “Do you have one?”
“Nah,” Akira says. “Ryuji was just talking big about it the other day and I was curious.”
Maybe he’d been a little more bothered about the apparent difference between him and his friends than he’d let on at the time. But it’s fine, because Akechi doesn’t care. If anything, he’ll probably just laugh and tell Akira he’s being an idiot in the nicest, most passive-aggressive way he can manage.
It’s funny how easily Akira can read him and how mad that seems to make Akechi. Akira wants him to snap one day, to go for Akira with teeth bared, because Akira pushed in just the right place. He’s still looking for what’ll do it, honestly.
“Hm,” Akechi says. “I can’t say I have.”
Akira internally releases a relieved breath.
“Not even with all your fangirls?” Akira teases, and Akechi laughs good-naturedly.
“No, I’m afraid not,” he says. “Sorry for the disappointment.”
“Not a disappointment,” Akira says. “Me neither.”
It only feels fair, after all. It’s not like it’s dangerous information to give Akechi, but he still looks at Akira like he’s the biggest puzzle in the world, almost distracting him from his throw. Triple-twenty, as usual, the way that pisses Akechi and his perfect little bullseyes off the most.
“I see,” Akechi says eventually. “Another similarity between us, then. You really are an interesting person, Kurusu. I can never figure you out.”
He likes that, at least. He likes being interesting, at least to Akechi.
“Maybe you’re just ace,” Futaba says as Akira lets the door to Leblanc swing shut, the not-quite-cold autumn air hitting his face and sinking into his hair. They’re going to Nakano, because Futaba wanted to pick something up and Akira can’t say no to her ever.
“Ace what,” Akira asks.
“Ace like asexual,” Futaba says. “I read about it online. It means you don’t have any attraction at all.”
He wonders, for a moment, how she knew it was a question, and why she’s bringing it up, before he realizes that she probably just listened to the bug she has on his phone and that he still hasn’t been able to find yet.
“Okay,” Akira says.
“Okay?” Futaba says. She’s suddenly nervous now, and Akira shrugs.
“Okay,” he says. “I’m not really that worked up about it, Futaba, but thank you.”
Her shoulders slump as she relaxes.
“Glad I could help,” she says.
It is actually interesting, he thinks as he looks it up later. That he was right, at least, that it wasn’t weird, but it still isn’t quite right, he thinks, because elementary school or not he has had a crush before. He closes the laptop and decides to go to sleep, though, because he has a long day tomorrow, and the culture festival isn’t going to wait for him to sort out his sexuality.
It’s not a priority. It can be not a priority until he doesn’t have a possible arrest hanging over his head.
He still ends up thinking about it as they walk around the festival the next day, at least in the back of his mind, and he almost misses Akechi’s slip of the tongue until Futaba points it out.
Akechi blackmails them, and Akira can’t even find it in him to be properly mad about it.
It finally hits him, too, what’s been nagging at him for months now: he heard Morgana, which means he’s lying about how long he’s been in the Metaverse, which means a lot of things that Akira’s not even sure Morgana’s put together yet.
The bastard.
Akira almost can’t be mad about that, either, too busy being impressed at how long Akechi’s been playing this game, too busy wondering if Akechi’s really the one responsible or if he, like Okumura, is just another pawn in someone else’s schemes.
He’s willing to bet real money on the latter.
He’s a high school student, after all, and Akira knows things about him that he’s pretty sure Akechi has never told anyone, things about his family situation that he plays close to his chest. When he says his justice is personal, and directed, and about shitty adults, Akira thinks about the real, unfiltered rage he’d gotten a glimpse of at the bathhouse when he’d mentioned his father and thinks, ah, of course.
Akira is pretty sure the only hurdle left to finding out the identity of the true culprit who’s been setting them up is to figure out who Akechi is working for, but he’s not about to ask. That’s showing far too much of his hand this early in the game, and he still wants to see exactly what Akechi’s going to pull off before then. Their dance is far from over. As far as the rest of the Thieves know, it’s really just started.
Akira knows better, knows now that he’s been playing a game of cat and mouse since June, and the thought would make him dizzy if it didn’t make him somehow more elated than before, almost high off of it.
Akechi is the most interesting person Akira has ever met. Forget just in Tokyo, in his whole life he’s never met anyone he wanted to dig into the way he wants to dig into Akechi, wants to drill straight into his brain and pull out every little secret he’s hiding. But he can’t, and he wouldn’t, because playing like this is far more interesting.
He doesn’t tell Akechi his code name, and neither does anyone else, so he has to fight to keep a smile off his face when Akechi slips up again and says, “Come on, Joker, let’s follow her.”
You shouldn’t know that, Akira thinks smugly.
Outwardly, he nods and leads the way down the steps to the casino’s elevator.
“Akira,” Makoto says outside of school, and Akira hums. “I have something I’d like to talk to you about, but it’s not… about the Palace.”
She looks nervous, and Akira gestures for her to follow him.
“Alright,” he says. “That’s not a problem.”
She breathes out.
“I, uh,” she says, “You know how you’ve been helping me get in touch with my generation, right?”
“Yeah?”
She still seems uncharacteristically nervous about this. He wonders what’s up. When he glances back, she’s almost blushing.
“I was wondering if you knew how to tell if you liked someone,” she says quietly, nervously, and Akira realizes why. It’s a personal thing, amongst the chaos of their lives right now, and she probably doesn’t want to distract from the very real danger they’re all in unless they can clear this Palace, not to mention it being her sister’s Palace.
But this is the one thing Akira doesn’t actually know anything about.
“Sorry,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I wouldn’t know, either.”
Makoto blinks, surprised.
“But I would have thought,” she says, and then cuts off.
“Hm?” Akira says.
“It’s just,” she says, “You always seem to know what’s going on, and with Akechi…”
Oh.
“We aren’t dating,” Akira says. “We’re friends.”
“But the way you look at each other,” she says. “Even I can see that there’s something special going on there.”
Akira doesn’t know if he could explain their rivalry to Makoto in a way that would make sense to her. It makes sense to Akira, at least, and it makes sense to Akechi, and that’s really all that matters, right? It should be all that matters, at least in Akira’s eyes. The relationship he has with Akechi is… meaningful. It’s less stressful, which feels weird and awful to say to Makoto, and he wouldn’t even know where to start with it.
“We’re friends, right?” Akira says instead, and Makoto nods vigorously.
“Of course!” Makoto says.
“And you don’t feel about me the way you feel about…” Akira trails off, and Makoto looks briefly away.
“It’s Haru,” she says. “And no, I don’t. And even if I did find that I liked Haru, I wouldn’t… want to put her in that position. Not right after her father died.”
“Then just trust your gut,” Akira says.
“Just trust my gut, huh,” Makoto says. “I think you still helped me, Akira. Thank you.”
Akira nods, and realizes he really might just be out of the loop.
The invitation to Mementos is… unexpected.
It’s not like Akira’s about to turn Akechi down, though. Far from it. He’s intrigued, and he’s fairly certain Akechi isn’t going to do anything until the deadline, and they still have time. Morgana knows it, too, which is probably the only reason he lets Akira go alone at all.
“So what’d you call me here for,” Akira asks, and Akechi smiles, sharp and mean and unfamiliar.
“This,” he says, and draws a gun aimed at Akira.
It’s not his ray gun. It looks very real and very dangerous, and Akira has to wonder if it’s really just the most impressively-realistic model he’s ever laid eyes on or if it’s actually real, and if it’s the latter, where the hell he got it from.
Akechi keeps talking, though, holding the gun steady towards Akira.
“Remember what I told you?” Akechi asks with an amused lilt to his voice. “If you ever won against me using my right hand, I’d take you on with everything I’ve got.”
He almost growls at the end, voice getting intense and scratchy, and Akira’s never heard anything like it from Akechi before. He likes it. He doesn’t know what to do with that information.
“I thought you meant in pool,” Akira says before he can stop the words leaving his mouth. Akechi’s mouth twitches up, the smile getting sharper, before it dips down.
“That wasn’t enough to satisfy me,” he says, tone sharp as his smile had been, and Akira’s heart thuds away in his chest, “That’s your own fault, though.”
Akira’s fault?
He continues before Akira could say anything, on and on in that weird, new intense way, how fast you’ve grown said with something between admiration and venom; you’ve exceeded my expectations in every way, halfway to purring. Akira’s entranced less with the specific words Akechi is saying and more with the way he’s saying them, with the gun in his hand, with the clean white of his Metaverse outfit contrasted against the tunnel they’re in.
Akira rolls back his shoulder, hands in his pocket, and meets Akechi’s expectant stare.
“Let’s do this,” he says at the end of Akechi’s speech, how he wants to duel Akira without holding anything back, just a hint of something more there, and Akechi smiles as he lowers the gun after a moment.
“Thank you for indulging my selfish request,” he says. “No need for pleasantries at this point, correct?”
Akira nods. He feels… weird. Good weird, but weird.
The anticipation of a fight, maybe, one-on-one in a way he hasn’t had yet in the Metaverse, against an opponent who actually knows what they’re doing. It’s thrilling. It’s exhilarating, fighting Akechi, a non-stop back-and-forth of their weaknesses; the cold-fire heat of Bless skills burns its way into Akira’s system, seeming almost to sink into his bloodstream as they abandon their magic and Akechi dives at him, saber extended.
It gets dirty, the two of them brawling on the floor, their weapons long forgotten in a corner. Neither of them are intent on giving up, though, both of them determined to best the other. Akechi fights dirty when he wants to, clawing and biting as Akira tries to pull his hands out of his reach. Akira has been waiting for a moment like this, for the time when Akechi would drop the pleasant mask and come at him, but this is somehow better than he’d ever hoped.
It ends with Akira picking up Goro’s own sword and holding it to his throat, panting as he stands over Akechi, who glares as though a look alone might switch their positions.
“I win,” Akira says, out of breath. It was close. It was far closer, he thinks, than either of them had wanted it to be, both hoping for and expecting a quick victory. They should have known better, of course, knowing each other.
“So you do,” Akechi says. “Hah. All right, then, Joker, I concede.”
It’s venomous, low and sharp and close to a hiss, and Akira lifts the sword and helps Akechi up from the ground.
“No wonder you’re the leader of the Phantom Thieves,” Akechi says, searching Akira’s face. “You’ve already caught up to me on this front, too.”
Akira doesn’t think he notices the slip. He doesn’t say anything about it. Instead, he looks at Akechi and says, “Are you satisfied?”
“Of course not,” Akechi says, “But if we went any further, we’d both go beyond the point of no return, wouldn’t we?”
Akira wonders what, exactly, that would mean for them in the Metaverse like this.
“In all honesty,” he continues, “I’d love to see just how far we could go…”
His eyes are sharp on Akira, and Akira feels weird, again, displaced from his chest, and the feeling follows him out of the Metaverse and through Akechi’s challenge of a rematch and he carries it home with him just the same as the glove now held tight in his pocket.
Sae asks him about the traitor. Akira doesn’t sell Akechi out. How could he? He doesn’t want to fuck over Akechi’s life just to save his own skin. It’s Akechi.
Maybe that’s why it feels so weird for his friends to celebrate besting Akechi as though it were any other of their missions, any other of their victories, rather than a spectacular lie and an even more spectacular performance. As though it weren’t Akechi, stunning and intriguing and powerful and dangerous all wrapped up together.
Just… any other villain.
It feels wrong.
But he plays nice, and lies low, and hopes every time he leaves the house that Akechi won’t be around to find out he’s been tricked, and mourns the whole time.
He misses his games with Akechi. He misses them so very much. Morgana picks up on it, too.
“You’re mopey,” he says while Akira’s reading in Leblanc. Akira looks up from his book to meet Morgana’s gaze. “What’s wrong?”
Akira shrugs.
“Still feel kinda off from the room,” Akira says, and it’s only half a lie. He does feel off from the interrogation room, but mostly it’s that he misses Akechi. He hadn’t realized he could miss someone this bad.
Maybe that’s just a factor of not having had any real friends back home, though. None that wouldn’t drop him the minute he got his charge, at least, nothing like the Thieves.
Akechi feels… different. Akira’s not sure how.
“Well… okay,” Morgana says. “If there’s anything I can do to help…”
“I’ll let you know,” Akira says. “I promise, Morgana.”
“If you’re sure,” he says. “Well, how’s the book?”
The book is mediocre, honestly, but Akira needs to do something or he feels like he’s going to go a little crazy inside like this.
“Fine,” he says.
“At least it’s not bad,” Morgana says. “...You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Perfectly sure,” Akira says.
…Maybe he should invite someone else to Penguin Sniper. Maybe that would solve some of the restlessness he’s feeling now.
Inviting someone else doesn’t help.
He brings Ryuji, because Ryuji’s always good company, and he brings along Yusuke, and they all take turns tossing darts at the board while Akira surreptitiously looks around to make sure Akechi isn’t going to come in at any point. If he does, it’s all over anyway, but at least he could get a moment of warning.
He doesn’t, and darts makes him feel, somehow, worse, and he sighs and gives up.
“Hey, dude,” Ryuji says, “You good?”
“Yeah,” Akira says. “Just… out of it.”
“Makes sense,” Yusuke says. “You went through quite an ordeal earlier this month.”
That’s one way to put it.
“You sure you’re not just down about Akechi?” Ryuji asks, and something on Akira’s face must give him away because Ryuji looks at Yusuke and then goes, “Really?”
“I’m not,” Akira starts.
“You totally are,” Ryuji says. “He tried to kill you, Akira.”
“And very nearly succeeded,” Yusuke says. “We got very lucky our plan worked.”
“Yeah,” Morgana adds from Akira’s shoulder. “You could have told me this was about Akechi, Akira.”
He couldn’t have, though, is the thing, because they would have done this anyway. Akira can’t guarantee that Morgana wouldn’t have tried to stage an intervention of some sort. And he doesn’t need that, the same way he doesn’t need the concerned look that Ryuji is giving him now, because he’s fine.
“It truly is a pity,” Yusuke says. “Young love cut short…”
“We weren’t dating,” Akira says, for the millionth time. Somehow, it sounds weaker to his ears this time.
“Sure you weren’t,” Ryuji says, indulgent.
“They went to the aquarium,” Morgana says. “He invited Akira.”
“For real?” Ryuji says, and then looks back at Akira. “Dude. I think he mighta been down bad for you.”
So then why kill me, Akira thinks, but he knows the answer. It wasn’t his choice, and besides, it’s part of the game. Akira is still sort of sad he couldn’t have actually been there, hiding outside the Metaverse as he was, because he really wanted to see Akechi’s face, really wanted to see the intense way it would have shifted. Akira doesn’t even know if Akechi’s aware of it.
“You’re hopeless,” Ryuji says. “Are you sure you’ve never had a crush?”
“I haven’t,” Akira says.
“At least, not before,” Ryuji prompts.
“Seriously,” Akira says. “It wasn’t going to happen.”
It comes out sharper than he means it to, more mean, and Ryuji holds up his hands.
“All I’m saying,” he says.
“Perhaps we should discuss something else,” Yusuke says, and Akira nods and tries not to feel too upset about Akechi never finding him.
They leave Shido’s Palace at the end, after Akechi’s…
Akira sits in his room and wishes he had a door so he could lock Morgana out so Morgana couldn’t see the way he’s close to tears and has been since…
He can’t say it. Can’t think it.
Akechi’s gone, like a knife in his chest, an actual physical pain that grips him and makes it impossible for him to breathe.
“Akira…” Morgana says, and Akira just balls himself tighter into the corner of his bed and tries not to sob.
Sojiro had given him one of those looks, a little too knowing and a lot too sympathetic, when he’d walked into Leblanc after it was all over. He hadn’t asked, hadn’t prodded, but Akira could see the concern written all over his face. He wasn’t exactly trying to hide it.
“Hey, kid,” Sojiro—speak of the devil, or something—says as he knocks on the wall next to the stairs and comes up. “You alright up here?”
“Fine,” Akira says. “Just had a rough day at… uh, work.”
Sojiro may know they’re Phantom Thieves, but he doesn’t know how dangerous it can get, how close to dying they’ve come sometimes. He barely understands how Akira avoided dying in the first place, and Akira doesn’t know if he could handle explaining that someone he knew didn’t.
That the person who’d tried to kill him already tried again, and failed, and didn’t manage to make it out with them. That he was just a kid, being tricked into the exact same trap Akira had almost fallen into except he hadn’t gotten so lucky.
That Akira cares so much about him, and now he’s gone, and Akira’s never going to see him again.
Akechi’s glove sits in Akira’s hand, gripped tight, the last sign of his existence that feels real. It’s not one of his televised interviews, or some perfect photo somewhere online, or anything of the sort. It’s the evidence that Akechi meant something to someone who didn’t fall for his front. That he was a real person.
“You sure?” Sojiro asks, pulling Akira out of his thoughts. “I’ve got some curry downstairs for you, if you want to eat something before I head home.”
He… should eat dinner. He doesn’t know if he can.
“Alright,” Akira says. “Thank you, Sojiro. Really. I mean it.”
“Of course, Akira,” he says. “Make sure you eat something, at least.”
And then he heads downstairs, and Morgana looks sadly at Akira, and Akira, after a moment or two(...or longer, he doesn’t really pay attention), goes downstairs to eat dinner, and he doesn’t let go of Akechi’s glove.
Christmas Eve is impossible.
Christmas Eve brings the end of the world, and them fixing it, and answers to questions Akira hadn’t even know he should have been asking, and Sae asking him to turn himself in, and it brings Goro Akechi, and end of the world or no that last one shouldn’t be possible because Akechi died.
Akira knows he died. He saw the distraught look on Futaba’s face as she announced she’d lost all readings from him, heard the gunshots himself, and yet here he is, getting Akira off the hook for things he’d actually done by promising to turn himself in as the culprit of the mental shutdowns, and it feels like losing him all over again.
He just stands there as Akechi talks, and stands there as he leaves, and stands there long after that, until he gets a text from Sojiro that he should be getting back to the store, and even after that he stands there a moment longer and tries to process what just happened.
He doesn’t see Akechi again, not until the second of January, not until after everything gets even weirder.
Morgana is human, and more pressingly Wakaba Isshiki isn’t dead, and Akechi walks into Leblanc as though he hadn’t been taken into police custody just days earlier. He asks for Akira to come talk with him, and Akira leaps up with a little too much enthusiasm to get out of this uncanny-valley Leblanc to follow him.
Akechi leads him to the laundromat across the street, then turns to him.
“Well, then,” he says, voice low and sharp, “Let’s try to sort through this situation.”
Akechi’s story doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but to be fair, neither does the rest of everything that’s been happening; he’s right, he shouldn’t have simply been released, but the fact remains that he was and that he’s here now and he’s alive.
It doesn’t make any sense.
And Akechi agrees, at least on the front of Wakaba, that things are weird and wrong.
“Let’s make a deal,” Akechi says, and Akira is prepared to accept before even hearing the whole thing. He missed working with Akechi, brief and transactional as it was, even knowing that Akechi was planning to kill him by the end of it. None of the Thieves seem to be able to tell anything’s wrong, either, which leaves this up to himself and Akechi to solve.
“What do you need me to do?” Akira says, and Akechi nods, matter-of-fact.
“I need information,” Akechi says. “What happened after we… parted ways in Shido’s Palace?”
What a delicate way to say it. Akira tries not to think too hard about it. But he shares, everything he can, from changing Shido’s heart to the moment Akechi had reappeared on Christmas Eve, and Akechi nods along. Akira wonders, briefly, if Akechi had been around to watch them defeat Yaldabaoth. Akechi’s expression doesn’t give away enough for Akira to tell.
He sort of hopes he had been.
When Akira’s phone rings, Akechi gestures to him, eyes sharp.
“Go ahead,” he says, and Akira answers his phone and tries to ignore the way Akechi is watching him as Kasumi tells him about the weird thing in Odaiba, and almost succeeds in pushing off the way it makes his heart jump.
Akechi is ruthless in the Metaverse, in a very different way than he was ruthless before.
In Sae’s Palace, he was clean and efficient and deadly in a very exact way. It all fit into the appearance he wanted to give off back then, practiced and intentional. Now, he’s much sharper, takes much more glee in the act of violence in the first place. Akira likes watching him fight regardless, but there’s something about this that makes him get the same competitive rush he’d had when he faked his death.
Akechi seems delighted by that, too, egging Akira on to greater and greater lengths, and Kasumi seems annoyed about it all but there are bigger things going on.
And then they lose her.
“Well,” Akechi says on the way back to Leblanc. “How do you know him, anyway?”
“Therapist,” Akira says. “Er—he’s mine. I…”
Helped him with his research, except now he feels guilty about that on a level he hadn’t realized he could feel guilty about, because he’d used that research for this. He should have been smarter about it. Shouldn’t have implied the existence of Mementos to him. Shouldn’t have said anything.
He feels tricked. He feels set up. It feels worse than Akechi’s betrayal had, because Akira had at least been able to tell there were things Akechi wasn’t telling him. He believed Maruki, and he should have been more worried, clearly, when Maruki admitted to knowing Akira was a Phantom Thief, but it had been the eighteenth and Akira had bigger things to worry about.
“He doesn’t seem like a particularly good one,” Akechi says, disdainful. Akira sighs.
“No,” Akira says. “He doesn’t.”
“You’re upset about this,” Akechi says. Akira winces.
“I trusted him,” Akira admits, and Akechi snorts.
“You trust everyone,” he says. “You trusted me.”
Akira makes a so-so motion with his hand.
“I kinda guessed something was weird with you back in June, actually,” Akira says. “No one’s naturally that… perfect, I guess.”
“Hm.” Akechi narrows his eyes. “But you still went along with everything.”
Akira shrugs.
“I was having fun,” he says. “Weren’t you?”
Akechi searches his face, then looks away, and doesn’t answer.
Akira’s not sure if that means yes or no, but he sort of feels like it’s a yes.
“You know, most of your targets were seen as perfectly amicable people before you exposed them,” Akechi changes the topic. “Why is this one such a surprise?”
It shouldn’t be.
“He didn’t… hurt people the same way,” Akira says. “I barely understand how he’s doing this.”
“Well, that’s what we’re going to find out, isn’t it?” Akechi says. “How he’s doing this.”
“I bet it’s Mementos,” Akira grouses. “I mentioned the idea of a collective unconscious to him once and he got excited about it. I thought he was just…”
“An eccentric researcher?” Akechi says. “Kurusu, the man manipulated you, clearly.”
“I see that now,” Akira snaps. “You don’t have to—”
He takes a deep breath.
“Sorry,” he says.
Because he had been, hadn’t he, and it finally sinks in that when he said he’d known Akira was a Phantom Thief from the start, he’d known Akira knew about the cognitive world for months, and didn’t say anything, and specifically sought him out because he knew Akira knew, and he feels gross and awful now.
“We’ll fix it,” Akira says. “Don’t worry about that.”
“I wasn’t,” Akechi says, and it rings, somehow, false.
Akechi refuses every single one of Akira’s requests to hang out until he must get tired of it and lets Akira bully him into a game at Penguin Sniper.
“We really don’t have time for this,” Akechi says, and Akira shrugs.
“I missed you,” he says, and Akechi sighs.
“I know that,” Akechi says. “You’ve made that glaringly clear.”
He sounds mad about it. He sounds mad about just about everything, these days, though. Akira isn’t sure why this feels so different. It does. It’s weird that Akira can tell.
Even with this new attitude, Akechi is still Akechi, Akira guesses. Akira’s spent long enough around him to get a read on him, sort of broadly. He knows it drives Akechi up the wall, because Akechi gets angry about people knowing him.
Not that Akira’s better.
Akira is happy to watch Akechi throw, happy to watch the focused little frown he gets that Akira’s not sure he realizes he gets. It’s one of his real expressions, because he used to get it all the time and he still does, and Akira’s made a game of cataloging them. He’s sure Akechi would give him one of his annoyed, confused frowns if he admitted to it out loud.
So, of course:
“So the dress shirts and sweater vests weren’t a Detective Prince image thing,” Akira says, just as Akechi is about to throw, and watches as he nearly does, nearly misses. He stops himself at the last second though, turning to Akira with an incredulous look on his face.
Confused, check. Annoyed, also check. Seemingly unaware of what his face is doing long enough for Akira to notice the shift, notice when the confusion fades out to be replaced with just annoyance: triple-check.
“What,” Akechi says, and Akira shrugs.
“I just thought, y’know,” Akira says. “Couldn’t be comfortable all the time.”
“It’s perfectly comfortable,” Akechi says. “You just don’t have a fashion sense.”
“Uh-huh,” Akira says, leaning against the table they have set up. Morgana rolls his eyes and ducks into the bag. “You dress like a university professor.”
Akechi scowls, just as practiced as his smiles used to be, and Akira grins back.
He doesn’t manage to get his frustrated little frown out of his head, and he realizes, as he’s lying in bed, oh.
Is this what a crush is?
The thought makes him a little giddy, actually; if this is what a crush is, this feeling of weird lightness in him any time he thinks about Akechi, then no wonder people make big deals out of them. No wonder Ann and Ryuji had been so thrown when he said he’d never had one before. This feels great, actually.
It makes him think that things might work out.
He doesn’t ask. They’re busy, after all, with a deadline looming over their heads.
And then it’s too late.
Akira listens to Maruki talk about his reality, and about the special relationship he and Akechi shared, and feels his heart sink.
Did he change me so I’d like Akechi, too? Akira thinks, and that feels, somehow, like the extra-terrible cherry on top of the news that Akechi really is supposed to be dead.
Unless Maruki is lying again, because he lies and lies and lies, all in the name of other people’s happiness, without even checking to see what they want first. Akira feels a little ill at the thought.
“What are you going to do,” Akechi asks him, and Akira is still reeling, still trying to sort out his own feelings, with Akechi’s clear panic bearing down on him. “I need an answer.”
He can’t force Akechi to live like this. Akira doesn’t know if the crush is Maruki’s fabrication or not but he does know that they’re friends, that he meant something to Akira, or else this wouldn’t have happened.
“We’re fighting him tomorrow,” Akira says. “But—Akechi.”
“Good,” Akechi says, and spins on his heel.
“Akechi!” Akira says. “Wait—”
The door slams shut.
Akira sinks into one of the booths, and buries his face in his hands.
Go back. Sort through it all. Try not to start crying.
It makes sense; he only came back after reality fixed itself, but he came back before reality got weird, so Akira had thought… but no, obviously, that was too perfect. Morgana’s probably going to be gone when they fix all of this too, then, and Akira takes a shuddering breath and puts more effort into trying not to cry.
Does he like Akechi? It’s not like the question matters. His only “real” crush ever and he’s dead, of course, because Akira can’t just be normal. He’s quiet and weird already, why not add this on top? Ryuji was right. But what’s the point of lingering on it? He’ll go back to reality, and mourn Akechi properly, and then probably never feel this again, because Maruki did something to his head.
It’s fine. He has his friends.
But Akechi hadn’t wanted to die.
Akira won’t let Akechi trick him into thinking he did. He’d been upset in that engine room about dying, and Akira had promised, and this news isn’t about to make him break it. That had been real. That had been real, and every single one of their pool games had been real. Their visit to the aquarium, the bathhouse, their duel. Those were all real. Maruki can’t make him doubt those emotions because Maruki had nothing to do with them.
So he’ll press on, and win tomorrow, because he promised Akechi, and even if this crush is an artificial thing Maruki did to try to sway him, Akira values Akechi and his wishes, even if Akira wants the world to be fair, just once.
They win, and Akechi is gone, and Akira mourns.
The crush doesn’t go away.
Which is a problem, because Akechi is gone, and when he realizes he still likes Akechi, he ends up crying. Morgana’s alarmed, but Akira doesn’t know how he could explain it, that the first person he’s liked died and he doesn’t even know what was so different about him so as to trigger it, but there’s nothing he can do about it, is there?
Sojiro suggests grief counseling, and Akira laughs.
“It was a real suggestion,” Sojiro says, crossing his arms.
“I know,” Akira says. “Sorry.”
Akira doesn’t think he can step into another therapist’s office again, maybe ever. He doesn’t think he can trust another therapist, not after what Maruki did. Not after the ways Maruki twisted him around his fingers like a puppet. He doesn’t think he could entrust his first(only) crush to one, couldn’t even begin to talk about him, not with how wrapped up in the Phantom Thieves his relationship with Akechi had been. He’s not sure if that’ll still get him in legal trouble or not, and besides that, there’s no way he could talk about the Metaverse.
“Don’t apologize,” Sojiro says. “Things go bad with that counselor at school?”
“You could say,” Akira says, a little surprised at the bitterness he lets slip out.
“That’s too bad,” Sojiro says. “It wasn’t Phantom Thief stuff, was it?”
Akira blinks.
“Why do you ask?”
“Came in here while you were on your trip with a book on cognitive psience,” Sojiro says, and Akira sort of remembers Futaba telling him about that. He’d been tired, though, and had maybe skimmed that conversation, and now he feels shitty and cold about it. “Futaba seemed fine with him being here, though.”
“Oh,” Akira says. So that was how he’d found out about Wakaba. He’d sort of assumed he’d just… looked into Sojiro or Futaba’s mind, or something. This feels… worse. “He never told me.”
Sojiro frowns, that one that means he’s actually mad about something but is trying to be calm for Futaba. Akira isn’t used to Sojiro trying to use it on him, though.
“Is that so,” he says, and doesn’t elaborate.
“I’ll try talking to someone about it, though,” Akira says, only partly truthfully and mostly because he doesn’t want to let Sojiro down.
“Better than keeping it locked up inside,” Sojiro says. “Trust me on that one.”
Yeah.
He goes home, and he doesn’t talk to anyone about it, and he catches the looks Morgana sends him when he has a bad night and just sits in his room holding Akechi’s glove like it’s some sort of charm. He has video chats with his friends as often as he can, because he misses them and there’s no one at home for him these days, barely even his parents, so it’s really the only time he gets to talk to anyone.
“How’s life out in the countryside going for you?” Futaba asks on one call. Akira shrugs.
“Quiet,” he says.
“That must be nice,” Haru says. “To get a break from all the chaos.”
“Not really,” Akira says. “I miss Tokyo.”
“Then just come back down here!” Ryuji says. Akira smiles.
“It’s not that easy,” he says. “But I’ll think about it.”
“We should do something this summer,” Ann says. “When Akira can come down here.”
“Oh, yeah!” Ryuji says. “Akira, your break’s the same as Shujin’s, right?”
“It should be,” Akira says.
“Then we’ll plan something!” Ryuji says.
“That sounds like a delightful idea,” Yusuke says. “When shall we begin planning?”
“Maybe we should wait until after exams,” Makoto says, and Akira smiles, letting the conversation fade into background noise as he listens.
At least, until Ann asks, “Oh, but I might have things to do with Shiho.”
“You’re still dating?” Morgana asks from Akira’s lap. Ann beams.
“Of course we are!” Ann says. “Her school’s not even that far away, and I make enough from my modeling that I can cover her train fare easily.”
“Hell yeah,” Ryuji says. “Ann’s the only one of us who’s got anyone still, isn’t she?”
“Actually,” Makoto says, and suddenly nervous, she looks away from the camera. Haru giggles from the seat next to her. They’re sharing a camera, presumably because they’ve been living together.
“Aw, Mako-chan, it’s alright,” she says. “We’re dating now.”
Akira blinks.
“Congrats,” he says.
“Thank you!” Haru smiles brightly. “We’ve been waiting for a good time to announce it.”
“You two are so cute,” Ann says. “We gotta throw you a party or something!”
“There’s—no need,” Makoto says, blushing. “But thank you.”
“No way,” Ryuji says. “We’re totally throwing you guys a party. Right, guys?”
“Of course,” Yusuke says.
“Let’s do it when we all meet up this summer, so Akira and I can be there, too!” Morgana says.
“I think that would be a fantastic idea,” Yusuke says. “It wouldn’t be a Phantom Thieves party without our leader present, after all.”
“Well,” Makoto says with a smile, “Alright. If you all want to, then I suppose I have no opposition.”
Haru giggles, and Akira smiles, and tries not to miss Akechi too fiercely that night.
The longer things go on, the more Akira’s sure that his lingering, impossible-to-shake crush is another leftover effect from Maruki’s reality, because it doesn’t happen again.
He’s not really worrying about it when he gets to Tokyo for the summer, too excited to be hanging out with his friends, and then the Jails happen. He’s launched straight back into the Metaverse without any warning, frustration and stress and a well-concealed panic mingling together into one terrible emotion that hits him all at once after Alice’s Shadow orders them removed and they get dropped down a pit.
“What the hell’s going on,” Ryuji asks. “Who does she think she is?”
Akira wanders off from them, wanting to make sure there’s no immediate danger in the area. He was supposed to be having a calm summer break with his friends, not… this. Not more Metaverse, more things for him to worry about.
There’s no way it’s going to be simple. He can feel it hovering over him already.
The girl in the box, Sophia, makes things more complicated. Trying to keep track of her while finding a way out of the Metaverse is a whole ordeal of its own, and then she’s on his phone, and now he’s going to have another constant companion.
Great.
Perfect.
He doesn’t let his annoyance show, instead taking up his old mantle as leader to get them through a meeting before they get to work.
When they get the news they’ll be going on a road trip, courtesy of the Public Security inspector who comes and bothers them, Akira doesn’t show his annoyance there, either, nodding and leaving to pack.
He takes his usual stuff, clothes, hygiene items, and, well, Akechi’s glove.
“You’re really bringing that?” Morgana asks. Akira shrugs.
“It’s like he gets to come with us,” Akira says. Morgana’s ears flick back.
“Akira…” Morgana says.
“I’m fine, Morgana. He’d hate all of this. Too bad we can’t actually drag him along.”
“Who’s him?” Sophia asks from Akira’s phone, and Akira props it up on the bed so he can look at her while he packs.
“A friend of Akira’s,” Morgana says. “He…”
“He’s gone,” Akira says.
“Why don’t you look for him?” Sophia asks. Akira breathes out a laugh.
“Not gone like that, Sophia. He, uh.” Akira looks away, shoving the glove in his pocket. “He died.”
“Oh,” Sophia says. “I’m sorry, Akira.”
“It was a while ago,” Akira says, like he hadn’t held a private little celebration on the tenth last month over getting to meet him, where Morgana had given him the sad eyes the whole time. “It’s fine now.”
“If you’re sure,” Sophia says.
“I am,” Akira says. “Thank you, though, Sophia.”
“If you ever want to talk about it, I’m here,” Sophia says.
“I might take you up on that,” Akira says.
It might be easier to talk to someone who didn’t know him, after all, someone who doesn’t have all the messy, mixed feelings the rest of the Thieves have about Akechi. He still did tell Sojiro he’d talk to someone, and he has yet to make good on that.
Maybe.
“Akira,” Sophia says one day while they’re out walking, “I have a question about the heart.”
“Go for it,” Akira says.
“Makoto and Haru are dating,” Sophia starts, and Akira nods, suddenly unsure where this is going. “And Ann has a girlfriend.”
“Yeah,” Akira says.
“What makes these people special to them in a way that their friends are not?” Sophia asks.
“I mean, they’re dating,” Morgana says. “They like each other.”
“Do friends not like each other?” Sophia asks.
“It’s… not like that,” Akira says. “Friends like each other. Some people just are… attracted to other people, I guess. Haru and Makoto are attracted to each other, and they decided they wanted to date, so they’re dating now. Same thing goes for Ann and Shiho.”
“Hm,” Sophia says. “What makes another person attractive?”
“Varies by person,” Akira says.
“What are you attracted to?”
Akechi, specifically, and so far only Akechi. Akira shrugs.
“I don’t really have a taste, the way most people do,” Akira says. “Futaba says it’s called asexuality. Only ever liked one person like that.”
Morgana pokes up in the bag.
“I thought you didn’t get crushes,” Morgana says. “We had a whole thing about it.”
“Yeah,” Akira says.
“Well, now you gotta share,” Morgana says. “Someone in your hometown? I didn’t notice you talking to anyone new, but…”
“Nah,” Akira says. “Just, uh.”
“...Oh,” Morgana says, ears flicking back. “It was Akechi, wasn’t it.”
“Figured it out in January,” Akira says as he turns down a street. “So, you know.”
“Akira…” Morgana’s tail lashes in the bag. Akira can feel it against his back. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Akira shrugs.
“Didn’t seem like a big deal after everything got fixed,” Akira says. “Never told him, either.”
“Who’s Akechi?” Sophia asks. “It sounds like he meant a lot to you.”
“Friend who died,” Akira says, suddenly weirdly choked up about it. “So there’s really no point to it now.”
“...You sounded like you were really close to Akechi,” Sophia says. “And you liked him?”
“Yeah,” Akira says. “A lot. Not… not just romantically, we were really good friends.”
“I see,” Sophia says. “Thank you for telling me.”
“Yeah,” Akira says.
If Akira notices Morgana curling up closer to him that night, well, Akira keeps it to himself.
It’s almost conspicuous for Akira to find himself, somehow, staring down Goro Akechi today, June ninth, in a hallway on his college campus. Or, at least, he sure looks like Goro Akechi.
“...Well,” Akechi says, and he sounds like Goro Akechi, too.
“The fuck,” Akira says, and Akechi blows out a breath.
“Fair,” he says, and then, weaker: “...Lunch? On me.”
“...Lunch,” Akira agrees, following him down the hall. “And an explanation.”
“Also fair,” Akechi says. “No Morgana?”
“With Haru,” Akira says. “The professor for one of my classes is allergic.”
“I see,” Akechi says.
This is surreal.
“What are you doing here,” Akira asks before they’ve even reached the student union building, and Akechi winces.
“Some mistaken idea to get my life together before I talked to you again,” he admits after a moment of clear internal debate. Akira’s a little impressed that he’s this good at reading Akechi, even this far on. “Considering where it was at when we parted ways, I… didn’t want to face you like that.”
“You could have texted,” Akira says. “Let me know you weren’t dead. Something. Which, speaking of.”
Akira digs around in his pocket, pulling out Akechi’s glove and pushing it into his chest. Akechi stares at it, and then stares at Akira, incredulous.
“Why are you still carrying that around,” Akechi asks, just as incredulous as his look.
“I promised you,” Akira says, like it’s that simple. For Akira, it is. Akechi continues to stare at him.
“So you did,” he says. “I’ve been worrying about this for the wrong reasons, clearly. I still don’t entirely understand you.”
“Clearly,” Akira says. “And you owe me.”
“How?” Akechi stands there, seemingly lost for what to do, whether to accept the glove back or to shove it at Akira. “There’s no Metaverse.”
“Sounds like quitter talk to me,” Akira says. And then, just like he’d hoped; Akechi’s eyes sharpen and he snatches the glove, not giving Akira a chance to revoke his challenge.
“Fine, then,” he says. “You have a deal, Kurusu.”
Akira grins, and follows Akechi to get lunch, and wonders if the lingering crush he has will raise its head again.
He’s sure that, if it does, he’ll handle that, too.