Perfect Treasures, Simple Pleasures

by Caerio

Summary:

“So, this is the Trickster you kept telling me about? Honestly, I’ve come to expect someone a bit more impressive, Lavenza.”

It can’t be.

There, in the luminescent blues of the Velvet Room’s corridor, unfamiliar white hair brushing against the shoulders of an unfamiliar uniform jacket, but eyes, yellow, unfamiliar eyes burning into Akira and setting him ablaze with that unforgettable, familiar glow, and alive, alive, alive, stood Goro Akechi.

And something inside Akira combusts.

—

After returning to the tranquility of his hometown, Akira Kurusu struggles to come to terms with the gains and losses of his adventures as the Phantom Thief of Hearts. Yet, in the slivers of blue that bleed into his dreams and reality, he finds treasures believed to be obliterated by his own choices.

Chapter 1: A Kinder World

Grief annihilates him through subtle whispers of promises stuck in a perpetual motion of being broken. Never quite by shattering them, but by always clawing deep enough to make him dread that it eventually will. 

Akira’s world, kind as it is, moves on, and, in a merciless clash of its waves, he moves on with it. Allegedly.

The realization comes to him in a disjointed collection of ripples. From any perspective but his own, it might appear that his past life has been demolished in a cathartic crash, just like it had begun around the same time a year ago. But for him, the transition between the different states of normalcy and distortion is nothing but a series of small adaptations, and Akira Kurusu is many things, but, above all else, he is adaptable .

And so he adapts. So he morphs, from the fearless leader of the Phantom Thieves of Hearts back into a regular student with meek aspirations and even meeker presence. From a dear confidant to people from all walks of life to a loner with an unclear criminal history whom most are advised to approach with caution, if approach at all. From someone who was always on the run to cram as much activity into his every day, to the point where even a second of idleness filled him with an almost unbearable sensation of unrest, to a person who spends afternoon after meaningless afternoon staring into the space between dream and reality, pondering if the gap between the two can ever be stretched wide enough to fit him again.

And yet, it splashes and pours, it wrinkles at the surface, unseen stones skipping on the water. And, through the created vibrations, it tears.

At first, it touches him with almost feather-like gentleness. A mention from one of his classmates of some trendy spot in Kichijoji she visited during her trip to Tokyo last summer he happened to overhear. A near-nostalgic ping of familiarity mixed with something he doesn’t yet dare name. 

A morning TV segment he catches halfway out the door, shot on a familiar backdrop. The spotlight he remembers occupied by a ghost of a memory is now taken by an up-and-coming idol he can’t see behind the murky veil of lightheadedness that suddenly obscures his vision.  

An awkwardness that fogs the air when Ann lets a slip-up fall through during one of their phone calls, mentioning something she shouldn’t have only to change the subject hastily. Akira carries on through their talk like nothing is out of place, even if Morgana’s eyes linger on him throughout, searching for a reaction he should know he wouldn’t be getting.

Akira walks through Inaba’s disquietingly empty streets and refuses to call it grief. Akira gets on calls with nothing to add to his friends’ infuriatingly lighthearted chatter and refuses to call it grief. Akira tells Morgana that he can’t focus on homework with him stalling around and spends his weekends lying in bed, unseeing eyes trying to focus on miscellaneous objects in his room and make them flicker in blue and refuses to call it grief. Akira leaves his bed almost nightly to stare at the marble tiles of his bathroom, clutching a piece of worn leather in his hands and trying, uselessly, desperately trying to recall its scent and refuses to call it grief.  

Grief is what something much less tragic leaves behind, a memento that something much less tragic once lived there. That it still haunts the same spaces within him, no matter how deeply it tries to wrap itself up in regret and bitterness. Yet, what purpose does it serve him if he can’t tear through the grief? What purpose would this feeling serve him if he could , half-finished and barely even started, unused and never to be useful again?

Less than a month passes before the splashes turn into waves, and Akira still refuses to call it grief.

Yet, it doesn’t need to be named to annihilate him. It seeps into the cracks nameless, and inflates his heart regardless of what he calls it. Grief doesn’t ask from Akira to be acknowledged, it doesn’t wonder if he recognizes its face. It grows from the crevice once occupied by something else until there’s no longer a space for it to grow, and then it refuses to stop growing.

And Akira moves on, leaking with it. Does he really have a choice?

 

“You weren’t lying, it really is boring here…” Morgana whines to him on the second week of their anticlimactic reunion with Akira’s hometown. Beforehand, he attempted to warn the cat of how needless his sacrifice of big city life will be, anticipating such a reaction.

What do you suggest, I stay with Futaba? She never leaves the house, I bet I’ll be less bored with you even in the countryside , Morgana told him at the time. Well, little did he know…

“Isn’t there anything you’d rather do than just sit here?” From where Morgana is perched up on the window sill, looming over Akira as he lays on the bed, the cat looks oddly imposing. Akira feels a warm reminder of how Mona used to usher him to sleep at absurd hours. “C’mon, I’m sure Inaba has at least something interesting going on besides just sulking in bed all day!”

“Not gonna happen,” Akira attempts to infuse his voice with as much of his signature cockiness as he can. He likes to think that he succeeds. He doesn’t like to think about how, just a few months ago, he didn’t have to try to sound like himself. “I deserve to rest in retirement.”

“You’re eighteen, not eighty,” Morgana rolls his eyes to the best of his ability and jumps onto his chest, earning a pathetic little squeal from Akira.

“What do you know about being eighteen?” He promptly responds after a short period of recovery. “Cats rarely even live to eighteen. How do you know that your days aren’t numbered?”

Morgana scoffs.

“That’s because I’m not a cat. You’ll see, I will outlive all of you!”

And then he stops. And then he looks at Akira from the corner of his eye, in a way Akira has come to learn means that he’s supposed not to notice that he’s looking, and stills. It’s been like that ever since, whenever the subject of death came up in any context.

“Good luck with that, I’ll have you know that I plan to live until I’m at least a hundred,” Akira replies.

That’s a lie. Akira is not planning to live for that long. Akira is barely planning to live, and is already barely living.

“Well, suit yourself,” Morgana gets down on the floor and refuses to meet his eyes as he strolls to the door. “If you intend to spend that hundred years in bed, I’m gonna go explore by myself. Leave the window open.”

“Sure thing. Have fun,” Akira replies and curls onto his side, determined to do just that.

 

Akira used to dread the nightmares. Even before the Metaverse entered his life, a blessing and a curse in the form of a concrete purpose haunted with Shadows and shadows of people, Akira wasn’t unfamiliar with restless nights of dreams that leave one more exhausted than any period of prolonged wakefulness. 

His time in jail was spent in such dreams, anthropomorphic visions of monsters he never feared in reality and labyrinths he, while awake, could navigate even blinded. Endless strings of choices he was unprepared to make and people he saw disintegrate into mist.

To both his horror and relief, he never dreams of what he expected to dream of most. None of his nightmares feature the suffocating smell of engine oil and soot. None feel like wet snow under his boots and sound like belated confessions. None of them begin with the familiar chime of Leblanc’s door and end with the ear-splitting shattering of pastel pinks and blues.

The metamorphosis of his dreams creeps up on him so delicately that, by the time he notes it with tardy horror, it has already settled all around him, penetrating his skin and wrapping around his brain tightly. His nights become dreamless and, by extent, peaceful. His nights become peaceful and, by extent, stop being just nights.

Akira sleeps through weekends and goes to bed together with the sun on weekdays. He starts taking afternoon naps, which soon extend all the way through the night, his eyes prying open at dusk with the same desire to close once again he held when getting into his bed right after school. At first, Morgana tries to voice his concerns, both vocally and physically by clawing on his arm in an attempt to rouse him out of unconsciousness every evening, but he deflects his worry by blaming his unusual sleeping patterns on the sudden change in environment. 

By mid April, he rarely ever sees Morgana. He rarely ever sees anything beyond the hazy motions of his school life and the back of his eyelids.

By mid April, his dreams begin to bleed blue.

 

“I already promised Sojiro that you're gonna help out at Leblanc when you come out here, by the way. Saying no is not an option.”

Golden Week is in two weeks. How Akira will be spending the holidays was decided long before he even boarded the train back to Inaba, which now feels like a lifetime ago.

“Thank you, Futaba. What I miss most about Tokyo is definitely all the unpaid labor,” he tries to sound enthusiastic. 

Akira has always been the only child, and barely a child to begin with, considering how unwelcome he felt in his own home throughout his tranquilized formative years. So, he always suspected that his irrevocable and near-instantaneous attachment to Futaba must’ve been an overcompensation for something . It seems shameful, almost criminally self-indulgent - his insecure desire to be a part of a family that seems just misfitted, and broken, and warm in its nurturing determination enough to erase the need for bonds forged in blood, and just right for him in its unconventional perfection. 

It’s a good thing that Futaba appears to feel the same. She is nagging, and perceptive, and idiosyncratic, and heart-wrenchingly willing to be vulnerable, and everything he’s ever wanted in a little sister. She texts him most and, shockingly, calls him second-most, beaten only by Ann.

“Consider it working for food and shelter. According to Sojiro, he’s not running a charity.”

“You don’t do anything for food and shelter,” he accuses warmly.

“Well, I am his child! Force him to sign adoption papers and then you can bleed him dry too.”

He doesn’t mention to Futaba that, in all honesty, it might be a decent enough idea, because he’s seen his parents exactly four times since returning a month ago. When he, distraught and barely held together by the need to maintain appearances in front of his cat, of all things, walked into the house he knows as nothing but stuffed with emptiness, he found it just as he remembered, the only sign that someone has been notified of his return was a hastily scribbled note on the kitchen table that read In Sapporo. Back Saturday. Welcome home.

“But yes, to answer your not-question. I’ll be there on the 28th. My parents are away for work, so it’ll be fine.”

Futaba lets out an endearingly genuine hooray , and he hears her spin in her office chair.

“Glad to have you back, leader! And I dare any god stand in the way of our vacation this time.”

“As I told Morgana, I am officially retired,” he says with faux content. “Your leader is no more, I am now just an old man looking to spend his remaining days staring at the sunset, or whatever old people like to do.”

Futaba chuckles.

“I’ll be sure to tell the others that you’re now exclusively interested in mahjong and gardening. Everyone is on board, by the way, as of today,” she adds excitedly. “Sumire told me in class that she’ll be coming back on the first from whatever sports thing she’s going to next week, so she’ll be a bit late to the party. But everyone else is ready! Even Makoto promised that she’ll make all the time ever for you, Keio’s fancy law school be damned.”

Is warming and oddly reassuring to hear Futaba go on and on about their Golden Week plans and, for a while, Akira simply basks in pretending like he is equally excited to come back. She plans too much and sounds too eager, and Akira attempts to picture himself from her perspective - less than a month gone, missed and missing the simple company of his friends and all the exhilaration of big city life that is no longer tinted by criminal fame or red skies, by the ever-demanding lust for chivalry and invisible blood soaking into his gloves.

“Joker? You listening?” Futaba’s voice sounds far away all of a sudden, and Akira almost lets the urge to snap, to bark Don’t call me that, win.

“Sorry, just spaced out. What were you saying?” He answers instead.

And then he sees it. 

In the corner of his eye, right where the wall meets with a nearly-empty bookcase he never got to filling with the absurd amount of novels and magazines he hauled all the way back from Tokyo, Akira notices a shimmer of royal blue.

At first, he, rationally, blames it on the tricks of his tired mind. He’s been awake since morning , way longer than he’s managed to stay up without succumbing to the serenity of sleep in a week, and his mind is buzzing with shameful thoughts of dreadful reunions. After all, his dreamscapes have been infused with ethereal impressions of blue for a while now, he must be so harshly conditioned to associate the color with dreaming that his subconscious just paints over his mind in blue on instinct. Futaba is still talking, something about treating high school like a life sim , but he tunes her out, eyes closing in an attempt to wish away the illusion. 

When he looks back, the blue flicker still stares at him, albeit a bit dimmer now, and Akira feels an overwhelming clash of dread and unease and excitement, and oh god, it’s back? Can it be back? Can we be Joker again? I thought you hated being Joker. Why are you so thrilled, friend, it’s disgusting, you’re a disgusting trigger-happy maniac. It can’t be back. Can it? You’re going insane, congratulations. Futaba is not speaking. Futaba can probably hear you losing your mind in real time. She’s asking something. It can’t possibly be back. Say something, you idiot!

“Akira? Earth to Akira?” Futaba sounds concerned. How long has she been calling out to him? Did he say any of it out loud? Does she now know that he went insane?

“Sorry, something urgent came up, need to run,” Akira notes that he sounds out of breath, like he’s been running for hours, not staring open-mouthed at the corner which, yep, still there. Still blue. Is it fading? Was it that small when he first saw it?

“What?.. Okay? Just text me when…” He doesn’t wait for her to finish, call ended and already on his feet, tentatively edging closer to the corner, fearing to even blink in case the glimmer chooses that moment to disappear without a trace. 

He reaches his hand and his fingertips connect with a solid wall, the flicker of blue dispersing into his flesh in liquid flames. Like it was never there.

That night, Akira, for the first time in what feels like ages, is restless. He stares at the ceiling, the room still, safe for Mona’s tiny snores, and caresses the fabric of the glove that feels impossibly heavy in his hand, eyes searching for a suggestion of a break between dream and reality. 

 

Akira hates Joker. He hates Joker the same way someone once told him they hated Akira. Joker is the relentless symbol of humanity’s rebelion. Joker is the embodiment of collected cool and authority that makes people feel invincible, even when he sends them rushing to their deaths. Joker is charmingly reckless and nonchalantly brilliant in his well-intentioned righteousness. Joker saved millions and slayed god. Akira loves being Joker. Akira loves Joker.

Before his chance encounter with Masayoshi Shido, Akira Kurusu was barely a presence. Sure, he believed in doing the right thing and held some convictions, even if he rarely dared to speak them aloud, but, ultimately, if someone asked him to describe Akira Kurusu circa a year ago, he’d draw a blank. He was what he needed to be, no more and no less. 

Joker was born when his pitiful, fear-bred talent to adapt was pushed to its limits. Then, out of the depths of his pathetic, meek heart, Arsène was born - he slayed him to put on yet another mask almost instantly. 

He finds it funny how the Trickster’s strength, apparently, stems from the power of his bonds. It’s funny, really, how, be it acquiring Shadows through interrogation or choosing just the right words of encouragement to deepen a relationship, his strength was always in adjusting himself to become a mask others needed to see.

Unlike Akira Kurusu, Joker is a stone wall. Still a performer, sure, but not the kind that tries to match whatever quirky personality he happened to befriend, fearing that the consequences of failing would leave him all alone. Instead, Joker is an auteur, more daring in his theatrics than Akira was ever allowed to be, more assured in the flawlessness of his aspirations than Akira could imagine. Joker was adored for all the right reasons, and Akira, who happened to share his face, just basked in the afterglow of that adoration. Joker was the person bold enough to shoot god in the face, while Akira was plagued with nightmares of his friends disintegrating into black mist. Joker was the person strong enough to conserve humanity’s free will at the cost of his own greatest desire, while Akira was the one who almost took Maruki’s deal. 

In the year of being Joker, Akira grew to resemble him as closely as he could. Charming and kind, proficient and intelligent, gutsy and reliable. The amalgamation of the two was what people wanted - Joker took the pathetic, spineless flexibility of Akira Kurusu and turned it into a strength, and let others latch onto his unbendable back, because Joker could carry them. Joker could carry the wishes of the entire human race on his shoulders and still have enough strength to pull the trigger on the God of Control. 

Yet, when Joker’s mask fell off his face, Akira found himself cracking under the weight.

He hated Joker for leaving him to bear the consequences. 

In all of his time as the Phantom Thieves’ fearless leader, Akira has truly come to feel like Akira Kurusu was enough only once. In that connection, the thrill of being Joker blended almost seamlessly with the truth of his own soul, and, if for only a few hours every time he got to be that version of himself, he felt seen . There was a cluster there, an unavoidable collision triggered by sameness and differences pulling to connect and combust, but when it came down to it, when the crash seemed as inescapable as it was lethal, they slotted together with a soft click that sounded suspiciously like the clanking of porcelain cups against a wooden counter, like the squeak of a chair in the middle of a somber jazz club, like a snort of laughter, realistically flawed, and endearingly silly, and sharp, and, for once, real. It was funny how, of all relationships he formed in Tokyo, that one was, at face value, most entangled in deceit and imposture.

He wishes he hated that person for leaving him, too.

But the flicker of blue he is now convinced he is not imagining but seeing, seeing in the space between the wooden boards in front of the drama club’s room, at the top of the shrine gates he passes on his way through the shopping district, in the lettering of the plank that reads his family name at the front of his house, the diaphanous slip of royal blue drowns that hatred every time his eyes manage to catch it before the illusion, ultimately, disperses, and he is left with the emotion he never imagined he would feel once again, not after everything, not after getting so desensitized to even its concept that, at first, he almost mistakes it for hope .

Fear.

He also fears Joker. Fears what, if this continuous glitching in the materiality of his world is, in fact, genuine, Joker will be expected to do this time. What burden he will be expected to take. What impossible choice he will be forced to make.

But the hope is also there. As is the masochistic excitement. They guide Akira’s fingers every time he reaches for the blue catch in the light while the fear holds its breath.

Morgana doesn’t seem to notice the glistening blue, but that’s not unexpected. If it represents what he knows it to represent, then Morgana, despite sharing a connection with the place much more primal than Akira’s, has no means to perceive it. He does, however, note Akira’s sudden shift in demeanor, the alertness that replaces his lethargic sulking and, thankfully, assumes it to be a change for the better. Akira doesn’t correct him, instead taking Morgana on the walks he demanded ever since they settled in Inaba, all in an attempt to, perhaps, accidentally stumble upon a familiar door. 

Around him, the preparations for his upcoming departure are in full swing. The rebranded Phantom Thieves chat is as lively as ever, and even Futaba, seemingly okay with the abrupt termination of their last call after Akira tells her an elaborate lie about how he heard something downstairs and thought someone broke into his house, doesn’t catch on to something being wrong. Akira, grateful as ever for his friends’ acceptance of his historically poor texting etiquette, learns of what awaits him in Tokyo through barely registering walls of dialogue he skims through every morning before beginning his hunt for delusions.

But, as expected, his destination was never one traveled to through conventional means. It, as always, reaches him first in the realm of dreams, where it always belonged.

Akira Kurusu falls asleep as himself and wakes in the condensed void of the limitless margin between selves, as another. 

The hatred and longing melt off of him the moment he identifies the heaviness of the mask perched on his face, and so, even if for just one inconsiderable moment of clairvoyant ecstasy, the grief he refuses to call grief thaws, too. 

The door to his cell is open, and in front of him hunches a familiar form of Igor.

“Welcome to the Velvet Room!”

Akira knows, with the instantaneous snap of the heightened reflexes he almost forgot he possessed, that something is not right. 

“Hello, Trickster.”

It’s the room, it’s in the room itself, its form less solid that he came to anticipate, as the dark blue scape around him appears to swim at the edges, rippling with the steps of the figure stepping out of the corridor behind Igor’s desk and into the low light. 

Despite it being an unfamiliar voice that welcomed him first, it’s Lavenza who strides out of the darkness, a relieved greeting of Oh, Trickster, we’ve tried to reach you for so long , on her lips. Yet, the bearer of the first hello is right behind her, steps crisp and confident compared to Lavenza’s childlike tramps. As Lavenza proceeds closer to the cell holding Akira, hopeful eyes gleaming at him from beneath, a tall, elegant woman comes to stand beside Igor’s desk, and while her eyes lack Lavenza’s obviously biased warmth, the way in which she assesses him somehow softens a part of the anxiety he didn’t know he felt until in begun to dissolve. 

After everything he has endured alongside the attendants of the Velvet Room, Akira seemingly lost his ability to feel surprised. It was no longer wired into his brain to question the mysterious appearances of enigmatic, vaguely supernatural characters in his life, so he simply meets the eyes of the woman, who, upon closer inspection, looks oddly similar to Lavenza, and nods with a polite smile.

“It’s nice to meet you, Kurusu-kun,” she responds to his silent acknowledgement. “My name is Margaret. I, like Lavenza here, serve the Velvet Room and, at the present moment, am here to assist you.”

“We apologize for suddenly intruding upon your life once again,” Lavenza picks up after Margaret with almost uncanny timing. “Reaching you this time around has proven exceptionally difficult and, as such, I had to rely on Margaret’s aid.”

“It’s good to see you, Lavenza,” Akira says and it is , he realizes as his chest swells with warmth at the sight of his attendant. Of all the confidants thoughts of whom don’t cause him to wail in unbearable despair, he was sure that Lavenza would be the one he’ll never get to see again, and even if her reappearance comes at the cost of the world being, once more, at the brink of peril, Akira is endlessly glad to see the girl is doing well.

“So, is there another god you need slayed?”

Lavenza sighs and shakes her head at the same time as Margaret looks somewhere behind her shoulder, as if trying to silently communicate with the darkness .

“Fortunately, the world is currently stable and not facing any threat of ruin. The matter which prompted us to seek you out is, for a lack of a better word, much more… personal, I’m afraid.”

The room ripples again, this time smudging around them much more severely. Lavenza’s quiet admission stirs something in Akira’s chest, some unidentified sense of unease rising to his throat, but before Akira has time to examine it, Margaret interrupts her explanation.

“I’m sorry, but it appears we’re out of time,” she says sternly and turns back to him. “Trickster. I believe there’s a location nearby that supports the manifestation of the Velvet Room in your world. Meet us in the South part of the shopping district tomorrow. We promise to explain the situation thoroughly.”

And, just like that, Akira is thrusted through a cobweb of blue-tinted thorns and wakes in his bedroom to Morgana’s demanding whines of hunger.

 

The following day is agonizing, and, by second period, Akira feels about ready to escape the classroom through the window and limp to the shopping district on broken legs. 

He doesn’t tell Morgana about the reemergence of the Velvet Room, deciding that all potential explanations would better wait until he himself has more than the vaguest idea of what’s going on. It’s less than a week till his Tokyo trip and, if the situation is, in fact, dire, there is a more than nonexistent chance that he will need the assistance of all the Phantom Thieves.

Unsurprisingly, once he wakes up and the initial wave of dumbfounded confusion passes him at breakfast, Akira is pragmatically stoic. In a way, it’s satisfying to realize that Joker’s disturbing ability to detach himself from Akira’s feelings is still within his reach, and he manages to calmly absorb all of Akira’s anxieties, safe, perhaps, for not-grief, which still persists as the reawakened memories of the Metaverse whisper at him in impressions of sterile corridors, but even then, it suddenly feels more numb that it has ever been since February, and Akira, without mirth, remembers why clutching to Joker’s sly grin and ever-present luminance was so addictive. 

The glove is still burning his skin through the thin fabric of his uniform pants. A cruel aide-mémoire that even Joker, as faultlessly selfless and excellent and winsome as he is, can fail. He might not be willing to fail the world, but Joker has failed Akira, and he has all this not-grief to show for it.

 

The school day can’t come to an end soon enough, and Akira is out of the front gate before most students even have the chance to exit their classrooms. He shoots a quick text Morgana’s way - he has found a new use for his old cell phone, which now permanently lays in the corner, open on a one-sided text thread he uses to update Morgana on his whereabouts and plans. According to Futaba, the next step should be equipping the cat with a monitor and a giant keyboard, and Morgana would be ready to join the wonderful world of the internet. Akira, frankly, doesn’t share her enthusiasm - Mona’s nagging is bad enough as is during their group calls, and the last thing he wants is the cat updating his friends on his allegedly deteriorating mental health and poor sleeping habits. But maybe he’ll get Morgana a small TV, if he asks nicely.

Mona has grown considerably more independent after his third awakening, and while Akira understood his former clinginess, duh, it must absolutely suck to be a sentient cat who can’t talk to anyone, can’t really do anything, and is understood by like ten people, give or take , but he’s glad for the newfound freedom of loneliness Morgana’s resent desire for self-sufficiency has provided him.

There is a restless determination in his step as he takes the route to the shopping district through the riverbank. Growing up the way that he did, Akira has spent countless evenings strolling by this exact path. There’s been an old lady, probably long gone nowadays, who used to occasionally indulge him in conversation , and often he crossed paths with a group of high school kids whom he never dared to approach, simply enjoying each other’s company by the water. In retrospect, they remind Akira of the Thieves, somewhat, - a mismatched group of do-gooders and delinquents, and even a famous idol who, apparently, was a local, finding a home amongst those who never seemed to belong anywhere else.

The water, still and clear, just like he remembers, reflects the sun in flickers of stark white, and Akira wonders if those kids he used to watch as undisputed examples of youthful happiness still think about the days they’ve spent throwing rocks at the river’s edge. If they have drifted apart or if they’ve stuck together, no matter how difficult or how unlikely it was to carry on their bonds into adulthood. If all of them found new places to belong after their endless summer was over. If all of them survived, and if not, if ghosts still haunt their remaining friends.

Akira hopes for his ghost to haunt him forever. There’s no one else for him to haunt, anyway, and Akira is only his to haunt. It seems only fair.

The shopping district is mostly deserted this early in the day, safe for a couple housewives chipping with a vendor and a bored-looking gas station employee smoking across the street from his post. In his early memories, place used to exist in an enduring state of desertedness, an abandoned relic that refuses to give up its last breath. By the time he entered middle school, things changed for the better. Even so, he thinks of it as a fitting place for a Velvet Room - a manifestation of people’s hope in their community, thriving despite all odds. Unlike Tokyo, Inaba doesn’t tend to forgive and forget, yet the revival of such places as the shopping district proves that it’s not always a bad thing to hold onto one’s roots.

Akira doesn’t notice the entrance at first - compared to the doors of Tokyo, this access point seems weaker and almost translucent against the wall of an unremarkable shop. It startles Akira, and, if just for a moment, he feels Joker’s resolve slip from his grasp, fear leaking into its place.

Get your shit together, you don’t even know what this is about yet , he scolds himself, only to be countered by a betrayal from within. Nothing good, I can tell you that right now. As good time as any for the great Joker to get a little angsty.

The door to the Velvet Room is open, and there’s no one waiting outside to greet him. So Joker invites himself in.

This time around, he finds the room looking much more solidified, yet the lights seem dimmer and, instead of a familiar sight of Lavenza standing in front of his cell, it’s Margaret, a thick tome he must’ve missed last time clutched in one of her hands and an unreadable expression obscuring her feelings.

Great.

“Hi, Margaret. Here I am.”

Even to his own ears he sounds meek, and Akira hopes the woman isn’t going to immediately dismiss him as incompetent . Part of him wishes she would, and he could go back to being miserable and pretending like he’s not, but alas.

“Hello, Kurusu-kun, welcome back.”

He waits for her to follow up with something, but transparency is, as he should have expected, too much to ask from the Velvet Room residents. Well, it’s the hard route, then.

“Where’s Lavenza?” He decides to open with the obvious.

A flicker of unease and something almost akin to concern allows itself to distort Margaret’s icy features, but when she responds, she sounds just as detachedly polite and elegant as yesterday.

“She is getting a different matter sorted. Don’t be alarmed, you will see her shortly.”

They both linger for a beat, probably equally unsure how to proceed. Or, if Margaret is anything like her coworkers, she knows exactly what needs to be done to proceed and is just waiting for Akira to pick up on some indecipherable clue.

“Are you two, like, related?” Let’s try for casual .

Margaret’s gaze hardens. Wrong move. “Is the question of our ancestry really the one currently occupying your mind?”

Then try to match. “Apologies. No, I would obviously like to know what exactly is going on here.”

Something amused and fond, almost like recognition, crosses Margaret’s features at his sudden change of attitude. Bingo.

“Very well,” she nods. “I must preface it by saying that I am mostly aware of your situation. Yet, as my knowledge is purely second-hand, I might lack the information about more, let’s say, sensitive details of your history. Please keep that in mind.”

Akira straps himself in for a long ride into the territory of esoterically absurd.

“To my knowledge, you have succeeded at reclaiming humanity’s free will from the original God of Control and, shortly after you brought the world back to its original state by defeating its successor.”

So far, so good. He killed god and made everyone miserable . Next question.

“Yet, it appears that, around the same time as reality returned to its unaltered state, a distortion creeped inside your own heart, resulting in, well, unforeseen consequences.”

Oh. That can’t be good. 

The manner in which Margaret had said it - distortion, he repeats to himself, distortion, my heart is distorted, like Kamoshida’s, like Shido’s? No, most likely like Maruki’s. Did I also used to have a Palace even before I awakened to my Persona? That would make sense. Do I still have a Palace, is that what this is all about? Oh god, will I have to infiltrate my own Palace? No, no no no no no, that can’t be right. I can’t have a Palace. Joker can’t have a Palace. Is his cognition also in my Palace? Is he the source of my distortion? Will I have to have a change of heart? Will they force me to get over it? They can’t. They can’t… - was not displeased or overly concerned, just factual, like updating him on the state of his Compendium or going over a new Velvet Room function. The calmness eased him somewhat, he supposes, but not enough to shut down the whispers of you have a Palace, surely you have a Palace, you are distorted and it’s all his fault, for leaving you, it’s all your fault, for failing to save him in the first place, irking and mocking and probably true. The worst part is that they were probably true.

“At first, we were unsure if the unusual activity was simply a temporary aftermath of the reset, or if it indicated something more serious. Our choice was not to bring this matter up to your attention, as the distortion was very mild and, as you are well aware, a Wildcard’s heart operates quite differently from the rest.”

Akira forces himself to listen, waiting in masochistic anticipation for Margaret to finally get to the point and say it . Will he agree to infiltrating his own Palace? Will he agree to rip his distortion, his precious, nauseatingly adored distortion right out of his own heart and let it dissolve into what? Fond memories? A memento of an unavoidable mistake in the back of his mind? Will he have to forgive himself and move on? Will they make his friends do it if he refuses? Appoint one of them the new Wildcard and task them with bringing him down because Joker is, clearly, no longer fit for the job?

“As it stands now, we apologize for this oversight in not warning you while your line of connection with the Velvet Room was still stable.”

Oh yes, his connection with the Velvet Room is already waning. But thanks for not bringing it up earlier, Margaret, no need to apologize. 

“But now, this matter is, frankly, outside of our scope of capabilities. As such, we were pressed to reach you here, and reach you quickly.”

She pauses for a beat, and Akira forces himself, bodily, to snap out of his progressing inner panic, just to see Margaret looking right back at him, not expectedly - Lavenza must’ve informed her that he is not a huge talker - but almost regretfully, like finding words for what comes next actively pains her. Here we go, I guess.

“There was… an unforeseen development that occurred in the distortion some time ago,” she starts, and then does it again, looks back behind her shoulder to where the corridor leading to the depths of the Velvet Room must be. “As you’re well aware, this place is a reflection of your soul, so things that arise within it or, alternatively, that are drawn to it from the outside, have an effect on your Velvet Room. Recently, that effect crescendoed in a manner that I, quite honestly, have never seen before, and a fragment of a living soul appeared within its constraints.”

She says it so levelly, so steadily in the string of her already convoluted explanation that, at first, Akira fails to catch it. He just continues to stare at her, anxiety still bubbling beneath the surface of his skin, when wait, a living soul? Someone just appeared in the Velvet Room? Like Morgana? Or like they’ve all woken up here after Yaldabaoth erased the Phantom Thieves from the consciousness of the masses? 

“There is a person here? Like, an actual living, breathing person?” he speaks up for the first time in what feels like hours, and Margaret, the Margaret that has been, so far, so affably, infuriatingly nonchalant, lets out a defeated sigh.

“Frankly, I am unsure how to proceed without outright revealing to you what currently resides here alongside us,” she says, regaining her composure somewhat, and turns bodily to face the back of the Velvet Room, nodding at Igor, who Akira, honestly, forgot was even in here. Margaret doesn’t walk away, just stands there, as if silently communicating with something in the depths of the room, and when she steps back to her place at Igor’s side, once again facing Akira, her eyes refuse to meet his own.

“But I must warn you - from what Lavenza has told me, this revelation might have an… unpredictable effect on your heart. Please be braced.”

He hears it first. It’s a muffled sound, but it grows crisper much faster than Akira anticipates. Two sets of footsteps, one gentle, if a bit hurried and jumpy - Lavenza, no doubt, - and one much more incongruous, too stern, too deafeningly determined in how it echoes around the room, and Akira thinks he recognizes a version of it, both gentler and even more frantic, yet he can’t place it next to a name. He thinks he’s heard those same footsteps pace the streets of Tokyo next to him, he thinks he’s heard them make the decaying floorboards of Leblanc creak. 

And then, even before anyone steps from the shadowed corner of the Velvet Room, the owner of the discordant footsteps speaks, and Akira is catatonic. It vibrates through the room, right through him, too sudden, too soon, inexplicably late; it’s a frenzy of discombobulation, it’s a rush of cognizance, and Akira feels superimposed onto the scene he refuses to admit he, in his deplorable desperation, has edited in the shades of his own consciousness myriads of times, but never like that, never with soon to be broken, without a doubt, promise of it being a reality, because it’s never a reality, it’s a chimera of a dream, and it speaks, and Akira crosses the invisible threshold of self-demolition, in leaps, in bounds. 

“So, this is the Trickster you kept telling me about? Honestly, I’ve come to expect someone a bit more impressive, Lavenza.”

It can’t be.

There, in the luminescent blues of the Velvet Room’s corridor, unfamiliar white hair brushing against the shoulders of an unfamiliar uniform jacket, but eyes, yellow, unfamiliar eyes burning into Akira and setting him ablaze with that unforgettable, familiar glow, and alive, alive, alive , stood Goro Akechi.

And something inside Akira combusts .

Chapter 2: The Third Epilogue

He steps into the world preemptively annihilated. Annihilated by chance, he still steps into the world that doesn’t welcome him.

It’s a disorienting climax of mind over matter, but he is not sure if it’s his mind that fuses the pieces of him, scattered, and ravaged, and so beyond salvation it’s difficult to tell them apart from nothingness, or if it’s the mind of something other, digging subconsciously through folds of potentiality to reach, to claw at the core of the vast nothingness and pry the pieces of him from the grip of the obscure. He almost thinks that the other has a name and, perhaps, insufferably lovely eyes, before the existence as he knows it blurs into a frenzied pandemonium, and he slips right into its bowels.

Nothing dies as a whole. As such, he is destined to be torn apart.

He awakens as a dead thing, mind with no matter.

It’s excruciatingly difficult to exercise rationalization when being pried apart, so he gives in, a part of him feeling that dying is like returning home, a part of him feeling like it’s akin to setting yourself ablaze with nothing to extinguish the flame for all eternity. There is no clarity to this exertion in perpetual destruction and restoration, it’s discombobulation, it’s a cognitive construction without cognition, it’s a will of movement that denies him agency and he is no longer certain of what agency he possessed in the first place, what constructs were available to him to employ, and it’s integration and severance existing in unison, parallel lines meeting in the middle.

He is not meant to survive, he must exist, he is not meant to live, he must return to the beginning, there is no beginning to return to, he must keep his promise, he is nothing, he must believe that the world is kind, that it’s not too late, he is not… he is… what exactly is he?

Goro Akechi steps into the world aware of two things, and two things only:

His name is Goro Akechi.

And he was refused annihilation, against all odds.

 

The world he steps into greets him with admittedly more equilibrium than expected under the circumstances. It's embryonic awakening - the world exists in flashes of incoherent furor, and in the very next moment, its hands poise him against a background of vibrant blues and purples.

A few things become immediately obvious.

He is, in his mental eye, preliminarily empty. It’s challenging to catch the exact moment between his exiting the cognitive field of non-existence and the flow of cardinal information about his surroundings and sensations breaking through the barricade of his mind, but the momentary agitation is so overwhelming that he realizes, if belatedly, that prior to the onslaught of comprehension his mind was definitely void of it all. He’s playing catch-up with both the material and incorporeal from second one.

He is, more curiously, surprisingly okay with such a turn of events. Or, rather, it might be tied by the chain of reaction to his lacking a frame of reference, in some capacity. There is a nagging realization, less in his mind and more… in his hands, and throat, and partially traveling up through his bloodstream, that what is currently unfolding within him, around him, and in all relative directions to him is not normal. Yet, when his mind attempts to scrape around for an alternative to contrast it against his factual predicament, it comes up blank of both evidence and, subsequently, anxiety.

In a more practical sense, he appears to be in a jail cell with no door, an utterly useless creation that, for reasons he can’t deduce, fills him with a sense of somehow expected irritation. It’s an imprint of emotion, not an emotion itself, and as he cautiously assesses his surroundings, such imprints begin to bleed through his inner monologues more freely. He’s playing catch-up, and he is catching up. He knows of cells and doorways, and by all empirical evidence he doesn’t know how he’s gathered, he should be anxious right now about how all of his knowledge appears to be lacking a source, but it’s impressions - not emotions -  that feel anxious, and wail, conflicted, within his hands, and throat, and partially traveling up through his bloodstream, and they feel distant, and alien, and somewhat indecent in intruding on his mind like that. Is that what they call shock? Who calls it shock?

His legs are stable, and the sensation of walking feels relatively familiar, on a more primal level than examining confusions and contradictions within the close quarters of his own supplementary psyche. His cell sits at the end of a corridor lined sparsely with similarly pointless enclosures, and, with none of his presumed captors in sight, he settles on the impractical prison’s most obscured corner to calmly sort through the crumbs of information at his disposal, because that’s what Goro Akechi does.

Frustratingly enough, he doesn’t know much else about Goro Akechi.

The crimes for which he was, allegedly, committed to this ineffectual place of confinement are unclear, as is his status as a prisoner, judging by the ridiculous blue outfit, a garish mix between a butler’s uniform and a particularly eccentric doorman’s attire, he is currently donning. But even outside of his immediate predicament, Goro seems unable to recall much of anything directly relating to his existence. He is unsure of his origins, or his position in society, or even if there is a society, as facts about what he imagines to be the real world seem oddly faraway and muddled in his mind, as if he’s spent years in a dream he isn’t sure how to wake up from.

He’s pretty certain coffee is a thing that exists, and he enjoys it, even if recalling what it tastes like seems improbable. He’s also pretty sure he dislikes far more things than he likes, but putting names on concepts in either category proves rather difficult.

The opinions and sensations feel definitely his, as if they belong to him in the current moment, yet existed historically as a part of a whole that framed them, and they are paint strokes without an outline. He might be coming down with psychosis, perhaps, or early-onset dementia? Blunt head trauma is another diagnosis worth considering.

Yet, it’s the clarity that’s troubling; it’s the briskness of comprehension. It’s just the memories, memories he knows he must objectively have, because he instinctively comprehends the concept of memory and memory loss, and how missing the link between the onset of a memory and its complete integration into one’s day-to-day mental function leaves one with terrifyingly little to latch on to in terms of selfhood. His selfhood appears sound, yet incomplete. He is Goro Akechi. There once was more to Goro Akechi, he knows because Goro Akechi is decent at acting under pressure for a reason, and he is the step beyond reason. He is effect without a cause.

He doesn’t get much further into prying - and it feels like prying, it’s his own damn mind, but it feels voyeuristic to be treating it as a foreign object, ruffling through contents of wrapping paper and glass jars and coming up empty-handed, always on the lookout to be spied by the cheap treasures’ rightful owner, a him who is not here and not… - before a set of hurried footsteps alerts him, and seconds after there is a little girl standing right in front of him, dressed in similarly ridiculous blues.

In real time, he watches her expression morph from determined concern to speechless disbelief. And then, to something akin to grief.

Well, at the very least, he still understands the concepts of age, gender, and nuanced facial expressions. That’s something.

“Goro Akechi?” she asks him, unsure, as if expecting him not to recognize his own name.

Language comprehension can also be marked as retained.

“Yes?”

The word tastes of plaster and burnt plastic. Does this child know him, or, perhaps, of him? Is the natural desire to deceive her in an attempt to find out indicative of parts of him recognizing her as a threat or imprints of Goro Akechi’s authentic modus operandi? Speaking is easy, as is making decisions based solely on instincts of rationalization; the work has been done for him - he must only follow the instructions from within, the only set of instructions he is inclined to trust, historically or otherwise.

He refuses to give the child intruder the satisfaction of catching him off guard. Perhaps, acting nonchalant is the ultimate strategy in these circumstances - any additional context clues can be gathered once he establishes his preexisting stances with whoever this lost-looking kid is.

“Are you… are you aware of how you got here?”

Or, perhaps, not.

“Care to enlighten me?”

Something about this interaction irks him, even beyond the obvious absurdity of being confronted by a child he’s never seen before in a place he has no recollection of entering. It’s the girl’s disbelief, he gathers, which doesn’t quite match the disbelief of someone finding a person they clearly know in a place they’re not supposed to occupy. It’s the way she asked Goro Akechi, not with the confusion of seeing him here but with utter horror of seeing him at all.

Oh, and his mind circles back to the two absolutes of memory he vividly realized upon waking. I’m not supposed to be alive.

The girl in front of him shifts, surprisingly composed for someone who is currently staring down a dead man, if his assumptions are, indeed, correct. A part of him thinks to make things easier for her, but even if he truly wanted to, there’s little he can confirm to her beyond his name, which she already knows, and his status as living and breathing, which he hopes she can determine herself.

“Do you… know where we are?”

Goro can almost applaud the girl’s ability to keep it together. He recalls such a feat to be impressive, even if the only two people he has interacted with in his recent complete memory, himself included, seem equally matched in the field of taking unfamiliar situations in stride.

“I do not.”

Despite it rarely being the case, this situation seems to be one where honesty is, in fact, the best policy. Judging by the girl’s response, she is either somewhat privy to his apparent memory loss or expects him not to know his surroundings. Deception is still not out of the question, and Goro knows, somehow, not to underestimate his opponents, but, if push comes to shove, he is quite sure he can overpower a child.

“We are in Akira Kurusu’s Velvet Room - the space between dream and reality where one’s soul takes shape. Are you… aware of this place’s existence?”

Okay, overpowering an insane child would definitely pose no problems. Great. On top of having little to no clues about anything occurring around him, he must now also deduce information from nonsensical riddles. Yet, there’s a surprising lack of instinctual disbelief he’s feeling. Is the supernatural somehow a part of his reality? Not unlikely, considering he is a dead man walking.

Instead of prying open that particular can of worms, he decides to settle for something more tame. His most concrete way of getting to the bottom of this is through familiar connections, so no esoteric discussions, and no questioning the presence of this girl, or her soundness of mind, until he can determine that he isn’t, in fact, the one sounding insane. She stumbled a bit before the name, as if unsure whether it was reasonable to bring up. Or, perchance, unsure if Goro knows who the name belongs to?

“Akira Kurusu?”

The subtle yet overwhelming look of horror he receives as his response informs Goro that this might’ve been an unwise name to bring up in the form of a question. Well, at least it somewhat confirms that she was unaware of his amnesia, that is, a moment ago.

It also adds a new piece to the playing board. The name doesn’t stir a reaction even if it must, by all empirical evidence.

“I apologize, Goro Akechi, but will you follow me to my Master? I believe he will be more competent in answering any… additional questions you might have.” Looking at him with apprehension, but without malice.

This sounds like a terrible idea. But does Goro really have a choice?

“And I apologize for not introducing myself earlier, I don’t believe we have met before. My name is Lavenza, and I am this room’s attendant.”

Lavenza. A newfound confidant or, perhaps, a foe. Goro Akechi is healthily suspicious, which is unlikely to be a trait that got him killed, so Goro Akechi will hold onto it, purposefully. He will infiltrate, he will progress with caution, and he will win - freedom or understanding, himself or an opportunity to build a new self, it doesn’t matter what the laurels are - he will keep himself steady, and proceed, and it must be, also, what Goro Akechi does.

“Well, lead the way, Lavenza.”

 

Lavenza is now firmly categorized in Goro’s mind as a fucking liar, because Igor does not have any answers to any questions. In fact, he might be physically incapable of forming sentences that aren’t cryptic bullshit or condescending nonsense. His only purpose might as well be enlightening Goro that he, apparently, gets pissed off very quickly.

The corridors lead them out into a circular room lined with cells, all similar to the one he woke up in, but this time barred, except for one. The entire design is impractical and gives Goro only one potential escape route through the giant staircase to nowhere they pass on their way to meet Lavenza’s mysterious “master.”

The “master" in question sits in front of a ridiculously placed desk, facing the singular open cell, but turns unexpectedly the moment he and Lavenza enter his atrocious domain. Absurd in both proportions and disposition, the man greets them with a crazed smile, and Goro mistrusts him immediately.

“How curious,” he creaks more than speaks, sending shivers of alertness down Goro’s spine. “Welcome to the Velvet Room.”

Despite the man’s blatant dubiousness, Lavenza seems to relax instantaneously the moment he acknowledges their arrival.

“Master, I have found the source of the disturbance.”

The man’s smile grows even more insane, and he gestures to her to come closer. When Goro intends to follow, she stops him with a weary glance, something akin to guilt flowing in the depths of her eyes.

“I apologize, please give us just one moment.”

Goro has an urge to disobey, yet, looking at the old man’s odd expression, decides against it.

Lavenza scurries to the side of the desk in quick steps, turning around to, once again, level him with a guilt-ridden gaze, before leaning into the old man’s personal space to quietly whisper something into his ear. The interaction looks unsettling, yet the girl’s open lack of discomfort around her presumed “master” suggests to Goro that he shouldn’t question their dynamic, at least not before these unorthodox individuals could enlighten him about his predicament.

Goro lingers, wary. At least the exit would be in his sight that way, and he sure can take on both a child and an old crazy man, if push comes to shove.

After, presumably, updating her “master” on whatever she has managed to gather from their short interaction, Lavenza takes a few steps back. Both of the Velvet Room residents turn to their unexpected guest.

“This is, indeed, an unprecedented turn of events. It seems as though the fate of the Justice Arcana truly is indecisive,” the man cackles.

Goro hates him. It’s once again like coming home to a world unrecognizable one moment and intimately familiar in the next, a sudden jump from impression to emotion, something he knows he felt before in how intimate its sizzling is, but colored askew.

“A spring of deformation in life and beyond, you appear to have swayed her once again, Goro Akechi. My name is Igor. I am delighted to make your acquaintance.”

Sentiment not reciprocated, Goro doesn’t say.

“So, what exactly am I doing here?”

Confident without sounding urgent. He needs information, and he needs to find an out, potentially, because this situation is seeming more suspicious by the second, and Goro is positive it’s not due to his failing to reconnect with his recognition of these people and their surroundings.

Igor looks at him, all eerie and patronizing, and Goro feels the urge to punch him right in that ridiculously long nose.

“We aren’t sure. I’m sorry, Goro Akechi. We did not call you here,” Lavenza says, uselessly, and lowers her head.

At the very least they don’t seem hostile. More… curious, for whatever reason, and Goro hates feeling like he is being kept out of the loop. He hates that, apparently, there is no other option for him but to rely on these people, and wait for an opportunity to… what exactly? To strike? To fight his way out through an old lunatic and a prepubescent girl? And then what? This is getting ridiculous. He is sounding ridiculous.

It’s disorienting, and irritating, and a part of Goro does want to fight, to tear through this liminal space they call the Velvet Room until it begins to make sense. Because Igor doesn’t, and Lavenza doesn’t, and he doesn’t, and he simply wants an opportunity to make sense of it all, that should be his first priority, not picturing how he’s gonna claw the face of the man in front of him.

Right, maybe concentrate on listening, then, if you’re so eager for knowledge.

“It appears that you have reversed your downfall, the end of your journey prevented through the power of the bond you’ve forged on the path of rebellion. I applaud you and am pleased to welcome you back into the game. However, something within the miracle performed appears to have led to unforeseen results.”

Or maybe listening is, after all, fruitless, and he’ll be better off killing everyone in the vicinity and looking for other potential candidates to be his guides into himself. What kind of crazed bullshit is that? The bond he forged on the path of rebellion? Unforeseen circumstances?

“Do you really not remember anything?” Lavenza chimes in.

Goro doesn’t grace her with an answer, yet neither she nor Igor seems to need his response.

“How peculiar.” There is, quite literally, nothing peculiar about that. “Master, could it be, perhaps, related to what was happening to the Trickster?”

Utterly irritating and completely unhelpful. And who the hell even is the Trickster? The one responsible for his resurrection? Maybe, just maybe, they can then take Goro directly to the source, and this Trickster individual would be more forthcoming and finally enlighten Goro about what the hell is going on here?

As if privy to his vexing inner monologue, Lavenza speaks up again:

“Must we attempt to summon the Trickster?”

Even if the girl doesn’t strike Goro as particularly likable or trustworthy, she, at the very least, appears more competent and willing to collaborate than her master. It’s a shame that she also strikes him as downright incapable of talking back to the man, all obedient smiles and compliant follow-up questions.

“It might prove challenging, but we must. His new journey awaits, and the time he has to act is far from infinite.”

Igor’s mouth opens to, without a doubt, spout some more cryptic nonsense their way, and Goro feels concerningly close to his boiling point. Who the hell does this man think he is? Is that how they treat everyone who has the misfortune of winding up in this place? If that’s the case, they’re fucking lucky Goro has some dignity and self-control not to be crying and rolling around on the floor, disoriented and horrified, because that is definitely not how you communicate with an amnesiac person who unwillingly ended up in your care, and Goro has had enough of this.

“Oh, cut the bullshit,” he spits out venomously, and Lavenza’s eyes snap at him in concern. Igor, however, appears completely unfazed by his impolite interruption, and just fucking stares at him, still smiling in that manic way of his, and it irritates Goro to no end.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but nothing you are saying actually makes sense. So if either of you could get off your esoteric high horse and explain what’s going on here properly, that would be very much appreciated.”

His little display of exasperation done, Goro crosses his arms and waits. Waits for the backlash, waits for the two to, maybe, see the errors of their ways and provide him with actual, relevant context, waits for fucking something to shift the status quo of absurd buzzword-throwing the Velvet Room residents appear to love so much. But Igor just stares back at him, the same irksome expression frozen on his face, and Goro, despite himself, wishes that they would just throw him out onto the streets and let him figure this whole amnesia thing out on his own.

“On second thought, Lavenza, why don’t you ensure that our guest is comfortable first? I’m sure he must have questions. Go on, and all the while I will begin our preparations.”

Well, no such luck. But Goro reluctantly complies. That sounds miles better than listening to any more of Igor’s bullshit.

“Understood, Master,” Lavenza nods. “Please follow me, Goro Akechi.”

 

She ends up taking him back into the corridors and through a surprisingly normal-looking door that he could’ve sworn wasn’t there when they first passed through here. Goro notes with stoic satisfaction that, at the very least, the more supernatural elements of his predicament still don’t appear to faze him, although how exactly he is so familiar with reality-bending concepts and why they never strike him as shocking remains a mystery. From what limited information he has stored about the world at large, magical rooms with disappearing passages aren’t counted amongst the norm.

The magical door opens into a space Goro could describe as something akin to a lounge or a break room, albeit designed by someone who’s never been in an actual break room in their lives. It’s in the same shade of vomit-inducing blue as the rest of the place, but lined with gaudy plush couches instead of cold stone cells. Even the walls look soft, as if plastered over with silk.

Lavenza watches him as he steps in after her, taking in the garish design.

“Good,” she speaks up as he settles in on the closest couch. “It appears that you have acquired some of the abilities of us attendants. We have currently exited the exact confines of the Trickster’s - Akira Kurusu’s - Velvet Room, this space being a sort of… in-between location I’ve generated for our talk.”

She sits on a couch across from him.

“What would you like to know?”

Goro almost groans out loud.

“Am I really gonna have to pry the information from your teeth?”

Lavenza shifts a little bit on the too-deep couch cushion, and if Goro was capable of feeling any emotion outside of irritation at the moment, he could probably even sympathize with the girl. Her “master” really should know better than to leave the explaining to a literal child. Does he really not rule over anyone more competent, or are they all just like that in the Velvet Room?

“It is quite a convoluted matter. A more direct approach to questioning might be our best bet at clearing your confusion,” Lavenza absent-mindedly traces her fingers over the binds of her surreally large book. “Please understand that your circumstances are, for the most part, just as puzzling to me as they are to you.”

At that, she throws Goro an apologetic smile, and fine, he does feel a bit bad for the child. Maybe he can play nice for a little while.

“Alright. So, what exactly is the Velvet Room? Am I supposed to be aware of it?”

She perks up at that, and Goro doesn’t think he was a religious person historically, but at that moment, he is willing to pray to whoever is listening that she is, for once, cohesive.

“You have never stepped foot into the Velvet Room, to my knowledge. It is, as I have stated, a place between dream and reality, existing to assist chosen individuals in their quest to fix distortions in the world. At first, when I saw you, I assumed that you might’ve been called here, or ended up in our domain, the way you are, due to some more… sorrowful alignment of fate. However, my Master had no hand in your summoning. And, from what both of us can sense, you must be the real soul of Goro Akechi.”

Lavenza stops for a second, as if unsure how to proceed.

“I must ask, Goro Akechi… do you recall anything related to the Metaverse?”

Shockingly enough, the word doesn’t strike him as totally unfamiliar. Something at the back of his mind hisses at the mention, oddly warm, and dangerously excited, and terrible, calling him to a world bathed in red where horrors roam, but Goro is unafraid of horrors, as the worst horror that exists within this terrible, glorious place is himself.

“Yes, I recall what it is,” he admits once the strange sensation settles, leaving him with just dry, factual recollections and a sour imprint of bloodlust. “Though my connection to it is not something I’m privy to.”

Lavenza smiles, relieved.

“Very well. It seems that the memories you’re lacking are only those concerning your personal existence. That must make matters easier for you.”

Goro snorts. If only that were the case.

“Like hell it does, Lavenza, like hell it does.”

The girl appears unfazed by his discourteous comment, and Goro respects her for that, if begrudgingly.

“Unlike most ordinary people, you bore the knowledge of the Metaverse and traversed it. Through the Metaverse, you were involved with this room’s owner, the Trickster, and his quest to overcome humanity’s ruin. You and the Trickster shared a particularly strong bond, yet your journey…”

“I know I died, Lavenza, no need to walk on eggshells,” he cuts her off before the girl can get too sympathetic. “But that’s about all I know about myself.”

“I apologize, Goro Akechi, but I must disappoint you in regards to information concerning you and your personal history, including details about your life and death. Today has been the first time we’ve met.”

Well, if he wants to know more about himself specifically, he might have to pry for some alternative sources.

“I figured. So, this Trickster, is he the one who revived me? How? Who exactly is he?”

Of all the ridiculous, mind-boggling, asinine bullshit thrown at him since the moment he awakened in the cell, this question, this person was, somehow, what irked Goro the most. There was something just not right, a crooked puzzle piece, a gap itching to be filled, about Akira Kurusu and Goro’s mysterious relation to the Trickster. Goro could not justify his desire to learn more beyond the healthy curiosity about the person who, perhaps, brought him back from the dead, but something told him that there was more to his intrigue than simply that. There was something far more primal in needing to know, or, well, to remember who Akira Kurusu was, to crack his enigma as soon as possible.

“The Trickster is a friend,” Lavenza says, only slightly hesitant. “He is someone I guided within this room to protect the world from ruin. You were of great aid to him in this quest. As for how you came back from the dead, we do not know. By all rules, it should not be achievable for the Trickster to revive you, but if anyone would have the motivation to do so, it would be him. Albeit, I’m not so sure he has done so consciously, if he is even aware you came back alive.”

But he was right here, and he felt alive, even if not quite human, he felt alive, and it could all Akira Kurusu’s fault, or achievement, or whatever, and Goro needed, he required to know how his person has done it, but most crucially why he has done it, because Goro Akechi knows nothing of himself yet he knows, painfully, instinctually, that no one should’ve done something like this for him, no one could have wanted to, of all people not Akira Kurusu, who he does not know but who knows him, and Goro has to, he has to know why.

“Yet, I can assure you that you are, in fact, not simply an illusory being,” Lavenza continues. “This you is incomplete, but you are alive. It appears that, in essence, you currently share more in common with me and my Master than with regular humans. You, if I must, are a soul. As for your body, I cannot tell you what has occurred to separate you from your human form. But, since it was Trickster’s dreamscape that your soul has, perhaps purposefully, sought out as its temporary sanctuary, reaching him would, undoubtedly, aid us in understanding your predicament. Worry not, though, as the Trickster is resourceful, and I’m sure he will be resolved to help us in solving this mystery.”

Goro blinks at her, the information of him, somehow, being truly alive washes over him and brings unexpected relief, easing a part of his soul he didn’t know was worried about not being totally safe from returning to the realm of death. If this Trickster actually brought him back to life, cheated the uncheatable and absolute rules of death, somehow, then the question of his reasoning pains him even more. What did Akira Kurusu want from him so badly that he was willing to pry Goro’s corpse directly out of Death’s claws? What purpose is he supposed to serve for the Trickster, and what price will he demand from Goro for the miracle of life performed upon him?

“Can I trust this Trickster to actually come through?” he asks meekly, and that seems like the first real question he has asked, because Goro can’t comprehend Akira Kurusu’s motivations. He can’t comprehend Akira Kurusu, period, because no one can be so good and kind as to simply resurrect a person and ask for nothing in return. “You said Akira Kurusu might not know that he has revived me, if it was even his doing. Would there be a purpose for him to bring me back specifically?”

There is wariness in his voice that sounds irritatingly like insecurity, like a fear he doesn’t remember having, a ghost of a sensation, overwhelming and ever-present, he must’ve carried all the way through his remembered life and wasn’t free of even in the absence of memories. He can’t name it, doesn’t recognize the tightness in his chest and the slight hunch in his shoulders, but he knows that this body recalls it, and it hates it, and it clings to it because this sensation, whatever it is, was one of the few things it knew intimately.

And Lavenza looks at him, and for the first time since he’s met her, the first person he has ever seen with these eyes that don’t recall a single face, he catches the smile between her lips, genuine, bright, like one of a kid she is, even if she doesn’t act like one. And Goro thinks - he must also be a kid, he doesn’t actually recall his age, but he feels, maybe, like he should still be a kid, even if he doesn’t actually feel like one, and why would a kid die so young, if not for a tragic reason, and why would someone feel pain, or maybe remorse, or maybe need, just unidentified need to bring him back to life viscerally enough to actually find a way of doing so, if not for a reason even more tragic?

“You shouldn’t worry about the Trickster,” Lavenza says softly, and Goro has no doubts that she believes her own words, unconditionally. “You were incredibly dear to him. I do not think it’s my place to tell you much about Akira Kurusu, not when you’ll soon have the opportunity to ask him anything you want yourself, but believe me - even if we don’t know how the Trickster managed to save you from ruin, he did it out of a genuine, subliminal desire to do just that.”

Foolish, Goro thinks to himself. But he still, against himself, believes every word.

“I must ask something of you, Goro Akechi,” Lavenza’s eyes lose a bit of their dreamy sentimentality, turning serious. “The Trickster’s heart, if I am correct and he is yet unaware of your presence in this world, must not be in the best of shape. The whole reason why we have uncovered your emergence in the Velvet Room was his heart’s slowly-growing distortion, and I believe your passing must’ve played a substantial part in why that distortion has surfaced in the first place. I ask you, Goro Akechi, to be patient with him. Don’t torment his heart any more than it’s already tormented.”

“I’ll try my best,” Goro says. He means it, yet the words still taste like a lie.

Their conversation withers shortly after, Lavenza excusing herself to assist Igor with whatever cryptic bullshit he makes his attendants decipher, and Goro is left alone in the lounge. He assumes Lavenza left so hurriedly to give him some space to process, well, everything, but he doesn’t let her know he caught on. No matter how much he hates to admit it, a bit of downtime alone with his thoughts might actually do him some good.

“You are free to roam the Velvet Room, if you so desire, but I must disappoint you that there’s not much to do around here, not if you can’t leave the premises of the Trickster’s realm and its vicinities,” she informs him before making her exit. “But you are, nevertheless, free to explore at your own leisure. We do not wish for you to feel like a prisoner.” How ironic.

The lounge room is eerily quiet and motionless, unlike the rest of the Velvet Room, which echoes with a whisper of distant humming and appears to be almost alive in how it occasionally flickers in the periphery of his vision. Even time appears to flow irrationally here, and Goro is unsure if his dialogue with Lavenza took minutes, hours, or perhaps days - he doesn’t feel physically tired, or, for that matter, much of anything physical.

He still stretches himself over the plush couch, a hand thrown over his eyes, and fruitlessly attempts to relax his muscles that, while not aching, feel oddly constricted. Goro Akechi is awfully tense, he could’ve really benefited from a massage before succumbing to whatever killed him.

He is restless and on edge, yet unwilling to, at the moment, dive any deeper into the sources of these impressions, so he takes Lavenza up on her offer, sneaking out of the break room and into the cell-lined corridor.

Lavenza is proven right in the span of minutes - there is, truly, jack shit to the Velvet Room outside of the corridor of cells and Igor’s makeshift work space, well, beyond the staircase, which Goro conquers only to find a blank wall staring right at him, just as useless and condescending as everything else about this wretched place.

“You might’ve said that you don’t want me to feel like a prisoner, but it’s rather difficult to take your word for it when all exits here lead to dead ends,” he tells Lavenza next time she comes to visit. “Something tells me you and your master can leave just fine.”

And then Lavenza pops out of existence right in front of his eyes.

Goro is feeling over getting shocked.

“We are not exactly bound by the material world,” she offers after reemerging at the same spot on the couch. “You appear to be more of a… borderline presence between someone like us and an actual human. I would prefer if we didn’t try to get you out of the Velvet Room before I can reach the Trickster, but if you really would like to try…”

They try. It’s frustratingly useless, just as Goro has anticipated.

Igor watches with manic amusement when they attempt to use the “exit” located in the cell he so lovingly stares down at all times. It ends with a wall. Lavenza goes right through that wall. Goro does not. It’s endlessly frustrating and makes him want to punch things, but the desire is somewhat dulled by the notion that he can’t, not in front of other people. There is a certain weakness in succumbing to his violent urges in front of others, especially when Lavenza is looking at him with such genuinely aggravating sympathy, and Igor would probably be amused if he punched a wall right now. And Goro would rather die a second time over than give Igor the satisfaction.

It’s peculiar how, despite having no notion of where his anger is coming from, it envelops him so easily. But it’s even more peculiar to realize how naturally he can hold it at bay, the library of masks in Goro Akechi’s arsenal seeming close to infinite.

He must’ve been a fascinatingly wretched man, Goro Akechi.

When popping out of existence at will proves to be equally impossible, he does curse loudly with Igor no longer in sight, Lavenza the only one to give him a tiny chuckle.

 

He settles into himself after a while. There is an almost suffocating quality to feeling so out of control, locked in a space he only vaguely comprehends, stuck with a mind that provides him with alarmingly little. But he settles, if begrudgingly, like a rabid dog getting tired of barking at the bars of its enclosure. He doesn’t bark, but he does hiss, - Lavenza patiently shouldering his occasional outbursts of So, no progress on the Trickster hunt today either? How unexpected, and Glad to see you’re putting in the legwork to see me, Lavenza, but maybe focus on getting the job done instead of checking in if I haven’t slit my wrists from boredom yet.

“We are here to help you, Goro Akechi,” she once snaps, or does the Lavenza equivalent of snapping. “I realize that it’s a difficult situation for you to be in, but we are attempting everything we can.”

But she does provide him with a distraction, seemingly assuming that Goro’s irritability might be partially aggravated by boredom, an assumption he wouldn’t deem entirely incorrect. During her next routine visit to the lounge room, which Goro officially assigned as his quarters, she hauls him books - a collection of myths and fables from all across time and cultures - and if Goro has some recollection of knowing their contents, reading them still feels surprisingly fresh.

He lays off of her, after that, if only a little bit. Comprehending what exactly sets Goro Akechi off is still proving somewhat difficult, but he appears to be at the very least partially capable of basic empathy.

When he finds himself in one of his more stable, if not entirely friendly, moods, he pesters Lavenza with questions both trivial and substantial and receives answers of varying degrees of soundness. When indulged in discussion one-on-one, Lavenza appears quite a bit more sensible, and Goro reluctantly admits to warming up to the girl, even if that may as well just be the logical result of her being one of only two people he knows in his current amnesia-altered state, the second person being an insufferable dick.

Through their lengthy back-and-forths, he comes to know that Lavenza is, indeed, physically incapable of speaking ill of her “master,” Akira Kurusu has killed a god in the past, and did something to prevent reality from getting altered on which she is reluctant to elaborate, reaching the Trickster now is difficult both because he moved somewhere and because his heart grew weaker in the months he’s been falling to “distortion,” whatever that might mean.

When the topic of his own past and present comes up, Lavenza seems to avoid giving him concrete answers, not elaborating on the cause of his death or his past relationship with Akira Kurusu. She does, however, express multiple times how odd his state of being appears to be, and how those inconsistencies could be connected to the Trickster’s distortion.

“It’s like you have been fractured. Neither I nor my Master has ever seen something like this before. I can sense that you are a real person, a living soul, but you lack a physical form. We, the attendants, are made by our Master. You, however, despite all of the external similarities, are still yourself - even if you can’t recall your past life.”

She also mentions to him that his appearance has changed, and when she produces a hand mirror out of thin air for him to make his own assessment, Goro feels rather unsettled by the reflection, even if he can’t pinpoint the exact source of his unease. It must be the hair, he guesses, but can’t recall what color his hair was before it turned this unnatural shade of silvery white. And the eyes, perhaps, because his recollection of how people are supposed to look doesn’t feature yellow as an ordinary eye color, even if its prominence amongst the current residents of the Velvet Room is 67%.

“Were they, perhaps, gray?” he asks after sharing his suspicions with Lavenza, and she, despite shaking her head, smiles at his reflection mischievously.

“No, but it’s a good guess.”

He and Lavenza match. Although his hair is cooler in tone, the yellow of his eyes is darker.

“Hold on. How do you even know what I used to look like, if you have never met me before?”

Bringing it up to Lavenza now feels, admittedly, somewhat unfair. Goro has caught onto the inconsistency on day one, but at the time, Lavenza’s lie could’ve been useful as leverage. He thinks of bringing it up as payment for the books - a line of defense downed in thanks for an indulgence provided.

“How did you even know I was Goro Akechi when you first saw me?”

Lavenza is still smiling at him through the mirror.

“I apologize for somewhat deceiving you, but we have actually met before, if only in passing. I have also seen you, albeit without you knowing of my presence, in the Metaverse. In the real world, only the Trickster can perceive the entrance to the Velvet Room, and you were there, at times, when I guided him inside.”

He raises an accusatory eyebrow at Lavenza.

“Anything else I should know that you’ve deceived me about?”

Goro somewhat understands Lavenza’s reluctance to reveal too much about his lost memories, but only to an extent. She is correct - there’s no telling what exactly could trigger them to reset, and they know so infuriatingly little about his current condition that risking it before Akira Kurusu arrives at the scene seems unwise. Nevertheless, it’s still annoying - not being able to tell falsehoods from truths in his own history, relying on a supernatural child and an infuriatingly creepy old man to navigate him through the world.

“No, as far as I recall. Please forgive me, my reasoning is only that I do not wish to interfere with anything regarding your personal history,” Lavenza says, probably for the hundredth time. “It is still unclear why you have lost your memory, and, in my opinion, it should be up to the Trickster to guide you in retrieving it.”

Again with the Trickster. Goro is beginning to resent the guy before even meeting him.

For all of Lavenza’s self-proclaimed reluctance to enlighten Goro about his past, she surely enjoys circling her conversations back to his enigmatic savior. It’s always the same shit - praises and reassurances without any evidence, and knowing Lavenza’s tendency to exercise blind faith, if her relationship with Igor is any indicator, her overly doubtless perception of the Trickster does little to put Goro at ease.

“You are so sure your precious Trickster will be willing to help. What if he refuses?”

Lavenza dares to look at him like he’s stupid. Oh yes, like questioning the morals and decisions of some random man he has never met and will now have to entrust his entire livelihood to is so fucking weird.

“Of course he will help, Goro Akechi,” she says, like there’s nothing more axiomatic in the entire world. “The Trickster cares deeply about you. And, even if he didn’t, the Trickster is a kind individual. Sometimes to a fault.”

So, a sentimental do-gooder. Wonderful.

“Oh, how lucky I am,” he says dryly.

Lavenza only giggles, a brush of a sound Goro finds oddly satisfying.

“I’m glad you seem to have retained your personality, Goro Akechi,” she says with far more mirth than Goro expected.

“If that’s the case, I must’ve been a delight,” he responds flatly. “And what is it with Goro Akechi? You can just call me Akechi, you know.”

She lets out another silent laugh.

“I will keep that in mind, Goro Akechi.”

Outside of conversing with Lavenza and flipping through pages of heroic exploits, there’s not much for him to do but wait. Wait for an update from Igor and Lavenza, or the emergence of Akira Kurusu, or maybe for Death to burst through the door and reclaim him. And so he waits, absent-mindedly juggling facts and impressions: he likes coffee and isn’t so fond of the color blue; he used to traverse the Metaverse, with Akira Kurusu at his side; Akira Kurusu is a soft-hearted fool who probably tricked death for his sake, and Goro is somewhat close to him; he hates the idea of having to be saved by the guy regardless of their past relationship; Akira Kurusu probably has gray eyes; unlike Lavenza, Goro can’t wish a mirror into existence, or create rooms on demand, or disappear through nonexistent pathways. It turns out Goro Akechi, for all of his restless aggression and snappiness, was surprisingly patient, but otherwise, he is unsure how to feel about this person he is, but not quite.

 

Margaret, for all intents and purposes, is the most pleasant acquaintance he’s ever made in his life. She has the kind of no-bullshit attitude and ruthless determination to get shit done that Goro would appreciate in anyone assigned to his case. She is met by Goro with excellently contained excitement - the human embodiment of his predicament finally exiting the limbo of stillness.

When she first lays eyes on him, her expression betrays the similar curiosity he has first assessed in Lavenza and Igor. Her roundup of the situation, once again, confirms that Goro Akechi is a living soul - one that should, for all intents and purposes of bringing someone back from the dead, have a body, yet doesn’t. One that should remember itself as well, yet doesn’t.

She also, regrettably, confirms that reaching Akira Kurusu is proving to be incredibly fucking difficult. So much for a dear noble hero.

As the discussion between Lavenza and Margaret moves on to the specifics of bending the quantum mechanics of reality, Goro tunes it out and doesn’t even hear the door shutting behind them.

Margaret does not pay him any more visits, but Lavenza’s demeanor shifts to almost gleeful next time she graces the break room with her presence, yet another mythology tome clutched close to her chest beneath her signature Compendium.

“Margaret is far more experienced and skilled than I am,” she admits without malice, awe coloring her voice in pastels. “And she has attended to someone at the same location where the Trickster is currently residing. We might reach him any day now.”

Goro is unsure if what he feels at the words is anticipation or dread, so he simply hums in response and buries himself in the myth of Prometheus.

 

Days, by Goro’s own hazy calculations, go by, and nothing much changes. From time to time, Lavenza would still sit with him, albeit her visits grew both shorter and less frequent, usually consisting of a small update and a gifted book. When walking the limited halls of the Velvet Room, Goro never sees either of the attendants around, yet Igor never leaves his post, always leveling him with manic eyes when he passes by, but never initiating conversation. Goro is curious about the man, but holds his distance.

It all, however, goes to shit approximately a week after Margaret joins their investigation team.

“We have reached the Trickster!” It’s not quite a shout, but it must be the closest approximation to one, by Lavenza’s standards.

“Oh, have you now,” Goro says, eyebrow raised.

“We were finally able to infiltrate his dream last night,” back to her more collected self, if ever-so-slightly shakier version of it, Lavenza sits across from him. “We were not able to maintain a connection for long. His heart really must be aching… But Margaret found a suitable access point in the real world to manifest an entrance.”

Despite being bored out of his mind for however many days he has been stuck here - one’s perception of time must truly warp when there’s so little to do - Goro suddenly feels that things are progressing rather rapidly.

“So, when are you expecting him next time?”

“Tonight, if all goes well. With the access point in place, we shouldn’t fear any… disturbances in the Velvet Room if he were to see you.”

Too fucking rapidly.

There is an unusual inner shakiness he is feeling when looking into Lavenza’s conservatively excited eyes. Impression, that objectively registers as anxiety.

“So, what’s the plan? Do you want me to just… meet him? From what I understand, your Trickster likely presumes me dead,” faux disinterest comes easy to Goro, like second nature, like a fake skin no one would be able to pry off him with the sharpest knife. He crosses his legs.

“Yes,” Lavenza confirms.

Goro isn’t sure that’s as sound a plan as Lavenza thinks it is.

“Did you inform him that I’m here?”

Lavenza shakes her head.

“We deemed it would be better to show him, before we explain to him all the specifics.”

Great. So, not ruling out a mental breakdown thus far.

“And why exactly did you deem that?”

Is she really not getting it?

“We in the Velvet Room believe that exposure is the optimal way of introducing new situations to Wildcards.”

“Oh, so that’s a tradition, then. Well, I’m terribly sorry for assuming that hitting a guy in the face with his dead friend might not be a perfectly sound plan,” he snarls.

Apparently, his perfectly good-natured concerns fail to reach Lavenza and fail miserably. Very well, it’s not like Goro even remembers the guy to care if he goes into shock. He just hopes the tears and potential reunion hugs can be avoided. And also that Akira Kurusu doesn’t slap him across the face in an attempt to exorcize a ghost.

“We do not have much time, Goro Akechi. I just ask you to be patient with the Trickster, and prepare for unexpected reactions,” Lavenza gets up, her composure returning in full. “I still need to assist Margaret, but I will be back to take you to the Trickster once he appears.”

And, before Goro could even protest, to, once again, try to convince Lavenza that the kind of exposure therapy they seem to be practicing in this magical place might be a tad barbaric, she exits, leaving him to dwell in the sudden shattering of the status quo he so desperately wanted to escape just minutes ago.

The following hours are anxiety-inducing, and Goro fails miserably to not appear like he is about to internally conflagrate, even if he is unsure for whom he is trying to pretend to be calm in the confines of his silk-garbed abode. It’s been weeks, six fucking weeks, if his perception of time is even relatively sound, of practical stillness, and yet it somehow feels like not enough, not even remotely.

The hours pass way too swiftly, before Lavenza’s head pops in the doorway.

“I believe it is time,” she says with a smile, as if completely failing to read his dread. Perhaps, he faked composure too effectively. “Margaret is currently in the main room to greet him.”

His Lavenza-appointed plan of action is just face the guy who thinks he is dead and roll with the punches. Well, let’s hope Akira Kurusu possesses an extraordinary amount of mental composure.

They exit, and Goro is, not for the first time, infinitely grateful that the real him appears to be an expert at wearing the mask of imperturbability. Beneath it, however? He fumes.

 

It’s a disorienting blur - meeting Akira Kurusu for the first time. He dully recalls worrying about potential tears of joy, but what he failed to even consider is that Akira Kurusu would just… go braindead? Is that what's going on here? Goro thinks he sees horror in his eyes, vaguely. What he knows for certain is that this particular reaction is not one would have when suddenly reunited with a long-lost friend.

His opening line, which he did say before he even saw Akira Kurusu and could, in actuality, determine if he matched the image constructed through Lavenza’s relentless praises, does turn out to be accurate. Apparently, the Trickster was more than simply a cryptic title - the boy’s ridiculous getup does prompt some associations with jesters, or overblown stunt performers. It’s not exactly clownish and is admittedly well-made, but he still looks rather stupid, especially paired with the utterly dumbfounded expression. Not that Goro’s outfit is any better, but he, at least, has enough pride to don it with confidence.

Goro was open to, potentially, recognizing Akira Kurusu on sight. Perhaps, floods of memories would’ve flushed into his skull, and he would fall into the boy’s eagerly anticipating arms, or some bullshit like that. But even with the stupid mask on, Goro can see that there’s absolutely nothing familiar about Akira Kurusu. If Goro didn’t know better, he would assume him to be yet another stranger, like Lavenza, or Margaret, or Igor, or even himself. It’s hard to believe that this person, in fact, not only possesses the power to challenge death itself, but has also done so for Goro’s sake.

He does, in fact, have gray eyes.

He is also starring. Right at him. Has been, for a while. And no one is speaking up.

“This can’t be happening again.”

Maybe it was, in fact, more optimal for Akira Kurusu to just stare.

“What the hell do you mean - again?” and maybe Goro could’ve just stayed silent. Oh, well. The exclamation was simply too absurd not to pry, really, what does he mean - again? How many dead acquaintances has he accidentally revived in the past? Lavenza surely made it seem like he was an outlier.

Oh, now Akira Kurusu looks like he is about to slap him.

But before the Trickster can plummet the already disastrous situation into utter chaos, Lavenza finally, fucking finally, has the decency to speak up.

“Trickster, I apologize for the abrupt intrusion.” Yeah, that might’ve been a bad fucking idea, don’t you think, Lavenza? “But I assure you, this situation is nothing like what has occurred in January. This is, in fact, Goro Akechi, or, more accurately, a fragment of him, which at the moment doesn’t possess the memories of his original self.”

“He… the what now? He is what?” Akira Kurusu is basically coming undone at the seams at this point, but Goro begrudgingly admits that he can’t blame him. It’s, at the very least, reassuring to see that the Velvet Room attendants are equally horrible with everyone when it comes to explanations. “Goro Akechi is fucking dead!”

Goro watches Akira Kurusu seize himself in real time, as if the admission caught even him off guard. And yet, he is still looking right at him, and there’s something in his eyes, not quite devastated and yet not hopeful, that glistens almost like guilt.

“Surprise,” Goro provides dryly. This is beginning to turn uncomfortable, and if no one is gonna start explaining what’s going on to Akira Kurusu now, Goro isn’t sure that the guy wouldn’t suffer permanent brain damage. “Sorry if you expected a more heartfelt reunion. She’s right - I really don’t remember who you are.”

With masochistic indifference, Goro watches Akira Kurusu’s face contort.

“Trickster,” this time it’s Margaret who attempts to salvage the situation. “I believe we have a lot to explain to you, and it might be optimal for us to do that in private.”

She turns to Goro then, eyes steely in a way that dares him to even think of protest.

“Akechi-kun. Would you mind reverting for the time being? We will call upon you in due time.”
And what was the point of his coming here in the first place? Just to traumatize the guy?

Goro almost feels the urge to fight her on this, to declare that he stays, and he listens, and he finally gets to the bottom of who Akira Kurusu is and how exactly they used to fit against one another. But then he looks over at the boy, who is still fucking staring, and for the first time, for the first time in this life, but as it inexplicably feels, for the first time ever, too, he sees it. In the confused whirlpool of anger, bafflement, hurt, disbelief, and longing, he sees Akira Kurusu’s grief melt into something akin to hope.

Goro doesn’t say a thing as he turns away, echoes of pained voices following him through the corridors like ghosts of a life he doesn’t remember living.

For the first time since waking up in this reality, Goro Akechi truly wishes for his memories to come back.

Notes:

Every bit of Persona lore this fic has is purely made up for my convenience and conceived out of an amalgamation of poorly remembered bits of Persona 1 (which I watched a playthrough of close to a decade ago) through 5. I have not played any of the P5/P5R sequels, have no idea how anything works, and, at this point, I refuse to learn anything. Shuake has been holding me hostage since 2016 and this is the result.

Chapter 3: Limerence

The last time he sees Goro Akechi, Akira can’t remember. He must’ve caught a glimpse of him while dangling dangerously from the helicopter before the fall, all smiles and signature Joker charms and his insides bleeding with fear, eyes darting between the silhouettes above in search of a familiar pointy outline, dreading to, instead, see an empty space.

The last time he really sees Goro Akechi and, perhaps, the first, in many ways, is on the night of February 2nd, crushing the lapels of Akira’s jacket in an alleyway outside of Leblanc, hot tears streaking his cold-flushed face.

Akira had never seen Goro cry before that night. A part of him breaks at the thought that his last real memory of Goro Akechi is one of pain, like he hasn't had enough of those already. 

“I won’t wait a moment longer. Answer me,” Goro demands minutes earlier, gaze burning in a mix of anger and determination, and Akira wants to scream. Akira wants to look him straight in the eyes and say that he accepts Maruki’s offer because it’s not sentimental bullshit, because it’s not trivial, because if he can have Goro Akechi here, alive with him, for fucking once alive , then it’s worth it to give up on free will. It’s worth giving up on humanity, for him, because Akira can’t keep making these choices for humanity, because Akira is seventeen, and mourning, and tired, and he just wants to, for once, doom the world and get what he wants .

“We’re stopping Maruki,” he says instead. The living never ask him if he regrets his decision, and he is glad they don’t, because he doesn’t think he could lie about it with a straight face. He doesn’t think there is an answer to that question that is not a lie.

The third first time he sees Goro Akechi feels nothing like the first or second. It’s curiosity that colored their first meeting, disinterest in the local girl-craze celebrity swiftly replaced by a razor blade of thrill once Akechi shakes his hand and strikes a deal that, for Akira, will prove to be one with the devil. In the eye of the memory, Akechi sort of looks like one of those poisonous flowers that, for all of their harmless external beauty, kill with a single brush of petals against unprotected skin. When Akira’s hand connects with the soft leather of his gloves, he doesn’t know yet how intimately he will know their texture. When Akechi’s eyes lock onto his, he doesn’t know yet that they are the same color as dried blood.

The second first time he knows their color intimately, as he does his voice, recognizing it on the first syllable. He is a bit shell-shocked, the second first time, and then events begin unraveling around them too sporadically, and then Goro dies, and Akira never ever even though those words before, Goro dies , but now…

The last first time he sees Goro Akechi, his eyes are yellow. 

He still recognizes his voice, nevertheless.

Goro speaks, and Akira spirals, it’s a pathetic rush of everything his overwhelmed brain refused to feel the second first time, but amplified, cranked up to a point of breaking, and Akira breaks, because he’s been here before, he’s heard this voice before, just as light and casual, if a bit less malicious, less real, and it does sound like the real Akechi, and he’s been caught here before, he knows it’s a trick, but who would be so cruel as to play him a second time? Goro wouldn’t, not after what he said, and his eyes are yellow, and his hair is white, but it’s Goro, standing there, with that stupid expression of faux annoyance, and does he still smell like Goro? Would he laugh in that stupid way of his, when he tries to pretend he is not actually laughing, if Akira said something raunchy right now? Goro smells woodsy, and a little bit like frankincense, and like Leblanc, and something is wrong with his eyes, and they are yellow, and he is looking at Akira like he doesn’t know , there’s something missing there, why is he wearing the Velvet Room uniform? Why would Goro Akechi be in the Velvet Room in the first place, Goro Akechi is dead-

“I really don’t remember who you are.”

It hurts.

The last first time it hurts, and if he is being honest, it hurt the first time, and the second, too.

Akira kinda wants to slap him. Maybe that would wake him up. Maybe his hand would go right through.

“This is, in fact, Goro Akechi.”

But it was always Goro Akechi. It was Goro Akechi the first time - sure, partially cast in raisin of faux politeness and overplayed pleasantries, but it was still him underneath, and Akira loved nothing more than peeling off those layers, rewarded with a sharp glance, and a soft smile, and a gun to his head. And it was Goro Akechi the second time, too, because he didn’t disappear when Maruki laid his cards in front of them, and because he didn’t want to die, and dead people don’t wish for death to spare them, and he was dead and crying to stay alive, and Akira could never wish for a version of Goro that would cry like that, never .

It was never about him being the real Goro Akechi . It was about for how long . 

He already knows this is the real Goro Akechi. It’s in the way he stares Akira down, calculating and slightly unnerved beneath the mask of detachment; it’s in in the way he talks back to him with familiar venom that Akira soaks up, eagerly; it’s even in the way his arms are crossed against his chest, and in the way he leans, bodily, out of the conversation, and in the way he looks so stoic yet so clearly uncomfortable under Akira’s gaze. It’s all bona fide Goro Akechi…

Akira kinda wants to seize the distance and crush him against his chest, feel him squirm around and hear him bicker under his breath until he settles there, solid and warm and smelling like a rundown wooden church, like coffee and yesterday’s clothes, like a home that hasn’t been visited in years, unoccupied, fatigued, and covered in a thick layer of neglect, yet still smelling of home .

As Goro Akechi turns away and disappears into the depths of the Velvet Room, Akira catches himself hoping for the next time he sees him again.

He always leaves the moment I get him back. 

“Trickster?..”

Lavenza’s voice, coated in concern and tentative sympathy, reaches him at a whisper, as from above the water’s surface as he is sinking, contentedly, not even trying to come up for air. It pulls him out, limp and unresponsive, eyes still glued to the depths that swallowed Goro Akechi’s silhouette.

“He is safe. I’ll go get him once we have updated you on the situation.”

Safe . Goro Akechi has never been safe , not really. Be it Shido, or the police, or the Phantom Thieves, or the very fabric of reality, or, most of the time, Goro Akechi himself, there was always someone betting on his downfall, pulling the strings of his demise. It’s no different now, he is sure of it. It’s just the question of figuring out who it is this time, dangling Goro Akechi’s body in front of Akira’s eyes, and what kind of unthinkable, implausible price they’ll be asking Akira to pay for a chance to save him.

Akira knows how this goes. And he also knows that he’ll still be gambling his entire life for another chance. 

But for that, he’ll need to at least know who he is playing against.

“What does this all mean, Lavenza?”

 

With a year of experience being the Velvet Room’s esteemed guest behind him, Akira came to expect the level of incoherency and riddle-filled speculations its attendants call guidance. He knows Lavenza and Igor have good intentions, and he truly appreciates their help. It doesn’t mean that he isn’t pissed and confused, all the same.

Margaret, for all of her unsettling professionalism, is more than willing to provide him with actual answers, Akira admiringly notes, unlike Lavenza or, god forbid, Igor, who, for having been present for this entire conversation, just continues to stare at him with a usual glint of curiosity in his eyes and similarly expected lack of concrete insight to add. Oh, what would he give to be able to just get into that man’s mind, he bets Igor knows exactly what needs to be done, at all times, and even if he has his reasons as to why telling it to Akira directly is unfavorable, Akira himself doesn’t really give a shit.

Between Margaret’s and Lavenza’s summaries of unfolding events, though, few admittedly reassuring facts somewhat slot themself into place.

Goro Akechi appeared in the Velvet Room in late March, and he is, indeed, Goro Akechi . Not a cognition, not a product of some fake reality, but a literal resurrection of Goro Akechi, if a bit incomplete.

Goro Akechi is, as Lavenza put it, “fractured,” as well as missing his memories, apart from knowing his name and, hauntingly enough, that he has died. But, according to Margaret, the “fractured” part and the “can’t remember anything about himself” part are unrelated, even though both need to be tackled in order to take Goro from “tentatively real” to “actually ready to rejoin the world of the living.”

Goro Akechi’s resurrection is speculated to be Akira’s doing, which doesn’t shock him as much as it probably should.

“We do not know what or who has bestowed the gift of life onto Alechi-kun. There is no denying the possibility that his resurrection has to do with the lingering powers of the God of Control. Or you, as its rightful - albeit temporary - inheritor,” is Margaret’s explanation. “This could also explain why he entered this space as just a soul, as, perhaps, either the power was too unstable or a part of Akechi-kun’s psyche refused the gift, after all. But please keep in mind that this is all speculation - this is, indeed, an out-of-the-ordinary predicament.”

And that would be very much like Akechi, to scoff at a third chance at life while reaching for it, nevertheless.

It is not all sunshine and rainbows, though, because it never is. 

The worst of it is that, this once, the Velvet Room - Igor tentatively included - appears to genuinely have no clue how exactly Akira Kurusu is supposed to save Goro Akechi, or why, despite seemingly being an intact soul, he can’t recall anything about his past life.

And that’s exactly the problem, isn’t it, because they also have no clue how to get Goro’s memories back.

There’s also the matter of what Akira himself has seen. What he, at the time, suppressed as the torturous manifestation of hope sabotaging his own mind, on the day he is now quite sure aligns perfectly with the day Goro Akechi’s incomplete fragment wound up in Lavenza and Igor’s care.

“On the day I left Tokyo,” it’s the first thing he utters since Margaret and Lavenza have begun their labyrinthine explanation. “I thought I saw him, at the station. I could’ve sworn I saw him walking by.”

Margaret’s eyebrows furrow.

“That could be possible, indeed. It is his physical body, in a sense, that is missing, and we can’t rule out its ability to act autonomously.”

The admission eases something that has been clawing at Akira’s chest for over a month now, a confirmation of conjectural lucidity he didn’t realize he needed.

“The question of Goro Akechi’s memory might be best approached with conventional methods,” Lavenza chimes in. “Stirring his cognition through things he recognizes, places he holds dear. If even his missing self appears confined to Tokyo, that’s where his chances of remembering himself are the highest. We’ll leave this task to you, Trickster.”

Akira nods and refuses to feel terrified. Refuses to think of Goro, waiting somewhere in the depths of the Velvet Room, who doesn’t remember Akira. Refuses to think of the Goro who does, and of what he would do to Akira for, after all they’ve been through, spitting on his wishes and dragging him back into hell. This will all come later, for now, he is finally given a task , a direction to move forward, and backing down isn’t an option.

“There is, however, the matter of the distortion.” Margaret’s eyes are intense, and her voice is level, but Akira can almost feel the waves of hesitation radiating from her.

Oh yes, the distortion . 

With everything about Goro Akechi’s revival overwhelming him so suddenly, he almost forgot about the distortion that initially almost sent him spiraling.

“I cannot locate where the distortion of your heart took root, just like I can’t locate if Akechi-kun’s body is, indeed, roaming somewhere amongst the living. But that is still something we must address, and swiftly, before it grows even further out of our control,” Margaret sounds almost apologetic, as if she were the one who wrecked Akira’s heart and made him grow a Palace or something. “On our end, we will do everything to track it, but you do your part as well, Trickster .”

Akira really knows of only one way a severe distortion, especially within a Persona user’s heart, can manifest in the Metaverse.

He must ask them. It doesn’t matter how much it hurts. He must .

“Do I have a Palace?”

“We don’t know.”

Well, that’s unexpected.

“What do you mean? Can’t you just check if there’s a hit on the Nav or something? I know we don’t have access to it anymore, but you still do, right? How else did it reappear for us to get to Maruki’s Palace?”

Lavenza throws a glance at Igor, then at Margaret, and, apparently, the silent exchange leaves her with just:

“It’s a bit more complicated than that.”

Akira wants to groan. Of course, it can’t be simple , as if it’s ever simple.

“What you recognize as Palaces isn't necessarily a result of a distorted desire that collapses once the distortion ceases to exist,” Margaret helpfully provides, climbing closer and closer to the top of his most favorite people in the entire Metaverse. “Ultimately, the cognitive world is the sea of human subconscious that will continue to exist for as long as collective emotions continue to feed it - the same applies to a pocket of it that is crafted by your feelings specifically.

“To answer your question - no, you don’t have a Palace, as far as we can locate it. Not in the same way you have been conditioned to view changes in the Metaverse. But it doesn’t mean that there’s no designated place in the cognitive world for your distortion to reside. As your guides, all we can feel is that a part of your heart has morphed into something the rest of you rejects.”

Metaverse bullshit. 

Alright. Akira can deal with Metaverse bullshit. Akira can deal with Palaces that are not Palaces. He doesn’t need to know much else.

This - the frustratingly vague concepts of cognitions , and desires , and consciousness , made a bit more intelligible by Margaret, but, ultimately, still out of his complete understanding, even a year into this mess - he can handle. This is Joker’s domain. This is where he gets to rip off his mask, fix his gloves, and be the hero. And a part of him - the part of him that reached for the blue when he first saw it, the part that saw his new school turn into a castle and immediately leaped into the new world of adventures, no questions asked, the part that killed god, the part that he fears, - wants to seize this distortion immediately, matters not that it arises from his own heart.

But this part doesn’t matter. Not right now.

“The distortion… Is there a chance that Akechi was brought here by my distortion? If I fix it, wouldn’t he-“

Akira can’t say it . Not to them, and not to himself. 

And instead of thinking it, he thinks of Palaces, and how you need both a location and a distortion to access them. What would be Akira Kurusu’s location, and what would be its distortion? Persona users are not supposed to have Palaces. Akira once tried to enter Goro Akechi’s name into the Nav - there wasn’t a hit. Akira’s location could be the entire city of Tokyo - almost like a slightly less grandiose version of Shido, he notes with humorless irony, - but what of his distortion? What would Goro’s Palace be, if he had one? Akira feels like it would be an incredibly difficult one to traverse, times worse than Shido or Maruki, and probably filled with puzzles and traps.

Lavenza’s voice seems far away again.

“Distorted desires aren’t known to bring people back from the dead. Why he ended up in the Velvet Room, however, and how his current condition, as well as his resurrection, tie into your distortion, remains to be uncovered. But we have all the reasons to believe that without ridding yourself of the distortion, you won’t be able to save him.”

He knows what she means, of course he does. He’s seen countless people fall victim to their distorted ideas - lowlife womanizers, neglectful parents, power-hungry politicians, broken people with good intentions, and good people overtaken by broken intentions. Hell, he is already feeling it in himself, has been feeling it, for quite some time - the guilt, the resentment, the apathy, the not-grief.

“Your connection with the Velvet Room is already thinning, Trickster… If this continues progressing unaddressed, your heart will be too distorted for us to assist you, I’m afraid. What would then happen to Goro Akechi, I can’t tell.”

And she is right. There will be no taking of saving Goro if he can’t even reach him, there will be no saving him without the Velvet Room’s aid. But is there a point to saving him if the moment Akira returns his world to its axis, he’ll just disappear again? Is there a point in fixing his own heart if it's doomed to distort beyond the point of no return the moment he seizes the Treasure?

“If I find the distortion, if I do it… will he get to stay alive, after his soul is restored?”

Will I get to keep him? Will I get to keep him this time?

“We don’t know.”

And that about sums it up, doesn’t it? They both look at him now, and Akira recognizes that look. The decision is left up to him. It’s time to make a choice .

So what is it gonna be, Trickster? Are we seizing the opportunity to keep Goro Akechi for the third time, knowing full well that he can vanish once again the moment we have him? Choose wisely, Trickster. It’s an all-or-nothing bet - all of your remaining hope and sanity on a handful of precious make-beliefs and an opportunity to commit a few more memories with Goro Akechi to the catalog of things that’ll haunt you for the rest of time .

It doesn’t fucking matter. Goro Akechi is alive, and Akira will do whatever it fucking takes to keep it that way, this time.

“So, where do we start?”

 

The start, apparently, is determining if Goro Akechi can aid in saving himself at all, because, apparently , no one bothered to mention that Goro Akechi can’t leave the Velvet Room .

“If you feel like attempting it today, Goro Akechi can try accompanying you out of the Velvet Room,” Lavenza says. “Now that the Velvet Room is physically manifested, he should be able to exit with your help. I must confess that Goro Akechi was quite eager to leave previously, and we did have the means to, theoretically, assist him in that endeavor. However, I did make a choice against it. Please do not inform Goro Akechi of my deception.”

She might not ask him directly, but the real prompt is clear as day - do you feel ready to see him again, or do you need some time to think, because once you commit, there will be no more thinking time left. They are giving him an out, a last chance to collect his thoughts and either return for Goro or never step foot into the Velvet Room again.

It’s a useless question, really. Even before learning as much as there is currently to learn about Goro’s predicament, Akira wanted nothing more than to see him again, yellow eyes and all.

Memories or no memories, it’s probably not even gonna be their most awkward reunion, by a long shot.

“Alright. Bring him over.”

“It will be a good practice in estimating his limitations,” Margaret, ever-practical. Oh, what would Akira’s run against ruin be if it were her guiding him from the start. “Lavenza, would you please fetch our guest?”

 

Goro Akechi looks shockingly good in blue. Akira is still not sold on the yellow eyes, but the white hair is starting to grow on him. 

It’s baffling how delusionally overpowering the feeling of hope can be.

When Lavenza emerges back into the main room, an evidently wary and on-guard Goro in tow, Akira almost feels his heart crush in glee. With the initial shock settled, it’s not dread or apprehension that replaces it, at least not entirely. Above all else, Akira is just glad . Selfishly glad to commemorate another image of Goro Akechi to memory and hope that, this time, he wouldn’t have to bury it in sorrow.

It really is Goro , he notes again, untying another weight from his heart. From the faux-relaxed posture where he tries to look nonchalant, but the too-high raise of his shoulders betrays that he actually just doesn’t want to be here, to the neutrally calculating expression he used to wear whenever he and Akira would enter a new place and Goro needed to assess if anyone around wanted to either kill him or ask for an autograph, it’s all there. Every little quirk Akira has committed to memory, every little tick he fondly observed for a better part of a year.

He also notes, with devious satisfaction, just how easy it is for him to read this version of Goro. An unexpected boon of memory loss - Goro must’ve retained all of the tools and tactics the ace detective had at his disposal, but has no idea that Akira knows every single one of them, and what hides underneath. This Goro Akechi might not be playing an ace detective, but he seems to rely on the comforting familiarity of the facade’s body language. Even if it’s just the snappy front of Goro’s real persona, Akira can read it just as well when the real master of playing Goro Akechi is absent.

Goro will probably catch on quickly. And Akira doesn’t plan to keep him without memories for any longer than absolutely necessary. But he is allowed to have some fun while he has the opportunity, even if it earns him a stray bullet once Goro fully comes to it.

And he will retrieve Goro in his entirety. If Goro’s memories are really all there, there’s no better person to task with dragging them back to the surface than Akira Kurusu, and he is willing to deal with the aftermath. 

“Long time no see, Akechi ,” and with his best Joker smile, Akira steps right back into the orbit of his beautiful downfall.

Goro scoffs, and Akira can swear it’s the most perfect sound he’s ever heard in his entire life. 

“I presume you’ve been brought up to speed,” he says, crossing his arms and stepping closer, taking on the challenge. “So, I suppose you have a plan for how we’re going to bring back my memories?”

“Sure do,” it almost feels as thrilling as fighting him back in Mementos, and Akira feels drunk on his presence alone, on the way he jumps straight to business, like Goro Akechi always does. “Step one, apparently, is taking you on a walk.”

 

If Akira wasn’t previously informed by Lavenza that Goro was chained to the Velvet Room with no options to leave, he would’ve never assumed it with how effortlessly Goro slips into the real world beside him. 

Akira would think Goro uses this passage between worlds all the time - a fellow Wildcard supported by the mystical powers at play, and not at all a prisoned estimation of an attendant whose one and only recollection of the world is narrowed to the mirage realm of Akira’s rebellion - if not for the disenchanted way Goro’s eyes spend a little too long assessing the surroundings, evaluating a world a level more unfamiliar to him than simply a new town.

Goro catches Akira’s fond smile, but doesn’t say anything. Nevertheless, Akira doesn’t miss the slight flicker of satisfaction in his eyes, and smiles even wider.

“Welcome back to the world of the living, Akechi.”

It’s terrifying how easily Goro slips back beside him, every time. 

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Goro shoots him an accusatory glance. “Although I must say - it’s rather rejuvenating. I didn’t realize just quite how much of a difference fresh air makes to the environment.”

It’s so undeniably him that Akira can’t help but admit:

“Glad to see you didn’t change much.”

“So I’ve been told.” 

He doesn’t look at Akira, eyes far away and wandering the vista around them.

Goro looks like he wants to add more, and for a moment Akira feels transported back in time to the strolls they took through Kichijoji’s snow-brushed streets, still warm from the residual coziness of Jazz Jin, Goro ranting on about one topic or another, and Akira adding contrasting comments, or insightful questions, but mostly just watching Goro, his eyes softening as the discussion carries him away. 

He really loosened up when his mind was allowed to wander freely. He was the same even before November, but the official downfall of the detective prince allowed the veil Akira only occasionally would see slipping to drop completely, revealing in these moments of unguarded conversation the snarky, stubborn, brilliant Goro Akechi who called Akira a brainless romanticist, yet intently listened to his every word.

Akira did appreciate the onslaught of gushing compliments at the beginning, but, in all honesty, Goro calling him stupid and then explaining why for twenty minutes straight was way more exciting.

This version of Goro seems a bit reluctant to do so. Although what did Akira expect from a guy who was currently taking his first steps through the world with basically a stranger ?

He definitely didn’t expect him to look so… puzzled? Annoyed? Concerned? Goro is staring at him. No, it’s probably Akira staring at Goro, not saying anything, and Goro is just reacting to that. Is Akira the one looking puzzled? That’s no good, he needs to-

“Something on your mind, Trickster ? Or shall we get moving?”

Right. Staring at him in silence is unlikely to earn Akira any points, and his memories don’t seem to just telepathically resonate into Goro, either. Moving it is, then.

“Alright,” he summons every ounce of Joker’s confident charm he can muster. “Time to show you the world.”

 

“Is this place supposed to stimulate any sort of a familiar reaction in me? Because if that was the aim, it’s failing miserably.”

Despite what he told Goro back in the Velvet Room, Akira doesn’t really have a plan. So, he decides that an attempt to walk Goro to the riverbank and back before parting for the night, followed by a guaranteed mental breakdown once he returns home, sounds as good a plan as any in their peculiar circumstances.

Velvet Rooms in Inaba seem to work a bit differently than in Tokyo, or maybe Akira’s new status as a distorted mess had an effect on the timeflow within it. By the time they exit and begin their stroll out of the shopping district, the town is already bathed in darkness. A quick glance at his phone confirms that it’s slightly past 10 pm, and that Morgana has sent him a concerned-looking keysmash an hour ago. But dealing with that would have to wait till the end of Goro Akechi’s first tour through reality.

Expectedly, Goro doesn’t look impressed.

“No, I don’t believe you’ve ever been here, not that I know of. This is Inaba. Not much else to say about it - small town, little to do but gossip and laze around,” Akira tries to play a helpful guide. “I did send a couple pictures to your old phone, but I’m guessing you’ve never received them.”

Akira doesn’t need to look over to bodily feel Goro roll his eyes.

“Wasn’t I supposed to be dead, from your perspective? Seems a bit counterproductive to be texting a dead man.”

Oh, if only you knew. Akira’s phone was full of messages delivered but never read, one-sided conversations sent into oblivion in the hopes that maybe there is someone, indeed, reading them on the other side. Now that their recipient is braving the night’s chill by Akira’s side, he is moderately glad his pleas never reached their addressee.

“I’m sentimental like that,” Akira shrugs. “Thought if you ever turned up to be alive, you’d appreciate being kept in the loop.”

“If your estimation that my personality stayed mostly intact is correct, I would’ve probably found it annoying and pointless.”

It all feels too familiar - the whips of banter, the shadows of mean-spirited self-satisfaction bleeding through the casual levelness of Goro’s voice, the instinctual comfort of parrying Goro’s comments with teasing fondness, and if Akira keeps his eyes on the horizon, he can almost pretend that the umbra of not-grief no longer lingers in his blind spot, like it was never there to behind with, and if he looks over, he’s gonna be met with the cold-flushed profile of a person he never regretted meeting, tawny hair glowing almost red in the streetlight.

“Yeah, you’d say that, but I know you’d appreciate it in secret. You’d reread them every night before going to sleep. Maybe even take a few screenshots, just in case.”

But when he turns and winks at Goro, his hair is silver, like the moon, and when he wards off Akira’s taunting accusations with an unconvinced glance, his eyes shine with an uncanny phosphorescence, an almost translucent, cold yellow. Akira is glad the citrine shade of Goro’s eyes is far too icy to remind him of Palace Rulers and cognitions. Yet, it still evokes an image of carnelian brown in his mind.

“Nonsense. Maybe you just really didn't know me that well.”

“Oh, I know plenty about you. You’d be surprised.”

Goro looks at him, and Akira can’t tell if he believes him or not. Goro probably can’t tell himself.

Akira can’t lose this time. This time, Akira will hold on, even if the entire world tries to fight him at once. All he needed was a chance to prove himself, a fighting chance. It doesn’t matter what the choice is gonna be this time - he will choose Goro Akechi.

He just hopes that, this time, Goro Akechi isn’t going to stand in his way.

 

The riverbank is expectedly deserted, the clear moon reflecting on the water’s surface in flickering flashes of white and yellow. It’s serene, peaceful in a way Akira always associated with large bodies of water. Goro once told him that he likes looking at the ocean, but the idea of being submerged in it somewhat unnerves him.

But Goro is barely looking at the river beneath. His eyes are glued to the sky, absorbing its colors.

“Feeling alright so far?”

Even though he doesn’t answer right away, his voice is level and sincere, almost unnaturally so:

“Yes. It seems that I can, after all, traverse the outside world safely.”

“ Don’t get ahead of yourself ,” Akira teases. “If you couldn’t even exit the Velvet Room without me, maybe it’s also just around me that you can stay in the real world.”

Goro finally lets go of whatever captivated him in the sight of the moon and looks over at Akira, the curl of his lips airy yet venomous.

“Oh, maybe we should attempt to part ways, then? See what happens? I’m quite sure I got it from here, your company will be redundant .”

“Not gonna happen,” I am not leaving your side, not ever again .

Akira expects Goro to scoff or to dismiss Akira at that, maybe even attempt to stand his ground and demand Akira walk away for the sake of determining his level of autonomy in the real world. Instead, Goro’s face falls, ever so slightly, and his gaze flicks back to the night sky, expression stoned in unreadable contemplation.

“So, how close were we, really?” he asks after a beat. “You don’t even call me by my given name. Am I to also refer to you as Kurusu-kun?”

It’s unclear if the question is asked out of a genuine want to determine the linguistic stances between them or a much more intimate uncertainty in where they stand, fundamentally, and Akira’s heart clenches with the reminder that, for all of the familiarity of Goro’s jabs and sly comments, the boy in front of him still doesn’t know a thing about Akira’s favorite coffee blend, or that he tears up at stupid movies about power of friendship, or that he keeps Goro’s glove in the back pocket of his uniform pants, or what Akira’s tear-streaked, sleeping face looks like in February’s cool moonlight.

Goro doesn’t know that Akira killed him.  

“You can call me Akira. You used to call me Akira, anyway. I just don’t call you Goro because you never let me. ”

“I can definitely see that being the case, Kurusu-kun.”

The name is clearly supposed to be an innocent jab, but it strikes Akira much deeper than expected.

“Everyone calls you Akechi. But, to answer your question, we were definitely close enough for you to call me Akira.” 

He falls silent, unsure of what else to say. Practically, Akira understands that he wouldn’t be able to conceal things from Goro forever, and even if sitting down and outright reciting the known history of Goro Akechi to him is, probably, a horrible idea, if they want Goro to organically regain his memory, he also can’t just keep him in the dark.

I get you now, kind of, his subconscious whispers to the ghost of a man who dreamed of a kinder world . Whose dream Akira shattered together with his own. Must’ve sucked to see your favorite person in the world look at you like you’re a stranger.

“You are, somehow, even worse than Lavenza,” Goro sighs when it becomes apparent that Akira isn’t going to elaborate. “And she assured me that you will be summoned specifically to enlighten me about my past.”

Somehow, Akira doubts that. 

“Did she really not tell you anything?”

Goro shrugs.

“Bits and pieces. Nothing concrete beyond us apparently being close enough for you to revive me.”

That’s one way of putting it. Did she tell you that I did it twice?

“We have a… complicated relationship, somewhat.” Brilliant, Akira, congrats on the understatement of the century. “Not in a bad way, though. We used to be rivals. We also hung out a lot, which you never admitted you liked. And we saved reality from being overwritten by my crazy therapist that one time.”

That’s not too bad of a summary for now.

“Your therapist attempted to overwrite reality ?” Of course that’s gonna be the part Goro chooses to focus on. Well, better for Akira than being forced to address any other part of this mess.

“Sure did. He is one interesting guy. Not as interesting as you, but he’ll probably rank in the top-five of most interesting people I know.”

Goro contemplates it for a little while, probably sorting through his mind for traces of anything related to so-called “evil therapists” and “overwritten realities.”

“Was he the one who killed me?”

What he comes up with almost forces Akira to choke on his own heart.

“Let’s- let’s maybe keep our first trip down the memory lane on lighter topics, alright?”

No, he brought you back, he fucking brought you back, for me, just for me, and you knew all along, and you still placed a gun into my hand, wrapped your hand over mine, and made me pull the trigger.

“Your favorite color was blue.”

Goro looks at him like it’s the most offensive thing he’s ever heard.

“Bullshit, it was red.”

“Got you! You always refused to tell me your favorite color.”

If Goro notices the tension underlying Akira’s lighthearted words, he doesn’t comment on it. Akira knows he wants to press him for all the answers in the world, and Akira knows that, if he does, there would be little he could do to avoid revealing bits and pieces of what culminates in the picture of their joint ruin. But Goro doesn’t press him, at least, not yet.

Instead, he looks down at his hands, and a gasp of confusion escapes his lips, quiet yet piercing in the dead of the night.

Akira adores watching Goro’s hands. They’re lithe and graceful, even in their destructiveness. He tucks a strand of stray hair behind his ear with the same elegance he stabs a sword straight through a Shadow’s heart. He brings a coffee cup to his lips as delicately yet precisely as he drags a clawed hand against his face in post-battle ecstasy. In Goro’s hands, the destructive beauty of moving a chess piece across the board is the same as pulling the trigger. Akira wants to press his face against the palm of Goro’s hand, even if it’s clawed, and even if it’s clutching a gun pointed directly at his forehead.

Even now, in this form that’s not quite cognitive yet definitively unnatural, the skin of Goro’s hands is hidden beneath the leather of stiff-looking gloves. Akira can see the dust-specked ground through Goro’s open palms.

Goro is staring at his hands growing translucent without any panic or dread. He just looks confused and somewhat disappointed.

Akira feels the Earth’s rotation cease beneath his feet.

This can’t be happening. This can’t be it. When looking at Goro’s now outstretched hand, he can see it growing translucent, thinning like a mirage. Goro’s disappearing, Goro is disappearing, and it’s only been moments since he’s seen his face again, he can’t be disappearing, they are all disappearing, his friends, everyone, floating into black mist, and he can’t help them, he can’t reach out, why is he the last one standing, they lost, Joker doesn’t lose, Joker can’t lose, and yet he is disappearing, I wonder if I get to see Goro where I’m going, I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry, and its his legs, too, now, it’s his entire fucking body, growing more and more translucent, and Akira can’t reach out, he is frozen, he can’t reach out because he is also disappearing, where are my hands, I can’t feel my hands, and he didn’t get to do anything, this time around, where did he fuck up, Goro can’t leave, he needs to tell him, he needs to-

“Akira.”

Goro’s eyes are composed, and grounding, and very beautiful, even if he misses their novel red shine.

“ Breathe . You look like you’re about to pass out,” and he is so calm, how the fuck is he so calm? “It looks like our time is up. Meet me in the Velvet Room.”

Arika runs. He doesn’t look back to see if Goro’s figure has completely disintegrated into air; he just runs, thinking of nothing.

 

The Velvet Room greets him with the sight of Goro Akechi, sitting somewhat pathetically on the floor next to a frowning Lavenza, still flickering back and forth between solidity and apparition, and Akira drowns in the crashing waves of his own relief.

Margaret is telling him something, but he doesn’t listen, crossing the room in a stride of frantic steps and collapsing on his knees in front of Goro. He doesn’t dare reach out, he rarely ever did, but his knee connects with Goro’s outstretched calf, and it feels solid, it feels like it belongs to someone alive.

“Stop fucking staring at me,” he sounds evidently out of breath, but otherwise normal, and Akira doesn’t stop staring at him. “Everything’s fine .”

“It seems that Akechi-kun’s manifestation in the real world is restricted by time.” Margaret sounds much closer to them than Akira expected, yet he refuses to look over at her, as though Goro could disappear again the moment he escapes his direct line of sight.

“It’s not dissimilar to how we attendants manifest in your world,” Lavenza adds from her spot at Goro’s left. She seems to avoid looking directly at Akira, a flush of pink dusting her cheeks. “It can be very taxing to maintain a physical form outside the Velvet Room. I imagine it’s even more challenging when you don’t have much control over it.”

“ Fucking great ,” Goro sounds definitively more level, and when he looks back at Akira, his face is solid, stable, and very annoyed. “I thought I told you to stop staring .”

“Sorry,” Akira hastily gets back onto his feet, but his eyes continue lingering on Goro, who straightens his posture but remains seated on the floor. 

“I think that’s a good place to conclude our work for the day,” Margaret steps back to her place by Igor’s desk. “We will be awaiting you tomorrow, Trickster, to determine how to progress from here. Please rest well.”

No matter how badly Akira doesn’t want to leave Goro out of his sight, he reluctantly agrees. Today was… a lot , and Akira isn’t sure if lingering for longer wouldn’t lead to him doing something he will regret for the rest of his life.

Goro decides to get up from his resting spot, either to bid Akira farewell or, more likely, to return to the depths of the Velvet Room without even sparing him a glance. 

“I presume I’ll be seeing you tomorrow,” he clearly aims for it to sound like a statement, but Akira catches the vulnerability of a question in his words.

And fuck , if he only knew, he would never question him, he would call him foolish, and sentimental, and short-sighted, but he would know that Akira would be here tomorrow, and the day after that, and for as long as he has the strength to crawl back, for as long as there is a place to crawl to.

But this Goro doesn’t know, and he doesn’t remember anything, hell, he doesn’t even remember who he was to Akira, and what this now-invisible bond tied around their necks used to mean, and Akira is selfish, Akira is scared and selfish, and if he doesn’t know, then what’s the harm in-

Akira turns on his heels, closes the distance of a few steps Goro has put between them in standing back up with all of the guts he had accumulated over the last year, and wraps his arms around Goro’s stiff shoulders.

“Of course,” he whispers next to his ear, and his voice is shaking. “You better still be here.”

Goro is solid and unnaturally cool. Not to the point of concern, but noticeably so. And, if Akira imagines him relaxing somewhat under his arms, he lets himself believe it.

As he bids his hurried farewells to Lavenza, Igor, and Margaret and steps out into the cool night air, Akira’s fingertips tingle.

Goro Akechi is alive.

As he traverses the empty night streets back to his house, it’s the only thought that he really allows to take root in his mind, tired and certainly overstimulated.

Goro Akechi is alive, and I will save him.

For the first time since he stepped foot into his family house in March, mind heavy with the memories of an entire year of tentative victories and excruciating losses, hell, for the first time he has ever stepped into this house, Akira feels like he can see his future.

What he doesn’t anticipate, however, head spinning and heart tearing from the intoxicating mix of hope and agitation, is Morgana’s panicked eyes greeting him at the door.

“Akira, why the hell were you at the shopping district with Akechi ?”

Chapter 4: The Octuple Personality and Eleven Crows

Goro did not know what to make of Akira Kurusu.

Akira Kurusu was definitely remarkable in certain ways commonly considered noteworthy when assessing a person. He was admirably swift to adapt under pressure, taking Goro’s predicament in stride, but not in a manner that spoke of crude ignorance, quite the opposite. He seemed clever and quick to grasp even the most convoluted, ridiculous concepts. That was a given - if Akira was really a person who held significant importance to Goro, he couldn’t be a fool. 

Nevertheless, Akira was a fool. Just not of the intellectually-challenged variety. He appeared charming in a way that, without a doubt, swayed people into liking him instantaneously, probably children and the elderly in particular , and if the charms didn’t work, his persistence would, without a doubt, eventually sweep even the most cold-hearted bastards off their feet. His idiotic jokes and shy smiles were irritating. His steady, silently confident disposition was unremarkable, if one didn’t pay attention. His voice, unexpectedly deep and oddly attention-grabbing for how definitely not flashy Akira looked outside of his Velvet Room garb, was annoying.

Akira genuinely cared for Goro Akechi; there was little doubt about that. 

He knew, instinctively, that he could spot a liar when he saw one. Goro was probably an adept liar himself. Akira was a shockingly good actor, that much was clear, but he wasn’t lying to Goro in all the subtle ways he promised to bring him back.

Goro didn’t feel much when his body began disintegrating, too caught up in trying to piece together the puzzle of Akira Kurusu to notice the first waves of fatigue that began to settle in his limbs. It felt like a pull, first a tentative nudge, then a firmer tug, luring him out, in a direction undetermined in reality but clearly perceivable from instinct, a metaphysical directive for his body to return home, which Goro couldn’t disobey, no matter how badly he wanted to.

It was obnoxious and inconvenient. Yet, even more obnoxious was the look of pure, unadulterated horror that contorted Akira’s face the moment he saw Goro’s hands turn see-through. 

Goro wonders how exactly he died in the memories of Akira Kurusu. Did he see it happen? Was it a painful, dragged-out death? Did he slip out of existence when Akira wasn’t looking, and that’s why he is now so persistent about staring Goro down? 

The staring was unnerving. 

The hug was outright uncalled for .

Goro didn’t think Akira noticed his own shaking hands when he leaped to wrap them around Goro’s shoulders. He smelled of coffee and warm spices, with a hint of something metallic. The embrace was uncomfortable and embarrassing, and Goro desperately wanted to pull away, to snap at Akira and tell him to get the hell out already. 

He didn’t know what betrayed him. Maybe it was, in fact, the rumored residue of his past self that naturally unwound under the contact, leaving Goro limp and perplexed and endlessly displeased.

It was the most infuriating part of it all - even his body seemed no longer under his control, leaning into the touch Goro doesn’t recognize as even remotely familiar.

Seemingly even more embarrassed than Goro, Lavenza refuses to meet his eyes once Akira exits the Velvet Room , but Margaret is there, smirking, fucking smirking at him with an amused glint in her eyes. 

Goro turns around and, without a word, walks off in the direction of the lounge room on unsteady legs.

 

Tiredness is an unfamiliar sensation, but not in a manner of reaccumulation Goro has adapted to recognize as a sign of encountering a concept he’s been familiar with prior to losing his memories. Instead, this fatigue he discovered himself coated in after rematerializing in the Velvet Room is novel altogether, most likely unique to the sort of non-human beings he can currently count himself amongst. Unlike the physical weariness, which he only understands from vague impressions of his past self, as Velvet Room attendants appear to lack the need for such frivolous things as sleep, food, or rest, this brand of exhaustion feels almost psychological, despite settling in his body. His mind feels clouded and heavy, as do his limbs, and as he lays on the couch, the dizziness continues to wash over him in quivers.

He doesn’t know how much time has passed when the emergence of a foreign presence alerts him back into the world, but he is pleased to find himself feeling more present, if still lethargic. Fuck, is every endeavor out of the Velvet Room going to leave me this incapacitated?

Lavenza is standing at the door, just shy of fully entering.

“Are you feeling better?” she asks meekly. Goro doesn’t think he’s ever heard her sound so uncertain.

“Yeah,” he doesn’t have much energy for abrasiveness. “You don’t have to stand in the doorway, you know? Either go or enter, but don’t linger there, will you?”

Lavenza tentatively obliges, inviting herself to stand right in front of Goro’s couch. 

“I have something that will help.” And with a wave of her arm, she cascades a flash of sparks down Goro’s body, which bring with them a sudden wave of welcome relief. “It’s a low-level recovery skill, but it should be effective.”

And it is, a somewhat familiar imprint of magic undoing the knots in Goro’s muscles and blowing away the fog in his brain, leaving behind only the slightest dusting of sluggishness. Noticing the immediate change, Lavenza smiles at him warmly.

“Please don’t take it wrongfully as pity, Goro Akechi,” she says quietly, eyes downcast but lips still holding on to that soft smile. “I’m aware that you dislike viscerally to be pitied, but I’m also familiar with the aftermath of traversing the material world past your capabilities, from first-hand experience. Take it as nothing but a gesture of goodwill.”

It’s an unusual sentiment for Lavenza to voice , but Goro begrudgingly admits that he might’ve dismissed her sincerity as an infuriating attempt at charity work if she didn’t address it first. Objectively, Goro never really felt pitied by the Velvet Room attendants. Their helpfulness seemed so integrated into their nature in all the awkward and odd ways human compassion doesn’t manifest that the idea of Lavenza or Margaret taking pity on anyone appeared somewhat ridiculous.

“I will accept it,” he nods at her.

At that, Lavenza smiles a bit more openly and makes her way to her preferred couch spot.

“So, has your excursion with the Trickster gone well? Do you still possess any doubts regarding his intentions?”

Goro almost feels like lying to her.

“I believe that Akira is, regardless of how foolish it is, sincerely willing to be useful to me in recovering myself.”

Lavenza’s chuckle is irritating.

“I am glad to hear that.”

It’s still difficult for him to see Akira Kurusu as nothing but innocently altruistic. No one is simply that kind by nature, and Akira doesn’t strike him as a selfless man. Which means, whatever odd sense of misplaced loyalty and affection drives Akira to so nobly dive right into the quest of returning Goro to his original self, it lies in the space most unreachable to Goro in his current state.

“Although I must admit to having a question that might sabotage my ability to work with him in the future.”

It’s a fruitless attempt, Goro knows from the start. Lavenza is going to give him none of the information he is seeking.

“What particular kind of relationship did I share with Akira?”

Yet, it doesn’t mean that he can’t gather what he needs from the way she avoids her response.

“I am not privy to the Trickster’s personal matters,” Lavenza expectedly deflects. “All I know is that you are one of his closest confidants, and even among those, your bond ranks as one of the most powerful. In life, you and the Trickster walked a complicated path, and you were taken away from him by circumstances outside of his control.”

Complicated . The same sentiment Akira expressed when discussing their shared past. Friends and rivals, a lost life and an indestructible bond. 

“Lavenza, I’m quite certain you know a tad more than that.”

The girl doesn’t even deny it, but there’s a spatter of melancholy staining her confirmation:

“You are correct in your assumption. However, anything beyond what I’ve already told you would have to be revealed to you either by the Trickster or through your mind making its own connections.”

And isn’t that inconvenient . Because how is he supposed to trust in Akira’s pure intentions, no matter how genuine, if he has not even the slightest idea of where they’re coming from?

“Speaking of, Akechi-kun,” a new voice chimes in, and Goro watches Margaret enter. “Has anything in your interaction with the Wildcard triggered any memories to surface?” 

Apparently, Lavenza is not the only one interested in prying into Goro’s first venture outside of the great beyond.

Thankfully, Margaret at least keeps her questioning on task.

“Not particularly,” he responds, watching as the woman gracefully leans against the wall. “I did find the experience of being outside the Velvet Room familiar overall, but nothing in particular stood out as significant to me personally. I was led to believe I’ve never been to Inaba before.”

There is a dangerous suggestion and a suggestive danger camouflaged in Margaret’s easy smile. 

“That’s to be expected. But that’s not what interests me, Akechi-kun. Has your encounter with the Trickster stimulated any recollections?”

And of course that’s what it’s all about. He’s seen Margaret eyeing them as Akira made his swift exit. She must’ve caught something in the interaction that betrayed Goro’s momentarily vulnerability, and of course she would be sadistic enough to explore it.

With his most pleasant expression, he responds in a honey-soaked voice:

“Oh, not that I’ve noticed. He seemed like a complete stranger to me!”

Expectedly, Margaret doesn’t buy it. He didn’t do it thinking she would.

“If you want to get out of here any time soon, I’ll need as many concrete facts on your progress as I can get, so don’t be coy about it, Akechi-kun.”

If either of the attendants is unnerved by the way his face immediately falls back into its preferred state of annoyed indifference, they hide it well. 

Margaret’s accusation is valid - their best bet at succeeding is the crumbs of potentially relevant information hidden within his own mind. And it’s not like Goro’s short-lived second-first interaction with Akira concealed some intimate revelations. It’s the self-satisfaction Margaret appears to gain from attempting to humiliate and humble him as severely as possible that pisses Goro off enough to actively sabotage their work.

“Nothing concrete, Margaret-san,” at least he is pleased to note that his voice sounds definitively unbothered. “But I do think a part of me recognizes him, somewhat.”

“And what part would that be, Akechi-kun?”

I might not remember Akira Kurusu, but some impulsive, innate part of me certainly does. I knew the sound of his laughter seconds before he actually laughed. I knew just how fast to walk for our steps to mirror one another.

“It's… the small things. Subtle details, like conversing with him casually, feel instinctively familiar. He looks like what I know him to look like, even if I haven’t had the slightest impression of him before today.” Margaret’s curious, amused eyes are infuriatingly attentive, but Goro refuses to avert his gaze.  “He… smells familiar. Also, I instinctively remember his… physical presence.”

“That’s reassuring. So, sensory experiences seem to be most effective in stimulating your memory.” Could’ve told youthat without having to engage in any attempted humiliation, thank you very much. “Hopefully, these instances of recognition will become more frequent as you interact more. Kurusu-kun has mentioned that he might’ve sighted you, or someone who appeared to look like you, in Tokyo, your hometown, prior to your emergence in the Velvet Room. You wouldn’t remember anything of sorts, would you, Akechi-kun?”

Tokyo. Goro remembers Tokyo, a vivid impression of bustling city life and corners of tranquil solitude , all intertwined within the confines of one metropolitan web. Goro knows the train schedule and which of the city’s date spots are advertised most violently in the media. He doesn’t remember in which part of town he used to live.

He wonders if there’s a version of him currently traversing those unfamiliar streets that does remember it all. He wonders which one of them, then, can be called the real Goro Akechi.

“I don’t,” he says a bit quieter than he ought to. “My first concrete memory dates moments before Lavenza discovered me here.”

Margaret nods and adjusts her focus to Lavenza.

The girl, somehow, appears more flustered by Goro and Margaret’s interaction than either of them, despite remaining silent for its entirety. “Then, we must arrange it so that the Trickster travels back to Tokyo, and swiftly.”

Yet, there’s one detail that bugs Goro about their whirlwind of determination.

“But isn’t Akira a high schooler? He was wearing a school uniform outside of the Velvet Room.” 

They are around the same age, give or take. Did Goro used to attend high school too, perhaps? How old is he, exactly? 

“Wouldn’t it be problematic for a high school student to leave for a different city for an undetermined period of time ? Might that cause some problems with his attendance, and with his family?”

Family? Do I have a family?

Lavenza looks at him like the thought hasn't even crossed her mind.

“That… might be problematic, indeed. But we can only hope that the Trickster’s resourcefulness would deal with that problem.”

Margaret nods.

“Getting to Tokyo is absolutely essential. I cannot pinpoint the location of his distortion without proximity.”

“Well, then let’s hope Akira doesn’t settle on deciding to drop out of high school for the sake of this endeavor,” Goro gloomily notes. Knowing what he knows about Akira so far, he might as well be stupid enough to do so.

 

The wait for Akira’s return is colored in agitation for all residents of the Velvet Room - safe for Igor, who, at this point, Goro considers as hardly more than an accessory. And yet, time passes anyway, and this time Goro is there to greet the Trickster alongside Lavenza and Margaret - and technically Igor, he supposes. The attendants seem to have a thing for greeting, and judging by Lavenza’s poorly concealed excitement at his presence in their little lineup, she is adding way too much subtextual meaning to his willingness to join them than she should.

When the back wall of the cell begins to finally contort in blue distortions, the somewhat agreeable atmosphere shatters the moment Akira sets foot into the realm of his heart.

“We might have a slight problem.”

Brilliant.

For all the subtlety of Akira’s expressions, Goro reads nervous worry on his face as clear as day.

“What is it?” he barks. Annoyingly enough, the moment Akira’s eyes dart to him, his apprehension is joined by an unmissable specter of fond disbelief, which just as swiftly morphs into just unadulterated fondness.

“So, I assume the silent agreement was to keep Akechi’s return lowkey,” Akira begins, the nonchalance in his voice so evidently forced, it sounds unnaturally extreme. “Everyone who needs to know - us, in other words - knows, and no one else needs to know, at least for now.”

Goro, with utmost certainty, does not like where this is going.

“Well, that is no longer an option. Morgana found out. He saw us going to the riverbank.”

Fucking great. As if dealing with just Akira wasn’t enough.

Goro realizes, albeit too fucking late , that he hasn’t even considered that Akira’s acquaintances, an unidentified group that must cross over with his acquaintances, to some extent, might find out about his revival. Since waking up, his world basically revolved around the Velvet Room and the Trickster who must assist him in escaping it, and Goro, somehow, failed to take into consideration that other people who know him must exist out there. That is, other people who know him as dead.

“Who the hell is Morgana ?” Well, the least he can do is attempt to know his enemy. “Is he going to be a problem?”

Akira hesitates, looking pleadingly between Lovenza and Igor. The former offers him an apologetic smile, while the latter just continues to stare in manic inactivity.

Clearly not finding the support he was seeking, Akira turns back to Goro, dejected.

“Does the idea of a talking cat sound crazy to you?”

A what now?

“Somewhat. Not the most asinine concept I’ve encountered thus far.”

Akira sighs, but no tension bleeds out of his posture.

“So, Morgana is my talking cat. Also, the manifestation of humanity’s hope, but that’s besides the point.”

No wonder Akira seems so adept at taking on whatever life throws his way so effortlessly. If that’s the kind of bullshit he had to deal with on top of killing god, Goro isn’t surprised it took him less than twenty minutes to get over the shock of seeing him back amongst the living.

“He just wants to confirm that what he saw and what I told him is true,” noticing Goro’s readiness to interfere, Akira hurriedly adds. “As for the telling part, I didn’t tell him much. Just confirmed that you are alive, you don’t remember a thing, including Morgana and I, and that you’ll need some help getting those memories back in order. Morgana can’t enter the Velvet Room, but he knows all about it, so spontaneous resurrections are far from the weirdest thing he’s seen.

“Sidenote - Morgana is not super fond of you, Akechi. So, I wouldn’t expect a warm welcome.”

That doesn’t come as a shock to Goro. Even with the little information he gathered from existing as himself for the last month, he could estimate that he was not a particularly likable person. If anything, Akira was an outlier, with how eager he appeared to keep him around.

“And what do you expect me to do now, conduct a little introduction for your talking cat?”

Akira shrugs.

“That would be ideal, yes.”

It’s, frankly, utterly absurd and meaningless. Goro has no interest in entertaining some animal Akira accidentally let in on their little secret. They clearly have more pressing issues to address, and making sure a potentially antagonistic cat doesn’t sabotage their objectives is definitely not one of them. 

“Akechi-kun, I do not necessarily see a problem with Kurusu-kun’s suggestion,” noting that the clash between Akira’s pleading look and Goro’s stubborn silence is getting them nowhere, Margaret promptly chooses the wrong side of the argument. “If anything, it would serve as concrete confirmation that those who are not guests of the Velvet Room can perceive you consistently in the material world.”

The cat has already seen him - isn’t that confirmation enough? And why would the cat need to confirm anything if he has already seen him ? Akira needs to learn to be more assertive with his own pet, not force Goro to take the blow for his own short-sightedness.  

“I’m inclined to agree with Margaret,” Lavenza takes a step closer to him in what he assumes to be encouragement but comes off as a pathetic attempt at mending potential confrontations before they take root. Her proximity feels more like a trap than a comfort. “While it is expected for the Trickster to see you, it’s a valuable insight to learn how others observe you. Usually, attendants have a choice in how and when they appear to people, but I expect it to be different for you.”

Once again, she makes a fairly valid point. But it still comes off as more of a justification for complying with Akira’s whims than a genuine reason for introducing Goro to a talking cat. Nevertheless, their collective encouragement of stupidity begins to leave Goro with no options. He can probably veto it, if he was adamant enough, - neither the attendants nor Akira have, so far, showcased any sort of desire to refuse Goro his freedom of action, however limited it is under current circumstances. But Akira is looking at him so pathetically, and what is Goro, afraid to meet a fucking cat ? He can probably kill a cat with a kick. His hesitation probably reads as nothing more than a sign of weakness.

“Morgana is no trouble. We’ll just have to literally pop out, say hi, send him on his merry way, and pop right back in, back to business.” The more Akira pleads and tries to convince him, the more irritated Goro grows with the entire situation. 

“You’re insufferable,” he finally relents. What am I even scared of in meeting a fucking cat? “I suppose there’s not much of a choice.”

 

“So it’s true…” Morgana turns out to be, by far, the most obnoxious creature Goro has ever encountered. He probably ranked relatively high even before the memory loss, or Goro’s reading of his past self is way off .

The piteous creature is perched up on the small portico over the neighboring bookstore, jumping down the moment Goro and Akira flicker back into the real world. The street doesn’t look that jarringly different in sunlight, and their sudden reappearance doesn’t seem to trigger a reaction out of the few loiters perusing around. Yet, the overpowering rejuvenation that comes with feeling the air glide over his skin is still as intoxicating for Goro as it was last night. Oddly enough, he can’t really tell if the air is cool or warm.

“Told you. Bona fide Akechi,” Akira sounds nonchalant, but it doesn’t escape Goro’s notice how he positions himself slightly in front of him, as if creating a buffer between Goro and the cat.

The cat is really just a cat , albeit, indeed, a talking one. A black little thing in a yellow collar with a voice so annoying, Goro kind of finds it the most offensive about the creature, at least so far. For all of the evident lack of human expressiveness a cat can possibly muster, it still looks at Goro with something closely resembling suspicion.

“Akechi, say hi. Don’t be an asshole,” Akira slightly nudges him with his elbow, the contact instantaneously triggering something within Goro’s subconscious mind, but he doesn’t step away from his spot at the frontline.

“I said I will meet him, not entertain any ideas of politeness,” Goro crosses his arms and gives the cat his most dismissive glare.

The animal doesn’t seem appalled, just slightly offended.

“Is he really missing his memories? That just seems like normal Akechi to me.” And what’s that supposed to mean?

“Yep, charming personality intact, memories, unfortunately, not so much.”

Akira is grinning down at the cat, who still doesn’t look convinced.

“And you believe that? What if he’s just lying ?”

He wants to strangle the cat. He is unsure if he was a big animal lover before; conceptually, cats seem quite pleasant and low-maintenance enough to constitute an agreeable companion. This particular cat? He is struck by an acute desire to yank it up by the scruff of its neck and hurl it at the fucking wall.

“And why exactly would I lie about that ?” The venom seeping from his words might not be effective in clearing any of the cat’s doubts, but Goro highly suspects that a worthless animal is already not going to get him any closer to his goals. Considering its preexisting mistrust of him, as well, there’s no point in acting all nice and bubbly around the vermin. 

“Well, you did-” apparently, the cat took his question at face value, and was about to say something, for once, potentially interesting , before Akira, the fucking spoilsport, dropped down and unceremoniously grabbed it by the face , physically keeping its mouth shut between two fingers.

“Mona!” he hisses at the squirming animal, and even if not getting to hear whatever the thing wanted to say is immensely annoying, seeing it wriggle around in Akira’s lax hold is somewhat satisfying. Goro meets the animal’s galled gaze with his most wicked smirk. 

“He is not lying,” Akira still holds onto the cat’s face, even as its twitching subsides. “You think I wouldn’t be able to tell? But the Velvet Room and I are currently working on getting his memories back. So, for now, please don’t say anything untactful.”

Akira only releases his hold when the vermin gives him a begrudging nod.

“Alright, Joker,” the cat relents. Joker? Why does everyone just refuse to call Akira by his actual name? “I trust your judgment. I still don’t like this, though!” And it has the audacity to glare at Goro. The little creature should be glad for Akira’s presence because amnesia, quite frankly, stripped Goro of the knowledge of his own stances on animal cruelty.

“Thanks, Mona, you’re my favorite.”

If a cat could objectively look flustered, that’s what Goro would describe it as. What an easy creature. Pathetic.

“If the round of pointless pleasantries is concluded, I believe there’s more important business we need to attend to than entertaining your cat, Akira,” despite addressing Akira, Goro keeps his eyes fixed on the cat, - it’s rewarding to watch it defloat from praise-fueled joy to uneasiness under his gaze.

“He’s right, Mona. We do need to go back and talk to Lavenza some more.”

The cat’s tail wags from side to side, but it compliantly gets onto its legs.

“Fine, Joker, I’ll be waiting at home,” it jumps back onto the portico in a series of easy leaps. “But don’t think you’re getting out of this that easily! I still have questions!”

And with that, it's gone, leaving Goro and Akira on the sidewalk, steeped in a silence that is growing tenser with every passing second.

“That wasn’t so bad,” Akira attempts cheerfully , but his expression is clearly restless, even if he would appear nonchalant to anyone else’s eye. “..Sorry you had to go through that,” he adds a bit sheepishly when Goro doesn’t respond. “You were never buddy-buddy with Mona, but I didn’t expect him to get quite this brassy. He’s usually quick to let things go.”

It’s apparent that Goro’s own open hostility towards the cat didn’t surprise Akira in the slightest. Interesting.

“Why didn’t you let the cat speak?”

Akira looks a bit taken aback by the question but regains his composure annoyingly fast.

“He isn’t the most thoughtful guy, probably comes with being a cat. I didn’t want him to say something that would just raise more questions for you ahead of time.”

It’s clear that Akira wants to avoid having this conversation at all costs. Tough fucking luck . He might be good at deflecting, but Goro isn’t blind - he appears to have a considerable advantage over everyone else when it comes to getting Akira talking, even if the origins of such an ability remain unknown . Which is exactly the point.

“So, you’re now in charge of deciding what I get and don’t get to know about my own life ?” Goro’s words are cold and oozing with irritation. 

It feels oddly satisfying to be mean to Akira. He isn’t sure if the realization should scare him or not.

“That’s- that’s not what I mean,” Akira raises his hand to tug at his hair. “You know that’s not what I mean.”

“Oh, please do tell me what you mean. Because I thought we have already established that I actually don’t know what you mean. I met you yesterday.”

And Akira looks so pained, and when his eyes meet Goro’s, who holds his gaze, unwavering, because he means what he said , every single word, they look pained, and vulnerable, and so sorrowful . And he is not looking at Goro with betrayal, or anger, or displeasure, Goro feels like he is not looking at him at all, as if it weren’t Goro’s words that hurt him so profusely, it’s something Goro can’t even catch in them, a past they’re both now stuck chasing, and its absence hurts Akira far greater than it does its rightful possessor.

Akira’s eyes are gray. Goro knows them better than he knows his own.

“..You’re right. Of course, you’re right,” Akira smiles, still sad, so damn dejected, and Goro doesn’t feel the urge to comfort him, but he feels the urge to do something. “You have no reason to trust me, do you?”

He does. He doesn’t .

“It’s just- You probably already figured that out, but your past is not necessarily simple, and there’s a lot of very… unpleasant things that have happened to you.” Yeah, I figured high schoolers who battle gods don’t just die in car accidents or from especially nasty colds. “I guess I… I just don’t think it’s something I can sit down and tell you, and you will understand and take my word for it. A lot of those things, the things that happened… I think you need to remember them, yourself, or there will be no point.”

It’s… a shockingly considerate notion to hold. It makes Goro only more confused about what Akira Kurusu plans to gain from all of this.

“Why would you care?” At least he attempts to sound a bit less bitter, unsuccessfully. “Why is it any of your concern if I recover my memories organically ? If I were in your place, and I got to pick and choose which things to reveal to someone who basically has no past, I would make full use of that opportunity.”

And he probably would, wouldn’t he. Goro Akechi is a pragmatic person. Would he make Akira into a puppet that believes all the things he tells him and has no way of telling right from wrong?

Akira chuckles. It’s a familiar, foreign sound.

“I really doubt you’d do that, to be honest. But in my case, well, and again, - I don’t know how to make you believe that , but the last thing I want is to control your personality , or your memories. I just want to help you remember it all yourself.”

Goro wants to believe Akira Kurusu. There is a part of him, primal and earnest and most likely the most dangerous, the most resilient part of his suppressed psyche that trusts Akira Kurusu, even now, blind to all the evidence that would justify such unconditional, cardinal trust.

But there are also parts of him that look at Akira Kurusu and see a stranger - an unknown variable, a potential danger, a possibility of betrayal far greater than what he can handle. There is a ghost of his past self in these parts, too.

“Let’s strike a deal, then, if you’re still not convinced,” Akira breaks the silence that, without Goro’s knowledge, has settled over them. “I will help you recover your memories and get you out of the Velvet Room. And in return, once you are fully yourself, you’ll answer a question.”

“I don’t think that constitutes a deal. It’s also nowhere near being an equivalent exchange.”

A question , really ? Is that all he is going to ask for?

“I don’t really want anything from you, Akechi,” Akira shrugs. “You can think that it’s your time I’m getting for being involved, or your company, or, I don’t know, you actually being alive ,” he lets out another small chuckle at that, and maybe, for Akira Kurusu, that’s really, genuinely enough to put himself through this hell yet unknown. “But if I could ask for one thing in return, that would be it. Single question, and single truthful answer.”

Goro wonders if Akira ever got to ask the real him that question, whatever it may be. Or if he had to see him die without ever getting the chance.

“And I suppose I don’t get to learn what the question is in advance.”

Akira grins.

“Nope! Not like you’d know the answer in your current state, anyway.”

Around them, the street had grown even more deserted than it was when they first exited the Velvet Room. He catches the eyes of an older woman talking on the phone across from where they’re standing, and she quickly averts her gaze, returning to whatever conversation she was having. 

“And what if my memories aren’t going to return?” he doesn’t look at Akira. “If the fragmentation is truly disconnected from amnesia, there is a likelihood of me regaining my humanity without remembering you and, subsequently, the answer to your question.”

“Well, that would mean I failed to keep my end of the deal.” As simple as that . “But don’t worry - your memories will come back.”

“Oh, aren’t you so sure of yourself.”

Akira Kurusu is insufferably overconfident and irksomely stubborn. That was, most likely, a big part of the reason why Goro Akechi kept him around in the past.

“Hey, I really wanna know your answer! Been bothering me for months.”

At that, Akira extends his hand, offering Goro to seal their agreement. Goro takes it. Even through the glove, it feels oddly delicate.

“Alright then. It’s a deal, Akira Kurusu.”

 

“Sorry it took forever,” Akira says as they reenter the Velvet Room. It probably has been barely fifteen minutes, but Goro gets where he’s coming from - his introduction to the obnoxious cat feels like it happened a lifetime ago. “You know Morgana - he’s a pain.”

“Welcome back,” Lavenza doesn’t look even remotely affected by their longer-than-expected absence. “I’m glad the matter is resolved. Is Morgana doing well?”

As Akira settles into his preferred spot right at the entrance of his “cell,” Goro strolls back into the circular room, choosing to stand next to Lavenza. It creates an odd sense of distance between Akira and the rest of them - the Velvet Room residents, all colored in deep blues and blacks, and the Trickster, trimmed with red and, even in his ridiculous attire, recognizably human compared to the unnatural presence of his guides.

“He’s fine. Bored, but fine,” Akira assures Lavenza. “Got a bit chubby since you last saw him.”

“Not going to enjoy his boredom for long,” Goro can’t help but add with a scoff.

At that, Margaret finally interfered, and Goro couldn’t be more glad for her steering the conversation away from the damn cat and back on task.

“That brings us to something we need to determine with you, Kurusu-kun,” she says from where she’s leaning next to Igor’s desk. “As you know, our next necessary step should be relocating to the birthplace of your rebellion, as it is the most likely place for us to search for both the memories of Akechi-kun and the source of your own distortion.”

Expectedly, Akira doesn’t look troubled by the request in the slightest. Resourceful , was that what Lavenza called him? 

“Perfect timing,” he grins in a way that seems exclusive to the Velvet Room. Unlike the more subtle changes in Akira’s disposition, the difference between his demeanor in and out of the Velvet Room must be noticeable to even those lacking Goro’s specific observational inclinations. The place seems to bring out a special brand of confidence in him. Or maybe it's the outfit? “I’m actually heading back to Tokyo for Golden Week, so, in three days? I’m taking the train on the afternoon of the 28th.”

“And how exactly is a week going to be enough?” Goro raises an eyebrow, but something irks him to believe Akira will find a way around this particular hurdle. Hopefully, one that still doesn’t involve him dropping out of school and running away from home.

“Goro Akechi is correct, I’m afraid”, Lavenza backs him up, and when is she going to drop the whole Goro Akechi thing? “This matter will, most likely, require significantly longer than a week.”

Akira stills for a moment, seemingly arranging potential options in his mind. It strikes Goro suddenly that he doesn’t even know what exactly ties Akira and his illusive “spirit of rebellion,” his distortion or whatever, to the city of Tokyo. From empirical evidence he himself is native to Tokyo. Akira, however, seems practically settled in Inaba, and the somewhat dissatisfied and embarrassed way he talks about the town suggests to Goro that it must be where he grew up. Goro himself has never stepped foot to Inaba, and Akira refers to their bond as one that existed for, at the very least, months. Goro’s connection to Akira aside, it’s unlikely Akira has completed his god-slaying quest during an average school trip, so there must be something significant in his connection to Tokyo.

Goro understands Akira’s reluctance to inform him about more personal aspects of his past life. But they urgently need to have a conversation covering all the factual basics if Akira wants Goro to remain socially functional . 

If there is another talking cat waiting for him in Tokyo, I’m wiping his own fucking memories.

“Ugh,” the uncharacteristically dejected noise that escapes Akira startles Goro out of his contemplation. “Guess I’ll have to call in some favors from old friends. ”

Considering how genuinely unhappy he sounds about it, Goro dreads that whoever Akira has chosen to turn to for help might be somehow worse than a talking cat.

“But it can be done. Hopefully, it wouldn’t cost me a billion hours of overtime…”

Margaret smiles in the face of Akira’s despondency.

“Glad to hear that. With this matter resolved, you are welcome to depart and make all necessary preparations,” she redirects her attention to Goro, and the glint of amusement in her eyes almost makes him bodily shiver. “Akechi-kun, why don’t you see our guest out? It would be helpful to determine if he can hold the passage open for you to re-enter on your own.”

Margaret is truly a formidable person. Being careless around her would be akin to signing his own death sentence a second time around.

“But of course, Margaret- san, ” it’s a good thing that two can play this game.

Unfortunately for Goro, Akira appears to be playing for the enemy, unbeknownst to himself, with how he basically bursts with zeal, desolation all but forgotten.

“After you,” he gestures at the veil of blue all gentleman-like, and Goro rolls his eyes, but steps through anyway.

There’s little for them to do but stand there in strained disquiet, once outside - Akira clearly unwilling to go and Goro with too much on his mind to promptly cut their goodbyes short. 

Goro did not know what to make of Akira Kurusu. He seemed to wear his thoughts on his sleeve, yet there was an edge of inauthenticity to him, not malicious but more guarded, apparent in how he slightly changed his disposition when addressing different people, how his body language shifted depending on location and company, how he never seemed to reveal anything but what was expected of him. And yet, in the few instances he’s gotten to observe Akira like this, just the two of them on the backdrop of an idle countryside, there was an edge of rawness to him, lurking in both his light-hearted teasing and the uncomfortably sincere words of fondness, and, most evidently, in the sorrow that he, unknowingly, allowed to seep through the cracks.

“In all honesty, I expect you to ask for something along the lines of staying with you forever, considering how obnoxiously obvious you are about wanting me around, all things taken into account. Not a stupid fucking question. ”

Akira seems to catch onto what he’s talking about immediately, and there it is again - oozing out, leaking into the space between them.

“Nah, that’s ultimately for you to decide, what you choose to do once this is all over. It has always been up to you.” And how foolish is that, depriving yourself of what you want so openly, all in the name of kindness, or altruism, or something much more sinister and selfish Goro yet has no way of recognizing. ”I know you kinda don’t have a choice now, with how it is, but to stick with me. But I’m not gonna pretend to know what you’ll want to do once the Velvet Room no longer has you chained down.”

And does he not? Does Akira Kurusu truly have no idea what Goro Akechi would’ve wanted, if he got a chance to live long enough to get it? Did he himself know that, at some point before he succumbed to oblivion barely out of adolescence, or was his doom so ineluctable, so certain from the very start that neither he nor Akira entertained an idea of a different future?

“It would be nice, though. If you decide to stay.”

It’s a barely audible admission, and for all of its obviousness, it still makes something inside Goro twist.

Goro Akechi doesn’t know what he wanted. He doesn’t know if he wanted to stay by Akira’s side, or to run somewhere far, far away from him - both options seem equally plausible and the desire for them exists in dichotomous synchronicity somewhere beneath his ribcage, a push of extremes against the ocean of uncertainty within the soul that, even when equipped with the cognizance of everything that shaped it into what it is, unlikely knew its own shape. 

“I don’t think I actually distrust you, you know,” Goro says.

Goro Akechi knows that. Even if he doubts his past self would appreciate him admitting to it, he knows that they both knew that.

“Well, I distrust you, to a healthy extent. But I don’t think the real me distrusted you. It’s not a memory, more of an impression. I think he trusted you a great amount.”

And Akira Kurusu gleams. Not objectively, his smiles appear to always stay on the conservative side, tentative little smirks, or cheeky grins, or soft, easy-to-miss pulls at the corners of his mouth that, despite distorting his features so insignificantly, always reach his eyes. This one is the latter, a tiny, missable thing, but it radiates the brightest glow, as if Goro just revealed the happiest of truths in his insignificant confession.

“But you are the real Akechi,” he says, and he looks so vibrant, like Goro hung the moon and the stars for him specifically, and Goro, not for the first time, wonders, what kind of a miracle did he perform for Akira Kurusu to see him as something so unapologetically, doubtlessly worthy of such a look. “So thank you, for trusting me. I’m not gonna let you down, this time.”

“You better not,” Goro can feel a ghost of his own smile tug at his lips, and doesn’t fight it, even if it probably comes out crooked, and puzzled, and far from bright and fond. “We made a deal, after all.”

Notes:

The chapter title comes from the song The Octuple Personality and Eleven Crows by World’s End Girlfriend. The likelihood of future chapters being named after World’s End Girlfriend songs is 100%. None of them are gonna be Teen Age Ziggy but you should listen to it regardless if you’re into that kinda stuff. This fic is brought to you with the indirect support of World’s End Girlfriend

Chapter 5: Checkmating Patterns

The Goro that comes back to him in December is not all that different from the boy he used to eat with at trendy cafés and stroll around Kichijoji all summer. Yet, it appeared that the shift was much more noticeable and far less enthusiastically welcomed by others than it was for Akira.

Sure, the so-called “real” Goro Akechi is a bit dryer and snarkier. He doesn’t hold in meaner comments his ace detective persona would surely never utter, and his expression is much less plasticy and more just neutrally indifferent. But Akira doesn’t mind. He always knew Goro’s realest smiles to be the softest, and the somewhat blank expression makes them that much easier to spot.

Goro in Maruki’s Palace is a different story altogether. He screams, and cackles, and rampages through the Shadows with maddened vigor none of them expected from the regal composure of the princey Robin Hood. However, compared to the desperation and mania the Thieves got to witness during their disastrous last fight on Shido’s ship, this Goro seems to revel in the madness of destruction, not simply succumb to it out of despair. But that’s what Palaces are sort of all about, and Akira understands. It’s cathartic to have the means to direct all of your anger at something you can physically eviscerate, and Akira always knew Goro to have a lot of pent-up rage he could never find a place to put down. Akira never particularly related to that side of Goro, but even he can admit that it feels good to unchain yourself and just enjoy the thrill of the fight. And, to be fair, once you understand that Goro firmly stands on their side, the theatrics of his colorful threats are sort of funny.

“When you see someone you thought you knew, but their personality changed into something completely different… That’s not funny at all. It’s disturbing . But for some, that change is a blessing… I can’t comprehend it at all,” Goro tells him during one of their nightly outings to Jazz Jin, mere weeks before Maruki presents them with his fatal ultimatum. And while Goro wasn’t talking about himself at that moment, Akira still understood.

But the thing is, Goro was still Goro for him, and if the ease with which they fell into their familiar discussions each and every night was anything to judge by, Akira was still Akira for Goro, too. For as long as that small fantasy lasted, the pretense was gone, and they, for once, were just allowed to enjoy each other’s company without hiding.

Goro was still Goro. He was just as introspective, clever, competitive, unyielding in his beliefs, and intense in his desire to follow his own path as he was before, and Akira admires him all the more for , this time around, not hiding the more damaged parts of his personality away. For others, it seems to be enough that Goro intends to do his part and leave the scheming behind, but for Akira, the most important part of Goro’s subtle transformation is not the honesty - it’s the trust.

If their quiet nights spent listening to ethereal jazz music and talking about happiness and betrayal, long-dead philosophers and living, lost children teach Akira anything, it’s that Goro Akechi trusts him more than anyone else. That the bond they forged, perhaps the first real bond Goro has ever forged with anyone, has changed them both for the better.  

He took Goro to the jazz club almost nightly throughout January, and Goro might’ve found it needlessly sentimental, but never refused.

It wasn’t like Akira didn’t know that Goro trusted him. It was just one of those things , another bullet point in the endless list of notions they never acknowledged out loud. When examined closer, it was full of silly little truths that, if spoken, would be denied with vigor, but in the shared quietness between them, these rejected facts could freely exist as true. Goro actually loves sweets and would probably take his coffee with an ungodly amount of cream if not for his pretentious desire to look cool and mature. Akira, for all of his relentless flirting, has never as much as held hands with anyone in his life, and he would probably combust on the spot at the sight of a bare ankle. Goro is a massive nerd, and every time Futaba would bring up any anime or video game during their short time working together, it took an ungodly amount of mental restraint to stop him from making a corrective comment. Akira actually could count the number of books he’s read prior to coming to Tokyo on one hand, and originally got into reading just to impress Goro, but found himself so intensely invested that he now knows that Goro misquotes dead philosophers.

Goro thinks that he is the master of self-control, but he can barely comprehend what causes him to go from complete and utter emptiness to maddening rage in seemingly an instant, and it scares him. Akira was secretly glad that the Phantom Thieves chose him as their leader because nothing fed his yearning for admiration quite like shooting god in the face, and he was secretly glad he got a second chance to do so, in February. 

Goro trusts him.

It was the second time anything from their list of unspoken truths was ever given shape through words, and Akira wasn’t particularly proud of how the first time unfolded, so no one can blame him for giving this admission more significance.

Maybe he’ll get to say the first thing right this time around. Hell, maybe they’ll get to go through the whole list, speaking out about all the things they both know to be true without the need to pretend that voicing them doesn’t matter.

It mattered that Goro trusted him, now more than ever. Goro always hated relying on people. This ridiculous need for self-sufficiency was, ultimately, one of the deciding factors in sealing his fate. And Akira, who loved nothing more than when people relied on him, made him feel useful, made him feel important, both respected and resented this side of Goro, the only one of his bonds who never asked him for anything, yet one that needed to ask, just fucking ask, most of all.

Goro associated reliance with control, and everyone always tried to control Goro, strip him of autonomy, and make him act the way they needed him to act while offering not an ounce of assistance, not even a flicker of actual help.

Akira being Goro’s only ticket to salvation was, in its own way, an exercise of control. And Goro hated being controlled. 

So, it mattered all the more that Goro trusts him. He had no other option but to make that trust count.

And for that, he’ll need to make some very uncomfortable phone calls.

 

“Futaba, I need you to forge me some documents.”

He does not give Morgana a chance to ambush him, hopping on the phone the moment he unlocks his front door. Judging by the cat’s exasperated yelp of frustration, he knows exactly what Akira is doing.

“What happened to hello ?” Futaba, bless her heart, doesn’t sound even remotely disturbed by his request. If anything, he can almost pick up her eager excitement through the distortion of electrical signals. “So, what are we forging?”

“What happened to no, Akira, that’s illegal, ” he goes up the stairs, Morgana still bickering something as he follows, and once in his room, puts Futaba on speaker while signaling to the cat to keep it down.

On the other line, Futaba cackles.

“Never stopped either of us before,” and she sounds so genuinely enthusiastic that Akira almost feels guilty for just how badly he’s going to burst her bubble. “But really, what’s up? Did you get in trouble with the cops again?”

“Nah. I did steal a cabbage from a cop here as a kid once, though. Pretty chill guy, for a cop, at least,” Akira says, and, from the look Morgana gives him, he definitely realizes where this is heading, and why Akira is prolonging the inevitable , and is probably just waiting until he tells Futaba already so they can both yell at him for his stupidity.

“That’s an origin story worthy of the great Joker - stole cabbage from the cops, gave it out to starving orphans or something,” Futaba obliviously continues.

Speaking of orphans, Akechi is back, and I’m gonna potentially end up fighting another god to keep it that way probably isn’t the right opener for this conversation.

“So, if not the cops, then what is it?” And there’s really no way to just not tell her, is there? Futaba is way too smart not to question his reasonings if he doesn’t bring up Goro, and even if he somehow convinces her that he just wants to stay in Tokyo because he misses his friends oh so much, she’s going to be the first to notice that he really isn’t spending much time with them, and he needs a person on the inside to keep the others from getting suspicious, preferably someone who can also convince Sojiro to lend him the attic for an indefinite period of time, give or take.

“I need you to forge a doctor’s diagnosis that I have some sort of illness with a recovery period of preferably multiple months, like a severe pneumonia case or something. And then I need you to submit that to my school here and make it look like it was my parents who notified them.” That’s a sound plan, in Akira’s books.

“Wait, what? Why ?”

“Well, I don’t need you to do it right now, it just needs to be ready as soon as I arrive in Tokyo. I thought about getting in touch with Takemi , but her clinic is not really a hospital, in actuality, and my full legal name is also on, like, all of her latest research, so I would prefer not to risk accidentally sabotaging her if this comes to light. But you should probably ask her to look over whatever you come up with, just in case.”

“Akira, I don’t give a shit why I’m forging these documents instead of your goth-next-door drug dealer. Why do you need to fake pneumonia in the first place?”

She doesn’t sound angry, or even particularly unwilling to help, still. At most concerned, and a tad confused, and Akira knows Futaba well enough to understand that she believes his reasonings to be just , every single one of the Phantom Thieves always believes his reasonings to be just - he is simply unsure if she would still hold the same belief when she finds out what prompted his request, exactly.

“So I can stay in Tokyo for longer. Because I just miss my friends oh so much.”  

Your mom’s killer needs my help, and I will destroy whatever comes between me and finally being able to help him.

“Real reason, please.”

“Because my family is secretly abusive and I need to run away from home?” 

The person for whom I almost gave up humanity’s free will, including your freedom to choose your own path through all the suffering he inadvertently caused, is here to probably press me to make a similar choice again , and this time around, I might actually do it.

“ Akira .”

“Just tell her already!” Morgana snaps, and really , how can he make them understand, how can he tell Futaba that-

“Because I accidentally revived Goro Akechi, and he now has amnesia and is stuck in the Velvet Room as some half-person, half-Lavenza-wannabe, and I need to stay in Tokyo to fix this shit and return his memories and get him back for real, okay?!”

The silence is deafening, almost comically so.

“You’re fucking joking, right?” Futaba’s voice is cracking, and she probably knows he would never joke about Goro Akechi, especially not like this, so there’s no hope in her voice, just a searching, blind need for confirmation.

“He really isn’t. I saw him,” even Morgana sounds somewhat dejected. “Akechi is really back.”

“What the actual fuck-”

And so he explains, for the second time in the span of two days, the peculiar case of Goro Akechi and the Velvet Room’s reappearance. If confirming it all to Morgana felt like he was justifying himself, above everything else he feltupon just meeting Goro Akechi, alive, he is still alive out there, waiting, probably, or talking to Lavenza, or just sitting there all agitated and prissy, and he should probably visit him tomorrow- well, scratch that, - he will visit him tomorrow, and every day after that, until there’s no need for him to seek Goro out in the Velvet Room or there’s no more Goro to visit, telling Futaba is more like sorting through his own recollection of events, just abridged. He obviously skips over plenty of key points - no mention of Goro’s fragmentation, or the conversations they had since his return, or any theories regarding how exactly Goro is still alive outside of the vague allusion to the complex and ever-elusive Metaverse bullshit. And, of course, no mention of Akira’s distortion, because the brave leader of the Phantom Thieves can’t have a distortion, and so, for Futaba, it will be just Goro, amnesiac and tied by the neck to the world of Akira’s subconscious, until Akira can work out a way to bring him back in full.

He does mention that Goro is now fashionably blonde, just to bring Futaba’s spirits up a little bit.

After he’s finished, she stays silent for a little while, likely attempting to come to terms with the fact that, this time around, it's not just her older brother’s would-be murderer, who he still inexplicably adores, she has to deal with, but a man with no past and a very tentative future who doesn’t even realize he is Akira’s would-be murderer and the one who all but shoved her mother in front of a moving car. 

She doesn’t ask any of the questions her brain is likely bursting with, probably reading on Akira’s tiredness, and he is grateful for that, because he is tired . When she speaks, her voice is unexpectedly gentle, even if her words cut through Akira like shards of razor-thin glass.

“Akira, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but… I just have to ask you one thing. Are you… Are you sure this is not like Maruki’s reality, all over again?”

He knows what she is really asking. Are you sure that this is the Akechi that stays? Would you be able to handle it if it’s not? And isn’t that a question he’s been asking himself ever since proclaiming to Goro, heart full of hope, that Goro Akechi is dead.

“I’m- I’m sure. He’s really here, this time.” 

But for how long? Dreams never stay forever.

“But- but it’s Akechi! You never really know with Akechi. ”

And he wants to scream at her, venomously, violently, that it was never about Akechi , that Akechi has chosen a lot of shitty things, but he never chose not staying, and Akira doesn’t know if he believes that himself, but it’s infinitely easier to believe that it was Shido, or Maruki, or Akira Kurusu who made him leave, because Goro Akechi didn’t want to die , because the one time Akira asked Goro Akechi to stay, he stayed , when nothing else mattered and all Akira wanted from him was to stay, he stayed.

“Futaba, I get it. I understand that none of you are Akechi’s biggest fans, and for valid reasons. It’s just… if I don’t help him, and soon, I don’t know for how long he will be around. And I can’t take losing him a third time. I need to help him.”

Futaba knows all of that. Of course she does.

“Fine. I’ll do it,” and even if Akira knew that she would never answer any other way, the relief he feels upon hearing it confirmed is still overbearing. “And I’ll talk to Sojiro. But you owe me big, enormous fucking time, Akira Kurusu! And the first thing you do when you get your ass over here is explain everything! ”

He will buy her the entirety of Akiba. He will listen to her meticulously explain whatever outdated MMO she is currently obsessed with. He will never once complain to Sojiro about washing the dishes ever again . He will let Takemi feed him rat poison. Hell, he’ll get Morgana the most premium cut of Kobe beef he can possibly find. Whatever they fucking want.

“Did you know that you are my favorite?” he grins in the phone’s direction and hopes Futaba knows him well enough to hear through his voice just how much he appreciates her.

“No way. We all, unfortunately, know who your real favorite is.”

 

The next day starts with him sending a very dubious text Takemi’s way, basically informing the doctor that Futaba will be coming over to potentially ask her to check some forged medical records for him, no big deal. All he gets in response is an okay , because Takemi is the best like that. 

He spends his school day the same way he has been spending them ever since his world, once again, got soaked in blue hues of unknown ruin - mindlessly waiting for it to end. Thankfully, the impending holidays seem to have made such an attitude more acceptable across the board, as students eagerly discuss their plans all around him, even in the middle of class. 

His lunch is dedicated to catching up with whatever the ex-Phantom Thieves are blowing up his phone about, their discussions permeated by a similar buzz of anticipation. The Shujin crowd, currently consisting of just Ann and Futaba in Sumire’s absence, seems aggravated by some sort of remodeling going on outside the practice building. Yusuke got out of class early and is now heading to pick up some confidential items before meeting up with Ryuji, who, apparently, now goes to a school close to Kosei. Haru and Makoto are quieter than usual, which is to be expected with their new lives as college students , but Akira has a DM from last night from Haru - a picture of them both smiling warmly, if a bit tiredly, over heaps of papers spread over their kitchen table, captioned Last stretch before Golden Week! Can’t wait to see you!!!

In fact, he has a concerning number of DMs to address, some of his confidants inquiring if he’ll be back in Tokyo for the holidays. And for all of the genuine adoration he feels towards every single one of them, Akira is tempted to tell everyone that he is staying in Inaba.

Less than a week ago, the idea of coming back to Tokyo filled him with dread. Walking the familiar streets of Shibuya while knowing that there’s no time limit on bringing another rotten adult to their knees seemed excruciating, promising him nothing but a sense of empty uselessness. There was no point for Akira to head to Untouchable outside of saying hi to Iwai, as he had exhausted his need for model guns that felt so ecstatically real when aimed at Shadows, blowing them into clouds of smoke and black goo. He could’ve invited Takemi out to the park instead of asking for a trial at the clinic, because, unless he got a common cold, her medicine serves him no purpose. And, of course, under no circumstances would he be allowed to set foot in Kichijoji, because there wasn’t a single corner of that place Akira could’ve looked at without shattering .

But it wasn’t just Kichijoji. It was all of Tokyo, in a sense. Even the streets he’s never walked with Goro Akechi carried ghosts of the past in which he was alive, probably rushing through them alone, or alongside Sae Niijima on some ridiculous, fake case, clenching his briefcase in a rush to make it to an early morning shoot or ensuring that no one spots him as he descends into Mementos, prepared to exchange yet another life for Shido’s eventual downfall. 

Even Yongen-Jaya, his sanctuary, has been tainted by Goro Akechi’s phantasmal presence. The bathhouse they once visited together on a day that almost ended with Akira’s heart giving out. The neighboring laundromat that carried memories of their second deal. The deserted alleyway that was the only witness to their collective lowest moment. Leblanc, and Goro’s favorite seat at the counter. Leblanc, and the attic that saw them say goodbye without saying anything at all , for the last time.

But now, returning to Tokyo fills him with a completely different kind of dread. One of excited anticipation and, if he is being completely honest with himself, slight terror of having to, somehow, navigate avoiding all of his confidants.  

 

The Velvet Room greets him with unexpected stillness and , at first, Akira struggles to comprehend what exactly is off . Igor still utters his signature welcome , but there’s no Lavenza patiently awaiting him at the cell’s entrance. In fact, there’s no Margaret either, or Goro, for that matter.

Akira tenses. At the very least, Igor doesn’t appear disturbed, but it is Igor, so judging the situation by the intensity of his reactions might not be in Akira’s best interest. 

“So… where’s everyone?” he attempts to ask casually, but, even to his own ears, his voice comes off as verging on anxious panic.

Igor has always been one of the Metaverse’s enigmas Akira felt the least competent in attempting to solve. For all intents and purposes, he’s worked with the guy for barely over a month, most of his “assistance” coming from an evil fake god who, allegedly, signed Goro and himself up for a suicide mission and wanted to mind-control the entire human race. But even Yaldabaoth was, somehow, more comprehensible than Igor. The true Master of the Velvet Room was just unsettling , in the same way fairytale wizards are unsettling - not necessarily dangerous, but too incomprehensible for a normal person to rule out a possibility of threat. 

Even now, Igor’s high-pitched chuckle sends an uncomfortable shiver down his spine.

“I am delighted to see that a bond you have carried with you through life and death continues to grow within your heart.” Expectantly, that’s totally not an answer to what Akira just asked. “Where there’s growth, there is transformation, and with it, a potential for new power. I wonder where this unforeseen road will lead, but I believe in your ability to obtain what lies at its end.”

Again, not relevant to the situation at hand whatsoever. At this point, Akira knows better than to try and directly ask Igor any follow-up questions.

“Don’t be stupid, Igor.” 

Ah, I always wanted to say that . 

Goro Akechi emerges from the darkness of the Velvet Room’s inner corridors, and is it gonna feel this exciting every time? There’s only so much a man’s heart can handle. It surprises Akira, not for the first time, just how accustomed to the Velvet Room Goro appears , navigating the inner world of his dreams with a practiced ease that must be the result of this basically being his home, for the time being. Currently, Goro doesn’t just look like the place’s resident - he feels like one, even if he is unlikely to help Akira with fusions or sound alarms at his beck and call.

Stopping in front of Akira’s cell, Goro gives him a pointed glance in place of a hello and, expectedly, goes straight to the point.

“Lavenza and Margaret are not currently present. They , apparently, need to set things up for our transition to Tokyo, whatever that entails. I told them I’ll be fine staying in charge.”

The bossy attitude suits him so well that Akira can’t hold in a suggestive smirk.

“So, wanna help me behead some Personas?”

Judging by Goro’s offended and, wait, is that intrigue we’re seeing? look, Akira, most likely, earned himself some extra explaining to do.

“No, I am, apparently , not allowed to touch the guillotine.”

Just how much did Lavenza tell him about what’s normally going on in this place? And how the hell did she stop Goro , of all people, from touching giant, deadly blades ?

“I won’t snitch if you won’t,” he smirks even wider. “Speaking of, if you’re so well-informed , can you still access your Personas?”

Goro’s face morphs into a slightly more severe mask of irritation.

“No, unfortunately.”

“A shame,” Akira sighs. “There used to be an option for me to battle here, thought you’d be delighted to join me.”

Akira misses fighting alongside Goro, and definitely not only because his yelling about slaughter and bloodshed was, somehow , entertaining and electrifying at the same time.

At that, he earns a shadow of a familiar razor-sharp grin. Akira’s insides twist a little bit, a familiar searing rush rising to the surface.

“Well, maybe we’ll get a chance, once everything is resolved. I still knew what Personas are, which, apparently, is a good sign. So, as long as you haven’t forgotten how to fight, I will keep you to that offer.”

And isn’t that all the motivation he needs to catch the nearest train to Tokyo and begin digging for whatever god is holding Goro’s physical form hostage immediately .

“However,” Goro rudely interrupts his daydreaming about manic laughter and shiny leather belts. “I actually need you here for something else.”

That’s… rather unexpected.

Akira simply cocks an eyebrow, urging him to continue. Instead, Goro lets out a sound that could almost be classified as the beginning of a groan, and nods towards something at the end of the corridor.

“Follow me.”

And Akira follows, deep into the bowels of the Velvet Room, because if Goro asked, there’s hardly anywhere he wouldn’t be willing to follow.

 

The oddly delicate-looking door that, Akira is quite sure, wasn’t there the last time he examined the inner catacombs of the space, opens to a cozy little room that, clashing with the oppressive aesthetic of the outside corridor, feels almost homely. There are way too many sofas, and only one low, wooden table, but Akira also notes how one particular couch seems more ruffled and worn than the others, and how there are neat stacks of books resting against one of its arms on the floor. It smells of night air and stone, just like the rest of the prison, but there’s also a faint trace of woodsy notes and myrrh, a scent he’d recognize anywhere. The faint piano melody that permeates the entirety of Akira's dream realm sounds fainter here, but only by a margin.

“You know, you could’ve mentioned that we’re going to your room ,” he plops onto a blue velvet couch, opposite the one he suspects to be Goro’s favorite, and tries to let none of his bona fide excitement bleed through his seductive tone. “I would’ve come prepared .”

Goro looks unimpressed, but thankfully, he doesn’t seem to catch onto the sincerity of his nervousness.

“Do people genuinely find you funny?” Ouch . 

“Who said I’m joking?” he doubles down, and adds a wink, for good measure.

Goro looks completely and utterly done , and Akira has been in the Velvet Room for barely ten minutes.

“I’m actually starting to doubt that I willingly used to tolerate you.” He really does sit down on the Goro couch , crossing his legs and folding his gloved hands over his lap in a way Akira knows to suggest a lengthy conversation. “But that leads me to my actual point - I need you to provide me with more information. So,” and he has no right to raise his eyebrow at Akira like that . “I’m gonna ask. And you’re going to answer.”

The room suddenly feels too stuffy. Too rigid, and still, and crammed for comfort. 

People come to Akira with questions all the time . Handling others’ requests, offering insightful advice from time to time, helping them navigate a problem - that’s what he’s best at, that’s the value most see in Akira Kurusu. Akira is a good listener, and with that comes the ability to answer almost any question exactly how his conversation partner wants him to. But something tells him that the questions Goro has in mind are nothing like the ones he’s used to answering.

“Oh, twenty questions game! Smooth,” he deflects, naturally falling back into the familiarity of divergence. 

Akira’s friends found out the name of his hometown through Sojiro, when he handed him the train tickets Akira apparently forgot behind the counter, two days before he left Tokyo. The only person to have ever known the names of his parents was Makoto, because she looked it up in the school records. Yusuke and Haru discovered he did dance in middle school on two separate yet equally accidental occasions. And Takemi was informed that he had a mild tree nut allergy, which may or may not have been a one-time choking hazard fluke.

And it’s not like his friends didn’t know enough about him. They knew the important stuff , like that they could always rely on him, that he is good with money, and incredibly funny, and charming, and likes retro games and shitty movies, and that he can be dared to eat just about anything, and what his main Persona lineup is.

The last time his friends really had a conversation with him about him was about Akechi. And he would prefer to never have a repeat of that, even if, in their current circumstances, it appeared to be just a matter of time before he’s inevitably forced to address the same things, just in the context of Goro being actually alive.

He hopes his previously voiced desire to stay away from anything too personal would prevent Goro from asking too much.

“Please. Get over yourself,” Goro snarls impatiently, perhaps oblivious to being the focal point of Akira’s inner debate but most likely regrettably aware of the reasons Akira is circling around his demand so hesitantly, just not of the specifics.

“Never,” he tries for a smile.

“I need factual information on some basics regarding the details of my life prior to cessation. I absolutely refuse to enter Tokyo as unprepared as you seemingly expect me to,” Goro is unyielding and stubbornly sensible in his argument. “The cat incident was enough. So you are going to sit tight and go down memory lane with me. Luckily, you apparently love a good question.”

And it’s not like Akira thinks of Goro as undeserving of some answers. It must be incredibly frustrating and disempowering to exist with just yourself circa a month ago to base all of your decision-making around, especially for someone like Goro, who defined so much of himself through his past. Maybe he doesn’t need to know about Shido, or Maruki, or, in a sense, Akira , at least not yet, not through a detached summary of events. Maybe he’ll get to enjoy not knowing about his mother’s suicide, or the interrogation room, or the night of Febuary 2nd for just a little longer , and Akira will enjoy , alongside him, a person who, while still holding onto the damage all of those things have caused him, is blissfully unaware of their destructive magnitude. 

But he deserves to know that Tokyo is not gonna greet him with an ambush, and that he is good at darts. Maybe he even deserves to know about Akira’s Gunpla collection, and that his favorite season used to be winter.

And maybe they can even have some fun with it, for old time’s sake.

“That sounds boring. C’mon, Akechi, I know you’re more imaginative than that,” Goro flinches at that, and Akira knows he has his attention. “Let’s at least gamify it a little bit.”

“Fine, I suppose,” for how unenthused he sounds, Akira can definitely catch a glint of that familiar competitive spirit in his citrine eyes. “What do you suggest, genius?”

And that is Akira’s in .

“Playing fair - no asking about things you know I can’t answer, like, no sneaky so how did I die or how do I know you don’t actually plan to manipulate me for some nefarious, supervillain goal,” Goro lets out a silent groan, but nods. “Questions that require long-winded explanations are also a no-go. I can refuse to answer three questions total - then it’s game over.” Another groan, and another nod. “And I also get to ask.”

Because what kind of a game would it be without another player?

“Why the hell would you be allowed to ask?” Despite how offended and bitter he sounds, Akira already knows he’ll agree. All he has to do now is entertain some for-show resilience. “There’s hardly any information I can provide you with. At this point, you know about me substantially more than I know about myself.”

“Oh, you’d be surprised ,” it’s the truth - Goro seems to have no idea how much untapped potential hides in his amnesiac brain for Akira to dissect. “And hey, if you have nothing to hide, no need to be so scared of some silly questions, am I right?”

This is where he gets him. Goro Akechi would never turn down a proposition to beat Akira’s ass at anything, including a silly questions game, memories or no memories.

“This is absurd.”

“Glad you’re game! So, three vetoes each, first to run out loses.”

Goro watches him, silent and searching, and Akira reaches for his most daring, most dangerous expression, the one he knows gets Goro’s blood boiling, with hatred or something else entirely, the one he wore during their duel in Mementos, and the one he would never waste on any other opponent.

He seems to find what he’s looking for, and his snarl is all teeth and sharp edges.

“Whatever.” He absolutely fails to sound apathetic.

It’s a look Akira cherishes. It’s a look that makes some primal part of Akira’s brain want to be held at gunpoint again, in the Metaverse or otherwise.

“Eager, aren’t we?” Akira matches his crooked smile with a grin of his own and relaxes against the back of the couch, letting the nervous anticipation settle deep in the pit of his stomach. “Ask away, then, white makes the first move.”

Goro’s features flatten, even if the dangerous glint doesn’t leave his eyes, and he studies Akira, intently, perhaps even knowing how Akira basks under his stare.

“How did you end up in Tokyo?”

It’s an easy one, if Akira doesn’t complicate it on purpose. He is not dumb enough to expect all of them to be this easy.

“Cautious yet deliberate opener, I like it. Well, I was on probation for a false assault charge and spent the last school year at Shujin Academy, where on day two, I discovered the Metaverse. Next thing you know, I killed god nine months later. What’s your favorite ice cream flavor?”

“Strawberry.”

Akira snickers loudly at just how fas t he answers. Asshole.

“I knew it wasn’t miso ice cream , you are just pretentious ! ”

“Is that the kind of questions I need to expect?” Goro is acting like he is not currently revealing the most guarded, unobtainable, exquisite Akechi lore , directly from the source.  

“Pretty much,” Akira shrugs, trying to contain his excitement. The ice cream thing has bothered him for ages, because there’s no way someone who carries around a secret stash of mini chocolates, gets refills on specifically the sweetest, fruitiest mocktails every time like Akira can’t taste them, and orders triple chocolate cake twice in a row despite complaining both times that it’s way too sweet genuinely loves miso ice cream over any other flavor. “Goro Akechi is an elusive guy. Comparatively, you are much more forthright post-amnesia.”

Smartly, Goro chooses not to acknowledge Akira’s comment, moving on to the next question immediately instead.

“Is there anyone in Tokyo I need to be worried about uncovering the truth behind my return? Like family members, close acquaintances, talking cats of my own ?”

Well, isn’t that a loaded one. 

“Second question, and we are already going for an all-out attack? That kinda requires a long-winded explanation, but the short answer is no , not really. You don’t have any family to worry about, unless you had a secret wife, in which case I would feel endlessly wounded,” or unless you count your serial killer mastermind dad, who is currently rotting in jail. “Some of my friends can be technically considered your friends, too, but I would try to keep your resurrection a secret from them, at least from those we can keep it from. No more cats, though. Morgana is special.”

“What do you mean, those we can keep it from?” And of course he catches that. Well, it is, indeed, better to explain Futaba before she gets the chance to ambush them next to Untouchable or something. “Who the fuck have you already told, Akira?”

He will explain, in a moment, when he makes sure that the moment he mentions Futaba’s name, Goro wouldn’t just magically remember that he killed her mom, like how he can apparently immediately recall the flavor of his favorite ice cream. 

So far, he has a pretty good - or, well, bad - track record when it comes to people-related information. He is yet to recall anything about Akira, even if the overall tone of their conversations is colored by their shared history, all the same . And he looked at Morgana like he was a total stranger, albeit an obnoxious one, and didn’t strangle him for being, in essence, the entire reason for his villainous downfall. 

Akira should try bringing up pancakes in casual conversation. Maybe that’s the keyword that will trigger Goro’s memories to rush back in.

“Hold on - my turn. How exactly do you know all the things you know? Like, you don’t remember if you had a family, but you do remember the Metaverse ? Knowledge of Akira Kurusu, your best friend in the whole wide world? Zero results. But favorite color? Red. How does that work ?”

“No idea, I just know.”

Scratch everything Akira has ever said about him being forthcoming , he is learning the twisted Akechi ways too quickly.

“That’s not an answer, I thought we were playing fair .”

“Requires a long-winded explanation,” Goro doesn’t even try to act like he is not blatantly avoiding the question while trying not to use his appointed skips. “Not allowed.”

“Oh, come on,” Akira gives him his best puppy eyes. An ineffective strategy in the past, but potentially worth a shot under these circumstances. “ I bent the rules for you a little. Just give me, like, a summary.”

Goro doesn’t look at him, defeating the entire purpose of the puppy eyes act. Instead, he stares at the door, contemplative and somewhat sad-looking, with an edge of something that could almost read as self-reproach. It’s a new look he picked up somewhere in the Velvet Room, yet it bears a shade of the exhausted, remorseful self-vanquishment Goro wore during the last seconds of their encounter in the engine room, and Akira despises it.

“It’s impression-based, from my own evaluation,” his voice is soft and unfaltering. “Things that had an intrinsic impression on me, like colors, sensations, and strong preferences, are still familiar to me, even if I do not comprehend the origins of my opinions. As far as the Metaverse, that would most likely qualify as general knowledge, even if it would not be considered as such by the public. I have retained most factual information about concepts and places I was familiar with in life.”

“To answer your previous question - two people, well, a person and a cat, currently know about you,” Akira doesn’t push for more, at least for now, waiting for the somber expression to melt away from Goro’s face. “The number will have to go up to three, but I plan to keep it at that. My guardian in Tokyo will have to know, because there’s no way I can sneak you into Leblanc otherwise, - and no,” he tells him off when Goro’s about to interject. “I’m not telling you about Leblanc, that’s something you’ll have to wait and see for yourself. And I already told his daughter, Futaba, who is kinda my step-sister, sort of. I needed her help to stay in Tokyo for longer, and there’s literally no excuse I could’ve come up with outside of straight-up telling her that you’re back. They’re both aware of the Metaverse, so they wouldn’t be too surprised by you coming back.”

“I suppose that’s acceptable,” Goro says, and Akira is both surprised and relieved he leaves it at that. “Well, ask away. What do you want to know now, my favorite flower?”

“I already know that one,” you like pink forget-me-nots. “What exactly do you remember about me ? How did you realize you could trust me?”

“I’m not answering that.”

He doesn’t even hesitate, face passive. 

“First strike already? Is it that embarrassing?”

“I have no interest in justifying myself to you,” he holds Akira’s gaze and dares him to push. Akira withdraws. If Goro is really set on not telling him, there’s little he can do to change that. And hey, that just got him a step closer to victory. 

“What was my occupation before dying? I’m assuming we are around the same age. Would that make me also a student at Shujin Academy?”

And wouldn’t that be an interesting twist of fate. Maybe if Goro was, in fact, there at Shujin, Akira could’ve done something differently. Maybe if Goro was one of the first people to step foot into the Metaverse with Akira… he’d probably kill him right then and there.

“No, you went to a different school, a year above me. You’ll be turning nineteen in June,” at least that much, Goro deserves to know. “You were also a local celebrity, by the way, the Second Detective Prince . Basically, a PR puppet for the police to flash a pretty face on-screen every once in a while. You even had fangirls. I have a few edits saved - I’ll show you when the time is right. Although I wouldn’t worry about anyone recognizing you as you are now.”

Goro looks at him like Akira just spat in his face. 

“That’s preposterous . Why the fuck would I work for the police ? That sounds utterly absurd.”

And it’s reassuring to see that’s how Goro, unburdened by the memories of his stupid suicide plan, would perceive siding with the cops. Not unexpected, but still pleasing to confirm. During their January outings to Jazz Jin, Goro never spoke of the police in anything but the most colorful, passive-aggressive insults, somewhat excluding Sae from his violent outbursts. It must’ve been one of the more excruciating sacrifices he had to make to get close to Shido - not only work alongside the people whose justice he despised, enduring their dismissive treatment, but also pretend in front of thousands of people that he was genuinely thrilled to work amongst them.

“You didn’t do it of your own volition, not entirely, at least. But I can’t really tell you why you did it, same as I can’t tell you why the public no longer remembers you. Complicated circumstances ,” Akira hopes that knowledge can be a small comfort. “Do you genuinely enjoy hanging out with me?”

“No.”

And really, what did he expect?

“Lying is not allowed!”

“Who said I was lying?” Goro flashes him a shadow of the classic ace detective smile, but his eyes remain spiteful. “And if you have already decided on the allegedly truthful answer, why the hell are you asking me?”

“I wanna hear you say it.”

Akira is getting it out of him even if it’s the last thing he does . No going back to square one for them. 

“Well, my truthful answer is no .”

“Truth or I count it as you refusing to answer a second time.”

“That is completely unjustifiable!”

“Akechi, c’mon. You know it. I know it. I will never get it out of you in any other context. Please. Just … indulge me.”

This time, he is quite sure it’s the puppy eyes that do the job. He is also quite sure that he’s deluding himself. Well, the result stays the same.

“You are insufferable.” Goro looks like it physically pains him not to avoid Akira’s expecting eyes. “ Alright . I genuinely do find your deposition and mannerisms irritating beyond belief, but I suppose your company is one I find pleasant, overall.”

In Goro’s language, that’s about as close to you are my favorite person ever as he’d ever get. In fact, that might be in the top three most genuine admissions of a positive sentiment he’s ever gotten from Goro in any life, including that time he told Akira he hates him.

“If god strikes me down right now, I will die a happy man.”

“Oh, wouldn’t I love for that to happen,” he hisses in the face of Akira’s smug look. “Who are the Phantom Thieves?”

And isn’t that a sudden tone shift.

Akira’s mind suddenly begins to flood with panic.

“What..? No, I’m not answering that. How the hell do you know about the Phantom Thieves ?”

Immediately after uttering his somewhat alarmed ban, Akira realizes his mistake. As it stands, the Phantom Thieves are not a non-existent phenomenon that someone like Goro, even in his amnesiac state, wouldn’t be able to classify as general knowledge. Akira losing his cool probably told Goro more about the Phantom Thieves than any somewhat vague response could, and now there’s definitely no denying the creeping inevitability of explaining to Goro that he is, in fact, the Phantom Thieves’ leader whom Goro both fought and aided. 

There’s also no denying the possibility that, depending on how Goro responds to his question, he’s already put two and two together. If he knows that the Phantom Thieves operate in the Metaverse, then he can certainly deduce that he is sitting right in front of one of them.

“I have conflicting internal information on the Phantom Thieves. It appears to be an urban legend, but I am also inclined to believe, as it turns out, rightfully so, that I was, in one way or another, associated with them.”

All things considered, the answer does wonders to pacify Akira. That means he has time to, at the very least, figure out how to bring up himself as the founding father of the Phantom Thieves to Goro without elaborating on the exact relationship Goro had with the group. Or, if Akira is unbelievably lucky, he might even avoid the topic long enough for Goro to remember that mess on his own.

“Were you and I romantically involved?”

Shit .

Goro looks at him, passive and indifferent. This is a question that doesn’t have an answer.

“Isn’t that a bit too personal of a question? Didn’t we agree to stick to the basics ?”

Akira shifts in his seat and hopes, against all logical reasoning, that his discomfort doesn’t give him away, similarly to how it did moments ago.

“It’s a yes or no question. Can’t get much more basic than that.”

Goro’s face is impassive. Akira runs a hand through his hair.

“You can count it as a second refusal, then. What made you think we might be romantically involved?”

“You can also count it as mine, then .”

It’s an oddity and a danger, whatever makes some impressions stick in Goro Akechi’s head, whatever ideas and flutters of feelings his mind, emptied of everything else, chose to clutch with bloodied fingers close and tight enough to his chest that even in a vacuum of memories, it still thrashes in his hold.

It’s a danger and an oddity, whatever Goro will make up of that, a delayed threat that will, without a doubt, backfire once the memories return. But then again, some questions wouldn’t have an answer even with all the evidence laid out in front of them.

“Have I killed someone?”

Goro still sounds passive and indifferent, but this time, he also sounds like he already knows the answer. 

Akira wonders when this game stopped being fun.

“Yes.”

“Oh, so this is the question you actually chose to answer?” he sounds genuinely surprised.

“No point in refusing. If I did, or tried to push on it being classified information, you’d just assume that it’s true,” Akira admits, humorlessly. “If you somehow thought to ask , you probably had your suspicions already, so I’m not gonna deny it. But I’m also not elaborating any further.”

Akira tries not to think about how the same logic could also be applied to the question he just withdrew from answering, and what falsehoods his incriminating non-answer might’ve told Goro.

A part of Goro Akechi knew these things. Even now, a part of him identified in itself the identity of a murderer. It was never a particularly pleasant topic of introspection - the idea of Goro killing so many people. People Akira knew, if briefly or indirectly . Complete strangers. Monstrous people, and likely never innocent people, shot in the realm of the collective subconscious by a child with a gun, on the orders of his own father.

Goro never expressed much remorse regarding those killings. Akira suspected that, if anything, it wasn’t remorse that colored those memories for him.

“How does it make you feel, that you have killed someone?”

“Fine, I guess,” Goro shrugs. “I view murder as justifiable in many theoretical scenarios, and without knowing the exact circumstances, I see no point in dwelling on this particular detail of my biography. I simply wanted to confirm a hunch.”

Akira, obviously, doesn’t ask how killing him made Goro feel. Did he enjoy it? Did it feel satisfying, in the moment? Was he aware that Akira wasn’t real, or did they actually manage to trick him? He didn’t seem particularly surprised when Joker came back onto the scene, and Goro had plenty of experience operating within the Metaverse, so there was always the possibility that he knew and just let Akira get away with it.

Was it supposed to be his first kill outside of the Metaverse? Did his hands shake? If he thought it was real, did he regret it, even a little bit?

“Have I died more than once?”

Goro’s soft, unexpectedly meek voice hits him like a truck. 

Akira looks up, and he doesn’t look any different than when asking any other of his stupidly preposterous questions. But Akira knows what he’s heard.

Soft and uncertain, likely knowing that he will not get an answer, Goro Akechi ends their game.

“Congratulations on winning, Akechi,” Akira’s smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “That’ll be my third strike, I guess.”

 

He leaves rather abruptly, after that, the secrets spilled and the assumptions made still tasting sour in his mouth. Goro doesn’t protest his sudden retreat, but likely doesn’t buy the excuse of it getting late and Akira still needing to do his homework.

As he parts ways with him outside of the Velvet Room, Akira can almost swear that Goro looks somewhat regretful behind his usual front of indifference.

“See ya,” he says, almost like a promise, and watches Akira disappear into the modest late-afternoon crowd.

Akira knows it’s unreasonable to feel upset with Goro, not when he doesn’t even know what he’s talking about. Akira has brushed off people’s apologies for much more severe missteps. Hell, that’s what he does - forgives and forgets and moves on, never allowing the hurt to linger behind him for too long. 

He remembers the conversations he held with his friends right after they mapped out the route to Maruki’s treasure. Apologies coated in some of the most vulnerable words he has ever heard from any of them, all of which he dismissed as mistakes of the past. My pain is still a part of me , Makoto told him then, vulnerable in her determination to look her most disgraceful parts in the eye and accept them, right then and there.

Akira never learned to live with his disgraceful parts. His pain was not a part of him - it was who he was, when no one was looking. 

He wonders if he should’ve gotten angry. He wonders if he could, at all. 

Unlike Akira, Goro knew how to live with his disgraceful parts. He nurtured them, and fostered them, and fed them blood and anger until they consumed the hand that was feeding them. It must’ve been what most saw him as - angry and unlovable, not worthy of mourning before and after life. It must’ve been what he saw himself as, even now - a freak accident some boy who didn’t know how to let go kept repeating over and over and over, only for fate itself to tell him, over and over and over, that the person he is trying to save was never worth saving to begin with.

And how can Akira be mad at him, when all he sees when he looks at Goro is just that - a person. Flawed, and angry, and endlessly resilient, and endlessly worthy of being cherished for it all.

Akira does his homework when he gets back home.

Morgana asks him if he went to see Akechi today, and he tells him that he will be going to see Akechi every day.

He almost goes back on his word. However, when yet another meaningless school day passes him by, and he is left at a crosswalk, he goes back to the shopping district, knowing too well that hiding away was never an option.

Notes:

I don’t think I ever mentioned that this is in fact my first fic ever, but seeing people enjoy it really makes the experience extra gratifying. This chapter and the next were originally just one big chapter but it made sense to separate them into parts. So it’s more Akira POV next

The cop Akira stole cabbage from was, in fact, Ryotaro “Great Vegetables” Dojima of Persona 4 fame

Chapter 6: Draw by Agreement

“Glad to see how diligent you are with paying us visits, Kurusu-kun,” it’s Margaret who greets him in the Velvet Room, neither Lovenza nor Goro, nor even Igor in sight. 

“Well, can’t necessarily leave Goro with just the three of you, he’ll probably drive you insane.”

Margaret reminds Akira of Sae, somewhat . Perhaps that’s why she and Goro seem to get along so well. Goro might’ve forgotten all about Sae Niijima, but the impression of a no-nonsense, resilient woman must still be one he automatically gravitates to. Akira wonders if that’s what Goro’s mother was like, or maybe she was the exact opposite.

“Need I remind you that Akechi-kun has been in our care for an entire month before we were able to reach you? And, as you can see, we are all perfectly sound of mind.”

Unlike Sae, Margaret lacks that signature shadow of Niijima-special embarrassment. Even in her highest moments, Sae always carried herself as lesser, - lesser than her father, or lesser than the system she is trying to battle, or even lesser than her sister who, in turn, always saw herself as lesser than Sae, an ouroboros of guilt and overcompensation that was only beginning to break the last time Akira interacted with either of the sisters. Unlike Sae, Margaret knew her worth, and in her presence, Akira felt almost insufficient to meet her unvoiced demands.

It makes Akira feel oddly comforted. 

“Akechi-kun is currently aiding Lavenza,” Margaret provides him with an answer to an unasked question, a rather vague elaboration that leaves him only more confused. “I will, however, be sure to inform him that you stopped by once they’re finished.”

It’s a relief, in a sense, to not have to face Goro so soon after their last interaction. However, Akira still feels disappointed.

“Is he adjusting alright? I mean, to being a Velvet Room resident?” he asks meekly.

Margaret’s smile is suggestive in a way that speaks of recognition, as if she reads much more from Akira’s innocent question than he intended to convey.

“Are you familiar with the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, Kurusu-kun?” she asks.

“Yes, although I don’t like it very much,” Akira responds, slightly confused, but rolling with the punches.

“Are you one drawn to more hopeful endings? I would expect so,” Margaret chuckles. She is not wrong, - Akira always preferred a conclusively jovial story to an open-ended tragedy. “You know, it always compelled me, how Orpheus’ downfall was not the lack of faith in his beloved, but doubt in the legitimacy of their deal as a whole.”

Akira raises an eyebrow.

“It was still Eurydice who ultimately suffered most. Although I can’t really blame Orpheus for having little faith in the gods. For me , personally , faith never did much good.”

There’s no trust that can be put into the hands of ones you do not comprehend. Akira had to put his trust, inadvertently, into things soulless and abstract, and his coming out of these encounters victorious had nothing to do with faith in the unknowable. At the end of the day, it was always the trust of those he knew intimately that guided him, somewhat clumsily, to the place where he could shoulder rejecting the gods for all of them.

It is a godless endeavor, to play god. And if god, as many religions propose, made them in his image, he, like Akira, must fear the faith of those he does not comprehend. A god’s prayer is a one-way conversation with the void, an echo of a cry. 

“Was it really the gods that Orpheus doubted?” Margaret continues, as if not even listening to Akira’s response, or, perhaps, listening to it too closely for comfort. “And even if he did, wouldn’t faith in his beloved be enough to assure him that, even if the gods did trick him, she would fight them in his stead to reunite in the world of the living? Was just one last glance, in the end, a prize or a punishment, for Orpheus?”

Gods had no time for doubt. When Orpheus found time to doubt, he had already lost his faith, moments before, when the idea of losing overwhelmed him enough to consider victory predeterminedly unattainable. And so he, a loser of his own making, claimed his selfish prize, a glance in exchange for eternity. It was a prize Akira, who never was allowed time to doubt, never got to seize.

“It’s never a punishment to lay eyes on the one you love, even if it hurts. Even if it’s for the last time.”

Even if the sight of Eurydice, betrayed and doomed by the glance of her salvation, was seething with hatred, it was, most likely, beautiful as scorched onto the back of Orpheus’ eyelids for all eternity. For the longest time, Akira saw nothing when he closed his eyes.

“That’s a surprisingly poetic sentiment, Kurusu-kun.”

But if Orpheus was blessed with the lingering curse of his selfish doubt, what became of Eurydice, who was loved enough to be granted a second chance, but insufficiently to see it to fruition? Does love that fails to see itself through, no matter how strong, remain a love to those it leaves behind? What was Eurydice left with, except a promise of heaven that chained her to the pits of the underworld twice over?

“Do you think Eurydice ever forgave Orpheus, Margaret-san?” Akira asks quietly.

“I wouldn’t, in her place. Would you?” Uncharacteristically soft, Margaret’s voice brims with unvoiced sympathy. 

Akira doesn’t know. He never considered himself in a position to ask others for his forgiveness, even if there was no one to ask. Isn’t that what gods do, demand of others to plead for their forgiveness? But you can’t hurt a god, so why would gods yearn so badly to be pleaded to?

It’s gods who should be pleading for forgiveness. If anything, it’s gods who should’ve fallen to their knees and prayed for Orpheus’ mercy for ever allowing him to doubt them.

“Maybe I would. But I don’t think that’s a good thing.”

Margaret looks at him fondly, and, for a moment, Akira wonders if she knows his own answer to this question better than he does. Yet, even if she is privy to some depths of Akira’s soul yet inaccessible to him, it doesn’t appear as if her knowledge comes from some condescending comprehension of humanity from a position above him. Instead, it looks lived through, experienced first hand, like when a mother sees her child make the mistakes they all have made in the hurtful process of growing up and wipes their tears with the back of her hand, and holds them close as if to tell them I have been there and I have survived, so you will too, you will too.

“Wildcards are always interesting like that,” she murmurs. “You exist as reflections of thousands of masks, yet none of your quests even seem to be concerned with uncovering your true selves. Before, I never saw that as a necessity, but amongst those the Velvet Room has aided, you, above all others, don’t wield your Persona - you become them.”

Akira knows her to be right. Yet, for how painfully correct Margaret’s observation may be, it doesn’t sound like an accusation.

“Have a little faith, Wildcard. None of you is ever truly lost. That’s what we are here for, and I’m certain that’s why Akechi-kun was brought here as well.”

Margaret is kind , an inner voice that , for once, sounds distinctly like his own provides .

“Wanna strike a deal, Margaret-san?” he asks playfully, even if it doesn’t feel like a necessity. In a way, they have already struck a deal. And, in a way, they never could, both standing now in the sanctuary of Akira’s metaphysical contracts for reasons that have nothing to do with one another, sharing a conversation that, once again, has nothing to do with ruin, or distortion, or the world’s uncertain fate.

“I’ve made my deal already, Trickster,” her eyes leave their exchange, for a brief moment, as she looks somewhere far away Akira has no means of following. “And so, I suspect, did you.”

As he bids his farewell to the Velvet Room and its lone attendant, Akira yearns for a world that doesn’t operate in the give-and-take of obligations. He yearns for a world that doesn’t need gods . A world where he is allowed to doubt and trust freely.

 

“I sure hope you still have that Mementos cash, because this is gonna cost you,” Futaba’s commandeering voice presses him as he ascends the stairs to his room. The big day is tomorrow, and he promised Morgana that he would at least bother to pack his bag before rushing off to the Velvet Room. “Also, would you kindly respond to the billion messages we left? I know you must be preoccupied,” she spits the word like she’s about to vomit, fake gag sound and all. “But others don’t. At least tell them your ETA, or I’m not gonna hesitate to uncover your dirty little secret.”

Akira knows she’s joking, and that his secret is safe in Futaba’s absurdly capable hands. However, he also knows that he has been , in fact, neglecting the group chat majorly. The 80+ unread messages glare at him from where he left the phone, Futaba still on speaker, at the table, while he rummages through his closet for the bag.

“Also, call Ann,” Futaba continues as he carelessly peruses random shirts, trying to find something even remotely nice. “She ambushed me today in the hall and asked if you died.”

“Hm,” Akira sighs, examining a wrinkled gray camp shirt he doesn’t even remember owning. He throws it on the bed, right into the bring pile. “I do need to talk to Ann. I’ll have to go shopping for clothes, like, first thing when I arrive, and no one could do a better job at making me look good than her.”

The shriek of pure, unadulterated disgust Futaba lets out is endlessly satisfying, even if it makes both him and Morgana cringe.

“ God , I forgot how gross you get about him. Would you even be able to hold it in in front of the others?”

Akira grins. This is familiar territory. Even the nervous dread of it all being so fleeting and uncertain. But most of all the excitement, and the thrill, and - yes - the obnoxious public pining. 

“Don’t doubt me, Futaba,” and for the first time in months, he doesn’t feel like he has to force the confidence into his voice. “I am a master of deceit.”

 

Despite the fraught disquiet from his last conversation with Goro still lingering in muggy mists around his heart, Akira can’t deny the eagerness with which she bolts out of the door the moment his bag is zipped and placed to await its finest hour at the door. He even gets through the unread walls of text shaming him within the Phantom Thieves’ group chat, - Futaba, of course , mislead him once again, most of the texts were dedicated to a ridiculously in-depth discussion between the instigator in question, Yusuke, and Makoto about the nutritional value of instant ramen, and he hates to agree with Makoto on something like this, but adding an egg does not suddenly make it a balanced meal, - and types in an obligatory reply to the few semi-relevant questions addressed to him. Conveying the notion that he is very much alive, thank you for your concern , to Ann proves to be considerably more difficult without triggering an immediate hour-long call , but he , somehow, manages, assuring her through text that he will call the moment he comes back from the imaginary errand she now believes him to be in a hurry to tackle.

If Morgana side-eyes him for lying so blatantly, he pretends not to notice.

The walk to the shopping district is almost intoxicating, and Akira catches himself realizing that he doesn’t even remember the last time he had that much spring in his step. Back when the Phantom Thieves were at their peak, he could’ve gone months without seeing Goro in person, living on the scraps of irregular text exchanges and glimpses of plastic smiles he would catch on Leblanc's TV. It all has changed in January when, hollowed by experiencing Goro vanish so permanently from his life without getting even a moment to familiarize himself with the emptiness now residing within him, Akira latched onto his reemerged image like a parasite, draining to the last drop every moment they could have to themselves, as if a part of him already knew that the instance he allows Goro to slip away, he will never see him again.

Goro was a crescendo of impermanence. Swaying from present to forever absent, from universally adored to publicly lynched, from stoic and collected to wild and manic, and while Akira never wanted to cage him, to stabilize him into something static and comprehensible, he desperately needed to learn how to keep his ever-precarious form in sight, even if it means allowing himself to veer just as wildly.

Especially now, when the very physicality of Goro Akechi was an impermanence in and of itself.

It is that same impermanent form that, shockingly enough, greets him outside of the Velvet Room, arms crossed and lingering next to the door invisible to all but them . A picture-perfect image of a diligent attendant.

“How are you out and about? No longer need me to take a stroll through the town?” Akira asks, genuinely perplexed, instead of greeting, and doesn’t even pretend that his heart doesn’t skip a beat, no matter how cliché that may sound.

Goro, seemingly expecting him, raises an eyebrow, and Akira could swear he catches his form solidify when he comes within a comfortable talking distance.

“Margaret figured out that the passage , apparently, opens for me when you approach close enough. That range, unfortunately, is now confirmed to be painfully insufficient, as I did not even have time to step away from the door.”

“Have you been waiting for me in there?” Akira takes a cautious step closer. Once again, it’s a familiar dance - he can see, as clear as day, that Goro is still sore from their previous discussion. To him, it’s obvious in the slight hesitation of his words, the minuscule delays in eye contact. Yet, he expectedly proceeds as if nothing is wrong, and Akira, knowing the steps to this routine by heart, does the same.

He also notes that Goro looks tired, almost worse for wear than he did after their first disastrous outing to the riverbank. Yet, judging by how irritated and snappy he already sounds, Akira figures that bringing it up would do nothing but aggravate Goro further.

“Not voluntarily,” Goro scoffs, and there it is - a barely noticeable gap between his words escaping and his eyes meeting Akira’s, the gleam of them unreadable, stern, and deeply exhausted. “Margaret-san was convinced you’d come by, and forced me to keep you company.”

Akira huffs. What an incredible, brilliant woman.

“Did she mention I stopped by yesterday to say hi?”

“She sure did,” Goro’s voice loses some of its vexation, but the tiny grin stretching his lips doesn’t reach his eyes. “Although there’s no need for you to do the same today. She asked me to inform you that all the preparations are complete on the side of the Velvet Room. Lavenza did try to rope me into helping, but , apparently, the assistance I can provide is insufficient.”

He pauses for a moment, looking back at the shimmering blue door behind him. When he returns his gaze to Akira, a strand of silver-white hair falls into his eye, and Akira swears he catches nervous anticipation underlining his next question.

“Tomorrow is the day, I presume?”

They’re standing close enough for Akira to reach a hand out and tuck the uncooperative lock of hair back behind Goro’s ear. He doesn’t, of course he doesn’t, but the opportunity is there, nonetheless.

“Tomorrow evening. So, I’ll likely only find time to stop by the day after tomorrow.”

It would be the longest he has spent without seeing Goro since he reinstalled himself back into Akira’s life at the beginning of this week. Despite so little time passing since their most recent reunion, Akira already feels like two days of separation is an impossibly long interval to handle.

“Well, no need to waste time, then.”

There’s a finality to his words, like Goro is expecting, no, demanding him to turn around and leave without delay , and although Akira would feel so incredibly, inexplicably awful turning his back on Goro without clearing the air, the ghost of fatigue plaguing every perceivable aspect of him is so severe, so clear to anyone who’s dedicated as much time to watching Goro Akechi as he has, that Akira feels compelled to comply, if just to let him rest .

Yet, just as Akira is about to bid his farewells and promise, sincerely and with as much not-so-faux flirtatiousness, to meet him in Tokyo as soon as he humanly can, Goro’s soft, almost murmuring voice shatters any and all escape plans he might’ve constructed in his head into a million sharp, blood-drawing pieces.

“You gave yourself away, just so you are aware.”

Akira stares at him, confused and oddly terrified.

“ This can’t be happening again. That’s what you said when you saw me for the first time. I even questioned you then, but I doubt you remember,” Goro clarifies in that same whisper-like tone.

Oh.

“Stupid slip-ups will do that to you.” You would know all about it.

“So, not gonna deny it, after all?” he asks without malice, more a statement than a question. “This is not your first rodeo with bringing me back from the dead?”

And how would he even begin to explain all the insufferable, unbearable ways in which Goro is wrong? Because it’s not , and it is , and it doesn’t really matter, because Akira never had a chance, a real shot of pulling it off ever before, and it was never about him bringing Goro to life, he never had a say in that, even this time he is still completely oblivious as to how exactly he pulled it off, it was always about the impossibility of keeping him there, by Akira’s side, and if this time is, indeed, different, if there’s no god standing in between them, then like hell will Akira let it pan out the same for the third time.

“It’s… It’s not like that. I didn’t- It’s just not like that.”

“And, let me guess, asking you how it is would be pointless, wouldn’t it? So what, you think this time would be different? Or should I prepare to die again in advance?”

He knows it will be different. There’s no other option than for it to be different.

“It would be different. I’m not letting you die.”

Goro chuckles at that, and the cruel glint in his eyes is so melancholically nostalgic, and the hurt it plunges right through Akira’s heart is so bittersweet in its familiar acidity. Akira knows so many variations of this look - the caged hatred mixed with self-conscious inner confusion Goro wore when challenging him to a duel, the heartbreaking disappointment bleeding into mania he expressed right before their disastrous showdown in the engine room, the sorrow colored red with rage of their last February fight outside of Leblanc. 

This isn’t cruelty, Akira. This is kindness, is what he told him then. Akira hates Goro for being right in that, because it was kindness, but no kindness should ever hurt so much.

“And you are so sure of that how, exactly? Past experiences seem to indicate that your track record isn’t exactly flawless.”

It hurts, all the same, even if this time Akira knows Goro’s inconsiderate words to be a reflection of his own doubt, his own fear. They were always that, partially - a protective shield of cruelty that allowed him to not get his hopes up before they get blown away by the shockwave of disappointment , and, by extension, prevent Akira from coming too close to get caught up in the blow. 

Akira knows them both to be aware that it never worked. Akira still rushed right into the epicenter and got erupted into pieces.

But that understanding never stopped him from being cruel, and kind in his cruelness, and so impossibly, foolishly determined in not backing down when it came to-

“I... I apologize, Akira.”

The soft whisper slaps Akira across the face.

“You what?”

“ Apologize , you dimwit,” even so, he still sounds somewhat pissed off, and like he is accusing Akira instead of- instead of what? Why is he apologizing? “I understand I don’t- I don’t possess all the necessary information to judge your actions. But even I can gather that the subject of my… previous demise, or demises , is rather sensitive for you. It is, frankly, unfair of me to patronize you regarding how you deal with the circumstances surrounding my death and revival.”

Akira doesn’t understand.

“Goro Akechi doesn’t apologize,” he says, sounding stupidly dumbfounded even to his own ears, because it’s the truth. 

“Well then, allow me to not apologize for attempting to be considerate,” Goro spits out, and Akira’s chest unclenches, somewhat, at the familiar sarcastic spite. “Listen, I can’t necessarily apologize for the actions I’ve committed before. But I can still hold myself accountable for whatever I do and say now , so either take the apology or fuck off. What you decide on is none of my business.”

Akira isn’t sure what to make of this. Goro doesn’t need to apologize to him. If anything, Akira should be the one apologizing.

“I don’t want to keep secrets from you, Akechi,” he breathes out, neither accepting nor denying Goro’s apology. “ Just so you know. This mess sucks for me just as much as it sucks for you.”

“Oh, I’m sure. ” Goro murmurs, shockingly genuine.

“But I mean what I said. It is different this time. And you won’t be dying again. I won’t let that happen.”

“Sure. Just don’t go around making promises you can’t keep.”

Like you’re the one to talk.

Seemingly satisfied to call it a day after saying all he had to say, Goro straightens his posture and waves a dismissive hand at Akira.

“Now go. Isn’t tomorrow the big day? Don’t waste your time when you can be doing something actually important.”

He doesn’t look like he’s gonna wait for a response, taking a step towards Akira to seemingly turn around and enter back into the Velvet Room, where he will wait , doing who knows what. The next time Akira sees him will be back in a world Goro Akechi left, barely noticed by anyone, mere months ago. Akira isn’t certain what that transition will mean, not yet, not quite.

There is so much he still wants to say before it happens. Before their quest becomes too tangible for Akira to allow himself the vulnerability, the freedom to do so.

A world where he can doubt freely.

“Akechi?” his voice reaches out, uncharacteristically quiet, at the same time as his hand jerks to grasp one of Goro’s wrists between his fingers.

“What now?”

He expects Goro to pull away. He doesn’t. His hand remains limp in Akira’s hold.

“I’m really happy . That you’re back.”

Goro doesn’t look up at him, standing there, still and stiff, in odd tranquility. Yet, when he does, eventually, pull away, his hand doesn’t rush, and Akira feels the ghost of his fingertips trace over his palm.

His gloves are much stiffer than the pair half of which Akira knows to be resting in his pocket, even now. His other hand, against his better judgment, goes to feel its texture, to store away the difference.

“..Yeah. I’m sure I’m glad to be back, too.” Goro says, almost soundlessly, and disappears without meeting Akira’s eyes.

Akira Kurusu doesn’t make wishes. Even as a child, he knew that things would never go his way if he simply wished upon a star for a new toy, or friendlier classmates, or a family that actually loved him. Even back in Maruki’s reality, he knew that he never explicitly wished for Goro to come back. Sure, he yearned for it, he craved it, hell, he desired it, but the wish itself was nothing more than Maruki’s interpretation, something Akira never allowed himself to utter even in the privacy of his own mind. 

As Goro’s silhouette disintegrates into the blue hue, Akira wishes, desperately, selfishly, for Goro’s quiet, uncertain confession to be true. He wishes for it to remain true even when Goro truly understands its implications upon placing it within the context of everything that has happened to him, to them, and to the world.

 

It’s ironic, in a twisted sort of way, how, during both his last train ride out of Tokyo and his current journey back into the city, he is accompanied by the ghost of Goro Akechi. 

His final days in Tokyo were defined through the melancholic sentimentality of preemptively reminiscing about people and places he would only get to experience in their full vibrancy through illusions, through yearnings to return not to a place but to a time, to himself that was and no longer could be. Akira, who never understood homesickness, endured it anticipatorily.

For him, it was never the new step that was most difficult to take. So when he hesitated, a foot already raised to board, he understood with a final ping of overbearing clarity that this step is a last.

The hope that threatened to flutter out of his heart at the glimpse of a memory out the window, he shot down. He spent the entire ride with hands drenched in its blood, which never dried and, as such, never could serve as another reminder.

You can’t ever fully love a person, but you can love a memory, as it is a god of your own making. And so, Akira hoped that once his hands do, eventually, dry, he’ll pick at the flakes lovingly, and arrange them into something less fierce, less sorrowful, and less prematurely tragic.

A part of him hoped they’ll never dry, after all, and he would mark everything he touches in crimson for eternity, or for as long of an eternity as he gets, which will be, regardless, too long.

His hands are washed askew on the parallel ride to the one he boarded merely over a month ago. His skin soaks up the moonlight.

“What are you gonna do, once we arrive?” Morgana asks him as the landscape behind his reflection turns familiar.

“Well, first things first, we are gonna give Sojiro the biggest, most unnecessary, uncomfortable hug,” Akira says with a dumbfounded smile. “Then, we're gonna avoid all the questions, go to sleep, have an enormous plate of curry, and only then will we explain to Sojiro why exactly I am, once again, reclaiming the attic.”

 

Akira does not expect the overwhelming avalanche of fondness that crushes him at the sight of a familiar head of red hair rushing his way through the platform, an equally welcome glimpse of a dapper white suit following close behind.

Sojiro beats him to the promised hug. And even has the courtesy not to question him until all four of them are situated in the car.

“For tonight, I’m letting you off the hook, but you both better have a good explanation prepared first thing in the morning,” he grunts at the same time as Akira whispers a what the hell did you tell him? to Futaba, who is a restless wreck next to him on the back seat, the front given up in fake courtesy to Mona.

“Nothing,” she whispers back. “That’s why he’s mad.”

Oblivious to their hushed conspiring, Sojiro takes their silence as a confirmation, and continues:

“I’m surprised your entire gang didn’t ambush you at the station. They’ve been coming an awful lot to the cafe lately, and all I could hear is the talk about you.”

Futaba, eyes glued to her phone, chimes in:

“That’d be my doing. I convinced them that a collective ambush tomorrow at Leblanc would deal more damage.”

“More damage to my business, that I’m sure of,” Sojiro sighs with no malice in his voice. God , Akira missed this man way more than he imagined.

 

Despite how bone-tired Akira feels once they get to Leblanc, the three of them end up talking about everything and nothing way past closing time, Futaba sharing her impressive achievements as a bona fide high schooler, Sojiro complaining about having to keep the place clean himself in the absence of his favorite part-timer, and Morgana, courtesy of Akira’s translation, gushing about the kind souls of Inaba’s shopping district who fattened him up on leftovers. The Phantom Thieves’ chat collectively welcomes him to Tokyo and conspicuously confirms something with Futaba in a separate Akira-excluding thread he gets hit with a spoon for trying to read. And as Sojiro drags Futaba’s half-asleep body out of the cafe with a parting reminder to Akira not to wander off into the night, he almost feels like the last month of his life never happened, safe for the reappearance of Goro Akechi, who, in his daydreams, never left to begin with.

“Never thought I’d miss sleeping on milk crates so much,” Morgana yawns as they get situated in the attic, which, safe for the additional layer of dust, looks just as unchanged as Akira hoped. Even his plant is still thriving in the corner.

“Me too, Mona, you have no idea how badly I yearned for perpetual back pain.”

Tomorrow, he will explain to Sojiro why he’ll need to lie to his parents, and check first-hand if walking the streets of Tokyo is as agonizing now as he imagined it would be just a week ago, and cry a little upon seeing all of his friends. Tomorrow, he will turn into the Shibuya alleyway tucked away from prying eyes and confirm that it still leads where he needs it to lead. Tomorrow, he will show Goro Akechi his forgotten home.

But tonight, he will sleep and dream of morning coffee. He will hold a glove between his fingers like an unbroken promise yet to be fulfilled.

 

In the end, thanks to Takemi’s lenient relationship with medical ethics, Sojiro’s frightening mastery of deceit, and Futaba’s expected willingness to apply her proficiencies in illegal business, he ends up staying in Tokyo until further notice with a particularly nasty case of pneumonia.

“Poor kid’s immune system probably got weakened by going back and forth too much. He arrived already looking half-dead, but it looks like it only got worse during the night. The doctor said it’s a miracle he even got through the train ride,” Sojiro explains to his mother on the phone while Akira, lively and definitively well, sips on his coffee across the counter. It tastes just as impeccable as he remembers.

“It really isn’t a bother. I’m aware you can be busy, and he has plenty of people here to take care of him.”

Futaba snickers from her place at the center booth.

“Yes, I’ll notify the school, he has their number. You really have nothing to worry about, Kurusu-san.”

Sojiro throws an accusatory glance his way as he politely wraps up the conversation, and Akira can’t believe his mother even bothered hoaxing concern when he knows all too well this is the last time they’ll be hearing from her until he returns to Inaba. In all honesty, his parents would probably be thankful if Sojiro just went ahead and adopted him at this point.

“You owe me one, kid,” Sojiro mutters after hanging up, but the smile that tugs at the corners of his lips assures Akira that most he’ll have to do is help around the café and take Futaba out to Akihabara when she gets too restless. “Welcome back - now, officially.” 

Akira can’t believe his luck at being entrusted to this man, of all people.

“Now that that’s over with, I believe you have some explaining to do,” Sojiro crosses his arms, eyes darting between Akira and Futaba, who grows tense under his gaze and pointedly closes her laptop. “And, please, don’t tell me that you just missed us so much that you deemed it worth faking your medical records.”

It seems that all Akira does lately is explain.

 

“So, Akechi-kun… Wasn’t he the one who betrayed you lot and almost got you killed?”

In between himself and Futaba, who mostly looked uncomfortable and occasionally threw berating comments towards him, Goro, or the situation in general, they managed to bring Sojiro up to speed. Excluding some more high-level Metaverse concepts and speaking as little of Akira and Goro’s personal relations as possible, they explain that the detective is, technically, not dead, but will need some supernatural collaboration to truly re-enter the world of the living .

Matters were somewhat complicated by the fact that Sojiro , apparently, didn’t know that Akechi was dead to begin with, but, on top of everything else that was so suddenly dumped onto his plate, he gets over that fact with just a single sympathetic glance Akira’s way.

“That’s the one!” Akira beams at the same time as Futaba sneers:

“Yeah, try telling this guy that he’s not worth the trouble.”

Akira knows that she doesn’t really mean it, at least not entirely. The topic of Goro Akechi was never an easy one to breach with any of the Phantom Thieves, and especially not Futaba. But he knows Futaba to be a kind person, and, for all of her disdain for Goro, he knows she will do what it takes to bring him back, if not for the boy himself then for Akira. From there, they can work on whatever comes next.

“He doesn’t have any of his memories as he is right now,” Akira says. “So it’s not even like he’s aware that he tried to kill me.”

Sojiro raises an eyebrow, clearly confused, but smartly chooses against questioning anything that might cost him another Metaverse lecture. Instead, he focuses on the last thing Akira wants to explain:

“And you want him to get his memories back?”

At least his short stay in Inaba didn’t atrophy his art of stupid overconfidence. It’s shocking how far one can lead others if they sound like they believe in themselves enough.

“Exactly!”

Futaba groans from her seat, and Akira can all but feel the burning of her accusatory gaze at the back of his head.

“It’s useless to even attempt to argue with his guy when it comes to Akechi ,” she spits his name like the poison of its sound could somehow blaze him out of existence again. Honestly, Akira kind of misses when everyone tiptoed around even mentioning the detective’s name in his presence, let alone openly showing that they can’t understand his grief. “He and Akira had this thing , and that , apparently, makes him forget that murder is still bad.”

“Oh, I know.”

Akira’s eyes snap back to Sojiro in horror, unsure if he means the murder or the thing .

Sojiro just raises an eyebrow. Okay, he means the thing, that can’t be good.

“I’m not blind, kid. I do remember the detective boy, and neither of you was particularly subtle . I just assumed it wasn’t something serious enough to overlook all the stuff he apparently did after.”

“Oh, we all assumed that, but apparently Akira is just full of surprises .” In moments like this, Akira regrets that Futaba ever grew bold enough to leave her room.

“He’s not really a bad guy, just misunderstood,” Akira shrugs and does his best not to look like he is about to start crying. If Sojiro picks up on that or simply realizes that the topic of Akira’s complicated feelings towards his would-be murderer isn't the best subject to cover at the moment, he doesn’t let it show.

“As long as you’re careful, do whatever you need to. The kid might’ve had issues, but it’s not like he doesn’t deserve a chance at life.”

Akira silently wonders if Sojiro’s opinion would remain the same if he knew that Goro was the one who killed Wakaba Isshiki. He hopes he’ll never have to find out.

 

The topic of conversation gets changed to more mundane things after that, and soon Sojiro conveniently orders them both to scram to the attic under the pretense of needing to open for business before the rest of the Thieves eventually come and ruin it all for him. Yet, Futaba ushers him to the Sakura house as she, apparently, refuses to talk about dead people in a room with no door, like it ever stopped them from shouting about the Phantom Thieves in broad daylight. But Akira understands that, in this particular instance, she is looking for the comfort of the most familiar environment, and obligingly follows her to her room.

Futaba doesn’t waste time once she’s securely positioned at her desk, her eyes burning into Akira, who takes a spot on the bed.

“So, when are you planning to tell the others?”

Shit.

“I don’t know,” he admits, fingers instinctively reaching to mess with his bangs. “Telling you was kinda a necessity, I really couldn’t pull it off otherwise. But I thought I could at least try and wait until Akechi gets his memory back before letting anyone else know, just in case he might not want me to.”

Futaba has the gall to somehow look appalled, disgusted, and concerned, all at the same time.

Here is the thing. He doesn’t like keeping secrets from the other Thieves. He doesn’t like to lie to the only people who can possibly assist him in whatever Metaverse bullshit the world decides to throw his way this time. But now, now that Goro Akechi, and he still can’t believe that he is allowed to think it, to say it out loud, is finally back in his grasp, no matter how fragile, how unrecognizable, how unstable in his newfound place between dream and reality he is, Akira isn’t sure he can handle defending his entire existence every step of the way to the people who are so rightful in hating him. 

He remembers the accusatory looks Ryuji used to throw his way every time, which was all the time, he chose Goro for the front lines while traversing Maruki’s Palace. He remembers the venomous hurt in Haru’s shaking voice as he overheard her near-crying What does he mean? He killed my father! at the group in the attic while he was fetching coffee. He remembers what he believes to be the poorly conceived betrayal leaking out of Sumire’s oh-so-kind, understanding eyes as he turned her down , and he could almost hear whimpers of they told me all about him, he is a murderer, he is a horrible person, he might not even be real and you choose him over me, me, who loves you so purely, me, who wants to be with you so bad, me, who would never hurt you like he did, like he does .

He sees, right now, the confusion in Futaba’s eyes as she tries to find words to persuade him. In them, he can almost make out a selfish glimmer of hope that the others might talk him into letting Goro Akechi go.

On Shido’s ship, in those agonizingly hopeful moments before a metal gate crushed Akira’s last hope at ever being okay, they might’ve all recognized Akechi as one of them. They might’ve even been willing to welcome him aboard, if Goro didn’t make a different choice for himself. But what Akira realized in their uncomfortable avoidance after Shido’s change of heart, and, most evidently, when Goro Akechi, all bitter grins and ruthless jabs and remorseless, seething rage, rejoined them in Maruki’s reality and subsequently faded from existence, leaving them with a version of Akira which they, for once, admitted to not understand, is that his friends, for all of their kindness and open-mindedness, could not accept forgiving Goro. And accepting him without forgiving was something none of them were capable of.

The only one of them who, unexpectedly, seemed most okay whenever Akira couldn’t bear it and the topic of Goro Akechi crawled out of the depths of him where it usually festered on his organs, was Ann. It was her, when Akira once allowed himself to break down last month, sitting dazed and with silent tears running down his face on the floor of his childhood bedroom in the middle of the night, phone almost breaking in the clutch of his fingers, and all of the I know I shouldn’t be like this, I know I shouldn’t, I let him go, he wanted me to let him go , but I can’t, I can’t , seeping from his mouth, who told him Of course you should, you care for him, right?

But even to her, saying that he will, once again, put his life on the line to save Goro Akechi was the wrong thing to say. And there’s hardly anything Akira fears more than saying the wrong thing.

“I’ll tell them, okay?” Akira meekly provides when it becomes evident that Futaba is not going to say anything more. “And I’ll tell them soon. Just… not right now. It’s been, like, five days, I still can barely comprehend this is happening, so…”

“Yeah, I get it,” Futaba cuts him off and, judging by the disapproving gleam in her eyes, Akira is inclined to believe that she really does. It disappears before Akira can continue making a fool out of himself through empty promises, replaced instead by a familiar mischievous twinkle. “More importantly, is his hair really blonde now? I bet he looks so stupid.”

The tension eases out of Akira’s shoulders, and he allows his own face to relax into a roguish smirk.

“It’s less blonde and more, like, white. And I hate to ruin your fantasies, but he still looks great. If anything, the silver hair, yellow eyes combo just makes him look cooler, you’ll be raging when you see it.”

Futaba raises an eyebrow.

“Can I, though? I mean, you say he’s in the Velvet Room, and you have to, like, show him all your date spots to jog his memory or whatever, but can he actually leave it? Did you try to get him out yet?”

“He can and we did, but he can’t stay out for long,” Akira clarifies. “He did go out in Inaba, but turned all translucent and lethargic, like, twenty minutes later. Mona met him no problem, though. Margaret thinks he’ll be able to stay in our world for longer in Tokyo, but we’ll just have to wait and see, I guess.”

Remembering their little outing to the riverbank, Akira really hopes that Margaret’s theory is right. Akira doubts that the sight of the Untouchable or, even worse, the pestering promoters of Shinjuku would be effective at bringing back any of Goro’s fond memories.

“Wait, Margaret?” Futaba rouses him from the daydream of Goro, the ridiculous Velvet Room getup and all, getting bombarded by obnoxious host recruiters.

Oh, that was probably important to mention days ago.

“Yeah, she’s something like Lavenza’s older sister? I honestly don’t know, but she looks older and is, by far, the most helpful person I’ve ever encountered in the Velvet Room, including Akechi. At this point, I just learned not to question it too much.”

The nicest thing about defeating god together is , apparently, how little he has to explain to his confidants when it comes to the unreasonable nature of the supernatural in order for them to just take his word for it.

It really does feel nice - to be back.

 

“Dude, I can’t believe it’s been only a month, I feel like I haven’t seen you in a freakin’ year!” Ryuji’s bright voice echoes through Leblanc’s walls.

Akira is pushed back through Leblanc’s door shortly after Futaba explains to him how exhausting faking a pneumonia case apparently is, even though it took her less than an hour of actual work and an entire business day to psyche herself up to contact Takemi. Akira makes a mental note to thank the doctor profusely the first chance he gets, potentially splurging on a new succulent to add to her collection and a box of nice chocolate truffles. Really, Futaba’s exaggeration of the doctor’s menacing vibes and Akira being into doms for sure is uncalled for and highly debatable, - Takemi is genuinely nice and would never hurt a fly. 

The giddiness in Futaba’s eager steps as they make their short walk back to the cafe tells Akira everything he needs to know long before the chime above the door announces their return, and he is ambushed, in a charming reenactment of his last long-awaited homecoming, by bone-crushing hugs, loud yelps of excitement, and almost-teary greetings, all coming from the people he trusts and cherishes more than anyone else in the world.  

“Hey! What about me? I was gone, too!” Morgana whines from where he is perched on the barstool next to Haru, purring under the girl’s gentle hand. 

“Sure, I guess I missed you too, whatever,” Ryuji dismisses him with a wave of a hand, his other arm looping over Akira’s shoulders. “Not as much as this guy, though!”

The complementary scents of coffee, curry spice, and aged wood, the familiar hustle of playful banter, even the casual ways in which they all fall back into their collective routine - it’s all so soul-warming, so liberating that Akira has allowed himself to miss it. 

“He’s just being Ryuji, of course we missed you too, Mona,” Ann provides , but her eyes rest on Akira instead of the already-melting cat, still just as creepily lovestruck as everyone remembers. 

“Lady Ann…”

Akira holds her gaze and lets her search, lets her take in his disposition, more at ease than any of them have probably seen in long months, the casual lightness of his smile, the carefree airiness of his voice. He lets her draw her own conclusions, even if it stings a bit. 

“It is considered that longing empowers the emotions one feels upon reunion,” Yusuke’s contemplative voice informs them. In the month Akira was gone all of them changed in their own tiny ways, - Makoto’s hair is a bit longer, Ryuji has put on some muscle, and even Futaba, now that he has time to look at her in the luminance of the afternoon sun, acquired some healthy color and glow to her skin, - yet none of them transformed quite as much as Yusuke, who looks not only definitively less malnourished and sickly, but also shockingly well-styled, his endearingly eccentric, if a tad garish casual outfits replaced by a sleek leather jacket and deep-blue button down. Akira is unsure who to thank for his friend’s rapid transformation, but suspects that it was a collective effort of taking the “starving” out of the local starving artist.

“Yeah, dude, I am empowered to make this week count for all the missin’ we did!” Ryuji finally releases Akira from his hold. “I’m so not looking forward to going back to school.”

“I agree with Ryuji-kun. A week is not nearly long enough,” Haru sighs , and after hearing all about her new lifestyle, which seems to leave little time for anything outside of intense business school classes, training to properly take over Okumura Foods , and treating to her and Makoto’s shared balcony garden, Akira is inclined to believe that Haru, above them all, is in dire need of a well-deserved break.

As the conversation moves back to gushing about just how much all of them, save for Akira, are now doing for themselves, and how disappointingly little time that leaves for them to have fun together, Futaba throws a knowing, if a bit indignant, look his way.

Back in Futaba’s room, they made an informed, if a tad disagreeable decision to not yet inform the others of the actual length of Akira’s Tokyo vacation. And while he managed, through some tough reasoning, to eventually convince Futaba that announcing such a development now would be akin to setting the entire save Akechi operation on fire, alongside Akira’s sanity, she still seemed less than pleased with lying to their friends. 

They laugh and reminisce together until the sun begins to set, and with it, sets in Akira’s anxious need to, no matter how rewardingly uplifting basking in their reunion feels, step away from the festivities into the dream that allowed Akira to enjoy their deception-lined company so freely to begin with.

He can feel the call of the Velvet Room, an urge to seek imprisonment not unlike the one he used to get whenever an alarm was sounded. Somewhere within his dream, Goro Akechi was asking him to return.

Potentially sensing his restlessness or, perhaps, mistaking it for fatigue, the Thieves begin to tickle out of Leblanc. First, it’s Haru and Makoto who depart, giving him a lingering hug and a stiff yet loving nod respectfully .

“If you plan to take tomorrow to see some of your other friends around town, do so, but don’t stay out late, as we are meeting Sumire at the station the day after at nine,” Makoto reminds him in place of a goodbye. “That applies to all of you.”

Next, it’s Yusuke and Ryuji who hurry to catch their train. Yusuke is , apparently, staying with the Sakamotos for the duration of the Golden Week, as insisted on by Ryuji after having to ride all the way to his new school for a month and finding out that Yusuke used to take that same allegedly endless route from the Kosei dorms every time he was supposed to meet up with the Thieves. Fortunately for Yusuke, Ryuji’s mother seems enamored with the boy and, upon meeting him, suggested her son bring all of his wonderful friends over for dinner sometime.

Left with the company of just Ann and Futaba, Morgana snoring, out of commission, in the corner booth, and Sojiro retreating to the Sakura residence hours ago, Akira feels oddly exposed. Of all the Phantom Thieves, he knows Ann to be most likely to pick up on his sudden shift in behavior, as well as the restlessness she, of all people, knows not to associate with Akira post-February. Yet, as Ann embraces him, warm and tight and crushing him in genuine affection, all she whispers in his ear is a sincere I’m glad you’re doing better, before winking at them both and skipping out of the door.

This leaves Akira with just one obstacle. Unfortunately for him, Futaba is not looking like she’ll let him go without a cursory fight.

“Akira.”

Her voice is stern, and it reminds Akira a bit of her mother, or, at the very least, of the brief cognitive image of her mother he came to meet in the perfect world his own manifestation of perfection stole from her.

“I know.”

“You will not be able to keep it from them for the whole week,” Futaba says, unhelpfully. “And if you’re planning to not tell anyone that you’re staying longer, count me out.”

“I know.”

She hops off the barstool to stand next to him, intimidating despite her frail appearance.

“Either hurry up reminding Akechi how much of a dick he used to be, or tell them so we can all remind him.”

“ I know, okay?”

And he does. He knows better than her, better than anyone, how prolonging the inevitable never works out, not for him. 

Whatever pained expression must’ve crossed his face at the admission, it softens Futaba’s features into a familiar, gentle smile.

“Then go and do something about it. And tell Akechi I said hi. And that he sucks, and you deserve better.”

Akira doesn’t need to be told twice.

Chapter 7: River was Filled with Stories

Goro Akechi doesn’t think that he, in life, death, or otherwise, has ever found much sacredness in annihilation. Historically and culturally, death, like all things permanent and ineluctable, has been a subject of fascination as the one thing humanity can never comprehend. Of all fated experiences, it was one no person could undergo in full. An agonizing ritual of ruin, a gap in the endless karmic cycle, a celebrated opportunity of salvation through rebirth, or a permanent solution to the inescapability of suffering, death was, is, and always will be the human race’s last frontier of the unknown. 

But not for Goro Akechi.

His impermanence was not an absolute but an already settled wager. One that was, by all objective accounts, betted on at least twice. If there was, indeed, an inherent sacredness to death, Goro Akechi has ravaged through its sanctuary or, more accurately, it was Akira Kurusu who did so in his blind defiance of permanence, and dragged Goro Akechi back through the rubble and ruin.

Goro didn’t know if a him who knew of his original annihilation would thank Akira Kurusu for doing so or attempt to pull them both into the pits of hell.

Akira was discreet, but Goro knew him with a certainty that, even in his current state, was inconceivable in a way that only true connections would allow for. What Akira felt the moment he laid eyes on Goro in the Velvet Room was dread, and not the dread of Goro but one of the circumstances that brought him to stand before Akira’s eyes. A dread of the known . A dread of something Akira has experienced before.

Goro believes that Akira himself is assured that, this time, whatever led to Goro succumbing back to his predetermined fate before would not come into fruition. Akira either knows the circumstances to be different or is blindly self-confident in avoiding the conditions of ruin now that he knows of them . 

Akira Kurusu, most likely, was in love with him. He, most likely, loves him still.

There is a non-zero chance that Goro Akechi loved him in return.

Goro does not know what to do with that information. He is unsure if his past self knew, either. 

And so, he does the only thing he knows how to do. He promises himself to keep Akira close without letting him close enough, and he works, relentlessly and, frankly, pointlessly, to help Lavenza with arranging their manifestation in Tokyo. 

He doesn’t provide much help. In fact, he barely understands what he’s supposed to do, and mostly wastes his time and energy on listening to Lavenza explain something infuriatingly vague about cognition and access points. Both Margaret and Lavenza can, apparently, teleport wherever they need to be, but he remains, even with Igor’s assistance, incapable of following them, even if, according to the attendants, he will, most likely, remain tied to the Velvet Room regardless of where Akira relocates. And yet, he tries, attempting to discern Lavenza’s explanations, getting himself so exhausted the night before his and Akira’s parting conversation that he doesn’t even dare face him, in embarrassed anger and, perhaps, a bit in guilt for how their little question game panned out. 

He is still shameless enough to listen in on Akira’s entire conversation with Margaret. Sound travels easily through the Velvet Room corridors. 

When he emerges from the shadows, Margaret gives him an infuriating smirk, but doesn’t say a word.

 

The actual transition to Tokyo passes Goro by without much of a notice. One moment, he is sitting on the couch, Virgil’s Georgics in hand, and the next the vista around him shifts , and with it disappears the oddly persistent sensation of lethargy that’s been weighing him down for the past day or so. 

No one comes to inform him of the occurred conversion, and so Goro steps out on his own, finding all three of the Velvet Room residents huddled around Igor’s desk.

Lavenza notices him first.

“Goro Akechi,” she sounds bright, but there is a slight trace of trouble coloring her face. “It was a success! Although we are not able to sustain all of Tokyo’s access points. Hopefully, the Trickster wouldn’t be too alarmed if he can’t find us immediately.”

Unlike Lavenza, Margaret does not turn to greet him and, as Goro edges closer to their little circle, he is surprised to find her frowning, more disquieted than he’s ever seen the Velvet Room’s most stoic mistress.

“I can sense it,” she murmurs, eyes still drilling holes through Igor’s desk. “I can’t pinpoint its exact location, but I sense it, here. Akira Kurusu’s distortion.”

Both he and Lavenza look at her with varying degrees of alarm.

“It’s hostile. And it definitely doesn’t want to be found.”

The startling sound of Igor’s cackling doesn’t seem to have an effect on Margaret or Lavenza, but it surely makes Goro feel like pushing his shoe down the man’s throat.

“This truly is a curious case,” he squeals, the fucking freak . “But I have faith that both of our guests will choose the right path towards unchaining themselves from the shackles of an inescapable fate.”

Expectedly, Igor’s useless declaration does nothing to ease anyone’s tension, so Goro decides to take matters into his own hands, if not for the sake of the attendants, then for his own.

“From what I can recall, aren’t distorted cognitions always hostile? Why is that troubling, Margaret-san?”

He doesn’t exactly understand how cognitions work, not precisely, not personally . Yet, just as when Lavenza mentioned an access point in Akihabara the day prior, his brain provided him with an immediate, dry comprehension of a crammed tech geek paradise, loud displays, and swarms of maid café promoters, the word distortion evokes its own set of data and imagery within him. One of the bloodthirsty monsters and Goro Akechi’s even more savage monstrousness. He knows what a Palace is, but he doesn’t remember a single one of them that he must’ve traversed. He knows that he fought Shadows and Personas alike, yet their impressions are blurry, and even more undefined is the imprint of them he knows to reside within his own heart. 

“A distortion within a Persona-user’s heart is already an abnormality. And in a Wildcard, too… That must be the first, to my knowledge,” the notion of unfamiliarity doesn’t seem to faze Margaret as much as the implication of the aberration being Akira Kurusu . A Wildcard, she calls him, an ironically suitable name. “If the distortion can display hostility, there’s a high likelihood of it being self-aware, and there’s simply no telling what a Shadow of a Wildcard, especially one as powerful as Kurusu-kun, may be capable of.”

A distortion within Akira Kurusu’s heart. Goro knows what one does with distortions, he remembers what triggers them to appear. Yet, concerningly enough, there is nothing in his mind that explains what happens to one in reality once their distortion crumbles.

“If by distortion we mean a distorted desire, mustn’t it seek something ? And with the actual Akira Kurusu on our side, wouldn’t we be able to determine that desire and fix it from within, in reality?”

If Goro’s voice betrays more hopefulness than he initially intends to bleed through the cracks, Margaret doesn’t, for once, make it known.

“It would’ve been ideal, Akechi-kun. However, I doubt that, at this point, there’s anything the real Kurusu-kun could do outside of confronting it head-on. Let’s just hope it doesn’t decide to confront him first.”

Goro doesn’t dare ask what that would mean for Akira Kurusu, facing his own insubordinate heart. He doesn’t ask what difference it makes if the aching heart gets to the mind first.

“What about my body?” he asks instead, hoping that, perhaps, the news on this front is a bit less bleak. “Can you sense it?”

Expectedly, he’s met with no such luck.

“That, I’m afraid, is something you will have to work on uncovering yourself, Akechi-kun,” Margaret, if he dares, looks apologetic. “While I can sense faint footprints of a cognition that resembles your own, they are too faint, almost a reminiscence of a reminiscence, for me to track down. Nonetheless, it’s still likely to aid you with manifesting in the world of the living for longer.”

There’s plenty about this entire situation he was thrust into so mercilessly and abruptly that makes Goro’s blood boil. Yet, above all, it’s the uncertainty that still, even a month in, kills him, crawling at his skin with unanswerable questions, uncontrollable variables, undetermined conditions that terminate even the idea of any sort of coherent planning in formation.

He’s come to accept, if begrudgingly, that both Akira and his assistants are accustomed to never expecting certainty. Yet, the understanding does little to prevent the poison of irritation from seeping into his words.

“So, what you’re saying is that Akira and I are, factually, tasked with running around Tokyo until we either find his distortion or it finds us, all the while hoping that something around here will jog my memory enough for me to magically recall where my other half wandered off?”

“Indeed,” she offers plainly.

“ Fucking great. ”

 

By the time the back wall of the cell begins to glint with a familiar blue flame, Goro’s patience is thinned to the point of translucency. Akira Kurusu, shiny-eyed and beaming, is met with the contrasting sight of Goro’s irritated glare and both he and Margaret sitting on either side of a pretentiously intricate table she’s manifested as far from Igor’s desk as possible, on Goro’s request, a spread of cards between them.

“Are you playing Tycoon ?”

The idiot has no right to sound so bewildered. 

“What did you think, we just stand around here doing nothing , waiting for you to grace us with your presence?” he spits just as Margaret, taking advantage of the distraction, pulls a Revolution out of her ass. 

Akira leisurely makes his way to their table, Lavenza, who insisted on waiting outside, in tow, and shrugs like he didn’t make them rot here for twenty-four hours straight. 

“Pretty much. So, who’s winning?”

Margaret gives Akira a gentle, welcoming smile.

“That would be me. Your turn, Akechi-kun.”

Goro slams his cards onto the table.

“Fuck both of you.”

“I guess we can finish another time. Well, Kurusu-kun, welcome to the Velvet Room, now, officially.”

As Margaret explains to Akira, this time in a bit more detail, what she has already told Goro the day prior, Goro watches him gradually lose much of the jovial vigor with which he initially entered the Velvet Room. Unconventionally for himself, Akira chooses not to go back to his little cell. Instead, in a bizarre fit of ordinariness, Margaret manifests for them a couple of new chairs, and their odd ensemble ends up seated as if they were awaiting their refreshments at a fancy café, not discussing the metaphysical deteriorations of souls.

Goro maliciously hopes that Igor would feel hurt at such a blatant demonstration of exclusion. Yet, he is expectedly unfazed in his lonesomeness, writing some mysterious notes with his stupid quill, and Goro, not for the first time, suspects that the man might just be demented, and his loyal attendants include him in the discussion just to make the old man feel important.

Lounged to Goro’s left, Akira must appear almost shockingly composed, taking in the information about his own distortion, lusting for blood somewhere in this city, with a blank face and nothing to add. Yet, he can do nothing to hide the way his shoulders round up and tense, the unconscious tick of his hand reaching to tug on his gloves. 

“So, I have a Shadow?” is the first question he asks, voice steady yet thick with faux composure. 

It’s Lavenza, surprisingly, who answers, despite remaining still and lost in thought ever since returning to the Velvet Room.

“I’m afraid that is the most likely explanation. I am deeply, sincerely sorry, Trickster.”

Akira lets the information sink in, for a beat. 

“And what, I will need to infiltrate my own Palace? Steal my Treasure? Can I even enter my own Palace to begin with?”

He doesn’t look at Goro, not once does he glance at him, and Goro feels such a primal need to ask, to finally confirm what happens to a heart you split and kill the other half? What happens when you steal what the heart desires badly enough to twist itself away from its owner, ugly and tormented in its sinful need?

Goro doesn’t remember what killing a Shadow entails, except agony. He doesn’t remember if he knows what annihilating a desire does, but the prospect of doing so to Akira, to anybody, makes him sick.

Goro remains silent. Akira’s hand rests beneath the table and trembles.

“Not all cognitions work the same, Kurusu-kun. It may as well be that yours doesn’t have what you call a Treasure at all.” Margaret’s words don’t sound reassuring.

Akira opens his mouth only to bite down on his own tongue the moment he realizes his lips are trembling. Only then, he does look over at Goro, subtly, and Goro expects him to look scared, he expects him to be uncertain or, perhaps, the opposite, faux-confident and reassuring, but that’s not at all what he catches in Akira’s cloudy, wide eyes.

He looks regretful .

“What if I- What if I don’t want to eliminate my distortion?”

Oh.

And that’s what he fears, isn’t it? That’s what Lavenza said before about Goro - his presence must tie to the distortion receding in Akira’s heart. Dead people don’t simply come back to life, and if they do, what power is needed to reverse annihilation? What can distort a heart enough to give shape to a being whose time on this Earth has reached its end? A distortion , a distortion within Akira’s heart of hearts, something Akira’s tarnished soul managed to pick up, piece by piece, from the depths of hell, and even if they’re correct in assuming that Goro’s manifestation in the world of the living is authentic, it was Akira’s distorted heart that, blindly and unknowingly, brought him here, wasn’t it?

Akira doesn’t fear that eliminating the distortion is going to kill him. Hell, he probably doesn’t even fear that it will kill Goro; it shouldn’t, right? Oh no, that’s not what Akira fears will die.

“Oh, fearing the rumored change of heart , Kurusu-kun?” Margaret’s voice, for all of its teasing cruelty, is empathetic.

Akira doesn’t respond.

“As I said, Kurusu-kun, the Metaverse is an ever-changing landscape. The experience you previously had with encountering people’s Shadow selves is unlikely to be the same as what you are about to face now, and I doubt the resolution to this particular distortion could be found through how you chose to confront cognitions in the past. A phenomenon similar to Palaces was accessible to a previous Wildcard, and in his case, the elimination of a distortion’s source didn’t lead to a Palace’s collapse or a drastic transformation within the person whose Shadow created it.”

Akira must know that the uncertainty is supposed to be meant as a comfort. And yet, his hands continue to shake.

“There’s no point in dwelling on the specifics at the moment, Trickster,” Lavenza says warmly. “Not until we know what we are dealing with more precisely. But I know your heart, at its core, to be strong. Stronger and more resilient than any challenge the world might put it through.”

Goro can see Akira forcing himself to perk up.

“You’re right, Lavenza. No point worrying about it now.”

Judging by the authentic warmth of the girl’s smile, she buys Akira’s little act wholeheartedly.

“Then, why don’t you and Goro Akechi go on a stroll? Maybe see if Tokyo’s landscapes aid his memory.”

 

“So, recalling anything new? Or, well, old ?”

They step out into a dark alleyway, Akira’s silhouette illuminated faintly by the neons bleeding from where the little side street opens into the hustle and bustle of Shibuya, and, momentarily, Goro feels overwhelmed. Yet, upon closer examination, it appears that his instantaneous recognition of his surroundings is nothing more than the familiar depersonalized awareness of knowing what without the why .

“No. But… it does feel familiar, in a detached, factual way. I am aware we are currently in Shibuya.”

Goro knows that, if he were to walk out of this alleyway and turn right, he’ll soon end up at the Shibuya Station. He still has no idea where Goro Akechi liked to go from there.

“You and I rarely ever hung out in Shibuya,” Akira hums. “I don’t think you stopped by here often at all, to be honest.”

Akira is dressed in a casual gray short-sleeve button-up, and it’s the first time Goro sees him out of his high school uniform. Gray seems to be a recurring color palette in Akira’s wardrobe, and Goro can see why. It complements his eyes.

Seemingly catching him looking, Akira wiggles his eyebrows, an obnoxious smirk covering the underlying gloom of his expression.

“Like what you see?” Then, when the comment fails to evoke anything beyond an eye roll. “I thought about wearing my Shujin uniform, even brought it with me, since it’s what you saw me in most often, but I figured it would’ve stood out too much, with it being Golden Week and all.”

Goro looks down at his own ridiculous getup and gives Akira a pointed look.

“Oh, would it, now?”

Akira smirks and reaches to flick the raised shoulders of Goro’s uniform jacket. For how casual the contact is, it still, somehow, sends a shiver down his arm.

“We could try getting you into something a bit more appropriate. I have some clothes to spare. You did promise to let me dress you up, once.”

“I most definitely never promised such an outrageous thing,” Goro really fucking hopes he didn’t. “Now you’re just maliciously using my condition for personal gain.”

It’s fascinating to see how the residual apologetic sorrow floats away beneath Akira’s mask of playfulness, slowly but surely, just by them simply conversing. When he laughs, it sounds almost genuine.

“You sure did! Maybe we can dye your hair back, too. Eyes might have to stay, for now, but otherwise, we can make you look like a bona fide Akechi.”

The suggestion is tempting. Yet, it also makes Goro remember that he, actually, still doesn’t know what a bona fide Akechi looks like.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he accuses with no real malice. “We should get moving. Even if I can, indeed, prevent disappearing for longer here, I still doubt we have all day to stand and ponder such frivolous things.”

Akira falls silent for a bit before breaking into an even brighter smirk.

“Well, wanna test out how far you can actually go? I have a location in mind, but we’ll have to use the train.”

The train? That seems like a rather extreme jump, considering how poorly their last extended outing ended.

“Does it not concern you that people on the train may take offense to my appearance?” Goro decides to start with a more obvious issue. “Or, I don’t know, if I were to randomly vanish right in front of their very eyes? ”

“Hey, my offer to get you dolled up still stands! But it doesn’t concern me, not really,” Akira says, obnoxiously unfazed. “It’s Tokyo, no one really looks at people weird here, they’ll most likely just take you for an overly enthusiastic cosplayer.”

Goro hates to admit that he does have a point. Yet, perhaps, he could still, somehow, manage to take Akira up on that dolling up offer without risking being teased for it for the rest of eternity, or however long of it he has left.

“As for vanishing, experience leads me to believe people don’t actually see when things like that happen. It just kinda passes right by them , like they forget there was a person there to begin with. It’ll be fine as long as I don’t freak out.”

“And you think you can, this time?” Akira’s panicked eyes, hands that fear to reach out, hands that reach out, fearing.

“I’ll give it my best shot.”

Akira’s confidence is dumb, reasonless, and painfully contagious.

“Well then... Lead the way, I suppose.”

 

The train station, thankfully, is not overly hectic. Akira keeps close to him, seemingly constantly surveilling their surroundings for unexpected threats, but nothing disturbs their walk to the station, safe for a couple of amused looks thrown Goro’s way. 

Even the car itself is not crowded, and he and Akira manage to steal a couple of seats by the doors. Despite there being room, Akira sits close, and Goro can feel the fabric of his jeans rubbing against his thigh in time with the soothing trembling of the train.

“Care to enlighten me where we are heading?” he asks quietly a few minutes into their ride.

Akira, who looked so hopelessly lost in thought, perks up at the sound of his voice almost instantaneously.

“Secret.”

“Well, I suppose it wouldn’t mean much to me, even if you told me.”

There is a flicker of sadness that comes and goes in an instant through Akira’s expression. 

“We’re going home,” he whispers with melancholic fondness, and Goro has to wonder if he does, indeed, mean their home , as in the shared space they occupied together.

Akira Kurusu is a wonderfully loathsome person. It’s an undeniable marvel how he, if Goro’s insistent suspicions are, in fact, correct, manages to act so casually, so unceremoniously laid-back in his presence, knowing all the while that Goro doesn’t remember ever having a home, ever belonging or even being anywhere outside of the cages of Akira Kurusu’s own dream realm. 

In the past, Goro Akechi died and left this insufferable, obnoxious fool of a person all alone. He disappeared, potentially over and over and over again, from his grasp, and all Akira does in anticipation of it happening once more is take Goro home . He smiles, and jokes around, and makes promises, and deals, and acts as if letting the pain Goro has caused him go is something he fears more than death itself.

Goro Akechi might’ve hated Akira Kurusu, because he knew that a person like Goro Akechi could never deserve the affection of a person like Akira Kurusu.

They get off at Yongen-Jaya, a quiet and rather unexciting neighborhood according to Goro’s internal database. Yet, Akira’s anticipatory pacing as he all but leaps out of the train and up the stairs suggests that, by all empirical accounts, there’s much more to this obscure corner of Tokyo’s map than what Goro can perceive. 

“How’re you feeling?” Akira asks, nervousness audible in his tone, once they emerge at the narrow maw of some dingy backstreet. In a tick he likely doesn’t notice, Akira’s eyes shoot to Goro’s hands, but Goro can tell even without looking that they’re solid.

“Stop fussing,” is all he offers Akira. Yet, even so, the boy’s face relaxes into an easy, if a bit skittish smile. 

Akira traverses through Yongen-Jaya with the same learned confidence he’s already seen him navigate Shibuya. Compared to Inaba, he truly seems at home within Tokyo’s hustle and bustle, as if a cutout from an odd collage settled neatly back into an old magazine it was originally ripped from. Yongen-Jaya in particular makes him almost giddy, jittery, even, and, following a step behind, Goro can see him messing restlessly with something in his jean pocket, throwing occasional glances behind his back.

He wonders, absent-mindedly, if that’s how it used to be, one day. If they have traversed through this same neighborhood, a lifetime ago, towards a shared destination.

It doesn’t take long before they stop at the entrance of a homely-looking café.

Leblanc .

While the location doesn’t stir up any particular memories within Goro’s sluggish mind - it’s rather unremarkable and eerily still, and the lights aren’t even on, indicating that, expectedly, the place isn’t even open this late - yet the name, Leblanc, when whispered in the placidity of Goro’s mind, brings over an odd sensation of waiting, of escaping and waiting in liminal serenity, for something, someone , in both eagerness and dread, in both yearning and disquietude. 

Akira has promised to take him here, somewhere he’ll have to wait and see for himself .

Next to him, that very same boy is digging a key out of his pocket, oblivious to Goro’s sudden rush of not a memory, not quite, but something close enough, in their circumstances. 

“So, this is where I reside,” he says.

“You live in a café ?” The surprise tastes fake, comes out like a confirmation instead of a question. 

“Yep. Don’t go anywhere, wait right here. I need to tell Morgana to scram if he’s up,” Akira throws behind his shoulder, the key already in the door.

“You brought your fucking cat with you?” I’ve waited here, for him, before.

Akira chuckles and throws him one last reassuring look before disappearing inside. The light does not come on, but he can still make out Akira’s faint shape through the glass door.

Goro doesn’t even have time to get angsty before the chime above the door dings once again, and Akira’s face, tentative smile and a light flush coloring his cheeks, greets him together with the flick of a light switch.

“Welcome home. We usually don’t serve customers this late at night, but I’ll make an exception for the great Detective Prince.”

Goro realizes that he didn’t even consider leaving his spot at Leblanc’s door, not for a moment.

The café is cozy in a way that Goro instinctively appreciates. Nothing too outlandish; rustic, and almost proudly unpopular. Yet, it’s not the layout that catches Goro’s attention - it’s the smell, bitter and savory with a mix of curry spice, coffee, and earthy notes of old wood, and Goro recognizes it instantly . It smells like Akira, and it smells like belonging .

Goro walks through the café, taking in and cataloging the worn, cracked leather of the booths, the admirable cleanliness of the wooden floors, the little collection of varied books resting next to an old line phone, the impressively tender painting in the corner. When he looks over, he finds Akira settled behind the counter, an apron already on, washing his hands at the metal sink. Once he’s done, he looks at Goro almost expectantly, but all Goro can offer him is a crooked, disappointing smile.

“If you hoped I’d suddenly remember everything, then I am sorry to ruin your little fantasy,” he slips into one of the stools at the counter.

Akira’s face contorts into an odd mashup of affection, surprise, and something close to torment , of all things. But before Goro can question his momentary emotional stroke , he is already back to normal, pulling out a porcelain cup from beneath the counter.

“I’ll make you some coffee.”

He gets to work, practiced and proficient in his movements in a way that indicates earned confidence. In the mundane noises of the buzzing coffee grinder and simmering water, immersed in these comforting scents and the murmur of Akira humming an indistinct tune under his nose, Goro allows himself to forget. Forget that he doesn’t remember the last time they were like this, absorbed in this tranquil routine of way-too-late coffee-drinking, alone in this still corner of the city that never sleeps, alone in the whole world. Forget that, just a week ago, he didn’t know who this boy was, glancing over at him like he could read every single thought passing through his mind. Forget that just a month ago, he wasn’t even here at all.

In the mundane noises of Akira’s fingertips tapping against the counter, fragrant coffee pouring from a height into a delicate porcelain cup, he allows himself to pretend, and the act of pretending, its dreadful familiarity, shifts something, ever so slightly, in his mind.

“Your favorite,” Akira places the cup in front of him with a wink. “On the house, detective.”

Blowing the aromatic steam away gently, perhaps too pointedly towards Akira’s hovering, smiling face, Goro brings the cup up to his lips. The first sip, delectable as always, burns the roof of his mouth. Impatience is gonna be the death of him. And why is Akira-

The cognitive dissonance is instantaneous, and the actuality of self-realization blurs him in a vortex. He can vaguely feel himself placing the cup down with shocking amounts of motor coordination, and Akira is still staring, he looks worried, why the hell does he look worried , as if Goro ever gave him reasons to look worried, he can fucking handle himself-

It’s indistinguishable acceleration. As if two equally massive objects collapse , they crash, and burn, and they are stuck in a perpetual motion of collapsing, is that what they call gravitational space-time distortion? Maybe not, he was never that much into physics, just for show and for the off chance there is something to be gained in researching conventional sciences for understanding cognition, and there was, sometimes, the Dirac sea model had a fascinating potential, but where- was the light always so bright in here? And he is accelerating, he is still accelerating, and his skin, oh, it’s his skin, it’s coming apart, it smells like burnt cloth, and saltwater, and burning fucking flesh in here, and it’s his flesh, it’s burning, he is coming apart, he is being torn apart, torn apart, there’s no longer a mass to him, mind with no-

It’s painful. Why exactly is it painful?

Do you want to know why it hurts?

It won’t stop hurting if he knows, there is an epiphonic clarity to that notion, no, it will hurt worse if he knows what’s beyond the pain, before the pain, because in this molasses of neurotic actualization he gets to exist without it hurting too much to kill him, but it killed him, it did, before, and he doesn’t know what killed him, he doesn’t, he doesn’t want to know, it’s through burning, and drowning, and tearing apart that he dies, every time, and it’s through falling asleep, in the cold of the winter night, but he still feels warm, content even, with dying, because he can’t stay, because you need to be in order to stay, and-

“You should not be here.”

And really, should he be here? But who the fuck is Akira to tell him what to do?

His eyes are closed. Perhaps, to shield themselves from the light, or perhaps he doesn’t have eyes , not anymore. He isn’t , anymore, and if he was, it was not here , not in this-

Where exactly is he? 

“You know full well where you’re supposed to be, and it’s not fucking here .”

It’s distorted, and quiet, barely above a whisper, like listening in from underwater, and he thinks he can hear a low, mechanical rumble, something moves without destination, but it sounds like Akira, only not at all, it sounds harsh, and clipped, and fundamentally wrong .

Akira.

He left Akira, in that damn café, and right after he told him he’s gonna hold himself together if something like this happens again, and that idiot definitely didn’t keep his word, he is probably coming apart at this very moment, or rushing to the Velvet Room to find Goro not there, because where the hell is he?

I think I can decide for myself where I should or shouldn’t be, he thinks pointedly in the direction of whatever is speaking to him from above, because he doesn’t have a mouth.

He doesn’t have anything, yet he feels like he is drowning, he feels like something is striking, and he can’t hear the screams, but he knows they are there, he knows, he can’t hear the pleas, because he doesn’t have ears, he can’t smell the cold air and can’t sense the dusting of snow melting underneath his knees, and something strikes him, and it hurts, and he is striking something, and it hurts , but he doesn’t have the tools, the senses to actualize the hurt, to tie it together and articulate to himself its source, to-

Until he does.

It’s an ugly, undignified gasp that escapes him, and Goro cringes. Fucking pathetic .

“He glitched right out of existence in front of me! And I don’t know what to do, what if he doesn’t reappear? How the fuck do you know that he’ll reappear? I can’t do this again, why the hell did I even take him there?!”

It’s Akira.

Shouting.

Thank fucking god .

There is a yelp, and someone shouts his name, and when Goro’s knees buckle, he connects with something warm, soft, and solid seconds before hitting the ground.

“Holy fucking shit, Goro,” Akira’s voice is close and clear, and he sounds out of breath, loud exhales wheezing out of his chest right next to Goro’s ear. “Thank fucking god.”

When he dares to open his eyes, it’s Margaret he sees first, even if he has to squint to make her out from behind a mop of messy black hair currently obstructing his vision.

A piteous groan passes through his lips, and then he finally sees Akira, wide-eyed, and flushed, and looking about ready to pass out.

“Goro, what the hell happened over there?”

“Are you… planning to break my fucking ribs?” Even to his own ears, he sounds feeble and laughably deplorable. Akira adjusts his hold in an instant but doesn’t let go.

The whine that escapes him as he buries his face in Goro’s neck almost evens out the playing field of haplessness.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs fiercely into the collar of his jacket.

“What the hell are you apologizing for?” Goro is pleased to notice that his voice is starting to come back under his control, the shellshock of whatever the fuck just happened to him dispersing rapidly.

All that lingers is the pain, dull and pressing, at the back of his chest and on the tips of his fingers. Burning, and surreal, and unidentifiable, and familiar.

“Do you recall what happened, Akechi-kun?” Margaret crouches down next to them and whispers, because they’re all whispering now, apparently, and there’s Lavenza, eyes darting between them under furrowed brows, also coming closer, right behind Margaret.

Igor’s desk is empty. And for that, Goro couldn’t be gladder.

“I’m not sure,” he admits.

It’s an awkward position to have a conversation in, with Akira still clinging onto him like one wrong move might make him vanish out of existence. And it’s not an unreasonable fear, and Goro doesn’t know when his hand raised to circle around Akira’s waist, and he’s all but pulled Goro onto his lap at this point, holding on with no apparent intentions of letting go.

Goro lets him stay, even if everything inside him screams to push Akira away.

“You glitched away, that’s what happened,” Goro isn’t sure if Margaret or Lavenza can hear Akira hiss into his neck. “You took a sip, got all hazy-eyed, I thought it was just that good, or maybe it triggered the memories to return like some magic potion, but then you glitched, like a broken TV, and you didn’t stop glitching until you just disappeared.”

“Kurusu-kun has rushed here a few minutes prior to your reappearance and informed us, in a rather concerned manner, that you have dispersed once again. Last time, you reemerged in the Velvet Room relatively soon, but Akira was insistent that this instance was, somehow, unprecedented. You were, in fact, gone for a concerningly long time.”

The steadiness of her words is reassuring without the need to be patronizing, and the tentative edge of her tone seems more aimed at soothing Akira than ensuring Goro’s soundness of composure, which Goro is, ultimately, indefinitely grateful for.

“It was… not like the last time,” he confirms delicately, and if Margaret hears Akira’s gruff mumble of no shit, she promptly ignores it, her eyes still studying Goro’s form.

“Do you feel stable enough to elaborate, Akechi-kun?”

And of course he feels fucking stable enough, he just isn’t sure if there’s a possibility of comprehensive elaboration. His head still swims with the impression of wrongness, and agony, misdirected and all-encompassing in a way that only things that lack the aim for their inflicted torment are. 

“Last thing I clearly remember is taking a sip of coffee at the café,” he attempts to start from the beginning, hoping that he can make sense of his own disorienting sensations as he goes. “I believe the experience has triggered something, not quite the onset of memories, but perhaps a possibility of one. It was rather turbulent, and I’m unsure how to articulate it accurately.

“It was… a confusing pool of sensations, but it didn’t seem to settle into any sort of concrete remembrance. I suppose my mind, in its current state, simply couldn’t handle it.”

Margaret is listening attentively, and judging by Akira’s tightening grip on his back, he is, too. From the corner of his eye, unfocused in an attempt to examine the retrospect of the experience he just endured, Goro sees Lavenza take a step towards them from around Margaret, but stop midway, as if suddenly discouraged by something in his tone.

“I do remember a voice, with surprising clarity. Also the pain, it was a rather painful undergoing, overall. But there was someone, or something, that reached out to me there. It was the clearest thing I could make sense of.”

At that, Akira finally loosens his grip and brings his face up into Goro’s line of vision, obscuring everything else to the point that Goro can see nothing but his searching, wide eyes.

Akira’s eyes are gray. Like winter skies. Like murky water.

“What do you mean? What did you hear?”

And isn’t that a peculiar thing to admit.

“You.”

With his brows furrowed and eyes creased in skepticism, Akira looks almost comically childlike. He rarely does, otherwise, look his age, too well-grown into his own body and mind, too certain in his words and movement, even with all the fidgeting, even with all the anxious hesitance and self-doubt he expresses in much subtler ways than one would expect of an eighteen-year-old boy.

It’s a look that suits him, even in the morbid circumstances.

“Me?”

“Do I need to repeat myself?” Goro can’t help but snap, with no real spite. He is mortified to find himself sounding almost fond. “Although I’m not sure it was actually you. I recognized your voice, but it was muffled, like there was something suppressing it in the background. It didn’t sound like something you’d say.”

Akira dislodges himself from him, somewhat, sliding from underneath Goro’s legs to put enough distance between them for Goro to see the entire room clearly. Yet, his hands, gliding down from his sides, find Goro’s, almost instinctively grabbing at the palms in a loose yet deliberate hold.

He can now see Margaret clearly, perplexed yet expectedly amused.

“Could you make out what Kurusu-kun’s voice told you?”

“That I shouldn’t be there . But not as a concern or a warning. It sounded more like a threat.”

At that, Akira’s confused expression firmly morphs into displeasure, as if even the idea of him, or something sounding like him, threatening Goro was insulting.

“No need to look so appalled ,” Goro jabs.

“But I would never- ” he starts, but seemingly fails to settle on the follow-up, tone torn between teasing and genuine dismay.

“The Trickster’s voice? Could it be..?” Lavenza’s quiet inquiry confirms to Goro his own gradually forming suspicion.

“Yes,” he nods solemnly. “I believe that wherever I was thrust, I came into contact with Akira’s distortion .”

It’s a heavy, shattering declaration, and the downcast of Lavenza’s eyes validates that he was about to suspect the same.

“I’m never making you another cup of coffee, ever,” Akira exhales with vigor.  

Goro chuckles.

“Oh, I believe you should do the contrary. If we want to reach your distortion and find out where it hides, I think we should do that again.”

Before Akira can, predictably, protest, Margaret draws the room's attention by getting up from their little crouched circle.

“It must’ve been a rather overwhelming experience for everyone involved, and while I am currently inclined to agree with Akechi-kun’s suggestion, I propose that we suspend this discussion for now.”

“I must go and update the Master on the situation’s advancement,” Lavenza silently agrees, yet, instead of retreating, she comes a bit closer, deliberately avoiding looking at Akira, and hovers her hand slightly above Goro’s shoulder. Like before, whatever trick she performs eases his fatigue, but considerably less than the last time.

Without waiting for gratitude that’s unlikely to come, she steps away.

“I suggest that you get some rest, both of you, and meet us here, once again, tomorrow.”

At that, Akira unexpectedly snaps his attention away from Goro, glaring at his attendants with a self-assured robustness he has never seen directed at anyone within the confines of the Velvet Room.

“Like hell am I going anywhere tonight.”

Goro’s face contorts in shocked annoyance. He what? And what is he proposing, he just moves into the Velvet Room to, again, what? Keep an eye on Goro to make sure his evil twin doesn’t ambush his own dream realm?

“Don’t be ridiculous ,” Goro barks. “You can’t just stay here. Go the fuck home.”

“If that’s what you wish for, Kurusu-kun,” Margaret, the traitor . “I believe in your current condition, the time for you passes the same in or out of the Velvet Room. It is your world, after all, so you are welcome to stay for as long as you’d like.”

And Akira fucking beams , right at him, and he looks so self-satisfied, and Goro wants to punch his teeth in.

“Thank you for having me!”

 

Goro expects there to be at least one agonizingly uncomfortable conversation as he begrudgingly leads Akira into his humble domain within the Velvet Room, as, apparently , neither Lavenza nor Margaret is willing to manifest their dear Trickster new sleeping quarters. Yet, once Akira’s head connects with the arm of the couch, he is out like a light in moments, tension and exhaustion of the day seeping out of his resting form with every deep breath. He discards both his gloves and his ridiculous coat before succumbing to what he claims will be just a nap, I’m just gonna rest my eyes for a moment, okay, just stay right here, revealing that the gray contraption he was wearing underneath was, in fact, a fucking vest , and Goro, already scolding himself internally, yields to draping the abandoned coat over his sleeping form once he’s sure Akira is gone enough not to be roused.

Watching him sleep feels creepy and a tad too intimate for comfort, so he promptly escapes from the lounge room.

It’s Margaret he finds, sifting through the cards they’ve abandoned what feels like ages ago. Recently, a lot of things have been feeling much longer to Goro than they appear in reality.

“Akechi-kun,” she greets him gently. “Has the Trickster settled well?”

“He was out immediately,” he informs the woman without making eye contact, making way to take a seat next to her at the table.

“That is to be expected. He was quite distressed by your disappearance,” she nods. “From what I’ve heard, Kurusu-kun is not one to get easily distressed. Although my experiences with him so far often suggest otherwise.”

Goro doesn’t give her the satisfaction of a reaction, reaching instead for the remains of the cards scattered on the table, and begins to organize them into a semblance of order.

They work on it in a comfortable silence for a beat.

“Akechi-kun, do you mind if I pry into something?”

Margaret is not one to ask before startling someone with an uncomfortable question. Even so, Goro is not one to be easily startled.

“Sure, Margaret-san,” he coats his voice with deceptive pleasantry, if not to misguide Margaret, which he knows to be fruitless, then to comfort himself in preparation.

“Has your experience today been completely ineffective in rousing your memory?”

“It was and it wasn’t,” he admits for the first time, after a moment. “I’m not quite sure what to make of it, but I believe some of the sensations, especially the pain, were my own, from a time I can’t recall.”

And was it really that he couldn’t recall it? The pain was, indeed, overbearing, blinding in its intensity, but was it really only pain? There was also tenderness to be found, somewhere he refused to reach, and jovial laughter, and rage, and sorrow, which was even more agony-inducing than the pain.

“Margaret-san.” She looks at him, indifferently affirming, without any expectation or pity, and it’s that indifference, that accepting vacancy, that gives him the courage to rip the bandaid off. “I believe there was a chance there for me, to remember. Is it possible that I have refused it myself, willingly?”

She smiles and looks at Goro as if he is both himself and someone other, someone only Margaret herself could see in the reflection of his eyes.

“All of us, residents and guests alike, are on a journey of self-discovery. You included, Akechi-kun,” she speaks softly. “It seems that for some of us residents, that journey ultimately leads to leaving the Velvet Room to save someone dear. I have someone like that, too, and if he were ever to need my assistance, little in this world would stop me from coming to his aid, no matter what it takes. Even if it means leaving. 

“Do you have someone for whom you’re willing to do something equally as preposterous?”

He doesn’t know. But he knows why she is telling him this. He knows Goro Akechi had what she describes. He just doesn't want to know if Goro Akechi ended up leaving his Velvet Room.

“I’m not a resident of the Velvet Room, Margaret-san, in case you’ve forgotten.”

Margaret’s chuckle is light and playful.

“Oh, but I wonder if we are all not still connected through this place, in our own ways. It is true that you have not been born here, and neither have you ever struck a deal with us to earn our support and guidance. Yet, of all places, the part of your soul most eager to reunite with the world of the living still ended up here. That constitutes a bond, does it not?”

A bond, huh. Goro wonders how many of those he would be severing if he never recalls his past life. Then, yet again, he thinks of Lavenza placing a mirror into his hand and exerting herself to meet his demand for books that have something to do with more than children’s fables. He thinks of Margaret’s teasing as they play cards, her snicker of have, perhaps, the memory of rules to Tycoon also fled your mind, Akechi-kun?

He thinks of Akira Kurusu, wide-eyed and vulnerable in his fear, who sleeps just a corridor away, neglecting the comfort of his home for the sake of spending the night caged in his own mind’s prison. 

“You know, all of us, attendants, enter this place the same as you did, in a sense,” Margaret reaches over to take his completed stack of cards from his hands, and merges it with her own. “We do not recall our past lives, we do not even know if we have lived prior, and we exist for no higher purpose than to serve our Master, who has created us. It is rumored that, perhaps, all of us were once Wildcards who have failed to avoid ruin.”

It’s a strange thought, imagining Margaret the same as himself, lost in a world she doesn’t comprehend, bound to this position of confinement by death, or rebirth, or the very concept of failure she cannot even recall.

“And what, this is supposed to be your punishment?”

“Well, if it’s intended as one, it is not very successful,” the lightness of her tone suggests that the morbid sentiment is, in fact, her truth. “Most of us feel perfectly content with our roles.”

Stuck as eternal helpers to the ones they hope will succeed at what they failed. Stuck guiding your future iterations from ruin neither of you has ever chosen.

The fate of the Wildcard, same as Akira, same as, he presumes, himself. A role no one chooses, in which both failure and success lead, unavoidably, to demolition.

“..You don’t ever wonder​​ what your life must’ve been like, as a human, if that is indeed true?”

“Oh, I do wonder. But here lies the difference between us that still makes you a guest, and not an inherent part of the Velvet Room. I simply wonder. You yearn to be reconnected with your past.”

And he must yearn, right? Even if it’s not a game he could win, and even if ruin awaits him regardless of what path he takes, he would still want to see it to fruition as himself .

The coffee Akira prepared for him was Goro’s favorite, a bit sweeter and nuttier than what he preferred himself. Goro never really liked the taste of coffee, too bitter and overbearing for his palate. Yet, he still used to drink it with a smile, a mask of maturity he had to put on in the absence of an option to exist within the bliss of adolescent innocence, a self-serving ritual of pretending to be someone greater than just a frightful, lonely child. Yet, Akira’s coffee is the first he genuinely enjoyed, made just the way he likes it, before Goro himself knew how he liked it.

“Care for a rematch, Margaret-san?”

She begins to deal the cards. The rules aren’t suited for just two people, but they make do.

Notes:

We’re getting into the real fast-paced plot progression stuff now. Also, from now on I’ll try to update this thing every Wednesday instead of like… randomly when I feel like it (but hey, the next chapter is 16k words). Work has been kicking my ass so it’s time to stop writing gay yearning and start writing some emails.

Chapter title from River was Filled with Stories / 水の線路 by World’s End Girlfriend.

Chapter 8: Membrane of Remembrance

Akira wakes up on his second night back in Tokyo to a sound of distant melodic serenading, the quiet rustling of pages, and an intense, almost paralyzing pain in his lower back.

“Rise and shine,” Goro’s flat voice comes from somewhere to his right, and all Akira can do is groan and turn away, nestling his aching body deeper into the cushions and pulling what appears to be his coat over his head.

“Not a morning person, I presume? Typical,” whatever Goro means by that, Akira wants to assure him that he is totally wrong. He has been late to school exactly once, because his school turned into a castle, and he is notorious for his old-person bedtime courtesy of the one and only Morgana.

Who, come to think of it, is probably freaking out in real time somewhere on the other side of Tokyo. Together with Futaba, most likely, if she managed to rouse her up this early. Is it early? The Velvet Room is strange like that. He’s been spoiled by viewing an hour here as equivalent to minutes in the real world, and, now that those privileges have been revoked, he can no longer comprehend time as a concept. 

He just hopes that Futaba didn’t alert the entire Phantom Thieves ensemble to his disappearance. And, most crucially, of the culprit behind it.

He should probably check his phone. Also, get up. Perhaps ask Goro out for breakfast.

Speaking of-

“Did you fall back asleep?” he sounds irritated, expectedly. But he also sounds definitively here.

Akira is officially over disappearance acts, his, Goro’s, or otherwise. They’ve never been much fun, but yesterday marked a new low for him, in that regard. For a moment there, in Leblanc, it almost felt okay, in all of its familiar disequilibrium and beautiful, cruel glory. Goro perched up on his usual seat, relaxed and content with a cup of coffee in his hand, and Akira, with his routinely ridiculed lovesick grin, waiting for him to acknowledge his efforts. The coffee was always just right. After December, Goro usually called it acceptable.

He knew something was off the moment Goro put that damn cup down. His entire ride back to Shibuya, spent in anxious twitching and iron-willed attempts to keep himself from outright sobbing, was dedicated to fearing the exact thing that happened - he stepped through the Velvet Room’s door and Goro was not there.

He was, quite frankly, over reminders of Goro’s impermanence. 

There is a weight in his chest that he doesn’t know how to shake off.

“I think I already know the answer, but do you guys actually sleep?” he says instead of a good morning, still not facing Goro, but knowing all too well that if he does, the weight in his chest would lift, just a little, only to plummet back down twice as heavy.

That’s the danger of it, letting yourself hope for improbable things.

“If you already know the answer, why ask the question?”

“Oh, I just like hearing you talk.” It’s embarrassingly true. He doesn’t think he ever got to tell him that.

“We don’t. Also, we don’t eat or have any bodily needs, for that matter. I assume it has to do with the fact that, unlike you, who traverses the Metaverse within your own physical body, ours are more or less cognitive in nature. I might not remember what having a body entails in practice, but I doubt I’m missing out on much by skipping the more tedious fundamentals. Also, don’t lump me and the attendants together; I do not reside here.”

“You quite literally reside here.”

“Don’t act pedantic, it doesn't suit you.”

Akira doesn't ask him what he thinks would suit him, because he doesn't think he could be an asshole so soon after waking up. He doesn’t turn to Goro either, like an asshole.

“I didn't use to go into the Velvet Room physically, either. Apparently, I just stood there and spaced out for a bit, all the while, from my perspective, I was spending hours chopping off heads in here. Or, mostly just being indecisive, I guess. Fusions were stressful.”

Akira hears Goro plop something down onto the little table, a book, presumably, and, for a moment, he dwells in an unfamiliar anxiety, not seeing him, not hearing a sound, and if that’s Goro’s tactic for making him turn around, it’s almost working, the key word being almost.

Goro lets out an audible sigh. Still here. Good.

“Are you just going to communicate with the back of the couch today?”

“Yeah.” That might not be the worst idea. Akira isn’t quite sure why he feels so anxious. There’s really no reason for him to feel anxious, especially not in Joker’s outfit, that’s disrespectful to Joker. Joker never gets anxious. “Do you know that you can actually eat?”

“Well, the coffee incident seems to suggest otherwise,” Goro parries teasingly. He seems to be in good spirits today, unexpectedly, and Akira desperately wishes he could enjoy this fragile rarity. 

“Lavenza can eat just fine, so I’m sure you can handle more than a single sip of coffee without giving me a heart attack.”

“Is that what you’re so upset about?”

Here’s the thing about him and Goro Akechi. Akira Kurusu and Goro Akechi don’t talk feelings. Feelings in their case exist in a perpetual vacuum of impossibilities and inevitabilities, as paradoxical as they are unspoken. And it’s not like Akira is incapable of talking feelings, hell, he could probably talk feelings with a fucking wall, it’s just that the combination of Akira Kurusu and Goro Akechi indulging in a dialogue, about feelings, leads to the assured conclusion that they will talk about Akira’s feelings, possibly even in the context of their correlation with Goro’s feelings, and that is simply something Akira Kurusu doesn’t engage in.

There is a chance Akira might be, indeed, feeling anxious. Which he doesn’t feel, period. The source of anxiety remains to be determined, but it is very likely currently staring him down from across the room, waiting for him to respond. 

“I’m not upset.” Even in his current state, Akira understands that these would be the exact words of someone who is, in fact, upset. Which is not him.

“You do realize that you’re currently sulking about what should be, by all empirical accounts, considered progress? I don’t permanently disappear if a certain stimulus triggers me to spawn back in the Velvet Room. You, quite frankly, have no right to lie here and hate me for something that is not only out of my control but also, objectively, brings us closer to our ultimate goal.”

“Akechi, I don’t think you realize that, and I don’t think you’ve ever realized that, but there’s quite literally nothing you can do that would make me hate you. Trust me.”

“I suppose the limits have been tested?”

“..Extensively.”

Goro doesn’t answer, and Akira, still drifting in his cocoon of unidentified unease, wonders what exactly goes through his mind in moments like these, when a careless nudge of his past life manages to pass the security lines Akira has deliberately put up in front of him, and Goro is given a puzzle piece to place inside a nearly-empty frame. Goro Akechi is a categorical person. For all of his dichotomies and extreme affectations, he still enjoys storing information deliberately. Does he store the puzzle pieces away for future use when the frame gets not so terrifyingly empty? Does he compare it against the pieces he already has and map out an approximation within the frame to potentially adjust it later?

He yearns for that frame to be filled out, once again. With impressions of bloodshed and with the toxicants of betrayal. With shared music and shared words and shared silences that speak of things improbable to ever take up space in worlds that see value in suffering. They share three deaths in between them, yet isn’t the death of remembrance also a death, in its own right? And doesn’t the death of something dear also kill something within those who are doomed to keep on living?

Akira wonders if a kinder world he had killed would’ve had Goro forget what he was willing to die for, in a world after his death. If this version of him had still asked Akira to blow it to pieces.

There is a shift in the room’s idleness, and Akira hears the weight of Goro Akechi lift from the couch, followed by a short string of determined footsteps.

And then Akira’s world physically shifts, and he is lying on his back, a pair of very resolute, very annoyed yellow eyes staring at him from above. Akira really hates how his heart jumps to clog his throat. 

“I’m right here, alive and well. Get over yourself.”

He doesn’t linger for more than a couple of beats of Akira's stupid heart, and Akira’s heart is beating very fast. 

Goro Akechi is a very beautiful person.

Akira rises almost to follow, sitting up straight and stretching the cramped muscles of his back. Arms crossed and expression deliberately unreadable, Goro watches him from the foot of the couch as he pulls on his jacket and shoves the discarded gloves into his pocket. 

“Now, are you ready to stop wasting everyone’s time?”

Akira was correct. The weight in his chest now threatens to crush his fucking diaphragm.

“Speaking of, what time is it?”  

“How the hell would I know?”

For how outlandish such a claim sounds, Akira supposes it makes sense. He is aware that Lavenza owns a phone, for some reason, but he doesn’t recall knowing of any other technological apparatuses within the Velvet Room, including good old-fashioned clocks. It does, however, raise a concern about what the hell was Goro doing here all this time? Goro doesn’t own a phone. He doesn’t really own anything anymore, does he? Was he just reading? Playing cards with Margaret? Dwelling on the nature of his existence, like a nihilistic prick he is? 

They should probably invest in a phone for Goro. Once they establish where the hell Akira’s phone went.

Right, break down a problem, address the immediate concerns first, then move with the flow. A classic Joker mantra that has never failed him. And the most immediate concern right now is figuring out how long he slept in, and if, in the time of his absence, Morgana or Futaba has pronounced him dead to the world.

“Do you know where my phone is?”

“How the hell would I know?”

Goro is still standing there, same pose, same irritated glare, like he expects Akira to leap from the couch and immediately follow him to chase down his own Shadow. 

“Is that your new catch phrase? Your new default dialogue option?” Akira can also do irritated. Not very successfully, but he knows Goro can handle it.

“Maybe check your pockets, genius.”

And check he does. It’s currently 8:34 am, Sunday, April 30th. He has twelve unread texts and seven missed calls from Futaba, twelve messages in the group chat, three each from Ryuji and Ann, one from Sojiro. This is, somehow, reassuring.

Goro is giving him a look that’s definitively aiming for annoyance but settles more in the self-satisfied territory.

“You might wanna sit down for a moment if you don’t want my entire friend group storming the place within an hour.”

Goro raises an eyebrow but does return to his seat, albeit deliberately sluggishly.

“Just don’t take too long. We don’t have all day. If you have time to chat with your precious friends, you can definitely find time to determine our next steps.”

Some things really never change.

The group chat, which was originally his biggest source of potential worriment, consists of nothing but a couple exclamations of excitement from last night and a short new thread reminding everyone that they’ll be meeting Sumire tomorrow. Similarly, Ryuji and Ann give him no grief by simply enquiring if he, in the off chance he hasn’t made plans, would like to meet up with them - in Ann’s case, with Makoto included - for an afternoon hangout. 

Sojiro’s message is, by far, the most foreboding.

6:21 am

Boss: Care to explain why I came into an empty cafe, unlocked, at six in the morning, with my daughter crying because you, allegedly, got kidnapped?

8:38 am

Akira: I’m so sorry. Did not get kidnapped. Will explain later. 

Akira: Be there in an hour max.

Oh, wouldn’t that be fun to explain.

Expectedly, the worst of it waits for him next.

5:12 am

Futaba: Akira.

Futaba: Mona just woke me up and told me you didn’t come home.

<Missed Call>

<Missed Call>

Futaba: I know you missed Akechi oh so much, but it’s not funny, at least pick up your phone.

5:25 am

Futaba: Earth to Akira!

Futaba: We’re worried here.

Futaba: Mona is so mad.

Futaba: I’m mad, too.

<Missed Call>

<Missed Call>

<Missed Call>

Futaba: Akechi is gonna die a third time if he did something to you!

<Missed Call>

Futaba: I’m waiting till six, and getting Sojiro.

5:58 am

<Missed Call>

Futaba: That’s it. I’m getting him.

7:18 am

Futaba: If I don’t hear from you in an hour, the Thieves are getting involved.

Futaba: You’ve been warned! Akira, pick up your stupid phone!

8:43 am

Akira: Please don’t tell me you told the others.

Futaba: What the hell, Akira?!

Akira: I’m alright, please don’t freak out. I’ll be in Leblanc as soon as I finish up here. We had Velvet Room business, and things went super wrong, and I ended up crashing here.

Futaba: You're literally indebted to me for the rest of ever.

Futaba: I didn’t call the Thieves.

“I will be crucified,” Akira exclaims into the void. 

“Did you really fail to inform your guardian that you wouldn’t be coming home?” his fellow void resident asks dryly. “Should I be worried? Did someone notify the police?”

“No, Futaba and Morgana got all freaked out, but they didn’t tell anyone. Also, when the hell did you expect me to inform them?”

Goro just shrugs in a way that’s clearly made to mask that he didn’t think his own smartass question through. 

“As long as it doesn’t interfere with our current objective, it’s not my problem,” he fails to look as indifferent as he sounds. So much for wanting to enjoy Goro’s good spirits.

“And what exactly is our current objective?” Akira has a damn good idea of what their next step must be. Yet, asking, somehow, makes it less foreboding. It’s a feeling similar to the one he used to get whenever Joker would round everyone up in a safe room, going over their progress and status, knowing full well that they would be pressing on regardless of how tired or low on supplies everyone was. 

Usually, it’s Akira’s responsibility to break the bad news to everyone. But Goro has always been the best at breaking the worst news to Akira. 

“Figure out more ways for me to contact your Shadow, or whatever it is that I’ve heard back at Leblanc, obviously,” and Goro says it like it is, indeed, obvious. Like there’s not a billion things that could go wrong in such a thoughtless, poorly defined plan, with so many undetermined variables, so many hidden dangers that might get Goro killed.

“So what, we're just gonna try giving you more coffee and hope for the best? We don’t even know what it was that you heard. It definitely didn’t sound like me, Shadow or not. I thought our prime objective was recovering your memories, not rushing into battle with whatever distorted mess my heart created.”

God, he sounds like Goro, doesn’t he? So what if it’s reckless, Joker feeds off of being reckless. Joker walks straight into the domain of the gods, blindly, like he owns the place, and lets all of his friends get disintegrated. Joker gets attached to danger incarnate and lets it shoot him in the face. Joker doesn’t have time for careful planning and meticulous preparations, because Joker has a gun, and a knife, and the heedless trust of a handful of traumatized teenagers, and that’s all he is allowed to wield to win.

Joker doesn’t fight to protect. He fights to win.

Really losing your spirit of rebellion there, aren’t we, friend? a traitorous voice within him murmurs.

“I’m not made out of glass, Akira,” Goro doesn’t scream, doesn’t even sound that appalled, despite Akira’s implications, Akira’s meek cowardice. Spineless, is that what he called me? Akira doesn’t need to ask himself that. He remembers every single word Goro has said to him that night, verbatim. “You are correct in stating that we don’t know what we’re facing, or even the exact mechanics of reaching it. But we are not particularly swimming in options here, and I am, frankly, tired of waiting and hoping that resolutions would be reached without my involvement.

“And didn’t you say that you’d do anything to get me back to normal?” Akira could imagine Goro saying these same words with malice, or with cruel irony. But never with such outright sincerity. Never as a real question. “It’s your Shadow we’re talking about. I doubt it’s even anything to treat apprehensively. It’s not like you would actually hurt me.”

Goro tries, almost successfully, to sound confident. It still comes out with a breathless apprehension of a question.

“Me, as in myself, would never,” I have done enough of that already. “But a part of me might.”

Goro looks at him like he is trying to read in his expression the inexplicable strings of fates, past and present. Like if he looks at him intensely enough, Akira would morph into a version of Goro he never knew and tell him all about the Akira he doesn’t know enough.

It’s a shameful thought, really. But Akira finds himself unsure of whether or not he actually wants him to ever find whatever he’s looking for.

“Having second thoughts already?” And here it is, what he expected. The cruelty. The hurt.

He looks so much like Goro, one who never made peace with monsters that hide in his closet, one who snarled at kindness and suffering alike, because he never knew the difference. One who defined himself by all the things that hurt him, and aimed to hurt them in return.

A part of Akira that lives concerningly close to the one that erased the existence of Goro Akechi with a sentence and a press of a button stirs at the hurt. It revels in it, masochistically tearing into the scabs of his wounds, clotted blood beneath dull fingernails.

Akira isn’t allowed second thoughts, that’s been established a long time ago. He is only allowed to move forward.

Maruki’s reality was a place defined by the man’s inability to move forward, by his desire to run away from pain. And, at the time, it was pretty easy for Akira to deny the man his truth - to fight, with everything he had, for the suffering that, according to Akira, was what made people who they are, what made him who he is. 

Standing at the top of a crumbling world he’s built as an escape from all that he deemed agonizing and unfair, beaten and bruised and crumbling right in front of Akira’s eyes, Maruki still spoke of Rumi. Screamed of her, desperately, the god of a painless kingdom, crying out in torment to a woman who didn’t even remember his name.

He seemed to master Azathoth’s power in giving them their perfect little realities. Hell, he gave Akira the exact same second chance he was denied. Yet, Maruki never used actualization on himself, or on Rumi, for that matter, after figuring out how exactly Azathoth worked. For all of Maruki’s desire to give everyone a perfect place to escape, his preferred hiding spot was his own suffering, bearing the weight of a perfect world.

Akira wonders if that’s why Maruki took such a liking to him, specifically.

He also wonders what Maruki would think of him now, thrust out of his own reality of grief, the one he fought so hard to return to, by a backfired subconscious wish.

At least he is glad that Maruki’s read on him was not correct - he isn’t kind, or altruistic. His wish was selfish. He wants his Rumi to bear the scars of the past. 

He wonders if he saved Maruki for the same reason - so he would have to bear his own scars alongside Akira. They almost matched, after all.

“No, I don’t.” Would Eurydice ever forgive Orpheus, even if he succeeded? When she wakes up from the nightmares of hell for the rest of her life, would she look over at him with gratitude or hatred? “I promised you. I don’t intend to back down.”

The pressure in Akira’s chest only tightens at the sight of Goro’s softened smile, a glint of fieriness flickering in the yellow of his eyes.

“Good. Me neither.”

 

First thing Akira notes is that Igor has returned to his usual spot, and he doesn’t miss how Goro’s expression sours at the sight. For how chummy he seems with Margaret and Lavenza, he really seems to hold some sort of vendetta against Igor, which Akira reluctantly understands. He’d take the guy over his evil copy any day, but Igor is a rather difficult person, or, well, entity, to trust, especially with how little comprehensive help he provides.

Once Goro’s eyes meet Margaret’s, who appears to be deep in discussing something with Lavenza to the side of Igor’s desk, he gives her a meaningful nod, which she returns with a subdued smile. If Akira knew that, for Goro to come out of his shell and make more than a single friend, he just needed to introduce him to some servants of the supernatural unknown, he would’ve invited him to hang out in the Velvet Room on day one.

“Did you sleep well, Trickster?” Lavenza separates from the conversation first to greet them.

“Yes, thank you, Lavenza. I feel shockingly well-rested.”

“Then, I presume, all of us are ready,” Margaret joins Lavenza in moving away from Igor’s desk, the four of them forming a circle to the side of their master, who, expectedly, appears uninterested in the discussion. Akira finds himself rather fond of this recent change in spatial subordination. Standing in the cell, even if it was unlocked, always gave him an uneasy feeling, especially after he got to experience what actual prison cells are like.

“Our Master has been updated on the events of yesterday, and, collaboratively, we were able to draw a few conclusions,” Lavenza begins promisingly. “This situation is completely unprecedented for the Velvet Room, but there is a high likelihood of the apparition you have contacted, Goro Akechi, indeed being the Trickster’s Shadow self. As for what might’ve triggered the clash, we truly don’t know.”

“We do, however, see Akechi-kun’s suggestion to attempt and trigger it again as reasonable, if highly precarious.”

It’s Joker who responds to Margaret, and Akira hopes, even prays, that his own face is hidden securely beneath the mask.

“Then we just have to figure it out, trial and error style,” he looks over at Goro and gives him a little wink. “Another coffee date might be a good starting point.”

In Goro’s eyes, he is reflected unmasked and vulnerable.

“If I understand it correctly, it’s experiences linked to memories, mostly sensational. So we might, in fact, be able to kill two birds with one stone - uncover more about Akira’s distortion and return my memory.”

“The memory resides within you already, Akechi-kun,” Akira can’t read Margaret’s expression, but judging by Goro’s suddenly tensed shoulders, there is a meaning to this sentiment he is missing. “All you need to ensure is an opportunity for you to reach it.”

The thought seems to stir as much doubt within Goro as it does in Akira’s own selfish heart, which Akira doesn’t expect. He stores this particular expression to examine later, preferably when no looming expectations of confidence are hanging over his shoulders.

“So, are we to head out now, or do you first need to deal with your little sneaking out problem ?” When Goro looks back at him, all shadows of apprehension have already vanished from his face, but the plastic gleam of Detective Prince’s polite smile warns Akira that they are still floating close to the surface.

There’s probably a small recreation of hell awaiting him at Leblanc as they speak, and truly, the accusatory looks and disappointing words of Morgana, Futaba, and likely Sojiro are the last thing Akira wants to deal with right now, even considering that his alternative is arranging a showdown between Goro and his own deranged, aggressive consciousness monster. There is, however, a gleeful suggestion to avoid direct confrontation through even more direct escalation already brewing in his mind, its scheming sounding dangerously like Joker.

“Well, that depends, Akechi. How would you feel about meeting my family?”

Goro, in fact, feels extremely poorly about the prospect of meeting the Sakuras. Which he makes known, unkindly, in as direct of terms as possible.

“This is, quite frankly, the most idiotic idea I’ve ever heard you suggest.” Well, at least he is no longer silently obsessing over whatever set him off previously about Margaret’s words. “Why the hell would I go to meet your damn family right now?”

From the corner of his eye, he catches Lavenza make a face, looking rather uncomfortable, not unlike a kid watching her parents fight. Margaret just looks smug. Akira begins regretting learning to read her expressions.

“First, this is far from the most idiotic idea you’ve ever heard me suggest. You’ve just blissfully forgotten the way more outrageous ones. Second, they already know your situation, and they are, in fact, also people you used to know, so meeting them might be beneficial in stirring your memory. And third, didn’t you wanna get a head start? I don’t see a point in wasting time on me going and mending this mess when I can just show them the culprit and go right back to wining and dining you.”

In all honesty, the last point is, mostly, what Akira plans to get out of this. He did already somewhat promise Futaba that he’s gonna let her meet this version of Goro, and, considering that the worst of introducing the Sakuras to the idea that the person who, in their humble opinion, inadvertently destroyed Akira’s life waltzed right back into the world of the living is behind them, he doesn’t see how anything too bad can come out of taking Goro to Leblanc right now. If anything, it will save Akira the grief of hiding him behind corners in the long run, if this whole memory restoration journey takes longer than expected.

Akira promptly stops his might from venturing back to what he expects to see at this journey’s end.

“And is your family, as you refer to them, equally as obnoxious as your cat?” Goro refuses to back down.

“Nah, I told you - Morgana is special. Futaba can be a bit eccentric, but she’ll probably behave for my sake.” You killed her mother, and you don’t remember, but she does, oh, she does, and I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry in advance that I want you to remember, too. “Sojiro used to somewhat like you, though.”

“Somewhat like me?”

Akira shrugs.

“Hey, take what you can get. Not all people have my exquisite tastes.”

It’s a lose-lose battle, it’s a zero-sum game where equal amounts of grief are lost and gained. It’s been this way from the very start, and Akira knew from the start that his pieces stand at a disadvantage, both in this little back-and-forth of getting Goro to join him in Leblanc and in the conflict of gods versus wishes, actuality versus personhood. Goro can either choose to stay, put his foot down and let Akira deal with the mild-to-moderate level of scolding for a bit before he finds an excuse to get Leblanc to himself and, ultimately, still drags Goro over; or he can yield and subject them both to a few shocked gazes and fruitless accusations, before potentially getting strangled by Akira’s Shadow the very same day, hopefully with neither of the Sakuras present.

Goro can regain all his memories any minute by random accident and, in a fit of uncharacteristic reasonableness, tell Akira to get the fuck out and never speak to him again, even if it means spending the rest of his days as a Velvet Room apparition, which is good for Akira, because he is very much done with respecting Goro’s wishes if they are stupid. Or he can never regain them at all, and probably have a plausible chance at healing this way, and doom Akira to wish for eternity for a him that knows all the horrible, despicable things that make them both who they are.

Akira knows he will stay either way, unwanted or unrecognized, because there is no option for him to stay known and loved.

“I guess I would have to face them eventually, if they are your allies and already aware of my existence,” Goro says with unexpected weariness straining his voice.

If that’s the excuse he chooses to settle on, Akira is not gonna argue.

And as they wave their goodbyes, Goro slightly rigid in an apprehension he refuses to acknowledge and Akira slightly lightheaded in an apprehension he refuses to examine, Akira things of hospital rooms as seen on tiny old TVs that don’t belong in modern labs, of funeral homes that don’t hold records of missing bodies, and of people dying in the worlds of their own minds. 

 

“Is there anything I must know about these people you’re about to expose me to?” Goro asks him once they walk onto the sun-bathed streets of Shibuya. Akira has never seen this version of him in such opulent lighting, and he is pleased to note that Goro’s hair, glowing in the sun, does, indeed, look stunning. Simple pleasures.

“Well, don’t call them these people, for one. Sojiro and Futaba Sakura, not related by blood, but like father and daughter in spirit. But I would avoid bringing up anything family-related,” You killed her mother, Goro. You have murdered Futaba’s mother and Sojiro’s closest friend because you wanted to kill your own dad. “Sensitive topic.”

“Duly noted. Anything else, or do you want this to be a shock for both parties? Wasn’t what Lavenza pulled on you in the Velvet Room enough to satiate your need for shocking reunions?”

Being outside, especially when they’re no longer shielded by the comfort of late-night anonymity, seems to be bringing Goro close to yet another edge. It seems like, nowadays, if they were to sit down and write a list of every single thing that, at all times, threatens to torment them to the point of a mental breakdown, Akira and Goro’s combined record could probably make up a hefty book. Akira really needs to convince him that a change of appearance might be beneficial. If not the hair and eyes, then, at least, the clothes need to go.

“Not much. Sojiro is chill, mostly, and if he does get angry, it’s gonna be with me, not you. Futaba is… an unpredictable variable, but I trust her not to make a fuss in front of you.”

There’s a group of teenage girls, maybe a couple of grades under Akira, eyeing Goro to their left with very obvious awe. If Goro notices, the present tension in his movements is already too high to tell. Akira tries to walk a bit closer to him, anyway.

“I surely hope that unpredictability doesn’t turn hostile.”

“Nah, Futaba knows you don’t remember anything,” Like the fact that you killed her mother, you might not remember, but she does, even if she never speaks about it to me, I know, we both used to know. “So she’ll behave. Maybe tease you a little, but that’s about it.”

“Does the annoying streak run in the family? ”

“Once again, none of us are related. But in spirit, Futaba and I are like twins separated at birth, so make of that what you will.”

Goro rolls his eyes, but Akira catches a thin veil of strain slide off his shoulders. It’s reassuring to know that Akira can still make him loosen up, and it’s reassuring to know that Goro still refuses to admit it.

“Oh, that’s just delightful to know.”

 

Akira knew that Futaba Sakura hated Goro Akechi. She has never told him that, not outright, not to his face, but she told him through the disappointed looks she would fail to mask every evening upon seeing Akira, coat on and a somewhat manic smile refusing to stay off his lips, rush out of Leblanc’s door while she stayed in the booth she shared with her mother mere days ago. She told him through the avoidant smiles that, unlike the rage, or the faux support, or the obvious ignorance, appeared laced with guiltful foreboding as she turned around and sat there, in silence, instead of changing the topic like the rest of them, every time she would catch Akira staring into space a certain way in the weeks between his parole and departure.

When Futaba spoke of her mother’s death, it was always they who killed her, or she who died, or, most often, there wasn’t a subject in the statements about Wakaba Isshiki's passing at all. That was their unspoken agreement - Futaba will act like she didn’t know the name and face attached to the hands that pushed her mom in front of that damned car, and Akira will comfort and encourage her whenever the grief gets unbearable, like he has never held onto those bloodied hands as if his own salvation lied in their clasp. 

Futaba Sakura was not good at pretending, but she was good at locking things up. 

Akira wasn’t particularly good at pretending, either, he saw it more as Goro’s domain, but he was good at becoming. Next to him, just a turn and a push of a door separating them from coming face-to-face with a point of no return, Goro was pretending that he wasn’t trepidatious. An abrasive, if a bit mellowed front Akira recognized from both their first January conversation at the laundromat and their cathartic introduction in the Velvet Room. 

Powering through the remaining steps the same way he did when sizing up a Palace guard, Akira has become confident.

The chime went off. 

Someone yelled his name.

All sound ceased.

To give credit where credit is due, Sojiro thought of keeping the place closed for the day, both he and Futaba seated across from each other at one of the booths in an otherwise empty café. Well, Akira assumes they were seated that way based on the abandoned laptop and half-empty cup of coffee, Futaba now frozen in a perpetual motion halfway to Akira, mouth agape and hands clenched in fists at her sides.

To give credit where credit is due, Sojiro also looks shockingly unbothered, if a bit irked, like he is about to scold Akira for failing to clean up the coffee equipment properly and not confront him about disappearing for an entire night only to return with a color-swapped apparition of his dead would-be-never-have-been-maybe-something. 

“Why did you bring him here?” 

A high-pitched squeal. Morgana. 

Right, Akira somehow forgot all about him.

“You were right, the white hair does look cool! I hate it!”

Futaba Sakura was best at hiding in plain sight, at locking things away where everyone could still see them, but not dare touch.

Both of them still standing in the doorway, Akira feels Goro shift behind him.

“Thank you..?” he somehow manages to sound both flattered and displeased.

Well, they’ve successfully infiltrated the café, and no murders have occurred. Akira dares to count it as a good start.

“I am so, so, so sorry,” he takes a step in to let the door close, hoping that Goro will follow suit and not just bolt out of the door. “I brought Akechi here yesterday and things went… very wrong, Metaverse-wise. Long story short, I had to rush back to the Velvet Room because Akechi has a tendency to spontaneously get teleported there sometimes, and I ended up staying.

“Oh, and yeah, Akechi,” he turns to Goro for the first time since entering Leblanc, and is pleased to find him looking like his usual unimpressed self. At least that works for selling them on it actually being Akechi and not some evil spirit deceiving Akira. “Sakura Sojiro and Sakura Futaba, respectively. Boss, Futaba,” he acknowledges them with what he hopes is a convincingly winsome smile. “Goro Akechi, in the flesh.”

“Nice seeing you back, kid,” Sojiro nods as he is getting up to, presumably, start on the truce coffee for them all. “And you,” he throws an intimidated glare at Akira. “Better not pull this crap again. I’m letting you off the hook this time, but make sure this doesn’t become a habit. You need to stay over somewhere - be my guest, you’re an adult, nominally. But have the decency to let us know, as long as you’re living under my roof.

“Also, if the detective kid needs a place to crash, the upstairs is all yours to do whatever you please, just remember that there’s no door.”

Bless this man, truly, Akira thinks to himself and throws a coy wink at Goro, who somehow manages to keep his face neutral despite, most likely, being about ready to start throwing hands.

“Gross, Sojiro. Also, gross, Akira,” Futaba makes a face, and just like that, the tension is dispersed. Really, what was Goro even worried about?

“Um, is no one going to think that Akechi being here is weird ?” Morgana yelps, jumping down from where she was hidden inside the booth. 

“Mona, it’s just Akechi, you know how he is,” Futaba shrugs, picking Morgana up and making her way back to her laptop. “We’ve all seen him do weirder things.”

At that, Goro raises a quizzical eyebrow, but stays silent.

“So, you two care for some coffee? Curry?”

Goro visibly tenses at the proposal, awkward and jarringly out of place in his stupid blues. 

“Maybe later, we actually have some business to take care of upstairs - Akechi needs a change of outfit if I want to take him anywhere around the city.”

Sojiro doesn’t look particularly convinced, but places down the cup he has already taken out.

“Suit yourselves. With all this morning mess, I’m not opening up today. You know where everything is if you get hungry.”

Then, throwing another look Akira can’t read between all four of them, Mona included, he adds, looking directly at where Futaba is whispering something into the cat's ear, too quietly for even Akira to pick up.

“C’mon, Futaba, let’s go home. Give the boys some privacy.”

Futaba’s head snaps up and, unexpectedly, turns to throw daggers directly at Goro.

“What?! No way! You can go, but I have questions to ask this guy right here!”

Goro doesn’t crumble under the sudden burst of attention, but Akira can almost hear him internally swearing.

“And why would I-”

Akira does not let him finish whatever he thought was an appropriate jab in this situation.

“Futaba, I absolutely, a thousand percent, a trillion percent promise you that I’ll give you the chance to torment Akechi, just not right now. We really do have something we need to deal with today, so please, will you and Morgana go for now?”

Futaba doesn’t look angry, as Akira expects her to. She doesn’t puff out her cheeks, doesn’t light up in determination to stand her ground. No, Futaba looks… sad? 

“But-”

“ Please .”

She looks the same way Akira remembers her looking when she talked about her friend - Kana, was it? - and the irreversible damage she feared she’d done to their bond. Hurt, remorseful, and a bit desperate, as if itching to take action but fearing that any step she psyches herself up to take would be fruitless.

“Fine,” she turns without sparing the two of them another glance, and joins the already-waiting Sojiro at the door. “Let’s go, Mona.”

Morgana does look up at him as she follows Futaba to the exit, eyes sparkling with a mix of confusion and mistrust, and even if the latter seems more directed towards Goro, Akira still catches the blooms of guilt taking root in his stomach.

Sojiro looks at him apologetically. Akira isn’t sure why.

The door barely has time to close when Akira’s phone vibrates.

Futaba: I get it that you want to keep it under wraps but… 

Futaba: Why from me?

Futaba: I can help, you know.

Futaba: It doesn't matter that it’s Akechi.

Next to him, Goro, clearly privy to it being his recently departed Acquaintance Number Six blowing up Akira’s phone, is obviously pretending not to be interested, looking over Leblanc’s impressive coffee collection.

Akira: I don’t doubt that you can, you already did so much.

Akira: It’s just something we need to deal with. On our own.

Akira: Akechi is a private guy. I don’t want him to remember everything and then hate me forever for letting everyone see him as he is right now.

Futaba: Are you just planning to keep hiding him forever?

Futaba: And I mean, even after he gets the memories back.

Futaba: It’s not like we all just blindly hate him, you know? We can be civil.

Of course you do, he killed your mom, he tried to kill you, you have every right to hate him.

Akira: I know. I’m sorry.

Akira: I just need time, okay? 

Futaba: Just don't shut us down.

Futaba: I’m just a text away. We all are.

To that, Akira has nothing to say.

He knows it to be true. Really, he does. But he also knows that it was just him and Goro who infiltrated Maruki’s Palace, and he knows that it was, once again, only they arguing whether or not free will is really worth dooming one another to misery. Akira fought god together with his best friends. He killed god alone. And he alone bore the Shadow that represented the regrets that came with it.

“Your guardian seems like a pleasant man,” Goro’s distant voice takes him out of his trance. “Not so sure about Futaba Sakura.”

And there he stands, the reason for it all, for all of his friends potentially turning on him, for the closest thing he has to family now looking at him with pained, mistrustful eyes, for his own fucking heart turning on itself and forming a confused, deranged monster that hides somewhere Akira can’t even reach.

“Futaba is an acquired taste.”

“Oh, I’m sure she is,” Goro runs his fingers across the countertop. “So, treat me to coffee?”

There is an intensity in his expression where Akira searches for hesitation.

“Coming right up.”

 

There is a ritualistic satisfaction to preparing coffee Akira has discovered somewhere along the way of learning the art from Sojiro. Unlike cooking, which, for all of its elements of near-scientific preciseness, still resonated with him as an art form of self-expression, brewing coffee is an almost engineerical celebration of method. Routines of the smallest movements that, when followed with utmost precision, result in a perfect cup finding its perfect person every time.

Akira is readying the water for what he used to consider one of his favorite single origins to prepare - Colombian Nariño, medium roast, a wonderfully creamy, almost honey-like variety with hints of walnut even Goro, for all of his lack of expertise in the field, could pick up. Goro has always referred to it as his favorite blend, all coffee was blends with him, and Akira, despite their mutual appreciation for exchanging trivia, never corrected him, maybe out of a malicious desire to enjoy Goro sounding like a pretentious, ignorant fool, or maybe just because he found it cute. Akira also never let him know that Colombian Nariño was one of the most popular coffee varieties carried by Leblanc, in fear that, in a childish attempt to feel more special, the detective would switch from the one coffee he actually enjoyed. Goro really needed to realize that he was plenty special as he was, no need to add an artificially curated appreciation for an obscure coffee type to the mix.

This time, there’s no magical fantasy-in-a-fantasy ambiance surrounding them. Goro is still perched up on his favorite seat, one Akira so firmly began to associate with void spaces during his last weeks at Leblanc that he’s almost forgotten what it looks like to have a person there, in his direct line of sight. He looks oddly vacant, yet Akira still sees no traces of anticipation in him that would mirror the tightness in his own throat, and that, for some inexplicable reason, makes him angry.

As he places the steaming cup in front of Goro, handle to his left, far enough from the counter’s edge that Goro can lean onto it with both elbows - a repetition of a motion he has performed so many times in such different contexts, yet this time he almost feels like losing his grip, like suddenly switching to manual breathing - their eyes meet and hold the contact, electrifying in a way that should be familiar but lacks the knowing Akira used to associate with the same pins and needles that run down his shoulders and settle in tingles at the tips of his fingers.

Akira wonders how much of loving a person is loving the context in which you learn how to love them, and if it would be the same love in its absence.

“Are you not nervous at all? You sure you can… you’re going to be okay?”

Goro traces the rim of the cup with one gloved finger.

“It’s fine. Stop fussing, it’s getting on my nerves.” Then, softer: “ I have discussed this with Margaret the night before, and I suspect a part of why it went so poorly last night was… my responsibility. But… I’m prepared now. I will not let it slip away again, and I won’t slip away myself.”

Akira wants to trust him. Akira has no other option but to trust him. His hand still unconsciously reaches into his pocket, in confirmation, because he knows that the last time he trusted Goro Akechi, he disappeared without Akira even remembering what was the last thing they said to one another.

“See you on the other side,” Goro says and lifts the cup to his lips.

Akira holds his breath.

He watches Goro’s lips move, and he definitely burns the roof of his mouth, because he always does.

The cup gracefully descends onto the plate.

Akira still holds his breath.

Goro’s eyes are shut close, uncomfortably tight by the looks of it. He is still gripping the handle of the cup. If not for the gloves, Akira is sure he could see his knuckles whiten.

Holding his breath is becoming rather uncomfortable.

“Shit.”

So, Akira stops holding his breath.

Goro’s eyes snap open and, for a moment, Akira lets his thoughts run rampant. Did he remember? Did he see something? Is he about to bolt from this chair and punch me straight in the face? What did he see? But Goro’s eyes burn into his, furious and dissatisfied, and his next words come out like a hiss, venom spewing straight into the freshly prepared cup.

“Fucking nothing.”

Well, that answers it. Akira readies himself to feel relieved, but, surprisingly enough, all he can muster is bitterness and matching disappointment. Seems like Goro’s historical confusion about feelings is rubbing off on him.

“Was the coffee at least to your liking?”

Goro’s annoyed stare never looks quite right nowadays, but it still brings Akira immense satisfaction.

“It was fine. Acceptable.”

He is sulking now, and while absolutely nothing in Akira feels like astral projecting Goro into some realm of his distortion is a good idea, he knows that there’s really little point in delaying the inevitable.

Delaying the inevitable is very much not like Akira, and even less like Joker.

“Well, I conveniently don’t have any other plans for today, so… how about I take you out somewhere nice? I have a place in mind that might jog your memory.”

 

After the coffee disaster, Akira does convince Goro to have a plate of curry with him, even if they both doubt that it would have any effect beyond satisfying Akira’s hunger and reintroducing Goro to the marvel that is Sojiro’s signature recipe. Over steaming plates and steaming cups, they also decide that it would be a good idea to start a timer, just to track how effective precisely moving from Inaba to Tokyo was in solidifying Goro’s real-world presence.

It’s painfully domestic, in a way. Even with the shadow of disappointment still lingering over Goro, Akira can’t help but marvel at how foreign yet homelike it feels, having breakfast with him, talking about the awful magical forces threatening their very existence.

Dishes handled and Goro sufficiently less displeased, almost to the extent of being back to his baseline of irritation, Akira mentally prepares for the next step in his little to-do list.

“I wasn’t joking, by the way, when I was talking about your outfit. Like it or not, there’s no way I’m taking you anywhere we used to go to in this.”

Goro watches him dry his hands with an impatient expression.

“And, I presume, your suggestion is still for me to borrow your clothes.”

“Not like you have a wardrobe available.”

It’s clearly one of those things. Like a cake Goro wants to try so obviously but pretends to order just for the sake of his food blog, or a Jazz Jin cocktail of the night he calls too extravagant, only to ask Akira if he would like another round.

“C’mon. It’s gonna be fun, live a little.”

And hey, a little fashion show might be just what Akira needs to brace himself.

“Maybe fun for you,” Goro grunts, but walks to meet Akira in the middle of the room regardless, eyes darting cautiously to the stairs leading to the attic.

Akira wonders if he, instinctively, remembers that’s where the Phantom Thieves' former hideout lies, or if he simply picked up on Sojiro mentioning him living upstairs earlier.

“I suppose there is a point in drawing the public’s attention away from me, if we were to go out.”

Akira smiles, already sorting through his limited selection of clothes in his head.

“Oh, this is going to be the best.”

 

“You might have the worst taste in clothes out of anyone I’ve ever encountered.”

Having Goro back in his room is a polarizing experience. Upon entering, he wrinkled his nose in almost the exact same way he did months ago, the first time Akira had led him to the attic under some bullshit excuse of grabbing something from his bag, albeit this time, he looks decisively more obvious in his disgust. There’s no recognition in his eyes, just dissatisfaction and dull interest. 

From Akira’s perspective, the situation couldn’t be more nerve-racking. All he can think about is the last two times they have been in this room - the final time Goro has ever been in the world of the living before entering Maruki’s Palace and the night that preceded that, attic dark and quiet safe for the muffled sound of their breathing, the echo of things both said and, as it seemed at the time, never to be said in this lifetime. Akira isn’t sure which memory brings him more misery.

Akira’s humble collection of shirts laid out on the bed in front of them, he watches Goro pick up a rather garish, Akira will admit, white t-shirt with two giant stars printed boldly on the front, and raise an eyebrow. 

Okay, point taken. But it’s not like Goro is the one to lecture him on fashion, he at least owns a grand total of zero sweater vests and only, maybe, one embarrassing jacket, which is, at the very least, not blue.

Really, when he thinks about it, there’s hardly a reason to bring Goro’s memories back grander than to question whatever deal there was between him and knitwear. No one that good-looking should be allowed by law to dress like a twice-divorced tenured professor, especially at the tender age of eighteen.

“First of all, rude. Second, you have encountered a grand total of six people, there is absolutely no way I dress worse than Igor. And finally, I’ll have you know that someone used to dress like a retirement home resident, so I absolutely refuse to take this kind of slander from you.”

Goro has the gall to look sincerely offended.

“I would bet my life on me having impeccable taste in clothes.”

“Better get back to being dead then, fashionista.”

For a moment, Akira thinks that he might’ve gone a bit too far with that comment. Goro, circa January, was more than happy to throw an occasional blow your mind joke in the privacy of Jazz Jin, but faux-killing Akira might’ve been less of a sensitive subject than actually dying twice. However, before Akira can begin apologizing, Goro’s mouth stretches in a familiar, amused smirk, and he puts the ugly t-shirt down with a chuckle.

“Do you actually have pictures of me before, by the way?” he asks while examining another item, which happens to be Akira’s Shujin turtleneck. “I would legitimately like a glance.”

Akira sure does. However-

“Are you sure that’s a good idea right now?”

“It’s fine. It’s just my face. From what I gathered, not much has changed regarding my appearance outside of my hair and eye color, so I doubt it will shock me profusely enough to trigger anything.”

Akira understands, logically, that he is right. Goro Akechi’s face is not some top secret he needs to protect, and even if it does, unexpectedly, have the same effect as the coffee did the night before, isn’t that what they’re seeking here, anyway? What makes his hands sweat as he reaches into his pocket for his phone, dismissing the few group chat messages and ignoring the ping of guilt he feels seeing Futaba’s icon among those currently chatting, is his own reaction.

Akira does, in fact, have quite a few photos of Goro Akechi. Tentative shots he took in secret, like some weirdo stalker, while they were walking around Kichijoji, a couple of saved pictures from interviews he found particularly charming in how the makeup department managed to highlight his natural beauty, and dozens upon dozens of miscellaneous moments captured in the open - Detective Prince throwing a peace sign next to some heart-attack-inducing desert, Akechi staring at the fish with poorly concealed childlike wonder, Goro frowning at him under the streetlamps, arms crossed and hair covered in snowflakes, in some alleyway behind the temple, Akira’s scarf wrapped comically tight around his neck because someone forgot to check the weather. Akira never got that scarf back. He wonders if it’s still somewhere in this world, or if it dispersed together with Maruki’s reality of dreams.

Akira has never looked at them, not since March, anyway. He used to have quite an idea as to what he would feel if he dared, before. Now, with the very person he’s spent months collecting in snippets of permanently fixed data standing next to him, expecting, Akira isn’t sure what he would feel when Goro looks through the window of their shared past and sees a stranger’s reality.

But Goro deserves to know. Akira wants him to know, wants him to see that, outside of some cosmetic differences, the two of them are not that different.

He doesn’t allow himself to spend much time scrolling, settling in advance on a rather inoffensive portrait of Goro smiling at the camera at Jazz Jin sometime in mid-January. The background is dimmed enough to be unrecognizable, and Goro is wearing a rare real smile, mood mellowed by the live performance and abstract conversation.

He turns the phone to Goro, who looks at himself blankly. It’s not quite recognition, but he doesn’t appear to be staring down a stranger, either. It’s like watching someone see themselves for the first time after a routine haircut - face searching for minor yet noticeable differences.

“I look… surprisingly normal. Were you the one to take this photo?”

“Yeah.”

Goro hums, and zooms in on his own face.

“You should work on your composition skills. Also, the lighting sucks. Makes my eyes look red.”

“That’s just how your eyes normally looked.”

At that, there is a slight twitch in his expression.

“That’s a rather… unorthodox eye color.”

And it was an unorthodox color. Dried blood, and spilled wine, and the unnatural glow of the Metaverse. In nature, it’s meant to signal danger. It was Akira’s favorite color.

“I think it suits you. I liked it.”

Goro chuckles humorlessly, and looks up at him with his very yellow, very inhuman eyes. The color of the sun. The color of gold. The color of betrayal.

The sin of thievery is greed. 

There once lived a boy with red eyes who knew what you’ve done, a voice in his head sings. There once lived a boy with red eyes who knew what you both did, and you killed him before he could tell you that he would stay by your side, anyway.

“I have to agree. I don’t think yellow is my color.” His smirk turns dangerous.

The sin of thievery is greed. 

Unable to hold eye contact for much longer, Akira redirects his attention to the clothes pile, picking up a black cashmere crewneck sweater. It’s a bit too warm for May, but with Goro’s seeming indifference to weather or temperature in his current form, it might work fine. 

“How about this? Fashionable enough for you? A literal model picked it out for me.”

Goro raises an eyebrow.

“You have the strangest connections.” He examines the sweater, feeling it between his fingers like he can tell anything about the fabric through the gloves. “I guess this is more or less acceptable.” 

He folds it to the side and begins unbuttoning his Velvet Room uniform. Akira almost chokes on air.

“You- you want me to leave the room or something?” In the time it takes for him to choke out the question, Goro has already discarded the jacket, throwing it carelessly on top of the pile, and moved on to loosen the tie. There is a familiar teasing glint in his eyes Akira used to welcome, a promise of danger, and Akira’s blood begins to simmer.

“Something wrong? I presume you’ve seen me shirtless before, or am I mistaken?”

Akira has, indeed, but why the hell would he presume that?

Akira isn’t sure what game Goro is playing here. But he was never one to leave Goro Akechi to play alone.

“Of course I have. Just enjoying the show.”

Goro dares to hold eye contact while popping the top button of his shirt. Bastard.

As Goro promptly unbuttons his shirt, seemingly done with teasing and back to business, Akira notices a curious inconsistency between his expectations and what he actually sees. Beyond the persistent screams of some parts of his brain that are only concerned with Goro Akechi is undressing in your house? Who would’ve thought we’d ever get here, not me! lies the realization that he presumed Goro’s body to, somehow, not be his own. Lavenza did mention that this form of Goro Akechi is not human in nature, even outside of such oddities as bleached hair and twenty-four-seven functionality. Goro’s skin is milky, almost hauntingly translucent, gone is that sun-kissed, rosy undertone Akira used to shamefully appreciate in secret, yet he notices with confused amusement a thin line of a scar on his upper arm, a blemish that looks like an old, faded burn on his forearm he remembers seeing there, and even the two oddly symmetrical lines that look suspiciously like incisions right under his collarbone Akira first uncovered when they went to the bathhouse together.

Every little physical sign of consequence is still etched into this impermanent body, pale manifestations of a chronicle forgotten, most of them telling stories even Akira never got a chance to hear. Above all else, somehow, these little imperfections Akira can’t even bring himself to call anything but perfect calm his mind. Tiny reminders that Goro is still Goro , his history, even if currently absent from his mind, carved instead into his skin.

Akira doesn’t notice any bullet wounds on his body. No raised scar tissue on his chest or abdomen, nothing that might indicate his skin ever being pierced deep enough to kill.

“I guess the pants are inoffensive enough,” Goro’s mumbling brings him back to reality, and there he stands. 

There is a rumble of satisfied possessiveness purring in Akira’s chest at seeing him pull down on the sleeves and adjust the hem of Akira’s sweater. He may have worn it only once, but hey, beggars can’t be choosers, and black is a shockingly flattering color on Goro, no one who has seen his true Metaverse outfit could deny that. 

“So, does this suit your idea of an acceptable outfit?”

“Better than the doorman jacket, that’s for sure.” Akira doesn’t let his inner thoughts show on his face, but can’t resist asking. “Not gonna take the gloves off?”

“No.”

He doesn’t even hesitate, which seems to surprise Goro himself more than it does Akira. Yet, neither pries nor pushes, and if Akira does, on instinct, reach into his pocket for a confirmation he doesn’t need, no one comments on that, either.

 

“So, where exactly are we heading?” Goro asks as they descend the stairs. “And I will not hesitate to punch you if you say it’s a secret.”

Akira chuckles.

“But it is a secret.”

“I fucking warned you,” Goro glares at him, but, thankfully, doesn’t actually go in for a punch before Akira has time to elaborate.

“I figured since it’s, technically, our first official day on the mission, we could explore Shibuya some more without venturing too far away from the Velvet Room. There is only one place we really went to in Shibuya, though, so it’ll have to do for today.”

Goro rolls his eyes but looks satisfied enough with his not-so-elaborate explanation. All things considered, Akira really doubts Shibuya is going to be the place they stumble into any meaningful progress, but other options seem a bit too intimidating for today, so he settles. It’s a good-enough shot, quite literary. 

Goro is studying the alleyway while Akira locks up, looking over to where the bathhouse and the laundromat are hidden beyond a turn. He almost looks normal like that, if one isn’t paying close attention, and it’s a relief both of them seem to preemptively bask in even before stepping onto far busier streets. Even with white hair, few could possibly mistake Goro for a delinquent of Ryuji’s kind, but he could definitely pass for someone really into high alternative fashion. 

Akira joins him in looking over the street. There is a cat perched up on someone’s parked motorcycle. It eyes them with suspicion, yet remains settled, its spotted fur glistening in the sun. As they pass it, Akira stops, just to be sure, in front of a tiny, near-unnoticeable crevice in between two buildings. There’s nothing of note hiding there, practically nonexistent to any passersby who are not him, just darkness and dirt, a sanctuary of filth that can be found lurking to the side of any street, in any neighborhood. Just barely wide enough to let two people stand face to face, Akira knows from experience.

Goro looks over, studies his hesitation with vacantly annoyed eyes. Looks over to where Akira is searching for ghosts. 

“What?” he asks.

It’s so easy to forget that there is a burden that’s meant to crush two currently grinding Akira’s bones to dust.

“Nothing,” Akira lies. “Just spacing out. Let’s go.”

 

As they depart from the nook that hosts Leblanc, Goro glances over at him with a contemplative look.

“You’ve accepted this surprisingly easily.”

Akira raises an eyebrow. Well, this can refer to an almost endless number of notions Akira has accepted in the last seven days, starting with the general idea of Goro coming back to life.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, just this morning, you were more willing to spend the entire day sulking into the couch than entertain the idea of using me to hunt down your Shadow, and now look at you - basically leading us to what I presume, from your perspective, is the very belly of the beast.”

Referring to this particular notion, Akira wouldn’t necessarily be comfortable with using the word acceptance. 

“I understand that we’re not necessarily swimming in options,” he shrugs. “I still don’t like the idea of putting you in any more compromising situations, but you’re right in that there’s no reason to believe that it’s necessarily dangerous, not when we know so little. You once told me yourself that scouting for information can be the most hazardous part of detective work, but omitting it means essentially giving up on the case.”

Goro doesn’t need to know that, in the context that statement was uttered, the hazard was Akira himself.

“Plus, I can’t just pass up the opportunity to take you out. It’s a rare pleasure.”

There is genuine surprise in Goro’s voice as he infers:

“Oh, was I the more prone to taking the initiative out of the two of us?”

Yes and no, Akira doesn’t say. Yes, when you thought it mattered. No, when it actually did.

“No, you were just busier. I didn’t want to bother the great Detective Prince with my measly invitations, after all.”

“Humbleness really doesn’t suit you, huh?” Goro murmurs, and there it is again, the danger, something that’s been brewing in him, viscous, poisonous, since this morning, or, possibly, ever since Goro Akechi of week-long memories and eighteen years' worth of mental tricks laid eyes on Akira Kurusu and decided to figure him out. “I’m sure I made plenty of time for you .”

It’s flirtatious, and familiar, and it’s threatening, whatever Goro thinks he’s doing. All too similar to the tricks old Detective Prince used to pull in his infiltration, that was, in his own words, not that dissimilar to romantic courting, yet there is a new edge to it, like an ice cube to a tongue, like the crackling of autumn leaves under a boot. A trigger to a temple and a claw to the face and a sword to a heart. 

It’s not a danger that excites the ever-hungry zeal of Joker. Unfortunately, it’s one that sets Akira Kurusu aflame.

It’s oh so dangerous to let Goro think that he has him all figured out. It has always been dangerous, too acute and too absorbing, and way, way too self-indulgent, like all things are about Goro Akechi. A Goro who knows too much is already dangerous. But a misinformed Goro is destructive.

Akira knows that. Akira has all the receipts left to him by regret and sorrow to prove that it’s true. And yet-

“Of course you did. It was a great honor, to reside so high on the great Detective Prince’s list of priorities.” Wink, smirk, self-hatred - the classic, never-disappointing combination, no matter how much time has passed since he last used it.

Goro’s expression mirrors his own.

Akira spends the entirety of their ride back to Shibuya trying to figure out what exactly is missing in it. 

 

Shibuya greets them with a usual weekend buzz, which is a blessing and a curse in one. Goro might not be receiving any overtly curious looks, yet when they pass the alleyway that hosts the Velvet Room, Akira still catches him throwing a longing glance to its quiet depths. For someone so accustomed to media attention, Goro has always been extremely protective of his personal space, and a part of Akira is glad to be proven that this trait wasn’t inherent to some sort of unsavory past experience and is simply one of his intrinsic personality aspects.

Their first stop is a small electronics store where, with surprisingly little reluctance, Goro allows Akira to purchase him an inexpensive smartphone and add his information as the first contact.

Just to be safe, he also adds Lavenza’s old number, which is met with skepticism that the attendant even still has a phone, and Leblanc’s landline, on which Goro doesn’t comment.

From there, they don’t have to navigate the crowd for long. Yet, when Akira stops in front of their destination, Goro almost bumps into him, his brows furrowing in doubtful scrutiny.

“Arcade? Really? I really doubt that I was a regular at a place like this.”

That Akira doesn’t know. They’ve only gone once together, and quite early on in their relationship, which is one of the reasons Akira doubts that the Shibuya arcade is going to aid Goro’s memory much or trigger another encounter with the presumed Shadow Akira. Yet, if there are two things he is certain about when it comes to Goro Akechi, they are that he loves shooting things, especially if he gets to do it against someone else, and that he is embarrassingly into stuff he himself sees as unbecoming of a serious and proper detective.

They deserve, perhaps, some time to relax.

“You’d be surprised.”

He might frown now, and he might’ve once denied all allegations of being a massive fucking nerd , but Akira knows better. For all of the congenital contradictions and enigmas that made up Goro Akechi, this one was as clear as day - a boy who spent his entire adolescence denied the simple pleasures of being a kid would grow up to latch onto his depravities, all the I’m good at gunplay because Metaverse assassinations excuses be damned.

He and Futaba could’ve really connected over this. Such a shame Goro killed her mom.

Expectedly, the moment Akira leads them to the Gun About cabinet and edges Goro to challenge him, it’s clear that this is far from his first rodeo with shooting things, artificial or not.

“Die, you vermin!” he hisses as yet another enemy explodes on screen, and Akira really tries his best not to follow in the downed monster’s footsteps. The manic laugh that follows really doesn’t help Akira’s already bursting heart.

“I despise that you know of such a childish side of me,” Goro admits as they set their controllers down after a few rounds of feverish competition, out of which he emerges as an undisputed winner. “Yet, I have to admit that it was fun. Even if it did nothing to get us closer to our goal, in the end.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being passionate about stuff, childish or not.” Even if Goro doesn’t know it, it’s a self-deprecating confession. Akira has always both admired and envied how into things Goro managed to get, be it a simple media franchise or an intricate revenge plot he’s been chaining around his heart for years. “I think it’s cute.”

“You are disgusting,” it sounds fond, even if it’s clear that Goro intends it as malicious.

Akira wonders, if, were this version of Goro Akechi to remain suspended in this limbo of being but not remembering, there could be a path for him that was forever shut for Goro in his previous life - a path to salvation, to that weightless oblivion where he is not chained to the ground by the burdens of their shared memories. If it’s a kindness or a cruelty that Akira wants to deny it to him, nonetheless.

Nonetheless, as he looks into Goro’s yellow eyes, studies his visage as he examines other arcade cabinets, searching, perhaps, for traces of himself that used to know this place on a level deeper than detached instinct, he sees in them traces of the same fire that burned its original possessor to the core. The fire that will, without a doubt, leave many more ugly marks on their souls, marks Akira will selfishly welcome. 

 

They walk out of the arcade parlor into a significantly dimmer street, their little outing lasting for, apparently, much longer than Akira anticipated, and, in the cloud-obscured late afternoon sun, Akira almost misses how Goro’s hands are letting through the glow of the gradually powering streetlights.

When he does notice, he meets it with a shocking calmness, as if his brain has finally caught up to the concept that Goro’s disappearances, for once, aren’t meant to be permanent.

“Oh,” Goro sighs like a statement, like an acceptance, as he sees the flesh of his own hand thinning. “I guess our time’s up. Well, Margaret wasn’t lying - it was significantly longer than twenty minutes.”

“Do you reckon we can make it to the Velvet Room?”

“I see no point in such an endeavor,” Goro dismisses his suggestion, leading them both off the main street and deeper into its sidelines. “I guess this is as much progress as we can cram into today, if my past experience with disintegration is indicative of anything.”

It might be longer, but it’s still not nearly enough. Akira doubts it would ever be enough, not with their history.

“I’ll still go with you.”

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” Goro waves him off, the brick of the building he’s leaning against already visible through his torso. “I’ll text you once I reappear. Good opportunity to test how technology works between dimensions.”

“Just… let me know you’re okay,” Akira still adds. “I don’t think I can make it in the morning tomorrow, but as soon as-”

Goro rolls his eyes.

“You’re giving me a preemptive headache, you do realize that time here is-”

“Akira?”

It’s a tiny, confused whisper, yet it stops them both in their metaphorical tracks, parting the buzz of the crowd with deadly precision and pinning them in place.

Oh no. 

No. No fucking way. This is not happening. No fucking way. Not now .

Akira knows this voice. Of course he knows this voice. Judging by the sudden look of conflicted exasperation on Goro’s already translucent face, he doesn’t, but is rapidly realizing that the owner of the voice does, in fact, know him.

Akira doesn’t want to turn around.

When Goro goes to grab his arm and say something, his hand goes right through Akira’s shoulder, and his words die somewhere in a vacuum between realities. The moment Akira more feels than sees him disappear, he is faced with five different variations of horrified confusion, and two of pure, unadulterated dread of comprehension.

After Morgana, he really should’ve done something to prevent this kind of bullshit from happening again.

“Was that…” It’s Haru. She is holding a shopping bag close to her chest. Akira is, frankly, impressed that it hasn't yet plummeted to the ground.

“Yeah, about that-” No one even looks at Futaba, and she, apparently, swiftly realizes that drawing attention to herself in this situation might be a bit beyond what she can handle, promptly going back to examining the ground. In her bag, Morgana is sheepishly glaring at Makoto, who was the one to initially spot Akira and, effectively, end his life.

“Was that… Akechi?” And there it is. Thank you for your incredible observation skills, Yusuke.

There are a few things Akira can say in this situation. I can explain is a good, classic option. But it implies that he would actually have to give an explanation, and he is really not feeling that right now. He can also say no, and pretend like it’s all some kind of mass hallucination, but that would most likely not cut it with some of the more hypervigilant Thieves, looping that conversation tree back to the beginning.

He can just choose to stay silent. Which is what he does.

“Shit, Akira, I told you this is how it’s gonna end,” Futaba breaks the silence again, apparently determining that Akira has shut down for good. 

In an uncharacteristic exercise of authority, she proclaims: 

“Leblanc. Everyone. Now .”

 

The train ride to Leblanc is, for lack of a better word, awkward.

The car is full, so they have no options but to disperse somewhat, Futaba and Haru shielded from getting crushed by Ryuji, while Makoto stands next to Yusuke to prevent him from spacing out and bumping into someone too hard. Akira remains close to the door, but Ann, his subtly assigned handler, remains close by, seemingly not trusting him not to exit at the wrong stop and make a run for it. She looks close to tears. Akira doesn’t understand.

They tickle into the café quietly, so laughably different from how they had reunited in here just a day prior. Behind him, Akira hears Ryuji whisper Why is it closed? Is the Boss around? to Futaba, but she doesn’t grace him with an answer.

As they find their seats, urging Akira into one side of the booth alone, so he can sit opposite them all, like it’s some kind of trial, the room grows so suffocating, Akira thinks none of them would be able to breach the silence. The static of tension cuts through them, and Akira isn’t sure it’s not going to shred him to pieces if he decides to look at anything other than the patterns of wood etched into the table’s surface.

The silence is a luxurious torture that doesn’t last for long. When it bursts, it leaves chaos in the wake of its explosion. 

“Akira, what was that?!” Ryuji, expectedly, is the one to ignite the flame. Yet, Akira doesn’t get a chance to answer before his exclamation triggers a forest fire.

“Was that really Akechi? How did he survive?”

“Was that a ghost? Did Akechi turn into a ghost?” 

“I was under the impression that Akechi had ceased to exist once Maruki’s reality was dispersed?”

“Dude, he disappeared there! Ann might be onto somethin’ with the whole ghost idea.”

“There’s no such thing as ghosts. I am far more concerned with the implications of his return. Akira, is the world once again in danger? I have not seen the Metaverse app reappear on my phone…”

“Akech-kun perished… Why did he contact you again? What does he want from you this time?”

“How the hell does someone disappear if they’re not a-”

There is a loud thump, and all heads turn to Futaba at the counter, who isn’t looking in their general direction, face pointed down onto the counter. Her voice shakes, but in the silence that follows her outburst, it sounds clearer than any of the preceding rambings.

“Let him fucking talk.” 

And their attention is back to Akira. Who really doesn’t want to talk.

Yet, he does. He has to. He tells them the same thing he told Futaba, the same thing he told Morgana. And he doesn’t tell them all the same things.

 

“So, to sum it up - yes, Akechi did die. No, the world is not in danger, the Metaverse is fine. Yes, it’s the real Akechi. Yes, I’m sure it is. No, he is not a ghost. He now lives in the Velvet Room because his cognition got scrambled, and he doesn’t remember anything about his life. And I’m currently trying to get him back.”

Somehow, the silence that follows is even more tense and laced with confusion. Akira feels within his bones, in some parts of his being that appear frighteningly somatic and pathologically separate from rationale, the need to straighten the trajectory of this conversation, to course-correct to moments before he, having spent his entire explanation deliberately making eye contact exclusively with inanimate objects, has challenged the option to assess his companions’ faces. His voice and, he hopes, his face, betray none of the accelerating, discordant choir that feels like swarms of maggots currently feasting on his flesh, right beneath his skin.

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Makoto is looking at him like he is insane. “Goro Akechi has returned to this world through some unknown means and is now a part of the same place where Lavenza resides.”

“Yup.”

“He no longer has his memories - of you, of Shido, of Maruki’s reality, of anything .”

“None whatsoever.”

“And the entities native to the Velvet Room confirmed his identity as Goro Akechi. And he became one of them following his death?”

“Ugh… pretty much? A bit more complicated than that, but yes, overall.”

Makoto gives him a look like he is missing something vital in her rundown of the situation. Akira knows what she believes him to be overlooking in mistaking his nonchalant conviction for ignorance, which, in no world, could ever constitute a bliss without consequence.

“So, why are you attempting to bring his memories back ?”

“You know why,” is all he says, because they do know, even beyond the notion that Akira’s own Shadow is currently roaming the Metaverse plain, a notion he will never, ever share with his confidants, they know the main reason why Akira is doing this.

Being a hero was always a selfish endeavor. Not to them, perhaps, these kids who forge strength out of moving on, who swim through the currents with a destination in mind and don’t swallow lungfuls of water hoping that the suffocation will get them close enough to coming into contact with impermanence, to forgetting that words and memories, drowning in disequilibrium, will always only be of value to the living things, will never exist for those who don’t, themselves.

“Akira-kun, forgive me if I’m wrong, but aren’t the Velvet Room residents simply beings that always look out for the Metaverse at large? What Makoto-chan is saying, I guess, is, wouldn’t it be okay for Akechi-kun to join them in his rest, or are you obligated to return his memories?” Haru’s voice is gentle, almost soothing, as if she were talking to a child.

The rest of them, seemingly catching up to the older girls’ much more advanced understanding of the situation, shift from looking at Akira in bewilderment to assessing him with open uncertainty.

“He doesn’t belong to the Velvet Room. None of you need to worry - the Metaverse has nothing to do with Akechi’s return, but he didn’t just become an attendant. He is still a person, and if I get his memories back and help him, he can fully come back to life.”

At the start, it seemed like such an obvious priority, to make Goro remember. And he knows that the Goro who did, the Goro who treasured his ruinous history enough to choose death over giving up on what, in his eyes, constituted his monstrous truth, would berate Akira and his loathsome sentimentality for even thinking of memory as something one can toss aside as an unpleasant afterimage. 

He sounded so pained, when its traces brushed against his skull. When Goro, in this very same café, just a day ago, encountered the vestige of his former self, what he took out of the experience was pain.

Would knowing its source make it any easier to carry? Akira doesn’t know. Yet, like so many things in his life, it is a choice without a choice. Akira made a promise.

Akira might delude himself with an occasional fantasy of a maybe, but, in his heart of hearts, regardless of how twisted and corrupted by rot it may be, he knows what is missing from Goro’s eyes. 

“Akira, we don’t worry about the Metaverse here! We worry about you!” Ann exclaims, and there it is again, a sympathetic, almost desperate gleam in her eyes that makes Akira think back to Shiho, to Kamoshida. 

“We trust you, Akira-kun - if you’re saying that this matter doesn’t call for the Phantom Thieves, that’s a relief, that’s okay,” Haru agrees, “What we’re asking is whether Akechi-kun’s memories need to come back.” 

Akira doesn’t understand them at all. And if a part of him does, that part has died together with a world that saw salvation in the denial of consequence. In the absence of the second culprit, the sin of pulling the trigger is only his to bear. 

The sin of thievery is greed.

“Of course they do. But I got this, none of you need to worry about it. I didn’t tell you exactly because, right now, it doesn’t concern you lot.”

“It does concern us, Akira!” Morgana yelps from the spot next to Futaba. “Akechi is never good news! I’ve been saying this all along - what if he’s tricking you, or what if he’ll snap the moment you get his memories back? Unless you’re not telling us something, all of this sounds sketchy!”

This is exactly what Akira was trying to avoid by keeping it all a secret. The accusations. The distrust. He lowers his head again, trying desperately not to snap at Morgana. His brain fogs with notions of how grand salvation and intimate ruin aren’t mutually exclusive, on scales both grand and intimate.

“Yeah, dude, if you can just not bring Akechi’s memories back, why would you? It’s not like he has anything good to remember, anyway. He is a dick, always was.”

“I never found Akechi to be unpalatable,” Yusuke suddenly chimes in, and, for once, even Akira looks over at him in shock. But Yusuke wouldn’t be Yusuke if the bewildered stares of others ever prevented him from making his point. “Admittedly, he has an immensely polarizing personality, but dichotomies are something you come to appreciate in the field of art. During the few discussions the two of us shared, he struck me as a thoughtful individual, if colored by his own idiosyncrasies. I can understand how his merits succeeded in winning over Akira’s affection.”

Futaba sighs from her spot at the counter. Her knees are shaking, Akira dully notes.

“Inari, buddy, we all love you, but I don’t think idiosyncrasies is something you can call multiple accounts of murder.”

And just like that, they’re apparently back on the “slander Akechi” train.

“Yeah, dude, he literally shot Akira in the head, point blank, and had, like, zero regrets!” Ryuji shouts. “Sure, he helped us back then with Maruki, but that was totally just because he had to!” 

“That was my cognition, not me. That murder doesn’t count,” at this point, Akira doesn’t even know why he’s trying. It’s as if he is separated from them all by a one-way mirror, a subject to a passionate discussion that, for hitting so close to home, feels frighteningly impersonate, as if the fantastical hypotheticals of Goro’s history can be tallied into a neat score of numerous crossed-out marks of four that parallel, on the other side, a single meek scratch, representing the entire weight of Akira’s conviction, its entire basis. Ann throws a condoling look his way from across the booth, but is interrupted by the eruption of concerned yelling before she, like Yusuke, can join him in the hated “Akechi apologist” corner.

“It does count! Dude, he shot you!”

“Must I also remind you that he caused countless people’s deaths and severe injuries through mental shutdowns and psychotic breakdowns? All to simply get back on his father, who, while an atrocious person, could’ve been taken down differently.”

“Yeah, and he killed Haru’s dad!”

“Akira, I told you so many times that getting so close to him is a bad idea!”

As he listens to them go on and on about every single one of Goro’s crimes that he already knows about, thank you very much, Akira remembers, almost fondly, something Akechi has told him back in January, expression, while unreadable, softened into a shadow of regret by the jazz club’s low lighting.

"In all honesty, I wasn't sure if teaming up with you again would work out. This may not apply to you, but... I'm sure there are others among the Phantom Thieves who hate me.”

And hate, apparently, they did. At the time, Akira was mostly convinced that it was the detective’s self-loathing speaking more than anything else. As it turns out, Goro was much more perceptive of his friends’ inner thoughts and feelings than Akira himself.

Expectedly, it comes down to Makoto to seize the chaos and deliver the final blow:

“Akira, we all understand how you feel about Akechi. We don’t approve, at least for the most part,” her eyes dart to Yusuke for a second, but when they return to Akira, he is terrified to see nothing but sympathetic concern in their depths. “But we understand, and we respect your feelings. But if even a fraction of what you said about his situation is true, it might be simply too unreasonably reckless to rush into reviving the memories of someone who, first and foremost, needs to atone for what they’ve done to you and to so many innocent people. Maybe even Akechi would benefit from not having to remember everything that has happened to him.”

She hesitates, and, for a moment, Akira allows himself to despise her. Despise them all. I thought the Phantom Thieves don’t leave those in need to suffer, he wants to scream. I thought we all agreed to help the broken. We spared fucking Kaneshiro, Makoto, we spared even Shido, and now you’re telling me to leave someone who doesn’t even need to be redeemed to rot in a limbo without even knowing who they are, what they did?

Akira doesn’t think about who would be truly spared by living in ignorant bliss.

The room stills, and Akira doesn’t dare look back up at his friends.

“So, I’m just supposed to leave him in the Velvet Room, is that what you’re saying? Or, even better, let him die again? You want to avoid the pain and trouble of facing Akechi, and I mean actually facing Akechi, and all he has done to you, so your solution is to just force me to leave him to rot?”

“Of course not! What are you even saying? Of course, we don’t want Akechi-kun to die!” Surprisingly enough, it’s Haru who raises her voice first. The rest seem to share her shock at Akira’s sudden conclusion, staring at him with a mix of horror and outright apprehension. “It’s just…”

She sighs, and there’s a shattering quality to her exhale, as though she is bracing herself to launch from a cliff into unpredictable, restless waters.

“What I’m trying to say, what we’re all trying to say, Akira, is that we’re concerned. We’re concerned about how easily you’re jumping right back into devoting yourself to a person who, effectively, betrayed you and didn’t think twice about your feelings. And this situation… it’s so unclear, and with Akechi’s history of dying on you twice, each time leaving you so much worse for wear, we don’t know how good an idea it is - for you to trust him again.”

Akira’s heart shatters as he recognizes the following silence as the sign that everyone agrees with what Haru just said.

“What is wrong with you people?”

Akira doesn’t feel surprised by the identity of the person to snap.

The experience of telling the Phantom Thieves about his feelings towards Goro Akechi shortly after the disastrous conclusion of Maruki’s downfall and Akira’s trial was humiliating. It’s a memory Akira prefers to never return to, buried so deep that even digging it up feels akin to shoveling through his own internal organs. Yet, what Akira does remember with bittersweet fondness is Ann’s face as she, last to leave the attic for Akira to wallow in his sorrow alone, flashes him an unexpectedly radiant smile. 

I knew all along, by the way, she says, almost proudly. 

Everyone knew, Akira parries. My crush on Akechi wasn’t some well-kept secret. That wasn’t what they were all so appalled by, I’m sure you understand. 

Ann just shakes her head. That’s not what I was talking about, her smile turns a bit less jovial, and her eyes find Akira’s, truly find them, holding in between them something that runs much deeper than simple eye contact. I know love when I see it. And if others don’t, they just never loved anyone before.

I’m sure he knew how lucky he was, for you to love him, she whispers before leaving. He doesn’t ask her what difference would it make now, what difference would it make ever, if neither of them chose it over ruin and salvation. First sobs begin to echo through the empty café seconds before the chime announces the closing of the door.

“Do you even listen to yourself?” Ann’s voice is bursting with disappointment, of all things. “We’re talking about a person’s life here! A person you all know, a person we all fought side-by-side with, damnit! Sure, I get it - we all have grievances with Akechi. But we’ve all seen him! He isn’t some monster, he’s not even some shitty adult like Kamoshida or Shido - he’s just a guy who was backed into a corner and made a bunch of mistakes! And Akira cares for him! Honestly, that alone should be enough for you to stop talking about him like he’s someone you get to decide to wipe out of existence!"

At this point, Akira is done counting how many uncomfortable silences this mess of a conversation has produced. But in this one, he has Ann’s supportive, beaming eyes to hold him in place.

“Ann is right.”

This time, it’s Futaba who, once again, shocks them by breaching the room’s uncertain stillness.

“I wouldn’t go as far as to call him just a guy who made mistakes, but... What we’re doing here… talking about Akechi like this… this is not how Phantom Thieves are supposed to act. This is no better than what all of those adults we put our lives in danger to change did.” Her voice is still shaking, but Akira can’t help the waves of pride, of pure, overbearing gratitude that blossom in his heart, regardless. “And… I don’t want to be like that, not after everything I’ve seen. And sure, Akechi is… a difficult person to like. I don’t think I could ever like him, or forgive him. But…”

She takes a deep breath, and it feels like the cafe lights up with her voice.

“Akira trusts him. So, if we’re really the Phantom Thieves of Hearts to whom people come when they’re at their lowest, then we would never let someone like Akechi die, or be completely abandoned in the Velvet Room. He… he deserves to be saved as well. If I deserved to be saved, even back when I thought I killed my mother, he deserves to be saved. And, I guess, he deserves to know that he is being saved despite all the horrible things he did.”

In the lingering stillness, asphyxiating and misty with mirages all of them remember oh so differently, Akira struggles to think of anything at all.

“I’m- yes, Futaba, you’re right,” in the lingering rigidity, Makoto is next to speak, deliberately avoiding Akira’s eyes. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what got into me… I, of course, don’t think he deserves death. It’s simply… not clear to me why you would care about his fate so feverishly, even after everything.”

“I don’t think I can really forgive Akechi, or even stop hating him for what he did, but Futaba is right - my inability to sort through my feelings shouldn’t decide if Akechi gets to remember his crimes,” Haru follows suit. Unlike Makoto, she does look at Akira, and it’s he who has to, nonetheless, avert his gaze. “And if he’s really here now, needing help, then just forgetting he exists is not something we should do. Not because I deem him worthy or not, but just because he is a person, too. He doesn’t deserve to stop being himself. There is no point in atonement if he doesn’t even know what he did.”

Neither of them sounds remorseful, per se. And yet, the nauseating feeling of fullness in his lungs gives, replaced by something slightly less oppressive. 

The proficiency at running away must be inherent to the act of thievery. They all, Akira mirthlessly lets himself think, excel at it in different ways.

“Yeah, dude, I guess you’re right. Some heroes we are - tellin’ you to just abandon the guy…”

“I guess we just continue doing it to you, Akira,” Ann whispers. “Say you can rely on all of us no matter what, but when it really matters, we just go and fuck it all up…”

This image of them all, heads lowered, stirs funny memories in Akira’s mind. It must be something of an odd quality all of them share, this desire to be good people, regardless of their own feelings, this ability to be swayed in the name of heroism, even if only slightly.

He can’t blame them. It’s one thing to make the likes of Kamoshida, or Madarame, or even Shido rot in jail, out of sight and out of mind. It’s a completely different predicament when you have no choice for easy justice. Wouldn’t, in their eyes, the prison realm of the Velvet Room be no different from an actual prison cell?

“It’s fine, guys,” because it truly is, now. And whatever part of him disagrees, he will drown together with the lingering lack of resolve, with the hollowness of his friends' not-quite-acceptance. “I understand that none of you like Akechi, and he didn’t really give you good reasons to like him. But… I still do. I still want to help him come back. And I don’t want him to live a lie. That’s the last thing he ever wanted.”

They still look somewhat conflicted as Akira answers any remaining questions his friends have, mostly about the nature of Goro’s current form and what he’s been doing to return his memories so far. Akira tells them, and Akira lies. 

His friends might’ve said some horrible stuff about Akechi, but what right does Akira have to judge them, really, when even in the face of their easily earned, if tentative, compliance, he can’t bring himself to tell them the whole truth?

Aren’t you a real piece of work, friend? And here I thought we wanted nothing more than to bring the good ol’ Thieves back and fight some gods, someone screeches in his mind.

As is usual for them, they end up talking for far longer than Akira expects, even if he gradually excludes himself from discussion as the topics shift from his and Goro’s predicament to more lighthearted stuff, like breaking the news to Sumire and adjusting their Golden Week plans now that everyone knows both about Goro and about Akira staying in Tokyo for the foreseeable future. 

The Thieves never allowed sorrow to linger over their heads for long, and Akira learned to match this fascinating ability of theirs, absorbing it into his own being. He knows that, come morning, they’ll act like Goro Akechi has never died. When they think Akira is not looking, they will exchange glances that speak of pity, or disgust, or righteous rage, and, when he looks, they will conceal them poorly, but for a greater cause. 

And Akira won’t speak of it, for as long as he can avoid it. He will pretend to be blind to it, just as he pretended to be blind to the chasm of his own heart for months. At least, in this case, the only death his chosen ignorance can result in is either one that has already happened, or his own. Akira, selfishly, bets his all on the latter over, or, at least, before the former.

In an ironic mirror of a memory from a lifetime ago, Ann is the last to leave, even beating Futaba and Morgana, who retreat early together in avoiding Ryuji’s accusations of not telling the Thieves about Akechi despite knowing all along. 

Her smile is a nostalgic balm to his heart, but this time it lacks the burn of desolation Akira remembers souring it in February.

“And here I was wondering what they did to you in Inaba to make you so giddy,” she teases before adding with much more sincerity. “I really hope it works, this time. You both deserve for it to work.”

“It will. I will make it work,” Akira assures her, and Ann looks like she really believes him.

Akira watches her leave, thinking that, all things considered, it went much better than he expected, and refuses to think of anything else, once more.

Eager to finally update Goro on what has happened, he fishes out his phone for the first time since putting Goro’s new number into it.

He’s probably sick with worry in the Velvet Room at this point. Hopefully, he wasn’t too exhausted after being outside for so long.

Three messages greet him.

It takes Akira two read-throughs before he is, once again, out of the door and on his way to Shibuya, already writing a polite text to Sojiro about staying in the Velvet Room again tonight.

Goro: Update me on the situation as soon as possible.

Goro: Also, there’s been an advancement in our primary matter. Seek me out the moment you’re done with your morning activities tomorrow. But don’t even think about heading here now. Deal with your mess first, we’re fine here.

Goro: I saw him. Your Shadow.

Notes:

I hate text interactions in any sort of fiction passionately, but here I am, too lazy to find a workaround, writing text interactions, like a hypocrite. They can be fun ig

Also, one of my favorite things about Akira is how, judging by the fact that Everyone caught onto him being a Phantom Thief, keeping secrets might not be his forte. So I find him and Goro just getting busted immediately both times very in character - also convenient for plot reasons

Chapter 9: Dream’s End Come True

It rages through him like a stone breaking the water’s surface. A painless clash, a painless drowning. 

Goro thinks he might’ve died by drowning. But when he thinks of water, of the ocean, he thinks of exotic fish and penguins, not of the burning in his lungs. Yet, he knows what that burning feels like, and that has to account for something.

He might’ve died by many means. He doesn’t delude himself into thinking he has it all figured out.

He wants to know his last words. He wants to know if anyone was there to hear them, whispered or cried out or said in a detached tone of a person yet unaware that they’re dying. 

If he died by drowning, there was only water to absorb his dying wail. So, Goro hopes he didn’t die by drowning.

The water’s surface breaks above his head, and he is standing in a dimly lit bar, or, perhaps, a club of some sort. The stage is empty, and so are the tables, save for one.

The person sits to the side, their back turned to him, and plays idly with the straw of their peculiarly colored cocktail. Goro doesn’t need the person to turn around to know exactly who they are.

“For someone so hell-bent on dying, you really suck at staying dead, don’t you?”

Familiar voice, unfamiliar tone. Akira Kurusu swings around in his chair, and yellow meets yellow.

“Good to see you, Goro.”

He doesn’t sound glad at all. He is dressed in the same pompous getup he dons in the Velvet Room, save for the coat being a muted red instead of black. On top of his messy hair rests a black mask, and his gloved hands end in sharp claws.

They look perturbingly alike, despite it all. Goro wonders if that’s how Akira feels, when their eyes meet.

“Akira’s Shadow, I presume?” It’s easy to inflect his voice with malice when it is genuine.

The specter lets out a single humorless bark of a laugh. It rings in Goro’s ears, against the shadow-swallowed walls.

“Sure, if that’s what you wanna call me,” he is assessing Goro, but without any curiosity or wariness. Yellow eyes look him up and down, and Goro feels in them, simmering, an emotion he knows Akira Kurusu to be incapable of. “I’d offer you to sit down for a chat, but I’m afraid we don’t have time.”

He stands, at that, to stroll leisurely to where Goro is standing, but stops a few steps short. There are no signs of hostility in his movements, yet Goro tenses regardless.

“I’m just gonna say it how it is - give it up,” he smiles. “You’re not gonna find me. And you’re not gonna find yourself, for that matter. You can go ahead and get your memories back if you want, but that’s not gonna help. So, if I were you, I’d go back to being dead. You're gonna die sooner or later anyway, half a soul without a body can’t roam around forever, even in the Velvet Room, and certainly not with how much you insist on leaving it at every opportunity.”

When Goro first met Akira Kurusu, he knew, seconds into their first interaction, that he didn’t hate the Trickster. However, this disgraceful caricature of him, he hates, viscerally, passionately.

The most disturbing part is that Shadow Akira appears to hate him back.

“Well, you’re here right now, aren’t you? What’s stopping me from killing you this very second, if you’re implying another opportunity might not arise?”

The air hisses, and the next thing Goro knows, there is a knife flying his way. Something behind him creeks, and the blade is now stuck firmly in the middle of a wall, passing right through him.

“That’s because you aren’t here, silly,” Shadow Akira smirks. “For what it matters, I’m not here, either. This is all just some shabby projection your mind created, and I just sneaked in to say hi, in a true gentleman thief fashion.”

“You are still a Shadow. As long as you exist in the Metaverse, we can find you, and we can make you bleed.”

Shadow Akira presses his palm to his chest in faux exasperation.

“No need to be so mean, Goro. What did I even do to you? ” Goro can think of a few things, just off the top of his head, namely that everything Shadow Akira has said so far implies that he, in fact, knows exactly where his fragment is. “But really, search all you want, if you want to spend however long this flimsy form of yours has left in it on that. Akira Kurusu doesn’t have a Palace, and I’m not gonna sit around waiting for you in Mementos, that’s for sure.”

Akira doesn’t have a Palace? That is, somehow, both surprising and distinctly not at all . Yet, Goro knows that if he asks, the Shadow would never give him a straight answer, even if it’s telling the truth.

“Good chat,” Shadow Akira clasps his claws, seemingly done with their conversation. “So, I know telling you what to do has never worked out for me or my real self, but I will still make a suggestion - just give up and die. That’s what you’re best at, anyway.”

Seemingly satisfied with his little exit speech, Shadow Akira turns to go back to his seat, and Goro feels a familiar sensation beginning to pull him back into the waters.

There appears to be little time to beat around the bush.

“What are you a desire of, really?”

Shadow Akira stops in his tracks.

“Huh?”

“Akira Kurusu doesn’t hate me. You do, but distortions are never quite this simple. You are an exaggeration of something Akira does feel, something he desires. So, what is it?”

In Akira’s own words, this is a part of Akira Kurusu that might want to hurt him. At no point in their interaction has Goro felt that it does, not even when Shadow Akira threw a knife directly at his chest. 

His expression falls, and Goro feels threatened.

Shadow Akira crosses the distance between them in dangerous strides, and he is suddenly breathing right into Goro’s personal space. If he could touch him, Goro thinks there would be a knife pressed deep into his abdomen.

“You got that right. I do hate you. And he fucking should, too, if he knows what’s best for him.”

Goro is pulled into nothingness, and the last thing he remembers is yellow eyes watching him disappear, pits of hatred that, for a split second before their image faded, looked about ready to well with tears of hurt.

The first thing he sees in the Velvet Room is Igor’s crazed smile, and, considering what he just witnessed, Goro is almost glad to see him.

The second thing he sees is the floor he sinks onto, crushed with exhaustion.

“Welcome back,” Igor cackles. “You appear to have grasped new parts of your soul in the time of your absence.”

Goro really doesn’t have time for this bullshit.

“Where’s Lavenza and Margaret-san?” he mumbles weakly. “I have to talk to them, now.”

“If that is the case, I will summon them immediately.” At the very least, Igor seems to comprehend that this is not the time to be difficult. “Please rest in the meantime, I assure you they will be here momentarily.”

Igor didn’t lie when he said momentarily, as Goro doesn’t even have time to consider rest before the air flickers with the appearance of his fellow Velvet Room residents.

“Goro Akechi, what seems to be the matter?” Lavenza hurriedly approaches him, hand at the ready to cast a restorative skill.

“I was unaware we were capable of changing outfits,” Margaret notes nonchalantly, coming closer as well. “I must say that it suits you quite well, Akechi-kun.”

“I appreciate it, Margaret-san, but now is really not the time,” he breathes out as the effects of Lavenza’s healing begin to take the edge off of his fatigue. “I think I have just talked to Akira’s Shadow.”

 

“So, it can reach you in the transition between reality and the Velvet Room? Curious.”

Expectedly, all three of the Velvet Room residents take his recollection of events with professional discernment, and theories begin to form the moment he is finished. Goro barely remembers his promise to let Akira know he is okay, memories of their unsavory encounter with whoever it was who recognized Goro on the street already faded and unimportant, but he still shoots Akira a few texts, hoping, desperately, that the fool has the mind to listen and not burst into the Velvet Room the moment he reads them. 

“The Palace comment is what bothers me the most,” Goro contemplates. “Is it even possible for a Shadow to exist in a space outside Mementos while not having a Palace?”

It's Igor who answers him, for once, thankfully, in a cohesive manner.

“Reality at large has a mirror in cognition, and, for a cognitive double as powerful as one born from a Wildcard’s heart, the feat of traversing it is plausible. A curiosity, indeed.”

Goro frowns. This complicates matters significantly. 

“So, the Shadow can be just anywhere, roaming around the cognitive plain? Fucking great. How the hell are we supposed to track it, in that case?”

Lavenza, despite looking equally as disheartened as Goro feels, shakes her head.

“All distortions still have a root. If you are correct in your assumption that the Trickster’s Shadow implied itself to be tied to a negative emotion directed at you, there must be something that would point us towards it, either in your memories or in the Trickster’s heart.”

“Akira doesn’t wanna talk about his distortion, does he?” Goro snaps.

“Maybe not to us, nor to you, currently,” Margaret points out with a contemplative smile. “But he would, if you knew the right questions to ask.”

Goro knows she is right. Akira probably doesn’t even understand his distortion, if he is being frank. But there is someone who would. The culprit. 

“If Akira’s distortion is rooted in his hate, something he suppressed, would dissolving it mean the death of the desire, or the death of whatever place it came from?”

Margaret’s smile sinks, but her eyes remain determined as they look into his own.

“You know the answer already, I’m afraid. Nothing is a guarantee, Akechi-kun.”

Goro retires to his little corner, still laced with leftover exhaustion, shortly after they reach a unanimous decision to save any further speculations for when Akira gets here tomorrow afternoon. 

This, unfortunately, gives Goro more than plenty of time to ponder things he has no business pondering.

Shadow Akira hates him. It wants him gone, sincerely and passionately wants to go against Akira’s own wishes to keep him alive. Shadow Akira hates him, but Akira cares for him so obviously, so shamelessly, that Goro refuses to believe that hate is, in fact, the core of the distortion roaming outside of Akira Kurusu's weakened heart. It could never be hate, so it must be something else.

Even beyond the overwhelmingly positive results of the little daring experiments Goro has been conducting ever since Akira refused to elaborate on the nature of their relationship, a week in the presence of one Akira Kurusu is more than enough to understand that, for all of the uncertainty of their shared past, he does not hate Goro Akechi. Without a shadow of a doubt. That, however, makes Goro even more comprehensive to learn what ugly thing Akira really desires, and what unimaginable pain lies in his memories of Akira Kurusu that has spawned a version of him capable of hatred.

There is another menacing suggestion in the implications made by Shadow Akira, something Goro conveniently failed to mention to Margaret and Lavenza. He wants him gone, dead if possible, yet he doesn’t want to fight Goro. Because he knows that, if Goro is left to linger for long enough, he will perish, once again, on his own. A fragment of a soul, and one without a body. The Velvet Room residents must know that he can’t impose on their hospitality forever. Yet, Goro isn’t sure if their omission of the fact is motivated by a desire to protect him or Akira Kurusu’s already fragile psyche.

In wondering about the past and present of this inexplicable bond he, somehow, stumbled into in the past he can’t recall, Goro almost feels the urge to text Akira again, maybe ask him how his little rendezvous with that group of teenagers went. After Futaba Sakura, whom he had noticed among their ranks, Goro was quite sure that, eventually, such encounters would become unavoidable. Akira seemed like the type to surround himself with the nosiest of people, and, while Goro wants no part in having to interact with them, Akira’s obnoxious confidants knowing of his existence would, at least, eliminate the need for overt caution during their outings.

In fidgeting with his phone, Goro notes that Akira has read his messages quite a while ago, but didn’t leave a response. Strange.

Unfortunately, this exact moment has been chosen to clarify any growing suspicions about his silence Goro might’ve had.

The door to the lounge room flies open, and there he is - disheveled, flushed, and very real Akira Kurusu. Gray eyes and a black coat.

“Are you fucking illiterate?” Goro hisses in place of a hello. “What in the phrasing of don’t even think about heading here now was impossible for you to comprehend?”

Akira pays him no mind.

“You saw my Shadow? What happened? Did it hurt you?”

“Again, what in the phrasing of we’re fine here did you not understand?”

Akira must’ve just lost both his reading and listening comprehension somewhere between opening Goro’s texts and bursting into the Velvet Room when he was explicitly asked not to , because he just ignores everything Goro is saying and plops next to him on the couch, eyes eager and a bit terrified.

“Tell me everything.”

“Fuck off. I’m tired.”

“Tell me a little bit?”

He just never gives up, does he?

And, apparently, Goro Akechi always gives in. 

As Goro explains the long and short of his encounter with the Shadow, standing firm on the decision that he will not go into details until, at the very least, morning, Akira’s expression falls from eager to concerned to despairingly brooding. 

When Goro finishes, he is silent for almost long enough for it to become worrisome. Yet, when Akira does speak, Goro feels like he would prefer that he didn’t.

“You know that I don’t hate you, right?” His voice is so meek and pathetic that Goro wants to slap him.

“Of course I know, don’t be stupid.”

Akira’s expression softens a little, but not enough for Goro to think that they’re out of the trenches.

“…What was he like?” Akira asks after another moment of quiet reflection. “Other than, well, murderous and awful.”

He seems to be searching for a particular answer, yet Goro doesn’t think it’s one he can provide.

“He seemed… spiteful,” he responds honestly. “He threw a knife at me.”

Which was, most definitely, not the right thing to say if he intended to return the atmosphere to some sort of a composed baseline. In fact, mentioning the very non-threatening and completely harmless knife-throwing Akira’s Shadow used to theatrically prove a point might’ve been the wrong thing to mention in any context.

“I’m gonna fucking kill him.”

Goro doesn’t comment that killing his own Shadow will, effectively, result in Akira himself dropping dead. Akira, of course, is aware of that. But he also must be aware that any potential confrontation with his Shadow will result in unpredictable, likely unfavorable change. This is a zero-sum game they’re playing.

What happens when you steal what the heart desires badly enough to twist itself away from its owner, ugly and tormented in its sinful need? What part of it do you kill, in the process?

Akira doesn’t want to kill his distortion, not really. A shame, because his distortion is a conniving asshole.

“So now you feel more ready to steal your heart’s desire or whatever it is you do with Shadows?” Goro asks because, in essence, he is no better than the ugly thing he created.

Goro knows the answer. Akira, nevertheless, doesn’t give him one. 

So, Goro goes for a different approach. 

“Have I… stolen other people’s desires before?”

For a beat, Akira assesses him with an intensity he almost wants to dub hopeful, yet whatever he sees reflected back at him in Goro’s eyes returns him to his despairing, contemplative baseline.

“No, not really,” he still responds. “I did, however, but never from people who didn’t deserve it. We call it a change of heart.”

A change of heart. Goro remembers Margaret mentioning that Akira must fear this exact thing. A process by which a desire is stolen, a forceful cognitive change. Come to think of it, Shadow Akira did refer to himself as a gentleman thief. The half-formed idea of an urban legend mixed with oddly personal notions of both detestation and regard comes to mind, and Goro begins to connect the dots. 

“What do you mean, people who didn’t deserve it? What even is a change of heart?”

Akira opens his mouth to respond, but hesitates, as if choosing the words is proving to be more difficult than he anticipated.

“It’s like- it takes away the person’s desire to do bad things, in a way. Takes the part of them that committed horrible acts, like abuse, or plagiarism, or murder, and makes them see the atrocities they’ve enacted for what they are. Makes them repent.”

How Akira stumbles with his words, sounding almost childish and uncharacteristically ineloquent, makes Goro suspect that he is sheepish due to already knowing how Goro feels about the issue. Well, if that’s the case, he is right to assume the worst.

“So, and you were the one to decide who needs to repent and who doesn’t? Is it atonement then, really?”

“Heh, I guess you’re right, it was pretty self-important of me to judge people like that. But I never pretended it wasn’t self-serving, to be honest,” he doesn’t sound like he himself is repenting, more just listing objective facts. “Don’t get me wrong, we changed the hearts of real bastards, and, if not for us, none of them would ever stop hurting others. But I would lie if I said there wasn’t any narcissistic drive behind my actions.”

Goro thinks back to what Akira has admitted to back in Inaba. Goro Akechi was a killer himself. Did Akira ever consider changing his heart? Or did the selfishness go both ways?

“The power over one’s free will is way too grandiose to be granted to a singular person, or even a small group of people, if you acted as a part of a troupe. Even if you did use it for the presumed good.”

What kind of justice is it, really - converting people from inside out to abide by someone else’s idea of ethics? Even if they were real bastards, as Akira called them, what kind of repentance can be achieved through the means of physically overwriting one’s cognition, essentially voiding any sense of personal growth in an instant? 

But if Akira is right, and, in the cases he had to get involved in, the people whose hearts he changed were immune to being persecuted by conventional means, would leaving them as horrid and destructive as they are be a just choice? Or is, in such desperate situations, the evil of allowing one to have control over someone’s free will to commit atrocities a necessary one?

“Some things really do never change, huh, Akechi?” 

Lost in his own thought paradoxes, Goro almost misses the saddened, nostalgic smile that graces Akira’s features.

“Maybe it’s my punishment, then. Having to face my own twisted desires.”

He says it like a verdict, and a part of Goro, one he truly didn’t know existed before this moment, marvels at his moral downfall.

“Regardless of your feelings on the matter, we must face it, and, for that, we first need to find it,” Goro snaps himself out of his momentary episode. “And that particular discussion I refuse to have right now. So, get out and go get some sleep. Didn’t you have some important business to attend to tomorrow morning?”

Akira looks at him like he, once again, lost his ability to comprehend human speech, and Goro knows nothing good has ever followed that particular look.

“I’m staying here tonight.”

Being always correct is both a curse and a blessing, it appears.

“Like hell you are. Don’t be ridiculous.” It seems like this phrase, when addressing Akira, comes up too often for comfort.

“I already told Futaba. And closed Leblanc for the night. So, yes, I am staying. Gonna be way easier to get to the station from here in the morning, anyway.”

Frankly, Goro is exhausted and done with the bullshit. So, he simply plops down, neck bent uncomfortably into the crook of the couch, with Akira still taking up half of it, and sighs in what he hopes to convey is complete and utter devastation.

“Do whatever you want. See if I care.”

Goro might not be able to sleep, but he sure as hell can pretend and be infuriatingly unresponsive. 

Akira is probably beaming at him right now, a winner in yet another little mind game they seem incapable to stop playing. Yet, he doesn’t move away or get up to claim a different couch for sleep. 

He is silent and motionless, eerily so, and Goro can feel his eyes on him, so he pretends not to notice. 

They exist like this for quite some time, and Goro tries not to wonder what goes through Akira’s head in this instance. He tries not to think of desires that deserve to be erased. He fails, miserably, and then there is a shift of weight, and a creak of movement, and suddenly his arms are filled with leather fabric and stiff, awkwardly angled limbs.

Akira’s head tucked where his shoulder meets his neck is becoming an uncomfortably familiar sensation. This close, the scent of coffee and gunmetal is overwhelming.

Before Goro finds the heart to push him away, Akira whispers something into the crook of his neck, his warm breath tickling his skin.

“Can you promise me something?” he asks tentatively, and it sounds crushed, it sounds vulnerable, it sounds like he has already rejected Akira’s plea for a promise time and time and time again.

He might have. And he might do it once again, now.

“What is it?”

“When we get your memory back, promise me you won’t just go away on your own. Promise you will at least try.”

It’s quiet, and desperate, and so fucking absurd in its implications that Goro would just… what? Leave? Where would he even go? What could he possibly achieve by leaving?

But it’s quiet, and desperate, and it sounds like something meant for his ears, not now, but in a future yet undetermined, in a past still shrouded in darkness.

Goro has no right to promise this to Akira. It’s not his promise to make, and they both know it.

“I promise,” he says anyway, and hopes, uselessly, that the Goro Akechi he regains at the end of this exhausting journey will honor his words.

Akira exhales loudly into his neck, and it almost sounds like a nervous, manic chuckle.

“Thank you,” he says, after a beat. “Can I just… stay, like this? For just a little while..?”

Goro doesn’t answer. He doesn’t move, either.

Akira’s weight is heavy in his arms, and is probably supposed to be familiar. In an odd way, it is, but not in the intrinsic sensational manner, like walking or holding a fake gun. It makes something within him stir in anxious recollection, yearning to be allowed to surface, and by the time Goro gives up on trying to provide it with an exit, Akira is already fast asleep.

Don’t leave him behind, he whispers into the future. I don’t know what you ran from, and I don’t know what you’re trying to make me run from now, but don’t run from him, again. He doesn’t deserve you running away. And you don’t deserve an option to run.

Goro lies still through the entire night, listening to Akira’s quiet breathing, and wonders how Goro Akechi, the terrible, fake, mistrustful killer that he is and used to be, could’ve had this and still leave. How could he have made Akira Kurusu, so kind, and perfect, and brilliantly infuriating, fear him leaving again so severely.

Akira is a surprisingly deep sleeper, and by the time morning does come around, it takes Goro disentangling himself from his corpse-like body and physically shaking Akira back to the world of the living for him to actually wake up.

“Oh fuck, what time is it?” is the first thing he says upon opening his eyes, and a quick glance at his phone proves that, for how deeply Akira sleeps, he is capable of going to full alertness just as swiftly. He is out of the Velvet Room with lightning speed, mumbling something about stupid trains and cats and their stupid routines. All he leaves in his wake is a promise to be back as soon as possible.

At the beginning, Goro remembers finding the boredom that comes with being a Velvet Room resident rather infuriating. It’s peculiar, really, how now he views it as a welcome test of patience, knowing that, at the end of the day, Akira will always come back. 

Margaret is looking at him with a knowing smirk from their little card table, shuffling through a deck with lazy proficiency.

“Lavenza,” Goro calls as he strolls to join Margaret at the table. “Care to indulge us in a game? Tycoon is really not meant to be played with just two people.”

Glancing to where Igor is seated, not even acknowledging any of them, Goro purposefully doesn’t mention that Tycoon is best played by a party of four. Maybe he will ask Akira to participate in a round with them later, instead.

Leaving her master’s side, Lavenza joins them with controlled eagerness, and Goro prepares for yet another long day.

8:56 am

Akira: I barely made it. 

Akira: Also, side note - five new people now know that you exist.

Akira: And, in like, ten minutes, it's gonna be six.

Akira: Sorry…

Goro: I figured.

Akira: You aren’t mad?

Goro: As long as they don’t stand in the way.

Akira: No promises… But I’ll try my best to keep them in line.

Goro: Don’t you have more pressing matters to attend to at the moment instead of distracting me?

Akira: From what? Getting your ass whooped in Tycoon?

Akira: But yeah, you’re right. The train is almost here, and Ann is looking at me weirdly.

Akira: She’s saying hi.

Akira: Okay, gotta run. The train is here. Talk to you soon.

Akira: Tell Margaret I’m rooting for her.

12:34 pm

Akira: So, Sumire took your return relatively well.

Akira: You and Sumire used to be on… relatively good terms? You helped her a lot at one point, so she is glad that there is a chance for me to help you now.

Akira: Everyone else also took it alright. I think I managed to convince them that meeting you until you remember who they all are is not the greatest idea.

Goro: As long as your precious friends don’t slow us down. I have no intentions to hinder our progress in favor of making useless introductions.

Akira: Sumire saw you text this and said, and I quote: “Oh, it really is Akechi-senpai!”

Goro: Your friends already disgust me.

Akira: Anyway.

Akira: We’re heading to grab some ramen. Then I need to quickly stop by Shinjuku to meet a friend. See you around five?

Goro: Don’t take too long.

4:43 pm

Akira: Heading your way.

Akira: Do you feel like lack of direction and procrastination describe you at the current moment?

Goro: What?

Akira: Also, does the name Munehisa Iwai ring any bells?

Goro: What do you think, genius?

Goro: Of course not. What was that about a lack of direction?

Akira: Thought so. Then it’s just the card itself.

Goro: Care to elaborate?

Akira: Not really. I have a friend who reads fortunes, so I asked her to give me a little sneak peek. 

Goro: Fortune telling is entirely unscientific and exists purely as a deception tool that brings comfort to weak-minded individuals incapable of taking responsibility for their own actions.

Akira: Don’t knock it till you try it. Chihaya is the real deal.

Akira: Also, you’re the one to talk. You literally got resurrected by magic.

Goro: It wasn’t magic. The science behind the cognitive world might still be extremely new and under-researched, but at least it has roots in actual scientific reasoning. Fortunes don’t.

Akira: Or maybe they do, and it’s just even less researched than the Metaverse science. 

Akira: And, in a few years, we’re all gonna live in a world dictated by Tarot readings.

Goro: That would be a nightmarish dystopia that abolishes all notions of free choice. I refuse to entertain the idea of existing as a puppet of blind fate.

Akira: Please never change.

Akira: I’m off the train now.

Akira: See you in a minute!

“So, wait a minute, can’t we just… open the Nav and roam around this mirror Metaverse world or something? See if Shadow me left any tracks?” Akira inquires as he organizes the played cards into a neat stack.

The undisputed winner of their round, as well as all previous rounds, only shakes her head.

“If your Shadow is as powerful as Akechi-kun’s recollection suggests, we will find nothing. What we really need to do is uncover the root of your distortion.”

“But what do you mean by the root of my distortion? Like, the keywords, the location? I thought I didn't have a Palace, though. Can you just reinstall the Nav so we can check?”

Akira’s confusion is expected, and Goro shares it, in a sense. But there’s also a desperate edge to his voice, like he is trying to confirm through annihilation that his distortion is, somehow, different enough for him not to need to battle it through conventional means.

  

Margaret looks at them both in consideration, and then, unexpectedly, turns to Igor. Goro can’t see what kind of reaction she awaits from her master, but it seems that whatever was said during their silent communication enabled her to continue with newfound resolve.

“The distortion of your kind is something I have encountered, previously, although back then, the distortion, while native to the hearts of promising Persona users, never occurred within the Wildcard. The cognitive world is ever-changing, and the means by which the Wildcard and his confidants have defeated that particular threat are no longer available to access. Yet, I don’t see why the Metaverse Navigator you’re speaking of can’t be altered to adjust to this type of distortion, now that we have more knowledge of it.”

“Yet, Trickster, this is about the extent of our assistance,” Lavenza carefully adds, and it’s a kind of rejection Goro has come to expect from the Velvet Room residents. They are assistants, not guides, and while it still frustrates Goro to no end, he is slowly beginning to comprehend that the limits of their help are set not by a malicious desire to make the guests do all the work but a genuine inability to provide more than they already do. “Uncovering the root itself still falls onto you and Goro Akechi, as well as discovering the location of Goro Akechi’s missing fragment.”

The missing fragment. By far the biggest mystery of their current predicament, yet, unbeknownst to Akira Kurusu and, perhaps, even the Velvet Room attendants, one that determines the prolonged survival of one Goro Akechi the most.

“I have… a theory about that.”

Three pairs of expecting eyes turn to him, and Goro can swear he even feels Igor’s burning side glance at the back of his head.

“Akira’s Shadow spoke of my fragment like it’s something he is aware of, personally. He knew I was looking for it, and he knew it wasn’t tied to my memories. He called me half a soul without a body, and that’s a specific I never heard any of you mention before, so even if the Shadow shares all memories and experiences with the real form, he wouldn’t have known that.”

Goro studies Margaret, expecting to see in her reaction a clue, expecting to convey through his stare the notion, the question, you know, don’t you? You know what it means, but where he finds the reaction he is looking for is, instead, Lavenza.

Lavenza is looking at him with regret. 

“I think he doesn’t just know where the other me is. I think he has it.”

“That would, indeed, explain why we can’t pinpoint its exact location, similarly to Kurusu-kun’s distortion,” Margaret says, and the spell is broken, Lavenza’s eyes darting back to her and leaving Goro to steep in the realization.

To his left, Akira, raging and oblivious, lets out a deep sigh.

“I really need to have a talk with that Shadow of mine…”

“Hopefully, such an opportunity would present itself soon,” Goro agrees. “But it’s pointless to waste time thinking about his pathetic self for now.”

He turns to Margaret, dread fueling a new kind of urgency in his soul.

“We trust you will make the agreed-upon preparations with the app, Margaret-san?”

“Of course, Akechi-kun. It should be done in a couple of weeks.”

“Then,” Goro gets up from his seat and, after throwing one last keen glance at Lavenza, who refuses to meet his eyes, returns his attention to Akira. “I presume we have memories to awaken. I trust it you have some semblance of a plan, or am I in for another disappointment?”

Snapping out of his disquieting tranquility with questions-raising swiftness, Akira greets him with a smile that, for its gentleness, could probably blind the sun itself.

“Sure do.”

He doesn’t sound so sure at all.

“You mentioned that my Shadow and you talked in a club of sorts, right?”

Akira’s voice is tentative, a skipping rock trying to keep its momentum before it, inevitably, sinks.

“Correct.” Dim and homely, familiar in all but actuality.

His head is a two-way radio with no one on the other side, but he can still hear the static. He knows the radio isn’t broken, and he knows that, while the other side wants him to believe that there’s no one for him to reach, he can still hear breathing coming from the receiver. You don’t wanna remember, because it hurts, the static whispers.

I do, even if it hurts, Goro says. I need to know which of us died by drowning, and which died by being torn apart. I need to know who was standing over me at the water’s surface.

The static breathes. 

And what can hurt about a stupid club, anyway? 

The static breathes. 

Oh, you have no idea. Things hurt much worse when you don’t die, didn’t you know?

“He also implied that the place was created by my own mind, so I presume that it is a location that used to be of some importance to me.”

Based on Akira’s thousand-yard stare, of some importance is definitely an understatement.

“..Yes,” he reaches for his face, as if to adjust his mask, but swiftly realizes that there’s nothing there, hand traveling to his pocket instead. “I honestly didn’t want to go there, not so soon. There are other places around that we frequented, somewhat, like this trendy café in Kichijoji, or billiards. The aquarium, also, although we only went once, was an important spot. I wanted to take you to all these places first, because… after Leblanc, I didn’t think any of the experiences there would succeed in jogging your memories, I just… wanted to hang out with you, again, I guess. But that was a selfish desire.”

He speaks of a history Goro can’t recall, and it settles around him like a whirlpool of snowflakes, elusive and impermanent, and meant to coat him just for long enough to feel the cold without it piercing deeper than the skin. People who come from up North must speak of the snow itself in a similar way. They move to warmer climates, where snow is no longer a constant, expected and permanent enough for it to become a nuisance, yet they still remember what it smells like, what it feels like to blink through eyelashes that freeze together, what it sounds like when the ground squeals under every heavy step.

Goro doesn’t think he grew up in the North. Yet, his memories smell somewhat like fresh snow, in places he can grasp.

“It’s not that selfish. I’m sure I would be happy to visit all of these places with you, once my memories return.”

“You don’t know that,” Akira says, like he knows.

“Well, what’s one more promise, then?” I accept. I promise. I’ll hold on to… “That’s one way to hold the past me accountable in the future.”

“..You really need to stop making promises you can’t guarantee you’ll keep.”

He sounds as if the path they walk is already littered with shards of words Goro couldn’t keep. As if Akira’s feet are maimed and bleeding from refusing to rest, regardless.

A promise is a sacred thing, at least Goro thinks it was, to him. So, how come whenever the urge to give his word to Akira overcomes him, he preemptively feels as though he has already broken it?

His promises aren’t paper-thin. They are shards of porcelain, and they cut deep. His promises aren’t meant to break so easily.

Akira is, once again, messing with something in his pocket. It’s getting on his nerves.

“And you need to stop telling me what to do,” he says sternly, because his promises aren’t meant to break, at all. “So what’s so important about the club then, that you decided on it as the last resort?”

“It was… special. To you and me, I mean.” There is an implication to the words, there is the same implication to many of the words Akira says to him. “Leblanc was, too, but I shared Leblanc with plenty of people. Jazz Jin was… our spot, you know? You showed it to me last June, and we used to go there all the time, just to chat, have some drinks, and listen to live music on occasion. There was a time when I took you there almost daily for an entire month, even. The owner knows our names and everything… I never took everyone else there, and I know you only went with me, too. I haven’t entered it ever since…”

Akira cuts himself off. Goro doesn’t think he can bring himself to say it.

“Since you died.”

But he does.

“And that’s part of the reason I didn’t wanna go, hell, I still would rather we just ditch this idea and head to look at some fish. But I know my distortion is growing, and we don’t have time to just… fool around. We never really did. The problem is… I don’t know what to do if Jazz Jin doesn’t work. If it doesn’t work, I will be out of options.”

It’s a good thing that Akira understands the urgency of their situation without Goro having to tell him the much more sinister reason why they need to find his Shadow as soon as possible. And Goro needs to remember, even if it means pushing Akira off the metaphorical hill of hurtful mementos right into the restless waters of grief.

Akira has lost him at least twice, already. There’s no way he can remain unbroken under the pressure of the imminent possibility of losing him once more. 

A precaution is not a lie.

“Then, let’s fucking hope it works.”

It’s immediately obvious why Goro Akechi must’ve loved Kichijoji .  

Compared to the relentless hustle of Shibuya, Kichijoji is on the quieter side, even if the prevalence of obvious tourist traps and spots that scream of overpriced opulence points out that even quiet luxury can be a for-sale commodity. The ambiance of Kichijoji is more of a hum than a roaring buzz, and the evening crowd provides just enough anonymity without the overbearing sensation of being suffocated. 

The main street seems to tickle out into numerous alleyways and nooks that make Goro feel oddly secure, locked into the neighborhood’s maze-like structure with plenty of potential routes to retreat. The streets of Kichijoji are rich with scents of cooking street food, expensive leather, and something almost akin to incense, although Goro doubts that the fragrance carries over all the way from the temple he can vaguely make out from where they’re standing.

Akira seems to melt into the district’s atmosphere almost as much as Goro, soaking in the doubtlessly nostalgic sights of its commercial sanctuaries and bright street signs. 

“C’mon,” he catches Goro’s stare with a lazy grin. “It’s a bit of a walk, no wasting time.”

Akira takes them through the back alleys, pointing out various locations like Goro can’t fucking read that it’s a Chinese Bun Shop, and in no time, they emerge back out in front of a wide passage off from the main street. From their spot at its maw, Goro can see the fairy lights of what, he safely assumes, is their destination.

The exterior of Jazz Jin, similarly to Leblanc, stirs no particular memories. This time, it’s the sound, a purr of a melody bleeding out onto the street, alluring passersby to succumb to its honeyed echo. It’s not a memory, but a sensation. A sensation of waiting, once again, and it seems like Goro Akechi has spent too much of his time waiting, stalling, idle and unable to rest, stuck in some perpetual motion of never getting where he’s supposed to go. 

Yet, this is never where the wait begins - this is its graveyard, a requiem for a longing he never admitted to feeling. Like all of Goro Akechi’s favorite places, this is a limbo, a make-belief played out in a mausoleum in which ghosts can pretend to just live a little, like it’s not their own bones they are crushing in their dance.

By his side stands another apparition, or, perhaps, an unwilling exorcist, Goro isn’t sure.

“Ready to go in?” 

Are you even ready yourself? Goro doesn’t ask.

“Sure,” he says, and takes the first step down. It rings an echo.

“Who do I spy? Isn’t that Akechi-kun!”

A dapper-looking man wearing sunglasses indoors greets them at the counter with much more enthusiasm than Goro had anticipated. Next to him, Akira sheepishly runs a hand through his unruly hair.

“Kept my word - brought him back for you, Boss.”

The man Goro assumes to be the owner of the place smiles at them like they’re his long-lost children.

“Where have you been? I haven’t seen either of you in, what, months? Last time I saw you alone,” he turns his attention to Akira. “You were looking so down, I thought you two broke up or something.”

Just how close are we to this man? 

Akira’s laugh is more uncomfortable than Goro has ever heard it. Usually, he is much more efficient at turning on his charms.

“Sorry to worry you, Boss. It’s nothing like that, we just moved.”

The owner rubs his chin for a beat.

“Oh yeah, I remember you mentioning something like going back to your hometown. Should’ve told me back then that Akechi-kun is going with you! I was so worried!” Seemingly satisfied with the white lie, the man adjusts his sunglasses. “Go grab your usual seats, today is on the house, for old times’ sake.”

“Thank you, Boss,” Akira nods, and all but drags Goro away to a side table.

“By the way, dig your new look, Akechi-kun. Very daring, didn’t know you had it in you - you always looked so proper. Must’ve been all that detective business holding you back,” the owner calls for them as they disappear into the shadows of the club.

Now that he has time to assess his surroundings, Goro finds them expectedly familiar. The real Jazz Jin is much livelier than his cognitive version - a singer is supposed to perform tonight according to the entrance sign - but, otherwise, it’s an almost eerie replica, down to the wall posters. 

The table to the side of the center stage Akira settles on is also unmistakably the same as the one Shadow Akira occupied, and, as Akira slides into the same spot as his distorted self, Goro feels a ping of dissonance.

“Completely forgot about him,” Akira mumbles under his breath.

“Were we close with the owner?”

Akira shakes his head.

“Not really. You alluded to knowing him from somewhere, but he only remembers me because we came together so often, and you never brought in anyone else.”

Yet, the interaction with the owner seems to have upset Akira way more than Goro expected.

“So, any memories popped up?”

“Of course not,” Goro scoffs. “It’s sensational, not just location-based, I thought I had explained it well enough even for you to grasp.”

“Don’t talk like an expert on the subject - it literally happened to you once. ”

“Once was enough,” and it was, it should’ve been enough, and if this doesn’t work today, the blame will lie solely on Goro’s shoulders for failing when he had a chance. “All I need is just a single more experience like that.”

Do you want to know why it hurts?

I don’t. I must.

“..Do you think Shadow me is gonna appear this time?”

Shadow Akira told him that it’s not going to matter, that his memories are not gonna get him any closer to any truths. That he will die, either way, again. But Shadows shouldn’t exist in disaccord with their owners, and Akira wants nothing more than to keep him alive. Shadow Akira didn’t stop him from seeking his memories. It couldn’t, or it didn’t care to.

It looked hurt there, for a moment. It looked like Akira.

“I doubt it. He indicated that he conveyed everything he wanted me to know during our last conversation. But you never know, he might’ve come up with something to add. He seemed obnoxiously chatty.”

“Couldn’t be me,” Akira smiles, trying to keep the atmosphere light.

You? Chatty? A preposterous concept.”

Their drinks come in a few minutes later, a colorful concoction of syrups and juice, and Goro feels hesitant, watching the beads of condensation slide down the sides of the chilled glass. 

Akira watches him, nerves in a cluster.

“Don’t put too much thought into it. I doubt the drink is gonna be the thing that does it. My bets are on…”

“..the music,” Goro finishes for him.

“Yeah. So, drink up. It’s about to start any minute, and I doubt your cocktail is gonna follow you to the Velvet Room.”

The drink is pleasantly refreshing and just sweet enough to cut through the acidity of citrus. 

The main event is announced by the clinking of heels over the wooden floors.

From the back emerges a gorgeous lady in a simple black dress, her wine-red hair done up in an elaborate, somewhat old-fashioned style. A man joins her at the piano and sifts through his sheet music, while the singer works on adjusting the microphone.

There’s no announcement, no elaborate entrance, yet the club’s atmosphere shifts in anticipation, the murmur of conversation suppressing itself.

Akira’s hand darts into his pocket. Goro watches the woman with the intensity of a hawk.

The first notes resonate through the space, and Goro melts into a synesthetic gyre.

This mind trips into a synergy outside of linearity, both chaotic and deliberately mathematical, structured in a way only things that understand order can distort it, well-informed, lateral-minded, an impression of sequence at a systematic disarray. It’s music that never minimizes risks, and that’s what Goro adores about it, ever-careful and ever-reckless, counting every second step in sets of eight. 

His mind trips and falls, down and down and possibly at an angle, and if you fall for long enough, you begin mistaking collapse for ascension. Flight as controlled falling, and flight as sinking to the bottom of the ocean, lead-weighted limbs and lead-weighted chest, and a drop, he jumps, he doesn’t catch his eyes before he jumps, does he? He doesn’t remember if he does, not really, but he catches him jumping, it’s frankly impossible to miss, the theatrics of it all. He doesn’t remember-

Wait.

He doesn’t remember?

It’s beautiful music, really. Perfectly composed, brilliantly performed. He can see why Goro Akechi liked jazz.

Goro Akechi liked jazz. Why again did Goro Akechi like jazz? 

When was the last time Goro Akechi and Akira Kurusu went out to listen to jazz together? Why did they frequent the jazz club? Did they go here, at all?

They did. He knows because, confronting him in a space between reality and a dream within a dream within a dream, the Shadow of Akira Kurusu manifested in this very same jazz club, one synthesized by Goro Akechi’s very mind.

They did. He knows because Akira Kurusu described this club as their special place, one reserved for just the two of them, one they visited often enough to have a favorite seat, to have the owner notice their absence.

They did. He knows because… he knows, he really does, but not because he, as himself , recalls ever sitting at this particular spot, mellowed and relaxed by the live music and the pleasure of the company. He knows, because he has to know. He knows…

“Akechi?”

Tentative. Gentle. Familiar, but not enough.

Goro downs his drink. The citrus tingles his lips.

“We’re leaving.”

Akira doesn’t ask any questions. Goro would expect him to look somewhat hopeful, or, perhaps, apprehensive. Maybe concerned, maybe even fearful or angry.

He looks dejected.

As they ascend the stairs, the owner urges them to come back soon.

“It didn’t work, right…” It’s not a question. Akira obviously doesn’t intend it as a question.

They walk out in silence, and, as if carried by some incomprehensible urge to get away, get somewhere where the music can’t reach him, or to where it flows, where it has fled together with his past impressions, the music that remembers him better than he does himself, Goro stomps through the terrains of these familiar unfamiliar streets, directionless yet determined. 

He doesn’t know where he’s going. The static in his head buzzes, mockingly unintelligible.

Akira doesn’t interrupt, and Goro wouldn’t know he follows if not for the regular rhythm of footsteps hitting the pavement a few paces behind him. If not for the knowledge, intrinsic and painfully unexplained, that he will follow, that he always does.

When Goro stops, and Akira breathes out his not-question, he sounds out of breath. Somehow, they ended up in a small crevice behind the temple, completely deserted, safe for their shadows distorting in the glow of a streetlamp. 

When he turns to look at Akira, he can’t make out his expression, blurred by the dim light and cast down, staring at the ground with messy hair falling into his eyes. Slumped shoulders and a hand clutching something in his pocket.

It bugs him, on a level deeper than ambiguous recollection or fabricated not-quite-first impressions, it bugs him to the point of infuriation, this falsehood of control and familiarity existing in parallels within the minds of two people where Goro is the one forced to play catch-up, where he can never dissolve the unease of forgetting, doesn’t want to dissolve it, regardless how easily pretending comes to him. And there is Akira, looking like he’s not enough yet acting like he is, even though he is not, definitively, because a matter can’t exist without a cause, just like a mind cannot exist without matter, and all that makes him up, those torn-apart pieces conjoined together, belong to someone else, and being someone else could never hurt more than being nothing at all. 

What he remembered first was a name, a name of someone who lived a short and, probably, sorrowful life, and that the short and sorrowful life of the person whose name he remembered had ended, and that the person was himself. He remembered the streets basked in artificial lights and phantasms of places incomprehensible to those walking the streets basked in artificial lights. He remembered the color of Akira’s eyes, and remembered the smell of the place Akira calls home. There exists no state of eternal equilibrium in those memories, but he doubts that Goro Akechi was ever prone to existing in equilibria of any kind, and that, in itself, is also a memory.

He remembers the anger, the very anger he feels now, charring the emotions of disappointment, and longing, and hopeful illusions of complacency within his heart to ash. Akira doesn’t move, doesn’t look up, and Goro wants to lash out, to scream in his face something cruel and needlessly dejected, to place the blame of failure on his slumped shoulders. They carry a plentitude of it, as is, what more would adding Goro’s disappointment and blistering anger do?

And yet, as if sensing the seething threaten to boil to the surface, Akira looks up. Perhaps, concerned by the silence. Perhaps, just to confirm there’s still someone there to look up at.

He looks up, eyes steady and concerningly empty.

Anger chars him in scorching brands, yet as instantaneously and completely as it overtakes him, it freezes just as swiftly. 

What it leaves behind is much more damning. A breeze of realization.

It was all for nothing. This was, in Akira’s words, their last resort, one he, feeling the urgency of the situation, chose to implement immediately. They no longer have a plan now. They must take action, they must move before the unclear deadline of his expiration or Akira’s full submission to whatever desire his heart spat out. 

Goro has failed. Once again, he has failed, and there’s no one to blame for his pathetic failure except himself.

“Let’s go back to Leblanc. No point in wasting time running over foolish hypotheticals.”

The words barely shake Akira out of his stupor.

“Are you sure? We can go back to the Velvet Room, rest, and decide what to do tomorrow. Maybe Lavenza or Margaret has some ideas.”

“I’m not letting you call it a day until we establish a cohesive action plan, or, at least, an outline of one. Unlike you, I don’t have the privilege to engage in saccharine procrastination.”

It’s odd to see Akira with so little fight in him, but, at the very least, his passivity promises compliance. They must have at least a few more hours before Goro is unceremoniously dragged back into the Velvet Room, and he is not about to waste them, with Akira’s assistance or not.

The ride to Leblanc is soundless, and so is their destination, seemingly already closed for the night. As they enter, Akira only breaks the silence to inquire if he wants any coffee, but after being snapped at in response, he returns to soundlessly contemplating whatever is spinning around in his head.

The attic looks the same as Goro recalls it from the other day, down to the clothes heaving in piles on the bed. Goro’s own Velvet Room jacket is staring back at him in mockery.

Akira plops down on the couch and buries his face in his hands.

“Stop sulking,” Goro stands over him. “Any bright ideas visited your head yet?”

Akira doesn’t look up at him as he speaks.

“We can always go back to my original plan, try the aquarium and the darts next. Margaret said it’ll take a while to get the Nav running again, anyway. We have time.”

“I refuse to stall,” Goro states forcefully, the inside of his brain swarming in static. “And it’s useless to consider places you know won’t have any effect. From what you told me, these are all superficial compared to the club or here. So, save your little date fantasies for when we finally tackle this issue.”

Akira hesitantly raises his head, cheeks flushed and eyes somewhat murky. Yet, he refuses to meet Goro’s gaze, staring instead somewhere behind him.

“There are still options… We can fight, for one. I don’t know if we can go down to Mementos, and we can’t duel with Personas, but we can fight, or look for Shadows to obliterate, or something.”

That’s an…unexpected suggestion. Did they fight each other in the past? The idea does meet the sensational criteria, but, in their current state, both incapable of calling upon their spirits of rebellion and denied access to familiar battling grounds, executing it might be challenging, if not outright impossible. 

But before Goro can vocalize adding a duel to their list of potential future steps, Akira’s almost soundless mumble stops him in his tracks.

“There must be something I’m missing…”

And there is, isn’t there? Something they are both missing, something Goro has been pondering, openly but mostly in the isolated backrooms of his mind, ever since he first met Akira Kurusu. An obvious measure, yet one some barely-there, residual parts of his psyche fear resorting to viciously, violently.

“Well, the memories are, as you are aware, triggered by extreme sensational déjà vu,” he begins tentatively, and the backrooms hiss. “So, if you do have something in mind that I have been sensationally conditioned to associate with strong emotions, now would be the time to mention it, Akira.”

For a beat, Akira looks at him like he genuinely doesn’t understand what he’s suggesting.

Until he does.

“It's not gonna be through me, if that’s what you’re implying.” His face is blank, not angry and not embarrassed. A clean state, spotless to the point of being, without a doubt, wiped out deliberately. “Outside of fighting, there are no sensational stimuli I can possibly trigger to give your memories a push. If you’re thinking what I believe you’re thinking, such fairy tale solutions won’t cut it here.”

“What?”

Akira just shrugs, like he hasn’t just uncovered something so utterly absurd that Goro struggles to believe that he hasn’t chosen this exact moment to crack one of his obnoxious jokes.

“You asked me before, and here you have it - no, we weren’t together, Akechi. We aren’t about to save you with a true love’s kiss or something.”

Once again, what? That doesn’t add up. Not on his side, and, most definitely, not on Akira’s.

“But, I presumed that you-”

“Oh, I am.”

He doesn’t hesitate, not for a moment.

“But then why-”

“That’s something you’ll have to ask yourself.”

He smiles, and this time it’s obviously bitter, a poisonous crack in the perfect facade of indifference, and Goro suddenly feels like punching him in the face, and then promptly shooting himself in the head.

Just what did you do, Goro Akechi?

Well, do you still think you want to know that?

He does. Now more than ever, he does.

Akira stands up, his hand automatically reaching back to mess with whatever it is he keeps in his pocket. Goro recognizes it as a nervous tic at this point, something he must be doing without even realizing, like fixing his hair or reaching for his eyes. Akira is prone to spasmodic habits like that, idle motions that disturb the stillness of the moment, and in most cases, Goro barely notes them. This particular habit, however, rubs him the wrong way.

“What is that thing that you keep fidgeting with in your pocket? It’s getting on my nerves.”

“Oh… this?” Akira fishes something crumbled out of his jeans, a dark piece of fabric. “It’s nothing, really, just an old memento, I guess.”

There is a lick of hesitancy in his voice, mixed into an ocean of melancholy, but Akira’s hold is steady as he hands his little treasure over. It really is nothing special, just an old, thin leather glove, clearly worn and firmly molded into the shape of someone’s hand, but of high enough quality for the material to remain smooth and uniform. It’s really peculiar that Akira kept it, a symbol of hate that, in his final moments, morphed into an oath of devotion, an anchor of a promise he never intended to keep but hoped, against all inconceivable odds, to never break. And really, Akira would be a kind of sentimental fool to hold onto that, of all things, for months, like his death was some unclosed door, like some stupid little pact could-

“Why did you even keep it? You know I never would’ve fulfilled that promise.”

“It’s not like you left much behind - this was the only thing I had.”

It seems to hit them at the same time, a moment too late.

Goro looks up, and for the first time in the incomprehensible number of preceding firsts, he sees Akira Kurusu, here, as he always was.

Akira was always there, and his infuriatingly cruel kindness that would lump in Goro’s throat, clog his veins, and settle short of choking him just above his heart. The cloudy eyes that looked at him with mirth, and longing, and fear, and desperation, but never pity, never true resentment like Goro’s did, and he would just grin, or look away, or stare him down, smiling, subtly but sincerely, like he knew something Goro didn’t. Like he heard something completely different while Goro spat poisonous words of hate his way, and he absorbed them like cherished declarations. 

“Hi,” Akira says.

Goro feels shockingly calm.

Until he doesn’t. 

His head feels like it’s milliseconds away from exploding his skull from within. 

His heart is beating like it preemptively decided to match the rhythm of running the hell away from here, which he would like to do quite badly. 

He feels something burning the retinas of his eyes.

They are two abysses - a well staring at the sky.

Something within his brain clicks, like an old radio coming back to life, and he used to have one of those, perched up on the window sill in a room that smelled like cigarette smoke and perfume that doesn’t even pretend to be expensive, like blood and vomit, and when he sits still, and simply loses himself in the static, he can pretend not to hear what thin walls, nicotine-stained wallpaper and tape marks and smudges of spilled wine, could never conceal, sound of violence both disguised as anything but and brutally volatile in being anything but. 

There is a method to not jerking equally as violently in response, there is a method to stillness and there is a method to holding a gun, there is a method to finding for oneself a space within systems of dismay that pretend to master impeccable organization, that conceal the chaos just as inefficiently as children hold guns and violent men exert their rage on those who cannot conceive fighting back. He can fight back, he has learned nothing from it all but how to hone the classless artistry of fighting back , and he has learned to hold a gun, from cartoons that speak of justice and from a man in a lab coat who, himself, learned it, perhaps, from unsophisticated crime movies and dry documents devoted to children who shoot themselves in the head, statistics of heroes fighting back that have nothing to do with what he uses his gun for, and he never spoke of vengeance, and he never learned to let go of vengeance, because vengefulness exists with a purpose, and he knows where those without purpose end up, the same place he ended up, the commendable strife tearing him apart, or maybe it wasn’t him who was torn apart, and he does not remember drowning in death, only the metaphorical drowning in suffocating himself with the very strife he honed, in the exhaustion of pretending that settles in hands that aren’t allowed to shake, even when aiming the gun he thinks he never actually learned to hold properly at the only ray of salvation he ever allowed himself to latch onto, even when pulling the trigger, even when-

There is a reactiveness to strife, as a rebel without a cause is not a rebel at all, but a fool. A driven rebel can also just as easily be a fool, and he has never rebelled against anything but things he saw as undeserved for himself, unobtainable for those who predict the unforeseen consequences of attachment, and there are causes to effects he was never oblivious to, until he was oblivious to it all, and they slot, they click , they come to life in waves that never claimed his body, the maw of the abyss he still only perceives as an impression, and an abyss of a different kind, one that claimed her first, one he wanted to claim others, one he chose would claim him after it’s over, to put out the glowing ambers, and he doesn’t remember dying, still, but he remembers choosing to die, maybe once, maybe twice, but, in reality, every single step of the way, motionless silence and a wasted life that was supposed to disintegrate into oblivion, mourned by none and, above all else, never mourned by the executioner and the victim, who happen to share the same name, a name he remembered , and yet it left something behind, not much, as it was supposed to leave nothing at all, in fake worlds colored in artificial pastels and in real worlds illuminated by fresh snow, it left cloudy eyes and broken promises, eyes that don’t have a grave to cry at, hands he knows are able to shake, yet don’t deserve to shake, neither of them ever deserved it, for different reasons, brought into this conundrum of corrosion by magnetic resonance, and by chance, and by calculated betrayal, by cruelty of not believing in kind worlds that require one to unlearn how to fight back.

He never accepted unlearning it, cause or effect. Neither of them did, it looks like.

Neither- 

“Goro?”

Sound breaking through the water’s surface, but words don’t distort, they click , reaching within him to resonate against his hollow lungs that were never to be filled with air again, and he doesn’t need to breathe, wraiths’ chests are hollow by design, then why does it feel so difficult to push words out of his mouth? 

Is it difficult?

Slotting together and tearing apart. 

He forgot to turn the lights off in his bathroom, in a world he forced Akira to shatter.

“I’m okay,” he breathes out. It must be the truth, he wills it to be the truth.

His voice sounds hoarse. It’s been, perhaps, a few infuriatingly viscous seconds since he spoke. The him who spoke a few minutes ago didn’t know who was there to watch him die. Who he has killed.

“I think I need to-”

He needs to leave.

His legs are steady, and his hands don’t shake. His hands never shake.

“I’m so fucking sorry,” Akira cuts him off instantaneously, as if knowing exactly what he was about to say.

And he probably did. On second thought, he definitely did, that’s why he made him promise that yesterday, sly fucker.

Disharmonious choirs, slotting into systems of order only to discover the disarray to be intrinsic to their ugly melody.

“What the hell do you have to apologize for now?” Bitterness comes way easier when you know its source, it appears. “You kept your promise. Or are you already having second thoughts, huh?”

Akira looks like he has struck a Molotov cocktail with a lit stick of dynamite.

He doesn’t think apparitions are capable of feeling nausea. He isn’t sure who is feeling nauseous. 

“I knew,” Akira chokes out, and if he starts crying, Goro will fucking leave. He doesn’t fucking care, if crying is about to commence on either side of this confrontation, Goro will end it, promises be damned.

“I am well aware that you knew. What about that urges an apology is the part I have trouble comprehending, Akira.”

“I knew, that entire time I knew what I’ll be making you remember, and I kept it all away, and I was aware how fucking horrible everything in your life, all the things you forgot, were, and how much of it was my fault, and I still didn’t say anything, didn’t warn you, didn’t give you another chance again. Because I wanted you to remember. It made sense for you to want to remember, because you had no idea, but I knew, and I still wanted it, I still wanted you to suffer.”

And of course, he would be a soft-hearted fool who gets stuck up on the most trivial of issues. He always was. Goro bets that if Akira were the one to lose his memory, he would still end up apologizing profusely for not handling it perfectly.

And maybe that, in a way, was one of the nooks where the issue lay. Goro never wanted him perfect. It just took him too long to realize that Akira never was. That if there was one thing in which they were equals, it was an unacknowledged, hated imperfection.

“You know, I always thought it said a lot about you that, in Maruki’s reality, your actualization of me was the real me. That you, even if subconsciously, chose for Maruki to bring back not the Detective Prince, not some clean-cut, pleasantry-spouting version of me, but the mean-spirited, bitter, ugly reality that I tried so hard to keep at bay.”

His voice stops shaking, at least. Maybe it never did.

Disharmonious choirs, the disequilibrium he died and killed to keep at disarray, returning to their state of atonality. 

“I never thought it was ugly. I just wanted you back.”

“But you do realize that it wasn’t, as Maruki said, just about you. It was also my wish, if poorly defined and abstract, to come back as that person. Maruki had the power, hell, he did that exact thing with Okumura, to erase all traces of people’s ugliness from their own pasts. But I wished you to see me that way, too. So don’t go around taking responsibility for my wishes.”

Akira is looking at him, all wide-eyed and stunned, like he still doesn’t get it. How much do I have to dumb that down for you, huh?

“My memories don’t define me, Akira, but they’re still a part of me that’s intrinsic to who I am. You know full well that I never wished for some bullshit, incomplete salvation. So, thank you,” Thank you for choosing the real me. “I will not say it again, but I’m thankful to you for recovering my memories.”

And there it is - the real smile, basically radiant by Akira’s standard. Existing now in splits, in twos and threes, one he remembers reflected in the aquarium glass, one he recalls falling into the wet, disgusting February snow, and one he has seen just earlier this day, as himself but also not. 

It’s an odd sensation, recalling himself from the past week and trying to fit the puzzle piece of that naive, ill-informed form into the grander narrative of self. And yet he fits, surprisingly well, in fact. He fits, and in the end, it wasn’t a revelation, coming back to himself - it was a slip, a tumbling so gentle and seamless neither of them recalls where the barrier used to lie.

It still hurts, expectedly, knowing hurts. But not that much more severely than not knowing used to. As is often the case, his mind just blew it out of proportion.

Whatever helps you sleep at night, sure.

And now he recognizes this snarling, cackling voice that has been pestering him for weeks about the hurting and the hurt, about drowning, which he still doesn’t remember if he died by, and being pried apart. Loki, of course, is there, within Hereward, together with Robin Hood, unreachable to be called upon but ever-present, nonetheless.

He wonders, eyes still locked into Akira’s, if he can hear Arsène or the buzz of any Persona from the hoard he used to carry around. Persona users can’t have Shadows, but what about the Shadows of those who were never bound by having just one manifestation for their rebellion? Does their heart distort in parts or all at once?

He will rip that Shadow to shreds if it means getting Akira back to how he’s supposed to be.

“What happened to your glasses?” Goro asks.

He thinks his voice is shaking. If it does, Akira doesn’t comment on it.

“Oh,” Akira automatically reaches to adjust them, like Goro didn’t just point out their absence. His hand is shaking. Goro won’t comment on it. “I ditched the glasses look. They were never real to begin with, so I figured it was time to stop hiding my beautiful face from the world.”

Akira would be one to assign some idiotic symbolism to glasses, of all things. Without them, he looks a bit more like Joker, but softer, with only a hint of his alter-ego’s flashiness and none of the poise. Out of all the Phantom Thieves, Joker was always the one who changed the most between reality and cognition. Maybe not in looks, but definitely in disposition.

“I must say that while I’m not angry with you for concealing information from me while working to restore my true self, I am furious about you informing all of the Phantom Thieves about my existence. Your pathetic sheep herd has no business in this, and if you decide to bring them into active collaboration on the matter, I would rather just go back to oblivion and leave you lot to tackle your distortion on your own.”

Akira’s chuckle is infuriatingly easy to miss, it appears, even if Goro recalls hearing it multiple times over the course of the last week. The context adds a level of nostalgia to it Goro regrets recalling.

“Hey, as you must remember, it wasn’t my choice to let them know. And no, I don’t plan to drag them into the Velvet Room so we can all have a turn getting slaughtered by Margaret in Tycoon while discussing the latest stupid thing my Shadow has said,” at that, he quiets for a beat, only to add in a much meeker voice. “I didn’t tell them about my distortion. I don’t wanna drag them into my mess, into the Metaverse. Not when they’re all finally doing so well.”

And there he is again, the bleeding-heart martyr of all the cognitive worlds, thinking of his friends before even considering himself. This time, at least, Akira’s savior complex is working in their favor, for once.

“Why do I still doubt that they’re just going to leave it alone, anyway?”

“You might be right, but I know they’ll let me handle all the Metaverse stuff on my own. The ex-Leader respect still goes a long way. But, of course, they still wanna see you again.”

“The feeling is not mutual. I would happily go another lifetime without having to interact with any of them.”

Akira chuckles again, but this time there’s a nervous underlining to it.

“C’mon, they’re not that bad. Ann used to like you, and, apparently, Yusuke was also fond of you, somewhat. If you plan to stick around, you’ll have to learn how to get along with them, eventually.”

And there it is, the question of the hour. 

“You will stick around, right?”

To that, Goro has no answer. It was an inexcusable offense, his existence in the same space as Akira Kurusu, and in this trial, Akira was the accuser and the defendant, the victim and the witness, the attorney and the prosecutor, and Goro didn’t know who to plead guilty to, in front of whom to shred his defenses.

“I don’t know.” It was the truth that felt like a lie. “I would prefer we ensure the survival of us both before we address this particular question. For now, I did promise you not to leave, and I intend to honor my word.”

It’s a cruel recreation of a conversation they had back in February. A promise to stay, but not when it matters. A plea to be let go, because the alternative means death for something much more important than himself. A plea to be let go, because there’s nothing in him worthy of staying.

Unlike back then, Akira doesn’t argue him.

“Alright,” he says. “You’re flickering, by the way.”

Huh?

But the descriptor turns out to be eerily accurate. He is, in fact, flickering, like the static, vastly ​​different from the familiar slow disintegration of running out of real-world time. 

“It’s the same thing that happened at Leblanc, after the coffee, just a lot less rapid. Maybe that’s just what happens if your form gets too overwhelmed with new sensations.”

It’s a sound theory. After the events of the past few hours, Goro definitely feels like overwhelmed with new sensations describes his state quite accurately. 

He meets it with relief.

“Well, I would indeed welcome some time to think on my own right about now.”

“Can I still come with?”

An expected inquiry, but nonetheless, irksome.

“What about me wanting to think on my own implies that your company is welcome?” While the mean-spirited tone of his words does nothing to weaken Akira’s resolve, his eyes gloss over with a sheen of hesitancy. “I’m not about to barricade myself in the Velvet Room, if that’s what you fear, or go off to stir trouble on my own now that my memory is back. You will still find me there tomorrow.”

“Alright,” it’s clear that his agreement comes to Akira with even more reluctance than the last. “But… text me. And don’t rattle my Shadow if you see him again.”

Can’t promise that, Goro doesn’t say. Instead, he tosses the glove that he just realized he is still holding back to Akira.

“I’m guessing you still want to hold on to that.”

Akira catches it without breaking eye contact.

His smile is slightly crooked, and his eyes are gray. It’s odd that this was, out of all experiences and forgotten sensations, the one insignificant detail Goro’s directionless mind held onto, clinging to their misty color even in the complete absence of everything else.

“Happy to have you back.”

You were right, Goro Akechi, you are, after all, glad to be back, too, aren’t you?

The thought persists even if Goro tries to strike it down, and it must be the last sentiment Akira sees reflected on his face before the nothingness swallows him whole.

Notes:

And with this anticlimactic reveal, what I have lovingly dubbed the prologue of this story is over. This has never been, in fact, about recovering memories, and frankly, there’s only so much character development one can have with all this amnesia nonsense in the way. To be honest, I personally like the following stretch of the story far more, even though writing no-memories Goro was incredibly fun. He will be missed.

Chapter 10: In Memory of the First Last Snow

“You hang out with Akechi an awful lot,” Morgana mentions a week into November.

“You know what they say - keep your enemies close and whatnot,” Akira tries to shrug him off while messing with his bangs through his phone’s front camera. He really should invest in a mirror. It’s not like he is struggling for funds, and going to the downstairs bathroom every time he wants to make sure he doesn’t have curry stuck in his teeth or Mona’s fur plastered all over his lapels is obnoxious. 

They’re going to the jazz club today. They’ve been going to the jazz club almost every day Goro is available this week. Akira feels sick in his stomach.

“Yeah, you fussing like a girl on your first date is keeping your enemies a bit too close ,” Morgana, obviously, doesn’t buy his excuses. But the good thing about Morgana is that he doesn’t push as long as Akira goes to sleep at an appropriate time. “Just don’t do anything stupid. It’s almost time - remember that Akechi is not our friend.”

I don’t know about you, but he is mine, Akira doesn’t say.

“Oh, you’re actually worried about me?” Instead, he bats his eyes at the cat, looking all flustered. “I’m so flattered, Mona, I had no idea you cared so deeply about little old me.”

Morgana wags his tail and scoffs, as well as a cat can be expected to scoff. Another good thing about Morgana is that he is very easy to sidetrack.

“Of course I care! Idiot!”

Akira lets out a soft laugh and pats Mona’s head on his way to the stairs.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be careful. Nothing the big bad detective can do to me.”

It has been a familiar routine to him since the very beginning - dancing around Morgana and his friends, sometimes all at once, whenever the topic of his relationship with Akechi came up. Even back when his little dates with the ace detective were nothing more than games of pretend, cat-and-mouse chases where they were both the hunted and the hunter. Looking back, Akira doubts they were ever just that, but, at the moment, the make-belief of cunning confrontation was easier to swallow than the make-belief of genuine connection.

He couldn’t pretend for long.

Akira is a lot of things, but he is not stupid. And it has nothing to do with his perfect grades, or the impressive number of difficult books he’s read at Leblanc’s counter, or the shogi moves he practiced with Hifiumi. When you spend your entire life desperately trying to say the right things to the right people, you learn a thing or two about emotions, and Akira isn’t stupid.

He knows exactly what it means. He knows exactly what it means when Goro texts him I’m alone right now and his heart almost jumps out of his chest. He knows exactly what it means when Goro looks at his reflection in the aquarium glass, Akira’s own casting back distorted in blues, and smiles in that soft, downhearted way that, for once, reaches his eyes, and Akira feels like shattering the glass tank with his head. He knows exactly what it means when he calls Goro his rival, and why he felt nothing but pure glee and awe when Goro said that he hated him and threw his glove at his chest, and why he holds onto that glove, poison biting into his fingers every time they stroke the worn leather, and even the idea of leaving the house without it makes him feel physically sick.

Akira has never asked Goro to specify their relationship. What they shared was not easily identifiable, yet certain in its persistence from the very beginning. A steady kindling Akira has mistaken for something that had time to be nurtured into a proper flame, time and time again. A dangerous game with a very particular prize at the end Akira was sure he’d earn. Wasn’t that what being a hero was all about?

It wasn’t, of course. Maybe in stories that were a tad kinder.

They were rivals, of course, but also companions. Friends, even if Goro only ever admitted to a possibility of friendship between them. Mirrors to each other, fated to shatter upon impact. Fated opposites who, in their clash, managed to reconcile in ways the keepers of their fate never envisioned. 

He knows what they are. Two sides of the same coin that, at the end, landed on its side. A relationship destined to be unfulfilled. 

But he also knows that Goro Akechi plans to kill him. And then he does.

In the discussion of the interrogation room plan, Akira remains silent. He watches his friends orchestrate his faux demise as though it’s already the cognitive version of himself sitting with them in the room, listening to how it's going to get shot in the head by some villainous, pretentious fraud of a detective. 

And what is he going to tell them? Please wait, let’s reconsider. How about I go there, the real deal, and talk to Akechi until he realizes that he doesn’t actually want to shoot me? How about I just kiss him until he stops being evil? I promise, it’s gonna work - none of you have ever seen how somber and soft he gets under the influence of live jazz music, none of you know how silky his hair is and how cute he looks in my glasses, none of you, somehow, realize that he is just hurt, and afraid, and angry, and not at all some malicious mastermind we need to defeat.

Yeah, like that’s ever gonna work.

In Sae’s Palace, Goro Akechi betrays them.

But Akira Kurusu betrays him first, when he bites his tongue and refuses to fight for Goro Akechi.

The last time they go to the jazz club before everything goes to shit is the day before they send the calling card. It takes a fake to know a fake, and Akira can see, even blindsided by the signature ace detective smile, how Goro fidgets with the straw of his drink. They talk of everything and nothing, but all Akira hears is what Goro desperately tries not to say, teeth clenched around a confession almost hard enough to shatter. 

Goro Akechi betrays them in Sae’s Palace.

But he betrays himself when he refuses to tell Akira what is that something he wanted to talk to him about before slipping into the night to return as the person who will put a gun against his forehead. 

Akira Kurusu betrays him a second time by not prying.

 

Somehow, it doesn’t hit him properly until the early afternoon, catching up to him while he sits, relaxed and ambient, at his counter spot, and watches Futaba complain to Sumire about some history project she has missed while away. Sumire was way too tired for a Leblanc run yesterday, especially after hearing the news about Goro Akechi as one of the first things she came back to, but she still wanted to indulge in some free-of-charge curry. 

So, here they all are, once again, and Akira feels that, if not for the burning in his lungs that’s telling him to run, as fast as he can, to the alleyway to the side of the Shibuya main street, just opposite the beef bowl place, he would almost be content. Happy, even.

There, behind the invisible door a few steps to the side of Untouchable, is Goro Akechi, as in the flesh as he can be, for now, probably playing endless rounds of Tycoon with Margaret and Lavenza, or reading to pass the time, or thinking back, in horror, to what being shot by your cognitive double feels like, to what a person who knew the real you yet still did nothing to prevent your death sounds like when his voice is distorted by a giant metal door you crushed down in front of him yourself. 

Or he is living through the memories of staring that same person in the eye and telling him to make a choice, knowing all too well that there is no choice , and, in that moment, in the eyes of that person, Goro Akechi is reflected as no god, no monstrous manifestation of humanity’s desires, no power-drunk altruist prepared to mold reality in the image of his perfection, but an eighteen-year-old boy who died alone. An eighteen-year-old boy who didn’t want to die alone, yet died alone twice over.

If Goro’s idea of salvation was letting at least one of them live happily, it clearly didn’t work. Akira Kurusu has mangled his salvation, twice over, because he loved too much to allow his love to end in death without ever obtaining it.

What is love, at its core, if not a violation of one’s property to self? What can be a desire more primal and all-encompassing than the yearning to consume, to obtain, eternally and wholly, one's desired? And where would such a desire lead, taken to its extreme, if not to death?

Desire is death, which physic did except.

 

Akira wakes up with a faint impression of fresh snow clouding his barely-awakened mind. He didn’t sleep well, but he didn’t dream, either. He doesn’t dream. Not lately. Not really. He wakes up, nonetheless, feeling as if he has been, in fact, dreaming, for days or weeks or months, perhaps, for a little over a year, floating as if controlled by someone else’s hand, free in only that he doesn’t have to make a choice. 

For an entire week, he has been looking into eyes familiar in everything but color, and he has been wondering what exactly was missing in them. It was what pushed him through heedless illusions of normalcy, this selfish desire to recognize within them the burning hollowness, the insight into depths that scorch, the undertone of cruelty that comes with the discernment of oneself. 

It was that low flame, that recognition , wordless and fathomless, like seemingly shallow waters one steps into to realize, a moment too late, that they’re sinking to the bottom. Something shifted in Goro’s eyes, and Akira knew, in the few heartbeats it took for him to instinctively process that look, that the missing piece clicked into place. A box of jumbled pieces was emptied into the near-empty puzzle frame all at once and, against all odds, made a complete picture. 

What overtook him first was happiness. A masochistic sense of relief at accomplishing a task and getting them one step closer to reaching the illusory kind world where Goro can exist as himself.

It didn’t last long, this elation. Yet the fear of what is to come is something Akira has no right to admit, to himself or to Goro, if he's even still there.

He promised to stay. But he made many useless promises. Akira is not stupid enough to believe the words of a man who didn’t know which promises he had already broken.

It’s been getting harder and harder for Akira to refuse himself emotions he has no right to feel.

He has made plans with the Thieves to meet up at Leblanc for a little bit, just for a couple of hours, to treat Sumire to curry. Plans like these rarely require Akira’s outright agreement to participate, they happen around him more than they do to him, yet, this time, through their entire conversation the other day, he could feel the underlying tension that settled in rare silences between them, the pointed, distorted normalcy in how casually Ann asked if Akechi is doing okay , in the look Futaba shared with Ryuji when Sumire met the news of Goro’s return with genuine enthusiasm. At a certain point, he caught Makoto whispering something to Haru. They fell silent, and looked guilty the moment Akira tried to smile their way.

The agreement to meet up was made before Akira knew what kind of a mess his day was going to evolve into, and he knows he can, technically, cancel his plans. He can rush to the Velvet Room, as he consistently yearned to do at every opportunity ever since its depths revealed to him his greatest, if unvoiced, desire. What he will find there, this time, is not a ghost of a memory but a fully realized spirit, one that knows of the promises Akira both made, fulfilled, and failed to keep. He has grown accustomed to visiting apparitions. He isn’t sure what awaits him beneath the torn membrane of remembrance.

As he gets ready for the day, his fingers linger over the keyboard of his phone, a few conformations staring at him from the screen. 

Joker doesn’t run away. 

He isn’t sure which option, in this scenario, constitutes running away.

Akira pockets his phone. He makes himself two cups of coffee. In an hour, he greets his friends at the door with a smile.

 

Somehow, it doesn’t hit him properly until the early afternoon, catching up to him while he sits, anxiety he refuses to feel bleeding into slow-burning resentment he definitely refuses to feel, at his counter spot, and watches Futaba complain to Sumire about some history project she has missed while away. 

“Akechi got his memories back, by the way.”

The confession has the expected effect of bringing every unfolding conversation to a halt. Akira isn’t sure if expected, in this case, is preferred. On second thought, he isn’t sure why he said it at all.

He has been known to enjoy the morbid satisfaction of playing with fire but, in this case, he also knows that the embers won’t be delightfully blazing. It’s the smoke of everything unsaid that will suffocate him.

Ann screams when? at about the same time as Futaba gasps already? and Ryuji yelps what?, and the cacophony of their confusion makes Akira even more tempted to just leave it at that and head out.

“Yesterday, after we parted ways. I took him to Jazz Jin, then we chatted here for a while, and it just kinda… happened.”

“Does that mean that Akechi is now fully back to being human?” Makoto asks, ever-practical. When she says his name, there is a strain to her voice that she obviously tries to conceal.

Akira shakes his head.

“No, his body is still missing, but the Velvet Room is figuring that out. Still no work for the Thieves, just good-old waiting and seeing.”

Ryuji lets out a disappointed sigh at the mention of no impending Metaverse shenanigans, which Akira chooses to ignore.

“When can we finally see him again, then?” Ann inquires, and Akira is surprised to see that none of his friends, even the still-sulking Ryuji, look openly disturbed by the suggestion. Though he admits to himself, he doesn’t look too closely.

“Not yet,” he carefully responds. “He’s going through a lot right now, and, no offense, but none of you were particularly his favorite people on Earth, so I’d give it at least a while before he’s open to an idea of hanging out with you.”

“Yeah, no shit, dude,” Ryuji says, somewhat recovered. “Even puttin’ the murder stuff aside, he barely acted like he liked you , and you two were, like, soulmates or somethin’.”

“Akechi’s totally a classic tsundere!” Futaba, predictably, concludes.

Unpredictably , it’s Yusuke who counter-argues:

“Wouldn’t Akechi be more of a yandere than a tsundere, considering his professional history?” 

Akira looks at him in abject horror.

“Futaba, when the hell did you corrupt Yusuke? Also, why? Stop putting sinful concepts into his innocent brain.”

Futaba throws him a condescending look Akira chooses not to read into too much. When she turns to Yusuke, she, to his horror, appears to be genuinely analysing his question. 

“But Akechi seems a bit of a different flavor of insane than a yandere, while the tsundere is strong in him, serial killer or not.”

“Yeah, dude, a yandere wouldn’t kill you, they’d kill for you!”  

Akira was gone for a month. What has Futaba done?

“Ryuji?! You too, buddy?”

Futaba absolutely ignores his cries of protest, nodding enthusiastically.

“Yeah, killing your rival-boyfriend is the ultimate tsundere move! Although all the murder does have a yandere feel to it. Say, is Akechi a jealous type?”

“He is not-”

“Akechi-senpai once invited himself to an outing Akira-senpai and I were having.” The last person Akira expected to betray him in such a delicate situation was Sumire. Alas. “I didn’t mind the company, and he was very pleasant about it, but, looking back, he did question me a bit too… aggressively? So, I would say he has a jealous streak.”

“Sumire! Akechi was not jealous . And he is not a yandere or a tsundere! He is just a bit emotionally constipated.”

Futaba doesn't look convinced. Frankly, none of them do. Even Yusuke is eyeing him doubtfully.

Even Akira can agree it was a losing battle from the start. Well, it’s not like he had much dignity to hold onto to begin with.

“Whatever you say. Next thing we know, you actually don’t get all weird when he calls you stupid.”

“I never said that! I am but a simple man.”

“Gross.”

Futaba makes a face, and, from her place at the booth, Ann laughs so hard she spills some of her coffee, and soon they all join in on her infectious joy, laughing about something Akira presumed would forever remain a topic for awkward pauses and concerned side glances.

It would’ve been elevating if Akira was stupid enough to mistake their joyous jabs for moving on. If he didn’t notice how fraught Haru’s smile looks, if he didn’t catch the questioning side glance Futaba throws his way after poking at the topic herself.

They, expectedly, move on from Goro Akechi right after that. Akira doesn’t mind, even if his next sip of coffee has an aftertaste of ash.

He does, however, understand what prompted him to bring it up. It hits him, then, one memory too late.

 

After an hour or so of trading anecdotes and treating Sumire to her third extra-large serving of curry, for which Boss, who is already, allegedly, losing business over Futaba’s persistent requests to let them have the café to themselves, will likely give her a stern talking, the ex-Phantom Thieves begin to assess regrouping plans.

“I promised Inari to show him Okami, that one artsy video game I was talking about yesterday. So, if any of you wanna join in, let’s go,” Futaba announces, dragging a very keen-looking Yusuke out of the booth.

“It appears to be simply marvelous from what you have shown me, Futaba. That level of aesthetic dedication, and applied in such an unexpected medium… I can already feel my creative juices preparing to burst!”

Ryuji gives him a disgusted look.

“Language, dude. Also, pass for today. Makoto is introducin’ me and Haru to her aikido group tonight, gotta hop on a train to grab my gear before we kick ass!”

“It’s an introductory lesson, Ryuji, we’re not going to, as you’ve put it, kick ass, ” Makoto says sternly. “But you do have the right idea. Haru and I should probably also head home to freshen up. Also, if anyone is interested in joining us, you are welcome.”

“I’d love to, Makoto-senpai!” Sumire perks up. “Is just regular athletic wear okay for such a class? That’s all I have on me after morning training, and I really don’t feel like heading all the way home…”

“Sure,” Makoto confirms. 

“If you’d like, you can wait with us at the apartment, Sumi-chan,” Haru adds. “I upgraded the garden quite a bit since you last visited. Maybe you can even take some veggies home for your dad.”

Sumire beams.

“Thank you for your hospitality, Haru-senpai, Makoto-senpai.”

Haru turns to Ann, who is still sitting at the booth, uncharacteristically quiet.

“Ann-chan, would you like to come over too?”

As if shaken from her stupor, Ann snaps back into the conversation.

“Ah, sure. Count me out of the aikido stuff, but I’d love to check out the garden,” she turns to Akira. “I presume you’re going back to Akechi?”

“Yeah,” he contributes his first piece to the discussion, already anticipating a reaction.

Yet, none comes, except for a simple acceptance of his confirmation.

“Cool. Then, we’ll leave you to it.”

And just like that, they tickle out, bidding their farewells and asking to keep them posted on his plans for tomorrow, pointedly leaving him behind without a single cruel word, a single concerned glance.

Only after the door closes after the last Phantom Thief does Akira realize that he has been holding his breath.

“Hey, Akira.”

The words come from somewhere beneath his eye level, and, with a guilty conscience, Akira meets Morgana’s heavy gaze.

“I need to… tell you something.”

Or maybe he has let go of his nervousness a bit preemptively. 

“Shoot,” Akira says, anyway.

“I know that I wasn’t the most… supportive about this Akechi business,” Morgana says, wasting no time. “But Futaba talked to me, and so did Lady Ann, and I guess I see their point. It’s not easy for anyone to just accept Akechi.” And doesn’t Akira fucking know it. “But he does… make you happy. We can all see that. I was there with you in Inaba. I saw how miserable you looked all the time. And, after Akechi came back, it was the first time you returned to looking like… the old you. So, what I’m trying to say is…”

He hesitates for a beat. Akira slips down into a crouch, and in the gesture is a leveling reminiscent of an in-between of a parent getting down to their knees to comfort a crying child and a vile man kneeling in front of a plank, eyes locked with the basket that, in a sweep motion of an axe, will soon catch their head.

“What I’m trying to say is - I’m sorry, okay! I still don’t like Akechi, and I don’t think I trust him, either, but I will try my best for you to-”

A chime.

“What is the cat blabbing about?”

Akira’s head spins, and the mental dissonance hits him hard enough to almost trigger mild cranial trauma.

At the door stands a distorted apparition of an image that haunted him ever since the February snows began to melt. Cross-armed and uncomfortably intense-looking, there stands Goro Akechi.

“Shit-talking you, of course,” Akira smiles, even if his head is rapidly clouding with all kinds of useless, single-word questions. He forces himself to turn his attention back to Morgana. “I understand, Mona, and you’re still my favorite. I really appreciate what you’re doing for me.”

If not for Akechi’s halted, needled presence weighing down the atmosphere, Morgana would probably joyously accept his praise. Even let Akira pet him. But, as it is, Akira only receives a nod of acknowledgement and a sheepish farewell.

“I’ll leave you two to it. Text Futaba if something comes up.”

“Got it, Mona. Have fun.”

At least Goro holds the door for the cat, and holds in any nasty comments undoubtedly itching to be thrown in Morgana’s wake. 

The chime rings again, and Akira is left face-to-face with the embodiment of all his regrets and desires, who, this time, is fully conscious of being such.

“How are you here? ”

Goro makes his way to his usual seat, and Akira wordlessly takes it as a request. He feels a bit pathetic as the water starts to simmer.

“I took a train, genius,” Goro, apparently, can’t resist but jab. “Margaret sensed something shift in my cognition yesterday, and today she suggested I give leaving the Velvet Room on my own a try. The result is right in front of you.”

“Did she pay for your train fare?”

Goro glares at him, unamused.

“Shut up.”

Akira lets out a morose chuckle and decides to drop it, bringing them back to the topic at hand.

“Is that a good thing? Does that mean your presence, or cognition, or whatever is getting stronger?”

Goro hesitates in a way that implies danger . Goro hesitates in a way that implies that whatever he is about to say has a fifty percent chance of being a lie.

“Not necessarily.” The truth, then . “Margaret suggested that it is, most likely, a sign of me fusing with the Velvet Room more thoroughly, now that I grasp the implications of my… situation. Which, in turn, indicates a growing breach between me and my physical body. Cognitively, I might be the closest I’ve ever been to baseline. Yet, practically, my humanity is dwindling.”

The water boils.

“I’m sorry. I promise we’ll find a way to solve this-”

“Can you stop apologizing like every single inconvenience in my life is, somehow, your responsibility to tackle?” There is an artistic consistency to this snap of emotion, and, as Akira absorbs the venomous screech of the question, however much rhetorical, yet still one that requires a nonexistent response, he watches in curiosity-induced dissociation the tips of Goro’s hair ruffle uncooperatively with the jerk of his head, glued to the sweater’s shoulders by static. “I’m not one of your weakling teammates, Akira. I am capable of resolving matters without asking you to handle them for me every step of the way.”

But you did, you asked me the worst fucking thing and Maybe you should ask more often, huh, and then I wouldn't have had to regret you for the rest of my life and I’m sorry, I can’t help it, I want to take it all off your shoulders, I don't know how else to do it, I don’t know if there is a way to save you unless I take all of you, entirely, eternally, and cannibalize your free will.

The options swim in Akira’s mind, one more horrible than the last, and he feels like he and Goro are back at square one, back in their equilibrium of dissatisfaction defined by unacknowledged desires and horrid needs, struggling for balance. Akira wonders what Goro must think about the fact that his own amnesiac self thought they were lovers, that he, in the absence of pretenses dictated by history, allowed Akira to rest for an entire night snuggled into the crook of his neck.

The return of pretense signals the return of the morbid hyperbola in which the force of a desire diminished its permission to be obtained, an open curve which variables, when placed in the hands of people equally dissatisfied with the simple axiom of existence, causes them to self-permit abhorrent acts of cruel greed in the name of indulgent satisfaction. Driven down and curled in parallels, Goro’s formulaic denial did not abide by greed, and it recoiled from guilt. Its shape was only determined by a masochistic notion that suffering and dedication go hand-in-hand in people who strive.

“I know you do,” Akira says, pouring the water over the grounds. “Me helping you has nothing to do with me thinking you can’t handle things on your own. But you already agreed to my help. So no take-backs.”

Memory is a punishment. Even happy ones have the peculiar affinity for curling around one’s limbs and neck, the stupor of nostalgia sickly-sweet until the moment one realizes they can no longer move in real time.

Akira can already feel the paralysis setting in from memories of Goro Akechi, circa one day ago. Their sweetness coats the back of his throat.

Living and breathing, Goro Akechi was already a bad memory.

He places the cup in front of Goro, and a perfect replica in front of himself. It’s too sweet.

“I don’t intend to take anything back. Achieving anything would be impossible without your involvement, considering that it’s your Shadow we’re dealing with.”

Goro takes a sip, and the corner of his mouth raises instinctively, even if he, without a doubt, tries to fight it. 

“Good?” Akira asks.

“Acceptable,” Goro lies.

Akira isn’t sure where to take this conversation so that the looming commination of memory doesn’t crush them both.

“So… Did you remember anything about my Shadow?” he asks, trying to sound casual. “About… how you came back to life?”

“That was always just a lead,” Goro’s voice betrays disappointment in its calmness. “And it proved to be the wrong one. The attendants were glad to learn I have recovered my memory, so they pried a bit, Margaret even attempted some esoteric experimentation to see if she could now sense my fragment in the real world. To no avail. My last memory prior to the Velvet Room is Maruki’s defeat.”

Detached and vexingly casual, like Akira himself doesn’t understand what morbid truth Maruki’s defeat is supposed to substitute in his statement. 

“Any updates on the Nav?” Akira changes the subject.

“Nothing substantial,” Goro takes another sip. “Steady progress, nevertheless. Margaret claims it might take a while. Until then, we can’t really do anything productive, outside of trying to force your Shadow to make another appearance, perhaps. See if he has something to share.”

There is a speculative line laid out in the middle of the pause that follows, a barrier that has now, once again, shifted in an indeterminate direction Akira struggles to grasp. Checks and balances, a tug-of-war of sentiments with rules changed afresh. Every time there is a shift in his and Goro’s delicate agreement Akira doesn’t remember signing, there is no way for him to determine its new directives outside of trial and error, and every error in this cruel, unbalanced game means punishment.

Akira still loves the game, because he loves its rush, and loves the players, because he is an idiot.

“Why are you really here?” he asks.

If the question takes Goro by surprise, he doesn’t make it known. Although Akira doubts that it does. It is a reasonable question. 

Where do we stand, now? he doesn’t ask but means. In this particular uncertainty, how far is too far for comfort, from your perspective?

“Am I not allowed to enjoy a cup of coffee? It was rather difficult for me to appreciate your craft the last few times.”

The facade falls on like a transparent curtain. Beneath the useless veil, Akira sees unease.

“Don’t do that,” he says softly.

“Do what?”

“Akechi.”

“...Alright,” he gives in, but it sounds cruel, vain, almost superficial. “I suppose if you, as I suspect, are trying to map out the status quo in your head - which, I must add, is a useless exercise - stick to the one you know best. This situation might not be as dire as Maruki’s mess, but it is still one where you can’t allow your judgment to be clouded by unnecessary emotions.”

And what a claim it is. What Akira knows best are things that never lead to anything but seas of death and regret. What Akira knows best is the void after purpose. He has grieved Goro Akechi from the moment they met.

“Are you serious? This entire situation exists because, as you say, my judgment was clouded by unnecessary emotions. You exist because of my unnecessary emotions, Akechi.”

“That is, precisely, my point,” Goro says. “I still stand by everything I said to you back in February.”

What he said to him back in February were the words of a dying man, and that’s precisely why Akira’s subconscious refused to listen.

What he said to him back in February, on the Palace runs, and in the ambience of Jazz Jin, and in the alleyway beside Leblanc, where gods couldn’t listen in, were words made out of smoke and mirrors and blood. They were cruel illusions and kindest savageries. 

There was no need for them now, Akira thought. There must be a world where there is no need for them, ever.

“But it’s a completely different situation from February!”

“It isn’t!” Goro snarls. “My doom might be less guaranteed, but, ultimately, everything that I have outlined, unrelated to the notion of my impending disappearance, stands.”

That night, Goro had outlined to him many things, right after pressing a gun into Akira’s hand and placing its barrel right against his own temple. 

His last words even tasted a bit like smoke.

“...You know that I heard you, right before you left?”

It was the last real thing the actualization of Goro Akechi had ever told him, a touch of a whisper Akira barely caught before succumbing to sleep on what still feels like the last night of his entire life.

Sometimes, when Akira thinks of the world’s cruelty, the only thing that keeps his faith in fate that isn’t inherently void of kindness is the fact that he has caught those words, and was able to press them into his own heart, and carry them ever since, like a ten-ton weight, like a wing of a butterfly.

“I heard what you told me. Does that still stand?”

Goro’s face, so collectedly cold, falls into irked embarrassment. He immediately understands what is not being said, of course, and that, against all odds, makes Akira’s heart flutter.

“...It was not meant for your ears. That was a momentary weakness, something I allowed myself while knowing that, come the next day, I would no longer be around. As such, don’t take it into consideration.”

At least he doesn’t deny it outright.

“How can I not take it into consideration? This is precisely what it all revolves around: your fragmentation, my distortion, your entire fucking resurrection, both times! So if the possibility-”

“Akira.”

When said coldly, or with a signature sigh of annoyance, or even screamed out in rage, Akira’s name escaping Goro’s lips is something he can easily ignore.

When said so desperately, it freezes him.

“I don’t fight for possibilities,” Goro says. “Fighting for possibilities is the exact thing that killed me in the first place.”

No, it wasn’t, Akira wants to scream. It was your careless recklessness, and your obsession, and, in fact, your inability to consider any possibility that didn’t involve you finding meaning in anything but rage and suffering.

“So what do you fight for now, then?”

“Certainties.”

Akira chuckles.

“There’s no path for us that leads to certainties. People like you don’t exist there. In a certain world, you died.”

Akira used, in desperation, to wish that there is, somewhere out in the world, a version of them that exists, simply exists in survival, in certainty. A version of them that wasn’t destined for obliteration, where the notion that they desired to survive was enough for them to be granted that wish, and they persisted in unison, unbroken and not choked out by the devotion they had no need to cast aside. The wish felt bitter, as Akira envied himself that got to exist in such a faultless reality, yet now, when its perfect treasure is finally looking him straight in the eye, Akira realizes with crushing finality that it was never inconceivable - it was simply rejected. 

You chose the wrong fucking hill to die on, friend, a voice in his head snickers. And you didn’t even end up being the one to die on it.

I didn’t choose shit, Akira argues. That, for once, was not the choice I made.

He did choose it, of course. If he didn’t choose it, there would be no point.

“And I might die again, or you might die. So what’s your point?”

“My point is,” Akira says, a thousand storms, a thousand wings. “That you won’t. I refuse to let it happen. And if that’s not certain for you enough, please do tell me all about it once I prove you wrong.”

There was never a guarantee that anything Akira had done would lead to a favorable outcome. At any point last year, hell, at any point in his entire life, he could’ve stumbled, made one wrong turn, suffered one consequential fumble, and the reality they are currently occupying wouldn’t even exist. Akira Kurusu was the one who faltered and agonized over choices made and missed, and Joker was the one who pushed forward without giving Akira Kurusu a choice. Yet, neither of them was one to back down when the choice was obvious. And choosing Goro Akechi should’ve been obvious from the start. 

“You never answered my question, Akechi. Why are you here?”

Goro doesn’t look at him.

“I’m not sure.”

For now, that’s enough. For now, Akira realizes, that’s already enough of a shift in their terms or agreement.

“Wanna hit the aquarium since we don’t have anything better to do, then? You did promise me that we could go.”

Another push. Another rule bent and balance upset.

“I suppose.”

A good thing about their little game is that Akira knows full well that they both intend on playing it to the bitter end.

 

“We went to the aquarium once, why was it even on your list of places that could potentially jog my memory?” Goro asks as they walk from the station in the direction of the Shinagawa Aquarium.

“I just like fish,” which wasn’t in and of itself a lie. Fish were cool. Goro knew a lot of useless fish facts, as one like Goro does. Akira thought penguins were cute, and stingrays looked somehow both cool and silly. “Also, I had an important epiphany back at the aquarium. Try guessing what it was.”

“I’ll pass,” Goro says, slightly unnerved, and Akira knows he guessed right.

It will never fail to amaze him how they can just switch like this, from almost screaming in each other’s faces, discussing the very nature of their doom, to pleasantly chatting while walking to their designated date location. Put a professional liar against a man with a mask for every situation and ask them to be themselves, and that’s what you’ll get, Akira guesses. 

“I also wanted to check if the fish trivia was still all there, but that’s an experiment I’ll never get to conduct now that your memories are back.”

“Want to bash me over the head so I lose them all again?” Goro says, the dangerous mirth in his voice daring Akira to try. “But I assure you I did, in fact, remember all of the fish trivia.”

“How do you even learn so much about fish?”

Goro shrugs.

“They are fascinating creatures. Humanity knows disappointingly little about marine life, and I find subjects like that very easy to get lost in. Also, a former marine biologist worked at the cognitive pscience research facility that had me for a while, and we used to get along quite well.”

He says it so casually, so matter-of-fact, that, for a beat, Akira is unsure if his ears aren’t betraying him.

“The what?"

Goro has the audacity to look at him like he needs to be ashamed of sounding so surprised.

“Yeah. That’s how I knew Wakaba Isshiki and got scouted by Shido.”

Factually, Akira has been somewhat aware that Goro’s past did involve some level of connection not only to Wakaba Isshiki’s death but life as well. It was never more than speculations and informed guesses, a holistic sum of disjointed parts that painted a rather grim picture in colors of blood and hues of Metaverse-red.

Goro had a way of talking about his past - always depersonalized and factual, as if talking about someone he barely knew. That tone, that dissonance of voice and subject matter, is exactly what makes anxiety spike up in Akira’s veins.

Wakaba Ishiki wasn’t a perfect person. No matter how much Futaba might idealize her mother, she still had a shadow for Goro to kill. 

What did they do to you, there? You couldn’t have been older than, what, fifteen, fourteen, when Wakaba Isshiki died? What has happened in between you learning her name and you killing her that made the blood not sting forever on your hands?

“Why are you mentioning it now?”

“With how much you already know of my past, I see no use in hiding such facts from my biography anymore,” Goro says calmly. “The facility is definitely not one of my brightest memories, but it had its positive moments. If you’re so interested, I don’t mind telling you more sometime later - at this point, I understand you well enough to know that you won’t pity me, so it’s fine. But now I would prefer we focus on enjoying some fish-sighting.”

They are, in fact, just a few steps away from the entrance, a small crowd of onlookers, mostly teenage couples and mothers with small kids, stalling in the front.

“If you can name every fish I point out, I’ll get you a plushie at the gift shop,” Akira says slyly. 

Goro rolls his eyes.

“Why the hell would I need a plushie? Don’t be ridiculous.”

Akira will get him a penguin, because they’re both cute. Or maybe a stingray, if they have those.

 

“That’s a goldengirdled coralfish. Native to the tropical waters of the Indo-Pacific,” Goro announces, pointing at a small white-and-yellow fish floating leisurely in front of their faces.

In the aquarium’s low lighting, his hair shines in the colors of the saltwater. 

“Looks like you,” Akira says, because he can and it does.

“It, in fact, does not look like me in the slightest.”

“Yeah, it does. See how it’s white, with yellow stripes, and sort of looks a little pissed? You.”

If Goro wanted him to stop comparing his appearance to that of random fish, he really should’ve thought better than to look so genuinely offended.

“The fact that I, mind you, not willingly, share a color palette with a fish does not mean that I look like said fish,” Goro says, strolling away from the poor little creature that was blissfully unaware that it looked like a certain pretentious ex-detective.

“Yeah, it does. I was getting the same general aura from that fish as I do from you. Do you think it kills people?”

“Akira, you can probably crush it in your hand,” Goro says, already occupied by looking for familiar fish in the next tank. “Do you think it kills people?”

“I bet I can also crush you in my hand.”

Akira isn’t sure if he means it as a threat or a euphemism of some kind.

“Oh, I’d love to see you try.”

Thankfully, in their case, it can be both.

“...Don’t tempt me,” Akira says in a low, playful voice. “Have you ever gotten hit with Myriad Truths before? That’s essentially crushing someone with your hand, or, like, a metaphorical sword-hand of your spirit-of-rebellion-self.”

“Myriad Truths is an utterly broken move, and if you were any good at killing Shadows, you would never use it.”

“That’s just mean to Izanagi-no-Okami. He is a part of my soul.”

Izanagi-no-Okami was, in fact, a part of someone else’s soul that Akira just borrowed, according to the Compendium. Which also implied that somewhere out there existed a Wildcard infinitely cooler than Joker, and that made Akira unreasonably envious.

“That simply means that your soul is immensely unbalanced, cowardly, and incapable of making strategic decisions under pressure,” Goro parries. From his lips, even the truth doesn’t sting.

Before Akira can come up with a witty comeback, something with just the right amount of self-deprecating flirtatiousness while still able to defend Izanagi-no-Okami’s tainted honor, however, a meek yet persistent voice from right behind them fumbles his thoughts.

“I’m sorry. Um, sorry to interrupt, but are you some kind of idol?” 

There is a girl, cute, with a nicely styled amber braid, around their age, give or take a year or two, standing right behind Goro, hand raised to potentially tap on his shoulder, bad idea, looking at him with preemptively star-struck eyes, even worse idea.

“I could’ve sworn I saw you somewhere before, like in a magazine? Or on a CD cover? I love your hair!”

Goro’s expression automatically attempts to morph into one of Detective Prince’s signature smiles, yet he catches himself, instead ending up with something confused in its own purpose and, to Akira’s eyes, utterly terrified.

“Sorry, you must be mistaking me for someone else,” he says in what any other person would read as a neutrally pleasant voice, yet Akira knows better. If this situation is not defused in moments, a disaster of some kind is unavoidable.

“...Um, sorry…” the girl stumbles, her cheeks turning a ludicrous shade of pink so bright even the dimmed lights don’t save her. “Yeah, probably. But, like, maybe you’d still like to exchange numbers or something? Can I find you on any socials?”

It’s adorable, really. Even without the fame and glamor of the Detective Prince persona, Goro still manages to turn heads and get girls asking him out. If Ryuji were here to see this, he would probably be fuming. 

Alas, this is Akira’s date, so thank you very much, aquarium girl, but-

“I’m very sorry, miss, totally understand your interest, but he is, fortunately for me, taken,” Akira says with a chest full of Joker’s overconfident charm, sliding a hand across Goro’s shoulders.

The girl looks at him for a beat before the pink of her cheeks, somehow, turns even more feverishly luminescent.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” she bows, and Akira feels a bit bad. She really is a nice girl. “I didn’t want to assume! I apologize, I’ll be going. Enjoy your date!”

She turns on her heels, throwing them one last curiously apologetic look:

“I highly recommend you stop by the dolphin show, it’s starting in twenty.”

“No need to apologize,” Akira smiles, hand still resting over Goro’s tense back. The guy could really benefit from a massage. “I am well aware that he is irresistible. Please enjoy your day!”

The girl doesn’t have time to even run out of their sight before Akira’s hand is unceremoniously dropped.

“What the hell was that?” Akira is unsure if he’s referring to the girl’s behavior or to Akira’s means of countering it.

“I knew you were gonna say something vile, and she was just enamored by your beauty. No one can be blamed for that. And she was super nice.”

Goro sighs and turns back to the tanks, tension gradually leaving his posture.

For a beat, Akira watches him study their joint reflection in the glass. The scene feels bitterly nostalgic.

“...Maybe I should dye my hair back to brown.”

“No, the white is so cool!” Akira strides closer to the tank, placing their reflections side-by-side, white against black. The desire to tilt his head and contrast their hair against each other is almost irrepressible. “I used to think it was a bit weird, but it really grew on me. You look like you’d have ice powers in an anime. And a tragic backstory.”

“I already have a tragic backstory,” Goro says mirthlessly, but Akira can see the playful flickers in the reflection of his eyes.

“Touché. Very self-aware of you.”

They spend a moment that feels oddly like their own version of eternity like that, neither looking at the fish but instead studying one another’s reflections distorted by the water.

If I fail, Akira thinks. This will be one of those memories that will make me feel like I’m losing myself. Like I’m coming home.

“...Akira, what exactly happened to the Detective Prince, officially?”

The question is still addressed at the glass, Goro’s eyes a reflection within a reflection.

“...It’s a bit of a weird situation,” Akira says to his mirror self. “Do you recall how, in Maruki’s reality, the Phantom Thieves were all considered just a myth, an urban legend, and the Detective Prince also sort of didn’t exist? Well, that changed, somewhat, in both cases, but surprisingly not by much. There is some information about you online, and you still exist in Shido’s trial records, but the public at large seems not to hold much of a memory of you. Like, if someone does happen to mention the Detective Prince Goro Akechi, I bet people might say, oh, I remember someone like that. But nothing more.”

Goro takes it in for a moment, and when he finally responds, it looks like he is answering the fish.

“So, the Detective Prince is finally dead. That’s a relief.”

“What, you didn’t want to go back to working for the cops once this is all over?”

“I would rather die again.”

“It doesn’t sound like much of a threat coming from you, not gonna lie.”

A hammerhead shark passes them by.

“So, wanna go to that dolphin show the girl mentioned?” Akira asks.

“Not really. I have a distaste for dolphins. They are very sadistic creatures.”

“What about sharks?”

“Sharks are fine, they just got a bad name. Did you know that hammerheads are a critically endangered species across the board? Their population is in constant decline. Humans are their number one threat. Their fins are considered to be of great quality, yet once the fins are taken, the rest of the body is discarded.”

Akira doesn’t know much about sharks. He thinks he heard that they have to constantly move to stay alive, and that they actually kill far fewer people than most domestic items.

Akira thinks he also likes sharks. 

 

When he picks out a cute shark plushie at the gift shop, Goro berates him throughout the entire process. No sharks are that blue in real life, he says, and I am not six years old, if you get it, I will burn it in front of your eyes.

He obviously doesn’t. Goro Akechi walks out of the Shinagawa Aquarium, clutching to his chest a plush shark toy half the size of his torso.

“This is utterly humiliating,” he mutters while Akira tries to inconspicuously take his phone out. The inconspicuous part fails. “Don’t even think about that, Akira, put the phone down .”

The picture comes out perfect, Goro’s annoyed expression and all.

“If this photo is ever seen by anybody, I will not hesitate to subject you to the most hellish sufferings a human can-”

“If you don’t admit you love the shark, I’m sending it to the Thieves’ chat.”

The speed with which Goro’s expression goes from annoyed to abysmally infuriated almost makes Akira want to take another picture.

“You would not dare.”

“You wanna try me?”

Hand hovering over the share button Goro can’t even see for dramatic effect, Akira begins a countdown from ten.

A meek whisper of a voice reaches him at seven.

“...It’s alright, I guess.”

“What was that?”

This is, most definitely, pushing his luck. 

“I said it’s an alright toy.”

Most definitely.

“But I don’t think that’s what I asked.”

“I do like the fucking shark. Happy?” Goro declares so venomously, so guiltily, one would think he just had to admit to mass murder. In fact, he sounded way more enthusiastic admitting to mass murder.

“You’re welcome, then,” Akira smiles. “C’mon, we must have a few more hours to spare. Wanna hit the crepe spot in Shibuya?”

Still looking rather pissed, Goro follows him to the train station, and Akira marvels in suspended horror at how unpredictably fate, indeed, works.

 

As they reach the station, Goro, newly out of his self-inflicted, shark-toy-induced despair, addresses him with an odd look of hesitation.

“I don’t think we’ll have time to enjoy the crepes. Do you mind if we finish this off at Leblanc? I would prefer to avoid dispersing in public.”

“Sure,” Akira doesn’t comment on how Goro doesn’t suggest they go straight to the Velvet Room. “I thought you didn’t feel it coming. Did that change?”

So far, the intervals at which Goro’s form could no longer handle existing in reality were sporadic and random. According to Goro, disappearing didn’t feel like much, but Akira can hardly believe it. Disappearing must feel like something. There must be a sensation to nonexistence, because how do you comprehend it otherwise?

“After it happened the first time, signs become a bit more obvious,” Goro says as they head into the subway’s maw. “It is still highly unreliable. I can feel it coming, but the moment it actually happens still takes me by surprise.”

Akira spends the entire train ride watching Goro’s hands, wrapped tightly around the plushie, a mindless, lighthearted discussion about the ethics of aquariums versus the ethics of zoos flowing between them in hushed voices. He still adores watching Goro’s hands, even if it’s looking out for the slightest signs of their flesh beginning to let the shark’s fluffy coat through.

By the time they reach Yongen-Jaya, the sun has already set, even though it’s still relatively early in the evening. The scarce street lighting paired with the modest illumination provided by the few open establishments creates an ambiance within the neighborhood that would, in any other setting, feel eerie, yet the shadowed crooks of the familiar street provide Akira nothing but comfort. 

“There’s just something inherently unsettling about treating living things as entertainment,” he says, leading Goro through the main street towards Leblanc.

“People treat everything as entertainment; that is simply in our disgusting nature,” Goro bitterly responds. “We treat other people as entertainment, and with even more cruel vigor than animals. We both know that firsthand.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right, there’s just something in the fact that people have more autonomy in being treated as entertainment, hell, many even choose it themselves. The Phantom Thieves used to purposefully seek the masses’ attention, even if it did backfire horribly.”

“We all do a version of that, in a way it-” Goro’s voice cuts off suddenly, and for a brief moment, Akira’s mind shirks into despair, expecting to find only the breeze of evening wind and a never-accepted void of presence at his side.

He hears Goro’s breath, and is it simply an automation at this point, impractical lips pushing air in and out of impractical lungs, scratch against his throat before he can turn to confirm it all, still, not being some grand, malicious delusion, and his heart gradually allows itself to unclench only to plummet onto the ground, shattering, the moment Akira realizes what exactly made Goro suspend his words and his movements.

They are still a short walk away from Leblanc, which appears visibly vacant from their point of view, stranded in front of a tiny, near-unnoticeable crevice in between two buildings. There’s nothing of note hiding there, practically nonexistent to any passersby who are not them, just darkness and dirt, a sanctuary of filth that can be found lurking to the side of any street, in any neighborhood. Just barely wide enough to let two people stand face to face, Akira knows from experience. 

Shimmers of ghosts live in its shadows. Suspended cognitions of a world that no longer exists. Akira remembers them with sympathy, he knows what their ruin tastes like, and he knows how they shatter in bodies and minds concordant with the actuality of them, yet different, different forms and different names, the same story told over a collection of reality clusters, never aligned quite right to last. 

In a kinder world…

There is materiality to desire. By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired. Or, so it is easier to think.

“It doesn’t have to play out the way it did, this time,” Akira whispers, to himself, or to Goro who asked him if he died more than once, or to himself who let him die more than once, or to the future versions of them who know whether Akira is lying.

“It was never about what it has to be. It’s just about what it was. And what it will be,” Goro says, and begins walking away, not sparing his own ghost another glance.

 

When Goro Akechi flees Leblanc on the night of February 2nd, Akira’s first instinct is to let him leave. Let him go, curl up in whatever corner of his past, dead self he appropriated in this reality, and watch the clock of his existence run out of sand alone.

Akira runs out of the door seconds after the door chime’s ring dies down.

“Akechi!” he calls out to the empty street. The snow begins to sprinkle his shoulders.

He couldn’t have run off far, Akira knows he couldn’t. Goro Akechi runs in slow, suspended strides, Goro Akechi runs in a way so others can see him disappear.

Just a few steps from Leblanc’s door, he finds him in a grimy alleyway nook Akira barely remembers being there, back pressed against the brick wall.

“Go the hell back inside. Our conversation is over,” he snarls before Akira can even decide why exactly he followed him outside, before Akira can assess if Goro looks tired, determined, or scared .

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asks, out of breath despite barely having to run, air escaping his lips in frosted clouds.

Goro pushes himself off the wall, and the facade is back up. He takes a step back, and Akira, without thinking, takes a step forward, their world closing in between the grubby dams of trash, snow, and darkness.

“As I told you, there was no point. The question of my life is irrelevant in this. Tomorrow, we will fight, and we will win.”

And he sounds so confident, so self-assured in his own suspended suicide, and Akira’s hands shake, and his eyes sting, and his heart attempts to reach out somewhere it knows it is not welcome, shake away the blood and the despair and reach a kinder world where it does not love ghosts or doesn’t love at all because in no world can it love and not shatter under that burden’s hammer, where it is not slashed by a sword and left to die.

Goro Akechi fought monsters too carelessly. He loved to fight, or he pretended to love to fight, because violence is never something born naturally from one’s heart. It festers when others enable it. It fights attackers until it becomes the one to bite first. And he bit, he bit Akira’s hands, and he bit his own, and now he, for the second time, is readying himself to close his teeth around his own neck, splashing Akira’s maimed hands in even more blood.

Living and breathing, Goro Akechi was already a bad memory. 

“You can’t be sure that you actually died, can you?” Akira tries, coming closer, reaching delicately to hold what he knows can only sink its teeth into his flesh, and never meet gentleness with anything but fury. “I mean, it might all be just a ploy Maruki is trying to pull, to make me doubt myself.”

“I’m quite fucking sure, Akira, but whatever helps you get it done, I suppose.” Where Akira’s voice is desperate, Goro’s is sharp and assured, yet they sync in odd dissonance, a nihilistic delusion arguing a hopeful actuality of doom.

When Akira pulls his hand back, it comes out mutilated and bloody. As he knew from the start. Yet, the lacerations still hurt, and Akira knows they will scar, and he knows he will, with time, grow to fall in love with even this sort of suffering.

“Would it physically fucking hurt you to not be so goddamn cruel, just this once?”

It’s, once again, a desperate plea, one Akira already expects to be met with more claws, more teeth.

What stares back at him is pain. 

Fear, and pain, and things that lie in the shadows of both, never named.

“This isn’t cruelty, Akira,” Goro says quietly. “This is kindness. This might be the damn kindest thing I’ve ever done for you.”

He means it, and Akira doesn’t understand. Or, perhaps, he does, and that, somehow, is worse. Much, much worse.

In front of him stood a dream of a nightmare of a dream he chased through lifeless, lightless terrains and abstractions of horrors manifested and streetlight-bathed megapolis streets and castles of metal and delusion. In front of him, stood a malicious creature of a person who shot Akira straight in the head and then got himself shot for Akira straight through the chest and then, dead, and maybe dying, and maybe immortal in how he will forever remain, screeching in his mind and coddling his heart, he placed the gun in Akira’s had and said shoot, because I wish you to, shoot, as it is my wish, shoot or not shoot, you will betray me, shoot or not shoot, you will regret.

In front of him stood his friend. His rival and his equal. In front of him stood someone who saw his life’s purpose in death, and life, unfair and cruel as it is, never gave him an opportunity to find it somewhere else.

In front of him stood Goro Akechi, whom he loved foolishly, but very much.

In a kinder world…

“But I-“

“Don’t.”

He stops him before Akira can meet Goro’s cruelest kindness with the kindest cruelty of his own.

“Don’t you dare say it, for both my sake and yours.”

“But-“

In the stride of a soldier about to throw themselves at a grenade, Goro closes the distance between them to grasp at Akira’s lapels in seething desperation.

“There’s no but, Akira,” he whispers at him sternly in his face, and he looks, in his downhearted rage, like a trapped animal, like a bird with broken wings thrashing around a cage knowing it will never escape. “Are you fucking delusional? Did Maruki actually succeed in brainwashing you, and you just failed to notice? You’re digging your own fucking grave here. Just get your shit together, get over it, and move on to the actual reality, leave all this Metaverse bullshit behind, and be fucking happy about it!

“Whatever idiotic delusion you think you want to believe in was doomed from day one, from the day you met me! There was never a chance for you to save me in the first place, and there’s no such thing as second chances. I fucking shot you, I was willing to kill you, twice! This is the ending people like me deserve, and I knew it from the start. So my point stands - get over it, cry for a week or two if you have to, and move on with your fucking life!”

It happens around halfway through his desperate speech, and Akira, at first, isn’t sure what to make of it. 

“You are crying,” Akira states simply, staring dumbfounded at the trails of tears bleeding out of his eyes. They glisten under moonlight.

“So fucking what?”

Akira has never seen him cry before. What shatters his heart is that he will never see him cry again.

“Please stay.”

“I just fucking told you-“

“Please stay at Leblanc, tonight.”

“That wouldn’t change anything, it’s pointless and-“

I don’t want you to spend the last night of your life alone, I don’t want to see you go away for the last time and remember it forever, I don’t want to let you go without ever saying what I meant to say, I don’t-

“I just want you to stay. So please, stay.”

It’s this simple truth that, of all things, breaks Goro, and he collapses onto him, shaking, voiceless in the violent sobs drowned in Akira’s shoulder, and Akira wants to carry his weight forever, and in knowing that he can never do so, he allows himself to break as well.

Beneath their knees, the snow is wet and dirty, and it seeps through Akira’s jeans. 

By the time Goro quiets down, his hair is dusted with snow, and Akira’s fingers feel stiff where they clench around his shoulders. When Goro gets to his feet, he says nothing, but turns left upon exiting their little corner of the world, and Akira follows him, just as wordlessly, into Leblanc and up the stairs. Morgana is not in sight, and the lights are off in the attic. Akira doesn’t turn them on.

Taking off his scarf and jacket and discarding them onto the couch in a semi-tidy pile, Goro still says nothing. He is quiet as he, still standing, takes off his shoes and places them with uncalled-for carefulness under the couch. Not a word passes between them as he walks across the room and sits on the bed, staring straight ahead like he is unsure where exactly he is.

There is a burning in Akira’s lungs. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever learn to live with it. He knows it will never go away.

Akira’s jacket and scarf are draped much less carefully over the back of the couch, and his shoes don’t quite make it all the way under it. When he sits down next to Goro, the milk crates that make up his bed creak just a little bit. 

They don’t talk as Akira, without changing, crawls behind Goro to lay on top of the covers, and they don’t talk when Goro, after a beat and a sigh that sounds raw, almost like a sob, but not quite, tugs the flimsy blanket from under him and lays down, too, as if he’s done it a million times before, and maybe in a kinder world, he did, maybe in a kinder world, he still does, and instead of silent condolences they share morning coffees, and a bed that can be made of milk crates, can have the flimsiest of blankets, and only one not-large-enough pillow, but smells like a rundown wooden church, like coffee and yesterday’s clothes, and they wake up and brush their teeth in front of the same mirror, and store their shoes under the same couch, and, if in the kinder world Akira has a closet, half of it is filled with stupid-looking sweater vests and white button-downs and grayish-brown jackets.

Goro’s hair brushes against his temple. As he turns and wraps a hesitant arm around Akira’s shoulders, bringing them face to face for a moment before burying his face in his chest, they don’t say a word. Akira catches that his eyes look scared in the dark. In the dark, they almost look black.

As Akira wraps his own arms, desperate and shaking, around him, he no longer thinks of a kinder world. He thinks instead of things unsaid between people nonexistent, of childish rage which is the most righteous, and of snowflakes that end their dance in death. Goro is warm and solid in his arms, like a real person would be, and Akira knows, in this timeless moment between two oceans of despair, that the pain of knowing and losing something precious is, after all, worth more than never knowing what you might’ve lost. He doesn’t know yet how much worse than both of these options is the pain of half-knowing yet still losing wholly, but he knows that he is about to find out. 

Please, he says to the darkness. Please, if there’s anyone who listens, anyone, please, let me wake up as someone else. Please let me wake up in April a year ago, and I can do it right. Please tell me it’s not too late. 

I was good, he says. I did it right. I saved the world. So why? Why do I have to lose him? Why does he have to die, every time? Why do I have to kill him?

The darkness remains silent as Akia falls asleep, and it is still watching him as he wakes up, disturbed by the feeling of the weight in his arms shifting, slipping away, like it always does.

Akira doesn’t open his eyes.

He keeps them closed as a hand, tentative and soft, comes down to lightly brush through his hair. He keeps them closed, listening to gentle breathing that, after a beat, comes down to brush against his skin. He feels his eyes sting, but keeps them closed as a feather-light touch of lips graces his temple. 

And what can be a sweeter way for the son of man to be betrayed.

Next to his ear, a voice, still so close, so delicate, whispers, and Akira keeps his eyes closed. He keeps his eyes closed and thinks that it’s the son of man who betrayed his heart, that in the touch of lips, betrayal goes both ways.

Ungloved hand still caressing his hair with gentleness Akira never knew them capable of, Goro Akechi whispers:

“If this is, somehow, inexplicably and against all odds, not the end, let’s try again. You can say, then, all you couldn’t say. And I can, too, try again. Please be there for me, if this world is kind.”

When, on a humid May evening, Goro Akechi walks first through Leblanc’s door, Akira sees a ghost of himself at the bottom of the stairs, as he used to stand on the third of February. 

Dressed and looking shockingly well-rested, Goro Akechi sits in the early morning hours at his usual counter seat, a cup of coffee in hand, chatting with Sojiro like it is not his last day on Earth. The Sojiro of this fake, perfect delusion seems to pay no mind to the oddity of Goro Akechi drinking coffee at his establishment at the crack of dawn. 

As Akira sits down next to him with a cup of his own, they don’t talk.

A few hours later, the world in which Goro Akechi wished for kindness is destroyed by Akira’s hand.

And yet, watching Goro place his ridiculous shark plushie onto the counter and sit down in a wordless demand at his usual seat, dispersing the ghost of his past self, Akira thinks. 

Maybe the world is kind.

“You have shark fur on your sweater,” Akira notes as he takes out two sets of cups.

Notes:

The final bosses of emotional avoidance strike again