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It had happened so fast. Joker was having a grand old time somersaulting through the cracked, brittle glass panes of the mysterious Okinawa Jail, so it really shouldn’t have come as a shock that the Shadows could do the same thing. One moment, he was creeping through the crawling darkness of the lab; the next, he’d been bodied to the floor by a half-formed Shadow from out of nowhere. Screams erupted around him and his team leapt into battle, but the damage was already done.
Everything went to shit from there.
Ten minutes later, he was wiping blood out of his eyes, propped up against a rusty metal shelf while Queen all but shoved some kind of pill down his throat. If it hadn’t been for Skull’s desperate, last-minute Showtime attack, they might not have made it out of that one alive. Someday, he hoped he’d get to tell Jose how many times his Wishing Star had saved their asses.
“Queen,” he mumbled, after swallowing whatever it was she had pushed past his lips. “Ev’ryone...?”
“The others have got everything under control, Joker,” she said sternly, pushing him back down as he tried to clamber to his feet. “Just rest for a moment. One of those Shiisaas fractured your skull; you need to stay still while it heals.”
Ah, that explained why he was having so much trouble focusing his eyes. And why it felt like someone had shot him in the head, for real this time. Nope, not thinking about that. “Ann s’okay?” he managed to slur out. He was fairly sure Ann had been fighting with him. He remembered having to dodge the fiery curl of her whip at one point. Ann was truly a force to be reckoned with these days. No, not Ann – Panther. Ann...ther?
He frowned as his thoughts wobbled around his head. Yeah... a cracked skull sounded about right.
“Panther will be fine.” Queen’s words were firm, but her eyes flickered to the side. Besides, he’d known her for long enough that the slight wobble in her expressive voice might as well have blared like a siren. Makoto always had been a shitty liar.
Joker closed his eyes and searched through the eternally clamouring set of voices at the back of his mind. He was all but wiped out, but he’d taught Arsène Dia for situations just like this – an emergency heal for times when he couldn’t wait for an item to kick in, or he couldn’t rely on his teammates. The Curse-type Persona wasn’t particularly comfortable with healing magic in general, but Arsène was part of him, after all. He understood that sometimes, you could only rely on yourself.
“Arsène,” he whispered, lifting his heavy arm to touch his mask. He felt Arsène’s massive claws briefly rest on his shoulder, and a little of the crushing pain in the back of his head faded away until he could think straight.
Queen’s hard gaze was the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes, stern behind her steel mask. Nonetheless, she took his hand and helped him haul himself upright onto legs that felt like noodles. When she was sure he wasn’t about to faceplant the ground (again), she stepped aside and he could finally take stock of his team.
It wasn’t a pretty picture. The grimy tiles on the floor were spattered with blood, both cognitive and Phantom, and the wounded Thieves were littered around the cramped confines of the room, much like the broken detritus strewn all over the lab. There had technically only been four of them involved in the initial fight, but he was pretty sure the others had panicked and charged in after he went down. Fox was leaning heavily on a cluttered desk nearby, attempting to polish out a deep nick in his katana. Skull was crouched down, wrapping a bandage around his bad knee. And the rest of his team were clustered around Panther, who was... not looking good.
“ – already cast Amrita on her twice,” Mona was saying as Joker gingerly made his way towards the group. “It didn’t make a difference. She’s been like this since the end of the fight.” The little cat’s ears were folded down, his tail flicking from side to side in clear distress. “Lady Ann...”
Panther was lying with her head pillowed on Sophie’s lap, with Noir gripping her shoulders on her other side. Her hair had fallen out of its usual twin tails into a tangled, blood-streaked mess that nearly obscured the dazed expression on her face. She was mumbling some kind of nonsense to herself, her bloodless lips barely moving, and every so often she lurched up as if there was an invisible rope tied around her throat. It was only by Sophie and Noir’s combined efforts that she was still horizontal at all. Panther’s bright crimson mask, Joker noticed grimly, had been laid carefully out of her reach.
Brainwashed. He wasn’t surprised – he did vaguely remember having to dodge an unexpected fireball somewhere in the carnage – but it still made Joker’s stomach turn to see how vacant his dear friend’s eyes had become. “How many times was she hit?” he asked, striding towards the group.
“Joker, your face!” Mona yelped. The feline left his place at Panther’s feet to leap onto Joker’s shoulder, making him stagger sideways.
“Holy shit, dude,” said Oracle, eyes wide.
He swiped irritably at the sticky red liquid plastering his bangs to his forehead. The Dia should have closed any surface injuries – his face no doubt looked like a horror show, but that was all it was.
“Are you quite certain you should be on your feet, Joker?” Noir asked uncertainly.
“I’m fine. How many times?”
They all turned to Oracle, who chewed her lip as she considered her answer. “I mean, I think she was only Brainwashed twice? But there was something in there that could inflict Forget too, so...”
“Black Ooze,” he confirmed, touching a hand to his forehead as he consulted the monsters in his skull. “And Legion. Uses psychic magic too.”
“Yeah... so honestly, it could have been anywhere from two to four, maybe more. I... kinda lost track after something gooey jumped on Necronomicon.”
Joker grimaced. He didn’t even remember that happening.
“I healed Panther to the best of my ability,” Sophie said. “It seems it was insufficient. I’m sorry.”
“You did all you could, Sophie,” Noir comforted her. “We both did.”
“Still... I wish I could help Panther more.” She looked sadly down at her patient. She was stroking Panther’s hair back from her sweaty forehead, the care and concern on her face every bit as human as the rest of them. Even in their dire situation, Joker couldn’t help but smile.
Noir moved gracefully to her feet, her dainty eyebrows creased in determination. “I can try another Amrita Shower,” she declared, already reaching for her mask. “Milady!”
The enormous, billowing skirts of her Persona were already beginning to shimmer into existence when Joker put a hand on her shoulder to stop her with a gentle shake of his head. “Save your strength. There’ll be more of those things – we’ll need Milady’s healing later.”
“Hold on a sec.” Skull stood up and moved forward to join the loose semi-circle they’d formed around their fallen comrade. He was still favouring his bad leg. “You want us to carry on? When Panther’s...”
They all looked down. On the ground, Panther tossed her head weakly, unaffected by Sophie’s attempts to soothe her. “Send us...” she mumbled, just loud enough to be audible. “Among the... the...”
“Dude,” Skull whispered uneasily, “If Panther’s this out of it, shouldn’t we head back? You know, like usual?”
This happened sometimes, with status effects. If someone was under too long, or was hit too many times with too many different spells, the effects could stick around even after the battle. Some of the Thieves had been dizzy, confused and disoriented for hours afterwards, even after leaving the Metaverse. One time in Futaba’s Palace, Fox had been hit by five consecutive Despair spells and had been inconsolable for days, lost in a fog of misery and depression.
Normally, it was a sure sign that they needed to find a safe room or a checkpoint and head back for the day. As this Jail had just proved beyond a doubt, the Metaverse was no place to be off your game, even for a second. But this time...
“We can’t go back.” Queen’s heavy declaration cut through the silence. As usual, she’d been thinking along the same lines as him. “There are people trying to kill us out there.”
“Uh, Queen,” Skull said, “There are things trying to kill us in here too. That’s kind of the problem!”
Oracle rolled her eyes so aggressively that her goggles nearly slipped off the back of her head. “There are always things trying to kill us in here, idiot!”
“Yeah, no shit, Sherlock!” Skull yelled back. “Joker looks like a blood bag threw up on his face!”
“Ew!”
“A compelling image,” Fox said thoughtfully.
“Everyone, please!” Queen snapped. “I know we’re still in danger here, but at least in the Metaverse, we can defend ourselves and heal any wounds we receive. In reality... we’re helpless.”
The quiet echoed with eight brains thinking the same, horrible thoughts. If the girls had been in their beds last night, if Zenkichi hadn’t noticed the locals’ suspicious behaviour, if they hadn’t listened to his warning in time... who knew what those men might have done to them? And in reality, there’d be no Recarm spells, no revival beads. Just their team, their friends, bleeding to death on the RV floor.
“I agree,” Joker said, his voice hoarse. “Going back to reality isn’t an option.”
A horrified silence descended on the room once more, broken only by Panther’s increasingly frantic mumbles. “We have to... we have to!” she hissed vehemently, and Noir had to crouch back down to help Sophie restrain the other girl’s wrists. Joker swallowed. It was like Ann was possessed by something, completely oblivious to the uneasy teenagers standing around her, let alone the distant clatter of Shadows moving around deeper inside the lab. Going on with Panther in this state would be a disaster... but leaving her unattended in the real world could be much, much worse. And he needed every one of his Thieves to tackle whatever was waiting for them inside.
“Hey, guys, having a thought here,” chirped Oracle. Her reedy, cheerful voice fell flat in the empty room. “I’ve been keeping an eye on Zenkichi, and it doesn’t look like there are any Shadows where he is. Sooo... maybe we could leave Panther with Gramps?”
“Oh, that’s an excellent idea!” Noir cried.
“That could work,” Queen mused. “We can give him some healing items in case of emergencies, and he can watch over Panther to make sure she doesn’t hurt herself.”
“Zenkichi is likely to be proficient in first aid as part of his line of work,” Fox agreed. “She would be in good hands.”
“And hey, it’s not like he’s doing anything else,” Oracle added. “The dude’s just sitting around twiddling his thumbs.”
“Then it’s agreed.” Fox nodded, stepping forward towards Panther. “Noir, if you would assist me, we can carry her back to – ”
“No.”
He didn’t know he’d said it until seven heads whipped round to stare at him. He couldn’t see Mona, but he could feel familiar sharp claws digging into his neck. “Joker?” Mona asked warily.
Joker shut his mouth, bit the inside of his cheek. It wasn’t like him to speak before he thought. Maybe it was just the head injury... or maybe it was the prickle of cold sweat on the back of his neck at the thought of leaving Ann alone with that man. His fists clenched by his sides with the familiar scrunch of red leather.
Skull’s firm grip on his left shoulder was a solid, grounding presence. “Dude, what’s wrong? If Oracle says it’s safe at the entrance, then that’s the best place for her, right?”
Of course he didn’t get it. None of them did. Joker glanced around the faces of his team, all of them creased in worry and genuine confusion, but not a single scrap of understanding. His heart sank.
The fluffy white tip of Mona’s tail flicked once at the edge of his vision, then the cat dropped to the ground to look him in the eye. “Joker...” he said slowly, “You still don’t trust Zenkichi, do you?”
“Joker, is this true?” Queen asked, craning her head around to nail him with her intense stare.
He should say something. He should plead his case, deliver the facts gently but firmly like the leader they expected... but his voice had shrivelled up in his throat. All he could do was nod.
“But dude... all that stuff with Akane, and her mom?” Ryuji said. “Like, maybe he’s kind of a shitty dad, but he seems like a good guy, y’know?”
“He did allow us into his home.” Fox placed a hand on his chin in a familiar thinking pose. “He certainly had no reason to permit us such close access to his personal life.”
Queen nodded in agreement. “I understand your caution, Joker, but... Zenkichi-san has had plenty of opportunities to sell us out before now.”
Joker’s eyes narrowed behind his mask. Of course he’d had plenty of opportunities. That was the role of an undercover agent – to slowly gain your target’s trust over time, offering up your own vulnerabilities as bait for the trap. A good undercover agent wouldn’t blow their cover until they had the perfect moment to strike... like, for example, a moment when the majority of the group were trapped in another dimension, leaving one member alone and completely vulnerable to interrogation, kidnapping... or worse.
His skin crawled. A phantom boot drove into his gut. He said nothing.
Queen’s eyes were still on him, the red of her penetrating gaze catching the gloomy lighting. He wondered how much she could see of his fears, his frustration... his memories. She and Mona always had been the best at seeing what was under all his masks, even when he didn’t want them to. “Do you... really think he’d hurt Panther?” she asked eventually, shrewd as always.
There were gasps from the whole group, like nobody else had even considered the possibility.
“Dude, no way!” Skull bellowed straight away.
“Wait, Zenkichi?” Oracle added incredulously. “We talking about the same guy? Gramps? Same dude who let Inari turn him into a mermaid a few hours ago?”
“A truly exquisite mermaid,” Fox confirmed. “He may have raised his voice, but I never felt threatened, Joker.”
Joker turned away to hide the irritation that must be crawling across his face. Sure, Zenkichi had looked completely harmless when he was asleep under all that sand, and all his bluster afterwards had been more endearing than threatening, but it wasn’t difficult to look harmless if you put some effort into it. Joker had done it every day at Shujin, hiding under his glasses, his bangs and a reticent slouch that had given him neck ache all year. It was easy: you just had to convince the people around you that you weren’t a threat. Perhaps you could ‘accidentally’ eat something spicy and let them laugh between themselves at your ‘mistake’. Or summon your ridiculous, extravagant Persona with such bombastic flair that your audience are too busy mocking you to notice the smirk twisting your lips. Or wield your tragic backstory like a weapon, thrust directly into your opponent’s soft heart until suddenly he finds himself sat in a cold, dark room staring down the barrel of a gun...
“Joker?”
He blinked hard. The walls and ceilings of the darkened room felt closer, somehow. This place had never felt more like a jail.
But he didn’t have the time to wallow in his regrets. He firmly pushed the memories back down into the dark pit they’d bubbled up from, and turned his attention to the present. His Thieves were waiting for him.
Hasegawa Zenkichi... tortured soul, struggling parent, conscientious officer. It would be nice to be able to rely on a capable adult, for once in their lives... but he’d seen the contempt in his eyes, the way he distanced himself from getting too close, the shady phone calls late at night. It was familiar – all of it was familiar. As much as he wanted to put the past behind him, he could see its echoes in their present.
“I don’t think this is a good time to test our alliance with him,” he said aloud. “Not with the situation out there. And with Panther so vulnerable.”
“Then... what do you propose we do?”
And that was the question, wasn’t it? Joker eyed their surroundings with resigned distaste. The only way out of here was through yet another tiny set of air vents, just past the puddle of blood where he’d gone down. Sophie had been sitting next to it the whole time; when she wasn’t staring at Panther with limpid blue eyes, she occasionally turned her face up to the ceiling as she listened to some mysterious being that only she could hear. What Joker could hear was the crackle of distant Shadows phasing through the floor, the creak of more miscellaneous machinery, the electric hum of the flickering lights. They weren’t even close to the end of this Jail, and they had no idea what horrors they’d find when they got there. Judging by the screams on the cassette tape from earlier... it wouldn’t be anything good.
Nonetheless, there was only one answer. “We’ll have to bring Panther with us.”
Everyone was silent as they digested the unexpected reply. Then, predictably, the room exploded.
“What the eff, man?!”
“Is that wise?”
“They just squashed us like bugs, Joker!”
“Guys, shut up!” Mona yelled, his piercing voice breaking through the din. He waited imperiously for everyone to settle down, then turned back to peer up at Joker, eyes like sharp blue lasers. “Joker, is that really our best bet?”
“We’ve still got a ways to go, Joker,” said Oracle, shifting nervously from foot to foot. “And there’s still something chatting to Sophie, and these things are nasty.”
“I’m afraid I must agree with Oracle,” Noir added. “Plus, I’m worried about Panther. She could injure herself or one of us if we encounter any more of those Legion Shadows. I believe it would be safer to take her somewhere she can recover in peace.”
“I know,” Joker said. “And I wish we could.” Fuck, how he wished he could let Panther rest in a nice, soft bed with someone holding her hand and whispering reassurances in her ear. He wanted that more than anything, right now. But... “But that’s not an option. So we’ll just have to do the best we can.” He looked up at them all, letting his eyes fill with Arsène’s fire. “I believe in you all. We can do this.”
There were a few nods, a weak smile, a sigh of resignation. He’d take what he could get, at this point.
“Hey Joker,” Skull said. His face was hidden behind mask and shadow, eyes cast down to the floor, but the hurt in his voice was laid bare. “You... you really don’t trust the guy?”
Once upon a time, maybe the answer to that question would have been different. Kurusu Akira had once been a kid who gave his trust freely and without hesitation, but it had backfired on him one too many times. He’d trusted his family and they discarded him. He’d trusted society and they cast him out. Finally, in one last act of faith, he’d laid his heart out on a silver platter for a boy who reminded him of himself... and that boy had smiled prettily while he stomped his heart into the dirt. Kurusu Akira had trusted easily, but Joker had learned that misplacing your trust could injure you in a way that no Metaverse Shadow could.
But one good thing had come out of all the lessons he’d learned: nothing was more important to him than the friends who’d had his back when nobody else bothered. Their unwavering faith in humanity was a strength that Joker could never let anyone take away from them. His Thieves could have the luxury of believing in every newcomer who tossed them a lopsided, fatherly smile... because it was Joker’s job to watch for the snake in the grass. He would never let anyone hurt them again.
“No,” he said. “I don’t trust him.”
Skull’s face fell. Oracle flinched back as if struck. Noir visibly withdrew into herself. And Sophie... Sophie just looked confused.
“But dude...” Skull protested weakly.
Queen’s voice was like a thunderclap through the tension. “You heard Joker,” she barked, eyes hard. “Fox, Skull, help Panther. Mona, Noir, watch the rear. The rest of us, in formation.”
Maybe this was unfair of him, Joker thought, as he watched his Thieves murmur their assent and turn away to their respective tasks. They all had so much faith in him, but maybe this was the wrong decision; maybe he was putting them all through even more hardship for no reason. Maybe this long, arduous ordeal could be a little shorter if he just extended a little trust to their new ally, just this once. That wouldn’t be so bad, would it?
I once promised myself I’d never end up like you, he thought softly to a dead boy. Now look at me. Is this what you wanted?
Seven pairs of eyes looked to him for orders, and he made the call.
“Move out.”