Chapter Text
“...You drew their attention? Good, now get going!”
“We’ve only got one shot at this, but I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that.”
“Stay calm, Red, you’ve got some distance. Just go the route we planned and you’ll be good!”
“Once you make it to the point, we’ll retrieve the briefcase.”
“Guys, I’m getting some noise on coms, they’re not aware of the rest of us yet…”
“Don’t worry about us, Red. Just concentrate on making it to the point, and try not to get held up by any shadows for too long!”
She jumped down a panel of neon lights and circuit boxes and continued forward. “Got it. Let’s keep it moving, team!”
Her red hood flowed through the wind like water, flashes of an obsidian black domino mask with an exaggerated white eyeliner design flashing from underneath long messy black curls, deep gray eyes looking in every direction, one red glove pumping forward and back in a smooth rhythm while the other held firmly onto a black briefcase…
“I gotta say, showing yourself above that crowd was an excellent move. Nice work as always, Red.”
“You know me, wherever I go, I gotta make a scene.” Red laughed to herself as she continued to jump across the light fixtures and rafters, looking down at the gasping patrons below. “Whether I like it or not.”
Toned legs with black tights, vibrant red tall-heeled winklepickers boots, a tattered red dress with a messy black petticoat, a white waistcoat beneath an ankle-length black tailcoat and a long, red hood… Confident. Suave. Red.
“I bet Skull wouldn’t have pulled that off that smoothly.”
“Oh come on, I can be theatrical if I wanted to!!”
“It’s not just a matter of theatrics, it’s that you have no sense for aesthetics.”
“Sh-Shut it, Inari, nobody asked you!!”
Red skidded to a stop, as a few black-suited agents busted out of a door she was just about to get to. “We got eyes on her!!” One shouted, with the others reaching for walkie-talkies and shouting orders into them.
The weight of the rifle on her back got the slightest bit heavier.
“Guys, we got trouble, some agents showed up.” Red darted further down the room, continuing down the rows of lights.
“Hold on, agents?! What the heck are real people doing in a palace?!”
“I’m going down route B, be careful and watch out. Queen, Knight, you two good?” Red asked into her coms, as she hopped across archways of lights, now with hundreds of patrons and suits alike looking up right at her.
“This is Queen, Team A is making our way down without any issues. Nobody has spotted anything out of the ordinary yet.”
“This is Knight, Team B is switching tactics to cause a distraction; Crow thought of it. Permission to go ahead?”
“Granted, just make sure nobody gets captured and remains out of sight,” Red responded. “I’m trusting it won't end up with the whole building coming down on our heads?”
“Are you sure about this, Red? I’m afraid of us being split up…”
“No worries, Noir. I can guide you all on the spot in case of any sudden route changes.”
Red vaulted up a sign, twirled over the railing, and landed on her feet in the middle of a circular area that overlooked the main foyer. “Made it to the elevators. I can climb up to the second floor, right, Oracle?”
“Yep, we’ve got a clear way through right now to the back rooms, just keep going!”
Red nodded and continued ahead, but not before being– once again– cut off by suddenly appearing agents in suits.
“...Or not.” Red sighed to herself.
“There’s nowhere to run!!” They said, suddenly morphing into Shadows, with another jumping from the second floor right behind her.
“These guys aren’t normal… I just saw a few agents turn into Shadows right before my eyes.” Red said into her communicator while quickly drawing her knife. “This won’t take long, you guys keep going.”
“What the heck… so, are they cognitions…? The interference on the coms makes me think at least some of them could be real…”
As the agents started to rush towards her, she smirked and jumped high above the one behind her, landing on the Shadow’s shoulders and pulling their mask clean off.
“Take ‘em down, Red!!”
Red hopped off of the Shadow, watched as the other two agents ran right past her and jumped straight into the Shadow’s liquifying form, merging into a single massive Shadow that now towered over her.
“Comparing power levels… no threat. Go get ‘em!”
“Got it.” Red smiled to herself as she dropped the briefcase to kick it away, and reached under her red hood, hooking the corner of her mask. “Let’s do this…Come, Riding Hood!! ”
Red ripped off her mask and felt her inner power explode as her persona came into form out of thin air, hovering behind her with a dark aura amid azure flames.
Riding Hood burst to life with a flourish of curse magic, her black and crimson lolita dress adorned with white frills and a fur dark cloak caked in blood, her dirty blonde hair spilling out from underneath her red hood and sinister blue eyes that seemed to glow through the dark peeking through her bangs.
The massive, bull-like Shadow roared at her, while Riding Hood yawned nonchalantly. “How boring, and here I was hoping for a challenge…”
Red dashed in, avoiding a wave of fire bursting out of the ground, and began slicing across the Shadow’s towering body with Riding Hood floating idly after her. “ Riding Hood, light it up with Gun skills!!”
“With pleasure!! ” Riding Hood laughed uproariously, as they pulled out a pair of pistols from underneath their dark fur cloak and began to unload a devastating Riot Gun into the shadow’s body.
The Shadow continued to fire pillars of flame from out of the ground amid its shrieks of pain as Red deftly avoided each spell, and quickly swung around to the Shadow’s backside, slicing it up while Riding Hood continued to fire upon it from the front.
“Wrap this up Red, I’m detecting a large group of agents heading your way from below. Get out of there when you see the elevators shut!”
Red kept dicing up the Shadow while Riding Hood fired continuous pot-shots all around its figure, melting down its defenses as its attacks became sloppier and further apart, the concentrated pillars of fire now becoming warbly waves of weaker flame spells.
Finally, the Shadow decided to strike with a last-resort physical attack and Red instantly saw the perfect opening to finish it off. As the Shadow swung way too wide, Red dove away into a roll, reached to her back once she landed, and quickly pulled out her compact sniper rifle to land a precision shot straight through the Shadow’s skull.
“...Holy shit.”
“Hey, I’m the designated sniper of the group for a reason.” Red chuckled to herself with a faint blush while she slung her rifle back around and recalled Riding Hood, (who was currently giving a crude gesture with their hand to the dissolving Shadow while blowing a raspberry,) now disappearing back into Red’s mask.
“Oracle, I’m back on the move.” Red picked up the discarded suitcase and watched as the nearby elevators all closed in unison, with the sign above it displaying the number going down. “The suits aren’t on me yet, but I imagine they’ll be gunning for me soon. Give me another route in case things go south.”
“You got it. Now get moving, they’ve found the surveillance room!”
Red nodded to herself and quickly turned around to break it for the next floor, hopping up a pillar and onto another overlook, while two groups of agents burst out of the elevators below.
“There’s a door right in front of you!”
Red lowered her body as much as she could and bolted for the door, ramming it open with her shoulder and sighing with relief when she saw that nobody was beyond it.
“You’re in the back rooms now, some suits are looking around but their numbers are really low. If you see one just stay out of sight, we’re still not sure if any of them are real people so just avoid them and subdue if necessary.”
Red turned to close the door behind her right when she heard a loud alarm blaring, followed by a chorus of sprinklers and screaming patrons.
“This is Knight. Skull and Crow just found the emergency controls for the main floor and flipped as many levers and pushed as many important buttons as they could, the agents are scrambling to retain order!”
“Got it, use the chaos to slip out of sight.” Red opened another door of the back rooms and ducked underneath one of the observation windows as soon as an agent ran down the hallway on the other side, who was shouting orders into a walkie-talkie while quickly scanning the rooms.
“I’ve got eyes ahead and some suits are blocking the exit in the room ahead of you, use your grappling hook to get to an upper level and you’ll be good!”
Red slowly climbed up a flight of stairs and she could hear the chatter of a few agents at the end of the tall, long room. She silently snuck behind a large box and whipped her grappling hook to a grated walkway above her, swinging herself under and over it and landing with a flourish.
“Okay, just continue ahead!”
“How close am I, Oracle?” Red asked as she continued to sprint low to the ground, darting through another storage room towards another upper level.
“Not too far from the checkpoint, you’re almost— Hold on, stop right there Red!!”
Red slid on her feet instantly and quickly whipped her head all around her. “What is it, Oracle?”
“Shadows all around you; it’s an ambush!!”
Red drew her sniper and backflipped away from the suddenly appearing Shadows, landing a clean shot right into one of their heads, before immediately being forced on the defensive as a few more appeared behind her, swinging at her and urging her into the middle of the group.
“Damn, they’ve got me surrounded!!” Red cursed under her breath as she drew her knife to keep as much distance between the Shadows and her as possible, while she kicked the briefcase in her hands away through a gap in their formation. “Can one of the teams assist?”
“Negative, both teams are too far away!! I might be able to—”
“Senpai!”
The shadows turned away from Red and looked down the hall at a now-approaching female figure.
“Hold on… what are these readings…?”
Red seized the opportunity and stabbed the Shadow in front’s back, pushing them forward to break out of the circle, quickly pulled her knife out as the Shadow dissolved and whipped around to aim her now-readied rifle at the rest of the group.
“You seem to have gotten into a bit of a bind, senpai?” The girl laughed as she closed the distance. “Seems I got here right on time!”
“You most certainly did.” Red smiled. “Although, now I have to ask, why are you here exactly?”
“...I’ve thought about it for quite some time.” The girl told her, as she readied a silver rapier and her own antique rifle at her sides, while the Shadows morphed into proper demons in front of them. “While I may not fully agree with the Phantom Thieves…”
Red started to fire upon the shadows, while the other girl followed suit, the two sticking close to concentrate their fire on the shadows’ heads and quickly dropping one after the other.
“...I know that all you guys are trying to do is help others. And I believe that is a valiant thing to do!” The girl smiled, as she threw her rapier across the room to peg one of the remaining shadow’s chests. “And knowing that I have the very same power… I guess it feels wrong to not use it to help out as well.”
The two finished off the last shadow, and Red sighed with relief. She turned to face the other girl and nodded. “Thanks, I owe you one.”
“There’s no need, senpai, just remember the promise we made.” The girl smiled back. “And, once this is over, I’ll meet up with you and we can talk a bit more about the whole Thieves thing, okay? I’ll try and keep the Shadows off your tail as best I can!”
Leaving no room for arguments, the girl picked up her discarded rapier and jumped up onto the overhead rafters, running out of sight.
“...I have no clue what just happened, but you gotta get out of there, reinforcements are coming and they’re coming fast!!”
Red picked the briefcase back up and turned ahead. “No need to tell me twice!!”
Continuing up a flight of stairs, she went through more of the backroom hallways and snuck underneath the large windows of the surveillance room, which was now packed with agents that continued to scan the cameras.
“...Find them, and kill them all!!” One of the agents loudly shouted.
Red continued to run up more flights of stairs, and she began to hear footsteps close behind, urging her to go faster and faster, skipping a few steps at a time until she finally reached her destination: the overlooking balconies of the high-rollers room.
“Your exit is just up ahead!”
Red looked ahead and was faced with a giant stain-glass window on the far end of the room.
“...Through there?” Red spoke to her communicator.
“That’s just how it is… the commotion downstairs kept a lot of the agents preoccupied, but now it’s way too busy to make an escape through… this is your best shot, Red.”
“Can you make it?!”
“Well, I don’t have much of a choice.” Red chuckled.
“Over there!!”
Red looked over her shoulder and saw a group of agents with guns pointed at her down the hall she had just come from.
“There’s nowhere to run!!” One of the agents shouted, as the others slowly advanced with their guns trained on her.
“Time to make a daring escape, I suppose…” Red whispered to herself, before quickly vaulting onto the railing and dashing across it towards the other end of the room, with a few patrons below gasping and pointing at her in shock as she jumped a corner.
“H-Hey, hold it!!” Red could hear one of the agents shout as she sprinted away, the suitcase still clutched in one hand as she looked back down at the patrons and agents one last time.
“See ya!”
And then she dove straight into the stain-glass window.
Truth be told, she couldn’t remember much after that.
All she could remember was the butt of a shotgun nearly caving her nose in, a fall, handcuffs, pictures, an empty briefcase, and being thrown into a tiny room with a table and a pair of metal chairs.
And now, a wave of exceedingly cold water.
She hacked and coughed as she slowly regained her surroundings, her eyelids feeling bruised along with practically every other part of her body as she slowly came to.
She could see the feet of at least 3 agents around her, and she slowly lifted her head to see a camera trained right on her, along with 3 dimly lit faces all staring what felt like molten napalm right into her.
“Finally came to, princess? ” The suit up front asked as he leaned in close. “Guess those drugs were a bit too strong…”
He snapped a few times in front of her face, she just scowled back.
“Just lucid enough, huh?” The suit glowered at her before he reeled himself back and kicked her right in the gut.
“Hopefully lucid enough to remember that…” The suit sighed, as she wheezed and coughed up a bit of blood on the floor, unable to do anything but wallow there thanks to the handcuffs keeping her arms behind her back.
Then she felt the sole of the suit’s shoe plant itself right onto the side of her head, felt tears stinging the corners of her eyes, immense pain as he ground his heel right onto her ear, pressing her head against the concrete flooring, attempting to break her— “Come on, cooperate. I wouldn’t want to ruin your pretty little face any more than I already am, you know.” The suit spat his words like venom.
She continued to look around the room at the other suits she could see, and hooked her eyes onto the camera, watching as it continued to train its lens perfectly onto her face.
The leading suit noticed her eyes, and she could feel his foot being taken off her head, as the suit turned to look at the camera. “What, do you think the camera’s gonna be used as video evidence?” He asked with a slight tinge of actual curiosity in his voice.
She opted to say nothing, which was apparently the wrong answer, because the suit quickly reached his hand down to grip her hair, slammed her head back down to the floor, and then kicked her hard straight in the ribs.
She could feel more blood splat out of her mouth and see stars in her eyes as she gasped for air, trying to breathe in huge breaths despite her rapidly increasing chest pain.
The suit walked towards another and grabbed a clipboard from their hands before tracing the room as they rattled off what was written.
“Obstruction of justice, blackmail, defamation, possession of weapons… Sheesh, manslaughter too? Quite the laundry list of crimes right here…”
He crossed his arms and looked down at her. “And to think… All of that from a punk like you. I bet you were enjoying every second of it too, huh?”
‘Oh shut the hell up already, merciless bastard…’
The suit nodded his head at another, and the two other suits in the room walked over to her and reached around back to undo her cuffs, before quickly pulling her onto her haunches and pushing her against the wall. Then, he walked up to her and crouched down to hand her the clipboard he was holding.
“It’s a confession under your name.” The suit explained.
She really wanted to just… swat the clipboard away, but seeing as every time she so much as looked at him funny she got a hit to the gut, so instead she opted to just swipe the thing out of the agent’s hand with a grimace.
“ Oh, so you’re starting to get an attitude now, are you?”
‘God damn it…’
“Now, I only need your hand to sign this, but…”
She tensed her body just in time as a foot was slammed straight into her ankle, but she was unable to stop the disgustingly masculine yelp that escaped her lips as the suit grounded his heel down, tears starting to form again at the corners of her eyes as she looked up at the suit with faux pleading eyes in an attempt to get them to stop without speaking up.
“...I don’t care if you end up losing a leg.”
She could finally feel tears going down her cheeks while the suit continued to mash his heel against her ankle for a few more moments before finally relenting with a scoff, and tossing down a metal pen right into her lap.
“Just sign the damn paper so we can stop wasting our time.”
She picked up the pen and scrolled down the paper until she found the dotted line.
‘Akane Kurusu’ She wrote, then she tossed the clipboard and pen onto the ground at the suit’s feet.
“Much obliged, miss. ” The agent spat as he pocketed his pen and picked up the clipboard to hand it off to another agent. “Oh, and one more thing…”
The two other agents filed out of the room, the last one now glowering down at her. “Don’t expect to make it out of here in one piece. We are going to make you understand that your actions have consequences. ”
Then the last agent finally left, leaving her alone in the room at last.
She screamed.
Akane wasn’t sure how long it was since the agents had left, because the only thing in the room with her was a camera, some chairs, and a table.
No matter where she moved the camera followed, so she assumed trying to do anything even remotely resembling hiding from the camera wasn’t going to work out.
Instead, she decided to just move the chairs back into their proper place and sit facing the door, while she counted who knows how many minutes until she heard a certain someone pipe up in her head.
‘ How are you feeling? ’ Riding Hood had asked her.
‘Like shit.’ Akane replied with an internal chuckle, while absentmindedly wrapping a finger around the red streak in her hair.
‘ We’re gonna make it out of this. ’
‘I know.’
‘ ...And I’m sorry for not popping up earlier. I thought you probably wouldn’t have wanted my commentary. ’
‘That’s uncharacteristically mature of you, Riding Hood.’ Akane smiled.
‘ I’m allowed to have my moments. You’ve got curse magic if you need to make a daring escape, don’t forget. ’
‘Don’t worry… hopefully, I won’t need to do anything drastic. And I’d rather not have to deal with a manhunt of my head.’
The sound of a long rattling click echoed out into the room. The door was getting unlocked.
‘Someone’s coming, keep quiet until I tell you, okay?’
‘ Got it. I’m always here with you, so don’t you forget about me!! ’
‘As if I ever could.’ Akane rolled her eyes.
And in came the last person she wanted to see: Prosecutor Sae Niijima.
“ ...Oh my god. ” Akane could hear Sae whisper under her breath.
“I would’ve freshened up if I knew you were coming, Niijima-san, but they only let me out if I need to use the bathroom… in handcuffs. Under supervision.” Akane grinned weakly.
Akane knew she was absolutely beaten to shit and that a good 90% of her body was either bruised or some form of broken… but she’d rather not see how she looked herself yet– let alone know how Sae felt about seeing the state of her currently.
“It’s… the leader of the Phantom Thieves is you? ” Sae asked as she pulled out the chair across from her. “I just invited you to dinner not even a week ago… you’re Makoto’s…” Sae rambled on for a moment before she took a cooling breath. “...That doesn’t matter. From here on you’ll be answering questions, do you understand?”
Akane nodded. “I’ll try my best to answer as honestly as I can Niijima-san… But I’ll give you a warning: I’m filled with so many mystery drugs that I’m not sure how long I’ll last.”
Sae’s eyebrows went up at that, and Akane watched as she leaned over to scan the room, taking notice of the copious amounts of empty syringes, splatterings of blood, spittle, and bile that littered the floor all around.
“Dear god, what did they do to you…? Those sick bastards…” Sae reached one hand up to rub her temple and used her other to rest her suitcase on the table. “...We can get to the torture of a minor portion of this whole thing if we can, but right now I need nothing but the truth, and I don’t have much time to get it. Am I understood?”
Akane nodded again, and she rested her head against an open palm. “I’ll try my best to keep it as understandable as possible, but I can’t promise full transparency either. You’re not getting a single thing out of me in regards to my comrades that I know you know I have.”
Sae sighed deeply but continued. “...What I’m having trouble grasping here is a motive. Why did you do it? It wasn’t a prank, considering the lengths you went to keep your identity a secret from the start, along with your targets continuing to go higher in ‘rank’ as you went, and without that motive, I can’t assemble a case for the prosecution.”
Akane smirked. “I feel like even with a motive, you couldn’t assemble a case either way, am I right?”
Sae managed to give a small smile at that comment. “...True. As it stands, there’s no possible way I can just… accept, let alone be convinced of such a ‘world’ that the reports of the case describe.” She leaned in closer, her eyes training on Akane’s.
“So, on that note, I’ll need to know just what this ‘other world’ is. How can you access it? How can you use it to steal another person’s heart? I’ll need you to tell me everything you can, convince me how this is plausible, and maybe as a result your sentence will be lightened. Are we clear?”
Akane took a moment to let Sae’s words sink in and, just before she got started, she realized that her mind was at a complete blank.
Then she watched as reality around her seemed to fade away, leaving only Sae, the table, and her.
She watched as a blue butterfly came in from out of the corner of her vision, and hovered over the table. Akane followed where it went, and she could see Sae staring at her with a confused look on her face as she did so.
“...You’ve come so far, Trickster.”
Akane could hear a familiar voice calling out to her.
“...You’ve overcome so much… you’ve surpassed all expectations with flying colors every step of the way…”
Sae was keeping quiet, just observing Akane as she continued to stare at the glimmering blue butterfly that hovered near a corner of the room.
“If my voice is reaching you… I know— We know, that you’re able to overcome even this. Reach deep into your mind, Trickster… Recall that day … and retread your steps from there.”
Akane closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
“We’re all rooting for you, Trickster… your allies, your loved ones, and us here in the Velvet Room… We know you can do it. For the sake of your future, and all of humanity…”
She could feel her mind slowly start to defog, things getting clearer and clearer with each passing moment.
“...You’ve got this, Trickster.”
“You got this, Akane! I love you!”
“I know you can do it, Akane! I love you!”
And when she opened her eyes Akane saw that reality was back to normal.
“Hey, are you alright?” Sae asked.
Akane turned to face Sae again while she corrected her posture as best she could; sitting up straight, knitting her fingers together, and lowering them down into her lap. For now, Red had to come out to keep things as quick and smooth as possible.
“...We are clear, Niijima-san… my apologies, I just needed to clear my head for a second.” Akane weakly smiled. “You better be taking notes, because this is gonna be a long story.”
Sae rested her elbows on the table and steepled her fingers. “Go on. I’m all ears.”
“Alright, well… It started like this…”
“Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for riding with us today!”
Akane woke up with a start as the intercom of the subway train blared out with a bit of static.
“We will be arriving in Shibuya shortly, this is the last stop for this line!”
She rubbed a bit of sleep out of her eyes and kept her gaze downcast, trying to avoid a few stares that went in her direction from her jumpy awakening.
“The doors to your left will open—”
She could already feel herself drifting off into slumber once again.
A hand grappling another woman’s wrist.
“Please, help!!”
A woman’s cry for help. Akane’s fist clenched.
“Hey, what’re you—”
The man jerked around, stumbling over his own feet before he fell onto the sidewalk head first.
“Damn brat… I’ll sue!! ”
Two police officers dragged her back towards a police car.
The woman testified that Akane assaulted the man. Akane was shoved into the back seat of the car and bashed her head against the opposite door.
The cops drove like they wanted to hit every single pothole and drive over every single divot in the road and take every turn too sharp—
“What, are you for real? A mental shutdown?”
Akane was once again pulled back into the present.
“It’s the truth!!” One student girl loudly told another.
“To a person, though?” The other girl responded with a laugh. “That’s gotta be a joke! You really love all that occult stuff, don’t you?”
The two then laughed together.
‘God… why do I keep dreaming about that night…’
Akane pulled out her headphones, started some music, turned her head to look out the window, and watched as the buildings continued to speed by.
‘So, I just gotta pass through here… Wait a minute, isn’t this…?’
Akane looked up with a small gasp as she watched what felt like hundreds of people crossing over a massive open section of the city street.
‘Shibuya Crossing… man, there are a lot more people than I would’ve thought… I guess it’s the busiest crosswalk in the world for a reason.’ Akane mused to herself for a moment before she heard a ping from her phone.
An app appeared over her navigator. One with a stylized red eye in the middle of a bunch of black protruding spikes that made it seem like an eye shooting out from broken glass.
“What the hell?” She whispered to herself, her eyes growing wide as the app icon quickly overtook the entire navigator.
‘Did I install some malware or something by accident…?’
Akane curiously pressed the icon, and when nothing happened, she tried pressing it a few more times and sighed when there still wasn’t any reaction. “Well, off into the trash bin you go—”
“It’s a gorgeous day out, isn’t it?”
Akane looked up to try and see who just spoke to her but was stunned when she saw that everybody around her was… frozen in place. There wasn’t even any noise, it was as if time had completely stood still.
“The sun is out… hardly a cloud in the sky…”
Akane turned to look over her shoulder and watched as a man with black hair done up in a ponytail, black turtleneck, and half his face obscured by a golden opera mask walked up to her with a smile.
“It’s quite the calm day for such a busy city, don’t you agree?” He asked her.
She wasn’t sure how to respond, because the sheer incredulousness of the situation left her completely stunned. Then, she heard a loud crackling noise in front of her and turned back ahead.
In the middle of the crosswalk was a brilliant azure flame. One that slowly began to take shape in the form of a small figure, one that looked like a young child. She couldn’t help but continue to stare at it… she wasn’t sure why, but it just kept her attention despite how bright it was.
Then she briefly saw herself. A sinister, wide smile with golden eyes—
And then everything started to move again. Akane quickly turned once more and saw that the man she had just seen completely vanished as well.
‘What… was that?’
Akane looked back down at her phone and saw that the app was still there. She promptly held her finger on it, and dragged it into the trash.
“Yongen-Jaya, huh? This place looks… pretty grime-y.”
Akane tried to keep herself out of the middle of the walkway as people continued to move back and forth down the allies that made up her now-new hometown. Clouds started to settle in and the gloom came with it, but it still seemed pretty nice.
‘Starting today, Sojiro Sakura will be taking care of me. His house should be in the backstreets… isn’t everywhere here a backstreet? It’s already so tight-knit…’
She could see an officer standing underneath a light post, overlooking the pedestrians.
‘...Not talking to that guy. To hell with asking a cop for directions…’
Should she try and just walk around all over to try and find the Sakura residence? Or should she try and visit a local place for that instead? All the buildings were close together, so she supposed it wouldn’t hurt to ask a local place if they’d heard of this ‘Sojiro Sakura…’
Akane turned a corner and saw the telltale sign of a place with food; an awning directly above a door with a sign that said “coffee & curry: Leblanc,” and a small menu of specials propped up on a chair right next to a door with a bell and an open sign.
‘Ooh, curry might be nice right about now, it’s kind of chilly too…’
Her reflection in the mirror was staring at her now. Her long winter skirt, her red plaid top, her black scarf wrapped around her neck. Her large black glasses, golden– no, gray eyes. A trick of the light…
She opened the door with a soft chime of the bell, and she could already feel– and smell– the atmosphere.
It was a small little place, with a bar on one side and a few booths with tables on the other, and she could spy a small kitchen, a clock, and even a stairway to the upper level.
“This just in: a public transit bus was driven down an opposing lane with its customers still in it!”
A TV placed above a small fridge at the far end of the small establishment seemed to be playing the local news station.
“The citizens can’t live in peace if this keeps up…”
“Oh, how frightening…” An elderly man said, him and his wife taking up the only filled booth of the place.
“What could be going on? Didn’t something similar happen just the other day?” The elderly woman responded.
It felt weird to just stand there and watch, but it’s not like Akane had any other options that weren’t rude. The only other person in the room was a man in a pink shirt behind a black apron sitting close by the elderly couple, who was hunched over working on… a crossword puzzle.
“...The name of a shellfish used in pearl farming…” The man said as he tapped the eraser of his pencil against his chin.
‘Okay, maybe waiting isn’t the best idea…’
“...Um, excuse me?” Akane spoke up.
The elderly couple didn’t seem to hear her, (being too engrossed in their conversation,) but the man with the apron did. He side-eyed her for a moment before his eyes shot up with recognition.
“Oh… that’s right, that is today…” He sighed, as he turned to put his newspaper and pencil on the bar table, and stood up, the elderly couple doing the same right after.
“Ah, we’ll be going now. The payment’s on the table.” The elderly man said with a nod. “Thank you very much for the extraordinary food as always, Boss.”
‘Boss’ nodded with a small smile. “Thanks for coming.”
The elderly couple filed out of the cafe, leaving Akane and ‘Boss’ alone at last.
“...Jeez, four hours for two plates of curry and a single cup of joe…” The man sighed.
“...Excuse me, but, do you happen to know who ‘Sojiro Sakura’ is?” Akane asked. “I thought that it would’ve been best to ask at a local cafe, seeing as I know he’s at least living somewhere around here.”
The man smirked. “Well you’re right about that; that’s me. Guess you got pretty lucky, huh?”
Akane’s eyes were a little wide for a moment, and then she let out a small chuckle. “I guess so.”
“So, you’re… Akane, right?” Sojiro asked.
Akane nodded. “Yeah, Akane Kurusu to be specific. Please take care of me.”
“...Uh-huh.” Sojiro looked at her with an incredulous look for a second, before he put on a pretty sly-looking smirk. “...And I’m Sojiro Sakura. You’ll be in my custody over the next year. You can call me Sojiro, Boss, pretty much anything that isn’t ‘Dad,’ you understand?”
“Got it, nothing other than ‘Dad.’ Do you care if I call you ‘Father’ instead?” Akane smiled.
“You certainly have a quick wit…” Sojiro sighed. “...Y’know, that reminds me a lot of your father. See, an old friend of mine knew him, so I hung out with him a few times, and—”
Akane quickly gave Sojiro an expression that hopefully gave off the vibe of ‘sorry, I don’t want to talk about that topic.’
Sojiro seemed to understand though, and trailed off rubbing the back of his head.“...Bah, not that any of that matters… follow me.”
‘Okay… maybe a little bit less of the wit.’ Akane noted to herself. ‘I can already tell he’s kind of a hard-ass… probably won't appreciate it if I keep trying to make jokes. Keep it more professional for now.
However, she was a bit worried when Sojiro– instead of going outside of the cafe– went towards the stairwell she saw earlier, and when Akane followed she could practically see the inches of thick dust that screamed ‘unused and unclean’ on the guardrails alone.
…And when they got to the top of the stairs it was even worse.
Sojiro scratched the back of his head anxiously as he turned to look at Akane. “...okay, so… I didn’t get the time today to clean things up…”
“This isn’t supposed to be my room… right?” Akane asked with a pleading expression.
With a heavy sigh, Sojiro shook his head ‘no.’ “I don’t have any extra space back at my place for you to stay… This was always the plan unfortunately. Y’know, I’m not too happy about the thought of keeping a girl in the upstairs of my establishment either, but… this is all I’ve got for you. You’ve at least got plenty of space, yeah?”
Akane took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. “Okay… okay. I can… work with this…”
“Well, you’re going to have to.” Sojiro crossed his arms. “I have sheets for your bed, and I can probably get a curtain or something to put on the ceiling to cover stairs for you because I can’t exactly get a door installed within the hour… and I’ll help clean up a bit, how’s that?”
Akane relented with a sigh. “I’d appreciate it a lot, Sakura-san… Is my stuff here at least?”
Sojiro nodded again and walked past Akane to the stairs. “I’ll get the mops and some water, there should be a duster somewhere around here…”
Sure enough, a large box sat in the middle of all the mess, one that had ‘Akane’s Belongings’ written over top with a black marker along with a few shipping labels plastered all over.
Her stuff was here, she had nowhere else to go… whether she liked it or not, her home for the next year was now the dusty attic of her temporary guardian’s cafe.
Akane whipped her backpack around and sat it on top of an open space of a particularly dirty table and tried her best to fan away the explosion of dust that was now all up in her face.
“Well… I certainly have my luck cut out for me now…” Akane coughed while failing to stifle a sneeze. “This is gonna be hell to clean…”
To her surprise, it didn’t actually take that long for things to get clean. A majority of the garbage and unused items were piled up in a corner, the whole room took on a deep brown color now that all of the layers of dust were removed from the floors and walls, and they both managed to get a thick black curtain nailed across the ceiling to cover up the stairway from any eyes.
“...I can’t even remember the time this room looked this clean.” Sojiro nodded to himself. “You make for a great helper, kid.”
Akane fell back into her ‘new’ futon bed with a heavy sigh. “I can do good work when I get my head in the game… cleaning can be a pretty cathartic thing for me, believe it or not.”
Sojiro pulled out a chair and sat down himself, wiping his brow. “I can bring over a vacuum cleaner tomorrow to get all of the dust out from the rafters, but I’m gonna leave you to that… I think my age is starting to catch up to me…”
“Yeah, I can get that done,” Akane nodded. “...Thank you again, Sojiro-san. You’ve been a big help.”
Sojiro shook his head with a small smile. “Don’t worry about it… just doing my job.” He then stood up with a stretch. “I’ve gotta go, but not before I say a few things first.”
Akane sat to attention, while Sojiro pulled his chair over to sit in front of her. “...I’ll be honest, I expected you to be a real piece of work… Hell, I still do… but I can tell you’ve got heart.”
‘Okay… guess I gotta work up some favor…’ Akane noted to herself in her head again.
“You did what you thought you had to, and you ended up getting punished for it. I know it sucks, but the lesson to gather from it all is there are some things you shouldn’t be messing with.” Sojiro told her with a stern expression. “Now, you just have to do a good job of remaining as normal as possible, you understand?”
Akane wanted to retort that, but she just nodded instead. She’d rather not get on Sojiro’s bad side on her first night.
“...But enough about all the serious crap, as far as I’m concerned all I care about is that you remain on your best behavior during your stay here: good grades, and no troubles. I’ll be locking up personally every night, and you’d best not be staying up late, because I’m not gonna take care of you if you get sick from it, got that?”
Akane nodded again. “Loud and clear, Boss.”
Sojiro gave her a smirk. “Good. I’m trusting you with the shop at night too, so you better not think you can get away with stealing anything from downstairs to have as a late-night snack. We’ve got to visit your school tomorrow as well, so rest up. I’ve got your uniform back at my place, so I’ll bring it over in the morning… oh, and one more thing…”
Sojiro fished a small but substantial book out from his back pocket and tossed it down into Akane’s lap.
“You don’t gotta do it tonight, but this is a daily journal. Part of your probation states that you’ve gotta write down what you do every day, but you don’t have to go into much detail if you don’t want to. As long as it’s a good amount per day, you’ll be fine.” Sojiro turned himself toward the stairs and waved. “See you tomorrow, kid.”
Akane watched as Sojiro disappeared through the curtains, and she wasted no time in slumping back down into the futon while she heard the cafe’s lower lights shut off, and the front doorbell chime.
“Man… what a day…” Akane sighed as she rubbed her hands against her face a bit. “I guess starting now, this attic is my new room…”
It was a bit of a fixer-upper, but she could probably do great things with this room. She could already feel gears turning in her head with ideas of how to spice the place up… if she got a summer job she could even consider getting small pieces of furniture– if Sojiro would allow that kind of thing, anyway.
“Well, I’d best get my pajamas on…”
Akane willed herself back up, shuffled over to her box of belongings and took out her favorite pair of pajamas: Red flannel pants, and an old, long-sleeved Char Aznable shirt.
‘Tomorrow’s gonna be another big day too… and the first time I’ll be attending school in a girl’s uniform now that I think about it… Wait, how’re my pills doing?’
She pulled her backpack over and shuffled around through her things, eventually finding a small pill bottle. She had gotten it refilled about a week before she left, so it wasn’t like she was gonna run out anytime soon… but it was a small bottle, and it’d be best to sort out her prescription refills with a local pharmacy as soon as possible.
‘Still tons of stuff to do… but that's my future me’s problem. For now, present me is tired as hell…’
Akane practically jumped back into bed after she turned off the lights, and shimmied around onto her side after she pulled up the covers Sojiro had given her. The futon wasn’t half-bad, but she was definitely considering getting a proper mattress or something… And a cooling blanket, because it was stuffy.
She plugged her phone into a nearby outlet, set an alarm, and could already feel herself drifting off to sleep.
…But as it turned out, her night wasn’t over quite yet. She could already feel herself wanting to wake up.
‘And here I thought I could go one night without some melatonin…’
She wasn’t sure why her ankle felt so heavy, though.
‘…Wait a minute.’
She could hear droplets falling around her, and chains rattling. Akane's eyes shot open as wide as she could, memories of a cell filling her mind.
She was trapped in a padded room of pure blue velvet, her ankle strapped to a large metal ball by a chain and she was dressed in a cartoonishly ragged prisoner’s garb.
Akane turned her head around frantically, and locked eyes with a desk far behind a pair of bars at the end of the cell. A desk with a very peculiar-looking man and a short girl in an extravagant blue and black dress right next to him.
“Ah… it seems we have yet another guest with an intriguing destiny ahead of them…”
Akane slowly stood up as the peculiar-looking man chuckled to himself. She hobbled her way forward toward the bars and as she did so, she spotted two more people on the man’s flanks… one was a lady singing into a microphone, and another a man playing the piano, filling the strange room with music.
“Trickster…” The man said. “Welcome to the Velvet Room. ” He gestured with a widespread hand, and a Cheshire smile.