aterat | [ ONE ] Arrival

Entry tags:

[ ONE ] Arrival

Who; Mitsuru + You
What;Arrival and wandering around the city+narrow escape from tonberries
Where;The residential buildings, market, the cemetery
When; 23rd and throughout the week
Warnings; Will update if any come up.

A. 23rd Residential Buildings

The young woman hasn't had a chance yet to replace her school uniform. There's a slight bit of awkwardness in her mannerisms about that, made most apparent by the way she seems to keep her arms wrapped around herself. Almost as if she thinks she can disappear into herself by doing that. Of course nothing is quite that simple. In the back of her mind she keeps telling herself that there's no need for awkwardness. After all, back home on a Saturday juts like this she'd be traveling through a sea of other students in their uniforms. This isn't home though and she can't help but feel like the uniform just makes her stand out.

There's not too much she can do about that particular fact at the moment though and her mind wanders quickly to the vastness of the situation at hand. Nothing about this place is similar to anything she's ever seen before. She holds the red key as she looks up at the buildings trimmed with their different colors.

"Green, Blue, Gray and," she looks down at hers, "Red. What does it mean? Why are we being categorized like this?"

B. 24th Market District

The market was like absolutely nothing Mitsuru had ever seen before and there was no denying that it was overwhelming. There were things Mitsuru needed though and so she'd made a list and headed out. The list was something she was clinging to as she walked through the open-air market with an icy expression that revealed nothing of her inner thoughts about the place. At least she was quite good at hiding her emotions, which hopefully meant that she wouldn't need to worry about embarrassing herself too much here.

In order to further avoid the potential for embarrassment she also seemed to be doing her best to avoid people in general. All of her attention seemed focused on her list and the various stalls and buildings. Nothing about this place seemed to make sense and she would even go so far as to say it looked like nobody actually planned the layout. Honestly, that in itself was a little frustrating. Frankly, it was just poor design. That wasn't something she needed to get distracted by though. She needed to be focusing on the list and trying to get out of here as quickly as possible.

Unfortunately, the ever important list slipped from her hand and went flying off away from her.

"Come back here right now," she commanded. Because certainly commanding a piece of paper would work.

C. 24th Just Outside the Cemetery just as it's getting dark

Artemisia had noticed something just as the sun was starting to set. From the brief whisper that came into her mind she couldn't quite figure out what she was sensing. The most logical thing to do here would be to contact Shinjiro and have some sort of backup before she attempted anything. However, she wasn't really thrilled with the idea of getting Shinjiro involved in something dangerous immediately after their mutual arrival here. It was selfish of her, deep down she truly did know that, but everyone could be selfish sometimes. She justified going forward alone as something she needed to do. She'd been the one to sense it and it would make more sense for her to put herself in danger than to let someone else do it for her.

Wasn't it amazing how someone could justify something in their own head?

It was easy enough to locate the hooded figure as it rounded a corner. All she could catch a glimpse of at the moment was it's heavy brown robe from the back. From a distance it looked to be a fairly decent size, perhaps around four feet in height? She couldn't quite tell, which only compelled her to try to get closer to it. She continued after it, using Artemisia to keep track of it every time it sped up around a corner. Eventually it stopped attempting to flee just outside what appeared to be a cemetery. It wasn't somewhere she'd been yet, though it wasn't as though she was too familiar with anything here as of yet.

When the creature turned around she steeled itself against it's hollow eyes. It reminded her considerably of a shadow and yet she knew that wasn't what it was. A terror began to prick at the back of her mind and instinctively she reached for the Evoker on her belt. She brought the gun to her head and pressed (making quite a sight for anyone to stumble upon).

"I command thee," she shouted with an authoritarian voice. With an explosion the Persona appeared hovering slightly above her.The creature began to shuffle closer to her, closing the gap to where it was almost close enough to touch. With a flourish of her own rapier she pointed Artemesia forward to attack as she quickly maneuvered backwards. A flurry of ice like daggers formed in from of Persona and then cascaded into the green skinned creature in front of her. It stumbled back allowing for more distance between the two of them. The terror that had only been prickling at her mind had started to push down the closer it got.

To make matters worse she was fairly certain she was sensing another somewhere nearby. This was not a battle that she should be taking, though a part of her did want to stay to finish it off. She stole a glance back and noticed that it was slowly getting back up on it's feet and heading her way. She needed to make a choice. Flee or stay.

In the end she chose something in between. Her goal now was to gather intel. Unfortunately, her Persona was a bit more geared towards combat than support, which meant her scanning took longer than Yamagishi would have. This ended up leaving her slightly vulnerable to the growing sense of dread and anguish that the creature seemed to dredge up the closer it got. Perhaps flee would have been the better choice.

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"I-I know you're right," more so than he could possibly know. "But...it's quite unlike us, isn't it?" And perhaps that had ben one of their problems. She let out a sigh.

"Ikutsuki lied to us." That was as good of a start as any.

"Clammin' up really worked out for us." That had been his biggest problem in the end. No one had discussed what had happened with Castor, how it had crushed a house and killed a boy's other. They'd swept it under the rug, leaving Shinjiro to face the consequences of his own consciousness and to wonder why no one wanted to punish him for the crime he'd committed. No one even saw it for what it had been, and so he'd punished himself for it.

"Ikutsuki? What do you mean?"

"I..." she stumbled over her words and fell silent again. Usually it was so easy for Mitsuru to speak but this topic made her throat close up as her chest began to tighten. It felt somehow like her insides were being twisted all over again. After a few long seconds she shook her head.

"Everything he told us was a lie. He was using us." The three of them more so than any of the others actually, after all they'd been believing these lies the longest. "Destroying the shadows was never going to end the Dark Hour, instead all it was doing was melding them together to create Death itself. He pushed us to do that to bring about something he referred to as the Fall." She didn't look up at him as she spoke and it was probably obvious to him that she was trying very hard to control her voice. "He never wanted to eliminate the Dark Hour."

He took a few moments to process what she'd set. Just the thought of being used like that, of his friends being used like that was enough to make him want to punch those corny puns right out of his mouth, but this wasn't about him. Sure, it pissed him off, royally, but it was all a lot more intense for Mitsuru. She'd been at it a lot longer than both of them had, after all.

"Fall of what?" He had a sinking feeling in his stomach, but he had to know now. Whatever it was, unwitting or not, he'd played a part in helping it along. They all had.

The silence stretched on before she finally looked over at him, though it was only a quick glance before she returned to looking down.

"Everything. It seems my grandfather was obsessed with the idea of creating the Fall, using Death to bring about the end of humanity. He...spoke about it like it would be some sort of ...gift. He was truly insane. He...intended to sacrifice us on crosses to summon Death. He was going to use Aigis to do so but my father..."

"He was damned good at hidin' it." Were there signs? He was dedicated to studying the shadows, kept them all focused on it, but was there more? Something he should have seen? Could this have been prevented? If her grandfather was involved, that meant this had been the Kirijo Group's point all along. All of humanity? Was all they were doing really that big a deal?

Did that mean the things they were seeing, doing, were happening all over Japan? Outside Japan? Shit...

"Wait. What about your father?" Her Grandfather had been responsible for all this, she'd said, so...

"I've gone over it a million times in my head, if I should have noticed his lies earlier. It was far too easy for him to manipulate me all this time...." And it was far too easy for her to fall into her own head with this line of thinking. At least he managed to snap her out of it by inquiring about her father.

"He tried to stop him. To save us. But..." her voice cracked and waivered. "Ikutsuki shot him."

"He..." What? It was a lot to take in. Ikutsuki made some weird sacrifice of them to end the world, Kirijo-san tried to stop him, Ikutuski...

...Ikutsuki took her father away. All of this was so fucked, but so much of it had been avoidable, and now...he didn't even know what it meant, what they were facing, and because of his own stupid decisions, they were facing it alone. Well, not alone, they had him, and Mitsuru and Akihiko had each other, but.

"I..." He swallowed. If he'd known what they'd been facing, maybe he wouldn't have-

-that didn't matter. He couldn't change the past, what he'd done two hours ago, any more than he could change two years ago. But he could change what he did from now on. He could be here. "...I'm so sorry, Mitsuru."

Tears had welled up in her eyes and she continued to look down at the ground as if it were the most fascinating thing that had ever existed. Maybe if she looked down there he wouldn't notice her tears. The last thing she wanted was for him to feel for her given his own situation. It seemed selfish.

"It's...it's alright. He...he jumped off the tower after that. Ending his own life rather than facing consequences for what he'd done." But the damage had already been done. He'd murdered her father and he'd manipulated them all into bringing about this Fall, whatever it would end up being. He hadn't even finished telling them all of what the Fall entailed before he jumped off. So now they were just left alone with an incomplete picture of a looming disaster beyond anything they could have prepared for.

"Fucking coward." He shook his head. He wanted to reach out to her, to let her know she wasn't alone, and that she wasn't having to hold it all herself, but he didn't. He did move to her side, though, a strong presence at her side, standing straighter than usual, as though that would will her to understand what he meant when he moved closer, that she could rely on him.

"And what now?"

"I don't know what I would have done had he not chosen that path himself," she said weakly. In the moment she'd been reaching for her weapon and the amount of anger she'd felt...well, she could only imagine what she might have done. She looked over at him as he moved closer and let herself relax. It was a strangely subconscious reaction that she took no note of.

"I believe we're all of a similar mindset, that we must continue to fight whatever this Fall may be. However...we know very little about what's to come. From what he said the implications are truly massive." What he'd said made it sound as though her grandfather wanted to bring about the end of all of humanity using some sort of Shadow connected to Tartarus. "If only I'd been able to stop him so that we could get more information out of him." But she'd failed at that, just as she'd failed at everything else.

"Don't do that to yourself, Mitsuru." He wasn't surprised she was internalizing it. It's what she'd always done when something didn't go right, and with all the loss she'd faced recently (not that he was thinking that his was that much of an impact) it was likely even worse than usual. He moved around her, stood in front of her, and reached out, putting his hands on her shoulders.

"You can't hold yourself responsible for Ikutsuki. You didn't know. Doubt your dad did, either, but you and Aki, Iori, Takaba...all'a you, you're strong. If there's a way to stop this Fall from coming, you'll find it."

The movement caused her to blush for a reason she wouldn't be able to explain even if asked and she looked down.

"I should have known." There had to have been signs, something she'd missed, that would have clued her in to his true intentions. "My sole purpose in deciding to use my Persona was to protect my father and I failed at that. I won't fail to stop the Fall." She'd decided that already, she would dedicate herself fully to that. However...it hardly stopped her from internalizing the blame for the entire situation. "However, I accept the role the Kirijo group, and I, played in things."

"Maybe we all should've seen it coming, but we didn't and..." He breathed a sigh. He'd done a lot of realizing this over the last few weeks. It was high time his friends started realizing the same. "...you can't change the past. All you can do is your best to make sure it doesn't define where you're goin'."

"It's not a matter of we, I knew him for much longer than any of you. He was employed by the Kirijo group, we should have known." she shook her head and sighed. "I know you're right and I intend to see everything through but it doesn't change my failures." Or how guilty she felt. Or how much it hurt. That was the real problem, wasn't it? The truth of the matter was his betrayal hurt more than anything. He'd worked with her grandfather and she'd trusted him, just as she'd trusted her family. Only for her to find out literally everything in her life had been a lie.

"It ain't like you're in charge of the Group or anything, Mitsuru. Sounds like there was a lot they hid from you. From us, and that ain't your fault." She was just a kid. They all were. Damn him, and he got the easy way out, too. Typical. He was pissed; pissed he hadn't seen it, pissed at himself for not coming back sooner, for punishing himself instead of being there for his friends when they needed him.

And he felt betrayed. He'd trusted the Kirijo Group, trusted Ikutsuki. Trusted they were doing the right thing, that if they'd continued on, they'd finally end it, and maybe kids like Ken or Mitsuru would never have to worry about taking up the Evoker again.

And if he felt betrayed... "I get it, Mitsuru. It's easy to say it's all your fault. Guilt eats you up inside unless you use it for somethin', but it gives you somethin' to focus on. Hurt, though? That's all it does. It hurts. Guilt's good at making the hurt less obvious, but you gotta let it go. This ain't on you."

"I...am in charge now, Shinjiro." Which changed quite a lot about her life rather quickly. Though, she'd be loathe to admit how much the pressure and the changes were getting to her. Especially here where there was nothing she could even do about it. "Which means that it's my responsibility to learn from these mistakes. It will be my duty to turn the Kirijo Group around and help it regain it's honor." That was all she could do to honor her father's memory after all. It wasn't as though she'd gotten the chance to have revenge against Ikutsuki, he'd taken the cowards way out of the situation.

"I understand that the true blame lies on Ikutsuki and...and my grandfather," that was certainly hard to accept. "However, I don't think it's wise to just ignore the problems my own ignorance caused." Mostly because she wanted to blame herself, it seemed appropriate somehow.

"Yeah, I'm not an idiot." He knew, academically, what the death of her father would mean. It meant Mitsuru would inherit the company, run a multinational organization to the best of her ability and run herself into the ground in the process. "Fine. Learn from 'em, but makin' sure you don't make 'em again ain't the same as makin' 'em happen in the first place."

He scoffed. "I get it. You want somebody to blame because there ain't anybody. I spent two years doin' the same shit. You need time? Fine. Take it, but don't let it take you." Don't be me.

"But, if it hadn't be for me and the Kirijo group then you and Akihiko would have never become involved in all of this." And then he'd have never...was that really a good path to go down? Probably not. "Everyone ended up in this mess because of us and I was the one to recruit Akihiko and then you." See? Everything could be traced back to being her fault.

"I've had time, everyone gave me plenty immediately after it happened." In fact, she'd refused to speak for nearly two weeks after it and, thankfully, everyone had left her alone.

"I ain't ridin' the blame-coaster with you, Mitsuru. We could go back and forth all day and I ain't got time for that shit." It wasn't that he had anything pressing he was working on, of course, they'd only just arrived, but sitting on his ass and twiddling his thumbs was something better to do than go down this particular road and he wasn't about it.

"Every single one of us had a choice. Aki chose, I chose. Sounds like you were the only one who didn't get the benefit. It ain't like you twisted my arm. Aki did, and it wasn't for you, or the Kirijo group." He breathed a sigh. "Aki stayed on 'cause he had the power to protect people, and he wasn't about to let them get hurt on his watch again. I joined to watch his back. If it wasn't you, it would've been something else, somebody else."

"Yeah, well, now you got time with nothin' else takin' your attention." And he meant to make sure she took it. "I'm checkin' out the apartments. You comin'?"

"I-I apologize, Shinjiro," she responded with an icy tone. He wasn't wrong for calling her out in that way, but she still wasn't particularly happy about it.

"I had a choice." That was all she said in response to his statements. None of them were things she could rightly argue with, nor were they things she had the energy to argue with. The only thing she could find to counter was the insistence that, despite her young age when it all had begun, she'd had a choice.

"There are a few other things I want to look at before I head to the apartments. I'm sure you can manage on your own." And so could she.

He knew when he was being dismissed, and he had a lot of adjustments to make himself, to being alive, to his thoughts, to this place. After a moment, he nodded, shoved his hands in the pockets of his coat, and stood to go.

"Yeah. Be safe."

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[ ONE ] Arrival

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