what branches grow out of this stony rubbish

I do not find the hanged man

Minato knew, on a deep, visceral level, that he wasn’t meant to be alive.

He hadn’t exactly died when he sealed Nyx, but that was because his soul was needed to maintain the seal. His body had stopped working and his soul had returned to the collective unconscious. The fact that he’d never quite made it into the Sea of Souls didn’t change the facts. He wasn’t meant to be here.

Sometimes, he would be in the middle of some routine task--preparing coffee, or dusting, or visiting the shrine down the road--and then he’d remember that he was out of place. The realization always made him feel strangely adrift, like the bustle of Tokyo was happening on the other side of a grimy window.

It reminded him of his time in foster care, before he’d met SEES. Apathy was an old friend, after all, but he’d worked to become someone who cared again. 

Even if he was out of place, his friends were still here. They were adults with their own lives, and they didn’t especially need him anymore, but he still wanted those connections. And he knew that the only way to keep them was by continuing to reach back, even when he didn’t feel like it.

So even though he was reluctant, he accepted Aegis’s invitation to spend a Friday night with her.

Aegis was so different from the robot he’d left behind. She no longer compulsively reminded everyone around her that she wasn’t human. She made jokes and had friends and knew more slang than he did, even if she was still hesitant about using it. The new group of Persona users, the ones who called themselves the Phantom Thieves, were all but enamored with her. When she showed up at LeBlanc, every single one of them perked up, and then deflated a bit when she made it clear that she was there for Minato.

Minato kind of wanted to step back and let them spend time with her, if they wanted to so badly. But Aegis wanted to spend time with him.

He wasn’t looking forward to the moment that she realized how much she’d built him up in her head. The way she talked about him…that kind of admiration wasn’t anything he’d earned, and he didn’t know how to react to it. 

Still, he couldn’t deny that he liked spending time with her. He always had. Even before, they’d been each other’s confidants, and now…

Aegis’s personality may have changed, but she still looked the same. When Minato spoke with the others, he kept forgetting that he wasn’t with the teenagers he remembered, and then an accidental glimpse of their face would remind him that he’d been left behind. It was nice to still have Aegis, to have someone who he could pretend hadn’t changed, if only for a moment.

Aegis led him out of LeBlanc at a brisk pace, leaving Minato to stumble in an attempt to keep up. She was wearing a breezy-looking black-and-white dress with a decorative blue bow on the front. On anyone else it might’ve looked silly, but it suited her.

“Where are we going, anyhow?” he asked.

“You’ll see,” Aegis said, smiling just a bit.

A little despite himself, Minato smiled back.

It was hard not to get lost in his memories of Iwatodai, of being the one who pulled Aegis along rather than the other way around. But…this was nice, too.

Minato didn’t know Tokyo very well, but clearly Aegis did. She led him to the subway station like she’d taken the route a dozen times, and didn’t even need to consult the maps to pick the right route.

“You know your way around, huh?” he asked.

“I visit LeBlanc often,” Aegis said. “Moreso now that you’re there.”

“You don’t have to,” Minato said. 

“What?” she asked.

“You don’t need to check in on me so often,” Minato said. “I know you have things to do.”

Something like frustration flickered across Aegis’s face, there and gone almost too fast to catch.

“Wait until we get there,” Aegis said. “Then, we can talk.”

Minato nodded, and said nothing else. The sound of the subway tracks rattling echoed in his ears.

Aegis grabbed his hands. “I’m not upset, I promise.”

She hadn’t been this perceptive before, had she?

At the next stop, she tugged him to his feet. “We’re here,” she said, leading him out of the subway and down yet another maze of streets.

Minato followed, still confused.

And then, they were in front of Shujin Academy.

“Aegis?” Minato asked.

“Do you need me to boost you over the fence?” Aegis asked.

“Boost me over--are we breaking in?” Minato asked.

“We aren’t planning to break or steal anything,” Aegis said. “If someone catches us, we’ll call Mitsuru.”

“We--what?”

“She knows about this,” Aegis said. “She’s gotten me out of trouble before.”

“Wait, does that mean you’ve broken into this place more than once?” Minato asked.

“Not Shujin,” Aegis said. “It’s just the closest school.” She seemed to think this was a clarifying statement, but Minato didn’t particularly agree.

“Aegis…”

“If you really don’t want to go in, we won’t,” Aegis said. “But I think it will be good for you. And it’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while.”

Minato was beginning to think he just didn’t know Aegis at all anymore. But she was giving him that expectant look, the one that wasn’t quite pleading but was as close as she’d let herself get to it, and he was still bad at telling her “no.”

“Yeah, I’ll need a boost,” he conceded.

Aegis smiled and knelt down with her hands cupped in front of her. Minato stepped into them, and Aegis rose to her feet with almost no effort. MInato grabbed onto the fence and tried to remember everything he’d learned about freeclimbing during the Dark Hour. In the end, he needed help from Aegis to get all the way to the top, but he did at least nail the dismount, hitting the ground with a loose roll that even Akihiko probably would’ve praised.

Aegis herself simply leapt down from the top of the fence, not bothering with a roll or even with distributing her weight. At least she hadn’t cracked the concrete under her shoes.

He followed her as she circled the building, occasionally pulling him into a bush or giving a specific wall a wide berth, until they came to an emergency exit that had been propped open. Aegis slipped through, then gestured for Minato to follow.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“Trust me,” she said.

Well, Minato could hardly say no to that.

As soon as he followed her in, she made a beeline for the nearest staircase. Minato kept expecting her to stop on a specific floor, but she kept climbing until they reached the door that led to the roof. Someone had propped it open, too.

“Bad security here,” Minato said.

“No, Ryuuji did this for me,” Aegis said. 

“How long have you been planning this?” Minato asked.

“A long time,” Aegis said, as they walked out onto the roof.

The evening air was crisp, and the fading sunlight cast long shadows across the roof.

It was surprisingly nostalgic, all told. How many afternoons and evenings had they passed on the roof of Gekkoukan High? It had been as much their place as the dorms were. 

Aegis must’ve seen something on his face, because she squeezed his hand and said, “Thank you for coming.”

“So, it’s Friday night, and we’re on the roof of a school neither of us attend,” Minato said. “What’s the plan?”

“You’re going to take a nap,” Aegis said. “On my lap. And then you’re going to wake up afterward.”

Well.

Minato had no idea what to say to that.

He barely remembered that last morning on the roof. What he could recall was blurred with exhaustion, a vague cluster of warm sunlight and the sounds of his friends’ voices and a faint sense of satisfaction that he’d made it.

But it was different for the others, wasn’t it? For the seniors, that would’ve been their last memory of the school roof. Even the other underclassmen…had they gone up there again, or had they avoided it?

He hadn’t meant to sour those memories. He hadn’t wanted to hurt them. But like always, he’d been thoughtless, too caught in his own head to see how his actions were hurting others--

“Stop,” Aegis said. “You’re obsessing and coming to the wrong conclusions again. You always used to do that.”

“I didn’t mean to--” Minato started.

“I know,” Aegis said. “But ever since Elizabeth said she was going to try to free you from the door, I’ve been planning this. When she got you out, we were going to find a school roof and you were going to have a nice, normal nap. Maybe it was a silly dream, but…”

“That doesn’t sound silly,” Minato said.

“Visiting the roof always made me feel a little closer to you,” Aegis said. “We spent so much time up there together. We became teammates the moment we met, but to me, the roof is where we became comrades.”

“Yeah,” Minato said.

“I know I’ve changed since you last knew me,” Aegis said. “But when we first spoke on the roof, we barely knew each other at all. Isn’t this easier?”

“Well, if you look at it that way…” Minato began.

Aegis squeezed his hand again. “I’ll tell you as much as I can, about what you’ve missed. And you can tell me about LeBlanc.”

“Okay,” Minato said.

Aegis sat down next to the fence surrounding the edges of the roof, smoothing her skirt across her lap. “Here,” she gestured.

“Are you sure this is…okay?” Minato said.

“It was okay before, why wouldn’t it be now?”

“I’m awake,” Minato said. “And I think you understand more about human…intimacy, now.”

“Yes,” Aegis said. “This is something that only people who are close do. And we were close. We are close, or at least I’d like us to be.”

Minato couldn’t argue with that. He laid down, the cement cold and rough even through his hoodie. He propped his head up on Aegis’s lap. Her legs were metal, and it should have been uncomfortable, but the humming warmth of her circuits was comfortable and familiar.

Aegis ran a hand through his hair. “You need a haircut,” she said.

“A little,” Minato agreed. “It’s starting to get in the way at work. Boss says I’ll need to wear a ponytail if I grow it out much more.”

“Do you want to wear a ponytail?” Aegis asked.

“I…don’t know?” Minato said. “I’ve never had my hair much longer than this.”

“Maybe you should try it,” she suggested. “I think it would look nice on you.”

She kept running her hand through his hair, and despite himself, Minato felt the pull of the exhaustion that constantly lingered at the edge of his mind nowadays. 

“Don’t let me sleep long,” Minato said.

“I wont,” Aegis said softly.

your shadow at morning striding behind you

Odagiri Hidetoshi knew who the Phantom Thieves of Hearts were. He wasn’t about to tell anyone, not even the Thieves themselves, but it had been pretty obvious from the start.

At least, to someone who’d gone to Gekkoukan High during the Apathy Syndrome incidents.

To this day, he didn’t know exactly what Arisato’s afterschool club had been doing. But they weren’t as subtle as they thought they were. When they walked through the hallways, they moved in an unconscious formation--Arisato always at the head, usually flanked by Takeba and Iori, while Kirijou or Sanada deliberately placed themselves in the back and Yamagishi usually ended up in the middle. They showed up to school with weird injuries--not just bruises and scrapes, but patches of shiny red skin that looked like acid scarring or electricity burns--and then lied to the teachers about where they were from. When they were scolded for being late or forgetting homework, they didn’t act guilty or regretful, but rather like the scolding was a trial they had to endure in the service of some higher purpose. One time, an entire arrow fell out of Takeba’s schoolbag and all of her friends acted like that was a normal thing for her to be carrying around with her textbooks.

Kurusu and his friends were the same way. Takamaki and Sakamoto took Takeba and Iori’s positions in their little formation, while Nijima usually brought up the rear. You could see them scanning the hallways for threats, and if anyone bumped into one of them, the entire group went on the defensive until it had been established that the offending student wasn’t going to make problems. All of them wore makeup all of the time, even the boys. Once, when asked where her homework was, Takamaki had asked point-blank whether it actually mattered and hadn’t even looked that upset at the resulting detention. Under other circumstances, maybe Hidetoshi could’ve brushed the rest of this off, but he’d also seen Kurusu making homemade lockpicks in the cafeteria once.

So Kurusu’s arrest hadn’t exactly come as a shock.

None of the Thieves were actually Hidetoshi's students; he'd been hired to teach first-year math when they were all in second or third year already. But whether they realized it or not, the other kids looked to them. It wasn't so much admiration as using them for an early warning system. If Kurusu and friends started acting weird, the whole student body started bracing themselves.

As it turned out, this was still true even after Kurusu transferred out. Two weeks out from summer vacation, Takamaki and Sakamoto were spending disproportionate amounts of time whispering (or failing to whisper) in corners, while the anxiety levels of the rest of the student body ratcheted higher and higher. Mishima, the head of the Thieves' fanclub, could frequently be seen in the halls, talking quickly and making placating motions.

Hidetoshi didn't want to get involved. He had only the faintest outline of what had actually happened with the Thieves after Kamoshida, and he liked it that way. The less he knew, the less he could tell anyone who asked. Particularly police officers.

Over the years, a fair bit of Hidetoshi's anger at the person who framed his father had shifted in the direction of the cops who fell for it. Under other circumstances, he probably would have been a supporter of the Phantom Thieves. Given what he knew, though, it was hard to be comfortable with a bunch of teens welding that kind of power.

But it wasn't his business and he wasn't getting involved. 

Well, that’s what he’d told himself.

But it was hard to pretend he knew nothing when he’d just caught Sakamoto in the middle of helping Takamaki climb over the school fence, at least an hour after the last of the practices and clubs had wrapped up for the night. Even most of the teachers were gone; he was only still here because he was behind on grading.

Takamaki hung off of the fence, apparently unconcerned about being caught in the midst of an illegal act. Sakamoto was already on the ground, and his stance said he was ready to fistfight Hidetoshi if necessary.

Hidetoshi sighed.

“I’m not going to call the police, but I am going to escort you back outside,” he told them.

Takamaki jumped down from the fence, landing next to Sakamoto.

“Sir, this is important,” she said, adjusting her hoodie.

Hidetoshi was inclined to believe her, but he also couldn’t let her wander the school after hours unsupervised. He sighed again. So much for getting home anytime soon.

“I can take you inside,” he said. “But if you leave my sight, I’ll have to give you a detention.”

“Are you kidding?” Sakamoto demanded.

Takamaki elbowed him in the side. “Shut up, Ryuuji,” she hissed, before telling Hidetoshi, “We won’t leave your sight.”

“But Kirijou said--” Sakamoto started.

“Kirijou Mitsuru?” Hidetoshi asked.

Takamaki physically covered Sakamoto’s mouth and said nothing herself.

“The two of us went to school together, you know,” Hidetoshi said carefully.

For all the comparisons he’d made, he’d never thought that the Thieves and Arisato’s group of friends had anything to do with each other. He was now fairly sure that had been a mistake.

“You did?” Takamaki asked, surprised enough that her hand dropped away from Sakamoto’s mouth.

“Wait, are you the same age?” Ryuuji asked.

“You can’t just ask someone that!” Takamaki scolded.

“It’s all right, I know she’s aged better,” Hidetoshi said, a little confused but willing to go with it. “Believe it or not, I’m a little younger. But I spent most of high school being asked when I’d graduated college.”

“Lucky,” Ryuuji grumbled.

He does have a bit of a babyface, despite the punk aesthetic, Hidetoshi reflected. Aloud, he asked, “Where do you two need to go?”

“Uh,” Ryuuji started.

“The roof,” Takamaki said. 

“Ann,” Ryuuji said. “If he knows Mitsuru, he probably knows those two.”

That meant nothing to Hidetoshi, but it clearly meant something to Takamaki, who looked almost embarrassed. 

“That’s…not ideal,” she said.

“Any chance you’d let us go alone?” Ryuuji said. “I swear we’re not up to anything, this is just going to get real complicated real fast.”

Hidetoshi sucked in a breath. “I apologize for being blunt here, but given the events of last year, I absolutely cannot allow you two to go up on the school roof unsupervised.”

Sakamoto winced, but Takamaki’s careful non-reaction was almost worse. 

“Again, apologies, but I really do have to come,” he said.

“Just remember, you asked for this,” Ann all but spat as she headed for the front doors.

“Uh, I’d suggest avoiding her for the next…forever, dude,” Ryuuji said.

“Please don’t call me dude,” Hidetoshi said.

“Right, whoops,” Ryuuji said, wincing. “You should probably unlock the door before she decides to kick it down.”

Hidetoshi didn’t think he was joking.

They walked the halls in silence, Ann took the lead, with Ryuuji following a few steps behind Hidetoshi. He knew he was being surrounded, and while he didn’t quite care for it, he could hardly fault either of them for distrusting a teacher.

Hidetoshi had his school ID ready, but every door they needed to pass through was conveniently propped open. Clearly, this excursion had been planned. He was still debating with himself about whether he ought to suggest to the principal that perhaps the school’s security was lacking when Ann opened the door to the roof.

Hidetoshi took in the scene in front of him and concluded that he was having some kind of hallucination.

He hadn’t been among the people who’d found Arisato on graduation day, but he’d overheard Takeba and Iori talking about it. The scene they’d described was nearly identical to the one before him--Minato, asleep, in Aegis’s lap on the school roof. 

Except, now that he was paying attention, the details were off. Aegis was wearing a black-and-white dress, while Minato was wearing a blue sweatshirt and jeans.

“Hey!” Sakamoto called, and Aegis reacted.

Because she was actually there, somehow.

Hidetoshi needed to sit down.

“I told you not to interrupt us unless it was a matter of life and death,” Aegis said.

“Haha, about that,” Sakamoto said.

“Some IT bigwig hacked the Kirijou Foundation,” Takamaki said. “It might turn out to be nothing, but some of the information he got was pretty sensitive. Kirijou called an all-hands meeting.”

Arisato grumbled and stirred in his sleep.

“Wake up, Leader,” Aegis said. “Time to save the world again.”

Arisato grumbled louder and then deliberately pressed his face into Aegis’s skirt.

“I didn’t realize you two were dating,” Takamaki said.

“We aren’t,” Aegis said.

“Aegis?” Hidetoshi asked.

He could feel Takamaki and Sakamoto watching him, but Aegis just met his eyes calmly.

“Odagiri Hidetoshi,” she said.

“Yes,” Hidetoshi said, a little surprised that she remembered him.

“You’re a teacher,” she said. “Minato always thought you’d be good at it.” She shook Arisato’s shoulder lightly. “Wake up, your friend is here.”

“Wha--” Minato started.

“Did you fake his death?” HIdetoshi managed.

Minato shot up, nearly hitting his head on Aegis’s chin. “Hidetoshi?”

“We didn’t,” Aegis said.

“Uh, so, Mr. Odagiri, how do you feel about the supernatural?” Sakamoto started.

“I don’t like it?” Hidetoshi said.

“But do you think it’s real?” Sakamoto pressed.

“Well, if Arisato’s death wasn’t faked, I guess I don’t have much of a choice,” Hidetoshi said. “It would also explain why everyone who had Apathy Syndrome woke up at the same time.”

“He did that,” Aegis said.

“She helped,” Arisato said. “Everyone helped.” He looked Hidetoshi over. “You’re a teacher? I thought you’d be good at it.”

“That’s what I told him,” Aegis said. 

“You’re…still the same age as my students,” Hidetoshi managed. He felt a little dizzy with the new information.

“Yeah, I was in the afterlife,” MInato said. “Kind of. Apparently I didn’t age there?”

“I’m not human,” Aegis offered.

Hidetoshi made a decision. “I don’t think I want to know anything else.”

Minato nodded, then got to his feet. “So, the meeting?”

“We’re all video-calling in from LeBlanc.” Takamaki said. “We’ve got a half-hour to get back, so we should make it if we hurry.”

Minato looked at Hidetoshi, conflicted. 

“I’ll still be here after you do…whatever it is you all do,” Hidetoshi said.

Sakamoto opened his mouth.

“Do not tell me what you do,” he said. “I don’t want to know. If a police officer asks me about this, I want to be able to honestly say that I have no idea what’s going on. Are we clear, Sakamoto?”

Sakamoto looked confused by this stance.

“I told you, some people really don’t want to know this kind of thing,” Takamaki said.

“Weird,” Sakamoto said.

Hidetoshi was going to need so much time to process this. He was going to find his college friends and get drunk about it, probably, and he might even end up crying on Arisato at some point.

But clearly whatever was going on was serious. It was the sort of thing that had taught his friends and later the Phantom Thieves to walk around a school like it was a battleground. So he’d give that priority, at least for now.

But he was getting Arisato’s number before they all left.