[. . . Akira gives himself a bit of time to come to terms with the news, to pull himself together so he doesn't crumble on anyone else as he makes his rounds to check on people. he finds Ken in the chapel, which is not much of a surprise considering that Ken had spent some time in there thinking about his mother]
[he knocks on the door to announce his presents, although the clunk of his prosthetic foot serves as an announcement enough]
[ post body announcement and post group two getting crawling out of the other room because there's no way that ken skipped out on that. sadly. that also said, it's probably a good thing that it takes a while for them to cross paths given. well.
he now has a severed arm chillin in his room and probably punched ayabe while he was still hurt. IT'S FINE??? no it isn't. ]
...oh. Hello Kurusu-san.
[ his usual greeting except with far less, if any, life in it. there are a lot emotions right now...mostly anger. ]
[W. WHY DOES KEN HAVE A SEVERED ARM CHILLING IN HIS ROOM???]
Hey.
[Akira understands. he doesn't know how close Phoenix and Ken were, exactly, but. . . he felt the pain streak through him the moment the announcement was made as well. Phoenix's loss is going to hurt]
[carefully, Akira limps over to where Ken is sitting and takes a seat right next to him]
but when akira hobbles over, ken will definitely make sure that there's ample of space for him to get cozy...despite him being in the smallest space he can be. ]
I'm not sure.
[ it seems like he wants to say more but the words just...kind of fail him. ]
I haven't felt like this in a long time.
[ ken you're eleven, what is a long time for you. ]
[honestly, Akira accepts that response, because even if Ken is eleven he has been through so much. he hates that the response is "a long time" and not "ever," though. Ken needs to stop losing people he cares about??]
[ what if people actually lived instead of dying. but ken will struggle to find the words he wants to say right away and instead settle for something that's sort of a middle ground.
ish. he'll try to make it sound as "happy" as anyone possibly could half believe. he's done this before. ]
He asked me that when this was over if I wanted to come live with him and his daughter when he found out that my mom was dead.
[ there's a weak laugh and ken will shake his head and the forced cheerfulness drops from his voice. he's trying to sound as he normally does, but it's not quite right. ]
His daughter sounded nice—she seemed nice. [ they had a cute memory share. well, phoenix gave him a cute memory. ] But I wouldn't know how something like that would happen.
Would we even get the choice to choose where we return to?
[ it's so much easier to talk about blue then to let himself grieve, okay? ]
Not too much. I asked them about the game we were playing and what we could do to win. [ here's a small smile, for real this time. ] I mainly wanted to understand them and see what kind of person they were.
[ they'll grieve when... they...grieve???? which is??? ]
I promised to come back and make origami with them.
[ that makes ken feel a little better too. ]
But they did. They told me we have to separate them from the house if we want to be free. Everyone. If we can find out where the house's source is and separate it from Blue—we'll win.
[yeah, that sounds about right with what Akira learned, both from Blue and Phoenix, as well. and vaguely. . . he wonders if Phoenix's source of information was Ken]
[his mouth twitches]
"Access to the source is available for those who seek it out."
. . . yeah. I've been thinking about that for a while now, actually. Especially since the room flashed red under Ash's Third Eye.
[the pieces are slowly starting to come together. . . Akira feels like they're in the home stretch, but-- even so, they still have a trial to go through this weekend, and that part sucks]
Blue mentions that the heart of the matter was what was most important to me, too. I wonder. . .
. . . is that room connected to the house's heart?
But we've been able to use it without certain things coming back for us. [ just. gonna touch his neck and eye akira's leg. ] Not to mention, there's still one more floor left, isn't there?
[ but blue was snatched up on the fifth floor which is what's confusing him. what's on the sixth floor?? ]
In the note that Phoe— [ he'll stumble for a bit and NOPE. NO CRYING. HE'S A BIG BOY. ] ...that Phoenix found, it was clearly what all that Blue had tried before.
If we want to separate Blue from the house, we can't do it using conventional means. There's some way to separate the two of them that Blue was also trying to figure out.
though speaking of notes and losing it—ken will slam his fist extremely hard against the walling behind him before replying. replying? shouting? shouting. ]
Absolutely not! We're not letting Blue do that! After everything they—
[ ah.
here's an outburst that's totally uncharacteristic of ken's normal behavior. or, well, how he's been acting. just everything building and building...sometimes it just get to be too much. ]
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w4, friday post-body announcement
[he knocks on the door to announce his presents, although the clunk of his prosthetic foot serves as an announcement enough]
. . . Ken?
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he now has a severed arm chillin in his room and probably punched ayabe while he was still hurt. IT'S FINE??? no it isn't. ]
...oh. Hello Kurusu-san.
[ his usual greeting except with far less, if any, life in it. there are a lot emotions right now...mostly anger. ]
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Hey.
[Akira understands. he doesn't know how close Phoenix and Ken were, exactly, but. . . he felt the pain streak through him the moment the announcement was made as well. Phoenix's loss is going to hurt]
[carefully, Akira limps over to where Ken is sitting and takes a seat right next to him]
How are you holding up?
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but when akira hobbles over, ken will definitely make sure that there's ample of space for him to get cozy...despite him being in the smallest space he can be. ]
I'm not sure.
[ it seems like he wants to say more but the words just...kind of fail him. ]
I haven't felt like this in a long time.
[ ken you're eleven, what is a long time for you. ]
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Were you and Nick close?
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ish. he'll try to make it sound as "happy" as anyone possibly could half believe. he's done this before. ]
He asked me that when this was over if I wanted to come live with him and his daughter when he found out that my mom was dead.
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[that sure does answer Akira's question, doesn't it?]
Oh, Ken.
[god. Nick was such a good guy, wasn't he. . .? good to Akira, good to Akechi, good to Ken. . . good to so many people]
[his heart twists. but he has to remain strong, doesn't he?]
Were you going to take him up on that offer?
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[ there's a weak laugh and ken will shake his head and the forced cheerfulness drops from his voice. he's trying to sound as he normally does, but it's not quite right. ]
His daughter sounded nice—she seemed nice. [ they had a cute memory share. well, phoenix gave him a cute memory. ] But I wouldn't know how something like that would happen.
Would we even get the choice to choose where we return to?
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She did seem very nice. I got to see the memory of when he decided to adopt her.
[and while it was bittersweet because Phoenix lost his attorney's badge in the same memory. . . it was also very heartwarming]
And who knows? There's always the chance we could, right?
Maybe that's a question to ask Blue.
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I saw the same one, then.
[ though as the subject of blue comes up—he'll turn dead serious. ]
I've met Blue, Kurusu-san. After we spoke—they wrote me back and then I went to meet them.
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Ah. . . yeah. I met with them on Thursday. Akechi got to talk to them in person after our meeting, too.
What did they say?
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Not too much. I asked them about the game we were playing and what we could do to win. [ here's a small smile, for real this time. ] I mainly wanted to understand them and see what kind of person they were.
[ he may or may not have befriended blue. ]
What did you talk about?
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I asked them what their favorite food was. The answer was peeps chili.
[his mouth twitches at that]
But I also asked them how to stop the vicious cycle the house is perpetuating. Did Blue mention anything about a "source?"
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I promised to come back and make origami with them.
[ that makes ken feel a little better too. ]
But they did. They told me we have to separate them from the house if we want to be free. Everyone. If we can find out where the house's source is and separate it from Blue—we'll win.
[ his brows furrow and he bites his bottom lip. ]
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[his mouth twitches]
"Access to the source is available for those who seek it out."
That's what Blue told me, when I asked about it.
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[ or would that be too easy? except there was that note that phoenix found...that ken also copied almost immediately. ]
Blue's last hint for me was, "things that are close to the heart will help the separation".
[ sadly, ken does not look very thrilled despite them putting more things together... ]
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[the pieces are slowly starting to come together. . . Akira feels like they're in the home stretch, but-- even so, they still have a trial to go through this weekend, and that part sucks]
Blue mentions that the heart of the matter was what was most important to me, too. I wonder. . .
. . . is that room connected to the house's heart?
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[ but blue was snatched up on the fifth floor which is what's confusing him. what's on the sixth floor?? ]
In the note that Phoe— [ he'll stumble for a bit and NOPE. NO CRYING. HE'S A BIG BOY. ] ...that Phoenix found, it was clearly what all that Blue had tried before.
[ ken presents his version of the note. ]
If we want to separate Blue from the house, we can't do it using conventional means. There's some way to separate the two of them that Blue was also trying to figure out.
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[well, the first thing Akira says is--]
Nobody had better try that last resort method.
[the staff are not the only ones who would be Very Unhappy, that's for sure]
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though speaking of notes and losing it—ken will slam his fist extremely hard against the walling behind him before replying. replying? shouting? shouting. ]
Absolutely not! We're not letting Blue do that! After everything they—
[ ah.
here's an outburst that's totally uncharacteristic of ken's normal behavior. or, well, how he's been acting. just everything building and building...sometimes it just get to be too much. ]
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[Akira doesn't jump when Ken slams his fist against the wall, but he does reach out to place his hand on his fellow Persona-user's shoulder]
We won't let it happen.
If you and I need to protect them, then we will.