[open/intro]

[fireandfaith]

Ann knows this place.

This shade of blue, and the song...though its notes flow far more harmoniously than they had the last (and only) time she'd heard them, the melody itself is enough to make Ann's heartbeat kick up a notch. That song only plays in the Velvet Room--and the Velvet Room is not a place she wants to be. Lavenza had said it. Her gut had said it--and Elizabeth had confirmed it. The Velvet Room was in the control of Yaldabaoth, wearing the skin of Igor.

Ann had never met Igor, personally, but both Akira in the previous timeline and the Attendants she'd encountered had painted a vivid picture of him. Taking in her surroundings carefully (this Room matched neither the descriptions of a prison Akira had once given her, or the crumbling ruins Lavenza had pulled her into at the End of a World), Ann eyes the man she can only assume is Yaldabaoth. And, even if it is truly Igor...

She's never met the man, and she doesn't trust anything he has to say to her. She might not be garbed in her will of rebellion, currently, but Célestine is always with her, and steeling her spine with a little of her flame, Carmine stands tall and proud.

Ann takes in the doors. Makes a split second decision that she shouldn't just be rushing into making a decision; Lavenza, and Elizabeth, she trusts--and she's heard Elizabeth describe their siblings enough that she feels as though she can trust them too. She'll poke around in this unfamiliar Velvet Room for now, and see if she can't encounter one of them...or at least someone who can tell her what's going on.

[OOC: check out Ann's AU info and perms here!]

Comments

[fireandfaith]

"Not the way you would expect me to be?" Ann parrots his words back to him, gaze sharpening to a glare. "And just how would you expect me to be?"

(She doesn't like the way his words implies that he knows things--about the Velvet Room, but mostly? About her.)

[reluctantprince]

"I expected you to be more confused. You seem familiar with the concept of the velvet room." He looked her over, she was different than his own.

"I guess I should have been expecting it, different universes and such." He sighed. He narrowed his eyes, something was strange about her. He couldn't quite place it.

[fireandfaith]

"I've only been to the Velvet Room once, myself," Ann says, "but even before then Akira had told us about it."

She crosses her arms. "Different universes, huh? Must be. It's funny, because I wouldn't have expected you to know about the Velvet Room either." As far as she's aware, neither the Akechi of the original timeline or the Goro she knows now knew of the space, or the services it offered. She hasn't even introduced him to Liz yet, not sure that she can trust him with that sort of power.

[reluctantprince]

"That's what happens when you sell your soul to the devil." He shrugged. Did he know exactly what he did... no. He didn't have that memory. He just knew he struck some sort of deal.

"I use the velvet room often enough, mostly to fuse personas." Evas had shown him as such. Ann was about as stand offish as he'd guess. She wasn't exactly happy with him in the previous timeline. He hadn't recruited her yet either. He wanted the thieves to form and she was pretty critical to that.

[fireandfaith]

"Interesting," Ann says. "You did make a deal, then." Or a contract, even--Ann is aware, from conversations with her Attendants, that a contract usually is what seals the deal. The relationship she has with Lavenza and Elizabeth is far less formal; simple deals made with no signing of a name. Just a mutual understanding that she was going to Try Her Best.

"I've never actually fused a persona, myself." Or recruited one--she's vaguely aware, now, that thanks to Elizabeth loaning Ann her 'Wildcard' that she has the ability to do so, and it would be the smartest move to make because Célestine and her fire can't cover all bases...but it doesn't feel like something Ann Takamaki should be capable of. It doesn't come naturally to her, like it must have for Akira.

[reluctantprince]

"Yes, I guess I did." He sighed. He tilted his head as she spoke. "You haven't fused? Well, it certainly an experience." A strange one at that. It wasn't something he enjoyed doing, but the power boosts and extra coverage on damage was certainly helpful.

"I advise it, but make sure you have enough personas to cover it. You use two or more to get one outcome. It's good to have your pockets full of them." He only fused when he ran out of room, it landed him in some weird times and weird combinations.

[fireandfaith]

"I intend to...eventually," Ann hedges. It's not untrue. She's well aware that she's going to have to do so, at some point, just to give her a fighting chance in the most difficult Palaces. She and Goro together aren't enough to make a dent in Shido's cognitive stronghold just yet--and she fully intends to see it crumble before the Thieves can so much as turn their attention to the mere idea of taking him on.

It's just...a little weird. To think of more than one Persona being a part of her, when it's Célestine that fills her up, like oxygen in her lungs, entwined so deeply with her and so vital that she can't imagine there being room for anyone else.

And then, reluctantly curious: "What was your first Persona fusion?"

(She wonders if he sacrificed either Loki or Robin Hood. Akira had wept, when he'd finally traded Arsene--had been red-eyed and sleepless with guilt and grief for days. Ann, herself, cannot imagine fusing Célestine...she's curious as to where Akechi would fall on that scale.

She's not going to ask, though. That seems...a little private, for a first encounter.)

[reluctantprince]

She seemed to have a lot of feelings towards this. Ann always was a bit more than him, she expressed it a lot more freely than he even felt he was allowed to, which was only amplified now. He needed to be more reserved.

"Pixie and jack frost." He shrugged, Hereward had followed him and that was the one thing he wouldn't let go of. He couldn't it was the silent reminder of the past that once was. The relationships that once were to never happen again. He couldn't allow them. That must have been the underlying ask. "You don't have to trade away your persona, you can keep them around for as long as you wish."

[fireandfaith]

Ann nods slowly. Those were Personas on the weaker end; Akira had recruited them both inside Kamoshida's Palace in the original timeline, before Ann had ever even awakened to Carmen.

"That's good," she replies softly. "I don't think I could ever trade Célestine away." Not after all she went through to reach her. They've been through hell together (metaphorically) and come out swinging (sometimes literally).

[reluctantprince]

Célestine, that wasn't what he thought she had. Good for her. He chucked. "I don't blame you. Hereward came with me when I lost everyone which is why I refuse to lose him. Even if his powers become... less than useful." He wasn't sure it would.

[fireandfaith]

"Hereward," Ann muses, thoughtful. "That's a new name--I only know about Robin Hood and Loki." But, she supposes, if she could gain a third Persona, there's no reason that Akechi couldn't...

"But if he came to you in a manner similar to Célestine did for me...yeah. I get that." Both Carmen and Hecate had meant the world to her...but they also felt startlingly distant from who she is now. The Ann that awoke to Carmen in Kamoshida's Palace is basically a stranger to the Ann that awoke Célestine, screaming, in the depths of Mementos. A guiding light to let her know she's on the right path. "It's not a bad thing, to keep something around even if you don't use it as much as you used to."

[reluctantprince]

His breath hitches just for a moment about Loki and Robin hood. He then narrows his eyes. "You haven't used the velvet room, yet you know about Loki and Robin hood." He had his guards up again. The guards that came back oh so easily, comfortable. They only learned about Loki after he betrayed them. Hereward was a Maruki special, so he didn't expect her to know that.

What could that mean, how he came to him, was a stupid thing left over from Akira. Shit, why did everything come down to him.

[fireandfaith]

"Well, my Akechi has used the both of them to fight me, haha," Ann laughs, a little nervous. "But I did sort of already know about them before he ambushed me...I'm on my second run of 2016, I guess? Things went...badly, in the end, and I went back to try and fix them."

[reluctantprince]

He just watched her. He felt a swell of emotions. "You too?" He felt his chest tighten, and he had to blink back the tears that threatened him. Someone else who went back. Someone else who might have those memories.

[fireandfaith]

"Wait--too?" Ann stares, for just a minute, a little overwhelmed. Lavenza had said she'd been the only one to answer her call, and her original Goro Akechi had been long dead by the time she'd been sent back...so they're not from the same original timeline.

Still. That there might be someone who understands in at least some form is enough to have her sniffling. "Yeah," she manages. "I got sent from late December all the way back to April 1st."

[reluctantprince]

He took a deep breath, trying to keep his emotions at bay. "February 3rd to April 1st." They went back to the same date, despite being from different times. He closed his eyes, he really needed to get himself under wraps. He shouldn't be this emotional. "We fought Maruki and exited, except I woke up in April. I had fallen asleep next to Akira."

[fireandfaith]

"Ah," Ann says, a little choked up. "April Fools for you too, huh? Must be some sort of multiversal joke." She looks down at her hands, and takes in a deep breath. "We never fought Maruki," she says. "Actually, I never even met the guy in the original timeline, and I've barely interacted with him in this one...it wasn't until coming here that I learned he's apparently dangerous? So that's something I'm going to have to investigate when I get home, but...for us, it was the Holy Grail. Things went bad, and Akira...he..."

It's hard to get the words out. She can't get the words out. "Well. Lavenza thought that things shouldn't end like that. She couldn't reach Akira, so she called out to his bonds instead, and got...me. She used the last of her power to send me back."

[reluctantprince]

"It certainly is a cruel joke." He laughed. The Holy Grail, that's a lot. "Shoot him. Don't even give him the time of day. He'll get in your head and make you act like a damn puppet." his voice had turned into a hiss.

"Lavenza sounds familiar, is she your attendant?" That name rang a bell, he wasn't sure he knew where he heard it before.

[fireandfaith]

"Ah--yes and no, I guess?" Ann says. "She was Akira's, but Yaldabaoth tore her in two, into twins--Caroline and Justine? In my original timeline, she was only rejoined into herself shortly before...it all ended." She says that last part on a whisper, like it's too painful to say it aloud at normal volume. "Since in my current timeline, she's still split and the Velvet Room is still under Yaldabaoth's control...I haven't been able to contact her. Recently though, I've met one of her older sisters who has agreed to help me; Elizabeth?"

(She frowns but does not protest the advice he gives in regards to Maruki. She's already killed Kamoshida...what's one more life, if it's to protect her friends?)

[reluctantprince]

No protest to killing, good for her. "Oh wow, that complicated. Mine is Evas. I couldn't tell you where she falls." Yaldabaoth always made him more prickly, like a displeased cat. He just really hated the name. He really hoped that wasn't who brought the deal upon him.

[fireandfaith]

"I don't think I've heard that name before," Ann says; Elizabeth has mentioned a Margaret and a Theodore, but that's all. But if her time here so far has taught her anything, it's that apparently there's just...a lot of worlds out there. And they're all wildly different.

[reluctantprince]

He nodded, "That wouldn't shock me. We have another velvet room attendant around here, Renee. She shocked me, but you'll learn there's plenty of us." He gave her a relaxed smile. "Who all do you have on your team? I assume you aren't with your phantom thieves since your version of me attacked you."

[fireandfaith]

"Right now, it's basically just me," Ann says. "My Goro and I have a sort of tentative"--and deeply uncomfortable--"ally thing going on right now, but I'm not quite sure how that's going to pan out." Her using their encounter in Mementos as an excuse to confront him in real life, claiming she wasn't so blind as to miss it was the Detective Prince behind Loki's mask...the Goro Akechi of her current timeline is warier of her than she think anyone else has ever been. It's kind of funny, in a sad way. "When it comes to the Thieves...well, I'm not one of them, this go around, for a few reasons, and the team itself...it's different, too."

She shrugs. "There's Akira--he's going by Shadow, now, not Joker--and Ryuji; he's still Skull. Yusuke's still a member, but he joined up after someone new to this timeline--Ember. Kasumi Yoshizawa. Futaba isn't a Thief, and...I don't know where Morgana is." Both Makoto and Haru, as far as Ann knows, have yet to get involved in Persona business at all.

[reluctantprince]

That's a lot of changes, though his timeline would probably also change. "I see, I'm not very far into knowing what changes for me. I know I got the velvet room, and I discovered another diet member had a palace so I was going through that. Seems they have loads of them, good for getting stronger I guess." He shrugged.

Then he blinked, "You didn't have Sumi before?" He couldn't bring himself to call her Kasumi, so the nickname worked fine for now. "That's why Maruki must be new to you."

[fireandfaith]

Ann mouths the name Sumi to herself, a little unable to believe that Goro Akechi is somehow so familiar with this girl?

"I've heard a bit about Dr Maruki, since coming here..." she says. "It's a little hard to believe it all, to be honest. I've only met him once, but he seemed so normal, you know?"

She nods to herself at what Goro says about his own timeline. "Sounds like you're making changes, though!" She says. "The bigger changes always come from the smaller ones, too."