all your mother's weaves and your father's threads

[flightpen]

Ren hasn't seen the Velvet Room in a while.

There was at time when he was in here every week, fusing Personas to Caroline's acerbic commentary or listening to Yaldabaoth mutter ominous words of praise. It was different in January, like a lot of things, but the point is that it's gone now. He's not even sure Lavenza and Igor survived what happened.

And yet here he is, in what's recognizably the Velvet Room. But it's changed. It's not a prison anymore, even though this would be the best time for it; Ren's heart is in chains. What was it Akechi said to him? Your heart is free. Maybe back then.

Never mind that. Igor, if it is Igor, is unforthcoming. Make bonds—as if Ren can make bonds when people can't even have a meaningful conversation. He'll be returned to the moment he left—as if he wants to go there. His friends are happy, Akechi is alive, and Ren, like Maruki himself, stands outside the world. When he tries to press, Igor gets cryptic and nonsensical, and that's so fucking familiar lately that Ren doesn't bother to keep trying.

You might find him in the following situations:


1: the rockrose and the thistle will whistle as you moan

Maruki has left him alone, mostly. God's favorite. As far as Ren can figure, it's because he knows perfectly damn well that Ren finds his reality repulsive, and he wants Ren to accept it on his own. The implication there is that Maruki also knows deep down that people aren't themselves once he changes their cognition, but that's not a surprise. Maruki talks a big game, but on some level he must know what he's doing. Surely.

Anyway, like we were saying, he's left Ren mostly alone. But he loses time, comes back to himself with the coffee cold or the sun at a different angle or an awful TV show at the end of its saccharine episode. And although he never remembers feeling what preceded it, he knows. Too much despair, too much bleak hopelessness, and Maruki turns him off like a lightbulb until it's gone again. Can't accept the new world if he's too depressed. The stupid self-defeating hypocrisy of it is annoying as hell—is he meant to accept the new reality of his own accord or isn't he? But there was a time when it would've pissed him off a lot more.

He stands in front of Igor's desk, in a place he doesn't recognize, unsure where he is or what's going to happen to him, or where his friends are, or whether this is a new stage of Maruki's reality or something entirely different, and despair swallows him whole. He waits to be shut down.

And waits. And waits, saturated in misery like he hasn't in weeks. For a split second he almost finds himself grateful to Maruki for taking it away, but he flinches back from going down that road. Like this, frozen, waiting to blink and find that his legs hurt from standing too long, he's barely aware of his surroundings.


2: all the pins inside your fretted head and your muttered whens and hows

Having pulled himself together (and not lost any time, as far as he can tell?), Ren decides that the obvious first stop is the conspicuous board that stands in the strange Velvet Room. It doesn't look... Velvet Room-y. It looks like it was brought in from outside, and as he scans its bizarre contents, he realizes he's right.

The business about Akechis and Rens being fated to be together makes him feel a little sick, so he skims it quickly and moves on. Demons, vampires, okay, that's... he'll deal with that when he has to. But as he reads the list of Akechi codenames, his eyes land on one in particular. In the middle of the corvids and the predators, there's Sparrow.

The description leaves him without any doubt. His stomach sinks. Is Akechi okay? Can he even survive in a place like this? How is Ren going to find him?


3: you gently gift it to me 'cause you've no clue how to sew

In a first, helpless attempt to locate his Akechi (different enough from other Akechis, apparently, to be identified on sight... well, that's true enough), Ren decides to head into Tokyo and go looking for places Akechi still enjoys. Kichijoji is an obvious one, with the jazz bar and Inokashira Park and his apartment, the location of which he kept behind his lips the entire time Ren knew him, only to immediately invite him over in February. But instead of taking the train, Ren walks. Travel is strangely quick, and it gives him time to look at the cognitions, which the board claimed were eerie.

The board wasn't wrong. They don't even seem like the brainwashed people Ren is used to—cognitions is definitely the better term. At least the people back home have some variability in how they act, and at least they have some kind of mild reaction if you inconvenience them. Ren steps in front of them once or twice, sticks out his leg to trip one of them even, and they don't even frown at him.

Maruki's reality is still new. Maybe this is where everyone is going to end up; automatons, puppets, walking around like video game NPCs. His skin crawls. He stands to the side of a busy road in Shibuya and watches, stomach churning.


[[ooc: This is the Ren from pheasantboy's universe.]]

Comments

[flightpen]

A chill runs down his spine. "That sounds like something that'd happen at home." Maruki repairing reality itself, solid earth and concrete because people want it that way. Although— "Except no one would blow anything up at home."

[rosemaudite]

Haru raises an eyebrow. "Wouldn't they?"

Sure, peer pressure is a hell of a thing, but that doesn't stop everyone from acting out.

[flightpen]

"No. Probably no one even wants to anymore." Everyone always smiling, always so happy. Why would they want to blow up a street? Goodness. The thought hasn't even occurred to anyone since February 3rd, probably.

In his head, Ren draws back from everything. He doesn't want to think about it. His gaze goes fixed and glassy.

[rosemaudite]

...ah. "You know Sparrow, I take it."

Or 'Broken Goro,' but Haru supposes she can not call him that to a friend's face.

[flightpen]

It takes a long moment, but the words penetrate. Ren blinks a few times as clarity returns to his face. "Yeah." His eyes fix on her face. "Yeah, I know him. I'm looking for him. Do you know where he is?"

[rosemaudite]

"Not offhand. I don't tend to seek out his company." Again, better than 'he's fucking disturbing to talk to, how did you make him Not Real?'

"I haven't seen him since Yoshizawa insisted on fishing him out of Tartarus. He's probably around here somewhere, though - I doubt he decided to stay in Iwatodai."

[flightpen]

"He was in Tartarus?"

His voice cracks. He's read the fucking board, he knows what Tartarus is like. Akechi probably can't even deflect a punch from a normal dude, the way he is now, much less... "Is he okay?"

[rosemaudite]

"Considering I doubt he was capable of processing that anything was happening to him, I'd imagine he's fine. He seemed to be when we got out of there, anyway."

But the whole thing was a clusterfuck and Haru just wanted to go to bed at that point.

[flightpen]

"Okay." Okay. Not... dismembered, or wounded, or anything. He takes a breath. "That's... Thanks. That's a relief."

[rosemaudite]

"You're welcome." At least Ren has the good sense to be worried about his friend. That's. Something.

Bit late, but it's something.

[flightpen]

"How was he okay, though? I spoke to... to Crow, and he said Akechi—Sparrow, sorry—he said he was in danger when he went in Mikage-cho."

[rosemaudite]

"He was stuck in a coffin. I'm not sure if he was even conscious in there."

But it meant Yoshizawa could get him out in one piece, at least.

[flightpen]

Ren flinches back as soon as she says He was stuck in a coffin. The blood drains from his face.

"Oh," he says after a moment, when he's... kind of sure his voice will be mostly stable. "Um. I guess that makes sense." Given what he read on the board about the coffins and everything. He's just. Not used to thinking of Akechi as someone without a Persona. He was so beautiful in the Metaverse, fierce and passionate and... never mind.

"You said you helped?"

[rosemaudite]

"We didn't know if Yoshizawa was planning to go in there alone, and I've been staying in Iwatodai so I was the most conveniently placed person to double-check. To her credit, she didn't plan to go in alone."

But it also all went to hell in a handbasket when Sparrow's Shadow showed up.

[flightpen]

"But you still helped him. Thank you."

He's looking earnestly at her. Oh, no.

[rosemaudite]

"You already thanked me once."

Really, it's not that big of a deal.

[flightpen]

"The first time was for..."

Midsentence, he runs out of energy to protest. "Anyway, it means a lot to me. Um. Not that you—I know you don't care what I think." Haru's demeanor changed when she realized who his Akechi was, and although she's had one of the most subdued reactions so far, Ren's met enough people here that he can figure out what's up. "I just. If you ever need a favor, I have strong Personas."

[rosemaudite]

"It's good that you care about your friend. And it's fucked up that you were put in the position you were put in." It's also fucked up that Ren made the choice he did, but Haru's pretty sure she doesn't need to tell him that.

"I'll be sure to keep that in mind. Though I will say, given how Sparrow is, I'm surprised you still have access to them."

[flightpen]

He blinks a couple of times hearing the word fuck in Haru's voice, but he doesn't otherwise react. Cursing or not, she's being kinder to him than she could be, which is... very Haru.

"Yeah, I didn't at home. They only came back when I got here. I guess I wasn't. Allowed, or something, at home." He tries not to sound bitter. Everything that's happened is his fault, anyway.

[rosemaudite]

"Well, if everything's meant to be fixed, what would you need access to them for?"

[flightpen]

"I guess I would've liked some company. Do Personas count as company if they're part of you?" He fiddles nervously with his hair. "...You're probably right, though. Makoto talks about aikido now like it's. A sport or something. Nothing to defend herself against."

[rosemaudite]

Niijima, of all people, getting caught up in the Phantom Thieves. What a concept.

"They don't not count, I would think. But it sounds like the ideal was that you never needed them in the first place."

[flightpen]

"No need for rebellion, I guess. Pretty fucking convenient for him, too."

Something about the thought is weird, like an ill-fitting jacket or shoes he hasn't worn in too long. But he can't figure out what.

[rosemaudite]

"...If he has to go to such extremes to lock in his control of you, he's not nearly as benevolent as he claims to be."

Haru's just more and more glad she probably doesn't have to deal with that idiot at home.

[flightpen]

"I don't even know what that word means anymore." He fiddles restlessly with a lock of hair. "Like, he really thinks he's helping people. He's saving the world by taking away our Personas. 'cause if I fought him and won, then his reality would shatter, and." He gestures with his free hand. "And the world is so fucked, and he did that. But he thinks it's great. So, like. Does he have good intentions? Can you say that?"

He's starting to come out of his shell a little as he speaks, his sentences coming more easily—but then he blinks, and remembers himself, and retreats again.

"...Sorry. You probably don't... I just. Think about it a lot."