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personavelvetroomdr2024-11-21 04:38 pm
vrdr_mods) wrote in personavelvetroomdr2024-11-21 04:38 pm
Entry tags:
[EVENT] Memory Tapes
On the morning of November 21st, denizens in the Velvet Room will awake to a message on their phones or by their bedsides in an envelope. Perhaps even on their computer screens.
Greetings! If you've received this message, then you've been selected as a participant in a new activity to strengthen bonds within this community.
In order to facilitate connections with your fellow residents, we advise you to watch this video. Watch it and return the tape to its rightful owner. If you lacked the means to watch VHS tapes before, we have provided you with the necessary equipment.
Failure to do so may put your own memories at risk. Do not be selfish, lest you find yourself struggling to recall crucial moments of your life. You have no way of knowing which memories have been shared, so ask yourself if it is worth the risk to selfishly hoard another's secrets.
They will soon find a VHS tape, with a case that gives off a soft, blue glow to symbolize its importance. If they lack a TV or VCR, they will find one in their living space.
What they do is up to them, but they should heed the warning, if they value their own memories.
[For links to characters' memories, please see this post in the OOC comm. Have fun!]
Greetings! If you've received this message, then you've been selected as a participant in a new activity to strengthen bonds within this community.
In order to facilitate connections with your fellow residents, we advise you to watch this video. Watch it and return the tape to its rightful owner. If you lacked the means to watch VHS tapes before, we have provided you with the necessary equipment.
Failure to do so may put your own memories at risk. Do not be selfish, lest you find yourself struggling to recall crucial moments of your life. You have no way of knowing which memories have been shared, so ask yourself if it is worth the risk to selfishly hoard another's secrets.
They will soon find a VHS tape, with a case that gives off a soft, blue glow to symbolize its importance. If they lack a TV or VCR, they will find one in their living space.
What they do is up to them, but they should heed the warning, if they value their own memories.
[For links to characters' memories, please see this post in the OOC comm. Have fun!]
1/2
Fueled by rage and grief and desperation, he forces his way through the walls of the maze, uncaring about the tentacles trying to cling to him, to drag him back on track. He doesn't care what Maruki's saying, how he's trying to excuse himself, what he's trying to offer. Kou doesn't want it. He never asked for it.
Of course he misses Goro more than he ever imagined he ever could. Of course he wants him back- but he's done this song and dance before. He knows what it would cost- and that cost isn't worth it. Of course he was happy to have Goro back, back then- but Goro didn't want it, and Kou also couldn't stand the thought of himself and Goro once again losing what little agency they had.
Goro's dead, and that's the reality of it all. No fake reality is worth his- either of their independence. Goro was fucking scared to die again, but at least dying was a choice he made for himself.
The maze tries to catch up to him, changing and whirling- places from his childhood, from his memories, echoes of him and Goro together. it only makes everything worse, and his breath heaves as he runs and runs, his lungs burning- he doesn't know how much longer he can keep this up but he has to, he won't-
A droplet of wetness hits him.
Multiple, actually.
A light rain makes him look up, trying to calm his breathing. Did he make it...? Is he out...?
But that's clearly wishful thinking, as the faces of people- dead people stare back at him, tombstones surrounding him. Some clear, others hazy, murky, forgotten, but the ones he recognizes-
These are his and Goro's victims.
Kou's breaths start speeding up again, eyes wild behind his mask, but he forces himself into a battle-ready stance regardless as the dead start approaching him. Some try to speak, others just gaze emptily, and dread runs up Kou's spine as they close in on him. How much of Palnatoke's power does he have left in him? How many peopel are there?
Palnatoke's own fury meets his own- but it's mixed with regret. A whisper of guilt. I only have one Megidolaon left in me.
That's not gonna do, and Kou grits his teeth as he backs up, holding his sword in front of him defensively-
He stumbles over a grave he didn't see before. He curses, and scrambles upright, ready to defend himself, but then he realizes- they are no longer approaching him. They are merely pointing at him- no, at something next to him- the gravestone he stumbled over.
He shouldn't. He shouldn't.
He can't stop himself from looking, only to immediately regret it.
Akechi, followed by an unintelligeble mess that could be either Goro or Kou- he can't tell, the Kanji are far, far too messed up to read. A pit that wasn't there before has opened itself, an empty, open casket in the depths.
Kou tries to swallows- but he can't, he can't- his heart is beating in his throat, and he's trembling so hard it's a miracle he hasn't dropped his sword. The dead stare at him and point at the grave and Maruki's voice exhoes in his head and and-
"MEGIDOLAON!"
Palnatoke bursts to life as he tears his mask off, roaring with a rage and grief that echoes his own, heartbroken and furious and everything in between as the white-purple magic of Megidolaon tears through the graveyard. He doesn't care what he hits, he just needs this place to go, he needs it gone-
When the light clears, the dead are gone, and he's alone. The only grave left is the Akechi one, and he sinks to the ground, completely out of energy.
A hand rises from the grave, grasping Kou's arm- and he jolts violently, trying to pull away-
Once again, Goro is staring at him. His smile is plastic, but there's something incredibly off about it.
"Join me, Kou-nii," he whispers, eyes crinkling in amusement, "join me. I'm so lonely, Kou-nii. You'll join your little brother, won't you?"
"Don't-" Kou tries, but his voice cuts off, unable to speak with how rapid his breathing is- he can't- there's not enough air-
"Join me," Goro repeats, "join me, join me, join me-"
"Give in."
2/2
Kou's eyes snap open, and he pulls himself away from- no, that's not Goro- that's a thing, and scrambles away furiously. The claws of his gauntlets dig into the dirt as he forces himself upright to run, every muscle in his body protesting but he has to- he can't do this- he needs to get away, he needs to get out of this place-
Goro's voice echoes behind him. Join me, join me, just give in Kou-nii, won't it be so much better? We'll be happy Kou-nii, we'll be so happy-
"Lea-ve- me alone!" Kou heaves, and with all the strength he has left, throws his blade Goro's way-
-and imbeds itself into a pristine, white wall.
Once again, hallways stretch out in front of him, and Kou collapses onto his knees once more, gasping for breath between gags. He doesn't puke, but it's a close thing.
"I wish-" he snarls, when he's finally regained his breath somewhat, "that it was you Shido ordered a mental shutdown on instead of Isshiki-san."
1/? Tw: vomiting sensation. suicidal thoughts.
For a moment he doesn't even try to breathe with the way the tentacle grasps away at his hand- the glowing talons at the ends of the tendrils merely tracing the white leather of his gloves as he feels the hair raise behind his neck. Danger.
This is dangerous.
The air shifts like the very shuffling of the cards, cascading and toppling on top of each other as Kou is forced to hover and keep up with the ever lasting change. Chip chip chip the dead flee and erase just as they did in the normal world. The blood that drenched the twins and consumnated their tragic life- bound by the chains of fate itself. In death, only they remain together in the maze as sweat traces Maruki's brow but he staunchly doesn't try to give away any emotion but flexes his fingers a little.
As the red button reading "STOP PROCESS" quickly sinks further into the console.
The screens glitch away to reflect golden eyes, held in spirals, watching him directly as he finds his fingers shaking- held in the cold embrace of Azathoth's watchful gaze.
A mental shutdown on him.
The possibility of it- the chances of his brain being scooped away and left with an empty husk of regrets and pain...somehow that's the only other ending he could imagine for himself when he lost to hearing Rumi's occasional screams in the cold air of the hospital. The pain of it all, haunting his dreams and fuelling his day-to-day actions- everything to make their faces disappear from Rumi's pleas, to make their voices stop echoing in her head or how if anyone- if anyone should have died it should have been-
"If it was me your...happiness- your dreams would not have come true. I- I was the only one who could give that to you-"
Him. It should have been him. He was always weak and frail. Where did he go wrong?
You're right
It should have been me.
Me.
Me.
"Its thanks to Azathoth who has granted me the chance against all odds- I- I- I could have never-"
He was going to puke.
He felt his body shake, a clambering pain shaking the very root of his being as he clasped his hand to his mouth before a tentacle followed, now resting on his back- patting him gently. Tears prickled his eyes as Azathoth, the one who was healing the very wounds festering inside him as he felt like he could lurch out the very essence of Azathoth seated within him and then-
It was coiling within him. He could feel it. He could feel it lifting away the unpleasant sensation. The tightness in his chest. He gasped in horror as he felt like for the first fucking time- he wanted to feel the pain which was being slowly removed from his anatomy. "Don't..." he pleads. "Please. Let me-"
That was undeniably Rumi's voice.
Fuck.
Fuck.
"Stop it."
His voice clambered and shook the very walls of the maze. "DON'T YOU DARE USE HER-"
He grows quiet when the tentacle shifts and a single sharp talon pokes right on his neck. Just a few inches within- if it shifted- it would make its burrow into his heart. He stopped. Tears gushing down his face as he doesn't even know what the hell he's doing anymore.
Why is he-
2/?
Azathoth's right.
The walls shift- the sterile walls darkening and shifting into brick red before bubbles start coursing its way up then solidifying into dark red metal. Tentacles lurch out, carving and curling as they solidify and manifest into cold metal that made the very ducts running around the different areas of the room. Panels manifest, shadows erupt and most of all.
The cognitions.
Kou would find himself behind the line.
Everyone's here.
The shadows. The twin's cognitive doubles- now keeping their guns aimed away at the cognitive Goro and Kou. The phantom thieves. The Ren they know.
"You're the one who's going to disappear-!" Goro screams through his throat as he turns his gun and-
BANG!
The cognition shifts its weight, now falling to its knees.
Crow grits his tongue before turning and aiming his gun at the switch mounted on the far well just beyond the phantom thieves' reach. Just beyond Kou's reach because despite their circumstances, despite the vision of a better tomorrow- they would never-
The word rang out unnaturally, dissonant and off-kilter. Goro’s voice sounded wrong—warped, like a radio signal cutting through static.
3/3
The gun in Goro’s hand suddenly evaporated—as though reality itself rejected its presence.
The cognitive Goro froze, his eyes widening unnaturally as his neck twitched toward the switch. His expression fractured—panic flashing behind those once-empty eyes. Then something worse:
Confusion.
Azathoth’s gaze—those spiraled golden eyes—surfaced in the cognitive’s expression, flickering behind its distorted face as though the chaos itself were peering through.
How did it get here?
The realization struck too late.
Goro’s body lurched forward with an unnatural jerk. His voice erupted—this time clear, raw, and entirely someone else’s.
“LISTEN TO ME, CORVUS—”
The words came from Maruki distorted into the original voice. A mad volatile mix threatening to tip over and explode.
The cognitive Goro’s face contorted violently, half-melting into something grotesque. Tentacles lashed out from his back, oozing and writhing like open wounds.
“SHUT IT DOWN! SHOOT THE BUTTON! GET OUT OF HERE—!”
The voice distorted into a scream.
The cognitive Goro’s head whipped violently to face Kou—one eye still human, panicked, and the other a hollow spiral.
Meanwhile—
Maruki screamed as Azathoth’s tentacle slammed him into the console with terrifying force. His breath was punched from his lungs as another appendage coiled around his waist, dragging him backward.
“NO!” Maruki roared, thrashing as much as he could, reaching toward the screens. “STOP! KOU, SHOOT IT—GET OUT—!”
He fought against the tendrils, his arms trembling with futile resistance as Azathoth pinned him against the console.
The screens—his only window to Kou—flickered violently. Static crackled as the image distorted, the labyrinth itself warping, collapsing in on itself like a dying star.
Azathoth’s voice resonated through Maruki’s skull like a drill boring into his mind. The pressure around him intensified.
Maruki’s eyes darted back to the flickering screens, desperately trying to catch a glimpse of Kou before the images vanished. But Azathoth’s tendrils surged upward, snapping against the monitors like whips, and the scene before Kou began to collapse.
The words rang cold, and Maruki could feel the weight of Azathoth’s disappointment seeping into his bones as the clawed talon hovered dangerously near his heart.
And then the screens—Maruki’s last connection—went black.
no subject
The scene starts melting, tearing at the seams, and Goro starts yelling- melting, screaming to shoot the button, and Kou-
Kou-
He screams, unholstering his gun and aiming at the quaking wall, willing his hands to still.
He fires-
-and the button shatters into pieces.
Bullseye.
1/?
Suddenly, the switch lurches out- stretching absurdly far across the wall like a distorted, glitching rod. For a moment Kou might find himself standing and looking at the button before it shifts—caught in a paradox of time folding in on itself—before it shifts violently. The environment becomes volatile, incomprehensible, wrong. Its volatile. Incomprehensible. Like an inescapable glitch in a game who’s odds are already against you. Cognitions and voices mix in together.
The walls pulse red.
A singular message stretching across its walls reading a few words in glitchy white text that surrounds Corvus in a blanket of horrors itself- as if he were stuck with a computer looping with the words-
Stop process!
Stop process!
S̴̥̮͈̫̭̤̉̽̎̉T̷̂̌̈́̾͜Ȏ̸͕̈́͝P̵̨̧̞̞̈́͋̑̀̚̕ ̸͎̲̻͒̊̍͆̉̕P̷̢̰̜̙͙̙̩̑͌̎͘͠ͅR̶̲͔̋̌͒͆̊̏͗̓͝͠Ó̵̜̫̱C̸̘͇͛͋̌̂̅E̶͓̯̣͕͑͐͛̈̈́̃̓Ş̸̈̔̍͛̓́̃̀͠S̸̪̠̰͈̲̘͂͌?̴͉̱̱̹͖̤̗̣̦̬͑͐͛͒̋̋̎̐̕͠
F҉i҉n҉d҉i҉n҉g҉ ҉n҉e҉w҉ ҉c҉l҉i҉e҉n҉t҉.҉.҉.҉
The walls around Kou would suddenly collapse, an endless abyss stretching as he would find himself falling.
The air would hold him. Suddenly. Now hovering just a couple metres away from where Maruki and Azathoth were truly stationed.
Maruki’s eyes remained widened in horror as he watched the scene before him.
But Kou will not get to see that sight.
He won’t perceive the golden all-consuming stare of Azathoth staring back at him through the screens before tentacles will lurch out and walls will erupt again- volatile. Ever shifting. The maze still remains a large cube with a side measuring 10 m of black mass in the real world but somehow that same 1000 cube metre is holding a world to infinite possibilities and the sheer madness of a god who should never take control.
[ooc: it says terminate connection and finding new client]
2/3
Draped in the clothing of a prisoner in Maruki’s world- held in the visage of black and white against the all homely presence of what could have only been the counselling room in Shujin Academy. The brown leather chairs, the green tiled floors along with beds lined up with translucent pink curtains- the study which held a chair and a hundred dozen pieces of information lined up in books and sticky notes.
The door was shut away and locked.
Across him two cognitions shimmered into cognitions. There was a faint glow around them- signifying that they weren’t real.
Two of the walls towards the study table shifted as the atmosphere changed.
Maruki sits in a sterile, quiet room, wrapped in a scratchy emergency blanket. His brown hair is shorter, but his face tells a different story—his eyes, hollow and lifeless, sit sunken beneath dark circles. The low hum of fluorescent lights buzzes above, and the faint sounds of police chatter filter through the thin walls. He doesn’t seem to notice the cup of lukewarm water placed in front of him or the soft murmurs from the officer seated across the table. His hands tremble slightly as they clutch at the edge of the blanket, his knuckles pale.
“You’re doing great, Maruki-san. Just take your time,” the officer says gently, voice calm but firm. “Can you go over what happened again? From when you and Rumi arrived at the house.”
Maruki exhales sharply, his gaze unfocused. “We were just... visiting,” he whispers, as though saying it out loud might somehow make it worse. “It was supposed to be a normal day. We’d been planning to see Rumi’s parents for weeks. When we got there, nothing seemed wrong at first. Just—nothing out of place.”
His voice falters, and he shuts his eyes tightly as if trying to force away the memory. He can’t.
“Rumi... she went ahead. She opened the door. I didn’t think—" His voice breaks. “There were noises—scuffling—and I just thought maybe it was the television, or... I don’t know. I didn’t react. I didn’t react.”
He slams his hand lightly against the table, anger and regret bleeding into his voice. The officer doesn’t stop him, just nods and waits.
“When I walked in... they were already there. The men.” His breathing grows uneven, and his fingers tangle into his hair, pulling as if the pain will anchor him. “They had guns. Rumi’s parents—her parents were—”
Maruki’s eyes dart toward the officer now, searching, almost desperate. “You have to understand. She was terrified, but she ran after them. She went after them! She wasn’t thinking—she just—” He gestures vaguely, hands shaking as he tries to recreate the moment in the air. “One of them turned back. He hit her with the gun—hard. She dropped to the floor, and there was blood—so much blood. I didn’t even know if she was alive.”
He stares blankly down at the table, his voice hollow now. “I didn’t catch them. I couldn’t stop them. They ran out, and I... I stayed. I—I tried to help her parents. I did everything I could. I tried to stop the bleeding—I thought maybe if I could hold on, maybe if the police got there soon enough...”
Maruki suddenly looks up at the officer, his eyes wide and pleading, his voice cracking with desperation. “Did they make it? Her parents—can they... are they going to be okay?”
3/3
Kou was left all alone again.
Except a woman’s scream echoed across in the empty counselling room.
The counselling room shifts violently. The fluorescent hum grows louder—almost unbearable—until suddenly, the noise cuts off.
Rumi’s cognition appears, seated across from Kou on one of the leather chairs. Her expression is distant, empty—but her voice is razor-sharp, drenched in cold accusation.
The words hit like a physical blow.
Maruki’s faint voice echoes somewhere in the space, frantic and pleading. “Rumi! It’s me! Please—please stop screaming. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry—”
Rumi’s cognition doesn’t flinch. Her eyes bore into Kou, but it feels like she’s looking through him.
Maruki’s voice breaks again, distant and desperate: “I didn’t want this! I tried—I tried to stop it! I didn’t—”
Rumi rises to her feet now, her figure shimmering as if she could vanish at any moment.
Her voice echoes around the room as the walls pulse faintly, the illusion threatening to shatter entirely.
Maruki’s broken whispers bleed into the room: “I can’t face her. I can’t... I didn’t save anyone...”
The counselling room—its strange, homely presence—feels crushing now. The light dims to a cold grey.
Rumi’s last words ring through the air like a final nail in the coffin:
The room begins to flicker.
The maze shifts again.
A single cognition sits across Kou. One that the brunette might find very much familiar.
….
no subject
All he cares about is that the visions and cognitions are gone- if only for now. He knows he can't let his guard down, his hands still trembling, his heart still beating in his throat, and his eyes wet, but he really is out of energy; he doesn't have a morsel left to even summon Palnatoke, let alone use his Persona to defend himself. All he has is his sword, and his gun.
The world shifts once more-
-and suddenly, he's watching several other visions. Visions from Maruki's past, he's very quick to realize, watching the scenes play out in front of him. It's nothing he didn't already know, not really.
What he doesn't know is why he's seeing this in the first place.
It's hard to feel sympathy for the man who just put him through... all that. But he does feel somewhat bad for the woman, Rumi, but that's just the world they live in, don't they? She definitely didn't deserve what happened to her- but what Maruki ended up doing to her, even if by accident-
A spark of irritation goes through him. What's Maruki hoping to achieve with this? Or is this his Palace working against him, showing it to Kou for... reasons. He doesn't know, and he doesn't particularly care. So Maruki had to go through some hardships, and decided to take out his own inability to cope on others by brainwashing them- or trying to force them to his side.
The rooms, the maze keep shifting, and like it or not, Kou is along for the ride, apparently.
That is, until he ends up in an office of sorts- a counselling office, and the woman, Rumi, sits in front of him. She cries and screams, causing the whole room to shake, and Kou tightens the grip on his sword, but at the same time- he can't fucking move, it's like he's glued to the chair, his breathing picking up again as she stands up, the entire room pulsing.
"Stay away-" he warns, but it looks like he didn't need to; rumi flickers away, wailing and scream, while Maruki's own voice answers in kind, small and pathetic.
In spite of his exhaustion, the remaining anxiety and grief and all, Kou's anger rises again.
"Do you think you're justified?" he grits out, though his voice is still tight from the earlier events, his hands still shaking. "Is this sob story supposed to- to convince me? You're dispicable."
The room flickers again- and suddenly, he's not in the counselling office anymore. No- this room is far darker, no windows at all. Cameras are mounted in the corners, and used syringes litter the floor.
Across from Kou, a very, very familiar figure sits in the chair of the interrogator.
Ren looks him in the eye, his glasses conspicuously absent, his gaze neutrally disappointed.
"You betrayed me. And now you dare to forget?"
What?
"Trying to guilt me now?" Kou bites out, but he can't stop his voice from shaking. "I didn't forget, for your information, and if dregging up my worst memories didn't, then guilt certainly won't either."
It wasn't even him who went to shoot Ren- that was Goro. Oh, Kou certainly betrayed the Phantom Thieves in his own right, but this?
Maruki's throwing shit at the wall, and it shows.
"Make this fucking circus stop," he hisses. "Give me the tape. You're not getting shit from me."
1/2
"I am afraid this circus was Takuto’s wish," he hums, voice dripping with an almost mocking patience. He crosses one leg over the other, his movements unnaturally fluid, like the joints weren’t quite connected right. “I am simply giving him what he wanted.”
"And oh I know that it wasn't you who shot your Ren," The figure sighs, the sound full of feigned disappointment, like a parent humoring a child’s missteps. "It was Goro Akechi. You two—played your lives into a single note. Harmonized in a way that few can. Somehow, you understood each other better than... some others.”" He is not willing to answer any of Kou's statements or doubts- but the way he looks at his hands to the way his eyes dart to the door, there's something inhuman crawling in each little twitch and action he undertakes.
"The tape is exactly where it should be. If you traverse the maze for a little longer- you will find it."
He stands—or tries to. His hand phases through the edge of the sofa as though it wasn’t even there, and for the briefest second, his face flickers. Anomalous. Too sharp in places, too vague in others, like a drawing smeared in the rain.
The room shudders. Its false atmosphere—its shaky grasp at realism—snaps apart into shadowed ruin.
"Without me you are nothing, Maruki-san," Akira continues- smiling brightly with teeth that are too wide for him. Like an anomaly drawn from memory- except something was deeply wrong with the mind. "Your research would have been nothing and now you betray me...tell me, how can you trust anyone but me?"
2/2
The sound crashes through the room like a hammer against glass.
Standing there is Maruki.
Or, at least, a cognition of him.
The figure in the doorway is glitching, shimmering in and out of focus as though the very fabric of his being can’t decide what it’s supposed to look like. His face is twisted in fury, sharp features barely holding together as he storms forward, teeth gritted, his coat flaring behind him.
The Akiren-cognition—Azathoth—pauses, tilting his head at the intrusion with mild curiosity. “Oh?”
Maruki doesn’t waste a second. His voice, ragged and furious, tears through the room.
“This is still my damn maze you built yourself on, dipshit.”
The figure across from Kou—Azathoth—actually raises a brow at that, as though offended. He doesn’t move, but the temperature in the room drops several degrees, and the shadows at his feet grow darker, deeper.
Maruki ignores it. He turns sharply toward Kou, his glitching form straining against itself, voice sharp and urgent.
“Run.”
He tries to grasp at his shoulder so that he can shove - only to find his hand phasing right through his body and instead landing on the sofa instead. He releases a growl in frustration as he turns away from him and kicks the damn coffee table at the center. It quite literally bounces off the floor, as if its made of literal air before its shattering like glass. His brown eyes glint with an idea and how he saw how Corvus couldn't get up from his seat earlier.
Azathoth can't replicate reality the way Maruki envisions it. Of course it fucking can't. He's the human here.
“Get through that door—try to get out of Shujin while you still can!" He phases right through Kou- grabbing the couch and pushing it away as it collides onto the wall with the prisoner clothes still clinging onto him (he has no idea what this memory is but he can ask plenty of questions to himself later). "Don't stay in one place for too long!”
The room shakes. Cracks splinter across the walls. The cameras in the corners pop and fizzle, sparks raining down like embers.
1/2
For a moment, he thinks about running. He's in no state to fight anymore, even if the Maruki is clearly just a cognition- he's more than shown that he has power, even through cognitions of himself, of others. It's the franticness that catches him off guard, though, the insistence that he runs; talking to the cognitive Ren as if it isn't one of his own creations. Talking as if he's trying to help Kou.
... Hah. Hahaha.
Perhaps, it would be smart to run, even if it's directed by Maruki himself- which means there is clearly something nasty attached to it, but- well.
Kou was always the more impulsive between himself and Goro- something he'd learned to smooth out with the years in favor of protecting Goro, of fooling Shido, the public, anyone they interacted with. He's old hat at suppressing his worst impulses, especially if they can lead to danger.
But Goro's not here anymore. He's dead, his grave thoroughly defiled by Maruki, his image used and abused in favor of trying to beat Kou down-
And Kou's not having it anymore. He's so, so done with this- all of this. He was before it even started. Lured, trapped, attacked- grief so much more raw and visceral after everything he's been through today. All Maruki had to do was return his tape, but no- even that was too much to ask.
Kou's not falling for whatever Maruki's doing, he doesn't care for this faux savior act, and he certainly isn't going to take Maruki's side.
2/2
"No," he grits out, voice still wet, "no- fuck you. I don't- care what you're trying to pull here. I'll never forgive you for trying to use my memories- my own damn brother against me." His breaths come out heavier despite himself, rage and grief coiling inside of him like horrid parasites. "Give me my goddamn tape back, let me go, and I'll consider not shoving my sword through your gut."
Palnatoke roars in approval in his mind, and Kou's face pulls into a snarl, flexing his clawed gauntlets dangerously. It's a bluff- all of this is a bluff, he knows he can't win, but fuck it if he's going down without a fight. It's not like death sticks here anyway, but-
He won't let Maruki actualize him. He won't let him spit on Goro's grave- his final wish any more.
tw; corpses. blood. murder. shido
“Unfortunately, you can’t stab me,” he muttered, his tone flat, almost disinterested. “I’m not actually here.”
The subtle flicker of his form emphasized his point. He wasn’t physically present—only an echo, a piece of himself navigating this mess of memories and distortions while god knows what was happening to his real body in the mess. He didn't have much time. Were he in his lab, he might have ejected Kou entirely, but the maze was different. They were both within Azathoth’s labyrinthine mass now, and its warped existence answered to no clear authority.
He glanced briefly at the cognitive Akira, watching it crush the table into splinters with a casual flick of its hand. Maruki’s jaw tightened. Even through the pandemonium, he was still analyzing, still piecing together the puzzle. The prototype... yes, it had to still be in here. Everything had gone sideways too quickly, but that meant Azathoth was relying on his original designs to sustain the maze. A flicker of clarity struck him—it was all still based on his framework.
"I just mentioned you will get your tape if you traverse the maze a little longer." the Akira continues, his hands behind his back as he watches the sofa shift around a little more before he brings up an index- makes a looping motion and crushes the furniture into split... wood? "Now," Azathoth casually stepped away as Maruki kept glaring at him. "With Takuto's defiance, I don't think I will do that. We have fresh fodder by the way- maybe putting you both in the same cage will help us get better results."
He levels his gaze at the doctor as he spreads his hands- and suddenly the room outright stretches. In a quite literal sense. Everything in the room- going from the bed to the pen left on Maruki's table- they had been unnaturally stretched like a badly pixelated picture. It was disorienting but...
"Isn't that what you wish for, Takuto?"
"Not like this," he grits his teeth before looking at the tiles. They shimmered for a moment, revealing the grid like designs Maruki had telegraphed like they did in three dimensional development environments. The key to everything. His prototype was still in there, which meant-
The Akira sighs tiredly. "You have really forgotten everything, haven't you?"
It shifts, now revealing a tired old man staring back at him. He had red hair, eyes held in pain as a gunshot wound resided beneath in his abdomen and to the right side of his chest. "You don't deserve to do that," the man shakes his head- his voice turning tired as he places a hand to the wound with blood still oozing out from his body. "To forget the reason why you started all this. You failed to protect my daughter, failed to help us- save us- why do you question yourself after everything you've done?"
"Do you remember her screams? Screaming for us—screaming for you to make her forget?!"
"..." For a moment, Maruki was paralyzed. The weight of his past, real or not, bore down on him. His hand shook—but then it moved. Before he even realized it, his fingers curled around the familiar weight of a gun that materialized in his grasp.
Goro’s gun.
He lifted it with trembling hands."...defiling the grave."
"I think I get what you were trying to say."
The man's eyes flashed gold.
Maruki moved. His hand swung out the gun towards the face of the man he respected and loved like a damn son.
He pulled the trigger.
BANG!
The gunshot cracked through the air like a thunderclap.
The room convulsed, walls glitching and collapsing into a grid of sterile white squares. The distortion rippled outward, and suddenly Azathoth’s cry tore through the air.
A mangled, otherworldly voice reverberated through the very walls themselves, shaking the ground beneath their feet.
Maruki turned sharply, his focus narrowing as the tentacles began to unfurl across the room, curling along the walls. They twisted and multiplied, growing in size and latching onto every surface. The room darkened, the walls solidifying into a deep, sickly green.
Maruki raised a hand, muttering to himself. “The patterns... they’re the same as the blueprints. If they’re negating the exits—” His fingers traced the shimmering tiles in the air, still visible like an architect’s sketches. He spoke aloud, his voice sharp and analytical. “Azathoth couldn’t replicate this maze without following my way of thinking.”
He raised his hand- tapping along the wall as he tried to remember the protocol swtches he had installed and then he felt it- his hand briefly touched something soft and then he slammed it into the nearest wall. The impact sent cracks splintering outward, and the wall buckled under his sheer force of will. “This maze is mine,” he muttered, eyes narrowing as he pushed through.
The wall shattered, and Maruki stepped into another room.
It wasn’t just Kou's trauma maze anymore. It was his labyrinth too.
Shujin Academy loomed before him, but the halls were wrong. Blood smeared the walls, and echoes of screams reverberated down the corridors.
Maruki pressed on, his breath steady but strained. His hand curled into a fist as he slammed through another wall.
The room shifted.
A hospital ward emerged, sterile and suffocating. The walls here dripped with ichor, the flickering lights casting shadows of figures he didn’t recognize. There stood the cognition of the Ren with a bullet wound gaping from his forehead. And beyond him, Maruki saw a glimpse of Rumi’s parents lying lifeless on the hospital bed, their hands reaching out for someone who never came.
Maruki’s teeth grit as he swung his arm, punching through the wall again.
The scene broke apart, and he stumbled into a darker, colder space. Mementos.
The labyrinthine tunnels twisted and warped, tendrils of darkness slithering through the air.
“It’s not real,” Maruki hissed, his voice firm. His hand tore through the wall again, the cracks webbing outward as he punctured the illusion.
The office of Masayoshi Shido unfolded next.
The twins were here too, younger, back to back as if one was part of the moment while the other was the shadow- listening in, shaking with restrained rage as Shido sneered from behind his desk.
“Keep going,” Maruki muttered to himself, his focus razor-sharp. He swung his fist again, breaking through the scene, his breath ragged.
Finally, he reached the last room.
The walls began to close in, suffocating and pulsing with tentacles that lashed out in desperation.
Maruki froze.
The engine room.
Cold metal walls loomed around him, and the sound of Goro’s voice—young, panicked—echoed in the air.
It wasn’t real. He knew it wasn’t real, but the sight of a cognitive Goro holding out the tape was too much. His pleading eyes, the desperation in his voice—it brought everything full circle.
Maruki sank to his knees, his legs trembling before they began to flicker, dissolving into nothingness. Azathoth is growing stronger. He's feeding off someone else.
“Azathoth is... rebuilding the maze again,” he murmured, his voice hollow as he watched the walls pulse violently, the bindings crude and frantically woven. “The intruder to the Lab—I noticed his presence before—he’s here. An Akira or a Ren.”
The tentacles bound the maze tighter, curling around every nook and cranny in a rushed attempt to stabilize the collapsing illusion.
“I can’t—”
And just like that, Maruki disappeared, swallowed by the maze once more.
But the tape was there. Ripe for taking.
1/2
"Then come out and face me. And I said, give me the tape. I'm done with your bullshit." He goes to take a step forward- even if this is just a cognitive projection, harming it should have some effect on the real Maruki- he's intent on forcing the issue, but-
He wavers when Maruki grabs the gun- Goro gun. It feels like yet another punch to the gut, his mouth dry- is Maruki going to shoot him with such a familiar weapon? What irony- how fucking hilarious. Kou really does hate this man, the way he shoves himself into other people's- into his thoughts, using them against him, and having the gall to act like he's the one above it all.
Then Maruki shoots the bloody old man, and the entire place screeches, loud enough that Kou's forced to cover his ears, feeling the vibrations echo through him like knives. It's dizzying, his ears ringing, not helped by his already exhausted state. Maruki's muttering and mumbling as Kou tries to regain his composure, the entire place slowly shifting, and Maruki slams through a wall- shit, he's so fucking out of practice. Palnatoke urges him on as he shakes his head. He can't lose Maruki here- not until he has his tape.
"Get back here!" he shouts, running after the cognitive Maruki, snarling. The walls tremble and change just like before- a Shujin where the walls scream, then a hospital where ichor paints the entire ward- doubtlessly trying to shatter Kou's already emotionally fragile state. Maruki keeps bursting through walls, and Kou follows on sheer willpower alone. Mementos, Shido's office, complete with a sneering, furious Shido, images of themselves simply taking the abuse. Something terrible crops up in Kou's throat, something that makes him feel so horrifically small- but he ignores it, forcing himself onwards-
The walls become metallic, and Kou's breath catches.
Here once again, huh. He's not even surprised at this point, but that doesn't make it any less shocking, any less impactful. Tears prick at his eyes, and he forces them closed- but Goro's begging echoes in his ears, and he grits his teeth.
How much longer does he have to do this?
He opens his eyes just in time to watch Maruki disappear, muttering something or the other about Ren- or Akire- shit-, it doesn't matter-!
Face to face with him is another illusion of Goro.
And he's holding Kou's tape.
2/2
Or is it a sob?"Of course he'd do this," he mutters to himself, forcing his legs forwards- at least his fucking tape is here, now. "Fuck, what did I expect?"
"Indeed. What did you expect?" Kou startles as the cognition speaks, its voice mild, but friendly. "I could have given this to you earlier, you know?"
"What?"
The cognition smiles at him, tilting its head in a distinctly detective prince way that would charm anyone- if they didn't know better. "Of course, Kou-nii. You know I want what's best for you, right?"
Kou shudders as Goro's voice echoes off the walls again, howling in despair, how he doesn't want to die.
"Give me my tape," Kou commands, hoarsely, but the cognition only laughs.
"Oh, no- I can't, really. Not yet, anyway." It smiles at him. "You know what I want, right? What you want, most of all?"
Kou tastes bile in his throat.
"All you need to do is let yourself be cured," it says, and Kou grits his teeth. "You can have your tape, and then, we can be happy forever, without any pain to weigh us down.
"Doesn't that sound wonderful?"
It's horrible. The words that this- this caricature of his brother is spouting, with his voice, with his face, making Kou want to scream-
"My brother would never say that," he spits, and the cognition frowns sadly, demurely, before sighing.
"Seems you can't have your tape back yet, then."
Motherfu-
"Give it HERE!" Kou shouts, lurching forward with his sword, swinging it in a wide arc- but the cognition merely jumps- no, damn near floats backwards and out of the way, still holding Kou's tape, still looking like a kicked puppy with his brother's face, and Kou screams, trying again- only to be stopped in his tracks by a tentacle. It wraps around his sword arm, holding him in place, and the thing with Goro's face tuts in disappointment.
"How truly saddening," it sighs, giving him such a melancholic look that it scratches Kou raw under his skin, "you need only accept this- me, and we could have it all..."
Blue fire bursts out from behind it, and Kou's throat dries out as Loki's shadowy form- or an approximation, at least- hovers in the air, red-hot sword spinning.
"I suppose a little more persuasion is in order."
Kou's efforts to break free double, but the tentacle holds fast, and Goro's voice echoes-
"Eigaon."
1/2
He doesn’t know where it all even began. He was rushing to the front, sprinting like his life depended on it while the shadows manifested- the alarms in his mind blaring louder with every second. Then, he found himself standing at a railing, staring down at the source of the distortion—a massive black cube, pulsating with eerie green patterns that slithered across its surface like living veins. It felt alive. Malicious.
Kira directed his attacks on the cube. Whatever it was. He used two teleports to trick the fafnir to load its Gigantomachia on the…room? It had hissed in anger and before he knew it-
There was a tentacle rushing at him.
And the world turned sterile.
When he woke up he thought he found himself back in the strange dream he found himself a couple times before. A world full of void. Of endless corridors. He had seen it before in fragments of dreams he dared not revisit. The walls were lined with pictures framed in bleeding gold. An old couple, now drenched in blood. A woman in hospital clothes. Two interlocked hands, one marked by a birthmark. A drowning ship. A freshly dug grave.
He followed the sounds echoing through the corridors. Screams, roars, cries of agony—he didn’t know who or what was making them, but they dragged him forward like a hook in his chest. He couldn’t stop. Not now.
The labyrinth’s oppressive walls scream in distorted echoes as Akira sprints through the maze, his whip flashing out to hook onto edges and launch him forward with practiced grace. CLAP. CLAP. He had six more teleportations until his ears would start to bleed. Sixteen more until his eyes would start growing blurry. He didn’t have much time. Every sound pulls him deeper, every tremor in the air promising something worse ahead. The maze twists and shifts around him like it’s alive, but he doesn’t stop, not even when his muscles ache.
When the terrible roar of fire and the chilling cry of "Eigaon!" rip through the air, his heart seizes. The voice—familiar yet wrong—claws at his ears. He rounds a corner just in time to see the monstrous shadow of some creature painted in shades of black and white hovering behind what looks like Goro, the face too perfect, too cruel. His head turns in that split second, finding Corvus bound in writhing tentacles, struggling wildly, a sword clenched in his restrained hand.
Kira doesn’t hesitate.
BANG BANG BANG!
The submachine gun in his hand flourishes in an instant, now held in one as he shoots- the bullets rushing at the main target.
The one who wore his face. Goro. Except not. His mind screamed at the sight.
The submachine gun in his hand blazed to life as he fired at the monster wearing Goro’s face. The bullets streaked through the air, landing clean hits. For a moment, the cognitive Akechi flinched, Loki’s fire momentarily dissipating as the Eigaon collided to an area really close to Kou instead- cursed energy hurling at his direction as it exploded. One bullet pierced its hand—the one not holding the tape.
“You—!” The voice hissed in outrage.
The tentacles writhed violently, blocking or taking in the damage of the rest of the shots with ease. The rest of the bullets ricocheted uselessly off their dense surface. Akira’s frustration boiled as he flipped backward to dodge an incoming strike, throwing the strap of the gun over his shoulder.
“Seriously?!” he shouted, glancing briefly at Kou. “How many of you things resist bullets? This isn’t fair!”
The cognitive Akechi tilted its head, almost amused. Its crimson gaze followed Akira as he sprinted toward Kou, still bound and struggling. In one hand, the monster clutched the tape, its black blood dripping from the bullet wound.
Akira pulled something from his pocket—a grenade.
He didn’t have time for this nonsense.
With a sharp flick of his wrist, he prepared to pull the pin and hurl it at the tentacle holding Kou when something wet snapped around his ankle.
“No- no- no-” He cries out as he finds the tentacle yanking him into the air. He hurtled through the air, clutching the explosive as his world spun violently. “FUCK!”
2/2
The environment simmers, now revealing itself to be shrouded in black with neon green grid outlines and tentacles wrapped or lazily clinging to the high walls.
Blood rushes to his head as he struggles against the constriction, releasing a frustrated groan. His mind raced for a plan.
The bullet pierced his hand. Does that mean he resists gunpowder? A lot of it would still do decent damage, right?
The cognitive Goro turns its attention to Akira now, tilting its amused head at him.
“Oh, Akira,” it says, voice smooth and venomous, as though it knows exactly which buttons to press. ”You really shouldn’t have come here. Atleast...not without an appointment.”
“Maruki, what the fuck-!” He cries out at the cognition- not sure if this was some twisted version of the Maruki in his world who can just make him hallucinate into thinking this is supposed to be Goro Akechi. “This is supposed to be your shitty maze?! You are seriously doing this again!?”
The monster laughed, the sound a cruel echo of Goro’s voice. “This maze is far superior to anything that man could envision,” it said, tilting its head like a predator playing with its food. “And I see you, Akira Kurusu. Or should I say- subject Five?”
Akira froze. His breath hitched. “Who the hell is-"
The cognitive Akechi’s eyes gleamed with malice. “Oh, but you’re not him, are you? Not really.” It laughed again, a sound that made Akira’s stomach churn. The room shifted. Flickered. Revealing the walls of some facility in stainless steel, flickering to the cozy plaster walls with overhanging wooden beams of the Leblanc attic before ultimately shifting back to the neon-green grid walls from earlier. “You and Kou-nii must be treated. Both of you have suffered soooo much. Isn’t it time to rest and let me do the work with your memories?”
Grey eyes widen when he sees the tentacles unfurl. Wow, he’s hanging off upside down in some black void with a twin of Goro from another alternate universe who he was attempting to save. He feels very uncomfortable and he feels delirious with the sheer amount of tentacles this cognition seemed to have. This feels like the start of a very bad hentai manga.
There had to be something that kept Corvus here, right? The tape in that Goro's hand- was it his or Marukis?
“CORVUS!” he yelled, his voice cutting through the labyrinth’s oppressive silence. “THAT’S YOUR TAPE, RIGHT?!”
1/2
A shower of bullets tears through the room, and the Eigaon goes wide, just barely. He can feel the sizzle of curse magic burning against his face, but thankfully not close enough to actually inflict any damage. He's momentarily stunned, before he twists against the tentacle towards the new presence in the room.
"Kira?!"
What the hell is he doing here? Wait- Maruki said something about an intruder earlier, didn't he? Then that intruder was Kira?
He doesn't have time to think too hard about it, before Kira is dragged upside down by a tentacle. He sneers at the cognition.
"He has nothing to do with this- let him go!" he growls. "Your fight is with me."
But it seems he's ignored- the cognition with his brother's face taunting Kira as the enviroment shifts and flickers, tentacles undulating. (Maruki never truly cared what he or Goro thought; it was always Ren he wanted. Always.) Anger rises in his gut as the cognition continues to ignore him, talking over Kira- referring to him as subject 5? What the fuck? Could it be that this Maruki-
Kou snarls as tentacles start surrounding them, growing out from the walls, the cognition. That fucking Maruki, how dare he- how dare he use his twin's face to say that! How dare he call him 'Kou-nii', when that was something Goro only did when-
Focus. He's not going to let this happen- he'll die before he lets Maruki destroy his free will- especially when he's tarnishing Goro like this.
And Kira- Kira-
2/2
He takes note of the grenade in Kira's hand, the smug victory on the cognition's face, gears turning in his head. It took damage from the bullets earlier, and from the way it had to protect itself, it wasn't going to be immune to damage without any tentacles to brace itself. and even then-
Kou's breath stutters. Fuck, he doesn't have much left in him, but he has to get his tape back, and get out of here somehow- and like hell is he just going to let Maruki win.
The tentacles' grip on him is tight. Rigid. Not something he can just wiggle his way out of unscathed- but that's the key word.
The tentacles close in, their tips glowing an eerie cyan. Kou's eyes narrow.
"So- that's it. No more pretenses, huh?" he spits, tugging against the tentacles, "not even pretending you want our consent for your 'treatment'."
"Hm? Well- you two are in no state to make any permanent decisions," the cognition hums in Goro's voice, and Kou's heart cracks, "but there's no need to worry. That's why I'm doing this- it's in your best interests."
"You keep saying that," Kou hisses, "but you're going to brainwash us. How does it not get through your thick skull that that's wrong?"
"I'm simply taking away your suffering, Kou-nii." Goro's face says, and Kou's breath hitches despite himself. "See? There will be no more need for your grief. Just hold still... it won't hurt a bit."
The tentacles shift slightly against him-
Bingo.
With a resounding crack, Kou wrenches his arm free from the tentacles, ignoring the way his vision blurrs and pain lances through the left side of his body, and shoots forwards. The thing with his brother's face balks, momentarily stunned at the fact that he broke his own arm just to get free, eyes drawn to the way it now uselessly dangles next to him- but that's all Kou needs. He slams into the cognition, hissing in pain at the shock it sends through both his already injured body and his now-broken arm, but it has the desired effect-
His tape goes flying-
-and Kou sprints after it as it skids on what passes for the 'ground' in this hell, reaching out with his good hand-
"How dare you-!"
A tentacle snaps at him, winding around his leg, but Kou shrieks as he dives forward, wrapping his fingers around the tape. He pulls it away from the tentacle trying to snatch it from his grip, kicking at the cognition as it closes in with a sneer.
"Stop struggling!" it snarls, "this is for your own good!"
Kou, of course, does not stop struggling, wrapping himself around the tape, and turning to Kira.
"THE GRENADE! THROW THE GRENADE!"
no subject
Prepare a distraction. Throw the grenade at the thing which has Akechi's face and skedaddle then somehow convince Corvus to highfive you because apparently that's a very integral part of their little escape.
Yeah. Seemed convincing enough, right?
Well, that didn't matter in the long run, did it?
None of it ever did.
Subject 5...where has he heard it before?
The momentary headache that spikes through his head is his undoing because he can't even begin to fathom the ends of his own peril and the time when he hears a loud sickening crack- of bones that echo into the pitiless void that it- nearly stunts Akira. If he weren't so fucking used to being on the other side of a gun held in a gloved hand or watching the light fade out from those carmine eyes- he would have been rendered motionless.
"NO-! CORVUS-!" He screams as he thrashes against the clutch of the tentacle wrapped around his ankle. As he practically shakes in its hold, the world shifts as he swings and for a moment he swears he sees the flash of the fucking universe itself and then- a flash of something else.
Dark sterile walls. An exploding planet.
None of it seems to matter when one of the tentacles ease in at Corvu's blatant shove and he finds himself falling or moving erratically.
He catches himself at the last moment as he falls to the ground and rolls out on said ground. The tendrils under his palm hiss as he tries to stabilize himself- his dark disshelved bangs laced in sweat as he finds Corvus struggling against the cognition. The tape.
The grenade.
Akira looks down at the grenade in his left hand. He could easily put an end to this madness but Corvus won't be able to get away on time.
He gulps as he looks up, a second delay before he's sprinting at him.
But instead of committing to the desired act of pulling away at the pin with his teeth and probably setting off a trap that could essentially kill both the cognitive Goro and Corvus, he shoves the grenade into his mouth and goes for the whip tucked next to him. It spreads out- lashes- curls around the struggling forms of Corvus and "Goro" and Kira connects his hands in a loud resounding CLAP!
He manifests right before Kou- his teeth still holding onto the body of the grenade as his boots would barely appear before the other's struggling position.
Without another second wasted, he cracks the whip again. This time hurling it like a rope as he forces the end of the whip, the default camera position which displays the fast propelling footage all too perfectly flickering into place as the cognitive Goro's back flashes on the camera of his watch.
Akira's eyes flare bright gold.
CLAP!!
He wraps his arms around the cognitive Goro- pulling him back for Kou to get away.
"Ah-! You brats! You-" BANG BANG BANG BANG!
Akira keeps pressing the trigger of his gun, shoving the barrel even further into "Goro's" back as every bit of play switches into cruel cold murder. The tentacles lurch out as Akira keeps weakening its source. It commands the damn tentacles. The Akechi doesn't even get to lift his hand as Akira empties out the whole round.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
Until he needs to reload.
He isn't done.
Swerving around the cognition, he tosses away the gun at Kou's direction and uses his now free hand, breathing hard as he took the grenade from his mouth and shoved it into the cognition’s face.
“Stay dead this time,” he hissed, wrenching the spoon free.
The grenade sank into the writhing mass as Akira spun on his heel, snapping his whip. It melts into tentacles- a silent golden eye manifesting in that void as Akira releases a gasp but pulls at the spoon at the last minute.
He cracks his whips again. Takes a look at his watch. CLAP!
The explosion triggers.
BOOM.
The explosion rocked the maze, fire and smoke engulfing the cognition. Akira reappeared meters away, slamming into the ground with a gasp as he coughed up blood. His body screamed in protest, his limbs trembling with exhaustion, but he forced himself upright, fumbling for the Bead in his pocket.
The glowing magical item radiated faint warmth in his hand. He hesitated, glancing at Corvus, who clutched his tape with one arm hanging uselessly at his side.
You’re running out of juice. You’ve got one Bead left after this. But Corvus—he’s hurt bad.
With a frustrated growl, Akira hurled the Bead toward Corvus. “Take it! Don’t argue—just keep moving!”
The maze shook like they were in a damn earthquake.
He vaguely remembers the words from the journals he had found earlier. "This maze—it's using power. It needs a source!"
As if to punctuate his words, the walls pulsed an ominous red. Akira turned sharply, eyes narrowing as a glitchy white text began to spread across the grid.
Stop process!
The words rippled, twisting into jagged shapes that blinked and jittered unnaturally.
Stop process!
Ș̵̘̈́́͠T̵̨̹̤̠̉͑̂̀͐ͅO̶̬͚͑͐P̴̳̹̍͗͝͝ͅ ̵͍͂̓͑ͅP̶̛̬̘̝̦̺͒̋͐͜͝͝R̵͉̤̩̈́̉́̍͋͂͘O̶̢͓̼̽̍͂͛͛͝͝C̵̡̲̘͕͉̹̔͑͛̀̚Ẻ̷̢̢̛̜̖̍̏͐S̷̹͓̬̯͉̀̎͌͌͋̆̋̎͠S̵̜̤̗̝̝͇̓͂͂̊͘?̴̛̝͓̈͘
The message multiplied, spiraling out of control, blanketing the maze’s walls. Akira could feel the static charge in the air, like a storm about to break.
The letters twisted and warped into unsettling, jagged shapes, multiplying until they covered every visible surface. But this time, the grid beneath Akira’s feet began to glow.
Red light spread outward, veins of energy snaking toward him like a predator honing in on its prey. His eyes widened in horror as the glow intensified, the maze itself breathing as it latched onto him.
“Oh no,” Akira whispered, the words barely audible over the crackling energy.
The text changed.
F҉i҉n҉d҉i҉n҉g҉ ҉n҉e҉w҉ ҉c҉l҉i҉e҉n҉t҉.҉.҉.
The words spiraled downward into a singular point—beneath Akira. The glow beneath him surged brighter, and walls began to build around him, fast and furious, like an unrelenting storm.
“Corvus!” Akira screamed, the maze shifting wildly as concentrated tentacles surged toward them, thick and barbed. “Don’t stay still!”
The tentacles slammed down between them with brutal force, tearing through the grid like a blade. Akira dove to the side as another mass shot toward him, slamming into the ground where he’d been standing moments before.
He looks up, finding a concentrated wall of pulsing green facing him.
"SHIT!" Because of course. "I KNOW A WAY OUT! I WILL TRY TO FIND MY WAY BACK TO YOU!"
no subject
-Kou's not sure what the fuck happens, dizzy with pain and exhaustion- until there's a bead being shoved in his face. The full heal is rejuvenating, even if it doesn't help the Persona situation, but he's been running on fumes for what feels like hours. With new energy and resolve, he runs together with Kira as the maze destabelizes- and fuck, Kira looks pretty goddamn badly hurt himself. Did he give Kou his last bead...?
Idiot-
A source of Power? "The obvious answer is Maruki, but how do we-?"
He's cut off by the maze rumbling further, ominous red words glowing through the grid. He barely gets the time to process before-
Tentacles surge between them, isolating them from each other. Kou is quick to avoid them, but he's also quick to notice something else.
They're targeting Kira.
Shit.
"Watch out! I don't know what he'll try to do if he catches you!" Kou calls back. "I'll meet you in the middle!"
One hand still clutched around his tape, the other goes to his gun, pointing them at the tentacles. With a snarl, he shoots the main tentacle dividing them.
"Hey, shithead! It was me you wanted, wasn't it? What, too much of a coward to come at me when I've so thoroughly rejected you?!"
He dodges out of the way as some smaller tentacles dive for him, the room's structure flashing and rumbling between locations, voices echoing. Kou steels himself against them, rushing forwards and hitting what he can.
"COME AND GET IT!"
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1/3
2/2 [TW: blood, injury]
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CW: vomit
Re: CW: vomit
Re: CW: vomit
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1/2- 10 minutes earlier
It looks serene. But Akira knows better.
He moves carefully through the overgrowth, crouched low as his sharp eyes dart around, scanning for movement. Sure enough, dark figures patrol the area—Shadows, their forms shaped like scientists, lab assistants, or occasionally floating black wraiths with white masks fixed onto their heads. They glide methodically, some murmuring to themselves like lost echoes of Maruki’s fractured reality.
Akira presses himself against a crumbling garden wall, peering out briefly before slipping further into the foliage. His heart pounds in his ears, and he’s already cursing himself for his earlier bravado on the phone. Calling reception might’ve been a long shot, but this—this sneaking around—is dangerous.
“Gotta love a guy who locks every entrance but leaves a garden wide open,” he mutters to himself under his breath, voice low and clipped as he slips past a Shadow obliviously fussing over a clipboard.
Up close, it’s even more unsettling.
The building is sprawling, a patchwork of dreamlike architecture—smooth glass panes framed by ethereal golden light, swirling columns of marble, and impossible floating sections of staircases that spiral and vanish into nothing. Some parts of the lab gleam with pristine, heavenly light, while others seem to sink into shadow, darker than any void Akira has seen.
His brow furrows as he scans the rear side of the building, his gaze narrowing in on a particular detail: vines. Long, thick tendrils twist along the walls, creeping up the glass panes on the second floor. One of the windows has an unnatural haze to it, like it’s flickering between states of reality.
Akira keeps watching, and then he sees it—a Shadow researcher or something emerging onto a rickety fire escape-like platform suspended on a floating staircase. They’re alone, pulling a key from their coat- locking away the door before turning around and placing the key back in- shuffling through a file clutched to their chest before glancing briefly over the edge and heading back inside.
An opportunity.
Akira sprints toward the base of the wall, sticking close to the shadows cast by the larger vines and foliage and grabs it with a hand. He and Goro have went bouldering before and he only needs to make it to the first floor from where he can use his teleportation powers to take advantage of the situation. The good part? For some reason this place was as easy to scale and jump around in like back in Mementos which he guesses...made sense. There were shadows here. Whatever this place meant.
He pauses only for a breath, checks that the fire escape staircase remains open as the shadow still stands there, then uncoils his whip with a flick of his wrist. The leather sings through the air with a sharp snap as he hooks it to the platform’s railing.
He glances at the watch which shows the footage of the camera now hooked onto the other end of the whip. He heaves a deep breath as he watches the shadow walk past, not noticing his little prop hooked onto the railing as he goes for the sunglasses tucked in his collar and switches it with his usual frames. Once the dark haze settles over him, his eyes narrow down like sharp blades.
CLAP!
CLAP!
Suddenly, his body shimmers, momentarily dissolving into fractal-like particles before snapping back into place on top of the fire escape platform—and directly above the Shadow researcher.
Akira wastes no time. The second his boots hit the platform, he flips out a small flashbomb with a practiced motion as he tosses the bomb downward.
“You—!” the Shadow starts, but it’s too late.
The flashbomb detonates.
A blinding white burst of light floods the narrow space, accompanied by the crackling pop of the bomb dispersing. The Shadow cries out in shock, fumbling backward and clutching at its mask as the light overwhelms its senses.
Akira doesn’t hesitate. He steps into the Shadow’s space with swift, deliberate movements, gripping the edge of its lab coat as the scuffle ensues. The Shadow thrashes, swiping wildly at him, but Akira is quicker—ducking beneath its arms and twisting the coat free before shoving the stunned Shadow to the ground.
The Shadow lets out a faint groan, already beginning to dissipate into black smoke.
Akira stands over it, panting softly as he flicks the coat into place over his shoulders. He adjusts the collar, straightens the fabric, and pulls his sunglasses a little higher onto his nose.
“Not bad. It even fits.”
He spares a glance back at the ruined flashbomb, smoke still curling in the air, before giving the fallen Shadow a small, mocking salute.
“Appreciate the uniform.”
With that, he turns around and starts retracing the shadow's steps. The place's effects certainly help him to propel around easily without putting a strain on his body as he makes it to the entrance. He hums, patting the pocket as he still looks through the bunch of keys. Jesus fucking christ, that's almost a dozen. Maruki has tight security>
Not his style of checking every key but what can you do?
2/2- right on maruki's protest
The further he went, the more bizarre this portion of the Palace became. It was as if he’d stumbled into a forgotten place, an area that Maruki himself had abandoned. Shadows patrolled lazily, muttering incoherently under their breaths, but Akira’s movements were quick and precise, a silent glide from corner to corner.
His boots made little sound as he crept along the edge of a wall, his borrowed lab coat fluttering faintly as he passed one darkened hallway after another before the light started giving way. Growing more polished by the second as he sprinted down a very inclined set of white stairs.
His focus was unwavering, eyes sharp and alert with his dagger and a gun strapped to his shoulder—until something stopped him in his tracks.
A void.
Akira blinked. At first, he thought it was a trick of the low light, but no—the hallway ahead didn’t simply end. It dissolved. A chunk of this area had been ripped out, like a missing piece of a puzzle. Beyond the jagged edge where tile and concrete abruptly stopped, there was only black, an oppressive nothingness swallowing whatever had once been here.
“The hell…?” Akira whispered under his breath.
Despite himself, he stepped closer, drawn to the strange scene. The edges of the broken room were frayed and uneven, as though the Palace itself had been violently torn. There was a sense of collapse here, as if time and purpose had disintegrated and left only this wreckage behind.
He stepped into what remained of the space. The air was colder here. Papers littered the floor in messy heaps, some stained and torn. Broken lab equipment lay scattered—test tubes shattered like fragile ice, microscope lenses cracked and clouded with dust. A few chairs were overturned, their legs bent awkwardly.
“Some kind of… lab?” Akira murmured, his voice barely audible. He knelt to the floor, curiosity tugging at him. Amid the papers, one stood out: an almost-burnt journal entry or some sort of lab report, the edges charred but the middle still legible.
He picked it up carefully, holding it close to his face in the dim light. Words were scrawled across the page in hurried handwriting.
Akira furrowed his brow, flipping through more of the scattered documents. Half-burned reports, calculations, diagrams of something resembling tangled corridors. Words like “cognitive construction,” “Azathoth integration,” and “initial parameters” jumped out at him, but nothing made total sense.
“Maruki… What the hell were you doing here?”
He straightened up, clutching the journal entry as he scanned the ruined space again. His mind buzzed. The maze design sounded familiar—like a concept Maruki had toyed with in his own universe but it was far different. Those were linked to photos. Not magic or the cognitive mumbo jumbo this place was built on. But here… it was raw. Broken. Dangerous.
Before he could dig any further, a voice snapped through the silence.
“Hey!”
Akira froze.
A Shadow researcher stood at the room’s entrance, wearing a pristine lab coat. Its face was obscured beneath that uncanny mask Shadows often wore, but its posture was sharp, suspicious.
“What are you doing here?” the researcher demanded, stepping forward. Its voice was clipped, low, and reverberated faintly like static. “This area is off-limits to unauthorized personnel.”
Akira’s heart jumped to his throat, but his expression remained cool. What the fuck- He slipped the journal page into his coat pocket with a flick of his wrist before spinning around to face the Shadow.
“Ah, my bad!” Akira raised his hands in an exaggerated gesture of sheepishness, flashing an awkward grin. “Guess I got turned around. You know how it is. Big palace. Lots of corridors.”
The Shadow didn’t move. Its head tilted slightly, unblinking.
Akira cleared his throat, straightening his coat with feigned authority. “I’m, uh, here for the cause, obviously.” He waved vaguely behind him as if the wrecked lab explained itself. “I was just… double-checking inventory. Can’t have too much trouble, right?”
There was a beat of silence. The Shadow took a step closer.
“You’re an intern?”it asked skeptically.
Akira nodded quickly. “Yup. Totally. Big fan of the work being done here.”
The Shadow regarded him carefully, and Akira fought to keep his easygoing mask intact. He could almost feel it scrutinizing him, the silence dragging out for far too long. Then—
“Why are you wearing a lead supervisor’s coat?”
Akira blinked.
“...Huh?”
The Shadow’s mask seemed to narrow in suspicion, its voice turning sharp. “The coat. That’s not standard intern issue.”
Akira glanced down at himself, a sinking feeling in his gut. The lab coat. The one he’d stolen. Of course it looked important—high-quality stitching, extra pockets, some frilly insignia on the cuff. Lead supervisor.
“Uh...I am his...favourite intern?”
The Shadow took another step closer. Its head cocked again, sniffing faintly at the air, the motion alien and unsettling.
"...Your scent...”
Akira stared, his brows furrowing. Scent? What the hell was it talking about?
“Okay, that’s weird,” he muttered under his breath. He took a step back instinctively, fingers flexing near the hilt of his dagger, already planning the fastest route out.
The Shadow suddenly stiffened. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
Uh-oh.
Before the Shadow could react further, Akira darted. With a sharp spin on his heel, he lunged for the nearest corner around the hallway sprawled before the otherwise destroyed void or room, his coat flaring out behind him as he sprinted.
“Intruder alert!” the Shadow roared, its voice echoing through the darkened corridors.
Akira’s pulse spiked as alarms blared to life, red warning lights flickering across the ceiling. Shadows stirred somewhere beyond the hallway, their voices rising in angered, distorted calls.
“Fantastic,” Akira hissed, leaping over the broken equipment as he bolted for the nearest door. “I’m not getting paid enough for this.”
The echoes of pursuing footsteps grew louder as he looks over a certain legend mounted on the top that read a few different locations marked like how some hospitals or labs posessed.
His eyes locked onto Reception and the chaos screeching in the phone call earlier.
Corvus.
That has to be it.