Chapter Text
Out of all the things Kotone expected to see today, a random door standing in the middle of Leblanc was not one of them.
I mean, sure, granted, random doors were basically a staple of the Persona user experience. She couldn’t go five feet without running into another damn Velvet Room door around Tokyo, so hey, was another random ass doorway sitting where it shouldn’t be really all that surprising?
In a vacuum, the answer was probably no.
But this wasn’t a vacuum. This was Leblanc. And right now, this spooky, extradimensional, completely out of place door was standing between her and a cup of coffee with her girlfriend.
“Hey, Ren?” Kotone cleared her throat, peering around the side of the door to where Ren stood standing behind the bar, as nonplussed as ever. “Why is there a door here?”
“Oh, you can see it?” Ren blinked, shrugging as he cleaned a mug. “Not sure. It’s been there for a few hours.”
“A few hours?” Aigis tilted her head, inspecting the doorway carefully. It just seemed like, well, a normal door. Maybe a little chipped and worn, but it was… a door. “Has it not disrupted business?”
“Nobody else can see it.” Ren placed the mug down on the counter, leaning forwards across the bar. “I tried to get Morgana to smack it, but he just ran off to go get fatty tuna from Futaba.”
“...huh.” Kotone blinked, sitting at the bar and frowning at the door. “Has it done anything?”
“It’s a door, Ko.” Ren deadpanned. “It sat there. Menacingly.”
“I don’t find it particularly menacing.” Aigis narrowed her eyes, reaching out to touch the door. It was solid. Unflinching. A door. “More… strange.”
“Super strange.” Kotone blinked. “So what, you were just going to like, leave it there?’
“Eh.” Ren just shrugged.
There was a long moment of silence.
“...wanna check it out?”
“Hell yeah I wanna check it out!” Kotone sprung to her feet, grinning. “We can’t not .”
“We most certainly could not.” Aigis nodded, cracking her neck and taking Kotone’s hand. “However, I believe we also certainly should .”
“Cool.” Ren pulled off his apron, shooting a quick text to the groupchat.
---
THE PHANTOM CHAT OF HEARTS
trickstered
hey, me angel and nyx are gonna go explore an interdimensional doorway
be back soon
skulln’bones
what
darkhourdanger
We’ll let you know how it goes! (´∀`)
officerbuchimaru
what
---
“Alright. Got my will in place.” Ren nodded at the other two. “You ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.” Kotone grinned, reaching for the doorhandle. “You gonna say it?”
“Sure.” Ren smirked, stepping through the open door. “It’s Showtime.”
---
Beyond the looking glass, the three Thieves found… a hallway. An apartment building hallway, to be precise. A rather crappy apartment building hallway, to be even more precise. Dinghy, rife with mold and mildew, adorned with a long-worn carpet that wafted with a smell Kotone couldn’t quite describe. Carefully they stepped forwards, looking around with… appropriately uneasy expressions. The door swung shut behind them, closing with a soft click. Something about their sensibilities told them it wouldn’t be opening again, at least not for a while.
And they were well and truly alone in Wonderland.
“So.” Kotone cleared her throat. “What’s the action on us being in the backrooms?”
“2000 yen says we aren’t.” Ren shook his head, looking around. “Feels more like an SCP to me.”
“I believe it is neither.” Aigis appraised Ren for a moment, looking him up and down. “However, it appears we are not in the Metaverse. You are still Ren, and I am still Aigis.”
“Huh.” Ren looked himself over, frowning. “Looks like it.”
“So what, no codenames then?” Kotone inspected the hallway carefully. It lead off in either direction, turning a corner not far from the three Thieves. “Works for me. Where to, Ren?’
“...that sounds wrong. Let’s do codenames.” Ren, Joker, shook his head. “And let’s go… this way.”
He set off down the hallway to the right, hands in his pockets. Aigis, Angel, glanced at her partner, shrugging. Kotone, Nyx, just shrugged back, following after Joker.
Off to see what awaited them in Wonderland.
The answer, or at the very least the first answer would come when they turned the corner and ran into a girl with fire in her eyes.
A girl who happened to look nearly exactly like Joker.
---
Joker’s first reaction upon running literally headfirst into a girl who looked essentially as if she could be his sister, was to say “Ow.”
Joker’s second reaction upon running literally headfirst into a girl who looked essentially as if she could be his sister, was to take a step back and just… stare.
The girl was… well, she looked like him. Nearly exactly. Same messy hair, same perched eyeglasses, same familiar Shujin uniform. The same. The only notable difference was, well, she was a girl. A girl who elected to use a tad more flowery language as she gazed back at her double. “What the fuck?”
“Uh… Joker?” Nyx blinked, glancing between the two dopplegangers as her hand instinctively went to her Evoker. “Why are there two of you? And why is the other one… uh…” Nyx wasn’t sure how to verbalize the fact that the girl before them was, y’know, a girl, without making things even more awkward than they were.
“I doubt he knows, sweetheart.” Angel blinked, carefully dropping into a combat stance. “Stranger, identify yoursel-”
She was cut off by Joker raising his hand, a strange look in his eyes as he looked over the girl standing across from him. Carefully, he leaned forwards. “I am thou…”
Nyx was pretty sure what he wanted to hear back. A ‘Thou art I…’ would make things remarkably clearer, as weird as that sounded.
Instead, the girl just fainted.
Dropped to the floor, stone cold, outright fainted.
“...smooth.” Nyx sighed, holstering her Evoker and standing upright. “Nice going Joker. You killed her.”
“She is breathing.” Angel shook her head, dropping out of her combat stance. “I believe he simply shocked her into fainting.”
“I mean, I guess that’s better.” Nyx blinked. “Is she gonna be okay?”
“She’ll be fine.” Joker nodded at the girl, who was already stirring and pulling herself back to her feet. “See?”
“You’re… real. You’re actually there. Okay. Okaaaay.” The girl stumbled, sighing as she looked between the three Thieves. “Alright. Okay. I… I’m normal, I’m fine, completely and totally, most definitely fine.”
The girl, as far as Nyx could tell, was most certainly not fine. The fainting was one thing, of course, but she also seemed to be taking the sudden appearance of her doppelganger a lot worse than Joker was.
Maybe that wasn’t surprising, considering Joker never seemed to approach situations with anything less than pure straightforward mania, but the comparison between how the two seemed to be dealing with the sudden encounter was enough to elicit a pang in Nyx’s heart.
She felt bad for the girl.
“Uh, hey.” Nyx cleared her throat, stepping forwards with her hands raised in front of her calmingly. “Sorry about that. Joker can be a little, uh, weird.”
“Weird is relative, Nyx.” Joker smirked, shrugging, eyes still locked on the new girl.
“...yeah. Weird.” Nyx smiled, trying to reassure the stranger. “Are you alright?”
“I’ve… been better, but I guess I can’t complain” The girl smiled faintly back, still clearly rather shook. After a moment, that too faltered. “So… ‘Joker’, huh… guess that’s not unique to me, it seems.”
“You are also Joker?” Angel tilted her head, frowning. “So then you are… what, exactly? Do you live here?”
“Why would I live in a dingy apartment building? I’m going to take a wild, wild guess ‘cuz this is a wild, wild situation…” The girl narrowed in on Joker, staring at him appraisingly. “You live at Leblanc, correct?”
“Yep.” Joker nodded, smirking. “You too?”
“Yeah, I do.” The girl looked suddenly defeated. Well, more defeated anyways. Like she was suddenly processing just what it all meant. “So… did the door to your Leblanc lead you and your friends to this place?”
“Not really.” Joker shrugged. “It was inside.”
“Indeed. Standing there.” Angel nodded severely. “Moderately menacingly.”
“Huh. Well…” The girl took a look around, seemingly not impressed by the group’s surroundings. “Since we’re all kinda… well… stuck together… I guess… Introductions?”
“Sure!” Nyx smiled broadly. Now that the early awkwardness of… uh, whatever this was, had begun to fade, she was getting back in the groove of things. “Wait, codenames or-”
“Ren Amamiya.” Ren smirked, holding his hand out to shake. “It’s nice to meet me.”
The girl took his hand, though much more hesitantly than he had. “Hello, Ren. I’m Rin Amamiya.”
“Rin?” Kotone blinked. Wow, so they really were just… the same. Though, by first impressions Rin seemed much more… uh, grounded than Ren. “It’s nice to meet you! I’m Kotone Shiomi, and this is Aigis Kirijo.”
“Greetings.” Aigis bowed her head. “A pleasure to meet you, even if circumstances are… strange.”
“Yeah, strange is a word for it alright…” Rin seemed to appraise them all for a moment, as if searching for some kind of sign from either them, or the strange place in which they had found themselves. “Well, since we’re all acquainted now… I guess, do you guys wanna look around with me?”
"I don't see why not." Ren nodded, a strange glint forming in his eyes. "Who leads? You or me?"
Rin seemed to consider it for a moment, eyes still darting around the room. Eventually, she just shrugged. "I think you should. I, uh, am still a little 'unsure', I guess would be the word."
"Works for me." Ren nodded, spinning around and gesturing for the others to follow. "Let's pick up the pace."
And then he set off without another word, heading straight down the hallway in the opposite direction of where Rin had emerged from. Kotone and Aigis simply watched for a long moment, long-used to his hijinks but nonetheless befuddled.
He was taking all of this… shockingly well.
"Sorry about him, I'm not sure how things are where you're from, but Ren is…" Kotone paused, searching for the words. "...well, he's Ren."
"Indeed." Aigis nodded, crossing her arms. "Though, he is usually not so upfront as to do this with strangers."
Rin actually laughed at that. Something about the sound put Kotone at ease. Despite the evident difference in… well, whatever had happened for there to be two Jokers, Rin still laughed like Ren did. It made her smile, even as strange as things were. “Yeah, I imagine so. Let’s catch up, before I lose more of my sanity.” Rin followed after her double without another word, not looking back as the two other Thieves stepped into line behind her.
Honestly, Kotone was bursting with questions. About Rin, about where she’d come from, about what her Phantom Thieves were like. Everything, really. But the poor girl still seemed so overwhelmed from what had happened. Her questions could wait until later.
…mostly.
---
Aigis took stock of the situation.
She was the only one that could, really. Not that there was any fault in that when it came to her companions, but she prided herself on having a measured head during times like these. Especially , during times like these. Ren was too busy trailblazing the unknown, his double seemed to still be recovering from the encounter, and Kotone had of course jumped at the chance to make a new friend like she was seemingly universally compelled to do. As benign as Rin had evidently turned out to be, that didn’t change their situation. They were in a strange place, with seemingly no path home, and no real means to defend themselves to any meaningful degree. In their rush to explore the unknown, they had left their equipment back home, and with the lack of Metaverse distortion to grant Ren his mask and herself her android form, their options were startlingly low.
They had Kotone’s Evoker, of course. And Ren would never be caught dead without his dagger. Though it was a dangerous assumption, Rin also seemed like the kind to keep herself armed at any given moment. That left them with one means of summoning Personae, and one or two melee weapons. It was certainly better than nothing, but if this place proved to be dangerous, then Aigis wouldn’t consider herself particularly happy about what they had on hand.
So far, however, her fears had been unrealized. This place seemed to just be a mostly empty apartment building. No Shadows, or hostile cognitions, or… well, anything really. Just multiple floors of seemingly randomly assorted rooms that had no place being in a building like this. There was a large formal dining hall, a pool, a room that seemed at first glance to be ripped straight from a back-alley mahjong club, and a dozen other more mundane places that didn’t seem as if they belonged here at all. All strange, all at least moderately asynchratic, all unhelpful in determining where exactly they were.
Kotone, for her part, did not seem particularly interested in where they were, and more so in who they were there with . She trailed behind Rin, asking her a variety of questions that… well, probably weren’t the most important to know at the moment, but definitely satiated her curiosity. At least, Aigis figured, it would help them understand just who they were stuck here with.
“So, you’re also Joker, huh?” Kotone grinned, hands behind her back as she leaned forwards. “That means you also have your own Phantom Thieves, right?”
“Yeah, I do.” Rin nodded, a hint of pride in her voice. “We’ve done some, uh pretty crazy things so far, which I’m sure Ren has as well.” She paused for a moment, seemingly glancing between Kotone and Aigis. “Are you two also a part of the Phantom Thieves?”
“Yep! Founding members!” Kotone nodded, bouncing on her feet. “Well, I guess technically Morgana, Ren, and Ryuji beat us to the punch, but… yeah, basically founding members. Are we not on the team where you’re from?”
“Nope. I don’t know anyone named Kotone,” Rin hummed, glancing at Aigis. “And I’m pretty sure I’d have noticed another natural blonde at Shujin.”
That gave Aigis pause, if only for a moment. She knew her and Kotone’s circumstances weren’t what you could ever call ‘normal’, but the idea that they would somehow be absent from whatever string of events had prompted Rin’s band of Thieves to form… it was disturbing.
If not, admittedly, somewhat expected.
“That makes sense.” Aigis glanced at the female Joker, mentally assesing their situation. “Or at the very least, it does not surprise me. We are…”
“Different.” Ren said, not looking back. Of course he would be listening.
“Yeah. Different.” Kotone shrugged. “Oh, wait, if you know a natural blonde, that means Ann is part of your Thieves, right? Is she still a girl, or is everyone-” Kotone paused midway through her sentence, seemingly realizing the absurd nature of her question. “Uh… y’know, flipped?”
“Yeah, Ann’s a part of my time." Time? Interesting terminology. "You mentioned Ryuji earlier too. They’re a part of my team, Shiho Suzui as well.”
“Shiho?” Kotone nearly stumbled over her feet. She clearly hadn’t been expecting that. Aigis would have found the gesture somewhat cute, if it hadn’t been brought on by such a serious topic. “Oh, that’s… I mean, good for her. Really good, actually. I’m glad to hear that.”
“I… I am going to go out on a limb and say Shiho isn’t on your guys’ team.” Rin seemed to have picked up on the way Kotone struggled for a moment. Not that it was particularly hard to spot, but still.
“No, she’s…” Kotone paused, lost for words.
“She’s in the hospital.” Ren elected to pick up the slack, glancing back at Rin. “Recovering.”
Rin frowned at that. Even if they had dodged mentioning exactly what had sent her there, Aigis had a sense that Rin could tell what was responsible by the way Kotone’s face fell. Or rather, who was responsible. For a moment, Aigis remembered the odd rage she had felt when she first locked eyes with Kamoshida. The certainty in her heart that he was going to do something terrible.
She had been right.
It really was good that at least one Shiho seemed to have had an opportunity to do something about it.
“So.” Rin cleared her throat, changing the subject. “Do you guys have someone that acts as your navigator?”
“Just Mona, for now.” Kotone nodded enthusiastically. “Wait, you… do have Morgana, right?”
“Yeah we do. However, we did pick someone up that’s basically become our full-on navigator thanks to his Persona.” Aigis frowned at that. His? They hadn’t seen anyone with those kinds of abilities aside from Morgana. “A guy named Yusuke joined up with us, and his Persona basically allows him to see and sense shadows weaknesses after some analysis is done.”
“Yusuke?” Aigis blinked. That was unexpected. “Yusuke Kitigawa? He is a member of our team. But, as far as we can tell, he is not a Navigator.”
“Huh.” Rin hummed, looking thoughtful. “What’s his Persona for you guys?”
“Goemon.” Kotone nodded, making some sort of gesture towards her forehead that Aigis could only assume was meant to allude to the Persona’s hairdoo. “Icy samurai guy? Big coat?”
“Goemon, huh?” Rin nodded, smiling amusedly. “For us, it’s Utamaro.”
“And it allows him to navigate?” Angel furrowed her brow. The idea of Yusuke navigating… it was certainly interesting, to say the least. “Strange. But I suppose the idea of him in combat would be strange to you as well.”
“It kinda is. He’s been so fascinated with Palaces, Shadows and everything else that it’s a bit hard to not imagine him having Utamaro conjure paintings every other minute.” Rin chuckled, looking more than a little wistful. “I will say, it’s pretty handy that he makes us maps.”
“He makes you maps?” Ren frowned, shaking his head. “He paints me skill cards.”
“Making our own maps would be useful… but I kinda think we’d be missing out not seeing Fox in action.” Kotone nodded determinedly. “I never knew fighting Shadows could be artsy before watching him.”
“Indeed.” Aigis nodded. “It is rather inefficient. Pretty. But inefficient.”
“I see.” Rin smiled. “Glad to see that he puts his artfulness into combat, too.”
“Yusuke’s still Yusuke, I guess. Whatever universe.” Kotone nodded happily. “I’m glad, honestly.”
“Me too. It may be a bit too early to say but I hope that whenever…” Rin faltered, gesturing around her. “...all this is done, we all get to go back to everyone.”
“We will.” Ren nodded. “I got a good feeling.”
“And with Ren, that counts for a lot.” Kotone grinned at Rin, trying to be reassuring. “Don’t worry. We’ll be fine.”
“I suppose so.” Rin nodded.
“Perhaps we should investigate more of these doors. They may lead to an exit.” Aigis nodded pensively.
“Good idea!” Kotone paused at one of the doors, pulling it open. “Oh. Huh.”
Huh?
“ ‘Oh, huh’ what?” Rin asked, peeking over Kotone’s shoulder. Aigis did the same. Inside the room was one ridiculously long pool table. Like, at least three times longer and twice as wide as normal.
“Oh.” Aigis blinked. “I see.”
“I’ll be honest.” Kotone took a few steps into the room, poking the table. “This is kinda cool.”
Aigis just watched for a long moment. So did Ren. So did Rin. None of them were quite sure what to make of it.
“It really is.” Rin finally nodded. “You could hold some insane games of pool here.”
“I know, right?” Kotone grinned. “Think we could find some more people to play?”
“Hopefully.” Rin nodded in agreement. “If I’m gonna be stuck here for some time, I might as well do something fun.”
“Agreed!” Kotone nodded, heading back to the door. “Are you any good?”
“Heh, I like to think I’m pretty good.” Rin nodded, then mumbled something Aigis didn’t quite catch.
“What was that last bit?”
Ren for his part did evidently catch it, offering his other self a fistbump. She took it without comment, a look passing between the two that Aigis wasn't sure if she was happy about. It was too… Joker, for her liking.
“How about we search all of these rooms on this floor?" Rin glanced back out into the hall. "Just see what this place has to offer?”
"Sounds good to me!" Kotone nodded, nearly bounding out the door back into the hall. "Where should we start?"
“Well, we could just work our way backwards from here, just peek inside the rooms.” Rin looked back down the hall where they had come from. “Then do the rest past the pool room here.”
“Sounds good to me.” Ren nodded, gesturing for the others to follow as he began to head back. “Aigis, you do left side. Kotone, right.”
“Got it Ren!” Kotone nodded enthusiastically.
“You do left, I do right?” Rin looked to Ren, who just nodded.
“Let’s see what’s behind door number one.”
And so, they got to exploring.
---
Most of the floor was boring, Ren was sorry to say. Just rooms upon rooms of varying levels of mild interest, none of which really stuck out to him. It was disappointing, more than anything. They hadn’t found anything weird like the pool table again. That is, until he heard Rin open a door behind him.
“Hey… uh…” Rin cleared her throat peering into one of the rooms. From beyond the threshold, Ren heard the sound of… crying? “I found something, but… Um.”
Ren shut the door he was looking through, making his way over to his double and peering over her shoulder. Inside was a room full of Mishimas. Almost chock-full, in fact. They were all sitting in a circle, weeping. Just, outright bawling actually.
“Oh.” He blinked. “Interesting.”
There wasn’t really much more to say. Somehow the idea that a bunch of Mishima would find their way here and start crying… it made more sense than he cared to admit.
They kept watching for a moment. Then two. Then three. Finally, Rin turned to Ren. “Let’s show Kotone and Aigis.”
“Why?” Ren raised an eyebrow. “Seems like cruel and unusual punishment.”
“Maybe so.” Rin shrugged. “But this seems like a once-in-a-lifetime moment that shouldn’t be passed up.”
Well, he couldn’t argue with that.
“Ko, Aigis!” Ren glanced down the hall. “Could you come here for a second?’
There was no response. Ren blinked, glancing at Rin.
“Uh, Kotone? Aigis?” Rin echoed Ren’s call, looking down the hall.
There was silence for another moment, before Aigis peeked her head out of one of the doors. She looked… concerned. “Have you seen Kotone?”
Ren hadn’t. At least, not for a while. He glanced at Rin, curious if she had spotted her. All he got back was a simple. “Nope.”
To be honest, Ren wasn’t surprised, nor was he particularly worried. Kotone could handle herself. Still, Aigis didn’t seem to share the sentiment, coming over to the two Jokers with a deep frown. “I have not been able to find her. What is it that you have…” She caught sight of the Mishimas, stopping in her tracks. “...found?”
Rin simply shrugged.
“I… do not like this.” Aigis bit her lip, eyes darting around. “We should find Kotone as soon as possible.”
Ren nodded. As… interesting as the room full of Mishimas was, finding Kotone was probably more important, if only because he knew just how Aigis got when she was worried about her. Rin seemed to agree, closing the door to the Mishima room and looking between the other two.
“Well, let’s look around then. She’s gotta be nearby.”
“Bold assumption.” Ren shook his head. “This is Kotone we’re talking about here.”
“She can’t be that bad.” Rin shrugged, doubtful.
“She once ran headfirst against a boss Shadow.” Aigis shook her head. “ Before awakening her Persona. We must find her quickly.”
Ren shrugged, looking to Rin. “You heard the lady.”
“Alrighty then.” Rin made her way over to some of the nearby doors, checking behind them carefully. After a moment, Ren and Aigis joined her. It was mostly just the same boring doors, the same boring rooms. The same… lack of Kotone.
So, obviously the question was, where the hell did she go?