Click Here for Update 44
: “Yeah, she was going on about domestic abuse and taking the case to court and stuff…”
: “…”
: “What’s up?”
: “… It’s nothing. So to summarize what you told us, Futaba is Boss’s daughter, and he’s abusing her? I don’t know her very well… is he really the kind of person who would do that?”
: Nah, Atlus already did the whole “One of your social links was secretly the villain the entire time” thing in Persona 4. Their writers are better than - actually, who the fuck am I kidding no they’re not.
: “I would like to believe so as well, but we don’t have any conclusive evidence, do we?”
: “Is it Alibaba!?”
: “What a selfish person.”
: “Well, he does have information on us…”
: “Anyways, this Futaba he’s talking about have a Palace? If so, we’ll need keywords to get in. Try messaging him about 'em.”
: I didn’t realize it, but this is another slip (which I don’t think was intentional, unlike the one with Akechi) on Hashino’s part. Why would they need to meet Alibaba at all?
: “He can’t go out?”
: “Huh…? Did he just shut the whole operation down?”
: “This doesn’t make any sense.. not only can Alibaba not go out, but he won’t let us meet Futaba either?”
: “Well, it’s none of our business now. We can’t contact him anymore.”
: “But.. what do we do about Medjed? We won’t be able to get Alibaba to help us with them now.”
: “Maybe they were just prankin’ us. They made that huge declaration, but they ain’t done nothing since. I bet we got 'em freaked out.”
: “You mean they backed out because they’re afraid we’ll change their hearts?”
: “Yup. And now it’d just make 'em look lame if they came out and apologized!”
: “But-”
: “I guess with Alibaba and Medjed outta the picture, can we just say this case is closed?”
: “…You do have a point. I guess it is safe for us to relax a little.”
: I’m kind of surprised it was only $1500, given that the entire briefcase was plated with what was presumably way more than an ounce of solid gold (at time of writing, gold has a spot price around $1700 an ounce).
: “That’s awesome! We can really go all out with that kinda money!”
: “Yeah! Let’s make up for what happened at the fireworks festival! We gotta go eat somethin’ fittin’ for the Phantom Thieves’ worldwide debut!”
: “Where would be good?”
: “Ooh, how 'bout sushi!? I could really go for some eel too!”
: Joker taps Yusuke on the arm as if to say “No, Yusuke, we talked about this. You are a human being and not some kind of ginger gremlin.”
: “I’m all for sushi! You’re okay with that too, right?”
: “Then it’s decided.”
: “All right! We’ll go tomorrow night!”
: We spend the night crafting useless garbage again, and again we get the extra point. I think we might have enough extra time that I can fit in the rest of the books in one run and then do the game console games in another.
: Oh, right! I read in a thread on /v/ that apparently, Akechi’s new confidant scenes for Royal were basically ripped from the P5 anime. I should really get around to watching that at some point.
: “The Phantom Thieves made a mockery of us when they brought down Kaneshiro.. and to make matters worse, Medjed, who has been dormant for some time now, just declared war on them. How much more can they screw us over?”
: “Stress is bad for the skin, you know.”
: “Did you come all this way simply to be sarcastic?”
: “How about you listen to my deductions for a change of pace? You may think it absurd… but don’t you think the case you’re pursuing and the actions of the Phantom Thieves overlap somehow?”
: “What are you basing this off of?”
: Someone once told Sae something was ‘based’ and she spent days trying to answer the question ‘based on what?’.
: “The one point of commonality across all cases is how those involved have an unforeseen change of heart.”
: “I’ve suspected that myself, but those suspicions are unfounded.”
: “I told you at the beginning that this was only a deduction. These ‘just’ Phantom Thieves are riling up the public. However, that is a disguise. Their true goal is terrorist action by way of psychotic breakdowns… is that too much?”
: Now look, I’m not saying John Persona caused the breakdowns, but John Persona caused the breakdowns.
: Meanwhile, Joker is eating sushi and Yusuke asks him “So wait, what’s our entire goal anyway?”, to which Joker responds “I dunno.”
: Ryuji looks over and goes “Can.. can we bring Bionicle back?”
: “There’s nothing at the moment that falsifies that claim. Have you mentioned this to the police?”
: “I’d never tell them such things. The only value they have to me is in their mobility and organizational capabilities.”
: “I’m glad to hear that. What about your case, Sae-san? Did you learn anything from the guardian of that mental shutdown victim’s daughter?”
: And now we know what Futaba’s deal is. They could’ve, you know, saved this for the actual dungeon.
: “Nothing at all.”
: “I see. Now, what should my next action be for our victory?”
: “Handle the Phantom Thieves. Without remorse. Use any means necessary to win. That’s how I would deal with them.”
: chuckle “Very well.”
: “This seems to be fun for you. Are you on to something?”
: “No, not at all. Well then, to our victory.”
: “I-I don’t see any prices listed here…”
: “It’s called market price. Don’t worry 'bout it; we got the cash!”
: “Sooo goooooood…”
: “Hey, is the fatty tuna ready yet?”
: “Hold your horses. And don’t talk!”
: “By the way, Akira-kun.. is Boss really the kind of person who would abuse someone?”
: “That again?”
: “I can’t get it off my mind. Especially if it means he could be taken to court… what kind of person is he? Do you truly believe he’d do such a thing?”
: “Hm…”
: “If it’s really true about the abuse, he’d be a no-good jerk pretendin’ to be a guardian.”
: “Maybe the chief is the one who needs a change of heart…”
: You know what would’ve been a good scene instead of some of the ones we got? Imagine a scene where the party (pre-Makoto) spends time trying to see if anyone they know has a Palace.
: “Sounds to me like there wasn’t a hit.”
: “Right. Anything beyond this is his family’s problem. We probably shouldn’t get any more involved.”
: “Wait.. you think Alibaba could be Boss’s ex-wife!? He musta cheated on her, and that’s where Futaba came from.”
: “Still, this is delicious. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it before.”
: God dammit.
: “U-Ummm.. Ph-Phan.. Fantastic! This sushi is delicious!”
: “Kamoshida’s Palace. At this time of year, at this time of day, localized entirely within your kitchen… may I see it?”
: “Y-Yeah! The fish is so fresh!”
: “Think about where we are, Ryuji.”
: “Sorry, it just kinda slipped…”
: “My apologies for bringing up Boss again. We should just enjoy the food.”
: When I got to this point, I was kind of surprised to see this scene was still in the game as-is and hadn’t been reworked.
: If you’ll recall, back when we met Akechi at the TV station, I mentioned that in the base game he was an auto-confidant. This scene was his Rank 2 scene in the base game.
: “Akechi-kun…”
: “Akechi?”
: “You’re the ones from the TV station.. could it be that you’re friends of Niijima-san?”
: I bet Joker wishes he didn’t. Look at that goddamn sweater vest.
: “It’s nice to meet you. My name is Akechi. Glad to make your acquaintance, Yusuke Kitagawa.”
: “How do you know my name?”
: “Well, because I’m a psychic, of course. Haha, I’m only joking. In truth, I’m a rookie detective. You’re a former pupil of Madrame, right?”
: “I have actually just recently joined the investigation team looking into the Phantom Thieves. Did you see that Medjed has declared war on them?”
: “War?”
: Metal Gear!?
: “Their website was updated just a moment ago.”
: “Wait, what!?”
: “What’s it say!?”
: “Hm? Why do you seem so agitated?”
: “Oh, um…”
: “She’s, uh.. a huge fan of the Phantom Thieves. A total nutjob for 'em.”
: “Hm, I don’t know how wise it is to be a fan of groups like them.”
: “What is with these comments?”
: “My apologies. I didn’t mean to butt into your conversation. But I must say, this is an interesting group. Prosecutor Niijima’s sister, an ex-pupil of Madarame, and a few Shujin Academy students… it seems you’re all connected to the Phantom Thieves. Perhaps you have better intel than I do.”
: “Ah yes, I wanted to ask you something. Regarding this whole Medjed commotion… if you were one of the Phantom Thieves, what would you do?”
: “Unsurprising. I suppose you aren’t interested in such gossip..”
: “Sorry to disappoint, but we’re just normal high school kids. If anything, we wanna hear what you gotta say, Mr. Detective.”
: I wish Joker would pull a Tatsuya here and just fucking deck Akechi in the face.
: “What, you gonna report us?”
: “I didn’t say I was being suspicious of you.”
: “M-Me!? You’re sidin’ with him!?”
: “I wasn’t anticipating that response. You always find a way to rise above my expectations. You really are an intriguing one. I lack your calm mannerisms.. but don’t you think my deduction is an interesting one?”
: What!? The hell’re you sayin’!?"
: “Well, this has been a valuable point of reference for me. I hope to see you all again.”
: “Do you think he’s ascertained our true identities?”
: “Nah, couldn’t be. Right?”
: “I’d like to say that it’s simply us overthinking this, but.. it may be best to be cautious from now on. We shouldn’t forget that Alibaba was able to discover who we are.”
: I’m surprised that, with Makoto being THE SMART GIRL and all, she hasn’t suggested.. I dunno, not meeting together in public? Going into the palaces and Mementos separately and meeting on the other side?
: “True, but it’s not as though he had tangible evidence to prove that discovery. Just keep acting normally.”
: “More importantly, things are getting serious with Medjed!”
: “Oh yeah! What’d they write!?”
: “Here, I’ll read it.”
: “We are disappointed in the people of Japan and their belief in the Phantom Thieves’ false justice. Hence, we shall proceed with our plan to cleanse Japan. This process will commence on August 21st. As a result, the Japanese economy shall suffer devastating damages.”
: Pfft. Got news for you there, the Japanese economy has been fucked since the late 80s.
: “For real…?”
: “Keep going.”
: “However, we are magnanimous. We will give the Phantom Thieves one final opportunity to repent. As proof of this repentance, we demand that they reveal their identities to the public. We will attack if these demands remain unmet. The fuure of Japan rests with the Phantom Thieves.”
: “We are Medjed. We are unseen. We will eliminate evil.”
: “…That’s what it says.”
: “Sounds bad…”
: “In other words, if we don’t unmask ourselves, Medjed will attack Japan… correct? It seems they are quite the attention-seekers…”
: “What are we gonna do about this?”
: “If only we could get in contact with Alibaba…”
: “Looks like we got no choice but to ask for Alibaba’s help.”
: “Question is, how do we get in touch with him?”
: “He cut off all contact with us after that misunderstanding. Then again, if we manage to steal Futaba’s heart, he may attempt to reach out to us once more.”
: “But we don’t have any clues on what her keywords are.”
: “Dammit, Alibaba! Where the hell are you!?”
: “Actually, he may be closer than we think.”
: “Huh?”
: “Hypothetically speaking, even if we stole Futaba’s heart.. how would Alibaba know that the deed has been done? Would he truly be able to discern that just from cell phone messages?”
: “You mean he’d have to meet her in person?”
: “Alibaba was able to deliver the calling card here. On top of that, he can check on Futaba’s condition. However, according to the circumstances he put forth, he’s unable to meet us. This leads me to believe that it would be bad for him if we were to see the two of them together.”
: What’s funny is how flawed her logic is here. You’re dealing with a person who can clearly hack cellphones, so what’s stopping it from being a third party who picks a target where it’d be really, really obvious if they had suddenly been brainfucked?
: “For real!?”
: “So she’s asking that we steal her own heart?”
: “Maybe she wants us to save her from the scars of her abuse? That would be hard to ask directly.”
: “I’d like to meet with Boss.. he lives nearby, right?”
: “I agree. It’s real late though. What’re we gonna tell Boss when we get there?”
: “We’ll say this take-out sushi is a gift for him.”
: “But my fatty tuna…!”
: “No complaining.”
: Sojiro gets the sushi and goes “Fatty tuna? What are you, a cat?”
: “Let’s all go together. Boss may get the wrong idea if Akira-kun and I show up alone.”
: “Think she’s nappin’?”
: “Even Boss would’ve woken up with how many times we’ve rung this doorbell.”
: “I would think Futaba would have answered by now if she were here too.”
: “Dude, you can’t go openin’ other people’s stuff like that.”
: I think I’ve said this before, but this reminds me of the godawful rewrite character in Tales of Zestiria who is an assassin that doesn’t kill people.
: “But look. The door seems to be slightly open as well. I wonder why. That’s rather careless..”
: You can hear a thunderclap right after this, but obviously you can’t because this is an SSLP.
: “…Do you think that’s okay?”
: “Prolly?”
: “My apologies, Boss!”
: “Have you heard the word of our lord and savior YHVH?”
: “The door ahead is open, and I can hear the TV.”
: “I hope he didn’t pass out or something… I mean, Boss is kinda old, ain’t he?”
: Unlike a lot of characters, Sojiro doesn’t have a canon age. He’s probably somewhere in his late 50s.
: “I’m a bit worried. Should we go in and check on him?”
: “Please excuse us…”
: There’s a scream in the background that happens as the power goes out.
: “A scream!? What was that!?”
: “H-How should I know?”
: “Let’s get out of here, please? Can we just go?”
: “What’re you freakin’ out for?”
: “I-I-I’m not freaking out!”
: “Could it be Alibaba? I mean, Futaba?”
: “Makoto, it’s like ten feet to the door. Everyone else is already out. I thought you were THE SMART GIRL.”
: I think they lengthened this hallway for this cutscene, because we’re about to see it from the other side and it won’t make any sense how it takes Makoto more than like two seconds to leave.
: “I can sense someone’s presence…”
: “I can’t take this anymore! I’m leaving!”
: Oh, hi Futaba. Are you here to point out that Joker is within arm’s reach of opening the door at this point?
: I too would probably shriek at the sight of someone wearing a Tetris tanktop. Something about that just isn’t right.
: My favorite part about this cutscene is that it’s just several minutes of Makoto getting fucking owned.
: “Alibaba! Futaba! Hey! C’mon, where are you!? You’re a hacker, right? Just show yourself!”
: And now she’s devolved into being Maya. How long until we find out she was locked in a shrine and nearly set on fire as a child?
: “Crap, he’s home!”
: Why is there a frog next to the door?
: “Ah…”
: “You’re…”
: “Oh… g-good.. evening, sir.. we… didn’t mean.. to intrude…”
: “Niijima-san! Wait, are you two dating?”
: “W-We’re j-just friends!”
: “Friends nowadays get that close to each other?”
: “That’s not it! This, um… things happened.. and..”
: “Um, we brought you some sushi, but nobody answered when we rang the bell… the door was unlocked too. We could hear the TV though, so we got worried you might have passed out or something.”
: “The door was unlocked?”
: “Yes.”
: “… I do that sometimes. Guess I’m getting old.”
: “Um, excuse me. There’s something we’d like to ask.”
: “Hm? You wanna ask me?”
: “There’s someone else living here.. isn’t there?”
: “Yeah… my daughter.”
: “Could she be Futaba Sakura?”
: “You told Niijima-san too!?”
: “U-Um.. is there any way we could meet with Futaba-san? I think we may have frightened her earlier, so we’d like to apologize if at all possible.”
: “Well… that’s…”
: “Is she sick?”
: “No, it’s not like that.”
: “Futaba’s mother and I knew each other long before Futaba was born. Her mother was a bit of a weird one, but we got along well for some reason…”
: “She was sharp-witted, somewhat stern, a little socially inept, but always carefree… she truly was a great woman.”
: “I see…”
: “When something piqued her interest, that’d be all she focused on. She always worked deep into the night. I thought that’d change after her kid was born, but having Futaba didn’t do much.”
: “Even with that, she always took good care of her.”
: “Working and watching over a child at the same time sounds rough…”
: “I guess raising Futaba alone turned out to be tough on her in more ways than one…”
: Futaba is 15 years old in Persona 5. I’m not sure how old her mother was when she died, but my headcanon is that Baofu is her father.
: “There wasn’t a father.”
: They should’ve put a line in here where Yusuke goes “Is your daughter Jesus? Was she immaculately conceived?”
: “Well, there probably was one. I didn’t know him though. She never said a word about him, either. She was single when she gave birth to Futaba, and single when she raised her.”
: “They were an ordinary, loving family. You could really tell how much she cared for Futaba. But one day, she left.. leaving Futaba behind.”
: “Suicide…!?”
: “Threw herself into the street, right in front of Futaba’s eyes…”
: I don’t hate this cutscene’s writing - in fact, I think this is one of the better cutscenes in the game. However, I still don’t like it.
: We already know pretty much everything there is to know about Futaba and Wakaba and we haven’t even set foot in the dungeon yet. The dungeon is therefore going to reiterate a lot of what we already know.
: The thing is, it would’ve been so much more effective if you just got to see it in the dungeon itself. Sure, there’s a few things we don’t know about Sojiro and Wakaba.. but those aren’t revealed until after the dungeon.
: Personally, if I had been writing this, I would have just had Sojiro mention that Futaba’s mother is dead without explaining the circumstances surrounding it because he doesn’t really understand them himself.
: “Shocking doesn’t begin to describe that…”
: “That’s gotta be devastating for a kid.”
: “So.. well, a lot happened after that, but I ended up taking custody of Futaba. First, she was so depressed that she wouldn’t even talk to me.”
: “Was that because she couldn’t get over her mother’s suicide?”
: God dammit Ann.
: “What!? But why!?”
: “That part she’s never told me. I wanted to know what led her to believing that, but I decided not to rub salt in the wound.”
: Then, a few months ago.. she started getting real scared, even when nothing was happening. She’d say things like ‘I hear voices…’ and, "Mom is looking at me…’ "
: “Visual and auditory hallucinations.. have you taken Futaba to a doctor?”
: “I wanted to, but she refused. Even when I had a doctor come, she locked herself away in her room. Since then, she’s become what you’d call a shut-in.”
: In case you’re wondering, the Japanese VA uses the word “hikikomori”, but the localizers didn’t for some reason.
: “She won’t take a single step outside the house, or even try to see other people.”
: “What about you?”
: “She doesn’t even let me come in her room.”
: “That’s pretty harsh…”
: “Futaba is, well, a unique girl. She’s so quick-minded that conversations with her tend to jump from one topic to the next. It seems like she’s always coming to conclusions in her head. There’s a lot I don’t get about her…”
: “Hmm..”
: “What Futaba needs is a safe place where nobody will threaten her. Somewhere she can be at ease. That’s why I won’t do anything she doesn’t want. I don’t make her do anything she’s unwilling to either.”
: “Then again, I know that’s no way for her to live. It’s all I can do though…”
: “I don’t know. She just asks me for things that she wants, like food or these complicated books… well, that’s that. So can you just.. leave her be?”
: “I’m gonna head back then. You all had better head home soon too.”
: “No way in hell he’s abusin’ her.”
: “The reason why Futaba wants her heart stolen must be related to what happened to her mother.”
: Ann, shut up.
: “So she’d like to discard her feelings of pain, but can’t do anything about it herself.”
: “Will changing her heart really help her, though?”
: “If we can help her, we may be able to stand up to Medjed.”
: “Hold on a sec. Do we even know if she has a Palace? Let’s check.”
: “What the…?”
: “She’s got one…”
: “So someone can have a Palace even if they’re not evil?”
: Futaba is pretty much the only person in 5 or Strikers to have (or be) a shadow and not be evil. There is a Futaba equivalent in Strikers, however, because Strikers largely mirrors the original game’s story but with different villains.
: “Hey, Morgana-”
: “Where’s Morgana?”
: “I haven’t seen him for some time.”
: “So, ever since we went inside Boss’s house?”
: “…Somewhere ‘round there. He’ll be fine though. He’s a cat, after all. The trains’re gonna be shuttin’ down for the night soon, so we should prolly be headin’ home.”
: From what I’ve seen in Game Center CX, the last train is sometime between 11PM and midnight.
: “We have to go to school in the morning, after all.”
: “Ohhh, right. The urgent assembly.”
: “An assembly? What about?”
: “Shujin has been garnering a lot of attention ever since Medjed called out the Phantom Thieves. So, they need to remind us not to say arbitrary stuff online and add more fuel to the fire.”
: “We’ve gotta meet up for every goddamn little thing. Talk about a pain in the ass.”
: “I mean, it is our fault.”
: “Anyway, let’s contact each other afterward.”
: There’s a bunch of repeated dialog here, so I’m just going to skip it.
: Unfortunately, we can’t go out even into Yongen-Jaya. We’re forced to sleep.
: “I take it the chief told you about Futaba, and then you guys disbanded in relief for now.”
: “You can’t underestimate my intel-gathering skills, you know. I was checking out the chief’s house. I didn’t think our Alibaba would be so young…”
: “She had long hair and a pretty young-sounding voice. Well… I say young, but I think she’s probably about the same age as you guys. At the very least, she’s no amateur. She completely overheard your conversation with the chief, and she can hack into our chats too.”
: “Even if she can’t take Medjed down directly, she might have some kind of lead on them.”
: “In any case, we’ll need to rely on Futaba to get closer to Medjed. Let’s meet up again tomorrow. How about we do it in here? It’s way too hot outside… anyway, make sure you let everyone know.”
: “Hold on. While Medjed was targeting you, you chose to deal with someone completely unrelated to them?”
: “Then how was Medjed… what you’ve said about the Sakura family generally falls in line with our investigation. It appears you aren’t feeding us a false testimony.”
: “Hmph. If you’re lucid enough for jabs, you can get back to your story. It’s still unclear to us as to how the Phantom Thieves dealt with Medjed since their identity is unknown. If you tell me something coherent, I may be a little more willing to believe you.”
: Next time, we’ll reload a bunch for a book that it turns out isn’t part of the 100% route, run into a near-permafuck, run into an actual permafuck, and see Futaba’s palace for the first time.