Yukiko’s Recovery

April 29

It's a day off from school. Showa day. All I can do at this point is wait for Yukiko to recover. There wasn't much to do today, everyone else was busy and it was pouring.

Evening.

All four of us were watching the news

"Due to heavy rainfall clear skies seem unlikely in the area. A thick fog is expected to set in tonight and remain until tomorrow morning, with heaviest concentration in the Inaba Area. Anyone planning to go out tonight should take care. Now for our hourly weather breakdown."

"More fog huh? There's been a lot of that lately, hopefully it's not a sign of more trouble." Dojima said as Nanako changed the channel. "Ah ah ah, what did I say about changing the channel without asking?"

"Have a great day even during Golden Week at your local Junes! Come see for yourself, and get in touch with our products. Every day's great at your Junes!"

"Every day's great at your Junes!" Nanako sung. "Dad! They're going to be open during Golden Week!"

"Hehehe, I heard. Do you want to go somewhere during the long holiday?" Dojima asked

"We can go somewhere!?" Nanako asked excitedly.

"How about it? Got any plans yet?" He asked us.

"Nope no plans." Yu said

"Me neither." I said

"Then let's all go somewhere together! Junes! Junes Junes Junes!" Nanako said

I don't have the heart to tell her that that's only downtown.

"You sure you want to go to Junes? We can go there anytime. Come on girl, time for bed, it's late." He said oh good he said it instead.

"Alright." Nanako said. "Every day's great at your Junes!"

She's pretty excited about the family outing. I'm frankly more surprised that I was invited. Dojima came back downstairs. God help anyone who tries to hurt that little bundle of joy.

"Junes Huh? She's satisfied to go somewhere that's so close. Well I'm not going to force you, but if you don't have any plans keep that in mind." Dojima said

Well, that's it for today I guess, maybe I'll check out the midnight channel.

Midnight.

The fog's set in, time to check it out. No one is appearing, that's a good thing I guess. Since Yukiko was rescued the killer was thwarted this time.

Mission accomplished for now.

April 30

Morning

I walked up to the school gate and saw Yukiko standing by the entrance.

"O-oh, good morning." She said

"Are you feeling better?" I asked

"Y-yeah. I'll be coming to school again, so that'll be nice. I caused everyone some real trouble. I'm sorry. No, "sorry" isn't quite right. What I mean to say is, thank you." She said. She seems a lot more cheerful than before. "My mother's back to work already. The maids are being really supportive, and I think things are going even smoother than before. I wonder if I was trying too hard? I may have been too caught up in the idea that I had to do everything myself. Ever since the incident, I feel like I can think about these things more calmly. B-but still. It's kind of embarrassing you guys saw everything, even the things I didn't want to admit."

"Everyone's like that." I said

"You think so?" She asked

"Yukiko!" Chie said as she came running up towards us.

"Oh it's Chie!" Yukiko said. "Well, I'll talk to you later."

She's back and is full of energy as ever.

After school.

The four of us met up on the school roof. Yukiko came walking up with some bowls of food.

"Sorry to keep you waiting. The Soba's yours, right Chie?"

"Thanks! Ooohhh, that's smells sooo gooooood! These instant noodles are just what I need to help me through club. How much longer do I have to wait on this?" Chie said

"It still needs a few minutes." Yukiko said as she sat down.

"So why are we here? Oh yeah, we were going to ask Yukiko what happened." Chie said

"Yukiko san, I hate to bring up stuff you'd rather not think about, but I need to ask you again. Do you recall anything about when you got kidnapped?" Yosuke asked

"..no. I thought I might remember something if I let it sit for a while, but as time passes it only gets hazier. I think, the doorbell rang at the entrance, and someone called for me. But when I woke up after that, I was already in that castle. I'm sorry." Yukiko said

"No need to apologize, but does this mean her visitor is the culprit!?" Chie asked

"I don't know. If that's true, then that's one daring criminal. What kind of killer would ring the doorbell?" Yosuke said

"..it's just a theory, but the person who kidnapped Yukiko may not have been the same one who killed Saki, Mayumi and my parents. I've spoken with a friend of mine on the police force, both bodies had signs of sexual assault, I really hate to ask you this, in fact I give Yu permission to punch me for doing so, but do you remember if he, did anything to you?" I asked

"No, at least not that I can tell. God I hope not!" Yukiko said

I flinched the second Yu shifted.

"Well, the police are probably looking for witnesses, if it is two different people, then they might have different motives and different methods of throwing people in. It's not as if the culprit wore bright yellow clothes at the scene of the crime." Yosuke said

"I wonder why whoever it is would do stuff like this." Chie said

"We won't know until we confront 'em ourselves, but we can be sure of one thing, it's no coincidence that people keep ending up in that place. Someone on our side is definitely kidnapping them and throwing them into the TV. It's murder alright. Oh yeah, we never told you! We're gonna catch the culprit ourselves! The police are out of their league on this case, but we got Personas, and whatever it is that he can do." Yosuke said

"Never fear, we'll get him." Yu said

"O-okay." Yukiko said

"I'm helping out too!" Chie said. "I can't believe someone would throw people into a place like that. I'm gonna sock whoever's doing this!"

"Chie. Let me help too. I want to know why this is happening. Especially if someone hates me so much they want to kill me. I don't want to run away from myself anymore." Yukiko said

"Alright! Then let's all work together and catch this asshole!" Yosuke said

"Agreed." Yukiko said

With Yukiko in the group, we've got another head in the case.

Fool Social Link: Rank 2

Can now imbue weapons with electric energy.

"But how're we gonna find them? We don't have a single lead yet." Chie said

"I'm the third one to be targeted so far, but I have a feeling this isn't the end of it. If we had an idea of who might be targeted next, wouldn't we have an advantage over the killer?" Yukiko asked

"So we'll outsmart them huh? Yeah, that might work. Ok, so let's see if we can figure out what ties these three victims together. First there was that announcer, second was Saki Konishi... senpai. Third was Yukiko Amagi. What do they all have in common?" Yosuke asked

"They're all female." Yu said

"Bingo." Yosuke said

"How dare he target Females! Now that's unforgivable! The culprit's gotta be some kind of pervert!" Chie said

"Also what about this? The second and third victims had some sort of connection to the first one!" Yosuke said

"Hey that's right! Yukiko and Saki Senpai both had connections to that announcer!" Chie said

"That's true. Then, does that mean females connected in some way to Ms. Yamano's case are being targeted?" Yukiko asked

"I think that's a safe assumption for now." Yosuke said

"I don't. It doesn't add up. Why target Yamano in the first place? My parents' case is still relatively fresh, so why make a move like this?" I asked

"I hate to bring this up, but we still don't even know for sure that it's the same person. Didn't you say last time he was careful with his identity?" Yu said

"Yeah he covered up their murder by raping and beating a woman to near death, and then dropped the blame on me." I said. "I don't need a reminder about my current circumstances thank you. If I had to guess though, I'd say he was going to do the same thing to Saki. But we're missing a piece of the puzzle here. Why continue?"

"What I want to know is why he'd go after Saki in the first place?" Yosuke said

"I wonder, does he know?" I said. Everyone looked at me with a concerned look. "I.. have a medical condition."

"Yeah no shit Sherlock." Chie said while gesturing to my leg.

"No not that, it's something I was born with. As I understand it, I'm the only one with something like it. It's a heart condition, of sorts. Whenever I feel pain, or sadness, or, anger, my body sometimes releases too much adrenaline, and sends me into a fit of rage, I lose all control, and take my anger out on the things closest to me. The killer might have planned to use that against me to shift the blame and suspicion away from him, thus ending the case." I said

"Damn, that's, scary." Chie said

"No what's scary is that if said fit goes on for too long, it might stop my heart." I said

"Yeah, that much adrenaline pumping through you would overwork your heart. Anyways, there's still another angle we can take too. If another person disappears-"

"You think they'd be on that Midnight Channel? That happened right before Yukiko was kidnapped too!" Chie said

"Yeah. It's hard to tell who's who at first, but what's important is, it's happened before the victims disappeared. Kinda like a ransom note. We still don't know why that happens, but we'll have to rely on it for now." Yosuke said

"The next time it rains." Yukiko said

Seems like the Midnight Channel is our only means of predicting who will be kidnapped next.

"By the way, aren't those done by now?" Yosuke asked

"Whoa that's right! Chow time!" Chie said

Her and Yukiko both took the lids off the containers and started eating.

"Hey, could I try just a little bit of that? Just one tiny bite!" Yosuke said

"Hands off the Soba pal! Go get your own if you want some. Rghnnn, ok just one bite got it?" She said as she handed Yosuke the bowl.

That gives me an idea, let's try this D4C thing. I walked to another area quietly.

"D4C system activate." I said

A link portal appeared. There was a message on it.

"Power Percentage?" It goes from 0 to 100

Interesting, I can make ten clones with each power level.

"D4C, uh, 1% power!" I said

There was a flash of light, and 10 clones of myself appeared in front of me. Now for some fun. I made a portal appear behind Chie, and as I understand it I'm the only one who can see them.

"Hey Chie, could I have a bite too?" I asked as all ten appeared behind me

"Sorry, Yosuke ate- AHHHHH!" She screamed as she jumped back. "Wha- what is this?

"It's my special power. I can clone myself and make portals!" All 11 of us said at once. "Cool, now we're talking in stereo!"

"Dude that's awesome!" Yosuke said

"What's not awesome is that you ate all of my Soba!" Chie said

Apparently Yu ate all of Yukiko's too.

"I'll pay you guys back I promise."

"Well then how about now!?" Chie said

"Sounds good to me, want to take a shortcut? Hey, wait a minute, how do I make you guys disappear?"

"I have a better question, which one's the original?" Yukiko said.

"We all are! Cloning's an inaccurate term, it's more like we're all doppelgängers from parallel worlds."

"Ok so which one's the one from this world?" Yu asked

"Ah! There's the return button!" I said as all of my duplicates disappeared. "So, who's for some steak?"