Chapter Text
It had been five years or so since Akechi had joined the shadow operatives, and of the course of that time he found himself using Loki less and less. Loki was still powerful, but Akechi now had access to a variety of personas, offering him far more flexibility. He also no longer had need of Loki's more specialized abilities anymore. And, though he was loath to admit it, he was a bit scared to use Loki.
Every time
he crushed the mask and summoned him forth, that feral insanity sunk its claws into him, burning him from the inside out until he inflicted the pain on everything surrounding him. And now that he was regularly surrounded by teammates, and occasionally friends, he was terrified to lose control.
It should have been a routine op. Akechi and a few other operatives had been sent to investigate reports of a small pocket of the cognitive world bleeding through into a small town. At the centre of the distortion his team had encountered a large shadow terrorising the inhabitants. As Akechi cycled through persona after persona to try and target its weakness (at times like these he missed having a navi to just tell them) he could feel the burning insistence of Loki pushing at his mind. He tried to ignore it, pushing it back, but then the shadow blasted Yumi, one of the youngest persona users in the operatives, and sent them flying. Fine, he thought, rage building, and he reached up and tore off his mask. "Loki!" He screeched, and as the persona took its form behind him, Akechi felt a faint sensation at the back of his mind, like glass shattering or a tether snapping. Then he was on the ground, watching helplessly as Loki ripped the shadow into shreds, laughing maniacally, before turning to look at him. Blade raised, it darted forwards, slashing down at Akechi's neck before something blocked it, and Akechi lost consciousness.
He awoke in a hospital room, blinding in its sterility. He felt listless, unreal. The only assurance that he was actually still alive was the steady beeping of his own heart rate on the monitors beside the bed. A strange sense of unease prickled at the back of his skull, but before he could focus on it, the door to his room slid open, and Mitsuru Kirijo herself stepped in.
"oh good, you're awake." She sat in a chair beside his bed and leaned forward, all business.
"To what do i owe the pleasure, Kirijo-san?" Akechi tried to shove down any panic at the fact that the head of the shadow operatives herself was sitting in his hospital room.
"Why don't you tell me, Akechi-san? Do you have any explanation for what happened out there?"
The anxiety shot back up as he struggled to recall. He remembered summoning Loki, feeling like something went wrong, and then- "Shit. Did anyone get hurt?" A small part of him laughed at that. Oh how far he had fallen, that he now cared about practically strangers.
Kirijo shook her head. "No one other than yourself. Yumi recovered after the fight, and the rest of the operatives on your team made it out safely. However," she interrupted his brief moment of relief. "You didn't answer my question."
He furrowed his brow, trying to recall. "Honestly, i have no clue Kirijo-san. the other operatives with me know as much as i do." He paused for a moment, considering. "Actually, they probably know more than i do. I have no clue what happened after Loki attacked me."
"Hmm." Kirijo leaned back, finally giving Akechi room to breathe. He scratched his arm anxiously while Kirijo thought. "The other operatives reported that you summoned Loki, who was more powerful than usual. He took down the shadow with ease, before turning to attack you instead. He was stopped from harming you by Robin Hood, who blocked his attack. You then collapsed, at which point both persona disappeared. Your team then brought you back here, where we have been monitoring you since."
She finished her explanation, and Akechi blinked as he took it all in. The fact that he had somehow summoned two persona at once, however briefly, jumped out at him, but he focused on the main issue. "I lost control of Loki." Shame filled him alongside that creeping stress, and he absentmindedly began clawing at his arm. "What it sounds like to me is Loki used his ability on himself, but that's impossible." He frowned, moving his free hand up to his chin.
Kirijo was examining him closely. "Did anything else happen when you summoned him?" He thought back, and remembered that strange breaking sensation he felt. And suddenly doubled over as sheer panic overtook him. He could faintly hear Kirijo calling out to him, but he couldn't hear her beyond the rushing of blood in his ears and the feeling of a blade pressed sharply against his neck.
He woke up, thrashing against the sheets that constricted him before he finally realised where he was.
Still in the hospital room, with a very concerned looking Kirijo still sitting in the same spot. He felt sluggish, and faintly realised he must be drugged up. He wanted to feel stressed at that, but couldn't feel anything at the moment.
"Akechi?" Kirijo's voice pulled at him through the drug haze, and he tried to focus in on her.
"Why am i drugged?" He tried to ask, but it came out more as "drugs?"
She nodded. "I apologise for that, but at the time it was the only way to stop him. We're keeping you hazed until the proper medications come in." She looked tired, and Akechi belatedly realised it was because of him.
"Meds?"
She nodded. "We only know of one other case where a persona tried to kill its user, and at the time we had a drug to suppress personas, which would limit the damage it caused." She gestured to his left arm, which he realised now was bandaged. "The only question is why? The other persona user, hers was an artificial persona, which led to its instability. We've never seen a case of a genuine persona turning against its wielder, so perhaps it's related to Loki's power?" She trailed off as she realised Akechi was laughing, or rather wheezing in an attempt to."What?"
"Nothing. Just that Loki is an artificial persona, if I'm guessing right."
"What? Explain."
So he told her, as best he could, about Wakaba Ishiki's research and Shido's own desire to hone his precious little metaverse assassin, and how through what might legitimately be counted as torture, now that he thought back on it, Loki was born. Kirijo sat silent and grim, nodding as she fit together the pieces.
"That does better explain how the other artificial persona users were created, as well as the high failure rate." At his questioning look, she launched into a brief explanation of the Kirijo Group's own misdeeds. "Only three of the original hundred survived, and only one of those three is still alive today."
She tapped a finger against her chin, thinking, "Perhaps it may be wise to put you in contact with her. While the drugs may work to stave off Loki's attempts, they will also weaken your other personas, which i can't believe you'd be happy with." He grimaced in response, and she nodded. "I'll reach out to her. In the meantime, you should be able to leave tomorrow."
So here he was a week later, sitting in a small café waiting for Kirijo's mysterious contact. The pills Kirijo had supplied were apparently working, as Loki hadn't made a peep since, but they made him tired, and dulled down the usual noise and energy that came from his other personas. He really hoped that whoever this person was, they'd give him a better solution.
He was beginning to doze off when someone pulled out the chair opposite him and sat down. He blinked himself awake, and then at the stranger's unusual appearance.
Bright red hair contrasted by a white Lolita dress, topped off by a frilly white headband. To make things even stranger, the woman was smiling at him.
"Hello Akechi-san. I am Yoshino Chidori. Kirijo-san asked me to speak with you."
Akechi shook himself from his stupor. "Ah. Hello, Yoshino-san. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I assume Kirijo-san informed you of the situation?"
She nodded, and leaned forwards, clasping her hands. "Yes. You are like us." She paused, and shook her head. "I'm sorry, you're like what we were. The others are gone, and Medea is no longer a part of me." She smiled faintly at that, looking off into space.
Akechi, on the other hand, was startled. "You no longer have your persona?"
"Mm, yes." She focused her attention back on him, and Akechi half wished she didn't, caught under that strange, knowing gaze. "I sacrificed my soul to bring my love back to life, and in doing so Medea was passed on to him. " She smiled again at his blank expression. "It is a bit complicated. Medea no longer exists as she was, and I am no longer the person I was either."
She sat up, all poised elegance. "And that brings us to the matter of yourself. Your persona, Loki, has tried to hurt you." He nodded, and she paused, looking thoughtful.
After an uncomfortable minute of silence, she spoke up again. "Jin and Takaya never had problems with their own personas trying to harm them. At least on purpose. Sometimes the power would be too great, and it would reflect back on them. But they never had the same issue I did. I wondered about that for so long, and for so long I simply blamed it on Medea being different. But now I wonder." At this she leaned forward and grabbed his hands, and Akechi barely suppressed a yelp at the contact. She was staring right into his eyes again, picking him apart.
"How long had it been since you used Loki?"
Her tone was anything but accusatory, but Akechi felt an unexpected wave of shame hit him. Was this whole thing really his fault? Had he messed up by not using Loki? A gentle tap on his hands pulled him back from his spiral, and he saw that Chidori was looking at him with - pity? No, that was empathy in her gaze.
"You have been refusing him, haven't you?" He was once again stunned at this stranger who was so easily dissecting him.
"How-?"
She smiled again, softly, but there was an edge of bitterness to it. "Because for so long, I refused Medea. What she was, the part of me she represented.” She sighed, releasing her grip on his hands to clasp her own. “Medea was life, when for so long what I was working for was death.” Akechi opened his mouth, to say what he did not know, but Chidori raised her hand to silence him.
“At the time, I felt I had no reason to live, and Takaya had a plan. One that I followed, and one that we all knew would lead to our deaths. But at the time, after the lives we had lived, that was truly what we wanted. But now I have a reason to live.” She smiled to herself. “I’m glad I do.”
She turned her attention back to him. “It was only when I had begun to accept living that Medea and I were able to work in sync. Perhaps the same is true of yourself?”
Akechi thought back, reviewing all the times in recent years he had once again been acting in a more palatable manner; each time he refused to summon Loki because of who he was when he did. He hated to admit it, but she might be right. He nodded, hesitantly, and she beamed at him. He ducked his head in embarrassment.
“There is nothing to be ashamed of. Admitting your faults it's the first step to recovery. Perhaps you should examine yourself and see if you are truly whole living as half yourself.”
The words stung a bit, and he was certain it was because they were true. It had been hell, suppressing one side or the other for the years he’d been working for Shido, so why was he inflicting it upon himself again?
She pushed back her chair, offering him a hand up. “I would be pleased if you accompanied me. Talking with you has been enjoyable. Or I suppose I’ve been talking to you? In any case, I would love to hear your thoughts on things.” Akechi stared at the proffered hand for a moment, before taking it.
“Yes, I suppose I can. And I’ll be thinking over your advice.”