Archive of Our Own ^beta

Time was relative, or so Akira learned the hard way. He began thinking of time not in hours or days, but in loops. The first loop—where it all began, from back when time could be marked on a clock—was also the last time his life was ‘normal’. He wasn’t exactly sure when this loop began, one could argue for many different times. The beginning of the universe, the first humans, his own birth, April 11^th, (the date in which he looped back to) or perhaps it was the day he fused Clockwork.

Clockwork was a curious thing. He had fused it halfway through Madarame’s palace, seeing as it had the supporting spells his team needed. He used it sparingly, for its attacks were not very strong, but whenever his team needed a boost, it was irreplaceably useful. In appearance, it resembled Arsene, the persona in which had been his first, but it was a sleek black and bronze, with curved golden ram horns and an outfit resembling something ‘steampunk’.

It didn’t speak to him, unlike the others. Sure, there were some quieter personas, but usually, whenever he was in the Metaverse, he could commune with any of those in his mind as he pleased. Clockwork, however, was always silent. He knew that each persona originated from some form of literature or mythology, and all he assumed was that the strange being originated from a character that always remained silent.

That loop ended prematurely, the cold muzzle of a gun pressed up against his forehead, staring into ruby-red eyes unwavering and malicious. He did not feel the gunshot, it all went dark far too quickly for that. But, he remained conscious just long enough to think one thing.

“This wasn’t meant to happen.”

The loops, he found, were instant. His world was dark for only a heartbeat before he found himself awake again, slowly blinking sleep out of his eyes. For a moment, he had thought it was all a dream—getting caught, speaking to Sae—until he pulled out his phone to see if he had gotten any texts.

The first thing he noticed was that the dates were wrong. Sure, people lose track of the dates all of the time, and he was no exception, but he was certain that it wasn’t April 11^th. After he adjusted the date on his phone, he went to look at his texts, but found none except those from old friends. Nothing from his fellow thieves.

His stomach churned, flicking through every tab on his phone feverishly. What happened? Did something reset his phone? He attempted to call Futaba, recalling her number purely from memory, but she didn’t pick up, and no texts would go through.

The thought of time-travel had briefly flickered through his mind, but he didn’t consider it until he went downstairs and heard the news—a brutal subway accident caused by a psychotic breakdown.

The second loop was one of the worst, by far. He had spent the whole time panicking, and through a stroke of what could have been bad luck, or just poor planning, he never met Ryuji or Ann on the first day. His initial trip into the Metaverse had been alone, and terrified. When he found himself backed against a wall, Kamoshida’s guards holding their spears to his throat, it was not Arsene’s voice that heeded his call, but a much lighter, more ethereal-sounding one.

‘You are a slave, want emancipation?’

When he tore off the mask, warm blood spilling from his skin, a black-and-bronze figure appeared before him, dark golden wings glistening in the light of the castle’s torches. Not only had Clockwork become his persona, and not simply one from the Sea of Souls, even his thief outfit had changed. His coat had become accented by the same bronze along the seams, and his mask had turned black, gold trimming the eyes.

Black, gold, and bronze. For some reason, he was already sick of the color combination.

He tried desperately to set his timeline back on track after that. He approached Ryuji after school that day, and attempted to earn his trust, but his nerves overwhelmed him, making each word strained and awkward. His attempts with Ann unfortunately ended the same way, though she had been considerably less blunt about telling him to leave.

He figured, at that point, that things would sort themselves out quickly enough. He went along, as one would, with the same process as the previous loop. He infiltrated the castle palace, secured a route to the treasure, and was set to take it. With a sick pit in his stomach, he found that without Morgana, these things were considerably harder.

That was right, he never did manage to find the cat.

One person, even if his persona was strong, could not beat Kamoshida’s shadow. He also had received no more help from the Velvet Room this time, so all he had was himself and Clockwork. In the end, the monstrous shadow had torn him to shreds, and left him bleeding in a puddle, where his vision went dark again.

Again.

It took until about the fourth loop for him to make it past Kamoshida’s palace. Each time he would meet his end there, on the spearhead of a guard, or crushed by the shadow’s bestial other form. He had never managed to find Morgana, and thus attempted each infiltration alone.

It was frustrating how utterly chance the first meetings with Ryuji and Ann were. Recreating them had took a few tries, and when he had finally managed to do it, it wasn’t even on purpose.

He had been walking to school, trying to figure out the best way to befriend the two even without the chance meeting, when he approached the familiar spot in which he had sheltered from the rain. She was there, staring out into the light storm with a distant look in her eyes.

After that, everything played out just as intended. Ann drove off with Kamoshida (and oh, how overwhelming the temptation to stop her was) and Ryuji pursued, only to give up. From there, everything proceeded as normal.

…Mostly.

Without Morgana, there was no one to explain to the others what the Metaverse was like without seeming suspicious. Without the Velvet room, there was no one to give the navigator to the other thieves. Suddenly, Akira was the only one with any knowledge of how the other world worked. Ryuji and Ann still ate up every ounce of information, but they did so with an edge of suspicion.

He tried and fumbled to make up excuses as to why he knew this much, but to no avail. Every word out of his mouth sounded fake and forced, and it didn’t take a genius to tell he was lying through his teeth. So sure, he had their support and loyalty, but he was far from having their trust. He wondered if he ever would again.

The loop lasted until the first trip into mementos. Without Morgana and his abilities, the group was left exploring on foot, which ended poorly. Ryuji went down first, thrown hard against a wall until the crack of his back breaking was audible. Then, Akira found himself struggling to hold his innards inside of his stomach after a shadow had slashed open his midsection.

As he lay there, bleeding out, he yelled to Ann with the last of his strength to run, dammit, but she didn’t listen. Even as dark curse magic began to circle around her, she still struggled with her waning strength to summon her persona and heal Akira. Before she could, the clouds of darkness closed in on her, and with a sick snap, a spurt of blood gushed out of her eyes and mouth, and she fell to the ground.

Again.

The tenth loop, he almost made it to Futaba’s palace.

He had managed to finally make up a believable enough story to earn the group’s trust, but it began to crumble when Kaneshiro mentioned the black-masked persona user abusing the Metaverse. That was one mystery Akira never solved in the original loop, though he had a good idea of who it could be. The unfortunate thing was, with his new mask influenced by Clockwork, he was now the one with the black mask.

He tried and tried to argue that it wasn’t him, and God, he had told so many lies during these loops, but this time he was telling the truth, the whole thing. But all of the looping had begun to leave him a bit numb, emotionally. He found himself caring less and less about the people he used to consider his best friends.

It made him sick, really.

So, he gave up. The discord within the group seemed to be incurable. He chalked this loop up to be a failure. They had barely made it through many of their struggles even when they were incredibly close; there was no way they could make it if they weren’t.

On his way to school one day, Akira ‘tripped’ onto the subway track.

Again.

He gave up completely a few loops after that.

There would always be something inorganic and forced about the relationships he made, now. He knew too much about all of these people, too much about what they would say and how they feel. He could never really be their friend again. So he gave up. On the first morning of the thirteenth loop, he decided to ignore the Metaverse. He didn’t even need to go there to awaken his persona anymore—Clockwork was always in his head now. It never spoke, but he could always hear the ticking.

Ironic, that a persona named Clockwork would tick.

There were still a few things he didn’t know about his former teammates, things that, had he been just a few loops earlier, would have repulsed him to think about. At this point, however, he stopped caring. He didn’t feel much of anything. There was only so many times a person could die before they wished they would just stay dead.

Ann was the easiest, he thought, and this time he didn’t even feel bad about it. He knew her almost perfectly, every single thing to get closer to her, the perfect masks to wear in every situation. It was sickening, really, how quickly he got her into his bed. The night was rough and impassionate, and he woke up in the morning to see her gone.

‘Ah,’ he thought, ‘what a shame.’

An hour later, he walked in front of an oncoming bus.

Again.

Really, when he thought about it, he could get away with anything. It would all just be reset after awhile, to the same damned day. His morals had not dissolved completely, but his curiosity had been getting the better of him by the minute. Yes, he had seen what would happen if he’d gotten close to all of his friends, complimented them, gave them gifts, and now he even knew what his name would sound like being moaned from their mouths.

He was curious, sickeningly so, about what would happen if he wasn’t so kind. He wanted to know their faces and how they would twist and contort in horror at a betrayal.

But he couldn’t do it. The small, slowly waning part of him that was still Akira and not some husk refused to hurt these people who had become so important to him. Even through the numbness that had settled into his mind, he hadn’t the heart to do anything too cruel to a friend.

(Friends. In this loop, he’d barely spoken to any of them. Calling them all friends seemed like an exaggeration.)

Of course, he had no moral qualms about hurting himself. There was very little that was interesting about simply injuring himself, anyone could do that, no, he wanted to see himself broken. He wanted to look at his own reflection and be unrecognizable, even though it was the same, un-aging face he saw in the mirror every damned day of his life.

At this point, he knew where to go to get fucked up. The drug dealers in the red light district were easy to find if you knew where to look at night. He bought whatever they sold, hardly even asking what it was, and stumbled into a nearby party. He mixed everything and took it until he was barely conscious.

The other guests took a fascination with him, but the drugs clogging his brain made it so he could only watch as they toyed with his body in every way imaginable. Eventually, things began to blur more and more, until the world went dark.

The next morning, he woke up feeling ill—yet surprised he had woken up at all. His body was covered in bruises and marks, and he amusedly thought to himself that it seemed like the other guests competed with one another to see who could do the most damage. At least, that’s about as bad as he felt. He knew, somehow, that there was something he couldn’t come back from that had happened to him, but he didn’t stick around long enough to find out what it was.

He found a sharp bit of metal on the floor nearby and put it deep into his throat. That did the trick.

Again.

He lost count of the loops, he simply couldn’t remember anymore. On the first day, the first thing he did was go into Mementos and summon Clockwork.

“I want this to be over,” is all he said. “Please, next time I die, let me stay dead.”

The ethereal being refused to respond, staring Akira down blankly. Perhaps he was simply going a bit mad, but the ticking in his head seemed to get louder. Summoning his willpower into his hand, a wickedly curved dagger appeared, clutched close to his palm. “Aren’t you listening to me!? I want this to end—I want to die.”

No response. Rage boiled in his veins, and before he could stop himself, he found himself charging at the persona. He slashed out with his knife, striking the being in the thigh. White light spilled out like blood, and Akira staggered as the same wound opened up on his leg, a perfect mirror to that of his Persona’s. Dark blood oozed down his leg, but he willed himself to stay standing.

“I don’t care what I have to do, or what I have to sacrifice, just let me die!” He roared, and, against his will, tears began to well up behind his eyes. “I’m done!”

He slashed blindly at the persona, putting gaping wounds both in himself and the strange being. Throughout it all, Clockwork did not move or react. It simply stood there, watching. For a moment, he almost found it funny that his persona had gone from a being as expressive as Arsene to a creature as numb as Clockwork.

Eventually, the pain of his own wounds caught up to him, and Akira fell to his knees. Blood soaked his coat, turning the bronze accents dark red. Finally, Clockwork decided to react. As he was doubled over, panting with pain, a cold piece of metal pressed to his forehead. Glancing up, he saw it was the persona, holding a glowing, ghost-like pistol to him.

“You are a slave,” it said, “want emancipation?”

He gasped out that yes, of course he does.

The was a single click, and the world went dark. This time, he didn’t wake up again.