Remember when I said I'd update last Sunday???

i lied.

---

-1 days remaining, nighttime

Arsene- or Raoul, or Jacques, or whoever he felt like being- distinctly remembered his death and what followed. The papers were talking about it for weeks after: the assassin who put a bullet in his head, then one in her own. The higher circles unanimously agreed it was a death befitting of such a thief, and the lower ones mourned the loss of their spectacle.

Arsene did not mourn. He had accepted death, and unlike most at the time, believed in no afterlife. To be human was like a flash of light- bright and beautiful, but so very temporary. It was that very fragile, temporary state that made humanity beautiful. He was dead and gone, and he would return to stardust.

But when he woke up, he was not stardust.

He found himself in a dark, dark place, with no body. Billions of luminescent eyes stared at him. The air felt thick and fluid- somehow, even without any senses, he could feel the cold. It was uncomfortably silent, even for a thief.

This place didn't seem like Heaven, but it certainly wasn't Hell.

Later, one of the eyes told him it was called the Sea of Human Souls. He was astonished, at first, that they spoke a language he understood. Some of the voices felt as ancient as the earth itself. They shared their minds, they said, so they knew all there was to know.

(He thought that a lie, because their minds were not his yet.)

They told him he was a ghost. A spectre. A remnant. He didn't belong on Earth anymore, his time having since passed. Time sped by faster in the Sea, they said, and now it was ten years past his death.

He asked if there was a way out, because he did not like to be confined. They laughed at him, and he thought they sounded sad.

We cannot leave this place, they said. We remain in death as we were in life: cowards.

(He didn't like that word.)

Our silence in life is our curse in death. We are the disillusioned who stood by; we saw the world for what it was, and we pretended it did not exist. Now, we watch it all burn with kindred souls. They said their next words with finality. There is no going back.

His memory had become hazy, his memories blurred like paint in water, but he did not remember standing by silently. He remembered laughing and crying and hiding and finding. There was a sharp memory of a man who cuffed him, and two months later, his astonished expression when he outplayed him.

No, he did not believe he had been a coward.

They were furious at him. He felt their minds in his, their hungry claws cruelly ripping through parts of himself, felt them tear the rebellion out. It fell away, and he still could not move as well as them, so he let it fall.

They said it would help him conform.

But he was nothing if not a rule-breaker.

He had entered the Sea of Souls, and surely there was an exit. The Sea cared not for this- there was a difference between their souls and his. But he looked, and he looked, and finally he found a weak spot. He tore a seam and escaped. None of the Souls followed, because he had spent ten years with them, and they were too afraid.

Our silence in life is our curse in death.

It was only then Arsene realized he had not remembered his own name. He could not remember who he had been before he had died, only that he was deceased and now wasn't.

He wandered Earth then, trying to remember pieces of himself. Arsene found that he had been called different names for his different faces. That the man who he might have been close friends with had died. That he had been called a phantom thief for his ability to change his face and manipulate minds.

Arsene thought that person sounded like a coward, but then he realized that was only one face. One facet of a finely-shaped gem. Who were the others?

He found who Arsene Lupin was later. He'd been drawn back to a part of the Sea there, and found a human boy. He felt his mind as keenly as the Souls had felt his own, and he understood why they had called each other we.

His name was Ren, and in Ren's mind, he was given a new body.

Arsene looked like the stuff of nightmare, but that was alright. There was a certain elegance he'd always coveted here, and the wings! Oh, to be able to fly! It made their heists so amusing, to dance circles around his soul-bonded's enemies.

He found who Jacques was after a month with Ren-Joker-Amamiya, who could dive in and out of the Sea of Souls with a knife-sharp grin. The boy was reading in his sad excuse of a room. Arsene was following the lines of French script, and his eyes widened when he found the name. There was a spark in his chest, and he remembered.

Remembered sailing. Remembered throwing open doors and writing calling cards, stealing treasure and kisses, and a laughing slip of a girl beside him. And he remembered a gunshot and a scream, and wondered if that scream was his own. And then Jacques sank into his subconsciousness.

But he never found who he was before his six-year old self, stuffing a wrapped necklace into his desk.

Not until Ren's eyes burned into his own and the final pieces clicked into place after over a century.

With the last piece- Raoul, he was whole, and he remembered everything.

-

Arsene knew this was coming, as surely as he knew the sun rose in the east and set in the west. He'd seen the signs here- Kronos had warned them with his last breath. Then, back at the beginning, Zorro explained that Morgana hadn't been able to talk with the Velvet Room. Of course, Lavenza had basically admitted to everything, telling him her first Personas.

Still, it would have been nice if he'd gotten a heads-up. Or time to rest. But it was perfectly in line with his luck.

"No. No, it's not."

The moment the words left his mouth, he realized his mistake. Never, never tempt fate. They'd already won. It was a long-standing rule in during Arsene's career and after, but if there was one thing he did well, it was breaking rules.

How else would he get their attention?

Sure enough, the sky lightened from black to blue. The clink-clack of his chains echoed in his ears. His vision blurred for an instant, and when everything reformed, he heard the Thieves' startled cries mingle with a train's whistle.

He blinked a few times, trying to shake off the dizziness. Traveling between parallel worlds did that. Arsene instinctively opened his wings and took off- but where were his wings- ah, right. Velvet Room. Goro Akechi's Velvet Room. It looked nearly the same as before, if not distinctly more crowded.

It was then he realized he was chained.

Not just the manacles that'd been on him since day one, no. Thin gold chains and heavy dark chains and the same spiked, heavy things Ren used to wear. He was stuck about a foot in the air, human form stretched out like a fly in a spiderweb. Everyone else was stuck the same way, their Thief clothes gone. Akechi was scowling at Ren, who was shirtless. He shrugged, like what can you do, and he rolled his eyes.

"Good evening, Wildcards; Thieves." Lavenza's golden, ringed eyes gleamed from the doorway. She moved slowly, as if walking on eggshells, over to the covered windows. "Treasure."

Arsene twisted his neck to look at Trae. The little girl hung limp in her spiderweb. He couldn't see if she was breathing.

Clack-clack-mreowww. Morgana thrashed in his chains, back in his cat form, and gave an irritated yowl. "Lavenza, what're you doing?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Arsene said. Where was Loki? "The Moirai, correct?"

She giggled. "Of course. They like you quite a lot. But as for me..." Lavenza said, her low voice twisting and turning like a river. She turned her back on them and threw open the windows.

Arsene's breath hissed between his very human teeth. A rotted wasteland laid before them, blood rolling from the hills, half-decayed skeletons crawling from guillotines and live wires. Crawling towards them.

None dared touch the train, but Arsene was already unsettled enough. Behind him, he heard Ryuji's horrified cursing and Akechi gasping for breath like he'd been running from those monstrosities.

Perhaps that was what he'd seen in the fog, back in the Hope Palace.

"What th' eff are these things?" Ryuji yelled, thrashing in his chains. Arsene had already determined his own bonds to be inescapable- pulled taunt, stretching his limbs as far apart as they could.

"To put it simply," Lavenza said, "They are the threads of Fate."

"Don't look much like threads t' me!"

"They still bind you, do they not?" A slight note of bitterness. "Whether thread or chains, do they still not tie you to a single future?"

Arsene realized, horrified, that they had been wrapped around him ever since he regained his physical form. Had the Fates been controlling him this entire time, as if he were some sort of puppet?

There was a horrible shriek, and a snowy-white feline with clear blue eyes launched itself at- not Lavenza, but him. Chained up as he was, Arsene clenched his teeth and hoped the cat with the very sharp claws wouldn't stab his eyes out. It passed by him harmlessly and struck the chains on Trae. Arsene twisted his neck backwards again, and as the cat slashed at it, he saw that the tail was striped black.

"Found you, Loki," Lavenza said. She turned, and a delicate butterfly mask covered her face, made of metal whirls and silver feathers. "Moirai, I summon thee."

It was so fast. The lights went out, as if they'd entered a tunnel. The white cat vanished and there was a triple flash of light. A flicker of auburn hair. The insistent wheedling of a spinning wheel. The smooth gleam of well-forged metal, and the distinct coppery smell of blood filled the room. A flash of fangs, a furious cry, and then the light came back.

A midnight-skinned boy, looking no more than twelve, laid flat on his stomach, pinned by a dark-haired, armored woman. Another woman, a brunette, leaned on him. Her fingers were twisting gold light into threads. The third had the auburn hair Arsene had seen, and stood by Lavenza's side. She smirked at them. When her gold-eyed gaze landed on Arsene and his master, it widened and her smile became just a touch more genuine.

"Fighting is pointless," the dark-haired one said to Loki. He snarled at her and shifted into a white, four-legged beast, which Arsene had learned was called a polar bear. He thrashed with five hundred pounds of weight. The dark-haired woman didn't even shift. Loki shifted into a griffin, which shredded several of the chairs (the chains rooted to them readjusted). He became a Western dragon and was stabbed through the chest with an ice spike.

A roaring, scaly-tailed lion.

A snarling, biting wolf.

An enormous spider with bladed legs.

A hissing serpent half the size of their cabin.

Finally, in a last-ditch effort, Loki turned into a Chimera- a two-headed beast, a poison-spitting snake for a tail. Arsene hadn't seen one before, although he'd sensed a few roaming Palaces. He could only watch in awe as it lunged for the woman, muscles and most likely vital organs shifting around, and was struck down with a flash of lightning. He staggered to his feet and twisted for the auburn woman. The goat head roared, and with it came fire and a Megidolaon- an Almighty spell, the one Ren asked about during the Kronos battle.

It was fast and impossible to block. The woman's eyes widened, and she shoved Lavenza away. Lavenza shrieked, her book falling to the floor. "Lachesis!"

The auburn woman- Lachesis clutched her shoulder, hissing in pain. "Loki," she whispered. The Chimera met her eyes, and all six of his narrowed.

She threw out her hand, and another Megidolaon hit him in the chest. With a flash, he shrank and shifted back into a pale-skinned child, who collapsed. The brunette caught him and twined gold thread around him. It morphed into something cold and slimy-looking.

Loki seemed ready to kill, but Arsene doubted he could even shift again. He'd been killed five times- should have been, actually. But he was a shapeshifter, one who could actually shift his organs around, so he was rather difficult to kill.

"Would anyone else like to play?" the brunette purred. No one moved, not even Arsene. There were no locks on these chains, and he had no idea yet on how to escape them. They likely weren't welded to him: he would have felt the pain when he awoke...

But if he could escape, Loki had proven they had weaknesses. Almighty spells, and if this was the Velvet Room, where Ren had bartered and exchanged pieces of his soul, perhaps... well, there were guillotines outside for a reason, right?

"If I might offer a suggestion, Pillager of Twilight," the auburn-haired woman said, "Perhaps you could leave the windows as they are. Certainly, those machines may help you, but the souls there are restless."

Arsene clenched his teeth. "We're in the Sea of Souls."

"You understand," she said with a sort of amusement. "Oh, but you don't know who we are-"

"Clotho the Spinner, Atropos the Unturnable, and Lachesis the Allotter," Arsene said. Their golden eyes widened as one.

Lavenza's narrowed. "Then surely you know our power. Why, might I ask, would you deviate from the script?"

Akechi growled. "I'm afraid I don't understand," he said in a strained, polite voice. He sounded seconds away from setting the entire place on fire, but Arsene doubted the bindings would let him.

"Yea, maybe you could explain it to us, too!" Ryuji burst out. "'Ts not like were side characters or some shit-"

Clotho snapped her fingers and a Curse spell sliced his leg open. Arsene heard him bellow and strain against the chains. "Y-you-" he snarled. Ryuji flinched as she snapped her fingers again, but the skin knitted together. In a few seconds, it looked as if nothing happened.

"To put it simply," Atropos said, unsheathing her sword, "Many of the beings in this room are side characters. You, for one, Ryuji Sakamoto. But fear not- the wandering ghosts rather like you." She tilted her head to one side as if she were listening to something.

Then Arsene heard it too. An incessant whispering sound, so consistent it blended in with the background. Something brushed his face. He flinched back and heard what might've been a giggle before it drifted away.

"We do not kill the favorites," said Lachesis. "So you, Skull, are safe."

Keep them talking, Ren prompted. Arsene blinked. Of course. They could communicate now- he'd nearly forgotten.

"And the script?" he asked. Arsene tried transforming into Raoul. Nothing.

The Moirai smiled in unison. "Ah, but Arsene," they said, their three voices harmonizing. "You're quite clever. Surely you understand..."

The Moirai wove a single future since the beginning of Time. A solid, stone-cold future- except some had deviated from it. Like... acting.

Deviate from the script, Lavenza had said.

Lachesis giggled. "Correct. We are, technically, the writers- sorry, authors- of fate."

"You changed your answer," Ren noted with forced calm. His eyes shifted sideways towards Akechi, who was uncharacteristically quiet.

Arsene could hear the ghosts, too. "They didn't like it, of course. The wandering ghosts may bow to Fate, but they have some influence on what you write, don't they?" He should know, he'd been a ghost for a hundred years. Probably the only Persona with memories of it, too.

His thoughts were unceremoniously cut short as Atropos suddenly appeared in front of him, her sword at his throat.

"You may have escaped Fate twice," she hissed, "But you shall not do it again. We must only keep you alive- your thread does not care if you have your limbs attached."

"You know what they say," Arsene managed, "Fool me twice; shame on you."

It was nice knowing you, Ren said.

Have some faith, he chided.

Atropos stared at him disbelievingly for a moment. Then she sighed and sheathed the blade. "Have you any fear for your life?" she demanded.

"None."

"You are an imbecile."

He ignored her. "Ren, Akechi, have you not encountered the wandering ghosts before? The ones taken from the Sea of Souls?"

Ren, of course, already knew about the Sea, but Akechi had never gotten Personas that way before. Keeping the 'main characters' on the same page would be imperative.

He watched the gears turn in the brown-haired assassin's head. Surely, if he'd masqueraded as a detective for a year, he'd at least learned someth-

"The Shadows, if I'm not mistaken." Akechi narrowed his eyes. "But..."

Clotho sneered. "Detective, they're called wandering ghosts for a reason- pray tell, what do you think that is?"

His face flushed, red wisps dancing across the cuffs as Clotho mocked him. All the souls were dead, of course.

Lavenza snapped her fingers. "Arsene. If you had known all of this, why would you demand our attention? You had won the game!" Frustration wrote itself across her small face. "He kissed the Shapeshifter, you destroyed Kronos without becoming Satanael, and Trae was free! Did your ego demand you find another challenge?"

That stung. Arsene pouted, crystal eyes widening innocently. "Surely you know me better than that? You see-"

But it was Futaba who answered. "Danganronpa," she said, almost like she was talking to herself. Then, louder, "You and the ghosts control everyone. Arsene is literally Ren's sense of rebellion! What'd you think he was gonna do, let himself be controlled? You expect any of us are just gonna bow down?"

"I expect you to be grateful," said Lachesis. "We control the future. If not for us, it would be utter chaos. You Thieves call yourself rebellion, but did you ever consider what happens after? The chaos it would bring?"

Ren's crimson eyes blazed. He strained against the chains. "Think about this, you tyrants: have you ever not controlled someone's fate? How could you know? It might bring chaos, or it might not! You just don't want to give up control, just like that Yaldabaoth!"

Akechi scoffed. "They couldn't know what it's like. They were never human, you fool."

He was a bit vague, but Arsene agreed. To not know the future was purely human. Of everyone he'd ever met, only Chihiya the fortune teller could guess. The Moirai would never understand what it was to second-guess their actions because they wrote the future. They would always be confident in their actions. It was all scripted and unfair, and so fucking cruel.

The worst part was, no one knew it.

"Lady Lavenza!" Morgana yowled, "You're better than this! Why are you helping them?"

Typical hero question.

For a second, Lavenza's eyes pooled with tears, then she furiously wiped them away. "They... they'll cut my master's string... if I didn't summon them."

Typical hostage answer.

You have no sympathy, Ren huffed.

Rather than answering that, Arsene thought of a grey house burning, and a flag under a lighter.

That was uncalled for, he pouted.

"Atropos threatened to, actually," Lachesis said. She put a hand on Lavenza's shoulder. "However, I... ah, suggested... that we leave him be. I'm rather attached to this one."

Lavenza's eyes were far away, like she was observing something no one else could see. "She did say that, but the whims of Fate... they change quite a lot."

She might not trust the fates, Arsene thought, but she certainly cared about Lachesis. That heartbroken scream when she was injured, the way the auburn-haired woman protected her... yes, Lavenza cared for her more than she'd admit.

"Do I have this right?" a new voice asked. Arsene twisted around as best he could. Trae. Her gold-green eyes looked tired, and her skin looked paler than it should, but she was awake. And she looked furious. She started counting off on one hand. "You three poopheads control the entire world and change things at the whims of some dead pric-uh, people. You won't give up control because you think it'll turn to chaos, but you really just don't wanna lose control. So... you're a bunch of all-powerful tyrant wusses, and Lavenza sorta trusts them, 'cause they're kinda-but-not-really her Persona." She raised a challenging eyebrow. "Akechi, does that sound correct?"

The corners of his mouth twitched. "Seems about right." He jerked his head at Ryuji. "Got that, dimwit?"

Arsene heard the ghosts again, rising and brushing past their skin. Lavenza's jaw tightened. He could certainly hear their dissent, and a fair amount of hostility towards their Treasure.

He was going to lock away every single one of those noncommittal, worthless bastards.

Clotho broke the silence. "What are you going to do about it?" she demanded. She sashayed across the room with the confidence only an immortal could have. "You realize that we have to kill you all now, right?"

Trae's eyes sharpened. "Would you have let us live anyways? You would have killed me for trying to leave!"

She had a point. But there was one more thing...

"Wait!" Futaba yelled. She flinched as everyone's attention landed on her, but she did her best to clear her throat. "So... who's played Danganronpa?"

"Futaba-" Makoto started.

"No! I'm not joking!" she yelled. Her hands clenched and unclenched. "'Cause I find it hard to believe that these all-powerful, all-seeing gods would make a mistake with a main character." She glared at the Moirai, who'd lost all traces of amusement. "Take it from a 'side character', but I think this is still part of the storyline."

There was a beat of silence.

Atropos turned to Clotho, who had stared unblinkingly at Futaba. "Shall we kill them?"

"Yes," Clotho said simply. 

If this was all part of the storyline, Arsene thought. If he was merely part of the story... how could he influence it to change? Futaba clearly wasn't supposed to realize it, so how had she thrown off Fate? How had he, when Arsene was among the living?

"Because the wandering ghosts liked you then," said Lachesis. "They like Futaba Sakura, too. And I am rather interested to see where she goes with this."

"And Atropos likes you," Clotho muttered. "Personally, I believe you're more trouble than you are worth."

The ghosts hummed, more insistant, and Lachesis put a finger to her lips. "Futaba Sakura, you have something to say, correct?"

The girl's eyes lit up. "Well, since none of you casuals have the patience to play mystery games-"

Akechi snorted.

"Oh please, Detective! You just stab people and move on with your life!"

"Says the gremlin with no friends."

"Yeah, and what does that make you!"

"A bastard child with trust issues," Akechi said plainly. "But I have a boyfriend, which is more than you'll have."

"You-"

"Stick to your waifus."

"At least they're hotter than you, Pancake Prince!"

"You take that back, four-eyes!"

Makoto sighed. "Guys, this isn't a good-"

Futaba cut her off. "Fine, I'll make it easier for you dumb casuals to get. If they were gonna kill us, they would've done it already. They're tryna get approval from the dead guys."

There was a beat of silence.

Holy shit, Ren said.

"You're... right," Ann said. That seemed to sum it up for everyone else, although it seemed to be a lot to take in. Arsene didn't see how, but he wasn't exactly human anymore, so he supposed he couldn't judge.

Akechi paused. His eyes narrowed. "I concede," he said. Futaba grinned, but he wasn't done. "Now since we've concluded that they're all-powerful, explain how we're supposed to win."

Arsene laughed. "Well, we could beg for our lives-"

"Kill me now," Ren muttered.

"Or," said Futaba, looking directly at Arsene, "We could convince the ghosts to stop Fate for us."

There was a clinking of chains, a rattling sound, and Trae dropped to the ground. In her hands was a rusted key, and one silver one.

"Yes, wandering ghosts," she all but snarled. Even though this wasn't her Palace, Arsene sensed her power triple, saw her grow to her former height and glory.

"What future shall I destroy?"

---

robin out