"Why would you even plan that plan?"

[Pilgrim]

Did anybody besides me even actually play Persona 3? Whatever, obscure (F) jrpg fic ftw(?) Click on the hyperlinked names to get an image of the character maybe if it works! Part 1 of 3, rest to come in same topic at a point that may also be in time.

Yukari Takeba walked slowly down the girl’s hallway of the SEES dorm, savoring the anticipation. Most of the time she avoided being the one to knock on Mitsuru Kirijo’s door and inform her that the group was heading out that night. The smug way she responded made Yukari feel somehow inadequate, as if the team was incapable of functioning properly without Mitsuru’s help, even though they had faced plenty of battles without her direct assistance. But this time, she knew she’d have a different attitude. Smiling confidently, she knocked twice on the door to her senior schoolmate’s room, and opened it at a soft-spoken “Come in”.

Yukari paused in the doorway, taking in the whole scene before her. Mitsuru was sitting at her desk, bent over a stack of workbooks as usual. But in addition to this conventional scene, there were the signs of the toll her summer allergies had taken on the redheaded teenager. A wastebasket filled with used tissues overflowed around her feet, and more lined the edges of her desk. A small tower of empty tissue boxes waiting to be taken to the recycling teetered in a back corner of the room. Several newly bought ones sat at the foot of her bed, and another open one beside her books. And of course, there was the sneezing.

“Ah-SHHH! Hetshhh Aschhh Hah-hah-HATSCHHH! Oh, Takeba, what, ahhhh, what-ahhh-Ahhh-AHH-TSCHHH! What brings you here?”

“Well, Minato wants to go hunting Shadows today, you know, to test the new member’s abilities. I think he was also hoping you could come too, since he hasn’t gotten to see you in action yet.” Yukari smiled devilishly. A cursory glance at Mitsuru’s red-rimmed nostrils, runny nose, and tearful eyes easily revealed that she was not anywhere near top condition.

“Oh, I see…I, um…” Mitsuru was struggling to control her breathing, clearly trying to suppress another fit of sneezing while she spoke. “I didn’t think…we’d be going out again…so soon…after a…ahhhh…Atschh Ataschhh Haah-Atschhhh! After a…full…moon ATSCHHH Haaah-TSCHHH Hatschh Haschhh Haatschh Heh-TSCHHH!!”

Mitsuru scrambled to pull a number of tissues out of her box and blew her nose wetly into them. Clearly the tickle persisted, since she continued rubbing at her nose afterward.

“Bless you, senpai. That was pretty, ah, impressive!” Yukari’s eyes gleamed with a mischievous glow as Mitsuru’s cheeks flushed. “Well, it has been three days since our last big fight, and while he does think it may be early to start moving further into Tartarus, he doesn’t think it’ll be too difficult to do a little fighting in the areas we’ve already explored. But, if you don’t think you’re up to it, of course he won’t mind oyu sitting out…”

“No no! I’ll meet you downstairs in just a little while” Mitsuru leapt from her desk, scattering used tissues in all directions.

“Are you sure, senpai? Because your allergies sound pretty awful tonight…”

“I…I’ll be fine. They’re really not so bad ah-at night…Haaah….Hahh HAH-“ She placed a finger under her nose, stopping any further sneezes that might undermine her point. Speaking through sniffles, Mitsuru continued “And they’ll *sniff* calm down *sniff* once we’re in *sniffle* Tartarus.”

“Okay, if you say so!” Yukari turned and headed back down to the lounge. She hadn’t really expected that Mitsuru would refuse to come along. However, she did feel pretty confident that if she started fighting Shadows in her present condition, sooner or later she’d make a fool of herself. Yukari didn’t generally enjoy the humiliation of others, but Mitsuru was a special case. Top of all her classes, former leader of the SEES team, and generally regarded as the Alpha-female of the dorm, she maintained an air of superiority that simply rubbed Yukari the wrong way. She hated how her senior teammate carried herself like she was the perfect woman, when she wasn’t even really all that much smarter or stronger or better looking than herself! Yukari smiled to herself and hurried down the stairs. She couldn’t wait for tonight’s operation to start.

***

“HETSCHHH! Heh-Etschh Hetshchhh Etschheew!”

“Bless you, senpai!” The team echoed for the fiftieth time. Mitsuru’s cheeks flushed as she wiped her nose on the back of her hand, not having enough time to search her pack for tissues in the middle of a fight. The team had only been chasing down Shadow monsters for around half an hour, and already she was many times worse than how she had been earlier. Her nose had been rubbed to a bright red, and she couldn’t go five minutes without sneezing. Although there was no plant life in Tartarus, the vast dungeon where Shadows dwelled, the journey there from the dorm had exposed Mitsuru to more than enough pollen to extend her allergies for the duration of the Dark Hour in which the dungeon existed. Although she had managed to perform well enough in battling the Shadows, she could feel her teammates’ ridiculing eyes on her as she took breaks in between fights to blow her nose or indulge another sneezing fit. Blessing her in chorus during the middle of a fight was too much for her pride to bear. Gripping her rapier, she lunged at the nearest shadow, a four-armed black blob, intent on redeeming herself.

“You’ll fall by my hah-haan-haaah-HATSCHHEEEW!!!”

In only a few steps, Mitsuru was overcome by her allergies. The Shadow creature not only easily avoided her assault, but also swiped her legs out from under her. She fell flat on her face, getting the wind knocked out of her and consequently stopping her sneezing fit short.

“Mitsuru’s down! Yukari, take out that Shadow, don’t let it counterattack!” Minato shouted while cleaving up another Shadow. As the only member of the team who used a ranged weapon, a bow, it commonly fell to her to cover for other teammate’s missteps. She could switch between targets much quicker and didn’t have to move much to engage them.

“You got it!” Yukari called back, smirking as she took careful aim at the monster bearing down on the redhead. Her smug satisfaction was so great that she could barely maintain her grip on her bowstring. Their first fight with Shadows alongside “the great” Mitsuru, and already Yukari was being asked to save her. This would knock her high-minded attitude down some.

“S-sorry about earlier…” After the battle, the team agreed to take a short rest. Mitsuru stammered out half-formed apologies between sniffles, unsure of exactly how to explain herself.

“Don’t worry about it, senpai.” Minato regarded her with his usual polite deferential attitude, though from his restless pacing Yukari could tell (and presumably Mitsuru could too) that he was agitated. “Though you know, if you’re not feeling up to fighting tonight, it’d be alright if you returned to the dorms. We can finish up here.”

“No!” Mitsuru exclaimed, a little more loudly than she may have intended. “I, um, I came tonight because you wanted to see what I was capable of. I haven’t shown you even half of what I can do yet.”

“Yes…” Minato replied, and then continued softly under his breath to Yukari “one would hope so”. She suppressed a giggle. “Well then, I suppose we’d better press onward. We’re losing time. Junpei, where were those stairs you said you thought you saw…”

Although the night continued without any further such incidents, Mitsuru still struggled against her allergies throughout their further battles, and eventually Minato decided that it was time they returned since “It wouldn’t be wise to push everyone too much after their last big battle”. Yukari was fairly certain that this was just an excuse he was offering so Mitsuru could save face. Later, she visited his room to confirm her suspicions.

"Yeah, that's right. I didn't want to embarrass her, you know? I mean I'm sure she figured out I was just giving an excuse too, but having it out in the open that she was holding us back just didn't seem right." He leaned back in his chair, running his hands through his hair. "I'm sure she's capable of more than what we saw tonight, but so long as those allergies keep her down we're basically down a team member. And the Shadows have been getting tougher; I don't know if you, me, Junpei, and Akihiko-san are going to be enough to push through to the next level of Tartarus by the next full moon. Thank goodness we can have Fuuka doing the scout work for us now instead of Mitsuru; I don't know where we'd be without her.

Yukari could tell he was exasperated. "Don't worry, Minato! At the very least, you can count on me to be ready for action the whole week! I won't let you down!"

He raised an eyebrow. "The whole week? We've never pushed for such a stint before...But we never had as big a team before either. Still, going out that late every night's gonna be rough. You really think we can do it without pushing everyone too hard?"

Yukari nodded, although in truth she was a little nervous. Still, this was the biggest chance she'd get to show up Mitsuru, and impress Minato as well. She couldn't miss it! "Sure we can! Just give it a shot!"

On the fourth day since Yukari's claim, after three nights of staying up late to fight monsters in grueling battles, Yukari woke up sweating with a fever, sore throat, and congested sinuses. Nonetheless, she forced herself to go to school, and by the time she returned to the dorm that evening she was an aching, sniffling, sneezing mess...

[Ciuty80]

awww this is cute

and the pics of the characters are just

[NoV]

Nice! Love how you've linked in the character pictures

[Alexandria]

cool and LOVE the charchters and this story... is this a game or an actual anime?