Persona:Shattered Dreams Ch4

Persona : Shattered Dreams

CHAPTER IV : MASQUERADE

"There's a dark secret in me.
Don't leave me locked in your heart.
Set me free."
-- Kylie Minogue

**********

"Oh, and don't forget the quiz next Tuesday. Since I like you all so much, I'll include today's lecture on factor groups in it." said a wolf clad in a crimson batik shirt to about sixty pairs of ears.

A symphony of groans rang throughout the lecture hall, accompanied by the clatter of stationery and rustling of bags. Ezra carefully placed several items into his briefcase, including his favourite green laser pointer, and switched off the LCD projector.

"Good to see you again, Prof." said a young and fresh-faced male canary as he passed, to which Ezra nodded and said his thanks. It was one of very few greetings he'd received since he returned to work, despite the fact that it had only been nine days after he was admitted to the hospital.

He was the one who insisted on the early discharge.

A lithe female Siamese cat sidled up next to him, close enough for him to smell her perfume. "Couldn't wait to get back on the horse, could you?" she said, in a breathy voice, smooth as caramel. The woman was Dr. Chan, a middle-aged widow dressed in an incredibly formal yet revealing purple suit, and a fellow professor coming in for the next class session in the hall. "I like a man who's too stubborn to lie down all day." She placed her notebook computer, a pink and white thing, down onto the dark wood grain of the table and switched it on.

"Hmmm, is Professor Shamsir on leave today?"
"No, he's not, Dr. Chan. Why do you ask?"
"Because he's supposed to be teaching the class you just lectured to for the last two hours."
"I think I'd know which class I'm supposed to..." A thought crossed his mind, and showed up on his face for a moment. "I'm not teaching them anymore, am I?"

She stroked his shoulder with a hand gloved in brown fur. "Didn't get the memo, huh? Well, you'd best go check with him later. You were away for a long time, dear."

"It's only been a week."

"Not just that. Checking out of the hospital so early, and a private hospital at that... it gets people talking, you know? Doesn't help you at all." Ezra made a face, as he noticed that his superior did not spare a beat out of her wry smile. He grabbed his briefcase and started walking towards the door.

That is, if his forearm hadn't been gently grasped by Dr. Chan, as she said: "Hang on a sec, Ezra." With another hand, she pointed to a grey-and-white rabbit girl still putting things into a tote bag. The girl seemed to be sheepishly stealing glances in Ezra's direction. "See that sweet little kitten over there? She went to my office the other day to get my signature for course registration. Guess what else she wanted?"

"What?"

"Your handphone number."

Ezra sighed, and closed his briefcase with a snap of the brass locking mechanism. "Dr. Chan, I distinctly remember that you promised not to try to set me up with anyone, anymore."

"Did I? Must have... forgotten." she said, as her smile grew into a grin. "Still, a young man like you is at just the right age to look for someone to call a wife."

She leaned in for a final whisper before she addressed her students. "Heads up, Professor E. You're the apple of someone's eye." He only smiled politely in reply, as the young lapine approached him. "Prof, is there a time when I can see you? I have trouble with the section about cosets."

"Hmm, Kelly, is it? I'm a busy man, so it's hard to say."

"Please, sir? I enjoy this class very much, and won't be too much trouble."

Ezra feigned consideration. "Come by Tuesday afternoon. After the quiz. If you see me then, you'll see me then."

"Okay, thanks a lot." She held her bag and a clear plastic folder full of notes close to herself, and smiled to him.

Ezra walked out from the lecture hall rather quickly, despite the limp in his leg.

He wasn't too far from the hall when he saw a brown cat with grey-streaked hair leaning against a motorcycle. Ryuumajin noticed Ezra as he swept dust off his biker's jacket, and smiled as he lifted a bag of gado-gado in his hand for Ezra to see. Seeing he was without any huge books to throw at the cat, he smiled and joined Ryuumajin for lunch.

They tucked into the food at one of a few gazebos dotting one side of the courtyard in front of the central mosque, well out of the glaring afternoon sunlight. As Ryuumajin chewed on a tender piece of squid, he noticed a thin scar running across Ezra's forehead, and a small slash of discoloured, brownish fur over it. He felt it was best he did not mention it, trying hard to resist his curiosity.

"One of my friends, Koku-kun." he ventured. "He said he'd done a wish on the Midnight Channel before and..."

"Midnight Channel?"

"That's what his girlfriend calls it."

"His girlfriend?"

"She didn't try it herself, she saw him do it. Anyhow... Koku-kun didn't know what to ask for, so he just looked at the pretty face on the screen for a while. Then it just disappeared."

"And this is relevant how?"

"I really want to know why I didn't see what he saw. Why I saw you getting hurt instead."

Ezra went quiet, as he thoughtfully chewed and swallowed a piece of peanut-sauce-smothered tofu. "What exactly did you see?"

"A weird wolf-guy was choking you with his hands."

Ezra nodded approvingly.

"I just think we should look into this thing with the Midnight Channel a little better." said the feline.

The wolf fiddled with a slice of boiled egg in the polystyrene carton, then set the plastic fork down. "Before, I'd've considered you a buffoon for even attempting it, but things are... different... now." He raised his head, and there was a sincerity on his face and in his voice. "If it rains tonight, or any night, I'll check the TV as well."

He looked over the table.

"Ryuu... didn't you get any drinks?"

"Uhhh."

**********

Two men were walking on the side of the street, under the glaring sunlight, holding plastic bowls of cold cendol. The taller one, who wore a pale beige dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up, stirred the coconut milk in his bowl with a plastic spoon, bringing the green noodles and red beans to the surface.

"Wait, that old makcik just left her purse at home and forgot?" said the larger one, a panda bear who wore a shirt one size too small and seemed to be sweating heavily. "Uh-huh." said the other.

"So the guy wasn't actually a pickpocket."

"Yep."

"Then why did you book him anyway?"

"When I went with him to his car, the license plate on it was the same as the one reported stolen three days ago."

"Masha-Allah."

Ahmady was quiet for a bit, before he started laughing. Hawkfeather gulped down some more of the ice-cold dessert.

They arrived at a small police station situated next to a school. In the early afternoon, children in uniforms were both coming out of and going through the school gates. Cars and vans were parked just outside, with parents and guardians waiting to pick up their young ones.

A pair of white police Kancils (tiny cars with wheels the size of watermelons) were parked at the station, with yellow and blue checker stripes on their sides. Ahmady gestured towards Hawkfeather, who held his bowl as the panda unlocked one of the cars and picked up a large envelope from the front passenger seat.

Inside the station, they made their way to their desks, both laden with stacks of reports and various folders. Hawkfeather adjusted his black tie while looking into a small oblong mirror, and turned on his computer. Ahmady sat down and carefully opened the envelope, marked as sent from the Johor State Police Department. In it was a formal letter, which Ahmady scrutinised as Hawkfeather typed up a report of the earlier arrest.

"I've got good news and bad news. Which one do you want first?"

"Bad news."

"Maria, Khairil and Jonny. Those three."

"What about them?"

"State P.D. is taking over. They say it's taking too long, and they have better facilities to handle stuff like this."

Hawkfeather held a stoic expression on his face, but his disappointment broke through. It's true that they haven't made any progress with the murders, but having the cases pulled out from under his feet was something he did not like at all. He rubbed the side of his head with taloned fingers. "So what's the good news?"

"To me, that was the good news." Ahmady stood up and placed the letter on the bird's desk. "Come on, Hawk. Did you really think we'd actually get anywhere with those cases?" Hawkfeather sighed, and nodded.

"It would be nice to see those big city cops get as much of a headache out of them as we do, wouldn't it?" he said, with a sly grin.

Hours passed at the station. Policemen went in and out, dropping reports and bringing in people for processing or testimony. A few officers passed by Hawkfeather's desk and dropped off case files, but they never seem to try to make eye contact with the bird.

At near half-past-three, Hawkfeather slammed a door closed when he overheard two officers discussing the latest exploits of The Raven, who had broken the jaw of a man who tried to rape a five-year-old girl under cover of rain and fog the week before.

Twilight came, and Ahmady returned to his desk from his Maghrib prayers. "Oh goody, you're still here." he said to the bird at the desk just across his own, who was scrutinising some photographs with a magnifying glass. "Are you free next Friday? I want to ask you to dinner with with my folks and my sis. They're picking her up from USTM for the mid-semester break and..."

"Sorry, can't."

Ahmady was taken aback, but said nothing for a while. "Look, I'm not cozying up to you, but I'd appreciate it if you told me what it is you actually do so late at night, every night?"

Hawkfeather raised his head, and calmly looked at the panda. "Do you really want me to tell you? Because it involves going downtown late at night and getting comfy, and I mean really close, really intimate contact with a couple of nice..."

"Okay! Alright. Fine, don't bother telling me. Aku tak nak tahu pun."

As Ahmady went back to his own business, Hawkfeather held up the picture he had been examining to the desk lamp's light. It was a blurry security camera capture of a three-man team that had knocked off two banks in downtown Johor Bahru in the past month. Two-thirds of the picture had been blacked out by spray-paint. The group seemed too well-armed and efficient to be in it purely for the money. They were then under scrutiny by the state police department, and the case is well beyond the capabilities of a suburban gumshoe. Nevertheless, Hawkfeather had a feeling this is something the mystery vigilante would love to stick his arrogant little beak in.

He pinned the picture onto a corkboard beside him, near various articles related to the murder cases that used to be his responsibility.

**********

"Damn, this is the best sangria I've ever tasted." said Dobb, as he put an empty glass onto a table. "Without any actual booze in it."

"I eased up on the pomegranate juice this time, for your sake. I'm a sucker for the red stuff." Ezra fished out a scrap of orange from his glass and chewed on it.

"It's really weird to be drinking this stuff while it's pouring sheets out there."

"I know, stupid timing."

Dobb chuckled. "On whose part?"

"It's way too late to discuss religion, I think."

Outside, the raindrops drummed against the aluminium awning over the front porch. When the shower started, Ezra promised Dobb he would drive him back as soon as it let up.

"Where were we again?"

"I was telling you about the thing in KL."

"Huh, yeah. What happened next?"

Dobb twirled a finger in the air, and pouted. "That's... it. I think. We went our separate ways."

"It's quite a story."

"It's what happened, that's all."

"So nobody but you, Shuraim, and the others know?"

"What would be the point of telling people about it? All traces of what we did went away after Lalita gave herself up to protect the city." The doberman poured himself another glass of the citrusy drink. "Well, except the parts that couldn't be repaired." he said, as he took a sip. "She made her choice, and part of her choice was to let us remember it. To let everyone move on."

Ezra stared at the half-filled pitcher. The condensation made it look like it was sweating through the glass. "Shuraim died because he was involved in it, didn't he? I mean, he gets sick all the time, but he's the kind who'll work through any pain."

"How close were you to him?"

Ezra refilled his glass, but for an inch from the top. "Close enough." He added ice from a transparent bucket beside the pitcher. "But ultimately no cigar."

Dobb stopped, and sniggered. "What?" said the wolf.

"You. Chasing cigars."

"Oh please, you're far past your quota for potshots on the gay guy."

Dobb raised a hand in silent apology. His eyes moved towards the television sets placed along one side of the living room. "Oh, hey, why do you have two TVs?" he asked, as he took a gulp of the sangria.

"The small one's for the satellite channels. The big one's for all my hardcore manporno."

Some of the punch Dobb was drinking went down the wrong way, and he coughed and sniffled. "God, you're easy." said Ezra, with a light chuckle.

After taking some time to recover, Dobb leaned back on the sofa and glanced towards the window. "Would I be right to think that there are no neighbours living next door to you?"

"That house hasn't been occupied since last year. The house behind is a rental. A gaggle of students stay there during university year, mostly just to sleep in, and it's vacant during the holidays."

"So this house is a bit isolated."

"It's nice and quiet."

Dobb held up his mostly-full glass at eye level. "And discreet."

"I value my privacy, Dobb."

The doberman set glass down on the table. "Look, Ezra... I knew Shuraim. I can tell when somebody's keeping things down low."

Ezra puttered with the glass in his hand for a while, before he spoke. "Contrary to popular belief, I don't really get much... experience. Not that I'd expect to. This town... it's not like KL or Singapore. I swear, if I hadn't studied well enough to spend time overseas, I'd never have known."

The black wolf drank some of the sangria, and made a face like he just swallowed acid. "Besides, I deal with young, impressionable minds almost every day, Dobb. They'll never live it down if they know."

"Who're 'they'?"

Ezra took another sip, instead of answering.

"You don't know."

"Yes, I do. 'They' will see to it that no one will ever trust me with another student. 'They' can make sure I never work again. Everyone else is 'they', sooner or later."

Just then, a strange noise rang through the living room. Both of them followed their ears, and their eyes landed upon the source of the sound: the smaller television set. "Do you have a timer on or something?" said Dobb. Ezra blinked a few times. "Actually, that set is broken. It's not even plugged in."

The screen flickered into life, showing the familiar snowstorm of a dead channel. The noises gradually transmuted into voices, and an image was forming from the initial visual chaos.

Shown on the screen was what seemed to be a sitcom. There was a room with a dining table, where people dressed like a prim and proper 1950's family sat. A tall and commanding father, a delicate mother, a charming girl. All of them looked exactly the same: brown-furred housecats with black, grey-streaked hair.

At the head of the table, however, sat a young male cat with the same face, dressed in a Rockman T-shirt with spots of blood on it. His eyes were lowered, and he looked extremely weak and pale.

"Thank you for that lovely recitation of the do'a, dear." said the mother.

"You're welcome, Mummy. I am so thankful to God that I have such a nice family." said the daughter.

"Now let's begin carving the meat, shall we?" said the father, as he raised a scalpel that glinted under the light.

"Not with your little butter knife, honey!" exclaimed the mother.

The family laughed, in a controlled and polite way.

A laugh track is heard.

With a blip, the screen returned to the black of a switched-off television set.

"Oh Hell, no."

**********

Dobb hummed a tune from an old cartoon series as he readied his bag, and wore a pair of earphones attached to a player inside it. "Another day of picture-taking?" said a black-furred cat coming down the stairs. "Mmm-hmm."

"You were out the whole night."

"Don't worry, I wasn't doing anything bad." said Dobb, who paused thoughtfully for a bit. "Unless you consider spending time with Ezra to be particularly squicky."

"Overnight... with Ezra?" Andy pushed the bridge of his spectacles up, and kept his eyes on the dog. "Stop looking at me like that."

"What? Oh, sorry, I just... nevermind. Forget it." Suddenly realising something, Andy went back up to his room and returned with a carboard box the size of a hair dryer.

"This came in the mail for you yesterday. I signed for it."

Dobb nodded, and placed the box onto the dining table. Using a blunt claw, he tore through the cellophane tape and opened the package. In his hand, he held up a leather-like collar with an attachment that looked vaguely like several acupressure massage heads. The doberman seemed a bit sad as he examined it.

Andy only had a severe tone to offer. "I thought you handed over your Evoker, like the rest of us. You know they're not ours to keep."

"I gave them the one I broke on the sixth full Moon. If they really wanted it back, they would have asked each one of us for it, and they didn't do that, did they?" He placed the object back into the box, and started to carry it back to his room. "I wanted to keep a souvenir. I really didn't expect to have to use this again."

Dobb glanced back towards the cat. "I know you're not convinced, but it's not up to me to prove things for you."

"If you're saying I'm just like everybody else, living in my own bubble of..."

"I'm not. I'm saying that I am doing what I will do. That's all."

Andy sighed, and nodded once. "Just don't end up getting hurt or anything like that, okay?"

Some time later, the feline watched as Dobb said goodbye and closed the front gate. "Lord knows we've had our share of it last time."

**********

Ezra listened as the ringing tone went on for about ten times before the voicemail system kicked in. "Nope, still nothing on his cell."

"What about his home phone num..." said Yaali.

"Handphone. Home phone. Instant Message. E-mail. Even a Note through his DefiantArt gallery."

It was relatively calm at the Student Union cafeteria, where a black wolf, a tall goat and a doberman sat at a table with various drinks and a few plates of food. Ezra placed his phone on the table, next to a serving of spring rolls, and rubbed his face.

Yaali raised his head from his cup of green tea, and noticed the scar on the wolf's forehead, and a V-shaped segment of discoloured fur over it. "That mark on your head is from your injuries, correct? It makes you look angry all the time."

"He isn't?" said Dobb, as he popped a fried squid ball into his mouth.

"As much as I would like to be a provider of your daily lools..." said Ezra as he broke a spring roll in half and dipped it in ginger-chilli sauce. "There's the matter of Ryuumajin showing up in the Midnight Channel, and his apparent disappearance."

"So you say." ventured Yaali. "There is the possibility, not entirely discountable, that he is just fine. His phone credit ran out, or the battery died. Or simply that he's very busy, or is away and forgot to tell you. It may very well be that the thing with Ezra had nothing to do with the Mid... what... Midnight Channel... rumour."

"Just humour me here: the worst case is that he's in that world you found me." said Ezra, as he chewed on a crispy, beansprout-filled spring roll. "From what happened last night with the unplugged TV, we're dealing with something that's beyond physical laws."

"And those, hm, Persona things." Yaali interjected. "Are either of you aware that 'persona' is Latin for 'mask'? In psychology it is a reprentation of ourselves we put out for other people to see. It's not a facet of yourself. It's a facade."

Dobb shrugged. "All I know is, a Shadow gets wasted when a Persona gets out."

Ezra placed a hand over one side of his face. "Just because it's a mask, doesn't mean it can't tell the truth. We try to appear smart or beautiful not because we want to lie, but because we want to feel better about ourselves and worry less about doing the things we want to do. The mask is power."

"Huh. Anyway, you're still unconvinced about this whole thing, Yaali?" said Dobb.

"I am fully convinced that what happened to the four of us in the past was very real. Uncomfortable, but very tangible nonetheless." He sipped some of the tea. "My doubts lie in our assumption that we know what we're doing at all. There is no evidence that the same thing with Ezra is happening to Ryuu."

The wolf set his eyes onto his tall glass of milk coffee. "It's instinct, Yaali. I've got a gut feeling about this."

Yaali made a face. "In...stinct? Guts?"

"I'm not sure about this touchy-feely stuff Ezra takes to so easily, but we should act on what little information and speculation we do have." said Dobb, as he stirred a milky, purple-coloured drink with a straw. "Whoever sent Ezra into that place probably figured out we saved him after Ryuu discovered the Midnight Channel and saw him. There's a chance that person can tell who've seen the transmissions."

"Assuming it was a person who did it. It could all be some poorly-understood non-sentient anomaly of reality." Yaali added.

"About that..." said Ezra, as he wiped his fingers with a paper napkin. "I heard a voice before I was knocked out and brought to that other world. Didn't know what it said, but it sounded like a young woman."

Dobb drummed the table with his fingers. "The Midnight Channel rumour involves seeing a beautiful person's face. Y'think it's..."

"You never mentioned that, Ezra." said Yaali, with a tone of disappointment.

"Well, I just did. Take from it what you will." Ezra replied, downed the last of his coffee. "We have to find him. He's in there because of me."

"We do not know that for certain." said Yaali.

"No, we don't, but even if you two aren't going to find out, I will."

"I... didn't say I wasn't going to help." said Yaali, quietly.

"Count me curious as well." said Dobb.

For a moment, Ezra had a genuinely warm and grateful smile on his face.

"How did you find the way in last time?" Dobb pointed a finger towards Yaali. "I just came across a television monitor with the strange sound coming out of it and saw the screen with the swirls. Ryuu was calling me at the time."

"I was waiting there for the rain to let up. It's on my route to the Computer Science lecture halls. So a portal like that should be somewhere Ryuu's been before."

"Where's the last place he went that you guys know?"

"Doesn't he work at a design studio?" Yaali suggested.

Ezra nodded. "Last time I saw him, I was visiting him at Awan Larat. Brought him fresh mee rebus."

"So, a visit is in order?" said Dobb, as he slurped the last of his purple drink.

"I know where it is. Meet me at the Library parking lot, around five. I'll drive us all there." said Ezra, as he swept a finger across his plate and licked crumbs off it.

**********

The Awan Larat Design Studio was actually the second floor of a shophouse lot in Taman Pulai Indah, adjacent to Taman Universiti. More accurately, it was the illustration branch of an advertising company which turned a decent profit most of the time, even then through its 3D animation work, but was otherwise unremarkable. Three men walked past the door in between the shuttered shops, and went up the stairs to a door with a stylised logo for the studio, complete with an oriental Monkey King cloud puff.

Inside it was several desks with computers and light-tables, arranged in some semblance to an arcane pecking order, with the more important staff members indicated by nicer nameplates getting places closer to the window and air-conditioning.

"Lots of monitors here. No TVs, though, except for the one at the mamak coffeeshop downstairs." said Dobb.

Ezra's eyes landed on a section labelled DIMAS. It was a small cubicle in the corner of the office space, equipped with a computer, a bulky CRT monitor and a basketful of drawing tools. It didn't have its own a waste basket. Various doodles and comics were pinned onto the foam board attached to a wall, and a blue Rockman figure was poised to unleash a devastating blast towards Doraemon at one side of the table.

The wolf received an elbow-nudge from Dobb, when a dark-furred sun bear walked up to them. He was a large man wearing an olive-coloured polo shirt, and he smelled like tobacco and cinnamon. "You people here for something or other?"

"Ah, you look like someone important here. My name is Ezra, and these are my associates, Yaali and Dobb." Ezra said, and held out a hand. The bear made a face, and shook it.

"Name's Badrul. Head of the 2D artsy things we do here. It's probably something important some time or other. Hah." The bear took out a pair of spectacles from a pants pocket, and put them on. "What can a guy like me do you for?"

Yaali stepped up to the plate. "We would like to inquire on the presence of Ryuuma..." He felt a bump just above his feet. "I mean, Dimas. We would like to ask if you possess knowledge of his whereabouts."

"Damn, you talk funny, tall guy."

"Yaali. It's Yaali."

"I apologise for my friend here, but what he means is that we'd appreciate it if you could tell us about Dimas, or Ryuumajin, as some of us call him. You do have the look of a well-informed man." said Ezra, with an absolutely dashing smile.

The bear looked sideways and back, and scratched his headfur. "Ryuu... he's a nice guy, y'know, but we can't afford guys who are just nice here. We need guys who can meet deadlines, and do what they're told to do. I like ol' whiskerface, sure, but the other guys can't seem to stand him. Now he's skipping days, and I dunno what I can do for him anymore."

"He didn't come to work? Since when?" asked Ezra, who had thought things were going well for the cat.

"We were all supposed to present our individual ideas to the head honcho, for next year's potential projects. Yet he hasn't clocked in since Friday."

"Any idea where he could be?" said Dobb.

"If there's anywhere you should look for him, it's his house. Is all I can say. He comes in with his bike, he leaves with his bike. Most of us don't see him stopping by anywhere. Sorry I can't be more help to you all." said the bear, as he started walking back to his section of the office.

At half the way, Badrul stopped, and turned to the three for a few last words. "Hey, if you see him, tell him Sathish's proposal got the pick for the main production flow." He paused, and frowned sadly. "...and tell him he's fired. I fought for him, but that didn't do any good. He ought to get his stuff out ay-sap."

On the way out, they passed by Sathish's desk. It was decked out with a laptop and two LCD monitors. Various highly-detailed illustrations were pasted on the board nearby. A few of them looked a little too much like recoloured Gundam robots. Other drawings involved curvaceous buxom female beauties in shiny, tight clothing. "Huh, Liefeld perspective." said Ezra. Yaali paused and stared at the certain figure thoughtfully. Dobb walked in reverse back to the others, and scrutinised the artwork. "And Mechaboobs."

They went down the stairs a bit slower than they did going up. "Hope you lay it down on Ryuu easy when all this is over, Yaali."

"Me? He told you to do it."

"Hello, my back was towards him. Big guy's obviously saying it to you."

"You had your back to him so you could wag your posterior at the man."

"Uhhh, ex-cuse you?" said Ezra, with one raised eyebrow.

"You were unusually polite to him the moment you laid eyes on his belly and tight jeans." Yaali observed, with no trace of vitriol in his voice.

The wolf scoffed and folded his arms across his chest. "I would remind you that if I hadn't played nice with the big lug, we wouldn't have learned quite so much."

"True." said Dobb, amidst the exchange, with his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets. "Though... you were giving out some vibes there. I know mister teddy's got an interesting package, but come on."

Ezra remained quiet until they all reached his car. "Now what?" said the goat.

"You heard 'mister teddy'. We go to Ryuu's house." said the wolf.

**********

Ryuumajin's house was sandwiched between two other houses, both heavily renovated and with gaudy paint schemes. The porch area was home to a few flowerpots with wilting bougainvilleas and several overturned plastic buckets. A motorbike sat silently in the shadows, its previously vibrant green detailing looking murky under the half-light. Clotheslines were suspended between a wall and the front grill, with a few shorts and a T-shirt still suspended on them.

A silver car was parked in front of the gate, and three figures stepped out of it. Dobb carried a heavy knapsack with him as he went to the front gate and examined the lock.

There wasn't any on it, though. Dobb slid the deadbolt open, and the three allowed themselves in.

"Man, this neighbourhood got really quiet since last time I came. Used to have all sorts of indie gigs around here." Ezra remarked, as he turned to see the grassy fields near an empty yellow-lit playground.

Though the external lights were on at full blast for the next-door neighbours, the insides told a different story. It was clear that the residents were asleep.

"The front door's locked. There's also the grill with a padlock on it. Too thick for the cutters." said Dobb. "Less talking, more doing." said Ezra. "Slavedriver." said Dobb, as he lowered his knapsack to the ground and poked around in it.

Yaali wrapped his arms around himself very tightly. "Why? Why are we doing this?"

"What if the portal is at the TV in his house?" said Ezra, matter-of-factly.

"What if? What if?! Why don't we break into all the electronics stores in this entire housing estate while we're at it!"

"Keep it down, hooves." Dobb said, as he kneeled in front of the padlock, and slipped a metallic rod into the keyhole. Yaali mumbled under his breath: "I can't be arrested. I can't. They'll take away my permit. I'll be thrown out of the country. I'll be heaped on a boat and..."

"Again. You. Didn't. Have. To come. With us." said Dobb, as he brought out a small canvas parcel filled with things that made clinking sounds.

"I had to make sure you didn't get into trouble." said Yaali, softly.

The padlock loosened and Dobb removed it from the door grill. He stood up, opened the grill, and began work on the door's lock. With a tension wrench and a narrow pick in his hands, the doberman did it like a seasoned expert. "We're lucky there's nothing here more complicated than a cylinder lock."

"Nooo, we're lucky you're such an accomplished housebreaker." said Ezra, as he examined the T-shirt hanging on a clothesline.

"A little respect for the craft, please. Is that too much to ask?" After a satisfying click, Dobb was able to twist the doorknob open. "There."

The interior of the house, with little surprise, was very obviously a bachelor's pad. A set of faded, orange sofas were arranged against a wall, only a few footsteps away from a dining table with unopened packets of wheat-and-seaweed chips and cartons of pineapple juice on it. A ratty pink towel was draped over the back of one of three similar dining chairs.

Ezra kneeled down to examine the stacks of manga volumes and anime DVDs sprawled over a low, Japanese-style coffee table. He picked up a crumpled ball of paper from the table, and opened it up. It was a scrunched-up letter of rejection for his comic proposal to another studio.

The living room television's large screen showed something disturbingly familiar: a swirling pattern of jagged black and white stripes.

"Th-that's... the doorway is actually here?" said the goat. Ezra slid his eyes towards Yaali and made them smaller.

Dobb noticed a game controller lying on the floor in front of the television, attached to a dusty black videogame console. "Looks like he was playing something when he got pulled in."

The canine opened his knapsack and took out a collar-like item. He fastened it around his neck, and winced slightly when he pressed a button on it. Ezra noticed this, and merely have him a nod. "What are you wearing?" Yaali asked.

"An Evoker."

"Again, what are you wearing?"

"You'll see."

"What now?" said Ezra, staring at the screen with hands on his hips.

"We go in." said Dobb.

"Where? Through that? Is it safe?"

Dobb groaned audibly, and went on to dive into the screen by himself.

Ezra spent some time looking at Yaali. The goat shrugged, and calmly eased himself past the screen.

Alone, the wolf crouched down and scrutinised the flickering portal. He touched the surface with a finger. "Nice." he said, before he climbed in through the screen.

**********

On the other side was the same house and the same living room, though all that was left was now right. A familiar thick fog, obscuring vision to but a few feet ahead, permeated the air, but did not saturate it with moisture or substance of any kind.

"Hm, it's not real fog is it?" said Ezra, waving his hand in front of himself. "Nope, it's just there so we can't see anything." said Dobb. "I was worried that I'd have to bring my inhaler." replied the wolf.

As they surveyed their surroundings, they noticed a light coming from under the door leading to Ryuumajin's drawing studio. "Grab something heavy." said Dobb. "Will this do?" Yaali held up a rubber doorstop. The doberman opened the door and carefully slid the doorstop under it. Ezra led them as they walked into the light.

**********

The sheer brightness was due to the fact that on the other side it was a clear afternoon. The three of them found themselves coming out of a grassy knoll. A gently-sloping path of low grass went down over the knoll towards a valley cutting into a rocky ridge. Above them was an expanse of blue sky with improbably-stylised clouds marching across it. Streaks and patches of flowerbeds went along the bottom of the knoll. Dobb noticed a cherry blossom tree right next to the cave they emerged from. It was in full bloom.

Yaali turned, and flinched a bit when he saw a lion-like creature over the cave, carved from stone.

Ezra smiled a bit at the cherry blossom petals floating around him, fondly remembering the time he spent in Japan.

"And this is the time I forget to bring my camera." said Dobb as he moved closer to the tree. As he observed the blossoms, he noticed a flock of birds circling high above them.

Something caught Ezra's attention. He walked farther from the cave, and noticed someone standing on a path through the grass. It was a feline boy with black hair, in a pair of shorts and a lime-coloured T-shirt. He seemed no older than twelve.

"That's..." The teenaged Ryuumajin turned and started running off towards the valley, disappearing quickly past the high stone cliffs. "Hey, wait!" The moment he reached a hand out, a terrible screech fell upon him from up high.

The 'birds' circling over the party began to dive towards him. It didn't take long for all of them to realise they were Shadows that looked like papery harpies with purple iron masks. Each one of them was graced with an Indian Maharajah crown over its head, and had massive, rough, ink brush-stroke feathers, as if they were painted under an intense rage.

Yaali shouted and waved his arms towards the wolf, as Dobb began running towards him. Ezra could only watch as great wings descended upon him.

At this moment, a blue glow began to surround him. He heard the goat shouting his name. "No. I'm... fine." he said, and looked at his hands, which started emitting a glowing mist. "What is... this...?" As the monster's talons reached out to dig into his cranium, he heard a single bell-chime from somewhere deep in his mind. Time seemed to slow. He could've sworn he saw a golden butterfly escape his chest.

A deep, echoing voice began speaking inside his head. 'I am thou, and thou art I. I am Steppenwolf, highest among men and beasts, standing alone. By my own will, I lend thee my power.'

He held his head in both hands, and snarled.

Masks. Power. Truth.

"Persona!"

A burst of blue light escaped from his body. Just above Ezra, the mirage of a canine man dressed in a black suit made of leather straps, with half his body and face concealed by a warped pearl crescent, emerged. The mirage unfurled its arms and gestured with hands made of large steel scissor blades. Narrow ice spikes immediately burst forth from the ground around Ezra and impaled the flying Shadows.

The beasts crumbled into black, oily pieces. Soon they evaporated into nothing.

The wolf went down to his knees and bent himself over the ground. He was panting heavily, as if he had just remembered how to breathe.

"Fuck." said Dobb, as he touched the apparatus around his neck. "You didn't even need one of these!"