"Oh! Yeah, kinda wondered if that might be why you said that. No clue before then, though. S'that why you're living in an attic? Birth family's too shit to support you?"

"Uh, more or less..." 

She pauses. 

"— you've heard the rumors at school, right, that I burnt down a house or tied my girlfriend to the train tracks or whatever they're saying today. There's a very small grain of truth about that. On my way back home from school a couple months ago I came across some guy in a suit clearly forcing himself on a woman in the street, grabbing at her, trying to get her into a car with him. I grabbed his shoulder to try and get him to stop. He sued. I got smacked with an assault charge for it. So I'm on probation, and will be for the next year. My family wanted nothing to do with me so they passed me off to a friend of a friend. That's Boss."

"Oh, so your family and the justice system are being shit to you. Makes sense. Corrupt fuckin' adults bein' fuckin' corrupt as usual."

He scowls for a moment at the thought, then shakes his head.

"Anyway, you're cool, fighting to be your real self is cool, and I'm glad to know you."

"Honestly I could've forgiven you for decking the guy, in that kind of situation. That's horrible." 

Ann pauses. " — so that's why you were so insistent that Ryuji taking the direct option was a bad idea."

"Yeah. If I got put on probation just for a grab like that, I don't want to know what the system would do to you if you actually hit him and he pressed charges."

"Same old Ryuji, still trying to punch people into not sucking," Shiho teases with a smile.

"Hey!", he replies, blushing and giving Shiho a bump with his shoulder.

Then, turning back to Akira, he scowls and shakes his head. "Getting my leg broken was bad enough. It'd break Ma's heart if he filed charges. Thanks for stopping me."

"Anytime." 

Akira takes her pack back from Ann, and stretches. "So, are we ready to storm the castle again?"

"I'm up for it."

"I'm game."

"Hell yeah."

Morgana nods. "Always."

"Let's go then."

Joker gets up from the table, and leads her team back toward the school.

They all follow behind her, soon reaching the alleyway they usually depart from.

Joker thumbs the Metaverse Explorer, and they change worlds, leaving Joker in her gothy clubwear outfit and Ann in her catsuit.

Skull is left in his armored leather, shotgun on his back.

And Morgana is now in their masked anthro-cat form.

Shiho gapes. "Wow! You all look so cool! And dangerous! It's awesome."

She may be blushing just a bit at Skull, Joker, and Clover's outfits.

Joker nods seriously, then grins. 

She exchanges her Tkachev for the Peacemaker, and hands Shiho her old gun. 

"Here," she says. "You'll need this in there."

"We're going to need a codename for her, too. Speaking of which, given the costume I'm Panther now."

"Oh, yeah. I'm Joker, he's Skull, they're Mona. In here at least. If you say our real names there's a risk Kamoshida could get subconcious awareness of what we're doing."

She accepts the Tkachev and inspects it seriously, getting a sense for the safety and the mechanisms.

"Ugh, I have no idea what to use as a codename."

"Maybe Spike, for how you always set the team up for spikes at volleyball practices?"

Shiho shakes her head. "No, no volleyball names."

"How about 'Aegis'? Or if you want to be less fancy, just 'Shield'."