Sea of the Unconscious Part 2

[madimpossibledreamer]

Main Points:
Persona 4 Sea of the Unconscious
Summary: Yosuke was not part of the original investigation team. In fact, he wasn't even part of their world. He was a huge fanboy. And then he fell into Inaba, and his life changed forever...
Really old, so not perfectly written, and it was during my FONTS EXIST phase.  Slightly inspired by Chisotahn's Ten Steps fic.  There are sections I really enjoy.  This isn't one of them, and on top of it the entire concept is a little chuuni/Gary Stu.  I don't think it would be bad with some tweaking, but that's tweaking i don't really want to do, so we've got this instead.
This chapter got slightly meta.
Word Count: 827
Rating: K
Pairing: Souji/Yosuke (mentioned at the beginning)
Warning: Bullying

 

          "Awaken."  Souji was inclined to ignore the voice, preferring to nestle further into the pillow, until he realized that somehow Izanagi had been summoned and was out of his body.
          He sat up, about to hiss at the figure of the god bending over him, shaking him, to knock it off and go to sleep like the rest of him...when that TV flickered on.  Instantly his eyes went to the clock, just for a moment, and it's long enough to confirm that it is indeed midnight.  He hadn't even known it was raining, but then, there was no real need to check, was there?
          The image was clear.  He thought it'd been raining for the past couple days, but he wasn't sure.  He'd have to check.  It should be easy enough.
          How could this be happening?  Adachi was still in jail!  And Izanami...
          Then his brain processed exactly who the figure on the screen was.  And his mouth dropped open.
          "Welcome, folks, for a Junes exclusive I guarantee you won't be able to find anywhere else!"  This Yosuke was obviously different from the normal Yosuke, the one with grins and laughs and a laid-back if occasionally shy attitude that Souji had come to know well.  That, and the unnatural yellow glow of the eyes, told him immediately that this was his Shadow.  An orange v-neck t-shirt was covered by the working apron of Junes.  He smirked, a mocking look in his eyes.  "Ladies and gentlemen, please, believe me.  You won't be able to tear your eyes off that screen!  Because even these advertisements, well, they'll be showing you a side of Junes you've never seen before."  For one, terrible, crazy moment, Souji's reminded strangely of Tanaka before he shakes his head, trying to focus again.  "They say those last-minute sales can be a killer.  Well, now you get to see what that's really like."
          Then his eyes flickered to Souji.  Stared right at him.  Souji involuntarily backed up, pulling the blankets closer around him as if they were a shield.  The smile softened and became infinitely sad, as if he'd carried the weight of the world, as if he'd had to see and sacrifice everything like Seta Souji had.  "Hey, dude.  I know you're there."
          Izanagi's hand clenched tight around the sword, and he approached the television.  Just a few steps.  The grey-haired teenager stopped breathing.  Yosuke couldn't possibly be talking about him, could he?  None of the others thrown into the TV were at all aware of the Midnight Channel before they'd been rescued, let alone who was watching.
          "Souji."  Well, that theory went sailing out the window and into the back yard of the dog which would never stop barking at night.  Souji's brain, which by this point, he guessed, was a little hysterical, insisted that the dog was too busy playing with the new toy of a theory to worry about anything else.  "You're my hero.  Come and save me, please.  I'm too weak to do it on my own."
          The image flickered out.
          Souji could feel Izanagi's urge to just go to the dance club, barge in, go to the TV world.  It was his own.  Thou art I.  But that wouldn't help matters.  He guessed that he'd have a hard enough time convincing the Investigation Team he wasn't imagining things in the morning.  He quickly booted up the laptop long enough to determine that no fog would occur tomorrow morning, and then fell asleep to the sound of Izanagi pacing.

          "You better be sure about this..." Takuma muttered, as Teddie sniffed at the air, back in the bear suit, and Rise scanned for a new dungeon with Himiko.  Souji didn't bother to answer, jaw tight.  It should have been obvious to anyone with eyes and a willingness to see that something had changed.  The land was different, not the paradise that they'd left it.  It wasn't the threatening, fog-filled world that they'd spent a year of their lives fighting in, but it looked more like Inaba.  A sunny, idealistic Inaba, but not the fields of grass that had shown they'd saved the world either.
          A giant circle, akin to the glowing television show signs that Yukiko and Kanji's Shadows had summoned, appeared before them.  Izanagi jumped and poked at it cautiously with the sword.
          Suddenly the circle filled in with a square.  With a large glowing yellow dot and smaller orange dots.  Souji counted.  Eight of them.  Then an idea occurred to him, and he moved.  The circle moved with him, and so did one of the dots.  He turned, and the square turned, so now it looked more like a diamond.
          "Rise, Teddie, we have a map."  The rest stared.  Naoto was the first to understand, closely followed by Yukiko.
          "Okay."  He took a deep breath.  "Yosuke's dungeon."  A somewhat transparent blinking yellow arrow appeared, saying that he should go off to his right.  He squared his shoulders.  "Here we go."