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part one | part two
Ann and Ryuji are left in the dark about what happened between Akira and Morgana. All they know is that one day, Akira shows up to school without his cat and calls one last meeting to tell them that the Phantom Thieves are over. He refuses to explain anything and starts ghosting them/avoiding them/acting all emo whenever they try to confront him about it. They are only left to assume something must have happened between Akira and Morgana. They talk to each other and eventually come to the conclusion that it must have been Morgana who decided to disband the Thieves, and Akira's just taking the fall for him. (Or, more like, that's what Ryuji thinks, and Ann agrees that Akira's acting completely out of character, so he's probably right.) So when Morgana finally approaches them a few days later with Haru, they're angry with him and don't want to hear his explanation at first.
Morgana manages to get through to them and catches them all up on everything he knows. They're suspicious at first, but when Haru backs him up, they decide to tentatively take him at his word. But they both decide they need to ask Akira about this directly and hopefully find out what the hell has gotten into him.
However, whenever they try to corner Akira, he manages to get himself out of the situation. This happens multiple times, until they finally corner him on the school roof and demand answers.
Akira stands by his original reasoning with Morgana, that it's simply out of self preservation. They're all, but especially Ryuji, extremely disappointed and shocked by this turn of events, and at an utter loss of what to do about Akira. He tells them both to leave him alone, that he wants nothing to do with them anymore since associating with him hurts his reputation. They let him leave, stunned and hurt and angry. And very, very worried.
They all gather together shortly afterwards--Haru, Morgana, Ryuji, and Ann. They talk about the situation they're in, and Morgana asks them if they still want to continue the Thieves without their leader. It's a unanimous, resounding yes. Haru is instated as their temporary new leader, being the oldest and most mature of the four.
So, Akira's plan to protect his friends fails spectacularly, and there's nothing he can do about it.
