It's A-Set, You Bet!

Given everything that’d happened, it wasn’t too out of the box to think about body swapping. Especially considering it seemed to still be happening here, in this place.... it was weird. 

But oh well, Iris wasn’t too worried about that. She was more concerned about who she’d swapped with, given the... well.... everything, related to what’d happened.

feel free to change pronouns as needed! warning- some quotes are nsfw.

“Maybe the problem isn’t with her. Maybe it’s you.”

“Wow, how “edgy teen” of you.”

“I broke all their front teeth.”

“If you don’t stop joking around I will kick your brain’s ass.”

“Never in my life... have I bought any “weird videos”.”

“I’ve always...wanted to say this line... “Nice punch”.”

“Well, let me use a line, too. “This is the end for you, chump”.”

“Your favorite thing is on that island. A porno magazine.”

“How do you like these fireworks?”

“I just want to go to the cabaret club...”

“Argue with me! Tell me that you have good taste in anime!”

“Heroes are supposed to be invincible. Even if the odds are stacked against them, something miraculous happens to save them.”

“And God’s a liar too!”

“What kind of low-IQ ignoramus calls a suspicious number and says they are from the police?!”

“Merry-go-rounds can fly?”

“Oof...”

“Could you please not call it a “rubber”...? You can say balloon.”

“The LGBT community is rich in sensibility, has excellent taste, and is full of talented, artistic people.”

“Water, dehydrated bread, chocolate, biscuits, a flashlight, a hand charger, Swiss army knife, a candle, matches, triangular badges, a first-aid kit, whistle, portable toilet, a plastic bag, duct tape, a grenade, disposable hand warmers...”

“I’m going to expose your browser history.”

“You’re a total tsundere.”

“A “tsundere”. One who appears cold or hostile initially but eventually shows a warm or friendly side. That describes you perfectly.”

“What kind of furniture always catches a cold?”

“‘Because I saw your dead body in a dream’. Are you seriously going to tell her that?”

“Once, she let out all the frogs that were going to be used for science class.”

“We were given legs and feet... so that we can gather riches and foreign currency in the labor market.”

“That doesn’t sound very nice! It’s more like... a way to exploit their vanity. To separate our customers from their money as much as possible.”

“Because beer tastes better if someone else buys it!”

“His normalcy must be punished by death!”

“It is time to unleash the drift king.”

“Look, a UFO!”

“Did you witness my superior driving technique?”

“Yeah, I saw you get in an accident.”

“Oh, I’ve seen a boss character like this before.”

“I like guys that like New Guinea fruit bats and yellow spotted-neck turtles.”

“I have some delicious Fugu eggs. I promise they’re not poisoned. Would you like some?”

“There’s a group of naked buff guys dancing outside your bar.”

“Macho muscles!”

“Use the most beautiful art form humanity has ever created! The power of dance!”

“They may have money and power, but they’ll never take our beating hearts!”

“Shut up, I’m not short. the Earth is just big.”

Iris’s obvious hesitation makes Date stop dead in his tracks. He’s learned how to handle people who are scared of him, even though he means them no harm. It was necessary as a detective and in raising Mizuki. It’s a bit worrying Iris is treating him like this now, though. 

“Again–what are you–? Saito???”

It takes Date a moment to organize his thoughts, considering how jumbled they are. The multiple timelines, and now finding himself somewhere entirely new with no memories of how (which seems to be a habit of his)… Once he has it straightened out, he puts his hands placatingly in front of him to show her he didn’t have any weapon. 

“Oh. Oh boy. Okay, so I don’t know how to explain this…exactly, except uh…”

He wants to move, in an attempt to explain, but he fights down the urge to instead stand completely still so Iris knows he won’t make any sudden movements and probably scare the shit out of her. 

“So…I’m not…Saito.”

Yeah, great argument. I’m sure she’ll totally buy that.

“It’s–I’m Date. But…you know how we once talked about parallel universes? With Ota? And we played rock paper scissors? It…turns out that’s…correct.”

It was just a theory at the time, to explain how Iris could be dead and alive at the same time. Schrodinger’s Iris. 

Date, now is not the time for stupid jokes. he could almost hear Aiba’s voice echoing in his mind. 

“I…remember…everything. Every timeline. Every world–every split where events diverged. I remember Saito. And…uh…what happened to him. But the timeline I’m from is…different.” 

He figures it’s probably not worth it to talk about all the times she’s died. That wouldn’t do any good in convincing her. He lets out a deep breath, and thinks back to when he looked differently, and had a different name. 

“I don’t know if it would do any good in convincing you, but… I remember that time we were at the shrine and you beat me at rock paper scissors…”

There’s a gentle smile on his face, that he hopes is at least somewhat reassuring. 

“I think the winter irises were blooming then, too…”

He wasn’t Saito. At least, that’s what he insisted- she did want to believe that. She did want to believe that this was her uncle, mostly because... she didn’t think Saito could be that gentle. Even when he’d pretended to be uncle, it hadn’t quite been the same- she’d just been... too desperate to notice. Too scared.

“Wait, you mean... seriously?” 

Her eyes lit up a little bit- parallel universes... that would make things make sense. This place was weird, nonsensical even- so why shouldn’t it be possible? The people in charge of this place... of course that made sense! 

“I knew it, I told you- but you didn’t believe me! There’s a ton of things that just don’t make sense without them!” If only Ota was here, to also get to listen in on Date admitting to being wrong. Although... given it was Ota, she doubted he’d come around near as quick to how Date looked. He’d probably try to pick a fight, and lose. “Then tell me. I want to know- what happened for you? Why do you still look like him? Oh, what happened to me?”

Her love of these topics had overridden her anxiety with ease, slowly opening up. She even found herself smiling as he continued to speak, nodding along. 

“You... you really do remember? ‘Ratty cakes’?”

“I can’t exactly say you’re wrong… but…”

Akane wasn’t accustomed to having physical control of another’s body– sure they could get into their brother’s or Junpei’s minds, but not normally enough to drive such precise control over them.

“It’s just different. I wonder about the implications and what this means for our individual identities, I mean…” Akane bright a hand up to tap at their cheek, “Essentially we’ve just lost a part of ourselves.”

“Well.... I guess. But... can you really say the body is what makes a person? I mean- our minds, our consciousness... isn’t that what’s important? And it seems like those swapped just fine.”

“H-Huh? What’s going on.... huh?!” When Iris looked at herself, she didn’t recognize what was going on. It’d been sudden, too sudden for it to’ve been like that.... but now she looked like a completely different person!! She immediately began scanning the crowd, trying to remember where she’d just been... quickly zeroing in on a girl walking around with her face.