Chapter Text
I don't even think I have to explain where we were and what we were doing, it was the study, you guys know the drill by now.
So, what was happening in the current moment?
Trevor was nowhere to be seen, thank god. And Eleanor ended up coming back, thank god.
Speaking of Eleanor, as Chidi was talking, Eleanor's 'chair kept making a noise' according to her, but let's be real, I think the people with common sense knew what the 'noise' really was.
"There's a bolt missing or something." Eleanor says as she tried adjusting her chair.
"Before we begin, Trevor is dropping out of the study. He sent me an email last night." Chidi then takes out his phone. "'I'm sad to inform you that I am too ugly and stupid to be in the study and I'm going home to my mommy.' That's too bad, but we press on. We're on to stage two of the study. I'm going to teach you some philosophical principles and then we will explore how those ideas have affected your personal moral machineries."
Then the 'chair' makes a noise again.
"Sorry, Eleanor, did you say something?" Tahani asks, turning to Eleanor.
"No, it's my chair. It's got this weird design..."
"Your chair smells bad." Jason says.
"I know! See? Another person who agrees, it's the chair."
You know, I wonder if this is how Ken felt being around us in SEES. We were older than him, so he probably expected us to be mature people, but we literally just goofed off 99.9% of the time with the exception of the seniors, but even they had their moments sometimes.
- - - - - -
"Great news, everyone!" Simone says as she walks into the room we were now chilling in since the study was over, and she was holding a box. "The funding from the Neuroscience department came through!" She opened the box, which was filled with cupcakes. Jason was the first one to walk over to her.
"And you blew it all on cupcakes? Exactly what I would've done. Respect." He then takes a cupcake.
"Eleanor?" Simone offers.
"Ah... I'm good. I try to avoid pointless group activities, you know, like office Christmas parties or jury duty. To me, the single most awful sound in the universe is that mangled opening note of your co-workers singing Happy Birthday."
"Cool stance. Counterpoint: these are free delicious cupcakes. Get over yourself and eat one."
"Fine." She relents, taking a cupcake.
"Oh! You guys, let's take a picture!" Simone suggests, taking out her phone before the rest of us went in front of the camera. "Everyone get in, get in, and say, uh... Oh! say 'ventromedial prefrontal cortex!'"
Everyone else stumbles trying to say that word, while Shinjiro and I just say the words 'what?' in unison.
"Jaguars rule!" Jason decides to say.
And then after we all posed for the camera, the photo was taken.
Hey, a group photo finally going right for Shinjiro and I!
*Three Months Later*
"You guys, this is nuts." Eleanor says as she walks into the room that we all usually hang out in for our study. "This morning, I found a lottery ticket on the ground outside my apartment. I scratched it off... and I won $18,000!" She shows us the lottery ticket.
We all congratulate her, clearly showing our amazement.
"Better luck next time." Tahani says, to which we all look at her. "Yes. Sorry, from context I see that is actually a large sum of money."
Eleanor then turns the lottery ticket back to herself, and looks at it with a smile.
*Three months after that*
We were all currently back in the room that we're always in for the study. We were doing some individual work, except for Jason who seemed tired as he was sitting down with his forehead resting on the table.
"Jason? You ok there, mate?" Simone asks.
"No." He lifts his head up. "I have to watch the Jaguars games alone, on my computer at like three in the morning on Mondays. It's so annoying. Everything here is in a... I don't know how to describe it, like... a different zone of time. No, that sounds stupid. A different clock land."
"That's-That's called timezones..." Shinjiro corrects.
"I'll watch the game with you, Jason!" Tahani tells Jason. "I enjoy American football - I actually dated a player once. But he wasn't my type, so I set him up with my friend Gisele... Bündchen."
"Yeah, we got it. We always get it." Eleanor says.
"I don't." I chime in. I never recognize any of the people Tahani talks about, I don't know if I should though or what.
"Awesome!" Jason exclaimed. "But if you want to watch with me, you have to learn my Jaguars cheer. It goes, 'Let's go, Jags! Kick their ass! Yeah!' Do you think you could learn that by the weekend?"
"I shall do my best." Tahani says.
"Nice! See you then!" He then leaves the room.
"Why do you want to watch football with Jason?" Eleanor asks, to which I nod, since I was wondering the same thing.
"I don't, really. But I am, these days, as you might say in America 'mad horny'."
"Oh..." I say.
"Yikes." Shinjiro adds.
"Ok, well..." Eleanor stumbles her words, clearly having the same reaction as us. "No judgements, babe. He's a straight hottie. You want to smash Jason, go smash."
*One day later*
"Looks like you had a good night." Eleanor says to Tahani as she walks in the room, to which Shinjiro and I look up from what we were doing since we were also quite interested in hearing what Tahani had to say.
"I did." Tahani smiles.
"You and Jason... Imagine that." Eleanor smirks as Tahani sat down. "To be fair, I have."
"Actually, I was with an ex-boyfriend. I ran into him unexpectedly, and the reunion was a smashing success."
I was about to ask what she meant by that.
"It's a pun, you see. We had intercourse."
Well...
"Yeah, again, I always get it."
"But I feel kind of bad though, I completely forgot about watching the game with Jason."
"Homies, guess what?" Jason suddenly appears.
"What the fuck." Shinjiro says.
Jason had a blue and yellow afro wig on his head, and his upper body was painted blue, with yellow cheetah prints, and the word "Jags" written in yellow on his chest.
"Yesterday I got a Facebook invite to the Australia chapter of the Jacksonville Jaguars fanclub!"
"Yeah, I think he's over it." Eleanor says to Tahani, to which I nod in agreement.
"Me and two other dudes just watched the Jags annihilate the Texans! It was super fun, I'm completely wasted. I gotta go barf one last time, then I'll be ready to learn philosophy! Duuuuvaaaal!" And then he runs out of the room.
*Six months later*
"You guys, this whole year has been amazing for all of us." Eleanor says. "I mean, literally every aspect of our lives has improved."
"Well, I don't know about every aspect." Chidi disagrees. "SuperBoard, activate!"
The lights dim as the projector lights up, with a robotic voice telling Chidi good morning and that he has his lesson plan ready. Chidi gets a proud smile on his face.
"SuperBoard, some triumphant announcement music please." Tahani speaks as she gets up from her seat, pushes Chidi to the side so she can take his place in the middle. "Last night, Larry Hemsworth proposed to me and we're moving back to London to begin planning the wedding!" She then shows us her wedding ring.
"Woah!"
"Holy smokes!"
"No way!"
We all basically show our shock and happiness at the same time, while the SuperBoard displayed fireworks on the board.
- - - - - -
"How are you even lugging this thing around? I'm not sure I could bench this much weight." Eleanor says as if in awe as she inspects Tahani's ring.
"Well, girls in my social class begin ring-training at a very young age." Tahani explains.
"Social class huh? Wonder if my friend had to do that." Shinjiro speaks, thinking out loud.
Honestly yeah, now I'm curious about it too.
"Really? Who's your friend you're referring to?" Tahani asks.
"Mitsuru Kirijo." Shinjiro answers.
"You're friends with her?"
"Yeah, both of us were. She was living with us in our school dorm." I answer.
"And she was one of my childhood best friends." Shinjiro adds on.
"But wait, you know her?" I ask.
"Well, not directly. I've only heard about her from her father, Takeharu, whom I know. Speaking of him, what happened to him? I haven't heard any news about him in a while."
"Uhhh."
"Well..."
Shinjiro and I both say at the same time as we look at each other with wide eyes.
"Y-You didn't hear?" I ask, looking back at Tahani.
"Hear what?"
"He... died back in November of last year..." Shinjiro answers.
"What? No, I didn't. How did he die?" Tahani asks with concern in her eyes.
Yeah, honestly I'm not surprised that the news didn't go international and just stayed in Japan, since that's where the Kirijo family is most well known.
"Sudden illness." I responded, hearing the 'lie' that we heard about his death due to people not knowing about the Dark Hour and Personas.
"Oh, that's horrible."
"Sorry for bringing down the mood." Shinjiro says.
"Don't worry about it." She says with a wave of her hand. "Still though, send Mitsuru my regards." To which Shinjiro and I both nod saying that we'll do that.
"So, back to your engagement." I speak, switching the topic to something more lighthearted.
"Yes, yes. I wanted to tell you all that I'm throwing a little engagement party at my AirBnB. It's very last minute, just come as you are."
- - - - - -
We look around inside the place the party was being held. A grand party hall looking thing with people dressed in fancy attire.
"I guess all these people... came as they were?" Chidi asked in slight astonishment.
"I have never felt so underdressed in my life." Shinjiro adds.
"Hello, everyone! I'm so glad you made it." Tahani greets us as we walk closer to each other, her putting her hands on Eleanor's shoulder.
"Holy crap, Tahani. You found this place on AirBnB?" Eleanor asks.
"Oh, no. I-I see why you're confused. I used HeirBnB. H-E-I-R. It's an app for heirs and heiresses where we swap mansions, private islands, blimp hangars, that sort of thing." She explains.
"Huh, interesting." I say, looking around the place once more.
"Anyway, everyone." Tahani leads us out of the room and into another one. "I want you to meet Larry Hemsworth."
He turns around. He has brown eyes and black hair with a clean shaven face, and he's wearing a tuxedo with a black bowtie.
"Oh! The legendary study group. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to build up the courage to meet you. I guess... you can see why."
"Is he ashamed of having a perfect jawline and 0% body fat?" Eleanor asks rhetorically to Simone and I.
"Still can't believe she wants to marry me... A dumb old pediatric surgeon who barely has an eight-pack." Larry says with a smile on his face as he looks at Tahani.
"Do you know what you look like?" Chidi asks.
"More importantly, did Miley Cyrus write her song about Chris' brother Liam?" Jason asks.
Larry pauses for a moment, before looking down and speaking. "Wonderful. More questions about my talented brothers. God forbid there's one single day where I'm the special one."
Then he walks away.
"No, sweetheart, don't go. You're important too!" Tahani tries reassuring Larry and going after him. "Fixing babies' spines in just as valuable as acting."
- - - - - -
"Hate to say it, but the group probably needs a new member. I dunno how we'll ever replace Tahani." Eleanor says to Shinjiro, Simone, Chidi and I in the room all of us and Jason were chilling in. "Do you think Margot Robbie is into philosophy?"
"Actually, Tahani's announcement made us take stock." Chidi starts. "You know, Simone and I need time to analyze the data, apply for grants. We've kind of hit a natural stopping point."
Simone nods in agreement. "Yeah, and the next step would be to repeat the experiment with new subjects, you know, compare results."
"Wait, what are you saying? That the study's over? We're splitting up?" Eleanor asks.
"No. No, no. We're just taking a break, for a year or so. And I'm sure you're all anxious to get back home." Chidi says.
"Yeah, I got a lot of stuff to get back to in Phoenix. Like... I have a free punch card at my spray tan place. They'll do my left side for free, so..."
*Timeskip to when the real celebration starts*
Tahani clinks her wine glass in order to get the attention of everyone in the room.
"I would like to acknowledge the wonderful group of people who brought me here. If I hadn't decided to get out of the spotlight of my 'Get Out of the Spotlight' tour and come here, and join the Brainy Bunch, I never would've reconnected with Larry."
The crowd 'aww's' from her words.
"So, to celebrate our group, I had my favourite pâtissier whip this up."
A caterer wheeled down a square cake, our picture from the time Simone took pictures of us with the cupcakes on it.
"Would any of you like to say a few words?" Eleanor gave a small nod to Tahani's question. "Eleanor!"
Eleanor steps forward as the crowd gives her applause. "Yay, Eleanor!" Tahani says.
"If nobody minds." Eleanor smiles. The crowd's applause then dies down. "Uh, I would like to address the people on this cake, I suppose. I get that we all have meaningful lives outside the study. Well, Tahani and Chidi do. Jason and I are straight trash. And it's currently ambiguous for Minako and Shinjiro."
"Ca-Caw!" Jason cups his hands over his mouth.
"But just... I mean, think about all the progress we've all made since that picture was taken. I know that what we're doing is important, and I'm not ready to stop. And I don't think you guys are either. So let's all stay here and keep it going. What do you say?"
"Eleanor." Tahani chuckles. "That was absolutely lovely."
"It really was." Chidi adds. "And I'm-I'm so glad that this study meant that much to you. But, realistically-"
"That's cool. I get it. No, you don't need to say it. I-I got it." Eleanor cuts him off. "That's all she wrote, cool."
"Are you ok? I hope you're not mad." Chidi asks out of concern.
"No, I'm not mad. I'm actually laughing." She gives what sounds like a bitter chuckle. "Because this whole study was a hilarious, stupid, pointless joke, and now it's over so let's hit the road. I don't need you guys. You don't need me, and since you don't need me, I'm just gonna take the 'me' out of this cake."
"Eleanor." Shinjiro tries saying out of slight concern as she walks over to the cake.
"No, no!" Tahani says. But it was already too late as Eleanor put a hand in the cake to take herself out of it, causing all of us to gasp. "Eleanor, please!"
"Oh, sorry, the deed is done!" She says with a mock British accent. "Pip pip, too late! Farewell to you, my liege. And a jolly Saint Ploopington's Day to all of you."
"USA! USA! USA!" She speaks in her normal voice as she backs away to leave the room.
*Timeskip to when the party finishes*
When everyone else, including Simone left, it was just the six of us still remaining. Eleanor called us to meet her in one of the rooms of the place we were in because she wanted to apologize, and also explain the reason for her sudden outburst.
"The point is, I'm not really an 'I'm sorry' type girl. I'm more of a, 'it's your fault your car got keyed in the movie theatre parking lot because you wouldn't shut up while watching 'John Wick' type girl." She explains.
"That... sounded oddly specific." I say quietly while tilting my head slightly.
"But I'm sorry that I freaked out. Just really gonna miss you guys." She smiles.
"We're gonna miss you too." Chidi says.
"Here's an idea." Tahani starts. "What if we all agree to a yearly reunion? And then that way the Brainy Bunch never dies. Each summer, we can all stay at one of our respective houses, mega-yachts, ski chalets, what have you."
"We should all meet up in Jacksonville!" Jason suggests. "My house is right on the water. It didn't used to be, but the whole city is a swamp and it's sinking into the ocean!"
"Woo! Strong pitch, bud." Eleanor says while rolling up her sleeves.
"Next year in Jacksonville." Chidi says.
"Yeah! Uh, we might not want to wait a whole year. It's sinking really fast."
"We should have a toast." Chidi suggests.
Eleanor exhales out of relief, and we all nod in agreement.
- - - - - -
We all go to walk into the room where we last placed the wine.
But as we walked in we saw this open door, portal looking thing, with two people, a man with white hair and a women with brown hair tied back in a bun standing near it.
"What the heck is that?" I ask.
The two of them turn around. "Oh! Hey, guys. What are you doing down here?" The man asks.