Futaba Sakura

Futaba Sakura

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Confidant

Party

Futaba Sakura
Also known as	Oracle (Code Name) Navi (Japanese Code Name) HoneyOTU (chat room alias) Alibaba (alternative alias) Medjed (former alias)
Japanese Name	佐倉 双葉 さくら ふたば ナビ アリババ
Romaji	Sakura Futaba Nabi Aribaba
First Appearance	Persona 5
Affiliation	Phantom Thieves of Hearts
School	Unknown *
Date of Birth	February 19 c.2001
Age	15-16 (P5) 16 (P5S)
Zodiac	Pisces
Height	152 cm (5'0")
Blood Type	AB-
Arcana	Hermit
Shadow Self	Shadow Futaba
Persona	Necronomicon, Prometheus, Al Azif (P5R)
Theme	"Last Surprise" (Taku Takahashi Remix) "The Days When My Mother Was There" (ATLUS Kitajoh Remix)
Japanese VA	Aoi Yūki
English VA	Erica Lindbeck

"I won't let those distorted lies deceive me anymore... And I won't be led astray by other's voices either... I'm going to trust my own eyes and my own heart to distinguish the truth from the lies. There's no way you're my mom! You're just a fake created by those horrid adults! I'll... I'll never... I'll never forgive them!"

—Futaba Sakura, Persona 5

Futaba Sakura is the Navigator of the Phantom Thieves from Persona 5. She is different from the main crew of the Phantom Thieves, as prior to Persona 5 Strikers, she was a shut-in who does not attend school and rarely, if ever, leaves her house.

Appearances

• Persona 5 / Royal: Major Character; Navigator; Hermit Confidant
  • Persona 5 (Manga): Major Character
  • Persona 5: Mementos Mission: Major Character
  • Persona 5 Dengeki Comic Anthology: Major Character
  • Persona 5 Comic à La Carte: Major Character
  • Persona 5 The Animation: Major Character
    • Persona O.A.: Major Character
• Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight: Playable Character; Hermit Social
• Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight: DLC partner
• Persona 5 Strikers: Navigator
• Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth: Navigator
  • Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth Roundabout Special

Design

Futaba is a young girl with hip length black hair dyed bright orange with straight-cut bangs and two long strands in the front along with a single small, thin strand at the top. Her brown eyes also seem to have some faint purple tones in them, appearing mauve. She wears large black circular glasses, and she is always seen wearing a set of AKG K845BT headphones with red earpads. She seems to be very short, even compared to other girls.

Her casual winter outfit consists of multiple layers: she wears an off-shoulder white top with a red splatter-like pattern on her chest with five white asterisks (*****) which are reminiscent of a password input system in the red splatter, a black tank top underneath that, a dark green jacket with a faux fur trimmed hood, black short shorts, a studded black belt in a slanted position, black thigh highs socks and black knee-high boots with buckles and studs at the top. The green jacket has A.F.K. on the back (for "away from keyboard"), although it is difficult to see because of Futaba's long hair.

Her casual summer outfit consists of a black tank top with a Tetris image in front, with a green tank top underneath. She wears gray baggy pants with black laces on the bottom and green sneakers. She also has a white hip pack that forms a monstrous face with the zipper as the mouth and green eyes.

Her nightwear outfit consists of a black shirt with "JLMK!" (presumably "just let me know") over a white-and-black striped long sleeve shirt and short black shorts with a light green trim.

During the Third Semester in Royal, Futaba now wears a neon green oversized hoodie with a pixelated purple alien creature on the front with the text "Mars Crusher" under it, and the number "23" printed on the left sleeve. She wears a black jean skirt underneath, black tights, two loose blue studded belts hanging off her hips and short calf-length black leather boots. For colder weather, she also wears a black knitted hat with a pom pom on top.

Her Metaverse costume consists of a skintight black bodysuit with fluorescent neon green glowing stripes and matching black boots with neon green soles. Her mask is a pair of big black goggles with orange lenses. This outfit was inspired by sci-fi movies like Tron.

In Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight, she wears an outfit similar to her main one. Her outfit consists of a white tank top with what appears to be a red shirt underneath along with a black strapless bra, a black studded necklace, black short shorts, ripped black thigh high stockings, a green sweat jacket with black cuffs and dark gray hightops. She retains the studded black belt. 

Personality

"Risking our lives to stop rotten adults... That's why we're Phantom Thieves!"

—Futaba Sakura talking about Masayoshi Shido, Persona 5

Futaba alone in her dark bedroom.

With a case of social anxiety bordering on agoraphobia developed from the trauma of losing her mother Wakaba Isshiki, combined with her generally introverted personality, Futaba is strongly discomforted by going outside. When the protagonist first meets her, she is a shut-in who does not attend school and almost never leaves her room. She communicates with the world remotely via the Internet, and her adoptive father Sojiro Sakura enables her lifestyle out of guilt that he could not protect her from trauma. Having disconnected herself from humanity and the world beyond her apartment, Futaba suffers from suicidal depression, crippling bouts of anxiety and would freak out instantly when seeing unknown people inside Sojiro's house. When first encountered, Futaba is so consumed with self-loathing that she suppresses her desire to live, causing her Shadow Self to develop a much more helpful personality than average, one who only desires Futaba's happiness. Prior to her Change of Heart, she thinks that her room is the only place she actually feels safe to dwell within due to the frequent hallucinations she has about Wakaba bearing hatred on her.

Even before her mother's death, Futaba was quite a lonely child growing up. Part of this was due to her isolation for being a genius, with other students thinking she was a freak due to her eidetic memory (things she's reminded of when she's given a tour of Shujin), while the other part was due to her mother working long hours to support her, meaning the two hardly ever got to spend time together. It got to the point where Futaba would sometimes think her mother cared more about her research than she did about her, an insecurity that only worsened when her mother died and she was read the fake suicide note. Because of her desire for her mother to be alive again, and the belief that she deserves to die, Futaba ended up creating a Palace where her mother wants her dead. With the help of the Phantom Thieves, however, she realizes that the suicide note was forged and manages to remember the real Wakaba. Futaba is also very fond of sushi and Sojiro's curry, both of which were meals she shared with her mother.

After her heart was changed and she begins to actively go out, Futaba still initially tends to hide behind the protagonist so that she won't be seen in public, or wears masks which make it impossible to identify her. Even during Strikers the anxiety issues do not completely go away, as if the protagonist talks to her while investigating Alice Hiiragi in Shibuya, she will say that the heat and crowds of people during summer still makes her somehow uncomfortable.

Futaba begins to change after meeting the protagonist and the other Phantom Thieves, opening up to them more and becoming more relaxed around them. Once she's truly comfortable around others, she shows her childish side and likes teasing her friends, particularly Ryuji Sakamoto, Yusuke Kitagawa and Morgana, and sometimes Makoto Niijima and Sojiro Sakura as well. Although she still has occasional anxiety and odd habits, she comes off as bright, playful and cheerful when with her newfound friends. However, due to being socially inept, Futaba is often extremely blunt, to the point that she seems to have no concept of tactfulness. An example of this is moments after she rehabilitates, Futaba begins to comment on the spikes of Makoto's queen outfit when she began to talk harsh words on her, and shortly after this, Ryuji joins the conversation and she makes a "note" making fun of Ann's coldness to Ryuji, causing Ann slight discomfort. She also likes to poke fun on Yusuke every once a while, often by calling him "Inari." "Inari" is a word which means fox, but can mean tofu curd sushi due to tofu being offered near Inari Shrines, forming a pun which implies that Yusuke was a degenerate.

She also has a rather ruthless side to her: not only does she have zero qualms with hacking, to the point of bugging the protagonist's phone so she can keep an eye on them during their trip to Hawaii, as well as hijacking the entire broadcasting system of Shibuya to announce the Thieves' grand return during Strikers, even if the target during that time amounts to nothing short of a glorified school bully. She also seems to not care much for the group's main goal of reforming society: she joins mainly to find out the truth behind her mother's death, and get revenge on the ones responsible. As she is actually the real Medjed, her hacking skills have been implied to be of worldwide fame. (In fact, she's shown to be capable of hijacking an entire city's broadcasting system, sometimes even nationwide all by herself within a few strokes of her keyboard) However, her identity remains anonymous to the public. Makoto even states right before the Shujin Hawaii trip that she's glad she's on their side, with fear of what she'd do if she was their enemy.

Futaba playing video games.

She appears to be the least physically fit member of the Phantom Thieves, to the point that she may end up sleeping for days at a time. Futaba is obsessed with computers (if the protagonist claims he built his own PC, she asks for details on the GPU, CPU, RAM, etc.), often plays video games, which she sees as a form of escapism, is into sci-fi, as shown by her Phantom Thief suit and her Persona being a UFO, and shows a very perverted side at times, commenting on the other girls' thief suits and the size of Ann Takamaki's breasts. She is also shown to be heavily reliant on the internet as she doesn't see the point in going shopping since you can buy anything online and even claims that she can use it as a substitute for going to school. She addresses Sojiro by his given name instead of "dad," which is considered very impolite in Japan, even in the case of adoptive paternal figures. Sojiro refers to himself as her father, and while he never insists on her calling him "dad," he becomes very pleased when she begins to occasionally.

Futaba is shown to have a soft spot for cats, a trait she shares with Sojiro, and when she realizes Morgana is a part of the Phantom Thieves, she begins teasing him regularly. She is a fan of the show Phoenix Ranger Featherman R evidenced by her posters and figurine collection. Futaba has little problem talking to people as long as the subject interests her, since when Makoto was making Futaba open up, she couldn't at first when she brought up mundane topics like food and the weather, the latter of which means nothing to Futaba since she had been a shut-in for the past few months. Once Yusuke starts rearranging her Featherman figures, she becomes noticably annoyed, allowing Makoto to deduct that she's simply not interested in mundane topics.

Profile

Persona 5

Past

"No! She scolded me whenever I had tantrums, but she cared for me! A total lie! It's because I couldn't face myself, or Mom's death... Even then, why did they have to yell at me like that!?"

—Futaba Sakura talking to Shadow Futaba, Persona 5

Futaba's mother dying in an accident.

Futaba is the daughter of cognitive psientist Wakaba Isshiki; her father is unknown. Due to her high intelligence compared to other children around her, she was bullied often and barely had any friends other than a girl named Kana. However, Kana's parents were sexually harassing their daughter, and when Futaba discovered this, Kana left her as well.

At some point, Futaba, under the codename "Medjed," began acting as a "hacker of justice," becoming well known. However, because she stayed anonymous, other hackers began using the name all over the world, eventually forming their own hacktivist group. Futaba saw that the group was getting out of hand, but found it too much trouble to expose its members. Instead, she simply changed her handle to "Alibaba" and stepped away from hacktivism. During the events of the game, the moniker that Futaba used was impersonated by an IT Company president to launch blank threats against the Phantom Thieves.

While Futaba and her mother had a great relationship with each other, two years ago, when she was in middle school and the first Metaverse-related incident instigated by Yaldabaoth and Shido started, her mother, Wakaba Isshiki, suspiciously died in front of her because of a mental shutdown caused by Goro Akechi and ordered by Masayoshi Shido, resulting in Wakaba throwing herself in front of traffic. Her relatives, who have an eye on Wakaba's legacy, blamed the prodigy programmer for her death, based on a forged "suicide note," particularly after agents of the Conspiracy used it to manipulate Wakaba's family, hoping to keep her (alongside other cognitive psience researcher's) research for themselves.

Before her mother died, Futaba asked her to go on a family trip, at which Wakaba expressed her annoyance at Futaba bothering her for completing her research for the sake of her life, which Futaba responds with a tantrum. In reality, she promised her that she will bring her to anywhere she wants to go after she completes the research. The combination of the suspicious timing of her mother's "suicide" being after a family quarrel between the two, and the derogatory content of the forged suicide note, engineered the delusional belief that her mother hated her, which drove her to a complete breakdown. Following her mother's death, custody of Futaba was passed to several of her uncaring relatives, including her uncle, Youji Isshiki, who refused to even treat her as a person, not even allowing her to bathe or have a proper bed. Futaba does not know that her mother died of a mental shutdown before witnessing Okumura's death from the same circumstances, and Shido quickly forgot about Wakaba after he killed her.

A hallucination of Wakaba haunting Futaba.

This led her to develop guilt, psychological trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder, extreme social anxiety and hallucinations. The hallucinations are often of Wakaba's face overlaid on other people (Or Wakaba herself) looking disappointed in her. She has not attended school ever since graduating middle school: by her age, she should have been a first year student in high school. Wakaba's close friend, Sojiro Sakura has adopted Futaba, paying her uncle the better part of Futaba's inheritance to leave her alone. During her isolation, she tried to use her substantial hacking skills to learn about her mother's research and how it relates to her death only to find all of the information related to it had disappeared completely, and she shut herself in so tight at Sojiro's house that nobody around Yongen-Jaya had heard of her before, even from stores where Sojiro frequents. By the time of the game, her depression has worsened into outright suicidal impulses and a refusal to meet anyone, including Sojiro, as well as a delusional subconscious belief that her death would bring Wakaba back to life. Sojiro even tried to call a doctor to no avail, since she refused to come out of her room and usually locks it. The sheer magnitude of her negative emotions went so bad to the point that she managed to generate a Palace, despite not being a criminal with a heavy desire for controlling other's lives unlike the majority of targets. Due to her heart being distorted, she does not properly recall any of the events that ruined her life, as the memories are concealed in three murals in her Palace.

Fourth Heist: Futaba Sakura

Shortly after Junya Kaneshiro's fall, the Phantom Thieves are being threatened by a hacker group named "Medjed," who threatens to unleash a "Cleanse" against the Phantom Thieves and all of its supporters. In reality, this is an impersonator and the "Cleanse" is actually a blank threat issued by the CEO of an IT company affiliated with Masayoshi Shido. Futaba finds out that the protagonist and his friends are the Phantom Thieves by listening to their conversation in Café Leblanc through the bug she placed there. Knowing her own impulses and realizing she has to stop, Futaba sends a message to the protagonist under the alias Alibaba, asking him to steal her heart in exchange for helping them deal with Medjed, who are declaring war against the Phantom Thieves. However, when the protagonist demands more information, Futaba realizes that in order to steal her heart, they need to know more about her. This causes her to panic and hastily attempts to cancel her request for the first time interacting. However, for the second time, "Alibaba" claims that if the protagonist does not change her heart before the Medjed "Cleanse," she will expose all identities of the Phantom Thieves and their supporters, which will most certainly lead to their arrest. Again, she then hastily attempts to cancel the request for the same reasons as the first time. This aroused heavy suspicions around the Phantom Thieves due to the heavily threatening and anonymous nature of the "Alibaba" deal.

Persona 5 Boss Fight 4 Wakaba Isshiki

Futaba enters her Palace.

When problems with Medjed start to get worse, the desperate Phantom Thieves conclude they require her hacking skills to put an end to the situation. After piecing together the facts, Makoto Niijima correctly deduces that Alibaba is in fact Futaba herself. When visiting Sojiro's house, they find out she also lives there so they directly ask her about herself to get the keyword into the Palace. They sneak into Sojiro's house at night trying to find her. The household was pitch black and seemingly empty, until a lightning broke out and Futaba can be heard screaming, greatly alerting Makoto. This alerts Futaba that people are barging into her house, and she comes out to check only to see a terrified Makoto clinging onto the protagonist's leg. Both are terrified with each other, and Futaba flees into her room instantly due to her extreme agoraphobia. Sojiro then returns to his house to see the party's mess. Despite initially being bewildered because the party deliberately barged into his home and the party terrified in fear of reprisal, he consented to their presence and brings the party back to LeBlanc and explains the situation to them. When the party sneaks into Sojiro's home the next day, they do not force her to come out and allow her to communicate through chat. She told the protagonist that she wanted to die shutting herself in her room, then inputs the keyword "Tomb" by accident into the protagonist's navigator, transporting the party into her Palace. However, exploration was halted when Futaba's heart started to instinctively reject them, causing Shadow Futaba to appear and drop a boulder on them, forcing escape.

Her sin is Wrath, which turns her Palace into a giant pyramid filled with numerous traps such as quicksand pits and boulders and contains several murals which represent her self guilt over "causing her mother's death." Due to her proficiency with technology, the pyramid's interior appear with integrated electronics, and mirroring her shut-in lifestyle, the desert that acts as the outskirts of the Palace is extremely hot while it is much cooler inside the pyramid. Since she does not see anyone other than her mother Wakaba in a distorted way and she outright refuses to even meet people, the only cognitive existence in the Palace is the massive, spiteful sphinx that takes her form, which represents Futaba's guilt over her death, and it fights with Shadow Futaba for control of her own mind.

Futaba accepting her deceased mother.

While the Phantom Thieves are having trouble with the sphinx, she notices the appearance of the Metaverse Navigator application on her own phone, and wonders if she can enter her own palace. She does so, encountering her Shadow and becoming her own Treasure in the process. She is forced to face her own fear as her Shadow urges her to remember her mother's death. Recalling that her mother's death was unnatural and realizing she had been deluding herself, Futaba awakens her Persona power and helps the party defeat the cognitive existence of her mother that she created, who wishes she was never born. After the battle, the image of the true, benevolent Wakaba appears before Futaba, and confesses her love for her daughter before disappearing. After the battle at her own Palace, Futaba holds her end of the bargain, hacking into Medjed's website to stop them from further bothering the Phantom Thieves. This does no damage to Medjed however, and is merely a part of the Conspiracy's plan, due to Medjed itself being an impersonator and the actual Medjed is Futaba herself.

If the protagonist cannot complete her Palace in time, the police come to arrest the protagonist with charges of extortion and suspicion of being a member of the Phantom Thieves, with Sojiro also being arrested for harboring a criminal, implying to be Futaba actually blackmailing them. This scenario is a false recollection made by the protagonist during Sae Niijima's interrogation, due to his mind being addled by drugs forcibly administered to him by the police. Futaba is also already reformed during the interrogation, further indicating that what happens is obviously a false recollection. Sae proceeds to leave the room to give the protagonist time to recover, at which point an assassin takes the opportunity to kill him.

After the Phantom Thieves change her heart, she finally comes out from her shell, starts to go outside by regularly visiting Café Leblanc, interacting with the protagonist and his friends and eventually joining the Phantom Thieves of Hearts to find the culprit truly responsible for her mother's death. She reveals she created the original Medjed identity and later gave her hacking scripts to a group of friends, but when counter-hacking the hostile Medjed she realizes that they do not use her distinct programs. From there, she deduces that someone else must have stolen their name. In addition, she reveals to the team the suspicious way that her mother's condition degenerated before she died, and that her physical notes were the only research that hadn't been destroyed and possibly are the only way to find the ones who forged the note that ruined her life.

After the death of Kunikazu Okumura, while cleaning Futaba's room, Sojiro accidentally finds the Phantom Thieves' calling card for Futaba that she keeps as a memento. He questions the protagonist and Futaba about this, giving them no choice but to explain what truly happened to Futaba's mother. Sojiro only thought that the protagonist had some kind of connection to the Phantom Thieves and got Futaba involved, but Futaba's slip makes him realize that the protagonist is in fact the ringleader of the Phantom Thieves himself. Sojiro then reveals the truth about his past, and how he had realized that the Thieves' methods have some similarity with details of Wakaba's research. Hearing Futaba's wish of wanting to find her mother's killer, Sojiro immediately rejects the idea. However, after seeing how determined both Futaba and the protagonist are, Sojiro promises to keep their secret and allows them to continue their activities under the condition that they should stop if it gets too dangerous.

The Phantom Thieves later find out that the ruining of Futaba's life was orchestrated by Masayoshi Shido, who ordered an assassination on her mother to protect his reputation from being damaged by her research that could otherwise expose his crimes, then forged a suicide note and told his men to read it aloud to her in an unnecessary act of cruelty. When the thieves finally secured the route to his Treasure, Futaba hijacks the broadcasting system of Japan to broadcast a message against him nationwide, which alerts him and causes his Treasure to take form.

She also tried to ruin a relationship but ended up failing due to the fact that she will never get laid.

Confidant

To check Futaba's Confidant dialogue options and skill, see: Confidant/Futaba Sakura

"We were impressed with the intel-gathering skills of the Phantom Thieves as well. We also know that this would've been impossible unless you had a skilled hacker... ...Who was doing this!?"

—Sae Niijima talking about Futaba Sakura, Persona 5

Hero on date with Sakura Futaba

The protagonist on a date with Futaba.

Futaba's Confidant is automatically unlocked on August 31st. However, advancing it past the first rank requires the protagonist to have rank 4 Kindness (Selfless). Maxing this Confidant makes Necronomicon evolve into Prometheus and unlocks the fusion of Ongyo-Ki.

Her story progression revolves around her exposure to the outside world, as years of social isolation has left her completely maladjusted, and fulfilling a list of things which her mother made her do to help boost her social skills. Progressing the Confidant will unlock additional support abilities for Futaba to aid the party with in-battle through her Persona.

As she slowly rehabilitates with the protagonist, her journey leads her to reveal that even in her youth she has been bullied for her intelligence and only had one friend named Kana who was the only one to actually try to talk with her. However, one day she uncovered that her best friend's parents were abusing her (the implication is of sexual abuse, as Kana wrote in her diary of being forced to wear strange costumes and have photos taken). Although Kana stopped talking to Futaba after she discovered her secret, Futaba lied to her mother that they were still getting along.

To soothe her guilt, she tracks down Kana and discovers that the abuse has not stopped. Futaba was then entrusted with the task of stealing her parent's hearts so she can live a normal life again. After Kana and Futaba reconnect, they rebuild their friendship, and both girls resolve to attend school again. At that point, the protagonist can choose to start a romantic relationship with her or not. If they do, Futaba goes out and buys a figure on her own as proof of her independence. If they do not, she spends close to an hour exploring Akihabara on her own. Either way, she thanks the protagonist for giving her something irreplaceable: her life back. Her newfound strength and independence causes Necronomicon to transform into Prometheus.

Futaba's farewell gift after maxing her Confidant is the Promise List that she and the protagonist were using in their Confidant. This item allows Futaba to use Mementos Scan and Treasure Reboot starting from Rank 1 of her Confidant in New Game+. If the protagonist pursues a romantic relationship with Futaba, she will gift the protagonist Headphones on Christmas, allowing the protagonist to earn more points when using a Hermit Persona during their Confidant in NG+, and Futaba's Chocolate on Valentines Day, which fully restores SP to one ally when consumed.

Persona 5 Royal

Taking Back Reality

Eight days after Yaldabaoth's fall, Futaba is seen celebrating the New Year with Wakaba on January 2, with Wakaba shown to be alive and well. This was revealed to be an alternate reality created by Takuto Maruki, who rewrote history so her assassination never happened, out of Futaba's desire for her mother to still be with her, and to have a complete family. Akechi still remembers murdering her, however, due to his special circumstances. Futaba then can be found at Akihabara, exploring with Sojiro and Wakaba when the protagonist goes to check on her. Once Futaba denies Maruki's reality, Wakaba was never from again.

Despite not being present in the party during these days due to living happily in Maruki's reality, her Treasure Reboot Confidant skill still has a chance to occur during the investigations on January 2 and January 9. This is likely due to an oversight.

If the protagonist maxes her Confidant, Futaba will call him over for a talk in her room. However, when inside the room, she wears the mask that she used to only wear when she was still learning to talk to people. She then takes off the mask and regrets having her selfish desires of seeing mom once again betray the protagonist's trust, even believing how he would be most definitely angry right now even after his reassurance. She then asks him if Maruki's reality is an illusion, in which he answers that it isn't in a sense. While she was grateful that she would see her mother once again and she could spend more time with her, even for a fleeting moment, she accepts the truth that she will never meet her again and Maruki's reality is not to be relied on. She tells the protagonist that she will move on from her grief so her mother will be proud. Realizing this, she tells the protagonist what she believes that her mother wished for her to become, causing Prometheus and Necronomicon evolve into Al Azif.

Should the protagonist allow Maruki to completely overwrite reality, Futaba would begin to go to school at Shujin Academy. She then will be seen enjoying life with Wakaba and Sojiro in the credits, their family complete like it was never able to be.

A few weeks after the Phantom Thieves defeated Maruki and restored their original reality, Futaba revealed to the group in Leblanc (at Sojiro's urging) that she passed her entrance exams for high school and plans to continue her education into college to pick up on researching cognitive psience in her mother's footsteps, inspired by the events within Maruki's reality. Everyone acknowledges that they'll remain connected with each other as they separate and move forward on their own paths towards their own future.

Some time after the group helped the protagonist evade tailing government officials (with the assistance of the reformed Maruki who now works as a taxi driver), Futaba continues to stay over at Sojiro's house and would write a letter for the protagonist in her room during the credits.

Persona 5 Strikers

Futaba is now fully rehabilitated and has enrolled to a high school as a first year student.

Four months after the protagonist and Morgana's departure, the former Phantom Thieves decide to reunite and go on a camping trip during summer vacation. While discussing preparation, Futaba suggests that they use a recently popular mobile app called EMMA, which can give them recommendations of equipment for their camping trip. However, the group learns of a new Metaverse-related threat where the EMMA application can be used by specific people to Change the Hearts of people via Jails, making them obsessive towards their ruler, known as Kings, which can lead to the point of property loss and violent incidents. They once again reestablish the Phantom Thieves of Heart to change the heart of the King of Shibuya's Jail, Alice Hiiragi.

While investigating Alice, the gang is approached by a police officer named Zenkichi Hasegawa, who reveals that they are the prime suspects of the recent-most change of heart incident against the TV host a day ago, even if Alice was the true instigator. He offers to clear their name in exchange they work together with him to solve the cases. Not wanting to accept the offer, the group is determined to clear their own name by changing Alice's heart. Like she did with Shido, Futaba hijacks the TV stream to send a calling card to Alice, allowing the group to fight her and get her back to her senses. Unfortunately, their plan backfires as the police instead became convinced that the Phantom Thieves are involved in the recent cases, and only now the Thieves knew that this was a Japan-wide incident. Futaba searches through the incidents that Zenkichi mentioned and discovered that he has been telling the truth. With no other option, they reluctantly accept his offer to investigate the incidents, although hand-to-hand with their trip.

During their trip at Kyoto, Futaba and her friends became acquainted with Zenkichi's daughter, Akane Hasegawa. Futaba is able to relate with Akane's feelings who had lost her mother. When the Phantom Thieves are framed for hacking into EMMA and murdering the King of Okinawa's Jail, they discover another Jail in Kyoto and enter it accidentally upon realizing Akane was captured. In reality, they are all unknowingly being lured into a trap set up by Akira Konoe under EMMA's proposal; when they found Akane, she was revealed to be not of her real person, but her Shadow Self, whom has became the King of Kyoto by accidentally consulting EMMA to "save her," with the real Akane being rendered comatose in her room. Shadow Akane captured the Phantom Thieves, but Futaba, who tripped while trying to catch up, ended up avoiding capture. Unable to fight, Futaba is forced to retreat and meet Zenkichi at their hideout. Having no one else to turn to, Futaba pleads Zenkichi to help her friends and Akane. She navigates Zenkichi during their infiltration until they reach the cage where the Phantom Thieves are being held captive, with Shadow Akane keeping an eye on them. Once Zenkichi awakened his Persona and defeated all the shadows Akane summoned, Futaba frees the rest of the Phantom Thieves.

Persona 5 The Animation

Futaba appears in the fifteenth episode of the anime, where like before she contacts the Phantom Thieves under her alias of Alibaba to have her own heart stolen. Unlike the game version where Futaba merely threatens Ren with an SNS deal at class, she hijacks the phones all other students in Ren's class by causing them to make noises. The Phantom Thieves were able to deduce her identity through the wording of Alibaba's texts and Sae's visit to LeBlanc to threaten Sojiro. Futaba herself makes a physical appearance at the end of the episode.

As she and Makoto scream, Sojiro appears, where he finally comes clean about his relation with Futaba. Like in the game, the Thieves agree to steal Futaba's heart in order to stop the group Medjed. While in her palace, it is shown that Futaba's mental state partially transfers over to Shadow Futaba, showing the shadow self in agony as the voices of Futaba's relatives in the tomb.

Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight / Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight

Futaba hacks into Fuuka Yamagishi's laptop, and befriends her using her screen name "Alibaba." Futaba informs her of new found love of dancing, alongside the other members of the Phantom Thieves of Hearts, though due to the fact that their memories are erased upon completion of the ball, neither retain the memories of these interactions. Fuuka's screen name was "Lucia."

Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth

Futaba is the party's default navigator. She uses the Persona Necronomicon.

As Hikari bears striking similarities to her old self, she is one of the party members that genuinely cares for her, often attempting to talk to her despite the fact that she often shuts down when being talked to. When the party is preparing to weaken Kamoshidaman, Futaba spends her time talking to Hikari.

During the 3rd labyrinth A.I.G.I.S, she acts as Ribbon's caretaker due to her pro-efficiency with technology. She was capable of undoing the Overseer's immobilization of Ribbon just by flipping a switch and was able to remove the seal that prevented her from activating Orgia Mode, allowing her to overthrow the Mother Computer with the help of the party. After the fight against the omnipotent AI, she was capable of repairing her completely from orgia mode overload with the help of Aigis.

Futaba enjoys tricking Aigis into behaving in inappropriate or informal manners, as Aigis is extremely suggestible and oblivious to it, to the point that she manages to carry Futaba's mannerisms into reality at the epilogue.

Etymology

• The name Futaba means "two" (双) (futa) and "leaf" (葉) (ha/ba). 
  • Futaba is a reference to the Futaba Channel (also known as 2chan), an imageboard in Japan that inspired the popular English-language imageboard 4chan. As a hikikomori, Futaba could be seen as representing Internet or otaku culture.
    • Her mother's name Wakaba is also a reference to the software that runs 2chan. 
  • Her online handle "Alibaba" is a Japanese word puzzle to her given name. Ali or Ari (あり/有) means "to have," so the handle can be constructed as "have leaf leaf" (有葉葉), in other words "have two leaves."
• Futaba's surname Sakura means "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "warehouse" (倉) (kura). 

In Other Languages

Language	Titles
English	Futaba Sakura	Oracle
Japanese	佐倉 双葉 (Sakura Futaba)	ナビ (Nabi)
Korean	사쿠라 후타바 (Sakura Hutaba)	내비 (Naebi)
Traditional Chinese	佐倉 雙葉 (Zuǒcāng shuāngyè)	NAVI

Trivia

• While Futaba has her own costume with every DLC pack, the only times she's seen wearing them is in safe locations within Mementos and the Palaces, the exit of the dungeons, or during certain non-animated cutscenes. If she activates one of her skills while in battle, she's depicted wearing her usual Metaverse outfit instead of the equipped costume.
• If Makoto is affected by an ailment during battle, Futaba will identify the affinities of enemies instead.
• Any information about her biological father is unknown and does not play a major role in the story.
• Futaba was originally imagined with having black hair. Original sketches show her looking a bit emo/goth, with a black jacket with a skull, and a black-and-white striped shirt. However, the character designer wanted to make her stand out and so her hair was made bright orange, as depicting a sad and suicidal character with dark hair and goth/emo clothing is a bit of a cliche. Her final outfit is a lot less goth/emo looking, although she still wears black boots.
• The game files indicate that there was supposed to be a Shadow Futaba icon indicating an alert in her Palace, most likely to be used after meeting Futaba's Shadow, although all instances of if this were to happen depict Futaba's regular self.
• Futaba's surname is her adopted name. Judging from her mother's surname, her birth name is Futaba Isshiki.
• Futaba shares the same Ultimate Persona, Prometheus, with Baofu from Persona 2: Eternal Punishment whose Japanese voice actor, Jouji Nakata, also voiced Futaba's guardian, Sojiro Sakura.
  • The allusion to Baofu also extends to the fact that Futaba performs computer hacking and wiretapping which are important to the main plots of both games.
• Futaba's rank 10 Confidant ability "Final Guard" was originally named "Last Guardian" (ラストガーディアン^*)^? as seen in the fourth Japanese trailer of Persona 5.

Catherine figure in top-right.

• She has a Catherine figurine in her room of Catherine sitting on a stool.
• The method in which Futaba gains her Persona is more evocative of the cast of Persona 4 than other party members. Rather than having a mask to tear off, Futaba is forced to face a part of herself she was repressing (her true memories and her desire to live). When she finally admits, "I couldn't face myself," and accepts the truth, her Shadow even becomes her Persona, just like in Persona 4.
• Futaba can equip gear and both of her Personas have stats, but these have no confirmed effect whatsoever on gameplay.
• Futaba appears in the first chapter of the Persona 5 manga during the time Akira is at the Shibuya crosswalk after time freezes around him. However, due to this contradicting her character plot it could easily be a look alike or just a gag from the author.
• Futaba's traits bear a resemblance to Hikari's, as they were initially shut-ins that have extreme depression and self-destructive tendencies based on trauma with their beloved parents and relatives being responsible for at least a part of them, and the disorders resulted in the formation of at least one dungeon during their respective debut, with the cognitive existences of their parents acting as bosses at the dungeon that directly embodies their self-destructive desires. Once the cognitive existences of their parents were defeated, their distorted desires clear and they make a full rehabilitation. They also have extraordinary talents that are unusual for people around their age, being respectively computers and technology for Futaba and film production for Hikari. Futaba also makes comparisons with her past self and Hikari during the events of Persona Q2.
• Futaba's calling card is initially worded differently from the final version; The text on the card says: "She never leaves her room or interacts with people, living an unproductive life of indolence. We are the Phantom Thieves that steal hearts. You will be made to bask in the light of the sun. Look forward to that time."
• In Persona 5 Royal, the protagonist can play darts with Futaba even though she is unable to use Baton Pass.
• Futaba has a poster of Egyptian Hieroglyphs on the back of her bedroom door.
• During the destruction of Shido's Palace, Futaba admits she can't swim.
• The official Twitter account for the Persona series posted a Happy Birthday message for Futaba on February 18, 2018.
  • Afterwards, for the rest of the day, Futaba tweeted on the Persona account in Morgana's place. Her tweets were signed with "Alibaba."
• As shown in the battle versus Caroline & Justine and in Persona Q2, Futaba thinks they are cute.
• Futaba is the only Phantom Thief to enact a request during her Confidant.
• During the game, Futaba makes various references to other games. One of the most distinct is her voice line 'Hey, listen', which is a reference to Navi's quote in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Futaba's Japanese codename is also "Navi."
• Due to an oversight in Royal, it is possible for Futaba's Treasure Reboot and Moral Support to activate while exploring the new Palace for the first time with Akechi, despite her not being in the party at that time. This is because they are Confidant abilities instead of skills on Futaba's Persona, and unlike similar skills such as Ryuji's Instant Kill which requires Ryuji to be in the party, Treasure Reboot and Moral Support does not require Futaba to be present.
• In the Sword Art Online collaborations, Yuuki is dressed as Futaba because they both share the same Japanese voice actress, Aoi Yuuki.

Appearances in Other Media

Title	Details	Date	External Links
Chain Chronicle	Collaboration event *Oracle, Clerics class, 4-star	January 19th, 2017 - January 31st, 2017	Article in Chain Chronicle Wiki
Puyo Puyo!! Quest:	Collaboration event for Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth *Futaba Sakura, Balance Type, 6-star	December 3rd, 2018	Article in Puyo Nexus
BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle:	Color swap for Akihiko Sanada.
Catherine: Full Body:	DLC NPC
BanG Dream! Girls Band Party	Collaboration event *Outfit for Aoba Moca	February 17th, 2019 - March 6th, 2019
Kyoutou Kotoba RPG	Collaboration event *Futaba (Kotodaman); Normal (5-star), Phantom Thief (6-star)	March 5th, 2019 - March 28th, 2019
Super Smash Bros: Ultimate	*Part of the Joker DLC: *Cameos in Joker's Final Smash, *Support Spirit (Novice Class)	April 17th, 2019	Article in SmashWiki
Star Ocean: Anamnesis	Collaboration event *Playable Character	October 2019	Article on the Star Ocean Wiki
Identity V	*Second collaboration event *Futaba Sakura & ORACLE Skin for Mechanic	November 7th, 2019 - November 28th, 2019
Sword Art Online: Memory Defrag	Collaboration event *Oracle, NPC, Oracle skin for Yuuki: Slash type, Neutral element, 6-star	February 17th, 2020 - March 10th, 2020
Sword Art Online: Integral Factor	Collaboration event *Oracle, NPC, Oracle outfit for avatar, Oracle skin for Yuuki	February 28th, 2020 - March 10th, 2020
Puzzle and Dragons	Collaboration Event	July 27, 2020 - August 10, 2020