You could have changed you. Or did you want to keep being someone else's lackey, used and then thrown away before you could even get your revenge? [ It's more savage than usual, but Akira is heated. He looks too deadset, now, without his glasses, staring directly into Akechi without flinching.

He doesn't know how else to communicate with Akechi. Akechi can't -- won't -- accept any of the kindness that Akira tends to give; he won't be swayed by any of the things that usually help Akira get close to the most prickly of people. So he'll punch straight through to the heart of the problem, like it's just another Palace to get through. ]

When you didn't have any time to decide, you tried to help us.

[ Akechi just overthinks everything until he talks himself out of things. Circles and circles and circles until he's chasing the echo of something that may have never existed in the first place, and Joker just wants him to stop. ]