Méqué

**Méqué** (メケ, *Méqué*) is a killer who dresses like a clown. Raised as a street performer, he is a murderer who targets drug dealers and abusive parents, whom he considers to be the cause of society's problems, of his own volition.

## Characteristics

### Appearance

Méqué is a young man of about 20. He has a striking, asymmetrical appearance accentuated by makeup and bizarre clothing. His face is painted in white greasepaint and he wears a small red false nose. His red lipstick curves into a smile on the left side and a frown on the right; with a blue teardrop painted on his right cheek, he looks like he is simultaneously smiling and crying.

A red hat covers his dull pink, wavy hair, and he wears a black bowtie and a vest over a dark red shirt. The vest is black on the right side and black-and-white harlequin-patterned on the left side. His bright red pants are cuffed and rolled up at the knees, showing mismatched socks. His right sock is black with white stripes, while the left is a black with white diamonds. He wears dark red clown shoes with bulbous tips, overall giving the impression of a busker.

### Personality

Méqué is an intelligent young man who is severely emotionally and developmentally stunted. Mentally much younger than he physically is, he speaks in broken, childish sentences and refers to himself in the third person, which is not uncommon for children in Japan, but is a trait individuals eventually grow out of. As a child he was abused heavily by his father, disassociating during the beatings and eventually developing dissociative identity disorder. His true personality, which he calls That One, rarely comes out. That One is timid and afraid, cries often and expects beatings.

Due to the frequent and brutal beatings he received from his drug-abusing father, he mentally broke and created a new personality who could take the beatings in his place. The personality created to protect That One is a clown called Méqué. Despite being a stand-in personality, Méqué is in control almost all of the time. He is more cheerful and bolder than the original, usually seen smiling and humming. He has a strong sense of what is right and wrong, desiring a world where all children can live happily, and he will kill anyone who gets in the way of that dream.

Méqué believes it is his mission to kill people. After growing up abused by his drug addict father, he initially believes drugs are the problem. Eventually, he switches from targeting drug pushers to targeting abusive parents, hoping to free children from abusive households and sever the link between abusers and future abusers. He adopts lessons from his own abusive father, punishing the people he kills by hanging up their bodies in the same way that his father used to string him up. He also does not see the problem in abducting children to make friends. As he has never had anyone on his side, he is incredibly lonely and wishes to have a friend, so he convinces himself that That One wants a friend and tries abducting children to fill the role.

## Background

Méqué's mother died when he was very young, and he was raised by his father, a street performer who took him overseas. He spent his childhood training under his father while touring America in an RV as part of a traveling circus. The training his father put him through was brutal and he was punished heavily for his failures. He was verbally abused, whipped, starved, and once locked outside of his RV in the snow. If he messed up a trick, he was hung upside down as a punishment and occasionally whipped while bound and helpless. Once his father took him to see an opera. It remains the most precious memory he has with his father, and he listens to, sings, and hums an aria from the opera constantly.

His father died during his teen years, and instead of an orphanage, Méqué was admitted to a short-term therapy facility for emotionally troubled youth. He was quiet and peaceful during those years, keeping largely to himself or putting on shows for the other children to make them happy. In one instance, another child lashed out at the others, and Méqué hit and strangled him, hating the disruption of the happy and calm life they generally enjoyed. Despite his emotional detachment, Méqué was aware of his surroundings and is believed to have pretended to recover in order to be released from the institution at 18. At some point after being released, he began targeting and killing drug dealers. His crimes are overlooked by the higher-ups as he only kills people generally believed to be better off dead.

## Synopsis

### Avengers Arc

Méqué is first spotted by a young boy leaving a festival who follows him out of curiosity. The clown enters an alley and attacks three gang members completing a drug deal. He leaves their bludgeoned bodies hanging upside down and abducts the boy, bringing him back to his RV. Finding an informant among one of the gang members' contacts, Méqué reaches out, requesting information on abusive parents.

The following morning when the boy wakes up, Méqué is hopeful he will become a friend to That One, but when the boy cannot stop crying, Méqué calls him annoying and covers his mouth until he passes out. He throws the boy out of the van and checks the list of abusive parents sent to him by the informant, choosing Mari Aikawa off the top of the list. He enters her home that afternoon and beats her to death, splitting her skull and tying her upside down.

After visiting the Aikawa household, Méqué kills a man named Ryouji Aoyama, a pedophile who had assaulted his step-son, causing the boy to undergo serious trauma, speech therapy, and counseling. That night, Méqué visits the Nakasu bar Smokin' Hot, ignoring the closed sign. The yakuza inside laugh at him, and as they attempt to shoo him away, he throws a knife into the bartender's throat. The others begin shooting at him, but Méqué dances and dodges around the room until they run out of bullets. As he is hanging up the bodies, he spots Misaki Tanaka peering in through the window and abducts her.

After they have driven a distance, Méqué brings Misaki into the back of the RV and unties her limbs. When she agrees to become That One's friend, Méqué allows her to meet his true personality. He cowers in a corner, sobbing and screaming, and Misaki gently tries to calm him down. He becomes scared and passes out, and Méqué returns, disappointed that That One was unable to befriend Misaki right away, but he allows her to bandage his bleeding arm.

The following morning, as Méqué is drying himself after a shower, Misaki asks about the scars covering his back, and he reveals that his father used to beat That One, so he would take the beatings in his place. Misaki relates to this and offers to be Méqué's friend, and when she tells him that she also has scars on her back, he comforts her in turn. Misaki is able to find some comfort and healing in sharing the full story of her abuse with him throughout the day, and he tells her of his own childhood. Still wishing to find a way to return home, however, Misaki asks him to attend Fukuoka's Houjouya festival with her.

Méqué refuses to step foot in a haunted house out of fear of ghosts, but he wins a prize for Misaki at a darts booth and expresses excitement over a magician, impressed by Misaki's ability to see through the performer's trick. The pair play games and eat sweets into the night, Misaki completely forgetting her goal of escaping him. Afterward, as they are returning to his van, Misaki asks to return home, and Méqué relents. He gives her his phone number, hoping that they can remain friends and he can see her again.

A week later, Méqué receives a phone call from Mieko Yamazaki, threatening Misaki's life, and Misaki asks for help over the phone. When he arrives at the warehouse he is directed to, he takes out the yakuza members stationed outside and enters the building. Inside, Misaki is bound to a chair. She apologizes for using their friendship and promises to do anything she can to help him in the future, asking him to kill everyone in the warehouse. Without a second thought, Méqué cheerfully agrees to her request, killing Mieko and the Mutagawa subordinates and leaving the warehouse with Misaki. Outside, he waits in the backseat of the Mutagawa executive Sanjou's car, slicing his throat when he attempts to drive away. Méqué leaves Misaki at the warehouse so she can be rescued by her father, and Misaki hopes to be able to see him again and invite him over to her home in the future.

## Trivia

* In the third inning of volume 5, he is shown to be humming along to the tune of "Vesti la giubba" ("Put on the costume"), an aria piece in the Italian opera *Pagliacci*. The piece depicts how the character has to put on a cheerful persona to face the world, despite being heartbroken and dealing with his own issues, reflecting aspects of Méqué's personality. It is noted his father took him to an opera once and has been humming the song he heard from it ever since, making it the likely inspiration behind his Méqué persona.