Akira not having realised that Akechi could have been only there and alive because he wanted it to be true, Akira possibly having not wanted to face that truth the same way that his friends had taken a week to wake up to things being “wrong” for them.
(Neither of them thinking too closely on the idea that Akechi might not actually be dead. It’s easier and better to think on the worst case scenario here, than risk everything on hope and wishes.)
Akechi’s fear and anger and resignation at the idea that yet again, his own thoughts and opinions matter for little in the grand scheme of things - the fact that it’s Akira saying yes, your free will does matter, I won’t fold, your choice is worth more than that, that gives him his third awakening is a relief, but Akechi feeling so alive at the awakening is like an incredibly ill patient appearing to get better before they’re gone for good.
It’s Akira’s slump when he’s finally alone, when he’s given Maruki the calling card and reassured Akechi that they’re going through with it, to the point where there’s no turning back now, and it’s his blood vow, but for the first time it doesn’t feel like something to be happy about. In the midst of everyone, he is, in the end, all alone.
It’s the idea that Akira has had to put on all of those masks for so many people, be something else for someone else, be the prisoner of fate in an unjust game and be beaten and brutalised by the system, figuratively and literally, to have died for all intents and purposes and still have to be the one to bring everyone else back, to have the weight of the world on his shoulders, to be the only one who can see what’s wrong with the world…
It’s that Akira gives so much of himself to anyone who he cares about, and when he finds something - someone - he cares about enough to want, he has to give them up.
And no one knows other than the three of them, and even when reality comes back, no one truly knows just how much he gave up for them.
How much he’d give up again, because it’s the world, and the world is worth more than Akira Kurusu.
(You’re the leader, Joker. You have to take responsibility.)
None of which is invalidated by the true ending.
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