"What the hell are you doing, Jinko?"
Paused in the middle of an abandoned street, Atsushi stood awkwardly with Akutagawa's arm draped around his shoulders. Emerging now from the cold, disorienting vision, Akutagawa lurched then managed to put his feet under him, and extricated himself.
"I… uh…" The detective's response was halting, probably because he was realizing for the first time the absurdity of his actions.
You simply don't take someone who just stabbed you in the heart (and has been a malicious rival ever since their first meeting) onto your shoulders and carry them halfway to a hospital just because they suddenly had a seemingly life-threatening coughing fit and collapsed.
Atsushi flinched away, instinctively going into a defensive position. But Akutagawa was not in an attacking mood. He was still reeling.
"Are you ok?" Atsushi ventured to ask, eventually. "Your lungs, I mean."
Atsushi knew the intensity of those coughs, could almost feel it burning his throat, exploding from his midsection, leaving him grasping— not enough— for air before another convulsion hits.
"That was not it," Akutagawa replied. It was not the coughing fit that made him lose consciousness (though Akutagawa loathed the weakness of his own body that would make somebody think so), "it was a vision."
"Oh?" Atsushi said, slowly coming out of his crouching position. "When was it?"
The question hung in the air, Akutagawa debating with himself whether or not to respond. After a few breaths, "you were in a basement cell. It was cold. Your headmaster brought you some broth."
For the first time that day Atsushi went pale. They simply stared at each other, for a long while, their minds filled with unpleasant recollections. Images from the past, dug up to haunt them. This strange, intrusive knowing. This alien, unwelcome compassion.
"I…. apologize." Akutagawa said, so unbelievable were the words that they felt unreal to the other man, "for taking revenge on you when you had no control over what you saw. And for seeing what I just did."
It was not fair. It was not welcome. But as long as they did not know its cause, there was no way to avoid it.
The disbelief in Atsushi's eyes eventually transformed into conviction. He could find no lie in those cold steel eyes. But then again, Akutagawa was not the type to lie. Brutal honesty was more his vice.
The were-tiger sighed.
"It is not your fault. Besides, I'm quite… glad," he said almost hesitantly, "that at least someone understands."
At least someone understands, the Yokohama sea wind repeats back to them, over and over.
Akutagawa inclined his head fractionally, turned, and walked away. A silent goodbye. A parting that need no words.
When Atsushi woke the next morning, there was great pain in his face, so great he was vomiting blood. He reached out frantically for the tiger's strength, and instead found another limb. He clawed at nothing, tried with life or death urgency to grip, to tear with these foreign fingers.
He had a sense that he was about to die.
"This is what you do to useless subordinates." A voice. A familiar voice. Atsushi's head was all jumbled, couldn't place anything, couldn't feel anything but the frantic struggle of Rashoumon against…. air. Against nothingness. He needed to—
Bang, bang, bang.
Three gunshots. Atsushi's eyes flew wide open just as Rashoumon gripped something. It was not a devouring of space, exactly, but more like a shredding. Like scrabbling by the fingernails for an almost nonexistent edge of reality, then ripping it out, tearing it asunder.
So this is how it feels to rip apart the fabric of space itself.
Red ripples loomed in his entire field of vision, disrupted only by three black dots, right in front of his head. The mafia's way of killing. Three bullets, breaking the jaw, agony… an echo of a job long ago in Atsushi's mind. Again, that sensation, like he was about to die. But he has a grip on the bullets now, through Rashoumon, he could feel the round edges of it, taste the energy of their great momentum pushing on him.
"Heh—" Dazai-san said, a drawn-out exclamation that was less than impressed but might contain a glimpse of approval. Like what you would say to a dog that performed a nice trick. "So you can do it if you try."
How?
"I have never been able to do it before." The words spilled out of Atsushi's mouth. Akutagawa's first time controlling the space-devouring ability. He realized. Another important, private moment that he has violated.
"But now you can. How nice." Said Dazai-san, in a greatly cold, greatly disapproving manner. "The next time you mess up, I will punch you twice and shoot you five times, got it?"
A sense of dread, but mixed with stubborn pride. I would not mess up next time. I would get stronger. I will get stronger— strong enough to stop five bullets.
And even more than that stubbornness, in a tiny corner of his mind, a sick sense of satisfaction. Dazai-san is paying attention to me. The wrongness Atsushi felt was disorienting enough to make him pay attention to his surroundings again. His face still hurts.
"— that the mafia is just about gathering subordinates and killing people. At this rate Odasaku will end up solving this all by himself."
Someone was saying something, but that name rang in Atsushi's mind. Odasaku, Odasaku, Odasaku… where has he seen that name?
An image came to his mind. An image of Dazai among grass and birdsongs, leaning against a gravestone.
There was an Oda Sakunosuke, once.
Something else again pulled him back into the moment.
"—a mafia who does not kill…."
"You had better not anger Odasaku. Never do that. A serious Odasaku is far fearsome than the Port Mafia…. Akutagawa-kun, you can't never beat Odasaku even in a hundred years."
"Nonsense!" Atsushi bursted, and then realized that he actually said it. It was disorienting how in these self-correcting visions he could only say what Akutagawa would have said. And even more so when he actually could say it out loud— to know that they were thinking the same thoughts, saying the same things, taking the same actions.
Anyhow, to think that anyone would best Akutagawa that easily was unthinkable. Rashoumon was powerful and Akutagawa has a sense for battles. He will be leagues more powerful in just another few years. In a hundred, he could be the most powerful ability-user in the entire world. What kind of ability does this Odasaku has to compete with this?
"Dazai-san, you're—
"We're going back to work." Dazai said, turning away looking at the dead soldier, not even bothering to look at him.
A void yawned open inside Atsushi. He clenched his teeth to keep it in, furrowed his brows and determined not to let it be seen.
You are made for killing, Akutagawa-kun. Dazai's voice rang in his head. Your ability is useful to the Port Mafia.
Yet here he was, getting beaten up and almost killed for killing. Dazai-san is obsessing over this minor case. Over this "Odasaku." A mafia who does not kill. What is the value in a mafia who does not kill?
I will give you a reason to live, and that is to kill, understood?
Atsushi woke again and found himself in his own futon. It was almost winter, and it was cold— yet his body was covered in hot, sticky sweat. An ache pounded in his head. Killing. Pain. Reasons for living. Confusion.
The blank void he could still feel inside him. The sense that he was not worthy enough to live. Perpetually seeking approval simply for being alive.
Atsushi grabbed the edge of his futon, pulled it over his head, and curled into a ball.
He laid there for almost an hour before reaching for his phone, dialing Kunikida's number to let him know he's calling in sick.
Then the detective got up, dressed, and went looking for his arch-rival.