13

Conviction

Chishiya

Hatter had sent most of the Militant Corps and Executives out to various games tonight, including Niragi. Chishiya though, was one of the few that remained at the Beach.

Now Hatter, Mira and him sat gathered in the meeting room, waiting for the different games' updates.

Niragi's group had been dealt a diamonds game. Luckily that was his specialty.

Chishiya slowly grew impatient, and the fact that Mira watched him like a hawk irritated him. Thankfully he'd mastered the art of the 'resting bitch face', which was a mask he'd always worn with ease.

Chishiya stared back at Mira, his dark, absorbing eyes boring into hers. Her unusual demeanour tonight set off a silent alarm in his mind. He couldn't pinpoint what it was exactly, but he knew better than to dismiss it. He made a mental note to observe her closely in the coming days.

The silence grew heavy as they waited, Hatter shifted in his seat, Mira twirled strands of her long, black hair between her fingers, and Chishiya as always sat still, his hands tucked into his pockets.

Just when Chishiya was about to call it a night, a voice crackled in the radio.

"Diamonds game cleared. Some member casualties. Heading back to the beach now." It was An, Rizuna An, member of the Executives under Hatter and the Beach's number six.

Some member casualties? Who?

Chishiya fought the rising urge to snatch the radio and ask. When he scanned the faces of his current company, he found Mira smirking at him with a devilish glint in her eye.

Something is definitely up with her.

Chishiya raised a hint of an eyebrow at her, his expression remained smug. "Practicing our theatrics again, are we, Mira?"

Mira clicked her tongue in response. "Are you talking about me or yourself? You seem rather.. nervous tonight."

What the hell?

That actually surprised Chishiya. Yet his control over his expression didn't falter, didn't show so much as a hint of surprise. Was she just trying to get under his skin or did Mira actually know something? He didn't know how she would though. Unless Niragi had...

No. He highly doubted Niragi had told her anything. She was most certainly just trying to get him flustered.

"Perhaps I am simply annoyed that I missed out on an intriguing diamonds game tonight." He replied, slipping a note of bemusement into his tone.

Two can play at this game.

Mira rolled her eyes and rose from her seat. "This is getting tiring. I have so many better things to do than wait for silly reports. Such a waste of precious time."

Hatter stared up at her with a frown, and watched her stalk out of the meeting room. "You can go too Chishiya. You're not needed here. Take the night off."

Chishiya regarded him for a moment, before he too silently rose from his seat and took his leave. Hatter clearly wanted to be alone. The executives had no obligation to attend the meetings on game nights. But Chishiya had wanted to stay updated on everyones movements, especially on Niragi's movements.

Chishiya now lounged in his chair on the roof, his hood thrown over his silver hair and hands tucked into his pockets.

He'd watched An and Niragi arrive half an hour ago, who were likely still reporting to Hatter. He had to admit, seeing Niragi return unharmed, had felt like a weight was taken off his shoulders. It was an interesting sensation to say the least.

Meanwhile Chishiya had been ruminating about the meeting with Hatter and Mira.

Why had Mira acted to strange tonight? Something didn't seem right, didn't feel right. Like she might know something he didn't. But Chishiya couldn't quite put his finger on it. Not yet, he told himself. It bothered him. Really, really bothered him.

"Hey, I thought you might be up here already."

Chishiya snapped to attention, and gazed in the direction of the voice he'd just heard. It was Niragi, equiped with a six pack of beer in one hand, and his gun in the other, heading towards him. He rested his gun against the free chair beside Chishiya before making himself comfortable in it.

"Want one?" Niragi held up the six pack as he shot Chishiya a questioning look.

Chishiya shrugged slightly. "Sure."

Niragi grabbed two beers and set the rest down on the ground between them. He opened them and handed one to Chishiya.

Niragi sighed and leaned back in his chair. "Anything interesting happen while I was out?"

Chishiya sipped his beer before replying, "you could say that."

Niragi frowned. "Care to elaborate?"

Chishiya stayed silent for a moment, contemplating whether he should ask his next question. But he just had to know. He wanted to trust Niragi, wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, but Mira's knowing smirk wouldn't let him rest easy.
"Have you spoken to Mira recently?" Chishiya inquired dryly.

"Mira?" Niragi frowned warily, before he continued. "No. Why?"

Chishiya knew he was telling the truth. He saw it in Niragi's body language, in his eyes, heard it in his tone.
"Her behaviour tonight was rather strange."

Niragi huffed a soft chuckle, then grinned. "She's always strange. Whacked in the head that one."

"I suppose you're right."

Niragi shot him a thoughtful look. "Speaking of strange... Were you in my room last night?"

Chishiya couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at his question as he side-eyed him. "Are you experiencing memory loss?"

"What? No! No. I mean after you left."

Chishiya's mouth quirked up slightly as he watched Niragi squirm. "No. I wasn't."

"Huh. Maybe I need to stop drinking so much." Niragi stared at the beer in his hand for a moment. "Nah. Where's the fun in that." Then he shrugged and took a deep swig.

"I'd hate to be your therapist." Chishiya mused, watching his every move.

"Did you just make a joke?" Niragi stared at him wide-eyed, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Wow. You have changed."

And all it took was a hearts game. The game. It had changed everything. Chishiya's face grew serious, as he remembered the secrets they'd both learned about each other last night.

"I wish I had changed sooner," Chishiya said dryly. If he wanted to figure out what he truly desired, he'd have to get to know Niragi. And the only way he might be able to get him to share his story with him, was to take the first step, and hope Niragi met him halfway.

Niragi cocked his head with a curious, yet slightly concerned look in his eyes.

"I was a doctor in the old world," Chishiya began. "Paediatric cardiovascular surgery." He paused for a moment and swallowed. Niragi remained silent, his soft, attentive eyes fixed on him.

"I wanted to save lives. I believed that way I could learn to forgive myself one day. For my mothers death. But the system was corrupt and it soon corrupted me. I watched people... children die because I turned a blind eye. I sentenced people, innocent people, to death."

Chishiya stared at the bottle he held in his hands so he couldn't see Niragi's reaction, couldn't see if he was judging him. His guilt was already threatening to drown him. For once in his life he was actually scared, he realised, scared that the one person, who understood, what he could finally feel again, would deem him a lost cause. For once in his life he'd actively taken a risk by entrusting someone with this knowledge, rather than carefully calculate and consider his actions, his words. He forced himself to take a deep breath and collect himself before he continued. "The wealthy could pay us off and I kept my mouth shut. I sold hearts to those who could afford it, rather than give them to those who needed them most." Chishiya finished and anxiously counted the seconds as silence lingered between them.

Niragi shifted in his seat and regarded him. "Tell me if I'm wrong but... they would've fired you had you fallen out of line. You did what those assholes forced you to do. But you still saved lives. Just maybe not the ones you wanted to save. You wouldn't have saved any if they'd fired you."

Chishiya stared at him incredulously. Had Niragi just defended him? "I still had a choice."

"Did you though? You said you were poor right? So you needed that job." Niragi leaned slightly closer. "Now in a corrupt system, they will make damn sure you either keep quiet or they will make you pay for it. Your career would have been over. No hospital would have hired you. Ever. So no. You didn't have a choice." He finished his beer before continuing. "Believe me, I know what it's like not to have a choice."

Chishiya watched him with pained eyes. He could hear the sorrow drifting in Niragi's voice with his last sentence.

"What happened to you in the old world?" Chishiya asked so softly, it was almost a whisper.

Niragi's gaze met his. The sorrow Chishiya witnessed in those intense, black eyes mirrored the sorrow he carried in his heart.

"They broke me." Niragi began in a bitter tone. "Physically and mentally." He swallowed hard and Chishiya watched him clench his jaw several times, as he contemplated his next words.

Niragi set his empty beer bottle on the ground, then he unbuttoned the left sleeve of his shirt and rolled it up. Chishiya almost flinched at the scars covering his forearm, a constant reminder of Niragi's painful past.

"You've already seen the main scars but..." He pointed to a faint white line at his elbow. "The boys at school shoved me down the stairs on several occasions. And uh... one day I broke my elbow on the way down. This scar is from the surgery." He shifted his finger to a spot on his upper arm, which resembled a burn mark. "Here, they thought it might be fun to use me to put out their cigarette buts. It's not the only spot either." He took a deep breath.

"They broke my nose using me as their target for baseball practice. They'd even made a game out of it. Points for hitting different areas. And if I moved or flinched..." Niragi's voice broke and he clenched his fists, digging his nails into his palms as he tried to keep himself together.

"My mother," he continued, loathing defining his tone. "She knew about it all. But she hated me, always wished she'd never had me, blamed me for her divorce." He closed his eyes. His next words were barely audible and his voice trembled when he hissed, "they all did unspeakable things..." His eyes, now slowly filling with tears, opened again after several moments and locked onto Chishiya's. "Made my life a living hell."

Chishiya was boiling on the inside, boiling with anger. Anger for what all those people had done to Niragi, had put him through. Anger for the position he'd been forced into at the hospital, gambling away lives. But at the same time he was sure he felt something like empathy, wanted to comfort Niragi, help him. He struggled for the right words, didn't know what to say. When he'd forced himself to detach from his emotions in the old world, these conversations had been so much simpler. But now, he cared, and he didn't want to hurt Niragi by saying the wrong thing. "I'm sorry that happened to you," he finally breathed.

Niragi averted his gaze and blinked the tears from his eyes. He grabbed another beer, opened it and sniffled once before murmuring, "thank you. For... for not judging."

"Oh I'm judging..." Chishiya mused in the hopes of lightening Niragi's mood. Niragi sucked in a breath and snapped his gaze back to Chishiya, eyes troubled. "I'm just not judging you," Chishiya finished, and couldn't help but smirk, when Niragi's mouth quirked up in relief.

"Screw you," Niragi huffed with a soft grin, humour replacing the sorrow in his eyes.

They both remained silent for a while, ruminating on the secrets they had each learned, the hurt they both shared.

"I'm sorry. You didn't deserve what they did to you. Any of it." Chishiya regarded Niragi for a moment, whose tension had visibly eased.
"You told me once, you didn't know, if you have been forced to become the person you are now, or, if you were born this way." Chishiya began, his voice gentle, and watched as Niragi slowly nodded in response.

"Well. I know that you were not born this way. You endured true torture for countless years, and became who you are today, to protect yourself, from ever having to experience that horror again. The fact you survived all of it, shows how strong willed you truly are."

"I... I don't," Niragi cleared his throat, struggled for words. "You don't have to say anything," Chishiya interrupted gently. "You needed to hear the truth. Just like I did."

"Thank you," Niragi breathed, his voice so soft it was almost a whisper.

Chishiya smiled, for the first time in what felt like eternity, he smiled, and so did his eyes. "I'm the one that has to thank you," he replied.

For waking me up from my nightmare.