Chapter Text
It had been a few days since the dust settled. Across Yokohama, victory celebrations spilled into the streets as life finally began to feel normal again. People sang, danced and drank everywhere and the two rivaling organizations of the Armed Detective Agency and Port Mafia were no different.
The Agency was bursting with joy and almost every day was filled with laughter with everyone staying after work to party just one more time, whether it be going out drinking or just simply having some tea after work to unwind and appreciate everyone somehow surviving in good health.
The Port Mafia shared a similar relief, with subordinates eagerly draining their bosses' expensive alcohol and celebrating alongside the otherwise untouchable executives. It wasn't as close-knit and familiar as the Agency but it also felt warmer than ever before on the dark side of the Moon.
Downstairs, the Mafia celebrated. But up on the top floor, locked behind heavy oak doors where the music couldn't reach, the atmosphere was dead silent. Mori Ougai, the president and the reformist of Port Mafia, sat behind his desk looking out of his window at the city skyline while Chūya Nakahara, the strongest member of the Port Mafia, and Kōyō Ozaki, commander of the mafia's specialized interrogation unit, waited for the reason behind this meeting.
“So, now that everything is as it should be… I decided to cash in our favour, of transferring one soul to us.” His fingers laced together naturally as he put his elbows on the table to lean towards the two of them sitting across from him. “I would like to strike while they are happy and careless. Sweeping their feet out from under them and watching them stumble, or better yet, fall.”
Kōyō Ozaki smiled behind her fan and nodded. “I agree… After everything that went down the mafia is, to put it lightly, weakened. People, resources, and work have all gone down.” She waved her fan gently in front of her pale face before she lowered it and a smile spread on her cherry lips. “However… Everyone is in the same position… dry. So if we were to transfer a high utility Agency member to our team, we would be able to leap ahead everyone before anybody else has the chance.”
Chūya Nakahara leaned back nodding. “Yeah, I'm on the same page. We're down on work, men, and money, the worst combination possible. Crime pays well but it sells in reputation. If we stumble now then we might not recover from the fall.” Chūya stretched his neck partly because of the stress and partly because he always felt uneasy when Mori stared at him like that. “If we manage to get someone with big potential, ability to carry out dangerous and insane missions. Then we could have a grace recovery period now while training the person. After a few months the Port Mafia would be unstoppable with a recovered arsenal and a new Nuke.”
Kōyō looked to her side, being a bit taken aback by the proposition. “A nuke? Nakahara Chūya I fear that I do not understand the reasoning behind it. What we need is not a delayed explosion, but an immediate catalyst. We need someone highly skilled and easily utilized who can take on the work we currently cannot.” She brought the fan back in front of her face to hide the slight twitch in her composed expression. “Work brings money, and money brings men. If we use this person to secure our capital right now, we can rebuild our foundation before anyone else in Yokohama even has a chance to catch their breath. That is the natural and logical way to navigate this.”
Chūya turned back to face her. Knowing better than to pick a fight with his mentor, he composed himself before responding. “That’s a fair point, Ane-san, but what better way to secure our position than to let our enemies think we’re weak, only to come back stronger than ever.” Chūya explained, impatiently tapping his fingers on his knee to relieve some stress. “You could win a game by playing it safe, but isn't it better to hide an ace up your sleeve when you have a talent for playing dirty?”
“Oh Chūya… It seems that through years of training, you have never truly calmed down enough to not pick a fight with everyone.” She smiled at the memory of training young Chūya, and how energetic he always was. “I see you have at least learned the patience required to train a new weapon, but you still lack the patience to take our recovery slowly.”
The ginger scoffed, not embarrassed about the fact she called him restless, because he knew it was true, but at the fact her words were laced with gentleness and sweetness that it made his stomach turn. He had seen her work many times. Her words made people feel safe, making them forget their defenses until, before they knew it, they had completely spilled their guts to her. Chūya knew what she was doing, however in the end the decision wasn't up to him, but up to someone far above them both.
“Observant as ever, I see… There is nothing wrong with starting a race slower only to sprint towards the finish line. But you sound a little too eager to have someone under your wing again.” Kōyō snapped her fan open, waving it lightly over her face to catch the sudden bead of sweat before it could ruin her immaculate makeup. Chūya leaned a fraction forward, making sure she heard every word, a razor-sharp smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. “Sounds like there is more than strictly business coming from your end. Don't let it get under your skin too much. After all, I am just a student still in my mentor's shadow, hmm?”
Koyo straightened her posture, before a smile appeared on her lips, hidden behind her fan. She felt embarrassed and undermined by the smirking ginger she trained since he was fifteen-years-old. However the sense of pride blooming in her chest for knowing how much she has impacted his behavior and how he can stand his ground made her other emotions be buried deeper than she wanted to acknowledge.
She snapped her fan shut, the crack echoing in the room. “We will not get anywhere if we keep this up so I propose further supporting our strategies by introducing our favorites to the boss.” She turned to face Mori who had not taken his eyes off either of them while they talked.
“The reality of our situation is that we lack eyes in the shadows and stealth of a highly trained assassin. We lost a highly valuable asset, and our espionage division is bleeding because of it. I propose we take the boy with the illusion ability, Tanizaki.” She rested her hands delicately in her lap, her voice returning to its smooth, untouchable cadence. “He would be a perfect replacement of our… asset that we have lost. His skills could be utilized right away while I would be able to guide him so his ability blooms even more.”
Chūya leaned back into his heavy leather chair, crossing his arms. “Guide him.” He let the words hang in the heavy silence, a low scoff vibrating in his throat. He saw right through her carefully chosen vocabulary. She didn't want an asset to utilize. She wanted a student to fill the empty room after her prodigy left. But he had already drawn blood on that subject, and he wasn't going to press the blade deeper. “A stealth operative is fine for maintaining the status quo. But we don't need to sneak around. We need to remind Yokohama exactly who owns the night.”
He uncrossed his arms, leaning forward to match her intensity, even if looking at his boss activated his fight or flight instinct. “I say we take the Weretiger. He is a walking natural disaster. Rapid regeneration, unmatched raw strength, and a deeply rooted orphanage trauma just waiting to be manipulated. Pair his defense with Akutagawa's offense, and they make a perfect duo. If we break him down and rebuild him, we don't just get a foot soldier. We get an unstoppable nuke. We drop them on a rival organization and let the massacre speak for itself. Fear buys reputation faster than shadow work.” Chuuya felt uneasy speaking about a human in that sense, but he knew exactly what would get through to Mori.
Kōyō’s eyes narrowed slightly, a terrifyingly perceptive glint flashing in her dark irises. She didn't bother opening her fan this time. She let him see the absolute certainty in her gaze.
“A perfect duo.” She repeated his words, her voice laced with a dangerous, knowing amusement. “Or perhaps... merely half of one.”
She saw the ghost of his past bleeding right through his flawless tactical assessment. He didn't just want a vanguard. He was desperately trying to forge a new duo to replace the one he had lost, using two traumatized boys to pretend he wasn't standing alone without his Double Black partner by his side.
“Oh..?” Mori finally uncrossed his fingers, leaning forward into the dim light so he could address them both properly. “It seems there is something of far greater value to you than simply moving pieces across a board.” He smiled, a twisted dark smile spreading across his face like a surgical cut. “You did not find an asset that fits your plan. You both simply chose the person you wanted, and built a plan to justify it.”
The air in the room suddenly turned freezing. The two executives went completely rigid, the blood draining from their faces as they realized he had seen right through their carefully constructed masks. “You both bring up very good points… I am almost impressed.” Mori continued, his voice dangerously soft. “However, what you have just told me only solidifies my own top choice.”
He paused, letting the crushing weight of his authority pin them to their seats. They waited in agonizing silence for the name that would be dragged into the underworld. “A person of high moldability, and intense potential.” Kōyō’s eyes narrowed slightly as Mori locked his dead, unblinking gaze with hers, before his gaze slid to Chūya. “A person with raw power and… nostalgic compatibility.”
He reached into the heavy oak desk, pulling out a photograph of a blonde young boy barefoot in overalls. The exact opposite of what they were both expecting.
“Who is this kid? I barely remember ever meeting him, to be honest. He doesn't exactly look like someone who makes a lethal first impression.” Chūya narrowed his eyes at the glossy paper, his gloved fingers tapping a slow, hesitant rhythm against his arm. If this kid really was the top choice of Mori Ōgai, then there surely had to be something about him that lifted him up above everyone else in the Agency.
“Yes I do agree… I have never met him before. He seems rather… Joyful. Not the type of person you would find in the Mafia.” Kōyō stared down at the photograph. The boy's bright, untainted smile sent an awful, phantom sting through her chest. He looked far too innocent for the underworld. He looked exactly like the phantom assassin she had just lost.
“Yes. You both are correct. He is indeed… different from anybody else in the Agency and Mafia. But an impressionable 14-year-old getting drafted into the Port Mafia? Doesn't it sound like borderline déjà vu?” Both executives locked eyes before looking back at their boss. “A young boy with destructive powers that he cannot control. A young boy that desperately needs training to achieve the extreme potential locked in him. History repeats itself after all.” Mori tilted the photograph toward them with a single, gloved finger. “His ability is to gain immense durability and inhuman strength by just being hungry… Based on the latest rumors and intel, he also has a secret power that is unlocked by anger and makes him lose all ability to control himself, being a true force of nature to be reckoned with.”
Chūya closed his eyes, a sickening knot twisting in his stomach. He had played exactly into his boss's hands. By demanding a weapon of mass destruction, he had just personally handed Mori the justification to drag another innocent child into the exact same bloody cycle he had been trapped in.
Kōyō kept her posture rigid, though the phantom sting in her chest twisted into a cold, suffocating dread. She had indeed asked for a person to mold. But looking at the untainted, blindingly bright smile in the photograph, a horrifying realization settled over her. The children she usually took under her wing were already fractured by the world. Abandoned, traumatized, and ready to be reshaped and given a purpose.
This boy was entirely whole.
And as she looked up from that innocent face to the dark, deeply paternal amusement on her Boss’s lips, the true horror of his choice finally sank in. Mori wasn't going to break the boy with violence. He was going to adopt him. He was going to wrap the boy in the exact same suffocating, twisted fatherly love he had used to leash them all, smiling warmly while he gently rewrote the child's soul.
Chūya stood up abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor as he put his hands on the boss's desk. His breathing was heavy and erratic, his hands slowly balling into tight fists.
“Chūya.” Kōyō's voice cut through the suffocating tension like a blade. Chūya’s attention snapped to the voice he had heard a thousand times, his heavy, labored breathing hitching in his chest. “I believe we do not have a further say in this. Do we, Chūya?” Her voice carried absolute authority without a stammer.
Chūya pushed himself off the desk, turning on his heel and walking out with his hands buried in his pockets. Kōyō meanwhile slowly bowed, her eyes closed before straightening up and walking after Chūya, her footsteps slow enough to catch the Boss's final words.
“Elise, you will soon have a playmate again… Isn't that exciting my dear? He looks quite like you.” The boss turned to the corner where a blond little girl was drawing.
“I will be excited when I meet him! I have not even seen what he looks like, old man!” The little girl meanly answered. Before marching up to the boss to take a look at the picture. “He has blonde hair like me. But that is the only similarity! You need new glasses, Mori, because you are not seeing correctly if you think we are similar.”
“Ah… I am sorry my dear… I think I am just getting a bit ahead of myself. I am not seeing what he is, but what he could turn into.” Mori's hand touched her blonde hair, his voice dropping to a soft, terrifying hum. “An extension of myself.”
Kōyō finally pulled the heavy door shut, cutting that part of the world out. She turned to her side seeing Chūya leaning against the wall of the door they just came out of. Smoking a cigarette and looking up at the smoke that slowly curled upwards before disappearing.
“Why did you stop me? Don't you have a problem with it? You know what he is gonna do.” His tone was as venomous as if he had spit in her face.
“I know, and I am just as upset about it as you are. But do you seriously think going against his direct wishes is a good idea? Do you think if I let you continue whatever you tried to do back there, it would have resolved anything?” Chūya stayed quiet, and continued to smoke. That was an answer he was expecting. He wasn't stupid. Mori didn't just want soldiers or weapons. He wanted children to mold, and they were all just trapped in his twisted dollhouse.
“When do you think we will go for the kid?” Chūya asked, his voice utterly defeated, knowing there was no timeline that would satisfy him
Kōyō closed her eyes, exhaling softly. “Tomorrow, this was the meeting just so that we are all on the same page before bringing a person in.” Koyo opened her eyes to look at Chūya before she began walking again. “The boss will call you tomorrow and give you more details.”
Chūya leaned his head back, resting on the wall behind him and taking another long drag of his cigarette. “Fuck… I should have just kept my mouth shut.”