◣ akutagawa ◥ :

His previously curved spine straightened so he could properly look upon her frail form. “Home? Is that what you dare to call that pitiful group of vermin?” They were not the ones who plucked her from a pool of her parents’ fresh blood, nor were they the ones who fostered her ability to kill so skillfully. They did not give her a place to flourish or a mentor to study under. They did not bequeath to her a meaning for her pitiful existence.

Contempt sank into sallow features. While he did not crave for her blood dripping over his jowls, he could not fathom why she would spurn all that the mafia had done for her. At her age, he desperately clawed and howled for a place that wasn’t a hollow life in the Nadir. She was given everything he struggled for and more, but forsook it all — simply because she did not like it. He found it to be quite impudent.

( tell me, does the mire seep into your flesh and rot your bones? would you beg for the earth to swallow you while trudging through the mud? you learn to embrace the bitter darkness yet you are starv’d for the transient light. oh, but your legs are so heavy. )

Another bout of coughs wracked his frame, Akutagawa pausing to catch them in his palm. “To think you can live among them is foolish; you are not a lamb. Your blood is black.” One could never fully break the chains of the mafia; even that person must know this. The child was filled with a misplaced bravado, a quality that irritated him to no end (and even moreso than his throat in the storming atmosphere). “Your name may be cleared, but that does not mean your sins have disappeared from existence.” They would be sure to fall upon her with one false step, much like the current downpour.

◣ ✿ ◥ She knew that. She anticipated the words that fell from his lips, for they were the same words that called to her from every shadow she passed ( and even worse at night when they bathed her in their taunting murkiness ). For years, she listened to every word he said, and each one echoed within her mind despite the times she tried to push them out. She killed thirty-five people. It gave her value. This man both honed and commended that ability. It’d be a shame to let it go to waste.

But she wanted to prove him wrong: that desire kept her from letting those words take hold of her once again so that she could keep fighting for the light. If she allowed herself, even for a moment, to fall back into those old habits, she’d be going back on her word to Atsushi, to Fukuzawa, to the entire Armed Detective Agency. They allowed her to join their ranks because they believed in her promise. On the other hand, all the man in front of her believed in was how much death and destruction could be brought on by her ability.

There were plenty of words Akutagawa spoke that Kyouka disagreed with; in fact, most of his lessons had been disregarded as false or delusional. That didn’t mean he didn’t know what he was talking about. Some of his words were truer that she would admit: “Your blood is black. Your name may be cleared, but that does not mean your sins have disappeared from existence.” She knew that. As much as she tried to convince herself otherwise, that was a fact she couldn’t ignore. That first day with the Agency–she should’ve been taken to the police to receive any punishment they saw fit.

Kyouka wouldn’t admit it. “So what?” she ground out, tone bitter. She didn’t look up at him. “Just because I’ve hurt people means I can’t help them? That’s stupid.” These words were to spite him–paraphrased from Akutagawa’s precious ex-mentor. “Even Dazai-san knows that.”