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Ep 9: The Man in Black, Part 1

"My name is Kyouka Izumi. I've killed 35 people in 6 months." The words appeared as Kyouka's voice spoke them.

The infirmary of the ADA is shown, with a distraught Atsushi sitting on a small bench outside of the door. Inside the room, Yosano types a couple of words on a computer before turning and looking at a medical bed. Kyouka is fast asleep.

"You're going to take responsibility for my Kyouyo." Kouyou said. She thought she would be able to get her back if they talked with those stupid agency members, but she could see it would be so much more complicated with that weretiger. She looked over at her other child, his blue eyes looking at her trying to tell her something, something she didn't want to be told. She turned away.

"You didn't do a good job taking care of her. She was almost killed by your underling,"

Akutagawa scoffed, and Kouyou slowly crossed her legs, her jaw tightening. Kyouyo looked at the weretiger in shock and fear of what big sis would do to him.

"So, I don't think she should be in your care any longer, Madame."

"Atsushi." Kyouko whispered. The weretiger turned to the girl sitting next to him and spoke so not just her but the older exec could hear him. "No one's going to harm you, not while I'm around."

Akutagawa could only roll his eyes at the proclamation. He was growing attached to a child he had met literally a day ago. He looked around the room to see others' reactions to this statement; most on the side of the agency smiled. Then he turned to his organization, and most of their faces showed displeasure, but then there was Gin. Finally, Gin's eyes centered on his own. What he had agreed to was for Gin, or at least that was what he told himself.

It was for Gin; it was for his mentor, but mostly and beyond all, it was for himself. He closed his eyes to see the dark night from the bottom of the pit. He was the frog at the bottom of the well, and Dazai was the turtle that told him about the sea. And the turtle was right it was beautiful but some days in the dark's place of his mind he longed for the well. Then he wouldn't feel this tightness in his chest that had remained ever since that man left. It just hurt. What he did was a necessary evil: someone always pains for someone else's freedom.

Gin's eyes stared back at him. His sibling made it clear how she felt about it all. However, he could never imagine anything else. Maybe this was the well, and Dazai was just another frog at the bottom. And that other frog did leave the well, freeing himself from the shackles of the port mafia, and Dazai left him; Dazai left all of them, and the pain remained.

His anger bubbled in his stomach, creating a violent acid that raised through his throat. He wanted to kill that tiger, but before that, he wanted to rip apart all of his morals and make him see that he wasn't any better than him. Prove to Dazai that he put his stock in the wrong apprentice. 'Superior to me. No, never I am superior to him and he will see.'

A gloved hand gently rested on his shoulder. He let out a sigh, shifting in the direction of Chuuya. "You know what you did wrong, right?"

He nodded. Chuuya questioned if Akutagawa actually got it, since he felt he was blind. Hellbent to seek after his former mentor.

"We will discuss your punishment soon."

Atsushi's face is a mixture of worry and pain. He remembers the train and Kyouka jumping off it, the words she's said to him resound in his ears. Then, he's jerked out of his head by Kunikida.

" Still attracting trouble, are you?" Kunikida's eyes are shadowed, "That girl is a lost cause. Her roots as a heartless assassin run much deeper than you know. She's taken out entire organizations."