There is more than one of him

Chapter 20

Chuuya only realized that Mori must have told the woman the thruth or worse in the back of his mind. He was focused on somehow keeping Dazais carefully layed out mask from slipping.

Because for one, he really didn't want to deal with psychotic killer Dazai, and because it would surely ruin something here right now.

"Mom, what's the matter?" Itsuki asked.

"No, no, no it- it's not true. ... That's a lie. It-it can't be true" She stuttered

Itsuki picked up the phone, while Gen'emon went up to his wife to try and bring her some comfort, despite not knowing what was going on.

The name on the phone only said boss, so it wasn't really any help. Though he already knew who that boss was.

"Mori Ougai, am I right?" He asked into the phone.

There was a barely surpressed rage on his tongue, this was the man who had hurt his borther so much and the man who had just told their mother something so terrible that she acted the way she had the day Shuji dissapeared.

"Itsuki Tsushima, yes you are correct. I must admit, your voice is astonishingly similar to Dazai's."

"Yes, well, we're identical twins. Of course we have similar voices. Just that thanks to you we no longer look anything alike!"

He had to calm down, he couldn't recklessly just scream out what he felt into this mans face. But what he had done and his provoking voice - no he had to contain himself.

"Now, aren't you being a bit harsh, in the end it wasn't me who ordered his kidnapping and neither was it me who taught him everything he knows and can do now. All I did was keep him around, because he was useful to me and he needed to feel useful in order to survive. I didn't even really force him to stay, he just had no reason to leave."

"And making someone feel useful inquires sending him out to kill people?"

"Ah ah ah, I didn't send him out to kill people, Dazai wasn't just some hitman. He was an executive of mine, he was part of the board of directors and the most trusted one as well. Had I just been using him without his own efforts, I would have made him some personal security who doesn't have anything to say, but only to follow orders"

"Yet you still made him executive and forced him into that position"

"I saw a talent which no one would encourage if discovered, a talent to torture, deceive and kill without mercy or regret. There aren't many people like that. He had had and seemingly still has a motive to kill me and evidence which would make others kill me. I had to give him power or otherwise he would have taken my place."

"You know that's bulshit" Itsuki knew, he should keep his emotion under controle, his brother had already told him most of this, not in such detail, but still, this wasn't really new.

But something about the way this man said it, made him angry or maybe he just didn't want to listen to anyone talking about his brother like that

"But is it really? Hasn't Dazai told you so himself. He doesn't regret what he's done. You know it. In the very beginning you believed it didn't you. In the beginning you believed he didn't regret it, you believed everything. But then suddenly he was kind to you for no apparent reason and all of a sudden you believe him to be secretly kind hearted?"

"I- I - No, I didn't believe that in the beginning and I don't believe it now. It was just a way to cope with it, no one can do such acts without regret unless they're truly monstrous like you for example!!"

suddenly all other motions in the room froze, Tane and Gen'emon, because their son had just screamed at Yokohoma's port mafia boss and Chuuya and Dazai because of the words he had used.

"Oh how right you are about that, yet you still don't get it do you? The one truly monstrous is not me, but your so called brother. I myself am very detestable, yet I have personally not nearly commited as many crimes as Dazai has within four years and just to tell you this, I'm 40."

But that couldn't be true, he knew his brother, he knew his brother wasn't that heartless, he knew his brother felt regret, he knew his brother cared for lives...

... he knew his brother was incapabile of caring.

The person this man was talking about, was his brother after five years of being tortured and abused by the previous port mafia boss, not the hurt child that had just been trying to survive.

The person this man was talking about, was his brother after years of surviving in a place where there was no safety, where there was only pain and suffering.

Not seeing anything other than that for five years straight, had to leave irreverseble marks in forms no one would ever understand.

Years of desperation, suddenly freed to do whatever they liked.

Of course that was a different person, with a different and much more violent perspective of life, with a much more merciless personality and a mentality of 'Why did I have to live through all of this while you didn't'

It created anger and resentment. The perfect weappon for torture, murder and other crimens.

While Itsuki was coming to conclusions on Ranpo speed, Chuuya decided to end his conversation with the boss by taking his phone back.

"Boss, I'll end the call here, do you approve of that?" Those words were carefully chosen, he would have perferred to scream in his face, but this was his boss and no matter how many evils he had just comitted, getting on his bad side was never good.

"Very well, I'll se you soon then, Chuuya"And with that the conversation came to a final ending.