You Were The Path I Chose | A Goro Akechi Romance

#The Cost . . .

... In which I return to Leblanc after our plan to outmaneuver our enemies has succeeded. But, unlike my friends who are jubilant, I can't quite bring myself to stop racking my brain over whether we really did the right thing, tormented by the thought that we may have crossed a line.

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". . . It would seem as though you have been killed."

Beyond the metal bars that I'm clinging to like my life depends on it, Igor's face is expressionless; he wears his usual composed amusement. I can't pay attention to it, though . . . All I see is the barrel of a gun and a pair of eyes that stare into my soul without truly seeing it. Not hostile or brimming with hatred, just . . . dead. More dead than I thought eyes could ever be.

Case closed . . . I swallow repeatedly, but the lump in my throat doesn't go away. This is how your "justice" ends.

My justice. I try to focus on the metal bars in front of me and not the lingering images that have already burned themselves into my mind. Part of me curses Igor for showing me, but also . . . he knows it as well as I do: I'm not dead.

I'm not, because our plan worked . . . somehow. And I'm here . . . I try my hardest to fight the uncontrollable shaking of my body. I am here . . . because, for some reason, he decided that I needed to see the truth. To see what I would have seen, hadn't we been prepared for this. What I would have seen if I hadn't spent the last hours curled up in the corner of a dark, empty interrogation room, paralyzed with terror.

Case closed . . .

I breathe in and out, fighting the urge to sob. I was there, until . . . I don't remember what happened or how I was brought to the velvet room—only that when I found myself here at last, it felt like waking up from a never-ending, hellish nightmare. It probably doesn't matter how I got here. Soon, I'll be back, and then . . .

. . . This is how your "justice" ends.

"But why were you killed?" Igor speaks over the words that replay in my head like another broken record. I could start a collection at this point.

"Why did you have to die?" Igor repeats. "Do you remember?"

I don't respond. Some memories are still fuzzy . . . Clouds of mist drift through my mind, but they're not overwhelming anymore. I know the answer to that question . . . I know . . . I tighten my grip on the bars. The only thing I really know with absolute certainty is that it wasn't supposed to be like this.

"It seems you forgot an important fact while your consciousness was hazy . . . I allowed you to see through the eyes of the cognition that took your place, but what happened to her didn't happen to you. Still, your "death" was a necessity for your escape from certain doom, was it not?" His grin widens. "What a tremendous plan."

My chest tightens, and I lower my eyes to the floor. It really was not. I knew from the moment my friends proposed it that essentially everything about this plan was an utter mess. It was far too risky and convoluted—there were so many unknown and uncontrollable factors, and each could have ruined everything.

In fact . . . for a second, I allow myself to marvel at how nothing went wrong. Part of me feels like it should have, even though I would be dead then. It doesn't feel like a victory that was truly earned. The only reason I'm still alive is because luck—and Sae—decided to be on our side.

"Indeed." Igor smiles. "How might you be capable of executing such a feat?"

I tighten my jaw.

"It wasn't all that great."