Touya was a prisoner, a shadow that walked the corridors of my house, a torment I had to endure until I could put an end to it.
He was the mirror of my mistakes, the reflection of my intention to purify my life.
If I must accept the consequences of my mistakes, he must know that it's only a matter of time before he pays the price for his actions.
I had been watching him for days, stalking my prey with the idea that he would make a mistake, a tiny little mistake that would be the end of him.
I'd already decided who would kill him and why, so no one would suspect me. All I needed was the video and I could put an end to my personal hell. And then...
Touya yawned at 2:12, stretched for six seconds, looked around the empty living room and then went to get his computer, which had been left on a wooden chest of drawers.
Touya was like a Swiss watch, his days so unnaturally precise that I knew they were planned by an acute paranoia - it only took one paranoid to recognise another.
I found it ironic that it was through planning his death that I got to know him, finding in his behaviour imitations of my own habits so astonishing as to be almost frightening.
He always sat at an angle, feet flat on the floor, facing both windows and doors. He didn't listen when Rei or his children spoke to him, spending his time answering exactly what they wanted. When the questions got too specific - in truth mere superficial questions - he'd dodge them or pretend that they brought back bad memories, memories of 'before I found back our family', and out of sensitivity they'd leave him alone.
I could see myself in his calculating glances when no one was looking, reminding me of the child I'd been as he floated like a shadow through the kitchen, eyeing knives intently, his hand trembling to pick one up and hide it in his pocket.
The nights I spent watching him sleep - when he chose to sleep - on the floor, under the bed, the sheets stuffed with pillows to make them look human, were not unknown to me.
The locked doors that were then blocked by chests of drawers, the dark circles and the jerks, the overweening suspicion, the trembling in his left hand when he thought he saw me approaching out of the corner of his eye, the relief in his shoulders when he saw it was my father, knowing that I couldn't hurt him as long as he was there, the worry when it was really me, the look of fear in his eyes when he met mine, because even though he had become impervious to pain, he knew that I was preparing a fate worse than death for him, a fate that would make him beg for an end to his torment, a fate that would make him whimper and cry and scream and shout and scream.
I'd never felt so close to him before.
Not even when he was a child, picking up the thimble in Monopoly to annoy Fuyumi.
Yet I knew I'd relish the way the light left his eyes, delight in the look of panic in his eyes as, triumphant, I would glower at him because I'd won.
I'll swap his ashes for a dog's so that no one can ever pay their respects to him.
Then I'll probably piss on his grave.
Touya cracked his knuckles, first his right, then his left, rolled his neck twice and shook his shoulders like an athlete about to step into the starting blocks.
I knew he hated being cooped up and scrutinised by Teka's two dogs, I knew his muscles were stiff and hard and heavy from lack of exercise and the atrophy that gave him cramps in the middle of the night.
I knew that he felt the walls were too close to each other, the rooms too cramped, the roof too unstable to be anything other than his future tomb.
I knew he sometimes regretted coming back, even though he loved the idea of having gotten me into deep shit, relished the idea of destroying me psychologically, and dreaded the way I would decide to destroy him.
Touya thought we were playing chess ; I was the sort of guy who destroyed the board to get to the king.
He leaned forward, eyes glued to the screen, a bluish light illuminating his face.
Cat video, MMA fight, cat video again, stupid challenge, cat video again, random video game videos for an hour and thirty-eight minutes, stupid challenge again, and - ah, there it was, the famous video of the man explaining how to swim or, for lack of energy, float on his back.
It was a small video from the depths of the Internet, with barely three thousand views and eighteen comments. Touya watched it every day, without exception, with an intensity that was almost frightening.
He scrolled down the list of comments.
I wonder if he thinks I'm going to drown hi-
He commented under someone else's reply and my sharingan activated automatically, catching his reply before he'd even finished typing it.
I can't manage to float on my back, please help me
Reply : You must be obese
Reply : Drown
Reply : Die
Touya often commented on random videos, but this was the third time he'd commented under the same text.
I was a shinobi, and shinobi did not believe in coincidence.
I dropped silently to the ground.
My chakra seeped into Touya's nervous system, giving him the illusion that he was still scrolling and watching other videos.
I picked up his computer and read the message he'd just typed.
Each of his three replies had been posted exactly two weeks apart.
The account he'd replied to had only been created two months earlier - just before Dabi decided to come back to life as Touya.
My eyes snapped back to Touya, who, with a misty look in his eyes and dilated pupils, was tapping away at the ghost of a computer, his hands hovering above the void.
I'd just found my clue.
*
- Listen, mate, I swear I don't know what you're talking about !
I kicked the door shut, sharingan focused on the pathetic man who retreated, arms in front of his face to protect himself.
I walked calmly, almost languidly, as he stumbled backwards, terrified, through his shabby, mouldy studio.
- I've never heard of-
My kunai leapt from my palm so quickly that I knew it gave the illusion that my hand hadn't moved.
The angle was perfect : the blade sliced through the Achilles tendon of his right ankle.
He collapsed like a tower hit by a missile, his right knee bending forward as the rest of his body fell backwards.
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His butt hit his bloody ankle and he screamed, rolling onto his left side to take his weight off it and move his injured foot, sending a jolt of pain through his body.
- Talk
He sat up on one elbow, too slowly for my liking, and tried to lift his chin from his neck to look me in the eye.
A kunai slammed into his shin, going through his thigh from one end to the other like a nail through a picture frame.
He screamed and looked straight at me, and I gave him another reason to scream by throwing another knife into his thigh.
He screamed, paler than death, beads of sweat glistening on his upper lip and rolling to a few hairs on his chin.
I knew it wasn't necessary.
He'd been terrified from the second he'd seen my face, determined from the first bit of flesh sliced, but I found it hard to stop, feeling a kind of obscene satisfaction wash over me.
The more frightened he was, the calmer I felt, the pressure that had been building up on my spine for months diminishing, my frustration and anger at the fucking mess my life was becoming less intense, leaving me serene and deadly calm in an addictive sort of way.
I grabbed the next kunai by its ring, twirling it skilfully in my hand as his lips turned white and the last drops of blood left his face to trickle down his leg.
- Shall we see if I have enough to turn you into a porcupine ?
He was sprawled like a puddle on the floor, his grey tracksuit bottoms stained with blood, his head slumped back on his shoulder, heavy eyelids drooping over adrenaline-filled eyes.
He smelled of fear and weakness, and I took a twisted, guilty satisfaction in it, for I knew that I was supposed to be better than the Shoto of Nagano, better than the Shoto of Tokyo, better than the Shoto of the Camp, better than the Shoto of Kenzei, and yet I was worse than at my worst.
Clemency and kindness should be my dogma, but I had no trouble dropping the mask as long as neither my father nor Keigo were around.
And that was a good thing, wasn't it ?
I could be a better person when they were looking at me, and be as ruthless as necessary when their backs were turned.
That way I could be the good Shoto, the kind Shoto, and let off steam on the side when I was under too much pressure.
It was better for someone to take all my pent-up anger than for me to risk exploding one day and killing someone with my bare hands.
That, or cause the extinction of humanity.
He let out a grunt, groaned, stood still and then spoke hastily.
- Okay, okay, I'll tell you everything, just let me-
The kunai flashed from my hand to his.
- Quicker
His head jerked to the side and for a second, I thought I'd gone too far too fast.
But then he blinked and his eyes fell on his pierced thigh without seeing it, and the arm his head rested on began to shake with the effort.
- There's a copy of the video in the tape box under my bed, next to the bedside table.
His head fell forward as if he were going to faint ; he straightened up in a surge.
- One is in the USB in my desk drawer, the other in a plastic bag I've hidden in my flower pot
I went to work immediately, retrieving a black cassette and two damaged purple and yellow USB keys.
His eyelids half closed, he leaned on his shoulder.
- There's, there's another one I keep in a locker in Shinjuku...
His head jerked forward, his wet lips showing his teeth as if his mouth were paralysed.
- Which store ?
He didn't answer.
I bent down and slapped him.
His eyes were wide and groggy as his head slumped back.
I grabbed his chin and squeezed hard, my fingers digging into his fat cheeks, forcing him to look me in the eyes.
- Which store ?
- Shinjukuest, locker 49
I stopped for a second when I heard the number.
4, 'shi', death, and 9, 'ku', pain.
- The key to the locker ?
- My cousin Ito, under his bed... He- he lives in Kabukicho, second floor above sex shop
His tongue fell between his lips and I shook him dryly to wake him up.
- How many copies of the video?
- 4
- How many physicals ?
- 4
- None on a computer, tablet or phone?
- I don't want to- if someone hacks me and finds it-
The precaution was commendable, as it was indeed through the hack of someone who had been paid handsomely that I managed to find him.
- The video that Dabi asked you to keep : how many copies are there ?
I repeated my questions six times in a row, phrasing them differently each time to make sure he hadn't forgotten a single one.
He drooled on my fingers and I gripped his chin tighter.
- Why are you hiding the video from him ?
I was pretty sure he would die with his head in my hand before he even answered me.
- There was... one day on the street... didn't want my wallet... beat me up... saved and took my money... just a video, so I said...
He smiled, his pale lips stretching lazily across his exhausted face.
- ... like a hero, you know...
I smashed the smoke detector and then set fire to his body and his computer.
I closed the windows and then used a knife to cut a hole in the gas valve that fed his micro-kitchen.
Then I calmly left the flat in a huff, stopped at the foot of the building and looked up at the third floor.
It exploded in a spray of red and grey, the burning explosion shattering the windows and sending a shower of broken glass into the street.
Then the two floors below exploded in unison, because if I was paranoid enough to trace the source of a YouTube comment, someone else would find it odd that this was the only flat with a gas leak.
*
Author's note :
I exceptionnaly will push back friday and saturday chapters to saturday and sunday as I am, sadly, behind on my translation schedule.
I'm writing and translating so much nowadays I now know I will never do this mistake again.
Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter, things are gonna get gradually more intense.
Drop me a comment if you feel like talking about this chapter, the story in general or where you think it's heading.
If you want to support the story AND read ahead of schedule, go check the story's P@treon, Nar_cisseENG
See you in the next update everyone !