"He can read moves, I'm sure you have the same skill," you hissed to Oda as you realised who it was.
"Then take Akutagawa and run!" Oda insisted. "I'm here to lay my life down if necessary, we cannot afford you to get caught in the mix!"
"Akutagawa should wake up soon, at least keep one of us as backup!" You pleaded. "Osamu would be ruined if something were to happen to you!"
"I'll keep the kid then, you run!" Oda ordered one last time.
And just like that, you sprinted for your life.
By the time you reached home, it was night. The injured piled up in the infirmary, while the executives counted the dead in the main foyer. It was a massacre. Many had laid down their lives for the glory of the mafia. You feared that Oda would be one of them, but were beyond relieved when he walked out of the infirmary that night.
Ever since that day, Mimic didn't attack again. Oda locked himself in his room, while Dazai became attached to your hip, even more than usual. Of course, this led to more and more people becoming suspsicious of your relationship. Not bothering to fight any accusations, the two of you let the rumour mill work, and got more familiar with one another. No one had any complaints, but it wasn't like anyone had the courage to against Yokohama's deadliest duo.
"Hey, I'm meeting Odasaku for work at the pub," Dazai informed, getting ready one night. "Do you want to come?"
"I'm coming for the drinks," you shrugged. "If anything gets awkward, I'm leaving."
"Alright," Dazai grinned.
The three of you took a walk through downtown Yokohama. The city residents were calmly roaming the streets. Buildings old and new equally bathed in the moist sea breeze. The golden stars in the sky flickered just like the lights on the earth's surface.
"Where are we going now?" Oda asked.
"To meet someone." Dazai smiled. "Anyway, I feel for you, Odasaku. Not only did you run into the enemy's boss, but he made some serious advances toward you, too. At this rate, you guys will be married by the weekend."
"That's not what happened." Oda sighed. "They're just a group of weirdos who start wars for the sake of it."
"Oh? I think it's kinda cute, going to such lengths to plan another person's death. I never would've thought of doing that." There was more than a hint of amusement in his tone. "But I can't ignore what he said to you before he left. They might try to switch up their strategy before attacking again. I need to have my men keep an eye on you."
"How much longer is this conflict gonna last?" Oda asked, trying to change the subject.
"The Mimic soldiers don't bother me so much, but the leader's skill is a real pain," Dazai grumbled. "Surprise attacks won't work, which means we need some inside information. Got any ideas?"
The Mafia was making every effort to get intel on Mimic, but so far it had been all for naught.
"Ango's the only lead I've got," Oda said. "He was working as a double agent for the Mafia and Mimic for years. He ought to know a lot more than what he told me the other day."
"I agree." Dazai nodded.
"Is there no way to find him?" Oda pressed.
"There is," he plainly declared.
"Oh, there is?" Oda nodded. "Wait. There is?"
"More precisely, there's no need to search for him. He'll be waiting for us. All right, we're here."
The two of you looked up in the direction Dazai was pointing in.
"Here?" You asked.
"Where else?" Dazai wryly smirked.
Before you was a bar with a white sign and a small light glowing in the darkness of the night.
The three of you went down the dimly lit stairs to the basement. You could hear the faint voices of people conversing as your feet were enveloped in a white cloud of cigarette smoke.
"Hey, nice to see you. I've already started," Ango greeted, before doing a double take. "The Consigerie?!"
"Sorry, Osamu dragged me here under the pretext of a work disucssion," you sighed.
Dazai and Oda sat down at what you assumed were their usual seats, and you took a seat next to Dazai. While you didn't come here as often as Dazai did, you often came here for post-work drinks with your best friend, hence the bartender knew you well enough. Without any of you needing to ask, he prepared you your usual drinks - Oda a coffee, Dazai a beer, and you a margherita.
"You could've at least tried to get in touch with me," Oda said.
"It took me a while to throw the pursuers off my trail," Ango let out a bitter laugh. "I've had a lot of difficulties that prevented me from talking. But now there are no wiretaps, and nobody followed me here. I can drink to my heart's content. More importantly, how did you know I was here?"
"I found a handkerchief at the site of the explosion." Dazai grinned fiendishly. "There was a napkin from this place wrapped inside. It was completely obvious. Who would've thought spies used such dated methods, huh?"
"We're the only ones who would pick up on something like that," Ango said before letting out a small sigh. "I thought I'd never get to drink here again. I'm lucky. And I want to share this luck with my two friends."
"Well, aren't you being rather sentimental for an undercover agent," Dazai coolly replied.
You and Oda looked at Ango. He didn't immediately react to what Dazai had said, but his lips seemed to faintly curl.
"...I'm impressed," Ango quietly admitted after a few moments went by.
"Ango, you were already somebody before you joined the Mafia. You were an agent for the Home Affairs Ministry's Special Division for Unusual Powers, a secret government agency. Your mission was to keep an eye on the Mafia and report back to headquarters," Dazai listed, pausing only to check if he was right.
"......Yes," Ango replied after a deep sigh.
"While you may be part of a secret organization that presides over the skill users in this country, you wouldn't make it out unscathed if you took on the Port Mafia head-on. Plus, the mission of the Special Division for Unusual Powers is to manage skill users, not wipe them out. That's why they sent an agent to infiltrate the Mafia to keep an eye on things. It was an unavoidable measure of action. Am I right?" Dazai continued.
That would mean the entire mess that got Ango into the Mafia was set up by the Special Division for Unusual Powers. Betrayal of the highest order was dealt with by extensive torture, before curb-stomping the traitor and shooting him dead. You were sure that other criminal organisations dealt with this in a similar manner, meaning Ango would be wanted dead by three different organisations.
"That's when Mimic came up. This criminal organization of skill users planned on coming to Japan, and they would prove to be another headache for the Special Division for Unusual Powers to deal with. Therefore, they got you to keep an eye on them...as a double agent for the Mafia," you realised. "Of course, those black-clothed Special Forces—the Division's task force—would come to your rescue if needed."
"Being a government official was a thankless job for little money," Ango claimed with a scowl.
"So that would mean Ango wasn't a double agent, but a triple agent," Oda said.
"Yep." Dazai nodded. "Well, that's about the extent of my research. Anyway, enough boring stuff. Let's drink."
Glasses were then gently placed before your seats. Usually, they would say cheers after that, but not this time. Perhaps that would never happen again.
Nobody spoke for a while after that. A bitter silence, more bitter than anything on the menu, filled the air between the four of you. At this stage, you already thought about leaving, but Ango had information which could turn the tide during this war.
"So..." Ango reluctantly spoke up since no one else would say anything. "Did you come here to affirm our abiding friendship?"
"As if." Only the corners of Dazai's lips curled. "We came to get information on Mimic. You knew that."
"It's strange. This is the same liquor I always order, yet it has no taste," Ango muttered while staring at his glass as if he was talking to himself. Then he turned his gaze to Oda and asked, "The Division's surveillance group informed us that you met Gide. Did you see his skill?"
I told him I saw that Gide could predict his enemy's attacks.
"Even the Special Division for Unusual Powers has no way of dealing with that skill." Ango shook his head. "The only option would be to drop a massive bomb on him...but he's elusive. We can't pin him down. The higher-ups apparently intend to let the Mafia deal with this case. After both crime syndicates take each other out, the Special Division for Unusual Powers can just manage whichever group survives, thus never having to sacrifice one of their own."
Such a brilliant maneuver would be like killing two birds with one stone for the Special Division for Unusual Powers.
"How convenient," you sighed, tilting your head to the side. "But even the Mafia would have a hard time dealing with that skill."
Dazai then looked at Oda out of the corner of his eye. "...With the exception of one lowest-ranked mafioso, of course."
"He's a military veteran in command of countless powerful soldiers," Oda mentioned as he stared at his reflection in the drink. "Besides, our skills merely allow us to see a few seconds into the future. Who wins depends on whoever's more skilled in battle and with a gun."
Being more skilled with a gun means being able to shoot your opponent from farther away with more accuracy.
"Odasaku's marksmanship..." Dazai broke into a meaningful grin. "There's a lot of uncertainty. Plus, there's also the problem of a skill singularity."
"Skill singularity?"
"Did anything unusual happen when you used your skill against Gide?"
Oda thought about it for a moment, and seemed to remember something.
"It's a phenomenon the government has started to research only recently." Ango's expression was stern as he spoke. "They've observed that when multiple skills interact, on rare occasions they'll careen off into a completely unexpected direction. The details are unclear, but for example...let's imagine two people are fighting, but both have the skill to always strike first... Or one has the skill to always deceive their opponent while the other has the skill to always see the truth... What would happen? The answer is we don't know until we try. Most of the time, one skill ends up winning. However, in some rare cases, it leads to a phenomenon that isn't initiated by either party. The Special Division for Unusual Powers calls this a singularity."
Then if Gide and Oda had the same skill, would their interaction count as a skill singularity? After all, the both saw futures stacked upon one other, where only one would superimpose the other each time. Or would a singularity be something much larger?
"I really wasn't supposed to tell you any of that," Ango mentioned. "Even the fact that we met here would be a huge problem if the higher-ups in the Home Affairs Ministry ever find out. I'll need to go into hiding for the time being."
Dazai looked at Ango, then beamed as he said, "Oh my. It almost sounds like you think you'll be able to leave here alive, Ango."
The air froze. Ango's expression slowly faded away, but Dazai was still smiling.
"I mean, you know what I'm saying, right? An elusive, secret agency of skill users shrouded in darkness—a group of mythical status that sends shivers down the spines of all criminal syndicates in the country—and one of the members from that organization is here right before my eyes. The amount of information I want out of you could create a tome thicker than the dictionary itself. Am I wrong?" Dazai drawled, wrapping an arm around your waist. "N/N-chan is very adept at getting people to talk, if you catch my drift."
"Can I finish my drink first?" You asked, wriggling out of his grasp.
"Do you want to turn this place into a warzone?" Oda deadpanned.
"It's my fault," Ango said as if he had given up. "I made a mistake. I assumed that this place was the one place we could meet that transcended status or rank. I wouldn't want to cause any trouble here, so do to me as you will. I won't resist."
"Ango." Dazai quietly spoke up, turning his hand back and forth as if to inspect both sides. "If I make just one phone call, my men will immediately surround the place. But they still haven't made a move. Get out of here before I change my mind."
Ango tried to say something, but he swallowed his words.
"I'm not sad. I knew from the very beginning," Dazai said. His face was a blank mask now. "It didn't matter whether you were with the Special Division for Unusual Powers. I always lose the things I don't want to lose the most. That's why I don't feel anything anymore. The moment you get your hands on something worth going after, you lose it. That's just how things are. There is nothing worth pursuing at the cost of prolonging a life of suffering."
To live a normal life.
To have friends were work didn't interfere.
Two of the things Dazai wanted most in life, only for them to be cruelly ripped away each time.
Such were the tragic tales of the Port Mafia.