I woke up the next morning to my dad and Eric screaming at each other.
“You will not do anything of the sort!” My father yelled.
“Who’s gonna stop me?” Eric responded back.
“You will not throw your life away over something so stupid!’
“It’s not stupid, it’s very worthwhile!”
“Worthwhile!? Do you even hear yourself right now!?”
“Yes I do, I have fucking ears!”
“Apparently you don’t have a brain in that head of yours!”
“Fuck you!”
Eric lunged forward at my dad, but Alice stepped in the way between both of them.
“Stop, please!” Alice pleaded. “No more fighting, there’s already enough of that outside. Let’s just keep it peaceful! Please!”
“I’m sorry that’s just not possible!” My dad said. “Eric here, wants to ‘complete the family legacy and shit!’ A horrible excuse for just throwing your life away!
“I can beat him!” Eric yelled. “I’ll be the first, I’ll put ourselves under government protection, If i go through with it.”
“If! Isn't an option, because it will never happen. No one in the world can beat Runasi Haruhiko.”
Runasi Haruhiko? My brother wanted to fight him? Why? Thats just suicide. Going to fight him is something you do if you’ve lost everything else in life. A last resort. I know Eric was a little hotheaded, but I didn't expect him to be ignorant.
I got up from my sleeping bag and my dad and Eric were still arguing. I tuned them out and realized my mom wasn’t anywhere in the apartment. Is she outside? I walked past my dad and Eric, and went outside the door. I peeped out the door and looked down the hallway. I saw my mom talking to one of the neighbors. The neighbor was also a mother, she had blonde hair and was the same height as my mother.
“I just don’t know what to do anymore.” My mother cried. “They came back home last night, both of them covered in blood. During the night, I took a look at the kill history at the bank.” My mom paused, and sniffled. “I saw that Eric killed two people.” My mother found out. And it didn’t take long, she was devastated. She never would have imagined that one of her kids could kill. She taught us that, even though killing was legal, it was really bad. I couldn’t imagine how she felt. The kill history is a place where you can search people’s names and find out if they killed anybody or if they are dead. I guess my mom did that last night when we all went to sleep.
“Right now they’re arguing, because Eric wants to fight that Haruhiko guy.”
“What!?” The woman said in shock. “Is your son suicidal?”
“I don’t even know anymore!” My mother sobbed as she hugged the woman. “He’s not the kid I raised! He’s a completely different person.” I felt the same. Eric was completely out of his mind recently.
“Don’t worry hun.” The woman responded. “He’ll get over it soon, maybe he’s in a rough patch right now, and that’s not uncommon, especially in today’s times.” The woman tried to comfort my mother, but it was pointless. Mom was right, Eric is becoming totally unhinged. I’m afraid to tell her what actually happened that night. It would only confirm her suspicions of Eric, but it has to be the right course of action. I was gonna go over to my mom and explain to her what really happened that night. But, then i heard her say.
“I’m worried about Lee.” I froze and kept hiding behind the door. “I’m afraid he’s gonna turn into his brother. Oh, god.” She kept her head down and kept rambling on. “If he keeps going to that school, who knows what's gonna happen. Maybe he’ll end up being Eric. What about Alice too? Is she gonna take inspiration from Eric and Lee? Please, oh please to the holy lords above that doesn’t happen. All I want is a normal family.”
I wanted to yell at her, because she thought I would end up the same as Eric. It made me so angry. Did she really think I could even end up like my brother? How could she think that? The main reason I was going to the school was because I wanted to be better than my brother. But mom sees it as me following in my brother’s footsteps.
“Close the door!” My dad yelled. “No one else needs to hear our argument!” I did as my dad told me to and closed the door.
“No, keep it open! I’m going out!” Eric demanded.
“Like hell you are!” My dad said.
“I’m going and you can’t stop me.”
“I’m sure fucking am!”
My dad came running towards Eric to try and pull him back from the door. But Eric pushed my dad to the ground. He fell to the ground with an “Oomph”
“Dad!” Alice yelled, rushing over to my dad’s side and making sure he was okay. Eric stormed out of the door and sped walked down the hallway.
“Don’t just stand there!” Alice yelled. “Do something!”
I pondered in my head on what just happened, Eric really pushed dad to the ground. Alice was already there helping my dad out. So, I needed to go after Eric. I bolted out of the apartment and ran towards Eric, who was going down the stairs. I ran past mom talking to the neighbor. I basically jumped down the stairs after Eric.
“Wait! Eric, wait!” I shouted, my voice echoing down the stairs. He turned around and looked at me. “You’re not serious right? You wouldn’t go fight Haruhiko, would you?” I questioned him.
“If i wasn’t serious then i wouldn’t have pushed dad now would I?” Eric responded.
“But, why? Why now? After what just happened yesterday, you want to put our family through more stress!?”
“The stress is only temporary, the outcome will put a solution to all of our problems. Once I kill Haruhiko, I’ll give our family and its future generations under government protection.”
“How do you even know you’re going to win? You could die just like the thousands that die trying to do the same thing as you!”
“I won’t”
“You don’t know that!”
“I do, because I’m stronger than everyone else that has been to his facility.”
“Just because you killed two people, doesn’t mean you’re gonna kill the best fighter in the world!”
“Just watch me.” Eric headed more downstairs.
“Goddammit!” I rushed at him trying to get face to face with him. He was at the bottom of the stairs. I finally caught up to him. I reached to tap him on the shoulder, then I remembered how he pushed my dad to the ground. So, I knew he sensed me behind him. I can predict him.
I reached out for him, and as soon as I saw him turn his back. I changed my direction and leapt to the right of him. He did as I thought he would do, he turned around and tried to hit me. I didn’t get to see the look on his face when he turned around and realized he swung at air. I was now behind him. I grabbed his shoulders and turned him around to face me. This is it, I can make him stop.
“Look at what just happened!” I yelled. “If you truly were greater than Haruhiko, then you should’ve known I was gonna do that!” His face was stone faced. He couldn’t speak. For the second time in his life, I made him speechless.
“You’re not the strongest and if you think that, you’re delusional! You will be killed, and you will have done that for nothing! I predicted your moves, and I've only been to that school for one day!” I needed to make my point that he’s not as strong as he thinks. This time, I needed to tell him what he needed to do, put him in his place, and give him a reality check. It’s clear he’s still not coming off of that dopamine high from last night. Please! Oh please! Go back to the apartment, don’t step outside! I thought to myself. Begging for him to calm down.
Thankfully, he seemed to calm down, and his shoulders loosened up and weren’t tense anymore. He lowered his guard. He actually listened to me. Eric turned around and began to walk back up the stairs. I heard his footsteps as he went up the stairs. I followed suit. Walking slowly back up the stairs.
I got to our floor and saw my mom at the top of the stairs.
“What happened?” My mom asked. It took me a while to respond.
“I stopped him from making a bad decision.” Is what I finally said. Mom understood and walked with me back to our room.
Eric was laying down in his sleeping bag not talking to anyone. My dad and Alice were both sitting on the couch. Alice stood straight up and came running to me and hugged me.
“Thanks for stopping him.” She said, as I felt a tear roll down her cheek. I didn’t say anything, and she shouldn’t be saying thanks. It was my duty as his brother to help him out, it’s basically in the agreement of being a family. And I did my part, now I was waiting for Eric to do his. My dad wasn’t hurt, he was only shocked that Eric would even do that. My mom laid down with my dad to comfort him.
Alice let go of the hug. She leaned over to me and motioned me to lean down. She whispered in my ear. “What really happened last night.” I was hesitant at first, she didn't need to know. But, I need to tell someone what happened. So, we sat at the kitchen table and I told her about what happened last night. I got choked up at some points, but I gave her a pretty detailed description of what happened. Even the part about the bodies. I saw the disgusted look on her face as I kept telling the story.
“Holy shit.” She said, She couldn’t really believe what I was telling her. The absolute brutalization Eric did to those guys in the alley. She looked at Eric in a new way. She didn’t say anything else, and grabbed a book from her sleeping bag and sat in the corner of the room, and read.
I almost forgot that today was the second day of school. I looked at the time. I only had 10 minutes to get there. I quickly got on a new shirt and made sure to actually carry a weapon with me this time. I thought about taking my dad’s gun but I didn’t want to bother him. So, I took a kitchen knife. I went to the door, expecting everybody to say goodbye to me. But, no one said anything, they were still trying to process what just happened this morning. I walked out the door, went down the stairs and walked outside of the apartment. Ready for another day of Yurinami fight school.
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