#he is the owner of that relationship w furuya in a way

[potahun]

i was thinking this morning about kazami, as they do, and his relationship with furuya, and specifically the fact that kazami is an elite in his own right. among his peers, he made it into the PSB, which, as we saw repeatedly in the movies, can order the regular crime divisions of the tokyo MPD around with minimal explanation. and even among his PSB colleagues, kazami is one of the rare people to have regular contact with the National Police Agency. In addition, within the PSB, kazami has people who answer to him and from the little we see, he's respected there.

so he is an elite, and would be considered highly competent by the average person, and that's how he's progressed in life, probably, but now he answers to furuya, who is younger than him, and setting aside the meta explanation that furuya wins by gary stu armour, as far as kazami is concerned, he's now faced with a daily situation where this one guy is outdoing him in every area by a landslide, whether it's work, baseball, ...and is ordering him around (and completely unreasonable in his expectations at times). and this guy is even younger than him. which brings me to my point:

does kazami ever get relieved that furuya is in a position where he's not a rival? and never has to be a rival or adversary? does the hierarchy between them make him feel some sort of weird, twisted comfort that he feels ashamed of? ashamed that the sense of distance inherent in the boss-subordinate relationship reassures him that furuya is, in fact, not a level he should aspire to? and then does it get to him sometimes? does he struggle with this? is he truly at peace with it? (the line "i've tried to follow you desperately, but-" comes to mind)

and does it get better or worse when their relationship starts becoming more complex, more layered, sometimes bordering friendship and lovers and power harrassment? when the sense of distance starts to crumble in places, does he feel frustrated with furuya's petulant sides, or does the fondness take over and he tells himself that, 'ah, well. it's this man, this person, and i follow him because it's him'? in the end, does he simply starts caring, and does that trump the rest?