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linkspooky · 4 years

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Kunikida + Oda: Death of a Good Man

While Kunikida and Oda have never met in canon they are characters with a lot in common. They both essentially play the same role, as the moral center of their respective groups (particularly acting as a conscience for Dazai). They both share the same strengths and weaknesses. However, one lives and one dies. MORE UNDER THE CUT.

1. Relationship with Dazai

Dazai is a character who has trouble seeing himself as a person. That is, he doesn’t see himself as the same as everyone else. (His ability is titled No Longer Human, surprise, surprise). Oda says as much to Dazai, that traditional values like good or evil don’t really mean that much to him.

“Whether you’re on the side that takes lives, or the side that saves them nothing beyond your own expectations will happen. Nothing in this world can fill the hole that is your loneliness. You will wander for eternity.”

...

“Be on the side that saves people. If both sides are the same, then choose to be a good person.” - Osamu Dazai and the Dark Era

It’s not that Dazai is a sociopath, or even unfeeling, it’s just that he is so distanced from his own humanity, and from other people. He genuinely believes he can’t feel the same way as they do. Dazai even described the way he saw himself to Fyodor.

Dazai tells Fyodor that he feels like he’s sperate from everyone else. It’s like he’s the player, and everybody else is pieces on the game board. But, even though he might come up with strategies and move the pieces, he’s not really the one changing things, or affecting other people’s lives because he’s not right there in the middle of things he’s far away.

Dazai even flashes back to Oda and Gide’s final showdown when trying to explain this feeling to Fyodor. Oda his closest and only friend at the time, who he could not reach out to and save. Dazai believes he can’t touch other people, he can’t reach out and save them, because he sees himself as lacking in feelings or a heart. Which is why, Dazai relies on the people around him. Dazai attached himself to Oda when he was in the Mafia, and then again to Kunikida when he was detective agency to essentially act as his heart, his external conscience for him. That’s the relationship he shares with both of them. It’s why the first two light novels are essentially about Dazai, but narrated from the point of view of his partner at the time. Light novel one is about his partnership with Kunikida, and Light Novel 2 is about his friendship with Oda back in the dark age. The connection between them is that both Oda, and Kunikida are good, just men who have tried to understand Dazai in one way or another.

The events of both light novels even mirror each other to an extent. Entrance exam is about Dazai joining the agency, Dark Era is about Dazai leaving the mafia. Entrance exam is about Kunikida failing to understand Dazai, but learning to trust him anyway. Dark Era is about Oda being the only one who fully understands Dazai, but then not listening to him at the end of the story. They both end with a symbolic death, Oda commits double suicide with Gide, whereas Kunikida pretends to shoot Dazai in order to follow his plan.

Dazai’s a master strategist, but he’s not a leader of men, nor does he have any particular ideals he stands for. Dazai was given a position of leadership within the port mafia, and not only did he spend the entire time tormenting his closest subordinate but he didn’t care about the lives of his subordinates the way Chuuya does.

Dazai sees Kunikida as someone having the ideals he does not have, therefore doing what he cannot, and being what he cannot be to others. This is a role Oda used to serve as his one and only friend. However, while they occupy the same spot as Dazai’s most trusted person their relationships with him are very different.

Kunikida is very combative with Dazai and always fighting against him. He personally expects Dazai to be better in all aspects. He scolds him for being lazy and neglecting his work. When Dazai messes with other people or manipulates them, it’s Kunikida who is the first to get frustrated with him. Kunikida also, tends to lack a fundamental understanding of Dazai. It’s a running joke that he’s always a step behind him (he’s the last person to find out Dazai was a mafia member when everyone else already knew). The literal first thing established about their relationship in the first chapter, is that they are constantly fighting with each other. They barely make it through a dinner with Atsushi.

However, Kunikida also listens to Dazai when it’s important. It’s the other way around with Oda, Oda is someone who does fundamentally understand who Dazai really is deep down. However, at the same time Oda doesn’t really try to exert any influence over Dazai until the very end of his life. Their relationship was defined by being distant to one another, and not asking questions.

The reason why Ango and I were able to be by his side was that we understood the solitude that surrounded him, and we never stepped inside it no matter how close we stood.

But in that moment, I kind of regretted not stepping in and invading that solitude.

Dazai Osamu and the Dark Era.

Him, Ango and Dazai could only keep meeting as the Buraiha at the Lupin bar if they pretended to not know anything about what each other did outside of the bar. They’re different in one main aspect, Kunikida fights Dazai, and Oda doesn’t start fighting until it’s almost far too late.

2. Living and Dying for One’s Ideals

One more direct parallel between the two is that Kunikida and Oda are both characters who strive to live up to the ideal they find in a book. Literally. Kunikida obsessively writes out his ideals in his notebook where he has his whole future planned out.

What are ideals? There are innumerable answers to that question. One could say it’s merely a term, or an idea, or perhaps even the soruce of all meaning. But if you ask me, the answer is obvious. It’s the word written on the cover of my notebook. My notebook has all the answers. It is my creed, my master, and a prophet that guides me. At times, it can either be a weapon ro a solution. Ideals. Everything I am is written in this notebook which I always carry with me. My entire future lies within it - Osamu Dazai’s Entrance Exam

Oda picked up a book and loved it so much he wanted to write the ending for himself.

After worrying about it for so long, I came to one conclusion. “Then you write what happens next.” I decided to write about it myself. I would become a novelist, and write a story about why the man stopped killing. But to become a novelist, I needed to sincerely know what it meant to live. So, I stopped killing. - Osamu Dazai and the Dark Era.

Kunikida and Oda are both characters who find their will to live for the future within the pages of a book. Which makes sense as both characters struggle with lofty ideals and a harsh reality. Oda and Kunikida are characters written about the struggle to be a good man, in a world that is not good. To hold ideals, in a world that is not ideal. This once again ties back to what Dazai said to Fyodor, God isn’t perfect harmony, he’s illogical and absurd.

The world isn’t ideal and orderly. It’s extremely, extremely messy. Kunikida and Oda are both characters who strive to be better, and want the world to be better and because of that they fall into conflict. However, Oda lost his fight, and Kunikida is still fighting. Part of why Dazai got so attached to Kunikida is also because he saw Oda’s ideals within Kunikida, and knew that carrying those ideals could crush him so easily.

“Justice is a weapon. It can be used to harm, but it cannot protect and save others.” -Osamu Dazai’s Entrance Exams

The meanings of Dazai’s words are clear when you look at them in the context of what he learned after losing Oda. Oda decided to throw his life away to avenge the children after Gide. He achieved justice then. However, nobody was saved. The children were already dead. Oda himself wasn’t saved. Dazai lost his only friend.

“Something?” I looked at Dazai. “There isn’t anything, Dazai. It’s all over. Everything. Whatever else happens now is meaningless - just like I’m about to do. AM I wrong?” “Odasaku...” Dazai said softly. “Forgive me for the absurd wording but - don’t go. Find something to rely on. Expect good things to happen from here on out. There’s gotta be soemthing...”

[...]

Oda’s march against Gide isn’t just tragic, it’s a deliberate choice. It was a suiide. He’s given several oppurtunities to just walk away, or wait for something else to give him a reason to live and he doesn’t. His final actions hurt more than they helped. Yes, he did save Dazai in a way by throwing his life away, but Dazai also lost the person who could understand him. Oda could have lived. He could have done more if he had lived. Dazai even says so in dead apple, saving people is the more beautiful path, but you have to be alive to see that beauty.

This is also why Kunikida and Oda have such a connection to Dazai. Underneath their struggles to be a good man they are both constantly dealing with suicidal feelings.

Kunikida is far more fragile than he lets on. Part of the reason he attaches himself to ideals rather than people, is because caring about people hurts, and he is so afraid of failing the people in his life (the same way Oda eventually failed to protect the children) that he can’t admit the depth to which he cares about them.

Kunikida struggles to save everyone in front of him, but that’s also because Kunikida is internally someone who is very fragile. He can’t handle the loss, especially losing those he is close to. When Atsushi is hospitalized after his first fight with Akutagawa, he pretends to be unconcerned. When Atsushi wants to save Kyoka, Kunikida tries to persuade him to not save her. Oda and Kunikida are both avoidant characters, Oda avoided ever stepping inside of Dazai’s loneliness, and Kunikida avoids getting close to others because they fear the people they cannot save. Kunikida cares so much and so deeply, that he’s completely shattered when he fails someone.

Every strategy by the detective agency’s enemies relies on crushing Kunikida because he’s the easiest target. When he fails like this he wants to give up. Kunikida and Oda have this dark underside to their actions where they’re fighting continually to be better, but when they fail, they long to throw their lives away and give up the struggle.

Part of the reason they’re attracted to Dazai is deep down Kunikida and Oda both have the same suicidal feelings. Kunikida knows that his ideals will never live up to the reality.

However, secretly he longs to fail so he won’t have to struggle against it anymore.

“I let go of Dazai. I understand what he’s aying. Perhaps righteousness isn’t something you seek in others, but something you search for inside of yourself. Even then... Miss Sasaki is dead, and so is Rokuzo. All I’ve found in my search for righteousness within myself is a sense of hopelessness.”

Osamu Dazai’s Entrance Exam

The question is can you continue to live? Even if you fail over and over again to do better. Even if the things you try to protect all die. Kunikida’s arc so far mirrors Oda’s. The things he told himself he would protect, he failed to. The promises he made, he breaks. He said he was never going to watch a child die in front of him, and then it happens.

He said he was never going to fail to protect the agency again, but then the agency became the victims of the hunting dogs, and Kunikida had to go completely on the run. He said he was going to throw himself away in a big bang against the hunting dogs to show his ideals would never fail, and instead.

He even loses his ideals and his ability to write in the notebook. So, what is the difference between Kunikida and Oda that allows Kunikida to keep struggling where Oda did not. I think it’s not really a difference between them, so much as it’s a difference between Dazai. Dazai’s grown since then and realized his mistakes with Oda, and because of that doesn’t stay at a comfortable distance from Kunikida.

Dazai has grown enough between then and now he’s able to reach people who feel similiarly to him. He understood the suicidal feelings of both Kunikida, and Oda, but he didn’t reach out to Oda until it was too late. However, Dazai has grown to the point where he not only understands Kunikida’s struggle and sympathizes with him, but he’s also able to say the words he couldn’t say to Oda until it was too late.

There’s no such thing as a point of no return. There is no point where everything is already over. Even if you fail to protect someone, even if you fail to protect everyone.

"Anything I would never want to lose will be lost. It is given that everything that is worth wanting will be lost the moment I obtain it. There's nothing worth pursuing at the cost of prolonging life of suffering."

Dazai is still the same person that said this. Deep down that’s what Kunikida and Oda both fear, that after Oda failed the orphans, that after Kunikida could not save an innocent child in front of them, that no matter how hard they fought all of their attempts to protect someone would fail that way. At which point their fighting seemed to become meaningless.

Dazai knowing those feelings has moved past that lament. He still believes that the struggle may be meaningless, but he reassures them that they can keep fighting anyway.

If there’s no great glorious ideal to live for, if nothing we do matters, than all that matters is what we do. The world isn’t good, the world will never be as good as we want it to be, yet Kunikida can still strive to be good in the face of that.

#dazai osamu #kunikida doppo #oda sakunosuke #odasaku #bungou stray dogs #bsd meta #bungou stray dogs meta #bungou stray dogs theory #bungou stray dogs analysis

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incorrect-ikevamp-quotes · 3 years

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Hi again! I come to you today with a question that may simply be a continuity error, but I'm still interested in your thoughts! In the main story, le Comte *knows* it was MC that came through the door behind him. Yet in Comte's "One Night, Beneath the Crescent Moon" POV story, he said he "...had no idea of what would happen next... That she would end up using the same door and end up stuck on the other side." What's your take on it? Thanks in advance! 💛

Hiya! First off I wanna apologize for how long it took to reply oTL I had originally drafted a response and then lost it when I accidentally closed the tab, and whenever that happens I always have to like sufficiently mourn the words I lost 😂😂😂

But to answer your question! If I’m entirely honest, I can’t remember what it was Comte said exactly in the Main Story in regards to her entering the door. There could be a lot of explanations for him saying he “knew”: continuity error, him wanting to put her at ease by seeming “in control” of the situation (while he’s screaming internally), or maybe even him wanting to cast some doubt as to whether or not he’s a person that can be trusted (aka the whole like “MC nooooooo don’t trust me I’m a vampire very bad very scary run away” kind of like Leonardo).

All that being said, given the evidence we have and the stories I’ve read from his POV--esp that Crescent Moon one you referenced--I’m most inclined to believe that he had no idea she would follow him that day at the Louvre. If anything I really don’t think he ever anticipated any human person could follow him through the door? Because remember Sebastian (and the suitors for that matter) only manage because Comte is their escort. Sure their will to live on was strong enough that he could hear them, but they had no capacity to approach or find a door on their own as far as we currently know. The door was closed when MC found it; this suggests that Comte fully closed off that avenue to make sure nobody wayward stepped in by accident. He did the responsible thing and he left long before he could ascertain her safe journey through time, but she still managed to make it across somehow.

That’s why I think MC’s mere existence is earth-shattering to Comte. I mean we have all the good basics: a lovely lady, sweet and hard-working, means well and does her best. And these attributes all do matter, for sure. But the door is perhaps a greater catalyst in their romance than we might have first anticipated.

There will be some semi-hefty JPN rt spoilers below the cut for Dazai and Comte, so I’m just going to keep it under wraps just in case there are people who want to remained 100% unspoiled:

TW: Mentions of suicide in Dazai’s rt

The reason I say this is twofold, based on information provided by Dazai and Comte’s Main Story route. In Dazai’s route, remember that the focal point of the story is that Dazai wants to go back in time to kill himself as a baby so that he can never grow up to write his books or cause anyone pain in the near future--essentially, suicidal ideation to a frightening extreme. One of the main reasons that he fails (though MC plays a significant role in stopping him, too) is that Dazai’s will to kill himself is too weak. In simpler terms, this means that--no matter how much he insisted he wanted to die, the truth of his heart was revealed in his constant hesitating and difficulty going through with it. This is very often a reaction from people who need sizable psychological assistance to overcome trauma; they don’t usually want to die, it’s more that the pain of surviving their experiences is outweighing any possible joy they can find in living.

But back to the most important part in bold. When Dazai asks about being able to use the door to travel through time, Charles confirms that it’s possible to travel without a pureblood escort. HOWEVER. This type of travel is very, very difficult unless you have an intense sense of willpower. I imagine the implication here is that you have to have an overwhelming desire and firmly believe it’s where you want to be in order for the travel attempt to succeed at all. (I don’t think the tethering point necessarily matters, but there is a suggestion that strong bonds between people--whether platonic or romantic--can serve as powerful guideposts when the door is distorted.) In other words, the reason Dazai relies on Charles’ moral bankruptcy is because Dazai knows he doesn’t feel strongly enough to go through with the suicide. He needs someone else who has the sheer determination and unbending will to see it through when the door opens.

This is why Dazai is forced to ask Charles to accompany him, even though Charles doesn’t necessarily want to kill him. For Charles, this is less about a desperation to kill Dazai and more about his intense obsession-love for MC, and his willingness to do anything to receive her love/attention in return. In Charles’ view, since MC is ostensibly in love with Dazai, removing Dazai from the picture permanently is ideal. While Charles’ judgement is clouded and a little horrific, he is nonetheless rock steady in comparison to Dazai’s nonstop wavering. Dazai knows that he’s fickle on a personal level; one moment he wants to die, another he’s too afraid to let go of what he does care about or upset anyone. He’s at a point where he doesn’t know what’s right or true anymore and he’s floundering, which is honestly fairly common among those who share his lamentable condition. (Most people don’t have a death wish--it’s more a combination of circumstantial problems and healing that has remained in stasis that constitutes the extremity of that behavior.)

Moving right along, Comte’s route also features a similar testament to willpower, believe it or not. This happens in the last few chapters of the main story. Basically, Shakespeare dumps MC on Vlad’s doorstep and she’s more or less suffering the latter’s monologuing for a good while. Not long after that Comte appears and nearly shoots Vlad in the head, the bullet just grazing his cheek. Comte demands that he let MC go, and Vlad--in a classic sadistic act of compliance--wrenches open the door and just tosses MC into the freefall of distorted spacetime.

Now this is dangerous to MC’s life in and of itself, but there’s a key element there: distorted spacetime. In this main story the door never returns to its normal state after that first month period. Rather, the expanse of the door is too dangerous to be traveled even by a pureblood, let alone a human being. The chances MC will ever be able to escape in order to survive are closer to zero than any other number. Remember that Comte is immortal. If he gets stuck on his own, he can’t die and the damage to his body is always more than able to heal when he’s back to safety. (He even warns Leonardo in Leo’s MS that the danger of getting stuck in some kind of pocket in spacetime is still too significant to be ignored, though I can’t be sure if that’s due to Leonardo’s inexperience with time travel/requirement for an escort, or just an inevitable risk you juggle anytime you travel through the door.)

Of course Comte leaps in after her to try to save her, but presumably their entry point is long gone now (Vlad shut the door), so they’re just kind of floating in amorphous time. They do and don’t exist. Comte is understandably distraught because MC’s life hangs in the balance; if they don’t find a way out, she is almost certainly going to die. Comte admits that--while he hates the fact that his very existence is a danger to her, he still doesn’t regret finding her by any extension. MC protests, naturally, that there’s nothing to regret. Circumstances be what they may, she loves him.

Now, here is the key. While Comte is trying to think of a way out, MC is thinking hard about wanting to return to the mansion. Her mind reflects an acute, intense desire to return home to the place where they both belong. And wouldn’t you know it? They both suddenly tumble out of the door in the mansion and onto the carpeted floor, whole and alive, sputtering in disbelief. Comte is baffled at first but it can only give way to immense relief that she’s safe, and he just immediately breaks down.

The only reason the two make it out unscathed is because of--I can only assume--MC’s overwhelming will to live on with Comte and return to the mansion. While it would have been natural for her to be overcome by fear to the point where she could make no productive decision, or even humor the concept of focusing on their home, she does it all the same with immediate success. That’s also part of why I think Comte just 100% caves into both of their feelings in the next chapter. He saw firsthand that, not only does MC keep a level head under duress, but she also has the overpowering will necessary to survive amongst vampires. And it was perhaps this unshakeable will in the first place that landed her in the late 19th century all those weeks ago.

It’s interesting because, honestly? Her entry through the door is more or less a hinge point for their romance. While it obviously isn’t the only reason he cares about her, it definitely is one of the bigger reasons he even feels safe enough to court her in earnest in the aftermath. It is literally only after this event that he confesses everything. Why he created the mansion and the men. How he’s really felt about her and himself all this time. What Vlad showed her and the implications of Vlad’s existence. And finally the truth about what he wants. He wants a relationship with her, but he keeps being held back by the fear that he’s too much. That the demand of being by his side will outweigh any happiness she might find choosing him. (Granted MC and I find that preposterous given how attentive and considerate he is, but you know). But after seeing her pull off surviving Vlad and traveling through the door by her own willpower again? I think it sufficiently lessens his doubts as to whether she could handle a future with him. It gives him the courage to just ask her: Do you want a future with me? Can you handle the demands of a vampire that cannot accept a mere human lifetime to be in love?

And so this is why I have unceasing Comte brainworms ladies and gentlethem. I need to go lie down before I start crying again, I love him oTL

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soukokuwu · 4 years

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i live for aku angst. could you please write a scenario where he develops feelings for a fem reader during the dark era, but watches as her & dazai fall in love together? he wouldn’t be able to do anything since he’s dazai’s subordinate. but imagine them having a significant friend (ish) relationship, so when she disappears along with dazai he gets left utterly heartbroken and alone, wishing he would have said something to her when she was still with him. thank you! i love your writing

➥ genre: angst

➥ pairing: akutagawa x crush!reader, dazai x reader

➥ synopsis: akutagawa watches as you fall in love... but not with him.

➥ word count: 2k

➥ a/n: and i live for angst 😼 i really really loved this idea & i really hope you’re still here — tried a certain theme for this, hopefully you like it!! and tysm kind anony ^.^

Black and blue

You came out of the blue.

In the form of medicine for his wounds, and a cure for his aches. You were his superior, but you were unlike a certain other superior he knew. You radiated warmth and comfort — something Akutagawa didn’t know he craved. And yet you managed to instil that feeling in him within a matter of seconds.

“Dazai did this to you again?”

What was that he heard in your voice? Was it pain? Disapproval? Sadness, maybe? He was too detached from any emotion to be able to tell. Everything he knew, he learned from Dazai himself. All he wanted was the man’s approval. That was all he worked for. But you ignited a conflict in Akutagawa that he didn’t bargain for. One that he didn’t know would lead to fireworks instead of just a single spark.

“Yes,” was all he said. Was there any other way to respond? This was the first time you spoke to him, was he supposed to continue the conversation? A part of him wanted to. This was the only time a superior has shown any sort of care to him after all. So why couldn’t he get anything out?

You pressed your lips into a firm line, and he couldn’t help but notice how soft and pink they looked. You didn’t wear a lot of makeup, and his opinion was that you didn’t need it anyway. You already looked... pleasing enough to the eyes. Was that how people described someone they found... good-looking?

Endless questions darted across Akutagawa’s mind that day. But none were answered. Because how could they be, when the one questioning didn’t have the guts to say a thing in the first place?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Akutagawa knew.

He knew you didn’t mean to. But you did it anyway. He knew why, too. Because he let you. And just like that, his walls came down. No, they didn’t crumble — he wouldn’t let them fall that easily, but still you were the only one who could take the bricks out piece by piece until the barrier was almost nonexistent.

It was like demolishing a house and rebuilding it again — just better, stronger. You painted over his grey with your red. It was your favourite color, and fitting enough; it was the color of his feelings for you.

Since that day you were always there for him. You had your own tasks, sure, but you always looked out for him when you could. And he found that days when you were especially busy were the days he felt most blue. Akutagawa found it strange though — why did you care? What did you have to gain?

And he found the answer one night, a conversation with you by the bay. You had invited him to take a walk with you, to get some proper fresh air and let off steam. But Akutagawa had read way too much into it, that he knew. Why else would he feel disappointed that there wasn’t so much as any physical contact with you? He merely stayed at a distance as he always did, and you never tried.

One fruit bore out of that night though. He learned more about you than he thought he would. You were much like him; joining the mafia because you had nowhere else, you accepted an invitation from a senior in the mafia, wanting to prove that you weren’t worthless, that you could produce something of value to someone. No wonder you looked out for him. You saw a part of yourself in him, didn’t you? You knew how lonely it felt. That night, Akutagawa felt something he never thought he would — a sense of belonging.

The longer you spoke to him that night, the larger that feeling grew. And somehow he looked at you in a way he didn’t before. It confused him, disgusted him. No, correction — he disgusted himself. Not his affection for you. Why did he feel like pursuing this; you? That night, he denied himself the chance to let you in on his feelings.

A useless kid like him doesn’t deserve you.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Akutagawa Ryuunosuke was a black sheep. But you were the golden girl.

Should he be surprised then? As he watched the way his mentor interacted with you, should he be worried? No, did he even have the right to be? But then he saw him smile at you, a smile he’d only seen formed when he was around that other guy — Oda Sakunosuke. You were... another exception? Yet again, many questions raced through his head. But one thing he knew for sure — he was turning into the green-eyed monster.

He started to notice how you reacted to Dazai. He hated how you always seemed so mesmerised whenever he walked by. He hated how your eyes twinkled whenever you talked to him — where’s that sparkle in your eye when you talked to Akutagawa? He hated how one day you just showed up with Dazai’s coat wrapped around your shoulders. He hated how much he was affected by it. It really wasn’t unexpected — next to Dazai, who would take a second look at him anyway? He wished he could be him. Then maybe you’d... He shook his head. No, maybe not even then.

What he hated the most? He couldn’t even hate the guy. He yearned for Dazai’s respect; approval, and that never changed. But then the upset dissolved into an understanding. Something in his head clicked. You belonged with Dazai. He knew next to nothing about your relationship and how it worked. But what Akutagawa did know? Dazai was a revered member of the Port Mafia, one likely to take Mori’s place as the big boss in the future. He couldn’t even lay a hit on him with Rashomon. Dazai wasn’t a formidable fighter like Chuuya either, and still he managed to beat Akutagawa into the ground. That man... was exceptional. You deserved that. You deserved the best.

That’s what Dazai was. He was the black that would take no other hue, and fittingly so he was the Port Mafia’s great white hope.

“Devour space? That sounds cool,” you had commented one day while bandaging up the cut on his wrist, one inflicted on by Dazai himself. He noticed how you didn’t comment on his barbarism as you usually would, and the usual concern in your tone never appeared. As it never did ever since the first day he saw you talk to Dazai.

“I still can’t do it.”

“If you try to imagine you’re protecting me, could you?”

You see, Akutagawa knew it was just a joke to you. And yet? His heart started pounding so fast, so loud in his chest the moment he heard it. It was a tiring dance — feeling so happy about a tiny comment and then feeling a heartache after realising your smiles, even then, were never as sweet as the ones you flashed at Dazai.

Did Dazai even love you? Or was he playing some sort of game as he usually does with women? He hated how he was praying for the latter. Hated how he wished that things would crumble for the two of you so that he could be the one to help you pick up the pieces — to be the one. Akutagawa sighed, knowing he could never get inside his head. Anyone who tried would fall into a cognitive prison. But even these selfish thoughts couldn’t last long, because Akutagawa got his answer later that day when he overheard his mentor talking to his friend.

“Odasaku, how vulnerable can humans get?”

Akutagawa is shocked at the depth of the conversation. He didn’t know Dazai was capable of talking about... emotions. He didn’t think he had any. The other man mentioned something about it being to a big extent, Akutagawa let it slip past his ears. He was more interested in what Dazai had to say.

“It’s weird. It’s like finally being seen after having lived in perpetual darkness. The light she holds, it’s small... but is it wrong of me to hope that it will grow with time?”

Was that... hope he heard in his mentor’s voice? ‘With time’? That meant the future... for all his suicidal thoughts, because of you, was Dazai really considering living? Akutagawa sighed in exasperation as he quietly walked away from the spot he eavesdropped from. He would never understand Dazai.

He never did. Especially not when the same Dazai who spoke so fondly of you was the same Dazai who shot three bullets at Akutagawa for killing the enemy. You were a saviour in more than one way. Your words echoed in his mind, and his shield came out of his will to protect you, an imaginary you. That’s why Dazai didn’t manage to shoot him dead this time. Because of you.

“Oh? See? You can do it. How many times have I told you? Cutting open unfortunate hostages isn’t the only thing you’re good for. You should be able to use your powers for defense too.”

“I’ve never been able to successfully do that before this.”

“But you just did. Isn’t that great?”

Akutagawa wanted so badly to argue back in an act of rebellion, to yell out that it was only because of you that he was able to do it. But the words got stuck in his throat. And Dazai’s threat embedded themselves in his brain. He always wondered if Dazai knew his subordinate harboured feelings for his partner. But Akutagawa already knew the answer. Nothing escapes that man. But he’s sure that he doesn’t view him as a threat, not even as competition, no.

To Dazai, it was probably just another reason to hate him; another reason to justify why he was in Dazai’s black books.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

It was a complete bolt from the blue.

Akutagawa remembered the day he realised he had lost two important people in his life. He thought that watching as you fell in love with Dazai was the most horrible emotion he could feel. He was wrong. Losing the two of you, not even being able to see either of you, not knowing where either of you vanished to — nothing could top that agony.

The day Oda died, the two of you disappeared along with him.

You took down his walls, painted the insides red, furnished it and made it vibrant again and then suddenly you were gone. You left him in the dark. You invaded his solitary space — slowly, ironically without any violence, and yet the moment you left, it was anything but peaceful for Akutagawa. No, you and Dazai left him even lonelier than before. You graced him with your presence and healed him, only to break him down even more than he already was before he met you.

Everything he heard about love after you left just seemed like everyone viewed the world through rose-coloured glasses. Nothing he found could describe the anguish he felt over losing you; or the regret he held for not telling you how he felt — the remorse that he knew wouldn’t change a thing, and yet wished he did anyway.

Because who knew when he would ever see you again, if he would? What if he never did? Yet ironically, your memory is always there — you’re sitting at the edge of his periphery, taunting him with your smile, tempting him to go and find you. And Akutagawa thinks of it everyday; what it would be like to find you, to hold you, to tell you everything he should have when you were still there.

However, a part of him nags at him not to. After all, the grass is always greener on the other side — maybe because Akutagawa isn’t there. And as an image of you flashed in his mind yet again, he scoffed at himself.

Beautiful. That’s the word he was looking for that first day you touched his soul.

You’re beautiful.

tags: @yokelish @gogolparadise @fyowyn-writes

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bungou-stray-dingus · 4 years

Text

Sacrifice

Pairing : Kunikida x Reader

A/N : Kunikida needs more love, and I'm not gonna give him that this month, but the next three months he will be happy!

T/W : Basically Suicide ; Death ; Depression ; Angst

Angstember Day 8

He knew when you walked in that day, your first day of working at the Agency, he knew you were the one. You had fit all of his ideals, sweet, kind, gentle, but also serious when you needed to be. When you had smiled at him from across the office, he knew that he needed to have you. He began gifting you with love letters, beautiful poems, and flowers. It wasn't too soon after that you two had begun dating. He was so proud to have you on his arm as he walked down the street, he felt like the luckiest man in the world to be able to call you his.

Your ability wasn't combative, not in the slightest. Being able to slow down peoples movements was only helpful for so long, and it didn't help much that using your ability exhausted you entirely. The longer you used it, the weaker you got, and you would often collapse after using it too long. Kunikida was always there to pull you away so you would be safe, but even then you felt like such a useless asset to the Agency.

Asking Kunikida for help in teaching you how to shoot proved to be useless, he thought that your ability was helpful enough without a firearm. You tried to not seem aggravated by this, he was just trying to keep you safe in every way possible, but you thought it would keep you extra safe if you knew how to use a gun. He again, would refute your claim, stating that you would always be safe with him around, and considering he was always around, there was no reason for you to not feel safe. You could never argue against his logic, even if he was wrong, in his mind, he was right.

"I can teach you how to shoot if he's too stuck up to teach you." Dazai offered you one afternoon while at the office. You shook your head, knowing that Kunikida would not only get pissed off at Dazai for interfering, but he would also be upset with you for not trusting his ability to keep you safe himself. "Tch, you have every right to learn how to use a gun Y/N. We're the Armed Detective Agency, key word being armed."

You didn't have time to respond before Kunikida was behind you, his hands on your shoulders as he glared at Dazai. "She has no need for guns when I am with her. I can protect her. You have no right to say what she needs or what she doesn't need." He wasn't controlling, at least that's not the way he thought of it, and not even you took it that way, he just had your best interest in mind and he truly believed that he would be able to keep you safe, always.

Dazai threw his hands in the air and walked away, sighing in frustration. Kunikida sat on the desk in front of you, staring down at you over his glasses with a disappointed look on his face. "Don't look at me like that. I said no." You mumbled, turning your head to look away from him. He grabbed your chin and tilted your head up to look at him.

"I want you to trust me. Trust that I'll keep you safe. I love you, Y/N, you don't need to worry about anything when I'm around. I'll always protect you." He leaned over to press a kiss to your forehead before hopping off your desk and scooting your chair in. "Now get back to work, I love you."

Fukuzawa called you and Kunikida to his office later that afternoon, telling you both about something that came up recently. There was an armed shooter on the loose, and Ranpo had already pinpointed where the mans hideout was, so Fukuzawa thought it would be better for Kunikida and yourself to bring the man into custody. Kunikida was skilled with a gun, and your ability to slow down peoples movements would give the two of you time contain the man and bring cuff the man.

"Thank you sir, we won't let you down." Kunikida bowed, and you followed the movements. You were nervous, and that might seem silly to other people, but you hadn't actually worked on a case with an armed person before. There was a big difference between using your ability on other ability users and regular people with real weapons. Nobody at the Agency knew the specifics of your ability, and the specifics were a real drawback.

You were able to slow down ability users and their abilities because they were basically one in the same. When a person is using their body as their weapon, your ability works perfectly. Guns were a different story, a totally different scenario, a scenario that you wished you wouldn't find yourself in. You would be able to slow the person shooting the gun, but you wouldn't be able to slow the bullet that could be fired from the gun.

You and Kunikida walked out of the building, his fingers placed perfectly between yours as he led you down the street. The map that Ranpo had provided showed that the hideout wasn't far from the office, and it wasn't much of a hideout either. An old, run down shed with the door falling off didn't provide much room for error, and it only had you more on edge. You silently cursed yourself for not pressing Kunikida more to teach you how to shoot, or even just teaching yourself.

"Everything will be fine Y/N. I've handled these kinds of cases many times, there's nothing to worry about." Kunikida whispered to you as he pressed his lips against your temple. Did you seem worried? Could he pick up on it? Your hands were sweating, and you were strangely silent which wasn't normal for you while out on a case.

"I know, I just feel a little warm. When we get back I should lay down, have a rest." You lied, forcing a smile as you looked up at him. He hummed in response, nodding his head, and you hoped that he would believe you.

The two of you turned a corner, ending up behind a bunch of buildings that seemed just as run down as the shack. They were condemned which made it easy for the man to use the shed, but you also wondered why he didn't choose to use the building instead. There had to be a reason behind it, and as you thought of the potential reasons for the choice of housing your thoughts grew more and more pessimistic.

You didn't have premonitions, you couldn't see the future, but something inside you was telling you to take it slow and not rush into things. You could see in your minds eye Kunikida getting hurt, and you couldn't let that happen. It would be your fault in a way for not letting anyone know that your ability wasn't capable of the things they believed it would be. There was no time to warn Kunikida, he was already marching towards the door, pulling you behind him. He trusted your ability and the capabilities he thought it had, he thought that he would be safe as long as you were there.

He kicked open the door, and just as you had thought, as if your premonitions had come to fruition, the man had been waiting for the two of you to come. He was set up behind a large stack of old cardboard boxes, a sniper pointed right at the door prepared to shoot. Even if your ability was capable to slowing down bullets, you wouldn't have had time. He had pulled the trigger before Kunikida could even pull out his own gun.

It was as if time had slowed down, but only for you. You didn't know what to do, you had thought of this scenario, but you hadn't thought of what you'd do if it actually happened. All you knew was that the Agency couldn't lose Kunikida, nothing bad could happen to him, and you wouldn't allow anything bad to happen to him. You jumped in front of the bullets that seemed to be going at Matrix speed through the air, just in time for them to hit your back. One, two, three, four, five... five shots, five bullets all going through you, throwing you against Kunikidas chest.

There had never been a scream so loud, let alone from him. It was guttural, it was terrifying, it was ungodly. The tears came fast, falling down his cheeks and landing on your face, his body was shaking as he carefully lowered you to the ground. The man was waiting for Kunikida to move you away before firing off another set of bullets. What he didn't know was that Kunikida was ready, he had pulled out his gun already when he was bent down next to you, ready to stand up and shoot in one swift move, and that's exactly what he did.

Kunikida wasn't worried about bringing the man into custody, not anymore. He wanted revenge, he saw red, he wanted that man dead for what he had done to you. It was one quick shot to the head, and Kunikida's accuracy was unparalleled. As quickly as his gun went off you heard the thud of the mans body hitting the ground. He would have someone from the Agency come clean up the mess, the only thing he was worried about right now was getting you back to Doctor Yosano.

He scooped you up bridal style, carefully positioning you in his arms as he ran back to the Agency building. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I should have thought about what could have happened, I should have been smarter, I should have thought of every possible outcome, I should have-" He felt you weakly bring your hand up to his face, brushing your fingers along his tear coated cheeks. It was strange, he was panicking more than you were, and you were the one who had been shot. Maybe it was because you had accepted the fact that you were already dead, and you were at peace with it, you had done it for him. "Y-Yoasano is going to save you, I promise. Just hold on a little longer." You had heard stories of her saving Naomi and Junichiro, and you hoped that she would be able to do the same for you, for Kunikida's sake.

He ran into the office going straight for Yosano's office, laying you carefully on the table. Yosano had followed him back, as did everyone else. Seeing Kunikida in that state was different, he was usually stoic and professional, only losing his cool with Dazai, but that was out of anger. He was a mess, his eyes were blood shot red from crying so much on his way over there, his entire body was shaking at this point as he stood back against the wall. "What happened?" Yosano was the first person to speak up, looking from you and then over to Kunikida. He couldn't even answer, he just shook his head before dropping it. He was ashamed of himself, disappointed that he had allowed you to basically sacrifice yourself to save him. "I need everyone to leave, you too Kunikida." He had to be pulled out of the room by Dazai and Atsushi, his body was like stone, he couldn't move on his own. He didn't want to think about losing you, not like this, but he knew that it was a possibility.

He paced the length of the office, everyone sat back and watched as he chewed on the ends of his fingers, only occasionally glancing up from the floor to see if anyone was coming out of the office. It felt like hours instead of minutes, he wanted news, any news at this point would be enough for him. He wanted to know whether he would be able to hold you again, whether he would be able to kiss you again, dance with you again in the seclusion of your small apartment. kiss along your knuckles as he held your hand late at night while the moon shone in through the bedroom window. Should he hold onto hope that he would do those things again, or should he prepare himself for the grieving process?

The second hand on the clock went around and around, how many full circulations had it done by the time Yosano had finally walked out of the office? Why hadn’t you walked out with her? Why did she look so upset, so disappointed? He knew that face, he knew what it meant, as much as he tried to not accept it, he had no choice but to do just that. Her face was one of someone that had lost the battle to save a life, the face of someone who had given their all but it wasn’t enough in the end. He looked her in the eye, trying to find some glimmer of hope in her eyes, but they were dull, there was nothing there.

“I’m sorry, Kunikida. I tried, I did. But, she was gone, she was dead when you brought her in.” She whispered, obviously feeling guilty about not being able to save you when he had trusted her with the task.

“No, that’s not right. You can heal her wounds, you can make her better. You-You saved Naomi and Junichiro, remember!” Kunikida began panicking, he didn’t know how to live life without you now. You were the only person who had ever fit his ideals, you were perfect for him, you were his other half, what was he supposed to do without you? It wasn’t fair.

“The bullet went through her head, Kunikida. She was dead immediately. I can’t fix that. The bullet was lodged in her brain, I-”

“No! That’s impossible! She smiled at me when I carried her here! She was breathing! She moved, she touched my face! It happened!”

“You were hallucinating, she wasn’t breathing when you brought her in. The shot killed her instantly. I’m sorry Kunikida.”

He wasn’t crazy, no. He couldn’t be crazy, he wasn’t hallucinating, He knew what he saw, he felt your hand reach out and touch him, it felt like you were breathing... but....

He looked down at his sleeve where your head had been laying, the stain of blood that was becoming darker... had he really felt you touch his face? Was he really capable of going that crazy? Did it even matter anymore? No... Nothing mattered anymore.

“Kunikida... maybe you should go home... get some rest.” Dazai finally spoke up, but he only shook his head. Home wouldn’t be much better knowing that you weren’t going home with him. Nothing was okay anymore. The worst part was that he didn’t know how to react now that he knew.

Should he be sad? Should he cry? Should he be angry at himself for not protecting you? Should he be angry at the shooter who had taken you away from him? Or maybe Yosano for not being able to save you? Or maybe Fukuzawa for pairing the two of you up for this case? Maybe he should be mad at you for being so dumb, to jump in front of bullets to save him. That’s one thing he couldn’t be though, he couldn’t be mad at you. You had sacrificed yourself for him, and that was the last act of love you had given him.

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bandaged-writer · 4 years

Text

gasoline - prologue || dazai

➤ Pairing: Mafia! Dazai x Ability User! Reader

➤ Genre: Action, fluff, angst, smut (maybe? idk yet), gore

➤ Warnings: character death, blood, language, physical abuse, maybe explicit sex but idk man

➤ Summary: What kind of father sold off their child? What kind of father was he? You only had him, after all.

➤ Word count: 1.3k

➤ Note: Starting this lovely series as a gift for reaching 100 followers! Please, let me know what you think. As this series is on-going, the warnings might get updated and will be individual for every chapter.

➤ previous || next

12 years prior..

Sceneries painted by the twilight were certainly a beautiful thing to look at. Many people would admire the sunset like a rose holding crimson petals, inhale its scent like it was the salty breeze of Yokohama’s air and bask in its beauty until it was time to go home to your beloved, family or roommate. Indeed, humans loved beautiful things, but failed to see the thorns hiding on the stem which would end up making them bleed; may it be their thumb or their heart, even. Perhaps, beauty blinded them.

It was no different for the father sitting down on the bench and watching his adorable 8-year-old daughter play with another child so carelessly like nothing could hurt the one he called his flesh and blood. It was a beautiful sight to witness. To see you bouncing up and down on the seesaw with the child whose name remained unknown to your dad. He could only describe the boy; short, brown hair a bit of a mess, twinkling brown eyes and bandages around his forearms. Worry had decorated your father’s face as the boy asked if it was okay to play with you for a while, because what had happened to the young child to be so bandaged up? He agreed nevertheless.

Maybe it was none of his business. Yes, he shouldn’t worry about the child of another person when his daughter had just come home after so many years. He breathed in the salty air, looked at his watch and noticed that it was almost time for dinner. 6 pm. Your father was about to get up and call out your name when a man approached him. The aura of the man was different than that of a parent; that much your dad could tell.

“Your daughter is quite gifted, no?” The man named Mori sat down next to your dad and watched you having fun on the seesaw with the child he had taken under his wing: Dazai. Your dad’s spine straightened, his facial features hardened. Of course, he knew of your ability which you had come back with after your time at the hospital - why? He didn’t know. “How do you know about my daughter’s ability?” The father asked, suddenly protective and not trusting Mori at all. However, Mori never answered that question. There were more important matters the black-haired doctor had to discuss and something precious to gain.

“Allow me to make a prediction for your daughter’s and Yokohama’s future,” Mori began, his gloved pointer finger tapping his temple in feigned thought just to build the suspense running through your father’s blood. “Your daughter’s ability is unstable, because the experiment done on her was neither a full success nor an entire failure, therefore she’s actually very likely to lose control over it,” your dad swallowed the lump in his throat. This was impossible, unbelievable, a lie. It had to be.

What was this guy talking about? What experiment? You’d been at the hospital due to pneumonia, so had your mother told him.

“She has the potential to destroy the entire city if pushed to her very limits. As someone who protects this place, I cannot allow for such a thing to happen and I regret to inform you of this,” Mori pointed his finger towards a bush which was a fair distance away and your dad saw something shimmering between the thick leaves. As he squinted his eyes, cold sweat ran down his spine.

A sniper hid in the bushes, scope fixed on you and probably just waiting for Mori to give him a sign.

“Don’t!” The father’s eyes went wide, realizing how very real Mori’s threat to take your life right then and there was. So many questions whirled within your dad’s mind such as why that doctor spat such nonsense, who the hell he really was and how he could dare to shoot someone in front of his own child - if it was Mori’s own flesh and blood, at all. But your life came before his curiosity. “I’ll give you anything you want! But please, spare my daughter’s life,” your father pleaded, eyes watery and flickering in anxiety. His hands shook, a stone in his stomach and a very bad feeling dawning on the young father. Mori tilted his head in faked innocence, lips almost pursed as he weighed his options.

“Anything you say?”

“Yes! What is it that you want? Money or perhaps-”

“Then I want your daughter.”

Taken aback, your father failed to formulate any words that would make sense. He was utterly speechless and desperate. Was he really to give you away to someone as shady as this doctor?

“Hand over your daughter in exactly 12 years and she’ll live. Refuse and her life will find its end right here, right now.”

A dead end. There was no room for negotiation, no mercy in Mori’s eyes nor any signs that this was a sick joke, an incredibly bad nightmare your father could wake up from. This was reality and it was worse than anything he could ever imagine. Your father’s eyes looked at your smiling, innocent self, his heart heavy with the decision he had to make, although he already knew the answer.

“..I’ll hand her over to you in 12 years,” your dad spoke in a defeated tone, his shoulders suddenly weighing more than the world’s sins combined. What kind of father sold off their child? What kind of father was he? You only had him, after all. Mori, on the other hand, was delighted at pleasant answer. Of course, no father would want their child’s life to be taken away. He clapped his gloved hands together, a genuinely delighted smile on his face. “I see you made the right decision,” he spoke and stood up, dusting off his coat and calling for the child named Dazai. “I’ll see you in 12 years, then!”

With those words being said, Mori left the playground along with Dazai and stepped into a matte black car which had just pulled up. As if this entire scenario had been carefully calculated beforehand. Defeated and helpless, your father buried his face in his hands, wanted to rip his hair out for making such a crude decision, but it was so that you could live.

Yes, it was only for you.

Gazing out of the window, Dazai sighed against the glass and watched it fog up with a bored expression on his face. “What’s so special about that girl?” He asked, not aware of the mafioso’s plan which was carefully planned out. Up to that point, everything had played into Mori’s hands but what would happen in 12 years? That was a gamble. Dazai’s mentor only smiled in response. “This is something for you to witness, Dazai-kun.”

His attention then shifted towards the driver, an incredibly skilled executive of the mafia. “Kouyou-kun. Please, make sure to send the girl a bouquet of orange lilies for her birthday, every year. He shall not forget his promise, after all,” Mori pushed some of his hair back and pulled out his phone as he seemed to be calculating a little gift for the dad. He wasn’t a cruel man. Of course, Mori would cover the expenses for a child until it reached its 20th birthday; one could look at it as a compensation for the emotional stress he had just put your father through. “Orange lilies?” Kouyou asked, her eyebrows raised in surprise. “Don’t you think this is a bit harsh?” However, as Kouyou only received an effortless “no” from the mafioso, she couldn’t help but sigh into the sleeve of her kimono, her other hand on the steering wheel.

What a shame to stain a little flower’s petals so early on in her life, Kouyou thought.

#bungou stray dogs #bungou stray dogs x reader #bsd #bsd x reader #dazai osamu #dazai x reader #dazai osamu x reader #fic: gasoline

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patchwork-panda · 3 years

Text

If A Moment Is All We Are (26/?)

AO3 link: HERE

Music is recommended for this chapter. When you hit the first **, please open up this link: HERE When you hit the second **, please open this link for the BSD 1st ED

It was dark.

So, so dark.

I opened my eyes as wide as I could and then squeezed them shut just to check that they were actually open. They were.

I swallowed uneasily and tried to stay calm.

Earlier, when he was carrying me to the car, Dazai had accidentally jostled me awake. When I looked at him, he simply said he was taking me back to the ADA, specifically to the infirmary so Dr. Yosano could heal me with her Ability.

“It’s going to be rough,” he’d murmured softly into my ear, “and she’ll probably keep you overnight, but it’s better than being in a hospital for several weeks.”

I heard a crack of a smile in his voice.

“You’ll be okay.”

I’d then floated in and out of consciousness as Dazai had gotten in the back seat with me, buckled in my seat belt and laid my head against his shoulder for support. As the low rumble of the engine starting slowly filled the car, I found myself drifting off yet again. I was so out of it that I didn’t really remember the trip... Except for one small detail.

At one point during the ride, I thought I felt Dazai brushing his long fingers through my hair. He was singing something under his breath, something low and pleasant that sounded like it had nothing to do with suicide... and his singing voice had sounded so beautiful that I could feel myself smiling as I listened...

That was the last thing I was aware of before I passed out entirely and woke up in this pitch-black room. Where the heck was I?!

Groaning a little, I tried to stretch out but found almost immediately that I couldn’t. My arms and legs were strapped down to a partially upright table—a cold, hard slab of a table I didn’t remember being strapped into. I then tried moving my hands and flexing what little muscle I had but instantly regretted it when my entire body was suddenly flooded with a sharp, electric surge of pain.

Right. My arms and ribs were still broken.

I rolled my head to the side with a sigh of defeat, my neck cracking loudly as I moved. It was pretty clear to me now that even if I were at full strength, there was no way that a weakling like me would be able to break free from these restraints. They were probably made for holding down the monstrous strength of an angry Kunikida or a starving Kenji... Which just left one question...

Who strapped me in here?

There was a soft creak.

I swiveled my head towards it and saw a sliver of light appearing in the corner, watching as it grew wider and wider until I realized it was the light from an open doorway. Then I heard a hollow “snap.” Lights—bright, white and blinding came on all around me, flooding into my eyeballs with such intensity that I winced and screwed my eyes shut against the onslaught.

** “Well, well, well,” a low, feminine voice purred, “If it isn’t our newest recruit? You’re hurt, aren’t you...? Kyou-chan?”

Heels clicked against tile, the sound echoing sharply throughout the room. I looked up to see Dr. Yosano in a lab coat and gloves, the golden butterfly clip gleaming brightly in her hair. I should’ve felt comforted at the sight of her but there was something about her smile—something sinister that made the blood turn cold in my veins...

“Y-Yosano-sensei.”

I tried to crack a smile but found my face feeling oddly stiff and frozen.

“Yeah, I guess I am... Dazai-san said you were going to heal me?”

Yosano’s smile widened.

“But of course, my dear.”

Her black-gloved fingers went for the buttons of her lab coat and that’s when I realized she hadn’t been wearing her tie. In fact, she wasn’t even wearing her shirt.

I suddenly wished I’d opted for a normal hospital...

“Welcome to my special operating room,” Dr. Yosano continued, slowly shrugging off her white lab coat. “I’m sure Tanizaki-kun has told you plenty of stories about what happens here, but let me be the first to reassure you...”

Her lab coat dropped to the floor and she kicked it under a tarp.

“It’s not as bad as he makes it sound.”

My eyes widened.

There were tarps everywhere, covering the other chairs, the floor—even the surgeon’s lamp over my head was covered in a thin sheet of plastic.

“Y-Y-Yosano-sensei...”

I could hear my own teeth chattering as I spoke.

“Wh-why’s everything covered in plastic? What are you—?”

I heard a heavy thunk.

Clad in only a lacy black bra and a matching set of panties, Dr. Yosano had dropped her thick black faux-leather bag on the ground and was now bent over it, fumbling with all sorts of things that jangled and clattered with a jarring metallic frequency. I couldn’t see past the edge of the table where she crouched but I could definitely hear her squeal of delight when she found what she was looking for.

“Kyou-chan.”

Something gleamed from underneath my table and I bit back a scream when I saw Yosano rise from the floor with an actual honest-to-God machete—the kind I once saw in a horror movie—in her gloved hands. The shine of the machete’s long, polished blade was reflected in the manic glint in her purple eyes and as I struggled against my bonds, I fully understood why the patients in this room needed to be strapped down.

“I believe I once told you how my Ability works, yes?” she whispered. “That I can heal you back to perfect health so long as you’re on the verge of death? Well, unfortunately, Kitten... you’re not quite there yet.”

“Unfortunately?!”

I started to shake.

“See, that’s where this beauty comes in,” the good doctor explained, running one finger along the edge of the blade. “You’re not quite injured enough, so I have to speed the process along. I mean...”

She shot me a pointed look.

“You do want to get better quick, don’t you?”

I didn’t have the courage to shake my head ‘no.’ For some reason, I found myself nodding instead.

“Good. In that case...”

Running her tongue over her glossy pink lips, Yosano approached.

“The doctor is in.”

Slowly, lovingly, she leaned in and tucked a stray lock of hair behind my ear. The golden butterfly shone in her short, dark hair.

“It’s not very often I get to patch up a girl,” Yosano crooned, her fingers deftly sliding from behind my ear down the line of my jaw. “Kyouka-chan is very good at avoiding severe injury you see, and it’s not like the office girls ever see combat...”

She cupped my chin and lifted my face up towards hers.

“But don’t worry, Kitten,” she whispered softly, “I promise I’ll take good care of you...”

She let go of me, raised the machete high into the air and let out an absolutely maniacal laugh.

“Hold still.”

She swung.

The last thing I heard before her machete buried itself in my flesh was the sound of my own terrified screams ringing in my ears.

***

“All done!” Yosano called brightly.

Fully clothed once again, she threw open the door to the main office, which hit the wall with a loud crack but not even that was enough to shake me from my stupor.

With no wheelchair available in the Agency infirmary, Dr. Yosano was forced to cart me into the room on a dolly, the kind that movers normally used to bring furniture into a house. While the wheels squeaked against the tiles below me, I sat mutely on the flat metal surface, staring straight ahead with blank, unseeing eyes in an upright fetal position. My knees were drawn up against my chest and my arms were wound so tightly around my body that I was cutting off the circulation the good doctor had just restored. But it’s not like having any amount of blood flow would’ve made a difference.

I was still feeling completely numb from the trauma of what had just happened. Had I spent the entire night in the infirmary? Two nights? I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that it was mid-morning, that there was bright sunlight streaming in through every open window but I was still feeling cold and numb in a way that had nothing to do with my body.

Someone approached and it took me a full ten seconds to remember where I had seen his concerned face before.

Tanizaki Junichiro frowned.

“Told you,” he mouthed without actually speaking, shooting a nervous, furtive look up at the terrifying woman who had literally just cut me apart and put me back together again.

“Come on,” he mumbled instead, struggling to pry my arms away from my body. “Let’s get you to your desk. You can pass out safely behind your laptop the way the rest of us do after ‘treatment’...”

As he gripped my wrists over the jacket sleeves and pulled me off the dolly, I looked up into his face, full recognition dawning at last. I tried to speak but found my mouth unable to cooperate with my brain.

“T...T...”

Tanizaki raised an eyebrow.

“Yes?”

“T...Ta...Ta...!”

Tanizaki was now looking slightly disturbed.

“What is it, Kusunoki-san?”

Unable to hold back any longer, I burst into tears.

“Tanizaki-kunnnn!!!!” I wailed, latching onto the redhead’s waist.

“What the—?!” Tanizaki squawked, instantly blanching. “Kusunoki-san, get a hold of yourself!”

“I was so scared!” I bawled, hanging on tighter even as Tanizaki tried to peel me off of him. “You were right! You were right about everything! I swear, I’ll never let myself get hurt ever again! I’M SO SORRY—”

“Kusunoki-san...”

Hiccuping, tears and snot running down my face as I clutched at the ends of the red sweatshirt Tanizaki tied around his waist, I turned to my left to see Naomi, standing there with a chilling look in her dark blue eyes.

“May I ask you why you’re hanging on so tightly to my dear brother?” she asked, her voice no louder than a whisper. “Is there something I need to know?”

Shaking my head, I was forced to let go as Tanizaki finally succeeded in pushing me away. I hit the ground with a sharp smack as Junichiro ran to his sister’s side, apologizing profusely and begging her not to take it out on him later on tonight, at which point I finally remembered to clap my hands over my ears and do my best not to listen.

Fortunately for me, someone else’s indignant shout suddenly shook the room.

“Like I said before, we’re the Armed Detective Agency, not the Lost and Found! Go take that thing to the police station instead!”

As one, we all turned to the door to see Edogawa Ranpo, standing in the doorway looking extremely irritated, with his arms loaded to the brim with an actual stack of pastry boxes. Behind him was a rather short, thin young man with close-cropped brown hair in a black tie and gray slacks—a regular office worker from the look of him. He was clutching a pink embroidered handkerchief in one hand.

“Now let go!”

Scowling, Edogawa snatched the end of his brown poncho out of the young man’s other hand and stomped into the room, the boxes in his arms wobbling dangerously as he went. Suddenly spotting me, he stopped walking and paused to squint at me.

“Oh, Kusunoki.”

Edogawa looked me up and down and frowned.

“I heard you got sent to the Infirmary. You all better now?”

When I gave him a very shaky nod, Edogawa nodded approvingly, then jabbed an index finger back at the guy in the doorway and demanded:

“Then do something about this guy, will you?”

“Do something?” I repeated, glancing towards the door.

The office worker waved.

“What... do you want me to do?” I asked blankly.

Edogawa slapped a palm over his face.

“Ugh. Do I have to do everything around here?” he griped. “Here—!”

He shoved the boxes in my arms and I let out a tiny squeak as I struggled to keep them all from falling over.

“Take these to my desk—and if you drop a single one, you’re going out to buy me two of whatever hits the floor. You!”

He jabbed his finger at the guy in the doorway once again. When the office worker perked up, Edogawa pointed in the direction of the client booth.

“In there.”

No sooner had I finished putting the boxes of pastries on Edogawa’s desk (taking extra care not to drop or smush a single thing) than the Great Detective grabbed me by the back of my shirt and dragged me to the client booth. The young man was already sitting and appeared to be fiddling slightly with the handkerchief in his hands.

I sat down opposite him.

“I’m Kusunoki,” I said, bowing slightly. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Miura,” the office guy said, also bowing awkwardly. “Thank you for your time.”

I glanced up at Edogawa, who had not taken a seat on the detectives’ side with me. His arms were crossed and he was tapping his foot impatiently.

“Tell her what you just told me,” he ordered.

“Uh, yes!” Miura stammered. “You see, I found this earlier today, at the subway entrance around the corner from here.”

He held up the pink handkerchief. There was a capitalized “R” embroidered in one corner and it looked slightly damp, as if the young man had taken the time to wash it in the sink before bringing it in.

“I don’t know who dropped it but, if it’s not too much trouble, could you help me return it to the rightful owner?” Miura asked.

“Uh, Miura-san,” I started, shooting a quick look over my shoulder at Edogawa, who was standing behind me and seemed only to be growing more irritated with every passing second.

Clearly he didn’t want to be kept from his pastries while they were still hot and fresh...

“I hate to repeat what my senpai said earlier, but...” I pressed my lips together. “We’re not the Lost and Found. Lost items are better off being returned to the police station—”

“But you’re a detective agency aren’t you?” Miura pressed. “I heard you’re the best in Yokohama! My friends tell me you solve cases the police can’t handle. They told me...”

He dropped his voice and looked around even though the door to the client booth was closed and the three of us were clearly alone in here.

“They told me a newcomer solved that recent serial kidnapping in their first week here—”

I flushed.

“Oh, uh, that—”

“—and that if all else fails, you have the power of a legendary genius at your disposal—”

“That is absolutely, one-hundred percent correct!” Edogawa crowed, suddenly beaming like he was being interviewed on TV.

I turned all the way around in my chair to gawk at Edogawa just as he slammed both hands on my shoulders and shook me in a friendly, if somewhat overly excitable way.

“In fact...”

He grinned and I suddenly felt the need to run.

“Kusunoki-kun here is the one who caught the serial kidnapper! And she’d be more than happy to help you return the handkerchief.”

My jaw dropped as Miura looked on in amazement.

“Ranpo-san, what—?!”

“On two conditions. One...”

Edogawa held up a finger.

“You buy the whole office a party-sized box of pastries from that new macaron shop downtown.”

I balked but Miura only nodded readily.

“Two...”

Edogawa held up a second finger.

“You have to go with her when it’s time to return the handkerchief. In fact, I want you to be the one to personally hand it over to the owner.”

Edogawa shot me a meaningful look.

“You got that?”

I breathed in sharply as I suddenly understood his meaning.

Edogawa wanted me to see into this man’s future and find the person he hands it back to. But how was I supposed to do that when I didn’t know when this event was going to take place?

As if reading my thoughts, Edogawa motioned me closer.

“You said that before,” he whispered in my ear, “when you looked into my future, you saw a massive book, right? And that there was writing in it, right?”

I nodded.

“Look for the word ‘handkerchief,’” Edogawa instructed me.

And with that last bit of advice, he patted my shoulder and walked out of the client booth.

‘Look for the word ‘handkerchief?’’

I frowned. I must’ve still been a little dazed from Yosano’s “treatment,” because this made no sense. Look for a word... Look for a word...? Why would Edogawa instruct me to do something like this? Unless...?

I let out a soft gasp as it came to me.

Edogawa really was brilliant...

Taking my cell phone out of my pocket, I set a timer to “vibrate,” and tucked it back inside my coat pocket. I turned to Miura and stuck out my other hand.

“Can I see the handkerchief?”

Miura nodded and as he passed the handkerchief to me over the table, I carefully switched on the timer and reached out for Miura’s hand.

If this worked, I’d have a new way to use my Ability...

My fingers brushed against Miura’s just as the timer went off and I closed my eyes and let the vibrations wash over me.

I felt a pull—just the slightest of tugs on the tips of my fingers, as if a small child were yanking on them and leading me forward. Taking a deep breath in, I concentrated on the sensation and let it lead me away...

...And I floated down, weightless, and sank into that dark tunnel once more.

When I opened my eyes again, my body had disappeared. All that was left of me was a pair of eyes and the memory of a form I’d long since left behind. Taking a moment to look around, I examined my surroundings. Words, silvery and undefined, twinkled all around me like stars, floating in the air in long, sparkling columns, like strings of crystal beads hanging from a massive chandelier. I quickly spotted the four walls of the tunnel and the four corners where the walls met and nodded to myself (or at least that’s what it felt like) as I realized I was once again in a giant, translucent book.

This was the “Story of Miura’s Life.”

I stared ahead of me, down the “tunnel” that was actually not a tunnel, but reams and reams of transparent pages and considered the task ahead.

Edogawa had said to look for the word “handkerchief.” Basically, he wanted me to find the very next instance of the word “handkerchief” and touch it to “activate” the vision—in the same way I’d done with the date and time when I’d looked into Edogawa’s future.

But what if the word showed up multiple times in Miura’s future? How was I supposed to know which one to touch?

Feeling nervous, I looked around and randomly selected a word to focus on. As before, the longer I stared at it, the more it began to take shape and within moments, the silvery amorphous blobs to my left condensed and became a legible set of characters.

“Armed Detective Agency.”

Okay, not what I needed.

I glanced back down at the hall of loosely glittering words and grimaced.

I may have found my way back to that strange metaphysical space where a person’s future was written down as if it were a literal story, but today the situation was different. If the words didn’t properly materialize until I spent enough time looking at them, how was I supposed to pick out a single word like, “handkerchief,” much less get to it in time before Miura got weirded out by my so-called “narcolepsy” and pulled away?

If only Edogawa was in here with me to give me some kind of hint...!

Fighting the growing sense of panic, I closed my “eyes” once again and tried to focus.

Concentrate. Think about the words you’re looking for. What exactly are the words you need to see?

Without thinking about what I was doing, I wrote the words “return the pink handkerchief” in the air.

At once, there was a sound like a chime. I opened my eyes to see the words I’d written hanging in the air, glowing before my eyes like molten gold. But before I could reach out and touch them, they shot off into the distance, streaking through the book like a shooting star in the sky.

I ran after it, phasing right through the translucent pages like a ghost, silvery words parting around me like curtains and fluttering in my wake. My Ability was guiding me—taking me to the exact moment I needed to see. I stopped running as the glimmer of gold stopped moving at last, shining like a beacon in the air, just up ahead of me. Knowing instinctively what I had to do, I reached forward and touched it, shielding my eyes as the entire page in front of me suddenly materialized like a solid wall.

I’m standing in front of a train station.

I’m halfway across town, nowhere near the place I picked it up, but the detective girl is insisting this is the place...

The clock nearby chimes three times... It’s two in the afternoon, a full week after I first picked up the handkerchief...

I sigh and glance down at the handkerchief in my hand, this tiny pink square I happened to pick up. I stare at the softly embroidered “R.” Something about this feels familiar but I’m not sure what...

I look up. A girl is walking towards me. She’s not really looking up at me or any of the other people around us but at the ground. She has softly curled, light brown hair and big eyes and—woah!! She’s really cute!

I can feel my heart beating faster as she approaches. Her skirt and purse are the same color as the handkerchief in my hands.

Panicking, I wave to the dark-haired girl behind me, the detective—oh man, she’s not even standing anywhere close is she? I can’t see the look on her face but she’s mumbling something, pushing me towards the girl with the pink skirt.

I can’t do this—I can’t!!

My mouth’s already open—too late!

“Excuse me, Miss,” I hear myself say.

Uwaaah... she’s looking at me... What do I do?! She’s so freaking cute...

I hold out the handkerchief

“Are you looking for this?”

She stops, she stares at me and her hands fly to her lips. She’s nodding...!

Suddenly, the girl disappeared. Darkness fell over my eyes, something pressed against my face and I let out a strangled gasp when I realized I was now back in the physical world. The handkerchief slipped right out of my hands.

“Guess who?” a warm, familiar tenor whispered right into my ear.

“What the—Dazai?!” I shrieked.

Irritated, I reached up and tried to remove his large half-bandaged hands, but before I could grab hold, Dazai jerked my head to the side and laughed.

“Let go of me!”

“Not until you turn around to check~!” Dazai sang.

“Dazai, I know it’s you,” I snapped, getting to my feet, “so take your hands—”

Wrenching his hands away at last, I spun to face him. But as the cool air hit my face at last, I realized my cheeks were wet.

I froze.

I hadn’t been crying, so that could only mean one thing...

Gingerly, I reached up and brought the tips of my fingers to the area below my eyes. They came away wet with flecks of bright, red, fresh blood.

“...shit.”

Had Miura seen...?

At once, Dazai gasped dramatically.

“Oh my gosh, Kusunoki-kun!” he cried, frantically digging a handkerchief out of his own pocket. “I’m so sorry! Your makeup is all smudged.”

He smushed his handkerchief against my face and stared smearing at the area over my eyes.

“But don’t worry, I’ll fix it!”

“Ah—wait—Dazai-san, stop!!” I sputtered, making a face as part of the hankie went into my open mouth. I spat it out and tried to fight him off as he kept wiping at my eyes.

“I said stop! I can do it myself!”

“But I wanna help,” Dazai whined as I finally snatched the hankie from him and held it up against my eyes.

“I think you’ve helped enough,” I mumbled.

Clearing my throat, I tried to turn around so I could speak to Miura again. Unfortunately, because I couldn’t take the hankie away from my eyes, I ended up doing an awkward shuffle and bumping back into my own chair instead. I hissed as a bruise appeared on my shin and immediately scowled as I heard Dazai stifle a tiny snicker behind me. Thankfully, before I could hurt myself further, I felt Dazai’s hands at my back as he helped guide me in the right direction.

“Uh, Miura-san?”

I did a sort of half-bow in apology, hoping I didn’t look too stupid doing it (what if I was bowing at the wall the way Katai had done with me?!). At least Dazai hadn’t laughed this time, so maybe I was safe...

“Yes...?” Miura’s voice sounded tiny and unsure, and thankfully, was coming from right in front of me.

“I can figure out who that pink handkerchief belongs to, but you’re going to have to give me some time,” I babbled. “Do you think you could meet me back here in a week? Around one in the afternoon?”

“One in the afternoon?” Miura asked, sounding ecstatic.

There was a loud clattering noise as he hurriedly got to his feet, nearly knocking over the table from the sound of it.

“Yes, Detective! I’ll set my calendar—oh crap, it’s this late already?!”

I heard the glass door slide open, followed immediately by the sound of running feet.

“I gotta go back to work,” he called, his voice growing quieter as he ran further out into the hall, “But I’ll be back! See you in a week Miss Detective!”

There was a bang—the front door of the Agency office slammed shut and I took Dazai’s handkerchief away from my eyes at last.

“Oh my God, that was too close!” I gasped, turning to the tall, bandaged detective beside me. “Do you think he saw the blood?”

“Judging from his reaction, probably not,” Dazai said, shrugging.

“Thank goodness...” I moaned, sagging on my feet in relief.

I probably should’ve expected something like this to happen, given what happened the last time I used my power with Edogawa. But in all honesty, I’d expected the side effects to be a little better this time...

I should probably have more control by now. After all, Edogawa hadn’t seemed worried...

Shoulders slumping a little, I glanced down at Dazai’s handkerchief and winced. Two bright red spots, roughly the size of a pair of ten-yen coins, had bloomed like rose petals in the middle of the white and gray striped cloth. They were still wet to the touch. I crumpled the handkerchief in my hand and sighed.

“Thanks for helping me out back there, Dazai-san...” I mumbled sheepishly. “I’m... sorry about your handkerchief. I’ll go wash it for you.”

But as I took a step towards the open door, Dazai shook his head.

“You don’t have to do that right now, Kusunoki-kun,” he said, waving his hand dismissively. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Yes, it is!” I insisted, to Dazai’s apparent surprise. “President Fukuzawa asked you to keep my Ability a secret, didn’t you? You really helped me out back there. I mean...”

I chewed the inside of my cheek. Heat crawled up my neck as I remembered that the last time I’d interacted with him, he’d been carrying me (princess style) around because I was injured. I suddenly couldn’t look him in the face.

“It’s not only that... you saved me from getting blown up after I fought Akutagawa. You... you saved my life. Dazai-san, I...”

I twisted the handkerchief in my hands. My face felt hot.

“I... owe you one,” I finished lamely, staring at his feet.

For a moment, silence reigned. Dazai watched me quietly as I fidgeted with my hands in front of him. Then he raised an eyebrow.

“You owe me one, huh...?” he asked, rubbing his chin. “Well...”

I looked up just in time to see a familiar smirk crossing his face and before I could stop him or even react, he walked over to the door and started pulling it closed.

“I can think of a few ways for you to pay me back,” he whispered, his dark eyes gleaming with possibility. “In fact, why don’t you keep that handkerchief. You might need it later...”

My breath hitched in my throat.

“What do you mean by that, Dazai-san?”

“Oh, I think you know exactly what I mean...”

I took a step back, only to hit my chair again and I cursed as I accidentally sat back down in it.

“What’s the matter, Kusunoki?”

Two half-bandaged hands shot out and grasped the armrests. I glanced up only to find myself staring directly into Dazai’s chocolate brown eyes. His lips parted seductively.

“You seem a little nervous.”

“I-I’m not nervous,” I stammered, heat flooding into my face. I struggled not to squirm in my seat as Dazai’s grin widened.

“I just want to know why you closed the door...!”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Dazai asked.

His dark, tousled bangs fell into his eyes as he cocked his head to the side.

“I wanted to make sure we weren’t interrupted.”

“Inter...?”

My cheeks were on fire. My voice was no louder than a squeak. I shrank back into the chair as Dazai slowly leaned in close.

“After all,” he murmured, his voice low and husky in my ear. “This is a very personal matter...”

“Dazai-san...!”

This was it. My heart was beating way too fast and my face felt so hot, my brain was probably boiling over. I was going to pass out on the spot...!

I closed my eyes and braced myself. But to my surprise, nothing happened. Instead, I heard the flapping of paper and when I opened my eyes, a sealed envelope had appeared before my eyes. I blinked at it.

Dazai grinned.

“For you,” he said sweetly.

I stared, looking from Dazai to the envelope and back.

“Eh?” was all I could manage as Dazai placed the envelope in my hand and went to take a seat on the coffee table in front of me.

“What?”

He propped his chin up in his half-bandaged hands and looked at me.

“Disappointed?”

I scowled and returned my attention to the envelope, my cheeks burning in humiliation and rage.

“You wish,” I snapped, refusing to look at him as I tore it open. “And you know what? I take back what I said earlier, I...”

I trailed off as I looked inside the envelope. There was only one thing inside and I grew quiet as I lifted it out.

It was a Polaroid—a very old one—and the rectangular image nestled within the yellowed, off-white frame was grainy and faded with age. I could see three people in the picture, all laughing and smiling as they toasted one another with tiny cups of sake. They looked like they were having the time of their lives. Squinting at them, I brought the picture closer to my face, peering more carefully at the two figures on the left and I let out a soft gasp as I finally recognized them as a much younger Mr. and Mrs. Yamazaki. They were wearing their wedding clothes—the same clothes they were wearing in the big photo in Mrs. Yamazaki’s apartment—and as I followed their gaze to the left of the photo, I realized I knew who the third person was.

He had to be the former president of Tanaka Investments—Tanaka Ichiro’s uncle, the man who started the business. The more I stared at him, the more I began to see the family resemblance: the angle of the jawline, the shape of the nose...

I lowered the photo and looked at Dazai.

“Where... did you get this?”

“Shimada-san dropped this off last night while you were resting in the infirmary,” the bandaged detective answered. “He said to tell you, ‘President Tanaka sends his regards.’”

My eyes widened.

“He did?”

Dazai nodded.

And as I glanced back down at the photo, I thought I saw something written in black on the back side. I flipped it over.

“To Tanaka Isshun,” I read aloud, “Thank you for everything. I owe you my life... Yamazaki Shuji.”

I grew quiet. Dazai took his chin out of his hands and sat up.

“Something wrong, Kusunoki-kun?” he asked. “You look confused.”

I put the photo down and glanced up at him.

“I... I don’t understand,” I said. “If President Tanaka had this in his possession the whole time, then why would he have told me that Shuji-san was a bad person?”

Dazai’s eyebrows drew together.

“When did he tell you this?”

“Yesterday,” I said, thinking hard. “Or maybe it was the day before...?”

I shrank down in my seat a little as I told him the truth.

“It was the day you were in Nagano...”

“Ah.”

Dazai’s expression grew placid. I looked away from him and back at the photo.

“I-in any case, he said Shuji-san was desperate to escape Nagano, that he was willing to do anything it took to leave CORVID, include faking his own death. If this photo tells the truth, then why...?”

The photo wrinkled in my hand.

“Why did he give me this?”

Dazai grew quiet. Noticing my hand was shaking, he gently took the photo from me and examined it.

“I think...” he said quietly, lowering his eyes and scanning the picture, “that this is a thank you present. A gift for the rookie detective who saved him from being killed by a car bomb in that dingy parking garage.”

His expression softened into a smile as he handed the photo back.

“It’s also an apology.”

“Apology...?”

Confused, I took the photo from him.

“For what?”

“You remember that conversation we had back there in the conference room?” Dazai asked, as I looked back up at him. “The one about the goodly apple? About whether or not the apple is still good when you finally learn the truth?”

I nodded.

“Well,” Dazai said, his deep brown eyes sparkling as he regarded me, “I think this is President Tanaka’s way of saying you were right. That Yamazaki Shuji was, in fact, a good person.”

He leaned forward, his expression gentle.

“While I was in Nagano, I got to talk to Shuji-san’s family,” he said. “Do you want to know the reason why he wanted to leave CORVID?”

He leaned forward and tapped the photo.

“I heard he left...”

The tip of his finger brushed Mrs. Yamazaki’s face. Dazai smiled.

“So that he could get married.”

I breathed in sharply.

As I stared at the photo in my hands, at Mrs. Yamazaki’s smiling face, Dazai stood.

“I have one more present for you. And before you say you don’t want it,” he said, waving me off as I opened my mouth to protest, “It’s not from me.”

He placed a second envelope in my hands. Inside was a short letter and a beautiful bookmark in the shape of a flowering tree branch.

“It’s from Tomie-san’s family,” he said as I took out the bookmark. “They wanted to say thank you for saving her.”

“But I...”

I swallowed thickly. A lump was forming in my throat.

“I didn’t...”

I heard my own voice crack as I spoke. I hung my head.

“I didn’t save her,” I whispered.

As I stared at the photograph in my left hand, Mrs. Yamazaki’s smiling face began to blur.

“She was still murdered a week later... How could they still think I saved her...?”

“Because you gave her an extra week.”

Something large and warm settled on my head. I felt Dazai’s fingers slipping through my hair as my eyes began to burn and sting.

“A full seven extra days that she was able to spend with the people she loved, who loved her in return.”

Dazai smiled, his expression tender.

“And those seven extra days may have meant more to them than you and I could ever know.”

** A single drop fell onto the photo, followed swiftly by another.

“See,” Dazai said, as one by one, the tears began to fall like spring rain onto Mr. and Mrs. Yamazaki’s smiling faces.

“I told you that you’d need the handkerchief later.”

Taking the photo from me, Dazai reached over and placed a comforting arm around my shoulders as I broke down at last.

“In the end you were right, Kusunoki-kun,” he whispered, gently rubbing my back as I cried into my hands. “I guess all a goodly apple needs to be a goodly apple... is someone to believe in it.”

#bungo stray dogs #bungou stray dogs #dazai x oc #dazai x reader #yosano akiko #bsd dazai #bsd dazai osamu #dazai #dazai osamu

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masked-buffoon · 3 years

Text

Chapter 4: To exist (Part 4)

Warnings: use of drugs

Author notes: I did my best to depict her condition but I am not sure it is accurate... Not going to spoil though so we’ll debate that in the 6th part!

I kept the four syringes of morphine for the next morning, enduring the pain all night long without a single moment of rest. There was no point denying it; I was dying. How many days had I left? One? Two? I doubted I would see the end of the week. I was not afraid; death would bring me the peaceful silence I had always craved for, and I would finally close my eyes and lose consciousness, forever, without ever hearing people's thoughts again. I just hoped there was no afterlife, so I could enjoy the quietness for eternity, comfortably nested in endless darkness. How would Dazai-san react, then? How would he feel, when his weakest subordinate would achieve his own dream, leaving this rotten world once and for all? Would he feel jealous? How I wanted to quit life with a last insolent smirk directed to him.

These thoughts were the only thing moving my legs toward the headquarters. Physically, I was unable to do anything; I could barely walk without panting and my muscles ached horribly, not to mention that terrible headache I could not even tale with morphine… Training would be particularly difficult, but I could not care less. I was practically arrived at relief, all I had to do was extending my hand to reach for the black hole I had dreamt of.

"Good morning, Dazai-san." I greeted him, more joyful than usual.

"... Good morning...?"

I narrowed my eyes at him. Was it my superior...? Not only had he never greeted me back, but his expression... He seemed lost. He did not look like a man at all anymore, but like a boy, a poor sixteen years old boy who was discovering life and its hazards.

"Is there anything wrong...?" I could not help asking, seeing he was staring at the void.

"I am fine..." He answered in a breath, barely turning his eye toward me "But you... Are rarely cheerful when coming..."

Was my behaviour bothering him? It indeed could appear odd for someone striving to understand human interactions like him... For one to change his mind so quick, we truly were bizarre animals.

"Some good news..." I hummed "For the both of us, I believe. By the way, Dazai-san, have you decided on my punishment for being a drug addict?"

"I'll let it slide..." He sighed, running his hand through his messy brown locks "There is no point... In punishing you for taking medications."

He left me speechless, astonished. He had been rather kind, in the past, but never to this point. What did he have in mind? What could he be thinking? Why did he not slap me for being cocky around him? What was the meaning in acting proud if he did not respond by getting pissed off?

"Well... Thank you, Dazai-san...?" I blinked, loading my guns for training.

It clicked to me. He was surely putting on the facade of a redeeming man so I could lower my guard and become the submissive pawn I once had been, then as soon as I would look down at my feet and bow to him, he would start hitting me again. Was he so sadistic...? No, he was able to think something like this. He was able to manipulate people's minds, even better than I could ever do thanks to using my own ability, with just the power of his words and his excellent acting.

"Why did you not rest at home today too?"

Another attack. His words, filled with make believe concern, did not manage to cross the wall of mistrust I built when facing him. Each time his tongue slid and his vocal chords worked, there was an implied meaning, an utter motive only he could know about. I did not fall for his scheme.

"I figured I did not want to be beaten for disobeying your previous order... You told me to be there this morning." I replied.

"Why do you obey if you think so lowly of me...?"

His trembling voice tugged on the sensitive strings of my heart, reminding me I still had one, and it required all of my willpower not to give in and admit I was defeated by his worries. They were fake, so was he, I could not play the game he wanted me to.

"Humans obey when they respect or fear one. In my case, it is both. I am scared of you. I am so frightened that, every time I see you, I wish I were elsewhere, but if I run away, you will hurt me." I explained "It doesn't matter anyway —"

I was cut by a sudden dizziness. My vision became blurred and I did not realise I was losing balance until the world reversed itself and I hit the ground. It was hard to breathe, as though something was compressing my lungs, and I was quickly suffocating. As I closed my heavy eyelids, letting the darkness take over, the sound of my heartbeat reached my ears. Slow, calm, almost serene… My time had come and I accepted it with opened arms. It was not all too bad… After all these sufferings, my death was unexpectedly peaceful. I had lived such a miserable and immoral life, yet, somehow, I could end everything without too much pain. I was so thankful… I had not been forsaken by this world… I had not been forgotten… I had perhaps been pitied for facing so many trials without success, it had been decided that I would die comfortably. Who would have thought the last moments of my existence would be the happiest ones…?

"Ogawa-kun...?!" My superior called me, his voice distant and confused "Ogawa-kun...!"

Could he not stay away and watch me agonise in silent…?

His footsteps were fast, and he turned me around, rather brusquely. I gasped, finally noticing I could not breath and I felt the muscles of my neck ache, contracting. Despite my will to die, that body would fight till the end. The desperate struggle brought tears to my eyes and I held onto my chest. The fire consuming my lungs made me cough, wasting the precious air that kept me alive. I glared at my superior and, through my tears saw his helpless expression as he pulled out his phone. I wanted to shout, yell at him for ruining my death… But a better idea came to my mind. I had to put the remaining oxygen to good use.

"Are you... Jealous...?" I found the force to grin one last time "That I would... Leave before you..."

"Don't say stupidities...!" His voice broke at the end, unexpectedly.

"If... You are… Not yet… Completely heartless..." I panted, regularly cut by my coughs "You could... Pull out… Your gun... And shoot me... Once and… For all..."

"I won't...!!" He shook his head "I've never wanted to... Nurse!! I need someone in the basement!! Immediately!!"

My eyes widened in pure shock. What… Was he saying…? Why… Why, now that I was leaving…? Why did he have to make me regret…?

My eyelids fell, and for once, the world died around me.

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yellowcanna · 4 years

Text

Duo Heroes, Double Black

Summary:

“We are broadcasting this live above U.A High School and you won’t believe what we are seeing! Everyone, please take a look!”

In the middle of a no-longer-empty track field, were three black vehicles. The cars were parked in a straight line with the perfect distances apart from one another. In front of the line of cars was a table oddly standing out in the middle of the field with black sunshade set over it.

Men dressed in black suits stood in a perfect line between the cars and the table. They stood up straight, chin held high and hands folded behind their backs. It was obvious that these were well-trained bodyguards.

However, those weren’t what shocked the audiences sitting in front of their TVs. No…rather than the men and the cars...it was that single man prostrating on the ground, his attire making him stand out from all the black.

“ALL MIGHT! IT’S ALL MIGHT!” The reporter screamed, causing the microphone to ring from her sharp voice. “The former No.1 Hero who hasn’t been seen since the announcement of his retirement!! But…just what is this current situation?!”

What was the current situation?

That was what Toshinori wanted to know.

Rating: T

Genre: Crossover, comedy, fluff, shounen-ai (mild boy love)

Pairing: Soukoku (Dazai x Chuuya)

Author: Canna / Yellow Canna

Status: Complete

AVAILABLE ON AO3

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Story Beta’d by Nanami_ontheShore

It began on an ordinary Friday.

The afternoon sun was strong, heating up the land below. There wasn’t a single sign of any clouds in the azure sky.

This was supposed to be a peaceful day for friends and families to gather and celebrate the coming of the weekend.

CRAAAAAASH

Unfortunately, this Friday was destined not to be a peaceful one.

“U.A has been invaded by unknown enemies!”

“Men in black are surrounding U.A High School!!”

“Could this be a Villain attack?!”

“We are awaiting the helicopters to get a better look—”

“Black cars can be seen barricading the entrances to U.A High school…!”

“The police are at the scene…!”

Every news channel was going crazy with Japan’s entire attention all directed to one school.

U.A High School.

“We interrupt everyone with an emergency broadcast.” The newscaster announced sternly as she sat before the camera. “This morning at 9:24 am, unknown vehicles were spotted breaking entry into U.A High school. The emergency gate of the school has been activated, but according to witnesses, the gate was blasted apart by an unknown force which is speculated to be some sort of psychokinesis Quirks.”

As she spoke, a screenshot appeared by her left. It was a picture of the U.A High school gate, where the thick metallic barrier was wretched.

“Police and Heroes are now at the scene. We will move over to Furi-san, who is currently at the sight.”

The screen changed to a man that had the appearance of a ferret with curly brown fur. He was standing amongst a mass of people—all of them being reporters judging from the equipment they were holding.

“Thank you, Tanaka-san.” The man had to shout into the mic in his hand to be heard. “I am currently at the front of U.A High School, but due to police and Hero involvements, we are unfortunately unable to get any closer!!”

He then stepped to the side and the cameraman raised the camera, shooting pass the crowd to give the audiences a look in the distance.

Thanks to the police pushing all the reporters back, they were able to create an empty space around U.A High School’s gate. The camera was easily able to capture the black vehicles blocking the entrance with men in black suits and dark sunglasses standing guard.

“As you can see, there are currently five black vehicles barricading the gate! Their identities and goals are unknown, but neither police nor Heroes are taking any action! It appears that they are not Villains!! As of yet, no one from U.A High School has stepped out to give us any information. We can only—” Furi then paused, hand going to the Bluetooth in his ear as he tried to hear whatever was being said.

After a moment, the man’s beady eyes lit up and hurriedly turned back to the camera.

“The helicopter team has just arrived! We will switch over to Saito-san who will give us an air view of just what is happening within U.A!”

Once more, the scene changed, this time to a woman with bob cut hair.

“This is Saito!” She shouted through the noise generated by the helicopter's main rotor. She had safety equipment tied over her body as she leaned over the open door of the helicopter. Her clothes and hair were flapping wildly in the wind as she gestured for the cameraman to get closer to her.

“We are broadcasting this live above U.A High School and you won’t believe what we are seeing! Everyone, please take a look!”

The camera then turned to the world outside. For a moment, the entire screen became white due to the difference in lighting, but the lens soon adjusted to show the audience just what was going on inside U.A.

Everyone sitting in front of the television had their eyes bulging out in shock at the sight.

There, in the middle of a no-longer-empty track field, were three black vehicles identical to the ones surrounding the gate. The cars were parked in a straight line with the perfect distances apart from one another. In front of the line of cars was a table oddly standing out in the middle of the field with black sunshade set over it.

But those weren’t what shocked the audiences. No…rather than the men and the cars...it was that single man kneeling before the table, his attire making him stand out from all the black.

“ALL MIGHT! IT’S ALL MIGHT!” The reporter all but screamed, causing the microphone to ring from her sharp voice. “The former No.1 Hero who hasn’t been seen since the announcement of his retirement!! But…just what is this current situation?!”

What was the current situation?

That was what Toshinori wanted to know as well.

The loud noises of helicopters rang in the air, followed by the reports’ screams as they constantly flew over him, casting short moments of shade over his burning body.

The former No.1 Hero has been kneeling here for a good hour now. There was a layer of sweat coating his body with the strong sunlight burning into his back. Even his hair became drier than usual.

To make matters worse, the scorching sunlight wasn’t the only thing drilling holes into his body. It was the eyes of the hundreds of students that made it all the more painful. When another shadow passed by him, All Might didn’t need to look up to know another helicopter had arrived, carrying more reporters to film his shameful situation.

He really wanted to crawl into a hole and die!

The loud sizzling sound was constantly tempting Toshinori. Unable to help himself any longer, he snuck a glance up to the chief who had just slapped a piece of beautiful wagyu onto the hot iron pan. The aromatic smell of meat only added to his torture as he swallowed hard.

“Here, Chuuya! Ah~” A cheerful voice sang as the young man with chocolate brown hair waved around a thin slice of finely cooked wagyu on the tip of his silver fork.

The man with pumpkin-orange hair glanced at it skeptically but still leaned over to his partner. The black chains bounding both of their arms between them jingled from his movement. A pair of rosy lips opened up and wrapped around the beautifully cooked beef.

His lips closed around the fork before he slid back. Just like that, the man took away the juicy beef from the fork, his lips wiping off the juice on the silver fork and leaving behind only a thin trace of his saliva.

“Hmm…it’s not bad!” The redhead commented with mild surprise as if expecting otherwise.

“Why of course!” The brunet said. He happily stabbed his fork into another slice. With the same fork he had fed the redhead, he brought the piece of meat into his mouth. “I did tell you that this store got the best wagyu recipe in Musutafu!”

“You said the same thing in Hokkaido and that place was shit.” The orange-haired man retorted, raising his empty glass as a man in a black suit stepped forward. He picked up the bottle of wine from the ice and elegantly refilled the glass.

“It was your fault for not realizing it was April the first.” The brunet shrugged, waving his glass with half-melted ice. A different man came up. He took the empty cup, dumping out the water and the melted ice to replace it with new ones. After that, he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and filled the glass with the golden fluid.

“How about I strangle you with your bandages and hang you on the rooftop on Halloween?”

“Chuuya! I never knew you were into that kind of play!”

“You—”

“Um…” A voice cut in just before the two could start bickering.

Umber and icy blue eyes instantly snapped to the No.1 Hero kneeling before them. The poor man was shivering badly, looking to be on the verge of tears as he looked pleadingly at the two youngsters.

“C-can we please take this somewhere else?”

It was truly a pitiful sight.

Anyone with a shred of sympathy would immediately escort the former Hero indoors and provide him with the finest treatment if they had saw him acting like this. Unfortunately for him, the two people in front of him had anything but sympathy.

“Oh?” The brown-haired male rested his chin in his palm. “I thought you liked attention. Or could it be that the audiences aren’t enough?” He said while nodding, as if agreeing with his own words. “After all, wherever you go you’re always surrounded by the media. That’s right! Let’s invite them into U.A right now! I’m sure they’ll be thrilled to see you! Especially with your spectacular battle last month! I’m sure the entire world is dying to see their Hero again!”

“I’M SO SORRY!” The No.1 Hero screamed off the top of his lungs as his forehead met the ground in a loud bang. The sound was so loud that even the students watching from the window cringed. “PLEASE FORGIVE ME!”

“What…is going on?” Iida muttered as he stared out the window with the rest of his classmates. None of them had any idea what had happened. They were just having breakfast in the cafeteria when the gate was blasted open and these cars charged into the school property.

At first, everything had been a mess. It was like that time with the reporters all over again. Everyone thought it was an attack from Villains, but rather than Villains, these people in black suits came out. At the centre of these bodyguard-like men were two people, instantly standing out from the “Extras” as Bakugou would call them.

These two were dressed in black suits like the rest of the men, but with more taste and uniqueness. The fiery-haired male with a fedora wore a crimson dress shirt underneath his suit with a leather choker around his neck.

The tall brown-haired male wore bandages that could easily be seen underneath his suits.

They looked young, perhaps having just entered their twenties. And what really caught the students’ eyes about them were that thick black chain. The chain looked to be around half a meter long, with one end wrapped around the shorter man’s left wrist while the other end wrapped around the taller one’s right hand.

The events after that were a blur.

All they saw was All Might scrambling out there while Principal Nezu announced for everyone to calm down. Due to all the reporters and the intruders outside, classes were temporarily stopped until the school could calm the situation.

But no matter how they looked at it…how could any of them be calm?!

BANG

Everyone jumped and turned their eyes to the shorter male who had just slammed his feet onto the beautifully crafted oak table—which even to now, no one had any idea how they transported. As if knowing he was going to do that, his companion had picked up the plate of wagyu and his whiskey to prevent the food from being flipped over by the sheer pressure. Those with more sensitive hearings even hear the cracks in the wood that was threatening to split it in half.

“Sorry?” The fedora-wearing man wasn’t loud, but in the absolute silence, his words clearly reached the student’s ears. “Sorry for what?”

“I…should have told you about my confrontation with All for One.” All Might admitted meekly, looking nothing like the No.1 Hero he used to be.

“And?” The brunet swirled his glass of whiskey around, seeming to enjoy the sight of the adult grovelling at their feet.

“I…” All Might’s voice faded and his sweats were coming out like waterfall now. He obviously didn’t know what else to say, but knew that he could never say that! Was there something else he should be apologizing?!

Even the students were affected by his nervousness. All of them were looking at their Hero worriedly, wondering just what in the world was going on.

“To think that they would make All Might…just who the heck are they?!” Kaminari choked, unable to continue looking at the sight.

“I’ve never seen them before. I don’t think they’re Heroes?” Yaoyorozu stated unsurely.

“Rather than Heroes, they look like some sort of Yakuza?” Kirishima pointed out.

“But do Yakuza wear suits?” Ashido asked.

“No way! All Might would never bow Villains or Yakuzas!!” Hagakure shouted, earning nods of approval from everyone within hearing range.

“Even the media have no idea,” Uraraka said, flipping her phone around to show the others. The helicopter had changed location in order to capture the two people being protected under the sunshade. Although they were able to catch the two men on camera, they were just as clueless as the students.

“It can’t be…could it? But…” Hearing that familiar mumbling, all eyes were turned to Midoriya.

“Hey nerd, you know something don’t you?!” Bakugou spat. Surprisingly, his voice didn’t snap Midoriya out of his thought. The green-haired boy’s muttering became faster and faster as he eyed the two men sitting outside. As his muttering increased, his eyes were shining brighter and brighter until they were practically sparkling.

“Black suits, chains intertwining their hands, hat, bandages…!”

“Deku-kun?” Uraraka was about to give her friend a pat on the shoulder when…

“WHAT DID YOU SAY?!”

Everyone jumped and all turned to Uraraka’s phone, where the scream had come from. The scene switched back to the female reporter who had a mixture of shock and horrified on her face. She hurriedly turned to the camera and put on the best professional face she could muster.

“IT’S THEM!” Midoriya shouted, his voice overlapping with the reporters’.

“We have just received the identity of the two mysterious men! You won’t believe it!” The woman shouted, barely containing her excitement.

“IT’S DOUBLE BLACK!”

Her and Midoriya’s voice shouted at the same time, causing countless jaws to hit the floor.

“YOU’VE HEARD IT RIGHT!” The reporter continued. “THE MYSTERIOUS MEN THAT INVADED U.A HIGH SCHOOL ARE NONE OTHER THAN THE DUO HEROES, DOUBLE BLACK!!”

A second of silence filled the entire cafeteria before everything fell into chaos.

“EEEEEEEEEEEH?!?!”

“D-D-Double Black?! That Double Black?!”

“The Port Mafia?!”

“The infamous duo?!”

“Why are they here?!”

“B-but aren’t they based in Yokohama?!”

“Are they seriously Double Black?!”

“The real deal?!”

“THEY REALLY ARE HERE!” Midoriya cried louder than anyone else as he snapped his head to his classmates. Stars were practically dancing out of his eyes from how brightly they were glittering.

“Double Black! The first underage Heroes in the histories of Heroes!!” Midoriya began to rant while frantically scribbling into his notepad.

“They debuted at fifteen and started their own Hero Agency in the heart of Yokohama! Since then, Villain activities in Yokohama has been zero! Yokohama became the very first city to ever achieve a zero crime rate! Their black suits are their signature Hero uniform! To this day, no one knows exactly what their Quirks are! All they know is that one of them has the ultimate offensive Quirk while the other has the ultimate defensive Quirk! They are the perfect duo that has ever—!”

“Okay, okay, we get it! You can stop now! We all know who Double Blacks are!” Kaminari cut in.

“But why is the Double Black here?” Ojirou asked the question they were all wondering. After all, everyone knew that Double Black—or the entire Port Mafia in general—never leaves Yokohama. They were always holed up inside that city and never bothered with anything happening outside.

They never even showed up at the Hero Billboard even though they ranked fourth—or third now since All Might retired. And those rankings they got was from the entire population living within Yokohama.

“And why is All Might bowing to them, gero?” Asui added.

Silence fell over them, even Midoriya, who finally seemed to snap out of his fanboy mode and remembered the situation his mentor was in.

The next moment, their idol—the former No.1 Hero, finally gave them the answer to the question that had been bothering them for the past hour.

“I’M SORRY! PLEASE FORGIVE ME, MY SONS!”

Those who were leaning against the window slipped and tumbled to the ground.

Those that were eating choked and spat out their food.

Those who had been standing normally and quietly observing…fell into a trance.

For a whole minute, everything was quiet.

And then, that serene silence was shattered by deafening screams ten times louder than before.

“HIS WHAT?!”

▬▭▬ ▬▭▬ ✦✧✦ ▬▭▬ ▬▭▬

It was merely human instinct to fear the night.

To the humans living within this society, night time was evil, for that evil took form during then. In Japan, crime activities became eighty percent higher during the night. When the last ray of sun left the land, Villains will emerge from the shadows to terrorize the city.

However, there is one place that welcomed the night.

That place is Yokohama—Japan's second-largest city with a population of over three million. The people that lived in that city enjoyed the night more than the day because in Yokohama, there was no time safer than the night.

This was all thanks to the living legend that walks within the darkness of their city.

They were an odd pair, dressed in black suits with a single black chain binding them together.

Just simply hearing their calm, steady footsteps and the jingling sounds of chains was enough to bring peace to the neighbourhood.

Catching a glimpse of their shadow was considered good luck.

They were the Pro Heroes that operated as one and shared a single Hero name—Double Black.

No one knew where they came from. Their Hero licenses were real and confirmed by the government, yet their records were unable to be found. No one even knew where they went to school.

Four years ago, the two of them—both at the tender age of fifteen—suddenly appeared within Yokohama and boldly announced the entire city as their territory. In the beginning, everyone took them as a joke.

They were children, after all.

However, in less than a week, these two children swept through the city like a hurricane. In a blink of an eye, they eradicated all Villains dwelling within Yokohama and even ripped out organizations that had been taking root in that city for years.

The Villains they had defeated were completely broken, both mentally and physically. Even if their bodies recovered, their minds could never be healed. No one knew just what happened to them, but one thing they can be certain of was that whenever the name Double Black was mentioned, they would break down. It was as if Double Black were using these Villains to send a warning around the world.

But Double Black didn’t stop there. They didn’t eradicate the Villains, but Heroes as well. All the local Heroes were thrown out of the city together with their agencies.

“Yokohama is now under our protection, so you’re no longer needed.”

“What’s the point of keeping you around when you can’t even clean up these shits?”

These were the infamous words that the Double Black had spoken and were trending even to this day.

It was also these words that sparked war between the Heroes of Yokohama and Double Black. The government has deleted all footage concerning the fight that had broken out between the Heroes, but witnesses of that night could still tell the tales of how Double Black single handedly crushed all the Heroes in just one night.

After the Heroes of Yokohama were chased out, they filed complaints to the police and the governments. They were hoping the government would do something about the pair, yet they didn’t do anything. Not only did they not punish Double Black for attacking other Heroes, the government even allowed Double Black’s request of not allowing anymore Heroes into their city.

Since then, Yokohama only has two Heroes.

In the beginning, the people of Yokohama had mixed feelings. On one hand, the Double Black completely pulled out all Villains rooted in their city. On the other hand, Double Black had also pulled out the Heroes that had been protecting them all this time.

Then later on, the people of Yokohama were livid.

It didn’t take long for them to discover how Double Black functions.

Double Black only acts during the night, as that is apparently their work hour.

Despite being Heroes, they were completely treating their profession as a standard job.

After their work hour, they will not act upon any of their Hero’s duties. Even if a bank robbery were to happen right in their face, they will walk around it and continue on with whatever they were doing. Even if they came across a dying person, the most they would do was call an ambulance and continue on with their lives.

The people of Yokohama began to protest, wanting the two teenagers that called themselves Heroes out of their city. But as time passed, these protests vanished without a trace.

The reason was that despite Double Black not acting during their off-hours, the moment night came, those who committed crimes during daytime would face the wrath of Double Black. It was said that the retaliation they were met with was worse than committing crimes during the night.

Whenever a Villain was collected from Yokohama, anyone that saw them would always say the same thing.

“It would have been better if they were dead.”

Yes, these Villains were beaten and abused to the point where death would be a blessing. At the very least, dying could free them from the suffering Quirks and current medical equipment cannot heal. That was how broken and beyond saving they were.

Double Black would never kill the Villains, yet all Villains would have been better off dead. Due to the concerns this news may bring to society, the government was quick to seal it off. It wasn’t hard, for that no one had ever witnessed Double Black engaging in enemies due to them operating only in the shadows.

The governments were concerned about the images Double Black may give off to Heroes in general. They needed to show the entire country that the future Heroes were striving. This was a time to show that Heroes are superior to Villains, especially with the symbol of peace leading them.

But more than anything…they cannot go against Double Black.

They can use all the righteous reasoning, but in the end, it all came down to fear.

The Japanese government was afraid of the duo Heroes they allowed into the society.

Unlike the naïve citizens, every single person in the government knew what these two teenagers were capable of. Not even the No.1 Hero—their adoptive father—can stop their rampage once they began.

The last thing anyone wanted was for these two to defect from Heroes and turn into Villains.

That and they simply can’t come up with the right argument against them.

“It just turned out this way after our battle, what are we supposed to do? If we let them go, innocent people would get hurt! Or are you suggesting that we Heroes should mind the welfare of Villains when we engage in a fight?

In that case, why don’t we set up a press conference right now and explain it to the world how Heroes should operate from here now on out! Let’s also not forget the new laws and restrictions needed to be placed on Heroes!

Firstly, Hero cannot attack Villain in the head! We wouldn’t want these Villains to suffer any head injuries or die, right? The stomach is another no! You never know what organs you might accidentally damage. Ribcage should be off limits as well! It would be dangerous if a broken rib punctured the lung or heart, wouldn’t it? On top of that, we have to worry whether or not they have heart conditions. Damages in the limbs would also be risky! If you don’t control your strength right, they may be disabled for life and we wouldn’t want that now, would we? We must illegalize any Quirk with destructive properties—such as fire, electricity or mental Quirks that directly attacks the brain.

And—”

Needless to say, neither the police nor the government would sit down to talk with Double Black ever again. If they really agreed to all of those things the Double Black had suggested, then both citizens and Heroes will start a riot.

The name Double Black, in many ways, brought more fear to Villains than All Might. No, compared to the devils wearing the skin of human children, All Might could be seen as an angel in comparison. Before anyone knew it, the crime rate within Yokohama dropped at an alarming rate.

In no time at all, Yokohama has become the first and only zero crime city.

This was a feat that not even the No.1 Hero All Might could achieve.

Despite never taking a step off Yokohama ground, Double Black became famous throughout the world and was ranked fourth on the Hero’s Billboard.

For the past four years, Yokohama was ranked first in the most ideal city people wanted to move to. The pricing for houses skyrocketed in a single week, up to the point where it became impossible for any outsider to move in, and no Yokohama citizens in their right mind would want to leave a zero-crime city.

The Double Black constructed their agency at the heart of Yokohama. The building was enormously tall, built in sleek black with modernized design. The locals would call this agency Double Black’s watchtower…or the God’s watchtower. It was a symbol addressing all Villains hiding within the shadows that they were always overseeing this city.

The Double Black didn’t stop there, however. Now, four more identical buildings were being constructed next to the existing one. Many people questioned it, as no one saw the need in having so many buildings.

In one of a rare interview with one of the Double Black, the man simply said this:

“It’s a business. As Heroes, we must constantly think of what we can do for the people we protect. Yokohama has become a zero-crime city, then what should we, as Heroes, do next? Of course, it is to help improve our country’s economy. That’s why my partner and I decided to merge our agency with our newly established trading company—The Port Mafia.”

And so…the Port Mafia was established.

Many people thought the two Heroes were joking. Who has ever heard of professional Heroes having a side job? Yet these two young Heroes did. Not only that they did it, but their company even flourished and the Port Mafia was now one of the leading trading companies and Hero agency within Japan.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call these two young Heroes living Legends.

Now these two Legends had left Yokohama and were inside Japan’s most distinguished Hero school.

“Imagine our surprise~” Dazai Osamu laughed as he sat with his partner on the couch inside the principal’s office. “To suddenly see our dear father live on the television, facing All for One in that wimpy form~”

“Uh…!” Toshinori who was still kneeling on the floor took an invisible jab into the heart.

“And all by himself! Truly the model of how all Heroes should be, isn’t that right, Chuuya?” Dazai continued to speak in that exaggerated tone of his, looking over to his partner who was anything but impressed.

The petite but muscly young man had his legs propped up on the table with his elbow pressed into the armrest and his cheek against his knuckles.

“So,” Chuuya eyed the man on the ground, “you lot were so confident you didn’t even need backups, huh?”

“No, that’s not it, we had backups.” Toshinori tried to explain, but the two young men weren't having it.

“Ah, those Heroes were your backups?” Dazai chuckled light-heartedly. He set his teacup on the table and his fingers along the rim, creating a small vibration into the air. “I’m sorry, they hadn’t done anything at all so I thought they had some cosplayers standing there for moral support!”

“Dazai-kun.” Nezu frowned, unable to overlook the disrespect the young man was clearly displaying. All the Heroes went all out in that battle and some were severely injured. For the brunet to say such a thing was pure insult to those Heroes. “Those Heroes fought their all—”

“And?” Chuuya cut in. “What did they do? Did they capture anyone from the League of Villains?”

“No, but it was thanks to them that—”

“So they got nothing to show for the result.” Chuuya snorted. Blue eyes narrowed over the white creature sitting on the opposite couch. “All you did was ruin a perfectly good opportunity to take the League of Villains down.”

“Chuuya!” Toshinori chided disapprovingly.

“Chuuya’s right.” Dazai hummed, completely ignoring their adoptive father and focused on the mouse, or bear—or whatever it was. “If you had waited a couple more days to assemble more Heroes into your little operations, the League of Villains wouldn’t have escaped. However, you prioritized the name of U.A over the safety of the entire country and you dare to preach us?”

“I did not prioritize U.A,” The principal said calmly. “They had captured one of our students. We have no time to—”

“No time?” The brunet smirked. “How? From what I see, he could hang on for a couple of days. The League of Villains went through all this trouble to capture him was to turn him to their side and showcase him to the world to break society's view on Heroes. Do you think that after all the trouble they went through, they would kill him just because he rebelled?”

“But young Bakugou—”

“—wouldn’t have died if you had waited a day or two.” Dazai finished for Toshinori. “And even by whatever miracle that he pissed them off and made them accidentally kill him, he’s just one life. That is where your plan failed. As long as your school’s name doesn’t get tarnished and that one student whose life obviously worth more than the rest of the country is safe, everything else doesn't matter.”

“Dazai!” Toshinori gasped. “You know it’s not like that!”

“Really?” This time, it wasn’t Dazai who responded, but Chuuya. “Because that’s how it looked to me, old man.”

“So what if your little school’s name got tarnished?” Dazai said. “Rip it apart and make a new one. If you don’t want that, then create a bigger gossip to cover up yours. If you’re incapable of doing even that, then give it five years and people will eventually move on and forget about it. You think reporters will still make news of you when there’s no news left to make and everyone’s tired of listening?”

Despite talking to Toshinori, Dazai’s eyes shifted to the principal who had kept silent despite the youth berating him.

“If it was me, I would gather all the Heroes in the top twenty Billboards and have the long-distance fighters supporting ex-No.1 here. With One for All launching an attack on the League of Villains, it’s obvious that All for One will appear. He told you about that little underling he picked up, didn’t he?”

Dazai looked over to Toshinori.

“What?” Toshinori stared at Dazai and Chuuya in shock. “You two…you knew? You know who Shigaraki Tomura is?!”

“When did you know?” The Principal asked, face turning grim as he regarded the two young men.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Chuuya huffed. “The moment we learned that All for One became a babysitter, this guy searched it up—starting with every orphanage in Japan.” He said as he jabbed his thumb at his partner.

“As long as the person got records, they can easily be tracked,” Dazai replied. “All for One hated you One for All holders. You’ve always been a thorn on his side. Then what can he do to get back at you? The only thing would be your master, dear father. Why wouldn’t you think he’ll use this against you?”

“Why…why didn’t you tell me?!” Toshinori coughed as he clenched onto his side.

“What would you do if I did?” Dazai questioned. “Save him? He’s beyond saving the moment Shimura Nana decided to abandon her son—his father. If she had really wanted to protect her family, she should have kept her child close or better yet, don’t give birth. Can you really say you’re surprised by the way things turned out?”

Toshinori gritted his teeth before going into another series of violent coughs. Blood was pouring out, but neither of the two sitting there looked like they cared.

“Tell me,” Dazai whispered softly - despite his cold, harsh words - as he looked at the two in front of them. “Did you guys seriously think you’ve won?”

Neither of the two in front of them answered.

“You captured All for One but the League of Villains escaped. The Symbol has retired. Everything went according to All for One’s plans. A new era for Villains is beginning. The Heroes, on the other hand, lost the only pillar that’s been their support for the past decades, and let’s not mention how incompetent most of them are. The world has now been reset into a clean slate. So let me ask you again, did you really think you’ve won?”

Dazai took another small sip of his tea before setting it onto the table.

“What is considered winning…was if you guys had done everything you could to capture that brat you guys called Shigaraki Tomura. He’s the one All for One created his plans around. You’ve let All for One lived for so long, what difference would it make letting him live longer? Which brings our discussion to our earlier topic—how the matter could have been easily resolved if you had waited for the other Heroes. For example, just having Hawks alone would have been able to change the outcome. With his speed, he could easily have stayed out of the fighting range and stayed hidden. The only time he needed to come out was to capture the escaping Villains you let go of.”

“…Dazai-kun, Chuuya-kun.” Principal Nezu spoke after a long while, setting the tea down onto the table as he looked at the two young men sitting before him. “If you two were to assist us, what do you think would be the casualty rate?”

Nezu had phrased it by casualty, not success…because they already knew the answer to that.

Had these two joined in, the success rate in capturing all of the Leagues of Villain, including All for One himself—was a hundred percent. What was more frightening was that this one hundred percent would still be if the two had worked alone, without the interference of other Heroes.

They only learned of this after the League of Villain’s attack on USJ, through Toshinori’s call with his sons.

The League of Villains was originally hiding in Kamino. When Chuuya and Dazai moved into Yokohama, All for One—for the first time in his life—was met with a mountain he couldn’t overcome. A battle happened one night…one that was never documented or recorded because it was over as soon as it began. With Chuuya alone, he singlehanded destroyed all the Nomus and critically injured All for One.

Had Kurogiri not warped them away, they would have died right then and there. No…not even that. With Dazai’s nullification Quirk, they wouldn’t have a chance in escaping. The only reason they were able to leave was that Dazai and Chuuya had no interest in any of them. It was no secret that Double Black never chases after Villains that left their territory.

It didn’t matter to them whether or not the Villain that fled was All for One. To them, All for One was the same as the other thugs that ran from them with their tails between their legs. They were all opponents that could be easily crushed anytime they wanted.

It wasn’t like Nezu never considered asking the two for help. It was simply that the pair made it clear the moment they became Heroes that they had no interest in peace or the safety of the world. They were only interested in looking after their territory, which was Yokohama.

“This isn’t about us.” Chuuya said, narrowing his eyes at the principal. “It’s about you. This bastard already told you what you should have done.”

“But if you must know, I can enlighten you.” Dazai said as he laced his fingers and set his hand on his knee. “If Chuuya and I were involved, the casualty rate would be zero. If you had formed a plan properly without putting that kid and your little school’s reputation first, your success rate would have been a hundred percent.”

The principal sighed, not saying anything to defend himself as that was the truth. They had let go of the League of Villain in order to preserve the school’s name and Bakugou.

Toshinori couldn’t argue either, as it was true that he failed in capturing the League of Villains. Although there were many things in which he disagreed with his two sons, he knew he wouldn’t win against Dazai in an argument.

“Chuuya, Dazai.” Toshinori sat upright to face his two boys. “I’m sorry for making you worry. I should have told you beforehand regarding—”

“Worry? Who?” Dazai blinked, tilting his head in mock-confusion.

“Eh?”

“You reaped what you sowed.” Chuuya deadpanned.

“Wait, aren’t you the least bit worried about me?!”

“Nope.” The two replied in perfect sync.

That was the last blow Toshinori needed.

With his body still recovering from his fight against All for One and having knelt in the burning sunlight for a whole hour (plus another hour in the principal’s office), his frail body finally gave out. The blond hurled out a large amount of blood before he fainted, face landing into the red puddle he had created.

Dazai sipped on his tea purposely loud. After drowning the tea in one go, he set the cup back onto the table and clapped his hand. The door to the principal’s office opened as two men in black suits walked in. One grabbed Toshinori under the arms while the other took his legs. Just like this, the two carried the former No.1 Hero out of the office.

“Well then, I do believe we’ve intruded long enough.” Dazai got up with Chuuya in toll. “These are the paper works and vacation forms our daddy has signed.”

Dazai waved and a man came up to set a stack of paper in front of Nezu. The principal took a glance at All Might’s signature signed on the top of the paper. It was certainly his signature, but Nezu knew for a fact that the blond man would have never signed it.

“Of course!” He chimed all too cheerfully and grabbed the stack of papers as if afraid Dazai and Chuuya would take it back. “Do let him rest up!”

“Tch.” Chuuya clicked his teeth, shoving his hands in his pockets as he followed his partner out the door. Just before the two leave, they heard Nezu spoke up.

“Dazai-kun, Chuuya-kun. I look forward to the following months.”

Neither of them said nor acknowledged anything as one of their men closed the door to the principal’s office. When the pair turned to leave, they were greeted by a familiar face coming from around the corner.

The moment Aizawa Shota saw these two, his eyelids began to jump and his eyeballs felt dryer than usual. For a moment, the raven wondered if it was too late to turn around and pretend not to have seen anything.

“Well if it isn’t Uncle Shouta~” Dazai greeted while Chuuya tipped his hat.

Aizawa let out a small sigh as he walked up to the two younger Heroes.

“You two made quite the scene.” He stated unhappily.

“Now, now, don’t say that! We’ll be colleagues from now on, please do show us the rope, senpai~”

“Colleagues?” Aizawa was taken back by this. “What is this about?”

“Weren’t you being called in by the principal?” Dazai smirked as he and Chuuya walked past the raven with their men carrying an unconscious Toshinori.

Aizawa stood there as he watched them go.

He suddenly got a dreaded feeling and hurried towards the principal’s office.

▬▭▬ ▬▭▬ ✦✧✦ ▬▭▬ ▬▭▬

Toshinori couldn’t begin to describe what this feeling was as he slowly woke from his dream. It had been so long since he was able to wake up feeling so refreshed and energetic. Being the top Hero, he rarely had any time for breaks. To be able to sleep five hours a night was already a blessing for him. Many times, he had even woke up in the middle of the night upon hearing the echoes of sirens.

He blinked at the warm sunlight spilling over his face. Very slowly, minding his injuries, he sat up. He looked around the room and was stunned by what he saw. The room was enormous.

The bed was enormous.

He was lying in a king-sized bed with an entire wall in the room filled up with windows, facing the direction of the ocean.

Toshinori looked down at the thick crimson quilt covering his body before pushing it away. The moment his bare feet touched the red rug under the bed, he couldn’t help but marvel on how soft it was.

“Where is this?”

Toshinori whispered as he walked up to the large glass panels showcasing the city. He looked over all the buildings before his eyes landed on the giant Ferris wheel in the distance, right beside the ocean. Toshinori didn’t know why, but that Ferris wheel feels oddly familiar, as if he had seen it somewhere before…

Click

The sound of the doorknob turning jolted him out of thought. Toshinori spun around and was surprised to see two familiar boys walking in.

The pair also seemed surprised that he was awake. One gave a very faint smile while the other maintained his stoic face.

“You’re awake, grandpa.” The white-haired boy with unevenly cut hair said.

“Young Atsushi, young Ryuunosuke?” Toshinori smiled widely as he walked over to the two children that were the same age as his students.

“It has been a while, grandfather.” Ryuunosuke greeted politely with a slight bow.

“It certainly has.” Toshinori chuckled. With looking for a successor for One for All and everything else that followed, he couldn’t find the spare time to visit these two adoptive children of his sons. Even when he called, their talks were always brief and minimal. Truthfully, Toshinori never knew how to interact with these two young boys. In many ways, these two young boys were harder to talk to than his sons.

“How are you two? What school did you two enroll to?”

“We did not enroll to any schools.” Ryuunosuke replied, his face still holding that usual sternness.

“No school?” Toshinori frowned. “Is Da—I mean, are your dads still homeschooling you?”

If that was the case, then it wasn’t good. He had never liked Dazai and Chuuya’s decision to homeschool the kids, even if they did have exceptional talents and powerful Quirks. After all, they are youths! They should enjoy the joy of school and making friends!

“Ryuunosuke and I already have gotten our Hero licenses.” Atsushi replied. “During Dazai-san and Chuuya-san’s absence, we will be overseeing Yokohama as the new Double Black.”

“…Come again?” Toshinori blinked, barely able to process the words. “Heroes? But you’re both fifteen!”

“Dazai-san and Chuuya-san debuted at fifteen as well.” Ryuunosuke pointed out.

“Yes, but they’re different—wait, how did you even get the license without doing the test?!”

“Dazai-san and Chuuya-san took us to the government’s Hero department and they deemed us suitable to become Heroes.” Atsushi replied.

Toshinori froze as he remembered that something similar had happened in the past. When he was called over to hold a congratulation ceremony for his sons…half of the room looked like they were about to tear up, and it wasn’t with joy.

What have you done, my sons? Toshinori wanted to weep. He wondered just what in the world happened for the Japanese government to approve of underage Heroes not once but twice.

“Wait…overseeing Yokohama?” Toshinori whirled around to stare at that Ferris wheel. That was why it looked so familiar! Wasn’t that Ferries Wheel the same one in Yokohama?!

“Then I’m in…Yokohama?!” Toshinori all but shouted and turned back to his grandsons. “How long was I out for?! I need to go back, I can’t be here!”

“You shouldn’t move so much,” Atsushi advised. “You’ve been asleep for three days. Your body is still healing from—”

Toshinori stopped listening from then on.

Three days?

He had been asleep for three days?!

“Then today’s Monday?!” He shouted, unable to believe he slept for this long. How?! Why?! “I have a class to teach, I can’t—”

“There is no need to concern yourself over such an insignificant matter.” Ryuunosuke said as he activated Rashomon, blocking Toshinori when the elder tried to walk around him.

“Dazai-san and Chuuya-san have filed your vacation form for you.”

“They what?!”

Atsushi kindly handed him a paper. Toshinori quickly took it from the boy’s hand, eyes widening in disbelief at what he was seeing. This was the U.A employee vacation form with his signature on it! But he never recalled sighing anything like this! And more importantly, he had taken three months off?!

“Where are Dazai and Chuuya?!” Toshinori shouted only to break into small coughs.

“They are taking your place in teaching at U.A during your break.” Atsushi replied.

Toshinori stared at the white-haired boy, then shifted his gaze to the black-haired one.

Blood splattered out of his opened mouth before he tipped backwards and fell onto his back. He seemed to struggle a bit before his limbs gone completely slack.

The two boys just observed their grandfather lying on the finely polished wooden floor. As if waiting for this moment, men and women dressed like doctors rushed into the room, preparing all sorts of equipment as they carried Toshinori back to the bed.

The two boys walked out without another word and into the long hallway of the Port Mafia headquarter.

“Heroes…huh?” Atsushi mumbled, looking out the window that made up one wall of the hallway. “Even though I knew this day is coming, it still feels surreal.”

Ryuunosuke walked beside Atsushi, hands tucked in his pockets as he too looked out at the city that was so familiar yet foreign at the same time. But at the least, some things never changed.

“We will begin patrol at sunset.” He announced. “We must uphold the name to gain the civilian’s trust.”

“That’s true.” Atsushi smiled, pulling out a phone from his pocket to see the news about the appearance of Double Black still trending. “Now that the Villains know that Dazai-san and Chuuya-san are away, there’s no doubt that they will make moves in Yokohama.”

He put his phone away before turning to Akutagawa. “You looked more relaxed now that Dazai-san’s gone. Do you still hate him?”

“No,” Akutagawa said curtly. “My grudges against him were gone the moment he died back then.”

Atsushi smiled a little, as if glad. “Remember that we need to keep the Villains alive.”

“Naturally.” Ryuunosuke looked at Atsushi, a little irritated that the other would remind him of this. “You do well to remember too, White Reaper.”

“I know.” Heterochromatic eyes gazed out at the lively city.

It was time to introduce the world to the new Double Black.

▬▭▬ ▬▭▬ ✦✧✦ ▬▭▬ ▬▭▬

“So there you have it!” Dazai announced, standing in front of a group of dumbfounded kids. “For the next three months, the two of us will be personally training you. All of your other courses will be postponed during this time.”

“I-it’s Double Black…it’s really Double Black!!” Midoriya looked like he was going to hyperventilate at any moment. How could he possibly keep calm when the most mysterious Heroes of all time were standing right in front of him?!

“S-sensei?” Yaoyorozu raised her hand hesitantly, unsure if that was the right way to call out to them.

“Ah, just Dazai is fine.” Dazai waved before gesturing to his partner. “And you can call him Chibi.”

BAM

The teacher’s table completely shattered under the pressure of the petit man’s palm. The sight startled the entire class. Their faces turned white as ghosts and Yaoyorozu looked like she was greatly regretting her decision to speak up.

“Just call me Chuuya.” Chuuya growled.

Never had the class nodded so fast in their entire lives.

“Don’t scare them, Chuuya~” Dazai sang. Despite saying that, he seemed to be enjoying the students’ reactions. “Look at them, they’re so scared that they can’t even talk now.”

“WHO THE HELL’S SCARED?!” Bakugou shouted, but was ignored as Dazai looked back to Yaoyorozu.

“Go ahead.” He said.

“Ah, yes…” Yaoyorozu hesitated, but still asked the question that’s been on the entire world’s mind. “Are you two really All Might’s…?”

“We’re his sons.” Dazai confirmed, purposely omitting the word adopted.

Despite already hearing this last Friday and every single news talking about it throughout the weekend, they were still shocked. After all, who wouldn’t?! The world’s No.1 Hero, the Symbol of Peace, had sons!! And these sons were none other than the famous duo Heroes, Double Black! The one that achieved in creating a city with zero crime rate!

“And if you must know, Chuuya and I got two lovely boys, which means your All Might-sensei is a grandfather~” Dazai beamed, dropping another bomb and these students’ jaws broke through the ground.

“WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!”

“Alright, enough chit chat!” Chuuya interrupted before anyone could voice their questions. Go change into your training uniforms and gather outside in the field behind the school in fifteen minutes! Anyone who is late will be punished!”

Then, the man turned and walked away, the chains binding his left arm dragging his partner with him. Although they didn’t know what was going on, no one dared to defy the feisty redhead. They hurried into the change room and changed into their school training uniforms. Fifteen minutes later when the students arrived at the field, their jaws dropped at the sight of a helicopter there.

No, that wasn’t even a helicopter! That’s a freaking military transport aircraft!

“Quit dawdling on your feet and get in!” Chuuya snapped out orders from the plane’s open hatch.

Class 1-A looked at one another before they walked over and entered the plane one by one. However, before entering the shorter half of Double Black would stop them to put a weird digital watch around their wrists.

“It’s to check your heart rates.” Dazai said helpfully beside his partner who continued to put these watches on them one by one.

No one thought anything more of it.

Once they were all inside, the hatch closed but none of them even noticed as they were too busy admiring the interior.

“Alright kids, grab and seat and buckle your seatbelts.” Dazai hummed as he and Chuuya walked through the kids.

“We’ll be taking off in one minute, hurry and sit down!” Chuuya repeated his partner’s words firmly.

The kids quickly found a seat for themselves and buckled their belts like the good children they were. After exactly one minute, the engine of the plane roared into life and there came the unpleasant sensation of being pulled off the ground.

Chuuya and Dazai just stood there, neither of them seemed to be affected as they stood over the pilot and watched them take off.

“Sen—Dazai-san! Where are we going?” Iida asked from all the way back.

“You’ll see,” Dazai only gave them a meaningful smile.

The flight was around forty minutes long. Not being able to see anything from where they sat, the kids had no idea where they were going. However, since the two men were Heroes hired by U.A, they knew nothing bad would happen to them. They just chattered quietly about their new teachers and the exploding news of their idol’s private life when Chuuya and Dazai suddenly walked back to them.

All of them instantly clamped their mouths shut and gave the two new teachers their full attention. After all, this was Double black!

“Now, let’s begin today’s first lesson,” Dazai said as he stepped forward to draw everyone’s attention to him. “What would happen if someone without any safety equipment falls from fifteen-thousand feet onto solid ground.”

“They die of course.” Kaminari answered without any hesitation. After all, what else but death awaits someone dropping from that kind of height?

“Wrong. There still is a very slim chance of survival if you angle your body just right to protect your upper body from the impact.” Dazai corrected. As he said that, the floor beneath their feet began to pull apart right from the center as a bright beam of light covered everything in sight.

“Gah! My eyes!”

“What is that?!”

“The floor’s moving!”

Gasps and shouts echoed throughout the plane as the floor fully pulled apart, revealing nothing but blue beneath them.

“We’re flying over the ocean?!” Uraraka spoke with a mixture of awe and fright. She nervously stared at her feet that were dangling over nothing. Although it may be rude, she still pulled her legs onto her seat, much like many of her classmates.

“Now then, next question,” Dazai continued lightheartedly, as if not noticing the teenagers’ panic. “If someone without any safety equipment falls from fifteen-thousand feet into the ocean, what would happen?”

No one answered this time.

The moment Dazai asked this, all the kids were staring at him in disbelief and horror.

“The right answer is, you will die for certain. Your bone will shatter the moment you hit the water, as falling from such height will be no different than falling onto concrete. Even if you manage to survive the impact, you will be swallowed by the ocean and drown. Isn’t that wonderful?”

“…Eh?” Midoriya blinked before his eyes slowly widened as the realization of their situation hit him hard.

“From a drop this height, it will take about a minute for you to reach the ocean. Keep in mind that this is neither U.A nor private property. The law of Quirk usage applies to all of you~”

“In other words, if any of you use Quirks, I will pummel you, got that?” Chuuya clarified. “Now off you go!”

“Wait, Dazai-san! Chuuya-saAAAAAAN?!!!!” Midoriya cried as the chair seat beneath him suddenly disappeared. His seatbelt also failed to work and just like that, he was freefalling from the sky with the rest of their classmates.

Everyone was screaming and crying for their lives as the carrier plane became smaller and smaller.

“I DON’T WANNA DIE!!!” Kaminari sobbed.

“GERO!” Asui croaked.

“SAUVE-MOI!!” Aoyama screeched.

“THIS ISN’T REAL! THIS ISN’T REAL, RIGHT?!” Hagakure shrieked.

“KYAAAA!!!” The usually quiet Koda was pale and screaming off the top of his lungs.

“E-E-E-EVERYONE!!! C-CALM D-D-DOWN!” Iida yelled despite panicking as well. “I’M S-S-SURE THE TEACHERS WILL SAVE US!!”

“Y-Yes!” Yaoyorozu choked out. “S-surely they wouldn't…!”

“WE’RE REACHING THE BOTTOM!” Uraraka notified them.

“A-ARE WE SERIOUSLY NOT GOING TO USE QUIRKS?!” Sero shouted.

“B-BUT THEY SAID THEY’LL BEAT US IF WE DO!” Kirishima shot back.

“FUCK! WOULD YOU STOP SCREAMING IN MY EARS?!” Bakugou roared, pushing away a screaming Mineta who had stuck to him like glue. This goes to show how desperate the little pervert was to survive.

“WE’RE NEARING THE GROUND—I MEAN WATER!” Sato shouted.

“AAAAAAH!” Ashido shut her eyes and braced herself, unable to watch.

Midoriya gritted his teeth and put his arms over his head.

Just split seconds before they reach the water, they stopped.

The wind was no longer roaring into their ears and smacking against their bodies.

It was as if time had suddenly stopped. All they could hear were their own heavy breathing and their intense heartbeat. When the class looked to one another, they saw their classmates suspended in midair with a layer of crimson light covering their body.

“This is…Quirk?” Midoriya whispered. Before he was given time to figure what this power was, the light disappeared and all of them were mercilessly dropped into the water.

Clap Clap Clap

When the students swam back to the surface, the first thing they heard was the sound of slow claps.

Midoriya turned to the source of the sound and was shocked by the sight of a motor yacht right beside them! They were all too preoccupied with the fear of dying that none of them noticed this luxury boat.

On the deck of the yacht were Double Black. Dazai was leaning his elbows on the steel railing, clapping his hand while his partner sat on the railing right next to him, swirling a cup of wine in his hand.

“How?!” Uraraka gasped at the sight of the two men. She looked up at the plane still in the sky, then back down to the duo Heroes.

“I wonder,” Dazai replied with a mischief smirk. “Though if you have time to be stunned, I would hurry and swim.”

“What do you mean?” Yaoyorozu asked.

“Well, it’s now 11:32 am. The sun will set in around eight hours. You are to reach the shore without the use of your Quirks before sunset. Anyone who fails to do so will receive punishment~”

“Wait, what?” Tokoyami couldn’t help but ask. What did this man say?

“Sensei!” Iida raised his hand.

“Dazai is fine.” Dazai waved to the class president.

“You don’t mean that we’ll have to swim to shore within eight hours?!” Iida yelled in disbelief.

“Yep, that is exactly what I mean!” Dazai clapped while his partner took a sip of his wine.

The kids stared at them for a bit longer. When the news finally registered in their brains, they immediately burst out into an uproar.

“WHAT?!!”

“THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE!!”

“THERE’S NO WAY!!!”

The two adults listened to the complaints for a couple of minutes before Chuuya finally spared them a glance.

“If you have time to complain, then hurry and get your ass moving.”

“But that’s just impossible!” Ashido shouted. “We’ll die from exhaustion before we get to the shore! I don’t even know where the shore is!”

“It’s over there, is it not?” Dazai helpfully pointed towards the direction of the shore. Everyone followed his finger and saw the city in the far, far distant. So far that they can’t even make out the outline of the city.

“This is crazy!” Sero complained. “No one can swim that far!”

“Even when you’re going to die?” Chuuya asked.

“We’ll die?!” Kaminari gaped.

Seeing the group still not getting it, Chuuya jabbed his thumb to the other end of the yacht.

Everyone cranked their head around. When they looked over the other side of the boat, they saw some men dressed in black suits holding a large hose that was ejecting crimson fluid into the sea.

“W-what’s that?” Hagakure questioned with a shaky voice. They all had a really bad feeling about this.

Midoriya squinted his eyes, swearing he saw something mixed in the chunky red fluid. Were those...fish parts? And bones?

“Well…” Dazai drummed his fingers along the railing. “Fish, chickens, cows, pigs, all kinds of meat mixed in together.”

“Eh?”

As the students stared at the two Heroes with eyes wide in disbelief. Before any of them could open their mouths to ask, they all heard a sharp yelp.

“Who pushed me?” Mineta asked, looking around the water before letting out another startled noise.

“M-Mineta-kun!” Midoriya frantically shouted Mineta’s name while the others slowly swam away from the boy.

“Mineta-chan, calm down!” Asui immediately followed up.

“Don’t move, Mineta-kun!” Iida shouted.

Seeing the pale faces of his classmates, Mineta stopped flapping around in the water. Although their expressions varied, all of them had fear in their eyes as they stared at Mineta.

Mineta suddenly got a very bad feeling and he slowly turned only his head around. He came face to face with a gray dorsal fin sticking out of the water surface.

At the same time, similar-looking fins slowly glided through the group as something in the water brushed by their bodies, sending chills down their spines.

“S-SHARKS!!!!!!!”

The entire class screamed, their current situation finally sinking into their brains. They started flapping their arms and kicking their legs to swim away.

“Are they stupid?” Chuuya watched the children jumping around the water like sardines. “They seriously thought these reef sharks would attack them?”

“It’s always human nature to fear nature’s predators.” Dazai chuckled. “Even back in our time, sharks, in general, had been used to instil fear into people from getting into the water. They naturally grouped all sharks together and wouldn’t bother to learn which ones attack them and which one doesn’t.”

Chuuya stared at the reef sharks gobbling up the meat. Though there were two curious ones swimming after the kids, probably trying to figure out what they were. That of course, earned more screams as the kids swam faster.

“They’re going to exhaust themselves within thirty minutes.” The redhead stated dryly. The look in his blue eyes showed that he was anything but impressed.

“Then it’s a good thing we planned ahead.” Dazai snapped his fingers. A woman in black suits came up to them with her hands folded behind her back, ready to receive orders.

“Release the first great white in thirty minutes.”

“Yes sir.” The woman bowed before she hurried off to relay the order.

Dazai picked up the bottle of wine on the stand beside them, refilling Chuuya’s glass before his own.

“We should do this more often.”

“Terrorizing kids?” The redhead arched a brow to his partner.

“Taking a vacation,” Dazai corrected.

Chuuya couldn’t help but smile and sipped his wine. Well, he couldn’t deny that he was having a good time. They never had the luxury of being so laid back when training their own sons. Or rather, being laid back was never an option when facing off against those two brats.

That and the work both of them had to do.

Since they were running a Hero agency and a trading company side-by-side, free time was scarce. After the painstaking years of rebuilding everything from scratch, they finally had the opportunity to take a short, well-deserved break.

“What are we doing tomorrow?” Chuuya asked curiously as he looked up to his partner.

“How does three nights at a private hot spring with a full view of Mt. Fuji sound?” Dazai asked.

Chuuya turned to the brunet and lifted his wine.

Their glass gently clinked together, creating a melodic sound in the air.

“Not bad at all.”

As for what Class 1-A will experience on Mt. Fuji for those three nights…that will be another story.

━»•» ❀ «•«━━━━━━━━

NEXT CHAPTER ▻

━━━━━━━━»•» ❀ «•«━

#soukoku #shin soukoku #bsd fanfic #bungou stray dogs #mha crossover #bnha fanfiction #bsd crossover

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an-otome-cally-correct · 5 years

Text

Ikemen Mousette: Temptation of Fluff with Great Furballs (Part 5)

*shakes pockets* Yeaaah that’s all the mousettes I got y’all for now ahem what. Tagging @themayamermaid-blog as per request~ If you wanna read more of my stuff, then check here.

She knew Mozart had a very good reason for staring at her as if she had grown three more heads because, technically, she did have three more heads on her shoulders. With a ball of fluff on each of her shoulders and one on top of her head, if there were ever an appropriate time for Mozart’s snark, it would’ve been right about then.

Too bad he couldn’t actually talk, for the time being.

Such a blessing in disguise.

For reasons she wouldn’t be able to fathom within her lifetime - a recurring theme, lately - Napoleon, Sebastian and Jeanne had opted to tag along for the remainder of her chores. From delivering the fresh laundry to their respective rooms, to cleaning the windows, to taking inventory in the cellar, the three of them stayed with her and helped the best they could, even when she repeatedly told them it wasn’t necessary.

“Oh, don’t mind us,” she hummed as she made her way towards the windows, armed with fresh curtains. “We’re just here to put your curtains back.”

From where he was perched atop the piano keys, Mozart squeaked in acknowledgement and picked up from where he had left off. Disjointed as it was, the beginnings of a melody echoed in the room as he pressed on one key at a time. It was admirable that he’d push on with doing what he loved despite being only a little bit bigger than the palm of her hand. It was also adorable, but she wasn’t about to say that out loud.

“Alright, alright. The three of you get down so I can hang these.”

Her passengers flew off, but just as she was about to pull a chair over for her to stand on, Napoleon and Jeanne squeaked at her. She saw them fly up to where one of the bare curtain rods were, and the two Frenchmen- er, furballs gave it a nudge. She had a pretty good idea what they were getting at but-

“I’m just hanging some curtains. It’s not like I’m going to-”

The trill of a piano key being repeatedly struck cut her off, and she turned her attention back to Mozart. It wasn’t easy to make out their expressions when they were just a little under half a ruler tall, but based on what she could see and what she knew of Mozart, the ball of fluff sitting on the piano was probably scowling.

“Something wrong, Mozart?”

Instead of answering her, Mozart flew over to where the three other puffs had perched themselves atop the curtain rods, and after what seemed to be a brief discussion, the four of them started coordinating with each other in removing the curtain rods for her. They eventually managed to lift one off, balancing the metal rod on top of their heads, and steadily lowered it to where she could reach.

Small and fluffy as they were, they were still the same, stubborn, yet thoughtful, men she lived with.

“Alright, you win,” she sighed in surrender as she carefully set down the curtain rod on the floor. “I’ll slip on the curtains while you get the other one.”

The four puffs did as they were told, and as soon as she finished threading the sheets through the pole, they put them back to where they belong. “Thanks for the help guys, but really, I could have handled it on my own.”

To her surprise, Sebastian tapped her forehead, almost as if to mimic the way he’d flick her whenever she was being silly albeit nowhere near as painful. He then pointed a wing at the fresh curtains, then at himself, at the curtain again, then at himself once more. She squinted her eyes, not entirely sure what he was signaling about, but still, she hazarded a guess.

“...Are you trying to tell me to leave the curtains to you next time?”

Sebastian nodded.

She quirked an eyebrow. “What if you’re not around and they need to be replaced?”

This time, Mozart raised a wing to catch her attention, and then gestured to himself.

“You’ll do it?”

Mozart nodded.

“...Because you don’t want me standing on a chair and risk falling?”

Sebastian, Napoleon and Jeanne nodded, while Mozart simply turned away, refusing to answer.

She could feel a small smile tugging on her lips, appreciating their worry for her, and returned their kindness with a gentle pat on their heads. Even when they were barely the size of a saucer and could fit snugly inside a teacup, they were still more concerned over her than their own selves. “Alright, I understand. I’ll leave it to you then.”

The four of them nodded in approval, just as the clock inside the piano room chimed. A quick glance told her that it was almost time to prepare dinner, but with the state everyone was in, a bottle of Rouge was more than enough for everyone, and probably a small meal for Sebastian.

“Oh, it’s that time already,” she murmured before turning to Sebastian. “I’ll check on everyone and let them know there’ll be Blanc and Rouge available in the dining hall. That sounds good?”

Sebastian let out an affirmative squeak and flew up to settle on her shoulder once more, causing her to blink.

“...Uh, I was kinda thinking I can leave you behind now?” When the other furballs heard what she said, they all hurried to return to their places - now with Mozart perched right beside Jeanne. “...I guess that’s a no.”

Sighing, she surrendered to her role as a tree and set off to look for the rest of the residents. The last she saw of Leonardo and the Count was back in the library, and she decided to start there. Luckily, the two vampires-turned-furballs were still there, still reading, albeit different books from what they were reading earlier and now with Lumiere comfortably curled around its owner.

“Leonardo, Count,” she evenly called out. “I’ll be preparing Rouge and Blanc in the dining room for dinner in a bit. Please join us when you can.”

Rather than an a squeak or a purr, she was met by looks that were not unlike the one Mozart had given her when she first entered the piano room. “They wanted to tag along,” she explained. The two balls of fluff nodded, and then they were flying over to her - Count resting on her head right next to Napoleon while Leonardo opted to sit beside Sebastian. “You two...”

She heard something like a laugh come from Leonardo, and she tried to shoot him a glare as best as she could without knocking anyone off balance. “Is flying that tiring, or do you all enjoy the free ride?”

At that, she felt two pairs of wings pat her head to console her, courtesy of Napoleon and the Count. It wasn’t that they were being a bother, but it was really just getting ridiculous - and she had set a high bar for ridiculous. Regardless, she really didn’t have any complaints except for them acting unusually childish, but in their current form, it was more amusing than annoying.

After all, what kind of monster would she be to hate such small puffballs?

With two new passengers, she decided to check on Isaac next, only to find his room empty. Arthur’s and Theo’s were empty as well, and so was Dazai’s and Vincent’s. Worry started to creep in on her, fearing the worst - they were big enough for Cherie to eat in one bite, of course she’d be worried - but to her relief, she found everyone else safe and sound in the parlor, watching a game of chess between Arthur and Isaac.

“There you all are,” she breathed. She counted the balls of fur surrounding the chessboard and once everyone was accounted for, she let out the breath she didn’t know she was holding. “Dinner will be ready in a bit. Anyone hungry can drop by the dining room. And since everyone’s here...”

One by one, she plucked the fluffballs sitting on her shoulders and head, and set them down on the table where everyone else was. “You lot have to stay here while I prepare dinner.” This time, they didn’t complain, and instead resigned to watching Arthur and Isaac resume their game.

With that settled, she headed for the cellar to fetch a fresh bottle of Rouge and Blanc before proceeding to the kitchen, so she could fix Sebastian and herself a meal. It didn’t take long for her to prepare everything, and soon enough, everyone had come into the dining room for their Rouge and Blanc.

The rest of the evening went without a hitch, and she let them all go back to whatever it was they were doing while she took care of the cleaning up the dining room and kitchen. She was thankful nothing bad happened despite the circumstances they were in, but frankly she had grown so used to cooking and eating with everyone that it was almost lonely to see only one plate of actual food on the table. She caught herself before she could entertain any more of those sad thoughts, reminding herself that they’d all be back to normal sooner or later.

“I guess I’m just a little tired,” she murmured to herself as she finally made her way back to her room.

A quick shower and a fresh set of clothes later, she tossed herself onto her bed and let herself relax. She might have told Sebastian and everyone else that she could handle all the housework by herself, but even though she could, it was still a lot of work. She felt it all finally weighing on her body as she drifted into a deep sleep, but not before wishing that everyone would be fine by the time she woke up.

It felt like morning came sooner than it usually did, her body protesting as she pushed herself up on her bed and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. If it weren’t for the sunlight streaming through her windows, she wouldn’t have believed she had actually slept through the entire night. Unfortunately, whether or not her body believed it was already morning, she had to get up and get ready for work, and she would have gotten on her feet to do just that if only it weren’t for sight she was greeted.

To her surprise, she found everyone sleeping in her room. Not on her bed, thank goodness, but they had somehow fallen asleep on her bedroom floor, her sofa… Someone was even slumped over her vanity and her coffee table. She doubted any one of them were comfortable, and maybe it was just the dregs of sleep talking, but oddly, she had missed them.

Enough that she didn’t have the heart to scold them for sleeping in a woman’s room - her room, of all places.

Not right now, anyway.

For sure, later though.

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musicprincess655 · 4 years

Link

Ryuu’s lungs burn and his heart beats too, too fast in his chest. He’s never been the best runner, and running for his life doesn’t offer the same motivation to him as it does to other people. After all, he’s been running for his life for almost twenty years now.

Gin doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even look at him, but he knows that she knows he can’t keep this up for much longer. No matter how much he wills himself to keep going, his body is going to give out.

Atsushi is keeping pace easily, enough that he can even talk while he runs, and Ryuu hates him for it right now.

“How are we going to escape?” he asks. “We can’t run all the way to the wall.”

No, they can’t. Ryuu and Gin had been hoping they’d have more time to hide out, if their plan to steal a police car didn’t work out. It would take longer to get out of No. 6, and that’s always dangerous, but they wouldn’t attract the kind of attention they would with faster methods.

“There,” Gin says, voice so soft Ryuu isn’t sure Atsushi even hears her, but he reacts when she points. Ryuu nods, ignoring whether Atsushi is on board or not. It’s not a perfect solution, but it sure is a solution.

They’ve gotten close enough to the developed area that there’s a car they can steal.

Well. Car is a generous term. It’s a small truck, probably used by gardeners, but it’ll get the job done.

The door is unlocked, and Gin slides into the driver’s seat while Ryuu and Atsushi run to scramble into the other side. It’s only a two-seater, and Ryuu and Atsushi have to awkwardly perch in the one seat so Gin has the room she needs to drive. The keys aren’t in the ignition, but it takes Ryuu and Gin together less than a minute to get around that. Then they’re off down the road as fast as is reasonable, as fast as will keep them from getting noticed.

And finally, Ryuu can breathe, just a little. He glances over at Atsushi, squished between Ryuu and the door, breathing already recovered. He doesn’t look much different from the last time Ryuu saw him, still unremarkable except for his eyes. They’re somehow both purple and gold, an unusual color that almost looks like sunset.

But more importantly…

“I’m taller now,” Ryuu says. Atsushi blinks those big, stupid doe eyes of his at Ryuu.

“What?”

“I’m taller,” Ryuu repeats. It’s childish and petty, and he knows Gin is rolling her eyes behind him even though he can’t see it. “You made fun of me for being smaller than you last time. Now I’m taller. Aren’t you supposed to be the one with plenty of food? You’re the one inside No. 6.”

“You’re talkative,” Atsushi says.

“I never said I wasn’t,” Ryuu shoots back.

“Why are you back in No. 6?” Atsushi asks, instead of staying on the subject. “And how did you pull this off? Did you know they were going to arrest me?”

Ryuu holds up one of the robots he stashed in his pockets. It’s almost indistinguishable from a real mouse, and that’s what makes it unnoticeable. Only close examination will reveal the tiny whirring sound of its motor.

“We keep an eye on everything in No. 6,” Ryuu says.

What he doesn’t tell Atsushi is that they figured out he was in danger just over six hours ago. It was a tight timetable, and it may or may not have contributed to the plan being less than perfect, but that’s an argument Ryuu isn’t going to lose when they get back, because he’s just not going to have it.

“And you came back to save me?” Atsushi asks.

“I don’t like owing people,” Ryuu says. It’s an understatement. Atsushi doesn’t need to know that, either. “Now we’re even.”

“But why now?” Atsushi asks. “Why would No. 6 go after me now? I’ve been saying stuff like that for years. What changed?”

Ryuu doesn’t answer. He’s not really a big picture kind of guy. Pulling off a plan in less than six hours to rescue an accident-prone idiot that Ryuu just so happens to owe a life debt to? No problem. Postulating on the mentality of an oppressive government? Not really his area.

Gin makes a frustrated noise behind him, and Ryuu finally pays her some attention.

There are cop cars speeding at them, coming from the gate to the outside. It’s a good thing they were never planning on leaving through the gate, anyway.

Gin turns the car sharply, sending Ryuu and Atsushi crashing into the door. Neither of them has a seatbelt on, considering they only have the one and it won’t stretch over them both. And unfortunately, this seems to be the part where they really should have a seatbelt on.

“The sewage facility?” Atsushi asks, realizing a few beats late what the plan is. “We can’t get through the gate without an ID.”

“You have no imagination,” Ryuu tells him, bracing his arms against the dashboard. This is probably going to hurt.

Gin slams the car through the gate, and while the engine makes some very unhappy noises, it keeps running, so she steers them into the facility.

“They’re going into lockdown, we won’t make it,” Atsushi warns. A metal grate is dropping in front of all the windows and doors. Gin guns it.

“Get down,” Ryuu growls, forcing Atsushi’s head down below the dashboard. It’s not the best protection, but when sliding under the grate takes off the top of the car, it also doesn’t take off their heads.

The car is toast, though, and rightly so. Ryuu stands from the wreckage of broken glass and twisted metal, ears only ringing a little. They’re very nearly home free.

“This way,” he says. Gin follows him, silent as a shadow, and Atsushi follows much less so.

“The sewers?” Atsushi asks.

“A perfect backdoor for people like us,” Ryuu says. Luckily, there’s enough of a lip on the side that they can still run. They don’t have to swim through this water.

Alarms blare, and Ryuu can hear people descending into the facility, but as long as Atsushi doesn’t slow them down, they shouldn’t have a problem escaping.

Ryuu and Gin could find their way through these tunnels in the dark with their eyes closed, and sometimes they have to. As far as smuggling goes, sewage tunnels are essential. Ryuu has spent so much time travelling through them that he knows them like the back of his hand.

Atsushi is doing less well. He keeps blinking his eyes, like he’s trying to force them to adjust to the darkness, and even though he would probably be faster than Ryuu if they ran on the surface, he’s not nearly as fast down here.

“Keep up,” Ryuu instructs harshly. “We’re not even halfway there yet.”

The sewers might be the safer path into No. 6, but they’re certainly not the fastest. It’s a long route that involves backtracking and mazes, turns that take them around where on the surface they could just go straight.

It’s more of a relief than usual when they haul themselves out of the sewers, up into the dying light of the day. They’re outside the wall, and that makes them safe, or as safe as anyone can be in a world like this.

Atsushi sprawls out on the ground, the sunlight slanting across his face to match his eyes. Ryuu leaves him to it for just a moment, but staying out in the open isn’t the safest thing they could be doing.

“This is the West Block,” Ryuu says. Atsushi’s eyes blink all the way open, and he stands to look around. His eyes widen at the warren of shacks that make up this slum. “Welcome to reality. Good luck in it.”

“What?” Atsushi’s eyes are still wide, but fear has suddenly crept into them, and Ryuu hates him for it. That fear he holds inside is so obvious, and it’s like he’s begging to be killed.

He won’t last a week out here, but that’s not actually Ryuu’s problem.

“I’d say stay out of trouble, but I don’t think you actually know how to do that,” Ryuu says. “So have a nice life, whatever’s left of it.”

“You’re just leaving me here?”

“You saved my life, I saved yours,” Ryuu says. “Transaction complete. We’re done here.”

“No, wait-”

“Making new friends now?”

Ryuu closes his eyes and only just barely keeps from screaming in frustration. The absolute last person he wanted to run into right now.

Dazai surveys them coolly, no emotion other than amusement leaking through. Chuuya sits on the wall behind him, leaning back on his hands casually.

“What are you two doing here?” Ryuu growls.

“You and Gin left so quickly, and I was curious,” Dazai says. “You usually plan so carefully when you go into No. 6. I wanted to see what was worth the risk.”

Of course Ryuu couldn’t hide this from Dazai entirely. Dazai knows Atsushi exists, and knows that Ryuu wants to square things with him, knows how badly Ryuu hates owing anyone. Not that Ryuu’s actually told him any of this. Dazai just knows things.

“Just tell them you were worried about them,” Chuuya growls. Ryuu believes that Dazai worried about Gin, but he probably would’ve been thrilled if Ryuu hadn’t come back. “Shitty Dazai.”

“Dazai?” Atsushi pipes up. “As in Dazai Osamu?”

Ryuu wonders if Atsushi realizes the danger he just walked into. If he can see the way Dazai’s face changes, morphs from simple amusement to something much colder. It’s not an easy shift to spot, but Ryuu’s had six years to learn Dazai’s moods, and six years to fear the darker changes.

“Who’s asking?” Dazai asks. His voice is light, airy, and a lesser man wouldn’t notice a difference. Ryuu might not have to wait for the West Block to kill Atsushi. Dazai might right now, if Atsushi can’t explain himself.

“My dad has a file on you,” Atsushi says. “He never let me look at it, but that’s the name on it. Dazai Osamu. A suicide victim.”

Dazai’s mind works faster than anyone else’s, which means he gets to his conclusions before Ryuu realizes the train wreck that is coming to destroy his life.

“You’re Fukuzawa’s kid?” Dazai asks. “Adopted, I’m guessing, since I would’ve known about you back then.”

“Yeah, that’s…you know my dad?” Atsushi asks. Damn it all. Ryuu will never be rid of him now.

“He used to let me hang around the detective agency,” Dazai says. “Gave me a place to hide from my guardian.”

“Then you…you weren’t a suicide victim,” Atsushi says. Ryuu can practically see him putting the pieces together. “That was faked. Because…you did something, and No. 6 came after you.”

“And he’s clever,” Dazai says, approval obvious in his voice. Ryuu bristles. He works so hard for the slightest glimpse of Dazai’s approval, and Atsushi gets it just for showing up?

“It makes more sense that you’re alive,” Atsushi says. “I think he always wondered, you know? He’d always pull that file out when he had a rough day. Or when he had to deal with Mori-san. Which I guess made it a rough day.”

“Ah, so you’re acquainted with my guardian,” Dazai says, voice gone cold. Ryuu just barely fights down a snarl. Of course they’re already getting along like a house on fire. That’s not fair, but Atsushi has already proven himself luckier than Ryuu, not that he appreciates it at all.

“Guardian?”

“Yeah, he’s…” Dazai trails off, apparently lost for words to describe Mori.

“He did a less than stellar fucking job of instilling a moral compass in Dazai,” Chuuya gripes in the interim.

“Slugs should be seen and not heard,” Dazai singsongs at him.

“Mackerels should be fried and eaten,” Chuuya shoots back, kicking Dazai’s shoulder so hard he stumbles. Chuuya jumps down from his perch on the wall. The dents his feet make don’t seem to line up with his size, but Ryuu is used to that by now. “Let’s take this inside. If you’re keeping that kid, we should get him out of the open for now.”

Ryuu tries desperately to signal to Chuuya no, please don’t because if they bring Atsushi inside, he really will be here for good, and the only thing Ryuu will be able to do is kill Atsushi himself.

“Oh, we’re keeping him,” Dazai says. “I can’t wait to hear how Fukuzawa’s kid ended up out here.”

“Come on, let’s get inside,” Chuuya says. “Ryuu, where’s your sister?”

Ryuu looks around for Gin, but she’s nowhere to be found. She’s probably already inside, though. Ryuu did wake her up to go save Atsushi, and she needs the sleep now.

“Sister?” Atsushi asks. “You have a sister?”

“Yes,” Ryuu grits out. “Make sure you thank her later. She did help save your life. You owe her one.”

“But the only ones that saved me were you and Gin,” Atsushi says. Ryuu tries to count backwards from one hundred, just to see if that will help. It doesn’t. But he has to keep it together in front of Dazai, especially now that Atsushi is Dazai’s new favorite. “Unless…wait, Gin is a girl?”

And that’s it. It doesn’t matter how much Dazai wants to keep Atsushi around. Ryuu is going to end up killing Atsushi himself.

#shin soukoku #sskk #akuatsu #atsuaku #bungou stray dogs #bsd #my writing #no. 6 au #systasis

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capisback · 5 years

Note

hehe, hello there! first kiss + did they or didn't they, with dazatsu please?

Tropes: First Kiss + Did they or Didn’t they?

Pairing: Nakajima Atsushi/Dazai Osamu (Dazatsu)

Notes: Sorry this took a while, dear anon! I actually worked on 4 ideas for this prompt for a while, fully intending to post all of them, but then I realised with how slow I am, this would never get finished like that, so I picked this one and discarded the other three. I really hope you like it, anon!!

Kunikida comes in to the Agency, after a long day on ajob with Atsushi and Dazai. His appearance looks a bit frazzled, since the jobdid involve some dangerous types. His coworkers greet him, as per usual. Then,one of them notices he seems a bit out of it, and asks him what’s up.

After a few seconds of silence, Kunikida answers in abreathy tone, an unsure lilt to his voice: “I think I just saw Dazai andAtsushi kiss.”

The whole Agency freezes.

And then -

“WHAT?!”

All Hell breaks loose.

They’re all yelling over one another, some closing inon Kunikida, trying to get all the “juicy” details out of him. The poor, tired,does-not-get-paid-enough-for-this man tries to placate and says that “I couldhave seen wrong. We don’t know for sure.”

To which Naomi cries out that that’s bullshit and shewon’t have it. “I’ve been waiting for this moment for the past six months of mylife and you’re not going to take it away from me, Kunikida!”

She’s seen those boys pining for months, to the pointshe had to almost physically restrain herself from yelling at them to justfucking kiss already. They HAD to have confessed and kissed, because if not shemight actually die on the spot.

Tanizaki, of course, tries to calm his sister down,but he backs down the instant she shoots him a rather terrifying glare. He’snot entirely convinced Dazai and Atsushi did finally confess to each other, buthe’ll wisely keep his mouth shut about that, lest he fall victim to hissister’s wrath.

Yosano voices his objections in his stead.“This is Dazai and Atsushi we’re talking about”, she says. “Those two idiotswill probably die before confessing.”

Noami tries to protest once more, but Yosano levelsher with an unimpressed look. “Do you really think they’d suddenly confess andkiss after nearly a year of obliviously pining?”

“You never know!” Naomi objects. She’s not going togive up hope, even if the memory of the two making such obvious googly eyes ateach other, with somehow neither of them noticing, makes her just a taddesperate.

Haruno, on her way to the file cabinet after havinggiven Ranpo some Ramune, says that perhaps Kunikida did see wrong, but that itwould be quite nice if they actually did confess.

This only fuels the supporters, and soon the Agencyhas divided itself into two camps: Did and Did Not.

Kunikida sits to the side, exasperated, wishing he’dnever opened his damn mouth. Kyouka places a silent, comforting hand on hisshoulder, as she watches the battle with a stoic expression.

The bickering continues until Kenji speaks up (and weall know everyone has to listen when the good boy speaks): “We won’t reallyknow what happened until we ask Dazai-san and Atsushi-kun themselves, right?”

The Agency bursts into quiet mumbles of agreement, andin the end they decide to wait for the duo in question to return so that theycan pry into their private lives. After waiting for what seems like forever,the door finally opens, and an unusually quiet, smiling Dazai enters, followed by acontently (and slightly flustered) smiling Atsushi.

Naomi can’t contain herself, her excitement burstingat the seams. “OH MY GOD, YOU GUYS DID KISS!” she yells-slash-squeals.

A bouquet of red dashes across Dazai’s face andAtsushi simply descends into being a flustered mess.

“We don’t know that!” Yosano admonishes, beforeeagerly turning towards the duo, expectation shining in her eyes. “But you guysdid kiss, right?”

“You guys – ” Kunikida growls, about to say somethingabout his co-workers’ poor behaviour.

“Why are you so interested?” Dazai says, trying toappear aloof. At the very least, he’s not really appreciating his co-workers’prying.

Yosano rolls her eyes. “Because we’re detectives”, shesays, sounding quite done. “Or maybe because we’ve been watching you two pineand drool over each other for a year.”

“Please tellus you confessed”, Naomi whines.

Atsushi squeaks out an answer before things can take abad turn: “Um – Y-yes. Dazai-san and I are…” The red in his face darkens ashade “We’re a couple now.”

The Agency “cheers” (Naomi literally so, while Ranposimply loudly says “Finally”) and take turns saying their own forms ofcongratulations to the newly formed couple (It feels surreal to them, how happytheir coworkers are. It’s like they’ve just announced they’d gotten engagedafter years of being a couple and that they’d decided to adopt a child, and hadsomehow saved Yokohama of destruction in the process. But they suppose they’lltake it just as is.)

Ithink I’d maybe even put a second chapter to this one (I’m a one-shot type ofgal most of the time, so), describing how their first kiss came to be. Basically,they’re coming back from that dangerous mission, and our dear fool Atsushi’sbeen a bit reckless again, probably got himself stabbed or something.Kunikida’s already far ahead of them as they hang back, walking together a bitsolemnly, covered by the low rays of the tired sun. Atsushi says “I’m sorry”,and Dazai plays the oblivious fool. “Hmm? For what, Atsushi-kun?”

“For…”Atsushi pauses. “For worrying you.”

Dazaiblinks at that answer, but then breathes out an amused breath. Of course that’swhat Atsushi’s sorry about. “You’re really too reckless”, he says, whichprompts another “I’m sorry” from Atsushi. He looks a bit sheepish. “I can’treally help it.” Dazai tuts his disapproval. “That’s not true, Atsushi-kun.It’s something you can learn. You just need more training.”

“Maybe”,Atsushi relents, looking back in front of him. “But my body moves on its ownwhen Dazai-san’s in danger.” Not really realising the effect his words have onpoor smitten Dazai, Atsushi continues in a teasing-slash-slightly scolding tone:“If anything, this means you’re theone who needs to be more careful, Dazai-san.” Dazai scrapes his throat to tryand dislodge the feelings (the pure fondness) getting stuck there.

“Ah,well,” he says, trying to collect himself, “I can try if it’s for you,Atsushi-kun.”

Atsushi’sface shows his surprise, and then it morphs into something entirely too gentle.“Really? You’d do that for me?”

Dazai swallows. “Yeah.”

Atsushismiles. “I’m glad. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

Dazaichuckles, humourlessly. “Nor I you, Atsushi-kun, but you seem to have a way ofdoing that.”

“Ireally can’t help it,” Atsushi pouts. “I don’t want to get hurt, either, butdanger always seems to find me.”

“Andthen you rush into it.” Dazai quirks an eyebrow and Atsushi’s pout deepens. “Can’thelp it”, he mumbles. “It just… happens.”

“It’sbecause you’re too kind”, Dazai says.

Atsushiwants to both protest and to say ‘I thought it was because I’m too reckless’.

“You’retoo good for – us.” Too good for me,Dazai thinks.

Atsushisimply stares at him for a few long seconds, before he averts his gaze. “I’mnot”, he says, finally. He lets out a breathy laugh. “If anything, I don’t deserveall of this.”

Not asurprising answer – it was the answer Dazai was expecting. He didn’t sayanything in response, no matter how much his soul cried it wasn’t true, nomatter how much he wanted to say Atsushi didn’t deserve to have such a warpedview of himself, no matter how much his body wanted to wrap itself aroundAtsushi and never let him go, to let him know just how wonderful he was.

“But”,Atsushi continued, mellowed sunset eyes meeting Dazai’s. “I’m so grateful Ihave it, anyway.” Atsushi smiled. “I’m so lucky, Dazai-san. I’m lucky I’msurrounded by such wonderful people. I’m lucky to have people who worry andcare for me. I’m lucky to have a place to belong.” A small pause, and a flashof something in Atsushi’s eyes. “Butmost importantly, I’m lucky to have met you, Dazai-san.”

Dazai’seyes widened just a tad. “Atsushi-kun – ” he breathed, though he didn’t knowwhat he wanted to say, why he was saying anything at all. His brain wasn’tcomputing with him, not when the object of his affection was looking at himwith such adoration.

“Dazai-san”,Atsushi said, voice just as gentle as the rest of him. “I love you.”

(Aaaandthere went Dazai’s ability to function. Just like that.) Stunned into silence,Dazai didn’t do much more than stare at his subordinate. Was this real? Thiscouldn’t be. No way. This was probably just a dream. A really, really gooddream. Dazai dug his nail into the palm of his hand. A flash of pain. Okay, nota dream then. But how could this possibly be real? What had Dazai done todeserve something like this?

Hissilence made Atsushi falter, and he stuttered when he next spoke “I – I knowit’s… weird. And I don’t – I’m not everything you deserve. I’m just me andyou’re – you.” The way Atsushibreathed that ‘you’ sent a shiver down Dazai’s back. He wasn’t used to peoplecalling him ‘you’ with such warmth ensnared in their voice. “But I hope you canaccept my feelings. You don’t have to return them. I wouldn’t ask you that. Icompletely understand. But, I thought, you should know that I…” Atsushi trailsoff when Dazai cups his cheek. Dazai doesn’t think he’s ever touched anythingor anyone so gently before.

“You’vegot it all wrong, Atsushi-kun,” he says. His voice isn’t soft, not likeAtsushi’s is, but his molten brown eyes shine with warmth and love, and Atsushiwishes he could freeze the moment and live in it forever, to be able to stareat Dazai’s beautiful eyes for all eternity. “I don’t deserve you.”

Andthen he’s leaning forward, and Atsushi’s reaching up to meet him halfway, andthen they’re kissing. It’s nothing too grand, it’s quick and simple, but it’sperfect. It’s everything they’ve been waiting for. When they part, they’re bothsmiling.

“So”,Atsushi breathes. “Does this mean we’re…” He trails off, unsure, but the smilewon’t stay off his face. Dazai’s smile widens just a tad. “Yes.” Atsushi beamsand kisses him again.

Andthen they’re late because they hang back to make out lol

(No,actually, it’s all really cute. They’re both quite hesitant and genuinely justso happy, and they just can’t get enough of each other or snap out of themoment.)

(It’swhen they sun has dipped down low, when the night colours are bleeding into thecity, that they realise just how late it is, and that Kunikida has effectivelyleft them behind. They laugh about it as they make their way back to the Agency(none the wiser about how much turmoil they’ve brought to their coworkers).)

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raven-writes-requests · 5 years

Text

Don’t Leave Me (pt.1)

Rating: Eveyone

Word count: 1.9 K

Fandom: Bungou Stray Dogs

Pairing: OC x Dark!Ango Sakaguchi

Genre: Angst and fluff

Warnings: I don’t think there’s anything to be warned about this one, maybe mentions of blood, but it’ll probably get darker as it progresses.

After a picture of one of the manga panels where Ango looks like he’s ready to kill someone and a long discussion, I finally wrote the dark!Ango fic I didn’t knew I needed. Once again, thank you Raiku, for that photo.

I’m still not really sure about it, but this will probably turn into a several chapters fic.

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The man was standing in a room really dark room, his hands were shaking, full of someone else’s blood. Another man was laying by his feet, looking completely terrified and scared for his life.

With a smirk in his face, he pulled his glasses up and then brought his fingers to his dark brown hair, mixing his sweaty hair with the blood of his victim.

The bloodied businessman wasn’t really sure of who the man who was torturing him was, but judging by the way he was using him as a pin cushion for his knife, he had a pretty good idea of who we was. He was the fifth executive of the Port Mafia, the more dangerous and mysterious of all of them. Even more than Dazai Osamu himself.

“Y… Y… You are…” he stuttered repeatedly. “You are the fifth executive?” his voice was suddenly terrified and the brown haired began to laugh. It began as a small giggle and, soon, it became a full maniacal laugh.

“It took you way too long. Now,” he dropped the bloodied knife he was holding into the floor and took out a gun. “Why don’t I…?” before he could finish the sentence, his phone rang.

He took his phone out, still pointing the gun into the man’s head with a crazed look in his eyes. Two words filled his screen, it read “Lupin’s later.”. With a small sigh, he answered positively and suddenly was glad to have a change of clothes with him.

After he put his phone away again, he focus went back to his victim. The man was trying to hide his face behind his hands in a futile effort for protecting himself.

Without a second thought, his instincts took over and he was already shooting him repeatedly, enjoying the feeling of each bullet that left his gun and the smell of death that lingered in the air. “Awww… You just ruined one of my best suits.” he complained looking at the hem of his light brown pants.

Once he was satisfied, he left the room and walked up to a conveniently placed shower room with his stuff in hand.

As the lukewarm water hit him softly in the back, he laughed dryly. That was what his life had been limited to since Mori and himself had discovered that he was better at getting rid of the mafia’s enemies and traitors than doing office work.

His position as an executive was a secret that he kept from everyone, even from his two best friends: Oda Sakunosuke and Dazai Osamu, who was an executive himself. It was hard to keep such a thing from both of them, but he decided it was for the best if they only knew him as the quiet and calm man that worked redacting the mafia’s archives.

He brought his hands to his head, the dried blood giving in and falling with the water like melted ice cream, dying his hands a deep crimson color. He took a look at both of his hands, a small smirk forming on his lips as he remembered the events that had lead to the moment he was in.

Suddenly, as if a calming wave hit him, he remembered her face and his hands began shaking again. What would she think of him if she knew the things that he did? Even if it was a dangerous thing, she knew that he was a record keeper in the mafia. But this, this was another level of dangerousness and a part of him he would never want her to see.

He clenched his hands and closed his eyes, trying not to think of such things that would make him want to go on a rampage.

With his bag hanging from his arm, he stood outside Lupin’s bar for a few seconds trying to come up with an excuse as to why his day had been so desperately boring. Then, after a little while, he opened the door and walked into the bar.

Both of his friends were already there, Dazai was laughing while Odasaku shook his head, as if he was disapproving of whatever Dazai had told him. “Ohhhh Ango! You’ve finally arrived! I was beginning to think that you were going to ran off with your girlfriend!”

Ango quietly sat beside him and asked the bartender for a tomato juice, he wouldn’t want to go back home drunk and spill any secrets to her. He was really overprotective of her when it was about knowing the shady things that he did in the mafia.

“Awwwnnn… You’re no fun, Ango! I was expecting you to have a drink with us!” he complained.

“I am having a drink.” he said as he turned to look at him while taking the glass that was now in front of him.

“Yeah, but it’s not alcohol!” Dazai complained, a pouty look on his face.

“Let him drink whatever he wants, Dazai.” Odasaku interrupted the young and slightly drunk Dazai. “How was your day, Ango?” the older one of the group asked him with a kind look on his face.

“Boring, as always, I had to deal with loads of paperwork. Most of them related to the incident that happened when Dazai was leading the Black Lizard the other day.” he looked at Dazai from behind his glasses, blaming him for the whole thing.

“I… It’s not my fault that the kid decided to act on his own and kill those people!” the young man wrapped in bandages complained about his subordinate.

“Actually, yes. It is, you’re the one who’s supposed to teach him some discipline. After all, you were the one who brought him in the first place.” from the other side of the table, he could see Odasaku nodding, clearly agreeing with him.

“Let’s talk about something else… Why not…” he looked down at his glass as he thought of a better topic, but kept silent for a really long time.

After a while, his phone began to ring insistently. He took it out of his pocket and, as soon as he saw it, he regretted not being more careful. He was sure that Dazai was going to notice it and point it out.

As if he was reading his mind, the brown haired opened up his mouth. “Is that… blood on your phone’s screen?” he looked confused as he put down the glass he was drinking from. The phone had a big print on the screen from where he had grabbed it when he responded to his message earlier, when he was torturing that businessman.

“Oh, I got hurt. Nothing serious, though.” he quickly said, his voice not wavering in the sight less. The last thing he wanted was to have Dazai on his back, closely watching his every move. “I might have left the stain when I answered your message.”

Even if Dazai didn’t made another comment about it, he could clearly see in his eyes that he wasn’t completely convinced by the excuse that he had given him. And that, sooner or later would become a problem, he was sure of it. But, for the time being, he just wanted to enjoy the time he had with both of them.

His attention went back to his phone, where a message from his girlfriend was waiting to be read. She was answering his message saying that he wouldn’t make it to dinner because he was hanging out with both of his friends. “Have fun, I’ll be waiting for you to come back.” she had answered. He smiled at the phone with a soft smile on his face, just thinking about her was enough to make him relax.

“What do you think about some dog food?” Dazai asked absent-minded as he looked up at the ceiling. Both, Odasaku and Ango looked at him like he had lost his mind. “I’m craving some dog food…” he whispered as he took his hands to his stomach.

“Dazai…” Odasaku said, warning the youngest of the group. Apparently, his fear of dogs didn’t stop him from eating their food.

“Yes, I’ll do that! It’s the best way to die!” he got up, suddenly sounding happy and left the place almost running.

With a sigh, Odasaku got up behind him and left a few bills on the counter. “I’ll go look after him, sorry for cutting this meeting short.” he apologized to his friend and left.

Finishing what was left of his tomato juice, he payed for his drinks and began to walk home.

He walked up the stairs of the apartment that he shared with his girlfriend with a relaxed stance, his face had a smile on it and the keys that were in his hands hit each other making a small metallic sound.

He stopped in front of his door, softly putting the key on the lock. With a twist of his wrist, the door opened up. Inside, the lights were off and he could hear the faint sounds of a TV near by.

He left the keys on a small ceramic bowl near the door and his small bag close to it. One of his hands went straight to his tie, sliding it down slowly and, then, he took his blazer off, leaving him just in a dressing shirt and his tie.

With his other hand, he pulled his glasses and afterwards, it ended again in his hair as he walked into the living room area. The TV was on, some cheesy romantic movie was playing in the backgroud.

“Hello.” he said as he kept walking towards the couch where he knew she was. The silence that greeted him confused him even farther, why didn’t he got an answer? As soon as he turned around the corner of the furniture that obstructed the view of the girl, he found out: she had fallen asleep.

With a small smile on his face, he turned the TV off and lifted his girlfriend in a bridal style fashion, carrying her to their bedroom.

He laid her down slowly on the soft mattress, the sudden change of surface woke her up a little bit. “Ango?” she asked sleepy as her face moved to face him.

“It’s late, go back to sleep.” he whispered, his lips gracing her ear. He kissed her forehead as she nodded and fell back alseep.

After he made sure that she was actually asleep, he got off of her and laid beside her, hugging her tightly to himself. He wasn’t always that way, but, at that moment, he needed her close to him. He needed to know that she was close and wouldn’t let him go.

As if sensing his distress, the girl turned around and faced him, but her eyes were still closed. Her head ended up on his chest as she got closer to him. His breath stopped for a second, as he felt her closer to him.

Some days he felt like when they started dating, scared that every little thing he did would end up in her getting mad at him, scared that she would find out his secret and decided to leave him. Many times after she moved in with him he would walk into the apartment and suddenly feel afraid that she wouldn’t be there.

But the feeling would be immediately chased away by the soft sound of his girlfriend’s voice greeting him as she ran to him and hugged him really tight, honestly happy that he came back home safely.

He never had someone so eagerly waiting for him to get back home and the feeling that someone was actually waiting for him was something he actually liked very much. The feeling of knowing that someone would greet him with a smile every time he crossed the apartment’s door was the happiest feeling he had since becoming friends with Odasaku and Dazai.

#Ravenwritesrequests #bungou stray dogs #BSD Ango #bsd fanfic #ango sakaguchi #dark!Ango

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timeskip · 5 years

Text

Kindness is the base of Yosano’s reason for existence, given to her by Ranpo and the agency, but it's not something that comes easily for her in the doctor's role. She is fierce, and she is powerful, and she will save people, but the kind of soft kindness that saved her is not natural to her.

She suspects that Dazai is much the same, in that way.

Yosano and Dazai (finally) talk about Mori and the mafia.

A/N: I’m 16 years old and I don’t know anything about bars or drinking, so please forgive me for anything I got wrong with that! Also, warning for Yosano’s past and everything that has to do with that.

(Word count: 3462)

In the low light of the bar, Dazai seems almost too young.

Yosano leans back on the faux leather-padded chair, swirling her beverage in one hand and tapping the nails of the other on the shiny table. The walls are a wine red, and there’s a neon sign in the far corner, blinking red and blue in the corner of her vision as she faces her coworker. Dazai’s hair covers his face in soft shadows, and he looks at her with his head resting lazily on his palm.

His cheerful disposition, which Yosano knows is largely a cover, often falls into a lesser version of itself on these nights; there’s still a smile gracing his lips, but his expression occasionally shifts into bittersweet. His conversational tone is pleasant, though, and Yosano still laughs at his jokes as he makes them, perhaps out of habitual courtesy.

It’s a habit they engage in rarely - the drinking together, that is. Ranpo doesn’t drink, since he doesn’t like the taste, and Kunikida would join them on occasion, but more often he seems to wish only reprieve from Dazai’s eccentric actions, so it’s taken upon the two of them to seek each other out.

Yosano, for her part, is usually the person to ask Dazai.

It’s been a long day, she’d commented, today, and Dazai had grinned at her. Yosano smiled back. Dazai, after hearing her request for him to accompany her, made a comment about ruining her health. The irony of being a doctor, she had replied.

A drink for the sorrows of being a doctor, then? Dazai’s words come back to her.

Being a doctor. Yosano has been a doctor since she was a child. Her ability is one thing that will never be taken from her, because despite the atrocities that she’s seen and committed by her mere existence, she still values human life too much to leave it behind.

Kindness is the base of her reason for existence, given to her by Ranpo and the agency, but it's not something that comes easily for her in the doctor's role. She is fierce, and she is powerful, and she will save people, but the kind of soft kindness that saved her is not natural to her.

She suspects that Dazai is much the same, in that way.

Yosano isn't sure how much Dazai knows about her past, but she's fairly certain that she knows very little about what happened in his past, as secretive as he is. Since he joined the agency at the age of twenty, it’s become a bit of a game for people to guess what sort of life Dazai had lead before he joined the agency, though it’s a game that Kunikida pays more attention to than Yosano does.

Yosano stopped asking questions of Dazai after she saw the scars under the bandages he wears. Though Dazai joined the agency at an age older than Yosano did, there aren't many reasons for a child to have gotten such wounds.

Dazai had, uncharacteristically, not been smiling at the time, as Yosano rewrapped the arm that had been shot by a criminal he'd been chasing, his face barely twitching despite the pain. His eyes lingered on the way she paused, the blood coating her fingers. There was resignment in the way he looked at her, knowing that she'd ask.

She hadn't asked.

But that incident made her look closer at Dazai, in a passive way if nothing else. He knows enough about the Port Mafia that it makes sense for that to be the connection that she would make. She's a detective too, after all.

And as the dots began to connect, she realized, like turning on a light in a dark room, that there was a new sympathy in their every interaction. Dazai, though he didn’t often show it outright, was nervous in Yosano’s presence; he was just a bit more cautious when speaking, or he would mess with the bandages on his hands. He still smiled with her, commented on everything she did, still involved her in his plans, no matter how insane they were, but Yosano could tell the work of Mori when she saw it.

She presses her lips together, thinking of the man. Mori’s ruined so many things for people. Doctors being one isn’t too far fetched, considering that Mori has a penchant for violence. Or, at least, he had when he was in the military. Yosano’s heart feels heavy.

Even if the nervousness disappeared in the weeks after Yosano discovered Dazai’s scars, she still feels the empathetic flame light up in her chest. Friendship between them will always be tentative because of that, she thinks, because she’s unable to ask and she’s unable to forget. There's no brushing off the similarities in their lives.

Her eyes stray again to Dazai, in a lapse of silence between them.

“You met Mori-sensei, didn’t you? When you were in the mafia,” Yosano speaks, almost without thinking, unable to stop herself.

Dazai stiffens momentarily before relaxing again. There’s a pause in the conversation.

“Once you got up the ranks, everyone had met Mori-san at least once,” Dazai states, blandly, like he’s forcing emotion out of his voice. His eyes travel up from the table to meet hers dead on, and his mouth is quirked up in a smile with more bite to it than usual. “Why do you ask, as a woman who was formerly in the hands of the mafia?”

Yosano doesn’t laugh, but the breath she releases almost feels like one, hissing out in some relentless amusement of the similarities between them. They’re both tortured by the wounds that only a man like Mori Ogai could inflict upon them. And maybe Yosano doesn’t understand Dazai’s past, and she almost certainly never will in the completeness she wants, but she at least knows for sure, now, that Dazai understands. If nothing else, she can have the fact that Dazai won’t learn her full, true past, until she tells him the whole story. They coexist in their lack of knowledge, and yet they still share one thing, in this moment; somehow, it doesn’t feel like enough.

“Is it so bad of me to have addressed the fact that Mori-sensei exists?” she asks, raising an eyebrow, and watches as Dazai laughs.

“Maybe if you have plans to kill him. Then I’d love to be of service.”

Yosano leans forward, taking a sip from her glass and laying it down with a clink as it hits the table. A small, devious smile stretches across her face, and she finds that it’s genuine. “As much as I’d love to gut the bastard, the agency runs itself with as few battles to the death with the Port Mafia as possible.”

“Ah, well,” Dazai leans back dramatically, as if it’s such a shame, and Yosano’s face breaks into a grin as she watches him lament towards the sky. “At least he knows how to run his business, if nothing else.”

Yosano remembers the efficiency of Mori in the war, the orders he would give and the bullets he would shoot into her patients, and Yosano’s nose scrunches up against her will. “I suppose so.”

She likes to think that the only thing she learned from him was how to make her patients not want to live, and how to avoid that outcome if at all possible. Or, maybe, the craving for life she holds comes from him as well, a hopes that she won’t be like that. In any case, her methods of bringing people close to death are much more creative, perhaps even as a way to cope with things, with the fact that in order to help those she cares about she has to hurt them as well.

Dazai is lucky that he can’t be healed by her, she thinks.

“Do you resent him?” Dazai asks, as if sensing how her mood has changed. Yosano doesn’t pause at the sudden question, curling her fingers into her hair in feigned casual interest.

“I think you know the answer to that.” She doesn’t want to answer. The words feel bitter in her mouth. “Tell me, how long did you spend around him?”

“Long enough to know that you should loathe him,” Dazai smiles around the rim of his glass as he swallows more of his own beverage. His eyes are dark, and Yosano can see how they flicker towards the hand that she’s resting on the table, pulled into a fist without her realizing, and the one in her hair, tugging on the dark strands.

She loosens them as she takes a breath in, then breathes it out. As always, the two of them dance around each other, never saying what they truly mean, but understanding all the same. Still, Yosano wants to know Dazai through more than the barest knowledge. Dragging information out of him, however, is like pulling teeth. Yosano pauses, tastes her words in her mouth before she voices them.

“I think I know why you hate him.”

Dazai leans back and sighs. “Manipulative man, isn’t he? Mmm, but I wonder what, exactly, he did to you.”

There’s a pause. Yosano can’t remember every atrocious action that Mori had taken against her and everyone around them, but she can remember most of it, flashing through her memories like a morbid vision of a movie, playing in her mind. She remembers him forcing her into making an “immortal army,” and she remembers him opening the door to the institution that she had found herself in after the war ended.

She had frozen solid at the sight of him. She had felt numb and distantly angry, but more than anything else she felt the crushing sorrow filling her limbs. She hadn’t put up any resistance when he took her, when Elise looked at her with doll-like eyes and smiled. She was too tired, too resigned to move away from Mori’s hands, the ones that, only a few years before, had clutched her arms or her hair, forcing her to stay and heal the soldiers again. Again. Again.

She looks away from Dazai, trying to stop her lips from pulling into a bitter frown. She’s not sure if she succeeds.

“That’s not fair, don’t you think?” she says. Her voice sounds more confident than her heart says she is. She’s felt almost free from her past since she joined the agency, but she still feels the shakiness of being eleven years old and scared when she remembers. “I think that if we’re going to share information, we should do it the right way.” Dazai opens his mouth to say something, smile still on his face, but she intercepts him easily, “If I say anything, you won’t tell me a thing. You’re always dodging questions.”

“Fair enough.” He doesn’t say anything for another moment, looking up at the ceiling with his hands resting casually behind his head. “How about this,” he says, looking back at her with an amused quirk of his brow, “I’ll tell you why I left the mafia, and you tell me why you left Mori-san’s care.”

Yosano rests her cheek on her fist, her other hand wrapped loosely around her glass, which is still chilled despite the melting ice. “That sounds good. You have my word that I’ll tell you the truth,” she bares her teeth in a grin, “but that’s only applicable if you don’t tell me blatant lies.”

Dazai looks more cheery at that, a mock-offended look covering his face. “And to think that Yosano-sensei doesn’t trust me!” He beams again, like he knew this was coming. “But of course! I’d never lie to you.”

Yosano snorts.

“Ah, but it’s simple, really,” Dazai says, and his expression turns bittersweet. “Mori-san killed my friend. He teamed up with the government, manipulating a stray group of gifteds to fight my only friend to the death - for his own benefit, of course.”

Yosano feels sympathy burn in her heart. “What was your friend like?” She doesn’t ask for the friend’s name, aware that Dazai likely wouldn’t give her that information.

“He was a good man, too good for the mafia. We would go drinking, with another person,” Dazai’s eyebrows draw down while his smile quirks upwards, smirking resentfully, as if irony has caught up to him. “Turns out we were drinking buddies with a dirty coward who worked with the very people who brought down my friend.”

Yosano stays quiet for a second, mulling over Dazai’s words. It’s tragic, a good reason to leave Mori and the mafia life behind. Yosano’s finger taps against her glass. Really, any reason would be a good reason for one to leave the mafia. She smiles softly at Dazai’s uncharacteristic honesty, brief as it may be.

“I see. Is it painful to be here, drinking with me?” Yosano asks, tracing the cool condensation on her glass with her fingertip.

“Is it painful for you to keep being a doctor after being near Mori-san?” Dazai retorts easily.

Yosano lets out a sharp laugh at that, smirk widening over her face. “Touche.”

“Well?” Dazai looks at her after a small pause with his eyebrows raised, inviting her to speak. “What about you? What pushed you to leave Mori-san?”

Yosano doesn’t keep her past as hidden as Dazai does, but she still feels apprehension as she breathes in. “I was never a part of the mafia. I never had to heal anyone for them, and the only reason for that is because the President got to me before Mori-sensei could force me to heal for him again.”

“Again?”

“Again,” Yosano clarifies. She meets Dazai’s eyes head on. “That's what he wanted me for in the first place. I thought that I couldn’t find a place where I would be more than a tool, but then Ranpo-san gave me the offer, saying that the agency didn't need my healing.” She shakes her head fondly. She will forever be thankful for Ranpo’s words, for his kindness and friendship, offered to her so honestly. “It was enough for me, to be given that offer.”

“You were saved, then.” Dazai smiles, voice airy as he continues, “Seems like we had very different reasons for joining the agency, hm?” He leans forward, his elbows pushing him slightly closer to Yosano’s space.

“No,” Yosano replies, even knowing that Dazai hasn't revealed his true reasons for becoming part of the agency. Her gaze is sharp, but Dazai doesn't react, as usual. “No, I don’t think so. You try so hard to be different from Mori-sensei, I can tell.”

“And how do you know?” Dazai’s fingers twitch and tighten around his glass as he takes a short sip. He's still looking at her, his lips pulled upwards into a lazy grin, fingers on one hand going to trace the edge of the bandages on the other. “How do you know I'm not lying to you, like any good mafia member would?”

Yosano knows that in the way that she knows his story, though only in bits and pieces, showing her a glimpse of what Dazai is really like. She knows Mori, and she knows with sickening familiarly how he would be with another child that he could use to his benefit. Dazai, with all his scheming, tries so hard to fit into what Mori is not. He wouldn’t go so far to use the Detective Agency’s abilities in his plans without harming them if it didn't matter to him.

Dazai isn't a member of the Port Mafia anymore, and if what he says is true, then that's important to him; it's important enough to leave his entire life of crime behind for his only friend.

Dazai is, Yosano thinks, a good person too, because of that care for others. It’s the same thing that sometimes lets her think she can be forgiven despite everything she’s done at the hands of the military. Dazai, in turn, was forgiven for his past by the agency. Blood stains both their hands, but it does not command them.

Yosano sighs, head tilting sympathetically as she smiles back at Dazai. “Maybe you're lying, but does that matter? You'd still be working in the agency. You're still helping people while you're with us, whether you were, as you say, saved or not.”

Dazai laughs, quiet compared to the noise around them, but his expression looks kinder and less on edge. Yosano feels herself relax slightly, not even having realized how tense she had gotten over the course of the conversation.

“I was lying, by the way,” Dazai says, after a minute. “When you asked about why I left the mafia, you said that I couldn’t tell blatant lies, but you clearly believed me. I’m not sure why it’s so easy to believe that I had attachments in the mafia, really! After all, the truth is that I just got bored of the killing.” Dazai grins at Yosano, holding his hands up in a cheerful shrug, as if he hadn’t just seemed relieved by Yosano’s words.

Yosano looks at him, smiling back, and doesn’t believe him. “I see,” she says, anyway. “Still. That's fairly kind, for a mafia member, don't you think?”

Dazai hums his affirmation.

The two of them lapse into silence, drinking more but not speaking. Yosano feels satisfied, somehow, with the small but genuine sincerity that Dazai allowed her to see.

Dazai, predictably, is the one who breaks the stillness that surrounds them.

“You feel responsible for talking to me about this,” he says, and it's stated as an observation, a simple fact of the conversation.

Yosano blinks at him, and then begins to laugh softly. Somehow, he figured it out before she did. Someone like Dazai, who understands people so well, would, of course, be the person to realize the underlying truth of Yosano’s burning curiosity, so tightly coiled around her heart.

No matter the similarities between them, it’s Dazai who is the younger of them, even if only by three years; her experience with Mori has made her careful with the lives of children like them. They’re in their twenties but still so young, the two of them, and Yosano sees a version of herself reflected in Dazai’s movements: somewhere behind her there’s a girl who had pushed beyond her past, but hadn’t quite let go yet. Dazai reminds her intrinsically of that part of herself. Yosano realizes, in that moment, how much she does feel that responsibility for them speaking to each other candidly, if only to break Dazai away from his own head for a moment.

Her laughter dies out, leaving a sharp smile in its wake.

“You're right,” she says, one eyebrow quirked up. “I am, after all, the responsible adult here. You’re so childish.”

“And yet you're drinking alcohol with me,” Dazai’s eyes crinkle at the edges as he leans back. “I'm shocked and offended that you consider me like a child!”

“Your reaction itself is proof,” Yosano smirks. She leans her head on her hand and watches a finger on her other as it traces the rim of her glass, then looks back up at him. “Though, if you really want to gain my approval, then, perhaps, have another drink with me?”

“I think I've had enough for tonight, Yosano-sensei.” Dazai looks amused, regardless. His own smile beams across his face, so natural that Yosano can't tell if it's fake or not. She’d like to believe, that for all her efforts, it’s real in her presence, a reprieve from people who don't understand.

“One last toast before we leave, then?”

Dazai laughs.

“Very well then. To death!” he says, cheerful as ever, raising his near-empty glass with a grin framed by the light from the neon signs.

Yosano quirks a brow and smiles, raising her own glass, but doesn't clink it against Dazai’s at first. “To life,” she responds, a note of finality in her tone.

Dazai’s smile widens, like she just told a joke, brown eyes crinkling at the edges. Yosano ignores the breath of air that leaves him that sounds almost like a sigh. “To life,” he echoes, and the sound of their glasses hitting each other resonates around them as they down the rest of their alcohol.

Yosano wonders, briefly, if Dazai is thinking of his friend, the one who died. She sighs into the bar’s air, filled with other people chatting and simply coexisting, just like she and Dazai are. It’s unknown to her, the truth of Dazai’s brain, of his lies and his past, and she thinks on whether their bond could, perhaps, be considered a strange friendship of their own.

She decides that it doesn’t matter, as Dazai smiles back at her, too young in the bar's soft light.

#bsd #yosano akiko #dazai osamu #mori ougai #my writing #bsd spoilers #oof it's been a while since i posted writing #is this even in character?#close enough i guess

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