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Osamu wonders what he can get away with.
It’s not an unusual thought, per se, but it’s new in a way that makes him slightly uncomfortable.
How close, Osamu thinks, rope around his neck in his empty dorm. How close can I get to death before he finds me?
The thought is tinged with apathy and excitement and curiosity. Osamu kicks the stool out from under his legs and starts counting.
——
Three minutes and forty seven seconds. Not even enough time for him to pass out. Osamu wants to applaud.
“Dazai-san,” who gave Atsushi the right to hold Osamu so gently? “Do you need some water?”
Usually, when people save Osamu from himself, it’s with disgust and pity and exasperation. Atsushi shows none of these things as he deposits Osamu on his futon and crouches over him worriedly.
Osamu laughs, his voice croaking and cracking. Atsushi disappears further into Osamu’s dorm.
Wait, Osamu wants to call after him. Come back.
Atsushi does. He lifts Osamu’s head and tips a water glass past his lips. Osamu wonders if he should refuse to swallow and start choking. But his throat really is dry and Atsushi came back, so Osamu doesn’t.
Falling back on the futon after a few greedy gulps, Osamu gazes at the ceiling.
Atsushi straddles his chest.
Horror rises in Osamu’s stomach before he can squash it down.
What are you doing? He thinks in his panic. What are you doing?
Hands come to rest gently on his bruised throat. Osamu almost sighs in relief aloud.
“Dazai-san,” the grip tightens minutely, “I told you I would take care of it. Why didn’t you ask?”
Osamu laughs again. Atsushi has an inscrutable face when he’s not feeling much emotion; Osamu thinks it’s a remnant of years as a tiger and lack of human contact. He’s slowly become more expressive as the months pass, so Osamu knows exactly what Atsushi is feeling now. Worry. Only worry. It’s refreshing.
“Wanted to see how long it would take you,” Osamu replies honestly, as he is wont to do when it’s Atsushi on the receiving end.
Atsushi’s brow puckered. “Then you don’t want death?”
His fingers squeeze a little more as an offer. Osamu is tempted, just to see if he’ll go through with it, but shakes his head.
“Not today.”
——
Atsushi is one of the most frustrating people Osamu has ever met.
Sometimes his reactions are so purely human that Osamu forgets there’s a tiger prowling under his skin. Other times Atsushi responds to Osamu’s prodding with odd cat-like gestures. More than that, Atsushi gives Osamu the most wild mix of weird as hell Law of the Jungle shit and some of the strangest logical leaps that Osamu has ever seen.
If it were just human reaction, Osamu could learn his ticks and prod Atsushi in the necessary directions.
If it were just animal reaction, Osamu would have an even easier time moving Atsushi about as he pleases.
Hell, if it were even just the bastard child of both, Osamu could begin to pick up a pattern to exploit.
But no, Atsushi is not human or beast. He is Atsushi, the only being Osamu has ever seen pick up the line between both and jump rope with it.
Chuuya straddled the line with ease and confidence. Akutagawa strayed firmly on the ‘beast’ side. Odasaku was purely human.
It makes Atsushi damn near impossible to manipulate into situations and needed conclusions. It makes Osamu annoyed and pathetically relieved in equal measures.
The only weak point that Osamu can really discern from Atsushi is his love of the Agency and children.
Osamu keeps those thoughts at the very back of his head for reasons he refuses to acknowledge.
(To use those would insure Atsushi’s hatred.)
——
“Dazai-san,” Atsushi huffs, tucking his head into Osamu’s neck.
Osamu idly thinks it would be nice to die this way. Atsushi’s limbs wrapped around him in embrace and trust as Osamu relaxed on a couch.
He then scraps the thought because the only way for that to happen is for Osamu to ask Atsushi to end it all.
Osamu is one of the worst people he knows. He has done unspeakable things and manipulated people he pretended to care about and bathed in blood for years. Osamu is one of the worst people he knows, but he can not ask that of Atsushi. Because Atsushi would follow through.
“Atsushi-kun.” Osamu responds in kind, hand rising to rub Atsushi’s back.
Atsushi let’s out a rolling sound and a puff of air. Atsushi chuffed. Osamu stares at the ceiling and engraved this moment of perfect contentment into his memory.
——
The new double black is a complete failure in the eyes of Osamu.
Shin Soukoku was meant to be the culmination of Osamu’s past sins and his new present. The edge of Akutagawa’s needless quest for strength and acknowledgment from Osamu to oppose Atsushi’s wild adoration for life and Osamu’s existing favor. A remix of Osamu and Chuuya’s rabid hatred and understanding and disgust and need for one another.
It was none of these things.
Osamu smiled inwardly when the title “ The Interloper” clawed its way from Atsushi’s throat so viciously.
Osamu laughed when Atsushi came to rescue him from the Port Mafia’s clutches and Osamu got to show off his new “subordinate”. He continued to laugh as Akutagawa howled.
Osamu crooned when he finally gave the praise Akutagawa so coveted only after he worked with Atsushi.
Osamu’s scheming halted when Akutagawa paid him barely half a mind, instead opting to stare at Atsushi as he fretted over Kyoka.
Osamu’s plans cracked when he heard Atsushi say “Akutagawa” so kindly and fondly when Akutagawa attempted to impale him on Rashomon.
Osamu’s machinations shattered when color rose in Akutagawa’s cheeks and he redoubled his efforts to slay a laughing Atsushi.
This isn’t right, Osamu wants to say. It’s not. Where’s the hate? Where’s the black blood in double black?
There was none. Any that Akutagawa might have harbored was swept away by the unstoppable force that was Atsushi. Any Atsushi had was forgotten in his fun with Akutagawa.
Osamu rarely didn’t understand the world around him. Osamu did not understand this. Maybe Shin Soukoku wasn’t the best name after all.
——
Atsushi finds Osamu in the tub, laying in blood instead of water. It was a riskier attempt, with Atsushi’s sense of smell, but Osamu had been confident that he was out stalking the city.
Osamu is drunk off his ass and barely functioning. The cuts on his wrists are too shallow for a quicker death and Osamu curses his own stupidity as Atsushi hauls him out.
Atsushi works quickly. He forces a pain relief down Osamu’s throat and staunches the blood flow before inexpertly stitching both slashes— Yosano’s teaching and influence most likely. Osamu can’t tell if the pill, the alcohol, or the apathy is making him numb to the sensation.
Atsushi gets a good look at Osamu’s scarred arms as he bandages him up. Atsushi doesn’t say anything so neither does Osamu.
“Dazai-san,” Atsushi says, his voice beckoning like Osamu is far away. Maybe he is. “What have I told you?”
“Don’ wanna die,” Osamu slurs back, tired of being anything but the vulnerable mess he is. “Not… not today. Odasaku…” Osamu’s voice trails off like he’s calling for him. “Odasaku wouldn’ wan’ tha’. Jus’ needed i’ to… stop.” Osamu reaches up to pat Atsushi’s cheek. “Knew you’d come.”
Atsushi gives him a sad smile. “That’s too much trust, Dazai-san.”
Atsushi brings him back to his and Kyoka’s dorm. He lays Osamu down on the futon in the closet and closes the door, most likely because he knows Osamu wants to hide and Atsushi doesn’t want Kyoka to see.
Osamu hears Atsushi stand guard outside the closet door. He speaks softly to Kyoka and doesn’t move. He probably won’t for the whole night.
Unbidden, a smile creeps up Osamu’s face.
——
“I know what you did to Akutagawa.” Atsushi tells him casually over dinner.
Atsushi had commandeered all of Osamu’s knives and refused to give them back. Osamu made a daily nuisance of himself in Atsushi and Kyoka’s dorm in return. At least that was the goal. But Atsushi lit up when Osamu appeared at his door weeks ago for dinner and looked so happy just sitting with Osamu and Kyoka on his little cramped table that… Osamu kept coming back.
Kyoka is out on a mission with Kenji, so it’s only Atsushi and Osamu. That’s probably why Atsushi brought it up now.
Osamu sets down his chopsticks. “Oh?”
It’s not an answer or confirmation. Atsushi knows this, knows Osamu, and didn’t ask for either.
“I don’t know any details,” Atsushi says in that bleakly, horribly honest way of his, “and I never want to.”
How, Osamu wants to ask, did you find out? Who told you?
Make no mistake, Osamu has done nothing to hide his past from Atsushi. He has taken no pains to cover what lurks beneath his skin, most likely drawn in by the way Atsushi himself never does so. Osamu didn’t hide it, but he didn’t mention it either. He… didn’t want Atsushi to know.
Atsushi reads the question on Osamu’s face.
(Osamu can’t tell if he’s getting better at comprehending expressions in general or if it’s just Osamu that Atsushi knows how to read. He doesn’t know which one he prefers.)
“I…” Atsushi says haltingly, likely trying to find the words. Osamu likes that about him, likes the deliberate cadence of Atsushi's sentences. “I had someone… that was to me what you were to Akutagawa. I think.”
Who? is Osamu’s first thought.
Who would do what he did to Akutagawa to Atsushi? Who would take the time to break Atsushi, to torment him awake and asleep? Who is this person, what is their name, and how can Osamu find them?
(Osamu had never poked into Atsushi’s background, had thought he was just an abandoned child with an Ability or a child abandoned because of his Ability, and had never felt the need to look. He felt idiotic in retrospect.)
“It’s easy to tell,” Atsushi continues like Osamu isn’t falling apart in front of him, “when you know the signs. I know you did it to Q, too. Those razors looked like something you would come up with.”
Yes, yes they did, didn’t they? Osamu hates that Atsushi can connect him to that.
“Atsushi,” Osamu finally said, trying to sort through the cacophony of questions rolling in his head.
Atsushi steamrolls over him. “There was a cage. I didn’t know then, but I was put there because I couldn’t control my tiger. I was chained in it by my neck, arms, and legs. But that wasn’t the only way I was trapped.”
Atsushi did not look at Osamu and kept his gaze trained on the table in front of him. “I was trapped with words, with hatred, with dependency. It was the only life I knew, and I thought I needed to stay to survive.”
Atsushi’s tail swishes back and forth anxiously. “I have no doubt that I wouldn’t have left that cage until I was thrown out, had my tiger not taken over.”
Atsushi is shaking. Osamu wonders if Atsushi has ever talked about this, has ever taken the time to parse through that chapter of his life. Knowing Atsushi, he had probably done very little of the latter and exactly none of the former.
“You still cage them.” Atsushi says after taking calming breaths. “And it doesn’t just hurt them. The keys are a noose around your throat that you’ve no idea how to cut.”
Osamu’s hands clutch the table with a white knuckle grip.
(It’s true, and Osamu knows it. He cages Chuuya and Akutagawa and Q and maybe even others he doesn’t know about. But Osamu doesn’t know any other way to keep them close at hand for what comes in the future. Osamu doesn’t know any other way, period. The only people he hadn’t managed to cage are Atsushi and Odasaku. One because he’s too strong and too smart to be caged once more and the other because he has caged Osamu.)
“I’m not saying to get rid of the cage; that would be just as bad as staying in it.” Atsushi finally meets Osamu’s eyes. “I’m saying that maybe you shouldn’t hold onto the keys any longer.”
“Would you like that, Atsushi-kun?” Osamu whispers. “Would you like me to give them the option you wish you had?”
Atsushi’s gaze does not waver. “I don’t think it matters what I’d like.”
“But it does, doesn’t it? This isn’t about Akutagawa or Q or anyone else I hurt.” Osamu smiles humorlessly. “This is about how you feel about someone you look up to hurting others the way you were hurt.”
“No,” Atsushi tells him stoutly. “It’s about how you said that name.”
Osamu flinches.
Don’t. Don’t bring him up. Please, Atsushi, don’t do it.
“You think ‘Odasaku’ is the keeper of your key.”
Osamu’s smile darkens. “Don’t speak about what you don’t understand, Atsushi.”
Atsushi does not waver. He is so strangely unafraid of Osamu that it makes Osamu want to scream. It makes Osamu want to show him why he was able to cage Akutagawa and Q and Chuuya, some of the most powerful Ability users in the world. It makes Osamu want to show Atsushi nothing but the better bits of himself and hide away the dark parts.
“The key that is the tightest around your neck is yours .”
Osamu walks out.
——
Osamu doesn’t ignore Atsushi. No, he pretends that nothing happened and Atsushi ignores Osamu.
It’s something far worse than when Atsushi told Osamu he was in trouble and wouldn’t get any cuddles. Because then, Osamu could lay himself out on a couch or on the floor and bemoan not having anybody to nap with. Atsushi would twitch and try to refocus on stumbling through his paperwork, but send longing looks towards Osamu and the couch.
Atsushi is not subtle about giving Osamu the cold shoulder. He doesn’t make it blatantly obvious, but he certainly doesn’t try to hide it. He avoids Osamu at lunch and goes out for beef bowls with Kenji or badgers Ranpo for snacks or eats quietly with Kyoka at his desk. He constantly stares just past Osamu and doesn’t acknowledge him unless it’s work related. Atsushi doesn’t nap once with Osamu or meet his gaze or plod up to him for attention.
It would be better if Atsushi were throwing a tantrum. If Atsushi was angry for a reason that didn’t reach past Osamu’s walls. If Atsushi was mad at him for being Osamu. But it’s not. Atsushi was prepared to push past it and work out what had been said. Osamu had pretended it had never happened.
Osamu had seen the anguish and outrage filter through Atsushi’s face when Osamu had smiled and questioned what Atsushi was talking about when he had spoken of the night before. Because Atsushi could live with Osamu ignoring his own problems— he’d be upset, but he’d live— but Atsushi could not bear to look at Osamu after Atsushi had opened up the tiniest bit about his past and Osamu elected to ignore it for his own selfish wants.
(Osamu could hardly bear it himself. He spends his nights searching for any record of Nakajima Atsushi. Something, anything to lead him to the person who had seen fit to try and snuff out Atsushi’s light.)
Osamu tells himself it doesn’t hurt, that he’s bringing this upon himself and has gone through more painful things, besides. Odasaku’s death, for instance.
(Osamu thinks it’s rather telling that he can’t grasp any moment other than that.)
——
Now that Atsushi has put the feeling into words, Osamu can feel the cords of the keys restricting his air flow.
Chuuya’s blazes white hot. It burns the lives of everyone Chuuya felt he needed to protect— the ones that Osamu had killed or allowed to die— deep into Osamu’s skin. It scorches a sensation of a hundred and one betrayals onto Osamu’s throat. It drips black blood in inky trails.
Akutagawa’s contracts and relaxes at odd moments, like the tendrils of Rashomon have wrapped around Osamu, unsure whether to suffocate him or not.
Q’s is the loosest, as Osamu had only interacted with him a handful of times. Sometimes it squeezed just slightly before giving up, as if it were an upset child.
(Atsushi’s words failed to leave him.
Osamu’s cord never slackened. It grew in strength every passing minute, taunting him for blaming Odasaku for something of his own making. Belittling his efforts on the side of ‘good’. Mocking him for daring to care about someone such as Atsushi.
The key that is tightest, indeed.)
——
Honesty was akin to sand cupped in Osamu’s palm. Too much and it slipped and fell and trickled free in droves until Osamu was left with an empty hand. Too little and it stayed stagnant in the hollow of skin, never to move into action.
For this reason, Osamu preferred to deal in half truths and lies of omission. Every falsehood is built on a core of truth and every certainty is mixed with a spoonful of lies.
However, Osamu was not particularly skilled at lying to himself in important matters. His brain simply refuses to acknowledge the denial Osamu wants to drown himself in. Which is why Osamu knows for certain he is unequivocally, monstrously jealous.
Atsushi most likely does not intend this outcome. It is a possibility, but its probability is low at best, negative at worst. Osamu knows this because Atsushi is an open book to those who stayed determined enough to flip the page, and Osamu liked to think he was a few chapters in.
( Not enough. His head snarled. Not far enough. You didn’t know he was caged, did you? Atsushi, chained up and locked away in the dark.
Osamu wondered if that was why Atsushi reveled in the sunlight. Wondered if sunlight was a privilege withheld from him. Sun loving Atsushi, who looked so excited when the warm rays splayed themselves out on the concrete or his couch or the grass. Sun loving Atsushi, locked up underground.)
Where Atsushi would lazily meander up to Osamu for affection and attention, not unlike a cat, he would now pester others. Yosano was the most common, and was happy to indulge Atsushi. She dragged him around for even more shopping trips, as the afternoons and lunches Atsushi reserved for Osamu were suddenly clear. Atsushi often came back showing off a new knickknack Yosano had gifted him or something Atsushi himself bought for someone else in the office.
Kyoka received a large stuffed rabbit similar to the charm dangling from her phone. She was exuberantly thankful, and kept it far away from Atsushi as he was often caught eyeing it ravenously.
Yosano was given an entire pack of mini butterfly clips. She would allow Atsushi to put her hair in tiny braids and spread them throughout, and Atsushi would crouch on a desk for a better vantage point, face scrunched in solemn concentration. Osamu is pretty sure Yosano has a picture of it framed on her desk.
(“I didn’t know you knew how to braid,” Yosano hums.
Pulled from his single-minded attentiveness, Atsushi pinches Yosano's hair to keep his half done braid together.
“I read books and watched tutorials on the computer.”
“He was very bad at it,” Kyoka says earnestly. “He practiced on me, and we had to cut my hair to take out the knot.”
If today were any other day but a human one, Osamu has no doubt Kyoka would find herself with a mouthful of fur, courtesy of being smacked with Atsushi’s tail. As it were, Atsushi only stuck his tongue out at her.)
Kenji got a ridiculous top hat. Osamu has no idea how or where Atsushi acquired it, and Kenji enthusiastically swapped it out for his usual straw hat. It clashed horribly with his frayed overalls, and Kenji took immense joy in tipping it flamboyantly to others.
Ranpo was handed a map of the subway system. It was handmade and cobbled together with paper and glue and staples. Some parts were clipped from existing maps, others were stapled bits of brochures, and a few were hand drawn paper pieces that Atsushi did himself. There were doodles and notes scrawled in any blank spaces with what Osamu recognized as Atsushi’s best handwriting.
(“Did you do that all by yourself, Atsushi?” Tanizaki asked in wonderment.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you ask for my help?” Kyoka asks a bit stiffly. “I’ve memorized the entire Yokohama underground.”
Smiling, Atsushi runs a hand over Kyoka’s head.
“It’s a gift from me to Ranpo. I had to do it myself.”
Ranpo carefully folded the map and tucked it deep in the pocket of his coat he reserves for his glasses.)
Tanizaki and Naomi got sweet bread to share. Kunikida got new pens. Haruno got a cat key charm. Fukuzawa got a wholeass kitten Atsushi had picked up from some hellhole. Poe got an adorable raccoon themed headband. Akutagawa got violently hunted down and nearly strangled with his new scarf. Every single clerk in the Agency got a sweet or something small and cute from Atsushi.
Osamu got nothing.
Why did it have to be when Atsushi discovered he loved giving gifts that Osamu decided to be an ass?
Osamu wanted to know what Atsushi thought he liked; wanted to know what lengths Atsushi would go to acquire it; wanted solid proof of Atsushi’s adoration of Osamu. Osamu wanted.
But Osamu wanted to avoid the oncoming conversation even more.
——
“Atsushi-san!” Kenji exclaims. “You can talk to cats?”
Glancing up from his intense staring contest with Fukuzawa’s kitten, Naka, Atsushi cocked his head.
“Not really? It’s more…” Atsushi trailed off with a thousand yard gaze, as he usually did when he was searching for a way to phrase or explain something.
Atsushi squirmed back and forth, flicking his ears and twitching his tail. Naka mewled plaintively at Atsushi, and Atsushi glared at her before looking up at Kenji meaningfully. Kenji smiled in polite bewilderment.
Atsushi slumped. Osamu has noticed that Atsushi has difficulties describing his more beastly instincts in words when he hadn’t ample time to mull them over, and it never failed to make Atsushi upset.
“It’s body language.” Osamu finds himself saying. “Cats ‘meow’ for humans and kittens, not other cats.”
Atsushi nods emphatically, staring at Osamu in thanks and adoration. Osamu soaks it in, savoring and appreciative, until Atsushi remembers he doesn’t like Osamu right now. Atsushi’s expression falls— he looks hurt, why does he look hurt when he’s the one hurting Osamu— and he turns away.
“Wow, Atsushi-san! That’s super cool!”
Atsushi hums before wandering over to Kyoka, leaving Kenji to his attempts at ‘talking’ to Naka.
——
Inky blackness embraces Osamu as intimately as a lover. Osamu can’t help but revel in it as he is swept far, far away from everything by the current. If he’s lucky , he’ll die. If he’s fortunate , he’ll wash up in another forest and adopt another stray Ability user to shove in Atsushi’s face. Make him the jealous one for a change.
But Osamu has never been lucky or fortunate. Hands grasp his torso, and at first Osamu thrashes. Rejects being saved (because he doesn’t want it if it’s not going to be Atsushi saving him) and re-emerging from the caress of the river. A growl slices through the water and Osamu is going limp because there is no way. No way is Atsushi here saving Osamu and holding him and giving him attention. Not when it’s just another suicide attempt, one done for the sake of doing it and not for the release of death.
Dripping and cold, Osamu is yanked from the water harshly. He is dropped carelessly on the grass of the river bank and receives a full view of Atsushi in all of his sunsets lit, barefoot glory scowling at him.
“Why do you do this,” Atsushi snarls, nose scrunching in a way that makes Osamu want to poke it, “and never ask me? Are you making fun of me? Do you think I won’t do it?”
Atsushi is pacing in front of Osamu’s prone form. He makes a decision and reaches down to lightly pinch Osamu’s windpipe.
“I can. I will.”
“I know,” Osamu finally responds. He’s a little dumbfounded by the brunt of Atsushi’s attention and touch.
“Then why?” Atsushi gasps. He looks as though he might cry. Osamu doesn’t know if he’s terrified and guilty or smugly satisfied by that.
“I would never do that to you, Atsushi. I’m not desperate enough yet.” Osamu chuckles hollowly. “You did say I could try. I wanted to see if you were mad enough to let me succeed.”
“Never,” Atsushi all but spits at him.
Osamu finds himself smiling. “I know that now.”
——
Atsushi follows Osamu back to his dorm. He waits, perched on the counter and tells Osamu to change.
Osamu wants to protest. (If he leaves, will Atsushi still be on his counter, royal purple and gilded gold eyes flickering about in judgment when he returns? Or will Atsushi decide Osamu is not worth it and walk out the door?) But Atsushi glares at him and Osamu knows that Atsushi is the one in charge at the moment, and if he walked out he would be damn well within his right to.
Soaking wet as he is, Osamu almost offers clothes to Atsushi. Almost, because Atsushi was still largely displeased with him and didn’t like clothes that weren’t tailored to his Ability. Osamu did not want his clothes to be returned to him with more holes than necessary.
Mercifully, Atsushi was still waiting for Osamu when he hurried back to the kitchen. He was painted in the dim silver light of the moon that filtered softly through Osamu’s single window, not looking at anything but his own hands.
“I’m so, so upset with you,” Atsushi admits quietly.
Osamu swallows. “I know.”
“I told you something I’ve never told anyone before.”
“Yes.”
“You acted like it didn’t matter.”
“Yes.”
“I hate you just a little bit for it.”
“You should.” Osamu’s voice sounds thick and croaking even to his ears.
“I don’t want to.”
Atsushi stares at Osamu in that silent, still way of his. Like he cannot decide if Osamu is prey to hunt or something to puzzle through. Like his human and beast instincts are not hand in hand for once.
(It’s going to be up to Osamu, isn’t it? Osamu is the one that cracked this, so Osamu has to try and weld it back together.)
“I thought,” Osamu starts haltingly, “I thought about what you said. About keys and all that.”
Atsushi regards him quietly.
“You… might have been right. About Akutagawa and Q, that is.”
Osamu isn’t ready to face the cage of his own making. He hopes Atsushi doesn’t hold it against him.
“I tried to cage you.” Osamu finds himself saying. “For the fight against Dostoyevsky.”
Atsushi’s hands flashed like claws for a second.
“You and Akutagawa both. Wanted to chain you to each other with hate and necessity and eventually make you crave it. Like how I was with my old partner.”
“I thought Dazai-san seemed disappointed.” Atsushi replies evenly, still flexing his fingers. “Now I know why.”
Osamu nods.
“I don’t know… if I’m ready.”
(To let them go, to have trust that they’ll still help without Osamu dangling their freedom in front of them, to free himself of the cords around his neck.)
“Does that matter?” Atsushi cocks his head in his feline manner.
Osamu chuckles. “No, I suppose not.”
There is soundless tension in the air between them. Osamu wonders if he’s done enough, said enough to ask.
Who did that to you Atsushi-kun? Who hurt you? Who are they?
Atsushi leaves before he can.
——
Chuuya is the first he finds. Even though Atsushi has no clue of his existence, it seems right to concede the first key Osamu had created.
The flat Chuuya lives in is opulent at the same time it is simple. Fine furniture and carpets but no expensively unnecessary embellishments. Tailored suits and vintage wines but practicality sewn into every seam and frugality in how much he drinks.
Chuuya is always there on his days off, maybe drinking, maybe relaxing, maybe doing the hobbies Osamu never thought to inquire about. Showing up in his residence unannounced is not the cleverest of ideas, but Chuuya had always responded better to tactlessness and blunt words.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Chuuya snarls, his ungloved fingers twitching when he spots Osamu in his armchair.
“Chuuya,” Osamu says to the ceiling. He feels more than sees Chuuya tense. Osamu rarely speaks in a tone other than condescendingly cheerful to him. (He wonders if that’s another chain.)
“You here for one of your goddamn favors? I don’t have time for that shit! It’s my day—”
“How many lives have I stolen from you?” Dazai interrupts. “How many times have I betrayed you?”
Chuuya snorts. “What, you think I count, bastard? I’m not nearly so pathetic.”
“Because I only remember the Sheep, about thirteen of your subordinates, and seven betrayals.”
Chuuya is always alive and chaotic and animated. Osamu rarely sees him freeze so completely.
Chuuya is silent as stomps over to a cabinet and pours himself a generous glass of wine without even glancing at the bottle. Taking methodical, calming breaths between sips, Chuuya takes his time pulling through the glass and only returns to his sitting room after he finishes two portions.
“That’s not even fucking close.”
“I figured.” Osamu tells the ceiling.
(Chuuya had always been a spark and a half to Osamu. Something on fire and white hot and untouchable. Something that blew up the world around him and made everything predictable yet not. He had done his best to murder the half spark that dug under Osamu’s skin, and hadn’t succeeded. What he did succeed in was making for certain the spark was never able to brush his skin again. On some days, he finds himself missing it. On others, Osamu wishes he had snuffed out the whole thing.)
“What the hell is this for? You suddenly gain a conscience or some shit?” Chuuya takes a deep swig of the wine glass still in his hand. Osamu wonders if he’ll be mad about that later. “Nah, you're too nasty for that. Must be something else you want.”
“Tell me,” Osamu tries not to let this sound demanding.
“No.” Chuuya says. “If you want to know, figure it out yourself.”
“I’m not playing your games, Chuuya,” Osamu croons, sickly sweet and dangerous.
Chuuya meets his gaze evenly. “I’m not playing yours either.”
——
Two weeks later finds stolen files laying upon Chuuya’s coffee table. On top is a sticky note scrawled sloppily and somewhat violently.
The Sheep, twenty eight men, fifteen betrayals.
Underneath the note and stamped on the topmost file is ‘Arahabaki Incident’.
——
Osamu finds Atsushi in his doorway late, late at night. He didn’t mind, mostly because Osamu hadn’t really been planning on sleeping at all.
“Dazai-san,” Atsushi says to the floor, “these are for you.” He shoves a large bag into Osamu’s hands harshly.
Osamu peeks inside and sees all manners of trinkets and knickknacks and baubles.
“Even though I was mad, I still got something for you when I went out shopping for the others. I didn’t want to give them to you, so they just piled up.”
The tight knot of jealousy and ugliness tangled deep in Osamu’s chest unraveled. Every time Atsushi went out for someone else, he got something for Osamu. Osamu might be receiving more than the entire Agency combined.
“Thank you, Atsushi-kun.” Osamu doesn’t pretend not to be a little choked up. “Do you… want to come in?”
Atsushi shakes his head. He leaves Osamu in the doorway to disappear in the gray and purple of the night.
——
An assortment of barrettes, mostly ones with cat and crab designs and popping colors.
A coffee mug with a stretching cat sprawled on it.
Hot pink and highlighter yellow bandages that are only a little rougher than his own.
An empty wooden picture frame.
Ceramic mushrooms that Osamu is pretty sure are window decorations.
A throw pillow Osamu has no clue where to put.
A small book that looked as though it had been leafed through already. Osamu wondered if Atsushi read it before giving it to Osamu or if he just bought it second hand.
A pad of stickers with mostly cats.
A dozen or so little candies that Atsushi probably picked at random.
Osamu packs them throughout his apartment. Leaves them on counters, in drawers, in cabinets, and on the floor. Tucks away the little pieces of Atsushi safely, to remind Osamu of him.
——
“Dazai-san,” Akutagawa begins, uncertain, “what is in your hair?”
Brushing the portion of his bangs that are held up by his newly gifted barrettes, Osamu grins.
“Atsushi-kun gave them to me. They suit me, don’t they?”
Akutagawa’s hand ghosts to his throat where a charcoal grey scarf winds protectively. Osamu’s smile widens.
“What is your business here, Dazai-san?”
“To talk, of course!”
Gaze sharp and wary, Akutagawa takes a few steps back.
“It’s nothing bad, exactly. It’s about Atsushi-kun.”
“Very well,” Akutagawa concedes, without pause.
“Atsushi-kun may have told you about someone. Someone from his past.” Osamu’s tone left no room for denials. Akutagawa made none. Which is good because this was Osamu’s last, most desperate attempt. He’s been met with too many dead ends and this is his only lead. “I want you to tell me what he said.”
Akutagawa— rabid, single-minded Akutagawa who’s only goal has ever been Osamu’s acknowledgement— hesitates. Mulls over the reason Osamu would ask Akutagawa instead of Atsushi. Ponders the consequences of telling him. Osamu wonders if he’s thinking about how Atsushi himself will react.
(Which is fair, because if Atsushi didn’t tell Osamu, it was probably for a reason. Maybe because he knew Osamu was going to hurt whoever did that to Atsushi.)
Rashomon crackles as Akutagawa makes up his mind.
“All he told me is that he’s dead.”
Osamu froze. “He’s what.”
“He briefly mentioned the man you ask of, but only to speak of his death. He was grieving.”
Of course, Osamu thinks hysterically. Of course Atsushi would grieve for someone like that.
Vaguely recalling comforting Atsushi as he cried over loss, Osamu barely refrains from gritting his teeth.
“Thank you, Akutagawa-kun.”
Akutagawa inclined his head. Osamu moves to leave, but turns back after a few steps.
“I hope you don’t grieve for me the way Atsushi-kun did for his monster.”
Akutagawa stiffens and says curtly, “I do as well.”
The sky is dark and the night is cold, and Osamu is reminded of how the moonlight refracted just slightly off of Atsushi’s skin. He finds himself gathering words before he can really stop himself.
“You know, Akutagawa-kun,” Osamu calls quietly to his retreating figure. “I will never do right by you.”
Akutagawa pauses for the barest of moments and does not turn back around.
“I am beginning to see that.”
——
Casually breaking into the Port Mafia is saddeningly easy. Osamu is a little confused as to why the security has yet to change even almost five years after his departure, but chalks it up to Mori knowing that no plan will ever measure up to Osamu’s own. And even if they did create a whole other system, Osamu has no doubt he would be able to figure his way around it.
Q is in the same room Osamu left them in all those years ago. Osamu gives the cameras positioned around their door his best, sweetest smile.
Q is on their futon when Osamu breaks through the door.
Osamu wiggles his fingers in greeting. “Yo.”
“You,” Q spits. “What are you doing here?”
“You don't have a Dogra Magra, right?”
Q huddles further into themself.
“Good.” Osamu shrugs his shoulders. “Well that’s it. If the threat to the Agency is neutralized, then it should be fine. As long as the dolls stay out of your hands and the razors leave, it should all be good, right?”
“Wh- what?”
Ignoring them, Osamu glances up at the cameras for emphasis and smiles wide, wide, wide.
“Bye then!”
With a sweeping wave, Osamu leaves just as abruptly as he arrived.
——
He can almost hear Mori’s huffing laugh.
Alright Dazai-kun, he coos, if that’s what you want.
He can’t bring himself to be displeased when a week later, Osamu sees Q skipping down the street, no doll in sight.
——
The weight bearing down Osamu’s neck grows lighter. Osamu wonders if this means the keys he had flaunted are being accepted or if they’re just slipping free. He finds he doesn’t care.
(He may be imagining it, but he thinks his own grows looser, too.)
——
“Dazai-san, do you want to get ice cream?”
Osamu looks up from where he is busy not working.
“Of course, Atsushi-kun.”
——
You don’t know half of what I’ve done , Osamu thinks as he sits with Atsushi over the dinner Kyoka cooked before she turned in for the night. How mafia black my blood runs.
“I’m glad we’re doing this again, Dazai-san.” Atsushi says between one mouthful and the next.
Osamu smiles. “Me too, Atsushi-kun.”
——
Atsushi and Osamu leave town for a case that takes them late into the night and arches just past early morning.
“I’ll tell you,” Atsushi says in the silence of Yokohama’s streets, “about him, if you tell me about Odasaku.”
If it were a month ago, Osamu would hesitate. But seven dead ends and several guilty, sleepless nights are stacked and stretched deep inside him, so Osamu doesn’t. He takes Atsushi to the river bank, mostly to soothe himself.
“Odasaku was my best friend,” Osamu says after a moment’s deliberation. “He was a good man; much too good for the mafia. He didn’t kill. He raised orphans. He made me feel as though I was well and truly alive. He… he was killed. Mori… the Port Mafia boss had him killed.”
Osamu swallows and takes a deep shuddering breath. “It’s because of him that I’m here, trying to become a good man. Mori is the one who wrapped me so tightly in chains that I didn’t notice the key around my neck, but I blamed Odasaku. Because blaming the dead is easier than blaming the living, even if it's you yourself responsible.”
Atsushi nuzzles into Osamu’s side, pushing past the drapings of his coat and laying his head directly over Osamu’s heart.
“The Headmaster was my worst nightmare.” Atsushi murmurs into Osamu’s chest. “He used to say that the lives of those who can’t save anyone have no value. That children whose parents threw them away have no right to cry. That I was a pathetic burden. And then… he told me to hate him, but never myself. He caged me, he hurt me, he starved me, he mutilated me. He never sold me off, even as the orphanage was penniless and my tiger form wrecked the crops.”
Atsushi laughed mirthlessly. “I hear him still, you know. When it’s my life against others, when I want something nice for the apartment, when I’m still hungry after a meal. He tells me all of the worst things he’s ever said to me.”
Osamu clasps a hand around Atsushi.
“You said you would have stayed there had your tiger not taken over. What happened?”
“The Headmaster nailed me to the floor of my cage.”
(Had Osamu not been cradling Atsushi to his side, he would have seethed in rage. My cage, Atsushi had said, in the same tone of a child sent to their room. Like it couldn’t be helped, like it was something that was common, normal even.)
“It wasn’t any different than before. He had almost killed me so many times. It shouldn’t have been different. But after just lying there in my own blood for hours, I went crazy. Pried out the nail and tried to stab my eye with it, just to end it all. But… I didn’t really want to die. More than anything, I wanted to be free. So my tiger instincts took over before the nail could touch me, and the next thing I knew was that I was in a forest alone.”
Unconsciously, Osamu’s fingers tightened on Atsushi.
You're not allowed to do that ever again, Osamu wants to say.
But he can’t. Osamu can’t find it in himself to be that hypocritical. Can’t find it within him to practice what he preaches. He can’t.
So he holds Atsushi tight against the tepid summer wind.
——
Generously, graciously, Osamu finally forgives Yosano and every other Agency member he had nursed a grudge for.
As much as Osamu hated to admit it, all of those smug, devious looks she and all the rest had sent in his direction as he stewed in jealousy were completely, utterly justified.
Having Atsushi give his utmost attention and care to you as he works in stone-faced concentration is both humbling and brag worthy.
Osamu had been gripped by cold claws of doubt and fear when Atsushi asked if he wanted help changing his bandages to his newer, much lighter kind before a long, hot day at work. He had asked so innocently, so genuinely, that Osamu had said yes before he had really thought about it. Before he could process what he had agreed to, he found himself sitting on the counter, violently pink and yellow bandages on stand-by and Atsushi in front of him.
Noticing his sudden irregular breathing, Atsushi put much needed space between their bodies.
“Don’t worry, Dazai-san.” Atsushi lifts his loose white shirt, showing off starkly red burns like the stripes of his tiger stamped on his pale skin. “I’m not in any position to judge.”
That doesn’t mean you won’t. Osamu thinks. That doesn’t mean you won’t ask, either.
But this is Atsushi. Atsushi who had already seen so many of his scars and said nothing of it even months later. Atsushi, who had already shown him, told him of so many vulnerable bits and pieces of himself that Osamu can’t help but want to reciprocate. Osamu steels himself and nods.
Atsushi is unfailingly gentle as he unwinds Osamu’s bandages, even as it reveals scar after scar on blemished skin. He is silent, which Osamu appreciates even more, as it allows him to do nothing but focus on his own breathing.
Hot pink and searing yellow intertwine and mesh on Osamu’s arms, neck, and torso in an almost expert binding.
At Osamu's questioning look, Atsushi flushes minusculy.
“I asked Yosano-san to help me learn.”
The last of the icy claws in Osamu’s heart melts away.
“Thank you, Atsushi-kun.”
——
The last time Osamu took a picture in a group, it was for proof. Desperate proof of his and his companions' meetings and friendship and existence. He keeps it close on hand, tucked deep into the furthest corner of his blackened heart.
The next time is one for fun. Kenji insists. It’s to send it back to his family, he said. To commemorate Osamu’s stellar fashion sense, he said.
Everyone readily agrees and Osamu finds himself swept along with it.
In the picture, Yosano is shouldering her wickedly sharp cleaver with a grin, butterfly clip perfectly in place, but not without a hint of a few extra tiny clips glinting in the sun. Ranpo is next to her, a lollipop placed cheekily in his mouth and hand up in a victory sign. Fukuzawa has only a hint of a smile behind the two of them, but his dour look is offset by Naka on his shoulder.
Naomi and Tanizaki are embracing, and Kenji is in front of them, top hat jaunting to the right, smiling gleefully with his fingers splayed widely as if to say Look at them. Aren’t they great?
Kunikida is straight-backed and serious, seeming irritated; like he’s only a second away from yelling at someone. Maybe everyone but Fukuzawa.
Osamu is in the center of everyone in the Armed Detective Agency, wrapped in pink and yellow and brown, hair pulled back from his face in kitten and crab barrettes, and smiling. Atsushi is next to him, close but not touching, so as to lift a gracefully posing Kyoka high in the air with a single hand, tiger ears and tail flicking proudly.
The picture is printed and a copy is handed to each member.
Something about keeping the picture tucked away and safe rankles at Osamu. Makes it feel as though he’s hiding this moment of pure joy.
So it finds a home in the little wooden frame Atsushi had gotten for him what feels like ages ago. It hangs on Osamu’s desolate wall, bright enough to not seem lonely as the only wall ornament.
——
“Pspspspspsps,” Osamu croons, aiming the laser pointer at another target.
Atsushi takes a flying leap at the red dot carefully placed on the chest of the gang members, bowling him over completely. Osamu laughs and zigzags the beam over to yet another human, Atsushi streaking after it.
Around them is complete pandemonium. Criminals are strewn across the floor haphazardly, unconscious or groaning in pain. Kenji and Yosano are bent in half with laughter, each poised on their own pile of victims, having stopped halfway through to watch. Atsushi is in full tiger form, merciless in his conquest. Osamu stands in the middle of it all, directing it as though he were a conductor and the chaos his composition.
The death count was still a total of zero, courtesy of Atsushi’s contracted claws and reluctance to kill humans, but the day was still young and Osamu may just aim for a head next.
Yowling in victory, Atsushi leapt upon his prey, only to spot the dot circling tauntingly a few feet away. Outrage began to color his movements, making Atsushi faster and faster. Little did he know that this was a game rigged against his kind from its very conception.
Osamu finds himself giggling gleefully, carefree in a way he doesn’t think he’s ever been.
——
Wind tugs and buffets Osamu’s coat as peers over the side of his chosen tower.
He can feel the free fall. Can feel the rip and ruthlessness of the air as he plummets. Can feel the exhilaration and relief as he streaks downward, a blotch of brown on a sky of oranges and pinks.
It’s not likely he’ll die. Atsushi has a sixth sense for when Osamu is up to something. He can jump inhuman heights, and as long as he’s careful, he can snatch Osamu and not lose his tiger strength.
But if Atsushi doesn’t make it, doesn’t know what Osamu is doing, then Osamu will die. He will have finally completed his lovely, fantastical suicide.
It’s a win-win.
Is it?
Osamu pauses, right foot dangling over the ledge.
If Atsushi saves him, he will be disappointed. He will be betrayed that Osamu had tried to end it when he promised he would ask Atsushi. He will be upset that Osamu had done it for the thrill, once again steamrolling over Atsushi’s feelings.
And… Atsushi had made him swear to take him and Kyoka to the aquarium this weekend. If Osamu died, who would take them? Would Atsushi even want to go?
He would break promises by doing this. He would hurt Atsushi by jumping.
Wind pushing and tempting him with every traitorous beat of his heart, Osamu dragged his right foot to sit parallel to his left. He took a step back. Then another and another and another and suddenly he was going down the stairs and out the door.
Osamu breathed in deeply. The air was less overpowering on the ground. Even Osamu’s chest was lighter. As was every step he took away from that building and back to the Agency.
(The noose around his neck slipped and slackened until it was but a key on a cord, ready to be taken off at a moment’s notice.)