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Chuuya's back slammed against the wall, the breath exploding from his lungs. Dazai had him pinned, angrily glaring at the smaller man. Chuuya reached up, grabbing Dazai's wrists, trying to twist them, but Dazai just slammed him back again.
"You need to stop," the other one hissed, amber eyes bright in the darkness of the infirmary.
Chuuya glowered back, his upper lip curling as he shoved Dazai off him. "What the fuck?" he snarled, tugging the collar of his shirt back into place.
Dazai was breathing heavily, eyes narrowed. "Chuuya," he snapped.
"Are you fucking high? What the actual fuck?"
"How often?" Dazai yelled, and Chuuya winced.
"How often what? Dazai, you're making zero sense!"
"How often have you been in here?"
Chuuya shrugged. Who cared? He had a job to do - make sure everyone made it out safely, and he was doing his job. What high horse did Dazai have to get in his face about it?
"What the hell do you care?" Chuuya shot back, moving to go around Dazai.
Dazai snagged his wrist, twisting the smaller man to face him. "This has to stop," he said, and there was a look on his face that Chuuya could not decipher.
Chuuya looked at him defiantly. "I don't think you get a say in what I do, Detective."
Something crossed the brunette's face - something ugly and twisted. It reminded Chuuya of the old Demon Prodigy.
But Dazai hadn't been that in years. He was now a Detective, fighting for the good of humanity, or whatever. At least trying to solve the murders that people like Chuuya committed.
Chuuya found himself pinned against the wall again, Dazai holding his wrists. Instinctively, Chuuya shot out his leg, kicking the other one in the shin. Dazai reeled back, and Chuuya slipped around him.
The hell was wrong with Dazai today? he thought as he kept an eye on the brunette. Dazai was rubbing his leg, and glaring at Chuuya.
Chuuya did the only thing he knew how to do in this situation.
He escaped.
He barreled through the door, knocking aside Glasses and made his way to the exit. He could hear Dazai running behind him, long legs working to catch up with him, but Chuuya had an advantage that Dazai didn't - and when he made it to the stairwell, he jumped, swinging his legs over the side and dropping to the ground floor.
Was Dazai possessed? Chuuya wracked his brain, trying to figure out what had happened. It had been another fight - another turf war with Fyodor, and seriously, didn't that guy ever die? Chuuya would have to rip out his heart next time, since dropping a helicopter on him clearly hadn't worked.
He chewed his thumbnail as he hailed a taxi cab, hoping in the back. He gave a random address close to where he lived, though he wasn't sure if he should go back there.
Dazai knew where he lived, and if the other was possessed, or something. Maybe it was a clone? Shit, did they have to deal with clones now outside of…? Chuuya sighed, letting his head fall back against the cushion of the cab. He needed to come up with a plan, one that Dazai wouldn't be able to follow or track. He needed a safe house - wait, what if it wasn't just Dazai?
Sure, Chuuya had a few places that he could go to if things got rough, but he knew that Dazai was aware of at least two of them, possibly more.
He never could track what Dazai knew versus what he didn't.
He hopped out of the cab, handing the driver a wad of money. He didn't know how much he gave him, or how much the ride cost, but by the wide eyes of the driver, it was a fantastic tip.
Making his way down the street, Chuuya knew he would have to disguise himself. He looked in the window of a store he was passing by - bright red hair, stylish clothes, the hat that Rimbaud had gotten him.
People in this part of town knew who he was, he had an image that he had created and fought hard to maintain.
First step, get rid of the hat. He looked around - there was a Mafia safe house only a few blocks away. He could deposit his more well-known look there and come back later to pick it up.
If he wasn't wrong, there was a clothing store near here as well - he'd have to check. He knew he should be contacting others of the Port Mafia - Kouyou, perhaps, or even Mori, but what if this was like the vampire incident?
If even Dazai was affected, then who could he trust? Better to keep to himself for a few days and resurface then. He had to come up with a plan. He stared at his red hair, twirling the end in his hand - he wasn't desperate, not yet, but if this didn't right itself, he would need to invest in hair dye.
He gave his reflection a face.
He would look awful with black hair - but living another day sometimes meant looking like hell.
He shoved as much of his hair as he could into his hat, popping the collar up around his chin, and making his way to the clothing store. He looked around, nose wrinkling when he got there. It wasn't his usual fare, but that was the point. He had to look as un-Chuuya as possible.
He picked up a dark green flannel sweatshirt with a hood and a brown canvas jacket on his way by some of the racks. Jeans were easy to find, and he needed good shoes that didn't look like they cost much - he decided on a brown pair of hiking boots. Looking at the ensemble he made, he made sure to grab an undershirt and a packet of boxers as well. Everything had to be new if he was going to make sure that no one could track him.
He was standing in line at the checkout when he saw non-prescription reading glasses. Trying on a few pairs to see if he could find one that he could still see through, finally deciding on a pair with heavy brown plastic frames. He dumped all of these onto the counter, and waited impatiently to be rung up.
He glanced outside the window - shit, was that Kajii? He ducked his head, tapping his foot impatiently. He should grab a pillow from somewhere - he had heard once that the easiest way to be mistaken for another person was weight - and his lithe, muscular body needed to change.
"Do you sell pillows?" he asked the clerk.
She frowned. "No… we don't, but there's a furniture store nearby," she informed him. He nodded. He'd need to stop there.
New clothes, new look, and he'd just need to grab the cash from the safehouse and rent a hotel room under a false name.
It had been a while since he had to go this deep into a disguise, but if Dazai had been compromised somehow, there was little else he could do.
A ding sounded in his pocket.
Shit, he thought. His phone. he hadn't turned it off. He scrambled to get it out and noticed there were several new messages waiting for him.
Kouyou: Chuuya, I heard that you were severely injured again. That boy has informed me. Please be careful in the future.
Kouyou: That boy has just informed me that he has gotten their insane doctor to fix you up. Let us know when you're awake and I'll send a car.
Kouyou: That boy said you ran out? Chuuya, what happened? Are you alight?
Kouyou: If you do not respond, I will be forced to send out search parties.
Kajii: Chuuya, where the fuck you at? I can't go to the ADA, that crazy ass doctor will murder me. I've got a car.
Akutagawa: Executive Ozaki is concerned. I have been tasked to find you. Please send your location at earliest convenience.
Hirotsu: I am heading your way. Please stay where you are.
Chuuya turned the phone off, shoving it back into his pocket. He'd need to leave that and any identification in the safehouse, just in case there was any sort of tracker on them. He frowned, grabbing his bags as the clerk finished up. He made sure to look out the door both ways before hurrying to the safehouse.
It wouldn't do to be found.
The safehouse - or apartment, if one was to be technical - was on the fourth floor. Chuuya climbed the wall in the alley using Tainted Sorrow. He slipped in through the window and looked around. The safehouse was stocked with easy-to-prep and non-perishable food like soups, ramen packets, and granola bars. There was a full cupboard dedicated to coffee because everyone in the mafia needed that extra caffeine boost. He grabbed one of the bags, as well as some bowls and cutlery. Hotels never had excellent coffee, but they usually had coffee makers and he'd make do with that.
He contemplated taking a shower - if he made it under ten minutes, just to get the stink of infirmary off his skin, he could do it.
No, he told himself. He was going to rent a hotel room. That would be enough. He stripped quickly, changing into his new clothes, making sure to tear all of the tags off. Rubbing a hand over his face, he nodded at himself in the mirror and began to stock some food from the cupboard into the bag he got from the store.
He knew that his time here was limited. He needed to move on. Placing his clothes and hat down, he dropped his wallet as well, just grabbing one of the fake IDs out of it, as well as the wad of cash. He didn't put it past Dazai to somehow track him from anything that was his. As it was, he almost left the ID but he also knew that hotels were weird about accepting guests without IDs these days.
He took a look at it, and the name was nothing like his: Shirogane Takashi. He snorted - whoever had made this one was a complete nerd.
He shook his head, looking subtly out through the blinds. He didn't recognize anyone in the street but that didn't mean anything. He made sure that his hair was covered completely by the hoodie before hunting around the apartment for a small pillow - there was a dark green one on the couch and he shoved that under the hoodie and t-shirt as well, keeping it secured by tucking the t-shirt into his jeans. Hopefully this would do. He looked about forty-pounds heavier, and his hair was covered. He shoved the ill-fitted reading glasses onto his face. There was nothing he could do about his eyes - and sometimes he really hated how strange he looked compared to others in Yokohama. Even two-toned hair colors like Akutagawa could fit in better than he could.
Taking a deep breath, he exited the room, walking down the back stairs - he didn't want to hop out the window like he had come in. Didn't need anyone seeing his disguise use gravity like Nakahara Chuuya could.
He exited out the back way into the street and nearly jostled into someone. He didn't dare look, just in case it was someone that he knew, and kept walking, hearing the person curse behind him. He needed to act natural, act like a normal person
What the fuck did a normal person even act like?
He looked around, as carefully as he could, making sure that he knew no one on the street. There was a long coat that could have been Dazai, or another that could have been Ryuunosuke. He was sure that was a golden butterfly clip from the crazy doctor and honestly, Chuuya just needed to get to a hotel, so he put his head down and shuffled along with the crowd.
The hotel was well to do - middle of the range. Chuuya wasn't going to stay in something that he hated, but he also wasn't going to stay in something insanely high class, like what Mori always put him up in.
No one paid him any mind as he handed over his ID. The clerk barely cared, and Chuuya was grateful. He didn't need anyone asking why he had the same name as the Black Paladin from the new Voltron series. Maybe people constantly were checking in with strange names.
Chuuya reviewed the morning's events once he got into the room, shucking off the jacket and laying it over the back of the chair. The room was modest - a double bed, a table with two chairs, a lounge chair, a mini-fridge and a tv stand. It was enough for him to hanker in for a few days. He'd wait until later and find a convenience store.
Dazai rubbed his hand over his face, trying to figure out how things could have gone so wrong so fast. He had only been worried - in the past year, he had watched Chuuya take on enemy after enemy, always standing in the way of fire, and usually ending up in the infirmary of the Armed Detective Agency because of it. His heart had stopped twice because of these antics, and Dazai was done with that. What could he do or say to make Chuuya realize that he didn't need to get himself killed?
He flailed back in his chair, trying in vain to figure out what to do next. Ever since Chuuya had left the infirmary, no one had seen him. His hat, wallet and cell phone were found at a safehouse nearby, but nothing from there.
Dazai was going to scream. He was going to murder Chuuya himself.
How could someone so smart be so dumb all the time?
"One month of lunch and I'll tell you where he is," Ranpo said in a sing song from the desk nearby.
Dazai cracked one eye open, staring at the impish detective. "One week," he countered.
"Three weeks," Ranpo offered, opening a bag of chips.
Dazai sat up straight, leaning on one hand. "Ten days."
"Fifteen days."
"Done."
Ranpo pulled out his phone and shot him the text: an address of a hotel, with a picture from the camera that showed Chuuya checking in, dressed in disguise.
Dazai frowned. "You're sure he's still there?" he asked cautiously.
The look on Ranpo's face soured. "Fifteen days of lunch, Dazai," he told him, and frankly, that was all that needed to be said.
Dazai added stealing Kunikida's wallet to his list of things to do today so that he could afford Ranpo's deal.
He left, thinking of how he would start the upcoming conversation with Chuuya.
Chuuya peered out the window of the hotel, knowing that he should be staying away from anywhere that anyone could see him, but he was curious. He had discarded most of his disguise - the pillow was tossed on a chair with the jacket. He hadn't heard anything yet - but that didn't mean Dazai or one of the others hadn't figured out where he was.
He could feel part of his panic start to crack as he tried to remember the rationalization of the entire flight to begin with. He had woken up in the Armed Detective Agency's infirmary and had found that once again, he wasn't dead.
Not that he wanted to be dead, just to make that clear.
But more that he wasn't. He was pretty sure half a building had fallen on him. Or was that last month? The problem with being brought back to life without any scars so often is that it tended to become harder to track the timeline of things to begin with.
It felt like the past several months had just been one thing after another when it came to Yokohama, and he was beginning to grow weary of how often Ability users were being targeted by… everyone.
If retirement was an option, he wasn't sure he would say no to it. As it was, there was no retirement from the battlefield, so he made it his focus to make sure that everyone came home.
He was startled from his thoughts as he heard something outside the door. Shit. Shit, shit, shit, fuck, shit.
In an instant, he dropped to the ground on the other side of the bed from the door, then berated himself - this was the worst hiding place he could think of.
The door clicked open, and then closed, before he could fix this.
He wasn't surprised to see Dazai leaning over him, kneeling on the bed. To be honest, he probably would have been more surprised if Dazai hadn't been the first one who found him.
"Why is chibi lying on the floor?" Dazai asked.
"It's great for my spine," Chuuya deadpanned.
The brunette raised an eyebrow and Chuuya mirrored the expression. Well, he was caught. If this was a possessed clone of his partner, he would have to fight his way out.
"Chuuya, we need to talk," Dazai said seriously, leaning even farther over the bed. Chuuya glared at him.
"Are you a clone?" Chuuya growled before Dazai could continue.
The other stilled, fingers clenching the comforter on the bed, both eyebrows well beyond the hair falling over his face. "Chuuya, what?" he asked.
Chuuya frowned. "Pretty simple question. Have you been replaced by a clone?"
"Do you have a concussion?" the brunette replied.
Chuuya scrunched up his face. "You still haven't answered my question, dumbass."
Dazai flopped on the bed, bouncing once or twice, reaching out and poking Chuuya in the cheek. "No, I'm not a clone."
Chuuya allowed the invasive touch once, twice, before he reached up and grabbed Dazai's hand. The other just grinned at him. "Awww, you wanted to hold my hand," he said.
"I will break all of your fingers."
"You're cranky." Dazai was smiling at him in a way that made Chuuya want to punch him. He dropped the other's hand.
"Ha? I'm normal."
"And cranky. Have you had enough food today? You always get hangry."
"I will murder you in your sleep."
"Promise?"
Chuuya sat up, "What the fuck are you even doing here?"
He could admit at this point, that no clone would annoy him this much - so his entire run from the Armed Detective Agency that morning had been… an exercise in stealth and undercover. Which he clearly did frequently to keep his skills up. And that was the story he was going to go with.
"Chuuya ran away," Dazai told him.
The redhead got to his feet, putting some distance between the two before he actually hurt the other. "I didn't run away," he protested. "I was not needed at your offices anymore this morning and so I left. And you were being weird."
Dazai wrinkled his nose. "Excuse you, how was I being weird?"
Chuuya raised and eyebrow and Dazai could feel the flush along the back of his neck.
"Well you need to stop killing yourself!" he shouted instead. "Do you know how many times this year alone I've had to get Yosano to fix you."
"Should I send her flowers?"
"No!" Dazai protested. Then he paused to think about it. "Actually, probably yes at this point, but that's not the point. Why are you always the one getting hurt?"
Chuuya face twisted. "You would prefer it to be someone else?" he asked quietly, his fists clenched as his sides. Every line of his shoulders were tense and he didn't meet Dazai's eyes. He slowly backed away from the bed, feeling the back of his legs hit the lounge chair. "Ryuunosuke? Gin? What about your weretiger? Or Kyouka? She's twelve, Dazai. She shouldn't even be there." Dazai gave a brief intake of breath. "Or you? I know you want to die, Dazai, but at least I can be fixed. You can't and the others… I don't give a shit anymore but they're kids. Fuck they shouldn't have to die either." He sank into the chair, his posture defensive. His voice was nearly a whisper when he continued, "Between Yosano and 'baki, I can't die, so I should be useful."
He wasn't expecting the wounded sound from the other's throat, partially a whine. His eyes snapped up to Dazai's, and the brunette couldn't hide the partially frantic look on his face. The moment stretched between the two former partners.
Slowly, carefully, as though approaching a wounded animal, Dazai lifted himself from the bed. He didn't miss how Chuuya's eyes kept flickering between his hands and his face, always keep an eye out for a weapon. Old habits were hard to kill, even among friends.
Dazai knelt in front of Chuuya's chair. "You don't have to die to be useful, Chuuya," the other's voice was soft, his eyes pleading as they stared into Chuuya's. "I'll rip out the fingernails of anyone who says differently."
Chuuya stared at him, face shuttered, tracing his jaw and cheekbones, looking for a lie - looking for any sign that Dazai wasn't serious.
"Dazai-" Chuuya began but his voice cracked, and he let it fade into the air between. Dazai reached forward, his hands on Chuuya's knees, and then one was gripping his, fiercely, tightly, the skin dry and warm around Chuuya's smaller knuckles.
"Chuuya, I can't keep watching you die," he whispered, and the honesty nearly broke him there. "If you can't do it for you, then at least think about what the rest of us go through every time we watch you fall." He sighed, a little, placing his forehead on their clasped hands so he didn't have to look at Chuuya. "You're right, they're all kids. They're all kids in a world that wants them to be experiments or soldiers. We were too, and maybe… maybe I'm finally starting to understand that that isn't okay. But we do what we must, to protect them."
"So we're in agreement?" Chuuya asked. He was still as a statue, looking down at Dazai's hair. It seemed to him that the answer was obvious. To protect the others, someone had to stand in the way.
"Absolutely not," Dazai growled and he looked up, finally, his face mere inches from Chuuya's. Something fierce burned within his eyes. "We protect them, but the cost can't be you."
The air was charged between them, too many emotions and a really bad year. Too many things that Dazai wanted to explain.
How many times had Dazai had to lift Chuuya, broken and bloodied, off a battlefield, hoping that Yosano was nearby, hoping that this time wouldn't be the last time? That maybe, this time, Chuuya would understand that he was needed, and necessary.
How was he to explain that Kyouka always visited him in the hospital, and left him small cards, and Gin would stay in the vents, a silent watcher from above?
How could even begin to tell this stupid redhead that people cared when he got hurt? The amount of death threats from Kouyou alone was staggering, but when you counted Akutagawa and Hirotsu, it had grown monstrous.
Dazai didn't know how to say any of this, so he gripped Chuuya's hands and hoped.
"Chuuya," he tried, but the other just pressed his forehead against his, and Dazai's eyes went a little cross trying to meet Chuuya's.
"Dazai," he whispered. "What do you want me to do instead?"
Dazai felt the words with each breath, a caress on his cheeks. He could try to explain it all, could try to make his stupid, beautiful partner understand. "Don't you get it?" he murmured back, just as quietly. "I just want you to live."