Chapter Text
Steps slammed against the ground. “Ranpo San, do you have any leads?” Dazai spoke into the phone in his hand.
“Uh huh, yeah sure.” Ranpo hummed through the mic, voice airy and carefree with clicks of a game system.
Kunikida ignored every word, no matter how rude. His eyes were fixed on Dazai’s flip phone in his large hand, barely even paying attention to where his steps took him. He was simply focusing on the beeping of the tracker, ringing through his brain.
The master detective sighed, “This tiger owes me big time for this one. Besides, that tracker isn’t adding up.” He hummed like it was the most obvious thing in the world, the creek of his chair coming through the mic. “The coordinates don’t make sense. They’re a dead end.”
“Oh?” Dazai hummed before chuckling with a scratch on the back of his neck, “Hm, then where to, Detective?”
“...” Ranpo stayed quiet, clearly thinking about it as his chair legs hit the floor, signaling his change of sitting position. The little game system let out a series of beeps in a jingle, turning it off.
And yet, Kunikida couldn’t listen, his mind torn in half. Where was Atsushi? Where was the tiger? What if someone found him and tried to hurt him? God, it hurt his heart to think about. He couldn’t let harm come to his subordinate.
He avoided using any other word.
“A tall building.” Ranpo spoke simply through the phone, starting to speak his mind. “This bears a striking similarity to a case I solved multiple years ago… A more complex case hidden under the disguise of something much more simple, like a murder or robbery. There are many possible motives, and the only one I can think of making sense is his ability.”
That made Kunikida’s heart race, pounding harder into his chest. Why his ability?
“The bounty on him was called off when we defeated the guild.” Dazai chimed in. “That is the only other thing.” Dazai sighed with a sense of exhaustion. “I don’t see how they would try to ransom money out of a government recognized agency…”
“Stop talking and tell us how we can get to him.” Kunikida almost growled, continuing to walk, following the tracker with bee line precision.
“The tracker is a sham, you can’t find him in a dead end. That’s basic!” Ranpo sighed with annoyance. “Even the possibility assumes I’m stupid.” He grumbled before sighing tiredly with a sense of weight, hating the very thought. “If he was in a dead end, he’d be caught by the port mafia and dead by now.”
Caught.
Dead.
God, Kunikida couldn’t stand those words.
One mistake, one wrong turn could lead to a dead end, and the path back was blocked and impossible to break through.
And every single second that was lost was another second that Atsushi could be closer and closer to a terrible death.
Dazai stopped walking, holding onto Kunikida’s wrist so he would stop as well. This snapped him out of his daze.
“The Port Mafia has no reason to capture him besides personal vendetta.” Dazai hummed curiously. “So the five buildings used by the Port Mafia are out of the question.”
“If he’s in a tall building, then we need to get to the helicopter.” Kunikida growled with a narrow glare, tension rising in his voice, his grip on the phone near cracking the screen.
“Can’t.” Ranpo sighed over the phone with exhaustion. “It’s being used for a special transport mission as we speak, it won’t be back until tomorrow at sundown.” He spoke with a sense of boredom, but a part of it seemed more serious, like he was less bored and more thinking in depth.
Kunikida growled, “Damn it…” He huffed, thinking about it with a narrow glare to the paved ground. If they were to go to the government for help, they’d have to wait for multiple days to get their request for an aircraft approved or even considered. Police? No, the local police don’t have access to that.
It was like following the branches of a tree down, each one ending and leading into the same trunk, the same decision.
He slicked his fingers through his honey hair, a rumble of a sigh leaving his throat. Kunikida eyed Dazai, who simply hummed with his signature sly grin.
“I know that look in your eyes, Kunikida Kun…” Dazai hummed, “You have the same idea as me.”
“God, I hate you.” Kunikida huffed heavily like he had just stopped running, “… The President should be able to help.”
Ranpo simply hummed, “I’ll go ask him, you keep up the search on the ground. Dazai San, you know why you’ll be meeting them with Kunikida San.”
Dazai simply chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck, eyes closed as the wind blew past his ears.
“Of course. If I’m involved?
The Port Mafia always responds.”
🎶🎵🎶
“I hope you have the understanding that this can all very well be in your head.” The mellow Russian voice spoke with a hum in front of Atsushi, the uncanny smile lingering on his voice like venom lingering under the skin and seeping into the muscle.
Atsushi growled like a tiger and looked up at him with his dark sunset eyes, refusing to speak, lest he show his fear to the taller, much holier, man.
The man slicked his nimble fingers through his raven hair, standing before Atsushi, gaze filled with patience, like the pastor who listens to the sins of the peasant people. “Kitti.” The nickname rumbled in his throat before he turned around, walking to the only door in and out of the room.
Atsushi felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, his brain noting everything about the room. The fact that there was only one exit unnerved him as much as the feeling of something that just barely resembled a bug crawling up your leg, but you couldn’t quite tell.
The Russian knocked once with his bony knuckles before opening the door. The man smiled as he took a silver and gold platter from the person on the other side. “Do you happen to like meat?” He asked with a look over his shoulder at Atsushi, cold violet irises digging past his flesh into his very soul.
Atsushi simply bared his teeth, glaring. He couldn’t bear to look into that gaze, he could feel his legs trembling like a cat above water, a spirally abyss of violet with nothing but pure malice underneath. Atsushi couldn’t show his fear, his terror, nothing to his captor.
“Refusing to speak, hm?” The man asked with a curious gaze, the bags under his eyes making them look sunken into his skull, like a corpse awakened from a long slumber. “Oh well.” He murmured with a light shrug as he sighed with mock disappointment. The man walked to Atsushi, each sway of his movements slow and calculated like sculptures of Michelangelo. The Russian placed the platter on the boy’s lap, almost using it as a table or stool, leaving his hands free. The silver shone like pearls in the room of stained glass, the dome of the platter engraved with patterns in gold, even a cross as the handle.
“I brought some of my best silverware out for you.” The Russian hummed as he brought his hand to his lip, taking the loose skin of the knuckles between his teeth, biting along many marks from before this one. “I got these from a friend of mine… I have to hope she didn’t lace the edges with poison.” He scoffed with a lingering, yet fleeting, amusement.
The weretiger swallowed his dry throat as he huffed. “… are you planning to feed me?” He asked with a low growl, filled with anxiety that bubbled up in his lungs, licking his throat and teasing it with the moisture it so desperately wanted.
But even that was a false hope.
“Feed you?” The Russian took a moment of looking aways before humming, a content smile on his face. “You can certainly call this that if it makes you feel better about your current predicament.” He reached slowly into his pocket, nimble, frail, and bitten fingers pinching out a pair of white medical gloves. The Russian tugged them onto his hands slowly with snaps of the latex, making sure they were comfortable against his pale skin. “Do you remember that doctor? The one that visited your orphanage only to meet an untimely demise?”
Atsushi’s eyes widened slowly. His heart sank to the bottom of his gut, threatening to weigh his entire body down. “How..” he swallowed his throat. “How do you know about that-? N-No one said a word…”
The man simply laughed, like the concept that he didn’t know something was absurd, unheard of. “It’s simple.” He tugged his other glove on with his teeth. “I’m the one who told him that you were, oh, so interesting… that you had an ability that exceeded all others in strength alone.”
The weretiger could feel his hands shaking in the binds as he looked down, “W-What-?” What was under that platter? Was this man planning on torturing him like he had been when he was younger?
It was the same thing all over again.
Every single time, it always falls back into his past.
No matter how better he gets, he always falls again. Back into the depths of hell, even farther than the last time.
First it was the Director, then Shibusawa, and now it was this Russian man. Hell, it might have been this Russian man from the very beginning of it all if he wasn’t lying.
The Russian man hummed before walking behind Atsushi with taps of his shoes against the dark flooring, taking the back of the other chair placed behind him and dragging it along the floor until it stopped right in front of Atsushi.
The man sat down in front of Atsushi with a huff, like even sitting took exorbitant effort, knees almost touching Atsushi’s, but not quite. His smile was content as he raised his hand to his lips, nibbling on the latex of his knuckle. “Now…” He hummed, reaching under the collar of his kosovorotka. Wood beads clicked together as he took a quality rosary from under the shirt. “… Do you know how to pray?” The Russian man asked, his voice sincere, soft. It had no underlying tone, no lingering unease, just a simple question.
Atsushi could feel his hands fidgeting against his restraints. The rosary looked different from the prayer beads that Atsushi had seen before in Japan. This rosary lacked tassels and had a cross along with knots along the string between certain numbers of beads. “… What do you mean?” He growled lowly. Could this be his ability? Something linked to an ancient power?
“A grace. I believe Yaponiya has something much like them… Ita… dakimasu, was it?” The Russian hummed curiously with his rough pronunciation. “Well… Churches in Russia have something close.”
He rose his rosary and clasped his hands together before his face, letting the cross dangle just above his wrists as he began to recite a grace of old. His words were practiced and graceful, as smooth as an artist’s hand. It was second nature to the holy man. “O Christ our God, bless the food, drink, and fellowship of Thy servants, for Thou art holy always, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.” The man opened his purple, violet eyes, dark and heavy under his dark raven bangs. “Now you say ‘Amen.’”
Atsushi fidgeted with his hands, feeling his lungs heave before choking out the word. “A… Amen…”
A small smile tugged at the cut up lips of the man, like the owner of a dog who did a trick. “Good kitti.” He hummed before placing the rosary back over his head, around his neck, the beads clicking against each other. His nimble hands delicately took the plater from Atsushi’s lap, placing it on his own. The man gave a small smile before lifting the plater dome.
Dark red meat, cooked like steak, but the smell… The smell was different. It wasn’t steak. It wasn’t pork.
It was the smell from his nightmares, the memories.
Of when Atsushi ate people.
“Ah… I know that look in your eyes… I take it, you recognize this kind of meat?” The Russian hummed, looking down at the slab of meat, basked in dark red like a dressing. Even a thin cut of bread basked in the blood on the side, soaking the thick liquid up into the white bread and staining it with sin. “The blood was such a pain… stopping it from clotting and still being safe to eat…” He spoke with exhaustion as he picked up the fork and knife from the plater edges, metal clicking against metal. “I really put in the work for you, Kitti.”
Atsushi simply stared at the platter, the dish before him. The meat was charred on the edges and cooked thoroughly. Once the man cut into it smoothly, dark brown juices of blood seeped out, mixing with the blood pooled around it. Perfect pink in the middle.
Atsushi could feel his eyes welling up in his eyes as he stared at his knees. “W-Why…?” He sobbed softly as tears rolled down his cheeks, “W-Why are you so cruel..?”
The Russian simply hummed lowly, “‘For food in a world where many walk in hunger; for faith in a world where many walk in fear; for friends in a world where many walk alone, we give you humble thanks, O Lord.’” Another Christian grace. “Be humble, Atsushi Kun… So many people starve, and you’ll deny a perfectly good meal that you didn’t even have to work for… so selfish.”
Atsushi could feel his heart breaking as tears streamed down his cheeks. “T-This isn’t the same…”
“But it is just meat, is it not?” Fyodor hummed as he chopped up a bit of the meat. “Cows feel pain… yet you still eat beef. Lambs feel sorrow when their mothers are killed for food… and you still eat mutton.” He stabbed a piece with the fork, humming as juice dripped from the warm meat. “How is this any different?”
“It… It is different!” Atsushi cried, shutting his eyes tight as the smell of metal basked his senses. “This person had a family! T-They could have had kids… t-their life shouldn’t just be considered meat… sustenance for others…” He felt tears dripping onto his pants.
“Lambs have mothers, Cows have calves…” The Russian hummed before raising the chunk of meat up, examining it with his keen violet eyes. “You don’t seem to care for that when you eat them. You’re such a terrible person that you don’t even think twice.” He chuckled before pressing the fork forward.
“I-I’m not! I-… I’m meant to save people…” Atsushi could feel his heart splitting in two. “I…”
‘Your very existence causes others to suffer.’
‘A man eater doesn’t deserve to live.’
‘Man eater.’
‘Man eater.’
He had eaten someone before.
‘How is this any different?’
He had eaten someone.
Just as others eat lamb.
Atsushi felt more tears fall from his eyes as the Russian man moved the flesh forward towards his lips. Atsushi shook his head, refusing to open his mouth. It was like a child when offered greens.
The Russian clicked his tongue. “Ungrateful for the lord’s blessings.” He hummed before reaching forward, dropping the steak knife onto the plater.
The untouchable man touched, gripping Atsushi’s hair and pulling it up.
“Agh-!“ Atsushi let out the strangled sound before the flesh was forced into his mouth, past his lips.
His eyes widened as he struggled, trying to spit it out, but the man pulled the fork back, metal raking against his teeth before the gloved hand clasped over his mouth, fork held between nimble fingers.
“Chew.” The command was a low growl, a smile too curved on the sides resting against his lips. “Don’t choke now…”
Atsushi could feel the blood against his tongue, coating his teeth and tongue as he refused to chew, to bite down. Under the vile, viscous liquid was the sweet meat, beef in texture, grilled against his tongue, sweet in taste, unnaturally sweet. It was like pork coated in sugar.
His dry throat cried in the pain of the meat against the back of his throat, trying to go down. Atsushi was lucky the piece was thin, licked by the stomach acid rising in his throat like the flames of hell against his feet.
Tears streamed down his face as he swallowed.
It fell down right next to the pit in his gut, making acid and blood splash against his heart.
The liquid anxiety in his body was tainted. Now dressed in sweet red velvet, iron and rust.
Atsushi cried, shaking as the Russian man kept his hand on his lips. He loosened his grip on his hair. “Such a good boy.” The man murmured. “See… it’s sweeter than pork… texture of beef… it truly is a marvel that people don’t enjoy more…” He hummed before smiling and pulling his hand back slowly. Softly, he petted the boy’s head, latex feeling through his white hair. “It’s truly delicious.” The Russian hummed with an almost loving look, watching the tears fall from the weretiger’s face as he cried. “Don’t you think so? Besides… you’ve tasted it before.”
Atsushi cried softly, shaking with his eyes closed. “T-That… that wasn’t me…” he sobbed softly. “I’m sorry… I’m sorry…”
“Mm…” the man hummed and continued petting him. “And that’s just why I’m here… to make you more in one with the beast inside of you.” The Russian hummed, holding the plater and placing it down onto Atsushi’s lap, the fork and knife shining in display to him. “I have come up with a theory.”
He got up and walked around Atsushi, making his way to Atsushi’s back. “While you were eating as the tiger, you seemed almost stronger. Out of control, yes, but powerful. Now, you hesitate due to your fear.” He reached down, placing his hands on his shoulders delicately. “I think you’re stronger when you feast on flesh. This would be a small sin… but if you’re stronger, you can protect people better, hm?” The man rubbed his thumbs into his shoulders before feeling up the back of his neck. “One small sin… for a hundred good deeds.”
The man reached down, pulling at the rope around Atsushi’s shaking hands. Easily, he made it come undone, releasing the boy’s hands and letting the rope fall to the floor with a thump.
The Russian simply smiled as he wrapped his arms around Atsushi’s shoulders, draping over him almost protectively.
Atsushi’s hands shook as he looked down at the meat. Flesh. Food.
Slowly, he took the silverware in his hands.
And cut.
He brought the small chunk of meat up, thinking for a moment.
‘One sin, a hundred good deeds.’
“I’m sorry…” Atsushi spoke softly under his breath as tears dripped down his cheeks.
He placed the meat against his tongue, and slid the metal against his teeth.
“Good Kitti.”