Chapter Text
The first mission he’s sent on as a Port Mafia worker is simple and straightforward. Manual labour. Him and a bunch of other people, carrying boxes they're not meant to check inside of and putting them in a truck they’re not meant to pry about the destination of. Type of work he should have expected from people just starting out, so he showed no complaints and started doing as he was told.
Chuuya would like to say that he’s gotten used to this new line of work. Would like to, except he hasn’t gotten used to anything. Not the orders, not the amount of people around, not even the creeping sensation of someone watching him.
At first he assumed it was the kid. He noticed them following him on his second day there, they had dark hair and seemed to jump when he looked over at them, but even now that he was sure they weren’t after him…
“It’s just a few boxes, can’t you new recruits even do the most basic things?” Chuuya craned his neck at the sound of their overseer chastising someone in the distance.
He hadn’t paid the guy much attention, at first, but with how mind numbing the work was, he couldn’t help himself.
An interesting one, he’ll have to say, though he wouldn’t want to be stuck alone with the guy.
“How about you go take a break, yes? There’s a nice cafe too, just fifteen minutes or so away from here.”
The guy… He didn’t introduce himself, Chuuya is sure. Gentle in both voice and tone, and yet both of those things combined with his smile still made the poor worker he was talking look ready to die.
And it seems to have worked, because the worker got back to work immediately.
There’s a sort of charm to it. Maybe Jouno should take notes.
“Ah, I’m sorry, is there something on my face?”
…Maybe he’s been staring for a bit too long.
“No. Nothing. Sorry.” He quickly shakes his head and rushes off to pick another box.
“Ah, you’re new, aren’t you? The new ones always tend to stare.”
Chuuya shoots the man a quizzical glance.
Is it because of his looks? He is quite pretty, Chuuya will admit that, but it seems unlikely that’d attract everyone’s attention. Maybe he’s missing something? Oh, forget it, there are a lot more things for him to worry about.
There’s the loud sound of a crash outside, but the man in charge seems unaffected by it.
He just rolls his eyes and sighs. “One of you, go take a look.”
Chuuya puts down the crate in his arms and practically jumps at the opportunity. It might not be a good sign for him as a secret spy, but he’s not sure how much he could stand around doing this anymore.
So he steps out of the warehouse and…
…The devil present there wasn’t even spoken about.
“Oh hey there! Nice to see you. Didn’t know they sent you for this one.”
Albatross is leaning against his bike. Helmet tucked under his arm, grinning widely. Chuuya has to try very hard not to make a face and immediately go back inside.
So he just narrows his eyes. “What was that noise about?”
Albatross jerks his head. “What noise?”
Chuuya takes a good look all around the area in search of something, anything, that has been destroyed, left in pieces, torn apart, or destroyed in various other ways, but there is nothing. Truly nothing out of the ordinary.
Clear skies, no crowds in the surroundings, various other warehouses.
After a few silent moments, he looks back at Albatross, who is still grinning and doesn’t seem to have moved an inch. Should he even try to explain what he heard?
Absolutely not. “What are you even doing here? You don’t seem like the type they’d take on for this kind of work.”
Albatross puts the helmet away and rushes over.
“Oh, just here to visit a friend.” He throws a hand over Chuuya’s shoulders and drags him along back inside.
“You just have those everywhere, huh.” Chuuya sighs and lets himself be pulled along. It’ll be over quicker the more that he cooperates, even if cooperation means skipping inside together while Albatross shouts for this friend of his.
Ah, it’s the one in charge, he should’ve seen it coming.
He’s left mostly ignored when the two blonds start chatting. Lippman, that’s the name of the other one, he knows that now. The man still has his attention on everyone, making sure they’re all well at work despite Albatross’ endless ramblings, but his eyes seem to slide right over Chuuya. Chuuya would be trying to listen in on their conversation and collect information, but it really does seem to be just the most mundane and normal things coming up. He should get back to work before Lippman actually notices and chides him for it, so when Albatross’ arm lets go, he takes a step to leave. Only for Albatross to this time grab him by the sleeve and shove him between himself and Lippman.
“This is the guy, actually.” He says, shaking Chuuya slightly like he’s showing off some sort of really expensive toy. “He’s a bit grumpy, but we’ve been working it out.”
Lippman’s eyes gaze Chuuya from up to down. He raises a brow. Even almost looks amused. “So I take it you two are close now?”
“Not really.”
“We went on a ride the other night.” Albatross nudges him lightly. Both blonds completely ignore Chuuya.
“If you say so.” Lippman smiles sweetly and puts one hand on each of their shoulders, then pulls them apart. “But please let him get back to work. Whatever you have planned, you can wait until later.”
“Oh, I don’t have anything planned.” Albatross lets go of the sleeve once they’re separated again. “Just wanted to see if we could gather tonight.”
He glances at the blond man gratefully and shuffles back to his work. He can feel the stares on him, it must be quite a scene to witness happening with a new guy.
A gathering, huh. Most likely none of Chuuya’s business, even more likely that it won’t even be relevant to the reason he’s here, but still. If it really is something like a friendly gathering, it’d be a good place to get more information, even if they’re not entirely related to his goal. Plus, it would be a bit suspicious if he’s not trying to make connections or talk to anyone whatsoever, right?
Scratch that, wrong, these people are way higher up, maybe not with them.
His hearing isn’t as super as Jouno’s, but the enhancements do make it easier to eavesdrop, but he can’t hear what the blonds are saying, they must be intentionally talking lower.
Even without hearing their words though, they’re animated enough that he can at least predict what they’re saying by glancing at them. Albatross has to be suggesting something, over and over, and with the way the older man keeps shaking his head and waving him off, it’s not being accepted.
Their gathering must not be happening then.
At least, until Lippman sighs and seems to give in.
Albatross turns and immediately comes in his direction.
People are staring again. And whispering, of course they’re whispering, people will whisper regardless of where they are or what their situation is.
Albatross’ arm is flung around his neck again and pulls him close. Chuuya sort of wants to try kicking him in the head, just to see if he’ll take that as a joke too.
“Well, Nari, seems you’re in luck!” The words send a small shudder through Chuuya. Anticipation or worry? “You’re invited! Tonight. Someone will come pick you up.”
“About that new boy.”
Dazai cranes his head to look at Randou.
The man has been acting off for the past week, it only felt appropriate to stay in his vicinity until he opened his mouth.
“You need to be more specific than that, there’s always some new boy.”
“Ah, did you not meet him?” Randou frowns and hums into his scarf. “I thought he was being introduced very… thoroughly.”
Ah, Dazai knows what that means, good thing the welcome wagon driver didn’t spot him then. “And what’s so interesting about him?”
With how long it takes the man to reply, Dazai just has to assume that the heat must really be getting to him. It’s the perfect temperature in this office for a heatstroke, but definitely not for thinking.
“There’s nothing especially noteworthy about him. Let’s call it a hunch.” He clears his throat. “I did assign Gin to… keep an eye on him, and again, he hasn’t been much different from everyone else. All the information on him is also clean, other than his odd name. Nothing to be suspicious of, nothing to keep an eye out for. But still, something about him bothers me, you should take a look.”
A few papers land on the floor, not too far away from where Dazai has laid.
He stretches his arm out and pulls them towards himself. His eyes scan over the words with boredom and disinterest.
Randou is right, nothing special about this guy other than his name. Clearly he’s using a fake name, since it’s on his current official records, there’s a chance he’s changed his original one to that, but that’s actually not uncommon for people who enter the mafia or any other organized crime. Like some way to detach themselves from their former identity. It’s sort of silly.
He has a common story. Orphan, a family who died during the war, moved around between family members until he could take care of himself.
But… He looks over at Randou again and raises a brow at him.
There’s no way he hasn’t noticed, Randou is fairly smart. Is he actually curious about this guy, or is it just a game?
Randou tilts his head. “What is it? Have you found something?” Dazai peels himself off the floor and walks over to the desk to return the papers.
“It’s very unverifiable, is all I think.”
One or two unverifiable things don’t make a story false, but when it’s nearly everything, that’s suspicious. Having no childhood records because your village was bombed is acceptable, so is records being missing or incomplete because new caretakers didn’t bother enough to keep them up to date. But the idea of also having gone to schools that have closed down since and having no relatives left to keep in contact with?
Either this boy is very unlucky, or someone has made up a false story and didn’t expect anyone to examine the information too closely. And considering these are meant to be official, it’s not too hard to guess what the real deal with this boy is if the latter is the case.
“That wasn’t something I was paying attention to.” Randou hums and takes another good look at all the information. “Shouldn’t we alert the boss about this? It seems like we should.”
Technically, yes. They should. They should do it right now. However… Ah, see, him and Mori haven’t been on great terms lately, and honestly speaking, this feels like the type of fun thing that’ll make him squirm when he does find out.
“Maybe we should actually make sure.” Dazai suggests with a shrug. He can feel the suspicious way Randou is staring at him. “If that’s not what put you off about the boy, then it might be something else to find out. And we don’t want to get some poor innocent guy in trouble now, do we?”
Randou looks straight at him and narrows his eyes, presses his lips together. “I didn’t know you cared about those things. You’re not hiding anything, are you?”
Hiding anything? No. Every bit of what is going on between him and Mori is written out like a cheap novel for everyone with an eye and a brain to understand it. It’s no secret.
What Dazai does instead though, is just grin. “I don’t know. Are you hiding anything?”
Funny thing about Randou; He always stiffens up the smallest bit when Dazai asks him something like that, but it’s actually not a bad thing.
It’s the Port Mafia, everyone has a little secret inside them. His has disappeared somewhere in the countryside, and Randou’s is somewhere he doesn’t care enough to investigate.
Of course, Randou chooses to change the subject. “Perhaps you could talk to the boy directly. See if you can spot anything about him that way.” He must catch something in Dazai’s expression, because he sighs and rolls his eyes. “Come on now, it’s not the type of thing I can do myself. And you have barely done anything since that whole ordeal with Mimic was finished a while back. Just because our dear boss is too paranoid about you to have you actually do anything doesn’t mean I am too.”
Dazai wrinkles his face at the man’s words and turns his head away with a huff.
“I’ll let you know I have plenty to do everyday.” He says, lifting himself with his hands to sit on the desk. “Just not in the office.”
“Ah, I wasn’t talking about office work.” Randou shakes his head and holds out the papers towards him again. “Just try it once and see what happens.”
“Hm.” Dazai reluctantly takes the papers. Just try it once means that there’s no way out of this, even if technically speaking his own will is held in a higher regard than Randou’s. So all he needs to do is talk with the guy that is clearly some sort of trap, it’s not like that hasn’t gone wrong before.
But he does have to admit his interest is piqued. This new boy’s information is put together a lot more carelessly than… the previous guy, which means they thought of him as capable enough to carry on through his sloppy fake life path.
How fun.
Slowly, he asks: “Why not do it yourself then? I’m sure you’ll be much better at detecting what you think is wrong.”
“That’s…” Randou drops his head and pulls away from his desk. “Well…” A pull on his gloves, an adjustment of his scarf. “I just thought since he is more about your age…”
“You think you know him from somewhere.”
It’d make sense, wouldn’t it? For the local amnesiac to be interested in someone so mysterious and yet reluctant to actually interact with him. Curious enough about him to even try directly asking Dazai for a favour. Even if it’s a reach, the way Randou presses his lips together and his shoulders fall is enough for him to confirm the hypothesis.
Dazai smiles and leans forward onto the desk. “If you’re getting your memories back, you do know what that means.”
“I am not getting them back.” The man snaps, lifting his head to look at the younger executive. “I don’t think this is actually a case of me remembering anything. More likely just that boy acting in a way that got my attention. By now with the way it’s been, I doubt those previous memories will ever be returning.”
Hah, how interesting. Denial, or just a weak defense?
“Well. You better hope they actually don’t come back. It’d be bad for business.”
It really doesn’t take a genius to figure it out.
A random frenchman, one who doesn’t remember anything from his past, found and taken in at one of the highest points in the war.
Of course, one who doesn’t remember isn’t usually a threat. But one who does remember, one who ended up overseas with the explicit purpose of remembering, now that would be bad if word about it got back to Mori.
“...Yes. It would be, wouldn’t it.”
“Yes. It would be.” Dazai says and smiles reassuringly at him. “Then it’s probably a good thing that I haven’t been on speaking terms with a few people. Is there anything else?”
The man sighs. “Yes. You are… not wrong. It’s less that I’m regaining my memories, and more that I think that boy will be the key to it.”
Something tells Dazai that the man is looking for familiarity in the wrong type of government spy, but he keeps that to himself. Randou is still lying to him, if he thought that guy was a key, then he’d be sending Gin to actually talk to him, not just spy.
He chuckles in amusement and straightens up. “And you think I’ll manage to get something out of him? Like what? Oh, hello new person, I have a quick question for you, have you ever seen a french person before?”
“If you don’t want to do it, you can just say no. I’m sure I can find someone more willing.”
Dazai nods with amusement and begins backing away towards the door. “And who exactly?”
Randou, to his credit, does spend a good few seconds on his answer. “I could always ask that Albatross, they seem quite close already, though I suspect he’s doing his own sort of investigation. Akutagawa—not Gin, the other one—also isn’t out of the question.”
Dazai can’t help the laugh that escapes out of him. Akutagawa? He was under the impression that Randou wanted information about this boy, not a corpse.
His laugh seems to annoy Randou, who sits back at his desk and seemingly gets back to work.
“Your tale doesn’t make sense, but I have a deal for you.”
Dazai shuffles back onto the desk, puts his palms onto the wood and gives a wide grin.
“I’ll talk to the boy.” He says. “And I’ll keep both your little secret and your weird behaviour from getting out of this room. And in return, you owe me a few favours, and not small ones either.” He holds out a hand.
Randou glares down at his hand for a few moments, and then reaches up his own.
“You have yourself a deal.”
It takes Chuuya almost the entire day to decide whether he’s actually going to the meeting or not.
It’s just a very sudden thing that Albatross sprung on him out of nowhere. There’s a difference between trying himself to land a spot in a meeting, compared to actually being invited for it. Being invited means they have a reason to take interest in him, and it could be just Albatross’ endless chattering, but it could also be anything else, or something slipping through in his act that’s making the spotlight shift over to him. Albatross, Lippman, Pianoman, whoever else, they seem like a close group of people, it’s not realistic that they’d randomly let a newbie in.
Chuuya paces the apartment with a heavy set of his jaw and thoughts racing through his head. Outside the window, he can see a sleek black car, it’s been waiting out there for a while now, probably for him.
He considered perstering Albatross about it at first, just to figure out what’s going on, but that guy disappeared from the warehouse almost immediately after inviting him. When Chuuya got back, he tried going up to his floor and knocking on his door, but he got no response, and seeing as it’s been so quiet, he’s inclined to believe that the blond hasn’t return to his apartment at all. If anything, that makes Chuuya even more suspicious. Why invite him somewhere and call a car for him instead of sticking around and dropping him off himself? He certainly didn’t have a problem doing that on the first night.
But it would also be weird if he doesn’t show up at the gathering, probably rude too.
And if something does go wrong, he can handle it.
Probably. He can probably handle it. They still don’t know about his ability.
Fine, he’ll go to the damn gathering.
And it won’t be a problem at all.
Hopefully.
The elevator ride down feels like it takes forever. He ends up stopping himself right at the lobby’s door and arguing with himself again, but eventually, he steps out into the new world and rushes over to the waiting car.
“Sorry for the wait.” He says, settling into the backseat. “Something came up. Uh— Where are you taking me?” The man behind the wheel doesn’t reply, just starts the engine and gets going.
…Alright then.
The car rolls down busy roads and crowded intersections until it makes a sudden turn into a much emptier area. It makes Chuuya put his guard up, but he can’t really ask again where they’re going, just hope that he can easily find a way out of it in case things go south. Looking out of the window, they seem to be in a residential district, he can see people mulling about but they’re all busy trying to get to their homes, none of them really spare a glance at the car. Chuuya startles when he looks away from the window and spots the driver watching him from the mirror, and quickly leans back into the chair.
The car eventually comes to a stop in front of a very old looking building.
It seems to be a bar. It feels a bit odd for one to be in a residential district, but Chuuya of all people can’t know that for sure.
When he looks back at the car, it’s already pulling out and driving away. No turning back now, he supposes. But is this place even open? The neon sign in the front is turned off, and it’s almost night, so it’s odd that it wouldn’t be open, though more likely one of these people just owns the place and does whatever they want. It’s not too late to go back. He can still go back and pretend that he never got invited. The weather is a bit chilly, but getting places doesn’t take too long with his ability, he’ll just have to be careful not to get spotted. He doesn’t do any of that though. He goes up to the door and pushes it open.
He can hear faint music from the inside now, chatting and laughing accompanying it.
It feels warm, in more ways than one.
“Hello?” He calls out as he goes further in, taking in the bright lights and soft music and the people huddled together and whispering about something.
Five heads whip around in his direction.
“There you are!” It takes a moment for Albatross to break away from the group and come to pull him towards them. The other four seem to unclench themselves when they realise Chuuya isn’t a complete stranger. “We were thinking you’d never show!”
Chuuya clenches his jaw slightly and walks along with the blond. “Didn’t mean to keep you waiting.” Albatross doesn’t respond much past a wave of his hand.
Chuuya recognises Lipmann and the executive that’s meant to be in charge of him, and then also two other people that he doesn’t know, though considering they’re with these three people, Chuuya assumes they have to be important too. He doesn’t like the way they’re all looking at him though, like they know so much about him already and they’ve been talking at length before he actually showed up.
What really is there for them to talk about him, anyway?
“Sorry for being late.” Chuuya drops his head, but keeps his gaze upwards instead of staring at the ground. They seem welcoming enough, Chuuya can’t sense any of them trying to attack him, at least not yet.
A thoughtful hum comes from one of the ones he doesn’t know, the one with a scar on his face. The man puts out his cigarette and leans back onto one of the pool tables. “So this is the one you were talking about? Doesn’t look like much.”
The second stranger, the only one not standing, elbows the other with a light laugh. “Now now, we don’t want him running off just yet, give him a break.” Condescending tone aside, Chuuya has to keep himself from wrinkling his nose at the man’s doctor-y clothes.
Chuuya lets himself be led towards the bar, as everyone gathers around to have a few drinks. He sits straight and denies the offer of alcohol. With all his upgrades, his body is more resistant to it than most, and he’s not sure how to really act drunk.
“So, are you enjoying the sights?”
Chuuya startles and looks up. Most of the group are absorbed in their own chats, but one of them, the doctor, is the one speaking to him.
“Oh, um, I guess?” Chuuya shakes his head and drums his fingers on the bar. It’s always troublesome when he has to talk with a doctor, he can never tell if they’re actually off or if his senses are just playing tricks on him. He presses his lips and shakes his head again. “It’s a nice place.” It really is. Even if he wasn’t paying attention to everything that goes on around him, he wouldn’t be able to deny the fact. There’s a warm sort of charm to it.
“You think so?” The doctor tilts his head and grins. “You seem on edge.”
“I guess I just… Well I didn’t expect to be invited?”
Can anyone blame him for being suspicious? Even under normal circumstances, a sudden ‘friendly’ gathering with people in the way higher ups is nerve-wracking.
“Oh. True.” The man shrugs and takes a sip of his drink. Chuuya has noticed that he also has a nonalcoholic one.
Chuuya takes a glance at everyone around him, and then leans towards the man. “Do you know why I’m invited?”
There is a full chance Chuuya has misread this situation, a chance that this guy and the other stranger might also be randos that were invited, or maybe just a big chance that this guy doesn’t know for either and it’s just Albatross being annoying.
But the doctor’s eyes glint.
“Well Albatross insisted.”
Chuuya presses his lips together and frowns. He’s lying, it’s obvious from that stupidly wide grin when he sees Chuuya’s reaction.
Still, no one is paying attention to the two of them, so Chuuya feels it might be safe enough to press on. He leans in far enough that he doesn’t have to speak too loudly. “You’re lying. Why was I invited?”
“Ah-ha. You’ve got me.” The doctor shrugs and kicks him lightly in the shin. “Just a replacement.”
Chuuya sits back up quickly enough that his hand instinctively slams onto the bar, and not very quietly.
A replacement?
Albatross turns his head towards them at the sound, and Chuuya notices how the doctor winks at him and waves his hand, and how Albatross immediately turns back to the conversation he was having with that other guy.
A replacement. He’s not exactly offended by being a replacement, he barely knows these people, it’d be weird to expect anything genuine from them, but just being a replacement, that’s also too innocent of a reason for him to just believe it. Maybe it’s the truth, but he’s hard pressed to believe it’s the complete truth of the situation. And a replacement for who? He says that last part out loud, before he can hold himself back.
“Oh, just a friend. See?” He gestures at the other four, split in groups of two and moved a bit further away to whisper to each other. “We had to invite someone, or I’d be alone!”
Chuuya narrows his eyes. “Or you’d be alone.”
Would he though? They seemed all very close before Chuuya showed up, it’s not believable that they’d just forget about one person along the night. And either way, it’s not even that hard to have a three-person conversation.
“Or I’d be alone.” The doctor repeats and pushes away his drink completely. “My turn! The name is Doc, by the way. Moving on, what do you do for fun?”
Chuuya can’t help but wrinkle his nose at that. “That’s a stupid name.” Enough is enough. This guy is friendly enough that Chuuya assumes he can’t be too important, and this whole conversation makes him think he’s being made fun of a bit, so it’s only fair he gets a bit mean about it.
Doc does snort, he’s definitely taken the jab well. “We can’t all have the cool codenames. Someone has to just be Doc. Not that you can talk.” Chuuya smiles before he can catch himself. It’d be stupid to pretend that Nakanari is his real actual name, anyway, risky as it may be to admit he goes by a fake one.
“Did you people send that kid too?”
Doc frowns slightly at that. “What kid?”
“The one that’s been following me.” Chuuya frowns back. “That one?”
Doc raises up his eyebrows and shrugs. “Not us. No clue what you’re on about.” He hums thoughtfully, and then shrugs again. “Albatross mentioned he took you around on your first day, maybe that’s why. Did you offend anyone enough to set them off on you?”
Chuuya blinks. He has a feeling he already knows who the culprit is. Afterall, he didn’t offend anyone, at least he doesn’t think he did, and if that’s not the reason, then there’s only one person he can think of that might have an interest in him.
That one damn executive. Chuuya has let himself think of a few theories about the man since that first night. He doubts the man is one of those doctors he had, he seemed to be European, and with the war that was going on at the time, it’d be very unlikely for him to be accepted to work on such a high secret government project.
The second option would be someone curious enough that he found access to the information from back then. Also something unlikely, even if the mafia has a big source of intelligence, it wouldn’t be feasible that the man got access to them and connected them to Chuuya so quickly.
The third option, he doesn’t actually know anything about that side of Chuuya’s life and Chuuya is just paranoid and Chuuya is just looking too far into it and Chuuya is just losing focus and maybe the only thing that guy suspects is that Chuuya is a liar and a fraud that he should keep an eye on. There. It’s the least likely option on his list of theories, in his own opinion, and he knows that Teruko for one would make fun of him for having the nothing-is-actually-wrong option as the dead last again.
And well, as for the fourth theory…
Chuuya is hoping the most that it’s not this one, that’d mean having to report back and drop the mission immediately.
But it’s still a possibility, and he has to acknowledge that, so here it goes, the least favourable option of all.
He doesn’t remember a lot of things about Professor N, most of it he’s come to the conclusion that he has blocked out, the rest have been swept away by time.
But there is one thing about the man that he can't possibly forget, if only for how he kept retelling it to him.
Never with a lot of details, but enough that Chuuya knows he used to be regarded as something very valuable, enough so that people from the other side of the war showed up and tried to steal him away.
They didn’t succeed, of course, Chuuya wouldn’t be here if they did, and presumably the people in the story were killed, but now that he thinks about it, did the professor ever actually say that?
“Oh. Okay. I’ll just figure it out.”
Doc doesn’t seem too convinced by that, if anything, what Chuuya has mentioned seems to make the man regard him with clear suspicion.
Chuuya turns his head and spots the others now gathered around the pool table.
He gulps and shakes his head as he gets up. “Come on. Someone should teach me how to play.”