Chapter Text
Chuuya didn’t sleep that night.
Instead, he’d chosen to scrub his body clean, clean of the blood that had already filled his lungs, waiting to spill out of his broken, cold body. The sponge reduced to shreds, veins of soap clogged his drain. His skin turned raw and flushed.
And all the while, he’d laughed. Coldly, manically, but, still, it was laughter nonetheless.
As long as you can still laugh, you’re fine.
Tears fell into the corners of his cracked smile.
—
I hate you.
It was perhaps too late for those words, infestations clinging to the dying sapling of his body.
I hate you. I love you. I hate you.
A fine line between love and hate indeed.
The bright sunlight mocked his weary trudge to the warehouse. His stomach growled upon salty scents wafting from food stalls and the loudly slurping of salarymen. The world kept bustling, and for the first time as well, the executive realised how he’d taken his bitter morning coffee every day for granted.
Too late now.
Maybe this was what not eating for a day looked like – thinking too deeply and too much for Chuuya’s liking. Did he really waste four years of his life with some incurable disease, slaving away for the mafia whilst craving for someone else? Did he really kneel to the hurt like a dog to its master, and only got back on his two wobbly feet last night?
Someone, please, write a memoir of this stupidity.
Even his last day wasn’t fulfilling.
The sight of brown, aged wood came into his view. He was surrounded by steel boxes, quiet filling the air. A figure dressed in black appeared by his side, and Mori’s detailed instructions were hurriedly whispered into his ear. He didn’t need a breakdown of what to do, didn’t need to determine whether Mori had stationed the correct medical personnel around to ensure his survival.
It was relieving, almost.
He batted a hand, the figure rushing away instantly, perhaps afraid of perpetual death.
The warehouse was cold, a chill spreading over his lungs and heart. Boxes littered the ground floor, fillbut this wasn’t Chuuya’s station. He trudged down spiral, creaky steps, entering the basement. It was darker here, strips of sunlight replaced with strips of peeling paint and old pillars.
A dingy old lamp flickered in the corner. He approached it.
Something caught his eye. Well, not caught, he was clearly meant to see it: A dusty rose. A singular, wilting, white rose. It lay innocently next to the flame, its thorns cleanly cut and snipped leaves.
He grabbed it. A petal fell.
Asshole.
Part of him wanted to fuck it all, wanted to blow up this shithole right now, the pain within his lungs returning with every musty breath.
The cement around him seemed to close in as another petal fell. And, as if on cue, a whimper came from the corner of the room.
He turned, fingers tightening around the weakening stem.
Three figures lay in the shadows, one significantly smaller than the other two. He approached, carrying the lamp as light shone across the captured, not doubt meant to die today as well.
The mafia doctor, his wife, and his daughter.
They looked terrified, barely sitting against the wall, the child crying silently with a gag pulled so tightly it was clearly bruising her face, wetness staining the ground beneath her.
The doctor’s gaze was half pleading, half painful.
Chuuya could almost laugh in shock. Mori must have definitely heard about Ron sending someone to threaten him. Typical. A boss that could abuse his own employees, but when they turned on each other, he was quick to remove disloyalty.
He vaguely wondered where Ron’s thug was now. Perhaps floating down the river, neck slit and disfigured.
Chuuya didn’t speak as he gazed at them.
Three petals fell, one smaller than the rest.
A blade appeared between his fingers, the metal slashing through rope, through the bindings of the man who had foolishly sent an assassin after him.
…
They were frozen, the fear flickering in their eyes as silent as their lungs; their lungs, drawing good, steady breaths.
“Do you want me to keep you here?”
The mother acted first. Her spindly arms scooped up her child, her bloody fingers running through her daughter’s hair, more of in an attempt to ground herself rather than comfort the crying thing. Her eyes cast a shaky look from him to her husband, locked in a staredown that bore no resemblance to actual threat.
“Go.” Chuuya broke first.
How many times will you break, right before your death?
Ron made a sudden movement. Chuuya withdrew, blade sheathed, his grip shaking a pistol, aimed at Ron’s skull.
…
“I tried to blackmail you.”
“Yes, well,” Chuuya sneered, and another white petal brushed his other fist. “A lot of people have.”
“You show me mercy?”
Chuuya opened his mouth a sliver, but no sound came out. His finger rested comfortably on the trigger, his soul ready to discharge this man from the earth for daring an attempt to cross him. He was the mafia, for God’s sake, and he had been a killer for years on end.
What has happened to you?
Love. That’s what had happened.
“If you don’t leave within the next second, my patience is thin.”
The woman squeaked as her child gave another wail, and that seemed to pull Ron back to his senses. Without looking back, he sprinted after his wife and kid, up the stairs, and out of sight.
Little clouds of dust rose, finding it hard to settle in the musty room. Chuuya put his gun away, sitting down next to the lamp and its dying flame. How silly it was, that with so much sawdust, not a speck of it fell on the white rose now clutched between both his hands. He watched it, his breath unusually whole for the first time in years.
He loves me. He loves me not.
A silly nursery rhyme rang through his head. The lack of food must be getting to him.
He loves me. He loves me not.
The second last petal fell. How fast time flies when one is approaching the end. He brought the flower closer to his chest, and it seemed–maybe it was a trick of the light–to reach, in its own impending death, for his chest, where its foreign family grew.
“Stupid,” Chuuya croaked, “How stupid.”
He loves me.
The last petal broke free, and as it floated downward, as Chuuya caught it between his fingers and crushed it as easily as his foolish, miniscule hope that maybe there was a fairytale world out there that this would all end another way, there was a loud bang from upstairs. Screams of children followed, so faraway, yet so loud.
Chuuya raised his head, the withered stem crumbling like dust.
Another bang. The nearby pillar shook.
It was time.
—
The first wave of pain was so unbearable he almost stopped himself, his chest heaving as blood poured from his mouth, dripping and cascading down his filthy coat. He felt his body tremble and shake, in line with the roars and shrieks echoing from every nook and cranny.
Corruption.
Blood tore through his veins like a knife, cold in its fire. There was roaring in his ears, splinters of wood and stems cutting into his lungs.
Arahabaki.
He vaguely registered that he was suspended in mid-air, his mouth open in a scream of agony. The entity within his soul was freeing him at last, and elation swept through the full tainted buds now leaking from his lips. His heart erupted with joy as his power roared.
One word registered from the file Mori had given him, shimmering in his mind, a piece of glass ready to deliver the final stab wound: Vacuum.
Chuuya seized, his arms and legs unfeeling, his heart erupting with joy. The black hole was appearing, the ground was breaking open, the building and the whole port was falling in on itself, and finally, he would be able to end this on his own terms.
To leave this world, leave that maniac’s stupid laugh-
And suddenly he was spluttering, rivers of crimson suddenly dry, his mouth gasping for breath and his tongue tasting dust and grime. He crumpled, and vaguely, in the ringing of his ears, he felt his limbs radiate a sort of grounded pain that was only brought about after an episode severe enough to kill.
Broken rubble, a caved ceiling, pieces of his love only possibly interrupted by one.
…
“Let. Go. Of. Me,” Chuuya’s rasped.
…
Chuuya blinked through the red. He was blinded in one eye, he realised, as his body continued to shatter within.
“Let. Me. Go. Dazai.”
“You followed my signal, stupid chibi.”
Fuck, that voice. Fuck him. Chuuya panted, with great effort, threw himself onto his back, attempting to choke on the blood and vomit gurgling in his throat. Dazai’s face was almost impossible to see in the dark and dusty air, and yet, Chuuya could make out gashes upon that face.
That face…that face was smiling.
“Ah, come now, don’t be silly.”
He felt a hand, as gentle and as comforting as it could be, lift him into a sitting position, so that the suicidal bits of bodily liquid leaked from his mouth.
Fuck. Damnit.
“You really went hard, didn’t you?” Dazai laughed. “You’re so silly, so silly. Did you really think I was just going to let you- did you really think- I’m not losing-” he chuckled again and shook his head, so that a couple of wet, crimson petals fell from his brown hair and onto Chuuya’s lap.
How you could tell a person’s true nature from their laugh, Chuuya marveled vaguely, for in the dickhead’s grin was a tremble, a crack. He could hear the tears.
He couldn’t speak, but gagged another fistful of blood, and couldn’t help but feel…something…as Dazai pulled him closer, leaning him against his chest. A hug where shallow breaths met shaking sobs, blood met flesh.
“I’m sorry.”
…
“I’m so sorry.”
…
“Help is coming, Chuuya. Please, I’m begging you, please.”
…
And with all the effort in the world, Chuuya raised a broken hand and laid it on Dazai’s.
“Please keep the roses,” he whispered, his vision sinking, his body losing its final breath, “...wipe my blood off the petals.”