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Kunikida Doppo thought of himself as a very patient person.
If you’ve seen the people around him, you’ll definitely agree. He worked in a place full of freaks, his partner was the freakiest freak of all, and said freaky partner lived directly above his apartment. That last part didn’t usually bother Kunikida that much, because other than the occasional thumps of footsteps and obnoxiously loud singing, Dazai rarely made much noise.
But that particular day had been an exception.
It was raining like there was no tomorrow that day. Fortunately for Kunikida, there had been no request for outdoor work, so he didn’t have to go out. He’d meant to spend the day arranging schedules for the next few weeks, a task that required great focus.
But the noise from upstairs kept distracting him.
Dazai was making a huge racket upstairs. First there were loud footsteps that sounded like Dazai was running around. Then there were sounds of things crashing and breaking. And then there were shouts, too muffled for Kunikida to make out the words, but more than enough to cause him to lose focus.
Kunikida groaned as his attention was taken away by yet another shout. What was wrong with that bandage-wasting device? Did he get his hands on another poisonous mushroom? Had he finally lost his mind? Kunikida turned his face toward the ceiling, internally debating with himself whether he should go up to yell at Dazai. He still had other things on his agenda, yes, but he didn’t think he could get anything done with Dazai distracting him every ten seconds.
Go up to yell at the waste of bandages it is.
Kunikida stood, eyes twitching as yet another shout came, followed by a loud thump. He stormed out of his apartment, grumbling under his breath. Didn’t Dazai know that he was disturbing people? How could the other neighbors stand the noise? Maybe they’d already moved out long ago. Yeah, that made sense. Kunikida took the steps upstairs two at a time. The moment he got to Dazai’s floor, he could already hear all the ruckus Dazai was making. As he approached the damned apartment, the words being shouted slowly stopped sounding muffled.
“–ya, my dear Petit Mafia, you’re not supposed to put metal in the microwave!” Dazai was shouting.
Then, to Kunikida’s surprise, another man’s voice, one he recalled hearing somewhere before, answered, “How the hell am I supposed to know? You know I hate instant food!”
“Is your brain only made up of muscles? Is that it? What happened to your logic?”
The exchange continued as Kunikida paused in front of the door. Would it be appropriate for him to just barge in and yell at Dazai in front of someone else? It might be really awkward, because the other person might not know the way Dazai and Kunikida worked. But that guy, whoever it was, must know Dazai really well. Dazai never invited anyone, even Kunikida, into his apartment, so those guys must know each other really well. Judging from the way they were shouting at each other (Dazai was shouting, wow), the other guy should justify Kunikida yelling at Dazai.
So Kunikida kicked the door open with a roar. “Will you please stop making a ruckus?!”
And then he stopped to stare.
The living room was very sparsely filled with furniture. There was only a low table, some cushions to sit on, and a bookshelf in one corner. A few miscellaneous objects were strewn across the floor, as if they’d been tossed carelessly, but all in all, the place wasn’t in too bad a condition. Kunikida thought that the place would be more chaotic, given the way Dazai usually behaved. But he didn’t get to dwell on that, because the source of the ruckus demanded his attention.
The kitchen was a mess. No, calling it a mess was the biggest understatement of the century. The kitchen counter was on fire. There was a mysterious blotch of something on the inside of the microwave. Shattered pieces of a plate were scattered on the floor. Thick egg yolk was running down one of the walls really slowly. There was flour all over the place, which made Kunikida wonder how the place hadn’t already gone up in flames.
And, at the center of it all, Dazai stood with a red-haired man Kunikida recognized as Nakahara Chuuya, one of the Port Mafia executives.
“Hello, Kunikida-kun!” Dazai waved cheerfully as if they’d only run into each other on the streets, as if Kunikida hadn’t just kicked the door open and the kitchen didn’t look like a hurricane had plowed through it. Nakahara, on the other hand, was looking at Kunikida really awkwardly the way a kid caught stealing a cookie from the jar would look at his mother.
Kunikida stared. He should probably put out the fire and then yell at the idiots starting it, but he was still too stunned to act. “What on earth has happened here?”
Dazai laughed. “Well, it’s a long story, but basically, we tried to cook. A food fight had happened at some point, but the biggest mess was caused by this hat-rack.”
“Who are you calling a hat-rack, bandaged freak?” Nakahara snarled.
Dazai ignored his companion’s words and pressed on, “He put an unopened can of canned crabs in the microwave! Can you believe that, Kunikida-kun?”
“You know I’ve never used the microwave to heat instant food and leftovers!”
“But the logic, Chuuya! And everyone knows not to pour alcohol on fire! Now look what happened to my kitchen counter!”
“Why didn’t you tell me it was alcohol?”
Kunikida watched with increasing horror as the duo continued bickering without a care for the fire blazing only two feet from them. His mind tried to make sense of the situation. There was a Port Mafia executive in the building. If Kunikida’s memory served him right, he used to be Dazai’s partner. According to what Dazai had just said, the kitchen’s current state was caused by their attempt at cooking.
There were so many wrong things with that. What was an executive doing in Dazai’s apartment? Surely he didn’t come over so they could cook together. Why did they start cooking? Why was the counter on fire?
There was a fire, Kunikida realized with a jolt. Why didn’t either of them put it out? He ran out of the room, grabbed the fire extinguisher in the hallway, and ran back in.
Five minutes later, the kitchen counter was covered in white foam and no longer on fire. Two very sorry-looking men were sitting seiza-style in the living room with Kunikida looming intimidatingly in front of them.
“What were you thinking, you idiots?” Kunikida barked. “Don’t you know that what you just did was really dangerous? The fire could’ve spread to the whole building! Now look what’s happened to this place! What’s more, you were making such a ruckus I couldn’t focus on anything! Has the loaf of meat in your heads that you call a brain gone bad? Are you no longer capable of logical thinking?”
“Kunikida-kun,” Dazai said, raising his hand, but he was silenced with only a single glare.
“Dazai, this is your apartment, so how could you not think about the results of your own action? You’re a disgrace to the Agency! And you,” Kunikida turned to Nakahara, who seemed surprised at suddenly being addressed, “what are you doing here? Why didn’t you stop this guy from causing such a mess? I thought a Port Mafia executive would be more responsible!”
Kunikida continued glaring at the two of them, who had their heads lowered. Sometime in the future, Kunikida might think back to this day and be amazed at himself for somehow being able to not only keep Dazai in check, but also make a Port Mafia executive lower his head to him. But at the moment, he was still angry at them, so that didn’t occur to him.
Before any of them could do anything else, Kunikida’s phone rang loudly to interrupt the silence. Kunikida pulled out his phone, saw Ranpo’s name on the screen, and hissed at the still kneeling duo, “You better have started cleaning the place before I return,” before exiting the room to take the call.
One ridiculous conversation later (“No, Ranpo-san, you can’t tell Kenji-kun to go out to buy sweets for you in this weather, even if he was supposed to be ‘Undefeated by the Rain’.”), Kunikida returned to the room, feeling ridiculously drained after such a short conversation.
And then he stopped to stare for the second time that day.
Dazai and Nakahara had started cleaning the place. Or at least they attempted to start. They’d gotten buckets and filled them with soap water and all.
Only instead of using those stuff to clean the place, they decided that further wrecking the place was more appropriate.
At least they had the common sense to stop moving when Kunikida entered the room.
Kunikida took in the most recent condition of the room as calmly as he could manage to. Someone had spilled soap water all over the kitchen floor. There were blotches of wet spot on the walls. Random cleaning tools were scattered all over the available surfaces. The mess they’d made in their earlier endeavors was still very much there.
Dazai was crouching behind the kitchen counter. In his left hand was a wet sponge. From the way his body was poised, he seemed to be preparing to throw the sponge toward Nakahara. Said redhead was squatting and reaching for a brush on the floor. They were both frozen and looking at Kunikida with comically wide eyes.
Kunikida closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. Inhale. Count to ten. Exhale. These idiots. Are they five year olds? Why couldn’t they stop fighting? Is this what it feels like to deal with children? If it is, Kunikida had truly found respect for mothers out there who had to deal with this sort of thing every day.
He wasn’t these guys’ mother, so leaving at that moment would make more sense to a normal person. But Kunikida was a responsible man and leaving these idiots behind with this mess wasn’t responsible.
After a moment, Kunikida opened his eyes, walked over to Dazai and Nakahara in turn, and whacked them atop their head before dragging them to the living room. “If any of you move while I clean up the place,” he warned, “I’m going to break your legs and make sure you never walk again.”
Seriously, Kunikida thought as he entered the kitchen, grimacing as his foot touched the puddle of soap water, what was up with people today? Wasn’t it supposed to be a day off?
Dazai and Nakahara remained mercifully docile while Kunikida cleaned up the kitchen. It took longer than expected (The egg yolk had dried and there was flour everywhere, gods), which was why Kunikida was surprised to find them still sitting where he left them.
Kunikida stood in front of the duo, glared, and said, “I’m leaving now. You’d better keep yourselves in check for the rest of the evening before I decide to do it for you.”
“Yes, Mom,” Dazai mumbled. Nakahara made a strange sound and elbowed Dazai in the ribs. Kunikida decided to pay none of that any mind and left, because he didn’t need to make this day off any harder for himself.
Seriously, what kind of day off was this?