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A bandaged hand weakly grasped around a shaking, bloody ankle. ‘The enemy has been defeated. Take a break, Chuuya.’ Dazai muttered the customary saying as Chuuya’s body collapsed to the ground, unmoving. Dazai couldn’t move his own body more than an inch, having been forced to the ground after a round of bullets hit his back. A small knife had joined soon after. Chuuya had taken care of his attacker.
‘Chuuya?’ Dazai shook his leg. There was no response. He couldn’t tell if Chuuya was breathing from this angle, with Chuuya facing away from him. He didn’t have the strength to turn Chuuya over to be sure, and he certainly didn’t have the energy to get them both back to headquarters safely.
Mori had made no mention of needing Corruption in their assignment. Either an oversight or an accident, Dazai didn’t care at this point. Without thinking, he dialed a number on his phone for pickup.
‘Dazai? What’s wrong?’ Oda’s voice was full of concern. It wasn’t like Dazai to call people - he preferred to text vague, ominous messages at 3am.
Dazai withdrew the phone from his ear and checked the number. Crap. He hadn’t intended on calling Oda, a regular faction squad would have done the job just fine. ‘It’s nothing, Odasaku. Wrong number, sorry.’ He moved to hang up the call when Oda interrupted.
‘Where are you?’
Dazai frowned. ‘Huh?’
Oda repeated his question. ‘You wouldn’t call unless something was wrong. Send me the coordinates.’
Dazai forced a chuckle, immediately regretting it as the chuckle turned to coughing. ‘It’s fine, Odasaku. It’s your night off, you said you’d be with your kids. I meant to call-’
An exasperated sigh came down the phone. ‘Dazai. Coordinates.’ Dazai knew that tone of voice - rarely used, but when it was, it meant Oda was deadly serious. Oda was serious most of the time anyway, but that usually meant Dazai could get away with joking around. Not when he used that voice, though. Dazai repeated the coordinates to him, trying not to cough every few seconds. Falling down on the ground must have knocked the wind out of him, he guessed. ‘I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Stay on the phone with me, I don’t want you passing out.’
The ground was cold. A warm substance trickled across it, dyeing his bandages where it touched them. The silence of a battlefield was always eerie, surrounded only by the bodies of the fighters trying to kill them just minutes before. The eeriness wasn’t helped by Chuuya’s continued lack of response. Dazai had tried all the insults, Oda scolding him gently down the phone. If Chuuya was awake he’d be kicking and screaming at them, but he lay on the ground as though he’d been turned to stone.
Dazai’s head started spinning. Each cough tore through his body, making the wounds on his back sting each time he shifted.
‘Almost here, just a few more minutes.’
Dazai mumbled something into the receiver. He wasn’t sure what combination of words he even spoke.
‘Dazai? Are you still there?’
He took a deep breath. When had breathing become hard? ‘...Yeah.’
He heard the car engine in the background halt. ‘I’m here. Where are you?’
Ignoring the pain seeping through his body, Dazai turned his head towards where Chuuya’s bike lay from their arrival. Sure enough, Oda was getting out of his old, battered car, scanning the battlefield of dead bodies.
Another cough escaped, this one worse than the others. Much worse. Dazai needed air. But every time he tried another cough came through. A cough demanding air. His lungs demanded air. But his body refused to give air a chance to make its way inside. The world began to fade as his thoughts were filled by the need for air and the sight of dark shoes running across the ground.
'I've got you, Dazai.'
---
When he opened his eyes, he was greeted by the familiar sight of Oda’s guest bedroom. On occasions, Dazai and Chuuya had spent the night there, either after returning from missions together, nights spent at the bar, or babysitting Oda’s kids. Dazai turned, a damp washcloth falling down his face. His back didn’t ache the same way it had, though he felt both hot and cold. When he turned his head, the other side of the bed lay empty, the sheets pushed back. Was Chuuya awake?
Dazai stumbled out of bed, leaning against the wall until he regained a sense of balance. When he emerged from the dark room into the welcoming living room, he spotted Chuuya sitting on the couch. He still looked paler than usual, though he held a steaming mug between his hands without shaking, which was a good sign. Dazai sighed with relief. Him being too late hadn’t cost Chuuya his life.
‘Dazai!’ He looked down to see two of Oda’s children, Kousuke and Shinji, staring up at him in wonder. They barely reached his kneecaps. ‘Oda! Uncle Dazai’s awake!’
Uncle?
Oda looked up from the plates of food he was holding in the adjacent kitchen. ‘Why are you out of bed?’
Dazai wasn’t sure who he was talking to, himself or the kids.
Oda placed the plates of food on the coffee table in front of them without a word. As Oda escorted the kids back to their rooms, Chuuya glanced over, wincing slightly as he moved. A small smile lit up his face as he patted the empty seat next to him. ‘Feeling better, Osamu?’
His own wellbeing was far from being at the front of his mind, and Dazai was taken by surprise. He sat down next to Chuuya, being careful not to bump him too much - though with the amount of blankets he had tucked around himself, it was hard not to. ‘I should be asking you the same thing. It’s not like you to be out of bed so soon.’
Chuuya shrugged. ‘Oda stitched us both up. Mine weren’t too bad, mostly exhaustion, I think.’ It was true, the recent conflict had only ended due to Chuuya using Corruption. It was unnerving how he had been able to use it twice in a week with so few consequences the second time, though. Dazai would have to hide that information from Mori. He tried his best to care, but he was still their boss, and Double Black were still the Port Mafia’s secret weapon. ‘You woke up a bit earlier, actually. He gave you the strongest painkillers he had since you have a slight fever.’
That would explain the washcloth and the uncomfortable air. Dazai picked up the plates, putting Chuuya’s oversized mug of hot chocolate on the table in their place. ‘We should eat.’
There was more he wanted to say, but even though he had just woken up, Dazai’s energy was depleting fast.
He didn’t make it halfway through the meal before he was lightly snoring against Chuuya.