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There’s a phrase Dazai always remembers back when he was at the top of his career and the height of his success. That time stops around 7000 RPM when he’s behind the wheel and hypnotized by the feeling of being in control.
Dazai sorta thought it was silly after his accident, the one that rendered him blind in his right eye.
Which brought the end to everything.
Now Dazai is the owner of his own garage and shop, Shuuji Repairs, selling cars with big racing names and tuning up the ones that need a nudge. After all he had to make a name for himself away from his title of winning the setting sun derpy.
He doesn’t race anymore and won’t ever again.
That was a promise he intended to keep.
No, right now Dazai supports a short hot heated redhead he’s become fond of after his departure from the racing scene. Dazai had known Chuuya prior when he was still racing, hell Dazai made way too many comments on the others about his height that he usually got punched in the gut often, but back then Chuuya was nothing more than a mechanic needing funds for his sister.
Even now in the present day Chuuya worked as a part time mechanic and racer under Dazai who came from a small town with no intention to pressure racing engines. That was until Dazai came into his life upon leaving his own career while making himself a designer and engineer instead.
Dazai still remembers that one race that changed it all.
It was some dirt race in some town Dazai didn’t care for and dubbed the Cloveheart rally. It was still early and Dazai had been talking to big shots full of themselves and having stacks of cash to spend on investments.
He tried the friendly approach with hooking sponsors, trying to aid their ego and rescue their fears of losing money that was probably nothing more than pocket change to them. But this is the legacy of the rich. Not a penny less, but certainly more.
They had reasonable hesitancy with his racer, Chuuya, since the redhead had a record for an unruly attitude and headstrong nature. He was stubborn as a bull and held the fury of one too.
He remembers walking with them and growing silent as they turned to gawk at Chuuya’s display of anger with the regulations inspector over the trunk of his car which involved a lot of screaming, taunting, and a ranch dangerously close to the employees face.
The sponsors spoke too easily with his fiery redhead, walking away as Dazai sighed and walked up to Chuuya and tried to resolve the issue civilly.
Of course being civil wasn’t an option with Chuuya.
As Dazai had cut off the conversation and made his own way to gain an exception, Chuuya did something Dazai could only stare at speechless, which was hitting the trunk with a ranch immediately, fishing for the error the regulation official had complained about.
If the sponsors had stayed, they surely would have left seeing Chuuya’s impulsive solution.
“Are satisfied now,” Chuuya spat, closing the trunk with a thunk making both Dazai and the employee flinch before he nodes and scurried off somewhere far from the angered individual.
Dazai sighs heavily, “You know you’re not helping at all.”
Chuuya humphs like a spoiled child accused of wrongdoing, “Why should I give a shit what those assholes want?” He snapped, crossing his arms.
“You should care because without sponsors you don’t get to race in that fancy car of ours. You don’t get any of the luxuries that would be handed to you. And you don’t reap the benefits of not having to scrap for a bit of cash!” Dazai ranted. “Why don’t you get that your hot head nature won't help you here. You’re not against country fools anymore. You’re lining up against experienced slickers who want you to lose.” Chuuya watches him closely as Dazai stays near the car.
“Is that what you want, Chuuya? Do you want to lose?” Chuuya was red in anger, fisting his knuckles. “Do you want to end up a loser who was too stubborn for his own good and ended up being alone and penniless? Is it Chuuya?”
If glares could kill, Dazai would have dropped dead a long time ago.
“But then again maybe I'll be better off without you—“ Dazai is cut off by a ranch thrown into his direction that he barely manages to dodge as it hits the glass of the shield and cracks the left side.
Dazai turns back to see Chuuya already storming off as Dazai picks up the thrown ranch.
Lucky for Dazai, Chuuya is in his car lined up for a race already gripping the wheel in anticipation as the other racers, or assholes full of shit as Chuuya called them, laughed at his broken shield and tried to mock him with pretty boy comments that only backfire when Chuuya opens his mouth and smirks at there reactions.
Just before it starts Chuuya fastens his black gloves and prepares for when his instincts take over. Whenever he was like this it was like he was possessed and was driven by something other than fury and determination. Something that feels like chaos and fire.
The other opponents are stricken, shocked and unable to handle the power Chuuya controls in the palm of the hands and petals of the car.
Then nearing the end something spectacular happens.
Something only Dazai and him were capable of. Something that feels like they are both synced, reading the other even from miles away and far too distant to hear the other.
The phrases repeat in each other’s minds.
Not yet.
Not yet.
Not yet.
Now.
That one phrase is the key and Chuuya turns it open as he shifts the gears, presses the petal and stirs the wheel into something that even gravity couldn’t manipulate as Chuuya takes the victory lap, leaving dust in his speed.
Dazai watched it all.
He smiles, lifting the ranch in his hands to Akutagawa, “ Frame this. ” dropping it as the younger scrabbles to complete the task and leaves to congratulate his smug little vixen.
“Better without me, huh?” Chuuya taunts.
Dazai laughs smirking as he replies, “ Never , but guess it worked you enough.”
Chuuya raises an eyebrow, “Not the only thing working me.”
Then they’re driving their own victory lap for themselves with the wind in their face and the radio full ballet before they land themselves at the familiar room of Dazai’s apartment with bottles of wine and a night that ends up tangled in each other’s arms.
That night was full of rough kisses and hands wandering too low with the intention to spring something to life. Bite marks and bruises on thighs were the only thing that colored both bodies in the morning, much too sore to do anything else but lay there and take in the scent of red wine and desire in the air.
They ended up cuddling all morning before eventually making breakfast and staying in to watch some old movie with Dazai lying on top of Chuuya's chest in between his thighs while Chuuya ran his fingers through Dazai’s hair.
That was one of the most peaceful moments Dazai will always remember.
Which brings Dazai back to the present with some car company executive asking for a shot at winning the Setting Sun Derpy again.
Dazai told them he won’t race for them. He’ll build a machine that can win it, but he can’t race it. Not anymore. But he reassures them that he knows someone who might just give them a chance of winning. A shot at the impossible.
That night he drives by Chuuya’s sister already knowing the redhead will be there and sneeks him away to a nearby diner they usually visited when they indulged in more domestic activities of comfort.
It’s only after they’ve ordered and ate that Chuuya hits him with a “Go on, bastard, tell me what you want to say or I’m taking this strawberry cake and leaving you to finish that lemon cake by yourself.”
“Someone came by the shop today…” Dazai trails as Chuuya gives him a look of irritation “and gave me a proposition that i could create a race car to win the Setting Sun Derpy and win it. And I want you to drive it.”
Chuuya stares at him before bursting out in laughter as if he just said the funniest thing in the world.
“You’re kidding,” Chuuya tries to breathe out “You’re kidding, right?” Chuuya calms down now looking at Dazai like he’s the craziest man in the world.
“Common Chuuya, it’s not impossible. I know we can do this,” Dazai assured.
Chuuya made a gesture with his hands, “You want to create the fastest car? To win a derpy that has only been won by you? And you want me to win that same race? Is that it?” he asked, the cake abandoned.
“Yes.”
“Are you fuckimg high again?!” Chuuya shrieked inside the practically empty diner.
“Will you shut it!” Dazai moved to cover the vixen’s mouth “What’s so crazy about it? Sure it might sound impossible but I can make it entirely possible. Don’t you believe in me?” Dazai asked with pouting eyes.
Chuuya struggled but sighs at the sight, grumbling, “That’s not it at all.”
“Then what is it?” Dazai asked.
“Dazai, these people, they aren’t like you at.” before Dazai could ask, Chuuya continued “They work for results and are all scumming assholes who will curse you until you fall from your place. You’re not like that. You’re different and that will drive them insane. They will curse how different you are.”
“This won’t change me, Chuuya.”
“You don’t know that,” Dazai countered.
Chuuya scowled, “It’s a waste.” he snaps getting up from his side of the booth.
“It will be a waste if it’s not you.” Chuuya turns back to Dazai “Take a chance, Chibikko. Find me Monday.”
“I told you to stop calling me that stupid nickname!” Chuuya yowls.
“But it suits you?”
— — —
Soon Monday rolls around and Chuuya arrives at the show gallery, scoffing at the entire ordeal, and manages to butt heads with an executive there. It’s already a bad start to his image.
More to be known for Chuuya supposes.
He makes his way outside where he spots Akutagawa and Atsushi sharing in conversation before Chuuya joins in asking where Dazai is.
They assure him that Dazai will be there.
They were right of course because when Dazai does arrive, he does it in his dramatic Dazai way.
Chuuya snickers as he sees the plane land dangerously close to the event before Dazai appears out of the open door announcing himself and his flight skills as the ones who come out behind him look pale and shaken.
Serves them right, Chuuya thinks.
Then Dazai moves to the stage and gives a speech that almost bores Chuuya in not for the implications made that were obviously made for him but directed to the sponsor to fund this project.
Chuuya listens and leaves without a word.
That night, Dazai seeks out Chuuya and brings him to a plane port where the testing car awaits.
Chuuya, who is trying not to act stunned, takes the offer to test her out for a spin. He swears he sees Dazai’s smile as he does and when he pulls up after experiencing the horsepower and adrenaline rush, Chuuya can only sputter his critics in a blunt but impressed tone.
“Anything else, chibikko” Chuuya doesn’t even register the nickname before he’s rushing back blurting out, “Let me try her one more time.” and then the sound of tires on asphalt and an engine running is all that's heard that late night.
Just like that, Chuuya’s in.
The following weeks are filled with the car’s design, building up her parts, making needed modifications for the weight and speech, and testing her out on the track.
It gives Chuuya a rush in his chest that makes more invested in how to fix and work the price of machinery betted to win the Setting Sun as he and Dazai focus on the kinks of the car and her motor.
But as luck would have it, the executive Chuuya, pissed off at the gallery show, had turned out to be the asshole in charge of who gets to drive the car for the first test race of the season.
Hearing this, Dazai becomes upset at the order to boot him when he promised Chuuya that he would be the only one driving the car and winning, but was given the reason of “we want a good impression for our brand. We can’t taint it with a hot head who can’t level his head.”
Dazai slumps in defeat when the time to tell Chuuya he won’t be the one racing anymore comes when Chuuya bursts into his office rambling off about the car and improvements to be made making Dazai’s heart beat fast.
He cuts him off and Chuuya falls quiet at the news before souring, “ Oh.”
“Chuuya—“
But Chuuya’s already walking towards the door mumbling something about mechanics and how he’ll be here alone while they’re all off in the race without him.
Dazai’s chest swells in guilt, “It’s not like that. Chuuya!” The door slams and rattles the frames inside Dazai’s office as he sighs heavily.
Then Dazai and the team are gone and Chuuya is alone at the port shop doing the only thing he can do. He gets his hands dirty and listens to the radio of the race they evidently don’t win.
Figures, is all Chuuya thinks before he goes home that night.
Then back with Dazai the next day at the tall skyscraper and sent to face the main boss, Mori, and asked why he shouldn’t be fired and why he should still continue this project.
Dazai can only explain that they have the enemy where they want them. He replies, “They have never even gone as fast as we have. They’re scared now because they know they might not win this year's derpy. They’re panicking. Because of us.”
After that Dazai is given control over who will reign the car and he knows who. He just needs to bring Chuuya back.
That ends up with Dazai in front of Chuuya’s sister’s house, giving what Chuuya called a shitty apology, which Dazai admits on his part it was rushed. Then both of them are tussling around on the grass with fallen groceries as weapons and use their fists as words along with the occasional kick from Chuuya.
“Great now they’re all ruined because of you, you bastard!” Chuuya nagged.
“I’ll buy you more,” Dazai wheezes, holding his lower stomach.
“You still can’t punch for shit,” Chuuya stated.
“And you still punch like a beast. I feel like I was almost snapped in half,” Dazai complained, breathing heavily.
“Not my fault you’re punches feel like messages to me,” Chuuya snorted.
“How long since we last did that?” Dazai grumbled.
“Three years ago when you first told me I looked like a slug,” Chuuya said, clearly not fond of the memory.
“You still look like a cute slimy slug,” Dazai muses.
“Why you—“
— — —
After their official make up the duo gets back on schedule to test the car around the track and all her limits, ending with a malfunction with the brakes and Chuuya maneuvers himself away as he crashes and the car is bursting into flames.
Immediately, the team and Dazai rush to pull Chuuya out of the flaming wreck.
Chuuya groans as someone has his arm over their shoulders, “Needs some tweaking… the brakes.” He grumbles in pain as Dazai pulls him from the teammates shoulder to his own.
“You okay?” Dazai’s voice is afraid and helpless.
Chuuya nods slowly regaining his senses but still feels the scare in his veins just like Dazai felt the panic in his heart as soon as the flames erupted from the wreck and he ran .
Chuuya leans closer into Dazai, “ I’m here. Still here.”
Chuuya tried to reassure him but the tightness in Dazai’s chest got even tighter, “You got out. That’s why you weren’t suffocating from the fire.” Dazai spat his words haunted before he whispered into Chuuya’s hair. “ You got out.”
He presses Chuuya closer to his body in reassurance to ease his mind that the redhead is safe now. He wasn’t trapped in the fire. He got out, damnit. He’s safe in his arms.
They know the risks of this path. Sometimes the driver doesn't make it out of the car.
He’s fucking relived Chuuya got out of the car because it feels like a strong wake up call from his repressed past he chose to ignore and forget. Back in his racing days with a different redhead and different circumstances and bonds than that of his and Chuuya’s current relationship.
A redhead called Oda who was an older idol to him and his closest best friend at the time before one day he didn’t come back from the car. Dazai remembers when he left racing behind him and started designing instead. He remembers that he found Chuuya back in his life.
For just a bit longer the two lovers stay like that so a peace of mind can pass.
The next day Dazai receives news about the boss and asshole executive are coming for a visit and plans how to handle this in a civil manner. Of course he might take some pointers out of Chuuya’s book.
Arriving the executive already is out for Chuuya and wants him out, so Dazai locks him in his office with the blinds closed and Akutagawa keeping guard as he brings the boss out for a spin in the fastest car he’s ever made.
To say the boss cried and screamed like a preschooler on their first roller coaster would be an understatement.
After all, the boss now sees that not just anyone can drive this car.
When Chuuya arrives the deal has been struck and if Chuuya wins his first test drive in the rally he will be the driver for the Setting Sun Derpy but if he loses the boss will take Dazai;s company.
Chuuya can’t let that happen so when the race does come, while still being average, waits for Dazai’s signal as he approaches his final lap before he spots his bastard near the end of the field holding up a sign with thick marker instruction “7000, drive like hell!”
Chuuya smirks, gripping the wheel and finally letting the horsepower of his grip take full force like he’a been dying to show off.
Of course it comes to no one’s surprise when he wins and the deal is complete where he’s the diver and Dazai keeps his companies name.
Skipping to the day of the Setting Sun Derpy, Chuuya and Dazai face many ups and downs with the heated enemy as they wind up being the only care left in Chuuya’s path and reaching a close climax Chuuya knows he can push the other to.
So he taunts them b driving ahead aching to irritate the driver and lead them to make a fatal mistakes and while prokoketed the enemy does just as Chuuya predicts pedals to the limit of their own car as the hood blows smoke from the running engine that ends up in steam making Chuuya take the lead from skipping all the other racers that where the “real” competition that’s already been taken care of. So he turns the gears and speeds through the laps ahead.
In the end Chuuya wins, the crowd cheers, and Dazai pulls him aside to embrace the small redhead and kiss the winner passionately like he was starving from the teased pecks of the morning at the hotel.
Chuuya only breaks the kiss to marvel his words, “You promised me the drive but I promised the win.”
Dazai smiles brightly with a soft glow in his eyes as he lifts the redhead of his feet in his arms and twirls them around nuzzling into Chuuya’s neck, “Yeah, let's get out here, chibikko. I’m not done with you yet.” he purrs out.
“Oh? Then what are we still doing here? Take me away, Osamu ” Chuuya all but boasts as he is cradled in Dazai’s arms.
It’s as Dazai recalls, “There's a point at 7,000 RPM where everything fades. The machine becomes weightless. It just disappears.”
Chuuya always comes back from the car every time and Dazai is right by his side every gear of the way and all, as Dazai laughs about every time it’s brought up, because of a ranch framed and hung in Dazai’s office with both there signatures are scribbled right next to a photograph of him and Chuuya wearing bands of gold.
Dazai who ends up glad he left the car after his best friend a long time ago and only wishes the drive never ends.