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The first time Chuuya met Ranpo, he was struck by the similarities between the detective’s cheerful smile and Dazai’s affect now that he was with the Agency. At the time, Chuuya discarded the thought; there was no way Ranpo could match Dazai’s casual violence. Whatever this youthful man was concealing beneath his sunny obliviousness, comparison to Dazai was unwarranted.
(Mostly, Chuuya thought, Ranpo was hiding his intellect. He didn’t know why masterminds liked doing that; something about the trick of it, maybe, or delighting in surprising people. But Ranpo didn’t even seem to notice he was hiding anything at all.)
The second time Chuuya met Ranpo, he realised how wrong he’d been.
Ranpo looked at people like they were puzzles. It didn’t matter if they were dead or alive; Ranpo considered them with the same excruciating care. Chuuya, glaring at him as he worked, could only meet Ranpo’s eyes for the slimmest fraction of a second before he’d had to look away.
(Ranpo solved their mysteries in a minute. Mori smiled at Chuuya, after the detective left with the candy he’d been provided as a prize, and said, “There is a reason I like borrowing him from the Agency sometimes.”)
When Ranpo taunted Chuuya, Chuuya could see the schemes in Ranpo’s eyes, could feel the strings wrapped around his own heart, and couldn’t do a thing about any of it.
Ranpo smiled at him, eyes wide open, and—even knowing he was being played—Chuuya danced to his tune.
(In that ability’s book, Chuuya saw Ranpo ignore threats to his life, absently sidestep danger, and unflinchingly face people who pointed weapons at his throat. Chuuya stomped and punched his way through the same encounters while cursing Ranpo; whatever Ranpo found in those suspects’ hearts, Chuuya couldn’t match his deductive skill.)
By the time the Agency came to the Mafia for shelter, Chuuya believed that their only member who came close to being as dangerous as Dazai was Ranpo.
Anyone who could manipulate their circumstances, disappear and reappear from even the Mafia’s eyes, and find information that should have been erased from the world was a terrifying foe. Ranpo held his pistol with a frown, but his hands were steady on the grip. Dangerous, Chuuya thought, and cursed himself for taking so long to believe what his heart had known from the start.
(For better or worse, he had a type.)