Chapter Text
Today
Dazai Osamu will die today.
But Atsushi doesn’t know that.
It’s the 27th of May. There is nothing special about it.
The silver-haired male wakes up at 5 am as he always has, his internal clock pulling his body to rise up from his futon without much struggle. The darkness of the space he sleeps in almost tricks him to thinking he’s still unconscious, the pitch black of the confined area indistinguishable from the darkness behind his eyelids when he blinks.
Then, he hears Kyōka’s faint, steady breathing through the door of the closet, signaling that the girl is still sleeping in the early hours of the morning. Quietly, almost shy in his movements, Atsushi slides the oshiire open, peeking his head out first.
The apartment is just as it was left the previous night; empty dinner bowls and chopsticks drying by the sink and the kotatsu ruffled from when the two residents headed off to bed. It’s barely one and a half rooms big, hence why Atsushi is still adamant about sleeping in the closet. Yet, even with the tight squeeze, the atmosphere in the apartment feels so lived in, making up for the lack of square feet with a familiar warmth.
Crawling out of the storage space fully and getting to his feet, Atsushi’s eyes quickly adapt to the shadowy lighting in the apartment. With the help of the moonlight filtering through the window, his tiger senses jump-start in adjusting to his surroundings.
It won’t be long for the sun to come up shortly after he awakens, especially at this time of the year. Still, Atsushi can’t complain about the little conveniences his heightened senses bring to his day-to-day life. Small quirks that he’s sure he takes for granted, even subconsciously.
The rest of his early morning advances peacefully. The young man prepares a small breakfast for Kyōka and himself, always pausing his movements whenever the girl stirs. Then continuing to cook as stealthily as possible while his eyes stray to the window, seeing the world outside change from a blanket of dark blues to a dusty shade of orange and pinks before the sun finally casts long morning shadows across the city buildings.
Two hours and a half after he initially wakes up, Atsushi slides his black boots on, completing the outfit he wears to work every day. He takes a final look over the apartment, smiling gently at Kyōka’s form still huddled under her covers without making a single peep. He’s already double-checked the note he wrote for her when she wakes up, also spending a couple minutes to make sure he placed it somewhere she’ll obviously see so she won’t have even a second to question where he is when she starts her day.
The girl had had a rather long trip with Kenji and Ranpo to cover a case. Not that it was dangerous by any means, but the location was rather far from Yokohama and the ones who sent the commission in made a personal request for “the world’s greatest detective”. Since the rest of the agency was backed up with other assignments under their own hands, Ranpo snatched the two youngest members to act as his guides, stating that “as the adult, he’d watch over them responsibly”.
As far as Atsushi knows, Kyōka ended up keeping the other two in line the most over the course of the two-day trip.
So, in his mind, the young girl deserves a long day off after dealing with such hyperactivity.
Atsushi arrives at the agency building promptly 10 minutes before it opens up, slipping through the cafe and riding the elevator up to the fourth floor. Besides the faint buzz of the old lift, he fills the silence with a light tapping rhythm of his shoes.
In the back of his mind, he runs through what he can help with today, and what still sits on his to-do list from yesterday.
Yesterday was the 26th of May, and like today, there was nothing special about that. Well- besides the fact that Kyōka was returning to the agency from her aforementioned trip.
He had completed all of his reports some time in the afternoon, and had just begun chipping away at Dazai’s stack of paperwork when the man himself pulled him away. If he recalls correctly, it was mid-afternoon, and Dazai, Kunikida, and himself were all seated at their shared table.
Atsushi had absentmindedly reached his hand out to Dazai’s end of the desk, instinctually expecting the brunet to prod at him about doing his share the moment the weretiger finished.
Instead, however, his forearm was gently grabbed from hovering over the stack of folders and pamphlets, and Atsushi looked over to give Dazai a questioning look. The older man wasn’t holding him back from moving forward, just grazing his fingertips over Atsushi’s wrist to hold him in place.
“Oh- Dazai-san?”
He couldn’t see the expression on Dazai’s face, only able to see his lips pulled in a thin line from his side profile. Kunikida, who always sat across the table from the duo, hadn’t looked up from his work at the quiet interaction between his coworkers. Though he did pause in typing for a moment.
Before Atsushi could inquire about Dazai’s hold on him once more, the brunet turned with a cheerful grin on his face, energetic and mischievous as always. “Atsushi-kun~, why don’t we get off early today?”
He drew the honorific at the end of his name out slightly, causing the silver-haired man to sweatdrop. Ah, so that’s what this was about.
“I have to finish reviewing the paperwork for the day, Dazai-san. Maybe we can go somewhere later.” Atsushi sighed, tugging his hand down to grab the top of his coworker’s assigned portion of responsibilities. “ The ” paperwork was really just his paperwork after all.
The older man let out a childish groan at Atsushi’s polite rejection, this time the obnoxious sound being enough to make Kunikida stop typing completely. Continuing to mope loudly, Dazai suddenly leaned toward Atsushi’s side of the desk, forcing him to lean away to support the taller man’s weight and subsequently pushing him away from his coworker’s papers.
“Ughhhhh booooooo… There’s still so much time until the end of the day though, Atsushi-kun.”
The speed of which Dazai reconfigured his composure would have still shocked Atsushi a year ago. But he was used to his mentor’s aloof behavior at this point, watching the brunet stand from his seat with a long stretch, an easygoing smile smoothly replacing the whiney pout on his face.
“You’ve finished your work for now, you don’t have to worry about mine anymore.”
That caught both Atsushi and Kunikida’s attention. The dirty blond reacted to his work partner’s line first however, grumbling with gritted teeth. His eyes didn’t move from his laptop screen, though the twitch of his eyebrows showed he had clearly been listening.
“You’ve made it the lad’s habit to cover for you. The only way he’ll stop is if you’re actually implying you’ll be doing your work from now on. And judging from our history, I wouldn’t take your word so easily.”
Dazai opened his mouth with mock surprise while Atsushi sweatdropped again, unable to deny his senior’s words. “And stop urging him to slack off in the first place!! You’re being a bad influence!” Kunikida continued, finally looking up at the brunet with a reprimanding glare.
“Ah, but Kunikida-kun, you know it’s good to go outside and take routine breaks right? It helps maintain your blood sugar levels.”
The blond raised a brow at Dazai’s words, cocking his head in curiosity. “Is that so?” Picking up his pen from beside his computer, Kunikida began to mutter the same words Dazai had uttered, scrawling the fun fact into his open notebook.
“Taking… routine breaks… helps maintain-”
“ I’m messing with you. ”
Kunikida immediately slammed his pen against the desk, hard enough to startle the Tanizaki pair at their own table. Before the blond could leap over the desk and wring Dazai by the neck however, the brunet gracefully moved away from the entire table, tugging a bewildered Atsushi along behind him.
The rest of the day passed rather uneventfully, as far as Atsushi can recall. Dazai acted a little odd here and there, but nothing too out of the ordinary. After dragging him out of the office, the brunet brought him to the cafe on the bottom floor of the building, where they ordered their usual coffees together.
Then, they two went on a walk along the riverside, where they had first met almost 2 years ago. And after some banter and perhaps slightly sentimental conversation, Dazai sent Atsushi to turn in to his apartment early.
Really, nothing special. Just an ordinary day with a little bit of Dazai’s usual spontaneity sprinkled in.
Perhaps, Dazai sent him home early because he knew Kyōka was returning from her trip as well. It did feel awfully coincidental for Atsushi when he saw the girl standing in front of their apartment just as he also arrived. If that was indeed the case, Atsushi should thank the older detective for nudging him toward having a relaxing evening with someone he views as family.
However, that was all yesterday. He can worry about giving Dazai his thanks whenever the brunet steps into the office today.
Peeking into the agency, Atsushi’s eyes almost immediately land on Kunikida, who is shuffling and organizing piles of folders and packets while moving from table to table. He always arrives punctually early to work, exactly 15 minutes before the day officially starts. Some days, Atsushi can’t understand how the blond manages to uphold such strict standards for himself. Still, it isn’t something to be considered as a negative. Really, it just makes his superior more admirable.
The click of the door opening breaks Kunikida out of focus. When he turns, his glasses glint momentarily as he acknowledges his silver-haired coworker. Their communication is silent; a transaction of a polite smile and a firm nod before they return to their own devices. It shows that the two of them are used to enjoying the quiet presence of one another in the early mornings.
Kunikida walks over to the calendar on the wall of the office and crosses out the 26th of May, just as he always does, to show when the previous day has been completed. He also writes out what takes priority in the box of the 27th. Again, as he always does.
When Yosano arrives with Kenji trailing behind a minute or so after the work day is expected to start, Atsushi is already settled at his desk, only peeking his head from his computer to wave at the two. Yosano returns his wave with a small grin before she ducks into the infirmary, while Kenji rubs his eye and stretches before returning the weretiger’s greeting. The boy only lingers in the office for a small while before apparently growing bored and walking out with a simple comment about “getting breakfast downstairs”.
Fukuzawa opens the door from his office half an hour later, implying that even with Kunikida’s early arrival, the President had been the first to step into the building for the day. He only emerges outside for a brief moment to collect a few papers before retreating back into his office with silent steps.
The brief window of time with the door open allows a peek into the room, exposing Haruno who seems deeply focused on whatever she’s writing for the President in a journal. Somehow, without moving her eyes from the pages, she seems to be preparing a cup of tea for Fukuzawa as well.
Then, the window into the office shuts the moment the door completely closes, and Atsushi’s focus returns back to his own work.
The Tanizaki siblings rush in some time later, Naomi wrapping her arms around Junichirō as usual. The ginger can only muster up a quick “good morning!” to the office that his sister choruses before the girl drags him to the infirmary. Atsushi mentally notes that Junichirō does sound a bit nasally, so he’s most likely picking up some allergy medication. It’s understandable given they’re in the transitional month between spring and summer. Despite cherry blossoms already shedding all of their petals, Atsushi’s nose still feels faintly itchy just at the thought of all the pollen still swimming in the air.
2 hours pass. It is 10 minutes after 11 am, as Atsushi can see from the digital clock Kunikida keeps between their desks. Neither Dazai nor Ranpo have shown up yet, although that isn’t anything new. Both of the intelligent detectives are known to avoid clocking in for as long as they can. Sometimes, Atsushi wonders if the two are competing to see who can slack off the most. It wouldn’t be too far-fetched of a theory.
Alas, it seems Ranpo steps in first today, practically skipping in with a pack of treats in his arms. He completely ignores Kunikida’s frustrated mutterings of his frequent tardiness in favor of swinging around to Atsushi’s desk, startling the boy from the case file he had been reviewing.
“Atsushi-kun! I am granting you the honor of being my delivery boy!”
Atsushi blinks thoughtlessly for a moment, tilting his head up at the detective when Ranpo begins poking his cheek with a package of chocolates. “Ah- Ranpo-san, what do you mean?”
The dark-haired man scoffs, shaking his head disapprovingly. “Come on Atsushi-kun, you’ve seen me in action plenty of times by now. Surely some of my genius has to have seeped into your own thick brain at this point, right?”
When all Ranpo gets in response is an unsure chuckle, his shoulders sag with a growing pout on his lips. “I don’t even want to tell you if you’re this clueless…” Sweatdropping at the usual ‘higher than thou’ aura his superior colleague gives off, Atsushi shrugs. “I’ll admit your request is vague. And also a bit sudden-”
“Fine, fine. I won’t leave my clueless assistant in the dark.” Ranpo taps the chocolates with a huff. “Give these to Kyōka when you go home today. I crossed paths with a rival of mine and he horribly lost a bet we had, so I made him buy all these snacks. Really, don’t worry about why I’m asking you to do this. Just follow my orders.” Then, with an overly dramatic sigh, Ranpo slides away from Atsushi’s desk, leaving the box of chocolates and dragging the rest of his gifted sweets behind him.
“Now then, the President is making me meet with a client, so don’t go looking for me unless you’re all at wits end.”
He pauses to stop in front of Kenji on the couch, giving him an identical chocolate box with a certain knowing smile. Then, the detective leaves the room almost as quickly as he arrives, with Atsushi staring incredulously after him.
“...Should I be worried about Ranpo willingly sharing his food?”
Kunikida glances up from his desk to spare the young man a shrug, and the rest of the conversation fizzles out, leading the office back to its previous productive atmosphere.
Another 2 hours pass. The desk beside Atsushi’s remains empty. He doesn’t realize he’s been tapping his foot against the floor in time with the flickering digital clock until he sees Kunikida’s silent deadpan. He apologizes and tries to stop his fidgeting thereafter, but it’s subconscious and clearly emerging out of anxiety. Though anxious about what, Atsushi is unsure.
Lunch passes in a blur and so does the early afternoon. At this point, Atsushi’s given up on holding in his nerves, flitting his eyes over to Dazai’s vacant chair until he finds himself openly staring at the spot.
He doesn’t know why his mentor’s absence is stressing him out now of all times. Dazai disappearing for days or even weeks wasn’t anything new. It wasn’t . But after overcoming whole organizations like The Guild and defeating terrorists like the Decay of Angels, Yokohama has become a place as peaceful as Kenji’s home village. The brunet’s sudden absences also haven’t occurred in general for at least a few months.
There’s just something that feels off. The circumstances feel odd enough to stew in Atsushi’s gut, swirling the remnants of his lunch from earlier. He really shouldn’t be overthinking this.
He’s known Dazai long enough to trust him.
Well, in actuality, he’s always trusted him.
Still, the hairs on the back of his neck raise with slowly building tension, and Atsushi can’t help but feel like he needs to find the brunet right at this moment.
Who is he even fooling, this still isn’t different from how it was when Dazai’s missing person turned up every other week. Atsushi always worried for him then, and he will always worry now. Even if the man can handle himself flawlessly, and always ends up 5 steps ahead of everyone around him, Atsushi will still worry.
Dazai may be a bona fide genius, and a masterful strategist. But he is a savior and companion to Atsushi first.
Which is precisely why he abandons his desk the moment he finishes reviewing his assigned commissions list. He can hear Kunikida sputter at Atsushi’s abrupt exit behind him, but he only glances back once before leaving the agency with the fleeting words of a farewell.
On Dazai’s desk still lays the same pile of manila folders and pamphlets settled there since the day before. Abandoned.
Atsushi doesn’t run anywhere. He’s not that frantic. He still trusts Dazai.
Instead, he opens his phone the moment he steps out onto the streets, already making his way back to the Agency’s apartment complex.
Three missed calls ring out until the voicemail prompt starts each time, and Atsushi’s pace subconsciously picks up by a few beats. Still, there’s no need to run. If this is one of the Port Mafia’s ploys to pull something again, then Dazai can handle it. If this is a brand new shadow group that is targeting the agency, then Dazai can handle it. There’s no need to panic. Atsushi needs to stabilize his breathing, because everything is fine . This is about Dazai. He can trust him.
He arrives at the dormitory and the sun is still far from setting, but it’s somewhere around dinner time at this point. About 5:30 pm. No one else is there besides Kyōka, as he himself was the first to leave the office. He can only hope Dazai is in his own apartment.
Trying not to make the nerves prickling his skin obvious, Atsushi politely knocks on the detective’s door. He stares at the surface for a full minute, as if trying to will the entrance to open for him. Alas, even after knocking a bit louder, the man is left without any response.
“Atsushi?”
Perking up at the sound of his name, Atsushi instantaneously recognizes the soft voice to be Kyōka’s. When he looks up, he can see the girl peeking over the balcony of the dorms, a wooden spoon in hand. Most likely making dinner for the two of them, if he has to guess. It’s the 27th of May, a Thursday. So dinner is most likely going to be gyūdon.
“Ah- Kyōka-chan! Sorry, I’m back a little early.” A completely pointless apology, but a habit Atsushi still struggles to shake. “Would you happen to know if Dazai went in or out of his apartment at all today?”
Kyōka blinks in pondering silence for a moment before her brows gently furrow. Her previously impassive expression tenses in focus before she shakes her head, much to Atsushi’s mild disappointment. “No…” Then, she perks up again. “Oh, but I did hear some thumps and shuffling under the apartment. Dazai has always been kind of messy, I think he might have tripped over something.”
Atsushi holds in an amused puff at the girl’s blunt honesty. At least he knows where Dazai is. Now there’s only the question of why he’s refusing to answer the door.
“Thank you Kyōka-chan. I’m going to check and make sure he’s alright, and I’ll be up for dinner after.”
A second passes before Kyōka gives a firm nod at his words, her twin-tailed hair bobbing with the movement and a happy smile on her face.
“Ok, see you inside then.”
With that, she retreats from Atsushi’s view, the door to their shared dorm clicking open and shut before the young man finds himself alone again.
The fond smile previously on Atsushi’s face slides down into a troubled frown when his eyes meet the mahogany wood door once more. A third attempt at knocking rings out, and Atsushi feels his momentarily eased anxieties winding up like before.
He could just be asleep. He could be playing a prank. He might just not want to talk to anyone. The irrational part of Atsushi’s brain tells him that the man is kidnapped, but he quickly pushes that idea aside.
Dozens of hypotheticals fly through the weretiger’s head, and he forces himself to swallow lest he begin visibly losing composure. “Dazai-san, it’s me. Um… I know you like to have your alone time, but I still wanted to check on you. You haven’t missed a full day of work for a while.” As if the brunet is standing right before him, Atsushi fidgets with his hands, averting his gaze from a nonexistent pair of eyes. In the back of his mind, he wonders if Dazai’s silence has to do with their talk yesterday. It’s a bit fuzzy in his mind, but maybe he said something hurtful..?
Sure, maybe this isn’t a big deal at all. Knowing Dazai, his absence could be the result of something serious like an overarching threat to all of Yokohama, or something completely bizarre like a “surprise nap” (as he had called it when Kunikida found the man lying face down in the middle of the office one day with ketchup spilled underneath him).
And yet, there was just… something. Something about this particular instance that makes Atsushi’s spine crawl with a foreboding hunch.
“I hope you’ve eaten at least-” Atsushi presses - literally - against the door. Originally out of concern, but moreso out of shock when he feels the entryway give a little under his weight. Experimentally twisting the knob, his sunset eyes widen when the door glides open without protest.
“...Huh?”
The fact that he can enter Dazai’s abode isn’t a cause for celebration. In fact, the darkness of the room inside only makes the hairs on Atsushi's arms shiver.
Atsushi has only ever been inside Dazai’s apartment a few times. Once when the bandaged man got absolutely wasted on alcohol and Kunikida dropped his colleague off as the albino’s responsibility, another time when he spontaneously invited Atsushi to make dinner with him, and again when he called Atsushi over and stated that he just “needed some company”.
Atsushi never questioned the man more than the surface level “are you ok” or “do you want to talk about it” during these occasions. He still doesn’t know all the intricacies of Dazai’s thoughts. A part of him thinks he never will. Then again, being able to know exactly what goes on in such a labyrinthine mind feels like something only Ranpo can achieve.
The most he can do is be there for the brunet, always willing to try his best to make the man feel fulfilled. He still doubts he’s the best person for such a task, but at least his effort isn’t a non-existent one.
To his questions, Dazai always dances around them. Atsushi only ever gets peeks behind the curtain or glances behind the tall walls that continuously shield the older detective’s soul from the world.
During the night when Dazai simply asked for the weretiger’s company, the man had muttered a line about “missing someone from the past”.
A flash of a gravestone flew by Atsushi’s eyes then, and he drew the dots together.
Both of them knew, and Atsushi chose not to dig any deeper on that topic for the rest of the night.
He’s not entirely sure, but he still thinks there was an appreciative flicker in Dazai’s otherwise hollow brown eyes after that. Perhaps a few other vulnerable emotions too.
Dazai’s apartment was always sparsely decorated. It never really felt ‘lived in’. It could even be argued that it barely holds the minimal necessities a place of residency usually has. Atsushi recalls commenting on that fact during one of his numbered visits, but Dazai had simply waved him off at the time. Something about being used to living more barren. Which is concerning.
It’s clear to see nothing has changed. A futon sits in one corner, half-made, while another corner houses a small chabudai and two cushions. During Atsushi’s first time in Dazai’s apartment (which was the shortest time he spent inside, as it was only to make sure the drunken man got into bed safely) there weren’t any cushions at all. He’s not sure if he should see it as a positive or negative that him being a guest in Dazai’s place is what finally incentivised the man to get two more pieces of furniture.
He knows Dazai couldn’t have tripped over anything like Kyōka suggested, much less knock anything over, with how empty the dorm is. Unless he stumbled over his own feet for some reason…
Atsushi takes note that the curtains are drawn to completely cover the windows, hence why the apartment looks so dark. His eyes flit through the shadows anyway as they quickly adjust to the room. Besides the more noticeable furniture, small details begin to stand out, only painting more concern over the albino’s features.
A cup of water is spilled at the doorway to the small kitchen, and the book Dazai usually keeps tucked away on his person, ‘ The Complete Manual of Suicide ’ is peeking out from under the futon.
The next thing Atsushi registers is the smell. The usual scent of Dazai, that of roasted coffee like what he always insists on drinking if not alcohol, permeates through the dorm, as is expected for his living quarters. However, taking another sniff, the faint inclusion of steam and iron makes a shudder travel up Atsushi’s body.
Iron… metallic… blood… blood… blood.
Once the scent is noticeable, it’s the only sensation Atsushi can focus on. It’s foreign, out of place. It shouldn’t be present in this environment.
Suddenly, it’s as if all of his surroundings are drowned out by the smell of blood.
“D-Dazai-san?!”
He doesn’t get a response, scrambling past the main room to the kitchen. The fallen glass of water isn’t nearly as important as the open pill bottle that sits politely on the countertop. The label Atsushi reads makes his eyes widen in horror.
‘ Fentanyl ’
The bathroom nestled by the side of the kitchen has its door slightly ajar, flickering light inside suggesting the room is being illuminated by candles.
Atsushi knows where Dazai is. And now, any of the hypotheticals that previously rang in his mind would be better than the scene he is terrified to walk in on.
He prays that he is wrong. He’s jumping to conclusions too fast. He’s not trusting Dazai right now with this paranoia. His trust is slipping.
He has to be wrong. All of this is circumstantial. All of this is some nightmare. A hallucination his scarred mind is coming up with to add on with the rest. It has to be. It has to be. It has to be it has to be it has to be .
It can’t be real.
Because if this is what Atsushi thinks it is, then what will he do-
The smell is overpowering before he even gets past the bathroom door.
The room is lit with orange candlelight. Two wax cylinders silently melting away at the rim of the tub. The warm colors only give the small room a freakish, uncanny atmosphere.
Atsushi steps on the tile flooring, and his shoes are already wet, because the puddle of blood that has formed by the tub is trailing outwards like small rivers.
And in the tub, is a body.
With a mop of brown hair, laying limp in a ceramic container that is almost filled to the brim with water. Atsushi can’t see the expression on his face, as the head is tilted down. He’s wearing his usual outfit in the tub, with his bolo tie and shoes and everything, but the left arm, the one hanging out of the tub, has the sleeve rolled up, barren of its usual bandages. He can see old scars and scabs littering the appendage, but the most noticeable, the most recent mark, is the deep gash that runs nearly the length of his forearm.
“Da- kh-” Atsushi chokes on the man’s name. His hands cover his mouth as he feels bile crawl up the back of his throat, and his vision blurs the sight before him to an unrecognizable image for a few moments.
Then, he takes some steps closer, and his trembling legs collapse the moment he gets close enough to see the bloodied knife on the other side of the tub. His pants are almost immediately soaked by the blood - Dazai’s blood - but all Atsushi can see is the lifeless corpse of his savior.
“W…Why?” Atsushi reaches a hand out, but pulls it back almost just as quickly. He doesn’t want to touch. He doesn’t want to see this. This is a cursed image. A nightmare brought to reality. He can’t accept this. He won’t.
“Why..? Why? Dazai-san… Dazai-san…”
It’s the only words Atsushi can manage to spill from his shaky lips. He doesn’t even register the tears spilling down his cheeks, or the way his nails dig into his palms. He can’t think straight. The only emotions he feels are devastation and agony.
Minutes pass, and Atsushi still doesn’t stop sobbing. He thinks he lets out a wail or a scream at some point, but it doesn’t matter. He peers over the edge of the tub, to the dead body soaking inside.
The water is lukewarm. It’s a sign that Atsushi was too late. Just a handful of minutes too late.
The smell of steam amidst the blood is still fresh, after all.
Why?
Why did he do it?
Why did he go out in this way? Why now?
Why didn’t Atsushi notice? Why didn’t he try harder for him? Why didn’t anyone?
Why is he so pathetic to snivel over Dazai’s death, when he could have done so much more for the man to change this?
Why?
Atsushi hiccups. He doesn’t move a hand up to wipe his tears, because he doesn’t even acknowledge that he is crying.
Instead, he reaches his palm out, with his body curled up beside the tub. Ever so gently, his fingers ghost over Dazai’s pulse point. Obviously, there is nothing, and the absence of a rhythm only makes Atsushi bite back another onslaught of tears. His fingertips still glide further though, until they match up with Dazai’s own limp hand. And then, ever so delicately, he slots his fingers between the other’s.
The silverhead parts his lips, some words forming on the tip of his tongue despite his brain not even formulating a thought.
Darkness swarms him in the next moment.
The smell of blood is replaced with nothing. The world around him abruptly turns non-existent.
Is he falling?
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Atsushi feels like he’s been hit by a train; a flood of nausea forces his arms to instinctively cover his guts despite no active threat being nearby. His eyes are wide, almost impossibly so, and they dart around to take in as much of the surroundings as he can without moving anything else. A cold sweat practically washes over him, and it’s as if he just woke up from a bad dream.
No. He did just have a nightmare. It isn’t a nightmare. Dazai is dead. He’s laying in a tub, with a pool of blood next to him. Then where is he? If Atsushi passed out in that bathroom, then where is he right now? There’s water, it’s a river, it’s that river. He can recognize the bridge he’s standing on.
But then, how did he get here of all places? Is it because of the tiger? Something else?
“Atsushi-kun?”
Atsushi freezes.
Then, he physically recoils.
“...Dazai-san?”
The brunet is a few paces ahead of him, with his head turning to look back over his shoulder, brows slightly furrowed.
The mop of chocolate brown hair is lightly ruffled by the spring breeze, sandy trench coat flowing just the same. His tall and slender form carries the same casual, easygoing air he always does, and from just under his collar and sleeves, Atsushi can see the pristine white bandages Dazai religiously wears. His chestnut eyes are murky and impossible to read, as usual. But there’s light in them at the very least.
It’s Dazai.
“Atsushi-kun…… what’s wrong?”
Atsushi realizes he’s seconds from falling apart then and there, only managing to weakly cough a bit before sputtering on nothing.
“...Sorry. I…” He grasps for something, anything coherent he can make up. He’s at a complete loss.
Dazai (it has to be Dazai. It is . Right?) pulls out his phone while Atsushi internally battles on if he’s supposed to act composed or crumble on the spot.
The world closes in around Atsushi for a bit, because still- it’s still fresh in his mind. What he saw, what he just sobbed over, what he just witnessed. Whatever is happening right now needs to wait. It’s too abrupt of a change in scenery.
A phone screen in his view clears the fog over Atsushi’s eyes, and he blinks, startled, before swallowing and focusing on whatever Dazai is trying to show him.
“It’s getting pretty late isn’t it, Atsushi-kun? I think you should head home for tonight.”
He’s not wrong, the time on Dazai’s lock screen shows that it is 6:30 pm.
But Atsushi hardly registers the time of day when he sees what day it is.
The 26th of May. Yesterday .