Archive of Our Own

CHUUYA

Admittedly it did sound too good to be true. The woman’s name is Jane Austen, and when Chuuya finds out that her ability, Pride and Prejudice, affects a person’s fated rival negatively, he’s thrilled. He’s even more thrilled when he does some digging and determines that her ability causes a person’s fated rival to lose the thing they love the most in the world. Austen isn’t a member of the Yokohama criminal underworld, and the people who have been affected by her ability all seem woefully unexcited when confirming to Chuuya what it does (he had to sneak into several fancy parties and pretend to be several fancy people to learn all this⁠—⁠take that, shitty fucking Dazai; Chuuya is great at undercover work), but that’s fine. That’s all Chuuya needs to know.

Pride and Prejudice will make it so Dazai Osamu will lose the thing he loves the most in the world. All Chuuya has to do is get this Jane Austen lady to touch him. Win/win.

Jane Austen turns out to be a tired-looking thirty-something with curly, black hair and dark eyes. She looks remarkably depressed when Chuuya happens upon her at a bar in England. She’s wearing a long-sleeved, green dress with a high, lace collar and gloves that go all the way up to her elbows. In no time at all she informs Chuuya that she’s taken a vow to never use her ability on people again after some sort of incident involving some Mr. Darcy fellow.

Chuuya nods sympathetically and orders a drink, all the while trying to determine the best course of action. He settles for being straightforward, explaining, “I really need you to use your ability on me, though, because of my rival. Oh my God he’s the worst.”

The next few hours are spent explaining the thousands of grievances Chuuya has accumulated against Dazai Osamu, while Jane Austen orders them both more and more alcohol, and seems worryingly enthusiastic about Chuuya’s plight. Or it would be worrying, if Chuuya were sober. Drunk-off-his-ass Chuuya just thinks Austen is kind.

By the end of the evening (or morning?) the woman leans over, peels off one of her gloves, and slaps her hand directly across Chuuya’s face. He doesn’t feel anything, but there is a telltale flash of green light that Chuuya has come to associate with some people’s touch-based abilities.

“It is fucking unfair how pretty Shitty Dazai’s blue light is,” Chuuya thinks he says.

Austen nods, seeming very invested. “Go get him, tiger,” she says, which is in hindsight a very odd thing to say.

Chuuya isn’t a tiger (that would be Nakajima Atsushi) and he’s also not been assigned to go and get anybody, be it in a kidnapping capacity or a good old-fashioned hit sort of way. But at that point Chuuya is too drunk to keep listening. So he nods to Austen and then somehow manages to get home to his hotel, whereupon he passes out. Hopefully when he wakes up he won’t be too hungover, and then he’ll be able to reap the benefits of Dazai’s despair.

Only Chuuya doesn’t get the chance to reap the benefits of Dazai’s despair because immediately after returning from England he gets put on a job that results in some low-level terrorist group trying to kill him.

And then his entire apartment complex gets closed temporarily after there is a near fatal gas leak.

Then he has to start taking public transportation (or more rather, using his ability to avoid taking public transportation) because Albatross’ bike breaks down one too many times, throwing him off it in ways that would be way more concerning if Chuuya were not himself and couldn’t use his ability to keep from splatting onto various hard surfaces.

Chuuya starts living temporarily in one of the rooms at HQ, which does wonders for his productivity but is hell on his work-life balance, and the near-constant exposure to him apparently makes some of the newer recruits more enterprising. He finds himself dodging random attacks every other day, all of them from people Chuuya has never seen before, and so he assumes must just be new to the Port Mafia.

He doesn’t realize they’re assassins and those were assassination attempts until he gets pulled into the boss’s office for some sort of intervention, and then, well.

“Chuuya-kun,” says the boss. For some reason he’s brought Kouyou as backup, and Chuuya’s Ane-san is standing behind the desk gazing at Chuuya somewhat pityingly. “Have you noticed anything . . . odd about the last couple of days?”

“Odd?” Chuuya wracks his brain for what the boss could be talking about. This morning his coffeemaker did attempt to set fire to his room, but the thing has been on the fritz for months at this point. He thinks it was a gift from Dazai back before the fucker defected and joined the ADA. Other than that, Chuuya’s day has been quiet. Oh⁠—⁠there was that new guy who tried to knife Chuuya in the stairwell earlier, but it ended up being a well-needed workout and Chuuya appreciated the exercise. So: “No,” Chuuya says.

Mori looks somewhat pained.

“You’ve been fending off quite a lot of assassination attempts lately,” Kouyou finally says. Her tone is incredibly diplomatic, but the sentence gives Chuuya pause.

“Those were assassination attempts?” he says.

Kouyou and Mori exchange a look, before Kouyou seems relegated to answering by virtue of not being the boss. “Yes . . . what did you think they were⁠—⁠”

“New recruits,” says Chuuya promptly. “I’m here a lot more often since my place is closed because of that freak accident gas leak, and I dunno. I guess I just thought some of the new guys wanted to try their hand at getting one over me.” He coughs, somewhat uncomfortably, realizing he’s walked himself into a bit of a corner. “And I’m, uh. Kind of a big deal.”

“Yes . . .”

Mori and Kouyou share another one of those looks.

Chuuya swears internally because what the fuck? Shitty Dazai never ran into this sort of judgment whenever he walked around HQ talking up his own ass.

Speaking of Shitty Dazai.

“You’re certain they were assassination attempts?”

Kouyou nods.

“Do you need me to go dangle Dazai off a roof or something to get him to rescind the hit?”

For some odd reason Mori coughs. “No, ah⁠—⁠no, that won’t be necessary, Chuuya-kun. I’ve already taken the liberty and confirmed with Dazai-kun that he has not been, erm, the one behind the hit.” The boss pauses for longer. “There is no hit,” he says.

Chuuya blinks.

And then blinks some more.

And then blinks some more. “You’re sure it’s not just Dazai on the dark dark web?” he asks.

Mori appears to be suffering.

“Yes, we are sure,” Kouyou says.

Chuuya furrows his brow. “Then why are people trying to kill me⁠—⁠”

Mori points at him emphatically. “Yes, that’s why I’ve called you in here, Chuuya-kun. Why indeed?”

That appears to be a legitimate question that Chuuya is expected to know the answer to. He scrambles about uselessly. “Erm, I’m not sure⁠—⁠”

“It seems to have started shortly after you took that small trip to England,” Kouyou says.

Chuuya narrows his eyes at her. “Yes . . . I cleared that leave time with you beforehand⁠—⁠”

“Yes, yes, we’re not here to dispute whether or not you obeyed protocol. Why is it you were in England, Chuuya-kun?”

Chuuya has a split second of worry that Mori is deathly ill, or something. The odd behavior does not make sense otherwise. “I went to visit a friend,” Chuuya lies. “Why⁠—⁠”

“A friend. Did that friend happen to be⁠—⁠I just mean because⁠—⁠there were rumors you were seen⁠—⁠”

“Was it Jane Austen?” Kouyou interrupts finally. “Were you meeting up with Jane Austen? Did she touch you, by any chance?”

Chuuya has no idea what’s gotten into either of them. He decides honesty is the only way forward. “Yes. Why?”

Mori and Kouyou look at each other for a third time. It’s really getting fucking old. “What exactly do you know about Austen’s ability, Pride and Prejudice, Chuuya-kun?”

“It makes it so a person’s fated rival loses the thing they love most in the world.”

Mori and Kouyou exchange a fourth look. Chuuya is going to start ripping pieces off the drywall and using his ability to launch them at them one at a time. Or maybe shatter one of Mori’s wall to ceiling windows. Just to blow off steam.

“What?” Chuuya says through his teeth.

Mori says something quickly but it’s not intelligible. Kouyou glares at him angrily, before facing Chuuya instead. “Jane Austen’s ability does all that you just said,” says Kouyou. “But with an unfortunate twist. It has a 100 percent chance of interpreting ‘what they love most in the world’ as a person.”

Chuuya is going to need her to spell it out for him and quickly. Especially since he’s starting to get the idea and it’s making ice grow in his stomach.

“It kills a person,” says Kouyou. “It determines the person that someone’s rival loves most in the world and then it kills them.”

The ice is now a giant iceberg, stabbing painfully at all of Chuuya’s internal organs like it’s 1912 and he’s the fucking Titanic. “What are you saying, Ane-san?”

“The person that Dazai Osamu loves most in the world is you, Chuuya. Which is why all those people keep trying to kill you.”

That’s what Chuuya thought.

“Right,” he says. “I’m just gonna . . . go take matters into my own hands, then.”

And then he turns on his heel and walks right back out the door.

Several hours and several panic attacks later, Chuuya has fought off three more random strangers, nearly electrocuted himself in the shower thanks to his electric shaver, been delivered some clearly toxic and probably fatal takeout, and very grudgingly has to accept the fact that Kouyou and Mori may be right. Jane Austen’s ability may work like that.

Luckily for Chuuya, he doesn’t have to live without knowing, because he and Austen exchanged numbers.

“Chuuya!” says Austen happily when Chuuya works up the courage to call her. “How are things going with that Dazai man of yours? Has he realized he’s in love with you yet?”

Chuuya hangs up the phone.

Then he slaps himself not at all metaphorically and calls right back. “Does your ability go after people? Is the thing that people lose always a person?”

Austen doesn’t seem too bothered by Chuuya hanging up on her, though she does go through a small song and dance of fake pleasantries before answering. “Yes, I thought we went over that before I touched you⁠—⁠”

“Thanks,” Chuuya tells her. He hangs up the phone once more.

Then he sits there, in the dark, trying to decide if he can just . . . keep living like this. No one has succeeded in killing him. It would probably be fine.

Chuuya’s phone beeps suddenly, the screen lighting up with a text from the boss. I’ve decided it’s best if you go on temporary leave until you’ve handled this, reads the message. It shouldn’t be too difficult. You just need to get Dazai-kun to nullify Austen-san’s ability. I’ll expect you back to work in a couple of days.

Right.

Well.

As long as Shitty Dazai doesn’t figure out what’s going on, Chuuya is fine. He’ll just . . . invite Jane Austen to Yokohama.

Chuuya has to kidnap Jane Austen. She’s lured to Yokohama easily enough, but when Chuuya meets her at Haneda airport and explains what he needs her here for, she gets an odd, squirrely look on her face and tries to ditch him three times between her arrival gate and baggage claim. This is made all the worse by the fact that Chuuya is still fighting off assassins and also now the fucking weather, which has been storming since early this morning, and keeps shooting off lightning strikes on the ground alarmingly close to wherever Chuuya happens to be located.

Chuuya is forced to take hold of both her and her luggage with his ability, all the while holding her hand for appearances, so as to avoid getting arrested (ha) for kidnapping, or whatever.

For whatever reason Austen doesn’t shout at him, though she does refuse to walk on her own at all, essentially being lugged along by way of For the Tainted Sorrow the whole entire way. She fights him a little more viciously when she sees the Mafia limo that Chuuya has procured for this occasion, provided to him enthusiastically by Mori, who really seems to need Chuuya to resolve this ASAP. He must have some big job coming up that he needs Chuuya on, or something. Chuuya can’t imagine what other thing (besides Dazai, who isn’t involved at all yet, thankfully) could light such a fire under his ass.

“Not until you take advantage of the circumstances and confess your undying love to each other!” shrieks Austen, thankfully in English, as Chuuya attempts to shove her into the car for the final time.

“What are you even talking about, you crazy person?” Chuuya replies. And then, because he cannot continue living like this and also his heart just did a weird little start-stop that could be a sign of a heart attack that Chuuya usually wouldn’t worry about but now does because of Austen’s fucking ability, he adds, “Fine! I’ll do what you say! Now will you get in the car?”

Austen does.

Chuuya follows her and gets in too, gesturing for the driver to start driving. “Here’s what we’re going to do,” he tells Austen. “We’re going to wait until it gets dark, because the Agency just had a pretty important case that took up their whole weekend and even Shitty Dazai has to pass out after forty-eight hours without sleep⁠—⁠”

“Wow, you know so much about each other⁠—⁠”

“⁠—⁠and then we’re going to break into his place while he’s sleeping and you are going to touch him and this is all going to go away, understand?” finishes Chuuya, ignoring her.

Austen is still looking at him all fondly, for some reason, but she nods, curls shaking. “Yes.”

“Great.”

Chuuya just has to survive the next twelve or so hours, and he’ll be home free.

DAZAI

Admittedly, it was the sort of day that Dazai usually decides has to be too good to be true. He wakes up that morning with the urge to actually eat breakfast, and once he gives in and does that, his body is thrilled. It’s even more thrilled when he walks into the Agency offices (on time, because he was feeling properly energized) and the first thing Kunikida tells him is that he should take the morning off and rest up⁠—⁠after their very successful case that weekend, everyone, including Dazai’s uptight partner, is in good spirits. Dazai makes use of his morning off to go see some sights around Yokohama, flirt with some beautiful women, and fail to find someone willing to try a double suicide with him, before deciding that not doing work is going so well for him that he may as well continue not doing work for the rest of the day.

He goes home, and later in the evening he actually eats dinner, and then he watches some mindless television before going back to bed. Win/win.

Consciousness is always rude to Dazai. This time it does come on rather gently, but with the added soundtrack of a particularly annoying miniature slug, whose voice Dazai would recognize anywhere, unfortunately.

Dazai’s dog is attempting to be quiet, at least. He’s whispering softly enough that because Dazai is still too asleep, he can’t properly understand him, but the cadence of his words suggests that he’s got some sort of companion along. That alone is alarming enough that Dazai attempts to swim towards wakefulness, mumbling, “Chibi?” out of a sleep-slick mouth.

Gosh he hates waking up. And more so when doing so involves Chuuya. It’s bad enough that he’s lived to see another day without adding dealing with a dog to the mix.

“Shh, Mackerel. Go back to sleep. Now! Do it now!” Chuuya hisses.

Dazai blinks painfully up at him, eyes having trouble adjusting to the darkness of his dorm room and seeing. He’s pretty sure he’d be able to find Chuuya’s stupid hair and dumb hat with his eyes closed, though.

A hand lands on Dazai’s cheek, warm, but unfamiliar. The room lights up with blue light. No Longer Human. Chuuya has brought someone here to Dazai so that he can nullify their ability?

“What⁠—⁠”

Chuuya yanks the person away from Dazai quickly. “Right, great, let’s go⁠—⁠”

“Excuse me?” says a melodic female voice. “You said you’d confess⁠—⁠”

Dazai takes a moment to figure out that the language he’s hearing isn’t Japanese but is instead English, and in that time Chuuya slaps a gloved hand over the woman’s mouth. She has curly black hair, suddenly livid brown eyes, and is wearing an extremely covering green dress and one elbow-high glove. Chuuya’s ability activates upon touching her, and he steals one of the pillows off Dazai’s futon and slaps that over the woman’s face with For The Tainted Sorrow as well, leaving it suctioned to her face by gravity in place of his hand. Whatever ability she’s got that Dazai just nullified must be touch-based like No Longer Human.

The angry woman keeps protesting, but she’s got no audible voice through the pillow.

Chuuya nods seriously in acknowledgment at Dazai, before flying both of them out Dazai’s front door. It closes behind them, loud in the silence.

“What just happened?” Dazai says.

/return all search results for:

Curly black-haired woman with brown eyes
British woman with curly black hair and brown eyes
British woman with black hair + Nakahara Chuuya
Nakahara Chuuya girlfriend
Nakahara Chuuya British girlfriend
British women ability users

Dazai’s phone rings. He doesn’t look away from the incredibly important work he is doing on Kunikida’s Agency computer, but he does answer it. “Ango! What a surprise that you’re up this late!”

“Dazai-san, why are you hacking into the Special Division database and using it to search for a woman with curly, black hair who is English and may or may not be dating Nakahara Chuuya?”

Dazai clicks to see the next page of British ability users, stopping to ooh and ah over a particularly interesting sounding ability belonging to a woman named Diana Wynne Jones. It’s called House of Many Ways and allows her to open any front door to any place in the world that she knows. The Special Division has made a note that it does specifically need to be the front door; they really are frighteningly thorough.

“Dazai-san?”

“Now, now, Ango. Would I waste precious government resources for anything that wasn’t important?”

“You can’t actually want me to answer that.”

“The slug broke into my apartment with this woman and made her touch me⁠—⁠nullifying her ability. I just want to make sure he didn’t accidentally threaten the fate of the universe and need me to save him . . . again!”

“When have you ever saved A5158–”

Virginia Woolf, ability The Hours. Hyper-specific mental time travel⁠—⁠she sends people “back in time” to their most pivotal memory. How fun.

Ango sighs. “It’s three a.m.,” he says in performative protest. Then he adds, “The only reports I’ve seen today are that A5158 was at Haneda airport yesterday morning picking up Jane Austen. British. Mid-thirties. Her ability, Pride and Prejudice, isn’t particularly world ending, although⁠—⁠”

“Jane Austen,” interrupts Dazai, exiting out of the Special Division database and changing Kunikida’s default desktop background to a photo of the man himself photoshopped onto a tan, shirtless, muscular body. “It’s not a pleasure as always, Ango.” Dazai lets his voice turn a little sharper. “I understand that it’s a habit but you shouldn’t refer to Chuuya as a number to me.”

He hangs up on Ango’s annoying sputtering and hums to himself, beginning to spin around and around on Kunikida’s chair, thinking. Dazai does some of his best thinking with a pen in his hand, and luckily Kunikida keeps plenty of spares. But there’s no paper around besides completed reports, and in a stunning show of work ethic, Dazai doesn’t decide to scribble on those, and instead decides to write directly on Kunikida’s desk.

Spin.

Spin.

Spin.

What’s the easiest way to get information about this Jane Austen woman and her business with Chuuya?

“Chibi!”

“Nope,” says Chuuya.

“But you didn’t even hear what I had to say!”

“Not interested.”

“But what if it were related to a joint mission between our two organizations?”

Chuuya stops walking and turns to face him. “Is it?”

“No, but⁠—⁠”

“Not. Interested,” Chuuya repeats as two sentences, turning and beginning walking away even faster now. For someone with much shorter legs⁠—⁠and much shorter everything minus his dick, actually (Dazai really regrets so many of the things he learned during his time in the Mafia)⁠—⁠Chuuya walks remarkably fast. Dazai nearly trips trying to keep up with him.

“Why didn’t my dog tell me he was going out with Jane Austen?” Dazai blurts out.

That stops Chuuya in his tracks. He whirls back around to face Dazai, stuttering and disbelieving. “Am I what?” he asks, the question a deliberate misunderstanding turned back on Dazai.

Dazai narrows his eyes at him. How rude of Chuuya to imply that Dazai might not know something important like that for certain.

“Chibi is dating Jane Austen and he didn’t tell me!”

A muscle in Chuuya’s jaw twitches but he doesn’t respond, which Dazai takes to be agreement⁠—⁠a confession⁠—⁠not that he didn’t know before, as stated previously.

“I had to find out from a traitor in glasses!”

Chuuya breathes in very deeply several times through his nose. “Well you’re a traitor in bandages. So I guess like really does attract like.” He glares hard at Dazai as if Dazai is the one in the wrong. “Are we done here?”

Dazai’s automatic instinct is to say “no,” but that runs the risk of making him sound sentimental. No Chuuya we’ll never be done here, please don’t ever be done with me, I won’t ever be done with you, you and I are meant to go around yelling at each other forever and ever and ever⁠—⁠

Which may very well be true (and something Dazai pretends to never think about only when it’s very dark and he’s very much not capable of sleeping) but isn’t something Dazai is ready to acknowledge at present.

He has other more important things to say. To do.

“What does her ability do?” Dazai asks.

It’s an innocent enough question. Surely not one worthy of any stress. Chuuya broke into Dazai’s home to get him to nullify Jane Austen’s ability, after all.

And yet Chuuya is suddenly looking at Dazai like Dazai has stabbed him (Dazai should know).

“I don’t know,” says Chuuya, lying so very badly. “But she touched me and I figured it couldn’t be good, so since we were in the area⁠—⁠”

“The area around my dorm?”

“⁠—⁠and that’s kind of the only thing you’re good for⁠—⁠”

Dazai actually feels bad for Chuuya. Surely after spending so much time with a master liar like Dazai he ought to have learned something.

“⁠—⁠I decided to stop by,” finishes Chuuya. “And I’m not dating her, incidentally. Not that it matters. Why the fuck do you care who I date?”

Okay that’s a little better. For a moment Dazai is rightfully distracted by that question because he should not care that Chuuya is (not) dating Jane Austen. He shouldn’t care who Chuuya is (not) dating, period. Unless of course they turn out to be someone dangerous who might attempt to utilize Corruption to destroy the entire city, in which case, as the only person capable of preventing that, it’s sort of Dazai’s business⁠—⁠as a protector of the city who works proudly on the side of good, thank you Odasaku⁠—⁠to be keeping tabs on all that.

To save Yokohama.

From Chuuya’s . . . not girlfriend.

Or not boyfriend?

Uh, anyway⁠—⁠

Chuuya is lying about not knowing what Jane Austen’s ability is and Dazai is going to figure out why.

“Okay, I understand. Thanks for telling me,” says Dazai, conveying a total lack of interest in getting to the bottom of this mystery and demonstrating an actually skilled bit of lying if he does say so himself. Everyone in the world would be fooled by Dazai.

Chuuya heaves out an incredibly put upon sigh. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

Okay, Chuuya clearly doesn’t count as “everyone” because Chuuya somehow always manages to know when Dazai is lying, except, of course, when it actually matters (“I blew up your car because I hate you,” “I left you in the woods that time because I hate you,” “I’d never have asked you to leave with me because I hate you,” etc.).

It’s some sort of weird exposure therapy thing because they were partners for so long. Dazai fears the day Kunikida develops the same skill and has actually preemptively purchased a calendar for the next year, on which he has already marked down the day that they will have been partners for three years just to be prepared. (He marked it down as Kunikida-kun Day, which is cryptic enough to cause the man great stress; if Dazai is going to lose the power to lie to yet another partner, he’s going to enjoy messing with him while it lasts).

Chuuya is staring at Dazai with an expression that lets Dazai know that he had been lost in his own thoughts for an embarrassing amount of time now.

Dazai smiles back extra pleasantly at Chuuya because he knows if he does it for long enough the slug will just go away.

Like clockwork, Chuuya sighs. “Yeah, okay,” he mutters. Then he walks off.

Dazai watches him go, mind already devoted to solving the central problem: how to find out Jane Austen’s ability when Chuuya won’t answer him outright.

“Ango!”

“I’m more scared of A5⁠—⁠of Nakahara than I am of you,” says Ango. “Ask someone else. And if you hack us again, I will put you in prison⁠—⁠”

“Fine,” says Dazai darkly, knowing a lost battle when he sees one. He can’t believe the Chibi Hatrack got to Ango before he could. “I was going to say I forgive you and we should go get drinks at Lupin but never mind.”

“Dazai-san⁠—⁠”

Dazai hangs up the phone.

The thing is, Dazai is a detective. He solves mysteries for a living; and he’s good at it, when he tries. So Dazai goes into the office, and he sits down at his desk very seriously, and then he asks Kunikida if he can borrow a notebook (the man looks close to tears when handing one over) and then he gets to work, listing out all the facts.

He doesn’t list the facts in the notebook⁠—⁠no, Dazai’s brain is too fast for something like that⁠—⁠but his hands work aimlessly and his mind wanders systematically as he attempts to puzzle things out. Asking Chuuya is out of the question. And hacking Ango is also a no go. Breaking into Mori’s office is an option, but it’s nearly impossible to be undetected when doing that. And Mori has been weird, lately.

Dazai debates hacking Jane Austen herself, but he wouldn’t put it past the hatrack not to have Ango prepared for that. And well: jail. In France. It’s not time for Dazai to go to jail in France. (Yet.)

Several times during the morning Atsushi clears his throat as if to ask Dazai a question, and each time Kunikida furiously heads him off. He answers the question, or he has someone else answer the question, and then if no one can answer the question because Dazai is a genius and an invaluable member of the Agency, Kunikida has Atsushi write it down to ask Dazai later.

“He is working, Atsushi,” says Kunikida. “Do you understand how momentous an occasion this is? We can’t distract him. Who knows when this will happen again!”

Dazai almost wants to fake-work more often, if only to put such a happy expression on Kunikida’s face. That’s what friendship is supposed to be about, right? Making someone happy just because? Dazai is such a great friend.

Anyways, he’s just reached a bit of a standstill when Atsushi asks timidly if he might be able to ask Dazai his collection of questions now and Kunikida begins lecturing once again. Dazai is fully aware that the fact that he’s focusing more on the things his partner is saying than he is on the problem is indicative of how very much he’s been trying to get blood out of a stone for the last ten minutes, but he doesn’t want to face that. Because then he’ll have to try other things. Gross.

Luckily Ranpo wanders by on his way to the bathroom. “He’s not working on a case,” he tells Kunikida calmly. “He’s trying to figure out what sort of ability Nakahara got hit with when he was in England the other day.”

Dazai’s entire body swivels to face Ranpo. “England?” he says. “This occurred in England?” He had been aware that the slug was out of the country, and this Jane Austen woman being English was evident from accent even before Ango confirmed it, but Dazai dismissed the whole thing as background information.

Dazai’s brow furrows. Speaking of background information . . .

“This doesn’t have anything to do with why Mori-san texted me asking if I put a hit out on Chuuya the other day, does it?”

Kunikida has recovered enough to tug the notebook out of Dazai’s grip, and Dazai is finally done enough with the exercise to allow it.

“Ranpo-san,” he whines.

Ranpo only shrugs. “Bathroom.” He squirrels off.

“Dazai!” wails Kunikida. “This isn’t work! This is a drawing of Nakahara Chuuya as one of those small dogs!”

“A chihuahua,” provides Atsushi helpfully. “And I think this is a scene from that American movie? Legally Blonde? With⁠—⁠with Dazai-san as the main character? And Chuuya-san as the dog?”

Dazai sniffs. “Thank you, Atsushi-kun,” he says. “It’s nice to see that at least one of you appreciates my artistic vision.”

“Your artistic vision!” roars Kunikida.

Dazai is not kicked out of the Agency offices. He leaves to avoid being killed by Kunikida, who is not a beautiful woman, and therefore not suitable for committing a double suicide with.

Breaking into Chuuya’s apartment should really be harder than it is. Dazai tries to time it so that he spends as little time as possible loitering, out of respect. It’s only when he has downtime in Chuuya’s place that he’s more likely to do things that Chuuya could maybe probably term as mischief. Therefore reducing the amount of downtime is an act of kindness.

Chuuya really should be more appreciative of that fact.

Chuuya comes stomping inside his place at a time late enough that Dazai wants to say something absurd like, “Do you know what time it is, young man?” in English. But even his footsteps sound tired, loud thump-thumps that have to be the product of Chuuya’s ability, because his shoes are off⁠—⁠Dazai heard that happen first⁠—⁠by the time he comes into view. Chuuya sees Dazai, curled innocently enough in a ball on the couch, and then he sighs like the world is ending and takes his enormously loud feet into the bedroom, whereupon he somehow makes a beeline to the rearranging of his sock drawer that Dazai is so very proud of⁠—⁠instead of being organized boringly into pairs, each one of Chuuya socks has now been introduced to and paired with the one that Dazai felt would suit it the best, talented matchmaker that he is⁠—⁠and begins calling Dazai names.

Dazai finds all the attention particularly nice, and so when Chuuya comes back out, having seemingly run out of insults for him, he says, “Chibi, they’re just socks.”

Chuuya may have an aneurysm. “Socks?” he repeats. “Just socks? I’ll show you just socks. I’d do the same thing to you if I thought for a second you owned more than a single pair of the things. I’ll buy you socks and then I’ll re-match them⁠—⁠”

“Good dog, Chuuya!” interrupts Dazai happily. “I do need to buy more socks! How kind of you to offer!”

It appears that Chuuya has finally reached his limit because he turns around, showing Dazai his much less interesting-to-look-at back (great ass notwithstanding).

When he faces Dazai again, his expression is blank. “What do you want?” He doesn’t even call Dazai anything. Or swear.

Dazai swallows uncomfortably. “Why did Mori-san text me to ask if I put a hit out on you?”

Chuuya’s eyes reveal nothing. “Because no less than ten assassins tried to kill me last week.”

Dazai’s eyes narrow immediately. “How dare they. I’ll find whoever put the hit on you and put a hit out on them.” Nobody tries to kill Dazai’s dog but Dazai.

But for some reason Chuuya only snorts. Dazai can’t imagine why; none of this is exactly funny. It’s (Chuuya’s) life or death!

Obviously Dazai is missing something.

Chuuya has walked across the room to his open bar and appears to be making himself a stiff drink. Not wine like he usually goes for, but whisky. “There was no hit, Dazai,” he says. “It was Austen’s ability.”

Dazai blinks at him. “Her ability puts out hits on people?” he asks. “In that case I’ll go kill her. She obviously can’t be trusted to exist in polite society if her response to being dumped by you was to try to kill you⁠—⁠”

“Aren’t you supposed to be a polite member of society?” interrupts Chuuya. “Kill? I thought you didn’t do that anymore.” He tips his bottle of whisky at Dazai curiously and Dazai waves him off, not interested in drinking tonight. Chuuya puts the bottle down with a shrug as if saying, “Suit yourself.”

“Arrest her then.”

Chuuya snorts. “Why’re you so convinced I’m dating her anyway?” he asks. “I’m not, by the way.”

Oh, Dazai hates him. He mumbles something nonsensical, hoping Chuuya won’t push.

“What was that?”

Slug bastard.

“I said she’s pretty,” Dazai enunciates clearly. “Chuuya has always liked pretty things. People.” Not me, he doesn’t add.

Only Chuuya laughs. He downs his entire drink in one quick shot, and then sets about making himself one more. “Now that’s definitely not true,” he says. “Because otherwise how do you explain how much I clearly like you?”

Dazai feels distinctly like a balloon that’s been popped. Or released by accident by a birthday child, forever doomed to wander the earth until he runs out of helium and deflates. “Uh,” he says. “What?”

Chuuya sighs. He sets down his whisky bottle and picks up his glass, crossing to sit across from Dazai on the other chair in the TV room. “Pride and Prejudice,” he explains. “Makes it so the fated rival of the person Austen touches loses the thing they love most in the world.”

Oh. “Cool,” Dazai says, not meaning it. How unfair that it can’t ever affect him.

“Yeah, cool,” agrees Chuuya. “The problem is that it uniformly goes after a person. It finds the person your rival loves most in the world and then it has them die.”

He pauses, this time more purposefully.

“She touched me.” Chuuya throws back his whisky again.

Dazai’s insides are on fire.

“And then the entire universe tried to kill me.”

Dazai’s insides have all burned to ash. “So that means⁠—⁠”

“Cheers,” says Chuuya, toasting Dazai with his empty glass. “The person you love most in the world is your shitty ex-partner you couldn’t even be bothered to say goodbye to before blowing up his car. You can see yourself out.”

Adrift and already bleeding helium, Dazai goes.

He finds Jane Austen in the singular safe house Chuuya cultivated during the period when they weren’t speaking to each other after Dazai’s initial defection, lying dead asleep on the futon.

He breaks in near-silently, not interested in wasting any time. “Hey,” he says, one hand over the woman’s mouth to keep her from screaming. “Wake up.”

Jane Austen⁠—⁠just as lovely looking as Dazai had remembered⁠—⁠nearly gives Dazai a concussion while head-butting him, then attempts to beat him to death with a pillow.

She stops shortly after, but at that point Dazai is part of the way blind and reeling, swaying around the safe room⁠—⁠once again⁠—⁠like a balloon.

“Who the hell are you?” shouts Jane Austen in English. And then, quieter, “Oh. It’s you. That Dazai person. Chuuya’s rival.”

She says it with the sort of emphasis that makes Dazai’s skin crawl, and he squints one watering eye open so that he can glare at her. “What does that mean?” She’s lucky he speaks so many languages fluently.

“Well, you’re clearly in love with him,” says Jane Austen simply. “Obviously.”

Maybe she killed Dazai with the pillow and this is hell.

Only, no. That would be too good to be true. Jane Austen is a beautiful woman, but Dazai doesn’t imagine the universe would ever be so kind to someone like him. He needs to focus. He came here for a reason.

“Your ability. Pride and Prejudice⁠—⁠”

“Yes, yes, it kills someone important to a person’s rival,” says Austen quickly. “Has he confessed?”

Dazai is going to need a couple more seconds. Maybe he actually has a concussion. “Confessed?”

“Chuuya,” says Austen, which doesn’t help.

Dazai’s eyes flash. “What does the slug have to do with anything?”

Austen looks almost . . . sympathetic. “Well now that he knows about your feelings thanks to my ability, it’s clearly the perfect time for him to tell you how he feels.”

Dazai is an empty balloon carcass, slumped down between a naked tree’s branches and left there to die. “My feelings?”

Austen almost seems disgusted by such a question. “Yes, your feelings.”

“How Chuuya feels?”

Austen is shaking her head with speechless exasperation, now. “Men,” is all she says.

Dazai decides to just leave. It’s safer.

He goes back to Chuuya, who seems to have stopped drinking and sobered up, somewhat. He’s sitting on the floor in his bedroom with all his mismatched socks in front of him, clearly attempting to put them back to rights.

Dazai stands there in the doorway watching him for long enough that Chuuya’s throat bobs around a request for him to stop standing there staring, and then he walks over and sinks down into the ground beside Chuuya, reaching silently into the pile.

For several minutes, they sit there together and unpair. Occasionally one of them will find a sock they’ve seen before, and Chuuya will float the rejoined bundle back into his drawer with his ability while Dazai does his best to touch him and ruin it all. He touches him plenty of times, just to watch Chuuya splutter. Chuuya starts tossing them with one handed, non-ability, getting them in one after the other with natural born skin.

It has no business being as hot as it is.

And ah. That. Dazai thinks it’s probably time.

“I went to see Jane Austen,” he says.

Chuuya finishes separating a dirty sock from a clean one and makes a terrible face. “Yeah, and?” He chucks the dirty sock in the direction of his laundry basket and seems to realize it’s remarkably empty, angry expression morphing into resigned acceptance as he considers the likelihood that Dazai has put away all his dirty clothes. He punches Dazai very hard in the right arm.

“Ow⁠—⁠”

“And, Mackerel?”

Dazai sighs. “She confirmed what you said.”

Chuuya swallows. “Right, yeah.” He licks his lips nervously. “Of course she did. I mean why would I lie?” He picks up a truly inspired pairing of a fiery red sock with a shocking teal-turquoise one and doesn’t seem to appreciate the color combination at all.

Dazai sorts through the pile and finds the answering pair, which he couldn’t help but put together in the exact same way. “I think it’s unfair that her ability won’t work on me,” he says. He holds out the red and blue sock to Chuuya.

Chuuya takes them. “What?”

“If she touched me, I’d probably die in twenty-four hours,” says Dazai. “I’m much less skilled at avoiding assassination attempts than you are, you see.”

Chuuya is just holding all four socks. “What are you talking about⁠—⁠”

“Well, if the thing that I love most in the world is Chuuya, it’s only fair that the thing Chuuya loves most in the world is me, don’t you think?”

Chuuya’s eyes cross thinking that one through. But once he gets it, his face turns a vibrant red. Almost matching two of the socks in his hand, in fact.

Dazai reaches for them, smiling. “They match Chibi’s hair.” He holds them up as an example.

Chuuya stares at him blankly for another beat then he rips them out of Dazai’s hand. “Shut up, they do not,” he says. Then he looks down at the blue pair also in his hand, gulping. “They match your, uh. Stupid tie,” he offers.

Dazai’s face hurts, he’s smiling so hard. “Yeah,” he agrees quietly. Carefully, in a way that Dazai has never been with something so perfectly given such as Chuuya’s heart, he reaches out and takes the socks back from Chuuya. He matches one red one and one blue one. “There,” Dazai says.

Chuuya swallows again. He looks . . . bared. “To be clear,” he says softly. “We’re the socks⁠—⁠”

“Don’t be silly, Chuuya.” Dazai takes the socks out of Chuuya’s hands and throws them aimlessly behind him, ignoring the stuttering emotions in Chuuya’s blue, blue eyes. “We’re so much more than a pair of socks⁠—⁠”

Chuuya gasps a little, voice teary. “Lead with that, you bastard mackerel.”

“Kiss me first, you demon slug.” Dazai rises up on his knees and meets him in the middle eagerly.

Jane Austen [xx:xx] Chuuya, may I leave the safe house now?
Jane Austen [xx:xx] Have you resolved things with your Dazai?
Jane Austen [xx:xx] I met him; he seems intense.
Jane Austen [xx:xx] I mean I get it, now.
Jane Austen [xx:xx] He’s handsome.
Jane Austen [xx:xx] Clearly insane though.
Jane Austen [xx:xx] And insane about you 😏
Jane Austen [xx:xx] Anyway, may I go home now?
Jane Austen [xx:xx] Chuuya?
Jane Austen [xx:xx] Hello?