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For the first time, Atsushi had completely and utterly failed a mission.
That was the only way to look at it. One of their informants died, three people were shot in the crossfire…
Atsushi's hand returned to its original form, shifting from tiger to human. Like that would fix his mistakes. Like that would erase his incompetence.
He was not the only one assigned to this mission—Tanizaki's face twisted in a show of regret, looking down at the body. He strode over to one of the living hostages in an attempt to comfort them, crouching down and speaking soft words. One of his strengths. It wasn't Tanizaki's fault. If Atsushi had been faster, if he had been better , this all could have been avoided.
This incident would have to be reported. Fukuzawa's disappointment leveled at him was not something Atsushi wanted to face.
Atsushi looked at the man at his feet and tried to feel something other than fear .
His mind was blank—blank in the way that precedes panic, the numbness before the storm. Blood pooled on the dirty ground of the warehouse, red and hot and damning.
A familiar presence loomed over his shoulder, a cold voice echoed in his ear. It had been years and yet he lingered still. You are a coward. Weaklings like you don't deserve second chances. You have killed a man and you are only scared of what is to come?
He would have to be punished for this. The President was powerful, he knew—years of experience had taught Atsushi how to tell, how to know where a blow would land. The President was kind, too, but surely there would be some consequences for this. That was how it worked.
Atsushi's hands did not shake. They didn't. He dug his fingernails into his palms and felt the pain spike in them. (The feeling matched the wound on his side, slowly healing with the help of Byakko, red staining his clothes.) It numbed him, and when he released his fist, he could feel sticky blood on his palm. It prepared him for what was to come.
The walk back to the Agency was silent. Neither he nor Tanizaki wanted to speak. He thinks Tanizaki is injured—the tiger's senses can smell it, the blood. Atsushi wasn't sure if it was from him or Tanizaki or the blood on his clothes or the blood on the ground, dripping, dripping, dripping, so he did not ask.
Sunlight streamed from between the trees, bathing the sidewalk golden. It was such a nice day. He wanted to savor it—he did not know if the President would cage him, if he would get to feel it again. If he did, Atsushi would accept the punishment, of course—he knew how to do that, knew how to bow his head and take what was given to him—but if he was to miss one thing, it was the sun.
At the orphanage, he hadn't always been caged. Sometimes it had been hot pokers. Others, a nail to the foot. There were times when it had been neither—just cold words and a slap to the face. That was what he was used to, what had happened for as long as he could remember.
But the Agency? The President? That was new. The most painful punishments were always delivered by new staff, new superiors—those he didn't know well enough to predict what they would do. The ones where when they entered the basement, he didn't know where to brace himself.
Desperately, Atsushi had hoped that he would never need to be punished again. The Headmaster was dead. Gone. Atsushi was free. Fuck, he had tried so hard to do everything perfectly. To save as many people as he could. But he always messed up, didn't he?
(Behind him—looming over his shoulder, like always—the Headmaster said: Children like you, people who can't even save others, don't deserve kindness. Don't deserve to live.
You don't need to keep telling me that, Atsushi thought. I already know. )
The usual chaos of the Agency greeted Tanizaki and him as they entered, and Atsushi smiled; while disconcerting at first, the Agency's environment had quickly grown to be his new normal, and one he treasured, even if it meant fishing Dazai out of a river occasionally. In fact, at the moment, the man in question was flopping over Kunikida, whispering something into his ear that made the blonde hiss angrily.
"I'm trying to work , Dazai, I don't have time for your stupid games—"
"But Kunikidaaaa—"
Yeah. Just normal Armed Detective Agency things.
After a moment, Tanizaki said, leaning over Atsushi's shoulder from his spot near the door, "We messed up." And then there was silence.
Atsushi started; for a moment, he had forgotten, and he berated himself for it—it wasn't just him at risk here, but Tanizaki, too. Or maybe Tanizaki wouldn't be punished? He had been a member of the Agency longer. But still, the idea of Tanizaki being harmed for Atsushi's slip-up made something in his stomach writhe.
Dazai had stopped his taunting. It was quiet, now; a still, oppressive quiet that could precede all manner of things, so Atsushi stepped in front of Tanizaki—more so than he already was, with the other teen to his left—and said:
"It's all my fault. If— if anyone should be blamed for what happened, it should be me. I'm really sorry." Tanizaki opened his mouth, clearly about to say something, before Atsushi stopped him with a look. Don't interfere. Please. You'll just make it worse for yourself.
It was still quiet. And then, finally—
"You'll have to write your reports later. For now, the President would like to see you in his office," Kunikida said, adjusting his glasses on his nose with a sigh. Dazai was still perched on his shoulders and gave Atsushi a look —dissecting and knowing in the way only he and Ranpo could achieve. Atsushi was startled at the sudden attention; he then repressed the nervous flinch that had almost shown. He admired Dazai and Ranpo's intelligence, of course, especially since it wasn't ability-related, but there was something about being on the opposite end of their deduction that made him feel vulnerable, exposed. There was no point in being nervous—he already knew what was going to happen. Not the specifics, no, but the general gist was something he could guess. The best he could do was brace himself. On his palms, red blood stuck between his fingers—no longer streaming from his wounds, Byakko had fixed that, but a reminder all the same.
Atsushi nodded. "Of course." There wasn't much else to say.
First was Tanizaki. He stepped out from behind Atsushi and, giving him a comforting glance, was ushered over to Yosano's office to be healed. Tanizaki's face paled as he was dragged over by an all-too-gleeful Yosano, who was already telling him about all the organs she had wanted to take a look at, and if it was any other day, Atsushi would have laughed. Yosano was certainly not a person to be messed with. As Atsushi was already being healed by Byakko, Kunikida explained, turning to speak with him, Atsushi would be the first to meet with the President.
No matter how much he had braced himself—in the warehouse, fingernails dug into his palms, the headmaster behind him; on the walk back, silent aside from the bustle of the public; in the Agency's main office, shuffling in front of Tanizaki, trying to protect him from something neither of them could prevent—a cold, empty terror washed over him when Kunikida finished speaking. Still… this was good, in the long run. It meant he could take the blame. Maybe that's why I'm first, Atsushi realized. Because Tanizaki won't be punished.
Well then. That just meant his plan would work. His fear lessened somewhat. So—bowing to Kunikida in acknowledgment, blood still drying on his palms, the Headmaster whispering in his ears, take your consequences without tears, this is what you deserve —Atsushi, after a moment of nervous pacing outside the door, knocked on the President's door and walked in.
Atsushi was familiar with being punished. Most of his life had been composed of pain—he didn't know who he was without it, the company of blood on his clothes and chains around his wrists and the bars of a cage pressed against his back his companions for the past 18 years.
So, walking into the office and only seeing the President sitting there behind his desk, he didn't know how to react. The President fixed him with a calm gaze.
"Sit," he said. Atsushi sat, shrinking into his chair.
"According to Tanizaki—Yosano has passed on his message—you killed your target. An accident, I assume."
"Yes, President. I'm sorry. Our plan didn't work out, and I panicked. But it wasn't Tanizaki's fault!" Atsushi added hastily. "It's all on me, really. I was the one who messed up. Please don't blame him." Even as he was saying it, Atsushi realized his mistake. To the Headmaster, Excuses weren't viable: it was results that mattered. Behavior. And Atsushi had just failed his mission.
The President looked at him, something careful in his eyes. He suppressed the urge to shrink away.
A sword was mounted on the wall behind him, and Atsushi wondered if the President would use it on him. For all the things the Headmaster had hurt him with—hammers and nails and buckets of water—he had never been injured by a sword in the Orphanage. That was a new punishment—one he had not experienced, one he did not know how to respond to. The thought terrified him.
"There will be consequences," Fukuzawa said calmly, and Atsushi flinched.
For a moment, he wanted the President to slap him. Drown him, hit him, yell at him, anything. Just something so that Atsushi can take the blame and leave , get it over with already.
Instead, Atsushi said, "I understand, President."
Worthless children like you don't deserve to cry—
And then Fukuzawa was moving toward him from behind the desk, arms outstretched, and Atsushi's mind went blank—flooded with panic, as it had at the warehouse, as it had when he was eight years old and his head was being held beneath the water by an unfeeling grip, tight and cold and callous—and he shrank back against the chair, don't resist, it'll just make it worse , and managed to spit out, "Please, sir, you can punish me however you want, but don't hurt Tanizaki—"
— It was cold, the Orphanage floor, an icy comfort against his broken leg, and the Headmaster stood over him with a poker in his hand and bloodstained shoes and a twisted frown that pins him to the ground, helpless—
There was a hand in front of his face. It quickly retracted, drawing back to show the President's face. An expression was painted onto it that Atsushi could not decipher—something careful, hesitant.
Was he going for the hair?
Atsushi shouldn't have pulled away. The Headmaster didn't like it when he resisted. Better to just stay put, to not give him any more reasons for further actions—the cage was cold, but it was even colder once the blood loss set in, once he was left on stone floors and behind iron bars. Already, an apology formed at the tip of his tongue, practiced and rehearsed so many times before.
The president said, "I will never raise my hand to you, Atsushi. Nor will I to Tanizaki." He was kind. Calm. Atsushi did not trust it. (It was always more dangerous, when the Headmaster was calm—calculating and cold, methodical in his punishments.)
"Can you promise?" A childish request . The President would laugh in his face.
"Of course. You have my word."
There was a moment of silence. The president still stood in front of him, hands at his sides, and Atsushi still sat in the chair, not knowing what to think.
He was not going to be hurt. He did not understand.
"How else will I be punished?"
It's a moment before the President responds. "You will have to do more paperwork, and will be removed from field duty until the end of the month. That is all."
Atsushi nodded. Any other responces fled him. That's it?
A lie. It had to be a lie, Atsushi knew it. Maybe this was his plan. Get him close, and then take it all away. Grab a knife and put it where he was most vulnerable.
And yet, when the President asks him if he wants a hug, arms open and with a soft look on his face, Atsushi complied.
Atsushi had never been hugged by his father, or the Headmaster. He didn't want it either—from them, it would be a trick, another means of hurting him. Even if they had given him one, it wouldn't feel the same as this. The Headmaster's cold gaze and freezing cages were nothng compared to the warm arms that now enveloped him.
One hand came up to brush against his hair, and Atsushi flinched; the President withdrew it with a quiet apology, returning the hand to his back.
"I do not know what you have been through, but you are safe here. I swear it."
Atsushi swallowed, and tucked his face into the President's shoulder with a shaking exhale. He was safe. Tanizaki was safe. He wasn't going to get hurt.
It would be a while before he what the President had told him would sink in. But right now, relaxing into the first hug he'd ever gotten, Atsushi closed his eyes and tried to believe it.
(Afterword, when he left and headed back to the main office, still in shock, Tanizaki would smile at him knowingly, a bandage wrapped around his arm. Kunikida would glance at Atsushi when he thought he wouldn't notice and then relax minutely, Dazai looking at his partner knowingly.
And when Tanizaki was called in to meet with the President for his account of the story, Atsushi was not scared for his safety.)