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Atsushi had a tendency to be judgmental. He knew this about himself and he couldn’t seem to stop himself from being this way and Akutagawa was most definitely not helping.

That damn bastard was rushing ahead as always and being about as reckless and thoughtless as he’d ever been despite swearing before all of this that he wouldn’t. Atsushi cursed and reluctantly ran after the black-clad mobster who was currently chasing their enemy to the edge of a long and rickety pier. If this had any chance of going well, even in the slightest, Atsushi struggled to imagine how at this moment.

“Stop!” He shouted. “It’s not safe!”

Akutagawa flashed an angry look at him over his shoulder and just kept running.

Atsushi’s fist clenched at his side. Reckless indeed.

He knew that Akutagawa was strong and could easily look after himself in most situations but Atushi disliked that he was taking such a risk by pursuing their enemy so viciously when they had no intel on him at all and had no way of knowing what, if any, his ability even was. For all either of them knew, it could be something terribly destructive and powerful and it might already be too late to turn back and come up with a better plan.

When Dazai and Chuuya had briefed the two of them about the joint need to bring this man into both the Mafia and Agency, even they–the original, legendary, twin dark–had admitted to a frustrating lack of information to go off of. This had not given Atsushi much hope or confidence for a speedy resolution from the start and Akutagawa was hardly inspiring any now.

It didn’t necessarily surprise Atsushi that Akutagawa was acting this way since it was only in his nature to be so irritable and stubborn but he had been seeming to get worse lately and had been barreling in head first more than usual and with even less care for himself, or Atsushi for that matter, than ever before. And now, he was probably about to get them both killed or worse and wasn’t even listening to Atsushi long enough for him to get to say ‘I told you so’ when it finally did happen.

This was the worst.

Akutagawa cornered their enemy at the edge of the dock and the man tried to take a fearful step back only to stumble and nearly lose his balance on the final plank before almost plummeting down into the icy water below. He yelped and thrust his weight forward to keep his footing.

“At last, I’ve caught you,” Akutagawa growled hungrily while rolling his shoulders with anticipation so that Atsushi could hear his joint crack and pop.

He winced. For such a frightful creature, Akutagawa often seemed to be made entirely of crepe paper and popsicle sticks like a child’s malnourished art project.

“There’s nowhere to run,” Atsushi agreed, finally catching up and standing beside Akutagawa to block any hope of escape the man might have had. “Please, just come peacefully. The agency just wants to ask you a few questions. That’s all.”

“It’s not the agency I’m worried about,” he shuddered glancing aside at the mobster.

“The Port Mafia wants more than that,” Akutagawa admitted. “But I don’t see that you have any choice but to comply.”

Atsushi shot his partner an aggravated look. As always, his lack of people skills was only making things worse.

If they were still hoping to take this man in alive, surely they needed to reassure him not threaten him and so Akutagawa’s usual brand of violence and intimidation was the very definition of counterproductive.

“You’re wrong,” the man warned, his voice trembling like a rabid dog trapped in a corner. “There is still one thing I can do. I was just hoping it wouldn’t come to this since I swore never to use my ability again.”

Instantly, Atsushi was on his guard. After all, an animal fearing for its life could always be expected to lash out and fight.

“There’s no need for that, just come quietly. I’ll make sure nothing bad happens to you,” Atsushi promised, already worrying as he spoke that he could not possibly uphold such a vow when the Port Mafia was involved.

Their enemy’s face softened and he looked at Atsushi with warm sympathy.

“You’re a kind soul,” he surmised a little sadly. “And for that, I’ll try to make sure the effect doesn’t last any longer than 24 hours. I can’t guarantee it since my control isn’t very precise but I’ll do my best for your sake. You have my word.”

Atsushi’s brows knit together. “Effect?”

The man’s eyes glanced between Atsushi and Akutagawa and he sighed.

“Yes, I can imagine it’ll be unpleasant for you both but just remember that you left me with no other choice. I refuse to be captured and used again like before. I swore I would never let it happen again. I’ve already caused far more pain than I ever intended…”

Before? Atsushi wore his confusion on his face like a mask. What was this guy talking about?

“Are you threatening us?” Akutagawa challenged with a snarl.

The man flinched away. “Desperation makes us do strange things I suppose.”

Before either of them could ask him what he meant, the man began to activate some sort of ability and, on instinct, Akutagawa charged at him to make him stop. On similar instinct, Atsushi ran after the mafioso, to stop him from killing himself if nothing else, but soon wished he hadn’t since he shortly found himself engulfed in a blinding white light. Then, a hand touched his chest and Atsushi felt his knees go weak, his head began to spin, and the next thing he was aware of was the sensation of falling.

He’d been nowhere near the dock’s edge when he’d first begun and yet he was instantly sure when his mind finally came to that he was falling off of it and confirmed this for himself when he hit the water and felt himself sink into the frigid depths. There was a confusing flush of bubbles that erupted around him and jumbled his senses so that he couldn’t tell which direction was up. So, without a plan, he just picked the one where he thought he could just vaguely see a blurry source of light and began to swim toward it.

His guess had been correct as he soon broke the water’s surface and gasped desperately for air while waves crashed around him and tried to drag him back under. Thankfully though, Atsushi’s luck didn’t end there since some unseen force started to lift him out of the water and then drop him, soaking and shaking, back on the rotted wooden dock above.

Hacking, he coughed out as much of the water he’d swallowed as he could and fought to catch his breath. His chest continued to burn though and he was finding it harder than he would have imagined to breathe.

“Fuck,” he coughed breathlessly.

“Fuck is right, numbskull,” a somewhat familiar voice cajoled from somewhere in front of him though Atsushi’s vision was still clouded and sluggishly clearing. “What did the mackerel and I tell you about not just chasing after that guy without a plan? It was idiotic of you. You could have gotten seriously hurt and then what would have happened, huh?”

“I’d have healed,” he shot back defensively, meaning only to point out that Byakko’s power would have mended any wounds with relative ease but now also wondering if he’d managed to damage his hearing as well or had gotten water trapped in his ears too since the sound of his voice sounded wrong somehow when he spoke.

“Not quickly enough. I mean honestly, what, are you spending so much time around the weretiger these days that you’re starting to think you can regenerate like him too?”

Admittedly, Atsushi’s head still hadn’t quite settled from the fall or the water in his ears but hearing this still made him perk up with confusion. He thought he’d been listening correctly but the words he was hearing didn’t make any sense.

When he did, his eyes finally managed to focus enough to see who was speaking to him. It was Chuuya and he looked furious in a way Atsushi had never seen before.

Atsushi frowned. Of course, Chuuya had been in on the mission from the start since he and Dazai had first assigned it but he and Atsushi had barely shared more than a handful of words one-on-one until now so getting such a passionate tirade from him felt like waking up in Bizarro Word.

“Wait, what?” He heard himself croak, the words, still, sounding odd coming from his mouth.

Chuuya snapped his fingers in Atsushi’s face impatiently. “I said, you’re being stupid and can’t be acting like this with your health the way it is. We’ve talked about this.”

“My health?” He repeated, still not any more clear about what was happening than before. “What’s wrong with my health?”

After that, Chuuya’s angry face changed and the features drooped into a new kind of concern.

He crouched down until he was at eye level with Atsushi on the ground. “What’s wrong?” He asked worriedly. “You hit your head too hard and lose your memory again or something?”

“I-I don’t think so,” he answered, vaguely already becoming aware that something was in fact wrong but not yet able to put a finger on what. “But, and I don’t mean to sound rude here, but, why are you talking to me like we know each other?”

This made Chuuya blink and pale.

“Okay, seriously, now I am getting worried here. Akutagawa, what’s wrong with you?”

Akutagawa?

Wait. Shit.

Akutagawa!

A jolt of panic hit Atsushi and, for just a moment, he blew completely passed the fact that Chuuya had just called him by Akutagawa’s name and jumped straight to worrying about his partner and where Akutagawa had finally wound up amidst the fray.

“Where is he?!” Atsushi demanded, lunging at Chuuya and grabbing at his shirt. “You got me out of the water but did anyone find Akutagawa?!”

What if he was still down there? How long had it been? Would he still be alive?

Chuuya’s eyes, wide with concern, suddenly went wide with surprise instead and Atsushi felt him pull away and stumble back with shock. For a second, his lips fumbled to form a response until, finally, he just turned over his shoulder and shouted, “Dazai, we’ve got a big fuckin’ problem over here!”

It was after this that Atsushi’s eyes fully began to adjust and he saw Dazai off in the distance with someone else sprawled out, sopping wet, in front of him whom he seemed to be arguing with while wearing a haunted sort of look Atsushi had never seen on him. At first, it occurred to Atsushi that this other person must have been Akutagawa which was almost a relief but everything came crumbling down when he saw that this other person was not dressed like Akutagawa at all. In fact, whoever this stranger was, he looked an awful lot like Atsushi…

Wait.

That was him! It was incomprehensible and yet the evidence was right here in front of him, albeit a little blurry in the distance.

He gasped and sat up straight as though he’d been electrocuted.

“What the fuck?!” He choked out, his words catching in his throat and forcing him to cough painfully into his hand.

Except, when he looked down at his hand, it wasn’t his hand. It was paler, the fingers longer and thinner, and, at his wrists, he could see frilled white cuffs beneath a long black sleeve that looked remarkably like the jacket Akutagawa always wore.

Behind Chuuya, Dazai turned with a sneer on his lips and yelled back, conjuring every ounce of sarcasm left in the word, “Oh, really? You don’t fucking say!”

Saying this, he shoved the man who looked like Atsushi off of his lap and wore a decidedly distasteful look on his face that made Atsushi wonder what Dazai and this other man had been talking about until now.

Chuuya turned back and glanced at Atsushi with uncertainty as though he truly had no idea how to talk to him anymore. “You’re not Akutagawa, are you?”

Feeling a pit of dread opening up in his stomach, Atsushi began to put the pieces together and shook his head. “No…”

Chuuya cringed. “You’re the weretiger, right?”

This time, Atsushi nodded.

“Shit.”

Atsushi looked back over at Dazai and the doppelganger of himself at his side and then back at himself and the hands attached to his body that were most definitely not his own. The final clue clicked into place and a surge of adrenaline shot through his body sending him scrambling up to his feet so fast that, yet again, the sudden movement careened him into a fit of coughing that just made the horror of the situation set in even more.

That was not just someone who happened to look like him sitting over next to Dazai, he realized. It actually was him but, since he knew he was actually lying over here, the impossible remaining truth was that someone else besides him was currently inside his body. And, worse yet–given the coughs he was currently experiencing, the clothes he appeared to be wearing, and the way Chuuya was looking at him–he was also inside someone else's body and the evidence stopped him from even having to guess whose it was.

“Fuck!” He cursed in abject revulsion.

At this, Dazai rose from where he was seated and pulled up Atsushi’s body along with him. The two of them stumbled over and Dazai and Chuuya shared a silent but animated conversation without ever speaking while Atsushi met the all too familiar eyes staring back at him.

“Weretiger?” His own voice asked him, full of the same trepidation that Atsushi felt in seeing someone else inhabiting his body.

“A-Akutagawa?”

Atsushi watched his eyes widen.

Whatever Dazai and Chuuya were wordlessly arguing about seemed to come to a close that was unsatisfying to them both and they turned back to Atsushi and Akutagawa, wearing their emotions a little too vividly.

“Well,” Dazai began, clapping his hands together and forcing on a tight smile. “This is an interesting new development.”

“That is not exactly what I’d call it,” Atsushi complained, annoyed by the apparent ease of Dazai’s summary of the situation.

“My line exactly,” Akutagawa agreed with a scowl.

Atsushi disliked the way his face looked when Akutagawa was the one using it to make expressions.

“How did this happen?” Chuuya demanded, glaring pointedly at Dazai. “I thought you said this mission would be straightforward. It’s not like you to fuck up this badly.”

Dazai shot him a sideways glance and then shrugged. “If they’d have taken my advice I’m sure things would have been fine.”

“Hear that?” Atsushi hissed, accusing Akutagawa. “This is your fault! If you’d have just listened to Dazai and me this wouldn’t have happened!”

Akutagawa’s eyes widened and then his lips spread into a thin line.

“I was only doing what was necessary,” he turned away his head and stuck his nose up in the air.

Atsushi grit his teeth. And by ‘his’ he supposed he technically meant Akutagawa’s teeth but that thought was way too much to deal with right now so he threw it aside the second it occurred to him.

“Dazai, you can fix this, right?” Atsushi asked hopefully. “It was the enemy’s ability so you can just nullify it, right?”

Dazai’s lips slanted. “Back when I thought Akutagawa here was still you and pulled him out of the water, I had to touch him to do it but, clearly, it doesn’t seem to have done anything.”

He reached out as proof of this and touched Atsushi’s cheek with the tip of his finger and then shrugged and gave him an apologetic look when, again, nothing happened and Atsushi remained firmly stuck in Akutagawa’s haunted house of a body.

“Wait,” Akutagawa said, his brow lowering over his eyes in thought. “The target said something right before he used his ability. He said that he would try to make sure the effect didn’t last longer than 24 hours. We weren’t sure what he meant at first but this must have been it.”

“Hmm,” Dazai hummed. “If he really does have control over the duration of whatever ability he has to cause this, then he must also be the source of it. That would explain why I can’t nullify it just by touching you two–I’d have to touch him.”

“Then, we just have to find him and beat the shit out of him,” Chuuya suggested.

“I think Dazai could probably just touch him, no beating required,” Atsushi countered.

“No one cares what you think,” Dazai snapped, almost on instinct.

Atsushi froze and gawked at the startling aggression behind that comment. Dazai had never spoken to him like that before and he wasn’t quite sure how to respond.

“Whoopsies!” Dazai began to laugh awkwardly after a moment. “Force of habit. Forgot you’re you.”

Next to him, Akutagawa’s face flattened. He took in a long breath and let go of a tired sigh as though to silently scream how tired he was of Dazai’s bullshit.

“Anyway,” Dazai continued. “If this ability really is going to only last for one day, I’m not sure it’s even worth the effort of tracking this guy down now that he has vamoosed off into the unknown. Honestly, it sounds like it’ll be a lot more trouble than it’s worth.”

“You’re not actually believing something that maniac said, are you?” Chuuya derided.

“Why would he lie?”

“Everybody lies,” Chuuya rolled his eyes. “Pick a reason.”

“Oh, ye of little faith,” Dazai teased. “If you want to chase a lead we don’t even have then by my guest but I say we just have to wait this one out. Besides, what good would it do if the two of us found him and he just did the same thing to us? Full offense but I have no interest in getting shrunk.”

Chuuya’s face reddened and his eyes filled with murder.

“As if I’d let you anywhere near my body, jackass. The last thing I need is you killing yourself and leaving me stranded in your demented suicidal bones,” his posture straightened when he said this, raising his height by a fraction of an inch, before clearing his throat and continuing. “Why don’t we just send these two morons again and then, worst case scenario, if the guy uses his ability on them again they’ll just get swapped back.”

“As if those are the only two options? Think, slug,” Dazai scoffed incredulously. “And anyway, it would just be foolish to send them back into a fight when both of them are effectively without their abilities. I don’t send people to their deaths anymore, I’m a good guy now. Haven’t you noticed?”

“Good guy, my ass!” Chuuya seethed. “This just probably suits you better. I bet you just think it’s entertainment.”

Dazai looked over at Akutagawa and Atushi and cracked a small smile while he considered this accusation.

“Now that you mention it, it is a little funny.”

“W-Wait a minute,” Atsushi spoke up. “Can we go back to the part about us being without our abilities? What do you mean? Do you think he took them as well?”

Dazai raised an eyebrow but Chuuya answered for him.

“He just means that since you’re in each other’s bodies, you also only have each other’s abilities to work with but neither of you know how to use each other’s powers. So basically, if you’re attacked by someone with an ability, you are both fucked.”

Atsushi’s eyes widened. He hadn’t thought about it like that yet but he supposed it was true.

While he was in Akutagawa’s body, he technically could wield Rashomon but had absolutely no idea how to do it or what to do with it for that matter. Atsushi’s ability was logically simple–he transformed into a weretiger and became faster, stronger, and could heal–so, aside from not allowing Byakko to fully take him over, there really wasn’t all that much he needed to do. Akutagawa’s ability was not like that and Atsushi suspected that it probably required more control and precision than his own which doubtlessly had required time and training that neither of them currently had.

“So we’ll wait,” Akutagawa surmised almost pleasantly, crossing his arms over his chest as if he didn’t have a care in the world and taking in a long peaceful breath like he was literally stopping to smell the roses. “No big deal.”

Atsushi was stunned to hear this attitude coming from Akutagawa of all people. He’d never been even remotely this chill about a single thing in his life but now couldn’t be bothered to care about the fact that he’d been magically transported into his rival’s body? The thought was preposterous. Atsushi knew that Akutagawa should be furious because he himself was, in fact, furious.

“How can you be so calm at a time like this?!”

Akutagawa shrugged carelessly. “What else is there to do about it? You heard Dazai.”

Atsushi’s eyes narrowed hatefully.

“And I definitely wouldn’t recommend trying to use Rashomon,” he suggested as though he’d somehow been reading Atsushi’s mind. “She’s a strong-willed and insatiable spirit that will eat you alive if you don’t know how to control her appetites.”

“Great, very helpful. Though, the same goes for Byakko so don’t even try it.”

“Wasn’t going to.” Atsushi disliked the way Akutagawa flicked Atsushi’s wrist so casually when he said this. Watching his own body talk and move while knowing that Akutagawa was in control of it was as vexing as it was disconcerting.

“I’m not sure if any of you have realized this yet,” Dazai prompted, interrupting them. “So, of course, I hate to be the bearer of bad news. But, seeing as neither of you can use your abilities, if that information happened to get out, you’d both most likely become targeted by enemies eager to take advantage of your weakened states.”

Atsushi knew all too well that Dazai actually delighted in being the bearer of bad news but he also had not considered this at all either and was newly at a loss for what to do next.

“So, what do we do now, just lay low until we hopefully get switched back?” Atsushed wondered. “Cause, honestly, I don’t imagine that Kyouka will be all too thrilled with me coming home looking like Akutagawa.”

As much as Atsushi desperately just wished to be safely at home right now, the idea was admittedly worrisome. Until they switched back, for all intents and purposes, the world would regard Atsushi as though he were Akutagawa and that thought, including all its many implications, was far more than Atsushi could stand.

They’d have to completely bunker down out of sight too since Akutagawa was technically a wanted criminal so if any authorities came across Atsushi for the time being, more than likely he’d end up in jail for crimes he didn’t commit. This was worse than any nightmare.

“Out of the question,” Dazai shook his head. “If our goal is to stop our enemies from coming after the two of you until the ability wears off, no one can suspect that anything is different whatsoever. The last thing we want is people asking dangerous questions that will lead them to figure out that the two of you are essentially just helpless sitting ducks until you get your own powers back. And Akutagawa going home to Atsushi’s apartment and Kyouka not killing him on sight is most definitely worth asking questions about.”

“So, what?” Atsushi couldn't help but whine. “I can’t even go home to wait this out, then?”

“Unfortunately not,” Dazai confirmed. “You’ll both have to go back to each other's homes and lay low until the time runs out or we can come up with another solution.”

This, finally, made Akutagawa sit up straight and take notice.

“I don’t want him anywhere near my house or my sister,” he growled.

“And I don’t want him anywhere near Kyouka,” Atsushi agreed instantly.

“As if I would do anything to Kyouka,” Akutagawa rolled his eyes.

“You already have!”

“That was different,” he scoffed, “and a lifetime ago.”

“Enough!” Chuuya shouted, halting all conversation where it stood. “We’re not discussing this anymore and we were never asking for your opinions in the first place. Both of you, get your asses back to each other's homes and stay there until you hear otherwise from us or you wake up back in the right bodies. The mackerel and I will let Kyouka and Gin know what’s going on and to expect you so there are no surprises.”

“But–!”

“No buts! And I don’t want to hear another word out of either of you so shut the fuck up and get out of my sight.”

Stunned, Atsushi’s and Akutagawa’s eyes met and they both stood shakily on each other's legs.

“I better not hear you even tried to do anything untoward to Gin,” Akutagawa hissed at Atsushi as they made their way away from the docks and back to their new respective homes for the next 24 hours. “Dead won’t be a strong enough word to describe what you’ll be by the time I’m finished with you.”

“Your assassin sister?” Atsushi gawked. “Who the hell do you think I am and what sort of death wish do you suppose I have? Also, I’m like 99% sure that she’d be a bigger problem than you if she wanted to be in that situation.”

Akutagawa nodded, satisfied, with this answer. “True enough.”

“And at the same time, you’ll have me to answer to if Kyouka tells me you said or did even one thing she doesn’t like,” Atsushi warned.

“Your assassin roommate and my former subordinate? Get a clue, jinko. She won’t even know I’m there. Believe me, she does not even factor into my plans.”

His plans? He had plans?

Atsushi wasn’t sure how he felt about the way that Akutagawa said that last part. It was dreamy in a pleasant sort of way that, coming from him, normally would have seemed nefarious but actually seemed unfathomably genuine. It was almost like he was looking forward to this in some twisted kind of way that was beyond comprehension. This, combined with his indifferent attitude earlier about getting switched back, just served to leave Atsushi without a clue. Why was Akutagawa so unbothered about all of this and what the hell kinds of plans did he have in mind?

If Atsushi didn’t know any better, he almost would have assumed that Akutagawa was actually… enjoying this?

–

Walking into Akutagawa’s apartment felt a little bit like walking into a dragon’s den loaded with landmines. It felt dangerous just to be there somehow, not to mention totally wrong. Atsushi had never really thought about the fact that Akutagawa had a place that he called home and so standing inside it now, his still-damp clothes dripping seawater onto the dark hardwood floors, felt like some sort of hallucination.

It was in a luxury highrise a few blocks away from the Port Mafia headquarters and the living room alone was twice the size of Atsushi’s entire apartment. As expected, it was sparsely decorated inside as though everything about it were temporary though all of the furniture and decor were notably various shades of black and gray which seemed like a personal choice.

“U-Um… Gin?” He called out down one of the hallways leading down and away from the living room. “Are you home?”

Atsushi couldn’t even begin to describe how strange this entire situation felt and how introducing himself to Akutagawa’s sister while inside his body was not helping in the slightest.

Elsewhere, a door creaked open slightly and a shape began to peak out carefully. It was dark down the hallway but Atsushi could just barely make out a pale face framed by long black hair with piercing black eyes staring back at him cautiously like they didn’t quite know what to make of him yet.

She didn’t speak for a minute, no doubt struggling to decide what to say but eventually all but whispered, “...Jinko?”

He nodded. “S-Sorry. I know this must be incredibly strange. I’m guessing Chuuya already called and explained, though?”

If he hadn’t, Atsushi supposed that this interaction would be going very differently which made him glad since, honestly, he had no earthly idea how to explain any of this nonsense.

“He did but… I guess this means what he said really was true. I wasn’t sure at first. It was hard to believe so I thought it might have been some kind of joke though he didn’t sound like he was joking.”

“I wish it was a joke.”

She just stared back at him with a blank face that Atsushi thought looked very much like her brother’s. Evidently, neither of them knew a lot about jokes and or joking.

“Anyway, Dazai thinks the effects of the ability that swapped us will wear off in about a day. I’ll just stay out of your way until then. I promise you won’t even have to see me.”

She frowned a little. “You don’t have to do that. That makes it sound like a punishment but neither of you did anything wrong,” she said. “You work for the agency which, I’ll admit, makes me uneasy but I also know you and my brother trust each other on some level and you’ve saved his life more than once so, as far as I’m concerned, you’ve earned at least a little of my trust for the time being.”

Atsushi wasn’t afraid to admit that this made him speechless. Gin may have looked like Akutagawa but they couldn’t have been more different if they tried.

“T-Thank you.”

She gave a quick nod and then began to shyly slide back behind her bedroom door before stopping and popping her head out again.

“You should probably change out of those wet clothes by the way or else you’ll catch a cold. Ryu’s bedroom is at the end of the hall and his bathroom is attached. There should be some dry clothes in there somewhere.”

“Uh, thanks,” he said again a little lamely, not sure how else to respond to this kindness from Akutagawa’s sister. His answer must have somehow amused her though because she let loose a small giggle at his expense. “Is something funny?”

“Not really,” she shook her head. “But, it is a little humorous to see my brother make those faces and say those things. It’s unlike him so I know now for certain that it must really be you instead.”

It occurred to Atsushi that this must have been infinitely more strange for her than it was even for him. He didn’t know much about the history that she and Akutagawa shared together but seeing as they were siblings and had presumably survived a hellish life together to get here, it must have been scary to suddenly be without him.

“You’ll have the real thing back soon,” Atsushi promised her.

Something about this comment made her stop and her eyes fell a little sadly.

“For a while maybe.”

Atsushi raised an eyebrow but before he could ask what she meant, she ducked back into her room and closed the door.

Despite wanting to pursue that lead further, once Gin was gone, Atsushi felt a chill move through him and he could suddenly focus on nothing else than exchanging these damp rags for drier clothes and maybe finally warming up with a hot shower too. Ever since waking up after his fall into the water, Atsushi had been struggling to warm up in a way that he wasn’t used to so he was eagerly awaiting the opportunity to finally right this very annoying wrong.

Making his way back into Akutagawa’s room, Atsushi first closed the door and then began snooping around for where to go next. The room was sparsely decorated like the rest of the apartment but did have an impressive-looking four-poster bed with black silk sheets and blankets in the center, a large dark-wood desk pushed up against the window, and some truly breathtaking wall-to-wall bookshelves all around the circumference of the room. Noticing the perfectly neat stacks of books on the desk and the bookmarked novel set aside on the nightstand, Atsushi couldn’t help but wonder if this meant Akutagawa was an avid reader. Somehow, this very human thought made him a little uncomfortable.

Instead of any cheap art from the local flea market or posters cut from magazines like Atsushi had up on his own walls, beautifully framed calligraphy was spaced evenly in keel with the rest of the furniture which gave the whole room an undeniably old-world sort of feeling. The room definitely reminded Atsushi of Akutagawa.

Once he finally warmed back up, Atsushi had to admit too that the bed was seriously calling his name. It looked incredibly comfortable and, considering he slept on the floor of a closet back at his own home, Atsushi couldn’t help but feel he’d gotten the better deal here. Knowing now that Akutagawa lived in such a luxurious home, it almost seemed funny to imagine him trying to get comfortable in Atsushi’s comparative hovel.

This amusing mental image brought a smile to his face.

Making his way through the bedroom and into the bathroom, Atsushi amused himself yet again by digging through a few of his rival’s drawers and discovering that the mafia’s black hellhound appeared to have some sort of skincare routine and used more than one hair product. The smile on his face faded a little though when he nosily peaked behind the mirror and into the medicine cabinet next where he was greeted by an impressive collection of prescription bottles all in a row, labeled with drug names he couldn’t pronounce.

Oh.

Right.

The unavoidable truth that Atsushi had somehow managed to avoid until now hit him hard again like a train chugging down the tracks at full speed–Akutagawa was sick. And not just any kind of sick either, Atsushi remembered, Akutagawa was really sick; fatally in fact. This was never something that Akutagawa had needed to say seeing as it was plain enough to see just by looking at him that he wasn’t well but, nonetheless, he’d confided in Atsushi a little while ago that he had only a short time left and now all of these medications only seemed to prove that he had been telling the truth.

Atsushi hadn’t realized it until this moment, staring at the evidence before him, but it was possible that some part of him hadn’t fully believed it until now. Perhaps, even, he hadn’t wanted to believe it but he couldn’t imagine why that might be so he let the thought fade away.

His stomach dropped a little and Atsushi felt a tickle in his throat that made him cough which made for an even more unpleasant reminder that Atsushi was actually currently the one stuck in Akutagawa’s sick and dying body. Paling, he gripped the damp clothes stuck to his chest and swallowed forcefully. Suddenly, the spacious bathroom started to feel claustrophobic, and, very fittingly, he began to feel as though he couldn’t breathe.

He tried to tell himself that he would be safely back in his own skin soon but this reassurance did not comfort him nearly as much as he had hoped.

Desperately trying to shake the thought out of his head, he closed the mirrored cabinet door and was disorientedly met with the reflection of Akutagawa’s face in the mirror in front of him. It startled him in a way that almost made him yelp but he managed to contain it in as a simple gasp instead. Even though Atsushi knew it was really just him staring back at himself, the way Akutagawa’s black eyes bore into him sent a shiver down his spine.

He couldn’t imagine ever getting used to this.

On instinct, he spun away quickly and turned on Akutagawa’s shower. Without looking back at his reflection again, he began to undress. Somewhere, deep down, he was aware that he was actually taking Akutagawa’s clothes off which might have been a bigger thought on another day but this was honestly the least of his concerns at present. So, instead of dwelling on it, he just removed all of the soaking fabrics from his body and walked under the steamy flow of water in the shower.

At first, the hot water did everything Atsushi had hoped it would and he started to warm up and feel clean. However, the effect faded after a few short minutes and he began to feel cold all over again. Confused, he turned up the water temperature and hoped this would solve the problem; which it did, for a little while. But then, he started to feel cold yet again.

Getting frustrated now, he yanked the knob all the way to one side until the water coming out from the tap was objectively scalding and turned the pale skin Atushi wore red on contact. And yet still, after another moment, inexplicably, the warmth lost its magic and became only a searing pain that could not touch the frigid cold in Atsushi’s core.

Irritated, Atsushi shut off the water and stepped out of the shower and back into the bathroom which, despite the sauna-like appearance of the steamy air around him, now felt even colder than before. Trembling, he searched for a towel in one of the cabinets under the sink and wrapped one around himself as quickly as he could before all of his body heat deserted him completely.

What was going on? He’d never felt like this before.

His teeth began to chatter.

Without meaning to, he turned back toward the mirror and accidentally saw his own reflection again and it was only then that he began to suspect the cause of this strange phenomenon.

Now dripping wet and shaking from the cold, Atsushi could not help but notice how much smaller Akutagawa looked than Atsushi did when he looked at himself. Akutagawa was actually probably a little bit taller than him but, the longer he stared at himself in the mirror, Atsushi realized how much thinner and scrawnier he was despite this. No wonder he couldn’t seem to keep warm, Atushi thought with horror.

The steam in the air mixed with the lump rising in Atsushi’s through until he found himself coughing again, annoyed beyond worders by how common of an occurrence this had become for him. He’d always noticed the way Akutagawa was always coughing but he’d never really put much thought into it before now to think about how miserable that must actually be for him. Atsushi had only been in this body for a couple of hours but already, his throat felt sore and raw from the irritation and his chest felt heavy and burdensome but he just couldn’t stop.

He turned on the sink and took a swig of water from running his cupped hands under the faucet to soothe the coughing for the moment, knowing dreadfully that it was only a temporary fix.

Turning back to look at himself, he saw the mess of scars and bruises etched across his body in the mirror and didn’t know quite how to feel. Surely, Akutagawa had earned and deserved most of these but it still served to drive home exactly how much this body had been through which was a truly miserable thought that Atsushi actually related to far more than he’d like.

Biting his lip, Atsushi left the bathroom in search of clothes to change into and put on the first t-shirt and pair of sweatpants he found. He’d never seen Akutagawa wear anything other than his ridiculous mafia uniform so he was almost surprised to find regular clothing in his drawers as well.

Maybe he was almost human after all.

He toweled off his hair and then collapsed exhaustedly onto Akutagawa’s bed. Even though he felt like he’d just taken a dip in the Arctic, Atsushi’s head felt light and his vision seemed askew and dark around the edges which he knew from experience was a sign that the water had been a little too hot after all. Realizing this, he also thought that it was probably a good thing he’d laid down since it probably would have caught up with him otherwise and made him pass out otherwise. Now, there was just a dull throbbing behind his eyes and a general spinning dizziness that wouldn’t go away. Sighing, he tossed his far-too-boney arm over his eyes to block out the light and began contemplating how the bed was not nearly as comfortable as he had hoped when there was a soft knock at the door.

“Hello?” He answered groggily, sitting back up but feeling his far-too-tender body protest every movement he tried to make.

The door opened and Gin popped her head inside.

“Sorry, I heard the shower stop and figured I’d make sure you found everything okay.”

Attempting a smile, Atsushi nodded. “It was fine, thanks,” he answered before thinking twice and adding, “although, do you think we can turn the heat up in here?”

Gin’s lips slanted. “It’s already up pretty high. Are you still cold?”

The concern in her voice was exactly the way Atsushi expected a worried sister to sound. He realized now that this request was probably fueling the fire and he should probably try to backtrack before she really got stressed.

“I-It’s fine. I’m probably just still warming up after wearing that stupid wet coat around for so long.”

He phrased it like a joke and appeared to be successful since it made Gin laugh but, by the time she answered, the humor had already worn off. “You should be careful while you’re in his body. I know that when you’re you, you have the ability to heal but he’s not like that. My brother is more… fragile.”

This almost made Atsushi laugh because the idea of Akutagawa, of all people, being fragile was damn near comedic. Sure his lungs were bad and he clearly didn’t eat enough but that had never stopped him from giving it his all in a fight and so Atsushi had never really thought of him like that before.

“I’m not sure that’s the word I would have gone with.”

Gin’s face went stony and serious. “It’s true though. Just because you recover easily from the fights you have against each other doesn’t mean he does. I’ve been the one to care for him while he’s bruised, broken, and bandaged. You don’t see the toll it all takes on him but I do.”

Atsushi blinked. There was another thing he’d never really thought of before.

His eyes fell this time. “I didn’t realize.”

Gin clicked her teeth and sighed as though Atsushi was missing her point. “I didn’t mean it like that. He’d never ask you to feel sorry for him and I won’t either,” she said. “The choices he makes are his own and so are the consequences but I just meant to point out that there are consequences to those actions and the physical ones are probably harder on him than they are on you in the long run.”

“So why does he keep doing this stuff? It has never made any sense to me. He’s completely illogical.”

As soon as he’d answered this way, Atsushi realized that he’d snapped more than a little too harshly at someone who, so far at least, had only been trying to help him. This wasn’t Gin’s fault. She wasn’t her brother’s keeper and she wasn’t responsible for him so it wasn’t fair to give her so much grief.

Because of this, Atsushi expected her to snap back at him and get angry but, instead, she stayed strangely calm. “I know he must seem that way to you but, for him, it’s all about finding a reason to live. That is all he has ever wanted and when we first came to the mafia, it was only because Dazai promised to give him one.”

“A reason to live?” Atsushi repeated, swearing he’d heard Akutagawa rant and rave about the very same thing many times before but had never really given it much thought until now.

“It might sound silly,” she acknowledged, a bit dejectedly. “But when we were growing up in the slums, the lack of one nearly killed us both. When you have no reason to live, you barely live at all. Instead, each day is just dwelling in your own compounding misery with no explanation for why you were chosen to suffer while others thrive; much less any hope that it could someday end. I think, my brother felt it even more keenly than I did because he’s always been perceptive and sensitive like that.” Again, Atsushi found that choice of adjective comical for someone who only freely displayed brimming neutrality or abject fury on their face but, he knew better now than to disregard what Gin had to say where Akutagawa was involved. “It all came to a head the night a group of mercenaries killed all of our friends and truly left us with nothing.”

Atsushi’s eyes widened. “... What?”

“One of our friends, another child our age, had stolen from them by mistake and they took revenge by coming after us all and slaughtering the lot,” Gin recalled with a shudder. “It was terrifying. I don’t think I’ll ever forget the smell of the blood or the way they all screamed and begged for their lives.”

“That's horrible…”

“They didn’t mean to harm anyone either,” Gin explained, chewing her lip as sad the memory came back to her. “They were just hungry and didn’t realize the trouble they would cause.”

“Of course not,” Atsushi nodded.

How could a starving child ever know better after all? This, Atsushi could actually understand with ease.

“My brother took it the hardest though because he was sort of like our leader back then and used to look out for us and protect us from danger. To him, what happened to the others was him failing at the closest thing to a reason to live he’d ever had,” she said. “Even before that, people used to whisper that there was something strange and cold about him but I think the night they all died was the night something inside him really broke and it all started to be true. He tracked down the outlaws and butchered them all. Dazai was there that night, saw what happened, and took him in. I’m still not sure I really know why but he promised Ryu a reason to live to replace the one he’d lost and… you know, the rest is history I guess.”

Atsushi was stunned. So that was how Dazai and Akutagawa met? He’d known that the two of them had some sort of history at the mafia but this was deeper than anything Atsushi had ever imagined.

No wonder Akutagawa idolized Dazai so much. No wonder.

“That’s… a lot.”

“It is and I suspect my brother will not thank me for telling you so, when you see him again, try not to let on. But, I felt like you needed to know in order to understand.”

Atsushi nodded. “I-I think you were right to tell me,” he said. “And, I promise, I’ll never say you did.”

This made Gin’s lips curve into a small smile again and the sight gave Atsushi some minute relief.

“So, did you find everything you needed then?”

“Um, yeah, I guess so. I know it’s still kind of early but it's honestly been such a weird day that I kind of thought I might try to get some sleep.”

Her eyes flashed with amusement. “Good luck with that,” she told him. “He tells me nothing for sure but I do not think my brother tends to sleep very well. I’ll be interested to see if you can manage it in his body.”

Atsushi blinked. He did not like the ominous sound of that warning at all.

“Then, uh, on second thought, you don’t happen to have anything to help with sleeping, do you?”

He wasn’t usually the type to need sleeping pills or anything like that but the way Gin was talking made him nervously suspect that tonight might be very different.

He half expected another shy giggle but instead just got a knowing look. “Of course.”

Saying this, Gin walked over into the bathroom where Atsushi could just barely hear her rustling through a few cabinets and drawers until, finally, she came out with several of the bottles from behind the mirror in her hands.

“This is actually kind of a good opportunity,” she prompted, coming over and dumping all the bottles onto the foot of the bed where she also took a seat.

“Glad there’s some sort of upside here.”

She picked up one of the bottles and shook a small pill out into the palm of her hand.

“Here. Will you take this?”

“Is this for… sleep?” Atsushi clarified, hoping it wouldn’t be the eternal kind given Gin’s status as a mafia assassin.

“Not this one,” she admitted before glancing back at the array of bottles lying around on top of the mattress. “But I think one of the other ones is.”

“Then…?” He didn’t quite know how to ask why she’d brought him this veritable pharmacy without sounding incredibly daft.

“Will you help me out while you can, weretiger?” She asked him earnestly before he even got the chance, popping open another bottle and pouring out another pill into her hand and then repeating the process for all the sundry bottles around them until she had a small collection of varied medications pooled in her hand. “He says he takes them but I think he lies to make me feel better. So, as long as it's you in there and not him, will you do me a favor and treat him more kindly than he treats himself by taking the medicine for him?”

Atsushi was stunned into speechlessness.

“I-I know it must sound odd but I swear that I w-wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important,” she stuttered a bit. “It’s just… I worry about him. Things will only get worse faster if he doesn’t take his medicine but that doesn’t seem to mean anything to him at all. I can’t make him value his life but I thought maybe I could convince you to, just for a while I mean since your fates are sort of tied together until this ability wears off.”

Completely unable to respond with words, Atsushi swallowed, feeling something strange bubbling in his chest that was much greater than just another one of Akutagawa’s infamous coughs. Hearing Gin talk like this made Atsushi so incredibly angry but also so incredibly sad. How could Akutagawa put her in this position? How could he make his own sister feel this way and believe she needed to go to a practical stranger just to get him to do something as simple as taking some pills?

Atsushi was furious but managed to control his rage enough to stop his hands from shaking so that Gin could transfer the tablets into them.

“Thank you,” she said, her voice soft and gentle and her eyes fighting back tears.

“I knew he was stubborn,” Atsushi seethed, popping a few of the pills into his mouth and swallowing. “But this takes the cake. I thought suicide was Dazai’s thing, not Akutagawa’s.”

As soon as he’d said this, he froze and wanted to curse himself for being so stupid and unfeeling. He’d spoken aloud without thinking from a place of frustration with the mobster but had accidentally said just about the most insensitive thing he could imagine to his innocent sister instead.

“T-That came out wrong,” he immediately tried to backtrack, dropping the last of the pills into his mouth while trying to communicate his regret to Gin as urgently as he could.

Her dark eyes drooped. “How can it be suicide when you’re already dying?”

“Everyone’s already dying,” Atsushi answered.

“Some are just faster than others I suppose.”

“Still, I didn’t mean–”

“Yes, you did,” she cut him off. “And you’re not entirely wrong to say it. I’m often angry with him as well but, believe it or not, I think it actually may come from a sense of misused kindness.”

“How is that?”

“My brother dislikes being ill,” Gin mused, glancing away and beginning to start screwing caps back onto the opened pill bottles around them. “Sure, no one likes feeling that way, but what he feels goes beyond that. He hates himself for being sick, detests it about himself even, and rejects the very idea of it wholeheartedly.”

“Then that sounds like denial, not kindness.”

Again, Gin just shook her head to say that Atsushi still didn’t understand her.

“Don’t be too quick to think understanding him is as easy as that,” she said. “He’ll surprise you if you let him. I know that because he often surprises me and I’ve known him my entire life. I-I think another reason he refuses to take that medicine is because, to him, it only prolongs the inevitable. There is no cure for him, the pills are just to treat symptoms and maybe buy him some time. He knows that but doesn’t wish to extend what is for him, a time of pain and suffering. And, at first, I thought this was selfish of him but I later came to understand that he also does not want to extend what he believes for me is a time of pain and suffering as well. Do you see?”

Atsushi wasn’t sure he did and Gin must have been able to tell from the dumbfounded look on his face.

“He watched our parents die, slowly, when I was too young to remember,” she explained. “He doesn’t talk about it but it must have been painful for him and I think that he doesn’t wish to put me through the same pain but with him.”

Now Atsushi was beginning to understand but he wished he wasn’t.

“So, then, you think he won’t take the medicine because he’s trying to die faster so you don't have to watch him suffer?”

There was a demented and perverse logic to it that Atsushi could, unfortunately, believe came from Akutagawa.

Gin’s lips flattened into a thin sad line and Atsushi could see that he was right.

“And Ryu always said you were dim,” she teased him half-heartedly. “When he’s back, I’ll have to tell him that you’re actually pretty smart after all. I think that will make him mad.”

Just feeling that sensation in his chest worsening, Atsushi bit his lip and felt his fingers tightly coil around the fabric of the bedspread.

“That damned fool,” Atsushi whispered furiously. “Trying to be a goddamned martyr like he thinks he's some kind of tragic main character or something…”

Gin’s shoulders shrugged even as her eyes stared off distantly to somewhere else unknown.

“That’s just Ryu for you,” she sighed. “Always thinks he knows best and wouldn’t know how to ask for help if it actually did kill him.”

The two of them sat in silence for a moment until Atsushi just couldn’t stand it anymore. There was nothing he could say to fix this which ate him up inside but there was one small promise he could make to at least alleviate some of the pain, for a short time at least.

“Then we won’t make him ask,” he said. “I’ll take whatever medicine you think will help him for now and, later, once we’re switched back, I’ll just have to come up with a way to keep helping without ever telling him why or making him ask.”

Gin looked up like she’d just seen the light and Atsushi swore he saw new life appear deep behind her eyes in a way that she hadn’t had before.

“You’d really do that?” She asked before carefully confirming, “You know he isn’t exactly a good person, right?”

This almost made him laugh.

“I, of all people, am well aware,” he assured her. “But that doesn’t mean I think he deserves to die. Or that you deserve to be orphaned for real in losing him.”

She thought about this and had to turn away to hide some sort of expression that was coming over her face against her will that she didn’t want him to see. Atushi hoped it was a smile.

“You’re really not so bad, you know that?”

Atsushi’s lips tugged up at the corners. “Tell that to your brother.”

“Like me, he prefers to make up his own mind about people,” Gin told him, some modicum of amusement peaking through her words. “But I’ll consider dropping the odd hint or two.”

Atsushi figured that was the best he could hope for, all things considered.

“Anyway,” Gin said, standing, collecting the pill bottles, and clearing her throat. “You said you were going to try to sleep and that’s something both of you could probably use so I should probably let you get to it.”

“Thanks.”

Atsushi started to lean back and into the feathery pillows beneath him as Gin went to leave but unpleasantly concluded that they were still not soft enough for how hypersensitive Akutagawa’s body seemed to be.

There had been a low-level ache in all of his joints since the moment he’d woken back up but something about the dizziness from the hot shower had amplified it so that he was beginning to feel like an exposed nerve come to life. And on top of everything else, taking all of those pills so quickly was beginning to make him feel nauseous as well. Atsushi felt like he just couldn’t win.

The tiger’s powers had been keeping him healthy and healed for so long now that he’d nearly forgotten how it felt to be in this sort enduring of pain. Normally, any pain he did feel was acute and easily vanquished since Byakko remedies everything from severed limbs to swords through his chest just as quickly as he could accrue them. Thinking about it now, Atsushi wasn’t even sure when the last time he’d been physically sick was. He certainly didn’t miss it.

“Oh yeah,” Gin remembered just as she was walking through the door. “Don’t forget to take his contact lens out before falling asleep. I think it’s bad to sleep in those but I don’t wear them myself.”

“Contact lenses?” Atsushi groaned, annoyed already at the idea of sitting back up and dragging this stupid failing body back to the bathroom.

Though, admittedly, the knowledge that Akutagawa wore contacts and therefore at some point has probably worn glasses was mildly entertaining. He probably looked good in them too.

“Just the one,” Gin corrected. “Do you know how to take them out? I’m not sure I do.”

Ignoring the fact that, no, Atsushi did not actually know how to take out a contact, the peculiar thing Gin had just said caught his attention.

“He just wears one contact lens? Singular?” What a weirdo. Do people do that?

Gin nodded and started to make her way back into the room and over to him to help him up.

“Yeah, he only needs it for the one eye, the other one is fine. I’m sure we can figure this out somehow, now get up.”

Wishing he could protest more, Atsushi let her help him to his feet.

Back in the bathroom, Gin turned the light on and the sight of Akutagawa’s reflection in the mirror yet again made Atushi jump. Something about the mafioso’s face just made Atsushi nervous and feel like he needed to duck and dodge. His history of being unceremoniously used as Akutagawa’s personal pincushion without warning probably explained this though.

“I will never get used to that,” Atsushi explained to Gin once he realized that she’d seen him react and was trying not to laugh.

She chuckled. “No, I don’t suppose I would either.”

“Anyway,” Atsushi sighed, tiredly. “Which eye is it?”

“I think it's your left one. Can you see it in there?”

He leaned over the counter and checked in the mirror. Sure enough, the clear but slightly raised shape of a contact lens sat comfortably over one of his eyes.

Learning this information might also have explained why his eyes had stung so much when he’d been taking his shower. Was he supposed to take them out before showering too? He literally had no idea but thought that sort of made sense.

“Now what do I do?”

“Hell if I know. Grab it?”

Atsushi glanced sideways at Gin through the mirror. “But, how?”

“Probably with your hands if I had to guess.”

What she said sounded like a joke but the way she said it, stone-cold serious, definitely did not. Ruefully, Atsushi realized that this also sounded like a very unhelpful suggestion Akutagawa himself might have probably made so, apparently, obliviousness ran in the family.

“Ugh!” he grunted, reaching in to try and touch the lens but just poking himself in the eye instead by mistake.

“Not like that.”

“Thank you.”

He blinked away the tears forming and ignored the pain long enough to give it another go. This time, he was more careful and shifted his eye up first toward the ceiling, used just his fingertip to push the lens down, and finally pinched it with his thumb to remove it. It came free but Atsushi’s eye continued to complain about his clumsy technique for another couple of seconds.

“Got it,” he reported tersely.

He blinked the eye a few times and was surprised by how much more lopsided and blurry his vision felt like just the one eye semi-out-of-commission.

“Gross,” Gin said pleasantly.

Locating a contact lens container filled with fluid from one of the drawers, Atsushi dropped the thing inside and sighed. “Why does he only wear one contact anyway? The vision in this one eye is so much worse than the other.”

Gin looked up at him. “That eye was damaged fighting you so, blame yourself,” she said, her face glowing with an impish good-hearted gleam.

“Me?”

“Yeah, back before the Guild showed up, the two of you had some big fight. He was in a coma for a while afterward with a metric shitton of injuries. I knew he’d been through worse and would be fine but Higuchi was inconsolable–I think she still hates you because of that actually. But, anyway, one of those injuries was a detached retina from a good punch to the face you gave him. That eye hasn’t been quite right ever since.”

Her words were horrifying to Atsushi but she was actively laughing as she spoke them.

Atsushi remembered that fight all too well. The image of that exact punch to the face replayed in his mind and he felt himself cringe. He hadn’t been able to control his power all that well back then so he’d probably used even more force than necessary though, of course, he and Akutagawa had been enemies back then–not even reluctant partners yet–so he’d had no reason not to fight at his full potential.

“Oh,” his face dropped. “H-He had kidnapped Kyouka and was trying to force her back into the mafia,” he explained hurriedly. “That’s why we fought. Well, he was also trying to sell me to Fitzgerald I guess but we didn’t know all of the details about that yet.”

Gin shrugged. “You don’t have to justify it to me. His actions are his own and I don’t necessarily agree with all of them but, then again, neither does he. We work for the mafia so you have to get used to taking orders that go against your own inclinations pretty quickly.”

Atsushi had never really thought about it like that before but he supposed it was true. Mori was a pretty intimidating guy after all and there were probably a thousand other reasons it would be worse to betray the mafia than to refuse an assignment.

Even so, it didn’t change what Akutagawa had done and that fact made Atsushi’s hand ball up into a fist by his side.

Part of him was now wondering too if Akutagawa was currently learning as much about Atsushi as Atsushi was about him or if only he was being made to suffer in this way. He wasn’t sure which answer he preferred. It almost seemed unfair if he wasn’t being forced into the same uncomfortable places that Atsushi was but he also wasn’t entirely thrilled about the idea of Akutagawa learning personal details about his life without his consent either.

Thinking of this, his mind turned to wondering what exactly Akutagawa was doing right now anyway. He figured that Kyouka probably would have sent up smoke signals if he’d done anything particularly awful but he still didn’t love the various Akutagawa-esque situations his imagination was conjuring.

“Well, I suppose I’ve taken up enough of your time and bothered you plenty by now,” Gin said, excusing herself and backing out of the bathroom. “I wish you luck on getting to sleep.”

“Thanks,” Atsushi muttered, watching as her now-more-blurry-than-before form slipped out of sight.

He made his way back over to the bed after turning off the lights and laid himself down at it as carefully as he could. Being here, in Akutagawa’s home–much less in his body–made Atsushi even more uneasy than he expected and he found himself just worrying while he lay there.

A tickle appeared in his throat after a few more minutes of laying still and, when he coughed into his fist, it came away with a stomach-churning smattering of red on it. His mouth tasted like copper and he had to force himself to wipe it off on his pant leg and look away. There was nothing he could do about any of this but he felt trapped in the cage that was Akutagawa’s body.

He couldn’t imagine having to do this for much longer. It was torturous.

It had been a very long time since he’d felt this helpless and weak and he hated it; it made him angry. In a way, he could now understand just a little bit better why Akutagawa was always so quick to insist upon his own strength even when it was all so clearly in vain.

Atsushi crawled carefully under the blankets and, trying not to think of how the sheets all smelled like Akutagawa, closed his eyes.

–

Sleep came easily at first, his body was run ragged with exhaustion after all, but it did not last and it certainly did not provide the rest that Atsushi so desperately desired. Instead, he woke often and sometimes inexplicably. At one point, he could tell that it was because his body was growing sore from lying in one position for too long and he needed to turn one way or another but, other times, it seemed like this body was just rejecting his every attempt to settle into oblivion out of sheer force of will.

Great, he thought groggily, Akutagawa’s body is less willing to give up than even he is. That damn stubborn piece of shit.

Another time, he woke up sweating profusely and feeling so suffocatingly hot so that he threw off the blankets and rolled up his pant legs just to be free. But then, who knows how much wasted time later, he found himself shivering from cold again and had to walk back every pitiful step he had taken.

By the time the sun was beginning to peak through Akutagawa’s black-out curtains, Atsushi estimated he’d barely slept a handful of hours all combined. Gin’s dire forebodings had come to pass and Atsushi swore he felt worse and even more tired than before.

What was the point of all the luxury around him if it brought no comfort and left him still feeling this beaten and defeated?

He missed his own body and the closet floor he slept much more peaceably on deep in his soul.

Reaching over to his bedside table, Atsushi picked up his cell phone and took a look at the time. It was just a little after 7:00 and the thought of several more hours stuck inside Akutagawa’s bones filled him with dread. Though, thankfully, it also served to remind him that he’d survived the worst of this already and his time was over halfway up now even if it wasn’t easy to see it that way with yet another cough clawing at the back of his throat.

It was about half an hour later when it was just mindlessly scrolling on the phone in the hopes of passing the creeping time a little quicker that there was a knock on his door.

“Gin?” He asked immediately.

“Oh, good. You’re up,” her voice answered from the other side.

Atsushi was unsure if she was glad of this because she needed something from him though or if she was just glad he hadn’t died in his sleep given that his body was her dying brother’s.

“Still kicking,” he moaned, rubbing at his one good eye weakly and setting his phone face-down on his chest.

“I’m going to make some breakfast,” she told him. “Feel free to come out of your cave in there if you want some.”

He had no choice but to crack a smile at that though, admittedly, the concept of breakfast was not quite hitting its usual cues for him this morning.

Atsushi wasn’t the type to skip meals. He’d spent so long underfed at the orphanage and praying for just enough to sustain himself that now, he was grateful for every bite and savored each minuscule morsel he could find. Normally, he looked forward to starting his day eating something delicious and had even woken up drooling over dreams of what lay in his moderately well-stocked pantry in the past.

But today, with the godawful sleep he’d had and the general low-level aching that he somehow felt in every inch of his flesh and bones, a morning meal was not particularly appealing. And sitting up too quickly, which made his head spin and his stomach lurch, didn’t help even though he knew he couldn’t lie around all day even if it was what his body was calling him to do.

Even so, he stood even though his knees wobbled under him and found a bathrobe to keep him warm despite his perfectly clear knowledge that the apartment was already heated much higher than he was used to in his own home.

Gin was already in the kitchen when Atsushi poked his head out and was sorting through ingredients from the fridge.

“He emerges,” she joked upon seeing him.

Every time she was so unexpectedly friendly toward Atsushi, it sent him through a loop. In spite of what she’d been saying, he still thought she would hate him or maybe even should hate him for all the things he’d done to her only living family member. It also made Atsushi wonder how Akutagawa was getting on with Kyouka back at his apartment. He couldn’t imagine Kyouka taking this same approach with him.

“I’ve got a bunch of vegetables that are about to go bad and some eggs I’ve been meaning to use up too,” Gin told him. “Do you like omelets?”

Nauseously, Atsushi nodded. “Sure, sounds good.”

His lack of interest was perplexing but unrelated to any assumptions he was making about Gin’s cooking. He’d eaten grass for breakfast as a child more than once so he didn’t tend to be picky unless something looked actively deadly like anything Dazai had ever made him. Instead, he just felt a notable lack of appetite that wasn’t like him at all which meant he knew exactly who else to blame.

It was like the way a sick person never wanted to eat while they had a fever except he had no fever and wasn’t technically sick at least not in the sort of way he was thinking about things. Surely, it wasn’t possible to live so completely uninspired by food all the time, he bargained, but, if it were, perhaps that and the lack of sleep just compounded on top of all the previous evidence to explain exactly why Akutagawa was constantly so unpleasant.

Atsushi had been living like this for just over 12 hours and was already beginning to feel himself becoming exactly as unpleasant as the man himself. Maybe that was what was really contagious around here.

He puttered around in silence, trying to make himself comfortable while Gin cooked, and even opened his eyes groggily at one point to note that a mug of strong-smelling breakfast tea had made its way in front of him.

“S’ this for me?” He murmured.

“You didn’t notice me put it right in front of you and say ‘here you go’ less than a minute ago?”

“Uh… no?”

He was living in a daze and felt like it was only getting worse.

“I’m guessing you didn’t sleep well after all, then?”

He shook his head. “Couldn’t seem to get comfortable.”

That was the short answer but he suspected Gin already knew the long one without having to ask.

She nodded darkly. “I warned you.”

“That you did,” he sighed, picking up the tea and taking a long drink even though the liquid was really way too hot to enjoy properly.

“Here,” she slid a plate over with a French-style omelet on it. “See if you can keep any of it down.”

Atsushi agreed solemnly and took a bite.

The flavor was fine, good even, but it still just didn’t quite hit the spot. With his seemingly nonexistent appetite, he just couldn’t make himself appreciate it as much as he wanted to. The eggs tasted too eggy and the vegetables were too green. He tried not to gag.

“No dice?” Gin asked, pondering him with curious sadness.

“Sorry,” Atsushi frowned. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

The assassin crossed her arms and leaned back exhaustedly against the counter.

“It’s not you, it’s him,” she lamented. “He’s had this problem for years. The fact that it's happening to you too must mean that it's happening in more than just his head though. It must actually be serious…” Her lips made a pout. “Damn it.”

For her sake, Atsushi took another bite and chewed the uninspiring dish with what little enthusiasm he could muster.

“Like I did with the medicine, I’ll see if I can get some of this into his system,” he promised, renewed ever so slightly by the deal he and Gin had made last night. “He won’t get better if he doesn’t eat.”

At this, Gin’s eyes flashed a familiar expression. It was the same look that she’d had yesterday when Atsushi had promised to give her brother back to her.

Her response echoed through his mind until an unhappy realization hit him.

For a while maybe. That was what she had said back then. And, oh, oh no…

It wasn’t just the usual sort of melancholy Atsushi had come to expect from someone with the Akutagawa surname though–this was grief in action.

Every time Atsushi would say something about Gin and Akutagawa’s futures together or him getting better, it only made her sadder because she knew the harsh truth of the matter–Akutagawa was not going to get better. He was going to die.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, bowing his head. “That was stupid of me to say.”

She pursed her lips and turned her back.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s not a big deal. It’s not as if I haven’t known for years…”

Atsushi knew all too well though that knowing wasn’t at all the same as being okay with it.

“Still, I-” He was interrupted by his phone beginning to ring in his hand. From the name on the screen, he could see that it was Kyouka calling. Oh no. What had Akutagawa done now? “Hello? Kyouka?”

“Ats-” she started and then stopped immediately, sounding some cocktail of startled and confused. “Oh, wow. Atsushi, is that really you?”

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“Wow,” she repeated again, this time more breathlessly than before, her voice trembling slightly with a sort of worry that Atsushi normally would have associated with himself a lot more than with her and her steady former-assassin nerves. “Sorry, I obviously know about what happened but I still wasn’t expecting to hear his voice pick up your phone.”

“Fair enough,” Atsushi admitted. “I’m not exactly used to it myself. But, does that have something to do with why you’re calling? Did he do something to you?”

A pause.

“Uh, no. Not exactly,” she said hesitantly. “But, I um… I think he’s dead.”

A silent beat in the room passed but, however long it actually went on for, it felt as though it were easily a hundred or even a thousand times that length.

The metallic clattering of Gin’s spatula falling from her hands and hitting the frying pan rang out and Atsushi almost jumped. His gut felt like a hollow pit and his breath caught in his throat in a way that instantly sent him careening into a fit of startled coughing.

“What?!” He all but screamed into the receiver.

Across the room, Gin’s face was pale.

The call wasn’t on a speaker but from the look she wore, she had still heard the only part that mattered to her.

“A-Are you sure?” He sputtered out, mind already reeling and heart beginning to race as the entirely selfish implications of this started to set in.

If Akutagawa had somehow died in Atsushi’s body, did that mean that Atsushi’s real body was dead too? And, if so, did that also mean that he could never return to it?

Oh god, was he now stuck in Akutagawa’s dying body for as long as it had left? Was Atsushi now officially dying too?

He wished that he could care more about the fact that this also meant that his partner and, goddamn it, sometimes even reluctant friend (though he doubted Akutagawa would have ever agreed with that summation of things), was apparently now dead but for what little he was worth, Atsushi could only seem to think about himself at a time like this. He hated himself a little bit at times like these.

“Well, no,” Kyouka answered and Atsushi’s galloping heart began to steady and slow.

He blinked. Huh?

“Kyouka, this is serious. Is he actually dead or not?” Was this some kind of joke?

“I’ve never heard this much emotion in his voice before,” she noted.

“Kyouka, please! What is going on over there?!”

He was seconds away from getting on his knees and begging.

“All I know is that last night, when he came back to the apartment, he barely said a word to me and just started making dinner,” she said. “It was some kind of sweet red bean soup, not really to my tastes but I do vaguely remember him liking it from the mafia days.”

“You’re killing me here,” Atsushi reminded her pathetically.

“Oh, right, sorry. Anyway, he made a huge batch of the stuff and actually gave me some which has rocked me to my core in a way that I am not sure I’ll ever recover from but that’s also an issue for another day. Then, he just sat in our living room in silence and ate like four bowls of the stuff and went to bed. That was over eleven hours ago now. I’m starting to think that he died in there.”

Atsushi was stunned.

“So… I mean, have you… like, gone in and checked on him or anything?”

“No?”

Her answer made it sound like she thought this suggestion was ridiculous beyond reason.

Atsushi could swear his blurry eye twitched.

“So… I’m sorry, just making sure I have this straight. You don’t actually know that he’s dead and, more than likely, he’s actually just sleeping late and, instead of going in and checking on him, you decided to call me first thing in the morning and tell me the guy swapped into my body died in it?”

A pause.

“Geez, when you put it that way it sounds bad.”

Perhaps it was the lack of a good night's sleep and a good morning’s breakfast but Atsushi’s grip on his phone tightened and he began to feel just a little violent.

On the other side of the kitchen, Gin stumbled back and slammed her back against the fridge. Evidently, her knees were going weak with relief after this clarification and the sudden shock of Kyouka’s announcement and subsequent correction were too much to handle.

“Fuck, Kyouka, you scared the shit out of me!” He growled. “Don’t ever do that again. What the hell?!”

“Damn, okay, now you sound like him,” she chuckled.

“It’s not funny!”

Atsushi put all of his efforts into controlling his anger. He knew Kyouka hadn’t meant anything by this and probably had only reached out due to real concern but the fading adrenaline in his veins made him less forgiving than usual. Clearly, Kyouka had not entirely thought through how a revelation such as that would affect Atsushi in this moment.

“Can you please just go pop your head into the closet and make sure he’s at least still breathing in there?”

“Sure, sure, whatever.”

Setting the phone down for just a second to catch his breath, Atushi made eye contact with Gin who now looked equally exhausted and annoyed.

“Sorry,” he mouthed to her.

Her lips curled into a snarl and, honestly, Atsushi couldn’t blame her.

“Okay, I’m back,” Kyouka’s voice said through the phone a moment later. Atsushi put it back up to his ear to listen. “He’s still stone-cold unconscious in there but, yeah, he’s breathing.”

An almost euphoric wave of relief washed over Atsushi and all the newfound tension began to dissipate though the impact the bombshell had had on him lingered.

Thinking on it now with the cloud of terror clearing around him, it did occur to Atsushi that perhaps Kyouka had actually been right to be worried. Eleven hours and counting was a pretty impressive amount of time to be asleep. Especially, Atsushi considered, inside his cramped and often too-hot closet of a bedroom.

“Thank god…”

“You’re that happy to hear he’s still alive?”

“I’m in his body!” Atsushi seethed. “If he died, who am I supposed to switch back with?!”

After a brief pause, Kyouka replied, “Ahh, that makes sense. I was just starting to think Dazai was right about the two of you.”

“Well, now you kno-” he paused. “Wait, what does Dazai say about us?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

Atsushi sputtered trying to form words for a few seconds before finally just giving up. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to know anymore.

“Fine, whatever, but can you just tell Akutagawa to call me when he does finally wake up? We should probably make sure we’re on the same page about switching back later.”

“What’s there to be on the same page about?” Kyouka wondered. “Doesn’t the ability just wear off and the two of you wind up back where you’re supposed to be?”

“I-I mean, I guess so b-but… just tell him to call me, okay?” Atsushi was too exasperated to argue at this point.

Maybe Kyouka really was right that it was unnecessary but Atsushi was beginning to think up some very choice words he wanted to say to the mobster. Now that his relief and fear were fading, he was left feeling oddly bitter now that he knew Akutagawa was getting to sleep off this body-swap in peace while Atushsi had to struggle through every minute of it.

It wasn’t fair.

“Fine, fine. Whatever you want.” Atsushi could hear her rolling her eyes through the phone.

“I’ll see you later tonight,” he said with a sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Try to be less Akutagawa-y, huh?”

Click.

Atsushi could hardly do more than just sit there in stunned silence for a few seconds once Kyouka hung up. Then, his sigh deepened and he sunk down onto the countertop, burning his head in his folded arms.

“Well, that’s one way to start the morning,” Gin told him.

He groaned in response. “She’s genuinely trying to kill me I think.”

“I suppose she was trained as an assassin,” Gin agreed with a sigh of her own.

From where he laid his his head down, Atsushi could hear the sound of her dumping an omlet of her own onto a plate, scraping a fork around restlessly, and then giving up and tossing the utensil down clinking against the ceramic plate. He looked up. Her face looked tired and unsettled, nauseous almost.

“Are you okay?” He asked lamely.

“Admittedly… a little shaken up,” she said with a sad chuckle, turning her face away so Atsushi couldn’t see her expression. “I’ve been waiting and expecting to eventually hear that news for most of my life so I always sort of figured that when the time came I’d be ready and prepared for it. But… I wasn’t and… that scares me.”

Gin amazed Atsushi. She was so open and honest, even to someone who should have been her enemy. He wished Akutagawa had even a trace of that inside of himself as well; it would have solved so many problems between them.

Atsushi nodded.

“I’m not sure it's possible to be fully prepared for something like that.”

Her shoulders sank. “I-I don’t know what I’m going to do when it's actually for real.”

The cracking in her voice made Atsushi’s heart sink.

Without even thinking, he was on his feet and traversed around the counter and into the kitchen. Then, before he knew it, his arms were around her and this seemed to strike just the right chord since she grabbed a hold of him and, for just a moment, pressed her face into his shoulder.

“It’ll be okay,” Atsushi promised, even though they both knew it wouldn’t.

He felt her nod her head.

“I know it’s just you hugging me, jinko,” she whispered. “But it also kind of feels like him and now I’m realizing that I’m not actually sure when the last time was that we really hugged each other.”

“He’s skimping on his brotherly duties then.”

This made her laugh a little. “You can’t bite into an apple and expect it to taste like a peach,” she said. “He is who he is and that’s enough for me even if having something different once and a while is nice too.”

“He seems more like a lemon to me.”

Another laugh. “I think he’d prefer to be a fig, personally, if anything.”

“Makes sense. I’m convinced he's full of wasps; just like a fig.”

Now this really made her laugh.

Pulling away, she wiped away a tear from her cheek with the heel of her palm and smiled.

“I needed that.”

Gin looked back down at her ruined omelet and blew out a stabilizing breath. “I think breakfast might be a bust today,” she decided.

“Well, there’s always lunch,” Atsushi supposed in agreement. After that shock, Gin wasn’t the only one without an appetite.

Following a few beats of silence, Gin straightened her back and looked at Atsushi decisively.

“Alright well nothing's going to change if we just keep just sitting here like two lumps on a log,” she announced. “Let's go get some air.”

Atsushi’s eyes widened. He wanted to take her up on the offer since, admittedly, he was feeling a little claustrophobic being stuck inside like a prisoner but he was still under strict orders not to be seen in case it stirred suspicion that might send an enemy after himself or Akutagawa.

“I’d love to but I’m not supposed to-”

Gin stopped him. “We don’t have to go far,” she promised, grabbing the sleeve of his bathrobe and pulling him toward the door. “I know a place.”

And as it turned out, she did. It was just a short trip behind Gin while she led Atsushi up the fire escape to the roof of their apartment building. The roof itself was bare and industrially plain but the view of the city from above took Atsushi’s breath away at first glance–not that this was currently a particularly difficult feat.

They were much higher up here than Atsushi had expected and that strangely made him feel safer, like he was completely untouchable. He could see the life that was unfolding beneath him but none of them were aware enough of him to even cast up their glance and scold him for his voyeurism. The passersby walking around on their various routes down on the street below and the lines of intersecting traffic weaved and clogged the streets in an organized sort of chaos that reminded Atsushi of watching colonies of ants all working together.

Gin walked over to the edge of the roof and sat so that her legs dangled precariously over the edge. The dangerous sight made Atsushi’s empty stomach churn but Gin looked entirely unbothered like fear had never even occurred to her.

“Careful not to fall.”

She glanced back at him over her shoulder and smirked. “Now you sound like a big brother.”

Atsushi wasn’t quite sure how to respond so he just took a few steps closer to her and took a seat a few feet back from the ledge.

“This view is incredible,” he said a little dreamily.

Gin nodded. “Ryu and I come up here a lot when we need the air or need to think or whatever.”

Atsushi tried to imagine that. He dreamt up funny mental images of Gin and Akutagawa up here at night exchanging gossip about their days with glasses of wine in their hands and green avocado facemasks smeared on with their hair pushed back by those funny elastic headbands with bunny ears on top.

Stopping himself from chuckling was a challenge.

“I can see why. Just being up here makes me feel a little bit lighter.”

This seemed to please her to hear.

“Good, you’ve been far too tense ever since you got here. I think we both have.”

“I mean, it is kind of a tense situation. I feel like that’s only natural.”

She shrugged and kicked her dangling legs like a child sitting on a swing. “Still, all work and no play makes a dull weretiger and, anyway, it does me good to see that face smile once in a while.”

On cue, Atsushi cracked a warm smile.

“He’s lucky to have a sister like you.”

“He is.” She agreed. “But I’m lucky to have a brother like him too. Quirks and all.”

“Oh, ‘quirks’? Is that what we’re calling it now?”

“Sounds nicer than antisocial personality disorder.”

Atsushi smirked. “If the mafia ever needs a PR department I think you should apply for the job. You have a knack for putting a polite spin on things.”

“How about you though, I’ve never met someone so determined to turn a bad situation into an opportunity. If Ryu had switched with anyone else in the world I can’t imagine they would have been half as nice as you about it.”

Atsushi looked down at the gravel under him and began to toy with a small piece of the stone.

“I suppose it could have been worse. We could have gotten seriously hurt so I suppose this is better than that.”

A guilty pit flared up in Atsushi’s stomach. He couldn’t stop himself from thinking that, from his own perspective, maybe just getting hurt would have been a whole lot easier than all of this. After all, he would have been just fine after a short while. Akutagawa is the one who would have had to suffer the longer route while Atsushi got off easy. And now, instead of that, Akutagawa was just apparently happily taking the longest nap in existence.

Now that he had spent a night trying to sleep in Akutagawa’s skin, Atsushi found it all too easy to understand why Akutagawa might have slipped into such a deep sleep in an objectively more comfortable body.

“Now he’s just biding his time like a vampire in his coffin,” Gin joked as though she had just been reading Atsushi’s mind. “Again.”

This caught Atsushi’s attention and he looked over at Gin whose eyes suddenly looked miles away.

“Sometimes the vampirism stuff feels like it was years ago, decades almost.”

“We’ve all been doing our best to put it behind us. I’m sure that’s why. Even if it was more like months ago than years, it sure is easier to breathe when you pretend it's much further removed from us.”

Atsushi kept his gaze fixed on Gin and saw her distant eyes hanging heavily in a way that reminded him that both of the Akutagawas had been turned into vampires, not just the one Atsushi most associated with the name. Gin hadn’t exactly been spared a cruel fate during that time either.

“It must have been hard,” he thought aloud. “I was bitten right at the end but never got fully turned. My healing probably played a role in that too though it was right at the end when Dazai and Ranpo were basically just tidying loose ends so I’m not even sure it counts.”

“Thankfully, I remember very little of it,” Gin said seriously. “But I do remember being turned and I’m not too hardened to admit that it was scary.”

“I bet…”

“And that doesn’t even cover the fact that, right before it all went down, I had just attended my brother’s funeral.”

Atsushi’s throat went dry. “Y-You guys had a funeral for him?”

“He was dead. That’s what you do for people that die. We’ll have to do it again eventually too.”

“Oh. Uh, yeah, I guess so…”

“Of course, when I woke back up and was told he hadn’t really died and had just been made into the first vampire I was almost excited at the idea.”

“Excited?”

She tossed her head flippantly, a gust of cold wind blowing her long dark hair back.

“Yeah. Well, I mean, vampires are immortal and we’d all been healing supernaturally while we were turned so it sort of got my hopes up that maybe the one good thing about the situation could be that it all would have at least cured Ryu’s lungs.”

Atsushi felt his face go slack.

“Obviously it didn’t but it was still a nice little delusion to hold onto for a small while.”

“I wish it had.”

She let go a breath from her nose that was almost like a laugh but entwined with too much bitterness to be funny.

“Me too.”

For a while, neither of them spoke. Embarrassment was at least part of the reason why on Atsushi’s part but he supposed conflict was more of an explanation on Gin’s.

“Can I ask you something unrelated?” Atsushi posed.

Gin looked over and bliked, taken aback.

“Um, y-yeah I guess so. What is it?”

“This is kind of the first time you and I have ever really met,” he prompted. “So, until now I didn’t really know what to expect from you or about what sort of person you would be. I suppose I always figured you’d be more like your brother than you actually are.”

She blew a humorous breath out of her nose in agreement. “And now you’re wondering what I’m doing mixed up in the same weird, dark, world as him?”

Gin was much more perceptive than people gave her credit for.

“Well, if it doesn’t sound too harsh… then, yes.”

She shifted her weight back onto her hands behind her and turned her eyes up to the clouds above.

“It’s true that I never envisioned a life in the mafia when I was younger,” she admitted. “But, then again, neither did Ryu. This wasn’t either of our plan. It was just sort of how things worked out. I’m not one to dwell in the past though or lament over decisions made long ago. This is my life because it is. No other reason than that.”

“If it had been up to you back then, what would you have wanted?”

Her eyes glazed over a little and then she shot him a low crooked grin. “A faster horse.”

“A what…?”

She giggled. “It doesn’t matter. Just an old story about the difference between dreamers and realists,” she looked down shyly. “I am not a dreamer. I know that. I do not have a strong vision or any particular aspirations other than the same things everyone wants. I happily leave that all up to my brother. It may be hard to believe but, for now at least, I am not where I expected but I am content nonetheless.”

The surprise on Atsushi’s face must have shown.

“I’ve shocked you,” she observed. “You think me a much better person than I am, weretiger. I am not innocent nor helpless and in need of rescue but, rather, I am just willfully complacent. Do not waste your time feeling sorry for someone who is not sorry themselves.”

Atsushi looked down and away. Every time Gin spoke, she seemed to challenge a deep-seated belief of Atsushi’s which he hadn’t even realized he held until confronted.

“I-I think I’ll go back inside now,” he said, stunned but standing slowly.

She nodded but stayed put. “And I think I will stay here a while longer. Consider getting some rest if you can. I’ll be back in when I feel more like it, alright?”

He nodded and began to walk back toward the fire exit but stopped just as he placed his foot on the first rung down. “You know, I didn’t mean to suggest you were some sort of damsel in distress. I may not think highly of your brother’s moral character but even I can see he’s not the type to drag you along with his schemes if you didn’t want to follow him. And, for that matter, I can tell you’re not the type to be dragged around either.”

Her head cocked to the side with a difficult expression. “Well, haven’t I turned you into quite the psychoanalyst?”

He had seen her and she had not liked the way she was seen.

Atsushi pursed his lips and began down the escape with one certain thought on his mind: Gin absolutely was Akutagawa’s sister in much more than name alone after all.

Once back inside, Atsushi made his way back into Akutagawa’s room.

He threw himself on the bed first thing but grew restless easily and was soon back up on his feet. Checking the time, he began calculating the ever-ticking hours and dared to hope things would all be over soon.

It did not take long after this until Atsushi found himself poking through Akutagawa’s possessions. First, it was just tinkering with objects on his dresser and then it became sorting through drawers and flipping through books on the desk until he realized that one of the books in his hand was a diary of sorts in the mobster's own hand.

He froze up, damn near petrified at this realization from the second he made it. It was a small but dense book wrapped in an ominous black leather blinding. A small note was inscribed into the inside cover of the book in neat penmanship denoting the book as: the life of a stupid man.

The handwriting was so perfect and delicate in fact that Atsushi almost believed it was Gin’s at first. However, the fact that he eventually found the word ‘weretiger’ written down in the dark ink indicative of a pen pressed with a heavy rage-fueled hand on a latter page superseded this completely.

Akutagawa had written about him? Did he dare to read on?

Surely this was an invasion of privacy on the greatest level and if, god forbid, Akutagawa ever found out that Atsushi had so much as held this book that would result in his almost immediate death. And yet, his curiosity twitched uncertainly. Really, when he thought about it, he had all but seen Akutagawa’s naked body at this point, slept in the man’s bed, and sort of befriended his sister so, was this really so much more invasive than everything else he’d already done?

Regrettably, this rationalization was stronger than mortal fear and he allowed his eyes to flicker on to the next word and then the one after that until he was undeniably reading Akutagawa’s most personal and innermost thoughts.

Thank god that most of these ramblings were boring and mundane happenings at the port mafia rather than salacious gossip but, it didn’t stop the odd tidbit from being juicier than expected. Even so, he skipped past the page where his name lay in fear of what he might learn and then have to live with.

“That moron Tachihara came by my office again today looking for Gin,” one sentence wrote. “When he found me instead he pretended this was not the case. He has clearly lost any skill at duplicity he might have once had since leaving the Hunting Dogs however. I should have stabbed him.”

So, the guy with the bandaid on his nose was into Gin and Akutagawa knew? Damn.

Then, “Dazai showed up at work today again. I hoped it was to see me about some matter but, instead, he spent the better part of an hour scratching at Chuuya’s office and singing explicitly sexual song lyrics under the door. Chuuya eventually came out and knocked him around for a while until they both got bored. It was nice to see him today.”

Okay, that one made sense.

The tentative amusement of this happenstance faded when, again, his own name appeared. Akutagawa mentioned him in this thing more than once? He didn’t know whether that was horrifying or sort of flattering. It probably would depend on the content of the entry but Atsushi found it difficult to make himself read.

Despite all of his higher reasoning telling him that he’d already committed far more egregious offenses to Akutagawa’s privacy over the last almost-day, Atsushi’s stomach felt twisted and sick about pressing on. It wasn’t his fault that he had wound up living in Akutagawa’s body but did that actually give him permission to meddle in the mafioso’s personal business? It seemed worse somehow than the other things he’d done and he was now suspecting that his initial feelings were probably a result of his an admittable fault in his personal character.

For as much as he had been criticizing Akutagawa lately, the mafioso was just sleeping off this whole mess and not intruding on Atsushi’s privacy. This just made Atsushi feel worse when, inadvertently, his eyes read one of the sentences as he attempted to close the book.

The words took a moment to process but made Atsushi’s hands seize up once they finished rendering and he tore the cover back open like a wild animal smelling blood.

“I remembered something else from my time as a vampire last night,” it read. Akutagawa had mentioned, after finally getting turned back, that his recollection of those days was fuzzy at best but this was the first Atsushi had heard of the memories starting to return. When had this started? Why had Akutagawa never said anything about it? “It was from my fight with the weretiger.” Atsushi swallowed nervously. “I won the fight but only because he held his punches. It wasn’t a true victory so I cannot rightly derive any pleasure from it. I wish I could understand why he spared me like that though. He knew I am dying and yet put himself in danger just to prolong what little time I have left. It was illogical and yet I suppose as I am glad. I dislike being in his debt but feel strangely grateful at the same time. I have never felt cared for by someone like this before. Is that even the right word for this feeling? I don’t rightly know.”

Atsushi pulled away from the book and felt a hand instinctively reach up to cover his mouth. A dry startled cough erupted from deep in his throat and he had to squeeze his eyes closed just to stop the tears from flowing. It was as if these diseased lungs he was borrowing were just as surprised as he was.

Atsushi made Akutagawa feel cared for? The idea was preposterous. The mafioso had certainly never said anything along those lines before though Atsushi supposed he wouldn’t. Regardless of whether this was all true or not, it was definitely proof that Akutagawa wasn’t as completely unfeeling and unaffected as he so often seemed to be.

Atsushi looked back down at the book and thumbed through a few more pages while he wondered what exactly Akutagawa had meant when he wrote that. And, more terrifying still, did he still feel that way at all or had he changed in mind in all the time since first making that entry? It was hard to be sure which answer made Atsushi the most apprehensive.

The shape of that stupid moniker Akutagawa always used for him, written out in Akutagawa’s own hand, must have been becoming more and more recognizable to Atsushi because the sight of it from out the side of his eye forcefully snagged his attention even when his mind wasn’t even really on the diary anymore.

“I bit the weretiger when I was undead,” it declared abruptly, a new entry being made in a more hurried pen than previous pages as though these thoughts needed to be written down before the courage to do so deserted Akutagawa entirely. “I’m sure of it now. I remembered it in training this morning when Chuuya landed a blow that made me taste blood. I have drank the weretiger’s blood. My teeth and tongue were on his neck. Now when I think of it, I can recall the taste. His blood was sweet.” Atsushi sucked in a small steadying breath. Sweet? “He never mentioned this to me when we first spoke about my missing memories from that time. Does he suppose I would be embarrassed about this? Should I be? All I can think is that he has known this transpired all this time and kept it to himself. He must not care at all. As ever, I am a fool alone then because I will probably care about it for the rest of my life. Dying with his taste on my lips wouldn’t be so bad.”

Heat rose to Atsushi’s face and he slammed the book closed for good. He had to be misunderstanding what he was reading. It sounded almost… romantic. But that couldn’t be right. Atsushi must have been reading into it. Perhaps it had just been some mindless musing or Akutagawa had misspoken in some way if that was at all possible in writing. A poor choice of words maybe? Yes, that must have been it.

It was true that Atsushi had never told Akutagawa about having bitten him when he was a vampire but it wasn’t like he’d excluded it for any particular reason. It wasn’t a secret but it also wasn’t that Atsushi just didn’t care like Akutagawa was assuming. In fact, he had thought of bringing it up before but there had never been a good time. Plus, he had never wanted Akutagawa to feel guilty about hurting him while he wasn’t in control of his body. It’s not like it was his fault. It’s not like he did it on purpose. Biting people and drinking their blood is just what vampires do.

As Atsushi thought on it though, he began to recall the event himself. It actually hadn’t hurt as must as he pretended. The fangs broke skin for sure and that would never be comfortable but he sort of knew what Akutagawa was talking about when he mentioned Atsushi’s blood having a specific taste since he could remember distinctly too that Akutagawa’s skin and hair had a very particular smell as well. He’d done little with that information in the moment but now the memory of that scent washed over him and it felt different somehow.

He fell back onto the bed and, again, he could smell Akutagawa on the blankets and sheets. It was familiar. Comfortable even? Nothing about who Akutagawa was read as soft or sweet on the surface but, without even realizing it, the smell of him must have transformed in Atsushi’s mind over the years of their partnership until it actually made him feel safe.

Atsushi draped an arm over his eyes and groaned as his own thoughts became undeniably his. “What the hell have I gotten myself into.”

His head was heavy as always but now spinning a bit too. Laying down like this made some of the aches in his joints go away and other become more pronounced in some sick twist of fate. When he finally got back into his own body, Atsushi was one hundred percent sure that he would never take his good health for granted again.

The darkness around him began to feel like a weighted blanket under which he could ignore all the new questions he wanted to ask Akutagawa and all the new thoughts racing through his mind. Without meaning to, Atsushi let the darkness take over softly and drifted gently into a light and peaceful sleep.

There were no dreams or thoughts at all until the wooden and hollow sound of rhythmic thumping began to register to his ears and rose Atsushi from his slumber. One eye cracked open groggily and then the other followed, slowly readjusting to the lights he had left on in the room but blacked out with his arm to sleep.

“Can I come in?” Gin’s voice asked through the door and Atsushi realized she had been knocking.

“Yes, of course,” he answered, hearing the weight of sleep still in Akutagawa’s voice when he spoke.

The door peaked open and Gin’s head slipped through. “Did you get a nap in?”

Atsushi chuckled, a little embarrassed since he’d only been awake for a short while before going back to bad on accident. “Guess I was still tired.”

Though, funnily enough, even with this nap after a whole night’s sleep he still felt tired. He’d slept better just now than he had last night but even so he could tell that it must not have been good quality sleep. It was like no matter what he did or how much time he spent with his eyes closed a true restfulness never came to him. Was this because he was still wondering so many things about Akutagawa after reading those diary entries or was it maybe because he was eager to return to his body and had subconsciously elected to doze the last hours away like Akutagawa himself was doing in Atsushi’s body?

The thought of Akutagawa also presented the uncomfortable possibility that perhaps this was just how Akutagawa lived and things were always this way for him no matter what. The fact that he’d been bordering on comatose while in Atsushi’s body began to make a little more sense in a way that made Atsushi kind of sad.

“Did you need something?” Atsushi asked Gin.

“Just wanted to let you know that your time is almost up.”

If Atsushi were not knowingly residing in a dying body he would have immediately recognized this as meaning that the ability was due to ware off any minute rather than the way he initially did take it before coming to his better senses–you are going to die soon.

“Oh, okay. Good.”

Gin raised an eyebrow. “You don’t sound as happy as I expected.”

“N-No I am,” Atsushi rushed to clarify, sitting up a little straighter. “Honestly, you have no idea how happy I am going to be. It’s just… I feel sort of bad too since me switching out means that your brother has to switch back in. Now that I’ve been in his shoes, I can’t say I’d wish this on anyone.”

“You’re sweet, weretiger,” Gin told him with a soft smile. “I hope you won’t stay away in the future. I’ve begun to understand a little bit of what my brother must see in you to keep you around like he does.”

Atsushi’s face reddened. She might have been saying more than she even knew if she meant that.

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You should,” she said, stepping into the room and holding up another orange prescription canister before giving it a little shake. “Would you mind taking another dose of these while it’s still you in there? He’d never thank you for it but he’d owe you anyway.”

“Give them here,” Atsushi reached out and deposited two onto his tongue. “I said I’d help and I meant it. To the last.”

“And I meant it too,” Gin clarified. “Come by sometime. Don’t be a stranger.”

“Right.” He swallowed the pills.

He’d probably been a tad ambitious choosing to send them down dry too because a note of irritation sprang up in his chest as they struggled to go through. A cough came out and then a heavier one and another until he was hunched over and wondering if he’d ever breathe right again or if he’d just inadvertently triggered his own early demise. His head was dizzy as he coughed and he lost track of what exactly was happening as his mind focused entirely on surviving like the narrowed in scope of a spyglass.

And then, in an instant the raw hacking and gagging vanished and Atsushi breathed in an easy gasp and felt his lungs fill, unencumbered and free.

He blinked and his eyesight returned, showing him his own little dark bedroom back at the dorms. His blanket was still folded over his lap and he was now sat bolt upright on his futon wearing his own pajamas and only narrowly missing hitting his head on the low ceiling in the closet where he slept.

He was home.

Scrambling, he tore open the door he slept behind and nearly fell out into the larger open room. Kyouka was there and had a look of shock and awe on her face that would have to wait because Atsushi was purely focused on getting to the bathroom and verifying once and for all that this was really happening.

And, sure enough, he was greeted with his own reflection in the mirror, and relief like no other coursed through him. His knees actually started to feel weak which nearly made him collapse onto the floor. It was like he’d been running for 24 hours straight and had finally been allowed to stop.

“I’m back!” He shouted gleefully, running back out into the living room and sharing a big toothy smile with Kyoua. “It’s me, Atsushi, we switched back!”

“Thank god!” She ran up and hugged him.

He lifted her into the air out of celebration and felt delirious with joy.

It was only now he realized how scared some part of him had been that, despite what Dazai had told them, maybe he wouldn’t switch back when the time was up after all.

“Oh my god,” he breathed crumbling down to the floor. “I am never doing that ever again.”

“Good. I don’t think I could take having to live with Akutagawa as a roommate.”

“You meant it when you said things were fine and he was just sleeping the whole time though, right?” Atsushi needed to confirm.

If Akutagawa had put a single toe out of place while staying here any new thing Atsushi was beginning to think and feel about him would be tossed out the window with no questions asked.

“Yeah, honestly it was kind of peaceful but it was still kind of like staying near a ticking bomb,” she laughed. “But what about you? I didn’t really get a chance to ask before 'cause you were being so Akutagawa-y but you were alright too weren't you?”

“I was fine. Just glad to be back to normal.”

“Perfect,” she nodded. “I thought maybe to celebrate your return we could make chazuke for dinner. How does that sound?”

It sounded wonderful but, weirdly, he didn’t feel the usual creeping hunger for his next meal he expected to at this time of day. It wasn’t like how he felt, unable to keep food down or even see the appeal of a meal, when he was in Akutagawa’s body though. He just felt… satisfied?

Actually, he felt amazing in every way. All of the haunting aches and pains, the dizziness, the nausea, the nagging burning coughs were gone. Instead, he felt rested and well-fed.

All that sleeping and eating Akutagawa had done while they were switched must have stayed with his body instead of going with Akutagawa’s spirit. So there had been no benefit to Akutagawa at all for this swap. He would be back now in a dying body, his afflictions returned, and no traces of all the sleep and food he’d finally been able to enjoy left to comfort him. This realization put a pit in Atsushi’s full stomach.

“I, uh, think there is somewhere I need to go first,” he said, standing with new purpose.

Kyouka’s face flashed surprise. “But you just got back!”

“I know and I’ll only be gone a minute but I just need to do something first.”

Before Kyouka could respond, Atsushi was rushing to change his clothes and flying out the door with only one destination in his sights.

–

It was breezy climbing up that metal fire escape but easier than the last time he had done it. He didn’t feel nearly as winded as before when he reached the top and found the black-clad mobster lying on his back and staring up at the darkening sky on the roof of his apartment building.

“Didn’t you get enough rest in this last day?” Atsushi called out to him annoyingly.

The mobster didn’t move but Atsushi could see his dark eyes flicker open. After spending the last many hours in his body and trying to grow accustomed to seeing Akutagawa’s face in the mirror, it was actually weird to see him back as a separate entity as he belonged.

“Was just enjoying the peace but I suppose that’s gone now too,” he retorted.

Atsushi walked over to him and, upon seeing that Akutagawa had no intentions of sitting or standing up to meet him, he decided to lay down beside the mafioso instead.

“Kyouka told me things went surprisingly well.”

“I told you I wouldn’t do anything to her. I keep my word.”

It was true. He did.

“And I kept mine. I tried not to bother Gin too much but she was actually pretty nice to me.”

“She can be that way when she wants to be. Don’t make the mistake of thinking she is always that way indiscriminately though.”

“I definitely think I learned that.”

There was a pause.

“So, did you come here to discuss Dazai an Chuuya’s next plans to capture our enemy and seek our revenge on him for switching us like that?”

“Nah,” Atsushi shook his head. “I mostly just wanted to see how you were.”

Akutagawa’s eyes darted over to Atsushi suspiciously. “Why?”

“You’ll think it's lame.”

“I think you’re lame,” Akutagawa corrected.

“Right, right,” Atsushi nodded. “I just honestly had a hard time being switched with you. It didn’t feel good and that makes me worry. Why didn’t you tell me how sick you really are?”

Akutagawa shrugged apathetically. “Didn’t see why it should matter. I can still do my job. It hasn’t progressed far enough to change that yet.”

All at once, it occurred to Atsushi that Akutagawa was right and one day he probably would have to stop being Atsushi’s partner like they had been for so long. He’d be too sick to fight before he died. The dying part of dying was sometimes lost under the shadow of the act of death that awaited at the end.

“That’s not what I’m worried about,” Atsushi shook his head. “I just meant, you should take better care of yourself. You don’t have to suffer through it. It’s not noble or stronger to be miserable all the time when you don’t need to be.”

“You sound like Gin.”

“And you should listen to her. She wants what’s best for you.”

“I know you took the medications she gave you,” Akutagawa told him.

Atsushi supposed that in the same way he could feel the effects of the rest and nourishment Akutagawa had enjoyed in his body, Akutagawa must have been left with the remnants of the painkillers and medications Atsushi had taken while in his. He hoped they helped but doubted Akutagawa would admit it either way.

“You should too. She’s scared and just wants to help you. Let her.”

“Perhaps…” Akutagawa mused after a beat of silence.

“I’m sorry you didn’t get to take all the sleep and sweet red bean soup with you.”

Akutagawa moaned a bit like he wished this conversation would just end.

“I enjoyed it then to its fullest and that was all I could ask for and more,” he answered. “I’m sure you must have realized that the experience would not be quite the same for me once things were put to rights. I won’t apologize for it if that’s what you’re looking for.”

Atsushi scoffed. “Hardly. It just must be frustrating to have done all of that and then have to leave it behind without a trace.”

“Believe me,” he snorted. “I’ve taken the traces with me. I slept better and ate better in the last day than the last twenty-some years of my life. It is unfortunate you had to spend the time as you did but I do not regret a thing.”

“What, the memories? What good are those on an empty stomach and in a sleepless bed?”

“Memories are everything,” he breathed argumentatively. “Nothing lasts forever but memories come as close to it as we’ll ever get.”

The last few words carried an air of dreaminess in their tone when spoken the way they were.

The passages in Akutagawa’s diary about his memories returning from his time as a vampire came to Atsushi’s mind. He knew better than to admit to reading the journal now or hint too heavily but he wondered if any of those memories were included in the ‘everything’ Akutagawa spoke up so wistfully.

He hoped so.

“I don’t want you to die,” Atushi said abruptly before he could stop himself.

Akutagawa almost laughed. “Well, that’s a sudden change. Good to hear from the guy watching my back in battle though.”

“I mean it,” Atsushi insisted, deciding he might as well die on this hell he’d accidentally wound up on.

“Too bad,” Akutagawa rolled his eyes. “Your feelings aren't going to change anything.”

This blase attitude made Atsushi mad. He hated to hear how defeatist Akutagawa was about something as important as this when he was always so fired up about everything else.

“Maybe not but that doesn’t permit you to just give up. Find something to live for goddamn you!”

This little outpouring caught the mobster’s attention and he looked up properly, raising his head and everything, for the first time since Atsushi arrived.

“Like what?” It was a challenge.

“Your sister for one,” Atsushi shouted.

“She is all I think about,” Akutagawa answered furiously.

Atsushi knew now that this was not necessarily true.

“Then think about me too.”

“You?”

“Yeah, me.”

Then, while the words were still hanging thick and saccharine in the air, Atsushi leaned in and kissed Akutagawa. It was small, chaste, polite maybe even forgettable to anyone else but the act and the feeling behind it made it unforgettable to Atsushi.

Akutagawa had written that he wouldn’t mind dying with Atsushi’s taste on his lips but Atsushi was not ready to give him and let him die just yet. So he would just have to live with the taste on his lips for now instead.

Akutagawa’s pale face was stunned.

“I won’t let you just be a memory,” Atsushi said before Akutagawa could speak. “So don’t go chasing bad guys off derelict piers again, okay?”

And then, heart pounding but dead set on keeping his promise to Gin as well as this new one to Akutagawa himself, he stood, dusted himself off, and disappeared back down the fire escape. Maybe it had taken getting so mixed around that he couldn’t think straight to see it but Atsushi had never felt more certain of what direction he was going in his life.

Once he was gone and only the sweet flavor of his lips remained in Akutagawa’s mouth, the mobster rested his head back down against the rooftop floor and asked himself what the chances were he was still dreaming in Atsushi’s bed.

Perhaps, he would be one day again soon but in a very different way.

He closed his eyes, clasped his fingers together over his struggling chest, and took in a difficult breath that scraped and clawed at the edges of his throat as it came in. Breathing would never again be as easy for him as it had been during this last day. He knew that. In fact, he’d enjoyed his time in a working body with painless lungs so much in part because he had been so sure that this day might be one of his last at all.

Now though, he was relieved and annoyed in equal parts to find that he wanted to stick around a little while longer at least. It was exactly what he had been fighting for every day of his life, it was what he had sought out specifically from Dazai, it was the reason he had joined the Port Mafia in the first place at all–it was a reason to live.