Chapter Text
In a cold, dimly lit office of the afterlife, two overworked clerks sat behind a mountain of paperwork. One of them, a ghostly figure with half-moon glasses, sighed as he scanned the file on his desk.
“Another one brought back last-minute,” he grumbled, marking the folder in bright red ink. “Dazai Osamu. Age…eh, ageless now. Status…pending…again.”
His coworker looked up, rolling translucent eyes. “Wait, isn’t that the guy from last week? The ‘I’m ready to die, take me now!’ one?”
“Yeah,” the first clerk replied, flipping through the pages. “We were halfway through processing his transition forms, but then, bam! Mortal doctors ‘revived’ him at the last second. Paperwork canceled, but the soul transfer? Already halfway done.” He pointed to a line that read Partial Transfer: Undead (See Annex B). “Left him in some sort of half-dead state. Vampirism, basically. Can’t finish the paperwork; he’s stuck between worlds now.”
They shared a moment of resigned silence, both of them exhausted by yet another Dazai complication.
Meanwhile, back in the living world, Dazai groggily blinked awake in a hospital bed, feeling an odd…hunger and a strange aversion to the sunlight streaming through the window. “Great,” he muttered to himself, pressing a hand to his head. “Just my luck. Can’t even die properly.”
And somewhere, in the in-between realms, a stack of incomplete afterlife forms with Dazai’s name on them was shelved in the ‘Maybe Later’ section.
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Ginger hair sways and blossoms in the wind, just gently, as Chuuya takes his evening walk down the local riverbank. Not many rocks, not many tree roots to trip over, nice and quiet, and most importantly, no Dazai. It’s quiet and calm, completely unlike that bastard. He’s so aggravating, honestly! How can one person be so annoying? He does it on purpose, Chuuya knows, and that’s what makes it even worse! He knows Dazai can be decent, and he has, Chuuya just wishes he’d do it a bit more often. Anyway, thinking about that guy around here completely defeats the purpose of coming here. He’s here to calm down, not aggravate himself more. He hadn’t even realized he stopped walking he was so lost in thought! He’s gotta get his act together.
Chuuya sighs deeply, deciding it’s too late to do much about that Dazai. They’re already partners, he might as well deal with it, as annoying as he is. He starts walking again, listening intently to the trees and the wind crashing down on the splashing of the water against sand. A calming enough atmosphere for a nice walk.
After a little while of walking with no interruptions, there’s the sound of branches twitching and rustling, followed by a little screeching. It’s not too loud, but it’s not enough like a squeak to be classified as such. Chuuya immediately snaps his eyes in that direction, checking the tree first before glancing to the ground, thinking it might have actually been in the bushes.
Nothing…
Maybe a squirrel got into a fight. That’s gotta be it.
Chuuya brushes it off, turning his head back to his front and— there’s that screech again! He twirls his head around once more, examining the tree with more focus. There’s nothing there… again. This is getting suspicious.
Chuuya stalks closer to the tree, looking through the branches and leaves, trying to find whatever it was that made that sound. Seeing absolutely nothing but more branches and leaves, Chuuya sighs, thinking maybe he’s overthinking this. Just as he was about to turn away, there’s movement in the corner of his eye. On the tree trunk, roughly eye level, a bat is slowly making its way down and around the trunk, in Chuuya’s direction.
That’s… weird. And funny? Watching a bat move in any way other than flying is sort of amusing.
The bat seems to notice Chuuya a bit too late, glancing up for a moment before focusing on its climbing again. It does a double take, staring Chuuya directly in the eyes, which Chuuya assumes is shock mixed with fear. Chuuya also assumed the little guy would fly away immediately after being startled, but it didn’t. It just stared at him.
Chuuya blinks.
The bat blinks.
“Hello, uhh… you.” Chuuya takes a hand out of his pocket, waving slowly at this bat that either isn’t scared or currently frozen in fear. The bat simply glances over to Chuuya’s hand, not keeping its eyes off of Chuuya’s face for very long. It seems calm? It’s not hyperventilating or anything. Usually wild animals go absolutely insane seeing a bigger animal, so what’s up with this little guy? The bat’s longer silence only makes Chuuya more curious, and soon it gets the best of him. After such long eye contact with this bat, he slowly reaches a pointed finger out, inching closer and closer to the little fuzzy critter. The bat only eyes Chuuya’s finger as it gets poked, squeaking when it looks back up to his face. That squeak almost felt like an insult…
Chuuya huffs in amusement at this, smiling with a bit of bafflement. This bat just let him touch it. Amazing! He probably received so many undisclosed germs, but that’s alright. He got to touch a bat. Bats are basically air dogs, so this is awesome! Surprisingly, the fur is a lot less gruff than he thought it would be. Isn’t this bat supposed to be wild? Actually, now that he’s looking closer, this bat is rather small. Maybe it’s still a juvenile.
Seeing as how the bat is so friendly, Chuuya once again extends his hand, this time gently petting it with a finger. Still, the bat remained unaffected! Maybe it was starting to seem a bit uncomfortable, judging by the way one of its ears twitched, but Chuuya can’t read bat body language. This is such a horrible idea, but what are the chances you even see a bat let alone pet one? He’s taking his chances. The Port Mafia has good medical care, he’ll probably be fine.
“I’m gonna call you Dracula. That alright?” The bat only blinks silently at him in response. Chuuya’s smile softens a little bit, “as if a bat would’ve been able to respond…” then, out of nowhere, the bat squeaks. It almost sounds amused or… maybe some kind of mocking. Was his name choice too basic? No, wait, that can’t be right. It’s a bat. Bats don’t know human language.
Chuuya shakes off the thought, standing up straight again and removing his hand from the bat. Making a mental note to wash his hands later, Chuuya looked off to the river and the footsteps he left in the sand. He has to get back to the apartment soon. Turning back at the little bat, Chuuya bid his farewell and went on his way again. He’ll tell Koyou about this, definitely, uncaring of whether or not she’d believe him—he really hoped she did, though.
After just a bit more of walking in complete silence, Chuuya hears faint wingbeats behind him. That can’t be good. He wearily turns to look behind him, scanning the area before locking onto what is likely the cause of the sound.
A bat! Is this the same one?
Chuuya’s eyes subtly light up, calming the tension from his body almost immediately. Who knows, maybe he has two abilities and one of them is animal whispering.
The bat approaches rather quickly, stopping to hover just a little ways away from Chuuya. “Hey! You following me, buddy?” The bat stayed silent, as expected, and blinked yet again. Maybe that’s its favorite communication method. After about a beat, the bat seemed to have made up its mind, because it decided to make itself comfortable in Chuuya’s hood he was currently not using. “I guess that also works…” Chuuya made another mental note—to wash his jacket when he got the chance.