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As Chuuya begrudgingly walked forward, he kicked a rock down the road as far as it could go. He knew today would be a bad day from the second it started.
He was starting to wish this truce never happened, just so he wouldn't have to work with Dazai. Just typical he'd get stuck with him.
But considering the compatibility of their abilities this outcome was inevitable and Chuuya knew that. Just his bad luck he supposes that he and Dazai always end up crossing paths.
If he were being honest, It was actually quite a scenic route they had to take back from the mission he and Dazai were sent on. A long walk through a mostly rural area. The long since darkened sky could be seen through the gaps in the trees and although there wasn't a star in sight the forest was oddly pretty at night.
Chuuya probably would have even enjoyed the walk, had Dazai not made it his own personal side quest to be extra irritating today. He sees another good stone on the ground to kick and sends it flying just like the other one.
“Wow, you look mad! Huh? Sure the mission could have gone better but hey! We all make mistakes” Dazai taunted, trying to get a reaction out of Chuuya. Walking dramatically with his arms stretched behind his head.
“Hey! It was you who messed up and you alone! Don't lump me in with you just because you fucked up!” Chuuya bites back. If it had been his fault, sure he'd admit it! But there was something particularly irritating about Dazai being the one to mess up the mission and act like it was equal.
“Ha! We're partners again now, so that means you take half the blame if the plan falls flat.That's how it is” Dazai rambled on and it chipped away Chuuya's slowly dying composure.
But then he feels it, the first small drops of rain. He initially thinks nothing of it and activates his ability so the rain doesn't hit him.
The rain drops stop just a centimeter or two before they touch him and ricochet. He doesn't do this for Dazai despite being able to as long as Dazai doesn't directly touch him.
“That's not how it works Daza-” Chuuya is barely able to get a sentence in. The light drizzle from before quickly devolved into lashing rain. Bucketing down and drenching everything in sight… Including Dazai who quickly has the smile wiped clean off his face. His expression twisted to one of irritation and despair. He whines.
“Chuuya!! You could have used your power to cover both of us!!” He complains. Chuuya can't help but chuckle at the karma, bringing a hand to his face, “Suppose that's what you get for being irritating-”.
His victory is cut short when Dazai glares and grabs him, nullifying his ability. Chuuya gasps as he is similarly quickly drenched in water.
He seethed his face going red, “You fucker! Get off me!” He tries to shove him off but Dazai clings to him. They shove and kick and childishly fight with each other in the rain. “Absolutely not! If I'm getting drenched, so are you!” Dazai refuses to let go. They push and shove for a long moment. “You bastard! Let go!” Chuuya keeps shoving.
He can't actually hurt Dazai, otherwise the truce would be over. It would break the agreement, but by god did he really want to hit him.
Clearly the weather took a turn for the worst, when the storm suddenly brought lightning along with it.
There was no warning, just a sudden loud crackle and snap that hit somewhere not too far away from them. Chuuya felt his heart drop.
He startled just slightly. Although if he put no effort at all into concealing his discomfort he would have flinched way worse. His eyes go slightly wide and he completely stops for a moment.
He doesn't even notice as Dazai finally lets go. Smoothing out his coat and then tilting his head to the side curiously. Chuuya swore there was a loud ringing in his ears, like all he could hear was static.
Dazai actually looks somewhat concerned but Chuuya doesn't seem to notice. His eyes were unable to peel themselves from the spot the lightning struck. It's not “Almost hit them” close but all the same, way too close for comfort. His breath catches. Dazai snaps a finger in front of his face.
“Chuuyaaaaa! As much as dying by lightning would be an interesting way to go, I have no desire to die here with you, we need to find some kind of shelter” Dazai explains, way less mockingly than before, more just straightforward and blunt. A genuine attempt to snap Chuuya out of it.
Chuuya blinks before glaring at him. His hands ball into tight shaking fists at his sides. “I know that!” He says in an uncanny angry tone. It seems to lack his usual confidence and fire. Angry like a cornered animal rather than actually truly pissed off.
Dazai knows about Chuuyas past. So he figured a normal human like him would probably end up with some sort of aversion to anything electrical after that.
He also knew Chuuya probably wouldn't feel comforted right now by conventional means. He'd certainly think he was patronising him, so he'd make sure he's alright by being reliable. He never used to care this much. But now Dazai finds that maybe he has learnt a thing or two from being in the detective agency.
He grabs Chuuya's hand and drags him forward, “Come along Chuuya! I'm sure if I remember correctly there was a safe house maybe 15 minutes from here” Dazai takes the lead in Dragging the unusually quiet Chuuya away from where his feet were practically glued to the floor.
He doesn't miss the way that when thunderstruck after the lightning Chuuya noticeably flinches. His hand twitching against his, he had been counting since the last lightning strike. It had been 24 seconds which wasn't good for them in the slightest, but he certainly wasn't going to tell Chuuya that.
They walk for about 10 minutes in silence, and every time thunder could be heard Chuuya flinches worse than before. His composure became hard to keep up.
At this rate he's just glad Dazai remembered where a safe house would be. That and the fact he's become noticeably more tolerable.
Lightning strikes again, the sky lighting up and a loud crackle and bang ring in his ears. It was definitely still close this time and he felt his anxiety worsen, his breathing getting faster and faster. He hates it but he hates the prospect of going through that much pain again even more.
Dazai stops where he is and tries to make sure Chuuya's still moving. He looks disconcerted when he turns to face him and Chuuya looks really freaked out. Dazai doesn't think it suits him, “Chuuya? Chuu, come on it's not far now, there probably won't even be any more lighting till we're indoors” Dazai catches Chuuya extremely off guard and he doesn't know what to think.
Chuuya grabs Dazai's wrist trying to as fast as possible regain himself, and while still trying to catch his breath says, “Fine… I'm fine, we're wasting time”.
Dazai nods “Right, okay come on” He continues to lead the way. They make it to the house shortly after and Dazai quickly retrieves the key from where it was hidden and slips it into the lock, it clicks open when he twists and pushes the door.
It's dark inside. Clearly having not been used by the mafia for years now, Chuuya goes in first and leans against the wall with a sigh. Dazai shuts the door and fiddles with the light switch for a second, flicking it a couple times before humming. “The powers out”. Chuuya groans in irritation and exhaustion “Your kidding?”.
Dazai quickly wanders around, picking up old stuff and looking around, not too keen to sit around doing nothing at all. “Hey Chuuya! Look at this, some of our stuff is still here” Chuuya doesn't really respond more than just an uninterested hum of acknowledgement.
Chuuya leans against the door and catches his breath, he hates this, he's used to thunderstorms when they happen and he's at home, alone and can therefore deal with whatever breakdown he has alone, he doesn't need nor want help.
Dazai walks back from presumably wandering to the bathroom, because when he returns Chuuya gets a towel thrown at his head. In the midst of his panic he almost forgot they got drenched in that rain. He's calm for a moment. He dries his hair with the towel so it's no longer dribbling.
A particularly loud lighting strike nearby finally got to him. Maybe it was the fact that he'd just calmed down, albeit slightly or that it was Weirdly louder than the other ones as it echoed throughout the house but it was bad.
Even Dazai startled ever so slightly. Chuuya however flinched rather badly and slumped against the wall breathing heavily. He glared at the floor for a split second before his eyes squeezed shut, god damn it! Why can't he get it together and just breathe again.
He knows logically he isn't in any real danger anymore and yet his body seems to be forced into fight or flight mode. His heart sinking uncontrollably, and his lungs feeling like no matter how much air he breathes in, he's not breathing at all. He's just so sick and tired of his own body and mind betraying him.
He feels a soft nudge at his shoulder, no voice accompanying it but he knows exactly who it is. And that someone is a person he has very complicated feelings about.
On one hand he's the most irritating man he's ever met in his life, on the other, he's the one that held him and let him sleep after he fought a dragon for him. On some level he knows he's safe around him.
He swats the familiar scrawny bandaged wrist away from him “Don’t- Don't touch me…” His breathing is ruining everything, he can't even sound the way he wants to, his voice shakes uncontrollably. Not at all giving off the confidence he wanted.
He finds himself sliding fully down the wall, his breathing only getting faster at another loud thunder crackle, he digs his palms into the hard wooden floor in an attempt to ground himself, he hates this, he hates it! He-
“Okay, I won't touch you… could you open your eyes at least?” Dazai asks, his calm serious voice is… weirdly grounding in of itself. It's not overly comforting like you'd expect, but it's caring in a different way, a way that makes Chuuya's heart ache painfully. He looks up glaring.
The feeling of being taken care of and having someone help him is something he feels that he'd never get used to.
His breathing doesn't get any better however, hyperventilating badly. He tears up, suddenly squeezing his eyes shut again. At this point he forgets himself for a moment, truly just caught up in the panic.
Dazai goes slightly wide eyed, “Hey? Chuuya?” he'd only ever seen him cry a small amount of times. All when they were teenagers and he'd certainly not reacted how he was supposed to. No wonder Chuuya thinks he doesn't care. He hates this, and he doesn't have the time now to address the fact that yeah, Chuuya crying hurts to watch.
Chuuya just curls up more and his hands find their way to his hair. Intertwining and yanking at the fiery ginger strands. At this rate he's stopped caring that Dazai was here, he just wants it to stop. Fuck it, it isn't like Dazai could use this against him, he'd had many more mental breakdowns that Chuuya helped with. He could have this one moment.
Dazai wouldn't dare use this against him with all the far more extreme breakdowns Dazai had that Chuuya witnessed.
Chuuya's breath hiccups and he shakily mumbles, “I want it to stop…” He keeps hyperventilating and Dazai is at a loss. He tries to grab Chuuya's shoulder again and Chuuya doesn't stop him this time, “Chuuya?” He doesn't respond.
Dazai hesitantly and carefully cups his hand over Chuuya's clenched one and tries to coax him into letting go of the strands, squeezing his hand lightly. “Chuuya, you need to let go”.
To his surprise he lets him, carefully pulling his hands down. He does the same for the other one, and by the time he does that Chuuya's hands are in his. Chuuya is left mostly just sniffling by this point. So physical constant was definitely helping, even if he would deny it to the sun and back. “It's going to happen again”. Chuuya mumbles.
At this point Dazai wasn't sure what he meant by that, whether he meant there's going to be more lighting. Or that he's out of it enough to think he'd be experimented on again. His heart hurts in an uncomfortable way.
Before learning how to actually help Atsushi with his panic attacks, he probably would have hit him to snap him out of it. Maybe he really has gone soft. At least odasaku would be proud. He's gotten far better at helping the people who had also helped him.
Dazai sits beside him and shifts Chuuya forward slightly then pulls him into his arms. He hugs him tightly, pressing Chuuya's back against his chest and pressing his face into his soft hair. God had he wanted an excuse to touch it.
He runs a hand down Chuuya's arm. “You know the lightning hasn't struck for a while, it'll probably stop for good soon”.
Chuuya doesn't really say anything in response, seemingly needing a minute, his breathing still struggles, but not as panicked as before, more just in the process of calming down again. They just sit in an odd comfortable silence.
After a couple minutes Chuuya becomes more aware of his surroundings and their current position but is too exhausted to want to do anything about it. He just slumps his head forward slightly. “The fuck are you doing?” Dazai doesn't move at all and simply responds “Hm? …Trying to calm you down, and I think it's working”.
Chuuya is about to deny it but part of him doesn't want to, he isn't sure if Dazai would let go if he did, and honestly he wanted the excuse to stay. He misses Dazai more than he even knows himself. “Well I don't know about that…” He mumbles.
“Chuuya is no fun when he's so out of it, I Prefer when you're not like that” Dazai mumbles back. Chuuya blinks dumbfounded for a moment, the fuck did he mean by that? Was it an insult? or a very long winded way of saying that he likes Chuuya when he's not hurting, or that he likes Chuuya in general.
The insane lack of communication has become such a staple in their dynamic that neither of them have the strength to break, stuck in a cycle of bickering like an old married couple to actually caring when the other is hurt. Chuuya himself has found time and time again that the second Dazai is actually hurt, he cares more than he wants to.
Maybe one day they'd actually talk about this, but for now they can just enjoy the moment like many others before it for what it is. A strange sense of trust and safety.
Eventually Chuuya shivers and pushes away, “Gross, we're still soaking wet…” Dazai frowns before laughing in response. “Well like I said earlier, we still left some stuff here. But I'm not going to fit into my 15 year old self's clothes! Won't be a problem for you at all!” Chuuya glares at him, “Hey!”
Dazai laughs more, “I'm not exactly wrong though!”. They start bickering and Childishly fighting with each other completely ignoring everything that just happened. A routine they are both used to, and neither ever knowledges.