Chrysanthemum Garden [Dazai x Reader] ✓

Epilogue

Kunikida shook his head and picked his notebook from the desk, shutting it reluctantly in his pale knuckles before clearing his throat and turning his laptop off.

'My emotional psyche should have no interference with my work,' the older male replied, alternating his gaze between the desk beside him that had once sat their newest member and the one set in front of him where his "waste of bandages" partner was seldom found sitting at, regardless of the occasion. 'A government worker has arranged to meet with the Agency, so kindly, whenever you're ready, head down to the –'

'Ready? I'll follow right behind you –' – Kunikida held out his palm as a way to deter the albino from taking any more steps forward, giving him the excuse that he was not ready for the meeting the Agency was to attend shortly. 'Is something wrong, Kunikida...?'

Without providing him with a response, the addressed male stalked his way out of the office reluctantly and pulled the door closed behind him, thus leaving Atsushi stranded in a life-lacking office.

The vivid green tiles seemed to have given up their beam despite being recently mopped, and the wine-coloured wooden desks looked far too abandoned despite their polished surfaces enchanting the eye of any beholder.

A morbid fear sprouted inside Atsushi – one he could only justify to have been the result of finding a neatly folded piece of paper laying dormant on Dazai's desk beside a clear zip-lock bag with specs of grey grains from dry ashes.

'Ashes?' the boy questioned in disbelief, squinting at the bag while letting its plastic material dance on his fingers as if it were a shapeable liquid.

It was with the aid of an intrusive thought that his heart stopped momentarily.

Were these... Dazai and [Y/N]'s... No, he couldn't be holding their... They couldn't be – no... Just the previous day he had seen them, up and about procrastinating their paperwork as they always did... plotting a new way to annoy the blond male that Atsushi had noticed to have been crying today...

His anxious fingers slid towards the paper left before him – the temptation to shred it to bits for being responsible for the grim aura now inhabiting the office was ringing far too loudly inside him, but he fought against it.

Atsushi could not read due to his sight being blurred with unsolicited tears... but he forced himself nonetheless... he forced himself because in this paper were the words of two people he may never come to hear from again...

Dear Armed Detective Agency (our colleagues),

We'd first and foremost like to address our absence from work; our gratitude is immense for being permitted a day off work to visit a lost friend on their birthday; by the time you're reading this, you may have noticed that several chrysanthemums buds are missing, thus, you can be assured that we have left early in the morning and headed towards the cemetery before anyone from the Agency arrived. (P.s. Beat that, Kunikida~)

It is not our intention to raise any alarm by those ashes we left behind; neither of us have been cremated, no – we do not seek such pain, no thanks!

These ashes are our last (cut) ties to the Port Mafia... we'll leave it up to you to decide what to do with them, but perhaps we ought to elaborate on its significance a little:

Upon joining the Port Mafia, one is awarded with a firearm of their own; the oldest of the two of us was given a gun with their name embedded on it – Osamu Dazai – and it wasn't until last year that this same weapon was brought into [Y/N]'s possession when she "joined" the Mafia... Well, that shan't no longer matter, for these ashes are the last remains of the gun we burnt down (willingly) with the efficient fire ability the youngest of us yields.