leo, leonis (Akutagawa x Reader)

Chapter Three

And so, Gin joined her brother in the ranks of the notorious organization. At Dazai's request, a strange and sudden act of kindness on the teenager's part, he had the pair moved into a bigger dorm room. It was more of an apartment than anything else: two bed rooms and a kitchen. Gin had been cleaned up, given a hair cut and new clothes, just like her older brother had.

She had incessantly complained about the short bob she'd been given, swearing that one day she would grow her hair out as long as it had been before. It made Akutagawa smile every time he saw her fussing with it in the mirror because what a luxury it was to have a bad haircut and a mirror to be upset with it in. He was proud, proud that he had managed to keep his promise. Proud that he had been able to give Gin a home, even if it was as a member of the Port Mafia.

A few days in to the beginning of her Mafia career, she too began to train, having been placed under some operative in the special ops division. This only made Akutagawa's pride grow.

Gin gushed about her new mentor, explaining everything in detail about her days and what she was learning to her big brother over the dinner table in the evenings. Before he even realized it, they'd been at the Mafia for nearly a year.

Gin was getting stronger, getting smarter, and so was her older brother. Still, the topic of conversation always ended up back at their mentors. They had such different teaching styles, such opposite ways of being.

"She's so cool, Ryu." Gin insisted through a mouthful of food, "She wears pretty much all black but she has these long white sleeves and when she comes back from a job they are like, covered in blood spatters and stuff and she always has her face covered by a mask and she is so strong! She does all this stuff by herself and she's not much older then me!"

"How old is she?" Akutagawa asked curiously, taking a bite of his own dinner.

"I dunno, probably your age?" Gin shrugged, "It doesn't matter. Did I even tell you the coolest part? She does everything without an ability. She isn't gifted! She is so amazing and... and strong... and just... ahhhh! And she's not gifted! Like..."

"Like you." Akutagawa smiled and Gin nodded happily.

It had been a long time since he'd seen his younger sister so overjoyed and so, he listened to her stories, even when they were ones she had already told him, without complaint.

"I want to be just like her when I grow up. Do you think it'd be weird if I started dressing more like her?"

Akutagawa nearly choked on his food.

"Yes?" he replied indignantly.

Gin shot him a calculating look before shaking her head.

"No." she replied, turning back to her food, "You don't know her. I think she'd probably take it as a compliment. How's your stuff going with Dazai?"

Ever since that day in the ally, Gin had held a quiet sort of reverence for her brother's mentor. Akuatagawa sighed, looking down at his food.

"He... he just wants me to be strong. I just can't seem to stop... I don't know. I feel like nothing I do is ever right with him."

At the feeling of Gin's hand on his, he looked back up across the table at her.

"You'll get it eventually, I know you will." she smiled softly at him, "You're like, the second coolest person I know. There is no way he wont see you for who you are eventually."

"Let me guess," he teased, a smile coming to his face at his sisters kindness, "the coolest person is your mentor there?"

"Yeah." Gin laughed, letting go of his hand and falling back into her seat, "Leo is the coolest. I swear. Did you know yesterday she was quoting the Aeneid from memory to me? In Latin?"

"You know I can do that too, right?" Akutagawa scoffed, eyebrows raised.

"Yeah but like," Gin took a bite of her dinner, "guys are supposed to be able to do stuff like that. Y/n always talks about subverting expectations and how important that is, how when a girl says something smart it can really throw people off so, Arma virumque cano."

"Troiae qui primus ab oris//Italiam" Akutagawa quipped back and Gin's eyes went wide.

"Woah, is that the next part?"

"I told you I knew it too." Akutagawa rolled his eyes.

"Yeah but like... I don't know. I thought you were joking."

Akutagawa laughed lightly, shaking his head slightly in exasperation.

"Still second coolest person I know though."

"Of course I am."

A few days later, Akutagawa was lost in thought as he and Dazai stepped into the elevator on their way to the training rooms. He was finding it odd that, though they seemed to have had the same education and though she trained his sister, though he'd been at the Mafia a year now, he had yet to meet the famed Lion herself.

He had heard rumors of course, stories of her accomplishments, and not just from Gin. He wondered what she was like, if she was really as strong and as kind as Gin made her out to be and if so, how she had survived, how her kindness had lived in this dark place when it had killed that of so many others.

The main elevators in the building were under repair at the moment and Dazai hadn't wanted to take the stairs. With the sheer height of the Mafia's buildings, no one ever did. That's why they were currently in one of the elevators which connected the dorms to the rest of the building, not the offices as was normal.

It came to a shuddering halt and the doors opened. A girl stepped in.

She was not someone he'd seen before. The Mafia was a huge organization so, it wasn't all that odd for him to encounter someone new but, this one caught his attention. She had hesitated when the doors opened before entering, shaking her head slightly in what seemed to be irritation.

As the doors closed, Akutagawa turned to look at her. Her h/c hair was loose and a little wild where it had been tucked behind her ears and she wore loose fitting grey sweatpants and a tank top, a laundry basket balanced on her hip. He watched her blank face carefully, there were bags beneath her eyes and a light smattering of acne on her cheeks. She couldn't have been much older than him. She ran her free hand through her hair with a slight sigh.

"You look well, L/n." Dazai hummed in the same, light tone he always used when he was covertly trying to threaten someone.

The elevator came to a halt once again and the doors opened. She stepped out into the dingy hallway leading to the communal laundry rooms.

"You've always been a bad liar, Dazai." she replied in an icy voice, her back to them.

The doors shut and the elevator continued on its way. Her words echoed through his mind, the coldness of her tone as she had said them.

Dazai? A bad liar?

If Akutagawa knew anything about the man, he knew his harshness and tendency for successful manipulation. If he knew anything, he knew the reverence and respect all other members of the Mafia held towards him, save the erratic red head, Chuuya, whom he worked with on occasion. But Chuuya made sense when he was rude to Dazai, Chuuya was rude to everyone. And besides, the two were friends of a sort and friends teased one another. This had been different, there had been a real anger, a true distaste for the man in her tone.

And Dazai had been different too. She was clearly disrespecting him. The only other times Akutagawa had seen someone disrespect Dazai like that, his mentor had attacked the person, beat them into submission through physical means or threat. Nothing like that had occurred in this case.

"Who was that?" Akutagawa asked, turning to look at his superior who wore a bemused expression.

"My, aren't we a curious one today."