Chuuya POV
Smoke filtered through the air as the city buzzed down below, still alive so late into the night. We didn't say anything to each other as Dazai handed me the cigarette that we've been passing back and forth between the two of us. Nights like these were some of the few where we didn't speak to each other. We didn't fight, just stood here, leaning against the railing of the mafia building, each of us slightly seeming to wonder just how we got to this point.
Of course I know just how I got here. The shitty bastard next to me manipulated everyone into believing I was a traitor so they would throw me away.
What stung the most even after the time that had passed wasn't that he did that, knowing more about Dazai it was almost expected that he'd try something like that. No, what hurt the most was that it worked.
I inhaled some of the smoke slowly, trying to drive those thoughts away. I'm already here, stuck. There's no turning back and going home to the Sheep.
There's no Sheep to go home to.
Anger boiled in the pit of my stomach at the thought, at the memories always threatening to resurface no matter how many times I bury them. I always push the thoughts away, letting them build like a pile of complaints, because I know that there's nothing I can do now to change anything. The only way out of the mafia is death. I'm stuck here until then, with him.
However... contrary to what my anger tells me, the mafia has been good to me. There's always enough food in the kitchen and around the base that I can eat my fill without having to feel guilty about taking too much from the kids around me that need it. The boss gave me my own place to live after the first few months that'd I been here. Now there's always a warm house and a bed to return to. There's people here, that while care might be too strong of a word to use, look out for me. People that don't seem to only keep me around because of my ability.
Even the bandage waste...
I passed the cigarette back to the teen in question before my brain went down a dangerous path that should be avoided at all cost. I let my eyes dance over the Yokohama skyline and my mind wander instead.
Dazai and I, we come out here and smoke together, sharing a cigarette or two, never saying anything. It's a silence that starts heavy, burdened by the reasons for one of us seeking the other out and coming up here to be stuck in one another's company even though the thought of doing so on a normal day would make either of us want to throw ourselves off this very rooftop just for fun. The silence becomes lighter as the time passes. When we're both okay, one of us throws the cigarette away and walks inside, the other tailing behind. No words ever spoken.
It's on nights like these when the memories of the people that I've killed, not just in the mafia, but in the Sheep as well, keep me awake at night. Keep me from falling into another dreamless sleep. I can't go to my few friends in the mafia with these troubles. The Flags are seasoned mafia members despite their young age, they would try to help in some way, but something tells me that it would only make me feel worse.
So I go to Dazai instead.
I hunt him down, normally finding him in his office late into the night. I show him the pack of cigarettes in my hand and wait. The sixteen year old, knee deep in paperwork, will put his pen down without a word and follow me to the roof, never asking what's wrong or why.
Dazai would also seek me out on nights like these. He'll show up with cigarettes and a lighter in his fingers. We'll go to the nearest roof if we're not still at the mafia building, and stay there until the ever fading light comes back into his dark eyes. On these nights, the ones that he comes to find me, there would always be a look on his normally expressionless face. It always looked like he was one wrong word or stray thought away from going against what he said that day at the shipyard. Like he's about to give up on giving living a try.
We pass the cigarette back and forth, breathing in the smoke, until I can see some of the light come back into his ever darkening eyes.
But it doesn't always get that far.
A ringing sound filled the air around us, breaking the silence that had previously presided there. It was the bandaged boy's phone. I could see the younger boy tense up next to me as he reached for the offending phone. The tension in his frame was there one second and gone the next, almost unnoticeable, but I still caught it. I've been Dazai's partner for months now, going on missions with him nearly every week. You'd be hard pressed to find someone that knows him better than I do. Though I may not understand him as well as the boss seems to, I know him. Because of this, I didn't miss the way his eyes got darker when he looked at the caller I.D. either.
I watched in anticipation as the bandaged boy threw the almost finished cigarette over the side of the railing, letting the wind catch and carry it before flipping open the phone and putting it up to his ear.
"Boss," the other teen said in lieu of hello, using a voice so emotionless that I couldn't even be called cold. The boy nodded and hummed in response to whatever Mori said on the other side of the line before hanging up and putting the phone back into whichever pocket he pulled it from this time.
"...We have a new job," Dazai said boredly, still not looking at me.
I could feel the cruel and excited smile tugging at my lips before the words even fully registered. "What is it?"
The other teen sighed tiredly before walking away from the railing to the roof access door, me following closely behind him. "We'll find out when we get there."
My body seemingly buzzed in silent excitement. One thing that I loved about the mafia, despite all of its cruelt and many sleepless nights, it was never boring.
It was a place I could finally let loose.
—-
"Boys, it's been so long," the man in the long dark coat and red scarf said in a sickly sweet voice that no one in the room seemed to believe. The man was standing in front of his desk with his arms opened out wide as if he was asking for a hug. "You should both visit more, Elise gets so lonely." He turned to look at the brunette next to me before continuing. "She'd especially love it if you came, Dazai, help her with her art. We both would love it."
Mori.
It was a pleasant greeting, one much too nice to be given by the body of the Port Mafia to people that aren't even at the sub-executive level yet, but it was still the one given by the doctor. I glanced at Dazai to see if he found this odd too, but all I found was a cold, lifeless, trained look on the suicidal maniac's face.
Right... he gets weird around the boss.
A brief memory filtered across my brain. The day the boss brought me down to the torture chambers in the basement of mafia headquarters. The way he proudly showed off the teen's apathetic, unfeeling look after committing such atrocities as if it was the prize he'd been hoping to get for a long time.
It was almost as if he was showing off his new toy, the newest monster that he had created.
I fought back the urge to roll my eyes at such a useless thought. Both of the other men in the room are dangerous, their brains make them so. Neither of them would ever let themselves be so thoroughly manipulated or changed by others.
The doctor frowned almost childishly at our lack of response.
"... Anyways, I've got a job for the two of you," Mori said after a brief moment. "Nothing too hard, just tracking down some missing weapons of ours."
Dazai crossed his arms across his chest in a disbelieving motion at the words 'nothing too hard' as if he didn't quite believe the boss. I didn't question the response, it wasn't really important whether the boss was telling the truth or not, we still had to do the mission either way. I chose to divert my energy to not looking too bored instead. Meetings are not the least bit interesting, I'd much rather jump straight into the action now.
But not everything can be solved with relentless violence. My first case with Dazai taught me that.
"No weapons have gone missing lately," the bastard observed, uncrossing his bandaged arms as he spoke, "are we talking about from the early days then?"
My eyebrow quirked up on its own. "Early days?"
The boss sighed as if the memories of those days tired him still, whether it was real or not, I don't really know. "Yes, back when I first came into the position of the boss of the Port Mafia. Between the change in power and the old boss's destructive orders at the end, the mafia was much weaker in those days. We got hit by a couple of smaller groups, taking out weapons from us so we couldn't fight back when they tried to take territory."
Thought so... Now I see... this is why we have the case.
Of course I knew all about the actions of those smaller groups, having been in one of them myself. Although the Sheep never broke into the mafia directly to take their weapons, we did intercept a few of their shipments here and there.
"If the weapons are from back then, why wait until now to go after them?" I asked, slightly annoyed that we'd have to poke around my old stomping grounds after being forcibly removed from them by some of the very people in this room.
Dazai sighed in a way closely to how Mori did earlier. "You don't sell weapons just after you steal them if you want to survive," he explained, almost like he was speaking to a child. It made me want to bash the arrogant bastard's teeth in. "You wait until the people you took them from have moved on, stopped looking for them, and began to forget about them altogether. It's safer that way. Even then, sometimes you wait longer so you can sell them when they're worth more."
"Like when an organization has risen to power and all of the smaller ones are now trigger happy, squirming in fear, desperately looking for a way to defend themselves," the boss finished. "Very good, Osamu. I see you've taken the information I've taught you to heart."
There they go again... The boss and the bandage waste's little dance. I guess this is what the Port Mafia classifies as a mentor-mentee relationship.
The boss walked closer to the two of us while pulling something out of his pocket. He held out his hand, palm down, waiting for the brown haired boy to hold out his own. When he finally did, the boss put a thick stack of money into the boy's palm. The whole time, the boss was wearing a sick smile that could almost look benevolent to anyone that doesn't know the things that the man has done.
"There you go. I'm sure you know what to do with all this, boys."
We nodded. It really is quite obvious.
"Bribes, got it," I said, ready to be out of this room. The air was becoming heavier by the second, and while I can manipulate gravity, I'm not as skilled at manipulating emotions as the other two beings in this room.
The boss let us go after that, but not before placing his hand on my shoulder and the other on the stuff that comes with the bandages' back. He pressed down on my shoulder with just enough pressure to tell me that this man was t playing the role of the benign doctor right now, but the mafia boss that I met in this office for the first time all those months ago.
"Play nice," he all but growled. The pressure didn't let up until we both told him that we would.
Dazai couldn't seem to get out of the office fast enough, not that I was all that far behind him.
—-
We trudged our way through the slums and back alleys of Yokohama for the rest of the night, effectively finding nothing for our efforts. Of course I already know who to go to. I know it and Dazai does too, but he's not saying it just yet for whatever Dazai reason he has to prolong this mission.
I sighed heavily, fighting the urge to dart my feet like a small child at the end of the day at a theme park as I saw the sun come up, just beginning to light the early morning sky. I would have done it too, but these shoes are too nice to ruin on a whim.
"Can we at least get coffee while you're playing your little mind games, bastard?"
I looked at the other teen. Always being on his blindsided, I can never quite see his face, but I know he must be tired too.
The jerk sleeps less than I do after all...
The boy in question threw his hand to his chest with an overdramatized gasp before speaking in an overly enthusiastic and offended voice. "How rude! I'm not such a bad owner as to not take care of my pet."
I swung my leg at the other boy, feeling the sting of disappointment when the teen read and dodged my movement easily. "I'm not your dog, you tricky bastard!" I screamed, not caring about the annoyed and strange looks thrown at the two of us by the early morning risers. Anyone up this early, voluntarily, deserves to be annoyed.
"I seem to remember someone losing our little bet," the demon shot back, his voice returning to its normal step above apathetic tone.
"I went back down there after that day, you know. Found that someone had poured some soda on the controls to make them stick!"
My aqusation went unanswered as the accused party all but skipped away, ahead of me.
"Get back here you ugly cyclops bastard!" I yelled, chasing after the bandaged teen. I'd never cop to the tired smile on my lips when I did this, not even if it was that or death.
—-
Dazai POV
Tyson... my little brother...
I managed to put some distance between me and the angry ginger behind me after hearing him yell that. I needed the time to school my features back into place.
The brother that I haven't seen in almost two years...
I shoved whatever train of thought that was threatening to form to the back of my mind, burying everything down so deep inside that it would suffocate and die with time.
It's almost time...
My face was back to its normal expressionless setting by the time that Chibi finally caught up with me.
"I'm going to kill you if we're not getting coffee right now," the ginger boy threatened. I could see him glaring at the slowly lightning sky as if he found the site offensive, not that I blamed the boy.
I made my voice slip into a false cheery tone. "You promise?" I asked, sounding like a little kid on Christmas asking for their favorite sweet.
Maybe... living with Gabe never really did give me a good idea of 'normal' holidays.
The gravity user gave a dismissive wave. "I really will if I don't get something soon."
If I'd been another person I might've laughed, but as it is, I'm not. A part of me can't help but wonder if I'm even capable of such a genuine show of human emotion anymore after these past two years. I could fake ones as well as any other trained mafia soldier though. Not that this situation called for it though. I don't need to fake emotions around the ginger boy, he already knows how much of a monster I am. The only time I do is with jokes like these.
"Aww, you're making me regret coming all the way here already," I cooed childishly at the other boy, leaning down to look at the other while walking backwards.
I watched Chuuya glance around the street we were on like a drug dog looking for the source of the smell. The small teen's face scrunched up in a mixture of disgust and confusion. "Where?"
I simply just pointed, not having the current motivation to do much more after already expending so much energy on walking through the night. There wasn't much energy there to begin with between my aversion to sleep and avoidance of sleep.
Chuuya followed the path that I was pointing with his eyes. The boy's annoyed expression only deepened. "A bookstore?" He asked dangerously.
I kept walking, all but ignoring the fact that Chuuya seemed to have stopped in mute disbelief. "Yes, Chibi. A bookstore. They added a cafe sometime last year," I explained to the teen behind me, not even bothering to look back at the other boy as I turned back around.
Hearing a light patter of footsteps trailing behind me after a moment, I slowed down my pace to let the other catch up to me. We walked through the store door together, Chuuya holding the door open with his foot for me.
The heavy aroma of coffee was the first thing to set me on edge. It's never really been a smell that I liked all that much between Gabe drinking it every morning to deal with his perpetual hangover and Mom trying to keep herself awake for all the extra shifts. It didn't bring back any pleasant memories to say the least, but at least I know we're in the right place.
Chuuya rushed past my side to the small cafe in the corner of the store, pulling his money out along the way. It was a small childlike move on his part, but I couldn't help but find it fitting.
This is how sixteen year olds should act.
In another world I would've stood here watching the smaller teen with a smile on my face. Maybe I would've even gone up there and stood with him while he ordered. But I'm still me no matter how much I hate the person I've become, that's a fact I can't just change. I'm the boy that can't smile or stand anyone's touch. The monster that torments even the mafia boss's nightmares. The bastard that can't even be classified as human by anyone's standards.
The Demon Prodigy... such a fitting name I suppose.
I left the boy alone at the counter instead, going to roam the shelves of the book store in the small amount of time we have till we need to leave. It didn't take long for my feet to carry me to the mythology section of the store. I felt almost like a child drawn to the pictures of their parents in the school trophy case, not that I had much experience with that either.
Most of the books, I noticed glumly, were Japanese myths. While those might prove to be interesting to read for leisure if I was such a person, they were useless for anything else. As it stands to date, the beings of Japanese mythology haven't made any contact with me. There wasn't really any need to waste energy on a nonexistent threat.
I almost gave up on this section of books when something caught my attention out of the corner of the unbandaged eye.
Greek.
The words on the spine of one of the books were in Greek.
I crouched down and grabbed the book from the bottom shelf, a triumphant sneer carved into my face at the words on the cover: Greek Myths and Legends
Found you.
Walking over to checkout, I saw Chuuya sitting down at one of the tables near the center back of the room. It was a good spot to choose, one that would let him easily see all of the small shop without looking suspicious.
Good, he's learning well.
The woman at the counter, the store owner, greeted me with a pleasant smile that soon turned lopsided as she soon stared at my face for a moment too long, confusion written all over her's. She seemed to have mentality written herself off as she stared at me for a beat longer before fixing her expression.
"Good morning, sir. Find everything you need?" She asked, sliding the book I'd put on the counter towards herself and scanning it.
It really wasn't her fault that she was so confused, I wouldn't have recognized me either if I were her. She was the same woman, and this the same store, that I bought my suicide manual from close to two years ago. Back then I was wearing a camp shirt and looked like a foreigner. Now I had on nice clothes and too many bandages to count. I look like a completely different person from the child back then, though I suppose that was the point.
I paid quickly for the book before slipping it into one of the many pockets in the coat that he gave me before walking over to the red head and sitting in the seat on his left.
"What'd you get?" The other teen asked in what seemed to be slight curiosity between sips.
"Just another suicide manual," I lied easily. "Can never have too many."
The way Chuuya sat his cup down on the table seemed to say otherwise.
"If you're done with that, let's go," I told him in a cold voice.
I could hear him shift at my side, turning his body towards mine. I fought back the urge to move away from the other boy. "Where?" He asked, clearly annoyed. "We just searched all night and found nothing."
He was wrong though, we found everything we needed during our earlier escapade through the district streets.
I stood up, smoothing out the nonexistent wrinkles from my clothes. "Come on, we have a Sunrise Auction to attend."
The teen sent me a questioning look that I promptly ignored.
It's time to get to work.