TW for suicide attempt!!! moderately graphic!!
-------------
"Where the hell is Dazai, and what happened between him and that All for One bastard?" Chuuya demands, voice loud and clear, entering Mori's office almost rudely. "It's been a week since he left."
Mori smiles like it's a long gone joke, though he isn't worried in the slightest. This makes Chuuya falter. Should he really be questioning the boss of the Port Mafia, after he's worked so hard to protect the city? It could easily be one of Dazai's stunts, but -
But he knows that bastard better than anyone else. He knows something has happened; his friend Sakaguchi Ango has been labelled as a traitor to the Port Mafia and Oda Sakunosuke is dead.
"I had a feeling you'd ask. Let's sit. You wouldn't make this old man stand around, would you?" Mori says. He sits himself in the plush red armchair that he would frequently use, and gestures for Chuuya to drag another over.
He complies, easily, because this man is the same one whom he pledges his allegiance to, no matter how angry or confused he might be.
"I've been real suspicious about how that suicidal idiot managed to trick a 200-year-old megavillain." Chuuya crosses his arms tightly, the exact opposite stance of Mori, who looks almost amused.
"I never doubted Dazai's capability." Mori's eyes twinkle. "Garaki Kyudai. He's the only member of the League of Villains still alive, and unfortunately, the creator of what the public calls Nomu. Now... it would be about six years now, but Dazai had an encounter with him and All for One, which they seized guardianship of him for a while under the law's nose. They were fascinated by his ability. As you can imagine, it is rather rare. Garaki had begun blueprints to construct a prototype for this 'nomu' and was hoping to include Dazai in it." Mori pauses, watching Chuuya's scowl. He knows he shouldn't look like this in front of his boss.
"What did they do to him?" Chuuya asks, a frown tugging at his lips. He's unusually calm when hearing about this, but he listens to the events with a sick sense of curiosity and rage burning in the back of his mind.
It's an invasion of privacy, and Chuuya knows it, but Dazai already knows everything that happened to him. He'll deal with the consequences if he ever even sees him again.
"All sorts of experiments transpired, I assume. The man possessed a rather horrifying meticulous nature. The reason his right eye is covered is because of that duo." Mori shakes his head, perhaps in some sympathy - false or not. "Dazai escaped the place he was being kept the night All for One battled All Might. It had been about two months since I had last seen him, but I aided his escape, stealing all the information and recordings that Garaki had collected. I concluded that was one of their motives for setting up their factory in Yokohama - to get back at me. And Dazai, he was the perfect bait."
"If you knew from the beginning where the League was, sending Dazai and me away from the source seems counterproductive."
He shared a house with Dazai, drank himself stupid with him, cooked food with him. He had to then live alone in a completely unknown place to him for months.
"It does seem that way. I wasn't sure of everything when I first announced the mission, but I knew I had to lure the masterminds behind the group out anyway. Dazai sat in the spotlight at UA where he was untouched. All for One reached out to him as I predicted, and Dazai knew the two of them well enough from the time he spent with them and easily ensnared them into his mental spiderweb. I taught him everything I know, after all."
"Dazai seemed shocked though. Right after we killed him," Chuuya argues. Dazai was more shaken up than he'd almost ever seen him. His fingers trembled minutely yet he brandished his cunning nature on display for the world to see.
"Yes, well, Dazai didn't know All for One and his tormentor were the same people. With his face melted off, he had no way to tell until he met him in person. Though I'm sure he could've guessed if he tried hard enough. Now Chuuya, you must be wondering, 'What part did I have in all of this?'" Mori says. Chuuya tries to smother his shock at the accurate guess. "Don't worry, your intel was something this plan needed. The League was quite unknown to me. Your information allowed me to accurately predict the timing of the events and factor in the personalities of the members."
Chuuya appreciates the acknowledgement of his skills, even for a moment. Undercover work took a toll on him in a way he wasn't expecting; he's always been surrounded by bloodshed and violence, not nutjobs who enjoy drinking copious amounts of blood like a vampire or burnt-up losers after revenge.
"Dazai's friend is dead. He's gone, right? Oda Sakunosuke did something to ensure that he would leave."
He might hate the man. What right did he have to order Dazai to be good when Dazai was the one who brought him into the mafia in the first place? He's been abandoned again, and Chuuya thinks, does he lose everyone he chases after?
"Oda Sakunosuke was dead before Dazai could reach him. Sakaguchi must have warned him afterwards, which isn't completely unexpected. I'm surprised Dazai had it in him to defect," Mori admits, raking a gloved hand down his face. "It was the ultimate test of his humanity, I suppose. But as I know, to create a monster, you must teach it grief and suffering first."
"Sometimes I just don't get you," Chuuya speaks up. "You're all for the future of Yokohama and the Port Mafia, but you have ruined people's lives like it's a walk in the park."
Mori glances out the window and takes in the city and the port.
"You see, Chuuya, I always focus on the greater good." His hands tap the arm of his chair, a slow pattern.
"Even if you end up having to sacrifice yourself to achieve it?"
The tapping stops.
Mori smiles, something softer than Chuuya has ever seen of his calm and collected boss, and his hands sweep around his office, at all the stacks of paperwork and files. "Well, isn't that what I'm doing now?"
"Boss," Chuuya starts, confused, at a loss for words.
Mori's laugh is airy.
"Ah, 'boss'. It has a ring to it. I never intended to lead the Port Mafia, though I can't find it in myself to regret it."
The notion that Mori Ougai was unshakeable diminished right before Chuuya's eyes, and he found a sort of humanity lurking beneath. Is cruelty really kindness disguised? A perfect leader puts every person above himself, stands tall baring the sins of their men in order to continue each trembling step, to live another day and to fight for the future.
Mori walks to just before the large glass window and looks down upon the entire city. A single finger of his traces the glass.
Although Chuuya thinks he might not be able to forgive his boss for his crime against Dazai six years ago, the profound respect for him that emerged within Chuuya one year ago had barely wavered in the presence of a true leader's burden.
And so he flees with a promise of return.
—---------
His bandages are thicker than they've ever been. Dazai was a fool to believe he had truly experienced hopelessness until Oda lay cold in his arm. He's dead. He's dead - dead -
The knife in his hand clutters to the ground. He watches it gleam in the moonlight that falls through the window of the apartment. It's not the one he's been in these past few months. This one is dingy in the outskirts of Musutafu, somewhere he knows the area of. He distantly recalls being in the area The heroes are searching for him, but so is the mafia, and their influence is weaker outside Yokohama.
He wonders which side he'd rather find him. The heroes, for certain, would lock him up without a second doubt. Maybe he'd become one of the Hero Comission's loyal plants. The mafia, on the other hand, would kill him immediately with three shots to the chest and a shattered jaw. Mori might have something special for him instead, though. He'd rather just die.
A TV illuminates the dark room. It crackles as it plays, an ancient boxy model that came with the apartment. Dazai watches it from his corner of the room, slumped against the wall. He tries to take another swig from the bottle, but it misses, spilling all down his shirt. He doesn't care about the mess. The bottle is brought up to his lips again, this time successfully, and he repeats the benefits without even a smile. Dazai's afraid to look at himself in the mirror in fear of what expression he's making.
Grief is supposed to get better over time, but he thinks whoever said that must have never experienced it. Grief clings to him, weighs his arms down when he reaches for another drink, and trembles in his fingers when he holds the knife. He feels sicker than he's ever felt in his life.
Yet he's thought about himself lately more than he's thought about Odasaku. He's a terribly selfish person. He can't even admit it's something silly like grief, because it must be something more primal and awful than that. It must be a different feeling entirely because he's not human. If he was human, if he was truly grieving, he would be crying for his friend, and he wouldn't be so self-centred. He was not born to love like a human being.
"Hagakure Tooru, a first-year UA student in class 1-A, has recently been declared missing. She has not been seen since the Kamino incident in Yokohama. Dazai Osamu from the same class has also been declared missing since he was kidnapped by the League of Villains during the first year summer camp. This is not looking good for UA, is it? Investigations have led us to believe that Dazai might still be somewhere in Yokohama - "
Dazai throws the almost empty bottle at the screen. It smashes into a thousand tiny pieces, too far away to impact him, but most certainly kills the TV. It splutters then slows to a stop. It's quiet for the first time in a while.
Properly quiet. So quiet indeed that he can feel his heartbeat beating slowly. He shouldn't be alive. He could stop his heart right now, but it would just begin beating again when he eventually passed out. Dazai's metaphorical heart is long gone; It might have slowly rotted inside his chest when he was young. To be young is to be naive, and to be a child is to be free. He is none of those.
Mori got what he wanted, didn't he?
Dazai coughs. He doubles over, clutching his chest, clawing at it like he's going to plunge into his lungs. Dizziness hits him aggressively. It's his punishment for drinking so much, he supposes, but he can't find it in himself to regret it. He still hasn't smoked a single cigarette since Oda died. He curls up into a ball on the cold floor and clutches his head. It's such a pathetic display that he thinks that he would never be able to live with himself if someone saw.
How can Dazai ever be good? What does it mean to live and breathe something besides bloodshed?
He was out of touch, and what a painful feeling it was. There were a thousand maggots of evil under his skin that threatened to crawl out with an empty shell beneath that. That's all he's ever been - an imposter, a terrible monster.
Everything worth wanting is lost the moment he obtains it.
If he had just heeded those words, if he hadn't been so greedy, Odasaku never would had to give up his dream. Dazai would have read his book. He would have read it over and over, to stand behind someone who was brave enough to chase after what they desired. Dazai has always been a coward.
Nothing is more absolute than death. Amidst all the uncertainty of his life, he has heeded those words religiously. He has experienced death secondhand too many times to count.
He's never really wanted to die until now.
And Dazai comes to the realisation
he is utterly alone.
Nobody can stop him
nobody
no one at all.
He can finally commit suicide, just like he's always imagined he would, just like he's dreamed about. It's always been the only thing waiting for him. He can't live without his friend, but he can't live in the darkness either anymore. Oda had reaped that privilege from him.
Because he's supposed to be a good person, he chooses the bathtub. Dazai tries to stumble up, bringing his newest bottle of whiskey (It's what Oda liked, after all. Even more than Dazai ever did) into his hand. He picks up a pocket knife in the other, and he knows it has to hurt. It has to hurt so much that it'll make up for the aberration that he is. A rarity, Mori would say.
He lets the bandages on his arms unwind slowly as he slips toward the bathroom. Every step he takes becomes difficult, a burden on his broken body, forcing him to stabilise himself with every wobbling movement. He can barely see through his warped vision. The only thing that makes itself abundantly clear is the mirage of warm colours that litter the sky in a beautiful sunset. It doesn't matter anymore. Nothing can fill this hole in his heart.
The bathroom is a small, disgusting room, yet Dazai finds himself content among the filth. It has a toilet, sink and bath. It possesses a single window.
The view is of a river. Just a quaint little river with rushing tides, but the ferocity of it reminds Dazai of the ocean. He has a strange fascination with the bottomless pit of it; a vast, lonely body that tends to lap at the sand and rocks, seeking attention. The ocean was a constant in his life near the ports of Yokohama.
Dazai settles into the bath. It's cold despite the rest of the apartment being scorching hot, he can feel it through his shirt and pants. He doesn't bother to fill it up with water, cold or warm. The bottle lies next to him, resting on a bundle of bandages that rest over the edge of the bathtub. They're in various bloody states.
His arms haven't even scarred over yet. Dazai observes them with a sort of detached apathy, that same nothingness gouging out his chest. He picks up the knife. Everything is silent except for the blood in his ears. His fingers continue to tremble, harder than ever, but they never really stopped since he killed All for One. It's like his body knows that this really is the final attempt.
Dazai feels sick.
The knife slides down the vein in his arm. It starts from his wrist, where his bandages would usually start, and keeps climbing. He wishes it didn't hurt, and that's only further proof of his innate selfishness. The other vein is harder.
Fireworks bloom over the city. They're loud and aggressive, contrasting the quiet scene Dazai is in. He bleeds sluggishly and watches the blood slowly drain. It soaks his clothes, but they're already filthy, so it doesn't matter. He's filthy too, and he can't get Oda's blood off his hands no matter how many times he scrubs, and scrubs and scrubs and scrubs -
He's scratching at his palms before he knows it. It's a festival today, one of the many summer ones. The fireworks come in many colours, but the brightest ones are a fiery red, which reminds him of Chuuya's hair. He reaches a hand out toward them. It's too weak to fully leave the tub.
Something slams nearby.
He doesn't want to think about it, so he tries to take hold of the bottle. His hands are too weak to lift it, and he watches it tip over and begin to mingle with the blood in the bath.
Something - someone - scrambles about.
He's always put his trust in the notion that there is a reason to live. That somewhere, out in the vast world, would be something that would truly motivate him.
"Dazai!"
He hears his name being called. His vision is blurring, either from the blood loss or the whiskey, he doesn't know. He doesn't want to answer.
He does, anyway.
"Chuuya."
A head of red hair comes into view. Dazai finds himself laughing, a horrible little sound, at the fact that he got what he was reaching for in the end. He's always been selfish, hasn't he?
Something pushes into the wounds on his arm. He tries to pull away - it hurts, it hurts more than when he made those wounds.
"Stop it. You're not going to - " the person makes a choking noise. " - to die."
At that moment, Dazai realises that the number of people Chuuya has lost greatly exceeds Dazai's.
And soon, he will become another one of those numbers.
"It's okay, Chuuya," Dazai says, slowly, over the noise. "I've been waiting for this for a long time. I think..." he pauses, then speaks quietly. "I've never wanted anything else more."
"Shut up," Chuuya growls. "Shut up!"
He goes for a smile - something reassuring - but he's sure it pulls at all the wrong facial muscles.
Dazai still wants to succeed at this. He's always been selfish, after all.
—--------
His eyes are glazed over. Dazai's eyes are filled with devastation, a hollow emotion. If not for the beating of his heart, Chuuya would have mistaken him for dead already.
The bleeding won't stop. It's already left a trail down to the drain, bloodying up his clothes, his other bandages, yet Chuuya cannot take his eyes off Dazai's own. Not a single person that he knows will treat Dazai because he's defected.
It's hopeless. He's going to watch another person die in front of him. It's hopeless. It's hopeless.
He reaches for the phone he found in a corner of the run-down room. Chuuya doesn't know anyone who could help, but Dazai might.
There are few contacts there, but one catches his eye.
So he calls it, and for the first time, desperately hopes for a Hero.