Chapter Text
The song pealed out of the car speakers, accompanied by a grating, annoying voice.
Love me, hate me,
Say what you want about me,
But all of the boys and all of the girls
Are begging to If You Seek-
The music abruptly stops following Chuuya aggressively punching the stop button on the radio. Immediately a slimy mackerel starts fussing and whining.
“Chuuuyaaa, do you have no taste? Put it back on! Put it on! Put it-
Just as the rat named Dazai tried to get his filthy fingers on the play button, Chuuya swiftly smacked his hand away and pushed him back to sit still in the car seat.
“You fucking bastard, get your hands off my damn radio!” Chuuya screamed with impeccable patience.
“What did Queen Brit ever do to you, slug!?”, the pest groaned.
“She did nothing. You, however, make me want to kill myself! My ears are gonna seriously start bleeding!”
Dazai then promptly gasped in a theatrical manner, clutching his chest. “Suicide is my thing! Just so you know, I won’t commit double suicide with you. You are far too ugly.”
“Didn’t plan on it” Chuuya grumbled in annoyance, “We just completed a week long mission, I’m exhausted, so shut the fuck up. I just wanna get home and sleep for two days.”
“The mission was boooring, Chuuya. I’m bored out of my mind.”
Chuuya felt his eye twitch as his grip on the steering wheel tightened. “Don’t care.”
He sighed. He was seriously too tired to bicker with the bandaged freak. Even as the aforementioned freak wiggled around in his seat and poked him, his resolve to ignore him was strong.
‘It’s harder than it looks. I wanna punch his teeth in.’
After Dazai bugged Chuuya for five minutes straight without provoking a reaction, he finally resigned and slumped in his seat, crossing his arms and pouting like a petulant child.
‘Fucking finally.’
The thought that he should start ignoring Dazai every time he was being an annoying cockroach passed through his mind, but was quickly discarded. He was being realistic, is all. He has a really short temper.
Chuuya internally sighed in relief after the car was finally silent. His body ached from all the physical strain he was put through during their assigned mission. He didn’t mind being the fighting force of Double Black. A good fight always made him pumped up. Doesn’t mean he likes the painful aftermath. Their mission was longer than usual, after all.
He drove mindlessly on the snow-covered road, thinking of his warm bed waiting for him in Yokohama. Now that he thought about it, the mackerel still lived in that shipping container, right? He never understood why he had to live there. He let himself feel bad about it for about two seconds, then rolled his eyes. ‘Sucks to suck.’
The drive continued for ten more minutes, before the car abruptly stopped.
“Huh?”
Chuuya stepped on the gas pedal with all his might. The car did not budge.
“Damn it!”
The bastard sitting next to him started snickering. “It seems your tire deflated. How horrible.” He giggled some more, covering his grin with his hand.
“You fucking asshole! Did you do this?!” Chuuya yelled, suddenly gaining his energy back in an instant.
“Literally why would I do that? You think I want to spend more time than necessary with a tiny hatrack like you? No way. I just like seeing you mad!”
Chuuya slammed his head against the steering wheel and gripped it like a life force, so he doesn’t actually go insane.
“I’m going out to check the tire, and you’re going with me.” He gritted out, glaring at Dazai.
Mackerel scoffed and crossed his arms. “No way. It’s your car. Not my problem.”
“I don’t care!”
Chuuya indignantly opened the car door, then went around and opened the passenger one. He grabbed the stupid smelly thing and yanked him out.
“Hey!”
“You’re helping me out. I drove us all the way here. If it was you behind the wheel, we would’ve crashed into a tree an hour ago.”
‘To be honest, I don’t need his help. But he should learn his place.’
“How do you store all that rage in your short little stature? I think you’re going to burst like a balloon one day. That would be so awesome.” Dazai snickered.
“Shut the fuck up!” Chuuya screamed and crouched down to see the tire, trying to ignore the idiot beside him that started grumbling to himself about tiny slugs and angry disobedient dogs.
Yep, it was definitely deflated.
He stood up straight with a sigh and reached in his pocket for a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He lit one up and took a deep breath in.
“I thought you would change the tire, doggy.” Said Dazai irritably.
“I’ll get to it, be quiet.” Chuuya took another hit, then turned to open the trunk, cigarette still in hand. Thankfully, it was empty aside from their bags, so the tire was easy to reach. He pulled it out and then reached for the lug wrench. This was going to be annoying.
He put the cigarette in his mouth, then activated his ability to get the car on the side of the road. He didn’t have a jack, but thankfully he wouldn’t have a problem lifting the car to switch the tire.
As he set the floating car back on the ground, he turned to check on the suspiciously quiet Dazai.
Chuuya’s eyes settled on Dazai, that was definitely standing a greater distance from him than before. He was just still, further in the forest on the sidelines of the road. He looked deep in thought.
“Dazai! You bastard! Get back here!” Chuuya yelled. The mackerel didn’t move an inch.
“God fucking damn it…” he grumbled to himself and started striding to where Dazai was standing still as a statue.
The thick, white snow squeaked beneath his boots as he walked up a slight hill. He was already standing out in the freezing cold far too long for comfort, and he shivered as the icy wind whipped him in the face.
He finally got to Dazai-
“You slime, stop wandering-“
-when he finally took notice of what was in front of him. Seems like Dazai had a reason to stand thoughtfully pondering like an idiot in the middle of the snow, after all.
“Huh.”
In front if them stood a child. Now, everything about this situation was plain wrong.
The boy stood eerily still. He had pale, white hair, and the strangest eyes Chuuya had ever seen- both irises donned with violet and yellow. He was in what looked like ripped pajama-rags. Perhaps a uniform? It was too ripped and ragged to tell. He was in thin slippers, just standing there on the side of the road, in the middle of nowhere, that was engulfed in snow white.
Now, that wasn’t even the strangest thing.
No, this child was covered in blood. The substance stayed sticking on his clothes and skin, still looking relatively fresh. There was a notably big splash smudged around his mouth. The boy himself, however, looked uninjured. Except for the nail rammed in his foot, of course. ‘What the fuck.’
“What the fuck?” Chuuya intelligently voiced his thoughts.
The brat in front slightly winced at his words, clenching his fists and tightening his jaw. Chuuya just looked at Dazai with a raised eyebrow, waiting for him to conduct a genius analysis of the situation. Dazai looked back at him, his lips pursed.
“I swear, I didn’t do anything. He was already like this.”
‘I guess Dazai is just as clueless as I am, then. Or he’s playing stupid.’
“I know that, stupid. Shut up.”
Chuuya diverted his attention to the boy in front. “Who are you, brat? And why do you look like you spent a vacation in a slaughterhouse?”
“How elegant, slug.” Dazai deadpanned.
Chuuya threw him an annoyed look but otherwise stayed silent to hear the answer to his question, dragging an inhale of his cigarette.
The boy looked.
And looked.
“Please don’t hurt me.”
The mackerel beside him released an amused huff. Chuuya just profoundly frowned.
“We’re not here to bend your bones, kid.” Dazai started with an amused tone, “Dealing with brats doesn’t particularly excite me. However, you are in the middle of assfuck nowhere covered head to toe with blood and a nail wedged in your foot, so forgive me for being a little curious.”
The kid’s expression turned stumped. He looked down at his clothes and skin, eyes widening when met with the absurd amount of blood adorning them. Like he honest to God just noticed.
It hurt him to look at this child. It was obvious that he was abused. Dazai surely must’ve noticed as much, too.
Suddenly, Chuuya could feel the air shift its pressure from beside him. He turned to look at his partner, to be met with his ‘I’m pondering shut up’ expression. It was barely a shift in the eyebrows, but its weight was intense. Dazai had a theory. Chuuya deliberated if this was about to be one of those moments where their mafia work prolonged with a random occurrence and promptly shivered.
‘Definitely.’
-
Dazai looked at the poor, pitiful thing. Not one person’s heart beat for him. No church or merciful holy servant could scrub open the carvings of foolish people from his tousled soul.
That is something he could observe the moment he looked at the boy.
He peered into his eyes, like he always did when met with a human, his sinful hunger for knowledge crawling to the surface like a cunning trichinella.
And his eyes met the boys’,
And he felt repulsion wash over him like a cold, wet blanket.
The boy’s eyes were so painfully alike the ones he saw every day in the reflection, so empty, like gaping holes leading nowhere.
This could not be a human. Because the boy is him.
Who would’ve known a trip with a slug would lead to meeting a pretend-person in the snow?
On that note, it is a snowy day in these forest clad hills of Japan. And yet, the boy showed no signs of the cold weather eating at his skin. No blue fingertips, or dry skin. The boy was barely shivering and seemed lucid enough despite the fact that he was out in the cold in what could barely be considered clothes, for two days at least considering the state of his rags and the splotched dry blood covering him.
He was cold, and pathetic,
But his skin was left innocent, barring the nail pierced foot.
He should be hurt, showing signs of hypothermia. But he was in way better shape than expected of the cold. There was something up with the lad, and he wanted to find out what.
Dazai let out a thoughtful hum. “Boy, what’s your name?”
The child looked at him apprehensively and pressed his nails to his palms tightly.
“Nakajima Atsushi.” He said, barely above a whisper.
Dazai clapped his hands theatrically. The boy inched backwards. “Well, Nakajima-kun-“
“Atsushi.”
“Atsushi-kun!”, Dazai continued, “Do you mind answering some teeny-weeny questions? It’s mutually beneficial, pinky promise.”
A look of terror flashed in the boy’s eyes. “Um, uh, okay?”
“Sweet!” Dazai exclaimed, “Then, Atsushi-kun, where are you from? You are pretty far from civilization, you know. Your parents must be worried.”
“Yeah, like you give a damn.” said the little bastard next to him, giving him the stink eye.
Dazai ignored him and looked on with slapped on cheer to the boy.
Atsushi seemed dejected by the question. “I lived in an orphanage. I do not have parents.”
“I see. ‘Lived’, you say?”
Atsushi paused slightly, seeming in thought. “I ran away… I think.”
“Ya ‘think’?” asked Chuuya.
“I don’t remember.” The boy stopped. “I don’t even know why I’m covered in blood. I don’t want to go back.”
Now that was interesting. The pieces were connecting.
“And how long ago did you leave?” Dazai prodded.
“… It feels like two days ago.”
Chuuya’s eyes widened. “That shouldn’t be possible. You’d be dead in this cold. Not to mention that wound on your foot.”
The smoke from the hatrack’s cigarette crawled across Atsushi’s face.
Chuuya clicked his tongue. “Damn, I’m sorry. I should put the cig out, huh?”
“You really should, Chuuya. Very inappropriate.” Dazai said from beside him.
“It’s fine. Adults smoke. So long as you don’t put it out on me.”
Chuuya felt a little smug with the brat assuming that he was an adult, considering both he and Dazai were merely 16. The rest of the sentence caught up with him in a flash, however.
“What? I won’t put it out on you kid, what the fuck. I’m not the devil.”
Atsushi just shrugged lamely.
Dazai from then on tuned them out to think. Dazai knows the mapping of this area, for this is not his first time traveling along this road.
The closest orphanage to this place was 26 miles away. That’s an approximately 30 minute drive by car. The travel on foot would take over 9 hours, without stopping, and that’s on good weather. The weather was not good, not for the last week. It was snowing hell the entire time. The boy is malnourished, and has a nail rammed in his foot. In these conditions, there was no way he would trudge over 2 miles, let alone 26. He walked for 26 miles in the dead of winter with an impaled foot, and his body seemed uninjured by the cold, aside from ruddy cheeks and shivers.
‘This boy is an ability user, no doubt,’ Dazai thought.
It was likely a strength-enhancing ability, with healing factors, though apparent by the scars visible beneath the gore it was a recent development. His healing is likely a subconscious thing, and when his ability is activated in full, his memory from it is either erased or he has no control over it at all. Atsushi probably used his ability to escape the orphanage by unconsciously raving carnage on the caretakers, made obvious by the blood covering him. But he doesn’t know where the blood came from, nor does he seem aware of his healing.
Which means he has no idea he has an ability.
Dazai shifted his intruding gaze to the boy’s injured foot.
There was one way to test his theory.
“Atsushi-kun.” He spoke up, “Do you know what an ability is?”
“Hah?” Chuuya looked at Dazai with a clear question in his expression.
Atsushi furrowed his brows. “No.” He responded, seeming terrified of having given a wrong response.
Dazai hummed. “Do you mind if I take a look at your injury? Maybe I can help.”
“Mackerel.” Chuuya spoke up, sounding like a broomstick found its way up his ass.
“Slug.” Dazai responded smartly, but he gave the hatrack an indicating look. Trust me.
“…”
After a bout of cerebrating, the kid announced tersely, “Okay.”
Dazai crouched down in front of Atsushi, inspecting the nail in his foot.
“Does it hurt?”
“Like hell.” said the child vehemently, his expression displayed more passionate and haunting than it ever did throughout their conversation.
The boy crouching in front of Atsushi chewed on his thoughts for a moment.
“Clench your teeth, Atsushi-kun. I’ll help you stop hurting; however, the pain you will feel briefly will be more punishing than the hurt you feel now.”
Atsushi’s eyes widened to the size of plate saucers, and shivers not correlated to the crisp weather in the slightest engulfed his body.
Chuuya turned to Dazai with a furious look.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, you ass?!”
“No, stop. I don’t- Please- “
The protests were cut off like a swift swipe of a knife when Dazai pulled out the nail, harsh and quick.
And then,
Screaming so intense that it pierced the air around them. Sorrowful, miserable screams and wails bouncing off of all surfaces, a truly pitiful display.
Blood sprayed mercilessly upon the pure white snow, a repulsive contrast.
“What the hell, you fucking psycho!? Are you really that mentally deranged to- “
“Slug, shut the hell up and look.”
The doggy lowered his head with ire to look at what Dazai was pointing out.
The kid was bending towards himself embracing his trembling form, looking ready to collapse. Yet he still stayed standing, and his foot was visible to the eye.
The foot that was graced with a gruesome wound. That same wound was closing with a speed not achievable by the ordinary, a pale blue light seeping through.
Chuuya gaped, words escaping him for a moment. He quickly understood.
“An ability. He has an ability.”
Atsushi halted his screaming, only choked up gasps escaping him. Tears streamed down his cheeks, a painful flood. He then looked at the ground, gripping his arms with so much force one could only assume he was close to ripping the flesh to shreds.
Upon fixing his gaze below, his gaze turned stumped, his brows furrowed. He could only gape at the wound already vanished with astonishment.
“…My foot…”
“Is healed.” Finished the bandaged boy for him. “Congratulations, Atsushi-kun. You have an ability.”