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fyorina · 14 days

Text

ᡣ𐭩 FIRST LIGHT

FEATURING: beast dazai osamu

SUMMARY: dazai severely overestimated his self-control. it takes approximately six days and thirteen hours for him to break, seeking you out again. when he does, he knows that nothing will ever be the same. {wordcount: 14.5k; fem!reader; romance & tragedy}

AUTHOR'S NOTES: PART TWOOOOOOO, we have one of my fav parallels in this one, i know you guys will catch it immediately but u still must tell me when you do. also, there's another hint about badlands!reader & dazai's relationship in this chapter that happened after the events of the last installment so u must let me know if you catch that too. reblogs are always appreciated! thank you guys & i hope you guys love this as much as i enjoyed writing it

GENERAL WARNINGS: again, i'll just leave this warning on every chapter - dazai struggles a lot with disassociation/derealization & losing himself in the pages of the book. + we have a bit more of unhinged thought processes on dazai's end. as always please let me know if i forgot any warnings!

SEE: UNREAL UNEARTH SERIES MASTERLIST READ: BADLANDS SIDE A

He understands now the temptation that Eve must have felt in the Garden of Eden with the forbidden fruit dangling right in front of her face. Traditional interpretation of the Bible places the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden on day six of creation; Dazai’s restraint has thus far rivaled that of the two Biblical figures. He’s on day six now, in fact; it’s been exactly six days, twelve hours and forty six minutes since he met you in the hallway of the club and each passing second has been more agonizing than the last.

He isn’t sure how much longer he’s going to last.

His office is dark and suffocating, the atmosphere so cold and unwelcoming that it has him craving the return to your warm and homely apartment so intensely that he thinks it might be making him sick. He turned off the light earlier when he felt a migraine coming on, hoping that the darkness would let his eyes and mind rest enough to catch it before it fully came on, but he’s realized that it probably wasn’t the light causing his headache, rather it was you.

He sighs as he tilts his head back, willing the migraine to go away even though he knows it's to no avail. But he can’t even rest his eyes in peace, because every time they slide shut, the image of you burns the inside of his eyelids—your soft gaze and bright smile, the way you held your hand out to take his and the way your lashes fluttered as you leaned into his touch.

Six days, twelve hours and forty seven minutes.

He thinks he would prefer the nightmares of his other lives to this. At least with those, they fuel his drive to press forward with his master plan, the reminder of your fates in the other worlds would scorch away any desire to seek you out in fear of bringing it upon you again in this one.

Now, every night for the past six days he’s been plagued with dreams of you—pleasant dreams. Dreams that when he wakes from them, he finds his cheeks wet and his chest heavy with such an intense longing for you that it makes him physically ill. He dreams of having you in his arms, kissing the top of your head as you do your best to study even with him making every effort to distract you. He dreams of watching sunrises with you, seeing the way the early morning colors wash over your face, your skin glowing and eyes glittering in such a vivid way that Dazai swears he can even picture it now. He dreams of a ring, and he dreams of his palms sweating as he walks with you down to the beach you met on to watch another sunrise, and he dreams of getting down on one knee in front of you just as the sun breaks over the horizon. He never dreams of a wedding, so Dazai theorizes that you never made it long enough for one to take place.

And the realization of that alone should be enough to make the yearning for you evaporate but it’s not, because dangerous thoughts have been circulating through his head since the night he left you. Thoughts of how maybe this could be different. Dazai is the boss of the Port Mafia in this life, he has enough resources to protect you—more money than god and enough armed forces behind him to rival the nation’s government. He has the power to keep you safe in this life, more than he ever had in any other.

If there was any life that he could be with you and ensure your safety, it’s this one.

Six days, twelve hours and forty nine minutes.

Does he really want to give this up?

Dazai rests his arms on his desk, lowering his head down, eyes sliding shut again. He can see you again, the image of you from last week, laughing wildly at something he’d said—he can’t even remember what it was, he was so nervous that he can’t even recall half of the night, but he doesn’t really care at all what he said anyway, too enraptured by the way you react to it.

He wonders if you’re there now. At the bar. Because what he does remember, of course, is your teasing grin as you tell him that of course, you’re scheming out a second meeting between the two of you because naturally you’ve decided that you already like him. And he remembers the hope thinly veiled behind your eyes, as you look over him, knowing that if the two of you are to meet again, it would be reliant on whether or not he decides to come back to the club, because you’ve already made your intentions clear.

Six days, twelve hours and fifty minutes.

Dazai’s throat feels swollen, his nails dig into his palms. He imagines you waiting there, he imagines the disappointment on your face as you slowly realize he’s not going to show up. And you’re so damn beautiful, radiant even beneath the shitty lighting of the club—he’s sure you saved a seat at the bar for him, and you’ve probably had dozens of interested men who’ve offered to buy you drinks, asking if you’d come to the club alone. And you’ll probably turn them down at first, telling them that you’re waiting on someone, but he wonders how long it’ll take for you to finally take one of them up on their offer after you’ve realized that Dazai isn’t going to show. He wonders if you’ll follow them out to the dance floor, he wonders if you’ll give them the same teasing smile you gave him. He can picture slim fingers caressing your hips, pulling you closer. He can picture your lashes fluttering as they lean their head down to ghost their lips against your neck, swaying to the music. He doesn’t want to picture anything else, but his mind, as always, betrays him.

He wonders if you’ll take them back to your apartment—would you get right into it or would you sit and talk with them for a while? His head spins as his thoughts take an increasingly more dangerous spiral. It’s a bitter cold night out, maybe you’ll take the opportunity to make them the hot chocolate you’ve made him hundreds of times, thousands of times before—no, he corrects as the lines start to blur in a treacherous way, you’ve never made it for him in this life. Maybe it’s so cold out that you’d forgo small talk altogether, instead seeking out the warmth of someone else’s body—you’d take them by the hand, lead them into your bedroom and lay them back on your bed.

Would you be gentle with them? Like you were with him? No, he reminds himself again, you’ve never been with him like that, not in this life. The pages of the Book pile around him, memories flooding him with an intensity that he’s never experienced before; he can hardly even remember what his reality is, all of the others blending and shifting together in his mind, making it impossible to decipher the lines between them.

You’re dragging him to the beach to watch your first sunrise with him and you’re telling him that you want to see as many as possible with him—he wants to tell you that he thinks he might love you but he doesn’t know how to say it You’re laying him back against a bed, asking him if he trusts you—of course, he does, how is that even a question? You’re leaning your head against his arm, standing before a familiar grave and accepting him for all that he is even after he strips bare down to all of the worst parts of himself for you—you shouldn’t, he wants to say desperately, but instead he’s telling you that he loves you, even though he knows it might kill you. And then-

And then he’s ripped violently from his fall into the pages of the Book as his phone vibrates and it’s not him anymore, it’s someone else, someone unworthy and undeserving, a stranger that you’d turned to because Dazai wasn’t there.

Dazai nearly heaves. He never should have indulged in you that night. He should have known he was never going to go back to normal after it. The difference between the memories and actually having seen you and heard you and touched you and smelt you was so much more severe than he ever could have expected. Now, the memories aren’t enough; he wants a life with you, he wants it to be his reality. He thinks that it’s not fair that he’s the only one who can’t be with you. He wants to make new memories with you so he no longer has to struggle with the blurred lines, so he doesn’t have to yearn for a life that he’ll never be able to experience, having to watch every single other Dazai get to have what he can’t.

Six days, twelve hours and fifty eight minutes.

He can do it, his thoughts are a bit manic as he tries to ground himself after the spiral. He has the knowledge. He has the power. He has the resources. If there’s any life that he’s able to be with you and keep you safe, it’s this one. He doesn’t have to hide from you, he doesn’t have to deny himself of you to protect you—he has the knowledge, he has the power, he has the resources. He can keep you safe. Instead of being the only Dazai who never gets to be with you, he’ll be the only Dazai who can actually spend his life with you—a long one, a happy one. He’ll have what none of them did. He can do it.

Before he can stop himself, he speaks.

“Gin-chan,” Dazai calls softly, knowing that he doesn’t have to speak any louder for the girl to hear him. As soon as he hears the door to the backroom open, he continues with, “Have Albatross be ready downstairs with one of the cars.”

“Of course. Where to, sir?”

To Gin’s credit, she doesn’t sound at all caught off guard by Dazai’s sudden request, as if it’s normal for Dazai to randomly decide to leave the Port Mafia base even though he can count on one hand the number of times he’s left the base since he ascended to the position of boss four years earlier.

“... The club we own in Naka,” Dazai says after a few moments, fingers thrumming against the mahogany of his desk for a moment before he adds, “... Don’t tell Chuuya.”

“... Yes, sir. I’ll have Albatross get everything ready immediately.”

At exactly six days and thirteen hours, Dazai’s self-control shatters.

You sigh.

The seat next to you remains damningly empty despite the many attempts of handsome strangers trying to join you at the bar. You’re sure you must’ve turned down half a dozen by now in hopes that the stranger from last Friday will end up showing up but those hopes are very quickly disappearing. You want to convince yourself that maybe you’ve just missed him—it’s a rather large club, after all—but it’s not half as packed as it was last week; you think that if he were here, you would’ve spotted him by now. Or he would have spotted you.

Dazai Osamu, you remember his name, eyes sliding shut briefly as you take a sip of your water, wondering if you should just switch to alcohol and drink your sorrows away, seek out one of the men who’d approached you already so you don’t end up spending the night alone. The thought leaves you unsatisfied, a pout rising to your lips around the rim of your glass as you finish off yet another glass of water.

You swear that you’re not usually this pathetic—especially not over a man—but there’s just something about this Dazai Osamu that has you acting up. Like honestly, who even are you? Going to the club alone on a Friday night with nothing but some faint hopes that the man you’d met here last week would show up too? It’s so embarrassing, you think you might die—but somehow you’re not embarrassed enough to leave because you’re still hoping that he shows up.

God, you think again, who are you anymore? You barely even know this man. You know his name and you know he’s handsome. And that’s just about it, but here you are, sitting bummed at a club because he isn’t showing even though he has absolutely no reason to.

The bartender raises his eyebrows with a small smile and you pass the glass over to him, letting him refill it. He’s the same one from last week and he recognized you as soon as you took a seat at the bar, making sure to get you what you need and keep you company whenever there’s a lull in patrons flagging him down. It’s a stark contrast from the treatment that you got early in the night last week, where it had taken you twenty minutes to get a single drink and even then you could barely hold his attention long enough to tell him what you wanted. You can’t help but notice that he seems hyperaware of the open seat next to you.

As the bartender passes you another glass of water, you flash him a wavering smile, unconsciously sparing another awkward glance to the empty seat next to you. While the club isn’t quite as packed as it was last week, it’s not exactly empty and you’re starting to feel bad hoarding the seat when plenty of others probably want to sit down too.

“I’m sure he’ll show,” the bartender tells you before he’s waved down by another patron. You wonder if he’s guessed who you’re waiting for or if it’s just meant to be some general comfort. “Probably just running late, he’s a busy man.”

Oh, you think, eyes widening, but before you can question him as to what he means, he’s rushing to go refill the drink of a blonde man on the opposite end of the bar.

A busy man.

Who are you, Dazai Osamu?

Even in your drunken state, you knew from the moment you met him that there was something off about him. The way he held himself, the way he looked at you, the way people treated him—it all screamed danger. Once you’d sobered up, you remembered all of the things you didn’t notice while you’d been intoxicated. You remembered the way people would rush to get out of his way or show him complete deference, eyes a bit wide and faces a bit pale. You remembered the way Takeda looked sick and scared when Dazai told him to go, and Takeda is usually a bull-headed and fearless man, it takes a lot to make him back down. You remembered his driver—he had a driver!—and how when he stepped out of the car to open the door for the two of you, you swore you caught a glint of gunmetal holstered at his waist before Dazai gave him a cold look and he quickly covered it up.

And you’re not usually a girl who seeks danger out, for as much as you went on your spiel about living life on the edge the last time you spoke to him, you’re usually a pretty careful person. If you were smart, you would have woken up the next morning and pretended that you were too drunk to remember the night before, forget all about Dazai Osamu and his dangerous smile and intense gaze.

But you aren’t smart, evidently, because instead of forgetting about him, you spent half of the next day mourning because he didn’t even leave you his number and the other half of it scheming out the best way of running into him again.

You sigh, resting your cheek on your hand as you prop your elbow up on the bartop, idly tracing the rim of your glass.

What is it about you, Dazai?

One meeting and you’re captivated. He must be some kind of witch, or siren, there’s no other explanation for how you’re so utterly enchanted by him. He spoke your name with the familiarity of a lover, watching you with gentle eyes even though they become cold and empty whenever they avert to someone other than you. And you—you felt as if you’ve known him your entire life. You’ve never had such an instant connection with someone like that before, you’re convinced that it’s fate at work, even if he’s adamant against the thought.

You want to see him again. You wonder if it was maybe just your drunken brain misconstruing things, although somehow you doubt it. You need to talk to him again to know if the connection is real, and if it’s real-

“Is this seat taken?”

At first, the voice doesn’t register as familiar, so you let out a soft puff of air, trying to figure out if you should deny another person. But as you turn to face the newcomer, your eyes widen a bit as you catch sight of the long, burgundy scarf hanging in your peripheral, stark against a long, sleek black suit jacket.

Your lips part in shock, head snapping to the side so you can fully look at the person to your left. Dazai Osamu stands there, hands resting comfortably in the pockets of his jacket, head tilted to the side, a small smile curving at his lips and a soft look in his eye as he looks down at you, comforting and warm compared to the cold emptiness you vaguely noticed from him at certain points last night.

You try to say no, it’s not taken, but no words leave your lips, so instead, you shake your head, eyes following Dazai as he takes a seat next to you at the bar. The bartender rushes over, all but abandoning the couple he’d been helping on the opposite side of the bar, pouring Dazai an expensive glass of whiskey and giving him a nod before going back to who he’d been helping before. Your eyes follow the man curiously before you turn your gaze back to Dazai, not speaking for a moment as you observe the way he stares down at the glass of whiskey for a second, the warmth in his eye slowly dissipating.

You don’t like it, and not because it makes you uncomfortable or anything, but rather because you just don’t like how alone he seems. So, you lean forward, smiling, and say, “Fancy seeing you here.”

Dazai turns his gaze back to you and the warmth returns, pools of honey rather than the endless void. You melt beneath it.

“I vaguely remember a beautiful woman mentioning scheming out a second meeting,” Dazai drawls, dark eye lidded as he looks down at you, a half-smile decorating his face. “It would be quite remiss of me to be the cause of her failure.”

Your cheeks feel a bit a hot as you grin down at your drink. “While we’re on the topic of things I may or may not have said last week, I have to be honest with you. I totally lied about something,” you say with a laugh, leaning on the bar. He raises his eyebrow curiously. You give him a sheepish smile as you continue with, “I have absolutely no idea how to charm someone, drunk or sober, I was entirely speaking out of my ass, so keep your expectations low.”

The smile that curls to the corner of his lips is soft enough to make your heart skip a beat. “I think you just being yourself is plenty charming,” he murmurs.

You let out a noise caught between a groan and a whimper, face going hot. “Oh my god, you’re the charmer,” you accuse loudly, burying your face in your arms. “I’ll never survive. Handsome and charming, a deadly combination.”

As you peer your eyes open to look at him, you can’t help but notice the way his smile briefly falters at your words. You promptly decide to change the subject with: “Thank you for making sure I got home safely last week.”

“You don’t need to thank me for that,” he says, one pale, lithe finger tracing along the rim of his glass. Your eyes linger for a moment on the digit, mind wandering, before you force your gaze up; you can see the bandages peeking out from beneath the sleeve of his dark coat as your eyes drag his arm back to his face. There’s a knowing expression on his face, the smile on his lips a bit more sensual. Your breath catches as you avert your gaze, feeling quite like you’ve just been caught doing something bad.

“Sure I do,” you try to make the words sound casual and easy but despite your most sincere attempts, your voice is strained. “Not many people would go out of their way like that for someone they just met.”

Something akin to amusement flashes through his eye. You’re not sure what he finds amusing, but you decide you don’t care because you very much prefer it to the distant look that had been painted in them before.

“An unfortunate world we live in, then,” he says softly, but there’s a lilt to his tone that makes you feel like he knows something that you don’t. He doesn’t give you much time to dwell on it though as he asks, “Are you going to have anything to drink?”

You startle slightly at the question, glancing down at the glass of water you’re drinking before you tell him with a laugh, “I don’t know if I want to force you to deal with me drunk twice. Didn’t I promise I’d stay sober this time?”

“If I remember correctly, you only said ‘not quite as drunk,’” he says, lips tilting up a bit and god, the way he’s looking at you has you flustered, gaze lidded and intense, as if you’re the only one in the room and not in a club with hundreds of other people. “Let me order you something, I think you’ll like it.”

“Oh, that’s bold,” you warn, tossing him a teasing smile. “I'm very particular about my drinks, I’ll have you know. I’m almost curious what you have in mind that makes you so confident.”

“I have a good feeling about it,” Dazai says, tilting his head to the side as he waits for your decision.

You give a heavy sigh, pretending like it’s a difficult decision even though you know it’s not. “Fine, but only if you promise to cut me off after two. Whenever I hit three, I hit the floor.”

You extend your pinky toward him, waiting for him to take it, and when he does, you swear a jolt of electricity shoots up your arm. As he wraps his finger around yours, your heart skips a beat, your eyes meet his and you think you might get lost in the dark pools, you don’t think you would mind if you do and that scares you. You’ve never had someone make your heart flutter and mind haze like this, especially not so quickly.

“Promise,” he breathes out, barely audible above the thundering music and crowds.

You dip your head down to press your lips against your thumb to seal the deal, and you think you fall even more when you don’t have to tell him to do the same, following your lead and kissing his own thumb to seal it. And you briefly wonder if this man might be your soulmate because he didn’t give you a single odd look and didn't hesitate for a second whereas when you’ve made pinky promises with some of your other friends and past partners, their expression always twists a bit in confusion or oddity at the second part.

Rather than letting go of your hand, he swaps to his other hand, intertwining his fingers with yours and resting it on your lap before he flags the bartender down—quite easily, might you add—and leans over the bartop to say something quietly to him. The man nods and rushes off, and you give Dazai a scandalized look as he turns his attention back to you, hyper aware of the warmth of his fingers against yours.

“You won’t even tell me what it is?” you gasp in mock offense.

Dazai rests his other elbow on the bar top, resting his chin on his hand as he watches you through his lashes. You couldn’t drag your gaze away if you wanted to, tunneled onto him.

“It’s a surprise,” he says with a smile. “You’ll like it, trust me.”

“Quite confident for someone that hardly knows me, aren’t you, Dazai?” you giggle, raising your hand to cover your lips, and god, he looks so amused again, and so handsome. You might die. “That’ll be for me to judge.”

“Very confident,” he agrees, and you think he winks but you can’t tell because one of his eyes is covered by bandages.

“So,” you begin, waiting for the drink. “You’re from around here then?”

You hope he is, at least, because you’d like to keep seeing him. Something about him is just so intoxicating, like a drug you just can’t get enough of. You think he must be, from the way he seems so familiar with the bartender and other patrons, but you could always be wrong.

You hope you’re not wrong.

“Mhm,” Dazai agrees, humming around the rim of his glass as he takes another sip. You hope the excitement you feel doesn’t flash across your face. “Yokohama born and raised… you?”

Distantly, a part of you feels like the question is just an afterthought, as though he already knows the answer and you wonder if you’re that obvious, but you pay no mind to that, instead nodding. “Same,” you say, and then, “... I wonder if we have crossed paths before then. You’re so familiar, I can’t imagine that we’ve never met before… Maybe uni? Did you happen to go to UTokyo? I graduated there last year.”

Dazai seems to hesitate at the question, as if considering his answer. You wonder why, but he leaves you little time to figure it out because he finally replies, “No… I was in Tokyo for business for a while a couple years ago though.”

Your eyes light up. “Really?” you ask, leaning forward as you speak. “Where did you work? I know the area pretty well.”

He hesitates again, this time more blatantly, and you can see the confliction that briefly flashes across his face. How curious.

“It wasn’t a particular storefront, or anything, just my line of work had me in the area for a while.”

You’re about to press into what his line of work is, desperate to know more about the man sitting in front of you, but you’re interrupted by the bartender returning with a martini so stunning that if it tastes half as good as it looks, you might fall in love.

But you’re not going to make it that easy.

“Go on,” Dazai says, leaning a bit back in his seat as he watches. He looks at you as if he already knows that you’re going to like it and you’re adamant on destroying his assumptions, you will hate this drink if it’s the last thing you do. “Tell me what you think.”

You lift the martini glass up to your lips carefully, the dark liquid so close to the brim that you’re nervous it will spill over the sides. He watches you expectantly, you pointedly hold his gaze as you take a sip of the drink and-

“Oh my god.”

Dazai looks utterly vindicated, raising his chin as you take a sip of the drink and stare at it in shock. It’s so… tasty. It’s creamy, and sweet, and you can hardly taste the alcohol but you can feel the tingle on your tongue and the light burn in your throat. All thoughts of the conversation you were having before the drink showed up disappear, and you’re focused solely on the glass in your hands and the man before you.

“So?” God, he’s evil. He almost purrs the word, as if he knows exactly what your response is going to be. He leans forward a bit, looking down at you through his lashes. “Give me the verdict, Your Honor.”

“It’s good,” you say, raising your chin in spite, hoping that your expression doesn’t betray but from the way his lips spread into a wider smile, you fear that you completely failed.

“Just good?” Dazai croons.

You pause for a second, debating on lying and telling him yes, just good, but the words you intend on speaking do not leave your lips. Rather, you say, “Okay. It may or may not be one of the best drinks I’ve had in a while. You have to tell me what it is so I know what to ask for.”

“Hmm.” Dazai lifts a finger to his chin, as if considering your words. “I don’t think I will.”

“What!”

His smile becomes a bit softer, his expression more teasing. “I think I’ll hold that information hostage, so you have to come out with me again if you want to drink it.”

A jittery feeling spreads through your chest, heart fluttering, cheeks hot. “Oh? Look who’s scheming out our third meeting already,” you taunt lightly. “How the tables turn.”

“Of course, I’m scheming out our third meeting, maybe our fourth and fifth too,” he mimics your words from last week shamelessly. “I’ve decided I already like you, bella.”

The pet name rolls off his tongue easily, as if it’s second nature to him, and your face is on fire but Dazai looks like he’s shocked even at himself. You fumble with your words for just a second, it takes you a moment too long to recover but you think that Dazai doesn’t even notice in his stunned state.

You decide to return fire.

“I hope all of our dates aren’t just going to be at clubs,” you tell him with a smile that edges on flirtatious, cocking your head to the left.

Your words hardly register until you notice that his cheeks have become bright and rosy, hand instinctively coming up to hide his face. He looks entirely like he’s at a loss for words, lips parting and closing several times. It’s so endearing that you think you might really die now, but then the gravity of your words hit you like a train.

Oh god. A date? A date?? This is only the second time you’ve met, that was way too soon. You-

“I’ll make sure the next place we meet is somewhere special,” he finally says, voice smooth and gaze gentle and-

And just like that, you’re a goner.

You’re not sure how long you sit there talking to him. Hours, probably. It feels like no time at all and forever all at once. You lose yourself in his gaze, and his smile, and you think the whole world could be burning around the two of you and you’d have no idea just because you’re so tunnel visioned on him. The music drowns out, and all you can hear is his voice. The people around you blur out of focus, and all you can see is him.

It’s insane, you think. You’ve never felt like this with anyone before. You’ve had so many flings and so many boyfriends over the years, but the way your stomach twists and turns and the way your head feels fuzzy with Dazai is so incomparable to how you felt with anyone else.

You feel like you’ve known him forever.

You feel like you’ve only just met him.

How is it possible to feel like you know someone you’ve only just met so intimately? When you know you don’t actually know much about him personally but it still feels like you can read into the depths of his soul?

God, you don’t know, but you do know one thing, and it’s that you never want to lose this feeling.

And that’s how it began.

Every Friday for weeks, you find yourself at the club, sipping cheap martinis at the bar until a certain handsome man in a dark suit decides to finally grace you with his presence. Sometimes, the two of you would just sit at the club’s bar until the sun threatens to rise, when you finally go your separate ways and you make your way back to your apartment, falling asleep with a smile on your face and waking up with a giddy feeling still sparkling in your chest. Other times, he only comes by the club to pick you up, fulfilling his promise of making sure to take you somewhere nice when you find yourself fine dining at the fanciest rooftop restaurants in the city.

He never stays over your place, even when he does drop you off. Sometimes he’ll hang around for an hour (you made him your favorite hot chocolate, he liked it so much that he nearly cried although he vehemently denied that was the reason why his eye got all misty), but he always leaves. You try not to let it bum you out, convincing yourself that it’s just because he doesn’t want to keep his driver waiting (albatross, you remember his name, he’s funny. you like him), but sometimes you can’t help the heavy feeling set over you when he makes his abrupt leave, wishing for just a bit more. He hasn’t even kissed you yet, for god’s sake.

You also distantly note that you don’t really know much about him, even after all of these weeks his personal life remains a mystery to you. The closest you were able to get to prying anything out of him was when he showed up so late that you were on the verge of leaving because you doubted he would even show, he apologized and said a work meeting ran late. You asked him what about and he hesitated, as if he was about to say it, but then gave you some vague response and steered the conversation to something less personal.

That’s what’s happened every time you try to learn a bit more about him. You don’t really notice it in the moment because he’s smooth and charming about it, but he always manages to turn the conversation to you or some other general topic. You want to respect that he doesn’t want to talk about his personal life because maybe he’s coming to you to have some sort of escape from it, but you also want to know him beyond just the flirting over drinks and the slim things you can gleam from his reactions, words hidden between the lines of what he actually says.

Your friends think you’re crazy. They think he’s bad news. They’ve come with you to the club a few times to wait with you until he shows up and every time they see him you can see the weary looks that they shoot at one another. You don’t care what they think—or well, that’s a lie, you do care what they think, you’re just too enamored with Dazai for their words to have any weight. Which probably should be concerning, but that’s something for you to think about another day.

Because now, you’re focused on him again. He’s been talking more tonight than he usually does—most nights, he’ll spend the majority of the time just listening to you, a soft smile on his face and a captivated look in his eye, but tonight, he’s been rather vocal, people watching with you and making sly advances that you think is just plain cruel considering he hasn’t even kissed you yet.

But tonight, you’ve decided, will be the night.

You’ve been trying to figure out how to go about it, if you should just invite him back to your apartment—something you’ve done before, so there shouldn’t be any nerves but you still find yourself wavering because you don’t know how you’re going to proceed once you get to your apartment. You are not a seducer. You have no experience in seducing. In fact, you are usually the one being seduced. So every time your lips part to ask if he wants to leave the club, you find yourself withering and faltering, waiting for a ‘better’ chance as if one will magically arise.

It does.

It’s when a fight breaks out on the dancefloor a bit too close to where you’re sitting, certainly the result of some sleazy man trying to put his hands on a woman who already has a date, when you finally force yourself to stop pussying out. You let out a shriek as you stumble forward off your barstool when one of the men careens a bit too closely to you, and it’s only by Dazai’s swift reaction, arm wrapping around your waist as he pulls you to him and steadies you, that you don’t go toppling onto the floor.

Your eyes widen as you watch the fight escalate, a bit entertained now that you’re safe in his arms from becoming collateral damage, but Dazai looks distinctly unimpressed by the scene taking place a few feet away, lips twisted into a deep frown. You watch as he shoots a sharp look to one of the bouncers lingering by the door, and you note how the man immediately moves forward to break up the fight. Interesting. You’ve noticed that the people at the work tend to be respectful to him, but that’s the first time you’ve seen them seemingly take a silent order from him.

You steel your nerves and you decide to try your hand.

“Would you… maybe want to get out of here?”

You look nervous, Dazai watches you carefully as he leads you across the club to the exits, so he figures that there’s something else going on in your head right now. You’ve been quiet most of the night, he realizes, and he wonders if something is wrong. If something happened. His mind immediately catapults to the worst case scenario: that someone found out about the two of you, despite how careful he’s been in making sure that the places he’s brought you to were locked down by the Port Mafia before you arrived with him, and you’re being threatened.

His thoughts race. Albatross should still be waiting where Dazai left him, so if something goes wrong, he’ll be ready. Dazai glances at you again, and he slowly realizes that you don’t seem nervous because you’re fearful of something, and his anxieties slowly are edged away.

But that only gives rise to new anxieties because then what’s making you so nervous then? What did you mean by get out of here? Do you want to go somewhere else? (but where, the longer he’s out in the open, the more of a risk there will be without him taking precautions beforehand like he usually does) Do you want to be dropped off back at your apartment? (that’s what he initially assumed, but he doesn’t want the night to end yet) Do you want to invite him to your apartment? (it wouldn’t be the first time, but it doesn’t leave him any less nervous. he’s terrified of making the wrong move) Do you want him to invite you to his apartment? (god, he hopes not)

The last option cannot happen. You’re already suspicious from the way the bartender and the other club patrons have been treating him the past few weeks, and now you’re doubly suspicious, Dazai can tell from the way your eyes squint as the bouncers at the entrance of the club nod their heads to him. If he brings you back to his place, the tallest of the five towers making up the Port Mafia base, there’s no way you won’t put together that something’s up with him and the last thing he wants is to scare you away. Even if you don’t know what the buildings are exactly, you’ll definitely question him about his occupation, go back to the dangerous line of questioning you’ve been treading on lately, and when he can’t give you a straight answer, it’ll become all the more apparent that it’s something shady and if you’re smart, you’ll make an excuse to leave and then never seek him out again.

Realistically, he probably won’t be able to hide this from you for long, but it just has to be long enough for him to woo you so the news isn’t so jarring that it makes you cut off all contact with him. Although, Dazai isn’t sure if any amount of time will make the knowledge that he’s a mafia boss not jarring enough to flee. His heart feels a bit heavy, wondering if this is all a mistake because how the hell is he supposed to just accept it when you inevitably decide to leave? And isn’t that what he should want, anyway? He wants you to keep yourself safe, no matter what the cost, and if you’re the one to cut him off, then he won’t be tempted to come looking for you again. He can protect you from the distance as he initially planned with the memory of the nights he’s spent with you pushing him forward. So maybe this is for the best.

You accepted all of the other Dazais, the traitorous part of his mind tried to convince himself that isn’t a hopeless cause, even though he knows that there’s a stark difference between who he is in this lifetime, the face of Japan’s underworld, drenched in blood and rotting from the inside out, and who he was in all of the other lifetimes, desperately trying to make himself a better man so that Odasaku would be proud of him.

Maybe you’ll understand, he thinks weakly as the two of you leave the club. It’s drizzling now, and his eyes cut across the parking lot looking for Albatross, but his thoughts are lost—you understanding would mean he would have to tell you everything. He can’t do that. Not just because you would probably think he’s delusional, or psychotic, but because it would put the very fabric of this reality at risk. He can’t tell more people than necessary and stage five…

His plan.

Dazai’s gaze shifts back over to you, the sudden remembrance of what he’s been planning since he came in contact with the Book so many years ago spreading like ice through him. He should take you by the hand and lead you to the car, the rain is going to start coming down harder any second now, but Dazai is frozen because in his manic state, when he’d decided he can protect you in this life, be with you in this life, he hadn’t even given any thought to what would become of his plan, and he’s been so consumed by thoughts of you the past few weeks that it’s hardly crossed his mind.

He has to force himself to move forward, ignoring the way his mind is reeling—if he decides to live, what does that mean for Odasaku? For Atsushi and Akutagawa and Chuuya? For the world? Would he be condemning everything he’s worked to protect? He still thinks he can do it—protect you, that is—but would it be at the cost of everything else? He feels sick, trying to figure out if he’s going to have to plot out a whole new plan, as if this one hadn’t taken him years to come up with and implement.

But you don’t move to follow him to the car where Albatross is waiting when he steps forward. Instead, you tilt your head up to the sky, lashes fluttering as rain begins to drizzle down from the dark sky.

And Dazai’s spiraling thoughts halt.

He thinks you look beautiful—you’re always beautiful, but he thinks there’s something magical about the picture of the small smile on your lips as rain drops slide across the smooth skin of your face. He tries to force himself to look away so he doesn’t seem creepy staring at you, but he can’t bring himself to.

You don’t seem to mind though, because you turn your attention to him, eyes lit up in a way that makes his heart race. “Dance with me,” you say suddenly, holding a hand out to him, the soft smile on your face is a bit mischievous now.

Dazai looks down at you, raising his eyebrows. “Here?” he asks, voice tainted with a hint of incredulity. “Now?”

“Mhm,” you say, unperturbed, holding your hand out more insistently.

Dazai thinks he isn’t capable of denying you much of anything, but he can’t help but hesitate. Not because he doesn’t want to dance with you—he would sell what’s left of his wretched soul for just a single dance with you—but because the longer he’s out in the open, the more of a chance there might be an assassination attempt on him. Every time he goes out, he’s gambling his life. It would put you in danger, and it’s not like he brought Chuuya along for if something goes wrong. Albatross is capable enough, but his ability is not combat centric.

Being seen with you in general could put you in danger, doubts begin to sprinkle through his head again, his heart lodged in his throat as remembers that Fyodor Dostoevsky and Agatha Christie aren’t the only threats to your life. He’s been as careful as he could be but even with all of the precautions in the world, there are still risks. He’s made new enemies in this lifetime, hundreds of them over the years, and if any one of them caught wind of you and his apparent attraction to you…

“If you wanted to dance, shouldn’t we have done that inside?” Dazai drawls instead, trying to play it off. Inside, where it’s significantly safer. Inside, where Dazai knows that there’s less of a chance of unsavory eyes falling upon the two of you because the club is owned by the Port Mafia and everyone let in is screened. Inside, where Dazai can still convince himself that he has the power to keep you safe. You’re entirely unbothered by his question, so he continues before you can shoot him down, “Where it’s not raining, and where there’s actually music.”

“Haven’t you seen all of the romance movies?” you complain, smile widening. “Dancing in the rain is romantic, Dazai. Who needs music anyway? C’mon, dance with me.”

And how is Dazai supposed to say no to you when you look at him like that? Eyes wide and imploring, smile gentle—you look at him in a way that Dazai’s only dreamed of, and he knows that he’s a goner. Well, he’s known since he first met you, but it’s being made abundantly more clear right now with the way his heart, which he usually has such keen control over, beats rapidly in his chest. His lips part because he still wants to try to deny you—for your sake, not his—but no words leave them.

You don’t wait for his response anyway, hand darting out to catch his so you can drag him out into the parking lot. His eyes widen, stumbling forward and trying to catch his balance—you only laugh, intertwining your fingers with his while your other hand finds his waist, spinning the two of you in a reckless circle.

“Keep up!” you tell him with a smile that causes his breath to catch.

Dazai thinks he might die. His head feels fuzzy as you lead him in a wide ballroom dance, sweeping across the vacant parking lot with ease. He thinks he must look like a fool being dragged along in your dance like a puppet, hardly able to keep himself from tripping over his own feet.

He’s not sure how you’re able to keep yourself so graceful, heels splashing in puddles as you lead him through spins and turns and pivots, but Dazai thinks you’re beautiful. Again. Extraordinarily so, even. Rain is pouring down over the two of you, the drizzle quickly becoming torrential, and your hair is wet and matted to your face, mascara a bit smeared underneath your eyes, but you’re laughing, and Dazai thinks you’re divine. Heavenly. Too ethereal to be tainted by the likes of him and yet here he is, the putrid skin of his fingers intertwined with your untarnished ones. You raise your arm and his, beckoning for him to twirl beneath it.

He does, and it’s awkward and clumsy because he’s too tall to comfortably perform the move, but you giggle loudly so it makes up for the embarrassment. And for a moment, Dazai can almost convince himself that this isn’t a life where he’s been forced to let the dark consume him for the betterment of the world; rather, it’s a world where he’s gone unsullied by the dark, his blood still runs red and you’re beautiful and you’re alive, and he’s just a boy who’s fallen so terribly in love with a girl so far out of his league that he thinks he might be dreaming when you return his interest. As he spins, he notices that his cheeks feel a bit strained and sore, and he realizes that there’s a smile on his face that matches your own, the muscles of his cheeks and jaw unused to stretching in such a manner and he hopes, anxiously, that it doesn’t look quite as unbearable as it feels.

If it does look unnatural, you don’t seem to mind. The rain blurs his vision and he’s forced to blink away the raindrops that keep falling into his eye, and for a split second, you’re standing before him in a pretty red dress on a sidewalk, and he’s the one leading you in the theatrical dance, dipping you down as lightning webs across the sky above the two of you, and he’s about to beg you for a kiss, he knows it but then-

He’s drawn out of his thoughts when you pull your hand back from his, but you don’t give him time to mourn the loss of your touch because then you’re slipping your arms around his neck, loose and casual. You’re pressed up close to him, chest brushing his and head tilted back so you can look up at him—a slower dance, swaying to the music of the wind and rain—and Dazai can hardly breathe. You’re so close. So close that he could kiss you if he wanted to. God, he wants to. He’s wanted to for weeks but every time he tries to gather the nerve to do it, he backs out.

“Where’d you go?” you ask softly, and he can barely hear you as thunder rumbles in the distance, brows furrowed in confusion, unsure of what you mean. You tap his temple twice gently, “Left me for a second there.”

Oh, his throat feels a bit dry, realizing that you must’ve noticed when he started to slip back into the pages of the Book. Terrifying. Beautiful and terrifying, that’s what you are, if you can read him that well after meeting him once a week for a few weeks, he dreads to know how well you’d be able to read him once you start spending more and more time with him. But would it be so bad? To have someone that knows him so profoundly? He’s so alone all the damn time in this world, and you’re giving him a taste of a life where maybe he wouldn’t have to be. It’s terrifying. Tempting. He forces another smile onto his lips, and this time your eyes narrow, as if you know this one isn’t as genuine as the last.

“How rude of me,” he murmurs, lifting his hand to tuck a stray strand of hair behind your ear. He’s so close, he realizes again, hyper aware of the way his lips are almost brushing yours. He could kiss you if he wanted, he repeats, and he wants so badly but he doesn’t want to scare you away. “To leave behind such fine company.”

You don’t look content with his apparent attempt at avoiding the subject, and Dazai’s throat feels tight because it’s not really a conversation to have with you here. Now. Ever, really.

For once, mother nature appears to be on his side, because before you can press on the subject, lightning strikes dangerously close to where the two of you are standing, making you jump, eyes wide. He takes the opportunity to wrap an arm around your waist, guiding you over to where he left Albatross earlier in the night.

The car is already running, Albatross is leaning back in the seat scrolling on the phone and Dazai nearly commits an atrocity when he sees that the man has his gun laying haphazardly on the dashboard. As if Albatross can feel Dazai’s murderous intent, he looks up from his phone and his eyes shoot open when he sees you with Dazai and he scrambles to holster his gun back at his waist.

Luckily, you don’t notice. Or maybe unluckily, because your attention is still fixated on him and Dazai is not ready to have that discussion with you because how the hell is he supposed to say “Sorry! Lost in some worlds that don’t exist, and just so you know, we almost got married in some of them! And just so you know, I got you killed in all of them!”

Yeah. That would go over well.

Instead, he opens the door to the car for you, letting you hop in the backseat. He follows after. Albatross slides his glasses to the bridge of his nose, an unscrupulous smile on his face that instantly has Dazai suspicious. He hopes the man knows that no friendship with Chuuya will save him if he decides to purposely embarrass Dazai in front of you.

“You’re back!” You recognize Albatross immediately, a smile spreading across your face at the sight of him. Dazai is almost jealous until he remembers that you’re still holding his hand. “You weren’t driving last time.”

Right. Because of the raid on one of the Scarlet Gang’s warehouses in Tokyo. A mission that Dazai definitely should have been more available for on the off chance that something went wrong, but he was far too busy indulging in you. In his defense, he had no doubts that the mission would go according to plan—the Scarlet Gang is dangerous, yes, and Kawabata is a force to be reckoned with, but he’s simply not Dazai.

“D’aw, didn’t think you’d recognize me, doll,” Albatross grins, tossing you a wink. “Good to see you again too. You’re significantly more sober tonight, aren’t you?”

Dazai’s eyes narrow a bit at the pet name, but he’s more focused on the way you throw your face into your hands with a groan, reminded of just how drunk you’d been the last time Albatross was playing chauffeur. You’re a messy drunk, he remembers fondly, he doesn’t remember ever seeing you drink in any of his other lives with you, and he feels a bit giddy at the thought that he gets to experience a side of you that the others never did. Even if he was spending half of the night holding your hair back while you threw your guts up, spluttering apologies through sobs and heaves. He would do it again. Without even the slightest hesitation, he would do it again.

“I wasn’t that bad, was I?” you ask, peeking one eye between your fingers to look at Dazai for confirmation.

Dazai doesn’t even have the chance to assure you that no, you weren’t that bad, because Albatross is speaking again. Of course.

“You were pretty damn bad, doll,” he grins, and you groan even louder, leaning your body over to rest your head on Dazai’s bicep. Dazai’s heart nearly leaps out of his throat. “S’alright though, boss took care of you.”

“Did he?” you ask with a teasing smile, eyes glittering as you look up at Dazai, who suddenly feels a bit embarrassed, but Albatross rescues him.

Maybe he does deserve the vacation he’s been bitching about wanting.

“Where to?” Albatross asks, putting the car in gear, gaze flickering between you and Dazai briefly.

Dazai is about to tell him your apartment when he catches the sudden apprehension on your face. He hesitates and waits for you to say whatever you want to say, but you don’t, instead you let out a puff of air and let your eyes slide shut.

“Where do you want to go?” Dazai asks you.

You still look uncertain, but then you finally say, “I was meaning to stop and get some groceries at the convenience store on the way home. There’s one a few blocks away from my apartment. I can just walk over there if you drop me off at my place though, it’s fine.”

As if. The idea of you walking anywhere so late at night makes his skin crawl, especially considering there’s been a rise of violent crimes in the city that the Mafia has yet to get a handle on. He needs to push for that to be taken care of if he has to worry about you leaving your apartment to wander around so late. He makes a note to himself to bring it up to Chuuya later.

“We can stop there on the way there. It’s no trouble.”

Albatross gives him a look, as if he’s asking if the boss of the Port Mafia is really about to go grocery shopping with a civilian in the middle of the night, forcing the Mafia’s best getaway driver to be their chauffeur. Dazai only gives him a cold, sharp look in return—if you need groceries, then they’ll stop for groceries. Simple as that. In a life where Dazai thought he’d never even be able to look at you, the chance of doing mundane chores like grocery shopping with you is not something he’ll just pass by.

He can pretend to be normal. If only for a little longer.

Until he has to go back to the base, and his lungs are clogged with corrupted air, being slowly suffocated by his surroundings.

Until you figure out who he is, and he’s alone again, being consumed by the void in his chest once more.

He hardly considers the fact that he’s going somewhere with you where his subordinates haven’t made extensive efforts to ensure that no one suspicious is around to see the two of you.

“Alrighty,” Albatross agrees, backing down as soon as he sees the expression on Dazai’s face. “To the convenience store.”

Your eyes brighten, a smile lights up your face. “Thanks,” you say relieved, and Dazai wants to say that you don’t ever have to thank him for everything and that he’d give you the entire world if given the chance, but he thinks that might be a bit weird so instead he settles on just giving you a small smile. “I’ll make you the best hot chocolate of your life when we get to my apartment. Just wait.”

Dazai’s chest feels warm. “I don’t doubt it.”

“Wait here,” you tell both Dazai and Albatross as Albatross pulls into the parking lot of your apartment complex and stops the car outside of your building. Dazai, who’d been about to follow you, pauses from where he’s ducking beneath the doorframe to step out of the car, looking at you and waiting for an explanation. “... My apartment is a mess… I, um, wasn’t expecting company. Let me just… tidy up before you come in. I’ll only be a few minutes.”

Dazai’s visible eye crinkles up in amusement as he sits back down in the backseat of the car and you immediately take off up toward the steps leading up to the second floor of your apartment, giddy and excited, grocery bag swinging and bumping against your hip as you make your way quickly up the steps. You don’t know what’s gotten into you. You feel like a schoolgirl dealing with her first real crush, flustered and giggly, hardly able to hold a conversation without stuttering over your words.

He’s just so… you don’t know how to describe it. Intense. But intense isn’t even the right word, because he’s not so intense that it makes you uncomfortable or overwhelmed, and that’s usually what you think of when someone is intense. Or maybe overwhelmed is a bit fitting, because you swear every time he sets his soft gaze down on you, your heart might leap out of your chest. Intense. Familiar, you don’t know how it’s possible to feel like you’ve known someone you’ve only met a few times your entire life.

Your fingers fumble as you try to unlock your door. One, two, three, it takes three attempts for you to finally slide the key into the lock, pushing open your door and stepping inside, free from the torrential rain and wild wind outside.

You sigh and rest your back against the door as you shut it behind you, eyes sliding shut.

Who are you, Dazai Osamu?

Someone important.

Of course, you noticed how he was treated by the workers of the club—the bartender, the bouncers, even just the regular patrons. The restaurants he’s brought you to the past few weeks, they all treated him the same way. There were plenty of men there that were dressed in expensive clothes and held themselves highly, but none were treated the same way Dazai was.

Someone dangerous.

You’d also caught a glimpse of the gun on the dash of Albatross’s car. (His driver, another point to note because who has a driver except very important people) Only three types of people have guns in Japan—military, police, and criminals, and you’re pretty sure he’s not part of the military or police force…

Someone you probably shouldn’t be so drawn to.

That should be enough to make you run. It really should be. You have no explanation or excuse for why you’re not besides the fact that you might not be as smart as you herald yourself to be. You shouldn’t feel giddy when he smiles softly at you, you should be nervous. You shouldn’t be longing for his touch, you should be avoiding it. Instead, you’re leaning against your door, smiling like an idiot after making him wait for you to clean up your apartment so you don’t embarrass yourself.

Oh, you’re such a fool. But how could you not be with how he treats you? Tucking hair behind your ear, setting a gaze so soft on you that you think it might make your heart stop, dancing with you in the rain clumsily with rosy cheeks and wide eyes. How is it possible for you to reconcile the way the man acts with you to the way others treat him? Or maybe that’s just delusion speaking. It could be, honestly. You think if your brother was living with you, he’d be horrified, might lock you away for the rest of your life; you think your friends already want to put you in a psych ward and they’d only become all the more insistent if they knew half of the things you’ve noticed.

But your brother left you and your friends don’t know, so nothing is stopping you from making what might be a terrible decision.

You let out a breath as you push yourself off the door, placing down your grocery bags on the table by your door so you can scramble to pick up all of the stray clothes you’d tossed around your apartment as you frantically tried to find an outfit earlier in the night. You reach over to turn on your light, flicking the switch once, then twice, and then three times.

No way.

You sigh deeply, head falling back against the wood door of your apartment, knocking the back of your head against it twice in frustration. Letting out a irate puff of air, you push yourself off of the door and force yourself to get to work. It’s not the end of the world, hopefully it'll come back soon, the providers are usually quick with getting the outages fixed, even in your shitty area.

You force yourself to move forward, frowning deeply as you scoop up all of the paperwork spread out on your coffee table, making sure to keep it all in order as you move them over to the desk you have by your window seat. You drop the pile down and cast your gaze out to all of the clothes strewn haphazardly around your apartment, cursing yourself for having been so messy earlier when you were trying on just about every outfit you own and then flinging them around frustrated when you decided they weren’t good enough.

You scowl as you bend down to pick them all up, deciding you’ll just stuff them messily in your closet and fold them later when you don’t have company. As you zoom around trying to snag all of the dresses and different pairs of bras and underwear scattered about, your mind races. Your stove should still work because your landlord refuses to install any modern appliances into your apartment, for better or for worse, so you have an old model that shouldn’t be affected by the outage. But you think it’ll be awkward sitting in the dark, you think you have a few candles stored away in your room—you’ll have to find them and set them up.

Candlelit evening, how romantic! you think to yourself, a bit dreamily. You wonder if Albatross will be coming up to join the two of you in your apartment, you’d offered to make him a drink too but you figure it’ll be Dazai’s decision if he’ll be waiting outside or…

Or maybe, he’ll send him home.

You get giddy at the thought—candlelights, slightly tipsy after a night out, you take a peek under your dress to try to figure out which underwear you’d decided on earlier and if you should change into a different pair but are delighted when you realize that you’d gone with your pretty red ones.

You think he’ll like them.

Hopefully.

You like them, they’re your favorites.

Oh, you have to clean your bedroom too, you think to yourself in partial agony because you don’t know how the hell you’re going to clean up everything in there without making Dazai wait out there for an hour. You get anxious at the thought, worrying that if you take too long, he might leave, so you pick up the pace. You snatch the last stray bra hanging on the arm of your couch before taking off into your bedroom.

You hardly get a step into the room before you’re freezing in your tracks.

No way.

You stare at your bed, arms falling loose to your side, lips parted in shock. The clothes you’d cleaned up all drop aimlessly to the floor around you. Your bed is drenched with water—your sheets soaked, your mattress soaked, the ceiling heavy with rainwater from a leak you didn’t know you had.

“Oh my god,” you breathe out to yourself, unsure of what exactly you should do, never having had a problem like this before.

You think this is what you get, seeking out the cheapest possible apartment complex to stay in because you’re trying to save all of the money you have for school. Now, your mattress is ruined, your ceiling looks like it’s on the verge of collapse and oh my god, you left your laptop on your bed.

A noise caught between a whimper and cry of frustration leaves your lips as you dive forward, fishing your laptop out of the massive pool of water flooding your bed. You hold it in front of your face between two fingers, watching as water drips from it down to the ground.

There goes your laptop too.

You think you might be sick.

Now, you have to deal with a landlord who is decidedly not helpful when it comes to issues in the complex and you have nowhere to sleep. Maybe you can call one of your friends to stay at their place, but it’s already the middle of the night and you know two of them have their own entrance exams tomorrow for the programs that they’re applying to.

Unless…

Your gaze shifts to the window in your room, looking between the blinds to see Dazai and Albatross still waiting outside in their car.

Okay. Most urgent problem temporarily fixed. Maybe.

Dazai has a place. He has to. He’s clearly rich. It’s probably a much nicer place than yours too. You can go there, at least for the night. He wouldn’t just leave you with nowhere to go… right? No, of course he wouldn’t. You need to pack then, instead of cleaning.

Okay, this is fine.

It’s fine.

It takes you about five minutes to grab a few spare pairs of clothes into the duffle bag laying at your bedroom door, occasionally tossing dirty looks at the leak ruining your bed. When you finish throwing your clothes in the duffle—unfolded and hastily, of course, they’ll be terribly wrinkled—you rise to your feet and swing the bag over your shoulder, making your way back to your door and grabbing your groceries.

You don’t know what to say to him when you get back to the car. You’re probably being a bit presumptuous. Okay, a lot presumptuous—Dazai has never invited you back to his place, you’ve invited him to yours—but you don’t really have another choice.

You exhale as you step back into the rain, locking your apartment and making your way back down the steps to the complex’s parking lot. You don’t let yourself hesitate as you dart across the parking lot toward the car, fearing that if you take a second to actually think about what you’re doing—inviting yourself into someone else’s home!—you’ll probably back out.

You open the car door. You slide back inside, taking a seat behind the passenger seat. You drop your duffle bag on the floor between your feet and place your groceries back down between you and Dazai. You can feel both Dazai and Albatross staring at you. You stare ahead.

“... My apartment is flooded,” you finally say after a few moments.

Dazai doesn’t say anything, brows furrowing as he watches you. You can hardly bring yourself to look at him, trying to peek at him from the corner of your eye as best as you can without being too obvious about it. He’s not responding. Albatross isn’t moving the car. You’re getting the urge to bolt, to run upstairs and drown yourself in the puddle of water on your bed.

Finally, Albatross clears his throat. “Boss?”

Dazai still doesn’t respond. You think you might be doubly sick now, and embarrassed. An awful combination, really. You know that he knows what you came back here hoping for, and you realize that he might just send you back to your flooded apartment instead because he obviously did not sign up for taking in some random girl that he’s met a few Fridays for the night because she has nowhere else to go.

You finally turn your face to look at Dazai head on and you can feel that your eyes are glassy, chewing on the inside of your cheek. You don’t know how pathetic you must look for Dazai’s expression to shift the way it does, his conflicted expression crumbling as he turns away from you. You don’t want to know how pathetic you must look, you’d only feel even more humiliated.

After what feels like an eternity, Dazai finally says: “Drive.”

Albatross’s eyes shoot open, he physically turns to look at Dazai, “But-”

You don’t catch the look that Dazai gives Albatross, too busy basking in the relief of having somewhere to stay for the night, but whatever it is, it makes Albatross turn back to face the wheel without another word, turning the car back on and shifting it into gear before pulling out of the parking lot.

As soon as you’re on the move, you turn your attention back down to your phone, trying to figure out if you should message your landlord now or in the morning, dreading the inevitable argument you’re going to have with him. You fiddle with the device, occasionally sparing looks at Dazai, but the man is lost in thought next to you, visible eye distant and conflicted.

You can’t bring yourself to say anything so the whole drive to Dazai’s apartment is long and quiet. Even Albatross, who’s had no difficult sparking conversation the whole drive to your place, stays silent.

You’re bummed, all of the excitement you felt about bringing Dazai back to your place is long gone, feeling the stress of having to replace everything that’s been ruined by the leak and the anxiety of dealing with your landlord; all you want to do is sleep and die. Okay. That’s dramatic. But you’re exhausted and you really do want to sleep. Maybe not die, but definitely sleep.

You lay your head against the window, eyes starting to droop shut, and you can feel Dazai glancing at you now but you can’t even bring yourself to look over at him. Instead, you keep your eyes trained outside the window, only perking up when Albatross finally starts slowing to a stop.

And then, you’re suddenly not tired at all. Your eyes widen as he pulls to the front of the tallest of the five black buildings that tower over the Naka ward, lips parting as you crane your head to look up out the window and then look pointedly back at Dazai, stunned.

Dazai refuses to meet your gaze, staring ahead.

… You think that your instincts about this man must be spot on.

Too bad you’re not listening to them.

“You’ve gone crazy.”

Dazai’s gaze draws up from the paperwork he’s definitely not doing, far too preoccupied with thoughts of you; it’s cold and cutting as it lands on Chuuya. His executive enters the room without any type of announcement, his voice just as cold as Dazai’s expression—he supposes it’s testimony to how angry he is, because Chuuya is only frigid in his anger when he’s really been pushed to the brink.

Naturally, Dazai only smiles, a slow and taunting one that he knows presses all of Chuuya’s buttons from the way the man’s bicolored eyes flash with fury. Chuuya storms over to Dazai’s desk, making his way until he’s standing right in front of him.

“How so?” Dazai drawls, folding his hands over his lap as he leans back in his chair, tilting his head to the side questioningly.

“How so?” Chuuya spits out, slamming his hands down on Dazai’s desk. Dazai raises his eyebrows and then lifts his chin, looking pointedly down to where Chuuya’s hands are splayed against his desk. Chuuya doesn’t flinch—of course he doesn’t, he’s Chuuya—but he does pull his hands back to himself, albeit snarling as he does it. “The hell are you bringing some random woman back to our base? Back to your room? Going out alone the past few weeks when you know you’ve got a bounty on your head higher than most world leaders? I was letting it slide but this is too far, why the hell is she here? You’ve gone crazy, what the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Careful, Chuuya,” Dazai warns, voice quiet, expression growing a bit flinty when he brings you up. Dazai doesn’t care if Chuuya wants to rail on him for being reckless, but he’s not allowed to drag you into it. He decides to not acknowledge the comment about you, focusing on the end of his tirade, “I was with one of the Flags, I wasn’t alone.”

“Albatross isn’t cut out for that type of combat and you know it,” Chuuya snaps, glaring at Dazai. “If one of those bounty hunters came after you, you both would’ve been killed. What’s gotten into you? Never took you for the type to be this reckless. You get a taste of a woman’s c-”

“I said careful, Chuuya. Know your place,” Dazai repeats, voice icy. The warning is gone, only a threat remains—Chuuya doesn’t need to finish his sentence for Dazai to know where he was going with it, the way the man’s eyes darted over to Dazai’s bedroom was more than enough to confirm it.

“Is this a goddamn joke to you?” Chuuya asks, keeping his voice low, his lips flat and his eyes narrowed. “I don’t get it. You’ve always been so careful, more than anyone else. What the hell does one random woman have that’s making you risk all of this?”

“I’m not risking anything,” Dazai tells him coolly, “and she’s not just some random woman.”

Chuuya’s expression shifts, brows furrowing deeper; Dazai can see the tiny cogs working behind his eyes as he thinks. He wonders if Chuuya has been drinking tonight, catching the pink hue to his cheeks and the hazy look coating his eyes.

No wonder he’s so angry then, Dazai muses, he must have been out with Kouyou when he got word that Dazai left the base again without any protection detail and then brought someone up to his room who in Chuuya’s mind, could be an assassin for all he knows.

Suddenly, the confusion clears and something closer to realization sweeps across Chuuya’s face. His gaze turns back pointedly in the direction of Dazai’s bedroom.

“That’s her,” Chuuya says, disbelief dripping from his tone. “The girl you’ve had Kouyou looking over for years. What the fuck, Dazai? I thought the whole point of having Kouyou look after her was so that you kept away from her.”

Dazai stares at Chuuya, only for a moment, because then his gaze drifts back to the door leading into his bedroom, mind drifting. He supposes that he shouldn’t be surprised that Kouyou told Chuuya about it—Dazai wasn’t explicit enough with his orders, only telling Kouyou to ensure that Dazai himself never knew anything about her. Of course, the woman would bring it up to Chuuya, probably hoping Chuuya had some insight into why Dazai is so insistent on your protection.

Chuuya didn’t, of course, but he guesses that only made the topic of you and Dazai’s apparent random attachment to you even more of an interesting topic for their wine sessions. Honestly, he’s surprised that Chuuya didn’t realize earlier that the girl he’s been seeing is the one he’s had Kouyou assigned to. Kouyou surely should have known by now.

You’re fast asleep by now. He got lucky because of how exhausted you were over the stress of the whole situation: he didn’t have to deal with the questions that he was certain would arise as soon as you caught sight of the Port Mafia base. You were all but falling asleep on your feet as the two of you stood in the glass elevator leading up to Dazai’s apartment, the penthouse in the centermost of the five buildings consisting of the Port Mafia base. Dazai thought he was about to have a heart attack when you swayed on your feet and ended up resting your head on his bicep, eyes drooping shut. You only managed a few sleepy protests as he led you to his bedroom, asking where he was going to sleep if you take his room (the fact that you worry about him when you’re even on the brink of falling asleep on your feet made his fingers tingle), but you gave in quickly at his insistence.

He should feel some sort of pity, or sympathy, because he could see the weariness in your eyes and the fatigue plaguing your body. Dazai might not be capable of feeling pity or sympathy for most people, but if he could feel it for anyone, it would be you. But he does not, and it’s for a selfish reason, of course: your misfortune led to you turning to him for help, and the thought of that alone makes his chest feel light and giddy.

Yes, he’s going to have to figure out some sort of excuse tomorrow for when you wake up and inevitably have questions—he is not ready for you to know about his position in the Port Mafia—but right now you’re sleeping in his bed and you’re relying on him for help. His fingers thrum against his desk, jittery with excitement, he almost forgets Chuuya is there until he hears the man let out a sharp noise of disgust at Dazai's apparent exhilaration.

Distantly, very distantly, he knows this is bad. You’ve been smart and observant in every universe, you’re going to put together that something is seriously wrong—you were not supposed to come back to his place, but how was he supposed to say no to you when you were looking at him with teary eyes and nowhere else to go? The thought itself feels like sacrilege.

“You know what we are and what we do,” Chuuya says, voice calmer now as he shakes his head and fishes a cigarette from his pocket, lighting it with his free hand before he turns to leave. “I don’t know what the hell you’re doing, but you’re putting this girl in danger after the lengths you went to keep her safe. I don’t get it.”

He squints a bit as Chuuya’s words ring through his head. That’s what he had thought too, but he’s the last person to admit to Chuuya that he might be right. A cold feeling starts to set over him, spreading through his chest like ice. If he’s going to think about this realistically, you’re probably already in danger just from being around him. The likelihood of someone catching sight of the two of you the past few weeks is higher than he’s comfortable with, even with the precautions that he’s taken, especially with tonight outside the club and at the convenience store. The thought is terrifying, enough to immediately kill off the jittery excitement that had been running through his body.

Dazai’s index finger traces the outline of his lips, his mind races. What does he do? If you’re in danger, he can’t just let you go back to your apartment and leave you undefended in a sketchier part of the city. His enemies will jump on it. They’ll target you. But he can’t just keep you here. It’ll be too risky, you’ll figure out who he is and what he does, and that’s not even considering the fact that maybe you won’t even want to stay. You might wake up in the morning and head to someone else’s place—you’d made a vague comment about not wanting to intrude and going to a friend’s house tomorrow but the thought makes his stomach twist a bit.

God, he’s so conflicted.

But the first thing to handle is making sure that you don’t go back to your apartment alone. The rest he can figure out later on—he has to decide if he’d rather try to keep you around the base and risk you figuring out what he does (god, he wants to keep you around) or if he should just send you off to a “friend’s” (he still stands by the fact that your ‘friends’ are shitty because what sort of friends leave their drunk friend alone at a bar with a stranger—even if he knows that he’d rather let the world burn than see harm come upon you, they don’t know that) with an extra protection detail. One that you wouldn’t know is there, naturally.

But how does he make sure you don’t go back to your apartment after the leak is fixed?

He thinks to himself, an idea coming to him swiftly. It’s a bit dark, yes, and he’s sure that if you knew, you’d run for the hills but… to keep you safe, he would do whatever it takes. Even if you’d hate him for it if you knew.

But what you don’t know won’t hurt you.

“Chuuya,” Dazai says before the man can leave his apartment. Chuuya stops dead in his tracks, not turning to look at Dazai, but waiting for whatever he has to say. “I’m going to text you the number of her landlord… make sure he doesn’t get her apartment fixed any time soon. And let Gin-chan know I might have a guest for the next few days so she’s not caught off guard tomorrow.”

Chuuya scoffs. “You’re a freak, Dazai.”

Dazai only smiles idly to himself, eyes sliding shut as he leans back in the chair at his desk, Chuuya leaves without another word, Dazai loses himself in thoughts of you.

A freak? Yeah, maybe. In love? Definitely.

Should he convince you to stay with him? The thought bounces around his head frantically. He doesn’t know the answer. The more careful part of him screams no, tells him that it’s too dangerous to keep you around. It’s dangerous for you, because the longer you’re around here, the more at risk you’ll be of getting hurt. It’s dangerous for him, because the longer you’re around here, the more at risk he’ll be of getting exposed,

But the less logical part of him, the one that’s consumed by the idea of you, and the chance he has of being with you, is much louder.

You came to him, he reminds himself. You found him. He tried to be good. He did everything he could to stay away from you, but you still found him. And you chose to seek him out again. You chose to. It’s easier to blame it on you, convince himself that you brought this upon yourself, as if you had any idea what sort of sick and fucked up person Dazai really is, as if you have any idea what’s happened to you in every other universe because of him.

He can never go back to how he was living before meeting you; he can’t.

You came to him.

Why should he have to let you go now?

With that thought in mind, Dazai thinks the answer to his question is made abundantly clear.

#dazai x reader #dazai x you #dazai osamu x reader #dazai osamu x you #bsd x reader #bsd x yoju #bungo stray dogs x reader #bungo stray dogs x you

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hopelesslyromanticshark · 2 months

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⋆ ˚｡⋆౨ৎ˚ My Brother's Best Friend Is The Guy For Me

content: leo valdez x daughter of jupiter! grace! reader warning: language (you startin to see a pattern yet?), mentions of a bra, kissing ig, author's note: another day another fanfic idea that haunted me until I wrote it. I'm really just a victim of my own mind😣😣 Also, deepest apologies i could drop three fics rn but i don't wanna like flood the tags or other people's feeds. but, if you guys want me to, just say the word🫡🫡🫡 I'm a people pleaser to my bones. Oh, and this is very non-canon compliant, i know. I'm re-reading the percy jackson series first bc i like things to be in order, even tho my fav was the lost hero. my copy of the lost hero just sits on my bedside table, staring at me until i finish the other books. IM SORRY-

after arriving in new rome, piper and leo figured it would be best to drag jason around the city and see if they could jumpstart his memory with familiar sights. they got lost a few times and clearly news of jason being back had yet to spread, as every few feet there were shocked looks and questions thrown at the trio. jason answered them, always, but people were quick to move on. almost like he wasn’t even missed. piper and leo could both sense jason coming to this conclusion and were unsure how to rectify the issue. jason sighed as he desperately looked at some statue, hoping against hope that it would mean something to him and just allow him to remember. like percy had the second he’d seen annabeth. jason barely knew percy and he was already growing bitter towards the boy, seeing it unfair that he got all of his memories back while jason was still just working with just flashes of smudged faces and warm feelings.

“anything?” piper whispered and jason just shook his head. he sighed before nodding towards where the ship should still be.

“We should be getting back,” he murmured, already walking away from the pair. leo and piper shared a glance, frowns deep set on their faces.

then, the clatter of metal on brick was heard, causing all three of them to jolt their heads towards the source of the noise. there stood a girl, probably their age, swords and spears scattered around her feet as she just stared at them. her hair was the color of golden straw, maybe a shade or two darker than jason’s. leo could tell tears were pooling in her eyes, her…shockingly blue eyes. leo’s eyes widened as he connected the dots before glancing at jason, who stilled and his eyes glazed over like he was lost in thought. she was dressed in the typical roman demigod attire, a purple shirt just peeking out from under a toga of sorts. she, admittedly, looked a little worse for wear; her hair was tangled and desperately pulled back into a ponytail, her eyes had bags under them, and she had clearly spent many recent nights awake.

“jason?” she asked in a broken sob, her chest heaving and the tears beginning to leak out of her eyes. jason’s eyes stayed on her before he jolted forwards, like he’d been struck by lightning. something snapped inside him, sending the boy rushing towards the girl, years and years of memories flashing before his eyes as he pulled her into a strong and loving embrace. memories of growing up together, training together, laughing and crying together. memories of his twin sister; no, memories of his baby sister. yes, yes, he was older. he remembers now. he knew he was still missing large chunks of his life, but getting his sister back was the only thing that mattered in the moment.

“y/n,” he gasped out as the girl cried against his chest, her hands desperately grasping at his shoulders. jason cried too, curling around her like she was the only thing that mattered, that protective older brother feeling coming back and filling his chest once more, slowly chipping away at the hole that juno left there.

“i- i looked for you. i didn’t give up, even after reyna put me on camp arrest. i knew you wouldn’t just leave, i knew it. they gave up too quickly, they just gave up,” the girl cried against his chest, pulling back to look at her brother, who had been gone for far too long. jason nodded at her, giving her shoulders a squeeze and offering her a comforting smile.

“it’s okay, y/n, i’m here now. and i remember you, which is more than enough for me,” he told her and her matching smile slowly slipped off her face.

“…you forgot me?” she whispered out, new tears brimming in her eyes. jason opened his mouth to reply but only sounds came out, his panic to comfort his little sister becoming overwhelming.

“it’s a long story. i’m piper and you must be jason’s sister?” piper cut in, saving the poor roman boy as she stepped forwards, her hand held out. some of her hair was standing up on its own, the moment the siblings collided sending a minor shockwave through the area causing both leo and piper’s hair to fly upwards from the static. y/n pulled her eyes from her brother, turning to the beautiful girl before her, bashfully acknowledging the flyaway hair. she let go of jason, promptly straightening her back out and shaking piper’s hand with both of hers.

“yes, yes. sorry, where are my manners?! i’m y/n grace, jason’s twin sister. lovely to meet you, piper,” she stated, a composed and diplomatic look taking over her face, which still had tear-stains but it didn’t make her appear any less regal.

piper smiled sweetly at the girl, the roman-ness of her basically radiating off like static electricity. though…she had a feeling the girl before her had a rebellious streak, based on the nike blazers on her feet instead of the standard sandals. y/n then turned her attention to leo, who quickly pulled himself out of his daydreams and took her hand into his, promptly flipping it over and pressing his lips to the back of her hand with a dazzling smile. the girl flared with a blush, looking away and slowly pulling her hand back, resting it flat against her stomach.

“leo valdez, at your service, princesa,” he mused as jason shot a glare at leo, who just smiled cheekily and pretended not to see it. he couldn’t help himself; it really wasn’t in his nature to ignore pretty girls, even if they were his best friend’s sister.

“come on, y/n, we’ve got a lot to talk about,” stated jason, nodding his head towards the streets of new rome. y/n’s eyes seemed to brighten at the prospects of getting updates on her brother and she quickly scooped up the swords and spears, leaning them against a bench before scampering off after her brother.

“i’ll meet you two at the boat later,” jason called, smiling widely at the pair, who waved him off. they shared a look, their smiles matching jason’s in size. they were just happy he was happy, assumably finally gaining back some memories.

piper shoved leo before turning around and heading in the opposite direction of the grace siblings and towards the argo ii. leo followed for a moment before looking over his shoulder, being met by the sight of the youngest grace doing the same. their eyes locked for a moment, the girl offering him the softest and sweetest smile he’d ever seen. leo beamed back at her, hoping she couldn’t see the steam rolling off him from so far away. they held each other's gaze for as long as they could before the daughter of jupiter disappeared behind the block. leo stopped, feeling the pounding of his chest and hearing the roar of his heartbeat in his ears before piper tugged him down the block with a glare.

“you cannot,” she hissed at him and leo gave her an innocent look as they started to walk towards the boat.

“i don’t know what you're talking about,” he lied, easily, averting his eyes from hers and pretending to take in the views new rome had to offer.

“i know when you lie, repair boy. you can’t date jason’s sister that he just got his memories back of. that’s, like, totally against bro code,” she huffed at him and leo rolled his eyes.

“you don’t even know bro code.” “i know enough. she’s off limits, valdez.”

and leo just smirked, wanting her more now that she was forbidden fruit. and based on how she looked at him, he had a feeling this thing wasn’t one sided.

over the next few days, while they were conversing over what to do and how to proceed as a group, leo went out of his way to immerse himself in the grace family. originally, he will admit, leo simply got close with y/n because he thought she was super hot, apparently forbidden, and totally out of his league. but, as he grew closer with the daughter of jupiter, he grew more attached. instead of focusing on her shiny hair, he found himself looking forward to her dumb jokes and they way she threw her head back when she laughed, desperately trying to cover her mouth with her hands. he quickly forgot - not entirely, of course, with a girl that attractive it’s kinda hard to miss - her dazzling figure, instead finding comfort in the soft looks she gave him when they spent too long planning the quest and boredom was starting to set in. his yearning for her was rapidly turning into something more solid, something more love-adjacent. he was certain that the princess of the gods was going to be the death of him…that being that jason didn’t get to him first.

it was one late evening when it happened, the breaking point between the two. most everyone had turned in for the night after a long day of arguing and training, the teens just wanted to sleep. save for y/n, who was sitting on the railing of the ship, her legs dangling over the edge and swinging through the sky. her eyes were trained on the setting sun, vibrant oranges and yellows shooting out from behind some mountain, turning to deep blues and lavenders as time continued to pass. jason told the girl good night, pressing a kiss to the top of her head before walking away. her eyes followed him for a moment before turning back to the sunset.

“careful, wouldn’t want you to fall,” leo joked as he walked up, resting his forearms against the railing next to her and keeping his eyes on the sun too. y/n laughed lightly, glancing at the curly-haired boy next to her.

“yes, you're soooo right, i'd have no way to save myself at all,” the girl mused, swishing her hand purposefully and causing a breeze to rush through leo’s hair, just teasing the beginning of her powers. he laughed lightly, looking over at her. she held his eyes for a moment before flirting them back to the sun.

“it’s beautiful, isn’t it?” she questioned. “yeah. gorgeous,” leo murmured back but his eyes weren’t on the sun at all but rather locked on her, enjoying the way she looked drenched in golden light.

y/n turned at his distracted tone and caught that his eyes were locked on her. she blushed and had the urge to look away but refused to do so, even pulling the courage from somewhere to move closer to the boy. leo shifted slightly, pushing himself closer and higher up so she wouldn’t have to bend so much to meet his gaze. his eyes flirted down to her lips before returning to her eyes, tilting his head the slightest bit in question at her. y/n swallowed nervously but she still reached her hand out, allowing her fingers to dance along the junction between his shoulder and neck.

“i wasn’t talking about the sunset,” admitted leo, his eyes staying trained on her as she leaned closer, mere centimeters between their lips. “i know,” she whispered and he felt the puffs of breath against his lips.

they weren’t sure who jolted forwards first, all they knew was that their lips were finally meeting. leo’s hand slid up her legs to her waist, his fingers desperate to feel her, to hold her close. her hand moved from his neck to his cheek, pulling his lips impossibly closer. leo was sure he felt sparks, but he just wasn’t sure how much of them were imagination or the daughter of lightning. leo pulled back first but her lips chased after his without much control. he chuckled at her, causing the girl to flush once again. she was easily embarrassed, leo found out. he also discovered that he loved the red hue on her face more than most things.

“jason’s gonna kill me,” she gulped, her brows furrowing and a panic flashing across her eyes as she looked at leo. leo reached up, cupping her face in his hands and he watched the fear slowly melt off her features.

“oh, to hades with jason. i like you…like, really like you. he can just get over it…saying that you like me, too,” replied leo, glancing down as he finished his sentence.

“hey, it’s not every boy that’s got me sparking, you know,” cut in y/n, causing leo to notice the sparks that flew off from her hands and hair every now and then, “i like you, too, leo. i thought that was obvious.”

“just checking,” leo stated with a dopey smile, which y/n managed to match with her own.

“no, but really, we’ve got to talk to jason,” she told leo firmly, who went to shrug her off again.

“talk to jason about what?” the man of the hour questioned as he walked back out onto the deck. y/n instantly paled, sputtering out vowels and constants but unable to form any words. leo subtly moved away from y/n, trying to remember what distance is acceptable for friends that totally didn’t just kiss and confess that they might love each other.

“What- what are you doing out here, jase?? i thought- you said you were going to bed,” the girl managed to spit out, finally. jason glanced between the two before reaching forwards and grabbing his jacket from the back of a chair, presenting it to the pair.

“piper accidentally left this up here…what’s going on? What did you have to tell me?” jason pushed, crossing his arms and glaring at the both of them. y/n shared a glance with leo, who’s eyes told her not to say anything before she turned back to her brother.

“jason, i- i really like leo. and i know you’ve got this whole protective streak thing but he-” “it’s cool,” jason cut in, shrugging his shoulders. y/n halted to a stop, frowning before cutting her eyes back up to her brother. leo nearly fell on his face with how quickly he turned to look at the son of jupiter.

“What?” they questioned in sync. “like, we’re good. leo, you’re my best friend. honestly, you’re probably the best guy to date my sister. though, if you even so much as think about hurting her, i'll deep fry you, got it?” jason added, turning and giving leo a cutting glare. leo’s back straightened out and he faked a salute at his friend.

“i have no plans of doing that, sir,” leo joked, using a largely fake sargent-like voice. y/n cracked a smile, hiding it behind her hand with a shake of her head. she then turned her attention to jason, who glanced between the two with a warm look.

“great! i’m actually off to bed now. sleep well, the both of you,” stated jason, waving a hand over his shoulder as he walked away. y/n turned back to leo, waiting a few seconds before promptly shooting forwards and pressing her lips against his. leo smiled into the kiss, knowing jason had nothing to worry about; he didn’t have plans on letting her go any time soon. as they pulled apart, y/n’s eyes trailed upwards and they widened near the top of his head.

“um, leo?” “yeah?” he questioned in a nearly dreamy voice. “your hair is on fire.” “oh, gods, not again,” he groaned, reaching and rapidly patting at the tiny flames with a roll of his eyes. y/n chuckled into her hand once more, watching all this with an amusing glint in her eyes.

“oh, yeah? you find this funny, princesa?” he bit out, jokingly glaring at her. she rolled her eyes at him as he leaned forwards and pressed his lips to hers.

then he did something unexpected, allowing his fingers to toy with the hem of her shirt. there was a moment of pause, just enough for her to push him away. When nothing happened, he slid his hand under, allowing his fingers to dance over her skin, slowly but surely climbing upwards and upwards the tip of his middle finger just barely brushing the bottom of her lace bra-

“that’s it! both of you, separate! i was cool and now i'm very much not cool,” jason shouted, causing the two to jump apart as jason stormed up to them, grabbing a hold of y/n and steering her towards the stairs to go below deck. he spun around, pointing at leo as they went.

“and keep your nasty paws off my sister!” “jason!” y/n cut in with an exasperated groan.

“don’t talk to your brother-in-law that way!” leo called back with a smirk before a gust of wind knocked him on his ass. he shouted greek and spanish curses at jason, who couldn’t understand them but it didn’t take a genius to figure out what he was saying. With a final battle of middle fingers, jason once more began to pull y/n below deck.

leo stood back up, rolling his eyes at the older twins' antics as y/n shot a look over her shoulder, just like the first day they met. her eyes glimmered at leo and she smiled a megavolt smile that only she could master, causing leo to return with a smile of his own. and as he watched her disappear from view, he couldn’t help but smirk, knowing that he’d do anything in his power to keep the daughter of jupiter by his side. he’d do anything for that smile, for that laugh, for that girl. even kissing ass to her brother for a few weeks.

author's note cont. : i feel like this was such a cute concept but my sleep depraved brain could not produce at the level i wanted smh 😭😭😭 but i also needed it to be done. but, c'est la vie! i think it's cute and sweet, but also rushed and held together with blood sweat and tears. anyways, good vibes and juju to everyone all over the world. kisses from covey😘😘😘

#postcards from covey ౨ৎ #all my love ౨ৎ #leo valdez x reader #heroes of olympus x reader #hoo #percy jackson #pjo #jason grace #pjo fandom #leo valdez #heroes of olympus

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hyperfixat · 2 months

Text

part three wooowooo this is like. half rushed. urgh. i want to get to the good part already but that can’t happen until i establish a world that it can happen in. she is a bit short this time around, uh i don’t have an excuse, bcs this is probably my least fav location/character bunch ☹️ i still like them but its a bit flat whatever just read it if u want

shortest chap. yet… 2.5k> words… [melts] on the bright side this ‘book’ or ‘series of events’ ..whatever has over 10k words now!!

< prev .. next >

** Written

** Written PRE 1.6 – Any mentions of new characters is pure speculation and or headcanons.

“I guess we have to talk to Ms Herta now,” Caelus sighs.

Part of you wonders why Caelus is so intimidated by Herta’s puppets. Maybe he has Pediophobia or something? The other part of you is intimidated at the prospect of meeting the eighty-third member of the Genius Society.

“I’m sure Herta will provide us with valuable insight regarding,” Welt says your name, “situation.”

Dan Heng has his nose buried into his phone screen, the dim light from the screen lights his face up, highlighting the planes as his eyes flicker from side to side as he reads. March slides into the spot next to him and you, grabbing for the half full coffee pot at the table.

“Ugh, how long till the warp jump?” March’s voice is grouchy as she stirs in a pod of creamer to her cute Pompom mug. She sways in her spot a little and her hand pauses for a second before she comes back to herself.

Dan Heng doesn’t look up, “two hours.” March lets out a dramatically anguished moan.

You had spent the night in Himeko’s room, it’s cozy and elegant like a hotel room. It’s the best way you think to describe it; beautifully decorated and clean, yet lived in. She let you share the bed with her and borrow a night shirt – after the day on the Lofou your lack of clothes was quite distressing. You were stinky and smelly from a busy day, and in desperate need of a shower and Himeko was your saving grace.

The ship stopping at Herta’s Space Station is useful regarding your (lack of) clothes, seeing as there should be plenty of regulation uniforms for you to wear until you accumulate a wardrobe of your own. (Luckily Caelus being an androgynous inhuman, somewhat recently synthesized being had a clean pack of proper undergarments for you to have.)

You had taken your retreat from Himeko’s room when she started brewing her (in)famous coffee.

Caelus puts their head in their hands, fingertips grasping at the gray strands loosely.

“Why are you so… scared, intimidated by Herta?” you breach their stupor, making them offer you a weak smile.

“I’m not scared of her per say, but she can be so brash, and I never know if I’m talking to an active puppet,” they sigh, “seriously she has so many puppets all over the station that it’s creepy like one per room. She does not need that many. It’s just that she’s hard to deal with sometimes, all geniuses are I’m told.”

Taking a deep gulp from her mug, March smacks her lips, “with you with us, I’m sure Herta will give us the time of day.” She smiles at you, still sleepy.

You aren’t sure what to make of Herta Space Station when the Astral Express arrives, the tracks are almost deserted save for a few spare workers. March hooks her arm around yours as your group traverses the grand place. There are some nearly deserted hallways that echo your footsteps, where the lights flicker and the only sound is your collective’s walking; just as there are some that are beyond packed, making you shrink into the center of the group, away from all the new sounds, scents, and people.

Sometimes you come across a Herta doll, prompting one of you to walk up and attempt to initiate a conversation with her, before walking off when she doesn’t react, idly staring blankly. It gives you the time to appreciate the craftsmanship Ms Herta put into the puppets. Their eyes are unlike any dolleyes that you saw on Earth, the glassy sheen over them glowing faintly. The joints look sturdy, as in some of the crowded rooms you saw some staff bump into her with decent force, making no movement from the collision.

“I guess we go to the room for the Simulated Universe testing,” Caelus suggests.

“Sounds good,” Welt affirms.

You wonder why you aren’t using any waypoints, maybe it was simply a game mechanic? You did see a Space Anchor when you were getting off the train….

The guards see Caelus approaching and tap on their wristbands simultaneously and the door’s to the testing room open up.

Herta’s eyes track over you and the other passengers, “I take it you’re not here to test the Simulated Universe?”

“No, not right now. Actually we came here because we thought you might be able to provide some insight to our situation right now. Besides, it concerns you as well.”

“Oh, and your strange guest? I take it they’re the center of this situation.” Herta stares straight into your soul with those doll eyes, making you shift behind Welt a little further. “Get on with it, don’t waste my time.”

“Wait!” March jumps in, “we need to gather a few more people!”

Herta sighs and her doll does an almost eye roll. “I’ll be here, or just get whatever doll is closest.” She sounds exasperated.

Asta is the easiest to find, not too far from Herta’s testing room. She’s standing where you usually find her in-game, looking at her phone, texting someone. She looks up when your group approaches her, giving you all an inviting smile.

“Hey there, trailblazers! Anything I can help you with?”

Her hair is really pretty, you note, the braid is tight against her scalp and it looks like she puts a lot of care into maintaining her look. You decide to subtly move away from the back of the group to stand next to Dan Heng and Caelus as they talk to her, explaining that she should follow them for an important meeting.

“Oh, and who’s this? I don’t think we’ve met before. Hi, I’m Asta, lead researcher here at the Herta Space Station.” Asta thrusts her hand forward for you to take, you do, introducing yourself in turn. “It’s lovely to meet you. Will you be a part of this meeting as well?”

“They will.” Dan Heng nods, corralling Asta into your party to head off to search for the next and final person, Arlan. “Do you know where Arlan is right now Ms Asta, he’s the last one that will be joining us.”

“Hm, I think he was talking with Adler, something about a missing Wubbaboo?”

“That kid…,” Caelus mutters under his breath, though it sounds more fond than annoyed, like one would talk about an annoying little sibling.

It takes a while to catch Arlan, you all find him coming out of the elevator on the second layer of the storage zone, close to where you first arrived. You convince him to join you and set off to look for one of Herta’s puppets to talk to.

“Hello? Helloooo?” March 7th waves her hand back and forth in front of the doll’s face and huffs when it doesn't react. Just when she's about to give up the doll jolts and Herta’s voice comes out of the voice box.

“I’m here. I’m here, what is it?”

“Asta, Arlan, you might want to sit down,” Dan Heng suggests kindly. “It might be a bit shocking.”

“Hm?” Asta tilts her head, eyes carefully decoding the emotion on his face, before taking the initiative to lean against the wall.

“Don’t say we didn’t warn you~!” March laughs, before Welt and Himeko bring the proper air of authority to the situation and begin helping you explain that they’re video game characters, you don’t belong here, and may need their help to get back home. At some point Herta’s doll stops its idle motions, but the light behind the eyes shows she’s still there, listening.

Arlan desperately looks at Asta, then you, then Caelus, as if at any moment you’ll all start laughing about how he definitely believed you for a moment. When that moment doesn’t come he takes a place with his back against the wall next to his pink haired superior.

There’s a block of quiet as they all process the bomb you’ve dropped on them, before Herta cuts into it, saying your name. “I’d like to speak with you, in person. Not now, I’ll have Caelus schedule it, but I may be able to offer some… wisdom.”

“Oh, that’s much appreciated, Ms Herta. Thank you,” you nod at her.

“Don’t be thanking me yet,” and at the mildly ominous words she promptly goes offline.

Hm. That’s not exactly reassuring, but it could always have been worse.

With the whole conversation thing done and dusted for everyone on the spaceship, you take a lone walk, breathing in the somewhat stuffy air, searching for any inner wisdom that could come from time alone without distraction.

Your mind doesn’t provide much thought, though being alone with yourself after so many eventful moments – spanning so close together too, gosh – is therapeutic in of itself. Only when it begins to get to the point of eerily quiet in the part of the station you’d wandered into does a small ‘yip’ sound at the end of the hall from whence you came. Spinning on your heel you spot a small, white and awfully cute dog.

Peppy!

You gasp in elation, kneeling where you stand and holding out your hand hoping the dog will come trotting over to greet you, it does, to your excitement, letting out another woof before following through.

“Hello there, little guy,” you coo at the dog, smiling as it yips happily at your soft touch.

Distantly echoing you here what you think is Arlan’s voice echoing down the halls, he sounds far. You lift your gaze away from Peppy as another echoing call arrives.

“Peppy!” you lift your eyebrow at the dog, giving it a skeptical look, almost as if it knows what you’re attempting to portray it averts it’s gaze, eyes flicking to the side.

An out-of-breath Arlan comes speeding down the hall, only stopping upon seeing you and the target he was searching for.

“There you are, Peppy. Lady Asta was looking all over for you,” he scolds the dog gently. “Sorry about this…” Arlan talks to you, bending in front of you to pick up the fluffy dog. His hands almost disappear into Peppy’s coat when he picks the dog up. “I hope Peppy didn’t cause you any grief?”

“They’re a sweet thing,” you laugh, petting the dog in his arms. Arlan smiles at you, verbally expressing his agreement.

Herta Space Station was fun to explore, and by the time your body begins to feel the wear of the day you aren’t far from a Space Anchor… hmm, you wonder if you could utilize it to make the trip back to the express much easier.

You walk up to the geometric floating object and hesitate before placing a hand on the surprisingly cool ring of gold around it. There’s no one around to hear the sound of alarm you let out when your entire vision is taken over by a bird’s eye map of the station. Oh! It’s just like the game, relief fills you at that.

Now, all you need to do is: click on the Pompom waypoint that will take you to the express and… your vision then goes white and you feel your legs fall.

This time someone is around to hear the sound you make as you crash and tumble into the carpet of the Astral Express. That someone being Pompom. Well. At least you managed to teleport.

Speaking of Pompom they were watering some of the plants over by the passenger log, but when you came in they jump, falling to the ground themself, landing on their furry butt with a huff. “HEY! Don’t scare Pompom like that!”

“Sorry, sorry,” you clasp your hands into a steeple; as if praying for forgiveness. “I didn’t know what would happen:” a half truth, as you had your expectations.

They brush their clothes off and you help them to their feet. You yawn then, holding a hand over your mouth.

“Have any of the others returned yet?”

“No. Pompom has been waiting for the first arrival to start making lunch,” the shuffle their paws together in a way that is sure to look dignified and professional, but from your perspective looks adorable. “Speaking of, the first passenger to return sometimes offers to assist the conductor….”

You pick up what they are putting down, as the idiom goes. “I can help in that case!”

You assist Pompom in the train’s kitchen. For a creature like them they’re quite purposeful with their movements, not that you have any reference of how a creature like them would usually move. That is to say they’re good in the kitchen. The rabbit(thing?) wears the cutest little bonnet and gloves to avoid getting fur into the meal, and tasks you with some simple chores to prepare the meal.

Cooking with Pompom is overall a fun and positive experience, and luckily the rest of the crew arrive just in time to eat. You all sit down around the dining cart’s table to discuss the day’s events and your future plans.

“The station is very clean. I like it,” you start the small talk the best you can.

“Indeed, the staff are very diligent,” Dan Heng nods.

There’s the scrape of utensils against plates and March speaks up, “so Jarlio VI tomorrow?”

“That is the plan,” Welt affirms. “Unless,” his eyes glint under the overhead lighting as they meet yours, “there have been any last minute change of plans.”

“Nope, we should be set.” You nod, feeling warm under the older man’s gaze.

“Well then, that settles it, Jarlio VI is tomorrow’s destination. All this adventuring isn’t meant for someone my age…” his last sentence is quieter and followed by a heavy sigh.

Himeko covers up a giggle with a bite of food, and March looks at you with mirth in her eyes.

“Jarilo-VI, here we come!” She finally laughs, lifting her glass in a mimicry of a toast. The rest of the table joins in, lifting their cups as well.

Jarilo-VI, here we come.

tags (comment or leave an ask to join) : @leafanonsforest @c00kie-cat @andromeda-gay

#verified hyperfixat post #sahsrau #hsr x reader #hsr x you #hsr x y/n #hsr x gender neutral reader #isekai #honkai star rail isekai #hsr isekai #honkai star rail x reader #honkai star rail fanfiction #herta space station #urgh #i hate having to tag posts bro #hsr #honkai star rail

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