β He knocks on her window. It's not like he can safely walk into the Agency without someone knowing-- but he's rather good at various cloaking expertise, being Mafia. As the window is opened, he shuffles around awkwardly for a good ten seconds and reveals a small velvet box from his coat, a little worse for wear. Slightly out of breath, Chuuya hands it over to her. He clutches her hand in his, protecting the box in her palm for a moment with his own. "Happy birthday." He mouths, and he's off.
◣ ✿ ◥ She squeezes his hand while it’s in hers, mouthing, “Thank you,” back at him before he leaves. Once he’s gone, she shuts the window and pads back to her bed before sitting down and opening the box–and ah, it’s familiar, a silver necklace with a rabbit pendant, something that appears to be rather expensive. She received something remarkably similar earlier in the day from someone who used to be remarkably close to Chuuya, and she decides that it’s a coincidence; the selection of rabbit-themed jewelry probably isn’t great, so they must’ve just happened to see the same thing.
Either way, she’s going to wear both of them at the same time.
Her gaze is scrutinising, more intense than usual, but she doesn't mean any harm by it; no, she'd gotten a new stuffed rabbit that she wanted to model after Chuuya, but she's trying to figure out how to do that without making it obvious (because, of course, she didn't want Atsushi or anyone else from the Agency to catch onto her secret friendship). "Aniki," she begins as she attempts to form a proper inquiry, "if you were a rabbit, what would you wear?"
A serious question, no doubt…And yet, Chuuya isn’t quite sure how to answer it. He looks at Kyouka, as if he’s trying to get more meaning out of the words she’s delivered to him with such care, before turning and staring at the ground, placing a gloved hand under his chin. His brow furrows, steely blue eyes narrowing.
“A rabbit, huh.” He scrutinizes in return. “I’d wear something cool. I’d be at the bottom of the food chain…Ueh, that’d be bad. I would have to wear something to make myself look intimidating to my enemies…Like a long coat, or something…A good leather belt, some suit pants, a waistcoat…” Chuuya turns back to her triumphantly. “And a hat like this one.”
♠ It’s not like he could just ignore the sound of the younger resident of the Mafia’s wheezing cough for days on end. Or her sniffling that she modestly hid under her sleeves as if ashamed to show the common weakness of a cold. Or perhaps it was her noticably reddened cheeks…Chuuya knew Kyouka was sick. Perhaps nobody else was going to do anything about it. Perhaps, he thought with a pang, she would only worsen and her illness would peak to a point where she wouldn’t be able to fight, and–
It just won’t do. Not on his watch.
On a break, he nonchalantly asks Kouyou for her recommended strain of decaffinated tea. She shrugs and offers him a small tin of chamomile flowers, which he then carefully steeps in a sieve and pours, steaming, into a mug sculpted for smaller hands than his. And, for the occasion, he even provides a bit of bottled cream to the drink.
He finds Kyouka curled up on the couch, feigning sleep whilst she holds a quill in her hand to finish a checkered list of deeds she had completed for the Mafia that day to hand in to their boss. Chuuya stalks up to her and takes it from her swiftly.
Instinctively, Kyouka’s eyes widen and she reaches for it defiantly. He holds it just out of her reach with a little too much triumphance and shakes his head. “I’ll complete it for you. After all, we doubled on everything half the time this week. Looks like you already did the half I wasn’t involved with, so it’s a fair deal.”
She seems as if she wants to object, so Chuuya places the small mug in Kyouka’s hands. “Drink it, girl.” He offers quietly, his blue eyes flicking away with a certain amount of hesitation. “It’ll help. You’re very ill. Go straightaway to your room to finish it and make sure to go to sleep soon after.”
In emphasis to his point, he brushes away her thin bangs to press the back of his hand to her forehead in a surprising show of shyness. He watches the resemblence of a tiny smile creep across her face. Before Chuuya can embarrass himself any longer, he stuffs the clipboard and pen under his arm and walks off quickly.
Later on that night, he notices Kyouka’s light off a lot earlier than usual.
◣ ✿ ◥ Life in the underground was tough: the people there saw and did awful things day in and day out, and it took its toll on the mind. Kyouka understood that, having spent years in the darkness and nearly getting lost within it. For a long time, she couldn’t see an end or an escape from that terrible affliction, and with no choice but to accept her fate, she trained as an assassin and killed. She hurt people. And knowing that she could never take back anything she did hurt her as well.
Knowing all this, she wasn’t surprised when Chuuya began dozing off in the middle of conversation. They’d found a nice little safehouse where they could sit and chat–staying out in public made them both a bit paranoid of being caught by their respective organisations. He seemed tired before; he probably finished up a tough mission. In that case, he’d need the rest.
While the man slept, she sat near him in silence. A book had been left in the apartment by its previous resident, so she picked it up and read. The subject was boring, but it was better than staring off into space. That lasted maybe twenty minutes until Chuuya started shifting, muttering under his breath as a grimace crossed his features.
The classic signs of a nightmare.
Kyouka set down the book and stood up before padding over to where he sat, resting a hand on his shoulder, and attempting to shake him awake. He woke up with a jump, and one of his hands reached up on instinct to push her away, but stopped once he realised who she was and sighed. She must’ve looked concerned because he offered a half-smile and assured, “I’m alright.”
With a nod, she stood once more. That time, it was to go pour him a glass of water and bring it back for him. “Here.” He accepted it, and she sat down next to him. It wasn’t much, but hopefully, he found comfort in her presence.
♠ Heart. Chuuya wondered if Kyouka had that word in her valid vocabulary for something that really meant something in their small, violent world, before that boy was able to show her a different path. To Chuuya, among the years that he spent working with her, she really was already different from them when she was first accounted for in the mafia. After all, that need to reach for light didn’t come from nowhere– that’s where Chuuya decidedly thinks she’s mistaken. Atsushi didn’t lead her to the light, like a soul wandering in the dark for as long as they could remember; she was lost, and she found what she was looking for in the agency’s glow. She found what she was meant to be.
“I see, I see. Well, at least you’ve found some way to get her under your control.” He shrugs. “Besides, I know she’s not sentient, but she’ll eventually ‘learn’ to work with you as well, right? Maybe she’ll eventually catch on completely.” He gives her a quick flash of teeth, chest reverberating with a laugh. “I…guess I can envision you with a set of throwing knives. If you ever have trouble with that, I’m always–well.” He stops himself quietly. “When I’m around, you can call me.” It’s different now, he has to remind himself. They are in seperate rivaling groups, after all. The truce suspends them, leaving many a sworn enemy to gentle their hand and release their weapons for now. Chuuya can’t help but feel a little solace in this fact, for a break feels welcome after such chaos with the Guild–despite not being able to help feeling that it will lead to something much darker.
◣ ✿ ◥ Well, that ended that trail of thought. I’m always here. You can count on me. Not anymore, really. Belonging to enemy organisations sure put a damper on any relationship they could have, but she didn’t like thinking about that. She had to acknowledge it, however, or else she might get careless on her way to their discreet meetings, and if that happened, someone from the agency could find out. That’d be troublesome. But she didn’t need to say it out loud. Hearing it from her companion, even if not directly in those words, made her pause. Hopefully they wouldn’t have that conversation again.
“Like Golden Demon,” the girl chimed in on the first topic. “Like how Kouyou-san can control her ability.” That was her goal, at least. It seemed Kyouka’s own mother had a good deal of control over Demon Snow, which made the outlook more promising. Even if her mother chose to kill people with it. Maybe Akutagawa wasn’t the only person she had to prove wrong. “Throwing knives is different from stabbing with them.” Even though her assassinations relied mostly on her ability, she did spend years of training prior to them learning how to fight for herself. It’d been difficult, but she managed fine.
♠ Scanning the back of his hand in pause for her reply, Chuuya has to wonder what it was like to have that sort of introduction to the agency. The protege in question wasn’t even properly trained at the time. Such actions like moving with what your heart tells you, seeing the good in a situation no matter what it means for the safety of the agency itself and taking that path–they weren’t advised by the mafia, which was more like a hivemind, something colder with careful schemes. It’s unfortunate that Chuuya has to group the two communities into light and darkness, but in this case, it’s easy to think of it that way.
He looks at her curiously. “I see, I see. He sounds like a bit of a handful, but if your director thought he fit in with everybody, then…” Chuuya rests his hand on his hip. “He’ll get used to Demon Snow. Besides, you’re able to get a handle on her for most of the time, right? ‘Specially with Fukuzawa-san.”
◣ ✿ ◥ Atsushi was naive by all accounts. He jumped straight into tasks with no true plan or strategy, whereas others put more thought into their actions. At first, the girl believed moving in such a way could never work–she could never spontaneously run from the mafia and get away with it if she didn’t make a plan first (and she wasn’t intelligent enough to make a plan). Then Atsushi barged into her life and made his method work, and (while she didn’t adopt it for herself) it changed her outlook.
“He has a good heart,” she murmured. Perhaps that was the difference between them: it was difficult to be spontaneous while wandering in the dark, but blinding light could cut through the murk. “She still moves on her own at times, but it’s good practice for throwing knives.” Kyouka said that with a straight face, as though assaulting her own ability was nothing out of the ordinary. “I’ve been getting better at it.”
♠ There’s a shift, a flutter. It’s as if a butterfly went right past his ear, barely gracing the tips of his hair– a gentle hush, sending an unfamiliar, yet prevalent warmth across his chest. What a funny feeling to recieve from such a simply put assurance from the smaller figure, staring up at him with those huge, light-filled eyes. Why are you looking at me in that way? You dragged yourself from misery (the misery we shared together, in a way.) You reached something perhaps higher than any of us could dream of for a moment. (I tried–I swear I tried–) Hope, and in absolution, a love greater than you’ve ever been shown.
Lose himself. Chuuya wonders if she even truly knows the meaning of this phrase.
For a moment, he imagines seeing her face as his vision distorts, clouds with dark spots clotting in front of his gaze and drowning her out, his arms ravaged with something sinister under the epidermal layer. His back seizes, his legs move unaccordingly and tear ligaments with impossible speeds. His throat and eyes fill with blood as his palms raise the weight of swallowed galaxies, stinging and humming in the air, rendering every living organism around him helpless to the impossible void. Chuuya wonders what she would feel if she watched him tear himself apart. He wonders if she could stop him from tearing into her.
This hurts him to imagine, Chuuya notes to himself in surprise. He doesn’t want to think about it anymore. He shakes it off. He’s good at doing that for a lot of things, and she…She wants to be good at making him feel all right.
Simple, but valuable. Rare. Sort of like a butterfly.
Chuuya finally lets himself smile, sigh. He pats her cheek with a warm, leather-clad palm, moves it to grip her shoulder with a squeeze, a show of power that he knows she’ll understand, forearm muscles flexing for a minute. His face draws serious as he bends down quickly, forehead creasing.
“I know. We still have each other’s backs. That’s a vow we took at the very beginning, and it can’t be broken by anything. That’s trust.” Oh, sweet girl.
♠ He steps at the very edge of the bridge. He is a slow, precarious flame, and you can see his teeth flash as he laughs, skipping a stone in the water below carelessly– (as if you don’t know you might fall in.) The very water that she, the shadow-girl, fell in with the tiger like two stars. A baptism of light.
“Tell me about him.” Chuuya offers casually, a little spark in his eye. “You know, the protege Dazai’s so proud of. I want to hear about him from you.”
◣ ✿ ◥ What an ironic meeting spot, the girl thought, though she hadn’t protested at the suggestion. The scenery was easy to recognise: not too long ago, she’d both almost blown up and almost drowned there. On one hand, she would’ve died if Atsushi hadn’t saved her; while on the other, she probably wouldn’t have been put in that situation in the first place if not for the bounty on the weretiger’s head.
All in all, considering where they were, the request came as no surprise. Kyouka watched him for a moment before answering. “He’s kind. And stubborn.” She turned her gaze to the water. “Not the smartest person, and he tends to get injured a lot. He’s scared of Demon Snow.” But with how many times her ability had been used to cut him to ribbons, she couldn’t blame him for that.
