When Dazai awakes, the evening has arrived. The bed he is in is plush and warm, and evening with the brace tight around his ribs, he is comfortable.
Still, in the gentle haze of sleep, he tiredly sits up, rubbing at his his face sleepy, and then his bare throat, trying to rub away the constantly lingering discomfort in the maimed flesh. He hates not having all of his bandages, his chest and legs are bare of them, the feeling of the clothes Frank had given him like sandpaper against his sore flesh. It's driving him a bit crazy, in all honesty. He's already tired of this assignment, and is preferring to be with Mori, for the first time in his very short, miserable life.
He creeps out of the room, peering into the main room, finding Frank napping on the couch. Dazai checks the kitchen to find Claire sat at her kitchen table, flicking through some papers, a note pad in front of her, pen in hand. She looks up at him, surprised, before smiling.
"Hey, your awake. Frank laid down for a nap an hour or so ago. He asked me to wake him up when you got up." Dazai nodded, observing as the woman stood, pasing him by to the kitchen counter, turning around and handing him some bandages.
"For your neck, you can go wrap it up right now while I get him up. If you need help, though, just let me know." Dazai nodded and quietly thanked the woman, who just nodded and left for the living room.
Dazai shuts himself in the bathroom for a few moments, fixing his necks bandages, pocketing the rest of the roll for when he next needs to change them, deciding it was better to save them than to go cover the skin beneath his shirt and pants.
When he exits, Frank is up, slipping his shoes back on and quietly speaking to the nurse. She nods slightly at his muted words and looks to Dazai, waving him over. Quietly, Dazai readies himself as well, a little surprised when the man hands him his jacket, considering there was no need for him to be wearing it now with his neck covered. Nonetheless, Dazai puts it on, and he'd never admit this allowed, but it was a comforting substitute for his now lost coat. Mori would certainly be disappointed that his old coat is gone, and would likely pass him on something else in its stead, considering the significance of it. And Dazai, over the years of wearing that thing, had grown a sort of parasitic attachment to it, in a way. It was comfort, but he hated that it symbolized Mori. But that same thing was also what he took so much comfort in... He held an odd relationship with it, and with it gone, he felt a little off kilter. The lack of its weight on his shoulders weighed heavy, and so the coat Frank had leant to him relieved that heaviness, in a way.
It was stupid.
Their walk to the van is silent, but Frank looks sure of himself.
It's ten minutes into the drive that he finally speaks up.
"Where are we going?" He inquired, watching the streets of Hells Kitchen as they pass them by, darkened by night, the neon of storefront lights and headlights illuminating the passersby. Drunk college kids, am old couple, a blind man, and a woman walking her dog, the streets are busy despite the hour and recent raise of crime rate.
It's just like Yokohama, it's people remaining ignorant and complacent to its underbelly.
"To meet a friend of mine. I asked her to get me information on the Port Mafia, and she has some." Dazai's eyes narrowed incredulously.
"You haven't forgotten that I work for the Port Mafia, right?" Frank, glanced at him, diverting his eyes from the road briefly to give him an unimpressed look.
"It's not like you would have given me jack shit, so I asked her." Dazai wondered if this man was truly this dense.
"That's not what I meant. Is your head screwed on right? Maybe we should turn back to have that nurse friend of yours check if you've knocked something out of place." Dazai tapped his head lightly, and the man clearly got the message.
"And why would my head be screwed up, exactly?" He was speaking as if he were a particularly dull child.
"Because you are bringing a member of the Port Mafia to meet this friend of yours. You do know that once I return-- unless you do kill me, which if you decide to, I will be eternally gratefully and bless you with good fortune--" Frank shook his head, rolling his eyes and letting out a long, exasperated sigh. "I will be reporting this." For a short while, Frank did not speak.
As Dazai waited, he fiddled with his bandages, lightly tugging at them, clipping and re-clipping them into place.
"You aren't returning to them." That was not an entirely surprising response. He still had to sound as if it were.
"Pardon?" He replied dryly.
"I'm going to find some place for you to go that isn't the Mafia, and you're staying there." It wasn't much more explanation wise.
"I don't want to leave." It's true, if he did he'd lose both Oda and Ango, and to lose his only friends... the two kindest individuals in his life surrounded by people who either feared or loathed him, it sounded unbearable.
"Well, you are." It's a finishing statement, and Dazai can't help but be amused at the idea that this man thought he held such monopoly over his actions-- like he could simply tell Dazai not to do something, and he would.
"And where you want me to go should matter to me... Why?" Frank's face twitched slightly in agitation, and perhaps it was a tad thrilling, similar to Chuuya, in the way pushing him to the brink of frustration brought Dazai a malicious amusement.
The busy streets bled way to a solitary, quiet suburban street alongside the ocean, beaches overlooking the ocean and it's beauties, the moonlight flickering across the gently lapping waves.
"Because I'm trying to put you somewhere you can have a life, somewhere you'll have a damn choice on what you do." Frank snapped, the man's patience that he had shown unendingly these last few days snapping as his nerves wore thin.
"I do have a choice, and I chose the Port Mafia. There is no other option for me." Dazai hummed matter of factly, and it only seemed to annoy the man more.
"Kid, don't be stupid, you don't have the-- the foresight to think there's other options for you, other ways to go about your life than crime." Dazai snorted and leaned further into the passengers seat.
"You do realize how hypocritical that is coming from you, right?" The car slammed to a stop, sending Dazai bouncing forward, back painfully jerking and hit the back of the seat once more with a lot more force than appreciated. Dazai hissed sharply, hand twitching up to grab his back, but he stopped himself before he could. Frank seemed to notice his mistake, and they remained stalled there, in the middle of the street, Dazai gingerly glaring out the side window to the sea.
"... Sorry." Dazai didn't see fit to respond to that, and Frank sighed deeply, frustration written deeply into his face.
"I'm not a good example, and that's the damn point, kid, my life turned out really shitty because I got involved with something I probably shouldn't have. I'm trying to give you some chance at something normal." Frank explained carefully, picking and choosing his words delicately.
"I don't want a chance." It's honest.
"Right now you don't, but I swear to Christ that in a few years you'll be regretting not taking it. I'm not letting you get to that point of regret." Frank replied strongly, and Dazai quirked a brow at him.
"I don't intend to be alive in a few years." Where Mori would have laughed bemusedly with a creeping hand on his shoulder or Chuuya snapped and told him that if he annoyed him enough, he'd kill him right, Frank remained quiet at that, staring at him with an unreadable expression. It was kind of uncomfortable, being faced with an emotions he's never had turned on him, one he wasn't even able to put a name to.
"You've tried to kill yourself." It's not really a question, more of a statement. Dazai answers nevertheless.
"Yes, quite frequently. Unfortunately, I'm terrible at it." Frank is not amused but his now jovial tone at the mention of suicide.
"Why do you want to die?" He didn't know how to reply, for a moment. It was hard to put it in words, the feeling that living gave him other than an overwhelming cold, numbing to the core. Chuuya had once described the feeling of No Longer Human to be a similar all encompassing chill, and to a degree, perhaps he blamed this apathy of his towards living on his ability itself.
But he couldn't say that.
"Life only ever brings suffering, in the end, and I really hate pain." Slowly, Frank starts driving again, and he seems to be thinking surprisingly hard about all this.
Dazai wants to laugh, but he thinks Frank wouldn't take too kindly to that.
In the end, all Frank said was quiet "Yeah."
Dazai couldn't help it, be sputtered out a laugh at that.
Frank had said he would arrive at around ten-thirty, but as minutes ticked by, Karen began to grow concerned.
She knew of Matt's strange, tense call with Frank, that someone else had been there, and her only conversation with him since then had been just as evasive. She had asked about the call, and if there was someone with him, and while he confirmed that he did indeed have someone with him at the moment, he did not explain any further. All he said was that he would explain it in person.
And now he was late and she was anxious.
Karen's about to call Frank to ask where he is we a familiar van pulls into a spot just outside the park, and visibly she deflates with relief.
Frank steps out, and Karen begins I his direction, intending to meet him half way. Around the car crept another figure, one shorter than both of them and clearly youthful. Standing beside Frank, is a teenage boy.
"Frank! You've got to communicate with me more, for God's sake!" Frank at least had the decency to look slightly guilty, rubbing at his neck.
"Yeah-- I've been a bit busy, laying low at the moment until I can figure out a plan."
"I'm here to help you, Frank, so you have to actually speak to me for me to be able to do that." Karen sighed exasperatedly, but her curiosity was growing more than her irritation.
"Who's this?" She asked, turning her attention to the kid. Frank also glances at him, as if expecting him to speak. He did not.
"Yeah, he still hasn't told me his name." Frank grunted, leaning back against his car.
"Can you tell me what your name is?" She took on a softer tone, trying to coax some sort of answer, but from the blank, unimpressed expression on the teens face, he did not take it well.
"No." Charming, was Karen's first thought, but the second was that she couldn't hold too much judgement of the kid. He was traveling around with Frank, associated with the Port Mafia in some way, and so his reluctance to disclose information could very likely come from a very reasonable place.
"Er-- alright, well, Frank I have information. I met with some guy who managed to get into one of the Mafia's servers for a bit, and he got a lot of information." Frank perked up, interested, and perhaps they both glanced to the kid for a moment, checking for a reaction to her words, but he did not so much as blink at her words.
"Anything on the Executive?" He asked, and she nodded, reaching into her bag and handing him a folder of papers. Carefully, he shuffled through, skimming the details even in the dark of the night.
"The Executive-- His name is Dazai Osamu. There isn't much else on the guy other than that he's new to the position and he's really, really good at what he does." The blonde woman explained, and Frank nodded along attentively before rounding on the kid.
"You know this Dazai Osamu guy?" Frank closed the folder, beginning to hand it back to Karen when she shook her head.
"I have my own set." The kid quirked a brow at the older man, as if he were stupid for asking.
"Are we talking personally, or...?" He folded his arms and peered up.
"I'm talking at all." Karen really is surprised by Frank's patience with the kid. He's not the most patient nor gentle of men, but despite the kids apart rude remarks and evasiveness, he remains calm.
He must have been a very good father.
"I do know of him. I was assigned to him when I was shipped out to work here." Frank's face hardened a bit.
"Is working under him where you got the 'Demon Prodigy' title?" She was struck with familiarity, because that title had been brought up many times. Her head snapped to the kid, confused, because it didn't make sense that the Executive and Demon Prodigy were different people, in the files themselves they were named to be the same person.
When she saw the kids expression, all she saw was confusion.
"What are you talking about?" He questioned, and Frank gave him a fairly unimpressed look.
"You fit the description to a T, I realized this a while ago, kid." The kid snorted.
"Wow, you kidnapped me thinking I was the exectuive? I'd say I'm flattered, but I'm not. He's an asshole." The kid mused, and Karen spoke up.
"In the files, the Executive and Demon Prodigy are said to be the same people. Something about it being a title he got before he became an executive." The boy nodded along with her.
"Then why were you there that night?" Frank questioned.
"I work there, Castle, I was there because I was told to. That's how it is, I go where I'm told and I don't complain." A car drove past them.
"The bandages are a trademark feature of this guy." It was a statement, and Karen looked closer at the kid, looking past the coat to the collar, seeing that, indeed he wore a thick layer of bandages around his neck.
"Lot's of people where bandages. It's quite a fashion trend in Japan." He chirped in response, and Frank made an unimpressed noise.
"Be serious." He warned lightly, and the kid waved a hand dismissively. Bandages were visible on the palms of his hands.
"Fine, fine. The Executive wears them because his ability." Frank squinted, confused, while Karen perked up, interested.
"No Longer Human?" She asked carefully. He nodded sullenly in response.
"Yes. There's two notable ability users in the Port Mafia," the kid put up two fingers, and Karen nodded slightly, engrossed. "Executive Dazai Osamu and Nakahara Chuuya. The second guy used to run his own gang, but the group merged with the Mafia last year. After that, during an incident-- the Dragon Head Fued-- the two formed a duo of sorts." The Dragon Head Fued, she remembered it from being mentioned in the files. A deadly incident between multiple organizations that ravaged the whole of Yokohama, leaving man dead and the Mafia victorious. And Nakahara Chuuya... that name was familiar. Vaguely, she recalled something, a name of something she thought was a sector formed after the incident, however...
"Double Black." Karen finished for him, and he hummed an affirmation, face deadly serious.
"Their abilities compliment each other, so they work together as assigned by the Boss."
"Are these abilities like mutations?" Frank asked, seemingly thoughtful.
"In a way. An ability is far more powerful than any mutation, though." Karen paled slightly. The idea that an ability user, one who formed a deadly duo and fought a war to its end and stood victorious was now here, in America, trying to do God knows what here... if an ability is more powerful, with the mutant vigilantes stand a chance against him?
"What's the Executives ability do?" The kid hesitated in responding, and Karen certainly understood why. This Executive seemed like a figure that demanded respect and loyalty, and him being here, divulging this information... it was like a death sentence.
"No Longer Human is unique. There is no other ability like it, which makes it difficult to deal with... He can nullify other abilities." The kid explained warily.
"... He's an on and off switch, basically?" Frank reiterated.
"That's one way to put it, yes."
"Does the ability do anything else?" He asked, incredulously, and Karen herself had to admit that it was a bit of an underwhelming reveal.
"Ah... you don't get it, do you?" He asked dryly.
"I understand the use, but I don't understand the name. Or the..." Frank seemed to be trying to find his words, so Karen cut in.
"Mystique?" She added, questioningly.
"Yeah, if he comes here, to America with that ability... what would happen, exactly?" The kid stared at them both for a moment, as I'd they were particularly dull, before answering.
"No vigilante nor ability user would be capable of using their powers on him. As long as he is making contact with either them or their powers in some way, they are rendered entirely useless..."
"Meaning nearly every vigilante or hero in the country is completely useless against this guy." Karen breathed, and perhaps she was more used to flashy powers. Mind control, super strength, flight, that a power and as terrifying considering their current climate like this was not only underwhelming in their minds, but completely affective against their heroes who are their last line of defense. It's a bit terrifying, the way she underestimated something she didn't even understand.
"... That sounds a bit more like threat explained that way." Frank admitted.
"Definitely." Karen cupped her head and sighed.
"How many ability users are in the Port Mafia?" The kid seemed to think for a moment.
"Ten." Ten people out there who are more powerful than mutants. Ten people in the Mafia, only God knows how many outside of them, or in other organizations.
"Is there an equivalent to the Avengers, or vigilantes in Yokohama to oppose them?" To her immense relief, the kid nodded.
"The Agency. Their a group of gifteds who often clash with the Port Mafia. Every Detective that works with them is an ability user." Karen shuffled in place, this Agency... it sounded familiar. She had heard the name, she thinks, possibly at some point in her search?
"Any chance they'll come here to deal with the Mafia?" He shook his head.
"Not likely, they stay in Japan, specifically Yokohama, however if they situation over here gets large enough..." he prompted.
"They may come on over." Frank concluded, and the kid hummed agreeably.
"So, at this point, we're on our own." Karen stated, more to herself than anything.
"I'll tell Matt, Jessica Jones already knows about the situation, society Spider-Man, word will get around pretty quickly, after this point. Maybe if they can be overwhelmed by a large group..." Her voice petered off.
"Maybe, we need to talk to others before coming up with any plans. Tell Murdock to give me a call so we can meet up and chat, Claire will probably tell Cage... This is something that needs a group effort." Karen nodded, somewhat pleased that the man wasn't hiking off to go try to deal with this situation on his own, something that Matt would have certainly down were he in this situation himself.
"Right, I'll head to his place to let him know about what's going on." Karen is just about to excuse herself when Frank stops her.
"I'll drive you there, it's late. Kid, hop in the back, she's taking passengers." The teenage mafioso groaned petulantly but did as told, hopping into the back if the van while Karen took the passengers, turning to him and apologizing. He waved off her apology, sitting on the vans floor, legs folded and back leaning against the vans walls.
Drive to Matt's is quiet, neither the kid nor Frank speak, just a loud silence as the quiet hum of country music played from the radio. The quiet was alright, though. She didn't mind it, because she knew that she would be spending the rest of the night speaking with Matt about all this.
She traded her goodbyes with Frank and the kid and made her way into the building.
She knew that with the frightened, stressed beating of her heart, Matt would be there waiting at his door for her to arrive.