Chapter 1: A Speck of Earthly Dust

It was something meant to be ignored, discarded even, due to its insignificance.
Yet, he found himself at a loss on his hesitance to leave it behind.

He was pissed.

Not enraged-at-Dazai, pissed

But still pissed nonetheless.

The past few days had been, in the Port Mafia's executive's words, no better than shitty. Don't get him wrong. He greatly enjoys his job. He revels and excels at it but there were some days that he just wants nothing but to give the people around him a good smackdown.

The self-assignments of his boss were usually the ones he awaits because he can exercise his skill and if push comes to shove, his Ability. Unfortunately, in the past week, the new recruits or grunts were weak as fuck or possibly stupid. He doesn't even use guns as much as the rest but even he knows not to keep a finger on the trigger unless there's an actual need to shoot or go for the kill.

It wasn't a surprise that the one who got accidentally shot wasn't the only one who got sent to the medical bay.

The backlog of the paperwork was a disaster. When he got to the root of the problem on why it was such, he wanted to smack someone's head to the ground – all because of a missing page. When the news got to the lower grunts in charge of the particular file, they all started to panic and run all over like headless chickens. It turned out, the particular page didn't get printed along with the rest because someone forgot to refill the papers on the printer. Therefore, it wasn't actually lost or stolen.

Suffice to say, they all got punished for being the idiots they are.

No one still knew who made the mistake or what happened to him.

Aside from that, most of his other missions were done full-time. It would've been the saving grace of the week but the damn mackerel was being an annoying prick messing up most, if not all, of his progress with that irritating Agency he had run off to.

So sleep?

What a joke.

Thankfully and finally, he had managed to finish it all. Due to that, the boss had gifted him a short vacation per se. Truthfully, he would opt to continue working but just for this specific time, he decides to give it a rest. And for the first time in months, he had felt peaceful and content.

As he closes his eyes, he immediately enters a dreamless sleep.

Or so he thinks.

The lights were out and his room was void of noise except for his breathing. A few hours had already passed since he had succumbed to the comfort of his pillows and bed. Even any slight noise couldn't rouse him from his well-deserved slumber.

And then that was when something happened.

The disturbance could be called minuscule. A tiny speck of light, something akin to a self-glowing glitter, had appeared without any pretense above the executive's body. It only appeared for what seemed like half-second. Most would definitely ignore such an occurrence but for what happened after that, it would definitely make a common man raise a curious brow.

A toddler lay asleep on top of Chuuya's chest as if seemingly belonging there.

It was only after a couple of hours later when he was about to turn over to one side, that he realized that there was something heavy weighing down on his chest making it slightly harder for him to breathe. When his natural instinct came up to speed with what was happening, he cursed himself for being unguarded in his sleep. He immediately prepared himself to outmaneuver what or whoever it was brave to attack him when he was asleep.

All those attacks and plans he had come up that moment went down the drain though.

At that moment he finds the sleeping child on his chest, he became dumbfounded. He was still guarded just in case it turns out to be a plot for him to lower his guard. He tries to feel any malicious intent around him and finds none. After checking multiple times, his attention switches to the kid on his chest, and unknowingly goes on to observe the child's features.

Since it was dark, he couldn't see clearly but deep inside of him, he immensely feels that the kid looks familiar. He couldn't place where he had seen him. Unfortunately for him, as much as he wanted to put a name on the look-a-like of the child, his tiredness still caught up to him. And he was off to sleep, again.

Time passes by and as the sun finally rose up in the sky. Chuuya yawns and stretches his arms to pop some joints. He sits on his bed and squints at the bright light passing between the gap in the curtains. As he lifts his hand to scratch his chest, he stops midway. He feels like he was forgetting something. He vaguely remembers that he woke up sometime in the night. For what reason, he doesn't exactly remember but the word child appeared in his head.

He shakes his head.

He doesn't have time for something stupid this early in the morning.

Whatever it was, it was just a weird dream.

He takes a quick shower and wore a blood-red polo shirt, black tie and jacket, pants, and brown shoes. Not forgetting his signature hat, he drags himself out of the room along with small luggage. After handing a leave of absence letter to his boss, Mori Ougai, for formality's sake, he went out of the Port Mafia's doors with a relieved smile.

As much as he wanted to use his powers to quickly reach his destination, he decides to take a cab just right outside the confines of the city. Paying the right amount of cash to the driver, he walks the rest of the way to a small house in the middle of the woods. He would've gotten a much classier place since he could afford it, but he rarely spends time in this place and it would be a hassle to clean so it stays as it is. As soon as he got in, it didn't take long for him to find his bed and crash land on it. He stared at the ceiling for god knows long and soon enough drifted to sleep again.

guwah mmmbbah

He sleepily blinked his eyes open and checked the time and date on his bedside clock. He raised an eyebrow when he realized that he had slept for almost half a day straight. Yawning, he threw himself out of the bed and looked outside to the dark night skies. He goes out of his room and that was where he heard it loud in clear. His senses went overdrive and sleepiness went out of his system. Activating his Ability, he walked in elevated silence down the hall. Nearing the living room, where the sound was gradually softer but nearer, he immediately went on offense only for him to stop his perfectly-aimed kick at what he saw.

A kid.

Not exactly school-age but more like an infant.

He was dumbfounded for a second before he schooled his features and tried to figure out if there were other intruders in his house. But before he could move onto another room, he felt a tug in his legs and saw the child reach his arms out to him. He stared long and hard at the child debating whether he should just ignore it or carry it. His eye twitched but reluctantly picked up the kid who, quickly enough, snuggled in his chest and had fallen asleep.

He was stupefied at the contact.

He had seen and had taken care, which were rare cases, of some children back then when he was still in the Sheep and the other kids under the Mafia's care but never ones this young. Never did he also find children who were comfortable with him. Akutagawa was way worse with his dangerous Ability and infamous temper. Nevertheless, he was sure children would scramble away from him screaming for their parents.

Sighing after heavily checking if there were anything else that could be dangerous for him or them – he reminds himself that there was a kid on his arms now – he decides to go back to his bedroom and properly let the child sleep on the bed. Seeing that he doesn't want to take the couch and the child doesn't take up much space on the bed, he ends up lying next to the kid. He doesn't move much anyway when sleeping so he doesn't fear squishing the kid at some point.

As he tried to find sleep again, he suddenly feels something uncomfortable on his right hand. With a questioning look, he noticed how one of his fingers was entrapped by the small fist of the child beside him. Irritated, he tried plucking each dainty finger one by one. It didn't take long before the child whimpered in his sleep that Chuuya stopped trying. Dumbfounded, he decided to ignore the numbing feeling in his hand due to the prospect of the child's crying which would further make him more exasperated than he already is.

With his finger clasped in one of the kid's small palms, he blankly stared up the ceiling and whispered,

"What the fuck."

He knew he drifted off to sleep again sometime that night. But as soon as he felt something patting his cheek, his eyes opened wide only to stare at the babbling baby who had somehow crawled up to his chest. He wished that it was one of those weird dreams instead but apparently reality slapped him in the face, literally, when the kid tapped his cheek again.

Grumbling to himself, he took the baby by the armpits and marched out of his bedroom. He didn't know what came over him last night but he should've left this child in some orphanage then. Call him heartless or anything but this was supposed to be a vacation, a well-earned rest before diving back into more missions. There wasn't supposed to be a child in the equation.

As he got out of the house, he internally debated whether to use his Ability to get to higher ground and easily find a random orphanage or not because it may traumatize the kid. He looked at the child blinking back up at him and decided it wouldn't matter since the child isn't his responsibility. Activating his Ability, For the Tainted Sorrow, he glows red and shoots up to the sky. Midway his ascent he felt the child shake in his arms and it made him doubt his actions. But as he heard the child squeal in happiness, it unconsciously made him smirk.

Jumping across high-rise buildings had never been this thrilling for him. However, that thrill quickly disappeared as soon as he landed discreetly in an alley beside an orphanage he'd seen before. This was simple – he walks up to the front door, places the child down the floor, ring the doorbell and he hightails back to his home. So far, he had done the first two but somehow, for whatever reason he couldn't fathom, he couldn't bring himself to press the doorbell.

His eyes kept switching from the child to the doorbell and he was getting irritated with himself. And as if sensing that something was going to happen, the child's eyes started to water and began hiccupping. This sent warning bells to Chuuya's head. He wasn't weak to crying people but he wasn't that heartless enough to leave a child bawling his eyes out, much less ones that are about a year old.

"…Fuck it"

He carries the child back up and runs away from the street. The sun was just rising and people started to fill up the streets. He somehow ended up in a park and set the child in his lap as he mentally berated himself for being a pathetic weakling and surrendering to the charms of a child. If this was part of someone's schemes, a certain suicide-maniac came into his mind, then he'd admit that it was working far too well. But knowing that person, he wouldn't resort to this kind of plan no matter how they hated each other's guts.

Sighing, he stared at the child who was busy making grabby motions on a butterfly that flew by. Without any warning, both of their stomachs grumbled in unison. He resisted the urge to facepalm now realizing that he had to feed more than one mouth now. Smelling something bad, he couldn't help but pinch his nose in disgust and also realized something else.

"Shit"

The trip to the supermarket was one that he would bury with him to the grave. He knew the basic things to get so he stalked up to the aisle where most of the baby stuff was. He was utterly dumbfounded though when he found out there were so many varieties of milk and diapers.

"What does beanstalk have to do with milk?"

"How the fuck would I know which kind would fit you?"

It doesn't take long for the shopkeeper and other costumers to notice him. He probably looked some kind of hoodlum with the way he was acting. Seeing how they crowded around him, he had no choice but to suck it up and ask for help. The older women had the gall to giggle at him and play with the child as they recommended him which brands to use. He initially wanted to just get the essentials but the old ladies insisted to buy rattles and an assortment of stuff for 'playtime and teething' or whatever.

"Aww, you want this too? Oh, yes you do."

"Ooh-oh Ahh-oh"

"Yes, your dada will buy you this toy too."

The amount and price of the items weren't a problem since he has a black card to pay for it.

Yet, he was flabbergasted by so many things he found himself paying for at the counter.

By the end of that ridiculous trip, he was so ready to punch someone to kingdom come. And the worst part wasn't the embarrassment of buying all that stuff, it was the fact that they assumed that the child was his.

He scoffed at the thought.

It was a good thing he had good control over himself not attacking civilians. But the thought stuck to him like glue all the way back to his house. After somehow cleaning her excretion in the most enlightening way – he had also discovered the baby's gender – he ends up feeding her with the mushy 'baby' food the women told him to buy.

With the baby accounted for, he took his time eating convenience store-bought food. He could've cooked up his own meal but he didn't feel like it. Besides, the kid might do something weird the moment he turns his back around. Shaking his head at the thought, he quietly observes the kid, who was busy munching her saggy breakfast on the baby chair. It didn't take long for the baby girl to notice him looking and he raised an eyebrow at this.

Without any warning, he was gifted with happy smile.

"…tch"

Taken aback by that reaction, he could only turn his face away. Fighting hard to prevent himself from grinning or feeling something, he proceeds to munch off another onigiri. With the moment passing, he continues to alternately feed the baby and himself. Now that he could focus and see better with the lights on, it finally registered in his head the features the child held.

The child had orange hair but it had reddish tint in it unlike his. The baby girl also had blue eyes but were darker than his as it was a bit grayer. Her irises looked like some sort of compass but he figured it might be a defect. And as much as he wanted to deny it, she does look like him. It was no wonder those old women thought she was his child. He was sure he never had engaged in such activities and he also made sure that if he ended up drunk, he would only be in the company of his most trusted subordinates.

Surely, the kid wasn't his at all.

Right?

He groaned as he shut his eyes and ran his hand down his face several times. He did a mental check of all the times in the past year he got in a party or any occasion he most probably had a drink. He was sure that he didn't do it any time when he was sober. The problem was when he was not because he only ends up with vague memories of any of those. Even so, whether she was his or not, it doesn't change the fact that the kid somehow resembles him and it doesn't bode well for him and her. He has many enemies and most, if not all, would use any sort of leverage against him.

Including children.

He grunts as he turned his face back to the kid only for him to jump in surprise not finding her across him. He only took his eyes off of her for few seconds and something like this happens. He was just thinking about how his enemies might use the child against him. He didn't even feel anyone coming into his house and it was daylight. As he was about to tug his hair out in frustration, he heard the child's babble somewhere above. His jaw drops as he looked up and saw her floating a few meters over his head surrounded by red runes almost similar to his own Ability.

"…hell no."

o0o

A/N

Hey, a new author here, and I finally decided to post this fic after so much debate. As mentioned in the tags, this fic was written about a year ago (the first chapter, at least) because I was looking for good Chuuya-and-a-baby fics and found none that suited my taste. Additionally, I love stories that involve characters trying to take care of a baby/children, and thus this was born. There are plenty of other reasons why this was made but generally, those two fuelled my desire to create this fic.

Don't expect regular updates because I, myself, am a very harsh critic on my fics so I always try to take my time writing until it passes my criteria of 'good'. Nevertheless, I assure you that by the time you are reading this I am already writing several chapters ahead.

Lastly, this fic is part of a universe I am trying to create ever since 2015. The series will contain a collection of crossover fics with some OCs sprinkled in. Somehow, all of them will connect with each other but you won't necessarily need to read everything in the correct order.

P.S. if anyone wants to/knows someone, feel free to draw Chuuya and the baby. I have certain scenes in mind that I want to see drawn (or maybe even a comic strip lol) so PM me, if you're interested.

Don't forget to leave kudos, and comments. Bookmark it and subscribe if you like this.
It helps a lot as motivation to put out a chapter.

CHAPTER 2: 1st week of August