The softness of foreign bed sheets was the first thing Chuuya noticed as he slowly came to.

The second thing that he noticed was that his wounds had been tended to and were covered with soft bandages.

Blearily blinking open his tired eyes, he confusedly studied his surroundings.

It looked like he was in some kind of guest room in a nicely furnished middle-class apartment. After having been shot with a tranquilizing dart, a room like this was one of the last things that he expected to see upon waking.

However, perhaps it was all some kind of ploy to make him let his guard down. Chuuya hadn't survived this long by just trusting what appeared to be good to be actually good. Anyone who kept that mindset with the lifestyle that Chuuya lived never lasted very long. Even while Chuuya had always expected himself to die young, given his line of work, he refused to let himself die over such basic mistakes.

Soundlessly, Chuuya slipped out of the bed and made his way to the door. In the back of his mind, he registered that someone had removed the clothes he'd been wearing when he'd been caught up in the explosion, in favor of replacing them with sweatpants and a hoodie. The thought of someone doing something like that while he was unconscious bothered him, but he'd been through much worse, so he did his best to keep the implications out of his mind.

Resting his hand on the doorknob, Chuuya resolved himself to find Dazai and get them the hell out of this place as soon as he took out whoever had come after them. Then, when they got out, Chuuya would find them some other safe house where they'd be okay since the old one had been compromised the moment Dostoevsky had figured out where it was.

Once they arrived at the new safe house, they'd talk about what had happened in the aftermath of the explosion, as hard as that would probably be. Dazai had almost died so that conversation needed to happen.

Pushing down on the doorknob, Chuuya was surprised to find that the door was unlocked. He'd expected to have to use his ability, but he supposed this was easier, so who was he to complain? Even if the thought that this implied that whoever had tranquilized him and Dazai didn't see him as a threat unnerved him.

Silently swinging the door open, Chuuya stepped into the apartment's living room ready to take out whoever had taken them there. However, the sight that met his eyes, made him quickly change his demeanor.

Sitting on two couches on opposite sides of the room were Dazai and none other than Ango Sakaguchi. Dazai was scrolling through his phone while ignoring Ango, who was attempting and failing to make basic conversation with him.

The situation didn't feel dangerous in the slightest.

In all honesty, it just felt kind of awkward.

It was at that moment that the pair seemed to notice Chuuya's presence.

Dazai briefly glanced up from his phone to acknowledge Chuuya before turning back to it. Meanwhile, Ango sat up straighter in his seat, quieting his attempted small talk with Dazai.

"A5158," Ango greeted, his posture becoming stiffer, "I'm glad to see you're finally awake, especially after the stunt the two of you pulled."

"Sakaguchi," Chuuya returned with a curt nod of his head, ignoring the subtle jab at his name as he took a seat beside Dazai. "What happened at the facility wasn't us and I don't think it was bad enough to resort to tranquilizing darts. How'd you find us anyway?"

"You can never be too careful," Ango mused, "besides, getting you two out of there was easier with both of you unconscious. As to how I found you… well, it's kind of hard to miss a giant explosion, especially when you're in the line of work that I am. As to how I knew it was you two, well... I have my ways. You should honestly be more grateful that I was there, you'd both probably be dead if I wasn't."

"Sure, of course," Chuuya dismissed with a wave of his hand, too exhausted with the current state of his life to argue any further. "So, where'd you bring us?"

"Oh, well this is actually one of my apartments. I just thought that since you couldn't even manage to stay undercover at that safe house for a month that this would be a bit better. I mean you're on the run, so no one's going to expect you to be housed by a government agent. Besides, I owe Dazai…" Ango trailed off, his gaze honing in on Dazai as if hoping that his statement would get him any sort of recognition whether it be good or bad. However, Dazai just continued to entirely ignore Ango and the conversation around him. It was almost as though he wasn't even in the same room.

Chuuya knew that Dazai had certain reservations when it came to Ango. Even Chuuya did, as Ango didn't always make himself the easiest person to like with how his dedication to his work often caused him to overlook the feelings of those around him.

While Chuuya wasn't entirely sure of the exact reason for Ango and Dazai's fallout, as he knew that they once used to be drinking buddies, he had an idea that it had something to do with Odasaku.

The timing of Odasaku's death and both of their departures from the Port Mafia were too close together to be considered a coincidence. Still, it wasn't like it was something that he could just ask about and expect a straight answer. The whole topic of Dazai's friendship with Odasaku was a sore one. It was best to just leave the timing of such a conversation up to Dazai if it ever happened at all.

Nevertheless, regardless of whether Ango potentially playing a part in Odasaku's death or not was the reason that Dazai seemed to hate the man, Chuuya understood Dazai's fundamental distrust of Ango. So, he didn't blame him for turning down any conversation fired his way, especially since with Dazai there was always a reason for everything he did. Even down to the last detail.

"Well, thanks for letting us stay here, I guess."

He couldn't wait for this conversation to just be over and for Ango to leave so that he could finally talk to Dazai. They had some things that they needed to address, after what had happened at the facility.

Like when Dazai had picked up the gun.

The desperation in Dazai's movement and the grief seared into his eyes would forever be burned into Chuuya's brain.

He needed to make sure that if he left Dazai alone, something like that wouldn't happen again. For while he knew that Dazai had suicidal tendencies, it had been a long time since he'd seen him make a serious attempt.

The thought that if he had been even a second later in tearing the gun out of Dazai's hands, he would be dead right now terrified him.

Ango stood up from his seat, seemingly noticing that he had overstayed his welcome despite this being his own apartment. Next to Chuuya, Dazai tensed almost imperceptibly at the movement. It was the only sign that he was acknowledging Ango's presence at all.

"I have to go to work," Ango announced, as his gaze bore into Dazai who continued to refuse to look up from his phone, "but I'll be back sometime this evening."

With one last look in Dazai's direction with something that looked almost like regret shining behind them, Ango left, locking the door behind him.

Finally, Dazai set down his phone. His eyes were trained on the space that Ango had previously occupied. However, there was something about Dazai's eyes that made it seem like he wasn't entirely there. It was almost as if his mind were on some other plane of existence while his body stayed rooted to the ground only by the will of life's chains which kept it ingrained in reality.

However, the odd moment only lasted a few more seconds before Dazai finally relaxed and leaned back in his seat. A contented look slipped over his face.

To anyone else, he would've looked totally fine, but Chuuya didn't buy the cheap act. Especially after everything that had happened.

"He's finally gone," Dazai exclaimed, heaving a sigh of relief and throwing his arms out. "Honestly, I deserve an award for putting up with all that I do. Anyway, now that he's gone, I've got a few ideas on where Fyodor may have gone-"

"Dazai," Chuuya cut in, "we can do that, but first can we talk about what happened at the facility?"

Dazai shook his head with a roll of his eyes, as he gave Chuuya a playful shove, "don't change the subject. Anyways, I've narrowed it down to two places. The first one-"

"Dazai," Chuuya cut in again, as worry stirred in the pit of his stomach. This wasn't a conversation that could just be pushed to the side any longer. "We really need to talk about what happened at the facility. You tried… you tried to kill yourself."

"Chuuya, why are you acting so weird? Did Ango add something extra to the tranquilizer dart he shot you with? Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if whatever it was is still in your bloodstream. With how short you are, your metabolism is probably super slow with processing it. Anyways, you already know it's my dream to have a double suicide with a beautiful woman and you are definitely not that, so I don't see what all of this is about?" Dazai complained, theatrically waving his hands around.

Ignoring Dazai's jab regarding his height, Chuuya's fists clenched at his sides as he tried to disregard the frustration stirring within him. He had to control his emotions because despite how angry he was getting, acting on it wouldn't help anything. This wasn't about him anyways, so he'd just have to swallow back the irritation at being dismissed because he needed to help Dazai. What Dazai had tried to do was serious and would have been permanent had Chuuya not acted as fast as he did.

There was much more determination behind this most recent attempt than previous ones.

Honestly, that shouldn't mean much though, because an attempt at all was worrying. Why hadn't he ever tried to help Dazai in the past? Why hadn't he ever tried to talk about this before?

He wished he didn't know the answer.

Growing up, Chuuya had always been an afterthought for everyone he'd ever crossed paths with.

Yet for the few years that they were partners, Chuuya had felt like someone finally cared. For even though they constantly fought and thought up schemes to prank one another with, it was undeniable that they shared a powerful bond. Even if they had never really talked about anything serious for more than a few minutes back then.

Back then, like many others, Chuuya had known about Dazai's tendency toward self-harm and his suicidal thoughts. There had even been many moments when they were on the battlefield that Dazai's bandages would loosen, allowing Chuuya to see glimpses of the scars that graced his skin underneath. They were too straight and neat to be anything else, besides scars put there by Dazai himself.

He remembered the more serious attempts where Mori had worked tirelessly to make sure Dazai's life didn't slip through their fingers.

At the time, it had scared him, but he hadn't said anything.

He hadn't even tried to help or find out how he could.

The reason? As stupid as it was, Chuuya was terrified that if he did do something to try to help Dazai that he would get angry at him for prying into his private life and leave him just like everyone did, which ironically enough happened regardless. It was just so selfish and childish that Chuuya hated himself for it.

Then while they did share a unique sort of intimacy that perhaps would have grown into something more had Dazai not left, they had never been great at emotions. Dazai ignored them while Chuuya became consumed by them. So serious topics were just generally not something that they did, because of that just as well.

However, now that they were older and had been through so much in the past several weeks, Chuuya knew that they couldn't keep playing this game of pretending that everything was alright and that Dazai's suicide jokes were simply gags because they weren't.

Still, Chuuya was realistic because, with the lives that they had led, it wasn't like they had many options when it came to mental health. For example, going to a therapist would be difficult, because what exactly was Dazai supposed to tell them?

"Hi! I'm traumatized because I became an Executive of the Port Mafia when I was fifteen, where I was made to kill people regularly under the training of my abusive mentor Mori Ougai. You see, we really bonded when I became the sole witness to his killing of the previous boss. In all honesty though, I never really liked him. Also, I think he gave me some daddy issues when he emotionally manipulated and physically tortured me into becoming the Demon Prodigy."

Yeah... so therapy would probably end with Dazai on death row.

And sure then there were antidepressants like Wellbutrin, Prozac, Lexapro, Zoloft, and Effexor amongst others. However, when Mori had made Dazai go on a couple of them during the years that they'd been in the Port Mafia, it had always ended with Dazai disposing of the pills in various ways until Mori gave up. A couple of times he'd even tried overdosing on some of them.

He said they made his mind feel foggy to which Mori would tell him that was because he wasn't on the right dosage or medication. Dazai never wanted to hear it though.

However, Chuuya was almost certain that while some of the pills and dosages had probably made Dazai's head feel cloudy like he had claimed that that most likely wasn't always the case. He was almost certain that the real reason was that Dazai thought that he deserved to feel terrible. So, he let his mental health take its toll.

But Chuuya couldn't let him keep doing that to himself, because no one deserved to feel like shit every day to the point where they felt like the only way out of such suffering was suicide.

He had to stop being so scared of saying something. He had to stop being so scared of trying to help because if he didn't then the next time he woke up it might be to Dazai's body hanging limply in the living room in which they now resided.

If that happened, when Chuuya could have done something to prevent it, he would never forgive himself.

Still, it wasn't like he could just tell Dazai that he needed to stay because Chuuya would be irreparably damaged if he chose to end it all. If Chuuya did that, then that would make things all about him, which was entirely the wrong thing to do. He needed to make sure that Dazai felt listened to. He needed to make sure that Dazai realized that all of the pain that had been wrought upon his life wasn't completely his fault. He needed to make sure that Dazai knew that lots of people really did care about and love him. He needed to make sure that Dazai knew that if he left, the world would feel much darker in the loss of the light that Dazai claimed not to have.

So, Chuuya resolved himself to the conversation. He wouldn't let Dazai just dance around the topic while wearing his usual façade this time.

"Dazai, you could have died. What happened to Atsushi wasn't your fault. What happened to Akutagawa wasn't your fault. It was Fyodor's."

At the mention of his former prodigies, Dazai's veneer finally disappeared in its entirety, now replaced by a look of aggravation. He minutely leaned further away from Chuuya.

"I don't want to talk about this."

In the past, Chuuya would've respected that wish. He would've just let life move forward because he was terrified that if he tried too hard to make someone do something they would then lose all interest in remaining by his side. This was serious though and he might be the only person that Dazai had left to talk to, at least for the time being.

This time, Chuuya wouldn't just let things slide as he had in the past.

Of course, he wasn't naïve enough to think that lending Dazai his ear would magically cure his depression and all the other mental issues that he probably had. However, it would at least be something, and that was better than nothing. So, he'd just have to force himself to stop being so ensnared by his own insecurities, to help Dazai before it was too late.

"Atsushi loved you like a father and so did Akutagawa. It was Fyodor that killed them, not you. Please understand that."

Dazai's hands curled into fists at his sides.

"Stop it."

"Dazai," Chuuya tried again, "please, just talk to me. I want to listen."

"No," Dazai reiterated, but his voice cracked this time, as the mask started to break.

"Please."

"Shut up."

"Dazai, why do you want to kill yourself?" The question wasn't accusatory or argumentative, but rather an open inquiry. A plea to gain some semblance of understanding as to how he could help, because they couldn't keep playing this game. Dazai's struggle with mental health needed to be addressed before it was too late.

This time, Dazai didn't tell Chuuya to stop, instead his gaze somehow just turned even more distant and he seemed deeply bothered by something.

"Why do you care so much? You never have in the past."

A claustrophobic air settled over them, making Chuuya feel even more uncomfortable than he already was. He was sure that Dazai felt the same way sitting next to him because despite getting a bit better at communicating in the past several weeks, they'd never had a conversation addressing something quite as serious as this.

"I should have been there for you sooner. I'm sorry I wasn't."

Dazai seemed startled by his answer, his eyes widening and finally flickering over to meet Chuuya's.

"Wait… I didn't mean that. You don't have to apologize."

"No," Chuuya dissented, "I do. It's no excuse, but I was a selfish kid back then. I should've tried to help you a long time ago."

A blend of malaise and concern flashed across Dazai's gaze.

"Chuuya, you were a lot of things but you were never selfish."

"No Dazai, I was, but this isn't about me. You know lots of people care about you right? You know that lots of people… well lots of people love you. I'm not trying to tell you that you should live your life for the contentment of others, but I want you to know that if you ever feel like you're going to… try something, there will always be someone you can talk to whether that's me, Kunikida or anyone else at your Agency. It doesn't matter when you need any of us, because we'll be there for you day and night. You've had a difficult life and the circumstances that were handed to you aren't your fault. So, if you ever want to try to seek any further help, I'd even be willing to drive you to pick up medication or to any therapist if you're able to find a suitable one… it's just, you matter, alright? I just want to make sure you know that. If you ever need to talk, I will always be here. No matter what."

Next to him, Dazai was unnaturally silent and seemingly lost in his thoughts as he deciphered what Chuuya had said, but then a glimmer of solace seemed to wash over him as he came to the conclusion that Chuuya had been hoping for.

"Thanks," was all he said in response, his voice unusually quiet and small. His eyes glossed over with the sheen of unshed tears that he quickly wiped away.

And sure it wasn't perfect. Dazai wasn't magically cured of all of his various mental illnesses. However, no matter how small the notion was, he now seemed to have at least some semblance of understanding that maybe he did matter.

It wasn't a solution. It wasn't an antidote.

It was however a glimpse of hope that maybe there was light at the end of the long tunnel that was his life. No matter how dim that light might be.

Then, because Chuuya didn't want to end the conversation on such a grim note, he cracked a smile.

"Besides, you can't let me outlive you. If you do, then I'll win and we both know that you can't have that."

For the first time in weeks, Dazai actually laughed.