Chuuya slumped over the steering wheel, releasing a loud and drawn-out sigh. He tapped his gloved fingers on the dashboard idly, staring out the windshield through half-lidded eyes.

The alley that they were parked in was dark and rather slimy. Dazai had insisted that they situate themselves over half a kilometer away from the set location of their arms deal and wait. Each time Chuuya had asked why on earth they couldn't have just accompanied their men into the deal and served as an extra layer of security right off the bat, Dazai simply shook his head and clicked his tongue in disapproval without giving him an answer.

The music streaming from his car radio was turned down to a whisper, but Chuuya still quietly hummed along with the melody. His chin dug into the leather of the steering wheel cover as he turned his head slightly to the side to observe his partner's face.

Dazai's already pallid skin took on an even more unnatural appearance in the soft blue glow of the laptop screen in front of him. The dark circles under his eyes appeared an unusual shade of purple in the unnatural light, and deepened as he squinted at the screen.

Chuuya's gaze lingered on his partner's long eyelashes, which caught the light in such a way that they appeared almost like they were glowing. They were thick and dark, much like his hair, and curled delicately at the tips. Many would kill to have eyelashes as pretty as his.

He shook head suddenly and dragged a hand over his face to clear his muddled brain. I did not just think that Osamu Dazai was pretty.

"Anything yet?" He asked abruptly.

"Not since the last time you asked me," Dazai responded with a sigh, keeping his eyes trained steadily on his laptop. "Can't you be patient? Or is that too much to ask of a child like you?"

"Child?" The redhead scowled, swinging his head to face his partner fully.

"That's right. You're a little kid."

"Excuse me? You're the one who's refusing to let me help. If anyone's a child, it's-"

"Shh. Save the temper tantrum for later. You're distracting me."

Chuuya fumed at the smug look on Dazai's face, but didn't say anything more. Instead, he reached over and flicked the brunette solidly on the forehead. He turned his head the other way and ignored Dazai's ensuing childish whining.

Truth be told, he was slightly relieved that Dazai had been acting so normally since the incident in his office. They hadn't talked about it since that night, though it still weighed heavily on Chuuya's mind. However, for some reason, he felt more at ease with his partner than he ever had before. It seemed like their argument had served to clear the air between them more than it did drive a wedge between them. He felt like he understood the mysterious entity named Dazai a little bit more, and that almost made the entire ordeal worth it.

He didn't know if their conversation had made any difference to Dazai. He didn't even know what he had hoped would come of it. But, at least whatever Dazai was thinking didn't interfere with their work duties.

"We've been sitting here for two hours," Chuuya groaned, "and he hasn't shown up yet. Maybe he won't come at all."

"Patience, Chuu-Chuu." He grinned. "Oh, that's a cute one. Chuu-Chuu."

Chuuya scowled and yanked a lock of Dazai's hair as the latter repeated the new nickname several more times with that gleeful (though slightly pained) smile plastered on his face.

"Besides," Dazai continued after extricating his hair from Chuuya's fingers, "the Port Mafia hasn't even shown up yet either."

"What?" Chuuya stared at him for a second in disbelief, then planted his face into the steering wheel. His forehead narrowly missed the car horn. "You've had us sitting here for this whole time, keeping watch for an arms deal that hasn't even started yet?"

"Precisely." Dazai's smile appeared innocent enough, but Chuuya narrowed his eyes at the self-satisfied tone in his voice. "Robun could show up at any moment. It would be best if we are more prepared than he is, don't you think?"

"Whatever," Chuuya muttered darkly, his voice muffled against the steering wheel.

The brunette stretched in his chair, deftly plucking Chuuya's hat from his head as he did so. The latter shot him a glare and immediately attempted to snatch it back, but Dazai yanked it out of his reach and carefully placed it on his own head.

"How do I look?" he asked airily, tilting his chin up to look down his nose at his partner. His voice sounded tight, like he was barely restraining his laughter, though he kept his face schooled in a solemn expression.

"Stupid," Chuuya responded immediately with a disdainful frown. He injected a healthy amount of irritation into his voice to hide the fact that he was biting back a smile of his own. "You look like you just walked out of the 1920s."

"Aha!" Dazai sat up suddenly, a mischievous gleam in his eye. The hat tilted precariously to the side of his head from the jerky movement. "So you admit that this look is hideous and horribly outdated."

Chuuya started. "On you, maybe." He pulled himself off of the steering wheel. "It looks good on me, though." He crossed his arms and jutted his chin out, daring Dazai to contradict him.

"Oh, poor Chuuya." His partner shook his head mournfully, removing the hat from his head and holding it to his chest in a gesture of feigned sincerity. "So quick to criticize others, yet so utterly blind to his own shortcomings."

"Why, you-" Chuuya launched himself at his partner, grabbing desperately for his hat. Dazai held him back with one hand and dangled the hat just out of his reach with the other. The sound of his laughter filled the car amid Chuuya's frustrated screams. The redhead strained against Dazai's hold, and his flailing fingers brushed, then finally latched onto the brim of his hat. He promptly wrenched it out of Dazai's grip and flung it to his own seat, out of the brunette's reach.

"I swear," he growled, turning back to his partner, "someday, I'm going to kill-"

He stopped short as his eyes met Dazai's. Sometime during the struggle, Chuuya had accidentally stretched himself almost on top of his partner. His knee was on his armrest, and with his arms he braced his weight on Dazai's door and car seat shoulder, effectively boxing the brunette in. Their faces were mere centimeters apart–so close that he could clearly make out Dazai's labored breathing and the twinkle in his brown eye.

He abruptly pulled himself back into his seat, their proximity suddenly suffocating. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of Dazai's slightly confused, but still amused expression. He glared out the windshield, arms crossed, as he tried to force his heartbeat into a more normal rhythm.

What's going on with me?

"The reason why you dragged me out this early," Chuuya mumbled gruffly, "was to annoy me, wasn't it?"

Dazai raised a hand to his forehead in mock distress. "Ah, you figured me out. Though, of course, my other case-related reasons also played a part in my decision." He let his hand drop and batted his eyelashes innocently. "And why wouldn't I want to spend more time with my favorite partner?"

Chuuya groaned and shoved Dazai's shoulder as the latter grinned. Despite his irritation, he couldn't ignore the warm sensation that bloomed in his chest and spread to every part of his body. Even if Dazai had been trying to be annoying, there was some truth to what he was saying. After all, who would intentionally plan to spend time with someone they didn't actually enjoy being around?

He was startled at the feeling which warmed his face and tugged at his lips. Why am I so happy? What did that idiot do to make me feel like this?

What exactly am I feeling right now?

His eyebrows furrowed in confusion as he considered this. He tentatively glanced back at Dazai, who was again focused on his computer. As he scanned his face, his stomach churned with a strange fluttery sensation, and he quickly fixed his eyes back on the steering wheel under his hands.

The feeling in his chest wasn't just the satisfaction of feeling wanted. It wasn't just the warmth of friendship; really, he doubted that he and Dazai would ever call each other friends. So what was it, really? Was there a name for it?

"Oh, here they come," Dazai chirped. "Our men are making their way into the warehouse. The dealers are already inside. No sign of Robun so far."

Chuuya blinked, and then slumped back in his chair with a sigh.

Right. No use thinking about that right now. We have a job to do.

"And what if Robun doesn't show up?"

Dazai's eye glittered. "He will. We just need to be ready when he does."

"You're pretty confident."

"Of course I am. I know."

Chuuya raised his eyebrows, but let out a frustrated sigh when Dazai didn't say anything more.

"You're unbelievable," he muttered.

Dazai smirked. "I choose to take that as a complim-"

The words died on his lips as his visible eye widened at his computer screen. He shot a sharp look at Chuuya.

"He's coming." His voice was flat, but Chuuya could detect the undertone of urgency that seeped into his words.

The redhead narrowed his eyes and instinctively placed his hand on the doorknob. "Where is he?"

Dazai tapped at his keyboard for a moment, then turned the computer so that Chuuya could see the screen. "About five minutes away. He'll be driving down this road."

Chuuya's eyebrows furrowed as he scanned the dense grid that stretched across the screen. Each cell on the grid showed a different image–no, a different video–of every street within a two-kilometer radius. His mind spun as he tried to figure out how Dazai had managed to hack into over fifty security cameras, let alone closely monitor each one at the same time.

"What am I looking for?" he grumbled.

Dazai sighed, then extended a long finger to point at one of the videos on the screen. "He just passed through here. The street he's driving on is the same one that our alley leads into. If he continues on his path, we can intercept him before he gets to the warehouse."

Chuuya stared at him, his eyebrows drawn slightly in irritation. "So you knew he was going to come this way. Would it really have been so hard to just tell me?"

The brunette grinned, his eye glinting in the dull blue light of the computer screen. "What do you mean?" he asked coolly. "All I used was my own intuition." He tapped a finger on his bandaged temple for emphasis.

Chuuya snorted, rolling his eyes in disgust. If Dazai didn't want to tell him where he got his information, then that was that. It was a fruitless endeavor to try to coax anything more out of him.

But if Dazai was telling the truth, and he really did use just his own mental power to deduce that Robun was going to drive down this exact street, then Chuuya was certain that he was the only one in Yokohama who could pull it off.

"Maybe you should've been a detective instead, blockhead," he muttered under his breath.

"What was that?" Dazai responded absently. Chuuya didn't bother repeating himself.

To say that Dazai's mental capabilities sometimes intimidated–even scared–Chuuya would not be an overstatement. Chuuya knew that Dazai was too smart for his own good, and that his intelligence threatened everyone around him–and apparently, Dazai himself was not exempt. Yet, Chuuya never felt inferior beside him; what he lacked in brain power (which was, of course, not a significant amount), he made up for in pure, raw strength. That balance, that perfect complementation, was precisely what made them such a good team.

Chuuya blinked. Yeah. They were a good team. He had refused to acknowledge it for so long, but it was useless to try to avoid an undeniable fact. They were one of the Port Mafia's best–if not the best. They were strong. They made each other stronger. They were depended upon, and depended on each other. They were inseparably bound by the chains of mutual trust and responsibility. So their fates were inevitably intertwined, and there was no use denying it. The realization ignited a strange feeling that clawed at Chuuya's gut, some mixture of desperation and something similar to excitement.

"How far is he now?" he asked almost breathlessly, his blood rushing through his veins and pounding in his ears. His fingers twitched in anticipation for the fight that he was sure would follow their confrontation. It had been a while since he had gone up against an even moderately formidable opponent, and he could hardly keep himself from bursting through the roof of his car in his eagerness.

Dazai glanced at him from the corner of his eye, his lips curving up almost imperceptibly. "Calm down, Chuuya. He's still a couple of minutes away." He raised an eyebrow. "And, just to let you know, the whole 'rabid dog' thing you have going on right now is not a good look for you. Though, I admit, it is rather fitting, given your status as my dog for life. I hope you haven't forgotten about that."

Chuuya threw a punch toward Dazai's head (which he narrowly dodged), growled in annoyance (earning a laugh from the brunette), then promptly swung the car door open and set off for the street.

"Upon the Tainted Sorrow," he muttered, and a glowing red aura enveloped him as he felt gravity immediately begin to bend and shift under his command. His steps quickened, the concrete cracking and crumbling like stale crackers under his shoes with each footfall. He suddenly shot upward, out of the alleyway and into the night sky. The wind whistled in his ears as he looked down at the road below him and quickly scanned it. The street was abandoned; not a single person was out on the sidewalks or around the large, shadowy buildings. The road was illuminated only by dimly flickering street lights and a single pair of headlights coming in his direction from a few hundred meters away.

Bingo.

The crackle of static filled his head, and Chuuya instinctively stuck a finger to his ear to adjust the device lodged in there.

"How's it looking out there?" Dazai's drawling voice hissed through the earpiece.

Chuuya rolled his eyes. "You can see just as well as I can, idiot. He's coming straight for me, and I'll be on top of him in thirty seconds."

Dazai hummed, the sound unnaturally loud in his ear. "This looks like 'Rain Beyond the Window' to me."

"Seriously?"

"Are you going to question everything I tell you? Just hurry up and get started already. Try not to kill him, he's much more valuable to us alive. I'll meet you out there in a few."

"Take your time," Chuuya responded sarcastically.

"I don't like your attitude, young man."

"Just shut up and get out here."

Dazai's laughter echoed in his ear as he began a rapid descent toward the oncoming car.

He hit the street like a crimson meteor, the pavement immediately disintegrating and flying in all directions from the force of his landing. The shock waves from the impact shattered the windows of a few nearby buildings, and airborne chunks of concrete broke still more. With a wave of Chuuya's hand, the dust immediately settled, revealing Robun's stopped car a few meters away.

Chuuya's lips twisted into something between a grin and a grimace as he began walking purposefully toward the car, stepping out of the crater he had created in the middle of the street. He flexed his fingers inside his pockets as raw power flooded into every part of him, saturating every cell of his body. Arahabaki rumbled within him, sending earthquake-like tremors rolling through his body.

It was hungry, Chuuya knew, and its appetite would not be sated until the city lay in ruins. Of course, he couldn't fully indulge the deity…but it surely wouldn't hurt to destroy a few buildings to tide it over.

His smile stretched further as he watched the car door burst open in a spray of pebbles and concrete dust. A boot-clad foot emerged, followed by another, and then all of Robun came into view as the car door slammed shut. He was not a tall man by any means, but was rather stocky. He was dressed much too warmly for the evening, with a dark jacket, dark gloves, and even a thick stocking cap pulled over his hair. His face, shiny with perspiration, was twisted in a scowl.

"Kanagaki Robun?" Chuuya called, unable to keep a note of mockery out of his voice. "We've been waiting for you."

***Sorry for the slower update! I didn't expect this chapter to be this long, but I guess I'm not really complaining. And it's always fun writing the mindless banter and interactions between Chuuya and Dazai.