Chapter Text
It takes Chuuya approximately five minutes to realize that this is not his Yokohama. It only took that long in the first place because Chuuya was mildly convinced he was lost and not actually in the right place.
For one, he does not see Suribachi City on the way in. For another, the mafia’s HQ is kind of entirely gone. Finally, there are costumed freaks running around like they own the place. In Chuuya’s Yokohama, would last for however long it took Dazai (wherever he is) to get over laughing at the idiots. Given said idiots are roaming the streets without bullets splattering their brains on the walls, something is clearly up.
What the fuck is all this? Could it be some sort of hallucination ability? Granted, Chuuya never thought he had this type of an imagination, so it’s probably not that. From his vantage point on the nicest curvy rooftop, Chuuya can see people that, for lack of a better word, look like mutants. It’s as if they are walking around with a constantly activated ability that changes their hair to blades, their skin to feathers or fur, their colouring to something vibrant Chuuya thought only belonged to fabric.
In a way, it’s beautiful. There are so many different kinds of people all walking around, going about their day, seemingly ignorant of the differences between them.
The illusion shatters as one of those colorfully dressed idiots starts shouting, pointing at a young blonde girl. Chuuya’s eyes narrow and he leans over the edge of the building to get a better view, a hand coming up to hold his hat. The young girl is pale, that grey-ish tint Dazai gets after not eating for multiple days on end, her hair is stringy and tied in two disarrayed buns, and she has literal vampire fangs.
Whether it’s the fangs or the fact that she is clearly a street kid, the costumed idiot that spotted her wastes no time setting to chasing her down.
This is definitely not a hallucination of Chuuya’s own making, then. If he were in charge of the world around him, he’d make a world where people were not singled out for their looks or life circumstances.
…And probably make a lot of these people shorter, because jeez. Are they trying for the world height record or something around here?!
Chuuya continues watching as the civilians on the street move out of the way, giving the costumed idiot a clear path to the young girl. The girl is trembling; Chuuya bites his lip. He knows he has no place butting in when he doesn’t know where he is or what is going on, but come on. How many times has he been forced to stand by and watch when he could have stepped in? With The Port Mafia, even with The Sheep, there were rules that he had to follow. Saving all those that his bleeding heart pangs for was not a part of any of those rules.
A second costumed idiot joins in, placing the young girl between the two of them with no place to run.
Even from all the way up here, Chuuya can see the fear in her eyes. It’s a fear he knows well, one he saw everyday when he lived on the streets. In this girl, he can see the members of The Sheep, all those he ended up letting down in the end.
Maybe it’s stupid and irresponsible. If Dazai were here, he would surely chew Chuuya out for even considering it.
But Dazai isn’t here. And neither is Mori, or the Port Mafia. This isn’t his Yokohama, so none of the people who could stop him are here.
Chuuya activates his ability, For The Tainted Sorrow thrumming to life in his veins, and he leaps off the building. It only takes a moment to drop to the ground, landing hard enough the road cracks beneath him.
Around him, the civilians start to scream. Strangely enough, they don’t run off. Yeah, they back off and give some space for Chuuya and the costumed idiots to duke it out, but they don’t run. Instead, they are watching like this is live action TV; some are even recording on their phones.
Yep. Definitely not his Yokohama. The people back home have good survival instincts.
“Hey,” Chuuya calls out, smirking at the two costumed idiots who are now looking between him and the scraggly young girl suspiciously. “Why don’t you leave that young lady alone? Pick on someone your own size?” Chuuya ignores the fact that this girl looks to be about the same height as him.
“Don’t do anything rash, kid.” The larger of the two, this one wearing a blue color scheme, warns. “Don’t you know who this is? Getting close to her could be dangerous—!” They cut off with the familiar gurgle of blood. The watching civilians clue in and finally start screaming and running away.
The young girl pulls her knife from the costumed idiot’s throat and scowls at Chuuya.
“I had them right where I wanted them!” The girl complains. She brings the knife to her mouth, her tongue flashing out to lick along the flat edge.
“Really?” Chuuya eyes the second costumed idiot, this one with a green color scheme, who is trying to run away. It takes half a thought to increase the gravity on them, quickly turning them to a puddle of crushed bone and bloody mush.
“Hey!”
Chuuya’s eyes widen and he leans back to dodge a swipe of the girl’s knife.
“What’d you do that for, dummy?!” The girl’s amber eyes are furious. “You ruined her! She was so pretty too, would’ve looked lovely covered in blood.” The girl sighs dreamily, then shakes her head and scowls at him again. “But you—” She trails off again, the bloodlust leaving her eyes as she takes the time to actually look at Chuuya. He raises a ginger eyebrow as she slowly scans him from head to foot.
“Oh.” Then the girl blushes. Ah, great. “I didn’t realize how pretty you are… I’m Himiko Toga, but you can call me your girlfriend, if you want!” She skips right up to him and latches onto Chuuya’s arm before he can stop it from happening.
“Um. I’m Chuuya.” He squints at her. “Aren’t you, like, a teenager?”
Himiko squints back at him. “Yeah? You are too, so I don’t see what the big deal is.” She sighs happily and presses closer to him. Chuuya uses his ability to deflect the blade that stabs for his side.
“See, we’re made for each other! Your hair is pretty close to the color of blood, you know.” She leans closer as if sharing a secret. “I bet it would be even prettier streaked with blood.”
“Ah.” Chuuya uses his ability to extract himself from the girl’s grasp. “Okay, no. Listen, Himiko—”
“My name sounds so perfect coming from you!”
“—I’m eighteen. Sorry, but we can’t be together.” Not that he had any interest in the first place; she’s way younger than him and is female.
Instead of sobbing and dramatically running off, like the other girls Chuuya has turned down, Himiko leans in close and sniffs him. Weird, but Chuuya has seen stranger things, so he lets it happen.
Her eyes widen. “Oh! Oh, I get it. You’re already in love. Don’t worry, Chuuya, I don’t get in the way of true love!” She salutes him, her eyes gleaming brightly. “Good luck wooing your lady. Later!” The girl scampers off, stopping only to scoop up the corpse of the costumed idiot she stabbed through the neck, then disappears into the nearest alley.
Chuuya shakes his head and rolls his eyes. Him in love? That would be quite something indeed. If Dazai were still around, he’d have never heard the end of something like that.
The sound of sirens fills the air, and as he does not want to deal with the cops, Chuuya activates his ability and takes to the rooftops, quickly parkouring away from the scene.
Well, with that out of the way, it’s about time Chuuya figured out where the fuck he is.
One internet café visit later — and, after discovering that his phone does still get signal and let him use his data plan to google things so there was no need to go to said internet café — and Chuuya knows a significant more about this place. Namely, it is most certainly not where he belongs. This is a world of superheroes and villains, of blatant white and black, with no grey areas. The Port Mafia was all about operating in those grey zones: protecting Yokohama and working with the government, but also handling illegal dealings and, you know, murder.
In this world, it seems like doing such things would get you punched by the big blond doofus everyone calls the number one hero. Cause yeah. Heroes are apparently ranked on how good they are or something. Really, they should be ranked on how bad their costumes are, cause oh boy. Chuuya would never be caught dead wearing most of those.
However, since all he found out from his research is that this is not his world, Chuuya returns to the scene of the crime to investigate and see if he can figure out a way home. Currently, he is banking on the ability that sent him here having a time limit. If there is a time limit, then at some point the ability will wear off and just boot him back to his world. Minimal effort for all parties.
The problem with that hope is that Chuuya has no proof of how the ability works. It is pure hopeful speculation. So, if there is no time limit, then he needs to figure a way back home himself.
Unfortunately, planning and figuring things out and whatever is not his strong suit. It’s not like he’s dumb or anything, but when working with a partner like Dazai, Chuuya never had to do any of the planning or big thinking. By the time he realized that they needed to figure something out, Dazai was already on the next step of the puzzle. Needless to say, Chuuya just gave up on all that and let Dazai do the masterminding.
It only takes a few hours of jogging and rooftop-hopping (with a medium amount of internal aching, so nothing too worrying) to bring him back to the construction site he first landed in. Thankfully, it is now late enough that it is void of construction workers.
Chuuya takes his time looking around. He carefully examines every scuff mark in the dirt, every blemish on the beams making up the structure around him, and mentally catalogues the different footprints he spies. However, while such steps are great for investigating a regular crime scene, they do not help much in Chuuya’s case. Knowing that there are three construction workers who wear the same shoes does not help him figure out how to portal back to his world.
“This is so fucking typical.” Of course his first mission without Dazai has to go so sideways. If that mackerel were here, then— actually, odds are the ability wouldn’t work on Dazai. So, even if they were still partners, Chuuya would be stuck in this mess alone anyway.
…But it would be nice to know that someone was worried and looking for him, even if that someone was Dazai.
Because, honestly, Mori doesn’t care. If Chuuya is gone, Mori will probably mope around a bit at the loss of such a strong weapon, then move on. At the end of the day, the mafia sees him as a weapon, and weapons are replaceable. Even Kouyou, for all she pretends to care, has expressed similar thoughts.
So, they won’t be looking for him. They’ll think he turned traitor and ran off, like Dazai did. They’ll spend a week or so searching for signs of him, then call it a day and label him as an enemy that is to be shot on sight.
If Chuuya wants to get back to his world, preferably before that happens and he loses the only home he has left, then he needs to figure this out by himself.
Groaning, Chuuya tips his head back to look up at the stars and takes a long, steadying breath. He can do this. All the ridiculous and insane situations he has gotten into in the past were manageable, so this is too. It doesn’t matter that this is the only time he’s been totally alone, he can do this. He’ll get home, murder the fucker that sent him here, and do so before the mafia writes him off as a traitor.
He takes a determined step and nearly eats dirt as his leg gives out.
“Wha— dammit!” Chuuya glares at his right leg as if scowling will get it to fix itself.
Great. It really shows how distracted with this whole situation he is that Chuuya didn’t even notice his body trying to shut down.
“Stupid fucking Arahabaki.” As if using his body as a conduit isn’t good enough, the dumb god just has to give Chuuya horrible after-effects of using that part of his ability. Jeez, he probably only held out this long without anything giving out on him thanks to whatever they did at that hospital he was in this morning.
Well, at least his leg didn’t give out while he was parkouring here, that would’ve been extra annoying.
Huffing, Chuuya settles on his butt in the cold dirt. He manhandles his right leg out straight, then sets to digging his thumbs into the muscles to kickstart them. Given this is not the first time a limb has decided to quit on him during post-Corruption use (it isn’t a side effect that happens every time, but it does happen more often than not), Chuuya knows how to deal with it.
…Well, his usual method won’t work. He doesn’t exactly have Dazai around to carry him back to his apartment and hover for a day or two in that anxious-silently-concerned way that Dazai does.
But whatever. He knows how to massage his limbs back to functional. That’s the part that matters.
As Chuuya is grinding his knuckles into his thigh, something moves in the corner of his eye.
He pauses his motion and twists to get a better view: there is a steel beam hovering in the air by itself. And it’s moving. Chuuya squints. There is no way that beam is moving by itself. After a moment, he can kind of make out a figure standing at the end of the beam, but it’s hard to be sure if that’s a person or just part of the structure.
“…Hello?”
There’s a high-pitched shriek and the beam is dropped to the ground. Ah, a person then.
Said person wastes no time coming over to where Chuuya is sitting on the ground. They come into view, revealing brown hair cut to her chin, round auburn eyes, pinkish cheeks, and baggy black clothes that don’t fit her quite right. The girl — a teenager, Chuuya guesses — plants her hands on her hips and scowls at him. It feels like being glared at by a puppy.
“You can’t be here!” The girl declares. “This is private property, so I’m going to have to ask you to leave right now.”
“You’re here too,” Chuuya points out. He goes back to kneading his leg; his gut tells him this girl is harmless. “So, it seems like we’re both trespassing then.”
“What! No! I’m allowed to be here. My parents own the construction company that is working here.”
Chuuya hums. “Then why are you sneaking around, moving beams and shit, in the middle of the night?”
“I— well, I’m helping! We’re a bit behind schedule, so I figured I could come move some beams with my quirk and speed things up a bit. So,” the girl’s scowl deepens, “what are you doing out here?”
“Sitting.” Chuuya shrugs. He pauses in his massage to pat the ground next to him. “You’re welcome to join me, if you want.”
The girl hesitates for a moment, then plops down a couple feet off to his side.
“I’m Chuuya,” he introduces himself. “Don’t worry about the trespassing or whatever, I’ll be outta here once my leg decides to work again.”
“Oh! Are you hurt?” The girl frowns and peers at his leg as if she’ll be able to detect an injury through his pants.
“Eh, don’t worry about it. Just happens sometimes if I overuse my abi— quirk.” Ah, yes. Abilities are called quirks here, for whatever reason.
“Oh.” This time the girl nods. “I get that. If I use mine too much, it makes me sick. I’m Ochako, by the way.” She twists and holds her hand out to him. “Nice to meet you, Chuuya!”
“Yeah, sure.” Chuuya shakes her hand, raising an eyebrow at the way she curls her pinky in so that it presses against her own palm when they shake hands.
They sit in silence for a few minutes, Chuuya massaging his stupid leg and Ochako watching the stars above them. Good thing it’s summer, otherwise sitting out this late at night might be cold. Well, cold for Ochako; Chuuya’s mafia coat does a decent job keeping him warm.
“So,” Ochako starts, breaking the silence. “I’m just gonna, uh, go move a few more beams. I think I can do a couple more before I reach my limit…” The teenager stands, brushes off her butt, and marches determinedly over to the huge beams that are apparently waiting to be moved.
Chuuya watches, a little curious to see a so-called ‘quirk’ in action. The girl plants all five fingers on one of the beams and it rises in the air, weightless. He sits up straighter.
“Gravity?” He calls out to the girl. She startles slightly but doesn’t drop the beam this time.
“Oh, yeah! My quirk is called Zero Gravity, so basically the things I touch become weightless. It’s not useful for that much, but I can help move the heavy things around the construction yard.” She shrugs bashfully, as if gravity isn’t the most badass ability.
Chuuya grins. “Huh. You know, I don’t think I’ve ever met another gravity manipulator before.”
It takes Ochako a second to get it, but once she does, her round eyes open impossibly wider. She claps her hands together happily, and subsequently drops the floating beam.
“Oh my gosh! Seriously? You’ve got a gravity quirk too?! That’s so cool! I’ve never met another person with a gravity quirk either! What’s yours called? Do you have a way to avoid getting nauseous?” Ochako scampers back over, the construction forgotten in favour of the stars gleaming in her eyes.
Chuuya leans back. That is far too much eagerness from a kid who doesn’t know him.
“Um. It’s called For The Tainted Sorrow. And, like I said, I can manipulate gravity.”
Ochako cocks her head. “That’s a really weird name for a quirk. Why’d your parents put something so random on your quirk registration?”
Chuuya shrugs. “I dunno. If I ever meet them, I guess I’ll ask.” The statement has the wanted effect: Ochako winces and looks away, no doubt feeling guilty for bringing up a ‘sensitive’ topic. Whatever. Chuuya just didn’t want her asking about the name of his ability. For The Tainted Sorrow sounds cool, way cooler than something boring and basic like Gravity Manipulation. Besides, he didn’t name his ability, that’s just what it’s called. And since it sounds cool and badass, Chuuya won’t be changing it.
“Sorry,” Ochako murmurs, shuffling awkwardly.
“It’s fine.” Chuuya digs his thumb deep into the muscle of his thigh, and his foot spasms this time. Ugh, finally. The numbness begins to slowly be pushed out with each press of his thumbs, allowing the near-painful tingles of nerves waking up to take over.
Once it’s all over with, Chuuya wastes no time shoving up to his feet. His leg wobbles a bit but holds.
“Hey, kid. Want me to show you how it’s done?” Chuuya jerks his thumb towards the pile of heavy metal beams the girl was trying to move.
Ochako perks up and nods eagerly.
Chuuya flexes his fingers and grins. It’s not often he gets to show off just for the sake of showing off, and never for a willing audience.
He walks confidently to the pile of beams, activating his ability along the way so red flares around him. Reaching the pile, he brushes his knuckles against the top one and removes the gravity from every one of the beams in the pile. He turns to Ochako as the beams rise to hover off the ground, wobbling a little more than they should thanks to his own exhaustion, and smirks.
“So? Where do you want these?”
Ochako guides the beams where she wants them, then, once Chuuya sets them all down and returns normal gravity to each, deactivating his ability, she spins to him.
“That was so cool! You’re so cool, Chuuya! Do you think you could help me learn to do that? You lifted, like, fifteen beams at once! I can hardly move one!”
Chuuya shrugs, unable to stop a small smirk from growing on his lips. It’s nice to hear praise like that sometimes. A nice contrast to being yelled at for messing something — there’s always something — up again.
“Just takes practice, kid.”
“Well, maybe we can practice together!” What. “Yeah, that would be great! Can we meet here again tomorrow night?” Ochako clasps her hands together in front of her, as if begging Chuuya to agree.
…He is weak. She’s smiling at him like he is a cool, impressive person, something more than the mafia’s weapon.
“Sure. Whatever.” Chuuya averts his eyes, unable to stand the glee shinning in her eyes any longer. “Not like I’ve got anywhere else to be.”
Instead of cheering at Chuuya’s agreement, he detects a dip in the girl’s energy.
“…Do you not have somewhere to go?”
Ah. Whoops.
“It’s fine,” Chuuya waves off her concern. “I can take care of myself, and it’s almost morning anyway.”
“It’s just past midnight.” Ochako is frowning now, an obvious furrow in her forehead. Then it clears, and she’s back to grinning. “Ok, well, you can just come stay the night at our house! I’m sure my parents won’t mind, and I think we have an extra futon somewhere. Plus, Mom is always telling me I should bring friends over, so she can’t even get mad at me for bringing you over without asking!”
How on earth did she come to any of those conclusions?
“Uh, really, I’m good. Thanks for the offer, though.”
“Oh, come on!” Ochako grabs Chuuya’s gloved hand and starts tugging him away from the construction site. “It’ll be fun. I’ve never had a sleepover before!”
Well, Chuuya could dig his heels in and rip his hand from hers, but he also doesn’t want to let a young girl walk back home alone at this hour. So there. It’s settled. He’ll walk her home, then slip away once she’s safe. He’ll find a good rooftop somewhere to crash for the night, then get back to finding a way home in the morning.
His plan is shredded once they get to Ochako’s home. She knocks on the door, still holding Chuuya’s hand and twisting to grin happily at him every few seconds. The door swings open, and Chuuya can see his own surprise reflected back at him.
“Kid?” Ruki Uraraka’s surprise melts into relief. “Oh goodness, I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Shit, it’s you.” Chuuya says at nearly the same time.
Ochako looks between the two of them and tightens her grip when Chuuya tries to sneakily extract his hand. “Dad? How do you know Chuuya?”
Uraraka steps aside, moving out of the doorway so they can enter. Ochako goes eagerly, but this time Chuuya does plant his heels. The girl is jerked to a halt. She turns back to him and frowns.
“Come on, Chuuya. Mom and Dad won’t mind if you stay over, really.” She tugs their linked fingers, trying to lure Chuuya inside with wide, kind eyes. It’s awfully tempting.
“Look, I really should go now—”
“Oh, nonsense!” Uraraka smiles warmly. “Please come in, Chuuya— that is your name, correct?”
Chuuya nods numbly.
“It’s late, there are no trains running at this hour and you must be exhausted! You’ll stay the night.”
“But—”
“Marya! We have a guest!”
“Mom! I brought a friend over; we’re having a sleepover!”
Ochako tugs again and this time Chuuya is too shocked to react properly. He lets himself be tugged indoors, which is the biggest mistake he’s made in a while.
The reason is quite simple: the Urarakas are too nice.
At a quick glance, Chuuya can tell that his coat alone costs more than their entire main room. Yet, despite any financial ends they might have to meet, they still offer him their spare futon, a space to sleep (next to Ochako, who wouldn’t have it any other way, since this is now a ‘sleepover’ or whatever that means), and they shove food (Chuuya reluctantly accepts an energy bar, which is safe as it came in a wrapper) at him when he admits to not having eaten anything all day.
They’re too kind. It’s unnerving. And the worst part is that Chuuya can tell they don’t expect anything in return; they’re just being genuinely nice.
He isn’t sure how to deal with such things, and ultimately caves, agreeing to stay the night.