Death Doesn’t Discriminate Between the Sinners and the Saints

by Lilys3426

Summary:

For people like Akutagawa, maybe the world was always meant to end at the tip of a blade.

OR: Akutagawa dies, and Atsushi realizes he made it back to the third dimension just a bit too late to save him

123.5 continuation

Notes:

FOR THE RECORD! Akutagawa is totally not dead. Consider this an alternate ending… and I’m sorry. My friend yelled at me when I sent this to her (sorry Sam).

Chapter 1: It takes, and it takes, and it takes

Death is a metamorphosis. For every person that experiences it, they are on the cusp of the knowledge they’ve always been seeking, the few words, a realization.

The first time Akutagawa died, he was granted the knowledge he wished for all his life. And it came quite unexpectedly, in the form of a boy smaller in stature than himself but bigger in heart and soul than Akutagawa could ever dream to be. Yes, the Weretiger would always be superior in the mental struggle when faced with a dying soldier boy. A dog, a reaper, a murderer.

Yet the dog went seeking scraps and stumbled upon a feast. The same man that outshined him in so many facets wasn’t all that different than the dog - he went through trial after trial, never seeming to have a moment’s reprieve.

Even reapers grow weary when made to take so many souls. And Akutagawa was tired. He was tired of being the same thing his whole life, just for it to turn out in the end that he drew the short end of the stick. That he wasn’t meant to amount to much.

For what is fate if not cruel?

20 years is not a long time. It amounts to nothing in the larger view of the world, yet 20 year old Akutagawa Ryuunosuke clung desperately to those years like one final, cruel lifeline.

And then it was over.

Ame-no-gozen is not a kind creature. It was in every way the amalgamation of horrors, a bringing together of everything that Akutagawa had ever fought against.

But whereas Akutagawa had come out victorious in the previous tribulations, there was a key difference in this one.

He had lost him . The boy who was always by his side left a gust of cool air and a painful smile behind where he should have stood.

And Akutagawa was mad. Atsushi should be beside him, and yet he was gone. He had slipped right through the mafioso’s fingers like everyone else he’d ever cared about. It seemed to be his curse, anyone he ever took a liking to, loved , even, would always be bound to die in front of the eyes of a boy far to young to have to see such disaster.

20 years to watch his world burn. It seemed rather fitting that Akutagawa should go down fighting.

He heard music.

A haunting melody, the inter workings of moonlight sonata, a Beethoven composition. He was familiar with the melody.

Memories when it came to Dazai were far from peaceful. Usually, they involved pain, hatred, such a loathing that could only be an outward projection of self-hatred.

Akutagawa could see that self hatred projected from Dazai reflected in his own. Yet this memory was a stark contrast from his others.

One evening, during Akutagawa’s early days in the mafia, he wandered the hallways of the mafia storerooms in search of access to the roof of the building. Mori told him if he wanted to get on the roof, Rashomon-ing his way up there would attract too much attention. He needed to climb like a “normal person”.

So, in search of a stairwell, or perhaps a window, the young mafioso instead stumbled upon a haunting melody coming from one of the storerooms labeled “valuable musical instruments”. A small facet of the mafia, but many expensive instruments caught quite the price, especially on the secondary market.

Curiosity killed the mafioso, or however the saying goes, though, because Akutagawa had entered the room to find his mentor’s slender fingers pushing the keys in time with the music, his whole form swaying softly. Apt with the name of the song, moonlight shone in through a window in the ceiling, which was open to the crisp night air.

Dazai did not look over when Akutagawa cautiously stepped into the room. He kept playing, not a falter in his tempo as he hit each chord.

Akutagawa listened intently, watching as his mentor’s fingers glazed over the keys. He looked so at peace, all the creases of distaste and disappointment washed off his face, and in place a more serene expression.

As the progression began to slow, a subtle decrescendo overtook the piece, bringing it to a close. The final key reverberated through the room as Dazai pressed it with a flick, his arm raised in the air in finality.

No body spoke. They just sat as the final note faded, Dazai remaining stock still in his final pose, and Akutagawa dared not even breathe lest he ruin the moment.

Finally, Dazai moved to stand up from his chair. He turned to Akutagawa, but the usual twist of a sneer did not graze his mentor’s face like it usually did when he laid eyes on the mafioso. Instead, he smiled.

It wasn’t a grin, but a small, soft thing. He pointed up to the window.

“You were looking for the roof, Akutagawa-kun?” It’s just up there”.

Akutagawa has never mentioned the roof, but he supposed for someone like Dazai, that wasn’t hard to figure out. He simply nodded, and Dazai nodded back, before walking towards the door.

Pausing, the older man turned once more to his mentee.

“It’s a lovely night outside, Akutagawa. Enjoy it”.

With that, he left Akutagawa in the room alone, only the memory of the soft piano melody to grace him in the night.

________

The memory of Dazai playing the piano wasn’t exactly what Akutagawa expected to see in his final moments, though it fit.

“Akutagawa. You fought so hard.” The phantom spoke, smiling that calm little curl. 

And he did. All his life Akutagawa had been fighting an uphill battle. And against all odds, he kept winning those battles, wearing himself down to a corpse of the boy he was until nothing remained but the need to go on, to continue the fight until his bones became ashes.

Tears welled up in the eyes of the boy 20 years too young. But it wasn’t for Dazai, it was for himself. For the acceptance of who he was. Not a monster, not a dog, not a reaper, just himself. Akutagawa Ryuunosuke. Because that would be enough.

Akutagawa smiled as he felt pressure on his head. This was the end, yet maybe that’s alright. It seemed rather fitting to go down fighting.

The pressure became too much, and Akutagawa’s vision quickly descended into a blanket of darkness…

…right as Atsushi reappeared in front of him.

Chapter 2: We rise and we fall and we break

Summary:

Atsushi returns from the fourth dimension

Notes:

Here goes nothing. I’m not entirely sure if I’m happy with this ending, but after taking the ACT I got in a bad enough mood that I could write angst, so here you go!
——
Chapter titles, as well as the name for the fic in general are taken from “Wait for It” from Hamilton

There’s a haze in the air.

The Fourth dimension was a disorienting experience, to say the least. This amalgamation of memories, events in the past, the present, and the future all brought into one space. But in killing Akinari, Atsushi finally made it out.

Exactly in the spot he disappeared, the body of the weretiger reformed itself out of bubbles and light, his head lifting as he re-entered the third dimension.

Thud.

As his hearing returned to him, Atsushi heard a sickening sound, like bones pounding concrete. He turned his head slightly to the right, where the noise had come from.

He saw blood.

There was so much blood, splattered in a sickening arc like a red halo around the head of the one person he thought he had left.

Atsushi had always wondered what being completely alone would feel like. He had almost experienced it on the cruise liner fighting Fukuchi, but Akutagawa had shown up. Every time, someone came to help him, to unlock his shackles, to fight alongside him.

He couldn’t breathe. Mere centimeters from where his feet had landed back on the ground, red pooled into rivers of diminished hope.

Akutagawa lay there, stock still at his feet.

He was too late.

He was too late.

Not a single thing moved as Atsushi dropped to his knees next to his partner. It was as if the fighting itself even stopped its encompassing assault for the mourning of a boy who lost the one person who understood him.

The last person on Earth Atsushi ever thought he would be sad to lose now was the only person he saw in his mind.

But Akutagawa was dead. He wasn’t breathing, and no matter how hard Atsushi urged the tiger’s hearing for even the faintest signs of a heartbeat, there was nothing. Not a single sign of the firecracker that was his partner. Not anymore.

The sight itself is gruesome. The vampire’s neck stuck out at an odd angle, exposing the top bit of a thick red scar over his jugular. His face was a mess of flesh and blood, seemingly having been crushed in. The telltale teeth of a vampire stick out from his upper lip, about the only recognizable detail of his face.

But the vampire teeth weren’t what drew Atsushi’s attention to his partner’s mouth. It was the small smile that graced his thin, chapped lips. Even in death, even in his gruesome state, Akutagawa looked so at peace that it made Atsushi sick.

Why the hell are you smiling? Atsushi asked desperately, yet no noise came out of his mouth. Tears were rolling down his face in huge droplets as he gingerly cupped the destroyed face of the boy he wished he could have saved.

He tried so, so hard. Yet Akutagawa had died believing he had lost Atsushi.

He had died alone.

Clutching the lapels of the knight’s coat, Atsushi carefully maneuvered the body Akutagawa into his arms, cradling him flush to his chest. Tears fell from the weretiger’s face onto the blood-splattered boy. It was hard to tell where one ended and the other began, yet only on heart beat. Only one was able to move and breathe and feel so painfully that he felt like he might burst.

20 years was far too little time for a life. It had barely begun, just to be cut off by a power greater than those insignificant three hundred sixty five days repeated over and over again.

He was gone. Gone, and no power in the world save maybe the meddlesome book could bring him back, though Atsushi supposed even that wouldn’t be the same.

“I’m so sorry” Atsushi breathed into the air of the demolished airport, cradling the body of someone he loved close to his chest.

“I’m so, so sorry”.

Notes:

Comments mean the world to me! If you enjoyed (or want to yell at me) please interact I will scream about sskk with you all

Notes:

Happy pride month homos