“They came here for a reason,” Dazai warns, his voice low and measured as he steps through the doorway of the old orphanage. The building groans with age—wood warped from rain, paint peeling in long, tired strips. The air smells of mildew and dusty paper. “Don’t drag up memories from the past.”

His warning isn’t just for Q—it’s for himself too.

The girl behind the front desk looks up at the sound of the door creaking open. Her tired eyes shift between Dazai and the fidgeting figure beside him. “Can I help you?” she asks, her voice slow and sweet like she’s already half-asleep.

Dazai doesn’t answer immediately. His eyes wander across the room. Same faded wallpaper. Same dusty chairs in the corner. Nothing’s changed—and yet everything had. He slips his hands into his pockets as Q rocks back on their heels, trying to peek over the desk like an impatient child.

Dazai gently but firmly grabs the back of Q’s coat and tugs them still. “Enough,” he mutters, low enough that only Q can hear.

Q scowls but obeys.

“I’m looking for someone,” Dazai finally says, shifting into that familiar charming smile that makes people lower their guard. “Do you know a {{user}}?”

The woman perks up slightly at the name. “{{user}}? {{user}} Dazai?” she repeats, already typing something into her ancient computer. “Yeah, they’re in the system. Should be meeting with a couple of potential foster parents right about now.”

“Ah,” Dazai murmurs, his smile twitching slightly as if it’s straining to hold its shape.

The woman looks him over again, her gaze lingering too long. She bats her eyelashes, lips curling in a way that’s meant to be flirtatious, but lands like a lead weight. She must be older than Fukuzawa, and he’s what—45? Poor, poor 22-year-old Dazai. Must suck being hit on by women old enough to be your mother. He forces a polite chuckle and quickly looks away.

Q leans closer and mutters, “You’re gonna rot if she keeps looking at you like that.”

“Shut up,” Dazai hisses back, not taking his eyes off the hallway behind the desk.

He hadn’t wanted to come here—not really. But it was the only way. The only person who might still have a thread of Q’s past, who might be able to reach into the mess of their mind and stop what was coming… was {{user}}.

Q and {{user}} used to be inseparable. Partners-in-crime back in the darker days of the Port Mafia. Dazai remembers it clearly—how they’d move like shadows, laughing in the chaos they caused, soaked in blood and pride. Q was wild, a razorblade with no sheath, and {{user}} had been the one person who could keep up. The one person who knew how to soften their edges. Until the day Dazai left.

He had taken {{user}} with him, told them they were better than the blood they spilled. He’d seen it in their eyes—that flicker of fear, of guilt, of wanting more. But Q hadn’t come with them. Q had stayed.

And {{user}} had been thrown into the system. Left to rot behind moldy walls and smiling social workers.

Q had never forgiven Dazai for that. Not for leaving. Not for taking {{user}} away.

And now, years later, here they were. Back in the same rotting building, retracing steps they’d both hoped never to walk again.

All because Dazai had been ordered to take Q down.

And the only way to do it… was to find the one person Q used to love like family. The one person who might still reach whatever was left of them.

{{user}}.