#no cap we go down with the DOA ship

[ohhcinnybuns]

Here I am again,

You've been expecting me because I can't keep my mouth shut,

But if we don't know how their story ends, what then?

I have another prompt for you that's sure to really cut

‘  i am aching to hold you  &  keep you safe,  to be pressed against you so that nothing can harm you.  ’ 👀

In his arms, by the sea - Merman! Chuuya and Captain Dazai (OTPOY alternate ending)

Words: 2.8k

The shushing of the ocean waves entered his ears, muffled as if his head was below water. It could be. His mind had felt absent for months, his irises becoming mornings waiting at dawn for a sign—any sign at all. 

Time seemingly moved along without him. Days became weeks and months. Every morning, the same routine. He would walk, wait by the pier, gaze at the horizon, and return to the lighthouse he called home. He waited by the shore, hoping that a streaking comet would surface from below the sea, vermillion-drenched locks and teardrop irises ready to call his name and bring him back from his mind’s deceptive trenches. 

Boats drift by, bellowing their horn, while seagulls turn over vacant shells, searching for a morsel. Whispers of people passing by began to call him insane as if the story of his life that made him human was nonexistent and make-believe.

It was as if he had not been there to witness the tragic event that seemingly had him frozen there in time, wondering what he could have done differently to bring his loved ones home. 

---

All he had wanted to know was answers. All he had wanted to do was to understand why his father never came home. 

Why did Fyodor have to reappear when his father was doing just fine, away from the life of piracy to start anew? Why did the rat have to remove someone who meant so much to him, stepping all over the bond they’d come to build, know, and grow? 

Fyodor never even liked Oda to begin with. He always suspected that Fyodor disliked Oda for walking away from his crew - the mark of the Decay of Angels blemished on his arm, a grim reminder of the gruesome things he participated in. 

Dazai gritted his teeth with every sight of it because that was not the Oda that raised him. There was no piracy to him, only a man in love with the sea, freedom, and exploration. Oda had tried to move away from the decay that wanted to mold him, and in the end, his love for the sea always called him back, like a siren tempting her sailor to come forth and pull him under. They lured him, never to come back this time. 

“Where is he?” Dazai pressed him, holding a knife to the captain’s neck. 

“Have you tried looking at the bottom of the Yokohama port, Dazai-kun?" the captain returned his question with a cackle that turned Dazai’s boiling blood glacier-cold. He shivered, breathing rapidly through the gut-wrenching feeling coiling in his stomach. 

“I’m not playing.”

"If you really want to know, Dazai dear, he never left the port. He tried to run, but unfortunately, Nikolai was much faster than he thought,” Fyodor said with a widening smirk. “He got him right here," he continued his tale, the back of his hand knocking against Dazai's chest, “two shots is all it took for him to tumble off the boat. So very sad, Dazai-kun. I’m so very sorry for your loss." 

A ringing in his ear. A shaky breath. Dizzy, tunneling vision. He had hoped it was a lie, but what did Fyodor have to gain from it? Nothing at all. Nothing was ever enough for a cold, blooded monster like him. No amount of plundering and violence was ever enough. He had told the truth and there was nothing more to it. 

Fyodor took hold of his devastation to make his escape. He shoved Dazai away, swiftly kicking open a barrel of oil and throwing a nearby lamp to the ground before dashing away. 

Fyodor ignited his ship with his followers, plans, and treasure still on it. Their convenience didn’t matter - they were only pawns ready to sink with their captain and ship. 

Dazai managed to escape the stores and jumped out of the burning ship into a safety raft. He cut the rope, ready to return to his boat, when a streak of a reddened bioluminescent tail swam past him beneath the bow of the blazing ship. 

“Chuu…ya?” His heart quickened, and he gulped down a knot forming in his throat in worry. The sound of screaming pirates roaring to extinguish fires blared in his ears, the crackling of compromised wood searing the sky. 

Dazai kept his sights on the water, waiting for any sign of Chuuya to return, but that’s when he heard a creaking, the sound of wood snapping out of place. Dazai gasped, smoky fires penetrating his lungs as his eyes stung from falling ash and soaking sea salt. He knew then Chuuya's plan to stop Fyodor. He couldn't do anything. He felt useless. 

Whatever Chuuya had attempted must not have been enough, the ship continued rocking, and Dazai could feel adrenaline as he waited for Chuuya to return to the surface. But he did not. 

Instead, the sea began to bubble and sway viciously, waves growing and pushing Dazai’s safety raft away from the blazing ship. He had to hold on to the side of his raft to keep his balance; otherwise, he risked tipping into the water. He placed a hand over his mouth and nose to slow the inhale of smog and water from entering his system, and when he was pushed a fair distance away, his eyes were wide as he watched the mighty ship struggle against the sudden force pulsing from below the boat. 

The once abysmal ocean thundered brightly as if a light switch had been flicked on, like an active volcano ready to burst. The sea turned a spilled bloody wine surrounding the vessel before a red and black beam broke through the mainmast. The boat started crumpling like a tin can before the ship splintered down its middle and split into two. 

“CHUUYA!” he had cried, heart drumming so quickly it trembled his body. 

Screaming bodies landed in the ocean, crying for help. The few rafts left on the ship had caught fire, unusable. Dazai searched the chaos for any sign of Chuuya but instead found Fyodor, who tossed aside a crewmate floating on a piece of wreckage for himself. 

The crewmate attempted to scale on again but was kicked away by the captain’s boot, which used him as leverage to float the makeshift raft away. The crewmate submerged underwater, nowhere to be seen. Then he sat leisurely, with a knee raised, surveying his surroundings while removing his wet dressings with a smirk. It made Dazai's blood boil, but it didn't last long. 

The same glowing light that brought down the boat sped towards the wreckage Fyodor sat upon at top speed and pulsed water like a geyser to flip it over, tossing the captain into the ocean’s depths once more. Dazai knew it was Chuuya, and he could not look away, slightly relieved that the merman was still out there. 

Fyodor’s head appeared above water briefly before Chuuya sprung from behind, clinging to a bewildered Fyodor with an arm hooked around their neck and hissing at his prey. He bit into the crook of the rat’s neck, his catch thrashing about and screaming in pain, shouting curses that fell on deaf ears as his surviving crewmates watched in terror, holding tightly to their wreckage and removing themselves from the water as quickly as possible. All the fighting did nothing to Chuuya except clench his teeth tighter. 

Dazai could feel Chuuya's gaze on him; pitch-black irises and red swirling symbols slithered all over his body, making him almost unrecognizable. The hand that held Fyodor became a claw resembling molten magma covered in inky veins, and blood seemed to leak from his orifices, staining his chest, shoulders, and face. He didn’t appear all that responsive, working on autopilot and consciousness.

“So this is… Chuuya’s true from…” is all Dazai could mumble, awe in his shaky breath. He wanted nothing more than for Chuuya to come back to him so he could wrap his arms around him and whisper to him that everything was okay now. He doesn't have to do more. Dazai beckoned for the merman to come close. 

The redhead detached his jaw from the rat’s nape, features twitching as if wincing now and again. He was in a primal state, and his instincts to attack were rampant, but beneath that, there were flickers of exhaustion, and Dazai could see the merman panting as if at his limit.

The merman's claw dug into the side of Fyodor’s throat and slashed it open. Blood rushed, screaming subsiding into gurgles, choking on salted water and iron. The captain's crewmates could only watch in horror as their leader pawed at his neck, trying to remove Chuuya’s hold on him. In the end, it was futile.

Drifting a little away from the wreckage had been Sigma and Nikolai, panting and soaking wet inside of a burnt boat, having seemingly gotten away just in time before the ship fractured. They could hear their captain screaming into the night sky, and all Sigma could do was turn his back to the scene and cover his ears. Nikolai, on the other hand, watched on with a balled fist and furrowed brows, turmoil flickering between Sigma and his captain. Ultimately, he chose to stay seated, watching his captain be mauled with a conflicted gaze. It's every man for themselves in open waters - any fight and loyalty they might have had in them sunk with their ship. 

Fyodor continued thrashing wildly until Chuuya couldn't handle his fuss anymore. The fins that shaped the redhead’s ears fanned back, and before Dazai could call to him, Chuuya dove below the surface with his prey in hand, their tail fanning swiftly to gain as much distance between himself and the surface before the flicker of his tail died out, losing sight of him. Dazai’s stomach drops, eyes round, hands gripping wood tightly as he leans against the bow of his raft for any sight of the merman, but he never resurfaces. 

He doesn't know how long he stood on that life raft out at sea waiting for Chuuya, hoping they would return. There was no sight of his bioluminescence. Dazai didn't know if Chuuya was alive or dead. 

Nothing could have prepared him to grieve as deeply as he did when he stepped back into his ship, rescued by his friends, who placed a blanket over him and directed him to his quarters. 

A piece of his heart sunk to the bottom of the ocean that night, an endless stream of tears over the reality of Oda's death and Chuuya's disappearance washing over him all at once. Everything around him moved in slow motion, rocking with his ship, paused forever in this moment, trapped in a loop that didn't want to let him go and hadn't let him go. 

How does anyone learn to move forward after the death of their loved ones? It is said that time heals all wounds, but what if some wounds don’t close? That has been a question that has plagued his mind since that night. Dazai never honestly thought about it, always having thought that his life should have ended at thirteen when he initially tried to drown himself. Yet, Oda and Chuuya became his saving grace when he thought he would never have anyone on his side, and now he was left to live without them. 

---

The walk back to the lighthouse this evening is a little chillier. Winter starts are always like that, much more polar next to the sea, but Dazai wouldn’t change it. He keeps his gaze lowered, mindful enough not to walk into others, hands in his tan coat pockets, breathing into the bundled navy scarf around his neck. The clicks of his shoes are the only evidence that he is moving forward and not floating to his destination. 

Crisp sea salt permeated his senses, hair fluffed and ruffled by the breeze. He walks the crisscrossing piers, the crescent shape of the harbor leading to a rocky shoreline, where a path veers off at its end, steps leading up to his lighthouse. This is where it all started. It’s only right that this is where he should end—the beginning of them and the entanglement of their Fates after the catalyst of his drowning. 

He had thought that maybe Oda would have loved Dazai buying the lighthouse - a home they could share instead of the shanty shack they used to live in because Oda was humble like that. The lighthouse kept them close to the coast, nights full of lulling tides and wondrous expanses of diamonds in the sky; perhaps it would have saved Oda from his end to have what he loved the most so close to him. Dazai wanted to give him that. 

He also thought Chuuya would have visited him more often. He thought they could meet again at the rocky ledges and dive together to explore the world below, fingers entwined and bodies close. He once joked to Chuuya that in another life, they would be fated sea horses drifting with the rolling tide in a swirling dance. The memory alone makes him smile, remembering the bright red hues that made the merman’s cheeks flush and splash water at him. 

Dazai bundles the scarf around his neck more tightly, the snugness comforting him as he ascends the steps. There is always tomorrow, he supposes as if that’s not what he’s been telling himself for months. There is always a tomorrow. 

As he reaches the door of his home, he unlocks it and enters, ready to close the door. A sound of quick steps enters his ears, and a hand holds his door open before he can fully close it shut. 

“Wait!” the person pants. They continue inhaling and exhaling as if they had been running for miles, finally trying to catch their breath.  

Dazai blinks, instinctively opening his door with a, “Yes? What can I do for you?” 

It wasn't often that he had visitors storming at his door. The last person to visit him had been Atsushi to check on his well-being. However, the sight he came upon made him speechless. 

“You walk…so fast…those lanky legs of yours… goddamn it… How am I supposed to keep up? Wait, I need a minute…” 

Before him was the soul of the ocean incarnate—flaming locks dry, curled, and swept to the side, trying to catch their breath. The stunning blue of his eyes glared at him playfully, a smirk plastered on his lips as his breathing regulated. He wore modern clothing and was rather handsome: a black leather jacket, onyx gloves, and a plain black T-shirt. At his neck rested a choker that replaced the seashell garland he used to wear. But even more surprising was the lack of a fishtail, replaced by legs hidden beneath navy jeans. 

“Chuuya?” Dazai croaked through the lump in his throat. All that time, waiting for time to shift along again. 

The redhead stands tall, a hand on his hip as he beams, asking, “Did you miss me?”

Dazai leaps forward, embracing Chuuya in his arms tightly, body trembling as if scared that the body he held was a figment of the imagination. He feels Chuuya chuckle into his chest, snaking his arms around his waist before whispering a small, “I’m home.” 

Dazai’s grip tightens for a minute before letting the redhead go, pulling back to look at Chuuya again, who gazes at him sheepishly, pink shading across his face. 

His eyes sting, caressing the softness of Chuuya’s cheek tenderly, still processing that Chuuya was standing before him. His hands continued to travel down to his neck, where he could feel their quickened blood flowing, and finally down to his chest, where a thumping heart beats. 

He looks in awe as Chuuya smirks up at him again. A smile surfaces, bubbling happiness overwhelming him as he leans in to capture his lover's lips in a kiss, tears finally falling free. Chuuya came back. 

Chuuya smiles, standing on his tiptoes, wrapping his arm around Dazai’s neck to keep them close. Dazai pulls away enough for their lips to brush together, a gentle “Welcome home” spilling from his lips, as Chuuya thumbs away the droplets from his eyes. 

The redhead grins, raking his hands through the brunette's knotting locks, speaking softly, “Sorry I kept you waiting so long.” 

Dazai hums with a smile and a nod, fondly gazing at his lover before kissing their forehead and taking hold of their hand. 

“You do have some explaining to do,” Dazai says with a small laugh. 

Chuuya laughs along, holding their hands up to place a kiss on Dazai’s wrist as an apology—one of Dazai’s favorite things that Chuuya did. Intimate and gentle. 

“Yeah, I know,” is all the redhead says calmly. 

Dazai nods, stepping away, leading Chuuya by their clasped hands into their home. Finally, time could move forward for him again - no longer stuck with ‘what ifs’  and wondering what he could have done differently for another outcome. No longer would Dazai be in his loneliness, gazing out at the ocean from his lighthouse or at the piers, waiting for a sign of life. Finally, he could live the rest of his days happily with his lover in his arms by the sea.