you can take my Soul, but never my Heart (omegaverse)

Chapter 27: departures

Dazai steps off of the plane to a place that looks much the same as the Tokyo International Airport, except for the multi-lingual mural that decorates the wall; Welcome to France!

***

Kunikida calls Dazai's phone at noon the next day, while Chuuya is making more microwaved noodles and Dazai himself is lounging on the couch in nothing more than his sleep shirt and underwear under the blanket, pouting because Chuuya had the nerve to say that food was more important than cuddling. Blasphemy.

"Kunikida!" he greets brightly, stretching out further on the couch with content at the idea of talking to Koko again. If he can't have cuddles, he wants to talk to his daughter, at the very least. "What do I owe this pleasure?"

"Dazai, I told you yesterday that I would call when we were on our way to the airport."

Dazai makes a face, checking the clock on the wall before the clock on his own phone. "Kunikida, the flight leaves at seven."

"Yes."

"It's quarter past twelve."

"Yes, we should have left fifteen minutes ago."

"Kunikida," he starts slowly, unsure if he should laugh or not, "Tokyo is only an hour's drive away. There are going to be agents in place to make sure the boarding goes smoothly, like I told you all last night. Why on earth do you need seven hours?"

"International flights can have their own complications," he says, as if Kunikida is suddenly an expert on these sorts of things when he's never even left Japan. "It's important to be early."

"Not that early, Kunikida."

"I suggest you get ready to leave, if you haven't yet. If you're going to be taking the trains, there could be delays."

Dazai is a smart person, but he cannot wrap his mind around Kunikida's logic half of the time. He knows that the man runs on a tight schedule, right down to the second, but this seems a little excessive. He can't imagine waiting in an airport for six hours after spending an hour driving there, especially when the flight itself is almost thirteen hours long. And Kunikida expects Koko to be okay with that?

He exhales, rubbing a hand over his face. "Alright, you're right. We'll get going now." He's not right, not at all, but if Koko is going to be there, he needs to be as well.

Chuuya stops what he's doing in the kitchen, frowning in confusion at the one-sided conversation.

"Good idea," he praises. "I'll let you go to get ready, then. See you later."

"Ne, you're not going to let me talk to Koko?"

"Yosano finally got her to sleep in her carseat for a nap. I'm not waking her up to say hello."

Right. It's her nap time.

But that means she's only going to be able to sleep for an hour, and the quality of that sleep is going to be absolute shit if she's stuck upright in a carseat. Which means she's going to be grumpy , which means she's going to cry-

"I'll meet you at the airport soon."

He hangs up before Kunikida says anything more, kicking off the blanket and getting to his feet as Chuuya watches with a pinched face, holding a steaming bowl of instant noodles.

"Oi, what's going on?"

"We need to get to the airport," he shouts, already in the bedroom and grabbing his scattered clothes and nesting materials to start shoving them back into his suitcase.