《SANCTUARY》 | Bungou Stray Dogs

Stubborn // Akutagawa Ryūnosuke

For the port mafia's combat squad, casualties were often minimal to non-existent.
     
Tachihara failed to understand why the one who took all the beating was the strongest meatsack of them all.
     
And he failed to understand why, in the constant absence of the rest, he was the undisputed medic at hand.
     
"Okay." Tachihara tried for the umpteenth time to haul his 'patient' up by the coat. It painted shame all over his conscience, because the guy was his superior.
     
"Akutagawa, it's rare enough to have medical assistance waiting at the rendevous point. The truck's at the dock. Excuse my shamelessness, really, but we're a butt inch away from there, if we-"
     
The sickly man grabbed the front of Tachihara's shirt, growing extra appendages from the tail of his coat. They struck like lightning, tearing apart a gunman behind both of them.
     
In spite of the raw slashes across the side of his neck and just about everywhere else, Akutagawa put out his unrelenting growl and glare.
     
That was some sort of knock-out duo, Tachihara supposed. One came after the other, and then next thing you know- you're pushed back into your inferiority corner.
     
"Just what," he gritted his teeth, "do you think I'm made of, you fool?"
     
No matter how many times he's heard that before, the kick of it just doesn't subside.
     
Tachihara backed slightly into the stretcher (someone had phoned for back-up after all, and got at least the stretcher transported), and watched Akutagawa stumble.
     
"The fight's died out already," Tachihara began once more. "It's.. Your sixth mission in the last three days."
      
'Keep at it, Tachihara. This was an order. This was an order.'
    
"Lose some dignity when you say that crap." Akutagawa frowned, clamping down hard on his side. He grimaced.
     
"You have nothing but your guns. I have sheer will power, and I will not hesitate to kill anyone- you included- even with my head cracked open. You are at my mercy. I don't need anyone's damn help. Do I make myself clear?"
   
A part of Tachihara wanted to flop onto the stretcher and be marked dead.
     
"Yes, sir." Better that, than to come at him with the stupid 'this was Hirotsu's idea, not mine' excuse.
     
Akutagawa lost footing soon enough, and fell forward. Dark blood pooled out from his underside. At that point, the redheaded commander knew neither what to do nor what to say.
Pure luck it was, that his saving grace finally arrived. Gin plopped down from one of the lower buildings, breathless as she sheathed her blade.
     
"Oi, Gin!" Tachihara hissed, dragging the girl aside. "The fight's done out there, right?"
     
"No."
     
"Damn. Hey, your brother just took some bullets and a tri-dagger to the stomach; he's practically dying! Burnt out worse than yesterday. The old man ordered him to be benched."
     
Even Gin, who's seen a fair amount of gore in her life, couldn't help wincing at the sight.
     
"Brother," she said calmly, bending over him. "Please get on the stretcher."
     
Tachihara prayed for sibling magic to work. It didn't, because the older Akutagawa only looked up to match the stiff frown of his sister.
     
Watching Akutagawa get up and leave his own puddle of blood made him look like a regenerated rpg character. It was a horror, to say the least.
     
Worse than that... Gin looked at Tachihara furtively, and walked away.
     
'Those siblings will be the DEATH OF ME!!!' he thought, hammering his temple.
     
'How.. How do I do this? What can possibly make Akutagawa give up? Does something like that exist? Wait. It's disrespectful to eploit your superior's weakness... Yeah, right. Like Akutagawa even has a weakness.'
     
"Ah. L/n."
     
L/n?
     
Akutagawa attentively snapped his head around first, and then Tachihara.
     
Gin had returned shortly, and this time, she had a phone pressed against her ear.
    
"... He's doing it again."
     
Tachihara ducked into the fluff of his green jacket, hesitant to see the expression of the older Akutagawa sibling.
     
Sure, Y/n was equal parts terrifying and annoying- but not enough for him to soil his britches. Definitely, definitely, it wasn't the case for Akutagawa. The man had his head dipped forward, eyes sharp as a buck's.
     
'I've never seen that face.'
     
"You... betray me, Gin," Akutagawa seethed slowly, as if trying to keep his voice down.
     
When Gin flipped the phone around to reveal a video call, Tachihara instinctively stiffened.
     
Quite obviously, so did Akutagawa.
     
Gunshots blasted on the other side of the line. You were very much absorbed in your own fight, sparing your phone a few glances only when your men were returning fire.
     
" 'Scuse me, Tachihara. Your face is in the way." Your cold voice cut through the still atmosphere of the back alley. You were, by no means, any higher up in the hierarchy than Tachihara, but the redhead obeyed, holding his hands up.
     
"RYU! MOTHER OF- You look like you're wearing Nakahara's head on your chest! What on earth wounded you?! Hell- you be blending into the carpet of Mori's office already. And that's way too many bruises!"
     
Tachihara felt his soul leave through his mouth. 'What are you doing, Y/n?! No way... I can't look...'
     
"I just killed twenty people," Akutagawa muttered, wiping off a trail of blood from his chin. "Blood's not mine."
     
"Because I'm on the other side of the dock, you didn't think I'd find out? You pulled out your IV, Ryu! You said you'd be bedridden today! "
     
"I was, and now I'm doing damn well," Akutagawa snapped back, balling up his fists. "Get back to work, Y/n. You stall me."
     
"Yes, yes. Because nobody dies after being stabbed in the side anyway, right?" You deadpanned. "GRAAAH! Don't do that to my poor heart!"
    
"Tch. What the hell 'that'?"
    
"Forcing yourself way past your limit! Ryūnosuke! And what's this talk about it being your sixth mission?!"
     
More gunshots and orders, and quite possibly Higuchi clamoring for Akutagawa on your side sounded.

And you were still scolding him.
     
"Ah, jeez. Ryūnosuke, don't be stubborn, and don't die on me, please. I'll come see you in exactly twenty minutes. Love you! Get on the stretcher."
     
The short call ended, and Gin casually pocketed her phone.
    
"Wait," Tachihara spoke through his teeth. "L/n just... Scolded him. First name basis? 'Love you'? Are-Are they..."
     
There was something creaking behind him. It was Akutagawa laborously clambering onto the stretcher.
     
"What the-?!"
     
After working through his mess on painful limbs, he lay flat on his back without putting up a fight. Had he not been coughing like usual, he would've been peaceful enough for death.
     
"Hey, you." Akutagawa's head popped back up. "She said twenty minutes. Push me."
     
The commander did, getting his superior into one of the vehicles. The medics on duty worked in a whirlwind, patching him up as best as they could.
     
Tachihara wondered if he really just spent at least ten minutes coaxing a stubborn dying man into a stretcher... When you did it in a minute.
     
He felt sorely defeated.
    
'So, it's some love business, huh? You and L/n.'
     
He shook his head and inwardly laughed, because Akutagawa Ryūnosuke was way too quiet, albeit breathing fine through an oxygen mask.
     
'That's a first in the port mafia.'

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Short and written on the spot, because I have no idea how to calm my nerves for an entrance exam DX  AAAAAH I shall edit later

Time to panic now-