Mizuki lies on the couch of the Armed Detective Agency. "I'm bored."

"You got used to a busy life?"

"I did," Mizuki sighs.

"Let's go out to eat," Oda hums. "I'm hungry."

"OHHHH, take me too Odasaku!" Dazai beams.

Atsushi stands up, and Akutagawa follows him.

"Coming!!!" Mizuki rushes over.

"Mizuki-chan, how are you feeling?"

"I'm literally exhausted," Mizuki yawns. 

"I heard you've been sleeping in?"

"Yeah," Mizuki hums. "I'm starving." 

The group heads to the cafe downstairs, and sits down to eat.

"I'll have a spiced curry." Oda orders.

"Shiruko and Houjicha," Akutagawa follows up.

"Just green tea," Dazai hums.

"No food?" Mizuki raises a brow. 

"I'll have a bowl of Chakuze!" Atsushi smiles.

"A chicken katsu-don, please," Mizuki closes her menu.

"Speaking of which," Oda hums. "Whatever happened to Kamui?"

Mizuki looks to the side. "You can say... I had a little bit of fun..."

"YOU TORTURED HIM?"

"Please tell me you didn't jump him-"

"OI, I'M MARRIED!" Mizuki hisses at Kunikada.

"NOT THAT KIND OF JUMP-"

Mizuki throws her head back, and places a hand over her eyes in frustration. 

"Say," Oda looks at Mizuki. 

"Hm?"

"Have you started... ovulating?"

"Don't be preposterous," Mizuki huffs. "Obviously not."

"That's literally the only other explanation."

"Wait, what was the first one?" Mizuki raises a brow.

"That you got possessed," Chuuya leans over the cafe's seat.

"Oh, it's you," Mizuki sighs, sitting back up again. "What are you doing here?"

"Am I not allowed to visit you??"

Mizuki shrugs. "Didn't peg you to be that kind of person. Is the mafia that carefree these days?"

"Mori gave me a week off," He hums. "Along with that fucker."

"Shrimp."

"Dumbass."

"Short."

"Bandage wasting device."

"HOW UNORIGINAL OF YOU, CHUUYA!" Dazai shoots back.

Mizuki doesn't bother wasting her efforts on them, and opts for eating instead. "Ah... food."

The rest of the group digs in, and Mizuki glances at Dazai, remembering Fyodor's words before he died.

"Hm," Mizuki finishes her food, and she thinks.

"Something on your mind, Mi-chan?" Dazai glances at the woman in thought. "Hm?"

"Feyda's last words," She hums. "A child."

"A child?"

"He wrote me a child, though it wasn't him." Mizuki shrugs. "He told me who it was, and now I'm stuck contemplating whether or not to tell him."

"Who was it?"

Mizuki smiles at him. "oh, great mafia boss, do tell?"

Dazai grins. "I will."

"The president's calling for his wife," One of the receptionists wave the phone in her hand. 

"Coming," Mizuki hums, placing her utensils in the plate. She follows the woman up the stairs, and opens the door to the president's office.

"Your son."

Mizuki stops in her steps, the door shutting behind her. 

"It's Dazai, isn't it?"

Mizuki sobs into her hands.

Ranpo is the first to figure it out. He taps the door to the president's office twice, and she lets him in.

"Dazai."

"Huh?"

"Your son is Dazai." Ranpo grimaces. "Right?"

Fukuzawa looks up from his newspaper, and beckons him to close the door behind him.

"Dazai is your son." Ranpo says it slower this time, as if uncertain in his deduction for once. 

"Yeah," Mizuki hums. "I gave him trauma."

Fukuzawa hums lowly.

"Am I... your son?"

"Of course," Mizuki pulls the boy in to her chest, pressing a kiss on his forehead. "You'll always be my son, regardless of which."

Then comes Yosano. 

And then Kunikada.

Chuuya.

The rest of the ADA.

Mizuki stares at Oda.

"Are you here to guess as well?"

"I just want to know why you left him."

"The book wrote it in. Remember?" She mumbles sadly. "I only knew I had a son because of the dove I trained."

"Then how were you exchanging letters with Fyodor instead of Dazai?"

"I don't know," She hides her face in her hands. "I don't know."

"Will you tell him?"

"He'll come to me on his own," She wipes her tears, Fukuzawa handing her a handkerchief. "I know it. He isn't dumb."

"Well," Ranpo looks behind the crowd. "He's here."

"Ah." Dazai stares at her, neither of the two breaking eye contact.

"When were you going to tell me? Were you just going to leave me out like you did when you first gave birth to me? Were you going to chase me out and hurt me again? You just wanted me to realize it myself and come to you?" Dazai clenches his fists, glaring at you.

"Yes," She breathes, staring at him, eyes the same devilish red. "Demons don't help each other out when it comes to shit like this. I didn't have you consciously, and the nanny had told me you were a stillborn. I didn't have time to consider-"

"You make excuses," He grimaces. "I wandered for a hundred years without you. A hundred. You never once considered that your child was immortal too? That it couldn't have been a stillborn if you were the one to give birth to it?"

Mizuki stares at him, the room going silent.

"no. I never considered that." She swallows. "Never once have I considered my immortality to be passable. You were the child of a man and a harlot. There was no way I could let you live with that shame."

"Now you make excuses," Dazai frowns. "Am I your son?"

"Only the eyes of the devil know," Mizuki looks down, hair falling to the side. 

"Does my ability not stem from yours?" His voice cracks. "Is the taking away of one's ability to use their ability not the same as removing them of an ability? Mi-chan-"

Mizuki stares at him, swallowing.

"Am I?"

He knows, yet he doesn't expect an answer from her.

"I'm sorry. I'll get going-"

"You are," She stares at him, eyes meeting his. "You're my child."

And Dazai cries. For the first time, Dazai cries. The emotions of a human flood through him like he's a child. He stands, back facing her, tears streaming down his face. Mizuki sits there, crying as well. It hurts. Doesn't it? Being abandoned for years and then suddenly being told you have parents who didn't know you existed. Dazai cries all of the tears his younger self held back to somehow live. He cries the tears of each failed suicide attempt he's tried. The tears don't stop, and Mizuki sits there, waiting for him to finish crying.

"Go on," Fukuzawa nudges her, and she wraps her jacket around him, pressing the handkerchief to his cheeks. Dazai wants to push her away, yet the warmth he envied his entire life was so liberating; he wanted to stay in it.

And for a brief moment, those red eyes of the devil are soft, gentle with emotion. 

Dazai wants to leave, yet he stays. 

Mizuki hoped she could make it up to him somehow, even if it took her eternity.