Peace & Chaos

[luxter]

Who ⬤ hinata + you!
What ⬤ event log
When ⬤ april
Where ⬤ everywhere really!
Content Warnings ⬤ none! will update if they should come up!

( in times of peace )

hanami.

[ He was always told that he'd know he was in love when the moment felt right. The kids at the orphanage used to describe it like butterflies flying around in your stomach, and your face feeling all hot. Ichi once described it as just wanting to live with a person for life. But Hidetoshi... He described it exactly like this. You'll be under a tree, a leaf will land in their hair, and you'll want to pluck it from their hair. And when they look at you and thank you for your kindness, you'll know that you're in love. Because that's how you find true love, after all! Underneath a tree!

Hinata doubted it at the time. The drunken ravings of an older man who flirted with whoever moved in hopes of finding someone who would deal with his bullshit 24/7 under the guise of marriage. He'd never been in love before. Mostly because falling in love often was impossible for a Yakuza. It was a weakness anyone could exploit. And Hinata was NOT weak. Never weak.

But now, at this very moment, he finally understood it. Because there they stood. A person... underneath a tree. A cherry blossom petal clinging to their hair like some kind of parasite. It fascinated him. This light feeling in his gut, this warming in his stomach, this feeling that he'd want to spend the rest of his life with them.

Yes. This was love, was it not?

Hinata would approach, his face flushed as he lightly picked away the cherry blossom petal from the person's hair. This is the moment he'd been waiting for. ]

I'm in love with you.

[ And he blurts it out, like a bumbling fool. ]

kanamara matsuri.

T-This is...

[ Hinata stares down at phallic-looking treat in his hands, his eyes wide with fear and his brows furrowed with worry. Now that he's touched it, there's nothing that he can do about it now. But the way that the person at the stand is staring at him with an increasingly eager smile on their face, he knows that there's no way he can just throw it away or put it back. He knows how these kinds of things go. He isn't that foolish.

This thing is surely cursed. One bite of the thing and he may as well kiss his entire dick goodbye.

Those passing by would have the misfortune of seeing Hinata collapsed on the ground on his knees, swearing to himself over the fact that he bought something without actually looking at it.

Or they may find themselves being grabbed by the wrist when they are reaching for one, Hinata doing his best to stop them from falling to the same fate that he did. ]

night parade.

[ Of course, Hinata somehow found himself being dragged along to help out with the parade. Though truthfully, a part of him had fun doing it. He'd never actually been to a parade before. And participating in one was never on his radar because he never had the time as an adult. Yet here he was, living the dream that his younger self longed to have. In Hell of all places. He'd say that he wouldn't mind staying forever if there weren't people back home depending on him to help them out.

Though not wishing to play all that active a roll, Hinata found himself dressed as a tengu of all things. It felt fitting. But he can't help but wonder if the boss man would scold him for dressing up like a tengu instead of a proud oni.

Walking along the parade float, listening to the cheers of the crowd, Hinata's gaze went towards the artwork that was being depicited on the float. The humans seemed to be chasing down the yokai, doing the thing that humans always seemed so good at.

Harming the things that they didn't understand. ]

It seems nothing's changed. Even here...

( in times of chaos )

assassination.

a (shuten). [ He should have known that the peace would not have lasted. These types of things are the perfect event for something to go down. Once the smoke cleared, and the confusion settled down, there was a brief bubble of confusion as others tried to understand what was going on. But chaos quickly broke out yet again once everyone realized that Daitengu was dead. Assassinated by some kind of group of mysterious assailants. But the main thought that was going through his mind first and foremost was making sure that his own faction leader was okay.

He was the key to him actually going home, after all.

Looking for someone he recognized, Hinata would grab the shoulder of a fellow Shuten Clan member. ]

Where's our boss?! We have to find him!

b (ota). [ Some time after the event, anyone wanting to visit the scene would see Hinata hanging around the scene himself. It probably looks very suspicious to any other individual still on edge about the death of Daitengu. But Hinata would be oblivious to how suspicious he may look. Instead, he would be doing his best to gather his own evidence to confirm the many theories about who may have conspired to kill Daitengu. ]

wildcard.

[ Feel free to throw anything at me! If you want to plot something out, feel free to contact me on my plurk: graywaves ]

Comments

[diesuki]

It's true that the smartest individual would not generally admit he's a yakuza member while prowling around the scene of a crime.

[That's probably a little bit more subtle here than it would be at home, even, but still. Regardless, Dazai isn't judging! ... Any criminal tendencies. He's maybe judging the lack of intelligence just a teensy bit.

He lets out a chuckle, short and humorless.] Assassinations are a little above my pay grade.

But if you think I'm suspicious, you're not as unsmart as you think you are! I'm hanging around here, the same as you, after all.

However, I am with the Department, so I do have some legitimization for my suspiciousness.

[luxter]

The Department? Ah, hell...

[ Just his luck that someone from the Department would end up catching him here. He doesn't particularly like the Department but his expertise would probably be a lot more helpful than what he planned on doing. Like staring at the crime scene with his hands on his hips hoping that something would jump out at him and be suspicious. That's what they did in detective movies, didn't they? ]

Well, did you find anything interesting? I've been staring at the place where Daitengu was for a while now. Nothing seems amiss...

[ At least to him. ]

Still, I think it was pretty well-coordinated for an assassination. It could've been an inside job since that clan tends to be pretty sneaky...

[ There's no way he's gonna accuse his own clan, of course. He's a loyal henchman! ]

[diesuki]

It was extremely well-coordinated.

[Dazai agrees. And of course it had to be well-coordinated, to have a chance of success, but it was still exactly that.]

Well-planned, taking everything into account, and not letting a single overt participant be taken for questioning or even identification... They knew what they were doing all around.

[Were this Dazai's old stomping grounds, he'd know every detail of the event already, and everyone even sideways involved in it, but hell is surprisingly new to him, and he has barely even started making connections. That makes this interesting... but also kind of annoying, really.]

By the way, Mr. Yakuza, would you mind introducing yourself? I'd rather not go through the trouble of arresting you just to get you identified.

[luxter]

I'm glad we're in agreement.

[ It's actually pretty concerning how clean of a job it was. Quick and easy with no way to trace it back to the actual perpetrators. Was it something personal? Or were they aiming for the other bosses to create total chaos? It's a pain overall...

Hinata blinks a bit in surprise when the other man actually asks him to introduce himself. The slight jest at arresting him was funny.

At least he hopes it was a jest. This guy is hard to read for sure. ]

Are ya really that concerned about who I am? [ Hinata sighs but ends up relenting anyway. It's just a name. ] But it's Tatsugami. And just who are you, Department Man?

[diesuki]

[It was definitely a joke! Probably!! ... Well, it was at the time it was made. Who knows what it might become? (Arresting seems like a lot of work though.)]

"Concerned" isn't what I'd call it, Tatsugami-kun.

[Can he get away with kun-ing him? Dazai decides yes. They don't seem that far apart in age.]

If you call me that, I feel like I should open a store~ [Department store GET IT?! (He is not nearly as funny as he thinks.)] I'm Dazai Osamu.

[luxter]

[ Hinata's eyebrow noticably raises at being called Tatsugami-kun. Oh, how the mighty have fallen... Not that he was all that mighty in the first place. But the only person who really called him that was Hidetoshi. Even if the older man tended to act more like a kid than Hinata did.

Deciding to let it slide, Hinata simply shrugged. ]

Alright then, Osamu-san. Now that we're properly acquainted, how about we temporarily team up to see what kind of information we can find?

[ He is purposefully ignoring the awful joke. Even if it was a little clever. ]

You're a cop and I'm a dumbass brute. That makes us the perfect team.

[ He can beat up the evidence or something. To be perfectly honest, Hinata's just trying to leech off of the man's intellect. If he's a cop, that must mean that he's good at this kind of stuff. At least he certainly hopes. Then it'll be two dumbasses investigating the crime scene. ]

[diesuki]

[Dazai lets out a theatrical little laugh at that.]

The perfect team, indeed! But if you have that level of insight, you can't be so dumbass after all.

[What a nice guy Dazai is. Look at him being all supportive and nice and -]

You must have at least ten percent of my intelligence!

[... Nah, he's still a dick. And also a dumbass, frankly; just a highly intelligent one.

Boasting aside, he has no problem whatsoever with teaming up. They do both stand to gain from it, and even if they find no useful information, Dazai will find out a thing or two about Tatsugami. If nothing else, that will make the investigation less boring!]

[luxter]

[ Ten percent of his intelligence. Truly an honor. ]

Well then, when the ten percent that I have I'm going to propose a solution to how to solve this mystery. You cop types always tend to do something weird when solving these kinds of things, right? So let's do something odd and hope it has some logic to it.

[ Typical movie logic. ]

They usually work backwards or think of the why first instead of the how, don't they? So, let's see. Why would someone want to assassinate him? He seemed like a nice guy, at least. Definitely the person least likely to pull one over on ya unless he's just that good at being a fake nice guy. So, it could possibly be a power struggle within? Maybe someone thought that he was too nice and wanted to rule the Sutoku Alliance in a different way than he did? You're a cop. Surely you know more about them than I do.

[diesuki]

Personally, I think figuring out the how might help lead us to the who, which in turn could lead us to the why... but I'll save the 90% for later.

[The how is not so easy to establish anyway - and the why is certainly an interesting topic. The problem is that, semi-comical boasting about his intelligence aside, Dazai is as new to hell as anyone, and he doesn't know half as much of hell politics as he would like. (The façade, yes. The real stuff? Not so much.)

Oh well, he may as well talk his way through his thoughts. Whether extremely intelligent or extremely dumb, a comment from Tatsugami might just give him some new insight.]

Of all the factions, the Alliance seemed the shakiest from the start. While that doesn't mean there's no reason for in-fighting, targeting its leader can only weaken the Alliance further, and they can't afford that. It seems unlikely, then, that it was an inside job.

At the same time, other factions should have much bigger concerns than weakening an already weak opponent.

[None of it makes sense. At the same time, should he really be expecting logic, here? Humans wouldn't necessary have any, and there's no reason to suspect that youkai are any better.]

Given their love of gossip, it's possible that the Daitengu knew something they shouldn't, but then whoever told them should have been taken out as well.

The timing is complicated regardless. Someone wanted this to be seen.

[So much about this is so easy for Dazai to figure out, and yet it feels like he's missing the one little fact that would bring all the puzzle pieces together, and have the resulting image make sense. It's kind of annoying, and so he goes to the other extreme on purpose.]

Orrrr maybe it was personal! With a nose like that, it would be no wonder if they stuck it somewhere it didn't belong.

[luxter]

It was a pretty big nose. [ He kind of laughs a bit at the memory of it before straightening his expression again and flicking Dazai on the shoulder. ] No respect for the dead, huh? Yeesh. Young people these days...

[ As if he's that much older himself. Still, Dazai's words certainly get the cogs in his brain going. Sure they're going very, very slowly after being covered in cobwebs for years but they moving at least. An inside job was his only real idea since that seemed like something that someone in the Ueno Clan would do. Hell, it was already done way before he had already joined that clan. ]

There had to have been something beneficial to his assassination if not to just take over as leader. Now that I think about it killing him would not benefit someone vying for leader. There's a whole bunch of people not used to life in Hell who would probably fight against it. Especially since we have those damn contracts in place. I'd be pissed if my leader was taken out leavin' me stranded. That would lead to a revolt and a revolt by Sutoku Alliance members seems scary as hell. No pun intended.

[ It wouldn't be all out war in the physical sense but in the mental sense. They'd probably dig up the poor bastard's internet history or something. And that's something Hinata wouldn't wish on any of his enemies. ]

Could have been beneficial in another way. Back in the place I'm from, I've heard about other clan members killing others for turf. Maybe Daitengu had hold over an important piece of territory or knew someone who did and killing him was the quickest way of claiming it without complications?

[diesuki]

Everybody dies eventually. [He shrugs. Clearly respect (or even the lack thereof) has nothing to do with it all.

As for Tatsugami's theories: Dazai is not convinced, but he does weigh them very carefully in his mind.]

I suspect that taking it over the traditional way would have offered fewer complications. The assassination has attracted a lot of unwanted attention.

If there was another faction, though... they could stand to benefit from the chaos while Shuten and Tamamo clash.

[In fact, Sutoku itself could stand a lot to gain that way - if it wasn't for their own position being at least as weakened by the assassination. Dazai has some theories for that reason... but nothing he can prove, and nothing he can say for sure is the case, anyway.]

[luxter]

You must be fun at parties.

[ What a downer outlook. Everyone dies eventually is a true statement. But to say it out loud is kind of dispiriting.

Hinata doesn't comment on it further. Instead he gets to thinking. Another faction? That's an interesting idea for sure. Something that Hinata hadn't even considered but it at least made some amount of sense. He snaps his fingers, his eyes alight as his two brain cells finally grinded together and sparked a single thought. ]

Oh, I get it! It's like a detective novel, isn't it? While everyone thinks it's the guests that murdered the master of the house, it turns out it was the neighbor's killer hound that got loose that did the deed.

[ Though he then sighed, his shoulders sagging dramatically. ]

Sucks that everyone else has to be dragged into this mess. I always expected I'd end up in Hell but I always thought I'd die in my early forties. I'm still young.

But that's neither here nor there now. We have some theories running through our head for now. Should we take the time to investigate?

[diesuki]

Invite me to one and find out~?

[... Is that a threat..? He says it so sweetly, it almost seems like a threat...
Then again, maybe Dazai legitimately wants to be invited, because free booze is good booze.]

Woof!

[Which, apparently, means "yes". Though that is a remarkably creative version of events... Everyone knows that the butler did it. (The question is: who is hell's butler?)]

Mhm, let's take a look. With how smooth this operation went, I doubt there was any evidence worth mentioning left behind, but...

Well, I'm here.

[Yes, he really does have that high an opinion of himself. Unfortunately, he often proves himself right.]