BlueSoladite

Fyodor/FEM!Oda Yuri Odazai.

Meursault. A small village in Europe. Dazai is a waitress at Lupin, a bar. She spends her days searching for a meaning to her mundane existence, failing miserably every time - until the day she meets the woman who has been haunting her dreams every single night... Meanwhile, in that small seaside town in France, everyone wonders about the silent étrangère...

The thing I’ve always been interested in exploring is seeing Fyodor deal with grief.

Honestly, I think he would handle it in a completely different way than Oda.

And that has always fascinated me.

If Sakunosuke lost someone she loves, she would just let herself go. She would accept the end, but all five stages of grief would crush her like an ant under the sole of a shoe. She would be depressed and angry.

With absolutely no reason left to keep going.

Fyodor, on the other hand, would never talk about his pain.

He would comfort himself with the idea that the person they lost was "called by God, for their own good."

And this would create a massive rift.

If they both lost someone they loved... Oda would spiral into self-destruction and revenge.

As I have already specified other times, I see Fyodor's character as truly devoted to God. Therefore, in my mind, he would seriously believe that one day everyone will meet again 'in the Promised Land'.

Imagine, now, a Fyodor who grew up seeing more funerals than Northern Lights. And all before even turning forty.

Fyodor would just stand there, watching her with a critical eye. Numb, less smug than usual, but always ready to tell her that "God has a plan, and there’s a reason things turned out this way."

And Sakunosuke would start hating God Himself, along with Fyodor.

Fyodor would notice.

He would have anticipated it, he wouldn't be surprised. And he would even point it out to her.

Sakunosuke would be completely unsettled by how Fyodor seems to be perfectly fine, while she has entirely lost the ability to recognize her own life and find a reason to wake up in the morning.

Imagine this au, this little storyline.

FYODA/Odazai.

okay.

There is no mafia. Fyodor isn't cursed with an ability that makes him almost immortal, and dazai is fighting depression, holding himself responsible for his parents' divorce.

he has no respect for life, but he doesn't hate it either. he feels like hating it would be more acceptable: hate can change, but something you respect stays immutable.

but what is there to live for?

The story opens days before sakunosuke and dazai meet, get to know each other, and both of their lives take a turning point.

We start on a very joyful day (cough) for a freshly 21-year-old sakunosuke. The day of the funeral of "uncle" - the man who was the closest thing to a father he’d ever known.

Losing Uncle - the very first person who had ever made him feel welcomed - makes Sakunosuke decide to throw away the dream that was slowly taking shape in his mind: graduating, teaching literature, heading toward the right path.

It was a dream he used to share, in a way, with Fyodor Dostoevsky, whom he had met years and years ago. Fyodor has always loved literature, books, and he was the very first person to ever read the few lines Sakunosuke had thrown together - even going as far as correcting them with a pencil.

Fyodor kept pursuing his studies because he was good at it, because a word can heal and kill more than a thousand medicines and poisons.

Sakunosuke could never truly understand fyodor. Both of them were reserved, but dostoevsky was almost enigmatic, as if he were guarding the story of his own life like an unconfessable sin.

what will happen to the diner?

what will happen to sakunosuke's studies?

There he is, smoking a cigarette. And maybe he gets approached by Fyodor, who had previously left without saying a single word.

Fyodor, the son of a wealthy but rigid man, lost his mother when he was a child. It wasn't the loss itself that permanently altered his view on life, but the agonizing reality of her illness. Watching his mother wither away, day after day, until that final, fatal moment.

what if fyodor already has too many deaths on his list of acquaintances?

what if he's just silently waiting for his turn?

is that why he left for university without looking back?

What if fyodor felt betrayed by sakunosuke’s decision to take over the diner?

What if this coincided with the death of the literature professor who meant the most to him?what if, as time went on, sakunosuke found himself slowly beginning to understand fyodor?and...

and what if... at the exact same time, Dazai finds himself hospitalized for yet another attempt?

what if he keeps trying, even just a little bit, to grasp the feeling of not wanting to give up, of living for something, without ever succeeding?

Chuuya would be a classmate. They'd hate each other - they do hate each other - but mori ougai (maybe dazai's maternal uncle) decided that putting them together might push them forward.

basically... imagine a story that acts as a countdown to the day when, finally, sakunosuke and dazai's paths intersect.

A heart stops beating, and the lives of many people change radically, permanently, becoming unrecognizable.

A heart stops, while the rest of the world keeps spinning.

And maybe it’s not the first time it has happened to you. As the years go by, more hearts stop, more voices fade, more faces vanish.

But after the anger, the sadness, the denial... sooner or later, you resign yourself. You come to terms with it.

The pain doesn't go away. It is a pain that cannot fade.

You simply get used to carrying it with you, just as you get used to an indelible scar.

You get used to the constant presence of an absence.

Yet the world hasn’t been the same for nearly twelve days.

It’s strange.

Until recently, the countdown was for the return home from a foreign country; now, the count is a succession of unrecognizable days. It went from a subtraction to an endless addition.

Endless.

Analyzing this word weighs heavily on the heart.

It all seems so absurd.

No longer being able to hear a voice that has accompanied you since you were born. No longer being able to tell them what happened.

Because yes, it makes you laugh and cry at the same time, but when you are standing before a casket, while a priest sprinkles it with incense, you are there thinking, "You really need to hear this one. Do you know what happened that day in church?"

Then it hits you: how can you talk about someone's funeral if that very someone is the one who is gone?

How can a person vanish from the face of the Earth?

And why do we keep looking for them in strangers?

Why do we feel disappointed when, obviously, we fail to find what we are uselessly searching for?

"Let's hope these months pass quickly, so we can see each other again."

You wish you could say that you came back, but there was already no one left. You wish you could say that now you are in that place again, that the days keep passing, but the place you first started from no longer exists.

They say you leave only to return.

It is hard to find the way back to Ithaca if Penelope has stopped weaving her shroud.

Your Ithaca has changed now. And you still can't believe it. But for the rest of the world, it is a matter of little consequence. An event heard and brushed aside.

For others, it’s even a annoying detail to listen to.

Because it can happen that a heart stops beating, and for many people, nothing changes and nobody gives a damn.

It can happen that a heart stops beating too soon, overnight, and you don’t quite know who to hate.

Others, because they seem to live in a wonderland, while you don’t even recognize your own reflection in the mirror.

Yourself, for all the times you didn't reach out when you could have.

The place you are in right now, which in hindsight has only stolen days and moments from you that will never return.

Sigma/Nikolai as Angela/Dwight

Now, now.

Fans of both shows (Bungou Stray Dogs and The Office) are definitely gonna have their doubts about this.

To some, Angela might give off more Fyodor vibes, and to others Dwight might feel more like Sigma.

And I admit that more often than not I tend to mentally associate Michael with Nikolai.

But let me explain THIS specific dynamic.

Angela is practicality personified: she hates pranks, she’s deadly serious, and she complains about everyone in the office...

Dwight is dedicated to his job (way too much), quirky, and maybe a bit too lost in his own world.

nerd. know-it-all.

So, why do I associate them with Sigma and Nikolai?

Because Nikolai would make everyone roll their eyes in an office setting. And because Sigma, just like Angela, doesn't really have a full life outside of work: Angela loves baking sweets, wants things done diligently, and doesn't feel comfortable around hers coworkers, but she always tries her absolute best at her job.

basically, she's just there to work.

Same goes for Sigma.

And where does Dwight fit into Nikolai?

he reminds me of him in an opposite way.

Nikolai is eccentric, but endlessly skilled and talented. It's just that his talent gets a bit overshadowed by his personality and his modus operandi.

Sigma, despite his anxious gasps, has to acknowledge Nikolai's strengths.

Nikolai, for his part, admires his coworker's spicy attitude.

Nikolai is naturally amazing at baking (practically a wizard eheh), while Sigma has to follow a recipe word for word—and still never gets the result he wanted.

Sigma lives in pure anxiety. Nikolai never wears a proper office uniform.

Sigma keeps wondering if this is really all there is to his life, just this office. Nikolai only works there to be free from himself and from the belief that if he goes against his own desires, he will win against the moral laws that keep human beings enchained.

They like each other. They won't admit it. But somehow they make it work, like a couple, without ever defining themselves as one.

Dazai started a secret office betting pool on how long they're gonna last.