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Saihara had always assumed most of what he knew about D.I.C.E and Ouma’s past were carefully layered lies. At best they were very, veryyy tall tales with slivers of reality. Ouma had a habit of telling the truth sideways, filtering it through so many embellishments that it took on a whole new shape. Yes, D.I.C.E was technically a secret organization, but only in the way a gaggle of dramatic teenagers pulling off pranks liked to think they were spies. Yes, there were many members — if you counted every kid they convinced to join in on their antics before getting grounded (Saihara would know, he’s the one receiving the missing kid cases in his uncle’s office.
Ouma’s storytelling didn’t fall short of the truth so much, mostly just shot past it, spiraling into orbit with every retelling. That much, Saihara thought, he understood. One of the few things that wasn’t said with glitter or flare though is that Ouma was an orphan. That much had always been said plainly, no hyperbole, no exaggeration. No memories of his parents and just a vague impression, like a dream he’d forgotten the second he woke up.
Saihara had wrongly assumed no one took him in after though; Ouma was so vague about his living conditions even after months of dating and Saihara couldn’t summon the courage to ask since it was a sensitive topic. He was under the impression Ouma and D.I.C.E raised themselves together in a chaotic but self-sufficient little found family because it was logical and well, they were clearly that close anyway — Saihara had filled in the rest of the questions himself.
And yet, he finds himself standing in front of what’s allegedly the Ouma residence. A very real house. With a doorbell. And, supposedly, with adoptive parents inside.
The lawn is littered with patches of dirt, a shovel and a pickaxe stabbed onto where grass would be normally. There’s a potted plant (Saihara recognizes some of the flowers to be from a bouquet he had given Ouma) sitting alone on the front porch beside a pair of checkered shoes. Saihara knows that pair of worn out sneakers better than anyone else so he’s confident this house was Ouma's. However that certainty doesn’t take away how the place felt a little off. Especially after he saw in the corner of his eye that a neighbour just peeked through their blinds, just to observe him before scampering away.
That could just be nerves talking though. It already took a whole hour of psyching himself up in front of the bathroom mirror to arrive at the shady neighborhood without trembling legs. Paranoia, or just something in the coffee he drank today.
With clammy hands, he rings the pristine doorbell. Saihara suddenly becomes very aware of his messy hair, the mayonnaise stain on his jacket (courtesy of Iruma), and the distinct scent of sunlight and sweat he’s probably carrying ─ but what can he do?
The door swings open. Ouma immediately lunges for him, grinning ear to ear. “Shumai! Glad you weren’t scared off by Cerberus!”
Before Saihara can question that, a strong hand lands on his shoulder — firm, calloused, and startlingly solid. He looks up from Ouma’s mischievous grin to meet the eyes of a man towering behind him. Ouma’s… father?
The man has dark purple hair, even darker eyes, and a wide, unnerving grin that’s unmistakably familiar . It’s easy to believe Ouma’s adopted, he swears up and down that he is — but this man could easily pass as his biological father, right down to the cartoonishly Cheshire smile.
“Hello! You are Shuichi?” There’s a faint foreign accent, hard to place but unmistakable. Saihara nods stiffly, not trusting his voice. The man’s handshake nearly tears his arm from the socket. Then, with casual ease, he hooks a hand around Ouma’s shirt collar and lifts him away like he was plucking grapes from a vine. All 44 kilograms of Ouma single-handedly. “Come inside then!”
The hallway was a bit cramped, packed tight with furniture that looked like it belonged in two entirely different homes (or countries). A low Japanese-style shoe rack sat beside an ornately carved coat stand covered in coats that only looked wearable in a blizzard. Above it, a golden Orthodox cross hung next to a paper charm scrawled with kanji in faded ink, both pressed against paisley wallpaper that clashed with the delicate calligraphy scroll trailing down from the ceiling.
There were too many rugs. Mismatched, overlapping, and all of them clearly well-loved; one embroidered with sunflowers, another in tatami weave, and one more worn Persian-style runner that threatened to trip Saihara with every step. The smell of soy sauce and dill hit him almost simultaneously and it was all… weirdly warm. Not just in temperature, though the heater was clearly working overtime. The house felt lived-in. Cluttered, yes. Chaotic, definitely. But the kind of chaos only a family could earn.
Ouma had already wiggled out of his father’s grasp and sprinted back, looping his arms around Saihara’s with a grin too wide to be innocent. “You’re staying for dinner, by the way! You don’t have a choice either.”
"Oh no." Saihara whispers back, chuckling when Ouma playfully pushes him back in feigned offense. Before he could ask who and what Cerberus referred to though, Ouma had already dragged him further in the house, past the beaded curtain separating the genkan from the inner hallway. He caught glimpses of the kitchen as they passed: a pot of something suspiciously red simmering on the stove, convenience store-bought sushi, and a really ornate object that resembled an urn to Saihara’s eyes.
Although the house interior took him by surprise, Saihara at least expects it when another man greets them in the living room. Ouma has retorted multiple times that Iruma cannot use Yo Mama jokes on him as it would be inaccurate, so he had an inkling Ouma’s parents were both men.
This one is a little more quiet, a lot less intimidating with the shorter stature and missing arm, but his appearance definitely still could pass as Ouma's biological dad. The purple hair is darker than Ouma's or his husband's, trimmed bluntly around his chin. Very noticeable eyebags, and the blue light of the laptop illuminating his face only seems to cast long shadows across his features that just amplified his exhaustion and gave him a… strangely sinister aura.
He takes a little while to take note of their presence, absorbed into whatever he was working on the screen. When he does, his eyes drift to his husband instead of Saihara's, a small smile gracing his tired features.
"Now, now, Kolya, lying to Saihara-kun about your appearance is rude." He scorns, yet it sounds affectionate if anything. There was also that faint accent. "Kokichi-kun, don't enable him either."
"Dos-kun is no fun at all!"
Saihara knows he just looked away for a second, yet when he looks back to Ouma's father, his hair had turned white and grown significantly longer, past the small of his back. "Kolya" turns to him with a manic grin, mismatched pupils blown wide after his husband reprimanded him.
Saihara flinches, swallowing the scream that threatened to spill out. "Did you get this talent from him?" He whispers to Ouma, cautious gaze fixed on the river of silver strands cautiously as if he was expecting for the tips to turn into snakes next and aim for his eyes.
"Maybe, maybe not!" Ouma whispers back, but he doesn’t share Saihara’s wariness.
Ouma’s father (the sinister one) sighs, hand on his cheek. "Did you lie about your name too?"
An offended gasp, one that’s too theatrical to be genuine. “Kolya” clutches his chest with mock betrayal. "I would never !"
"Of course..." He turns to Saihara next, outstretching his hand politely. Saihara catches only a glimpse of the bite marks and the dried scabs on his fingers before he retracts the gesture with a bow instead. "Ah, oops. Japanese custom. Fyodor Dostoevsky. Ouma likes to call me Dos, so feel free to do the same."
Russian? That would explain the stack of Matryoshka dolls lined up on the coffee table. Everything else… maybe not so much?
"Nikolai Gogol!" The one disguised a few moments ago pipes up cheerfully. His silver hair was now braided neatly with a little puffball, whipping behind his movements. Upon closer inspection, Saihara noticed the mismatched eye colors were golden and teal, and poorly hidden with foundation was a little scar across his right eye. He adds with a pout, leaning down to Ouma’s eye level with his hands on his hips. "You should call me pops, Oumie never calls me that anymore!"
Although Saihara is usually more wary of people that were physically stronger, his gut puts more warning signs on Dostoyevsky. Although he lacks Ouma and Gogol’s mischievous glint and looks like a rational person, Saihara’s instincts tell him he should trust him less than Gogol. There was something about how he spoke that bugged him, prickling beneath his skin and seeing through the mass into his soul and core. Every word, no matter how mundane, sounds like it was dipped in honey and handed to him on a poison-laced spoon.
Saihara imagines this was the feeling of brainwashing, if it was possible. “Saihara-kun?”
"Yes…!"
"Again, I'm really sorry about this idiot." He tugs at Gogol's cheek, smiling thinly. "He also gives me trust issues. I’m sure he forged our marriage document."
"Yet you married me!" Gogol coos, lifting Dostoyevsky's hand to his lips and kissing the knuckles. Ouma makes a gagging noise at the display, and Saihara's worries briefly halt. “Could have gotten your money back!”
"It is a decision I regret greatly." Dostoevsky murmurs without hesitation, barely fazed even when Gogol bites his palm in retaliation and starts to whine about “ how that's not true, right?!”
"Make yourself at home, Saihara-kun," Dostoevsky tilts his head, dark hair falling over the calculating eyes like a curtain of ink. "I'm sure a detective like you would never bore us."
What the hell does he mean by that? Saihara doesn’t know how to respond, instead holding onto Ouma’s hand a tad bit tighter as his boyfriend happily leads him to their yard to introduce Cerberus. He hesitantly breaks eye contact with Dostoyevsky, but still feels both of their piercing gaze on his back.
It seems only the front yard of the house is the only bare bones, or remotely normal and hides the insanity of the interior and the back. Passing through the hallway felt eerily long, one door was decked out in deadbolts, and another had its wooden surface carved with tally marks. For what, Ouma says it was Gogol’s idea of decoration. By the time they reach the backyard, the grass is overgrown and coarse, but that's hardly the weirdest part thanks to the half-constructed shed on one corner. Beside it were power tools of all kinds still plugged in via a reckless daisy chain of extension cords trailing from inside the house, and a way too realistic mannequin dressed like a scarecrow in which the head lolls a bit way too heavy.
“Cerberus! Come here, boy!” Ouma claps his hands. With that name, Saihara braces himself for a large dog to appear from behind the bushes.
But what comes out is not a dog. Definitely not a dog.
No bigger than a football, with patchy fur as if recovering from being burned alive, and a pink, short tail. Saihara takes a step back as the animal crawls up Ouma’s leg and up to his shoulder with surprising fluidity. “...Is that a rat?”
“Yeah, Dos likes them.” Ouma shrugs, petting Cerberus’ tiny head with one finger. “This one’s named Cerberus ‘cus he looked like he had three heads when he was a baby.”
Saihara’s afraid to ask what the hell was that supposed to look like. From the doorway, Dostoyevsky sips from his mug and calls out, “Actually, Kolya left the cage open and Cerberus lost two of his heads when we found him again.”
“Oh, hush! He’s thriving! He outlived the other two, that’s gotta mean something.” Gogol pipes in, appearing upside-down from the kitchen window. Somehow. He slips out of the window with a bowl of yogurt and like a moth to fire, Cerberus leaps out of Ouma’s shoulder to devour the yogurt. It even lets out a low, guttural growl at Gogol when he tries to make sure Cerberus doesn’t fall in the bowl. “Agh, fine! Drown in your greed, Cerberus.”
Saihara flinches when Gogol suddenly smiles at him. “Sorry about earlier, by the way.” He wipes his hands on his shirt, which has the Eiffel Tower on it despite it boldly spelling Greetings from Spain . “About the disguise. I was told looking like a terrifying stranger might not be ideal for first impressions. So I became someone you look like you could trust! Clever, right?”
Not when you reveal that was a lie. Saihara refrains from saying. Instead, he forces a smile out. “Dos-san looks like Kokichi.”
Gogol’s face turns sour. “Ugh, and he still refuses to play as the father!”
CLANG!
Saihara flinches as a metal bowl smacks Gogol on the back of his head with the precision of a sniper. Dostoyevsky had moved to the kitchen, washing his emptied mug. “I am much, much too busy to attend the PTCs and listen to others how to raise my child just because he hides the art class skeletons in the closet and enacts hauntings after sundown.”
Gogol whirls his head around, massaging the soft flesh as if Saihara just didn’t hear a part of his skull crack. “You could be saving me the trouble of having to dress up as a normal person!”
“I crossdress to be his mother. You had no complaints with that.” Dostoyevsky raises a brow.
Gogol flushes, clasping his hands together in a begging motion. “Well, you look dashing when you do, my darling!”
Ouma nudges Saihara, holding up a faded polaroid of a woman with a medical mask on, holding a school award that Saihara remembers Ouma had on his profile picture a few years back. It’s almost unsettling how Dostoyevsky looks different but also the same. “This is Dos.”
“He’ll get some flack if kids find out he’s adopted, you know.” Gogol laments. “So charming as I am, I’ll be very normal and help him blend in with the illusion of having boring parents.”
“Don’t trust him, he just likes playing dress-up.” Dostoyevsky sighs.
“Both are true!” Gogol perks up. “Ohh, how about we play Two Truths and One Lie! I’ll go first!”
Saihara can’t even voice out his refusal before Gogol leans down to his eye level, grinning ear to ear. “I’ve poisoned someone for love, I’ve hidden a dead body under this very ground, and I used to be a ballet dancer!”
His mouth goes dry at the choices. “Um, that you used to be a ballet dancer…?”
Gogol’s eyebrows raise. “My, no wonder you’re a detective at such a young age!”
Dinner time arrives too fast in the household. With all the bombarding of Gogol’s little games and insistence on talking and talking, hours pass by and Ouma’s already leading him back inside. The transition between rooms is jarring; the kitchen looks almost painfully normal by contrast, warm light spilling over a neat table set for four. Plates are stacked, soup is steaming, and a rice cooker chimes softly in the background. The suspicious pot from earlier is gone, to which Saihara has mixed feelings about.
Dostoyevsky is already seated, legs crossed like a bored professor. Which, he probably is with how his laptop seems to have sticky notes tacked in inside. Gogol lounges beside him in a floating chair that might’ve just appeared. But since no one comments on that, Saihara doesn’t question it. With the way this visit has been going, Saihara knows asking is futile and just opens a whole different can of worms he isn’t quite ready to open yet.
“Come on,” Ouma says, tugging Saihara to the sink to wash their hands. Who knows what kind of germs Cerberus was harboring in its sparse and singed fur. “You sit next to me. Between them is a danger zone.”
“Hey!” Gogol whines with flailing arms, “I only stabbed someone with a fork once.”
“That was yesterday,” Dostoyevsky replies coolly, lifting his teacup. Ouma hums, unimpressed as he scoops rice and an unfamiliar soup into Saihara’s bowl.
Then, casually: “Ask whatever you like.” Dostoyevsky offers kindly. The smile he gives Saihara feels fake, but it somehow coaxes Saihara’s earlier resolve. “I’m sure detectives like you have a lot to ask.”
“Of course, you’d know,” Gogol sulks, pouting petulantly. To his chagrin, Dostoyevsky ignores it.
Well, he offered. Saihara perks up. “Um, sorry if this is weird to ask but… why don’t you all share the same surname?”
The silence that follows is comical. As if a record had been scratched was the only sound missing. Ouma, with his mouth full of rice, groans and looks away as both of his fathers seem to react in different levels of frustration. “Ugh, this again.”
Dostoyevsky smiles stiffly. “We find surnames largely performative.”
Gogol seethes beside him, clutching the table cover to his chest. “I wanted him to be a Gogol, but nooo—!”
Ouma scrunches his nose. “Change.”
What ? Saihara stares at Ouma, who only flashes him a thumbs-up and with his tongue sticking out playfully.
“We gave him the power of choice and identity!” Gogol suddenly cuts in. “A sovereign citizen! Like a tiny, dramatic diplomat!”
This time, Dostoyevsky looks up from his plate, disgruntled. "Change.”
Saihara blinks as Gogol curses under his breath. “Pfft! It’s just so much more fun this way! Everyone keeps asking who the real parent is. What a lovely, ongoing joke!”
Dostoyevsky shakes his head, deadpan. “If one of us is caught, the others should not be immediately linked. Family ties make you a liability.”
Ouma grimaces at that answer. “Change.”
“Names are illusions. What matters is how useful they are at border checkpoints.” Dostoyevsky notes.
“Ooh, true.” Gogol hums. “He married me as Joonghyuk in Korea, and I married him as Lu Guang in China. The honeymoon was a heist!”
“Change.”
Calmly, Dostoyevsky smiles. “We couldn’t agree, so we did a trial separation and forgot to pick one.”
“Unlikely. Change,” Gogol coos.
Dostoyevsky’s expression grows cold. “I would rather go by ‘Smith’ than take Gogol’s last name.”
“Oh please, you can’t even spell your own name without autocorrect!” Gogol retorts, the offended tone sounds genuine this time around.
Saihara pauses mid-bite. “Wait, are you two even legally married?”
Gogol nods cheerfully, smitten in tone and the way he drapes over Dostoyevsky’s shoulder. “We are! In seven countries!”
“Change.”
“We’ve never been married. Our union is metaphysical.”
“Change.” Ouma pouts.
“Only one of us exists on paper. The other is a hallucination from the coffee Ouma spiked.”
“Okay, stop it before Shumai cries.” Ouma rolls his eyes. “Actually, I picked my own name. They’re too shady.” Well , at least Ouma acknowledges that. Saihara sighs in relief.
Tearfully, Gogol returns to clutching the table cover. “He could’ve been Kokichi Gogol ! It has flair!”
“It sounds like a circus act.” Both Dostoyevsky and Ouma reply.
“Which we are, may I remind you!”
“…So they let you pick?” Saihara glances at Ouma.
Ouma just shrugs. “Not really. They argued about it so long that I just filed the school paperwork myself. I think Dos was blacklisted from the parent portal anyway.”
“It is beneath me to care. But yes, I am.” Dostoyevsky muses.
Ouma sighs, annoyed. “And when I suggested to them I’d take both their names. They stopped talking to me for a week.”
“It’s awful, and a mouthful!” Gogol protests dramatically. “Kokichi Gogol-Dostoyevsky?! Imagine the paperwork we’d have to sign with such a dreadful name!”
Saihara’s head is spinning by the time they finish dinner. His brain is a little overloaded, lies on top of lies on top of lies made it naturally difficult to discern what he was supposed to believe. While he’s certain in his ability to catch up to Ouma’s lies, Dostoyevsky and Gogol were a different level of deception. As if they didn’t want him to figure out the truth after all, or at least, have him second-guessing with everything they say.
To his misfortune, he offers to wash the dishes to gather his thoughts in peace and steady himself from the insanity of dinner, but Dostoyevevsky insists. Before he knew it, he’s by the sink, washing dishes beside no one other than Dostoyevsky. Ouma tried to pull him aside, but then Gogol dragged him back to the yard under the pretense of helping clean up the power tools. This was obviously a set-up, Dostoyevsky only had one arm with no prosthetics. Someone as maritorious as Gogol wouldn’t allow his husband to do the dishes by himself.
“I have surveillance on you,” Dostoyevsky smiles. Saihara tries not to shudder and bolt away from his spot. Being under the other’s gaze was heavy, like punishment awaits him. “Standard parenting, you know how it is.”
Saihara, fearing for his life, just nods stiffly. “Yes, sir.”
“Open that freezer, won’t you?” Worded like a request, but it was anything but that. Saihara obediently does so, and tenses up when in there, he sees a jar of liquid, one in a color one he’s all too familiar with. The same red he sees in his uncle’s crime scene photographs. In neat Cyrillic handwriting: Do not thaw.
“Maybe you feel like saving Kokichi-kun from us. That look you have in your eye tells me you already have an idea on who we are, detective ,” Dostoyevsky continues, the title spat like a slur. “But I assure you, he’s safe and happy.”
Saihara doesn’t speak. He closes the freezer gently, like even the air inside might shatter if he moves too quickly. His hands are still wet. His heart feels louder than the water running from the faucet. Even if Dostoyevsky doesn’t move from his spot when he returns to the sink, his presence feels bigger — closer somehow, too close for him to be safe. Like a deer in headlights, Saihara freezes up on his spot.
“He knows more than he lets on,” Dostoyevsky adds on, still smiling. Saihara scrubs harder at a ceramic bowl, not sure if the red smear on it was sauce or something else. He wants to ask why that jar exists, who it used to belong to, what “do not thaw” means. “But it’s easier for everyone if we pretend he doesn’t.”
Saihara nearly drops the sponge. “Kokichi is… complicated.”
“Of course. He’s ours.” There’s a gentle clink as another dish is passed to him. Saihara takes it automatically, rigid. A long silence passes. Only the running water and scrubbing fills it. Then Dostoyevsky chuckles, soft and slow. Condescending and approving at the same time. “Good boy.”
Just as Saihara thinks his knees might buckle from the pressure, the back door slams open and Ouma bursts in, covered in sawdust, laughing with Gogol trailing after him wielding a leaf blower. Saihara’s just glad it wasn’t a chainsaw.
Dostoyevsky takes the last rinsed plate and sets it on the rack, drying his hands on a towel. “I’ll go accompany Kolya,” he says lightly, like they didn’t just have a conversation that may haunt Saihara for the rest of his life. Dostoyevsky disappears down the hall, leaving Saihara rooted to his position.
Ouma slides back to his side, legs brushing against his. His knee taps against Saihara’s then he leans in slightly, voice low so only Saihara hears: “Scary, huh?” He muses, soft and sympathetic.
Saihara doesn’t answer. He doesn’t know how to after facing a threat such as that. He dries his hands slowly, carefully, as if stalling will help him. Despite that, Ouma grins, that same teasing curl of his lips, and taps his own chest with two fingers. “But I’m fine.”
A beat.
“Seriously. I’m fine.” Ouma whines as he hugs Saihara’s arm, then offers the lollipop in his mouth to Saihara with a spark of something unreadable in his eyes. “You don’t have to get it. You just have to stay.”
Saihara hesitates, then he opens his mouth and lets Ouma feed him. “If they ever hurt you, you know where to go.”
“That I do.”
From behind them, Gogol makes an exaggerated squealing noise and Dostoyevsky gives them a long, unimpressed look over his teacup. Saihara doesn’t even summon the energy to be surprised. He’s long accepted the couple just manages to do such things.
Dessert comes in the form of gelatinous cubes that shimmer ominously in the light and a cake that smells faintly of gunpowder. Saihara doesn’t ask. He already knows he doesn’t want the answer. Whoever cooked it wouldn’t make him feel better about digesting it. Dostoyevsky sets his laptop aside at last, taking a delicate forkful of the jelly from Gogol’s plate.
“A client of mine was removed from the chessboard today,” he comments mildly, as if commenting on the weather. Saihara doesn't know what kind of business Fyodor is in, or pretends to be in. The phrasing makes his stomach turn and with all that he’s gathered today, there was no way he’d be fine with any of the possible answers to that.
Gogol hums thoughtfully. “Knight or rook?”
“Pawn.” Dostoyevsky smiles without looking up, dabbing his mouth with a napkin. “Though a very noisy one.”
Saihara suddenly finds the gelatin unappealing at that remark. He pushes his share to Ouma, mumbling about how he’s not a big fan of sweets. Gogol pouts — “Aww, bummer” — which confirms he made them.
“Speaking of pawns, how is school, Kokichi-kun?”
Ouma, who’s been busy stuffing cake into Cerberus’ mouth, looks up. “Boring. I had to dissect a frog and the guy next to me cried.”
“See?” Dostoyevsky sips from a teacup filled with what Saihara hopes is just tea. The blood jar in the freezer makes him doubt, if Dostoyevsky had been drinking blood all this time. “Another reason private schools aren’t worth the investment. Weaklings raised in bubbles, unable to handle even a simple dissection in science.”
“You enrolled him in a public school for that reason?” Saihara asks, before he can stop himself.
Dostoyevsky nods, placid as ever. “Minimizing casualties. A controlled environment cultivates illusions. I prefer Kokichi to be adaptable.”
“...You make it sound like training a soldier.”
“That’s absurd. Soldiers follow orders.”
Ouma snorts, elbowing Saihara playfully. “Don’t worry, I’ll cause casualties on both sides.”
Gogol claps cheerfully. “Atta boy!”
Dostoyevsky sets down his cup. “I only ask because I care,” he starts, that piercing gaze sliding back to Saihara. “What exactly are your intentions with our Kokichi-kun?”
Saihara blinks. Beside him, Ouma looked offended that Dostoyevsky even asked. “Dos!”
“I like him. I want to protect him.” There is a long pause before Saihara adds, seeing Dostoyevsky’s expression hadn’t changed. “Mostly from himself.”
To Saihara’s immense relief, Dostoyevsky chuckles. It sounds genuine, albeit chilling and creepy. “Good answer. I like that.”
“Oumie said you used to cry watching dog movies. That’s cute. I did too! Except because the dogs survived.” Gogol raises his spoon as if proposing a toast. “That said, I don’t mind whoever Oumie chooses, just don’t cross the line!”
“And that line is…?” Ouma asks on his behalf.
“I’m making it up as I go.”
“You’ll know it.” Dostoyevsky shrugs. “It’ll manifest as dread in your stomach.”
Saihara later confirms their identities online when he arrives home. Two key members from a terrorist organization that allegedly perished in a helicopter explosion just a few years ago. Although nothing but an arm was retrieved, they were announced dead.
When he thinks of calling his uncle, his stomach hurts too much he just returns the files to its place. It’s nothing he has to worry about, not yet.