"So... there's a giant rainbow snail."

"Yeah."

"Going around Yokohama."

"Yes."

"And whoever touches its slime turns violently homosexual?"

"No, not violent." Ranpo corrects. "But very gay. One lady ran across an entire block to the nearest woman and gave her an earth-shattering kiss. I imagine her husband is going to be very upset, though."

"Not the point!" Kunikida snaps. "And no one has found the ability user behind it?"

"No, the ability user is the snail."

"So just get Dazai to nullify it! Speaking of, where even is he?"

"That's the problem," Yosano states, heels clicking as she walks over. "Whatever's in the slime is just some kind of drug, not an ability. It's likely that the ability is just turning into the snail, not any of its secretions. Anyway, Dazai touched the slime because he was curious so now I think he's boning that executive from the mafia."

A vein bulges out of Kunikida's forehead. "That bandage-wasting bastard!" Stomping over to his desk, he sits down furiously and opens his laptop. "Are there any known weaknesses? Immunities?"

Yosano hums. "It doesn't work on animals or anyone under the age of fifteen. Small mercies, I suppose. Also, from what we know, it's just a regular if upsized and colorful snail."

Kunikida sighs, pushing up his glasses. "Alright then. Atsushi, we're counting on you to take the snail down."

From his desk, Atsushi startles. "Me?! How would I even defeat it, it's like two stories tall!"

"Since it's so big," Kunikida starts. "We can't use conventional methods like salt and coffee. However, if you crush the shell enough, it should be injured enough to turn back. Perfect for you, too, since your ability is basically brute force."

Wow, what a way to insult a guy, Atsushi thinks to himself, but nods anyway. "So, lure it to the docks or something, then crush its shell?"

Kunikida nods.

"Alright then! I'll head out now."

-

"Oh my god." Kunikida wasn't lying, Atushi thinks to himself hysterically. The snail was indeed over two stories tall. The slug part of it was violently rainbow, bright red at the top cascading into purple at the bottom. The shell was worse. An eye-searing tie-dye design assaulted Atsushi's senses, and he was close to hearing colors at this point.

And, oh God, the smell. It was probably the most ridiculous thing Atsushi has ever witnessed. The shell had an aroma of pure sugar wafting out, and the slime itself was violently sweet. Like you took vanilla cake, lollipops, honey, milk, and an ocean's worth of sugary candies and blended it together. Atsushi has the self preservation to stay away from the slime, but he imagines it would taste like the shittiest and sickeningly sweetest milk chocolate known to man.

From the corner of his eye, he sees a father and daughter near the slime. Before he can shout at them, the girl jumps into the slime, her father being caught in the blast radius. Immediately, the father's skin starts glittering like a Twilight vampire and his hair starts floating as a rainbow aura flares out of his body. The father starts rushing to an unknown direction, probably to the nearest guy, and his daughter sits abandoned, licking up the slime from her fingers like a particularly yummy sweet. It's sickening in the most ridiculous way, and Atsushi really wishes he hadn't taken up the job.

"I guess we're doing this now," he mutters, Byakko snorting in agreement in his head. He transforms as far as his control will let him, rocketing off towards the snail's shell. Kicking the snail's shell as hard as he can, he watches incredulously as the snail plops over onto its side with a sick squelching noise, knocking over a crepe stand and soaking an office building in slime. He then stares silently as the snail gets back up with a wealth of slick noises and pops.

Atsushi is really, really disgusted, and he wants to have a talk with whoever created snails.

"Okay," he groans. "Byakko, we might have to pull out the big guns." Byakko roars in agreement, and also with some other feelings Atsushi really doesn't want to think about right now.

Fully transformed, Atsushi watches from the back of his head as Byakko roars and pounces on the snail. For a second, he's grateful that Byakko is so cooperative, and vainly hopes everything will be over quickly.

He is very wrong.

Atsushi stares in horror and Byakko takes a bite out of the snail's sludgy neck. He's not sure if tigers can eat snails. The stare turns into disgust when Byakko vomits out what he assumes to be chewed-up snail bits, but really looks more like someone blended up Nerds candies and poured enough water to turn it into a lumpy paste. He wants to cry. He wants to throw up. Preferably not rainbow snails, though.

"Byakko!" he hisses. "What the hell are you doing?!" Byakko returns to him the mental equivalent of a snort, and then physically chomps on the snail's shell like a hard candy. All the while, snail slime is gushing around the street, forming something like a pond of slime. Most people are smart enough to stay away, but every so often someone trips or curiously pokes the slime, and whatever screams of horror are happening turn into screams of anger when lovers are suddenly kissing other people's lovers.

"Kunikida is going to kill me," he moans, mental hands covering his face. He wallows in his coming doom before mentally sitting up and slapping his cheeks. "Byakko," he calls, "if we get this done I'll treat you to something! You can't taste sugar, so this thing shouldn't even be delicious!"

Byakko reluctantly agrees, but takes a bite out of the snail's eye out of spite. Then spits out a basketball-sized chunk of bluebell-colored eyeball. And then sends the mental image of a blueberry to Atsushi. Atsushi is never eating blueberries ever again.

"Dear god," he whimpers as Byakko decides to finally be sensible. Rather than taking another sickening bite out of the snail, the tiger lazily swipes at the snail's shell with supernaturally sharp claws.

The attack lands and the shell cracks a little, even more nauseating slime dripping out of the shell like an overflowing bucket. Atsushi feels a little ill looking at it.

This is it, he thinks to himself. Nakajima Atsushi, age eighteen, dying via mental torture due to a mutated homosexual snail that probably forgot to make a cameo at the Sao Paulo pride parade, instead staying at home to make scented soaps and slimes with budding lesbians.

He doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. Probably laugh, he's done enough crying already.

The snail makes a loud squelching noise, probably the closest it can get to crying in pain. Atsushi feels a vicious surge of schadenfreude, Byakko gearing up to swipe at it again. With just a few more hits, the shell should be crushed enough for the snail to turn back, and then Atsushi will finally be free to take the next few days off for mental health reasons. He can already imagine his futon, infinitely more appealing now that he's witnessed an outbreak of homosexuals and seen with his own two eyes glittery neon rainbow slime flooding the streets.

Suddenly, the snail's remaining beady bluebell eye swivels around, locking onto the tiger. It slowly turns around, its single eye staring at him all the while. It charges at him with single minded focus, slime sloshing around as it moves will all its might at a very oppressive 1 kmph. The gay aura intensifies, rainbows practically exploding around the snail as a beam of rainbow light shoots out of the snail's eye and crashes into a pedestrian near them, the woman quickly turning into the definition of 'hot butch lesbian with tattoos' and running off to the nearest coffee shop. Atsushi is extremely intimidated, and Byakko seems a little disgusted now that the queer aura has turned into a queer laser beam.

Oh my god, someone PLEASE help me, Atsushi screams internally. He really doesn't know if he can take this anymore.

"Hmph," a cold voice sounds behind him. "How pathetic."

Atsushi swivels around, almost choking on his relief. "Oh, thank the Lords, Akutaga- what the hell happened to you?!"

Akutagawa stood in front of him stoically, by all means acting normal, except for the clothes. Somehow, Akutagawa had changed into a coat exactly like his normal one but in painfully saturated colors of the cool-toned gay flag, eye-searing turquoise transitioning into a dazzling indigo. He had plastic rainbow shutter shades with heart-shaped glitter, and his white cravat had turned into the beautiful hues of the lesbian flag. His pants were striped in the colors of the transgender flag, blue and pink and white repeating over and over like Elise's tights. His shoes were red Louboutins with thick platforms. Perhaps the most shocking thing was his face; the most extravagant drag makeup Atsushi had ever seen was plastered upon his face, a masterpiece of neon rainbow sparkly eyeshadow with juicy and plump crimson lips. Akutagawa's eyeliner was thick and sharp, eyelashes voluminous and shining. Thick, hot latina-worthy eyebrows were drawn on his face. He had massive golden hoop earrings and jewel-encrusted nail extensions, and the tips of his hair were a violent purple where it was usually white. Even his eye color changed, slate gray morphing into a bright Barbie pink. The scene was burned into Atsushi's brain, a nightmare he would never be able to forget even if he lived to a hundred years.

Atsushi snapped his head around, steadfastly looking at the laser beam-shooting snail instead of the gay boogeyman behind him. "Are you.. Trying out a new look?"

He heard a huff behind him. "Nothing about me has changed. Clearly, your eyes are failing you."

Atsushi ignored the jab, analyzing the snail's new power as it turned yet another pedestrian into a soft twink. "No, you've definitely changed. You look like a clown, and when did you even get nails? I've never seen a nail salon anywhere in the city."

"That would be because you don't have the money. But we're getting away from the problem; you are clearly incapable of defeating the snail on your own."

"Okay, first, rude. Second, I'm doing perfectly fine! You're the one who looks like they got run over by the snail thing."

Akutagawa hmphed. "I have already touched the snail slime with no apparent behavioral changes, but it is not guaranteed that you will be immune as well. Do you really believe you can crush the snail's shell without touching even a hint of its slime?"

Atsushi looked at the snail as it gurgled, more slime pouring out of the cracks of the shell. "Yeah..." he muttered, "I might need some help."

Akutagawa snorted, but remained silent otherwise, Rashomon flaring up behind him. Getting the memo, Atsushi activated his ability as well, bright blue light flaring as his limbs transformed. They charged at the snail in tandem, Atsushi attacking and Akutagawa defending him from slime and rainbow lasers. With Akutagawa's protection, Atsushi felt a sense of safety, an odd feeling welling up in him as Rashomon blocked an incoming wave of light. Looking at Akutagawa, even in this odd and horrifying state, had Atsushi feeling some kind of way.

Just a bit more, he thought to himself internally. Just a little more, and then everything will go back to normal.

"Jinko!"

"Huh?" Atsushi instinctively turned around to Akutagawa, who was looking at him through wide eyes. "What's wro-"

A cold and wet feeling landed on his hand. Looking down, Atsushi saw a drop of sparkly slime on the back of his hand. His mind went stone cold, horror welling up in his gut. Yet, despite his feelings, his body was wrapped in a comfortable warmth as it began to glow. His body rose uncontrollably into a cloud of pink glitter, floating gently even as his brain seized in panic. As his mind began to cloud over, all he could see was Akutagawa's uncharacteristically terrified face before the world went white.

And then he was awake.

"Jinko!" Akutagawa exclaimed, running over to him with weird clicking noises. For some reason, the moment Atsushi's eyes landed on him, a pink aura flared around Akutagawa's body, sparkles and roses blooming around his face.

"What the fuck-" Atsushi looked down at himself. "Huh?!"

He was sparkly. Looking from his own perspective, his white shirt had become a rainbow gradient, somehow halfway unbuttoned as well. His suspender straps were striped with the trans flag, the pants themselves the vividly saturated colors of the gay flag. He had white and lacey fishnet gloves from his elbow to the middle of his palm, decorated with frilly bows and ribbons.His nails, sharp as they already were, became pitch black with neon rainbow accents and pearlescent pink chain decorations. His belt became a pastel pink, the end a heart-shaped point. Somehow, he had stockings on, his legs covered with wide fishnets leading into shiny black combat boots with four-inch soles. He didn't even want to see what his face looked like, but all in all he felt like the most disorganized mashup of a pride parade and a soft e-kitten the world had ever seen. It was weird. It was also, in Atsushi's humble opinion, weirdly normal; he didn't know why this outfit that was logically horrifyingly cringe felt like the kind of thing he'd go grocery shopping in.

The monstrosity of an outfit otherwise, he didn't feel particularly different. Sure, there was the weird shoujo filter on Akutagawa as well, but he didn't feel any overwhelming urges to kiss him or anything.

"Do you feel any different?" Akutagawa asked him, a note of urgency creeping into his tone.

"No?" Atsushi held up his arms, giving himself a once over. "I don't think anything has changed aside from my appearance and whatever is going on with your face."

Akutagawa's eyebrows creased, an expression that Atsushi has learned to be mildly offended appearing on his face. "There is nothing wrong with my face."

Atsushi rolled his eyes, conceding to Akutagawa's cute face. Wait what. "W-well, since we're fine, let's just get this stupid snail over with!"

Glancing at each other, the two leaped at the snail in tandem. With a roar, Atsushi let out a devastating attack. Without the fear of getting hit by slime, Atsushi poured all his strength into his assault, the snail's shell beginning to crack rapidly as more and more goop oozed out in self defense. From the corner of his eye, he saw Akutagawa and his proudly gay Rashomon take a swipe at the snail's other eye, preventing it from shooting more lasers.

With a final shout, the snail's shell finally caved in, letting out an onslaught of panicked sploshing noises. With a final silent cry, the snail glowed a bright yellow, condensing down into the shaking form of a middle aged office worker. The rest of the city began to glow as well, the slime levitating off the roads and buildings and coalescing into a simple glass bottle. The people affected by the slime glowed as well, transforming back into their normal selves with a shower of purple and blue sparkles, many beginning to scream in confusion at the random people in oddly close proximity to them.

"Damn it," the man warbles as Atsushi approaches him, glass bottle in hand. "I hate this stupid conservative country!" He curls into a fetal position and sobs into his hands, the kind of person a bystander would pity but also be annoyed with.

Atsushi really doesn't want to get into the man's apparent trauma over Japan's lack of PDA, so he sighs and dials Kunikida. "Kunikida-san, we got him."

"Finally!" Kunikida huffed from the other side of the line. "You've been fighting the snail for over an hour, do you realize how many marriage and divorce forms are flooding the government?!"

"Ah, sorry..."

"Whatever," Kunikida sighs. "Just get back soon, we'll be going over a debriefing and picking up that damn waste of bandages." He hands up abruptly, probably realizing hoe behind he is on his schedule.

"Okay then.." Atsushi turns around to face Akutagawa, thankfully back into his normal eyebrowless goth self. "So.."

Akutagawa huffs. "Pathetic. I'll be seeing you next Thursday at five, you look atrocious right now." He gives Atsushi a peck on the mouth and stalks off.

"What." Atsushi's face heats up, steam pouring out of his ears. "Wait, no, what the hell?! Akutagawa?!"

But Akutagawa was already gone.

Atsushi is left standing in the middle of the road, stunned. Byakko snorts in his head. Gay people.

-

"Hey, hey, Chuuya."

"What?"

"Do you think either of them realized they weren't affected because they were already as homosexual as possible?"

"No, now go back to sleep. I don't want your ass all up in my face tomorrow morning moaning about how you didn't sleep enough."

"Ah, Chibikko is so cruel!~"

Dazai laughs silently to himself, deleting a contact on a nondescript phone.

Suzuki Kenzo, 43 y.o.

Ability: Rainbow Day on a Heartless Foray