Episode 13

The Dark Age (黒の時代,) is the 13th episode of Bungo Stray Dogs anime series. It aired on October 06, 2016.

Synopsis
On a misty night, Sakunosuke Oda, Osamu Dazai, and Ango Sakaguchi meet as always at their usual bar. For the trio of Port Mafia members, it a night spent in camaraderie like any other, but Ango vanishes that very night. Oda is given a direct order from the Port Mafia boss to find Ango, but...

Summary
Four years prior to The Guild's arrival to Yokohama, Sakunosuke Oda visits the bar and encounters Port Mafia executive, Osamu Dazai, who tells him about his day. As Dazai voices out his desire for death, mafia intelligence officer Ango Sakaguchi arrives at the bar and tells them about his disastrous day. Lastly, Oda narrates to them the seemingly mundane jobs he did as a low-ranking member in the mafia. To have a memento to remember by, the three take a photograph altogether.

The following day, Oda is summoned by mafia boss Ōgai Mori to find Ango, who had gone missing the previous night. Mori hands Oda a silver oracle, after which he asks why the mafioso has never used his gun to kill others, but Oda declines to answer. Meanwhile, Ryūrō Hirotsu and his men find three of their armory guards killed. Dazai deduces from their corpses that the assailants were skilled, quite possibly soldiers. From a footage photograph, Hirotsu identifies an assailant's Grau Geist, an old European pistol. Dazai recalls his recent encounter with attackers and claims that they also had such guns, inferring that their attack must have been a distraction. Piecing the facts they have gathered from their recent operations, Dazai nevertheless informs Hirotsu that they know the assailants' organization, Mimic.

Oda heads to Ango's hotel room, where he finds a safe hidden in the ventilation shaft. Thanks to his ability — Flawless — that allows him to see five to six seconds into the future, Oda evades attacks from a sniper from a building across. He then contacts Dazai and informs him of the attack on him in Ango's room, requesting to cut the sniper's escape routes.

As he chases the sniper, Oda is cornered by two hooded assailants. Dazai and his men arrive on time to kill the assailants, who carry Grau Geist pistols. Given the pistol's low firing rate and accuracy, Dazai deduces that Mimic operatives' Grau Geist pistols merely serve as an emblem to their organization. They later open Ango's safe and find a Grau Geist pistol inside. Though Dazai does not accuse Ango of being part of Mimic at once, he suspects that Ango did not go to a deal as he said to them at the bar and merely used it as an alibi for another secret meeting. In the end, Dazai asks Oda to find Ango.

Characters in Order of Appearance

 * Sakunosuke Oda (debut)
 * Osamu Dazai
 * Ango Sakaguchi (debut)
 * Elise
 * Ōgai Mori
 * Ryūrō Hirotsu

Light Novel and Anime Differences

 * Dazai, Oda, and Ango met at the bar by 11 p.m. in the light novel, while they encountered one another at the bar by 10 p.m. in this episode.
 * The light novel features Oda and Ango recommending Dazai some hobbies that he could try other than attempting suicide. Among others, Ango suggests cooking, though he immediately retracts it after he and Oda remember how Dazai's cooking apparently tastes terrible. This description of Dazai's cooking skills is omitted in this episode.
 * Oda gets embroiled in a brief combat with the two assailants in the light novel, while they are almost immediately killed by Dazai's men after cornering Oda in this episode.

Trivia

 * In the beginning of the episode, a calico cat resembling Sōseki Natsume's feline form appeared in Bar Lupin. Interestingly, Dazai referred to the cat as "Sensei", a title often attributed to Natsume by other characters throughout the series.