Author's Ek-ek:

This was actually a gift fic to someone but I think it had not been appreciated. So instead of letting it go to waste, I'd rather share it here. Hope you guys like it.

You've cried.

When old man Kline died, I saw again that very human side of you which proved me wrong all the time, that side that makes you so vulnerable, the side which shows that no matter how abnormal your strength might be, the once dubbed Monster could still hurt, could still grieve, could still shed lonely tears. No matter how you now stand so resolute, a picture of apathy, decked in your most somber black as a sign of your sadness, shaking hands with the visitors who will soon be part of the breadth and width of our new life.

"Shaun Kline? Roan McKinney. Official liaison of the Federal Government to Arthur Kline Industries. I was friends with your father. I am sorry for your loss."

I watch silently as you clasp hands with this person who gives you his condolences, condolences from the very authorities of this country we have made well ado of, before you turn to introduce me as your partner and brother.

"Isaiah…"

"Pleasure," and it's my turn to give my acknowledgements, aware that in the near future, this acquaintance will come very useful.

I hate funerals. As I sit looking at the gold-plated coffin, I feel irked by the fact that He has to share part in this, indulging myself in a bit of an imagining, seeing how I may smash His great crucifix into so many pieces on the marble of the hall, scattering the large English roses surrounding it, dance upon its powdered remnants to the tune of some devil's violin.

But then I stop.

Though I never perhaps believed, this is a desecration even from someone the likes of me. Because the man who now lies in that casket had likewise been my father. He was the man whom, no matter how much of a conniving bastard or pied piper I see him to be, was still the man who mentored you to be what you are, and I thank him for that. And he has given me equal chance, and I thank him for that.

"May I take one of the twins, Boss Isaiah?"

Miranda Arci. She reminds me of my former secretary though her warmth is more obvious in her personality. She comes to me and offers a helping hand, carefully taking Shizaya from my other arm and cradling our child's sleeping form as she sits right beside, crooning "Shh, Sabre…" our dearest little one's American name rolling very sweetly over her tongue, lulling him so effectively back to slumber, those strong arms taking him, rocking him back to sleep.

"Isley is a rather behaved sleeper," she notes, looking over at Izuo who can be a polar bear of sorts at times; as long as he isn't cold, as long as he is wrapped in his fur and coat, he dozes with no trouble. The conversation before she points something more, "Boss Shaun has taken it rather hard."

Of course.

That is something all of us understands.

You had been at the hospital when father breathed his last, had held his hand and heard his last wishes, and you had been distracted ever since I could see. But this I have also come to comprehend.

No one knew but this might as well be the first real death you have witnessed in your life, have never really killed anyone during our olden times together, no matter how often you scream the intent like an incantation, kill kill kill.

I fall to quietly watch you, a standing figure with a pretty face looking over our dead patriarch's final bed, hair never once bleached the last three years and had since returned to its subtle brown because, here in America, there was no longer the need to put up appearances. You never needed to set off any warning signs. You could be you as I could be me. But then who are we?

We are the adopted sons of this rich mogul who had lost his own family long ago. We had reminded him so much of the offsprings he will never see again save perhaps now in death. We are Shaun and Isaiah Kline. And we had been married…

As the hours drag on, I get bored, the kids I have entrusted to their keepers earlier and have both disappeared upstairs since. Two-year-olds need that much rest after all. Plus what use have they with chatter? With talk amongst clients and other personages? With discussions about the business of guns and weapons and politics that we shall soon take over and had began to take over under our father's tutoring?

I hear the president will come to the funeral. I don't really care. And neither do the children as they will see more of these people in their lifetime. But where are you now?

I walk the steps towards their room to check up on them, our little ones, wondering however where you had disappeared to. I could not find you downstairs, not even in the gardens where you often sought your peace. The crowd below is still thick, these seemingly faceless strangers preferring to play at their anonymity and do transactions in the night. The habit extends even to the wake of the old man doesn't it? Human eccentricity. How amusing.

"Boss Isaiah."

On my way up, I see Yuri and Schneider, their strong European features a stunning contrast to my own which you have more than once described to be delicately Asian that it's beautiful. They carry with them no smile. Not today anyway. And had I not left the kids in their care?

I ask them about that. They both inform me that you had given them leave. I see. So that is where you are?

"Come back in thirty minutes," I ask them. "I may want to get Shizu-chan to bed in a bit. He hasn't slept that well lately." At this they nod, no questions really, as everyone accepts what we are…

I slowly twist the knob of the door of the nursery located at the farthest end of the hall, quietly peeking in, seeing your form as you were seated on one of the chairs in the room, looking down upon the cradle.

The gentle sound of the music box tinkled about, a tiny lullaby and it makes me want to hum as that song often gets stuck in my head until morning.

"Found you," I smile and it makes you smile slowly, though you never really turn to look at me. You stay looking down, the low beam of the night light casting its shadows upon your face but catching the pretty little jewelry of a piercing I had once conned you into getting. A remnant of Ikebukuro, this trinket. A proof of home.

"You run away from them and come here for some solace? If the kids awake, you'll have a handful."

I am teasing. I know you never really cared about babysitting. You love to do this. You take care of the young ones perhaps more than I could and I was supposedly the mother in this equation.

You finally turn to me.

"Come here, Izzy." And I do. Obediently. I move to stand just before you, to look upon your tired face, your burdened eyes with that unmistakable expression you can't quite hide. You had been so easy to read, or is it more accurately said that I am used to everything that is you so I know when you are troubled?

You need rest but why don't you take it? I ask eventually and you just shun the concern with the tiniest of smirks. You make me frown. Then you lift your arms and embrace my waist, as if that alone was enough to pacify me. In a way yes. It is.

"I love you," you say.

"I know," I say back. "But the old man will be cremated in the morning and we have to take that trip to New Orleans. You might crash. You're already so stressed out.

"You're not invincible Mr. Monster."

It's a long way to that State where we are to rest the old man's ashes, in the mausoleum where his family had been laid in urns and jars many years before. He will join them there finally, and I'd like to think our adopted father is at last content.

"You smell lovely."

Ah diversion. Since when had you learned to change the topic of our discussions when I press you for a confrontation of them? It's unnerving sometimes, how you can now match me by wits after you had been properly schooled by the dead father. But then I found out how this could sometimes be your way to obtain some manner of attention. You now know how to quirk me the right way to respond like how you want to.

"I thought I stink? Don't tell me the change in location changes the scent of a person," and I easily give in to your way, glad at least that I have caught you in conversation. Not like yesterday, or the day before that.

"Who said you stink?"

"Liar."

Now at last I hear you chuckle, the small sound of your amused voice echoing gently around the room, before I hear you sigh, your embrace tightening around me, burying your face. Your breath tickles. It so easily sends shivers through even the barriers of clothing between us.

I embrace you back, running my hands through the silkiness of your hair, smoothing the strands and twirling them idly around my fingertips. It takes me back to the days we had first met, the games I annoyed you with, the endless chases that could have continued on and on.

And to think everyone would now be so surprised, nay, shocked, how we, of polar opposites with no chance to get along, are now partners. Me, the infamous sleuth and incurable troublemaker, incapable of caring could actually fall...in love with you.

And have kids.

Never mind if it could be called an accident the way they have been conceived.

"Hey, Izaya…"

Ah, I've never heard you call me that in a while. It's either Izzy or Isaiah which is fine, but the ring that comes with it is somehow different. You reach up to me, palms cupping the sides of my head and running your thumb across my cheek, a tiny slice of affection, a gesture of want. Of love. Yet I can see still the sorrow. I could not possibly have that, not tonight. Not ever. It hurts me in turn.

"Make love to me?" I ask you. I mean it, needing you as I always do.

"We can't. We have guests."

"The hell," I smile seductively, the way I know which gets to you. "Screw the guests. Or rather screw me, and let me show you how my body can console you."

Now it's my turn to convince you to come at me, and all I need is to bend right in, tempt you with my kisses, urge you to return the movement of my lips, the flick of my tongue, the little teases I let slip and slide until you take over, command my body as you please, locking your lips upon mine possessively. We haven't done this in days. I'm hungry. And so are you apparently.

"Shizu-cha…ahn…" I throw my head back. Challenge answered.

"Let's go to the other room," you say. "I don't want to wake the kids."

But then you never really let go. You keep kissing and caressing, hands running over, building up the fires and stoking at the flames. I feel myself warming up, and quickly, body so used to the sense of your touch, the feel of your palms, the hot skin I am utterly enchanted with beneath your clothes, the hair you sweep back over your forehead.

I shudder. Then all I hear is the lock of the door as you click it open, pushing us both through the adjacent chamber only to shut us both in. At least for some minutes, or hours, however long it takes, as we meld together in the silence of this darkness, I will share a bit in your burdens, as you had once shared in mine three years behind us…

I'd passed out.

It's embarrassing to admit, but in the onslaught of such high strung passion, having just come down from heaven if that was what I can closely relate it with, I most always never survive your sheer dominance and tenacity, your body always difficult to please thus it could rip out of me all that it needs, all that it demands, and I give forth like a cup to your desires…

When I came to, all I could feel was you, as if the outline of your form were stuck to mine still, and I search about in the room to find you already dressed, clean in a crisp suit, straightening a sable tie in front the mirror. So handsome, my husband. So unlike what you had been in the detritus that was Tokyo.

You smile when you noticed how I'd awakened to look at you, me actually thinking you to be the most amazing of beings, not that you had been anything else but that. Even in the never-ending bartender's garb you so lovingly paraded in before, you looked like a painting to me, as sensual as a Botticelli.

I close my eyes.

I've actually fallen asleep wrapped in the sheets and your coat, ah, when all that I intended earlier was to give you repose. My plan had backfired. Irony of ironies…how they most always do when it's with you, switchblades and traffic posts notwithstanding. But you never seem to tire, never seem to care, the one who slumbers lightly now during the nights when that had been my habit before.

"What time is it?"

I'm too lazy. Of course the digital clock tells me it's been a couple of hours since you held me, took me about thrice, teased me until all I could do was beg mercy.

I want to complain. "You must be tired," but it's you who reaches with the first touch of concern, running a hand so affectionately down the side of my cheek again, wrinkling your nose when you notice your jacket which I all but snuggled further in, inhaling your scent.

"I can't use that now can I?" you smirk. "Damned flea."

"It was your fault you'd used it to tie me with," I spat back, but only to blush, remembering how I'd shuddered after the sleeves had become a fastening to hold me still while you worked above me.

You notice this. You laugh. Then bend in to grant me a little kiss, this time determined not to let it go over. It may be past three but we know of those guests, the ones who'd come from overseas who will be arriving to pay their final respects.

"Stay here," you requested, as much as it was a command.

I will. I feel sleepy now. But then if I can, I'll be the one to do away with preparations tomorrow. I say this to you and you merely smile. There's always Clyde or Miranda for that, you reply. But I insist. At least let me do my share as a son to Arthur Kline…to the man who had adopted us when we were so lost on this foreign soil.

But let me touch you, yes? Let me reach my hand. Feel you before you walk out the door.

"Where are your rings Mr. Information Broker?" was your question, even as you incline that cheek upon the palm by which I caress it with.

"Oh they're there," I say with a grin. You can feel them. But this is just a question you test me with. You meant something else. I know that beloved. Especially as you move to twine your hand with mine.

Oh they are there. Just a different pair now decorating that one most important finger to my left as yours decorated that one important finger of your right.

The engagement and wedding bands you had given me. I have never really taken them off, or never for too long when I do. That way they remind me that…that…

"I already belong to you," I vow. I just want to, amusing even myself that I am capable now of such sweetness. "Until death Shizuo Heiwajima…"

[RIP

Arthur Leon Francesco-Kline

In loving memory of your sons Shaun and Isaiah

Grandsons Isley and Sabre

Friends and Acquaintances]