For Cam.

-Note- Shizuo and Izaya. I wondered for hours if I should have made this with Namie instead, but chose based on my bias alone. Therefore I want to make it work.

Consequences

"Less than a week if I keep this up."

Namie sighed from her seat, a look of disapproval crossing her beautiful face. With that said, if she was truly concerned or if she was just doing this because it was expected out of her, they both wouldn't even try to guess. What was known was the significance of both hands still steady on work, as if this was a trivial matter that could be dismissed easily.

As Namie raised both her arms in the air, she exaggerated a yawn, her mouth twitching open and tears brimming from the corner of her eyes. One slid down gracefully across her cheek, glistening like diamond before stopping at her chin where it was carelessly brushed off. The remnants shattered away into oblivion, for a moment looking like a hundred tiny sparkles, but no human eye could capture that phenomenon.

Chest contracted and expanded as air was swallowed and released. The brunette ran, jumped if given the occasion, but only fast enough to keep enough distance between himself and his rival. It had been going around for nearly an hour now and surprisingly Izaya still felt able. It was exhilarating to run against the wind. As the cold air pushed past his sweaty visage, his expression split into a refreshing grin. Better end something while it was still exciting right? His grin was replaced with a beautiful smile, albeit with a melancholy feeling itched deep, deep inside. Then he sighed, and raised both his hands high in the air and turned around to face Shizuo.

Izaya let himself be cornered. Shizuo spun the signpost viciously around himself before holding it like a javelin over his shoulder. Their eyes met, and in that split second all the hate in the world could be felt, like a jolt of boiling magma that had suppressed and suppressed, but was finally all about to explode in one go. Crimson eyes never broke the gaze as the pole was whirled toward him, as if pleading the other to go on. End this game.

Thud.

Gray birds lifted off simultaneously from atop the buildings. Their wings fluttered furiously, detecting the threat that set them off from the nests they had come to build on the skyscrapers. Above them, the murky blue sky. The same vast sky that reached and connected everywhere, over everyone. Truly…from the eyes of many suffering all around the world this would have been an insignificant occurrence. But this kind of confrontation was bound to leave an impact for the rest of their…

Life. Singular.

Izaya's arms descended slowly. Narrowly missing his abdomen, the pole clung against the brick wall with force that could have easily penetrated him. From that distance and with the brunette still as a statue, there was no way Shizuo could have aimed and missed. But also as unlikely was that it being thrown randomly and hitting somewhere so close. Shizuo aimed, but not at him.

Biting his lower lip bitterly, and eyes shooting up, the dull crimson drilling against the piercing blue sunglasses, there was a long moment of silence. The brunette furrowed his brows and his eyes narrowed, even twitching. He sucked in breath, holding it in, frustration radiating from his very presence. One word. Just one word, was bellowed, but not angrily as one would have expected. It was desperate, the very core of breaking emotions, sadness, fatigue, wonder, and astonishment mixed and matched all through the utterance. Vibrating strongly, but volume weaker then it should have been it resonated across the now empty walls. "Why?"

Shizuo accepted it silently, taking in the word for what it was. In all honestly he wasn't waiting for a question. He was waiting, however, for the brunette to run. To not think deeply about this occurrence. To just run, and dodge, and mock him like he usually did. So when the voice sounded, and the question was asked, the entire world seem to dawn the fact on him. Izaya had actually surrendered.

Izaya wanted to die.

And it wasn't just any death if all Shizuo promised in the past had been the absolute truth. He would have been beaten, killed several times over even, beyond recognition, beyond anything humanly possible. Yet, he desired it, and when he didn't receive it, he had been reduced to a torturous process of wondering. Why? Why was he still alive? Because there was no way he deserved a peaceful death.

Their hate had been and always be the one absolute truth connecting them together in a twisted mess. Their hate, the bond that kept them away and close to each other, on a game of actual life or death each encounter. That's the way it had always been, and the malice strewn in each others gazes never betrayed this fact. It was the only simple and pure emotion that they couldn't lie about, only erupting to loathing and even the desire to kill.

"Because," Izaya watched in longing, hungrily waiting for the explanation that drove him to the brink of insanity. Shizuo watched this calmly, his face contorting into unmistaken disgust. At what, now, wasn't especially clear anymore. "I'm just a human."

"Screwing my life over you isn't worth it."

Between the two of them, they could remember countless incidents in which immeasurable amounts of hate could be obtained and cultivated. But even accumulating them over time, even the countless times they chased each other with weapons and bare fists, Shizuo was content. Just with the fact that if he didn't have to see or remember Izaya again, he wouldn't have to dirty his hands with that matter.

So when he was thrown into the decision of killing or not killing, he chose not to. It might have taken Izaya many days to come up with this scenario and preparation to dying, but it was not the same on the other side. He just assumed…that he had gotten enough loathing aimed at him enough to drive the blonde into boring that pole through him. If not once, twice or even three times. But the count remained at zero.

Shizuo had forgotten most of the incidents. He suppressed them in his mind, only concentrating on the impulses of now. Izaya had forgotten that the race he loved and observed like a lifelong documentary was one that could be saved only because they were smart enough to understand each other. No one needed to, of course, but it was that that separated them from anything else, their ability to make their own decisions. To think in a simple, yet complex manner.

There had been no understanding between the two of them. Ever. They had clashed and burned like two opposite sides of war, the lords unable to talk peace to each other and simply using the brute force they had to command. To destroy. But even then, as the last head rolled, there would be agreement reached. The conditions of tomorrow, that could bend and sprout options.

"Why don't you try to be a human too?"

If there was still time. A little more time to reconsider all that he had done, and repent. Izaya reached out, slowly, his trembling arm towards the bright, white human being. If he hadn't known better, that human called chance could have easily been an angel. But to him, there was no God. No heaven or hell. Only darkness leading to the final, eternal darkness…

"Hey Namie, when you're done with that make me some food."

"Ugh, don't order me around like some housewife," Namie retorted. "I'll put poison in it if it's for you."

"Haha, I'll have you eat it first then. Just in case."

"If you keep treating people like this, you won't have a peaceful death."

Izaya stopped spinning in his seat, only enough to give her a sorrowful smile. "My death is predetermined."

"Oh?"

"It's been ticking for a long time now, just like a bomb about to explode…in fact I visited a trusted doctor only recently."

"How long do you have?"

"Less then a week if I keep this up."

The tips of his fingers didn't reach anything. Only the air and wind caressing the sides, gently gliding over his arms and giving a comforting graze at the edge of his cheek. His heart thumped lightly against his chest, speeding…speeding… as he slowly lowered to the ground, the blonde caught him.

Izaya ignored the shouts of his…his own name, so unfamiliar. His mind was spinning, the sky was beautiful. The alley was spacious. A feather of a bird finally drifted down landing softly beside them. He didn't have time anymore. Not enough to become a human. Not enough to repent.

"Sorry…" He whispered into the frantic voice of his rival's calls. "Sorry Shizu-chan."

Everything was echoing unusually now and the whirls of darkness seeped through his vision. The comforting darkness of his life, ending in another gulf of darkness. That's how it was supposed to be. His heart stopped beating altogether, but he managed to say one last word.

"Thank…"

God? Shizuo? Namie? The world? What?

Shizuo fell silent, as if waiting for the continuation that was never to come. Silent, wondering what had just happened, and his mind couldn't yet grasp it. As the still body he held between his arms fell limp, he could only stare at the peaceful expression of the deceased. His last moments, no matter what he had done in the past…had been human. Completely human.

Hate and hurt would linger.

Past memories haunt people easily, and there's just too many things that time is unable to erase. However, before they resurface, humans are able to understand a severed bond. Whether its love or hate, a strong bond never really disappears. And here, one that tugged each one over the course of several years was no exception to leaving a trace. It was because they had watched each other for so long that Shizuo could understand the excruciating difficulty in which the last words were uttered.

There, for that moment, Izaya had been forgiven.

"Hey Izaya," Namie gave a rare smile as she collected all the documents on her desk and stacked them in her hands neatly. "What do you want to eat?"

Subject to being edited. A concept I want to work a little bit more with.