Chapter 1: Part I
"So dear I love him that with him, all deaths
I could endure. Without him, live no life."
~ Paradise Lost, Book IX
S
Shion's hand tremble but he wills them to keep steady. He cannot slip. He cannot make a mistake. He will not make a mistake when it's Nezumi's life hanging on the line.
I have saved his life with these hands before. I can do it again. I can do it again.
Nezumi has lost a lot of blood. Shion has to clean the wound, stop the bleeding as much as he can and get him to a hospital. He has no data to rely on but compared to his own measurements Nezumi should be around 180cm tall and around 60 kgs heavy. He should have approximately 4,7 liters of blood in full heath. That may vary due to malnutrition but definitely can't be less than 4,5 liters total. Losing fourty percent of his entire blood volume can kill him and Shion estimates he has lost at least thirty percent by now given the fact he was already losing blood because of the wounds on his arm and leg before he got shot one more time on the chest. Even if Shion manages to give him a sufficient first aid Shion knows Nezumi can only last two hours at most before he dies Shion has to get him out of here. Fast.
Nezumi lays sprawled on a white, quality material stretcher on his back. The bullet wound on his chest -please not his heart, please no, please, no, no, no- is soaked in blood. With every heartbeat it lazily pumps more blood out of his pierced flesh. He is breathing still breathing but it's slow. Its so slow. His forehead is slick with sweat and his eyes are closed. He keeps losing consciousness even as Shion's hands continuously work on him.
Shion keeps talking to him. He never stops, letting his voice be a beacon, an anchor to keep him in this stuffed, clattered, smoke filled medical room with him. He can hear distant explosions and people running in all directions in panic outside the infirmary's locked door but he doesn't care anything right now. Nothing matters now. Nothing else matters but Nezumi and the bullet wound on his chest. Shion yells at him, challenges him to stay and fight, to keep his eyes open, to not give up -how dare you give up when you are the one who kept me alive when I wanted to go- for him to survive as he has always done. The silver glint of his eyes catches on the crimson and Shion feels the entire correctional facility the whole city of No.6 the universe with all its vastness and infinity expanding above their heads crash over him. Those silvery grey eyes lock on him through heavy lids and there is a heartbreaking awareness in them.
No no.. don't look at me like that. No, Nezumi. No. I won't have it. No.
'I am sorry,' his eyes say. Like a sun-tamed typhoon or the dulled edge of a knife, flickering with frail flames that are mere ghosts of the once all consuming inferno which resided in them, Nezumi's eyes seal his soul away. The forcep in Shion's hand trembles when his fist clenches around it involuntarily. Nezumi's eyes burn into his and then he smiles. A corner of his pale lips curve upwards slightly only a fraction of his usual snarky smile. And then he exhales slowly and Shion wants to stop him to throw himself on him and keep that breath in his crushed, thrown, blood soaked, injured body but he can't even move Nezumi breathes out and Shion's heart stops dead in his chest.
That single release of air in his beaten lungs drive away the light in his eyes. Shion watches it fade like a candle burning out before him as Nezumi's chest sinks beneath his own bloody hands and doesn't rise again.
Shion.
Shion stares down at him, unable to move, unable to think, unable to comprehend what just happened. His fingers, numb and shaky, travel up his bloody, smooth skin and his palm flattens over his heart. He has done this before. He has rested his hand on this very spot and felt the warm, steady heartbeat beneath the layers of millions of nerves, skin and bones. It was him who had taught Shion how important being alive meant.
Shion.
He can't feel anything. He waits longer, repeats in his head that his pulse is weak and that's why he can't feel it -then why have I stopped working on him?- and that Nezumi will open his eyes and tell him they don't have time to idle around and Shion should get it over with already. But his eyes are already open. Staring blankly at the plaster shedding ceiling.
Shion!
Darkness ascend inside him. An overwhelming wave of pitch black fog as thick as coal tar devours him whole. A pain, stronger than a million bullets, more paralyzing than being buried alive under hundreds of dead bodies disposed like garbage below this very building takes ahold of every single fiber of his being. His fingers dig into Nezumi's bloody chest, digging for life, digging for the light in his eyes, the air that just left his lungs, the air that will keep him and keep Shion alive and he finds nothing but flesh and bones and Nezumi laying on a snow white stretcher and drowning in scarlet blood spent injured broken beyond repair dead.
He vaguely hears a scream as his world falls apart and everything he has ever known and loved dissipates and settles in a wreckage a typhoon has left behind.
SHION!
N
Since returning to No.6, Nezumi occasionally found himself struggling to fall asleep. It wasn't because the bed he slept in was uncomfortable, not at all It was a blissful experience to lay on such a comfortable mattress, especially when he was used to broken wires and springs and painful lumps pushing up against his back in shabby, run down, sad excuses for homes. It wasn't because Shion was a poor bedmate either sure, the Royal Airhead enjoyed holding Nezumi at night, with his warm arms wrapping around Nezumi's body in fear he may once again disappear but Nezumi didn't mind that at all, in fact, he catered to it, holding him just as tightly back, pressing a kiss to his forehead and often times resting the side of his face against Shion's chest.
What kept Nezumi wide awake in the middle of the night, at least from time to time, were his thoughts, or, worse yet, his nightmares. Nezumi would take the former over those painstakingly accurate dreams of infernos, and being burned alive any night. The thoughts that plagued his mind weren't exactly harmful, but more nostalgic Often times he would look back on the years that had passed him by, his travels and experiences everything that shaped him into the man he was today. He would think about the ocean, or the largest theater in the world or his mice, and how old they were getting.
With his arms casually folded behind his head on his pillow, he would consider who he was four years ago a terrified, angry young man who craved vengeance for all of the hell No.6 had put him through, had put his people and his family through and who he was now. How much he had grown how much he owed Shion. A smile would often grace his lips as thoughts of the other boy would fill his mind, reminding him of everything he was, and everything he aspired to be all of the sacrifices he had made along the way, and just how scary yet absolutely spectacular a feeling it was to finally indulge in the love he had spent so much of his life running from.
Tonight, Nezumi's mind was restless.
He sighed and rubbed his face as he sat up in bed, wondering why he couldn't quite fall asleep. Perhaps it was the black tea he had drank hours ago Shion had tried to warn him, telling him the caffeine would keep him up all night but of course, Nezumi had been stubborn as always, drinking it anyway and claiming that such a stupid substance wouldn't have any affect on him. Nezumi internally cursed at himself, rolling his eyes as he flicked on one of the dim lights on their nightstand. Of course the stupid airhead had been right 'fucking figures.'
Maybe if he just got some water, it would help
'Yeah, water should do the trick,' Nezumi thought to himself with a sigh. He looked over at Shion as his chest continued to rise and fall, smiling over at the white haired boy who had become a man in such a short period of time. His fingers ran through Shion's hair comfortingly before he finally got up off the bed, beginning his journey to the dark kitchen.
Nezumi didn't bother to look over at the time that furiously glowed from the microwave, casting the kitchen in an eerie green light. He turned on the faucet, holding a glass underneath the water and filling it up to the brim. He then leaned over the kitchen counter, guzzling down the cold liquid in hopes it would help put him at ease.
It couldn't have been more than 10 minutes that Nezumi had been in the kitchen before a strange feeling set into his bones. The raven-haired individual knew he had a heightened sense of danger, after all, he had grown up on the very edges of terror, trying desperately just to live another day in a world that wanted him to perish, just so that another human being could steal his money, his clothes, his belongings so that perhaps they too could survive another day. But this .
What was this feeling?
Nezumi set the glass down in the sink and padded back over to the bedroom, closing the door behind him before walking slowly over to the bed. His eyebrows were furrowed as he approached the restless figure strewn across the mattress. Shion's fingers were clutching tightly onto crumbled sheets, gripping them harder with each and every violent twitch.
"Shion?" Nezumi asked as he sat down on the edge of the bed. The nightlight's dim glow only served to highlight the worst parts of the thrashing individual the messy, strewn-about hair, and the tears that were trailing down his soft pale cheeks the gasps, the pleas and desperate cries of Nezumi's name only left the raven-haired man even more concerned.
Knowing that he needed to wake the other up, Nezumi roughly shook Shion's bare shoulder, hoping that the sudden movement would force him to open his eyes. "Shion," Nezumi called out, a bit harsher this time.
It was no use. The pained cries only grew louder, his tears still flowing 'What the hell is he dreaming about?' Nezumi wondered before he heard his own name escape from his companion's lips once more. "Shion, wake up Shion!"
Nezumi closed in on the other man, hovering over him as his voice became firmer. "Shion!" He called out, giving him one last shake. He watched as Shion's eyes finally popped open, and the look in those crimson orbs nearly broke his heart in two.
"Shhhhh," Nezumi murmured as he ran his fingers through Shion's hair, tucking a lock of white gingerly behind his ear. He pulled the blankets up over both of them as he settled back into the bed, concern still ebbing the features of his face as he moved closer to Shion.
"Shion hey are you okay?"
S
A pair of deep crimson eyes shot wide open as Shion tore himself away from his nightmare. His throat was tight and he couldn't breathe and he was soaked in sweat and it was cold so ruthlessly cold Shion felt like his whole blood was drawn out of his body, leaving behind an empty shell of a human being.
Before his mind even registered that he had been dreaming and that it was now over, his panic-stricken mind immediately locked on to the luminescent grey eyes looking down at him and the deep, hurried voice repeating his name. It was him, of course, who had pulled him out of his nightmare as he had always pulled him out of darkness. Nezumi's hand ran through his hair, brushing his white locks behind his ear and Shion felt a pressure rise within his chest, pushing against his lungs and crushing them, twisting his ribs and tearing his flesh apart. Unadulterated pain, almost as strong as the wave of infinite despair from his nightmare crashed over him with the same drawn-out speed of that last breath Nezumi's lungs released before his chest moved no more.
The lights were gone from those eyes. The skin cooling the heart quiet.
Shion could not hold himself any longer and broke down under the worried gaze of his companion. He felt arms wrapping around him as violent sobs took over his body and he covered his face with both hands to hide his tears, to keep his pain dormant, to prevent Nezumi from seeing him in such state. It was useless.
Images relentlessly flashed in his mind. Fragments of his nightmare assaulted all his senses. Nezumi laying on the white stretcher drenched in blood, the cold metal of the forcep in his hand, the distant sound of explosions and people screaming, the smell of burnt flesh, antiseptics and smoke and Nezumi's lifeless eyes staring blankly at the ceiling.
Pain pierced his heart that was frantically struggling to hold on to the sense of Nezumi's warmth against his bare skin, holding onto it with all his might. Shion couldn't keep his sobs quiet. He cried into Nezumi's chest completely out of control. He had had nightmares before. Many times. Nightmares had become common place for the boy who had never had a single nightmare before the age of 16, ever since he had spent two days in the correctional facility. He had awaken screaming, sweating, crying countless times in the past four years. At times greeted by his mother's concerned face, while the others greeted by nothing but the reigning darkness and silence of his bedroom. He had buried his face into his pillow to stifle his agonizing gasps for air when he was alone when he when Nezumi wasn't with him.
Shion had exceptional memory. His nightmares had never consisted of vague images or indiscernible shapes. They always had a profound substance of his memories of the past. But this was this was extreme even to his standards. It left him hanging between the dream and reality and he couldn't even tell which was real. He could hear Nezumi whisper into his ear, his lips brushing over his hair but he was still trapped in his nightmare. He was still much closer to the Nezumi with lifeless eyes and a heart that didn't beat than the one holding him right now. The slick feeling of his blood soaked chest under his shaking hands still too strong.
Nezumi's name spilled through his lips in between jagged breaths. Shion's arms wrapped around his shoulders, wanting desperately needing to close the remaining distance between their bodies and hold onto him, one more time, as he did four years ago over and over again, to keep sane.
Wake me up. Please, I don't want to see it. Please. Wake me up.
Nezumi
Tell me you are alive.
N
The look of absolute terror and heartache in Shion's eyes as he awakened from his nightmare was extremely unsettling for Nezumi. The way he turned to Nezumi and looked at him as though he were a ghost, a figment of his imagination some sort of horrible mirage that would only cause Shion pain it hurt more than he could ever put into words. A part of him wondered what could've upset Shion so much what could he have possibly been dreaming about? Did Nezumi's absence affect him this much? Was this a result of the four years he had spent traveling?
Did Shion think that Nezumi would really abandon him?
The way he kept calling his name, and the way Shion's crimson eyes filled with such blinding fear and utter loss as they stared into his stormy grey orbs Nezumi could only imagine that whatever had filled Shion's heart and mind in the minutes he had been away from him, making tea in the kitchen in hopes that the hot beverage would calm his restless mind, had truly disturbed the man who embodied his idea of home. He had never seen such a look on Shion's face, and he couldn't help but loathe it with all of his might. Such terror and pain didn't deserve the opportunity to mar Shion's face, or to make its presence known in Shion's heart and mind.
But what the hell could he have been dreaming about? Nezumi thought about teasing Shion about it, but that look it was enough to prove to the raven-haired boy just how serious this was. And Nezumi knew how wretched nightmares could be. Nezumi's expression softened as he moved to wrap his arms tightly around him, offering him as much comfort as he could. "Hey ," Nezumi murmured, his lips brushing against Shion's ear, "It's alright it's okay now, Shion, shh "
The violent sobs coming from Shion only made him worry even more, and it wasn't long before Nezumi was prying those hands away from Shion's face, wanting more than anything to see him, and to understand what was going on. "Shion, it's okay," Nezumi whispered again as he pressed a kiss to his forehead. "Calm down "
It was only after feeling Shion's arms wrap tightly around his shoulders, and after hearing him continue to cry out his name, that Nezumi finally began to pick up on what Shion could've been dreaming about.
And Nezumi knew, not just because he knew Shion better than anyone else
But he knew what it was like to have nightmares about losing those he loved, and cherished. He knew what it felt like to wake up after seeing images of dead family members reaching out for him, wanting to be saved, only to perish in the fires that No.6 had inflicted upon his people.
Nezumi swallowed as he began to feel hot tears soaking into his shirt. His heart hurt, seeing Shion like this and in all honesty, he wasn't sure how to comfort him. He wasn't really that good with comforting. At least he didn't think so. He was good at telling the cold hard truth, and not dancing around any subject but this? This was a different matter entirely.
"Shion," Nezumi spoke a bit more firmly, "It's okay, I'm here please, stop crying " Nezumi's hold on Shion loosened and his hands moved up to cup Shion's cheeks. A gentle, inviting smile presented itself on Nezumi's lips as his eyes searched Shion's. "It's okay, Shion," Nezumi whispered as his thumb pushed away some of the tears that had collected under his lover's left eye. "Everything's okay now. I'm here.. I'm not going anywhere."
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
This is my Tumblr RP thread Heartbeat with Contendaz (Drenched-Rat on Tumblr).
From now on I'll be posting all of our threads on here in chapters so that you guys will see I have indeed NOT been idle. I've done A LOT of writing actually and both Jackie and I have some fantastic threads to share with you.
Nezumi: Contendaz ( u/2788304/contendaz)
Shion: Me
Feedback is always appreciated.
Disclaimer: No.6 and all character's belong to Asano Atsuko. This is a non-profit fan product.
Cover art belongs to: Steel-Chocolate ( pixiv id=4433068)