The pistol goes off with a harrowing crackle in Izaya's ear, and he waits for the pain, waits for his brains to get blown out and to splatter all over the adjacent wall. His biggest regret is the place he chose to let himself get killed. It's a grungy smelly flat where someone he fucked over decided to kidnap him, hardly anywhere comfortable. His arms and legs ache, brutally bruised and beaten to the point where Izaya can't really laugh it off and say he's had worse because he honestly hasn't.
Everything shitty about his situation pales in comparison to the fact that Shizuo is standing right there, eyes wide, and Izaya can't really blame him. Shizuo probably came to collect debts and not witness a brutal murder - but then again, considering how much the guy fucking hates him, this might just be a bonus. He waits for the bullet to drill into his head, to finally end his suffering.
But nothing happens.
It's a blank.
His captor drops him to the ground, and when he falls, he can still see Shizuo right there in the doorway. Shizuo, who was just watching and waiting for him to die the whole time Izaya had that handgun rested snug on his skull.
The man behind Izaya curses loudly as the informant hits the ground unconscious and all he can hear within the last of his waking moments is the sickening crunch of bone.
How unsightly.
When Shinra wakes up to his phone ringing in the middle of the night, the last thing he's expecting is a disoriented Shizuo when he picks up, not that he would ever expect to think of Shizuo and disoriented in the same sentence, let alone experience it.
"It's me." Shizuo's voice sounds muffled and shaken. "Is it alright if I come over right now?"
"You better have a good reason for waking me up at," Shinra glances over his shoulder at the digital clock mounted on his bedside table. "1am."
"Trust me, it's a pretty damn good reason."
"Don't tell me you beat someone up again."
"You'll see," comes the cryptic answer before Shizuo hangs up.
Half an hour passes and someone's knocking at Shinra's door. He gets up and looks through the peephole to find Shizuo carrying someone. It's hard to discern any real details with the subpar, fogged up lens on the door, but Shinra can already see some nasty bruises on the guy and little else. The underground doctor opens the door finally.
He's seen some awful trauma, but this really takes the cake. He almost has to pinch himself to make sure that what he's seeing isn't a dream or a wild hallucination.
In Shizuo's arms lays a crippled husk of a man who's been through hell and back. His dark hair is matted with something (probably blood, notes Shinra) and his fair skin is gruesomely pebbled with varying hues of black and blue. Cuts, both fresh and healing, line his arms and legs, and it's right then that Shinra knows that Shizuo didn't do this. He swears that he can even spot a few rope burns here and there.
"You need to learn to control your strength." Shinra jokes.
"I didn't do this. Someone else did." Shizuo's tone is stone cold and grim, contrasting the lighthearted attitude of his friend.
Shinra knows better than to ask any questions. As Shizuo walks past him to place the limp body on the nearby couch, he finally gets a glimpse of the poor guy's face. His eyes widen. "That's Izaya?"
"I'm just as surprised as you." The blond takes a step back. He glares at the unconscious body. "Shitty flea getting himself in trouble. Fucking inconvenience."
"To be frank, I'm even more shocked that you didn't leave him there to die."
Somewhere out there and in his head, there's a world where Izaya is still being held captive. Where the knives kiss his flesh and lips press themselves to his skin not lovingly, but with the intention to leave marks. The acid drips onto fresh and closing wounds, reopening them and forcing his to stretch in a silent scream. Burns, cuts, fists - they hurt all the same now.
He can still hear the taunting. He can still remember those hours he spent by himself in that dark, stuffy room shivering and dressed in nothing but rags. He remembers those nights where he was so heavily drugged that it felt like he was trying to listen through a soundproof wall half the time and everything felt wonderfully numb because sometimes, he would rather be numb and senseless than feel anything at all.
But that's not even the worst of it.
Izaya has always had miserable dreams.
He wakes up in a world of pain. In the back of Izaya's mind, something screams for the drugs, and something else wishes that he had never woken up. He squeezes his eyes shut to sleep off the pain, but there's too much of it and it's everywhere. His arms, his legs, his back. His throat closes itself off before he can groan.
"Awake?"
It feels like it's been years since he heard that voice. The informant cranes his head to look at Shinra, lets out a bitter laugh. "No, I'm dead." I wish I weren't kidding, Izaya adds to himself silently.
Shinra doesn't laugh at his joke. After some silence, he finally says, "Your injuries are really something. Haven't seen anything this bad in a while."
"Shizu-chan must be disappointed."
"You'd be surprised." Shinra turns his head like he's watching for someone, and lowers his voice, "He left work early to bring you here."
"But he knows that I wouldn't do the same for him. How touching." Izaya snorts.
In that moment, Shizuo walks in from the hallway. Normally, Izaya would say something snarky or call him a monster, but he's at a loss for words. He's finally back in Ikebukuro, but it doesn't quite feel like it. It feels like there's something weighing him down, but he can't label it as fear. He won't. Izaya's too strong to let this affect him.
Shizuo stops at the doorway, running a hand through bleached locks of hair. The monster stares, but doesn't do anything else. In his eyes, Izaya can see pity and sadness. Being pitied is a foreign feeling that wrenches his gut and reminds him of everything wrong with the situation. They meet eyes, but Izaya drops his gaze to the ground and they're both speechless. Shinra breaks the silence eventually, but there's something about his voice that makes him sound restless and nervous. "It's a miracle that neither of you want to kill each other yet."
More silence.
"Tough crowd." Shinra picks up some bags, and throws on a lab coat. "Well, as fun as this conversation is, I have work to do. Izaya, your injuries are pretty bad, but it's nothing life-threatening for now. Call me if anything comes up. Can I trust you not to kill him, Shizuo?"
The lack of response from Shizuo is not promising.
"Shizuo?" Shinra asks again.
"Yeah." The blond's voice sounds oddly distant, but Shinra takes it anyway and leaves the room quickly, leaving the two alone.
Shizuo stands awkwardly, like he doesn't know how to act around Izaya without tearing up anything in his immediate vicinity. Without anything else in mind to do, he starts heading towards the door. "I should leave, too."
"Don't." The plead leaves Izaya's throat before he even realizes it. It comes out strange, and for a second, Izaya doesn't realize that he was the one who said it. The word sounds desperate and needy; panicked, anxious, and nothing like how the informant is used to hearing himself sound. Smoothly recovering from his slip up, Izaya says, "If my injuries worsen, there won't be anyone to tell Shinra."
The other man stops in his tracks and turns. He hesitates, and Izaya almost sees something unexpectedly human. He can't really put a finger on it, but it's not a look he's used to getting from Shizuo. Usually, it's pure rage or disgust.
"Okay. But if you piss me off, I might just be the reason your injuries worsen."
"Maybe that's what I want." Izaya drawls. He rolls onto his back, wincing at the pain. He traces patterns on the ceiling with his eyes but otherwise remains unmoving. His nemesis takes a seat by his bed. He repeats, almost as though he feared that Shizuo didn't hear him the first time. "That's what I want."
"Be careful what you wish for."
Izaya's usual chuckle comes out as a coughing and wheezing that earns him a concerned look from the blond. It hurts. Maybe he's been hit in the head a few too many times, but he's almost starting to appreciate Shizuo's company. "Hey, if it's you, Shizu-chan, I wouldn't mind."
No reply. Shizuo's eyes widen in surprise. "Izaya."
"Why haven't you beaten me up yet?" His voice starts to raise. Izaya can feel himself spiraling out of control and little parts of him tell himself, no, this isn't me but at this point, he's just blurting out the first thing that comes to mind. He tells himself that it's okay and he doesn't have to run his words through a filter because Shizuo is a monster and words don't matter to a monster. They're meaningless. "You're… You're supposed to be a monster, Shizu-chan. Don't you hate me? Don't you-don't you want to kill me?"
He glances at Shizuo and all he can see is pity. Izaya feels like he's seconds away from breaking, and Shizuo has that look on his face that he puts on when he's holding something fragile and he's trying not to break it. It feels like Izaya's going to lose it, it feels like his hold on himself is slipping away like quicksand through his fingers, and he's powerless to stop it. His face burns, and his heart starts racing. He's vulnerable and weak. He feels human, but all he wants to do is feel numb. His gaze is absent, bearing into nothing.
"Shizuo."
For the first time in ages, Izaya says the other's name fully. He enunciates each syllable. His hands shake visibly. He looks at Shizuo, grim and solemn. His lighthearted exterior shatters, and he's on the verge of becoming a shaking and sobbing mess. His voice cracks.
"Why did you save me?"
