Shorter chapter this time but quickly written as thanks for my two reviewers, I hope my story lives up to any expectations you may have. :)

Dreams are said to sometimes be the dreamer's suppressed thoughts or desires, playing out in their head as if to taunt them into making them real. A sort of subconscious tempting of what could be possible if you could only do this, or if this had happened, or if you had the courage to say this. Whatever 'this' is, your mind fills it in.

However, there's always a point after you wake up when the dream gets hazy, you're grasping at its threads, and the more you think about the details the more the details seem to disappear. The loss may be a defense mechanism this species developed in order to not get the real world confused with the one you can only dream of.

Or it's the barriers of the person's mind rejecting their own self. Humans do tend to do that.

It seems there aren't a lot of exceptions to that...

He could feel a warm chest pressed against his back and an arm draped over the bottom of his ribcage, bent up and limply resting in front of Izaya's chest.

Slowly opening his eyes he felt the warmth, the comfort of feeling safe for once in his life. Blinking lazily, his gaze shifted as he tilted his chin down to see what was touching his chest with feather-like sensations.

Moving his own arm that hung over the one that held him, he gently touched the back of the hand as if to test its reality. Confident that it wouldn't disappear, he laced his fingers in between the others, feeling them respond by tightly gripping his and pull their joined hands against Izaya's chest, right above his heart. A sleepy smile formed on his blank face, and Izaya closed his eyes.

It was very simple and anticlimactic.

.

..

...

For what seems like the second time, Izaya opened his eyes. Without knowing why, he tilted his chin down and looked at his hand that rested on the bed up by his heart. The warm feeling in his chest that he seemed to wake up with began to fade away, and a sleepy frown formed on his newly awoken face.

Turning so that he was laying on his stomach instead of his side, he dropped his head so that his face was completely submerged in a pillow.

"I feel like I'm forgetting something." he mumbled.

-14 Hours Ago-

"...Izaya?"

In the doorway of Shinra's apartment stood a disheveled looking information broker, a hand weakly covering his mouth, and the other gripping his heart like it pained him.

Panicked by the sight in front of him, he took in everything, the downturned eyebrows giving emotion to eyes that are usually masked so well, and the small audible breathing sounds that are escaping past the hand over his mouth.

"Come in, what happened, what's wrong?" the doctor asked, heralding in his now patient pulling out a chair as he continued into his home ahead of Izaya, gesturing him to sit down.

"I- ah. My-my heart-hahh...I think."

"Was it a pain in your chest, like someone had grabbed hold of your heart?" the doctor called while he gather some supplies from across the room.

"Nno, just. It started beating really fast and my chest felt really heavy, everything ahh. Slowed down, and I couldn't nn..hear anything." Izaya tried to explain, not exactly knowing what was going on and immediately rethinking coming here. It was probably nothing, he tells himself as the new sensation that settled in his chest continued to send sparks under his skin.

"Nnn?" Shinra hummed while thinking of possible ideas. "What were you doing, anyway?" the other asked, coming back with a box of medical supplies. Putting a stethoscope into his ears and lifting up the black shirt to listen to his heart beat, he took in Izaya's twitching grip on the arm of the chair he sat on. It seemed like he didn't even know he was doing it.

"Shizu-chan found me today. When I was running..ah I tripped over my fucking shoelace, what a joke." he sighed out, mouth closed now but chest raising and falling with deep breaths.

"He caught you?" Shinra asked, looking genuinely surprised.

Giving him a look that meant that this line of questioning should be kept on the same track as trying to figure out what happened to him, Shinra gave him a semi-apologetic smile but still expected an answer.

"Mmm. I didn't exactly think my vacation from Shizu-chan's violence would last only two weeks." After this there was a dramatic sigh that Shinra saw as a sign that the other was starting to get a hold of himself and his defenses were going back up. "I was going to milk that underground status for as long as I could, trust Shizuo to wake up earlier than usual on his day off." This he said in a small, quick, and pained voice, looking to his left in mild annoyance, the strained smile never leaving his face.

"What symptoms did you experience, exactly?" Shinra asked, apparently done with listening to his heart and lungs took out the stethoscope from his ears.

"My vision went hazy, I couldn't stand up, like all the strength was sucked from my muscles...ah..I couldn't hear anything but my own breathing and a heartbeat. My breathing went haywire, like every breath I took sparked a sensation all over my body. My..my wrist and arm were tingling I suppose." He finished, looking at said wrist like it had betrayed him by working for the enemy.

"Hey, Shinra, I'm starting to believe I'm growing a second head, so if you'd stop staring-"

"R-Right, yes, well I'm not exactly sure about the temporary deafness, but the rest of your symptoms go with a panic attack."

"You're telling me I had a panic attack?"

"Now, now, don't look at me like that. That's the only scientific reason I can give you for all of them that isn't that bad."

"What's the other possibilities."

"Well, you have some symptoms for multiple diseases, but none that would give you all of those at the same time, usually they're only experienced one at a time. Trust me Izaya-san, my earlier assessment is the most likely. Though-...the way you describe them, I haven't really heard of..."

Turning his head to look at him instead of out one of the large side windows overlooking the city, he gave Shinra a blank faced frown.

"What?"

"No, nothing, it's nothing."

Minutes later, Izaya took his leave. A few more minutes later, Celty came in alongside her bike.

"Ah, Celty!~" Shinra exclaimed, walking towards her with his arms outstretched. When he got close she stopped typing on her PDA and made it so that it was right in front of his face, stopping him at arms length.

[I saw Izaya downstairs when he exited the elevator. Did something happen?]

"Celty, you just got home, why don't you come give me a hug or a ki-" A sharp jab to the stomach stopped him mid sentence, causing a pained smile to appear on his face as he held where she hit him.

"A-Ahaha, I guess not. " Straightening up a little bit, he started walking back into the apartment, listening while she propped her bike against the entryway and followed in after him, joining him on the couch he had fallen into moments before.

"You should have seen it, Celty. It was like a person I've never seen before suddenly emerged from somewhere he's been hiding it."

While he was talking, he laced his hands together and placed them behind his head, looking up at the ceiling in thought.

[Did he say anything?]

"He said he came from one of those fights with Shizuo, I suppose. This time Shizuo had caught up to him, and when he did Izaya began to have panic attack symptoms."

[You aren't sure?]

"How he described it there were some things that coincide with what occurs when one has a panic attack, but...panic attacks usually have a trigger, right? He didn't mention being afraid and in the state he was in I would have seen it on his face. No, I just... Maybe you could talk to Shizuo tomorrow?"

After nodding an affirmative, they fell into a comfortable silence.

...

..

.

Opening his eyes, Shizuo held onto a pillow he had grabbed in his sleep in the middle of the night. Noticing his hand had a firm hold on one side of the soft plush, he relaxed it, feeling the air in his room begin to cool his heated palm.

"I had that dream again...huh?"

Rolling onto his back to stare up at the ceiling, he silently wished he could remember what his mind has retreated to off and on ever since he could remember dreaming. It's been a few months since the last time it's happened, but it always ends the same. Waking up with a feeling set deep in his chest, and truly knowing he shouldn't have woken up alone.