Author's Note: Enter Heiwajima Shizuo and Tom.
【Scratch where it itches】
More often than not, a lot of people underestimate Ikebukuro.
Those who do, get nicked.
It sadly ain't a petty scratch, but a full on amputation; and Tom Tanaka saw it all the time. He lost count of how many suckers walked into this place and left it without a leg, or a kidney, or worse—didn't leave at all. Sure, it's a city. Outward appearances mattered after all. Masked by false trepidation's, egged on by infomercials and fruity pamphlets, it incited eye candy into tourists and foreigners alike. So yeah, first and foremost it was part of Japan's eight central wards, and for all everyone else knew…it would stay that way.
However, before describing it as a place or even a home, Tom Tanaka saw it as a living, breathing thing. It has veins, channels that work to the edge of Toshima ward to its vocal point, Sunshine city. It has a voice that articulates itself in the form of cheesy TV advertisements, to the visualized red-light district. It has fingers that reach out to other countries in the world, and entice them to visit. And like all living things, it has a will and a way.
If it wants you to be happy, it'll help you along. If it wants you to find solace, it'll ensure your stay is peaceful. But if it wants you to be corrupted? Dragged into the filth that rests deep within its underbelly? Then you find yourself waist-deep in shit…
…and that was Tom's job.
To deal with the shit.
Sitting in a patrol car, parked near the alley of a popular arcade, Tom fanned himself against the scorching, summer heat. He's worked for the Ikebukuro Police Department for a consecutive ten years. Family business. His father retired just last year, so now he was basically in charge. And as much as he could get used to the violence, the shooting, even the troublesome chasing he's had to do during his stay, what he couldn't get used to were summers. Man was today a real cooker. He let out a loud sigh.
Windows down, and bubble-gum pop music playing, Tom watched his partner slam the door to the back seat open and throw someone in. After shutting the door, Tom felt the car rock as his companion sat down in the driver's seat, lighting a cigarette with a quick swish of his hands. A drawn out puff of smoke seeped through the open window of the car, dissolving into the air. It was channeled past chapped, pink lips, and a deeply etched scowl, and Tom knew his fellow officer was especially peeved under this sun.
Brushing a blonde hair behind his ear, Tom smirked as he heard his friend sigh just as irritated as he had a minute ago. They worked in tandem, he and his partner, though today seemed a little less quiet than usual since all they had to do was hunt some crook that robbed a little old lady of her purse. Though trust that it wasn't easy either since the guy ran like a race horse.
They probably chased the criminal a good three miles out before they cornered him, cuffed him, and his partner nearly broke the other man's legs. Now with the criminal sitting in the back seat, complaining about it being too hot, about being abused, etcetera—Tom knew his partner's patience was waning. Shizuo Heiwajima, his friend, and officer in arms since training could be a little on the temperamental side. The lady on the radio, squawking loudly about needing them on some scene, wasn't making Shizuo's already shit day any better. For the past five minutes they've been hearing the same over-repeated transmission.
"Officer's we've got a code green. Code green on 96th and Sunshine Street."
A click, and some static.
"Ikebukuro bank. There's a hostage situation. Possible robbery. Do you copy?"
Tom readied himself for the onslaught of slurs.
The women on the other end of the transmitter was new, so she didn't know any better. That saying anything to Officer Heiwajima, when he was in a bad mood, was like lighting a fire under an already burning kettle.
"Requesting immediate assistance. Code green on 96th and Sunshine street, I repeat, do you copy?"
With a harsh smack, the device was messily taken out of its cradle.
"I heard you the first time. We're on it," Shizuo snarled, scary enough to paralyze even the most dangerous offenders. The poor women let out something akin to a pig squeal before responding with a choked, A-alright. Tom chuckled, because she was probably having a heart attack right about now. Shizuo could be pretty intimidating, after all, but he swore to the highest heavens the guy had a heart of gold.
He just wasn't adept at showing it.
Slammed back into its socket with enough force to shake the vehicle, Tom watched Shizuo grunt and eye the transmitter like it was scum. "I swear, they think we're deaf." Shizuo muttered obstinately. The large man with bleached blond hair and blue sunglasses, tugged his police cap down.
"Sometimes these radios don't work, man," Tom pointed out. He tapped the device, "I think it's just protocol."
"Well, it's annoying." Shizuo responded with a huff. He snapped his cigarette in half and promptly tossed it out the window, into the nearest trash can.
Shizuo Heiwajima was a peculiar addition to the Ikebukuro police department. Though that in itself is an understatement since he's everything a cop shouldn't be. Ill tempered, aggressive, and quick to make rash decisions, Tom couldn't count on hand how many times he's had to stop his partner from practically chucking vigilantes across the span of a football field, or had to tell him it wasn't okay to stick them to a lamppost—because that could get them law suits.
They've known each other since high school, though Tom was a few years ahead of Shizuo, a senior at the time. Back in the day, Shizuo—as he could best describe him—was misunderstood. A lot of people would pick fights with the guy because of some rumors back in middle school - about him being a monster with super strength. And when they did? Well, they'd end up in the hospital with more than a few broken ribs and a fractured jaw, that's for sure. Trust Tom didn't feel sorry for them, but when he did witness Shizuo throwing an underclassmen across a fence, it was surprising to say the least.
This only fueled the speculations about Shizuo being some menace.
From then on people would avoid him, and Tom witnessed him throwing his fists around every day. Everyone was gossiping he was bad news. Tom admits, he was kind of an odd one himself, so he never really fell into the trends or listened to the rumors. One day, he just approached Shizuo, started talking to him and found he was just a peaceful dude trying to make it by.
Shizuo was as harmless as a puppy, so long as you didn't piss him off. That abnormal strength of his just made it difficult to appear normal to people.
"Shinra told me it's like an adrenaline rush to the brain, I think," Shizuo said at the time. "But I really don't care what it is…I don't like violence, Tom." Tom could only nod his head then, and stare mutely at the ground.
Later Tom found out Shinra was Shizuo's childhood friend, who later grew up to become one of Japan's finest medical surgeons. Shizuo, who graduated soon after and was wafting from job to job, didn't know what he wanted to do.
Tom heard he got fired from several establishments. Even got pissed at a customer and threw a cash register at him in a grocery store. So when Shizuo lost that job, Tom decided to swing by.
There he asked one particular question.
"You still don't like violence?"
Shizuo stared at him with an indistinguishable look in his eyes. The sound of rain pitter-pattered against the hard, cold pavement of a convenience store parking lot. There was a lengthy silence before.
"No." He said softly, taking off his uniform and tossing it to the ground. "I don't."
Tom gave a small smile.
"Well…how do you feel about joining the police force?"
Shizuo slammed one hand against the radio. "…Tom, can you turn that music off?" He growled under his breath. Tom gave a sly smile before he rolled up his window.
"Why? It's the hottest song to hit the charts these days. Really hip with the kids, apparently."
"Well it's giving me a migraine…" Shizuo mumbled, strapping his seat belt on. Tom turned off the station and did the same, switching the police sirens on and looking to Shizuo for their next move. From that moment, Shizuo used his strength for meaningful purposes. Yes, he was everything a policeman shouldn't be. But his defects were his strengths. He's the most efficient cop Tom, more so Japan, has ever seen; and having rounded up over one hundred criminals in just his first month in the line of duty, Shizuo was a force to be reckoned with. Though there were a few things he could work on, composure being one of them.
"So, guess we've got a hostage situation, huh? Looks like we've got our hands full today. Exciting stuff."
Shizuo gave him a clueless look.
"We do?"
Tom shook his head in disappointment.
"See? This is why the nice lady was repeating herself," Tom mumbled. "She was just doing her job."
"Hey, you!" A raspy voice interrupted from the back. Tom turned around to see that the purse stealer was staring at the back of Shizuo's head, obviously livid about how he was shoved into the car. "I know my rights. You think you can just manhandle me like this, almost break my arms tough guy? When I get my lawyer, your ass is toast, ya hear?! I'm gonna get you fired, you damned shit-head."
"Where's it at again, Tom?" Shizuo asked, promptly ignoring the idiot. Tom knew this was going to be a bumpy ride. He squinted his eyes, and looked at the nearest street sign, pointing to it.
"Two blocks from here, turn right on this street."
"Got it."
Shizuo slammed his foot on the gas pedal and the criminal jerked forward.
"Hey!" The man cried. His hands slammed against the metal gate that separated the perp and the officers. "That hurts!"
Shizuo looked back. The two individuals locked eyes. "Yeah? Well," Letting a grin grace his lips, Shizuo revved the engine and they whizzed down the street. "Blame the fuckers that decided to rob a bank today."
"Okaaaaaaay!"
Here Mikado was.
"Now, would you please give our lovely assistant a round of applause?!"
Utterly perplexed by the turn of events, Mikado watched the request be met with awkward looks, and cautious hands, limply smacking together. Faces, a mix between shock and pity, peered at Mikado while he was deciding whether he was being hounded by a bunch of robbers, or a group of very enthusiastic philanthropists. They were wooing the crowd well and no longer was anyone crying, but rather laughing with their captors turned entertainers.
"You know, if I weren't robbing this bank, I would definitely be robbing your heart," The ring leader with the exceptionally bold tongue slyly quipped, and Mikado watched him skip across the room, wiggling his eyebrows at one of the bank's tellers. The business women in a very short skirt was his target, and tousling her luscious, crimson locks over her shoulder with a giggle, she rolled her eyes. Swaying her hips in a lucrative manner, the thiry-something year old turned away but hummed to herself.
"Mmm, maybe in ten years, kid."
This was starting to become highly inappropriate.
Mikado could point out a list of things wrong with this scene. Was this supposed to be a joke?
"You can have my number stud," Another of the bank's employee's cat called, and Mikado's mouth hung open stupidly. For having the IQ of a certified genius, he in all his intellect, couldn't comprehend what was going on.
One minute he was being pushed towards the vault, over the counter, his feet dragging as he went and his face paler than a ghost's sheet on Halloween - and the next? He was watching in mute disturbance as his captor—as well as the evening's entertainer—was turning this whole hostage situation into a circus. Laughs and all.
"So where ya from, hottie?"
"You're quite the cutie."
"Haha. You like Three-way stand off? Me too!"
The people in yellow scarves were chatting away with their "hostages," and Mikado was beginning to feel disoriented. Meanwhile, Kida actually pulled out his phone, and to Mikado's incredulity, took down a few of the women's numbers. He felt his jaw drop a few more levels. If this was reality, and not some lewd scene out of a highly pedonistic porno, he was finding it very hard to distinguish the two. He shook his head in a vain effort to wake himself up before turning back towards the vault.
While everyone was joking around and making friends with their savior turned captors, the young man was trying to think of a subtle way to steer the robbers in a direction that wasn't conducive to their cause.
Mikado shut his eyes. He had to think. Think. Maybe if he just said that before he was bluffing, they would believe him? Besides, he was sixteen. No one here knew he was actually in college, except Anri, so it was plausible that he, being a teenager, could have just been boasting to impress the lovely girl next to him.
Mikado decided he would run with that.
"Sooo…how about that code?" Kida's voice chirped from behind him, and Mikado actually squeaked in surprise. How did he get there so fast when just a minute ago he was peeking up an employee's skirt?
"Ah. The code? Well, u-uhm…you see," the brunet swallowed. He could do this, he told himself. It was just a white lie. There was no way Kida would see through it, right? "I actually…really don't know it." Mikado said steadily. Alright. Almost there.
"I was just bluffing before...because she was watching." He continued to mumble. Embarrassedly he glanced at Anri, trying to make his voice convincing. "It isn't like I'm a genius or anything. Besides, Kida, that would be ridiculous, right? I'm sorry, for lying." Mikado didn't even know why he was the one apologizing here, but he hoped that he sounded sincere enough that it would get him out of this jam
Kida remained silent for a few, tense seconds.
Then he smiled wide.
"Don't sweat it." The boy laughed, smacking Mikado playfully on the shoulder. The college student's body practically slumped with relief. It worked? Ah, Mikado was so happy he got himself out of this without getting bludgeoned to death! He timidly smiled back at Kida, realizing now that he was in the clear.
"Thank you."
"I mean, it isn't like this." There was a swish of the hand. A square, plastic picture, held between the thumb and forefinger of glowing, milky skin appeared. "Is yours, am I right?" Kida's lips curved upwards into the most sadistic grin Mikado's ever seen, and his stomach dropped.
Mikado patted his pockets, noticing that his wallet was gone. Which meant…
"How...did you get that?"
His Raira ID.
"Sticky fingers, Mikado," Kida practically sing-songed, wiggling his hands in a motion to emphasize his point. "I don't only use my hands for pleasing the ladies. I'm actually quite skilled in the art of item preservation!" Item preservation? Did he mean thievery?
"I'm just so hurt!" Kida finished with a wail. "To think, we were becoming such good friends too. Yes! Just moments ago, we were engaging in such an intimate, heavy conversation over a certain goddess's D-sized rack. Didn't you feel the strength of our bond? The connection?"
At the time, all Mikado felt was concerned.
"Ah, cruel fate's a man in women's clothing!" Kida continued on and he flicked the card at Mikado's chest, then swayed dramatically to the left. It was a miracle the other didn't hit something. "But it seems I was right about before. You're my age, and in college no less? You really are the professor of nerds!"
Mikado felt his eye twitch.
"Those weren't your exact words."
Kida chuckled. He placed a hand on Mikado's shoulder and leaned in.
"Well, you weren't exactly truthful." Kida murmured against the brunet's ear, his hot breath fanning over the flesh of Mikado's cheek, causing him to recoil with something unfamiliar.
Feeling himself shiver, Mikado's face flushed pink when Kida pulled away. They locked eyes. Kida's large, yellow irises, burned into his questioning blue ones. Then suddenly, as the moment happened, it passed; and a song played. A loud, fruity melody, that had had Kida stiffening, straight as plank. The obstructing tune that rang in the bank made Kida's face morph from deep thought, to noticeable anxiety.
"…Shit." He cussed.
Mikado, still slightly dazed watched a conflicted look etch onto the others features, then Kida pulled out an orange cell. He quickly brought it to his ear. Begrudgingly, Kida clicked the call button.
"Hello?"
Mikado snapped out of whatever trance like state he'd been in—was it claustrophobia? Shock?—before a voice, loud and lethal like a toxin, dripped through the receiver.
"Is there a problem, Masaomi?"
Kida winced.
"None at all," He answered, his voice noticeably cracking. "Everything's going well. You should't have had to call."
Masaomi? Mikado overheard it and ran the name through his head. Masaomi Kida was his full name, then. He looked to Kida for answers but received none. He was disturbingly tense for someone who was so full of life. Mikado found that it didn't suit him, but he stayed quiet enough to eavesdrop on the rest, curious as to who would make him nervous like this.
Grinding his teeth together, Kida hissed a harsh, "Well? What do you want?"
The voice on the end of the phone laughed.
"Oh, nothing. Can't a concerned friend check up on your progress?"
"I didn't realize you were capable of concern…Izaya." Kida spat mockingly. The name was said with bile and fists clenched and unclenched, as if he were trying desperately hard not to scream. Mikado stared rather dumbfounded. Clueless as to what was going on, and kind of…what's the right word? Intimidated of whomever was making Kida react this way. This Izaya person was obviously not someone Kida liked.
"There are a lot of things about me that might surprise you."
Kida rolled his eyes at that.
"I think I know enough."
"Ah, but that's where you're painfully wrong, Masaomi." Somewhere, in some office, devilish lips curved into a taut sneer. "If you knew enough, you wouldn't be in this predicament now would you?"
Kida's breath hitched, and Izaya took that moment to chide the delinquent's ignorance with a soft tutt of his lips. His voice became low and expectant as the next sentence made Mikado's heart race. "Have you succeeded in opening the vault?"
Kida avoided Mikado's wandering orbs like the plague. "I'm getting too it." Kida answered on autopilot, all cheer and pep from earlier devoid from his vocal chords. Mikado heard it loud and clear. The person on the phone asked about the vault, so that meant hek new what was going on. Which meant, Mikado could only hypothesize, that whoever was on the phone might have been the brains behind this operation. Or at least, helped organize it.
With his face fixated on the ground, Kida bit his lip. His shoulders stayed hunched, almost trembling, and it looked like Kida was waiting for whoever this mastermind was, to hang up before he started screaming.
"I'll be out of here soon," Kida reassured Izaya, but it sounded more like he was reassuring himself.
"Well I have no doubt you'll succeed., Izaya chirped. "If you do everything I instructed."
"It'll be done," Kida said almost resignedly.
"Good boy."
Mikado found he really hated how patronizing he sounded.
Maybe the college student felt even more inclined to sympathize, considering Kida was his age, yet involved in something so incriminating to his future. But none of this settled right. How someone as lively as Kida was clammed up like this. He thought for a moment, how much fun Kida would be if he were just a normal kid. Not delving in stuff like this. Just what kind of trouble had he gotten himself into? What drove him to this point? Mikado was drawn to him for reasons that went beyond curiosity and he couldn't quite place it, because destiny and fate were clichés, and he'd never entertain the concept of them.
"Seeing as my dear Officer Shizu-chan is going to be here soon, it would behoove you to work a little more quickly."
"I'm on it."
Mikado just knew it wasn't in his colorful personality to blindly follow orders like this.
"Unless you no longer care about what happens to…-haha, well I don't need to spell it out now, do I?" The voice said humorously, and Mikado blinked. That sounded…almost like a…"But just remember, Masaomi. Where your priorities are."
Kida's voice became urgent. "I do!" He insisted with surprising force, now holding the phone with both hands. "I do remember! J-just…give me some time. Haha. Alright? It'll be done."
Mikado watched Kida swallow thickly, and traced the curvature of his adam's apple, appearing and disappearing behind a smooth pasture of skin.
Kida nodded his head, albeit no one but Mikado was around to watch him. "It'll be done." He repeated one last, desperate time. The voice seemed satisfied with that answer, because clapping could be hear beyond the static that followed.
"Very good."
Kida released a much needed breath.
"I'll see you soon then, Masaomi."
A promise.
A click.
Those words hung in the air, heavy and burdening like a ship anchor. Mikado never felt so relieved to hear a dial tone, but he noticed Kida's face looked stone cold. The arm Kida used to answer his device, fell limply to the side. Mikado could do nothing but watch all the light from the teen's eyes disappear, to be replaced with something raw. A black canvas of hopelessness, Mikado thought he only witnessed in horror movies.
Faintly, Mikado heard the sound of police sirens. He decided to speak out.
"…U-Uh…Kida…?" He watched himself call.
He didn't know what drove him into doing so, but it was probably a bad idea. Mikado placed a hand on Kida's shoulder for whatever reason. He didn't even know if it was because he felt bad, or if it was to simply reassure him of an unknown idea that needed reassurance, but he wasn't surprised when he received no response, because it looked like the bandit leader just…shut down. Mikado realized how odd this situation was truly turning out to be. Here he was, trying to comfort the same person who was attempting to rob everyone. It just he wasn't used to seeing someone so…destroyed."Kida are…you okay?" Mikado asked seriously, ignoring the stares from the other occupants who were watching him from the corner of the bank.
Kida suddenly came to life with a start.
Mikado wasn't prepared for it. Kida let out a chuckle, but it lacked the true humor from before. It was wrong somehow. Mikado's gut told him he should step away.
"Sorry, about this…"
"S-sorry?" Mikado echoed. "About…what-…?"
Before he could so much as twitch, the barrel of a gun he didn't know Kida had was aimed directly at Mikado's face.
Mikado couldn't react.
Not when Kida was staring straight through him.
"But I can't afford to mess around anymore…Open the vault."
The gun cocked.
