Shinra's head snapped back to Shizuo, and jerked forward to try the paddles again. Celty restrained him from behind, only able to keep him still as tears began to well in his eyes and the choked breathlessness in his voice echoed through the room.
"Let me go… please, Shizuo… I can still…"
He began to relax in her grip, dropping the paddles haphazardly on the crash cart and leaning against her. They clattered against the crash cart and brushed the floor, cords going slack with gravity. She rubbed his shoulders and turned back to Izaya, who was holding himself up against the doorframe.
"out…"
The mumble caught their attention.
"…I said, get out."
Celty started to pull the doctor out of the room, and all at once Shinra was back to protesting again. The droplets flowed freely from his cheeks now, catching the dim light as they fell. The Dullahan drew him into a loving, solemn embrace and closed the door. Besides the broken sobs that passed muffled through the door, the room was quiet except for one thing; Izaya could only take so much of the hollow sound, the loud, stretched "beeeeee" that would never end, and in a burst of anger he found his flickblade and stabbed the screen. The monitor short-circuited and was effectively silenced. He let the handle go quietly, leaving the knife embedded in the shattered shards of pirite.
No amount of the physical pain he'd just endured compared to the conflicting emotions that now afflicted him.
Izaya felt dizzy. This couldn't be real. Shizuo wasn't supposed to die. Monsters don't die. They were invincible, always ready to get back on their feet at the strongest attack. They were inhuman, they were impure, and they weren't supposed to effect from one as heartless as Izaya a feeling of sickening fear.
Seeing it for himself was a whole other matter.
Shizuo's hair, slightly faded in color and roots beginning to show signs of returning to brown, laid strewn under his head in a tangled mop. A cool, damp sheen was visible on his forehead and the lower curves of his neck. Those eyes were peacefully closed.
For good.
Izaya examined the room. Besides the potted plant having dropped from the window, everything else was intact: the posters, he assumed, that had been hung up by Erika and friends, and on the bedside table a half-eaten cake, neatly cleaned of the crumbs about the plate. The TV was opposite the bed but rarely used, judging from the dust that had accumulated on the remote.
Hadn't Shinra said that Shizuo was improving?
then why...
Izaya pursed his lips to stifle a small whimper he hadn't known could come out of his throat. Without another single word, Izaya drew the stool to the side of the bed, taking Shizuo's hand between both of his own, and pressed a thumb to the slope of his nose in the hopes of stopping tears.