A/N: Sorryyy for the delay! I had no internet at home the couple of days, hence I had to wait until I returned to my second apartment :(

I'm currently always updating the new dates for updates on my profile. So if some stuff happens (like no internet) it'll stand there!

Enjoy~

Chapter 18

Izaya couldn't help it. He felt desperate. Normally he would be chirping now. That's what he did whenever he had a nice talk with his best friend. But this time the talk hadn't been nice and his life wasn't really the best either at the moment. Though the raven almost couldn't feel the pain in his shoulder anymore, his whole body felt sore. And tired. At first he hadn't felt it, but now he noticed how weak his body actually appeared to him.

Weak. That was the best word to describe him. He couldn't protect his sisters. Hell, he couldn't do anything without Shizuo! It frustrated him! The bad thing was that he wasn't just angry at himself, but also at Shizuo for being so strong, for being granted a gift that Izaya would never possess. And whenever that thought crossed his mind, he would feel even worse, because he knew that Shizuo was just meaning well and that the blonde loved him.

For a while Izaya had thought too that he had loved the blonde, but then he thought again, that he felt really insecure at the moment, that his mind was a mess and that he couldn't really understand what was going on with it. Maybe he was just clinging to the next person that would give him some attention and take care of him? Maybe he was just using Shizuo? Maybe he would throw the blonde away as soon as his sisters were rescued and everything could go back to normal, after this fog in his brain would be finally removed? And the worst part was that Izaya felt guilt over everything of this when he thought about it. Whenever the blonde was close to him, holding him, spending him some warmth, he would just stop thinking and give into it. But as soon as Shizuo was gone, Izaya would think about it. The guilt would eat him from the inside. All he could think was that this wasn't like him at all. This wasn't him. The Izaya before his sisters had kidnapped, would have never fallen in love with Shizuo, would have never craved for the man's proximity, and over all would have never felt guilty for using the blonde.

After all Izaya had been playing with the blonde plenty before things went downhill.

Or could it actually be possible that he harbored some feelings for Shizuo and hadn't even noticed it?

An ironic smile appeared on his lips. What absolutely strange things had happened, just because they shared the same love for their siblings. If Shizuo wasn't thinking about Kasuka and if he wasn't a good guy from the bottom of his heart, he would have never done that. He would have never helped the raven after all the shit he had pulled on the blonde in the past. Hell, Izaya got him arrested! And even now, all he could think about was how unfair this situation was. His sisters never deserved this. They never deserved such a failure as brother, that couldn't even save them. If Shizuo was their brother, they would have been rescued ages ago. Shit! If Shizuo was their brother, they would have never been kidnapped in the first place. Because he wasn't pulling shit at other people out of curiosity how they could react. Shizuo wasn't a rich bastard that hurt people for his own sick pleasure. And even if he hurt them, they deserved it. Then they would never show up again, because they knew if they angered him, he could break all their bones at once.

Shizuo was amazing. He was gifted. And Izaya couldn't help but hate and love the guy at the same time for it.

He had tried talking about it to Shinra, but the doctor just wouldn't really be a big help.

"I've been thinking that this is absolutely not like me..." the raven had mumbled under his breath.

"You mean, acting all lovey-dovey with Shizuo Heiwajima? You're right. If someone had told me that a few years ago, I'd laughed at them and call them crazy." Shinra had answered with a sarcastic grin on his face.

"You know, I like it. This feeling, whenever Shizuo is close to me..." Izaya had hesitated to continue his thought, but he eventually figured, that he could trust his friend with it. "But I think this is undeserved, in various ways for me."

His eyes had fallen on his friend try to find something in the doctor's eyes. Maybe understanding? Maybe pity? He didn't quite know.

"This now is actually a lot like you." Shinra finally said with a serious tone. The raven had given a confused look. "You tend to overthink everything. What you do, what others do. What their motives are to do, what they do. And what your hidden motives are for what you do. You always think, there's something hidden, something deeper. Humans are complex, that's why it cant be easy." At this point the doctor had lowered himself in front of the raven and had taken one of his hand into his own. "But sometimes there's just one feeling. And sometimes this feeling is love. It's that simple."

The smile the doctor had shown him had made the raven shudder.

Even now the raven's fingers where circling over his hands unconsciously where the doctor had touched him.

A soft smile was creeping onto his face.

Sometimes it was that simple, ne~?

The raven turned around the keys and opened the door to his apartment.

He welcomed the silence for a second and closed his eyes.

The door fell into its ankles behind his back.

And suddenly he jumped in surprise, when his phone started ringing. Within the silence the sound was horribly loud and annoying.

The raven was close to just ignore the call, but then he saw the text on his phone.

Suppressed number.

Could it be-?

He gulped.

He pressed the button and held the phone to his ear. Waiting.

"Izaya Orihara"

His eyes widened. A distorted voice!

The raven immediately started breathing faster, when everything around him started spinning.

All he could hear was that voice. He was sure. It must be one of the kidnappers.

Izaya could hear the breathing on the other end of the phone, slowly, as if it was right next to his ear. Or was it his own breath that was getting to his brain?

"Yes?" he whispered, almost not able to hear what he was saying.

"Do you have the money?"

Izaya couldn't believe it. His head started spinning. Had it been a week yet? Or was this just a "friendly" reminder that he should hurry up? What if he had to hear his sisters scream again? The raven slowly started to panic, because he knew that it didn't matter. He would never be able to get that money. And if he said it now or later, his sisters would be done for!

How? HOW?! Then it struck him. What Simon had mentioned before! Just lie to them. Tell them, he had the money…

This sounded like a stupid idea. Hell, it was a stupid idea! And right now Shizuo wasn't here!

Izaya hesitated his teeth biting on his lip to calm him down.

He had to do it. This was the only way. He could save his sisters right now. The raven couldn't wait anymore. He couldn't endure anymore. Now or never.

"Yes." Izaya was surprised how steady his voice was. He had expected it to come out whispered or husky, but he sounded absolutely sincere and confident.

For a while, there was nothing on the other end. The raven wasn't even sure, whether he could still hear the sick breathing or not. It felt like eternity to him while he waited for the other one to reply.

"We will send you further instructions now to your phone. No police. You'll come alone."

The raven couldn't even reply anything before the call ended abruptly. He just stared at his phone in disbelief. That was it?! Nothing more?!

He waited a few seconds but nothing came. No message. At first he felt furious, that his plan apparently didn't work. Then this fury turned into panic. If the kidnappers really knew that he didn't have the money, what would they do to his sisters?!

The thought almost brought tears to his eyes.

The raven flinched when his phone finally made a sound signalizing that a message had come it. Izaya opened it hesitantly. It was an e-mail and it showed clear instructions on where to go, even with a map.

The raven couldn't believe it. He actually made it! He was so short away from saving his sisters!

A smile spread all over his face when he dialed Shizuo's number.

How would Shizuo react? The blonde would clearly rush and help him. But still, the raven was curious how the other one would want to approach it. Clearly Shizuo would just want to smash that place. It would be so much like him. A laugh left the raven's mouth while he waited for the blonde to take the call. And waited. And waited.

"Stupid protozoan!" the raven hissed after a whole minute. Shizuo probably had his phone silent, the battery was empty or he had destroyed it once again. Wouldn't be a surprise.

Izaya watched the time worriedly. The instructions also included a small time window he had to get there. Of course. If he took too long, the guys would think he had made a visit at the police station first. Izaya sighed in frustration. Those kidnappers weren't stupid. They had thought of everything. Now he couldn't even go out and search for the blonde.

The raven hurried towards his desk, pulling open a couple of drawers. He took out a pen and a piece of paper. His hand almost flew over it when he swiftly wrote some words including a description of the address to the debt collector hoping that he would come and read them in time. After all, Shizuo had mentioned that he had been free at first, but Tom just needed him for one job. He shouldn't take that long then.

He ran over to the desk in front of his couch and placed the paper on it in a way that the blonde should immediately see it. It was the only thing on the desk and was lying right in the middle of it.

Grabbing his jacket he shot one last glance into his apartment.

Why did it feel to him as if he would leave for a longer time? The raven gulped. This insecurity was indeed killing him. If the kidnappers wouldn't be faster. But thinking would bring him nowhere now. All he could do was to hope that the blonde would be here in time.

He left the door unlocked just in case.

Then he left.

"Don't get in debt, if you don't have the money in the first place!" Shizuo shouted when a baseball bat hit him on the forehead. Instead of starting to bleed the wood on the baseball bat crackled a little. The sound reached the attacker, who started to tumble backwards in shock. His eyes darted towards the now broken wood and then back to the blonde, who was seemingly unhurt.

"M-Monster!" he screamed just in the moment, when the blonde reached towards him and pulled him off the ground to swirl him into the next wall.

"Monster, huh?" Shizuo mumbled to himself, just slightly catching Tom's attention who was standing behind him.

The blonde had beaten a whole group of guys today. Apparently the target had been just the one with the baseball bat, but this one had been surrounding himself with a lot of troublesome guys. Shizuo could totally understand that Tom had wanted his help for this.

Though his mind had been somewhere else most of the time.

At first he had felt guilty that he had left the raven. Once again that was, though he had promised to stay at the raven's side. Then the first guy had started calling him a monster. It didn't bother him. It was an insult he got to hear all the time. But then another guy said it and Shizuo started to wonder. Was he a monster? Because whenever he thought about this word, he had to remember this "thing" from the morning. That demon or whatever that had taken place inside Izaya's body. With eyes as red as blood and an inhuman strength probably equal or even stronger than Shizuo's.

But that wasn't what made the blonde tremble in fear. And it was indeed fear. He hadn't wanted to admit it at first. But Shizuo was scared. He was unbelievable scared of this thing. It was evil in every fiber. He had felt it in the atmosphere surrounding it. As strange as it sounded, he had smelled it too. Evil didn't exactly had an own smell, but the blonde had noticed this foul scent, as if something long dead was in the room. He was sure if "evil" had a smell, this would be it. And then there had been this absolute ignorance about pain. Maybe it was even worse.

Shizuo had thought about this over and over again. At first he had been almost sure, that the demon was just so strong, that he didn't really notice the pain and hence had no problem with hurting himself. But then a different thought hit him. What if it could feel the pain, but had no problem with it, because he actually "liked" it? The blonde was sure that this thing took a sick pleasure from hurting others, but what if it was just as pleasurable for it to get hurt itself? It didn't matter who it was, as long as someone or something got hurt or destroyed. And this was what scared the blonde. The absolute absence of humanity. This wasn't human. It couldn't be.

"Shizuo?"

The blonde jumped in surprise when he heard his name and a hand touched his shoulder. He turned around to see Tom staring at him worriedly.

"What is it?" he asked a bit too fast.

"You've been really absent today. I'm just worried." His friend answered almost apologizing. He took his hand back from Shizuo's shoulder and stepped back.

The blonde sighed. Did he snap at his senpai and didn't notice it? His hand went to his hand covering his eyes for a second. The bright sun was giving him a headache. Was he acting strange? Compared to his usual self probably yes. Was he acting strange when it came to the events that had happened the last days? Izaya's sisters getting kidnapped that Shizuo cared for, him falling in love with the raven or probably just discovering a hidden love that had already been there before, just to get attacked by an enraged demon impersonating his new found lover trying the devour the blonde or at least trying to bite his arm off? Probably not. Actually Shizuo was surprised that he could still deal with it this calmly.

"It's just, a lot of stuff happened lately." He tried to explain. "Not only bad stuff. Something good happened, too. But mainly it's been bad stuff. And some really bad stuff happened just this morning. I'm still dealing with it." Tom already opened his mouth to ask but the blonde silenced him with his hand before he could do so. The blonde himself knew how stupid his explanation sounded. "Don't even ask. It's too hard to explain."

His friend just looked at him confused but then nodded.

"You know, you can always talk to me, Shizuo." He replied instead.

Shizuo smiled at the honest companionship. "I know. But I'm actually in a hurry today. If you don't mind I'll leave now."

Tom gave him a worried look but didn't contradict. "Okay. We're done here."

"I'll tell you everything once it's over. I promise." The blonde said feeling guilty. It felt as if he wasn't trusting Tom to help him. His friend already knew about Izaya's sisters, but he still couldn't tell him about this demon thing. It was just too … frightening. Most probably he wouldn't be able to do anything. The only one who would come to his mind for help would be Celty. After all, she was a kind of supernatural creature, too. So maybe, she knew something about this. Or Shinra or his father? Maybe Izaya had been able to find out something about this.

Shizuo needed to hurry home.

"Sure. See you." He heard his friend say. Shizuo's mind was already with the raven again. Absently he waved his goodbye and made his way towards Izaya's apartment.

He didn't even notice that his steps got faster the closer he got towards the apartment. He was feeling restless when the raven wasn't close to him. Shizuo couldn't really define it, but he needed Izaya to be close to him to know that everything was alright. He constantly had the feeling that something bad might happen whenever he wasn't close and that the blonde wouldn't be able to protect Izaya, once this time came.

He reached the apartment in no time.

He knocked the door quite violently. For him a wonder that it didn't break. It was probably due to Izaya's precautions from the past. The raven had a few apartments and Shizuo knew at least the most common ones. Of course, Izaya wasn't stupid. Back then, the blonde (of course just when the raven had pulled some shit again) would come by and try to kick in the door to kill the raven. At first it actually worked because apparently the raven didn't expect the blonde to find out where he lived. But after a while, the doors got thicker and harder to destroy and some security devices would immediately set off an alarm to get the police there in no time. Shizuo learned to hate closed doors.

When Izaya didn't open up, Shizuo got worried. More out of reflex he tried to open it. A bit surprised he learned that the door had been unlocked.

Immediately a bad feeling rose inside him.

"Izaya?" The blonde shouted storming inside the apartment. The living room was empty and the normally very clean working desk looked as if someone had rummaged through it.

Shizuo ran upwards into the bathroom and the bed room but all he could find was the mess they had left behind after the morning.

Growing desperate the blonde started looking under the desks and inside the closets.

"Come on, flea! That's not funny! Get out here!" he tried to calm himself with, but it didn't help. Once the horrible truth got to him, Shizuo felt as if someone had stolen every bit of air out of his lungs.

Izaya wasn't there.

Three chapters left :D