While time can never truly heal all wounds, it can certainly dull the pain caused by some of them. Izaya no longer felt his heart being crushed between monstrous hands each time he ran into Shizuo, but the brute was still very much capable of inflicting new wounds. The blood running down the side of his face served as a testimony to that fact, as did the dislocated shoulder Izaya doubted he could pop back into place by himself before Shizuo picked up his trail again.
But as the saying goes, when it rains it pours, Izaya had the misfortune of running into a few people who just so happened to have a strong grudge against him. "Is there a problem?" he chirped innocently even as he was being trapped in the middle of an alleyway by several men armed with switchblades and baseball bats.
"Orihara Izaya, as funny as always," the leader said, laughing along with his men for a good twenty or so seconds until he raised a hand and everyone stopped abruptly. "Not." Glaring at the informant, he began advancing towards him, fingers tightening around the bat he couldn't wait to slam into the bloodied head. "Clearly I'm not the only one who wants to bash your skull in," he remarked while pointing to the left side of his face, mirroring the informant's injury.
Sighing, Izaya flicked open his switchblade, slightly bent his knees and raised his right arm to chest level (it was a good thing he was ambidextrous), assuming a defensive stance. "Indeed, but you're clearly taking advantage of the situation."
"Wouldn't you?" the man asked as he too raised his weapon and gripped it tightly with both hands.
Momentarily forgetting about his dislocated shoulder, Izaya attempted to shrug, something he immediately came to regret when a fresh wave of pain flared from his shoulder and washed over his body. His face scrunched up in agony and a hiss slipped through his tightly clenched teeth (the blunder making some of the thugs closing in on him snicker), but he quickly hid his pain and forced a lazy smile on his face even as he fought to push back the dizziness threatening to get him killed by suddenly intensifying at such an inopportune time.
Izaya was obviously not in top shape, but he still easily evaded the leader's incoming attack, as well as the switchblade nearly piercing his side (wielded by one of the many underlings hoping to impress their boss by taking down the enemy), but he couldn't avoid the third attack manifesting in the form of a metal bat hitting his dislocated shoulder and violently propelling him into the wall. He cried out in pain, a scream that was cut short when the air was knocked out of his lungs by a vicious punch to his stomach. He crumpled to the floor, gasping for air that would not come while laughter he couldn't even hear because of the loud ringing in his ears boomed around him and reverberated across the alleyway.
Now looming over the fallen informant, the gang leader waited until Izaya could breathe again before he pushed the bat beneath the man's chin and forced his head up. "You don't always get to win," he gleefully taunted, hoping to see Izaya's defeated expression, but the corners of the informant's lips went up and the man grinned at him, the sight of those white teeth stained by blood making him see red with fury. "I'll show you!" he roared as he ruthlessly slammed his foot into Izaya's jaw, sending the already bleeding head crashing into the wall behind.
Izaya felt his brain rattle inside his skull at the impact and he nearly blacked out, a new wound opening in his scalp and more blood soaking his hair. The thug was spewing ridiculous insults meant to hurt him, but words coming from a lowlife meant nothing to someone like him. The only thing Izaya cared about was finding a way to get out of there so that he could pay Shizuo back for throwing a vending machine at him no more than fifteen minutes earlier, the dislocated shoulder and the head injury resulted from that encounter being the main reason why he was now at the mercy of a man who seemed determined to either kill him or beat him within an inch of his life.
"Oi, you still alive?" the man asked as he poked the bleeding head with the bat, the informant twitching and mumbling something indecipherable. Orihara Izaya was most likely trying to beg for his life, so the man leaned forward (hoping to hear him better) until his ear was right beside the informant's lips. "What? You want me to spare your miserable life?" he mocked, laughing.
"I s-said… don't move," Izaya hissed the command as he pressed the sharp edge of a throwing knife into the man's throat. He'd lost his grip on the switchblade when he hit the wall, the bastard he was now threatening having kicked it away before Izaya could retrieve it. In the grand scheme of things, it was a fortunate thing that he hadn't used his last throwing knife on Shizuo before he lost him and entered the alley. "And put the bat down, now!"
"Okay, you got it; putting it down now, slowly," the man assured his prey turned captor as he lowered his hand and placed the bat on the dirty ground.
Ignoring the black spots tainting his vision and the sensation of reeling threatening to send him plummeting to the ground, Izaya made sure not to lose his prisoner as he put all of his strength into getting up. He was surprisingly steady on his feet as he stood there in the middle of the alleyway, smirking at the foolish humans who'd thought he'd been defeated.
"Make way!" Izaya ordered the enraged underlings who seemed torn between attacking and getting out of the way. "Move or I'll slit his throat!" he threatened, but the crowd of thugs only parted when their boss ordered them to listen to "this bastard," as the man put it. Izaya's eyes drifted over to the switchblade he'd dropped earlier but they only lingered for a moment before he tore them away and stared straight ahead, knowing that he couldn't risk retrieving it.
Consoling himself with the thought that he had a couple more switchblades at home, Izaya walked out of the alley with his prisoner, telling the others not to follow if they wanted their boss back in one piece. He'd learned over the years that if he wanted something done, he'd have to do it himself. Waiting around and hoping to be rescued was not in his nature, which is why he always fought with everything he had to find a way out of every dangerous situation he found himself in.
"You've never been too smart, have you, Ma~tsu~da~? I mean, you had the advantage and yet look at you now~" Izaya quipped, enjoying his prisoner's enraged snarl. "Why yes, I do remember you," he chirped, doing his best to hide that he was one step away from losing consciousness. The blood loss was making it hard for him to maintain control over his limbs, and he had no doubts that Matsuda would not hesitate to attack him if the knife pressed against his throat started swaying. "You're nobody."
"Shut up," Matsuda growled, "I'll fucking kill—"
Instead of waiting for the man to finish spewing his threat, Izaya elbowed him on the side of his head as hard as he could, Matsuda hitting the hard surface of the wall they were walking next to and losing consciousness at the impact. Izaya himself nearly fell as well, but he leaned against the wall, lowered his head and closed his eyes, hoping to chase away the lightheadedness if he took a few moments to recover.
As soon as he was certain that he wouldn't pass out, he shoved the blade back into his pocket and pulled out his phone, slowly typing a message and sending it to Celty before moving away from Matsuda's unconscious form and heading towards the rendezvous spot. He tried to stick to alleys and side streets, but he still ran into a few people who either gasped or screeched when they saw him. He obviously didn't make a pretty picture with blood running down the side of his face, but luckily he soon met up with Celty who was already waiting for him at the designated spot.
[Shizuo?] she couldn't help but ask.
"Not all of them," Izaya answered weakly as Celty helped him get on the bike and secured him with her shadowy smoke. She then gingerly placed a helmet on his head and drove off, but not before messaging Shinra and letting him know that she was en route with an injured Izaya.