Chapter 1
The morning Izaya gets the call; the illness has already progressed so he watches the first black rose hitting the whiteness of the snow in a foreign country where it almost always snows. He had run, he had disappeared; but, Izaya wouldn't be Izaya if he could simply stop.
An invisible pull is what has always pulled him, tied him to him. So, he picks the black rose painted red with his own blood, and painted white with the color of snow; and, he puts it in a box to be delivered just because it feels like he needs to remind the monster that he still exists. He fears that if he wouldn't do it, the monster would forget who he is.
He cannot ever let that happen; and, after all, he is coming back today. So, he will get to personally deliver what has clearly become an omen of his death. They have called and if he is late, they will kill what is his. He can't simply sit and wait. The monster has looked for him, searched and poked until he found a dragon's nest. So, Izaya needs to go back and stop him before dragons take things into their own hands. So, he stands up from the bench, takes his already packed bag and goes back to Ikebukuro.
It hasn't crossed his mind that he would be late. He came running as fast as he could. However, Russia is miles away. Even after he runs from the train station and looks everywhere for him with a bag still in one of his hands and the box in the other, he is still too late. Or, perhaps, he is just in time to see, in a slow motion, like from an old black and white movie, how the monster, his monster, looks at him from afar as bullets pierce his chest.
The blood is everywhere. It is so red. It looks as if a painter took a red paint into the brush and splashed the whiteness of Shizuo's shirt.
Shizuo coughs, and, there is a blood dirty white rose beside him. It is too much blood that has already left his body and the stains on the whiteness of the rose is simply a cherry on the top of the cake. The last thing Shizuo does is smile and looks at the blood, but not his own. He looks at the blood that is buried deep into the color of Izaya's eyes.
Izaya has always thought that he will slay monsters. After all, that is what gods do. But in all of his years he had never thought that he will just lose it. The bag falls; and, then the box with black roses follows. He runs as he takes his knife and he can think only one thing. They hurt what was his to hurt, his to hate; what was his to break... his to love; they hurt his everything.
So, he runs; and, he stabs; and, he slashes until there is nothing left to stab or to slash. He falls on his knees; his face red with someone else's blood that he took; and, he is just in time to see the color of his monster's eyes just one more time. Shizuo closes them and coughs. White rose with blood stains falls near Izaya's feet as if it was a gift for the lives he took.
Shizuo is dying before his eyes and there is so much blood, so much more blood than it should be. Everything is red and he feels so much regret for leaving Shizuo alone. Now, it is just them in a dark alley with more than dozen Awakusu kai operatives laid down on the concrete floor, dead from Izaya's knife even if he said that he will never kill his precious humans. But, to him there is no need for remorse. They are simply beasts, dragons that needed to be butchered for taking what was his; even if they did it without knowing it.
He looks into almost dead eyes and beautiful face that coughs and coughs blood stained roses. Shizuo will suffocate; he will die if Izaya chooses to run now. And, even Izaya had thought that dying was ok if they die together, for each other, he just can't do it now. So, he smiles and his smile is so broken; and, like a broken glass should, it hurts. His eyes are watering and for the first time in his life he chooses honesty instead being selfish. So, he lets go of his ego.
He looks at Shizuo's limp body, almost unmoving, that lies in his arms. He holds it tighter, as tight as he can; and, he cries broken "I love you-s" and "please don't die-s".
Shizuo doesn't open his eyes; but, the white roses finally stop. Izaya can hear the ambulance coming as he begs all the gods and the other not to leave him. He just wants him alive and existing; all other things be damned. Nothing would ever matter again if Shizuo is not here. And, Izaya doesn't need to be a god; or Shizuo to be a monster. Izaya doesn't need to be there, and Shizuo can think about who ever he wants to think. He can forget that Izaya ever existed. Izaya just wants for Shizuo to be here; to be alive.
Two more months have passed. Shizuo isn't waking up, but he looks better. Izaya is right next to him. He doesn't leave his side. There are hundreds of black and bloody roses around Shizuo's bed. They are neatly packed in vases and baskets. Izaya sits in the chair. He looks too thin, too broken, with dark circles under his eyes. He doesn't talk if not to refuse to leave and he doesn't do anything except coughing the roses for the one he loves. He isn't sorry that he will die. He is happy that Shizuo won't go with him.
So, when no one is around, he smiles sadly and takes whatever time he has left to be with the only person he has ever loved, even if it is in complete silence and even if the clock always ticks away.