Durarara: Family Resemblance
Aug. 5th, 2010 09:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
what_we_dreamTitle: Family Resemblance
Series: Durarara
Pairing: None
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Tom spends more time looking after Shizuo than Shizuo does looking after him. Despite that, he still can't control his employee.
Tom thinks, rather frequently, that despite Shizuo’s position as his bodyguard it is in fact Tom who does most of the guarding. He’s the one who ends up having to protect his clients from his own hustler, the one who ends up protecting the neighbourhood and public property from his hustler, the one who ends up protecting his hustler from himself. Except that it never really works out, because Heiwajima Shizuo doesn’t listen to anyone. Doesn’t even listen to his own common sense. Tom’s become quite efficient at filling out witness reports, on the rare occasion anyone has the balls to lay charges.
Shizuo unstable temper makes him a frankly terrible employee in many ways, but he tries to make up for it with those of his actions which he can control. He works damn hard at it, despite his apparent slack attitude – there aren’t many people willing to employ someone who sooner or later is bound to wreck any environment and Shizuo has cause to know it. He’s never drunk, he’s never lazy, and he’s never late.
Which is why, when he doesn’t show up for work today and doesn’t answer his phone, Tom checks the hospitals first. And then the police stations. And then, finally, Shizuo’s apartment. And comes up blank.
Ikebukuro’s a big city, but Tom knows most of the movers and shakers. The fact that his name is tied to Heiwajima Shizuo’s is a major factor; his employee is immeasurably more famous than him. By the afternoon, word has spread. By dinner, he has an ID: Yagiri Pharmaceuticals van, licence number. By mid-evening, a location.
Ikebukuro, like all the cities that make up the hulking behemoth of Tokyo, has its own feel. Less flashy than Shinjuku, less pretentious than Shibuya. Busier than Ueno, less so than Harajuku. Tom drives through the crowded streets, passing sidewalks crammed with school kids moving from club activities to juku or karaoke clubs, businessmen going home to dinner and women doing evening shopping.
Some group of kids has found the van while looking for someone else entirely, as far as Tom understands from the report that reaches him through three degrees of separation. When he turns into the condemned parking-lot he’s been directed to, he notices that while there is a van in it, it’s not marked with the Yagiri Pharmaceuticals logo.
The parking lot’s a wreck. Its concrete is crumbling, floor full of potholes and walls covered in graffiti. The large pillars supporting the ceiling have been scored by the dull blades of generations of short-lived street gangs, simple messages carved out in sharp, slanted lines.
The electricity to the parking lot has long since been cut off, but as Tom kills the engine and his headlights die along with it he notices the flashlight glow from over near the other parked van. He slips out quietly, phone in one hand and the knife he hasn’t had to take out of his pocket since he hired Shizuo in the other. The light, he sees as his eyes adjust, is being focused on one of the pillars. That’s as much as he takes in before it’s turned into his face, the diffuse glow harsh and blinding when shone right into his eyes. He throws up a hand, phone flipped open with 119 on the screen and his thumb on the dial button.
“Who’s there?” asks a defensive voice, a young man. And then, before he has time to consider an answer, “Ah, Tanaka-san? You were the one looking for Heiwajima-san?”
The light is lowered but his retinas are still burning with the afterimage, and he takes an uncertain step forward while blinking furiously. “Yeah,” he answers, easing his finger cautiously off the smooth button. And then, as he chalks in a line between the van and the voice, “Kadota-kun?”
His eyes are recovering fast, and his steps find certainty as he heads towards the yellowish glow. He begins to be able to pick out the details of the scene outside the immediate pool of light, and feels his teeth begin to clench as he does. The four kids, Kadota and his gang, are standing around a pillar. There’s a loose chain lying on the ground and a man sitting casually in their centre, rubbing at the inside of his left arm. Orihara Izaya. His eyes are strangely large, shining like a cat’s, pupils huge and black.
“What’s going on? Where’s Shizuo?”
The kids glance at each other, faces closed. Tom’s been doing his job long enough that he can recognize the look without thought, feels his shoulders tense under the weight of it. We’re afraid to tell you.
“Shizu-chan’s right over there,” drawls Orihara, nodding with puppet-like jerkiness into the shadows. Tom doubts he’s ever in his life been afraid to give anyone bad news; probably he cultivates opportunities to do so.
Tom follows his indication, Kadota reluctantly swinging the light over to run across the cement and fetch up against the pillar standing as a mirror to the one Orihara’s sitting against. By the time the beam reaches it, the glow is dull at best. Tom’s first thought is: ragdoll. Then there’s just the sharp, bitter taste of anger and fear mixed with each other.
In the low light thick chains glint like dirty coins and dyed blond hair shines like false gold. Shizuo’s been chained to the pillar from his shoulders to the bottom of his ribcage, long legs splayed out in front of him, head drooped low over his chest.
Tom grabs the flashlight and crosses the distance in a span of time that has no place in his memory. He’s simply beside Kadota one minute and Shizuo the next, on his knees to yank at the chains pulled tight enough to bruise at the least. There is dried blood on Shizuo’s neck, rusty blooms against pale skin in the harsh contrast of the flashlight. Tom reaches out to it.
The man’s head snaps up so fast Tom actually falls back onto his ass in shock, flashlight clattering as it hits the ground. From the shadows behind him Orihara’s voice drifts over, his tones mocking. “Ah, Tanaka-san, I wouldn’t let him go just yet. He seems to have had a bad reaction to the serum they gave us. Probably his ridiculous adrenaline flaring up again.”
Shizuo’s fighting against the chains, snarling incoherently as he kicks and twists furiously. His breath is coming in short, laboured pants, face contorted in a level of rage Tom’s never seen. He’s nearly foaming at the mouth as he struggles and shouts, chain links clinking quietly against each other. Even Shizuo needs leverage or grip to exert his strength, and with the whole of his spine and his arms trapped flat against the pillar he has none.
“Shizuo! Oi, Shizuo! Calm down! Calm down!” Tom has both hands on the man’s struggling shoulders, trying to press him back into the pillar to keep him from crushing his arms and ribs against the unforgiving chains, but Shizuo never listens to him in his rages and now’s no different.
“Maa, don’t worry Tanaka-san. He’ll pass out from lack of oxygen soon enough.”
Tom can hear Orihara smiling, grits his teeth as his lips turn involuntarily. The sound of the coordinator’s voice affects Shizuo as it always does, and he throws himself with renewed force against the chains, raging mindless as a mad dog. Tom doesn’t turn, doesn’t let go of Shizuo’s shoulders. “Just get the hell out of here. Kadota. Get him out of here.”
There’s a muffled conversation; someone asks, “But what –” and is cut off shortly. The consensus is reached quickly.
“Do you want us to call for help, Tanaka-san?” asks Kadota, with a thin veneer of calm. Tom can hear the pain under it.
“No, I’ll handle it. Just go, please.”
Just get Orihara the hell out of here, before Shizuo gives himself a heart-attack.
There’s no reply, not even from Orihara thankfully, because Tom couldn’t let that go and he knows he doesn’t have the power to fight the man. Just the quiet shuffling of footsteps and then the rumble of an engine.
In front of him, the now red-faced Shizuo gives a choking gasp and passes out, head dropping heavily. Tom’s relief is razor-edged, slices painfully into his gut as it spreads. He sighs, and tries to think. Calling the cops or an ambulance will just get more people hurt, and Shizuo will probably be one of them. But there’s no chance of him being able to restrain the man on his own, and until he can he can’t let him go.
A man who can restrain Heiwajima Shizuo. It’s a puzzle. Simon probably could – at least, if Shizuo were in his normal state, although with the way he is now all bets are off – but Tom doubts he could pull Simon away from his job. Besides, bringing someone out to physically restrain the injured man just feels… wrong. Shizuo needs someone to snap him out of his rage, not more chains. There’s only one person Tom can think of who might be able to do that, and he doesn’t have his number.
Even unconscious, Shizuo’s still taking quick, uneven breaths. But he doesn’t wake as Tom checks his pants pockets. By some miracle his cell phone is still there.
The tiny lit screen glows merrily in the gloom as he flips through Shizuo’s contacts list, searching for the name he hopes is there. He flicks through, scrolling faster and faster as he nears the bottom and desperation beginning to pour in thick and cold: it has to be here, it has to be here. If it’s not, he doesn’t know what he’ll do. Damn Shizuo. Damn Orihara. Damn whoever got them into this whole mess.
He’s clutching the phone so hard he’s slightly surprised the casing isn’t cracking by the time the sidebar is reaching the bottom, muttering to himself under his breath. Come on, come on, come on.
Yes!
There, completely out of alphabetical order at the very bottom of the list, is the name he’s been looking for. Tom takes a deep breath, and presses send.
He tries to think about what he’s going to say, how to phrase this, how to explain, but all he can think of is this ridiculous situation. Squatting in an abandoned parking lot next to his employee who’s been chained to a pillar, sliding in and out of murderous rage. Completely ridiculous. The rings slide away into the past while he reflects on it. And then, before he’s ready, there’s a click.
“Hello?” says the quiet voice on the other end.
“Ah, Heiwajima Kasuka-san?” says Tom, blinking. There’s a pause. And then,
“Who is this?”
“Tanaka Tom. I guess you could say I’m your brother’s employer,” he says, then berates himself for the qualification. A longer pause. And then,
“He’s in trouble,” says the soft voice, flatly. Tom smiles. Shizuo’s brother indeed.
“Yes. I’m sorry to ask, but could you come?”
“The hospital or the police station?” There’s a level of resignation there that hurts, or maybe it’s just indifference. Tom’s never met Shizuo’s brother, has only seen him from afar or on the big screen, but he rarely shows emotion there even in the worst of situations.
“Neither,” replies Tom, and gives the location of the parking lot.
There’s another pause, this one harder than the others, with sharp edges. “Tanaka-san, I’ll say this frankly. How much money will I need?”
Tom sighs, and smiles wryly. “Heiwajima-san, this isn’t the kind of help a movie star can give. It’s the kind a younger brother can.”
For the first time, he hears a sign of expression in the voice on the other end of the phone. Of intensity. “I understand. I can be there in half an hour. No – twenty minutes.” There’s a click, and then the regular beeping of a dead line. Tom snaps the phone closed and nods. Stands and goes to see how hard the chains will be to get off.
----------------------------------------
He’s been sitting on the hard ground beside his unconscious employee for long enough that his ass is getting sore when Heiwajima Kasuka shows up.
The young man comes without any fanfare, which doesn’t surprise Tom, but also comes alone, which does. He simply walks up the in-ramp, a shadow in a night of shadows, and says, “Tanaka-san?”
Tom turns the flashlight to point across the floor towards him, lighting his way.
Kasuka doesn’t look much like his older brother. Part of it may be the hair and the age, but there’s also a distinct lack of expression, a kind of permanent disinterest which is one of the young man’s most recognizable aspects and key selling points while simultaneously being so totally opposite from his brother. Shizuo isn’t always angry, but he’s never apathetic. Still, when the young actor sets his eyes on his older brother, Tom sees the flash of reaction there. Of shock, and hurt, and anger. And then they’re all gone and he’s kneeling beside Shizuo’s long legs with a calm face.
“What’s going on here, Tanaka-san?” He doesn’t look at Tom, but doesn’t reach out for his brother either. Just stares, taking it all in quietly.
“I’m not quite sure myself. As far as I understand Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were grabbed by Yagiri Pharmaceuticals – I don’t know why, or how. Knock-out gas, maybe.” Tom’s had a while to think about it. “They gave them something, again, I don’t know what. But the drug, and being in the same room with Orihara and unable to do anything about it…” he trails off. Kasuka nods, once. “He was awake for a while, but the chains were too tight for him to breathe and rage, and he passed out. Until I’m sure he’s not going to go on a rampage, I don’t want to let him go.”
Making him not much better than the bastards from Yagiri, or Orihara. The same results, born from different objectives.
But Kasuka nods again, and if he has similar thoughts they don’t show on his blank face. “Tanaka-san, can I ask you a favour?”
Tom starts. “What? Sure.”
“Could you go buy a bottle of milk, please? There’s a convenience store just down the street.”
Tom gapes for a minute, then shuts his mouth. The kid must want to be alone with his brother, must want to talk to him privately. He nods. “Sure. I’ll be right back.”
“Thank you.”
----------------------------------------
There is, as Kasuka said, a convenience store near by – 7/11. Tom wanders in and browses the magazine selection before picking up the bottle of milk he’s been sent for. It feels strange, feels downright wrong to be light-heartedly inspecting this week’s magazines while Shizuo’s chained up down the street, but the kid deserves a few minutes to deal with the situation.
He pays for the milk and walks back, re-enters the dark parking lot and heads for the yellow glow. And then hears Shizuo, raging wordlessly against his chains again. He’s losing what little of his voice he has left, throat sounding dry and ragged as he yells and snarls like an animal. Tom crosses the remainder of the distance in a run, kneels down and drops the milk thoughtlessly to help Kasuka restrain his brother.
But as soon as Tom returns, Kasuka lets go of Shizuo’s shoulders and turns. Picks up the milk he brought and tips the flashlight so that it’s lit clearly in the gloom. Moves it until he’s holding it directly in front of Shizuo’s face and stares at him intently.
And, as Tom watches in amazement, Shizuo’s struggles slowly die back. The shouts and growls fade away and his legs drop back to the floor. He collapses back against the pillar, breathing hard with his head thrown back so that Tom can clearly see the smeared bloodstains on his strong neck, dried unevenly over the knotted muscles standing out like wires under his pale skin. Kasuka opens the milk and, when Shizuo drops his head back down to stare at them blearily, lifts it so that his brother can take a drink of it.
He hasn’t, Tom realises, said one word to him.
----------------------------------------
They unchain Shizuo with relative ease, the ends of the chain being linked at the back by knotted rope. Kasuka sits next to him, forearm pressed laxly against his brother’s shoulder to keep him from falling forwards while Tom kneels behind the pillar and pulls away the long length of chain hand over hand as if raising a flag. Shizuo doesn’t seem up for much talking, sits with surprising passivity while Tom releases him, doesn’t say more than a dozen words to either of them. It’s clear he’s far from all here.
They help him to the car together, Shizuo’s long legs shaking and unsteady, his arms heavy over their shoulders. Kasuka goes into the back with him, shoves him over with the same bland expression until his brother has left him enough room to sit in, and then closes the door. Shizuo hardly objects, but whether that’s the drugs or a facet of their relationship he can’t tell.
In the front seat, Tom adjusts the mirror to be able to see the two men sitting in the back seat, and then starts the engine.
“Where are you going?” asks Kasuka quietly, eyes flashing to Tom’s in the mirror.
“I was going to take him to my apartment. I can keep an eye on him there.”
“No,” says the younger man, showing the first hint of a man used to getting his own way Tom’s seen in him. “Take him to his. I can watch him.”
“Don’t need watching,” slurs Shizuo, head lolling on his brother’s shoulder. They both ignore him.
“Alright,” agrees Tom, partially because he doesn’t need Shizuo wrecking his apartment and partially because he thinks it will do the man good to spend some time with his brother. As far as he knows, Shizuo hasn’t seen him since he started working for Tom.
Shizuo slides progressively further into sleep as they drive on, head lower every time Tom glances back, Kasuka twisting further and further to keep his ungainly brother from sliding off the seat. If Shizuo ever decides to buy a car, or at least a domestic one, he’ll have a damn hard time. But, reflects Tom with a weary smile, since he’d probably end up throwing it at some jaywalking pedestrian the second week in, it would hardly matter.
The night traffic isn’t too bad, and they make Shizuo’s apartment building in less than twenty minutes. Tom parks on the street and hurries around to help. Kasuka pulls up the hood of his jacket.
They wrestle Shizuo into the elevator after several false-starts, Tom pressing the button while Kasuka asks his brother if he has his key.
“’Course,” answers Shizuo, possibly trying for affronted but managing only a kind of drunken assurance.
“Where is it?”
“Pocket.”
“Get it.”
Tom watches the exchange out of the corner of his eye, watches Shizuo fumble for his pocket for a minute, watches Kasuka give up and fish it out for him. Tries not to smile.
Shizuo’s apartment is small and clean and bare, some coloured bottles in the modern kitchen lending a splash of brightness to that room, and a few worn posters on the wall in the bedroom beyond breaking up the blank walls. They put Shizuo down on a kitchen chair and Kasuka stands by to keep him from tipping himself off while Tom goes and lays out his employee’s futon and covers. The low table in the bedroom, holding Shizuo’s computer and phone, also has a few picture frames on it. One of a group of boys in Raira uniforms; the other two of a young Shizuo and even younger Kasuka, both staring ambivalently at the camera. Tom smiles, and goes back to fetch them.
“Do you want me to stay?” he asks, when they’ve got Shizuo lying in his bed. He’s already asleep, sweating slightly with a low fever. Kasuka’s fetched a bowl of cold water and a towel for his forehead.
“No, that’s alright.”
Tom nods, slowly. “If you need me, my number is in his phone.”
“Thank you, Tanaka-san.”
“I’ll come by and take over tomorrow morning. I’m sure you’re busy.”
Kasuka doesn’t answer, doesn’t look up.
“Well, I’ll get going then.” Tom stands, glancing down at the brothers. With Shizuo asleep, the resemblance is much stronger.
A strange family. One brother all fire, the other all ice.
“Tanaka-san?”
In the doorway, Tom turns. Kasuka is sitting with his back to him, looking down at his brother.
“Yes?”
“If my – If he – I appreciate you calling me,” he says at last, in the same quiet tones.
“He’s not an easy person to look after, is he?” Tom smiles. “Aa, I understand. If he needs someone to rein him in, I know who to call.”
“And – Tanaka-san?”
“Hm?”
“If you need help in regards to Yagiri Pharmaceuticals… you know my number.” Kasuka’s tone has none of his brother’s fury, not even the low growl that indicates Shizuo is about to snap and start throwing telephone poles. It’s firm and quiet, and sharp as newly-broken steel. As dangerous as his older brother. At least.
Not fire and ice, thinks Tom. Just the difference between an uncontrollable forest fire, and the banked white-hot flames of a kiln. He can’t help wonder what their parents were like.
And then decides that, in fact, he almost certainly doesn’t want to know.
Series: Durarara
Pairing: None
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Tom spends more time looking after Shizuo than Shizuo does looking after him. Despite that, he still can't control his employee.
Tom thinks, rather frequently, that despite Shizuo’s position as his bodyguard it is in fact Tom who does most of the guarding. He’s the one who ends up having to protect his clients from his own hustler, the one who ends up protecting the neighbourhood and public property from his hustler, the one who ends up protecting his hustler from himself. Except that it never really works out, because Heiwajima Shizuo doesn’t listen to anyone. Doesn’t even listen to his own common sense. Tom’s become quite efficient at filling out witness reports, on the rare occasion anyone has the balls to lay charges.
Shizuo unstable temper makes him a frankly terrible employee in many ways, but he tries to make up for it with those of his actions which he can control. He works damn hard at it, despite his apparent slack attitude – there aren’t many people willing to employ someone who sooner or later is bound to wreck any environment and Shizuo has cause to know it. He’s never drunk, he’s never lazy, and he’s never late.
Which is why, when he doesn’t show up for work today and doesn’t answer his phone, Tom checks the hospitals first. And then the police stations. And then, finally, Shizuo’s apartment. And comes up blank.
Ikebukuro’s a big city, but Tom knows most of the movers and shakers. The fact that his name is tied to Heiwajima Shizuo’s is a major factor; his employee is immeasurably more famous than him. By the afternoon, word has spread. By dinner, he has an ID: Yagiri Pharmaceuticals van, licence number. By mid-evening, a location.
Ikebukuro, like all the cities that make up the hulking behemoth of Tokyo, has its own feel. Less flashy than Shinjuku, less pretentious than Shibuya. Busier than Ueno, less so than Harajuku. Tom drives through the crowded streets, passing sidewalks crammed with school kids moving from club activities to juku or karaoke clubs, businessmen going home to dinner and women doing evening shopping.
Some group of kids has found the van while looking for someone else entirely, as far as Tom understands from the report that reaches him through three degrees of separation. When he turns into the condemned parking-lot he’s been directed to, he notices that while there is a van in it, it’s not marked with the Yagiri Pharmaceuticals logo.
The parking lot’s a wreck. Its concrete is crumbling, floor full of potholes and walls covered in graffiti. The large pillars supporting the ceiling have been scored by the dull blades of generations of short-lived street gangs, simple messages carved out in sharp, slanted lines.
The electricity to the parking lot has long since been cut off, but as Tom kills the engine and his headlights die along with it he notices the flashlight glow from over near the other parked van. He slips out quietly, phone in one hand and the knife he hasn’t had to take out of his pocket since he hired Shizuo in the other. The light, he sees as his eyes adjust, is being focused on one of the pillars. That’s as much as he takes in before it’s turned into his face, the diffuse glow harsh and blinding when shone right into his eyes. He throws up a hand, phone flipped open with 119 on the screen and his thumb on the dial button.
“Who’s there?” asks a defensive voice, a young man. And then, before he has time to consider an answer, “Ah, Tanaka-san? You were the one looking for Heiwajima-san?”
The light is lowered but his retinas are still burning with the afterimage, and he takes an uncertain step forward while blinking furiously. “Yeah,” he answers, easing his finger cautiously off the smooth button. And then, as he chalks in a line between the van and the voice, “Kadota-kun?”
His eyes are recovering fast, and his steps find certainty as he heads towards the yellowish glow. He begins to be able to pick out the details of the scene outside the immediate pool of light, and feels his teeth begin to clench as he does. The four kids, Kadota and his gang, are standing around a pillar. There’s a loose chain lying on the ground and a man sitting casually in their centre, rubbing at the inside of his left arm. Orihara Izaya. His eyes are strangely large, shining like a cat’s, pupils huge and black.
“What’s going on? Where’s Shizuo?”
The kids glance at each other, faces closed. Tom’s been doing his job long enough that he can recognize the look without thought, feels his shoulders tense under the weight of it. We’re afraid to tell you.
“Shizu-chan’s right over there,” drawls Orihara, nodding with puppet-like jerkiness into the shadows. Tom doubts he’s ever in his life been afraid to give anyone bad news; probably he cultivates opportunities to do so.
Tom follows his indication, Kadota reluctantly swinging the light over to run across the cement and fetch up against the pillar standing as a mirror to the one Orihara’s sitting against. By the time the beam reaches it, the glow is dull at best. Tom’s first thought is: ragdoll. Then there’s just the sharp, bitter taste of anger and fear mixed with each other.
In the low light thick chains glint like dirty coins and dyed blond hair shines like false gold. Shizuo’s been chained to the pillar from his shoulders to the bottom of his ribcage, long legs splayed out in front of him, head drooped low over his chest.
Tom grabs the flashlight and crosses the distance in a span of time that has no place in his memory. He’s simply beside Kadota one minute and Shizuo the next, on his knees to yank at the chains pulled tight enough to bruise at the least. There is dried blood on Shizuo’s neck, rusty blooms against pale skin in the harsh contrast of the flashlight. Tom reaches out to it.
The man’s head snaps up so fast Tom actually falls back onto his ass in shock, flashlight clattering as it hits the ground. From the shadows behind him Orihara’s voice drifts over, his tones mocking. “Ah, Tanaka-san, I wouldn’t let him go just yet. He seems to have had a bad reaction to the serum they gave us. Probably his ridiculous adrenaline flaring up again.”
Shizuo’s fighting against the chains, snarling incoherently as he kicks and twists furiously. His breath is coming in short, laboured pants, face contorted in a level of rage Tom’s never seen. He’s nearly foaming at the mouth as he struggles and shouts, chain links clinking quietly against each other. Even Shizuo needs leverage or grip to exert his strength, and with the whole of his spine and his arms trapped flat against the pillar he has none.
“Shizuo! Oi, Shizuo! Calm down! Calm down!” Tom has both hands on the man’s struggling shoulders, trying to press him back into the pillar to keep him from crushing his arms and ribs against the unforgiving chains, but Shizuo never listens to him in his rages and now’s no different.
“Maa, don’t worry Tanaka-san. He’ll pass out from lack of oxygen soon enough.”
Tom can hear Orihara smiling, grits his teeth as his lips turn involuntarily. The sound of the coordinator’s voice affects Shizuo as it always does, and he throws himself with renewed force against the chains, raging mindless as a mad dog. Tom doesn’t turn, doesn’t let go of Shizuo’s shoulders. “Just get the hell out of here. Kadota. Get him out of here.”
There’s a muffled conversation; someone asks, “But what –” and is cut off shortly. The consensus is reached quickly.
“Do you want us to call for help, Tanaka-san?” asks Kadota, with a thin veneer of calm. Tom can hear the pain under it.
“No, I’ll handle it. Just go, please.”
Just get Orihara the hell out of here, before Shizuo gives himself a heart-attack.
There’s no reply, not even from Orihara thankfully, because Tom couldn’t let that go and he knows he doesn’t have the power to fight the man. Just the quiet shuffling of footsteps and then the rumble of an engine.
In front of him, the now red-faced Shizuo gives a choking gasp and passes out, head dropping heavily. Tom’s relief is razor-edged, slices painfully into his gut as it spreads. He sighs, and tries to think. Calling the cops or an ambulance will just get more people hurt, and Shizuo will probably be one of them. But there’s no chance of him being able to restrain the man on his own, and until he can he can’t let him go.
A man who can restrain Heiwajima Shizuo. It’s a puzzle. Simon probably could – at least, if Shizuo were in his normal state, although with the way he is now all bets are off – but Tom doubts he could pull Simon away from his job. Besides, bringing someone out to physically restrain the injured man just feels… wrong. Shizuo needs someone to snap him out of his rage, not more chains. There’s only one person Tom can think of who might be able to do that, and he doesn’t have his number.
Even unconscious, Shizuo’s still taking quick, uneven breaths. But he doesn’t wake as Tom checks his pants pockets. By some miracle his cell phone is still there.
The tiny lit screen glows merrily in the gloom as he flips through Shizuo’s contacts list, searching for the name he hopes is there. He flicks through, scrolling faster and faster as he nears the bottom and desperation beginning to pour in thick and cold: it has to be here, it has to be here. If it’s not, he doesn’t know what he’ll do. Damn Shizuo. Damn Orihara. Damn whoever got them into this whole mess.
He’s clutching the phone so hard he’s slightly surprised the casing isn’t cracking by the time the sidebar is reaching the bottom, muttering to himself under his breath. Come on, come on, come on.
Yes!
There, completely out of alphabetical order at the very bottom of the list, is the name he’s been looking for. Tom takes a deep breath, and presses send.
He tries to think about what he’s going to say, how to phrase this, how to explain, but all he can think of is this ridiculous situation. Squatting in an abandoned parking lot next to his employee who’s been chained to a pillar, sliding in and out of murderous rage. Completely ridiculous. The rings slide away into the past while he reflects on it. And then, before he’s ready, there’s a click.
“Hello?” says the quiet voice on the other end.
“Ah, Heiwajima Kasuka-san?” says Tom, blinking. There’s a pause. And then,
“Who is this?”
“Tanaka Tom. I guess you could say I’m your brother’s employer,” he says, then berates himself for the qualification. A longer pause. And then,
“He’s in trouble,” says the soft voice, flatly. Tom smiles. Shizuo’s brother indeed.
“Yes. I’m sorry to ask, but could you come?”
“The hospital or the police station?” There’s a level of resignation there that hurts, or maybe it’s just indifference. Tom’s never met Shizuo’s brother, has only seen him from afar or on the big screen, but he rarely shows emotion there even in the worst of situations.
“Neither,” replies Tom, and gives the location of the parking lot.
There’s another pause, this one harder than the others, with sharp edges. “Tanaka-san, I’ll say this frankly. How much money will I need?”
Tom sighs, and smiles wryly. “Heiwajima-san, this isn’t the kind of help a movie star can give. It’s the kind a younger brother can.”
For the first time, he hears a sign of expression in the voice on the other end of the phone. Of intensity. “I understand. I can be there in half an hour. No – twenty minutes.” There’s a click, and then the regular beeping of a dead line. Tom snaps the phone closed and nods. Stands and goes to see how hard the chains will be to get off.
----------------------------------------
He’s been sitting on the hard ground beside his unconscious employee for long enough that his ass is getting sore when Heiwajima Kasuka shows up.
The young man comes without any fanfare, which doesn’t surprise Tom, but also comes alone, which does. He simply walks up the in-ramp, a shadow in a night of shadows, and says, “Tanaka-san?”
Tom turns the flashlight to point across the floor towards him, lighting his way.
Kasuka doesn’t look much like his older brother. Part of it may be the hair and the age, but there’s also a distinct lack of expression, a kind of permanent disinterest which is one of the young man’s most recognizable aspects and key selling points while simultaneously being so totally opposite from his brother. Shizuo isn’t always angry, but he’s never apathetic. Still, when the young actor sets his eyes on his older brother, Tom sees the flash of reaction there. Of shock, and hurt, and anger. And then they’re all gone and he’s kneeling beside Shizuo’s long legs with a calm face.
“What’s going on here, Tanaka-san?” He doesn’t look at Tom, but doesn’t reach out for his brother either. Just stares, taking it all in quietly.
“I’m not quite sure myself. As far as I understand Shizuo and Orihara Izaya were grabbed by Yagiri Pharmaceuticals – I don’t know why, or how. Knock-out gas, maybe.” Tom’s had a while to think about it. “They gave them something, again, I don’t know what. But the drug, and being in the same room with Orihara and unable to do anything about it…” he trails off. Kasuka nods, once. “He was awake for a while, but the chains were too tight for him to breathe and rage, and he passed out. Until I’m sure he’s not going to go on a rampage, I don’t want to let him go.”
Making him not much better than the bastards from Yagiri, or Orihara. The same results, born from different objectives.
But Kasuka nods again, and if he has similar thoughts they don’t show on his blank face. “Tanaka-san, can I ask you a favour?”
Tom starts. “What? Sure.”
“Could you go buy a bottle of milk, please? There’s a convenience store just down the street.”
Tom gapes for a minute, then shuts his mouth. The kid must want to be alone with his brother, must want to talk to him privately. He nods. “Sure. I’ll be right back.”
“Thank you.”
----------------------------------------
There is, as Kasuka said, a convenience store near by – 7/11. Tom wanders in and browses the magazine selection before picking up the bottle of milk he’s been sent for. It feels strange, feels downright wrong to be light-heartedly inspecting this week’s magazines while Shizuo’s chained up down the street, but the kid deserves a few minutes to deal with the situation.
He pays for the milk and walks back, re-enters the dark parking lot and heads for the yellow glow. And then hears Shizuo, raging wordlessly against his chains again. He’s losing what little of his voice he has left, throat sounding dry and ragged as he yells and snarls like an animal. Tom crosses the remainder of the distance in a run, kneels down and drops the milk thoughtlessly to help Kasuka restrain his brother.
But as soon as Tom returns, Kasuka lets go of Shizuo’s shoulders and turns. Picks up the milk he brought and tips the flashlight so that it’s lit clearly in the gloom. Moves it until he’s holding it directly in front of Shizuo’s face and stares at him intently.
And, as Tom watches in amazement, Shizuo’s struggles slowly die back. The shouts and growls fade away and his legs drop back to the floor. He collapses back against the pillar, breathing hard with his head thrown back so that Tom can clearly see the smeared bloodstains on his strong neck, dried unevenly over the knotted muscles standing out like wires under his pale skin. Kasuka opens the milk and, when Shizuo drops his head back down to stare at them blearily, lifts it so that his brother can take a drink of it.
He hasn’t, Tom realises, said one word to him.
----------------------------------------
They unchain Shizuo with relative ease, the ends of the chain being linked at the back by knotted rope. Kasuka sits next to him, forearm pressed laxly against his brother’s shoulder to keep him from falling forwards while Tom kneels behind the pillar and pulls away the long length of chain hand over hand as if raising a flag. Shizuo doesn’t seem up for much talking, sits with surprising passivity while Tom releases him, doesn’t say more than a dozen words to either of them. It’s clear he’s far from all here.
They help him to the car together, Shizuo’s long legs shaking and unsteady, his arms heavy over their shoulders. Kasuka goes into the back with him, shoves him over with the same bland expression until his brother has left him enough room to sit in, and then closes the door. Shizuo hardly objects, but whether that’s the drugs or a facet of their relationship he can’t tell.
In the front seat, Tom adjusts the mirror to be able to see the two men sitting in the back seat, and then starts the engine.
“Where are you going?” asks Kasuka quietly, eyes flashing to Tom’s in the mirror.
“I was going to take him to my apartment. I can keep an eye on him there.”
“No,” says the younger man, showing the first hint of a man used to getting his own way Tom’s seen in him. “Take him to his. I can watch him.”
“Don’t need watching,” slurs Shizuo, head lolling on his brother’s shoulder. They both ignore him.
“Alright,” agrees Tom, partially because he doesn’t need Shizuo wrecking his apartment and partially because he thinks it will do the man good to spend some time with his brother. As far as he knows, Shizuo hasn’t seen him since he started working for Tom.
Shizuo slides progressively further into sleep as they drive on, head lower every time Tom glances back, Kasuka twisting further and further to keep his ungainly brother from sliding off the seat. If Shizuo ever decides to buy a car, or at least a domestic one, he’ll have a damn hard time. But, reflects Tom with a weary smile, since he’d probably end up throwing it at some jaywalking pedestrian the second week in, it would hardly matter.
The night traffic isn’t too bad, and they make Shizuo’s apartment building in less than twenty minutes. Tom parks on the street and hurries around to help. Kasuka pulls up the hood of his jacket.
They wrestle Shizuo into the elevator after several false-starts, Tom pressing the button while Kasuka asks his brother if he has his key.
“’Course,” answers Shizuo, possibly trying for affronted but managing only a kind of drunken assurance.
“Where is it?”
“Pocket.”
“Get it.”
Tom watches the exchange out of the corner of his eye, watches Shizuo fumble for his pocket for a minute, watches Kasuka give up and fish it out for him. Tries not to smile.
Shizuo’s apartment is small and clean and bare, some coloured bottles in the modern kitchen lending a splash of brightness to that room, and a few worn posters on the wall in the bedroom beyond breaking up the blank walls. They put Shizuo down on a kitchen chair and Kasuka stands by to keep him from tipping himself off while Tom goes and lays out his employee’s futon and covers. The low table in the bedroom, holding Shizuo’s computer and phone, also has a few picture frames on it. One of a group of boys in Raira uniforms; the other two of a young Shizuo and even younger Kasuka, both staring ambivalently at the camera. Tom smiles, and goes back to fetch them.
“Do you want me to stay?” he asks, when they’ve got Shizuo lying in his bed. He’s already asleep, sweating slightly with a low fever. Kasuka’s fetched a bowl of cold water and a towel for his forehead.
“No, that’s alright.”
Tom nods, slowly. “If you need me, my number is in his phone.”
“Thank you, Tanaka-san.”
“I’ll come by and take over tomorrow morning. I’m sure you’re busy.”
Kasuka doesn’t answer, doesn’t look up.
“Well, I’ll get going then.” Tom stands, glancing down at the brothers. With Shizuo asleep, the resemblance is much stronger.
A strange family. One brother all fire, the other all ice.
“Tanaka-san?”
In the doorway, Tom turns. Kasuka is sitting with his back to him, looking down at his brother.
“Yes?”
“If my – If he – I appreciate you calling me,” he says at last, in the same quiet tones.
“He’s not an easy person to look after, is he?” Tom smiles. “Aa, I understand. If he needs someone to rein him in, I know who to call.”
“And – Tanaka-san?”
“Hm?”
“If you need help in regards to Yagiri Pharmaceuticals… you know my number.” Kasuka’s tone has none of his brother’s fury, not even the low growl that indicates Shizuo is about to snap and start throwing telephone poles. It’s firm and quiet, and sharp as newly-broken steel. As dangerous as his older brother. At least.
Not fire and ice, thinks Tom. Just the difference between an uncontrollable forest fire, and the banked white-hot flames of a kiln. He can’t help wonder what their parents were like.
And then decides that, in fact, he almost certainly doesn’t want to know.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-08-06 10:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-08 11:13 pm (UTC)