Chapter Text
Izaya was conflicted. a common feeling these days.
he leaned against the glass window, staring out into his city below.
his thoughts, as they so often were, were consumed by that monster of ikebukuro. Shizuo.
there was a time, maybe a year ago, when Izaya genuinely believed he hated the man. it was easier then. he'd since come to realize that hatred wasn't quite the right feeling, but that realization didn't actually change anything.
Shizuo still wanted to kill him. Izaya still wanted to kill Shizuo, even if the reasoning had changed. he didn't want to kill Shizuo because he hated him, Izaya wanted him dead only because Shizuo hated him.
that didn't make any sense. Izaya's thoughts were getting muddled. he sighed dramatically, wandering over his game board.
It was almost an objective fact- if such a thing could exist- that Izaya and Shizuo were opposing queens on a chessboard. eithers death would slow things down, but the game would go on. both were the most powerful players on the board.
Izaya grabbed the opposing queen, an unpainted natural wood carved and sanded to perfection. he put it's head between his teeth as he grabbed his own piece. it was from a different game set, ill fitting among the squares of the chessboard.
Shizuo… Izaya placed the man's piece where the knight should've been.
what could he do? Izaya placed his own piece in it's proper place.
there were other pieces, but for now they were pushed to the floor, irrelevant for this particular game.
was there a world where Shizuo could switch teams? two queens on one team would ruin the game but perhaps, for selfish reasons… but no, that was wishful thinking. veered sharply into the realm of fantasy.
(it goes without saying that the opposite could never be true).
Izaya could kill him. easily. more or less. but… that would ruin the game. both objectively and subjectively. again, pretending objectivity existed.
Izaya stared at the board for a time longer, eventually grabbing both troublesome pieces and walking to a window, not the window, instead one that could be opened. he held them both several stories above the floor outside, considering. a fall from this height would shatter his piece, made from ceramic that not even the strengthened paint could protect from this high up. Shizuo might chip, but he wouldn't break.
the concrete below almost looked soft.
this was a lot easier a year ago.
but, no. Izaya had seen Romeo and Juliet. he wasn't stupid.
what if Romeo had been loyal to the Montague's? what if he'd killed Tybalt not out of frustration but because he wanted to? would Juliet still have forgiven him? what if Juliet was a Capulet through and through, and her loyalty to her family and her love for Romeo only conflicted externally?
what if they killed each other's friends one by one? could their relationship handle that, if it was mutual?
Izaya didn't have a Tybalt, but if he did, and Shizuo killed them…
well, this was all hypothetical.
Izaya dropped the pieces, watched one shatter and the other bounce. a second later he heard the clatter.