[Shizuo's POV]
Morning went by and I was woken by my alarm. I sat up in the sofa as I tried to go over my dream. This wasn't the first time I woke up for today. I woke up a while ago, but it was so dark and Celty was standing next to me.
In my dream, I saw (F/n) walk around Shinra's place and pulled a knife over me. I was pretending to be asleep and I didn't do anything about it. I could feel that she was holding back, she was trembling. She even apologized to me in that dream and it happened as if it were true. But then, when Celty appeared, everything went black and I woke up.
Celty was there. She was there, staring at the window when I woke up, and (F/n) was gone. I suspected (F/n) and my suspicion of her proves to be right.
This second time I woke up, Celty is with me, sitting on the adjacent smaller sofa. I turned to her and asked, "Am I alive?"
Celty was surprised and she quickly responded through her PDA, "Of course you are! What made you ask that?!"
I held the back of my head, thoroughly confused. I cannot fully differentiate the dream from the real. "The last thing I recalled is that I was about to be killed..."
She jumped back a bit more.
"...by (F/n)," I continued and studied her strange reactions even more. "She pulled a knife on me while I was asleep."
"Maybe it's just a dream!"
"No... I don't know... It felt real."
Celty looked down and I looked down as well. "She's even gone now," I added.
Shinra went out of his room, unchanged, yawning and stretching at the same time. "Celty, why didn't you wake me up?" he asked as he approached her.
At that time, Celty furiously typed on her PDA, showed it to him, and punched him all of a sudden. I was shocked.
"Ouch!" Shinra fell on the floor. I didn't help him up. "That hurts, Celty. I was only worried about you."
She typed again on her PDA and showed it to him.
"Even so! That's not an acceptable reason for you to punch me!" He stood up and sat next to me, still facing Celty, pouting like a child.
When I looked on the floor, I saw a knife with a dark blade. "What is this?" I took it and examined it. Celty tried to take it from me, but I didn't hand it to her.
Sliding my finger on the side of the blade, I felt something greasy and when I smelled it, I realized and said, "This is poison." I looked back at Celty.
"Ah, this is the house knife," Shinra said as he took it from me. "Why is this on the floor, Celty?"
"Maybe it was dropped when you cleaned the table last night and it was there when I sprayed insecticide, so it got some poison," she reasoned with the help of her PDA, but she seems uneasy about it.
"Is that so?" Shinra asked, and she nodded. However, through her actions, I can tell that her reason was fake. Celty is a terrible liar and I believe that flea realized she was faking it out when he asked that question.
"It can't be right, it can't be a coincidence," I stated, the two looked at me. "(F/n) has something to do with this."
"(F/n)?" The confused Shinra asked. Celty didn't answer a word, so I was able to tell that I guessed the right thing. It wasn't a dream... it was reality!
"That bitch!" I stood up furiously, cracking my knuckles and nearly popping a vein with fury. "I should kill her before she could kill me!"
I stomped my way to the window and opened it, but before I could jump, flea stopped me and tried to pull me back. "Let go of me, flea! I should have killed her sooner! I'm going to kill her now!"
"No, Shizuo! Calm down! Think!" he shouted at me and pissed me off even more. If he wasn't the flea who's my friend, I would have kicked him off me. "If you kill her, you'll be a murderer like her. And who knows if that's all she got? Maybe she has something up her sleeve. So think this well! I beg you, Shizuo!"
"Shinra is right! Besides, we have no clue where (F/n) could be," Celty showed me her PDA through the window. It felt like I could listen more to Celty's advice. I backed off the window and pushed flea away.
Flea sighed and followed me to the middle of the room.
"So, what do you suppose we do, Celty?" I asked the rider.
"We wait and observe." She showed me her response on her PDA, "That's all we can do for now. Let's pin our hopes that something helpful will happen."
I sighed and agreed to that.
-
[Reader's POV]
My head hurts as I wearily opened my eyes. Then suddenly, I felt something splash on my face and my entire body. It was frigid; I was fully awake.
"Huh? What the...? Where am I?" I asked to no one in particular.
Then, I heard footsteps approaching. "There you are! You're finally awake, (F/n)!"
"I recognize that voice... you are..." When I turned to see who it was, I grasped in response. "Angela Veron, my rival ... And Alex Frodd!"
"Yes, it is us," Alex stoically answered.
I looked around to see that I am in an old warehouse. I recognize the warehouse! This is where I ended up when the man stole my phone! And I remember that a group of men captured me last night and put me to sleep.
"Uh-huh," Angela said, clinging into her boyfriend, Alex. "It's been quite long, (F/n)... ~"
"Tch!" I tried to move a bit, but then I was tightly wrapped with a chain, my arms and legs were handcuffed, and my clothes were... changed?
My face turned red with fury. "Where are my clothes? Give them back!" I demanded.
"Oh." She went off him, took my clothes and showed it to me. "This... you mean?" My eyes bulged. She pulled out some lighter and burned them. I tried to stand up, but the chains kept me from doing what I please.
I looked back at my clothes. Ah great! Now I'm gonna stick with this oversized rag shirt and bleached old shorts... They're freaking itchy and I can't scratch my body with the chains and cuffs on me!
I tried to make an evil grin. "Don't think you can crush my spirit just by burning my clothes!"
"Eh-heh?~" But she wore the most evil grin between us. She went to the four men to the other side and pulled their hoods away. I was shocked.
"Akari? Allison? Venn? Mari?!" I felt like I was crushed, with those friends holding the face of a traitor before me. And the men who took me last night who had covers in their faces looks the same as Akari and Venn. "What are you four doing here?!"
"Isn't it obvious, (F/n)?" Allison spoke those words to me as if they were daggers. "We no longer want to be by your side.
"Huh? What are you talking about?" I retorted fast, confused, and disbelieving.
"It's just as she said," Mari answered, stepping a bit forward, flashing me an apologetic look on her face.
"No way..." I told myself.
"How silly of you," Venn said, mimicking the voice of one of the men who captured me last night. My eyes widened.
Akari laughed, his voice was the same as the other guy from earlier, the one who kidnapped me. It's really them... there's no way...
"I thought you four swore to be my friends and work alongside me forever?" I insisted, with the hint of blood rush inside me.
"Promise are just promises, (F/n). They can be broken just as how easily they were made," Mari answered, still with that apologetic look on her face and voice colder than the ice water thrown into my face. I began to shiver and the pang on my chest felt so painful.
How can it be that I lost four friends in a snap of a finger... I glared back at the couple who is currently lovey-dovey and touchy-feely with one another. Besides the feeling of betrayal, I felt disgust and it was stronger.
"Veronica..." Alex breathed on her ear, having noticed my glare on them. "Stop this at once, (F/n) is watching us."
"Oh, is that right?" Angela retorted at him seductively, running a finger on his chest as she pulled her neckline back on place. "Make her wait... she is our humble pet waiting to be punished."
I raised a brow at them. What the heck is this? ...
"Veronica, I said 'stop'." He gently push her off and gave her a serious look on his face.
"Oh. Then stop calling me 'Veronica' for now." She fixed her hair and turned her back on him, walking close to me. "I'm sorry to have exposed you with my unsightly behavior."
"Much appreciation to that apology," I mouthed and knitted my brow on her face, resisting the urge to throw up after I saw her flirt. My shivering became intense.
"I don't like the looks on those eyes..." she lingered in those words, examining me close. "Should I gouge them out?"
"Anything but that!" I shouted without even thinking. My traitor friends and Alex were just looking at us, not bothering to butt in, which I am glad of.
"What if I say 'no'?" Veron chuckled evilly. I bit my lips. "But I think I don't have anything I can use to do that..."
Then, she called Alex. "Hon, look for something we can use to gouge her eyes."
He nodded and walk to her. "For the meantime, use this." He handed her something small that I didn't see. "We can't afford to get her bored." He smirks at her.
"That's a brilliant idea," she retorted as she flashed a smirk at me. Then, she put that small item she got in contact with my chain, and when she pressed the button, I realized that it was an electric stun gun.
I couldn't scream, I couldn't make a word. All I could feel is that my entire body and flesh is being sucked up by the chains so fast and my heartbeat is speeding up insanely. My visions goes on and off. My head throbs. My body won't stop shaking. My breath was running out.
"P-P-Plea-sh s-st-top!!" I managed to say somehow, but the bitch didn't hear me out. She's laughing like evil. I don't know if I could take this any longer.
When I feel like my body was about to give in, she let go. I was panting really hard and my heart felt like it would rip of my chest. My breathing is also erratic.
"How would you like that?" she taunted as she did it over and over for shorter, but more frequent laps. I can feel that my head was about to explode.
"Angela-sama, please stop!" I heard Allison plea.
"Huh?" Angela walked up to her intimidatingly, giving her almost no space at all. "What did you say? You want to help (F/n)?"
"No, Angela-sama," Venn answered for Allison. "What we meant is that if we kill her now, what do we get out of this?"
"I believe that accomplishment is not enough for you as well," Akari butted in humbly, "We need to get money out of this, too."
"Tch!" Angela spat to her side. Alex was still busy looking around for sharp objects.
Angela stomped back before me. "Damn you bitch! If only you aren't the most skilled among us assassins, and only if you aren't the descendant of the (L/n)s, you won't reap all the good jobs and credits!"
I was too worn out to say anything, but only if I can, I'd smack those words at her right now. I didn't want those things to happen to me, they happen because they happen, and there's no fucking way I can do something about it!
"It's all your fault for being selfish!" She continued her tiresome rants that won't get us anywhere. "If only you'd acknowledge us, think that we exists, and give us part of your missions, we wouldn't end up like this."
"T-that's n-not it..." I managed to say somehow and coughed a lot.
"Huh?!"
"I-It was y-you... who... re-rejec-cted it..." She hit me hard in the face. The pain I felt was ten times, probably because I can see the smoke coming out of my body from the electrocution. Yet, she wasn't hurt because she's wearing a pair of latex gloves.
I was willing to give her and Alex my fame, but they were the ones who rejected it, especially her... because they can't afford to accept any spoon feeding from me. I was their boundary and I was their greatest enemy. I don't know what they did to my friends to get them, and I don't know how I can get my friends back... it's impossible. I'm a rag here and there's nothing I can do.
Alex came back to her side and gave her the blade and a dirty needle with thread. "I found these instead and I don't know if these are enough," he said. "Do whatever you want to do, but spare me some chance to hurt her... and save the worst for the last."
I felt my breath hitch on my throat.
"Okay~" she replied happily as she took out a phone, which I recognize to be mine.
"M-my p-phone...?"
"Yes, it's yours!" The bitch winked and she opened it and called the one labelled Orihara Izaya.
My phone is in loud mode so I can hear the phone ring. She squinted her eyes as a dangerous glint went on it. "I'm gonna let your man hear your sufferings."
Just then, I was slowly gaining my strength... somehow. But... My man?! He's not- but whatever... just please. I need help no matter who it comes from.
"He-" I could feel my eyes coming out as I felt the searing pain. I looked down and she was cutting through my flesh.
Alex tied my mouth with a thick cloth. "Shut up."
I kept hearing the ring tone. I was hopeless. He wasn't picking up... I was begging deep inside, I was on the brink of shredding tears. Izaya, please... pick up your phone up...