Daily Life : Not Available

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Chapter 5

Posted: 02/10/2020

Status: Ongoing

Author's note: Rearranged chapters a bit so if you're wondering why the published chapters number seems off, that's why. No content was removed, just combined.

I did rewrite some parts, but the plot was unchanged so re-reading it is not mandatory at all.

When he opened his eyes, a few things surprised Shizuo.

First, not only did he wake up before his alarm (saving the poor alarm clock from certain doom), but it seemed he had also forgotten to even set said alarm. Good thing he woke up before the usual time, or he might have overslept and been late for work, and while he was sure Tom would let it slide as he usually did for most things Shizuo did, he didn’t want to let his boss down again. He promised himself he wouldn’t disappoint his loved ones any more.

He emerged from bed sheets that were halfway fallen to the ground, feeling like complete hell. After leaving the bed, he didn’t bother folding the sheets and left his bedroom still in his sleepwear (which comprised nothing but sweatpants) to go do his morning ritual in the bathroom, only to pause in the tiny living room-slash-kitchen.

“It’s so quiet…” Shizuo mused, voice barely louder than a whisper.

He frowned. Usually at this hour his neighbors would start getting ready for the day, and a few cars would pass on the road near his apartment complex. Heiwajima Shizuo, as his name implied, was a man who loved peace and quiet; it was nice to wake up to pure quiet once in a while, yet this particular brand of quiet felt off. Wrong.

He walked to the sliding glass door, opening it to go on his small balcony. He spent a few minutes there, leaning on the railing and observing.

Shizuo decided he didn’t like that quiet.

He frowned, going back inside to continue his morning routine, an uncomfortable feeling in the back of his mind.

…

Izaya was used to waking up in a silent, empty apartment as soon as dawn broke. He had always been used to the quiet since his early childhood (though it had gotten significantly less quiet when his sisters were born), yet today the quiet felt different. If he had to describe it, instead of the usual peace of waking up with the morning rays and quietly getting ready for another day of observing his lovely humans, this felt more like the quiet just before a devastating storm. It felt wrong, too quiet.

Not only that, but he felt like shit. Clearly, he shouldn’t have pulled that all-nighter working until 4 AM. He felt the exhaustion in his entire body, pain particularly strong in his arms and legs, probably from sitting at his desk and typing all night without a single break.

He sat up in his queen-sized bed and stretched his arms and legs before getting up and out of bed. He made sure the bed was all neat and proper before heading for the bathroom connected to his bedroom.

He passed in front of the mirror and stopped to look at himself. He looked like shit, dark bags prominent under his dull eyes, and hair an absolute mess. He went to the shower, getting undressed and throwing the clothes in the laundry basket. He then turned on the water, waiting a few seconds for it to heat up, then stepped inside and under the wonderfully warm water. Hopefully, this would wake him up.

In the vast apartment, the only sound that could be heard was that of running water on the second floor, until eventually that sound too, stopped, and out stepped a squeaky-clean and freshly dried Orihara Izaya, fully dressed and wearing white bunny slippers, which he may or may not have bought because he found them adorable. He may or may not have given his hard-working secretary a matching pair to annoy her. She wore them anyway, because she liked to be contrary.

He still felt tired, but at least he looked a bit less like a corpse. His body still hurt, though.

With some difficulty, he stepped down to the bottom floor in his kitchen and made himself some black coffee to wake himself up some more, then left the kitchen with the steaming cup. He walked past the couch to go behind his desk, stopping in front of the immense glass windows.

The streets were empty. Neither person nor animal in sight, all cars parked and empty.

He frowned as he drank his coffee. It burned his tongue, but with all the pain in the rest of his body, he barely paid attention to it.

His hands were shaking, as if holding up the cup took great effort, and, he realized, the pain in his legs felt gradually stronger as minutes passed, to the point he had to sit down at his desk, feeling like he would collapse any moment.

‘Might as well look into what’s happening in the streets’, he supposed as he booted up his computer painstakingly. He typed his password much slower than usual thanks to his trembling hands. He doubted the pain was simply from overworking himself. This felt too… physical. Like he had gotten into some sort of accident and forgot about it, which would be… strange, but trauma could cause amnesia, so it was still a possibility.

The first surprise was seeing his browser give nothing but blank pages with each search he typed. The second was realizing that not only was the Wi-Fi down, but the cellular network was as well when he checked the phone in his desk.

The third, when he tried to get up and get his other phones, was realizing he couldn’t stand up anymore.

Incredible pain racked his whole body when he tried to stand, bracing his arms on the desk chair. He was good at ignoring physical pain and run through it thanks to years of getting heavy objects thrown at him, but this was too much. Even when he leaned back in the chair, relaxing both arms and legs, the pain was still a constant, although slightly milder.

What the fuck had happened to him to put him in such a state? Something clearly transpired between the time he went to sleep and now, and that wasn’t to mention the mystery of the complete lack of human and animal life in the streets of the usually active Shinjuku.

He wanted to investigate himself, but what could he do in his current state? He was stuck in his office chair with no means of communicating with the outside world. What was he supposed to do except hope for someone who wasn’t an enemy to find him?

With some difficulty, Izaya rolled the office chair through his apartment, going to the door where his coat hung. He put it on, as well as some shoes (though he doubted he would use them much) and exited through the door, dragging himself to the elevator by pushing against the walls.

He probably seemed ridiculous, a cringing, tired looking young man who tried getting around in an office chair.

It’d be easier if he was in a wheelchair, he thought pitifully as he managed to leave the empty apartment building.