Durarara!! - Volume 3 - Chapter 3

Chapter 3: Why…?

Raira Academy, near the front gate

Raira Academy was a private high school located fairly close to Ikebukuro Station.

Though it was a private school, its scholastic rank and tuition were only average, which, combined with its proximity to downtown, made it quite a popular school to attend. Parents typically expressed resistance, but for students coming from distant regions, it held a distinct, powerful allure.

And like any other school, it served as a meeting place for students of all different types, facilitating the creation of groups of like-minded teens, and occasionally very unlikely combinations as well.

After the closing bell dismissed the student populace, these little groups of varied friends gathered and dispersed to their own destinations.

“So I was wondering,” the boy said, straight-faced, in the sunset light that flooded the campus, “what makes you so cute and sexy, Anri?”

The boy and girl listening to him instantly gave their typical reactions.

The bespectacled girl blushed in consternation and mumbled, “Uh…what?”

While the reserved-looking boy shook his head in disappointment. “Not sexy… You shouldn’t say that, Masaomi.”

Masaomi, who was recognizable by his brown hair and earrings, grinned impishly. “Ahh, I see… So Mikado admits that she’s cute, even if he doesn’t think she’s sexy!”

“Wha…? Uh, no. I mean…”

“No? So you’re saying she’s not cute to begin with?”

“No, that’s not what I—! Y-yes, she’s cute!”

The girl’s face got redder and redder.

“Okay, so you will admit she’s cute… But what I’m saying is, she’s not just cute, but really sexy, and that’s what makes her a total babe. So by viewing her as a sex symbol where you don’t, I understand her more…which means I love her more! And therefore, I win!”

“Hey, who made you judge of that?!” protested his childhood friend, Mikado Ryuugamine. Masaomi side-eyed him and turned to the girl, Anri Sonohara, who was looking flustered between the two boys.

“Well, anyhoo, I’m glad that Anri’s fully recovered from her injuries.”

“Yes, that’s a very good thing!”

“Uh, um…thank you, both of you…”

Prompted by the boys’ smiles, Anri clumsily put on the best grin she could manage.

Mikado Ryuugamine.

Masaomi Kida.

Anri Sonohara.

It was the trio that perhaps most powerfully exuded an aura of “closeness” to other students at Raira Academy. In terms of romantic couples, Seiji Yagiri and Mika Harima in Class A were most famous, but the peaceful romantic triangle between these three was so well-known that some even took bets on which of the two boys Anri would end up with.

Mikado Ryuugamine was a reserved, proper boy. His hair was as black as it was when he was born, he didn’t have any piercings or accessories, and he dutifully wore his school uniform on a campus where that was not required.

In stark contrast, Masaomi Kida’s hair was dyed an eye-catching brown color, his ears had multiple piercings, and at the end of the sleeve of his own personal jacket glinted a silver bracelet and a ring.

Between the two boys, the girl seemed closer to Mikado in personality. She was like an even more boring version of him. The glasses gave her the image of a meek librarian or an honor student.

It didn’t seem like the three shared anything in common, but the smiles on their faces told any observer that they were close friends, and indeed, this was the case.

“All right! Let’s all go pick up some chicks, so we can compare Anri’s cute sexiness to theirs and prove her superiority!”

“What kind of nonsense is that?!”

“Uh…p-pick them up…?”

“Don’t worry, Anri. Your presence will lure them in: ‘Oh, there’s a girl with them, so this has to be safe!’ You won’t need to do a thing.”

The trio created a warm friendliness that shielded them from the chilly breeze. The other groups of students milling around were invested in similar conversations, which gave the school a different atmosphere from the rest of the city surrounding it.

Just as they were about to pass through the school gate, Masaomi came to a sudden stop and turned back wistfully to the building.

“So, just one week left on the path of our first year of school. It all happened so fast.”

“Yeah, it sure did.”

“It was very brief.”

Mikado and Anri found it surprising that Masaomi would act so sentimental. They joined him in looking back at the school, reflecting in their own way—except that Mikado quickly looked sideways at Anri’s meaningful expression, blushing slightly.

She looked back toward him suddenly. He hastily snapped his eyes to the school building, but it felt like their gazes had met for an instant. He didn’t feel like making an excuse like, “I was looking at you”—that was more up Masaomi’s alley—so he tried to hide the awkwardness by changing the subject instead.

“S-speaking of which…Mr. Nasujima sure quit school all of a sudden, didn’t he?”

“…”

Anri’s face looked pensive for a moment. But Mikado didn’t notice; he continued to chatter on about the relatively unfamiliar teacher. “I wonder why? It’s such a random time to leave. He could have just waited another week and made it a clean break at the end of the year.”

It was not Anri, but Masaomi, who responded, “Who knows? Maybe he got busted for leaking the finals questions to me. But if so, wouldn’t I have gotten called in and punished, too?”

“Did I just hear you let slip what I think you did?”

“It wasn’t a slip at all. I summoned considerable courage in coming clean and admitting my crimes to you. Praise me! The same way you’d praise the honesty of the biographer who admitted the story about George Washington chopping down the cherry tree was a total fabrication!”

“I don’t give a crap about the honesty of someone who has to twist logic in knots to make his point.”

As they bickered like usual, Anri’s conflicted expression gradually softened. Mikado noticed her slight grin and shyly switched to a new topic.

“Speaking of people who vanished…the same goes for the slasher.”

Anri’s smile vanished as well. Mikado suddenly realized his mistake and hastily bowed his head.

“S-sorry, Sonohara. I didn’t mean to make you remember…”

“Huh? No! I’m fine. I’m sorry. It’s nothing, really,” she apologized back for no real reason, startled by his sudden concession.

Anri had been admitted to the hospital after she was attacked by the slasher on that infamous night a few weeks back. Mikado and Masaomi were more concerned for her sake than anyone. Then again, she didn’t really have any other friends, and without a family, the only other people than these two who visited her in the hospital were her teacher Kitagoma and her old friend Mika.

The speed of her recovery surprised everyone, and after a few days and tests—with only Mikado and Masaomi visiting her on each of those days—she was cleared to leave. Once out, they treated her like nothing had ever happened.

Then again, Masaomi’s visits had been very brief, and he usually had some parting comment like, “RN? Caretaker? No, there’s no better term for an angel in white than nurse.”

In personality, Mikado and Masaomi were just as different as their appearances suggested. Masaomi publicly professed his attraction to Anri but said the same thing about other girls equally. Meanwhile, Mikado had never officially announced his fondness for her. He was shy enough that he seemed to be satisfied just hanging out as a threesome at Masaomi’s insistence.

Meanwhile, Anri did not wish to destroy that relationship, and she had no score to settle with the boys on that matter. The other girls at the school understood her personality and therefore didn’t spread false rumors about how she was playing the both of them.

Even the group of bullies who usually harassed her had been strangely well behaved since their leader found herself one of the slasher’s victims. Mikado heard a number of such rumors regarding their little trio.

Now that he no longer felt uncomfortable with his standing, he was ready to head out into the city with Masaomi on his frivolous plan, grumbling all the while.

The sudden vibration of a phone put an end to that brief moment of peace.

Masaomi pulled his phone out of his pants pocket and answered it at once. “Hello? It’s me…” His face hardened for an instant. He murmured a few words back, then stashed the phone away and turned to them, bowing with a hand held vertically in front of his face.

“Sorry. An old friend wants to meet up all of a sudden.”

“Oh, really?”

“If you want to blame anyone, blame my friend all you want. Blaming is free, and it’s no skin off my back: two birds with one stone!”

Mikado shrugged off this sudden change of plans like it was just business as usual. “If it means we don’t have to pick up girls, I’m more inclined to thank your friend instead.”

“Nah, save the thanks for me.”

“You’re such a tyrant.”

“Tyrants make their way into the history books a lot easier than a nice old king. See ya tomorrow!” Masaomi called out, a poor excuse for an excuse, and trotted out of the gate.

Mikado watched his friend grow smaller and smaller in the distance. He turned to Anri with a wry, exasperated grin.

“We could have at least gone with him partway. What’s the rush about?”

“Dunno…”

“What about you, Sonohara? Are you going home now?”

“I suppose… I’ve got something to take care of, too,” Anri said, grinning. She headed for the gate to prod Mikado onward.

“I see… Yeah, okay. It’s funny… The sunset was so pretty today, but there are scary-looking clouds overhead. There could be some showers soon. Stay dry, okay?”

“Ah, okay… Thank you for your concern.”

That doesn’t just mean she wants to stay away from me, does it?

“They say the day after a pretty sunset is always clear, but I don’t know about the night in between.”

“Good point…”

Anri’s typical reaction stung Mikado a bit. He was concerned at the fact that as soon as Masaomi left, she found she had “something to take care of.”

If possible, he hoped to visit a café with her—but it was difficult to bring himself to ask that now, certainly not after she claimed she had business of her own.

Mikado was curious about the nature of her errand, but he never managed to ask. They talked about their usual harmless topics on the way back home.

He never once stopped to think about the nature of Masaomi’s errand, however.

One hour later, Sunshine, Sixtieth Floor Street, Ikebukuro

“Hey, Shizuo.”

“What is it, Tom?”

Two men carefully wound through the crowd that was largely made up of Raira students. The one with glasses and dreads spoke to the other man.

“I’m gettin’ hungry. Time to grab a bite.”

“Good idea. I’m not feeling picky,” the young man in the bartender outfit replied quietly.

“Hey, Shizuo…why the bartender getup?”

“I had a part-time job bartending once, and my little brother wanted to make sure I didn’t get fired this time, so he ordered me twenty of the same outfit. These clothes are all over my house.”

“…Your brother’s pretty damn generous.”

“If there’s one thing he’s got a lot of, it’s money.”

The man envisioned the face of his brother and sighed. This was Shizuo Heiwajima, widely seen as the most dangerous man in the streets of Ikebukuro. At his side was his work superior, Tom Tanaka.

The two worked together as debt collectors for a telekura—a phone-based dating service. As their job was to collect money from folks who tried to run out on their debts, it involved danger in a variety of ways.

“Money, huh? Hey, wasn’t there an armed robbery around here just a little while ago? I bet it was just a model gun made to look real. Then again, if you tinker with them enough, even a model gun can be deadly.”

“Scary stuff.”

“Says you,” snorted Tom, but his laugh was not directed at Shizuo. He didn’t want the trouble of pissing the other fellow off over something as harmless as this.

They had finished their daytime collecting, and next they would be after those customers who only showed up at night. There was plenty of time until then, so they decided to look for a place to eat, when…

“Hello, Shizoo-oh. Tom. Nice to see yoo.”

Two black hands grabbed their shoulders, accompanied by cartoonishly accented Japanese.

The men spun around and saw an enormous black man standing nearly seven feet tall.

There were a surprising number of black street solicitors in Ikebukuro, most of them working for thrift shops and clubs. But what set this man apart was the outfit—a blue-and-white apron with RUSSIA SUSHI stitched on the breast.

“Your tummy growl, just now. Yes? I hear it. Good ears, me. You eat. Eat sushi. Even Satan in hell like sushi.”

“…”

Tom smiled uncomfortably at the man’s Japanese, which was broken in a variety of ways. He looked over at Shizuo.

Shizuo was staring impassively back at the black man. His state of mind was unreadable.

But it was clear that at the very least, he was not in a good mood.

“Sorry, Simon. I’m not flush with cash today…”

“Oh. I make cheap. No worry, half-price sale.”

“What…really?”

For a second, the two men were seriously tempted. That was a deal too good to pass up.

“Other half goes on tab. You pay other half with interest next time.”

Something in Shizuo’s neck made a sharp crackling noise. “Listen, Simon… You have any idea what the hell you’re saying to me?”

Tom noted the pulsing in Shizuo’s temples and took a position a good six feet away. Despite the obvious warning signs, the man named Simon continued with an innocent smile.

“Rip-off is wisdom of Japan. Grandma’s best advice, yes? Izaya tell me long time ago.”

“—!”

The word Izaya was the switch. Shizuo unleashed a devastating attack from point-blank range.

The fist seemed to slice directly through the air itself, only to be enveloped in Simon’s massive palm like it was made of paper. Though this might have given the impression that the blow was light and harmless, Simon’s body slid backward about three feet the instant it stopped the punch.

A savvy viewer might believe that Simon slid backward himself to soften the impact, but no, it was at least 270 pounds of pressure from the fist alone that pushed him.

Shizuo took a step forward to close the gap and unleashed more punches. Simon rotated his hands back and forth to absorb the blows, a troubled smile on his face as he tried to calm the younger man.

“Shizoo-oh angry. Make stomach emptily empty. Not enough calcium. Oh, Shizuo. Hands are sushi chef’s life. Punching not good.”

“Only because! You’re using them! To stop my blows!”

The words only served to make Shizuo angrier, the force and speed of his punches rising.

“Oh, scary, scary.”

At the limit of what his hands could absorb, Simon sidestepped to evade the body blow this time. In the space behind him was a red postal box sticking out of the concrete.

The hard metal object wavered in a way it was not meant to move, with the pop of a balloon exploding.

The onlookers around them assumed that it was the sound of Shizuo’s fist cracking to pieces. Some of them shrieked and turned away.

But Shizuo only moved on to his next attack, unaffected. He thrust a leaping knee in Simon’s direction.

“Who said you could dodge? You have any idea how much a postal box costs? Huh?!”

Tom watched Shizuo run off after Simon, then cast a glance at the side of the box. The red metal was cracked around a dent about four inches deep, like a cannonball had struck the box directly.

The passersby noticed the dent as well and glanced back and forth between Shizuo and the postal box in disbelief.

Tom scanned the crowd quickly to ensure there were no cops present. He mumbled, “Uh-oh. What if they come after us and demand repair costs? How much does a postal box cost anyway? And how can Simon take punches like this one and laugh them off…?”

He continued to examine the surrounding crowd—then realized that he wasn’t seeing any of the people with the yellow scraps today.

“Hmm…? What’s this? You’d think the kids in the yellow scarves would be all over this.”

If they weren’t around at this time of day, there had to be a gathering somewhere. Tom looked up at the darkening sky and noticed the black, heavy clouds massing overhead. The sunset light against their underbellies shone down on Ikebukuro, eerily red.

He gazed at the sky for several moments until he realized that Shizuo and Simon were steadily proceeding farther into an alley. He started walking in their direction, sighing.

Thinking of their night shift collecting debts, he mumbled dejectedly.

“Crap… Does this mean rain?”

Several hours later, abandoned factory, Tokyo

In a location slightly removed from Ikebukuro, there was a whole row of factories, one of which looked especially run-down and desolate.

It was likely used to produce some kind of steel at one point, but aside from a few clearly useless artifacts remaining behind, all of the operating equipment had been taken out, leaving it barren.

Despite its reasonably close proximity to the downtown parts of the city, the surroundings were truly desolate. Hardly anyone could be seen walking the streets around the factory.

It had clearly been several years since the building had been abandoned, its gray walls rusting out in spots. The land wasn’t even valuable enough to have the deed recycled for another purpose—but that did not mean it was not being used.

To make up for the emptiness outside, the interior of the factory was packed with people.

It was not a large variety—most within the building were of a young age. In fact, the sea of faces could be described as “boys,” with some as young as middle school or even elementary age.

But that did not mean the factory was buzzing with youthful energy. The boys were even quieter and better behaved than how they must have acted while in class at school.

Every single one of the boys had some kind of yellow cloth displayed on his body, whether bandanna, scarf, or boxer’s bandages wrapped around the hands. When combined with the overwhelming number present, it produced a sea of yellow.

“So…who got hit?” asked a boy leaning against a drum can in the midst of the group of dozens.

A boy near him mumbled in a sluggish voice devoid of emotion. “It was Mr. Horada.”

“Don’t recognize that name. Who’s Horada? I would remember an odd name like that…and what do you mean, ‘Mister’?”

“Uh…just that he was an alum of Higa and his friends’ high school…,” the boy mumbled again, growing quieter as the sentence went on.

The boy in the middle asked, “Higa… Oh, one of the people who joined while I was away from the group? But when you say ‘alum,’ does that mean he’s over twenty now?”

“Yeah…I think he’s right about there.”

“Hmm.”

The boy went silent for a while. Eventually he craned his head, cracking his neck, and hopped down off the drum canister.

“Well, it’s fine. Whatever happened in the organization while I was gone was your decision, and I’m not gonna fuss over it.”

“…’Kay.”

“I just want you to be careful. If the older folks bring in even older people, and it eventually reached the point that so-and-so from the so-and-so syndicate comes knocking on the door…that’s when this whole thing is finished.”

The boy’s smile was more wry and self-mocking than one who was simply lecturing his fellows would wear. The gathering of youths were all the type to despise that sort of patronization, but they heard him out without a single complaint.

“We’re kids. No matter how many of us there are, we can’t overcome real adults. We’re not smart enough about the world. They’ll use us to their ends, and then it’s over.”

He paused for a breath and glanced sideways balefully, murmuring, “The same way that Izaya Orihara used me.”

“That wasn’t your fault, Shogun…”

“C’mon, how many times do I have to tell you?” he said exasperatedly, correcting their theatrical title for him. “I’m not your shogun, I’m Masaomi Kida.”

And the boy thought about his past.

The inescapable past that had created the Masaomi Kida of today.

The Yellow Scarves.

When did the color gang based around a Romance of the Three Kingdoms motif get started? Even Masaomi couldn’t remember.

There was no real necessity behind the creation of the gang.

Even the choice of yellow for the gang’s color was based on nothing more than a TV show that was popular at the time. That’s all that Masaomi recalled of the decision, and even after this much time, he had almost no sentiment or attachment to the color at all.

Because the manga Masaomi was into at the time was based in the Three Kingdoms setting and they knew the color would be yellow, it was inevitable that the name of the gang ended up being Yellow Scarves.

That was the extent of the rationale behind the name and color.

The only important question was why they got together.

But even that genesis was nothing more than a fragment of memory from Masaomi’s distant past.

Masaomi was still in elementary school when he left his hometown and came to Ikebukuro.

It was a massive culture shock to move to such a wildly different place from the familiar countryside he knew.

He had to tell someone about this—so he chose to boast about the big city to his old friend, Mikado Ryuugamine.

It wasn’t because he was particularly close with Mikado, but just because he was the only one who had Internet access at his house. Back in the early days of the Internet, chat partners were a valuable commodity. Masaomi regaled him with tales of the things that happened in Ikebukuro.

His friend showed no lack of curiosity over the adventurous stories of Tokyo. Mikado was the perfect audience for Masaomi.

When Masaomi reached middle school and his innate feistiness grew more pronounced, he would brag to Mikado about the fights he’d seen and participated in during his urban stay.

“Just don’t overdo it,” Mikado would warn, but his eyes sparkled in fascination at Masaomi’s exploits, and he still demanded to hear all about them.

Eventually, Masaomi found his way deeper and deeper.

Deeper into the heart of Ikebukuro.

Even deeper.

When he first started talking about his fights, there was no feeling of guilt. He believed that they were all fights someone else picked with him, and he hadn’t hurt his opponents too much.

But it all started going south when he saw a classmate being harassed in town and took on the fight for him.

Soon people began to gather around him. His classmates’ friends called more friends into the circle, causing it to grow.

At times, some people offered to handle the fights for him, and Masaomi’s group began to make a name for itself within their public middle school. Of course, it was a school without many true delinquents, and they weren’t in a position to make trouble with any nearby schools.

But that only meant there were no brakes to stop them.

Slowly, so slowly, the group grew in size.

In his youth, Masaomi did not understand what this meant yet. There was merely a vague sense of anxiety in the back of his mind.

And then, around the time their group took on the name of Yellow Scarves…

…Masaomi stopped telling Mikado about it.

Instead, he told his old friend about things in town like usual. He just didn’t include any details about his odd companions.

During the days, he would hang out with his Yellow Scarves as always. It wasn’t awkward for him. In fact, he enjoyed the feeling of lording it over his little group.

But he couldn’t shake the feeling that it only served to further distance the old memories of his countryside home.

He cared about his friends in his new environment. But he felt that there was a fundamental distinction between them.

If he bragged about his gang leadership to Mikado, that would somehow end his connection to home for good, he felt.

Should he stay true to his old self? Or embrace his new role as leader of the Yellow Scarves?

It was a silly and unnecessary choice, but it tormented him all the same.

His friends here were only connected to him as long as he was fighting. He was worried that they might leave him as soon as he slipped up and made a mistake.

He wanted someone.

Someone to affirm his actions and support him.

Someone who, like Mikado from his hometown, set him at ease and grounded him so that he could be at home in Ikebukuro.

It was during this period of growing unease that she showed up out of the blue.

“That’s a cool yellow scarf. It looks nice on you.”

She was referring to the trademark of the Yellow Scarves tied around his arm.

The girls showed little fear or concern about Masaomi. It was what one might call a “reverse pickup,” where a group of young women around their age reached out to contact Masaomi’s little group hanging out at the train station.

Masaomi was fully comfortable with his life in the big city right around the time that the Yellow Scarves numbered about thirty in total. As their numbers grew, Masaomi got tired of the fighting, and the Yellow Scarves as a whole turned easygoing and relaxed. There were very few squabbles with other gangs at that point.

He tried picking up girls when he was on his own, but he rarely succeeded, and even when he did, the relationship was lazy and brief. That’s how he had always related to women, even before coming to Ikebukuro.

Mikado always marveled at these exploits, claiming that he was “still just in middle school!” But Masaomi had been going out with girls since his elementary years, so he usually turned the tables and teased Mikado for being too shy instead.

So when this moment came, Masaomi didn’t give it any more thought than Hey, I got hit on by some girls, and they’re pretty hot, too. Lucky me, I’m not doing anything right now.

“You’re called the Yellow Scarves. Isn’t that right?” one of the girls asked boldly. Masaomi felt his excitement cool off.

Oh. She’s not interested in me personally, just the group. Then again, we must be getting famous if even normal girls like her are aware of us.

He was ready to put on a different face, to express more acutely his individual nature as Masaomi Kida, but one of the girls preempted him with a gentle smile.

“You’re way cooler in person than the rumors suggest, Masaomi Kida.”

“Huh?” he gaped stupidly.

How did she know his name? It was the girl in the center of the opposing group. She had a bright smile and lightly dyed a lock of her boyish short hair, a look that made her rather visually similar to him. He blinked in surprise.

“What? How do you know my name? Are you psychic? Like Psychic Itou? If you keep reading people’s minds, I’m gonna have to stuff you into a bag and take you home with me!” he teased, referencing a popular TV comedian to hide his consternation about being recognized.

Masaomi’s fellow Yellow Scarves looked among themselves, unsure of how they should react, while the girls giggled at Masaomi’s joke. The one in the center gleefully responded, “Oh my God, you’re being so weird! You’re so funny, Kida!”

After a bout of laughter, she gently shook her head. “But I’m not a psychic. The real psychic is someone else.”

“Oh? Who’s that? Does one of these girls around here speak to ghosts?” Masaomi asked, looking at the others with a gentle smile of his own. Some of the girls were already speaking to other members of the Yellow Scarves, and only the three clustered around the short-haired girl were facing him directly.

“Let me guess, she asked the ghosts of my ancestors just what a cool guy I am, right? Or is it one of the sort that hangs out behind my back? Or a paralysis ghost, or a floating ghost, or what have you. Whatever kind of ghost it is, I’m sure it’ll be reborn under the most awesome conditions in the future. Maybe as the child of you and me?” he joked bawdily, testing her reaction. Though her hair was dyed, she and the other girls seemed fairly straightforward, not trashy. He was testing their reactions to see if they would get along with his style.

“Now you’re just being silly. Let me guess, do you already have a name picked out?”

“Well, we’d need to take a look at the characters in the parents’ names, right? So what’s your name?”

The girl played along well, not missing a beat.

“Saki Mikajima. Mikajima is spelled with three, a small ke, and island. And Saki is a shortened form of the Stewartia tree.”

“Stewartia? So in flower language, your name means like, ‘Seize your chance before it wilts away’?”

“Oh, wow! You know what it is? I figured you would ask, ‘What’s that?’” she said, surprised.

Masaomi grinned, feeling his engine kicking in. “Sure, I know everything. I just ask the ghost hanging out over my back.” He wasn’t sure if that one was a little too corny.

Saki said, “Exactly.”

“Huh?”

“The person standing behind you is kind of psychic, in a way. He’s very special. He knows everything.”

“Huh?”

Before Masaomi could turn around in shock, a hand fell on his shoulder.

“Whah?”

Masaomi spun on his heels and saw an unfamiliar man standing there.

“Hi, nice to meet you. It’s, um…Masaomi Kida, right?” the man said, smiling amiably.

When he looked at the man’s face, a single emotion rose in Masaomi’s chest: vague anxiety. The same sensation he’d felt when people started to rally around him.

Masaomi felt his entire body wrapped in an odd prickling alienation that he couldn’t quite describe.

“…And you are?” he asked suspiciously.

The older man held out his hand and beamed. “I’m Izaya Orihara. Information is my business.”

“Nice to meet you.”

The boy recalled the impishly innocent yet cunning and crafty smile of Izaya and clicked his tongue in irritation. “There, see? I just remembered some shit I didn’t want to think about. Enough of the depressing talk!”

He crossed his legs in front of him and changed the topic. “Oh, right, this is depressing, too. So what was the deal? Who beat up this Horada guy last night?”

“I told you… Um, the Black Rider. I mean, technically it was the guy the rider was with who did Mr. Horada.”

“…Wasn’t Higa telling me the exact same story a while back? Right around the time I returned… It was Shizuo, wasn’t it? They didn’t go back for a rematch with him, did they? If so, I don’t have a lot of sympathy. In fact, if that was the case, I’d tell them to get the hell away.”

His tone was light and jokey, but there was a sheen of sweat on his expression. It was the face of someone who knew the terror that this man named Shizuo commanded.

One of the boy’s companions mumbled, “Er, well… Higa’s group is in a panic, too. They got whacked by some freak wearing a white gas mask. Said their limbs got tied down by…shadows or some weird shit like that.”

“…What is that, some ninjutsu arts or something?”

“I have no idea. Anyway, the Black Rider gave the gas mask dude a ride, and they just took off…”

With that rather unhelpful report, Masaomi was back to a serious expression again. “I wonder what’s up with that Black Rider.”

Anyone who lived in Ikebukuro knew the urban legend of the Black Rider. When his old friend moved to Tokyo, Masaomi had bragged about the rider—but in truth, he didn’t know the identity or intentions of the strange being.

“All I’ve heard is that he’s supposed to be a member of the Dollars.”

Dollars.

The expressions on those in yellow around him slowly began to evolve.

Many of them believed that the slashing incidents were the work of the Dollars, and an equal number of them found the concept of a color gang without a color to be eerie and unsettling.

But for whatever reason, all of the Yellow Scarves who were actually hurt in the attacks only claimed that they “didn’t remember” what happened. For the Yellow Scarves, the police, and the media, the full picture of the slasher was still unclear.

Now that the slasher was in hiding, the news had moved on to newer topics, and the incident was beginning to fade from the public’s mind. But for those who had felt the madness of that incident at close range, those who knew some of the victims, the truth of the matter was carved into them just as deeply as those wounds the victims had suffered.

“I have no intention of forgiving whoever cut down my people,” Masaomi announced, his foot perched boldly up on top of a drum canister. He got down and strode through the meaningful glances of the crowd toward the exit, mumbling to himself.

It was a sentiment he had uttered over and over to himself since he had first returned to this place several days ago. As though he was trying to convince himself of something.

“Shit… How dare you suck me back in…”

“Who’s there?!” echoed a sudden shout of anger off the factory walls.

It could have been the bellow of the landowner come to see what was happening—but the shout came from the members of the group standing watch outside.

“What’s up?” Masaomi asked promptly and received an answer from one of the guards just as promptly.

“They said some girl was trying to spy on us… They’re chasing her now.”

“Girl?”

It was probably just some bystander passing by who peered in out of curiosity from all the commotion inside, Masaomi thought. But then he remembered that several members were guarding each entrance to the property, so that seemed unlikely.

“I want to talk to her. Catch her, make it quiet.”

The factory was not particularly large, but there was scrap material and junked vehicles piled up outside the structure, which might make catching her difficult if she hid among the piles.

Masaomi headed outside to assist in the search, heard the bustle of his fellow members following behind him, and held up a hand. “We don’t need a big group. Just ten will do.”

If the entire gang ran around the property, they would surely draw notice. The last thing a big group like theirs needed was the loss of one of the few places they could meet in private because someone reported them to the police.

Masaomi knew that the authorities had stepped up their crackdown on the color gangs in recent years. He wanted to protect their space at all costs. They had been hanging here since the days when he was their full-time leader. Something about the space, something distinct from say, a nightclub, reminded him of the vibes of his hometown. He didn’t want to lose the space if he could help it.

Not that it’s up to me. I don’t own the building, Masaomi thought wryly to himself. It’s funny…after I already gave up the place once.

The sun was already down, and without many streetlights in the vicinity, the factory grounds were surprisingly dark. It seemed to Masaomi that she could easily get away under these circumstances. He tried to imagine the intruder.

They said it was a woman—probably a curious tabloid writer. If she was an official of some kind, she would have just marched right through the entrance.

It could be someone from an opposing color gang, but there were few of those around these days, and Masaomi’s team did not beef with any of them.

Except for the Dollars.

The Dollars were a unique organization that expanded its reach through the Internet. Masaomi himself had registered on their site for kicks ages ago.

About a year ago, he heard that they were having their first real-life meeting. Masaomi did not attend. He assumed that by gathering as a group and using that power, they would be no different from the Yellow Scarves.

Then again, if I had really dug deep into the Dollars and become an officer…maybe I could have prevented this from happening.

It was with that thought in mind that Masaomi started walking the opposite direction as the one the lookouts had run. The lot was small enough that it would be faster to circle around from the other side.

Suddenly, he got a subtle sensation of something moving. Masaomi was once again plunged into a vague sense of unease.

No, not quite.

The unease…has always been there.

Masaomi quickened his pace, trying to process the swirling, bubbling emotions within him.

The first time I felt it was when people started to gather around me, when all I did was fight.

He took step after step through the darkness, classifying the emotion that had plagued him from past to present. The usual smirking grin on Masaomi’s face was completely gone. Only the unease grew.

The vague unease I’d forgotten came back to my mind when I first met Saki.

The gloom of the sky covered his heart like a suffocating blanket, fanning the flames of his smoldering concerns.

And when I met Izaya after that, the vagueness of that unease turned into rock-hard anxiety.

The farther he got from the entrance to the building, the thicker the darkness became, until he could no longer see his feet.

But Saki…helped me forget that dread.

As his pace increased, Masaomi’s state of mind gradually shook more and more violently.

And when the accident happened…I broke away from Saki…and left the Yellow Scarves…

The past flashed before his eyes. His pulse quickened by the moment.

That should have been the end of the dread.

Thump, thump. His heart thudded.

I can’t forgive…whoever attacked Anri and the guys who used to be my friends…

His feet hit the ground faster and faster, matching that rhythm.

That’s why I came back. It’s the only reason.

He suddenly realized that large raindrops were falling.

So…why is it happening now?

As the rhythm of the rain picked up to join him, it churned up Masaomi’s unease into a thicker froth.

Why is the anxiety rushing back stronger than it ever did before?

He felt as though he was in reach of the nature of that unease.

Masaomi realized that he was in a full sprint around the back of the factory.

Run.

Run, run, run.

Just run.

Not to a specific destination, but to escape from the chasing shadows.

Spurring legs onward in danger of cramps—forward, ever forward.

She only wanted to know.

The truth.

The truth of a matter that involved her.

The cost of that truth was the scampering of a mouse on the run from a cat.

In the cramped factory lot, there were only so many places to hide.

She slid into the shadow of a pile of scrap material, shrank to lower her profile.

The escapee judged that hiding would be a more effective option than running like mad.

She couldn’t feel anything.

The only sensation was the mental shock of what she had just seen.

She spoke, only for the purpose of calming her frayed nerves.

“Why…?”

She knew that no one could answer her.

“Why…why was Kida…in a place like that…?”

The girl in glasses asked the void.

The sky visible between the piles of junk was covered in dark clouds, silently dispersing her query to nothingness.

By way of answer, a cold droplet hit her cheek.

As she watched, rain began to fall around her.

A curtain of water and sound, covering everything beneath it.

Fshh, fshh, fshh, fshh.

Anri Sonohara’s heart calmed itself into that wave of radio static.

Fshh, fshh, fshh, fshh.