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Prologue: Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha
Hey.
Wanna hear a nasty story?
Hey, you. You ever killed someone?
I have.
C’mon, don’t look at me like that.
Pretty much anyone who’s worked on a big farm has killed something.
Chickens, cows. Killing really takes it out of you.
There are lots of ways to get over that: experience, environment, religion, hunger. But until you get to that point, it’s still rough.
Once you’re a full-grown adult, not a stupid kid, some people aren’t even sure if they want to stomp on a line of ants. What about you?
Whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on. C’mon, I told you not to look at me like that. I’m not trying to lecture you, and I’m not preaching a religion or a vegetarian diet or anything like that.
Listen, I’m not talking about animals here. I love raw meat. I have pride. But all that aside…
I’m talking about people.
The thing is, it takes a lot of labor to kill a person.
I mean, don’t get the wrong idea. People die easy. Push ’em off the train platform, wedge an ice pick into the back of their head, and that’s it. Age, sex, and experience all mean nothing. If you can’t beat them in a fight, just poison them.
Anyone with eyes in their back who can dodge bullets and digest poison isn’t a mere human, so they’re not applicable to this exercise. Rule out the Headless Rider, who might be dead from the start for all I know, and that freak of nature who throws vending machines one-handed.
…Oops, I’m getting off track. Sorry.
At any rate, you can kill people real easily.
But it takes an incredible amount of work to actually kill.
People die quick, but it takes labor to go from “wanting to kill” to “killing.”
You often hear about stupid kids thinking they were just gonna beat on a guy, real easy, and then he just up and died on them. Right?
But when you have an adult, someone much, much stronger than a kid, possibly in possession of a gun…and they calmly think to themselves, All right, I’m going to kill him, that takes quite a lot of mental effort. Especially the first time. It’s different once you get used to it—then there’s no going back. At least, according to what I heard a soldier say once on TV when he came back from some war or another.
What I’m getting at is, it’s really, really hard for normal folks like you to rationally kill a person.
It’s a whole lot easier to suddenly go into a rage, scream that you’re going to kill someone, and then start firing.
Isn’t that weird?
Someone without intent to murder can’t kill a person. If they do, it’s an accident. There’s still a punishment for that, of course. The only difference between “I killed him” and “I accidentally killed him” is the level of intent.
So let me ask again.
Could you kill a person?
You sell information in Shinjuku, toying with people however you like.
But you love human beings more than anyone else around. Isn’t that right?
I’ve heard about you, Izaya Orihara.
Could you kill a person? With your own hands, I mean.
Instead, you stab them with a knife real weak so they don’t die, and you pretend you’re a real bad guy.
Either way, you’re gonna use them, right?
You know, it’s laughable what a cowardly creep you are.
Ha ha!
Ha ha ha!
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Chat room
{Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha.}
{Aha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha}
{Aha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha}
—SETTON HAS ENTERED THE CHAT—
[Evenin’.]
{Oh, good evening.}
[Are you just copy-pasting that mechanical laugh? What’s up, Tarou?]
{Well, what else can you do? Check out the backlogs.}
{Huh?}
[Ah!]
{The backlog disappeared!}
{This is tyranny!}
[That’s mean.]
[So what happened?]
{That’s the thing… Kanra said something weird.}
{You know Shizuo Heiwajima, right?}
[Yes. You were talking about him?]
[I’m not sure why, but his name seems to pop up in here a lot.]
{You’re right, lol. So, about Shizuo…}
|well|
[Huh?!]
|i’m going to leave for today|
{Oh, sure. Good night, Saika.}
[When did you get here, Saika?!]
[Huh? Where is that displayed…?]
{User list?}
|i’m not used to this yet|
{Where is the user list displayed, Kanra?}
[Oh, Kanra… Well, either way, good evening, Saika.]
|good evening|
|i’m sorry for not saying hello|
|thank you|
|sorry|
—SAIKA HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
{Good night, Saika. Then again, it’s only eight thirty.}
[Maybe Saika’s coming from an Internet café.]
[That reminds me, there was just that armed robbery in Ikebukuro, so I hope everyone’s being careful walking around the area.]
{First, a slasher, now guns? It’s getting dangerous out there.}
[Yes, a few times since then. The viruses and whatnot are fine now. She’s just not used to computers yet, so I’m giving her some tips.]
[Re: always dangerous—Yes, someone I know told me that even back in the Edo period, there were many street slashers around here.]
{Oh, really?}
[Oops, sorry.]
[Looks like I have some work all of a sudden. I’ve got to go.]
[So long!]
{Oh, no worries.}
[Night!]
—SETTON HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
{Good night.}
{Well, I suppose we’ll log off now.}
{Don’t use that with me.}
{I’m not going to keep playing this game.}
—TAROU HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
—KANRA HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
—THE CHAT ROOM IS CURRENTLY EMPTY—
—THE CHAT ROOM IS CURRENTLY EMPTY—
—THE CHAT ROOM IS CURRENTLY EMPTY—
Chapter 1: You Know Perfectly Well.
Two years ago, Raira University Hospital, Ikebukuro
The boy’s eyes were focused on a single mass of white.
A scene like snow beyond the glass window.
Sheets behind the window.
Sheets on the bed.
A pipe frame supporting that bed.
The ceiling and walls surrounding it all.
Even the numerous devices filling the room.
Each and every one, white.
Even the skin tone and the black floating amid the white were connected with white tubes.
That point of color was like one giant eye, which the boy felt was looking out at him.
With a pale gaze.
It was an illusion, of course; the point floating in the white was the face of a girl about his age, her eyes closed and face pointed toward the ceiling.
It was the boy himself who was creating the illusion.
The guilt that gripped him so terribly made him wish that she would blame him for his transgression.
He wanted to run, but he had nowhere to go. He was afraid of the guilt that would remain after he did, so he hoped that if she blamed him, at least that guilt would disappear—a shameful, cowardly hope.
But the bedridden girl was almost cruelly silent.
In fact, she could neither hear anything nor open her eyes to see anything.
Unable to even speak to her, the boy could only tremble in fear.
“Hey, isn’t that great?”
The voice was completely at odds with the gravity of the situation.
The boy didn’t bother to turn around toward it. He ground his teeth audibly.
But the owner of the voice didn’t seem to be affected in the least by the boy’s bare hostility. He continued, “So she didn’t die, huh? Lady Luck’s on your side. As long as she’s alive, you can find a way to work things out.”
“Iza…ya…,” the boy replied, the anger palpable now. The only reason he didn’t turn around and pummel Izaya Orihara was because he knew the true target of his anger was his own self.
The black-clad Izaya, who stood out in stark relief against the white hospital hallway, gave the boy a knowing smile. “You’re smart—that’s why I like you. You understand that what happened to her was because of you. It is to your great credit that you didn’t let your emotions goad you into attacking me. I’m certain that she’s grateful for that too. Can’t wait until she wakes up truly.”
At the very moment Izaya’s speech finished, the boy leaped onto him. He knew they were in a hospital, but he could find no good reason to stop himself this time.
Yet Izaya easily evaded the boy’s desperate punch by a hair’s breadth, extending a leg to knock him off-balance. He grabbed the boy’s unsteady arm and spun him down to the floor. There was no sound or impact, just the soft landing of leaves onto the ground.
Stunned that he was now sitting on the hallway tile, the boy could only stare up at the man. From below, Izaya’s smile took on a hint of shadow.
“Correct.”
“…”
“You were right to turn your anger on me there. I taunted you with clear and present malice,” Izaya cackled with no hint of remorse. He brought a finger up to his lips. “But this is a hospital. Gotta keep it quiet in here,” he taunted, turning his gaze to the girl in the room.
“In a coma, huh? I really hope she wakes up. On the other hand, perhaps you would prefer that she never opens her eyes again?”
“What does…that mean…?” the boy gasped haltingly. The anger had faded a bit, leaving only the rasp of fear.
Izaya looked down on the desperate boy. “What does it mean? You know exactly what I mean. By even asking that question, aren’t you just attempting to delude yourself into thinking you don’t know what’s going on? You’re afraid, aren’t you? If she wakes up, you might be blamed for your part in this for the rest of your life.”
“…”
“But what would happen if she dies without ever waking up? Wouldn’t that be a lifetime of guilt for you? I suppose it would be, knowing you. So whether she lives or dies, you’re left with the guilt on your conscience.”
“…”
The boy fell silent. Izaya turned to him and gently spoke words of comfort. It was as if he was doling out the forgiveness in the girl’s stead. But the actual content of those words was anything but warm.
“You can’t escape it, no matter how you struggle. No matter where you go, the past will follow you. No matter how hard you try to forget, no matter if you die and let it all disappear, the past will always be right behind you, chasing you down. Chasing, chasing, chasing, chasing… Do you know why?”
Izaya shrugged his shoulders, gesturing that even he could do nothing about this. “Because it’s lonely. The past, memories, and outcomes are all very lonely things. They want a companion.”
He stopped momentarily, leaned back against the wall, and gazed into the distance. When he spoke again, it was practically a monologue.
“I don’t believe in God. Because its existence is anything but certain.”
“…”
“In a world where even the future is uncertain, the past is a great and mighty thing—because it surely existed,” he said, the grand concepts belied by the matter-of-fact tone of his voice. “Sometimes, I even think that the accumulation of the past itself should be ‘God’ to mankind.”
Simple, so simple.
“Even if the past is colored by mistakes and illusions that make it differ from reality…as long as the person involved believes it, that past becomes the truth to them.”
He could have been speaking to anyone, or perhaps even himself. But it almost seemed like he was talking to the silent girl on the other side of the glass.
“And if you use that past as the basis for your actio
ns and your way of life, wouldn’t that make it a type of god?”
“I have no idea…what you’re trying to say,” the boy grunted, shaking his head in dead seriousness.
Izaya sighed with the trace of a bitter smile. “You know perfectly well,” the information agent said, his mouth twisted with pleasure, as he stared down at the trembling boy. His answer couldn’t have been more simple and direct. “You cannot escape her anymore. Your guilt toward her will become your past, which means that, in a way, she has become your god.”
The boy was silent. He had no choice but to feel the impact of Izaya’s words.
“She is absolute. But that’s not so bad, is it? After all…you love her, don’t you?”
Even as the boy accepted that truth, he wanted nothing more than to expel it from his being.
It was two days later that she regained consciousness.
When the girl, who had no family, opened her eyes at last, the boy was not there.
Masaomi Kida had fled from her.
Even though he knew, as Izaya said, he could never escape her.
He couldn’t find an answer other than to run. That was his only reason.
Time passed.
The girl became Masaomi’s past, and thus she gripped his heart.
Even as she lived, she became the past.
Present day, Raira University Hospital, Ikebukuro
In the quiet of the hospital, slightly removed from the bustle of the train station, the boy stared out at the sky through the window.
He thought on the serial slashings that had gripped the city just a few weeks earlier.
On the night that fifty people were attacked by the slasher, Ikebukuro went into a minor panic. It made front-page headlines in the papers the next day, turning the “slasher” incident into national news.
But meanwhile, on that same night, a number of different events converged, sending certain official institutions—particularly the police and hospitals—into even greater confusion than the media had reported.
Immediately after the slashing happened, a large-scale brawl broke out nearby, which caused the hospital to be flooded with nearly a hundred emergency patients. At least, that’s what the boy heard.
Durarara!!, Vol. 3 (Novel) Page 1
