“Sorry, I actually thought it was pretty cool.”
“Me, too. I can just imagine the scene: The hero of the cooking manga claims that he shouldn’t use a knife as a weapon, while the sushi chef busts out his combat sambo.”
“Ugh, you people and your inability to distinguish fantasy from reality!” Kadota groaned as he facepalmed and shook his head, more exasperated than angry.
Karisawa argued back, her eyes sparkling. “But you know, Dotachin, that chef’s actually quite a character. He was a hand-to-hand instructor in the Russian military, so I hear. And he also fought off some mafia types who came over from America.”
“There you go with your imagination again… Then again, putting the chef aside, Simon’s definitely got some serious strength and reflexes.”
“Oh, you bet. He can even stop Shizuo and Izaya from fighting. You think maybe he was the captain of some crazy mercenary band or something?! In order to avoid the notice of the state-sponsored assassins after his head, he takes on the role of a simple sushi chef!”
“Why would he start a restaurant called Russia Sushi if he wanted to avoid attention?” Kadota quipped. “But…I don’t mind, because the sushi’s good. I don’t care about their past.”
He watched a gang of yellow youths cross their path, then turned his head up to the sky and its endless rain.
The Sunshine building provided its own light to the sky around it, but there was still no sign that the rain would stop.
“In the end, the only one who can’t escape the past…is he himself.”
Masaomi returned to Sixtieth Floor Street with a renewed sense of purpose in his eyes.
The number Kadota gave him was still saved in his phone’s contact list.
Yep…you just can’t escape the past…
Izaya Orihara.
That was the name saved in his phone’s address book. The number listed next to it matched the one that Kadota gave him.
Perhaps he hadn’t bothered to say the name because he knew that Masaomi and Izaya had known each other for years.
Perhaps Kadota and the Izaya of years ago were right, and there was no escape from his past.
Masaomi’s eyes followed the groups of young men in yellow that dotted the major street, but his mind had melted into the past.
It was time to face the things he’d been trying to escape from for so long.
Chapter 7: Reality’s a Bitch, Huh?
Two years earlier
It was two fateful encounters that happened at the same moment.
At the same time that Masaomi met Saki Mikajima, he also happened across the information agent.
“Me? Let’s see… I’m kind of like a guardian of Saki’s. Don’t worry, I’m not her boyfriend. And badger games have gone out of style,” the man said, unsolicited.
When Saki came to see Masaomi at first, he was like a ghost following her around. He claimed to sell information from his base around Ikebukuro, but Masaomi didn’t have much interest in the man. Or to be honest, he didn’t want to hold any interest in him.
Contrary to his pleasant features, the man had a downright eerie atmosphere to him. The things he said put him at odds with society, but he was often frightfully insightful. That strange sense of being unmoored from the rest of the world must have been inspiring to those who wanted an escape from reality. So oddly enough, the man named Izaya Orihara found himself surrounded by a variety of people.
The girls who followed him around like a personal retinue were practically his own little cult. Saki was one of them. Whether serious or not, she showed Izaya the greatest respect and claimed that he was psychic.
If Masaomi was ever uncertain about anything, she would claim, “Just ask Izaya, and you’ll be fine,” even if it had nothing to do with the older man. The Yellow Scarves disliked the informant at first, but things did get much easier when they started following Izaya’s suggestions. The group slowly came around to him.
Except for Masaomi.
The first night he met her, Masaomi asked Saki, “If Izaya told you to kill yourself, would you do it?” After a few seconds of hesitation, she said, “I think I would.”
Wow, I feel really sorry for her.
Masaomi decided he ought to stay away from her—but it felt so good to bask in her obvious affection for him. Nowadays, after he’d grown older and known many other girls, he would have felt danger in her eerie nature and kept her at bay.
But back then, Masaomi didn’t have that personal defense. He kept meeting Saki.
He felt that somehow he could break her free of Izaya’s chains.
Izaya wasn’t bilking Saki out of money or making her his slave, but it was clear to see that her reverence for him was abnormal.
And Saki—obsession with Izaya aside, an adorable and ordinary girl—was absolutely one of the most desirable women that Masaomi had ever met, in both personality and looks.
If he could just fix that one flaw, they could have a perfectly normal relationship. It was with this calculation in mind that Masaomi spent time around the city with the girl.
About a month after they’d first met, Masaomi had a rare opportunity to be alone with Saki. He nonchalantly asked, “Would you say the two of us are going out?”
“What do you think?” Saki countered, chuckling.
Masaomi continued, “Listen, why are you even with me?”
“Umm, because I like you?” she replied, matter-of-fact.
Masaomi raised an eyebrow. “Did that Izaya guy tell you to like me?”
“Mmm, only at the start. Izaya doesn’t really interfere much in romance.”
“Then why do you still like me?”
“Because you’re cool. Mm, no—because you’re cute, I guess.”
He couldn’t tell if she was joking or not. Saki turned the question on him. “And Masaomi? Do you like me?”
“If you stop fanatically worshipping that Izaya guy, I might decide I like you.”
He figured that this would make her mad, but Saki only giggled and owned up to it. “I can’t help it. I’d appreciate it if you could just overlook that one little flaw I have.”
“…So you know it’s a flaw?”
“Yeah. I just don’t want to fix it.”
What’s up with her?
Masaomi felt like he understood her even less than before. He had no idea how to respond. But his mouth had a simple message that it delivered on its own.
“If it’s a flaw, then fix it.” It was as close to a confession of his affection as he’d ever given. “I’m here… I’ll help you get over it.”
From that point on, Masaomi and Saki were a couple.
Masaomi stopped hitting on girls altogether, and everyone who knew him was more than a little shocked that he’d been tied down to a single girl.
But no one blamed him for his choice. The Yellow Scarves had more pressing concerns than the love life of their leader.
It was the Blue Squares.
They were a street gang that staked their turf in Ikebukuro, just like the Yellow Scarves, but they differed in that they had a wider range of ages and a greater inclination toward violence.
It started when the Blue Squares saw the signature yellow cloths and decided to pick a fight, arguing over “territory.”
And they’d accepted that fight.
Masaomi thought it was just another situation like any other. But it wasn’t.
This enemy’s numbers and style of fighting were completely unlike anything they’d faced before.
When they approached, they went to great lengths to hide themselves and only attacked when they were certain they had the advantage in numbers. There was no attempt to justify their attacks. They only picked fights they knew they would win, methodically and mechanically.
The gang of over a hundred was picked off one by one, and fear rapidly spread through the group. Masaomi was frightened as well at encountering a completely different kind of foe, but without experience in leading organized battles, he was
n’t able to respond with the same strategy. Neither was he able to remove their yellow signifiers and break up the gang.
The majority of his comrades were sick of being taken down. But even stronger than that anger was Masaomi’s fear.
He was afraid of breaking up the Yellow Scarves and losing the place that he’d finally carved out for himself. At the same time, he felt like he would be losing everything he’d gained as a member of the Yellow Scarves.
When he looked at the girl who was first and foremost on that list, she wore her typical smile and said something meant to comfort him.
“You should just ask Izaya what to do.”
Masaomi’s memory was fuzzy when it came to exactly how he got involved with Izaya.
The only impression he still had was walking into Izaya’s apartment somewhere in Ikebukuro and seeing Izaya throw his arms wide with an ostentatious “Welcome!”
In retrospect, it wasn’t a “welcome” to his home. He was welcoming Masaomi to his side of the city—the seedy underbelly. But Masaomi didn’t realize this at the time. He just wanted to use Izaya’s information to help his team win.
He believed this was the right choice without an ounce of hesitation. Later, Masaomi would reflect upon his choices at the time and see himself as being drunk on his own power. He was drunk on himself, waving the sake of his companions around like a get-out-of-jail-free card.
But part of him had to be uneasy about it. He did not tell his old friend back home about these events in their chat room. In fact, he was chatting with his friend less and less often.
“After all, it’s much healthier to have a personal relationship face-to-face, rather than through mere words on a screen,” the experts on TV would say when discussing Internet addiction or crimes committed as a result of such issues. Masaomi used that very logic as an excuse to cut down on his Internet time.
The Internet eats away at your mind, he told himself, as he moved away from the bracing, refreshing one-on-one fights lionized in comic books and plunged further into a deep, dark war.
Izaya’s knowledge dramatically changed the Yellow Scarves.
He offered them not just the Blue Squares’ hideouts, but their methods of fighting as well. Bit by bit, they turned the town back to yellow, the way it had been before.
At first, Masaomi was alarmed at the way Izaya strategically manipulated the Yellow Scarves. But that alarm was soon forgotten, replaced by a different emotion—one that Masaomi had never been able to indulge in before.
“We can win.”
The next thing he knew, Masaomi was smiling with absolute certainty in their triumph.
He had already forgotten that winning fights wasn’t the reason he was doing this.
He forgot the face of his old friend, banishing him and the sights of his country home to oblivion. All he experienced was one long bask in the glory of victory.
Until he got the call that Saki Mikajima had been abducted by the Blue Squares’ van.
It was on a night when the Yellow Scarves were truly beginning to dominate their foe. Masaomi’s phone rang out of the blue.
The screen said that it was from Kijimura, one of the lieutenants of the Yellow Scarves, so he answered it without hesitation.
“Is this Masaomi Kiiidaaa?”
The voice that came out of the speaker was unfamiliar, insistent and unpleasant.
“…Who is this? It’s not Kijimura, is it?”
“Nice—to—meet—you. This is Izumii, leader of the Blue Squares, at your service.”
“…!”
Masaomi’s entire body began to tremble. His mouth worked soundlessly, while the man on the other side smeared the raw reality of his sticky voice into Masaomi’s eardrums.
“We’re having a quiz show tonight.”
“Hey, wait a second… What happened to Kijimura?!”
“Here’s your question: ding-ding! Kijimura’s already been sent to the hospital. Instead, we have a very special guest with us. Can you guess who? Here’s a hint! It’s someone very, very, verrry important to you—you—you—you…”
The instant his last sentence finished, Masaomi’s body stopped trembling and broke into a chilling sweat. His every pore screamed. He could barely squeeze the breath out of his lungs.
“Hey…”
“Tick, tick, tick. Bzzt! Time’s up. But I’ll cut you some slack. You did think of someone very specific, didn’t you? In that case, ding-ding-ding! You’re correct!”
“No, not Saki! What did you do with Saki?!” Masaomi raged.
The voice continued, unperturbed. “Question number two!”
“Shut the hell up! Saki has nothing to do with anything!”
“What do you think your dear girlfriend looks like right about now?”
“…!”
“Well, I’ll leave you hanging on that one until you can see for yourself. But question three is the bonus round! There we go…”
A moment later came the sound of something hard breaking. A familiar voice shot into Masaomi’s brain as a scream.
“Now, that was the sound of which bone breaking? Here’s your hint: She probably won’t be walking for a while.”
“!”
Masaomi raged with a silent scream. The man on the other side of the receiver—the leader of the Blue Squares known as Izumii—abandoned his jovial tone and went heavy and dark, the words stabbing like knives.
“Now for your final question… If you don’t come to the following location, all alone, in the next twenty minutes… Or alternately, if you decide to alert the police…”
“…then what will happen to this lovely young lady…?”
Several minutes later, Ikebukuro
“Whaddaya say, Kadota? You really oughta swing by,” cackled a young man in a blue hat, a carbonated beverage in his hand.
His conversation partner, himself wearing a knit cap colored blue, had a sharp gleam to his eyes. He leaned back against the side of the van, looking unconvinced.
“Where to?”
“You know, him. The guy. Yellow Scarves. We’re gonna go destroy their leader.”
“I told you, I’m not into this latest fight. First of all, I thought this guy was supposed to be cautious. It would be one thing if we were in the country, but invading his house in Ikebukuro? The cops will be raiding us before we’re even done with the guy,” said Kadota.
The young man in the blue hat grinned wickedly. “Nah, I’m telling you, Izumii abducted his girlfriend.”
“…Huh?”
“She’s just a kid, really, but pretty cute. I figured she’d be like a club girl, but I guess she’s more of a rich girl. Exciting, right? It’ll be plenty of fun, even if Kida never shows up.”
“…Oh, you kidnapped her.”
Kadota looked up at the sky for a bit as he thought it over. Eventually he smiled and clapped a hand on the shoulder of the man across from him. “I see… In that case, I’m going.”
“Right? You gotta get in on this!”
“Tell Izumii something for me when you wake up.”
“Eh?”
What did he mean by “wake up”? the young man in the blue hat couldn’t help but wonder.
“Tell him… ‘Later, you piece of shit.’”
Kadota’s forehead smashed into the bridge of his nose.
“Hey, guys… You wanna take a trip somewhere far off? Like, go to an onsen hot spring or something,” Kadota suggested to his companions inside the van as he climbed through the door.
“Whuh?”
“What’s up, Kadota?”
Yumasaki and the others glanced dumbly back and forth between their unconscious crewmate outside and the enlightened look on Kadota’s face.
“What I’m saying is…you wanna go on a vacation or something, until the tempers cool down?” Kadota said enigmatically.
Karisawa had been listening to their conversation from her window seat, and she snickered now. “Rather than run for safety, why don’t we just not inflame the tem
pers further?”
“Look…I’m not saying I necessarily think it’s the right thing to do.”
And then, Kadota explained to the rest what he was thinking of doing, as matter-of-fact as if he were planning out a picnic.
They would betray their team, the Blue Squares, and rescue the girl from the dozen or so members who had kidnapped her.
“I’m not going to force the rest of you into the plan, and I ain’t dumb enough to play heroic and go on my own… I’ll let you decide.”
The other people in the car all smirked together.
“Look, we’re following you. We have no attachment to the Blue Squares.”
“To be honest, I actually hated Izumii and his little brownnoser Horada.”
“We taking my van? I’m not gonna complain.”
“If we’re going to a different city, I’m going to request somewhere with an Animate, a Toranoana, and a Manga no Mori location.”
“I agree with the above.”
With the group unanimous, Kadota smiled to himself. He pulled off the blue cap he’d been wearing and tossed it into the van’s trash can.
“Aw, man. It would have been so much cooler if you’d thrown that hat out the window,” Yumasaki grumbled.
Kadota grinned impishly. “Nah… I make it a point to keep the town clean.”
After the call finished, Masaomi stood stock-still, clutching his phone.
He decided he must be stuck in a dream—and prayed.
Prayed, prayed, prayed.
All he could do was pray.
He couldn’t take a step. He couldn’t take the phone from his ear. Time slowly slipped away, moment by moment.
How many seconds did it take before he was able to accept it as reality?
Masaomi wondered why he didn’t rush out the instant he heard about Saki to go save her.
No, wait. I can’t save Saki by acting rashly. That’s just what they want. Gotta be cool… Be cool, Masaomi… Ah…aah, aaaaaaaa…
“Aaaaaaaaaa
Durarara!!, Vol. 3 (Novel) Page 13
