Durarara!!, Vol. 12

“Izaya.” His voice was calm, betraying not a shred of anger.

“…What is it?” Izaya replied.

Shizuo’s voice was still calm.

“…So long.”

It was the last remaining shred of Shizuo’s sense of reason.

“…”

Once Izaya had confirmed that there would be no follow-up, he gave his own parting words before hanging up.

“Yeah, good-bye.”

His voice, too, was calmer than it had ever been before.

One wouldn’t suspect that they were about to engage in a brutal fight to the death.

A bit later, Vorona and Kujiragi ventured into the building.

“Do you really intend to follow him?”

“…I deliberated the necessity to see it through. Stopping me is meaningless.”

“You might suffer directly.”

“Your assistance is not required,” said Vorona, who wobbled toward the stairs despite the wounds all over her body.

Kujiragi, who was unharmed, just shook her head. “I suspect that attack was the work of Izaya Orihara. He is the savior who gave me my freedom but is also a clear and dangerous enemy. I will need to ascertain the outcome.”

“…” Vorona continued in silence.

Kujiragi followed behind her. Inside this building, she could still maintain her link to Saika. If Izaya and Shizuo were to take each other out, she could then collect the dullahan’s body and safely perform the final transaction.

But while this calculation was for the benefit of her business, the truth was that she also wanted to see the conclusion of Shizuo and Izaya’s clash.

Surprised that she had this looky-loo sentiment within herself, Kujiragi walked steadily behind Vorona. But right when they were about to reach the stairs, a voice stopped them.

“All right, ladies, that’s far enough.”

They turned back to see a young woman. She looked like a fighter of some kind, based on the toughness and litheness of her physique.

“Sorry. But Izaya told me not to let anyone else inside,” she said with a shrug.

“When we announce a refusal, what is the state of the outcome?” Verona asked.

“…You must be Slon’s partner, huh?”

“!”

Vorona’s eyes widened at the mention of her partner’s name.

“And you must know about Slon, too,” the woman said to Kujiragi, but she gave no reaction, either affirmative or negative.

Mikage Sharaku twisted and waved her body left and right.

“It’s no fun fighting against someone injured…but if you really insist, I can play with you for a while,” she said, sounding bored about it. She glanced at the ceiling. “What’s happening up there is probably the world’s stupidest and most meaningless fight to the death.”

She shook out her limbs and put on a rare smile.

“But for whatever reason, I just don’t feel like letting anyone interrupt it.”

Alleyway

“Th-the head… Must at least recover the head,” Seitarou muttered to himself, writhing along the ground like an insect. He made his way through the mess of steel beams and rebar, fighting against the pain in his back.

But just when he was one pace away from reaching the bag Vorona had left on the ground in the alley, a pale shadow swooped in out of nowhere and snatched it up.

“!”

When Seitarou looked up, he was aghast.

Standing there in a white gas mask was the Nebula scientist Shingen Kishitani.

“Shingen…!”

“Fwa-ha-ha-ha, look at you now, Seitarou. It reminds me of when you would beg me on hands and knees as students.”

“Shut your lying mouth! I never begged you for anything! Why are you here?!”

“Hmph. I thought it would be a good opportunity to falsify some old tales of school, but it seems to have failed right out of the gate,” Shingen said, his shoulders drooping theatrically. He took a few steps away from Seitarou and made a show of opening the bag. “I’ve been watching this all from the shadows. I have to say, that Shizuo really is something. I nearly unleashed my bladder when he struck that forklift. Did your drawers stay as dry as mine, I wonder?”

“Answer my question!”

“I heard that Miss Kasane had kidnapped my son. I figured that following you would lead me to the right place, and sure enough…”

“Your son…? What do you mean?” wondered Seitarou, who knew nothing about Shinra’s abduction. When Shingen pulled the head out of the bag, Seitarou’s voice went ragged. “Oh! Ohhh…what a sight for sore eyes… Such beauty! That belongs to me! Give it here!”

“But of course. I am a gentleman. When I find something that belongs to someone else, I turn it in to the police…or to the owner directly.”

Owner. The choice of words caused the breath to catch in Seitarou’s throat.

“You… You don’t mean…”

“Well, how fortunate that the owner happens to be so close by! A sure sign of my own good virtue!” Shingen exclaimed. He looked up—at where the cloud of shadow was still held prisoner by Saika’s wire cage.

“W-wait, Shingen! Your son is the one I’m thinking of, right? He’s in love with the dullahan’s body, yes?!”

“I will not deny it. Oh, my son and his troublesome interests. How can he consort with a woman who won’t even call me Papa or Father?” Shingen joked.

“Wait!” Seitarou shouted. “Don’t give her back the head! According to Kujiragi, it might completely erase all of her memory of life in Ikebukuro!”

He wasn’t worried for Shinra’s sake, of course. It was just more likely that if the dullahan was restored to normal, Shingen would snatch away everything he’d been working toward—and his warning was an attempt to prevent that.

Shingen just laughed and shrugged. “I suppose that is quite possible. As a researcher for Nebula, if I were on the clock, my first priority would have to be bringing back the head…but while on vacation, I cannot help but want to run an experiment to see if putting the head back on the body will really erase its memories or not!”

“You would ruin your own son’s life?!”

“Oh, he’ll be fine. Shinra’s a tough kid. If Celty loses all her memories, he’ll just start the whole twenty years over again!”

“You… You knave!” Seitarou roared.

Shingen ignored him and grandiosely announced, “Life is an endless process of trial and error! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! And away we go!”

With that, he hurled the head straight upward.

It went only a few dozen feet and bounced harmlessly off the wall of the second floor.

“…”

“…”

The beautiful woman’s head hit the ground and rolled.

In the embarrassing silence that followed, Shingen crossed his arms and proudly declared, “It is said that the human head weighs between six and eighteen pounds. Celty’s head was on the lighter side; I’d wager closer to nine. Can you hurl a nine-pound dumbbell up to the top of a building? I certainly cannot!”

Seitarou stared at him, aghast, but Shingen merely hid behind his white gas mask and excuses. “What did I just tell you? Life is a process of trial and error.”

And then a man appeared from behind Shingen and scooped up the head. “Are you certain you’re using that phrase correctly?”

Shingen glanced at him and pointed forcefully to the sky. “Aha! The experiment resumes! Your turn now, Egor!”

Egor smirked uncomfortably at the obnoxiousness of Shingen’s command but proceeded to take off his jacket to use it as a sort of primitive sling into which he placed the head. The next moment, he rotated rapidly and hurled the head high into the air.

“Nooooooo! That belongs to meeeeee!” Seitarou cried, the sound echoing off the walls of the alley like a movie effect.

The head shot upward like a cannonball until it reached the shadow cloud trapped inside the wires.

And Shooter, which had been watching this unfold in bicycle form, instantly transformed into a horse.

Building under construction, first floor

“…”

The women inside the building faced off in silent tension, until Kujiragi suddenly looked up into the corner—in the direction of her wire-form Saika.

“What’s up?” wondered Mikage, without losing any of her battle preparedness. Kujiragi did not answer immediately.

Eventually, she sighed without adjusting her features and said, “I suppose it’s true… Shizuo really is the wild card.”

“?” “?”

Mikage and Vorona merely glanced at her, punctuation marks over their heads. She elaborated sadly, “The final transaction was a failure.

“With Saika distracted, I was unable to keep her under control.”

Building under construction, top floor

Izaya Orihara sat on the lip of the building, watching the scene unfolding below as he waited for the arrival of his archenemy.

He’d already evacuated the Dragon Zombies from the rooftop. He knew that the average motorcycle-gang member would do little more than briefly delay Shizuo Heiwajima. He might pass them on the way up and beat them to a pulp, but that wasn’t Izaya’s concern.

There was one odd thing happening under his duly watchful eye. Saika’s wires snapped and broke, falling down to the center of the alley intersection below.

Then the huge mass of shadow contracted all at once and took the form of a human figure. The figure cast out little shadow tendrils like a spiderweb to stand upon, making it look as if it was floating in place.

But that part was not particularly surprising to Izaya.

At first, he believed that Celty had regained her intelligence—but something was wrong.

The figure that emerged from this transformation was not in a motorcycle riding suit, but in heavy, medieval armor. It wasn’t reflecting the light, so it had to be made of that same shadow material.

And this time, most uncharacteristic of all, Celty carried a human woman’s head under her arm.

He recognized the head, of course.

The shadow-born thing looked smoothly all around and detected Izaya’s presence. It then created a set of shadow stairs, still cradling the head, and began to walk toward Izaya.

Once it was within earshot, Izaya called out, “Hi there, Celty. How does it feel to have your head back?”

But there was no response.

After a short pause, the head under the figure’s arm slowly opened its mouth. The voice that emerged spoke to him in an eerie tenor that seemed to register in his eardrums and his mind at the same time.

“[Who are you?]”

It was a statement that would cause certain people to despair upon hearing it.

“Oh, I see. So you’re not the Celty I know any longer.”

Izaya smiled thinly to himself. But he did not ask the questions about the human soul and the afterlife that he’d been so eager to learn. Instead, he pushed her away.

“But the thing is, I don’t have time to mess with the likes of you right now anyway.”

“[…]”

“If you don’t know who I am, get lost.”

The head was silent for a time, until it spoke again in the same manner.

“[Forget that you saw me, human.]”

He watched the dullahan descend toward the foot of the building and exhaled a deep breath. Then Izaya looked up to the sky and chuckled to himself, “Oh, it’s just so laughable. There has to be a limit to stupidity.”

There was no one around to ask the meaning of this statement, just the expansive darkness of night.

However, at that moment, he was aware that the shining stars that had been overhead just moments ago had vanished. The sky was entirely black, without even the reflection of the neon lights of Tokyo. As if a giant lid had just been placed over the sky.

But even that, in this moment, meant nothing to him.

Izaya Orihara waited and waited.

For this moment when he would close the book on the grudge that had been abandoned for long years.

Grudge? That gives him too much credit. Does one call the instinct to smash a hateful cockroach a grudge?

He considered his “grudge” with Shizuo Heiwajima beneath the starless sky.

Shizuo would be coming to kill him very soon. He had attempted that any number of times before, of course, but this time was clearly different. What he had heard from Shizuo’s voice over the phone had not been annoyance or irritated anger, but pure, undiluted murder.

Sure, Izaya might have dropped a little forklift off a building, but he hadn’t been trying to kill Shizuo. He just didn’t mind if the guy died as a result.

And yet, Shizuo was coming to kill him. Perhaps if Vorona hadn’t gotten hurt, Shizuo wouldn’t feel such bloodlust at the moment, but if that was the case, it seemed laughable that he was ready to murder for the sake of a human being.

At the same time, Izaya felt annoyed. He couldn’t accept that this preposterous monster should be able to use his boundless violence to extinguish the fates of human lives.

There was a parade happening around Mikado Ryuugamine, a procession that drew many others into its gravity.

Izaya Orihara found himself surprisingly excited about the whole thing, thinking he might catch a glimpse of a side of human nature he had never seen before.

He loved all of humanity’s actions. He wasn’t going to complain about the outcome of the festival, no matter what it ended up being. If Mikado had an abrupt change of heart and made up with Masaomi Kida without any more trouble, Izaya would respect that conclusion.

Because that would be the life Mikado Ryuugamine chose.

Life.

To live as a human.

That was all Izaya really wanted from others, at the root of it all.

When he made himself a pest, interfering in the way of life that others chose, it was just because he wanted to see their human reactions. If it resulted in their downfall or even the end of their lives, well, seeing the end points of their human lives would also be entertaining to him.

But monsters could overturn the fate of a human being. With their magical powers or supernatural strength.

And Izaya couldn’t have that.

Humans had to determine the outcome of human lives.

The forces of nature were unavoidable, but it wouldn’t be right if a being with the strength of a full typhoon were to have a human personality, act like a human, and manipulate human lives.

Izaya briefly recalled something a friend had said in the past.

“If Shizuo’s a monster, what does that make you? You’ve got differences in strength and intelligence, but you can hold your own against him, so how do you view yourself? Do you want to be the hero who defeats the monster? Or do you treat this as a territorial squabble between monsters, where you’re staking your claim to those humans?”

Izaya wondered why he would have remembered such a quote at this moment, but he was grinning before he realized what he was doing.

“You’ve got it all wrong, Shinra,” he murmured to no one in the dark. “I never held my own against him.”

Within his narrowed eyes there was a kind of resolution that hadn’t been there before.

“What I’m about to do now is a good old-fashioned monster hunt,” Izaya said, using the excuse that he had arrived at after considering dozens. “Maybe if I beat him, I’ll finally feel like I’m a human being.”

The word grudge also included the insinuation of mudslinging.

Ah yes. I suppose other people might think what I’m saying isn’t entirely fair. At this point, Izaya realized he was actually feeling rather refreshed. I’m going to erase Shizuo Heiwajima from the earth over mere dirty accusations and slander.

Was the fact that he felt better knowing this actually just a sign that he was incredibly human already? If so, he didn’t care.

As long as Shizuo Heiwajima vanished, he would be free of this shackle.

Did Izaya like humans because he was a human being himself? Or did he enjoy observing their foibles from on high, like some god? Izaya was fine with either case being the answer, but there was one thing he didn’t like.

Shizuo Heiwajima was a monster who transcended the limits of humanity. By eliminating Shizuo, Izaya might be able to see himself as a human being. All the exaggerations he had ever made might become truths.

When Namie or Shinra got snarky with him, he might be able to sincerely reply, “Of course I love myself. I am a human being, after all.” It felt strange, but he even considered it worth risking his life for the sake of that one stupid phrase.

He stood there on the silent, empty roof, wearing a vaguely human smile, thinking of the world that existed beyond his release from this accursed relationship—and came to a conclusion that would hold true, no matter what that world was.

“Yeah…I love humanity.”

The words melted into the starless black sky, like his last will and testament.