Bungo Stray Dogs - Volume 6 Chapter 2 Part 5

Chapter 2 Part 5

My name is Sakunosuke Oda. I’m a detective with the Armed Detective Agency. Some say the quickest way to get to know someone is to find out what they do for work. They may have a point, but that rule doesn’t apply to me. Why? Because I don’t have the mentality or the talent to be a detective. I’m just an ordinary, worn-out guy. Nothing more than a two-bit agent. No different from a cigarette butt on the ground.
Two years ago, I solved the “Azure Apostle” case and joined the detective agency. I can still remember those days like it was yesterday. One moment, everything was leaning to the right, then the next, everything was leaning to the left. The case was rocky, so I grabbed onto the closest thing I could, and it took everything I had just to hold on and wait it out. It was mere coincidence that I was able to solve the case. Beginner’s luck.
Nevertheless, I managed to solve it, which meant I passed the test. Ever since then, I’ve been solving whatever cases the agency throws at me to make a living. I take care of orphans, drink coffee, and on my days off, I do a little gambling before writing novels in the kitchen at night. That’s my life. It’s a humble, cozy life. Nothing to brag about, but I like it.
Today’s work at the agency was a little peculiar, though.

I was walking down the shopping arcade to meet someone. It was almost nightfall. Everyone was quietly coming and going like creatures of the deep sea as the orange evening sun sank into the horizon. There was a stain at the end of the pavement where someone threw up last night. A young man’s silver bicycle passed by me, its wheels lit up like some sort of spacecraft. The townscape was the color of dingy coffee jelly. I just couldn’t bring myself to hate this place.
My job today had to do with the new recruit Akutagawa. He’d broken into the Port Mafia’s headquarters, an underground organization that had spread its roots deep within this city. Saying he had a few screws loose would be putting it lightly. He might as well have smashed his bones with a hammer and fed them to the wolves. That would’ve made more sense than infiltrating the Mafia’s headquarters. Incidentally, I was the one who’d invited him to join the detective agency.
Once again, I’d shot myself in the foot. As always. At this point, it had become a bad habit I just couldn’t shake, so all I could do was accept it. What I needed to do now, however, was worry about the new recruit, since he was a hundred times more messed up in the head than me.
The new guy—Akutagawa—was a powerful skill user who had been through hell and back many times. If anyone was capable of penetrating Port Mafia’s defenses and reuniting with their sister, it was Akutagawa.
But that’s the end of the line for him. Akutagawa would never be able to get his old life back. Port Mafia was like the night breeze that blew through the darkest areas of this city. Not even a single back alley or gutter was out of their reach. Even if Akutagawa managed to get his sister back and escape their headquarters, Port Mafia would find them, hang them upside down, and parade them through the streets. They would slit the siblings’ throats, put them on hooks, and show everyone what happens to those who oppose the Mafia.
That was why the president gave me orders to rescue them—to make sure Akutagawa saved his sister’s life and they returned to the agency safely. My job was to help them after they escaped.
There was no way the Mafia would let either Akutagawa or his sister go. It’d make them look bad. If they let an intruder like Akutagawa go free, they’d just seem weak to anyone outside the Mafia, and if they let his sister leave, they’d appear weak to those inside the organization. Money or privileges weren’t enough to wipe the slate clean. What could we do, then?
After much consideration, I came to a single conclusion: Threaten them. That was the only way. Tell the Mafia that I was going to give the government information on them that would sink them for good. Then, in return for this information, they would promise to leave Akutagawa alone. To do this, however, I needed help from someone on the inside. It couldn’t be just any collaborator, though. It had to be someone who played a pivotal role in the Mafia. Ideally, someone who worked close to the heart of their money. After all, money was like blood to the organization, and a living creature can’t survive if you pump poison into its bloodstream.
I investigated and tracked criminals working underground until I found “the one”: a Mafia accountant who handled their finances. He was an old man who’d worked for years as the organization’s safe keeper by laundering their money. His hobbies included bonsai and chess. He’d asked to meet at an old bar in a back alley.
It was nightfall, and the bar still wasn’t open yet, but the wooden door was ajar—maybe he’d pulled some strings for us. I walked through the doorway and began descending the staircase. The dark, dry staircase to the basement made me feel as if I were going back in time. I could faintly hear jazz music coming from the bar.
The inside was as cramped as a shoebox and quiet. A counter, barstools, various brands of bottled liquor lined up against the wall—but no bartender. The man I was planning to meet was already sitting in the back. He stared despondently at his liquor-filled glass while running his finger
around the rim. I blinked. “…Who are you?”
It wasn’t the old man who was sitting there.
The person raised his head when he heard my voice and looked up at me through his long eyelashes. His lips curled into a smile so subtle I thought I was maybe imagining things.
“Hey, Odasaku. Long time no see,” said the young man wearing a black overcoat. “Still too early to have a drink?”

I’m scared.
I’m scared. I’m scared. I’m scared. I’m scared. I’m scared.
It chased me from the darkness. I desperately tried to run away. I didn’t even care if my legs snapped off or my lungs burst. I ran as fast as I could. I tried to get away, but there was no escape—because the monster was inside my head.
“Do not no matter what, Atsushi.”
A voice from my past echoed in my mind. Whose voice was it? It was Dazai’s. It turned into a black chain and coiled around my body. It was a cursed voice.
“Do not no matter what, Atsushi.”
I couldn’t escape no matter how fast I ran.
I know it’ll come after me no matter where I go.
I wanted to scream, but I had no throat. I wanted to cry, but I had no eyes. My entire body trembled so violently that it felt like it was going to shatter into a million pieces. I continued to run away from myself.
But you can’t run away from yourself. Nobody can.
Atsushi sped through the Mafia headquarters with his head bent forward, almost exactly how a beast would run. He kicked off the walls while he turned the corners and leaped up the staircase, ascending the building at any angle he could. All he could think about was catching up with Akutagawa
—saving Kyouka, in other words. Everything else had vanished from his mind.
He saw armed Mafia soldiers at the end of the passageway. There were around eight of them, and they were blocking Atsushi’s path.
“Move.”
Like a tornado or cannonball, Atsushi thrust himself through the group with a growl. The impact slammed the soldiers against the wall, knocking most of them out before they even really knew what hit them. One of the soldiers noticed Atsushi coming and reflexively raised his gun, but the moment Atsushi passed by him, his pistol had already been sliced into pieces. By the time the soldier realized this, blood had already begun spraying out of his arm and body as well. There were no conscious soldiers left after the calamity passed. Atsushi was hardly even aware of what he had just done. He simply kept moving forward to escape the fear.

“Do not no matter what, Atsushi.”
Akutagawa’s back finally came into view. Atsushi howled, then sped up. Akutagawa turned around at the sound of the ominous voice. He tried to spread his overcoat like a curtain to create a wall of defense, but Atsushi

was quicker. He lunged at Akutagawa’s chest, knocking his overcoat out of the way before he had a chance to attack.
“Do not go to no matter what, Atsushi.”
Atsushi howled. “Awooooooooo!!” “What the—?!”
Atsushi’s fist slammed into his stunned opponent’s face, bending Akutagawa’s neck back as far as it would go. Akutagawa was sent flying as if he had just been hit by a truck; then he lost consciousness the moment he crashed into the wall before dropping face forward toward the ground like a marionette that had its strings cut. But he never hit the ground—Atsushi rushed forward and grabbed Akutagawa’s shoulders, stopping him midair.
The beast roared.
He pinned Akutagawa’s shoulder against the wall and punched his torso relentlessly.
Punch. Punch. Punch. Punch. Punch. It was like a machine gun rhythmically unloading bullet after bullet, shattering Akutagawa’s bones and forming cracks in the wall behind him. His body swung like a pendulum.
Atsushi’s bare hands could slice the barrel of a gun in two. A single punch would be fatal to any ordinary person, and Akutagawa was being barraged with dozens. No matter how many times he hit him, Atsushi didn’t stop. His eyes, opened wide, were wavering with overpowering terror. His hands trembled. His teeth chattered. A cold sweat poured down his body.
I’m scared. I’m scared. I’m scared. I’m scared. I’m scared. “Do not go to no matter what, Atsushi.”
Atsushi didn’t stop attacking. Even if he wanted to, he couldn’t. He was a prisoner of fear. His body wouldn’t listen to him anymore.
His fractured soul was screaming. He couldn’t stop; it continued to splinter…ever since that day one year ago.
“…It out.”
Atsushi’s fist stopped. Akutagawa’s lips moved to form words: “I’ve…figured…it out—What you feel…isn’t fear.”
A terrifying chill ran down Atsushi’s spine, and he ceased breathing. “That emotion…is guilt.”

All Atsushi could see was a white light as the unbearable emotion consumed every one of his brain cells.
“Ah…”
He could hear a voice. The voice of his master:
“I’m giving you orders as your boss.”
It was a voice of the past. A black chain that bound him.
“Do not go to the orphanage no matter what, Atsushi… Got it?”
………………………………………………
I didn’t follow orders that day. The Mafia’s orders. Dazai’s orders.
Orders that I had to obey at all costs.
I attacked the orphanage.
I was already a member of the Mafia’s commando unit one year ago. I was the leader with a few men of my own, and I had power—I had information. I could make investigations into violent incidents go away just by leaking information to a collaborator in the city police.
But I only did it once…to erase my past.
Inside every person’s mind is a small child.
It’s you. It’s your childhood self, sobbing in the darkness—a younger version of yourself whom nobody can ever understand, whom nobody will ever extend a helping hand to. People will do anything to calm that child or to get them to stop crying…no matter how inhumane it may be.
For me, that was burning the prison of my past to ashes and killing the demon within.
It was ridiculously simple, to tell the truth. I sealed off the premises with my men, then began the attack. After cutting the telephone line and destroying all their parked vehicles, I turned into the tiger and rushed into the dormitory.
I was afraid, but it wasn’t the fear of committing a sin. It was the fear that I might lose to the orphanage director. I was afraid that he could just look at me, and blood would burst out of my body as I dropped to the ground. I needed years to overcome that fear. I came up with plan after plan, but I would get cold feet every time.
Today, however, I would overcome the fear. I would win.
There were a few reasons why I was able summon the courage. One was something that would seem to be of little significance to others, but that day was my birthday. That’s why I wanted to make the day I was born, in the truest sense, the birth of something new.
The orphanage, which I hadn’t seen for three years, looked so tiny and miserable. The plaster walls were cracked, the pathways were just dirt that hadn’t been paved, and the well for drinking water had dried up. It was like looking at weather-beaten bones, which had been slowly wasting away.
Nevertheless, every step I took removed a scab from my memories, and I inevitably bled. The alley where I was punched until my teeth chipped and broke, the disciplinary room with fingernails still stuck in the wall where I used to scratch until they broke off, the pantry I snuck into out of hunger but was so afraid of being punished that I couldn’t leave—I had to burn it all, or the child in my memories would never stop crying. It was simple. Something anyone could understand. Today was my birthday. Today was the day I was going to reduce my prison to ashes and be born again.

I ran through the orphanage, which I faithfully remembered to the finest detail, until I arrived at the demon lord’s castle—the director’s office. I kicked the door open, and immediately, my heart froze. The director was staring right at me from the back of the room with his arms crossed.
“You’re late, Number Seventy-Eight,” he snapped.
It was an ambush. There was neither fear nor surprise on his face. All there was, was his usual frigid gaze. They were the eyes of a man who looked down on the orphans and ruled over them.
“D-don’t call me that,” I managed to stammer with as much force as I could.
But he simply looked at me as if he could see right through me.
“It appears you made it to your graduation just in time,” noted the director.
“‘Graduation’?”
The door suddenly slammed shut behind me. The sturdy iron door automatically closed, followed by the sound of it locking. I didn’t know at the time, but the director’s office could automatically close and lock. The only reason I was able to walk inside was because he had unlocked the door in advance for me.
An alarm went off. It was the bell for cleanup time after lunch. My body suddenly wanted to start cleaning, and I had to make a mental effort to stop myself.
“Does it bring back memories?” asked the director as he looked down at me. “It’s the sound of order. It’s the sound that let you all know what governed you.”
“You’re right.” I glared at the director. “There aren’t any clocks here, so this alarm was the only way we knew when to do what. This sound held us hostage because there was only one person in the orphanage who had a clock: you.”
I looked up at the clock on the wall. It was an antique amber pendulum clock. Even now, the second hand marked the passage of time like a god.
“‘Owning a clock is proof of a strong, independent will,’” I recited, since I had heard him say it hundreds of times.
“Therefore…”
“‘Therefore, those of you who were born to be ruled and disciplined have no need for a clock.’” I finished reciting one of his favorite stock phrases. “So you made it a rule that we couldn’t have clocks. One of the older kids tried to buy one once after saving up his money, but he was kicked out of the orphanage…after he was beaten nearly to death.”
“Yes. But you never did something so foolish, Number Seventy-Eight. You were obedient. Submissive,” he added before picking up a white wooden box on his desk. I’d never seen it before. It was a plain box slightly larger than the palm of his hand.
“What’s in that box?” My voice was trembling.
“Isn’t it obvious?” The director spoke in a flat voice. “It’s something you need to graduate from here.”
An ambush. A box. I had a bad feeling in my gut that had swelled all the way up to my throat.
“‘Graduate’? What are you talking about? What’s in that box?! What are you scheming?!”
The director slowly approached me with the box still in hand. Cold sweat began to pour down my entire body.
There was probably a weapon in the box, yet my body wouldn’t move.

I repeatedly tried to convince myself to calm down. I would easily win in hand-to-hand combat. Even if there was a gun in that wooden box, a small pistol couldn’t kill me.
However, the director knew I was coming, and he surely knew about the tiger within me as well. Which meant…
A bomb?
If there was an explosion in a sealed-off room like this, the reflection of the blast waves would increase the lethality severalfold. A high explosive would probably blow my head off before I could heal myself with the regeneration capability of the tiger. I focused my tiger’s hearing, then froze
—because I could hear what was inside the wooden box. It was the passage of time. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
This isn’t good.
“Do you remember what I taught you?” The director slowly approached me. “Those who fail to protect others do not deserve to live.”
“Stop,” I begged, my voice trembling. “Stay back.”
The director stood right in front of me and spread his arms. A colossal ruler.
My feet instinctively took a step back. It was fate. I was helpless before him.
No. No. No. No.
Fight it. Fight. Fight. Fight. Fight it, Atsushi. Or you’ll die!
The tips of my fingers and toes trembled. My racing heart hammered against my chest.
This was fear—the absolute ruler etched into my soul. “Today marks the last day of my teachings to you.” “Stop…!”
Fight it. Fight it. Fight it. Fight it. Fight it!
Every cell in my body screamed. “Ahhhhhh!”
I heard the sound of something moist.
My arm had pierced the director’s chest, and my fingers were sticking out of his back.
“…”
He whispered something. I heard what he said, but I couldn’t process it.
Red alarm bells rang in my mind as it continued screaming the words Fight it.