1932 Drug & The Dominos

by Ryohgo Narita

  The way they live, they’re like a giant domino “main line.” They coast along at breakneck speed, knocking down branches of tiles through all sorts of gimmicks. These two affect other people’s lives all the time, the way they did with Ennis and me… Even though, as far as they’re concerned, they’re just barreling along any way they please.

  “Fine. Next time you do it, I’ll help you out… Unless I’ve got something better to do.”

  “Yesss! Now you’re a fellow dominer, too, Firo!”

  “Or maybe a dominist! Which do you like better?”

  “…Would you please tell me the difference between those things?”

  Firo groaned and held his head.

  If more and more people began to act like these two, they’d probably have world peace before anyone knew what was happening. However, no matter how many people they might influence, he doubted there was anyone eccentric enough to want to be like them.

  Maybe I’m overthinking that.

  Smiling wryly at his delusions, Firo scooped a handful of tiles out of the barrel.

  In her second residence on Millionaires’ Row, Eve sat quietly at the dinner table, head bowed.

  She was lost in thought, squeezing the little scrap of paper, remembering her brother and Luck.

  If I rescue Dallas like this, will I have done the right thing in the end?

  This was something she’d yearned for, so why was her resolution wavering?

  She thought she might have hurt that man very badly with her selfish wish. However, there was no way she could stop wanting to save her brother.

  What should I do? What should I have done? I…I—

  “You look a bit down. Here, have something to eat and cheer up.”

  When she looked toward the cheerful voice, she saw that Fang, the Asian cook, had just brought out the night’s meal.

  “I don’t know what you’re worrying about, but for now, eat up. The only time people can be unconditionally happy is when they’re eating good food.”

  “Quit with the bromides. That’s irresponsible.”

  Beside him, Jon delivered a curt comeback.

  At first, Eve hadn’t been hungry, but drawn by the aroma, she brought some of the food to her mouth.

  “—It’s delicious. It’s just as good as what Kate made!”

  “Who is this Kate person?”

  Ignoring Fang, who looked mystified, the butler and Samantha watched the scene happily.

  Eve had been blue since the incident, but now she was smiling again, and they were as pleased as if her mood had been their own.

  Seeing them, Eve was reminded of just how fortunate her circumstances were. However, it was also true that neither her father nor her brothers were here. There was no point in grieving for people who were gone… But Dallas was definitely still alive.

  As she ate, Eve kept thinking about what she should do.

  What could she do, personally? What could she do so that everyone—Dallas and Luck and the Gandor members—would be happy?

  I was only thinking about my own happiness, wasn’t I…?

  When she’d thought that far, she resolved to rescue Dallas as soon as possible.

  If there was nothing for it but to keep thinking, at the very least, she wanted to start working on what she could do now.

  Of course. I’ll…I’ll try to be like those two.

  Just like the two burglars who’d brought her that temporary happiness, she’d think, and keep on thinking, about what she could do for everyone else. Then, when she decided to act, she wouldn’t hesitate. She’d try to make sure that happiness—her own or other people’s—didn’t slip through her fingers again.

  As she remembered the pair of thieves, she banished the hesitation from her heart.

  Resolved, Eve squeezed the scrap of paper to her chest, tightly, ever so tightly.

  BEGG

  August 2002 Somewhere in New Jersey

  “Begg.”

  Maiza called the man’s name for the first time in several decades, but there was no response. Begg only stayed where he was, curled up in the corner of a room in a certain hospital. He was muttering something to himself, and he showed no interest in anything else.

  “They say that’s how he’s been for decades… I hear he’s been like that ever since Mr. Bartolo Runorata died of old age, about thirty years back. Do you know him? He was, uh, a famous mafia don in these parts.”

  “I knew of him, yes.”

  Bartolo Runorata. Maiza had never met him personally, but he was famous among people in his profession. He had been Begg’s boss, and the one person Begg had trusted, aside from his old companions.

  The last time Maiza had seen Begg, Bartolo had still ruled his syndicate.

  He didn’t know what had happened, but after a certain point, Begg had completely lost his spirit. He’d simply gone on compounding drugs in accordance with Bartolo’s instructions, with an expression that made him look as if he had no hope left.

  His loyalty to his master had seemed to be his one refuge, and Maiza had worried about what would happen to him after Bartolo died, but…

  “Begg. Do you remember me?”

  He spoke to him again, but Begg didn’t even look his way.

  The nurse was watching Maiza as if he interested him greatly, but Maiza asked him a question without seeming to care.

  “How are his hospital expenses being dealt with?”

  “Government-run charity. Well, we’ve gotten real generous donations from the acting head of the Genoard family for generations. We’re guaranteed the minimum necessary environment for drug treatment and the like.”

  “Is that right…?”

  Without asking anything else in particular, his eyes returned to the man in the room.

  “And anyway, he’s like that all the time. No matter what we do, he doesn’t respond… By the way, how do you know this patient?”

  “He’s an old friend.”

  “……”

  The nurse didn’t say anything. This man, who only seemed to be thirty or so, had called himself a friend of a man who’d survived for decades without eating. They’d been warned by the FBI not to interfere with this patient. Who on earth was this guy?

  The question had been bothering the nurse for ages, but he didn’t ask it.

  Even when Maiza entered the room, Begg showed no reaction.

  “These days, there are drugs in circulation that are far more impressive than what you made. Drugs that bring people happiness, and drugs that bring them misfortune.”

  Remembering that earlier time, Maiza sat down beside Begg.

  “There are substances in urban back alleys whose effects and side effects are dozens of times greater than those of the narcotics you compounded. It’s incredible how many people use those substances in the full knowledge that nearly eighty percent of them will die… Humans truly are beings beyond imagining.”

  He went on to speak to him about a variety of other things, but no light appeared in the man’s eyes.

  “Begg…”

  Slowly, Maiza lifted his right hand, then placed it on Begg’s forehead.

  If he was just going to spend eternity wandering in darkness this way, wouldn’t it be better to—?

  The moment that doubt reared its head, he caught a familiar name in the man’s mutterings.

  “…Czes, over there…ship’s hold…see…take a look…on this ship…to America…”

  When he heard those fragmented words, Maiza quietly lowered his right hand.

  Right now, Begg had returned to a time when he was happy. It was a conversation from when he and a child who’d been on the ship with him had gone exploring.

  “I’ll come again.”

  As Maiza quietly made to leave, Begg murmured in a voice that was suddenly clear:

  “Maiza, thank you…for…not…eating…me.”

  The nurse looked up, startled, but Begg did nothing else.

  As if I could possibly get angry…

 
Pulling his hat low on his head, Maiza left the hospital.

  “How was he?”

  Outside, a boy who looked about ten years old had waited for him.

  “He’s all right. He seems a little tired, but he’ll recover someday.”

  As he spoke, Maiza got behind the wheel of a passenger car.

  “Someday, for sure…”

  Without saying anything else, Maiza let the boy into the car, then drove away.

  For the first time in decades, they were headed back to New York.

  DOPE ADDICT

  One day in January, 1932

  Ahhhh, this feels great. Absolute tops.

  …But I get the feeling there’s something else.

  Something’s missing. What could it be…? It feels like I’ve gotta remember.

  Everything’s here. It’s all here, inside my brain.

  Everything’s melting together right before my eyes. Ah, the sky and the ground and the forest and the town and the day and the night are all melting together messily. Is this reality, in the end? My fingers are melting, too; my arms, my legs, my hips, my stomach, my chest, my bones, my heart… They’re melting, blending with everything around me. I’m enfolding everything I see. The world itself has gotten inside me.

  My eyeballs have started to melt. Ohh, I can see everywhere, from everything in the world.

  But then, for the first time, I start to wonder what this world is shaped like.

  I remove my half-melted eyeballs from the world and try looking in from the outside.

  At last, I’ve completely merged with the world. In other words, the world is me.

  At that point, I finally realize what it is the world doesn’t have.

  Except for me, there’s nobody here.

  “………y, Roy……”

  Somebody’s calling me.

  Who is it? It doesn’t matter who; I’ve got to see them. I’m here, I’m right here. The world of my body has started to crumble. It’s turned into tens of thousands of hands, and they’re coming after me, trying to grab my eyeballs. Knock it off; don’t engulf me. Oh, the voice—the voice is getting farther away. Stop it, stopstopstopstopstop Would you cut it the hell out, you pile of crap?!

  “Roy…… Roy……”

  My body’s been thrown to the bottom of a deep ocean. Forget chaos, it’s a pitch-black world, and there’s absolutely nothing around me. I’ve gotta get to the surface fast. I’ll drown. The closer I get to the light at the surface, the brighter the world gets. The sky and the ground and the people and the town and the day and the night all appear in the shapes I remember. The light illuminates my memories, making them clearer and clearer, and my mind desperately crawls upward, clawing through the water, toward the surface, toward that voice.

  “Roy!”

  Then my body finally reaches the surface.

  When I opened my eyes, I was in a place that looked like a hospital room.

  “Oh, thank God! You’re awake, aren’t you?!”

  “Edith…”

  When I looked around, I recognized the hospital. It was Fred’s hospital, in the East Village. They brought me here before, when I hurt my neck real bad. I’d heard he was away traveling and that the place was closed, but I guess it opened up again at some point.

  An old guy who stank like liquor and another guy with bandages wrapped around his legs and face were in the beds on either side of me.

  “I see he’s come to.”

  The doctor, who was dressed all in gray, spoke to us. Yeah, that’s Fred for sure. There was a guy who looked like an assistant beside him; I wondered when he’d hired somebody like that.

  “You come here every time you use any sort of drug. We don’t handle drug addictions as a rule, but in your case, you’re always badly injured.”

  Then, making the man who seemed to be his assistant bring the implements over, he began to examine my bandaged right arm.

  He didn’t reproach me or lecture me about having messed with drugs, and when the treatment was over, he left the room right away. This doctor’s always like that.

  When I happened to look to the side, Edith was watching me like she wanted to say something.

  “Thanks, Edith. That was seriously all my fault.” I decided to apologize first, before she called me an idiot.

  I’m completely pathetic. I bet she calls me an idiot again.

  “I’m so glad… When you didn’t wake up, I didn’t know what I was going to do…”

  She didn’t call me an idiot. It felt weird.

  Neither of us knew what to say to the other, and silence flowed between us. Breaking it, Edith raised her voice, as if she’d suddenly remembered something. “Oh… That’s right, of course. About that truck.”

  Truck? …Oh, I remember. She probably means the truck I stole and used to ram the Runorata carriers’ car. Right: Either way, I’ll be going to the cops after this. What do I do…?

  I started to feel like something was squeezing my belly. Still, it’s a fact that I did it. I’d have to suck it up and turn myself in.

  At that, Edith smiled brightly and said something weird:

  “Listen, you don’t have to worry. It’s all taken care of.”

  “Huh?”

  “The Gandors intervened and paid the owner for the truck and everything. In other words, they negotiated an out-of-court settlement, without going through the police.”

  “An out-of-court… I don’t have that kinda money…”

  The next instant, Edith said something straight-up crazy.

  “With borrowed money, of course. From the Gandors… You borrowed it.”

  “Huh? Uh? Wha—?”

  “The interest is something awful, but if you buckle down and work hard, you’ll be able to pay it all back someday. The Gandors’ loan sharks are famous for being better than some!”

  When Edith had gotten that far, she smiled quietly and stroked my cheek.

  “You need to pay for the crimes you committed. I’m the guarantor, so I’ll be able to help you a little. The Gandors say they’ll point you toward a job, too, so let’s pay it back, bit by bit. Oh, and don’t forget to go apologize to the truck’s owner.”

  They got me.

  Just when I thought I’d escaped the Runorata Grim Reapers, the Gandor hyenas got me by the throat. I couldn’t run now, and if I did any more drugs, the Gandors would probably ice me on the spot. Hard work: That was the only way out of this.

  From the way Edith looked, she knew all that. It felt like she had me right in the palm of her hand. I had a hunch that from now on, I wouldn’t be able to defy Edith for as long as I lived… But even that was fine. For now, I could let myself think that way. Just for now.

  …Still, something was off. It felt like something was missing.

  Am I still in the dream? Have I not woken up yet?

  I looked at Edith, meaning to say something, and then, for the first time, I realized she was different from before.

  “Is your hair a little shorter?”

  “It took you long enough to notice—idiot.”

  When I heard that word, I was finally sure I was awake.

  “It looks good. Yeah, it looks really good on you.”

  Somehow, I felt kinda happy.

  POSTLUDE

  The sun had long since set over the streets of Manhattan.

  In a corner of Hell’s Kitchen, a little melody played.

  The sound, performed on an old organ, seemed to be celebrating someone’s modest happiness.

  As if it were declaring the end of one story and beginning to tell another.

  It flowed, soaking in, echoing through the sooty gray streets.

  Far and wide, on and on…

  Baccano! 1932—The End

  AFTERWORD

  First, my sincere thanks for reading this afterword, too.

  …And so: Hello, this is Narita.

  My goal this time? “Write a heartwarming story.”

  After I had the manuscript checked, when I said,
“The theme this time around is ‘heartwarming,’” my editor, Chief Editor Suzuki, said, “……Huh?!” and his eyes got really wide. That concerned me a bit, but at any rate, I tried to make this story heartwarming.

  When I reread it, even I thought, “Heartwarming?” and had slight doubts, but, well… Everybody has their own standard for “heartwarming,” so whether you—the readers—find it warm and fuzzy or gritty, I hope you enjoy it.

  This story deals with a certain incident in Manhattan that’s separate from the other stories, but some of its timeline overlaps with the previous story, Baccano! 1931. They’re linked in places, too, so if you read it together with the previously released volumes in the Baccano! series, I think you’ll probably enjoy it more. If you don’t enjoy it…I’m sorry.

  When I was creating the story for Baccano!, I imagined a spiral, and for the sequel 1931, I visualized two parallel train tracks.

  Just when I was thinking about what to do next, I got the opportunity to see the video Endless Dominos. I thought it was really neat how the ring of dominos fell and rose again, around and around, and that led me to the story for this volume. I added “information”—an element that is, in a way, less realistic than the immortals—to that ring of dominos, and the result was this structure.

  In this story, the protagonist is even less clear than before, but in any case, for the group of stories that have “Baccano!” in their titles, even I don’t have one particular protagonist picked out. If I get the chance to release more Baccano! books, completely new characters may take the stage, or I might write stories that focus on familiar characters or on characters that have only appeared in a few lines up until now. I hope you’ll expect a different character to be the protagonist every time and look forward to it… Assuming they let me keep writing the series, that is. As a matter of fact, at the time when I’m writing this, Volume 2 hasn’t been released yet, so I really have no idea how it’s going over.

  This time, all sorts of things happened, and they let me release three months in a row. When I finished writing the second book, I casually mentioned wanting to try doing a three-month series, and a few weeks later, I got a call from my editor, Suzuki…