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Chapter Seven
Seventh Track I

Once upon a time, there was an angel. Never once had he disobeyed his God, the ruler of all. He was God's favorite or as so said until one day, the first appearance of a human spoiled everything by foiling and pulling on the strings of jealousy inside him. Indeed, the angel became jealous as anger was clearly evident in his eyes. The jealousy drew him insane until finally, it managed to push him into saying things what he had what human did not. For that, he was proud. But who knew? A boast, a small boast that was actually the truth was all it took to become a fallen angel. From then on, he called himself; the Devil. And jealousy became his weakness.

Weakness. Everyone has them. Those who does not have a weakness, they are to be seen as invincible. In the modern world where realism exists, none ( but the prophecies filled of lies ) had a weakness. The prophecies included myth and urban legends as well. Albeit, that did not mean every single story that lived for decades were lies. Izaya knew this, and Izaya learned it the hard way. For once, he was an angel and now dubbed by few people, a devil.

If only they knew that the term devil was not suitable enough for him. Izaya was more than that. Izaya faced much more complications than the Devil. If that was not exaggerating enough then he might as well be the devil, himself.

"If this isn't a truly boring day?"

Hot tea was poured into his cup, the teapot soon found its way back onto the table as its lad, the cup was brought near to its owner's lips. One sip and it took less than a second for the tongue to get burned, the informant tore the cup away from his lips immediately, his face contorted into some sort of a twist by a second later. Too hot, Izaya thought to himself before placing the cup back down.

"I wonder what I should do today. Pester my lovely beast again?"

"Namie sure is coming in late." He began to tap his fingers against his desk, his ears listened to the rhythm the clock made. Tick tock, tick tock. It granted him no ease nor comfort. If anything, it made him more nervous. Delusional. Perhaps delusional as he started to hear the sounds of his heartbeat in his head. Thump thump, thump thump. And it was that moment when death flashed across his mind.

Sigh.

There was exactly nothing to do today. There were no appointments as of today, and so far, no one had contacted him. Not even that pestering Psyche who had somehow gotten his number. It must have been Kururi and Mairu, he sneered. Those two often played around with him. They hate him, it was clearly obvious although he knew that there has to be a part of them somewhere that didn't hate him. But ah, who was he kidding? What a fool he was to think that they'll care.

Now that he gave a thought, it had been years since he met up with his family. Not that he'd like to meet them, given that they were still on terms of sour relationship but that didn't affect the informant much anymore. At least, that was what he managed to convince himself.

All these years, he have been coped up in his peaceful quaint apartment. His apartment was quite large, too big for a single person yet Izaya felt perfectly fine with it. It was better than living in a cramped space. As much as he enjoyed his peace in his nest, there are times he'd admit when the peaceful atmosphere in the air broke. Shattered into all tiny pieces whenever the barrier to his apartment was barged through by none other than Heiwajima Shizuo.

Shizuo.

Where was he now, he wondered?

'Probably off with Psyche again.' Bitterly thought he, the bubbling sensation in his stomach began to boil at the sudden thought of his sibling together with his... what?

What was Shizuo to him now?

A nemesis?

An arch-enemy?

A former crush?

The grip on the handle of his cup tightened, and for a second, he felt his heart tightening and wrenching in agony. No, no, he shouldn't be feeling this way. There is no way would he still like Shizuo anymore. They hate each other, they've decided that. From the very start when their eyes laid on each other, they were destined to be enemies. Never lovers like Shizuo with Psyche.

Fate decided to have them as enemies.

RING! RING!

Pullled back into reality quite harshly, Izaya looked to the side and saw one of his smart phones on the table ringing rather loudly. Probably a client. And this early in the morning too! With a grin covering up his lips, he released swirled his chair around and pushed to get to the other side of the table. His hand distinctively reaching out for the ringing phone as he flipped it open, answering it with a tone filled of delight. "Yes, hello! Orihara Izaya at your service!"

"Are you?"

This voice sounds too familiar.

"Hm? Of course, it is. Is there something you'd like me to provide you? A delicious information, perhaps?" Izaya responded in a sugary tone, another sip taken from his cup of tea.

"... Sunshine 60 Observatory. Tonight. Eight o'clock sharp. "

Then the phone was hang up, leaving the informant's ears listening to a buzz of deadline instead.

...

...

...

Who was that? The voice sounded very familiar but Izaya could not tell who it was at all. Confusion settled into his mind as he pulled the phone away from his ears, looking down at the number that said- ''000-000-0000". Odd, how odd. Then it struck him what the number meant.

Creak.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Izaya turned, seeing his secretary entering through the door with a box filled of papers in her hand.

"You're late again." He smiled as if nothing had happened at all. Namie on the other hand simply scoffed before replying, "It's not like I'm late everyday. What about you? You don't turn up at work most of the time."

"Namie."

"What?"

"Have you heard of a phone number that's listed with all zero's?"

"A phone number that has no number at all. Does that even exist?"

"It does."

"Ah?" The brunette glanced at him right after placing down the box on her desk harshly. Izaya however continued to smile, sensing the curiosity that seeped from his secretary.

"Hackers."

"... What?"

"The phone number suggests that this caller wishes not to have their central spot discovered. People usually do this when they wish to deceive the caller, by means of finding out their address or to scare them. And if they were to be found out in the process, they wouldn't have to worry about getting captured. After all, they have this blockage, something that covers the real numbers of their phone which prevents people nor the police from seeing their IP address."

"... Why are you even telling me this?"

Izaya simply continued to smile. Now that reminded him, why didn't he checked the number earlier before picking it up? What was even more odd they even said his name. This was definitely not someone who was trying to coax him into purchasing something or tell them their address. This was, without a doubt, definitely intentional. He frowned, unconsciously gripping hard onto the handle of his cup, a loud CRACK! sound heard and before he even knew it, the tea was spilled onto his pants followed by the fragile bowl which rolled down somehow and ended up lying in shards on the ground. And whoever that was, they have successfully managed to throw Izaya off guard.

Why does he feel like there's something bad about to happen?

"— Ah, I spilled tea on my pants."

Sunshine 60 Street. 7:28PM, 5th February.

Izaya looked up from the screen, flipping his phone closed as his eyes scanned through the crowd that brushed against him. The young man who was in his twenties wore his typical trimmed fur jacket and his usual simple black pants. He visited Russian Sushi for a while back then, ordering for his usual ootoro sashimi slices before he could proceed to meet this mystery man.

This mystery man who was being suspicious.

The informant knew that he know this man. And this man too somehow knew him. It frustrated him to no end, frustration became evident in his face for only a short second. Izaya was used to solving problems quickly, he was used to figuring people out easily.

He supposed that's why there were times when he can't help but feel annoyed by Shizuo, his twin sisters and most importantly, Psyche. Ah, Psyche. That stupid boy who kept making an effort to get their friendship back. When will he ever understand that Izaya wished not to see his face ever again? What did Shizuo even see in him?

Shaking off the train of his thoughts, Izaya kept walking towards the choice of his destination. Quickly before the envy begins to eat away his heart.

Few moments later, he now stands before the tallest building in Ikebukuro. Sunshine 60 Observatory should be at the top floor since it was the place to view Ikebukuro from all angles. Pushing back the doubts and negative thoughts, he slipped through the doors and is now heading his way to the said place.

It is now eight o'clock. Sharp just as how the stranger had told him over the phone.

By now, he was not too far away from the entrance. With a deep breath, Izaya leisurely took few more steps then turned to enter the observatory section where the landscape of all Ikebukuro could be seen.

Three steps away.

There was the entrance. He didn't know why but for some reason, he can't help but feel nervous. The thumping sounds of his heart began to sound a bit more loud.

Two steps away.

His hands slowly reached out to slide open the door. Then he paused for a moment, wondering if it really was the right thing to meet up with this stranger. It might have been a little bit too late but what if- what if it was his father? No, no, it couldn't be. He distinctively remembered the stranger's voice sounded higher than his father's voice was.

One step away.

It didn't take long until his determination suddenly sprang back up to life, and with courage now settling into his mind, Izaya finally slid the door open. And when he did enter by taking a step forward, his anticipation was quickly flushed down the toilet. He might have expected the person a tall man with a suit on. But instead, what he saw was not expected. There, in front of him were several bodies lying lifeless with blood splattered all over the ground.

—–— what?

His eyes widened, the smell of blood tasted like copper in his mouth but Izaya could not move nor could he scream. Instead, he stood there frozen with a hand still latched onto the sliding door handle. Who... Who were these people?

"HEY, HOLD ON THERE!"

The voice startled Izaya slightly as he quickly made a move to turn around. The police now had Izaya surrounded, and only then did he realize—

he had been framed.

Author's note:

To one of those reviewers out there: this story isn't exactly a reference to Frozen and Thirteen Reasons Why. I'll admit that Frozen was actually the sole reason that inspired me to do this fanfiction, and I was actually going to do almost the exact same plot like the movie but eventually with few ideas from friends, I managed to make a whole another kind of story. Also, I did some research on Thirteen Reasons Why, now I could see why you thought I made a reference to it.

Thank you for the reviews very much! I'm glad that I was able to update this story, I was actually debating on putting this story to a hiatus. To be honest, I actually planned to have the Raijin Days to be longer but I wanted the story to go faster as well. But no worries, I will try to add in some fillers regarding Raijin Days back then. And sorry for the lateness, I had a story block. orz