"L!"
The sudden exclamation of my name surprised me. I jumped about 6 inches out of my seat, disturbing the cup of coffee I was holding and spilling it, burning my thighs and staining my jeans. I winced from the pain and turned toward the speaker, trying to keep my face unemotional. "Yes?"
"Ah, sorry about that," Matsuda said. He started to step forward, hands extended, about to "help", before I shooed him back, saying that I was fine. He would only make it worse, I knew it. I wasn't stupid.
"What do you need?"
"Uhh, we were talking; Aizawa, Light, and I that is, and I can't see enough details to see this, but Light said that you have been 'slowing down deductively', and I'm like–"
"Your point, Matsuda?" I said through gritted teeth. Matsuda meant well, but he was amazingly frustrating. I knew that if I didn't cut him off there, he'd go on for a long time before he reached the part I needed to hear.
"Uhh, okay, well, we were talking and we decided that we haven't seen you sleep in a long time and you should because Light said that you were slowing down slightly, not that I think you are. I think you're still great, but Light thinks –"
"Okay, I understand."
"Sorry…"
"It's…not a problem. Just get back to work. I will sleep." I was actually pretty tired, now that he mentioned it.
"O…okay." Matsuda said. He slouched in disappointment, turned, and left.
I arranged details with Watari for while I slept and stood up, painfully stretching muscles that hadn't been used in days. I slouched slightly to lessen the pain in my back, which was the worst. I stuffed my hands in my pockets and made my way to the elevator that would take me to the top of the building. At the third-to-top floor, I left. I went directly to my scarcely used bedroom, and crawled directly under the covers at exactly 2:48 AM. By 2:51 I had fallen asleep.
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Groggy, I awoke in pure white. Waking the rest of the way, I started as soon as I noticed my surroundings. I tried to stand before I discovered I wasn't on any ground, just floating in space. I tensed my body, waiting for an attack.
Quite suddenly, the space turned from white to a deep red from the bottom up, almost as if…the room was being filled with blood. The red splattered onto my body until I had just melded in with the rest of this strange dimension.
Up until this point, it had been completely silent, but at that moment, a loud, cackling laugh filled my ears. From the red stepped a figure, dressed entirely in black, grinning at me. I tried to scream, to run, but I was nothing now. Just something to give the room its color. Absolutely nothing individual, nothing important, just something to fill a hole.
Just like the title of L.
I tried to scream again, tried to tear my eyes away from the approaching figure, but to no avail. The person approached, grabbed the area that I was lying in, tore me away, and held me up to his mad, gleaming red eyes.
I tried talking again. "No…you…you're…"
B threw his head back again and laughed. "Dead? Do I look dead to you?"
"It's…over…I beat you…"
His face dropped to a serious mask. He leaned in to me and breathed on my neck. Chills ran up and down my spine. "It's only just begun, my dear Lawliet. LABB will come again…and this time I'm mad. This attack will be personal, and you know who that means."
"No…not Light…"
He grinned again. "Yes, L. Light. He will die soon, the numbers say so. I will be the cause, I swear to it. You'll see what happens when you make me angry."
"You don't have to…"
"Yes I do." He grinned, and a knife appeared in his hand. "You find life so much easier if you just break free." I suddenly realized I was now hanging from miles of chains and shackles. B held up the knife. "See what happens when you make the one you love…" He cut the chain. The red was gone, replaced by an endless black hole that I was falling through. Echoing without fading was B's final word to me, "Fall."
I tried to scream as I fell. I wanted to scream for myself, for Light, and for B. He knew that I loved him…and Light too. Such a weapon he could use against me. I tried to scream, but I couldn't…I had no control over myself…it was all for B to decide.
In an instant, I felt a cold band around my wrist. I fell faster, and as I looked down, I saw another one of my worst fears.
The handcuffs were back on, just like they had been with Light, except now, I was attached to someone else.
A's corpse, complete with noose around his neck and those blank, dull eyes that had been burned into my brain, was on the other end. He was wearing nothing but white, with words written in blood all over his clothes. Words such as "Pressure", "Pain", "Gone", "Weight", "Impossible", and by far the worst: "You".
B's voice began taunting me with persuasive monologues about how A's death was all my fault. I closed my eyes when it became too much to bear. Suddenly, the voice stopped ringing in my ears. I opened my eyes, only to be back in the white.
I landed with a thud on an invisible platform. As I rose to a kneeling position, physically and mentally sickened by this insane realm, B flew up behind me like a wraith racing into to posses its vessel. He wrapped his strong fingers around my exposed throat and began strangling me. I fell to the ground, no longer able to breathe. Right before I was about to lose consciousness, a sadistic grin spread across his twisted face, and a knife materialized quickly into his hand, quickly becoming solid and providing his thin, pale fingers something substantial to clench. He said two simple words. "For L." His knife plunged into my gut, and as it twisted, a shiny, mirroring liquid erupted from the wound in place of blood. I was forced by B to look into the fountain of reflection, into a face that wasn't mine. I had become Light. B was hurting me…no, not me, Light…no, no…me…us, for L. Not the title, like most would expect, but for the person himself. I pitied the poor man, before I remembered he was me. I blinked, and the reflection was once again mine.
B leaned over my broken body. "It's all over, Lawliet. I've won…"
I stared at him for a while, trembling, when I realized with horror that I wanted him to win. I had been rooting for him.
I felt no regret, only terror, as he shoved his shining knife into my head, right between my eyes. The last thing I saw was my standard font "L" from the computer painted over to become a "B".
I let the darkness take me.
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I awoke with a jolt. I balled myself into a small bundle, experiencing a new sensation. For the first time in my life, I felt hot, shaky tears streak down my cheeks.
I, L Lawliet, lay there in bed, thinking about B, and cried.
Fin