January 21st 2004
Two things happened on this seemingly bland winter day.
The first was that Light Yagami gained entrance to records from the Los Angeles police department.
Since finishing his entrance exams, and of course no longer having to worry about who was watching over his shoulder, Light was enjoying the freedom to really research and punish the worst of the worst criminals. He almost regretted the death of the petty embezzler he had to sacrifice while under surveillance. Light had set out to punish the worst of humanity- that petty thief, though, it wormed at his mind. It was really L's fault, the police's fault. Keeping him under watch, forcing his hand, still, Light figured he could make up for the small, but undeniable blunder by researching and ending the most twisted and deserving criminals he could find.
It was that mission that led to him hacking into the Los Angeles database. He had heard of the BB murder cases, it was often mentioned as one of L's most recent and shining cases. It also stood out as an unlikely case for L to agree to help on. There were only a few victims, and aside from the violence, there was little remarkable about the case. Yet L had shown up and wrapped the case up in short order. In the official records, the killer was listed as dead by suicide, but the deeper Light dug into the case the more anomalies he encountered.
He did not miss the fact that aside from L, another familiar name popped up in relation to the incident. Naomi Misora. Light couldn't help but grin at the name, remembering his victory over the women. Knowing she had worked so close to L so recently only sweetening her defeat. You can tell a lot about someone based on the company they keep and the fact at Light had so easily tricked Naomi gave him more reassurance that he could defeat L.
Naomi Misora aside, the case was still very interesting, and Light was compelled to find out what exactly it had been about this case that had attracted L.
Buried in some original police report Light found the name of the mysterious killer, Beyond Birthday. Light snickered at the bizarre name , in fact all of the names associated with the case were strange. Of course Light had not missed the significance of the double letter initials, but what was even more interesting was a name that popped up in one of Naomi's Misora's early reports. Most of these reports were edited heavily, even within the secure data base. But mentioned briefly was the name Rue Ryuzaki. Another double initial, but he didn't seem to be a victim.
Light slid his chair closer to the computer, eyes skimming over document after document, enjoying the feeling of getting lost in the research. This Ryuzaki is mentioned only twice that Light can see in the official report, so he decides to dig deeper. This could be another associate of L, perhaps someone even closer to L than Misora thought she had been. This Rue Ryuzaki could be just the person Light needed to get closer to L and eventually destroy the infernal detective.
But the more that Light looked, the stranger the case and this man became. He could find no records of this individual before the start of the case. Okay a fake identity, Light could expect nothing less from a potential associate of L, but what was strange was the paper trail that existed after the case had concluded. Hospital records for an R. Ryuzaki, followed by an admission into a high security mental hospital for criminal offenders.
It was embarrassingly easy to pull up the man's records from the mental hospital. The words violent, delusional and psychopath dotted the reports. Finally a there was a picture of the man.
Light sat up in his chair, startled by the bizarre appearance. Dark matted hair stuck up at all angles, and framed an unnaturally pale face. A strange smirk was on the man's face, like he knew a secret that no one else was privy too, but what struck Light was the man's eyes. Dark, shining and framed by shadows, his eyes seemed to look straight through the picture and into Light's own mind. He felt a shiver run up his spine.
Ryuk, who had been sprawled over his bed, watching with idle curiosity as Light had worked suddenly perked up and moved closer.
Light turned when he heard the god laugh.
"What is it?"
"That man seems interesting," Ryuk chuckled. Light could tell the god of death was interested and knew something.
"How so?" Light inquired, glancing over his shoulder. Even when he looked away, something about that man's eyes, Rue Ryuzaki's eyes, that stayed with him.
Ryuk was quiet for a moment before offering a low laugh followed by a shrug of his large shoulders.
"I dunno, just seemed interesting. Is he a criminal? Ya going kill him?" The death god asked.
"I can't find any criminal records for him…but he was connected to a case L solved a few years back. I thought he would have been interesting as a way to get to L." Light said, scrolling further down the page, trying to escape the feeling of being stared at by those creepy eyes. "But I don't think he will be of any use to me locked up in a mental hospital in America."
Ryuk let out a low laugh once more before moving back towards the bed. Light reached over and grabbed an apple from his desk and tossed it to the shinigami. He could tell the god knew more, and in fact, Light could feel that he was missing something about this man, about the BB murder case in general. Ryuk caught the apple and grinned accepting the fruit as the bribery it was intended to be.
"What's interesting about him, Ryuk?" Light asked again.
"A lot, I suppose. I've said it before, humans are interesting. That's why I am here," the god said, after a large bite of the apple.
"But in particular…" Light continued, reaching for another apple from the stash in his desk. Ryuk finished his apple, core stem and all, like always before giving Light a strange look. The god had said he wasn't actively on any one's side, yet Light had learned that he couldn't resist two things, apples, and anything he deemed interesting, and using those Light had managed to get a few pieces of information from the hulking god.
Ryuk rolled his eyes, or rather Light assumed that the gesture he made was the god's equivalent.
"Rue Ryuzaki," the god said, "the names don't match." He immediately reached out his large hand and Light tossed him two more apples. "That's all your getting," the god added, before swallowing an apple whole. Light smirked, it was enough, but he still got the feeling there was more Ryuk could say about the matter. He didn't press the issue any further and turned back to his computer screen.
The names don't match? Light thought for a second, and scrolled back up to meet the man's wild eyes again. Names didn't match…In a spilt second everything snapped into place and Light cursed to himself that it had taken him this long to figure it out.
Rue Ryuzaki was Beyond Birthday. For some reason the man's death had been falsely reported and his identity hidden.
Light smiled and opened his death note, glancing once more at the picture of the wild man. Beyond Birthday, a criminal supposedly defeated by L was right in front of him. Light carefully added the man's name to the growing list decorating his note.
Here you go, L, Light thought, setting down his pen and checking his watch, think of this as a present. There was no obvious connection to L and the man's faked death, but Light figured someone of L's status had to be at least be aware, if he wasn't directly responsible for the cover up.
Light didn't know who this man was, or why he was important enough to be hidden from the world. He would have surely faced execution for his crimes had true justice prevailed. This man's death was both a present and a message to L.
No one can hide from Kira, L. If I can get to him, I can get to you.
40 seconds came and went and Light sat back in his chair, a self-satisfied smirk on his lips.
"You killed him," Ryuk said, it was more of a statement than a question.
"He murdered at least three people, brutally," Light said, he glanced over his shoulder at the god. Normally Ryuk didn't comment on Light's sense of justice or who he chose to kill and why.
"Shame," Ryuk said after a minute, "he was really interesting." He then erupted into a fit of giggles and Light stared. He didn't think too much about the god's strange behaviour. If he was concerned every time the shinigami did something bizarre Light would never get any work done.
He closed the documents, sparing one last glance at the picture of Beyond Birthday. Knowledge that the man was now dead did little to stop the uncomfortable feeling that passed through Light. He shook his head, and went back to his research. Beyond was not the last criminal he intended to kill today.
The second thing was that that a phone rang at the Kira Task force's current HQ.
L generally avoided phone calls, they were distractions, unless, of course he was the one making the call, then it was vital.
The line that rang, though made L pause in the middle of the sentence he was typing. The line was reserved for vital, personal information. Generally it was for Watari, something relating to Wammy's house. It never rang for cases, and it wasn't used at all for the Kira investigation. The last two times it had rang, it was followed by grave news. It reported the suicide of the young man known as A, and later the disappearance of B.
L shivered at the memory of B, and glanced over at the phone, still ringing. Most of the task force members were so used to constant phones that none of them paid attention to the small ring of the phone. It was only the nature of the line that had made L pause, normally he too ignored phone. Watari answered the phone, Watari relayed vital information. Despite a hole growing in his stomach L went back to his work. Watari would answer it, and just as L finished up what he was typing, the ringing stopped short.
L pulled his bottom lip between his teeth worrying the skin as he thought about the children still at Wammy's. He had only visited a few times, and had web chatted with some of the older and smarter child a handful of times. Still, ever scince the death of A and…well everything that happened with B, L was wary to get too attached. He knew there were children there being groomed to take his place one day, he was aware of names tagged with iq scores and personality assessments, but he tried to stay as objective as possible when it came to Wammy's house and its peculiar children.
A moment later his computer screen flashed, informing L he had a message from Watari. He let out a small sigh of relief. It couldn't be anything too serious, then, if all it warranted was an email, assuming though, this email was related to the phone call. It made sense logically as far as timing was concerned, though.
L clicked the icon and after reading the message he slide quietly from his normal perched position to sitting on his ass, like a normal human being. He blinked and read the message a second time, despite the fact that there was no way he had misread.
L, message from LA: B is dead. Heart attack.
Beyond…Beyond was dead. L closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair. It somehow didn't seem possible. B had always seemed invincible, something that had honestly scared the shit out of L. The man was twisted, his actions in LA spoke to that, but even before then L had knew there was something off with Beyond. A and B were the only two that L had ever known personally, they were both only a few years his junior and both were excelling at Wammy's, though in different ways. L let his thoughts drift, something he very rarely did, back to A and B. A had failed, ultimately because he had been too human, smart, but still attached to the world and humanity in general, it was that stress, everyone had concluded that lead to his untimely death. As for B, L's eyebrows shifted as he pictured the man who shared a strikingly similar appearance to his own, B had failed because there wasn't a human thing about him. He was separate, different, bizarre in the most extreme ways possible.
His death was B's first and last human action.
L opened his eyes and pulled his legs back to his chest before leaning over and typing out a quick reply to Watari, thanking in for the information, and closing the email. He couldn't let this get to him, but the knowledge that B was gone was eating up his insides for some reason. He knew B had attempted to communicate with L a few times since his incarceration. L had only visited the man once, shortly after he had been locked up, and that brief contact had left L feeling so violated he ignored all further commutations. B hadn't done or said anything particularly troubling that day, in fact he hadn't said a single thing. He had just stared, with his wide, wild eyes, glinting with a strange power that L could never understand or escape.
The computer pinged again and L clicked the email open, eager for a distraction from the memory of B's eyes, boring into his skull. He didn't find one. There was another message from Watari.
Should I add him to the list of Kira's victims, or erase it?
Kira's victim. Of course, he was a violent criminal who died of a heart attack, of course it was Kira. L cursed to himself, he had been so surprised by simple fact that B was dead to properly think of the circumstances.
L had tried to bury B's existence after the events in LA. He still wasn't sure why he did it. There were several viable reasons for hiding B from the world, protecting Wammy's house, being the most sensible. It was also possible that L did it out of a twisted sense of respect. Respect for the shared past the two had. It hadn't been much, but L had spent time getting to know the twisted shell of a human that B was, and couldn't bear to see that destroyed. But the most likely reason behind L erasing Beyond Birthday form the world had to do with his own sense of fear. He wanted to erase the abomination from the world, burying the monster under false names and blacked out recorders. Maybe if he hid the man far away enough L could finally escape B's haunting gaze.
Still, whatever the reason for burying Beyond, the fact remains, he was buried, yet somehow Kira had found out about him. Kira had connected the case of Beyond Birthday to the crazed mental patient Rue Ryuzaki.
Something dark swirled in L's stomach. He was grateful, for the smallest moment, he was grateful to Kira. Kira had done what he hadn't been able to…Kira had destroyed the monster that stalked L's rare dreams. L felt sick at the thought, but what was worse, he didn't feel guilty.
L stared at Watari's message, debating how respond. Kira had probably dug through the case file to find the answer, Kira had to know that there was some connection between L and the cover up. This death was almost personal, the way it was handed to L…though it was impossible that Kira understood exactly how personal it was, the message that B's death sent was not missed by L.
Still, L looked at the simple question before him. The rational thing was to acknowledge the death as the work of Kira. Add Beyond's name to the ever growing list of Kira victims, though that thought sat wrong with L.
Beyond was not a victim. Beyond was never a victim, even murdered by Kira, the man couldn't be a victim, it was so against his very nature. He was always the predator, never the prey.
L chewed on his lip once more, and leaned over and typed his last words on the subject of Beyond Birthday.
Erase it.
L closed his email again, before picking up a doughnut from a trey next to his computer. The powdered sugar covered his figure tips and filled his nose as his bit into the pastry.
He had erased Beyond. Again, there were a number of logical reasons for doing this, but L knew deep down what the truth was. Erase him, erase B from existence, just as Kira had. He wasn't better than the murderer he was chasing. He erased B, not for any logistical, sensible reason, but because he had been scared. He was scared of B and Kira had taken away his fear, and by erasing it further from the record, L was openly acknowledging that fear.
L took a second bite of his doughnut only to be surprised by a splash of cool red jam. The stuff ran down his chin and dropped onto his shirt, staining it crimson. L put the doughnut down, stood up quietly, and excused himself to the bathroom to vomit.
There was no escaping B, even after his death it seemed.