Who said Vengeance is Best Served Cold?, a death note fanfic

Disclaimer: Yosh! This is me, Volital. (Yes, I am aware that my name is spelled wrong. And I love it.) And this is my story. See? But this is not my Death Note. And yes, angst is going to be soon.

...But not in this chapter. This chapter is fluff and DDR and L going into an arcade. Pairings are OC X L, and a tie between the other OC X Matt and OC X Mello. . Stupid plot bunnies! Haven't even gotten there and they're bothering me already!! GAH!

This is set slightly before L and the Task Force meet. :D

OMGALINE.YOUKNOWYOULOVEITLIKERYUKLOVESHISAPPLESANDMISALOVESLIGHT

Shirousaki Tarou. Age 17. Died April 21, 2005.

"Don't worry Nee-chan, you didn't do it. You'll get out of this."

"Of course I will! The day I'm not convicted, let's go out an eat ice-cream, 'kay?"

Yuusai Midoriko. Age 19. Witness.

"O-Nee-chan... I'm scared..."

"How come?"

"There's talk of someone who's killing off the criminals, all of them, with... Heart attacks..."

"...?"

"Even the ones that aren't convicted."

"...Nee-chan-"

"Even ones in prison, where they are already being punished..."

"Nee-chan, stop. He won't get you."

"How do you know? What if he kills me just because there was a possibility! What if-"

"He. Won't. Get you."

"Promise?"

"Cross my heart and hope to die."

Yuusai Takiri. Age 17. Suspect in the murder of Shirousaki Tarou.

"Nee-chan? What is it? N-nee-chan? Nee-chan!"

Suspect died at 4:00 PM on June 16, 2005, Just as she was walking out of the building after being proclaimed as innocent.

"NO! We were going to go out and get ice cream, remember? You aren't guilty! Kira can't kill you! You can't die!"

Midoriko did not know what to wear that day. In college she would not get a uniform, and thus would not already have an outfit chosen for her. She was a week late for starting term, a fact that would either have pity or scorn from the teachers, depending on how much they knew...

She shook those thoughts from her head. At-least Cassie had gotten in as well. It would be slightly bearable then.

Cassie Lee had moved from America five years ago, and had cracked a reference from a certain anime (it had been Inuyasha, for the record) in the middle of class, which made her and Midori instant-friends. Her dad was a detective, and when he had been transferred here Cassie had followed.

She decided upon brown sneakers, green velvet-esque pants, a white v-shirt that revealed a flash of a gold necklace, and a brown jacket that covered her hands if she pulled the sleeves down. If she zipped said jacket all the way up, she looked like a ninja, what with the collar coming up to her eyes and all. She zipped it up just enough to keep her warm, and flipped the collar down.

"Oh yes." She grinned at her reflection, and was stunned for a moment by the resemblance to Takiri. She sobered immediately, feeling sadness followed by a rush of anger. "Kira, that bastard..." She snarled, her fists tightening as well as her throat, just from thinking about it.

She forced her mind elsewhere. She had class to get to, and an apartment to pack.

"We have homework, Cassie-chan."

"...Your point being?" Cassie asked. She looked the picture of innocence; her hair died an electric blue to offset her dark blue eyes. Midoriko could have sworn that years ago her hair had been blond, but since then Cassie had taken to randomly dying it. She was positive that the last time she had seen her best friend it had been pink. Said randomly changing hair was tied up into pigtails, after the style of Misa-Misa. Blue butterflies flew up a knee-length yellow dress she wore over regular jeans.

Midoriko looked plain next to her: Pale brown curls tied back into a ponytail, tannish skin, and brown eyes.

"I'd rather not get behind so quickly."

"Procrastination is not a sin, it is an art," Cassie informed her loftily, walking off in the direction of the street. She intended to beat her high score on several game machines, and then puppy-dog-pout Riko-chan into doing her homework.

"...True..." Midoriko grinned, running to catch up.

L crouched in his chair, toes burrowing into the cushions as he stared, nearly unblinking at the computer screen. In this game of chess between him and Kira, it Kira's move.

But which piece to move? His Queen? A quick set of jabs from an agile source to set L on edge? Hmm... No, Kira did not want to sacrifice his Queen this early in the game. Besides, nothing fought better against opponents with unknown pieces than Knights. Kira seemed unusually inept at using the tricky piece: the Shinigami notes were evidence enough of that.

This happened very rarely: He was at a standstill in his thoughts. A headache was coming on, and all the possible roads seemed to lead to the same place... None of them Rome. They all leaded to oblivion.

And failure was hardly an option in this case.

Watari appeared beside him, rolling a cake on a cart. L did not touch it, lost in his thoughts. Frowning, Watari looked at L. "Are you alright, Ryuuzaki?"

L blinked for the first time in over a minute, the most surprise he could bear to show. "I believe that I am, yes..."

Watari waited for an explanation. 'I believe I am' was unusually vague for him.

L understood that, and took his time forcing his unruly thoughts into words. "I... am stuck."

Watari thought for a moment, then understood. "Maybe you should take a break, then."

L groaned internally. To him, going outside was like walking into hell. Sun, wind, bees, allergies, people, more sun, more bees, cars, loud, hot, cold… But he did not make a sound as he thought logically about it.

But, he knew that he needed inspiration, a new standpoint, anything. Anything but this unbearable waiting for another development. Maybe when he got back Kira would have moved a piece or two.

He stood, and found that Watari already had his shoes. Onyx eyes narrowed slowly as he took them, waiting until the last moment to actually put them on, and ignored the included socks altogether.

Midoriko dragged Cassie right off the bat towards the shoot-'em-up section of the arcade.

L did not monitor how long he walked, but he did stop for a short time in a park to buy an ice-cream cone.

Near the park he saw a large building that was full of teenagers and such. He heard beeping and got curious. He did not know what most people his own age did for entertainment, let alone anyone younger than he. But with his awesome intelligence, he figured this was an arcade.

He had never been inside one before, but had deduced from several murder cases involving arcades that they were an entertainment source for the masses: Machines played games while customers gave them even more money in hopes of getting a high score.

Curiosity drove him inside, and into madness. It was loud, and there were far more small children than he had predicted. The carpet was black with multi-colored abstract squares, triangles, and rectangles covering it's surface. On one end of the building the carpet gave way to rubber: A small food court (though it was really just a few stands). Typical arcade games were pressed against the walls and in two rows down the center, making the place seem much larger than it was.

He eased into the chaos, searching for what to do first.

A change machine was near him, and several more dotted the building. That was the logical thing to do. He studied the nearest one, and pulled a five from his wallet: One of the only three he possessed. The machine would not take any larger bills.

Quarters fell into the slot, and he took his time picking out each and every one with only two fingers and placing them in his pocket, unaware of the small line of three people behind him.

He stepped out of the way of a mother and her two children to find what to do next. He was clueless, so he decided to observe before actually playing.

Midoriko laughed maniacally as her car crashed into another, creating a small pile-up.

Cassie had to grin. "Why do you always do that at the beginning of every race?"

"Because destruction is good. Destruction is fun. Destruction makes the world spin into the sun," Midori grinned evilly, driving around the pile and gaining third place. "Besides that, it makes most of my competition out of the game..." She grinned maniacally as she finished in second. "Wow! That's my best time yet!"

"...You're in second place..." Cassie frowned, watching her.

"When did you get time to lurk?" Midoriko asked, cleverly dodging the question. (In truth, it was the best score she had ever gotten on that stupid game. She hated it.) She turned in her seat, shouldering her small backpack.

"I ran out of quarters. Hey, look! DDR!"

"SWEET!" Midoriko handed two more quarters to her cash-guzzling friend, running off in the direction of the crowded machine.

L was pushed by the crowd towards a big machine in the very center of the arcade. It was actually four machines, back to back, with eight multi-colored pads set into a metal platform. From what he could tell from where he stood, there were arrows on the pads that corresponded to the screens in front of them. The person playing had to press the arrows at the same time as the arrow on the screen reached the top.

He did not fancy getting onto the machine in front of everyone. People would see him and remember him, which was not exactly what he wanted.

He did, however, watch as a blue-haired girl chased a brunette onto the platform.

Midoriko grinned as she pushed coins into the game and put down her backpack below the screen where she could see it: Having someone steal her textbooks (70 dollars each! Times that by four, and she would have to pay 280 dollars. Not as planned.) was not what she wanted.

Cassie looked apprehensive. "But... Riko-chan, you'll totally wipe the floor with me! If 'Through the Fire and Flames' was a DDR game, you'd beat it without a problem!"

Midoriko blinked. "I have no clue what you're talking about, but I'll take it as a complement." She started cycling through songs, heading straight for the hard section. Cassie groaned.

Ryuuzaki blinked as the two had a short conversation, unable to hear over the noise and distance. From what he could read of the blue-haired lips- he was in a position right behind the brunette, so when blue-head turned her face he could see it clearly- something about 'wiping the floor' came up.

He presumed that the brunette was going to win. That thought was supported by the blue-head's body language and the brunette's instant journey to the songs colored red.

Midoriko grinned as she effortlessly kept up with the machine on Extreme, while Cassie was cruising along on Light. Cassie wasn't bad at DDR... She just wasn't as good as her friend. And damn, Midoriko was GOOD.

The song ended, and she grinned. "New high score!" The machine said cheerfully.

Cassie groaned. Midoriko's score was third on the entire list.

The teenager pouted. "Only third?" She whined, typing in "Riko" for her name, and then she started a new song.

Cassie sighed. They would be there for quite some time. She got a dollar from her pocket and went to get more quarters.

End of chapter one.

Next chapter: Midoriko suddenly stopped, and L wondered if she had seen him.

Sorry about the stalker!L thing in the next chapter, just in advance. Stalker!L is fun! Reviews are fun too! Reviewers get quarters for the Epik DDR machine of Epikness.

And yes, I am aware that they do not have quarters in Japan. But I'm lazy and didn't want to look up what the hell they have on google. Cassie's saying of Procrastination is my motto! OH YES!

Volital

May you find peace with yourself. I'm not saying anything about the world: Hate that as much as you want. I hate it too.