Chapter 1- Double Indemnity
"What did you say your name was again, young man?" The older gentleman adjusted his glasses and looked at the young boy with kindly eyes.
"He called me Near." The little boy replied.
"Ahh. Near. Yes. L told me about…" At that moment, the man held his hand to the receiver in his ear.
"Yes, L. You have a visitor… Ahh. I understand."
The old man turned to the child. "I'm sorry, Near. I've got to go and retrieve someone for L. Could you please wait in here for a couple of minutes?"
The little boy nodded. The man left, and the door to the room clicked shut softly behind him. The little boy looked at the monitors on the wall. He understood that this room was special, that it somehow controlled access to the rest of the building. He walked over to the pad on the wall, and began entering numbers. In minutes, the soft click of the door unlocking sounded, and the little boy slipped out into the hall. He followed the hall into another large room with screens on the wall. As he looked around, he heard voices coming nearer. He scooted into the knee space of a desk and hid. From his hiding place, he watched as L and some people he didn't recognize entered. He heard them talking, and then L collapsed onto the floor, dropping a spoon as he fell. Without thinking, Near stuck his hand out of the knee space, and grabbed on to L's ankle. A look of surprise washed over the boy's face at the exact moment L softly exhaled his last breath.
*****
"Ryuk, this is all your fault, you know." O-Baku rumbled in his thunderous voice. The ruler of the Shikigami was a grotesque parody of an octopus with a bony, human head. He thrashed his tentacles in obvious displeasure.
"I had no idea this would happen." Ryuk said, jerking a thumb at the man and small boy who lay on the bare, cracked ground, their bodies partially obscured by the foul yellow mist that swirled around them.
"Well it has happened, and something must be done." O-Baku said in a low growl.
The man on the ground began to stir. He scratched is head, mussing his dark hair even more.
"The note user awakens." O-Baku boomed.
L looked around, the impassive expression on his face hiding his surprise. "Am I dead? I must be. Either that, or I'm hallucinating."
"This is no hallucination, I assure you." Ryuk said, his preternaturally wide smile revealing pointy teeth. "You are in the realm of the Shikigami. Your misuse of the Death Note has landed you here."
"My misuse? I wrote my name in it. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?" L inquired.
"Under normal conditions, yes. But in this instance, another Death Note was used to kill you at the exact second your Death Note was activated. Because one note may not override another, the system was overloaded. So now you're here. And that's bad, because no human is ever supposed to set foot in the realm of the shikigami." Ryuk said as he looked intently at L.
"What is the child doing here?" O-Baku bellowed.
"Are you asking me? I don't really know. I think I remember him touching my ankle as I fell. Perhaps because of the unusual circumstances of my death, and the close contact he had with me at that instant, he was transported here in the same way I was." L offered.
"The whole thing seems pretty unfortunate, if you ask me." Ryuk said as he slowly walked around L and Near.
"No one did!" O-Baku bellowed. "Now it is up to me to sort out this mess. First, the child." O-Baku held one of his tentacles out over Near.
"The child is clean. There is no malice, no wish for death in him. There is nothing to bind him to this realm. I can send him back to the Earth with no memory of this incident. But time moves differently in this realm than on Earth. A year down there is a moment here. Since he was alive when he entered, his life processes have been speeded up. I can see the effect of the time dilation all ready." O-Baku said.
All eyes went to Near, who had, in the few moments they were speaking, grown several inches.
"I will return him now, to minimize the effect of the time dilation, but he will still go back several years older than when he started." With that, O-Baku waved his tentacle over Near again, and Near vanished.
"Now. For the one who used the note. I cannot return you to life, nor can I release you to death. You have touched the Realm of the Shikigami with a wish for death. That makes you, by default, a shikigami. But since you did not use the note with malice in your heart, you will not be transformed fully- you will retain your human form and spirit as long as you do not kill with malice. But if you kill with malice, or give others the chance to kill with malice, the transformation will be complete. The darkness in your heart will twist your body and your spirit. As a shikigami, you will have the burden of a Death Note. It will torment you, as it torments us." O-Baku said with a solemn look.
"As for you, Ryuk." O-Baku said, narrowing his eyes. "You have caused this thing. Why couldn't you content yourself with games of chance? No, you must learn a lesson." O-Baku waved a tentacle again, and the two Death Notes L had destroyed materialized in the air. "There will be no rest for you, Ryuk. First, I will reverse your last five kills- you will get no benefit in years from them. Next, I will return these to their owners at the time of destruction. Your ambition will be your undoing."
"O-Baku. I am not questioning your wisdom or your judgment, but one of my last five kills was Light Yagami, the man who started this whole mess. He makes me look like a slacker in the killing department. He also happens to be the last owner of one of those notes. The cycle that led to this disruption may begin again. I also wonder if breaking one of the rules of the note is advisable. If you…"
"Silence!" O-Baku roared. He levitated in the air, and slowly turned in circles. "It is your responsibility to see that the cycle does not continue, Ryuk. You will spend your days keeping the balance and order. If you do not, you will pay the price."
"Yes, Vengeful One." Ryuk said as he bowed in O-Baku's direction.
"Then let it be done! Note user, you will return to the Earth with your notebook. Use it more wisely than this one." O-Baku jerked a tentacle in Ryuk's direction, then spun away at an astonishing rate.
L held his book between his thumb and forefinger as he examined it. A large hunch-backed shikigami with long dragging arms passed by. One of his arms caught the edge of the notebook as he passed, and the notebook hurtled through the foul yellow mist.
"Oops." The ponderous shikigami said as he continued on his way.
"Fain!" Ryuk yelled as the other shikigami passed. "How could you!"
"Hmph. Its not my fault this skin sack is up here, Ryuk. Blame yourself." Fain replied.
"Relax. It just dropped on the ground. I'll find it in a minute." L said as he peered through the mist.
Ryuk looked at L and shook his head. "You don't get it. When a shikigami drops a Death Note, it falls all the way down. Down to Earth. Things just got a lot more complicated."
Fain lumbered back in L's direction. "I wasn't trying to start something. I didn't realize you were a new Shikigami. You look funny- still a skin sack. I've got an extra Note- I won it off of old Bulware. Here- have it. No hard feelings?"
"None. In fact, I'm not sure what to feel at all. Not at this point." L said mildly as he took the Death Note from Fain's long fingers.
"Just hope someone bloodthirsty doesn't find your note," Ryuk said, "Or you'll never feel anything again."