AN: I do not own the rights to the characters or whatever the official thing is. Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata do. I, however, own much too large a vocabulary but lack a single ounce of social skills, and hope I transferred that well to L (that totally rhymed. Ha.).
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Everything
1: Fascinating
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Light felt the strange presence behind him even as he stepped down the carpeted steps back among the plebeians who were in awe of his dominating glory, and perhaps disgusted at this creature of a man who was now much too close behind him.
"Light Yagami?" the voice asked, just as monotone as it had been as it delivered a speech from a blank piece of paper. Light turned his head just a fraction to acknowledge the flat black eyes hovering over his shoulder.
"Yes?" he asked in response.
A wide-eyed blink. The action seemed unnatural for someone with such strange eyes. "Good job," the voice said, flawless Japanese with no accent whatsoever.
That was it? He was expecting something different from this peculiar man with an aura that made him paranoid in ways that generally only came when Ryuk was hovering right over his shoulder.
"You too," he answered, voice even and not displaying any of his suspicions about...well, what was he suspicious about? What was there to be suspicious about?
They sat down as the new speaker, someone among those in charge of To-oh, started his own speech. The weird man, Ryuuga supposedly, pulled his knees to his chest in the same motion he used to draw his feet--bony and large, Light noticed, and he then wondered why he noticed--out of shoes that were maybe a month away from falling apart completely.
Who came to a function like this dressed like that? Light pondered this for a moment, finding this abnormal thing next to him much more captivating that the speech. It was strangely ironic, as this speech was delivered with a tone that was excited and enthusiastic. Somehow the speech the abnormality gave was more interesting despite the fact that it was delivered with a tone that made the speaker sound like he couldn't care less.
Despite his relatively obvious staring, the man, the strange man, paid no attention to Light. He had to admit, this was relatively annoying. Most people found his dominating personality captivating and blushed or stuttered if they realized he was staring at them. This person's aura was meshing with his in ways that forced for dominance, and he realized that the neighbor to Ryuuga's left had eyes that were straying between the two of them.
He glanced to his immediate right and realized that his more normal neighbor was doing the same thing, but he blushed and turned away when Light raised an eyebrow.
So, their silent interaction had an audience. How strange.
"Ah, Ryuuga?" Light asked when the current speaker bowed and stepped back to thunderous applause, well aware that nobody other than the intended receiver of the inquiry would hear him. Instantly, those black orbs snapped to his, betraying absolutely nothing. Neither of the two were clapping, he realized, and in the interest of public image, he halfheartedly put his hands together while maintaining eye contact.
What an unsettling stare. It was bad enough when he was behind Light, but now that they were face to face it was just plain creepy. He leaned in, too, as if he was about to reveal a great secret, and that also unsettled him. Too close, he realized, for a normal conversation.
"Yagami?" the abnormality asked in return, eyes not betraying any emotion. He also did not follow Light's example and clap. Completely oblivious to how others observed him. Too close, he remembered again as he realized he could see the slight red veins in the man's too-wide eyes.
"I think you're supposed to wear shoes here," he said as filler for what he had somehow forgotten. Why was talking to this man so different from talking to anyone else? He normally could make almost anyone think anything with a few words, even if he had just woken up and wasn't thinking straight. However, trying to communicate with this freak of a man made his thoughts curve in strange directions and also made him want to look over his shoulder for the axe murderer that this man might have placed behind him. Maybe that was why he was so close, so he would see blood spattered everywhere.
That would be an awkward end to Kira.
"Nobody has informed me of this uspoken rule and nobody has cared to correct my flippancy," was the simple response, and his eyes snapped back to the current speaker with glassiness that indicated he was not paying any attention. So it seemed, at any rate. He leaned back into his chair, and Light relaxed and was slightly surprised to find that he had tensed under the strange man's observation.
They did not talk the rest of the ceremony, and the moment it was over, Ryuuga jumped down from his chair, slid his shoes on, and shuffled out of the assembly room. His messy black hair rather instantly vanished in the crowd, and Light considered following him briefly.
"What did you think of that kid?" Ryuk asked innocently from directly behind Light, who jumped slightly.
"He's odd," Light responded quietly, also sliding through the masses of students. The tuft of black hair stood out not five feet away quite suddenly, and Light couldn't help but start to follow it. He felt frankly foolish, especially as he was ignoring professors and fellow students' congratulations in favor of following the abnormality. "I'm almost certain Ryuuga Hideki is an alias. It's not a common name, and it almost seems like he's flaunting it, also as if he's trying to point out to Kira that he can't be killed so easily. He must have a good amount of power, to be able to enter a university under a false name…"
Ryuk chuckled, and Light knew he was right. He emerged out of the crowd, which was now congregating around a very nice black Bentley, into which the abnormality ducked rather rapidly and shut the door almost violently.
It started up and drove off, and Light was left feeling marginally safer and also mightily confused. Why was this man using an alias, and why did he make Light so blatantly nervous?
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L smiled slightly through the tinted glass as a few students gave him bug-eyed looks. They were probably not expecting such an eccentric person to be financially well-off. Watari, in the front seat, chuckled slightly at the bewildered faces before gently pressing his foot to the pedal and easing off.
A hint of distaste twisted his features as it was so damn slow...Watari honestly drove like an old man.
Then again, the first time L had been allowed to drive a car, he had been pulled over and had only gotten out of being arrested for driving while intoxicated with a phone call to the highest up authority figure acknowledged in the country on speed dial.
Somehow he had forgotten that in America, you drive on the right side of the road. And that 55 did not equal 70. And blinkers were there for a reason.
Yes, Watari had never let him drive again.
This reflection was happening at the same time the ten-track mind contemplated the potential for Light Yagami to be Kira based on the slight interaction they had.
Personally, L found Light's behaviour disturbing. The files seemed to have him listed as a perfect son, student, brother, whatever the situation was. He certainly seemed that way while delivering his speech. Perfectly relaxed, but at the same time, he acted just humble enough to not seem conceited.
L threw his speech together at the last second, warping some of what Light said to make it sound different, and delivering it in his own apathetic way that probably got more attention than the enthusiastic speeches that followed. Most speeches seemed to get the same thing across, so long as it was not in government. Government was where things got icky, where appearances were everything, and where people were expected to wear shoes. Horrible.
Even during L's speech, Light had seemed fine. It was when they were close, when L fell into a habit he didn't actually know he had. Interaction was a strange thing, he had learned. Watari, who had known him from age five, learned to accept L's abnormalities before L completely realized that they were strange. He didn't even blink when L leaned in not an inch from the older man's face for impersonal interactions, and distanced himself for utterly personal conversations.
And having no interaction with anybody other than Watari, he had to admit that he had accidently learned to believe that his quirks were in some way normal. So in a completely impersonal environment, he had not hesitated to hover just behind Light's shoulder as he congraulated him.
Light had taken two seconds to respond. It was one and a half seconds too long. Light had overthought it, perhaps he had been expecting something else? Close interaction was, according to the slightly uncomfortable body language displayed by the Yagami boy, the way his fingers and neck tensed almost unnoticeably, apparently meant to be more personal. About more awkward topics, like murders and drugs. And rape.
Yes, L decided in one of the tracks of his mind, he spent too much time around these sorts of cases. At least Kira was something not as dark, having a heart attack would not be something a dramatic novel would be written about, which had happened already with murders, drugs, and rape.
At any rate, he really hoped nobody would ever write a sappy story revolving around a heart attack. A large part of him would probably die inside.
In the part of his mind that was still focusing on analyzing Light's actions, he thought back to when Light had reprimanded him about his lack of shoes. It was clear he had meant to say something different, but the slight, ever slight, blush that was not quite on his cheeks but closer to his ears seemed to indicate that he had forgotten and was annoyed that he had forgotten.
He also had tensed again when L leaned in unconsciously, as this was not a personal conversation and he had no problems with getting close. He seemed to base his assumptions around social formalities, and L was apparently defying a very common one that was rarely usurped.
The fact that he had followed L was what made the least sense. Curiousity was the most likely cause, and as L had not revealed his identity, it was difficult to see Kira's hands in this. Difficult, but not impossible. Light was obviously much more paranoid than the files or observation would lead anyone to believe. In his paranoia, he could have very well suspected L of being, well...L, and wanted to make this theory concrete.
Then again, the odds of this being true were probably superfluous in the face of simple facts: Light was shockingly intelligent and had probably never encountered anyone as intelligent, he thrived on knowledge, and in the aftermath of the ceremony had next to no choice as to what direction to wander off to.
He pondered why he did not want to write the brief instance of stalking as pure coincidence in a part of his mind that was begging for something to do, came up with no answer except that he truly desired to solve the case, and rather abruptly found the part of his mind feeling rather empty again.
The rest of it was thankfully full, however, and he decided to read up on controlling one's body language and societal normalities. Perhaps he could make Light uncomfortable enough to reveal something compromising.
Watari pulled into the latest hotel, a four star but still ritzy seventeen story building with excellent cheesecake available via room service. He permitted his mind to trail off into more blissful thoughts regarding aforementioned cheesecake, but still kept a good portion of it focused on the Kira case. More specifically on Light, and what he could learn from interaction with the younger man.
Besides, he found the teen rather fascinating.
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AN: Cheesecake is a gift of God. Coming from an atheist, that means a lot. Seriously.
-Pepper