~Death Note Fanfiction LxOC Part 1~

Disclaimer: Sadly I don't even own an L plushie (thought I really wish I did XP) so I don't own Death Note or any of the characters…only Hoshiko Murakami

Hoshiko eyed the weird man as he entered the café. She had just begun the shift and had a coworker help her tie the apron to the maid ensemble.
"Welcome!" If the other waitresses weren't going to approach him, she would. She needed the money, thus the extra shift. After four hours of sleep after her last shift and a quick shower, she was about ready to die of exhaustion. However, the man who entered looked even worse than she did.

Raven hair with equally dark eyes were the first things she noticed. She'd seen her share of interesting people because of the cosplay café, but this one exceeded all the rest. She led him to a booth on the far wall where no one could see or hear him so as not to frighten the other guests. This seemed to please him as well when he took out a manila envelope and placed it on the table.

"Here's the menu, and if you need anything at all, I'm Hoshiko Murakami," she said with as bright a smile she could muster. This didn't seem to effect him as he gave her a blank stare that was starting to creep her out a little. He mumbled a thank you and brought his knees up to his chest, discarding his shoes underneath the table.

When she returned to the strange man's table, she'd only seated one other guest seeing as how it wasn't their busiest time of the day.
"I'd like a strawberry parfait, raspberry cheesecake, and coffee with extra sugar cubes," She hadn't even completely gotten her notepad out of her apron by the time he was done, looking up at her expectantly as he held the menu up for her to retrieve. It didn't need to be repeated since he was her only other customer, but he seemed to be in a bit of a rush.

"If you'd like, we do deliver, master," She saw one of his eyebrows twitch at the title she used, but didn't say anything.
"Yes, if you could deliver it here personally it would be a tremendous help," he said as he took a napkin from one of the holders and scribbled down an address with the pen she didn't know he'd borrowed from her. He placed it back in her hand and got up to leave, forgetting the manila envelope on the table. Before she could turn and tell him, he had disappeared.

~

As much as she wanted to open the envelope in the bag next to the pastries, she didn't. Seeing as how the extra shift wasn't going to earn her the money she needed, Hoshiko went ahead and left with her boss's consent. The bag weighed down her left hand while the to-go coffee cup in her right burned. She hadn't even changed before she left, deciding that he'd recognize her more easily in the maid outfit.

The front desk clerks almost sent her away before they got a mysterious phone call and sent her to the hotel's highest level suite, giving her a key for the elevator. Each time a number lit up, indicating which level she'd reached, her nerves seemed to increase with it. How was this guy important enough to have a luxury hotel's highest suite? The more she thought about it, the more she had the urge to stop the elevator and go back down.

What if he decided to molest her or something? There was no way she could escape. The guy looked like he could barely pay for the pastries, much less a high class hotel room. Had she missed something? Maybe he was some celebrity in disguise? What was she doing coming here alone? However, all the questions halted with the elevator.

The door opened and she stepped into the little entry area. Everything looked way too pricey for her tastes. Sure, she could barely keep up with the rent for her dingy apartment but this was overkill for luxury. This was the kind of room she only saw in movies. And here she was, in a maid dress to suit it, with a very dumbfounded look on her face.

"I see you made it," The voice came from the couch in the living room where he sat in that weird position of his. It looked like the fetal position for when there was a tornado drill.
"Uh, yes. I brought your order and the envelope you left," she responded, not feeling the need to add 'master' since they weren't in the café.
"Did you read the contents?" he asked curiously while she set the bag on the table in front of the couch and proceeded to take out the packaged sweets for him.

"No, all customers are given their privacy. If none of us respected that rule we'd be fired," She didn't add that the ones who got away with it weren't.
"Hm," he sort of grumbled. "Do you abide by that rule? Tell me, Hoshiko, what is my name?"
"Yes, and you never said. Would you like me to add a few sugar cubes to your coffee?" She set out the plates of sweets from the boxes and set a fork toward him, opening the lid of the coffee efficiently for either him or her to drop the sugar cubes in. If she was going to deliver, she might as well do her best to get a good tip from this obviously rich guy.

"How would you describe me?" Now he was just getting a tad annoying with all the questions.
"If you're trying to ask me out, I'm going to have to say no,"
"I assure you, I am not. I only wish to know how you would describe me Miss Murakami," he said, tilting his head to one side that she could only think of as slightly cute.
"A very tired, very strange, and very rich man. Sugar cubes?" she asked once again since he had yet to answer whether or not he wished to add them.

He nodded in thought and she took that as the go ahead to adding a few cubes.
"Open the envelope,"
"Excuse me?" She had to admit now, this was seriously getting weird, but at least she hadn't been attacked like so many had tried before. He was the customer and she was still the waitress, even if she was off duty, so she of course had to oblige.

Hoshiko lifted the metal pieces of the manila envelope, folded back the paper, and spilled the contents onto her side of the table. There were several sheets of paper. One in particular stood out from the rest. On it, was the name Hoshiko Murakami. It was a death certificate. This had to be some mistake. She wasn't dead! What the hell was going on? Was this guy going to kill her?

"Please calm down for a moment and I will explain," he said calmly as if he wasn't going to kill her.
"How the hell am I supposed to calm down! Oh god, you're going to kill me aren't you? I'm only 19! I can't die yet! I have a job and school and…well okay, I don't have family or friends but my boss would miss me! Please don't-"
"Miss Murakami, I told you to let me explain. I am L," he interrupted her and she shut up for the moment. L? What did this psycho claiming he was L have to do with anything?

"I can prove this solely by the fact that I am able to afford this hotel room. These accommodations are only temporary though. After going through the files of all the employees in your café, you were the one with least suspicion of being Kira. Seeing as how it seems I'll be working on this case for quite some time and Watari has many other tasks to accomplish, I've enlisted you to help. Now you may either be a help to the task force focused on bringing Kira down, or you can simply live in the hotel under surveillance," he said as if all of this wasn't a big deal. Kira? Watari? Surveillance? Hoshiko dropped to the floor, done setting up his treats.

"Why is this happening to me?"
"Simply because you are one of the only people to have seen my face in public and have reason to remember it. We're understaffed at the moment and Watari is currently stationed at the task force headquarters, leaving me to order sweets like these myself when I would rather spend that time working on the case. You're aspiring to be a pastry chef are you not? You live alone and the performance of serving you put on just now was impressive. Whether you like it or not Miss Murakami, you're perfect for this job," he said, then proceeding to dump the rest of the sugar cubes into his cup and digging into the strawberry parfait.

The only reason he could know all of that was if he was either a really good stalker, or he really was L. Well that destroyed her image of the handsome, mysterious, spy type she'd made up in her head of what L would look like. Lind L Taylor looked more like an L than this sweet loving, sleep deprived guy did.

"Wait, how did you know I was going to be the one who served you in the café?" It was a good question, if she may say so herself.
"I didn't, though if you weren't, I would have asked for you," Oh yes, not creepy at all. Hoshiko was still considering whether she wanted to believe his story or not.

"Why the need for the death certificates?" she asked, waving absentmindedly toward the papers. If she was going to be dead to the world, she wanted a reason.
"I'll reveal that when the time comes for you to know,"
"That just sounds like an intelligent way of saying 'I don't know'," she replied. He looked at her oddly and she glared, not really knowing if that was the appropriate thing to do in return to that.
"If you must know, it's another safety measure. If I find myself in the presence of Kira, I want the people around me to be adequately protected. Your brother has died, making you an innocent bystander to Kira's wrath, or Kira trying to throw off suspicion. This means that there's a 98% chance that you're not Kira. This percentage will vary while you're under surveillance and I can get a better idea of how you think. With such a high chance of you not being Kira, I need you to have an alias and disguise, seeing as how you'll probably be working for me for quite some time. The documents for your new alias is among your death certificate. Read your background and take on the persona as needed,"

"But-"
"You will of course be paid gratuitously for risking your life. This includes a savings account of several million dollars, meaning that after this, you will never have to worry about your expenses again,"
"Risking my li-!"
"Yes, as I said before, I'm dealing with one of the most dangerous cases of my life," he interrupted again. Hoshiko had so many questions that she was sure her head would burst. The only thing she was sure of was that this guy was crazy. This was going to be one very long night.