Fic: The Lightning Strike
Rating: T
Characters: Light & L
Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note, Snow Patrol's lyrics or Corrine de Winter's poems.
Warnings: AU, double genderswitch
Dedication: I like the mention of gold halo in the lyrics because it reminds me of gold fire.
A/N: Based on Snow Patrol's song "The lightning strike." Which is quite possibly the most awesome song I've listened to lately. I've wanted to write this fic for a while now and the creative bug just bit me. It's not femslash but...oh, just read it
But Sweetheart, I will tell you,
although I strayed,
although I kneeled for many gods
I always have returned to you.
Corrine de Winter, "Carnation"
from Of Desire
i) What If This Storm Ends?
What if this storm ends
And leaves us nothing
Except a memory
A distant echo?
There should be a law against all things human that have the ability to weigh upon your soul like an anvil that drops on a cartoon character (like the Road Runner) from out of nowhere, and just shocks you, jolts you out of the blue, making you keep on wondering, Why?
When Light opens her eyes in the silence of her room (their room), she is greeted with darkness from the drawn curtains and the lightning tap tap tap on a laptop keyboard that draws her out of sleep, as though sleep were a huge blob of jello.
There must be something wrong with her, she who rules the world with the flick of the pen, filling silken page after page with her neat, block handwriting (she never learned to write cursive, though her father tried to make her).
Her voice is hoarse, tired (even after nine straight hours of sleep) when she speaks. "Why is it so dark in here?"
The hunched back does not turn towards her, as though she is not worth the movement. "There's a storm outside," the detective mumbles in her soft, husky voice. "The building's running on low power. I kept the curtains closed because I didn't want the lightning to scare you."
But Light feels that the storm isn't really on the outside. It's on the inside, where seas rage and waves rise and break on dark brown hard rocks that glisten from the moisture of the water, tossing and turning the hapless ships of her conscience like they're rubber ducks in a tub. She rises and stretches almost mechanically, and later, she joins L in their work.
Why does it have to go this way? wonders the girl as she watches L's ivory fingers fly across the keypad so that you don't know where skin ends and plastic begins. The unease in her swells and gives out at uneven intervals like a melodramatic tune of a badly written horror movie, and when L offers her a small plate of chocolate eclairs, she has hardly has the strength to raise her hand and wave no.
The detective shrugs, a smooth ripple of bony shoulders. Suit yourself.
But beneath the porcelain facade, the lack of sleep (running on only five hours everyday), the monstrous appetite that makes her shove sweets down her throat, she must suffer from the same mortal sickness that eats away at the soul like a ravenous cancer, bent on devouring all things alive.
The mortal coil that wraps itself tighter around Light, tight as a boa constrictor, is weighing on her heart with each passing minute, forcing her to keep her eyes open and finally see and see she does, because she can no longer justify.
Where do we go from here?
Later, no one will disturb her when she is left alone to her own musings in the dark, leaning against the chair, a resigned look on her face. She would rather be on her own, Light, instead of grace the others with her illuminating presence downstairs where they are fighting with L – and perhaps surprised that she is not with them.
Here is the room, the empty room with its walls white and high, towering over her like a menacing serpent, peeks of pale blue light coming through the window. Here is the bed, unmade, rumpled like L's hair, and while Light has always been a neat freak, she cannot muster the energy to tidy the room.
So much uncertainty, blurring of things that were once as sharp as a knife, the tip of a pen, its elegant scratch on preternatural paper. And now, a cloud of blood is passing over her eyes and she is forced to watch the diffusion of red expanding like the universe.
(And what is that when it is compared to her fruit of love, of friendship, of loyalty for L?)
A knock on the door. Soft, patient, unintrusive. Light makes no answer, no gesture. Soon enough the footsteps pad away, and the guillotine hovers over her back neck and Ryuk laughs over her shoulder.
Sometimes you must think me insane because I keep myself locked away from all the things that I really want.
ii) The Sunlight Through The Flags
These accidents of faith and nature,
They tend to stick in the spokes of you.
But every now and then the trend bucks
And you're repaired by more than glue.
When L looks at her days later, concern tinges her dark orbs and her voice is unusually soft. "Are you all right?"
Light keep staring at the file in her hand, reading the same line over and over again in a sick cycle of redundancy. "Yes." No.
She should've known that the older woman wouldn't be fooled.
"Don't stare so hard at that piece of paper," says L, a trace of humor in her tone. "Your eyes might burn holes through it."
When the girl looks up, L has already turned away.
But why, she thinks to herself, almost pleads with the guillotine as Matsuda rushes into the main room, frantically waving a newspaper, Guys, it's Kira! She's killed twenty-four more people in the last twelve hours! and L's mouth presses in a grim, displeased line as if to say, Is this supposed to make me happy?
Misa is the silent lamb and Light curses under her breath (Damn you, Kira) simply because she has to and she pretends not to notice that L is staring intently at her, black gaze like a piercing vice that would like nothing more than to crack the mask.
But why can't I have this?
"You know," L says to the younger woman when they are on the roof alone, the sky blanketed with dark grey clouds, the wind rustling the cables and wires that cross intricate paths over their heads. "I used to be your age, too. I know that sometimes...we can make really unwise decisions in the heat of passion."
Light raises her head and this time, her gaze meets the detective's. They are unreadable, though, the onyx eyes, almost waiting to see how she'll react to this.
"I don't know what you're talking about," she says coldly, and regrets the instant the words flee her lips. Instead she wants to say, But there was no heat of passion when I decided to pass judgement with the Death Note. Only cold logic.
L remains undaunted, the only person who does not fear Light's temper. "Just think about it," she says with a casual shrug, and looks away to reach for a plate of sweetened chicken.
"But what if -" she starts when the queasiness has gotten the better of her and blackness shrouds them both in their quarters, giving her odd comfort that she cannot clearly make out the look on the other's face, her chest heaving as the detective's warm breath falls on her cheek. Her voice nearly falters.
"What if there's no way to turn back because it's too late?"
"There's always a way out." L shakes her head, resting a pale, boney, reassuring hand on the girl's shoulder. "It's never too late to turn back."
And when her skin touches Light's, she feels a jolt of electricity, a clap of thunder, a strike of lightning.
iii) Daybreak
Something was bound to go right sometime today
All these broken pieces fit together to make a perfect picture of us
First break of day and sunlight cracks in through the window, bathing the room in a golden halo when Light opens her eyes and blinks the sleep out of them. And then she turns her head.
L is fast asleep beside her, curled up into a ball (or rather, more like a kitten), the sheets kicked away, her white shirt and blue jeans creased. There is a tranquility reflected on her gaunt face and she sighs in her dreams and Light realizes that she has never seen L asleep before this.
She climbs out of bed. She walked towards the windows, towards the light that is beckoning her to marvel at how the storm is over, and make the promise of a new day.
She feels like a snake who's just shed it's skin...no: rather, she feels like a butterfly come out of its cocoon ready to fly away into the sunlight.
L mumbles something in her sleep that breaks into Light's thoughts. She glances over her shoulder, just to find the detective turning over, as if to shun the golden light. She smiles.
Gingerly, she treads to the bathroom, bare feet moving soundlessly on the carpet, and goes to the mirror to look at her face. Her almond eyes are no longer narrow like serpentine slits, but instead, wide and warm.
Behind Light, Ryuk laughs again, the bemused chuckle of a spirit that knew all along that this was coming and he waves her an easy goodbye before he walks through the wall, dematerializing, quite possibly never to be seen again.
A/N: if you find any typoes, please let me know.