"Light! Light, come back here!" Aizawa ran out of the warehouse and after the deceased Chief's son.
Matsuda rose from his spot on the cold ground. He was shakey; he'd never had to fire a shot at anyone before... he never had intended to do so, either. Especially not at the old Chief's son, the elected leader of the Task Force, Yagami Light. Matsuda followed Aizawa into the chilly air outside the warehouse, and Mogi followed behind him.
Aizawa spotted the traitor laying on a staircase. He was drenched in his own blood, and seemed very irresponsive. Matsuda and Mogi caught up to him.
"Yagami Light! You're under arrest! You have-"
"Matsuda..." Aizawa stepped closer to the motionless body on the staircase as he spoke, "shutup."
Matsuda's voice came from behind Aizawa, "Is he-?"
"Yeah..." Aizawa turned around to face his colleges, "He's dead."
Aizawa began to dial a number on his cell phone. "We'll tell them he was killed by Kira..."
A woman picked up on the other end of the phone, "Hello? What's the emergency?"
"Hi... my name's Aizawa, I was working separately from the police division on the Kira case... it seems Kira has attacked my group's leader... we need someone out here right away."
"Oh! I'll send someone over as soon as I can!" She hung up.
"That's it? That's all we're going to do?!" Matsuda asked.
Aizawa nodded, flipping his phone shut, "That's all we can do."
"What about his family?" Mogi inquirred curiously.
Aizawa sighed, "The Yagami women deserve to know that Light has died... but they don't need to know his true identity... they'll have enough grief to deal with as it stands."
The Emergency Units arrived in under two minutes. Aizawa explained the situation to officers who came with several medical squads.
One of the medics noticed the three bullet wounds in Light's flesh, "Hey! He was shot!"
"Looks like he bled to death..."
"Poor guy must've really suffered..."
Matsuda felt guilty. He knew it had been the right thing to do... but he hated himself for it. If he had killed Light, the son of the one man he truely admired, that made him a murderer as well, right? Matsuda watched them heave Light's corpse onto a stretcher. Blood dripped from the dead body onto the pavement, staining the cement with its crimson shade.
"There's another dead man in the warehouse a couple blocks away from here... we've identified him as a man named Mikami." Aizawa informed the police.
"Thanks we'll make sure to take care of this... Aizawa, in the meantime, please make sure the boy's family is notified of this tragic loss, will you?" The officer asked him.
"Yeah, I got it."
The officer nodded and drove off to collect Mikami's corpse. The Emergency Units all sped off, leaving the three remaining members of the Task Force to themselves. Matsuda decided that since he felt at fault for Light's death, that he should also be responsible for announcing it to the Yagami family.
"Aizawa, I think I should tel-"
"No. I will tell the Yagami family of this devastation... and I forbid you from coming in contact with them."
xXx
Matsuda sat in his apartment. It was the second day since they found Light's corpse sprawled across a bloodstained staircase. Aizawa had called him on his cell phone that morning to inform him that he was not the cause of Light's death.
"What?" Matsuda had asked into the phone.
Aizawa's voice came through the speaker, "Yeah, the medical core says that Light died of a heart attack... it makes me wonder if he really was killed by Kira... in any case, if the killings stop now, it definitely means that Light was Kira. Anyway, I'll see you at the police station later, okay?"
"Yeah... okay..."
"Alright, bye."
"Bye."
Matsuda felt somewhat better knowing he wasn't the cause of Light's death. However... something still felt out of place. Matsuda's gaze shifted over to a picture on his wall. It was taken a few summers ago when he went to the beach with the Yagami family.
The Chief and his wife were sitting on beach towels under a large umbrella to block out the sun and provide some shade, Light was sitting in the wet sand beside a very architectural sand castle, and Sayu... her mouth was wide open; she was laughing. Why was she laughing? In the bottom of the picture was Matsuda, wailing in pain because a crab attatched itself to his finger. Being the big idiot he is, Matsuda had started flailing his arm around, frantically trying to fling the crab off of him. Needless to say, it was halarious to watch.
Matsuda stared at Sayu's giggling face. She seemed so happy and carefree back then... but nowadays, all Sayu ever seemed to do was cry. Matsuda knew that Aizawa wanted to wait to tell Sayu that Kira had been her brother, but he didn't feel that was a wise choice. He came to a conclusion. Matsuda decided that if he told Sayu the truth now, she would only have to cry one more time before she could be happy again... and he would rather that be sooner than later.
He glanced at the picture one last time before heading out into the chilly night air, "I will make you smile again, Sayu... I promise."
xXx
Matsuda stood numbly on Sayu's doorstep. For whatever reason he was suddenly having second thoughts about telling her the truth. Was it her reaction that frightened him? Or was it perhaps the way he seemed to screw everything up when he tried to speak to her? Matsuda smiled internally, it was definitely the latter of the two.
He reached forward, grasping the brass knocker in his palm. Matsuda tapped the knocker against the door several times. He heard a voice from behind the door, "I'm coming..."
As he watched the knob turn and the door creak open slowly, Matsuda's heart began to race faster. Her face came from the shadows of the inside.
Her hair was down, unbrushed... her face was red, and her intricate brown eyes looked swollen from several teary outbursts. She sniffled, "W-what is it you want?"
Matsuda shifted his weight from one foot to another. He wasn't sure how he was going to approach this situation. It wasn't that he enjoyed disobeying the rules... he just felt like this needed to be done. He was risking a lot, just by coming to see her. It was now or never, and Matsuda knew it had to be now.
"Sayu... uhm... there's something... I need to tell you..." Matsuda began, only to have Sayu interrupt, "My brother's dead... I know-sniffle-Aizawa told me this morning... now, if you don't mind... I need to drown my sorrows away in some sake..."
She made to close the door, but Matsuda quickly wedged his toe in the door to keep it from closing. "Sayu... that's not what I was going to say..."
"If it has to do with my brother in any way, I don't want to hear it."
His face became suddenly serious; a face she did not realize Matsuda possessed. Her eyes seemed fixed upon the onyx orbs that were equally tranced upon her gaze. Silence. For what seemed like an eturnity... there was silence between the two.
Finally, Sayu conjured up enough of her old spirit to speak, "Then... perhaps you should come inside..."
She opened the door wider, and allowed him to enter into her dark apartment. She wandered into her kitchen, "Oi! Matsuda-san, want something to drink?"
He inhaled the scent of the air. Disgusting. It smelled like a mixture of smoke and beer. Matsuda's eye were distracted by what Sayu was wearing. It seemed as though she wasn't wearing any shorts, and if she was, then they were hidden beneath the over-sized, black T-shirt she was wearing.
"Erm... yeah... sure."
Sayu brought over a couple of sake bottles. She handed one to Matsuda who hadn't moved from the doorway, then plopped herself down on a busted up couch.
"Make yourself comfortable... sorry it's not very "classy", but I can't afford much of anything else right now..." Sayu reached for a lighter on the empty, overturned crate that was supposed to be some form of a coffee table. She reached into the crease of the couch's cusion and pulled out an opened pack of cigarrettes.
Matsuda couldn't believe what had happend to Sayu. He remembered her as being so happy and cheerful, but now she seemed depressed and she came across as seeing no value in her life anymore. He watched silently as she set the lighter aflame and held the flame close to a cigarrette she'd pulled from the box.
She took a long drag on the cigarrette before exhaling through her nose. Smoke slowly began creeping through the air. She didn't smile, but she asked Matsuda in a playful tone why he was still standing. "You can sit down, you know... or move... or something! Heh, I don't bite... much."
He smiled. Even though she wasn't able to smile, he knew she was trying her hardest to lighten the mood on his account. Although, he must say, gloom really had sucked Sayu in and taken over her life from what he saw. Matsuda knew this wasn't the same Sayu that he'd accidentally fallen for, but he also knew... it wasn't too late to bring her back.
Watching Sayu down her entire bottle in one swig, he unscrewed the cap on his sake and took a sip, not wanting to seem rude to his hostess. Matsuda looked at her moussey eyes again... this time... seeing much pain revealed in them.
"Whatever it is Aizawa sent you to tell me... I can handle it," Sayu told him sharply.
"Aizawa didn't send me... in fact... he forbade me from seeing you."
Sayu laughed, but it was not at all hearty. It was a sickening, mocking laugh that only the most corrupt of people would use. "Is that so? Tell me, Matsu-kuuuuun..." He could tell she'd had enough to drink, "why did you come to see me? You don't seem like the "rule-breaking" type."
Matsuda chose his words carefully, not something he does on a regular basis, "There was something we discovered about Light that Aizawa didn't want you to know..." Matsuda had her full (yet 3/4 drunken) attention now, "Sayu... your brother, Yagami Light..."
Her wide eyes stared at Matsuda. She could hear her heart beating loudly in her chest. What was it? What is it? She wanted to know!
"...was Kira."
Sayu didn't believe the words that came from his mouth. Kira? Her brother? Now that's just ridiculous. Her brother had been a kind guy who was incredibly intelligent and always helping others. He worked very hard for the cause of capturing Kira. Light was a very anti-Kira man, so there was no possible way the he could have been Kira... she resigned to the notion that she would never agree with the facts... but desparately, Sayu wished she could.
"Kira..." she repeated the word, allowing it to roll off her tongue like some sort of poison.
"Yes."
Sayu sighed, "Matsuda..."
"I'm not joking!!" He quickly responded, "Really! I'm telling the truth! Honest!!"
"I know..."
Matsuda didn't understand. She knew? That wasn't exactly the response he had anticipated from her. He watched Sayu put out her cigarrette, smothering it in an ash tray on the crate. She held the empty sake bottle in her callused hands.
"Light... can't be... dead..." A single tear streamed down Sayu's pale face, "Why... Why did it have to be Light?!"
Matsuda breathed her name, "Sayu..."
Wiping her face dry, Sayu explained herself, "I might not be a mad genius like my brother, but I'm not stupid either. When they installed the cameras to keep track of Light I felt totally violated! The house might have been where Light lived, but I lived there too! It was around that time that I started wondering if he actually was Kira... and just before I turned 20... I was captured... I was so scared... I had pretty much convinced myself that Light was Kira by that point, afterall, I had been completing my own undercover investigation for several years... I thought he would kill me rather than give up whatever it was that they were asking for... but... if he killed me it would have blown his cover if he was really Kira... and so I was spared..."
She stood from the couch, casting her emptied bottle to the side of the room. It was only then that Matsuda noticed all of the excessive sake bottles scattered across her floor.
"But... if you knew... then..."
"I wasn't exactly bent on giving up my life in order to stop Kira... besides..." Sayu turned away from Matsuda, "he was my brother... and he wasn't all bad..."
Matsuda nodded. Who better to understand Sayu's exact feelings than he? The Task Force regularly scolded him for praising even the slightest of Kira's murderous actions, telling him to make up his mind or get lost. Matsuda truely was dedicated to stopping Kira for all the wrong he had done... but for the things Kira had stopped or prevented... he was somewhat ashamed to have thought otherwise.
"Well... I should probably head over to the station now... if I'm late Aizawa will have my head!" Matsuda said, changing the depressing subject.
"Well, we can't have that now can we?" Sayu giggled a bit.
That giggle must have escaped from Sayu's old self who was trapped under the weight of a heavy loss. She wasn't smiling, but Matsuda knew it would take awhile for her to move on after such tragedies. He stood, thanking her for the drink. He began walking towards the door...
Leave it to Matsuda to trip over an empty sake bottle on his way out. CRASH! Head first into the wall. Sayu began laughing uncontrollably.
"What a klutz! Wanna watch where you step next time, eh, Matsuda-san? Hehehe!!" Sayu managed to exclaim between her fits of laughter.
Matsuda rubbed his head gingerly, "Ow..."
Yep, that was definitely going to leave a mark. Sayu casually walked over to him, hanging her head over his and looking down into the eyes of the clumsy man. She gave him one of her signature smiles; gentle and loving.
Helping him to his feet, Sayu appologized, "I'm sorry... I really should pick up this dump... are you going to be okay?"
"Me? I'll be fine... but I should really be asking you the same question."
Sayu smiled a very unconvincing smile, "Uh... yeah... I'll... uhm... be alright..."
"Promise you'll call me if you need me, okay?" Matsuda handed her a slip of paper with his cellphone number on it.
"I will... thank you for stopping by to check on me..." Sayu began to blush, clutching the paper tight.
Matsuda also began to blush, "Erm... yeah..."
There was silence for a few moments before Sayu finally said, "You'd better get going then..."
"Right... erm... I'll see you... later, then?" Matsuda asked her unsurely.
Sayu smiled and nodded before waving to him as he left. She closed the door behind him and stared at the slip of paper in her hands. Quickly she stuck it to the refridgerator with a magnet. Suddenly, her stomach began to gripe, and she held a hand to her mouth. Was it the butterflies making a knot in her stomach at the thought of Matsuda?
Sayu ran into the bathroom and proceeded to puke her guts out into the toilet. Butterflies? Erm... no. Sayu learned a very valuable lesson on this night... too much sake will make you vomitt.
xXx
"Matsuda! What's wrong with you?! You're late!!" Aizawa screamed.
"Well... uh... you see... it's sort of like this..."
"No! Don't even try to make up some lame-brained excuse! I know the exact reason for your tardiness!" Aizawa was not pleased, he knew there was only one reason Matsuda would come in late, "I thought I told you to stay away from her!"
Matsuda jumped, he didn't think Aizawa would be able to figure it out so fast. Of course... he was Matsuda, so he really never thought at all.
Matsuda made an attempt to deny the persecution, "Erm... no! Y-you've got it wron-"
"Don't even try... it's too obvious... you told Sayu the truth about Light." It wasn't a question, because Aizawa knew it was the answer.
Matsuda sighed, "Okay... yeah... but I-"
"You disobeyed a direct order! Really, Matsuda, can't you even follow the simplest directions?" Aizawa exhaled a heavy sigh, "Well... what's done is done... I suppose... you're working your shift with Ide tonight... just patrolling... do you think you can handle that?"
Matsuda immediately perked up, "Yessir!"
"Fine... go on then..."
Matsuda hurried off to his shift, leaving behind a very annoyed Aizawa.
xXx
The night had been completely uneventful. Absolutely nothing exciting had happened while patrolling with Ide. Someone called in a bank robbery, but Ide insisted that they were too far away to help.
Matsuda trudged through the door of his appartment and tiredly hung his jacket on the coat hanger. He sat down on his comfortable couch and decided to watch some TV before he hit the hay. Grabbing the remote, Matsuda flipped to the News channel. The reporter was so enthusiastic he almost seemed unreal.
'This just in! It seems that a fire has broke out early this morning!'
"A fire?" Matsuda asked himself.
'Fire fighters are hurrying to the Ibara Complex. A community of appartments located-'
"Ibara Complex?? That's where Sayu lives!"
'Several of the appartments have been burned to the ground, and several more are expected to follow... No one is quite sure who started the fire or even how. Here are some live shots taken from one of our helicopters...'
Matsuda saw the fire engulfed appartments and the many people watching their homes burn from the streets. He deperately glanced around the screen for Sayu.
'Some are saying that the flames have reached nearly 46 feet into the air. Many of the residents have either been reported missing or dead. Fire fighters are desparately searching for the missing people in the fire. The search continues for Yumane Kaguo, Yuhari Nami, Yoko Tamaki, Ying Tsuchi, Yameru Rukia, Yagami Sayu, Yakaru Sora, Wu Lee-'
Matsuda's eyes flared open and he lept from his seat at the sound of her name, "Sayu!"
Suddenly, Matsuda's cellphone began ringing. He pulled the device from his back pocket. He stared disbelievingly at the caller ID...
Yagami Sayu.
Quickly he flipped the phone open, "Hello?!"
"Matsuda!! Help me!!" The line went dead.
"Sayu?! Sayu!!"
Matsuda dropped the phone to the floor and ran out into the early morning light, praying he reached Sayu in time.
Just so everyone knows, I am assuming that Sayu is 3 years younger than Light. He died at the age of 23 which would mean Sayu is 20. The legal drinking age in Japan is 20, so Sayu isn't breaking any laws or anything. It's the same for smoking, too. Okay, just thought I'd add that in there. What do you think is going to happen next? Review? :(