Part 2

November 2030

"I would rather there be blood on my hands as a result of my actions," Tesla reads aloud, slouched against the doorway holding the grey book up to her gaze by one corner, "than because I failed to act at all."

She looks sidelong at him. "Pithy."

Tesla clearly expects some reply of retort or defense, but Near's attention is already split between the praying mantis slowly taking shape under his whittling knife and the security footage from his current case.

Anyway, he doesn't have a response. Near wouldn't have had her brought to his headquarters if he wasn't willing to teach her, but he wants her to seek out answers on her own initiative. Everything he wanted to say about Florence is in that book, and that's enough to set her on track. If Tesla wants to know more about the accident itself, she's just going to have to ask the right questions. It's true that this isn't a case per se, but he's interested to see how she goes about trying to pry the story out of him. Watch her thought process in action. Try to figure out how best to work with his new apprentice.

He's reaffirmed in his choice of heir when instead of waiting or getting frustrated as it becomes apparent Near's not going to reply Tesla asks instead, "What do you think you should have done?"

"Taken the suspect into custody," Near says without hesitation, one eye still on the TV screens.

"You didn't have the evidence to do so," his protégé points out flatly.

"Perhaps not, but I had a hunch, and we had the opportunity, even if technically it was illegal. Once he was in custody, retrieving the victims should have been relatively easy."

"You were trying to make a clean case of it," Tesla argues. She's getting mad. Somehow her hair seems knottier when she's upset. Near understands her anger, understands the feeling of unfairness far too well, but he's been around long enough by now to know that it doesn't accomplish anything to get mad about it.

"The integrity of the case must be balanced against other potential losses. Ultimately, the result is what matters. Crafting apologies for offended parties is far easier than knowing that you could have averted tragedy and failed to do so out of pride. If you want to win, you first have to define what you mean by winning." Near frowns a little in concentration on a very delicate cut. "Proving who kidnapped two children after he has given up on the ransom and killed them is not winning."

"…I see."

Near finally looks up. Tesla has sprawled on her back, holding the book aloft in front of her face with one hand and twirling a calligraphy pen in the other. Her scowl is quickly schooled into a mask of cool neutrality the moment she realizes his gaze is on her.

"I just always assumed L had more control over things," she says in a measured tone.

If he were given to such things, Near would chuckle at that. "Control is a lie. There will always be more factors than you can possibly account for—there's always that .0001% or more. The trick is convincing your opponent that they are in control and your allies that you are in control without believing it yourself."

"Hmph." Tesla clearly hates the idea. He supposes he would have too at that age.

Brooding silence reigns as the mantid's head takes clearer shape under his knife. His protégé breaks it suddenly.

"So why Florence? Why didn't you write about the Kira case?"

His hand stills. He'd considered it, actually, but for some reason it had seemed far too…personal.

"No point in writing the same story twice," Near settles on, returning to his task.

His protégé lets her arms and the book drop to her sides with a thunk, tilting her head to peer quizzically at him upside-down. "Are the House stories true?"

"Which ones?" he asks, sighing a little. This little conversation is growing somewhat tiresome, but he's promised Roger he'll be patient. And really, he started it, obliquely, by giving her the books in the first place. There were stories when he was a child at the House too, stories about L, and stories about A and B and ghosts. More often than not they were too obviously stretched and embroidered far past the realm of likely fact. It doesn't surprise him that there would be ghost stories now about the Kira case among the students who had not been around to witness the history of the matter.

Tesla seems a little embarrassed. "Well, they were obviously metaphorical and not literal," she's hasty to temporize. "Solar used to tell us stories about the House, but she always tried too hard to turn them into 'legends'."

"…Hm," Near says neutrally, quite understanding the distaste in her voice and not really sure he wants to hear just how elaborately the students have decorated his own story.

Taking this as encouragement, Tesla goes on, "Well, anyway, the dragon story was supposedly about Kira and two brothers."

"Oh?" She's watching him very closely now, hoping for some reaction. Wondering if she's on the right track. Taking the question from a different angle, and Near sees exactly where she's heading with this now. Well, she is on the right track, so he might as well accept the bait. "Go on."

"In her story, there's this king with twin sons." Rolling up into a sitting position, Tesla props her chin in her hand and starts doodling on the paper in front of her. "L, presumably. The king refuses to split up the kingdom between his kids and so they fight over who will take the crown. While they're still bickering about it, the king is killed by this dragon. Representing Kira." Tesla glances over, hoping for feedback. Near reluctantly looks up from his carving to examine the illustration taking shape under her pen.

"Hmph. And then?"

"The twins agree that whoever slays the dragon gets to be king. So they go out and are fighting this dragon—it was just waiting around for them, I guess—" Tesla snorted. "And one of them notices a weakness in its armor. He goes to stab it—I think it was under the wing or something like that— but the dragon sees and is about to smash him with its tail before he can do it. The other guy realizes his twin about to get killed, so he attacks the dragon head-on to distract it. He gets fried, as the first brother kills the dragon and inherits the title." She pauses, then finishes ironically, "The End."

Mello would hate it, Near thinks dryly, and he doesn't care too much for it himself. Settling back a little into the motorized chair, he tries to stretch his legs and takes some comfort in the frustration that he can't.

"So how much of it is true? Beyond the veneer of royalty and mythical creatures?" Tesla wonders out loud, chewing on the end of her pen and staring down at the scene she's sketched. When he doesn't answer immediately, she presses, "The sacrifice motif fits the Florence case."

Near considers for a moment. "I doubt Mello was intentionally helping me," he says, and adds for his old rival's sake, "and we weren't actually brothers."

Spring, 2015

It would not have been accurate to say he had completely forgotten the motorcycle.

Near forgot very few things. Even details judged irrelevant at the time of observation got filed away in the shelves and drawers of his mind, to be dusted off and examined later as necessary. He was aware that the motorcycle was still there in secured storage, down in the sub-basement of his headquarters, along with everything else that had belonged to Mello.

Near had been in something of a state when they'd gathered Mello's belongings, exhausted at the end of the case and unsure of what the future held for him now that it was over, and so terribly, terribly angry—angry at Mello, for promising to wait instead of abandoning him again and then throwing his life away, leaving Near behind for good—angry at himself for trusting in a promise that he had no reason to trust in except that he wanted to believe it. Angry at himself for standing by, paralyzed in complacency, and allowing Mello to die. He'd read Mello's book about the BB case over and over again, the first time almost certain he'd find some apology, some explanation or justification, even an insult or a last slap in the face, but there was nothing, really, no matter how he stretched his rival's words.

Still, even if none of it was anything he wanted to hear, it was the last communication that Mello had left him, and he had been so wrapped up in the book that he had given little thought to everything else after ordering Rester to have it all put in safe storage.

When they got back from Florence and he went down to rummage through Mello's old things, he wasn't looking for the motorcycle in particular. He wasn't really sure what he was looking for, except perhaps…inspiration.

The fallout of the Florence case had just been too similar to the bungled mess of the Kira case, too damn similar, and he was angry with himself again. Those two little girls shouldn't have died. If he had acted more aggressively on what he did have, instead of sitting back to observe how things unfolded—

(Unfolded, hah! Exploded in his face was more accurate)

—and even though Roger assured him time and time again that missing Mello and needing him to be the complete package of L were not remotely the same, Near still couldn't help but feel that Mello would have done something. Mello would have galvanized him to act, or taken matters into his own hands.

The book did nothing to make him feel better—it never did, he always felt as though it ought to because it was Mello's last message, the one thing his estranged brother had left for him—but it just exacerbated his frustration with L and the unfairness of the world in general. Because he'd done exactly as L might have, waiting to see all the pieces on the board before ending the game, and that had been the wrong move. But instead of being killed for his mistakes, as L had, children had died in his place.

Waiting to see everything was all well and good for games, but Near was sick and tired of people dying because of it, and he was more convinced than ever that Mello would not have let it happen.

While on the plane to New York (reading the stupid book again, even though he hated it, and the seeds of an idea that he ought to write his own book so that if he ever had a successor they wouldn't have to learn his lessons the hard way forming in the back of his mind) it had suddenly occurred to him that the book was not the only thing Mello had left behind, if perhaps not by intent.

And so before even eating or sleeping, Near had gone down to storage in the empty, stupid, irrational hope that somehow in the flotsam Mello had left behind he might find some magical solution to his frustrations.

And there it was.

It was dusty, having been sitting unused in a dark storage room for the last five years, but the streaks left by his fingers where he traced the contours of the gas tank and the leather seat were dark and glossy, deep red and black. Near had never ridden a motorcycle before—nor any other sort of bike, actually—and he couldn't tell by looking at it if it would still run. It would need fuel, he assumed, and he had a vague notion that things like oil and other fluids might be necessary. Certainly it needed a good cleaning. It wasn't rusted at all, however, and there was no visible damage.

Near grasped one handlebar lightly in his hand. It was textured for an easy grip, but it was just reinforced rubber and plastic and aluminum. Like a toy. That's all it really was, Near thought, a really, really big toy. The sleek chassis even reminded him a little of the robots he had played with as a child.

All of the regret in the world wasn't going to bring Mello back. Whether he liked it or not, Near found himself thinking, if he wanted to be the L they would have been together and prevent another Florence, it fell to him to make it that way.

His apprehension and doubt at the mental image of himself careening around on this raucous thing of fire and metal cemented the impulsive thought that sprang to his mind. Taking risks was the whole point, wasn't it? It was the one thing he could never bring himself to do, the thing that was his greatest weakness as L, his inability to step out on a limb and throw his certainty into a hunch.

"Aren't you a little old for teenage rebellion?" Roger asked from behind his newspaper when Near informed him of his intent to have the bike restored and learn to ride it. "You're certainly a bit early for a midlife crisis."

Roger disliked the idea from the start, but Near was stubborn and ignored his weak protests, and they quickly subsided. Near didn't hear anything more on the subject from him until six months later, lying in a hospital bed while the old man who had raised him shouted about idiotic recklessness and how dare you and how do you think I would have felt if you were killed until he was hoarse.