Still reading?
Of course you are. You can't stand not knowing the answer, can you L? Of course not. That's all your life's been made of. That's all any of our lives are made out of.
Of course, I can't completely blame you for how you are. We all know we're brainwashed from the time we're brought in here. But you just had to be so damn good at everything, didn't you? You had to be so damn good that a plan B was needed in case something happened to you. And you know what L? I admired you. I wanted to be you. I worshiped you.
We all did.
And maybe you didn't ask for it. Maybe you did. It doesn't really matter anymore, does it?
I was one of the few people lucky enough to meet you. From the start, I thought you were odd. Can you blame me? Maybe I should have known then what I had been dragged into. Maybe then I could have run far, far away. I could have begged to have been sent anywhere else. I should have begged to be sent anywhere else.
But you introduced yourself.
And by then you'd already entered the rankings of the world's greatest detectives and the world's greatest minds. I was intrigued, no fascinated. I wanted to learn everything I could about you. I wanted to learn your secrets. I wanted to learn your strategies. You were my hero, L. Or so I thought. It's amazing how naive young minds could be. How we see the world through rose-colored glasses. i wish I could go back in time and rip them off my face.
I spent my life trying to live up to you. I worked hard. I read and I read and I read. I played those stupid logic games. I solved mock cases. Hell, I even looked at some case files to see if we'd get to the same conclusion. Sometimes we did, sometimes we didn't. I adored you. I wanted to be you.
And yet somehow I was never going to be good enough. I was smart, oh so very smart, but that only amounts to part of it, now doesn't it? I was going to be you. I was ahead of B. I made my best friend hate me so that I could be at the top, so that I could be you.
Was it worth it?
Of course not.
Let me tell you something, L. You're nothing. You're a name the public uses to feel safe. You're an image. A symbol. That's it. The world doesn't need you. It got by well enough before you, and it will get on well enough after you're gone. Or maybe it won't.
I'm gone now, and that leaves B.
And you and I both know B will never be allowed to have the kind of power associated with your name.
Who will it be, then? Mello? Matt? Near? Linda? Oh, but I'm sure your precious Wammy's House will only fuck them up as much as B and myself. They'll snap too. Just you watch.
L? You can go to hell.
Everyone would be better off for it.