Disclaimer: Death Note and all of its characters, story line, and properties belong to their respective owner and creator, Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata. This fanfiction is purely written for fans' satisfaction without any intention of gaining any profit.

A.I.

Chapter II: Walking and Struggling

When Near had been sure that the uncertainty would have awaited him in his walk, he had not expected it to be this severe. It felt like, with every step he took, conditions—whether it was his or the environment's—just had to throw a question into his brain. It was not pleasant for he did not have the necessary answers to all of those endless queries, to fulfill and satisfy the thirst which had been gnawing his mind, unpleasantly making it dry, cracked open with question marks.

And, for Near, the uncertainty certainly had got into him. He was so unsure of many things, but another thing arose and made him instantly put his doubt in this matter. He had been walking, but neither hunger, thirst, or exhaustion had come to drain his lithe body. Though he had not counted the time spent for his seemingly endless walk, he was certain that he had walked far enough, for the reds which had stayed with the sky had been replaced by a curtain of the night sky.

The man had thought that perhaps, with the tall buildings and structures now in complete ruins, he would have had the chance to take a glance at the field of stars which apparently had shied away behind the once dauntless buildings and skyscrapers. Nonetheless, he had been proved wrong. The sky was dead, and only a few stars and a half-moon graced the silent grave which was the night sky.

With the limited lightning, looking at his surrounding became a hard task. Due to the unknown disaster, the street light and electricity seemed to have got disabled. However, Near knew that was how it was, the broken street accompanied by the seemingly forgotten ruins, but still, it was empty of the very essence of any living being. He tried his best to keep on walking, avoiding the piles of concretes, destroyed rocks and pebbles. Once, or perhaps twice, he accidentally walked on one of the debris which obviously would trip him. He had slightly lost his balance, nevertheless, he did not fall, nor did he feel any string of pain or injury. He expected it, he thought that, as he was regaining his balance, the sensation of pain would trailed along. But, again, he was proved wrong. And always briefly, he wondered why—or perhaps, how. And always he dismissed the thought, for it was not his main focus at this very crucial moment.

As Near was pacing slowly yet steadily, a faint noise abruptly stole his attention. He turned his head a few degrees, taking in notes of every detail the faint sound could muster. Then, he turned his head again to the front as he immediately realized that the source of the faint sound had come from a few meters in front of him. As he walked forward, he drew out a pattern of the sound and immediately recognized that it was the noise of an obstructed electricity. Near quickened his paces, as he expected to have a further inspection on the said noise. As he neared to the object, his steady gazes immediately met with broken lamp posts, which were round and actually poor of rich ornaments. One of the round big bulbs—which were scattered on the ground—were switching on and off continuously. The extra lightning abruptly gave the chance for Near to look at his close surrounding a bit better. To the right of the lamp posts, a broken, dark brown board was laying lifelessly. On it, there was some big-sized letters. Unfortunately, most of the letters were missing or scattered to pieces not recognized. The remaining letters which were left, however, were two Cs, an A, two Es, an R, and an F. Nevertheless, they were jumbled and not placed in order. As he signed in this information into his mind, his stares hardened with anticipation.

"How long do you think it will be until it's obvious that the change's happening here in this area? And by that time, do you think it will be too late to do anything about it?"

It was dark, an utter pitch black. However, one could tell that the one who had just inquired those questions was indeed a female—a teenager, perhaps, or a young adult—for the voice was slightly pitched and highly feminine. One could also tell that her voice rose from a microphone. And, just briefly after the questions, an eruption of people's laughter echoed.

"Yeah … well, summers are already warmer than they used to be. And if you go forward a few years, you'll begin to see the changes happen. With this, I think it's going to be a big factor in helping people to understand what's happening and to make decisions whether or not to take actions about it," another female's voice answered. This time, it sounded deeper. It was apparently an older woman, perhaps someone wiser in her field. "Is it too late already? Um, my answer to that is it's never too late. The planet will be different, we will be adapting to changes—we probably already made some interesting adaptations. Perhaps, a good example is Europe. It has experienced quite a few very, very hot summers, a lot of heat waves, variety numbers of deaths happened, and in 2003—a very bad heat wave. But, of course, after that, they began to adapt to that and they began to protect people from that kind of heat wave."

That was the first of Near's memory to come back to him after a few hours of struggling. The gears in his mind began to speed up, as if sorting out the probabilities and the important meaning behind this current revelation. His fingers grabbed a hold of a few ivory strands, tugging at them a bit too tightly. Who had those female's voices belonged to? There had been questions and answers—which seemed to have come out from an expert's lips. Then, had it been perhaps a seminar? However, why did this memory have no picture? Perhaps, whoever had been responsible for this had used a tape recorder instead of the usual video camera. And, again, he apparently had witnessed a memory which did not belong to him—and it was always through some sort of device. Why, just why could not he just see his own memories through a normal human's eyes?

Apart from that, Near was trying to decode the information his new memory had just provided. Did this memory of his eventually suggest something? If indeed the disaster which had befallen this place was related to something like a heat wave, it would be clear that the cause of this grand destruction had not been caused by a war. The closest to that would have been a natural disaster. The problem was, what kind of natural disaster? Besides, that was just a seminar, that hardly proved anything. He decided, at the end, that he did not have the sufficient data to make out a fine and complete conclusion.

Near's mind traveled elsewhere as his hardened stares were loyally locked on the dark brown board. He began to think that, perhaps, his memories eventually had a pattern, that it was not a hundred percent random. Probably, his memories worked better when stimulated. If that was indeed the case, then, this dark brown board must have held some kind of connection to the events of his previous life. A board like this must have been a sign to a public place. Perhaps, he had gone to that public place.

Again, it was dark, completely, and the hubbub of a few people chattering inaudibly became the only given information. The chats were not loud, instead, they gave one a feeling of being in the midst of a comfortable, cozy tranquility which belonged to the environment of a nice café or restaurant.

"You came after all." There was that steady voice which belonged to Nate which seemed clearer than the rest of the unknown conversations. Nevertheless, it sounded more distorted than clear.

"Don't get me wrong, I just came along to accompany Mail. You know that he's head over heels for your sister and rather shy about it," and then, that all-too-familiar voice trailed along. "I still do not like you. Keep that in your mind."

Nate took a brief moment of silence before he spoke softly, "But, I think I'm quite fond of you. In fact, I think you're sort of an interesting person—challenging, just like the Mathematical equations I usually solve. The difference is that you're more unpredictable and that you don't have an obvious pattern that those equations obviously have. And that's what makes you so unresi—"

"God damn it, Nate, shut the fuck up!" Mihael's voice roared, abruptly cutting Nate's sentence, leaving it unfinished. "God, I don't know why Linda has a freak-of-nature brother like you while she's obviously a decent girl."

"I'm just being honest with what I feel."

Nate's retort left Mihael without any words for a few seconds, and then, barely audible, he muttered a "creep" under his breath.

"Sorry to keep you guys waiting," another voice abruptly filled the blank space. This time, it was a male's. "What do you guys want to order? Let me and Linda take them."

"Hot chocolate, 16 oz," Mihael quickly answered.

"What about you, Nate?" a female's voice suddenly inquired.

"I'm fine."

"Okay." The female's voice became the last bit of their conversation, and then, just as suddenly, the silence drifted into the current comfortable atmosphere.

Nonetheless, the silence last no more than half a minute for a deafening noise of a zipper being undone broke through the tranquility. As the noise met its end, there came Mihael's face all of the sudden, framed by the familiar screen of the same video camera. His face looked younger, there was a deep frown which was gracing his young, flawless face. The screen moved vertically up, still in a state of filming his face. Now, it was perpendicularly face to face with his face.

"Is something the matter?" came Nate's concerned voice.

"No," Mihael answered briefly. The frown which had stayed on his face apparently began to subside. "It seems that I forgot to turn off the video while we were in that seminar, and now the battery's drained."

And then, once again, the picture immediately went pitch black and Mihael's face disappeared into the darkness.

What an interesting development, or Near should say, a reduction of Nate's and Mihael's relationship. In one of his previous memories, they had been making love, showing off the love and affection. And now, Mihael had seemed to be an enemy to his supposed lover. Near deduced, that it would be only logical if his previous memory had taken time when Nate and Mihael had not been lovers. Mihael's flawless, young face had proved it. Then, it would be obvious that in the next time of their previous lives, Mihael had fallen for Nate. And the start of their romance was because of Mihael's supposed best friend, Mail. Near frowned slightly. Why would have Nate wanted to come along to accompany Mail's and Linda's love affair? Perhaps, Linda had forced him to come along, just like Mail had forced Mihael. Teenagers, Near's thought echoed loudly within the shell of his mind. They couldn't even take care of their own romances.

Nevertheless, Near predicted, that it would have been a long journey for such distaste to take form into the feeling of love and affection. And, just slightly, the curiosity slipped into his mind, knocking on the door of his sense, and lastly, sent him wondering just how had Mihael and Nate plunged into such romance. Of course, he quickly diminished the feeling for it was, once again, not his main focus at this very moment.

"Two spade." There was an undeniable smugness in that sentence, in that voice, which could only belong to one entity.

"Pass." And then, there came another familiar voice. Was it Mail's?

And another familiar voice, a feminine one, which could be recognized as Linda's voice, chimed in, "Pass."

"Straight flush." Lastly, there was that steady tone, very much similar to that steady one of Near's.

An eruption of laughter spontaneously echoed. This time, it did not belong to Mihael or Nate. It did, however, belong to Mail.

"Serves you right for always going with two."

"Shut up, Mail. It was pure luck that he got those cards."

The camera, which was supposed to be held by Mail, was focused on Mihael's figure. He was there, sitting with both legs crossed, on the tiled floor. A black and loose camisole, as well as baggy shorts, were hanging freely on his tanned body. His hair was tied in one knot at his back, a few of his blonde strands were flailing the flawless skin of his face. A dash of annoyance flushed his flawless face as his hands were busy with gathering the cards which were laying idly on the floor.

Supposedly, they were in a room, specifically, perhaps, a boy's bedroom. It was a chaos. Clothes—presumably dirty ones—were laying here and there on the white floor. Just a meter away from Mihael, stacks of CDs and DVDs were scattering in a jumbled way.

"Okay, you know our rule, right?" Mail interjected, his previous laughter had subsided. Nevertheless, one could still hear the tinge of playfulness in his question.

"Yeah, yeah, just get your damn hand on the powder already," Mihael prompted as he stacked the once messy cards into one, neat pack.

"I'll go first." Mail's voice beamed with excitement as the image on the screen shook slightly.

An arm, which was wrapped in a long, stripped sleeve abruptly came into the screen, reaching for Mihael as the camera itself went near to the blond. It turned out that the hands were already fully coated with face powder. And, much to Mihael's dislike, the powder was spontaneously transferred to his face, painting almost half of it white.

"You look like Snow White, only with blonde hair." Once again, at the scenery of Mihael's half-white face and the clear distaste which adorned his face, Mail's died laughter immediately came to live.

Mihael vented no verbal response. Instead he countered Mail's jest and laughter with a roll of eyes.

Linda's soft laugh trailed along. "Okay, my turn." Manicured fingers instantly filled the screen of the camera. With the white powder, they reached for the half of Mihael's untouched face and ruined it instantly with the white substance. This time, the blond's face was a hundred percent white.

"If you guys lose next time, I'll be sure to get your hair as well."

"Pssh … yeah." Mail chuckled as he forced his laughter to subside. He then coughed and talked, "C'mon, Nate, grab the powder, too."

The camera was moving away from Mihael, at the same time changing its focus to both him and Nate. To say that Mihael looked like Snow White would be an exaggeration, for Nate, the natural white man, seemed paler than usual with the white powder covering half of the mild skin of his face. One could witness that he did not intend to laugh on Mihael's dismay. However, he did show his amusement by silently, and secretly, curving his thin lips into a mocking smirk. If one squinted, they could see it, and Mihael did, and he glared at the pale man who was sitting just right next to him. Slowly, Nate put his forefinger on the powder which was resting on a small plate, dipping it, then taking just a small amount. He was still showing off that peculiar smirk of his when he neared Mihael. That amusement, nevertheless, silently and slowly faded away as the tip of his forefinger made the slightest contact with the skin of Mihael's temple. The image on the screen of the video camera seemed to freeze, time had no significance, and space held no bound, as that slim forefinger went down …

… To Nate's small nose, to both of his pale yet kissable lips, and finally that finger stopped on his V-shaped chin. Those fingers, which were painted black, were holding a steady grip on Nate's chin. The image which was from the same video camera drifted, and the last things it showed were Nate's forcedly parted lips and …

… Mihael's apparently astonished face, as Nate's finger and the powder found their stop at his chin.

From the board, Near looked up at the dark sky. In silence, he seemed to ponder, to question the sky itself which eventually held no apparent answer, How come it's possible for memories which don't even belong to me to feel so realistic? He held up a hand then mimicked what Mihael and Nate had done to each others in his previous memories. He felt nothing. He frowned, and the feeling of dissatisfaction engulfed his person. His hand shifted position, then, to his hair. He grabbed a lock and forcefully twirled it. It doesn't make any sense, he decided. But, he then interjected, as always, it's not my main focus at this moment. The force which was put on his hair reduced and his thoughts steadily reorganized themselves.

Near breathed in, at the same time trying to deduce the new information given to him. Now, he was pretty sure that his memories did not come a hundred percent randomly. A trigger could possibly help, or not—it probably depended on what kind of trigger that happened to occur to him. If it held a strong connection to the past of his previous life, the chance for his memory to fade into his mind strengthened. Else, it would be a fifty-fifty. However, none of those memories apparently held some kind of strong connection with him—he had not even been there!

Near frowned slightly and darted his views to the empty space in front of him and waited, waited for another nonsense, illogical memory to drown him into the madness which was the endless, unanswered questions. However, there was nothing. He waited again, his body a static being, but the only thing he envisioned was the dark place which was surrounding his person. Perhaps, that was it, he decided, for now.

Eventually, the man decided to brave himself against the unknown—once again. And, when his tiny feet made a first step, the darkness which was engulfing the sky began to fade, silently, unbeknown to Near.

"I know to accomplish this, there are still problem like the Natural Language Understanding to be solved," Mihael's voice echoed. It was not his usual clear, sharp and deep voice. Rather, it sounded more like it was amplified by a microphone—and further. Perhaps, he was currently talking in a different room. "But in this assignment, Mister Howard asked us to use our imagination—so, I'd like create an intelligent machine which can perfectly understand what we, humans, say and feel. So, that it can actually communicate with us, using our common sense—"

The screen of the camera was adjusted at a figure. From the zoomed in shoot, one could perfectly perceive that the said figure was a fine-looking, young brunette. She seemed to be talking with a group of friends in front of the door of a classroom. Occasionally, her twin pigtails bounced ever so slightly as she sometimes let out a laugh.

In the background, however, Mihael's familiar voice kept ranting on and on, this time a bit vaguely.

"Mail!" The girl figure immediately blurred as the one in charge of holding the camera seemed to have been startled by another unknown voice. "What are you doing here?"

The picture shook horribly as Mail's voice filled the screen, "Fuck, Rowd, you startled the hell out of me!" He cleared his voice a bit then spoke, "I'm waiting for Mihael to finish his class so that we can have lunch together. See, the guy's still doing a presentation on his assignment." By this time, it was clearly obvious that he was the one holding the camera. Then, hastily, he put the camera down, to the side of his body. It was now filming his own feet, which was wrapped by a pair of white sneakers.

"Are you waiting for Mihael, or are you waiting for that cute girl over there?" Rowd was not fooled, it seemed.

"What?"

As a response to Mail's faked innocence, Rowd prompted, "I saw you filming Linda, even using Mihael's camera. Do you have a crush on her?" The camera was not currently shooting Rowd's face, nevertheless, his voice itself was sufficient enough to prove that he was smirking.

"What, no! I don't even know her!"

"Oh, so you're her secret admirer?"

"Fuck off, Rowd, stop making false assumption."

"So, a no, eh? What a pity, I know her—she's my girlfriend's classmate, plus, she's single."

Rowd was confident that he was using the right lure when Mail, with a significant enthusiasm, eagerly asked, "Wait, so, she's not an IT student?"

"Of course not, my sweet Mail, she's from the Art Department. Why did you even think about our department having a cute girl like her? We hardly have female students in our class."

"But, what's she doing here then?"

And, Mail's second question was more than enough for Rowd to pull out a firm conclusion.

"You said you weren't interested—I know you were lying. C'mon, Mail, you've been single your entire life time. It's time for you to get out of your game world and have some real life romance."

"Wait!"

The once steady picture now shook. For a few moments of brief seconds, it succeeded in gaining a shoot of an arm in stripped sleeve being dragged forcedly by another hand. And then, just as suddenly, the picture blurred some more before it went off completely.

So, Mihael Keehl was Computer Science student. That was the first thing which graced Near's mind as soon as the memory vanished into the darkness. Did this new information eventually mean something? Apparently, it did not, for there had not been any other supporting information provided. Perhaps, it was just another slice of life story his memories usually displayed to him. As always, it did not seem to hold any significance with his own personal life. He started to get used to it.

And always briefly, he wondered silently, perhaps his own life was not even about him. Perhaps, it was about another, entirely different entity. He wondered why. But, as always, the thought disappeared as soon as it emerged. This, as well, he started to get used to these little, useless thoughts which somehow, unbeknown to him, occasionally and in an illogical way, came to fill the gap between those yet unanswered queries.

Near's head escalated just a few centimeters and his eyes witnessed the change which was taking place in the sky. It was dawn, probably morning would come in an hour. With the darkness now slowly fading out, he could perfectly see the path he was pacing on. And, it showed nothing. The ruins looked as if they were desperate for a life, any form of life, just as he had been desperate for the answers which could fill the crack in his mind. Perhaps, that was it, he was not tired, he was not hungry, neither did he feel thirsty—and it was all because he was … desperate. His mind quickly shook the thought away. Was that even possible? His question merged with the wind which brought to him nothing but emptiness.

If this indeed continued to stretch for a few days to weeks, would he eventually die? Would his existence be eaten up by this rotten earth? Would he disappear without knowing who he really was?

Near's right hand reached up to the sky, fingers trying in a failed attempt to get a solid grip of the newly arising morning sun. The arrays of the burning star's warm light escaped through the gaps between his small fingers. His eyes morphed into two paper-thin slits. He did not know why, perhaps, he wanted to get a better view of the sun rise. Or perhaps, there was something else—

His eyes widened instantly when the scenery of a helicopter passed through the empty spaces between his fingers. The sound of the propellers was distant, but it was deafening all of his hearing senses. The gears in his mind rotated quickly, forcing both of his feet to move, move, and move. He stepped to the side and he ran, chasing the flying machine. The best of his body's ability was put into an action, and he felt like he could fly with the speed of his run.

Unfortunately, he fell.

Before he could even fly, he tripped—and he fell on to the ground.

His wide eyes widened even more. It did not hurt. No, it did not hurt physically. But, it felt as if the life itself had been taken out from his person, forcefully.

"No! It's not possible!" Mihael's voice roared. It was a cry, a cry which spoke of protest.

The camera was apparently put on a night stand. It was filming two figures, standing face to face with each others. The camera, however, only showed the bottom half of their bodies. One of the figures was a doctor—it was for sure, for he was seen wearing a white lab coat. As for the other one, the one clad in black leather seemed to be Mihael. Beside them was Nate, still laying in the same hospital bed, eyes closed, ears shut tightly to the voices around his person.

"Mihael, I … don't know what to be done anymore," the doctor spoke softly, as if he was afraid to wound the blond.

"Please, tell me that you're lying!" Mihael reached forward and planted a grip on both of the doctor's lower arms.

It was silent for a few seconds, but Mihael broke it instantly. And once more, he cried, "Nate, Nate! Wake up!" He was grabbing Nate's shoulders, his messy blond strands were shadowing his face as he did so. He was shouting. He was crying. He was shaking. "God … Nate …"

"… Wake up …."

"Wake up."

"Wake up!"

To Be Continued

A/N: I didn't expect that it would take me this long to update the second chapter. Anyway, does anyone have any idea what game they played? It's called Cap Sa. When I'm at campus, waiting for the next class to start, I usually play it with my classmates. And, no, I don't play it for gambling. It's a fun game to kill some time. For the ones who haven't tried it, you can Google the rules. Oh, and, thank you for the people who have favorited and reviewed! I hope this second chapter is worth the wait. Tell me what you think via review!