A Kyrie for the New World
Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note. I make no profit off of this work of fiction. However, I do not give permission for anyone to take this body of work and claim it as their own.
Summary: Movieverse. On the battered spine of an old friend is written a prayer for man. Touch it and sing its hymn, for the Madeleine of memories loosens the tongue with its bitter sapor. A detective game begins anew. T for bad language, some violence.
CHAPTER THREE
Think of the grayest possible winter morning. Death is in the canopy of twisted, cracked boughs. A breath of air embeds your esophageal lining with frigid splinters. Nothing but the cold hard ground holds you up. Everything is a shade of sleet and slate.
That is the Shinigami realm.
Dust corpses are as plentiful as anthills. Typically, they populate popular napping spots— under trees, cave entrances, and around the viewing pools. An atmosphere of utter boredom infests these grave sites but the ennui does not move very far from the impromptu tombs. Since about a year ago, things have become damn exciting.
"Another game?"
"Another!"
"Lost my turn this time around but that bastard gets three chances. Three!"
"Has anyone seen my Death Note?"
The world of death is abuzz with exchanges—of thoughts, ideas and gambling prizes. Shinigami working out strategy on rock walls! Shinigami showing active interest in the mortal world! Armonia Justin Beyondormason would perhaps fear for his position as the King's right hand if ever he were to witness such a scene.
"You think he'll find him?" coughs a masked blond Shinigami.
"I hope he doesn't," rasps a Shinigami with a prominent vertebrae. "I have three apples from the mortal realm at stake."
Nu blinks her thirty-some eyes, rotating in place until her body points away from all the racket and fanfare. The feelings of regret are nice to soak in but the noise it brings is not worth it. The Realm is not what it used to be— more of a concert hall of machinations and cachinnations than the world of death. Her fellow Shinigami must really want the throne. Nu, the second most powerful god of death, could not care if she were to try.
Yet, she is curious. She loves entertainment like any of her skeletal comrades. It is the hubbub she detests. Eyes closing and opening out of sync, she settles by a viewing pool and rakes her numerous irises all over the globe. Names and lifespans jump out at her as she searches. She takes her time. Nu is a responsible Shinigami. No one attains top rank due to obscene laziness.
A hospital in Kanto draws her eyes. In the viewing pool, she waves away the walls of the hospital as if they are nothing. The babble of the hospital residents are, thankfully, but a tinny murmur. Whispers of a man who has finally awoken shake the halls. The beautiful Hikaru Tsukuyomi has risen from his grave of spotless linen. The heir to a grand church, they say. The one to lead us all, they breathe behind their hands.
Nu reaches over to the pile of powder next to her, shakes out the book underneath and readies her veiny wings, two red optic nerve forms sprouting from her back. Perhaps she will get in on this throne business after all.
The life form known as Ryu Ryuugu does not stop screaming. He shrieks as he gawks at the jeweled skeleton before him. He howls as his eyes dart from gem to gem and from bone to bone. He yelps shrilly when he stumbles backwards into the entrance in an attempt to flee the monstrosity at the door, the book he holds between two shaking fingers dangerously close to slipping from his grasp.
"I wouldn't let go of that if I were you," snickers the creature.
Scrambling even farther from the door, Ryu cries out right before colliding headfirst into the hallway mirror.
While staring, almost mesmerized, at the image of him and the mess of dark, dark brown hair and even darker eyes and the gushing head wound, and the notebook he clutches to his chest reflected within the glass, he almost fails to hear the voice calling to him, drifting in through the open front door.
"Ryu?"
Ryu retreats, scuttling down the corridor until he happens on the door at the end of the hall, its plaque labeled "Ryu-chan's room" in bubbly kanji. Ryu throws himself into the quarters, locking the door behind him. Not a moment later, he hears a knock.
"Ryu, sweetie. I came home early and I—Was that you, screaming? Did you lose a video game?"
Mama Ryuugu speaks the incantation of silence. Ryu's bulging eyes retract back into their sockets. The man's thin lips are pressed together.
"Yes," he says. He ogles the door.
The voice on the other side speaks again. "Ryu, honey, do you want me to leave your dinner by your door?"
"No, I am fine. Thank you."
Silence follows. Then—
"Ryu? Baby? Are you all right?"
"I am," Ryu answers. The next word coats his tongue like glue. "Mother. I am fine."
"Well, okay," she says after a second or two. "Good night. Don't stay up too late, now."
"I will not," replies the voice of her son. As soon as she retreats, he creeps towards the desk all while refusing to break eye contact with the ghoul whose cranium scrapes the ceiling.
"Shinigami," Ryu says in a low murmur, settling down into the swivel chair, "what is this game?"
"Precisely as you say," answers a voice of gravel, unfurling his carpus to the man as he gestures towards the notebook in Ryu's hands. "A game."
Hunkering down in his seat, the man fixes the monster with a look while stashing the notebook underneath his shirt and drawing the keyboard towards him. "May I have a name?"
The golden skull above him clicks his mandible in soft laughter. "Armonia. Armonia Justin Beyondormason. And you, mortal?"
Ryu would laugh right back if he were certain that he would not choke on his own disbelief. He swallows. "You know my name."
That would be debatable. Beyondormason eyes the faded name and scrambled numbers above Ryu's head but says nothing.
Ryu descends upon the computer, summoning an old high school composition. Ryu Ryuugu. Class A-2. This is sorted into a mental filing cabinet.
A good thing he has so much room in there because he immediately proceeds to delete every last trace of his current identity from the hard drive, committing to memory every last element of this life as he does.
"Shinigami not knowing their own rules, their own source of their existence. How very mystifying." Hunched over the desk, Ryu positions his fingers over the keyboard. In a breath and a blink, the digits are flitting from one end to the other, backwards and forwards and all over. He manipulates systems and computer keys as expertly as a master musician maneuvers clavier.
"I know the rules," sniffs Armonia. "I merely choose to not reveal to you the specifics. Besides, it is not important." When no response follows his explanation, Armonia cocks his skull at the hunched figure somehow managing to type a mile a minute. "What are you doing?"
After a few more keystrokes, Ryu pushes his knuckle to his teeth and bites down. "Locked out," he mutters. "Though I should have expected as much. They would have increased security and changed codes by now." Ryu squints at the computer clock. His eyes widen.
"You are one of the more clever souls this world has seen," Armonia begins. "Should you not be able to... " Armonia gropes around for the proper terminology. "... cracker these new codes on their...waiters?"
"It's 'servers,' and yes," agrees Ryu, allowing himself a tiny smile at the Shinigami's fumble, "but it would be a waste of time and could alert certain unsavory people to my presence. That handle is also currently not mine to wield."
For now.
Sinking his fingers back into the keyboard, Ryu calls up all manner of search engines and news articles. Armonia chortles and stoops down so his creaky jaw can cough unpleasantries into the man's ear. "You are taking this all in stride, aren't you?"
The only indication that Ryu has heard him is in the flicker of an iris from monitor to Shinigami to monitor.
Armonia, who is not like his fellow Shinigami in many ways, is still a being who is used to the fear and reverence of man. He will not be ignored. Surely the mortal realm has not changed all that much. He whispers the faded name in the young man's ear.
Ryu bows his head lower and keeps typing.
DEATH NOTE
HOW TO USE IT
LXVII
• All humans, without exception, will eventually die.
• After they die, the place they go to is Mu (nothingness).
• Once dead, they can never come back to life.
Author Notes:
I'm so sad that the other Shinigami weren't really touched upon in canon. Nu seems like a lot of fun.
It's picking up a little now. Read and review, please!