This chapter is dedicated to recipe for insanity, because not only is she a faithful and encouraging reviewer, she sent cyber-brownies for me and my overworked Muses. Thanks!


New Purpose, New Direction

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"What?!"

Sayu waited, her hands behind her back as she rocked slightly back on her heels. She had waited until her mother was outside, kneeling in the garden and far from anything breakable, before she told her the decision she had come to that morning.

"I said I'm going to try to join the NPA." A smile formed on Sachiko's face in response, but the cocked eyebrow betrayed her disbelief. She shook her head as though Sayu had said she was running away to join a nudist colony, or something similarly outlandish. She opened her mouth to speak, set down the trowel she was using in the flowerbed, and looked to the side, as though the words she wanted would be found somewhere over there.

"Have you lost your mind?" Her eyes moved back to Sayu, who dropped her gaze in response. She knew she was never going to win this argument by being so meek, but it was incredibly difficult to do something that was going to upset her mother this much.

"No, Mom. I-"

"Then why would you say something like that?!" Sayu had never heard her mother raise her voice before, and she flinched unconsciously. "Did you forget how your father and brother died?"

"I have to do this."

"No, you don't." She raised a hand to silence Sayu when she started to object. "You don't have to throw your life away like they did."

"Listen to me," Sayu whispered, hoping that an even meeker plea would get her to at least stop interrupting her.

"I've heard enough. Now leave me be." Sachiko picked the trowel back up and attacked the weeds with renewed vengeance, the lines around her mouth tight with anger.

Sayu waited, debating her next words before turning and heading back into the house. The fact that she couldn't get through this time merely made her more determined to try again. Her mind was made up, after all, and she wanted her mother to understand and not condemn her for it.

She had woken that morning, her eyes alighting on the badges again, and she knew exactly what she was supposed to do. Light was not the only brave one in this family, and she would prove it. If he could risk his life along with her father, then so could she. She would take over where they had left off, picking up the reins and continuing the fight. No one would ever accuse the Yagami family of being cowards.

It was the most certain thing that she had felt since she woke up. What better way to make restitution for the problems she had caused months ago? It was her fault that her father had been manipulated, and she would do this to show him that he hadn't made the wrong decision in choosing her over the killer notebook. She had a multitude of sins to pay for, and a legacy to continue.

For better or worse, the decision was made, and now all she had to do was see it through to completion. That meant finishing her degree, probably one in Criminal Justice or another degree that would look good on an application to the NPA. She hadn't known her father's colleagues well enough to ask them for advice. She only knew Matsuda as well as … Aizawa? Was that his name? She didn't know their full names, though, and she wasn't about to walk up to the headquarters and ask for them.

Well, the Internet was as good a place as any to start looking, so she started looking for the actual application so she could find a college that would offer the degree she needed.

Sooner or later, Sachiko would be willing to listen, but Sayu was not going to waste time waiting for her. It would take another two years to finish her degree and however long it took to get hired. If she put the application in early enough…

As she lost herself in the details, she found that she had never felt better about a decision in her life, even smiling as she started taking notes. On top of giving her purpose, joining the NPA would make her feel even closer to them. It was a fitting testament to their lives, to continue the fight.


She still hadn't spoken to her mother again about joining the NPA several weeks later when Misa called. The other woman's voice was welcome even if she sounded different, and Sayu agreed to get coffee with her that afternoon. She was blissfully free of the cane and had no trouble being on her feet all day anymore, so she headed out early so she would have time to glance around the shopping district that the coffeeshop would be located in. Even though they didn't have the money to shop anymore, she still looked. She had finally gotten a haircut, so she felt more normal out in public with her long layers and a few textured pieces to frame her face.

It was still a few minutes until their meeting time, but she headed into the small shop and tried to find a table for them. Instead, she saw Misa already sitting there, stirring a cup of what looked like black coffee. She had let her bangs grow out and dyed her hair dark brown, but it had to be the former pop star and actress since her face was the same.

"Misa?" she asked as she stepped closer to the table. The older woman glanced up at her from her contemplation of the table surface, and it surprised Sayu to see how much had changed. The false eyelashes and dark makeup were gone, and even her jewelry was simple compared to her earlier displays of glamour.

"Hi, Sayu," Misa surprised her again by standing and hugging her in one smooth motion. They had been friends, but Misa was never big on hugs unless they were for publicity or to further wrap her managers around her finger. "I'm sorry for your loss."

The automatic words of condolences made Sayu swallow as she returned the hug; Misa's entire attitude was cultivated to make her always seem cheerful. She sounded like a stranger saying things like that.

'Thanks, Misa," she murmured, and Misa let go of her and sat back down. "It must have been hard for you, too. How are you?" Misa took a sip of her coffee, grimaced, and set the mug back down as Sayu took the seat across from her.

"I'm doing alright. I got back into work after- afterward just to have something to do, and I'm out of the country as much as I can be." She tipped the coffee away from her, watching the liquid move around. "He always drank it black, and I hate it. I don't know why I kept trying to like it."

"It's hard to let go," Sayu murmured, feeling a familiar melancholy swelling inside her. She fiddled with the menu to have something to do with her hands.

"I'm sorry. Get something to drink or eat. On me, of course," Misa straightened up and set the coffee aside. "Sorry for bringing up that up. I haven't seen anyone that knew him in a while."

"Did you get to keep any of his things? My mother-"

"She cleaned all of his things out when I left to stay with friends. I didn't want to be alone after he-- died." There was a pause, as though she was still having trouble referring to Light as dead. "All of his things were gone when I got back. They weren't mine anyway. None of it was," she laughed a cold, humorless laugh. "I don't think Light belonged to anyone but himself."

"He loved you, Misa." The other woman smiled a little as she trailed one finger in circles on the tabletop.

"He said so too, but I'm a little old now to believe there was any truth in that." She gave the waitress a smile as she approached, ending the conversation. Misa ordered a sugar-free, fat-free mocha, something much more along the lines of her typical drink, and Sayu asked for an Italian soda and a muffin. An abnormal silence settled as they waited for their orders to arrive, and Sayu wondered if even one part of her life could feel completely normal again.

"How are you holding up? No one from the NPA had heard about you after you stopped speaking, and I wasn't about to go see your mother." Misa tried to steer the conversation back to something less painful.

"I'm mostly back to normal. I just... wasn't responding for months." She looked for something to say rather than admit why she hadn't said anything. "You stayed in touch with the people from the NPA?" This could be useful if she could get some inside connections to help get her application accepted.

"Not willingly. They were keeping an eye on me because there was still suspicion that I was the Second Kira, if you can believe that. Monchichi stayed on as my manager for a few more weeks until they pinned the Kira killings on some Teru Mikami. He's dead now, though." Sayu tucked the name away for later. She had done some preliminary research on the resolution of the Kira case, but most of the details were being kept secret from the media.

"Do you still keep in touch with any of them?"

"No. The sooner I could get away from them, the better. Why, you have some interest in them?"

"Yeah." Their orders arrived, and Sayu waited until the waitress was gone before continuing. "I'm going to try to get into the NPA. I need connections." Misa didn't say anything to that, and Sayu took a long sip of her soda before looking up, afraid of what she would see on her face. There was no emotion on Misa's face, only a blank, cold look. When she finally spoke, her voice was bitter in contrast to her dead expression.

"If you want any advice: be careful. It swallows you whole and leaves your loved ones with nothing." Her gaze was intense. "If you have to do this, just be sure before you sign your life away." Sayu had nothing to say to that, and another silence settled over them while they finished off their drinks.

"Well, I should probably get going. I have to get packing for another shoot next week." Sayu reached across the table and caught Misa's hand before the other woman could stand.

"Thanks for meeting me, Misa. It was good to see you again."

"You're welcome. It was nice to see you're alright now. Look, I'll be in and out for months, but I can let you know when I'm in Japan, even if it's only for a few days."

"We can get lunch or something."

"Sounds good. Take care of yourself, Sayu, and think hard about this decision of yours." Sayu squeezed Misa's hand before letting it go.

"I will. Keep in touch, Misa."

"Goodbye, Sayu."

Sayu looked out the window for a while after Misa left. Their friendship had grown strange, like everything else. A few months had ruined every aspect of her life, crushing it all to dust, and here she was still searching through the rubble for one thing left intact. She was starting to lose hope that she could find anything that would make her happy again.

Purpose was a fine substitute for happiness, though, and she tossed her trash before heading back home to continue planning out her future. It was time to talk to her mother again.


"Mom, I'm going to join the NPA after I graduate. If it bothers you that much, tell me now so I can get a job to pay for school." She had walked into the house and said it without preamble, for carefully planning out every word had not made it any easier to broach the subject with her.

"Not this again." Sachiko was cleaning the kitchen, and she didn't even look at Sayu when she stood in the doorway.

"I mean it. I've thought about it for a long time, and I want to do it because Light and Dad aren't the only strong ones in this family. I can do this, Mom."

"Is that why you want to do it? To prove yourself?" Sachiko finally put down her cleaning rag and looked at her. Her tone of voice was condescending and exasperated. "There are other things you can do in order to prove yourself. You don't have to go to your father and brothers' murderers and do the same work."

"It's not just that, Mom. They thought it was worth giving their lives to, and I respect their decision. I want to keep doing the same thing."

"Maybe they were fools," her mother bit out, turning away from Sayu again. "Maybe they forgot what was important in life and died for their mistakes. I don't want you to die too, Sayu. What does that leave me with? You think I like being alone out here?" Sachiko's hands stilled on the counter, and she leaned forward on her hands.

"Mom?" she asked, taking a few steps closer. "I don't... I don't want to leave you alone." Her mother let out a short laugh.

"No one plans to die going into the NPA, Sayu, it just happens." Sachiko turned back around and wiped away a tear. It shouldn't have surprised Sayu to see that, but her mother hadn't cried once since Sayu had woken, so it jarred her a little. "The worst part is, I know you're every bit as stubborn as your father. Nothing I say is going to stop you if your mind is made up."

"I don't want you to be unhappy. I just... I have to be doing something or I'm going to stop living again." She glanced away from the pain in her mother's eyes.

"No one knows that better than me." Sachiko heaved a sigh. "You don't have to find a job. I'm not going to take your college fund away from you even if I don't like what you're doing with it. Just... take a few years and think about it, please."

"Thanks, Mom. I'm not in a hurry, anyway." She gave her mother a quick hug to cover up her guilt for even that small lie. It was time to get started.


It took far more work than Sayu had anticipated. First, she had to study and attend cram school to get into a more prestigious university than she had been going to. While even her new school was no To-Oh University, it would look better on her NPA application. She passed the entrance exams on the first try, for while she was no genius, she was still better than the average student thanks to the same miracle of genetics that had made her brother a genius. She had ambition, and if she ever started doubting it, she was going to slip, so she worked harder every day than she had the last and never looked back.

After starting school, she shunned any sort of extracurricular activity during her first year in order to have the time to study and work out. The Police Academy had very strict physical entrance requirements, and she intended to be on the same level as the men applying to enter. That meant she ran 4 times a week and used the university's weight room and pool every chance that she had. On Saturdays, she only worked out since she didn't have classes, and on Sunday she slept like the dead until nearly noon to recuperate from the grueling schedule she was setting for herself.

Her weight fluctuated wildly since she was still partially recovering from her months spent asleep, but after a while it leveled off around about 10 more pounds than she weighed prior to the kidnapping. She was gaining muscle mass to the point that her mother noticed it, and she liked how she looked in the mirror with the wiry muscle that was starting to form. Occasionally, boys tried to ask her out while she was working out, but she put a stop to that annoyance with earphones and studious ignorance.

Dating was a distraction she wasn't willing to even contemplate, after all. She had a few female friends, but they were mostly on the track and field team and were in the gym anyway. That was how she met them, and that was about the extent of her relationship with them. She was too busy working to finish her degree within the two years she had allotted to spend time with friends.

She was a different person than she had been a year ago. She still wore the same clothes, since with limited funds she didn't bother to keep up with the trends and her old ones mostly fit even with her new build. She stopped wearing makeup since it was eating up time she could be sleeping, and she was a lot less friendly, spending most of her time studying and working on her list of things to do to get ready for work in the NPA. Her direction in life had changed, and her attitude shifted to go with it. She watched the news a lot more even if it was boring, and notebooks and textbooks replaced the magazines she used to own.

Most of all, she never let herself doubt the decision she had made, and every night the last thing she saw before going to sleep was the badges on her nightstand.

Misa called every time that she was back in Japan, and they met for lunch or coffee since Misa didn't have an apartment in Japan anymore. She simply stayed in hotels while she waited to leave for her next job. Sayu was reluctant to ask her to come back to the house, so they either met downtown or in the restaurant in Misa's hotel. The older woman was changing. Every time Sayu saw her, she looked a little more tired even if their conversation was lively enough after that first awkward meeting. Misa was far from happy, but for a few hours, they could both pretend that things were better.

She commented on Sayu's new look, which was more casual than it had been before. She hadn't said anything more negative about her decision, seeming to accept it as part of her new life. They had both tried to leave their old lives behind in different ways, and they stopped drawing to each other's escape plans. Instead, they asked about each other's jobs and lives and goals. Misa never had anything to say about goals, though. It sounded as though she was still living day to day and not thinking too far ahead, and Sayu didn't know what to say to that. As long as they kept in touch, she could push the worries to the back of her head, though.

Misa had started emailing photos of the locations she was shooting at, along with a picture of herself if the fashions she wore were at all unusual, and Sayu would send back reports of school. It became normal for them to email several times a month, but around mid-February, the emails from Misa stopped. Sayu continued to send letters, for sometimes she knew Misa traveled just to get away and stopped talking to everyone, but when April still brought no response, she stopped sending letters and just waited for her to call when she returned to Japan.

It wasn't until she had finished her third year of school that a package finally came in the mail for Sayu. There was no return address and nothing exceptional about the wrapping, but it was large and flat like a large book. Her mother gave it to her when she got home from her last day of school, and Sayu took it to her room to open it.

Inside, there was a huge album wrapped in tissue paper with a short note inside. The note was in Misa's handwriting with her practiced signature at the bottom. All it said was "I thought you should have this. I don't need it anymore, and I'm sorry I couldn't give it to you in person." The date on it read February 14th, Valentine's Day. Puzzled, she opened it to find a sort of photo journal. There were probably hundreds of photos dating back to what would have been high school for Misa even though she had been tutored by her foster parents instead of going to school. There were notes and souvenirs tacked everywhere inside alongside brief descriptions of shoots and tours and the beginning of her status as an idol singer. The last third of the book held pictures of Light and herself along with Misa. Even Matsuda and the man she called "Monchichi" were in here, for they had both been her managers at some point. This book was a veritable treasure, something Misa should have hung onto for years since it held so many memories. These were the pictures of Light that she had been searching for in the storage building, even if he looked every bit as serious as he had in his other photos. It was more than what she had, and that made the book worth more than its weight in gold to her.

Feeling suddenly ill, Sayu closed it and set it down. Now she had an inkling why Misa had not returned her letters, but she couldn't make herself get up and tried to find out.

It was a few weeks into her summer break before she looked on the Internet for any mention of Misa's name in the news. Sure enough, there were several, all dated shortly after Feb 14th. Misa Amane, former Japanese idol singer and an actress just getting started internationally, had fallen to her death from the skydeck of the hotel she had last stayed in. There were fatal levels of SSRI's in her blood from an attempted overdose as well. Sayu hadn't even know she was taking anything for depression.

After that, she stopped investigating Misa's name. She had her answer for why Misa wasn't responding as well as why she had sent her memory album. It hurt, but she had cried all of her tears out long ago. She just felt cold and even more reluctant to speak to anyone now. One by one, everyone she had known was dying or vanishing, leaving her and her mother alone.

It was just one more reason to focus on her career. There would always be work even if there would not always be the same people.


Sachiko did not grown any more amenable to Sayu joining the NPA, but she did ask about Sayu's progress in school during her fourth year, complimenting her on finally getting into the top 5 in rank in her class. It had taken so much work, and it made her work even harder to hang onto it despite her decision to join the track and field team. Joining the team made her improve her running and weight training because she could compete with the others on the team even if she didn't meet them for meals or parties after the meets. She had to keep studying, after all, even if she was winning several of the events on a regular basis. It was all done in pursuit of one goal, and it nearly consumed her every waking moment at that point.

About six months before graduation, she went shopping for proper attire for an interview. She had to look professional in order to get a job at all, and she wanted to look her best even just to hand in an application, for she wanted to start working as soon as she graduated even if all she was doing was waiting for her application to the Police Academy to go through. She was applying to the Academy first to become a full-fledged police officer before applying to the NPA, which was more of an intelligence agency than a police force.

The problem was, all the good suits were so expensive that it made her head hurt. She knew where Light had gotten his clothes, and the names were places she hadn't set foot in since her father had been alive. They had been an upper middle-class family, and she and her mother were not poor now, but their resources were so limited that Sayu couldn't justify spending hundreds of thousands of yen on a single outfit when she would need several.

Maybe it was pride keeping her from going to the department stores and finding a cheaper substitute, but she went home dejected from that first trip. When her mother asked what was wrong, she was honest about being angry that she couldn't afford good clothes.

"I have a reputation to live up to if anyone of them remember Light and Dad. I can't go in wearing department store chic when Light looked like he came off the pages of the latest fashion magazine."

"There was no denying they both looked the part," Sachiko was much less hostile about discussing the NPA, and Sayu suspected it was only because she refused to stop talking about it and had just worn her mother down after all these months. "Light had almost as many clothes as you do. How many boxes of them did we move?" Last year, Sayu had convinced Sachiko to bring all of Light's things home, and they had put them in the attic rather than leaving them stored somewhere far away.

"Probably 10 or so. Oh my gosh, Mom." Sayu stopped, setting down her chopsticks with a clack. She had just gotten the solution to her problem. "How well can you sew?" Sachiko looked at her in surprise.

"I can mend, but I can't do tailoring of the sort you're probably asking for."

"So it's okay with you if I... if I remake Light's clothes to fit me?" Sachiko smiled, her eyes a little sad at first, but when she looked up there was only approval on her face.

"I suppose it's best if you get some use out of them, since they're doing no one any good in storage. Besides, it might be nice to see someone wearing them again, especially where you'll be working."

Sayu looked at her in wonder at the first sign that her mother accepted her decision to join the NPA. She stood up and walked around the table to hug her mother tightly.

"Thanks, Mom. I won't disappoint you." Sachiko hugged her back briefly before letting her go and telling her to finish her food. There might have been tears in her eyes but she blinked them away.

"Don't let me regret it. We'll start going through those clothes tomorrow. I know where we can take them to see if we can modify them and still have them look good."


Six months later, Sayu set a new picture beside the one of Light graduating from To-Oh University. They looked more like a brother and sister than ever, for not only were their expressions similarly happy at their final class ranking, they were wearing the same suit. Of course, on Sayu it fit her curves much better, but it, along with all the others she had gotten fitted, was just another memento of her brother that she was carrying along with her. She had kept her fifth place ranking, but that was high enough that the NPA shouldn't overlook her application. She had surpassed the Academy's physical requirements for males her age as well, and coupled with a degree in Criminal Justice, she was in place to get hired. It was only a matter of waiting to start Academy training at this point.

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A/N - This still feels like exposition, but next chapter, Sayu will finally meet some familiar faces again! There's a timeskip between this chapter and the next, hence the break here.

I really wanted to use Misa more, but it would take too much of the focus away from Sayu if I included any more about what she probably went through. I feel bad for her.

Thanks for reading! See you next chapter.