In order to summarize the time between L's disseverance with Light Yagami and Light's tour through the chalet to what happened beyond, only the major points will be addressed herein.
Firstly, Light had used his brief emailing splurge to its fullest extent. He'd booked a flight and researched historical societies and decided France was his favorite European country, from what he remembered of a trip to Europe to relive a nineteenth century-obsessed version of a Tour meant for finishing off an aristocratic boy of that era. Using his analytical brilliance in two hours he had both location talked through with staff and the concierge staff of The Drake busily folding slips of square paper.
Secondly, Light had kept the gun he'd used to threaten Mello and Near with his first full day at the camp, and it was this gun that he held to the head of Quillish Wammy when Quillish opened his door at two that morning to Light's knock. Light escorted the elderly gentleman from the hotel after a strip-search, handed him over to half of L's protective regiment and ordered him to be taken to Wammy's personal summer residence in the Bahamas under house arrest.
Wammy was (and who were they to mistrust L's boyfriend—so Misa had told them) whisked away at once.
Thirdly, Yagami knew that in order to make his position secure he had to once again seek out Beyond Birthday. An allegiance with B would anchor his actions as permanent. Besides, B knew L, and he knew how the camp ran, and he could be used as a sort of reference guide. A deranged reference guide, but Light could not afford to forgo any helpful options. Now that he had security on his side, he felt safe in his presence.
With L trapped and Wammy banished and B in allegiance, dear reader, our darling naïf was soon on a path to self-destruction.
Now, let us turn to L.
L was, to put it mildly, upset. Light had bested him. But natural curiosity took hold once the anger had cooled to something lukewarm and half-hearted and he didn't seek to rescue Light right away. He watched the news instead, wondering what on earth Yagami was going to do.
Suddenly, a mild economic crisis in southeastern Africa was quieted.
The sixth day, L received note that antagonisms brewing between two European countries were stopped, quickly followed by the announcement that two notorious pirates had just been arrested off the coast of Japan. The events continued as Light and B played their giant game of Risk together and it was only when L received the polaroid of a flushed, sleeping, tousle-haired Light with his head pillowed on a lanky cadaver-white arm that L knew he had to go rescue him at once, making sure B was dead when all was said and done.
"Okay okay okay okay!" Matt shouted into the phone. "Calm down, L, we'll go find him, I'm sorry, it's not our fault—"
Mello snatched the phone away. "I'M SORRY HE'S SCREAMING AT YOU WHAT DID LIGHT DO TO YOU I'M SORRY L WE'LL COME BACK RIGHT NOW I'M SORRY I'M SORRY I LO—"
"L, this is Near."
Two and Three seethed.
"This is your fault," Near said after listening for a bit. Then he stared at the receiver. "He hung up."
"I wonder why." Mello snatched the phone back. "You don't tell the GDITW that he sucks cause he's in love."
"Is that why you lost the plane tickets?"
Matt curled into a tighter circle around his laptop and wished they'd just go into the next room and get it over with. But that wasn't to be, no, instead there was an awkward, meaningful pause in which Near and Mello gazed into each other's eyes and and the hormones seethed more abundantly.
"France," Near blinked. "L said he's using the French campus."
"I'm buying the tickets," Matt muttered, and they were on a plane by the next day.
Only at the end of the second week did B become intimidating and Light knew the scope of the decision he'd made to allow B to trap him.
Foremost: Light's cunning had held. The staffers were oblivious. Money was flooding the camp's accounts as more parents gave in to the idea of a European education instead of one in the wilds of the USA, the children adored him, and slowly and surely he and B were following Light's plan to create world peace. But pride at trouncing every idealist and philosopher and power-holder and achieving his dreams was beginning to blind Light's caution.
Such as now. He'd woke tied to his bed with B leering over him.
In the light his eyes were enough like blood that Light held his breath and waited for a drop to splatter against his skin.
"What's wrong, Light-kun?" B asked.
"Please untie me."
"No."
Light stayed quiet. B dropped a kiss on Light's bare stomach and Light counted seconds to control his anger.
B smiled and traced Light's ribs. "You're very pretty, Light-kun."
"Thank you," Light forced out.
"Watch this. Watch me." B kissed Light's stomach again and dashed off to the dresser where Light's cell was. B flipped it open and jabbed at buttons.
"Hello? Hello? Yes, do it now. Now." Then he dropped the phone and jumped onto the bed, snuggling into Light as he turned on the TV attached to the ceiling above the pair. (This method of watching the news had been B's suggestion.)
Not ten minutes had passed before it was announced that the PM of England had been assassinated.
"I made my own plans," B laughed in Light's ear. "Wasn't that funny? Let's do it again!"
"No." Light knew he was going to throw up, he was going to throw up but he had to stop B, he was going to throw up but—he dropped his head down, staring at the TV screen. B stilled. If Light could just figure out how to contact L discreetly…
"Uh, no," B sighed, and dug under the mattress for the gun he'd hid there. "Stop," he sighed as he cocked it.
Light shrunk back and choked. If B knew his thoughts, what did L know?
"Kiss me."
Light obeyed.
"You're very pretty, Light-kun. And you're mine." He dropped the gun beside Light's head and began untying Light's hands and feet. "If you would have tried to get away I would have killed you. The PM or you. Which is better?" He laughed. "I would have killed you."
"I know."
"No you don't."
"You should be working," Near said in Mello's direction. They were being held in a bunker in Poland—the closest they'd gotten to France before being waylaid by unspeaking men in suits and dark sunglasses. Currently Matt was being questioned. It was all very movie-like except that it was rank with the stench of B's handiwork, and the three felt helpless, knowing what B could unleash.
Near flicked over an origami crane and looked up at Mello. The latter had yet to reply as his mouth was filled with seedless cherry, stem and all.
"Imitating L isn't working," Near continued as he answered the imaginary response.
Mello spat out a knotted stem and grinned, insolent. "What did you want me to do?"
Near stared at the cherry stem.
"Near?"
"I'm thinking."
Mello began a long, slow cleansing of his juice-stained fingers by sucking on them and Near switched distractions.
"Mmhmm," Mello hummed around a finger. Near made a hot little noise in the back of his throat that made Mello's hand waver before pinky was swallowed by swollen lips.
"I hate you," Near whispered.
Matt walked out of the interrogation room at this moment, swore, and ducked back inside, abruptly deciding he had more information of great import.
As B had garnered more control and Light became more of a figurehead to sate the other's neediness, to pass the time Light had ordered all of L's personal files to be delivered to the chalet. Light switched obsessions. He memorized cases and trials and records and with each folder opened and click of the mouse only thought, I can beat you, I'm getting closer, I know you now.
And, at the end of a day of researching or helpless pandering to his family, Light would touch his wrist and count the links he'd forged for himself that pride refused to to let him sever.
All it took was the sight of a spindly hand on the doorknob for Light to sink into his office chair with defeat.
"You're..."
"Just shut up," Light hissed, trying to rid himself of shame with anger. He scratched beneath his ear.
L shoved his hands in his pockets and began whistling Daft Punk.
Last night, I had a dream about you, Light thought. No. That was not how this was supposed to go. L was supposed to use his vast international authority to banish Light to an execution block or at the very least throw him in a Scottish dungeon to be fed rat-nibbled bread and alkaline-laced water. No, L was just killing atmosphere by whistling.
"You are going to arrest me," Light said, watching L pull out the handcuffs, still incredulous even if he did deserve nothing less than torture.
"No," said L, also incredulous. "You disobeyed me. The penalty doesn't change. Action and consequence." He went back to whistling as he shuffled forward.
"Stop whistling."
"Why?"
"Because I like that song and you're ruining it."
"There are other reactions—"
Light knew L was expecting it but the kick still ripped out of him. L dodged the kick, grabbed Light by the front of his shirt, and used him to wipe the desk clean before slamming him flat on his back.
"And there are different sorts of releases for built tension, Yagami."
"I had created one."
L wavered at that, holding back the sympathy he knew Light despised seeing. "Please hold out your arm. Don't punch."
Light obeyed and swallowed down the sigh of relief that the command didn't come with a kick or snarl or sloppy, wet kiss.
Once snared L gently tugged Light up.
"Where are we going?"
"To eat."
Light noticed how much the chain was trembling. "When...when was the last time you ate, L?"
L sucked on his finger. "I don't remember. I had something on the plane but I don't remember which plane."
"I missed you."
"You, Light Yagami, are second only to myself at lying. Or how much damage did B do?"
He shoved Light against the wall, pinning his arms down with a stretched length of chain across his body. L stepped in closer and Light flinched.
"Ah," L whispered. He reached into his pocket and yanked out the polaroid, now cracked and stained. "How did the domestic violence ever escalate from this coziness?"
Light took one look at the picture and sniggered. "I made him take that. I figured by the time you got it you might come back faster if I was losing control of him. It was," he blinked, hazel eyes flashing, "a precautionary measure."
"So L flies back to Light in a jealous rage because he thinks his greatest enemy has his secret love in his embrace?"
He had such a talent for making Light's sound theories wholly ridiculous.
L followed the sentence with a giggle, a creepy and high little noise that made all defenses go up. "Of course I'd come back to rescue you, you, Light Yagami, you, Raito-kun, only you are the most important...not the death of the British PM, the one I helped ascend to that position, not because of the biological warfare B unleashed in the Congo when you weren't looking, it wasn't the arms he smuggled to the child sex trade ring in the Philippines, it wasn't the way he destroyed evidence of hundreds of cases I had locked away until you gave him the keys at some point...no, Light, only you are important. Because I love you. Come on, there's still leftovers from your meeting this morning."
Light slouched after L, silently lapping at his injuries as they entered the conference room, and L made straight for the tables piled with cold food. He grabbed a flimsy paper plate and began heaping it high with cheese and pastries.
"Are you ready to tell me everything?"
And Light tore a stack of napkins into pieces and told L everything, his perfect memory outlining the daily events and recalling exact conversations that would be checked against the cameras B had made sure to keep on after Light turned them off. It took three and a quarter hours to tell, and L quietly consumed the contents of each silver platter as Light spoke.
"Now where?" Light croaked, thirsty and touching a finger to a temple to soothe his hunger headache.
"Now I ask questions. We aren't done."
"I'm hungry. I need to go the bathroom."
"So, what's pseudo-me, exactly?"
"I told you."
"Play nice, Yagami, or I'll hold you here till you pee yourself." The muted rage in his eyes was disconcerting.
Light laid his head on the table and remembered he deserved this.
"Are you crying?"
"No," Light choked.
"Why are you crying?"
"I'm sorry," Light bawled. "I'm sorry already. Can I GO TO THE BATHROOM NOW."
"Yes," L whispered, and Light's head wasn't up to see the self-recrimination in his eyes.
