Wrote this a while ago... never got around to posting it. It's a WHU challenge one... A bit of a stretch again, I suppose. To link the title with the idea, I mean, but oh well.

Character(s): Near, Roger

Setting: Shortly after page.59

Spoilers: Strong, page.58/59

Disclaimer: It's late and I wanna go to bed. YOU decide whether or not I own DN.

A gentle hand touched Near's shoulder, pulling him out of spiraling thoughts, and Roger's voice said, "Near, will you come with me?"

Near blinked once and looked at him. "You're going to tell them?"

Roger nodded silently. Near stood and followed Roger toward the cafeteria. He could hear the voices of the other children; though blurred by distance, they still sounded happy—content, at least. Some people in Near's position would probably have been jealous of their ignorance. But Near wasn't. He felt sorry for them because they didn't know, and he felt sorry for them because they were about to find out. Paradoxical, perhaps, but he felt sorry all the same.

Roger creaked (had he seemed this old before? Near had never noticed) to the front of the cafeteria. "Children, I'd like your attention, please," he called, just over the volume of the crowd.

They quieted, most of them staring curiously at Near rather at Roger. There were still some whisperers in the crowd, but once Roger felt he had a large enough percentage listening to him, he looked sadly around and repeated the same awful sentence he'd told Near and Mello the day before.

"L is dead."

--Near thought he'd suddenly gone deaf. Was it even possible for a room full of people to become this silent so quickly? Had everyone stopped breathing at once? All Near could hear was his own pounding heart.

He felt sorry for them.

He knew better than to look around.

Finally a voice, female, shakily demanded, "Explain." Natalie. An older girl. High on the House's hierarchy, though Near couldn't remember exactly where she stood.

With a weak, sympathetic smile, Roger said, "Before his death, he prepared a mechanism to alert me if he passed away, and I received communication from that mechanism yesterday."

Now there were whispers, and soft tears. Near knew what they were thinking. A whole day's gone by, and we assumed L was still alive, but he wasn't. Again he pitied them, because Roger had explained the "mechanism" to him. It hadn't just been one day, but a whole month. A whole month of thinking about, of idolizing a dead person. It made him feel foolish. He didn't like being wrong.

Again Roger touched Near's shoulder, squeezed it. "Near has agreed to take on L's role from now on. Near, would you like to say anything?"

Near lifted his face and looked expressionlessly at the crowd, at those whom until yesterday he had thought of as peers, as classmates. But now he was set apart, not just by his own choice but by circumstance, and they were looking to him for reassurance.

"I will take on L's role," he reiterated, his tone deliberate and blank. "I may ask some of you for help in the future, and at that time I will appreciate your cooperation." That wasn't what they wanted to hear, and he could tell. He knew what they wanted to hear, too. But he was afraid to let it through his lips in front of everyone, afraid to reveal that he wasn't as cold as he pretended, afraid that if he said it some of what he really felt would slip through.

But they so needed to hear it, and Near felt sorry for them.

"I will catch Kira no matter what," he promised.