Chapter 11
In my short time as pope I had achieved a lot. One of my most important achievements came just a handful of days after I gained my position and forced my way to the top of the food chain.
January 31, 2012
I set the Death Note on the table with Misa watching every move I made and opened it. I grabbed a pen and wrote down a name and a cause of death as well as some very detailed instructions for what should happen before the time of death.
Bruce Higgins
Heart attack
Sends experimental weapon 02958 to Rome via secure military transport. Dies 2 days later.
You see, Bruce Higgins was the chief military advisor to the President of the United States and through various sources I had learnt of a weapon being developed that was vital to my plans. I had been using the Death Note for spying purposes, controlling members of the armed forces and making them spy on my behalf. I was worried at first because the Death Note does say it has to be reasonable to think that a human would do what you are requesting of them in the details of the cause of death but of course, any human is capable of spying and it wasn't unreasonable to think that some of them would. It was perfect. My spies would scout the place, report back and die the same day, usually the next minute or so, before they could blab. No clue was left for the authorities to trace back to me.
I set down the Death Note and put it in a drawer. I stood up and passed Misa. She looked confused and I guessed that she hadn't done anything that inventive with her Death Note before. That was when I had decided to help her to do exactly that. She was a nice girl who just happened to have a Death Note but she didn't have the heart nor the strength it takes to truly master one. Later that day I told her my plan and she seemed willing to help. I would look even more impressive if I was seen to be the master of two shinigami instead of just one.
February 10, 2012
After my triumph on the balcony I sat in my armchair, thinking about exactly was happening at that moment in time. A couple of days after the weapon had been delivered I had taken all of my men, including the Swiss Guards to an empty space underneath the Vatican and told them that they were to be part of something special and they must swear allegiance to me in order to be included. I made them take an oath. To do this they had to put one hand on either side of a book and repeat what I told them. However, the book I used was in fact two books. Two notebooks. Mine and Misa's Death Notes. Each hand would touch one Death Note but of course they didn't know that they were holding. After the last man had completed his oath and stood back in line I shouted a command to the door behind me without turning my head or breaking eye contact with the men in front of me. The look of terror on the many faces was exquisite. The door had opened behind me, revealing Ryuk and Rem to the crowd of aghast onlookers. I think the only reason Rem played along with my games was because Misa wanted her to. She cared for Misa a lot and Misa cared for me. The two shinigami walked toward me and stood, one on either side. I now had the full force of the Vatican behind me. I had created a dictatorship in one fell swoop.
I get up from my armchair and walk out of the apartment. I just had to see what was happening. My pace quickened as I reached the end of the corridor and ten minutes later I was back in the large underground space where I had taken my people for the oath. In the middle of the floor was the machine. It was only up to stomach height but it was a menacing thing to look at if you knew what it could do. It was square but going through it lengthways was a cylindrical hole about the size of a human head and the outside of it looked to be reinforced. The team switched it on and emptied the contents of a large box into it. The box was full of a powder that I had made especially. The powder was actually made from pages of both mine and Misa's Death Notes. Thousands of pages had been ripped up, shredded, grinded and mashed up until we got it into a powder. The only reason this was possible was because of a certain rule in the Death Note.
The number of pages of the Death Note will never run out.
Because of this rule, Misa and myself sat for hours pulling pages out of our Death Notes starting from the back, and we never reached the front. They don't look like they've been altered in any way.
I walked over to the machine and the men around it immediately stepped back and let me have room to examine it. I was impressed.
"Is it ready?" I ask the man who I had chosen to lead the team.
"Yes, quite ready. All you have to do is flip that switch right there and it will complete it's objective." he replies. I put my finger underneath the switch and turn it on. The engine begins to whirl and a heat radiates from it. The whirring gets louder and I feel a kind of shockwave pass through me and the machine stops. I turn to the man I had just talked to and he gives me a nod.
Upon entering the apartment I make a quick phone call and settle back down into my armchair. Misa, Ryuk and Rem are waiting for me to speak but I say nothing and turn on the TV. A charming female news anchor is just finishing off a story and puts her finger to her ear.
"Breaking news now," she says. "the controversial new pope has just phoned this very station." I sense the three of them behind me and smile as the newsreader carries on. "Apparently, he has passed on a message that after our speculation about whether the creatures he claims to be in command of are in fact real, we will all be able to see for ourselves the next time he makes a public appearance. We will have reaction to this later." I switch off the TV and stand up, looking at the faces of Misa and the two shinigami.
"So, I presume it went well." says Ryuk.
"Well it must have done if he's confident of revealing us next time." Rem butts in.
"It went smoothly. The machine worked perfectly." I reply.
"You still haven't told us exactly what it does you know." Rem adds, hinting that I should tell them.
"I had kept it from you for this long because I wanted to make sure it would work. Now that it has I can tell you." I poor myself a drink and sit down again with Misaacross from me and Ryuk and Rem choosing to stand up. "This machine that I came across has a very special purpose. It was deemed inhumane by authorities because it is used to infect the enemy's water supply with any substance, be it poison, hallucinogens, you name it. It transmits the substance you put into it into the water. I reduced the pages of our Death Notes to dust and loaded them into the machine. All I had to do was flip the switch and there you have it; a fully infected water supply. The people who drink that water will have touched a part, if only a very small part, of the Death Notes and will be able to see you."
"And how far does this thing reach?" asks Rem. "How far will the infected water supply go?" I turn and look at her with a big grin.
"Worldwide."
