Misa Amane was not one to cause trouble on purpose. There was nothing to prevent her admitting yes, she liked attention, but not trouble. Trouble led to conflict, and she had never been one for conflict. Her natural instinct was to please. Even when whining, she never meant to stir up problems. However, when it came to it, she would fight back. And this was a moment to fight back.
Her boyfriend was reading a book about Carl Jung when she entered the room. It was like she wasn't even there by his response, just a nod in her direction with his eyes barely leaving the page. Carl Jung, a long-dead psychoanalyst, was more important to him than she was living and breathing, or at least that was how it appeared.
Taking a deep breath, she mumbled his name, only to receive a useless 'hm' in acknowledgment. Still his eyes did not move from the book's print.
"Light," she said firmly, louder than before. "Look at me when I talk to you."
This made him sit up and turn to look at her. Never before had she been the one giving instructions or asserting authority with him. In addition, this voice was not the whimpering whine of a girl who was not being listened to because she did not deserve to be heard. She definitely had a voice to be heard. Startled brown eyes observed the blonde idol steel herself and clench her fists.
"Light, I have something important to say to you, and to be honest, they're two words I've wanted to say for a while." She cleared her throat. "Fuck you."
"Misa?" he choked out.
"No, you hear me out!" she snapped. "I have put up with your superior crap when I know I'm not an idiot. I have done my absolute best for you for so long, because I thought you were perfect." Finally, she quieted and composed herself. "Light, when I think about what it is I've done to myself for this length of time, lying, saying it was okay, and it was my fault you didn't love me the way I wanted, I feel like such a total moron. Because it's not me. It's you."
Light bowed his head, taking the abuse with fair grace.
"I was okay with it until she came into your life," Misa shrugged. "I saw a change in you, that you weren't just an unfeeling asshole, that you were capable of loving, but just not me. I saw the way you looked at me, like I was a pest or dog shit on the bottom of your shoe. Then you looked at her, like she was the most amazing thing you'd ever set eyes on."
"Misa, I'm so-"
"It's okay, I guess, now the anger's out." She tucked a lock of stray golden hair behind her ear. "I mean, do I like you? Yes, very much so, and I probably will for a little while longer. But do I love you?" She sighed. "No. No, I don't think so. If I loved you, it'd be harder to walk away."
Exhaling slowly, Light stood. He put down his book. This was the first time he had ever felt such strong respect for his girlfriend – the day she was breaking up with him. Actually, well, dumping him. Ouch. Being dumped. He had never been dumped. It just didn't fit his image.
Swallowing his pride, he stepped forward and moved to embrace her, then realizing that was not such a good idea. Instead, he offered his hand for her to shake, which she accepted. He placed his other hand over hers out of compassion. Although full of his own self-importance, somewhat arrogant, quick to judge and often slippery as a snake, Light Yagami was not a bad person.
"Thank you," he said, "for being honest with me."
"Go on," she mumbled. "Go on and… you know… be with her."
XXX
The leads on anything phantom-related had not come to fruition, even chasing up on random strands of thought such as the progression of Rose's power. It had taken a backseat priority compared to the problems caused by the Prime Minister and President's possession, Clarissa Deaver and Soichiro Yagami's imprisonment and stopping Melody from strangling Claire because she had kept the entire Zapped ordeal a secret. Drew had managed to placate her, but only just. Unfortunately, trust was not something that was circulating throughout the group.
First off, Elisabeth was angry with L for hiding his curiosity about Claire and bringing her back to Wammy's House. Melody was annoyed at Claire for not being told the truth about the circumstances of her coma. Tom was irritated with Drew for clipping his wings, so to speak. Emilia was pissed off at everyone for not letting her speak to her mother at the courthouse. Misa was tired of Matsuda not making his move to ask her out. Tessa was disturbed by Claire's unknown intentions. Lara was exasperated by Mello not talking out his feelings.
By this time, tensions were running high. You could taste in the air like electricity as you wandered the halls, literally felt the cold shoulder emanating from people as they brushed past you in corridors. The situation was by far worse than the incident with Takada, for at least in that time they had all stood together in the face of a threat, and had been prepared in case of an open confrontation. In this climate, it looked like no one would protect each other.
Despite the new additions to Wammy's House in the form of Tom, Drew and Melody, there had been no welcoming party. Before, upon the arrival of newcomers, the people living at the House had always greeted them with warmth or at the very least, civility. After Claire had turned up out of the blue, there was proof that not all new arrivals came without hostility, ready to accept and be accepted. Now there was no guarantee that newbies would trigger a happy response.
Matt could not quite pinpoint the time at which the reaction of the Zapped had changed. Pondering, he walked around one of the science labs, where a giant rotating solar system model had been built. Moonlight glinted off the silver hoops keeping the planets in place, filtering in through the windows. He wondered if seeing the wider universe, beyond the orphanage and beyond the politics of children of the storm would put things into perspective.
A black figure, a silhouette, flickered across his vision, behind the solar system model. He frowned. "Is anybody there?" he called.
Swallowing, he took a step forward. "Hello?"
A small character stepped into the limited silver light. "Relax," Claire said, "it's just me."
Like that put his mind at rest. "Is everything all right?"
"I thought I might find you here," she shrugged. "Tessa told me you would be in your room, but Mello told me you would be here, and I suppose he knows you the best out of all of them, doesn't he?"
"Why were you searching for me?"
"I wasn't," she admitted. "I was just curious."
"That's weird."
"So are you," she countered.
"I guess we all are," he said. "I mean, we can't be called normal, can we? Look at us."
"Mm." She traveled around to the window and sat on a stool nearby so she could look out at the orphanage grounds. "These power cuts had better not last much longer. People will start walking into things."
"Why do they keep happening, anyway?" Matt asked.
"Council. Some big construction keeps using up a lot of power. Knocks the grid for six. They'll fix it, I imagine, but in the meantime, Elisabeth's going to be exhausting herself trying to manipulate electricity that isn't there," Claire sighed.
"That sucks."
"Doesn't it just?" she smiled wryly. After a moment's silence, she turned back to him. "Matt, does your power bother you?"
"What?" he stammered, startled.
"Does it bother you?" she repeated. "That you know you're never going to die whilst everyone else drops like flies around you?"
He had never been asked that question before, and it was not something he knew how to answer. "I try not to think about it."
She chuckled at his carefully worded response, as though he were a politician under fire from the press. "But if I told you that I had a way to remove your power, and you'd live just as long as everyone else, would you take that opportunity?"
"I… I…"
"I'm not saying there is a way. It is purely hypothetical."
"Oh." He bowed his head as he thought. A chance to get rid of his power? Become mortal again, like the others? But would he still be considered special if he was no longer immortal?
"Matt, I don't think I could take your power away from you. Once awakened in us, it is an integral part of us. Our powers all relate to something in us, some part we didn't know existed until it happened. Could you dispose of that?"
"I don't know," he confessed. "I really don't know."
"Just a question," she murmured, eyes straying back to the window again.
His hands curled up into fists. Something in him felt invaded, intruded upon. A certain unspoken sentiment hanging in the air left him uncomfortable. That she had asked the question only out of interest was debatable. He hardly knew the woman, and yet she seemed to know a scary amount of information about him.
"What about you?" he mumbled. "If you were immortal and you could get rid of that, would you?"
She frowned. "I'm not you, Matt. I don't have the same things to live for. In fact, I must admit I have very little to live for. In another life, I have a lot. We're quite good friends, you and I."
Matt didn't quite know what to say to that, so, wordlessly, he patted Claire on the shoulder and left the room. That night, as he began to drift off to sleep, he was haunted by her words.
"If I told you I had a way to remove your power, and you'd live just as long as everyone else, would you take that opportunity?"
XXX
Rose awoke to the sound of fingernails tapping rhythmically against glass, her eyes snapping open. B did not even start as she sat up. She rubbed the dust from her eyes and looked around the room. Emerging from the darkness was a familiar figure, the same skinny sixteen-year-old, cheekbones sharply prominent and eyes the color of black coffee. It was impossible not to recognize those pointed shoulders.
Alternative could have grown up to become a very handsome young man in life. Instead, he had resorted to suicide and now could only speak to two people on the entire planet for the rest of eternity.
"A," Rose groaned, trying to gather her bearings. "For Christ's sake, it's two in the morning. What do you want?"
"Oh, that's the greeting I get? I haven't seen you for months, and that's how you respond." He folded his arms, the loop of rope he always carried with him still in his right hand. "I haven't had anyone to talk to. Do you know how boring that gets?"
"All right, all right," she muttered. "So what did you need to talk to me for?"
A's entire demeanor suddenly exuded severity. He took another step forward, and then another, until he was little more than a foot away from Rose. He knelt down so his face was level with hers, seeing as she was sat on the bed.
"It's really important you listen to me right now," A said seriously. "Because there's a lot you don't know quite yet, and it's going to come up. You have to watch out for ghosts."
"Ghosts?" Rose sighed. "Jesus, A, I'm surrounded by ghosts all the time. How am I supposed to be wary of every single specter that crosses my path? I get on the bus and I see a bloody ghost, I can't get away from them. Sometimes I can't even tell they're dead until someone walks through them, unless they look like you, in which case there's no way they're alive."
"That's my point," A said sternly. "Sometimes you can't tell the difference between a ghost and a normal person. You have to learn how to tell them apart, Rose, because things are about to get really tricky. I don't want my only link to the human world in a hole in the ground because I didn't warn them of what was coming."
"A, it's late." She swung her legs back under the covers and pulled the blanket up to her chin. "Us live people need sleep, something you're not all that familiar with, so can you bother me with this in the morning? I'll do some training, I'll figure out a way to tell the difference, but in the meantime, I'm going to catch a few hours."
A stood in the doorway until she fell asleep. If she didn't listen to him, that was her prerogative. More fool her when people began to die.
So, yeah, after my brief stay in Hermitville, this is what I churn out. Due to exams and things that are going on and you guys don't care about, my output will be somewhat slow, but more likely. Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, and please let me know you're still there so I'm not writing for empty cyberspace.
Thanks!
C.
P.S. 'Achluophobia' is the fear of the dark.
