Oh dear me…
You know, as far as ANs go, I don't have my usual mile-long agenda to toss at you all. Good for you. :)
Glad to hear that a lot of you enjoyed the Beyond Birthday tangent that Glass Slipper went off on. Ah, I love B – I actually started posting a separate fic about him, a six-part BxL/LxB "mini-fic" called Scarlet Letter.
Anyway, enough shameless plugging. :D
Thankyou to: Angela and MiniMix, Anja-chan, MiaoShou, CheeseFaerieXXL, Otaku Sage of Llamas, Strange and Intoxicating –rsa, Mask of Mirage, Lady Keruri, Sinful Ang3l, Lostpharoah, April-loves-naota16, Lawliet's Angel, Kiki-sama, fouloldron, Tanka, Tsuki aoi Usagi, Oztan, Olynara Sedai, DoYouFindMeDreadful, Pluto, Vedevria, AutumnDynasty, Fool4Sasuke33, Auxifer, Skyhe, Stargirl7, ProfessorKatze, Anonymous, Kira-Kira, Itallia, Ayachan, Reese Craven, Shima-ru, Greentail, Neko-chwan, Zuzeca, blumarshin, Hazel2Eyes, Phoenix of Hell, Raha, Silverfox, JudasBetrayed, Waychou, Perdue, N.E.May, FacelessIdol, Denika, Dark Chocolate Alchemist, Liviania and Yukiko Tsukishirou.
This chapter: Misa, Matsuda and – finally – the truth about L! Hurrah!
Hair Black as Ebony
He had to know.
It was a base desire that burned him from the inside; a low flame that heated his inquisitiveness subtly yet consistently until it was unbearably searing thought. The vulgar question gnawed away at his mind like a consuming cancer; a malformed creature slowly eating its way out of him. Since he'd stood there in that churchyard, gray sky above and withered roses below; with the wind at his back and the grave in front of him and L at his side…
It had cumulated over the last few days, the bizarre and repugnant reality that constituted L in his most physical sense. Every time L passed silently into his field of vision, he found himself questioning if it was the real thing before him – the real thing, or just a replica of the dead detective, a shell for his soul to inhabit conjured up by gravesoil and the blood of sacrificed animals and wicked spells…
…If the coffin in that grave was empty.
He told himself that such a tasteless question would only show his own immaturity, and it was a waste of time and mental energy to think about it, especially since there were much bigger fish to fry on the Kira menu. That sense of impending pettiness held him back for days before overactive mind demanded the missing details – the what, and how, and who, all became starving hollow bowls to fill with his conjectures.
He had to know.
Which was why…
"Matsuda?"
"Li-Light?"
Matsuda sounded shocked to hear from him; well, to be fair, it was an unorthodox time. It was almost eleven at night. Light himself probably would have been preparing for bed if he hadn't been preoccupied by pacing restlessly up and down the hall, trying to sort through his half-memories and figure out this whole 'Is-he-actually-L-or-isn't-he?' thing before succumbing to the impulse and taking up his laptop and cell phone and heading to the kitchen.
"Yeah, hey, Matsuda. Sorry it's so late."
"Oh, that's okay, Light!" Matsuda gabbled. "It's no problem, honestly! I was just watching TV. Have you ever—?"
"That's great, Matsuda." Light interjected, all the while tiredly kneading his forehead. "I was wondering if you could do me a favor, actually."
He could practically sense Matsuda jumping to attention on the other end of the line; he could feel the snapping salute in the older man's voice as his back visibly straightened and focused straight ahead, engendering a bustle of formality without any other prompting on Light's part.
"Absolutely, Light. Of course. Anything to help you out. What can I do for you?"
Light's determination cringed, completely unwilling to say the screwball scheme aloud, much less ask Matsuda to actually carry it out…
"Uh, okay, well… this is going to sound weird, but… Ryuzaki's grave…"
There was a short bout of confused silence on the other end, giving just enough time for regret to perch in Light's throat as he attempted to salvage his direction.
"…Yeah, what about it?" Matsuda asked, suddenly sounding rather wary as his suspicion immediately drained out the impromptu professionalism. Light hesitated again, stubbornly holding his breath against his own insatiable curiosity. He just needed to say it, fast and dirty, like ripping off an old bandage.
"I, um… I need you to… check if it's been… disturbed recently…" Even with his resolve hardened, the question still awkwardly tiptoed out, as if the ludicrousness was trying to avoid detection.
"D-disturbed? What do you mean by disturbed? You mean, like… you think he's come back to life and crawled out of it, or you think someone dug him up, or—?" Light was both relieved by Matsuda's brainless assumption, and unsettled by its uncanny accuracy.
"Matsuda, please don't ask questions right now. You don't have to go now, anyway. I'm sending you a pre-approved police exhumation warrant, and I have already contacted the morgue; get some equipment and go in the morning."
"I… don't have to dig it up, do I…?" Matsuda sounded rather faint now, and Light took comfort in the fact that he wasn't the only one creeped out by the possible zombie situation.
"You might. I mean… if it's too difficult to tell whether or not it's been touched, you'll probably have to check for yourself, but… don't think about that."
"Why… why do you want to—?"
"Please, Matsuda. No questions. It's just… a hunch I have."
"Okay." Matsuda's confidence returned at the mention of a possible lead. "I'll check it out for you tomorrow, Light. No worries."
"Thanks, Matsuda. I knew I could count on you. Goodnight."
Light snapped his phone shut with a relieved sigh and put it aside, tapping his mouse to take his computer off its screensaver mode.
"It's pathetic," L said from across the table. "You're going to defile my resting place, yet you can't even do it yourself."
Light had been acutely aware of L's presence as soon as he had stepped into the kitchen, feeling the dead eyes track his paces like a silent metronome, so he wasn't startled by the statement; he was only slightly surprised by the fact that L had taken so long to remark on the plan even as it was discussed right over his head.
"Shut up," Light snapped dismissively, not looking at him. "I can't go myself. I have other things to do. I need to find Misa – I think I'm going to be needing her eyes at some point…"
"Indeed." L glanced at the ceiling. "I think you're too scared to dig up a grave, Light-kun. You needn't be, incidentally. What's left of my corpse certainly won't bite you…"
Light steadfastly ignored him – just because L said there'd be the remains of a corpse in that coffin, it didn't mean that there would be. Maybe it really was the real thing sitting across from him—
No, he couldn't just speculate like this. He needed to know before it drove him mad. Even though, ultimately, he realized that no matter what Matsuda found (or didn't find), there wasn't very much he could do about it. All it was, all it could be, was a way to better understand his enemy. And if he knew what L was, then maybe he could find a weakness to exploit. A way to shove him back down the dimensional wormhole he had crawled out of. It had to start with a more intimate understanding of what made L's body tick.
All these possibilities – was he real or a ghost or a merely a puppet stitched together by the remains of a dead man's restless soul and animated by his hatred…? Light just couldn't tell and it didn't seem as though it was the kind of information that L would part with – it seemed stupid to be relying on Matsuda to check out the grave to see if it lay empty or not when L himself was sitting not three feet from him; L the very man who should be able to tell him what he wanted to know, but Light knew that L had no interest on setting him straight on that count.
"You could just tell me," Light said anyway, "and then I wouldn't have to get Matsuda to dig you up."
L shook his head slowly, savoring the denial and the frustration it created in Light.
"I wouldn't even if I could."
Light glanced over at him, eyes narrowed in distaste.
"What do you mean, 'if you could'?" He asked warily.
"I'm not allowed to tell you what I am," the dead detective replied dully. "You may think me a ghost, a zombie, an angel, a demon, even a Shinigami if it pleases you… but I am not allowed to answer you when you ask if you are correct."
"Says who?" Light demanded.
"I'm not allowed to tell you that either."
Light sighed irritably and gave a dismissive wave of his hand.
"Whatever. I'm sure I can find out for myself."
"Always so confident, Light-kun."
"How do you think I got this far?"
L gave a disinterested shrug, got up and wandered away, leaving Light alone at the kitchen table with his laptop.
Light had always considered his father's position as chief of the NPA a vast asset to his cause – a decided advantage over his enemies and, indeed, over anyone else who might have happened to have picked up the Death Note in his place. Kira had prevailed this far not just because of intelligence and resourcefulness, but also because of fate-given stepping stones like these that proved he was the chosen one for the job of cleansing the world.
Quite simply, unless you had access to police equipment, Kira was a tough gig.
Light had access to police equipment.
He brought up the electronic map of metropolitan Tokyo on his laptop screen and set up the tracing program; the tracing device itself was a tiny black plastic box, plugged in via a USB connection, with another small wire running from it that went into the smaller USB port on his phone.
He had no idea why Misa wasn't answering his calls, her silence an eerie anomaly, a blinking misproportion in his plan, but now it didn't matter – even if she didn't pick up he could trace her location using this equipment. He'd figured it was probably better to do it late at night when she'd probably be at home; during the day she could be just about anywhere in the city.
He dialed her number and brought the phone to his ear, listening to it ring as he concentrated on his screen. A small window had appeared over the center of the map reading 'Connecting'; on the fourth ring it changed to 'Connected', and then from there speedily became 'Located'.
The phone was still ringing with no sign of Misa about to answer it, but Light was more interested now in the tiny red pixelated pinpoint that had begun flashing on the map. He clicked on it to enlarge that segment of the map, studying it as the text in the window became 'Retrieving Address'.
So, she was in Shinjuku, was she…?
The address came up in a separate window; The Palace Hotel, Shinjuku, Tokyo.
He knew where that was. It was one of the hotels L had stayed in, back before he'd had the taskforce headquarters built. Really, for someone who didn't want to be found, Misa was making this way too easy for him…
He opened a new window and quickly navigated to the Palace Hotel's official website; from there he found it laughably easy to hack into their database and get into the information bank, in which were details about rooms and customers and payments. He smiled indulgently, his eyes reflecting the red blinking tracer on the screen that betrayed his missing pawn's location; the blood hue that didn't quite fade even when the computer screen was turned off.
'Amane, M' was in Room 234.
Light turned off his phone in the elevator up to Misa's hotel room floor because the last thing he wanted was Matsuda calling him in the middle of this saying that he'd been arrested for digging up a grave in broad daylight.
With his fantastic track record of blunders, Light feared that even with the warrant and the morgue notification, Matsuda probably wouldn't think to flash his police ID and say he was on police business until he'd been escorted to the beat car.
It wasn't a conversation he wanted to have while in the process of wooing Misa back into his graces.
Though maybe the romancing was unnecessary. He still didn't know what to expect from Misa. Maybe there was a valid reason for her to not contact him, maybe this was part of his plan that he had forgotten. Was she deliberately not answering his calls or did he just have a knack of ringing at inconvenient times? But no, surely then she'd call back after receiving 'Missed Call' messages, so maybe she really was ignoring him, but why…?
L had said that he only had half his memories, and agreeably, his mind was rather blank when it came to Misa…
Well, it didn't matter. Even with his uncertainty (Light's least favorite thing in the world), he still had no fears about confronting Misa. No matter what the reason was, he was sure that everything could be explained and worked out and fit neatly back into place. Misa's fierce loyalty trumped all other factors, and he was looking forward to the shallow-watered predictability after so many weeks of dealing with a turbulently fickle L.
He'd tracked her down and now hopefully he'd get some answers. He needed Misa back at his side – her eyes were invaluable to him, and having Ryuk around probably wouldn't hurt either. Ryuk wasn't the brightest crayon in the box, but he had his uses…
He came to Room 234 and paused outside it, tugging his scarlet tie straight and running his fingers through his hair to neaten it up.
L had smirked at him this morning when he'd walked into the kitchen to make his morning coffee dressed like this; he'd smirked at the red tie and he'd smirked at the crisp white shirt and he'd smirked at the fitted black pinstriped suit.
He hadn't said anything; only stared with that leering septic smirk that begged not for an explanation, but an excuse to gloat. The silence was only a provocation, and Light had ignored him.
Since he wasn't sure where he stood with Misa, he thought it best to give a good impression on turning up uninvited at the door of her swish hotel room. He was wearing a good mask today – he had stored up an entire internal bunker of patience to put up with Misa all day, if it got him what he wanted.
He knocked smartly on the door and stepped back from it, waiting for her to answer it.
…So he was shocked, to say the least, when Ryuk's ashen bug-eyed face suddenly leaned through the door, staring right at him like a hideous unwelcoming door-knocker.
The Shinigami blinked in equal surprise, eyes turning phosphorous in delighted surprise.
"Light?" He gave a sudden malicious snigger. "Oh, boy, she's not going to be happy to see you…"
"I—wait!"
Ryuk vanished back through as the door cracked open just enough to reveal Misa, her smiling face lit up like a halo, while the rest of her was shrouded in darkness of the room.
Her picture perfect smile snapped off the instant she recognized him, and it only took half a second more to vacate all the color from her face as well, until the smudge of her lipstick was the only surviving pigmentation.
"Hey, Misa, I—"
Misa let go of the door, letting it slam in his face.
Light was taken aback by the action; no-one ever slammed doors on him. He felt indignant anger begin to bubble up, but knowing that a fight would be detrimental to his cause, he stroked his temper and stepped forward, knocking less politely this time.
"Misa, can I talk to you for a minute?" He said loudly through the door.
"I don't want to talk to you," Misa replied sharply; her voice tightly strung and close, as though she was leaning against the other side of the door. "I don't want to talk to you ever again."
It was true that Light couldn't fathom the reason for this, but thought that it was best to avoid the "Dumb Boyfriend" card – banging on the door and saying that he didn't know what he'd done to make her so mad would just piss her off even more.
"I know that," he coaxed, altering his method, and letting sugar crystallize on his voice, "and I understand, but I really need to talk to you. It'll only be for a moment. Please, Misa?" He leaned his head against the varnished grain trying to get closer to her as vulnerability shivered through his voice; he simply had to wait for it to have its intended effect.
There was silence on the other side of the door for a moment, and then the lock clicked and the door swung open a little, which Light took as a sulky invitation to enter. He slipped into the hotel room and pushed the door shut behind him.
"Smooth," Ryuk murmured, passing him. "I'll leave you two alone…"
He vanished through the wall, like a puff of greasy smoke disintegrating into the air, but Light wasn't looking at him; rather at Misa, who was sitting on the edge of the huge bed, looking down at the carpet, her bare feet placed closely together.
She wasn't dressed, instead wearing her short red silk nightgown and white robe. There was a small silver crucifix glinting around her neck that seemed to catch even the smallest gleam in the darkened room. However, that wasn't the most striking thing about her appearance right now. It was—
"…Your hair…?" Light couldn't help but blink at her a few times as his eyes adjusted, thinking perhaps it was simply a trick of the shadows. She was wearing it loose and the style was still the same, but…
"It was dyed anyway," Misa replied flatly, not looking at him, hiding her eyes beneath the now black fringe. "I just let it grow out. You know that."
"You… you look different… with black hair," Light said lamely.
She looked up, eyebrows knitted together over searing eyes; their glaring heat was the only emotion that penetrated the sullen hood covering the rest of her features.
"What do you want?" She asked, her voice low and thick as though she was holding something back, though he couldn't tell what.
Light didn't say anything, just staring at her still. She was completely different to how he remembered her, and it wasn't just because of the black hair. Her demeanor had altered entirely, sharpened, hardened; she seemed much more mature and didn't refer to herself in the third person and although a lot of it was most likely to do with his unwelcome appearance, she didn't seem nearly so bouncy and hyperactive.
"I…" Light shook his head a little, trying to clear the strange fog surrounding the situation. "Do… do you still have… the Eyes, Misa?"
Misa sat up a little straighter, regarding him suspiciously, flint still in her gaze.
"Yes, I do. There's not really a cure for that apart from giving up the Death Note. That's what Ryuk said, anyway."
"Right. Well…" Light cleared his throat, feeling awkward. He shouldn't even have to ask. "…I need them, so—"
"Trade for them yourself, then," Misa snapped, efficiently cutting him off as she jutted out her chin in defiance.
Light blinked at her taken aback by the blatant hostility coiling around her words. Was this really Misa Amane before him? The girl who'd become the Second Kira just so she could meet and thank him for passing judgment on the murderer of her parents; who'd traded twice for Shinigami Eyes just so she could help him…?
"But… Misa, you already have them, so what's the point—?"
"Yes, I already have them." Misa stood up, her unexplained anger no longer concealed by the thin veil of morosity. "I have them. They're mine, and I don't want to use them to help you."
Light was floored by this revelation. Misa… Misa didn't want to help him…?
"Misa, I don't understand," he started gently. "You traded half your lifespan for them so you could help me—"
"And now I've changed my mind." Misa toyed with the little silver cross at her throat. "Don't you understand? Because of you, my lifespan has been shortened twice over, I've been imprisoned, in danger of being executed… I know it was my own doing, but I was following you because I thought you were right." She was shaking her head now, black strands sweeping across her face in an ebony curtain. "But you aren't right, Light. Kira isn't right. I don't believe in your new world anymore, so I won't help you create it."
The paradigm shift had turned into a landslide, and Light couldn't help but flounder under the differences. This revelation, this discrepancy, was almost as jolting as the morning L decided to show up. Not quite the same shock factor as seeing someone who is (was) dead, but it was close…
For all Misa had ever annoyed him, what he wouldn't give for the squeaky blonde pigtailed version right now; he might not have been her biggest fan, but she had showed up on his doorstep pre-melted, succumbing to his rhetoric without him even having to explain. He really didn't like this one.
This one had a spine.
Still, Light was adept at winning people over; he was confident he could get Misa back on his side fairly easily. He took a reviving breath, and swore to himself that he would not leave this hotel room without her promise to help him hunt down Mello and Near.
"Come on, Misa," he said softly, taking a step towards her. "How can you have lost faith in me so easily? Look at all we've accomplished together, all the judgments we've passed on the wicked… You belong at my side, and together we'll create a world free of evil that I will rule over as God, and you'll—"
"No!" Misa cried, interrupting him yet again. "No, you're not God! How can you say that; how can you be so arrogant, Light? There is a God, but he isn't you."
Light blinked at her incredulously as the record of this new reality continued to skip and jar him with the offbeats. This Misa was entirely opposite to everything he'd ever categorized her by.
"You're… talking about religion…?"
Misa gripped her crucifix in her fist, turning to face him straight on.
"I know you think that what you're doing is right," she said, talking to him like he was a naughty child, as if he hadn't known any better, "but it isn't your place to judge other people. You aren't God, no matter how much you think you are."
"Since when are you a Christian, Misa?" Light spat, almost more upset by the tone she dared to use, rather than what she was actually saying.
"My parents were, and now I am too," she replied simply. "I find more comfort in Christianity's teachings than I did helping you. I don't believe in Kira anymore, Light."
Comfort? Since when did Misa care for spiritual comfort? She was dependent on personal revenge, and divine justice, the two twining together until they were an indistinguishable force that drove her to believe anything Kira said, drove her to love him no matter what he did…
She still believed in him, she had to. There was no way such a core impression could be so easily shaken, at least not without her losing the definition of who she was. The proof of that was held in the fact that she still knew him at all. The fact that she hadn't given up her memories of their accomplishments…
"Why don't you give up your notebook, then?"
Misa shook her head violently, the shimmering black hair capturing Light's unwilling gaze.
"No. I've done terrible things. I need to be aware of them; I need to be repentant for my sins. Besides, it could just fall into someone else's hands. It's safer if I keep it."
"You could destroy it."
Again Misa shook her head, and again Light's eyes were drawn to the inky locks.
"No. I have to keep it. It's my own cross to bear."
Light glared at her uneasily as the reasons continued to slip between his fingers. He knew that this was a front, that there was something more potent lurking beneath the surface that could explain this dramatic reversal. A more compelling reason, one that he was already supposed to know, that was somehow his fault; a reason that wasn't rooted in changed moral ideals or attempts at redemption… He continued to dig, determined to hit a true vein.
"If you're so certain that what I'm doing is wrong, why don't you kill me?" He asked, willing to play Russian roulette to get her back.
Misa's eyes glinted at him with a malice he hadn't thought she was capable of.
"I've been tempted, Light; at least, I was at the start. But I won't take another life, especially not yours. I think you're wrong, but I always swore I'd be loyal to you. I won't go back on that, no matter how much you've hurt me or however many people you've killed."
"Misa…" Light gave a frustrated sigh. "This is stupid. You're my partner in this; the Second Kira. I need you."
"No, you don't. You just want to use me for my eyes. I'm just a tool to you. I know you think I'm stupid, and okay, I'm not as smart as you, but… I can see that you were just using me. I could always see it. I didn't care back then because I loved you and wanted to help you, but I'm not going to be used by you anymore. We're finished."
"Misa, that's not true." Light took another few steps towards her. "Come on, you know I care about you—"
"No!" Misa screamed hysterically, the mask finally cracked to reveal the hurt she had been hiding behind her rage. "No more, no more lies… Don't act as though nothing happened, as though I walked out on you just because I stopped believing in your ideals…!"
"What?" Light blinked at her, bewildered by something he was supposed to know but didn't. "I don't… Misa, what are you talking about…?"
"No, no…! Don't pretend you don't know…!" Misa had wrapped her arms around herself as if to hold the ripping seams of her world together. She was stepping away from him, shaking her head violently. "I was good, I didn't kill him… I didn't kill… didn't kill…"
"Misa… Misa!" Light crossed over to her and grabbed hold of her shoulders, shaking her even as she shattered in his grasp, legs going limp and arms twisting as she tried to pull away from him. "Stop this. Calm down. I swear, I don't know what you're talking about—"
"You didn't love me. You never loved me…" Misa shivered violently, her head rolling back to pin him with eyes eerily similar to L's glassy gaze. "I knew that, I knew… Rem warned me, but… I thought… I didn't mind if you didn't love me as long as you didn't love anyone else either…"
"Misa, don't be silly." Light tried to put his arms around her. "Of course I love—"
"No, you don't!" Misa cried, tears welling in her eyes now as she pushed him away. "You don't, you never did, you loved him…!"
Light blinked as the conclusive lightning struck, bleaching everything with the truth she was never supposed to know.
"…Him?"
"Ryuzaki," Misa hissed with conviction, her eyes reviving and sparking once again.
"I-I… Misa, I didn't—"
She stiffened in his arms, pulling herself together with renewed fury.
"You haven't truly come here to deny it…?" Misa backed right up against the bed. "Don't lie about it, Light – I know you loved him. I didn't realize it while he was still alive, but afterwards… do you think I couldn't see it? That I didn't know? At night, I could hear you saying his name, while you… a-and sometimes you called me Ryuzaki while we were having sex, and… and I… walked in on you, when—"
"What?" Light blinked at her as the colorful tapestry his lies had woven over the years was so easily unraveled. "You walked in… with… Ryuzaki…?"
"No!" There was a steady stream of tears running down Misa's face now. "With Matsuda! Don't you remember? I came back early from that photo shoot in Los Angeles and walked into the bedroom and you were busy… with Matsuda, and—"
"But you just said Ryuzaki!"
"You called him Ryuzaki too!" Misa cried, nearly screaming now as her hands balled up into tight shaking fists. "I don't think he heard you, but I did… You didn't care, you were just using him, pretending he was Ryuzaki because obviously I wasn't a good enough simulation…" The words were laced with spite; leaden, self-deriding, and difficult to hear because, strangely enough, they were true. He didn't remember the act, but simultaneously could not deny it happening.
"Misa—"
"I know why, though. I know why…" Misa grabbed at her own ebony hair with straining hands, fingers twisted until they more resembled talons. "It was the hair. Matsuda has black hair like Ryuzaki did, I know that because you were running your fingers through it and smiling, you were pretending he was Ryuzaki… and I… Why do you think I let the blonde grow out, Light?! I-I thought… if there was even one thing about me that reminded you of him, the way Matsuda had… you'd want me…"
She let her hair go and gave a shuddering sigh.
"I wanted to kill Matsuda, but I didn't. It wasn't his fault. It was yours. You used him just like you used me. Ryuzaki's the only person you ever cared about other than yourself, and even then…" She glared at Light across the room. "…You made Rem kill him. It made me think… if that's what you would do to someone you loved, what would you do to someone like me…?"
"God… Misa…" Light rubbed at his temples, unable to think clearly as he was thoroughly beaten down and dragged by the revelation; he'd slept with Matsuda, just to pretend that…? "I… look, okay… I did mess about with Ryuzaki. A lot. While were chained together, but… how could you think that that means that I didn't – or don't – love you? Didn't I have you move in with me? Didn't we go out places together? Didn't I sleep with you and buy you things and ask you to marry me—?"
"But you don't love me!" Misa burst out in exasperation. "I'm just an asset to you. The only reason you came here today is because you want to use my Shinigami Eyes. All those others things you mentioned mattered to me back when I was that immature little magazine model, but now… even if you never touched me at all, I'd be happy, as long as you loved me. I'd… I'd even stand at your side, fighting for a cause I no longer believe in, if only you loved me, but… you don't. You really don't. I know that now."
Misa suddenly slouched, as though drained, burnt out by her yelling. Her tear-laden gaze slipped to the floor, which Light took as an opportunity to approach her silently as he changed tactics once again, desperate for a toehold to sway her.
"You're doing a dangerous thing by going against Kira," he said quietly, taking hold of her chin and tilting her face up again. "How can you trust me not to kill you if you can't even trust me not to sleep with other men, hmm?"
"I can't." Misa gazed defiantly at him. "But I'm not afraid of Kira; I'm not afraid of you. Kill me if you want, Light. I'm surprised you haven't by now."
He looked levelly at her.
"Give me your notebook, Misa."
"No."
Light, finally unable to contain himself, reached out and grasped her tiny crucifix, tugging hard enough to snap the chain; he threw it across the room angrily.
"That's what I think of your God!" He seethed. "He, if He even exists, just sits about and allows evil to happen. I don't. I do something about it."
"Humans were given free will," Misa replied coolly, unaffected by Light's violent display, even with tears still staining her face. "It is not up to God to decide whether or not they will be good or evil – and it's not up to you."
Light was silent for a while, the balance in his eyes tipping precariously, weighing out the pros and cons with same detached logic as Kira.
"I'm probably going to kill you, you know."
For the first time, Misa actually smiled.
"Yes, I suppose… now that Rem isn't here to protect me from you anymore, there's nothing to stop you."
"Give me your Death Note, Misa. Give up your memories, and you have my word that I'll let you live."
"No." Misa shook her head. "Threaten me with death all you want. You should know it's not something I'm afraid of. I traded half of my life twice – you're too afraid to even trade once. But I won't give you my notebook."
"I can just kill you and inherit it," Light growled. "I'm offering you a better solution. You get to give up your memories and forget all about it."
"You could do that," Misa agreed, "but I could expose you as Kira."
"…What?" Light blinked at her, not quite registering what he had heard.
Misa tossed her head, shaking off tears as a haughty expression settled in their place.
"I'm an actress now, Light. Quite a famous one. I could cause a lot of trouble for you, especially since we were both held by Ryuzaki a few years ago."
"You'd be arrested too, idiot!"
Misa shrugged, sniffing a bit.
"A small price to pay."
Light stared at her in silence for a moment or two.
"I appear to have been mistaken about you, Misa," he said stiffly. "You're stronger and smarter than I've previously given you credit for."
Misa gave another bitter little smile.
"I learned the hard way." Her eyes narrowed. "If you leave now and stay away from me, I'll keep your secret."
Light let go of her chin, stepping backwards away from here; his brain was working rapidly. He couldn't let it end like this, couldn't let Misa slither out of his grasp so easily, he needed her—
"Alright, I'll go," he said airily, turning away and striding slowly and lazily across the hotel room. "You've made your point, Misa." He found her broken crucifix at his feet by the draped window and bent to pick it up. "But, please… let's not end everything we've been through together on such a bitter note."
He stood, throwing open the heavy curtains with the same motion. The morning sunlight streamed in, caressing his hair into tawny and russet hues, throwing a halo behind his head as he turned to face a blinking Misa. He reached over to the fruit bowl near the bed he'd noticed on his way in; there were only two apples left, which made sense given that Misa had Ryuk for a roommate. He picked one up and held it out for her to see, the dazzling sunlight giving it the appearance of glowing.
"You want to know about Ryuzaki?" He asked softly, approaching her again. "I'll tell you about him. We used to have this thing… it was just a stupid little thing really, something we came up with one night… A love apple…"
"I don't understand."
"It's a token of love. You see…" Light sank his teeth into the fruit, bringing away a chunk of it and eating it. "…This is my apple. I'm enjoying it, but…"
He reached out and took Misa's wrist, turning her palm up and pressing the apple into her hand. He placed her broken necklace on top of it, then closed her fingers around it.
"…I want you to have it. It's sort of a… 'No hard feelings' thing. It is love, you see, if I want you to have the thing I was enjoying."
Misa looked down at the fruit in silence; as Light slipped behind her, putting his arms around her slender waist and leaning over her shoulder in a soft embrace. They were in front of the hotel room dresser; before the mirror, reflecting her in his arms, with hair black as ebony (like L's; and like Matsuda's…) and skin white as snow and the apple clutched in her hands—
"Look at us, Misa," Light whispered in her ear. "Look. We belong together. You're my queen. I need you."
Misa still said nothing, looking intently at the picture of herself held covetously in Light's arms; the way, years ago, she'd have killed for him to hold her…
"You once promised me your heart," Light went on, his voice soothing, lulling, full of promises. "You once said that, if you could, you'd tear out your heart and give it to me in a box. I wouldn't ever hold you to that, Misa, but the sentiment of it… the sentiment has always meant a lot to me, you know."
Misa remained silent for a while longer still; then looked at Light's reflection.
"You call this a love apple?" She asked icily; and she dropped it onto the carpet. "More like a poison apple…!"
She wrenched away from him and leaned up against the dresser; the crucifix gripped in her hand and her head bowed and her shoulders shaking as she began to sob once again.
Frustrated, Light reached for her shoulder—
There was a sudden knock on the door; Misa didn't move, but the lock turned and the door opened without her needing to answer it. A small, slender woman in a gray suit, her hair tied back, hurried in, holding a magazine – a publicist or manager or something, Light would guess.
"Ms Amane, look!" She said briskly, waving the magazine as Light backed away. "You won that 'Fairest of Them All' poll in J-Chic! Ms Amane…?"
Misa gave a strangled little sob and collapsed to her knees, her entire body wracked with anguished convulsions.
The publicist immediately turned her sharp gaze on Light, who was almost at the door.
"I upset her," he said. "I'm sorry. I'll go."
He made himself scarce, still hearing Misa's sobs after the door had swung shut behind him.
He knew he'd lost his chance with her now. She would never be willing to accommodate him like that ever again. It was a severe blow to his crusade to have lost her – his most powerful pawn – but then again…
…He'd always prepared himself for Misa going out of the equation. She'd always been dangerous; a volatile time-bomb just waiting to go off in his hands.
He'd always known there would come a time when he'd just have to kill her.
He was sitting back at his kitchen table, the Death Note open on two blank pages before him, idly twirling his pen as he allowed his thoughts to simmer slowly, breaking down the newest developments, when the doorbell rang.
Once. Then twice. Then several more times in a frantic symphony of shrill rings.
Light grabbed the Death Note and slipped it on top of the refrigerator, pushing it right back against the wall so that it was invisible to anyone who happened to walk in here, then went to the door. Whoever was on the other side was still jabbing the button frenetically.
Light hauled open the door irritably…
…Finding Matsuda on his doormat, his eyes wide and rimmed in white panic, his suit covered in mud and dirt and his finger still jabbing the doorbell.
"Light…!" He pounced as soon as the door was out of the way. He grabbed the front of Light's shirt, gripping it tightly with white knuckles. "I tried and tried to call you… your phone is off…!"
"Oh, yeah, I… had something to attend to this morning and turned it off, guess I forgot to…" Suddenly composing himself before trailing off even further, Light grabbed Matsuda's lapel and yanked him into the apartment. "Get in here, idiot."
He shut the door and turned to Matsuda, leaning against it.
"You dug him up," he said simply, glancing over the detective's filthy clothes.
"Yes… I mean, n-no… No, I didn't dig him up, because…" Matsuda looked shakily up at Light. "…It's empty. His grave is empty. You were right, it's been disturbed… The coffin was empty, he's not in it… Ryuzaki's gone, Light!"
Light blinked, stun rapidly turning to nausea; then it was the real thing prowling around his apartment like a savage house cat. He had a reanimated corpse for a housemate…
"Look, come in a minute, Matsuda," Light said, exhaling to drive the quaver out of his own voice, and the slick twisting that threatened to overtake his stomach. "I'll make you some coffee."
Matsuda gave a wordless nod; he was still quite breathless, giving the impression that he'd ran at least part of the way here. He let Light put a hand to his back and steer him towards the kitchen as though he had suddenly gone numb after delivering his fateful message.
Light himself was too busy processing the confirmation that Matsuda had brought to even consider him as the man he had slept with… The fact that L had somehow had life breathed back into him, his rotting flesh restored and then managed to drag himself out of his grave without it appearing to have been disturbed was a much more paramount discovery rather than what Misa had been yelling at him only that morning; that L's absence had driven him to seduce Matsuda and take him home with him, solely for the sake of pretending he was the long-gone detective.
Matsuda was a logical choice, incidentally. He was only a year or two L's senior, putting him in the same age category; he was the most likely to react to Light's advances and keep the whole affair a secret; and he had the required black-as-ebony hair.
Not that it mattered right now, when that same black-as-ebony hair was flecked with the dirt of L's grave; and when the man himself was sitting silently at Light's kitchen table, apparently in shock due to his finding that grave absent of its occupant.
"Maybe… maybe Kira dug him up," Matsuda offered eventually, have caught his breath and regained some of his nerve in the quiet normalcy of Light's kitchen, as he watched the younger man clatter about making coffee. "I once read that sometimes, all over the world, the bodies of traitors were sometimes dug up and hung and stuff. Maybe it was Kira or his followers or something."
"I don't think Kira would do that," Light replied, feeling his gag reflex buck at the very thought of it. "Besides, nobody knew Ryuzaki was L except for us."
"Oh, right. Of course." Matsuda gave a weak little laugh. "You're right, Light. That was dumb. Sorry."
"It's okay." Light forced a little laugh of his own, not looking at Matsuda. "At least you're giving it some thought."
"Well… heh… I guess it's not like he really did come back to life and get out of it himself… right?"
"I don't think so, Matsuda." Light stirred the coffee and then laid the spoon aside. "Here, I made it strong for you…"
He picked up the cup and turned around to cross the kitchen to give it to the filthy detective—
And he jerked in surprise and dropped it; it slipped from his slack fingers and fell, shattering on the kitchen floor.
L was standing right behind Matsuda, unnoticed; smiling blackly at Light.
"Light?" Matsuda leaned forwards, L's presence behind him still utterly unobserved. "What's wrong? Are you alright?"
"I… y-yeah, I'm fine…" Light tore his gaze away from L, crouching down to clear up the mess. "I'm sorry, I just slipped… I'll make you another cup…"
It's okay, he thought, barely able to hear himself over the pounding of his heart. I'm overreacting, and L's only doing this to unnerve me. I bet Matsuda can't even see or hear him…
"Will you make me some coffee too, Light-kun?" L suddenly asked, stepping aside from behind Matsuda's chair and hopping up into the one next to it.
He'd heard him. Light could only watch in sinking horror as the chain reaction ripped the situation beyond his control. Matsuda's head snapped in L's direction, whiplash and terror visibly draining all the color out of his face as his mouth began to silhouette silent words, and his eyes widened until his pupils resembled catatonic pinpricks.
"Hello, Matsuda-san," L said politely, tilting his head. "It's been a while. How are you?"
L's voice animated Matsuda from his numb shocked state and he suddenly gave a strangled, terrified yell, jumping up and backwards too quickly and stumbling over his chair, falling hard to the kitchen floor, his eyes never leaving L's form.
"Ohmygod… ohmygod…" he breathed, scrabbling away from the kitchen table. "…You're here, that's why your grave… that's why… ohmygod…"
"You… you can see him?" Light whispered faintly, slowly standing up again, the shattered coffee cup forgotten.
"He was here… he's been here the whole time…?" Matsuda scrambled to his feet, stepping away in fright. "You knew he was here…?!"
"He's been… Matsuda, please listen…" Light tried to approach Matsuda. "He's been here for a while, I can't get rid of him… I don't know why he's haunting me, but I needed to know if it really was him or just a replica or something, so…"
Matsuda backed up against the wall as Light tried to get near him.
"No, y-you stay away…!" Matsuda tried to compose himself, holding his body rigid while staring at Light in horror and disbelief. "You weren't going to tell me he was here! Why were you hiding him? Why haven't you told the task force…?!"
"I can answer that," L said drolly from the kitchen table.
"You shut your mouth!" Light blazed, not even looking at him.
"Light-kun, you are only heightening suspicion against yourself," L replied flatly. He got down from his chair again and came a little closer. "Then again, I presume Matsuda-san knows what I am about to say, anyway. There is only one reason that Light Yagami, previous Kira suspect, would hide the resurrected L from the Kira Investigation task force, isn't there?"
"…If he was Kira," Matsuda whispered, wide-eyed, plucking the answer from the air without L even needing to say it. His simple existence was more powerful than any possible words.
"That's enough!" Light thundered; he reached out and grabbed L by his upper arm, dragging him towards the kitchen door. "You, get out! You're frightening him."
He turned to Matsuda on escorting L towards the door.
"I'm not Kira," he said firmly. "I'm sorry, okay; I think being dead drove him a bit mad, he hasn't been right ever since he showed up here—"
L cracked up laughing; doubling over to accommodate for his horrific screeches that coated the room in howling decibels of shattered mirth. Matsuda seemed aghast by the very sight and sound of it, and Light redoubled his efforts to evict L from the kitchen.
"Get out, you whack job!" He hissed. "I don't even—"
"Whack job?" L shook his head violently. "You call me mad, yet you think you can convince Matsuda-san of your innocence when your victim stands before him, attesting your guilt? You're the mad one, Light-kun."
"You're dead," Light spat. "No-one cares what you think!"
"That doesn't make you not Kira—"
Light shoved him out of the kitchen and pulled the door shut; he turned to Matsuda, who was just staring at him, completely speechless; the ability to put two words together to make a rational thought suddenly as futile as rubbing two sticks together and expecting a fire.
Things had slipped out of Light's control, and admittedly it was a situation he could have avoided. He hadn't thought that L was visible to other people, but now that Matsuda had seen him… it was all he could do to just play damage control and hope it was enough to keep him alive.
"Matsuda, I—" he started.
"It wasn't the Shinigami who killed him," Matsuda interrupted quietly. "It was you. Or, at least… you made her do it. She didn't seem aggressive to me, you know. I always thought it was a bit strange that she would just kill Ryuzaki and Watari for no apparent reason…"
"Matsuda, that's ridiculous—"
"Then why have you been hiding him?" Matsuda whispered urgently, accusation barbing his tongue. "Why didn't you tell us he was here? There's only reason you wouldn't want to bring in the resurrected man who was the only one to suspect you – because he was right to do so. If you weren't Kira then surely you'd be eager to have Ryuzaki back on the team again—"
"Matsuda, he's dead! We buried him, remember? Don't talk about it like he just got back from a holiday or something."
Matsuda offered no response other than pushing Light aside and leaving the kitchen.
"Wh…? Matsuda, where the hell are you going…?!" Light followed him out into the hall, finding him opening the front door and sprinting out into the hallway. "Matsuda!"
By the time Light had got out into the hall, Matsuda was gone, with only the resounding sound of his steps in the stairwell marking his presence and after a moment, even those went silent. Light stood in his open doorway, stunned. This had backfired very badly; more than that, it had exploded in his face – if only he'd curbed his curiosity about L…
He knew what he had to do now. It was the only thing he could do.
He went back into the apartment, shutting the door; he glanced about for L, but there was no sign of him in the immediate vicinity. The bastard had cleared off after dealing his desired damage, as per usual.
This world was different; it was different, and now he knew that unless he did something about it, those differences were going to spiral towards his destruction.
This was a world in which Misa had lost faith in him; in which Matsuda would readily believe ill of him; in which L haunted him to remind him of his greatest sin.
This world was not just going to fall into his palm – he would have to fight even harder than before to make it his. So it was time to make changes to a world that had already changed against his favor, a world more poisoned than ever before.
It was the only way to win.
It was the only way to survive.
Light took his Death Note down from the top of the fridge and brought it back to the table, opening it again and seating himself before it.
He wrote Misa's name.
He wrote Matsuda's name.
He paused, took a reviving breath, already feeling slightly better, and then laid the pen back to the paper and began to rewrite this world so eager to see Kira fail.
"When will they be coming to arrest you?" L asked innocently, glancing up when Light came into the bedroom. He was on the floor with the chessboard, rearranging the pieces.
"They won't be," Light growled, throwing open the wardrobe. "I've dealt with it, no thanks to you."
"I may be dead, but I'm still L, and you're still Kira," L responded pleasantly. "I'm here to make life difficult for you."
"Too bad. I'm one step ahead."
"Curses, foiled again," L sighed drolly, going back to his chessboard.
Light ignored his dry humor, digging out the dark canvas camping bag he'd been looking for and unzipping it, throwing it open on the bed. The entire action captured L's attention again; he looked up, blinking as Light went back to foraging through the wardrobe like a starving post-hibernation squirrel.
"What are you doing, Light-kun?" He asked, watching as Light started tearing clothes off their hangers and throwing them over his shoulder haphazardly into the bag. "Or perhaps 'Where are you going?' is a better question."
"I'm going. I can't stay here now. We're going." He paused, looking at L. "You're coming with me. I guess you don't need to pack anything, but if there's anything you want to take with you, go and get it."
"Going?" L echoed, seemingly quite genuinely perplexed by this news. "Where? Why?"
"Don't ask questions!" Light snapped. "If there's nothing you want, just shut up and stay there."
"Are we running away?"
"No." Light threw socks and underwear into his bag, not looking at L. "We're not running. We don't need to run."
"Oh." L's eyes glinted. "Then we're hiding?"
"I told you not to ask questions." Light tossed his laptop onto the bed, flipped it open and turned it on, letting it load up as he continued to pack essentials. "Don't you want any books or anything?"
"No."
Light waved his hand dismissively at him, digging out his portable memory device and shoving it into the USB port. He quickly downloaded everything he thought he would need from it, then used a police program to erase anything remotely suspicious from the hard-drive, so that it was untraceable and irretrievable.
"Aren't you taking your computer?" L asked in disinterest.
"No. I can't." Light shut it down and put it back in its bag, leaning it up against the dresser. "I can't take my phone, either. They can both be traced."
"And why are you worried about being traced? I thought you said you were one step ahead."
"I am." Light smirked. "But this time tomorrow, the authorities are going to think that Light Yagami is dead, and what use does a dead man have for a computer…?"
Light knew where he was going, and he knew how to get there.
They didn't take the train because he knew there were CCTV cameras in operation and he didn't want his "last" movements recorded.
Instead they walked. It was a long, tiring trek via a remote route, with Light clutching L tightly by the hand to ensure that he didn't make off. L hadn't previously shown any interest in running away, but Light just didn't trust him, and after that whole thing with Matsuda…
It was better to just hold onto him, he decided, dragging him along like a sulky child being forced to go to the dentist.
L had smirked at the hand-holding thing at first, saying it was too late to win him back over by going for a hand-in-hand lovers' stroll, but his risible attitude hadn't lasted very long, and now he was just walking after Light in silence, looking up at the overcast sky.
In fact, he said absolutely nothing at all until—
"Here again, Light-kun?"
"Shut up. It's perfect." Light pushed open the door. "No-one will ever find us here."
"I think I prefer your apartment."
"I don't care." Light shoved him in through the door. "I never invited you to share my apartment in the first place. Besides, there's nothing wrong with this place, it's just out of use. A good clean and it'll be back to the way it used to be."
"Is that so?" L tilted his head. "I don't think I agree."
"That's probably because you've never cleaned anything in your entire life. Or death. Or whatever."
"That wasn't what I meant." L looked at him dully. "You seemed to imply that everything would go back to the way it used to be, back when… well, when we used this building as our headquarters."
Light scowled.
"Don't be idiotic. Of course that isn't what I meant." He waved his hand at L. "I mean, look at you. You're a corpse!"
"I'd like to respond to that by saying 'And you're Kira', but, of course… that isn't a difference. You were always Kira, Light-kun."
"Yes. I was." Light threw his bag down on the lobby floor. "But this is going to be different. It is different."
He grabbed the front of L's top and pulled him close; pressing up against him despite the discomfort of how cold he was so that he could look into the lifeless eyes that no longer declared him fairest in the land.
"Instead of the Kira Investigation Headquarters," Light murmured, sinking his fingers into L's black-as-ebony hair (the real thing – Misa and Matsuda had tried so hard, but it just wasn't the same…), "…this is now simply the Kira Headquarters."
He smiled, holding L tighter still.
"That's the difference. I'm going to work from here, the place you had built so that you could catch me…"
L shrugged in his arms; reaching into his pocket and taking out the one thing he'd brought from the apartment.
He pressed the ice white queen into Light's hand.
"And this," he whispered, "is the other difference."
ZOMG, plot… Mwa ha ha!
You know, Narroch and I actually clashed quite a bit over this chapter. I mean, one thing I didn't put up much of a fight about – I didn't write in about Matsuda having a warrant or anything to go dig up L's grave, so Narroch pointed out that it kind of conjured up this ridiculous mental image of Matsuda just strolling down a graveyard in broad daylight with a shovel…
It made me laugh on reflection, anyway. :)
The other thing was with Misa and her "dumping" of Light and her reasoning for it, which is debatably out-of-character… I dunno, it wasn't an abusive fight we had over it or anything, but a definite differing of opinions. Still, I'm kind of glad we didn't agree on it because we both had the opportunity to put our personal viewpoints on the situation across and I think it resulted in a better final outcome in the form of this chapter.
Anyway, it's important to remember that this is a "universe" different to the one that had existed beforehand – one that does not favour Light's victory, exactly, so things have changed. Example: He falls out of Misa's favour in a way that could be considered OOC in the normal Death Note-verse, but, I mean… At this point you'll have noticed that this fic has technically gone a little AU, so…
Narroch also found the whole LightxMatsuda tilt on things hilarious. Though, for the record, it's not something I just threw in for no reason; I was planning this in advance. A couple of you questioned a line in Black Opera, that went as follows:
'…He'd loved him more than anything, wanted for nothing more than that white-as-snow skin and black-as-ebony hair, needed it just stop himself from falling apart, so badly that after L's death he'd… he'd even—'
That cut-off line refers to (or would have referred to) Light's little "fling" with dear Matsuda.
:P
Okay, well… That's that, I guess. Our forum is open as usual for any burning questions you might have.
- RobinRocks and Narroch xXx
P.S: Next chapter… oh, you guys are gonna love it! Seriously. …We hope.