L sat on the top step, elbows leaning on his knees, head down, hair hanging in front of his face. He watched through the curtain of dark locks as two bodies hidden safely in body bags were rolled out of the house. A paramedic was speaking to Roger, who looked rather hassled. The paramedic said something, waving his hands around agitatedly. Roger shook his head and, looking around to make sure none of the other emergency services saw him, slipped the doctor a wad of pound notes. The doctor's eyes widened, and he looked at Roger, a look of shock under his mask. Roger waved his hand, and the paramedic nodded hastily, turning and shouting something at his underlings.

"L," L turned around, seeing Watari standing behind him. "You should really head up to the infirmary. I need to treat your wounds –"

"No, Watari," L interrupted, shaking his head. "Later."

Watari hesitated, then sighed. He turned and walked off. As he left, he whispered, "I'm sorry," L's lip twitched as the two words drifted past his ear.

There was the sound of footsteps approaching, and he glanced up yet again to see his three successors approaching him. Mello sat down right next to him, Near claiming the other side, leaving Matt to squish in next to Mello, squeezing as close to L as he could.

"Are you okay?" Matt asked, and L blinked in surprise.

"Of course," L turned his face away, and came nose-to-nose with Near, his huge grey eyes boring into his bottomless black ones.

"You don't have to lie," Near said bluntly, turning a finger puppet around on his index. "You're allowed to be sad."

L turned away again, looking forwards, but not really seeing what was going on. "I. . ." he hesitated, before continuing. "My heart hurts," he said tentatively, a hand reaching up to brush his chest. "But. . . not in the way that you would expect from an illness or injury." he stopped, moistening his lips, unsure of what to say. "It's tugging; pulling, really. I'm not sure what it's supposed to mean."

Mello and Matt shared a glance, and Near averted his gaze. L nodded quietly to himself. He hadn't expected them to respond either.

Nobody noticed him slip a tiny, crumpled-up sheet of paper into his pocket.

xxx

Beyond Birthday, stab wound. January 21, 5:25 p.m.

夜神月, snapped neck. January 21, 5:27 p.m.

Explanations

Rue: A child version of Ryuzaki from Light Up the NEW World/Death Note: New Generation (I personally think that the beforementioned live-actions aren't actually that bad. . . as movies. As a part of the Death Note franchise, they are a disgrace; kind of like Solo, really). Ryuzaki is the 'true successor of L', who solves cases under the same alias that L and Beyond went under. I felt like just right-out calling him Ryuzaki would be a bit confusing, so I called him Rue, instead (I didn't notice I gave him the same name as Rue from the Hunger Games until I was about fifteen chapters in. . . I'm so dim XD) I got a review from a person who didn't understand what I was getting at with Rue. Don't worry, it wasn't meant to be obvious :) In his episode of New Generation, Ryuzaki makes a reference implying that he was 'L's successor born from IVF'. IVF is short for in vitro fertilisation, in which an embryo is made outside of the body. This implied that he was a biological recreation of L, and I thought that would be interesting to explore. My personal second-favorite character from my least favorite part of the franchise (Arma tops in at first ;)).

The last piece of the notebook: I don't think that the court would have sent Light to prison if he didn't remember his crimes as Kira, so I had them attach a tiny piece to his skin. Why they made it big enough for him to write names, you will have to guess for yourself (jk, I was just to lazy to come up with a proper explanation). How did L get the last piece of the Death Note in the human world? My story was that he kept a sheet after they burnt the notebooks. I was originally going to write it into the story, but couldn't find the right place to stick it. Before you knew it, we were on the last chapter, and I still hadn't managed to work it in.

Amanda and Anthony: If you didn't figure it out, I meant for Amanda and Anthony to be Near's parents. I know that it's not exactly in line with the rest of the story, but I've always had this theory that Commander Rester was secretly somehow Near's dad, and I really just wanted to work it in, somehow.

'My heart hurts': A reference to the novel L: chage the WorLd (a novel adaptation to the film, with some notable changes and additions). During one part of the novel, L states that his heart hurts. I really wanted to work that line in here (also, just a fun fact, that was the one line that I've been sitting on since the start of the story. I pretty much wrote the entire story just so I could fit in that final paragraph).