Risks and Rewards
Description: Elijah has a new year and a new mission, but this time Light won't be so cooperative. Let the battle of ideology begin.
Disclaimer: Death Note is still not mine. Go figure.
A/N: Here you are, the final chapter of "Risks and Rewards". Afterwards, please continue on to the short epilogue and my final comments.
Chapter 25
To all things there is a beginning and an end. Someone said that once, and as annoying a statement as it was, it was true. This beginning had occurred on a normal school day when he was young and disillusioned and bored. It had begun with a mild curiosity that had quickly morphed to revulsion and fear. Those emotions, however, had almost immediately stepped aside to make room for the excitement, the thrill of power, and the lust for more. His madness had well and truly begun then, and it had carried him upon its wildly raging back for years.
Yet his insanity had been destined to end from the moment it had begun. Such was the way of all things: a beginning and an end. Had he continued on as a passenger of the madness, Death would have eventually ended his ride, either at the end of a long and successful life or far before his time in the seat of an electric chair. Either way, there would have been no new beginnings after the end of this one; his life would have ended at the same time. It would have been his very last beginning.
Would have been. Those were the important words. Because he had already dismounted the beast that had been bearing him to his doom, and now he was ready to shoot it dead with his own hands. He was ready in mind, body, and spirit to kill the madness and walk away.
He had everything prepared. He had both remaining Death Notes. He had the little plastic lighter he had bought months ago and a newly purchased container in which the fire could safely burn. He had the window of his dormroom open even though it was January. He had Elijah in the room with him in case anything went wrong. He had a distinct lack of Shinigami as Ryuk had decided to stay in Japan and follow Misa around for a while. Nothing he needed was absent.
It was time. Time to end one thing and to begin something new.
"Well, Kira," Elijah murmured from his place on the bed, "do you have any last words?"
Light smirked at his best friend, cocky to the very end and proud of it. "No," he replied. "Should I?"
Elijah laughed a little. "I suppose not," he admitted. "Besides, you and I both know that Kira has been dead for many months. This …" He motioned to the notebooks in Light's lap. "This is merely his funeral."
"Kira's funeral," Light added, leveling a meaningful gaze on the man opposite him, "and your birth."
The other smiled. "I suppose."
That smile. How many times over the past year and a half had he seen that same exact smile being directed at him? Light didn't know, but he suspected that, come this same time tomorrow, he would no longer be able to remember even half of them. Too many of their conversations, especially the private ones, had been wrapped up in the truth that he was Kira and Elijah was L. All of those memories would soon be gone, and all Light would have of them would be faint echoes of remembrance, impossibly blurred and indistinct. It hurt to know that, to know that half of their friendship was about to be obliterated in the span of a few seconds.
And yet I will not waver, he told himself as he lifted the lighter from off of his desk. Our friendship is strong, unshakable. It will bear this blow with little effort. And we will make new memories together to replace the ones I will have lost.
A small clicking noise, and Misa's Death Note was burning. Light lifted the little black book by one corner and watched it for a while, just like he had done with Rem's. The flickering flames were oddly mesmerizing as they licked up the sides of the notebook and began snaking across the front and back. Before the grasping red tendrils could reach his fingers, Light dropped the book into the container on the floor and watched it until it was ash. One part of his mind idly thought about the Shinigami who had owned it originally and wondered in a detached way whether his remains in any way resembled the crumbled dust that his notebook had become.
To all things a beginning and an end.
"One left," Elijah said softly once the first fire had burned itself out.
"Yeah," Light agreed in a similar tone. Unconsciously, his hand tightened around the black book in his lap.
"Are you scared?" the older man questioned after a short pause.
The younger snapped his head up to glare at his best friend. Perhaps his stomach was churning abnormally as if in anxiety, and perhaps he was hesitating a little bit before willingly wiping his mind clear of years worth of memories. But that didn't mean he was scared, and even if he was, he'd be damned before he'd admit to it.
Elijah responded to Light's angry gaze with an apologetic smile. "Well," he said gently, turning his head to gaze with clear eyes out the open window, "whatever you are or aren't feeling at this moment, I'm sure you know as I do that you can always trust me." His gaze slipped sideways and he smirked a little. "Ne, Raito-kun?"
"Aa," Light replied immediately, reassured by the other's words and expression. That's right; he trusted Elijah more than anyone. He didn't need to worry about taking this step into the abyss of the unknown. Elijah would be there waiting for him to take his hand and guide him until Light could walk on his own once more. And even then, Elijah would still be there, walking beside him for as long as Light wished him to be. Never before had Light felt such an immense amount of trust as he did when he looked at his best friend's face at this critical moment. It truly was a wonderful and liberating feeling.
Smiling serenely, Light lifted the final Death Note from his lap into the air and said, "Please take care of me, Eraisho-san."
He flicked his thumb, producing a small flare of fire, and lowered one corner of the Death Note into its reach.
The headache started immediately. A warning, he supposed, a chance to stop the flames before the book was entirely destroyed. Light ignored it, but he dropped the book into the container right away rather than try to hold it for any length of time. Slowly, steadily, the pain increased, slicing through his brain with fiery fingers nearly identical to the ones that devoured the black book in front of him. Light could feel the sweat begin to bead on his forehead and the back of his neck. Fighting the natural beginnings of panic, he steeled his resolve and focused on his breathing instead. When the fire finally reached the white lettering on the cover, he slipped from his desk chair to the floor. He had the sneaking suspicion that he was about to faint, and he figured it would hurt less if he didn't have as far to fall.
"Light?" Elijah's concerned voice filtered through the pain that burned behind his eyes. "Are you all right?"
Light didn't answer. He had clenched his teeth to prevent himself from accidentally biting his tongue. A moment later, Elijah was on the floor with him, one hand lightly gripping Light's shoulder, steadying him. Even though his head was throbbing with a pounding pain unlike anything he had ever experienced, Light had kept his gaze fixed on the burning notebook. It was a point of pride for him, his very last challenge, to watch the destruction of his madness until the very end. But when he felt Elijah's soft touch on his shoulder, he instantly broke his staring match with the flames to meet his friend's worried gaze instead. For some reason, the blue of the older man's eyes cooled the fire within him slightly, soothing the pain just enough that he was able to give Elijah a small triumphant smile.
Elijah's gentle return smile was the last thing Light saw before the pain dragged him down into darkness.
xXx
After guiding Light's limp body gently to the floor, Elijah turned and managed to see the last few flickers of fire before it completely consumed its fuel and burned itself out. All that remained of the weapons that had claimed countless lives was a pile of gray ash.
Elijah sighed and turned back to his unconscious friend. "It's done, Light," he whispered to the pinched face. "It's over now."
Rising to his feet, he shifted his attention to the evidence of the burning. It would have to be removed before Light woke up. Elijah knew he was going to have a hard enough time explaining to Light why the younger man had passed out in his room without having to deal with the question of what had been burned and why. He would have to move quickly since he didn't know how long Light would be out.
He had only taken one step, however, when his whole body ignited.
Elijah threw his head back and bit down a cry of surprise and pain as something hot and sharp vibrated through him. It gripped his entire body, threading through every inch of him. He could feel each individual artery, each capillary, as the heat shot through his bloodstream. Weaving through his brain, branching out into each finger and toe, coursing strongly down his back and across his chest. And yet, far worse, as the hot shocks passed through, they left an icy emptiness behind. A cold ingrained knowledge of the mortality of flesh. An unavoidable truth: this body will one day die.
For one terrible moment, Elijah was consumed by the inevitability of death. The next moment, it was over. His natural mental shutters had kicked in, leaving him panting and sweating as if he had just run a mile but thankfully once again blinded to the reality of mortality. He had very little time to recover, however, for only a few seconds had passed before a new sensation gripped him, this one of pressure from an extremely large and powerful being.
"Congratulations," a voice he knew well whispered through his mind. "Enjoy your new life. I wish you well."
The pressure began to ease as his soul monitor began to move away, but Elijah had been prepared for this moment. He had not expected to be so shaken and winded, but what he had just experienced had done nothing to lessen his resolve.
"Wait," he croaked, voice cracking from the strain his body had recently suffered. "Don't leave yet. Wait!"
The retreating presence paused, and a moment later, Elijah heard the voice in his head once more. "What is it?"
He quickly swallowed a few times to fix his voice and took a short breath before stating, "I wish to argue for Light's soul."
For a moment, his monitor did nothing; then the pressure returned, making Elijah bow his head a little from the strength of it.
"What do you mean?"
"The bearer of a Death Note cannot go to Heaven or Hell," Elijah explained. "I wish to submit a request that this rule be discarded in Light's case, and I am prepared to fight until my request is accepted."
A small sigh ghosted through his mind, and he felt the pressure shift as if his monitor were settling in for a long discussion. "I am afraid your request cannot even be considered," the response came. "The reason why the soul does not go to Heaven or Hell is because it goes to the Shinigami instead. After death, a soul that has been touched by a Death Note is reborn as a new Shinigami. It retains no memory of its life as a human and lives in subservience to the Shinigami King for as long as that being decrees. That was the deal made between Heaven and the Shinigami world many millennia ago. It is not something that can be discarded simply because you ask for it."
Quickly, Elijah processed this new information. If anything, it made him even more determined to win Light's soul back from its predetermined fate. The thought of his strong-willed, intelligent friend being a slave to the Shinigami King, memories or no, made him sick to his stomach. "Yet Heaven can go against that agreement," he argued, "because Heaven has power over the Shinigami realm. The fact that you have cameras there, secretly I might add, asserts your dominance over them."
Out of nowhere, the pressure that was bearing down on Elijah's shoulders increased to the point where his back bowed and he could no longer raise his head. For a moment, he felt alarmed that he had angered his monitor, but then he realized that the feel of the presence around him had changed. He could still feel the aura that he knew as his own monitor, but there was also a different aura surrounding him now, one that radiated curious interest. He realized with a sudden shock that a second high-ranking soul had arrived to watch.
"While it is true that Heaven has power over the Shinigami," his own monitor was continuing, "exercising it would put considerable strain on our relations which, as you might expect, are already not in the best shape. We are not willing to do that for a single soul, much less for Kira."
"And what about me?" Elijah immediately shot back. "I am the first soul to ever live out its full year and I eliminated Kira for you."
"Both of which you have been rewarded for, Elijah McCormick."
"I disagree. After my first year, I was given a mission, not a reward. A mission which Heaven wanted done but which, because of its current policy, was unable to do itself. From that standpoint, you were the ones who were rewarded by me successfully making it through a year, not me. And while I was given a payment for completing your request, I finished it in half the time allotted, for which I should be given special consideration."
The pressure suddenly doubled, driving Elijah to his knees. He felt his face and back begin to sweat again, and his arms shook slightly as they braced his upper body against the floor. More spectators had arrived. While Elijah was heartened by the obvious fact that he was making a spectacle large enough to make others take notice, he didn't think his body would be able to handle much more.
"It is January," his monitor argued, apparently unaware of his plight.
"But the deaths stopped in October!" Elijah gasped out, tasting the sweat as it beaded on his upper lip. "That's what you wanted, wasn't it? With the Notes gone, Light can't change his mind and no one else can pick them up and use them, but what you really wanted was to stop people dying before their time. And that happened in October, six months after I was given my mission!"
Somewhere within his mind, something began to rustle faintly. At first, he thought it was simply an effect of the strain on his physical body, but after a moment, Elijah realized it was the other souls. They were whispering amongst themselves.
Encouraged, he continued, "There has never been another soul like me before in the history of Heaven. Similarly, has there ever been a soul like Light? No other Death Note user has tried to use its power to bring good to the world. He strayed, yes, he strayed terribly, but originally, he wanted to use it to help other people. How many users did that? How many were so dedicated, so ambitious, and so intelligent that it made Heaven sit up and take notice? And how many other users have given up their Notes, not out of a fear of their actions or of being caught, but out of a desire to help someone else?"
His arms were aching from holding himself upright and sweat was trickling down his face and neck, but Elijah fought to keep going. After several gasping breaths, he gathered up all his remaining strength and finished, "I know that Light still believed that the Death Note was not entirely useless, that he could still do good if he kept it. But he destroyed it with his own hands because he wanted to save me and because he knew that by taking this road, he could do so much more. Are you saying that worsening an already bad relationship is more important than two souls the likes of which have never been seen since the birth of humanity itself?!"
His elbows buckled and Elijah fell forward as the pressure increased even more. Somehow, he managed to keep his head from hitting the floor, but he couldn't stop the cry of pain that escaped him. His panic instincts were beginning to trigger, and he fought to keep them at bay and to keep his mind clear. He still needed to be able to think and reason even if his body felt as if it were slowly being crushed.
The voice of his monitor filtered into his mind through the haze that the adrenaline was beginning to create. "Do you realize what you are suggesting for him? His sins are too numerous to count. If we keep his soul from the Shinigami, it will only be to send him to Hell. Is that what you want for him?"
"I realize that," he choked out, each lungful of air a struggle to obtain, "but he has a lifetime to atone. He wants to do so much good for the world. If he accomplishes even half of his goals, surely that will count for something. Enough to place him in Purgatory instead of Hell." Somehow, even as he fought and suffered, Elijah managed a small smirk as he said, "And the Christians are always saying that God is merciful and forgiving. Are they wrong?"
"He has lost the memories of his sins. It will be easy for him to lose focus and stray."
"He has me!" Elijah cried, his shout of anger turning into a semi-squeak from lack of air. "I will keep him focused. Because of him, I have a second life and I will use it to make sure that we both go to the same place when we die."
The pressure bearing down on him decreased slightly, enough to allow him to breathe again but not enough that he could lift himself from his bowed position on the floor. As he gasped in much-needed oxygen, he faintly heard a voice whisper in an impressed and mildly fond tone, "You have a second life due to your own merits, soul once known as L Lawliet."
In the silence that followed, broken only by the slight rustling of the high-level souls whispering together, Elijah managed to move his head just enough to be able to see Light's face through the damp curtain of his sweat-soaked bangs. The pain had left his best friend's expression, and for the moment, the young man appeared to be peacefully sleeping. Elijah's heart smiled even if his face could not. Slowly and with great effort, the older man inched one of his hands closer to the younger's, and finally, after about five minutes of constant struggle, their fingers gently brushed against each other. Satisfied, Elijah dropped his forehead onto the floor, closed his eyes, and waited.
Eventually, the pressure that had hindered his breathing returned, although this time his own monitor seemed to notice his difficulty. "All of you back up!" the soul ordered sternly. "Or better yet, get out of here. He is my business; you have your own to attend to." Almost instantly, over half of the weight that kept him down evaporated. At least one soul remained with his monitor, but Elijah was too relieved to care that he had not been released entirely. Now that he could move without having to fight for every inch, he grasped Light's limp hand fully, but he kept his body bowed and his head on the floor. Too much of his strength had drained to move further yet.
In his head, two voices exchanged a few brief words in a language he didn't understand. Then, the second presence was gone and only his monitor remained. "Your request and arguments have been relayed to The Father. No decision has been made as of yet. However, soul known as Elijah McCormick, be heartened by the fact that it is being considered at all. Know that this day you have gained several advocates to your cause who will argue your side during the debates that are sure to follow." A slight pause followed in which Elijah felt a warmth travel through his tired muscles like the caress of a caring hand. When his monitor spoke again, the fondness had returned. "Know also," the voice said, "that I am among them. I am glad to have met you, Elijah McCormick, formerly L Lawliet. A long and happy life to you and to those you love."
The presence and the pressure vanished. Elijah crumpled from the relief, fighting to retain the consciousness that threatened to slip away at any moment. But even as his world faded in and out of blackness, he never once lost the joyful smile on his face or loosened the grip he had on his best friend's hand.
xXx
Light woke slowly and painfully, fighting for every inch of clarity. His head hurt as if someone had strung him up upside-down and used him for a piñata. Every nerve ending in his brain seemed to flare in protest of something, although what it was he didn't know. Whenever he tried to think of what could have happened to cause this pain, his memory failed him. It didn't matter how many times he tried to remember; he kept coming up blank.
"Light?" a quiet voice asked directly above him as cool fingers gently touched his aching forehead. "Are you awake?"
Stifling a groan, he cracked open one eye and blearily took in a concerned blue gaze set in a pale, slightly-freckled face. For a single frightening moment, his mind remained blank, but then, thankfully, his brain finally kick-started itself into some semblance of functionality.
"Elijah," he said, his voice hoarse and scratchy. "What the hell happened to me?"
His friend smiled and returned his hands to his own lap as he perched on the bed where Light lay. "You weren't feeling well after lunch," the older man answered easily, "so I suggested we come back here so you could rest. You fell asleep and have been out for quite some time. Do you feel better?"
"No," Light half-growled. "I feel terrible." He clutched his head with one hand as Elijah's words bounced around inside of it. Now that he had been reminded, he could remember eating lunch with his best friend. He remembered the restaurant and even what he had ordered, but he couldn't remember feeling sick or coming back to his room to lie down. And for some reason that he didn't understand, his instinct was telling him that Elijah had just lied to him. That the particular answer he had just received had been rehearsed. But that didn't make sense. Why would Elijah lie to him?
The bed dipped as Elijah slipped off of it and moved towards Light's dresser. Watching him go, Light suddenly noticed something else amiss.
"'Lij, why is my window open?"
"Ah, I thought that some fresh air would be beneficial," the other answered without turning around.
Again, something prickled at the back of Light's mind as if to say that Elijah's answer had been predetermined. Or perhaps Light was merely experiencing déjà vu? Shaking off the unsettling sensation, Light snapped, "It's January, 'Lij. It's freezing outside. Shut it now."
"Of course." A moment later the window was shut and Elijah was standing in front of him with a couple of pills in his outstretched hand. "For your head," he explained when Light stared at them. "You were holding it as if in pain, so I thought you might appreciate some medication."
"Oh. Thanks." Head protesting the movement, Light sat up and took the medicine from Elijah's hand, but before he could swallow them dry, he paused. The other man had slipped his empty hands in his pockets, and now he stood there, feet bare, shoulders slightly hunched, gazing at Light from behind messy blond bangs. The sight had frozen the brunet solid, and he could only sit there and gape at the figure before him.
"Light?" Elijah questioned after a moment, cocking his head to one side.
The movement sent an unexplained shock of sadness through Light's chest; he shook his head to get rid of it, not caring about the pain the action caused. "Sorry," he apologized weakly. "I just …" He stopped himself and swallowed a few times to regain his proper voice. "I told you, didn't I?" he finally asked with eyes averted. "That you remind me of a friend I used to have."
"Ah, yes," Elijah answered, his tone suddenly soft and full of understanding. "A friend of yours who is now dead. I believe his name was … Ryuzaki?"
"That's right." For some reason, Light couldn't seem to bring up a clear memory of meeting Ryuzaki or of the man's death, but some aspects of his old friend remained perfectly clear. His habits and his strange appearance and Light's overwhelming respect for him even as the panda-faced eccentric drove him completely up the wall. Elijah physically looked so very much like Ryuzaki that it had momentarily stunned Light and sent him hurtling back into old emotions and slightly-hazy memories.
Yet, when Light looked again, he could easily see the differences between the two men, apart from the obvious hair and eye color. Elijah may have been standing in his room with bare feet, but the blond's shoes and -- more importantly -- socks sat by the door ready to be put on when he wanted to leave. And while Elijah's stance was indeed slumped, it wasn't nearly as bowed as Ryuzaki's had been. His best friend's sweater was a hunter green, not white, and Light knew that the body beneath that baggy shirt was healthy-looking, not rib-baring skinny.
The most important difference, however, was that smile that rested upon Elijah's lips as the older man looked at him. Ryuzaki had never, in all the time Light had known him, worn such an open, friendly smile as that one. He and Ryuzaki had been friends, but they had never trusted each other, never truly cared for one another the way he and Elijah did. Searching what remaining memories he had of the man, Light came to the conclusion that Ryuzaki hadn't known how to care for someone else, and, if he were being honest with himself, he would have to admit that until he met Elijah, he hadn't known how either.
"You look a lot like him," Light said, breaking out into a grin, "but you aren't him. Not by a long shot."
Elijah grinned back. "I'm glad to hear that," he stated. "While I have heard many good things from you about your old friend, I am very happy being who I am. I do not wish to change."
"Good," Light laughed. "I don't want you to change either." Ryuzaki had been a good friend, and Light would never forget him completely. But Elijah was his best friend, the best he had ever had, and he had no doubt in his mind that it would stay that way for the rest of his life.
Still smiling, Light swallowed the pills in his hand, lay back on the bed, and waited for the pain in his head to subside. It bothered him a little that he still couldn't seem to access all of his memories of the past few years, that he was still occasionally getting twinges of déjà vu or little prods from his instincts telling him that something was off, but for now he would just rest and try to ignore it. Whatever happened tomorrow would happen, and he would deal with it as it came.
After all, he was Light Yagami -- brilliant, confident, efficient Light Yagami -- and the future was his for the taking. With his family to support him and his friends to challenge him and push him forward, his success was absolutely assured.
I'll make my mark on the world yet, he thought to himself as he shut his eyes and relaxed into the mattress. I'll leave this world a better place than it was when I found it. I'm not sure exactly how I'm going to do it, but I'm going to do it.
Just wait and see.
End