A/N - This is the second update today. Don't get confused. :D I'm on FIRE! I've subsisted on three pots of tea and need food! Thanks, recipe for speedy feedback!

Malevolent

Matt's phone rang around 11 o'clock. He hit a switch on the earpiece he was wearing so he wouldn't have to take his hands off his controller for long.

Light took advantage of the momentary distraction to get ahead of him in Mario Kart, smirking when whoever called Matt got a string of curses as a greeting.

"Yeah," Matt said distractedly, leaning forward as if that would make his car go faster. "He's here."

Light frowned when it became apparent who was calling. Ryuzaki was checking up on him without bothering to come out in the drizzle to see him in person.

"You have a message for him or something?"

Light hit pause and leaned back against his office chair so he could watch Matt's expression. Hearing one-sided conversations about himself was always unpleasant.

"Oh." Matt's eyebrows rose under his goggles. "Okay. Bye."

Matt switched off the call and took the game off pause.

Light waited for him to say something, anything, but Matt paid no attention to him, only leaning around corners and cursing whenever he ran into giant ducks or banana peels.

"Did Ryuzaki have anything for me?" Light finally asked when he crossed the finish line only a hair ahead of Matt.

"No. He just asked where you were."

Light reluctantly set the controller aside and put his head back on the chair.

"I should probably go back."

"Why? He said you could have the rest of the day off if you wanted it."

Light frowned; that would have constituted a "message" for him, but apparently Matt had already assumed that he would take the entire day off.

"I have weekends off. I don't need to be taking weekdays too."

"But don't you see?" Matt fiddled with the video game as he spoke. "This is a victory for you."

"There is no victor in this game we're playing." Light sat up and rubbed at his neck. He was tired of yesterday's clothes; he did need to go back to the house. "It's a stalemate."

"Not if you don't let him walk all over you."

"What do you have against... L?" Light tried to recall if Roger had left the building before using Ryuzaki's real name.

Light had been wondering this for a while, but today Matt's behavior seemed more antagonistic than flippant toward the older man.

"Against L? Nothing personally." Matt looked away from the television in what appeared to be surprise but was probably feigned. "Well, almost nothing. I don't like how he treats people but that doesn't really bother me since we don't work together."

Light wondered if Matt knew he was lying to himself or if he had been doing it so long that he now believed it.

Matt picked up the remote and started scrolling through the cable television channels after shutting off the Wii.

"You know how he was there when Mello died?"

Light's ears perked up and he sat up a little straighter. "I remember you telling me that."

"Right." Matt waited again before speaking. "Well, it doesn't make sense. Mello and L were rivals, not friends, and L never told me why they were together that day."

Matt tapped the fingers of one hand on the remote. "I think he doesn't want to say what happened, not that he lost his memory for good. That is why I have issues with L. We're all liars here but you don't withhold things like that from friends."

Light knew all too well that their very existence seemed to be built around an ever-increasing series of lies. False names, fake identities, counterintelligence, secrecy, misdirection… Fortunately he was having less and less of a problem with it. Otherwise, he would probably go mad here.

"Why were they rivals?"

"We all are, or were. How much do you know about L?"

"My father said he was a great international detective but no one knew who he really was."

"Your father?"

"He's a police chief. He worked with Watari and L before without knowing anything about them other than their titles. He figured out who L was." Light waved a hand in dismissal; these details were irrelevant. "That's all I really know."

Matt hummed in response to the information for a second. "I probably shouldn't say much else but we're all supposed to become like that. Detectives, investigators, all-around-geniuses, I suppose. L was just the first and he's the example of 'perfection' that we all had to grow up with."

"Mello didn't like that, did he?" Light tried to direct the conversation back to this mystery person that he heard so little about.

"No, and can you see why?" Matt leaned forward, the television ignored. "L wouldn't leave so Mello couldn't ever do anything worthwhile since he was always in L's shadow. There's no glory in being the best when the prototype is still around to make you look like just another wannabe. At least, I think that was his problem."

Matt looked down for a moment and picked at a seam in his jeans, but when he lifted his head, his expression was forcibly cheerful. "He didn't talk to me as much at the end."

Light waited to see if anything else was forthcoming as the silence stretched out uncomfortably. "I'm sorry for asking questions."

"Don't worry about it." Matt shrugged. "I got it out of my system."

"Well, I think I need to go eat something." He really meant that he wanted to go take a shower and change his clothes, but that was an unnecessary detail.

"You going to go back to L for the day?"

"I think so. It was nice just to have the break this morning."

"Don't let him order you around, Light. You deserve better than that."

Light paused as he adjusted his wrinkled collar. Matt wasn't looking at him anymore and was resolutely clicking through the channels. He smiled faintly; no one knew how to communicate effectively at this house, but it was almost endearing at this point.

He was nearly out the door before Matt's final query came to him.

"When are you going to tell him that you know who he is?"

"I don't know yet." Light grinned at Matt's amused expression. "I rather like having my own secrets."

Matt waved at him as he left the building.

"Perhaps Light should look into getting his own place."

Wammy attempted to be nonchalant about dropping that suggestion in the midst of one of his and L's profound busy silences. They were working out of the suite next to L's, the main room of which was actually gutted to serve as a communications center with a server and too many computer screens. It was a miniature version of Matt's cave behind the house. The room was continually dark and oppressive with the only glare from the screens to light it, but L liked it that way so he didn't argue with him.

"Why?" L asked immediately, glancing up from his work in what constituted surprise for him. "All the resources he needs are here, and there's no reason to make him drive here every day."

"What does he do whenever you two argue?" Wammy paused for effect. "He leaves. He feels trapped living here with us."

"I don't..." L frowned fiercely in a shocking display of emotion. "I don't want to let him go just yet."

"Why are you so worried? He's not going to return to Japan." Wammy adjusted the small light over his desk so he could see his book better while L remained shrouded in blue-white gloom.

"It's not Japan I worry about. I don't trust him on his own."

"So how do you plan to ever work with him if you can't trust him?" Wammy was deliberately misinterpreting L's words to get L to talk about his and Light's unstable relationship. L would only speak to correct misconceptions when he was in one of his moods.

The fact that he had asked Wammy to join him instead of working with Light was a definite sign that L's plans had gone awry.

Again.

"Not that kind of trust." L finally took his hands off the keyboard and picked up his box of Panda cookies instead. "I don't trust him... not to do anything foolish."

Wammy sat back, satisfied. "But you think keeping him under surveillance is going to help."

L's silence was a definite negative.

"Do you think he's suicidal?"

L shook his head slowly as he crunched through a tiny cookie, his eyes focused on something that didn't exist.

"So why do you think he won't do well on his own?"

"He'll stop taking care of himself again." L peeked at Wammy through his hair momentarily. "He's not better, he's not 'fixed'. Remember what he looked like when he arrived? At least now he's eating and he's around people all the time."

"So what do you think we should do? He doesn't like it here but you think he'll do worse on his own."

"I'm not a psychiatrist!" L snapped as he slammed the half-empty box into the keyboard.

Wammy jumped and dropped the book he had been holding at the sudden noise.

L never raised his voice.

Between one breath and the next, L regained control of his breathing and picked the fallen box off the floor. He inspected the inside and removed a broken cookie with a faint look of consternation.

If only Wammy could get his heart to stop racing as easily. Sometimes he wondered if he'd created a machine rather than a detective.

"As I was saying, I'm an investigator, not a doctor. I didn't think hiring him would entail having to put him back together." L put the cookie in his mouth and set the rest back down. He pulled his feet up into the chair and curled around his knees while he chewed.

"I'm doing the only thing I know how to do but it's not working. My own work has become secondary to trying to figure out how to work with him." L looked over at Watari, his eyes showing the anger that his expression wouldn't.

"I am failing with him in every way."

Wammy could only imagine what it had cost L to admit that.

"Give it a little more time. You've only been together, what, two months?"

"I'm starting to think two years won't be enough. You were right; it isn't possible for any of us to work together."

"I meant Mello back then. He wanted to be in charge of himself so, no, you two would never have worked out." Wammy briefly considered the oddity of convincing L of the validity of his own argument to hire Light. "Light is different. He's not going to end up like Mello did."

"How would you know?" L bit out. "You didn't hear the things he said."

"Which one?"

"Mello." L physically wiped his disgusted expression clear. It was unnerving to watch, how cleanly he shunted all of his emotions aside. He and Wammy had never had an argument in which he lost control of his emotions, twice no less. Not since L was a child.

"Mello wanted me dead. He said as much at the end, that they were all waiting for me to die so they could take over." L affected a laugh. "Mello just tried to make it happen."

"What?" Wammy choked out.

"I don't think he planned it, but he tried to take advantage of a bad situation."

L's hands trembled slightly from where they rested on the tabletop, but that was nothing compared to Wammy's shortness of breath.

"But I thought... The amnesia, it was only temporary?"

L nodded. "I remembered the rest before I left the hospital." He stopped tapping his fingers and stared off across the room.

"What did he do? The police said it was... an accident." Why couldn't he catch his breath?

"It was. Something made the lorry ahead of us swerve into our lane."

"Another wreck on the bridge ahead of you, around the curve. I saw it when I got there." Wammy regretted interrupting the narrative but L continued as if he hadn't said anything.

"Mello was already speeding and..." L paused and tilted his head calmly as if he wasn't talking about a homicide attempt. "He knew we couldn't stop in time, so he turned and tried to take the collision on my side."

"You can't know that. He--" Wammy grimaced. This wasn't possible! No child that he had raised would even consider such a thing. It wasn't… It couldn't be true.

"He looked at me before he swerved." L smiled, and nothing had ever looked so perversely out of place. "Plus his last words were about my death anyway.

"We hit the back of the lorry at an angle. I went through the windshield and apparently barely cleared the trailer but the car went under the truck." L studied his ragged fingernails as if relating a story from the newspaper. "It seems not wearing my seat belt saved my life, but it decapitated him. I saw it when I came to on the side of the road."

"Oh God..." Wammy shuddered as L's behavior after the accident became clear. "Why didn't you tell anyone?"

"Why would anyone need to know? It was my lesson to learn." L crossed his arms defensively and looked into the corner. "Matt didn't need to know that about his best friend, so I pretended I still didn't remember anything."

"You have a very cavalier attitude about death."

L was halfway out of his chair and facing the door behind him before Light even finished.

"Light!" Wammy said unnecessarily, coming to his feet as well. A sudden ache in his shoulder made him wince, but he couldn't focus on that right now.

The dim nature of the room had made it impossible to see that the door was open, much less that Light was leaning against the doorframe. His expression was unreadable in the darkness, but his posture belied his fury.

"What did you hear?" L hissed, his paranoia overcoming his surprise.

"I have to agree." Light continued, pointedly ignoring L as he uncrossed his arms. "You're not a psychiatrist.

"In fact, despite being the 'world's greatest detective', I'd say you don't know one goddamn thing about people, L."

L flinched but said nothing.

"So what am I, besides a failure? A charity case? Another lesson for you to learn and then lie about?" Light leaned forward from his slouch and stepped away from the door.

"I was not implying--"

"Shut up." L closed his mouth at Light's order, and Wammy could not have been more shocked at his complaisance. "I'm playing the investigator right now."

Light picked his way across the dark carpet, primly avoiding the crumbs on the floor until he stood well within L's personal space. L inclined his head slightly away from Light's but didn't give him any ground. Light's face was mere inches from L's and he wore an eerily relaxed expression.

"Would you chalk my suicide up to experience too if you failed?" He asked drily, and L scowled in response.

"Light-kun, don't--"

Light's fist connected with L's face so quickly that Wammy could only guess at what happened when L stumbled backward and nearly tripped over his chair. He clapped a hand to his mouth and nose and bent nearly double, one hand holding him steady against the desk.

Meanwhile, Light stood there, impassive and calm while he flexed his bloodied fingers.

"You were right, Mr. Wammy. It's much more effective when you aim several inches beyond their heads."

Light cocked his head in a creepy parody of L's occasional manner of listening, his eyes fixed on L. "You cut me. Did I knock out any teeth?"

L lifted his head, his eyes livid and blood seeping between his fingers as he glared silently at Light. Wammy took the few steps toward L and reached out to offer his handkerchief, but his fingers were going numb and he dropped it.

Light picked up the scrap of cloth and pressed it into L's free hand with both of his.

That did it. L lunged toward Light with a snarl and Wammy only barely managed to get in the way as Light took a calm step backward.

"Temper, temper," Light chided with a faint smile as Wammy fought to control L. "Who would know the great L was such a terrible loser?" His expression darkened as he stared into L's eyes. "I knew this was a mistake from the start too."

Light turned away from L, who had allowed his arms to be trapped at his sides. Wammy knew that L could have broken free if he really wanted it.

"Let's just end this charade." Light said enigmatically over his shoulder before leaving the room and closing the door.

"L..." Wammy gasped as he let go of L so he could press his fingers against the pain that had crept into his chest.

L sniffed and wiped at his streaming eyes with a hand slick with blood. There was more running from his nose and dribbling from his cut lip. "He broke my nose." He said in a strangely forlorn tone. Then, horribly and inexplicably, he started crying.

Wammy could only stare in shock. Too much was happening at once.

Then he was lying on the floor, his hand still pressing weakly against the shooting pain in his shoulder, and he knew something was really wrong.

L fell to his knees beside him, the sobs only making it harder to hear him. "Mr. Wammy? What's wrong?"

But Wammy was past being able to speak.