Chapter Three

Friday came with receiving the results of mid-terms, which I had taken in lieu of examined entrance into the Academy. My ranking within the nation was 29th. I blinked in surprise. Miss Hisashi clapped with joy when she got the news out of me during lunch. Kuroda slapped me on the back. Nizomi and Mikoto were congratulating, though I could see the jealousy behind Mikoto's eyes. Ayako smiled in her gentle, sweet way.

Light smiled, gave me a cordial hug and made sure I saw the 1st place on his results as he placed them in his bag.

I smiled back. I'd figured out what it was I drew at his house.

The blurred image of a man hanging.

Quinn turned on the TV that night.

"We'd like to apologise for the interruption. As of now we are bringing you a live, world-wide broadcast of Interpol's ICPO."

I watched in surprise as a man named Lind L. Tailor appeared on screen. Surprise quickly turned to dismay.

"Otherwise known as L."

Oh no. Oh please, no. This is exactly what I was worried about.

I scrambled into my room and dialled in the number that appeared in my mind's eye. It was picked up on the third excruciatingly slow ring.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Yagami-san, it's Minerva. Can I talk to Light?"

"Oh course, Catearro-san. It's lovely hearing from you so soon. What did you want to talk to him about?"

"I have a question on some of the homework we were given for maths." Come on. I need to get to him before he does something stupid.

"I am sure he'll be happy to help. Have you seen what's on the TV right now?"

"Hmm? Oh, no, I haven't."

"Well, Light can tell you about it. Here he is." Sachiko's voice sounded amused. There was the crackle of static.

Then, "Yes?"

"It's Minerva."

There was silence on the other end, broken only by the sound of the door shutting. I held my breath, listeneing to Lind L. Tailor spout a diatribe on Kira.

"Yes?"

"Light! I know you are watching the L announcement at the moment. Don't you dare kill him. He is an international detective who can solve any case. Please, do not kill him." There was no reply again but this time I stiffened as I heard the ominous sound of pen on paper. "Please don't tell me that you are writing his name down."

"Why?"

"Why? Because I guarantee you that L would have rigged this thing in some way to work out where you are! What would L gain if he just died and left the entire world to the hands of the police? He must have a plan in this; for all we know that might not even be L! How could you not think of –" I broke off at Quinn's gasp, whirled around and ran into the living room. My mind blanked at the sight of Lind L. Tailor slumped over on his desk, motionless.

"Minerva?" Light's voice came through. I narrowed my eyes and didn't bother to leave, regardless of the fact that Quinn could hear here. Soon the entire world would know of Light's stupidity.

"You. Are. An. Idiot."

The screen changed suddenly and switched to a gothic L emblazoned on white. A heavily synthesised voice spoke.

"I – I had to test this just in case but I never thought it would actually happen." They sounded disturbed and almost . . . triumphant.

Light inhaled sharply.

"Kira, it seems you can kill people without having to be there in person. I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't just witnessed it. Listen to me, Kira. If you did indeed kill Lind L. Tailor – the man you just saw die on television – I should tell you that he was an inmate whose execution was scheduled for today. That wasn't me."

"What?" Light gasped.

"Idiot. A complete idiot," I repeated.

"The police arrested him in absolute secrecy so you wouldn't have heard about him on TV or on the internet but it appears that not even you have access to information about these types of criminals." Ryuk chuckled in the background. "But I assure you, L is real. I do exist. Now, try to kill me!"

I watched, the phone almost slipping from my hand, as L backed Kira into a corner. Light's breathing grew heavier and heavier with every word that came from the invisible man's mouth. By the time it was over with a final, "Let's meet again soon, Kira," Ryuk was laughing. I fell onto the sofa next to Quinn. He switched the television off.

"We need to meet," said Light.

"I don't think so." I hung up, tucked Quinn into my side and said, "You won't mind walking to school by yourself tomorrow, right?"

Quinn, being the perfect little brother he was, simply shook his head. No questions, no fuss.

So much better than Light Yagami.

On Saturday I finally remembered the need to buy eggs. Photographic memory only extended so far when it came to whimsical thoughts before traumatic events. So into the rain I went, feeling the winter chill more thoroughly than ever. Tokyo, as I'd discovered, had a much warmer winter than Canada, which meant that I could forgo the fluffy hooded coat from Granny Hiro. In jeans and a raincoat with nothing but my wallet and phone, I headed out with a quick word to Quinn.

It started raining mere seconds into the walk, the heavy, painful kind that blurred everything together into a grey watercolour. It drilled into the sidewalk as though trying to escape the watchful clouds above. They were heavy, black and oppressive with the rain that had been falling for a week now. The hallways of Daikoku hadn't been dry since Tuesday.

Still, it was better than a blizzard. I slogged through, barely paying the unbroken mass of water any attention as my mind whirled with thoughts of driving the old quadbike through the hunting range and Quinn sneaking up behind me to shove snow down my collar. A smile curled my lips even as a twist of homesickness made itself known in my chest.

So caught up in the memories I almost didn't notice when a bike shot past just too close for comfort. The red haze of its lights disappeared into the downpour within seconds, but then another came, and another. Their engines roared, in dire need of a tune up. Familiar.

The rain suddenly started to lessen, which at first I thought was fortunate. It only took a minute or so before than idea was inverted.

One of the bikes wheeled around and just as it was passing the biker looked at me and recognition burst within his eyes. He'd been the one who'd spat at me during the night Takuo was killed. I walked faster, and just like before he cruised alongside.

"Hey!" he shouted. A few of his biker mates slowed and joined him. There were pitifully few cars driving along the street.

"Who's the broad?" one of them asked.

"She was there when Takuo got hit," he replied.

"She was there?"

"Yeah."

"I saw her. Chick was running toward him just when the truck came."

There was something about their voices that worried me. A touch of madness in their tones, an undercurrent of fear. The threat of Kira was strongest in criminals like these, lowlifes who knew they did not have the power to possibly fight the 'god of justice' off. They were scared, superstitious, and scared people did stupid things.

If I'd known how badly that night ended I would have run right there and then. In one second the night took a much deadlier turn.

"What if she was the one who killed him?"

"Like Kira?"

"She's Kira?"

My heart froze in my chest. My legs refused to move. The bikers halted and one by one twisted on their seats to stare, their eyes no different to those of wild, injured animals bent on revenge.

"Kira," one of them hissed. He revved his motorcycle. The first reached into his back pocket. I dropped into a dead sprint before I could see what he had.

The engines of the bikes roared to life behind me and they were off with a screech of rubber on concrete. I careened down the street, knocking those brave enough to wander the streets out of the way. The lightened rain meant I couldn't hide, couldn't meld with the grey background because they could see me.

I remembered the road narrowed into suburban Tokyo. The route Light and I had taken flared in my mind, redirecting itself to coincide with my current path. Alleways connecting the route into a labyrinth appeared like a map and I ducked down the closest one I could find, dodging a wild grab from the frontmost biker. The alley was too small to fit them, perfect for me, but it was short and led out onto another wide street that my pursuers swerved onto quickly. They shouted, they swore, kicking up large sprays of water in their wake as they hurtled after me. Another alley, another wide road, again and again until all I could feel was fear and visualise a haphazard connect-the-dots to Light's house.

My breathing was coming heavily. I tore down another narrow street when my escape was blocked. The motorcyle was quiet, a mere purr compared to the hungry screaming of the other machines, and its rider wore a grey helmet that melted into the rain so he appeared decapitated. A scream caught in my throat as the jeers of his friends shouted from the other side. He and one of the others dismounted and entered the alley, their shoulders nearly touching the walls on either side.

Trapped, I cast around desperately. A lower wooden fence was only a few metres to my left, closer to the group. Taking one last look at the grey-helmeted motorcyclist, I ran in the other direction. The biker on that side laughed, his mouth twisting into a cruel grin as his spread his arms as if to embrace me. Only a mere two metres from him, I used the brick building to one side to catapult myself onto the top of the wooden fence and over. A nail, hidden by the haze, ripped through my jeans as I tumbled down, and gored, tore, down my left leg. A strangled shout rent its way through my throat. Collapsed on the ground, I gasped for breath as my leg burned with pain.

Get up. Move. You can't stay here. Get to Light's and he'll protect you. Following the instruction, I struggled to my feet and limped forwards, using the closest wall as a support. My shoulder banged into metal. Biting down a curse, I felt for the object. A ladder. I glanced down the rest of the path which was shrouded in darkness and then up the ladder. Raindrops splashed into my eyes, blinding me momentarily. Two options presented themselves; onwards, to where the bikers might be circling like vultures, or up to what could be nothing but a blank wall.

Steeling myself, I placed my hands on the rungs and slowly, agonisingly, pulled myself up.

Soon enough the ladder gave way to rusty emergency exit which opened with one hard shove. I crawled in.

The room itself was dark, too dark to see anything, but lent itself the atmosphere of largeness, a great, dilapidated maw of a building. The floor was wooden and splintering but it was dry and as soon as I was far enough away from the sound of the rain through the open door I curled up. My hair was a bedraggled mess, sticking to my face and neck, and water had soaked my shirt beneath my raincoat. The injury to my leg only grew in intensity of agony.

I need . . . someone.

Fumbling, I reached for the phone in my pocket and rang the first number I found. Vaguely I realised it was late and maybe whoever I was calling would be in bed but damn that, I needed help. A shiver wracked my body, causing it to spasm. My free hand smacked the wooden floorboards painfully.

The phone stopped ringing. "Yes?" I heaved a breath, a thousand words trying to make their way from my mind to my mouth but all that came out before my consciousness faded was,

"Help me."

When I awoke it was to the view of a dimly lit ceiling that I had seen before, cream-coloured and bland. Not my room, that was for certain; the apartment ceilings were all stark white or grey. Even Daikoku Academy had white plaster.

Light's room. What am I doing here? I tried to sit up and was immediately hit by a wave of pain from my leg. It broke through the just-awoken mist over my mind and the memories that went with it came flooding back with a vengeance. I gritted my teeth and flopped back onto the soft pillows, concious that I was lying between the sheets of a serial killer.

A serial killer who had, apparently, braved the stormy night to find me in an abandoned building bring me back here to . . . stitch up my leg? Layered under the torturous sensation of torn flesh was definitely an unnatural tug, like I'd been sewn up as a living puppet.

That disturbing thought was quickly overriden by the notion that instead of Light himself finding me, he'd sent Ryuk to get his hands wet and that I'd been carried here in the arms of an unnatural creature of death who dressed like a punk rocker. A shudder ran through my body, and this time it wasn't from bloodloss or cold.

"You're awake, finally." There was a creak and a groan. Light was sitting at his desk, straightening from where he had been slumped over, a blanket over his shoulders. His hair was a mess and his shirt was wrinkled and creased in the pattern of recently dried cotton that remained unironed. Ryuk was nowhere to be seen. A part of me shrivelled with guilt at supposing that Light did not have the capacity to get me himself.

"How did you find me?" I asked, my voice a dry rasp.

"Triangulated the phone signal. You never hung up," he said as he stood and placed a water bottle in my hand. I was too tired to recoil. All I could manage was to wonder why he had the technology to do such a thing. Something better left unsaid, I assumed.

After an awkward, drawn out silence in which he sat back down, eyes focused unseeingly on the closed curtains, I managed to gather my courage enough to ask, "So why did you bother to help? Aren't I more use to you dead?" A frown marred his line-less face, creating a persona of a young academic who'd learnt too much of the world already.

"You think I'm so cruel as to deprive your brother of you?" I swallowed, too afraid to answer that question. He sighed. "Minerva, you can be of use to me. And your death could be seen as suspicious if someone was to investigate."

Right. It's all about you. How could I forget?

"Also . . ." a smile tugged at his lips, lighting his whole face with something so much younger, more innocent than his usual blank expression. This was the boy who girls swooned over at Daikoku. "You are rather different to anyone else I've met. It's refreshing."

The cold, hard fear that settled in my heart whenever he was near stoppered any physical reaction I might have had to what he said, luckily. He must have seen something in my gaze anyway because his smile grew.

"I need to call my brother," I cut in before he could spout anymore ridiculous, affecting lies. Smirk still firmly in place, gave me my cell phone. It had been sitting on his desk. He'd probably read every text on it.

"Quinn?" I said when it stopped ringing.

"V? Where are you? You've been gone all night."

I grimaced. That many words so quickly was basically babbling for my younger brother. "I managed to hurt myself. I'll tell you everything when I see you, but I'm at Light's now."

"Are you safe?" His tone was flat, mistrustful.

"I'll be fine." I cast a wary eye at my host. "I'll be home as soon as possible."

"Good. You need to paint. I know you didn't yesterday."

"I know. See you soon."

"Bye."

Light didn't take my phone from me when the call ended, surprisingly.

"I'll be back," he said, flicking the lights on as he left the room. With no other distractions my injury made itself known with a vengeance. I tossed back the covers and inspected it. And found I was wearing only my underwear and singlet. And that it was cold in Light's room. Gritting my teeth, I pulled back the bandages to see a neat line of black stitches down the very centre of my thigh, the skin around them angry and red. The wound itself was hideous in its jagged depth. I could feel my muscles seizing around it.

The stitches were almost medically perfect, I noted. I'd seen plenty of wounds from bearhunts during my time in Canada and this was almost as well cleaned and repaired as the results the doctors over there produced. Was there anything Light couldn't do?

"I had to get stitches when I was twelve after I slipped off a wall in the park. It wasn't too hard to replicate the process." Light was back, a glass of water in hand. I took it gratefully with a nod of thanks.

"So, tell me." He sat down. "How do you know L?"

I nearly choked on the water. The glass hit the sidetable top with a dull thud. Light didn't move to take it.

"Well?"

"Oh, I knew someone in Canada who'd worked on a case with him before," I lied. Light raised an eyebrow, obviously aware of the falsehood.

"What was the case?"

"He'd worked in Kentucky before moving to Canada. During March it rained meat for three minutes. L was interested."

"Rained meat?"

"Yes. They discovered it was lung tissue from infants."

"Where did it come from?"

"No idea. They classified the case before he learned the cause."

"I see . . ." Light's disbelief was palpable. "Just to clarify this, do you mind if I research?" He spun on his chair and quickly typed in the case into his search drive. Within seconds he had me disproven. It was a story I was told when I was young, and it had enthralled Quinn and I. I'd never bothered to find out the date it occurred though, assuming it was in recent times. As it turned out, the Kentucky meat shower happened 1876.

Damn.

"L and this source of yours are immortals, I take it?" Light asked.

"Shut up," I shot back, folding my arms and falling back on his pillows. The annoyance of being caught out for the lie coalesced into mindless irritation and obstinancy. "I'm not going to tell you how I know L, though."

"Don't worry," Light practically purred. "I'll get it out of you someday." I scowled at the ceiling.

That was when Ryuk came through the wall. I clamped my jaw down on a screech and scrambled back into the pillows. He grinned at me.

"Hey, Light, I want an apple." Light rolled his eyes.

"Fine." To me he said, "Stay here," and exited, leaving only Ryuk and I together. Ryuk started to speak before I could feign unconsciousness.

"You know he only wants to use you, right?" he asked in that gravelly, grating voice of his.

"I gathered as much," I replied. Despite the recent drink my mouth was suddenly dry.

Ryuk chuckled and floated closer. "He was mumbling your name last night as he slept. Something about being a Queen . . ."

That was the second time I'd heard that word in association with Light. "What does he want with me?"

"To –" The door swung open, cutting him off. The instant his eyes caught sight of the red apple in Light's hand I knew I'd lost all hope of getting answers from the Shinigami.

"What did he say –" Light began but this time it was his turn to get cut off as a young girl, cute with black hair and large eyes, bounded into the room, saying,

"Light! This is the first time you've opened your door since . . ." She trailed off at the sight of me. I tried to smile. It didn't work.

"Who's that?" she hissed to Light, who was pretending to be worried as he swiped the apple from Ryuk's grip and bit into it.

"Don't tell Mum and Dad, okay?" he said, tugging her by the arm. His role swap into older brother was rather impressive. The girl nodded, suddenly looking a lot more excited. A gossip, then. Light sighed, and gestured to me. "This is my girlfriend, Catearro Minerva."

Something in my mind broke. I barely noticed in the midst of my mental meltdown when the girl turned to me and grinned predatorily, some hint of her relation to Light peeking through.

"You didn't tell me you had a girlfriend, Light!" she exclaimed. Her expression turned sly. "Is that why you told Mum and Dad to go out without us?"

"Believe me, I wanted you to go with them too."

"Mean!" She bounded over to the bed, taking in my lack of attire with a gleeful eye. "I'm Yagami Sayu, Light's little sister. How long have you two been dating?"

"Uh . . . I moved here last Friday."

"She's the transfer I was telling you about."

"Whoa, you guys are already dating after less than a week? It's like a romance novel!"

"More like a horror," I muttered. Sayu was too busy babbling to hear but I know Light heard from the way his hands curled into fists. Right, time for some damage control. "Hey, Sayu?" Sayu started, a frown marring her pretty face. "Oh, sorry. I'm from Canada so I haven't gotten into the swing of honorifics." I started again. "Sayu-san, do you have anything I could draw with?"

"Draw?"

"Yes, I'm an artist."

Her eyes lit up. "Could you draw me?" she asked in awe. I smiled. Hook, line and sinker.

"Of course. Just give me a minute to get dressed and I'd be happy to."

"All right! I'll go find my old sketchpad!" she skipped out of the room, slamming it shut behind her. Light tossed the apple back to Ryuk, who looked disturbed to eat something Light had already chewed. His addiction won out though and soon the whole fruit was down his gullet, stem and all.

"Here." Light threw me a pair of sweatpants and a old jersey. I quickly pulled on the jersey – it was so oversized it hung off my frame like a child's ghost costume – and attempted to get the sweatpants on. My injury wasn't having any of that though, as it sent jagged shards of hurt through my leg and up my torso as soon as I shifted it. Groaning in frustration, I smacked the sweatpants on the cover and leaned back, trying to cover up the fact that I was shaking.

"Where are my jeans?" I asked.

"I threw them out. They were bloody and ripped. You never did tell me how you managed to hurt yourself."

"Takuo's biker gang. They blamed me for his death. Called me Kira." I scowled at him, all my original anger and annoyance coming back, this time directed at him. "They chased me and I hurt myself trying to get away."

To my shock, Light was at my side in an instant, hands firmly tilting my head so he could peer into my eyes. His breath mingled with mine. There, in the depths of the brown irises, I thought I saw a flicker of concern. It was quickly overwhelmed by hard anger.

"They will pay for this," he hissed, letting go and pacing across the length of his room. "It's because of people like them that this world is so rotten. I will rid the world of them. I will make it better and you'll see! Everything will be better for it."

"Light . . ."

He twisted and came back, grabbing my hand in a grip that was crushing. His gaze was wild, terrifying. "Minerva, I promise you, I won't stop until no one can hurt you anymore."

I could see the ulterior motive in his words, the calculating set of his mouth despite the fury in his eyes. It was as though manipulation was his natural language even when his temper reigned. I swallowed and nodded because I had no idea what else to do when confronted with someone who had become this within a week.

He must have thought my agreement was honest because his hold relaxed until it was an imitation of the comfort given between friends. His fingers interlaced with mine as he sat down on the edge of the bed, much too close.

Pounding footsteps came rushing up to the door and it swung open to reveal Sayu, grin firmly set in place. She stopped upon entering, eyes growing wide at seeing Light and I together. A sound came out of her mouth that I placed firmly within the hearing range of most dogs. It wasn't human, that's for sure.

"You two are so cute together!" she cried, dancing into the room and straight through Ryuk.

"You're not going to tell Mum or Dad, right?" Light asked, a warning in his voice. She shook her head.

"Of course not!" she said. She stuck her tongue out at him, the sentiment 'duh' written all over her face. "Now go away, I want to talk to Minerva-san alone."

"It's my room."

"And I have a massive rip through my leg," I whispered to him. Squeezing my hand once, he got up and grabbed his bag.

"Don't mess with my stuff," he said to Sayu, ruffling her hair on his way out. She smacked him with her sketchbook. Ryuk phased through the wall with him. As soon as he was gone she rushed to his desk, opening his drawers.

"Aha!" she cried, pulling out a journal marked 'diary'. I scoffed inwardly. As if Light would write anything important in there.

"Don't you want me to draw you?" I asked.

"Oh, right." She replaced the diary and bounced onto the bed. "So how does this work? Do you want me to pose or turn up to lights or wear something different or –" I held up my hand to cut her off, smiling.

"Unless you want to wear something different I don't mind. Just make sure you're comfortable."

"Okay." She gave me the pencils – good quality ones, I noted – and sketchbook and sat in Light's chair with her legs crossed. I was hit by the very obvious differences between the siblings. How had Light managed to turn into the manipulative liar with a god-complex when he was raised in the same environment as this bouncy, happy girl was?

The old saying 'genius is a curse' wandered through my mind and not for the first time I found myself agreeing with it.

I got to work sketching her figure, including only the chair. When a few minutes passed and she started to fidget, I said in amusement, "You can talk, you know."

"Really?"

"Yes. As long as you stay still it's fine. I've already got the basics of your face down."

She let out a long breath in relief. "So how did you and Light meet?"

"He gave me a tour of the school on my first day."

"When did he ask you out?"

A chuckle escaped my lips. "On Thursday."

"And you've already spent the night!?" I glanced up at her shrewdly to see the blush on her cheeks. In that instant I could see where her thoughts were going and almost blushed myself.

"It's not what you think," I said. "I got into a spot of trouble last night and I couldn't get home. I've only been here a week and Light is my closest . . . friend." And wasn't that a depressing thought.

Sayu nodded, the blush slow in disappearing, and looked down at her hands.

"Head up."

"Sorry." She seemed to be wrestling with something inwardly, her mouth pinched, brows furrowed. I didn't pry, instead focusing on the way her brown hair fell over her forehead and shoulders. If there was something the Yagami siblings had in common it was their good looks.

Eventually she spoke up, softly, hesitantly. "Why are you dating my brother?"

I blinked, pencil freezing on her interlocked fingers in her lap. "Pardon?"

"Why are you dating him? I saw the way you looked at him before I walked in. You looked . . . scared."

Oh. So there was another thing they shared. Irritatingly sharp observational skills.

Light, for once I could use one of your lies.

I set the sketchpad to the side and leaned back on the pillows, looking into the middle distance. How in the world was I going to get myself out of this one? I didn't want to lie to the girl yet there seemed no way around it. After several false starts, I finally managed a simple, "He's like no one I've met before."

"Then why were you scared?"

It took me a second before a very good reason came to me. I pushed off the covers, exposing the gruesome injury. She gasped, got off the chair and padded closer, morbidly curious.

"How did it happen?" she whispered, as though speaking any louder would make the injury worse.

"Some bikers last night. They were the trouble. Light was the one who stitched me up."

"So that's why you stayed the night."

I nodded. "I wasn't scared of Light. I was remembering last night."

"And he was comforting you!" The dots quickly connected in her mind, albeit into a pattern that was a little off from the true picture. "Now it makes sense. Light's a good guy, isn't he?"

I smiled, unable to do anything more without blurting the name Kira to her. She rattled off a few more questions like did it hurt? are you going to stay much longer? how did it happen? and trotted back to the chair. I finished her portrait quickly and let her join me on the bed as I filled in the gaps and finished the shading from memory. Her constant stream of chatter was a nice change from Light's poisonous words and long stares. When it was done she squealed in delight, hugged me and ran out of the room. Light came back seconds later.

"Did she steal my diary?"

"She tried to. I distracted her though."

"Thanks."

"There's nothing in there, right?"

He laughed. "I've got to keep up appearances somehow. You should get some rest. We'll need to explain to my parents what happened when they get home tonight."

I grimaced at the thought but dutifully slid down and hugged myself beneath the blankets. Sayu's light-hearted manner had eased my heart and I didn't want to wait around for Ryuk to return. Those dead eyes were a surefire way to bring back my horror.

Sleep came quickly.

Peaceful sleep didn't.

There was blood on the walls. Fire licking the curtains. A body on the ground, another on the chair, twitching and groaning.

I knelt on the ground, hands tied behind my back, and tried to keep the hysterical, terrified sobs that shook my body at bay. A voice spoke above me but I couldn't understand. Smoke was filling the room, bringing tears to my eyes and coating my mouth and nose with ash.

My hair was jerked roughly and my head pulled back so I could see the blank, staring face of my attacker looking down from above. As I watched the dark eyes reddened, the hair lengthened and a profoundly familiar smirk twisted their lips. I look back at the entity of Kira, covered in the skin of Light Yagami. It grinned. A knife rested on my throat.

"Please," I begged. My voice was young, high, the voice of a child barely out of infancy.

Kira leaned closer, those red eyes burning.

"Don't worry. You won't feel a thing." With that it stabbed the knife into my throat but it was my leg that tore open. I screamed, falling to the ground with the knife still in my trachea. Hands grabbed me but I fought them off, curling into a ball and muffling my screaming with my knees as blood poured out of the gash in my thigh.

The fire grew hotter and I heard the unnatural, grating laugh of Ryuk resounding through the room. I hugged myself tighter and let myself be burned alive.

"Minerva! Minerva!" I shot up, covered in a cold sweat. There were people in my room. There were never people in my room. Even Quinn knew never to enter.

"Minerva!" Slowly the sensation of fire and blood drifted away and I realised who the people were, where I was. Light's room, with Sayu and Light and Sachiko and a man who could only be Light's father watching me worriedly. Light was sitting on the bed, holding both my hands.

"What were you dreaming about?" Light asked. I shook my head. I had already shuffled the dream into the mental box full of all the others, never to be opened again. He touched my forehead and then checked my leg. The stitches were still intact, like I knew they would be. After years of being restained, I never thrashed during a nightmare, only screamed.

"Light, should we leave you two alone?" asked Sachiko, wringing her hands nervously. Sayu was gaping in fear and Light's father was visibly disturbed.

"No, don't worry," I said, already sounding like myself. I threw off the last vestiges of the nightmare and smiled at the family. "Sorry for the disturbance. I should have warned Light."

"Do you often have nightmares?" asked Mr Yagami.

"I used to have a lot when I was younger. It's gotten better as I've grown."

"I see." His frown didn't let up but did become less severe. He nodded his head. "I'm Yagami Soichiro. Light told us you were injured by a biker gang."

"Just chased. I was injured when I was running from them." I shifted my leg out from under the covers. Sachiko gasped and covered her mouth with her hands. Soichiro stiffened. "Your son stitched me up and let me stay the night."

"I'll drive you to the hospital," Soichiro said immediately. "Are you well enough to move?" With Light helping me, I managed to struggle out of the covers though it required extreme compartmentalisation of the pain. Panting, I leant heavily on him and let none of my weight on my left leg.

Sayu stifled a giggle. I looked up and realised that Soichiro and Sachiko were staring at Light in disappointment. Light sighed and said, "There was no other way to sew up the wound. Nothing happened, I assure you."

I looked down at myself and realised I was only wearing Light's oversized jersey that fell to mid-thigh. A blush stained my cheeks. What an impression to make.

"I'm sorry," I said quickly. "It hurt to much to put on the pants."

"It's fine, dear," said Sachiko, coming over. "Sayu and I can help." She levelled Light with a look so fearsome it was a wonder he didn't wither where he stood. "Sayu, can you come help Minerva-san? Soichiro, Light, you can wait in the hall."

The men were hustled out of the room and somehow it took Sachiko only moments to slide on the sweatpants Light had left out while I used Sayu as a crutch. Then they helped me hobble out of the room and into the hallway. Light ducked into his bedroom before the door closed and came out with a bag containing my jacket, shirt and shoes.

With Light's guidance and Sachiko hovering like Ryuk, I made it down the stairs step by painstaking step, and into the car waiting outside. The rain had let up and the residential street looked picturesque in the dying light of the setting sun. A chill had me shifting closer to Light.

The drive to the hospital was silent while I checked my messages from Quinn, tucked securely between the siblings in the back seat. He asked only if I was sure when I would be home. His independence was reassuring but I found myself worrying about him. We had only ever been apart this long during a school day.

Ryuk followed the car like a grotesque parade balloon. I turned to Light and said, "Quinn needs to know what happened."

"Don't worry," he said. "I'll make sure he gets here."

"V?" A quiet voice interrupted my drawing. Sayu had brought her sketchbook with her to give me something to do. At the doorway to the hospital room stood Quinn, his blonde hair a mess and eyes worried. I set aside the pad and held out my arms. He dropped his bag and ran to me, burying his face in my neck.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. He clutched me tighter.

Light stood up from his chair by the window, gave me one last look and left.

I closed my eyes and returned Quinn's embrace with equal fervour.

"I missed you, Q."

TOWRTA: I don't know what's happening. I've already veered from my plot line! It's been three chapters.

This is getting ridiculous. (Plus this story is pretty much unedited - sorry for mistakes. I don't have time to go through it)

Additional note: This is a peace offering. I have exams coming up which I need to ace and so I don't know when I'm going to have the time to write this story again. We'll just have to see, alright? Thank you for all those that have reviewed and favourited and followed! It's great to know that my writing is worth something.

Reply to Prince (anon): 'Stockholm Syndrome'? I hope not. And I hope this answers some part of your Queen question. Remember, Light doesn't do anything by mistake (usually) so if she heard him, she was probably meant to. Oh ho ho.

Review if you feel so inclined.