A/N... I do not own Death Note or the characters associated with it. I only take credit for the character, E.

Just like Beyond said the red began to fade after three days. It was around that time when we completed both stakeouts, and as far as we were aware, nothing had come up. "So we were there both days," Aizawa reported. The officer read the report in summary, "In Aoyama on the twenty-second and Shibuya on the twenty-fourth, and we observed nothing of significance on either occasion. That leaves us with only the dome on the thirtieth." We gathered in the general living space of the hotel room. Aizawa and Matsuda sat together on the couch, and Chief Yagami sat across them while L and Light faced each other on the two remaining sides of the table. As for me, I sat on the floor leaning against the side of L's chair with one leg tucked under me.

I made a point not to stare at Light for too long, and I avoided making eye contact with the Shinigami hovering over him. That was a concern for another time. At the moment, Aizawa was right. We basically had nothing. Whoever this second Kira was, he or she was a greater threat than Light who we could monitor and didn't possess the ability to kill by sight alone.

L's computer beeped and Watari's voice came through the speakers, "Ryuzaki, apparently Sakura TV has just received another message from the second Kira. The men from the police force rose to their feet in anticipation, and even I got up to gain a better view of the screen, "It was post marked on the twenty-third."

The kira text appeared on the screen and then the message, "I'm happy to say I have found Kira. To all the people of the television station and the police department, I'd like to thank you very much." My grip on my laptop tightened considerably at these words. The second Kira didn't have any reason to thank the police for this supposed encounter. If anything, we had tried to prevent it at all costs. It was possible that Light had managed to slip past, but neither L nor I would have allowed that to happen. When could this have happened? I was with Light at Aoyama and after, and I hadn't seen anything of importance, excluding the alteration of my vision. The day after? It was a possibility, but a slim one.

"This is a disaster if he found him," Aizawa pointed out needlessly.

"It most likely means that the two Kiras are now cooperating with each other," Mr. Yagami agreed. I sincerely doubted it, but I kept my mouth shut. Light knew better than to associate with someone as capricious as the second Kira, but one can never be too sure.

L picked up his coffee and teaspoon, "At this point I don't think we should jump to any conclusions. The second Kira is only saying that he found him nothing more. He may not have made contact yet. Now that it's come to this," L took a noisy sip, but when he spoke, it was serious, "we have no choice but to communicate as the police directly with the second Kira."

"You want to send a message?" Matsuda asked for confirmation of another seemingly outrageous suggestion from L.

"Yes. The police need to reach out to the copycat and offer him a deal. We need to negotiate with him if we can get Kira's real name," L expounded. A part of me felt guilty for withholding vital information from L, but I had to do what was best for my cause.

Ryuk chuckled from Light's side, "That's the last thing you wanted to hear, right?"

As the day turned to night, the Task Force carried out L's plan. "It's not too late… Whatever you do, don't make friends with Kira. Blah, blah, blah. Kira will kill you. Blah, blah, this is your second chance. Blah, blah, blah, blah, we need you," I paraphrased the message that was to be broadcasted. "It won't work," I stated to L. The pleading and word choice of the message wouldn't get a desired result from the second Kira. Even L must have known that.

"Really?" L drawled.

"The second Kira displayed a willingness to kill innocents that even the original didn't. From what we've seen so far, the second Kira is obviously harboring an obsession. Ryuzaki, something that runs as deep as obsession isn't going to be won over with something like that!" I exclaimed in frustration. The rest of the Task Force had remained in the living room conducting their business, but L and I had shifted to the dining room.

"Hmm, I hadn't thought of that," L touched his chin with his index finger feigning ignorance.

I slammed my palm on the table, a much better alternative to striking the detective, and leaned closer to the senior detective, "What are you playing at, L?" There had to be more, something he knew. He was just like Beyond. He always knew something. My logic and L's had been the same for so long that we could get into each other's head, but he had always been better than me. There were times when I missed things, and this turned out to be one of those times.

After a long lasting moment of silence and unbroken eye contact, L muttered, "I could ask you the same thing."

I felt a sharp stab of guilt, but I kept my voice steady when I spoke, "You probably know better than I do at this point." I waited for him to say something, do something. When he didn't, I joined the rest of the Task Force. They quickly averted their eyes from the door, but I knew they realized that something had happened. We continued to work in silence until Light decided to call it a night. I grabbed my jacket deciding to accompany him. I could feel the heat of L's stare as I closed the door behind me.

"What was that about?" Light asked while the three of us walked. Us being he, Ryuk, and myself.

"He's being a pain," I replied lightly.

Light scoffed, "How'd you even get involved with him?"

I laughed at the question because of its complexity. I hadn't just gotten involved with L. It wasn't that simple. "The most I can tell you is that we were rivals at one point," I stated honestly. We walked a little further before I asked, "Did the second Kira contact you?"

"I'm waiting," he responded.

I snorted, "That was a deflection. You know, it's alright for you to not know what's going to happen."

He started in surprise, and for a moment some genuine humanity slipped through his mask before it disappeared, "What? Who said anything about not knowing what's going to happen?"

"I did," I replied with a shrug. "I mean, no one can really know what's going to happen next. At least, not for sure, and that's alright."

"No, it's not," Light snapped, again a small burst of humanity showing through. I was pushing him, I admit to that, but I wanted to know Light Yagami. He was my classmate. He was my target. He was my friend. He was my enemy. He was all of these things, but I still barely knew him. "One wrong move could send it all on a downward spiral."

I nodded thoughtfully, wondering about Light's wonderings, and finally, I asked, "Have any cases you've ever worked on gone wrong, Light?"

"What?" he was thrown off again.

I shook my head, "I remember the first time one of my cases went wrong. When I was first starting out as a detective, I took on a job. It was in America, and I was supposed to bust a drug smuggling operation that ran from Mexico all the way to Detroit. It was easy enough."

"Yeah, so?" Light asked uninterestedly.

"So something went wrong while we were in the field," I stated, remembering the day. "We had two men undercover, and on the day of the exchange, we had them surrounded. What we didn't count on was being discovered. One of our inside guys slipped up, and they were taken hostage. Then things got bad. Three of our guys died in the rescue, and four of theirs went down with them." I noticed him watching me intently with that calculating look in his eyes. I shot him a smile and said, "You sounded as if you thought I don't understand. Trust me on this one, I know about downhill spirals."

"I'm sorry," Light broke the silence after a short while.

"Nobody knows what's going to happen next," I repeated sadly, looking up at the darkened sky above us. "No matter how much we plan and calculate and theorize, there's always going to be one variable that we miss. We can try as hard as possible, but we still can't be sure. Nobody knows for sure. Not me, not you, not even L. It's the only mystery we can't solve."

"Why not?" Light countered, "There's always the chance that our theory will be correct."

"One percent," I stated softly.

"One percent?" Light repeated questioningly.

I nodded and looked at the handsome young killer, "The probability of everything ending up according to plan. It's one percent." Sometime during that brief exchange, we had moved closer to each other and ended up standing face to face.

I could see the human stirring in his eyes. That was his Achilles' heel. Light could conceal every trace of truth from the rest of his face, but he couldn't hide the light in his eyes. Every thought, reaction, and emotion glimmered faintly from his eyes. It was the only weakness I could find in Light so far. The only tell that I could see. It was there, and I could use it. It was humanity, and it made him vulnerable.

"You're flawed, Light," I observed in a whisper, reaching out and touching his face gently. He was a specimen to study, and I was a scientist in awe. I was going to take him down and make sure he paid for his sins, but before I could do that, I had to ignore the incessant thudding within my chest that seemed to grow louder and louder and louder.

"No, E," he differed, "I'm god."

He closed the space between us and pressed his lips to mine. It wasn't sweet, and it wasn't passionate, but it was sincere. It was the first truth I exchanged with Light Yagami. He kissed me, and then, I kissed him back. There was neither love nor hate between us then. In different circumstances, there might have been more, but not in this reality. This was the world in which Light Yagami was the man who killed Beyond Birthday, and I was the woman sworn to avenge his death.

When we stopped, his arm was around my waist, and my hands were on his chest. This was a downward spiral that neither of us had expected, and we would be forced to deal with it later.

"I should get back to the hotel," I stated. "We still have work to do in the morning."

Light nodded in agreement, "Goodnight, E."

"Goodnight," I replied. We began walking in different directions. He went back to his home, and I went back to the hotel with this new variable that had to be added into the equation.

Light returned home and watched the broadcast on the news. The events of earlier that night did nothing to improve his day. E was proving to be more than just a pawn for him to use. He was losing control of the playing field. He didn't know what this second Kira would do in response to the police broadcast, and he didn't know what to do about E.

He still planned to use her against L, and he would eventually kill her along with the other detective. Recently, he had begun to rethink the end he had in store for her. Damn E for being a threat, but she could also be an ally. She was intelligent and reasonable. She understood justice. She could play a part in his new world.

From outside the unlit room, Sayu called his name in a singsong voice. He opened the door and she relayed to him that a visitor had arrived to return his important notebook. For an instant, he wondered if it was E, if she had come after him, but then he thought, Notebook? Could it be? He walked down to the door and found a young woman standing before him, but she wasn't the female detective.

This girl was blond and her lips were painted red. She dressed in black, and Light only knew E to wear pastels. He observed her; silently comparing her to the detective he had walked home with. He closed the door behind him as she stepped into his home.

"Um, pleased to meet you," she spoke softly, "I'm Misa Amane. I thought you might get worried if you saw that message on TV. I just couldn't take it anymore so I brought this notebook." She held out a black bound notebook that was almost identical to his Death Note. Light's breath hitched, and he moved to hold the corner of her note.

Slowly, he looked up and saw a skeletal creature standing behind the girl. Shinigami, he breathed heavily. Then his eyes narrowed, She's the fake Kira. Light invited her in and approached his family, ignoring her thanks, "Mom, she came all this way to return my notebook. Could you make us some tea?"

"Sure," his mother replied. "I don't see why not."

He couldn't ignore his sister's and mother's looks of curiosity as he passed them, "I already told you about her." They looked at each other with surprise at the revelation. He and the girl headed upstairs, and once they were in his room, Light offered her his desk chair, "Have a seat."

"Oh, uh, thank you." She had a feminine voice. He sat on his bed while she took the chair.

He began his questioning, "How did you find me?"

She gasped loudly, "I knew it. You never made the Shinigami eye deal. When you have the Shinigami eyes, like I do, you can see most people's name and lifespan just by looking at them. However, you can't see the lifespan of any person who possesses a Death Note." Light's eyes widened in surprise and eagerness, then he glared at the Shinigami who failed to inform him of this.

"No kidding," Ryuk said, "I have to admit, even I wasn't aware of that little detail." Light suspected that to be false, but he ignored it.

"Well, now you've managed to find me," Light stated dangerously. "But, you were careless. What if you had been caught by the police, then they'd know everything about Kira." The faces of a black haired hunchback and blue-eyed woman came to his mind. E was just down his street only moments ago. She could have caught this other girl, and it would have all been over.

"It's alright," she said calmly, "because the police didn't catch me, and if I do as you say from now on, they'll never be able to. So, we're safe. After all, don't you need someone to see L's name? If you want, I can be your eyes. So…" The girl looked down.

"So what?" Light asked sharply.

"Would you please make me your girlfriend?" she requested in a rush.

Light's eyes widened in surprise. This was the second, no, third time he had been taken off guard this evening. "Girlfriend?" he repeated.

"Yes."

Ryuk chuckled. If she finds out I'm manipulating her and gets hurt, she'll probably kill me, but still… Light thought to himself regarding this deal. "Impossible! The day you and I were at Aoyama, there were three times the number of usual surveillance cameras around," Light stated. "Anyone who was in Aoyama on the twenty second would have definitely been caught on camera. That includes me. If anyone had seen us together, it wouldn't look very good. In fact, even being here together right now is a problem. I wish you'd understand that." He thought about E, Reika Endo, Everest. The girl who was on her own side in all of this. Everything with her seemed to begin as another move in the game, but always, it became something else. They were using each other, but that night, they hadn't. No. Light couldn't allow that moment they shared interfere with his goals.

"Look," Misa held out two photographs of a young girl with short black hair, a school uniform, and glasses. "These are pictures of me when I went to Aoyama that day."

"Well, I'm sure no one would recognize her from this," Ryuk commented. Unknown to Light and Ryuk, Misa was withholding information from them concerning a girl whose name she couldn't see.

"And what about your fingerprints?" Light searched for another reason against her, "All those tapes you sent to the TV station. They all had the same fingerprints on them."

"Yeah, but those aren't my fingerprints!" she insisted, "It's not like I do these things without thinking about them first. Up until recently, I lived in the Konsai region, and I had this friend who was into the occult. I suggested that we distribute this fake poltergeist video I made to a bunch of different TV shows, sort of as a prank, and she agreed to help me with it. I had her take care of all the dubbing so my fingerprints wouldn't be on the tapes. Then, I took them from her, added the Kira graphic, and added the message with that voice effect."

"And this friend you made the tapes with?" Light questioned. "Where is she now?"

Suddenly, Misa Amane spoke strongly, "Why are you doing this to me? If you want me to kill her just say so, and I'll kill her!" With less anger, she continued, "If you really still can't trust me, then here." His mouth dropped slightly as she offered him her Death Note. "I'll even let you hold on to my Death Note, but you'd just be holding it, so I'd still be the rightful owner of it, and that means I get to keep my Shinigami eyes. Isn't that right, Rem?"

"Yes, that's right," her Shinigami replied in a low, slow voice. Light took the notebook. Well, it was definitely a more tangible display of trust than anything E had offered him.

"Now there's no way I can possibly kill you, and if I become a burden to you, then you can just kill me, okay?" she offered her own life to him.

Why would she go this far? Light thought silently. Out loud he said, "But you might've removed several pages from your Death Note. You could be hiding them somewhere for all I know." He was searching for reasons not to trust her. She had practically just given up her life to him, but he was still looking for reasons not to trust her. Yet, E offered him nothing and even betrayed him, and he still treated her as a companion.

She cringed and shot to her feet with tears forming in her eyes, "Why are you so suspicious of me? I already told you, I don't care even if all you do is use me! Believe me."

"How can you say that?" Light asked partially in awe of her display of desperation. It was so unlike E's effort to gain his trust. Instead of begging and pleading, she showed a side of her capable of bringing down anyone who got in her path.

"Exactly one year ago," she sank down to the floor, "my parents were killed in a robbery. I was home with them at the time. It happened right in front of me. I wanted that man to pay for what he did."

I want both of you to pay. A similar statement drifted through his mind.

She continued, "But the trial dragged on forever. Opinions started surfacing that he was falsely accused. Then it happened. Kira punished him for what he did to my parents, and that's why Kira means everything – Kira means everything to me." She finally looked up to him with wide eyes, "All I wanted was a chance to meet you one day so I could thank you for what you did." She began to cry on his floor.

So all these irrational moves, Light concluded, they were just a means for her to meet Kira. Still, she got around the surveillance cameras with ease and managed not to leave her fingerprints on the evidence. She's not as stupid as I thought, and she has promised to obey me from now on.

She's so different, Light rose to his feet and stepped toward her.

She was willing to give him everything. While she held her secrets close to her.

She believed in his cause. While she stood as an obstacle in his plans.

She was grateful for what he had done to get justice. While she swore vengeance against him.

He gathered her into his arms, and she gasped at the contact. "I understand," he told her. "I can't be your boyfriend, but I can act like it. The lengths you went to meet me, to be of help to me, those eyes of yours you sacrificed half of your life to get will become my weapon."

"Thank you so much," she breathed. "I'll try my hardest to make you love me, I promise."

Again they were different. E didn't even have to try.

Regardless, Light had a new weapon. E was right about the variables, but this wouldn't be a detriment to him. With Misa Amane's eyes, he had an advantage. He would use her to kill L, and he would use her to kill E. Yes, he had it decided. E was even more dangerous than L.

With Misa Amane in his arms, Light only thought about how he had gained the upper hand. It had been different with E. He had wanted to hold her closer and keep her against him longer, and not once in that moment did he think about being Kira. Despite everything that damned woman was, his pulse quickened near her.

And he hated it.

A/N...Wow I'm sorry this has taken so long! I hope you liked it ^.^ MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT : I AM LOOKING FOR A COVER ARTIST/ COVER ART IF YOU'RE INTERESTED PLEASE PM OR REVIEW AND LET ME KNOW.

A huge thank you to everyone who has reviewed, favorited, and followed this story! I'm going to try to answer some questions, so if you have any feel free to keep asking. I'm so sorry that I haven't answered these sooner, but I'll try to do better in the future! I hope you're all still out there to read these because I really really really appreciate your enthusiasm ^.^ Thank you!

pinkdoughnuts : Wow, thank you so so much for all of your reviews! I'm so glad you're keeping with this story! In response to your question, E is nineteen years old. I'm including events from the manga in this story, but it's setting is based on the anime, so this is happening in 2007 instead of the years used in the manga. I hope this helps ^.^ Thanks for reading and reviewing. If you have any questions about E or the story, I'm always here to answer.

Animefreak1145 THANK YOU FOR READING THIS STORY! I'm so glad that you enjoy it! I know, and I really want to write a Death Note worthy ending. I hope you won't be disappointed, but no spoilers ;)

ssooo : Yay! I'm glad you caught that vibe ^.^ Thank you so much! I hope you're still out there and still reading ^.^

Irokoutlo1 : Thank you! I'm glad you like her! It's a challenge to develop her since she has so much driving her, but I hope that I can reveal her to you and other readers well! And belated happy all holidays since december xD

baofu : You literally made my month when I read your review! I'll keep trying to do as well as you say I'm doing. Wow, thanks a lotta. ^.^

toolazytologin : Thank you! It's kind of difficult for me to write Light and L, and even E sometimes, but I'm glad you think I'm doing well ^.^

Broccoli monster:Thanks so much! I'm glad that you're getting so involved with the story! I definitely intend to incorporate Misa, and I think that her shock was because she couldn't read E's name more than anything else, but that's very possible, too. Honestly, I haven't really tried to get into Misa's character yet, but your proposals are all very plausible. I hope the next few chapters are to your liking!

BloodDDB : I thought that Beyond was a great opportunity to add an OC since he doesn't have a very clear background, and he's such an interesting character, I couldn't help but love him. Thank you for reading!

Maiannaise : Beyond and E were related, but there's going to be more on that in later chapters ^.^ I hope you'll like them when they're posted

Thank you to all reviewers, and I'm sorry if I didn't answer you, but I will try to get to everyone I promise!

Happy reading ^.^