Chapter Sixteen:

CONTENT WARNING: Body Horror, discussions about health-related problems including blood clots, chest pains etc. Also, themes of isolation, in case people have a hard time with that. Understandable.

"Um," Erin stammered in a brilliant display of wit. Her fingers tightened around the blanket, and she stared at the detective across from her trying to figure out what she was feeling. Bafflement mostly. Everything was dwarfed by the remaining agitation lingering like a stain or an echo in her head. If it had been even just a couple days before, meeting L in person might have had more of an impact… but now she just waited for her brain to catch up.

The room was well lit, warm, tidy and terribly mundane. That was perhaps the most jarring—it should not have been, she knew. The anime had given up on the whole 'mysterious, shadowy figure in a dark room, lit only by the cold glow of a computer' pretty quickly. And yet she had only ever envisioned the L that she knew that way. It was understandable given that he'd been hidden behind the fortress of his screens and his microphones with his modulated voice, and she had been on the other side of that tossed about like a ship in a storm.

Now though he seemed very terribly human—not so different from her.

Then again, anything would seem rather banal when compared to giant space butterflies and horrible otherness.

Erin's hand unknotted itself from the blanket and pressed against her sternum, hard, like there was still a gushing wound there, and she was trying to stem the flow before she bled out entirely. There was still no blood, but she knew there would still be an unfamiliar black scar.

Warily she waited for the detective crouched across from her to say something.

He didn't, perfectly happy to let the silence fill up the space between them. One bare foot curled over the other, and he pressed a thumb against his bottom lip idly. She'd have thought he wasn't paying any attention at all, lost in some train of thought hurtling far ahead of her, if it were not for the heavy black stare that he was levelling back at her. It was as disconcerting as she had imagined it would be, if not more so. It was unsettling mostly because the heavy focus—despite being directed at her—felt like it did not involve her in a way that made her feel like she was a specimen being cut open on a lab table.

Belatedly she realized he might have been expecting her to say something beyond 'um'.

She blinked and tried to think of something to say. "So," she began, her voice still scratchy and raw, "didn't talk to Ilmort. Did run into the other thing." Distantly she realized she could hear the sound of a kettle boiling, which was a sound infinitely more comforting than the whole sky cracking and opening up.

L's hand dropped away from his lip and joined the other atop his knees and Erin was surprised that she could read just how much attention he was conveying in that gesture. "What happened?"

The young woman opened her mouth, inhaling deeply, trying to figure out where to start. And then she stopped. Not because she did not know how to begin retelling the night's experience, no, that was easy, really. It was not as if her nightmare had been one of those confusing dreams filled with strange gaps and ill-fitting logics that lost their sense come morning and sounder minds. No, this had had a definite beginning, a clear journey, although she had no way to put into words what she had seen behind the butterfly. No, she stopped because it was a lot.

As always.

Watari appeared with a tray of biscuits and two steaming mugs. He passed one to both her and L, cautioning them both that it was hot. The biscuits he placed on the coffee table between the two of them and told Erin to help herself.

L did so immediately, taking a noisy slurp from his mug, and then reaching with long, spidery fingers for the sweets.

She watched and found her lips twitching at the humour of it. For all that some things had changed beyond recognition this felt bizarrely familiar in a way that filled her with a deep sense of irony. To everyone else this scene would have been hard to reconcile with their idea of a world-renowned genius detective. For her, well. It was too familiar, and that was what bothered her.

With a. Sigh, she turned her focus to her blessedly warm beverage—hot chocolate, sweet and rich and pure comfort in a mug. Again, she felt a swell of fondness for Watari, and stuttered out an awkward couple of word of gratitude. Or tried to anyway, but she wasn't sure how much sense she was making, and L cut her off anyway.

"The dream," he demanded.

"Right. Well, I knew right away that it wasn't the right place. The Shinigami realm is… I dunno. What it might look like if the world ended? That sounds dramatic. It was all ashy and grey. Everything. And there were big bones and chains but no proper signs of civilization. The place I ended up in this time was colourful. Lots of blue. Flowers, stars. Really… nice. Only I knew it was a weird dream because I was lucid. And then the sky freaked out, and turned into this massive, like incomprehensively big butterfly. And it kind of, um, peeled itself away. And there was a hole behind it, and then the voice spoke again." She winced.

"The one that sounds like me."

"Not this time. It had its own voice this time. I tried to see if I knew it, but everything was all in chaos, and it was really really loud. And then it was quiet. And. Um. In the midst of it all I think my heart got ripped out? But I didn't see how or when. It just… happened." She finished the explanation staring into her cup and wondering if that had really been it. If that had really been all. It sounded like nothing more than a bad dream, spoken out loud. None of the wrongness, the bone deep existential dread had been conveyed.

She kneaded her sternum again, trying to chase away the phantom ache.

"Sounds stupid now," She admitted out loud, the brief chuckle that followed a grim and frustrated thing.

She was answered by a crunching of biscuits.

With a sigh she reached for one for herself, and quietly snapped off a corner and chewed on it dismally. They were very nice biscuits, she observed apathetically, and reached for another one upon finishing the first.

"Shortly after 1:00 am this morning, I observed unnatural behaviour from you. While you are prone to disturbed sleep patterns that cause you to be restless during the night, these seemed more extreme. The behaviours seemed most in line with a Night Terror, symptomatic of many sleep disorders. While you medication should have aided that, I did consider that you had lied about taking them, or that your disorder had worsened as a result of your situation. However, shortly afterwards an extreme light abnormality interfered with the video quality. When normal function of the cameras resumed, approximately 40 seconds later, the room had been contaminated by a swarm of insects which appeared to match the previous incident. Following that, the levels of distress you were displaying increased. Attempts to intervene via auditory means had little effect—do you recall specifically what woke you up?"

Erin chewed her cookie contemplatively, though it was largely farcical. She'd already decided to not even bother trying to process the onslaught of information L had spewed at her. "You realize how creepy that is, right?" She asked, thoughts still caught on that rather than his question.

"It is a necessary step for me to evaluate how reliable the information you provide is." L did not seem at all abashed by her idle reprimand, appearing more bored than anything. No doubt he had heard similar complaints quite a bit up until now.

She squinted at him. "Have you already started watching the suspects?"

He glanced up from the biscuit he was soaking in hot chocolate. "I cannot share information about the investigation with you," the detective recited blandly.

Erin stared at him, wondering how the hell that mattered when she was literally sitting right across from him. "But you said that your surveillance of Light would act as his alibi."

"Mm," L began, reaching for another cookie, even though the one he'd just had was still stuffed in his mouth. "Light has shown no signs that he is anything other than an extraordinarily bright student, with a strong moral compass up until now. There is nothing to indicate that he should be a focus of our investigation. Other than your insistence, that is"

Erin sighed and slouched in her seat. "He's a student, like you said was possible. He lives in the right area to have seen the broadcast. He can access police databases via his father's computer. He was at the bus jacking with Raye Penber and was under surveillance by said FBI agent who got killed. By Kira." She frowned. "Have you reviewed the tapes of Raye Penber's death yet? At the train station? Light was there in person. Doesn't get caught on cam and he had his hood up, but I dunno if you could track his train pass or whatever they are. Oh! He knows there are cameras in his room because he set up a who bunch of traps on his door. God, I really do remember the weirdest things. Um, he does lift the doorknob all the way back in place, there's a piece of paper in the door frame, and a piece of mechanical lead in the hinges."

L sipped his hot chocolate loudly. "I cannot act on clues without premise. And a biased investigation will not hold up under scrutiny."

"So you do think it's him," Erin said, firmly.

This made the detective pause, a still sort of consideration settling around him as he watched her back. "I had considered the possibility that it might be him to be relatively higher than most other options."

She did not ask whether her testimony helped or hindered that percentage. She hoped L believed her. He had to know she was telling the truth—he had seen the impossible things happening around her. Not matter how insane he thought it likely for her to be, there were just so many things she did know that she shouldn't, and so many events that could only be explained by the supernatural. He had to believe her.

"So much for not telling me about the investigation," she huffed, her thumb digging deep into her chest, hard enough to bruise. "Actually, what does happen now?"

"You did not answer my question.

"Oh. Right. Not sure. I passed out in the dream trying to look at whoever was talking. They started out in surround sound, and then they were super close and quiet. It might have been the pain though. I could feel—" She winced and pressed her whole fist over her heart. "It was like it was real."

"She has developed an abrasion on the indicated area," Watari piped up from where he had been jotting something down in a notebook to the side. "The appearance is not dissimilar to a Spider Vein. There may be a need to have her seen by a specialist—it could be a sign of a Peripheral Artery Disease, Deep Vein Thrombosis, or a Pulmonary Embolism. Although she lacks the majority of the symptoms for any of those, and the location is strange, and seems more cosmetic. The discolouring is only skin deep, as opposed to actually being the result of a blood clot or poor circulation."

The detective looked at her expectantly.

With a sigh Erin tugged down the neck of her shirt, exposing no more than a deep V-neck would but feeling deeply vexed by the exposure.

The skin was red and sore looking, though that was obviously because she had been practically trying to erase the spot by rubbing it. Still, it did nothing to disguise the strange black strand that cut down from the hollow of her collar bone over her clavicle. It wasn't three dimensional like a swollen artery of vein might have been, but it was jagged and frayed like a very fine, specific lightning burn—though it didn't fork quite so much. No, mostly it really did look like a crack running through porcelain.

"Do you feel any pain in the area?" L asked. "You have been acting in a way that suggests it is bothering you."

"Bothering me yes, causing me pain, no," Erin explained. "I feel…" And she stopped to think about that. "Well actually I feel like crap but no more than usual. Tired. Achy. A little dizzy. I think I might be coming down with a cold or something. But no, I don't feel like my chest is about to crack open and unleash a tornado of butterflies or something…Shit, you don't think that's what happened do you?"

Releasing the neck of her shirt back into place, her hand clapped over the affected area loudly, as if she could keep it together by doing that. "Oh fuck, am I some sort of weird nightmare butterfly portal?"

"Jumping to conclusions does nothing but create unnecessary panic," L stated with a blasé lack of concern that she felt was a little unwarranted given the situation.

"Sure, easy for you to say." Erin groused back and snatched up a handful of biscuits in retaliation. "But panic is starting to become my bread and butter, so excuse me if I seem a little hysterical."

"For now, we will have a new room prepared." The detective apparently didn't feel inclined to respond to her grumbling. "And we will need to find a way to relocate the butterflies to a secure facility for testing. Watari will also be giving you daily checkups in the event that any complications arise."

Erin gnawed on her bottom lip; her eyes directed at the dregs of hot chocolate in the bottom of her mug. When had she drank all of that? "How important is it that you try and speak with a Shinigami?" she hedged uncertainly.

"Yes. It might be best if you forestall any active attempts to contact him in your dreams, even if it appears to be something you have little control over. We will have to wait until he appears to you on his own to broach that."

Unfortunate, but there were plenty of other things for L to look into regarding Light, not just the Shinigami. "Well. Hopefully with all this weird stuff happening it'll be sooner, rather than later, yeah?"

L hummed at that but seemed to have lost his interest in the current conversation. He reached down into the space between his leg and the arm of the chair and withdrew a laptop that he perched on his knees and opened, immediately blocking his face from view. Erin, for her part, awkwardly reached for another biscuit, if only to have something else to do, but nearly toppled out of her chair when L lurched forward sending his laptop tumbling, and subsequently sent his mug toppling of the table as well.

Erin jolted and drew back sharply. "Jesus! What?" She asked, and her body had jolted into fight or flight mode so fast that her hands were shaking and aching with the force of it.

"Watari!" L demanded, ignoring her entirely. "The specimen you put in jars! Where are they?"

Watari stood quickly and exited the main room.

Knowing she wasn't going to get any answers from either of them fast enough to satisfy her, Erin scrambled to her feet and darted around the coffee table to see whatever it was that L had witnessed on the laptop. It might not have been her business, but she'd already heard what L had said about specimens, and she was pretty confident that meant this was about the damned butterflies.

The computer screen showed an empty room in grainy tones. She recognized that room, had been trapped there until just recently. The sheets were still strewn about after her escape, and one of her sweaters was slung across the back of the chair. Everything was as it should have been, and this was terribly disconcerting on account of the fact that it should have been a nightmarish heaving mass of butterflies.

But not a single fluttering wing could be seen.

Watari returned with a couple of familiar containers. At the bottom was a fine, gritty black sand, and no sign of the insect that had been there.

Erin fell into a crouch and buried her face in her hands. "Give me a break," she whined into her fingers. "Seriously."

X.X.X

Much, much later Erin was sitting on the edge of a bed in a new hotel room that looked barely any different from the previous one. It was different though, because L hadn't wanted her interfering with the other one in case there was still information which could be found from it. It hadn't shown any signs of the weird black sand, or any other freakiness, but he seemed to think they shouldn't risk carelessness. Erin didn't argue if only because she very much did not want to go back there.

Day was coming, another night having slipped away from her. She didn't feel like sleeping all the same. Well. She did. Everything in her body was screaming for rest. But Erin sat and stared at a wall, gnawing on her lip and trying very hard not to continue picking at the mark of her skin.

There were no speakers, in this room. They'd not had time for that. But Erin had been given a small flip phone as a temporary measure, and very strict instructions to contact L via the first and only number in the contacts the second anything at all happened (there had been a clear warning about how she was to use the phone, and that it was being monitored closely). The young woman had also been informed that he would continue to check in, and that they had set up the same level of surveillance, so she wasn't sure what the point of the nagging had been. Probably L was a control freak.

Fair. There was nothing about her situation that wouldn't put someone on edge.

At the moment she wanted to crawl into another small space, except for her fear that if the butterflies came back, she'd be buried alive by them. In addition to that, the need to not be alone had only grown. Likely because she had discovered how little she could do on her own in her situation. She'd felt much safer drinking hot chocolate and eating biscuits, even if it had only been L and Watari, instead of someone who actually counted as safe.

Her teeth clicked together as she gritted them. It'd been a long time she'd had that. Even before coming here. She'd always been alone before, but in the end, it had not felt so horrible as this. This was something she couldn't escape from by just walking out of the closed door keeping her away from the rest of the world. Who did she know in this world? L? Watari? Ilmort? Laughable.

Erin didn't know anyone. There wasn't anyone on her side to look out for her.

In the end she decided to risk taking a bath. She wanted to chase away the feeling of insects crawling all over her which had surged now that she didn't have a conversation with a genius, deranged detective to distract her. There was the fear that the bugs would show up again, but she tried to convince herself that it only happened when she was asleep.

She'd be fine so long as she stayed awake.

Of course, she woke up spluttering on water that had long since grown cold, pruned beyond belief. There were no butterflies, so she'd take almost drowning herself in a tub as a relatively harmless alternative.

She spent some time, wrapped in a towel and shivering like a small chihuahua, standing in front of the mirror, and eyeing the black scar on her skin unhappily. But in the end, it was just one of the many changes that had been made to her—the only difference was that this one was visible.

There was yet more to come, she reminded herself. To turn back the same as to go over.

A/N: So. Now that the butterflies have happened and meeting L has happened, it's time to start ramping up to the next 'event', hence what might feel like an awkward transitional chapter. Still, I like to think some important groundwork was laid out. Also, writing L never gets any less nerve wracking. Technically it not much different to writing him the way I have been, but it still feels like foreign territory. I guess I want to respect how beloved he is as a character. I'll warn you guys now though—I cannot sustain chapters as fast as I have been the last week; I have responsibilities that have been sorely neglected. It's a miracle such a strange event has happened at all. But I don't want to vanish for another full year, so I'm going to tentatively try and set a system of weekly updates? I dunno, making promises is scary so we'll see how it goes. Thank you as always for every bit of support you show, I'm giddy from delight!

Guest: Thank you so, so much! I love your enthusiasm, it's a delight!