The Folly of Gods
"There's been a mistake! I don't belong here!"
"I think you're exactly where you need to be." The lazy, slow rumble drowns out cries that seem juvenile in comparison, an adult scolding a child who knows no better.
"I didn't do anything wrong! I only wanted to help…" The voice diminishes, its owner shamed at his own words.
"You are no god to make those decisions." Claws drag across stone, a deep grinding that escalates to a shriek. "And you are not the first to make that mistake."
"He said he wouldn't take my soul! That's the only reason…" The voice whispers, barely audible but for the giant's acute hearing. Fear makes it quaver as one claw hovers over the child, the single digit enough to crush him.
"And he won't." Teeth the length of swords glimmer with saliva in the dimness as the monster grins.
A mindless wailing spirals out of the cave, rising unheeded into the night sky.
In time, even that dies away.
The sky is darker when L emerges and the shadows make the landscape more ominous. The land from one horizon to another is a mass of shades, unidentifiable shapes that seem to move in the ceaseless wind.
He shivers, an echo of fear humming through his veins as he slows. He wonders how many of these shapes are alive and how many are merely trees and rocks.
Justyn is quite alive in contrast, his golden tones not diminished in the slightest by the dimness, a corrupted metal angel in the midst of this wasteland. The sparkling jewels of his eyes turn to L when he forgets to keep walking.
"Don't keep the King waiting."
L belatedly starts walking again, the sand sliding so he constantly has to pull his feet out of the hollows he creates.
Justyn leads him to another shell of rock. This one glitters like the sun through murky water, swirls of black and grey moving sluggishly across its surface. It must pass for beauty here. A makeshift throne carved from unreflective rock is near the entrance and Justyn sits in it, looking like a king himself. He points to a stairway leading down into darkness.
"That way. Get going."
L moves forward, as if he is again compelled to walk to his doom. Warm air drifts from the cave's mouth, and the temperature change makes his skin prickle fiercely. It sounds like something breathing, something far larger than he can comprehend.
The steps are rough; the gravel and slivers of rock at the edge of each stair hurt his feet. He can't see in the dark as he descends and is forced to rely on touch to find his footing.
"Come inside, L Lawliet."
The voice is low and booming as a wave of heated air washes over him. The force of it ruffles his hair slightly. Perhaps it is the use of his name that bothers him more than the voice itself but his breathing accelerates anyway.
He is already dead; what more can the King do to him? His fear is pointless.
He edges down the stairs until his questing toes find no more and he stops. He has no desire to step into a pit or blunder into the beast itself. The air is warm and wet and he can almost feel the proximity of something massive not far in front of him.
"You must be wondering why you're here." The rumble comes again as the stink of char and sulfur fills his nose.
He scowls faintly. "Yes." Why else would he be in this cave? Does the King enjoy theatrics?
"You did not have to come; you're not one of my shinigami."
"I thought I was choosing my death." It doesn't shame him to admit this like it should. His pride is worth less than nothing now.
The King laughs, the sound both a throaty purr and a tremor in the earth, and L catches a glimpse of light reflecting off golden reptilian eyes. The slitted pupils are larger than his head and hover at least ten feet in the air.
"You only die once. Anything after that only takes you from one plane to another." Given the King's indolent tone, L guesses that he is lying on the ground and he again revises his estimate of the beast's size.
"What other planes are there?" As long as the King is willing to humor L by answering his questions, he will take advantage of it.
"Earth, the Shinigami Realm, the bridge, and greater Mu. Perhaps more, but that is not for me to say."
"Where should I be?"
"Exactly where you are, human. What I wish to know is why you chose this place." The King speaks slowly, as if he is never interrupted and has a surfeit of time. L can hear the wet slap of the King's tongue against his teeth, so total is the silence around him. Even he feels the compulsion not to speak as long as the King addresses him.
"Shall I tell you?" Laughter lurks somewhere in the King's throat and he continues. "There have been others who chose this destination, mistakenly or not. Their reasons vary, but often there is a common thread." Golden eyes peer down at L with a pitiless stare.
"Who have you lost that you hope to find here?"
L stills, only breathing the dusty air in and out. It was not his intent to come here looking for anyone. Maybe this is nothing but a huge misunderstanding; he should have taken the ferry after all.
But if others have come looking as well… L has no answers that he is willing to admit. The vain hopes that he can feel stirring will only hurt more if he gives voice to them so he looks for a distraction.
"What if I was one of your shinigami?" Disgust crawls through him as he remembers Rem and the others he has already met. Dim echoes of humanity. Soulless. Purposeless.
"You have much to look forward to." The mad shinigami's laughter rings in his ears.
"Are you offering yourself? New ones always come when my ranks diminish." A grin stretches wider than L is tall, faintly luminescent as if an ember burns in the King's throat.
"I would rather remain human."
"You won't be saying that forever. Living here as a human is difficult and in time, you too will ask to be changed. Then I will owe you a Death Note and I will dictate the terms of your payment."
He has no desire to find out what this payment is.
"Have new shinigami come recently?" L asks instead. This would at least give him something to do here, somewhere to start. Hope's poison is already swimming through his veins, and for a moment he wonders if surrendering these wretched human emotions would be so terrible. After all, isn't that what he tried to suppress his entire life? Is being soulless any different from being a machine?
If only he could give up the emotions and keep his body. Hope and all her useless sisters should have died during all that wasted time back in Limbo.
"I have been alive for millennia." The King snorts disdainfully at his inquiry. "'Recently' means nothing to me and I always get new shinigami. Besides, telling you would rob me of the joy of watching you stumble around.
"I will tell you this, L Lawliet. My shinigami have mentioned you before, your name and… others."
To L's consternation, before he can even open his mouth the King laughs, the sound like a roar of thunder in the enclosed space. L closes his eyes against the burning sulfur and covers his ears with his hands.
"Now go. That's enough excitement for one day, though do come amuse me some other time. Tell me all about your quest." The King sneers at the last, the disdain in his voice obvious.
L backs away quickly as a vast hissing fills the chamber. One heel slams into the steps and he turns to bound up them, breathing hard. He rushes most of the way up before he realizes it is just the sound of thousands of scales sliding over each other, not the sound of pursuit.
His steps grow inexplicably weary as his head reaches the level of the ground outside; the fear that so seldom surfaces always makes a fool of him when it does. He has learned little from the King and found few answers, only more questions.
The rushing jingle of Justyn rising to his feet greets L as he emerges.
"He invited you back. Most shinigami only meet the King but once." Justyn sounds amused as he turns away. L watches him go for a moment before reluctantly shuffling through the sand after him.
Justyn adds over his shoulder without stopping. "Talk to Ryuk and Redival if you want to know more than the King told you. Otherwise, you have very little to do here, unless you like gambling."
L wants to ask where to find food or water but upon further reflection, he is neither thirsty nor hungry. He is tired, but it seems perfectly normal for shinigami to sleep. Perhaps here he doesn't require the same things to survive that he did on Earth.
"Where can I find them?" The word Ryuk sounds vaguely familiar. Perhaps he heard it said before, but by whom?
"They're almost always on Earth and they're more talkative than the King. Ryuk is a troublemaker and Redival is… newer." Justyn's grin is a further baring of his already-exposed teeth through the gold jewelry. "It's impossible to remember when new shinigami get here, but he's not as old as some."
"Can I go to Earth?" Why hasn't this occurred to him yet? Obviously Rem was on Earth along with others, if each Death Note had a single owner.
That makes Justyn stop in his tracks, tilting his head curiously. "I have no idea. You have no wings, but maybe you could fly with someone else if they'll take you." Justyn's dismissive tone seems to end the conversation, and he heads back in the direction of the shinigami who were gambling.
L slows as something registers in his memory.
If Ryuk was always on earth and L had heard his name before, was he one of the Kiras' shinigami? Had either Misa or Light said it during their incarceration?
No, not during their incarceration. Light had spoken the name when they were still chained together. Ryuk must have been Light's shinigami.
Despite all of L's wishing for it, Light had not once talked in his sleep during the months that he had been chained to L. L had watched from the other bed, waiting for the vulnerability of slumber to give him even a single clue to Light's other identity. He had seen nothing except how well Light slept, guileless and at peace.
The murderer.
The night Higuchi died, L finally got what he was waiting for. He could see that Light had changed even if he couldn't explain it to anyone else. Light's scream in the helicopter was like nothing L had ever heard out of him, and he wasn't even looking at the shinigami outside. If anything, Light's gaze was unfocused, turned inward as if he had just realized something of earth-shattering import. Afterward he was too cool, too collected in contrast to that display of horror.
The changes only magnified after that. Light was still determined and earnest on the surface, seemingly transparent with honesty, but that time it had truly felt like an act. Light was trying just a little too hard. No one but L could have noticed for he was the only one who had spent every waking moment with Light, looking for just such a slip.
Hours after daybreak, the adrenaline from the night before finally ran out and even those police who didn't normally stay at headquarters retreated to a bedroom, exhausted. L wasn't tired at all; he was too busy watching this new Light, doubly aware of everything he did.
Nothing unusual happened until after they had both gone to their beds. L stared off into the corner until Light's breathing evened out with sleep, and only then did L refocus on Light, performing his nightly vigil. Light's eyes had just begun to flutter with REM sleep when he breathed out the word: Ryuk. Had he known then that Ryuk was a name, it would have sounded like Light was summoning him.
However, the isolated word meant nothing to L, and Light had said it so softly that L almost convinced himself that it was nonsense, the last foundering of a mind losing a battle against dreams. L himself was so strung-out on nerves, caffeine, and residual horror that he could have been hearing things. It was long past the time when a normal person would have started hallucinating.
The next day, the team essentially forced L to let Light free, and six days later…
L lost.
Twenty-seven years later, L lost again, played for a fool again by Light.
Why was he looking for him?
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A/N - This has been waiting around for me to post it long enough. Ah, well. Thanks, recipe, for letting me bounce ideas off you all the time and reading this. I'm still waiting for yours!