Abstraction

A Death Note fan-fiction

Disclaimers: Again, not much. Glad that the cliché is working so well for all you out in internet land. And there's a bit (or a lot) of disturbing imagery in this chapter, and there will probably be disturbing imagery in the rest of the story. Consider yourself warned… And also, Near has a train of thought that led to the title of this fic. Abstract thought hurts my brain.

ALSO! VERY IMPORTANT! Unless you want a mega huge spoiler, do NOT read this chapter unless you've finished Another Note! I'm dead serious, people, this could potentially ruin the whole book for you. However, if you do want a spoiler, read on heedlessly…

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Page Three: Blood and Fire

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"Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Wh-what?"

"You're looking at me like you've never seen me before. You know me, Yagami-kun. You know me very well. Please, tell me why you're looking at me in that manner."

Light, struggling to keep his eyes off the corpse of the boy called Mail Jeevas, determinedly fixed his eyes on L – the fourth least appealing sight in the room, after the skeleton, corpse, and tray of metal instruments. "What… ha… happen… ed… to y… you…?" he asked quietly, his vocal chords and throat still protesting against speech. He was, at the very least, becoming more coherent. That was a good sign.

"You did," L answered calmly as he poured the grayish black contents of the urn on the metal gurney, a slow sweeping motion of his arm leaving it a trail rather than a pile. He then placed the lid back and set the urn back on the table, shifting the knife to his left hand while keeping the feather in his right. "You cut me down in my prime, Yagami-kun. I could have done so much if it hadn't been for you. I even had a plan. A plan that was so great… well, never mind that," he shrugged idly, walking over to Light, his bare feet padding gently on the concrete floor.

"I suppose you're wondering how I got the Life Note?" he asked quietly as he studied Light carefully. "Simple, actually. I was brought back to life with it, and the old man who used the Life Note on me died. Simple as that, right? Of course, I didn't want to bring him back with it. He was… hit by a car. Tragic, really."

Something in L's eyes failed to convince Light that the detective truly believed it was tragic.

"So I came back to Japan and found out that you had been killed." He slowly rolled up the sleeve on Light's right arm, revealing the bare skin, still deathly pale. "Heart attack, they said. How… ironic," he said quietly, his lips twitching upwards in amusement. With a quick movement of his left arm, the knife in his hand sliced through Light's flesh like butter. Light let out a strangled cry of surprise mixed with this new pain – the old pains had only just begun to fade.

L leaned over and set the knife on the bedside table, picking up the Life Note. "Sorry, Yagami-kun," he apologized, quite insincerely, as he flicked open the pages and pressed the tip of the feather against the blood oozing down towards Light's wrist. "You see, the words on the Life Note must be written in blood. As I already had to cut myself to bring you back, I believe that the least you can do is make yourself useful as an inkwell."

He slowly scrawled a name that Light couldn't read, blowing on the words to dry them before setting it back down on the table and retrieving a bandage, wrapping it around the cut. "Now, let's watch and see what happens, shall we?" he asked with a smile before looking at the ashes on the gurney.

--

He didn't understand it. And he didn't know why he didn't understand it. Reaching up slowly, Near flicked the tower of dice that had formed in front of him, watching as they crashed to the table and bounced off in different directions, some escaping to the floor, some rolling around the table.

There was something here… something obvious. Something that he should know but didn't. And there was probably a link that he hadn't discovered, much like the link L hadn't discovered in the Kira case.

The Death Note.

That was the link L hadn't discovered.

However, as this detail was far from being inconspicuous, he hardly patted himself on the back over this revelation. Leaning forward, he picked up two of the dice and swept the rest away with his arm, leaving a clean expanse of desk in front of him. He then rolled the dice.

Seven.

The Death Note was the link that L couldn't discover.

He rolled the dice again.

Three.

If this was on the same scale as the Kira case, there must be a link he hadn't discovered either.

He rolled the dice a third time.

Eight.

He had nothing to go on, except that one detail.

Eleven.

All of the fingerprints had been wiped away.

Nine.

All wiped away.

Five.

But why?

Near stared down at the table as the two red dots stared back at him. Snake eyes. If Near had been superstitious, he would have suspected that he was on the wrong track with all of this, and that the dice were trying to tell him that.

Two.

And he would believe that this entire escapade was fruitless.

Two.

But that one detail was irritating him.

Two.

All wiped away.

Two…

Reaching up, he began twisting a curl of hair around his index finger. Maybe the dice weren't telling him something, exactly, but more something he was using to help put his finger on something.

Two. Two what? Two… links. Two clues. Two… two…

Near sighed. He wasn't getting anywhere with this.

… or was he?

He didn't have two clues, and he didn't suspect two separate links. One link, one clue. L had that.

L… Two. Two Ls.

But there weren't two Ls.

There were three.

L, M, N. Or, at least, there had been. Then again, maybe he shouldn't be looking at the technical side of it. In the literal sense, were there two Ls?

No.

But there was someone who wanted, not to be L, but to surpass L in every way, shape, and form imaginable. He wanted to step on L, make him grovel and beg and plead. He wanted to sabotage L so badly he even pretended to be L. He wanted to make the world forget the ominous letter L, and forever remember the letter…

… what letter?

…

Near slammed his fists on the table. He was so close to the answer that he could taste it. He just knew he was. However, a pertinent detail was flitting just out of reach in the corners of his mind. Quickly standing, he moved the two snake eye dice to the side and gathered the rest of the dice in a pile, including those that had made a valiant escape to the floor. He then began reconstructing the English alphabet in dice along the length of the table in good sized letters, until he had A through Z in a perfect row, with the two snake eye dice right in front of his seat in the middle.

He unceremoniously swept away the L, M, and N, as he knew that the owners of those letters were not the ones who were in control here. After a moment of thought, he also swept away the K.

Not K.

Not Kira.

Twenty-two letters left.

Two and two.

Two.

He looked at the second letter of the alphabet – B. That had been it. Plan B. Beyond Birthday. The copy that failed. Another L. He had been almost as intelligent as L. They were so close in ability it would have taken a close observer a long time to realize the miniscule difference between the two.

But it was there. And B hated it.

And he would do anything to get back at L, wouldn't he?

Near began reconstructing the tower slowly. This would require thought, to say the least.

--

Nothing had happened.

Yet.

Light stared at the pile of ashes on the gurney with the sort of morbid fascination held by train wreck witnesses. Something was going to happen; he just didn't know what it was or when it would be. How long would it take? The bandage on his arm was tightly bound to stem the bleeding, but he could feel it growing wet.

Something would happen.

And it did.

Smoke slowly began rising from the ashes. It was grayish-white, like cigarette smoke, and only visible due to the halogen lights. "It's starting," L said quietly, the smile apparent in his voice. "Now, this is how it's going to work. I'm really doing this mostly for experimental purposes, and when his lips finish forming, I'll gag him. I don't want to run the risk of his screams getting too loud.

"I've never resurrected anyone whose body was burned, as I've said, but this is what I think will happen. The cause of death was a heart attack, and his body was destroyed after death. However, his body cannot heal until he is alive, as evidenced by both you and me. Therefore, the Life Note will go as far as re-constructing his body to a charred corpse before bringing him back to life, and then will resume healing him, as that state would kill him. At least, this is my theory."

The smoke rising from the ashes had begun to darken until it was an ashen gray-black, like the substance rising from a smokestack. After a minute of this, the ashes slowly began moving on their own. It was truly the strangest sight Light had ever witnessed. The smoke above the ashes then slowly began descending again, back into the ashes, as though they were being inhaled. Slowly, the ashes began looking less like ashes and more like a pile of burned flesh.

Slowly, it began growing. It was almost like a burning in reverse – the pile of flesh slowly began to gain the shape of a torso, and was sprouting things that looked like limbs. The arms sprouted stubby, fingerless hands, and the legs grew things that almost resembled feet. As the fingers and toes began appearing, a head was sprouting as well.

The entire process took about two minutes. In fact, it still more closely resembled a creature that had been turned on a spit than a human being. The blackened flesh was cracked all over, showing deep crimson in spots, and it looked like it would begin flaking if anyone so much as walked past it.

Nothing happened for a few moments. L and Light merely stared at the corpse in silence. The room was quiet except for the gentle buzzing of the lamp overhead. It was, truly, the most horrible thing Light had ever laid eyes on in his entire life. It was almost like stepping into some kind of sick video game, where he was less the hero who stepped in and saved everyone and more the victim who would be found dead on level six.

A bit of flesh fell from the body as a rasping sound filled the room. It took Light a minute to realize that it was the body on the table taking its first breath in an extremely long time. A horrible, quiet cracking sound followed as, mostly fueled by terror, the eyes snapped open, revealing bright green eyes coated with a fogged, milky film, a bit of liquid running from the corner of his eye down his face.

L smiled a bit. "Ah, it worked. I was right." Light could sympathize with the man on the table – after all, he knew that horror could make a body do things that it would be incapable of otherwise. Slowly, with more cracking, the mouth opened in a silent scream. Obviously, the vocal chords were still destroyed.

Acting as though there was nothing strange about the body coming back to life in the middle of the room, L crossed over to the table and pulled off a towel, which he gently laid across the man's waist. "After all, we must protect decency, and all that," he said with a quiet laugh, smiling at the man who was still trying to scream. All that escaped his throat, however, was a rasping rush of air.

Slowly, blood began to ooze out of the cracks in the skin. It was thick and dark, like a syrup, and when it dripped down onto the gurney a thread remained attached to the skin. It was truly fascinating to watch, if not pleasant – the body was, in fact, being healed slowly, as the red patches on the blackened skin very slowly began to spread.

"He will be unable to talk for quite some time, I would imagine. However, he is currently deaf, dumb, and blind, and will remain that way until his body heals further. But I was right, as I always am," L laughed as he walked away from the table, walking over to Light.

"Do you see, Yagami-kun? I am the best. I am the best. There is no one who is better than me. Not even you. I have no equals, and I never will. Is this proof enough that I have defeated you?" he asked quietly as he held up the Life Note.

This wasn't right. This wasn't the L that he had fought and tried to outsmart for so long. This wasn't the L he had been handcuffed to while attempting to work on the Kira case. What had happened to change him so much?

"Ah, but I am being rude," L said quietly, a smile spreading on his lips. "I don't think you two have been… properly introduced. I don't know if he can hear, but it's worth a try." He slowly walked over to the gurney until he was on the opposite side of it, staring at Light over the body.

"Yagami Light, it is my utmost pleasure to introduce Mihael Keehl to you. Mello, I would like you to meet Kira."