notes/warnings
+ hi there remember me?
+ stuff happens
Face
"Well?" Naomi asks, as soon as Wedy enters her office. "What happened?"
It's no real surprise that she's worried. She's the deputy; she has to make up for all of L's failings.
"We talked," Wedy says, vaguely. "And his explanation was sufficient. I'm not leaving his employ, or anything."
Naomi raises an eyebrow. She has brightly coloured fluff on one shoulder, a remnant of one of Connor's toys. Wedy can't imagine what it's like to be a parent. It's certainly not a career she would ever consider, especially given the role models she has in her life.
"What explanation?" Naomi asks.
Wedy doesn't answer. L said it was a secret, and there's no cause for Naomi to know at this point. L is - golly gee - L is in love with some supernatural creature thing that turned out to be a person in hell. Wedy still has trouble believing it. She didn't think L was capable of important emotions like love and fashion.
"What explanation?" Naomi asks again, a little more sharply. Her knuckles are white. Nothing is easy.
"He doesn't think less of me because of Marvin," Wedy answers. "That's all I wanted."
"But we're not working together properly," Naomi continues. "We're not meshing like we used to. I need to speak to L."
Wedy holds out a hand, gesturing for her to stop.
"He said he needs some time to himself," Wedy informs Naomi. "He needs to understand his own strengths and weaknesses, because they've changed since we all last worked together."
"How much time?" Naomi asks. She sounds lost. Wedy doesn't really care.
"Seventy-two hours," Wedy replies.
Lydia Stanton arrives home, and examines her garden as she makes her way to the back porch.
The tea plant is still looking healthy and strong. The vegetable patch is attempting to infiltrate the house, reaching spindly green tendrils into the spaces between the window and the window pane. The rest is unremarkable; nothing that any of Mills' compliance-ensuring spies would consider abnormal. Lydia opens the door, closes it behind her and sinks slowly to the floor.
Nobody suspects her, of course. The main reason she's doing this is that nobody will ever suspect her, but keeping cover is still taxing and fraught. She never knows when Mills might decide to check up on her. It's only a matter of time before L or his team try to interfere with her, or Light decides to get involved in something difficult. And now Mikami has witnessed her using the ring. Who knows what he'll do with that information?
Lydia tips her head back, and tugs the pins from her hair. In public, she is the very picture of rigidity and severity, a worshipper of the rules. It's a good persona because it masks the fact that sometimes she forgets how to be a human, the way her fringe masks the cross on her forehead. But being a double agent is a delicate balance, and her safety is always in jeopardy. All she can hope is that L and his team will win before her cover is blown.
"Urf," Gelus says, happily, bounding across the kitchen floor and licking her face.
Lydia pats him absently. He's a useful dog. He isn't particularly obedient, he's barely toilet-trained, and sometimes he gets frightened by his own wagging tail. But he hates cats with a vengeance, and that is all she needs from a dog right now. Lydia loves him, but she loved every single dog at the shelter. She chose Gelus for his ailurophobia alone.
"She's still here, isn't she?" Lydia asks her dog, softly. "She's still living on my sofa."
Now is definitely not a good time to have a houseguest, even if it's one that Mills can't detect. But Gelus is wearing a radiant sort of expression, like he hasn't had to deal with being alone for even a moment, and Lydia resigns herself to the fact that they still have company before she even sets foot in the living room.
Sure enough, the forlorn bundle of blankets and blonde hair and Lydia's favourite purple hoodie is still there, flicking through the channels on the television. Lydia sighs loudly. Her lungs contract and expand again in her chest. She's so very, very tired.
"You are watching television," she begins, stating the obvious because that's what she does.
"Yes. I thought I would see what is happening in the world," the bundle tells her, miserably.
Lydia sighs and sits down on the arm of the couch.
"You must have somewhere else to go," she begins. "You are not supposed to be living in my house."
Her sort-of-friend finally stops looking at the television and turns instead to glare at her.
"And you weren't supposed to grow the tea," she says, accusingly. "It was for one-time use, and it was for you. You definitely weren't supposed to grow it and powder it and deliver it to all the hospitals."
Lydia shrugs.
"You should not have given me tea with seeds in it, then," she pronounces. "I cannot see people sick and injured and do nothing."
Not even if the people are criminals. Not even if they're Light fucking Yagami. Even he gets food, right on his doorstep, like clockwork every fortnight. Lydia wouldn't want Shadow to starve, would she?
"Whatever," Jas replies. "Can I stay here a few more nights?"
Lydia hesitates, considering this.
"Can I stop you?" she asks, genuinely. "As I understand, you are still omnipotent, if depressed."
It doesn't really matter. Lydia is supposed to be starting an undercover assignment tomorrow. Maybe she can convince Jas to feed the dog while she's away.
"I feel horrible," Jas says, thickly. "I feel so sad inside, like everything is pointless. I've never felt like this before, and I don't know what to do."
Gelus licks her knee sympathetically. Lydia doesn't feel quite so kindly towards her old captor.
"Perhaps you could think of something happy?"
She has no idea how to deal with things like this. She isn't even used to having a body. Sometimes she forgets how to make expressions. How is she supposed to help someone? She deals solely in tea and, less recently, death.
Jas shivers and curls her body around the blankets.
"It's almost like…I can feel him," she whispers, obviously terrified. "It's like he's breathing down the back of my neck."
"He?" Lydia echoes. Maybe Jas has figured something out. "Do you mean the person who took the notebook paper?"
"No," Jas murmurs. "Him. Lazarus."
Sometimes, Lydia wonders what would happen if she just threw Jas out on the doorstep. Jas could theoretically make a lot of trouble, but she's not supposed to interfere with people outside her jurisdiction. But instead she's here, on the damn sofa, and now it sounds like something else might have followed her.
"Is Lazarus a human, a shinigami, a monster, or something else?" Lydia asks, folding her arms.
"None," Jas murmurs. "He's…he's not supposed to exist at all. He doesn't exist. But if he ever does, then…"
Dramatic pausing means that Jas is implying something terrible will happen. Something terrible happens more or less every other week. Lydia can handle most terrible things.
"Then he's already won," Jas finishes, with difficult. "He can't win!"
"Okay," Lydia tells her, wearily. "I'll keep an eye out for him, too."
Light takes time out of his busy schedule of hating his life and scowling at his cat to check his online messages. Sometimes the other hackers can cause quite a lot of trouble. Light never had a reason to care about trouble in this world before, but he certainly has a reason now that L is here. And he knows from experience that Fivenine and Volution tend to work together, and when they do work together they are almost unstoppable. And if Light needed to stop them, he'd risk them tracing back and uncovering his location. Because nobody can crack code like Volution.
Being a genius isn't so easy when you're not the only genius around.
But Light doesn't have to worry about that today. The only messages are from groceries-lady. He scans her words without interest.
[Activelydreaming] – I won't be able to make a delivery for a few weeks.
[Activelydreaming] – You're on your own.
Light smirks bitterly to himself. She must be enjoying the thought of leaving him to starve. He reaches for the keyboard and responds.
[Nocks] – don't worry
[Nocks] – I'll still be alive when you come back
[Activelydreaming] – I wasn't worried.
[Nocks] – you'd worry about Shadow though
[Activelydreaming] – Shadow is not a serial killer.
[Activelydreaming] – And she never has been and never will be a Shinigami.
[Nocks] – you still haven't told me how you know all this stuff
[Nocks] – did Jas tell you?
[Nocks] – is it a perk of being my handler?
[Activelydreaming] – I am not your handler.
[Activelydreaming] – And if I was I can assure you it would be a job with exactly zero perks.
Light would probably laugh if he could remember how. The entire trajectory of his life is objectively hilarious. How did he ever come to this? How is it that he's sitting in the dark in a dilapidated house bantering with the only person in the world he can talk to who also happens to blatantly hate his guts.
He was supposed to be a god.
He was supposed to be with L.
[Nocks] – right. so where are you going for the next few weeks?
[Nocks] – is it a work thing?
[Nocks] –where do you work?
/Activelydreaming has signed out.
L sorts through newspaper clippings, checks the answering machine, and refreshes the reporting websites set up so that people can contact him directly. There are no major unsolved cases at the moment, but there are two or three medium ones and that's exactly what L needs right now.
He needs to work. He needs to prove himself.
L chews on his thumb and ignores the dish of disappointing lukewarm custard he microwaved for himself. There's a serial killer picking off elderly victims in Birmingham, and an apparent serial kidnapper in Manchester. People keep complaining about the actions of the hacker called Hangman, but L can't say he agrees with their concerns. There's a suspected cult here in London, but the whole thing seems so pedestrian that surely the local forces can handle it without his help. And – oh – someone in Aberdeen purporting to be the second Kira. That should be interesting. Especially since there have been at least a dozen 'second Kiras' since Light Yagami. L assumes that 'thirteenth Kira' just doesn't have the same ring to it.
He opens his mouth to say as much, and then remembers that he is alone. He asked to be left alone, of course, but that isn't the point. The point – and the problem that nearly cost them dearly – is that he isn't used to working alone. He's used to Rae.
Everything would be so much easier if Rae were here. Or if he had at least some idea of where Rae is. Or hell, at least some idea of who Rae is. There is no doubt in L's mind that human Rae must be a lot more vulnerable than Shinigami Rae, and L would have no way of knowing if anything bad happened to her.
But if she's here, she must be looking for him. Surely. Surely.
The thing, Rae never told L who she was, nor did she give anything much in the way of hints. Back in the first world, the people who supported Kira numbered in the tens of thousands. L has almost nothing to work with, and no way to find Rae.
Rae has to find him, and the truth is, she's taking her time about it. And that makes him uneasy.
What if she's already dead?
What if she ended up back in hell?
Surely not. Surely, surely not. But if that were the truth, L would have no way of knowing it.
Why did this have to be so difficult?
"Hi!" Matsuda says brightly, apparently not fully understanding the definition of the phrase 'I need to be left alone'. "I made you proper custard, since you only have the cheap, nasty stuff from the store"
L eyes Matsuda and his proffered bowl carefully.
"You can cook?" he wonders.
"I can usually get a recipe right around the seventh or eighth time," Matsuda explains. "This is my ninth attempt, so it's definitely safe for eating."
"Huh," L says, noncommittally.
"Also, I tested it on Wedy," Matsuda adds. "And she didn't even criticise it."
As far as food goes, that's a reasonable standard of praise. L accepts the bowl without further question. Matsuda leans across the desk to pass it to him.
"Thanks for this," Matsuda adds, in a rush. "I know you're working to try and make things right. " He pauses for a moment and laughs softly to himself. "You know, when I first met you, I thought you were really rude and mean. I was so wrong."
"No," L replies.
L has only a vague understanding of who he was back in the first world. Dying – and losing – has defined so much of who he is now. L thinks that his old self might have been extraordinarily rude and mean. If he had been the one to find the notebook…
…if he had been the one to find the notebook…
…he's not actually sure what he would have done. He doesn't remember who he used to be. But if Matsuda had found the notebook, the world would probably have been fine.
"No," L says again, momentarily as to how to explain himself. He reaches for the air, gesticulating, and Matsuda leans over a little further and kisses him behind the ear. L's breath hitches for a moment, and then comes easier than before. Everything is not lost.
"You still believe in me, don't you?" L says, quietly.
"The whole team believes in you," Matsuda tells him, with utter confidence. "That's probably why you're so stressed right now."
L takes his hand and squeezes it and wonders if it wasn't worth it. If it wasn't worth Kira and dying and losing and failing because now he's here with these amazing people and maybe someday Rae will come home too.
[Fivenine] – hiiii
[Goldilocks] – good job not being dead and stuff. Also, one i is sufficient.
[Fivenine] – okay darling. So what is the plan?
[Goldilocks] –still not your darling. There are people lining up to call me darling, okay? People who've done a lot more for me than you.
[Fivenine] – sorry. How is your cult going, anyway?
[Goldilocks] – never mind that. I need you to use your influence to commission an artist.
[Fivenine} - ?
[Fivenine] – world's greatest hacker and you want me to do a secretary's work?
[Fivenine] – no offence, but can't one of your cult floozies do this?
[Goldilocks] – if you don't want to help, don't. If you do want to help, find me an artist who can recreate faces just from hearing them described.
[Fivenine] – holy fuck.
[Fivenine] – what are you even going to do with L, once you get his attention?
[Goldilocks] – the same thing anyone wants from L.
[Goldilocks] – revenge.
"I'm sorry," Halle tells you, and there is no emotion in her voice. "Near has made the decision to isolate you from the Kira case."
Near. Not L, Near. L doesn't even make decisions about you anymore. He's an enigmatic superstar. He's practically a god.
But he still can't stop Kira, and that's terrifying. The word 'isolate' is terrifying, too. You stare at your feet.
"What does that mean?" you drawl, because you don't know. Nothing makes sense to you anymore. It's only been three days since you were last kidnapped. They held a drill to your head and you told them exactly where Near worked, because you are a piece of shit.
Halle sighs, almost imperceptibly. She's obviously got better things to do than stand around talking to you, but she doesn't want you to know that.
She's too kind.
"It means that the headquarters have moved," Halle explains, "and this time you won't be told where they are. It also means you aren't permitted to see Near or anyone involved with the Kira case."
You give exactly zero shits about ever seeing Near again. Wait, what was that last part? Surely she doesn't mean—
"This includes the Jeevases," Halle finishes crisply. "No calls. No visits. No contact."
Your heart stops. You cannot believe this.
"No," you say. And then you say it again, more loudly. "No! You can't do that. They're my family. I need to talk to them!"
"If you talk to them," Halle says. "Then you are putting their very lives in danger."
Of course you are. You are the worst person in the world. Everything you touch dies. Everyone you care for gets hurt. You are the number one liability in the Kira case, and you always will be. It's a smart decision. Near is a smart person.
But you cannot survive without your family.
"I'll take your silence as acquiescence," Halle tells you. It's another kindness. She's sparing you the pain of having to respond, of having to pretend.
"Okay," you tell her. You don't say anything else. Halle leaves and gets back into her shiny car and pulls out onto the road and you are left alone with only Dwayne and your own dreadful company.
Your survival doesn't matter, anyway.
Teru Mikami slumps over the desk. He's on reception duty this week. The constant sitting and lack of doing anything useful would usually be immensely frustrating, but today he's glad for the stillness. He still doesn't know what to do.
Stanton is a monster.
Stanton is a monster.
A literal damn monster.
What is he supposed to do with this information? Nobody will ever believe him. Nobody will help him. Whatever Stanton is planning, Teru has no way of stopping her. It was only sheer dumb luck that she didn't succeed in getting L's address. What will he do, next time she makes a move?
Teru breathes deeply. It's ten o'clock in the morning. He should be drinking his second cup of coffee at quarter past ten. His routine is the only thing he has left, and he needs to hang onto it. Stick to the routine, and don't kill anyone. Don't let anyone die.
How is anyone supposed to function in this world of murderers and demons?
Teru forces himself to walk to the break room, and runs into Sergeant Riley. Teru bows slightly before moving towards the coffee machine. Riley is currently overseeing Southwest in Stanton's absence. Stanton and Daniels are both away on an undercover mission, which is probably the only reason Teru hasn't had a complete meltdown.
"Mornin'," Riley says, soberly. He's a young-looking man with messy hair, a permanent five o'clock shadow, and a picture of two identical girls on his desk. So far he hasn't turned out to be a bully or a witch, which is more than Teru can say for any of his other commanding officers.
"Good morning," Teru replies.
Edison is investigating a petty theft, and Kylie is working with Berkshire's old team to try and solve a mass kidnapping or something. Everything is still going along as normal.
Teru gets his coffee back to reception right at ten fifteen.
Naomi flips through the channels on the television. Connor sits on her lap, diligently playing with his new Pteranodon stuffed toy. He's no trouble at all for a child, the exact opposite of his father. Sometimes Naomi misses Raye as a dying person misses air. Sometimes she finds herself idly wondering how long marriage is supposed to last, given that life is apparently infinite. It's so nice, working on her own without having to fight against anyone.
Naomi selects a news channel at random, and wraps both her arms around her son.
"And yet another person claiming to be Kira has been thwarted by an anonymous tipster," the newsreader announces. "The man, whose real name is Jeremy Stannis, was taken into custody last night. Police say they found weapons and a suspected hit-list at Stannis' property."
The newsreader has a tattoo on her hand, clearly visible to the camera. It reads never again. A statement of solidarity, shared by many. The disgust in her voice is obvious when she says the word 'Kira'.
"Many are wondering just who this anonymous tipster is," the newsreader continues. "Personally, I think that Hangman has struck again, and I couldn't be happier. Back to you, Stewart."
Naomi smiles to herself and switches off the television.
Good, she thinks.
Rudi East doesn't have a job, or very many friends to speak of. She lives on the outskirts of London in a beaten-down one-room apartment. There are vermin living in the roof. She munches on another forkful of noodles and considers the proposal in front of her.
[REast] – you mean, like an identikit picture.
[Fivenine] – something like that. But you'll only get paid if it looks exactly like him.
Rudi examines the preliminary description; pale man with androgynous features, permanent bags under his eyes, bushy black hair. In the accompanying file, the description reaches an insane level of detail. The angle of his nose, the exact curve of his mouth. Someone has converted a person's description into fucking math, and they want her to convert it back again.
"I guess you should have just taken a photo when you had the chance," Rudi muses.
[REast] – I don't work for free. If you commission, you pay.
She's absolutely sick of being ripped off.
The person purporting to be Fivenine doesn't answer for a few moments, and Rudi thinks maybe she's lost the deal altogether. Maybe that's not such a bad thing. It's all starting to sound a little too weird for her tastes.
[Fivenine] – fine. Your retainer is $100. If you get it right, you get an extra $600. Sound fair?
Rudi has never even seen so much money in one place in all her life.
[REast] – you got yourself a deal.
The entire fourteen-story apartment building has been converted on the inside, so that it better resembles a slightly vampiric palace. The floors are black marble, the walls are crimson, and the pillars are adorned with little bat silhouettes. The curtains are a heavy black lace. The staircases that stretch between the levels have golden spiderwebs painted on the bannisters.
The people swanning around the place are all beautiful, all well-dressed. Most of them are young women. Typical. Trust teenage girls to get mixed up in some stupid cult. Daniels tugs at his tie and wonders absently at the whereabouts of his boss. They aren't able to wear wires due to the scanners and the regular strip searching, and the two of them are pretending not to know each other. They're also pretending to not be police officers, obviously. And perhaps most importantly, they're pretending to be completely enthralled with the cult leader, a woman who is generally referred to as 'the Lady', or 'my Lady', depending on the level of enthralment.
The only way to enter the cult is to act like you're in love with its leader. What a fucking egotist. The whole thing is a saccharine and infuriating endeavour. People who are stupid enough to join a cult should be left to rot in it. If Daniels had his way, the world would be purged of the weak and the stupid and anyone who has any sort of mark on their forehead.
Starting with that scum of the earth, Constable Mikami.
Daniels is absolutely, completely convinced that Mikami is evil, and all he needs to do is prove it to the world. In the past six months or so, Daniels has tried yelling and sneering, belittling and insulting, gaslighting and lying and downright bullying. Mikami is utterly impervious to all of it.
But that's okay, because Daniels has a plan. Obviously, Mikami is thriving on being able to play the victim. All Daniels needs to do is make him the bully, instead.
It's perfect.
At three o'clock on the dot, everyone gathers in the second-largest dining hall for tea. It's an elegant, stupid affair with perfectly polished antique cups and unnecessarily tiny cakes. Daniels spots Stanton sitting halfway across the room, poker-faced as ever, but with her long hair loose and a strappy purple-and-white dress in place of her usual uniform. Her position is close to the head of the table, to signify her closeness with their leader. How Stanton managed to even pretend to bond with anyone is one of the universe's great unsolved mysteries.
Daniels goes back to daydreaming about how he's going to ruin Mikami's life. It won't be difficult. Mikami already acts as suspicious as fuck, and nobody's going to doubt any accusations that Daniels throws his way if there's even the tiniest bit of evidence. And then Daniels will finally be happy, instead of having to work with nasty bastards who make him want to punch himself in the face.
Their Lady deigns to join them today. She sweeps into the hall, long blonde hair tied into an oversized bow, heels clicking against the floor, gold on her eyelids and wearing pastel layered clothes from some sort of Japanese fashion that Daniels absolutely does not understand. Everyone acts like she's the baby Jesus incarnate, even the new recruits.
They're recruiting every day now. Every single day, more crazy people decide to dedicate their life to some washed up ex-supermodel. Sometimes Daniels privately thinks that Kira had the right idea, that the world does need to be purged of the stupid.
"Is it really okay to eat so much cake?" a girl with star-shaped earrings says to a young man in a silver suit. "Won't we get fat?"
The clicking sound stops, abruptly, ominously. The Lady turns slowly, the tip of her ponytail swishing against her back. Everyone else in the room immediately goes still, the air suddenly thick with terrified anticipation. Daniels is so, so bored of this already.
"You know," the Lady says quietly, her voice echoing in the too-big room. "Someone once told me that you can burn up calories just by thinking."
It's such a weird and stupid thing to say. She always talks in riddles and roundabouts, dispensing knowledge, and more often than not alluding to some revenge that Daniels doesn't understand. Sometimes it's as if she doesn't notice her followers at all.
"Oh," squeaks the girl, turning her reddening face downwards. "Thank you, my Lady."
No conversation follows. After a few awkward moments, everyone begins to eat again. Daniels can barely swallow past his tight collar.
At the end of the hour, the Lady calls on two of them.
"Moore," she says, gesturing to a man who Daniels recognises as an ex newsreader. "And Lee," she adds, gesturing to Stanton. "I've got a job for both of you."
Daniels raises an eyebrow. This wasn't part of the plan.
Working undercover sucks.
Stanton isn't afraid. The marble is cold and hard under her hands, her ring clicks softly against the surface. She's only ever a touch away from ten feet tall and bulletproof. The Lady has chosen her for something. She doesn't know what that means, but she knows it's only a coincidence. It's not possible that she's been recognised.
What would there be to recognise? She was barely anyone back then, and she's barely anyone now. Mass murderer, police officer, monster and nobody.
But Stanton recognises the Lady with absolute certainty. With a painful rush of nostalgia and guilt. It doesn't really matter, does it?
"Moore," the Lady says, briskly. "I need you to use your contacts to hijack a news feed."
Moore blanches, and then recovers admirably.
"I regret that I am not certain whether I can do that alone, my Lady," he says, and maybe he genuinely loves her. Maybe everyone here does.
"You will work with Fivenine," the Lady clarifies, pointing at her computer. Online, she goes by the handle 'Goldilocks'. Stanton can't help but wonder who the three bears are supposed to be, if there are any at all. Perhaps it's just a reference to hair colour.
Even the most ill thought-out of handles is probably safer than just slapping 'Misa Amane' onto everything like a brand.
"And Lee?" Misa continues, though it's better just to think of her as the Lady for now. "I want you to check this script. Our demands need to be perfect."
"Demands?" Stanton echoes.
"Yes. You see, I need something that only L can get me. And he needs his anonymity. So it's a perfect bargain, you see?"
"Oh," Stanton says, faintly, and in her head she follows that syllable with a laundry list of curse words.
She's going to need more than magic tea to fix this.
The solved cases begin to pile up. The news networks are waxing poetic about this new mystery case solver. Are they affiliated with the government? The police? Or are they some other plucky new freelance detective? L doesn't let them deduce any sort of answer. He operates under a quintet of aliases; L, Deneuve, Near, Wedy and Hangman. The last two he uses carefully; Wedy's alias is only used for cases where members of the police or public already know she is involved. By using her name, L severs her from him a little. He hopes the severance will protect her. And he uses Hangman for cases that can be plausibly considered philanthropic or human rights oriented. So far the real Hangman has not protested.
"Upsetting one of the Big Four is bad, you know," Naomi tells him, leaning over the back of his chair. "If they wanted to, they could make your entire browser history and all the files on your computer public."
L gives her half a smile. He's pleased that she's here, but he won't allow himself to be distracted. He's currently narrowing down the suspects for a serial classroom gunman, a particularly loathsome kind of terrorist. It used to be that L half-admired his adversaries. Now he doesn't even consider them adversaries, just criminals and scum. Anyone who threatens human life is scum.
Perhaps the handle of Hangman is not entirely unfitting. Some days L barely recognises his own face in the mirror. He's changed so much, but his appearance remains entirely as it did in the first world. Briefly minus an eye, of course.
"Twenty-four solved cases," Naomi continues, her tone growing lighter. "Do you think you've proved whatever you were trying to prove yet?"
L doesn't look at her.
"I need to be good enough," he says determinedly. "I must be good enough to lead you, otherwise I must step aside."
There's a series of soft clinks that can only be caused by Naomi fiddling with the ceramic pen-holder on his desk. "L, I'm proud of you. Matsuda and Aiber are proud of you. If Wedy was capable of feeling pride in other people I'm sure she'd be proud of you, too. What happened a few weeks ago was as much my fault as yours, really. Let's do a case together next." Naomi fishes a piece of paper out of L's loosely gathered Potential Case Pile and examines it thoughtfully. "Let's look into this cult that people keep complaining about."
"That is hardly a case befitting our entire team," L murmurs. "You could easily solve it on your own with a simple visit, I imagine. And I am not quite ready to return to working with the team. I still want to gain a better stronghold on my emotions."
Naomi sighs heavily.
"It's okay to have emotions, you know," she says. "You can have emotions and not make mistakes because of them."
Naomi is a perfect example of her own statement. She is utterly reliable, and L trusts her. And with that simple revelation, some of the anxiousness in his heart eases. The downside to having friends is that they can get hurt. The upside to having friends is that your strengths are combined and amplified.
It's just that L wants to have at least one more of his friends around. At least one. He doesn't want to have to wait any longer, and part of him is worried that the longer Rae takes to find him, the more likely it is that Rae will meet and fall for someone else.
"Naomi," L says, finally turning to face her. "Are you still in love with your husband?"
If their love can last for three worlds, surely his can span across two. Surely.
"Of course," Naomi says, and L chooses to take comfort in her words and ignore the way her tone grows robotic and cold, like she's reciting a phrase learned by rote.
There really is a definite chance that Rae doesn't love him anymore, and L isn't ready to face that.
Light finds some markers behind the boxes under the desk, and spends four hours sketching a six-foot-high picture of L's face onto the wall.
That night they eat dinner together in front of the television, like a proper family. Matsuda sprawls out across the sofa, feet in Wedy's lap and head against L's leg. Wedy manages to look casual and cool with an arm thrown over the backrest, even though her posture is impeccable. Naomi sits on the floor next to Aiber's chair, and Connor sits on the floor under Aiber's chair. But even he makes an effort, leaving a good third of his legs poking out in his own gesture of companionship.
"To the team," Aiber says, raising his glass. "To the cases we solve even when we make mistakes."
"To making fewer mistakes," L says, quietly. He still hasn't forgiven himself.
"To trusting each other," Naomi adds.
"To maybe getting a cat!" Matsuda pipes up.
"Megalodon!" Connor mutters loudly to himself.
Wedy half-smiles.
"You two always add such finesse to the conversation," she says, affectionately. And then she hesitates a moment, deciding on her own toast. "To Yagami rotting in hell," she adds, finally.
"I'll drink to that," Aiber says, loudly.
They browse the channels for a quarter hour. A news program reports three detective constables have gone missing in Wistshield, a medium-sized town near London that did not exist in the first world. L takes a few mental notes. He ought to be looking for a new case for his team, something fitting and complicated and hopefully more interesting than an inconsequential cult.
"I'll keep an eye on the reports," Naomi says, as if she can read his mind. "I'll let you know if it turns into anything."
Abruptly, the news program halts and for a moment the television shows nothing but static.
"Weird." Wedy muses.
"Owls," Matsuda says, with absolute certainty.
When the picture returns, the scene is clearly not the national news set, or any set that L recognises. It is a somewhat grainy feed of an office, and a man L recognises as disgraced reporter Jackson Moore. He is reading from some sort of script. L sits up stiffly, watching. He has not seen such a thing happen in this world before. The last time someone hijacked a news station was the Kira case.
"Pay attention," Moore addresses the camera. "This is important. I have a message-"
"Sometimes the Big Four do things like this," Aiber says, reassuringly.
"- a message for the detective known as L," Moore continues, and L's heart seizes in his chest.
This is either terrible, or a message from Rae. One or the other. In an instant he is almost sick with hope and fear and anticipation.
"Oh my god," Naomi breathes.
"My Lady wants to make a deal with you," Moore tells the camera. "She knows exactly what you look like. If you decline to help her, she will publish your face on a thousand different websites."
Okay, not Rae. Definitely not Rae. Definitely bad. Such an outcome would utterly destroy L. He'd be unable to leave the house. He wouldn't be able to function in this world or any other. He'd have to abandon his team entirely and live on his own, away from society.
So what does this lady want in return for his anonymity?
"She requests that you deliver to her Light Yagami's whereabouts," Moore finishes. "You have exactly twenty days to do this. If you do not provide the information, or if the information is found to be incorrect, she will reveal you to the world."
A second later the regular news program returns to the screen, and L can hardly breathe.
How on earth is he supposed to do such a thing?
tbc
a/n
+ thank you so much for reading.
+ as always, this fic is not abandoned, I am still working on it, but I'm not sure when the next chapter will be up. hopefully before the end of the year.
+ this chapter brought to you courtesy of the baby bird sitting on my spacebar.