Hey guys, sorry this is slightly later than usual, there were technical difficulties involving internet connection. Anyway, thank you to Exogenesis Symphony Fm7 for being the only person to review this week, although thank you also to all those who favourited/followed as well!

To answer you question, and to clarify for everyone else, L is 19 in this story (I did warn that he would be aged down in this) and so (obviously) is Mitsu while Raito is 18, as he would have been in the manga by now. If there is anything else, don't be afraid to ask, although if it is spoiler worthy for this story, then the answer will probably be a bit vague.

Moving on, I hope that you enjoy this chapter and please tell me what you think!

Just as a side note: "words"- Japanese, "words"- English and "words"- French

The boy in the corner had red eyes and everyone was avoiding him like he was diseased. L wondered why. Other than the red eyes he was nothing special, merely a boy roughly the same age as himself and Mitsu. But the others were taking great care to move around him, some even pressing themselves into the opposite wall to get as far away from him as possible. L glanced over at him again, taking in the curly black hair and bright red eyes once more. Nope, still not seeing much wrong with him, other than the odd tendency to glance above a person's head as they passed. Probably some kind of quirks- lots of the kids at Wammy's House had quirks so he wasn't concerned by this one.

He glanced to his left where Mitsu was watching too, eyes bright. She wouldn't care about odd colouring- heck, their own was odd enough that even they had been avoided like they were the devil incarnate for a while. But L's intelligence had soon put them in their place along with Mitsu's natural brazen nature.

"What do you think?" he whispered toward her. She glanced towards him, her mouth turned down in a pout.

"I think everyone's being mean." With that she flounced over to the boy, skirts bouncing along with her skipping steps. It was strange, considering they had spent most of their most recent time wearing similar clothing, right up until Roger had gotten fed up with mixing them up and insisted that Mitsu wear skirts all the time, and L jeans. It seemed drastic action to take against two seven year olds but who was he to question Roger?

"Hi, my name's Mitsu. What's yours?" The boy looked genuinely shocked that she had come to talk to him. L approached much more sedately, offering him a comforting smile.

"You don't have to answer. She demands everything," he stated as Mitsu mock scowled at him.

"Hey!" The boy giggled at that and uncurled from the little ball he had formed, eyes flickering to just above his head. L glanced up wondering what was so special in the air above his head but then shrugged it off. Quirks, as usual.

"My name's Karabas Bretznev," he said, voice still thick with a Russian accent. He had clearly only been in the country for a small amount of time, but he had the feeling that their new friend wasn't fully Russian- his skin was too pale, almost as pale as theirs. "Call me B."

"Your mother named you after an evil puppet master?" Mitsu asked, surprised. B blinked, surprised that she even knew that story. L supposed that he was yet to learn that they were forced to learn three or four languages depending on their IQ from the moment they entered Wammy's. He had to learn five, but Mitsu only had to learn three- Mr Wammy had stated that he didn't think it fair to force her to compete with her brother when her talents clearly lay elsewhere. Personally he thought that was just a long winded way of saying that compared to the others she was stupid. It wasn't her fault that academics were not really her thing, although she was far from stupid in reality.

"Why do you think I want to be called B?" There was a hint of annoyance in his voice but Mitsu was impossible to discourage. She merely smiled.

"Funny. I always liked that character." B blinked again, thrown and L resisted the urge to laugh. He resisted the urge to do a lot of things lately, but at least this time had a reason.

"I'm L." He wasn't allowed to use his real name anymore. Only Mitsu ever said it anymore, usually in the middle of the night when neither could sleep and they crept into the same bed. Roger didn't mind- they weren't old enough yet for it to be a problem but he was warned that in the next three years, he could expect that to change. L didn't want to think about that and three years was a long time to him. B's eyebrows twisted together in a frown but he didn't say anything. L would have said something more but Mr Bourgious stuck his head around the classroom door and scowled at him.

"L, what are you doing? You are supposed to be with Miss Lang in the library!" L couldn't wait until he was old enough to not be summoned from whatever he was doing at the whim of his tutors. The house had been excited at finding his intelligence higher than many other children in the orphanage and he was barely allowed to sleep with how hard they worked him, well into the evening and sometimes through and past dinner. Mitsu looked upset at the calling but B surprisingly took her hand.

"It's ok. I'll look after your sister for you." He smiled at L and L was struck suddenly by the similarities of them all. Dark haired, pale skinned and thin lanky frames. The only thing that separated B from them was the red eyes but L preferred to think that they were cool more than anything. Unique, much like the person that owned them. Roger appeared at the end of the corridor, looking shocked.

"L, M, what are you doing here? L you're supposed to be in the library with Miss Lang and M you're late for English in classroom 2B. Off with you!" He waved a hand as if that would get them to move faster. "B, let me show you to the room that you'll be sharing with A…" Roger was ferrying B away, pulling the pair apart. Mitsu looked heartbroken, but determined.

"Fine. See you on the other side B!" L grinned and he could hear B laughing as he and Roger turned the corner. Her face then fell as she looked at him sadly. "See you when you're finished?" He sighed.

"See you then," he murmured, watching as she turned and ran off down the corridor. He then made his way to the orphanage's library where the strict librarian was, waiting with about six different volumes, written in six different languages.

"Nice of you to turn up," she sniffed as if he had intentionally been late. Honestly, he had been so busy these past few weeks, months and years, his timetable, full as it was, was shoved to the back of his mind but never forgotten. He knew he was supposed to be elsewhere, he just couldn't bring himself to care. He had seen so little of Mitsu this week, he had almost forgotten what her face looked like when it wasn't bathed in moonlight- a point in which he was thankful for the photographic memory he had been born with.

"What is today's lesson?" he asked politely, settling at the table. Miss Lang sniffed again and dumped one of the books in front of him.

"Crime and punishment…"

For once, L woke slowly, something that was unusual for him. Normally, he would be awake instantly due to his being a light-sleeper, even after recovering from his coma, but perhaps the overly exuberant Matsuda had worn him out. The man didn't seem bad- in fact he was almost exactly what he had expected. A young, awe-struck young man who would endear even the most hard-hearted officer to him, although he supposed that some would find that more annoying rather than sweet. It was more Mitsu's job than his to deal with people like him but that didn't mean that he didn't like the man- more he thought that he could do with toning it down a little and at points acting more like the detective he was rather than a love-struck teenager.

Mitsu had called the previous day he had been awake to state that she was in the country, but on her way to bed. Apparently she looked too awful to be seen in public which L took to mean that she was actually just dressed for her art projects rather than any kind of fashion disaster. Mitsu didn't generally care about such a thing and found it frustrating when anyone suggested it so. Once more he found himself alone in the hospital room, but at least they allowed him to eat his own food now and had even helped him attempt moving about. L wanted to be out of the hospital as soon as possible and the removal of the feeding tube had been one step closer towards that. Forcing mobility on his heavy and disused muscles may not have been the medically approved version of how treatment ought to be taken, but L had been adamant. The sooner he was up and about, the happier he would be.

He was almost regretting that action now. Three months of lying immobile on a hospital bed had seized all of his carefully honed muscles up, leaving them weak and lethargic, his movements clumsy. Just taking three steps to reach a wheelchair to take himself to the bathroom (there had been absolutely no way he was using the bedpan) almost exhausted him too, probably contributing to the now slightly hungover feeling left over as dregs of a deep sleep. He wondered when Matsuda or Mitsu might show up again, or if he would have to settle for Mr Yagami or even- heaven forbid- his son, although that was highly unlikely considering Mitsu's hatred of the boy. He didn't know why or what had led to this (he felt certain that the pair had never physically met- perhaps they had chatted over Skype when he was out of the room?), only that nothing good would come of meeting this Raito Yagami.

He sighed, wondering why on earth he had decided that coming to Japan was a good idea. Wait, no I didn't. Watari mentioned the beginning of murders in Japan and your interest was piqued by the interesting effects on the victims… You thought that for a serial killer they were too clean. And they had been compared to the others. Serial killers and mass murderers tended to leave behind messy remains of their victims, usually left there by hand in grisly detail, with a few gory clues thrown in for good measure. They all thought of themselves as above the law and loved playing cat and mouse games until they turned into the mice. The reason that L was so flummoxed by Kira however, was that he didn't seem to have either a hands on approach or messy kills. In fact, other than a few car accidents, the worst were the suicides, mainly because it involved shooting themselves or jumping off high buildings. The rest had been heart attacks.

It seemed odd that this serial killer was so different to the others. While no two psychopaths thought the same, there was a strange sense of familiarity to these kills, something cold-blooded and calculated that he hadn't seen since the LA murder cases and B's rampage. After he finally lost it he thought, trying to suppress that memory altogether. The only reason that B hadn't gotten the death sentence for his crimes was because L had spoken up himself against that decision, stating that he was clearly delusional but it would be a shame to lose a brilliant mind such as B's. There would be no dragging it back from the cesspit it had fallen into, but there was still traces of his friend in there, still small motions that their friendship had not ended with A in the bathtub… Not helping right now. He needed to focus.

Unfortunately, this was not to be. A soft knock interrupted his musings and Mitsu stuck her head around the door, grinning broadly, a bag filled with food slung over her wrist. She was dressed shamelessly in a short tight-fitting black dress and heels and looked as much the same as the last time he had seen her, although a little more worried.

"Hey," she said as she set the bag down on the mobile table slung over the bed. Useful, in that it let him use the laptop provided in the room to surf the internet, looking up articles on the past nine months, but this was where he would get the answers he was looking for.

"Hey," he smiled awkwardly and focused instead on the bag. "What did you buy?"

"Oh, the normal titbits. Cake, chocolate etc. and some green tea KitKats, but they're sadly smaller than the ones in England." He smiled, remembering that KitKats had been her favourite treat for a while when they were still at Wammy's House, all those years ago.

"How much?" he asked and she shrugged.

"Half the length and only two bars instead of four," she stated, picking at her nails. "But I didn't come all this way to talk about the various flavours of KitKat you can buy in Japan."

"I know but you know what hospital food is like," he said. She spared him a grin before her face dissolved into worry.

"You scared me. I thought you were dead when I heard the news that Mr Wammy had been killed."

"I'm sorry," he said because that was all he could say right now. He didn't know what had happened to kill Quillish Wammy, and he certainly had no idea as to what had happened to himself. He hoped to leave here and find out as soon as possible. Mitsu's face softened a little as she shrugged.

"It's not your fault. It's whoever put you in a coma," she stated, before her face darkened. "I can't find any records past the 18th February. I was going to call Matt in to see whether he could salvage the footage from that month, but apparently he and Mello decided to bugger off somewhere and the orphanage 'doesn't have the resources' to get them back."

"Have you tried contacting them yourself?" he asked. Matt and Mello may not have been all that enamoured with the Wammy's House system, but they had been friendly enough with Mitsu and L themselves to have offered them back up contacts if they ever 'disappeared'. It had probably helped that they had both contributed to the orphanage's less than happy view on their attitudes towards anybody (suffice to say neither he nor Mitsu had been allowed near a motorbike while they were in a hundred metre vicinity of them). Mitsu looked slightly affronted at the thought that she hadn't tried that.

"Course I did. They said that they would be here in a week, so you've got plenty of time to kick back and relax." He raised an eyebrow at that.

"While a serial killer continues killing people?"

"Well, Kira's no B," she pointed out. "Personally he's not much of a serial killer if he's getting other people to do his dirty work for him. Probably some upstart git with a perchance for dramatic flair and an ego the size of the moon."

"Most probably," L said, his lips quirking as he resisted the urge to smile at her stuffy tone. After the delightful scenery B had left them to clear up, the sight of Kira's murders were like a walk in the park and Mitsu tended to judge how good a serial killer one was compared to his work. "Doesn't want to actually get blood on his hands."

"Pfft, bet he hasn't even been to a serial killer's murder site. That's why his kills are so lame. I mean supernatural heart attacks aside, how is killing people naturally creative?" Mitsu was shaking her head. "It's like he's got all brains and no creativity."

"Considering his followers are trying to start a new world order, he's not exactly original either." She grinned in response just as there was a knock on the door. Sighing, Mitsu went to the door to open it for Doctor Yamada, who was waiting on the other side with the nurse who had brought L his dinner. The smell was about as appetising as ever.

"Hello Yagami-san," he said with the same smile that most doctors had in place (after so many weeks listening to the same address, L was no longer surprised by the alias anymore). "I'd like to run through some basic checks if that's alright?" The fact that the demand was presented as a question didn't fail to cover up that he wasn't taking no as an answer. L just shrugged, glancing towards Mitsu who just raised an eyebrow at the man's commanding nature. In all honesty Doctor Yamada would not have been a bad police officer, but L supposed that he had to be able to talk down the authorities on occasion and so shouldn't be too surprised.

The checks were the same as every night. The doctor took his pulse and monitored his breathing by listening to his chest as if that would tell him any differently from the monitors that already did that and other boring check-up procedures that L had been forced to sit through at any doctor's meeting. Eventually he seemed to decide that he was doing well enough to be able to eat and left them in peace once more. Glancing at the time, L supposed that either Matsuda would do a return soon or Mr Yagami might come back to visit instead.

"That looks amazing," Mitsu said flatly, staring at the bowl that had been set in front of him. It was a soup of some kind, with noodles and some kind of meat floating in it, although L knew already that it was bland. Most of the food he was forced to eat was that way in order for his stomach to get used to processing food once more after basically being given nutrition through the feeding tube and IV's. He knew the science behind it but for someone with a raging sweet tooth it was still disappointing.

Exactly twenty minutes after the intrusion and most of the soup was gone (he honestly couldn't choke down the last few mouthfuls of the bland soup any longer), Matsuda crashed into the room, a smile on his face. Mitsu looked up from the roses Mr Yagami had brought in that she had been admiring while L finished his dinner ( she insisted that she would make herself something back at her apartment), looking only slightly surprised at the semi-violent way Matsuda had made his entrance. In fairness, L supposed that the man had tried to open the door normally but, considering the way he had practically fallen through the door, had tripped halfway through. He coloured instantly upon spotting Mitsu, as if the idea that a girl in his room was a little awkward. I really wonder what people must have thought about me…

"Oh, um, if I was interrupting anything…" Matsuda said, rubbing the back of his hand. "I-I didn't know you would have, err, company." He looked awkward as L and Mitsu glanced towards each other, Mitsu having wrinkled her nose slightly.

"Eww, gross. He's my brother and I was just visiting," she stated flatly and Matsuda blushed even more, clearly embarrassed about it all already.

"No, no! That's not what I meant! I mean… it's obvious you're related…!" His stuttering continued for a few more minutes before L decided to put him out of his misery.

"I think we could tell what you thought but I can assure you that Mitsu is my twin sister and not my love interest." Matsuda coughed awkwardly, face red and looking as if he wished the floor would open up and swallow him.

"Oh, um, hi. I'm Matsuda," he said, not looking quite sure what to do. "I'm sorry if I offended you."

"No, it's refreshing not being mistaken as the great L for once," she said, flashing a smile. "You'd be surprised by how often that happens."

"Really?" Looking relieved that the conversation had moved elsewhere, Matsuda attempted to carry on down that vein of thought instead.

"Yeah, whenever we were in the same country," she said. L rolled his eyes.

"It was a long time ago. It hasn't happened as recently as she makes it out to be."

"How long ago was that?" L had decided at the last visit that questions that he would probably have considered invasive to his privacy before the amnesia were just a part of Matsuda's natural curiosity. Half the time it seemed that he didn't realise what he had said was offensive or upfront but L could see how the man had potential. He wasn't afraid to ask awkward questions, even if he did leap to conclusions at times and stopped once it was made aware to him that it was either inappropriate or not working. This time, he decided that it wouldn't matter if they revealed a tiny amount of their past. After all, he was trusting them to keep Mitsu a secret, as well as watching out for Mr Yagami's elusive son who he really needed to talk to Mitsu about.

"Probably about nine years ago," he said before Mitsu chimed in with her own piece.

"Before puberty and the odd attraction to the opposite sex." She paused and glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and flashed him a grin. "Mostly at least." Matsuda looked embarrassed again at the realisation that Mitsu had no filter between what was decent and indecent, something that would probably get her in trouble far more often if her brother hadn't been L.

"Forgive her, she doesn't have a filter between her brain and her mouth."

"And you have a filter too many," she quipped, as sharp as ever on comebacks. Matsuda just gave an awkward smile.

"Have you been updated yet on the recent Kira news?" he asked, clearly eager to move away from the subject of teenage puberty and undercurrents of cross-dressing.

"Not yet. Only what I've found on the internet, which is interesting and vast enough," L stated but Matsuda just nodded.

"I suppose catching up on nine months' worth of news is a lot to take in," he said. "You won't have missed much though if you decide to return to the case. We don't exactly move very fast without you and its like Kira's keeping on the quiet at the moment." Mitsu snorted in the corner.

"Or he's playing you like paper dolls…" she muttered quietly but L ignored her.

"What's Raito Yagami like?" he asked instead. His father had been rather vague on the details other than 'a brilliant detective' and other praises that came with being a father, and while Matsuda tended to dote on people he deemed smarter than himself, at least he was another first hand source. Matsuda looked delighted at the question, as if he had been hoping that he would want to know about him.

"You remember him?"

"No, but I know that it's suspicious how he managed to get into the position he is in now. Most likely I didn't trust him."

"No-" Matsuda started but Mitsu cut him off.

"You didn't. He was your number one suspect and honestly, just reading through some of your notes and how he's ended up where he is now, I'm not going to say you're wrong." Matsuda frowned, an expression which looked distinctly foreign on his face, like he didn't get annoyed often.

"Hey, Raito cleared his name! He's a great detective and he's almost as thorough and good as you were! He was the top student in school, probably the whole country and would have been the top student in the To-Oh University if he hadn't decided to pick up the case when you weren't able to continue to search for Kira!" he practically shouted but L raised an eyebrow.

"He was the main suspect in a murder case who was almost as smart as I was and could have become Japan's number one inhabitant, and yet decides to take a job as the world's most elusive detective where the people who would pay his wages won't do so because they think I'm dead? And how exactly did he clear his name?" L asked sceptically. Mitsu was staring at Matsuda too, nibbling on a green tea KitKat.

"There was a rule in the Death Note the stated that if a name wasn't written in the book after 13 days, the person who owned the book would die. You imprisoned Raito for 50 days with no access to anything and then chained him to yourself for nearly three months before releasing him again." L stared at Matsuda critically, wondering if he needed to call in a doctor for him, but the man looked sane, if a little worked up. Kind of how B had when insisting that he could see names and lifetimes above a person's head. Instead he opted for playing along, despite not being entirely sure what he was going on about, but it all still sounded suspicious.

"Could one of these rules have been fake?" he asked. Matsuda frowned and shook his head but L continued. "Was I going to test this thirteen day rule to be sure?" That was when Matsuda paused, as if thinking that through.

"Actually… yes, you were. You announced it right before Kira struck." A heart attack that the hospital was able to resuscitate me from only minutes after announcing that I would test this rule… Surely Kira would be smart enough to follow through on the results though if he truly were this Raito Yagami or was he simply so sure that the Task Force was his that he would merely drop the issue and take what appears to be rules from a questionable source as legitimate? Mitsu seemed to be thinking along the same lines.

"Has Raito actually proposed following through on that test?" she asked.

"What? No!" Matsuda said, seemingly shocked. "If it were true then the person who wrote the name would die thirteen days later!"

"And if it were false not only would Raito Yagami be a suspect once more, but the evidence would be there that he most likely faked the rule to clear his name and continue his work as Kira," L stated in his best detective's monotone. Matsuda whirled around, now looking lost.

"B-But… but Raito would never do that. He has a strong sense of justice. He wants to take Kira down not become him!"

"Actually L's earliest notes on creating a profile of Kira states that through his killing of only criminals, evidence points to Kira having that strong sense of justice, "Mitsu injected quietly. "There are also notes which profile Raito upon meeting him and the two match up almost perfectly and honestly, I've lived with geniuses and I can tell you that they are either insane or quirky, never in between." She was clearly thinking of B's liking of opening people up almost surgically while they were still alive, or Mello's chocolate eating habit or Matt's constant gaming. Even his own quirks of sitting oddly when concentrating hard on a case and chewing his thumbnail were not exactly considered 'normal'. He supposed that out of all of them, Mitsu was the one closest to socially acceptable. Matsuda looked like someone had slapped him round the face, hard.

"I-I need to think," he said, rising from his chair. "I'll be back soon. Oh, and, err, Yagami-san will be here tomorrow." At least they were varying as to who would come on each night, although L truly wanted to be left alone for a night or two and it wouldn't reflect badly on them if they did so, especially if they wanted to appear- at least to outsiders- less suspicious. He nodded towards Matsuda as the young man hurriedly man his farewells and left, looking decidedly shell-shocked, as if trying to process what he had been told. After a moment of silence Mitsu spoke.

"I think you broke him."

"I know," L sighed, staring at the spot that Matsuda had just vacated. "But somebody had to break it to him." He paused, just long enough to collect his thoughts. "So, you've read my notes. What can you tell me about the case?" Mitsu shook her head.

"No, I'm not saying anything. I'll bring them to you tomorrow instead." He sighed but conceded to that. There would be too much to talk about and, besides, he had far too much time to kill. Might as well catch up with himself while he was stuck here.

So, L's back and so is Matsuda! I always wondered what L might think of the nature of Light's killings, especially since when you think 'serial killer' you don't think mostly clean, natural deaths. I imagine many of the type that L deals with would involve blood and lots of it. I will be playing around with this idea a lot in this story because I always thought that Light's plan was slightly... naive in thinking that everything can be compartmentalised into 'good' or 'bad' categories.

So did you like the beginning with the introduction of B? He'll keep popping up from time to time, don't worry- and he will eventually be in this story. Please leave a review of what you thought this week while we try and fix the internet on this end :)