She expected to hear a thud. It was inevitable. Hiro would crash to the ground, and she would hear that sickening, moist crunch of his body colliding against concrete. His neck would be broken first, if he were lucky, and he wouldn't have to go through the pain of every bone in his body cracking against stone...

But the sound never came. As soon as she was coherent again, all she could hear was a slow, steady beeping off in the distance. Everything was dark, but as soon as she opened her eyes in an attempt to rid herself of the black, the lights above her flared to life from between her dry eyelids. The glare of it struck her straight in the back of her skull, shooting tendrils of pain down her neck. She groaned, reaching up to shade her eyes and finding her motion limited by an intravenous tube positioned in the back of her hand.

"Sir! She's awake."

Whoever it was, his voice was young and far too enthusiastic to be trusted. Besides, it made her head throb. She managed to squeeze out a word of questioning, but it sounded foreign and nonsensical even to /her/ ears.

"Ah, good. Nikaido-san, how are you feeling?"

The second voice belonged to a much older man, of that she was sure before his blurry image began to focus in her vision. Two men were at her bedside, and from what she gathered she happened to be in a hospital bed. Well, that explained the beeping at least.

"I-painful." It was a struggle to be intelligible, but it was apparently good enough for the older of the pair. He nodded thoughtfully and turned to his companion brows raised slightly.

While the elder of the two men moved with a certain hesitant grace, his partner was steadfast but light on his feet. Even as he stood at the end of her bed she could tell-at any moment, she expected him to leap into action. The badge hanging out of his suit pocket told her that might even be necessary, and her heart shot into a race that was echoed by that annoying beeping sound.

"Relax, relax." The younger man managed what she supposed was a charming smile, a strand of his blonde hair falling out from behind his ear as he gestured toward her.

It only reminded her...

"Hiro?" Her heart almost stopped as she tried to sit up, panicked, turning to the older man. But his expression was grim, and as he lowered his gaze to the floor and shook his head...she knew.

Every inch of her went numb for the news, and she sank back onto the pillows. She had the distant sense that her head was spinning from moving too fast, but she honestly couldn't care. There wasn't much at all she could feel past the shock of it all.

The lights above her head were so, so bright, and the smallest of movements from the men sounded like the screams of monsters.

"I know you've been through an ordeal, but I'd like to ask you a few questions if you don't mind."

It was all she could do to nod her head. What else could she say? No? If this was going to happen, she wanted it over and done with while she was still in shock. Behind her closed eyelids, she could hear the heavier of the men shifting down into the seat at her bedside, could hear the rumple of his suit jacket as he gestured for the other to follow suit.

"I'll make it brief." The old man promised, but she wasn't entirely sure. Saying anything would have taken too much effort, however.

He cleared his throat, glancing to the man beside him to give him a permissive nod. The blonde tugged a small notepad out of inside his suit jacket and clicked open a pen.

It sounded like the thud she had never heard, and her stomach rolled.

"Witnesses saw you on the rooftop with Muroi just before he fell, is that correct?" Though his voice was gentle, like that of a father speaking to a child, she suddenly realized what they might have been there for. Hiro had been a perfectly happy, excellent young man. He was going to be a doctor, could have his pick of any hundred of women, was born into money and status...and he just decided, one day, to jump off of a roof? People with everything they wanted in life weren't supposed to commit suicide. Not unless they were driven to it.

Was that what they thought? That she had /driven/ him to suicide?

"I didn't see-"

"Tell them the truth, Maki."

L was there again, perched on the bedside table with his bare toes curled over the edge. The two men at her bedside were completely oblivious to his presence. That was right; only people who had touched his death note could see him. If she hadn't panicked like a child, maybe she would have been able to stop Hiro in time? If she hadn't rushed over to try and get L out of the way...maybe she would have saved him?

She swallowed hard against a lump in her throat. Though her eyes were burning with tears, they didn't register in her mind at all. Some distant part of her brain was confused-why was she going to cry? What had happened?

"I didn't see him at first." A shaky, soothing breath escaped her at that. "I was eating my lunch on the roof. I do that sometimes...the caretaker knows me." There was no need to explain it, but something about doing so made her feel normal. She needed that; nothing about this was normal. "He just...walked out." Her voice broke, and she couldn't continue. She could see him as if he were right there in front of her, thumbing off his tie and dropping his bag as he moved closer. His suit jacket was next...and then his shoes...

"It was like I wasn't even there."

The men were listening patiently, but it didn't matter. She wasn't talking to them, not really. As she lay there, seemingly peering off into the distance, her gaze was locked with L's.

"Why didn't you say anything?" She whispered, brows furrowed. L only peered down at her, expression unchanging. "Why didn't you /do/ anything?"

Shifting in his seat, the older man straightened and leaned closer to his companion. "Hart, give us a moment, please."

Vaguely, in her periphery, she could see the blonde stand and push his way through the curtains. Most of her attention, however, was on L. He was either unwilling or unable to answer her questions, but either way she didn't like it.

Her view of him was soon obscured, however, as the detective leaned closer to her bedside, resting a hand on the small plastic bumper meant to keep her safely atop the mattress. There was something weighing heavily on him as he pulled off his glasses, holding them by the hinge at his side. He seemed determined to avoid her gaze for the moment, peering down at the lenses as he drew a steady breath.

"Those of us left behind always feel guilty," he said, brows furrowed deeply. "I can tell you that from first-hand experience." Finally, he looked back to her, fingers twitching against the plastic of the bed as if he were tempted to reach out to her. "Whatever you do, do not blame yourself. It won't accomplish anything."

He had thought she was speaking to herself.

All the same, she couldn't help but feel touched. It had been a long time since someone offered her some kind of advice. A pang of pain broke through her shock then, and as she nodded at his words she was forcing back tears.

"I will leave my contact information here for you, alright?" He waited for her to nod again before he continued. "If you remember anything that might help us, please contact me."

The way he frowned almost looked like a smile, somehow.

Before she could say anything else, the man pressed out from between the break in the curtain. She could hear his footsteps retreat, the sound of a door opening and closing.

He met his partner outside of the room, a deep crease between his eyebrows as he resettled his glasses on the bridge of his nose. Hart perked at his arrival, pushing off of the wall in the hallway and stepping forward to meet him.

"What do you think, Yagami-san?"

The old man rubbed at the stubble across his jaw and shook his head, a frown clear on his face. "Another dead-end."