DS
Disclaimer: Oh look! A bird!
Me: Sorry for posting so goddamn late. I was being a Narutard all month :D
Chibi Raito: You got a corrective review.
Me: I know.
Chibi Raito: You gonna' defend your position?
Me: Damn right:3 I recently got a review saying that Raito would have died of his fever in chapter one. Either that or he'd have severe brain damage. So here's the deal. Funny story.
Chibi L: Ooh! A story! I can't wait!
Me: During one Superbowl, I had a fever of one hundred and five. I had no ice and no fever reducers. No meds at all. All this fever did was make me feel uncomfortable. That, and I was thoroughly convinced that Jesus was on the Seahawks' team... But that's a minor detail. The point is, I'm perfectly fine. I have no brain damage whatsoever (as if I can defend that point with my writing style). Since this fever did nothing to me, I figured some guy as cool as Raito could stand a hundred and seven. Plus, I did research and the highest fever was higher.
Chibi Raito: Nice. I'm going to kill you, by the way.
Me: Eep!
Chibi L: No! If she dies, we die.
Chibi Raito: …You win this time…
Me: Yosh!
Chibi Misa: Read, review, and relax!
D S 9
L heard a suggestive cough from over his shoulder. He looked back suspiciously to find a scowling portrait of pale uneasiness framed by a halo of white hair.
Near.
What was Near doing here? Near hated tennis! L had taken a day off from carting souls back and forth through dimensions to watch a junior championship tennis match. He desperately wanted to participate, because he was just that good, but was unable to due to the unfortunate trip he'd taken down his front steps. His twisted ankle smarted whenever he walked on it.
Back to the present…
"What are you doing here?" L demanded flatly.
Near shuffled his feet. "I have something I need to talk to you about," he stated rather blatantly.
L sat in his seat for several seconds before he realized that whatever Near had to talk about was too private to speak of in open air. Huffing boredly to himself and wondering what the white-haired psychopomp had to talk about, L rose out of his seat and padded over to Near.
The agitated mini-death led him out of the bleachers and into the bathroom.
The bathroom.
Women discussed things in the bathroom.
Whatever Near's predicament, it was almost certainly about Mello.
"So," L began disinterestedly, "Where's Mello?"
"Staying at my house for the night," Near mentioned with his posture somewhat straighter and prouder than before. L congratulated him.
"You wanted to talk to me about something?" L hinted, trying to get Near to explain what was going on.
Near blinked once, as if remembering something, and then apologized, "Yes, sorry. It's… actually, it's about Mello."
Go figure.
In spite of his Smart-Alec mind, L remained the interested friend he wanted to be and asked Near just what about Mello was wrong.
"Well, Mello likes to jump around on the human world's space-time continuum. He doesn't really like to stay in one spot for more than one week. He's been to the past, the present, the future… anywhere," Near explained hesitantly, "But…"
"But what?" L asked, intrigued by Near's introduction.
"Well…" Near shuffled his feet again in an unusual display of discomfort, "Lately, he's been just hanging around in one spot."
L quirked an eyebrow. "Where is this 'one spot' of his?"
"Late Twentieth century Los Angeles," came the forced reply, "The year Nineteen eighty three, to be exact."
L nodded thoughtfully to himself. "You said he had a mob there," he suggested helpfully.
"Yes," Near muttered, "But he's had other gangs as well. He gets bored of them rather quickly. In about two weeks, actually."
"And how long has he been staying in Los Angeles?"
"Over three months."
L crooned appraisingly to himself. "How'd you manage to get him here?"
"I told him that there was a chocolate fountain in my backyard," Near admitted craftily.
L snorted. "He believed you?"
"Yes," shrugged Near, "But he's quite angry at me now. He says he's leaving for L.A. again after tonight."
The raccoon-eyed mini-death patted his friend sympathetically on the shoulder. "Has he mentioned any reason for staying there?"
"Not really," remarked Near, "But…" Suddenly, the white-haired psychopomp's eyes lit up with understanding. "I think he's been disappearing lately. We'll be sitting in his apartment above the mob's center of operations and I'll look away for just one second. When I look back, he's gone! Just like that!"
This was interesting. So Mello was sneaking off, quite literally, whenever Near had his back turned. "How long is he gone for?" L asked with a thumb to his lips.
"Minimally, about two hours. On average, four. The longest he's been gone, though, is two days."
Two days? That was a little extreme.
"It worries me," Near said as he played with the sleeves of his shirt. "When I can't see him, I can't watch over him. He has millions of different people in millions of different eras looking for him. He could be killed! Or… or worse…" Near suddenly stopped worrying the seams of his sweater. "I just realized that, most of the time, he's gone at night. Whenever I fall asleep by accident, I wake up and he isn't there. When he disappears at night, he's gone until the middle of the next day."
L glared flatly at nothing in particular. "I see where this is going…"
Near gazed up at L with his huge, confused, dark eyes. "L," he murmured, "Do you think he's seeing someone else?"
----
Imagine that.
L had caught himself reminiscing.
Granted, there wasn't much else to do in Raito's psychiatric meeting. Halle had gradually lessened the amount of conversations between himself and Raito. L recognized this as an attempt to ease the troubled teenager away from his made-up world.
Hah.
Made up his ass.
Still, Raito diligently played the part of the mentally incorrect adolescent and participated in Halle's psychiatric sessions as best he could.
L missed their talks. Halle once forced Raito to talk with L about his recent graduation from high school. L responded with praise Raito already knew he had. Raito had to ask him whether or not L graduated from high school. L replied that no, he hadn't, because where he came from, school didn't exist.
That was good enough for Halle.
She had them talk about everything from cars to global warming. She even forced Raito to ask L what his favorite color was.
Halle thought carefully over everything she heard. L noticed and informed Raito that she took on a much more serious look when his back was turned. Occasionally, she wrote things down on a pad of paper and hid it in her coat.
L found this suspicious.
She may not have been able to tell the outside world information about Raito's condition without his consent, but she sure as hell could write something down, 'accidentally' drop it, and forget it somewhere.
Despite L's suspicion against her, the background research he'd done on her while Raito was asleep provided proof that she was who she said she was. Halle Lidner was fresh out of college with a master's degree in psychiatry. She was single, had no kids, and lived in a small apartment complex just outside of the greater Tokyo area.
Yet, there was a large possibility that she was just as two-faced as Raito.
"Raito-kun," Two-Faced Halle crashed L's train of thought, "I'd like you to have another conversation with Ryuzaki, just to make things clear."
"Alright," the unhappy, brunette, Yagami-boy grumbled, "What do you want me to talk about this time?"
"I want you to talk about Kira."
L's eyes snapped open and he tilted his head in Halle's general direction. He glared analytically into her annoyingly attentive face. What was she getting at?
"God," hissed Kira, "He makes me so mad, I feel like a volcano. I just want to blow up."
"Nice work," commented L while recognizing Raito's plea for help. L had told him long ago to use the word 'volcano' in a sentence if he felt threatened. "She seems rather suspicious, Raito-kun," L explained as Halle condoled Raito about his strong feelings toward the mass-murderer. "Try not to go into too much detail about hating Kira. I don't doubt that she's answering to a higher power. If you ramble on and on about your 'anger,' your powerful, adverse emotions to a Kira supporter could make you a suspect."
Raito dipped his head in a barely noticeable affirmative.
He turned his head to L, closing his eyes and breathing deeply through his nose in a remarkable impression of cooling down. "Alright, Ryuzaki," he growled, "What do you think about Kira?"
L searched a moment for the best answer. Quite suddenly, he came up with one that Raito may not have expected. "I believe that Kira isn't a god at all."
Raito blinked, uncertain of L's answer. The psychopomp knew he would be. He pressed a thoughtful thumb to his lips. "Go ahead, Raito-kun," he encouraged, "Tell her."
When the mortal hesitated still, L grinned slyly and said, "Trust me."
"…Ryuzaki believes," Raito began warily, "that Kira isn't a god."
Halle's eyes widened ever so slightly. L smirked. That wasn't her professional 'Oh, darn. I didn't know that was coming' look. It was a gaze of shock. She'd been taken completely by surprise.
"That's strange," she murmured, "Do go on."
Raito turned back around, faced L, and gave him a look that said, 'Do you have any idea what you're saying?' Before he could speak for or against L's opinions, though, L made himself heard. "Raito-kun," he hushed, "believe me when I say this is the best course of action. Contradict me. Tell me I'm a fool and you know Kira is a god. Yet… Don't make him sound like a god of all things bright and happy. Make him sound evil. You were victimized by one of his heart attacks after all."
L could tell by the apprehension in Raito's eyes that he wasn't entirely trusting of the mini-death's judgment. Quite out of the blue, though, he nodded in dark realization and bit his bottom lip. "No, you idiot," he growled, "I know Kira's a god! He can't be human! It's impossible for a human to do the things he does!"
"True, true," L nodded, "One person cannot perform an action against crime on this scale. However…" he dragged his thumb around on his lips, "An organization can."
Raito, still not quite seeing clearly, gave him a questioning look. "You're making no sense," he argued.
L gave him a break. "This woman is not only suspicious, but she appears to be a quite accomplished professor in the function of the human mind," he explained, "Furthermore, I overheard her discussing with your father about how my existence may be linked to your innermost subconscious. She told your father that I might be a manifestation of your true feelings. If she's taking notes on our conversations, I'm the one she's noting, not you."
Raito leaned in with his head on his fist, looking profoundly thoughtful.
In the interest of moving his thought process along, L elaborated. "Therefore," he announced, "I believe it is in your best interest if I think of Kira not as an empyrean being, but as a lowly, mundane mortal. Not only does it drive Halle's superiors in circles, but it also cuts you slack. Kira's innermost thoughts on himself would be 'Oh, yes! I'm a god! I have power over all I survey!' I saw the look in Halle's eyes at my reply and she was clearly taken aback by it." He sighed, "I believe that you already may be suspected as Kira."
Raito's blinked slowly in a manner that suggested he already knew that.
"They may reconsider," L ensured, "if enough unexpected opinions of mine occur." He leaned in and announced, "If Kira is as self-righteous as you've led the law to believe, thinking of himself as a mere, stupid, earthly being would be unacceptable."
Raito shook his head. Unexpectedly, he returned to answering L's original reply. "Fuckin' idiot. An organization? What sort of organization could do that? Things aren't that simple."
Then, one of Raito's long-lashed, luxuriously mocha-colored eyes winked at him.
Good. So he understood.
"Glad we agree," L nodded regally.
"He thinks it's a group of people?" Halle interjected suddenly. L's eyes lit up.
Bingo.
The dark look in Raito's eyes suggested that he already knew what L was planning, but the psychopomp decided to fill him in anyway. "Part two of my plan," L explained. "I have a growing suspicion that she answers to our nemeses, A and W." He bit his thumb excitedly and bounced slightly on the spot. "This is our chance to turn her on her own superiors."
Raito gave him a sly look. "I think it's a load of bullshit," he shrugged at Halle for good effect, "How could any number of humans just cause heart attacks like that?"
"Ask him," Halle deadpanned.
Raito turned around and glared in L's direction under the pretense of being severely pissed-off. "You heard me," he spat.
L went into detail about super-drugs, super-humans, and other incredible things. Raito used some of these to disinterestedly explain L's 'misguided' opinions to Halle while disguising his own thoughts as L's as well. "He says the organization must be either too small or too secretive to be noticed," scoffed Raito. "Either that or they have to be functioning under the shadow of their own fame…" he added a grumbled "Bullshit" to the end of his sentence to make it sound more believable.
L praised Raito's way with words. Functioning under the shadow of their own fame, eh? So poetically put…
"And you don't agree with this?" Halle mused after a long silence.
Raito scoffed. "Are you kidding? I know what I felt! That's that! Let him believe what he wants…"
Ah… Raito was manipulating Halle's supposed beliefs that L was his subconscious. 'Let him believe what he wants' was a statement of surrender; giving ground to his conscience. L wondered if Halle would pick it up.
As L had predicted, she remained very, very quiet. He noticed that she'd scribbled on her small, concealed notepad, but stopped when Raito mentioned L's idea of an organization at fault. It was a sign as subtle as any, but L knew she was having second thoughts.
"Well," she breathed a puff of air into her bangs, "I'd say that's all the time we have today. It's been nice talking to you, Yagami-kun."
Raito shook hands with her on his way out. L was about to follow him when suddenly, he got an idea. "Don't go too far, Raito-kun," L hollered, "I'll be at the subway station in a minute."
Raito made an 'okay' symbol with the fingers on his right hand and kept walking.
L saw him out the building's front door before stalking back into Halle's room. He wanted to see just how big of an impact Raito's charade had made.
Halle sat in her chair, leaning back and giving the ceiling a meditative leer. L glanced out the window to make sure Raito was getting along alright. Sure enough, the brunette mortal was walking down the street toward the subway station. Nothing was wrong.
Halle moved.
L's eyes were instantly trained on her disgustingly slender, curvy form as she rose from the couch and made for the phone. The beeping, bleeping noise of buttons being pushed reached L's ears.
And then, nothing.
Waiting for the called to answer the caller.
Someone picked up.
"Gevanni, this is Lidner." Halle reported, "I have something I want to talk to you about…"
----
Raito strolled down the street quite inconspicuously. There was nothing eye-catching about the way he stood, the clothes he wore, or the way he walked. In short, there was nothing remarkable about one Raito Yagami.
So why was someone following him?
The brunette stole a furtive glance into a round mirror at one corner of the station's entryway.
Yes, he knew he was being followed. He'd known for the last block and a half. Unlike Raito, his stalker glared out from the cloud like a black sheep. Absolutely no one would wear a black trench coat coupled with sleek sunglasses and work boots on a sunny afternoon.
No one.
When Raito first noticed him, he hadn't thought much about him. As time drew on and steps accumulated, though, he began to notice that the man would not turn away. The suspicious Yagami boy had taken into account that his stalker may have merely been interested in taking the same subway route as he, but his sunglasses made Raito wary. Though he could not see his pursuer's eyes, he got the burning, withering feeling that he was being watched.
Raito rounded the corner. Sure enough, his stalker followed. Raito had hoped to make himself less noticeable in the bustling, pushing, shouting crowd of commuters, but to no avail. It appeared that his pursuer was equipped with some strange form of Yagami-dar. Raito ducked left, the man followed. Raito purchased a subway coin, the man did likewise. Raito sat down at one side of the station, the man sat directly opposite.
The way he took a gander about the room every time Raito moved his head wasn't a good sign either. Raito wondered distantly where Ryuzaki was.
The brunette could assume that it was his mind overreacting when he described this unknown person. He didn't look particularly Japanese. Perhaps he was a foreigner, overdressed and over-observant as a precaution.
A possibility.
Still, the adrenaline rush inside of his chest begged to differ. Being stalked by a government agent was much more exciting.
As Raito sat at his bench and mulled over each possibility, a scraggly, long-legged thing in jeans and a white sweater popped out of the ceiling and looked around. Raito glanced upward at it.
It was Ryuzaki.
As relieved as Raito was, he didn't show it. Who knew what the man at the opposite side of the terminal was looking for?
Ryuzaki spotted him with little effort and sailed down to greet him. "Raito-kun!" he addressed excitedly, "I've found something out. You want to know what this is, yes?"
Raito said nothing. Noting his strange behavior, the mini-death searched Kira's eyes for a hint. Once Raito had his eye-contact, he slowly dragged his eyes over an invisible horizon and rested his gaze on a spot just through the man he was apprehensive about.
Ryuzaki blinked his black-rimmed eyes for a split second before humming perceptively to himself. "I see. So they are after you after all?"
Raito nodded shallowly.
The psychopomp slipped a thumb between his lips and slid it along his teeth. "Hmm," he mumbled absently, "This could be a problem." He then snapped his gaze back to Raito and announced, "After you left, Halle called a man on the phone: Gevanni, she named him. Our little charade may have worked, but the two seem to be very adept at solving problems together."
Solving… problems…
Together?
"I know what you're thinking," remarked Ryuzaki. "I thought that too. It's possible, but highly improbable."
Raito knew what the psychopomp was talking about. If A and W suspected him of being Kira, even one of them would never make contact with him. Still… if these detectives were as desperate as Raito hoped they were, they would be willing to risk each other's lives. If one of them met up with Raito and died, the other would be able to infer that he was Kira.
Two people were much more difficult to kill than one.
But back to the present…
His subway train was screeching into the station.
Sighing nonchalantly to himself and swiping his palms across the back of his jeans, Raito made his way for the train. Passengers were already pooling at the sliding doors and vying to be the first ones out. Equally rowdy crowds were swarming around the outside of the doors. When they all simultaneously jerked open, a yin-yang of flowing people rushed in and out from either side.
Raito heard Ryuzaki mumble a comment about how similar Tokyo was to a beehive before scrambling through the top of the train. The brunette followed him into the packed car and snagged a coffee-stained seat nearest to the window.
It was from this vantage point that Raito Yagami watched his stalker enter the subway car. "He appears to be a foreigner," inferred Ryuzaki from his roost near the ceiling. "Why would your enemies send a foreign spy after you, I wonder?"
Possibly in the interest of saving their own skins. Foreign agents could be A and W's canaries in the massive coal-mine of Tokyo. They were merely pawns to narrow down the pool of suspects.
Raito wondered if Ryuzaki held the same opinion.
The man tried to offset his conspicuous outfit in choosing the most inconspicuous spot to stand: One foot directly to the left of the middle of everything.
"Raito-kun," came Ryuzaki's enlightened voice.
Raito focused his attention skyward under the guise of being profoundly bored. Seeing that he had Kira's attention, the psychopomp continued. "If you want, I can make a few observations that may help you later."
Since when did Raito not want him to do that?
Raito yawned and nodded his head at the same time.
"Good," hummed Ryuzaki. "In observing this stalker of yours, I have noticed a few things. Firstly, I believe he has blue eyes."
Raito didn't ask how the mini-death could have noticed through those sunglasses.
"Secondly," Ryuzaki continued, "He appears to be engaged. There is a ring on his left hand."
And how did Ryuzaki know this man didn't merely like to accessorize? Raito supposed that, in living so long, the mini-death knew the difference between an ordinary ring and an engagement ring.
"Thirdly, we were right to assume that he's a government agent. He favors the right side of his overcoat. Furthermore, the right side sags much more than the left, as if he's carrying something heavy in a single pocket. When he got into the subway car, due to the crowd, he was unable to enter without colliding with the wall on his right side."
Raito gave him a look that said 'and..?'
"And his coat made a very heavy clanking noise." Ryuzaki stuck his feet to the grooves in the ceiling and hung just above Raito. "I think he has a gun in his pocket."
Raito quirked an eyebrow. Couldn't Ryuzaki sneak over there and check his pockets?
The mini-death's eyes lit up. "You're quite right," he said. Before Raito could glare at him for reading his mind like an open book, Ryuzaki was off like a shot. He crawled across the ceiling in a manner that would have made Spider-man drool and slowly crept toward Raito's stalker.
The brunette turned his head slightly and gazed out the window, paying close attention to his peripheral vision.
Ryuzaki oozed halfway into the wall and started carefully prodding the man's coat pockets. It didn't take long before the psychopomp found what he was looking for. Quite suddenly, in the middle of examining the third pocket, Ryuzaki smirked with satisfaction. He deftly reached further into the pocket and half-closed his eyes in concentration.
Two seconds later and the mini-death had vaulted himself back across the room.
"He has a Sig-Sauer handgun along with a pistol I couldn't identify," Ryuzaki mentioned with a troubled thumb to his lips. "He has plenty of ammunition as well. It's a miracle he was able to get past security."
Yes, definitely a miracle.
Unless a higher power planned it that way.
"Shinigami may be at work here," mused Ryuzaki, voicing Raito's thoughts. "Though I think a shinigami's notebook has rules against involving more than one person per entry."
Raito gave him a questioning look.
"A shinigami cannot make a person kill another person," clarified Ryuzaki. "Unless…" Suddenly, a very depressed and worrisome droop found its way into nearly every aspect of Ryuzaki's face. This greatly worried Raito, who was having trouble hiding his apprehension from the man across the subway car.
"Unless what?" Raito hissed through his teeth.
Ryuzaki cast him a woeful look. "Unless the shinigami have found the loophole in the system."
Raito tried not to look as shocked as he felt. Loophole? What loophole?
Ryuzaki sighed, "One shinigami cannot involve more than one person per entry, but if two shinigami intertwine the deaths of two people, it can be done."
Raito blinked at him.
…What?
"If a shinigami were to write, 'So-and-so slipped past all security devices and entered such-and-such subway car, shooting all ammunition in random directions. The very last bullet ricocheted off of the side of the car and hit him in the head, killing him instantly,' then another shinigami could write, 'Raito Yagami bled to death in such-and-such subway car when several stray bullets pierced his chest.'"
Raito gulped.
"You see?" lamented Ryuzaki.
Rhinos stampeding through his lungs, the Yagami boy rigidly rested his head on the window and awaited his doom. What if Ryuzaki was right? What if the shinigami were teaming up against him? What if Raito died?
Ryuzaki was proof that there was life after death, but some primeval part of Raito's psyche still feared it more than anything. Death was wrong, wrong, wrong! Raito didn't want to die!
Something shifted in place on Raito's side. Fearing the worst, his body seized up and the hair on the back of his neck rose out like a field of needles.
Nothing happened.
Still on edge, Raito's eyes roamed over to the offending side, irises mere amber ribbons surrounding massive pools of black.
The movement he saw earlier had been Ryuzaki.
The psychopomp wordlessly floated up from his spot near Raito and slithered effortlessly across the ceiling. Raito's spine prickled as he wondered what the mini-death was planning.
He focused his attention out the window again, trying to keep his cool and keep an eye on Ryuzaki at the same time. The psychopomp was digging through Raito's stalker's pockets again. This time, though, he had gingerly undone the buttons on each pocket.
What the fuck was he doing?
A frustrated and somewhat frantic look flashed through Ryuzaki's face and he temporarily abandoned his post. He disappeared beneath the seats of various people and reappeared a minute later sliding a pair of keys across the floor. Amidst the clanking and bustling of the subway car, Ryuzaki was able to tear one of the keys away from the key ring unnoticed.
It was with this key of his that he carefully reached into the man's pocket.
Raito wondered what he could possibly need another person's key for.
Suddenly, light flooded the dark subway car. The train had pulled into the next station. Raito sighed with relief. The ride was half over. People throughout the car began bunching up at the door like a clot in an artery. As these loud, noisy, pushing, shoving people began to accumulate…
Raito found that he was no longer able to see Ryuzaki.
A lump formed in his throat. The rational side of his mind reasoned that just because Raito couldn't see him, it didn't mean that Ryuzaki was going do disappear. The other side, and currently the winning side, told the panicking brunette that they'd been separated.
Raito had been separated from Ryuzaki.
Something horrible could happen in an instant.
Keeping his face carefully neutral, Kira subconsciously pushed himself as far into the corner as he could and braced his feet roughly against the bolted-down legs of the bench in front of him. As the crowd began to sort itself out and Ryuzaki was still nowhere to be seen, Raito's ears started to ring. He could see half of the man across the room, but not Ryuzaki. When the man shuffled and reached a hand into the side of his coat that Raito couldn't see- the right side- Raito's jaw set and his tongue went dry. His heart was beating so hard, it felt as if it were trying to break through his ribcage and fly away.
This was it. He was going to have to blow his cover. Raito was going to have to kill this guy before he killed Raito. He knew he was falling straight into A and W's trap, but if he didn't do something soon, he'd die. Raito clenched his thumb and middle finger together, almost ready to snap his stalker's lights out.
Suddenly, the man's eyebrows shot up and his jaw came unhinged. He flinched and shot a hand into his overcoat, causing even the hair on Raito's head to fluff out in fear.
"We're safe," panted a taxed voice to Raito's side.
The brunette looked over his shoulder in alarm at the sudden vocalization. His heart went from the top of his chest to the pit of his gut in a second. Through the pain and stress throughout his body, Raito was relieved to see Ryuzaki perched rigidly on the wall next to him.
"I thought at first that the weapons were too large to fit unnoticed in those pockets of his," Ryuzaki breathed, "and it turns out I was right. He had extra large pockets only accessible from the inside of his coat. I had to rip through the lowest pocket to get to them."
Raito's fingers went lax and he melted into his chair.
Ryuzaki exhaled a long, shaky sigh. "The guns were too big to fit through the hole I created, so I took the ammunition instead."
Oh, thank God. Did he get the bullets-
"The Sig-Sauer was unarmed," sighed Ryuzaki, speaking Raito's mind again, "Probably for use as a bluff. Only the pistol was loaded."
So what did he-
"So I took it apart."
If he took it apart, then there would be-
"I put it back together. Leaving unwanted evidence of foul play wouldn't be very productive, would it?"
He took a gun apart and put it back together in thirty seconds? How the hell did he manage that?
Ryuzaki turned and faced Raito, his panda-eyes burning. The mini-death's fists were clenched at his sides and his shoulders were squared resolutely. "I will not let you die, Raito-kun," he announced with his voice halfway to a yell,"I will not let you die."
----
L was glad to be out of the subway.
Not only did he leave Raito's shadow behind, but also the reminder of all of the stupid mistakes L had made.
Mistake number one: L had become emotional. He had panicked. He'd found the worst possible situation and dwelled on it. He wasn't even sure whether or not shinigami were allowed to work together.
Mistake number two: He had made a scene for Raito's stalker to elaborate on. It's his first day tailing Raito Yagami and what happens? Suddenly, a mysterious hole appears in the bottom of his coat and all of his ammunition is gone, including the rounds he loaded into his pistol. Suspicious? Fuck yes.
Mistake number three: In putting the pistol back together after he ruined it, L only added to the mysterious factor of the situation. L could have made it look like the gun was poorly built and that it simply fell apart. No! He had to put the thing back together! His own logic had worked against him! He wasn't eliminating suspicion by repairing the gun, he was creating it!
In short, L had backed Raito into a corner.
L.
The L.
The psychopomp who never ever made mistakes.
…
L was depressed.
"It has come to my attention that what I did in the subway train may not have been in your best interest, Raito-kun," L moped.
Raito said nothing.
"They'll likely suspect you even more now," L added despairingly, hoping to get a reaction out of Raito.
Raito said nothing.
Yes… chances were, he already knew that. Raito may have needed L's assistance in impromptu emergencies, but he was perfectly capable of thinking for himself. Given the proper time and space, Raito was very good at thinking.
"You don't need to apologize."
L was suddenly ripped away from his train of thought by Raito's calm, collected voice. Was Raito forgiving him? No. That wasn't the Kira L knew.
"There was no easy way out," Raito continued with his hands in his pockets, "After all, if he tails me more, I may get an opportunity to find out which organization he belongs to."
L's ears must have been deceiving him. Either that or Raito had been abducted by aliens and substituted for an android while the mini-death wasn't looking.
"Pardon?" L inquired lamely, trotting up to Raito's side and tilting his head as he walked.
Raito closed his eyes and leaned his head back. "You did what you thought was best and…" he breathed a reluctant sigh through his nose.
"And?" L egged, intrigued by Raito's sympathy.
"…And you may have saved my life," Raito exhaled in one grateful breath, "Thank you."
L was speechless. This was definitely not the Raito he knew. "You're forgiving me?" he asked disbelievingly with a thumb to his lips. "Better, still, you're thanking me, Raito-kun?"
Raito opened his eyes again and graced L with a sidelong glare. "Don't think too much about it."
L knew what that meant. 'Yes, Ryuzaki, you're my friend. That's it.' Raito was still wary about his sexual orientation. Hmph! As if Raito could be molested by a breeze of chilled air.
…
…Wait.
L could make it work.
Raito had probably already taken this into account.
L fell back and plodded silently behind him.
Without much ado, L was walking through Raito's door. The aforementioned teen hollered into the house. No one answered. That was definitely odd…
It was much too quiet.
L commented on the silence. "Normally, your mother is home right now," he stated what Raito already knew, "Something is amiss."
Raito furtively climbed the stairs and made for his room. L followed. He examined the door before opening it, but only for a split second. This short analysis led L to believe that something was definitely wrong, and Raito knew all about it.
Seeing as how Raito was making no move to notice him, L lurked about his doorway and scrutinized it. The paper he had placed between the door and the frame had been there prior to Raito's opening it, so it appeared as if the teen had nothing to worry about. However…
The small piece of led he inserted in the hinge had broken, suggesting that someone had been in his room. Whoever had infiltrated Raito's personal space had done so with the intention of leaving no evidence, the paper proved that much.
At first, L thought that the paper was Raito's only means of security. That was until he noticed the graphite led on the top hinge of his door. The led was his true alarm system. The paper was a decoy.
Interesting.
"Breaking and entering," L mused aloud, "What a dirty trick." He then took a gander around the innocent room. Everything seemed as it should have been. Everything was neat and orderly, just as Raito had left it.
And yet, there was an extra presence in the room. It was a presence that was not entirely welcome. Mechanical.
On a whim, L picked a spot above Raito's wall-mounted digital clock and examined it. Stuck to the roof of the screen was a tiny mechanism with a tiny antenna, altogether measuring less than a dime in volume. L peered accusingly into a microscopic, glossy half-dome at the front of the machine.
It was a camera.
Someone had come into Raito's room and rigged it while he was out.
"I've found a camera," he informed Raito. "I think it's safe to assume that there's more than one." Seeing as how Raito wouldn't answer him, given the situation, L rambled on. "They will probably be active as long as A and W suspect you."
L bit his thumb dejectedly. "I feel somewhat responsible for this trouble. These cameras will be here longer now…"
Raito gave him a sidelong look that said, 'Stop griping and help me look for more cameras.'
L complied.
While Raito busied himself with pretending to be the normal teenager he wasn't, L scaled the wall and scanned the room for any other useful hiding places.
He took A and W's interests to heart. If they had rigged the room, they would want a camera in every corner of the room. They wouldn't leave a single blind spot. Chances were, the room was bugged as well. This was the reason for Raito's silence.
Hmm…
This was going to be tricky.
Raito didn't want all of these cameras in his room, and neither did L. It was an invasion of privacy. Plus, Raito couldn't do his work when he was being watched. Tailed from outside his room, observed from inside.
L didn't like it.
Not one bit.
Either Raito would have to find a new hideout, or he'd have to convince the police as soon as possible that he was just an average teenage genius.
While L was locating various cameras, Raito had taken a sudden interest in his e-mail inbox. "Wonder what kind of mail I have today," he whistled drearily to himself. L understood this as his cue to zip over to the computer and examine what was on the screen. He alighted daintily on the desk and crouched on all fours to peer accusingly at whatever e-mail message was on Raito's screen.
Just another E-mail
He glared at the sender. It was an e-mail from Mikami.
L cast Raito a scornful look. "Well, what are you waiting for?" he gnarred, "Trash it!"
As if to spite L, Raito hummed interestedly to himself and clicked on it. The psychopomp cast Kira a baleful look. "The Devil would be proud."
He tore his gaze away from Raito's face when the corner of the mortal's lips twitched. L scanned the e-mail to find the culprit of this sudden spastic movement.
Raito-kun,
You truly are amazing. I overheard my fellow examiners talking about how incredibly high your test scores were. I don't think you missed anything.
You're amazing in other ways as well.
L just knew this was the part in the message where he was going to scream and tear his hair out. Unwilling though he was, he dragged his pupils across the screen.
I don't know if it's your eyes, your smile, the way you talk, or if it's just you, but there's something about you that makes me crazy. I say crazy things, I do crazy things… the works. I'll even go as far as to say that you make me think crazy things.
I sound like a complete idiot and you're way out of my league, I know. To top things off, I'm in college. It's not that awkward though, considering that you will most definitely be accepted into To-Oh University. We'll both be in college together.
I never had a way with words, so I won't be surprised if you turn me down, but I'd like to have the privilege of doing at least one thing for you.
Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. L didn't want to read the rest. He couldn't! Mikami couldn't… no! He just couldn't! Raito couldn't… The sheer mechanics of it were mind-boggling! Nevertheless, his pessimism wanted the satisfaction of knowing just how horrible L's future would be. His pessimism was not disappointed.
L read it and gagged.
Please let me take you out.
L stopped right there and squealed. Oh! The horror! The strangling, suffocating, shrieking horror! Raito couldn't possibly accept! No! No, he could not! L informed him of this immediately.
"You cannot accept, Raito-kun. I won't let you."
Raito grinned at the screen as if to say, 'Oh yes? And tell me, Ryuzaki, just how are you not going to let me?'
L clenched his eyes shut and wound his hands roughly into his hair. This was not happening. L jerked unevenly on his hair and told himself that something this bad couldn't possibly be happening.
Raito hit the reply button.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no-
Teru-san,
I'm flattered that you think of me in such a way. Personally, I don't find anything extraordinary about my eyes, my smile, the way I talk, or myself in general-
Narcissistic liar!
-but I'm glad you think otherwise. You have no idea how happy this e-mail made me.
Yeah? Well, he was only happy because he made L the most jealous creature on the face of the planet!
…Right?
"Please tell me you're not accepting, Raito-kun!" L pleaded pathetically with his hands clasped in front of his face. "If you're saying 'yes,' just to make me mad, you're a horrible man. No one should play with a human's emotions like that, not even you."
Raito's wicked grin ate up the bottom half of his face.
Oh no!
No!
NO!!!
"Raito-kun!" L waved his hands frantically in front of the monitor, "Please reconsider. Perhaps you should give yourself time to think since you've just had a traumatizing day. Yes. Think about it! Just think before you answer, Raito-kun!"
L knew by the voracious look in Raito's eyes that he'd already done all the thinking he needed to.
Reluctantly and woefully, L resigned himself to the fate of the e-mail and oozed miserably into the floor. He wafted back up through the wood, though, needing to see just how this e-mail from hell would end.
You're not too old. I once knew a couple who were seven years apart and they were the two happiest people I ever met.
Oh God. Raito was alluding to the 'I want to be with you for eeever and eeever and eeever…' cliché. It made L sick.
As for going out…
Oh God. L was going to get sick all over the back of Raito's shirt.
I'd love to.
L's heart made a shriveling, choking, dying noise inside of his ribcage. Goodbye, cruel world! If the mini-death could have jumped out of the window and died right then, he would have. Raito was such a cold bastard!
Talk to you soon,
-Raito
L swooned and fell into the floor with an asphyxiated 'Graaaauugh..!' He knew that under any other circumstances, he would not be this emotional. However, the subway incident, the cameras, and now this e-mail were stretching the mini-death's nerves thin.
…He needed food.
He needed food now.
Raito sighed suddenly and put his computer into sleep mode. "Jeez, it's boring here. I guess I'll take a walk."
Looked like L wouldn't get his snack… Oh well. He probably wouldn't get to eat it anyway. Who knew? Maybe there were cameras all over the house. He couldn't eat any more food…
Ever…
Now L was very, very depressed.
----
Raito checked his coat for bugs once he was outside. Finding none, he decided to let Ryuzaki know just how irritating he found his mumbling and grumbling. "You're really angry, Ryuzaki, and it's rubbing off on me. Now stop."
Instead of shutting up, the mini-death cast a world-weary look at him with those droopy black eyes and said, "Angry? Oh, Raito-kun, you have not seen angry."
"Depressed, then," Raito suggested with a roll of the eyes. "You know," he jeered, "depression is only anger without enthusiasm."
"Enthusiasm, Raito-kun?" Ryuzaki remarked, sounding winded, "Oh, I'm all out of enthusiasm. I used it to save your life, to find a few of your cameras…"
"Drop it!" Raito commanded loudly. God, Ryuzaki was such a girl! Raito was just dating Mikami out of strategy, that was all! He informed the brooding mini-death of this. "I'm just doing this so I can find out more about who he is and who he works for!"
"I know," Ryuzaki whined, "That's half of the problem. You use people, Raito-kun. It's immoral. It's a bad thing to do."
Raito got the feeling that Ryuzaki didn't only mean Mikami. Was that what this was about? Ryuzaki felt used? He felt that way because Raito didn't return his feelings?
"Look," Raito growled, "I don't like you. You're a friend, that's all. That's it, Ryuzaki! Be happy I even consider you a friend!"
"I am," Ryuzaki replied sullenly, "I just wish I were more."
"Look, Ryuzaki," Raito hissed, "You've got bags under your eyes, you have no eyebrows, you sit in the most impolite of manners, you wear no socks, you have really long toes, your hair is a mess, your wardrobe is disgusting, and you're NOT. MY. TYPE. Understand?"
Every part of Ryuzaki slumped as if he were filled to the brim with misery. His eyes drooped and his gaze fell to the pavement, his toes flattened, his fingers un-curled, his head dipped forward, and his scraggly hair bent slowly toward the ground. He sighed, long and empty.
Raito blinked sullenly, eyes flitting across Ryuzaki's crestfallen form. Boy… he was really crushed, wasn't he?
Oh, no…
"Ryuzaki," Raito sighed heavily, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean-"
"No, Raito-kun," the mini-death interrupted, "I understand."
"Well…" Raito was about to say 'good!' He deemed, however, that neither himself nor Ryuzaki was in the mood for the comment. He left his breath hanging in the air.
Oh… shit. Guilt, guilt, guilt. Raito should not have said that. He should not have said that. Out of all the things he could have said, he picked the worst one and vomited it up like a hairball.
Now he was in deep shit.
Really, really deep shit.
"Ryuzaki," he pleaded, spinning around on one heel. Alas, he was talking to the air.
Ryuzaki had vanished.
Around the regretful lump in his throat, Raito choked the word, "Fuck!" and kicked the pavement with the toe of his sneaker. Ryuzaki was gone! After what Raito said to him, he'd probably never come back!
Fuck!
And this time… Raito wasn't sure if his worry was because he was afraid of dying or not. He needed to settle things with Ryuzaki. Raito needed to let him know that he meant nothing he said! He was just… irritated!
He was just angry!
Raito did stupid shit when he was angry!
He kicked a pebble into the street before muttering profanity to himself and trudging down the sidewalk. Raito felt like an idiot. He couldn't move on. He just felt like a complete, ignorant, insensitive asshole.
…
He needed caffeine.
Raito remembered that, somewhere amidst all of the small shops he saw, there was a certain coffee shop full of nerds, bookworms, and soft chit-chat. It was just the atmosphere Raito needed. He turned right at the corner of the sidewalk and felt his way toward the café.
It was past noon, the wind was wet, and the rain was threatening to fall. The wan sunlight through the grey sky served only to make the scenery more dreary. Raito shoved his hands in his coat pockets. Why did it have to be so gloomy outside? Why was the weather in cahoots with his conscience? Why was he asking?
Raito noticed the modest little sign heralding his destination. He pushed the glass door open and walked into the shop on auto-pilot.
There were just as many people sitting at the small, circular tables as there had been last time. The noise in the room was at a dull roar as it had been last time. There were still some empty tables and seats just as there had been last time.
The familiarity was medicinal.
Raito searched for the spot he sat in before. It was the one closest to the wall on the right, nearest to the front. It was the first table Raito noticed when he first came to the coffee shop, and it was closest to the door so he could drop his studying aids as quickly as possible.
Raito dragged his feet over to the table's single upholstered chair, pulled it out from under the table, and flopped gracelessly into it. He folded his arms and set his elbows on the table, clasping his hands together and hooking them around the back of his head. He glanced tiredly at the roman-numeral clock on the wall.
It was three forty five in the afternoon.
To Raito, it felt like seven.
Feeling more tired than he had ever been, Raito unhooked his hands and crossed his arms across the table. He took one last baleful look at the clock and buried his face in his arms.
Today was not his day. He had a stalker, he had cameras in his room, and now this. Raito had agreed to go on a date with a man he barely knew and there Ryuzaki was, with him all hours of the day, keeping him out of trouble and threatening to kick Death in the face if it came near him…
And Raito just insulted everything about him.
God, now even Raito was depressed. The Great Kira, God of Death, Lord of the Living, needed a gallon of chocolate ice-cream, an overstuffed couch, and a romance film.
Through his morose musings, Raito could hear various people coming up to him, no less than two minutes apart, and asking him whether or not he was okay.
No. He was not okay. He didn't understand why these people expected him to be any less than devastated. He also didn't understand why they expected him to spill his guts and tell them everything about his dysfunctional love life.
It wasn't going to happen.
Suddenly, Raito heard a familiar voice. "Raito-kun," it crooned hesitantly, "Are you feeling alright?"
He knew that voice. Raito lifted his head out of his arms and peered strangely at the first thing he saw. What he saw was a very tall man dressed completely in black, leaning sideways expectantly with a worried look on his face. It was Mikami's face.
Thoughtlessly, Raito said the first thing that came to his mind.
"God, you're everywhere."
Teru smiled disarmingly. "Well, you are in my coffee shop."
"Your coffee shop?" Raito asked, pushing himself off of the table and swiping one sleeve across his face just in case he'd let a tear fall. Not surprisingly, Raito had not been crying.
Men didn't cry.
"Well, it's not exactly my coffee shop," Mikami admitted, settling his weight on the other foot, "but I come here every other day at about this time. They even named a cake after me." Out of the blue, he added, "Do you mind if I sit with you?"
Raito shook his head and messed with his hair.
"Good," Teru said with a smile, "because I would have done it anyway." He turned around briefly before locating an empty chair and dragging it to the other side of Raito's table. It was during his companion's brief absence that Raito noticed the amount of attention the two of them were getting.
Wow.
Raito didn't know he was that popular.
"So," Teru drawled, attracting Raito's attention, "You want to tell me what's wrong?"
Raito laughed lifelessly. "If I told you everything that went wrong today, we'd be sitting here for two weeks."
"That bad huh?" Teru whistled and crossed his arms over his chest. Raito nodded at him, blowing a puff of air at his bangs. To tell or not to tell? As much as he hated to admit it, Raito wanted to spit out all of the nasty things that happened that morning. Instead, he took a more ambiguous approach.
"I had a fight with my best friend," Raito sighed.
Teru blinked, as if the cause of Raito's melancholy was unexpected. Nevertheless, being the caring, comforting man he was supposed to be, Tall, Dark, and Geeky asked, "What about?"
If Raito said, 'loooove…' Mikami was going to look at him funny.
"Just… stuff," Raito sighed, "It's my fault, actually. I said some nasty shit about him straight to his face, so it's no wonder he's angry."
Raito rolled his internal eyes and asked himself why the hell he was telling Teru this. He could have been another police officer assigned to tail him. Teru, however, seemed like the farthest thing from a stalker. Why would the police agency send a guy to ask Raito out anyway?
The police agency…
Oh yes.
Raito just found his excuse for keeping to himself all day. He just found an excuse to feed to A and W's cameras. It was something that, were it sincere, Raito would definitely keep away from the prying eyes of his overprotective father.
It was too perfect.
It was Teru Mikami.
If Raito were Raito, studious and morally correct as he was, being gay would never be acceptable. He knew what his parents and his sister wanted. They were always waiting for him to come home with two things: good grades and a stone fox of a girlfriend.
Boy, Soichiro would have a heart attack over that one.
Day brightened somewhat, Raito gleefully absorbed the positive encouragement gushing out of Teru's mouth. Stuff about, 'I bet it's not your fault,' and 'you're too nice,' and blah, blah, blah.
Still… even with an upside, the hill of Raito's life had suddenly split and formed a huge, menacing ravine, complete with sharp, pointy rocks at the bottom. He had to fix things with Ryuzaki.
Fast.
"By the way," Teru announced suddenly with an undertone of excitement, "I got your e-mail."
Raito smirked. "So what, you're on the computer all day?"
Teru fluffed his proverbial feathers out like a perturbed waterfowl. "I am not!" he insisted, "I just check my e-mail regularly, that's all!"
Raito chuckled at Teru's defensiveness. Teru would never be a true 'boyfriend,' but he was actually making Raito feel better.
----
L was mindlessly floating around downtown when he noticed that a certain bakery was still open. Not particularly caring whether or not it was open, as he would have robbed it either way, L floated into the wall and raided the fridge.
He needed cake.
Lots of cake.
He felt like he'd just been kicked, and while he was trying to get back up, he'd been shot twice, right in the heart. Raito's words stung him more than he'd ever know. More than he cared, probably. When Raito tried to apologize, L took it as his fear-of-imminent-death talking.
And that was what it was.
Raito was afraid of dying.
That was all he needed L for.
L wondered if what Raito said was for the best. Now he knew, at least, that Raito was every bit as shallow as L suspected. He judged on appearances instead of character. L wondered with horror if this was his cue to let the mortal die so he could go back home and sleep everything off. It would make things much easier, wouldn't it?
He should have known from the beginning that relationships between two worlds only ended in blood and tears. If Near had taught him anything, it was that. Humans were selfish creatures, only capable of preserving their own happiness.
Granted, there were many things Mikami could do to Raito that L could not. Mikami could touch him. He could run his hands through Raito's hair, he could hold Raito close and comfort him, he could give Raito back rubs…
He could kiss him…
He could impassion him…
And here L was, an ugly mass of cold air, unable to do any of those things. Especially the last few.
He could eat as much food as possible and shout his undying love for the mortal to the world and become human, but L would also be unable to protect him. Raito's life mattered more than L's feelings.
L stuffed himself full of two whole pieces of strawberry shortcake.
It wasn't meant to be.
Humans were only capable of loving other humans. Even Mello ended up loving another human. At least this is what L gathered from Near's many hissy-fits concerning the blonde he had his heart set on. He was always complaining that he could never find where Mello was going. He'd swept every block within a mile of Mello's L.A. safe house and found him nowhere. He followed his car and lost it in traffic. Near never did track Mello down.
That was what L figured, anyway. Near could have found out and been too devastated to accept it.
L could accept anything.
Even that the one person he truly loved would rather be with someone else.
…
L angrily threw a wedge of mousse cake at the back of the fridge. Who was he kidding? He couldn't accept it! It made him angry as hell! He wanted to find Mikami, beat him to death with a trash can, and lock Raito up in a closet so he could NEVER LEAVE!
EVER!
Having completely lost his appetite, L morphed out of the fridge and tore through the sitting area, not caring which people he flew through and which he avoided. He set out in search of the single mortal beyond his reach.
L wanted to be angry at Raito. He wanted to be furious! But as L stated before, the importance of his feelings was dwarfed by the importance of the preservation of Raito's life. Kira was harsh, difficult, and painful to deal with, but L had to watch over him. He had to keep him safe. He couldn't let Ryuk or Sidoh get to him while he was away.
If L knew Raito as well as he thought, the mortal was probably heading for home about then.
----
Raito booked it for home. He didn't want to be out longer than was absolutely necessary. Besides, wouldn't it be convenient for Raito to slip out of the house the first day his room was being monitored by cameras? Considering all of the other convenient things that had been happening that day, Raito wouldn't be surprised if A and W arrested him right then and there.
At least he had an excuse now. Golden Boy Raito Yagami had a boyfriend. It was perfect cover.
Raito yelled into the house, wondering if anyone was home yet. His mother yelled back. Secure in the feeling that at least he wasn't by himself, Raito headed for his room. He casually opened the door, making a show of snatching his scrap of paper off of the floor and placing it in a nondescript spot on his desk.
As he flopped tiredly down on his bed, he became aware of a cold presence outside his balcony. Raito knew what it was, but hadn't expected it to return so soon.
He hadn't expected it to return at all.
Raito glanced sidelong out onto the balcony. Sure enough, there was Ryuzaki, perched gloomily on the corner of the railing, biting his thumb and looking off in no particular direction. Raito's previous optimistic high declined quickly and smoldered itself into oblivion.
He'd been such an asshole to Ryuzaki lately. He accused him, he pushed him away, he insulted him, and yet here he was. Despite everything Raito did to him, Ryuzaki still sat quietly outside the boundaries of his personal space and kept him safe.
For the first time in Raito's life, he was afraid of making Ryuzaki angry.
He sheepishly wondered if Ryuzaki had done any camera-searching while he was gone. He didn't want to ask, though. Not only would it be awkward to speak to the brooding mini-death at this time, but it would also make Raito seem like the insensitive pig Ryuzaki thought him to be. If Raito said anything at all, it would be another apology. Currently though, it was awkward to speak and there were cameras everywhere.
Raito said nothing.
…And in doing so, had gotten very depressed very quickly. He needed to focus on something. While he was focusing on this 'something,' he needed to make himself look busy and innocent.
Well… innocent of being Kira anyway.
Raito stretched and got off of his bed. If he could remember correctly, he had a few pornographic magazines hidden in his bookshelf. One of said magazines was chock full of men.
It wasn't his magazine, of course. Come to think of it, he had no idea how it got there. The brunette could only figure that one of his past acquaintances had left it at his house. Why Raito had kept it was another mystery.
He pulled the remnants of a large box-set of books off of his shelf. Within the box, he had unassumingly placed several magazines. He found the one he was looking for, being the only black magazine with silver kanji, and set the rest back on the shelf.
As he walked back to his bed, Kira thought of two things. Firstly, he had no idea why he'd kept the magazine. His initial excuse had been that he wanted to return it to its owner. The owner, however, had moved away to Osaka a year ago.
Secondly, if he looked at said magazine in the presence of the melancholic psychopomp outside his glass door, would he seem like a pig? Hell yes, he would. It was a miracle Ryuzaki even came back in the first place. Raito definitely didn't want him to leave all in a huff again.
Ever again.
He fell back into his blankets with a woeful sigh.
Raito absolutely hated feeling as penitent as he did. He never felt that way. He never did anything to feel that way! It was new and Raito didn't know what to do about it.
He hated feeling embarrassed and regretful at the same time!
He hated not knowing what ignited the feeling! Sure, he'd insulted Ryuzaki beyond forgiveness, but ordinarily, Raito would be glad to have that monkey off his back. He didn't actually… like Ryuzaki, did he? Was that why he felt so guilty? After stating the many reasons why he'd never be attracted to the panda-eyed mini-death only a few hours ago, the suggestion seemed laughably ridiculous.
Perhaps it was because he didn't fully appreciate the things Ryuzaki did for him until he vanished. That must've been it. Raito took his divine protection for granted.
He rolled over on his stomach and flipped through his colorful magazine.
And that was when he felt a pair of dark, ringed eyes boring holes in his side.
Shit. Ryuzaki was looking. Raito could only make assumptions pertaining to the myriad of dialogue that was flying through his head. Most of said imaginary dialogue contained the words 'Raito, Kira, pervert, heartless, insensitive, bastard, mortal, evil,' and Raito's personal favorite, 'whore.'
He dared not look the brooding mini-death in the eye.
Another thing he hated about the present was that he was usually the aggressor. It was Raito who told Ryuzaki what to do. It was Raito who had the I'm-a-badass-so-don't-mess-with-me attitude.
Right now, he couldn't bring himself to feel larger than an ant.
The brunette originally planned to use the magazine as cover for devising ways to kill criminals without revealing himself, but any attempt on thinking was shot to hell. All Raito could think of was 'Ryuzaki hates me' or 'He's going to step aside and let me die.'
Hell…
…he could think of ways…
…tomorrow.
He had plenty of criminals dying throughout the day.
After he put his magazine away, Raito sat on his bed and pretended to read a book. His creeping, seeping depression commanded him to sit still and do absolutely nothing, but Raito thought it would be strange if he sat in his room all day and did nothing. He still didn't know how many cameras there were and he wasn't about to show any of them that he was the least bit suspicious.
As Raito flipped listlessly to page forty seven, he heard a pattering noise dancing across the roof. He set his book down and propped himself up on one elbow to peer onto the balcony. His eyes shifted from the black, angry sky, to the swaying trees on the other side of the street, to the dark dots forming on his balcony, to Ryuzaki. The mini-death was sitting in the very same spot in much the same way, ringed eyes distant, body scrunched together like an accordion, and toes curled dispassionately around the railing.
Raito's first thought was that he was going to get wet. It was a silly thought, considering that Ryuzaki was intangible to anything he didn't want to touch.
But…
Raito sighed and set his book on his pillow. Silly though the action was, Raito wanted some way of getting through to the impervious mini-death sitting out in the rain. He didn't care what the men behind the cameras thought about it. He didn't care if his floor got wet. He didn't care that Ryuzaki could have morphed through the door if he so desired.
He walked over to the door and did something that Ryuzaki had been wanting him to do for a very long time.
Raito released the latch on the door, pushed it to the side, and left it wide open.
----
Not entirely sure of his sanity when he returned to Raito's house, L had perched on the balcony and waited. He reasoned with himself at first that he needed to protect Raito from shinigami, but the idea started to whither as time went on. L would be much better off if he let Raito die. After all, death was merely the transition between this life and the next.
But when he let Near die, L had lost him forever.
He had a feeling that the snow-haired mini-death ascended to heaven, but he knew not which one. Being a psychopomp, he knew all about the deaths of humans, but the deaths of his own kind were much more mysterious. None of his acquaintances had ever been to the Other Side. None of them knew if there was an Other Side.
To top this off, he never heard reports of Mello either. Being a human, he would have gone to heaven or hell. Every psychopomp knew Mello, and yet L heard no stories about him. Perhaps the afterlife was different for Kira as well.
When Raito entered the room, heralded by the soft slam of his door, L sat rigidly on the banister of his balcony and half turned his back. L dared to look when Raito was lying on his bed. He'd hoped to catch Raito staring back at him, but he was staring at something else completely.
L had become unspeakably angry. He sulked on his corner of the balcony, seething and boiling internally.
Yet…
There was a certain way humans looked at pictures they liked. There was a certain gleam in their eyes and a certain pink tint to their cheeks. There was a particular way they breathed, a particular way they shuffled about.
Raito showed none of this particular behavior.
He didn't even appear to enjoy what he was looking at. When he turned the pages, his fingers were clumsy and heavy with guilt. His eyebrows were turned down and his eyes were half-closed as if his thoughts and his visions hadn't even crossed each others' paths.
He put the magazine back on his shelf sometime after that and replaced it with a book. Personally, L had read it from cover to cover more times than Raito could possibly imagine and he knew it to be one of the most boring books ever written.
But Raito wasn't reading it.
His eyes flitted across the pages from time to time, but he wasn't absorbing a single word he read.
Raito simply wasn't there.
L began to wonder if it was his imagination, but Raito looked positively pathetic. Miserable even. The light in his eyes had faded out and the confidence in his step had been replaced by a low, careful slump that was almost submissive.
L was certain that his wishful thinking was making all of these things appear, but all of Raito's actions suggested that he was really, deeply, truly sorry. That he hadn't meant anything he said.
The mini-death was convinced that he was imagining things.
Until it started to rain.
L had been sitting in his spot, debating whether or not he was feeling down enough to let the rain hit him, when he heard the telltale swooshing noise of a sliding door being pushed aside. He let an hour slip past, lest Raito be waiting for him to look. L's ears picked up Raito's mother's voice calling him down for dinner. He let Raito hesitantly leave the room before slowly turning his head.
If L ever had any doubts of Raito's sincerity, that was the moment they all began to whither away.
Raito left the door open for him.
It was a simple act, but given the impracticality of it due to the rain, L could only assume that Raito had left it open as a plea to resolve the conflict. L's mind hadn't been deceiving him. The brunette mortal was actually feeling regretful.
He was sorry.
The rain was getting much fiercer now and an icy gale was beginning to blow papers off of Raito's desk.
In the midst of all this, the mini-death thought up an Oscar-winning plan. L would test Raito's resolve. If he really was sorry enough, he'd weather the storm and leave the door open until the mini-death so decided that he wanted to walk inside.
Quicker than usual, Raito's door opened and in walked the mortal himself. L kept a close watch over his peripheral vision as Raito glanced expectantly at the balcony. Everything about him drooped an inch or so before he sighed and gave up. He wandered listlessly over to his bed, picked his book up, and not-read it.
Wind howled through the room and blew a few papers and pens off of Raito's desk. The wooden floor just inside of his doorway shimmered with raindrops.
The door was still open.
An hour in and the storm was getting worse. Thunder rolled and a single microburst came down, pushing a tree over the power line and blacking four blocks out. Every light in the neighborhood suddenly went black and numerous surprised screams erupted simultaneously through the street. Raito's house was not spared. The pitter-patter of Sayu's feet could be heard through the open window below Raito's balcony. She screamed with excitement and every once in a while, the beam of her flashlight shown out the windows and into the rain.
The cameras were probably still running on batteries, but L doubted their ability to see anything.
Raito had been forced to stop reading his book. He tossed it aside and shuffled off of his bed. L wondered whether or not he was going to close the balcony door. Instead of heading outside, though, Raito headed in the opposite direction. Being inhuman and having all of the extraordinary powers of an inhuman, L was able to see Raito, even in the dark. The brunette blindly felt his way along the wall until he hit the door. He fumbled for the doorknob and jerked the door open, disappearing once he headed out of it.
L strained his ears to hear Raito yelling down the stairs for his dad to get him a flashlight. Luminescence flickered beneath the door before disappearing with a muffled 'Thanks, dad.' Raito was gone for a grand total of one minute and twelve seconds.
L knew.
L counted.
Ordinarily, L would have been fretting over Raito walking around in the dark. He could trip on anything and break his neck. However, not only had L not seen any shinigami lately, but he also had an image to keep up.
Lightning flashed across the sky and for a brief moment, the windows two blocks down were the brightest things in Japan. The next thing L knew, and it was very quickly after the first thing, almost simultaneous, in fact, was that it had become extremely loud.
After this, with his hands to his ears, Raito stumbled back into the room. Through the corner of L's eye, he could see that the Yagami boy had something in one of his hands. He stepped unassumingly over to the doorway and dropped whatever he had in his hands onto the floor. After that, Raito turned his back and retreated.
L furtively examined the thing on the floor.
It was a white, terrycloth towel to soak the rainwater up with.
The psychopomp smirked. So Raito had every intention of leaving the door open as long as it took.
L was touched.
Another microburst swept through and shoved a wall of rain and dirt through the street. The mini-death wondered vaguely if he was in the middle of a typhoon. He began to worry about the state of Raito's desk.
Ten o clock came slowly. This time of night found Raito with no television to watch, no L to talk to, no internet to surf, and no people to kill, but plenty of cameras to worry about. In short, when L glanced back into the room, ten o clock found Raito curled up with his back to the weather, tucked quietly into his quilts.
Odd. Raito never slept before twelve. Given the cameras and the electric state of emergency, though, the mortal had nothing better to do. L heard also that humans had an overwhelming desire to sleep when they were severely unhappy.
Raito had given up hope and fallen asleep.
The storm rolled on and the rain kept falling. If L wasn't mistaken, the air was only getting colder.
He glanced at the open door. Raito was asleep, so walking into the room and ending his pain was definitely an option. The case would be settled. His unspoken challenge had been that Raito leave his door open all night, and unless the brunette sleep-walked to close it, it wasn't going to close itself.
Raito had won, and L was all too happy to lose for him.
It appeared that he really was as sorry as L hoped. Cheerful in that notion, L padded over to the open door and walked in. The towel on the floor was soaking wet, water droplets were scattered everywhere, and the room was ice cold.
No wonder why Raito went to sleep so fast.
His bed was warm.
Speaking of Raito's bed, L had been left with yet another endearing surprise. Raito knew very well that L didn't sleep, and yet he wasn't sleeping in the center of the bed as he usually did. Raito had moved slightly to the side, leaving just enough room that, if L wanted, he could sprawl out on Raito's bed and fall asleep.
L knew what Raito would say about it later.
"I was just making room for you to sit if you wanted to! I wasn't asking you to sleep with me!"
Against his will, the corners of L's lips stretched out in a smile.
Raito had apologized to him, left the door open, and was now grudgingly inviting L to share a bed with him. All because he said a few things he shouldn't have.
It was cute.
Cute.
L didn't think anything was cute. Yet, Raito, for all his Kira huff-and-puff, was the cutest thing L had ever seen.
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Me: -checklist- Strategy, Action, Angst, Fluff, Convenient Weather… looks like we got it all, guys.
Chibi Raito: Yeah, fine! It was a bitch having to shop for it all! No thanks for sending Ryuzaki with me, by the way. Every time he sees Romance or Fluff, he just has to buy it.
Chibi Misa: -mimics- 'Just one, Raito-kun, just one!'
Chibi Raito: Just like that! And I say 'Fine! Just one!' and he buys the whole friggin' store!
Me: Well, I suppose L is a sucker for sweets…
Chibi Raito: I am NEVER going shopping with him again!
Chibi L: What's goin' on, guys:3
Chibi Raito: Nothing…
Me: Mm hmm… right. Anyway! Speaking of sweets, one more month and I'll be Sweet Smixteen!
Chibi L: -pets Fluff- Sweet? Can I eat it?
Chibi Misa: Yay!
Me: Cookies and cake for you guys! The reviewers I mean. I know I've been extra slow with this chapter, but you know me. My middle name is 'I'll do it Tomorrow.' Hope this chapter's everything you ever wanted! Well… almost.
Chibi L: Lemons? With extra sugar:x
Chibi Raito: Oh, no you don't.
Me: Aww… you guys have to like each other first. –plot, scheme, plot, scheme- And L has to turn into a human.
Chibi Raito: EEEeeek! No way! You wouldn't!
Me: I would. Sometime. Right now, I have to load this thing with more action-fluff. And I have a plot I have to build… -lightning strike- Muuuahahaha!
Chibi Misa: Aaah! Creepy Swirl-chan! I'll end the fic right now! For the love of God, review, review, review!