A/N: Gee whiz you guys! I'm still shocked and amazed that I'm getting such a good response on this story! Thank ya'll so much for reading and reviewing!
NOTE (PLEASE READ!!!!!!!): Yes, I am aware that Light is a tad bit OOC, but seeing as this story is highly (well, not that high, but high enough) AU, then, of course Light is going to be OOC! He's a completely (well, not COMPLETELY, but still) different person that the Light from canon. For example, the Light from canon didn't GROW UP with L as his BEST FRIEND since he was a BABY. Sure as hell didn't share a bed with the kid for X NUMBER OF YEARS.
That sort of constant interaction either brings people together or makes them kill each other. In this case, Light and Lawli's relationship in the past was an unsually strong one. They were all that the other had, so of course they attached themselves together more that what is considered to be the norm, and it is because of this that Light is so fucking loopy and martyr-esque right now. He thought Lawli was dead, after all, and his twisted sense of justice was shaped to a great extent by the events of his early life and the "murder" of his best friend. That kinda thing really fucks with a guy, y'know?
Hope that clears some things up! Sorry for the long A/N!
The Art of Drowning
In One Ear, Out the Other
It was quiet in the operations room. When asked about Raito's whereabouts, L had simply replied that Raito was indisposed. Everyone was fairly happy with this answer, even if Chief Yagami looked as if he wanted to question him further, and the team generally left L alone. L was studiously ignoring them, concentrating fully on the computer in front of him.
He had lost his nerve upon seeing the chief walk through the doors. It wasn't like him to lose his nerve.
He was more unsettled than previously theorized.
L's ears picked up on the soft murmurings of Mogi, discussing a file that Aizawa was showing him. Matsuda hummed softly, which was slightly annoying, but tolerable. Yagami-san was quiet, but L could hear the sound of his fingers against the keyboard.
He sighed.
This wasn't supposed to be hard. It wouldn't have been hard months ago, but things had changed. He had been honest when he had told Raito that he considered him to be his first ever friend, but he had been fairly certain, no, positive that Raito and Kira were the same person. And yet, he had not stopped himself from becoming attached to Raito.
L knew the possibility that their relationship would end with either the death of Raito or the death of himself was great, but L had prepared himself in the event that he would have to see his friend executed or that he himself would die at the hand of his friend. He had even entertained fantasies of Raito coming to him for help, not wanting to continue his life as Kira.
But never in all of L's wild imaginings did he suspect that Light would go and pull a stunt like this.
L had profiled Raito a very long time ago - at the beginning of the case - and this was completely out of character for him. It was out of character for anyone who might be Kira.
So now L doubted whether Raito really was Kira, which was not good, because L never truly doubted. He left room for alternate explanations and extenuating evidence, yes, but heve never doubted. He always knew, and now he didn't.
L wanted to tell the team what had transpired during the night, but he wasn't feeling up to dealing with what would more than likely be a very emotional, and perhaps even violent, confrontation between a disbelieving investigations team and himself.
He closed his eyes, sighing to himself once more. He had been doing that a lot this morning.
And L was feeling depressed - again.
He scowled, remembering the first days he had been handcuffed to Raito. He was feeling even more depressed than he had been then. What he really needed was some cheesecake. Maybe if he had Watari - oh. Watari was watching over Raito.
L growled. How convenient.
A few heads looked up to see what had agitated the detective, but L refused to look their way. Thankfully, the team turned back to their work.
Fine. So he couldn't have Watari bring him some cheesecake. That didn't mean he couldn't have somebody else bring him cheesecake.
"Matsuda-san!" barked L.
"Uh, yes?" blinked Matsuda. It wasn't customary for L to sound so cross. In fact, it wasn't customary for L to sound anything other than monotonous.
"Fetch me a slice of cheesecake, would you?" demanded L.
Matsuda seemed slightly disappointed, but complied nonetheless. However, as Matsuda bumbled towards L with his cake, he tripped, the cake plate flying from his hands, and unceremoniously landing face down on the floor.
L's eye twitched.
"Oh! Ryuuzaki! I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to -"
L held his hand up, ceasing the inane wailings of the detective.
"Not another word, Matsuda-san. I feel as if I might shoot something, and you are looking more and more like an appealing target," said L through gritted teeth.
Matsuda opened his mouth as if to reply, but wisely thought better of it.
L raised himself from his seat, his shoulders hunched and hands buried deep within his pockets.
"Ryuuzaki? Is everything alright?" asked Yagami-san cautiously.
L shook his head. "No."
And he walked out, intent on consuming a whole cheesecake before setting foot back into the operations room.
"I am not scared of confrontation."
"Yes, you are."
"No, I'm not."
"Yes, you are."
"No, I'm not."
"Okay, there are exceptions to when you aren't, but for the most part, you'd rather avoid people altogether."
Lawli growled, irritated at his friend.
"You know I'm right. Light 4,145 to Lawli 4,146."
"Well, it's about time you caught up to me. I was disappointed that you were falling so behind. It didn't feel like much of a competition anymore," goaded L, who was feeling particularly uncharitable.
Unfortunately for L, his best friend knew him well enough that his tactic would not work.
"You are terrified of confronting him," stated Light.
"I am not terrified!" whispered L furiously.
"Yes, Lawli, you are. If you weren't, then you'd be up there right now demanding to have your score changed," pointed out Light.
L had the overwhelming urge to kick Light in the head. He made a good attempt to do so when the teacher's back was turned, but Light was shorter and faster than Lawli, and ducked before his foot could slam into Light's head. It didn't help that L and Light were currently sitting in school desks.
"Temper, temper," sang Light.
"Shut up, Light! I am not bloody afraid! And I'll prove it, you stodgy prick!"
"Sure, sure," agreed Light. He gave the impression that he was just humoring L.
This only served to piss L off more.
The orphanage had it's own classrooms for the children, and Light had been smart enough to be advanced into L's class, even though there was a significant age difference. Truthfully, they were both intelligent enough to advance further, but both were happy with the easy pace of primary school.
However, when the science test had been returned, L had discovered, to his dismay, that his score was less than perfect. Apparently, the teacher had made a mistake in grading, because L just knew that everything on his test paper was perfectly correct.
So this in turn had led to the heated, though whispered, debate between Lawli and Light in the back of the classroom as the teacher continued with the lesson.
When it was time to leave, L's jaw grew taut with rigid determination. He was not a coward, and he was definitely not deserving of a less than perfect test score when he knew the answers were correct.
With sure, confident steps, he made his way up to his teacher's desk, test gripped tightly in one hand, book bag in the other.
"Mr. Moore?" questioned L.
Mr. Moore smiled genially. He was an old man with crooked teeth.
"Did you have a question, Miss Layerlett?"
Mr. Moore was also half-blind and senile. L felt his eye twitch, but didn't try to correct his teacher. It never worked.
L coughed, pulling slightly on his shirt collar. It seemed slightly warmer in the classroom then it had a few minutes ago.
"Erm, sir, I'm concerned about my grade on the test we took last Friday. I was wondering on which question I was docked three points for? I am fairly certain that I have answered all the questions correctly."
Mr. Moore hummed under his breathe, taking the proferred test paper with gnarled, liver-spotted hands. He adjusted his large coke bottle glasses, squinting extra hard at the paper.
L glanced towards the door. Light was watching, a smirk firmly in place. L almost growled at him, but instead settled on throwing him a nasty glare.
Mr. Moore cleared his throat. "Uh, oh yes, I see the problem. Miss Layerlett, I docked you three points for not putting your correct name down."
L's jaw dropped. He thought he might have heard a loud snort from the classroom door, but it was quickly smothered.
"What?" asked Lawli incredulously.
"Surely you can't expect full credit when you sign your test 'L Lawliet,' can you?" asked Mr. Moore, though not unkindly.
Lawli glanced over to Raito in disbelief, wondering what his friend thought of this. His eyes narrowed. Raito was faced away from him, his shoulder shaking madly.
"I understand, sir. Thank you for your time," L gritted out, his eyes still glued at the shaking figure of his supposed best friend.
L stomped from the classroom, grabbing on to Light's arm and jerking him after. Once they had made it safely down the hall, Light broke out into uproarious laughter.
Lawli gave a savage growl and let a kick fly at Light's head.
This time, he didn't miss.
Light must have fallen asleep, but it was a pleasant sleep. It was full of warmth and laughter, and . . . cookies? He didn't even like cookies. What a strange dream. He was saddened to awaken from it, but it didn't matter. Not when he saw who had woken him.
"Hey Ryuuzaki. Did you get everything set up? When are you taking me away?" he asked lightly, his voice scratched and soft.
L regarded him with wide eyes, his dilated pupils piercing through him, trying to dissect him. Any other time, Light might have been put off, but not any more. He was used to such looks. He had borne the brunt of them many times before - both long ago and now. He only smiled.
This obviously either encouraged the detective to speak, or annoyed him enough to give in and answer. Light assumed it was the later.
"After spending time pondering over Raito-kun's rather peculiar behavior, I have narrowed down my tentative conclusions to either Raito-kun is completely out of his mind, possibly being controlled by the first Kira, or is being truthful for some reason unknown to me. With the way Raito-kun is smiling, and if I was a betting man, I'd guess that Raito-kun has completely lost his mind, and with the way your mood has been changing from one extreme to the next lately, I would guess that you are also bi-polar."
Light blinked and then laughed hoarsely, delighted.
Wrong. Light 7,472 to Lawli 7,470, but really. Maybe Light should give up that game. It wasn't fair if L didn't know he was playing.
L had no idea, and he seemed to glean as much from Light' reaction.
"I'm off, aren't I? Or is this further evidence attesting to your lack of sanity?" L asked, his head quirked as he regarded the amused man still tied and on the floor.
"Yes, you are off," Light agreed, still grinning. But his grin faded when he realized something.
"You're going to drag this out, aren't you? You haven't even alerted the team. You've probably fed them some lame excuse for our disappearance, and you're planning on using your borrowed time to figure out why I confessed and how I know your name," Light concluded morosely.
L seemed slightly surprised at how easily Light had guessed the situation.
"Yes, well, something like that," he answered, continuing to scrutinize Light for unspoken answers.
Light sighed. He wanted to just tell Lawli who he was, but he couldn't, especially if Lawli didn't know who he truly was already. What would Lawli think of him? What would he think of his friend who had fallen so far? Lawli must have thought something had happened to him. Otherwise, he would know who was tied up in front of him, or he would have found Light a long time ago.
Wouldn't he?
It didn't matter.
Light didn't want to leave Lawli with the knowledge that the man who had once been his best friend and family was a mass murderer who had at one time been bent on Lawli's destruction.
He refused to do that to Lawli.
"I won't tell you why I confessed. My reasons are my own, but please know that I tell the truth. As for how I know your name, let me assure you that I am the only one who knows, and hopefully the knowlege will die with me as well. So, please, just save us both the trouble and have me executed already," whispered Light. His vocal chords twinged in pain from his earlier bout of laughing.
L made a frustrated noise in the back of his throat, and Light would have smacked himself if he had been physically able to. Of course that wasn't going to get Lawli off his back anytime soon! If anything, he'd probably just made his friend that much more determined to figure Light out.
If Lawli was frustrated and angry enough, nothing would stop him from doing or finding out what he wanted. He was positively dogged about it.
Light breathed in deeply before letting it out slowly.
He was going to be here awhile, wasn't he? That was fine. Not even Lawli could hold him here forever. It was just another game between them, one of many many games that they had played over the years. But who would be the first to crack? Would Light tell Lawli or would Lawli send him to the executioner's block first?
Light was tired of the games. He only wanted to be left in peace. Games had no place in his life anymore. Not when he knew what he wanted, and he wanted to leave this earth, especially before he lost control over the monster inside of him.
"If that is your wish, Raito-kun, then I will wait, but I have my doubts that you are who you claim to be," said L.
Light was shocked. After everything L had said these past few months? "You don't believe me?!"
L shook his head.
"But I am Kira!"
"The percentage in favor of you being Kira has dropped significantly since the previous evening," replied L evenly.
"That's . . .that's . . . total bullshit! I've never heard such nonsense in my life! When someone confesses to being a mass murderer, especially someone you've been highly suspicious of since the beginning, it doesn't make the likely hood that they aren't what the confess to be drop significantly! It means you've got a confession from a mass murderer! Have you lost your mind?!" yelled Raito, his voice cracking pitifully.
"No, but I still have my doubts about your mind's location."
"How could my confession possibly deter you in arresting me, Ryuuzaki?" exclaimed Light, struggling against his bonds. He had the sudden urge to choke L.
"Because if you were Kira the last thing you'd ever do is confess to me."
Light paused in his struggles for freedom and just stared at L in wonder.
Well. He should have been confessing all along if he wanted to avoid suspicion, shouldn't he?
Light had never thought to question who was the smarter one in their relationship, believing them to be equals. But now . . . now Light knew the truth of the matter.
Lawli was an idiot.
And even more unfortunate - Lawli was a smart idiot.
At this rate, Light might as well be thinking about which classes he wanted to take in the spring semester instead of his impending execution.
EDITED: 7-3-09
A/N: Haha! I freaking loved this chapter! The flashback was my favorite!! Woooot!
And poor Light! He just can't get a break! What with that mean ol' Lawli ruining his noble self-sacrificing plans! I'd be pissed, personally. I hate it when you tell someone the truth and it goes in one ear and out the other! Hence, the title. Hah!
Anyways, I can't wait to hear from everybody! So SAY SOMETHING!