Chapter 4: Righteousness
"I cannot say that I am particularly thrilled with this arrangement myself, Yagami-kun," said L for the fifth time as Light yet again voiced his distaste at some fitting or fixture in L's apartment. This time, it was the constant dripping of the kitchen tap which had received the disparaging assessment from the young man, hot on the heels of the malfunctioning door, the dingy wallpaper, the grotty floorboards, the mismatched furniture and the utter lack of anything remotely healthy in the fridge. "But I am unwilling to let you out from under my scrutiny, and if we are to work together, it would be prudent to be within easy reach of each other."
"Then I would suggest that you get something done about this place," snarked Light. "I have yet to find anything which performs its proper function."
"The bed," L said flatly. Anyone else would have been unsure whether he was joking or not, with his immobile expression and his deadened voice, but Light bit out a snort of unamused laughter.
"I take it I won't be able to appreciate the wonderfully effective bed," he said bitterly. "Since there's only one."
"You can have the bed," L shrugged. "I don't sleep much."
"Everyone needs to sleep," Light said sceptically.
"But not everyone can," L replied simply. "I won't sleep any worse on the sofa than on the bed."
"Then apparently the bed does not perform its proper function effectively," Light smirked. L felt like hitting the man, not for the first time.
"If you continue to be so insulting of my hospitality, I shall revoke the offer," he snapped. Light shrugged.
"Is there at least some coffee in the house?" he asked. L nodded tersely, and went to the kitchen to start a pot. Although most of his appliances and furniture were of the cheapest and most unattractive sort, his kitchen was well stocked with cake and chocolate, some of it very expensive or exotic, and his coffee brand was of the non-instant, imported variety. Even Light looked impressed at the steaming brew as its fragrant scent curled upwards in a delicate spiral of steam.
"Coffee pot," L said flatly, referring to Light's earlier comment. Light, of course, understood his meaning immediately, and nodded his concession.
"Although it is almost eleven in the evening," L interjected as Light sipped his drink. "Shouldn't you be thinking about going to sleep?"
"Caffeine won't keep me up," Light shrugged. "Anyway, if you are an insomniac, you shouldn't have any issues with my sleeping habits, irregular or otherwise."
"I don't want to disrupt your usual routine," L said, although truth be told he did not really care what Light did.
"Well I am not tired yet," dismissed Light. "And we have much to discuss. I would like to begin right away, if you are amenable?"
"Certainly, Yagami-kun," L conceded, his thoughts similarly directed. "I believe we have come to the conclusion that our views on justice are undoubtedly very similar." They had. They had talked in the cafe until they had been politely informed the shop would be closing, the mismatched pair drawing curious glances from the young worker. "However, whilst I have been content to let the rest of the world do whatever it chooses up until now, it seems that you have greater aspirations. I would like to hear about these in more detail." And therefore find out more about your personality, Kira.
"Well," Light drawled, stretching out his long, dark-clad legs as he finished his coffee, "I believe you are already well aware of the aims of Kira; to kill all those criminals who escaped normal justice. However, this is not the way in which I would have originally chosen to exact punishment. Death is so messy, so vulgar."
"Yet you killed people, Light-kun, with those very hands," L interrupted, staring penetratingly into the younger man's face. Not so much as a flicker in the relaxed expression. "As I recall, that was what you originally chose."
"I have had a lot of time to refine my views," Light continued, ignoring the interruption completely. "Why is it that so many criminals escape justice? Why is it that so many people are allowed out to kill again? Are the police so corrupt that they will allow murders to walk free simply for a few years of good behaviour?" The latter was a barb directed at L, but he did not let the irritation show in his expression as he continued to listen to the arrogant youth.
"I have come to the conclusion," continued Light, "that the police are to blame. The weaknesses in our own system of justice are at fault, and this is where we need to begin, to ensure a world in which criminals are punished for their crimes."
"That is what the police are for, Yagami-kun," said L blandly, mostly to irritate.
"Then why do so many criminals walk free?" asked Light. "I'll tell you; it is because the police are too lazy or too incompetent to do their job properly. It is because they are too soft on criminals, too unwilling to be firm with them. It is people like us, Ryuuzaki, who need to take the law into our own hands and achieve justice where others are too weak, too base to understand what true justice is."
"But what you have just described is mob justice, Yagami-kun," L pointed out. "Laws are there for a reason. Human beings have no right to decide what is right and wrong, who should live and who should die."
"But wedo," emphasised Light, a strange gleam of excitement in his cold eyes. "We have the intellect, the strength of will and the understanding. Not any fool may decide the fates of men, but somebody needs to. A responsibility, maybe, a difficult burden to bear, but nevertheless it must be done, and by people like us, to make the world a place worth living in for the good and the just."
"What Yagami-kun is suggesting, then," L said slowly, although he was 100% certain he understood his companion perfectly, "is that we act as gods."
"If you wish to use the word," Light frowned slightly, "then yes, Ryuuzaki, I suppose we would be like gods."
"And what makes you think that this power to destroy lives should be in the hands of any mortal? Do you not believe in a true God who allows evil and suffering?" L questioned.
"If there was a God, why would He allow suffering?" Light asked. "No, Ryuuzaki, it is up to us to make the world a better place."
"Yagami-kun has strange ideas of justice for the son of a police officer," L stated. "I doubt these views are inherited from your father. From what I know of Yagami-san, he would not approve of murder."
"I am not suggesting murder," Light replied, unaffected by the mention of his father. "Murder is base, it puts us on the same level as criminals, no matter how beautifully done. What I am suggesting is more... that we make a list."
"A list?" L asked, intrigued. This was not what he had expected.
"Yes, exactly that," Light nodded emphatically. "With your police connections, Ryuuzaki, and my connections in, let us say, the underworld, for the sake of poetics, and our combined intellectual capacities, we have the means to solve some of the most difficult cases in the world. Anything which catches our interest, anything the police are at a loss to understand, anything which they are too corrupt or afraid to bring out in the open... we will do it for them. In spite of them. And the names of those criminals, their faces, will be thrown out to the hyenas, plastered across billboards and computer screens worldwide until we have the people screaming for their capture. We will make the criminals cower in fear, give them nowhere to hide, and put the police under immense pressure to make captures, make punishments harsher."
"The world does not care," L replied starkly. "The world already knows names and faces, and it allows criminals to shelter in its poisoned underbelly. The people will not scream for justice. They would not know justice if it came knocking on their door selling girl-scout cookies."
"When you have been in prison for as long as I have," Light replied, unperturbed, "you will learn above all else one thing."
"Not to drop the soap?" L said blithely.
"To be patient," Light said smoothly. "Nobody can build a mansion in a day, but piece by tiny piece, our name will be known."
"Kira?" L asked scathingly.
"No," Light frowned again. "Kira is dead. He died approximately four hours ago, if you remember. What we will represent is seigi – righteousness."
"Seigi?" repeated L doubtfully. "At least Kira had a ring to it."
"Well the charm," Light smiled deviously, "is to let the people choose their own name. Seigi is merely what we represent. Trust me, within three months at the most, we will have a name. Our goals will take true form."
"Our goals?" L questioned. "These sound a lot more like your goals, Light-kun." He dropped the more formal name almost unconsciously. "Do I not get a say?"
"Do you not agree?" Light asked mildly.
"It seems... almost more inviting than any concept I have ever come across before," L admitted. "To solve crimes nobody else can, I admit it is an attractive goal, something I could truly apply my intellect to. But Light-kun is too idealistic. Working with the police anonymously to help solve crimes, to make the system stronger, this is a truly great goal. But to undermine the police will more likely weaken the system, and to allow the world to exact justice... this is mob rule. It is too ambitious, to become gods. The world changes in small ways, Light-kun. What you are suggesting... it would never work, unless-"
"Unless?" Light asked, and there was a hint of triumph in his voice. L looked sharply up at his companion, and realised that he was being played with. Light had wanted all the way along for him to be the one to suggest it.
"Unless we make and broadcast the list, and bring about the death of the criminal in question, to prove we have the might to exact the justice we preach," L finished his thought without a hint of emotion in his voice.
"Ryuuzaki makes an excellent point," Light smirked, pretending to ponder L's statement.
"Then I believe we are at an impasse," L said firmly. "I refuse to be party to murder, even of criminals."
"Impasse bears a lot of the same letters as passive," Light pointed out. "And passive intimates giving up. I do not, as a rule, give up. I believe a better word is compromise."
"And you believe that a suitable compromise can be found?" L enquired.
"There is always a suitable compromise, especially between two such civilised minds as ours," Light mused. "I am willing, perhaps, to cooperate with the police, or rather, to have the police cooperate with us, on some occasions, in return for relinquishing the suggestion that the criminals we uncover be assassinated."
"Does Light-kun think me so blind?" L asked archly. "He has just suggested blackmailing the police into giving us information in exchange for refraining from first degree murder. I daresay he would see the encouragement of harsher punishment within this context, also. I have no particular wish, in any case, to work alongside the NPA, merely I do not wish to undermine them."
"Then what situation would you be comfortable with?" asked Light politely, seemingly genuinely offering him a chance to contribute. His eyes were wide and innocent, his face mirroring an expression of perfect interest and polite concentration. L knew better.
He brought his thumb to his lips, thinking. Light was a master of manipulation, this much was clear, and he had had far longer than L to think out all the different options and reactions L might have. Or rather, that a prospective partner might have. He could not have anticipated L himself into the equation more than a few nights ago. So L had the advantage of being able to pre-empt Light's assumptions about his reactions, thus putting Light into the position of L, forcing him to be the one who had to think hard on the spot.
"I would wish to be in charge of the treatment or disposal of criminals once they have been discovered," he replied finally, and was rewarded with a slight widening of Light's eyes in surprise.
"And what would you propose to do with them?" he asked, trying to mask his shock.
"I am not new to the judgement of criminals on my own terms," L replied in a low voice. "It would not be the first time I have offered a criminal an ultimatum, or a second chance. Nor would it be the first time I have had a criminal arrested on falsified evidence because I was aware of his guilt but was unable with my resources to prove it with legal means. What I propose is a new court system of justice. It is really an adaption of Light-kun's own idea of allowing the people to decide. Each criminal will receive a choice; to give himself up into the hands of the police, or to be killed by Seigi. Killed by justice. Does Light-kun concur?"
"I... I find myself amenable to the suggestion," Light got out eventually. L got the distinct impression that Light was rather attracted to the idea. It was simple and ruthless, yet just. A choice. And L was satisfied that those who tried to escape justice would be the ones truly guilty of polluting the world. It would not be murder if they were choosing their own fate. A creative and convoluted suicide, perhaps, but not murder. Victims of murder did not get to choose their manner of passing. And as time progressed, and the two of them succeeded in executing those who tried to flee from justice, the deaths would decrease and the police would gain strength, with Lawliet and Light in the background, wielding the power. It was the perfect compromise. Light-kun had been right about that.
"Then we have ourselves a compromise," L said, and for the first time in as long as he could remember, he smiled. It wasn't a pleasant smile, nor a smile which spoke of humour. It was wide and genuine, but almost predatory, like a carnivore contemplating its next meal. But for once, L could taste something more than his usual antipathy towards the world in general. It was not necessarily a healthy feeling, but it was something caught between hope and ambition, something which gave his lethargic body strength and drive. Looking at his new partner in not-quite-crime, he could sense the same thing. It was a gleam in his eyes, a lilt to his voice, a quirk to his lips. Lawliet knew that in their own minds, despite what had been said, they were already gods, their sense of their own mortality dissipating like smoke in the wind.
But for him, it was a worthy exchange. Something about feeling so close, so similar, to another human being, to Light, seeing the same look reflected in his eyes, made him for once wish for more than his boring lot in life. He wanted this.