A/N: …I got eaten by a dinosaur.
Actually, I really wanted to include more in this chapter, and it was set to be the longest yet. But I ended up cutting things in halfjust posting what I had here for the sake of updating.
I am, however, quite thrilled with what you guys are picking up. It makes me happy to know I'm communicating everything as it's supposed to be understood.
As always, thanks to all who've reviewed!
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Chapter Eight
"Are you saying it's my fault that he's here?" Matt demanded, glaring mutinously down at the tuffs of white hair he was facing.
Near didn't even bother to glance behind at the irate fuchsia haired teen and continued to snap K-Nex together into the pattern of a Ferris wheel.
"It must be. You're the only one who interacted with him. He must have followed you back to the car after you left the crime scene and then pursued you and Watari back here."
L rubbed his temples gingerly as Matt once more began shouting at Near. The two had been at it for six minutes already, and although Watari kept reassuring him it wasn't that long for the teenagers to have been fighting, he was unaccustomed to such blatant displays of obnoxiousness. And they were giving him a headache. He'd already instructed Watari to go and collect Light Yagami from the lobby and was now awaiting the elder's return with the young man.
The crouching detective fell slowly back into his swivel chair, a pout steadily creeping across his usually expressionless features. Light Yagami's appearance would no doubt hinder the investigation. It would create a stir among the others to add an entirely unpredictable variable into their already dysfunctional mix. L was confident that given the case's current stagnation, Yagami would do little to help things. Possibly, if he hadn't been related to Beyond's first victim, Yagami could have proved useful, but not now. Not when the case became personal. L didn't do personal.
L also didn't tolerate ranting teenagers.
"Shut up!" he snapped abruptly, his voice slinging through the air and smacking both Matt and Near in the face. "Between the persistent shouting and the caustic, unimpressed rebuttals I can hardly hear myself think!"
The Wammy's House students blinked vacantly at him, his outburst surprising both of the teenagers.
Slowly, Near stood up and shuffled over to the table L was situated at. "Are you upset over the lack of progress in this case?" the petite boy inquired. "It's been less than a week L, you can't have expected Beyond to have been apprehended by now."
L let out a breath, reigning in his emotions. That had been the most confrontational statement he'd heard Near make all week, apparently the boy could take initiative when he wanted. He was perceptive as well, L granted Near that. Then again, the boy had excelled in his psychology classes, more than even L himself had when he'd been a student. To have the child call him out on it thought, it signaled L had been somewhat out of line. He knew he was frustrated, and he knew it wasn't fair to take such anger out on his successors. Unfortunately for his successors, he couldn't bring himself to care.
"Of course he should be upset!" Matt countered, hoisting himself onto the solid wood table and plopping an M&M in his mouth. "He's solved cases in less than twelve hours before."
"Be that as it may, Beyond isn't any ordinary criminal, he's one of us," Near claimed, sternly eyeing Matt over L's head.
One of us, L turned the phrase over in his mind. Coming from Near's lips the phrase sounded cult like. The worst thing about it was that it was true. None of them were normal. No Wammy's House graduate had such a luxury. Sure, they could blend into the crowd of civilians, climb the ranks of political power with the most nefarious of politicians, and single handedly control the world's justice system. But they could never fit in as themselves. They were each tailor made to fit a specific purpose that was molded to their talents. It was in those aspects that Wammy's House fit the parameters of a conspiracy theory.
Matt gaped at Near, eyes widening in anger behind orange tinted lenses. "One of us? No he's not! He's weaker than we are. The bastard ran away because he couldn't take the pressure. Mello is one of us. Mello deserves better than us just sitting around, looking at pictures of an embalmed corpse!" He gestured to the slide show that was cycling through on one of the TV monitors.
"I think he's stronger than us," L whispered thoughtfully.
"What?" Matt whipped his head to stare at L in shock. "Dear mentor, please explain what you just said!"
"Well it's as you said, actually. Except it's not. B didn't run, B escaped. I can't imagine thrusting any child into the Wammy life. We're given the responsibility that comes with intellect at a young age. But who's to say it was the proper thing to do?"
The question posed was more philosophical than L cared to deal with, but they needed to understand exactly who they were after. Plus, Watari seemed to be taking his time collecting Light Yagami, so there was little left for the three of them to do then discuss the babble of Beyond Birthday's mind.
"We're gifted children, we need to be challenged," Near answered with a shrug. "But I understand what you're saying. I don't think we'd be geniuses if we didn't contemplate it at least once. "
"Beyond's a murderer," Matt snapped. "To me, that makes him a coward. He ran because he couldn't stand up for what he wanted in his life. He couldn't stand up for his friend." Matt's hands gripped into the side of the table, his finger nails scratching across the underside of the wooden surface.
L glanced at Matt from the corner of his eye, inquiring. He often forgot that Matt had been a resident of The House during the A, B fiasco. "You remember him before he left?"
The pink haired teen bobbed his head up and down slowly. "I remember him obsessing over you. Now that I've actually met you in person I think he did a bang up job of mimicking your every move. In fact, it's incredibly creepy. But when he wasn't trying to become you he was hateful towards everything in The House. He despised living there, despised what the teachers made us do. Yet he took it all quietly. Until A died that is."
"That leaves five years in which he was unaccounted for," Near observed, twirling a lock of hair around his finger. "What do you think he did during that time?"
L lifted his legs and pushed off against the table with his feet, propelling his chair to spin across the floor towards the far window. "I don't wish to know what Beyond was doing for all those years. In fact," L turned to face the two teenagers, "I don't much care about what he was doing. I just want to catch him now, it's none of my concern as to what got him here."
"Well that's not something I ever expected the world's greatest detective to say."
A smooth voice danced across the air, permanently silencing the conversation that had been taking place. L turned his head to look over his shoulder and asses the man standing in the foyer of his hotel suite. Light Yagami leaned casually against the wall, his stance one of complete ease and calmness. The man had a way of making even a blank, plaster wall look like a princely throne.
"Explain," L demanded without so much as a 'how do you do' or, more appropriately in L's opinion, 'who the hell do you think you are.'
Light blinked in mild shock but complied with a shrug, walking further into the room. "A person's past is a clear indication for possible future avenues they may take as a criminal. Every profiler knows at least that much."
"I've never needed to look that far back into a criminal's past to apprehend them. One murder is usually enough," L responded breezily, turning the chair so it properly faced Yagami.
Light raised his eyebrows at the petulant detective. "So then where is Beyond?"
A chocking laughter caught both L's and Light's attention. Matt sat on the table, his hand held to his face as he tried to control his mirth. L rolled his eyes at the younger boy's antics and snapped his gaze back to Light Yagami who was already staring down at him in mild amusement.
"What are you doing here?"
Light removed the laptop case that had been strung across his shoulder and rifled through it for a moment. "I came to give you these." He pulled a thick, manila file from the brown leather case and handed it to L. The detective made no move to take the offered papers.
"Watari!"
At L's call the elderly man came walking into the room, a cart piled with an assortment of miscellaneous desserts as well as a small plate of sandwiches being pulled after him. "Yes L?"
"Take the file."
Watari glanced at the file Light was holding out quizzically and then back and forth between his ward and the young man he had just fetched from the hotel lobby and sighed. "I'm afraid, L, that I did not bring Light Yagami up here for you and him to engage in a pissing contest."
L gaped, scandalized at his mentor before scowling. "I'd like you to make scans of the file's contents for Matt and Near, Mr. Yagami here can brief us on its contents." The detective then turned from Watari in dismissal, a pout firmly lodged on his place.
He watched Watari shake his head and walk out of the room through the reflection of the window. He supposed Watari had a point, but L was still in charge of the investigation, no matter how informal of an investigation it was. As such, L had every right to test those under him in any way he saw fit. The raven haired man honestly had no idea why the inventor was always against his methods of ascertaining an agent's worth, they were effective. L shook his head and turned back to face the group. Near, Matt, and Light were each looking at him expectantly.
L placed a thumb in his mouth and glanced at the auburn haired twenty year old. "How did you conclude Matt worked for me? No doubt that is how you deduced I was here."
"Well it was rather obvious he wasn't a real cop," Light glanced at Matt offhandedly, "no offense."
L spared a glare at his successor before nodding to Light for an explanation. "And how exactly were you able to determine that Mr. Yagami, Matt's unprofessional behavior notwithstanding."
"Actually he was very professional, if not a little too helpful. Honestly, it was more a feeling I got from him, as well as an evaluation of his probable age. He's too young to be coming out of police training, that I know for a fact," Light spoke with a grimace. "But mainly it was the last mistake he made that clued me in."
"What was that?" Matt asked. The goggle eyed boy leaned forward slightly, the gaming device in his hands tilting towards the floor, a sign he was actually paying attention to what was being said.
Light smiled faintly. "I called for help as you were leaving the crime scene. You were the only officer who didn't turn to look. It suggested you had a different goal in mind than helping the innocent," the last word fell from Light's lips with a slightly acidic bite to it, one L did not miss. "In this case, you were collecting case data from the crime scene," the young man concluded.
It was a simple deduction. What was impressive was the amount of time it took to devise the plan. No doubt Yagami had only had a span of seconds to formulate the ploy. The boy was quick on his feet, something L regarded highly, as well as something he'd observed his successors lacking in sufficiently. It was either that, or the two boys did not possess the inclination to use their intelligence as efficiently as possible. The latter may have been the case, judging by the amount of time Matt had spent dancing around the Yagami family at the crime scene.
"How were you able to conclude that Matt worked for me?" L asked, propelling his chair off the window so he could spin in lazy circles. "I can't imagine you were presented with enough details to lead the trail of information back to me."
"I got this," Light pulled a piece of paper from the inside of his jacket, "a few weeks ago." Light hadn't expected the raven haired detective to acknowledge the document outwardly, but surprisingly L stopped spinning in circles and reached out to snatch paper from his grasp. Stupefied by the surprising motion Light blinked once before continuing his explanation. "It's about Beyond Birthday's escape. I assume you wanted to keep the investigation under wraps, thus the lack of police knowledge of B's current location, but the California Penitentiary you dumped him in saw fit to inform individuals who had a history with the man. This included myself, as well as Naomi Misora."
L's eyes flew across the page, irritation growing as he moved over the short, to the point, paragraphs. "And what lead you to conclude I'm here for B?" the detective drawled.
Light rolled his eyes. Was the man really going to continue with this? "Who else would you be after?" he spat incredulously. Light had no idea who L was trying to fool; a fifth grader could have worked it out.
L nodded in mild acceptance, relishing the irritation growing in the boy's eyes. L knew it took a lot of patience to work with a man like him, and L prided himself for his high maintenance, demanding behavior. It ensured only those who were truly dedicated to the cause, whatever that was, worked under him. Light Yagami seemed to be of a similar nature, which L knew could be highly entertaining for himself. He'd have fun pushing the boy's buttons. But the boy was out of the question.
"I suppose you wish to know how I found you?" Light commented, warily crossing his arms in hopes of masking his frustration.
L looked up at Yagami, a smirk growing just behind his irises but not reaching his face. "No, I don't much care to know actually."
Indignation pooled across Light's neck, but before it could be unleashed upon the detective Matt broke in. "Who care if you don't want to know," the teen snapped. "I for one however would like to know! Please tell me you didn't follow me!" he practically begged Light.
Light's brows furrowed as he shook his head. "No I didn't follow you."
"Hah!" the pink haired teen rounded on Near. "See, it's not my fault!"
Light snorted in bemusement. "I work for Naomi Misora, who you've employed on countless occasions. Why I've no idea, the woman's annoying. But she'd told me enough regarding your person to know you'd be staying in a luxury hotel," he said, ignoring L's earlier declaration. "I've been standing for an hour in each upscale hotel lobby within a five mile radius of the crime scene hoping that's all it would take for you to single me out."
L emitted a hiss of annoyance and finally sprung out of his chair. Did no one understand what a confidentiality agreement entailed anymore? At the very least the monetary threat he was holding over the California State Prison System and Naomi Misora should have been enough to ward them off of blabbing.
Misora had always been a little too willful for his liking, but that was probably why he liked her. She was a woman of incredible personal strength with a moral code no one could bend at all. As a woman, those traits tended to cause resentment from her superiors, and occasionally her coworkers just before they got to know her better. It really was unsurprising that, when L'd begun poking into Yagami's files and asking questions, Naomi had alerted the young man. She was the type of agent who found his methods questionable. What made her one of his favorites was that she didn't bitch about it like all the others.
A polite cough drew L's attention back to the room's occupants. L glanced at Near, the small boy was giving Light a pointed look, like a predatory bird trying to decide if it's prey was worth devouring. With the limited amount of information L had on Light Yagami, he thought it would be amusing to see the two ever face off against each other. Matt's eyes moved back and forth between the two uncertainly.
"So L," Light intoned. "Why don't we bypass these pleasantries and you ask me what you originally wanted to ask last week." The auburn haired man smirked in a pleased gesture of victory. His eyes glinted charmingly, but L could feel the challenge radiating from them.
"Why would I ask a question I already know the answer to Mr. Yagami?"
"So you were aware my answer would be no?"
Light took pleasure in the expression that fell across L's face, like theater curtains coming undone and tumbling to the stage floor right before the finale.
Rejection was not something L had to face often, mainly because everyone wanted to work with him. He was L for god's sake. If the boy wasn't there to grovel and beg to work with the greatest detective in the world then what the hell had been gallivanting across London, chatting up cute hotel receptionists, for hours for?
"I wasn't lying when I said I came to give you the file," Light admitted, moving to stand directly in front of the detective. "There's only so much you could possibly gain from a mediocre undercover agent." A pair of eyes glared out through the fringe of pink hair, but Light ignored it. "Before your mild interrogation, I believe you mentioned I'd brief you on the contents of the file? It contains all the data from the current crime scene. The information I think you'll find of most significance to be the autopsy. Certain fibers were found in Rei's hair, fibers not found in any other area of the parking garage."
L stared hard at Light. "And you only came to give me this information?"
"You're chasing Beyond here L. You're not going to catch him without having someone on the inside. Wouldn't it be a shame if I, a mere psychologist, got to him before you did?"
L nibbled his thumb, an expression of dark thoughtfulness occupying his eyes as he stared down Light Yagami. The boy was more intelligent than L had originally thought, it was a frightening prospect. Near and Matt observed the two from the background, a slight steam of anticipation flowing, mentally between the two teens.
Light smiled warmly at L, enjoying the itch he'd personally spurred into the detectives mind far too much. "Well L, I thank you for your time and will not impose on you any longer. Also, extend my thanks to Watari for me?"
Light turned on his heel and strode purposefully out of the hotel room and into the small hallway that extended towards the elevator. If all went well, L would do exactly what was required of him.
3B
Mello was unceremoniously thrown backwards, his head bouncing against the ballroom's marble flooring, sending an unpleasant crack to echo out through the hall.
"What the hell!" Mello demanded, blinking the stars of a concussion from his eyes. A leering grin swam into focus as Mello found a thin, red fabric tickling his cheek.
Beyond Birthday spun away from the boy as soon as it became apparent that he hadn't inflicted any critical damage upon his ward, permanent maybe, given the small area of Mello's head that had begun to turn a light red with blood, but nothing too serious. "Don't I look pretty!" the murderer cried with a gleeful cackle.
Mello tenderly sat up, bringing his hand up to the side of his head in a vain attempt to control the dull pain B had graced him with. It took him a minute to fully take in everything Beyond was wearing. "Are you wearing a dress?"
"It's a corset skirt actually," B said seriously. "But to us men folk, I suppose there is little discernable difference."
The blonde prodigy stood uncertainly, trying to keep himself from toppling back onto his ass as he approached Beyond. Indeed, Mello saw the black, lace skirt was an extension of the black corset cinched around Beyond's narrow waist. A white dress shirt was neatly tucked into the skirt, while a chain collar roped around the man's pale neck and then ran across his chest to loop around his arm. Red stockings glared brightly from Beyond's legs, clashing horribly with the man's combat boots. The worst of the ensemble Mellow found though was the large, black and white, poke-a-dot bow secured to atop B's head. From the bow, cascading across B's face and highlighting the man's vicious red eyes, was a thin veil of red fabric.
B smirked as Mello's eyes widened in apprehension at the sight before him. "So are you ready?" the serial killer intoned.
"Ready for what?"
"We're going out Little Dear!"
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A/N:
Thank you for reading! Please Review!