'Just for tonight?'
0o0o0o
'Take me, use me, burn me,' Light pleaded, and the blue shackles around his wrist clattered against themselves.
L knelt beside him and wished for a different ending. One where Light was happy, even if he wasn't.
'I love you,' L found himself saying, over and over, and the words were branding themselves into Light's skin.
Light smiled and laughed, and L saw the word 'LIAR' burnt onto his tongue.
'BORROWED POWER' on his arms.
'CHILDISH GAMES' on his back.
'WORD GAMES' on his collarbones.
Simply 'GAMES' on his chest.
Underneath of each of L's accusations, there were the words he'd written, things he'd loved, twisted and broken, but still recognizable.
And when Light opened his eyes again, they were dead and unseeing, with 'KIRA' seared into the irises.
They were brown.
With shaking hands, L reached for a compliant Light's palm and looked at their note, their final promise.
'KIRA CASE'.
Light pulled L closer and kissed him. His lips tasted like blood, with no trace of Light left.
'L, I lo-'
L woke up to the taste of salt and the bitterness that comes when you sleep too long. He woke up to his own breathing, which was too loud and too quiet and far too alone. He woke up cold all over, and the blue-ink words were barely there anymore.
If he was with Light, had woken up beside him, the brunette with beautiful eyes would have kissed him as he retraced the words.
What was his-what was Light doing, L wondered. What was he thinking, how had he passed the night alone?
Had he sat curled in the blankets, fingers tapping as he straightened the sheets? Had he stared at the ceiling for hours before he'd thrown the pillows at the walls and laid back down sore but satisfied in the way a small child does when it defies it's parents?
Had he slept with his face buried in the pillows, just in case Death should stop by? Had he hurt until four AM, writhing in the sheets, hallucinating every time he closed his eyes, unsure if he'd dreamed stumbling to the bathroom and scrubbing every trace of blue ink from his body?
0o0o0o
L stared at himself in the mirror and tried to see the reflection as his, to see this crumpled paper doll as his. Tried to see whatever it was that held so much breakage, so many burn scars, so much potential for hurting anything and everything he loved.
He stared until his reflection was just as alien as he felt. He stared until he saw Beyond, messily flattened hair and unfocused eyes, a lie already poised on his lips, and jerked back, falling away from the deranged genius before he realized it has just been him.
Him, all along, all alone.
'If he'd been with Light' were the gateway words, and they kept coming back, bringing poisoned offerings and fake smiles, telling him everything that could have been different, if only he hadn't ruined it. If only, if only.
What if he'd done everything different, starting with that first night? What if he'd ignored Light, ignored the falling angel? What if he hadn't turned, hadn't ran and caught it, hadn't used pain and pleasure as a diversion from his true means: simply wanting to keep the angelic being from becoming like him?
What if, what if the Kira Case didn't exist.
0o0o0o
Tears and hands on mirrors, choked sobs, his crumpled paper doll of a body.
Everything, everything that could have been. He could have been leaning against Light's shoulder, drifting asleep, catching barely the remnants of Light's whispered 'I love you' and the kiss on his forehead. He could have stood in the middle of their room, hands tangled with Light's, kissing away his angel's tears in the minutes before his own death.
Everything, everything burned to nothing.
0o0o0o
The god watched Light tangled up, waking up, looking up at heaven as his wings were stripped.
Light had been successfully reminded of what his purpose was. It had been hard, though. L had been woven so deeply into his being that cutting the poison out had reforged him.
It had been worth it, though, the god mused. He hadn't predicted this-not even he knew circumstance that well-but look! Look at Light, his perfect vessel, purged clean once again.
The god was never meant to be the one to kill L. That was Light's role to fill.
It was always so much better when they had to come up with their own plans and watch them come to poisonous fruition.
The god let himself fall asleep. The next time he woke up, L and Light both would be dead.
The last thing the god remembered was Light choking back words and sobs as he scrubbed the blue ink from his palm, so hard the skin reddened.
0o0o0o
The meeting was hard. Speaking normally was, surprisingly, the easiest task. L had learned never to let emotions out during a case, and that included speech. Breaking down was not an option.
What was? In this dangerously calm aftermath of the storm, when all he knew how to do was fight against the gales of fate?
Ignore it; like he did everything he didn't know how to handle. Ignore the fire at his shoulder and the fresh wounds they both had.
God, Light, I wish I could make all the cuts I gave you better.
It would have been better if they didn't have to speak, L thought. But they'd made an image to the Task Force of 'more than friends', and they had to keep the mask up.
It hurt to rip off. It was so hard not to fall back in when Light's hand brushed his between keystrokes. The only thing that kept L from convincing himself that whatever they had been was still possible was the brittleness of Light's smile. If he tapped it, it'd crack, but L wouldn't.
0o0o0o
L stayed behind, claiming he had a few last possibilities to run through. Alone. Light held his gaze an extra second when he said that, but didn't challenge.
There had been a time when Light would have sat down beside him and fiddled with his watch and maybe accidentally grabbed L's hand under the table and ran his thumb over his palm.
Once.
L watched Light turn and leave and gave his angel his heart, told him to keep it, to rip it up and burn it like firewood.
He told Light 'goodbye' in the way he could, because the sight of him so betrayed juxtaposed against someone else's normality was too much.
L sat in the middle of the room where he'd challenged Kira, where he'd ran a thousand tests for his rival and found himself crying.
He didn't move for a long time. When he did, it was to find Light.
0o0o0o
'Back again?' were the first words Light said. It was Light, too, pained brown eyes and all. 'Back like I said, back like you'll always be?'
'Back,' L said. 'You were right.'
'No,' Light said quietly. 'No!' Louder. 'I was wrong about everything. I was wrong about you, Ryuzaki. In a perfect world, none of this ever would have happened.'
'This isn't a perfect world, Light-kun.'
'It could have been.'
They stared at each other across what used to be their bed, where it had all started with a choice and the words 'just for tonight'.
Light kept glancing at his hands. He was the one who broke first, too, running across the room and nearly grabbing L before he pulled back, keeping them inches apart. Those few inches hurt.
'Ryuzaki…' Light growled.
'It's L,' L reminded him, aching at the way he couldn't close the space between them.
'L,' Light said, testing the name again. 'God, I don't even know how I thought we could have something so fragile.'
L reached out and skimmed his fingers over the back of Light's hand. Light shivered and flinched and pulled away all in the same heartbeat, but his eyes stayed fixed on L's long enough for the raven to read what he wanted.
It was unearthly, how much hurting and hate could be held in just one look. His Light was gone, but this thing wasn't quite Kira, either.
'You can't build something on addiction,' L said.
'Even if it's mutual.' Light moved closer; maybe it was just L's imagination. 'Even if both want it to hold desperately.'
''The road to hell is paved with good intentions,'' L quoted.
'Maybe.' Light was definitely closer this time.
'And maybe…' L whispered, to those awful broken brown eyes; a promise. 'Maybe you're my drug, and maybe you're the medicine that heals it. Maybe you're both, Light-kun. All I know is that if I don't get more, I'll die.'
Let me die, Light, because escape was never an option with you. From the moment I said 'just for tonight', I've been caught in your web, and your strings are still tangled around me.
Light stepped closer and tipped L's head up with a gentle touch and kissed him.
He kissed wrong, not like Kira, but not like his Light.
It was close enough, close enough that L could pretend.
'There,' he said, before L could even start to kiss him back.
'Will that do, just for tonight?'
'It's enough,' L said.
'If I was what could keep you alive, L…' Light stared at him for a long second, like he was everything and then nothing, like he would have come back if he wasn't burnt to ashes.
'You wouldn't,' L finished. 'You would have, once?'
'Maybe I wouldn't have, even then,' Light murmured, so quiet L had almost convinced himself he'd imagined it when Light dropped his hands from L's hips and stepped back.
Wait, not yet.
Maybe he'd said the words aloud, maybe he'd whispered them too soft before Light was pressed against him again, L's hands hesitant everywhere.
'Not yet,' L said, and kissed his angel again, his Light, and wished for a different world without Kira.
It was barely a moment before Light's mouth started moving against his, those tanned hands resting on his back and drawing lines.
This was his Light.
Light, his Light who he'd hunted, chained, hurt, used.
Back for the seconds before his death, angry, broken. His Light would kill him and burn the ashes, and he would finally be released.
Back for what L had tried to ignore since they met.
It was always going to be like this, wasn't it?
Just as it'd always been?
'Just for tonight?'
0o0o0o
The truth is hard and cold, but it has a pinprick of brightness somewhere in the unilluminated depths. This twisted version is warmer, but it has no light anywhere.
That's fine with L. Searching for that tiny, dancing dot in the abysses of the truth was too hard. The lie didn't have any light anywhere, but you could wrap yourself in it and bury your face so nobody saw you crying.
He would accept the knife that Light offered with every word, every glance, every moment he was near, and drive it straight through his heart. Use Light, like Light used him, because the only thing they knew how was to hurt and abuse each other.
Use him to cauterize the wound the truth had made, the ones he himself had until they didn't hurt anymore.
I will always go running back to the person who hurt me. Not so I'll be healed. Just for another chance at the pain.
Maybe Light was Kira right now. It didn't matter. Whichever brilliant mind lay behind those eyes, they still had Light's body.
L would cut the warm, intoxicating drug Light's had given him out of his veins and replace it with Kira's poison in a wine glass.
Burn it all out with the glow of power that Light wore like a crown. Lose himself in the fire. Forget.
Just for tonight.
It was the same, exactly the same as their first night. Hard and rough and awful and addictive.
From the moment they'd fallen into bed and their clothes ended up across the room. From the moment they hadn't needed the cracked window to know where every point of the other was. From the moment they'd started kissing as a distraction for nail marks down their back.
They'd never made it past 'just for tonight', had they?
0o0o0o
Angel, is it time to dance again?
Take me, use me, make me bleed and bruise and break.
Make me forget, angel. Just like before. Just like we always do. Do you remember our routine?
Purify me, purge me, through this holy fire of a sinful act.
What's that? Purifying me would kill me?
Angel, why are you stopping?
0o0o0o
L let himself burn again, and reveled in the pain and pleasure.
He fell into pure and unbridled hate and love and lust, and unraveled himself from the last of Light's red strings.
Every bite and scratch and moan from his rival's lips cut away one of the words and promises he'd made with Light and let him begin again with Kira, back to that first night.
And if that incinerated the whole of his heart so that he couldn't ever feel love for anyone else after him, then so be it. Anyone else would just be a replacement. What could have been with Light, what could have been happiness, but was just lies under sometimes-red, sometimes-brown eyes.
Beautiful brown eyes.
They'd never had anything more than pretty words and games and childish delusions. This was not stepping back, this was stripping away all their lies and realizing that 'just for tonight' was all they'd ever had and be.
We are nothing to each other, Light, Kira, the only one who I can trust to hurt me just right.
That heat, that mind-blowing tightness and the slick sound of skin on skin. Their familiar rhythm. He'd come back for this. For hair haloed on a pillow, for half-lidded eyes barely visible as anything but crescents of honey and caramel, for his voice and twisting body when he begged, for his taste, of his skin and sweat and kiss. For the rapture that seemed to take over his body when he finished and the sudden clenching that dragged L's orgasm out of him as well. He'd come back for what Beyond always came back for.
Light Yagami was a drug, a poison you drank for the taste.
0o0o0o
We kept mistaking addiction for love; do you remember, angel? Every time. And the next time the universe pushes us together, we'll do this dance again, and again, and again...
They wouldn't say 'I love you' tonight, or ever again. Not out loud.
I hate you, I love you.
My pyromaniac.
0o0o0o
Maybe, maybe it could have ended differently.
Maybe Light could have held him and told him that 'just for tonight' was broken and still have had blue ink on his palm.
Maybe they could have kept up their game a little bit longer.
(Their beautiful, awful game of lies. He'd grown to love it.)
Maybe L should have expected it. Maybe he shouldn't have fallen back in. Maybe he shouldn't have thought that last night was enough.
For a suspect and a detective who never should have made a deal. For two humans who were nothing more than pawns fated to break no matter how hard they tried to hold the pieces together.
0o0o0o
Forty, thirty-nine, thirty-eight…
I never loved you, Light whispered. I lied, and you believed me.
He had repeated those words until he could believe them. Light twisted his image of his rival one final time and slowly, carefully, revealed his hand, showing the redness, like he'd gotten just a little bit too close to touching fire. The blue ink, fresh, in his own handwriting; 'Just for tonight?'
The look in those dark eyes was all surprise and disbelief and sorrow, like he'd really thought he'd meant something to Light.
He shouldn't have been so surprised. They were angel and demon, after all. They weren't supposed to make deals.
0o0o0o
L looked at his angel, his Light, and searched for some hint that the man he'd fallen in love with was anything but pretty lies.
Nothing, nothing, though he'd have searched forever.
He'd been wrong, L finally accepted. Wrong in thinking that Kira and Light were separate. Wrong in thinking Light loved him. Wrong in choosing him over and over. Wrong in all the ways being with Beyond had been.
This was just a repeat performance, with better actors and a final scene that spilled into reality.
He'd always known he was in love with Light, and that now Light hated him. What he hasn't considered (hadn't allowed himself) was that maybe the one who'd loved him back was never Light. It had been Kira. Kira, with the same kind of 'love' Beyond Birthday had.
Was Kira the one he'd loved all along, too?
Some people are like firewood, and they destroy beautiful things that could have been for no other reason than to watch the flames.
L broke.
Ten, nine, eight…
0o0o0o
L died in the arms of his angel, his angel with their first promise in blue ink on his hands and the words 'I love you' dead in his throat.
(With brown eyes; he would have preferred Kira over a Light who hated him.)
L didn't think anything else could have hurt him then. Light had proved his point, hadn't he? Proved that L wasn't fireproof by burning him to ashes?
For anybody else, it would have been over, but they had promised to take it to the grave.
0o0o0o
Because, angel, people always warned me about the drugs that made you fall asleep for too long, the ones that clouded your perception and made all your choices wrong, the ones that took you to heaven and then threw you into hell. The ones that burned.
What they never told me is that sometimes drugs come as pills and powders and sometimes they come as humans, humans with brown eyes and red strings.
They never told me so much about you, angel, so I had to figure it out myself. And I couldn't, not in time.
Because they never told me that I'd grow to love you like firewood burns only to end like this, with you turning around and kissing me one last time before my name was written down for death.
They never told me that I'd break things and that you'd hate me in the end and that I'd wonder forever why I kept choosing you, if I knew from the start that our last words would be…
'I win.'
0o0o0o
I have won, haven't I?
:: 3 AM, simply
-LyingMonsters, against the scale of the universe nothing but a few syllables