notes/warnings
+ mild sexual themes, I guess?
+ swearing
Future
Over the course of the day Rae manages to track all of Bridges' recent flights, uncover another of his false identities, and pinpoint his current location in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Then it leaves for the night, presumably to try and gather more concrete evidence. Raye doesn't understand Rae's methods, and tonight he doesn't much care. He trusts Rae. He'll report whatever criminals it tells him to report.
Because the alternative is trusting L. And…no. Just, just fucking no. Raye hates L, hates this place, hates everything. He feels uncomfortable, like he's too big for his skin, like his nerves are too sensitive and everything hurts. He's all alone. He hates the fact that Mail is still allied to L, after Naomi, after Rae, after everything.
Raye slams the computer shut, and goes to bed. Mail trots after him twenty seconds later, closes the door, and resumes his usual position on the carpet. Mail always follows him. And Raye never complains about the laptop-screen glow that penetrates the comfortable darkness of his room. That is their routine. Raye feels slightly better, as if a small quantity of his anger has somehow dissolved. For Rae's sake, he cannot consider Mail a colleague. But he does consider Mail a friend. Sort of.
We should run away from this place. You and me and the Shinigami. We should run away from L.
He's got hooks in all of them. Raye stays because of Naomi. The Shinigami is obligated to stay near L until the five years are over. Mail stays because…
Because.
Because L is important to him, maybe. Because L is the only person left in his whole world who merits any attention at all.
And that's horrible.
No, that can't be true. Mail has Raye. Watches over Raye. Is Raye's companion. They're always together. They're the only two humans left in this building. In this whole, nightmarish world of murder and monsters and gods. All that Raye has left. Mail cannot belong to L. He cannot.
Mail cannot belong to anyone, because Mail isn't anyone. He's dead inside. He cannot be fixed. He is Raye's future.
"Don't you ever need to sleep?" Raye asks, hoarsely.
The weather is getting cooler. The room is tidy, now. Nothing smells bad. The sheets are clean and well-worn. It's a good night for sleeping.
Mail turns his head abruptly. The moonlight paints him in shades of grey. He's still so young, too young for this crap, too young to be in love. His hair is long, now. Naomi was the only one who could convince him to keep it reasonably short. His fringe flops into his eyes.
"No," he says, without sadness or hesitation. "Not ever."
As if it means nothing. As if it's as easy as throwing out an old pair of shoes, as thoughtless as shaving. Raye aches for rest, aches for the comfort of unconsciousness in his own, safe bed. He wants to sleep all the time. He wants to solve crimes all the time. He wants to feel like a human being again, goddamnit.
"Even L needs it, sometimes," Raye whispers, unable to keep the loathing from his voice.
Mail always answers his questions within a few seconds. Raye never has to wait long. Sometimes, Mail is proof that he exists, that he is separate from Naomi, that he did not die alongside her.
"L is damaged," Mail tells him, softly. "Leave him alone."
A thousand different words rush through Raye's head at once.
No. Don't say that. You know what he's like.
He doesn't deserve your sympathy.
Don't waste the little humanity you have left. Not on him.
He's just an ugly guy with a decent brain and poor social skills.
Why can't you SEE?
Staying with L won't bring Mello back. Mello is gone. Naomi is gone. We should run away.
The skeleton is a better detective than he is.
Mail is Raye's future and L destroys futures, destroys families, destroys everything. Raye won't stand for this. He won't.Mail should…
Leaning all over you…
What's wrong with you?
What's WRONG with you?
Why would you choose somebody like him, when you…
The sentences collide and mash in Raye's mind and stopper around the region of his vocal chords. Mail watches him, carefully. Mail has dark hair. In the wrong light, he resembles Naomi.
"Come here," Raye manages, and it isn't what he'd intended to say at all.
Nothing in his life is right, and he doesn't know what to do. But it's a comfortable night. There isn't much light.
It's such a vague and strange request that he expects Mail to ask for clarification. When Mail doesn't, and simply gets to his feet, turns, and touches a knee to the bed, Raye feels inconceivably relieved.
Raye is suffocating. He's been suffocating for weeks; in anger, in grief, in boredom, in his own unhealthy internal monologue.
"What do you need?" Mail asks, blandly. Like Raye is asking for the time, or for a cup of tea. Raye doesn't know what he's asking for. He wants to be saved. He wants Naomi.
It strikes Raye that the most important thing in the universe, right now, is to bring Mail down onto the same horizontal plane. Like somehow, they'll be okay, then. He hits the empty side of the bed with his right hand. There isn't any Naomi to stop his palm from connecting with the mattress.
"Here," he repeats.
This is a test. Mail has always done everything for him. If he denies Raye this, then Raye will know. He can't be trusted. He can't be weaned from L. Raye will truly always be alone. Mail has always been right where Raye needed him.
So far.
Mail's expression does not change, but he puts a little more weight on his knee, making a tiny divot in the bedspread.
Nobody has been in this bed except Raye. He's festered here for so long. Mail is different. He changes things. Maybe he can save Raye, even if he is beyond repair himself. Maybe Raye will use him as a stepping stone, even if Mail drowns.
If it meant…
…he could feel alive again.
Raye grabs at the front of Mail's filthy trench-coat, locking one finger deftly into the button-hole. Mail doesn't flinch. Mail doesn't stop him.
Okay. This is good. Raye feels better, already.
Mail drops down onto the empty mattress-space with a surprising amount of grace. He's all hard edges, skin and bone and grime. He's walking proof that this afterlife is a bad, bad, terrible concept. That the dead should be left dead oh god no Naomi. The dead cannot be left dead. Naomi needed to live. Mail needed to die.
Raye can still see L in the office, draped over Mail like a drunkard, like a bad smell. Like he was taking comfort in it.
Mail still doesn't speak. He's so compliant. L made him that way. Raye hates L for everything he's done to everyone. He hates Mail for never getting better. Mail is his future.
Raye reaches out and tips Mail's chin, because he can. Because this is the thing that he's doing right now, the thing that L cannot do, has not done. Mail is letting Raye do it, and that's another nail in L's metaphorical coffin. Raye is doing this for Rae and himself and Mail and all of them. Especially Rae.
Raye puts a hand on Mail's waist, and there's almost nothing there. He's skinny to the point of starvation. He's so different from Naomi, and Raye wants her here so badly. He wants her to come home. This is her home. He is her home.
Mello is Mail's home. But maybe, if Raye can break him away from that, if Raye can force him to recover, to be a person again, then Raye will be all right, too.
Mail is his future. Raye is changing his future. They're the only two humans left in the whole world. Raye pushes a hand under Mail's shirt. His skin feels like nothing, like any other criminal Raye has patted down.
Mail hasn't moved. His breathing is steady, his hands curled together in front of his chest. His eyes are glassy, staring straight ahead, like he doesn't care what happens to him. Like nothing matters, and…
What the fuck am I doing?
The revelation comes like a shock, like a torrent of ice-cold water. Raye is in bed with someone. Someone who isn't Naomi, and it's only ever been Naomi, and Mail is disgusting and everything about him is wrong.
Raye lashes out, violent and furious and desperate to fix this. Mail tumbles to the floor and doesn't even try to catch himself. Raye loathes him for not caring, more than anything else.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Raye says, with as much venom as possible, because he wants Mail to suffer, to bleed.
Mail sits up and shrugs.
"S'posed to take care of you," he monotones.
"Fuck you," Raye yells, because Mail is nothing. Feels nothing. Cares about nothing. He's not going to be Raye's future. "You're not even a fucking person!"
And then he gets out of bed, and grabs Mail by his grotesquely bony shoulder, drags him across the room, throws him through the doorway, and slams the door shut between them, locking it with a satisfying click.
I'm not going to be you I'm not going to be you I'm not going to be you.
Three minutes later, Raye shoves the door back open, hauls Mail back into the room, dumps him on his regular spot on the carpet, and the walls finally finally finally stop closing in, stop screaming at him.
"Just stay there," Raye hisses, without looking at Mail's awful fucking face. "Don't…don't fucking move."
He buries himself under the covers and prays for sleep and to never wake up.
At midnight, L gets a phone call from one of his liaisons in Washington.
"This is Eileen Nicholson from the Federal Beareau of Investigations, calling in regards to the recent serial terrorist case," she announces, crisply. "I wish to speak to L, please."
L dangles the phone next to his ear and tries to force himself to remain awake. He's never spoken to Eileen Nicholson. And he is not presently investigating any acts of terrorism.
This must be Rae's case. With Raye Penber's help, Rae is able to pose as him. Become him. A better version of him.
L wouldn't mind being succeeded by his Shinigami.
"I am an agent of L," he says, softly. "We are familiar with that case. Please go ahead."
"The suspect, a Mr Gary Greenville - alias Edgar Bridges – has just been taken into custody," Eileen tells him. "We have indisputable forensic evidence that links him to all three of the attacked buildings. No further participation from you is required."
L frowns.
"It is rare for someone to seek L's assistance and then find they do not need it," he tells her. "You are aware there will still be charges incurred for his services so far?"
"That's fine," she tells him, shortly. "Please let L know we may require less of his help in the future. We are more than happy with the efforts of the detective who solved this case."
L stares at the ceiling.
Someone solved this case. Someone other than Rae.
No one is better than Rae. No one.
"Your feedback has been noted and filed accordingly," he tells her. "Is there anything else?"
"You may wish to confirm that your colleagues are all safe," Eileen adds. "My primary contact number for L seems to be ringing out."
Probably because Raye is asleep and Rae is gone. But L makes a note to check on them immediately, just in case.
"Thank you for your concern," he says graciously. "May I enquire about the name of your new detective?"
Eileen snorts.
"It seems like detectives don't give out names, these days," she says, with unprofessional levels of exasperation. "All I know is that we call him Buzz."
"I see. Thank you."
L snaps the phone shut, and heads out to secure the building.
Buzz.
L should have been able to guess that for himself.
Raye wakes up, and the sun is shining, and his throat hurts, and Naomi is still dead, and Mail is still on the floor like a sack of so much garbage. And Raye still tried to seduce him last night, just to get revenge on L.
No. That. That isn't right. That wasn't why. That wasn't what he was trying to prove.
"Why did you let me do that?" he growls, immediately, because this is more important. More important than the terrible thing that he almost did. "Do you want to sleep with me?"
"I don't want anyone," Mail says, like he's reciting from a script. "I don't care about anyone. I don't care what happens to me."
"You wouldn't have stopped me, would you?" Raye demands.
For fuck's sake, don't say no. Nobody is that broken. Everybody cares what happens to them.
"I wouldn't have stopped you," Mail confirms, easily. "What difference would it have made? Maybe you'd have felt better. I don't know. I don't fuckin' understand you."
And Raye finally, finally realizes that there is no escape. Mail is a doll. A puppet. L's puppet. A dead man walking. No will of his own. No nothing. He's barely even alive.
Raye wants to scream. Wants to run and run and run and never look back. But it's pointless, isn't it? Avoiding the inevitable is pointless. Mail is his future. This is what he will become. No hope. No feelings. A shadow.
Inside Raye's own mind, the walls close in and in and in and do not stop until he is surrounded on all sides, claustrophobic and squashed and unable to move.
"Right," he murmurs, and his voice already sounds horrifyingly deadpan. "Right. I see."
Everything is lost.
"I want you to contact the chief of police for Northern Ireland. He currently has a suspect in custody, but the evidence doesn't match up. He needs to let her go and arrest her brother instead."
"Oh. Ahh, right. You want me to…to…ah…"
The sun has barely risen, and the day is already exasperating. Raye is vacant-eyed, uselessly blank, and completely unable to focus. L is still alive and looking infuriatingly healthy, and some other big-shot detective has gone and solved Rae's case.
That's okay, though. Rae is okay with anyone who brings criminals to justice. Even more so if they manage to make L look stupid along the way.
The world may never recognize L for the inherently evil megalomaniac that he is, but if he is simply disregarded, that will be enough. Without power and money, his hands are tied. Without power and money, L cannot hurt anyone. Rae wants to see L punished for his sins, but the most important thing, first and foremost, must be the safety of innocent people.
And besides. L doesn't have much time.
Tick tick tick.
Are you frightened?
Do you know you're going to die all alone?
Just like last time.
It's okay. Rae is okay. Rae didn't fall. Everything is fine.
"Look, I know his alibi is solid, but he's the only one who possibly could have entered the facility without setting off the alarms," Rae explains. "The forensic report noted no unusual fingerprints, but there are two matches right above the air-conditioning unit in the main laboratory. Tell them they need to bring in the brother and re-investigate. It's definitely him."
"Definitely," Raye echoes. "I get it. Right. I'll…make that call."
"Is something wrong, Raye Penber?" Rae asks, voice dripping with sincere-sounding patience. "You seem particularly upset today."
Raye stares into the middle distance.
"It's…nothing," he says, thickly. "I can keep working cases. That's…that's the only thing I can do."
"Okay," Rae replies. "Just remember, I'm here if you want someone to talk to."
It's possible that L has gotten to him. That L has harmed him somehow, for daring to support Rae. That wouldn't be surprising at all.
"Yeah. Thanks."
Raye can't work cases. Raye can't even reliably make a phone call. Instead, Rae ends up hovering beside him and dictating every single word.
Today is an abysmal day, and Rae deserves better.
L takes on another case, a hacker who is wiping massive amounts of information from the websites of several prominent news companies. It's reasonably easy, it's probably too low-key to attract the attention of either Buzz or Rae, and he can work closely with Mail.
He's so pathetic. One little illness and he's desperate for companionship and support. And he can't ask anything of his protégé, not with Mail working so hard to deal with Raye already, so L just takes what he can get. Probably he shouldn't have leant all over Mail yesterday, but.
They've been through a lot together. Mail is practically almost his son.
"Why'd you come to check on us last night?" Mail asks, boredly. "Did something happen?"
"Not really," L tells him. "It was a routine check."
Mail huffs his hair out of his eyes.
"You used to do that all the time, in the beginning. When I was first...starting here."
"Yes," L affirms, and waits for Mail to make whatever point he's trying to make. But he doesn't say any more, he just returns his attention to his computer screen.
L tilts his head.
"Thank you," he says, softly. "For looking after Raye Penber."
"You don't need to thank me all the time," Mail says, harshly.
The others are working at the far end of the room. Raye is staring at the computer. Rae is staring at L with pure, untempered hatred.
And that's fine.
Throughout the course of the day, Rae solves a high-profile murder case. L barely covers any preliminary groundwork at all.
Rae is such a good detective. So much more competent than Buzz.
No one is better than Rae.
Well, no.
They were.
He and Rae, together, were better than the sum of their respective abilities. They were a good team.
It doesn't matter now. It doesn't matter any more.
Rae wants him to suffer and die. He wants Rae to live forever.
Everything is as it should be.
A week drags past, taking Rae seven days closer to being able to leave L forever and be safe. Nothing else in the universe is good. Nothing else is worth noticing.
Raye barely remembers the case they solved yesterday, or the case he's working on right now. Rae could be arresting people by drawing names out of a hat, and he wouldn't know.
But Rae would never do that. And Raye has made the decision to trust the Shinigami, and he has neither the desire nor the energy to reassess that.
Raye has no purpose in life. He'll save the people he can save, but in the end, he's just passing time.
Just passing time.
It comes to him slowly, insidiously, like the worst of bad ideas. It's insane and illogical, but his entire future is insanity. Raye is used to dealing with insanity. And it keeps unfolding in his head, like a map, like the origami cranes Naomi used to make, punctuated by Rae's quiet, focused voice.
Raye isn't listening to a damn thing the Shinigami says. For the first time in a week, he has hope.
Desperate, impossible hope.
It occurs to Mail that maybe he did something immoral. That maybe it was wrong, to be totally okay with the idea of sleeping with Raye. That maybe he ought to wait for Mello forever, even though…even if Mello were to come back, it's not like he'd ever…
And Mello cannot come back. No matter what Mail does, or how hard he prays, or how hard he loves, Mello will always be gone. Vanished.
But Naomi isn't gone forever, and perhaps that is why Raye seems to be getting worse instead of better. Because he is disgusted at the fact that he considered fucking someone else, even for a moment, even in the most platonic and necessary of capacities. It shouldn't even count as cheating, really, because – how did Raye put it – Mail is barely even a person.
Raye still talks to Mail, still follows him from room to room. Raye's life seems to be spiraling out of control, but their tenuous almost-friendship has been left intact. And Mail ought to be able to use that to help Raye, to somehow break him out of his own depressive funk. Mail ought to be able to protect Raye, but he can't. Raye isn't like him, and he has no idea what to say.
Mail is broken, and L should never have expected that he'd be able to save anybody.
When Rae is finally finished with him, Raye flat-out runs to the balcony and slams the door behind him.
Mail pauses mid-smoke, and eyes him with mild interest. Raye is practically vibrating with apprehension and possibility, and Mail looks like he's barely awake.
You are so broken.
You can't relate to anybody, can you?
It doesn't matter. Raye is going to escape. If he possibly, possibly can, Raye is going to escape.
It's not a good plan. It's an insane plan. It is the tiniest shard of hope, paper-thin and near invisible.
"I'm going to try something," he announces. "I'm going to try something and I don't want you to stop me. I don't even really care what you think."
Mail raises an eyebrow at him.
"If you don't care what I think, then why are you fuckin' telling me?" he murmurs, and the exhaustion in his voice is almost tangible.
"Shut up and listen," Raye snarls. He hates Mail. He doesn't have time for Mail's crap. He has all the time in the world, but he still doesn't have enough.
Not yet.
He hasn't done any research at all, but that barely matters. Even if he fails, it will take him years and years and years to reach a conclusion. And that means years and years and years before he's forced to emulate Mail.
And… he might succeed.
"I'm listening."
"I'm going…to go back," Raye tells him, inelegantly.
It's a difficult concept to put into words.
Mail takes the cigarette from his mouth, balances it precariously on the railing, and looks at Raye with unnerving clarity.
"Back to where she was killed?" he asks, but there's an edge to his voice that suggests he knows the truth.
Raye shakes his head.
"Back to when she…lived," he answers, carefully.
There isn't any reason for Mail not to think him absolutely bat-shit crazy. But he's telling Mail because Mail is his spectator, the one thing that makes him real, makes him more than the punch-line in a tragic, tragic story. Mail has to know everything that he does, all of the time.
"Go on," Mail prompts.
Raye glares at him.
"Why shouldn't I try? I was never happy, except when I was with her. When I was married to her. Even before I met her, my life was just…pointless. I don't want to change anything. I just want…all I care about is the days we spent together. Even if we were getting our asses kicked. Even if we were here, with him. I want to relive my time with her. Even just a day. A second. I don't care."
Mail nods, once.
"You want to time-travel," he states, sagely.
"Why not?" Raye yells. "We're all in the fucking afterlife anyway. There's obviously more to this fucked-up universe than what science tells us! Why shouldn't I try? I have nothing left to lose!"
"You shouldn't try," Mail enunciates, "because it is fucking impossible."
"I told you not to try and stop me," Raye whispers, threateningly. "I don't care what you think!"
Mail retrieves his cigarette and tucks it behind his ear, then reaches for the sliding door.
"I won't stop you," he deadpans. "But there's something I want to show you, first."
Mail's room is both filthy and sparse. There isn't any mess, because he barely owns anything other than a broken rosary and a few sets of clothes, but everything is covered in dust and stained with nicotine and sweat. His bed is disgusting, but the pillow is slightly less grotty than the mattress.
Naomi did that, Raye thinks, sadly. Naomi was the one who cut his hair, and made him keep it clean.
Mail might only care about his precious Mello, but he'll suffer from Naomi's passing, too. Even if he's too selfish to realize it.
If Raye could go back, if Raye could see her again. Even for the briefest of moments, it wouldn't matter. It would be one more time, and he would have the chance to tell her, oh god, tell her everything that he's missing, now, and he could be happy again.
So Raye will try. He'll try until it kills him, until he destroys everything. Nothing that Mail could show him will ever change his mind.
And he doesn't want to see this place. He's not going to turn into Mail. Not for a very long time, if Raye has anything to do with it.
Mail seems to be oblivious to both the grime and Raye's discomfort. He marches over to his closet – the only other item of furniture in the room – and yanks it open. Several piles of paper spill onto the floor by his feet. Raye wanders up behind him and stares.
He'd presumed the closet would be just one more shrine to what's-his-face, but it isn't. It's filled with paper. Charts and notes. Raye selects a sheaf at random and stares at it. It's practically gibberish, a mishmash of numbers and vectors and times.
"I said it was impossible," Mail tells him softly, "because I know. I know."
Raye stares at him, with mounting horror. With mounting awe.
"You," he chokes. "You've already tried to do this?"
Mail smiles bitterly and doesn't meet his eyes.
"Everyone wants to be happy, right?"
Raye shakes his head, reaches for another piece of paper. A third. A fourth. Mail's research is so much more advanced than anything he could ever hope to produce. Lengthy calculations and imaginary numbers and hardcore physics. Complicated spreadsheets. Engine designs.
There must be thousands of pages in here, Raye thinks, and the sheer impossibility of it all hits him like a sack of cement.
"I did this years ago," Mail continues. "Not long after I first started working for L. If you want, you can use my research to get started. But…I swear to you, it's impossible. Otherwise, I never would have..never would…have…"
What the hell was I thinking, Raye wonders. I'm actually going mad. This is it. This is the beginning.
His future is inevitable, and he knows that. He's known it all along, all week.
And Mail. Mail worked so hard. For months on end, maybe. Mail dealt with this same, insane hope, and the same life-shattering disappointment, and they're both just.
Broken.
Wasted.
Raye unclenches his fist, letting the papers drift gently to the carpet. He grabs Mail around the shoulders in a rough hug.
You.
How much are you hurting?
Naomi loved me, married me, devoted her life to me, but that bastard never even looked at you twice.
"I'm sorry," Raye says, out loud. "I'm sorry for all of this."
It's hard to tell whether Mail is tense, or whether he just lacks the necessary soft parts to properly reciprocate. Mail hates being touched, though, so it's probably the former.
He hates being touched, and yet, he couldn't be bothered to resist, that night. The other night. When Raye nearly…
"I'm sorry," Raye says again, and he's possibly crying.
Mail is pretty much just a sack of bones, fragile and uncomfortable and light. It's amazing he's even still alive at all.
"It's okay," Mail says, distantly, and presses one palm between Raye's shoulder-blades.
"Nothing is okay," Raye tells him, pulling back and letting his arms drop to his sides. "Nothing about any of this is okay. You and me, we're both fucked."
"Mmm," Mail says, sweeping the fruits of his research back into the closet with one foot. "I'm fucked. But…I don't think you have to be. I don't think you should be me. I think you should go and get your life back."
Mail is the resident expert on grief, and everything that he says is pretty much gospel. Raye feels strange. Different. Like something has snapped inside him.
Something ugly. Something unnecessary.
Maybe this is what he's been waiting for, all along.
Mail can't be his future if Mail refuses to be his future. And Raye's not. He's not okay.
But maybe he could be. One day.
"It's what Naomi would want, right?" Mail asks, gently.
Raye grins, sudden and stupid and completely inappropriate.
"Yeah," he agrees. "It is."
tbc
a/n
+ estimated time of next update: two to four weeks.
+ thank you for reading, and for your patience with my slow-ass updates. I really appreciate it. thank you.