notes/warnings
+ I want to clear up something from my last chapter. the 'Mary' that Grianna referred to was Mary Kenwood, ie Wedy (her real name is listed as either Mary or Merrie in canon). nothing definitive has been stated about Grianna's othe child yet. hope that helps clear things up. :)
+ warnings for character contemplating suicide
Offer
L takes the notebook from under his shirt and sets it on the desk. He hardly notices it any more, most of the time. It has become a part of him, like his shirt, like the lock of hair that grazes the back of his neck. He will miss it when it is gone.
L stares at the notebook for a good hour, deep in thought. Rae floats into the room and settles down beside him. These days, Rae is constantly watching him, constantly following him, constantly two-and-a-half steps behind him. L is concerned by just how desperately he wants Rae to always be around.
Will we really still be together when you are king?
Will we even be friends?
You seem to care about me now, but will you care about anything, once you get what you want?
On some levels, L supposes, he still doesn't quite believe the things Rae says.
"Hello," he says, out loud.
"Mail's gotten to work on the bathroom," Rae says, leaning against him casually. "Raye bought him a new set of markers."
"Oh," L says, touching his thumb to his lower lip. "I see. That's okay, though."
"Are you going to use the notebook?" Rae asks.
"I was considering it," L says. He would never have admitted to such a thing a year ago. He would have been unlikely to admit to such a thing a month ago. But Rae has slowly and steadily become his confidante, and it already knows plenty of his weaknesses to exploit if it chooses to do so.
But it doesn't choose to do so.
"And you've decided not to?"
L pushes his chair away from the desk, and Rae moves with him easily, like they've been together for decades.
"I can't," he says, simply.
He would die for Rae, but he cannot kill for Rae. He cannot set foot down that slippery slope.
"Light," he begins, and then swallows against the ugly name before continuing, "Light Yagami, who was born to good parents and an ancestry of decent people, became a ruthless killer once he used the notebook. I have the blood of a murderer in my veins. Imagine what I would become."
"You'd become you, but with a notebook," Rae says, shrugging.
"You don't understand," L says, sadly.
"No, you don't understand," Rae says, cheerfully. "But you'll figure it out, soon enough."
"What will you do?" Mail asks, rubbing aimlessly at one of the ink stains on his arm. "What will you do if you see Naomi again?"
"I don't know," Raye replies. It's a difficult question. Sometimes he feels like it's not so much Naomi, as the absence of the absence of Naomi. She was always going to be a constant in his life. "Breathe again, I guess."
"Fair enough," Mail says, and looks away. Raye wonders, suddenly, awkwardly, if Mail is trying to live vicariously through him, in some small way.
I'm so sorry, my friend.
I'm sorry you don't have any hope at all.
Raye goes over to sit beside Mail, tugging at his new long-sleeved undershirt. It's really too warm to wear such a garment inside, but every time Raye catches a glimpse of his bare forearms, he gets the urge to draw on them. Something to do with skulls.
Fucking Shinigami. Now he has skulls on the goddamned brain.
"Maybe get her to cut your hair," he continues, just to fill the silence. "It's a mess."
He smiles, and Mail smiles weakly back, looking like he might shatter at any moment.
Sometimes, Raye wonders if they've got it all wrong, and maybe this world is hell, too.
The first time you see her, you haven't slept in what feels like days. You're confined to a bathroom-sized, rounded room, with nothing to distract you from your thoughts except a smooth bed. The food is inedible, and you are starving. The nurses keep shouting at you and telling you to go to sleep. The doctors are discussing invasive surgery and electric shock therapy. They've taken your phone from you.
You are alone, and you are slowly going mad. You see teeth and death and lurking horrors out of the corners of your eyes. Nobody will show you any kindness. Nobody will even have a conversation with you.
It is midnight, and the shadows on the wall don't seem to come from anywhere. You sit on your bed, knees around your ears, rocking slowly and wishing you were strong enough to get better or kill yourself.
You close your eyes for just a moment, and you see her. It's the first proper hallucination you've had since you arrived here, and you wait in terror for her face to split apart, for the claws to appear. She looks like a proper angel, all shades of white and beautiful with feathered wings and long hair. And real angels don't come to people like you.
Real angels don't even exist, what are you talking about? You are completely stupid. You've lost the fucking plot. If Near knew about this, he would fucking laugh. And Near isn't even capable of laughing. You're pretty sure the corners of his mouth are permanently fixed in neutral.
"You need to rest," says the angel, with a voice like bells and honey. "It's been a long day."
And for a single second, you feel at peace.
Then she disappears.
L goes to Watari, to collect some weird sort of watch device. He already has quite a functional, resilient and expensive watch, so Rae watches him intently to try and deduce what this new device is for.
The man is like a cute little puzzle. The more Rae can figure out, the more power it has. The more power it has, the more it can control L and make sure they are always together. And the more they are together, the more Rae can figure out.
It's an extremely rewarding cycle. Rae can't believe it didn't think of this earlier.
Nothing bad can ever happen to you.
The underside of the watch band is made of a weird sort of fibre that Rae hasn't seen before, with a slot to insert something like a very thin business card. L shuffles down the hallway, humming tunelessly under his breath, dangling the watch from his fingertips. When he arrives in his office, he locks the door and takes out the death note.
Then he opens the death note, and tears a thin strip from one of the middle pages. Finally, he inserts the strip into the watch band.
"The material is constructed to keep the note paper safe and undamaged," L says, without looking around, utterly certain that Rae is right with him and listening, "while still keeping a small part of it against my skin. As long as I wear this, I'll be able to see you, even after the five years are over and you've taken the original notebook back."
Rae almost bursts out laughing. L is positively cute.
Why didn't I ever see this before?
"Good idea," Rae replies, indulgently. "You won't need it, though. I'll make sure you can always see me."
The king has those sorts of powers, Rae is sure. L smiles warmly before turning to his computer. And sometimes, especially recently, Rae feels almost bad about lying to L about the way the death note works. Especially now that things are so certain. It hardly needed to invent clairvoyant powers at all.
The truth is, as long as L is reasonably certain that the condition will bring about a death, the condition for being king will be met.
This whole test, after all, is about proving that Rae's will is stronger that L's. But that's just the thing. L will be upset if he finds out Rae lied, and it's too early to take risks. L has already come at such a price. The fact that Rae is even willing to accept someone who still disagrees with Kira is almost blasphemy.
After all, it's not as if Rae has changed its mind.
Has it?
A brunette, today. Ross is getting particularly antsy. A brunette with mid-brown hair, the colour of milk chocolate. He likes to set himself specific criteria as a challenge. Sometimes it's hard to find a person who fits the bill, but the rush is always worth the wait.
A little girl passes, staring past him, clutching her bag tightly. She has mousey brown hair. Not right. Ross lets her go.
The sun is still shining. It's a beautiful day.
The sun is shining today. One of the nurses said so. You don't know, because you can't see the sun.
You get food at midday. And by midday you mean 'sometime between dawn and dusk'. And by food you mean 'fucking vegetables'. You don't eat them. Which is probably part of the doctor's plan, since he keeps telling you how you'll feel better if you just lose some weight.
His name is Doctor Jay. He has a hooked nose and a disapproving stare. You have to see him three times a day, and he always shouts at you and calls you a failure.
When you tried to sleep earlier today, you could swear that the ceiling was grinning at you. Jay says that if you don't start improving by this morning, they're going to keep you here permanently for a minimum of two years.
There's an edge of panic under everything you do. You feel like you've only got a little bit of time left before things start going horribly wrong. You're so terrified of being stuck in this place, abandoned and forgotten. You feel like the madness is worse here, away from anyone who could possibly make you feel better. You'd give both of your legs just to see Dwayne again, and you don't even like Dwayne.
This is hell. This must be what hell is like. You deserve it.
You lie on your bed because there's nothing else to do. Only as soon as you are horizontal, the hallucination comes back.
Not one of the bad hallucinations. The angel.
"I'm going to do you a favour," she says, smiling. "I'm going to give you a proper sleep this time, okay?"
"Okay," you say quietly, momentarily amazed, in spite of yourself.
How is this even happening? Nothing good ever happens to you.
You drift off slowly, with her hand on your shoulder, and sleep soundly for the rest of the night.
"It's not much use starting a new case," L says, thoughtfully. "We have two days left."
"Yes," Rae says, placing one hand on L's head. "Are you worried, Miss Marple?"
L chews on his lower lip.
"I'm not entirely calm," he admits. "What will happen when the time is up?"
"I'll have to go to a church in the middle of the city," Rae says, shrugging.
L frowns.
"That sounds odd."
"That's the way it is," Rae says, unconcerned. "That's where the king will be waiting for me, at exactly eight o'clock in the morning. It's customary, apparently."
L really wishes that Rae would be a little more critical of its circumstances. He feels helpless. There's nothing he can do, and even if he could, there isn't enough time in which to do it. Whatever is going to happen to Rae will happen.
It's terrible to feel helpless about someone you love.
He's felt this way before, too. Panicked. Desperately trying to make someone else do the one thing he thinks might save them.
Like pathetically trying to force an eight year old boy to remember a foot-thick textbook, in the vain hope that one day he might have revenge against a woman already destined for the electric chair.
L still can't remember that boy's name. The boy his mother destroyed, made fatherless, for the temerity of being brighter than L.
"Oy," Rae says, poking him gently under the ribs. "You're zoning out. Don't tell me you're finally going into a sugar coma."
L smiles back weakly, and takes Rae's hand.
When will he learn that he can't save anyone?
They sit on the roof that evening, just the two of them. Finishing each other's sentences and laughing in unison.
"Maybe we should start another case tomorrow," Rae says, thoughtfully. "To give us something to focus on."
"To take our minds off of the next day, you mean," L says, keenly. "You are worried, my friend."
"I'm not worried," Rae says, honestly. It's a little on edge, maybe. Finally getting what it wants after all this time.
Will I actually be happy?
Rae scrubs that thought immediately from its brain, disgusted with itself. Of course it will be happy. Everything will be fine. Everything must be fine.
"What do you know of Misa Amane?" L asks quietly, clearly unaware of Rae's thought processes.
"That's kind of a random question," Rae says.
L shrugs.
"I admit I haven't thought much about her," L says. "But she was a significant ally of Light's, and she is possibly still in hell. So she could theoretically show up in this world at any time, like Kiyomi Takada did. And I remember that she was fairly resourceful in the Kira case. She could be a danger to me if she did come here."
"Resourceful? You think Misa had brains?" Rae asks, disbelievingly.
Whoops.
But seriously, who gives a fuck about Misa Amane?
"I think I should be careful," L says. "Especially when you are not around."
"I'll be around."
"Ah," L says, and Rae wishes it could make him believe.
Oh well. It will be able to make him believe soon enough. When it is king and they are together and everything is great.
"It's an odd thing, too," L muses. "I have seen photographs of both Misa's parents, and neither of them look much like her. I wonder if she was adopted."
"I wonder why you ask such stupid questions," Rae says. "Who cares? Besides, if you're thinking of adoption, you should be thinking about your 'son'."
"Don't make air quotes when you're talking about my son."
"You're not even a decade older than him. I'll use air quotes."
"Fine," L groans, rubbing his good eye. "What about him?"
"I dunno," Rae says, stretching its legs out in front of it. "When are you going to tell him about the redemption thing?"
"Never," L replies, promptly. "If I gave him hope, only to have it taken from him again later, that would utterly destroy him."
"But Mail refuses to ever die here. Even if Mello gets out of hell, they'll never be together."
"I know," L says, sadly. "But there's nothing I can do about that."
"Fair enough," Rae says, trying to sound empathetic. Like Rae knows what it's like to cobble together some weird-ass family of various crazies in lieu of actually having friends.
I'm your friend now, L.
Fuck that, though. Rae is more than L's friend. Friend doesn't have nearly enough bite to it. Owner is much better, although not exactly socially acceptable.
They stay up on the roof for a long time, until L starts nodding off and Rae has to carry him to bed.
"Two years," Jay proclaims. "No family. No friends. No visits. Nothing, until you get better."
You fall to the floor and scream and scream and scream. You're not angry. You're not violent. You are frightened and all you want is to go home.
The nurses start zapping you with cattle prods to make you shut up. People are shouting at you. Everything is grey. Everything is cold. The pain from your hand is driving you mad. It's only a matter of time before the world falls apart and all you want is to go home, to be anywhere other than here.
You don't think you've been here that long, but you aren't sure. You've already forgotten what the sky looks like, and you wonder why you ever thought there were cracks in it.
This world is definitely real. The worst, realest place ever. You don't want to go on living.
Nobody comes to make things better. Even the angel has abandoned you.
You are so scared, and you miss her.
L doesn't need Mail's company like he used to, but he still wants to take care of his almost-nearly-son.
Mail beats him easily, with three kicks and an uppercut while L is still blocking the second kick. L falls back with an inelegant, surprised noise. Mail eyes him skeptically.
"You're out of practice," he pronounces in his usual monotone.
"Yes," L agrees. He's been too preoccupied with the hell-god and saving Rae. He needs to get back in shape once all of this is over.
Mail shrugs and takes a marker from the pocket of his coat. It's an expensive marker with opaque white ink. Perfect for the solid concrete, navy walls of the gymnasium. Mail Jeevas is very creative in his grief. Still, it will probably take him the rest of the day and half the night to fill the entire room.
L watches for a little while, hands shoved deeply into his pockets.
"You haven't gotten any better at all," he comments. "Not since the day I found you at the library."
"Nope," Mail agrees, a note of pride in his voice. "Never. Never better."
Never better. That phrase has two distinct, utterly opposite meanings. Mail will never be better.
And there isn't a damn thing that L can do for him. Not even if he-.
Oh.
Fuck.
Raye Penber sits in his office, working on the next version of his signature. He and Naomi used to change their signatures together every eighteen months or so. Another one of her brilliant ideas that Raye always took for granted.
Raye increases the slant of his handwriting slightly, and alters the curve of the 'e's. As a finishing touch, he incorporates a little skull and crossbones at the end of the capital 'R'. No reason, he just likes it there.
It helps him to remember things, he thinks.
RememberGraceBackstrumrememb erHolland.
The thought is fleeting and odd, garbled and invasive, and Raye brushes it aside like nothing at all.
It is nearly midnight. Jas hums to herself, truly happy for perhaps the first time in her life. She twirls the locket around her fingers, like a strand of hair.
In a few minutes. Just a few more minutes.
You walk around your room, over and over again, exasperated at the repetition. Sometimes you walk right over the top of the bed, like a kid at an obstacle course.
Except that you can hardly remember when you were a kid. Except for the bits with Matt, of course. Those you remember in vivid detail. He was always the only good thing in your life.
Where did all that go so wrong?
You deliberately stub your toe against the wall, over and over again, because it dulls the pain in your hand and your aching head. You don't even know why you're trying to survive. You stole a razor blade from the staff bathroom at lunchtime. It sits heavy in your pocket, your only friend. Eventually exhaustion stops you. You collapse on the floor in the middle of the room, defeated and panting. A spider scurries halfway across the ceiling and then disappears. You are starting to hallucinate. It won't be long.
You run your index finger along the sharp side of the blade. It cuts satisfyingly deeply. It would do the job, if you wanted to use it.
But you can't.
This is your hell, forever. You will never leave. It will never be over.
"Hi."
You sit up, suddenly, braced for an onslaught from some imaginary new foe. But it isn't a monster. It's her. It's the angel. Sitting right next to you, wings taking up half the room, smiling kindly. She touches your arm and her hand is warm.
"You," you say, croakily. You want her to stay forever. You want to shove your face against her shoulder and sob. You want to be fucking comforted. You want to escape from the hellhole that is the inside of your own head, if only for a moment.
"Me," she says, laughing gently. She has different coloured eyes, one blue and one green. She rubs your wrist, and the pain in your hand disappears, miraculously, and you can suddenly think straight.
The urge to hug her definitely isn't going away. You restrain yourself, though. You're good at that.
"You look like someone I know," you tell her, stupidly. What are you supposed to fucking say to a benevolent hallucination, anyway?
"Yes," she says. "You will find that particularly good-hearted people often resemble angels in some way."
"Makes sense," you say. You don't even have the energy to snort derisively.
No, actually, you do have the energy. You feel better. Well-rested and well-fed and pain-free. You feel like you are actually okay.
You are going to start fucking crying all over the place.
"My name is Hope," she says gently. "There are two things you need to know about me, Mihael. The first is that I am real."
All your hallucinations say they are real. And yet, you believe her. It is as if somewhere deep inside you, you always knew that angels existed.
Maybe you read it years ago in one of your books. You don't remember. But you believe.
"And the second thing is that I have been watching you for quite some time."
"Stay with me then," you blurt out. The outline of Hope's body is translucent and insubstantial, like she might disappear at any moment, and you are afraid if losing her. "If…if you're my guardian angel or whatever, then just stay here."
If Near were in the room right now, he'd be thrilled to hear you having this conversation. He's been looking for a reason to have you certified insane for years.
Oh wait, you already are certified insane. Never mind, then.
"I can't stay for long," she says, brushing the hair out of your face, carefully not touching your scar. You hate people touching your scar. You hate people reminding you that half your face is irrevocably fucked up.
"Figures," you say. Everyone leaves you. You will never be okay.
The angel bites her lip.
"Listen," she says. "I don't have much time. Angels can't survive for very long in this world, we're like fish out of water. But I wanted to see you. I've been watching you for so long and I hate how much you're suffering."
"Me too," you say. "I'm pretty sure my life can't get much fucking worse. Not unless tiger sharks start getting involved."
She laughs again, like you're actually funny. Like she likes your company. Like nobody has in years and years and years until you forgot you actually had a sense of humour.
"Why me?" you ask, abruptly. "Why have you been watching me? I'm the most useless fucking person on Earth. Why would someone like you watch someone like me?"
"I like you."
"What?" you say, certain you've misheard. "I think you have me mixed up with someone else."
Hope smiles.
"Angels aren't the same as humans. We value different things. We are drawn to love the way humans are drawn to competence and success."
You duck your head but you don't withdraw your arm.
"You can read my mind, huh?"
"A little."
You shake your head. This all seems impossible. Incredible. A pleasant, wishful dream and nothing more.
"So, can you help me?" you ask. "Can you heal my hand, or my mind, or something?"
"Only while I'm here," Hope replies, sadly. "I'm afraid my powers are limited here. The only thing I can do is…well, I could take you with me."
"You could what?"
Hope fidgets with her hair.
"I could take you back to my own dimension," she says. "My job, as an angel, is to take care of the dead. You could leave this place, and come with me. Then I could take away your pain permanently. I could give you anything you wanted. You wouldn't have to deal with Dwayne or Near or any of the other humans who have hurt you."
You stare at her.
"You can do that?" you ask. "You actually live somewhere where Near doesn't have any influence?"
It seems impossible. Near and L are practically gods now.
"I live in another dimension," Hope explains. "Near has no power there. I can change many things. I live in a good place. You could make friends and be happy. You could start again. I could make you beautiful."
You can feel your mind going into overload. You could be…the way you used to be? You could start again? You could have everything you've ever fucking wanted?
"This is a one-time offer" the angel says. "I won't be able to come back here for quite some time. This world is a horrible, awful place. If you say yes, you will be with me forever. You will never suffer this world again. You will feel as you do right now, only a thousand times better."
You feel more amazing than you ever remember feeling. You feel better than okay. And because of that, you can suddenly recognize just how terrible your life has been. How much this world is wearing you out.
You are so tired, and you want to sleep.
"You can sleep if you come with me," Hope answers, effortlessly reading your mind. "So, Mihael, what do you say?"
tbc
a/n
+ I notice quite a few of you were disappointed with the last chapter. sorry guys, sometimes not a lot happens in 5000 words I guess. hopefully the next few chapters will be a bit more exciting.
+ thank you as always for reading. I really appreciate it.