CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Behind the Norm

When Matsuda walked into the main foyer, he saw several things at once:

Light, looking somehow tidy, professional and comfortable all at once as he laboured over several sheets of paper.

Ryuzaki, who was staring up at the ceiling and dropping cherries into his mouth, chewing them thoughtfully.

And Emiko, in a cocoon of blankets, doing nothing.

And these were the so called geniuses of the case – all years younger than him. Ryuzaki noticed him first, his black eyes sliding towards the Task Force Member. "Well good morning, Matsuda," he greeted pleasantly yet somehow there was a tone of insincerity beneath it. The strange thing about Ryuzaki, Matsuda realized, is that as condescending as he may be…there will always be that urge to impress him, to be recognized by such a renowned detective – or rather three.

"H-Hey Ryuzaki," he couldn't help but stutter, "any progress?"

Light was too deep into the work to notice that he had spoken but Emiko peeked out from beneath her barricade of blankets. "Nope. I did, however, found out that the currency in Zimbabwe had dropped –"

"Emi," Ryuzaki stopped her, his voice in a warning, "focus."

Instead of looking scolded as Matsuda would have if Ryuzaki were to look at him with his black eyes like that, Emiko snorted. "Right, you're telling me to focus when for the past half hour, you've done nothing but work on your twisted stem collection."

"Better than reading about the Sub-Saharan economic status –"

"Oh, please, at least mine has to do with humans! Unlike you, you man-child person doing what are supposedly sexually-teasing activ –"

Ryuzaki. Sexually teasing? What had Matsuda walk into?

"Man child? I'm hearing this from a girl who doesn't even know how to drive–"

"Because driving is more superior than to piloting a helicopter. Anyway, at least I can do laundry-"

"No, you're a liar. Watari does it for you."

"Liar?! Look who's talking Mister Five Percent!"

They were arguing. Ryuzaki and Emiko were arguing. It had literally broken out of nowhere. Matsuda wondered if this was real, or if he was still asleep. The two dark-haired foreigners were in each others' faces, eyes wide and spitting out things nonstop. How things have escalated to this point, he could not remember.

"…at least I don't have bags worse than the Pope!"

"You're just saying that because he gave me an honorary mention –"

"Shocker! Ryuzaki only has his awards to back him up!"

"As opposed to what, per se?"

"Hm, I don't know, maybe human gratitude –"

"You got one hug and that was three years ago –"

"Don't bother hiding your envy, Ryuzaki, I saw your face –"

" – well then please explain further since I was in Russia –"

"Oh right! That's when that hitman guy almost got to you! Look at that. Emiko gets a hug and Ryuzaki gets almost murdered. I wonder what that –"

And then suddenly they were shouting in English and the Matsuda just gave up on understanding the two. Light's fist tightened around his paper and his eyes were shut, a vein pulsing at his forehead until finally he had enough. "Stop it!" He shoved the two apart, "both of you! You're acting like children!" They had been close enough to kiss with all the shouting and he had to kick Emiko's wheeled chair since it didn't look like she would let go of Ryuzaki's shirt but the dark haired man who looked not at all disturbed.

It was as if nothing had happened.

"Why'd you that, Light?" he asked curiously, his face betraying no hint of anger or even annoyance. Strangely enough, Emiko reflected the exact same confusion. Matsuda blinked. What the hell had just happened in front of him?

"I don't want you two ripping out each other's throat." Light continued, glowering, his amber eyes intense. "I know that we're all stressed here but that doesn't give the excuse for you two argue like that."

"Argue?" he repeated as if he wasn't aware that he was shouting only moments ago. He leaned over Light to look at Elaine, who looked just as bewildered by the assumption. They shared a glance and shrugged before looking back at Light. "Why would we do that?" she asked. Light stopped, dumbfounded.

"Maybe you're the one stressed out, Light," Ryuzaki shrugged as he spun around and threw a cherry into his mouth. Elaine spun in her chair before pushing against it with her weight to slide back to the computers. "Maybe you should take a break," she added hesitantly, looking genuinely concerned.

Light looked between the two at them, and then at Matsuda and then his father wondering if he really was going crazy. But Matsuda was still staring, and that single phrase repeated in his mind for the fourth time since he walked in less than three minutes ago.

What the hell?

xxx-xx-xxx

"Hey - guys!" Elaine ran into Misa's room, grinning and then -

She was smacked onto the floor.

"Emiko!"

She struggled to breathe for a moment as she felt someone else smash into her. Again. And then she couldn't breathe at all, groaning as she forced herself to look and all she saw was two men hovered over her, shouting out her name but for heaven's sake she wished they would just be quiet. As if it wasn't enough for her to get knocked out. Everything happened too fast but she vaguely remembered Light slamming into her first, the chain around his wrist whipping around and there came L and then they were both rolling off her as if she was a part of the floor.

"I'm fine, I'm fine!" she exclaimed, hand on her chest. She was winded, but fine as she tried to back off from the two wide eyed men. Their individual weights alone would have been tolerable but with the force included, she was...hurt. The pain was pounding but tolerable. She found Light's hand first, not looking as he pulled her up.

"Why didn't you look at where you were going?!" L said, annoyed, at Light, grabbing him by his collar. "You could have killed her -"

"Me? You were the one that kicked me all the way across the room!"

"Shut up, both of you!" She sighed. "I just..." Instinctively, she let go of Light's hand and looked at L instead, and something about that movement was very clear to Light. Her pale eyes peered into L's dark ones with a pleaded look. "I remember something and I have to talk to you – the both of you soon, okay?"

"Do you need medical attention first?" Light asked, stepping in and Misa couldn't help but pout at the attention on this girl, despite the fact that she, only seconds ago, had been tackled down. She glanced back at him and shook her head, hoping that the minor injury won't stop her flow of thought. At last, she remembered what was so important: she found something.

"No, no I'm fine really. It's just," she shook her head, "Please? Just come soon – before I forget."

"Hey, what about the date!" Misa was complaining, but the three of them were already leaving, slamming the door behind them.

xxx-xx-xxx

"And then I recognized some of these names as CEO and compiled a list of all the recent deaths. Making a graph of their company's grossing, they all were noticeably drop with one exception – the Yotsuba group so -"

"- so you're a genius," L sighed.

"This is amazing," Light said, barely containing his laughter of disbelief. "How did you even see this?"

She looked at L triumphly. "Well, I was looking at the Sub-Saharan market and then switched over to Japan." She grinned and he rolled her eyes but there was without a doubt, a proud look on his face. "And then I just...saw it." She shrugged, genuinely modest. She still didn't quite know how her mind worked yet – her eyes just saw relationships and every time she had a nagging feeling that maybe this person did this because it was this date, it usually turned out to be true. That knack was what made her a good detective, but it was nothing reliable such as L's intelligence. She had to wait for it to appear, and now that it did – she felt like a weight was lifted off her shoulders.

"So now," L said, "we plan our next move."

Didn't plan on such quick updates, but I reached 50 alerts/40 fav and since I have mini-goals like that...here it is! A bit shorter than usual, but we're getting closer to the dreaded moment!

:(

Anyways, reviews would be lovely and motivating :) Whether it's a "yes" "no" or "5/10" honestly...your thoughts mean a lot! Thanks for reading!