A/N: This has to be the chapter that gave me the most trouble in all. I got stuck on this in June of last year (or at least I think it was June) because I wanted to completely rewrite it into something else, something clever and not just a chapter repeat. Then I said screw it, several months later, made some changes, shorted the main scene and added another scene, and there you go!
So, yes, this is a little bland because of how much it hugs the episode.
On the bright side, I did some creative things with words and a scene with a Shinigami, so it's all good.
- DW
Chapter Seven - Unmasked
Face to face,
They are identical.
Back to back,
They are complete opposites.
Exactly the same,
But very different.
I am met by the stares of six people. Five of them are wearing very formal looking suits. I assume those are the people from the Task Force. Are these the only ones that are willing to risk it all to catch Kira? Apparently so … what a shame. I look at each of their names one by one: Soichiro Yagami, Tota Matsuda, Shuichi Aizawa, Kanzo Mogi, and Hirokazu Ukita.
The last man surprises me, but at the same time doesn't. He seems to be the second youngest, next to the one named Matsuda – in fact he only seems a few years older than me. He is staring straight at me, and is the only one that hasn't made a noise. He is sitting on his feet in a crouch-like stance, his knees up to his chest. His clothes are simple and casual – a white long-sleeved shirt and a baggy pair of faded jeans that he wears over his thin frame. His hair is a mess of black locks that look like they've never been brushed.
What really stands out is his face. He is staring at me with black, seemingly dead eyes. I know those eyes; I have eyes like those. Under them are black circles, but are much darker than the ones I now have. He looks like he's never slept a day in his life. He looks rather surprised; his round eyes are wider than I thought they could go.
"Good evening gentlemen," I say, trying to hold back a smile. I tear my gaze from the person who is obviously L and look over the people from the Task Force.
"Excuse me, but are you the person known as Red?" Mr. Yagami asks me.
"I am. Forgive me if I haven't exactly lived up to your expectations."
"You look like you're still in high school though!" the young one, Matsuda, blurts out. I stare at him through annoyed eyes.
"That's because I am in high school. This happens to be my last year."
"Oh …" Matsuda looks embarrassed as the other Task Force members glare at him. I walk over and take a seat on the couch next to the guy with the afro, not really caring about opinions.
"Well, do your parents know where you are?" The man with next to me, Aizawa, asks.
"They're dead," I state morbidly, and the people there (besides L) shift uncomfortably, "And it's not the business of my current legal guardians." The Task Force looks unsure whether or not that I am credible to be working with them, or if I can fully devote myself to the cause. I expected this, but it still hurts. L takes this moment to make a short statement.
"Red has proven to be an efficient detective. Her deductive reasoning skills are quite remarkable," he says, getting over the initial shock and focusing on the tea pot in front of him.
An incredibly awkward silence fills the room as L pours himself some tea, and then proceeds to put a large amount of sugar cubes in said tea. That's odd; does the tea really taste that bad?
Matsuda is the one to break this new silence, the brave kid. I can already tell that I'll like him, even if he's a bit slow. "Excuse me, L-"
"From now on, I'll have to ask you to stop calling me L. It's Ryuzaki now, just to be safe." Alias after alias, this man is wrapped up in a little bubble of secrecy and deceit, isn't he?
"Uh, okay, Ryuzaki," Matsuda murmurs. The other Task Force members seem off-balance in the presence of this person. I actually find it refreshing! For L to not be a stuck up man in a business suit, to really be a young adult that doesn't put much effort in making himself presentable actually makes me feel relaxed. I don't feel so out of place. I came here in clothes that I wear on a daily basis after all. "If we know that he needs a name and a face to kill, couldn't we cut down on the number of victims by keeping criminals names from the news?"
I see. I only got here a couple minutes after the Task Force then. I wasn't the only one late after all! They must have had the start of a conversation beforehand, but I am annoyed by Matsuda's comment. Of course it's the most obvious solution to the base level problem, but the possibilities branch off from there. Personally I think Kira would do something rash and destructive.
"If we do that, we are only putting the general public at risk," L replies calmly.
"The general public?" Ukita asks. The Task Force seems to be led on, tugged on a string. No doubt these are the mindless henchmen that will do as they're told.
"Why?" Aizawa adds.
L stops stirring his tea, and finally looks up at the rest of us, "Kira is childish, and he hates losing."
"But how do you-"
"Just what do you mean?" Mr. Yagami asks for his confused assistant.
"Well, I am also childish and hate to lose. That's how I know."
I nearly lose my composure and burst out laughing.
"Ryuzaki, would you mind being a little more specific for us?" Mr. Yagami deadpans, not really impressed. I decide that it's my turn to speak up.
"Look what happened when he provoked Kira with that broadcast," I say, and everybody's gazes fix on me. "Kira took it upon himself to kill Ryuzaki's stand in. Afterwards all his victims came from within Japan. He was taunting us."
The conversation continues, to where they come to the conclusion that they can create an obvious bluff. Announce that they're bringing in many, many investigators to sweat Kira out. The Task Force seems really impressed, but I find myself frowning. Only an idiot would fall for that, and this Kira is no idiot. They all seem to think that this will actually work.
"So he'll think that there are fifteen-hundred, then there really only eight of us." Aizawa is grinning like an idiot. I get the urge to shave his afro. "And since none of these investigators exist, Kira won't be able to kill them."
"It just might work!" Ukita adds.
"I doubt it," my voice isn't very loud, but everybody immediately shuts up. "You would have to be pretty dull to fall for something like that."
"But it's worth a shot," Aizawa argues.
"We'll find out whether Kira is an idiot or not," I growl.
"Before we jump to any conclusions, I'll tell you the rest of my thoughts on the Kira case," L breaks up the soon-to-be-fight. All the attention is taken from me and is focused once again at the odd detective. They all nod, giving him their undivided attention.
"Kira works alone," a Death Note can only have one owner after all, "He had access to all of our classified information."
"Well, it's not actually that hard to do that," I say, almost laughing.
"Oh?" Mr. Yagami raises an eyebrow.
"I got the information, didn't I?"
"What evidence do you have that he's working alone?" Aizawa asks, ignoring me.
"We know that he needs a name and a face to kill. And to some extent he can control the victim's time of death, and their actions before dying. We already know that much, please keep that in mind" the detective reaches forward and picks up a small black sharpie pen that was on the table, "and listen carefully to what I have to say next."
L quickly outlines important dates and events by scribbling on the hotel table with a permanent marker. This is already information we know. On the 27th of December, as we are very familiar with, all the investigators died, with the addition of many more scapegoats – some actual pawns and others decoys. I voice that opinion. It sounds like Kira came into contact with the FBI, threatened, frightened and manipulated them. Along with those experiments, he obviously learned a few tips and tricks to help him with the slaughter. He's probably experimenting more than we know.
Kira also cut off his own timeline, but we can still narrow down the possibilities. It's amazing, watching all of this at work. L just sacrificed his Rook, to use a chess metaphor. Kira is now suspected to be one of the people investigated between the 14th and the 19th, which L outlines by drawing a big X over the two dates. I raise an eyebrow at all the doodles now on the hotel table. The Task Force is absolutely amazed. "These are files provided by the FBI, and they contain additional information you might find useful. For obvious reasons, you are not allowed to take them out of this room, but-"
"Amazing! There might only be six of us, but with this much information we should be able to cover a lot of ground," Matsuda exclaims. He seemed barely able to hold in his excitement. I find a small grin forming on my face.
"We'll split into two teams. One team traces the FBI agents, the other the heart attack victims," Aizawa suggests. It seems Matsuda's excitement is contagious.
"There weren't that many people who had access to information from headquarters, and of those, the FBI only investigated a small group in the first five days," the young man pointed out.
"Yeah."
"So, any questions?" L growls, evidently surprised by the Task Force's enthusiasm.
"Actually, Ryuzaki, I do have one question for you, and it pertains to what you said earlier about how you hate to lose. Does the fact that you've show us your face mean that you've lost? By just being here, are you admitting defeat to Kira?" Everyone pauses, and I find myself staring at the detective. He seems rather … sad. He looks back at the chief and replies steadily with more emotion than before.
"That's right. By showing my face to you now and by sacrificing the lives of twelve FBI agents, I have lost the battle." I don't know what it is, but I can actually sense a feeling of regret in his tone. Maybe it's because I can actually relate to this scruffy person. I've found myself thinking over the phone conversations that we come to a lot of the same conclusions. It's admirable how he can be so emotionally detached during this, when I was shaking with rage some of the time. "But I'm not going to lose the war." Shivers travel down my spine at the pure conviction in his voice. We are on the same page. We will do anything to catch Kira.
"This is the first time I've ever put my life on the line. I want to show Kira that we're all willing to risk our lives if that's what it takes, and that Justice will prevail no matter what." Then he gives a small smile, and something breaks within me. I actually manage to keep a straight face even if I want to just give into my emotions, give him a gigantic hug and scream out that we all agree. I'm sure K wouldn't hesitate to do that …
Wait, what? Something must be wrong with me …
"Hey yeah, that's right," Mogi says, speaking for the first time that night.
"I like the sound of that," Matsuda visibly relaxes.
"We can do this!" Ukita smiles.
"Alright, let's do this Ryuzaki … and Red of course," Aizawa says, and the others notice me again.
"As much as I like the thought of sticking Kira behind bars, we still have to catch him first," I say, but a smile still graces my lips.
"Before we go any further, I have to be absolutely sure that none of you are Kira. So I will need to speak with each of you individually before you leave today," Ryuzaki says.
"What's the deal, he still doesn't trust us?" Aizawa complains to the other Task Force members. Ryuzaki gets up from his seat, and makes his way to the large un-obstructed windows on the walls. His back is hunched as he walks.
"Relax, it's just a precaution. Think of this way, there is a possibility that one of us is in fact Kira. He just wants to be 100% sure," I say, and the others relax. Mr. Yagami nods in agreement.
"She's right. Working on this case has given us the opportunity to see him in person," Matsuda says.
"He's risking his life to be here," Aizawa says with concern, and everyone looks over to the detective. He has his back to us, and is staring out the window at the Tokyo skyline.
"Yeah, aren't we all," I sigh, crossing my arms over my chest.
"Red, can I ask you something?" Matsuda asks me directly. "How did you get on the case?"
"I had someone hack your system," eyes widen, "and this person found the laptop linking the system to L's computer. He tried to hack that to see if there was any confidential information on that, but we were found out."
"Well why did you hack us in the first place?" Aizawa gives me a stern glare, signaling his disapproval.
"I wanted to help on this case. I want to catch Kira. And as you can probably tell, you wouldn't exactly take me seriously if I walked up to headquarters and demanded to speak with you. I would simply be dismissed." I can tell that's true, because the Task Force diverts their eyes.
"You have your whole life ahead of you though, why throw it away on a case that doesn't involve you," Mr. Yagami asks me. I know he means well, but …
"You think it doesn't involve me? You have no idea how wrong you are. It is true that I could have just walked away, but I am not that sort of person. Besides, it's not like I have anything to lose."
It seems that I will need to prove myself before they fully trust me. I don't blame them after all. They feel almost insulted just by the fact that I'm a young teenage girl. It still pisses me off, but I can manage.
Vile watched, silent and unmoving in the darker corner of the room. It was fascinating. Humans were always great entertainment, with their petty concerns. But this was a change. This was … he couldn't describe it, but it got his shriveled heart pumping.
What a shame it would be when it ended.
It was on a grand scale, a global scale, something that had sparked in the recesses of human subconscious. Ryuk was a lucky bastard for getting the criminal, but Vile was happy that he had come long ago and followed this bloodline.
His human was going to make it worth his while. It was worth putting up with her pathetic family if he could watch all of this unfold with a front row seat.
Oh so very interesting.
This girl certainly is interesting. She does not seem intimidated by me. No, she is relaxed. No muscles are tense, breathing is normal. I believe this is the real Red. She didn't send a stand in. Although, I am curious to find out how she came into contact with a skilled hacker, and I wish to know who this other person on her team is.
This is the last interview. It's early in the morning, and many of the Task Force seem worn out from lack of sleep. I believe Matsuda and Red even fell asleep for a while on the couches. Red sits across from me on another chair, sipping on a cup of black coffee while wrapped in her jacket.
"Why are you staring at me?" she asks finally, a touch of annoyance in her voice. She stares right at me, undaunted by my gaze.
"I am simply observing," I reply.
"Observing me?" a raised eyebrow, "If I didn't know better I would have thought you were checking me out." I was not expecting that, I will admit. She smiles lightly at my lack of reaction. It seems somewhat forced.
Interesting. Very interesting.
"I'm also curious … you haven't been asking me questions. I thought the whole purpose for this private meeting was to reassure you that I am not Kira," Red says, staring at me all the while over the lip of her coffee mug.
"I do not think you are Kira," I state.
"Oh?"
"Although, having said that, it does not mean you are unsuspicious."
A laugh. She is laughing. "I figured you would say that. It's remarkable really."
"What is?"
"We are more alike than you think Ryuzaki," Her grin vanishes. She is deadly serious, and there is a glint in her dark eyes.
"How so?"
"Our minds are dangerously similar, in terms of thought process. We are different, but we are also very similar. It's uncanny, really."
"Is that all?"
"… Yes."
There is a short silence, as I ponder her words. Unconsciously, my thumb comes up to my mouth and I nibble on the nail. Red watches me with mild interest, and … amusement?
If so, it is slightly unnerving.