Of course this isn't something you don't know.
You've known it ever since you sat in that car in the wake of the mock execution; sweat cooling on your skin and your heart a terrible, fast percussion. You had looked up toward the mirror at the front of the car, the mirror with a small camera hidden above it, as L's words had crackled to life as tinny and absolute as he had been during your confinement.
He's not going to let you go. He picked you out of a list of suspects, created the Kira profile around you, pursued you from school to confinement and afterwards. Still, it's not something either of you have said before. This is it.
This is your future.
You close the lid with a heavy clang, press the button, and the washing machine judders to life. Ryuzaki screws the cap back on the soap and puts it back on the shelf. He's sitting on top of the dryer, swinging his feet until his heels bang against the metal. It's Sunday. September 5th.
You lean back against the washer and say, apropos of nothing, "what if it's what I want?"
"Is it?"
"Do you even know what I'm talking about?"
"Well, I assume you're talking about the conversation we had about Kira," Ryuzaki says. "You've had a thinking look about you ever since, so I'm not surprised."
"So…? What if it's what I want?"
"What if it is?"
"Wouldn't that make a difference?"
Ryuzaki shrugs. "Light-kun, it's not what you want."
"Don't tell me what I'm supposed to think, Ryuzaki, it's rude."
"I'm only extrapolating based on what I know about you."
"You don't know everything about me."
"All right," Ryuzaki says. "Tell me it's what you want."
You glance over at him, catch, for a moment, the dark reflective surface of his eyes.
"There we go then," Ryuzaki says.
"Ryuzaki—"
"Light-kun."
What Ryuzaki calls being a liar you call being socially adept. There's no way to get anywhere in life without the ability to smile and say a downright falsehood if that's what the other person wants to hear. Society is made up of all the things people choose not to say to one another in order to save face, to keep the peace, to make sure things run smoothly—and even after confinement, you hadn't lost that ability. Even when the mere thought of talking to the task force members had made you nearly nauseous. There is no world in which Yagami Light doesn't have his persona under control, carefully filtered to present only the best aspects.
Anywhere, even in Ryuzaki's multiverse.
I want this, you could say. I want this, I want this, I've never wanted anything but. And he wouldn't believe a word of it.
"I'm not talking about whether I want it or not," you say. "I'm asking whether it would make a difference."
"Everything makes a difference."
"A statistically significant difference."
"Probably not."
"After making such a big deal about motive, how can you say it's not statistically significant?"
"Because it isn't," Ryuzaki says. "Facts remain facts. Motives can give clues to facts, but they can't take the place of it. What I believe holds no power over the truth, that's the way the game works."
"Bullshit. Internalized biases are present in every situation. You've said yourself, Ryuzaki, it's not possible to be an objective observer in the world."
"Of course; but still you try, in order to solve crimes. You see, I didn't say 'this is how the world works' I said 'this is how the game works.'"
"And who makes the rules of this game?"
"Precedent."
"You take no accountability?"
"Mm. No."
You frown at his nonchalant tone. Then, after a second, you climb onto the washing machine and sit cross-legged, facing him.
"What are you doing?" he asks.
"Taking your perspective," you say.
"...Is this sarcasm?"
"It's a game. I made a rule."
"I see."
"So?"
"...So?"
"The definition of a prisoner is someone who's confined against his will."
"True," Ryuzaki says. "But the concept of will indicates desire and consent."
"It also indicates choice."
"Then, if you can't choose not to be confined, it must be against your will," Ryuzaki says. "There's no choice."
"There's the choice of whether to consent or whether not to."
"Splitting hairs, Light-kun. If there's no choice, then how convincing can it really be to say, 'but I chose this?'"
"Didn't I?" you say. "I offered to be locked up in the first place."
"In order to catch Kira."
"Yeah, okay."
"Then if, hypothetically, it were impossible to catch Kira—"
"I would have to choose again."
"As you were saying… nothing takes place in a vacuum, right, Light-kun? If a prisoner is given a 'choice' to remain a prisoner or die, what kind of choice is that?"
"A sucky one," you say. "But it's still a choice and I know you agree with me, Ryuzaki. If you were to say, 'you're a prisoner and you have to be, because of this handcuff,' you couldn't, and still respect my decision. That's just as bad as chaining me up in the first place."
"Good point," Ryuzaki says. "But, let me remind Light-kun that it was he who first brought up the prisoner terminology…"
"...In response to your suspect terminology!"
"...Which implies that he does, in fact, think of himself as a prisoner, regardless of the fact that he is trying to convince me otherwise."
"I know," you say. "I did, of course I did. Because I believe—I believed it. Because it fit with the framework that we'd set up. Because it made me feel vindicated. I'm sure you could go on and keep finding reasons. But if I say, 'from this moment on, I'm not a prisoner—'"
"Then what are you?"
"Someone who wants to catch Kira. —I know, we're putting that aside for now," you wave your hand. "Someone who wants to catch criminals, then. Someone who wants to work with you, who chose to ally with the greatest detective in the world."
"And this chain is very expensive jewelry?" Ryuzaki says drily.
You laugh, startled into spontaneity. "Yeah, we can go with that."
"And your aspirations to become a detective…?"
"Come on, that's not even hard. I'm already doing it. How many people my age can say that?"
"And university?"
You pause. After a moment, glancing down at your hands, you say, "if I'm not planning to get into the NPA or get a real job it's not like I need it. I mean, there's social prestige, yeah, but nothing that I can't get by working alongside the guy who controls the law."
"I don't control the law."
"Splitting hairs, Ryuzaki."
He nods. "True. But, Light-kun… there's a difference between social prestige, and social acceptance. Which one do you really want?"
"Both, but considering the second's not in the cards as long as I'm handcuffed to you, I'll take the former."
Ryuzaki looks at you for a long moment, and then spreads his hands in a well then gesture. "Congratulations, Light-kun. You're no longer a prisoner. Does it change anything?"
"I guess we'll just have to wait and see."
/
Yagami Light, then, is L's partner. He's a college dropout.
Your mother got you into the best nursery school, pre-school and kindergarten; you went to the most expensive cram school to take the most advanced courses and, occasionally, some of them were able to hold your interest. You took the national entrance exams and scored perfect marks, getting into Todai on a level that should have been yours alone—high above everyone around you; as though you were standing on one of the tallest buildings, overlooking the city below. The world has always been that kind of place for you: an expanse of infinite freedom, that you can share with nobody.
Your expanse has been eclipsed. You can't go anywhere alone; you can't leave this building and even if you could, you would probably have a panic attack over it. You can't carry on in your father's footsteps in the NPA, you can't get married and carry on the family line, you can't make one wrong move… but how is that different than what your entire life has been from start to finish? You've never had the luxury of wrong moves.
What you have, whether you want it or not, is Ryuzaki. Someone who will stand with you on the rooftop against the infinite sky, while you shake and take one long breath after another: three counts in. Seven out. You cling to the edge of a girder and stare into a cloudless day while your blood, like a river, washes through you. You close your eyes; feel the taste of iron on your lip, and struggle to keep your focus: three counts in. Seven out.
Ten minutes.
You go back inside and let the door hiss shut behind you, and when it does you sag, grabbing onto Ryuzaki's forearm with your nails digging into the skin. You rest your chin against his collarbone, while his wiry strength holds you up. Three breaths in, seven out.
You have never failed in anything you set your mind to. Neither will you fail in this.
Someday soon, Ryuzaki will believe you.
/
"I was born last night when you met me," Johnny tells Ballin. "That way, I'm no past and all future, see? And I like it that way." No past and all future, Gilda echoes.
It's the evening of the seventh, and you're staring up at the ceiling, unable to sleep and pretending, while to your side Ryuzaki has pulled up his computer and is scrolling, the faint flicker of colors casting themselves eerily over his hunched form. Not evening, you amend, glancing over at your watch—it's three o'clock A.M. Technically, they call that morning.
Some unremembered dream is knocking at the inside of your lungs and your eyes are scratchy, dragged down as though by weights. You shift a little on your pillow, closing your eyes, but there's nowhere to drift away from the thoughts raking their way through your skull. Did I really give it all up? they're saying.
Give what all up? There's nothing left to give. You already lost these things that comprise your past. You're just admitting it.
You feel ill. You've felt ill ever since you made that move, two days ago. In the middle of the night, it feels more real.
I've lost everything!
Your fingers grab the edge of your pillow. You push into the dull pressure of the handcuff against your wrist. Three breaths in. Seven breaths out. But not my life, you remind yourself. It's a paltry thing to cling to but you do. You cling to it with your shaking hands as though you could claw your way through ripped fingernails out of the darkness and the stale water.
Pragmatism. You can be anything you need to be to get the job done. Anything.
During the Occupation, the Superintendent-General of the Metropolitan Police Headquarters, along with the heads of the Tokyo Restaurant Association, met informally with representatives of nightclubs, bars, and brothels to talk about what could be done to protect the people. On August 23, 1945, they had a formal meeting to create what would come to be known as the Recreation and Amusement Association. It created comfort facilities to cater to U.S. troops in order to prevent incidents of rape. After all, when there is a ready outlet for desire that won't say no, why look further?
You blink. Time has slid away from you—it is three forty-five, and you're as tired as ever; only the faintest disoriented sense that you must have fallen asleep, though you remember nothing. The computer is back on the floor, rain noises playing from its speakers, and Ryuzaki is lying askew, face smushed into his pillow and snoring softly.
Did I really give it all up? The thoughts sear through your mind again, starting up a clamor. I'm over it, you remind yourself. Intellectually, you have no complaints about the tactics you've chosen. Why, then, have you found it so hard to sleep? It's not as though your mind tormenting you will change what you've decided.
(You can remember: walking home from school with Yamamoto and Minato, gossiping about how Emi had had sex with that jerk Sudou.
"Seriously, what does that guy have to recommend him anyway?" Minato complains.
"The muscles of an ox and the brains of a pea?" you joke.
"Man, to think about Emi-chan having the intellectual advantage over anyone," Yamamoto says.
"We all know why she really did it," Minato says. "She's checking off her tally on sleeping her way through the entire school."
"Ah, but it's good practice for her career path," Yamamoto adds sagely.)
You blink. It's four fourteen in the morning, and your head is aching savagely. Your dry mouth feels like it's made of cement and the chain is rattling softly, so you press your hands under your armpits to stop them from shaking. The combination of a sleepless night with the lack of caffeine is making you jittery, and you really want to strangle someone.
"Someone."
Okay, Ryuzaki.
Who is still asleep, blissfully, ignorantly asleep. For once. Maybe he, too, should suffer from wakefulness.
You turn to face him. Wrap your hand carefully around the chain, ready yourself to tug.
And then, you think, If I do that, I certainly won't fall asleep tonight.
Were you going to anyway?
You barely slept last night, either, or the one before. You feel like an explosion just waiting to go off. Having Ryuzaki within the blast radius will be immensely satisfying in the short term, but it could ruin everything.
'I want this,' you might say. 'Therefore, I'll torment you while you sleep!' No, it doesn't follow. You need to be able to look Ryuzaki in the eyes with calm composure, not dark bags under your eyes as bad as his and no inhibitions left to speak of. You've played this game perfectly so far, and to lose your footing now, when Ryuzaki didn't even make a move? Just because you can't come to terms with the fact that you dropped out of college? How lame are you?
Yes, lame and a failure! Your thoughts attack you, pointedly.
Shut up!
You're telling your own brain to shut up. You might as well tell Ryuzaki to stop crouching on things.
You've lied about anything and everything; it didn't affect you one bit. What is this?
It's not a lie.
It's the truth.
You've lost everything, and now… you've admitted it.
So what! you think, vehemently. It's not like I even wanted that. Being first in class, first in the nation, top of everything, it just happened. It was what I did, but now I do something else. Big deal.
They aren't going to look at you that way again.
As though you are perfect.
They're never going to look at you that way again.
They're going to look at you the way they look at Ryuzaki. 'What a freak… Yagami Light disappears from school and is never heard from again, like what is he, a hikikomori, hiding out in his room all day and avoiding the world?' 'No, there he is, standing with the barefoot guy who crawled out of a dumpster!' 'No way, that can't be him.' 'Yes, look at him!' 'I almost didn't recognize him… he didn't even keep his looks… and what's that, a chain? This isn't some perverted fetish thing, is it?' 'I heard he actually got legally adopted into Ryuzaki's family line, like, you know… they're "together"'…the torrent of self-pitying anger stops short as your brain chooses that moment to remind you that, seeing as Ryuzaki isn't Japanese, or at least (as he'd told you once) "more than a quarter, I think," (how the fuck could he not know? Didn't his parents ever talk to him? —Actually, that could explain a lot)—the point is, he'd probably move to the Netherlands and you'd have some sort of ridiculous Western-style wedding and you'd never be able to show your face to your family again and… and… you're really sleep-deprived, aren't you.
You're more likely to die before you're thirty than to end up unhappily married to Ryuzaki of all people.
This is stupid, you think. So I'm 'not a prisoner anymore.' That doesn't mean anything's different. It just means we're changing the rules of the game. Which I asked for, myself. This is a win. Sometime soon, Ryuzaki will start to believe me and then…
And then?
He's Kira.
He won't let you go. You know this. If by some miracle he decides to let the Third Kira take the fall instead of you, you doubt he'll just turn around and say, 'okay Light-kun, you're allowed to change your mind now.'
Because you could take him down if you had anything to go on. You're his equal, after all.
When you set out to play the long game, there were three possible endings: your death, his death, or your submission.
That's it.
I've gone through all the possibilities, you think, a little calmer. Throwing in my lot with him is the only one with a high enough probability of success. There's no way I can make an enemy of Kira—he doesn't even have to frame me; if I left and he was afraid I might tell anyone who he is, he knows my name and face… he could kill me easily. So, I make a friend of him instead. I try to get as close as I can. There's no move, here, that I made wrong. I'm on the right track.
This is your only option, so 'choice' or no 'choice'—what's the point in blaming yourself for it? None of this is your fault. It's all Ryuzaki's.
That's right, you think clearly. It's all Ryuzaki's fault.
You close your eyes. Your eyes ache with tiredness, scratched and heavy. They pull you down, and you drift…
.
.
.