Chapter Text
Death was final.
At least, that was what L had always believed.
L was dead. There was no doubt about it. He could clearly recall the feeling of his heart stopping, the pain tearing through his chest, the inability to stop himself from collapsing and ending up in Kira’s arms, of all places.
And yet, he was still fully conscious. Conscious that he couldn’t feel the ground on which he stood on. Conscious that no one could see him. Conscious of everything happening in front of him - the task force’s panicked cries, his physical body still lying in Kira’s arms - and Kira, screaming, pretending, lying.
Kira. Light.
L had been right all along.
Not that he had ever truly doubted it, but it was nice to see his theory confirmed. Even if said confirmation had come in the form of a victorious grin twisting Light’s face while deranged eyes watched him die.
Light stood up suddenly, leaving someone else to hold his dead body - why even bother? - and L followed instinctively. He felt mildly dazed, disconnected from everything - which he supposed wasn’t entirely illogical considering his situation. He wasn’t sure whether he was actually walking or not, only that he kept going after Light until the man stopped in front of a pile of… was that sand? And another notebook?
His mind too busy trying to work out what was going on, L barely noticed Light hiding the notebook or the task force rushing through the door. Then, then Light started again with the corny act, and L glared up at him, his jaw clenching. Oh, right, you will ‘avenge’ me, ‘avenge’ Wa—
Watari!
L suddenly recalled those few seconds before his death, the emergency data deletion, Watari not responding… He abandoned Light to his fake speech and pretty much flew through the floors, absently noting that he was indeed passing through walls, until he reached Watari’s office and he went still.
Memories of the past flashed through his mind, clear as day, as L slowly moved towards the man lying on the floor. The man who had found him - saved him, really, considering the treatment he’d gotten at the previous orphanage - the man who had raised him, stayed by his side, indulged him…
It’s my fault.
“Watari?” L asked out loud, a vain hope that maybe he wasn’t the only one still around in this fashion. But the silence that answered him only confirmed what he already knew deep down. He moved closer, kneeling in front of Watari’s body, reaching out to try and touch his arm even though he knew he couldn’t.
“I’m sorry. I should never have let you take the same risks as I did,” he said quietly. “If you had remained in the shadows, you might have lived…”
L could hear a commotion outside of the door, and he knew the others had to be trying to get in and check on Watari. He also knew he wouldn’t be able to deal with the sight of Light standing next to his mentor, pretending to care - actually just the thought of it was making him shake with anger. He spared one last glance towards the only person who had ever seemed to care for him, whispered one last apology, and flew away just as the door opened.
Somehow, he ended up on the roof.
The rain was still falling, except this time he couldn’t feel it. He couldn’t feel anything, not the wind, not the concrete floor under his bare feet. He was standing on the edge of the rooftop, looking down at the drenched city, wondering idly if falling down would maybe kill him again, this time for good.
Why am I still here?
Was it really like those tales about ghosts - some unfinished business bullshit? Did he actually need for the Kira case to be closed, for Light to be exposed and condemned, only so he could find peace?
I don’t care about all this. I just wanted to win - it was just about my ego.
But I lost. Fine. Let the world submit to Kira’s reign of fear, for all I care. It’s not my problem anymore.
He closed his eyes, feeling himself start shaking again. He forced himself to take some deep breaths - he knew it was pointless now but it was still a reflex - and tried focusing on the sound of the rain.
That was when he realized. The bells had stopped.
In a way, he’d already known back then that they were an illusion. A strange foreboding that should have made him reconsider - but L had always been too stubborn for his own good. Case in point.
On a whim, he glanced above his shoulder, half-hoping to see Light standing there like before. Hoping for a second chance at the past hour - for the time to come up with a different plan, one that would at least allow him to save Watari, or send all his findings to Wammy’s house so that his successors could move quickly.
The point was always for them to figure things out on their own.
Screw all that! I’m dead now. How long will I have to stay like this? Alone, watching things unfold without being able to do anything.
Alone.
More memories assaulted him - recent ones, this time. Observing Light, meeting him - all the taunting, the back and forth between them before Light’s confinement. Then being handcuffed to each other, fighting, arguing… talking for hours… laughing?
L gritted his teeth and clenched his fists, trying to push the images away. He’d already spent too much time mulling over those two sides of Light - the one he wanted to analyze and expose, and the one he almost felt he could have become friends with under different circumstances. Both equally thrilling, both equally dangerous - whether for L’s life or his impartiality. In the end, he’d only barely managed to hold on to his impartiality.
It doesn’t matter. Maybe at some point he wasn’t Kira anymore, but that didn’t last. He certainly seemed happy to have killed me.
He is, right?
The incessant reel of memories stopped and lingered on the look Light had given him earlier, on the stairs. Almost regretful, hesitant… sad? It had been miles away from how Kira had looked at him as he had died - and yet Light definitely had been Kira then as well.
“It will be lonely, won’t it?” L had asked, for no other reason that he wanted to know whether Light felt it too.
Will you feel lonely as well once the game is over?
Suddenly it was all too much. He was dead; Watari was dead; and now L was facing a future that could only be made of crushing loneliness - all of this at the hands of the one person that could maybe have been his equal, could maybe have cured the loneliness of the life he had had before. How tragically ironic.
Something inside L’s chest clenched again and some part of him wondered whether he was finally allowed to die and be set free, but then he suddenly felt wetness run down his face. He brought his hand up to brush it away, trying to tell himself it was the rain when he knew full well it had been pouring right through him this whole time.
His hand stopped in front of his eyes, and L finally let himself cry.
The passage of time was slow, but not as unbearable as L had initially thought. He noticed soon enough that when he managed to lose focus on the moment, hours could go by without him noticing. If he could make it happen for days, it would certainly help alleviate the boredom.
Boredom.
L also met Ryuk one night, not too long after his death. The Shinigami had been hovering behind Light on the building’s rooftop, grumbling about how things weren’t going to be as interesting now that L was dead - and as such, he was extremely amused when he realized L had been eavesdropping the whole time.
“Too stubborn to die, huh?” Ryuk said after Light had left. That sounded about right.
Ryuk told him everything after that. Aside from the relief L felt at simply being able to communicate with someone in his state, it was also fascinating to finally have every answer - to be able to explain every single grey area of the case.
He knew now. How boredom had been the root of everything. How it had made Ryuk drop the first Death Note in the human world, and how it had led Light to use it.
L understood boredom. He had spent his life trying to escape it, and it had always been the main drive behind his desire to solve complicated cases. It wasn’t that he was righteous or anything - he had just been in it for the challenge - the fun. Granted, he had certainly killed a lot less people than Light had, but his reasons had only ever been selfish.
Some part of him really wanted to believe that Light had had ‘good’ intentions at first. It made it easier to deal with the fact that his stubbornness had ended up giving Kira free rein to do whatever he wanted for the foreseeable future.
That is, until the kids caught up to the investigation and finally exposed him.
L felt confident that they would. Especially after Ryuk told him that Light hadn’t been the one to really kill him - not directly, at least. The knowledge pissed him off - that was cheating - but also comforted him a little. Without Rem, without her feelings for Misa, Light would still not have been able to kill him. Having only just learned of the existence of Shinigami and supernatural killer notebooks, L definitely couldn’t have accounted for the fact that a Shinigami could actually have feelings for a human, and would go as far as to sacrifice themselves in order to save said human.
It had been a well executed move on Light’s part - L could recognize that, at least. But he wouldn’t be able to use the same trick again when L’s successors came for him. Rem had disappeared, and Ryuk certainly didn’t seem like the type to get attached to humans. He just wanted entertainment.
“Well, if you can be a little patient, I guarantee you will be entertained again,” L told him cryptically. Ryuk certainly seemed excited at the prospect.
Later that night, after Ryuk had left, L decided to finally leave the building’s rooftop. Staying around Light didn’t appeal to him in the least for the moment. Some part of him knew that he would be back eventually, but right now he needed to put some distance between himself and the man who had killed him - albeit indirectly.
Plus, L had been starting to feel curious about what he could and couldn’t do. If he was going to spend years like this, he’d better find ways to keep himself busy. Studying his condition and testing his limits would be a start.
Straightening up, L looked up at the starless sky one last time before running straight ahead, not thinking twice before he jumped off the edge into the night.
L’s return to England didn’t go at all like he had expected.
He had noticed already, during his experimentations, that familiar places could trigger vivid memories. Maybe memories wasn’t the right word, those felt more like extremely realistic flashbacks. Almost as if L was living through the moment again.
It hadn’t posed too much of a problem while he had been staying in Japan. He hadn’t gone out that much, after all, and reliving uneventful trips to sweets shops and cafes hadn’t specifically bothered him. He had grumbled at some of the flashbacks of him hanging out with Light on campus - but mainly because he still didn’t want to see Light’s face for now. It was enough already to hear about Kira whenever some screen would broadcast the latest news.
Anyway, after what might have been a year of testing his abilities - and a lot of frustration at not being able to interact with the world in any way - he had decided to go to Wammy’s House and check how far the kids had gone. He had purposefully waited so long already because he knew there was no way they had caught up to Light yet, and that was already going to test his patience.
He just wanted this to be over. And somehow, he was sure that his ‘peace’ was linked to Light’s defeat.
His experimentations had shown that he could pretty much will himself anywhere if he focused hard enough. He hadn’t been sure whether that would work for such a long distance, but there had only been one way to know...
The moment he opened his eyes and saw the familiar stairwell was when it started. Immediately, he berated himself for being such an idiot and not being prepared enough.
Wammy’s House was very different from Japan - in that it was riddled with memories. Not necessarily bad ones, but not all good ones either, and given the circumstances it was too much for L to handle. Especially with how the flashbacks all seemed to overlap, not leaving L any room to try and control them.
Watari, alive, smiling. “Welcome to your new home, L.”
Stares, whispers. “Who’s the new kid?” “He looks weird.”
Running to hide in Watari’s office. “I don’t want to be with the others.”
Another smile. “It’s alright. You’re doing well.”
Eating alone. Sitting alone.
“You should give them a chance. They’re not like the kids where you used to be.” “I don’t want to. I’m fine on my own.”
Studying alone. Skipping class to read books, crouched in a corner of Watari’s office.
“I want to be a detective.” Soft look, warm smile. “Of course you can.”
A vision of himself in a hallway. Red eyes. “Who are you?” A demented grin. “Your backup.”
“No!”
“I’m sorry, L. We should have been more careful with him.”
Holing up in his room to work. Only agreeing to see Watari.
“I don’t need anyone. It’s easier to be alone.”
Alone.
Alone.
L screamed, clutching at his hair and trying desperately to ignore the images and voices assaulting his mind. Make it stop.
He needed to leave. He needed to practice, to learn to control the flashbacks if he ever wanted to come back and check on the kids. Gritting his teeth, he tried to focus as hard as he could on the first place that came to mind - the room he had shared with Light during the investigation.
When everything was finally quiet, L opened his eyes and immediately realized he wasn’t at all where he had willed himself to be.
Light, however, was there. The man was sitting in front of a computer, surrounded by several screens. Well, not so much sitting as currently asleep on his chair. Despite everything, L found himself smiling at the sight. It reminded him of all the nights Light had fallen asleep while working, back when they were handcuffed together.
He only realized that he had begun experiencing another flashback when Ryuk’s voice brought him back to the moment. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
L blinked, then glanced up at the Shinigami, the look in his eyes saying he had no patience for this kind of joke. “I wanted to check up on your upcoming entertainment,” L said, his voice carrying a fair amount of snark. “But I hadn’t accounted for how intense the flashbacks could get.”
It’s weird though, I got one again after getting here but it didn’t feel as powerful. It felt… almost comfortable.
L immediately shook off the thought. Still, he had to admit that seeing Light again after having avoided him for so long wasn’t as bad as he had expected it to be. I guess I’m less angry now. He glanced at the sleeping man again. Even if they were in a different place, the scene felt so familiar. With Light being unconscious, L could almost believe he himself was truly here too. That like so many of those nights, he would keep working until he noticed Light’s lack of movement, then roll his eyes fondly before carrying Light back up to their room.
“But you were different back then,” L said quietly, gnawing at his fingertips. “Although when you look like this, I suppose no one could tell you’re a crazy mass murderer with a god complex.”
“I think he misses you, you know,” Ryuk said, interrupting L’s musings.
L looked up at the Shinigami and snorted. “Right. He does.”
“I mean, it’s become too easy again. I suppose it wasn’t just me who found it all more entertaining when you were around.”
L huffed and glanced towards Light again. The man shifted in his sleep, which resulted in his headset digging even more into his cheek. That made L smile again. I guess it was kind of fun. Even when you were Kira - you were my best opponent after all.
“Ryuk, I think I’ll be hanging around from now on.” The Shinigami perked up, and L shook his head. “Don’t get me wrong, things aren’t going to change anytime soon. I’ll practice controlling the flashbacks so I can actually go and check, but it just wouldn’t make sense for anything to happen just yet. It hasn’t been long enough.” L sighed, his eyes drawn back to Light. “I suppose I just…”
I’ve always told myself I was better off alone. As long as I was busy, I wouldn’t notice how lonely I was.
I’m tired of pretending. There’s no point anymore.
Even if it means being with you. Even if you had me killed. Even if you can’t see or hear me.
I think I might miss you too, his brain provided, but L pushed it down. He knew that if he went down that particular road, he wouldn’t be able to handle what he might find. Instead, he whispered the one thing he could finally admit.
“I don’t want to be alone.”
“Any day now, Ryuk.”
It had been almost five years since L’s death. Four years since he had decided to remain around Light most of the time. It had been long. It had certainly not been fun. L had actually spent most of his time highly frustrated by not being able to hurl something at Light’s head whenever he was being horribly infuriating.
And then when he had been confident he could go check on Near and Mello without being assaulted by uncontrollable memories, he had found out Mello had left and pretty much been a drama queen about everything. And when L had finally found him, deep within the mafia, he also hadn't been able to hurl something at that little shit’s head.
At least Near wasn’t as frustrating. He had made good progress, and L had faith in his ability to stop Light. He was kind of a little shit as well, but in a way L could appreciate more. If only just because he reminded him a bit of his younger self.
In spite of whatever sense of ‘caring’ he felt towards Near and Mello - mainly because they had all grown up at the same place, he hadn’t ever even met them after all - L kept coming back to Light. He was arguably the most irritating of the three, and being unable to kick his stupid face was really aggravating…
His stupid, handsome face.
Oh, well.
Even though he had definitely abused his ability to make time pass by faster, L had still been observing Light for years. He had had the time to make peace with his thoughts and feelings as well.
Never mind that Light was Kira, L still felt closer to him than anyone else.
He supposed they were maybe like two sides of the same coin. Kira or not, Light and he were similar in many aspects - yet always opposed. They didn’t have the same values or ideas, but their thought processes were frighteningly alike. L had felt it often enough back when he had still been alive, how talking to Light sometimes felt like talking to himself.
An equal.
L had never had such a person in his life. So it came as no surprise that he would feel some kind of attachment towards Light, no matter how horrible a person he was. And anyway, L wasn’t exactly a good person either.
Still, Light was really starting to push it. With no one to oppose him, he had grown even more conceited than he used to be. He had everyone wrapped around his little finger - the police, his poor family, Misa, and a large part of the world by now. It pissed L off to no end, which was why he regularly wanted to kick Light in his stupid handsome face - because maybe if he looked significantly less perfect, people would stop believing every single lie that came out of his equally perfect mouth.
It had definitely nothing to do with the conflicting feelings L had sporadically experienced over years of watching Light.
As it turned out, there were still some thoughts inside of him that he wasn’t ready to make peace with.
In any case, things would be moving soon. Mello had drawn up some kidnapping plan that L wasn’t exactly certain what to think of. But he was getting tired of waiting and lamenting his inability to throw things at people, so he decided to focus on the positive: this would finally set everything in motion.
He glanced towards Ryuk, who grinned at him excitedly. L knew the Shinigami wasn’t going to talk to him while Light was awake, so he just smirked at him, then focused his gaze on Light. Just like every other day, the man was pretending to work at catching Kira - but really he was just leading the task force towards another dead end.
“Enjoy it while it lasts, Light,” L said quietly. He’d taken to talking to the man regularly, even though he knew Light couldn’t hear him. It helped with the solitude, and it was also cathartic. When L had come back four years ago, he had spent quite some time yelling at Light for having killed Watari, Aiber and Wedy. It had been pointless, but it had felt rather good to let it all out.
“Things will become complicated again for you very soon. And this time you won’t be able to rely on Rem’s feelings to help you. I’m also rather certain Near won’t take the same risks as I did. He’ll find you, and you’ll finally be exposed.”
Whatever Light was doing must have made him feel satisfied as L caught his lips twitching into one of his devious ‘Kira’ smiles for a fraction of a second. Of course no one on the task force had seen it, but L always found it interesting to see Light slip up like this. It seemed to happen more often as time went by, and L wondered whether this was because Light’s mind was becoming more and more twisted.
“You know, you irritate me most of the time, but sometimes I do feel sorry for you. Such a brilliant mind… Lost in its own disillusion. I wonder if you will even understand where you went wrong when Near exposes you. I know your intentions felt all noble and righteous when you started out, but you became too high on power, Light. Someone has to stop you now.”
Sometimes L regretted not having confronted Light more directly before his death, or tried to make a deal with him. He had never been one to shy away from working with criminals, after all, so maybe they could have worked something out and avoided all this. Then again, Light might have taken such a thing as admitting defeat, so maybe it was a pointless thought.
What’s pointless is to think about it now, L berated himself. He sighed and went to stand in front of the window, looking into the night.
“Any day now,” he repeated slowly, more to himself than anything, then turned back to look up at Ryuk. “I hope it’ll prove enough fun for you. I’m not sure how long it will last once it starts, and then…” L knew what would happen when Light got caught. Ryuk had explained the reason why he was here, and what the deal between him and Light was.
L turned his eyes towards Light again, his lips curling into a small, sad smile.
“I’ll see you soon, Light.”