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There was something very unnatural about Light Yagami.
You couldn't pinpoint it, if you broke him into pieces and picked him apart. There was nothing wrong with round, deep brown eyes. His smile wasn't twisted or menacing. Nor was there anything about his body language, or his voice, or the words that came out of those soft, faint pink lips that indicated anything other than kindness. Too kind. It'd kill a man, to be that kind.
He had his quirks, oddities, certainly. The way he rarely raised his voice, but when he did, he screamed. His quiet discomfort when others touched his wristwatch, his affinity for half-eating red apples. But it wasn't these things that made him strange, not at all. In fact, they were the only human things about him at all.
For when one looked at perfect, flawless Light Yagami, it became clearer that you weren't looking at a man at all. Instead, in front of you was little more than a mirage, a construct.
You might expect him to be pretty, with his well-groomed appearance, his formal attire and sculpted physique. Yet, he was the most uniquely ugly thing L had ever seen. For what his name suggested, there was no light in his eyes, other than what reflected. When his hand reached out to you, you couldn't help but suspect that you were taking a deal from the devil, or a fae, or perhaps a Shinigami - not that L believed in such follies. When Yagami paused to answer a difficult question, his breathing, his focused expression were rehearsed.
This man, asleep in bed with his wrist bound, wasn't Light Yagami. Not the one L knew. This Light was pretty, objectively speaking, and seemed to truly want the best for everyone. There was a person in there, a measurable pulse, warm skin you could touch. L knew because he'd tried it, and Light had blinked at him- Actually blinked, long lashes over seeing eyes.
The other Light Yagami did not blink, not until you looked at him and therefore forced him to. He had no eyes, so he did not see. He merely ran off of input, negative and positive reinforcements that elicited trained reactions. L understood that man much better than the one next to him.
L had been told he did not blink enough, but he certainly saw. Too much, perhaps. Though, could one really see too much? If they were weak, certainly.
Regardless, what L saw right now, breathing slow and even, was a person. A brave person, a better person than he, objectively speaking, and one who could match his intellect like no other, but instead chose to side with him. This Light confused him, because he was both caring and genius, and L had always associated empathy with stupidity. What does he get out of it, when he's not aware he's Kira?
Humans were cunning; All humans, even Watari. Light was the furthest thing from an exception. But, unlike most others, L knew exactly what Light's cunning looked like. He'd know when it returned from this strange, sleepy state it had fallen into. When this absurdly sweet boy, this creature to be cherished and held (if L was the type to cherish and hold; he wasn't) slipped away, leaving a wrong, crooked emptiness in its place.
But that hadn't happened yet. And so, L reasoned, there was nothing to bar him from smiling slightly at the sight of Light's sleeping form nestled into the pillow. The way his golden-brown hair raked over his eyelids, the chronically polite manner in which he tossed and turned, even murmuring a 'sorry' as the bed creaked. The soft, high sigh that passed his lips as he apparently found a comfortable position laying on his side, facing away from L. The slight furrow in his brow in the moment before he'd turned away. The- the way his fingers twitched, as though unconsciously grasping for something he could not reach.
Whatever it is, he will have it soon enough. L grimaced as though at a bitter taste and bit into his free thumbnail, his other hand coming to rest on Light's left shoulder. Still jarringly warm; he shivered in his sleep at the lingering cool of the chains binding them together. I'm sure of that.