Chapter Text
The sky overhead was a mottled mess of grey and pale blue, sun obscured by heavy clouds in the chill of early January. A crowd of people stood behind a red-and-white striped barrier, most on their phones, some watching the approaching train.
The eyes of anyone who glanced over this crowd would stick to one man - not for long, not long enough to remember him, but long enough for him to leave an impression. Maybe, enough to later provide a sense of deja vu.
It wouldn’t be immediately clear, to such a person, what it was that had drawn their eye. This man was a little taller than the rest of the crowd, but only by an inch; his hair was fairer, but not enough to be properly blond, and while one could imagine he would have a rather impressive physique, it was mostly hidden by an untailored high school uniform.
It was probably something in the way he carried himself. As though he was the player character, and the rest of the world was wallpaper.
Light pushed open the front door to his family’s house. “I’m home,” he called, as he toed his shoes off in the entryway.
“Welcome home, Light,” his mother’s voice came from the kitchen, along with the sporadic clinks of clattering dishes.
The stairs groaned softly under his steps as he made his way up to his bedroom. Removing the pencil lead from his door hinge and the paper from the jamb, he padded his way in, tossing his school bag into the bed. Methodically, he shrugged out of his jacket, tugged off his tie, unbuttoned his shirt, and kicked off his pants. By the time he’d thrown the day’s uniform in the hamper and wrapped a soft towel around his waist, he was already smiling.
From behind him as he made his way to the bathroom to take his shower, Light’s gangly, floating shadow cackled. “You excited for tonight?”
“Always, Ryuk.” He turned the knob and returned to the mirror to comb out his hair. “Always.”
When the water had warmed, Light stepped into it, letting out an appreciative sigh at the way it soothed the stiffness he’d acquired from a day sitting at uncomfortable classroom desks. He went through his usual regimen, only half-paying-attention to the earthy and floral scents of his skincare products. This was - contrary to his parents’ beliefs - not because he was fretting (or even thinking) about the To-Oh entrance exams, which he was scheduled to take soon. They would be easy.
It also wasn’t because he was planning anything Kira-related. Everything on that front seemed to be going perfectly, for the moment. He’d rid himself of those FBI agents - and that one ex-agent, Misora, who was more competent than all the rest combined - so right now, proverbially speaking, the ball was in L’s court.
No, right now Light was considering nothing of any real importance. He was thinking about the dances he would do tonight.
Humming Good Girls as he turned off the water, and putting an unnecessary amount of flair into the way he stepped out of the shower, he debated how much of his makeup he was going to do before he left. Probably just the lip plumper and eyeliner, he decided while working a little wax into his hair. The rest could wait until he got to the club.
Finished with one half of his beauty routine, Light returned to his bedroom. From under his bed, he slid out a small black duffel bag. His death note was already sitting inside a stiff false bottom which he’d sewn in himself - the only way to open this, of course, was a tiny zipper whose pull was hidden behind a seam. (And on top of that, the cover of the notebook itself was implanted with a tiny RFID chip which would send him its location every five minutes if it ever got more than two hundred feet away from his phone. Sensible precautions.)
In the main compartment of the bag were a few comfortable, casual outfits, consisting mainly of sweatpants, t-shirts, zip-up hoodies, and knit caps. They were artfully plain, deliberately boring, designed to leave as little an impression as possible on anyone who might see him. It was one of these he’d worn for his final meeting with Raye Penber, and it was a different one which he donned now: dark blue and black instead of beige and brown.
“I’m heading to the library,” Light called to his mother as he slid his shoes back on.
He was already halfway out the door when she replied: “Okay, Light! We’ll see you later, be safe.”
“I will,” he promised. He used to feel strange saying things like that, because most of what determined his safety was out of his control… but not anymore. With a death note and a shinigami at his side, what could go wrong?
A sharp prick of pain made L still, pulling his thumb out of his mouth to realize he’d accidentally bitten off enough skin for it to bleed. The inconvenient redness that bubbled up from the spot made him frown, then slot the offending digit back between his lips to prevent the blood from staining his clothes.
The Task Force had gone home for the day, so it was only L and Watari in their hotel suite. Shortly, L would be the only one awake.
L stared at his screen, tasting copper as he rocked slowly in his chair. Displayed was a spreadsheet containing all known victims of the brilliant, elusive, likely-supernatural serial killer, Kira. He’d hoped that maintaining such data would lend some insight, but he’d gotten nothing particularly useful out of the project besides the clue from the very beginning of this case, which had led to his (correct) deduction that Kira must be located in Japan and his (necessary) relocation to the country shortly thereafter.
Right now, though, his best lead was missing. After the suspicious circumstances of Raye Penber’s death had led L to believe that Kira was on that train (though inconveniently out of view of the surveillance cameras), he’d contacted Naomi Misora immediately. But after two days of no replies, it was starting to become likely that he wasn’t going to get any.
The very fact that she might have been killed by Kira seemed to indicate that Kira could kill by methods other than heart attacks… Though, of course, nobody else on the Task Force knew who she was, nor did they consider that her possible suicide would be at all unusual. The lot of them were hopeless. L had put them to use today doing possibly (probably) pointless busywork, like compiling this spreadsheet.
L looked up. A partially-drawn curtain off to his right revealed part of the seemingly-endless Tokyo skyline, lit up in bright neon colors as it was throughout the night. He climbed slowly out of his chair, wandering over to the window and staring out of it.
Kira was out there, somewhere. And the death of Raye - and probably Naomi - had given L a very good idea of where, specifically, that might be.
He wasn’t looking forward to informing Mr. Yagami or Mr. Kitamura of his suspicions of their families, nor his ideas for a possible way to allay them. Illegal surveillance of police officers’ homes wasn't exactly a popular prospect. But, as L saw it, it would be necessary.
L sighed, aloud. He knew he was stewing on plans he’d already made, and information he’d already processed, because he had nothing to do with the next twelve hours. Unfortunately, the Task Force was comprised of ordinary people who needed to sleep.
In the past, L had solved these types of problems by working simultaneously on another case for someone in another part of the world. However, he had stopped taking any other cases. This one was too demanding, too interesting to allow for any distractions…
Except right now, when he’d narrowed his pool of suspects just enough to know all his next steps, but not quite enough to be able to take any of them.
L left the window, pacing back and forth, the sounds of his footfalls hushing into the soft carpet. He was bored. Bored, bored, bored, with nothing to do-
He passed the window again. The unsleeping lights of Tokyo lit up the night. Walking over and leaning against the glass to look down at the street, he could see the headlights of cars illuminating the blissfully-swaying bodies of passersby.
Maybe there wasn’t nothing for him to do.
L returned to his chair, and his computer, and opened a new browser tab. Without much of an idea what he wanted, he searched a very generic, “what to do in Tokyo tonight”.
At the top of the list was some event at a dance club, which, purely from the pictures on the website, would certainly be sensory overload central. No thank you.
After that, an article purporting to rank the 10 best ramen restaurants in the area. L didn’t even click into that one. If there wasn’t going to be sweet food, he wouldn’t be going.
The third link, L almost didn’t look at. The title was just advertising some drink special at a club. But then he looked in the description under the result: “Small, classy, upscale venue. Foreigner friendly. Highly personable service. Strip show begins at 9:30pm nightly.”
That was interesting enough to warrant a click, and after looking at the photos (and the menu), intrigue turned into real interest. Without a thought spared for embarrassment at the idea of going to a strip club, no matter how nice, L went to his room to change into the one and only nice thing he owned.
About two years ago, due to a need to do some field work for a case at a high-society cocktail party, L had gone (read: been dragged by Watari) to Gieves & Hawkes. The bespoke suit which had come out of this endeavor was dark grey linen with a subtle crosshatched pattern in a desaturated red. With this went a warm grey collared shirt, a wide maroon silk tie, and a pair of brown-and-black Oxfords. A proper gentleman should have worn a watch, but wearing anything around his wrists was too awful a sensory experience to contemplate. And besides, even with his hair combed and gelled within an inch of its life, L was hardly a “proper gentleman”.
Without two hours to spend on his hair this time, all L did before he left was brush it, which… really didn’t change its appearance that much. It still stuck out in all kinds of weird directions. But, confident no bouncer would turn him away on account of his unruly hair, L simply straightened his tie and called himself a lift. The app said it would arrive in five minutes.
On the elevator ride to the lobby, L fired off a perfunctory text to Watari: “I’ll be away tonight. Back by noon tomorrow.”
Then, trying not to feel too much like an imposter, L slid his hands into his pockets and walked out into the night.
