[FFML] [FIC][DEATH NOTE AU] Silent Partner, Unfinished Business ch. 06

[Paul Durant]

    I am not Brian Azzarello, author of 100 Bullets, nor am I Tsugumi
Ohba, author of Death Note.


                               * * * * * * *


    SILENT PARTNER, UNFINISHED BUSINESS:


    SIX DEGREES OF SEVERANCE


                                * M I S A *


    "I... don't have any idea how to kiss girls..." I stammered. "But
it's all going to be all right." I nuzzled up to Naomi's face, and I
hugged her, and it was warm, and all was right in the world. "Being with
you, I know that everything is going to be okay."


    And right then I realized two wonderful things. I was in love with
Naomi.


    And Naomi was in love with me. Everything really was going to be
okay.


    I kissed her on the neck. On the cheek. On the...


    And then her arms went totally rigid. Her eyes went wide. She
looked terrified. She was grabbing onto me so hard I couldn't move. "W...
What's wrong?" I asked. I squirmed in her grip but I couldn't get out.
"Naomi, you're hurting me!"


    "Love..." she whispered.


    "I... I do! But you're scaring me, Naomi!"


    "Love... Love, uh. And, and Light."


    "I... yeah, I still love Light," I said. "I don't... want to hurt
him. But it's complicated! I'm sure he'll understand." He would! He was
super smart.


    "And... And... and, and, and love, and, Kira," she finally said.


    I squirmed in her grip some more. "That's not -- I don't -- You
know it's not like that any more! I know... I know how much he hurt you...
even though he killed my parents' murderer, I love that, but, that doesn't
make it..." but she was shaking her head. That's not what she meant. It's
not what she was talking about. What, what did she mean?


    Oh God.


    Oh God no.


    I started to whimper. Then I started to sob. And my face fell onto
her neck. "Please no," I choked. "Please tell me no. Please tell me it's
something else."


    But it wasn't. It was the only thing that made sense. I fell in
love with Naomi. Because she made me feel safe, and she'd hurt people who
tried to hurt me. She worked hard to get me out of danger. I fell in love
with Kira because he made me feel safe, and he killed the person who
killed my family. He worked hard to make the world not dangerous. I fell
in love with Light... because I thought he looked like he'd probably do
that? Without talking to him?


    I fell in love with Light because he was Kira. It was the only
story that made sense, that was all I cared about. It was the only
possible reason for me to be interested in him. I was the second Kira.
Ryuzaki was right the whole time. I was the second Kira and somehow,
somehow Kiraness crawled out of me, and it took my memories with it. And I
made up new ones to fill in the gaps.


    And I thought I deserved to be free because I wasn't Kira. And I
killed those people for speaking out against Kira. Against Light. Even...
even though they didn't do anything wrong. And they were just scared of
ending up like Naomi. Or like Raye. And then I did it! Just what they were
afraid of! Kira needed to be reined in, but I was killing people who said
he was wrong! I didn't care, I wanted him to make more horrible mistakes!


    It was me! I told everyone it wasn't, and it was me! I was a liar!
I didn't know anything! Everything was my fault!


    "Please," I whimpered. Naomi was still vice-gripping me. "It
wasn't me. Not really. I don't ruh-remember it. It whu-was Kuh-Kuh-Kira. I
was puh-possessed." My tears were falling freely onto her. I was
blubbering too much for words. Neither of us could talk.


    And she held on to me in that vice-grip with one arm. And the
other one... she, she stroked the back of my head. She started to relax
her grip. Maybe she was afraid of me running before, but I couldn't walk.
I'd fall. She... her grip got looser. She wasn't pinning me. She was
holding me. Like I was a person who needed to be held. Like she was going
to keep me safe. And make things make sense.


    "It wasn't me," I whispered. "I don't remember. It wasn't me. I
was possessed."


    She was breathing evenly, like she was controlling herself and it
was working. "Know." she said with a nod. Of course she did. She believed
me before. But I didn't know I was lying, and I made a liar out of her and
Matsuda. She still believed me now. I didn't know if I did.


    "We... we have to tell Ryuzaki," I said. "He has to put me back in
jail. It's not safe for anyone. I'm not responsible enough to be Kira."


    And she shook her head. "Know." Of course. Ryuzaki already knew
all of this, didn't he? We were just catching up. It was exactly the thing
he said it was: I was Kira when he arrested me and then I wasn't, and he
didn't think I was a risk now. We just knew instead of thinking he was
playing a logic game. We knew in our souls.


    "Th-then... Light! Please don't kill him, Naomi!" I knew she had a
gun, I knew she wanted revenge, and if I was the second Kira that meant
Light was the one who killed Raye and killed her. She had to be thinking
of it. She had to want it. "We can... Ryuzaki already knows too, doesn't
he? But he's, he's a good person. He's probably not Kira anymore either,
and, and if he is, Kira's inside of him. I want to save him."


    And she just said it again. "Know."


    "I want you to save me too, Naomi," I whispered. "Please don't let
me be Kira. Please don't let me hurt people like you. Please. I love you."


    She picked up my head. She looked into my red, tear-stained eyes.
"Know." And she kissed me.


                                 * * * * *


    Light is Kira, and Ryuzaki knew before they did. Ryuzaki's not
reacted to any of this evidence so far. And Light and Ryuzaki are very
close. How to exonerate him, or confirm suspicion? Something Ryuzaki
doesn't know about, something Light doesn't know to react to.


    Misa needs to be in character all week, of course. She's afraid of
slipping up. She has to be projecting another personality, even a similar
one. One that is okay with being Kira. But one that isn't Kira. One who
will be kind of jumpy around Light. Because he's so committed to stopping
Kira, who her character loves! Better to stay out of his path, you know!


    The deception is simple, and at that point, costs the
investigation nothing. If Light is Kira, he must have some method of
communicating with Kira-Y. He knows what Ryuzaki wants, and will talk his
way out of anything Ryuzaki has. So they change things just a bit. They
put on a bit of a show at the interview. Naomi expresses her emotions,
though sincere, about things that aren't quite what the Yotsuba Prosperity
Council think they are. Misa never lays a hint of her suspicion of being
the second Kira. The Kuleshov effect is an actress's best friend. They put
on a little pageant of an idol who loves only Kira, a bodyguard who will
stop at nothing to make her safe and happy. One who has resigned herself
to the fact the idol will not love her back. Misa never explains the
extent of "Shoko's" disability. She reads a complete and correct sentence
as if it was written by "Shoko's" hand.


    //I'M SORRY TO MAKE YOU WASTE YOUR TIME WITH THAT CHARADE, BUT
IT'S OBVIOUS WHY I COULD NOT TALK ABOUT WHY WE REALLY CAME. BUT NOW YOUR
INTENTIONS ARE CLEAR TO ME, BASED ON WHAT I HEARD. I AM THE SECOND KIRA,
AND ONE OF YOU KNOWS THE ORIGINAL. AND I THINK YOU KNOW WHY I NEED TO FIND
HIM, AND KEEP IT SECRET. WHOEVER HAS CONTACTED KIRA, THE ORIGINAL KIRA,
NEEDS TO CONTACT ME.


    I DO NOT EXPECT YOU TO ACT WITHOUT PROOF. MY CONTACT INFORMATION
IS IN THE PACKET YOU RECIEVED. PURCHASE A BURNER PHONE AND SEND ME THE
FACE OF SOMEONE YOU WISH KILLED, OTHER THAN A MEMBER OF YOUR GROUP, TO
PROVE MY ABILITIES. WHEN THAT PERSON IS DEAD, WE CAN TALK ABOUT GETTING IN
TOUCH WITH KIRA.


    I LOOK FORWARD TO WORKING WITH YOU --K2//


    Misa Amane's number gets a message from an anonymous burner cell
phone, with the face of a man Isamu Egawa wanted dead.


    The other five are forwarded from //SHOKO MAKI, SECURITY (TEXT
MESSAGE ONLY)//.


                               * N A O M I *


    "It's not silly," Misa said. "Wedy got us the reports of
everyone's routine. Tonight is Pai-Gow night for Eba. She's in that little
casino place. If she confesses, nobody has to get hurt, and if she's in
public, she can't make a big scene." Isamu would also be at home tonight.
With his wife, Nabiki. But nobody else.


    We were in a panel van on the other side of Yokohama. In the back
was a straitjacket, gurney, blindfold, gag, and other various restraints.
Random shit I grabbed from props, just in case. Misa and I had on Kevlar
underneath our jackets; hers still had gaffer's tape and squib splat marks
on it. This was a bad plan, but it was a fast one, and that was what
counted. Light could not have the opportunity to know he has to
communicate with Isamu, much less to do so. Every one of L's resources,
for the next short while, were going to be following Nori while she served
Eba with papers.


    I could hear Ryuzaki yelling, though not the words he used. Misa
didn't care. "I still love you too, Light," she said, and she hung up,
turned her phone to silent. And she meant it. That's why we were doing
this. Not giving him a chance to keep being Kira and hurting himself. She
took a deep breath and turned off her phone. "They're going."


    I rounded the corner into Isamu's neighborhood. Luxury
freestanding homes. Even had lawns. All of them had shishi-odoshi. The
wooden thing that goes "doink".


    She looked up at me. "We're gonna do this. This is gonna work." I
think I needed psyching up more than she did. The last time I went against
Kira alone it ended very, very poorly. And she swiped her hand over her
face. She didn't really "become" Kasumi, the Yakuza assassin. But she did
get an assist.


    We pulled in to his driveway. Block exit. Lights on on the ground
floor, curtains drawn. One human figure at the window... They quickly
pulled away. Shit. All right, no subtle approach. I kicked open my door,
and behind me, Misa clicked out her box cutter. One, two, three, four
bounding steps to take me to the door. One foot high on the door. Wave
Misa down. Draw the gun, take the shot...


    BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!


    Shooting a door lock without a specialized doorbuster round is a
bad idea, you just jam it. Door hinges are much weaker. A bullet in the
wood there will blow off the hinge. I kicked the door in, and it landed
with a crash. Isamu and Nabiki were inside, looking shocked. She was like
seven months pregnant, wearing her nightgown already. He was in a suit
without a jacket, standing behind her, with a kitchen knife to her neck.
The dining room table was too large for the two chairs at it; in the
kitchen, the granite-topped island was laden with pieces of notebook
paper, some of which were in plastic baggies. Some craft project, maybe.


    "Don't m--" was as much as Isamu said.


    "DON'T SAY A GOD DAMN WORD, ISAMU!" Misa barked. "Not a syllable!"
She waved her box cutter menacingly like I wasn't pointing a gun at them.
"You say one syllable that might be about giving something up and she is
going to kill you before you finish your sentence." Both of them looked
real confused by this. "We don't know what that will do to you but it
probably isn't good." I clicked on my laser sight. I shined it right in
his eye. "Now... put your hands up. And let her go. Kira."


    Slowly, wordlessly, he raised his hands. His wife looked back up
to him, and ducked away to cower in the corner of the kitchen. He dropped
his knife when she was clear, he looked over...


    No! I dove to the side. Misa didn't realize it, I grabbed her by
the neck and I YANKED her out of the doorway. In an instant, Nabiki was
over the counter, shooting.


    BLAM!


    Chips of wood sprayed outward as a chunk of the door frame was
peppered by steel balls. She was in on it. She got out of the way instead
of asking what was going on. Shit. I noticed too late. Misa gasped in pain
as the shot winged her. "Aaaagh, that HURTS!" She looked down to her side,
where she was hit. "Ah, ah, it's okay, it hit the vest! Damn, I didn't
know how much that smarts!"


    Isamu was in the clear for a second. But he wasn't saying anything
about giving a thing up. The gun clattered to the floor. And then Isamu
pleaded, "It's birdshot! It's birdshot! It will put her down, but it won't
kill her!"


    For one, at less than ten meters he didn't know that if he didn't
know she was wearing a vest. For two, I don't know what for two was
because Misa and I peeked around the corner.


    Nabiki was floating, in mid-air, kicking her legs wildly. She was
clawing at her throat, batting at an invisible assailant. She wasn't
touching the ground, a wall, ANYTHING. Isamu was on his ass on the floor
with the shotgun -- a break-action over-under. Shotguns are the only gun
civilians in Japan can own, he must have been licensed to hunt with it. He
raised the barrel toward us and we ducked out of the way. His wife was
still struggling against an invisible noose. No. A hand.


    BLAM!


    Isamu fired again, but we were already behind the wall. No
magazine, he was going to have to reload. And he'd fired high, into the
ceiling. When I rolled back in he had scooted his ass behind the low wall
separating kitchen and dining room. I heard him eject his spent shells.
They went arcing through the air. And one of them bounced off of something
in mid-flight. If it was whatever was holding Nabiki, it was enormous, at
least 250 cm.


    "If you want us to keep her safe, we can't do that when she's
trying to kill us!" Isamu squealed in a panic. "You need us! She--"


    Misa ran from the doorway to under the dining room table, ducking
from cover to cover just like I showed her. "Shut up, Kira!" she snarled.
"Surrender and all of this can be over!" It was about this time that
Nabiki got lowered to the ground. It was also the time I vaulted over the
kitchen divider wall and dropped both my knees onto Isamu's chest, while
he fumbled with the box of shotshells. It hurt my bad knee to land on him.
It hurt him a lot more.


    I held the gun to his temple and I snarled. I didn't need to
speak. He got the message.


    Nabiki fell to her knees, gasping for air. I banged on the
counter, and I waved Misa over. But Nabiki wasn't done. "She'll... go to
jail... a long time..." she gasped. No she wasn't, but Nabiki didn't know
that. "Get her out alone... we can save her..."


    "Stop talking!" Misa said. She had the boxcutter to Nabiki's neck.
But her hands were shaking. She didn't want to kill. "You're an
accomplice! And a hostage!"


    "Give it to me," Nabiki said. "I'll do it for you. Humans kill
each other. It's what we do."


    And then something started to pull the gun from my hand. BLAM! It
went off as my hand was wrenched, it nearly blew Isamu's brains out and
singed his hair and likely damaged his hearing. Something with big, long,
COLD hands wrapped its hands around my weapon. Pulling. Misa's boxcutter
went flying across the room and she had no idea how much punching was
okay. She grabbed at Nabiki and started yanking her hair, trying to
grapple her, until Nabiki stomped Misa's foot and grabbed her in a half
nelson.


    "Honey, stop!" Isamu begged, his voice atonal. "The baby!"


    "WE CAN MAKE ANOTHER ONE!" Nabiki screamed.


    There was a second hand on my weapon now. Fearfully strong. I
pulled the trigger twice more, trying to empty the magazine -- the bullets
never struck the far wall. Then it pinned my trigger finger with what felt
like a giant phalange that had no flesh. It wasn't wrenching the gun away,
it was dragging it away and up, and I couldn't break the grip.


    I was standing now, just to keep up with the gun, no longer
pinning Isamu to the ground. Misa was watching helplessly. For that
matter, so was I. Whatever this thing was wasn't going to shoot me, it was
going to hand the gun to Nabiki and she was going to shoot me. My only
hope was to get the ammo. Okay. It pulled the boxcutter out of Misa's hand
there... none of the chairs moved... the thing has to be standing riiight
there. I hope. Every second calculating was one more that gun was moving
away from my body. The arc was pulling it toward that cat-clock, but if
this thing had shoulders, it would have to twist...


    And I let go. My trigger finger still pinned, my middle finger had
room to graze the magazine ejector as it was yanked away -- a mag with 3
bullets went clattering onto the table. The entity pulled it in exactly
the direction I anticipated, and when it struggled to twist its grip and
release my trigger finger, I racked the slide, ejecting the last bullet
unfired. The gun was disarmed. I stomped on the mag so Isamu couldn't grab
it. Then I stomped on his hand. And ground my foot onto it. The entity had
the gun, but Nabiki would have to bludgeon me to death with it.


    Misa had been transfixed by the supernatural event before her. but
when my gun got tossed to Nabiki, she had a chance. Nabiki put out one
hand to catch the gun, shouted "There's no bullets! It's useless!" And
Misa shoved her into the counter. The gun went clattering to the floor.
Nabiki pulled a weapon from the counter -- there was another knife sitting
right there, but she went for the cutting board. She was in a vulnerable
state, but compared to Misa she was still bigger, stronger, and knew at
least some kind of martial art. And she wasn't wearing shoes.


    I kicked the shotgun up and grabbed it in midair. Only seconds
before Star Kira Platinum would be on me again. I couldn't snap the break
action in half, so I chucked it to the far end of the room. And then I
felt them on my neck. Lifting me into the air just like Nabiki. Cold, bony
fingers. Perfectly shaped for the scars around my neck. The hands of the
Reaper lifting me up to choke the life out of me -- or to pin me down so
Isamu or his wife could cut out my heart. They left their mark before. Now
they were here to finish the job.


    I grabbed its invisible arms. They felt like spinal vertebrae.
Misa was being pinned by her wrists, and Nabiki was grabbing the zip-tie
from her jacket to bind them. My legs flailed uselessly. But Misa wasn't
giving up. And she wasn't calm, either.


    "Do you not know who you're messing with?" she barked. "Naomi got
killed by Kira once before and it didn't TAKE! She crawled BACK because
she wasn't DONE WITH YOU! She's the toughest God-damn person on this
planet and you freaks have until the count of THREE to surrender before
she kicks the living shit out of all of you!" She winced her eyes shut and
bellowed. "ONE! TWO! THREE! WRECK THEM!"


    I could do nothing.


    The two of them gave a slight sigh of relief.


    THAT was when I kicked the invisible monster in the face with both
boots.


    Human arms, human hands -- stands to reason had a human face, too.
Arms had to meet, here, judging by the slope. And nothing that has a face
enjoys being kicked in it. I doubt I did any lasting damage since it
shrugged off bullets, but it had a sense of touch, and it was enough of a
startle to let me go while I still had its arms. I wrenched them down to
make for a lock, but they vanished from my hands. Great. It was also
selectively intangible.


    But I didn't have to worry about disarming anyone and the entity
wasn't tangible right now. Isamu had stood up, so the first order of
business was to sweep his legs out from under him, then catch him as I
rolled to my feet and slam his jaw into the counter on the kitchen island.
Judging by this encounter he wasn't planning on telling his ghost friend
to leave him, but better safe than sorry. Nabiki pulled the knife, but it
was no contest. She didn't even know where to point it before I nailed her
elbow, got the knife out of her hand, cut Misa free, and let Misa bind
Nabiki's wrists while I watched Isamu moan on the floor. She may have
wrestled more than a model who used a stunt double for her fight scenes,
but they were both noncombatants, it was no contest. Misa was clapping.
"Oh my God! Naomi, you really are the best!" The moment Nabiki's wrists
were bound, Misa hopped up on one foot and kissed my cheek. The entity
wasn't attacking me. Why not?


    And Nabiki looked very concerned by this. "Well... If we can't do
that, then we need to be separated. Just call a mulligan on this fight."


    "Stop talking!" Misa snapped. "Stop talking to the ghost! I'm
gagging you!" We didn't have official gags, but we bought some new gym
socks, and Misa brandished hers.


    "Split us up and goourseparaaaahhhhhhfffffff!" Nabiki got out
before she got a sock stuffed in her mouth. I knelt down to zip-tie
Isamu... and that was when I saw the granite countertop ripped off the
kitchen island, sending its papers falling off to the side, and pressed up
against me. It pushed me to the floor, but never with shocking or violent
force -- like it really was incapable of killing me. It just left me
pinned under 200 kilos of rock.


    Misa looked to the couple. Then to me. She was not solving this on
her own, and the other side couldn't fight her. I struggled, but I didn't
have any range of movement. What was it, what was the word for the thing I
needed or I was going to die? The weight was painful. My eyes were
watering. I couldn't find a single word.


    "I can't, I can't move it on my own," Misa gasped. "I... I need a
handle or something, right? Like a lever? Right?" God, I hoped I gave the
right gesture to indicate she was correct.


    "Get up! Grab the briefcase, pick up the sheets and let's get the
hell out of here!" Nabiki barked once she spat out the gag. She
shoulder-checked Misa to the ground, running with her hands tied behind
her. "The keys are on the key rack! Cut me out!" Isamu got to his feet in
a daze and complied with her orders. I rolled myself back and forth,
trying to have some other part of my chest crushed.


    Misa looked around for a broom -- past the Egawas, in a back
closet. She had to walk past them both ways, but they weren't stopping
her. They grabbed a briefcase, they grabbed the keys. Misa clearly thought
about following them, but she made the right choice. The garage was
blocked by our van --


    And as Misa pried the countertop upward the six inches I needed to
be able to tip it sideways, we heard the CRASH of their blue Corolla
punching out the side wall of the garage and leaving two muddy streaks on
the neighbor's yard as they peeled out of the neighborhood.


    I caught my breath. She remembered to lose it, and then caught it
again. We couldn't turn the van around in time. "We... we have to get all
the evidence out of here we can. They took the papers and the gun, but,
but they didn't have any time to clean out any other rooms... What's that
smell?"


    Just as I noticed it too, the smoke detector started beeping.
There wasn't any...


    The oven. Sure enough, Nabiki had turned on all the burners
without lighting them. Filling the room with natural gas. Wanted the house
to explode when it hit a flame source. If she was counting on it igniting,
there was Thermite burning through a hard drive and any incriminating
paperwork right now. Fancy smoke detector that can notify you of gas
leaking, though, must be a perk of being in charge of home appliances. I
went to shut the smoke alarm off so I could think.


    Wait.


    What's that stuck inside of it?


                                 * * * * *


    Nabiki Egawa lays tread the moment her wheels hit asphalt. Her
assailants won't be pursuing, not with a butcher knife chucked into their
front tire. Her husband clutches his hand and moans in pain. He should be
reloading the shotgun, but he isn't.


    "So let's review," Nabiki says through gritted teeth. "What went
wrong that time, so we can avoid it happening again?"


    "I think she broke something in my hand," Isamu whimpers. "We need
to go to a hospital."


    "We're not going to a hospital!" Nabiki barks. "No guards, long
sight lines. Unless Rem can catch bullets, then if that lady gets out
before the cops arrive, she has a really good chance of picking us off!
Your hand is going to be fine, you big baby. Now, Rem, I thought you said
she couldn't be killed by the Death Note, what is this about her being hit
but coming back?"


    "That is why she cannot be killed," Rem drones. "A human can only
have one entry in the Death Note. She was killed by means other than heart
attack, but revived by human medicine. If I wrote her name again, it would
not take effect."


    "Okay." Nabiki bristles with her hands pushing the steering wheel.
"That's real good to know." She thinks for a couple of seconds. "Rem, I
took some hits back there. Did I lose the baby?"


    "I don't know."


    "Rem, you can walk through objects, you can walk through people,
you can see how long people have left to live, you can stick your head in
there and tell me if she's still alive -- BRRRRRR!" Nabiki shudders as Rem
phases through her body.


    "Your child is still alive."


    "Okay. Great. Fantastic." Nabiki is still shivering. "Now we need
to get to the police until we know she's been caught. They can splint your
hand there, honey."


    Rem ponders. Isamu whimpers. "Misa seemed proud of that woman."
Rem muses. Rem has seen her before, flying out to give away the Death Note
-- she had stopped for a few seconds to recall what her negative lifespan
meant. "She was very fond. Attached. She kissed the woman."


    "Yeah, and that's why we didn't kill her, right?" Nabiki says back
even though she wasn't addressed. And as though they had a good chance to
kill her they never took. "So what if they're friends or lovers or
whatever?"


    "Nothing," Rem mumbled as she took out her Death Note and wrote in
Greek. //LIGHT YAGAMI. SUICIDE. CONSUMED WITH REGRET BY THE WICKEDNESS OF
HIS ACTIONS, HE APOLOGIZES TO HIS MOST RECENT GIRLFRIEND, REVEALS THE
EXTENT OF HIS DECEPTIONS AND MANIPULATIONS, AND HELPS HER TO MOVE ON AND
FIND HAPPINESS WITH ANOTHER HUMAN AS WELL AS HE POSSIBLY CAN. THEN TO RID
HER OF HIS POISONOUS INFLUENCE, HE LEAPS INTO TRAFFIC AND HAS HIS HEAD
REMOVED BY A PASSING BUS ON OCTOBER 7th, 2007, 3:08 PM.//


                               * L I G H T *


    Everything was bright and white and cool. Ryuzaki's lips were on
mine. My heart was pumping. He was singing.


    "Don't you die on me Yagami," he said. Why was he saying that? He
pinched my nose and breathed into my mouth again. He sang in English,
"It's all right, and it's okay, and you may look the other way, and we can
try, to understand, the New York Times' effect on man..." as he shoved the
flats of his palms into my sternum in time with the music. "You're my
subordinate and I didn't give you permission to die." I coughed, and
foul-smelling liquid sprayed out of my mouth. He exhaled relief. "He's
breathing! Light! Can you hear me, Light? You're alive!"


    "I am?" I was? Groggily I rolled onto my side, and coughed up
more. My head was killing me. My mouth tasted absolutely foul. "Where am
I? Why is it so bright in here?"


    "Light. You are in the women's bathroom at the command center,"
Ryuzaki said. He was still all perched on the balls of his feet on the
tile floor. "Your heart completely stopped, Light. You died."


    "Oh. Cool?" That seemed like it would be a neat story to tell.
"Where's Ryuk?"


    "Who is Ryuk?" he asked. Good question. Who was Ryuk?


    "He was... I think he was here with me?" Everything seemed real
foggy. I was here... to do something important... and someone was with me.


    "Light. Light! You ran into the women's bathroom. You closed the
panic door to snap the handcuff chain. Then you drowned yourself in the
toilet. You were dead when I found you." He pointed up to the red box on
the wall. "Thank God we have those defibrillators."


    "Huh. Did I really do that? I feel like I was here for something
else." It was... it was coming back to me I think. I was keeping something
secret...


    Right. Kira. That was the secret. Big secret, too. Don't wanna
tell this guy! Where was Ryuk, anyway? I bet he'd want to laugh at me, or
say I wasn't in the spirit of the game.


    No, he probably left. You gave up the Note when you died, but you
only gave up your memories when you renounced it. Why bother to tell it to
take your memories when you die, when that gets accomplished anyway?
Whoever made it probably didn't think 'what happens if they die with the
note, and come back?' and the answer was the 'give up ownership' event
happens and 'give up memories' doesn't.


    I sat up, rubbing my aching head. "Ugh. What was I in here for?"
It was really important. I had to get away from something.


    Ryuzaki wouldn't stop staring at me. "Kira made you kill yourself.
Kira made you kill yourself in a disgusting, humiliating manner." That...
That rings a bell, actually. "Light... You really, really aren't Kira, are
you?"


    I winced at the brightness of the light. Seriously, were all
women's rooms this bright? "That's what I've been trying to tell you,
dude. I'm not Kira."


    Ryuzaki was looking down at the floor, chewing his nail. "I was so
focused on you. I thought it would be an insult to think it wasn't you.
Everything was always about you. I figured you were hitting too many
buttons for a Holy paladin. I was letting you play your game just so you
could feed information to Kira-Y and expose guilty knowledge. I thought I
was going to trap you."


    Thaaaaaat was it. Guilty knowledge. Naomi and Misa were at the
real Kira-Y's place right now, because I fed him a tip I shouldn't have.
If Misa looked too much like she was over me where Rem could see it, if
Naomi got her suspicions confirmed and then got the Death Note, I'd be
dead after 40 seconds plus the time it took to write my name. So I had to
do it first. That was why the second entry on my watch paper read:


    //LIGHT YAGAMI. DROWNING. 8:14 PM.//


    And it was in here, because there were no cameras in the women's
room. There was a panic door that locked Ryuzaki out. An AED on the wall.
I think I figured drowning was the easiest thing to come back from? I
probably had like a 60, 70% chance of being revived. I mean, that ain't
great, but it's better than 0%. So I did it in a way that didn't make it
look like I was planning on being revived. And it worked! Go me. Man, I
hoped I didn't have any brain damage.


    "I... I didn't even think it might not be you. I didn't think Misa
needed to be monitored outside of contact with you." he continued. "I have
two rogue operatives and I didn't even notice it. Light. Light." His
sunken eyes were the most dire I ever saw them. "I think I really fucked
this investigation up, Light."


    "Well, you're not dead yet," I croaked. "There is still room to
get worse." I got up on one elbow. "When I died, did I beat myself with a
hammer? My head is killing me." It was. It was also clearing. I think.
Ryuzaki handed me some pills. "I think... I think Naomi and Misa did this.
They ran off, right? Why else waste our time with that big ruse?"


    "Misa Amane is active as the second Kira once again," Ryuzaki
said. "She hasn't killed me so I assume her power didn't return until just
now, when she killed you for being her ex-boyfriend. We have to take her
out." Could I kill Misa right now? That would solve a shit-zillion
problems for me. I could put her name in the Note. Everyone but me thought
she was immune to it, so with a plausible cause of death it wouldn't even
be suspicious.


    No, no. I can't kill Misa. Rem can't kill me with her Death Note
but she was still an invincible spectre that's suicidal over Misa's
well-being. A shinigami will be horrifically tortured to death if they
kill a human by any means other than the Death Note -- but I doubted Rem
would give a shit if I killed Misa. The odds were not good enough, when I
couldn't guarantee Misa's impending death was happening at the hands of an
unmasked person where Rem could see it. "What if it wasn't her? What if it
was Naomi?"


    "I don't think so. I'll tell you when I brief the others, but
Light, I'm not..." His breaths were heavier and his head was shaking. "I'm
not holding back any more. I've put the entire world in danger with my
irresponsibility." He closed his eyes and breathed deeply. "One of them
definitely is. And I missed it."


    And then, Ryuzaki's phone started to ring.


    It was Misa.


    I snatched it out of his hand and flipped it open. I was loopy,
right? I had to make sure I spoke before she said anything that assumed I
was alive. I set the phone to speaker and said "Hey Misa, what's up?"


    "L-Light?" she stammered. Perfect. Perfect. Now it looked like
she's surprised I am alive. "Why are you-- I need to talk to Ryuzaki,
Light. It's really important. Put him on right now."


    "I'm here, Misa," he said. "What is going on? You have gone
missing."


    "Light is Kira!" she blurted. "He's Kira and we know it and we can
prove it! He was talking to Isamu at Yotsuba and told them I was going to
send him a message, and we made it look like Naomi sent the message
instead, and Isamu still knew it was supposed to be from me! Isamu is the
guy too, we went to his house, but his Kira power is like a ghost or
something and it threw us around and let them escape! He's doing something
with sheets of paper! You have to lock Light up right now!"


    "Misa... what are you talking about?" I slurred.


    "I know it's not really you, Light!" she said. "It's Kira! It's
controlling you or it's blackmailing you or something! Naomi actually
fought a Kira and she kicked it in the face and she's gonna beat the shit
out of yours too!" She kicked Rem in the face? That was funny.


    "This is useful information," Ryuzaki said. "The team is going to
need time to go over this. How soon can you return to headquarters?"


    Misa did not answer that question. "Lock. Light. Up. Right. Now.
Don't talk to him. Don't give him a chance to explain anything. Kira is
using him to do evil. Lock him up in an empty room."


    "I will detain Light, miss Amane," Ryuzaki said while shaking his
head 'no' at me. "But you need to come back here. It isn't safe out there
on your own."


    There was a wordless grunt in the negative. Naomi was there. She
did not trust the offer. Time to be loopy again!


    "You guys did kill me, you know. I think you can at least come by
to say sorry, right?" Don't come by. Keep Misa in the field and able to
get her memories. Lose all ability to claim you didn't know what was
happening, and taint your story.


    "KILL you?" Misa barked. "How did we... Oh. Oh, that's how it is.
That's what you did. You're really, really smart, Light. You framed us."


    "You had ample opportunity to transmit a secret message to the
Yotsuba Kira," Ryuzaki said "You are cheating on Light with another woman
and would want to be rid of him. You wasted everyone's time and
compromised the entire investigation of Yotsuba so you could go to an
unknown location, after which point Light died in a vindictive manner. You
have prepared yourself for deception by staying in character for a week,
but you were surprised and shocked when he was alive. If you have a better
story, tell it in person. Otherwise, your access is revoked and every
member of the investigation will be hunting you down." He looked up at me
with resolve. "We know one of the two of you is Kira. We will not rest
until you are captured."


    "We're going to get Isamu," she said. "We're going to fix
everything."


                                 * * * * *


    "Deridovely! C'mere!" Ryuk croaks happily, gesturing to the
observation hole, waving his acquaintance over. From here, shinigami can
observe humanity, deciding who to prey upon. One of the few interesting
things in the shinigami realm. "Check this shit out."


    The bandaged, masked creature pokes his head to the portal and
looks. Inside, he sees a human with no shoes, //LESLIE TAYLOR LAWLIET
75231362// helping up a human who has shoes, //LIGHT YAGAMI -34//


    "W... What's that number mean? With the dash."


    "It's negative!" Ryuk chortles. "Remember the Death Note I dropped
in the human world? He got it! He just killed himself with a page, so the
detective looking for whoever has the notebook can bring him back, so Rem
-- you remember Rem, right? -- so SHE couldn't kill him like a minute
later, and now the detective guy totally trusts him! Where's Gola, I want
one of those reference books. I gotta see how bad these humans are
screwing with the rules!"


    "Oh wow..." The shinigami doesn't quite follow all of that but it
sounds neat. "I guess you were right. Humans really are interesting
creatures!"


                               * N A O M I *


    "I know this is not an appropriate time to worry about this?" Misa
said. "But I really hope being arrested doesn't affect my career. I mean,
I guess it isn't for drugs, right?"


    I was humiliated, made helpless and powerless, twice. Unable to
resist its assault. Our attack had been completely thwarted. The cops came
soon after the Egawas left, I was happily surprised Misa didn't tip our
location when she saw the blue and red lights pull up. All we could
recover was a single blank sheet of notebook paper wedged in a smoke
detector.


    "I don't know why you had me shoot the gun, either. I know it's
probably a complicated plan, but, please remember to explain it when you
get a pen." She had to get GSR on her hands. Had to be part of the same
crime.


    Now we were in the back of a squad car. Handcuffed. Our gear,
taken. Everything in the van would be presumed lost outside of the duffle
bag and my messenger bag. Those things and the contents of our pockets
would be admitted into evidence. Except my cards. My crutch. And that
sheet of notebook paper Misa slipped into my pocket. I needed those to
walk and to communicate with my interrogator, you see.


    Now I couldn't tell Misa everything I had concluded. I didn't have
a pen back here, I couldn't use the cards. I had to get HER to realize it.
I had to say... what was it... a name... "Kira."


    "Okay. Kira. We just learned that Kira is a ghost. Or like a Stand
or something." Grunt in the affirmative. "The ghost is the Kira. So then
what are Isamu and Light and... and, and, uh, and me?"


    "Kill." I said while shaking my head.


    "Kira kills. No. Kira doesn't kill. But Kira does kill people,
that's what he does!"


    "Nnngh!" I couldn't get my hands to my head, but I mimed my finger
as a pistol and made "pchoo" noises.


    "Shoot. Oh. Kira doesn't SHOOT people." she was starting to get
it. "Because Nabiki had to say she would do it for him. So Kira... can't
kill anyone, but he does, all the time?"


    You should know this Misa, come on, we need to finish this
conversation before we get to the station!


    "You two should know, just because you claim to be involved with
Kira, and the police aren't investigating him, that doesn't mean we'll let
you out," said the officer driving. "That didn't work for the last twenty
people and it won't work with you."


    Argh! I pointed at Misa as best I could with one hand, and mimed
speaking. "You're talking. I'm talking? I'm talking. You can't talk.
Right, so I say things... Oh! An interpreter! Kira needs an interpreter!
Someone else HAS to do it for him!" The most logical inference to make.
Kira was someone or something that can grant the power to kill with a name
and face, but Kira must do so through a human intermediary, and was
forbidden or incapable of taking life on its own.


    "And. And, paper. Paper." There was paper on the counter. They
left in a hurry, she didn't put on shoes, and yet they picked up every
single piece. And there was a piece of paper hidden in a smoke detector,
where nobody should have been able to find it.


    "They had paper... they ran off with it... they hid some... it was
blank, so there was nothing like incriminating written on it. Unless it
was invisible ink." Possible, but I didn't think so. "So... the paper
itself is special. It's how they use Kira's power! They, they draw up a
contract on a sheet, and they sign it in blood or something!" I shushed
her before she got to the part where she resulted in that paper being
taken out of my pocket. "This is huge!" she whispered back. "We gotta tell
L!"


    Crap. We were coming up on the station. Why couldn't I just talk
like a normal God damned person and whisper her the whole plan?


    But then we were being taken out of the car, and walked through
the front door of the station. Front desk. Two prisoners, take them this
way. The holding cells are in the back, past the offices and the bullpen,
so you can't escape without running past thirty cops. We needed to be
spotted by the Egawas, who wouldn't know how soon we would be leaving.
They just got here, so they'd be at an office having their statements
taken. If we were lucky, we'd slip in inconspicuously, they'd run the
serial number, and we'd be ready to leave before the Egawas...


    Misa fell onto her ass, screaming, as soon as we came through the
doors to the bullpen. "HOLY SHIT! WHAT IN GOD'S NAME IS THAT THING?" she
howled, pointing an unsteady hand... at nothing. A closed office. With the
lights on. And two silhouettes by the window. "IT'S KIRA! IT'S HERE!
SOMEONE SHOOT IT! WHERE --" Misa looked around to everyone in a panic.
Nobody knew what she was screaming about. Nobody saw what she saw.
Everyone was staring at her. Including the eyes on the other side of the
blinds. Nabiki's eyes. Right by what she was screaming at.


    Misa couldn't see it before. I still couldn't. It can't be
something you can see because you're immune to Kira-ing. But we looked for
evidence after Kira left with them... I pulled the blank paper out of the
smoke detector when I still had gloves on, but Misa stuffed it in my
pocket with her bare hands. Maybe it's a business card...


    I slid my hand into my pocket. I felt a jolt, like a surge of
static electricity. And I saw it. Kira.


    Looming and gangly, like a skeleton's mummy. Arms and legs made
out of spinal columns. Purple, gelatinous hair concealing at least one
ophidian eye. Chest like a ribcage with so many extra ribs they were
flying off the shoulders. Staring at us. I sort of knew what was coming,
so I only staggered backwards into the officer escorting us when I saw the
horror. That was a murder wraith. That was a god of death.


    "It's... right... there..." Misa said. "Right where my finger is
pointing. Shoot right THERE."


    It wouldn't work. I shot it before. There were no bullet holes in
it now. "P... uh. Uh. Paint?"


    "Yes! Spray it with paint! So it can't hide!" Misa barked, never
taking her eyes off it.


    "Are you two done making a scene?" the officer asked us. "Because
you're still under arrest."


    "My name is Rem," the thing said, voice like a rumble coming from
a crypt.


    The officer pulled Misa to her feet. We shared a glance. Around
us, there were murmurs.


    "Is that who I think it is?"


    "What's she doing, getting arrested?"


    "Did she go crazy?"


    Okay. New plan. She saw what I was thinking, or close to it.
"Sorry! I must be loopy from not eating. Confused my life for a movie
again! My apologies. Hey, but if anyone wants to talk to me," she said
while staring at 'Rem', "I'll be in the ladies' holding cell, and I have
nothing but time!" She winked.


                                 * * * * *


    "I have to see Misa," Rem says. "She is in the ladies' holding
cell. You have to take me there."


    The lieutenant behind his desk is scrolling on his computer
screen, looking for the record of the Egawa's permit for a hunting
shotgun. It is probably there, but he can't search an index, and the whole
thing is a mess. Computers, right?


    Nabiki looks to the LT. Then she looks to Rem. Can't talk in here.
She shakes her head when she's sure the cop isn't looking, and makes the
'cut' sign over her throat.


    "I don't care what the human enforcer will find suspicious," Rem
snarls. "Take me to see Misa."


    "Are there some paper records you can look through?" Isamu asks,
very helpfully. "This is our home precinct. A copy of our license should
be in this building."


    "Well, yeah, but the computer's supposed to be faster..." the cop
trails off. "Yeah, I'll go check archives. You two sit tight, all right?"


    Rem waits until the door is almost finished closing. "He's gone.
Ladies holding cell. Now."


    "That's not going to be how this works, Rem," Nabiki chides.
"You're going to be a good little god of death and do what we say. Isamu,
please show her why she's going to be good from now on."


    His Death Note is covered in butcher's paper to conceal its
properties, but it's right in his briefcase. His handwriting is sloppy
from the injury to his hand. But it's clearly legible: //NABIKI EGAWA.
9:03 PM//


    It's 9:18.


    "One entry per person," Nabiki says like she's correcting a
wayward child. "One kill per entry. You can tell my baby lives with your
freaky eyes, so as far as gods of death are concerned, my child is right
now a living entity. The notebook isn't separate from how you work. And it
can't kill me with a heart attack without killing the baby, can it?" She
fixes Rem with an expectant glare. "CAN IT?"


    "It... it can't."


    "If it can't kill someone in a given way, it tries to make a heart
attack. You told us that. But it can't do a heart attack. It's not smart
enough to write that I walk to the hospital and deliver a C-section before
I die. We know there are things that can happen so that if your name is
written you don't die. You warned us not to spell things wrong, remember?
But there's no way for it to ever kill two living people at once. So it
can't kill me now. And I only get the one entry." she lectures. "Now if
you want to kill me you have to do it yourself, and that's going to mean
you die. And my husband is going to do what?"


    "I'm going to write Misa's name in the Death Note, honey."


    "That's riiight. And if you try to write HIS name, well, that's
against the rules because you're stopping him from killing her bodyguard!
And you die. And guess what I do ten seconds later?" she says like we've
all learned a valuable lesson. "We agree we don't hurt Misa, and that's
it. Everything else is fair game. You keep your trap shut."


    Rem has nothing to do but fume when the door opens through her
body.


                               * N A O M I *


    "Oh, it's no trouble at all," Misa explained while she autographed
her photo. "It's just a big misunderstanding. I'm not upset by it, I know
you police work very hard, and it's not much of an inconvenience."


    "Ballistic." I said from the back bench. Easier when it was the
most recent word I used. "Ballistic."


    "Shoko says that the faster you run ballistics, or, like, whatever
the thing you do to scan a gun is, then the faster this all gets cleared
up," Misa added in an incredibly reasonable voice. "Serial number or
something, maybe? I'm not sure. They haven't let her have a writing
utensil."


    Her cop fan nodded and slid the picture into his back pocket.
"Hey, sure," he said with a shrug. "It's not like you're asking me to let
you go, or anything. I could tell 'em to speed it up."


    "If I asked for you to let me go, would you?" she asked jokingly,
batting her eyelashes.


    "This is for my daughter, ma'am." he said frankly. "She brought me
to see 'Heart of Hands'."


    "Whoa, then I guess I'm lucky you're helping at all!" she
chuckled. They bowed to each other, politely, and her fan walked away. She
walked back to the bench and sat next to me. The women's holding cell was
nicer than in America, and the bench on the wall had a cushion on it, as
well as being flanked by nice plush chairs. There was even a TV on the
wall. Unfortunately, it was broadcasting the execrable 'Kira Knowledge'.
We had two cellmates: a stocky obaasan dozing away, reeking of booze, and
a scrawny girl with stringy hair who loved Kira despite not really being
Kira's target audience. As a compromise, we turned the TV show low enough
so she had to stand under the TV to watch it, and I could pretend it
wasn't there. Much more important things to do.


    "I have no idea what happened in that movie," Misa said when she
sat down. "I'm preeeeeetty sure I wasn't the star?" She looked down.
"And... This is all somehow going to get us out of lockup, right?" I
nodded at her. "You're certain?" I was.


    And that was it. She didn't keep asking, doubt didn't keep gnawing
at her. We were getting out because I said so and she was utterly tranquil
in her confidence. "Okay. What is our next move?"


    I held up one finger. "Rem." She nodded. Rem may come to speak to
us. Or start a fight, but that would create an opportunity on its own.
Hopefully. I held up a second finger, then I pulled out the paper from my
pocket. Between my fingers, I started batting Misa's face with it.


    "Ack! Stop! Stop! Pphhhhhttt!" she sputtered while batting her
hands at me uselessly. "Cut it out! It tickles!" I did cut it out, and I
held it up for her again. "Why did... Oh. That let us see 'Rem'. So we
just kind of run around slapping everyone in the face with it until they
all see Rem too." She thought about it. "If you think it's cool to tear it
up, I have a better idea. That doesn't put paper in my nose."


    Was it okay to tear? If it wasn't, then the rules were so arcane
we couldn't predict what was and wasn't okay. And if we tore it up, nobody
could get it away from us and sign a death contract. I nodded, and she
folded the sheet and started licking it along the folds to weaken it, then
tearing it into thin strips. "Bracelet!" she said like she figured out the
solution. "Anyone who touches your arm or hand will probably touch it. You
can brush it up against someone no problem. But it doesn't look like you
are doing anything special. And if you need to destroy it, you can eat
it." She mimed swallowing. "Like a spy."


    I was impressed, and I hoped the noise I made conveyed that.
Immediately, she was lying on her stomach, feet kicking up in the air,
like this was muscle memory. And I was down on the ground with her. I
watched her carefully folding each strip into a shape she could weave
together. "I used to make these in middle school. I was in a home video
about them, but I didn't have any lines. Just giggles." She used her
earring as a flat tip, rubbing her creases as flat as possible before
pulling it apart. "You try one! Fold the strip just like this one. By the
end it'll all look like triangles."


    I worked slow, careful. Bend... make sure it's aligned with the
page edge... crease. These weren't my middle school forte; we made the
Japanese version of cootie catchers and our friendship bracelets were
plastic beads. But it felt nice. Like we were just hanging out and being
friends, and not in lockup with a murderous ghost a few rooms away.
Bend... line it up... crease.


    "I'd paint this black so it matches your aesthetic," she said
without looking up, "but I don't know if paint covers the effect up." The
scrawny Kira fan was staring at us while the TV played an ad for a show
about a cat who was supposed to solve mysteries but was too lazy, this
fall on Sakura. I felt like a detective show advertising in the Kira
Praise Hour was a conflict of interest, or at least off-message.


    I tapped for her attention, and I shook my head. Hand around my
wrist, like holding a bracelet, I said "You."


    "Me? I should wear it." She nodded and returned to her folding.
"That makes sense, people want to get closer to me more easily. Plus I can
run around slapping people while you wrestle with 'Rem'. It's good to be
useful to you." Her feet were idly kicking back and forth. It made me feel
younger. Ugh, the fact that I could feel young again should make me feel
like an old hag. But just... not so much when I was around her.


    I wanted to kiss her right now. But we had a very important
friendship bracelet to make and lockup wasn't the time for public displays
of affection.


    She looked up at me, and she giggled. I think she was thinking the
same thing. She put out her hand daintily, and I kissed the back of it. I
felt lighter. All that self-recrimination about loving a killer, how it
was destroying me, they were melting slowly but surely. Seeing her stand
against an invincible ghost and get arrested for me and keep charging
forward was doing a lot for that.


    I finished a strip. It was a bit crooked, but Misa looked like it
would work. It was almost like -- man, I hadn't thought about that in
years. The little caterpillars. I chuckled to myself.


    "What?" Misa asked. "What's so funny?"


    "Caterpillar..." I said. I wished I had my cards.


    "Caterpillar. What about a caterpillar?"


    God damn it, the thing, the thing where they came from, green and
white lines... "Printer."


    "You printed a caterpillar? No?"


    "Uh. Ah. Uhhhhhh.... Line." I stammered.


    "You printed a line of caterpillars?"


    Ugh. My mood was ruined. I was already crying in frustration. It
was a simple story, a tiny thing, it didn't matter, why did I try? Why
couldn't I just say it like a normal functional human being? I waved my
hand in frustration to dismiss the idea. Forget it. Not worth it.


    And Misa looked up at me. "No. I want to hear it. I want to know
what you have to say." This. This was life and death for her. This was how
devoted she was.


    Okay. She cared. This thing, they only had them on the printers,
they were, they were, like, a property... "Old."


    "Old. Something is old. What thing is old?"


    What -- what did I say before? The machine, the old ones, with
paper. "Printer."


    "Something about an old printer. Right." She clasped her hands
together.


    I picked up the ever-dwindling sheet of unripped paper and held it
up next to a strip. I mimicked the noise of a printer while slowly moving
it upward, and after a bit of that, I did a tearing noise as I pulled the
strip away. Pantomime.


    "Old printers did something where you tore a strip off of them.
Oh, is that like the thing that had little holes in the sides, in the old
movies? That's what the line is?" She was getting it! I mimicked folding,
left to right and up to down and right to left and down to up. "Oh, and
you folded them. And that is a caterpillar? Is that right?"


    Yup. The perforated strips on the side of form feed printer paper,
you can tear them off, and you folded them together, and it was a little
caterpillar. That's all. A useless little anecdote of what I did when I
was 8. Not worth all of that time to communicate for anyone on Earth.
Except for Misa Amane.


    "It's just a caterpillar. Don't make a big deal out of it,"
croaked the drunken aunt.


    "I like it," Misa said. "It sounds cute. Could you make one for
me?" she asked. "I think we have enough paper here for like one point
three bracelets, so there's spares."


    So I did. I folded them as tight as I could, like an eight year
old, while Misa finished her work on her Rem-revealing friendship
bracelet. It did indeed look like a bunch of woven triangles. My
caterpillar needed googly eyes, or at least one. It may have been a waste
of time, but it wasted just enough time for Misa's friend the cop to come
back. He looked... as unhappy as I expected.


    "We're releasing both of you," he monotoned. "You're free to go."


    "Yay!" Misa chirped. "I told you it was all a big
misunderstanding. Thanks so much for your help!"


    "It wasn't a misunderstanding!" he spat. "The HEAD OF THE YOKOHAMA
POLICE called me! Not his secretary! Not his deputy! The actual
commissioner of all police stations in Yokohama, called me AT MY DESK, to
tell me what happened wasn't a crime! How did -- he's not in his office!
How fast did someone tell him I ran the serial number on that handgun?"
Oh. That was... disturbing. I hadn't heard this much the last two times.
Was that better or worse than if it was the Prime Minister? The conspiracy
didn't reach as high, but more people had to be in on it.


    "Well, I mean, whatever it was," Misa said, "we appreciate your
understanding."


    "You're involved in some dark conspiracy at the highest echelons
of power. You are exactly the sort of person Kira should be killing," he
spat as he unlocked the door. Scrawny girl started getting worked up over
something on the TV. He was wrong, though. This wasn't a conspiracy. This
was the two of us. That was how we were going to win: we were clever,
flexible and slippery. Kira may kill from afar, and we had short range --
but nothing was going to stick to us, and we didn't have complicated face
rules or one-time-only vulnerability windows. From now on I just needed
line of sight. Just one woman and her voice, out for revenge.


                               * L I G H T *


    "Light!" Dad couldn't pretend to be stoic right now. He ran at me
and hugged me so hard he picked me up off the ground. "Light! You're
alive!" Tears were running down his face and into his moustache. "I was so
worried! Don't... Don't do that to me, son!"


    "Geez, Dad," I squeaked. "You didn't know I was dead until you
knew I was alive."


    He dropped me and held me by my shoulders. "Light... I could never
forgive myself if something happened. Sayu and your mother..."


    "Dad! I'm fine. Really. And Ryuzaki said now he knows I'm not
Kira," I told him. I started rubbing my neck -- it was sore, especially
right where it rested against the bowl. Like it was real sensitive.


    "That is the only good news we have," said Ryuzaki. Normally he
said everything in a disinterested kind of almost-monotone. Now he was the
most serious I ever heard him. Like he was someone who knew he really
messed up. "And you all deserve to know the rest of it. Light, may I?"


    Why ask me? "Hit it, Ryuzaki."


    He pressed a little remote and the main display screen popped up
Naomi and Misa's headshots -- Naomi was the photo for her fake ID, but
Misa's was literally a headshot from her portfolio, wrapped in rose stem
designs, where she was winking and throwing up the 'V for Victory'. "Two
of our agents have gone rogue. While she was monitoring her, Naomi Misora
became emotionally involved with Misa Amane. They staged a deception by
using Misa's stunt double Nori, to distract and occupy our attention. This
distraction destroyed our secret surveillance of the Yotsuba Prosperity
Council. While we were distracted, they snuck away in secret to a
clandestine location. And then Light Yagami killed himself in a
humiliating fashion. Misa Amane has re-obtained the power of Kira. Naomi
has removed her hearing aid. They have no tracking device and no tail."


    "My God!" said Mogi. "Are we safe?"


    "It gets worse," he said. "Naomi is armed with a Minuteman's
pistol. She used it to kill Koreyoshi Kitamura, and--" He barely even
acknowledged the chorus of gasps that came with that statement. "--and,
she could not be prosecuted for it. Systems put in place by my employers
would destroy the entire economy of Japan if anyone prosecuted a crime
committed with that weapon."


    "SHE HAS A WHAT?" SHE HAD A WHAT?  There was a cacophony and I was
part of it. This was absurd. This was insane. I was going to drop
Kitamura's murder as a bomb, but this, oh man, this was NOT what I was
expecting. Dad said what we were all thinking: "That's impossible,
Ryuzaki! How could she be above the law?"


    Ryuzaki stared my father down from 30 cm below him. "Where did you
think the money for this complex came from, Soichiro? Is solving crimes
that lucrative? How did I get a backdoor to every single law enforcement
organization on the planet? Why do I have access to the best person of
every single profession that has ever existed? Do I look that charismatic
to you?" His teeth were gritted. He was crying. Ryuzaki never cried. He
held his hand to his forehead, panting, and just when it looked like he
was done he started in again. "Do you think good people can bankroll this
sort of operation, Soichiro? How many acts of criminal trespass and
wiretapping have I ordered while you were in the room? Did you see me
falsify drug charges to imprison someone on evidence I never showed to the
police? Why do I get to steal cancer patients to use as human shields? How
do I have the right to steal Geraldo Coil's name? Whose idea was it to
raise orphans who answered only to code letters so NOBODY COULD EVER KNOW
WHO THEY WERE? WHERE DOES THE GOD DAMN MONEY COME FROM, SOICHIRO?" He was
shouting. Ryuzaki never shouted.


    He took a few breaths through gritted teeth to re-control his
temper. "Things are the way they are because there are powerful people who
want things to be that way. Sometimes these people want someone who will
hunt down other criminals and bring them to light. But sometimes they want
to send someone in to make a problem completely disappear. They empowered
two people to make these goals happen, and gave them the tools they
needed. I suppose both went rogue. One offered his detective skills to the
people of the world, in the name of Justice. One offered his untraceable
weapons to those who had been wronged, in the name of Revenge. And
Koreyoshi Kitamura greatly wronged Naomi Misora." How? what the heck was
in that file, that Ryuzaki would not stop her from murdering a police
official, even one who sided with Kira? "She was visited by a god of death
who gave her the power to kill someone and get away with it. I concealed
this from you. I was trying not to pick a side between the Minutemen and
our employers, but... I will choose the path that's clear. I side with
Justice. I pick civilization. The police may not cooperate with us. They
may not be able to touch her. But we aren't the police. We're doing what
we came here for. We're going to take her down."


    The room was silent. It was a lot to take in. There were going to
be some big, big people for Kira to kill when this was over. And my best
patsy had just been eliminated -- if you had a gun that was above the law,
why would you bother seeking out Kira power? I was going to say she could
still use it because she didn't need language to use the default heart
attack option, but compared to shooting people in the face and walking
away, yeah, I can't see her jumping through many hoops for the ability to
hand out heart attacks!


    Shit! If I can't pin Kira on Naomi with maybe a coerced assist for
proper syntax, then it's all Misa. She might be in line for execution.
Even if Misa takes the fall but lives, I could get her out once I have
total control of L, but Rem may not be so patient. And it's hard to GET
total control without someone who has shinigami eyes who can run into my
arms and cry about how the big mean brain-damaged cripple made her assist
those evil Kira deeds!


    "How could you do this?" Matsuda said. "I trusted her, because I
trusted YOU! And you, you let us pal around with a murderer!" He was not
the only one who was angry. The whole room was practically roiling.


    "I had problem with this operation from the start, but I shut up
for the sake of the mission," Aizawa barked. "I cannot believe the shit
you have gotten us into, Ryuzaki. Consider this my resignation."


    "Don't be so hasty. I can't accept that resignation. Because I'm
stepping down as leader of this investigation effective immediately."
Ryuzaki's voice was a mumble that somehow projected to every corner of the
room. "Light Yagami is now leading the case. I will remain as
second-in-command and advisor." He took a real deep breath. "I allowed my
emotions to compromise the integrity of this investigation. I put all of
us in danger. This is the greatest failure of my career and I'm not going
to prolong it. Light?"


    Oh God he was taking orders from me now. Oh, delicious. Oh,
everything just became wonderful, my fortune reversed in a second. I
couldn't ask for his name, of course, but if anything took him out by now
I was in the clear. I was even going to get Watari! Free and clear! All I
had to do was clean up two loose ends, one of whom was brain-damaged and
the other of whom was an idiot!


    "Okay. Okay." Deep breath. Act like I am thinking hard. "I think
if it is Misa, and all she needs is your face, everyone is dead anyway.
She's seen our faces. There's nothing we can do about it. But... I don't
think that's how that works." I knew that wasn't how it worked, but now I
had a chance to infer it. "If it was, she could have done something to
Ryuzaki by now. I think..." Steeple hands in front of face, deep thought.
"What's more likely? There is one power that allows you to kill with a
name and face, and then another power that allows you to kill with a face,
that otherwise follows the same rules? Or that there's a power that allows
you to kill with a name and face... and a power to know someone's name if
you can see their face?


    "Whichever one of them it was, they knew my name and face already,
but they haven't seen your faces while they possessed that power." Not too
far off the real rules, but assuming 'Misa would get name vision and Naomi
would not' would let me pin it on Naomi better. "So I don't want anyone
leaving this building without facial protection. Aizawa, Mogi, and
Matsuda, none of you ever used your first names around them, did you?"


    Aizawa had interrupted his storming off procedure and was now
waiting to be impressed. "Mogi and I only used our last names. I don't
know about Matsuda, he spent a lot of alone time with them."


    "We'll... have to think about you, Matsuda," I said. "Misa is
incredibly charismatic. I'm honestly not sure where your loyalties lie.
Mogi and Aizawa, you're going to have to be our ground game for now. If
you are okay with that, Aizawa. But Dad... Dad, everyone was calling you
Soichiro so you wouldn't get confused for me."


    Dad looked down. Glum. Defeated. "I'm a point of vulnerability. I
could be made to sabotage the investigation. I'll go home."


    "Dad, you can't go home," I told him. And this part really was
sad. Mom and Sayu were going to be out of their minds. "She can make you
do something out there that helps her escape. You need to be in a holding
cell with doctors watching you... and probably a convenient place to
attempt suicide that makes it possible to revive you." This was really for
the best, though. The rest of this investigation might end up having to
die, so Dad should be stashed in a safe place. Dad didn't look happy about
it, but he wasn't mad at me. Or even, really, Ryuzaki. He was just
resigned.


    "Misa attempted to cast blame on Isamu Egawa of the Yotsuba
Prosperity Council," Ryuzaki said. I was in charge but he was the guy who
was reading the briefings and giving the orders until a minute ago. And my
line of communication with Egawa had just been severed -- he was a rogue
agent too. "I don't know if Isamu is innocent and under attack, or is
Kira-Y and is where she acquired the power. But there were reports of
gunfire at the home of Isamu and Nabiki Egawa a few hours ago. Before I
handed off investigation lead, I ordered Wedy to the area, and to never
remove her helmet."


    "Good. Keep her on that," I told him. "She may have the power to
kill but we've got unprecedented information and coordination to track her
down with. That's how we're going to win." That, and the sheet of Death
Note paper in my watch, with room enough for one more entry. So far, the
two entries I'd used already had worked perfectly, though not pleasantly.
"All right, there's not many places we know they can go, and Aiber would
be most useful at her talent agency. Aiber?" I asked with a tap of his
communication panel.


    "Yeah, I know, I'm watching it too, Ryuzaki!" he said, voice
filled with shock.


    "...Wait, watching what?"


                                 * * * * *


    "I just... I don't know how to explain it to you any clearer," the
lieutenant says. "What happened to you wasn't a crime. We can't help you."


    "What do you mean?" Isamu asks, incredulous. They are still in the
office, giving as much information as they could about possible motives.
"She shot my door off, broke into my house, and tried to murder me and my
wife with a pistol! What combination of that makes it not a crime? Is
there just so much criminality it rolls over back to zero?"


    "I don't... I don't know, sir." The man isn't really clear on it
himself. "It just... isn't a crime. It's not a thing we're capable of
prosecuting. We're not going to charge you with a weapons violation,
either. We can return your property, drive you back to your home, and
that's about it."


    "BACK TO OUR HOME?" Isamu shouts. "Where there's nothing stopping
her from walking in and trying to kill us again? Literally, because I
don't have a front door any more? You're just going to let her out, aren't
you?"


    "I..." the officer sighs. "Once they get the paperwork cleared,
they're going to release the two of them and return their personal
effects. They didn't commit any crime. Because what happened in your home
was, apparently, not a crime."


    Isamu's about to yell, but Nabiki taps him on the shoulder.
"Yelling won't solve anything, honey," she says with a gentleness that is
entirely false. "Can I have your phone? I need to go outside and call my
sister, to see if she can put us up for the night." She points down to
Isamu's briefcase. "Could you make a note, darling? About that TV show we
watch? It may not be the most important thing in the world but I would
like to see it." And then she pauses. She looks at the desk in front of
them. A picture frame that has been turned face down. "And write down
something about getting Lieutenant Taro Ogawa a gift. Something that will
really make him love me. I think he deserves it."


    "I don't... Honey, I don't think he deserves it," Isamu says, but
there's only trepidation, not anger. "He couldn't help us, but it wasn't
his choice. He didn't really do anything."


    "I'm... not allowed to accept gifts," says the LT. "And I couldn't
really help you."


    "Isamu. I. Insist." Nabiki says in a forceful tone that brooks no
disagreement. And then she smiles pleasantly and walks out the door,
shivering through Rem's body.


    "What was that all about?" asks the officer.


    "Oh, nothing," Isamu says while he pulls out a notebook, covered
in butcher's paper like a high school textbook. "I... forget things
sometimes. So I have a notebook to write myself memos in. Nothing more."


                               * N A O M I *


    "Thanks for all you do for the community," Misa said, giving the
patrolman a firm handshake. With the paper friendship bracelet dangling
halfway over his hand.


    Right to the next desk. She bowed graciously. Then, ever the
cosmopolitan, gave a handshake. "Thanks for all you do for the community."


    And her bodyguard was behind her, of course. Holding the bag with
our stuff. As she worked her way, with legitimate purpose, to the back of
the room. With the office. With the monster.


    I wasn't so untouchable that a room full of cops weren't going to
STOP me from assassinating someone in the station. But when I drew iron on
a giant monster everyone saw, nobody would notice I was aiming behind it.
And if the fight went prolonged, they'd be running out of the range where
Isamu could see their name tags.


    "Thanks for all you do for the community," Misa said with a
winning smile.


    That's six by the time another patrolman ran into the room. "GUYS!
Are you not watching this? Turn it -- turn the TV on! Sakura!"


    Sakura should be on the tail end of... oh no. Oh shit. I saw Rem's
silhouette, but that didn't mean both of them were in there!


    The TV flickered on, the volume cranked up. "--epeat this message
for the next hour of programming," says a scrambled but feminine voice.
Then it cut.


    The host was sitting in his chair. "And now, we're taking a call
from Yamada in Yokohama, who has something to say about Kira's impact on
the financial sector. Yamada?"


    Misa and I looked at each other. Whatever this was, it was bad.
There's no time or ability for me to walk Misa through a nuanced plan of
action, so if we want to be in sync it's time to follow her playbook:
complete our prior objective with berserk aggression.


    "I want you to have a heart attack. Now," commanded the scrambled
voice on set.


    "Okay, very funny, we get a lot of -- HHHHHHGGGGGGH!" the host
grabbed his chest in pain immediately. She killed over the phone. How? Rem
was still over here! The host fell out of his chair and started writhing
on the floor. This was a tape. It was too late for him.


    Everyone watching the TV, transfixed, barely even noticed when
Misa grazed their hands with the bracelet as she ran past them. I dropped
our duffle bag on an empty desk and tore my pistol and spare mag out of
their evidence baggies. My vest was already on, I was a bodyguard, but
Misa's wasn't.


    The host stopped writhing, and the voice continued. "Good. Now I
want the rest of you to listen to me. This is not a message for L. This is
for the people of my new kingdom. Misa Amane is the Prophet of Kira. I
want her delivered COMPLETELY UNHARMED to the studio where this show is
recorded, where she will be taken for safekeeping. Anyone who causes her
any injury will spend 23 days begging for death before I grant it to them.
Anyone who attempts to prevent Misa's recovery, like the woman with her
right now, must be slain to prove your devotion to me."


    God.


    Damn it.


    "Now, repeat this message for the next hour of programming." the
voice concluded. The host was sitting in his chair again. The police were
looking at each other. At Misa. Backing away from each other. Office
political discussions were about to get really, really relevant.


    Japanese police carry guns while on duty. I knew that. How many of
the police here were still on duty enough to have not turned their weapons
in to the weapons locker? Does this precinct make you turn it in before
you sit down, or before you leave the station? One of them drew his
service revolver. Then three more. Pointing at each other, while the rest
of the officers tried to gauge who they should be diving toward. Four
guns. No idea what side each was on. They didn't know either.


    "You don't think..."


    "Our job is clear..."


    "You can't possibly believe..."


    "If Kira wants her, there has to be a reason..."


    All right, now we're just hoping to turn the entire situation into
a total disaster. I grabbed the chair from this empty desk and I hurled it
through the office window, shattering it, tearing the mini blinds down. I
didn't wait for gasps of shock before I started shooting, because Isamu
was sitting with his back to the window.


    BLAM! Graze to the shoulder.


    BLAM! Solid hit to center mass. He didn't instantly fall, so it
wasn't the heart, but I definitely punched a hole in his lung. Blood
sprayed all over the far wall. Even if it was a through-and-through, he
would NOT be getting far.


    BLAM! Rem's skeletal hand. Glass shards fell from the open window
hole as she interposed her body between me and Isamu, who fell to his
hands and knees and scampered behind the lieutenant's desk for cover. Any
shock at me trying to assassinate someone, and the debate brewing about
where the precinct's loyalties lied, was overridden by the gasping terror
at the nightmarish bone-beast sticking its face out of the broken window.
I knew it was coming and my hands were shaking. I'd never had time to
reload beyond sticking the one bullet back in for Misa to fire, so this
mag was dry. I ducked behind my little patrolman desk and started
reloading. The scattered POP! POP! of .38 Special fire bounced across the
room as two of them fired on the beast, tapering to nothing as they
realized how little impact they had, how little Rem was doing. They gaped
in shock. Worlds were falling apart.


    "What the shit is going on?" one officer asked in panic. "She, she
just pulled a gun, why are you shooting at-- AAAAAAGH WHAT IS THAT THING?"
he screamed as Misa grazed him. But she couldn't get back to me. Someone
grabbed her, a younger guy, one of the four armed officers. There were
probably 11 cops here, and I had a mag with ten bullets. I just needed to
stop Isamu from leaving, which wasn't difficult when he had a sucking
chest wound. But if everyone here went to Kira's side, I couldn't drop all
of them without reloading even if I had perfect accuracy. And I was really
hoping the officers would join me, because those gunshots echoed through
the entire station... Most of the cops would be here, but there was a
secretary, probably 2 or 3 more officers, and backup coming from another
precinct. I hoped wherever the other cops were, they were arguing with
each other about Kira. At least Misa got grabbed further from the exit
than I was.


    Misa struggled, but couldn't free herself. But the room was quiet.
Rem hadn't done anything. She was just... looking. Misa's struggling
slowed down.


    "Why is it looking at me like that?"


    No malice in this god of death. It was forlorn. Sorrowful. Filled
with regret. One visible eye, overflowing with pain.


    "Why are you looking at me like that?" she asked, desperate and
ragged.


    I glanced around at who might be on what side, but kept my face
mostly peeking around the corner to see if Isamu was getting up to give
something to Rem.


    "If you kill him, she will kill you," Rem said in that awful,
mournful voice. She turned her head slightly, and she pointed at me, and
my heart froze. "She will find a way."


    "Why are you telling me this." Misa said through gritted teeth and
rapid breaths. "Why are you looking at me like that."


    "Write the name while thinking of the face. Write a cause of death
within forty seconds. If so, write time and circumstance within 400
seconds. Do not ever write a name you do not intend to kill," Rem said.
Was that... She knew we had the paper because we could see her. She was
saying how to use it. That was... You just wrote it down? She didn't sign
it? Didn't devil-notarize it? She wasn't involved AT ALL? I checked my
pocket -- I still had the caterpillar and the top margin. Can't let that
shit get away from us.


    Oh god. There was a lieutenant in there with Isamu. He didn't HAVE
to poke his head up. He was dead the minute they walked in there. Worse.
The same thing that happened to me was going to happen to him. The office
was behind me. Misa was in front of me to the left. Exit in front of me to
the right. Nobody would move until I did, because they didn't know who was
on what side...


    "Uh! Uh! Ahhhh... Wait!" God it would be nice if I could bark
things in a clipped, even tone. What did I have on me? Duffel bag. Had our
stuff in it. Misa's vest, her spare clothes, the fake gun, my ammo. I
could load more bullets into the other mag...


    "Why are you telling me this?" Misa asked. She was stalling for
time but she would have asked anyway. "Why am I important to you?"


    "Someone... very important to me... cared deeply for you," Rem
said. A cell phone rang behind her. Picked up on the second ring. "If you
die, so does the last piece of him. If you give up, so would he. It's your
right to have the notebook."


    Okay, what does every cop have in his desk drawer? Revolver? Nope,
backup weapons are only in America, got to keep your guns in the weapons
locker. Bottle of bourbon? Nope, because here it's a bottle of shochu! And
in a glass bottle, not a hip flask. Little sake cups too, like a tea set.
Three quarters full. I don't get you, mystery cop whose desk I raided.


    "If I interfere, they will kill you. I can only kill one of them
to protect you," Rem said. She made sure I knew it wasn't just the paper
they could use. I believed it. Immunity to Kira isn't immunity to murder.


    "Gentlemen!" came the voice from the office. Oh no. Oh no. "And
lady, of course! Please, everyone calm down!" The officer wasn't poking
his head out from the desk. "This is an angel of Kira, that's all! You all
should know this precinct is loyal to Kira's new order!"


    My hands started shaking. My grimace threatened to cleave off my
jaw. That was how easily he'd done it. He was in there raping this man's
fundamental humanity and there was nothing I could do about it. It was all
happening again. I didn't care how valuable Isamu was. If he managed to
get out of here alive, he was going to beg me for his life before I gave
his skull some new air holes.


    But if he died, Nabiki would kill Misa. She clearly had a piece or
two of the special paper. She'd do what she did to the broadcaster, she'd
have Misa whacked, make someone suicide-bomb her, have me taken out. She'd
been very insistent on Misa's safety when she clearly didn't care herself.
So Rem was in a Mexican standoff with the Egawas over Misa's life, and
with L hunting us, I couldn't afford piling on more danger. I had to
either take out both of them at the same time, with one of them outside
the building. Or I needed to remove their method of attack.


    They don't sell gym socks in packs of two, so we had extras. One
can easily join the cause here. I stuffed it into the neck of the shochu
bottle and shook it. Of course I had a lighter in here, I needed to burn
my written notes to not leave a trail.


    "Now everyone, you know what we have to do. Kira has given us
orders, and we have to carry them out!" the lieutenant continued. "Any of
you who feel disloyal, you will be... will be..." He stopped, Isamu was
trying to whisper something to him. "--detained! Your difference in
political opinion makes you disloyal, but Kira is merciful." Why would he
say that? "Now, please, secure miss Amane, unharmed!"


    "Okay... There's something you guys should know, then." Misa said.
I could hear it. There was a revolver to her temple and I could hear her
asking herself 'What would Kasumi say?' "You know if you use your guns,
you might hit me, and then you'll be tortured to death. You should also
know that we just got let out because nothing my bodyguard does is legally
considered a crime. Her aim is much, much better than yours. And if none
of you has a ghost to block bullets for you, anyone who sides with Kira to
perform a kidnapping will leave this room in a black bag." I wanted to
clap. I told myself she was my voice, and I got partial credit for that.
Maybe at least one of them would be intimidated into not attacking. The
officer holding her didn't seem impressed.


    I didn't clap or cheer. What I did was chuck my Molotov cocktail,
exposing as little of my body as possible. Rem was blocking gunfire, but
that left a big area above and beside her for a glass bottle of shochu to
sail, crack against the back wall, and blanket the area in flaming
alcohol.


    If this patrolman's vice was Bacardi 151, I'd be causing a serious
problem in there, flushing both men from cover because the alternative was
death. But shochu didn't have enough alcohol content for that. Anyone who
ever had a friend show the cool trick of lighting a fire on their skin
would know how the flames would FWOOSH over and leave them untouched. But
paper, paper would have a problem. Paper would burn like it is wont to do.


    I hoped.


    One more gun was drawn on me but I was already behind the desk
when I heard the staccato POP! of gunfire. Wood chunks exploded above me,
paperwork went flying. Whoever had Misa tried to stare me down. Holding
her like a human shield. Gun to her head. He had a human shield 25 cm
shorter than he was, and he let me stand still to aim, so he was confident
I wouldn't shoot. There was a very important question I couldn't ask him.
Did he know what they called me at the FBI?


    He got as far as "Ki--" before he lost the back of his head with a
BLAM! That was as long as it took to see his trigger discipline, that he
wasn't sticking his finger into the trigger guard before he intended to
fire. A very good, very responsible habit to have for a police officer,
instilled in him by police firearm training that said firearms were a last
resort. When you're a piece of shit cultist for a serial killer who's
holding a human shield, though, the threat that your death spasms will
cause you to pull the trigger is the only reason I have not to blow your
fucking head off.


    It was "Massacre Misora", by the way.


    Misa dove to the ground and scampered toward me, and I let the box
cutter drop when she was close enough to grab it. "Anybody comes at me I'm
gonna stab you!" she shouted to the room, and then whispered to me, "How
in the heck are we going to get out of here?" She flicked the blade open,
taking heavy ragged breaths, holding it with both hands and waiting for
someone to try and get around this desk and grab her.


    "The cooler!" came the voice of the cop in the office. "There's
still water in it! We can put it out!" Shit. I hoped the paper didn't like
being wet. Now there was more gunfire. Blood sprayed the wall above us in
a fine mist -- then another shot from another direction. They'd shot each
other. Now was the perfect time to escape, but I had to see if I could get
line of sight on Isamu as he went to dunk the notebook. There was a water
cooler in the office, could I break it somehow...


    No. It was behind the wooden door. BLAM! BLAM! I hoped I tagged
it, broke it open before the burning notebook could be dunked in, but I
knew I wasn't going to be that lucky. It looked like someone was winning
the scuffle between the officers. I heard the one in the office exclaim in
surprise "Where did all the water go?" about when a broad-shouldered man
and a stocky woman looked at me with sinister intent.


    "You're under arrest for murdering a police officer," she snarled
as I ducked back into cover. No gunshot yet. We couldn't get up. One gun
left, at least. If we stood up, we'd have our heads blown off. They didn't
know how bad my hearing was on the left, I doubted they would walk
around... They were going to wait for backup. Misa was still gasping,
holding her box cutter with both hands.


    "You're under arrest," the woman repeated. "Come out with your
hands up." If I did, I'd have my head blown off. If she was handing out
threats, the anti-Kira police were dealt with. We needed a way out.


    Misa was necessary. I took some slow, deep breaths, calming
myself. If I was panicking I wouldn't be able to talk at all. Maybe better
that way. I held the duffle bag vertically, and I put it in Misa's hands.
Her eyes were wide, looking to me for answers. I held out my hands like I
was holding the bag, and I jerked them upwards. She nodded. Then I had to
turn away, put my good ear facing them. Crouched, ready to spring. Held
out my hand with three fingers. Two. One.


    When you are waiting for someone to jump out of cover, and that
person has a gun, waiting long enough to identify their head might be
suicidal. So when Misa suddenly jerked a dark, soft, cylindrical object
upwards, either this cop-cultist was NOT going to shoot the sudden
movement before she could identify it wasn't a head, meaning she had her
finger off the trigger like her friend. Or...


    POP!


    Or she would shoot it. Now our bag had a hole in it.


    "What in God's name are you DOING!" her colleague shouted. "You
could have shot Misa! Are you INSANE?"


    And he'd grab her arm or her shooting hand, and divert her
attention to him as he tried to restrain her. I sprung up over the desk.
There's no room for mercy because she's a woman, and if there was, this
was after she shot one of her colleagues for standing against Kira's
order. No time for any fancy trick-shooting to knock the gun out of her
hand.


    BLAM! BLAM!


    Two shots to center mass. She fell forward onto the desk like a
bag of potting soil, and she slid off with a trail of blood, just like the
coworker she shot. Her friend looked at me. Then at the gun she was
holding. Then at the barrel pointed into his face. He put his hands up and
backed off, slowly. "Okay. Okay. Let's all calm down. Let's discuss this
like adults."


    Rem was behind him, in the office. But not in the front. Isamu and
the lieutenant were behind the big desk, but Rem was against the wall,
with her arm phasing out of the brick wall. God damn it, god damn it, that
was an exterior wall, her arm was poking out into the parking lot. I could
have missed a sound when my head was turned to Misa and my bad ear was
toward the office...


    There was a scuffle. Grunts. Something collided with a metal desk
leg. And a man in a patrolman's uniform with blood streaming from his
forehead ran at the cultist now asking me to be reasonable, and tackled
him to the ground. Shit. God damn it. I bounded over one desk. How much
time do I have, how many more of them are on the ground? Who was going to
grab the gun in the tussle?


    I had absolutely no time to think about how to solve this problem.
The wall of the lieutenant's office exploded inward like in a Sergio Leone
movie, rammed open by the back of an ambulance. Shit! Did they smash it
open in one go, or did they hit before when my bad ear was turned that
way? The back of the ambulance went right through Rem's body. The back
doors got kicked open, and there was Nabiki Egawa, barefoot, pregnant,
holding a shotgun, shouting "Get him inside! Hurry!" She saw me, I saw
her, and I plummeted to the ground just as she pulled the trigger. Papers
went flying everywhere, filling the room with a blizzard as she filled
this desk with birdshot. "WHY THE FUCK HAVEN'T YOU PEOPLE TAKEN OFF THAT
MUTE BITCH'S HEAD?" she screamed.


    Okay. She must have got her gun back from evidence before we got
out.


    "Please!" the lieutenant called to his patrol officers. "We need
to evacuate this man! He needs medical attention -- don't let her
assassinate him!"


    I wasn't standing up, not without some bait to throw. I only
exposed my gun and the barest part of my wrist when I put my hand over the
desk and blind-fired in Nabiki's direction. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! I didn't
think I was going to hit anyone on purpose, but that isn't the point. You
fire blind so that your opponent ducks into cover, so you won't hit them
by accident.


    But I knew I didn't hit. I knew she wasn't hiding. I could see the
shadows shifting. Rem was playing inhuman shield again. "This is how she
will win," she intoned. "She will do anything." There couldn't have been
time to fit Isamu onto a gurney, because right away, the ambulance was
peeling out. Rem was dragged along with it.


    For about two seconds, the only sound in the bullpen was the soft
crinkling of paper sheets wafting to the floor.


    Then the guys on the ground started fighting over the gun again.
We could not stay here. We had no idea who was on our side, and any
mistake would be costly.


    Misa must have had the same idea. She had the bag slung over her
shoulder, box cutter in her hand. "Come on! Let's get the Hell out of
here, I figured out how we can escape! Out the front!" She beckoned me
over from around the side. My knee, already aching, started to flare up as
if it knew it was going to be having a terrible time without that crutch
when I scampered out. Commotion from behind us as we ran, but nobody was
poking up. We stood, I turned backwards, and fired a couple more shots as
we ran to keep their heads down. BLAM! BLAM! Nobody would follow us as we
sprinted out the front doors.


    And I got grabbed the moment we passed the wall that separated the
bullpen from the lobby. Of course. There was more than enough time for
someone to come from elsewhere in the building, but he would have to hide
behind a wall, because I'd be able to shoot him easily when he walked in.
A somewhat portly guy grabbed my arm and twisted, locking it around his
nightstick, pointing my gun away from his body and trying to wrest it from
my grasp. I had to try and get him to bend forward, get some momentum to
throw him--


    "Get OFF of her!" Misa barked, and she leapt forward with the box
cutter, stabbing him as hard as she could with both hands. He screamed in
pain, and that was long enough for me to smash my elbow into his jaw. That
bought me enough time to twist my way out of his partial arm lock. That
gave me the time to put my good knee into his solar plexus and send him to
the floor. Who else was here? A receptionist, staring at me with hate and
terror in her eyes but not willing to move. Nobody else between me and the
door. Nobody else outside the glass doors. I didn't need to shoot this
guy.


    I needed to run. He had friends coming.


    I shoulder-tackled the exit doors open and burst out into the
dark, rain-slick parking lot, Misa following a step behind. We were out of
the building. With no ride, stranded in enemy territory, with the cops
from the next three precincts over all closing in.


    "ALL RIGHT!" Misa shouted at the top of her lungs. "WHICH ONE OF
YOU VULTURES WANTS AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW?"


                             * * * * * * * * *


    2b. The human who touches the Death Note can recognize the image
and voice of its original owner, a god of death, even if the human is not
the owner of the note.


    CLARIFICATION: A human who owns the Death Note can revoke this
ability, but a human who does not own it may not unless they gain
ownership first.


    X-6a. Gods of death are invisible and intangible to the human
world. This invisibility is revoked for those who have touched the Death
Note they haunt, but they may revoke their intangibility at will, if for
example they wish to pick up or manipulate objects. A god of death who
does so while halfway through a solid object may still move through that
object.


    X-6b. Human methods of recording,  whether of pictures or sound,
are perfectly able to capture the likeness and voice of gods of death.
Only gods of death themselves, and those humans touched by the notes
haunted by the depicted gods of death, are able to see and hear the
recordings.


    X-6c. Human recording devices can also capture images that can be
read by Shinigami Eyes, displaying name and lifespan of the captured
human. The lifespan is only accurate at the time the picture is taken, and
if the image is old, envisioning it while writing the human's name may not
be accurate enough to kill that human.