DN -- The End Is Near XXIX: The Cop Way
Title: The End Is Near
Chapter: 29. The Cop Way
Fandom: Death Note
Pairing: Light/L, Matt/Mello
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,847
Warnings: criminal puns, language, madness, boys in denial
Summary: A horrible day gets a bit bet -- er, worse -- when Mello discovers that a certain albino boy has disa-Neared. Matt, Mello, L, and Light set out to find him, come hell, high water, or chocolate shortages. Well, maybe not those.
Author's Note: lol F-bomb lol. XD
XXIX - THE COP WAY
Matt was alternately trying to figure out what exactly Near had been drugged with (though he supposed it didn’t matter, so long as it wasn’t fatal or permanently damaging) and dialing L’s phone over and over, all while striding along after Light, the rich carpet muffling their steps.
Looked like he was getting his multitasking marathon after all.
“I think it’s this way,” Light called over his shoulder, leading the way past a curving stair that gave Matt a glimpse of the party, which was in full swing by now. The jubilant swell of the orchestra’s efforts dogged them momentarily, dwindling as they continued down the hall and fading again into the silence that stretched between fits of guttering from the candles. Matt chewed his lip and listened to the phone ring.
“If you were B,” Light began, “where would you hide?”
“In a black hole,” Mello snapped. “Or an operative garbage disposal.”
Near’s sock-feet bobbed as Light glanced around a corner. “Fair enough,” he decided. “Where would you hide L?”
“Somewhere no one would find him,” Mello muttered.
Light shot him a Look. “You’re really not helping,” he sniffed. “We have to do this systematically.”
Matt pushed his glasses up his nose. Going goggle-less was taxing, and the stress wasn’t helping.
…though he had gotten to make out with Mello twice, which wasn’t too shabby at all for an evening of chaos.
“Oh,” Mello snarled, “let me play Mr. Policeman, too, Yagami. I’ll pretend like I’ve got an investment in this just like you.”
Light spun so fast that the wind blew Near’s hair off of his forehead.
“Pretend I have an investment?” he repeated, his dark eyes narrowing to slits. “Is that what you think, Mello? You think I could live with L for months, work with him for months, look at him every morning and bid him goodnight at the end of every day knowing full well he wasn’t going to sleep-you think I could have him in my life that long and not have an investment?”
Matt skirted around them, avoiding their matching incinerating Death Glares, and stood on his toes, trying to figure out what he might be seeing.
“I think you’re a cop, Yagami,” Mello returned, voice climbing the register towards a shout. “I think you’re a cop first, and I think you’ll always be a cop, and I think you’ll always try to understand things the cop way. I think you look at L like some sort of training exercise you can set the curve on-”
“Are you blind?” Light yelled back, presumably having forgotten that Near was attempting to sleep. “Have you even seen-how-”
“Guys,” Matt said.
“How what?” Mello sneered, lip curling. “How much you love him? You’re not worth the dirt on the soles of his feet-”
“Guys,” Matt repeated, louder.
“You have no idea-”
Matt took a deep breath, readied his diaphragm, and then made use of it:
“You stupid fucking idiots; will you look over here?”
There was a weighty pause, and then they both blinked at him.
He pointed wordlessly to the bobby pin, torque wrench, and black clutch purse on the floor. The lattermost item was vibrating softly as he called the phone nestled inside it.
“Oh, snap,” Mello managed.
Light came closer to examine the objects strewn across the carpet.
“He dropped them,” he muttered, his eyes flickering from one item to the next. “But not to leave them there. He was moving backwards-pulled backwards-” He looked up at the intricate tapestry on the wall.
Tentatively, Matt went over and drew the tapestry a little bit aside. He poked his head in.
“There’s a giant hole,” he announced meekly, his voice echoing, probably just to spite him. “Like, a huge passageway that goes off somewhere.”
“Lead the way, Matt,” Light told him. “Mello, could you grab L’s things and bring them? I don’t know if we’ll be coming back.”
There was a pause.
“Coming back here,” Light specified.
“Right,” Mello muttered.
It was actually kind of nice to have a fuzz-man ordering you around. At the least, it took the authority out of Matt’s unsteady hands.
Matt held up the tapestry-which was tough; damn thing weighed a ton-for Light and Near and then for Mello. When they were all accounted for, he let it fall, and the darkness consumed them.
Matt pulled out his lighter and ground the wheel with his thumb. A small orange flame popped up cheerfully.
“Thank you for smoking,” Light said, his faint smile looking slightly ghoulish.
“Har,” Mello said.
-
L was not feeling optimistic now either.
He tumbled into the passageway, the tapestry flapping dully into place again. The stones of the floor bruised his knees and the palms of his hands where he caught himself, but the gloves saved him a set of scrapes, and he had his windpipe back.
For the moment, at least.
A candle’s flame broke the blackness around him, isolated and inadequate. Faintly, from below, it half-illuminated a face he recognized-or a face he could recognize, beneath the subtle scarring encircling the neck, climbing greedily up both cheeks, reaching for the beautiful-terrible crimson eyes.
They danced gleefully in the fickle orange grasp of the flame. Of course they did, L realized bitterly. Of course B derived a familiar twisted joy from seeing L trapped, found, forced onto his hands and knees. Bowing.
Throat tight with anger now, he gathered himself to his feet, summoning all the dignity he could muster.
Between the ridiculous dress, the slipping shawl, and the skewed veil, it wasn’t much, but the shreds of his pride were better than nothing at all.
“Well-done,” he said quietly. “You finally won.”
B didn’t seem to be listening. He held the candle out at arm’s length, looking mystified.
“Has anyone ever told you,” he asked, his voice hoarser and deeper than L remembered but undeniably that of the boy they’d failed, “that you look really good in a dress?”
L blinked. “Not… in so many words…”
“Hmm,” B replied.
L wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that.
Actually, he was quite sure that he didn’t; this was no time for polite ambiguity. If anything, it was a time for panicking and running in the other direction.
Before he could realize this halfhearted plan, B had taken his wrist almost gently and commenced pulling him down the passage. The tiny flame coughed harshly as they moved, buffeted by the close air, and L stumbled in-and accordingly promptly abandoned-his slippers. The wretched things were much too close about his feet anyway, and the more impediments he could shed, the better.
He didn’t know what was going to happen, but he’d be ready.
As the passage unfurled before them, endless stones blurring into being at the edges of the candle’s reach, B glanced over his shoulder at intervals, his fingers tightening about L’s wrist, as if to confirm that his prize still trailed behind him. The smile that the affirmation prompted was eerier still in the midst of the ambiance. L felt B’s thumb slide over the back of his hand and steeled himself against a shudder.
The stone corridor ejected them into a different hall almost indistinguishable from the one they’d left. In fact, as L noticed out of the corner of his eye, the tapestry here was virtually identical to the first-likely as a way of identifying which ornaments concealed secret tunnels.
Sharper inspection permitted L to notice that this hall wasn’t quite like its predecessor-there were cracks on the ceiling, and dust eddied in secluded corners.
“The ruined wing, I presume?” he inquired flatly.
B’s grin spread with a feral gleam. “Very good,” he commended, tugging L towards an elaborate set of double doors at the end of the hallway. “It’s remarkable what a bit of well-placed rubble can convey. The only thing the wrecking ball really touched was the tower.”
The squeal of hinges ushered them into a sitting room all in mahogany and red velvet. L’s stomach clenched. No, he didn’t like this at all.
B peeled off the veil and tossed it to the floor, released his hostage, shut the doors, and then considered L pensively, touching a fingertip to his lips. L tried not to seethe. Apparently the great pretender couldn’t shake his finest act.
“Won’t you sit?” B asked kindly, red eyes shining. Stiffly, L obliged, taking the opportunity to examine his resurrected nemesis for the first time in detail. B was dressed simply in black slacks and a white shirt, and his ragged hair was slightly shorter than his model’s.
Additionally, his posture was too decent by half.
“Tea?” B went on, motioning eloquently to the laden silver tray on the table by the armchair L had selected.
“Might we just skip to the sugar cubes?” L replied coldly, his hands folded demurely in his lap to hide their trembling.
Still smiling bemusedly-or, as Matt would have noted, B-musedly-the House’s fallen angel strolled to the table, plucked the jar of jam from amongst its articles, removed the lid, and delved his finger into the contents.
Before L could speak, B had moved with dizzying dexterity, one firm-fingered hand curled around L’s shoulder, the other hovering, reddened index finger extended, inches from his chin.
“A craving, perhaps?” B prompted softly, his impossible eyes a perfect match for the glaze of color oozing downward over his knuckles. His voice dropped to a whisper, and he leaned in to press his fingertip to L’s bottom lip, tracing the curve of it slowly. “That I can understand…”
Strawberry. Strawberry jam.
The bastard-
“What do you intend to do now?” L prompted, fighting the urge to grit his teeth.
“Do you know what dogs do when they finally catch the car?” B asked, his breath warm and wet on L’s cheek.
L could see the stretching of the corpse-white skin where it had knitted into a thousand tiny scars along his captor’s jaw. “I don’t think they would know what to do,” he responded levelly.
“Why don’t we find out?” B inquired.
In truth, L could think of a vast collection of reasons why they shouldn’t, but he bit his tongue as B moved closer still.
Scarlet eyes danced, twin windows to a maddening hell.
“Why don’t you resist?” B murmured.
L hated the pressure of the creature’s finger, detested the smooth edge of his fingernail, deplored the inescapability of them both-
“Because I imagine,” he answered frostily, his hands clasped so tightly that they shook, “that you’ve attached a safeguard of some sort to Near, likely a small explosive, to be detonated remotely should I protest too violently.”
B paused. “That’s brilliant,” he said.
L stared, completely forgetting the distinctly creepy finger at his lips for a long moment.
“You mean you haven’t?” he demanded.
B smiled, bashfully this time.
For the first time, L smiled back-because he was about to give the phrase “violent protest” an entirely new meaning.
[Chapter XXVIII] [Chapter XXX]
Chapter: 29. The Cop Way
Fandom: Death Note
Pairing: Light/L, Matt/Mello
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,847
Warnings: criminal puns, language, madness, boys in denial
Summary: A horrible day gets a bit bet -- er, worse -- when Mello discovers that a certain albino boy has disa-Neared. Matt, Mello, L, and Light set out to find him, come hell, high water, or chocolate shortages. Well, maybe not those.
Author's Note: lol F-bomb lol. XD
XXIX - THE COP WAY
Matt was alternately trying to figure out what exactly Near had been drugged with (though he supposed it didn’t matter, so long as it wasn’t fatal or permanently damaging) and dialing L’s phone over and over, all while striding along after Light, the rich carpet muffling their steps.
Looked like he was getting his multitasking marathon after all.
“I think it’s this way,” Light called over his shoulder, leading the way past a curving stair that gave Matt a glimpse of the party, which was in full swing by now. The jubilant swell of the orchestra’s efforts dogged them momentarily, dwindling as they continued down the hall and fading again into the silence that stretched between fits of guttering from the candles. Matt chewed his lip and listened to the phone ring.
“If you were B,” Light began, “where would you hide?”
“In a black hole,” Mello snapped. “Or an operative garbage disposal.”
Near’s sock-feet bobbed as Light glanced around a corner. “Fair enough,” he decided. “Where would you hide L?”
“Somewhere no one would find him,” Mello muttered.
Light shot him a Look. “You’re really not helping,” he sniffed. “We have to do this systematically.”
Matt pushed his glasses up his nose. Going goggle-less was taxing, and the stress wasn’t helping.
…though he had gotten to make out with Mello twice, which wasn’t too shabby at all for an evening of chaos.
“Oh,” Mello snarled, “let me play Mr. Policeman, too, Yagami. I’ll pretend like I’ve got an investment in this just like you.”
Light spun so fast that the wind blew Near’s hair off of his forehead.
“Pretend I have an investment?” he repeated, his dark eyes narrowing to slits. “Is that what you think, Mello? You think I could live with L for months, work with him for months, look at him every morning and bid him goodnight at the end of every day knowing full well he wasn’t going to sleep-you think I could have him in my life that long and not have an investment?”
Matt skirted around them, avoiding their matching incinerating Death Glares, and stood on his toes, trying to figure out what he might be seeing.
“I think you’re a cop, Yagami,” Mello returned, voice climbing the register towards a shout. “I think you’re a cop first, and I think you’ll always be a cop, and I think you’ll always try to understand things the cop way. I think you look at L like some sort of training exercise you can set the curve on-”
“Are you blind?” Light yelled back, presumably having forgotten that Near was attempting to sleep. “Have you even seen-how-”
“Guys,” Matt said.
“How what?” Mello sneered, lip curling. “How much you love him? You’re not worth the dirt on the soles of his feet-”
“Guys,” Matt repeated, louder.
“You have no idea-”
Matt took a deep breath, readied his diaphragm, and then made use of it:
“You stupid fucking idiots; will you look over here?”
There was a weighty pause, and then they both blinked at him.
He pointed wordlessly to the bobby pin, torque wrench, and black clutch purse on the floor. The lattermost item was vibrating softly as he called the phone nestled inside it.
“Oh, snap,” Mello managed.
Light came closer to examine the objects strewn across the carpet.
“He dropped them,” he muttered, his eyes flickering from one item to the next. “But not to leave them there. He was moving backwards-pulled backwards-” He looked up at the intricate tapestry on the wall.
Tentatively, Matt went over and drew the tapestry a little bit aside. He poked his head in.
“There’s a giant hole,” he announced meekly, his voice echoing, probably just to spite him. “Like, a huge passageway that goes off somewhere.”
“Lead the way, Matt,” Light told him. “Mello, could you grab L’s things and bring them? I don’t know if we’ll be coming back.”
There was a pause.
“Coming back here,” Light specified.
“Right,” Mello muttered.
It was actually kind of nice to have a fuzz-man ordering you around. At the least, it took the authority out of Matt’s unsteady hands.
Matt held up the tapestry-which was tough; damn thing weighed a ton-for Light and Near and then for Mello. When they were all accounted for, he let it fall, and the darkness consumed them.
Matt pulled out his lighter and ground the wheel with his thumb. A small orange flame popped up cheerfully.
“Thank you for smoking,” Light said, his faint smile looking slightly ghoulish.
“Har,” Mello said.
-
L was not feeling optimistic now either.
He tumbled into the passageway, the tapestry flapping dully into place again. The stones of the floor bruised his knees and the palms of his hands where he caught himself, but the gloves saved him a set of scrapes, and he had his windpipe back.
For the moment, at least.
A candle’s flame broke the blackness around him, isolated and inadequate. Faintly, from below, it half-illuminated a face he recognized-or a face he could recognize, beneath the subtle scarring encircling the neck, climbing greedily up both cheeks, reaching for the beautiful-terrible crimson eyes.
They danced gleefully in the fickle orange grasp of the flame. Of course they did, L realized bitterly. Of course B derived a familiar twisted joy from seeing L trapped, found, forced onto his hands and knees. Bowing.
Throat tight with anger now, he gathered himself to his feet, summoning all the dignity he could muster.
Between the ridiculous dress, the slipping shawl, and the skewed veil, it wasn’t much, but the shreds of his pride were better than nothing at all.
“Well-done,” he said quietly. “You finally won.”
B didn’t seem to be listening. He held the candle out at arm’s length, looking mystified.
“Has anyone ever told you,” he asked, his voice hoarser and deeper than L remembered but undeniably that of the boy they’d failed, “that you look really good in a dress?”
L blinked. “Not… in so many words…”
“Hmm,” B replied.
L wasn’t sure he liked the sound of that.
Actually, he was quite sure that he didn’t; this was no time for polite ambiguity. If anything, it was a time for panicking and running in the other direction.
Before he could realize this halfhearted plan, B had taken his wrist almost gently and commenced pulling him down the passage. The tiny flame coughed harshly as they moved, buffeted by the close air, and L stumbled in-and accordingly promptly abandoned-his slippers. The wretched things were much too close about his feet anyway, and the more impediments he could shed, the better.
He didn’t know what was going to happen, but he’d be ready.
As the passage unfurled before them, endless stones blurring into being at the edges of the candle’s reach, B glanced over his shoulder at intervals, his fingers tightening about L’s wrist, as if to confirm that his prize still trailed behind him. The smile that the affirmation prompted was eerier still in the midst of the ambiance. L felt B’s thumb slide over the back of his hand and steeled himself against a shudder.
The stone corridor ejected them into a different hall almost indistinguishable from the one they’d left. In fact, as L noticed out of the corner of his eye, the tapestry here was virtually identical to the first-likely as a way of identifying which ornaments concealed secret tunnels.
Sharper inspection permitted L to notice that this hall wasn’t quite like its predecessor-there were cracks on the ceiling, and dust eddied in secluded corners.
“The ruined wing, I presume?” he inquired flatly.
B’s grin spread with a feral gleam. “Very good,” he commended, tugging L towards an elaborate set of double doors at the end of the hallway. “It’s remarkable what a bit of well-placed rubble can convey. The only thing the wrecking ball really touched was the tower.”
The squeal of hinges ushered them into a sitting room all in mahogany and red velvet. L’s stomach clenched. No, he didn’t like this at all.
B peeled off the veil and tossed it to the floor, released his hostage, shut the doors, and then considered L pensively, touching a fingertip to his lips. L tried not to seethe. Apparently the great pretender couldn’t shake his finest act.
“Won’t you sit?” B asked kindly, red eyes shining. Stiffly, L obliged, taking the opportunity to examine his resurrected nemesis for the first time in detail. B was dressed simply in black slacks and a white shirt, and his ragged hair was slightly shorter than his model’s.
Additionally, his posture was too decent by half.
“Tea?” B went on, motioning eloquently to the laden silver tray on the table by the armchair L had selected.
“Might we just skip to the sugar cubes?” L replied coldly, his hands folded demurely in his lap to hide their trembling.
Still smiling bemusedly-or, as Matt would have noted, B-musedly-the House’s fallen angel strolled to the table, plucked the jar of jam from amongst its articles, removed the lid, and delved his finger into the contents.
Before L could speak, B had moved with dizzying dexterity, one firm-fingered hand curled around L’s shoulder, the other hovering, reddened index finger extended, inches from his chin.
“A craving, perhaps?” B prompted softly, his impossible eyes a perfect match for the glaze of color oozing downward over his knuckles. His voice dropped to a whisper, and he leaned in to press his fingertip to L’s bottom lip, tracing the curve of it slowly. “That I can understand…”
Strawberry. Strawberry jam.
The bastard-
“What do you intend to do now?” L prompted, fighting the urge to grit his teeth.
“Do you know what dogs do when they finally catch the car?” B asked, his breath warm and wet on L’s cheek.
L could see the stretching of the corpse-white skin where it had knitted into a thousand tiny scars along his captor’s jaw. “I don’t think they would know what to do,” he responded levelly.
“Why don’t we find out?” B inquired.
In truth, L could think of a vast collection of reasons why they shouldn’t, but he bit his tongue as B moved closer still.
Scarlet eyes danced, twin windows to a maddening hell.
“Why don’t you resist?” B murmured.
L hated the pressure of the creature’s finger, detested the smooth edge of his fingernail, deplored the inescapability of them both-
“Because I imagine,” he answered frostily, his hands clasped so tightly that they shook, “that you’ve attached a safeguard of some sort to Near, likely a small explosive, to be detonated remotely should I protest too violently.”
B paused. “That’s brilliant,” he said.
L stared, completely forgetting the distinctly creepy finger at his lips for a long moment.
“You mean you haven’t?” he demanded.
B smiled, bashfully this time.
For the first time, L smiled back-because he was about to give the phrase “violent protest” an entirely new meaning.
[Chapter XXVIII] [Chapter XXX]