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Fifty Days	By : sashocirrione Category: Death Note > Het-Male/Female > L/Misa Views: 2868 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note, and I do not make any money from these writings.

Chapter List
- 26
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CHAPTER 27: Lifespans
Ryuk clearly didn't want to be interrogated, but it wasn't that difficult to get Ryuk involved in idle discussion, and a little more information came out that way. Ryuk seemed to want to talk when there was nothing happening, though L had the feeling Ryuk was skirting all the most important details, anything that might actually close the case or lead to a clue about how to stop Rem. Ryuk was genuinely intrigued with the idea that L wasn't using his one question right away, but was instead hoarding it and considering it carefully.
Ryuk came right out and said, "I'd think that question should be pretty obvious. You're smart, right? You should know what to ask by now."
"I've been here with you for less than a day, and yet you're quite anxious for me to ask that question."
Ryuk said, "Well, that's because I like to see an investigation, not just sitting around. If you find out something more, then you'll probably start actually doing something."
L used one finger to nudge at the several doughnuts still on the plate in front of him, trying to decide which to eat next. He glanced up at the monitors. Mikami was acting like a model prisoner, dignified and seemingly cooperative. He had a defiant expression on his face, but he knew just how to act and what to say in order to cause nagging doubts as to whether he was lying. The several additional questioning sessions he'd been subjected to after the first didn't yield anything useful, didn't reveal a single contradiction. It didn't even contradict anything Ryuk had said.
Perhaps Misa did threaten him into the scheme he described... no, if I think that way, Mikami will have the upper hand. He is almost certainly lying, and he will try something if I end up letting him go.
L chose a doughnut with chocolate frosting and coconut sprinkles, and before taking a bite said, "Ryuk, I would like to add one more item to the deal we have."
"You're only getting one honestly-answered question in return for keeping me supplied with apples, not two."
"No, not a question, an additional condition. Another investigator will arrive a day from now. We call him Matt. Watari and Wedy already know that Misa has had sex with me. Matt does not. In addition to getting one honest answer from you for a question of my choosing, I want you to never reveal this fact to Matt or anyone unless I give you permission first."
"That is disgusting, so I probably wouldn't bring it up anyway. Yeah, I'll add keeping quiet about it to the deal. No problem."
L silently ate his doughnuts until Ryuk started getting fidgety again, and then, judging Ryuk vulnerable, said, "What do you think about Light?"
"Is that your one question?"
"Of course not. I'll tell you when I'm asking that question. This is just talk."
Ryuk said, "Oh, Light was incredible fun. He was great to watch. Did you know he had a little screaming and laughing fit in his room after he got home from the To-Oh University freshmen ceremony?"
"No, I did not know that."
"For someone who was so smart he sure had a lot of problems, and he did some stupid things. Light never thought he made any mistakes, though. Like when he let the police know he had access to their files. He said he was doing it to lure L in close, and it worked, but then he ended up being the prime suspect pretty fast. Yeah, if he'd never done anything to draw attention to himself, he could probably have kept being Kira without anyone bothering him."
L said, "Yes, that was rather stupid. It was because of his pride. Ever since the Lind L. Tailor broadcast, I became a symbol to him, a person he had to destroy in order to rule comfortably as Kira. In that way, the broadcast was a tremendous success. Because of it, I was able to use myself as bait to successfully draw Light closer and closer to being caught."
"You know the most hilarious thing he did?"
"No."
Ryuk waved one arm sweepingly, as if indicating the entire world. He said, "It was hilarious that Light thought he was changing anything. Even if his scheme did work, the world would only be his idea of a paradise until he died. After that, it'd just become the same or worse. Also, he wasn't saving any lives at all."
I suspect... this could be...
L kept his face blank and said, "How so?"
"Human lifespans don't change unless a death note or a shinigami is involved. People die when they're fated to. Light changed the minds of some murderers, but the victims were still fated to die at the same moment as before. They just had accidents or got sick instead."
This is extremely important. I could test this, do a statistical analysis to see whether deaths by other causes have risen by the same number that murders have dropped. Since murder is a very rare cause of death, it would be difficult to prove statistical significance, but I could probably get to the point where I could make a fairly dependable guess whether Ryuk is lying or not.
Ryuk said, "Misa knows how lifespans work. She was an idiot to try to off herself with a gun. If she'd used her death note, it would have been a success for sure."
L replied, "I suspect that Rem would have taken it away before Misa could finish writing, and would burn it instead of letting Misa have it again."
Ryuk said, "You know, before all the shinigami got to be so lazy, it used to be a game. Find some human who wasn't sick or old or anything, but had a lifespan about to run out, and then try to save them. I remember the very best one was when a bunch of us were watching Calikarcha try to save this guy. An attacker came at the human with a knife. She killed the attacker with her death note, and just then the guy she'd saved fell into a river and started drowning. She pulled him out. He was terrified because he couldn't see her so that made it especially funny. Then, while he's on the riverbank, a bear comes out of the forest and tries to get him. Calikarcha holds off the bear, and while she's doing that the guy gets hit by a meteorite. It was the best one ever. We were laughing about it for days."
"I do not believe you. Rem saved Misa from a stalker by killing him."
Ryuk went into a laughing fit. He didn't come out of it until L had finished two more doughnuts.
When Ryuk had his composure back, he said, "You really are entertaining, you know that? That's Rem's story to tell, so I won't say anything about the details, but a human's life can be extended in one special situation. If a shinigami transfers years from their own lifespan onto a human's lifespan. For all you know, Misa might not be fated to die until thousands of years from now."
If Ryuk is telling the truth, then it might be impossible to ever act against Misa. Extreme coincidences would always keep her alive. Even if I could put her on trial, something odd might happen to ensure she is judged innocent, since a guilty verdict would almost certainly result in a death penalty. Rem can get more lifespan from humans, so it doesn't harm her to subtract years from her lifespan and add them onto Misa's. Still, something isn't right here. It doesn't fully make sense.
L said, "Ryuk, could I convince you to add more years to my lifespan?"
"Not for all the apples in the world. If I wouldn't do it for Light I certainly won't do it for you."
"Why not? You can easily gather more to replace it."
Ryuk leaned close again and said, "I'm not that kind of shinigami."
L asked, "There's something shameful involved in it?"
"For a shinigami, caring whether a human lives or dies is shameful. Humans are our prey. What Rem is doing with Misa is a complete disgrace. She'll probably be an outcast in the shinigami realm, if she ever returns to it. Not that she really had any respect before. Everyone's thought of her as a joke ever since she got involved in the human world."
Ryuk picked up an apple and began eating it. Two bites later, only the core was left. He dangled the core in the air, seeming to study it thoughtfully, and then swallowed it too.
Ryuk said, "Yeah, Light might have stopped a lot of robberies and rapes, but he never saved a single human life."
"Only a tiny percentage of rapes ever enter the justice system. I doubt Light has dissuaded many rapists since they are unlikely to be noticed by Kira in the first place."
"Well, then I guess everything awful that happened to Light was just so that humans would steal less stuff."
L replied, "It was a waste of intelligence and determination."
After that, the conversation dried up. L tried to get more information out of Ryuk, but Ryuk seemed to have caught on once again, realizing that simple discussions always turned into subtle attempts to interrogate. Or perhaps Ryuk was quiet and introspective merely because the subject of Light had come up. Had Ryuk cared about Light as anything other than a source of entertainment? L had a feeling there had been something between the two of them.
If Ryuk has not lied to me about the way lifespans work, then Misa has had however many years added onto her lifespan as Rem wishes. Since Rem cares for Misa, there is almost no chance Misa's lifespan will run out anytime soon. What would happen if I sent an attacker to Misa? Rem would know that Misa could not be killed except by someone using a notebook, however Rem would wish to prevent Misa from receiving further injuries. Misa might be effectively immortal, but she could still spend the rest of her life in a coma or severely disabled. I know of one plausible threat. This will be the first test of Rem's power, and if it fails Rem should not be suspicious.
L had Watari make the preparations for another visit to the hospital, this time utilizing being smuggled inside a laundry cart as his way to thwart any agents of the Matsuzaki Detective Agency. As before, Wedy had searched extensively for surveillance devices immediately before L's visit, but found none this time.
When L was left alone in the room and crawled out of the laundry cart, Rem was immediately there, looming uncomfortably close. She looked oddly bouncy and cheerful.
She immediately said, "None of the doctors noticed and the therapist you hired to talk to Misa wasn't here when it happened, but Misa sat up! She sat all the way up and looked directly at me and blinked!"
L's stomach lurched, and he glanced over at Misa. Her eyes had that completely blank, dead look. Before speaking or removing the cloth mask hiding his face, L spent several minutes using a detecting device to comb the room for any hidden surveillance that Wedy might have missed.
Then he piled towels against the crack at the bottom of the door and turned to Rem, saying, "I have a man named Teru Mikami. Ryuk is attached to him, but everything else about the situation is unclear. Mikami is only in my custody temporarily. The NPA will force me to let him go eventually if I can't prove he is Kira."
There's no doubt Mikami has indeed sent pages to at least one other person, since newly-announced criminals continue to die. The only question is whether the notebook itself is being used, or if it has been hidden away in a place where Mikami plans to retrieve it. Even if Reina Nakano is completely telling the truth, the larger package she mailed might have been a decoy. Why would Mikami send the killing notebook to a business?
Rem said, "Will you be able to frame Teru Mikami as the second Kira, releasing Misa from suspicion?"
"Possibly, depending on the circumstances. However, a worse problem has come to my attention, and I need your help."
"What is it?"
If anything can be a plausible, non-suspicious threat to Misa now, it is this.
L said, "Ryuk told me how lifespans work. Those with ownership of a killing notebook do not have visible lifespans to other humans who have the shinigami eyes."
"Yes, that is true. But I can see Misa's lifespan. If Misa dies prematurely, I will know that her name was written in a death note."
That was a warning to me. Rem doesn't trust me.
L said, "Misa is famous, and Teru Mikami has traded for the shinigami eyes. It is only luck that he did not discover her identity. If I am forced to release him because of a lack of evidence, he could notice at any time and kill Misa. Or if Mikami decides to give up his memories at some point, then the current borrower of the notebook, whoever that is, might trade for the eyes and kill Misa."
"You do not know where Ryuk's death note is now?"
Rem will wish to kill Mikami, or to kill the newest Kira. This is the only way I can test Rem for now, the only believable threat I can point at Misa.
L said, "Tell me everything Misa did to put the notebook into new hands. There is no point in withholding information from me any longer."
Rem said, "Very well, I will tell you all that happened."
Rem launched into a very detailed story that involved exactly what L expected, plus a few things he didn't. Misa had seen Mikami as one of the audience members being questioned during 'Kira's Kingdom' and had selected him as a possible candidate. She'd also selected four other people, three extremely pro-Kira bloggers and one journalist known for writing pro-Kira articles.
Misa had then gotten Rem to steal a cellphone from a random person on the street, so that the calls could never be traced to her, and had used a voice modulator to disguise her voice. She'd interviewed all five candidates and selected Mikami as the most devoted to Kira's ideals. She killed the other four and mailed the notebook to Mikami along with instructions. She had threatened to kill him if he failed to obey, but she hadn't suggested any scheme of sending out additional pages. She had told him that she might not contact him for a long time.
Rem concluded her story by saying, "I listened to everything Mikami said. He worships Kira, and would never try to kill Kira. He is not a threat. Even if he knew Misa's identity, he would probably be willing to be executed in her place, if he thought it would help her to escape and to continue killing criminals."
L said, "However, this unknown person with the notebook might not be as loyal to Kira as Mikami is. Rem, do shinigami have any sense of where their notebook is?"
"Ryuk would not know where his death note was unless that human became the new owner. Even then, if the death note were hidden away, he would only be able to sense the location of the person, not the hiding place of the death note. As long as Mikami retains ownership, there is no way to tell where it is."
The notebook may not even be in the hands of a new person, but if I can make Rem think so, and then present to her a criminal condemned to death as the supposed borrower of the notebook, Rem could be compelled to protect Misa.
L said, "This borrower cannot have the shinigami eyes now, because of not being an owner. However, Misa is in danger regardless of whether Mikami gives up ownership or not. Misa is one of many celebrities named by the tabloids as a Kira suspect. It is possible this new person could kill off all Kira suspects in an attempt to gain the power solely for themselves. I need any help you can give me. For Misa's sake."
Rem was silent, just staring with her single visible eye. Then she drifted over to the bed and looked down at Misa in a motherly way, her face full of tenderness and concern. She reached out and drew a finger across Misa's forehead, brushing aside some hair.
Misa's eyes briefly seemed to show some life, and then it was gone again.
Rem stood straighter, drawn up to her full height in a stance that was perhaps an attempt to be intimidating, and said, "I did not wish to tell you this, but it will now help you and I do not think you will be able to use it against me. If you do, I will take revenge in a way that is extremely unpleasant, so do not try to do so."
Is this going to be...
Rem continued, "Misa is completely safe. Pregnant women cannot be killed by death notes, so unless her lifespan is scheduled to run out during her pregnancy, she will not die. I think when the rules were being made there were fewer humans, and then it was a waste of resources to kill such a woman when we could simply wait for the child, and harvest that lifespan as well."
No, I already tested this possibility. Women commit only a small number of serious crimes so Kira rarely victimizes them, but of those 518 women killed by Kira there was one who was pregnant. Abigail Degenstein, and I already had an autopsy done on her to confirm her pregnancy. She is still in that frozen morgue in Chicago, along with every other Kira victim who's death was relevant to Kira's method of operation and might be needed as evidence for a trial.
L said, "I have records of Kira killing a pregnant woman."
Rem said, "You are mistaken."
Before L could answer, Rem had taken out her notebook and was writing in it. L didn't realize he was biting his lip until he felt a sharp, stabbing pain. When done, Rem held it open to reveal Misa's name.
L said, "How could you do that? Perhaps Misa's death will simply be delayed and she will die as soon as she gives birth."
L was helplessly counting off the seconds in his head and watching Misa, even though the shinigami's calmness told him that Rem must not have put Misa in any danger.
Rem said, "The death note either kills, or it does not kill. The only way a death note can work partially is in the case of details of death or a cause of death that is impossible. Then it simply reverts to a heart attack. If even a heart attack is impossible, it does not delay until a later time."
L silently counted off the last of those forty seconds, but Misa was unchanged, her chest barely rising and falling with her breaths, her heart rate monitor still showing strong, steady beats. He felt relieved and upset all at once. It would have been so much easier if Rem had killed Misa by accident. But he'd also felt a moment of panic for that life growing inside Misa, a strangely creepy protective emotion. It seemed almost foreign, like an outside emotion imposed on him, or a base instinct worming its way into his brain. A parenting instinct.
If both Rem and Ryuk are telling the truth, Misa will survive the entire pregnancy. Rem would not allow Misa's lifespan to run out, and Misa will not be killed by the power of the notebooks either. I will be a father. What will I do?
L stared and stared at that spot on Misa's blankets that hid her belly. Even if there were no blankets to hide her form, she wasn't showing yet. Misa was only six weeks pregnant. When he tried to think of what to do with a baby, his mind simply went blank. It froze up, shying away from the topic.
He was not able to really start thinking until he was being smuggled away again, buried within the depths of clothing in another laundry cart. And then his mind shut out Misa and focused on the case alone. With Rem's admission and demonstration, the previous plan of provoking Rem into killing a Kira decoy to save Misa would need to be scrapped, which was a shame because it could have been the perfect test, very unsuspicious. Replacing it with another test would be extremely difficult.
But, I should not believe things that shinigami say until I have tested them as well as I can. I need to do that statistical analysis to see if Ryuk's explanation of lifespans is correct, and I need to order another autopsy, a better one, of Abigail Degenstein. Something happened there.
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Fifty Days