Choices

Choices: Chapter 9

This chapter is strictly Light and L only, with some Mikami thrown in. no more Misa annoying us for now!

Also, I have no beta readers, so the only thing I can depend on is my grammar check, and my spell-check. So if some parts seem a little off, then sorry! ^^;

Just got a new pc too… Go me! Woot!
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Light stared at Misa’s retreating back in disbelief.

He couldn’t believe how stupid this girl was… pretending to be some sort of psychic and doing it rather badly too at that? There was just no way that he could seriously believe such a thing!

“Did you get all that, Ryuuzaki?” Light mumbled under his breath.

“Yes, I did. I have to admit that was very… interesting.” L’s mechanized voice spoke into his ear.

Light was now working with L, and had been doing so for a short while.

He had agreed to do the stakeouts at all of the spots that were mentioned in one of the Kira’s business diary page. He even agreed to be wired; so that L could hear every word anybody spoke to him, and also for conveying commands back to Light in the event that anything happened. L had even gone to the extra measure of equipping a button-sized camera in his jacket.

So Light was now L’s eyes and ears, in a sense.

“I don’t believe anything that girl told me at all. Her acting was a little too exaggerated at times, and it’s obvious that she knows a whole lot more than what she’s told me. Also, I’m a little concerned that she somehow knew that I was connected to this Kira case. ” Light whispered into the hidden microphone.

“Indeed, that part worries me too. It’s possible that she could had followed you around until she got enough information about you, or had some way to gain inside information. I think you better come back to headquarters for now, but be careful not to be followed. I have some news to share with you as well.”

“Alright.”

With that, Light walked to a bus stop where he waited for the bus to come.

His mind wandered a little bit as he wondered how it was possible that somebody like Misa could had followed him around without him noticing. It was possible that she could have been at the entire stakeout locations, and had noticed him. But for him to not notice somebody like her at all? After all, he had been so careful to look for any reoccurring faces.

The bus came, so he got on and went to sit in the back of the bus, where there were fewer people. His mind then went though the past days, looking for any clues.

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Light had just joined the task force, and had gotten to work right away by analyzing the tapes for L. After he had passed L’s little test, he had to think of a way to get in contact with this second Kira.

The whole day, he couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of déjà vu. He couldn’t help but wonder why it was that every time he spoke with or worked with L on something, he got that strange feeling. It wasn’t like L had one of those common faces that made people think that they looked familiar or something.

In fact, L had this face that seemed as if he had both European and Japanese features, making up for a very uncommon face. If it wasn’t for the messy hair, the dark circles under his eyes and the strange way that he moved about, he would had been the type of man who would have been very desirable to women. The way he was right now though, the attention he got in public, much less women, wasn’t always positive at all.

So why did Light feel like he had been working with this man for such a long time that he practically knew what L was going to do and say next?

He even knew that L wasn’t going to be amused at all with his little “essay” on how one of the Kiras out there might say to one other, considering that it had that little bit about killing L. He knew this might even make L suspect him even more, yet he did it anyway for reasons he couldn’t fathom. Well, to be honest, he knew WHY… he wanted to provoke L. But, THAT was the reason that left him scratching his head. Why would he want to provoke L, when they were supposed to work together? It wasn’t like he still suspected L of being Kira.

He had even made this comment about how if he was Kira, he would see L as very dangerous just so that he could see how L reacted to that.

L’s sudden move towards him had surprised him, as the other man straddled his legs and purred in his ear: “I see. So Light-kun considers me dangerous?”

Light would had said something right then, and even opened his mouth to say something… but for some reason he suddenly realized that a certain part of his body had reacted somewhat to L’s purring voice, and his hot breath on Light’s ear.

‘WTF?!’ That was all Light could think, as he tried to wrap his mind around why he would even be aroused by what L just did and said.

He knew that L was just kidding around, returning bits of the provoking from earlier. So why his body just suddenly rise in heat and reacted with such intensity? For some reason ever since he met L he often had those mixed feelings that didn’t seem to make sense at all. The pestering sense of familiarity was one thing, but this?

Did he actually have some sort of subconscious crush on L?

That thought was too mortifying for words!

much to his horror his face had developed a strong red blush as he thought about this development.

He knew that L had noticed his blush, as he was staring at him with this look that was like a mixture of wonderment and a puzzled expression. And with his luck any second now L was probably going to comment on why Light was blushing. At this thought Light couldn’t help but sarcastically think: ‘oh joy!’

He had never been so thankful for his father as this moment when he interrupted, questioning why in the fuck L was on top of Light like this in front of the entire room.

L had said something about him just kidding around. Light used this chance to regain his composure and then laughed along with L’s “joke”.

“I have to say, you’ve got a real unusual sense of humor, Ryuuzaki. But can you get off me? My legs are starting to get tired… ” Light politely asked.

“ Very well, Light-kun. ” with that L returned to his seat and started eating some cake as if nothing happened at all.

Afterwards Light stared at L out of the corner of his eyes. He studied the strange way L sat and all the excess sweets he ate.

He couldn’t help but think: ‘Ha! To think that I actually considered the possibility that I was attracted to someone like that! Completely ridiculous… and my body just instinctively responded to the close contact, that was all… It doesn’t mean anything at all…’

Happy with that bit of rationalization, he returned to work.
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There were no more incidents between L and Light over the next few days as they worked on how to get in contact with Kira.

The task force had considered creating a fake Kira to lure in the other Kiras out there… and at first it had seemed like a good idea. But at the very last second that plan had been scrapped. L had decided that the second Kira was overly emotional to the point of making mistakes, but he wasn’t the stupid type. He would surely recognize the fact that it was a trap, he said.

So instead they returned the diary page to Sakura TV and decided to do stakeouts at all of the mentioned locations for days until they found somebody.

The second plan was to keep on tracing back the tapes to their original owner.

They took turns in the stakeouts, and it had gone on for days. Light was even starting to think that they should have gone with the original plan, even if it was stupid. After all, the stakeouts weren’t yielding any results…. That is, until Misa had arrived.
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Light let out a sigh, as he got off the bus and walked towards the headquarters.

L hadn’t spoken to him the whole time, but that was perfectly fine with him. After all, it was rather difficult to try to speak into a hidden microphone without anybody noticing. Or even without everyone around him thinking that he was some sort of loon.

Finally, he arrived at the headquarters’ room inside the hotel room.

“Hmm, took you a while to get here, Light-kun.” L couldn’t help but comment.

“Well, the sakura tree garden is rather far off from here… if you knew of any shortcuts, you could have told me.” Light retorted. “So what was the news you wanted to tell me?”

“Well, I have some good news for you. Mogi-san and Ukita-san just came back with results… we already have a suspect… besides the one you just encountered, that is. The others are out now arresting him and bringing him back here for questioning.” L told answered.

Light’s eyes widened at this. He then gave the sugar-addicted detective one of his rare genuine smiles. “Really? That’s great! I was starting to become worried that we wouldn’t get anywhere like this.”

L merely nodded, and then handed Light an folder. “here, you can read up on our suspect. I’m sure you’ll be very curious to see what sort of person this Kira is like.”

Light sat down next to L, who had been sitting on one of the large plush sofas in the main headquarters’ office. He opened up the folder and began reading the contents…. And then he gave out a small gasp when he looked at the attached photo of Mikami Teru.

“I don’t believe it… this person… I’ve met him before!”

L perked up at this. He stared at Light. “Oh? Is that so?”

Light sighed, feeling slightly worried and baffled. He couldn’t decide if it was mere coincidence or if there was something more to it.

“I don’t know him personally… but I met him once out in the streets. You remember how I confronted that FBI guy that you sent around to follow me? Well, at the time I knew I was being followed by him. I made an public ruckus in the crosswalks to unsettle the man and try to find out who he was. I rather loudly declared to everyone in sight that he was an stalker, and a possible pervert. As an result, I had several curious onlookers and a couple of helpful people who thought I might be in trouble. This man came to my aid then.” Light explained, having a slightly troubled expression on his face.

L’s eyes seemed to bore right into Light’s own eyes, as he asked: “I gather that you feel that it wasn’t a coincidence?”

Light shook his head. “I… I don’t know to be honest. I always had the feeling of being followed for two weeks at the time—The first week I had caught your FBI agent in the act, and then I found out that you had wiretapped my whole home. So after that, I just thought it was him following me again, so I didn’t think to look around for more ‘stalkers’. This Mikami… at the time I thought him to be nothing but this normal man who helped out others.”

L frowned. “Two weeks, you say? But I had my agent stop following you promptly after he was discovered after only having followed you for three to four days. After all, he was found out so easily…. I had no more use for him at all. And I removed the cameras after one week. I’m sure your father told you this?”

Light couldn’t help but feel a chill go down his whole body at the moment. “……what? So that means…. I was really being followed by somebody else? Oh, damn….”

“Seems like I’m not the only one who finds you interesting in more than one way, Light.” L couldn’t help but comment.

Light was feeling very upset at the moment, and with very good reason. He stood up rather fast, and then started pacing around. “But why me? I don’t understand why anybody would go that far! At least with you, I understood that you were doing it to try to catch a criminal, and not to fill full some sort of perverted desire. What would anybody, much less Kira, get out of following me around?”

L chewed on his thumb gently, watching Light’s upset outburst with great interest. It wasn’t often that he got to see Light this emotional, after all. Finally, he spoke. “Come on, Light. I’m sure the answer is obvious to you as it is to me. I can’t help but think of what you told me before….about that criminal who died of a heart attack, and how when you had been running home that strange man stopped you and asked you how you liked his little gift to you.”

Light rubbed his forehead, feeling a slight headache coming on due to all the stress he was feeling right now. “Yes, I know it’s obvious that somebody out there might be trying to use me for their own purposes in this case. But I can’t help but wonder how they managed to plan ahead of us and somehow knew that my own father would end up working with you even before we even knew of each other’s existence. To have laid all this out… going so far to use me as some sort of possible decoy… That’s what disturbs me so much.”

L nodded. That thought did disturb him too as well. “Yes, Kira seems to be a rather clever criminal… and he does have many resources at his fingertips just like us. Yes… there’s more than one Kira too which makes this problematic as well. We’re not just trying to outwit one person, but many.”

Light sat down next to L again, and the two became silent for a while… slightly brooding over the fact that Kira wasn’t going to be so easy to catch.

But then Light smiled. “Oh well… at least we still have two suspects. That’s better than nothing, right?”

L merely nodded.

It was then Watari came in. “Ryuuzaki, We secured the suspect in our custody, and he’s ready for questioning now. The others are waiting for you in the other room.”

“Thank you, we’ll be right there.” L replied.

With that, the two young men got up.

They arrived in the aforementioned room that Watari had mentioned. That room wasn’t exactly very familiar to Light, as seeing he hadn’t really explored all of the rooms in the large building that their headquarters resided in. and with good reason, since the whole building was 18 stories tall, and had over 300 rooms.

The room was very similar to the main headquarter office, save for a few differences. For one thing, there wasn’t as many computers in this room…. Just a large console which appeared to have microphones, volume knobs, and the like. On one wall, there was a large one-way mirror window which showed that there was another room on the other side. It almost looked like an recording studio… save for the fact that it was clearly meant as an interrogation chamber.

And sure enough in the other room which the one-way mirror showed, there was a man bound and gagged.

He was in a straightjacket with a strange blindfold covering his eyes. But that wasn’t what had caught Light’s attention. It was the fact that the man was literally strapped to a metallic, tall wheelbarrow cart..forcing him to stand upright at all times.

Even though the man’s face was halfway covered like that, Light still recognized him to be Mikami Teru.

Light was completely silent as he took in this whole scene, while L promptly took the main seat at the console.

The team, inducing his own father, silently acknowledged his presence as he went to sit in the back where he could watch what went on. But they said nothing, and let L proceed.

L pressed a button on the console. He spoke into the microphone, which distorted his voice into his trademark mechanized public voice.

“Before I start the interrogation, I want to make sure that you know why you’re in there. Why don’t you tell me why you think you’re in here?” He asked.

Mikami almost seemed to smirk at this. “Ah, legally covering your ass, eh? Make sure that I can’t sue you for this kind of treatment… very smart. Yes, I had my rights read to me. I was also told by the men who blindfolded me and shoved me into that van that I was an Kira suspect. But it’s no use…. Anything you get out of me won’t help you find Kira.”

L only took this as an challenge. He smirked slightly, even though Mikami couldn’t see him at all. “We’ll see about that, shall we? Now, can you tell me why the envelope that held the letters and the tapes of Kira’s messages had fibers and hair that led right back to you?”

Mikami was silent for a few minutes, but then he all too innocently remarked: “I handle a lot of envelopes in my line of work….and sometimes some blank envelopes get reused by many members at the company where I work. It’s to the point that I don’t even keep track of anything I send to the post office whenever I run errands for others. I believe you when you say that the envelope had traces on it that came from me. But the contents within it could had came from anybody in my company! I…. I……”

Mikami then spat out the last sentence, seemingly pained at having to say it. “I have nothing to do with Kira!”

Matsuda then whispered: “you know…that kind of defense sounds stupid at first… but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense.”

L ignored Matsuda’s remark, and just kept on going with the questions. “You have nothing to do with Kira? How strange…in the public records it shows that you’ve stated that you actually support Kira.”

Mikami started laughing loudly. “So what? So what if I think that Kira’s actually doing a good thing? It doesn’t mean that I killed all of those criminals. If that was true… then that means that everyone who supports Kira would be guilty! I’m sure the most famous detective in the world would realize how flawed that viewpoint is, right?”

L’s eyes narrowed. “So you admit you think that the deaths of the criminals are a good thing?”

“Yes! That part I certainly will admit to. I’m not ashamed of that fact at all… I know I’m not the only one who feels this way. After all, we’ve seen the crime rate plummet to record lows all over the world. Most people now can go about their business without having to worry about muggings, rape or any of those random violent crimes that used to occur so much in heavily populated areas. Hell, I don’t even mind the fact that I could lose my own job as an criminal prosecutor if it meant that no more innocent people would ever be harmed at all… or wouldn’t have to suffer the indignity of not having justice served just because the criminal found some loopholes in the court’s legal system. I don’t think that’s a bad thing at all to wish for.”

L was rendered speechless by Mikami’s passionate speech. He let go of the button which enabled Mikami to hear him. He had a slightly dumbfounded expression on his face as he wondered just what the hell this suspect was up to. It was almost like this suspect actually WANTED to be suspected of being Kira, by putting up such a feeble defense like this.

Matsuda on the other hand, was somewhat moved by Mikami’s speech. He sighed. “I know how he feels. When you look at what Kira’s doing… it looks wrong at first glance. But when you look at how the world is affected as an whole, you actually can see a positive outcome as an result of the Kira killings. Sometimes I can’t help but wonder if Kira’s really doing the right thing after all.”

The others turned to stare at Matsuda, with expressions that varied from strong disbelief to annoyance.

Matsuda just smiled sheepishly, sweat-dropping a little.

“Honestly, Matsuda!” Light couldn’t help but reprimand the man, “don’t you think it’s strange to work on a case like this one if you’re going to be a Kira supporter?? If you keep on thinking like that, then you won’t be an asset to this team at all.”

Matsuda nearly started stumbling over his own words at this point, due to the fact that he was upset that Light was thinking so critically of him. “B-but, Light! I didn’t say I supported Kira. I… I… all I said was that I could understand where the Kira supporters were coming from! That was all! And… Well, I wouldn’t let my personal feelings get in the way of this investigation!”

Light shook his head, choosing not to say anything more.

L had gone back to questioning his suspect, ignoring Matsuda completely.

Matsuda sighed, his expression akin to that of a kicked puppy now.

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After that day, Light didn’t really have much to do with Mikami anymore and now focused more on investigating Misa, which took up the whole month.

The team had of course put cameras into Misa’s apartment just like they had done with Light’s, much to the chagrin of a few members. They had been uncomfortable watching Light’s household when it came to Yagami’s wife and daughter… and they were equally uncomfortable at the prospect of bugging some young girl’s room again. After all, doing such things made them feel like some sort of dirty voyeur… and being policemen they didn’t like that feeling at all.

However they still pressed on, understanding that it was an unnecessary evil.

Light was equally displeased, although for different reasons. Investigating Misa also meant getting into contact with her, and complying with some of her demands such as going out on a date. And well… going out on a date with Misa was like pulling teeth, in the sense that it was rather difficult and painful to go though such a thing.

Misa wouldn’t tell him anything helpful at all regarding the other Kiras out there, and only continued to drop vague hints that didn’t help him with his Kira investigation at all. She would drag him to shopping malls, and then shop for hours… using him as her personal pack mule.

Afterwards they would eat at cafes, where she would ramble about random things and he’d pretend to be interested.

She had to be the most shallow girl that he had ever met in his whole life.

Just before the month was over, he finally snapped.

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“I’m not going out with her anymore! I don’t care what she said about helping stopping the Kiras before… If she wants to talk to somebody, send somebody else! Matsuda will do…!” Light fumed angrily. He was resting on one of the sofas in the investigation room, due to the fact that his whole body was now aching from being Misa’s personal mule.

L stared at Light, and then spoke. “ I know it’s hard, but please do this for the team. Why don’t you try getting a little more closer to her? Then perhaps she would open up a little more and offer us some useful information.”

L had once again wired light so that he was carrying a small microphone and the same button-sized camera. So L knew what exactly went on in those dates, and somewhat understood why Light was getting so frustrated. However he couldn’t understand at all why Light didn’t act like his usual friendly self when it came to Misa.

Light stared back. “Ryuuzaki, are you actually asking me to lie to her about my feelings? I’m sorry, but I refuse to do something so backhanded. I’m not the type to manipulate some woman’s feelings just to get what I want! I tried to be pleasant and to act like a good friend… but that’s far as I go.”

L was mildly disappointed at this.

Matsuda couldn’t help but overhear all this. “Come on, is she really that bad?” He asked.

Light let out an sigh. He then semi-jokingly answered: “Let me put it this way. I’d rather date somebody like Ryuuzaki here instead of Misa. In fact I suspect that I would enjoy dating him more than I do her. That’s just how bad she is.”

Matsuda laughed at this, not quite sure if he believed Light.

L however, didn’t catch on to the fact that it had been a joke. He stared at Light with wide eyes, startled that Light would boldly say such a thing. His expression returned to normal, once the shock wore off. He then couldn’t help but think: ‘chances that Light is gay…40 percent. The chances he has a thing for me… 10 percent.’

Light choose that moment to change the subject. “So how is it going with the suspect Mikami? Any luck?”

Seeing Matsuda’s depressed look and L’s stoic stare, he tsk’ed in sympathy. “He’s still giving you trouble?”

L nodded. “He’s much more strong-willed than I previously thought. I’ve put him though a whole month of sleep devration, gave him only enough food to stay live, and every other interrogation method that I could think of. Yet, he still refuses to confess to anything. A normal person would had cracked ages ago. Mikami just finally broke down yesterday… yet he was saying things that didn’t make sense, and he was this close to killing himself by choking on his own tongue. I had to gag him so that he wouldn’t be able to that.”

Light looked vaguely puzzled. “That sounded like the perfect time to start questioning him again while he’s in that state of mind. So why aren’t you two back in the interrogation chamber?”

Matsuda answered before L could, much to L’s annoyance. “That’s because the rest of the team felt that this method of interrogation went on too long, and were too cruel to be considered humane. We haven’t collected enough evidence against him to be convinced that he’s truly 100% guilty of being one of the Kiras despite the physical evidence. So for now we’re actually letting him rest in the medical ward a few floors down. We’re still keeping him bound and blindfolded though.”

Light nodded. “I see… yeah, in such a situation you couldn’t say if he was being honest with his confession or not. Sometimes with that type of interrogation even innocent people would say anything to get it to stop.”

Matsuda smiled. “That’s exactly what your father said too! Sometimes you two do think alike…”

L just frowned at this.

It was then an sudden idea came to him. “Say, Ryuuzaki… since your method failed, would you mind if I tried another method with Mikami? It’s obvious that he was fully expecting this sort of interrogation. So we have to do something completely different to take him off guard.”

L looked up at Light, interested. “Oh? What is it that you’re planning to do?”

Light then explained his idea, while internally smirking to himself. “With this, I hopefully won’t have to deal with Misa again for a while…”
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L looked over all the video screens that they had set up. Every screen showed rooms of the large luxurious apartment he had set up 4 floors down just below headquarters. In one screen, Light was with his father, as his own father was placing an lightweight shackle around one of his legs.

The shackle had a very long chain attached to it… which enabled Light to move around the apartment but he couldn’t leave at all. He was essentially an prisoner now.
L internally frowned. Light had surprised him completely when he told him of his idea.

Light’s idea was that he going to pretend to be L’s prisoner too, and confine him together in a cell together with Mikami. He would gain Mikami’s trust this way and maybe get Mikami to confess if he thought that nobody was looking.

It was actually a rather good idea at that. But he couldn’t shake off this weird feeling he had. Normally L would think that the weird feeling was due to the fact that he was suspicious of Light. But…he had taken the time to get to know Light.

There was times when Light had acted too perfect and completely fake at times, but he was also a very honest young man as well when situations called for it.

As an result, he couldn’t read any evil intent from him at all… or anything else that could come off as being Kira-like. L also had a small suspicion that Light was quite possibly gay or at least bisexual… due to the times that Light had actually blushed somewhat when L got too close to him for comfort, and that offhand comment about how Light would rather date him over Misa.

L wasn’t sure about how Light’s father felt concerning homosexuals. But he did know that despite the massive amount of boy’s love magazines, comic books and literate in Japan, that Japan could be quite homophobic in certain situations. Sometimes men could easily get fired from their jobs if they were found out to be gay… sometimes on the ground that the other co-workers feared that they might become sexually harassed, even if the gay person had no intention of doing so. There was also very few discrimination lawsuits in Japan, mainly because Japanese gay men were usually very conservative, having grown up in a conservative society.
They usually disliked publicly announcing that they were gay… even if they had been discriminated against. They saw such trials as just other way of “flaunting” their gayness… it would take a very extremely open gay person to do something like that.

So if it was true that Light wasn’t a straight person at all, then that would explain why Light often projected this image of a young man that was so perfect, that it was obviously fake…even if others couldn’t see the ‘fakeness’ like L could. From what he knew of Light, he was a very conservative, privative person… so most likely he was feeling pressured to put up some sort of front.

It was for this reason why L had stopped suspecting Light a long time ago…mostly. There was something about Light that he couldn’t just put his finger on. It was the only reason why he had allowed Light to keep on working with the team, so that he could keep an eye on him. Otherwise, he wouldn’t had allowed Light to be around anymore… on the grounds that while he was obviously talented, he was still just a young man who hadn’t even finished college.

L paused at that thought. Perhaps that’s why he was feeling so uneasy? After all, he was letting Light stay in a room with an Kira suspect…one that could kill anybody over the whole world with heart attacks. It was certainly very dangerous… and reckless. And much as he disliked to admit it… but he did like Light very much, and considered him a friend.

He looked up at the TV screens. On the screen, the team was now escorting a unconscious Mikami into the room, and shackling him up in the same fashion that they had done for Light.

Light’s father looked very upset as he was attaching the chain to Mikami’s leg. Soichori Yagami nearly had an heart attack when he had discovered what his son was planning, and had been against it. Not that L blamed him—it was certainly a very risky plan. After all. Mikami, if he was an Kira who did not need a name to go with a face… he could kill Light somehow.

However, Light still managed to talk his father into letting him go through with the plan.

They deposited the unconscious man into the bed, and then left.

Now all L had to do was wait.
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Author note: not much to say for this chapter.

review as always, lords and ladies! =D