Death Note Fan Fiction ❯ Triad ❯ Triad ( Chapter 1 )

Disclaimer: Not mine.

AN: Written for different people, but all revolving around the same theme.

* * *

They wait for the ambulance in an uneasy silence. They're all policemen, they know that no one should touch the bodies, but Light is still a teenage boy, and his best friend has just died in his arms. Matsuda knows he shouldn't be staring - he knows it through Aizawa's silence and Mogi's glare, knows it for the way the chief stares resolutely at the door, silently willing the ambulance to come faster. But he can't help it, it's so strange, so surreal, and Light still hasn't let the body go. It's not healthy - they all know that, know that they should start coaxing him away, know that there's no chance for hope and that he should be pulled away from this as soon as possible.

But Light is brave and Light is brilliant and Light is only eighteen years old, and Light's shoulders are trembling just a little as he clutches the corpse ever-tighter and trails his fingers through ink-black hair, over and over, like a mantra or a prayer, and Matsuda is the only one to notice when he shudders violently with what looks like a repressed sob.

So he drags himself to his feet and walks over, puts a hand on his shoulder and murmurs "Light-kun?" and tries not to be hurt when the boy jerks violently away.

"Leave me alone!" he snarls through a choked throat, crouching even further over the body, like he's trying to protect him, like Matsuda will steal L away from him, and he knows right then that prying a grief-stricken teenager away from the dead body of the only person who understood him is going to be a nightmare no matter how mature and responsible he is. "Just - go away!"

Matsuda pulls back, stung, and skulks back to his chair under the accusing glares of the rest of the team. No one speaks again until the ambulance arrives, and when the time comes, Light lets go with only a last caress and a look that Matsuda knows will give him nightmares.

It isn't until years later, staring down through his tears at another dead boy, that he wonders if Light hadn't been laughing instead.

* * *

Light was a premature baby. Sachiko almost lost him six months in, and he was born at seven and a half. Soichiro remembers staring at him through the plastic and silently willing the tiny heart to keep beating. They held off on naming him until it became clear that he would survive, and then Sachiko picked his name out of a Japanese-English dictionary.

He smiles early, walks early, and babbles baby-talk at them much earlier than a normal baby would. By age three, it's clear he's brilliant, and by five, it's clear he's a genius. Neither he nor Sachiko have any idea what to do with a genius for a son, but they do their best to struggle along, buying him books and toys and talking to him about everything that they can, and sometimes things that they can't, because Light always wants to know why.

The world blurs a little during Sachiko's second pregnancy, and Soichiro spends his days stressing through cases and hovering near the phone, because she's alone with only a precocious toddler for company and birthing Light nearly broke her.

But Sayu is born at nine months, plump and healthy and laughing, and Light listens with wide eyes as he learns of his duties as an elder sibling.

And he works, and his children grow, Light sweeping through school and athletics like a whirlwind with Sayu stumbling along behind him, and Sachiko behind them all, a steady rock of a woman whose easy smiles still make him feel like he's a stupid teenager again. Through all of the stress and the sickness and the human depravity he faces every day, his family remains his one warm constant, Light bright and attentive and still curious about his casework, Sayu warm and still laughing, Sachiko still calm and sure.

It isn't until Kira that he feels the world start to splinter.

It isn't until L that it starts to shatter.

It isn't until America that it breaks, but oh, he was right, he was right all along. His children are still alive, and his son is no murderer. Sachiko is strong.

They will be just fine without him.

* * *

Misa-Misa won't admit it to anyone, but the first time she saw L in person - the first time that's a clear memory, not one half-blurred of a sunny day and blue skies and Light's sly smile - the first time she really saw him, she was terrified.

That man, she thinks, that man tortured me. That man tortured Light. That man thinks we're murderers and he tortured us because he thinks so.

And he's creepy and rude and strange and chained to her Light, and there's nothing she can do about it.

Later, she laughs. Later than that, she cries. Later still, she cries again, harder, even though she's not sure why.

My Light killed that man, she remembers in a moment of crystal clarity. And now he's killed my Light.

The world goes soft around the edges, and she thinks it's sad that she's crying now. They never needed me at all.

And then there is pain, and nothing.

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