welcome to the first annual (as far as i know?) death note holiday fic and fanart exchange! please read the rules and direct any questions to the askbox. and prepare to get your holiday spirit on by drinking eggnog, singing carols, and slaughtering the unworthy!
artist notes: hi, this is your mod writing these notes, because the artists submitted this gift without the form and didn't respond to my numerous messages asking them to send it again with the form. i'm adding it myself now, going off my best guess by looking at your sign up form. apologies for the delay! i hope you enjoy the gift nonetheless!
i really really hate to do this after so long but one of the people who swore they'd be able to get their fic in has disappeared on me, no fic to be seen. as i can't rightly wait around for them anymore, i'm asking for someone to work on the last outstanding gift we have waiting, so that i can post the masterlist.
writers or artists welcome, and you'd have about a week at least to get it done. thank you all so much for participating!
author’s notes: primarily gen, with a hint of L/Misa. apologies for the wait! enjoy!
The Greyhounds of Heaven
L finds the death note in blue trunk, beneath a crumbling wedding dress and a handwritten note that reads, “I’m sorry.”
The attic has a steepled roof, and a clutch of silver pigeons coo in the rafters. L sneezes a lungful of dust from his chest, and wipes the book’s cover with his sleeve. His fingers are stiff and end in brick-red knuckles, tucked beneath the cuff of a flannel shirt. It is late fall. L had come to rifle for winter clothes in the fortress of cardboard boxes. A raccoon watches from behind a toppled, blank-faced mannequin.
He opens the notebook, and a yellowed photograph of a man in horn-rimmed glasses slips from behind the inside cover. There is a name written in blue ink on the first page, Quentin Thorpe. The final ‘e’ ends in a runny streak, as if its author had let the pen drag across the page, reluctant to pull away.
The human whose name is written in this note shall die, L reads. He cracks a peppermint between his molars and puts the book in his satchel, between Wammy’s mildewed undershirts. Wammy collects antiques relating to the estate’s history, and L thinks he may find the notebook interesting. However, an enormous creature with an ape-like body and a dog skull for a head intercepts him before he can reach Wammy’s quarters on the first floor.
“Hey, you found it!” it says, while L struggles to lift himself from the carpet. The tendons in his elbow have gone slack, and his arm gives a useless flop against the floor. One of the older girls — Linda, L thinks — watches from the hallway’s opposite end, a hand fisted in her paisley skirt.
“Wha-what are you?” L says. His voice dips on the second syllable, with an odd hiss of dry suction.
“That notebook is mine,” the creature says, at the same time a surprised “Huh?” pops from Linda’s mouth. She follows it with a sigh, retreating the opposite way down the hall, as if she has finally had enough of the insanity so prevalent amongst Wammy’s male residents.
“I’m a shinigami. That’s my notebook. I’ve been looking for it for ages,” the creature explains, in a delighted tone L does not expect to hear from the skull of a dog. There is a shifting, multi-colored cloud of color somewhere behind its eye sockets.
“Are you going to kill me?” L asks, trying to steady his hand enough to search through the knapsack.
“Not right now. Once I get the notebook, it’s very likely. Why aren’t you wearing shoes? That’s unsanitary, you know.”
L glances at the clump of lint between his toes, but does not give the shinigami the notebook.
~*~
The shinigami rides two seats over on the flight to Tokyo, enjoying a vodka tonic with lime. The liquid sloshes out of its jaw, leaving splotches on the violet swathe of fabric around its torso. In the week it has followed him, L has learned a number of facts.
The creature’s name is Mouja, and despite her androgynous appearance, she is apparently female. She is fond of stray cats, vodka, and British sitcoms. She has wandered Wammy’s for nearly forty years, and has read through most of the slimmer volumes in the library. She can quote Nabokov at length, but seems mystified by any mention of human sexuality, giggling softly into her hairy palm.
“If you’re not going to give the notebook back, you should at least write in it. You’re so boring,” Mouja says, and yawns. Her teeth are damp and reflective in the airplane’s fluorescent lights. L’s sees his own image — black, blue, and white — stretched across her canine. “You’d think for a secret multi-millionaire detective, you’d be more interesting.”
“I ordered you that drink, didn’t I?”
“Yes, and thanks. But aren’t you tempted? Even a little bit?”
L shrugs, and presses his forehead against the window to watch landing lights flicker beneath ice on the wing. “Of course, but forgive me about being wary about using a cursed object lost by a death god.”
“I didn’t lose it,” Mouja says in a strange tone, and presses him no farther.
~*~
L is hired by a Tokyo studio with a habit of misplacing its actresses. They’ve lost four in the past few months, despite increased security on shoots, and over three million yen on private detectives. L has reviewed the case files himself, and come to no conclusions, other than the corporation is more concerned with its public image than the lives of the young women it’s employed.
L arranges to visit a set himself, posing as a British journalist. A press pass dangles from a lanyard around his neck. The movie is a science fiction romance called New World, and they are filming in a black room with spiral galaxies projected on the ceiling. There is a diamond of fabric missing from the chest of the lead actress’s space suit. L doodles crude eyes on his notepad while Mouja trails behind him, sipping from a red cup she picked up at the concession table.
“Hey! Hey, there’s Rem! She’s my best friend. Rem, get over here!” Mouja calls, just as L thinks he’s memorized the wavering, human cycles of the set. The director frames shots between the rectangle formed by his thumbs and index fingers. Misa Amane checks her eyeliner in a compact. Her manager, a tall man in square glasses, barks into his cell phone.
Mouja engages in a one-sided conversation with an invisible entity. Her teeth clack against one another. She occasionally gestures towards L with an apologetic look, and then laughs like a raven, prophesying from a streetlamp.
“Oh, he’s the worst,” Mouja says into the air, “He uses the note as a coaster for milkshakes. At least he lets me drink.”
L solves the case the moment he sees Misa Amane turn and glance briefly towards the empty space beside his shinigami. Misa’s earrings catch the stage lights, and prismatic streaks appear briefly on the asphalt. For a moment, L’s sees her mouth droop into a self-aware frown, but the expression is gone a moment later when a stylist appears coat her hair in platinum gel.
L feels like he’s swallowed a hand grenade.
“Mouja,” L says, “Can I talk to you for a moment?”
~*~
Misa Amane contacts L first.
Watari arranges for them to meet in the lobby of the Teito Hotel. L is immensely fond of hotel lobbies. The lacquered black furniture reminds him of open coffins. Two American sailors on shore leave argue over the weather report. Somewhere above, Watari watches with a clear line of sight and a high-powered rifle. L, on impulse, had ripped a page from his death note while dressing, and he can feel it squirming and twisting in his pocket, like a rat trapped in a dog’s jaws.
Mouja picks up a cap she finds discarded on a chaise lounge. The opalescent light behind her eye sockets pulses in shades of pink and green.
“This is a terrible idea, not that I care. Rem will probably kill you, if Misa doesn’t first. At least, I get my death note back. Everyone’s happy.”
“I won’t be happy.”
“You’ll be dead. You won’t know the difference,” Mouja says, while a tourist points at the floating hat, spinning beneath a chandelier.
Misa appears a moment later, in a lace dress and paramilitary boots. She wears a rabbit skull on a long silver chain. L had not expected her to arrive alone, but he searches the space over her left shoulder for the silhouette of a shinigami, sending ripples through the air around it.
“Amane-san,” he says, bowing his head, but not standing. She takes a moment to assess the thin denim over his kneecaps, the ink stain on his thumb, and the grey dust packed beneath his right toenail.
“You’re L?” she asks, leaning her umbrella against the armchair. Misa sits, and digs a soft pack of cigarettes from her purse. She beats it twice against her thigh and removes one, but doesn’t light it. L notes the bump of a writing callus on her index finger.
“My manager hates these. He says it’s ruining my voice. I’m trying to quit,” she explains, “I just like holding one. Isn’t that strange? Do you smoke?”
“I’m an associate of L’s. And, no, thank you.”
“I wasn’t offering.”
They sit in silence, listening to glasses click in the hotel bar. Amane adjusts the hem of her dress. For a moment, L’s eyes are pulled towards the deep shadow that forms between her thighs. There is a blue rose tattooed on her wrist.
“So, are you going to let me see her?”
“Let you see who?”
“Your shinigami,” she says. Misa opens her purse again. She removes a tube of violet lipstick, and dismantles it with a clockwise twist. Inside, is a rolled piece of bone-white paper. She holds it out to L. “Go ahead.”
L does. A second being materializes behind Misa, while L struggles not to react. It looms over them like the idol of an ancient tribe, assembled from the bones of a prehistoric mammal. One eye is concealed by a diagonal bandage, but the other is the gold and fixed on L. For a moment, he is reminded of a distant childhood fear — fire spreading across the hillsides, swallowing houses and leafless trees.
He tears a corner off his own page and hands it to Misa, who gives a delighted gasp when she catches sight of Mouja, dressed in a growing collection of ponchos and scarves she’s found in the lobby.
“Oh, she’s adorable! And look, you gave her a hat.“
“Adorable! She called me adorable, L, did you hear? I don’t think you’ve ever complimented me before,” Mouja says, popping her knuckles, one by one.
Rem seems less pleased by the situation, and points a gaunt finger at L. It has finally begun raining in the window behind them, and city lights are stretched into shimmering, neon streaks. “Tell him, Misa.”
“Oh. Well. It’s actually rather embarrassing. I know who’s responsible for the missing girls. And, I know what you’re thinking. It’s not me. I’m not that petty, for god’s sake. I was just going to kill him and be done with it, but he has — files — about me. Hidden on a laptop somewhere,” Misa says, and then pauses to allow an arguing couple to make their way from the bar to the elevator.
“It’s alright,” L says, once the elevator doors have closed and the couple has been zipped away to the upper floors. L spares a half-second to contemplate Misa’s split ends, and the scent of her plum blossom hand cream. “I know you’re not responsible. Not directly, at least. The real culprit is your manager. Teru Mikami.”
~*~
“It was too easy,” Mouja says, watching lies about Teru Mikami scroll by on the evening news. L has to agree. The story is familiar. A beautiful young actress, adored by a god of death. An ambitious manager, who discovers her ability to kill with a face and a name. A secret arrest, and an even-more-secret prison. There is something tremulous and suppressed in L’s stomach, that wishes someone else had picked up the notebook meant for Misa. Someone who understood its power, someone —
Huh, L thinks.
The apartment is lime green and starkly furnished. Mouja lounges on the couch, in a bathrobe embroidered with the hotel’s monogram, sipping from a tumbler she’s chipped twice with her canines. L is sure he’s seen her swallow several pebbles of glass already.
“The illegal surveillance helped,” L admits, and plays his hand, two queens.
“Two aces, I win. Will you write in the death note now? Misa would write in the notebook. She would probably say something nice to me too.”
“No. I’m actually not entirely sure what to do about her,” L says, gathering the playing cards into a ridged pile. They are warped from ten years of the grease on his fingertips, and smell faintly of England, hand sanitizer, and fruit jellies.
“Rem will kill you if you try to arrest her.”
“Yes, she made that very clear,” L says, passing out cards once more. He cares little whether or not Amane kills the stray criminal now and again, but there is something whispering, something in the wheeze of air pushed forcefully from the vents, that tells him a great potential has been left unfulfilled.
He thinks of the death note in a locked safe beneath his desk. He thinks of a wedding dress in an attic, eaten by moth larvae, and a single name, smudged by tears.
“You said you didn’t lose the notebook?” L asks, because Mouja is swaying like a life preserver, seized by a rip tide. She is talkative at odd moments, when the lights in her eye sockets gather into something nebulous and otherworldly. Her fingers curl into themselves, and L understands the gesture, because it is human. It means Mouja’s mind is prowling through the shifting, dreamy territory of the past.
“It really doesn’t matter anymore,” she says, and refuses to mention it again.
~*~
They take another plane to another place.
“The greyhounds of heaven,” Mouja quotes, watching clouds roll across the wing.
“What does that mean?” L asks, distracted. He has just woken from a dream in which he was standing on the roof of a dark skyscraper, waiting for someone in the rain. In the dream, bells had echoed through the low clouds, shattering each droplet.
“Nothing,” Mouja says. Her voice is muffled by the metallic drone of the airplane.
~*~
L doesn’t get the notebook out for several weeks, and only after an encrypted phone call to Misa Amane, in which he asks, more politely than he means to, that she stop killing his criminals before they have a chance to be tried. She’s filming in Malaysia, and the connection is patchy. She sounds hollow, like a recording of herself played back on crumbling technology. There is a dog barking in the static distance.
“Sorry,” she says, “Don’t be mad, I got the cases all mixed up. Director is calling, have to go. Kisses!”
L frowns at the phone, the screen lit in emergency-red. Mouja is hovering in place above the balcony, and the death note is wrapped in a linen cloth in his safe. L punches in the code and opens the book to its first page, where the fate of Quentin Thorpe was determined by dark blue ink. There is a pen on the desk, but L doesn’t reach for it.
L hears Mouja’s fur bristling behind him, but doesn’t turn.
After a long moment, Mouja says, “You know, I really thought you were about to be interesting.”
“I’m sorry to disappoint you.”
“Believe me, I’m used to it.”
L eventually puts the notebook back, and reaches for the jar of hard candies on his desk. He chooses a licorice by accident, and spits it into his palm. In the apartment, computers thrum, a cell phone vibrates against a wooden table, and a stray cat bellows mournfully through the window.
“You like it,” Mouja says, eventually, and with a subtle confidence that L has never heard from her before. “You don’t want to use it, but you like having it. And you like knowing that you could write in it at any moment, but you won’t. At least, you think you won’t.”
“You’re wrong,” L lies, and closes the door to the safe with his big toe.
Prompt: Light develops a crush on L and realizes he can’t kill him
Summary: Falling in love wasn't part of the plan, but what does this mean for Light as he realizes that he really doesn't want L dead?
Author's note: I volunteered to make this gift since someone dropped out, and I hope you enjoy this despite how lame it is, ha ha. I know you said you wanted fluff, but even though it's mostly angst, there is some fluff!
An exhausted L was sleeping peacefully on his bed (a bed he and Light used to share a long time ago), a complete first for Light to witness. After L and the Task Force discussed the apparently real “13-day” rule, time got a hold of them and they had to get back home. Although he was allowed to leave, Light convinced his father to stay and help L with the rest of the investigation, despite the obvious disappointment on L and Soichiro’s faces. Once he dealt with that, L and Light tried to find a way to test the rule, which Light debunked L’s theories several times. L didn’t stay for long since he decided to take a nap. A nap that he wasn’t going to wake up from soon later on.
Light still remembered those restless nights where L stayed up almost all night working on his laptop, the typing of his fingers keeping Light’s eyes wide open. He also remembered how coldly he responded when Light complained about it. “If Light-kun wishes to sleep, then he should sleep. If you are really that tired, then it should be easy for you to fall asleep.”
Those nights were even worse with those damned handcuffs jangling with his movements.
And despite that, Light ended up caring for L; way more than he wanted admit. In fact, he fell in love with the detective. He wasn’t still sure why or how it happened—his memories of him being well, memoryless, were very fuzzy. He wanted to slap himself for it; the plan was to trick everyone from discovering his identity as Kira, not to also fall in love with his enemy.
He hated him, oh how he hated him for changing his feelings that way. How dare he do whatever he did to make him fall in love with L. None of this was fair.
A deep sigh erupted from the sleeping detective and Light tried to control the urge to punch him for interrupting his thoughts. Light inspected him carefully. L was curled up in a fetal position, his thumb near his mouth. What used to be just deep, dark circles, they now looked purple, as if someone had punched him brutally. The case must have gotten to him. It was a sad thing really: Here was The World’s Greatest Detective looking so utterly pathetic like a crushed insect. But he won’t be for long, Light thought, his days are numbered.
All he needed was his real name and he was out of the way. If everything went as planned, L will be dead before he uncovered the truth.
It really is a shame, isn’t it, L? We don’t have to do this. Why don’t you just surrender to me and accept that I am the justice the world needs? Then again, it is more fun this way.
“Light-kun. . .”
His thoughts were interrupted once again. He observed the apparent sleeping detective shifting his movements, whispers and small shudders filling out the room as L rapidly made his movements frequent.
Light felt a shiver of disgust pass through him, already having an idea of what L could have been dreaming about.
“Light-kun. . .”
Ah, there it was again.
“Light-kun. . .”
He wanted him to say it once more. Somehow it was turning him on how L was whispering his name, as if it was the most important word that has ever existed. Say it again, L. It’s good to know that you want me so desperately.
“Light-kun. . .” L whispered again, as his arms reached out to hold whatever was in front of him, probably the Light that was in his dreams.
Light leaned in closer to L and trailed his hand delicately across his cheek. “Yes, Ryuzaki?” He said softly.
But what L did wasn’t what he expected. Suddenly, L joined his hands slightly, and his wrists were moving uncontrollably. As he did so, his fingers trembled as he was applying pressure to whatever was in front of him.
“Light-kun,” L muttered in his slumber. “I’m sorry things have to end this way. Since there is no evidence, it’s the least I can do to defeat Kira once and for all.” And then he shook his hands with so much force.
Light was appalled to what he was witnessing. L was dreaming about choking him to death!
He wanted to wake him up, to slap him for dreaming of him that way. Something. And yet, he stayed, wondering what he was going to do next.
L continued to shake his hands for a full minute until he abruptly loosened the force of his hands, and a sob escaped from his mouth.
“No. I can’t do this. I don’t want to do this.”
Hmm? Light raised an eyebrow. What was he planning now?
“I wish things were easier for us,” L said evenly. “I don’t want to kill you.”
“Why not?” Light couldn’t help but ask.
“Because this isn’t fair. I should get the evidence first, and then send you to your execution. I don’t want to be the one to kill you.” He said it so easily, as it were just a small nuisance for him.
Light felt disappointment. So he doesn’t feel the same way about me. He knew it was too good to be true. Of course L wouldn’t want him; he was focused on his goal. Unlike me, he thought bitterly. He did the right thing to do and I didn’t. I shouldn’t have allowed myself to care for him. It’s like I told myself before, falling for someone is for idiots. Maybe after he’s dead, my feelings will go away, that’s all I hope.
And yet, Light circled his arms around the sleepy detective and held him against him. Maybe he imagined it, but L sighed contentedly as his head landed on his chest. Light reached for his hair and passed a hand thoroughly, massaging the scalp every now and then. Light was aware of his breathing against him, aware that this might be the last time he will hold him like this. The only person who wants to give him this much affection is the same person who wishes his death. Now, wasn’t that a shame?
L slowly opened his eyes and noticed the body close to him. He thought he was still dreaming, Light wouldn’t hold him like this, it’s not like he wanted to. And yet, here he was doing exactly that. Do you care about me the same way I care about you, Light, or this just another game of yours? There was only one way to find out.
L suddenly pulled away from Light and gave him a hard kiss on the mouth. He didn’t have much experienced with kissing, but that was the only affection he could come out with.
A surprised Light kept his eyes wide open at the sudden change of events and when he relaxed and closed his eyes, he kissed L back with the same intensity. If I die in the next few days, I want this to be my fondest memory of you, L thought. As they pulled apart, they were both left breathless.
“Ryuzaki?”
“Shhh,” L shushed with another kiss and this time there was nothing else to say. Light let L get on top of him, and the need to feel skin-to-skin contact was the only thing they wanted to do.
They both had the same thought: I don’t want you gone.
author: crumplehornedsnorkacking (DN blog at jesuiskira; formerly megalomaniaissexy)
rating: T
word count: 4129
prompt: plot twist -- Misa was using Light all along. (tbh, this story started out following that plot line, but it had a mind of its own so it's not exactly the same thing)
summary: Misa, disillusioned, decides it might be time to do something drastic to gain a little power and get Light's attention -- whether or not it goes along with his intentions.
author's notes: I wish I had months and months to write this perfectly, and make it stretch over a long period of time, and have lots of cool nuances. But you have been waiting long enough, and I figured post-exchange pinch-hitting should not take as long as the original span of the exchange, so I had to get a move-on. I hope you like it.
Something shatters when she hangs up the phone in the middle of his sentence.
In retrospect it will probably seem strange that what shattered the relative peace was something as mundane as a missed birthday, but it’s her godforsaken twenty-second year and her boyfriend, by the light of whose face she practically tells the time of day, cannot be bothered to come home for dinner.
Seated in a swiveling kitchen chair, she folds her knees up to hug them. “He promised,” she sobs softly to herself, trying not to let her chin pucker, because her mom always said if she contorted her face too much it would stick that way. “I know he’s busy,” she says, “but I’m so tired of – stop laughing! Ryuk, it isn’t funny to me!”
Ryuk, who hardly ever does anything but laugh and mooch off her freshly bought produce, is chuckling. Balling up a napkin, she rubs at the tears on her cheeks and then half-heartedly tosses it at him. She goes to wash her face and brush her hair, because she has a shoot in two hours and disappointment does not sell magazines.
She’s dabbing makeup on her face to cover the dark circles under her eyes when he appears behind her in the mirror. It’s such a part of routine for Ryuk to follow her around – in and out of the shower, clothed, unclothed, microwaving food, watching soap operas – that she doesn’t jump, but only continues dabbing at her face.
“Don’t you ever think about dishing it back at him?”
Expertly coasting over the contours of her face with a makeup brush, Misa watches her face repair itself. “What are you talking about?”
Ryuk smirks, although with the structure of his face it’s difficult to tell the difference between a smirk and his typical expression. “I mean, don’t you ever wonder what it would be like to give him a good shock? Do something to scare him a little bit? Don’t you wonder what it would be like to be something other than Light Yagami’s pawn?”
With a deep, stabilizing breath, she self-soothes by spritzing on a flowery perfume and pushes her hair behind her ears. “Not really,” she says. “Isn’t that what love is, anyway? Giving yourself to someone?”
../../..
That night, when he slips into bed while she pretends to sleep, she turns over to stare at his face, tensed with dreams. Light is one of those people who in unconsciousness never looks like the troubles of the world have lifted from his features. It’s more like he’s grudgingly entered into a state of vulnerability and would prefer to be constantly looking over his shoulder. Maybe when he was a child he slept peacefully, but now there are tiny frown lines forming between his brows that don’t totally disappear when he wakes.
Lying in the streetlight glow that leaks through the slats in the window blinds, Misa wonders if there’s any life for them outside of the vise of the constant undertone of fear that colors all of Light Yagami’s actions, his excuses, and his absentminded brand of affection. Misa wonders if real gods fear other people.
“Thinkin’ much?” Ryuk’s great ghastly eyes materialize in the darkness by the armoire.
“Go away, Ryuk,” Misa huffs, tossing a pillow at his outline. “It’s time for us humans to sleep.”
“Your nose is all scrunched up,” he says. “You’re all worked up about something.”
“I said go away,” she says, turning onto her stomach. Her gaze lands on the night stand beside the bed, on which there lies a small white bottle.
“You could take one of those,” Ryuk says. “They’re supposed to knock you out, right?”
“I don’t want to,” she says. “They make me drowsy during work. Stop being so loud; you’ll wake Light. He’s not a deep sleeper.”
“One of those might help him sleep a little deeper.”
“Ryuk, enough.”
“All I’m saying is it would be awfully entertaining to watch you take a little action,” he says. “You have exactly the tools you need to be in control of the situation, and you’re just letting him walk all over you.”
“He is not walking all over me,” she says. “Relationships require give and take.”
“Fine,” says Ryuk, probably shrugging, although Misa can’t tell in the darkness. He says no more about it, and when she rises at two in the morning to make a cup of tea and lament the bleakest hours of the morning, he makes no appearance. But when she finally arises in a hurry at nine that morning, already late for her TV interview prep, she spares a thought for the black notebook which has somehow moved from the bedside drawer to under the pill bottle.
Whenever he tries to rearrange the pieces of the game for his own amusement, he is none too subtle about it. She scoffs.
../../..
But as she sits in the makeup chair, she wonders if maybe it’s really too much to want a little more respect.
When the host asks her how she charmed her fiancé, she smiles and gives the obligatory answer about a deep personal connection, blah blah blah. She can hardly tell the host that she trapped an unwitting mass murderer into being her boyfriend, right?
../../..
Well, she reasons, speed-walking to the train with her coffee in hand. She did manage to get his attention in the first place. Why shouldn’t she be able to do it again now?
It would be so nice if he would look at her like she was a force to be reckoned with, something with agency and depth. It would be nice not to be an ornament or a dummy prop. It would be nice to really, really have his attention.
../../..
Ryuk is right.
She does have every tool she needs.
The notebook is with her pretty much at all times, and since she does most of the actual writing of the names now, Light sometimes goes days without actually handling it himself. So it’s very easy to write an extra name without supervision. She adds twenty-three days to the cause of death, scribbles in a few specifications, and in a matter of hours there’s an unmarked envelope slid through the crack in the bottom of the door. When she opens it, there’s bank information written on the inside; specifically, information to access a safe deposit box. She memorizes the information and then holds it to a lighted match. She writes extra names every day for weeks, scheduling and predicting and planning with all the precision she can muster.
The plan is efficient in its simplicity. The only real problem with her idea is that its success is contingent upon her thorough examination of every crevice of the apartment and Light’s belongings. For weeks she rips the seams of his pockets to get at the pieces of the Note sewn into the linings. It takes days to hide jackets and sew them back up flawlessly, and to lift the padding in the soles of his shoes, and to find all of his wristwatches and click the buttons to check for hidden compartments (several times she confuses buttons with the knobs on the side that allow for adjustment, and Light wonders aloud why his watches are all turning up out of sync with the digital clock on the bedside table).
Soon, she will have his undivided attention. But first, she has to tie up the loose ends, retrace her steps, and ensure that she hasn’t left off any crucial details.
But Light always holds his cards close to his heart, and she knows the only way to fully know how many pieces of notebook paper he’s got on him is to subdue him bodily and do a little investigation.
It’s probably safest to get him good and drunk first.
../../..
On the fourth anniversary of L’s death, Light Yagami hangs up his suit jacket in a minimalistic, modern apartment on a fashionable Tokyo street and goes to greet his fiancée.
Tonight she’s sitting at the table, which is adorned with a lace table cloth, and wearing a dress that might as well be a second layer of skin. Her hair is in a mature, elegant updo, with not a single hair out of place except for one strand purposefully left to hang around her face – it emphasizes her smooth cheekbones. She forms what she knows is her most charming, beatific smile over her glass of red wine, held delicately between fingers manicured to perfection. “Hello, sweetheart,” she says. “Did you have a good day?”
It is not unusual for her to try him with good food and alcohol, and somehow it always ends with her getting drunk enough to pass out and wake up the next morning on their bed without ever having made a successful advance on her boyfriend. Tonight he looks particularly distant; there’s an erratic rhythm in his step, in his breath, in the way his eyes dart from side to side. This happens once a year.
“Don’t get mad at me, Light,” she says, knowing this is her best chance because he’s already mentally compromised. “I know you’re tired. I’m not trying to get anything out of you tonight. I just thought you might need to relax, you know? Don’t you remember what day it is?”
“How could I forget? It’s the day things started to go our way.”
Our way, he says so certainly, like she should be dancing in the street at his victory. Privately, she feels a little sulky when she remembers that Ryuzaki is dead. As much as she verbally abused him whenever he bothered to interact with her, as much as they were antagonistic toward each other, he used to sometimes look earnestly at her, like he actually liked her or something.
“But you know I don’t drink alcohol except in social situations,” Light says, breaking through her momentary reverie. “It’s unwise.”
“I don’t know why you’re so tense about it,” she says, pursing her lips. “Even the greatest man in the world has to relax and enjoy himself sometimes. It’s healthy.”
“You know, you shouldn’t get drunk either,” he says, “considering your daily responsibilities have to be carried out punctually, and if you get hungover you won’t wake up in time.”
“That’s not a problem – tomorrow’s my day off. I wrote down all of tomorrow’s names in advance! It took hours, but you can relax tonight and no one will ever know! Please, Light, just drink one glass with me. Have some food! I worked hard.” She shoves his plate toward him. “I cooked it myself.”
(That’s a flat lie, but she traipsed all the way to the little gourmet shop to order it and then walked back with it, so it’s not like there was no effort involved.)
With a final wary glance at the platters before him, Light sits down to eat. “One glass,” he says.
She fills his to the brim and he drinks. “There’s so much left,” Misa says when he finishes. “Don’t waste it; it’s impractical.” And she pours him another glass. He glares, but a moment later he lifts it to his lips. She’ll never hear him admit that he’s a lightweight, but his limbs acquire a looseness that’s hardly ever been there. His cheeks start to glow a little more than before, when they were drawn and pale.
Fifteen minutes later, after another glass, he loosens his tie and undoes the two uppermost buttons of his starched white-collar dress shirt. He unbuttons the cuffs of his sleeves and rolls them up to his elbows. Misa, wondering if he’s starting to feel the effects of the crushed prescription sleeping pill she sprinkled into the bottle of wine after pouring her own glass, stands up and moves around the table to shove a hand through his hair, mussing it up in a way he would never allow if not under the influence of a depressant. “I like it when you’re a little messy,” she says, admiring the glitter in his eyes that comes with tipsiness. “You’re so clean cut all the time. It almost gets boring. You’re so much more interesting than that, Light.”
She can’t stop her own sharp intake of breath when he wraps one arm around her waist – an exceedingly rare gesture of attraction – and pulls her closer to share his chair. He buries his head in her shoulder, unable to see her beaming even as a familiar lump forms at the back of her throat. Why is it that she has to get her boyfriend intoxicated for him to want to put his hands on her? “I wish we would do this more often,” she laments as he runs a lazy hand up her thigh. “You know, a lot of guys would feel lucky to be able to grab me like you just did. Even Ryuzaki used to look at me like that sometimes. Why is it so rare for my own boyfriend to look at me like that?”
It’s a neatly played line that she thought up ten minutes ago, knowing it would strike a chord, but she immediately regrets it when his hand removes itself from her leg and his spine goes rigid. “Misa, why would you say something like that? You know I try my best!”
“No, no, I’m sorry,” she says feverishly. “I didn’t mean to, I really didn’t mean to make you upset. Please forgive me?”
“I guess it’s fine,” he says unconvincingly, his outer varnish stripped away by the wine and the reminder of the victim he looked in the eyes. He doesn’t touch her again.
He never actually touches his food, and she smiles a thin, close-lipped smile as she guides him across the floor to their bedroom. He’s given in to the idea of sleep, nonverbally conceding drunken vulnerability, if only for a night. She shucks of her dress and he throws off his shirt and they fall into bed and drift off (or pretend to drift off, in Misa’s case) without remembering to blow out the dumb candles she lit.
../../..
When his breathing evens out, she rises out of bed in nothing but her lacy, blush-colored lingerie. Silently, she expresses thanks for Light’s utter lack of tolerance for anything stronger than Diet Coke.
In the kitchen, the fat red tapers still burn. They flicker dimly, and for a moment she stops to admire the shadows they throw against the wall.
“Ryuk! Ryuk, are you around?”
A loud crunch answers her whisper. She turns to find the god of death munching cheerfully on an apple, looming in the way of the candlelight. “Clever of you to leave a bowl of apples out for me,” he says in his deepest monstrous voice.
“You goof,” she says affectionately. “Cut the scary death god act. We have business to take care of.”
“You have business to take care of,” he says. “I stay out of the way and keep my mouth shut.”
“When have you ever kept your mouth shut?! I don’t believe you. You meddle wherever it suits you.”
“Details, details.” He takes another bite out of the apple. “I’m impressed that you managed to get him drunk.”
“Yeah, well, it took alcohol and medication,” she says bitterly. “I’m not even sure that’s recommended, but it’s not supposed to kill you or anything. And besides,” she says, glancing wistfully toward the bedroom door, “he’s so cute when he’s asleep.”
“Too bad about what he’s like all the rest of the time,” Ryuk snorts.
Misa nods her head once, sighing.
“Hold on,” says Ryuk. “I thought you loved him, down to the last sickeningly perfect pinky fingernail?”
“Oh, I do. But you can love someone and still get tired of the way they treat you, right? That’s okay, that’s normal, I think – and now I’m just going to do something about it, that’s all. You have to work hard to keep a relationship together.”
“What exactly are you going to do?”
“I’m going to take back control.”
../../..
He drifts through a day and a half before he actually becomes aware of what she’s done. When he tells her to write a name in the Note, she feels a thrill of excitement (and a little fear) radiate from her stomach upward. “I can’t,” she says.
When his eyes narrow and he asks what she means, she shrugs again and says, “I just can’t tell you, okay? It’s my notebook, after all. It’s not yours.”
“Misa,” he says quietly. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I don’t have it,” she says. “It’s not here.”
There are probably a few more words exchanged, but later, the only thing she’ll recall with any clarity is that he’s shoved her up against the wall and he’s shaking her shoulders. Her head is bobbing back and forth. “Tell me, you idiot,” he snaps, and suddenly she realizes his clean-cut businessman hands are actually around her neck. She begins to cry. When he lets go of her the room spins.
Even the people who love you sometimes hurt you, she tells herself. But because they love you, it will all get better.
“Misa,” he says in his smoothest, calmest voice. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to do it, I didn’t. I was wrong. You just gave me a bad scare, though. Someone could jeopardize what we have if I don’t have all the information. When you keep secrets, I get worried.”
She sniffles, swiping tears out of her eyes.
“If we’re ever going to get married,” he says gently, “we have to trust each other. I can’t protect you if you don’t trust me. And how can I trust you if you won’t tell me what’s going on?”
“Oh, Light,” she gasps. “Really?! Do you really mean it? That’s all I’ve ever wanted, for us to have a real life together! I thought you were never going to--”
“So you’ll tell me where the Death Note is, and why you can’t write in it?”
She looks down at her pretty little bare toes, painted sparkly purple with a slightly unsteady hand. “Well, no,” she says apologetically.
“Why not?”
“Because,” she says, sticking out her chin obstinately and ducking out from under his arms, which cage her against the wall. “Because. Some things have to change around here.”
“What things? What are you talking about?” His eyes are narrow and he’s looking at her the same way he used to look at Ryuzaki or anything else that got in his way – like an obstacle to be conquered. Suddenly she understands that she’s being reduced to a roadblock in his mind, something to be toppled.
It’s chilling, like being doused in icy water. But it’s this burst of horror that gives her the anger to fortify her resolve.
“Don’t talk to me like I’m a stupid child,” she says forcefully. “You have to stop keeping me in the background like a prop in your life.”
“Misa,” he says, as though trying to talk a mental patient down off a ledge, “you know I have a lot of responsibilities as--”
“No,” she says, shaking her head furiously. “You always put your new world first – ‘new world’ this and ‘new world’ that. You didn’t even come home early for me on my birthday. I work a lot too – I hardly ever get a day off, you know – but that doesn’t mean you get to shove me into a supply closet.”
“So you thought this – my coming home late on your birthday – was worth jeopardizing everything we ever worked for?”
Willing her words to come out strong, she loses her bearings for a moment. “Yes and no.” Then she changes her mind. “Yes,” she says decisively. Righteous anger wells up in her. “Yes. Our relationship is more important to me than anything in the world, even the ‘new world.’ If you think there’s anything I wouldn’t sacrifice to stay with you, you don’t know me at all.”
Silence.
“And I didn’t jeopardize anything. I didn’t put us in any danger and I wrote down names for weeks in advance.” She shrugs. “I’ve been planning this for a while."
He stares coldly at her for a moment more, then abruptly turns on his heel and walks at a leisurely pace towards the bedroom. She waits a few moments, heart pounding, until she hears the sound of clothes hangers rattling. He’s checking the linings of his jackets. Probably the soles of his shoes, the sock drawer, and the briefcase he carries with him every day. Probably trying to find enough scraps of the Death Note to last a while.
(The darkest part of her says he might want to skip that step and simply dispose of the obstacle in his way – her – but that’s the part she squashes down. When you love someone, you trust them with your life.)
“Don’t bother,” she calls, forcing conviction into her voice. “I burned them all.”
“What?”
“You heard me,” she says. “I put every piece of paper I found in this apartment into the fireplace and burned it. Even the invoices and the junk mail. I searched every place I could. I even got the piece you keep taped to the back of your leg! I mostly did it while you were asleep last night.”
She follows him into the bedroom, finding him disheveled and ruddy, breathing hard. “You have to do what I say if you want to find out where I put it all,” she says smoothly.
“Why should I do anything you say?!”
“Because the notebook I hid is mine,” she says, “and if you disturb the one held by the task force you’ll be making yourself look even more suspicious. If you try to find the notebook I hid, or if you try to find or use any of the pieces, I will give up ownership of the Death Note on the spot. I will tell Ryuk to take it back. I’ll forget about it completely. And then you’ll never find out where it is.” She tries to keep her voice from wavering, but it dips and rises despite her will.
He regards her with an expression that she desperately tries to convince herself is not hatred, only a little bewilderment at her betrayal. “Of all people,” he says, “I didn’t expect you to go directly against my wishes.”
“I told you, I’ll do what I have to do for us,” she says. “You don’t give me enough credit. I drew you out of hiding back before I even knew who you were, didn’t I? I’m not as smart as you, but I can think for myself.”
He says nothing, still breathing like he’s run a marathon.
“You need me,” she says. “You really need me, because without me you don’t have anyone to do your dirty work. Without me, your whole charade falls through. Don’t you see it, Light? I’m in control now. You have to listen to me. Maybe if you do what I ask, I’ll tell you where it is and we can go back to like we were before. I’m only doing this so we can fix this…this rift. Light, please!”
He turns away for a moment, and when he faces her again his features are composed. “What is it that you want, Misa? What do I have to do to appease you?”
“Well,” she says, “for starters, we can go out for a fancy dinner. And we’re going to eat and drink and enjoy ourselves, and you don’t get to shrug me off at all.”
There is an embarrassingly long pause. Misa looks at Light and then down at the hardwood floor and then back again, praying that deadened look in his eyes won’t make tonight as miserable as all the others.
He rakes his hands through his hair, taking a deep, hissing breath. “Go put on something nice,” he says.
As she turns away to go shed her denim shorts, she smothers the instinct that tells her this is only a temporary solution, that she can’t keep this game up forever, that it’s all going to end with a bang. He may think he’s only appeasing her for now, he may think he’s going to shove her back out of the way, but he won’t. Misa will make him see – she knows she can. It will just take persistence, that’s all. But she has nothing if not persistence, right? And now the cards are all in her hands, at least for tonight.
She flounces out of the room and pulls on her best skintight dress.
(And she takes extra care with her crimson lipstick, because Kira’s beloved must look her best.)
by this point (tuesday february 4th) all the completed gifts that have been submitted to me have been posted. i'm still waiting on seven more (three late gifts which the gifters have received extensions for, and four pinch-hitters for people who have dropped out or otherwise disappeared on me.)
i plan to compile a masterlist of all the gifts (listing the recipient and the author/artist) and i'm wondering if you guys would like me to do that now - and add in the late gifts when they come in - or wait until all the gifts have been posted?
please let me know if you have an opinion. thank you all so much for participating, and a special super-warm gracias to my lovely pinch-hitters. everyone who put time and effort into this exchange is a superstar! i love you guys!
rating: T (rated for making out but nothing else they’re just cute happy babies)
word count: 1063
prompt: Character 1 [Matt] doesn’t want Character 2 [Mello] to get out of bed in the morning- it’s too cold.
author’s notes: title from “calm before the storm” by fall out boy
They’ve never had heating in the loft, but once the department store that they had never been kicked out of had a sale on comforters, so now winter is far from their worst enemy. Matt isn’t awake yet - or, at least, he’s decided he isn’t - even though whatever gods govern the weather are wreaking havoc on the shattered windows of the old brick building. The mess of blonde hair, curling at the tips as it often did in the mornings, beside him moves off of the pillow.
"You’re not getting up yet, are you?" Matt asks, his voice scratchy. "It’s not even seven." He buries further down into the blankets, his knee brushing against Mello’s bare thigh.
"I need to work." Mello says. He pushes his long fringe back as he makes an effort to sit up on the mattress, but the cold drips under his skin like coffee stains and he lays back, swearing. "I should’ve laid my clothes out before I got into bed, I knew it was going to get cold." He speaks more to himself than to Matt.
"I like you better without clothes," Matt whispers. He presses his cheek against the angular junction of Mello’s long neck and his shoulder. He slings an arm low around Mello’s stomach and gives him a kiss to the jaw. There’s something of a friction in the air and the younger boy turns away.
"I can’t work naked. Unfortunately, prostitution wasn’t quite my calling." Mello wants to get out of bed, wants to take a deep breath and take the frigidity like a grown up but instead, he pulls the covers over his head. Matt ducks under with him.
For a moment, it feels like a more intimate version of the blanket forts that they used to make, stringing comforters over chairs and tables. Mello used to make his with lengths of string and clothespins attached to doors and table legs but Matt never had that much patience. His legs tangle with the younger man’s.
"It’ll warm up in a few hours. I’m sure we can find something to do until then." Matt presses a nicotine stained thumb against one of the soft coloured bruises on Mello’s jaw. Mello’s laughs and throws the blankets back. Matt groans loudly at the cold. His sleepshirt is warm but it isn’t nearly enough. He reaches for his laptop which is plugged in beside him and flicks it open, typing something into the search bar. "It’s literally forty fucking six degrees out. It’s still dark out. Definitely time to stay in bed."
"I have to work. There are buildings to be cased and there’s ammo to buy and…" Mello’s voice is softer than it was as Matt starts pressing wet, open mouthed kisses to Mello’s jaw and neck. His tongue slides against the crumpled mass of scar tissue lining the blonde’s face, and this time when Mello shivers, it isn’t because of the cold. "Come on, stop it."
Matt kisses Mello’s lips this time. “And they’ll all still be there in three hours.” He presses kisses to the unmarred side of Mello’s face, down his neck and over his clavicle until Mello finally grasps him by his chin and guides him into a messy kiss with too much teeth and not enough heat.
"Get me a shirt, loser. I’m not getting out of bed in my boxer briefs. You’re more dressed than I am." Mello says. Matt shakes his head. He’s halfway desensitised by the circuitous nature of the conversation and half adoring the banter. It seems like more often than not, Mello is working and Matt is hacking or one of them is sleeping. Less frequently, they’re sleeping together.
"That’s precisely why there’s no way in hell I’m getting you clothing. Come on. Let me warm you up on my own." He rubs his hands over Mello’s stomach like he’s trying to make fire from friction. Mello tenses, then laughs. "You can work from the bed." He suggests as he pulls the laptop over again. There’s a lightness that lingers on Mello’s cheekbones and clavicle that Matt hasn’t seen since they were thirteen, give or take.
"Okay," Mello says, his voice the auditory picture of resignation. "You win, loser. You have thirty minutes, and then I really need to work." He lets his eyes flash from Matt’s eyes peeking out from under his messily chopped red hair which he’d never admit curled slightly in the mornings to his lips and back. "What?"
Matt stays unmoving, his body still half draped over Mello’s, his breaths puffing in the cold air. The blond had expected sudden movement, a flurry of excitement and kisses and undergarments going every which way, but when Matt nuzzles his way up to Mello’s face, he does so softly without the aggressive passion Mello is so accustomed to.
"Do you like this?" The words are hardly off from the usual ones he gasps out at two in the morning but they taste differently to Mello. Matt’s fingertips streak over Mello’s torso and Mello shivers, having completely given himself over to the gentleness. Matt feels warm to him.
“Less talking, more kissing.” Mello manages, his blunt nails pressing through Matt’s hair and pulling the boy in closer to him. His hips press and shift, not like he’s grinding to some dumb technopop song but like he’s trying to make friction, to make heat. Matt thinks it’s gorgeous. Mello is gorgeous, with his long limbs and joints that stick out of his frail skin. He tongues the mottling on his somewhat lover’s cheek.
“Funny, I think I’ve heard that before.” Matt whispers. The dynamic has shifted with Mello’s self control now faltering with the unsteady tempo of his heartbeats. “Are you warmed up yet?” He asks as if he’s waiting to pull away, but his hands stay fixed to Mello’s hips. Mello can still feel the frigidity of the air but he can also feel the stinging heat of his own blood.
“Not warm enough, I don’t think.” He says in the softest voice he can muster, because as he rolls over to cover Matt’s limbs with his own he knows that the steam he breathes out will never be as warm as the taste of Matt’s mouth or the colour of his hair. Perhaps, he thinks, warmth is as relative as love.
prompt: Mello dies and Near regrets not being able to work with him, because he honestly liked him. He feels guilty and lonely. Eventually his team members find out why he’s depressed and comforts him.
artist’s notes: hope you like it, its messy and the prompt is more implied than anything, but i really didnt feel like a lot of words were needed. merry christmas!
author's notes: Hello! I decided that i wanted to use a younger L, and I went off of the manga dates and years, so this fic is actually taking place in 1994/95, so the music is also from around that time period. I hope that's okay, and I hope you enjoy it! The songs used are "Under the Bridge" by TRHCP, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Nirvana, "Cotton Eye Joe" by Rednex, "The Sign" by Ace of Bace. and "We Didn't Start The Fire" by Billy Joel".
The young genius known as L was almost always able to keep himself busy. He was given intricate puzzles and complex crime cases to solve, so it was very rare for him to grow bored.
Like he had on on this occasion.
L had grown weary of the puzzles he had, and there were no current cases of his level that were worth solving. So he wandered through the halls of Wammy's House trying to find some sort of activity that could entertain him.
He wasn't to keen on going to the yard to play, and he certainly did not care to play with the other children. So wandered through the halls of Wammy’s House trying to find some sort of activity that could entertain him.
He wandered through the class halls, and various other parts of the orphanage, such as the dormitory, the foyer, and the mess hall.
As he meandered throughout the building, he had contemplated many ideas about how to rid himself of boredom.
Being one of the very few who had the privilege to do so, he could get a pass to head into town. But he dismissed the idea, because it was getting somewhat late, and he had already spent his weekly allowance (another privilege he exclusively got for solving cases).
He considered maybe writing. he could fix up a story in his head, or write a report.
No, that didn’t perk his interest, either.
He eventually wandered back to his room. He grabbed a lollipop from his dresser stash, unwrapped it and stuck it in his mouth.
L glanced at the digital clock on the dresser, then sighed as he realized it was already dinnertime. He gave his sucker one last lick, then stuck it back into the wrapper and tossed it back into the drawer.
L had felt a bit disappointed that the day had gone by so quickly, and he felt frustrated that he spent it doing nothing of interest.
When he got to the mess hall there was already quite a large line. So he plopped down in a seat and rested his head on the table.
From where he was sitting, it looked like they only had two fruit options, and a pudding cup for dessert. The fruit choices were bananas and pears, which displeased L, because the bananas were not yet ripe, and L did not care for pears, and the pudding at Wammy’s House cafeteria was always sugar free.
The young man sighed as he got up to get in line, because unfortunately, breakfast, lunch, and dinner were mandatory, unless you were sick. As L stood in the slow moving line, he leaned against the door to a storage room. He glanced through the narrow window on the door, and saw something that perked up his interest.
He saw a TV set. Wammy’s house had a few of them, though they were used primarily for educational purposes. L was pretty certain Watari would let him use it anyway, though.
While L didn’t normally care for watching TV, he figured that he would hook it up to the cable to see if anything that would interest him would be on.
L picked at the food on his tray until he was allowed to leave, then abruptly hurried towards Watari’s office.
He rapped his knuckles on the door, then opened it and went in after hearing an elderly “Come in.”
Inside, L saw Watari sitting at his desk sipping on Earl Grey tea.
“Hello, L. what can I do for you this evening?” Watari asked.
“May I use the TV in the storage room?”
“I don’t mind if you do, but is your room clean? Watari inquired.
“Yes, Watari,” L responded.
“Well, let’s go grab it, then,” Watari said while setting down his tea and grabbing his keys out of his desk.
“I’m assuming you know how to hook everything up?” Watari asked as they walked down to the cafeteria.
“Yes, I do,” The younger one responded.
Watari unlocked the the Storage room door, and steered the TV over to L’s room, while trying to create some small talk between them, like asking about L’s day, to which L mumbled out a quick “fine.”
Once they arrived at L’s room, Watari studied the room, and nodded in approval of the room.
After wheeling the TV cart into a corner of the room, The elderly man said a quick goodnight, then left L to hook the TV up to the cable.
After everything was connected and ready, L grabbed the remote and plopped down on his bed. He flipped through the channels, stopping for a few minutes every once in a while, but didn’t stay too long on any one channel.
After the third time around, L finally found something that caught his attention.
It was a station playing what looked to be a music video.
The young man had never watched any music videos, but had heard of them. He also wasn’t used to this type of music,but that was because L had grown up listening to classical musicians, such as Debussy, and Beethoven, and Mozart.
L decided that listening to modern music could be beneficial, whether he cared for it or not. He could study it, and use it to reflect on the behavior of young adults. L dabbled in psychology, as it helped him with some of the cases he solved.
As the current video ended, L sat up a little more, and listened to the lyrics of the next song.
“Sometimes I feel like
I don’t have a partner
Sometimes I feel like
My only friend
Is the city I live in
The city of angels
Lonely as I am
Together we cry”
“Ah. music that gives people something to relate to. That’s not bad at all. I was expecting songs about drugs, and sex,” L thought. He grabbed some red licorice from under his pillow and started munching on it. L hoped that the rest of the songs were like that.
“Load up on guns
and bring your friends
It’s fun to lose
and to pretend
She’s over bored
and self assured
oh no,
I know a dirty word”
L wasn’t fond of the lyrics to this song, but he caught himself tapping his foot and nodding his head along with the beat. After he caught himself doing so, L pulled his legs up to his chest so he was sitting in a fetal position.
“If it hadn’t been for Cotton Eye Joe
I’d been married long time ago
Where did you come from
Where did you go
Where did you come from, Cotton Eye Joe
This song was obnoxious to L. But he could see why people would like it. It was upbeat, and easy to sing along to. But it could also easily get stuck in your head. L really hoped that this annoying song wouldn’t get stuck in his head.
At this point,L stopped trying to analyze the music, and started listening to it more for entertainment.
“I saw the sign
and it opened up my eyes
I saw the sign
no one’s gonna drag you up
to get into the light where you belong
But where do you belong?”
The lyrics weren’t very relevant to L, but he did like the way it sounded.
“We didn’t start the fire
It was always burning
since the world’s been turning”
L found this song catchy, and it humored him.
This pattern continued for a while. L would listen to a song, decide if he liked it or not, and sometimes memorize the name and artist of a song if he liked it enough.
L glanced at the clock and noticed that it had gotten very late. L decided that it couldn’t hurt him to stay up a little longer, seeing as he had no plans for tomorrow, either.
Unfortunately, that plan didn’t last for long. L’s eyes slowly started to droop, and he fell asleep listening to the sounds of bass guitars, and drums.
After that night, L decided that he preferred the liveliness of modern music, over classical (much to Watari’s disapproval).
prompt: if someone said they’d do fanmixes instead omf g i’ll go down for that one 100% frick the rest
tracklist: 01. vcr - the xx | 2. young boys - sin fang | 3. lump sum - bon iver | 4. death valley - fall out boy | 5. i know i know i know - tegan and sara | 6. split me wide open - the bravery | 7. skulls - bastille | 8. trees are a' swayin' - say hi | 9. poison oak - bright eyes | 10. c'mon (with fun.) - panic! at the disco | 11. amour love - la roux | 12. what i'm trying to say - stars
notes: so, funny story, i'm not sure what kind of gift you'd have gotten otherwise, but as your original gifter dropped out, i stepped in to pick up the slack, and lo and behold you were the one person out of everyone who asked for a fanmix, which made fixing up an extra gift for you a whole lot easier than cranking out another fic. i really hope you enjoy the mix! happy late holidays!
Prompt: 4) MelloxNear, in which they are parked somewhere in a car (or on a motorcycle) and they’re either holding hands, kissing, or both.
Artist notes: I'm so sorry for the delay haha I wanted to try and make it perect because I really love your art but it still came out like crap. (SORRY) I still had so much fun and when i found out who i got and read all the amazing prompts I was filled with glee (We're all going to ignore the bike please let's all ignore the bike)
Prompt: Misa takes L up on the possibility of him falling for her.
Artist’s Notes: I redrew this picture approximately 100 times and chose the best 2 versions of each of them in the end(Unfortunately, they were drawn in different mediums, but I tried to make up for that,) so sorry if it looks a little wonky!! Shippy stuff is not my forte, haha.
Anyways, I hope you like it, and I hope your holidays were great!! uwu
author’s notes: i started writing about mello and near… just arrived…also, i hope you don’t mind that i used this as the start of a collection of wammy’s one-shots i’ve been working on anyway! the prompt fitted perfectly with the chronology… but yes, i hope you enjoy it!! <3
hey, so i'm need of another pinch-hitter (and maybe several!) another person has dropped out and i need someone who's willing to do some extra art? message me if you're up for it and i'll send you the prompts and you can let me know if they work for you.
along with that, there are five people who, although they asked for extensions, haven't been responding to my messages. i'm going to try to get in contact with them again, but if i can't, i'm going to need five (maybe four, because i can definitely pick up some of the slack myself) people willing to pinch-hit. two of the requests are for fic specifically and the other three are for either. if you're interested, please message me and we'll sort of the details. thanks!
prompt: "Mello has just received his burn, and Matt is helping him."
artist's note: Hi~. At first I wanted to draw Matt helping Mello with his wounds but failed miserably, and drawing something sad would kill me inside, so this is what it turned out to be. Hope that Matt making Mello a cup of chocolate is a way of helping him. Hope you'll like it.
