Inspiration (or rather, the plot bunny) for this story came from Nilahxapiel. I'm just taking her plot idea and running amok with it. If you're curious how to adopt your very own bunny, see the Plot Bunny Exchange link on her profile or the address on mine. Enjoy!

Spoiler warning - Since this is post-series, it goes without saying that the end is going to be ruined for you if you read this.

Unexpected

Loss

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When Yagami Sachiko opened the door for Matsuda Touta on February 1st, 2010, only a few days after the incident at the Yellow Box Warehouse, it was a different woman altogether than the one he was accustomed to meeting.

He had spent plenty of time with Sachiko in the past at their home inside the city limits, accompanied by either Light or Soichiro. She was a cheerful and domestically gifted wife, for her dinners were wonderful and she occasionally sent cookies, daifuku, or other treats with Soichiro to share with his colleagues. She had inadvertently made parts of the Kira Investigation more bearable by providing even a tiny bit of homemade comfort to an otherwise deadly serious investigation.

The woman that answered the door at the relatively new home in the country was tired and unhappy. She didn't even greet him, merely opening the door and waiting for him to speak. She wasn't impatient or impolite, just… weary, as though she didn't care about who or what was at the door and only answered out of habit. There were lines around her mouth that he would swear had not been there before, and her eyes were red and sunken, as though she had not slept in days.

In short, it looked as though all the joy had fled from her life. Light's death, following on the heels of Soichiro's own, had broken Sachiko. Matsuda knew she had no one right now since even her daughter Sayu was still catatonic, unresponsive to questions even if her eyes were open.

Matsuda swallowed and held out what he had come to deliver. He had volunteered to do this, for he was the one that had helped kill someone this woman held very dear even if his shots had not ultimately delivered the killing blow.

"Yagami-san, the department sent this," he held out a small basket of lilies and roses with a card attached, "as condolences. We are all very sorry for your loss." The words sounded so hollow and pathetic even though he'd rehearsed them in the car on the way over. He felt terrible for even bringing this, for something similar had been done for Soichiro back in November. Sending flowers and taking up a collection for the family of a policeman that had been killed was standard, but to do so when she had so recently suffered the same loss seemed insulting. Even though Light had been a murderer, concealing this fact from his remaining family had become paramount, and they could not refuse to do the same thing for him that they had done for Soichiro. If she had even the slightest hint about the true nature of her son's death… none of them wanted to contemplate that.

She stared at it for a time almost incomprehensibly, her eyes slightly out of focus. He broke with the rehearsed nonsense and couldn't keep from saying more in a rush, desperate to somehow wipe that dead look off her face.

"I know this doesn't make up for Light's loss, but we wanted you to know that you aren't alone. If there's any—"

"How would you know anything?" Her subdued voice interrupted, her eyes slowly focusing on him. "Have you ever lost a child? Have you lost a wife and your oldest child to the same case in 3 months?"

She waited, staring at him with those dead eyes, so Matsuda finally said, "No." He felt ashamed. "We just wanted you to know, if there's anything we can do for you please don't hesitate to call."

"Can you raise the dead?" Another remorseful shake of his head as she waited expectantly. "Then there's nothing I want from you." She started to close the door.

"Yagami-san, please take this!" he said, holding out the meager gift. "If nothing else, give the flowers to your daughter." This was not how it was supposed to happen, even if he had expected little else given what had happened to her.

"Don't get any ideas, Matsuda." His name sounded like a curse. "I recall how you acted around her, but she doesn't remember you, so give up whatever fantasies you have about her." Even with such cruel words, her voice never betrayed anger, except when she'd said his name.

"Don't any of you ever come out here again." She took the basket and shut the door before Matsuda could protest. He stood there for several moments, his hand outstretched as if he was still holding the flowers, frozen in place from the horror of the situation.

He turned woodenly, heading back down the sidewalk to his car, the beauty of the sun-dappled trees lost on him. Then he was in his car, turning the key in the ignition and hurrying away from something that was sure to haunt him for years to come.

"Aizawa, I won't be back at work today." Matsuda had his forehead in his hand and the other holding his cell phone to his ear, both elbows on the bar before him. "I need some time off, just the rest of today."

"I don't think any of us expected you to come back." Aizawa Shuichi's voice sounded remorseful on the other end. "I'll take care of your time off. Is she alright?"

"She blames us for all of it." Matsuda ran his fingers through his hair and went back to pressing both tightly closed eyes into his palm. If he didn't keep them shut, he was bound to start crying, as shameful as it was. He'd been a wreck since the moment he knew Light had strung them along the entire time, but this was the closest he'd come to breaking down. Seeing the devastation Light had left behind on his mother's face was going to undo him. "She doesn't want anyone from the department to come out there ever again."

"Did she- does she need anything?" Even Aizawa sounded doubtful, but he knew the older man was asking out of a sense of duty.

"Yeah," his voice was getting shaky. "She wants her family back. I have to go." He snapped the phone shut before his wavering voice could completely betray him. Instead he picked up the glass that was only inches from his elbow and downed the entire glass of scotch, breathing hard at the burn in his throat as he set it down. It took the focus away from his tears, if nothing else, and now his wavering voice was entirely justified.

"Another, please," he told the bartender hoarsely, who nodded at his request. He put both hands to his temples, squeezing hard and massaging to ward off his growing headache, his cell phone lying forgotten next to his empty glass. He didn't want to speak to anyone else until he had his head back on straight, which wasn't likely to happen if he kept drinking, middle of the day or not. He really didn't care if he looked ridiculous to the patrons of the restaurant as long as he could keep from thinking about Sachiko's face and her comment about Sayu's continued unresponsiveness.

Sachiko and Sayu were innocent bystanders caught up in this whole mess. Light had died by his shinigami's treacherous hand, and his father had died in the line of duty while trying to discover Kira's identity, but the two women had done nothing to deserve this kind of tragedy. Sayu had been kidnapped and even taken out of the country, and as far as he knew, she had said nothing since her return from that ordeal. Sachiko surely felt like she was the only one left alive, and Matsuda had gone to comfort her with hands still wet with her son's blood.

He wished he'd never joined the NPA, never been assigned to the Kira task force, and never agreed to stay on with L when he asked them to do so. He would never have met Soichiro, never started to idolize this man's maturity and coolheadedness when it came to everything but his precious family. He would never have admired Light's genius and masterful scheming and unknowingly praised Kira's intelligence as well.

Most of all, without being in the task force, he would never know the real truth behind the Kira killings and would never be forced to harbor the secrets that he did. They were going to eat away at him until he died, festering like an infected wound that would never heal. Perhaps it was a good thing that Sachiko had told them to never come back, for every time her face swam before his mind's eye, he wanted to beg forgiveness for trying to kill her son for being Kira.

"I'm sorry, Sachiko," he whispered, daring to use her first name even if she wasn't there. "I'm sorry, Sayu, for everything."

The bartender set down his next drink with a dull clunk of heavy glass against wood. He stared at the glass, thinking that it would never be enough.

It was like waking from a thousand dreams, a thousand nightmares, and never knowing if she was truly awake. There was that still quiet between sleeping and waking, that serene place where thoughts couldn't reach and there was only fuzzy sensation, and she was suspended there. She drifted in and out of dreams, the images and sounds playing like a movie that she didn't have to pay attention to if she didn't want to. The movies could have been fantasy or scraps of memory so disjointed that she could make no sense of them; everything had an unreal quality to it.

Months could have passed by, years, and she wouldn't know it. Time had no meaning here, and she ignored even the concept of it, only occasionally taking note of the images that flashed by, whether her eyes saw them or her mind created them.

Some people showed up in these movies more often than others. An older woman with dark hair and streaks of gray, a young sandy-haired man with a ready smile, a man with salt and pepper hair and a mustache, policemen in uniform, white-garbed doctors. She looked at them, unsure if they were real or imaginary, her mouth closed either way for she had nothing to say to any of them. Sometimes she had glimpses of food, a house in the country surrounded by greenery, flowers, alien landscapes with barren rocky desert, a prison cell. No memory or image was any more significant than another; it was all the same to her. Sometimes there was a woman's voice in the background, like a narrator for her nonsensical movies. It sounded familiar, but she couldn't make out the words and had no desire to decipher them.

It was no surprise that when she opened her eyes that day, the world was still unreal, for she had no idea where she was or even how she had gotten there. If it was another dream, it was at least consistent; nothing changed shape or color in the time it took for her to look around the room. It was large and full of windows and sunlight, which she had to close her eyes against for the brightness stung a little. When she tentatively opened them back up, more details of the room became clear. Almost everything was white, the doors on the closet, the dresser, even the wicker nightstand beside the bed. The bed itself was a riot of color, though, for the comforter was a flower pattern in vivid scarlet, yellow, and orange hues. Her hands were folded in her lap, and she was reclined slightly against pillows, as though propped up in order to look out the bay window before her. It looked out onto a garden that was bright with spring blooms, spots of blue, red, and purple standing out against a striking green.

The room was warm, and she used those pale hands before her to push the comforter away slightly, for the heat was making her uncomfortable. Her eyes fell upon another nightstand on the other side of the bed. This one had flowers atop it, a small pot of tea roses with a plastic spear that held a card in it. She reached out a hand to it, and her arm felt like lead weights. The motion of reaching out was weak and jerky rather than smooth as she expected. If this was still a dream, it was quite realistic.

She leaned, and the basket of flowers was finally in her weak grasp. She hooked a finger around the basket's handle and pulled it toward her. It fell on its side atop the comforter, so she straightened it, her fingers resting on the butter soft petals before picking up the card. Her hands felt clumsy, as though they were someone else's and she couldn't figure out how to use them. The envelope was unopened, but she was still curious what it was, so shaking fingers tore it open after dropping it several times. Several thousand yen worth of notes fell out into her lap as she pulled the card out, but she ignored that puzzle and read the card.

Yagami Sachiko and Sayu, we at the NPA are deeply sorry for the recent loss of your son in the line of duty, as well as your husband. Know that they both did their duty as police officers and died as heroes. Please let us know if there is anything at all that we can do for you.

There were several names signed on the card as well as phone numbers, but none of it made any sense to her. Not even the names were familiar.

She closed the card and let it fall to her lap. Even so little activity had exhausted her, and now that she had accomplished the goal of finding out what the flowers were, there was nothing more to keep her awake, so she drifted off again into disorganized dreams and memories.

Sachiko nearly dropped the tray she was carrying when she came into Sayu's room for the third time that day. It was too much work most days to get her out of bed for meals as well as a stroll in her wheelchair in the garden, so she had taken to bringing the food to her room. Every day thus far had been the same; Sayu's empty eyes would not acknowledge her if they were open, or they would be closed in a slumber that made her look dead. She never moved or rolled over, always staying in whatever position she left Sayu in. It was disturbing, for not only were her husband and son dead, but her daughter seemed it as well, caught somewhere between life and death and always reminding Sachiko of her presence, whereas sometimes gardening distracted her enough to forget that the men in her life were gone. Sayu was always there, though, and it was breaking her heart even more to tend her every day but see no signs that the girl was alive.

Today, though, there was something different. Sayu was sleeping with her head to the side, which was different enough, but there were yen scattered across her lap and a note in her hand. As she circled the bed, she saw the basket of flowers that Matsuda had brought months ago leaning on its side beside her, spilling a small amount of dirt on the bedspread. The cut lilies were long dead, but she had continued watering the roses so there would be more life in this room. Sayu had apparently dragged the basket to her and opened the card that Sachiko had not cared to open, for it surely contained little more than empty words.

Suddenly fearful, she set the tray down and pulled the note from her daughter's limp grasp, her eyes scanning the words before going back to Sayu's face. She didn't look upset, but that didn't mean she didn't understand what the card had said. She crumpled it in her hand and jammed it in her pocket, sitting on the bed after righting the flowers and putting them back on the nightstand.

"Sayu? Sweetheart, wake up," she smoothed a lock of hair back from her face, hoping to see those chestnut brown eyes flicker awake and look at her rather than off into space, but nothing happened. She waited long minutes, continuing to talk softly to her, telling her of the garden and her plans to expand it, letting her know about the latest books she had read and what she thought of the characters. She didn't watch the news anymore, and she'd stopped talking to the other women whose spouses were in the NPA, so she had little to relate as far as current events. Her old life had fallen apart, and she was working to build a new one devoid of things that reminded her of her former life.

Sayu didn't respond verbally even though her eyes did eventually open, the irises flat and mud-colored with no life in them. Sachiko got her to sit back up and put the spoon in her hand and the tray before her. Most of the time, Sayu would feed herself, but sometimes Sachiko needed to guide her through the motions a few times before she started. It was a mechanical process devoid of life, for Sayu would stare at nothing while she ate, sometimes scraping the bottom of the bowl several times and lifting the empty spoon to her mouth, unaware that the food was gone but continuing to go through the motions until Sachiko stopped her.

Sometimes, only sometimes, she wished her daughter had died as well, for the lifeless doll left behind had no humanity left in her, and it was only making them both suffer for her to stay like this. Upon realizing what she'd thought, she would usually flee the house and work furiously at the garden, even if it was pouring rain, for what kind of mother could think such a thing? Even if she'd lost the Light of her life, her wonderful son, and no longer had her hardworking husband in the home, she could not ignore the fact that she still had a daughter. The hard work was penance, and she would stay out there until the dark wouldn't let her see anymore and her thoughts stopped playing like a broken record in her head.

Then she would go back inside and stay with her daughter, one dirt-stained hand holding Sayu's and the other holding her book open as she read to her. The doctors said that she could come truly awake at any time, and she could probably hear what was going on around her, so Sachiko kept her company, hoping that someday she would see those eyes looking back at her.

Today was a step forward, even if she had only seen the evidence of it. For a few minutes, Sayu had been awake, even if she didn't know what was going on. It was a good reason to step up her vigilance, for perhaps if Sayu returned, her life could return to some semblance of normal, even if it was nothing more than a façade.

It was the bright room again, but it must be early morning, for the sunlight was rosy and weaker in comparison to the last time. She tried to stretch, for her limbs felt dead and unresponsive to her. There was no money in her lap now, and the flower pot was back on the nightstand where she had found it before. There was a new basket on the other stand, one full of fresh cut flowers that looked like the ones she could normally see outside the window. She held out a hand weakly and cupped an orchid, running a finger along the petals. Breathing deeply, she found she could smell the flowers, their mingled scent perfuming the air with a soft sweetness. It made her smile even though the muscles found the motion foreign to them.

Her eyes focused on the new shapes in the room and found that there was a woman in the doorway this time as well, the one with the gray-streaked hair from her dreams. She wasn't moving, a look of surprise and shock on her face. There was something she was supposed to say, something that she was supposed to greet people with. She felt her brow furrow as she thought before it came to her.

Smiling a little, she lifted one hand weakly and whispered in a voice rusty with disuse, "Hi." The woman started crying, and that made about as much sense as anything else in her dreams, so she looked back out the window and went back to sleep.

Many more times she came awake with the feeling that it wasn't a dream anymore. Sometimes it was day and the woman was there, and she would speak to her for long periods of time. Her voice was soothing even if the words were incomprehensible, but as the vision or wakefulness kept returning, she found that she wanted to know what was being said and started to focus on the sounds, her eyes usually on the woman's face. One word kept surfacing over and over, "Sayu". She thought it was probably her name, for something about it seemed more familiar than the other sounds the woman used.

One day, she finally thought to ask the question. Before, she had simply listened to the woman, never thinking that she should or needed to respond in some way. Opening her mouth made the woman fall silent, so it was in a quiet room that her voice, which was much harder to use than her hands and arms, asked, "Am I Sayu?"

The woman nodded, a tear slipping out of her eye. "Yes, dear, that's your name. Do you know what I'm saying?"

She nodded, finding that speaking had made the woman's words clear now, their meaning finally understood. "I understand you. What's your name?"

"I'm Sachiko. I'm your mother." Sayu, for she now knew that was her name, smiled a little as her hand clasped Sachiko's, and the woman's tired-looking face broke into a smile as well.

"Hello, Mother."

That was all she said that day, but each time she woke after that, it became easier to speak, to converse. Some of her visions and dreams started to solidify into memories, and she asked Sachiko about new ones each day, trying to confirm which ones were real and which were false.

She started to see new people, for her mother took her to physical therapy so she could start walking again, as well as re-learn how to write and use a keyboard. One day she asked on the way to the doctor's how long she had been asleep, and her mother waited a long time before she answered.

"It's June 3rd, 2010. You've been asleep since mid-October. What's the last thing you remember?"

"I don't know. It's still really fuzzy." There was no other word for it. There were memories of homework and junior high school and childhood friends so closely intermingled with college and learning to drive and finding a part-time job that she couldn't tell which were more recent.

"Don't worry about it, then. It'll come back to you in time." Her mother turned her attention back to the road. "Just focus on walking and writing again."

Her mother never seemed taken aback by what was surely a lot of unexpected questions about memories, taking them all in stride and answering them with infinite patience. Sayu couldn't anticipate when they would surface, so as soon as she recalled something new, she would check it against her mother for veracity.

It should have occurred to her long ago to ask, but one day a few weeks after she started speaking and she was sitting at the dinner table with her mother, she noticed that not once had her mother set the table for two more people.

"Mom, are Light and Dad coming back anytime soon from headquarters?" Her mother didn't say anything, so Sayu kept seasoning her food and arranging it to her liking. "I mean, they've been gone for months and months if it's almost July now." Now the silence was oppressive, and she looked up to see that her mother was sitting motionless, her chopsticks still in her mouth and her eyes intensely focused on her bowl of rice.

"Mom?" she asked, her heart rate picking up slightly. "Mom, what did I say?"

"Sayu…" she trailed off, putting her chopsticks down but not looking at her still. "They're not coming back." She put a hand to her mouth, probably to hide the grimace that formed there.

"No." Sayu shook her head, dreading what was coming. She could see it building like a storm cloud that she couldn't run away from.

"They… they were both killed while you were asleep." Sachiko held a hand to her mouth, and it looked like she was biting down on her fingers to keep from crying. "I don't know how else to tell you."

Sayu felt her face fall slowly, her eyes staring at her own plate. It was an eternity before she mumbled "Excuse me" and pushed her chair back slowly, as if shoving it back would break some fragile tension in the room. Her mother didn't stop her as she left the dining room, heading right out the front door wearing only her house shoes. It was late afternoon, and the air was getting warm with summer heat, but she couldn't feel it. Her skin prickled as though it was freezing out.

She didn't know where she was going, but she wanted to keep moving. Her thoughts ran in frantic circles as she berated herself mentally for being so stupid. There should have been some sign, something she should have noticed that would have let her know they were alone now. There were only their shoes by the door, only their coats in the winter closet. None of her father's things were in Sachiko's bedroom, and none of Light's awards were on display in the living room. Was she blind?

Like shutting off the tap of those memories, she let her mind go blank and just focused on the pebbles under her thin-soled shoes and the play of shadow on the road through the leaves in the trees. She could think about… that… later. Right now her mother was upset. She would go back to her in a few minutes. Her mother shouldn't have to deal with this alone.

Later, she'd think about it all later. She had to, or she'd go right back to being catatonic, dead to the world and hiding in her dreams untouched by reality. Right now she needed to be with someone, not standing alone in the road with the knowledge that her brother and her father were dead, and that she hadn't even been awake in their last moments.

With a heavy heart, she turned back to the house, forcing the thoughts away until she could deal with them later. She would go to the gravesites tomorrow and think about this whole horrible nightmare then.

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A/N - First off, to the faithful readers of my other stories, I have not abandoned them! I just needed a brief respite from all the angst. As you can see, however, I failed in this chapter, and it doesn't get any better next chapter. I actually ended the chapter here just because any more sadness would have been unbearable, and there's nothing positive to put in there.

I'm really trying to turn over a new leaf by writing stories that do not center around angst and death, and this is far outside my comfort zone. You'll see what I mean in upcoming chapters. This plot bunny I'm working on not only involves characters I used to hate but also story elements I'm completely unfamiliar with, but why write if I'm not trying to improve?

If you made it through my lengthy exposition, yay! Thanks for reading!