Long absence is long... :D?

-is pelted with apples-

Okay, sorry for being gone so long. Real life and other chaotic things, you know. I don't have much of a precise excuse because nothing is very precise on my end these days, but here's a new chapter anyway.

Review replies?

aflaskj.: Nah, the meeting with Kira hasn't been canceled at all. And no, she definitely isn't, except with Ant xP

MochaLuLu: Heh, thanks xD Cute was part of what I was going for. I always pictured anything to do with kid-Mello as cute. Devious and disastrous, but still cute.

Liah Cauthon: Yay chapter times again? :3

Ganta: Mmm, I'm still deciding exactly when he's going to find out. May not actually be for a while yet... but I certainly can't wait to write it. I sort of covered it in one of the epilogues in Mellow Out, but I may remove it from there and/or rewrite that epilogue to end this fic with. Not sure.

VoidOfDoomAndCupcakes: To be honest... I'm not even sure. If it ever turns into one, it won't be for a while yet. As of right now, Alpha definitely doesn't look at L as anything but a friend, and L doesn't look at Alpha as anything else either. So... I'm really not sure.

zzzDeath2Societyzzz: Aaah, I doubt he will. I don't think I'm going to have him run away until he does in the manga/anime, at fourteen and off to America. But thanks so much, I really appreciate the compliment x3 I like to think that my writing is at least average, but my self esteem makes me doubt it a lot more often than natural; so it's always awesome to know that my efforts are appreciated by others.

Shi-chan: Thanks! Hehe, I've always grinned stupidly when thinking of llamas, but that's just me.

Wolf and Leopard: Er... well, it wasn't exactly soon, but I did update! And thanks! I tend to put a lot of effort into characterization/character development and I love knowing my work is appreciated. -head explodes from sudden swelling of pride-

randomgirl: Updated~! And thanks! And actually... I've got more than one Death Note OC story. =P This one and The King's Note rewrite are the only ones I'm remotely keeping up with at the moment, but yeah.

And now story stuff.

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note. I just don't. Stop patronizing me about it!
Warnings: Er... :3?
OMGWTFBBQuote :D
Alpha gave a nervous laugh. "And to think I freaked when I first saw Akino…"

"Well as far as Shinigami go, I'd say I'm pretty damn sexy." Alpha gave an annoyed sigh and tossed Akino a shut-up-you-idiot glare. The Shinigami snickered, and Alpha rolled her eyes.

"All right, egogami."

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So I know I haven't written anything in a little while, nearly a week, but… things have been strange lately. Minime thinks I'm dead. I had Rabbit and Llama convince him of it, and I've been worried sick about him for the past few days now. I hope he doesn't do anything…

Look at me, I can't even bring myself to think it.

I don't think he will, though. If Llama's telling the truth, Minime's too much like me. I didn't kill myself after what happened to my family, I sought revenge. But thinking about that, there might still be a chance of Minime running off and coming here to hunt that stupid Duck, of putting himself in danger. I don't want him to be in danger, that's the last thing I want, but either way there's still a chance of him running off. I thought this would be the better option, but now, thinking about it…. Couldn't I have convinced him to stay at the orphanage if he knew I was alive?

God, this is a mess. Don't do anything stupid, Minime, please…

Right now, I'm sitting here on a bench on the side of the road waiting for a Duck to come quacking my way. No doubt looking to see who's side I'm on and kill me if it's not his. But… I could be a spy. I could pretend I'm on his side, even though I wouldn't be of much use since I don't have my—THE notebook with me, not mine, it's NOT mine. It's not even in this country.

Don't worry, Ant, you're the only notebook for me! Even if you don't have any special powers. I don't think you do, anyway. Though I'm not denying any potential special powers you might have.

Wait, could it be—why, I think it is! With an apple bobbing along behind his head and eating itself, too. Naturally. And Akino's eating one as well, so I guess I'll be pretty identifiable. Gotta get going now, buddy. I'll let you know how this turns out, if I live long enough to let you.
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Alpha closed the notebook and stood, stuffing it back into her messenger bag at her side, heart thumping in her chest so hard that she was sure passersby would be able to hear it. This was something she doubted anyone else had yet had the horror of doing, meeting Kira face to face as Kira—with the exception of perhaps Naomi Misora, but given she had been missing for so long, it was hard to say.

The boy stopped in front of her. She would have placed him at around high school age, possibly a freshman in college. Judging by his clothes, he was probably from an at least relatively well to do family. Probably popular and well-liked, used to getting what he wanted when he asked for it. He was L's exact description of Kira, there was no denying that, and Alpha couldn't deny to herself that she would never be that good at profiling criminals.

The two stood in silence for a moment—what was there to say, really? How could someone start a conversation with Kira, or how could Kira start a conversation with someone who knew who he was? There was no doubt he would be looking for an opportunity to kill her, so she had to be on her guard. He had to know, since she had a Shinigami and therefore probably assumed that she also had a Death Note, that it would be near impossible for him to get her name.

In Alpha's ear, there came the crunch of an apple, and she gave an annoyed sigh. She looked over to see Akino holding up a small corner of a piece of paper in one hand, and his own Death Note was in the same hand as his apple.

"Should I break the ice or do you want to?" he asked, obviously quite amused. Alpha held out her hand, looking annoyed, and Akino handed her the small piece of paper, which instantly became visible to the teen.

"I don't currently have my own Note with me," she informed him, holding out her hand, "Or even a piece of it. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about."

He took the piece of paper, and his eyes instantly fell on Akino. He was relatively nonplussed, especially in comparison to Alpha's initial reaction to seeing what Akino really was four years ago. Alpha gave a sigh. "This is Akino. The culprit behind this disaster. If he wasn't such a smart ass, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now."

Alpha watched him take a billfold from his pocket as she spoke and pull a small square of paper from a hidden pocket within it. "I don't tend to carry mine around, either." He held it out. Almost reluctantly, Alpha took it from him. She didn't have any idea of what to expect, so it wasn't a surprise that she found herself taking a step back when she saw the thing hovering behind Kira—for that's all she could think of it as, a thing. Black hair that came to spikes that looked sharp enough to impale someone, the bulging eyes and flattened nose, a grin worthy of a Cheshire Cat, and that black, tattered tutu, all combining to give it the appearance of a demonic fairy of some sort.

Alpha gave a nervous laugh. "And to think I freaked when I first saw Akino…"

"Well as far as Shinigami go, I'd say I'm pretty damn sexy." Alpha gave an annoyed sigh and tossed Akino a shut-up-you-idiot glare. The Shinigami snickered, and Alpha rolled her eyes.

"All right, egogami." Akino glared, and she heard the Shinigami behind Light give a cackle. She turned back to face the pair. "You know who he is," she said to Light, nodding at the Shinigami beside her. "And you can call me Alpha. I don't give my real name out to many people, particularly not death note users. Particularly not Kira."

He nodded. "This is Ryuk," he said. "I'd say the same thing about not giving my real name out to other death note users, but my name is easy enough to find. Light Yagami."

Yagami…? The name gave her a jolt, but she did her best not to show this outwardly. This… had been L's number one suspect since very shortly after he began investigating, the son of none other than Soichiro Yagami. Then L was right, this early on. This Light Yagami was just smart enough to make himself seem totally innocent. L knew who Kira was, but he had no proof.

No—thinking so much about it would give her away. She needed to get to business as quickly as possible. "Well?" she kept her eyes set on him, heart pounding. What if Akino was wrong and he could see her real name? This could be her last day alive, then…. "You were the one who insisted on meeting with me. If it was to get me to join you, I can assure you that I'd be a useless ally even if I did support what you're doing. My death note isn't even in this country at the moment."

"What were you writing in before, then?" Alpha blinked. "You put it in that bag before you stood up."

"Ah, that." She flipped open her messenger bag and dug through it among the various bars of chocolate and apples for her notebook. Holding up the spiral notebook, added pages sticking out of it haphazardly, she continued, "It's… my journal, more or less. That's all. I've had it for quite awhile. Definitely not a death note."

"Then where is it?"

"I could tell you," she said slowly, "but I don't think I'm going to. Whenever I go to get it, it'll only be to forfeit it."

Light's disposition remained perfectly calm as he said, "What if I have your name?"

"Then I would probably be forced to give in to you," Alpha said, "but I know you're bluffing."

"Are you sure enough of that to take the risk?"

Frowning, Alpha looked up at the grinning monstrosity hovering behind Light. It was a stretch, but it could work. "Based on my experience with Shinigami… you're just in this for entertainment, right?"

"Yep, that's it."

Alpha nodded. "Does he know my name?"

"I've never heard him mention it."

Alpha shrugged and looked back at Light. "That's good enough for me. I know that Shinigami can't venture far away from the person in possession of their death note. For short periods of time, yes, but I also know how well my identity is protected. If you do know it, go ahead and kill me. I'm not joining your side." Her heart was pounding. If he did have her name, she was as good as dead.

"Fair enough. If what you're saying is true, you don't have your death note anyway." Alpha shook her head. "You're not exactly a threat, then."

"The only reason I'm even alive is because I haven't told him where his other death note is," Alpha said, nodding at Akino. "I tell him, he'll probably kill it and go get it so he can go home."

Interestingly, Ryuk cackled at this. Alpha glanced at Akino to see him glaring at his fellow Shinigami and frowned. Addressing this now probably wouldn't be the greatest idea—Akino probably wouldn't acknowledge it anyway, but it would be worth pestering him about later. Even if the reason wasn't his death note, it didn't seem likely he would kill her now if he hadn't already. She turned her attention back to Light. "Was that all, then?"

Light nodded. "For now, yes."

"All right. I suppose you can just send Ryuk to track down Akino if you need anything else." She laughed. "Nothing like using gods of death as secretaries. Eh, egogami?" She attempted to elbow Akino, but he was a few seconds too fast for her—he was already translucent, so her elbow just went through his left side. She looked over to glare at him and noticed he was still looking at Ryuk warily. Ryuk kept up his Cheshire grin—Alpha somehow doubted his expression was very changeable. She shook her head. "I have to be off, anyway. Got a few things I need to pick up at the grocery store."

Alpha entered the hotel room as the sky outside was darkening. The investigation team all glanced up as she entered and tread across the floor to set the bag down on a coffee table—fitting, since the majority of the contents in the bag was indeed a gratuitous amount of coffee.

"Took you long enough." Alpha glanced down at Aizawa, eyebrows raised slightly. "How long does it take to buy coffee?"

"I had to walk." This was a bit of a lie—it wasn't as though she couldn't have flagged down a taxi on the way there, but she wasn't fond of public transportation, honestly preferred walking most of the time. "Besides, I don't see any of you offering to go out and get any." She took a seat at the opposite end of his sofa and slid her messenger bag strap off of her shoulder. "Find out anything important while I was gone?"

A combination of somewhat exasperated sighs and glances met her in response, which she supposed she should take as a definitive "no." She sighed herself and picked up a stack of papers from the table. Online news articles, mostly obituaries, detailing Kira's latest victims. Kira was right under their noses, connected to them through close ties of family, and was leaving absolutely no tracks. If she had brought a recorder with her today, just a small mic that she could have hidden in her pocket, they would have had as good as a confession from Kira himself. Asking to meet him again without reason would no doubt seem suspicious. Just another example of her inferiority to L—Kira had no way of knowing who she was, that she was working alongside L to catch him, and yet she hadn't taken advantage of the situation, had been too busy panicking about their little meeting to be thinking straight. In the same situation, L would have caught him. The damned llama would have hidden a bug somewhere and gotten him to say straight out who he was.

Alpha gave a slight grimace. The past weeks had so far been nothing but a huge mess. Nothing about Kira had been discovered; Mello believed she was dead; the whole investigation team was looking at her as a nuisance; and in her one chance to prove her worth, she had let Kira slip through her fingers. Perhaps, she thought, glancing off to the side at Akino, it was for the better that she hadn't recorded their conversation. Would they have even believed a word of it? Their discussions of notebooks and gods of death would have seemed especially mad. L would have remembered the name Akino from B's mutterings back at the orphanage, would have been the only one to know that something strange was going on.

Perhaps an awful lot of complication could be avoided if she showed them Akino. If they knew of the existence of Shinigami, then they would at the very least have a better chance at finding Kira. There was the trouble of getting Akino to agree to this, of course, not to mention the fact that they could use it as incentive to suspect her. It would be better if none of them ever had to know anything about Shinigami; it certainly wasn't something that Alpha had ever wanted to learn about, and now she was stuck with a rather moody one hovering next to her, back and forth across the room. He had been moody since the meeting with Kira, since that Ryuk character had laughed at her claims that Akino was only keeping her alive until she returned his other death note. He really was quite the egogami, upset over an old friend laughing about his inclination to kill the master of his death note.

Hours that felt like days had passed before most of the investigation team gave in and fell asleep, and Alpha headed off to crash in the bedroom of the suite not long thereafter. Beaten combat boots on the floor next to the large bed, eyes closed and her notebook beneath her pillow, it wasn't long before her relaxation was interrupted by several round, heavy somethings falling on her abdomen. Her eyes snapped open as she looked at her stomach—the majority of the bag of apples she had earlier purchased was there, and Akino hovered over the other side of the bed, arms crossed and looking rather indignant. The bag they had been in was clutched in one hand.

"What the hell?" she demanded, sitting up and glaring back at him—a few apples fell to the floor. "What was that for?

"Trying to feed me pears now?"

"Pears—?" She looked down at the apples and a hand came to her face. "There weren't many red apples left so I had to get mostly green!" She shook her head. "They were labeled in the store as Granny Smiths. Do you pay attention to anything?"

His one eyebrow lowered. "Apples aren't green," he insisted, though he sounded a bit more uncertain now. "They're red."

"There're also yellow ones. And green ones, and you've just dumped a whole bag of those on me. Pears and apples don't look alike anyway!" She picked one up and shoved it in his face. "Try it."

"You're trying to trick me. They could be a different kind of pear."

"Have you been living under a rock your entire life?" Alpha asked, slightly dumbfounded.

"Yeah, and it was called The Wammy House. And they only ever had red apples." Alpha threw the apple at him—he hadn't anticipated the attack and it hit him on the skeletal side of his face rather hard. He glared in response. "And living with B in Las Angeles wasn't much better."

"Just. Try. One." She said through her teeth, picking up another and shoving it in his face. Grumbling, the Shinigami snatched it away, held it slightly away from him and gave it a rather suspicious look. "And stop complaining. Those're more expensive than the red, I'm not having them go to waste. Be glad I bought them at all." He took a bite of the apple, and his suspicious expression changed to one of slight confusion.

"It is an apple…" He took another bite. "Not bad, either. I might like these better than the red ones."

"Yeah." Alpha brushed the rest of them off of her and the bed, onto the floor. "Now pick them up and find somewhere to put them before I get very angry."

"Oooh, angry human. Shinigami scared."

"Oh, shut up…" she grumbled, rolling onto her side as Akino flew over her to retrieve his apples. Alpha shut her eyes again. "Stupid egogami." She flinched as an apple hit her in the back of the head. "What was that Ryuk laughing about earlier anyway?" The rustling of the apple bag behind her stopped quite suddenly. "When I said you'd probably kill me as soon as I gave back your other death note."

"That's not important," the echoic voice behind her said tonelessly.

"Evasive, are we?"

"Not really," Akino said, "but it would still do you some good to mind your own damn business. I might not kill you now, but there are seven other people you work with on a daily basis that I could."

"And you'll probably keep using them as a threat any time I bring up a subject you don't want to talk about." Alpha rolled over onto her back and opened her eyes, looking over at him. Judging by the look she was receiving from the Shinigami, that was undoubtedly the case. "All right, then." She turned her gaze back to the ceiling. "I still say you're evasive," she said airily, closing her eyes again.

This earned her another apple to the head, and she decided to just keep her mouth shut and go to sleep that time, trying to tune out Akino's annoyed, echoing mumblings.

I've gotten apple-to-the-headed before. It isn't exactly pleasant and I don't recommend it if you value your skull.

So... perhaps there's more to my Shinigami than meets the eye?

-whistles innocently- -has developed Akino waaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much-