Dragonmage27: This was written for Secret Santa, for my friend Lois who loves Death Note and L and cheese and potatoes. Please disregard all plot holes, timeline discrepancies and inaccuracy. I have a bad memory.

Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note

Wordplay

Many things irritated Yagami Raito, but nothing more than the sleep-deprived, chocolate-eyed, chocolate-brained detective who sat two feet away from him, sitting up in the most inhuman way. Yagami Raito, being the (unknown) ruler of the New World, possessor of the Death Note (except it's currently forfeited in exchange for the handcuffs on his wrist), and honor student of Todai obviously knew his grammar, but he liked to doubt his captor's humanity, because who else consumes a diet of pure sugar?

And there was a pent-up rage boiling within him as he watched L sit curled up on a chair, drizzling a sickening amount of melted chocolate over strawberries. He watched L wriggle his bare toes periodically as he scrolled down the document he was scanning on the computer. If L noticed Raito's penetrating stare—glower—he didn't say anything it.

At least not for five seconds. "You seem like you really want some chocolate, Raito-kun."

"I'd rather kill myself with the Death Note than to die of diabetes."

"Is that a confession?"

Raito ground his teeth. "No."

L nudged his desk until he turned around to face his friend. The chain between their cuffs jangled loudly, reminding them that someone in that room was still a prisoner. "A strawberry then?"

"No." Raito's resolve seemed falter slightly as L chewed around the offending fruit, and the slightest amount of juice dribbled from the corner of his mouth. Raito felt something flip around in his stomach.

"That's right. Raito-kun likes baked potatoes with cheese."

"What? Who told you that?"

L gestured towards the computer he was previously using. "You did. On this internet survey, filled out three years ago."

Raito knew better than to ask why L was still investigating him. "It must be the wrong person; I never fill out idiotic surveys online."

"Are you sure? It has your correct birthday, phone number and mailing address. Of course, I'd entirely understand if you don't want people to know you filled out this survey to win a," L leaned towards the screen to read the words, "free Super-Hot-In-Style-Cosmetics-Bag." L's eyes were comically wide as he looked into Raito's stunned face. "Raito-kun, as you are my sole friend, if you ever need to talk to someone, please know you can feel free to talk to me about it anytime. I promise I won't tell the rest of the team or your father. As long as it is not evidence proving you are Kira of course."

The ridiculousness of the situation would send Raito into a hysterical laughter if not for L's entirely serious face. "It was Sayu. You can't sign up for these surveys until you are of fifteen years old, and Sayu used to use my information."

L nibbled on his finger. "For now I will believe you. But I wonder if it's true…" He popped another strawberry into his mouth. "Do you really like baked cheese potatoes, Raito-kun?"

Raito threw his hands up into the air with frustration. "Why does it matter, Ryuuzaki?"

"Well, based on the studies of the Agricultural and Science Research Lab at Cambridge University, potatoes have natural enzymes that stimulate the brainstem and lactose is its natural catalyst. It can explain your high intellect."

Raito looked slightly smug, "Really."

"Of course, Cambridge also released another study that cacao beans are a further stimulant, more than potatoes by almost ten percent." L started to lick his chocolate-coated fingers as if to prove a point. Raito felt his stomach flip around a few more times just watching him. He couldn't tell if it was from disgust, or something else.

"Let me guess, the sugar added to cacao beans to make chocolate allows it to have a faster reaction?" Raito said dryly.

"You are an odd character, Raito-kun. The sugar is to make the cacao beans taste better." L peered at Raito's face. "You still never answered me if you liked cheese baked potatoes or not?"

Raito fell back into his chair in defeat. "Shouldn't we be working on the Kira case? I mean, finding Kira?"

"But I've already found Kira. I'm chained with him right now. I just need to prove it."

Raito sighed. L would use anything he said as incriminating evidence against this offense he had never—or would ever—commit.

"That's a sigh of paranoia, Raito-kun. You're upset because you can't say anything because you think I'll think you're Kira, which is, in fact, incorrect."

"Incorrect?"

"I don't think. I know."

Frustration often leads to suicidal tendencies, but if worsened can also have homicidal tendencies. Of course, L would say that Raito wanted to kill him because he was Kira and not because L was an infuriating little British twit who wouldn't back off.

"Oh, Raito-kun. What I said about the potatoe and chocolate thing? It was a joke. Did you find it funny?" L's dark eyes were on him, and the faintest hint of a smile on the edge of his lips. Was it hope that Raito saw in his eyes?

"No, it wasn't very funny."

L had the nerve to look crestfallen. "It seems I must work on my sense of humor then. Watari often tells me I should practice. I told this same joke to an acquaintance of mine, many years ago. He told me I would never joke and believed every word. Now he obsessively eats chocolate. It is entirely my fault."

Raito was roused from his reverie of staring blankly into the computer screen while pretending he was working by the jangling of chains and some toes nudging into his side. The chains were rather background noise, as he had gotten used to L moving around to grab another slice of black forest cake. The toes, however, were frigidly cold.

Luckily the rest of the team were currently on their lunch break and didn't see Raito leap out of his chair with a yelp. "What are you doing?" he half-yelled, trying to get his bearings straight.

"We're going out, Raito-kun."

"You couldn't have just called me?"

"I did. Yotsuba's annual fiscal reports must be extremely interesting to hold your attention for so long. Did you find anything?" L had the faintest smirk as he slowly drew a piece of cake into his mouth.

Raito had little excuse for why his eyes followed the cake into L's mouth, "Where are we going?"

L shrugged. "Since there has been no progress, Watari says it would be best if we took a break and walked around the city."

Raito reached for his coat from behind his chair. He was grabbing any chance to leave headquarters. "I thought curled up, not sleeping, not moving, eating donuts and tiramisu was the best way your brain worked.

"It is," L looked pleased but he also didn't know that Raito wanted to throw a keyboard at his face. "But yours does not work this way."

L started to walk towards the exit, and the chain pulled Raito as well. "Wait. Wait. Aren't you going to unchain us?"

"Of course not. What if you run away?"

Raito suppressed another frustrated scream of horror. "I promise I won't run away."

"How can I trust the words of a suspected murderer?" L was eyeing the sneakers that Watari placed by the exit with more suspicion than he did towards Raito. Which meant a lot.

"But you trust me on the case and in your headquarters?"

"There's a reason why you're chained to me."

Raito aggressively lifted the metal chain that bound him to the infuriating insomniac. "I'm not walking around chained to you."

"I suppose that is a problem…since you have such concerns for your image." L said it almost disdainfully.

"I'm don't. I just care more than you." Raito continued to see L eye his shoes and he snapped, "Wear your sneakers."

"They're ill-fitting."

"Then wear socks. Like normal people." Raito liked enunciating that word. L had given him the slightest look of hurt.

"Socks constrain my flow of thought even more than shoes."

"We're walking around the city. You don't need to think." On the contrary, Raito was formulating a plot to overthrow L's tyranny, murder him in the city, and then drag his dead body back to show Watari exactly how homicidal L can make him.

"But what if Raito-kun was planning to murder me in the city? I would need to think to formulate a back-up plan."

Raito had enough. He took three steps towards L, balled up the thin chain, and grabbed hold of L's hand. "Let's go." L's hand was surprisingly warm.

"So, Raito-kun would rather hold my hand than to be seen chained around. Interesting."

He would not hit him. He would not hit him. Watari was still monitoring the cameras. He would not hit him.

Oddly, walking with L was not as horrifying as he expected. Although the detective drudged through the streets at a slow pace that belied his quick thoughts, his presence was quite comfortable. Perhaps he had gotten used to the insomniac at the headquarters, though it seemed hard to wrap his mind around. The hand he was holding was strangely reassuring and fit rather nicely.

After they bypassed the third sweets store and second café, Raito began to wonder. "Where are we heading?"

"I have a destination in mind," L replied offhandedly. He seemed distracted.

"You look distracted." Raito was never one to suppress his thoughts as long as it didn't somehow become evidence of him being a murderer.

"I am." L sounded so lost, it was almost ridiculous. "It's the shoes."

This was ridiculous.

"Ah, here we are." L had led him to a Western diner. Raito had visited this American restaurant chain before with his family, but he had no idea why the detective would want to go. They served mostly entrees, not desserts.

L dragged him in and signaled the waitress for a table for two. She led them to a booth, and Raito slid in first. Surprisingly, L chose to scoot in next to him, rather than sitting across.

The waitress raised a heavily eye-lined brow and furrowed them even more when Raito, forgetting about the chains he was holding, dropped them to grab a menu. They jangled onto the leather seats.

"He's a convict," Raito blurted out.

The waitress looked at L in his white shirt, blue jeans, and sitting crouched onto the seat without shoes and laughed. "Sure he is, honey. I know what you youngsters are into these days. I understand. I'll be right back with your water."

Raito groaned into his arm as L just peered into the dessert case near the cash register. The waitress came back with glasses of water and took out her notepad. "What can I get you two?"

"I'll have two slices of red velvet cake," L quipped. "Actually, make that three. And he'll have a baked potato with cheese."

"Sure thing, sweetie. I'll be back with your cake in a second."

"What was that about, Ryuuzaki?" Raito hissed out the alias. "Are you still not over this potato thing?"

"Yagami-san said Sayu-chan is allergic to dairy. So why would she put that food on the survey. Since she used you, it must have some truth to it. I'm guessing eighty-seven percent."

Raito sighed. He should've known better than to question L. "Well then. Thank you."

L happily dug in as the waitress lay down his order, and with a smile and a mouth full of cake, he replied earnestly, "You're welcome."

As he waited for his potato, Raito was very conscious of the body beside him. Lithe and curled up like a child as he daintily ate cake holding a fork with two fingers, L almost seemed frail.

"Raito-kun," L had stopped eating, but he didn't put down his fork. "I don't want you to be Kira. I can't trust you. But I want to. You're my only friend."

Raito could see L curling in his toes nervously. "I know." They both remained silent as their waitress laid down his dish, and though Raito had not eaten it in years, he pushed aside the food for other concerns. "I'm not Kira. Trust me."

"I hope this case will end, Ryuuzaki. And I hope that when it ends, we can still be sitting like this, and there will not be this chain between us."

Despite all his thoughts of murdering L in his rare moments of sleep, or when L would stay up late watching him sleep, or when they had to go through the troubles of using the bathroom while being chained together, Raito couldn't help but understand. And his knee gently brushed past L's bare toes, just so the detective would know that Raito hoped for it too.