Mirror, Mirror, a death note fanfic

Author's Notes: This is a one-shot, and a very horrific one at that. (Some torture is involved, and for goodness sakes NO, it is not kinky torture!) I needed to get the creative juices flowing, so when the Newton Apple (pun intended) whacked me on the head, I had to do it. Not that 'it' makes a lot of sense in this case: 'it' ended up being riddled with some interesting Snow White parallels, and I seriously don't think I've watched that movie in at least five years. Which makes me question my sanity. Plus, it was written while listening to some "Requiem for a Dream" stuff, and if you've ever heard that music... you know why I'm mentioning it.

Anyhow. Read it, and drop me a review when you've finished if you liked it at all.

Mirror, Mirror

Drip.

It sounded like water, or perhaps a similar liquid, dripping, dripping, dripping onto a floor. Steadily; slowly; marking time in perfect intervals.

Okay... There were two problems with that.

Problem one: what floor?

Problem two: what time?

Because in theory, there wasn't any time, much less a goddamned floor, when you didn't exist.

Light Yagami was dead.

But despite these two obvious errors in the equation, he kept hearing the drips and feeling time pass.

Drip.

It occurred to him some time later that, perhaps, he could open his eyes.

He did; or he tried, anyway.

His eyes had been open the entire time, it seemed. He just hadn't realized because there was nothing to see.

Literally. It was blacker than the deepest pit of Hell.

Perhaps, if he were alive, he would have attempted to convince himself that it was all a nightmare, and that he was going to wake up safe in his bed. He wasn't really stuck here, Nowhere, in Nothingness, where he knew he existed when he should not have, where nobody could hear him scream.

But he knew that wasn't true.

Light Yagami was dead.

And when he screamed, it wasn't because he was frightened of the darkness. It was because he knew he was never getting out.

The only witness to his apparent weakness: the dripping. The dripping that was slowly driving him insane even after his death.

Drip.

After what was probably several thousand drips, he heard something. Something familiar. Something inhuman.

Something that could have verged on nightmarish.

"Hyuk hyuk hyuk."

Laughter. Specifically, laughter that very well could have come from Ryuk.

It came from behind; forgetting all caution he turned to find himself faced with an unexpected figure.

Not a shinigami; himself.

It was a reflection, of course, from a mirror that was at least as tall and as wide as he. He touched it to make sure there really was a mirror, and once it was confirmed he really looked his reflection over. Wearing a suit, Light appeared tall and handsome. As he always had.

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, art thou the fairest of them all?" he muttered for no particular reason. Granted, he didn't know if the mirror was simply hanging on the wall, if it was the wall, or if it was something else entirely that he did not realize, but it didn't really matter to him.

He was the fairest.

Obviously.

But even as the rhyme escaped his mouth, something changed. It was meant as an innocent way to amuse himself, since he asked the question when he knew no one was there to argue against his point, but his intentions backfired.

The Light reflected in the mirror began to snicker.

The real Light most certainly wasn't snickering.

Three drips passed, where they just stared at each other from the opposite sides of the mirror.

Drip.

The figure in the mirror grinned maliciously, with a knowing look in his eyes. The real Light knew, sure as Hell existed, that he didn't have that expression on his face; the real look was one of horror.

And the mirrored Light knew it.

"You want out, don't you?" Mirror-Light asked poisonously.

Out of what? The darkness? The nightmare?

Or perhaps he was the one actually on the wrong side of the mirror.

"Yes," the real Light found himself answering.

Mirror-Light smirked. Seemingly out of the thin air next to him, an apple materialized in his palm. With another menacingly pleasant expression, Mirror-Light slowly held the apple out to the real Light through the mirror's glass. The real Light involuntarily stumbled back half a step in surprise; Mirror-Light just grinned more.

"Take it," he said with a sneer.

Light couldn't simply refuse for reasons beyond his knowledge. He hesitated, but he knew he would take it anyway. Temptation would be too much.

Ironic how the very symbol for that dastardly sin was an apple...

With a cautious hand, he took it into his grasp. It felt almost like a normal apple; it looked almost like a normal apple.

Almost.

It was slightly heavier than what Light had expected, rather like it was made of some denser material. As for looking normal... it was blood red--not the color one would normally think of, a mild red, but the deepest crimson shade of rich blood that came straight from the heart.

He nervously glanced back and forth between the apple and Mirror-Light, who still had that hideously cunning smile on his lips.

"Bite into it."

Light raised an eyebrow and asked with a shaking voice, "Why should I?"

"Because," Mirror-Light explained, still smirking, "if you eat the apple, the whole thing... you get to leave this place." He paused, and his grin grew even wider. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

Yes. He would.

"Why should I trust you?" the real Light murmured in a strangely high-pitched voice. "You could be lying!"

Mirror-Light tilted his head in such a way that it sent a shiver down the real Light's spine. "I'm not lying. I cannot lie, because this is a mirror of truth."

Of course. Mirrors were said to only show the truth; why should this one be any different?

"Bite into it," Mirror-Light commanded with a sneer.

For a moment, the real Light pretended to hesitate.

But only pretend. Temptation, in the end, would win out, and he knew it.

He raised the fruit to his lips.

With a small crunch, his teeth broke through the apple's skin.

When he was finally aware of what had happened, he was sunk down on the ground clenching at his chest and screaming out of agony. The apple was lying several feet away from him, with hardly a dent made in it's surface.

Scarlet blood dripped from the small punctures his teeth had made.

"What... happened...?!" he gasped.

"Silly. You're just getting what you deserve!"

He forced himself to look up again at Mirror-Light, who was standing there with an expression placed somewhere between excited and bored.

That voice... "Misa?"

"Well, who else?"

Mirror-Light began to warp right in front of his eyes and take on Misa's form. Within three drips of time, she was glaring at him from her side of the mirror.

"You didn't honestly think you could get away with killing all those people without some kind of consequence later, did you?!"

"I was told there was no 'later'!!" he yelled in a harsh whisper.

"Pfft." Misa looked down to examine her nails. "Well, there is. SURPRISE!"

This was it.

There was no hope.

No eternal rest.

Only forever of being tortured by the mirror and the dripping water.

Drip.

"...Well, actually, there is a way for you to get out..." Misa hinted.

What??

Light scrambled towards the mirror on his knees. "What is it?" he pleaded. "Anything, I'll do it!"

Her face showed a trace of amusement. "Reeeeeally..." She considered for a moment before allowing herself to say, "You were already told how."

His eyes widened in confusion. "I... I was??"

She pointed. "The apple. You have to eat the apple."

Perhaps foolishly, without even thinking anymore, Light dove for it.

Upon grasping it, took another bite.

He lost track of how many drips passed after that.

He could only feel the pain, the burn, the absolute Hellfire that threatened to consume his chest and kill him even after dying the first time. It came straight from in front of his left lung...

Where his heart was located.

The pain of a burning heart attack.

What poetic justice.

"D-dammit..."

He was on his back when the pain finally vanished. Exhausted, he could barely force himself to sit up and look at the mirror again.

Misa was gone.

Instead, he saw his father.

"You knew it," Soichiro said emotionlessly. "You were always Kira. You knew what you were doing when you picked up that notebook, and you managed to fool all of us."

...It... It hurt.

It physically hurt to see his father like that: so uncaring, so indifferent.

"I did it for you!" Light found himself screaming. "I couldn't stand to see the world going to hell!!"

Soichiro looked his son straight in the eye.

"So you sent yourself there instead?"

Light had no answer to that. Silent tears began streaming down his cheeks.

"Eat the apple, son," Soichiro said softly.

"It just inflicts more pain," he screeched.

"Would you rather stay here forever??" Soichiro's voice still held no emotion.

Light bent his head.

Drip.

"How long does each bit of pain last for?" he muttered as he wiped his eyes dry.

"You already know."

And he did.

Forty drips.

Forty seconds.

"How many more bites do I have to go?"

Soichiro didn't respond. Light raised his head, and for the first time since realizing there was a mirror, it only reflected himself and not a demon.

And reflected on the floor next to him was an apple.

Sickened with what he knew he would have to do, Light bent down and grabbed it before biting it once more.

Drip.

His legs gave way as the sensation of a heart attack took over once again.

Drip.

Agony.

And another bite.

Drip.

Gasping for breath.

Blindly reaching for the apple that slipped from his palm while he was screaming.

And still he tried to eat it.

Drip.

Several potential minutes worth of time later.

A very small chunk of the apple was gone, in one corner of the top near the stem.

It oozed thick crimson blood that made Light want to vomit.

He now understood why the apple was heavier than a normal fruit. It was just another aspect of why it was so torturous, because it seemed to require more effort to hold it each time.

He wouldn't do it anymore.

...No, he couldn't do it anymore.

"What the hell'd ya stop for?!"

He ignored the familiar voice and didn't face the mirror. He was in too much aftershock from the pain to even remotely consider facing that damned mirror at the moment.

"Hey!! I'm talking to you!!"

"Go away," he whispered in a hoarse voice.

"Hyuk hyuk hyuk. You always say that. But I ain't gonna listen."

Scowling, he rolled over to face the mirror. "What do you want??" he hissed.

Ryuk scratched his head. "I want to see you eat the damn apple."

"And what do I gain from that??" Light seethed.

"Well, you get to leave."

His scowl deepened. "You lied to me about there not being an afterlife; why should I believe you now?"

Ryuk raised his hands in a gesture of self-defense. "Hey, I told you the truth! There isn't a Heaven or Hell!"

"Then why am I stuck here??" Light spat.

"What, this place?" Ryuk began to smirk. "Everyone has to come here. Humans have to pay for their sins before drifting away into Nothingness."

Light was quiet for a moment. Somehow, that made perfect sense.

But... to pay for all of his sins...?!

"How many times do I have to suffer before I finally finish the whole apple?" he finally muttered, breaking the silence.

Ryuk snickered at that. "Well, gee, I don't know how many people you killed, but..." He didn't finish the sentence aloud.

But Light certainly got the point.

"I endure," he panted with horror, "forty seconds of nearly unbearable pain for every name I ever wrote in the Death Note?!"

Ryuk shrugged. "Yeah."

Light nearly began hyperventalating. "No, no, no, no no no no no NO!!" He faced the shinigami with terrified eyes. "There has to be something else I can do to get out!! Tell me there's some other way I can get out of here!!"

Ryuk's smirk grew. "Alright," he chuckled. With a deadpan tone, he recited, "'There is something else you can do to get out of here.'"

"NO!!" Light screamed. "I DIDN'T MEAN IT THAT WAY, YOU BASTARD!!"

"'There is some other way you can get out of here.'" Ryuk barely made it to the end of the second sentence before collapsing out of laughter.

Light stared, and for a moment his fear of the Hellhole he was stuck in disappeared.

At that moment, he was just pissed.

His eyes narrowed into slits, and he forced himself to stand on his feet despite his weakness after being tortured.

"Ryuk..." he whispered dangerously.

Unperturbed, Ryuk just glanced at him while laughing. In between chuckles, he said, "Yeah, what?"

"Go to hell!!"

With every ounce of his remaining strength, Light threw the apple and shattered the mirror.

Drip.

...

Drip.

...

Drip.

Light was shaking, and he collapsed on the floor once more.

What had he just done??

The mirror was cracked; from the obvious dent where the apple had collided head-on, the glass formed a spiderweb pattern stretching beyond where Light's pitiful eyes allowed him to see.

Did he regret shattering the mirror? No.

Did he regret throwing the apple?

Oh, damnable hell, he completely did.

Because now the apple was no longer on his side of the glass.

Upon impact, it had passed through the mirror and landed on the other side. He should have been able to predict that something like that might happen: after all, it had been given to him through the mirror by his demonic dopelganger.

But now it was too late. Light knew for a fact that he couldn't get to it--the first thing he'd done upon realizing his foolishness was to try and do just that--and the only reflection he could see was his own shaking self, who appeared just as broken as the glass he was reflected in.

He was never getting out.

For the first time since his childhood, Light cried for himself and nobody else.

Drip.

"...Poor little Light-kun."

For just a moment, he forced the tears to stop.

That voice.

"Your one weakness: you always act for your own good and never think of the long term."

Light's head snapped up. "That's not true!" he hissed, his voice cracking.

L stood there in the mirror near to the apple, looking and sounding as bored as ever. "Then you don't want the apple back, I suppose?"

Light completely panicked and lost what little composure he had gained back. "No, I do!! Give it back to me, L!! Please!!"

It was the one thing Light had promised himself he would never do. Beg L for forgiveness; beg his mortal enemy to do something for him to save his life, or perhaps lack thereof.

The L that Light thought he knew would never have saved him--but things could change.

With Light entirely at his mercy, L would have to be completely heartless to do otherwise.

Still appearing indifferent, without any expression at all, L squatted over and picked up the apple.

"Yes!!" Light hissed with a small smile daring to creep onto his face. "Please!!"

L rubbed the skin of it on the sleeve of his shirt to make it gleam, then he examined it over carefully as he used to do to evidence and sweets. A tiny frown appeared. "This apple is poisonous; did you know that, Light-kun?"

Light's brow furrowed in confusion. "Wh... what?"

"If you take a bite," L said while looking the apple over at eye-level, "you will endure intolerable physical pain."

Light was running out of patience, but he tried not to show it for fear of losing any possible advantage. "I know that!! Just give me the damned apple back!!"

"And yet," L continued to himself, as though Light had not spoken, "it is impossible to not take a bite, and it is impossible to stop trying to eat it once you have tasted it... It is inescapable; you can never get out."

L was wrong.

He had to be wrong!

"But L," Light began to plead again, "there is a way out! If I eat the whole apple, I can get out!!"

For the first time since he had appeared in the mirror, L looked Light directly in the eye.

"No, Light. You will never get out of here."

He was lying... he had to be! He was fibbing to test Light like he always had done when they were alive--that was all!

Light dared himself to grin. "But I will get out!! I just need the apple!!"

L merely stared.

With eyes that were stone cold.

"No."

Light could only stare back. He slowly pushed himself up off the ground to stand once more.

"What??" he whispered, horrified.

L didn't respond.

It was silent... except for the dripping.

Drip.

...

"Why did it stop?" Light asked, panicking again.

"Because there is no more need for it," L replied simply.

And Light knew he was right. If there was no more need to measure out forty second intervals, why keep the clock running?

The thought tortured him, especially since he knew it was the truth.

"There--there must be something you can do!! Have mercy!!" Light pled as he fell to his knees.

L's eyes seemed--perhaps--just a bit sadder as Light said that. "It isn't my decision to make," he whispered softly.

"Of course it is!!" Light begged. "You're L!! You... you're justice!!"

It killed him to say that.

L still didn't let any emotions cross his face. "Perhaps I thought that once long ago, but now... There is one true judge above all mortals. I recognize that now."

"Then appeal to him for me!! Tell him I've changed and that I'm sorry!!"

"He already knows, and he doesn't care." L's voice dropped to a whisper. "You could have eaten the apple and gotten past this place, where you would have found eternal rest on the other side, but it's too late now. You could have, but you didn't."

This was it.

Maybe there had been a chance before, but no longer.

"Who is he?" Light murmured. If L couldn't do anything, maybe if Light appealed to him directly--

"You're looking at him," L replied simply, gazing at the apple once again.

Who... L? "You just said--"

"Not me," L denied with bored eyes.

"Then who--?"

And then he finally figured it out.

"Oh shit," Light whispered hoarsly.

The people he'd seen... none of them judged him.

The real judge was...

...The mirror.

"There really isn't any other chance for me, is there?" he whispered hopelessly.

"No."

L didn't even try to comfort him.

"But... It's not fair!!" Light cried out as he buried his head in his hands.

There was a soft crunching noise, and he looked up to see L taking a large bite out of the apple he had so carelessly thrown away. Blood streamed from the fleshy wound in the fruit down the length of L's arm until is silently dripped onto the dark ground.

"Regardless of what you judge to be fair, Kira--" L spat out the name like an insult, "--the mirror is just in every decision it makes."

"I don't want just," Light thought aloud.

"Funny," L replied, taking another bite. "You asked for fairness."

"...I did?"

"Oh, but of course you did."

Light knew, somehow, exactly what he was going to say next.

After another sickening crunch as the apple was bit into once more, L sneered, "'Mirror, mirror, on the wall... art thou the fairest of them all?'"

Author's Notes: Well... dang. That's some pretty scary ess-aych-eye-tee right there, eh?

...Still. I feel a heck of a lot better after writing this. My main pet peeve with the end of the series was that Light couldn't rot in Hell because there was no Hell... and whaddya know. I managed to screw that rule over and still keep it canon.

Sweet.

(Review time? ^.^)