Title: the bells put out their tongues

Fandom: Death Note

Pairing: Light/L

Rating: Strong R to NC17

Notes: L's last 24 hours. Including, but not limited to: sex, copious use of flashback, the insufferable ringing of bells, accidently-on-purpose broken cell phones, waffles, tapioca pudding, donuts, cake. Then, possibly more cake. Then, possibly more sex.

the bells put out their tongues

(24)

L's sense of time has been absent for months. It's a surprise watch the numbers roll to 10:00 PM. He pulls his knees against his chest, able to feel the blood stalling in his ankles — squeezes his feet, and feels them as foreign objects. Watari has him worried about his circulation, keeps reminding him of the rheumatic fever that nearly ended his life in childhood, and now leaves L permanently thin, permanently tired.

He pushes his fingers into the tight space between his knees, and watches the lights blinking on the hard-drives, the voice scramblers, the letter-bomb detectors. He is frustrated. This is no longer chess; the sophistication of the game remains, the mathematical precision, but L realizes now that there will be no clear winner, because their goals are not entirely opposed. No winner, no loser. Only the one who survives the longest.

(23)

L can't sleep, not even with the muted hum of the computers running in the room below him. He curls on his side, and feel the knuckles of his spine pressing uncomfortably into the mattress. His fingers and toes move involuntarily. He feels reckless. Feels like finding something he wants, and taking it.

(22)

"Waffles?"

L can see the tiredness like pressure behind Watari's eyes, but he looks as polished as ever, straight-backed in the office chair, with his mustache freshly trimmed above his upper lip. The lenses of his glasses are clear. If it were not for the reflection of the monitors, they would be entirely invisible. "You want waffles?," he repeats, and thinks for a moment, drumming his fingers on the porcelain teapot in front of him. "I don't believe we have any here."

"That's all right. I think I'd like to go out."

(21)

It's a bad idea. It's definitely a bad idea, but maybe that's why it feels so good. L wears a cap, the rim angled over his face. His hair splays out at all angles beneath it. He's given up on licking his fingers and trying to smooth it down. The buttons on his jacket are misaligned, and it hangs askew from his shoulders.

This was the only place open. In the morning, this same street is filled with kiosks selling magazines and rows of neon-wrapped candy bars. Now, their dark green canopies are rolled down. They move as if being beat by fists. The traffic lights continue to blink in synchronized patterns, but all the cars have gone. The waitress sees them and sighs, rubbing her palms against her apron, taking her time collecting the coins from a neighboring table before noting their order. Such a strange pair, this old man, and this slouched foreign boy with no manners.

L holds the fork with the very tips of his fingers, which makes it sway, buoyant. Of five attempts to bring the food to his mouth, only three are successful, but the taste of the syrup, and the crunch of the waffle between his molars, that's worth it. Watari watches, stirring his tea counterclockwise, taking note of where L has dropped his shoes. It will be such a hassle to find another pair he'll accept.

"Do you think I went wrong somewhere?," L says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. The question is addressed to himself, if anyone.

Watari's answer is interrupted by the sudden clang of bells above them.

(20)

A memory:

He cries until one of the nurses brings him a tapioca pudding. It isn't an especially brilliant move, on her part. She just wants something to occupy his mouth, because she has a headache, and there's something about this boy that irritates her, just irritates the hell out of her. Then again, all of Wammy's strays are like this — eyes like two-way mirrors, you know something's going on in there, some plot, some scheme, but all you can do is stare dumbly at yourself.

She's pleased with this discovery, anyway, so it pisses her off when Wammy shows up at the clinic, watches the handle of a lollipop bob up and down in the boy's mouth, then says, "This might not be good."

"Keeps him quiet, anyway," she says, and Jesus, she really hates him too, and hates these heels, and hates these itchy white stockings. She scratches the inside of her thigh. The fabric makes a strange, synthetic noise. "I think you just think too much. I think everybody here just thinks too much."

The boy seems uninterested in their conversation, instead shifting his attention to the hard candies in the jar on the countertop. He chooses one and removes it slowly, careful not to let his crooked fingers touch the glass. Jerky movements, a signature of the high-functioning autistic. Wammy frowns. "I'm concerned that this — "

He trails off, which is an unfortunate habit of geniuses and those unable remove themselves from their inner worlds. I really can't stand this place, she thinks again, and fuck, if this boy isn't getting sugar on all her equipment, and —

(19)

"Couldn't sleep?"

At this hour, the headquarters are very still, except for the rhythmic pulse of the screensavers. At the center of the desk, L's personal computer streams news reports in both English and Japanese, which he can read equally well. There is a black rectangle filled with programming language in the left corner of the screen. This he cannot understand, but he's already hit on three repeating patterns — with a fourth, he may begin to decipher it. It's just a distraction, but it's better than this sulking, this self-pity.

"I couldn't either," Matsuda continues, without waiting for a response. There are deep, permanent creases in his suit. In the glow of the monitors, L catches his eyes on the table. Not on the Death Note, which rests closed and face down to L's left, but on the half-eaten donut on the saucer in front of him.

L fights the sudden surge of possessiveness. "Do you — want the rest of this donut, Matsuda?"

He could have done without the company, but the dazed honor on Matsuda's face may be worth the price.

(18)

He sleeps without realizing it. Upright, and without changing position.

He dreams of a sunless landscape, and abandoned cities.

A sightless monster, with a bird skull in place of a head.

(17)

A memory:

At Wammy's House, you don't get anything for free. It's all a puzzle, a riddle, a dilemma, a chess move, an experiment in Social Darwinism, in Game Theory.

As a result, the orphanage has produced generation after generation of rational children who distrust each other's rationality. They distrust L because of his curled hyena-spine, his expressionless stare, the way he seems to talk without intonation. They distrust him because Wammy favors him, allows L his appalling diet, his lazy posture. The caretakers consider him to be brilliant, but somewhat useless, unwilling to clean his own room, agitated by foods with certain textures and smells.

He is taught English, German, French, and Japanese. His interests are immediately indulged. If he expresses a curiosity about chemistry, his room is filled with textbooks, with beakers, with molecular models. His is obsessive, a monomaniac, but his fixations shift on a whim. He is spoiled. He gets what he wants, and he expects to get what he wants — at most, for solving whatever little problem Wammy may present to him.

"You're making a right brat, you are," the nurse says to Wammy. L dislikes her. Like the others, she has a tendency to talk about him as if he's not immediately in front of her. It is the privacy of his thoughts. It makes his eyes seem deceptively empty.

"No," Wammy says. "He'll be perfect."

(16)

The shinigami moves silently through headquarters.

Outside, the bells ring.

(15)

A memory:

He is sixteen years old, and seated across from an admissions officer at Oxford University. He has never been nervous in his life, but he is now, keeping his eyes trained on a votive lamp on the desktop. This dilates his pupils; when he looks away, the room is unfocused. It makes him dizzy, unable to interpret the small actions of the face across from him.

"You'll be studying statistics," the man says, and in his unease, L is unable to decide whether this is a question or a statement. He fights to keep his feet against the floor, resists the urge to bring his knees to his chest.

He answers, "Yes. I'm very good at math," which is only a half-truth. He's excellent at math, prodigious, but his real reasons for coming to Oxford lie more with escaping the terrible boredom he's found everywhere else. The average people, the average cities. The one constant in L's life is that he has been under-challenged by everything and everyone. He sees no use in developing friendships; with the exception of Wammy, he lays most people aside like old dictionaries, consulting them only for mundane things like the meaning of a German word, or to ask for another bowl of sugar cubes.

He can't predict now that, within the year, he'll be back on Wammy's doorstep. Not even the professors can compete with him intellectually. He invents complex problems, which he solves for his own amusement. Sometimes, he shows these to his teachers, deciding at random whether he will present them with the right answer or the wrong one — they praise him either way. Sometimes, he accepts this, and sometimes he shouts, "What are we doing here?," and lets the embarrassed silence accumulate around them.

In retrospect, dropping out was one of the smartest decisions he ever made.

(14)

When he wakes, his body aches from sleeping in such an improbable position. Matsuda has been dutifully keeping guard from across the room, his elbow resting on the coffee maker. L counts it as a small miracle that it has just been turned on. The machine gives a choked gasp.

L stretches his limbs experimentally, then decides against it. His mind refuses to cooperate with the sight of the death god moving restlessly about the room. From this angle, he can't see her eye, which is fine, because he can't take another look of condescension. He would prefer hatred. He would prefer anger. He would never have imagined a god of death to look so preoccupied, so inconvenienced.

L watches the Death Note on the formica tabletop. It hasn't moved. He reaches out, grasps it gingerly at the corner. It's almost disappointing. He expects it to be charged, powerful. It feels like every other notebook he's ever held.

(13)

He fixates on this, because there is nothing else to fixate on. The tiny ripped corner. He can feel Light's eyes on his back, watching with some intent, although it's already been proven that L cannot figure what that is. L asks, "Would someone die if their name was written on this scrap?"

The shinigami gives vague, uncertain answers. Light's eyes never leave him, although all they can see is a bobbing burst of hair.

It's not that one excels at what the other is incapable. They don't compliment each other, they vie for the same position. They are no longer playing a game based on probabilities alone. It's poker, now. It's bluffing. It's a matter of who believes who has the upper hand.

L digs his thumbnail into his bottom lip. He lets out a nasal sigh. "Hm," he says.

(12)

A memory:

At one point, Light turns to the cameras and snarls, "You're obsessed with me."

L isn't able to deny it.

And later, watching Light sleep on the bare cot, L's own hand is down his pants for several minutes before realizing it. He gives one illicit laugh, cut off abruptly, embarrassed by his own reaction.

(11)

The killings continue.

The team watches the reports come in with respectful disbelief, crossing their arms, bouncing on their toes. They've learned to appreciate rumors. To accept the worst version of the story as the truest.

Light leans over him and grasps his shoulder. This is a message to L, but also to the rest of the team. It suggests they are connected in ways the others cannot fully appreciate. This is their case. The others are welcome to watch, but not to stand in the way.

(10)

A memory:

L gawps. L stares. He knows he's doing it, but he has only ever felt vaguely embarrassed about this own peculiarities. Light has him pushed against the wall, trapped one of L's thighs with his knee, and L hasn't been given time to formulate a proper response.

For a moment, any uncertainty that Light is Kira drops away. L watches and waits for the killing blow, so sure this is the end that he doesn't notice Light's erection digging into his hip. Light kisses him. L chokes.

"I knew it, Ryuuzaki."

He is about to ask, Knew what?, but is interrupted by a second kiss, harder this time, more objective. Light has his hands on either side of L's neck, and the handcuff chain drapes over his shoulder. The muscles in his legs seize, working on instinct to kick out, but he is no match for Light physically, not in this confined setting. L can't stand to be touched. Can't stand the way Light's stomach feels beneath his fingertips, the jolt of heat, can't stand having another tongue in his mouth — the wetness, the foreignness, it disgusts him. Hates being touched. Hates being touched and hates touching things.

So, why are his fingers curling around the waistband of Light's pants? Why are they pulling down, or out, or just away, off, gone? Why is his prime suspect, his only suspect, struggling with the button of his jeans, and Light is Kira, L knows it, Light is Kira and why is that turning him on?

Light says something else, but both are reluctant to pull their mouths away. It is lost. L's body is held together with glue and string, and it's good that Light is holding him up. Good that Light keeps one hand strong on L's hip when he begins dropping to the floor, running his mouth over L's stomach as he goes. "The cameras," L says, which is only a desperate, half-hearted attempt to keep this from happening.

Light looks up, but L can still feel his breath on his cock. He may be thinking, Then turn them off?, but he can't say it, they both know that. Not unless Light wants those percentages to shoot up.

And, what about Light's tongue, dragging across the inside of his thigh — what does that do? Up or down?

Up or down?

Up, he decides, and comes so hard his knees unlock. His back is scraped and sore for days from sliding down the wall.

(9)

Now, he feels the skimming tips of Light's fingers on his back. The handcuffs have been removed, so the touch is no longer accompanied by the cold press of metal. It's a shame, really. L doesn't know him any other way.

This is the kitchen, but it is quiet except for the radiation-hum of the microwave and the whoosh of sliding doors. The pantries are well-stocked and bright, full of instant cake mix with pastel photographs. L eats cake like some people eat steak, tearing it apart with wide motions. There are no clean forks, so L has to eat with his hands, scraping icing from beneath his nails with his bottom teeth. It is against L's nature to wash a fork.

Light intercepts one of his hands and bites the edge of L's thumb, which is permanently pruned and dented. "It's going to fall off one day," Light says.

Maybe he wishes L were a better adversary. One who stood up straight, and packed on muscle, and who was witty, and deceptively charming — besides, your adversary should always be better looking that you are.

"That's very unlikely."

They invade each other's personal space. They disregard each other's comfort, with a kind of animal animosity. L lifts his chin, looks at the pattern on the ceiling. Light bares his teeth against L's throat. He touches the kohl-black rings beneath L's eyes. Months ago, Light had kissed him firmly on the mouth, and L's first thought had been, I can use this.

But, what — what now, Lawliet?

Light fucks him right there, bent over the countertop, frosting smeared beneath his stomach. After, Light says, "Today could be the day Kira wanders into the police station and offers up a full confession. Then, we could go out and get a cake. A big fucking cake with ten layers and raspberries and strawberries and lollipops, and whatever the hell you eat. Wouldn't that be nice?"

Wouldn't that be nice, L thinks, and closes his eyes.

(8)

"Watari," L says. "The system I asked you about. The data deletion. Is it ready?"

Watari smiles at him. The blue light from the computer screens is deceptively cool. It makes him look older than L can ever remember. "Yes. Of course, yes. But, let's hope it doesn't come to that."

"Yes, let's hope."

Hope is just an expression. A word that L's reserves for things that are statistically unlikely.

(7)

A memory:

L is hollow-boned and inflexible. He squats like a swamp animal, like a toad, watching Light undress ungracefully around the handcuffs. They've ignored each other as much as it is possible to ignore someone who is chained to you at all times. L has always managed his awkwardness, which comes from never having interacted with someone on the quite same level as he is, but this is not the Light he knew before confinement.

The Light who blew him up against the wall of their suite, he was not the same either.

But, he was closer.

Light sees him watching. He snaps, "You're always staring at me," and then, "What am I at now?"

This is his new catch-phrase. Maybe he takes some comfort in L's incomprehensible equations.What am I at now? Like a dying patient in a hospital bed, looking back at his heart rate monitor, What am I at now?

"Sixty-percent."

"Fuck you," Light says, with more resignation than vehemence. He takes L's face in his hands. His thumbs touch each corner of L's mouth, skin catching on the ever-present film of sugar. Light pushes on L's shouldercaps, and they seem to fall away. The bedsprings sink beneath their combined weight. "Fuck you."

The statement is ambiguous enough. Maybe it means: Think what you want, but I'm going to fuck you anyway, or I'm innocent, and you still won't let me go, because you're fucked up, Ryuuzaki, you're just as fucked up as Kira is.

Not even L can say.

Their mouths seem to meet accidentally. It's different now, horizontal. L's body is a mess of asymmetries, nearly-exposed bones, sharp angles, but Light seems — more solid than L had figured he would. Light is already down to his boxers. He lifts L's sweater over his head; it gets tangled in the chain.

"This is going to end, one way or another, and we're both going to be there when it happens."

L doesn't say what he's thinking. Not to Light, and certainly not to himself.

(6)

By the time L climbs up to the roof, he's surprised to find it's dark again. It's raining. Between this and what moonlight makes it through Tokyo's filter of pollution, the air feels too dense, too gauzy. L doesn't come outside to clear his mind. L hates outside. L prefers snugness, has a phobia of open spaces. But those bells having been ringing all day, and maybe he's just narcissistic enough to believe that if he goes out there and scolds them, they'll stop. Below him, the neon lights look acidic. Each individual raindrop vibrates as it hits his face.

Light makes no attempt to hide his presence, but L is surprised to see him there, watching him from the awning. He hears Light's question, but damned if he's going to stand out here in the rain by himself, making some stupid gesture that doesn't suit his body. "What are you doing, Ryuuzaki?"

He responds with something vague about the bells. He is neither inclined to nor capable of telling Light the real reason. Although, maybe when Light says, "Come back inside, you're soaked," there is more tenderness in his voice than L expected.

Maybe that doesn't change anything, and maybe that changes everything, and maybe death is the ringing of bells, forever, forever, uniform and maddening.

Does he say this aloud?

Light tells him he's talking nonsense again.

"Everything I say is nonsense," he agrees. Soaked through by rain, his hair feels heavy, rope-like against his shoulders. The cold is making his body hyper-sensitive to the slightest movements of Light's fingers on his back. Light kisses his jaw, moving into the spotlight of the halogen lamps that line the rooftop. He looks luminous. He looks messianic.

Not for the first time, L closes his eyes.

(5)

L returns from the bathroom with a towel draped over his head and water trapped in his eyelashes. Blinking only seems to make them stick together. They should go back down to headquarters, he thinks, he's waiting for an answer — but the hum of the florescent lights seems less apocalyptic than usual, and Light is leaning against the stairway, barefoot, soaked. Somehow, the glow on his face remains, filled with clarity and precision.

L shakes off his muddy tennis shoes. He kneels. He takes Light's foot between his hands, ignoring his minor protest, and squeezes too hard. His feet, L admits to himself, are not entirely ugly. There is a practicality to his body, an efficiency which L lacks. Light gathers a fistful of L's hair through the towel. It hurts.

They're even now.

"How sad," L says, unsure of why, feeling reckless again, feeling rebellious, feeling like breaking the rules of the game, like no longer playing the game, which is the greatest violation of all. "We'll soon part ways."

Light's response is cut short by L's phone. He holds it away from his face, gives responses that are as generic and curt as possible. The game may be falling apart, but he wants Light to know it. Wants him to feel this same helplessness. Wants him to watch the pieces clatter to the floor.

"It seems everything has gone well," he says, and then after a moment, "We don't have to go down immediately."

Light does not bother to ask. He no longer looks curious. Confident, reflective, maybe, but not curious. "What would you like to do?"

"Let's go back to the kitchen."

"Of course," Light says.

Of course.

(4)

The cake is dry from sitting the fridge, but it still tastes good, it still tastes really fucking good, and L even convinces Light to have a piece, though he winces at the over-sweetened frosting. It flakes off on their lips, makes their kisses gravelly. They're both still wet, still cold. The whole thing feels strange, amphibian, but good. Maybe it's the barely-concealed triumph in Light's eyes. Maybe it's the fact that L is tired, and for once, he isn't factoring Light's hand between his thighs into a percentage.

If it's already been decided, there's longer any point in trying to out-smart it. The sex is better, now that L has accepted this. Maybe this is the first time they've ever really had sex. The way Light's teeth are locked on his shoulder. The way he's rougher than usual. There is more honesty in this, more truth and reason, than in anything Light has ever said.

Halfway through, L's phone starts ringing. He shoves it aside without checking the number; it bounces off the wall and into the sink, where it disappears beneath a layer of foam. L laughs, a satisfied warmth in his stomach, in his right brain, in the places where Light's chest connects with his back. It's funny and lousy and wonderful, all at once.

(3)

A memory:

The helicopter ride en route to apprehend Higuchi.

Light takes his hand without warning, alternating fingers.

"We've won," he mouths, over the vacuum-sound of the rotors.

For a moment, L believes him.

(2)

They must notice. They all must notice. The way L's hair, which always seems to mock the laws of physics, is even worse than usual. The flushed-look of Light's face, and the smell of sex, and sweat, and stale cake, and filthy Tokyo rain water. Maybe this is part of Light's plan, L thinks. Maybe no one would ever believe Light could hurt someone he cared about.

He's got approval to test the note, so why does L suddenly choose to worry on this?

The screens change to white. The sudden brightness sears L's pupils, so that he is unable to read the message saying ALL DATA DELETED, but he knows that it is there. His feet curl, stubbornly grip the chair.

"Watari?," he asks.

(1)

Light is standing over him when the valves in his heart seem to open all at once, and his blood is sucked the wrong way up the arteries. His lungs go slack. They lose the power to deflate. Large portions of his brain switch off immediately, and only the questions are left, never finished, never resolved.

L is falling, but unable to tell his proximity from the ground, and that's all right, because there are arms there. Arms there, suspending him in a moment without measurable duration.

Light's eyes staring down at him.

There is more honesty in this, more truth and reason, than in anything Light has ever said.

(0)

It was not death, for I stood up,

And all the dead lie down;

It was not night, for all the bells

Put out their tongues, for noon.

(E. Dickinson)