Chapter 40

Chapter 40

It was a busy day.

Dad was extremely conflicted as both his son and the world's greatest detective entered the helicopter in a hurry to detain the criminal named Kyosuke Higuchi.

I stayed back at the HQ, studying everyone's movements before they all rushed out to the battlefield, leaving Watari and a few other side characters to wait on the side.

An hour passed as I stared out at the lowering sunset outside the window, its fluid peaks downing into a deep red before disappearing from my eyes.

It was July 3rd, 2005.

It had been 2 years since I arrived in this world.

Another hour passed as Watari listened into the microphone that connected to L's voice, trying to decipher what was going on. His brows knitted and unknitted each passing minute before typing something into his computer and ordering a few other members to hand him the files located on the table.

I turned back to my thick university textbooks in silence.

2 years.

I had been living for two years as Sayu.

I closed my eyes as memories of my first contact with Light in the hospital bed flickered into my mind. I remembered the mother who was so worried for my well-being and happiness for the disappearance of her real daughter.

I remembered the day I clung to Light as he innocently tried to rat out how I learned about birds and bees from my teacher.

I remembered working with Matsuda and inspecting the interrogation room with innocence.

I remembered dad buying me the chessboard that was now long gone and lost in the fire.

I remembered my pleas for a family that could love me.

I opened my eyes to stare blankly at the darkened night sky.

There was no way for me to go back and prevent everything that happened. I had to move on without looking back.

You have come a long way, Sayu.

And there was more to come if I wanted to win.

Time ticked on without my permission, seeping through my fingers without a care in the world.

I will win this game.

They came back with a Rem floating behind them with disgust.

Sweat and fatigue filled the room as the group of officers and the detective trudged back with grim yet victorious faces. Watari stood on the steps of the stairs beside me and took a hold of the wrapped-up black book from dad who gave me a warm smile when he saw me.

I didn't give one back.

His downturned eyes hesitated as he coughed from his dry throat while he lowered his head, walking past me with heavy steps. I continued to ignore him without batting an eyelash, feeling my own frown deepen at my actions before clearing them away to greet the rest of the members.

Matsuda and the rest had black circles and grins plastered all over their faces before sighing about their wishes to plop onto the bed. Matsuda seemed tired. His matted hair along with his soaked through shirt was apparent after he took his jacket off, hanging a pale blue suit on his left arm as he walked up the stairs.

I gave them my condolences with a sympathetic nod towards Matsuda before continuing to wait on the marble stairs and glancing towards the last two who entered the building.

L walked quietly with his head in his thoughts before passing me and giving me a nod of greeting. I returned the gesture instantly, passing off a small smile to him as the long-chain scraped behind him, linking his hand to the other end.

My eyes trailed up Light's soft features and stopped at the glimmer in his eyes.

Yep, the darkness was there.

"Welcome back," I paused before lifting my face in greeting. "Brother."

Something like recognition and surprise flashed through Light's eyes before the corners of his lips curled up like he expected it. His hand carefully slid into my hair and ruffled it fondly with a dark chuckle.

"I'm back, my dear sister."

"-There is no way that with this rule, Light Yagami and Amane Misa are Kira suspects!" I heard Matsuda's loud and booming voice the moment I passed through the entrance of L's investigation office.

Oh, they're at that rule now?

I glanced outside of the big windows as my footsteps came to a silent halt. Despite me not making any noise, Watari turned around and greeted me briefly with a small smile, causing L and the gang to turn their heads at me.

Did he have eyes on the back of his head or something?

"Good morning, Sayu," Light's conniving pleasant smile plastered across his face before walking towards me with his left hand that was free from the chains which attached him to L. He ruffled my hair before chuckling at my narrowed eyes, knowing that I had gotten his message that he was released from L's strict surveillance.

"Good morning everyone," I nodded back before leaning out of Light's tall build and earning a chorus of 'good mornings' from everyone. Light's release was good for me since if he was excused from surveillance, that would mean that I was completely free from anyone babysitting and watching each and every movement that came from me.

"Sayu! Light and Misa aren't Kira for sure!" Matsuda came jogging up to me despite the small distance between us and breathed an air of relief. Behind him, I saw L murmur 'impossible' as he eyed the Death Note with such accusation of covering for Light that it nearly made the pages of the Death Note quiver in fear.

"My son," I heard dad walk up with a tired grin before placing his hand on Light's shoulder. "I'm proud that I believed in you."

Both Light and I almost scoffed at his words, exchanging glances at each other for a quick second before shaking our heads in what everyone else interpreted to be relief and happiness.

"Thank you, dad, I almost convinced myself that I was that criminal," Light sighed with exasperation before shifting his weight onto his left leg, earning a pitiful and deep frown from the parent. Dad was about to say something to Light's comment before Light assured Soichiro with a small smile, shaking his head to convey that everything was in the past.

"It doesn't make sense," L continued to murmur as a lot of his colleagues turned to L with distrust and disbelief. "It was so evident that-"

"Ryuzaki, I believe that this case must have created too much stress for you," a tall, broad man who acted as Misa's manager after Matsuda faked his death to escape from Kira the 3rd spoke, causing Mastuda to gasp.

I gasped also, this being the first time ever that I had heard his voice in the whole duration of my stay at L's HQ's. Kanzo Mogi was one of the quietest yet reliable men in the task force. Although he rarely spoke which caused him to have literally zero presence during the whole time, he was there to make everyone calm down with his quiet agreements.

Mogi's spiky black hair waved as he shook his head in disappointment before sighing.

"Ryuzaki, I don't blame you for being wrong," Mogi said quietly as the whole room fell into complete utter silence to honour his words. "But since Light and Misa are proven innocent, I think it is time to let it go."

L bit his nails harder, breaking off the skin that surrounded his thumb before looking up at everyone in the room with minimal eye contact. I could see that he was scanning our faces, yet L was avoiding our eyes like the plague. L knew he wasn't wrong, but everyone in the room thought he was wrong. And that made a huge difference.

I glanced at Light before his eyes flickered to mine, twitching his lips upwards in sheer victory before pressing it down like the innocent and wrongfully accused boy that he was. I turned my head towards L who was now glaring hard at the note, inhaling in a sigh before flashing Light an apologetic smile.

"It looks like my suspicions were wrongfully accused, Light Yagami." L spit out with a pleasant tone as everyone in the room untensed their shoulders at L's wise decision.

"I'm only glad that I could prove my innocence, Ryuzaki," Light returned L's fake gesture with his genuine smile, walking towards L and turning to the group with determination.

"Now," Light raised his voice. "Let's catch the real Kira."

I swallowed uncomfortably at Light's takeover of the investigation. Although L was the leader in name, everyone in the room was now leaning towards the true leader of the investigation.

It felt stuffy knowing that L's death was near.

"Haven't seen you in a while," Tsubame raised her eyebrows as I sat down behind the table in the cafe, taking off my backpack straps from my shoulders which had my heavy university textbooks crammed together. I studied her new look, her hair was dyed in a bluish-gray colour as her brown eyes stared back at me without any hesitation. The cold colour truly suited her.

"And did you miss me?" I teased, leaning towards her with a sly smile before she pushed my face out of the way and scoffed at my actions, turning towards her bubble tea and sucking the life out of the straw. Isame giggled at Tsubame's actions before Miyara grunted at how late I was.

"Well sorry I'm currently studying 8 courses per semester," I huffed before glancing over the menu and ordering a rose tea with ice cream waffles. "How are you guys doing with life?"

"My dad thanks you for levelling up our house," Tsubame said without an ounce of emotion, keeping her eyes on her food without looking at me. I raised my eyebrows at her colourful words, knowing that her intent was completely grateful, but the way she voiced it out…

"I spent my whole week trying to study for my exams," Miyara rolled her eyes before chomping down on her pretzels, munching them with an open mouth. I made a face, her mouth reminding me of someone from the task force.

"Miyara! Manners!" Isame picked up her handkerchief and wiped Miyara's mouth which she clamped down to let Isame correctly wipe the pieces of food stuck on both sides of her mouth. Isame giggled before turning back to us and explaining her own achievements with her online toy store, gaining whistles and knowledgeable sounds from all of us.

Her happily chattering face echoed on in my mind as the dark and swirly feeling started eating my insides again. Isame had the power to control some of my subordinates. If she somehow turned herself against me…

My eyes narrowed at her slightly although the expression on my face did not shift completely hostile. Every inch of her movements felt restless to me, and every time she smiled it shot a distaste into my gut, knowing that my back was completely vulnerable for her to attack.

It's always the backstabbers themselves that feel the eerie emptiness of their own backs when moving with a group. I knew all the signs of betrayal, and the first one was that the person was helping the victim full-heartedly.

It hurts most when the person you trust betrays you.

"I see," I hissed out with my own fake pleasant tone. "That sounds extremely interesting."

Beside me, I felt Tsubame stiffen at my words directed to Isame, her turning slightly shaken from my tone while narrowing her eyes at me.

I ignored it, smiling with congratulations on my face to my friends.

"See you again, Sayu!" Isame waved as Miyara shrugged, walking with Isame since their house was in the same direction. I too waved back without a single hint of being disturbed and turned in my direction, finally glad that no one was here to pick me up. Just before taking my third step, I felt Tsubame's tight grip snatch my wandering wrist before the stress in her tone was highlighted with the sharp inhale of her breath.

"We need to talk. Now."

I stepped into her room, confused.

The frown on my face deepened when she locked her door and turned her hardened eyes to me in silence, making me squirm under her intense gaze.

"What is it, Tsub-"

"What are you planning?" She hissed out, completely cutting my words off as I stared at her like a deer in headlights.

"What do you mean?" It took me a full second to snap back and tilt my head to play the innocent card as Tsubame started rubbing her eyebrows and yanking her hand to stare at her messed up makeup smudged across her hand.

"Fuck this," I heard her murmur before she threw her hand away, penetrating me with her rattled state.

"Listen, I can tell that you have something against Isame right now," she inhaled sharply before walking to the small blue mat located in the middle of her room, sitting across from me as I stared at her with a flabbergasted expression.

Was I making it that obvious?

"I can tell because I am one of your closest friends," Tsubame spat out the word with disgust before eyeing me accusingly. Once again, I was speechless.

Did she mean Sayu's closest friend, or-

"Don't tell me you're going to kill her."

Tsubame's one sentence shook me so hard that I started to sputter. Her eyes narrowed harder at my reaction before gritting out again, seething out with rage.

"A warning beforehand, I am going to hit you."

"What?"

Before I could stop it, Tsubame lunged at me, grabbing me by the collar before flinging my head back and forth with her arms. I gasped before my whole world tilted like a rollercoaster, yelping before I started kicking her in the stomach to get her away.

"What the fuck TsuTsu-"

Grabbing her claws she pinned me onto the ground, we both rolled like two kindergarteners on the floor, one punching the other, and one avoiding like some kind of acrobat movement with her neck. Cross-chopping me in the face, I grunted before finally attacking back by locking her arm with my legs yet failing to do so because she yanked me by my arm, striking me again in the face.

"Not the face! Not the face!" I lashed out and headbutted her in the stomach as she humphed a yell of surprise. I screamed as she tackled me down onto my knees and flopped me onto my belly, twisting my wrist while sitting on my back before I winced from the sharp pain.

"You have a screw loose, don't you?!" I heard her yell before she jerked my limb hard. I fought the urge to slap her back as she continued to pour her heart out.

"I can tell you're going for the villain route, but at least have your bottom line!" She hammered her fists onto my back like she was beating a bag of potatoes. I grunted again, this time falling in silence to actually ponder on her words.

"What are you, some kind of emo bull crap that will kill anyone for the sake of killing? Then you go busting out some kind of plotline to make yourself the victim?!"

I cringed from her words, physically making a face.

Her fists started to slow with her heavy breathing.

"I don't like how you see us as nothing but tools," I heard her mutter with a long pant. "Your freaking paper is starting to turn you into a birdbrain-"

Did she- was she actually able to speak about knowing my powers? Well, indeed I did say that my orders were not to be specified with other people, but to directly talk to me about it…

My eyes widened.

She was aware that I placed her under the Death Note.

"Hey! Birds are quite smart in contrast to that phrase!" I called out before biting my lip. "But before that…"

"You-" I paused before lowering my eyes in guilt but then cleaning away my thoughts as I slowly turned my head back to see her on my body with perplexion. Huffing for a quick second, Tsubame flung my arm from her grasp before getting off of me and spinning onto her feet, smoothing the wrinkles on her clothes.

"You are aware that I…" I trailed off while slowly trudging back into my sitting position, grabbing my twisted wrist before wincing again. Tsubame's eyes sharpened before crossing her arms and giving me a dirty look.

"I don't think it takes a genius to figure that out when you've literally been ordering us to write names on a piece of paper." She flicked her bottom lip with her thumb, wiping away the saliva.

"Okay," I raised up my hand to absorb all the information that was pouring out of Tsubame's mouth. So she was aware that I had them on the Death Note to follow my orders constantly. But she probably wasn't aware that Aoiko was sent to America by me. I glanced up at Tsubame with curiosity.

"Let's talk to each other like civilized people. You're correct, I do have something against Isame right now," I addressed the core problem quickly as Tsubame's scowl deepened again, raising her fist as I bit out a small laugh playfully.

"You," she pointed rudely at me before lowering her voice into a deep growl. "Are changing too much for your own good."

"Changing?" I quirked my eyebrows with a slight smirk. "What do you mean, changing? I've always been like this."

"I can get over the fact that your distrustful ass forced us into slaves, but if you want to hurt any of us without a proper reason," she took a deep breath before spitting out. "You will regret it."

"You sound pretty confident for someone who cannot disobey my orders," I countered back her words with my own breezy ones. Frustration crossed her eyebrows as she took another deep breath to calm herself down. In a minute, her face flattened into a nonchalant one before twisting the corner of her own lips.

"I am confident for someone who is supposedly your friend."

"You literally just called yourself my slave," I pointed out before leaning back onto my hands that supported my body from falling backwards. Glancing around the room with curiosity, it was the first time that I realized that the room was so quiet despite me seeing her mom cooking with clamours of the pans and her dad twerking a new machine that he had gotten from one of his clients.

This room was soundproof.

No wonder all our screaming didn't alert her parents.

"Listen up, Sayu!" She barked before forcing my attention towards her. "You see me as your friend no matter what I say and what you do."

She placed both of her hands onto the table as he clenched them tightly.

Friends? Now that was a thing that I have never considered nor thought of them as.

"Don't give me that look, Sayu," she said deadly before continuing. "If you really saw us as slaves, you would have never supported Isame's shop nor visited Miyara after she saw the scene on the bridge."

It took me a minute to remember which scene that Tsubame was talking about before realizing she was mentioning Kyotani's gorey death under the bridge.

Ah, but I supported Isame because I took away her dream of becoming a teacher. I visited Miyara because I needed to ask her about her mission status and order her to write Shinori's name onto the Death Note.

My mind flashed to Shinori's wife and child before scrunching up bitterly.

"You'd need to do better than that to convince me, TsuTsu," I called out boredly as her face twitched in amusement.

"You would have never fairly paid for the materials that you bought from my store."

I paused.

Now that, was actually good proof of my stupid decision.

"And you would have never let me smack your head."

I paused again, this time fully glaring at her.

"How do you know I didn't pay it fairly because I didn't want your store to be bankrupt?" I echoed out as Tsubame lowered her eyes accusingly at me.

"Did you?" She stared.

"...No."

"Good," she clenched her hands and relaxed them, drumming her fingers with each other, smirking. "Because if you did, then it would have deemed me to have a bad eye for people."

I opened my mouth to argue but she cocked out her finger to silence me.

"Look, when I told you to pay me back for all the devices Isame used, you found a way immediately. Just because I told you to," she shrugged lightly before studying my uncomfortable face.

It was true.

Despite all that she had said and all my reasons for doing what I did, I could have just run when I first met Felix. I had no reason to continue and play the bad girl who wanted to propose an offer to the group.

Of course, at the end I found that the group could be useful when I couldn't get into contact with my writers...but…

My motive when proposing the deal to Henrik in the first place was to earn money and resources to pay off my debt for Tsubame.

"Listen," she echoed out as I raised my wary eyes to meet hers. "I know why you did what you did, and I don't care if you're trying to become the world's villain."

I gave an awkward grin.

To be completely honest, I wasn't planning on becoming the villain of my story.

"Are you trying to encourage me to kill more people?"

Tsubame's lips lifted ironically.

"Have a bit more faith in us, coward." She said softly before standing up to get some water after that intense wrestling match. "No matter what, remember that we are friends."

I was left in silence.

It was true that I saw Tsubame favourably. She was blunt and cool, not the type that seemed to lie in my face even if it was beneficial for me.

I had ordered her to lose her memories of me torturing Shinori's family because I feared what I would look in her eyes if she remembered.

I had considered Tsubame's schedule instead of directly ordering her to stay at the train station to follow Raye Penber.

I did allow Tsubame to act rudely to me even though I had the choice to silence her and force her to submit to me like an obedient puppy.

I had chosen to go to the pub myself and get my name written down four times on the Death Note instead of choosing the easier way which was ordering one of my writers to directly take control of a stranger in the pub to write down my name.

Did I consider them as my friends?

Not Isame and Miyara as much, but Tsubame…?

What were friends even?

I tensed at my own question as I thought about my past friends who did not help me at all. Instead, they had increased my burden and had backstabbed me countless times with rumours and words.

But Isame had control of the mafia group. If she were to turn on me, I would not even last a single second under their weapons or vast numbers.

No matter what Tsubame said...Isame had to die no matter what.