Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You were hunched over your desk, head in your hands while you listened to the recording of your first session with Light, you were supposed to be finalising your notes before you sent it over to Near to be transcribed by one of his men, but you struggled. Your mind wandered off every time, unable to comprehend that it had really happened, it felt like some sort of fever dream, had it not been playing on the tape beside you, you would have believed so. 

His voice was low and tired in the recording. Nothing like what had been described to you when he was apprehended, the majority of the task force seemed to not be willing to relay to you the information of what had happened that day and the SPK wasn’t exactly the easiest to come into contact with. It had been Aizawa Shuichi who had stepped forward to be the one to tell you everything, from Near’s plan, to Light being shot. The man they described, Light - no, Kira - was deranged, a mess, erratic and only a fraction away from trying to kill everyone in that warehouse, had it not been for Matsuda. 

You turned the recording off and pushed the player away. You could still clearly see Light in the forefront of your mind. The bandage around his hand from the gunshot, the same hand that had killed so many, the tired look in his eyes and something behind them, you couldn’t pin what it was exactly, but there was something there. You pushed yourself away from your desk and peeled your lab coat off, hanging it on the hook as you left your office. The task force headquarters had received upgrades since Kira’s capture. One being you now had your own research office, you didn’t exactly need it but who were you to say no, besides, you appreciated having a dedicated workspace, especially a private space, a pin code that changed bi-weekly sent to you by Near. Even if Kira was in custody, there was no room for faulty security. 

You had considered following suit with other members of the task force, who had just moved back into their homes with their families. You couldn’t bring yourself to leave the headquarters, and Near had no objections to you staying, in fact, he had suggested that it was for the best. You suspected he didn’t want to risk information leaking, and with you providing your services to the team, it would be best for you to stay. According to your watch it was nearing three in the afternoon, yet it felt so much later. You were practically considered crashing down on your bed the moment you opened the door to your room, but you restrained yourself. 

Your room had changed over the past weeks, the boxes upon boxes that you had previously kept stacked around the room had since been moved into the storage and archive area of the building. Which had only exposed how bare your room truly was to things outside of the Kira investigation, par some photos set on your bookshelf, one of you with a girl in an overly excited girl who clung onto you, wearing a red jacket that was sizes too big for her stood out to you the most and greeted you every time you walked in. 

Someone had remembered to turn the heater on for you, which you were incredibly grateful for, you weren’t sure if there were still people inside the building to thank. You pulled out your phone and gave a quick call to one of the contacts Near had given you, Stephen Gevanni, you had been taken aback at first as he seemed to be very much over your calibre for him to be taking requests from you, but he was nice enough about it; you let him know that you had locked up the office and had started your notes for the day, and gave him full reign to transcribe the interview if he wanted it done as soon as possible. 

“If you need the code just let me know,” you assured him as you opened your fridge, cringing, you needed to get more food soon, unless you wanted to do cup noodles again. 

“Thank you, I’m sure Near will give it to me. Everything all right there?” He must have heard your disgust in your fridge selection.

“Oh no everything’s good,” you pulled some things out of the fridge that maybe could be turned into some sort of meal for later, “oh also! If you don’t mind could you please look over my notes, I’m not sure if they’re up to par with what Near needs.”

“I can do that.”

He sounded way too serious to you, it made you feel like a toddler trying to talk to a businessman, a lame comparison, but you couldn’t quite place the feeling, “Thank you I really appreciate it, please call me if you need anything.”

You had been glad when the goodbyes were said and you could finally hang up, you rested your head against the fridge shelf, it would have been worse if he were in person. Stupid. You sighed and stepped back from the fridge to let the door close. A scream filled the room as you dropped everything to your feet. Hidden behind the door had been a looming figure, grin grossly stretched from ear to ear, the death god you had come to know. He jumped back when you had started to scream, scrambling with his words on what was the big deal.

“Ryuk don’t do that,” you placed your hand over your chest, “you almost gave me a heart attack.”

“Well I can arrange that,” he laughed in his raspy voice. 

You ignored him and looked down at the food you had dropped to the floor you had heard them splatter when they dropped and inwardly cringed at the thought of cleaning it up later, cup noodles it is, wait a second - “What are you even doing here? No one has seen you since Light - Kira – ugh, since everything,” you kept correcting yourself before just giving up.

“I do have a life outside of your human world, you do realise that, right? You humans are so self-absorbed,” he huffed. Was he seriously offended?

You picked your abandoned food up and threw it in the compost bin, “okay well why are you back?” you rolled your eyes and leaned back on your counter.

“I thought this might be interesting.”

“Interesting huh?” how could you forget, the death god viewed the entire situation like a game, but the game was over, Kira was caught, what more was there to see. Surely this had to have been boring for him, especially if he had disappeared ever since Light was caught. You had forgotten how pestering the death god could be, why would he even want to come back? Did he want to collect his notebook? –

You paused for a moment, “Ryuk, you know a lot about the Death Note right?”

“I wouldn’t say a lot,” he shrugged, even though you had become accustomed to the death gods particular look, you couldn’t help but want to shudder when you would see its skin move, not appearing as skin but more as bits of pieces that had been stitched together on a skeleton, seeming as though it would fall apart if it moved too much, “I would say I know just as much as another Shinigami but there are rules that even I don’t understand.”

You sat down at the kitchen table and rolled an apple towards him, which he had caught just as it tipped over the edge, “Would you like to see things get really interesting Ryuk?”

He took a large bite from the apple, his sharp teeth cutting it effortlessly in half, “Oh?”

“Mhmm, you know more about this than anyone, you’d be a valuable asset to us.”

“Hmm, how true,” he pondered for a moment and finished off his apple, leaving you in anticipation for his response, “no can-do kid.”

You hadn’t realised how tense you were until your shoulders fell in disappointment – that’s what you get for thinking you could out smart a god (even if it was Ryuk); you were about to protest when the death god raised a long bony finger at you.

“However, if for some reason I feel the need to share my knowledge, I just might.”

You narrowed your eyes at him for a moment, clearly this was as close as you would ever be able to get to a deal with him. It would do for now, “All right then . . . mind explaining why you’re in my home then?”

“No one else will talk to me.”

Oh, for God's sake, “Ah. I see. Lucky me,” you got up from your seat, “well you’re out of luck I’m taking a nap soon.”

“No, you’re not!”

You looked back over at him confused, “I’m sorry?”

“C’mooon I’ve known you long enough to know that every time you told Light you were ‘going to bed’ that you were actually going to go watch movies or play video games.”

Fuck. It always would escape you just how much Ryuk had been part of your life, even if you were none the wiser to it all. You rolled your eyes and grabbed your scheduler from your bag before you walked over to your room to crash down on your bed.

You had three therapy sessions to run the next day: Amane Misa 09:00-11:00, Aizawa Shuichi, 11:30-12:30, and last on the list Touta Matsuda, ~4:00. You hadn’t given Matsuda a definitive time. Especially since it seemed that he had been avoiding any conversation about therapy with you. You doubted he would come, but you had let him know that he was free to see you or call you any time after four or before nine.

Ryuk’s raspy voice cut you out of your thoughts, “So this therapy thing you’re doing.”

You jumped slightly and shut your planner, “What of it?”

“Do you think I could get that? I feel like I went through a lot too.”

You held back a laugh and threw your planner on the bedside table, “A Shinigami going to therapy? Sounds a bit outlandish, do you guys even do that in – wherever it is you’re from.”

“No,” he sighed.

“What no one talks to you there either?” you smirked and turned the television on and flicked through the channels.

“You and Light are both quite rude you know that?”

“Yeah well I didn’t murder millions under the delusion I was a God, so I’ve got that going for me.”

“You think you would have done things differently?”

There was a look in his eyes that disturbed you, as though he was challenging you, you stared back at him for a moment, unsure of how you were even meant to respond, “Is that supposed to be a trick question?”

“No, but it’s all very curious how you’re so quick to judge, the Death Note has fallen on this earth countless times before Light, and it will continue to fall long after you’re all gone, so I’m curious to see how you think you’re any different to all owners that have come before,” he said simply, his intense stare never leaving you, “some may have not been very high on the morality scale, but there have been many before like Light, those who seemed to have a righteous sense of Justice, those who seemed destined for something more, each and every owner became something that many would never suspect them.”

You wouldn’t kill anyone, the very thought made you sick inside, was this a hint? Was Ryuk saying that the Death Note encourages people to kill? That it corrupts them?

Before you could question him any further on your thoughts he started to laugh, “Who knows, maybe you’d be part of the select few who rejected the power of the Death Note and forfeit ownership; that’s the noble route you’d like right?”

You stared up at the ceiling, dead air filled the room as you thought about his question, would you have forfeited it? If it had been you that day who had found the note could you have easily become Kira? Could the roles have been reversed and you would be the one being interviewed by a shrink?

You closed your eyes. No. There was no use thinking about such things. It didn’t happen. You didn’t find the notebook, and you didn’t become the criminal with the highest body count in history, you didn’t manipulate the people around you to meet your ends, you didn’t kill innocent people for the sake of ‘Justice’, you didn’t view yourself as a God among men and used your cult like following as a steppingstone. You weren’t the one who lied to your friends and family for years. You were not the one locked in a cell. You were here, and you were going to help. You were part of a team that wanted to be sure that something like this could never happen again. You were going to study the effects of the Death Note. 

You were going to help the world recover from its trauma.