A Death Note Short Fiction Story

"SHALLOW VICTORY"

by Roderick Stewart

The heavy set man struck Light across the face with the back of his hand. The man looked like a bouncer from a high profiled nightclub, he was hefty and muscular with a shaven head. He was a member of the Yakuza crime syndicate, whom the N.P.A. where trying to take down for years.

Light recoiled from the impact, his neck cranking to the right. The left side of his mouth bled from a deep cut; his face was battered and bruised. He turned back after the hit. His left eye was partially shut, swelled by continuous excessive blunt trauma. The man had struck him repeatedly for information. But Light refused to talk.

Light was tied to a chair, his hands behind him, his ankles bound to the legs; the chair was bolted to the floor. He was in a ducky, darkened, empty room. There were no windows, and he could not seen a door. He had been kidnapped when the Yakuza eliminated all the members of a drug squad he was on. He had also been shot in the shoulder, which hurt like hell.

Asked to assist in what was supposed to be a relatively easy bust at the docks of smuggled drugs, he set aside the Kira case, and allowed the taskforce to handle everything. He was the N.P.A.'s top information agent, and they needed his expertise to gather some Intel before the bust. He was only supposed to provide information, but he opted to join the squad on a temporary bases because the Kira case was taxing his boredom. He wanted to flex his mental muscle.

The Kira taskforce agreed to his decision as they said he was looking a little tired, and needed a break. They were all fools, Light had thought. Soon he would rule as a god and they would all be dead. But he needed to string them along for a little while longer, at least for Near's sake.

Still, he had gotten himself into trouble with the drug bust. All the agents involved had been killed, and the Yakuza had taken his cell, so there was no way for the others, meaning the Kira taskforce, to track his whereabouts with the 'call sharing system' he has implement, or even GPS.

The heavy set man hit Light again, and Light turned back to face him. "Tell me what I want to know or I'll kill you!" the man demanded.

Light smirked. "Oh, if you only knew who I am. . ."

"You're a cop, nothing else." The man grabbed Light's chin, cupping it, straightened it. Light cringed and grunted from the hold. The man looked directly into Light's eyes. "You think you're so smart. We knew of your raid ahead of time. Someone tipped us off."

Light recalled the man's face. He had at one time been in league with Mello. He had seen his face on the FBI's most wanted list. But he was only an enforcer, a stupid lonely thug.

Light spit blood in the man's face. The man recoiled, releasing him. The man wiped his face, looking at the blood on his hand. The he laughed. "You're unlike any cop I've encountered, you have balls." He then leaned back in closer. "But if you spit on me again, I'll make sure you no longer have any left." Light sneered, and the man laughed again.

The man took Light's gun off a near-by table. The table was a standard wooden ply square table, easily expendable, and held the weapon aloft, looking at it. "Interesting weapon, not your standard Japanese police issue. Custom made, I think." He caressed the barrel. "I'm not your typical Yakuza enforcer, as you may have already guessed."

Light deduced that already. This man was more than he appeared, he even showed a higher degree of intelligence than he originally expressed. In fact, not only was an enforcer and interrogator, but the FBI had improperly profiled him based solely on his appearance.

The man pointed the gun at Light, but Light knew he wouldn't fire. Light still had information he needed. The man jabbed the barrel into Light's shoulder, further causing injury. Light cried out. The pain was excruciating, as the man pushed the barrel further in, turning it to get distance.

But then he stopped. Light would not give the man the satisfaction of his cries. He resisted, gritting his teeth. He looked at the man with evil intention. The man pulled the gun back when there appeared no more amusement for him.

"I'm going to kill you! I swear it!" Light proclaimed.

The man took a few steps back, as if seeing a devil in Light's eyes.

Misa had the Death Note, Light knew. But there was a piece hidden in his watch. If he could only get at it, the man was dead.

"You're a fighter," the man said with some amusement. "It's going to be fun to break you."

"You can forget it!" Light shouted. "I'll never tell you anything!"

The man put the gun back on the table. "Then you'll die, right here. There's no one coming for you. So stop believing you're going to be rescued. No one knows where you are."

Light smirked.

The man noticed Light's sinister smile. "What's so funny?"

"You have no idea. . ." All I need is to reach my watch, Light thought. He stretched his right hand and pulled the pin three times. The hidden panel ejected. "I'm going to kill you."

"I've never known a cop more reliant than you."

"I'll take that as a compliment." Light felt for the pin also in the panel and pricked his forefinger drawing blood. Feeling the paper, he slowly wrote the man's name down, recalling it from the FBI profile. He knew it wasn't an alias. "I'll let you in on a little secret, one that only a select few know."

"Yeah, what is it? Tell me now. I'm all ears."

Light grinned innately after finishing the man's name, pushing back the panel in his watch. "I am Kira."

The man laughed. "You? Kira? Now that's rich. If you were Kira, you could have killed me instantly." The man leaned in closer, eyeing Light as if to challenge him. "You're a cop, nothing more."

Light smirked sinisterly. "I am much more than I appear, just like you and the FBI's insipid profile of you. Any last words before you die?"

The man's eyes widened slightly as if Light's words rang believability to him. The man shook his head. "Like I said, I've never known a cop so resilient than you."

"And you never will again."

The man's eyes widened fully, and he clutched his chest. 40 seconds were up. He staggered backwards, looking at Light in utter disbelief. "No...you can't be..."

"Am I, you fool! Playing coy is one of my specialties."

The man's mouth gapped wide as he collapsed to his knees, then he fell at Light's feet dead.

Light laughed. "I am Kira, god of the new world, you fool!"

Light heard gunfire, then a door burst open. Light looked up. Men in SWAT gear entered with guns drawn. Once the room was secured, one of the men took off his helmet as he approached Light. It was Soichiro Yagami, his father. "Light, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Dad. A little worse for wear, but I'll recover," Light said lightly.

Soichiro Yagami looked at the man laying dead at Light's feet. "What happened to him?"

"Heart attack."

"Heart attack?" his father repeated.

Lightly immediately redirected the conversion. "How did you find me?"

"Satellite surveillance. The FBI has been monitoring this area for some time," his father said, as Light was untied. "and when the drug squad failed to call in, they sent in another team. I wanted to be on the team. I was so worried. I didn't know if you were dead or alive."

His father told him the rest as they ventured outside. Sunlight stung Light's eyes like sharp needles. A medical unit was on site, and Light's injuries were taken care of. "You'll need to visit a hospital," one of the medical techs said to Light.

"I will, thank you," Light replied.

"I'm glad you're safe, Light," Soichiro Yagami said with a fathers worry. "I wouldn't know what to do if I lost you. Sayu is still recovering from Mello's kidnapping. I demanded to be a part of the SWAT team to find you."

"I'm going to be fine, Dad," Light smiled. "Nothing than a week or two of recuperation won't handle. After that, I'll be back with the Kira taskforce."

"You concentrate on healing. Let us deal with Kira."

Light mentally smiled, knowing that their efforts would be futile. "Sure Dad. Anything you say."

But then he mentally frowned, as he looked at the medical techs haul out the dead Yakuza enforcer on a stretcher covered with a sheet.

-

I wanted to take a case where I wouldn't need the Death Note, something simple to prove my mantle, intelligence. But I failed. A criminal was killed, that was good. Kira still reigns superior. But as for me, Light Yagami - I am greatly disappointed.