True Elision Chapter 1: Prologue, a death note fanfic

Hi guys! How is everyone? I decided –against my better judgment- to have a go at that Death Note fanfic I've been thinking of writing. Truth be told, I don't think anyone is going to like this, since it's my first try at something so serious.

For the yaoi fans out there, this story will definitely contain slash, but it will take a long time to develop, since my main concern is to prevent the characters from being OOC. I will respect the plot of the manga and the true actions of all characters. I want to have decent, flowing character development and plot before I rush to the yaoi. I believe that these useful elements will help create a better, more believable, more satisfying romance in the long run - always combined with mystery and thrill.

It's the first time I've ever taken on such a daunting task. The Death Note characters are much too complex for me, and I'm jittery - no one will really like the fanfic. I'll just drop the prologue and if I see people reviewing positively, then I'll keep writing. Btw, I don't mind flames. Be my guest with any comment.

I hope to deliver a better fanfiction than ever before. I have become obsessed with Death Note (which is usually a good sign about the updating progress of my fics) and feel that I can't rest until I write a good long story about it.

Title: True Elision

Pairing: Raito (Light Yagami)) x Ryuuzaki (L)

Warnings: This story contains YAOI (a.k.a. slash, male homosexual romance)

Summary: After he died, Raito was sent neither to heaven nor hell. He was turned to nothing, and stopped existing. But a conglomeration of factors works to Raito's advantage one last time after death: the population of the Shinigami, who permanently draw the life of the souls they have vaporized with their Death Notes, is falling at alarming rates. The Shinigami need new recruits –new souls to convert to Gods of Death, or else their entire race shall be wiped out. Naturally, Raito is a great candidate.

Raito's spirit is reformed and thrust into hell: he is allowed a chance. If he withstands the levels of hell, he is allowed to pass to the Afterlife and atone for his sins. If not, he becomes a Shinigami and loses his soul once again. Raito then realizes that the hell he must withstand is a giant labyrinth, where each room is the same. Each room features a never-ending, torturous chess game between him and his great nemesis, L. But the Ryuuzaki in Raito's hell is not the real man. He is a demon – a true demon. Beat the demonic Ryuuzaki and have a second chance, or lose the tournament and be damned forever. The duel of his fate begins!

Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note.

"Kira-sama…"

A wise person once said: "it's better to be hated than to be ignored". Some people can attest to this during their first pre-pubescent crush, when they insist on trying to do anything in their power to attract their idol's attention – even if it means becoming mean and cruel. Even if their bully-like efforts, perfect subterfuges of misdirected hormonal desperation, render them ironically despised by the very objects of their affection, they still prefer it compared to the frightening truth of non-existence.

But most people, very mediocre and simple in their demands, fail to understand this concept. Very few have the experience of being involved in some fascinating, earth-shattering, awesome emotional discovery during their lifetimes. Most live their lives as they have been taught to: go to school, go to college, copulate, graduate, engage in careerism, marry, procreate, retire and die. And in their drab, everyday routines, they fail to consider basic human behavioral patterns. When asked if they'd rather be ignored or hated by another being, the majority of them reply that they'd rather be ignored, since they're probably thinking either of their employer or their spouse.

Nevertheless, it is an intrinsic –if technically illogical- elemental belief of human nature: non-existence is a frightening idea. Better to be something- even something despicable – than to be nothing at all.

But when a person becomes intelligent, intelligent enough to fancy himself a God, such basic sentiments of the human animal become negligible. The line between important and crucial becomes translucent, and the borders that separate the planes of true life and the ideal are merged. That kind of man, in his perceived superiority, his overwhelming intelligence which has no time for dallying with 'plebeian, everyday matters', may actually lose sight of some very common, sensible things, that any relatively functional member of society with much lower IQ, would immediately understand.

In his effort to prove himself to himself, he becomes absorbed in surrealistic addictions – he occupies himself more and more with matters, which, on the one hand may require superior intelligence, but on the other have no actual significance in real life interactions. It happens all the time in casinos, when the occasional math wizard attempts to create the ultimate mathematical formula for winning in poker. But no one really congratulates him –they just consider him another regular waste of talent.

There may be a goal offered to defend these obsessive actions: the casino-addict, for instance, in his effort to present himself as a mathematical genius rather than the nondescript gambler he is, claims massive amounts of money or fame as his reason for playing. Another man may announce an idealistic goal, such as "the cleansing of the world of all criminals and all evil". He may go as far as to create the philosophy of an entire dogma behind his irrationality. But the bottom line always remains the same: beneath the pompous speeches, the grandiose hand gestures and the carefully constructed demented grimaces that he displays in the mirror to convince himself of his differentiation, he is a human who bleeds like any other, only with more egoistic blood.

Perhaps a trifle too many praises had followed the young Light Yagami in his life, and that had been a problem all along. Everything had been too easy, too soon for him. When people have clapped their hands and widened sparkling, aghast eyes at everything you've ever done since the age of four, then your sense of self becomes distorted. You "lose sight". You can't see the big picture that everyone else - simple, stupid everyone else - is easily looking at. Your understanding of the world and your capabilities becomes limited, ironically, by the very way your mind has grown so complex and your chest so easy to puff. Their praises and congratulations become the cries of the roaring crowds under the guillotine, bloodthirsty and calling for your execution. Their hands as they clasp yours in proud handshakes become shackles, manacles binding you onto the ornate, seemingly beautiful, nefarious prison.

The prison of vanity.

It's the worst one, and the Gods of Death know it. They know what you're thinking, you poor human. They know how easy it is to excite your human mind with thoughts of ambition, how hotly arrogant the blood that flows within your veins. Deep down, even though you understand the repercussions of admitting it, you think you're smarter even than the Reaper. You think you can cheat Death, because you're just that good. You think you're witty, writing down pretty names with your little pen, sitting in your cozy room. And when your mind takes the big leap, and dares to think it's equal to a God's, then the true Gods laugh within their nasty, rotting heads.

But you're not as courageous as you think. You've never plunged your fingers in their bodies, have you? To clasp the breaking vertebrae as their fragile hearts freeze. Your hands retain their porcelain pallor, your slim wrists and the soft curve of your nape move as tautly as the strings of a harp as you sonorously recite names and faces, marking them for Death.

It has been decided. You say.

Marked for Death. You say

"…Kira – sama…"

Death within forty seconds. You write.

Better to be hated. At least they'll remember you when they hate you. They'll remember you with passion. Yes. Better to be sent to hell. At least, through the torturous dungeons and fires that smell of burning vomit, you will know that God was angry with you enough to torture you. You will know that God admits your existence. You will exist. In hell and in pain, but you will have been confirmed as special.

But not this.

Not this.

"Didn't I tell you I'd write your name on my notebook one day, Raito?" the fierce yellow eyes sing their dirge, wide and unblinking as ever.

"Oh! Don't worry…the user of the Death Note cannot go to heaven or hell after he dies. When you die you'll see…nothing."

And you shall be lost from the world. You will not be 'left alone in a sea of darkness'. You will not be 'left alone in a sea of light'. Nothing doesn't mean alone. Nothing means nothing. Your eyes and ears will stop existing. Your pretty fingers, which have written the deaths of a hundred thousand men, shall dissipate. Your living thoughts shall evaporate. And you shall vaporize from the galaxies and the universe, and the material that composes your soul will crumble to dust.

Ryuuku never was one for long explanations. He knows Raito is smart – let him figure it out by himself. But even so, as he writhes on the floor in arrogant pain and suffering, Raito is not intelligent enough to realize that he's screwed up. Had anyone marched up to him at the very time of his death and asked if he were sorry, Raito would have barked that of course he wasn't, because this denouement was never his fault – it was always somebody else's fault, because Raito is flawless. He is Special.

And indeed Raito died. And after his heart stopped beating, and his eyes shut, nothing else happened. He just died. The soul inside him was destroyed, pulverized into a million pieces and dispersed in the atmosphere. He didn't see any tunnels with lights at the far end.

He just didn't exist anymore, which was proof that God didn't even want to see him repent. Obviously, God didn't want to see him at all. Even the smallest, most pathetic worm can revitalize a tail. But all it took for great god Raito to die and finally shut his mouth was a few Shinigami chicken-scratch on a black notebook.

For years and years after his death, the occult Covens would try to devise all kinds of evil spiritual talismans, hoping to resurrect him. Whenever Japan was in crisis, whenever the politicians and the zaibatsu (1) seemed to be starving the country's resources a trifle too fast, or whenever the blonde, blue-eyed Americans nationally insulted us with their annoying Hollywood anti-culture (2), we'd try to resurrect Kira-sama so that he'd bring order back to the world. The man whose hands have dripped with the blood of a hundred thousand men. He'd set the world right. He'd kill all the evil-doers.

To bring the Killer Lord back from the dead.

They tried everything. They composed hymns and Killer sutras, they wrote Bibles of Death, they wrote Appendices, they drew hellish paintings, they conjured spirits, they invented scions, they partook in orgies, they almost sacrificed newborn female children on altars. They even resorted to rather laughable imitations of American Heavy Metal, 'Gothic' bands. But Kira still wouldn't be resurrected, and if he ever did, it probably would have been in order to stop their ghastly music.

They didn't stop trying, though. Well, how were they supposed to know that Kira didn't exist in the world anymore? To them, Kira was like an angel. A saviour. A saint. The thought that he had stopped existing was preposterous.

How were they to know that the Reaper, after he forces you to amuse him and laughs to his heart's content with your plight, throws you away and burns your soul to ashes, without caring?

Even the last of all humans has a right to be in one of the hells. But not Kira. The man whose hands still drip with the blood of a hundred thousand men. His damnation doesn't deserve punishment.

When Light Yagami died, despite his being a criminal overlord, all those who knew him attended the funeral. His most personal belonging was the Death Note. They didn't put it in his grave. No one wanted to admit it, but most were still afraid. Subconsciously, they thought that if they left him alone with the notebook, even in his coffin, he'd probably start killing again. No. Best burn the accursed book and bury Yagami on his lonesome. Just to be sure.

After the burial, Near himself seized all of Raito's property and spent hours in Raito's rented house, rifling through files and folders, admiring the noticeable lack of murderous signs he found in Raito's living space. Raito hadn't been lying when he said he wasn't a murderer. He had probably truly believed he wasn't. There were no perverted trophies from his mass slaughters adorning his bedroom walls, and no conspicuous small rooms with hidden torture arsenals. Obviously, Raito wasn't enough of a psychopath to enjoy the act of physical murder, but was enough of a sociopath to take another man's life without so much as a flinch.

It was in fact very possible that, until he died himself, he hadn't truly realized the actual repercussions of his actions. He'd probably been thinking of the whole thing as a grand game of chess, where he'd been wiping out the opponent's pawns. He'd never once wondered, like any other human with mediocre IQ would have in his place, whether the pawns were in actual pain.

When Raito's body collapsed from heart failure in front of Ryuuku's pointy feet and sharp teeth, Matsuda had been the only one who'd shed a tear or two. Some had kept observing with disgust. Others with disguised pity and a few with surreptitious glances of malice. Near, as non-committal and expressionless as always, had approached Raito's corpse and shuffled through the pockets of the blood-covered suit, like the uninhibited investigating human computer that he was.

Matsuda, Mogi and Near's party had all gathered around the body to stare. Ryuuku had long floated away to tell his Shinigami chums the news, cackling the whole time. As Near bent over Raito's once proud figure, he didn't bother closing the corpse's eyes. He left Yagami's face frozen there as a display of a barbaric mute scream, in a stony grimace of paranoid, wild tremor. It seems Raito had been staring at something before he died, as though the glassy eyes of his corpse alone could see the dripping, bleeding hands of a hundred thousand men reaching forward to strangle him.

Near pulled Raito's wallet from a pocket and unabashedly opened it to skim through the contents. He paused when his eyes fell on a slightly crumpled piece of paper, buried in a tight stack of the wallet folds.

Now, most people who had a relationship as long-lasting and committed as Raito's with Misa would keep a picture of their beloved in their wallet. It was fairly obvious to everyone present – except perhaps Matsuda – that Raito had never really been in love with Misa, or even cared about her in any way beyond that of a moderately useful tool. Therefore, the lack of her picture was not surprising.

But the existence of another picture was.

Near touched the thin piece of paper gingerly, in that familiar insect-like way he touched all things – almost ghost-like in familiarity, for those who'd known the predecessor. He plucked it out of the folds of the wallet, displaying it to the audience gathered around. It was a photograph, very old and worn, with the characteristic magenta tinge of old film, and cropped haphazardly at the edges. Near felt a very distinct, very human pulse quicken on his white-covered, usually cool temples as he stared at the figure in the picture.

The ignorant members of Near's team asked about the identity of the face in the photo, but Matsuda and Mogi's faces said everything. Near looked at the picture too, his usually restless eyes unusually still. A pair of eerily familiar dark orbs stared right back at him, poised like black jewels within planes of pale skin. It was the picture of a child, not more than nine or ten years old.

The boy in the picture was standing in slightly hunched – but not deformed – position, wearing a soft-looking beige coat, which reached a little beneath his knees. He had a black scarf and black mittens on, to match his rough batch of tousled locks. His wide, black eyes were unclear in the photo, but seemed uncomfortably bottomless in their ebony colour. His expression was one of skittishness – perhaps weariness – not of childish excitement. In the background of the picture, Big Ben towered over the House of Parliament in London. The boy looked minuscule compared to the impending tower, his already vague expression completely lost in the sea of shadows.

Near wasn't sure where he'd seen that face before, if he'd ever seen it. But it vaguely reminded him of something he sometimes saw in the mirror. A shadow of dark hair and soft fabric he'd known during his toddler years, a feeling more than a memory. He'd never really seen L, after all. But how, why and when had Yagami…

"Is that-" Matsuda started, but never managed to complete the statement, aghast as he was.

"Ryuuzaki…?" Mogi finished it for him, the same disbelief in his voice. Why would Raito…no…Kira, have his worst enemy's childhood picture in his wallet? How had he gotten hold of it, when it was universally known that Ryuuzaki had always refused to take pictures or give information about his background…who knows where Raito had acquired it? Why would he want to carry Ryuuzaki's picture everywhere he went? Ryuuzaki, the man killed as a result of Raito's own efforts. Ryuuzaki of all people, who Mogi hadn't thought about for at least two years and whose distinctive ugliness in both form and facial features could only be matched by his incapability in table manners.

Near didn't comment, just gritted his teeth surreptitiously. He slipped the picture back into Yagami's wallet as carefully as he'd removed it, in the exact place and position he'd found it, and then entrusted the wallet itself to one of the members of his elite investigation team. Matsuda and Mogi never saw that wallet again. A few more years after that, they'd almost completely forgotten what Ryuuzaki ever even looked like.

They couldn't really remember his facial characteristics. All they could remember was a distinct sense of…attractive ugliness, somehow. Ryuuzaki had never been the man schoolgirls would call even remotely good-looking: his customary slouching posture was not flattering for the male physique, and his notable lack of facial hair, along with the unusual fullness of his lips, could render him mediocre at best, if not hermaphroditic in terms of appearance.

But some of his more prominent characteristics, the ones he wasn't as reluctant to display, such as the length of his fingers, the pallor of his skin, or the soft-looking, androgynous curves of his throat, had carved a decidedly sensual atmosphere to his remembrance. The whispered memory of his bizarre elegance lived as a legacy of impression in the minds of the few who had known him – as a person and not as a machine.

With Raito it was the exact opposite. They all remembered the striking, classic beauty of his appearance. They meticulously recalled his distinguishing characteristics and not so much the way he moved or spoke. Everyone had always agreed that Raito had been a particularly good-looking man, not at all monstrous, spidery or deformed like Ryuuzaki.

Even so, even though he was so very attractive, people always recalled Raito's body with a sense of sterilization. Unlike Ryuuzaki's strange, underlying sensuality, and his skin which, despite its pallor, had looked soft, pliant and voluptuous to the taste, Raito's body – perhaps because of its strict, tight musculature – had always been remembered as something desensitized, unapproachable, cold and empty. His gestures were forgotten. His soul evaporated from his body, leaving nothing but an empty, though beautiful, carcass.

In this way, each was reduced to nothingness in others' memories, each in their own way. The legendary tales of their fatal cerebral duel were gradually forgotten. The universal dimensions became calm again after the Killer's death, and all was right in the world. Ironically enough, a few humans were killed by Shinigami here and there, but never as massively or as creatively as they had been by other humans.

In fact, constant gambling and the decay of general disinterest had prevailed more than anything in the dull lives of the Reapers, these days. Even when Ryuuku decided to meddle with more humans and tried to amuse himself by provoking situations equally chaotic to the former one, he was to be sorely disappointed, since no new 'Kira' ever lasted for more than a few days at a time or provided satisfying amusement. There were no grandiose fights for justice and no mind games. No suspense. Sure, humans were always interesting…but…

Soon, more and more Shinigami kept realizing that they'd forgotten to write human names in their notebooks, or even care about their own sad, long lives. In the calm oblivion of prolonged non-existence and the persistent uneventful routines of both the living and the dead, Reapers with anxieties became aware once again, as beings usually do – as even Kira-sama, the Killer of a hundred thousand men did – when faced with imminent death and permanent extinction.

"zaibatsu" are the corporate giants, the financial conglomerates, who have at various periods amalgamated to control the political and economical events in Japan. This has been going on since the Middle Ages.

certainly not intended as an insult. Heck, I even want to go to college in America. It's just something I've heard Japanese nationalists say, sometimes, and thought it was funny.