* * * April 27 * * *
It was a warm spring afternoon, and the sun shined brightly on the inhabitants of Tokyo. A few blocks from To-Oh University was a small café nestled between two shops. The aroma of coffee and freshly baked treats filled the area, enticing anyone who walked by to come and take a look. Despite the hour, the café only had a handful of customers at the tables. A waitress retrieved her most recent order from the chef and approached a table in a small alcove at the front of the café where a young man and woman were sitting.
She placed the plates in front of her two customers before asking, "Can I get you anything else?"
The brunet smiled and shook his head. "No, thank you."
She nodded and turned to walk away.
As Bambi returned her attention to her food, Light spoke up. "Thanks for making the time to meet on a weekday. I'm too busy on the weekends."
The brunette smiled at him as she waved a hand lightly. "Don't worry about it."
Light pushed his plate off to the side to make room for his laptop and the rubric.
"We should split the work for the presentation in half," he suggested. "If you don't mind, I was hoping to do the parts involving the crimes he committed, Birthday's background, and unusual aspects of his crimes." He looked up at his work partner expectantly.
That would leave her with profiling Beyond Birthday, connecting the case to a modern topic, and discussing his fate. The hacker's expression remained neutral for a moment as she sat in silence. I'm already wary of what he may know about me, and I don't want to deepen his suspicions. I'm going to be out of my comfort zone no matter what part of the project I have to do.
"Yeah, sure," she said as she shrugged her shoulders. "I don't really care what I do. It makes more sense for you to do the crime stuff anyway with your major."
Light gazed into her eyes for a few moments, almost as if he were searching for something, before smiling and beginning to eat his food. Bambi's eyebrow twitched upward as she noted his apparent surprise. How was he expecting me to answer? She frowned before starting to pick at the danish on her plate.
They both took out their laptops soon after that and began working. Since Bambi already had a vast collection of information published on Beyond Birthday, she simply kept it hidden and pretended to search. A few minutes passed before Light broke the silence.
His tone was that of interest as he explained, "A quick look at his Wikipedia page tells us that Detective L actually worked on the original case a few years ago. A detective called Deneuve worked on the second case after Birthday's escape from prison last year."
A few moments passed before he added, "Is 'Beyond Birthday' a normal name to you? From my point of view it's fairly strange, but that may just be cultural."
"Yeah, it's pretty weird if you ask me," she admitted with a laugh.
Light nodded to himself before continuing. "It also says that he killed fifteen people - three in his first case along with an attempted suicide. He is suspected of murdering twelve people in the past year in addition to an attempted murder in Japan, and a kidnapping and torture incident. He also seems to have loved puzzles. And apparently he died this past January due to complications with a gunshot wound."
She wasn't sure, but it almost seemed like he had narrowed his eyes for a brief second after reading that last line.
A few moments passed before he asked, "So, what do you make of all that?"
Bambi frowned slightly as she shrugged and tried to push her memories aside. "He sounds like a terrible person?"
"Anything else?" he asked expectantly.
"What do you want me to say? He liked to listen to Guns & Roses when he wasn't killing people?" she grumbled. "There isn't exactly a lot to go by with such little information."
Light frowned. "We can't go that far, but we can deduce that he had a flair for drama from his attempted suicide, kidnapping, and those cryptic puzzles he sent out for each murder."
The brunette silently nodded.
Both teens continued working in silence - well, Bambi gave the semblance of working before bringing up relevant articles and showing them to Light. Over the course of an hour the pair found all information they could on the Beyond's first victims, his mugshot, scans of the autopsy reports that were used in his trial, and a few articles summarizing his alleged crimes as the Encryption Killer over the past year. The autopsy reports for his recent crimes were not available, so Light was relying more on articles from local newspapers covering the crimes. It had come to the point where Light was positive that he had enough information on the murders and was ready to move on to Beyond's final crimes in the United States: the kidnapping and torture of a young, unidentified woman. She did her best to keep her cool as the two of them worked.
"Hey, Emily," Light called out. "I found an article with a picture that seems fairly useful. What do you think of it?"
He clicked around before turning his laptop to face the young woman, allowing her to read it. She closed her laptop and pushed it slightly to the side before turning her attention to the article. At the top of the page was an editor's note.
Edit February 13th: The image that accompanied this article has since been removed because the file was corrupted.
The brunette paused for a moment and glanced up at Light. He gave off an air of confidence as he waited expectantly for her response. She redirected her attention to read through the article. It described in a fair amount of detail how long Beyond held his victim, the types of injuries she and her rescuer sustained, and a final description of what the picture had looked like.
The rescuer was a white man in his late teens or early twenties. He had long blonde hair and was pictured carrying the unconscious victim out of the building. He sustained heavy burns to his left side in the explosion that later collapsed the building. The woman that he saved had sustained slight burning around her elbow and feet, suggesting that the rescuer may have used his own body to protect her from the blast. The woman's individual injuries were hard to distinguish because she was covered in what appeared to be dried blood, and we were unable to get hospital records on her or the man. The victim was white and in her late teens or early twenties. She also had short brown hair.
Bambi glanced back and forth between Light and the article. Does he know?
She coughed and smiled nervously at him. "It's really detailed, but it looks like they took the picture down."
Light furrowed his eyebrows and frowned before looking down at the article himself. A few moments passed as she heard him scroll throughout the article. His eyes narrowed for a brief moment before he looked back up at her with a perfectly calm expression.
"That's strange, I must have just read it wrong," he told her. "If I'm missing this much right now, then perhaps we should continue another day."
"Yeah, don't worry about it," she told him.
After letting Light cover the bill, the teens gathered their belongings and headed their separate ways. As Bambi drove home, she found herself lost in thought. I wonder if he actually made that mistake or he was lying to cover the fact that he saw it before the picture was taken down. He's too smart for the first to be likely, but there's no way I'm admitting it, even if he brings it up.
* * * April 30 * * *
The sun was high that Sunday afternoon, and the men of the Yagami household had been hard at work at the task force headquarters. The youngest of the investigators - as far as he knew - walked over to L with a curious smile plastered on his face.
"Ryuzaki, is it true that you worked on the case of a murderer called Beyond Birthday?" Light asked.
L was silent for a moment as he glanced to his suspect. He must either suspicious of Amelia being Beyond's victim or he researched Misora after killing her as Kira and found out that she worked for me on that case.
"Ryuzaki?"
The great detective smiled childishly as he looked over to the brunet. "Did you say something, Light?"
The teen forced a laugh and repeated himself. "Is it true that you worked on the case of Beyond Birthday?"
"Yes, it's true." L shoveled some cake into his mouth as he asked, "You've been researching my past cases, haven't you?"
Light's eyebrows twitched downward for a moment before he explained, "No, I'm actually doing a project on Beyond Birthday for one of my classes. After I read that you worked on the case, I thought that it would be best to ask you if it were true. Since it is, would you mind if I asked you a few questions about the case?"
I'll have to contact Amelia tomorrow morning to see how true this is. L smiled. "Go right ahead."
"Is it true that you let Beyond Birthday pretend to be you while your agent was investigating the case?"
"I never let him do anything," L argued. "Agent Misora never told me about the other person who claimed to be investigating with her." After seeing Light's eyes widen slightly at the mention of the woman's name, L smiled and added, "Naomi Misora was the FBI agent who helped me put Beyond Birthday behind bars the first time. She recently went missing this year after her fiancé's death."
There was a small lull in the conversation before Light asked, "The first time? Didn't the detective Deneuve work on his case after he escaped from prison?"
Nice save, Yagami, but you have raised my suspicions by two percent. L took another bite of his cake as he told the teen, "There is actually a network of L's. Deneuve is simply one of our alternate aliases."
"A network of L's?" Light's expression was neutral for a moment before he smiled. "You sure are full of surprises, Ryuzaki."
L put a thumb to his lip as he seemingly-mused, "There are other L's working on the Kira case too, but they are based elsewhere." After a moment he added, "As is obvious, please also keep this information confidential."
"Of course, Ryuzaki."
* * * May 4 * * *
After their programming lab, Bambi and Light went straight to the café to finish their presentation. A few hours of hard work and practice passed before they submitted the powerpoint online and ordered a celebratory dinner. The two of them conversed about their classes as they waited for their meals to arrive.
"So, Emily," Light began. "I've noticed that you're really good at programming. Why didn't you just take the class at the next level?"
"Well, I taught myself how to do it, so I had no credits to transfer," she explained.
"That's unfortunate," he commented. "Remind me: how did you get interested in programming anyway?"
Shit. What the heck did I tell him before? She furrowed her eyebrows as she told him, "I've been interested in it as long as I can remember."
"Really?" he asked with an intrigued tone. "What kind of programs did you write?"
"Eh, mostly websites and organizers."
Before he could pester her with more questions, the waitress returned with their meals. The two teens ate in silence for a few minutes before Light spoke up again.
"I was wondering: how did you and Takeshi meet?"
Bambi thought back to Mello before telling the brunet, "He's just a family friend."
Light pursed his lips for a moment as he thought. Between what happened during their research last week and his recent stream of questions, Bambi wondered what he was trying to uncover. Was he really Kira and paranoid of her working for L? Did he find one of those articles that Kato mentioned before he got rid of her picture? Or maybe he was suspicious of her being the Robin Hood Hacker? One thing was certain: he was suspicious of her past. She had to take all of his possible suspicions into account, no matter how unlikely they were.
"Do you remember when we first met and I asked you about Kira?" Light began, drawing her full attention to him once more. "Well, I was wondering-"
"Emily, you've gotta help me!" a masculine voice cried out from behind the brunette.
Bambi furrowed her eyebrows and craned her neck to see the man. "What's up?"
Kai tripped as he raced to the table, landing flat on his face. He quickly brushed it off and climbed into the chair next to the young woman.
"You've gotta help me," he repeated before glancing across the table. "Hi, Light." Brown irises returned to Bambi. "Please?"
As She opened her mouth, Light spoke up with annoyance clear in his voice. "She can't help you if you don't tell her what's wrong."
"Right!" Kai exclaimed before brushing his hair back and smiling at her. "So, there's this girl I like - No, she's not a girl, she's a woman," he amended. "And she's really pretty and really, really smart. I want to ask her out, but she makes me super nervous and I never know what to say. So, I was trying to figure out how to do it, and then I was like, 'Hey, why don't I just ask another super smart girl what I should do?' Then I walked by and saw you in the window, and I was like, 'Hey, Emily's a super smart girl, I should go ask her.'" He then put his hands together. "So, will you help me?"
Bambi shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know. Just be honest with her, I guess. If she doesn't like you for being you, then you should find someone who does."
Kai was silent for a moment as he pondered what she said.
"I guess that shouldn't be too hard," he mused before a panicked look took shape on his face. "Oh, I hope she doesn't fine me annoying."
"Who is it, anyway?" the brunette asked.
Kai's cheeks flushed red as he mumbled, "Kiyomi Takada." After a moment he added, "Is there anything else you can do to help?"
Bambi pursed her lips as she thought back to her old friends.
A smile rose to her lips. "You know what? I've got an idea that's so crazy it just might work. I'll go with you and help you ask her out, but I'll be hiding when you do it. Sound good?"
"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" Kai cried out as he bowed repeatedly. "Oh, I could kiss your feet right now, but I won't because that would be weird."
As he sat up straight, he continued. "So, I was thinking that maybe we could do it on Monday after programming, but around noon because Kiyomi has a class after programming. Can I have your phone number so we can coordinate more?"
"Uh... no, sorry. It's not something I give out lightly," she explained with an apologetic smile.
Light chimed in, "I don't even have Emily's number."
Kai nodded. "Okay, just meet me by the fountain after programming. Maybe you can coach me a bit before she gets there."
Bambi agreed to his terms, so the teen left with a smile. After watching him walk out the door, she turned to face Light.
He smiled at her. "It was nice of you to help him."
She smiled and shrugged her shoulders. After paying, they both headed out and bid their goodbyes. The young woman watched Light as he walked down the street before beginning her own trek back to the house. On the way, she decided to give someone a call. She turned on her Bluetooth device before dialing the number.
The phone rang for a few seconds before someone answered it.
"Hey, what's up?" Matt asked.
"Hey, I'm on my way back, so I was wondering if anyone wants me to pick up dinner."
"Thanks for the offer, but I'm not actually at the house," he told her. "Near's the only one home, but I guess you should probably get him something."
The brunette raised an eyebrow. "Where are you?"
"The forensics team is done with the second Kira stuff. Mogi's busy with Mello, so Aizawa asked me to help," he explained. "They ID'ed the fingerprint, but the person died a few days before the tapes reached Sakura TV."
Bambi sighed. "It looks like this Kira can also control people before they die."
"Yeah, that's what it seems like."
"Well, that really sucks." After a short pause, she changed the subject. "So how are you feeling?"
He huffed a sigh. "I mean, I'm kinda irritable, but it's more bearable than the last few times I tried to quite. Probably because I tried to do it all at once."
She nodded to herself. "Hey, do you need me to pick up more carrots for when you get back?"
"No, I think I'm just gonna play some games to let off some steam."
"Alright. Take it easy."
"Yeah, you too."
* * * May 8 * * *
The sun shined brightly above as Bambi hid behind a bush near To-Oh's grand fountain. Miss To-Oh had just approached the fountain, her back to the bushes. The hacker watched as Kai circled around and approached her. He nervously glanced over to Bambi for a moment as he greeted his crush. The brunette gave him a big smile and a thumbs-up to try to encourage him.
"H-Hey, Kiyomi, f-fancy meeting you here," he started.
"Good afternoon, Kai." She nodded in his direction.
The poor boy began to tremble slightly as he glanced to Bambi again, apparently having forgotten her earlier coaching. She tugged on her hair lightly as she pointed to Kiyomi. Kai's eyes lit up as he turned to her again.
"Your hair is especially dark today!" he told her with a nervous smile.
Bambi slammed her palm to her forehead and ducked behind the bush when Kiyomi glanced back.
The brunette waited a few moments before peeking around the bush again and mouthing, "Compliment her."
"Y-You look nice today," he told Kiyomi. "Not that you don't always look nice, but today you look especially nice..."
Bambi heard Kiyomi laugh slightly. "Thank you, Kai."
Kai began to wring his hands nervously. "So, I was wondering... um..."
He smiled awkwardly as he looked behind her again. Kiyomi glanced back only to see the bush before returning her attention to the teenager before her. Bambi took an exaggerated deep breath to try to convey that he needed to relax.
He took a deep breath as he looked back to her. "Kiyomi Takada, will you-"
Bambi's phone loudly sounded off as someone called her. Kai froze and his eyes went wide as Kiyomi whipped around to look directly at the brunette.
"Come out here right now," she ordered as she narrowed her eyes.
Bambi winced before quietly standing and shooting Kai an apologetic smile.
"Now explain to me what is going on," she demanded as she looked between the guilty teens.
"I'm so sorry, Kiyomi. Please, don't be mad at Emily, though. If there's anyone to blame, blame me for being a coward," Kai begged as he took a step toward her.
Kiyomi's expression softened, though she remained silent.
He huffed a sigh. "Look, I know that a guy like me has no chance with a girl like you, but I really like you." He smiled. "Every time I see you, I get butterflies in my stomach and I get all tongue-tied. I feel like my heart's going to explode out of my chest any second now," he laughed. "But, that's why I asked Emily to help me."
Kai rubbed his arm as he looked back up at Kiyomi. "So, I was wondering, would you go out on a date with me?" After a moment, he added, "I'll understand if you refuse."
All was silent as Bambi and Kai looked at Kiyomi expectantly.
She smiled softly at him. "I appreciate your honesty, Kai. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt this time, but that doesn't mean I'm your girlfriend."
"Yes!" He jumped into the air and clicked his heels. "I promise that you won't regret it!"
Bambi smiled at the pair before quietly slipping away. Once she was out of sight, she called back the person who tried to reach her before.
A few moments of ringing passed before Near picked up the phone. "Bambi, I just received another influx of heart attack deaths. I need you to return."
"No problem. I'll be back in a bit."
* * * May 9 * * *
A day had passed since Bambi last saw Kai, and it was currently her turn to go grocery shopping. She had to keep what she bought to a minimum so that it would be able to fit on the back of her moped. She fished the shopping list out of her pocket and glanced through it. She already got the milk, lunch meats, and bread as well as some other things that she personally wanted. All that was left were a few things that the guys wanted.
First the teen went down the candy aisle to get some chocolate for Mello. He was about to run out and she certainly didn't want to put up with him in a bad mood. Luckily, Bambi managed to get the last box of his preferred brand of chocolate bars. Then she went to the next aisle and grabbed some peanut butter for Near. She walked down to the other end to get some more pancake mix for Matt, but upon further investigation it was out of stock. The young woman frowned as she fished her phone out of her pocket and dialed Matt's number. After a few moments, the redhead answered.
"Hey, what's up?"
"They're out of pancake mix," she told him. "Do you want something else?"
There was a short silence as he thought. "If they have any of those frozen waffles, that'd be good. Otherwise, don't worry about it."
"Alright. I'll see you later."
Bambi hung up the phone and made her way to the frozen section. Luckily, she was able to find some waffles. After putting them in her cart, she made her way to the cash register.
The brunette paid for the goods before making her way outside. She pushed the cart down the parking lot to where she had parked her moped and began unloading the groceries. After that, she returned the cart to its proper place. As the teen walked back to her moped, she heard someone cry out to her.
"Emily!"
Bambi raised an eyebrow at the sound of her To-Oh alias as she turned to see Kai running up to her. He tripped over his own feet, but managed to catch himself before his face met the pavement. When he finally reached the brunette, he was grinning ear to ear.
Kai could barely keep still as he excitedly spoke. "Thank you so much for all your help the other day. It worked out perfectly because now Kiyomi and I are officially dating!"
"Way to go, Kai!" She gave him a high five.
"Thanks! I really owe you," he began. "So, if you ever need my help with something, I'd be glad to lend a hand. Not that I really know what I could do, but the offer stands."
With that, he big Bambi a goodbye and scurried into the grocery store. She smiled before heading back to the house.