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Chapter 60

"Mello!" Jubilee shrieked, jolting forward to clutch the screen of her laptop with her hands. Onscreen, the camera angle had been knocked askew and was now pointing at the empty passenger seat. The interior of the cab looked dim. "Oh, God," she whispered. Beside her, Hellenos had disappeared. "Mello!" she cried again in desperation. Tears filled her eyes as she suddenly realized that their last exchange had been her yelling at him.

"For Pete's sake, J," Mello whispered. "Quit hollering. I'm trying to pretend I'm dead."

Jubilee almost cried with relief. "Mello!" she exclaimed a third time.

"Yes, that's my name," intoned Mello dryly.

"For the love of—" she began, slightly irritated, before cutting herself off. "You nearly gave me a heart attack! Are you okay?" she whispered.

"Yes," he murmured. "Drove through the wall of an abandoned farmhouse. The structure is old so the walls are weak and the impact wasn't severe...but it made enough of a ruckus that Takada should think it's a serious crash."

Jubilee sat back on her heels, stunned. So the kid had managed to plan out even that little detail in advance.

Mello continued, "Can you tell me what she's doing now? Oh, and by the way, J...you don't have to whisper. I just wanted you to stop yelling because you were hurting my ears."

She huffed, but was too relieved to be angry with him. Turning her attention to the other video feed on her screen, she saw Takada pulling herself up from the floor of the truck. She seemed a little worse for wear—several plastic tanks of spare fuel had slid from the back of the cab and knocked into her—but well enough. Rewrapping the blanket around herself, she took shaky but determined steps forward.

"Takada looks a little bruised, but overall okay," Jubilee reported. "She's coming up to the front and...putting her ear to the wall of the cab. I think she's trying to listen for you."

Mello remained silent.

Jubilee continued to watch. "Now she's getting her phone...and making a call."

"Listen in," instructed Mello quietly.

Jubilee raised the volume on Takada's video feed.

"Light?" the other woman's voice filled her headset. It was quavering with fear. "Light, please...I need you to come and save me. Someone's—someone's kidnapped me, and I don't know where I am." There was a pause. "I don't know...it was an intern at the station—but he's just a boy, I don't know who could have put him up to it, and—and he's dead now, he crashed while driving but I'm still in the back of the truck and...Light, please! I'm scared and I—" She stopped again, listening. Taking a deep breath, she continued, more calmly, "Yes." She nodded, then repeated, "Yes. I understand." A single tear fell from the corner of her eye then. "You'll find me soon...right, Light?" She lowered her head, clutching the phone to her ear like it was a lifeline. "I believe in you," she whispered, then let the phone fall to her side.

"She called Light to have him come find her," Jubilee reported, her voice involuntarily hushed once more as she continued to observe Takada. She almost felt bad for the other woman. If the pulsing red and blue hues over her were any indication, she was terrified.

"Okay," Mello whispered back. "Listen really carefully, J. I need you to do several things, all at once."

Jubilee snapped to attention. "What are they?"

"First, I need you to keep a close watch on what Light does next, while still keeping an eye on Takada. Light's the current priority though. Open up a channel to downstairs so you can monitor him. Do it now."

Jubilee obeyed without protest, opening up a new video feed and dragging it over to the one that still showed Takada. Surveillance from the main room downstairs appeared in the new window. In it, L sat in his usual spot at the forefront, while Aizawa and Matsuda paced anxiously in the background. Light was standing a little ways in front of them, behind L, with his phone still held in his hand. His face was carefully blank, but anxious reddish streaks spiked from out of the black haze surrounding him.

"What are you going to do, Light?" asked L quietly without turning around.

Light's fingers tightened around his phone but his expression didn't change. "Is there any way we can track Kiyomi's phone location to go and rescue her?" he asked calmly.

"Hmm," L hummed. He rapidly tapped a few keys on his keyboard. "I think we can manage that." Within a minute, he gestured towards the main monitor. "There she is. Looks like the kidnapper was driving into the countryside before he crashed." With that, he swiveled to Light. "How do you think it just so happened that he had a fatal crash, right after kidnapping Kira's spokesperson?"

Light returned his gaze steadily. "I imagine that Kira must've had a hand in that, but I couldn't know for sure." The line over his head snapped. He turned towards the exit. "What's more important is Kiyomi right now. Even if she is is Kira's spokesperson, she's still a human being, so I'm going to go and help her." Again, the line snapped. He nodded to Aizawa and Matsuda. "Could either of you give me a ride?"

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"Yes," agreed Aizawa.

L had risen from his seat. "I will come with you."

Light seemed to pause at that. Then he glanced over his shoulder at L. "Alright," he said simply. "Let's go."

"J," Mello was speaking into Jubilee's headset again. "When you get a chance...I need you to do something else."

"Okay," she said, her eyes still on the Task Force as they filed out of the room. "Everyone is leaving now to go find Takada, by the way. L's going with them." Takada's video feed caught her eye. "And Takada...looks like she's writing again."

"Alright," said Mello, then continued at rapid fire speed, "L will keep an eye on Light now, so that's good. You keep an eye on Takada. Make sure the cameras are getting everything that she does, and what she's writing."

Jubilee hurried to obey, tapping keys to zoom in with the camera.

Mello went on quickly, "Also, send a message to Wedy and to Matt. Make sure Wedy is closely monitoring Mikami like she's supposed to be doing. Then, ask Matt to call you and pull up the phone call that Light just had with Takada. It probably won't reveal too much because Light was in front of the Task Force, but let's find out what was said on his end and see if there might have been some sort of code they used. Matt will be able to patch me in to the call too."

"Okay," muttered Jubilee again, struggling to switch her attention back and forth between Takada and the contacts list that she was now pulling up. "Uh...looks like Takada is writing names. As many as she can. She's keeping the print tiny to fill up the scrap of paper she has. I don't recognize any of the names off the bat." Pulling up two message windows, she took her eyes off the video feed for a moment to type brief messages to both Wedy and Matt.

Wedy responded right away, with a short Roger that. Seconds later, Jubilee's headset buzzed as a call came through, with a lower-case m blinking on her screen.

"Hey there," greeted Matt when she answered. "Let me just connect Mello real quick...there we go. You with us, buddy?"

"Yeah, I'm here," answered Mello.

"Course you are," said Matt jovially. "Okay, here's your call." There was a light click, and then a recording of Light's and Takada's voices filled the headset.

"What do you mean, someone's kidnapped you?" said Light's voice. "Who?"

Takada babbled her response from earlier, finishing with, "Light, please! I'm scared and I—"

"Kiyomi, calm down," Light cut her off. "You sound like you're not hurt, so just take a deep breath and let's think rationally for a second. Someone must have had you kidnapped because you are Kira's spokesperson, and they're trying to get to Kira. Right? But it sounds like Kira's already taken care of your kidnapper. So things are going to be okay. Your kidnapping failed, and the plan against Kira failed. Yes?"

A pause, before Takada answered, "Yes."

"And I'm going to come and get you now, so there's nothing to worry about," continued Light. "Just stay calm, and don't be scared. Think about Kira and what he would do. Okay?"

"Yes. I understand," said Takada after a moment. "You'll find me soon...right, Light?"

"Of course," promised Light.

"I believe in you," whispered Takada, and the recording ended.

"Think about Kira and what he would do," repeated Mello lowly. "There it is."

"What would Kira do?" quipped Matt. "Oh, kill as many people as possible, I suppose."

Jubilee glanced back at the video of Takada, where the other woman was still hunched over in the back of the truck, scribbling down names. It suddenly registered with her that she was witnessing multiple murders take place, right before her very eyes.

"Shouldn't we stop her?" she questioned nervously.

At that moment a message from Wedy popped up on her screen, distracting her from the boys' replies. Mikami moving outside of normal schedule, it read. Went to bank. Used deposit safe.

Jubilee's brow furrowed. She was vaguely aware of Mello and Matt arguing over something in the background as she typed back, Break into it.

"Hey, Mello?" she began.

"I get where you guys are coming from," Mello was saying, "But saving a dozen people at the risk of losing a lead is—"

"And I get where you're coming from," Matt refuted, "But J has a point and it's not like you have anything to lose at this point..."

"Not true," shot back Mello. "There's always something to lose."

"Guys—" tried Jubilee again.

"Takada's in an isolated box," argued Matt. "It won't blow your cover."

"It will, once Light finds her and she tells him that the dead intern came back to life and stopped her from writing down any more names," snapped Mello.

"We have enough evidence to apprehend her at this point," pointed out the other boy.

"But not him," returned the blonde.

Matt seemed to deflate a little at that. "Okay, but..."

A response from Wedy popped up on Jubilee's screen. There was no text, only a photo—of a Death Note, lying inside a safe.

Jubilee went cold.

Before she could say anything, another photo followed the first. This time the Death Note was open. The page on the left was full of names, but the one on the right had only one.

Kiyomi Takada.

"Um, guys?" said Jubilee again. "We have a situation here." She quickly zoomed in on the photo to read the sentence written in smaller text below Kiyomi's name.

"What is it, J?" snapped Mello.

Jubilee gasped at what she read. Whipping her head back to the other video feed, she watched in horror as Takada finished dumping the final tank of gasoline over herself and her surroundings, a vacant expression in her eyes. The blanket had slid from her shoulders to the floor, and was also drenched in fluid.

"Get out of the truck, Mello," Jubilee ordered.

"What?" said Mello, exasperated. "Not you too, J. I'm telling you guys, I'm not going to get out and—"

"Takada's gonna blow up the truck," Jubilee said quickly, hoping that a shorter explanation would make Mello move faster.

"She what?" said Matt, incredulous.

"That's impossible," said Mello. "She has no way to start a fire."

Jubilee hesitated. He had a point. Surely it wasn't actually possible for the woman to carry out what had been written down in the Death Note. Not if it was physically impossible to do so.

Then Takada reached up and retrieved something out of her bra. It was a lighter.

"Get out of the truck now, Mello!" Jubilee screamed.

There was a pause that seemed simultaneously too long and yet too fast, during which Takada knelt down to the floor and held the lighter to the tip of the blanket. Jubilee had only a moment to register a small spark grow into a whoosh of flames that enveloped the entire scene. There was a loud BOOM.

The cameras on both Takada and the interior of the truck cab jolted violently, fizzled with static, and went black.