The others gawked at L. Light, his face etched with terrified fury, whipped towards him.

"You—" Light spluttered. "You bastard. You think you're some kind of hero or something?" His voice rose to a shriek as he threw himself forward. "You are just as bad as me!"

Mogi and Aizawa tightened their holds around Light, restraining him. They looked warily at L, but said nothing.

L ignored Light, keeping his gaze on the shinigami. "Well?" he asked.

Ryuk looked positively gleeful. "You're telling me, that you want to be the one to kill Light?"

"Yes."

"And why should I let you do that?"

L kept his face impassive. "Because he doesn't deserve an easy, painless death...and I can come up with a far more interesting way for him to die."

In front of him, Light sagged in the officers' arms, pale with dread.

"Hmm." The shinigami's eyes gleamed as he twirled his pen. He laughed. "Oh, why not? Bloodlust is one of my favorite things to feed on. Sorry, Light—" He turned to grin at Light, who stared at him in horror. "But Sherlock here is offering me too good of a show to pass on, and I'd love to see what he comes up with while fueled by revenge. I've always admired you humans for your creativity. So!" He presented his own Death Note to L with a flourish. "Would you like to use mine, or...?"

"No need." L pulled out the notebook that was already in his possession. "But I do need a pen. And I'd rather not use that one." He eyed the one sticking out of Mikami's corpse, before sweeping his gaze over the members of the Task Force. "Does anyone happen to have one on them?"

The others shook their heads. No one had exactly anticipated taking notes at the final showdown with Kira.

"Here, use mine," Ryuk cackled, proffering his own writing utensil.

L took it stiffly. The pen looked and felt just as innocuous as the notebook did. He silently prayed that it didn't hold any similar properties. Slowly, he flipped the notebook open to a blank page, as a hundred different calculations of risks and benefits ran through his head all at once. He did a rapid inventory of all the rules from the notebook which he'd committed to memory. His mind paused upon one.

Whosoever writes in this notebook will go to the shinigami realm when he or she dies.

Jaw tightening, L remembered another rule. One that might make risking the prior one worth it. Slowly, he brought the pen down to the page as he did a final mental check over everything. Would he regret what he was about to write? He glanced at Jubilee's pale face, and came to a decision.

Lowering the pen to the page, he started to write Light's name.

Somewhere in the background, Light howled with rage. L ignored him, taking his time to write out a lengthy sentence. When he was finished, he raised his gaze to Light, locking eyes with him.

"It is done," L said softly.

Light stared back at him in despair.

Ryuk cackled gleefully. "Well, out with it! Tell the boy how he's going to die. It's so much better when they know what it is beforehand, but can't do anything to stop it. Plus, I'm dying to find out myself." He guffawed at his own pun.

L slowly raised the notebook and turned it to face Light and the others. Light's name was clearly written on the page—along with a sentence.

Dies from complications due to Alzheimer's disease, in a nursing home while surrounded by family members.

There was a long moment of confused silence. Then, Ryuk suddenly stalked toward the detective, towering over him with a fierce scowl.

"What," the demon snarled, "Have you done?"

L eyed the shinigami calmly, pushing down the great unease he felt at its nearness. "Judging from your reaction," L said coolly, "I assume that what I've written successfully fulfills rule number twenty-seven of the notebook—that, if the cause of death is a specified disease, and the progression of that disease takes more than twenty-four days...then the twenty-three day rule will not take effect, and the human will die at an appropriate time depending on the disease. Which means—" He returned his gaze to Light and the others. "That Light will likely die anywhere between twenty to seventy years from now. Plenty of time for a proper trial and sentencing."

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Ryuk reached out as if to throttle the detective, then stopped short, as though some invisible barrier hindered him. He glowered at the pale man. "Why?" he demanded. "Why are you showing him mercy? Didn't you want him to pay for what he's done? For what he's done to her?" He jabbed a finger at Jubilee. Then he suddenly stopped short, seeming thunderstruck.

"Oh," he said softly. "I see now. It's because of her." His claw withdrew, clenching together tightly. "Her, and this stupid delusion you've both been infected with." He threw his head back and laughed, a cruel and bitter laugh, before thrusting his finger in Light's direction. "You think that this might give him a chance to think over what he's done, and not end up going where he deserves to once he dies, is that right?" The demon stopped laughing, and crouched low to be eye to eye with L. The detective managed to retain an impassive expression even though everything in him screamed to leap away.

"You're a fool," the shinigami said softly. "You call yourself the epitome of justice? Even Light knew from the beginning that he was bound for hell. That's why—" His wings unfurled as he stood and turned in Light's direction, gliding over to the boy with sudden and terrifying speed. Light cowered beneath him. "You can't escape what you've got coming, kid," Ryuk said. "No matter how much time anyone tries to buy you. Remember that, when you're old and wrinkled and on your death bed. I'll see you then."

His dark lips stretched into a leer then, and he swiveled back to L with a mischievous gleam in his eyes. "And who knows? Maybe I'll see you, too. You did write a name down in the Death Note, after all. And also...a person can change a lot in several decades. That's what you were banking on when you wrote what you did—isn't it?" With one last smirk, the demon vanished.

There was a long moment of silence.

Then, a roar of sirens shattered the stillness. The ambulance had arrived.

L's grip tightened around Jubilee as medics poured into the room moments later, carrying a stretcher. He'd have to think about the shinigami's words later.

For now, he just wanted to make sure Jubilee stayed alive.

----------------------------------------

Images and snatches of conversation floated through Jubilee's consciousness. Whether they were dreams, memories, or visions, she did not know.

There was L, writing in a Death Note. Blinding light shone about him, bright tendrils unfurling from a radiant crest above his head to surround him like a shield.

There was Light, kneeling on the ground, shaking with both terror and fury. The black haze that shrouded him—usually an impenetrable miasma—suddenly loosened, appearing less dense. It remained just as dark as before, but whereas it was once thick as mud, now it was like a dark mist that could be blown away by a strong wind.

A thick rope which Jubilee had never noticed before—or was it a chain?—and which connected Light to the shinigami standing between him and L, suddenly broke, fraying and crumbling into nothingness.

"What have you done?" the shinigami's voice snarled.

Different scenes shifted and slid through Jubilee's mind. L was holding her body tight. The demon was advancing upon them. The light over L flared up around him to encase them both, and the demon halted. Voices and words swirled about her.

"You can't escape," the shinigami was saying to Light. Above his head, a line snapped.

And then, his eyes gleamed with malice as he turned to L, his lips stretched into a leer. "Maybe I'll see you, too," he said, and the line broke again, but the two pieces dangled from each other as though held by a thread. "A person can change a lot in several decades."

There was a chilling sliver of fear, a stab of doubt. Jubilee wondered where the feeling came from. The grip around her frame slackened for a second, the light surrounding her lessening ever so slightly.

Then, sirens. Movement, sound, chaos. There was cold air, white sheets, so many people, and a tumble of different auras. Jubilee felt them all slip together into one, into a dimension of rushing about and worry and worldliness that was all starting to make less and less sense to her.

Why were so many people fussing over her? She was going to be okay.

"Please," she heard a voice say. A man's voice. Someone she knew. Someone she must love, judging from the memory of tender emotion that the voiced evoked. "Please, save her."

A view of the heavens opened up before her in her mind's eye. A warm, familiar hand reached out and touched her face.

Welcome back, dear one, a voice said, and her soul sang at the sound of it.

She leaned into the touch with a sigh of contentment. Is it time for me to come home, Dad? she thought.

The hand brushed her hair from her face and caressed her brow, smoothing away every line of worry that life had etched there. Another hand came up to lightly touch the corners of her eyes, and she felt as though ever tear she had ever shed on earth was finally wiped away, for eternity.

Then both hands cupped her face. Not yet, beloved.

A swirl of color, a rush of light. The weight of gravity pulled her with sudden force from the heavenly realm and its warm touch. She was sucked through a roar of sound, into an abrupt and still silence, and then...

Jubilee opened her eyes.

For the second time in her life, she found herself in a hospital bed. The room was dark, with only the soft glow of an overhead heart monitor—and of Hellenos, standing by her side.

She stared at him blearily for a second before remembering who he was. And who she was, for that matter. And everything that had happened.

"You—" Her voice came out in a quiet rasp. She swallowed dryly, then tried again. "You let me get shot," she said, incredulous. "I could've died!"

The angel looked at her for a long moment, his expression neutral and unreadable. Finally, a soft smile broke out across his face.

But you didn't...did you?