Current mood:	nervous
Current music:	The fan.

Will you meet me in the middle, will you meet me in the end
Well. I finished my 1fandom claim on Death Note (fifty one-sentence themes), so if anyone is interested, here it is. Spoilers for the end of the series, contains some speculation, various pairings (het, slash, femmeslash, yay)… off the top of my head there’s a little L/Light, Light/Misa, Matt/Misa, Mello/Matt, Mello/Near, Misa/Sayu, Mello/Hal, Light/Takada, Light/Mikami (eep, this is starting to sound like my 15pairings listing…)… and I’ve probably missed something. There’s a good bit of gen too, though. Mostly serious takes, but there’s a little fluff thrown in every so often.


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1. [mortal] Misa chases false gods like a little girl runs as she tries to net butterflies, the whole attempt so poignantly lovely only because it is so pointless.

2. [broken] Light doesn’t immediately throw all his moralities aside; they simply start to crack into pieces, until he’s shed another scruple, committed another sin.

3. [vanish] Mello plays football during recess, forcing his presence onto the field—angrily, because Near is away, Near is inside, and Near isn’t there to defeat.

4. [rain] When it rains at work, Matsuda’s good mood tends to fade, perhaps, as he tells Chief Yagami, because it makes him sleepy; perhaps, as he admits to himself, because they buried L in rain and mud.

5. [ocean] Near would like to think, if he were sentimental, that he saw the ocean while he flew across it, but the truth is that all he saw on the hours on the plane was the means to a final, ultimate end.

6. [tense] Hal stiffened when Mello pointed the gun at her—not nearly so much, she likes to think, as he stiffened when she asked him if he often spied on girls in the shower.

7. [soon] Seven years and Light has all but achieved immortality; these four final deaths and he will unveil himself for the world to worship.

8. [why] Childhood indoctrinated L in an unfailing belief that the whys and hows can always be discovered, and not even Kira can convince L he’s incorrect in that assumption.

9. [winter] Misa was born on Christmas Day and Mello was born sometime in the winter and that’s really all that connects them, besides the hair color and the madness, the brutal madness that makes them both rip the life out of anyone that stands between them and Kira.

10. [fallen] He collapses and the spoon clatters to the floor; all he can see is the Devil grinning straight at him, and the best L can manage in forty seconds is one solitary smile right back.

11. [storm] The day Mello leaves, there’s a thunderstorm, and Matt, playing his Game Boy, eyes watering up, mumbles to Near about how Mello’s supposed to be so fucking smart but he didn’t even think to bring an umbrella.

12. [door] Matsuda says that Ide just doesn’t understand love, but in truth, Ide doesn’t understand how this could even be a façade of love, these animal moans of pleasure from behind the hotel doors.

13. [flash] Misa’s cross earrings and necklaces always flash in the sunlight, making Rem think of all the lives lost just so Misa could call the jewelry “pretty.”

14. [wait] Wasting your life is easy when you have someone to wait for, so Matt wastes it well, in hotel room and clubs, wearing faded jeans, baggy shirts, hoping (Mello) someone will come and tell him to stop it, for Christ’s sake.

15. [shrine] Misa’s bedroom is littered with the images of martyrs and saints, her heroes bleeding, dying on the wall, but if ever asked Misa will never tell why.

16. [black] Mello’s orphanage dorm room has black curtains and a poster of the Blessed Virgin Mary, text beneath her spelling pray-for-us-sinners.

17. [lost] All we like sheep have gone astray, Isaiah says, all but Mikami, all but the only man who works with his eyes focused on the glory of God.

18. [cell] Mikami doesn’t belong in this prison, does-not-belong, and so for ten days he denies all the food they give him, calculating his death in calories not taken (angry at his weakness when he reaches for the water).

19. [villain] Were Matt not cognizant of the fact that he’s a bit player in this game, he’d like to think that if it weren’t for the brilliant bastards they both lusted after, he and Misa could have had some fun, after all.

20. [road] Matt wants them to ride motorcycles because it sounds more fun; Mello just tells him it would take longer (but in the end Mello humors him perversely—only one motorcycle, and Mello drives).

21. [weep] The world doesn’t know to mourn L’s death; it marches forward like a reporter from model to model, interest never wavering, pen continually jotting notes down.

22. [blind] Soichiro gasps out his last breaths in the hospital room, his son by his side and the divine thought that L was so wonderfully wrong, my child isn’t Kira running through his head as he dies.

23. [pact] Light promises Kiyomi the world at her feet, but she’s the one on her knees, she finds, fur coat on the floor, grandeur forced aside, as she begs him and begs him for more.

24. [flight] Lester isn’t sure why Near seems almost—afraid to ride in an airplane alone; he doesn’t know it’s because that’s how L left England for the case, alone on an airplane, that’s the last fear Near can’t manage to rationalize away.

25. [hard] L has never encountered a case this difficult, never been pitted against an intelligence that matches his, and he mulls it over, eating strawberries and cherries until his stomach is full and he can pretend that his mind is empty.

26. [war] When Misa becomes a liability, Light has her memory wiped, in part because she is his first willing trophy in these years of battle, one he would rather not get rid of entirely.

27. [deed] Mello’s last deed on earth is like suicide right on the stage, the act of atonement that sends him gasping over the steering wheel, eyes on the crucifix swinging from his neck one final time.

28. [unknown] Through the pileups of Gundams and scale models that fill up his headquarters, Near only holds one toy sacred: the doll of wide-eyed L, because he knew.

29. [deep] The realization that he’s drowned himself in the case comes slowly for L, which surprises everyone but himself.

30. [sudden] It’s a crush gone horribly wrong when Sayu realizes (barely fifteen in barrettes and ponytails) that she wishes Misa was her girlfriend (and not his—not his because Light gets everything, he gets everything—).

31. [dread] Matt tries to talk Mello out of his latest plan, but it’s so damn useless that finally he smiles emptily and tells him whatever you say, Mello, whatever you say.

32. [burn] When Mello was fourteen he wanted Kira damned to hell (bones burned black from his sins); when Mello was nineteen he’d been through hell and wanted Kira damned to nothingness.

33. [clock] It clicks down for ten days, until finally Roger shakes his head, because he realizes (the game’s been lost) and so quietly he asks for Mello and Near and hopes (but knows) they will (not) suffice.

34. [words] It’s darkly hilarious that Matt never has much to say but he finds himself calling Mello on the hour, every hour, reporting on faces to kill for and minds to shatter.

35. [fast] L plays chess against Misa (who makes eight moves and then refuses to play anymore), then he plays against Light (who makes four dozen more moves and then tips over his king in silence).

36. [three] The three of them, his son and his girlfriend, and him in his suit, the three of them, on a road to hell, and as Soichiro fires the blanks Misa Amane screams.

37. [place] Wammy never flinches as L demands figures and statistics, says nothing while L tells the investigators to use Watari, if they want, if he dies (you made this mess, this sugarcoated heap of intellect, you made it, and now, here, it’s making you his).

38. [irony] In an odd mood once L starts telling Misa the story of the brothers that sought to find and kill Death, but Misa interrupts halfway through, saying she’s heard that one already.

39. [sky] Ryuk desires apples in the same way Light desires power, in ever-increasing amounts, and Light sighs and thinks Ryuk childish as he tosses another apple into the air.

40. [closet] Light’s closet in the hotel room is impeccably sorted, each shirt starched stiff, but L uses the bureau, pulling out piles of wrinkled tee-shirts and jeans that have never been folded.

41. [real] It takes a foot on the brake to convince Matt of the reality of his situation; it takes fifteen bullets in his body to convince Takada’s guards that they’ve avenged their goddess’ kidnapping.

42. [fair] Wammy’s House functions on the basis of the honors system, fairness, and equality—that means that the children there would serve each other Lysol cocktails if they thought it would give them four more points on their tests.

43. [knot] Misa tells him once she’ll comb his matted hair, but L, doubting her sincerity, lies and tells her he’d rather it stay the way it is.

44. [low] Light’s vision is spinning when he dies; he sees L, stark and black-and-white, Misa, painted in dripping funhouse colors; a million faces and names—he begs them all to save him, not realizing he’s the one that’s folded their arms across their chests and sewed their mouths shut.

45. [well] In his dreams, Mikami hears God saying unto him, “Well done, thy good and faithful servant,” feels Him wrapping strong, perfect fingers in his hair, and Mikami awakens to a bed covered in sweat and swears he will do His will.

46. [token] Light asks for the handcuffs months after the funeral, stows them away in his desk at work, to look at sometimes and remember (with almost-excitement) how close it had all been.

47. [ugly] Sayu sees Mello’s face years after he’s breathed his last, and her mother grows concerned (maybe they’ll put me away—put me away—again—) when she giggles in her sleep about how glad she is that he’s nothing but rot now.

48. [lure] L strings Light along until neither of them is sure who’s the puppeteer, and that’s his undoing, in the end, tied up by his own strings, fingers frozen in his own hooks and barbs.

49. [drink] Near forces down a mug of hot chocolate the day after Kira dies, four days after Mello dies, and he vomits it all down the white of his pajamas, the stain like dried blood, the color of ancient sin.

50. [dust] There’s barely enough left of Mello to bury, but Near requests it anyway, knowing Mello would have despised having to face another fire after coming so close to the finish line.