Chapter Eleven

                                    

                                          
Weeks passed. And nothing. A dull, quintessential nothing. 
Well, not entirely nothing. In that time, I'd finally organised another call with Jason in which he (begrudgingly) agreed to give me more money. It was more than I'd had initially, but probably still not enough to support me for the following months (or years, or decades; however long this hellish case would last). With L's input, I'd invested into a number of certain stocks, and was steadily cultivating a small wealth of my own. Of course, my humble fortune couldn't hold a candle to the amount of cash L had stuffed into the pockets of his metaphorical jeans, but I was happy with it nonetheless. 
Despite my steady inflow of money weighing down my purse, I decided I would still remain with L (for various reasons; namely because it meant I wouldn't have to commute every morning, and after all the conversations we'd shared about friendship, the poor guy just seemed lonely). The detective didn't seem to mind my limpet-like clinging, and we continued to live as we had erewhile - in a peaceful, symbiotic coexistence.  
Still, with no signs of life from either of our two killers, it was a very boring coexistence. 
Though, at long last, after a long eternity of aforementioned nothing, we received - and by this, I meant we intercepted and thus stole - a message from the second Kira. Said message was constructed of yet another video and, interestingly enough, a sheet of paper taken from a journal - because apparently pseudo Kira liked to keep track of his non-murderous hobbies in life. Said paper was currently being dangled from the detective's spindly fingers as he studied its contents. 
"The last entry," he mused. "It's clearly a proposition."
I outstretched my hand like an eager child begging for candy. "Here, I want to see."
The man obliged and my eyes skimmed the paper. All the entries listed dated back to 2006 from the first to last day of May. The dates in the journal seemed scattered; totally random; a bit boring to be honest. Still, pseudo Kira being the devious prankster he is, couldn't help but toss a casual Shinigami comment in the entry made on May thirtieth. I huffed. 
"Oh, I'm so sick of hearing about Shinigamis!" I groaned, thrusting the paper back in the direction of the detective. "I swear, if someone mentions anything more about Gods of death or apples, I might just casually throw myself out of the window."
The rest of the task force looked slightly nonplussed by my passionate deceleration, but the detective hardly took any notice, his expression remaining unchanged. 
"These windows are bulletproof; they don't open," he told me simply. His tone had shifted from its usual bored melancholy to something much more uplifted. Was he teasing me? "You could try a lower floor, however."
"Don't tempt me, Ryuzaki."
Of course, I was joking. I'd never actually go through with it. I had way too much going for me. Besides, I hadn't even written out a will yet. Where would my humble fortune go? Who would I even include in my will? Having said that, did I actually like anyone that much to give them what few belongings I owned?
... I'm on the Kira case. Why don't I have a will yet?
"I would greatly prefer that you did not attempt to jump out of a window, regardless of what floor it is on, as it would most likely result in you dying," the detective argued. "Your death would not only be a complete waste of talent, but it would also be a shame to lose my first friend so quickly."