Worth the Wait (Death Note Fan Fiction-Aizawa x Matsuda)

Chapter 15: Close Call

*Contains spoilers for the anime and manga! The part of this chapter that starts after the first page break, would be where the time skip begins. I'm not going to include the time skip in this story, but I wanted to offer a bit of context. That part is also post Aizawa's haircut, so from that point on, Aizawa has his shorter hair. The Task Force is now working with Near and has to deal with Mello, as well. I do briefly go over the events that happened in the anime.*

Chapter Summary: Matsuda, with help from the rest of the Task Force, is able to successfully wrap up the investigation that L put him in charge of.

However, the loss of L soon after, sends the investigation in a new direction as his successors take over for him. In an attempt to get the Death Note back from Mello, the Task Force members are involved in an explosion that lands each of them in the hospital.

The case that L had put Matsuda in charge of kept the Task Force busy for the first two weeks of this investigation. A lot of the information they had in that file was inconclusive or incomplete. This meant a lot of double- and triple-checking news reports and other sources, re-interviewing witnesses, and thus, finding new leads to follow.

Matsuda still felt honored that L had entrusted an entire investigation to him. He was still afraid of causing a major screwup, too. Matsuda figured that if he messed up this investigation, L would never trust him with anything else again. And if this were the case, Matsuda wouldn't blame him.

Matsuda also did not want to let Aizawa down. He had been the one to vouch for Matsuda and requested that Ryuzaki give him something important to do. He loved Aizawa and had been touched when Aizawa did this for him.

Ide and Mogi didn't question anything that Matsuda asked of them. Of course, if either of them had misgivings, they likely would not say so out of fear of facing Aizawa's wrath. Still though, Matsuda knew them well enough to tell that they completely trusted him.

"Hey Matsu," Aizawa said. "I found something interesting in those reports you asked me to look through. Do you remember Kenchi Yamoto?"

The name sounded familiar. Matsuda thought it over and suddenly remembered. "The man that we found in that old building nearly a few months ago. Presumably killed by Kira."

"It's not presumably anymore," Aizawa said. "Remember before the Deputy Director hid the Death Note, we took scans of the pages, so that we could check the names written in there?"

"Yes."

"Listen to this." Aizawa drew a paper from the file in front of him and read from it. "Kenchi Yamoto. Heart attack. Using the alias Kenzo Yamashita, he calls the Task Force headquarters. He tells them that he saw Kira in a deserted building and asks to meet with detectives there. After he hangs up, he destroys his phone, hides it, and then dies instantly."

Matsuda got up and stood behind Aizawa, reading it himself. "Shichi, this is amazing. That's the kind of break we needed in this case. Hey, Ide."

Ide walked over to them. "What is it?"

"You took the initial call from the witness who claimed to have seen Kira, where Aiza and I found the body of Kenchi Yamoto," Matsuda told him. "Do you remember the name of the witness?"

"Kenzo Yamashita," Ide said. "But once Yamoto was found, we could never get a hold of him."

"Take a look at this," Aizawa said, handing Ide the paper he had been reading off of.

Ide quickly read through it. Then appeared to read through it a second time. "I-I don't believe it. Kenchi Yamoto was Kenzo Yamashita. He was the witness."