Stalemate (A Death Note Story)

Chapter Three: Distrust

It had been a week since the first showdown of L vs. Kira, and Nemo was working overtime at the NJPA headquarters.

These meetings were unbelievably boring and could put someone to sleep in a matter of minutes. Because of this, Nemo got two cups of coffee, just so she didn't pass out.

"Hey night owl,'' another one of her coworkers, Aizawa, joked, sitting next to her. "Drinking two cups at the same time. How the hell are you supposed to sleep?"

"That's the point, genius. If I fall asleep at this meeting, I'll miss lots of important information." Nemo took a sip of one of the coffees. "Here, take the coffee, dumbass."

"Well, thanks, Nemo. Polite and ladylike as always." Aizawa chuckled, heading off.

"Yeah, sure., Nemo said, rolling her eyes.

"Ms. Kimura, could you please tell us the approximate time the victims experienced heart attacks?" Mr. Yagami asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

"Oh, yes. We found that all of them occurred between the hours of 4 p.m. and 2 a.m. on weekdays, local time, with 68% of them occurring between 8 p.m. and 12 a.m." Nemo said, reading off the datasheet.

"That information is extremely relevant to us. Our suspect could very well be a student." L said, through the computer screen. "I've also deduced that this Kira might aspire to be a godlike figure, with a black and white sense of right and wrong."

Nemo jotted some notes down. "All this may be true, but who's to say that the culprit isn't a student?" She said, aloud.

"This is all just mere speculation at this point. On the off chance that Kira isn't a student, we'd have to look at other evidence to prove them otherwise." L seemed to be speaking directly to Nemo. "Excellent question, Ms. Kimura."

Nemo nodded and smiled slightly, writing down her notes.

Matsuda stood up. "Another observation is that we saw a dramatic decrease in the rate of violent crime, especially here in Japan."

Nemo nodded at that too. "He's got a point, but it'd make sense because Kira is killing criminals."

"Oh, right." Matsuda sat down.

"Right, I think that concludes our report for today." Mr. Yagami was dismissed.

"Thank you, everyone. I feel like we're one step closer to catching Kira. I would like to make one last request, please research how the victims' identities were made public, especially the names and faces." L logged off afterward.

Two weeks went by, and it seems that Kira's pattern of killings seemed to fluctuate.

At first, the pattern stumped her. It soon dawned on her that Kira was purposely using the death note to write down the time of death too. Not only that, someone was leaking information outside the task force. It wouldn't be a shock to her if fingers started pointing at her.

However, she wasn't the first to come to this conclusion. It seemed that she and L were both thinking the same thing.

"Mr. Yagami," Nemo announced, "I've concluded that there might be some leaks that Kira might've gotten his hands on. Just when we hypothesized that Kira might be a student, the change in deaths started to occur."

"I see your point." Soichiro nodded.

"Not only that, but I've analyzed some of the victims, and it seems to determine that Kira can kill anyone at any given time." Nemo pointed to the data on the graph.

"Interesting, Ms. Kimura. I was thinking the same thing." L said. "You seem to be just as interested in this case as I am."

"Well, I'm determined to catch Kira. Even if it costs me everything." Nemo looked down at her notes. "Death is already rampant in our society. We don't need someone killing criminals to add onto that."