(no subject)

[evowhisperer]

  

-----

"Stand aside, please, I'm a doctor!"

 

Chaos. Pure, grainy, cheaply recorded chaos. The cellphone trembles violently with its owner's hands, and frightened shouting in Spanish from all around threatens to drown out the wails of a child. The dirty sidewalk is no place to treat the wounded.

 

The seven people bleeding out on the ground may not be alive to care, soon. The child screaming at a young couple's side is unhurt, but rightfully frightened.

 

Several someones pass in front of the camera. The owner moves to the side, and a loud male voice blares out, 'Are they alright? Are they alright?' when no one answers. The owner continues to move, and a frilly sleeve is pushed out of the way.

 

There's a man in a white labcoat kneeling over one of the bodies, pressing a cloth flat against a puddle of red.

 

'Hey, are they going to survive?'  the phone owner repeats. The doctor snags the cuff of someone standing too close, and orders them to keep pressing down. They step forward with shaking hands and kneel also, and soon the doctor stands and moves on.

 

Someone's voice is rising and falling hysterically. There's shouting about police, and an ambulance. The camera turns to look, but it doesn't seem that either have arrived, and when it looks back several people have begun to grab shirts from the store's open sidewalk display, following the doctor's example. 

 

The doctor is wearing a large woman's hat with a tag sticking out of it, now, conspicuously snatched from a knocked-over shelf. He's facing a direction that would normally let the camera see his profile, but the hat is big enough to hide all but his neck. He slows as he reaches a body that stares vacantly away--it's not the first he would've reached, but it is the first the camera has seen--and moves on.

 

Finally, there's the body that no one seems ready to approach, curled up and with its back to the crowd. Broken glass litters the ground around it, and when the doctor pushes it onto its back, he kicks a gun further out of reach.

 

Someone passes in front of the camera. "Hey..." The owner complains. No response, and the owner moves around. "Hey, why's he helping that fucker when there's people here who need help?"

 

The doctor's back is to the camera. It's impossible to see what he's doing until he glances towards the crowd, loops the hat's strap tightly around his jaw, and starts CPR.

 

No one stops or helps him. The camera continues to watch, eventually panning over the wounded, and the unhurt victims still milling around. Someone shouts about the police again, and more people are kneeling over the wounded victim's bodies, pressing down more cloth. The child has climbed into a sitting woman's lap, face buried in her hair.

One of makeshift medics calls out to the doctor tearfully, but they are ignored.

 

There's an outcry. The camera snaps back to the doctor, who's lifting his head from the shooter's chest, pushing down arms that have begun to move sluggishly. More shouting, with more than a couple of screams. The crowd is starting to shuffle back, and the doctor throws up a blood-soaked hand, shouting urgent assurances. The camera glimpses part of his face, and he's young, and very clearly aware of the new dangers--both from revived shooter, and the crowd.

 

"He's not armed!" Triple checking. The doctor kneels on his wrist, shifting the man to check underneath. Quadruple checking. "He has no more weapons! He's unconscious!"

 

The shooter's eyes are glazed but open, and the confusion in the crowd eddies and swirls. Before anyone can do anything, there's armed men in uniforms of the law shoving through the crowd, taking control of the situation. The crowd's din reaches a new high, and the man with the camera is forced back. It becomes impossible to see anything else, as people move back and shake the camera every which way.

 

There's only a glimpse left of the doctor left in the clip, and it's from one last ditch effort. The phone gets held high in the air, and it shows a white coat turned to one of the uniforms, hands forward, bloody, and earnestly reassuring.

 

The clip cuts out.

 

Comments

[dead_black_eyes]

Lazarus grinds his teeth.

"All that really proves is that Cesar's cell phone wasn't actually in airplane mode," he says. "I take it you're the only one tracking it? If you've shared your information, you're only further endangering your man, and I doubt very much that's in your best interests."

[evowhisperer]

"Well you're right on one account," he says, and the humor is gone. "I haven't shared this with anyone. However--"

Silence. It stretches on for seconds, as though he'd been distracted by reading something. When the silence breaks he sounds clipped, with renewed unease.

"This conversation has gone on long enough. I can't do anything to convince you without evidence and trust, and right now we have neither."

[dead_black_eyes]

"On that, we can agree," Ryuzaki replies, stare level, vaguely predatory, and intent on Cesar. "If there's nothing more to say, I'm hanging up, and we'll talk again before the end of the month when I've found you."

He removes the phone from his ear, punching the "end call" button and pocketing it.

"Sorry, but this time, you can't have your phone back. Get in the car."

[evowhisperer]

For a wild second, Caesar considers cutting his losses. Would it be so hard to run now, and evade L for the indefinite future?

Yes, actually. The thought isn't anything more than a fleeting impulse, and he presses his lips together in a granite-like line, following the single order. This is just like Rylander, to lose his temper when he should've just followed his head. Even if he does realize the mess he's just made for Caesar, he'll never have to deal with the consequences.

L's gaze burns a hole in his back as he steps towards the car, and it's hard for Caesar to not let his imagination run wild. A white cell with nothing but a chair, cold air, and a camera to watch him suffer. A hood over his eyes, and shocks he's seen delivered to mammoth-like EVOs to persuade him to speak. L's investigation team is in charge of uncovering the likes of Kira. What wouldn't they do to him?

The rest of the team wouldn't let that happen. No, they wouldn't--assuming they ever knew. Even if they did, how much authority do they really have? He'd been confident earlier, but years of working for the consortium has shaken any faith he's ever had in authority.

Caesar fastens his seatbelt and returns L's gaze, trying to make himself seem like an equal predator. All he manages is the look of a gazelle watching a lion for the slightest sign of attack, though he doesn't know it.

He speaks as soon as Lazarus enters the car.

"I will need the phone later, for my investigation."

[dead_black_eyes]

Even if Ryuzaki doesn't have the whole picture or the entire story, he does seem confident enough that Cesar won't make a break for it even after being told that he can't have his phone back. The extent of that rule isn't being disclosed yet; in Ryuzaki's experience investigating, it's better to give those being tortured a tantalizing sliver of hope that things might yet go their way if they behave, and so after Cesar is seated beside him and the car begins moving, he doesn't even make a noncommittal noise of acknowledgment when the man makes a bid for his instrument.

"Watari," he says to the driver, "we'll need to change hotels sooner than I'd anticipated. Please notify the others and make arrangements."

[evowhisperer]

Caesar hears the driver murmur assent, picking up his own cellphone once they're out into the street. He hears the man relay the message, but doesn't pay attention while he does.

He has his own problems to think about. Damage control, wasn't it? Rylander ticked off his assigned babysitter, and it's up to Caesar to diffuse the situation.

"I'm sure you must have a lot of questions," Caesar begins, taking a conciliatory tact. "If you ask them, I'll answer to the best of my ability."

[dead_black_eyes]

Ryuzaki is silent for a few long, heavy moments that probably seem to drag on far longer than they actually do.

"You've got some nerve," he says finally. "You'll answer my questions, to the best of your ability which is perhaps better than you're currently anticipating. You're correct there. But I'm not asking them here; once we've moved, it'll be on my terms, and in an environment I control."

He falls silent, but glances Cesar's way, as if hinting that if he doesn't want to be thrown in a cold room and questioned relentlessly, he should start trying to convince him why he's wrong immediately.

[evowhisperer]

Caesar didn't make it to where he is by being blind, and he knows what L is suggesting. He knows it as easily as he knows what he's being invited to do: succeed where Rylander failed, and persuade L that he's not a threat. His mouth is dry, and his gut feels like lead. Adrenaline sings through his blood with each heartbeat, while his heart goes luh-dump-luh-dump-luh-dump.

Focus.

It's one word. He shoves rising panic aside as though clearing a workdesk in a single swipe, throwing books and lamps to the floor. What should he do? Build a damping field as soon as possible. Keep the metananite out of the Consortium's hands.

He needs those steps to survive. Everything else is secondary, including fear. This is no time to ask if he'll succeed. All he has left is 'where can he start'?

Options branch invisibly before his eyes, laid out with detail that's far better suited to exhausting every scientific possibility than it is to picking the fastest actions on the fly. He makes do.

"Of course it will be," he agrees, feeling out this choice. He's sick with fear, but his mind is sharp, and the adrenaline has a twisted, invigorating effect. He feels alive. Step one: give Ryuzaki enough to sooth the damage Rylander did. Get him back on Caesar's side. Show him that there's no option as beneficial to him as the one where they're allies, not enemies.

"Before we get there, there is one thing you should know. I'll willingly undergo any interrogation you like, but if you don't let me build Rylander's damping field before we start, then you won't have me in your custody for very long. Rylander wasn't tracking me by my phone, but through the nanites in my body."

"He's not the only one who can. If I don't build the field before my employers discover me, then you'll allow them to get their hands on what I've stolen from them. You'll have no cure, no leads, and most importantly, nothing to stop them from using their prize indiscriminately."

That should get his attention. He knows it's vague. He's trying to vent Ryuzaki's attention now, like burning a forest before its rotting vegetation turns explosive.

[dead_black_eyes]

If Caesar's thought process happens to be similar to L's own, that can only help him. In fact, it's likely the only thing that can.

"The nanites in your body?" he inquires, staring intently at the other man. "Tell me. When your hand passed under the sensor and it responded, you lied, didn't you?"

His gaze is patient, unwavering, and frightening in its iciness.

"Build your dampening field, but if you lie to me again, you'll pay for it before you know I know."

[evowhisperer]

He wants to lie, but he also knows better than to do so. Caesar nods once. There's nothing for it if L decides Caesar's blood might be a good harvesting ground to extract this strange new 'cure' now. Things are well and truly beyond Caesar's control.

Except for the damping field. Built-up tension in his chest releases in an inaudible gust of air, and he presses his lips closed, nodding again. He's not safe by any means, but he's bought himself time to address the biggest emergency. What next?

He starts planning a schematic in the back of his mind. Out loud, he says, "I understand completely."

[dead_black_eyes]

Whatever L might be thinking or planning, it's well-disguised by his frozen, placid features and unwavering, dark gaze. That is the thin ice Caesar's skating on, and anyone with a survival instinct worth a damn would know to tread cautiously when faced with it. He's not an agent or an actor, or even a highly trusted and regarded proxy; that much is clear by the self-assured, intimidating confidence he effortlessly broadcasts, carrying one reassurance only: my threats are not the empty kind.

If he wanted to, he could reach out and take the man's blood, after ordering one of the host at his beck and call to tie him down, of course.

"I would hope so. If you weren't at least that quick on the uptake, I'd have no use for you," he says shortly. "I'll want to know more about these nanites, of course; I'm very interested in knowing what you can survive and recover from in particular, but if they're drawing unwanted attention, building that field is the first order of business for you, and it should go without saying that you are my hostage and I will behave accordingly if you botch it and draw more."

[evowhisperer]

What could L do? He could shoot the hostage, of course. It's a common mistake to think that Caesar's survival instincts are gone altogether, but they're certainly still present enough to tell him that his own life means absolutely nothing to those glacial eyes.

"The field should effectively scramble the signal. It will take a few minutes to an hour to built something short term, but it will work." Nevermind about the percentages of possible failure. Nevermind how much of this depends on what materials Headquarters has on hand. Caesar is good at getting results, and right now he'd promise anything he thought he could conceivably reach.

[dead_black_eyes]

He could, and one of the truly terrifying things about this particular detective is that he actually might. Caesar's likely already gathered from the Task Force's tenseness that whether they like it or not, this wiry, strange man who sits like a child and stands like someone aged and feeble calls the shots, and his word is absolute

...even if his whims and wants border on the utterly unreasonable and insane.

"What do you need for it? Watari will secure the proper materials, for the long term, since that is what we are working with, Caesar Salazar."

With a slight lurch, the car starts forward.

[evowhisperer]

Familiar parts lists light up parts of his mind and disappear just as quickly, like distant fireworks. What can he use for long term? What could he possibly ask for that local technology could do? Caesar's lips thin, and he frowns past L for a second or two.

Then, off the top of his head, he names a few parts. There's no requests for any specific brands, and the only kinds of features he asks for are relative, such as 'high speed', and 'durable'.

[dead_black_eyes]

The listed parts are met with silence from both L and Watari; clearly, the former trusts the latter to keep immaculate track of everything he's told. If for any reason he fails to, L is confident in his ability to confirm it later.

L is at his best when he is confident, which is a huge reason that this latest threat has unnerved him so much and made him so cantankerous.

"It'll be done. What would you do in my place, to deal with you?" He asks quietly. "A security breach, even by omission of information, is equal to an attempt on my life."

[evowhisperer]

Caesar wrinkles his forehead and 'hmm's, looking down and to the left. Ryuzaki might think of things this way, but Caesar has different standards: If a violent EVO escapes its restraints, was there any point on blaming it on the agent whose grip failed first? Circumstances could be uncontrollable. Layers of unknown were an established fact of life. It's naive of this man to think himself above that.

None of this is part of the game Caesar is clearly expected to play. "That's an unusual question," he comments, buying himself time. What would the Black Knight settle on in a case like this?

Black Knight couldn't afford to damage his mind. That didn't mean there wasn't plenty to do that would leave him completely untouched: She could cut his funding. She could put him in a cell, subjecting him to low-key torture that would chip away at his sanity. She could send troops that could drag Rex in and keep him hostage, drugged and vulnerable to malice. His skin crawls: she might even hurt him, just as a warning for next time.

He forces the thoughts back, swallowing.

"Constant supervision." A beat. How's that different from now? "Obvious supervision. No private living space. I would sleep in the main living area and deliver summaries of every step of work before and after. Tasteless food. Maybe high-density nutritional rations." He's picturing the wafer-thin granola bars that Providence agents keep for emergencies. Or worse yet, the nutritional pills.

What more? It doesn't seem like enough, not for a man who thinks his life has been threatened.

"... Establish a severe consequence for future transgressions. All of this with a defined ending time, to encourage positive behavior." Or in other words, a warning. Caesar is asking for a slap on the wrist, and a chance to gain his trust enough that the attention dies down again.

[dead_black_eyes]

L listens, eyes narrowing shrewdly as he considers what Cesar is positing. There's quite a lot he considers himself above; whether this is naive or foolish has never been proven otherwise to him, and the result is an arrogant, childish, prince-like attitude.

This is what the other task force members find exhausting and exasperating. The man's brilliance isn't the problem, it's most of the other aspects of an excruciatingly difficult personality.

He snorts loudly at the level of detail and discomfort Cesar speaks of. "Either you're an unapologetic masochist or you've gotten good at figuring out the way I think," he says, chewing his thumb thoughtfully. I like the sound of all of that... minus, of course, the tasteless food. That, I deem to be unnecessary."

[evowhisperer]

Caesar's eyebrows shoot up, but his shoulders relax. He's relatively safe. He's...

... facing an undetermined amount of time with all the inconveniences they just listed, undoubtedly made worse by this agent's abrasiveness. He's getting a headache just thinking about it, but at least he's not going back to his cell. Maybe it won't be as awful as he expects?

He nods in acknowledgement, not trusting himself to comment.

"How long should I expect this to last?"

A few days? Maybe a week.

[dead_black_eyes]

Not only does L realize that Caesar has drastically underestimated his ability to maintain a fixation, he knows how to shift his weight and balance and make the implied agreement work to his shameless, indefinite advantage. Why wouldn't he, when a man has just essentially signed himself up to be the prisoner of the world's greatest detective?

The question makes his mouth twist upward in a smirk.

"Why," he answers softly, "until we catch Kira, of course."

[evowhisperer]

Just like that, Caesar is feeling a lot less sympathetic.

"That could take weeks in time. Maybe months," he says slowly, as though Ryzaki might not be well aware of it. A week or two of these conditions, he can handle. Months? He'll become a machine, living for work and dreaming of it while he sleeps. It's not a state he's unfamiliar with, but is it really necessary?

No, Caesar thinks as he looks at the smirk, it's not. This is petty vengeance, and he'd feel more hope in bringing this up with L if the reality weren't sinking in: this agent is in charge. He could probably put Caesar in that pristine interrogation room, and no one would say a word.

This isn't Providence. They aren't fixing a blight on the world that Caesar directly helped cause. He owes them nothing but curiosity and a helping hand, and by all rights he should be able to stop whenever he wants.

[dead_black_eyes]

L has a way of not holding onto sympathy for very long, even if his childish mannerisms and wide, owlish eyes seem custom-made for getting it.

"Yes, it could," he says blithely, chewing at the pad of his thumb and glancing down at his lap as though Caesar has just pointed out that a side trip would be out of the way and inconvenient given the set schedule. "But that's just how dedicated I am to catching him, you must understand. I thought that you were dedicated, too, and then you got that phone call."

[evowhisperer]

"I am dedicated", Caesar says, thinking about the upcoming months stretched in front of him. He'll have to call on sleeping habits formed during his college days, and he'll have to not just gain Ryuzaki's trust with his summaries, but play a careful hand in bullshitting sensitive material out of view. Never once does it occur to him that he'll actually roll over and go along with the situation quietly: no Salazar has been successfully manipulated out of rebellion in his lifespan, and he's not about to break this record now.

... He can't just let this go. "Surely you must realize that this isn't sustainable long-term," he counters, brow twisting with annoyance. "I am very dedicated to solving the mystery that is Kira, but these conditions are going to become detrimental to the quality of my work."

[dead_black_eyes]

At the very least, Caesar can count on those sleeping habits being shared by one who is devoted beyond all other areas of his life, forgoing most other things a man in his twenties might have. The more time he spends with Ryuzaki... no, L, the more he'll see just how pure that dedication is. Driven snow doesn't quite come to mind; that would, unfortunately, be too wholesome and chaste an image for the gaunt, sleepless ghoul with its stunted bone structure sitting beside Caesar in the back seat of a limo.

"It's as sustainable as our wills," L answers with disarming ease. "Mine shows no signs of flagging, because I don't stop until I've solved my cases. No matter what the cost, no matter what circumstances drive me to do. No matter how long it takes, how many meals or hours of sleep I have to give up. They're trifles. The end result is what matters, and then the next one starts. That's my life. I would have it no other way, so it doesn't seem unfit to demand it of those working under me as well."

[evowhisperer]

Echoes of parts of his youth have come back to haunt him. Is this what his classmates felt when they were assigned to team projects? Resisting the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose, Caesar makes a mental note to send them apologies sometime.

Can he afford to fight this any more? It hasn't actually gone into active sleep or food deprivation, and once he reaches a critical exhaustion he'll have no trouble falling asleep anywhere at all. The threat of a cold empty room is still very present, and none of this means he can't argue again when his position is more stable.

"I understand," he says reluctantly.

[dead_black_eyes]

It's like watching a spider finally relax its hold on struggling prey. L's posture and demeanor get less bristly and tense, and he's offering a flippant shrug in response to that sorely won word of agreement.

"Yes, I thought you would eventually. You wouldn't be here if you were an idiot. Only Matsuda gets a pass for that, and I have to reconsider every day whether or not that should be the case."

It probably sounds like a strange thing to say; L seems to like asserting his authority and then attempting to talk to Caesar like a peer, almost within the same breath.