Lawliet was approached by Quillish Wammy, who he instantly came to like. He was a nice man, even though he had this darkness behind his eyes. Quillish told him of the orphanage that he built for extraordinary young minds and he was hesitant at first. Lawliet was a cautious boy and he would not trust somebody unless they gave him a reason too. While he was on the streets it was eat or be eaten and, though Quillish may have taken him off the streets for a brief time, he had no way of evaluating if what he said was true. That was when Mr.Wammy took him to the sweet shop. The name had been lost to him as soon as he had entered because of the fragrant aromas that wafted about his face. He was automatically drawn towards the sweets that he dreamed of; something sweet enough to drown the tart flavor of sorrow.

Lawliet’s mouth had watered with desire as he looked at everything around him; there were so many options that it was dizzying. There were lollipops, fromage, tarte au chocolat, mille-feuille, tiramisu, Chou a la crème, shortcakes, cheesecakes, and various other deserts that made his stomach growl with yearning; not to mention the variety of teas and coffees that they had. There were glass displays, each holding a delicacy far more delicious than the last, that made Lawliet press his face against them in awe. It was torture. Lawliet fished through his pockets, though he knew that he had no money to afford such treats, and gave a little sigh of frustration. Quillish smiled at him and pressed a hand over his unruly hair.

“Would you like something, Lawliet? I have plenty of money.” Mr.Wammy said kindly. His eyes sparkled with a strange affection and it made Lawliet feel warm and safe. It was the same kind of look his mother used to give him. He stared at Wammy for a moment, his dark eyes boring into him for any hints of deception, and then he looked around the shop.

“I don’t know what to pick, there are so many options. I would eat it all if I could.” Lawliet said. The man beside him laughed with mirth before searching through his coat pockets and then fishing out his wallet. Lawliet stared at Quillish with fascination. The man was old, his black hair turning to gray around the edges and his skin sagging slightly. And yet, despite his obvious age, he had strong arms like many of the gang members he’d seen on the streets; evenly muscled and sturdy. Lawliet wondered how Quillish wound up like that but eventually brushed it off as ‘unnecessary information’.

“If you think you can eat it all then I’ll order everything. Just pace yourself and try not to get sick.” Quillish said warmly. Lawliet stared in disbelief as Mr.Wammy did exactly that and placed an order for everything they had. The waitress looked equally flabbergasted and began bustling about the room in panic. Quillish smiled with amusement and took a seat in the back of the room, pulling Lawliet along as they awaited the order. Lawliet felt high, as if everything he’d ever wanted was coming straight towards him and nothing could ever stop it. It was bliss.

“So Lawliet, have you considered joining the orphanage? I think you would be an excellent addition and role model for the other children. You are quite intelligent for being only eight.” Quillish said. He sounded impressed and Lawliet’s chest swelled with pride. He’d tried to learn as much as possible while he’d been on the streets. He valued his knowledge over everything else and, though he rarely spoke, was quite a prodigy. Lawliet ran over the thought of the orphanage in his head and it seemed right.

“I must admit, I am considering it. I would like to see this orphanage for myself. Also, are there any specific requirements that I should be aware of?” He asked. He’d prefer to know what he was getting himself into before he agreed to anything. Quillish smiled at him and crossed his hands on the table.

“I was planning to take you to see the orphanage today, after this detour. I imagine you haven’t had any sweets in quite a while. I saw you gazing at this window once while I was on one of my strolls and you looked really hungry. The only requirements of the orphanage would be your name. Everyone who’s admitted into the orphanage is admitted with an alias. They all lose their names. Though right now, the orphanage is still in its early stages, I suspect after you it would become a large success.” Wammy said politely. Lawliet thought this over. He would lose his name? If he really thought about it, his name really had no purpose. He had no family and no one knew him. Then he thought of his mother; black hair and black eyes but always graceful. Those were the things he remembered about her. Her name was Elle but pronounced as the letter. He wanted that name. He made up his mind; he wished to go with Wammy. Wammy seemed kind and honest, a good caretaker and, perhaps, could become a father to Lawliet.

“I want to go with you. I do not care if I’m required to lose my name. All I ask is that I be taken care of and taught. I want to learn new things because I never went to school. I want to become a detective and with your resources, I believe I can.” He said. Quillish nodded and the sweets he ordered began to pile on the table top.

Lawliet took a large bite from a cake and shuddered in delight as the bitterness was swept away. He could never eat the same way again. This was what he needed to rid himself of the taste of tears; the sweets were maddeningly sweets. And still, they were not sweet enough. Lawliet bit his nails as he spoke, taking several sugar packets and emptying them into his tea.

“Have you considered your alias?” Quillish asked in curiosity. The child shoveled down the cakes and cookies, the teas and candies and yet he still seemed dissatisfied. Lawliet swallowed a mouth full of his sweetened black tea and smiled. He knew exactly what he wished his alias to be. To Quillish Wammy it may seem insignificant but to Lawliet …This alias meant the world.

“I wish my name to be L.” he said. And that was how Quillish and Lawliet became a team. Quillish had never had a son and had always wondered what it would be like. Lawliet was his first child in Wammy’s house and was practically his son. Blood didn’t matter in Quillish’s eyes. He cared about Lawliet, would die for Lawliet and protect him at all costs. Which caused him to spoil little L; not that L minded.

L’s training went on; he learned many significant things and continued to grow. The orphanage was a beautiful place, with vast yards and serene landscapes. Fountains were placed at random around the area and the children were always running about and playing games. There was noise all the time but it wasn’t unpleasant; bells, children laughing, water and animals. It was calming. And it was the one place where L could think all the time. No one bothered him because they brushed him off as stupid, even though that was the furthest thing from what he actually was. They only assumed this because, even though L was happy with his current surroundings, he rarely spoke. He trusted everyone as far as he could throw them and he had no upper body strength so that wasn’t very far. The only people L ever spoke to were Quillish and Roger; they were the owners of Wammy’s house.

L enjoyed his studies most of all. He was always seen with his nose in a book and a finger in his mouth. He went through books as quickly as he devoured his beloved sweets. His desire for knowledge was nearly insatiable. Quillish loved L as a son and constantly bought him sweets; he even set up a large library for L to go through. And the results were astonishing. By the time L was ten he’d gotten his first case to work on. At the time he’d been a small detective and hid his face so that people couldn’t judge him. If they knew he was only ten then they would not have hired him at all. He used Quillish as his face and went through the clues as to solve the case. L learned that Quillish had previously worked with various agencies and had once even been with the FBI so he was already highly respected by his comrades. L relished in the resources he had and quickly solved the case.

After that, L’s name slowly spread across the globe; his skills were unmatched by any other detectives and his knowledge was growing by the minute. He became well known in the orphanage as well, but he learned to hide his face. By the time he was twelve he already had several aliases, as did Quillish. One of Quillish’s aliases was Watari, a name he used often, even before he’d met L. L’s name took the word by storm as he inched his way up the detective ladder; Watari and L were always stated together. When one wanted L’s help on a case they had to contact Watari because no one could contact L. Many of the children in the orphanage wished to become L themselves and began studying to succeed him if he ever failed. Among them were B, N, and M; Beyond Birthday, Nate River (Near), and Mihael Keehl (Mello).

One day L asked Quillish something strange. It was when L was fourteen. He wanted to learn some ‘off-color’ techniques to get information out of suspects. Quillish had been furious with L, even reverted back to calling him Lawliet for a short time before he allowed it. L wanted to learn something new that would help him with his chosen career no matter what the cost. Quillish only feared for L’s sanity; seeing torture was almost as bad as being tortured. The images would never leave him and Quillish feared that L was too young to be able to handle it. But he gave in because it was what L wanted.

He took L to several shady areas of town where he witnessed things that were horrifying and appalling. He learned many different forms of torture but he couldn’t sleep without seeing these people in his head; screaming for it to stop. L even developed a new way of sitting out of fear; a defensive curl around his knees. It looked childish but it made L feel better and think clearly without terrifying images popping in his head. When he sat in his knee-hug he felt like his mom had her arms wrapped around him. It made all the bad things go away and made his logic conquer the revulsion.

L had learned many things about torture despite his fear; both physical and psychological. There was blackmail, shaming, exploitation of phobias, sleep deprivation, solitary confinement, and sensory deprivation to psychologically attack a suspect. Then there was tooth extraction, beatings (which brought back vivid memories), bone breaking, branding, cutting, de-nailing, electric shock, force feeding, high pitched sounds, starvation, whipping and various other twisted methods that made L sob into his knees after he saw them. After a long time, he just stopped crying and felt he could no longer smile.

He remembered one of the sessions quite clearly, a young woman in her twenties. He couldn’t remember why they tortured her, only the method. They strapped her to a chair and covered her eyes and mouth so that she would panic at the loss of senses. He remembered how she struggled in the chair, tears rolling down her cheeks and muffled screams. One of the men took out a pair of pliers and L had recoiled in fear, gripping Quillish’s arm tightly and biting down on his lip roughly so as not to make the men aware of his presence. The man then began to remove the woman’s nails one at a time, slowly and gruesomely. L remembered the bloody fingers and screaming. It was so loud despite the gag and he trembled in alarm. Then the men took out two by fours and began to beat the woman and then L ran out, Quillish following behind him with a solemn expression. Quillish had warned him it would be difficult to see that but he hadn’t believed him. Now he did.

L continued with his job as a detective, years passing as quickly as they came. His birthday was hardly important and was only celebrated as Elle’s death. On those days he wore all black and picked flowers in the garden. He would visit her grave with Quillish and pay her respects. On those days he refused any cases unless he was currently in the middle of a case. Then he would work on the case n silence, locking the door to his room and not coming out until the next morning.

The other children in Wammy’s house barely saw L anymore, and when they did they did not approach him out of awe for his vast skills. L reviewed his possible successors often but never spoke to them, preferring for them to find their own way. He heard one boy, B, was beginning to fold under the pressure. B wanted to be better than L and even went to the extent of modeling himself after him. One time L had observed B from afar, the boy wore the same blue jeans and white shirt as L and had the same messy hair. The bags under B’s eyes matched L’s and the boy was never seen without some kind of sweet in his hands. B mostly ate strawberry jam with his hands. And his eyes were red. It was unnerving for L to see him. He avoided B after that.

He actually spoke to Mello once and it was only to tell stories of his past achievements. Mello appreciated these stories and went as far as to write them down. This was after Beyond Birthday had left and became a murderer. L had expected that to happen, B had always had the look of a killer in his eyes. Like he always saw death. He sympathized with B for a reason he could not understand and felt he’d made a connection with him. So he made a new alias; Ryuzaki. He’d defeated two of the world’s greatest detectives and stolen their titles, become the top three detectives in the world; but he still had so much to learn. He told Mello of these stories, if only so that someone else could know. Mello was too emotional and probably wouldn’t live very long and would never become his successor, but L saw great things in him. He didn’t want Mello to become his successor because it would destroy Mello’s heart. L had his heart set on B as his successor but after the Los Angeles Murder Cases Near seemed the best bet.

Not long after, L heard of a mysterious killer in Japan. He was given the name Kira. At first, L did not want to join the case but as the number of deaths grew, L became infuriated. How could someone kill so needlessly and hide behind the front that it was justice? He joined the case in December. It was the most difficult case he’d ever had. The people disrespected him and when he finally won their admiration, his prime suspect wound up as the son of one of his comrades. L attempted to find Kira, though he had no personal grudge with him. That was when Light Yagami motivated him. And then B died because Kira killed him. B died, all alone in a California prison because he’d wanted to defeat L. Would L’s name always bring about pain? He almost wished Kira would hurry up and kill him. But first he wanted to catch Kira because he killed B.

November came around quickly and it was already 2005. The years had passed so quickly it was almost like they’d never been there. He still felt like he was that helpless child being beaten, that helpless child watching a woman tortured before his eyes. He wanted to curl up. That day was a quiet day, rain battering atop the room tops in an inviting dance. L felt that it was his time. Today he was going to die. He stood in the rain as he stared up at the sky. He thought he could see his mother’s face smiling at him in that rain that battered his frail form. He felt tears slip down his face that were hidden by the rain. That was the first time he’d cried in years. He touched his cheeks in awe and longed for the vast fields of Wammy’s house. He could hear the bells ringing loudly in his head. Wedding bells? Or maybe they were for a funeral.

“The bells are loud today…” L said to himself. Light came outside and spotted L, motioning him over. He said something and L pretended not her, placing a hand to his ear as a small smile graced his lips. Light was his friend; but he would also be his downfall. L had accepted that long ago.

“Light-kun….Can you hear the bells?” L said quietly. They went back inside together after drying off. Quillish Wammy and Lawliet died November fifth because of a heart attack.

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A/N: I enjoyed writing this and some things may seem off to you. Also, I’ve heard L’s name is L Lawliet, thus the alias. I liked my explanation better so I never revealed L’s full name in this. Also, Beyond Birthday was caught on my birthday. I just thought that was pretty cool. Death Note does not belong to me. It belongs to Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata.