#the name lawliet never actually shows up in the manga y’know. he hides it well for the entire series

[applestorms]

thinking about how near refers to light at the end of the series— not really as light yagami, not even really as kira, and not quite as L, but rather an amalgamation of titles: L-KIRA, a twisted mix of two personas, masks on top of masks. no longer a person but a series of letters, a filtered voice through a screen. a man who has built his entire life in the space between lies, who cannot let himself stop for a second without the weight of his own guilt, his sins, crushing him. regrets repressed because this is the only way it could ever be, it has to be worth it, it has to, it has to, because you can’t even bring yourself to consider what it all means otherwise.

i am a firm believer that light yagami, the son, the student, the average human person, dies at the same time that L does. at least at the beginning of the series he has some semblance of normalcy to hold himself to, the Serious Student persona that keeps him walking to and from school and talking to people and eating dinner with his family at home. how many times do we really see him going outside, post-L death? how often do we see him outside of some L-based police HQ, talking to people he isn’t trying to manipulate? really, it’s no wonder he falls so far, alienated as he is from the rest of humanity. when was the last time he breathed long enough to remember what the sky looks like? hugged his mom, laughed with his sister? did he ever visit his father’s grave? does he remember what the breeze smells like? was he ever really happy? did he deny himself his only chance?

at least in the case of L and near the isolation feels intentional, a preferable choice, carefully and logically considered for all the pros and cons. light never asked for the position he fell into, that fell upon him, that he created for himself. he denies the death note being a curse, but it’s not like he could ever admit it if it was.

light’s story arc in death note really feels like a tragedy to me, specifically in the sense that he never really gets the chance to change. on a plot level this is true, much of the second half of the story post-L death is light utilizing the exact same strategies as before (taking away his ownership of the DN to Strategize, romancing a woman he doesn’t care for to use her, fighting a snarky troll of a super genius hiding behind a letter whose real name & face he cannot find), but it’s true on an emotional level too. light never really gets to grow up, he never gets the chance to truly question his ideals or goals without the world he’s built by himself crashing down around him.

i keep thinking back to the significance of matsuda asking him about his dad, how he could drag him to his death for the sake of all of this. light’s response, so truthful in its desperation, really sums it all up: he died for a reason. KIRA has to win, or his dad died for nothing. he cannot face the idea that he caused his own father’s death, so KIRA must be justice. there is no other alternative. KIRA is god, or light yagami killed his own father for a fairytale.

really, it’s so fitting that his name uses the kanji for moon. moonlight— not originating from the moon itself but a reflection, of something brighter, greater, more powerful than he could ever be. light dies the same way as every other criminal he passed his judgement upon, on his knees and desperate, pathetic, begging for life even as he knows he is doomed to the same fate of nothingness that he granted to everybody else. godhood denied. he said it himself, that he could never be anything more than a human, but somewhere in the fog he lost track of the person he once was. and it’s near’s cruelest observation that stands out the most to me in that final scene— that he never really had to be this. he could’ve stopped at any point, felt his guilt, paid his regrets, and moved on with his humanity still intact. light has spent far too long repressing and denying to ever consider that an option anymore— but there was still room for sympathy for the 17 year old kid who killed without thinking, long before he built up such a dedicated palace of lies to justify his actions and hide away his guilt.

L-KIRA dies on the floor of a dirty, abandoned building, surrounded by the people he spent years manipulating and lying to and betraying. light yagami dies in a helicopter, locked and chained to his only closest equal, holding a notebook that he would use to sound the death knell of his own fate and wearing his father’s gifted watch.