There was a moment, when the Death Note dropped into his hands again and everything slammed back into his mind with the force of a semi-truck, that he wanted to set it on fire and never see the thing again.

He didn't scream in surprise. It hurt, the sudden reversal of everything built up over the past months turning his mind inside out and upside down, and it hit him all over again- I killed people. Me. Every memory seared with new freshness from the nerves of his hands through the axons and synapses of his body without pity.

Help me. I need to get free of this.

He felt the bitter taste of his former denials on his tongue. L had been right all along. He'd been lying all along, without even knowing that he was lying. And it all came back to this.

His mouth opened and his throat closed, cutting off the scream. And just as cleanly as that, the thought was gone. No. There was too much to lose if he gave up now. His head throbbed in time with the beat of the helicopters' rotors. But he knew what he had to do.

Light's hands tightened on the notebook. It was his once again. L had to die.

Exactly as planned.

It was, after all, only a moment.