A young fighter screaming, with no time for doubt
With the pain and anger can't see a way out,
It ain't much I'm asking, I heard him say,
Gotta find me a future move out of my way,
I want it all, I want it all, I want it all, and I want it now

- 'I Want It All' by Queen

July 2001

It was a wonderfully sunny day, with not a cloud in the sky, just one of those days that slaps you in the face with a big hand of happy. Such days were rare for England, even during summer. The sky could well have been the Caribbean sea in August, the grass lush green meadows. Of course, the worst things always occur on days such as this. When people can find nothing to complain about, they simply create something. Easy – like the drop of a hat. Are people not delightful?

A yell of unadulterated anger punctured the previous tranquility that had settled over the institution for gifted children that was Wammy's House. What followed this was a young boy by the name of Near being chased out onto the grass. Children fight all the time. However, most children do not fight every single week without fail chasing each other around the garden with a chunk of wood (that has been confiscated several times before) and intent to kill.

Because of this, an older man known as Roger pursued the children for a short time. Unfortunately, being the age he was, he had to hang back. Mello, the blonde teen with the piece of wood, was getting closer every time. Although in terms of speed, strength and stature Mello was far above Near, Near had the edge in terms of intelligence. Whenever he saw Mello getting too close, he dropped onto his front and let Mello run ahead.

"Why don't you ever just not tell Mels what his score is?" a redhead said lazily to Roger. He leant up against a tree casually, a pair of orange goggles strapped to his head. Despite having left the building to watch the fight that was unfurling in front of them, his attention was drawn back to his gaming console.

"You know, sometimes I wish that I did, Matt," Roger sighed, "but who would I be if I kept the results of all of his hard work from him?"

"The man with average blood pressure," Matt chuckled throatily. "Do you want me to stop them again?"

Roger bowed his head. "Please."

Matt smirked and tucked his Gameboy Advance into his jeans pocket. It took him only a few seconds to walk out into the daylight, take a whistle out of his pocket and blow into it sharply. There was no response. Mello must have been even more incensed with rage than usual. The gamer rolled his eyes impatiently and tracked him, figuring out where he was going to be.

That was when he took a run at the blonde, leg ready to hook around his torso and take him down. From there on, he simply had to sit on him. Infuriated, Mello squirmed and lashed out, all to no avail. Matt, relaxed as ever, took out his Nintendo DS and proceeded to absolutely demolish Kirby.

"Matt!" Mello screamed. "Get off of me right now, or I swear I'll-"

"What you gonna do, pretty boy?" Matt snickered. "I just owned you." He got bored after about a minute, then looked down at his best friend again. "Are you calm now?"

"If I say yes, will you quit crushing my ribcage?"

"You think I give a shit?"

"I'm gonna kill you-!"

"Dude, I'm thinking of taking up smoking. I very highly doubt you'll be the thing that kills me."

"You start smoking when I blow myself up!" Mello threatened.

"I didn't know you cared so much…" Matt said mock-sweetly. He stood and helped Mello up, though the blonde refused help on second thought, as damaged as his bad-boy reputation was already. "You all right, mate?"

"Yeah," Mello muttered.

"Let's go inside, yeah?" Matt suggested patiently. "I heard someone's coming to give us a talk on some stuff. If it's Sex Ed again, I'm gonna crack up laughing. The amount kids here don't know…"

This would have been the conventional time that Mello was placated and joined Matt in ridiculing the latest speaker that had been sent to teach the students things that they already were well aware of. However, this being such a beautiful day, something unpleasant was sure to happen, and it did so when the blonde spied Near walking away from their confrontation scot-free, without so much as a hint of breathlessness.

How dare he humiliate Mello with his ease of effort? How many times had the albino gotten away with such conceited behavior, never once feeling anything other than smugness? Where was the bloody guilt? It was the smugness of the albino that really got to him.

The final straw was when he caught Near smirking. Smirking. As if the simplicity of his situation was amusing.

Suddenly, Mello flew at Near with the fury and speed of a wild animal, shoving him to the ground and punching him. Neither Matt nor Roger had expected this, and so it was a few moments before they responded. Matt sprinted to where his best friend was, attempting to pry him away before he did too much damage. This was difficult – Mello fought back, yanking his arms from Matt's grasp and trying to get at the boy again.

"Stop it!" Matt yelled. "Let him go! Jesus!"

"You smug little shit!" Mello was roaring. "I'm gonna kill you!"

"Christ, drop it, Mels!" Matt insisted, pulling him away again.

"Mello!" Roger barked. "Get inside! Now."

When Near emerged from the brawl, the students saw him with breathing difficulties and clutching at the area where his ribs were located. Roger supported him all the way to the infirmary. Mello sank to the ground, sitting beside Matt as he attempted to cool off. The rage was still pulsing through him, though, and he was still receiving stares from horrified or morbidly curious students.

He glared at them, humiliated. "Will all of you just fuck off?" he shouted.

"Oh, man," Matt sighed. "This isn't gonna be good."

XXX

L had never been particularly fussed about planes. They ascended, flew a bit, then descended. The air hosts and hostesses were giving extremely bemused looks, and he had spotted two air hostesses pointing at him and giggling. So much for customer service. Admittedly, he had already possessed a negative attitude when Watari had told him that they were traveling back to England for a short while. He would rather have been in a hotel room in New York than on a plane home.

Now there was this thing to attend to with choosing a successor. This was depressing to say the least. For goodness' sake, he had no plans to die yet. He was twenty-one years old, not eighty-one. He knew he would be turning twenty-two in October, and then, officially, his responsibilities would pile up. Twenty-one was the last age at which someone could make seriously ridiculous mistakes and still be called 'too young to deal with them'. After this, he would have to give up being childish.

Watari sighed, glancing at his phone. "Oh dear."

"What is it?" He did not really want to know, yet asked anyway out of curious habit.

"It seems there has been trouble with your successors." He glanced at his charge. "I know you are weary of them. Ryuzaki. Ryuzaki, are you concentrating?"

"Mm." His attention was actually fixed on the legs of an air hostess approximately his age. Just because he did not outwardly show any signs of sexual interest did not mean he could not appreciate a view. As far as Watari knew, he was an asexual man with deep, profound thoughts on his mind.

"Well, apparently one of your successors attacked another one."

This caught L's attention. "Backup again?"

"No, not this time. Rather, Mello."

"He is too volatile," L muttered. "And if he wishes to succeed anyone, then he needs to learn to control his temper. It is not a lack of intelligence, just a lack of self-restraint. He needs what Near has, and Near requires what Mello has."

"There is a lot of trouble to be expected with children, especially those entering adolescence," Watari told him. "You cannot ignore that, since you agreed to-"

"It was your idea," L pointed out dryly. "And look at just how successful it was. Alternative is on the brink of self-destruction with his need for psychiatric help. Backup is acting out violently and is set to be in detention for the rest of his education-"

"He needs help as much as A, Ryuzaki."

"He tortured the class hamster with a scalpel and keeps jarfuls of what he says are organs in his bedroom," L said. "I cannot deny that he needs help of a certain kind."

"Backup is desperately misunderstood-"

"He cut open a rodent and disemboweled it in front of the entire infant Biology class," L cut him off.

"There was another boy I knew who was just misunderstood," Watari reminded him, only to receive a glower in response. "It strikes me that this decision you have to make, choosing your successor, is particularly difficult for you."

"It is not as if I am going to die any time soon," L remarked.

"Obviously, I hope that your dying is not the case. However, everyone dies, and I want you to be prepared in that situation. So you must make your choice." He frowned. "Or… no, that is a silly idea, ignore me…"

L put a thumb to his lips with interest. "What is a silly idea?"

"Nothing… foolish old man…"

"Tell me."

"No, no, it's a ludicrous, mad notion."

Just what he needed before he turned twenty-two and waved goodbye to recklessness forever. "Watari. Tell me."

"Well, you… you could pass your title down to… to your offspring." L could tell his guardian was trying to phrase this in the most delicate manner possible, and the idea still made his heart hammer under his ribcage.

"I don't have any children, Watari." He exhaled slowly. "Are you honestly suggesting that I father a child in order to find an appropriate successor?"

"As you said, you aren't likely to die soon. You would have time to train the child before you… popped your clogs. In the meantime, you could take on less dangerous cases. Make time to get to know your child. Then, when you eventually… push up carnations… they can take your place, minus the fuss that comes with choosing a successor." Once he had finished, he studied L's expression to gauge his reaction, and came up with nothing.

After a few minutes of saying nada, L spoke up. "So all I would have to do would be find a surrogate mother?"

"Yes."

"Can I just not become the first man to clone myself?"

"No."

He sighed. "Damn."

"Now, Ryuzaki… do you want to do this?" Watari asked severely. "Having a child is a huge responsibility, and you would need to find the perfect mother should you want the child a specific way, with certain traits. Using the Darwinian theory, the survival of the fittest, you should be able to make a child."

"I know how procreation works," L informed him. "I assume what I will be doing is in vitro fertilization, and not…?"

"IVF would probably be the best option. Emotional attachments are not the ultimate aim of this undertaking, are they?" He appraised L with a cautious expression. "Are you positive that you will be capable of finding a self-respecting, intelligent and pleasant woman willing to do this kind of job?"

L smirked a little, unclipping his seatbelt and standing, careful not to his head in the overhead storage lockers. "I do not understand your concern, Watari. I am excellent with women."

That was around the point that the air hostess whose legs he had been admiring from a distance earlier rammed the refreshment cart into his ankles roughly. She glared at him.

"Drink, sir?" she snapped. "A glass of cold water, perhaps?"

This is the first pre-Kira non-AU story I've ever written. It should be good fun, as it is essentially a comedy. This is only a pilot chapter. If it gets zilch reviews I'll take it that no one's interested and will drop it. This is also not going to have sequels, or be part of a series.

Please review letting me know what you think. The best is yet to come!

C.