1BB: I don't own Death Note and I don't own Numb, by Linkin Park!
I've become so numb, I can't feel you there, tired of being what you want me to be...
He was tired. Deep down, bone-weary tired. He was so tired of being forced into being things he didn't want. You must be this, you must be that, you must go here, you must learn that.He could barely think straight anymore. It was a wonder he could even do the math problems in front of him now.
Wait...maybe he couldn't. The numbers were starting to blur in front of his eyes and he pushed away, rubbing at them with his fists. He needed sleep.
No. I don't need sleep. If L can solve these cases, I can solve them faster. The thought that was like a mantra now coursed through his mind and he pushed his tiredness away. I can do it...I can do it...
Determined, he turned back to his math book, to the thousands of problems he had to do in it, then to his biology, his criminology, his forensics, his ancient languages, his history, his advanced mathematics, his architecture (and why would they use that?), and countless of other things he needed to know. He had to get them done with, though, or else he would lose his position. He couldn't do that - he couldn't lose himself. He couldn't lose the number one spot. He couldn't lose to someone like-
"Anthony, why are you up so late?"
-him.
"It isn't late, Beyond," the boy at the desk stated, looking at the alarm clock he had near him. It was, in fact, very late, later than children should stay up. He didn't turn around to look at the person he knew was standing in his doorframe, the boy with the dark hair, the too-pale skin - paler than his,even, and he never went outside anymore - and those red eyes. Those eyes freaked him out, because when they stared at him, it was like they knew everything he was thinking. "I was just finishing up my homework."
Footsteps, bare feet shuffling across carpet, and then a warm hand was on his shoulder, turning his chair around to face his bed, to face the thing that swung above it. He had made it earlier, before he had decided homework could be done first. A habit, something he needed to break. "Do you not have something to do, Anthony?"
Anthony. He hadn't been Anthony for years now. It'd been forever since he'd been Anthony, But Beyond never called him by his letter. Never called him A. Never called him Alternate. It was always Anthony.
How he hated it.
"I needed to finish this first. Surely you understand that, right?" The other would have to understand that, wouldn't he? After all, when he did what he was planning to do, the other would be number one now. He just needed to get up the courage to do it. Beyond smirked at him and pointed toward the bed, to the noose that hung above it. "Homework is less important than not feeling numb."