It's another day, and the third time Light has been hit over the head with an age reversal. This time, he's a little older than the place has made him before - twelve years old, and more reserved and serious than you'd expect him to have become in just two years.

His hands are tucked into his pockets, and he's leaning back against the wall of the fish lounge, visible from its entrance, in a way not entirely unlike his adult self.

He doesn't like this place at all.

[[OOC: private to refractings.]]

I've got some unexpected family stuff I need to take care of, which means I need to be pretty much gone for a bit. Sorry, gah. :/ I'll try and tag when and where I can. This affects stalky here, subversion and siafukira.

Update 2009-09-27 Family stuff has worked out okay, but I'm still pretty much worn out. Am making efforts to get back in here and there, and doing easy stuff, but I think it will be a while. orz.

Only active characters are shown - feel free to comment if you think someone's been missed, my memory fails totally and I went by his memories for this.

Yes, the diagram is a reference. Yes, there are points for getting it.

( <firmdetective> ... Apart from a general sense that Stalky doesn't "really" care about anyone )

Light isn't bored; doesn't know how to be, at the age he is now. For all that he's surrounded by people who hate him - or at least, who hate his adult self - for all that he knows he's supposed to be dead and can't ever go back where he belongs, he's interested in everything, and he's in a magic mansion full of things that are calculated to fascinate him. And if some of them are dangerous - well, they can't be anything he can't cope with.

It's the swings he sees, through the door. And - well - it's not as if there's anyone around. After checking the room's door systematically from top to bottom, he steps inside.

As he does so, though, a snow monkey runs up behind him and pulls on his trouser leg with a sharp tug. Light! - but you're different. We're different.

... Okay, a monkey is talking to him. He can deal with that...

An hour later, he's sitting on one of the swings, with a small, spotted cat on his lap. They talk in smiles and half-heard whispers, for all the world as if they need nothing but each other.

[[OOC: private to chilichoc.]]

It's a river, winding through the base of a shallow valley in spring. A cool, green smell hangs in the air. The sky is clear and blue, dotted with fluffy white clouds. It could be anywhere reasonably temperate.

Light is watching the river. The setting would be interesting to draw - he's never found this room before - but he's not bothering; instead the book is closed on his lap, with one hand securing it.

He looks a little (depressed, miserable) thoughtful, pulled down into himself on a bench. If someone were to approach across the grass, he likely wouldn't notice.

[[OOC: private to chilichoc.]]

Light is scribbling a letter to someone. For some reason, the ink is green. How strange. A few precisely-marked words leap off the page to a casual glance: "incoherent", "maudlin" and "incompetent" are high on the list.

[[OOC: private to chilichoc.]]

Another one for the_gabih at comment_fic. I should shut up and tag, huh? Light and Sayu, Kira victory AU.

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( rapunzel, rapunzel, let down your hair / so i can climb without a stair )

Ficwriting: like running a marathon, but without the free bottles of water and the shiny silver blanket at the end. This one was for the_gabih at comment_fic; it's a songfic for "Get Out Alive" by Three Days' Grace.

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( if you want to get out alive, run for your life )

dn_contest week #61. Prompt was "terrorism".

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( something's lost but something's gained in living every day )

For Phoebe, who was sorry she missed it due to something she calls "sleep".

( The WJC attack. stalky / mel ... kind of. )

Another one for dn_contest. The prompt was, ohgod, self-insert. That's me at the end thar.

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( somewhere down the road you're going to find a place )

Another dn_contest attempt. Prompt is "allergy". It's a bit of a divergence from my usual tone. Yotsuba arc, Light and L and a lot of cake.

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( I'm reborn, it's a false dawn )

I cannot take credit for this. It's based entirely on versipellis's wonderful fic The Right to Remain Silent, which you should all go and read right now. Go. Go on. *shoos*

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( sometimes the worst thing is to get all we desire )

It's the fifth floor kitchen. Not the floor Light lives on, not one of the ones awash with the sheep on the lower floors, and not high up enough to have a significant risk of dropping him into a deadly room. Sitting at the table, he's picking aimlessly at a small bowl of mixed rice with peas, and leafing through a book the size of a small dictionary. It's in French, and at this point, his problems are mostly vocabulary and practice. Lots of practice. The sketchbook is also on the table, to his right.

The mansion's been startlingly well-behaved and friendly, of late. He knows it can't last.

[[OOC: private to smallpackaging.]]

This is absolutely nothing to do with Light. See? I can do it if I try!

...uh, kid!Mikami and his mother, for dn_contest.

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( now I know I never knew about you, only me )

Light has just come from a run-in with L, at which Sayu's presence was urgently requested. He sees no reason not to comply, which is why he finds himself outside a room on the first floor, hoping nobody's going to arrive around a corner or out of a door, and glaring at some glittering stickers that bear a startling resemblance to the cross the mansion placed on his own door.

Sayu has thirty seconds to answer before Light clears off - or at least finds a nearby room to wait in.

[[OOC: private to smallpackaging.]]