The soft summer sunshine of early morning poured into the living room window, casting a golden glow on the fluffy rug. Naomi stood, sipping her coffee, and watching contentedly as the city of Paris woke up.

It had been nearly six months ago that she had received L's phone call and, as it turned out, they were a dynamic team. Justice prevailed on their watch and dozens of cases had been closed, thanks to their efforts. She had wondered early on if she would regret her decision to devote her career to L, but now she knew it was the best decision she'd ever made. She loved her job.

It had been an adjustment, to be sure. Whereas L's efforts always produced outstanding results, his methods were far from conventional and never by the book. And, his detective work aside, his quirks and lifestyle were something to get used to as well.

Naomi had not realized going into this that she was going to be working for a chronic insomniac. L would stay awake for nearly a hundred hours- sometimes more- and then would sleep for nearly a whole day. And when exactly he would fall asleep was completely unpredictable.

In fact, he was sleeping now and he had been for about 15 hours.

Naomi thought back to the first time he had fallen asleep without warning in front of her. It had happened on her third day of working for L. She had been sitting on the couch reading a police report and he had been perched at the computer...

"L? Something in this report doesn't make sense."

No reply.

"It's just that when you compare it to the- hold on, let me show you." She stood and crossed over to the desk chair. She was about to continue speaking but stopped herself when she saw him.

L sat as he normally did in the chair, his bare feet one on top of the other. His head had dropped, his crazy mop of hair flopped over to one side, and his chin rested on his chest, which was rising and falling slowly and rhythmically. An empty coffee cup was held in both his hands and his swollen, darkened eyes were closed in sleep.

"Psst."

Naomi looked over to the other side of the room to see Watari beckoning. She moved quietly over to him.

"Is he alright?" she asked, her voice low.

"He's fine," Watari answered, "but he likely won't wake up until tomorrow."

Naomi looked at the clock. It was only two-thirty in the afternoon.

"Oh. Is this... normal?"

Watari nodded. "Quite," he answered.

And that's how it always was: spontaneous and without much warning, though Naomi had picked up on a few tell-tale hints. For instance, his breathing would become slower and heavier and he would begin absentmindedly sighing out loud. Also, he would begin rubbing the back of his neck. When he started doing those things, Naomi knew he'd be asleep very soon. She'd started gently suggesting that he move to the couch when she saw those behaviors, figuring he'd wake up with less of a kink in his joints than if he slept for hours in a computer chair.

Naomi's phone buzzed loudly on the end table next to her and she jumped slightly, having been lost in her thoughts. Speak of the devil. It was a text from Watari that L was up.

Naomi slipped her black boots on over her jeans and exited her bedroom. They were staying in a house and she had the second floor to herself.

She descended the stairs to find L positioned on the living room floor in a crow pose, his palms flat on the floor and his knees tucked into the bends of his arms with his feet in the air. L usually did a few minutes of yoga upon waking up to loosen his muscles.

"Morning," she greeted, taking a seat in one of the two chairs at the desk with her coffee.

"Morning," he replied, slowly lifting his feet up over his head. His arms didn't wobble even slightly. His shirt dropped to his chin as he straightened his arms into a handstand.

"Can you do that one-handed?" Naomi asked, just for fun.

L didn't answer, but he shifted his weight to his right side and stuck his left arm out sideways.

"Nice," Naomi said, smiling casually, and took another sip of coffee. Slight as he was, he was strong.

"Did you finish comparing the photographs?" L asked, referring to a case they were working on. His left hand had returned to the floor. He was still upside-down and now, his elbows slightly bent, he was doing a scissor-split in the air. He was quite the contortionist.

"Yes I did and they all match up," Naomi replied. She finished her coffee and stood to take the mug to the kitchen.

Just as she did, though, L, his palms flat on the ground, swung his feet to the floor in a back bend, his bare foot nearly kicking her in the face.

"Woah!" Naomi stopped herself just in time to keep from toppling over him.

"Naomi, watch where you're going," L's voice said calmly from below.

Naomi lowered her eyelids in annoyance. She flippantly gestured toward L in his upward-facing bow pose and sassed back, "Well, thanks for the lovely view!"

She was referring to his scrawny raised torso and her more-than-necessary view of his boxers.

L pushed off of his hands to roll into a standing position and looked at her with dark-rimmed eyes. His normally paper-white face was slightly flushed from being upside-down.

"What?" He genuinely seemed confused by her snark.

Naomi shook her head, smiling. He wasn't good with jokes.

She brushed past him toward the kitchen.

"The photos are on the desk," she said over her shoulder.

L rolled his shoulders a few times and cracked his neck loudly on both sides before heading to the desk to assume his knees-up stance on the chair.

Watari was in the kitchen donned in a black suit and tie and a blue and white apron. He was mixing some sort of batter.

"Good morning, Agent Misora," he greeted pleasantly.

"Good morning!" Naomi replied, smiling. She moved to the sink to wash her mug. "What are you making today?"

Before Watari could answer, L suddenly appeared at the kitchen doorway, seeming to have run the distance.

"It's him!" was all he said quickly before darting away.

But no one in the room needed more information than that. In a hurried frenzy, the three dashed out to the parking deck. L practically dove into the passenger seat and Naomi slid into the backseat as Watari tossed a duffel bag inside with her.

"Drive, Watari!" L shouted, using only his left hand to type an address into the car's GPS.

And drive he did.

Watari peeled out of the parking space and Naomi, who was frantically digging in the duffel bag and not wearing a seatbelt, lost her balance and tipped over. She righted herself and pulled out a men's black dress shirt.

L flung his white shirt back at her and she tossed him the black one.

Naomi was digging through the bag again when his jeans hit her in the face.

"Misora!" he yelled.

"I'm looking! I can't find- oh, here!" She threw him a pair of grey dress pants just as Watari turned a sharp corner, making her tip over again. Her head was spinning with nervousness and excitement, though being excited about what was happening was rather morbid.

But she couldn't help it. It was in her blood. After two months of dead ends trailing a serial killer, it was thrilling to finally have some potential new clues to investigate. Maybe this time, they'd get him.

He was known as The Bishop.

His victims appeared in various abandoned locations. The corpses, their throats neatly slit, were always found lying on their backs and surrounded by lit candles with a crucifix placed ceremoniously in their hands over their heart.

After hitting a brick wall again and again, following the previous murder, L had declared that he would be personally visiting the next crime scene. In order for this to work, however, they would have to go undercover. It was decided that L and Naomi would pose as agents who were working for L.

And in the interest of getting to the scene of the crime as quickly as possible, L had made the decision to make his appearance more professional than he normally did.

L had quite the knack for becoming an entirely different person for the sake of a mission and Naomi had to hold back a snicker looking at him now. He was so out of his element with his black dress shirt tucked in to pin-striped pants and a belt.

He had also put on sunglasses and was holding the end of a flat, red lollipop between his thumb and index finger. Apparently, not even a top-priority undercover mission could separate L from his sweets.

Naomi handed him his dress shoes.

"Are you really not going to wear socks?" she asked, already knowing what the answer would be.

He turned to look at her, his narrowed giant eyes peering over the rims of the sunglasses. The lollipop was tucked in his cheek. The stick flopped up and down and the hard candy knocked against his teeth as he spoke.

"Naomi, I will go to great lengths to solve a crime," he said importantly as he finished buttoning the top buttons of his shirt. "In fact, I've done a lot that would probably surprise you. But!" he said, holding up one finger and turning to shove his bare feet into the shoes, "I will not wear socks."

He said it with such conviction that Naomi wondered what on earth had spawned such hatred toward something as ordinary as socks.

But this was not the time to dwell on this. The car came to a halt in front of a house that looked as though it hadn't been lived in for quite some time. French police cars with their colored lights twirling and yellow caution tape had already been set up to block off the area. Naomi handed L the finishing touches to his ensemble- a grey blazer and a fake ID- and stuffed her own falsified badge into her jacket pocket as she stepped out of the car.

L shoved his arms awkwardly into the suit jacket sleeves and, looking thoroughly uncomfortable, jammed his hands into his pants pockets. His sunglasses and lollipop stick extending from his mouth paired with his flip floppy hair and bad posture to create quite the character.

As they approached the scene, Naomi flashed him a smile and quipped, "You clean up nice, Sir."

"Shut up," L muttered, using his tongue to switch the lollipop to the other cheek.

A scruffy, stout police officer approached them with an outstretched palm, speaking in French. Naomi did not speak the language but knew that he was informing them that the area was off-limits.

L held up his fake ID and began speaking in fluent French. She heard him use his alias "Ryuzaki" and she thought she heard "L" in there somewhere. The police officer took L's badge and Naomi offered hers as well.

The officer studied the badges. His facial expression changed from suspicious to mildly impressed.

"Le célèbre détective, L, hein? Hmm."

He then looked directly at Naomi. He seemed to be checking her out. Smiling, he said something she didn't understand but his tone indicated that he was hitting on her.

"Oh, je ne parle pas Français," she said curtly, with a slight wave of her hand.

The police officer didn't take his eyes off of her as he returned the badges. He rubbed his scratchy face before turning to L and making some sort of suggestive-sounding remark.

Naomi rolled her eyes and looked to L for support.

But L grinned mischievously, his teeth stained red from the candy. It was a little creepy. He made a cocky-sounding reply, gesturing with his lollipop in Naomi's direction.

The two men broke into noisy laughter. The officer clapped L on the back and lifted the yellow tape. The smile on L's face vanished abruptly.

Naomi put her hand on her hip and opened to ask what in the world was going on but L nudged her back to start walking. They ducked under the tape and proceeded toward the house.

"Okay, Ryuzaki, what was that?" she queried in a bothered tone.

L shrugged, hunched over again with his hands stuffed in his pockets. "Nothing. He... complemented you. I did the same. It got us through quickly."

"Ew, what did you say?" Naomi insisted. "And I have a feeling 'complemented' is the wrong word to use, isn't it?"

When he didn't answer again, she stopped walking and reached over to snatch the lollipop out of his mouth.

"Ow!" he complained, putting a hand to his teeth.

Naomi smirked. She stood blocking his path and holding the lollipop up like a mother who had just taken a treat away from her child.

"Tell me what you said to that ert," she stubbornly demanded.

She could see L's eyes a little from behind his sunglasses. He didn't look pleased.

"Naomi," he began, his voice calm but transparently irritated. "I am not telling you what I said. Do not ask me again. We work together and it would be... uncomfortable. Please understand that I will do and say whatever it takes to get me the information I need in a timely manner, and right now, you are actively preventing me from getting that information. Furthermore, your petty emotional intrigue is currently eliminating whatever time I may have saved us back there, so please, Agent Misora... Step. Aside."

His voice remained low but it was the closest L had ever come to yelling at her.

Naomi swallowed and nodded. She and L had become so candid with one another, what with all the time they spent together, that she had lost sight of the fact that he was still her superior and her boss- not to mention the legendary world's greatest detective.

"I'm sorry, Sir," she apologized, her head dropping and her cheeks burning. She knew L didn't require her to use the formal address but it felt appropriate at the moment. She stepped aside meekly.

As he walked past her, hands in his pockets, he used his mouth to retrieve the lollipop from her hand and stepped into the house. Naomi followed behind him, determined to restore L's faith in her as a professional agent.

As they entered the house and showed their badges to the necessary personnel, Naomi was reminded once again how much respect the mere mention of the name "L" merited. Police men and women stepped aside as L's agents were led upstairs and into a small room with wood flooring. The room was empty, save for the carefully laid out body of a young woman and the few dozen candles surrounding her.

The flames had been put out, but everything else remained untouched and a police officer was placing evidence cards around the scene. He was asked to leave the room by the officer in charge and L and Naomi thereafter found themselves alone with the victim.

Naomi swallowed. Experience never made scenes like the one before her any easier to behold. The woman was young and appeared no older than 25. Her blonde hair had been carefully arranged about her shoulders and her long eyelashes rested gently on her pale, grey face. Her hands were placed over her heart holding a wooden crucifix- just like always. Were it not for the horrific, scarlet gash on , she would've looked like she were only sleeping.

L handed his sunglasses to Naomi and approached the girl's body, crouching down on the floor next to her, his arms folding atop his knees. He chewed on the lollipop stick as his eyes scanned the scene, taking in every detail.

At length, he rolled forward onto his hands and feet and began sniffing the body. He sniffed her shirt and down by her knees and then back up to her shirt. It looked like he was playing a game of "hotter or colder." He seemed to find what he was looking for in the girl's hair.

"Misora," he said, returning to his frog pose. "Come here, please."

Naomi stepped over and knelt down next to L.

L gestured toward the girl's hair. "What do you smell?"

Naomi leaned forward and sniffed.

"It smells like... flowers?"

"Yes, specifically roses. What seems off about that to you?" The lollipop stick was pinched between his thumb and finger and was being vigorously chewed, despite the candy on the end of it being gone.

Naomi looked at what the girl was wearing. Khaki pants and a tucked-in polo shirt indicated that she was dressed for work. The state of the clothes pointed to her having come from a shift rather than her being on her way to one. A ketchup stain on her shirt that appeared quite new confirmed this theory.

"Her hair wouldn't smell so nice after a waitressing shift," Naomi concluded.

"That's exactly what I was thinking," L said thoughtfully, his eyes narrowing. He was trailing the lollipop stick back and forth across his bottom lip.

"Hmm." He stood up and stuffed his hands into his pockets again. He took a slow turn about the room, bending to inspect the candles and pausing a long moment to gaze out the room's single window.

Naomi realized with amusement that, all dressed up, he appeared much more like she had originally pictured him in her head, though she never would have included the lollipop or the wild hair in that mental image.

After several minutes, he turned to Naomi. The stick was tucked under his top lip like a cigarette.

"Misora, I am going to go speak to the head officer. Please give this room a thorough inspection and take photos. I'll be waiting outside when you are through."

He collected his sunglasses and walked past her. But he paused at the top of the stairs, his back curved and his hands pocketed. Without turning around, he spoke quietly.

"Naomi Misora, I should not have spoken about you in that way to the police officer. Please accept my apology."

Naomi was surprised. But she smiled. She was well aware that an apology from L was only made with the utmost sincerity.

"Of course I do, Sir. Thank you."

"Please stop calling me Sir."

And with that, he descended the stairs, leaving Naomi to do what she did best.

As she worked, she wondered for the millionth time in her career what would drive someone to do such horrible things as this. What was The Bishop's motive? What was the connection between the seemingly random choices of victims? There was no discernible pattern when it came to gender, age, race, or personal acquaintances. Was it really just coincidence?

She did her job quickly and met L downstairs when she was through. He was speaking in French with the head officer. Somehow, he had obtained another lollipop. This one was yellow.

He saw Naomi approaching and bid his farewells, turning to leave with her. As they walked toward the car, Naomi noticed a look in his eyes that she recognized. She grinned.

"You're onto something, aren't you?"

L didn't answer but he smiled a little around the lollipop in his mouth. He removed the sunglasses and placed them on top of his head.

Then he turned to face the house and walked backwards, his hands in his pockets. His dark-rimmed eyes were fixed and determined, as if he were challenging a rival. When they reached the car, he pulled the lollipop out of his mouth and pointed forcefully with it toward the house that held The Bishop's latest victim to make a parting declaration:

"Je suis la justice!"

Then he hopped inside the car, promptly kicking off his shoes.