Near sighs. "...It means a lot of things. L is... Well," Near pauses, trying to sort the information into the best manner possible. "L was my predecessor." He smiles a little. "The world's foremost detective, until he was murdered by Kira. Of course, the general public doesn't actually know that, and the people who do know that the original L is dead also know that I was trained in the same environment --sort of-- so... they're quite happy to let me hold the title," he explains.
He takes a sip of water, and continues:
"I'm not doing things the same way he did, though. L was... L was first. He was raised independently of other children, and I don't think he realized how bad things were for those of us who were being trained to succeed him. It was... very intense, and very competitive. The first child tipped to succeed him killed himself at fifteen. The second became a serial killer, and L ended up having to go after him. And then there was Mello and myself, and they weren't sure which of us L would choose, but he died before he had the chance. They offered us the position jointly, but Mello declined and ended up in the, ah... criminal underground," he says, with a bit of a sniff. Eighteen months later and that still pisses him off. Wonders will never cease.
"...So clearly, this business of spending your entire childhood being trained for a job that only one person can hold is a bit... counter-productive," he says with a shrug. "It's not good for the children, and it's not good for "L". So... While I'm still the 'world's foremost detective', I don't plan on working alone, as he did. But I still command the respect of various governments and agencies, especially after catching Kira," he adds. "So really, when I said I wanted things changed, they didn't have much choice but to go along with me."
He grins at this. Narcissistic, but he's terribly proud of it, really.
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He takes a sip of water, and continues:
"I'm not doing things the same way he did, though. L was... L was first. He was raised independently of other children, and I don't think he realized how bad things were for those of us who were being trained to succeed him. It was... very intense, and very competitive. The first child tipped to succeed him killed himself at fifteen. The second became a serial killer, and L ended up having to go after him. And then there was Mello and myself, and they weren't sure which of us L would choose, but he died before he had the chance. They offered us the position jointly, but Mello declined and ended up in the, ah... criminal underground," he says, with a bit of a sniff. Eighteen months later and that still pisses him off. Wonders will never cease.
"...So clearly, this business of spending your entire childhood being trained for a job that only one person can hold is a bit... counter-productive," he says with a shrug. "It's not good for the children, and it's not good for "L". So... While I'm still the 'world's foremost detective', I don't plan on working alone, as he did. But I still command the respect of various governments and agencies, especially after catching Kira," he adds. "So really, when I said I wanted things changed, they didn't have much choice but to go along with me."
He grins at this. Narcissistic, but he's terribly proud of it, really.