The corner of the inspector’s mouth twitched in a smile as L added his own links to the chain of thoughts. While this wasn’t the time to discuss the matter of profiling at length, he couldn’t resist continuing. “Naturally. The man already has a sizeable body count from what I’ve heard, regardless his state of mind.”
Lunge’s eyes never left L’s face once. Interesting how the man seemed to intensify along with the conversation. It was as though someone had taken a microscope and tightened the focus for a few moments, or like a cheetah suddenly breaking pace for a brief, blinding sprint before falling back into a trot. The man’s languor seemed similarly fated to be breached by the occasional emergence of sharp insight. A hint of what lay beneath the surface.
“The question of what kind of megalomaniac we are looking at,” he agreed, “is the key one. Until that is answered- which won’t be any time soon, I’d wager- there is little that can be done. For the moment, I’ll be keeping my investigations on a more tangible level, one that I can personally verify in some way. Alec Doyle and the patient files are just a couple of the possible topics, the latter of which I’d like to look into as soon as possible.”
“As for the clubs…” Lunge shook his head. “No. I had considered signing up for something, but eventually I decided that it would be an unnecessary distraction from my work.”
Not that this was any great loss, so far as Lunge was concerned; the tasks they set were well-meaning but of little use to him, besides which he had never worked well with authority even at the best of times. It was fortunate, therefore, that at the worst of times he had never shied away from working alone. If Ruhenheim hadn’t managed to break him, he severely doubted that Landel’s Institute would.
Just why L wanted to keep his identity so carefully under wraps, however… now that was less clear to him. There was taking the necessary precautions and then there was paranoia, but the line between the two seemed less well defined with him.
Something in the back of his own mind made a casual, drifting connection with the mysterious ‘Kira case’ the man had been so reluctant to discuss, but brushed it off with a nod. The relevance of that matter was debatable. Prioritising was necessary. “Of course.”
Having settled that, the chair gave a quiet squeak of protest as Lunge sat back. “Well. I think that about covers things for the moment. If all things go as planned, this should be the beginning of an… interesting partnership.” He held out a hand, but there was something oddly challenging behind the well-mannered smile that accompanied it. “Don’t you think?”
no subject
The corner of the inspector’s mouth twitched in a smile as L added his own links to the chain of thoughts. While this wasn’t the time to discuss the matter of profiling at length, he couldn’t resist continuing. “Naturally. The man already has a sizeable body count from what I’ve heard, regardless his state of mind.”
Lunge’s eyes never left L’s face once. Interesting how the man seemed to intensify along with the conversation. It was as though someone had taken a microscope and tightened the focus for a few moments, or like a cheetah suddenly breaking pace for a brief, blinding sprint before falling back into a trot. The man’s languor seemed similarly fated to be breached by the occasional emergence of sharp insight. A hint of what lay beneath the surface.
“The question of what kind of megalomaniac we are looking at,” he agreed, “is the key one. Until that is answered- which won’t be any time soon, I’d wager- there is little that can be done. For the moment, I’ll be keeping my investigations on a more tangible level, one that I can personally verify in some way. Alec Doyle and the patient files are just a couple of the possible topics, the latter of which I’d like to look into as soon as possible.”
“As for the clubs…” Lunge shook his head. “No. I had considered signing up for something, but eventually I decided that it would be an unnecessary distraction from my work.”
Not that this was any great loss, so far as Lunge was concerned; the tasks they set were well-meaning but of little use to him, besides which he had never worked well with authority even at the best of times. It was fortunate, therefore, that at the worst of times he had never shied away from working alone. If Ruhenheim hadn’t managed to break him, he severely doubted that Landel’s Institute would.
Just why L wanted to keep his identity so carefully under wraps, however… now that was less clear to him. There was taking the necessary precautions and then there was paranoia, but the line between the two seemed less well defined with him.
Something in the back of his own mind made a casual, drifting connection with the mysterious ‘Kira case’ the man had been so reluctant to discuss, but brushed it off with a nod. The relevance of that matter was debatable. Prioritising was necessary. “Of course.”
Having settled that, the chair gave a quiet squeak of protest as Lunge sat back. “Well. I think that about covers things for the moment. If all things go as planned, this should be the beginning of an… interesting partnership.” He held out a hand, but there was something oddly challenging behind the well-mannered smile that accompanied it. “Don’t you think?”