Watari Pt 1: L\'s Heirs

Mello ran into their back pantry the second they were home, throwing the switches that would activate the electrical fence around their property. Checking all of the alarms and light sensors, he felt reasonably satisfied that no-one or nothing had been in here since they were last home. Matt had already dashed upstairs and Mello followed, taking the steps two at a time, but they disappeared into different rooms. In Mello\'s study, he first checked the security monitors, flicking through any of the motion activated recordings. His heart skipped a beat when the retrieval scan told him that there had been two.



"Matt!" Mello called, before clicking on the first. The redhead appeared beside him. But the first was just Matt running back into the house shortly after they had started to leave. They watched him cross the kitchen and empty milk down the sink before rinsing out the carton and leaving again. "We didn\'t pick up any more milk. Shit."



"I\'ll nip and get some once I\'ve got my programmes running in there."



The second clip was much shorter. It briefly showed their landing with no-one upon it, then finished six seconds later. Mello frowned and rewound it. It showed exactly the same thing. "Spider?"



"Shouldn\'t be that sensitive." He started to leave again. "I\'ll pick it up from in here and manipulate it a bit, see if there\'s anything there. Probably the ghost."



"Matt!" Mello snapped. "Don\'t tell me we\'ve got ghosts, then say you\'re going to leave me to get milk."



Matt stopped at the door. "Since when have you believed in ghosts?"



"Just get on with what you\'ve got to do. I\'ll get the milk." Mello tapped angrily at his keyboard, bringing up the files that he had been looking through on the laptop all the way home. "Matt, you did make all of these lines restricted, didn\'t you?" There was no response. The redhead had gone into his own study. Mello crossed and closed his door, more nervous than he would have admitted by the sight of the landing outside. He had once glimpsed Lawliet and he still wasn\'t sure if that was hallucination or real. He had spoken with a Shinigami. He had faith in the Holy Spirit. He reminded himself that Matt was being ridiculous and returned to the monitors. He selected a number and fed the link through to Matt before dialling. They could both listen in.



A huge W filled the screen and Roger\'s voice sounded, "Hello M."



"Have you given the case to Near?"



"He has been working on it since it was first announced."



"And?" Mello snapped, impatiently.



Roger sighed, "I have sent him the information as it arrives, but he hasn\'t discussed his conclusions with me."



"Has he got anything that I haven\'t?"



"M, I am not even supposed to be sending you..."



"It\'s either send them or I hack in and get them." Mello growled. "Don\'t fuck with me Roger, please."



"M, a gentleman does not use language like that." Roger replied softly. "It makes you sound like an uneducated villain, now please deport yourself as befits your upbringing. I have a webcam link to the crime scene. Would you like to be connected to that?"



Mello paused in the process of pressing the button to retort the reprimanding, but instead pressed it to say, "Yes, please."



"One moment, please, M." He was gone for several minutes, then the W lit up again. "I am addressing you all. You need to know that this is a conference call." Mello glared at the speakers. "I am connecting D."



The voice was synthetic, but Mello know that it was Deontic. "Hello all." Even through the electronics, she sounded uncharacteristically flustered. "I have just found Nathalie shot dead. I am in her apartment right now. I haven\'t alerted the police. What should I do?"



Although similarly warped, the reply unmistakably came from Near. "Do not touch a thing. Describe what you see."



"Describe what I see?" Deontic practically screamed. "I see my best friend dead on the floor and her blood everywhere."



Mello pressed the button. "D, if I was still in London, I\'d come over. I feel for you and I\'m here best I can over a telephone." He swallowed. "You are contacting us on a laptop? Is there a webcam?"



"M?" Deontic shrieked. "M! You are telling me that Mello is listening to this conversation? Roger, what the Hell?"



Roger and Near tried to speak together, but the older man bowed out. Near continued, "Mello didn\'t shoot Jonny." There was a loud \'woot\' from across the landing. "The fact that Nathalie has been killed too means that we are all in danger."



"N, you had better have some good evidence to back up your theory." Deontic responded. "From where I\'m standing, I just see a psychopathic bastard, who made all of our lives Hell on Earth when we were kids; scared the life out of us all yesterday, pulling guns out at the gallery and at Nathalie\'s; threatening Nathalie with the Mafia; then all of this! Are you telling me he\'s never pulled a gun on you, N? Because it\'s really scary when he does."



Mello\'s door opened and Matt sauntered in. "Want me to tell them that you\'ve been with me all the time?"



"No." Mello was sitting on his hands to resist the temptation to respond himself. "The case has to come from Near."



Near replied, "D, you have every right to be scared. I would be scared if I was you, because the killer could still be around. You are a target too."



"For fuck\'s sake, Near, you tactless arse!" Mello shouted at the screen, but none of them could hear him. "Just get on with it, so I can advise her what to do." He paced the floor in front of the monitors. "Who was fourth, Matt?" He glared at the redhead\'s quizzical look. "In fact, get me the rankings of all fifteen of us, as they were last known."



Near was speaking over the monitors. "D should wait there until my people reach her. What is your address?"



"Forget it, Near. I\'m leaving. I\'ll call later with Nathalie\'s address."



"D!" Mello pressed the button. "D! The webcam was for your protection. If you put it on, then anyone coming in knows that we can see them. If that person wants to kill the rest of us, then that\'s too risky. N, she needs to know why I couldn\'t have been the person who shot Jonny or Nathalie. She would be less scared then. D, if you leave on your own, you could be followed. Nathalie\'s loft is open, you can see anyone there, though you should check the bathroom. She also had a lot of security, so she must have known the killer and let that person in. How did you get in?"



There was the longest pause. "The door was open."



Matt suddenly leapt away from the desk and ran into his own room. Mello watched him go, but no word of explanation was called back. Near stated firmly, "D should photograph the door and then lock it."



"No." Mello growled into the receiver. "D should just lock the fucking door. Her safety is paramount over disturbing a crime scene."



A new voice spoke up and none of them recognised it. "For what\'s it\'s worth, I agree with Mello."



Near and Mello tried to speak together. There was a jumbled tangle of voices, indiscernable to anyone. Then Matt\'s voice sounded, "D, the laptop is about to switch itself on. Don\'t be scared. It\'s just me. I\'ve got a Trojan in it."



Near interjected, "Roger, send me a list of who is in this conference call."



Mello sighed, "Let\'s just have a bloody register. Mello and Matt are both here at my end." He jumped as a screen beside him suddenly showed the scene in Nathalie\'s apartment. Deontic was cowering by the side of the cupboards folding paper with her laptop beside her. She looked terrified. "D, I can see you. You\'re ok, baby. Matt\'s patched through a webcam feed to me." He smirked, imagining how that information would go down in Near\'s offices, then saw Nathalie. He whispered another \'De Profundis\', though he kept his finger off the button to do so.



"Matt should patch the feed through to Watari." Near bristled.



"Oh really?" Matt taunted. "Well maybe Matt would feel more inclined to do that, if Near would just get on with clearing Mello\'s name." Mello closed his eyes and cringed. "Let\'s put it this way. Near, I assume that you have had the information longer than Mello. But in less time, Mello has the address, has a webcam in the second crime scene and has a pretty good idea who the killer is. His priority is keeping D safe, but he can\'t do that until you spill the fucking defence. You do that and I give you the feed. \'kay?"



Mello responded before Near could, "Matt, let them have the feed, please?" His finger lingered on the button. "Just in case anyone thinks I\'m intimidating him, the whole reason we\'re having a conversation through this is because he\'s not standing next to me. D, I can see a good section of the room and I can\'t see any movement other than yourself. I\'m going to keep talking to you. Please stand up and walk along the cupboard. I know you\'re scared. I am going to shout out the second there is movement. I\'m watching your back." He kept his voice low, hypnotic. "Stand up now, D." On his screen, the woman just curled up closer into the corner where the cupboard met the wall. "D, listen to me. If it was me stalking you, wouldn\'t you be able to hear my voice outside the door too?" She looked up, terror and grief exhibited stark on her features. Her hands continued to make the little figures in paper. Mello glanced at the listing that Matt had sent to him a few seconds before. Deontic was fourth. Just slightly less intelligent than Matt, which was impressive in itself out of fifteen Wammy\'s House students. "I know you\'re afraid, but lock the door. Keep yourself safe. You\'re precious too, darling. I\'m watching your back."



"Mello should stop telling D to destroy evidence at a crime scene."



"Yes, well Near should remember what\'s important." Mello barked back. "Since when did the Watari remit ask us to be martyrs?" He watched Deontic edge along the cupboard and dash across the open doorway to see behind the door. "You\'re doing great, D. Now close the door." She slammed it shut and ran across to kick open the bathroom door. He watched her whole body sink with relief, then she ran back to her corner.



"I\'ve closed the door. I\'m alone in here, except for Nathalie." Her voice cracked.



"You\'re a brave woman, D. I\'m proud of you." Mello responded. "Now, who else is here?" The roll call came: Watari, Near, Mello, Matt, Deontic and Salvo. Mello glanced down the list. Salvo had been eleventh. He could barely recall him. "Ok, is everyone seeing the scene?" There was a round of negative responses. "Matt, why is no-one getting the feed?"



"Sorry, I\'m struggling with patching it though." Came the blase response. "Near, you were about to clear Mello\'s name."



Mello stepped across his room, opened the door, opened Matt\'s door and glared at the redhead. "You\'re not even touching your keyboard." His gaze took in the smirk. "Stop being an immature twat and get it patched through."



From Matt\'s speakers, Near began talking. "There is no motivation for Mello to kill Jonny and Nathalie. He wants to scare them so they will not overtake him, but he will lose more by killing them than not." Matt pressed the \'send\' button that had been waiting on his screen. "Mello would not overlook details like chocolate and cigarette butts, unless he was making a point about being there. There is no reason for Mello to leave clues like that, then deny it in person. He either did it and wants us to know or he doesn\'t; he wouldn\'t edge his bets. The very fact that this looks like he is means that he didn\'t do it. There is no gain for Mello here. I find it hard to believe that Mello would do something so uninteresting as these murders. Besides the cigarettes were not smoked in that room. There is no smell of smoke in the air, though the windows and doors were closed. If they were planted, it makes it more likely that the chocolate was planted too."



"Uninteresting?" Deontic burst out the second that she could interupt. "Two of my friends are dead and you are calling it uninteresting? Fuck you, Nate!"



Roger spoke next, "I have the feed, thank you, Matt. I am transmitting it out to you all."



Mello returned to his own study, closing the door behind him. He watched Deontic filling the floor around her with origami. The very sight made him need chocolate with a junkie\'s yearning. He took a fresh one from the table and bit into it. Matt was speaking again. "Near, you gave a lot of circumstantial evidence, but little in the way of hard facts." Mello glared at the door. Matt hadn\'t spoken this much, outside their room, in years at Wammy\'s House. "Look at the teethmarks on the chocolate. In fact look at the chocolate. Right brand, wrong size. But that size is easier to conceal in ordinary trouser pockets. The size that Mello eats, he has to keep it in his jacket pocket or else it\'s sticking out and someone would see it. That chocolate was soft, because it could be bitten into. That\'s consistent with being in a pocket where the body heat can get to it. Mello detests melted chocolate. He whinges for hours if that happens. When he eats chocolate, he snaps it off, so there are no teethmarks. A whole section goes diagonally across, because it\'s kept cold or room temperature. A cast can be made of the teethmarks on the chocolate at Jonny\'s house and compared to Mello\'s dental records at Wammy\'s and I am certain they will show a difference."



Mello returned to Matt\'s room. "Guapo, I love you, but please shut up. Near has to do it." He heard his own voice through the speakers. Matt still had his finger on the button. He released it with an apologetic grimace. "They won\'t believe you. I\'m sorry."



Roger\'s voice sounded, "It is also my professional opinion that Mello did not do this. He made an oath by his God, which is usually the sign that he is in earnest, that he is innocent."



"Of course, he didn\'t do it." Near snapped, evidentally becoming bored. "Does anybody want to offer an opinion on who did?"



There was silence.



Mello ran into his own room and pressed his button. "I guess the race is on again, Near. I\'ll be waiting at the finishing line for you again." He cut the connection and smiled.