Choices

AN: This was originally not going to be out until Friday, but to thank everyone for getting this fic over 200 reviews on ff.net I decided to get off my lazy a** and edit this. (It’s also a treat for me because it gets me closer to posting my FAVORITE chapter of the fic, 16) Also if there are some errors, please don’t hurt me, I got like no sleep last night and I edited this only twice instead of three times.

And if anyone can spot them, there are plenty of allusions to coming events in here... buwhahahah!

Suggested Listening: Fever by Adam Lambert (Yes I know it's also by lady gaga, but I'm kind of addicted to his version, don't ask me why. You might just hit me...); Him by Lunic

Chapter Thirteen: Chaos

Matt walked back to their room, coffee in hand, and yawned widely as he opened the door. Mello was already inside, as he had suspected, and Mello glanced up wordlessly as he shut the door.

Mello seemed to have gotten enough studying done the night before, as he was now sprawled across his bed, novel in one hand, and chocolate bar between his lips.

Once classes had ended Matt knew there would be no hope of him being able stay awake after his restless night of sleep. He'd gotten a fair amount of sleep, surprisingly, as he hadn't woken up once during the night, but whatever dreams he'd been having had left him rather unrested in the morning.

Though Matt doubted they had been of the sexual kind, despite how the night had ended, he would have noticed something like that.

He hadn't been able to hide out in the bathroom as long as he'd have liked, as Mello would have questioned the reasons. And he doubted Mello would have understood his embarrassment over the situation.

“I had wondered why you practically ran from class. You even got here before me and dropped your things off.” Mello commented. Matt saw no reason to reply, as there had been no question.

He took a textbook off his desk and placed it on his bed along with his laptop before he sat down. As he booted up the laptop he set the coffee gently on the book; careful not to knock it off his mini coffee table.

It had been a long shot going to the kitchens after classes, as he hadn’t known how long it took to prepare dinner, but it had paid off in the end. He had made a half pot of strong coffee and practically chugged his first cup before he took the second back with him.

He couldn't afford to delay the second hack into Whammys any further. There were, from what he remembered, a lot of files to go through and he didn't know how long it would take him to find, if anything, useful.

“You're always on your laptop if your PSP is charging, what are you doing on it? And please don't tell me you’re watching porn.”

Matt cracked a smile and looked up. “Playing solitaire. Though you did give me a good idea.” Mello groaned at his answer and shook his head.

“You're hopeless Matty!” Mello stilled, near instantly, after he'd spoken. What had Mello just called him?

“It's just a nickname....” the blonde murmured, eyes glued to the novel, though it was clear he wasn't reading. Mello had given him a nickname, one that he'd obviously never intended to speak out loud.

Matt grinned, happy, and ridiculously so.

“Ok, Mel. And I thought nicknames were supposed to be shorter than the name?” Matt teased. He found that it amused him how Mello's eyes widened, almost double, as the blonde looked up sharply.

“Mel? I'm not a girl!” Mello growled. Matt shrugged.

“It suits you though. If you call me Matty, then I’m going to call you Mel.” Matt found that he rather liked that idea, despite having never thought of calling Mello anything else other than Mello. Mello seemed to frown, for an instant, before he let his head fall to the bedspread.

“Fine!”

Matt wondered, now that they had agreed to that, if Mello would dare call him that in public. Dare let anyone know just how close of friends they were. Mello, despite how much he protested, did care what others thought of him. And Mello would be the type to consider friendship a weakness if it got in his way.

“Hey Matt... why are you so comfortable around me?” Matt stared back at Mello, who was now propped up on his elbows, still lying on his stomach. “I mean, you were rather distant when you first got here, quiet as hell until I pissed you off...” Mello trailed off as he obviously waited for an answer.

“You're the same with me. So what's your answer?” Matt smirked at the annoyed look on the blondes face, though Mello did appear to consider his own question. His brows knitted in concentration; he seemed to struggle with the answer. A few minutes passed and Matt thought he saw surprise flicker across Mello's features before the blonde shrugged; he either didn't know, or didn’t feel like elaborating.

“Well, when you can answer your own question I'll tell you my answer.” Matt said evenly. He wasn't sure what Mello's answer would be, though by the time Mello felt like answering perhaps Matt would be able to tell him the truth.

Mello pouted.

Actually pouted.

Matt swallowed inaudibly; he knew that if the blonde ever used that on him purposely, he'd do whatever Mello wanted. Matt was just thankful his friend didn't seem to have noticed his reaction.

Mello was too cute for his own good. Though he knew Mello would probably kill him for having thought of him as cute. Not that the blonde wasn’t sexy too, how could he not be when he wore that leather all the time?

Matt completely cut off that train of thought as his jeans had started to become tight; the thought of Mello in those painted on leathers, and being able to see him in said leathers at that moment, was enough to give him bad thoughts.

Those sorts of things had happened a lot more lately, now that he'd uncovered what he felt, and Matt knew that it was mostly his teenage hormones to blame. Just because he was a genius didn’t mean he was immune to that sort of thing, sadly.

And he knew that thus far he'd been very lucky, all things considered. A lot more embarrassing things could have happened, but so far hadn’t, if he excluded a certain incident; which he still didn't know what Mello had heard.

He looked down at his laptop, which had long since finished booting up, and gave a quiet sigh. It would be quite a lengthy task, not the hack, but the files themselves. He pulled up a game of solitaire, moved a few cards, and opened his real work.

He had told Mello he played games on there...

It was still ridiculously easy to hack Whammys, and nothing had been changed since the first hack. No one had noticed his presence at all, and no new security had been added. Matt knew that if worse came to worse, he could always quietly mention Mello and Near's names to L, which should get his attention. At least he hoped, because that was the only backup plan he had if there was nothing of value to be had.

There were hundreds of folders, though for the moment he could rule the ones on the other orphans out. Though it still left a rather large amount to go over. He turned everything into a list, rather than thumbnails, and started at the top.

The first folder dealt entirely with Whammys financial situation. The amount of money that Quillsh Whammy had, and used for Whammys or L, was astounding. Matt couldn't even begin to think of what he would do with that kind of money.

It was no surprise, given those figures, that the kids at Whammys were well taken care of and were given the best of everything they desired. But that folder didn't hold anything of real importance, mainly a history of dealings and shipment logs.

What he really needed was L's name, though he doubted that would be on there, as nothing about L had even been mentioned the last time he'd skimmed the folders. Though he hadn't looked at all the folders...

He sipped at his coffee, though it had grown cool.

More folders and more misses, it went on for hours. Each folder contained more folders to go through, and more useless albeit interesting information. He had passed over Mello, Near and his own folders as he knew what was in it, though they had been updated. He wondered what it said about him and Mello as friends, but his curiosity would have to wait.

He had begun to get frustrated, he'd known it would take time to go through everything, but there was just so much... he wondered if everything valuable, if there was anything, was hidden amidst the mountain of mundane files.

It would certainly be a deterrent to a normal hacker, who would only get orphans names and Whammys account history, but perhaps if he looked hard enough there would be something else....

“Matt!” he ignored Mello in favor of a new file. The size was fairly large and about decorations, or so stated the folder name. Not something you'd normally find mixed in.

“Maaatty!” Mello yelled. With a sigh Matt glanced at his friend, perhaps the nicknames were a bad idea...

“Get off your ass, it's time to eat.”

Matt blinked; he'd been going through the folders for that long already?

“You go on ahead. I'm staying.” though he wondered how exactly he was going to accomplish that.

Mello stopped and stared at him. “I don't think so.” Mello made a move to grab him so he flinched backwards away from him, he really hadn't wanted to play that card but he couldn't afford to stop and eat at the moment.

The blonde froze and backed away, crossing his arms uncertainly. Matt knew that if Mello stayed much longer, he would probably just decide not to go as well, and Mello was skinny enough as it was.

“I'm in the middle of beating my high score, it’s not something I can pause either.” he said but didn't look up. He already knew what Mello's expression would be; incredulous.

He heard the sharp intake of breath and knew he was about to get a lecture, which from Mello was more of a one sided shouting match.

“If you're that worried about my health, than bring me back an apple or something.” he told Mello. And when he glanced up, Matt smirked as Mello caught the silent jab pointed at him.

The blonde only rolled his eyes and sighed heavily. “How is it that you get to miss meals and I don’t?”

“Because I haven't missed many before, and I know when to stop myself before I get exhausted, unlike a certain someone I know.” though Matt supposed some of his statements were untrue, as he sometimes went beyond his own limits if it was something important; and this was important.

“I don't think they have apples at dinner.” Mello said with a smirk.

“I'm sure you'll think of something.” Matt answered and went back to the files. He heard Mello sigh again before he left, and the room was plunged into complete silence.

He really wished things could have stayed simple for a little while longer. He felt as though something was coming to an end, he just wasn't sure what. “Damn Kira...”

A name on a folder caught his eye, Beyond Birthday.

He remembered reading about the Los Angeles BB murder cases a few years back, and according to this, Beyond had come from Whammys. He'd been L's backup. And in a connecting folder, another student, only known as A, had committed suicide.

Whammys certainly had their fair share of skeletons in the closet, didn't it?

He backed out of those folders, as it wasn't the information he was interested in, but still stayed under the 'decorations' file. There had to be something...

Two sub-folders later, and he was in the middle of L’s previous case files. He pulled his goggles free and rubbed carefully at his eyes. Why couldn't there be flashing neon signs that pointed him to what he wanted?

But the fact that there was more stuff on L meant he was getting somewhere, right?

It figured that it would be completely buried though. His stomach rumbled but he ignored it, dinner was almost over at any rate, so even had he decided to leave he wouldn't have made it in time. He hoped Mello was able to bring him something...

The next sub-folder contained cake recipes. Matt blinked for a few seconds before he exited that folder. Cake recipes? What the hell...

The door swung open and crashed against the wall and Matt jumped, startled.

Mello stood in the doorway, grin on his face as though he'd done it purposely, with a plate in one hand and an apple in the other. “There is a thing called knocking, have you heard of it?” Matt asked, as he minimized Whammys and pulled up Solitaire.

“I shouldn’t have to knock on my own door.” Mello snorted as he strode into the room.

“No, but you didn't have to send the door flying either.” Matt replied, though he took the plate that was offered to him.

It was filled with some pasta dish and had a few pieces of bread to the side. It looked good and his stomach rumbled again.

“And you were going to skip dinner completely. Idiot.” Mello sat beside him, careful not to knock over the mostly empty coffee mug. Before he ate Matt replaced his goggles. It was strange, but he didn't really mind having them off when he was around Mello.

Well, perhaps it wasn't that strange...

“How did you even get this out of there, doesn't Rodger always hover by the doors to make sure kids don’t try and take stuff?” Rodger didn't want the food to leave the dining hall because he didn't want to clean up any messes that would be made.

Chocolate was the only exception.

“I just told him you weren't feeling well, and that if a mess was made I’d clean it with him watching over me.” Mello's tone was amused, though Matt could also tell he was being warned not to spill anything, especially as the pasta was covered in a red sauce.

“Thanks.” he smiled at Mello who turned away and bit into the apple, his face looked a little pink though...

Matt took a bite of the pasta, it wasn't bad, though he'd never really been a fan of red sauce. But he was hungry, and Mello would probably force him to eat it either way.

“It was boring without you. I almost strangled Near when he asked where you were. Little bastard...” Mello commented a few minutes later.

“Sorry I missed it.” he smirked around the fork. Mello's form of almost usually involved lunging across the table and grabbing Near by the front of his shirt, at least in the case of the dinning hall. Mello sent him a lopsided grin and continued to eat the apple.

It was a little odd to see the blonde eat something other than chocolate, or something that wasn’t dipped in chocolate, and Matt wondered at that. Though perhaps it was just the fact that it was an apple...

Mello took the plate from him just as he finished off the reminder of the bread slices. “You have to take that back now?” he asked. Mello nodded. “I can take it.” he mumbled. Five minutes wouldn't disrupt the hack. The entire forty minute dinner however, would have.

And Matt supposed that he did need a break…

“It's fine Matt.” Mello said as he walked to the door. But Matt didn’t feel comfortable with the blonde doing that for him, and Mello's tone had changed in a way that left an odd feeling in his chest.

Mello wasn't annoyed... it was something else. Something Matt couldn't figure out.

“I'm between games so I’ll go with you. Maybe I can get more coffee while we're out, though I doubt it.” Matt mumbled, as he stood up. Mello looked at him and sighed, evidently having realized that there was no choice in the matter.

“You do realize that if Rodger spots you walking around my cover story goes down the drain?” Mello commented dryly as he opened the door for them.

“If we have to cross that bridge I’ll figure something out.” Matt called from the bathroom, having run to quickly rinse the cup of the previous leftover coffee. It wasn't like Rodger couldn't be fooled. The man was smart enough, most of the time, to realize when he was being lied to, his time spent managing an orphanage full of genii made sure of it, but Matt knew he could easily spin a lie should a problem arise.

The pair was silent in the hallway, which was void of most children who were either in the common room or their own rooms by then, and even more so as they approached the kitchens. There was a multitude of noise from the other side that made Matt sigh. There would most definitely be no refill of coffee that night.

Even so he followed Mello inside. It was probably time that the cup got properly washed at any rate. Rinsing it out could only do so much. He would just have to get a new cup the next time he needed coffee.

“You wanted to come, so let’s go.” Mello interrupted his thoughts, and though his tone was annoyed, the image was broken by the smirk on his lips. “You can fantasize about your coffee another time.”

It wasn't the coffee he fantasized about....

Not that Matt would ever admit to it.

They walked into the kitchen, which was alive with people running about and putting things away or just cleaning things in general. Mello took the cup from his hands and walked over to a counter and placed the dishes on it; he didn't wait for anyone to spot them and motioned for Matt to leave.

“Rodger never said I had to wait for them.” Mello said with a shrug as they headed back to their room. Mello seemed slightly more relaxed than he had been earlier, and Matt wondered if he was just getting annoyed with being cooped up in their room for hours on end.

Though that was mainly Mello's own fault, as he could always go and play sports with the other teens if he so chose. Matt however, had no such problem with staying inside, and in one spot, for long periods of time.

They reached their room in what seemed like record time, though it was probably only because nothing had been going on, including talking. Matt had almost wished that someone had come along to hassle them, at least then the trip wouldn't have been utterly boring.

Though it was probably better that nothing of the sort had happened.

Matt knew it was back to the hack for him, but Mello was left with nothing more entertaining than a book to read. Matt supposed, since the next day was Friday, that Mello should probably study, or he would worry about things the entire day.

He wondered if Mello felt like he would be breaking their ongoing deal if he studied too often. Which as long as he didn't exhaust himself and actually took care of himself, he wouldn't be.

“Hey Mello?” he asked as he tugged his boots off, having not wanted them on his bed anymore.

“Hmmm?” the blonde answered noncommittally as he searched through a small pile of novels he had stacked on the corner of his desk.

“Don't stay up too late studying.” Matt said while he lay on his stomach in front of the laptop. Mello looked over at him with a large grin stretched across his face. Matt would never understand why Mello got so excited over studying...

Matt pulled open Whammys again, the hack still holding strong and nothing had happened in his absence. He still had a lot of files to go through, and just in that one main folder.

He had been about to skip over one of the sub-folders, as inside there was nothing more than more finances and cases, when two words stuck out to him.

Death Note.

Matt eyes widened. He knew exactly what that was. Death Note was a series of underground night clubs that Light had established in order to safely complete his business with other criminals.

Though Light hated being referred to as such.

Matt quickly opened the folder and skimmed through its contents. It seemed that L had caught on to the clubs, though it appeared that he only suspected it was some small time dealer or mafia that ran things.

L had no idea about Kira, or he would have connected him with Death Note.

While that was definitely good information, it still wasn't enough to make L want to speak with him privately. He could have easily found out about it on the web, or from someone he or his 'parents' had known.

Death Note was an underground club, not a secret of substantial proportions.

But that was more than promising. Though he couldn't figure out why it was mixed in with those files rather than the previous cases. Unless it was only there because it was a current case...

He pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind and exited the sub-folder; it was back to the search.

Finally he found a folder that appeared to be what he was looking for. It was simply entitled '12'; which would mean nothing to most people. But, if Matt was correct, lead straight to L.

The mouse hovered silently over the folder as he pressed his finger down to click on it.

Matt swore as an alert popped up in the middle of his screen, flashing red lights on the border stuck out against the black screen and white lettering. He had to pull out, someone was attempting to trace his location. It might even be L, since Matt was in Whammys systems.

He easily pulled out of Whammys and disengaged the hack, and made sure he left nothing that could be traced back to his computer.

He would have to be careful when he went back in the next day. He didn't have a choice but to go back, he still hadn't found anything, and he'd rather not use Mello's real name as a bargaining chip. It just felt wrong... especially since Mello hadn't freely told Matt his name.

But he knew where to look now. It might end up being nothing, or it might end up being his holy grail.

Matt looked up finally and glanced over at Mello, who was asleep on his bed, surrounded by textbooks and chocolate wrappers. Matt shook his head and carefully slid off his bed. He made sure the laptop was on shut down before he closed the lid gently as he placed it on his desk.

He quickly changed and made sure his PSP was on charge, though he probably should have thought of that sooner.

He yawned quietly. It was probably, despite the numerous reasons against it, a good thing that he'd been forced to retire early, he was tired. All those long nights, sleepless or otherwise, in a row and the building stress had really begun to bother him.

He picked up no less than six wrappers from Mello's bed, tossed them into the trash, and gathered the textbooks. Once they were on Mello's desk, he frowned as he watched the blonde.

He was on top of the covers, and Matt knew he wouldn't be able to move him without Mello waking. The only thing he could do was pull what portion of the blanket that was available over the blonde and hope he stayed warm. Thankfully Mello wasn't one to toss around during his sleep, at least not usually. So the blanket should stay over him.

Damn Rodger and his stinginess over the heat.

Matt stretched and yawned again. He turned off Mello's lamp and walked over to his own side of the room and got into bed. The sheets were cool underneath and made him shiver as he shifted to get comfortable.

He glanced over at Mello one last time and grinned at the cute smile that now tugged at the blonde’s lips, though Matt couldn't think of any reason other than a pleasant dream for it to be there.

He switched his light off and the room was plunged into darkness. He blinked a few times to let his eyes get a little more adjusted. Though he didn't know why he bothered as the PSP was on charge.

He yawned again and rolled over with a sigh. When everything was over with, he was going to take a nice long sleep, everyone else be damned.

He closed his eyes to the darkness and felt sleep tug at him. Though he would remain in that half state for a while longer.

-End Chaos-

AN: Wow this one got long... And I originally didn't see it getting any longer than 2,000 words. ;D

And this chapter was nice to me after the last two..... I got so frustrated with writing this fic that it became very hard to write it, and I actually had to rewrite most of the last chapter. No worries, I just needed to start a oneshot ( which happened to be ‘Dead is the New Alive’) to divert my issues onto, this fic is back in working order... for now -_-;

Also, I will probably post this up here a few more times before the end of the fic, but look carefully at the summary for this fic. ^_^