Watari Pt 1: L\'s Heirs

Minor eruptions of verbal sniping had taken place throughout the evening, yet were quickly smothered. Hal was quite surprised at just how quickly an exasperated glance from her could subdue them. It did help to consider them as children rather than geniuses; it wasn\'t far from the truth, as their ages ranged from seventeen to twenty-one. She strongly suspected that they all wanted to be calm and co-operative, but ingrained rivalry and pride meant that they couldn\'t be seen to be regulating themselves. It was very late when the news came through from Wammy\'s House, but they were all still at their stations. Hollow had died of a heart attack.



Mello stiffened and turned to look at Near, "Death Note?"



"I burned them all."



"New Shinigami bringing one down?"



Near played with his hair, his gaze resolutely turned away. After a moment, he stood and padded over to a cupboard, bringing out a box of finger-puppets. These were up-ended in the middle of the ordinary cards he had been engaged with. Mello nodded and returned to his screen. The rest of them took that as their cue to speculate. "It makes no sense!" Lamond moaned. "She has a heart attack, on a pew, in full view of dozens of tourists, then dies peacefully in a position of prayer? How does that even happen?"



Mello could answer the second part of that, though he didn\'t speak it aloud. Matt had placed her in that position. She had been wearing his ring. The more he ran through the facts, the closer he came to reasoning out a version of events less damning of his redhead. Eventually, he coughed. "There is something I haven\'t told you. Hollow was wearing Matt\'s ring." Mello pulled off his glove to show them his own, slightly more ornate version. "I took that as Matt\'s way of telling me that he had been with Hollow. I now think it\'s more than that. I think I was underestimating how easily he would give that ring up. I think Matt placed Hollow in that position and gave her the ring at the same time. It was his way of saying that he was in danger."



Deontic replied, "Evidence, Mello." It wasn\'t a question.



"You don\'t lie there in a position of prayer, after having a heart-attack, without someone putting you there. You\'d be more slumped than that. The facts are then that someone handled Hollow after her death without alerting the Cathedral staff to the situation. Agreed?" They all nodded or mumbled \'yes\'. "The last known person to have spoken with her was Matt. He was witnessed sitting beside her on the same pew. She was wearing his ring."



"Lovers?" Linda asked. Mello bowed his head. "Look, someone has to state the bloody obvious. We\'re trying to solve a case, not pussy-foot around your love-life. Basic facts here are that a man has given a woman a ring. What does that normally suggest to you?"



Salvo shook his head. "No. Matt\'s gay. He told Chrissie that when we were about twelve." He shrugged. "Ok, so she told me. It was juicy gossip. It was obvious that Mello was gay and they shared a room, so two and two together..."



Mello\'s head shot up. "What do you mean it was obvious that I was gay?" He was met with silence and a roomful of people not meeting his eyes. Hal raised her eyebrows at him and he sighed. "Salvo, carry on answering Linda\'s point."



"Right. Evidence since then, the mess he got into after Mello left. The fact that they\'ve since turned up blatantly as a couple. I would conclude that it\'s unlikely that Matt and Hollow were lovers. Matt\'s gay."



Lamond shook her head. "He could be trying it. I mean he might turn the other way, if he tried it with a woman."



Salvo reached out to place a heavy hand onto Mello\'s arm. "Lamond, I\'m going to treat that with the contempt it deserves. Mello, it doesn\'t deserve a response. If everyone is happy that I\'ve made a case for them not being lovers, then Mello continue with your line of thought. Everyone happy?"



No-one objected, so Mello spoke up. "There is circumstantial evidence then that Matt was the person to place Hollow in that position. Ergo he witnessed her death." Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Deontic writing down her equations of logic in truth values. He followed the Deontic Logic until she stopped writing. "Yes, I know that I haven\'t proved he didn\'t cause it, but have I proved that he witnessed it?"



"Not necessarily, but it\'s the most logical theory at the moment."



"Yes, well, I\'m only 66% certain about it." Mello sucked on a tiny piece of chocolate, letting it dissolve onto his tongue. The time was worrying him. Every instinct in him said that time was of the essense and not just to calm his nerves. "To my knowledge, Matt has never had access to a Death Note. He has been in the room with one once, but it never left Near\'s possession." He glanced back to where the white-haired boy barely seemed to be listening, though they all knew that he was. Near was moving puppets around apparently randomly. "Near is working on that part of the puzzle as we speak. But failing a Death Note, how could Matt induce a heart attack? And why would he cover it up? Why would he give her his ring?" He stood up and paced the floor. "Taking the hypothesis that he did kill her. Somehow he managed to sit there and cover up her death throes, why then would he place her in that position, give her his ring and leave? The first one, it\'s because it\'s the easiest way to be left alone in a holy place. Sit there praying and only a priest is going to interupt you, or whatever you call them in Anglican churches. Everyone else is going to respectfully leave you alone. She could have stayed there for a long time undisturbed. Agreed?"



"It logically follows so far." Deontic agreed.



Linda waved her hand. "I\'m still stuck on how he covered up the death throes."



"Yes, me too. We\'ll come back to that." Mello glanced at Near\'s puppets, looking for answers. None were forthcoming. "The ring is a message that would be understood only by myself. But I didn\'t need a message saying that he\'d met Hollow. He\'d already e-mailed me to say that."



"He killed her and he\'s gone on the run. The ring was a message to you to say sorry." Salvo proffered, but dubiously. He was debating each point simply because they had been raised to do that.



Mello understood. "If Matt was on the run, he\'d call me and I\'d help him. There is no reason for him to believe that I wouldn\'t. I\'ve had his number on redial since half past two this afternoon and he\'s not answering it. He wouldn\'t need cryptic messages to let me know what he\'d done. He could have just sent a text message." He asked randomly, "Why would you take off a wedding ring?"



"Death." Linda responded. "\'Til death do us part\'... or divorce, obviously."



Deontic spoke up. "I\'ve followed this through to its logical conclusion and I agree with Mello. It\'s a message to say that he was in danger. They did not look like a couple on the verge of divorce the other night and Mello\'s reactions prove that he didn\'t think that their relationship was in trouble. If it\'s not divorce, it\'s death. Ergo danger."



"Agreed." Near spoke up from the floor. They all looked at him, but he carried on playing.



"So," Mello spoke pointedly, "if Matt was in danger, what was it? I don\'t know if I\'ve proved it enough for you all, but call it gut instinct here. I don\'t think that Matt is on the run. He could have found Hollow dead, but I think he would have returned home or gone to Wammy\'s House, as I did. There is no reason for him not to. Occam\'s Razor." He paused at his seat, then paced again. "Besides they were seen talking. I think that Hollow was alive in that church, while Matt was there. I think he witnessed her death and knew that he could be killed in the same way. The fact that he left a ring instead of calling me means that he couldn\'t call. I think there was a third party there."



Deontic shook her head. "Bit of a leap of faith there with the last statement, Mello. It fits the evidence, but isn\'t proved." She stopped as the lift opened, her eyes widening as she saw who had arrived. Salvo hadn\'t warned them, so Chrissie\'s arrival caused a stir. She was heavily pregnant and obviously uncomfortably so. Lamond and Linda both rushed to her side, gushing over her condition, while most of the others just stared. Salvo had stood to over her his seat and she was conveyed into it with an audible sigh of relief. All of which eclipsed much notice of the teenager who loitered just inside the room, holding her bags. He was pale, almost alabaster, beneath his black hair. His eyes tired and searching. He spotted Mello and froze.



Mello smiled to indicate that he meant no harm. "Hello, Century. Where did you pop up from?"



"Salvo asked me not to leave Chrissie\'s side." He seemed about ready to turn around and run.



"Century!" Came the cries, as people were alerted to his presense.



Mello glared at the African. "You knew where he was all along. Anything else you are with-holding?"



"I\'m sorry, but my wife is nine months pregnant. Do you think I\'m going to leave her exposed until I\'ve checked out this set-up?" Salvo didn\'t appear at all contrite. "I swear I don\'t know where Fenian is. He\'s all who\'s missing now, yeah? Fenian and Matt."



Lamond sat on the desk between Chrissie and Mello. "I hope Fenian is alright. It doesn\'t look good, does it?"



Before anyone could respond, every screen changed to display an Old English \'W\'. Instantly alert, every Wammy person turned to stare at the monitors at their stations, as the connection was made. Roger explained that a package had been thrown over the wall, on the garden side, which meant that the deliverer had been shielded by the high walls from the security cameras. Only the fact that the envelope had set off the motion sensor lights prompted one of the children to look outside and spot it before the illumination ceased again. Inside there was a disc containing two files. An image file and a .wmv file. He was sending them both through.



They waited for tense moments while the files uploaded. Linda\'s voice was tight. "Mello, you are prepared for what this picture might be, aren\'t you?" He didn\'t respond, though his hand clasped his rosary. "Chrissie, maybe you shouldn\'t be seeing this."



"I\'m pregnant not infirm."



The image arrived pixelated and quickly formed into focus. It was Matt. Mello\'s heart rose to his throat, but the redhead wasn\'t dead. In fact, he had his middle finger raised flicking off the camera, but that was about the only reassuring aspect of the scene repeated on every screen in the room. It was difficult to immediately determine what they were seeing. The redhead was on a narrow ledge, just wide enough for him to sit lengthways with his back against a chalky wall. It may have been possible for him to lie down, but there was no way of ascertaining the depth of the drop beside him. Neither his hands nor ankles were bound, but a chain rose from the back of his neck to some point above him out of camera shot. His head was bowed, so red hair and his chin hid its connection to his neck. There was no apparent exit nor entrance to the ledge and the foreground, from whence the picture had been taken, was in darkness.



"The third person present theory just got a boost, Mello." Luigi commented dryly.



"Let\'s hear the audio file." Mello snapped back.



It was Matt\'s voice. He sounded unconcerned, almost lazy, but his breathing constricted at odd points. "So, erm, I got owned by someone cleverer than me. Here I am, no food, no water, noose-chain around my neck." He paused and sniffed. "Even can\'t sleep, because I\'ll fall off the ledge and hang. Only thing to save me is exchange for Mello. Leave a message on dedication hour, City Sounds FM." He had named a Winchester local radio station, but one which could be heard throughout the county. It was played again, several times, but that was the entire message.



Mello had bent down so that all anyone could see was a fall of blond hair, but he called out. "Initial thoughts?"



"He\'s been kidnapped." Chrissie replied quietly. "Oh God, Mello what are you going to do?"



"Hear everyone\'s initial thoughts." Mello replied brusquely. "Shout them out."



"He\'s in Hampshire. Or the kidnapper is." Luigi contributed.



"Is he being kept with no food or water?" Linda asked. "Or sleep? Only that\'s... how long can the human body live without food or water, Lamond?"



Lamond glared. "Rule of threes. Three minutes without air, three hours without shelter, three days without water, three weeks without food. And, incidentally, one week sanely without sleep and one slip to be hanged."



"So there are our deadlines." Mello sat up with a whipping back of his hair and his eyes blazing. "Anything else?"



Near replied, deadpan, "Transcribe the audio. He is breathing incorrectly."



Linda rolled her eyes. "He\'s got a noose around his neck, Nate."



Mello glared at the image. "No, transcribe it, because his choice of words didn\'t sound like Matt either, but they didn\'t sound scripted either. Somewhere between the two." It was played back and around the room fingers typed or pens scratched. Once it finished, it was replayed, but most of them already had the transcription.



"Sheol." Deontic said aloud. "If you take the first letter of the first word after each of those weird breaths, you get Sheol."



"Which means?" Lamond asked.



"Hades." Various voices replied, except Mello\'s. He contradicted even Near by saying, "Death."



"Wow! Mello! Did you actually get something wrong there?" Linda smirked.



Near frowned. "Idiot." After the initial flinching, people turned with all the rubbernecking instincts of those watching a car crash. But he continued. "Mello is a Roman Catholic. That is the only religion in the world with an alternative meaning for Sheol, though the other Christian religions sometimes translate it as \'Hell\'." He picked up his Mello finger-puppet and surveyed it. "As Mello is a Roman Catholic, he answered correctly. As none of the rest of us are Roman Catholics, we also answered correctly. Who do you think Matt was sending his message to?"



There were contradictory replies, some favouring Mello and others Near. Chrissie proposed an alternative. "Both? He\'s using the dual meaning to convey two messages?"



Near picked up a second puppet. Its features were etched with goggles and topped with red hair, its body lined with red and black stripes. "I find it hard to believe that Matt thinks in layers like that. I see the question as who is the person he thought might receive this message? The clue depends upon whether it is the Roman Catholic or the secular meaning."



Linda searched for images, pulling up several classic renderings of the Greek Otherworld. "Hades is just where the dead went in Greek mythology, isn\'t that the same as Mello saying \'dead\'?"



"No." Mello whispered. Then yelled at the picture of Matt on the nearest large screen. "No! I fucking promised you." He gestured sharply at both Salvo and Hal. "Iz dubina plakah na tebe, O Gospodine: Gospodine,


uj moj glas." His lips were so tightly pursed that they lost all colour. "He\'s heard me say it often enough just recently. It\'s the \'De Profundis\'. It\'s the Litany for the Dead. Out of the depths... Out of Sheol..." He sighed. "In English, out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, O Lord: Lord hear my voice...." He couldn\'t continue the prayer. He couldn\'t turn away from the image of Matt in such peril, because it was everywhere. "He\'s telling me to say the \'De Profundis\' for him, because the message said that he would only live if he was exchanged for him. He\'s trying to tell me not to make the exchange, but to let him die. Well, no! Fuck, no. No!"



"So why did he say Sheol and not the word in whatever language that just was, Mello?" Deontic asked. "It is more logical that a message given to Wammy\'s House would reach Near instead of you."



"Why not just say Hades then?" Lamond called over. "It\'s less ambiguous." Around the room, people were searching for Hades, De Profundis and Sheol.



Luigi laughed without mirth, "Sheol is part of a game. It\'s a sizeable area of the Shadowlands, in a game called \'Anarchy Online\'. Oh! It\'s also part of a game called \'Fury3\'." He read on. "It produces a mineral that gets you to your destination faster than the speed of light."



Linda sighed. "Oh God, Mail, what are you trying to tell us?"



"Recap!" Deontic demanded. "Specific to Mello, Sheol means \'leave me alone and don\'t exchange yourself\'; in Matt\'s gaming world, it can mean \'get here quickly\', which contradicts the Catholic message, or it can mean... someone look up that \'Anarchy Online\' - hackers?; to everyone else, Sheol would suggest..."



"Underground!" Salvo called. "Hades is underground, you descend to it. So is Hell. Mello, you said \'out of the depths\', could Sheol mean underground to you too?"



"No. The Depths are the oceans."



"Underground near an ocean?" Linda threw out. "Near, if we weren\'t here throwing words at you, how would you have interpeted the clue \'Hades\'?"



"The pit." Near stated calmly. "Nothingness. Mu."



Hal coughed. "I apologize for leaping in here, but could it be a phrase? She OL. Do any of your friends have the initials OL?"



There was a brief silence, then several people replied, "No."



Hal blushed and watched Mello return to his seat. He searched for City Sounds FM and found the listings for the dedication show. On the periphery of her hearing, she could hear the on-going conversations - \'so he\'s in a pit, underground, near an ocean\', \'oh! Come on! This is Matt Jeevas, we\'re talking about. I\'d be amazed if he came up with one meaning, let alone twelve!\' \'Don\'t underestimate him, he kept me off the third spot for half a decade\'; \'we need quarries, mines, caves, sewers, drainage systems, anything underground...\' - but Hal dismissed them, tuning them out to focus on the blond man. Mihael, she knew his real name now, in a bubble of misery all on his own. He alone answering the demands of the ransom message, despite no guarantee that Near would let him go. Hal wondered if how they would stop him. She crossed to lay her hand on his shoulder, as he clicked the link for more information. Contact here to place your dedication, include a message in no more than fifteen words. Hal leaned over and whispered. "Mello, we will find him."



"I know I will."