Watari Pt 1: L\'s Heirs

With Near arranging clearance, the limosine pulled right alongside the passenger flight and opened its door. Fenian stepped inside. The Irishman was still filthy from his escapades in the caves of West Ireland, but hid his wariness beneath a scathing look at those inside. "There wasn\'t a flight from Shannon to Southampton, I had to change at fucking Dublin. I\'ve been told off three fucking times for using my laptop on a flight without the fucking pilot\'s permission. I\'ve surrounded by fucking Garda with guns to my head. Now I\'m in a car with Mello." He crossed himself. "I\'m having a really good fucking day."



"Thank you for coming, Fenian." Mello smiled.



"What the fuck have you done to your face?" Fenian glared back. "And who\'s the mini-me?"



"He\'s a mini-me actually." Mello corrected. "His name is Neuron."



Fenian sat down, causing a small cloud of dust to rise from his paratrousers, as the vehicle moved smoothly along the tarmac. "Well that\'s fucking obvious. I\'m not the one who\'s come dressed like a pimp." His contemptuous glance took in Mello\'s trousers. "Fuck, man, have you gone ahead and had your dick removed or is it shoved in there somewhere?"



Mello languidly raised his hand, the semi-automatic pointing straight at Fenian\'s head. "Why do you disrespect me?" He asked, with icy calmness, though his gaze burned.



Fenian exhaled loudly, his hands rising, and the laptop he had just fetched out crashed to the floor of the car. "You\'re still a crazy motherfucker."



"And you aren\'t dead because Century assures me that you know every cave south of Watford and some above it." Mello smiled dangerously. "You\'re out of your league with me, Fenian. You always were."



"And you\'ve got the cross of our Lord dangling off a fucking gun."



"Stop talking, Fenian."



The laptop, which had slid to beside Neuron\'s foot, sparked into life with an immediate call from Century. "Put the gun down, Mello. You got me across the Irish Sea, you need me. Put the fucking gun down." Fenian\'s voice tremored at the end. Mello sniggered and lowered the Beretta. It was pushed back into the waistband of his trousers between the cross of his belt buckle and the dangling rosary. Fenian glowered, but retrieved his laptop with trembling hands. He fitted his headset and answered the call. "You fucking owe me for this, Century."



The youngest of them paused before he replied. "Everything alright there? I\'m sending through the files properly."



"Yes, me and Mello have slipped back into old times like there was no fucking intermission." Fenian growled. "I thought you said it would be Near sitting here? If he\'s still the freak he used to be, then that would be fucking fun, but not half as many laughs a fucking minute as it is at the moment." He jabbed at the inbuilt mouse and clicked on the folders. "It would be fucking easy if one of you just gave me the summary, you know?"



Century spoke so quietly that he could barely be heard. "Mello is supposed to be doing that." He hesitated, then added, "Gabh mo leithscéal!"



"Gaeilge?" Fenian smiled. "Your accent is fucking shit, but I appreciate the sentiment. Ok, I got the files, speak to you later. If I don\'t come back, look towards blondie over here." He opened the first image. "You\'re supposed to be giving me a summary."



"Hollow, Neuron and some fucker called Catania, who is from Wammy\'s House but that\'s obviously a pseudonym, they are the ones who killed Jonny, Nathalie and Mairoo. Catania killed Hollow."



"Century\'s told me all this. He told me while I was freezing my fucking balls off, balancing half out the top of a pothole, with Garda pointing their fucking sniper rifles at me." Fenian snapped. "I\'m only interested in the geology. Tell me about your rocks." He paused, squinted at the screen, then laughed. "In fact, don\'t bother. I\'ve seen that ledge. Actually, I\'ve seen about hundred ledges like that."



Mello held his breath. "What?"



"Give me a day or two, I\'ll crawl through the system, see where he is."



The hope that had transformed Mello\'s features became transfixed in limbo. "What system?" He inched forward, resisting the urge to grab the Irishman. "We haven\'t got a day or two. He could already be dead and every second we leave him there doubles his danger. Lamond keeps giving us an hourly update on how badly his body is going to be failing him and..."



"Ok! Calm down." Fenian flicked between the two images. "Let me concentrate. I haven\'t got the sort of memory you have." He switched to the transcriptions and the artist\'s impression of the markings on the wall. "It\'s definitely Purbeck Hills, but the thing is chalk. It\'s riddled with fucking tunnels and caverns and they go on for miles." He stopped, looking up sharply. "Reverse a bit. Did you say this..." He surveyed Neuron, struggling for an adjective, "kid is called Neuron? And a Neuron has been killing us?"



Mello nodded, his gaze willing Fenian to leave it and return to his investigation. "He wanted to be like me and now he\'s going to be me." He pointed towards the laptop. "Fenian, please find something."



"I\'m sitting in a car with you and the person who\'s been killing my friends and..." Fenian half-closed the monitor. "I\'m doing this to save the Matt who once stepped over me when I was crying in the corridor, because his arsehole friend had just punched me in the fucking nuts. That Matt?"



"I\'m sorry. I acknowledge that I was a really nasty piece of work as a child, but I promise you..."



"You\'ve just had a fucking gun in my face." Fenian reached into his pocket. "You can smoke in here, yeah?"



"Matt did." Mello replied meakly. He glanced at Neuron, wondering how he could tell Fenian that the hard image was simply for the teenager\'s benefit. Neuron had to remain scared. He had to be in the presense of a Mario Puzo style Mafia don, being played by someone who had merely been a Consigliere in the real Cosa Nostra. It was hard work, especially when all Mello really wanted to do was sob and beg forgiveness of the Gael. He had never learned any of the Celtic languages and the lack of Irish Gaelic battered on his academic conscience. He couldn\'t think of a single Wammy House trick of communication that Neuron might not know too. He could only continue to frighten the pair of them and hope to make it up to Fenian later. "Tell me more about the Purbeck Hills."



"I\'ve just told you. Fucking miles. Millions of ledges like this." His laptop illuminated with a huge \'Lu\'. "Which one\'s Lu? It\'s not fucking Lamond is it?"



"Luigi."



Fenian answered the call. "Yep?"



The uncertain voice of the number eight drifted out. "I think I might have a lead on Catania. There was an Italian in the third generation called Orsino Manetti, whose speciality was geography. He moved to an orphanage in Buckinghamshire."



"There\'s a world of difference between geology and geography." Fenian frowned. He continued flicking through the files, smoke rising around his face. "Mello, you\'re hearing this, right? These headphones are shit, I know."



Mello nodded. He was sucking on chocolate trying to recall the child. He would have been nine or ten when the last of the third generation left Wammy\'s House and most of the other children had been a lot older. "Ok, I think I remember him."



"Thank you, Luigi. Get back to us if you get anything else." Fenian ended the call. "This is really fucking surreal. I try to forget you bastards ever existed and now I\'m in England, in the House car, with you, talking to two of the others. I\'d like to say that my heart was filled with nostalgia, but it fucking isn\'t."



The intercom buzzed into being and their driver announced the proximity of Wareham Forest. Mello thanked him and stiffened in his seat. "I\'m not sure there\'s any need to go through with this now. Except for the fact that he could find Matt before we did." He sucked on his chocolate. "Oh, fuck it. It\'ll be a pleasure clipping the bastard."



Fenian glanced up, cautiously. "What is the actual plan here?"



Mello indicated the teenager. "Exhibit A here is going to go and handcuff himself to a tree, hence the wig and the leather. He should pass for me from a distance and, if he doesn\'t, then his cute, little sister is going to swim with the fishes tonight." Mello grinned delightedly, though inwardly he was cringing at what the likes of Rod Ross would have said if they could hear him now. So cliched, so unrealistic. "He\'s going to be unarmed and quite alone." He caught Fenian\'s look. "May I remind you what that he was planning to blow up an orphanage?"



"What do you want me to do, put something in a collection tin?" Fenian snapped, his head bowing over his laptop. "And Near agreed this?"



"Near agreed to leave this side of the operation to me, while he gets that mathematical brain of his around some random Bronze Age numbers that Matt felt important enough to share."



"So Near\'s in agreement, but too shit scared of admitting that he knows what\'s happening. Got you." Fenian looked nervous. "And no-one else said, \'Mello, this is a fucked up idea\'?"



"No-one else asked me what I was planning." Mello scrowled. "Why would they?" He watched Neuron turn away to hide a distraught face from view. Mello ceased on the moment to tap Fenian\'s boot with his own and mouth. \'Play along!\' Fenian froze, frowning at him. "They keep out of it, if they know what\'s good for them. Capisco?"



"You\'re a sick fucker, Mello." Fenian raised his hands in surrender. "But I\'m not playing martyr. If none of them have the balls to stand up to you, I\'m not sacrificing myself for the noble cause." He returned to his reading. "God will know his own." Then he glanced sharply up again. "What\'s my role in all of this?"



"Stay with the car and get up to date." Mello smiled sweetly. "And be here when I get back. Preferably with a more precise location for Matt."



Fenian exhaled. "The changes of that happening are about 3%, but I\'ll do my best."



The car slid silently to a halt and Mello grinned at Neuron. "It looks like it\'s time for our walk." He leaned past Fenian and opened the door. The scent of pine trees rushed inside. Mello grabbed Neuron\'s arm and pushed him out onto the ground. Only now did Fenian realise that the boy had been handcuffed during their journey. "Good luck."



Fenian touched Mello\'s wrist, hidden from view by the edge of the door. He mouthed, "Mihael, what the fuck?"



Mello leaned down and whispered, "Liam, please trust me. This is 80% an act." He glared out of the doorway, then turned and whispered, "\'Out of the depths, I have called for thee...\'" With a final push, Mello was out of the car, slamming the door shut behind him. A moment later, the car pulled away leaving them alone in the forest. "Get up, Neuron. You\'re damaging my top." Mello kicked the teenager, then pulled him by the scruff of his neck to his feet. Tears were falling freely. "Oh dear. Your hair is all skewiff." He used both hands to pull the wig back into place on Neuron\'s head. "Lamond did a really good job with that make-up, didn\'t she? You look just as beautiful as I do."



"Mello." Neuron gasped, choking on his words. "Is it too late to say I\'m sorry?"



"Oh yes." Mello smirked. "Way too late." He pushed the teenager in front of him. "Around about two o\'clock yesterday afternoon, it became too late for you to ever apologise to me." Mello sniggered. "But I\'m a reasonable man. I\'ll teach you the rules on the way. Rule two: Never even so much as look at the spouse of one of our friends. That would be Matt." He glanced up at the sky. The dusk wasn\'t so far away. "Never, ever disrespect the spouse of one of our friends. In my case, that would be Matt. Are you seeing your error yet, Neuron?"



"Yes."



"And you\'re aware you are not going to make it out alive now." Mello snorted. "Poor, little man. You\'re what? Sixteen? And the best you can hope for is that your baby sister makes it to puberty. You should have taken my warning the last time we met."



Neuron sobbed, "I am sorry. I\'m really, really sorry."



"Well stop crying then, because you\'re going to ruin Lamond\'s lovely make-up job and I\'m all out of eye-shadow." He checked his compass. "You wanted to live like a man. You should be prepared to die like one."



"I got in over my head." Neuron nearly lost his footing, as Mello propelled him into a track to the west. "I admit it, I was excited at first. It was like a drug or something. The power and... I\'m sorry." He sniffed and spat onto the floor. "I\'m trying to be brave, honestly."



"Try harder." Mello replied, coldly.



"Then I worked out the full details of the plan and..." He gazed up at the sky, at the deepening colours ahead of them. It was going to be a gorgeous sunset. "It wasn\'t so good anymore."



"Yeah, well real life is shit like that." Mello pulled him to a stop. Though the thinning of the trees, they could see the heath. "Imagine how difficult it\'s going to be for me having to shoot a small girl, if her brother doesn\'t shut the fuck up and get on with it." He unlocked the handcuffs with a faint smile on his face. Though Neuron looked, he could see no sanity, no mercy, in those blue eyes, only a kind of monstrous enjoyment. Mello pointed. "There\'s a tree over there with railings around it. Remember to stretch your arms out to show that you\'re unarmed."



"He also said alone."



"Oh. You will be alone." Mello pushed him down the slope and Neuron half-slid, half-ran out onto the heath. The Slav stepped back into the foliage and disappeared from view. Neuron held his head high and pushed through the hard grasses. At the railings, there were handcuffs, attached and open. The teenager raised his hands and turned around. Nothing stirred in the forest, but for the birds and the high-pitched creaking of insects. At the last, he took the rosary that had been placed around his neck. In a moment of inspired improvisation, he sank to his knees and prayed with it, to a God he didn\'t believe in, under a reddening sky. Long moments passed and no-one came. He stood and clicked the cuffs into place around his wrists and tried to imagine what Mello would be doing now. Laughing at Fate and standing with a defiant pose, a madman ready to die. Neuron felt the madness. He straightened his back, but kept his head bowed, gazing out from under the fringe of the blond wig. Gritting his teeth against surrendering to trembling and sobs, he wondered when the shot would come.



Half an hour passed and the angry streaks of crimson gave way to pinks and peaches, before descending into night. No-one came. Out on the heath, a lone deer walked through. It took a while for it to gain Neuron\'s scent, but when it did, it froze, located him and fled with surprising speed into the forest. It was quite dark before a voice spoke from behind the tree. "Well done. I\'ve circled and I see no back-up. You really are a masochist, Mello."



A shot rang out, reverberating around the trees, causing a ruckus amongst the settling birds. Neuron screamed and then realised that he wasn\'t dead. Behind him, there were the most horrific gurgling sounds, but he couldn\'t turn enough to see. He heard Mello\'s voice then, harsh and angry as the Angel of Death. "Where the fuck is Matt, you arsehole?" There was another shot, as loud as the first. Then, "Oh shit." Mello rounded the tree. "The fucker shot himself! Crap! Motherfucking, bastard, shitting Hell!" He kicked the railings. The vibrations jolted Neuron\'s wrists. Mello sat down heavily, his head in his hands. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!"



"Mello." Neuron\'s voice waivered so badly that he had to swallow and try again. "What just happened?"



"I shot him, then he shot himself." Mello responded from the depths of his hands. "Neuron, this is your last chance to make this right. Where is Matt?"



"I swear, on my sister\'s life, I don\'t know."



"Ok." Mello rose from the ground, infinite sadness in his gaze. He really did look like he pitied Neuron now, but it didn\'t stop him raising his gun. "Why didn\'t you listen to me at Wammy\'s House? I did my best to frighten you and got into trouble with Roger over it. You still tried to find the Mafia. You idiot child."



"I know. I\'m sorry." Neuron clamped his mouth shut, trying to stop the panicked sobs from escaping.



Mello paced to a spot a few feet in front of him. "All the things you told me on the way here. Such knowledge comes much too late, doesn\'t it?" An apologetic smile flickered onto his lips and was quickly gone. "If it had been anyone else but Matt, I might have spared you." He crossed himself and spoke words in an Eastern European language, then pointed the gun and fired. "However, I was very impressed with how you were prepared to die for your sister. Maybe we all need second chances sometimes." Mello walked across to the railings and took a pick to the locks. "Next time, Neuron, I won\'t aim inches from your head. It\'ll be right in the centre of it."



The teenager fell to his knees. "Thank you!" He covered his head. "Mello, right at the end, just before you pulled the trigger, I prayed. To God. I prayed and... it... I don\'t know... oh! My... oh! God!" His sobs came hard and fast, crawling at the dirt with shuddering grasps. "I prayed! I prayed! I prayed! I...."



"Me too." Mello replied quietly. When Neuron eventually looked up, it was to find Mello looking back. But his expression was impenetrable around a numinous gaze. "Come on, let\'s find the car. This isn\'t over yet."