The Annals of Fear

"Where are we?" Mello asked, as they entered what was obviously a hangar. It was mostly empty, but for one jet fighter parked at the other end and another, smaller aircraft beside it. Mello was visibly trembling. His hand tightly gripped Matt\'s. His own bag was over his shoulder, while Matt carried his in his hand. Occasionally another tickling sound on the floor signalled a nail or something else sharp falling from wherever it had been secreted upon Matt\'s hair and clothing. He was still bloody. Mello just wanted to get Matt out of here and somewhere where he could be looked after. Matt, of course, was closed down. Just walking silently, though a glance through those goggles showed that Matt was watching everything. On red alert.



Their escort pointed to a light at the other end. "We will pass through there, then there is a small barrack beyond it. Hot water and access to medical personnel."



Hal had already had this briefing on the flight down. "These are disused barracks. There are no permanent troops stationed here. Just a skeleton crew keeping things ticking over. We can debrief here and then you can tell me what you need."



Mello nodded. He needed to be alone with Matt. He needed to find out what the Hell had just happened to them all. "Has Century been found yet?"



"No." Hal retained her professional voice, but Mello saw through it. He glanced sharply at her. "They\'ve got dogs on his trail, but it ran out at the river."



Mello snorted. "You realise that Century holds the record for the sheer number of times that someone has run away from the institution. Some of us managed never to be found and he\'s mostly one of them." His lips tightened. "He\'s on his own turf as well."



"Mello, let\'s discuss this later." Hal warned and it irked Mello. He kept quiet though, until they were through the hangar and crossing towards the barracks. He could see people through the window and cast a look at Hal. "What?"



"Get them all out. This isn\'t turning into a circus."



The door was opened for them, as Hal nodded. She passed through and the couple followed her. There were ten members of the military there, including one Squadron Leader. Mello\'s gaze sought out Deontic, who was sitting woodenly upon a chair. She was wrapped in a blanket, glaring daggers at him. "Deontic."



Her tone pierced him. "You went too far."



Mello\'s eyes widened. Beside him, Matt moved just a touch closer to him and Mello caught sight of the medic flanking them. "Hal, get them the fuck out of here. This is between me, Matt and Deontic."



Hal sighed and strode across to where the Squadron Leader stood waiting. They engaged in private conversation, which resulted in the Squadron Leader calling his people out of the room. Only Hal lingered and, as soon as the door closed, she barked, "What happened out there? Is Century ok?"



Deontic replied, not taking her eyes off the Slav, "Mello shot at him."



Mello\'s jaw dropped. "I..."



But Matt was quicker, "And you replaced the floorboards, trapping me inside the chapel."



Deontic\'s attention turned to the redhead. "I did not!"



Mello growled at her, "And I didn\'t shoot at anyone, especially not Century." He kicked a chair into his vicinity. "Matt, sit down." He released his husband\'s hand long enough to dash across for the First Aid box on the wall. Matt was still standing where he\'d left him. Mello repeated, with feeling, "Matt, please sit down." Then ordered Hal, "We need to stay in the area until we know what we\'re carrying. Something got into us and it\'s probably the same thing that got into that music. It\'s following us. I can fucking sense it. We\'re going to be no safer wherever we go, so we might as well stay close to the source. We\'re going to need somewhere to shower and take stock." He stopped as Matt mumbled something. "Mail, speak up."



"They sent dogs after Century. Think of the mythology."



"Cŵn Annwn." Mello sighed. "Hal..." He faltered, unsure what to tell her.



Deontic shivered under her blanket. "What do you mean I replaced the floorboards? I didn\'t do that, Matt."



Matt shrugged, picking a shard of glass out of his shirt. Mello roared, "This is fucking stupid! This does not go into the scorebook, Hal!" He stood back, his arms wrapped around himself. They all stared at him. He shuddered, but the words that emerged next sounded more like Mello the leader. "Ok, before we do anything, we need to sort out the immediate. Hal, we need a room, just me and Matt with hot water. I\'m taking this First Aid box. Deontic, whatever happened to you, have you received the care for it?"



Deontic pursed her lips. Hal hurried to the Malaysian woman\'s side, bending down to hug her. "Dee, I came as soon as I could."



Mello was nodding. "Hal, deal with Dee. Where can I take Matt?" He glanced at the window. "Who\'s finding Century?"



"Police officers, mountain rescue and now the army."



"It\'s not enough." Mello declared. "Alert Chrissie, Salvo and Fenian. If he\'s alive, he needs to know he\'s safe. We need to speak with him."



Hal frowned. "Why Fenian? The mountain rescue people are local, they..."



"You see that sea over there?" Mello pointed to the back wall. "We saw it as we flew in. Where do you end up if you cross it?"



Hal glanced automatically at the wall. The others just stared at him. "I still don\'t..."



Mello raised his hand. "Chrissie, Salvo and Century are thick as thieves, but Fenian is an outrider in their gang. We are on the west coast of Wales. Out there is the Irish Sea. If Century can get to a boat and persuade the captain to take him across it, then he\'ll be in Ireland. You do the mathematics." He stared at Matt. "Trust me, Hal, Century can disappear very well on his own. Let him reach Fenian and we\'ll probably never see him again. At least if he makes it to the other two, there\'s always the chance that Salvo can be persuaded to see sense."



Deontic spoke, shakily, "Matt, I did not replace the floorboards. They were open when I left the room."



Mello yelled suddenly, "And why did you leave him alone down there?"



Deontic flinched, but returned icily, "Because you were firing shots at Century!"



Their eyes locked in anger, upset and tension. It was Deontic who looked away first. Hal straightened. She flicked her earpiece on and made a call. A moment later, a corporal entered the room. "This way please." He commanded. Hal gave Mello a pleading look and he picked up the First Aid kit, as well as both his own and Matt\'s bags. Hal put her hand onto Deontic\'s back and followed them out. They were directed to another building and into rooms, which were evidently officers\' quarters. A couple of airmen were hurriedly laying fresh linen on one of the beds. Another room was already done and this was the one into which Mello directed Matt.



"Mello." Hal rushed forward, as Mello would have shut the door. "Please can...?"



He lingered just long enough to say, "Find Century, look after Deontic. I will be out later. Keep me informed." Mello closed the door. He waited until he heard Hal move away, then he turned and flinched. He had expected Matt to be distracted by something. Looking at the floor or rolling a cigarette or something. He wasn\'t. Matt was staring straight back at him. "I\'m sorry."



"Where were you?" Matt asked, the sting nonetheless for the soft tone.



Mello opened his mouth to tell him, but none of it made sense. The only things that he could think of to say sounded trite in his own mind. He bit his lip. He glanced down at the chocolate bar sticking out of the side pocket of his bag He left it there. He shrugged helplessly. "I let you down and I\'m sorry."



"Eat the chocolate."



Mello turned his back to see where the bathroom was. He found it and hurried through. There was a bath and a shower, so he ran the former. It might have made more sense to run the shower instead, but... Mello\'s hand rose to his mouth. He stopped the taps, pulled out the plug and ran the shower. He jumped, startled, when a chocolate bar appeared in front of his face. "What?" He snatched it out of Matt\'s hand and put it down on the sink. "We\'ll sort you out and..."



"Mello." Matt picked it back up again. "Eat the God-damned, fucking chocolate before I ram it down your bastard throat."



Mello\'s jaw gaped, but he recovered. He took it from Matt and leaned up against the sink to take a bite. "Happy?"



Matt gave him a withering look. "I know it must have been bad. It\'s not logical otherwise that you wouldn\'t have checked sooner." Behind the goggles, those dark, green eyes seemed to bear into Mello\'s soul. "And you look haunted. You\'ve been shaken pretty badly. So have I. But right now I smell of piss, so I\'m going to take a shower."



It finally dawned on Mello why he had initially run a bath. A shower had running water. It might dislodge something sharp to cut Matt lower down on his body. "I hugged you. I must have hurt you."



Matt smiled, but it seemed forced. "Yeah. So?"



"Mail..." Mello sighed, but reached around him to switch off the shower and replace the plug. "Get undressed." Behind him, Matt hesitated and Mello panicked inwardly about what fresh injuries those clothes were hiding. "You were under the floorboards. I came into there and the band were playing in the room. I couldn\'t see them, but I could bloody hear them! I was standing in the middle of the room and they were playing all around me. All the time, you were under my feet." Horror was rising again in his eyes. "Shit! Did you cut yourself?"



"Fuck off."



"Mail, I think I went.." Mello backtracked, letting the anxiety show. "I know that I went mad earlier. I lost all reason. I was hallucinating. I was back in Yugo..."



"Mello!" Matt snapped, with a sharp look at the walls. "Army barracks?"



It took a couple of seconds for Mello to follow Matt\'s train of thought. "Bugged?" Mello swallowed. "Oh Christ."



Matt gave him a long, searching look. "Ok, don\'t freak. It\'s ok." He bent down to remove his boots. "If it\'s any consolation, you probably saved my life today. There was a rat in there. I came close to shooting it, but I remembered you going ape shit over me shooting in an enclosed space before."



Mello felt like someone had punched him in the gut. "Matt..."



"Why have you switched my water off?"



"Are you hurt, baby? I mean really hurt?" Mello resisted the urge to touch him. Matt was radiating coldness. There were ways to break through that, but Mello wasn\'t sure that he had the strength to do it at the moment. He reached down and switched on the taps, letting the bath fill again. There had been no reply, unless it had been non-verbal, whilst Mello was looking away. "Matt?"



"No."



"Ok." Mello sat down on the edge of the bath, startled to find Matt watching him again. "I don\'t know what to say to you."



Matt nodded. "Don\'t worry about it, ok? Let me get myself clean again, then we\'ll sort your head out." He still wasn\'t undressing.



Mello looked around for bubble bath. There was none. It was possibly just as well, because Matt had cuts and Mello wasn\'t sure that perfumed bubble bath would be good for them. He stood up and gestured to Matt to wait, then dashed through into the other room to search his own bag for shampoo. While he was there, Mello opened Matt\'s bag to retrieve a clean shirt and jeans. There wasn\'t a shirt, other than yesterday\'s, which had been slept in. Mello dipped into his own bag and found a plain black t-shirt, which he\'d packed with a vague view to running in. He\'d forgotten it was there until he\'d changed that morning or else it would have been pressed into service as a pyjama top. Mello hadn\'t enjoyed letting Deontic and Century see the scars on his back and chest. He held it up. It would expose Matt\'s arms, with their ancient self-harm scars, but that couldn\'t be helped.



Being busy was helping, Mello vaguely noted, as he folded the jeans and black t-shirt over his arm. The door knocked, as he started to walk towards the bathroom. Mello detoured to answer it. Hal stood on the threshold. "Just to let you know that all of your belongings have been retrieved from the house and brought here, except for Matt\'s car. If you give me the keys..."



"Heh." Mello smirked, trying to appear more light-hearted than he felt. "Like Matt\'s going to let some GI Joe drive his car."



"I\'ll fetch it personally."



"You," Mello leaned forward, his gaze darkening, "aren\'t going within a mile of that house. No-one is, until I\'ve worked out what the fuck is happening in it. The military is one thing, they\'re paid to die. You aren\'t."



Hal rolled her eyes. "Then it will just have to stay there. What do you want doing with all of the other stuff?"



"I\'ll have it in here." Mello smiled at her. "Can you organise some laundry as well?"



"What?"



"Please." Mello touched her arm. She held out her hand, evidently thinking it was the garments in over his arm. He darted back inside and put those on the bed. He grabbed the crumpled striped shirt, then ran into the bathroom. Matt was already naked in the bath. Mello\'s gaze swept over him. He appeared largely intact, with the most bruising coming from the beating that Mello had given him before they\'d even arrived in Wales. "Stay there and don\'t try to sort it yourself. I\'m going to pick the crap out of your hair in a second." He picked up Matt\'s blood-stained shirt and jeans, then unhooked the keys.



"What are you doing?" Matt snapped, as his wallet, the box of matches, rolling tobacco, cigarette papers, filters, PSP and other assorted detritus from his jeans pockets were piled on the windowsill.



"Getting you some clean clothes." He left before Matt could really work himself up to whinging.



Hal was still in the doorway, but she had acquired a carrier bag. She held it up. "Deontic just gave me these for you. She bought pyjamas for you and Matt, apparently."



Mello frowned. "She did?" The \'why?\' froze on his lips, when he contemplated what their sleeping arrangements might have been tonight. "Right. Thank you." He returned to the room and emptied the Marks and Spencer\'s pyjamas on the bed, then used the bag to stuff full of Matt\'s shirts and a pair of jeans. He added both of their dirty socks and, hesitating slightly, shoved in a pair of Matt\'s boxer shorts. Then returned to the door and Hal. "Thanks for this."



"You\'re very welcome." She took them. "Still no sign of Century, but the three people whom you mentioned have been alerted."



"Good." Mello hung on the door. "I\'m going to sort Matt out. Keep me informed." He backed inside and closed the door. He didn\'t wait to hear Hal leaving, before he rushed into the bathroom. Matt looked up and a thought occurred to Mello. He raced back to the door and opened it. He could hear Hal, but not see her. Another door was open across the corridor and down a little from his own. "Hal?" He called, but jogged out anyway. She leaned out of the open doorway, just as he reached it. Mello could see Deontic inside the room. "Those things in the bag might have glass and shit attached to them."



Hal nodded. "I figured."



"Right. Fine." Mello hurried back to his room. "Thanks." He closed the door behind him and darted into the bathroom. Matt was smoking a cigarette. The bathwater was grey. Matt had washed the blood off, revealing the cuts beneath. "I wanted to do that."



Matt gave him a long, appraising look. He was wearing his goggles in the bath. "You look a bit calmer."



"I\'m not." Mello replied, though he did feel slightly better. He compromised with the explanation, "Being active helped." Mello sat on the edge of the bath again and took in Matt\'s body language. His knees were drawn up. His eyes concealed. "Will you let me take your goggles? You don\'t have to hide from me."



"No." Matt replied. "Because I don\'t want the next bit of glass that falls out of my hair to slash my retina."



Mello felt stupid and belittled. He covered it up with taking up a comb and biting into his chocolate, as he inspected Matt\'s thick hair to work out how to deal with it. "It might be easier to shave your head." He spoke over the chocolate stashed between his teeth. But he already knew what Matt\'s response to that would be, so he invalidated the comment by leaning in to comb carefully through the first lock. He couldn\'t actually see any larger objects still in Matt\'s hair, but there could be anything lurking.



"Or not." Matt finally stated, long after Mello had forgotten his own comment. Mello recalled it and just nodded. He had never seriously expected Matt to agree to shaving his head anyway. Mello worked silently, inspecting and brushing out every inch of his husband\'s hair. He uncovered only three minute shards of glass and one small tack. They were gently lifted out and deposited in the sink. Matt just sat there, in that putrid water, his arms wrapped around his drawn up knees and his chin resting on top. Mello tried not to think about the house or his broken rosary. It bothered him more than he could say that there was a bead still lost in that cellar. For that reason, if no other, Mello knew that he\'d be returning to the house. He had to retrieve that bead and fix his rosary. If Matt had noticed the trailing end, he hadn\'t commented upon it. But it was Matt who broke the silence. His voice barely audible, as he whispered, "Were the nails back in the floorboards?"



"Huh?"



"I didn\'t hear hammering." Matt moved, peering over the edge of the bath, probably looking for his cigarettes. "There wasn\'t time for that. Was there anything on top of the boards or were they nailed in?"



Mello handed over the baccy and Rizlas. "They were nailed in."



"Filter tips as well please." Matt said, blankly, leaning over the edge of the bath to dry his hands on a towel gathered there.



Mello gave him those too. "I\'m so sorry."



"It wasn\'t your fault."



"How can you say that?" Mello countered. "You don\'t know what I was doing!"



"I know you."



Mello gave Matt\'s hair a fourth inspection, less thorough than the previous three, but enough to satisfy himself that there was nothing left in it to hurt the redhead. "I don\'t trust my own mind at the moment." Mello stated, as honestly as he could. "Do I appear sane to you?"



"Never." Matt smirked at him. "But in relative terms, you seem shaken but as sane as you get."



Mello kissed his shoulder, as Matt lit a cigarette. "You don\'t know what I saw in there yet."



Matt nodded. "I\'m suspecting that we all saw and heard a great many things that weren\'t really there. I\'m wondering about that rat." He took off his goggles and handed them to Mello. That was as big a statement of trust that Mello could hope to receive. He stood and rinsed them out in the sink, then dried them with infinite care on a towel. "The floorboards were definitely nailed down? That wasn\'t an hallucination?"



"If it was, it was a mass hallucination." Mello looked down at the broken rosary, willing that to be a bad dream too. "I relived part of my childhood. The really, really bad part."



Matt glanced sidewards at him. "A few to choose from there, Mell. But I think I know the one you mean and I\'m sorry." The tip of his cigarette glowed with the depth of the drag he took on the other end.



"It\'s not your fault."



Matt nodded. "So much shit doesn\'t make sense."



Mello agreed. "No."



"I need to wash my hair. The smell of piss is making me nauseous."



Mello put aside the goggles and reached in to pull the plug on the bath. As Matt finished his cigarette and stood, Mello switched on the shower and stripped off. He climbed in beside his husband and embraced him under the cascading water. "I\'m so sorry I wasn\'t there for you."



"Ditto."



Mello\'s eyes filled up and he buried his face in Matt\'s shoulder, so that the redhead wouldn\'t see. Matt must have known anyway, because his hand slid up and down Mello\'s back, even over the roughness near to the top. They held each other closely. "Te amo, Mail."



"Volim te." Matt replied automatically, then patted his back. "Let me wash my hair, then you can do what you want to me."



Mello nodded, hearing both the dismissal and the promise. He stepped back against the white tiled wall and took the shampoo that Matt picked up. He lathered Matt\'s hair and ran his fingers through it. "Does anything mean anything or is that code for you telling me that you need taking over?"



Matt waited several seconds before responding. "Why?"



"Because right now," Mello paused as he rubbed the shampoo in, "my needs might be different to yours, but I\'m willing to give you what you want."



Green eyes scanned Mello\'s face, "What do you need?"



"To hold you." Mello felt like layers of self were being flayed away. It hurt to speak like this. "I was scared shitless and..."



"Ok, don\'t cry." Matt interrupted and, until he said it, Mello hadn\'t realised that he was.



Mello lifted a shaking hand to his mouth. There were still suds on it. "I\'m going mad, Mail. I\'m..."



"You\'re not." Matt reassured him. "Deontic called it. Something about the house made you think you were, because it\'s your greatest fear. But I swear you\'re not." Matt met and held his gaze. "Do you believe me? I mean, you\'re having to lean on the flawed intellect of the mere third and fourth here, but...."



Mello glared, "You know better."



"Good. Get angry."



Mello stared, "You\'re trying to get me angry, so I\'ll fuck you like you need."



Matt laughed, "That works too. But mostly I was trying to encourage you to get angry, because otherwise you channel that same rage inwards and that\'s never good in your case."



"How can you laugh?" Mello\'s eyes widened. "The whole fucking world is falling down around us and you\'re laughing!"



"Is it?" Matt smirked. "Are we in more danger now than we\'ve ever been?" He leaned in conspiratorially. "Between me and you, we always win. Didn\'t you know that?"



"Stop patronising me with pop psychology."



"Ohai Mello." Matt leaned back again, washing the suds from his hair, until Mello yanked his hands off and took over. "Pretty man."



Mello could see what his husband was trying to do. Inside despair, rage and anxiety were battling with the kernal of delight that was trying to awaken. "Please just stop."



"But Mello, you did miss an important point." Matt touched his collar, tilting his head up the inch it took to bring his lips close to Mello\'s. "You were there. And you came for me, just like I knew you would." When the kiss came, Mello surrendered himself to it. It felt like absolution.