All The Way Here

Matt drove, nipping through traffic to explore side streets. It wasn\'t just other vehicles that had to be dodged down here, but pedestrians too. They wandered across streets seemingly with no regard for the fact that they could be knocked down. The latest thumped Matt\'s bonnet, letting rip a stream of Japanese expletives, though it had been his gentleman\'s lack of checking to see if it was safe to cross that had caused the screech of brakes.



The redhead leaned out of the window, responding in Japanese, "Yeah, well, you look where you\'re going and there will be no problem. Road. Car. Right of way."



For a man in a suit, this one certainly knew some choice words. He finished them with, "I could take your photo. I have my mobile \'phone. I could put it on the internet and who knows what Kira will do." A smug leer hung on his features.



Behind them, a car started hooting its horn and Matt inched forward, trying to scare the man into moving. With another whack of the bonnet with his fist, he did so. Matt gritted his teeth, wanting nothing more than to get that ringing out of his ears and a cigarette in his mouth. Mello was right, the past was close to the surface now. He\'d never been so jumpy at the sound of metal being struck. He eased the car out of the way and spotted a cafe. It was time for a tea-break.



Matt sat inside, where it was warmer and enjoyed the fact that even in places where food was served, you could still smoke in Japan. The hostility towards smokers in England had, he knew, fed into his already reclusive psyche and kept him indoors for longer and longer periods. Perfect strangers in the street felt like it was ok to just walk up and abuse you. He had lost count of the amount of times he had been told by random people that he was going to die; as if that was a sane thing to say to someone of whom you knew nothing. At first he had had an artillery of retorts, \'So if I give up, I\'ll live forever?\' or \'Ok, you hate my smoking, but I think your blouse looks really ugly.\' Then the cleverness petered out to simply, \'fuck off\'. He didn\'t say anything these days, just let them say their worst while he tried not to feel the barbs. The last time he had even responded had been to tell a sanctimonious old dear, \'It doesn\'t matter. I was considering committing suicide and you\'ve just helped me make up my mind. I\'m going to do it. Thank you for helping me clarify things.\' Then he\'d driven off hopefully leaving her with a guilt complex that sent her over the edge. Japan was so refreshing.



He patted down his pockets, realising with a sinking feeling that there was no handheld game in them. Telling the cafe owner that he\'d be right back, he searched the car, but it wasn\'t there. Memory recalled how Mello was raging about, throwing orders and acting like everything needed to be done yesterday. He had just taken his and fled to the car. Learn the streets of the city. Find all of the rabbit runs and the short-cuts. Find safe-spots. Right. He took out his map and marked off the areas he had explored. Sections of the city started to fit together like jigsaw pieces in his mind. That road led ultimately to this one, the main strip could be accessed over there; that smaller alley would link the two further along.



A shadow fell over his map and Matt looked up to find the elder Japanese lady and another, presumably her grand-daughter, standing beside him. His mind flew guiltily through possible justifications for looking at a map and marking it with a pen, but settled on the realisation that no explanations were necessary. "Cheerio!" The girl told him, with a wave, though she didn\'t go anywhere.



Matt raised a gloved hand and waved back. He spoke in Japanese, "May I help you ladies?"



The elder lady bowed deeply and responded, "I would view it as a great honour if you would look at Michiko-chan\'s English homework. She has it right here." Her hands lifted. "In return, I let you try my new dessert. My Kira Surprise, free on the house."



Matt briefly considered telling them that he was French, but the notes on his map were all in English. He stood and bowed. "I would be honoured to help." Mello was going to kill him. "You just want me to read through and check that the English is correct?"



"That is correct." She handed him the dessert after he took the notebook.



Michiko-chan at in the seat opposite, contriving to look sweet until the moment they were alone. Then the bored teenager emerged. "Is that your Chevy outside?"



"Yes." Matt replied shortly, his mind turning over what Mello would say if Matt made himself too conspicuous in this city.



"Can I have a cigarette?"



"No, you\'re not old enough to smoke." Matt took a drag on his own, ignoring the beautiful irony of his automatic response. Then he sighed and flicked the packet over to her. It was revenge against all of the supercilious people who harassed him constantly; though the second after she had helped herself, he felt guilty about abetting a minor. Vaguely he wondered what his life would have been like, if BB hadn\'t sneaked cigarettes into Wammy\'s House when he was only twelve. Or if Mello hadn\'t left him there and he had gone from \'just having one\' to \'OMG I\'m addicted\' with no discernable point of no return. His attention flicked back to the present and Matt was faintly surprised to find that he had been reading and marking the pages in front of him as his mind had drifted. "Your English is very good."



"Thanks. I hate it." Michiko leaned in. "So what brings you to Japan?"



Matt was just wondering how he could answer that, when a worse threat presented itself. His telephone was ringing. He answered in German, the first language which sprang to mind other than English or Japanese. "Hello, how\'s things going your end?"



There was a short silence, but Mello could explode in a variety of languages. He was fluent in at least seven, while he could get by in many more. German, unfortunately, was one of his stronger ones. "Why the fuck aren\'t you alone?"



"It\'s complicated." Matt made another correction on the passage in front of him and eyed the dessert. It had chocolate on it, but that was no help whatsoever.



"What do you mean, it\'s harder?" Mello snapped.



Matt frowned. "I think I just used the wrong word, being too clever for my own good." If in doubt, flippancy often worked. "Can I help you with something?"



"I need you to keep an eye out for a road, near to the city centre, that can fit a lorry in it. One where there is a loading bay. Not indented."



"Stop!" Matt switched to French. "My German isn\'t good enough." On the table in front of him, he saw Michiko\'s hand counted out a fourth digit and stared at her. "I was with you right up until the lorry, then lost it."



"I need to park a lorry in a road, somewhere sheltered." Mello barely paused before conversing in French. "I need to be able to drive a car from the road, up a ramp and into the back of the lorry. Can you just find the place where that can happen please? Then, if you have your laptop, I\'m going to need a parking permit to leave it there. Put deliveries."



"Anywhere in the city centre?" Matt moved the notebook and surveyed the map. "Check."



Then Mello really threw him by switching to Spanish. "Thank you, lover, I\'ll see you later."



Matt froze. Speaking in Spanish himself, he asked, "When did you learn...? We didn\'t do Spanish!" In front of him, a fifth digit flipped open on the girl\'s hand. "I didn\'t know you spoke it."



"I haven\'t got time to chit-chat." Mello snapped. "Come back as soon as you can."



Matt was left listening to silence, just the empty waves of a disconnected line. His stomach twisted and he thrust the notebook back at the girl. "I\'m sorry." He spluttered, still in Spanish. "I have to go."



"Please don\'t." The girl grabbed his hand. "You haven\'t finished your dessert." She seemed surprised, despite her confidence, when he sat back down again. "The person on the other end of the telephone scares you."



"I\'m sorry." Matt responded, back to Japanese now. "That was impolite. I just have business and I have to go and attend to it."



"Your boss?"



"Yes." Matt laughed. "Yes, he is."



"You speak five languages." Michiko looked very impressed. "That is awesome. Would you like me to show you around the city after you finish your work?"



Matt realised that her finger was stroking his gloved hand. A deep blush rose from his neck and he bowed his head. "That is a lovely offer, truly, but... I can\'t." She snatched her hand away and Matt looked up to apologize, only to find that the older lady was back. "I am very sorry to leave you both. Your hospitality has been wonderful. Thank you very much." Matt scraped the chair in his bid for escape. He collected his map and cigarettes. "I\'m sorry I didn\'t get to eat the, erm, Kira Surprise. I need to go now." He bowed very low and made a dash for the door.



It wasn\'t until Matt was in his car and three streets away that the sickening feeling died down inside. He had never been any good with people chatting him up. It made him self-conscious and awkward, flight being the most usual response. He sometimes thought that, if Mello hadn\'t taken pity on him, he might still be a virgin at nineteen years old. Probably forever. He stopped and re-examined his thoughts. Mello took pity on him?



By the time he reached the warehouse, the insecurity had erupted into downright paranoia. He flew through the ritual of opening the shutter and parking the car. A glance at the motorcycle informed him that Mello was back too. Matt careered up the stairs, but faltered at the sight of the blond. Mello glanced up, then stopped for a longer look, his eyebrows raised quizzically.



Matt made to speak, then waved the sentiment away. "Nothing. I found a spot." He strode off into the kitchen and switched on the kettle. He was shaking. He shoved his hands into his pockets.



"Matty." Mello called, mildly enough. "What is it?"



Matt banged his head up against the fridge, then decided to ignore him. He would make tea. He didn\'t even hear Mello moving across the tiles and the landing. He was just suddenly there at the doorway, startling the redhead. "Was someone else killed?"



The words burst out of Matt, in Spanish, before he could stop them. "Are you having sex with me out of pity?"



"Erm, no." Mello eyed him carefully. "What on earth brought you to that conclusion?" He watched the blush travel over that portion of Matt\'s face that was visible between hair and collar. "Who were you with?"



"Sorry, just being insecure. Not the time and the place." Matt pulled mugs from the sink and swilled them out. "Put it down to teenage angst and ignore me."



"Ok." Mello smiled. "So you found a spot you said?"



"Yes, I\'ll show you on the map." With the change of subject, his face emerged from the jacket. "I think I\'ll be able to get you a permit easily enough. But where will you get a lorry?"



"I\'ve got one." Mello crossed the distance and hugged him. "I have sex with you because I can\'t look at you without getting hard and I need to put it somewhere."



"Things have changed so much between us." Matt muttered, mortified, into the flesh where Mello\'s neck met his shoulder. "A few weeks ago, I couldn\'t have asked you that. I\'d have just punched you or got you to punch me and it would have ended in sex. Then I could have found out."



"Yeah, but everything did change." Mello squeezed him tighter, the steam from the kettle rising behind him. "I have sex with you because I love you. I have sex with you because it hurts me to think of you not in my life. I have sex with you because you are gorgeous. I have sex with you because I can\'t think of me anymore without thinking of you. I have sex with you because you are hot and..." The blond just held on and let him cry. "It was never, ever pity."



"Once..." Matt sniffed, recalling a time right at the beginning.



"Never, Matt. Never." Mello gripped onto him like he was trying to merge the two of them into one safe place. "It might have looked that way, but it never was. I promise you."



"I\'m sorry." Matt could feel himself creasing into folds inside. It occurred to him suddenly that their whole conversation thus far had been in Spanish and he felt his knees buckling. Mello caught him, held him up and Matt switched to English. "I\'m sorry. You don\'t need this."



Mello managed to shrug. "I need you safe and I need to catch Kira. That\'s all I need." He stroked the red hair under his chin. "If I need to send you back to England for your own sanity, I will."



"No!" Matt struggled free and pushed back. "No fucking way." He pulled the map from his pocket and slapped it down onto the worksurface. "If you have a lorry, then you have five roads that are fit for purpose." He straightened out the map. "Here, here, here... hold on. Oh yes, here. There\'s another one a little further out. All of these have huge department stores behind them, so they are used to lorries being parked up. I need to do some digging to rustle up a permit, but you should be ok." Fierce green eyes flared from behind his goggles. "Mello, I would die for you. Do not try to send me back, because I would not go."



"Ok." It was a little frightening to see Mello looking out of his depth, but he did now. He covered it with attention to the case again. "Show me again."



"If you\'re going to steal a lorry, it\'s going to be more difficult." Matt plunged sharply on. "You are going to have a lot less time to make your move before the police pull you. Things like lorries are hard to hide."



"It\'s not stolen. Sato is making one available to me." A black-polished fingernail traced the city centre. "Now our job is to find out precisely where Raito Yagami is hiding."



"This is a man who was confined for nearly two months by L and didn\'t crack. What makes you think you will fare any better?"



"I\'m less orthodox than L in my tactics." Mello kept flashing him sidewards looks. "Matt, the case will survive two minutes. Why are you looking so scared?"



"I\'m not scared." Matt snapped despite all of the evidence. "Just don\'t send me away."



Mello sighed. "Give me some clues. Tell me what I can do." His voice and expression were calm, caring, but his eyes flashed irritation. "I know that I\'ve never led you so far out of your comfort zone before. I didn\'t think that you would break."



"Don\'t keep telling me that I\'m breaking and I\'m scared and..." Matt stamped out onto the landing. "Don\'t keep fucking with my head! I\'m not Near. Stop playing games with me."



"Honestly, Matt, I\'m not playing games with you." Mello advanced slowly. "All I\'ve seen is that, since your concussion, there\'s all this... I don\'t know how to put it."



"Then I\'ll shut up, like a good boy, and stop bothering you." Matt\'s fists were clenched. "Just tell me what needs doing. I\'m your point and click genius, ready to solve all of your problems." He ran into the living area, sitting down in front of his laptop. "I\'m getting parking permits. Look here I am. I\'m hacking into the city council or whatever they are fucking called. Anything else while I\'m in? I could try and get our rubbish collected."



"That would be..." Mello loitered at the edge of the unit, then he nodded. "It\'s stability, isn\'t it? All you ever wanted."



"No. All I ever wanted was a cigarette and my PlayStation. Don\'t try to analyse me. I don\'t always make sense." Matt angrily typed onto the keypad.



"It\'s stability." Mello bit off chocolate. "It wasn\'t you who changed after your concussion. It was me." He leaned up against the railings, piecing it together. "I lost the will to hurt you."



"I\'m in past the first layer. This is going to be a piece of piss." Matt lit a cigarette. "Mello, concentrate on catching Kira. You have a plan, I know you have, because your demands are getting more coherent."



Mello peered over the chocolate. "I started treating you more like an equal than my servant. You started pushing me to... Right." The blond stormed across the room, behind Matt\'s armchair, then reached out to yank him back by the hair. "I was talking to you." He glared down into green eyes which were slowly losing their fire. "Don\'t ever walk out of a room when I am saying something again. I have been trying very hard to include you in my thought processes, but no more. If you are going to act like this. Fuck you."



"Wha...?" Matt started, but he was being dragged up and over the top of the armchair, his hands rising to stop his hair being pulled out from the root. Face to face with Mello now, his back was bent right back. "Mell, what the fuck?"



"Shut up." Mello snapped, kissing him so hard that the redhead nearly toppled backwards. Only his feet, finding purchase on the cushion, saved him. The blond pulled him though, by his fleeced jacket, until Matt lost his balance and fell, out of the kiss, into a sprawling heap on the floor. His shoulder screamed protest and he saw stars. "Get up." Mello prompted with the toe of his boot, prodding at the back of his head. Matt\'s heart pounded, but he did as he was told. On his knees, he peered up at the angry blond towering above him. "Now tell, who the fuck is in charge around here?"



"You are." Matt spluttered, waiting for the inevitable slap around the head. Mello, though, just stood there, staring at him appraisingly. "You are in charge."



"That\'s all I needed to know." Mello turned and strode away. "Get me those permits, I\'m going in the shower."



Matt stared after him. It was like being transported through time to his Mafia days, when sometimes it was hard to see Mello at all underneath the exterior. He gingerly explored his head with his fingers, finding blood on the tips, but not a lot of it. His shoulder would bruise. Quietly, he returned to his seat and carried on hacking into the transport department of the city offices.