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Annals of Fear II	By : DeathNoteFangirl Category: Death Note > Yaoi-Male/Male > Mello/Matt Views: 5803 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note and I do not make any money from these writings

Chapter List
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"Well, that's not ideal, is it?"   Mello sighed, watching Kiana suddenly take off to run after the group strolling down the trackway.   Century was returning to Aberystwyth with Valerie.    Hal was going to collect whatever provisions that Deontic had seen fit to send for them.    Lauren was with them, ostensibly to provide Hal with company on the walk back, but mostly to ensure that any information passed between Century and Hal was overheard and reported back.    Mello and Matt had hoped that Kiana would stay.    "Shit."

Matt blew out his cheeks, chewing on the glove at the tip of his index finger.   "That's placing them all three at the chalets."

"Yes, Mail."   Mello growled. "I'm well aware."   He leaned on the drystone wall, peering down into the chasm.   There was still a musty smell of smoke in the air, but the fire had lost its intensity.   He tried not to think about the two people who had lost their lives down there.   "Shit."   He stood up again, looking around himself.    The manor house felt uninviting.   He couldn't shake the feeling that invisible eyes were watching from every window.    The yew tree was protecting them, but it presented itself as a potential threat.   The witch bottle needed guarding.   It would help if he understood precisely how the witch bottle worked.   The evidence of it niggled at his logic and slapped the face of his faith.   He watched the group starting to fade from visibility in the night.    "Fuck it, Mail. Let's go with them."

"Really?"   Matt asked, with no enthusiasm and just a touch of censure.

Mello looked sharply at him.   "What would you rather do?"

"Dunno. We're fighting a war on too many fronts."   Matt exchanged the chewed bit of glove for a cigarette.   "I wouldn't have let Century go."

"I thought I was going to keep Kiana." Mello countered.   "And Century is scared.   He's going to end up killing himself."

The flame flared from Matt's lighter.   He lit his cigarette and exhaled smoke.   "Why is that your problem?"

Mello stared at him with wide eyes.   "You never used to be this fucking nasty."   He strode off into the direction that the others had taken.   Matt had to jog to catch up with him, but he took Mello's hand and, by example, slowed him down a bit.   Mello was pensive. "I'm not joking, Mail.   Something has twisted in your head. You never used to want them dead."

"Joke?"   Matt supplied.

Mello cast him a sidewards glance and kept on walking.    At least they were several yards behind the front runners. They could talk without being overheard.    "I want electricity and I want those three together.    I want to know what Fenian found down there.   I want to know whether it's time to use the rest of our preparations.    I want to end this case and go home."

"Those three aren't going anywhere with the Land Rover dead."   Matt replied.    "I can ensure it now. Hobble the bloody thing until we're ready for them to leave."

Mello bit off a square of chocolate.   His arm was looped through the motorbike helmet.   He wished now that he'd left it with the motorbike.   "You realise that our lives would be slightly easier, if we split up and took the two fronts?"   Mello didn't need to look at Matt to know how that suggestion was being received.   Mello nodded. "But it would probably be the end of our marriage, so we won't."

"Eh?"

"I just get the feeling that you really hate me at the moment."   Mello gave a half-shrug.   "But that's not going to be resolved until we're away from all of this."    He waited for Matt to say something, but he didn't.   Mello took a deep breath. "We're dealing with more than one phenomenon.   That's my take on this.   There is obviously a fair amount of hallucination going on. High infrasound and high electromagnetic force.   Would they account for everything that's happened?"

Matt considered it.   "Not for weird shit like how that ambulance would have had to turn to crash down there from that angle." They had just passed the spot.   They were nearly on the road.

"If the driver was hallucinating too?"

Matt paused and twisted around to peer up the hill.   "We are assuming that it came from the hospital rather than up.   It could have been out on the road and picked up speed as it approached. Though it should have lost some entering the track. There's a sharp turn into it."

"Or it went in at an angle, but because it's drystone, it knocked half of the wall next to it down too."   Mello saw Matt's expression and couldn't resist a smirk.   "We haven't exactly measured the ambulance to compare it to the dimensions of the gap it left."

"No." Matt replied, quietly.    They walked in silence.    "Something did put the floorboards back, when I got stuck in the priest hole last time we were down here."

Mello nodded.   "I also think that something moved the statue of Mother Mary around.    There's definitely more to this than hallucination.    When we go under, Mail, what does that to us?   Was infrasound recorded into the music?    Is there some kind of hypnotic suggestion?"

Matt took a deep drag on his cigarette.   "I didn't test it for infrasound."

"There's your priority when we next have electricity."

"Ok."

Mello turned his head to stare into the woods, falling away to their left-hand side.   "Have you noticed that we still can't hear anything?    The foxes kicked off, but since they've shut up, we haven't heard anything.   No birds singing.   Nothing in the trees."    He mused on it.   Matt didn't respond.   He had neither knowledge nor interest in the subject.   "The music makes us do it to ourselves.   It is going to be infrasound, isn't it?    We perceive it differently, in line with our own preconceptions and fears.   Even you and I, as close as we are, get something different from it.   Mail?"

Matt glanced at him. "Yes?"

"For the record, I am still freaked out by what I experienced under it.   I'm just aware that I haven't time to be freaked out by it."

Matt nodded. "I know."

"Are you?"

Matt's cigarette glowed orange-red in the night.    He didn't respond for long seconds, then said, "Not really."

"Oh." Mello bit off another strip of chocolate and chewed it immediately.   They could hear voices further down the road. The others had found the local cyclist and gathered around him.   Mello pulled Matt to a stop.   "Ok, walk with me through this. The unease, the hallucinations, all of that shit, could have a natural cause.   Let's dismiss it for the moment.   The activity which does seem paranormal, assuming that we are talking about ghosts here, all have something in common.   They direct us to the priest hole and try to tell us what happened.   The band repeating the events leading up to their deaths.   The statue on the stairs, leading us up there, then in the room with the priest hole.    That fucking ghost that was right behind me, walking into the room with the priest hole.   The floorboards going back on, keeping you in the priest hole.   See where I'm going here?"

"Yep."

"So I'm not talking shit?"

Matt exhaled smoke, "You might be, but it sounds coherent so far."

"Ok, so assume that the ghosts are doing that.   It's all leading to us opening the altar.   Century made a good call there."   Mello let his next strip of chocolate rest on his tongue, clamped into place between his teeth.   Eventually he asked, "What's trying to kill us?"

"We are."

"No." Mello frowned. "We are being led to want to kill ourselves. We're not initiating it."   He swallowed the chocolate. "We need Kiana."    He took a step, then stopped.   "Mail, honest answer, can we leave that witch bottle with any hope that none of them will touch it?"

Matt shook his head. "If not those tossers, then it's only a matter of time before whatever moved the statue moves the witch bottle."

"Then we guard it ourselves or we persuade Lauren and Hal to guard it, until it can be taken care of.   Are those our choices?"   He watched Matt nod.   Further down the road, they could hear goodbyes being spoken.   Mello yelled suddenly, "Hold up!"   He started running, trailing Matt behind him.   They quickly reached the party.    Century and Kiana were squeezed into a large net.   Valerie was on the saddle of the bike. The local man stood up on the pedals in front of her. Mello smiled politely at him. "Noswaith dda."   He nodded his good evening, then stalked around the back of the bike.   "Kiana, in your opinion, what has taken the electricity out of this area?"

Kiana stared, warily, at him.   Her expression dared him to laugh at her, "I think it's the ghosts.   It takes a lot of energy for them to manifest.   That's why they're so often associated with cold spots. They've taken the heat and transmuted it into enough energy to show themselves."

"Thank you, ma'am."   Mello shifted his gaze onto Century.    "Did the lights go off when you opened the altar?"   There was a stare off.   Mello sighed, "You owe me something, Century. You cheated taking that witch bottle out."

"Didn't take it out, did I?   Fenian did that."

"You didn't stop him, when you could have done." Mello narrowed his eyes. "You opened the altar. Did the lights go off immediately?"

Century sucked on his lollipop.   "No. It was after Fenian disappeared.   There was a cracking noise, then the rope went slack.   I went downstairs to summon help and the lights went out."

"Ok. Good."   Mello snapped off another chunk of chocolate. "Then the altar being open or closed isn't making the slightest bit of difference.   It's whatever Fenian disturbed.   But the electricity also died on us.   Though granted that was another night of high paranormal activity."   His wandering gaze took in the bewildered expression of the cyclist.   It didn't matter. If the man went home and repeated it, he'd sound like a nutter.    Still, he had local knowledge.   Mello smiled at him. "I wonder if you might tell me how often you have power cuts like this in Aberystwyth?"

Daf shook his head.   "Never."

"Right."   Mello ran the tip of his tongue over the chocolate caught between his lips, then worked it into his mouth.   "Lived here long?"

"Born and bred."

"Ok, thank you." Mello stared at him with unfocused eyes.   On the periphery of hearing, he was aware of the clip-clopping of horse's hooves and the turning of wheels.   He absently stepped off the road to let them by.   "Kiana, how is...?"   He was cognisant suddenly of a collective sucking in of breath.   He turned around, realising that the sound of the horse and trap was close enough to be passing them.   They all felt it, as a rush of icy wind washing over them, but none of them saw it, except Kiana.   She clutched Century's sleeve.   Her eyes bulged in her face.   They were all spooked, hearing it speed past, yet seeing nothing.   Over the general exclamations and multi-lingual expletives all around him, Mello was animated.   "She said it was happening down there too." Mello whispered.   "It's not just confined to the house.   We're out of the house now and it's happening here.   It's happening down there.   It's probably happening wherever the power cut is." He stopped and pointed at Kiana. "How is the witch bottle stopping the ghosts?"

Kiana's gaze skittered towards him, "It's not!"

"Evidently!   But why would it normally?"   Mello hoped that he wouldn't have to spell out what it was stopping. It might give Century ideas.

"It's stopping the sidhe."

Mello stared at her. "The sidhe?"

Unexpectedly, it was Century who replied, "Tylwyth Teg.   The fairies. Supposed to like blonds, they are.   Steal them away and leave the changeling behind to plague us."

Lauren coughed, "Sorry to interrupt, but are we going to ignore what just happened?"   She indicated the road.   They could still hear the horse's hooves fading into the distance.   "Because my legs have gone to jelly."

Mello glanced at her, then handed his helmet to Matt.   With his chocolate bar held between his teeth, Mello put his arm around Lauren and gave her a quick, one-armed hug.   He surveyed the others.    Hal was constantly looking around herself, on red alert, sentinel duty.    A pile of their belongings was on the ground at her feet.   Daf's head was bowed.   Valerie seemed uncomfortable and a little embarrassed.    Kiana and Century both appeared drained and cold.    "Is this Fenian's fairy-path theory?" Mello asked, over his chocolate.

Kiana nodded, "It's more than a fucking theory.   It's right."

Mello lifted the hand clasped in Matt's and removed the chocolate from his mouth.   "Say that you're correct, then the problem is that the outhouses are built over your fairy path.   Is that right?"

"He proved it." Kiana flared, fierce. "The very first day we were here, he climbed down the edge. You saw him do it.   He found where there had been a rock slide, breaking up the path."

Mello stared.   "Further along the same chasm where the ambulance crashed."   His eyes took a distant haze.   "Fenian got out somehow.   He found an exit underground.   He didn't return through the house."   Mello lifted Matt's hand, took a bite of chocolate and lowered it again.   "They showed us the priest hole.   Are they now showing us the other way in?"    His eyes widened. "I was in the basement. That's one entrance.   Matt was in the priest hole. That's another.    Century, you ran into the woods.   That's the third.    Deontic..." He faltered.   "Is there a fourth down by the river?"    His stare fastened upon Kiana again. "Where does the Gwrach-y-Rhibyn fit into this?"   He saw Century flinch.   "Kiana, your opinion.   Gwrach-y-Rhibyn."

"If she's related to the Irish banshee, then she's one of the fairy-folk too."

"Right."   Mello looked from one frightened face to the next.   The sound of the horse and trap had finally receded.    It had gone in the direction that he now wished to travel himself.   "Kiana. If this was your show..."

"Don't fucking drag me into this."   Kiana glared.   "I was not raised in that place.   I don't feel the need to fucking kill myself to get it over with."

Mello squeezed Matt's hand, as much for his own reassurance as for his husband's sake.   Matt appeared utterly unmoved. Mello knew him well enough to know that he wasn't.   "I'm not asking that of you, Kiana.   I'm asking to ensure I know enough to deal with this situation."

Kiana wiped her mouth.   "If I ran this show, I'd be looking for the nearest fucking dark corner to curl up in.   Then I'd cry myself fucking hoarse."   She sniffed. "And once that was out of my system, I'd hunt Liam down and break his fucking neck."

"Ki,"   Century looked at her, "crazy about you, he is.   I don't know what happened, but I know that he wouldn't have left you there on purpose."

"He fucking well did!"   Kiana snapped. "He fucking dragged me there in the first place, after I told him it was too much."

Century flinched. "I know you're scared."

"I don't scare easily!"   Kiana gasped.   "Are you not getting that?   It's fucking overwhelming me! It's fucking evil!   An onslaught like that could fucking kill me!"

"Is it as bad here?"   Mello asked, gently.   He was wondering if he could, at least, persuade her to stay here on the road.   Close enough for consultation, but still away from the house.   He wasn't sure how far he shared her interpretation of events, but it was convincing.    "Better than the house?"

Kiana covered her face with her hand.   She sighed heavily.   Then she looked up at him.    She was close to breaking now.   "Mello, they're everywhere."

Mello grit his teeth.   "But worse in the house itself?"

Century took Kiana's other hand and held it.    He asked, "Who are they?   The ghosts?   What period of history?"

Kiana snatched her hand away. "You've told me already that you don't fucking believe in ghosts."

"No."   Century found a weak smile. "Coming around to the idea, I am.   Hard not to."   He took her hand again.   "If you could just describe them. Their dress..."

She locked eye contact with him.   "Who is Gethin Jones?"   They all watched Century freeze.   He didn't respond to her. His expression became as impassive as any Watari trained man could be.   Kiana sighed.   "He's your father.   I know that."

Century shook his head, very slightly.   He spoke tightly, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"I've seen him as often now as I've seen Zlata Janakovac.   They want you out. They want you all out."   Kiana jumped suddenly.   She was so profoundly startled, that she caused the others to react too.   Mello, Matt and Lauren all froze.   Valerie flinched into Daf.   Hal moved back one pace up the road.   Century cowered into his net seat.   Kiana scrambled out of the trailer. "Ok!" She told thin air. "Let me repeat that!" She was agitated, deeply so.   "Mae'n amser mynd!   Mae'n amser mynd nawr, Iestyn!"

Century looked terrified.   Daf could speak Welsh and he was already turning the bike around.   Mello blinked, softly translating, half under his breath. "It's time to go. It's time to go now, Iestyn."

Kiana stepped out of the way of the bike.   Century was in the back of it still, holding his breath.   Kiana gestured, as if to stop someone that they couldn't see.   She frowned. "Rachel?" She was very close to tears now. "I can't understand what you're saying. I'm so sorry!"   She was listening.   "Shit! She's gone!" Kiana looked stricken. Behind her, Daf had stopped a couple of feet down the road.   "Her name was Karita, she was so faint and I couldn't understand her language.   I tried to listen to the repeat, but she went back.   It was for Rachel."

Mello's grip was iron around Lauren's waist.   He surveyed Kiana carefully.   She believed what she was saying; or else she was an amazing actress.   "Raakel?"

Kiana rounded on him, "Yes! One of yours?"

"Yes." Mello smiled.   "One of mine."   He didn't mention that Raakel was Lauren's real name nor that her heart was pounding against him.   Lauren, herself, remained unmovable.   Her features were studiously blank.

Valerie called back, "Kiana, are you coming?"

Kiana swung around.   She seemed besieged, swaying slightly.   "I hear you, Roxanne. I'll..." She paused, listening.   "She'll know you as Roxy."

Hal spoke up, her mouth dry, "My great-aunt was called Roxy."

"Get out! Just leave! Get out! Run!"   Kiana screamed.   Her legs seemed to go from under her.   She fell in a heap on the road. Hal rushed to her side, while Mello pulled away from both Matt and Lauren to reach her too.    She looked wildly up at them, whispering, "So drained."

Mello ducked down and lifted her, bridal style. Hal helped steady her in his arms.   Century was out and standing too. Mello rushed to the bike and placed Kiana into the net.   "Century, get back in."   Mello marched around to the front of the bike.   "Will you get them to the hospital, then come back?"    He stared at Daf, noting how shaken the man seemed.    "I would be very grateful."

Daf nodded and, with a glance back to ensure that his passengers were all in, kicked off.   He called behind him, "I'll be back. Hold tight."

Mello yelled into his wake, "Diolch yn fawr!"   He could see Century holding Kiana and hoped that Fenian never saw that. Mello turned and surveyed the remainder of their party.    Hal looking more thrown than she ever had during the Kira case; Lauren covering her own ill-ease by picking through the provisions left for them.   Matt was quietly smoking.    "Ok. That was seriously weird."

Lauren peered up. "Karita is my mother."

"Yes, I know."   Mello shoved the rest of the chocolate into his mouth.   He walked back into their midst.   "It's always possible that Fenian hacked Wammy's House years ago and read those details."   He caught Matt's sharp look.   "Yeah. I know you did the security.   Maybe before you did that."   He forced a light-heartedness into his tone.   "Well, this is good, isn't it?   We've got my baka, Lauren's mother, Hal's great-aunt Roxy and..." With a sinking heart, he realised that Kiana hadn't mentioned anyone looking out for Matt. The one person whom she ought to have prioritised, in his opinion.   Matt pushed past him and swooped on the cigarettes and his gilet.   "Mail."

"It doesn't matter."

"Yes, it does."   Mello started to say, but it occurred to him that he didn't know what else to say. In a day full of stress, it just felt like too much that the boy neglected by the living had also been abandoned by the dead.    Mello experienced the emotion too strongly.   It rose up from the pit of his stomach and stuck in his throat.   Matt took off Mr Roberts's coat and dropped it in a heap beside Lauren. He pulled on his own gilet. Mello rallied.   "It's probably all shit anyway, but she practically fainted before she got to you."

Matt picked up the chocolate bars and pocketed half of them himself.   He handed the rest to Mello, who used the act to try and pull Matt in to a hug.   "Leave it, Mello."   Matt ducked away and started striding off back up the road.

"Mail."   Mello stared, stunned.    "Where are you going?"

Matt didn't turn around.   "We have work to do."

Mello's helmet had been left beside the other stuff.   He snatched it up and hurtled up the road after his husband.   He called after himself, "When the bike returns, go with him.   Meet at the chalets."

Hal and Lauren exchanged looks of trepidation.   Lauren quickly instructed, "Leave Matt to Mello."   Hal still seemed set to race after them. Lauren stood.   "Honestly, Hal.   Leave them.   They'll probably be back in a minute, but even if they're not," She peered up the road after them, "it's always best to leave Matt to Mello."

Author's Note: This story is being discussed here: http://mrsjeevas.joharrington.co.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=11
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Annals of Fear II