We Sleep Forever

AN: This is actually my least favorite chapter, namely because it was a bitch to write. It just didn’t want to cooperate with me, AT ALL. (Again, my beta has yet to see this)

Suggested Listening: Real World by All American Rejects

Chapter 6 – Clueless

~Matt~

I smirked as Mello's face darkened; his eyes moving along the length of my car. It had once been a great car but after a little incident during a case it was pretty much KO'd. It had more bullet holes in it than I had brain cells.

It was that bad. But it still ran pretty well, after I had replaced the engine that is. I still hadn’t gotten around to fixing the rest of it. That would come when I had the patience and the time to do it.

“Front or back?” I asked him while gesturing to the car. He raised an eyebrow at me.

“Back is fine.” I smirked. He seemed to know I was playing with him, and it was odd to see him do it back to someone he didn’t know. When we were younger he probably would have blushed and hit someone had they asked him that, myself included. I guess the years really will change a person.

I got in the drivers seat, Miranda in the passenger, and Mello sat behind me in the backseat. Lighting a cigarette with one hand I steered us away from the ratty apartment with the other.

“What exactly are we looking for at the scene?” Miranda questioned from my right. Mello snorted.

“Anything.” I noticed her scowl in annoyance. I wondered if she would ever get along with him, because at the rate they were going, a full scale fight was on the rise. That was really the last thing I needed.

“Shouldn't you at least have a clue as to what we need to find, oh great Sherlock?” Miranda spat from her seat, her arms crossed.

“That's exactly it. A clue. What more do you want, the murderer sitting on the front steps?” Mello had his eyes closed and gave off a 'fuck you' aura. Why had I wanted to come along? Oh yes, because I was still hopelessly attached to the blond.

“Now I see why J wanted me to come along.” I stated aloud. Miranda shot me a glare and I smirked around my cigarette.

“And why is that?” I head Mello mumble from the backseat.

“To keep you two from killing each other before the case is solved.” I watched as the corner of Mello's lip twitched, as though he wanted to smile but forced himself not to. A cell phone rang out loudly in the car and I heard shuffling from the back and knew it was Mello's.

“What?” he snapped irritably into the phone. Whoever was on the other end had completely erased his good mood.

“No, now isn't a good time-” I couldn't quite make out what the other person was saying but they were definitely shouting. Mello flicked a glance at Miranda and I before he switched to another language.

“I don't need to hear you of all people lecturing me on how I obtain my information!” he hissed angrily in German.

I suppose he though neither of us would know it, and in truth I knew Miranda couldn't understand a word of it. I on the other hand had brushed up on other languages in the last seven years. German happened to be one of many that I had mastered.

What had Mello done in the past day that would warrant the even more pronounced shouting from the other line?

“Don't you dare bring my past with them into this. It was a one, excuse me two time, thing. You know I needed the stuff for my case.” his voice was chipped and even more volatile in German.

What did you get yourself into Mels?

I forced myself to divert my attention to the road; the car would probably completely fall apart if we got into an accident, no to mention we could, I don’t know, die? Miranda seemed to share those thoughts as she pinched me in the arm and pointed towards the road.

“Fuck you Jasper! And yes, Dom was my work. Prick deserved it for marking me.”

Mello snarled into the phone, no longer trying to remain quiet. He slammed the phone shut and stuffed it into his pocket. Not even a second later it rang again but he ignored it and instead pulled out a bar of dark chocolate. He closed his eyes and snapped a piece off, grinding it between his teeth.

This only made my thoughts wander even more. What did he mean by 'marking me'? And more importantly what did Mello mean by 'his work'?

Somehow I managed to get us to the crime scene in one piece even with my distracted thoughts. Parking the car around the corner, since I was sure the local police wouldn't take too kindly to the holes in my car, our mismatched group exited the metal death trap. And that was when I saw it.

Mello's coat had shifted as he heaved himself from the backseat and exposed his neck. There was a large bite mark, red and inflamed, that adorned his tanned skin. My eyes narrowed. Just who the hell had given him that? Miranda seemed to have noticed my less than friendly demeanor and hit me in the arm.

“Think about whatever the hell it is later, the case comes first.” she hissed into my ear. She was of course correct. I would have plenty of time later to brood over this. As we walked over to the police tape Mello pulled something from his pocket and before the cop could even ask anything the object was shoved into the guys face.

Looking over the documents the cop eyed the three of us before sighing heavily and letting us pass. Miranda glanced at me and I shrugged. We hadn't even needed to use our fake Id's. It wasn’t like I could say I was a mostly secret underground detective and expect to be let in.

The smell in the apartment was nauseating as we stepped in, and yet Mello didn’t even bat an eyelash. It was the thick coppery smell of too much blood. There was blood spatter in every immediate direction, and the room we were in was huge, the woman had been a CEO after all. They had already moved the body and I mentally swore for not knowing about the death as soon as it happened. So much evidence could have been lost...

“Hm..” Mello cocked his head to the side and I watched curiously as he paused by where the victim had lain. Following his gaze I saw nothing more than blood, however the spilled blood formed that of a cross.

“Does this have any real religious meaning or is the killer just trying to hide something? Or throw us off the trail somehow?” Miranda asked although she made no move to go closer to the blood. Mello walked to the opposite side of the room so I started searching for anything useful right where I was. We all knew it was a long shot.

Whoever was killing was precise, and wouldn't leave anything behind that they didn’t want to be found. I was beginning to think that maybe this person had a career in something that required a lot of organization, something that forced them to be neat to the point where they might not even notice it themselves.

Of course that was merely speculation; the person could just be a neat freak. And yet I felt my theory was closer to the truth though I couldn't explain why. Holding in a sigh I scanned the bookshelf in the corner. There was nothing out of place save for a white binder. Odd considering the organization of the surrounding area.

Picking up the item, I quickly leafed through the contents, it was nothing more than a business log. A thought stopped me.

“I wonder...” scanning the pages I found what I was looking for. Whammys. Command Electronics donated a large amount of equipment to Whammys, and had been doing so for years. They were on the list I had made. But there were far more than two companies left on the list, and I had a feeling it would be very difficult to figure out just which ones this criminal would be targeting.

“Find anything?” Miranda asked as she walked up to me.

“Not really, just confirming something I already knew.” she peered over my shoulder and made a noise of agreement.

“There must be some sort of pattern... maybe in how much the companies donated or sold to this orphanage?” she questioned. It wasn't like I hadn’t already thought of that, and I was sure Mello had already as well, there was simply nothing to go on. In an odd twist of irony, the one case I can’t seem to solve instantly happened to be the one Mello was involved in.

Across the room Mello was being pulled aside by a police officer who was gesturing to something in a plastic evidence bag. Strolling over to them I left Miranda standing by the bookshelf. The officer held out the item and showed it Mello, as well as myself once I got there.

“Do any of you know what the letter 'S' might stand for?” the officer asked. When neither of us replied the officer sighed.

“Then what about what's on the back?” Mello and I shared a look and Mello took the paper from the officer and flipped it over. Dear DM. Mello frowned, but shook his head. The M couldn't possibly stand for Mello could it? Then what about the D, detective perhaps?

But why would the killer be leaving the letter for Mello? It didn’t make sense unless I was missing something.

There had to be something else that the killer left at another or possibly even all of the crime scenes. “It seems that no one has any idea what these mean.” the officer sounded frustrated as he turned away. And I knew exactly how he felt.

Mello seemed uncomfortable after the appearance of 'Dear DM'. Was there something that he knew and wasn't telling me? I pondered that but ultimately discarded the idea. If Mello knew something he would tell us, especially if it meant he were in danger.

“So instead of gaining more clues we gained more questions?” Miranda said as she stood beside me, when she had even gotten there I couldn't tell.

“Seems like it...” Mello murmured distractedly.

“I'm sure that J can get the crime scene photos easier than I could, correct?” Mello asked, turning to me. I nodded.

“Good, because I need to see them.”

“Think of something new?” I asked him. He shook his head.

“Not necessarily new. But I need to confirm something. Though J no doubt has already noticed it.” then as if he finally remembered we had been searching in different places, asked if either of us found anything.

“No, but Emerson did confirm that Command Electronics did donate to the Whammys orphanage.” Mello's eye twitched as she said Whammys but he said nothing in return. There were too many people being exposed to Whammys name, too many questions that were being raised.

I was sure that L would be on the case soon, there would be no way he couldn't hear about this. But some selfish part of me wanted to solve the case with Mello, secrets be damned. That same part of me was now the reason I was using hair dye and contacts.

“I suppose we should head back. Miranda, you should probably call J and let him know that we need all the crime scene photos.” Miranda shot me a confused look but did as she was told. She looked even more confused when the phone in my pocket didn't vibrate. It was so fun to mess with her.

I had purposely shut my phone off before we got into the car so that it would go straight to voicemail. She looked very irritated as she left a message while pretending to actually speak with me. Yes, very amusing.

The drive back was painfully silent and not even Miranda dared to break it. Parking the car wreck on wheels in exactly the same spot none of us spoke until we entered the apartment.

“I'll be right back.” I murmured and was able to slip into the laptop room unnoticed. I quickly hacked the needed photos and sent them to another laptop, one that was in the living room. It was also mine but I had it set up to delete everything after a twelve hour time frame, it was used mainly for situations like this.

Shutting the laptop down I quickly exited the kitchen via the main door, which led directly to the living room. Entering the living room I watched as Mello stood awkwardly while Miranda conversed with one of our stoned guests. Quickly texting Miranda, I made it known that although I had acquired the data, we were to wait a little while before telling Michael about it. Otherwise it would be all too obvious that I was J.

“Hm. J says that he will be getting to the pictures soon, he is currently doing something for another case. But it shouldn't be more than an hour before he has everything. I wish J wouldn't work on more than one thing at once. Honestly.” Miranda was a convincing liar when she wanted to be and for someone who doesn’t know her, like Mello, she can seem genuine.

“Well, I’m starved so I say we eat while we wait.” Miranda said while practically dragging us to the kitchen.

“Who the hell left the oven on? Bunch of idiots.” she growled and turned the over dial to off.

“Now it’s all hot in here...” she shrugged off her jacket and rested it on the back of a chair. She was right, it was hot, enough that it actually bothered me.

I unzipped the blue fleece jacket I wore and copied Miranda as I also placed my discarded jacket on a chair back.

“What do you guys want?” I shrugged a shoulder, I really couldn't care less. Food was food. “I'm fine with this.” Mello said while waving around a chocolate bar.

“You're all useless.” she rolled her eyes and began rummaging through the refrigerator, eventually pulling out all the fixings to make sandwiches. She dumped everything onto the kitchen table and seated herself across from me.

“Take your jacket off, that thing must be like a furnace!” Miranda was staring intently at Mello. Apparently not wanting to argue, but looking apprehensive at the same time, he removed his jacket.

“Whoa! What happened to your neck?!” Miranda gasped.

“I got mauled by a bear.” Mello informed her sarcastically. “But don't worry I shot it.” his tone turned just a little too sadistic for my liking.

Then it clicked. Dom was his work. Did that mean he had shot someone for doing that to him? And what in the hell was going on for Mello to receive that bite mark. My stomach flopped uncomfortably at the possibilities.

“Sure, whatever. Either way eat something.” she motioned towards the store bought meats and cheeses that sat beside a jar of pickles and mustard. I sighed. I really wasn’t in the mood for a sandwich now that I saw it, but it was food.

Grabbing two slices of bread I poured mustard on it and slapped a few pieces of ham and turkey on it. Topping it with swiss cheese and a few pickles I placed it on a paper towel and slide it to my side of the table. Mello had yet to even look at the food.

“Sure you don't want something?” I asked as I took a bite of the sandwich. Mello glanced over at me before quickly averting his eyes and mumbling a soft 'no'. That was not a normal reaction to the sight of food, and I doubt he had recognized me or I would probably be on the floor getting my face beaten in.

“Do you have a thing against sandwiches or something?” Miranda persisted as she finished making her own.

“No, I'm just not hungry.” the growling of his stomach at that moment contradicted him.

“Oh, so you're on a diet to fit into your leather.” Mello glared darkly at her.

“Unlike you I don’t need to diet to fit into something like this.” Miranda glared back and I sighed. Honestly, why did I even bother?

“Then why not eat something, it's not like we poisoned it. We wouldn't be eating it if we did.” she jerked her turkey sandwich in his direction; I think she liked getting a rise out of him. However I had a feeling that she might not like it if he snapped.

“I just happen to prefer chocolate.” he angrily snapped of a piece to prove his point, but the expression on his face turned sour and he closed his eyes for a moment and breathed deeply. What the hell was wrong with him? He leaned foreword slightly before standing up.

“Excuse me.” his hand went to cover his mouth and he walked quickly off towards the bathroom. That was not normal by any means.

“You don't think he has an eating disorder do you?” Miranda whispered guiltily. My finger tapped my lip gently.

“No. From the way his figure looks I'd say no.” she raised an eyebrow.

“You already checked him out?” I choked on my next bite of food and eyed her wearily. “No more than I would eye you.” she laughed.

“You really suck at lying to me.” I grimaced. “He could just be getting sick...” she continued on to the other topic, though I knew my little slip up was going to be brought up later.

“It doesn't seem like that either...” I trailed off as a pale faced Mello walked back into the kitchen. I had a feeling it had to do with the mysterious phone call from earlier, and whatever he was involved in within the past day or two. I would pull out all the stops now concerning Mello's missing data, it was no longer just curiosity that drove me; he was making me worried.

After a few moments of awkward silence Mello picked up the forgotten chocolate bar and eyed it apprehensively. Lifting it to his lips he nibbled at the end experimentally, and when nothing adverse happened he bit a larger chunk off. Since I had finished my food, and Miranda was mostly done, I decided that it was time for a text message from J.

Carefully I slid my phone from my pocket and using my memory of the keys, texted Miranda. Miranda looked up sharply at the beeping of her phone and glanced quickly at me.

“Alright, J has sent the photos to the living room laptop. So if you are ready we can take a look at them.” Mello nodded and stood from his seat immediately. The rest of us followed suit but let Miranda lead us to the living room, though it was merely a doorway away.

I shooed a few people of the couch and the three of us sat around the laptop, Mello in the middle with Miranda on his right and me to his left. He opened the files I had sent and Miranda quickly looked away. She had never been one for dead bodies or blood. Mello quickly flipped through the photos while his sharp eyes memorized everything he saw.

“Yes, so this confirms the pattern I had noticed.” The first victim had been shot at the base of their skull and left to bleed to death on their office floor. The second victim had been stabbed twice and placed in their bed; the third was shot three times in his office. The fourth had been burned, which seemed to break the pattern that had been going on; but upon closer inspection the pattern remained.

Three other lethal chemicals had been found in their bloodstream so along with being burnt, it made four. The newest victim had been stabbed five times in different areas of their body in order for the blood to form the shape of the cross.

“As well as proves the killer is obsessed with order.”

“What the hell do you mean by that?” Miranda questioned.

“If you look at the crime scenes themselves, everything is neat; nothing is out of place unless it is meant to be.” Miranda looked confused.

“What, about that is neat?” she pointed to the picture of victim number two.

“Do you honestly expect a struggle to not have occurred?” Miranda shook her head.

“So where is the evidence of it? Where are the overturned items, the signs of struggle that should be around the house as we know the body was moved post death.” Mello, although going a different route than I had, had come to at least part of the same conclusion I had. The killer liked things to be precise. Perfect. A killer like that was perhaps even more dangerous than a spontaneous one.

“I agree.” I said while motioning to the pictures.

“In victim fives apartment, the entire bookshelf was completely organized, and everything was put away. Everything except the business records that had the dealing with Whammys in it.”

“I wonder if there are other things that were missed as we weren't there to see the scenes?” Mello drummed his gloved fingers against his thigh in thought.

“Why don't you send these to your e-mail and you can look at them later. I'm sure you are sick of hanging around here for now, and it looks like all we can do is play catch up for today.” Mello nodded to me absentmindedly and did as he was told. It bothered me that he was being this silent, and compliant for that matter. It once again gave me the feeling that he was hiding something.

“Done.” he said while standing.

“I suppose that if anything else comes up before tomorrow we will contact one another?” he asked Miranda.

“Yeah, so you'll be back tomorrow?” he nodded.

“Unless I find something else out there isn’t much we can do on our own.” he nodded to us before entering the kitchen to retrieve his jacket and leave out the front door.

“Is he living up to your expectations?” Miranda asked as soon as the door shut.

“I never had any for him, I already knew he was smart enough for this.” I spoke softly.

“You just love to torture yourself don’t you?” she asked irritably. She heaved herself off the couch and went to the other side of the room leaving me alone, although I was surrounded by other people. Not wanting to deal with this any longer I vacated my spot on the couch, which was quickly filled, and left for the laptop room.

It was dark when I entered and I didn’t bother to turn the lights on. Shuffling my way through the room I managed to turn on the computer and seat myself on the chair without incident. I didn’t need to worry about the computer in the living room still being on since all the data would be gone in under eleven hours from now. Checking my e-mails made me smirk in triumph.

One of the people who had worked with me before had come through for me again and sent me an encrypted file. As long as I could hack into it without setting off any of the traps then all of Mello's history for the last seven years would literally be at my fingertips.

Opening a program from the start screen I added the file to it and began to carefully sift through the files. I needed to find the actual data that was mixed in with useless junk and viruses. It wasn’t a hard task but it was tedious.

After an hour I lifted my fingers from the keys and stretched the cramps from them. Lighting a cigarette I let it rest loosely in the corner of my mouth while smoke trailed off to the side. I was finally done.

Clicking on the earliest dated file I pulled it open under a word document and began to read. From the wording of this, it was written by L, how the hell had they gotten their hands on this? I might as well give them a bonus for this. Halfway down the page I frowned.

The further I read the worse it got, and this was only one of twenty documents. At least it wasn't anything too bad so far. He had left Whammys not long after I did and had made his way to America, our current location, and gotten a few shady jobs to earn money. After all, what respectable job would hire a fourteen year old?

Closing out that document I opened the next one. At the end of the first paragraph my cigarette slipped from my mouth.

“Oh God.”

-End Chapter 6-