All The Way Here

Matt beckoned Mello towards the computer screens and pointed to two Japanese gentlemen standing in the shadows. He had zoomed close enough to lip-read them, though neither man spoke. The blond peered carefully at them and emitted a sneering half-laugh. Then he scrowled, as Matt\'s hand reached up to take the mobile telephone from him, flashed a \'fuck off, freak\' look and took a step back. Patiently, Matt wriggled a connection lead, its plug hanging limp from his fingers. Mello\'s quick gaze took in all of the equipment, trying to work out without asking what the redhead had in mind. Experimentally, he took the plug from Matt and inspected the \'phone for somewhere to insert it. He found the fit and suddenly the speakers filled with the conversation from Near\'s room.



"Bet it was getting too hot to hold, wasn\'t it?" Matt said aloud and Mello clasped a hand roughly over his mouth. Muffled comment followed, "They can\'t hear me."



Mello understood, though his glare hardened at the unscheduled deviation to his original plans. "Near?" There was no response from their erstwhile housemate. "So we\'re muted?" He released Matt\'s head. "But anyone walking outside our door can hear every word that they are saying."



"I can fit headphones." Matt shrugged. "My thinking is this. The Japanese bloke hasn\'t spoken for ages and Near did say goodbye to him. I don\'t think that they are officially listening in, but, if it was me, I\'d still be tapping that Mogi\'s \'phone. The fact that we can still hear means that Near hasn\'t switched it off. The sound has changed though, so I think he\'s moved the \'phone further away from Mogi. I heard something a while ago which I think was him plugging it in, via a charger, to the wall. We could be here for hours." He stretched and stood. "Cup of tea, I think."



Mello loitered at the control panels, following leads and programmes, until he was certain that this wasn\'t just a hands-free contraption, but actually was just linked through the speakers. Then he stood and monitored the two men again. "Matt, I want you to watch them."



"\'kay." Along with the sound of the kettle being filled and plugged in, there came the electronic fanfare of a game being switched on.



"I thought I told you to mute all of your games." Mello flared. "For fuck\'s sake."



"They can\'t hear me." Matt murmered.



"Well, mute it anyway. I need to hear this." The blond leaned closer to the speakers, though nothing was currently being said. He had turned the sound down, as the best that they could do against external eavesdroppers. A long silence enveloped them, punctuated by a mug of hot chocolate being set down on the table beside Mello and the occasional tapping noises coming from Near\'s end. "Matt."



"Mmm?" Matt spoke from the chair, his concentration on the game in his hands, though he did stand as an obvious afterthought and slowly made his way to Mello\'s side.



"Can I have your attention please?"



The red fringe bobbed, as Matt glanced up, then quickly down again. One elbow rose a bit, as he patently undertook a difficult in-game manoeuvre. "Listening."



"It doesn\'t matter." Mello turned his back and focused on the screens instead, though the two men hadn\'t moved and no-one had entered nor left Near\'s building. Matt reacted as if Mello had screamed in his face. He saved the game, put down the handheld and sat in the second wheeled chair. The blond waited a minute before asking, gruffly, "I want your take on what just happened."



"Mine?" Matt blinked in surprise. "Erm... \'kay. You and Near just pwned the Japanese taskforce." A little smile. "Well, you did. Near just got landed with it and coped."



"And Kira?"



"You and Near think it\'s the new L." The redhead dutifully repeated. "And the pair of you have put a lot of doubts into the minds of everyone listening in. That was the point, wasn\'t it? To create enough chaos that someone who knows something comes to speak to Near, with you listening in." He awaited prompts for whatever else Mello was angling to hear. "I\'ve got it all recorded, if you need to hear it again."



"I\'m not interested at the moment in hearing the evidence again. I know what I did. I\'m waiting to hear your opinion on things."



"Opinion?" Matt looked blankly at him. "To be honest, I was awfully impressed with what you did there. You managed to kidnap a high level Japanese police officer with no danger to yourself; ruffle the feathers of the person you think is Kira; and create a stream for information. Daring, elaborate... very Mello."



"Ooohh!" Mello contrived to bang his own head on the desk, though it only connected lightly once. He sat back up in a melodramatic sweep. "What is your opinion of what you just saw and heard?"



"Impressed. Definitely impressed."



"I\'m going to shake you in a minute." Mello reached angrily for the bar that he\'d only just put down. "Ok, pretend you\'re L." He paused. "The real L." He snapped off a ragged edge of chocolate. "Based on the evidence, what did you deduce?"



Matt lit a cigarette, his mouth setting stonily around it. His hand covered the handheld game on the desk beside him. "I already told you what I deduced."



"No, you gave a synopsis of the bloody obvious." Mello flashed a sidewards glare. "Tell me."



"You used Near as a tool." A slight smirk lightened Matt\'s features for a brief instant, like a promise of spring on a winter\'s day. "Which was bloody lucky for him, if you pardon the expression, because he was out of ideas until you shoved a rocket up his arse. Judging from his questions, he was in a cul-de-sac until you did that."



"I don\'t actually care if Near is winning or losing, as long as I\'m one step ahead." Mello spoke harshly enough, but his expression belied the sentiment somewhat. He looked as though he had a taste in his mouth that was unfamiliar and he still hadn\'t decided if he like it or not. "I needed what he had, so I took it."



"Yes." Matt\'s hand left the touch of his game and he leaned forward in his chair. "For what it\'s worth, I think you\'re both right. Kira is a member of the Japanese taskforce. It doesn\'t make sense for him not to be. Occam\'s Razor, innit?"



"Did you deduce anything else?"



Matt stared, through orange tinted goggles and red hair, eyes protected against being read. He thought to himself, \'Yes, I deduced that Linda made a very good point when she said that the strength of Wammy\'s was its genius minds, but its weakness was its divide and conquer mentality. She meant back then, but I applied it to now. Kira would be caught already if you and Near just joined forces, but that\'s never going to happen. The Wammy House messed both of your minds up too badly and set you on a collision course against each other. So, the best we can hope for is that we combine Linda\'s insight, especially the part where she said that if there was an army of us, we could do anything, with my rebellious self-destruction; then use me as the atomic detonator that fuses together the amazing minds of you and Near. Let\'s pile the results onto Lawliet\'s foundations and watch the case get closed. Five Wammy kids one very, very owned Kira. Oh! And I wish I could tell you, Mello, because it kills me being the latest one to manipulate you; and it hurts to know that Near is suffering in there all alone.\' But what he actually said was, "Nope, nothing really. Though it was really impressive watching you and Near doing that." Matt sniffed. "Oh and a bit weird that he\'s still letting you listen in, when he can\'t hear us."



Mello nodded, gazing at the monitors. Through the speakers, they heard a male voice ask, "Are you hungry?" The response came from Near in the negative, though he suggested that Mogi should be offered refreshments. They listened to the whole pantomine of hospitality being played out, then retreating footsteps. A door closed. Another male voice, American, spoke up, "Sir, you haven\'t eaten in two days." "I don\'t feel hunger." Came the blank response. Then silence descended again, but for the frequent tapping of a keyboard.



Matt glanced at Mello, but he didn\'t look up. His gloved hand lay clenched on the desk, his gaze trained on the monitors. The redhead broke into sudden laughter, "Poor Mogi."



"What?"



"He\'s so out of his depth. Dragged halfway across the world, sent alone into a personal meeting with a scary Mafia type, interrogated in another language and then has to get his head around Near." Matt wore a broad grin. "I\'m just imagining the scene over there. Near\'s got his white pyjamas on, playing with his toys on the floor, all curled up and that Japanese man trying to work out if he\'s been set up with someone\'s kid. I\'m willing to bet my..." Matt paused, as the notion crossed his mind that he\'d gone too far. He was imprinting a memory of Near into Mello\'s head, but it might not be a good move. A second thought chased it out, that he shouldn\'t consider plans mid-sentence, if he didn\'t want Mello to pick up on them. "My Halo."



The reaction from the blond was immediate. He dashed out of his seat, punching the unsuspecting redhead with all the momentum swing of his rising. Matt\'s wheeled chair partially rode backwards, before he toppled over and landed bodily on the bare floorboards. In front of the monitors, Mello had his gun out, pointing it straight at Matt\'s body. His expression blazed from shocked fury, through betrayal and into panic, as Mello surveyed the equipment behind him with swift darting glances.



"What have I done?" Matt cried out, genuinely afraid. His left eye was starting to close. Mello looked so much like a cornered wild animal, it was hard to imagine any cold calculation going on in the mind controlling that trigger. Was this sex? Was it paranoia? Did he take out his own semi-automatic or strip off or meet it cockily as this blond psychopath\'s oldest friend? "Mello, what the fuck?"



"Are you completely insane?" Mello shrieked. The lack of reaction from Near\'s end was testimony enough that this wasn\'t being overheard. There was a minute calming in his demeanour, but he still appeared about to end it with a blast of gunfire. "Of all the incomparable... you did that by accident?" The last was yelled at the frightened redhead on the floor. "What the... what am I doing here with you?"



Matt chose to raise his hands, absolutely unable to read this one. It still seemed to him like Mello had lost the plot. He said quietly, so not to startle the blond, "Please, Mello, I don\'t know what I did."



"What did you just say?" Mello spat out the words like they were bullets.



"Erm..." Matt scrambled to recall. "I was describing what I thought was happening over there. I said, \'I\'d be willing to bet my Halo 3 on it.\'"



Mello visibly shrank. The hand wielding the gun dropped to his side and his head bowed. Long, shaggy hair, desperately in need of a trim, fell down, hiding his whole face. As suddenly as the storm had arrived, it had receded again. Matt stayed on the floor, trying not to move, not to tremble, not to speak. Mello released a long sigh, his shoulders sagging, then spoke up. He sounded defeated. "No, you said \'my Halo\'. You\'d didn\'t get as far as the \'3\'." Relief dripped from every pore. "You said \'my Halo\'. That\'s all you said."



"Yes." Matt agreed in a whisper. Then he remembered Mello\'s frantic glance at the mobile \'phone and pieced it together. \'My Halo\' sounded Hell of a lot like \'Mihael\' to someone barely listening to you. If that someone only theoretically trusted the computer and audio rigging, on the sole basis that he hadn\'t set it up himself, then there was also an outside chance that Kira could somehow be eavesdropping on this conversation too. "Oh." Matt slid to sitting. "Right." Mello didn\'t completely trust him not to shout from the rafters, \'By the way, Mello\'s real name is Mihael Keehl and here\'s a picture\'; worse, Mello didn\'t have faith in Matt\'s technological prowess. "Ok." Matt touched his eye, where a bruise was going form as soon as his nerve-endings stopped screaming. He stood, turning his back on the blond and sloped off towards the bathroom, wrapping his arms around his body.



"Matt." Mello called softly. "I\'m sorry."



Matt stayed in there, just calming down, for a while. In the meantime, light footsteps had approached and retreated again. Mello hadn\'t tried to speak to him. Eventually, though, the incessant niggling for a cigarette caused him to open the door. He would just have to work out how he was going to deal with Mello when he got there. The redhead stopped. Just outside the door was a glass of water, an ashtray, a packet of cigarettes, a lighter and his Gameboy Advanced. Matt looked from them back up into the room. Mello sat, stiff and unmoving, at the monitors. He had his back to him, making it easier.



The water helped with the lump in his throat. Matt hadn\'t cried because he was too pig-headed to let Mello hear him cry over something like this. He hadn\'t cried for years until that concussion, not in misery anyway, but since then, it seemed like the floodgates had opened and he was ten years old or something every time anything went wrong. He didn\'t like it. The nicotine helped with the anxiety. Two drags in, comfort sank like blanket over his tattered nerves, soothing. He pocketed the Gameboy, though its weight felt like a safety line. Instant gratification and the praise of beaten levels, promised in the pixels, should his battered pride need it.



Matt walked across the distance between them, then draped his arms around Mello from behind, kissing the back of his neck. His lover raised a hand to hold Matt\'s against his heart. It was thundering so fast under Matt\'s palm. Mello kissed the inside of Matt\'s elbow, the nearest bit of him to his mouth. Matt bent further to rest his cheek against the smooth skin of Mello\'s uninjured cheek and they stayed in that tableau for long moments.



"That Kira..." Matt spoke when he knew he could without a croak in his tone, "he is more damaging than... erm." He started again. "Without Kira, I wonder if any of us would be at each other\'s throats." He gazed at the speakers. "Roger was just as lost as us, you know. Watari wasn\'t there to make it alright for us, so Roger had to do the best he could. He didn\'t have the whole picture. Too busy taking orders from Watari to ask for it. When Kira took out L, he fucked us up. When he took out Watari, he took away any hope of redemption. Who else would know to give chocolate to a frightened child, screaming in a corner, clutching a rosary like it\'s the only thing that will save him? I wouldn\'t know to do that, not without the prompting. Counselling, a hug, a smack... I don\'t know. But chocolate? No, that was Watari\'s genius, he put things together and made them work. When Kira took him, he unbalanced us all."



Matt drew away and Mello let him. He sat down, flicked on the game and began to play.