Yo, duuuuudes. XD Fanfic numero tres. To be honest, I can't believe I've gotten this far. And, guess what? This one actually has CHAPTERS!! O_O Not another one-shot! 'Kay, so, this is set sometime after Mello's abandonment of Matt… Right after (RIGHT after, literally) he blows the base up. (Yeah, that was a spoiler. Don't want to see any more? Then stop reading.)

Rated M for: language (It's Mello, guys. In pain. A lot of pain. And a sometimes-pissed-off Matt. So, yeah.), gore (Again, Mello just blew up a base. He's burnt to a crisp, more or less.), and mature themes (There may be some yaoi/shounen-ai in later chapters. As far as this chapter goes, I think you're good on that front. Expect it later—but don't expect mindless fucking. Lo and behold, there will be plot and emotions even if things do get hot and heavy!).

Spoilers include: names (Matt and Mello's real names), ep… whatever ep Mello decides to push the pretty red button. So yeah.

Please please please review! And don't fave and run! I mean, faving is great and all, but I want to know why you liked it!!

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Push the pretty red button.

Nothing could possibly prepare him for this. He had no choice.

The world exploded. Literally. Searing light tore through the back of his eyelids, and a roar ripped through the silent, dark air an instant faster than the heat that engulfed half his body, burning him, destroying him.

Some twenty feet from where he'd been about half a second before, the man on the ground screamed and thrashed, desperate to escape that god-awful pain. Quickly it became too much for his mind to bear—black patches swarmed haphazardly across his vision, a sickening, dizzying feeling of falling, and he collapsed into unconsciousness.

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Meanwhile

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The redhead in front of the screen, hair turned a strange greenish color from the diffused blue light, lit another cigarette and lifted it to his lips. Orange goggles flashed as his head flicked back and forth slightly, processing the information on the monitor at lightning speed.

Yeah, he was good at what he did. But that didn't mean he gave a shit about it.

Apathy was definitely a word that described the eccentric, red-haired young man. Stripe-clad arm draped nonchalantly over the back of his chair, fingers still grasping the glowing cigarette, he didn't seem to care at all about his surroundings, his current task, anything.

It seemed that way because it was factual.

Mail Jeevas didn't care about anything anymore—he'd kept up with hacking jobs half out of habit, half to distract himself from reality. The reality that Mello, his best and only friend since his days at Wammy's House for Gifted Orphans, since two mere weeks after his parents' death, had left him.

Mail, alias Matt, remembered that day very clearly. Not that he wanted to.

Mello had rushed into their shared room, turbulent as always. Matt was wrong in his assumption that it was about Near, like it usually was. His blonde companion simply hated—loathed, in fact—to be one-upped by the pale, white-haired prodigy.

Matt was wrong. But he still wasn't terribly surprised when Mello began flurrying about, a blonde whirlwind, pulling the same plain black bag given to every 'student' recruited to Wammy's. It was the bag that had carried the few belongings Mello brought with him in his first days. He ignored those things now, not that there were many—a ragged album of faded photos, a small silver music box belonging to his mother, a tarnished harmonica—all but the rosary that had belonged to his father—the only thing Matt knew about him was that he had been a priest. Matt had never seen Mello look at it, let along touch it—and now here he was, slinging it around his neck in a hurried fashion.

Matt was unconcerned as yet of this activity because of Mello's constant threats towards Roger, the bumbling, stern overseer of their 'cases,' to 'blow this shithole and never come back.' Matt, like Roger, had never taken these threats seriously before now.

"Dude," Matt said, glancing up from his gaming magazine. "Chill out before Rog freaks."

The blonde didn't stop in his movements, even as he shot a heated glare at the slightly younger redhead. "I don't give a fucking shit what he thinks. I've got to get out of here."

Matt raised an eyebrow at this. "Again?"

Finally, Mello stopped with an extremely exasperated sigh to face Matt, hands on his hips. "I'm serious this time, Matt. I'm leaving, and I'm not coming back."

If it weren't for the unusually quiet, determined tone in the other's voice, there was no way that Matt would have believed him even now. "W-why?" It was all he could think of to say.

"L's dead."

The statement hit Matt like a ton of bricks—almost literally. He went slightly limp, in shock. "W-what? What are you talking about, Mells? This isn't f-funny!"

"I'm not kidding. Roger just told me. And he didn't name a successor—Roger says Near and I have to work together." A sour sneer worked its way over Mello's features despite the grief he was clearly experiencing. "Near agrees, the little shit. But there's no way in hell I'm sticking around to tag-team with that freak. That's why I'm leaving."

Over the initial shock and unexpected wave of sadness that had engulfed him—not that L had ever been affectionate towards Matt, or anyone else for that matter, as far as Matt knew; it was just that L had been an unstoppable force, it seemed, always present in Matt's life; it was hard to believe he was dead—Matt jumped to his next initiative. "I'm coming with you."

"No, Matt." That same quiet, strong voice. Matt hated it.

"Yes, dammit," he argued.

Mello threw his head back and groaned. "Don't you get it, Matt? Jeez, you're number fucking three; I thought you would've figured it out by now."

Matt blinked. "Figured what out?"

"I'm not leaving just to get away. I'm going after Kira myself, Matt." The blonde spoke slowly and clearly, enunciating each word to enforce its meaning.

Matt paled. "No. No way, Mells! You'll get yourself killed!"

The other smiled sadly, walking over to where Matt sat, and gently placed a hand on his cheek. "No, I won't. I'm pretty damn smart. Smart as Near, smarter if my emotions don't get in the way. And so are you. That's why I want you to stay here. Keep your head down, don't get hurt. Okay? When this is all over and Kira's dead, I'll come back for you, I promise. Will you wait for me?"

Matt was crying by now. "No, no, Mello, no… Please…" He was begging. It made his pride writhe and shriek, but he couldn't help it. Over the years he'd become addicted to the blonde, depending on him more and more until he was Matt's crutch; the only thing he had left to live for.

"Will you wait for me?" Mello demanded, blue eyes ablaze.

The redhead couldn't answer through his sobbing. When the blonde tried to stand and leave, though, he made his last fraught attempt to keep the other near—he grasped at his arms, clutching with a desperation that spoke plainly of the love and fear in his heart. Catching the blonde off-guard, he managed to pull him down far enough to catch his lips in a fierce kiss. When Mello tried to struggle away, he only pulled harder. Finally the blonde reached up with one hand, tugging Matt's face back with one hand as though to down at him.

The redhead never saw the damp white cloth the other hand held. But suddenly it was pressed to his mouth and nose, cloying his senses in a thick dizziness that swept him down, down, into darkness…

It had been five years since Matt woke up to find Mello gone. Sure, he'd left a note, explaining all the bullshit he'd tried to convince Matt of before drugging him and running away. But that was all—before long, Matt had a new roommate (one he completely ignored; he never spoke at Wammy's again, except to Roger), and when he turned eighteen, he left.

There he was, a brilliant young adult, with no prospects and nowhere to go. So he did the only thing he could think of: he moved to New York. Approximately two hours after his arrival, he had an apartment—a shitty-ass, one-room apartment, but an apartment nonetheless—and was making phone calls to line up jobs. Back at Wammy's, he'd gradually gained connections for hacking missions to keep his mind occupied, and as much as New York City had changed since his brief childhood stint there, it was not nearly enough to keep his mind away from the certain blonde he'd loved and lost.

One year after his arrival in the Big Apple, and he was still in that same apartment, though by now he could have afforded a much nicer residence. Nevertheless, he remained where he was; Matt naturally resisted change, and it helped him to keep a low profile even as a high-profile hacker.

Five years after Mello's departure, he was still nursing the wounds that Mello had left him with; bleeding out, he'd stitched himself back together with the barbed wire of forgetting. Of course Matt could never forget the huge impact his chaotic, beloved blonde had had on his life, but even for a moment, to escape was bliss.

Five years later, and Matt had long ago given up all hope of seeing Mello again when his cell phone suddenly rang.