Title Running with Scissors
Rating PG-13
Category Death Note
Pairing/s Mello/Near
Summary When you run with scissors, be careful not to trip.
Author's Note Bit of a drabble, bit of a right and wrong debate and watered down with light comedy. Every fanfic writer needs to do the morning after scene at some stage in their life, haha.
I love doing clever dialog. However you might have noticed, I very rarely use it in my fictions. So for a change this is a very heavy dialog fiction X3
This is ma 30th fanfiction. WOOPWOOP! And I wish it was more meaningful.
Disclaimer I do not own Death Note but sort of wish I do, because I would like to think I can come up with brilliant story lines too.
On the bedside table lies the gun.
Near has no knowledge of what brand it is, is slightly aware of some of the mechanics behind it, and knows for certain it's a killing tool. He's been thinking about the gun for sometime now, rather bored with counting the ceiling panels and listening to Mello's shallow breathes and snuffles next to him.
At last he simply bites the bullet- at it were- and sits up, careful of the blankets, and leans boldly over the blonde, knowing he could bash on pans and pans and Mello would never wake up from the noise.
He picks up the gun.
Cold from the bitter night temperature, it's surprisingly heavy to hold- much heavier than a plastic robot. As an experiment and nothing more, Near slides his index finger around the trigger, discovering his hands to small to hold it in place for very long. Like it's silently telling him a child shouldn't be holding such a thing.
One slip, slight pressure, and he could take one of his toes off.
He has no idea if the safety is on, or if it's loaded, if it's just a shell of a dangerous weapon. He could probably prod Mello awake and find out that way, but decides against it.
It's slightly scary how very toy like it is. The bulky shape, simplistic lever system and dull colours, it seems harmless and not a tool of destruction at all. Near can't see it killing anyone in its dormant state.
Mello stirs beside him, and Near blinks himself away from the realm of his thoughts. Fingers still on the trigger, staring down the dark barrel of the gun.
Like it has the answers to every problem in life.
Scary thing is. . .it does.
"Don't go hurting yourself, love," Mello murmurs sleepily- accent a rusty British unused as he's been speaking Japanese for so long now - not really awake at all. One arm is buried under the pillow and he tugs the gun out of Near's hands with his free one. "Safety's not on. Me being paranoid."
"Have you ever killed someone, Mello?" Near asks as Mello slips the gun under the pillow to join his hands, reminding Near of a child putting their tooth in the same place waiting for the Tooth Fairy- then realises the comparison isn't the same at all.
"Mm," he makes a disapproving sound into the cotton. "I don't do philosophical topics in the morning, Near, least of all when I just wake up."
"A yes or no would suffice."
"Yeah, I have. I've shot a guy's brains out onto a graffiti stained backalley, cut someone across the stomach and pushed them over just to see their guts spill open then threw up afterwards and I suppose the Death Note counts for some. Happy?"
"Charming," Near says, slightly amused at the half censored images Mello has describe. "I thought you didn't do philosophical."
"Brat."
"I've always thought," he pauses when Mello murmurs something like 'oh here we go' then sobers when he notices he's been caught out via the grumpy silence. ". . alright, I'll leave you in your basking then."
Mello laughs, tucking blonde strands behind an ear then pulls Near down so he's lying instead of doing The Thinker impression. "I'm kidding. I'm kidding, stop being so serious all the time. Continue on with your moral ethics debate, I could do with a few more winks- ow don't pinch me there you little snot."
"Don't you think it's very Kira like. The notion of taking the life of anyone because they simply annoy you, or you think they're in your way. Thinking it's for the greater good. Who grants people the power to think they can take a life?"
Not a statement one hopes to be bombarded with in the early hours of the morning.
"Oh my gawd. Near," Mello groans, shading his face with a theatrically sprawled arm.
"You said I could continue on with my thoughts. I'm not insinuating you have to answer."
Mm-mm is what he gets in reply. Near knows he has to answer anyway, because Mello is simply like that.
"I think, what your problem is," Mello grunts, sentence broken up as he shifts to roll over and face Near properly. He smirks in exasperation. "Your too damn noble is what you are."
Near blows out a prissy breath of air, not thinking that's the case at all. He remembers Mello can't read his mind. "That's not true."
"It's is. It really is," eye roll. Tiredly, Mello rubs at his scars, over his nose and under his eye, a habit that has grown over time whenever he gets irritated over something. Near notices his black nail polish is chipped in places. "Hear me out. You simply believe the world is full of two types of people. The good and the bad. And nothing in between. Hence to why you can't sympathise with Kira's ideals."
"And you do," Near summarises, not impressed with Mello's hypothesise at all.
Kira is evil. Kira is childish. When he doesn't get his way, he believes that killing the road block in his path will solve everything. What happens when that road block starts to push right back? Maybe in the beginning- when there was the darkness and God clapped his hands, and the Word and the garden that held forbidden apples, he jokes silently- his intentions were noble but killing people is definitely in the bad category as far as Near is concerned.
Just like the barrel of the gun, people believe death is the answer to all of life's problems.
That being said, Mello has killed people, and does he slip him into the bad category?
"I wouldn't go that far. Kira wants to create a perfect world. Everyone wants to do that- you are doing it right now, Near. However you're doing it passively by trying to capture Kira. I suppose the Death Note came in handy. Hey," he glares when rage flares behind Near's black eyes. "Hey. The Death Note is just like a gun. Or a cross bow, or a bomb. Or any other weapon humans have touched. It's a tool made for killing."
"The Death Note is nothing like a gun," Near disagrees. He's quite positive his only purpose in life is to simply disagree with everything Mello says. "When you fire a gun, you're in contact with your victim even if it's just for a short amount of time. You can have time to reconsider. With the Death Note, all you see is a name and face and can kill from afar- it's like taking a dart and pinning all the names in the world up on a map and throwing at random. That is the Death Note."
Mello sighs in an enduring way. "A bomb is like that too."
Near sighs because he simply gives up on trying to convince the man otherwise. No good comes from chasing your own tail. Mello chews on a hair strand before spitting that out and chews on the bone of thought instead.
"Near if you were to have the Death Note right now, you'd never write Kira's real name in it, yeah?"
"Hm."
"You could always let me do it if you're scared you're going to blemish your immortal soul."
"Oh please, Mello."
"You might find, Near, that in life, it doesn't always pay to be good. What goes around doesn't necessarily come around. If you we really trying to change the world, you would write in the Notebook; On X date and at X time, Kira will meet with the SPK task force to discuss the Kira case at –say, ummm- Daikoku waft, under the docks. Kira will write all the names present, save for his own, in a fake Notebook and exclaim 'I win, Near', hence revealing himself. He then commits suicide with his own pen. There."
Near stares at him like he's spun the biggest yarn ever.
"It wouldn't feel like a win if I had to stoop to Kira's level," he says after a great deal of consideration and trying not to laugh out loud at the ludicrous scenario.
"You'll end up impaling yourself with your own sword with that kind of attitude," Mello scoffs. At that, Near creates an analogy, carrying a pair of scissors, open at the hilt. He sees himself running with them. If he was to trip and fall with those. . . that could very well happen. "I don't know if you're a fool or if that's something to be admired. Not killing people, I mean."
"Mello. . are you complimenting me?"
Instead of blowing his top- or at the very least denying it- Mello grows distance, pressing his face into Near's shoulder and breaths out slowly. "I've heard that killing a person can rip your soul in half."
"So now you're worried about your soul. Mello, you aren't even religious," he wears a crucifix, but that doesn't mean anything. Like when people wear black or have long fringes.
"When I left the orphanage, Roger pulled me to the side and gave me two things. My real name. And this cross, saying it was wrapped up beside me in the basket I was left in, but as it was made for an adult, he was going to give it to me when I got older. Maybe I'm Catholic by parentage, but I don't pray and have never asked for forgiveness. I daresay I'd spend every second asking for it by my track record," he laughs, fingering the rosaries that lie about his collar bone.
Near covers up the face of the cross, where on larger ones Jesus would be nailed across. He hides it away, like it just being is offensive.
Mello has so many different faces and masks alike, Near is constantly surprised. What he marvels at most is how unsecure he can be when he always appears so confident. He isn't sure if he likes a lose footed Mello.
"Mm. I don't think I like it. You being nice, I mean."
He steers the conversation back to dry land.
"Wh-hey. Excuse me then," Mello says, sounding a little scandalised. He rolls away from Near. And just like that, everything is okay again. Near wonders why an almost kind Mello bothers him so much. He's the only intellect of his level he can speak to on morals truths, yet he would rather have Mello annoyed and angry with him than calm and insightful. He must really be a masochist. "Remind me why I'm here again?" Mello wants to know, sounding utterly exhausted by just having to lie next to the boy.
"Not even a room full of brilliant minds working all at once could figure that enigma out, Mello. However I suspect you secretly enjoy my random fortune cookies of wisdom."
"Oh yes. Your biggest turn on that's for sure," the blonde sneers, somehow having closed the frosted distanced that had formed between them, nuzzling his nose into Near's white mess of curls and drawing his arms around him. "Having the Notebook back suddenly seems very appealing."
"Mello. Between the two of us, if anyone was to reveal their name first, it would be you."
"How so?" Mello says, tone suspicious of the cheeky detective. Near wriggles slightly, freeing up a hand and he plays with a chunk of Mello's hair instead of his own. He twirls it over the tip of Mello's nose until it gives an irritated little wiggle.
"You're so egotistical, I'm surprised you don't scream it out when you-"
The rest of his sentence is interrupted as Mello exclaims loudly, sitting up with a look of outrage. "I don't know why I even bother with you! Yeah, whatever brat. I'm going now," he huffs moodily, swinging out of the bed and sweeping his eyes around in an attempt to find his discarded clothes.
Near smiles quietly to himself, worming his way deeper under the blankets to recover the warmth Mello has stolen away. Gathering the sheets together in a fist, Near rolls over to find Mello more or less ready to go, looking behind the couch- really the only other piece of furniture apart from the bed and night stand in the room- seeking out a misplaced glove.
Mello glances up, feeling eyes on him. Near always enjoys how Mello flushes when being caught out in embarrassing positions.
The detective finds the silence amusing. The blonde finds it awkward.
When Mello reaches the doorknob, he glances back. "Near."
"Mm."
"Aren't you going to stop me?"
"Now why would I do a cliché thing like that?"
With a frustrated sound, Mello slams the door on his way out.
Near doesn't flinch. With a yawn, he stretches his arms above his head, fingernails scratching at the headboard. He knows Mello will be back.
He's left his gun under his pillow after all.
END