Synopsis: "I want to give you a high five, but you're not here. I wonder if you're already dead. Just as you planned." Matt's running thoughts during and after The Suicide Mission, about how Mello can also say "Just as planned" if dying wasN'T part of the plan. No yaoi, ever.

A/N:

. Death Note, Matt's POV

. Song-lyrics-fiction format

. Song lyrics from the first fifty seconds of "Gone" by The Butterfly Effect

. Spacing, italics, brackets indicate various levels of thought rapid-running at the same time

. I own nothing, hence the term "fanfiction"

_-_- Gone-_-_

I'm all alone on the road

The engine hums with the rhythm of the road beneath the wheels.

Smoke patterns in the air.

You're not here, as planned.

But I am…as planned.

Skid, turn, shoot, bail—

Drive, drive, drive—

Disjointed, I'm wondering at the back of my mind… This is only phase one. This is the easy part.

I want to give you a high five. (So many I haven't given you yet).

I want to say, "That was awesome, man! Like in that video game—"

Want you to shut me up with a slap to the back of the head, tell me to keep my eyes on the road and

FOCUS.

But you're not here.

I wonder, idly, numbly, if you're already dead.

Just as you planned.

High water tied underneath the flood

Is it insane to worry about you more than myself, even though I'm the one who would be getting away alive, and you're not getting away at all?

I cruise down the freeway, tensed, tailed.

Damn them.

More organized, relentless than we figured. This is that fifteen percent chance of risk you were fretting about, right? The thing you worried about most?

Well, raise that risk to a hundred percent, buddy…

Tonight, I'm sleeping on tarmac in my own blood.

Deserts of dust, if I must, I will stand

These are my promises

Suicide, damn it, this is suicide!

There are too many of them.

(What was the plan again?)

It's terrifying – a high no game could raise me to. It's too real.

I'm surrounded now. I can see bloodlust in their movements, in their words; their twisted ideas of law and justice…

(The essence of law is force; the essence of justice is fairness. That's what you always say. That was your strongest point: Kira is not justice, but Kira is the law.)

Remember, back in Wammy's, the House, when I forgot you were in my team and so I shot at you twenty-something times in paintball, to win the bonus round? We did win in the end, even if you had to take the shots for us to win. Later, you said I owed you for that.

And remember that time I accidentally shot you in the foot and you couldn't walk for a week, so I had to go instead and plant the bugs in Ms Kira's apartment? You said I owed you for that, too, that you owed me a bullet, that I would take a shot from you. Said you would make me pay, get back at me.

You've forgotten all that (maybe, have you?) but I haven't.

(Well, I did, but these guys reminded me. Life flashing before my goggles…)

You know I'm good for it. I keep promises.

I see a getaway, an opening up ahead, several of them. The squad cars are spaced out as much as possible, making it look like I'm trapped, but there are so many ways out. They know it, and now so do I. I could go… go save myself.

My last gift, the only kind you'd tolerate from me: I'm going to make things even between us. That's something you yearned for: equality. The same level. That's why you roped me in, Rank Three in line to Successor, not Rank Four, why you didn't agree to work aside Rank One. You couldn't bear the inequity, the injustice of it.

NM, NL. No More, No Less. Near, Mello. Near, L. The odds were always against you.

Rank Three… I was the closest you could bear to work with. (I bet you had to swallow a storm of pride before you did.)

I step on the brakes, screech the car to a halt. I hope you don't die before you hear of this. I know you'll be watching.

(God, I'm not thinking straight, am I?)

I hope these guys have enough firepower, because I'm going to need a lot of bullets.

I hope you're winning the war ––

Uh…Damn… it.

(One thing: I'm glad I didn't bet on the outcome of this.

Two things: God, this hurts. This really, really hurts.

Help me.

Three things: I hope you saw that.

I hope you're dead by now.

So you would have avenged L.

It's what you've wanted. That was the plan.)

––to make everything like it was before

Hal brought me here, told me she was saving my sorry skin as a favor, an obligation, told me what Near figured out from the kidnapping escapade. (So much relief, I almost died from it.) Made sure I would get all the medical treatment I needed to survive. Said I was an idiot to do what I did. She only ate back half her words when I explained about the bulletproof vest you insisted I wear. I was perfect distraction with a personal issue thrown in. I didn't plan on dying.

(That wasn't the plan.)

Hal also told me about the burning church you wound up in. You've always wanted a big dramatic ending, haven't you? Somehow you even managed to fit that into the plan.

(She punched me where it hurt when I explained your strategy, how you were planning on dying, that that part wasn't an accident, and how I went along with it for the greater good. "Greater good, my foot," she said. I think she likes you.)

I guess I should be proud of you, you hero of the day. You always knew what to do and did it without a second thought.

That's my Mello.

Like always.

On my hospital bed, I look up at the ceiling and smile. It hurts to smile.

All that we were, we can still be again

I swear

It's easy to see how everything went wrong when you slow down long enough to think about it, when it's all over. It all comes back to me: I remember it all, clear as a nightmare I just woke out of. I don't remember one thing, though:

What was I thinking?

You didn't need that, didn't need to see me "die."

I'm sorry for that, if it hurt, seeing the result of my insane stunt. God knows you had enough pain to go through without this.

But I'm alive; you made sure I would. That's for the vest, for arrangements with Hal to look out for me.

I don't cry at your empty, nameless grave. You wouldn't have liked that. (I don't even smoke there. You wouldn't have liked that either.)

I stand there, deeply wounded but still breathing, and applaud, softly, slowly, grimly, but respectfully. Your due, unknown hero. Ultimate martyr for the end of Kira's reign.

Everything worked out the way you planned it to. The world is rid of Kira (and of you too). I'm alive, and the world has another L. They know nothing of our sacrifice.

Everything is like how it was before all this began.

The world is once again its usual rotten, broken, damned self, with the great, faceless letter L upholding justice for the heck of an interesting game.

Near is Number One.

I'm all alone.

And you're gone.

Just like before. Just like you planned.

I'm all alone on the road

High water tied underneath the flood

Deserts of dust, if I must, I will stand

These are my promises

I hope you're winning the war,

To make everything like it was before;

All that we were, we can still be again,

I swear.