Mello ran.

He didn't care where he went, but he was going there. He stopped thinking, stopped feeling, all that mattered was running.

The wind on his face was almost burning. His hair being pulled back, his heart pounding against his ribs, the sound of feet pounding against the hard cracked earth. And tears. He never cried, but the wind was pushing against his eyes, forcing the liquid out and down his face.

He nearly closed his eyes, but opened them quickly again as human restrictions forced him to have his eyes open or risk loosing his balance.

When he found himself on a patch of grass in front of a church, he stopped. He sat down on the grass, threading his fingers through it and collecting the dew that now sat on his fingers, and contemplated the idea of being sat on top of the dead. He read a gravestone to his right. Maurine Gibson. If his maths was right, she died about age 22.

He wondered if she had known she would die. Did she even see it coming? Was she given a chance? Was she ok with dying? Was it her fault she died? What did she do in her life? Who were her family? Did anyone still know she had existed? Did anyone come here, and stand over her grave?

He closed his eyes, and pictured the funeral around himself. A priest standing over a square shaped hole in the ground, a crying parent, a few spectators, a screaming baby…

His eyes snapped open, as he tried not to relive past memories….

He stands next to a woman in black, clinging to her dress. The baby in her arms is screaming as the box is lowered down. He squeezes his eyes shut as hard as he can. He feels his mother stiffen; she can't even comfort Miheal's sister. An older woman comes over and takes the baby from the shaking woman. She prises Miheal's hands of his mothers dress, and takes them into her own. They walk away, leaving the woman to mourn in private.

Miheal sniffs. They stop a little way of, and he turns to cling to his grandmother's dress.

"There, there," she sighs, ruffling his hair. "It'll get better soon enough."

It didn't get better. It got far, far worse.

Miheal's mother remarried. She changed into a different woman, as if she wanted to forget everything she had been. The man she married was ok at first. Then, not so long after the wedding, Miheal was hungry and went to pick up some chocolate. Which was apparently his stepfather's. A black eye, a split lip and a cut arm later Miheal forgot how to cry.

"Miheal," the voice keeps calling. "Miheal, wake up Miheal."

The grey blur became clearer, as his mothers face came into view. He turned away.

"Come on Miheal! We have to go," she keeps saying.

"I don' wanna to go anywhere with you."

"You'd rather stay with the man that beats you than your own mother and sister?"

"Huh?"

"Come on, pack something, we're leaving," his mother sounds excited, and he quickly packs some of his things. They run out of the house and into the car. His step dad is still sleeping.

"Why are we leaving?" Miheal's sister pipes up. She looks tired and Miheal puts his arm round her. For the first time in about a year, he feels hopeful.

His mum shakes her head. "Lets not think of that," she says "lets just… start a new life, and never think of that one again."

Miheal's sister nods and closes her eyes. Miheal smiles at her, she looks so sweet when she's asleep.

"Where are we gonna live?" always thinking ahead, Miheal asks the sensible question. His mum sighs.

"I don't know Miheal, I don't know. If my mum was still alive, I suppose we could've gone to her, but I wouldn't want to put her in danger. I suppose we'll have to stay in a hotel for a while, then… I don't know,"

Miheal nodded. Maybe now they were leaving, he could go to a new school? No, scratch that, he'd have to go to a new school. This was to good, no more step dad, no more school where kids pick on you for your intelligence, he had his mum back.… if only there was his…

No.

That wouldn't ever happen, and he knew it. No point imagining.

He leans against his sister, and closes his eyes. He was happy.

Well, at least he got his new life.

His eyes snapped open. He tried hard, but he couldn't stop the next bit from playing behind his eyes. The sudden stop, the sound of glass and metal, the sound of snapping bones, the feeling of his sister slumping in his arms… and the screams, the horrible screams.

He still has nightmares about it. He was trapped in a car with his dead mother and sister for half an hour before someone noticed. He was only seven at the time. That was the day he lost his ability to hope and love.

After being passed around to several orphanages, someone recognised his intelligence, and sent him to become a successor to the great, mysterious detective L.

He'd been at Whammy's for three months. He'd made his status very clear. Don't talk to him, and you wouldn't have your insides ripped out.

His biggest goal was to beat Near. He already hated the brat for beating him in every test they'd had so far.

Mello (that was the name they'd given him) looked up to the church. In his whole life, he'd never really thought anything about religion. Well, now was a good a time as ever to try…

He prayed for the first time in his life. He asked for a friend, something good to happen. He felt a little odd after a while, and got up. That was when he noticed a boy stood next to the grave. He shrugged and walked past.

"Hi," the boy called, "are you from round here?"

"Yeah."

"Do you know where…" he looked at a piece of paper in his pocket. "'Whammy's house' is?"

Mello shrugged. "Well I should do, I live there. You new?" The boy nodded.

"What you doing here?"

"My aunt," the boy pointed to "Maurine Gibson"'s grave. Well that's ironic… thought Mello. At least most of his earlier questions were answered. "I remembered it was around here, so I thought I'd come to see her," The boy grinned and followed Mello. "What about you? Are we allowed out?"

"No, I just felt like going somewhere." The boy just nodded at what Mello had said.

Mello sighed. He supposed he should try and be nice to the boy. Moving to a new home was never fun, especially as moving to an orphanage mostly meant you were an orphan. But he'd only be nice for today. After that, the kid had to fend for himself.

"So, what's your name?" it seemed like a good enough place to start.

"…. Mail. Jeevas," he rolled his eyes. "Don't worry, I know."

"What?"

"It's a weird name, right? I don't know what my parents were thinking," he winced at the thought of his parents, and fell silent. Poor kid, must've happened recently then, Mello thought to himself.

"Oh yeah. Mine's…." (He wondered vaguely whether he should tell the new boy, when even Roger didn't know) "Miheal, so I don't really notice weird names. Anyway, when you get there they'll give you a new name. Mine's Mello, so just call me that from now on."

Mail grinned at him, it seemed to be a permanent feature, and started a conversation about Mario.

By the time they got to Whammy's Mello found out that Mail was actually quite a cool person. He liked video games, was a year younger than Mello, and loved hacking into other people's computers or games. Mail also sympathised with Mello's hatred of Near, which instantly stuck him in the good books. He couldn't stand going outside as he was fairly lazy, his bright red hair was a natural colour, and he liked wearing stripes. He briefly mentioned that his parents died in a house fire, to which Mello quickly said about his dad dieing, his mother remarrying, and then about the car crash. They were both silent for a while after that, before Mail asked what Mello liked doing.

"Uh, well, I just go on the computer or read most of the time. Eating chocolate is mainly what I do. One of the great things about Whammy's is they don't care how many sweets you eat, coz L is practically famous for the amount he eats."

They were almost at the gates, and continued talking on and off about nothing in particular until there. Once there Mello looked through. No one seemed to know he had left, which was good. Sad, but good. He supposed he'd have to at least be absent for the day before anyone really noticed.

"Wait here a minute," he said to Mail, before climbing quickly up the wall next to the gates. He noticed with little interest that his jeans had torn at the knee on his way out. After jumping down he turned back to Mail, who was watching him with a slightly quizzical look on his face.

"Remember I told you we aren't really supposed to go out?" Mail nodded, and his face cleared a little.

"Ok, what should I do?" he asked.

"Just push that button, say who you are, and they should let you in."

Mail proceeded to do so, and was quickly allowed in. Mello offered to walk him to Roger's office.

"If anyone asks me I'm gonna say I saw you out here, and came over to talk to you, so stick to that. It might not work, but I doubt anyone will ask."

"Why?" Mello held the door open for Mail, vaguely wondering why he did so, who thanked him and asked the question.

"Coz I don't think anyone noticed I left."

Mail shook his head. "No, I mean; why wouldn't it work?"

Mello looked down. "I don't really get along with…. People."

Matt nodded and didn't say anything else. Mostly because they were at the office by then, but also because he was thinking about what Mello had just said. He didn't have many friends? Was Mail an odd one out from the others, or was it just because they met under strange conditions?

Meanwhile Mello was thinking about the other. He wasn't too bad to have around. Maybe they could carry on being friends? He'd see.

Around 20 minutes later Mail came out again, a bored expression on his face. For the first time Mello noticed that Mail wore goggles. He scanned back in his mind to earlier, and remembered the younger boy had positioned them at the top of his head. He wondered why he wore them, before noticing he'd been spoken to.

"…. So is it ok for you to take Matt to his new room, seeing as you're friends?"

"…. Matt?" Mello frowned at Roger, who had followed the redhead outside.

"That's my name now," Matt explained. Mello mentally slapped his face for not working that out.

"Right, yeah, that's fine," he said. Matt started grinning again, and then followed Mello, who had decided to show Matt around.

"Um, sorry I said we were friends, it's just he saw you and asked if I was ok-"

"Yeah, I have a tendency to hate the new kid."

"Mm-hmm, he mentioned that. So I said that we were friends. He seemed pretty shocked about it, but then he seemed happy. Um, sorry," he repeated. Mello shrugged.

"That's ok, you seem alright."

"So we're friends?"

"Sure. Just don't annoy me."