Note: Today's lyric line is not a lyric line. It is a quote from my favourite play of all time, Othello, by William Shakespeare. Beyond's last line here, "demand me nothing", is also a quote from the play. It's a little reference to one of the most incredible villains in literature that is nice if you get, and hopefully won't detract anything if you don't.

This chapter ran away from me entirely. It got (slightly) homoerotic at a point and I had NO plans for that. And, it's long. At one point I was debating whether or not to make it two chapters, but then went "NAAAAH". So here you are. Also, phollie, I owe you a proper breakdown and all the other stuff. This chapter began deciding where it was going all on its own. It deals with mental descent and I am not good at that. So if this turns out okay, please let me know. Hope you're all enjoying.

x

The Dark Lands

I'll pour this pestilence into his ear...

I am not what I am.

-

Mello has never quite understood the idea of dying of fright until precisely this moment.

The pair of wide red eyes floating in front of him are fixed on his own.

"Who are you?"

It's pointless. He knows who this is, this pale and mad man, and his voice comes soundlessly from his lips, dying the moment it hits the dark.

The face leers, and it is either Mello's imagination or the machinations of this place that makes Beyond's teeth look sharper than any teeth Mello has ever seen.

Teeth for biting tearing shredding, teeth for rending, teeth for meat, teeth for –

Mello starts violently, not sure where the hideous ring of those thoughts has come from. But there is a knowing look in those red eyes that he does not like.

"Little Second, little Second, how are we today?" chants Beyond, all sing-song, nursery rhymes hanging behind his voice.

Mello does not answer.

Beyond's look grows disapproving. "Now, now, now, my new friend, don't be impolite. Just because you cannot hear yourself speak, it doesn't mean that I cannot." He smiles again, that pointed-toothed smile. "You learn things, you see, being here this long. Though I expect he told you that."

"You're BB, aren't you?" Mello asks. Again, he cannot hear his voice. But Beyond nods. Out of the darkness, shoulders loom, and the top of a torso. It is like he is standing in a pit of pitch, and leaning out, ever so slowly, like some monster from children's tales come to life and ready to wreak the kind of destruction that people have always spoken of in hushed tones.

"Why yes I am, little Keehl, and you are my successor, are you not?"

My successor, are you not? My successor, are you not?

It rings in Mello's mind over and over and eventually he finds enough of his voice so force out, "what?"

Beyond chuckles. It is a gurgling sound like underground streams, those ones that lie in the deepest caves when all you can see is shadow and rock and all you can hear is the swell of water. "Of course. That is what you were in life, and that is what I will make you now. Here." Menace flashes across his face like a glance of light. "There's no leaving the dark lands, you know."

"Th – that's a lie." Mello tells himself he believes it, over and over again, because that's the only way he can make the words feel certain. "L got out. And I'm not your successor!"

Beyond's smile spreads wider, and it's as smug as the cat who got the cream. "And yet he came baaack."

"He came with me!"

"And don't you wonder why that is?"

Mello is thrown by the question. "What? He came to help me."

Beyond chuckles again and there is this kind of unrestrained glee about him, a kind of hideous mania, and a wildness that Mello thinks even he could not match up to.

"Tilt and turn, little Keehl, tilt and turn."

"What?"

Beyond does not answer, just carries on chuckling. Then he tips his head back and lets out a yowl of mirth, like whatever's going on, that's the funniest thing in the world. His laugh becomes high and keening and at the edges of it Mello can taste the gathering notes of hysteria, and if there are two things Mello learnt from the LABB murders it is that second place is never safe and Beyond Birthday is insane.

Suddenly Beyond's head snaps down, falling barely an inch from Mello's own. His teeth are bared in a macabre smile and his eyes are blood red and disengaged. "L brought you here to die," he says, in a rasping voice, all hisses and lilts and vicious delight. "To die all over again because that is the only way he can get through. He is cruel, the number one is, cruel cruel cruel. He doesn't care for you, little Keehl, he cares for the fact that this place demands a soul and it suits him better to deliver yours than his own. He wants to get to the other side, you see! What little lies did he tell you, my friend? What little lies did the number one tell you?"

And then Beyond emerges. He is skeletal, with broad shoulder and wide cheekbones that make Mello think of days in the dark and days spent wishing so hard that you were someone else that you waste away into nothing. He's wearing something ragged and white, and looking again, he sees it's the old remains of a prison psych ward jumpsuit. Winding up and around his skin, in odd patterns, are the tracks of flame.

Mello cannot help but notice how they have spared his face.

He advances, in awkward, predatory steps, on Mello. His teeth are still bared and Mello wills his body to move, sends signals to every muscle, tries to force himself backwards.

And, miraculously, the space between them widens.

There is a second, a split second, where all the feeling rushes back into Mello's limbs and he is suddenly very aware of how to move, how to run, how to fight. It fades as quickly as it came, but that's all he needed – they are still there, his arms, his legs, and he's going to use them. He forces himself around, forces himself to remember how to put one foot in front of the other, and not knowing where he is headed or what he will find, he runs.

***

L can feel the darkness prickling closer.

He knows Mello can't feel it. Or that if he does, he won't know what it means, or will just dismiss it as another sensation of the storm. L doesn't blame him. He'd thought that, the first time – he'd just let it go. And then all of a sudden –

He grips Mello's hand tighter. Don't let go, he thinks. Don't let go, then when it comes, you'll have something to tether yourself to, something outside the dark –

Then he feels Mello's hand slip out of his and the distant sound of a candle hissing out, and the heavy, soundless, crushing blanket of black descends.

There was a reason, really, that he did not panic earlier when looking at the horizon. There was a reason the tendrils of fear did not snake their way out and send his heart into a frenzy. That reason was because once you have been here, in the middle of it, with the darkness stretching forever in every direction, just looking at it won't scare you anymore.

Nothing will scare you anymore.

L closes his eyes. At least, he thinks he closes his eyes. And here it comes. He cannot see a single thing but he is becoming painfully, awfully aware of every aspect of his body – he can feel the tremble spread down his fingers, feel the hairs prickle on his neck. He is oh so keenly aware of the heaviness of his legs, the heat of his clothes as they shift against him, aware of everything and aware of it so individually and so minutely he can feel himself caving in.

The collapse of Gestalt.

He hears the sound of the first blade begin to whir, and seconds later, there is a flash of silver in the dark and a sickeningly familiar, ice cold pain spreading through his arm.

Then the whirring sound of metal and metal and shadow intensifies.

And then, spot by spot, flecks of silver sparkle and disappear.

He cannot track them. He cannot avoid them. Everything he was good at, everything he knows, every single thing he has ever learnt is no good about invisible threats in the dark. He can feel himself shaking and can feel nausea bubbling up inside him, and he can feel a heavy and chilling fog around him in the shadow.

Then one by one he hears the blades rise upwards, the hideous sound of steel against rock echoing through the dark.

Then everything stops.

And then they descend.

***

Mello does not know how long he has been here.

Time, he is realising, does not pass the same way anymore. He is not entirely sure that it has been passing at all since he arrived here. Since he died. He is feeling slow, and heavy, and it is all he can do to convince himself he is still moving. He thinks he has his hands splayed out, somewhere in the unbreakable darkness, feeling around for anything solid, anything tangible. But here, in this place, he isn't sure. He isn't sure. The closeness of the blackness is the worst thing he has ever felt. It is impenetrable and muffling and thick and he has this awful, sneaking feeling that something is out there.

Every now and again he can hear Beyond's laughter. Sometimes it is close, sometimes he's put distance between them, and sometimes he is sure he can feel hot and rancid breath curl against his ear and the shrieking laughter split his mind.

And at the back of it all, behind the shadows and behind the fear and behind the silence, he can feel himself slipping.

There is no noise but he knows that Beyond is still in pursuit. He isn't sure what's doing this to him, what's making him run, but there's this strange kind of panic creeping its way through his limbs. It's this feeling like, you're gonna die unless you run. And it's mad, he knows it's mad, because he's dead already, but all of Beyond's talk of souls and second deaths and all this darkness has got his mind playing –

Flash of red, flash of white; "BOO!"

This time, when Beyond's wasted face and wild eyes materialise barely a breath from his own, Mello hears the scream rip from his throat.

Beyond is not laughing anymore. His eyes are narrowed into slits of rouge and there is something altogether more sinister about the curl of his lips now. Mello tries to back away, but nothing he's doing is making any difference. Beyond remains as close as ever.

And he is getting closer.

Mello feels fixed and frozen as Beyond's face inches inexorably closer, until Mello can feel their eyelashes brush when they blink. Beyond's forehead presses against his, and it is as cold as ice water. The heat of his breath whispers against Mello's lips and Mello shudders, violently and instinctively. A low and dark memory of laughter slips from Beyond's throat.

"I think I'll keep you, little Keehl," he whispers, and Mello feels a skinny hand wind into his hair. "You and I are really quite alike, you know. We will both never be L...he is the reason we have both lost the lives we should have led...he is the reason we are both dead...and he is the reason we have lived our lives in second place." Beyond's voice has risen to a rasping hiss and he shifts forward, until he is cheek to clammy cheek with Mello, and he brings his lips against his ear. "You know it's true, little Keehl...you and I could have been so much more...we are the strong ones, the mad ones, the ones with fire in our steps! And because of him...and now he has brought you here and left you to the dark lands. What a hero he is!"

Mello is suddenly aware that he can see again. Not very far, and not very much, but he can see his hands, his feet, his body – and how close Beyond's raggedy frame has come to his own. Beyond that, there is nothing but the encroaching dark.

"That's not true." Mello steadies his voice, and tries to pull away from Beyond. He can't move. "L isn't – L is helping me. He's taking me to –"

"To your friend?" Mello can feel Beyond's smirk, and as he draws breath for his next words, his tongue runs along the edge of Mello's ear. "Who exactly, little Keehl, told you your friend was in danger in the first place?"

"L," Mello says, without thinking, and then it hits him. "L told me."

Beyond's chuckle is drier this time, but louder, curling into his mind. "Yes he did, didn't he? And I expect he told you there are only two ways out of the waiting room, too...I expect he told you this was the only way to go..."

Mello stands stock still and now it is horror that freezes him in place. Could it...could that be true? Could L – L, his hero, his idol, the man he's built all his ideals and all his principles and all of everything about himself around – could L have tricked him?

"Why?"

His voice is echoing around in the dark, and it bounces back to him softly and softly, and it strikes him how wide and empty and black this place must be.

"I already told you." Beyond's voice drops to a murmur, warm and with a trickling edge of certainty that is beginning to work its way inside Mello's mind. "He wants you to die here. He wants you to lose your soul to this place so he can pass through. And he knew...oh, he is a clever one, because he knew, did L, that the only person I would be more interested in meeting than him would be you."

Beyond's hand is still tangled in his hair. Mello becomes are that he is trembling at about the same moment Beyond brings a jagged fingernail to rest underneath his eye. Mello can feel him pull his lower eyelid down very gently. The air is cold against the exposed heat of the wet skin.

"How does it feel?" Beyond croons, and he drags another finger up the side of Mello's face, raking a hard red line over his only unspoilt cheek. "How does it feel, little Keehl, to be betrayed this way? To find out that all you are is a useful thing for the great L – that he does not actually care? How does it feel to feel like me?"

Mello cannot stop himself shuddering now. He can barely keep still, and he brings his arms up around himself. The closeness and awfulness of Beyond, the thought that L could have just – and worse, deeper, the knowledge that now, he has no idea where Matt is, or what is happening to him, or how he can help him...

"You're going to spend all of eternity in the darkness with me, you know. That's what he wanted for you. That's why he came for you in the waiting room. Because you could be useful..."

Beyond tightens his grip on his hair and pushes down, and Mello feels his knees collapse. He crumbles to the ground, hands splaying forward, and the ground is cool and hard and feels like rock. And then Beyond is everywhere, pressing against his side, one hand behind him, one hand wrapped around, holding him in some kind of distorted embrace.

"You belong to me now, Mihael...you're with me now."

The hand on his cheek shifts and Beyond's thumb moves over his mouth, and he slides his nail between Mello's lips. Mello feels his bottom lip being peeled down as the pressure on his eye releases. Beyond's hand is still tight in his hair, holding him like a ragdoll, keeping him from collapsing to the floor completely, and as he feels a tongue snake out and run over the tendrils of skin beginning to form over his exposed flesh his stomach lurches. He wants to throw up. He wants to die.

Beyond's tongue curls round to where his nail is pinning Mello's lip in place. He traces the tip over his own nail and he is so close now Mello is not sure he can tell whose breaths are whose.

"Tilt and turn, little Keehl, tilt and turn...never matters what you did, never matters what you do...you will be the skinny little second best for ever and for ever...trapped in the dark with me."

Trapped in the dark with Beyond, Mello can feel his mind steadily unravelling. The heat and stench of the other man's impossible breath and the feel of his skin fill his senses.

"Tilt and turn and twist and tear and bend and break and groan and gasp –" Beyond is hissing against his mouth and he cannot make sense of it. He feels something tight and hot in his throat, he feels himself shaking so uncontrollably, he feels Beyond's tongue wet and warm against his bottom lip. "Mine, little Keehl, forever in the dark..."

"No."

Then, there is the sound of flesh connecting with flesh, and a sudden coldness wraps around Mello as the heat of Beyond is send skidding into the darkness. There's a snarl and the sound of him jumping to his feet and he stalks back into sight, into the impossible globe of semi-light that seems to be surrounding them here.

Mello looks up. Standing above him, unhunched, with a look of ferocious anger bright in his eye, is L.

"Run away, Beyond. Go back to skulking in your shadows."

"You!" Beyond's face distorts into a picture of hatred and rage. "How did you find me?"

L remains impassive, the same silent threat hanging in his eyes. "Run away," he repeats.

Beyond straightens up, and there's the sound of bones grating and clicking against each other as he does. He reaches L in two long strides and squares up to him. He's a few inches taller, and would have been bulkier if he hadn't wasted away to all but nothing.

"Make me, L." Beyond's voice has become feral. "This is my place of strength, not yours. L is after Beyond Birthday in the dark lands!"

Without warning, L strikes him once, hard, across the face.

"You are a fool and a madman and you have no strength anywhere."

The sheer vitriolic coldness of L's words is astonishing. The entire temperature seems to drop, and a kind of iced-over fury emanates from the dead detective.

"What?!" Beyond's face contorts again. "How dare you!"

He flies at L, his scream ripping through the darkness and quiet, reaching out his ragged nails to his face –

- And deftly, L sidesteps, and twists his body into a kick that sends Beyond skuttering into the shadows again.

"I think you will remember who I learnt that from, BB."

There is a growl and Beyond reappears. But this time, L does not hesitate. He advances on him, all silence and anger and swift capoeira attacks that land Beyond on the stony floor with the bare flat of L's foot pressed on his chest.

"Why are you still scuttling around, BB? Don't you have places to go? This is only supposed to be a temporary holding, you know."

Beyond makes a hateful noise deep in throat. "Same could be said of you, L."

"I have unfinished business that I will shortly be able to attend to. If your bitterness is going to keep you here then you know what's going to happen to you. Why do you persist?"

Beyond's eyes narrow and a twisted, detached kind of smile tangles his lips. "Demand me nothing," Beyond snarls, "what you know, you know. From this time forth I never will speak word."

L looks down at him coldly. "Do not fool yourself, Beyond. You do not have the graceful refuge of motiveless malignancy. Everything you do you do from hatred of me and petty vengeance. You are going to destroy yourself here." L removes his foot. "Go away, B."

Beyond remains silent, but there is a hatred burning behind his eyes that will never die. He clambers to his feet, shoots one last resentful look at L, and disappears into the darkness.

L drops down next to Mello, crouching onto his heels. He brings gentle hand up to Mello's head. His eyes are still focused on the floor, but he can feel L's slender fingers working to undo the knot Beyond has made in his hair.

"Mello," he says, softly, "are you alright?"

The concern in his tone is such a stark and sudden contrast to the lechery and viciousness filling Beyond's words that it tears something in Mello apart. He reacts instinctively, animalistically, and lashes out. He swings at L's hand, and the force of it sends him sprawling backwards onto the ground. L staggers backwards, and gets to his feet.

"Get away from me!" The words sound high and childish and bounce back at him in the dark.

L stares at him, in shock. "Mello?"

"Why did you bring me here?" he demands, his voice shaking worse than it had ever shaken during his life. "Why did you bring me here?"

L is still looking blank. "You know why, Mello. We have to pass through here. Beyond it is the shinigami realm, and that's where –"

"How do I know? How do I know? How do I know you're not lying to me?! For all I know you've brought me here to die!"

"Mello, you're already –"

"You said it yourself," Mello says, his voice low and hard and tearing at his throat. "You said it, there are worse things than life. How do I know you're not – that you're not trying to -?!"

He stops. He has no more words. Instead, he feels hot tears swelling up behind his eyes, feels hysteria biting its way into his mind, and struggles to hold it down.

And then, he looks at L's face. His expression is one of purest heart-break, of the sadness felt by a father when he learns his son no longer trusts him. "Mello..."

And then, Mello really does cry. He doubles over, pressed against the ground, shaking, and weeping, and harsh sobs rip through him. All the terror and the panic and the hate and the horror and disgust and heat and cold he has felt in these dark lands takes hold of him. He can feel himself coming apart, and all he knows is the wracking anguish washing through him.

He does not know precisely when L crouched down beside him again. But when he begins to calm down, when he feels the waves of nausea brought on by thoughts like what if L hadn't come subside, he feels the slender fingers combing through his hair, and wiping the sweat from his brow.

When he finally falls quiet, L asks tentatively, "Mello?"

He draws a long, shuddering breath. "I'm sorry," he mumbles.

L laughs dryly. "Oh, Mello. You have nothing to apologise for. If you had seen how I reacted when I encountered this place for the first time..."

He trails off, and Mello does not press him. He does not think he wants to. Instead, he says, "he said such – the things he said – was that really Beyond Birthday?"

L nods sombrely. "The real thing, I am afraid. Dead, of course. He was killed by Kira."

Mello drags the heel of his hand across his unscarred cheek, roughly drying his tears. He glances across the welt left by Beyond's nail, and feels sick again. But this time, he manages to suppress the nausea, to push it aside.

"What did you mean?" he asks. "About – you said about if he stayed here..."

"If he stays here, he will become nothingness," L says grimly. "He will pass on to Mu. He will exist as nothing but a disembodied feeling of hatred and anger and loneliness."

Mello stares up at him. "Is that what happens to – to everyone?" Could it have happened to me hangs unsaid in the air.

"No," L tells him, laying a hand on his shoulder. "It is only for those who refuse to try...who cling to the feeling they were cheated from life. Who refuse to admit there can be anything more. Who will not let go of the feelings that guided them to their downfall."

One other thing sticks out in Mello's mind, and so he asks, "what's your unfinished business? I mean, if you don't – move on – or whatever – won't you...go to Mu?"

L shrugs. "Maybe I will. After I have helped you here, I will only have one piece left, and that lies not too far ahead, I think."

Mello frowns. "Me? I was some of your unfinished business?"

L smiles down at him fondly, and once again, Mello is strongly reminded of a father looking at his only son. "I know what you're like, Mello. I knew you were bound to do something that would land you in the waiting room instead of on the platform."

Sitting up, Mello brings a hand to his head. "This doesn't make much sense, does it?"

L's smile turns rueful. "One thing I am learning here is that even in life, very little ever really did." He gets up, and offers Mello his hand. Mello reaches to take it, but then, he stops.

There are fresh white scars running all over L's palm, curling round his whole hand, disappearing under his sleeve.

"L," he breathes, aghast. "What -?"

L follows his gaze and his face grows dark. "This place has its ways of getting to everyone, Mello. You are a strong, strong young man. But what is it you have always doubted?"

"I don't –"

"Your mind, Mello. You have doubted your mind and you have doubted your ability to ever live up to what the orphanage wanted you to be."

Mello cannot tear his eyes away from the horrible white scars. "I suppose..."

"And you have always, always relied on your body. You were always the fastest, the strongest, and you know that. Even when you were young. This place, this darkness...it froze you. It took away your strength. And Beyond...he was only too happy to play on your doubts."

He swallows heavily. "How do you know what he said to me?"

"Someone was watching you."

"What?! Who?"

A ghost of a smile flickers on L's lips. "I will show you." His hand is still outstretched. Hesitantly, Mello takes it.

"So," he asks, slowly, uncertain if he really wants to know. "What...um, what happens to you in here?"

L hangs his head a little, and looks up at Mello from underneath the shadow of his fringe. "My weakness is somewhat the opposite of yours. My mind, I have never doubted. It is my sole skill. My weakness is in my body. I am skilled in capoeira, yes, but in physical strength, in swiftness and grace of movements, in physical instincts..." he shakes his head. "Imagine a hundred invisible daggers flying at you out of the darkness. The only glimpse of them you get is a sudden flash just before they strike, to torment you into thinking that if you were simply a little smarter, a little quicker, you could evade them. But they cannot be evaded."

Mello's jaw has gone slack. "That happened to you?"

L raises his head. "We all face our demons in here, Mello. Many of the souls I have seen enter here do not re-emerge. I cannot express how proud I am of you that you have withstood it."

It is Mello's turn to hang his head. "I wouldn't have," he mutters. "Not if you –"

"I think you would, Mello," L says kindly. He is smiling. "I have met and seen and spoken to a very great number of people in my time – and trust me, because of this place, I have had perhaps more than I should have – but it is a true rarity to find someone of as strong a spirit and of as noble a mind as you. You withstand. You endeavour. For all the ill you may have done, Mello...you have a good heart."

Mello opens his mouth. He does not know what to say. He feels something twist and swell inside him, but before he can land on any kind of right words, L has turned, and headed into the darkness.

"This way, Mello. Our guide is not far."

"Guide?"

Mello is unsteady on his legs, but stumbles after L as quickly as he can. He feels the darkness drop around him once again.

"L?!"

"Don't worry," comes L's disembodied voice. "Just keep going straight ahead."

Mello obeys, and emerges into another pool of semi-light like the one before. L is standing there alone.

"So where's the guide?" he asks.

L smiles. There is something strange and wicked twisting at the edges of it, but before Mello can wonder why, it becomes clear enough.

With a sound like the clattering of old bones and the sweep of a curtain over a coffin, a huge, winged figure looms from the darkness.

"Hyuk hyuk hyuk..."

"Mello," L says, "I would like you to meet Ryuk. He is a shinigami. He's going to show us the way."