I'm sorry, L.
The words were imprinted in Mello's mind for days, weeks even, to where they'd become knowing familiar, steady and curiously calming; that night, though, when they got on the plane to Japan, there began to form a strange paralysis that left even this shrouded in flickering anxiety.
They were ready, they knew the mission by heart. They knew what to do in case of failure and in case of emergency, what prints to use where and what prints to avoid and how to see in the dark and how information travels in fibers of light, and why this is the right thing to do and how even if it wasn't, now there is no way out anyhow.
When Mello closes his eyes, he remembers when first L had left for Japan, many years before, when he was younger and didn't want L to go, and definitely didn't want him to battle against Kira.
I'm sorry, L.
But maybe this is what L had wanted, too.
It's cold and dry on the plane, and they've never been to Japan before; they've been so heavily wound and meticulously prepared they haven't really given much thought to the fact that they're on their way to a new country.
Sueprmax, that's the slang term for maximum security facilities, and that's the kind of place they were going to infiltrate. It didn't sound very nice at all.
Prisoners have presumably gone mad from the things that go on there, he heard, but he also heard Kira was already mad to begin with. Mello finds he wishes almost this was something loud and hard and violent, and not so hauntingly eerie.
They arrive in Japan two stops and almost a day later, red-eyed and tired and disoriented and jet-lagged, but quietly alive with stress; and when finally they are on the cab ride to their hotel, Mello leans lethargically into Matt's shoulder.
There comes the gentle brush of long fingers through Mello's hair, Matt says to him, "We're here, Mello, we're in Japan."
Matt leans to kiss his forehead, whispering things Mello can't hear, and it's all he can do to console his friend for now.
They're very quiet when they reach their hotel room, Mello slides in the key and pushes the heavy door open, he's got sunglasses on even though it's night.
Matt leaves the suitcases by the door, he turns to Mello and runs his fingers along the plastic handles of his sunglasses, sliding them out from under his hair and placing them on the dresser nearby.
Mello's eyelids bat a few times, eyes red and inflamed; Matt playfully kisses each of his eyes in what's really a show of compassion. He knows that when Mello isn't like Mello, it's usually because of L.
His fingers come gentle and warm on his friend's skin when he pulls down the zipper at his vest, Mello watches with distant composure when Matt kisses the skin beneath— but no matter how warm or how gentle or how kind Matt is with him, Mello remains tight and rigid, cerebral and frozen solid with purpose.
"Okay," Matt gives up, and he doesn't try anything on Mello, but he attempts to explain they're going to have to get some sleep.
"I'm sorry, Matt,"
it comes quiet and serious when, some time after the fact, they lie wide-eyed in the dark.
"Remember when you used to sleep over in my room? Back at Wammy's?" Matt asks.
"Yeah, when we did homework."
"Not that. I mean, after the homework."
"You always fell asleep before I finished my homework."
Matt thinks about this.
"Always? You sure?"
"Yeah, because you studied on your bed."
"I studied?"
Mello smirks. "You know you did, dumbass."
And then he grows quiet, because he realizes that Matt has managed to make him smile for the first time that day.
His hands come slowly around Matt's naked back; the memory of doing homework at Matt's desk all those years ago is comforting. He doesn't remember when exactly or how, or whether it's in his head or aloud when, inaudibly, he murmurs,
I love you, Matt,
but he does finally fall asleep.
XXX
It's twilight when they set out the next day.
They've trained a long time for this, coming in undercover with every print and ID and code, and with the sterile needle strapped to the inside of the metal buckle in Mello's belt.
It rings at the security check as expected, and he takes it off and watches the guard pass it through and hand it back to him on the other side of the gate.
They get through the entrance hall unscathed, and on to the second wing, not because that's the right way, but because this way is more common, and then down beneath the solitary confinement unit and through to the fifth wing.
They've memorized the entire layout, but, needless to say, it's entirely different in real life.
It's entirely different when at each hall you have to reproduce the code sequence associated with that door or that ward or that turn.
It's entirely different with the hitch in breath that comes with adrenaline so intense that Mello wonders if, by the time they actually arrive, he won't feel drugged, himself.
Most of the cells they pass are lined with bars and hard glass, and while some of the prisoners are calm, some stare at them and whisper or say things, and some sleep, and some don't bother or don't care— and because, really, Mello and Matt have no idea what they're in for in the first place, they can't help wondering how different from them these people really are.
They walk past the units with bars and the units with glass and the units with windows in doors, until they reach a hall with units that have no windows and no spaces at all, and the doors are white, heavy metal and you can't see anything in or out; and the flickering, fluorescent light of the ceiling lamp gives way to a greenish dim, they stop almost in place by the very sound of their own footsteps when they come at last before the cell, itself.
Cell G.
This is the first of two doors.
You get in with a dual sliding key.
They don't look at each other; they can almost feel each other's heartbeat through the mutual slide of the plastic cards.
There comes the ringing echo of the snapping lock within, then the heavy slide of metal as, like all the other doors there, these ones come apart.
And then again the disconcerting sound of their own footsteps on the white linoleum floor;
And the second of two doors.
This one works by fingerprint.
They had the prints mounted to the very underside of their fingers, because there are cameras all around.
Mello thinks he's never felt a pulse beat so undeniably alive through the vessels coursing in him; from the corner of his eye, he peers at Matt peering back, and, hand trembling, he reaches for the print pad.
I'm sorry, L.
Biting down on his lip, he presses firm, tense, hard, deaf to all the world when there comes again the heavy sliding of doors, slow and cold and metal—
And then all is silent.
They're in.
To be continued…
