Cloudy darkness. Heaviness. But the cloudiness wasn't a product of her environment; Rose could tell it was the product of her mind. She blinked a few times, took a few focused breaths, and her eyes gained some clarity. She was in a long, low, underground room, up against one of the longer sides. A battery powered lamp emitted a faint beige glow from one corner, next to an armchair and two upright wooden chairs. Some antiquated and defunct bits of old machinery stuck out of the wall opposite her, on either side of the only door.

A slight strain in her arms made her focus on the position of her body. Her arms were each secured to the wall above her head in some kind of metal cuff. Her ankles were similarly locked to the floor, but the cuffs were located such that Rose found she was sitting quite comfortably on the floor leaning against the cool concrete wall. This comforted her – it meant that Mello wasn't interested in torturing them, for now at least. And if he's not fallen that far... then maybe we have a chance of saving him.

Turning her head to her right, Rose saw L mirroring her position. He, however, hadn't woken up yet. To her surprise Rose could see that Misa was similarly trussed up just beyond him. And she was awake. Rose felt a little coil of fury twist inside her.

"Misa," she growled.

The blonde jumped at the sound of her voice.

"Oh, hey Fern! I didn't realise you were awake," she said, in perfectly respectable English.

"Of course you know English," Rose muttered. "Why are you tied up too? I thought you were on his side?"

"I am." Rose couldn't see her properly with L in the way, but she heard Misa's voice turn woeful, wistful and self-pitying. "He's punishing me for leading you here. He told me not to come, I didn't listen... I couldn't help it I had to see him!"

"Do you have any idea," Rose said slowly and deliberately, laying heavy stress on each word, "what you've done to Matt?"

"I'm sure he's fine, boys are always fine aren't they?"

"No he isn't – and no, they're not. You really hurt him Misa."

There was a small silence. "I did like him, I genuinely did. I wasn't totally faking it all, you know. It's just... I like Mello more. Lots more. I think we must be soulmates!"

Rose snorted. "With what I've seen of you you're more likely to be soulmates with my big toe."

"Hey no need to get bitchy, who the hell do you think you are, English woman? I'm the one who's a top model, I'm the one who's also a double agent for the sexiest man in the world who's helped him do amazing things!"

Rose didn't respond – there was really no point. At her silence Misa crowed in victory, and Rose hid her dry smile.

At that point the door swung open, and Mello strolled in.

"Mello!" Misa squeaked.

He didn't reply to her, but gave Rose an appraising stare. "How good to see you again! You're awake. Good. Let's wake him up," he said, spitting out the pronoun.

Rose watched him as he walked over to L and shook his face until L woke up. Rose had thought that maybe, after all that had happened, she'd look at Mello and not find him attractive, but he still was. The lustrous brown fur coat he'd been wearing in London encased his form again, and once L was blinking into consciousness, he strode over to the armchair, and laid the heavy garment on it. The big black boots, skin-tight trousers and vest were also in place, but this time the trousers were deep purple. Mello removed a bar of chocolate from the folds of his coat and took a measured bite. The crack of splitting chocolate sounded supernaturally loud in the concrete room.

"And I suppose she's tied up for leading us here?" L asked, motioning towards Misa.

"Yep. I was very fucking angry at her. But, as it happens, it's all gone rather wonderfully, so I'm going to let her free now. A few hours down there is enough of a punishment for disobeying me." He took a key out of his pocket and released each of Misa's cuffs, causing her to spring upon him like an excitable Tigger.

"Yayyyyyyy! So are you gonna take me on that date you promised as thanks for leading him to you?"

"Once this all blows over, of course I will."

Rose wondered if he was telling the truth.

Mello settled comfortably in the armchair, one ankle resting on the opposite leg, and surveyed the scene with satisfaction. Misa sat on the floor at his feet, arms around his calves.

"Well!" Mello exclaimed quietly. "This really couldn't have gone much better." He flashed a dazzling smile. Taking a hipflask from the fur coat, he took a deep gulp and sighed with satisfaction. "Well, what to do with you now?"

"You could tell us how you pulled off the assassinations," suggested L.

Mello's eyes widened and his eyebrows raised, in both surprise and disdain. "You mean that famous L hasn't worked it out? Fucking hell, you must be getting old. You're losing your touch."

"I knew enough to keep up with you."

"Not enough to stop me," Mello jeered.

"How did you gain influence in the criminal world?"

Rose was impressed at how calm L sounded. She was even slightly disturbed at how coolly interested he appeared. Is it a facade? Or is he as interested in this game as Mello is himself?

Mello chuckled. "It's pretty easy. Most people in the global underworld are horribly predictable: all are self-interested, all see status in terms of power, money, and sex. So first you give the big guys what they want – you devise a few strategies that make them millions of pounds within a week, quickly and easily – they love that. So then they love you, but they still gotta respect you. So you gotta show your power over weak people, gotta show them you're ruthless and can't be tricked, which I can't. And the final nail in the coffin – women. If all the women wanna fuck you, the men respect you. And if you get the hearts of their women, the bosses ain't got nothin' on ya that you can't repay. It's a simple game."

L nodded. "Yes, I also find the criminal world depressingly predictable."

Rose was seething at Mello's words, and thus also at L's seeming lack of reaction to them. How dare he be so cosy with him! I hope this is part of some bigger strategy, because right now he's behaving like an arsehole.

"So what do YOU care about Mello?" Rose snarled. "Because as it appears to me right now, you're exactly the same as them: a self-interested angry little boy, just wanting status through power, money and sex. You're just a little cleverer at it, that's all, well fucking done, bravo. What makes you so superior?"

L sent her a warning look, but it was too late because Mello's face had darkened, and he had risen fluidly from the chair, kicking Misa gently aside.

"You're in a funny sort of position to be making such remarks," he hissed in a gilded, smooth voice, but one that seemed to be painted on top of a great concealed tension. "Have you forgotten where you are? Have you forgotten how utterly you have failed? Have you forgotten that I could kill you any minute that I chose?" He had drawn a small gun out of his back pocket, at which Misa made a funny little squeak, but was silenced by a wave of Mello's hand. His eyes burned into hers with a strained, supernatural green light. "Or better still... him? It could be a slow death, and you could watch even second of it if you like."

Rose bit back the fury and frustration seething inside her. Mustn't push him. That must've been L's thoughts – best not to push him in these circumstances.

Mello had slowly pressed the gun into L's shoulder. "Apologise."

"Sorry."

"No, a better apology than that. Else I won't believe you really want to keep him alive."

Rose cursed inwardly. I do not want to prostrate myself before you, you silly child. But do I have a choice? I don't want to encourage in anyway a circumstance where he actually WOULD shoot L. Fine. I'll do it. "I'm really truly sorry Mello, for speaking stupidly. You're right, I'm in no position to say such things, you're the one in control here."

"So, should I shoot him?"

"No."

"Beg me." Mello gave a wide toothy grin.

Once more swallowing her retorts, Rose attempted to spit out what he wanted to hear. "Please please please don't shoot L. I beg you."

Mello laughed, and stood up, swaying slightly as if from exhilaration. "Whoo! That was fun. I could do this all day." Taking a little pot from his pocket, he inhaled some of the fine white powder from inside and whooped again, his head tilting back and his pupils dilating. "But I'm going to go now and play some other games. See you guys later, it's been great!"

He headed for the door, taking a key out of his pocket, pressing it, and unlocking the door

with something like an electronic car-key. "Come on Misa!"

She trotted out behind him, and the door shut again.

"Aaaaargghhh!" Rose screamed out her anger and irritation, her fear of their helplessness. "What are we gonna do?"

L shut his eyes for a second, hiding his panic from her. She's losing it. Must not seem weak, or she'll get even worse. He slowed the frantic pacing of his heart, tried to erase the pressure of the gun pressing into his shoulder that was still somehow there. "Well there's nothing much we CAN do." He was relieved to hear his usual monotone had been achieved. "Which for now, does not matter."

"Why?"

"Because Mello is playing cat-and-mouse – I suspect he'll want to play with his food a long time before he eats it."

"Do you reckon this room is bugged?"

"I'm not sure." L's eyes darted around. "I really couldn't say. Whilst from an analysis of Mello's current psychological state I would imagine he will be too busy enjoying himself to be listening to us, it wouldn't be wise to assume that there isn't someone else monitoring us for him. No, we must proceed as if he can hear."

The storms of fury within Rose began to subside into the turgid waters of grim resignation. "So we can't even make plans."

"Not that there's really anything we could plan to do," L pointed out. "As Mello will be well aware of, unless he decides to let us go, there's nothing we ourselves can do."

"True. He's not the sort of person to be reasoned or persuaded to do it, he'd just want to keep us here even more if we tried."

"Exactly. The only way we'd have a chance to do something would be if someone from the outside helped us, but of course that will not happen."

L's voice had gone a little despairing. He had also just rolled his eyes in a circle in a curious fashion.

"No?"

"Of course not, we didn't tell anyone on the outside the precise location, did we? It'll take a long time for someone to figure this place out."

Again came the weird roll of the eyes. Is that him telling me he's lying deliberately? Rose pondered. Because of course people on the outside know, Matt found the maps for this place. I suppose it's good for Mello not to know that, but I'd be surprised if Mello was silly enough to assume no one else knew, and so I'm surprised that L seems to think so. Am I missing something?

"It will," Rose agreed tentatively, putting a little despair into her voice too. L's eyes sparkled a little, and he nodded in affirmation. "So I guess we just sit here and wait."

"I suppose we do."

They drifted naturally into silence. The chemicals from the stun darts were still swimming around in their blood, and both easily sunk into a state of consciousness that was dim and lethargic, but not quite asleep.

After a timeless gap that could've been anywhere between ten minutes and ten days, the sound of the door opening jolted Rose into alertness. The deep ache in her body's stiff limbs, but the relative lack of hunger, suggested to Rose the time had been around one day. Mello had sauntered in, encased in nothing but a purple dressing gown, and alone this time. An unlit cigarette hung on his lip, and he carried a litre bottle of water. Rose opened her mouth to say something, but found the inside of her mouth was too dry, and she coughed. Her bladder was telling her that she'd needed a wee for some hours.

"So, my friends," he addressed magnanimously. "Getting thirsty? Let me help you out."

Rose glanced sideways at L, wincing at her stiff neck, and saw he was awake and bright-eyed. It looked like he'd been sitting that way for a while.

"You first, ugly. Open your mouth."

L obliged, and Mello poured a few mouthfuls in, waiting for him to swallow each time.

"And last but not least..." Mello sidestepped to Rose, and performed the same task with her, pouring water into her mouth, watching her parted lips, and the movement of her throat as she swallowed. The wicked Cheshire cat grin spread over his face. "Hmmm, now what does this remind me of..." he purred.

Rose flushed with shame and anger, and mustering her strength, spat her final mouthful full into his face. Mello laughed and wiped it off.

"Well I sure am glad you didn't do THAT at the time!"

L felt sick and impotent, wanted to run and fall into oblivion, but mastered himself as best he could to give his voice his authoritative tone. "Leave her, Mello. Don't punish her to get to me. I'm right here. Do as you will."

Mello's smiled widened. "Aww, are you scared?" He stroked Roses cheek, and watched with pleasure as an involuntary shudder rocked L's form. "But don't worry." He gazed down at them dismissively. "I'm not a barbarian, I don't go where I'm not wanted. Which really hasn't been a problem, since she was more than willing." His eyes narrowed and sparkled, teased her. Rose glared stonily back. "Besides, I wouldn't mess about with you whilst Misa and the girls are around, Jesus, they give me quite enough of a workout as it is."

Mello sat himself in the armchair and lit his cigarette. All was silent except for the inhales and exhales of his breath, whilst his marine eyes bored into L.

"In the end you've been so disappointing," Mello sighed. "Everyone is always so fucking disappointing. When I was little I thought my dad was the superhero. I'd sleep in the back of the tour bus while he was partying with all the cool radicals, and I knew when I grew up I wanted to be as cool as him. But he couldn't save his wife from heroine and he couldn't save himself from the government – what a stupid fool he turned out to be."

Mello's pretty jaw-line had been tensed in an ugly way. Even the soft surfaces of him seemed almost as if they'd turned to stone. Rose didn't move, not even to turn to look at him, afraid that if she did he might stop speaking.

"So when I got to Wammy's and all these clever interesting people were supporting the law of the governments I figured I must've been wrong, and my dad had been wrong. So I dedicated myself to becoming the best I possibly could, so one day L would choose ME as the successor. Everyone was so in love with this 'L'. I thought, if L just came here and saw what I was doing, then he'd see, he'd see how good at it I could be. Maybe not quite as good as him, but maybe nearly! So each time I heard he was in the house I hoped and prayed he would come and talk to me, to see the things I'd been making, but he never did. Then one day I built up the courage to try and visit him. Hah!" He exclaimed bitterly. "I wasn't even allowed to see him. There was just Watari at the door saying; 'not now Mello, he's very busy, he shouldn't be disturbed'. I tried twice more, but each attempt was greeted with the same answer.

That was the first time I doubted L's perfection. So when I finally met him a couple of years later and saw what a pathetic scrawny bag of awkwardness he really was it all made a horrible kind of sense. I still learnt my shit, but this time to replace him, to prove I was better than him, him and that creepy Near.

So I went out into the world more and more, and the more I saw the more I realised that I couldn't even trust the governments. It turned out my dad had been right after all! He had been a bit useless, but he'd been right. I realised if no one else could pull off the things he'd wanted to achieve, it could only be me. Only I wasn't gonna fuck it up. And I haven't!"

He relit the cigarette that had gone out whilst speaking. "Coz here you are, and three world leaders are dead. Viva la revolucion!"

He spoke with pride, but his face was oddly hollow, his eyes too bright. Stubbing the cigarette out on the arm of the armchair, he stood up, and removed a simple metal key from the pocket of the dressing gown.

"So, for our next game..." He moved toward Rose, and started undoing her cuffs. Immediately she attempted to get up and knock him down, but found to her shock that her body was too numb and painful to stand up yet. Her bruises from the mechanical legs could barely be felt against the deep ache in her back and shoulders. Mello turned calmly to undo L's, fully aware that neither of them could do anything.

"For our next game you get three hours to figure out how to escape this room. Have fun!"

He left the half-full bottle of water on the armchair, turned, and opened the door with the car-key-esque thing. "Oh, and one more thing-" he leant out of the door, and then leant back in, throwing a plastic bucket on the ground. "Forgot to give you your toilet. See you later!"

Rose lay on her back, slowly wiggling her muscles until they began to feel a little more normal. A cold despair had settled in on her. So she was surprised to find that, on turning to look towards L, that he had a strange little grin upon his face.

"Huh? What is it?"

"I think it's safe to say that there's a ninety five percent chance that we're not bugged."

Rose watched him roll into his usual crouching ball with satisfaction, as her mind worked speedily in attempt to figure out how he'd reached the conclusion. "Aaah, okay I think I've got it," she said after a moment. "So the over-dramatic lying you did was deliberately bad acting? You reckon that in his state of competitive euphoria, he'd jump on any opportunity to show you up as bad at something, so he'd have been sure to crow about seeing through your lie."

"Precisely. I also assumed that if someone else had been monitoring for him, it would have probably been obvious enough for them to pick up on too, and that during a 24 hour period, they would be likely to pass on the recordings to him if anything seemed fishy."

"That makes sense. We still cannot be sure, though."

"We can rarely be absolutely sure of anything. I think in our predicament, we may as well take it."

"Yes, I think you're right."

Rose had struggled up to hands and knees, and pulled herself slowly up onto the armchair. "Aaaah," she sighed in relief. "That's better. So, are we going to play his game?" Then she twisted uncomfortably. Her newfound comfort had made her remember how desperately she needed to toilet.

"I'm sure he will want to devise some sort of forfeit if we fail to try. But it is a choice for us – how much do we value three hours of freedom? Well – relative freedom?"

Rose twisted her lips and pondered. "True. I didn't think of it that way."

L watched her face, still pretty but haggard from the sleeping drugs and the hours of pain, tighten and blush a little as she turned her eyes back to him. "What is it?" he probed quietly.

"Umm, can you turn around?"

"Why?" he asked, nonplussed.

Rose rolled her eyes to the ceiling. "Because I need to go to the toilet."

The reasons for her blush were so amusing to L that a smile cracked his face. She went even redder.

"But it's nothing I haven't seen before."

"Yeah, but it's different. Turn around."

He obliged, and looked with deliberate interest at the strange patterns the mould was making in the top corner of the concrete wall.

"And don't listen!"

"You seem incredibly perturbed by my awareness of your bodily functions," L drawled mildly. "I must confess, I don't see the problem."

"Just because you have no social conditioning, doesn't mean I don't."

"Well maybe you should forget it," he responded evenly. "It seems like a silly thing to me."

"Is it?"

"Yes. It's gender conditioning, is it not? Society conditions us to think of women as only valuable and desirable insofar as their physicality is purely attractive and sexual, definitely not functional for the fulfilment of her own humanity, and certainly not in the least bit gross. Therefore, women must hide and be ashamed of the waste products of their perfectly normal digestive system."

"Curse you and your accurate deconstructions!" Rose retorted, but she laughed, and moved towards the bucket. "There's no way I can persuade you to put your fingers in your ears and 'laa', is there?"

"Not a chance."

"Fine, whatever. I know you're right really."

And she sat down on the bucket with as much dignity as she could muster.

When they had both relieved themselves, they took a few generous sips each from the water bottle.

"Hey," said Rose, after the initial pleasure of gulping down the water had passed, "do you reckon it was spiked?"

"The chance of that is almost certainly below twenty percent. I think he feels he's got us in enough of a bind. It's a risky manoeuvre un-cuffing us – for all he knows, in three hours time we could be perfectly ready to fight. So I think for now, his irrational confidence keeps us safe from further measures."

They were sat on the floor, each leaning sideways on the front of an arm of the broad, squishy chair. Rose gingerly moved her wrists, elbows, and shoulders in turn, loosening slowly.

"Perhaps there ISN'T any way to get out, and it's just a joke."

"Well, there is the door," L pointed out. "It can't be impossible to open."

"Hmm."

Rose shifted along the floor awkwardly towards the door. The surface seemed as impregnable as the large door outside, and there were no obvious hinges, joints, or weak spots. In fact there wasn't a single obvious flaw in its smooth metal surface.

"Anything electrical in the room?"

"Just the lamp."

"Hmmm. Not enough to work with."

"Perhaps a well-placed fire."

"L I hardly think-" But Rose stopped mid-retort when she saw his eyes dancing with humour.

"Well it's a comfort it is not, that if worst comes to worst, we can always curtail the length of our punishment."

There was something a little mad in the humorous light in his eyes, and Rose was mildly disconcerted. "Let's not think about THAT yet."

With difficulty she heaved herself up, and began pacing around the room for inspiration. Every idea was immediately discarded. Rubbish, she thought angrily, what a load of shit. Her anger was bubbling around on top of a deep well of panic, like oil on the surface of a boiling pot. This won't do. I've trained better than this, what am I doing? With a grim self-awareness, Rose was aware that each time she was imprisoned, it was becoming MORE difficult to handle, not easier. It's like each time carries the weight of all the others, I can feel in my body the echo of all those fears and pains. And between each time, I forget the scars, but it only takes a moment to rip open the memories in my heart. I'm shaking, I'm actually shaking. I can't do this forever, I can't do it. Can't do it. Can't. Can't-

"Rose."

She turned, swaying. L was sitting in the armchair: not crouching, but sitting. Okay, L thought with determination, you have read the emotional signs, now comes the important part. Get in some practise. "Come here," he ordered gently.

Rose half-stumbled towards him, too shaky to question.

"Sit," he said, and nodded to his own knees.

She collapsed somewhat awkwardly onto his lap and buried her face into his neck as two, bony arms, strong even now, curled tightly around her. The sweet, sharp smell of him and the stable warmth around her made the shaking worse as the energy of terror stuck in her body began to release. She was too dehydrated to cry.

Perhaps ten, fifteen minutes passed. The shaking gradually subsided, and eventually Rose felt able to sit up a little and look at him. Breathe, Rose, Breathe. There was a question in his eyes.

"What?" She prompted.

"Did that help?" He asked doubtfully.

She coughed out a laugh of disbelief. "Definitely."

"Good. It was an assumption of mine that you, like many other people, would find physical contact a comfort in times of panic. I'm glad it proved correct, it was only inductive reasoning from one singular event after all, going off your response following that dream you once had."

Rose rolled her eyes. "Well don't go spoiling it by getting all analytical."

"Does that spoil things?"

"Some things."

After a few moments, Rose got up and sat by herself in silence, clearing her mind and stilling her heart and body. A little strength and clarity began to return. She viewed the situation in her mind's eye, zooming as far out as she could to take in the whole picture objectively. It could have been any length of time when she eventually opened her eyes, and saw that L had reverted to crouching, eyes closed too.

"So I think the best thing we can do-"

"-is just wait." L finished her sentence, and Rose nodded approvingly.

"Exactly. Wait for Mello to slip up when he's drunk perhaps, or for him to get bored and change things, or for Matt to figure something out from the outside."

"Yes. And meanwhile, we can conserve our energy. I wish there was coffee. Or maybe some sugar cubes. My brain has never felt so slow."

"When was the last time you went a day without coffee?"

"In Australia."

A silence descended. At the mention of that word there were too many shades of thought and emotion flowing through Rose to know what she was feeling. However they all pointed to one course of action.

"So..." she said, feeling almost as if she was speaking against her will, even though she knew she wanted to do it. "We've got time to kill. How about you tell me what happened?"

The question hung in the air.

L's jaw clenched a little. "Now?"

"Why not? It's as good a time as any." Rose chewed out the words, dreading their answer, but totally compelled.

He closed his eyes for a second, and when he opened them again they were matt black and heavy. "Very well. I will answer your question." His toes shifted about on the chair.

So yes, it's been a VERY long time since an update, I've been rather busy in Spain planting trees... I'm determined to get to the end of this story arc now! Thank you, as ever, for reading, and Happy Christmas/Solstice/Chanukah/whatever else makes the festive season happen.