Restart
Author's Note: It has been almost one year since I started writing this fiction. Sorting out scraps of ideas is incredibly difficult and I have struggled to overcome procrastination. I read a few fictions of Mello coming back to Winchester with someone. How I wish Mello could come back with Halle, which is the reason I write this story. According to details in the manga, I also think it is possible for Mello and Halle to have in-depth conversations that makes them know each other. In addition, English is not my mother tongue. Thank you for tolerating my broken English and grammar errors.
"Thank you! I'd go upstairs myself. Bye!"
After the elevator went up to the fifth floor, Halle came out of it and walked to the door of her room. She put her room card against the lock and pushed the door open as she heard a click. When she was about to turn on the light in the room, she realized someone had a gun pointed at her behind her back. She looked back nervously, but a familiar figure came into her sight. "Mello?" Halle opened her eyes wide and called Mello's name in surprise when she saw his face clearly.
"Huh…" The blonde boy lowered his pistol and took off his hood. Halle poked her head out to warily glance down the hall and closed the door quickly.
"It's been a long time. Why are you in London?" Halle asked excitedly as she walked through the foyer into the room. Mello followed silently, watching Halle taking off her coat. Suddenly he asked. "Who is he?"
"Who?" Halle was stunned.
"The guy who sent you back. I stood by the window just now and saw you getting out of a black car. He got out of the back seat, opened the door for you, and helped you out." Mello described it seriously.
Halle blinked and it clicked. "Oh, a friend. He invited me to have dinner with him and to talk about work."
"You still drank when talking about work?" Mello narrowed his eyes, looking at Halle along her slinky dress from head to foot, and his gaze paused for a moment on her chest before his eyes fixed on her face. Mello smirked. "Then you…"
"I didn't drink too much." Halle muttered as she subconsciously pulled the neckline up. She wondered if Mello got something against her dress which she paid big money for, and she wouldn't allow anyone to say she didn't look good in it. She got a glimpse of herself in the mirror on the wall out of the corner of her eyes. She walked over to the mirror and gently touched her reddened cheeks, which was obviously caused by the intake of alcohol.
"God. It never happened." She grumbled, noticing Mello's gaze into her in the mirror.
"How do you know I'm here?" Halle deflected sheepishly.
"I went to your flat in New York, but you had moved out."
"The rent was due. I moved to a low-rent flat."
"You didn't tell me that."
Halle leaned forward to let her face be close to the mirror and looked at her face carefully. "Kira was arrested. I have no idea you still had the need to contact me."
Embarrassment and torment crossed Mello's face and vanished, which was caught by Halle.
"I went to your new flat, but you weren't at home."
"Then you came to London. But I'm going back to New York in two weeks. Tell me. What do you come to England for?"
"Go to the Wammy's House with me tomorrow." Mello said and plonked himself on the couch.
"Why?" Halle asked, confused.
"I have something to do." Mello took out a bar of chocolate as usual. "You will take the document that Near asked you to give to Roger."
"How could you… You opened the safe." Halle gave a deprecating stare. "Did you read it?"
"No." Mello waved his hand and took a bite of chocolate. "I didn't open the document bag."
Halle sighed with relief and hesitated. "It's not urgent. I'll find time next week."
"Will you work tomorrow, won't you? Tomorrow is Saturday." Mello said impatiently, putting his feet up on the coffee table.
"No." Halle raised her eyebrows. She didn't want her nice weekend taking away.
"So why aren't you willing to visit Wammy's House with me?"
"I have other plans for tomorrow." Halle glanced at him sharply, "Why shall I go with you?"
"Because I'm going to Wammy's House tomorrow." Mello chewed the chocolate with crunching. "We can drive there together."
"Can you tell me what it is you're going to do there tomorrow?" Halle said, with her arms crossed.
"I'm going to pick up what I left there." Mello said evenly.
Halle wordlessly stared at Mello's expression and profoundly doubted the truth of what Mello told. Is there anything else Mello had left at the House besides that picture? If I don't promise, he won't leave. She thought. Although she thought Mello's proposal was not bad, and she would go to Winchester sooner or later, it still irked her that she had been always obedient to this boy.
"Halle, will you go?" Mello huffed.
Halle did not reply, then she took a blanket out of the closet and smashed it into Mello.
Mello looked at the soft thing Halle threw to him and gave Halle a questioning look.
"Give it back if you don't need it tonight." Halle stood with her hands on her hips.
They stared at each other like two cats meeting on a narrow foot bridge. Halle sighed and turned around, loosening her belt. "Well, I'm taking a shower. Think about it." She came into the bathroom and closed the door.
With the light off, Halle lay on her side, facing the window. Meanwhile, Mello lay on the couch, wrapping himself in a blanket as he stared at the ceiling.
After a while, Halle opened her eyes as the sound of Mello tossing and turning could be heard clearly. Moonlight spread into the room through the window. "Hey, where did you go after you left the YB warehouse that day?" She first broke the silence.
"They monitored me for three months, and even tapped my phone, trying to know your whereabouts"
"Did they press?" Mello's voice sounded from her back.
"No. But Near asked about you." Halle turned over and looked sideways at the blonde.
"Did you tell him?" Mello said curiously.
"I told him the truth." They two happened to coincide the ground smiled.
Halle and Mello said a few more words off and on. Perhaps under the influence of alcohol, Halle fell asleep soon.
The next morning Halle sat in the passenger seat, looking out the window and yawning. "It's a nice day." she muttered. It was still early in the morning when Halle heard Mello's voice in a daze and opened her eyes to see Mello standing neatly dressed beside the bed looking down at her.
"You're right." replied Mello. He held the steering wheel, watching the traffic ahead.
The car he drove was booked on the car rental website before Halle came to London, and she had drove it once. In a city like London, driving oneself might not be the best way of getting around. Halle stared idly at Mello's scar face.
Mello gave her a quick glance, his sunglasses concealing his emotion.
"You haven't been back since you left the House, have you?" Halle asked. Mello didn't answer, but Halle noticed he bit his lip unnaturally. "What are you going to say when you see Roger?"
"I don't think I have much to say to him. I'll take my thing. You'll give him the documents" Mello said indifferently.
Winchester was a small and beautiful city. They drove through Winchester and stopped the car outside a large yard on the outskirts of town.
It looked like an ordinary church school in outward view. There was an old building in the yard, surrounded by neatly mowed lawn and a wide range of plants. She guessed that the owner of the building either inherited it from his ancestors or bought it from a noble family.
Halle knocked rhythmically on the door. There was no reply, and she knocked again. The door opened and a brown-haired girl poked her head out.
"Hello. Who are you?" The little girl's voice sounded sweet.
"Hello. I'm Halle Lidner. I'm here to see Mr. Roger." Halle said softly.
"Oh, Madam, please, just a minute." The girl disappeared into the room.
"Hey, are you sure you won't come in?" Halle turned her head, as Mello went down the stairs and walked down the path toward the other side of the main building. He stopped and looked back at her. He moved on, without any words.
"Please come in." The girl made a welcoming gesture to her as she came back.
With a gaze at Mello's back, Halle shook her head and followed the girl into the room.
They went up the stairs, as the wooden stairs creaked as if to verify what she had just guessed. The children walking past them peeked at her and whispered.
Halle was led to Roger's office. Roger was a slim, grey-haired, and bespectacled man as Halle had imagined before.
"Near asked me to give you these documents."
Roger took the document bag and put it on the desk. Near might had contacted Roger. Roger seemed calm and was in no hurry to see the documents.
"Thank you very much." Roger was silent for a moment and said, "Agent Lidner, may I ask if you have planned to come here today in advance?"
"No ... I ..." Halle suddenly realized that Roger was actually trying to ask about Mello, and that they must have been seen by Roger when they walked into the yard together.
"I'm surprised that kid is willing to come back here again. I would have thought he couldn't look back on his memories of this place with equanimity." Roger's gray eyebrows lifted, with a deep long look as if to see through everything.
"Yeah, I'm surprised too ..." Halle replied carefully, her heart fluttering. She wasn't sure if Roger misunderstood it was inspired by Near that she came with Mello.
Mello stood by a large tree halfway across the backyard and nostalgically stroked a carved mark in the trunk. He trod on the grass underfoot, as the sunlight shined through the leaves and left dappled shadows on the grass. He gripped a shovel to dig down until it hit something hard with a crashing sound. He knelt down and swept away the dirt on the hard object.
"Mello!" Mello looked up and saw Halle running this way from a distance. "I was looking for you. Why are you here?" Halle asked breathlessly, as she bent over and put her hands on her knees. She noticed the box in the center of the plowed earth, and leaned down curiously.
"What did Roger say to you?" Mello said and continued sweeping the soil, with head bending.
Halle hesitated for a moment. "... I think he welcomes you back."
Mello sneered and carefully took out what was buried under the grass. This is a small wooden box without complex decoration, with an old-fashioned lock on it.
"Is this what you're taking away?" Halle tilted her head and stared at the small box.
Mello grunted and sat down on the grass. He took out an old-fashioned key from somewhere and opened the box. Inside the box lay silent a white envelope and an oval pendant worn on a golden chain. Mello picked up the pendant and the chain hung from Mello's black glove. He lowered his eyes and opened the pendant.
Halle quietly watched Mello and leaned over curiously, and the pendant embedded a picture of a blonde woman holding a baby.
Halle felt the woman looked familiar. "They are..."
"She is my mother and the baby in her arms is me." Mello paused. "The last time I saw her, she left this pendent to me." He showed a pain look.
"You really look like her. What about this?" Halle asked tentatively, trying to reach for the envelope in the box. But Mello touched her hand with his, and they withdrew their hands simultaneously as if they had been electrocuted.
"I'm sorry." Halle bit her lips in embarrassment. "May I see it?"
Mello moved to the side to make room and gestured for Halle to sit down. Halle took the letter out of the envelope, on which there are a few lines in his immature handwriting.
To my future self:
Mello, how do you feel as the successor of L? How many difficult cases have you solved? ...
"When did you write this?" Halle said as she skimmed the letter in general.
"Not long after I was sent here. My teacher gave all students the assignment that everybody wrote a letter to future self." Mello leaned his back against the tree trunk and laughed at himself. "Since then I had only one goal. I swore, I would be the successor of L when I saw the letter next time. So I had to urge myself to become the one with the best grades. I buried the letter and pendant under this tree. I told myself, I can get the pendant back only when I achieve my goal."
"Obviously, this box is a time capsule little Mello buried." Halle said understandingly.
"What's that? I never named it." Mello frowned.
"How old were you when you came to the Wammy's House?" After a short moment of silence, Halle talked on.
"I flitted from one orphanage to another for about three years since I had separated from my family. I was almost six when I got here. I thought I would make it to my goal easily, but Near appeared one day. I try to do better at something to surpass Near and to be the best, even at any cost. But every time I get nothing for my efforts, and the glory always belongs to Near." Mello couldn't help but clench his fists. Halle propped her chin in her hands and a smile lifted the corner of her mouth as she watched Mello talking. Now she was happy to be a listener. It was rare for Mello to tell his own story eloquently. After all, most of the time Mello focused on observing others in silence or thought alone.
"However, what I didn't expect was that L died before he chose his successor. Actually, I had a chance to dig the box out after L died. Roger asked me to work with Near. I refused."
"Oh, what a pity!" Halle blurted out.
"What?" Mello turned his head instantly and stared suspiciously at Halle.
"Nothing." Halle pouted innocently, "Go on..."
"I couldn't allow myself to deviate from the goal of being No.1. I chose to leave here and thought I could catch Kira earlier than Near on my own way. Now there is no point in keeping it buried here." Mello carefully placed the pendant and the letter in the box and closed it。Halle gave a glance at the box in Mello's hands. A wide smile automatically spread across her face again. Mello raised his chin, squinting at Halle.
"Yes?" Halle blinked in confusion.
"Halle. I really want to know what you have been smirking."
"It was just good to have a chance of hearing you tell me that. I never expected I could sit here with you. We all owe you a thank you." Halle said frankly. Somehow, she felt that the scene before her was filled with dreamlike atmospheres as the image of burning church floated into her mind.
"Thank me for what?" Mello asked in wide-eyed amazement.
"Thanks to you, Kira was captured successfully." Halle continued.
Obviously, Mello was not good at responding to direct expression of feeling. He frowned, pretending to be irritated as he usually did. "And what about Near? Shouldn't you thank Near for capturing Kira? "
"Near almost missed the ploy to deceive all of us by a fake notebook. If you hadn't risked your life to make your move, we would be died now."
"You think so?" Mello gave a short laugh. "It was just the only choice I could make under the circumstances. When you told me they would write each other's name on the notebook, I knew it was hard to surpass Near this time. I had to move before Near."
"But the fact is that you are an ally we cannot afford to lose."
"Really?" Mello sniffed. "The fact is that I compromised with reality that fell far short of ideals."
"It's no big deal." Halle cast a concerned look at Mello. "Life is the process of learning to compromise with oneself. It's not shame or cowardice. That just proves that you've grown up."
Meeting Halle's sincere eyes, Mello looked away as if to escape. The shadows on the ground shook with a sudden gust of wind, and branches of the trees made a harrumphing sound. He wrinkled his nose and put on his sunglasses. "I gotta go." Said he. The he stood up and patted upper dust of buttocks. He went a few paces before he turned back. "You are as convincing as ever, Halle. Have you considered changing your job? Near should recommend you to be a teacher of the Wammy's House." Halle seemed to see Mello's mouth twitching slightly.
"Teacher was indeed on my list of ideal profession when I was a child." Halle answered brightly.
Mello did leave the Wammy's House several years ago, where he had left much obsession. It was until he took away the last thing he had left here today that he was totally free from the Wammy's House and let go of everything here, and he truly graduated from the House.
As Halle looked at Mello's back, she recalled what Roger had just said. She thought that Roger should had met him and seen the kind of man he had been becoming.
"Don't hang about, Halle." Mello drew out her name deliberately.
"Ah, I'm just coming." Halle stood up and followed him.