If it was a surprise to those who stood outside his door, they didn't show it. In his sleep, he screamed, filled with so much more emotion than he ever showed when he was awake. Occasionally, it was only nonsensical ramblings that seemed to relieve his stress, but other times he would truly scream, his lunatic's ramblings forming full sentences and names. When early morning came and the shadows of the night that had danced over the walls were fading to gray, he would twist in desperation, whining to people that weren't there.

"L! Don't leave! Come back! Oh, God please don't take him! Mello! Mello! Please don't. I don't wanna be alone! Matt, Matt, make him not leave me! Make him stay! I don't want you to go! Mello, L, Matt! Please! Ple-" His words would stop abruptly and he often whimpered once or twice, straining his neck as if he were leaning into a touch brushing on his pale cheek. Then colorless eyes would flicker open to stare at the walls, all of them shadow-stained gray.

On the mornings after these nights, it was known only that Near would disappear for a few hours before suddenly appearing from nowhere to continue working on his current case. He, after all, had fulfilled his promise and become the next L, lacking only a Watari and an obsession with sweets.

Mello would have fit better, Near often muses. He would have been perfect, given his fixation with chocolate. He would even have had a Watari, Near thinks, recalling Matt's habit of hanging off the blonde's every word. That was, of course, before the gamer had pulled his feeble suicide stunt and gotten littered with bullet holes.

Nobody would ever know that later in that car, stuffed beneath the seat was an old gameboy, one of the kinds that looked more like a box than a game, and its screen was flashing 'Game Over' quite fitting to Matt's situation. An invitation to restart and try again scrolled beneath them, but the buttons were broken, and the choice was no longer a choice, but a fierce taunt. Game over… Try again? No; he wasn't allowed.

Eventually, though Near didn't know it, those teasing words would become a part of his nightly cries ravings. "No, no, God… Mello, you're so stupid for believing… 'He' let this… let his… we died, Mello. You, Matt, L, even… all of us, just a little bit. It's game over… no trying again… just dead…"

People never interrupted him, never dared enter his room, never even mentioned his cries. The one time someone did, he glared and sat, but a few minutes later, dice were hitting the man in the back of the head every so often and Near was smiling, and though his facsimile of happiness was etched onto his face, his eyes were broken and dead, reflecting only the light from the computer screen.

"Mello, L, Matt, please! Please, Kira! Kill me too! I wanna go with them! Please, please!"

His last cries were ones begging the false god to fulfill his promise, and Kira, of course, could not, or possibly would not listen. The next day, Near stopped talking all together, his only remaining words the occasional mumble of one of three names, and the phrase "Game Over" spiraling endlessly among them.