Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note.

A/N: Last chapter!

I woke up and, for a moment, was unsure that I had opened my eyes at all. It was pitch-black. I was also starting to suspect that people got some kind of fucked-up pleasure out of making me unconscious, because it sure seemed like a lot of people had an affinity for it and it was getting damn annoying. Judging only from the pressure against my face, I was lying on my stomach on something hard.

I didn't need to think about it to figure it out, though. I had seen it happen enough times to know where I was, and as I blindly got to my feet and began to carefully pad around my immediate vicinity, it was becoming increasingly obvious.

I was in the cells where they kept people to be targets for new recruits. The odds were good that I was even in the same cell as the one the guy I had shot to get into the Mafia had been stored in, and here I would remain until some oblivious dick wandered in wanting to join up.

I had three or four days, max, until a new person came by, and I had no idea how long I had already been in here and no way of measuring the time from this point on, unless I wanted to count seconds. I knew from my own rounds guarding this place that there were no windows, that there were lots of guards and really no ways to escape. A prison built by criminals, for criminals. They didn't even bring in food. They brought water every two days, though.

Days and days to wait, and nothing to do but think.

I didn't want to think, so I killed as much time as I could by walking the perimeter of my cell, examining every nook and cranny for methods of escape. I wasn't going to just sit by and wait to be killed. If I didn't escape, I wasn't going to get out of here. If the kid missed, they'd just kill both of us. If the kid hit me, obviously I'd be dead. There was a chance that the kid would hit me in a non-essential body part, but a) the odds of that were slim and b) the Mafia would just kill me anyway, and debate for a while about whether or not to kill him before coming to the conclusion that they should.

After a point, though, I did have to sit down. There was no cot or pile of straw or anything, so I just plopped down on the floor with my back against the wall and closed my eyes.

When I closed my eyes I saw, not the faces of the men I had killed, but Matt.

And all of a sudden I was crying, because I was never going to see him again and suddenly I understood that I wouldn't be able to keep my promise. Even if I somehow managed to do the impossible and escape, I couldn't go back to him. They would hunt me down and kill anyone they found me with, especially when they realized he was my lover, especially when they realized that he was -PlayAGame?-.

But I wouldn't escape. I would die here, and Matt would never know anything about it.

What would he think? Would he think that I'd left him? Would he think that I just used him all this time and took off when I no longer needed him?

No, he knew me well enough to know that I wasn't lying when I told him I'd never leave him again. He would come to the correct conclusion that I was dead.

But was that better or worse?

PAGE BREAK

I don't know how long I sat in that place, but it felt like a very long time. They never gave me water, so it must have been less than two days.

I never really stopped looking for a way to escape, but it was so dark that it was nearly impossible. I felt like a cave creature, it was so dark.

Then, suddenly, it wasn't anymore. A door opened and light poured in, temporarily blinding me. Well, a different kind of blind than I had been. "'Mere, asshole," an unfamiliar voice ordered. Ah, gone were the days when they called me Crazy Fuck or got their heads blown off. That's what I get for killing my superior.

It was worth it.

When I didn't react (it really was rather bright after about forty-eight hours of darkness), I felt a hand roughly grab me by the shoulder and haul me out of the little room, only to shove me into another.

This room looked familiar, even through the haze that was my vision. It was weird to think about how, only months ago, I was standing on the other end of it. The hands released me and I stood up straight, regaining my balance.

Once I was sure that I wasn't going to fall over, I flipped my ragged hair out of my eyes and smirked at the newbie across from me although I still couldn't really see more than just a red blur. "Hey. What's your name, kid?"

He was silent for a moment before he said, in a voice so familiar that it made my stomach drop right down to my pelvis, "Miles."

No, dammit! How had this happened? This wasn't supposed to happen! The point of this whole thing was to keep Matt safe! Damn it! Fucking hell! Damn it!

I stared at him, horrified, and the look of confusion on his face would have been funny in any other situation.

He must have come here to find me, maybe avenge me if they had already killed me.

No. No, no, no, no, no. He would never shoot me. He would aim to miss, and he was such a good shot that he could make it completely convincing. Then they would kill us both, but he didn't know that...

Because I knew him, I could tell that he was thinking hard about what he should do, not that he ever even considered actually shooting me, and I watched his facial muscles relax slightly when he made the decision. He held up the gun they gave him and pointed it at my head.

Only I could tell because it was my face the gun was aiming at, but it would whizz past my ear without touching my skin. It would probably take off a bit of my hair.

Damn it, damn it, damn it! My mind was reeling and I couldn't think. I had to tell him, but if I said anything they might figure out that we knew each other. And I couldn't communicate a phrase like, "Shoot me in the head and kill me, sweetheart, because if you miss they'll kill us both" with just my eyes, although I was sure as hell trying.

He frowned, catching the desperation in my expression if not the actual message. He thought that I thought he was actually going to kill me. He tilted the gun a little more to the side so that it would clearly miss and shook his head very, very slightly. My eyes went wider and he turned it back, although the confusion in his eyes only grew.

But he would never be willing to kill me, no matter what, even if I had been able to communicate the whole story to him. Even if he knew how it worked, he would still miss on purpose. He wouldn't want to be living if I was dead, so he'd choose the option that would leave him dead along with me.

It was then that I knew what I had to do.

I looked at him, nodded a fraction of an inch, and breathed out a miniscule smile.

He relaxed, cocked the gun, and fired to miss.

At the last moment, I tilted my face only inches and took the bullet in the side of my head.

Pain exploded in my skull louder than the gunshot. I instantly fell to the floor, and somewhere far, far away, I heard Matt screaming. I had never heard someone scream like that in my entire life, and then I felt heat where he threw himself onto me, and also on my head where he applied pressure with his palms to try to stop the bleeding.

Lightheaded was an understatement for obvious reasons, and my vision was dim.

"Mello," I heard Matt sob, and I was glad the room was largely soundproof, "I aimed to miss, I swear, I know I did. You... why did you purposely take the bullet? Do you really want to die that much? Mel, why'd you make me kill you? How am I supposed to live without you? Mello, don't leave me, you promised you would never leave me again. You promised, Mihael..."

Now my hearing was gone, and all I could see was a blood-stained image of his lips moving in the pattern of my name. My real name, the name only he and I knew.

If I had had control of my mouth, I still wouldn't have been able to tell him. If I told him, they would kill him. Even with his freakout now, he still had a chance, if he thought to act cold quickly enough.

I saw Rod Ross come into the room, just like he did for me so, so long ago. I saw his lips move, and I saw Matt freeze up, freeze over. Perfect timing. They would let him live. Matt would be in the Mafia now, but it was better than him being dead. They are mostly good to hackers, because a single hacker could cause a ton of trouble if they were pissed off. Matt would never have to kill anyone. At least, anyone besides me.

He kept physical contact with me for as long as he could while he stood up and faced his new boss's boss's boss. He was still shaking with grief, but he disguised it as adrenalin. I saw his lips form, "I want to watch him die" and Ross grinned.

"Looks like we have a new Mello," I made out.

Matt, trained so perfectly to stay cold when he needed to, didn't react until Ross was out of earshot. Then he instantly dropped to his knees next to me, then onto his side, curling up with me. He wrapped his arms around me, and while it was uncomfortably warm, I only had a few seconds left to live anyway. It was amazing that I had held on this long.

My hearing came back in patchy, but well enough that I heard him say, "Mello, I'd do anything for you. You just had to tell me, and I would have done it. Anything but this. Anything but killing you. I don't understand why you..."

"-att," I croaked out. I don't know how I did it. I guess he has just always had that affect on me. He's always been able to make me do the impossible. I felt his arms tighten around me and I both heard and felt his sharp intake of breath. Where my senses had been dulled or given up a moment ago, now they were hyperrealistic and back with a vengeance. I was sure I could hear his heart beating.

It was still beating. That was good. That's the way it was supposed to be.

I'd do anything for him, and it had never been clearer to me than at that very moment, even with all the years we had been together. As kids, I killed spiders for him. As teenagers, I beat the shit out of people who made fun of him for being gay. I left him to protect him. And now, I would happily take this bullet all over again if it meant he continued to be in the world, with or without me.

And as the darkness took me over for the very last time, as I used the last bit of control I had to brush the lock of his hair that was closest to my hand, my last thoughts dragged themselves sluggishly over his heavy sobs through my blurry mind.

'Mail, for you, I would die."