The Mello Code

It started with a large D, in Old English Text, filling an otherwise white screen. A conference call, nine pairs of ears hearing Deontic\'s subdued tone utter precise, bitter words. "Do you know what happened to us when we die? What Watari does with the body? We are sent home, at last, to be buried alone. The local representative of the network, that is all, there to ensure that duty is done by us. Unless we are claimed by loved ones here and which of us is social enough to gain those? Nathalie called it when she said that we are basically siblings now, yet we get buried, and married, alone. I am not demanding. I\'m not pleading. As your foster-sister, I\'m asking."



It continued through individual voyages to a small town in western Greece and a funeral. Now they stood around a room, in a secure penthouse suite, in Athens. Deontic had made the arrangements. She had not told them that they would all be ending up in the same place, shuttled there in the same cars, so that no-one had the opportunity to arrive first, realise and leave. Deontic ordered the guards, Near\'s and Watari\'s alike, to remain in the outer reception hall, before she walked along the short corridor, locking the doors at either end behind her. She stepped into their midst. Dressed in plain black, with her shoes off, traditionally one of the most reserved of the alumni, she commanded the attention of them all.



"Ten left standing. Five dead. Not through the justice we were raised to deliver, but in Wammy\'s House civil wars." She raised a hand, though no-one had made a move to speak. Her head was bowed, her eyes blazing at the carpet. "Do not tell me that Lamond wasn\'t killed by us. The system and our lack of compassion for each other killed Lamond. I cannot do this. I cannot go on waiting for the next flare up. I cannot live my life wondering which of us will be taken out next, because old hurts went unchecked and our upbringing forced us at each other\'s throats."



"D..." Chrissie began, the baby stirring in her arms. "It was a shock to all of us, but..."



Deontic gestured for silence. "I want it all aired. I want it out in the open. I want to hear the things that bind us together, not the things that tear us apart. Salvo, Mello, you pair spent years fighting each other. Let me put this another way. Kamwala, you survived the First and Second Congo Wars. In the process, Zaire no longer exists. Mihael, you survived the Croatian War of Independence. In the process, Yugoslavia no longer exists. Don\'t you think you pair might have something of empathy here?" She looked up finally, at the people mostly standing with their backs to the wall. "Look how nervous you all are. This room is secure. I have personally overseen it. Near has the most to lose here and it was his man, Gevanni, who stayed here between me leaving and us all returning."



Chrissie swallowed and tried again. "Deontic, you are very stressed..."



"Lim Pek Wan!" Deontic snapped. "We are not detectives in this room. We are men and women ensuring our futures by appeasing our pasts. You can each give in to that nurtured fear now and leave. You\'re all genius enough to find a way out. But the next time the call comes to say that another of us has gone under, then I hope that you can live with yourselves."



Chrissie held the baby close and turned towards the door. Wordlessly, Salvo made to follow her. Mello spoke up. "Kamwala. I didn\'t know that was your name." It was said around a bar of chocolate, Mello\'s head was bowed as he leaned up agains the wall. Salvo stiffened, looking back. Chrissie\'s expression was murderously still, as she paused by the door. Mello\'s head rose and he fixed his eyes on them. "Civil wars are really shit, aren\'t they?"



Salvo nodded. "Not something I want to revisit."



"Have you been back since?" Mello frowned suddenly. "Where did Zaire disappear to? I thought it just changed its name."



"It did. It\'s the Democratic Republic of the Congo." Salvo reached across and took his son from Chrissie\'s arms. "No, I haven\'t been back. No-one left there for me to go back to." He walked between Century and the settee, carrying the baby with him. "There is no future there for me."



"Sal?" Chrissie said cautiously. "What are you doing?"



Salvo stopped in front of Mello. "Here is my future. My little boy." He didn\'t hand the baby over, but he did hold him so that Mello could see his face. They all watched, Chrissie\'s face hardening to mask her concern. Century\'s fists clenched. Nobody else giving away anything of emotion. Just watching. Wariness heavy in the air. No-one there liked surprises.



Mello\'s gaze searched Salvo\'s face, trying to determine the rules of the game. Then he grinned and peered at the baby. "He\'s really freaking cute." He raised a hand and even Salvo tensed, but Mello just tickled the infant\'s chest. "How did you and Chrissie manage something this cute?"



"Oh fuck this." Fenian detached himself from a wall across the room. "We didn\'t play happy families then. We\'ve met for necessity and business since. No. No fucking way."



It was Matt\'s quiet voice that intercepted him. "Go raibh maith agat." The redhead didn\'t move, though his head was turned in Fenian\'s direction. "Thank you for rescuing me from that pit."



Fenian stared. "Since when did you have the Gaeilge?"



Matt just smiled enigmatically. Mello turned his own attention to the Irishman. "My thanks too for that. I\'ve given them before but, as far as I\'m concerned, I owe you one." He inclined his head. "I take my debts seriously. If you ever need something, or if one of yours is in trouble, call on me. That goes for everyone."



"Bullshit." Linda interupted. "We were there to save..." She stopped, thinking past that to more recent events.



Deontic continued for her. "Mello came for Lamond. We called him in too late, but he came. You knew as you called him in that it was too late. I\'m guessing that Mello knew, because you had resorted to calling him, that it was too late. But he came anyway."



Fenian shook his head, hoisting his bag off the floor onto his shoulder. "So what now? We\'re all here to sign a peace treaty? Haven\'t we already done that? We\'re working together for Wammy\'s House, aren\'t we? Board of fucking bored alumni and shit."



"No." Deontic replied quietly. "We\'re here to step aside from Wammy\'s House and to try and find a future that doesn\'t involve mutually assured destruction."



Century laughed, muttering under his breath, "Mr Tighe, tear down this wall."



"Century, shut the fuck up."



Linda looked across, "What did he say?"



Fenian ignored her, marching across to peer out of the window. They were over 500ft off the ground. He had climbed down deeper potholes. He was on the windowsill before a gasp from behind caused him to look around. Mello had drawn a gun. Chrissie immediately raced to reclaim her baby, but Salvo had already twisted away, shielding him. Mello ignored them, his attention fully on Fenian. "Liam, if you\'re that desperate to leave, then I can more easily blow the locks off the doors. If you fall from there, it\'s going to be really fucking expensive to transport your mangled body all the way to Eire."



Chrissie exploded. "How dare you pull a gun in the face of a baby!"



Mello frowned. "Your son\'s quite safe." He stared at her. "For a start, as he\'s your son, I have no intention of doing anything but protecting him, and secondly, the gun\'s not loaded."



In the centre of the floor, Deontic screamed. They all looked at her, then around their environment. With no immediate threat discernable, they watched her scream again. Linda dashed across, hugging her friend. "D, come on. It\'s ok. D." Chrissie gave Mello a withering look, then ran around to hold Deontic too. Linda was murmering. "D, it was a doomed idea. I\'m sorry. I know that you\'re shook up about Lamond, but this was never going to work." She finished weakly, as Deontic wept. "It was a good try."



Fenian growled from the windowsill, then leapt down into the room. "I fucking hate blarting women. They start crying and I just go all..." He didn\'t finish, but dropped his bag again. "Deontic, what\'s it going to take for you to stop crying?"



"Can I choose the terms?" Mello gushed. "Oh! Go on, please D, I\'ll come up with some good ones."



"Mello." Fenian glowered. "I\'m not fucking you. I\'m not kissing you. I\'m not coming within ten fucking feet of you."



Mello affected desolation, but he did add, "Fenian\'s right though. Pek Wan, what are your intentions?"



Deontic stepped away from the two women and took off her glasses to wipe her eyes. "It\'s no good." She shook her head. "It would never happen."



Fenian disagreed, "You\'ve diluted all the fucking testosterone now. You and the fucking baby. Go on, you\'ve got us all waiting like perfect gentlemen. Apart from the harpies, of course. They\'re immune."



Chrissie narrowed her eyes. "Fenian, póg mo thóin, and before you ask, those are my only words in Irish Gaelic." She rubbed Deontic\'s back. "And, as this situation has clearly demonstrated, they are pretty much the only words I need."



Deontic sniffed. "Can we just all settle our differences please?" She broke away to sit beside Luigi on the settee. He was one of the few not standing with their backs to the wall. Instead, he was curled up tightly there, trying to slip beneath everyone\'s radar. She was no longer crying and, if anyone thought that her descent and recovery had been a little fast, no-one mentioned it. "Lamond said to me, before she," a catch came to her voice, "died, that the animosity succeeds between us because we dehumanise each other. It\'s easy to have no patience, and moreover to set out to destroy each other, if we see just a genius behind a code. There\'s no room for compassion there. This is why I said that, in this room, I want you to call me Pek Wan."



"Claire was a very clever woman." Mello smirked, but he spoke sincerely, despite the fact that she\'d passed off his own theory as her own. "However, don\'t the majority of us know each other\'s names? Everyone who was in the House before May 2002 were habitually addressed by our real names. It didn\'t stop us going for each other\'s throats then. I think that what Lamond was getting at were the other details. The things that stop us seeming like \'other\' and move us instead to being \'someone\'."



Fenian exhaled, "Like we\'re all going to just hand over all the shit that we\'ve spent nearly a decade ensuring no-one knows." His fingers found his cigarettes, then he stared at the baby. "Fuck that. Right! Where can we smoke in this gig?"



Chrissie replied, "I\'d rather you didn\'t smoke around my son."



"Did I say I was going to?"



Deontic sighed. "I wasn\'t after every detail, just enough to make us know that we\'re real. To humanise each other." She looked at Fenian, then bowed her head, hands together. "Please can you hang on for your nicotine fix, just long enough for this to happen?"



"That could take fucking years!"



Deontic looked defeated. "But you\'re going to have to go outside and then you might not come back."



Matt already had a cigarette, unlit, between his lips, as he straightened across the wall. "Mail Jeevas, Spain." He sauntered towards the door.



"Matt, please." Deontic called out.



Mello looked incredulously at her. "You think by stopping them going for a cigarette, you\'ll get..."



Matt coughed. "Mihael Keehl, Yugoslavia; Iestyn Jones, Wales; Kamwala Wa Ndongala, Zaire; don\'t know the baby\'s name; Liam Tighe, Eire; Nate River, America; Sharon Haif, Israel..." He didn\'t get any further. Century had grabbed him and held him fast, his hand over Matt\'s mouth. Matt didn\'t even struggle, he just stood there and no-one could even tell where he was looking. Around the room, everyone seemed poised, alert, as if waiting for lightning to strike.



Mello stared at Century. After moment, when the teenager still hadn\'t released Matt, Mello growled, "Let him go."



"Century, do it." Chrissie agreed. "Then come over here."



Century stepped away, but he didn\'t join Chrissie. Instead, he crossed the room to stand behind Near. He didn\'t take his eyes off Mello. The Slav sniggered. "I\'m the least of your worries. You\'re lucky he\'s on his best behaviour. Just don\'t touch Matt, ok?"



Near yawned. "Matt hacked the Watari Network." Several people glanced in Matt\'s direction for confirmation, but he was engaged in picking the lock the door and so ignored them. "Deontic, as fascinating as this is, I have a lot of work to do. Where is my room?"



The first door clicked open and Matt stood, "Hold on, can we smoke in our rooms?" He faced Deontic, who left the settee and led the way to a second corridor leading off the large lounge. "Pwnage."



Deontic stood in the corridor. "The rooms are all identical. They all have king sized beds. They all have en suite bathrooms and a wonderful view. No doubt we\'ll find some reason to think that someone else has the edge anyway." Matt rushed past her and just took the first door. He lit up the instant he was inside. Fenian took the next one. They heard his lighter strike and the window open, before the door closed and they heard nothing more. "They are also soundproofed."



"We\'re not staying." Chrissie told her. "I\'m sorry, D. If it was just me and Salvo, then yes, I\'d probably agree with you that this is potentially beneficial. We have the baby to think about."



Mello sighed. "No-one is going to take your baby and smash its head up against the wall or whatever else you\'re thinking. I personally have nothing against babies." Near shuffled past him and Mello tensed, but his rival didn\'t look at him. He merely walked until he reached the last room of all and then entered it. Mello frowned. "Having said that, I doubt that we\'ll be staying either."



Linda glared. "Deontic went to the trouble to find accommodation for us." She wrapped her arm around her friend. "I\'ll stay, D. Fuck the lot of them." She glowered at Mello, then called back. "You\'ll stay as well, won\'t you, Lu?"



Still on the settee, Luigi nodded. "There\'s no reason for everyone to be so worried. No-one here wants everyone else dead. Only Hollow wanted that and she\'s dead."



Mello sneered. "That\'s really niave."



"Oy!" Linda snapped at him. "Leave Luigi the fuck alone."



Mello shook his head. "It\'s niave. Wammy gave us the motivation and desire. Hollow gave us the idea. Now Deontic has given us the opportunity. While we\'re on the subject, Neuron has taught us that we could get away with it. The Watari Network covers even its monsters."



"So why did Beyond Birthday end up in a civilian prison?"



"Because it was B who taught L that he needed a Watari prison." He bit into his chocolate. "Personally, Chrissie, I think you\'re right now. Take the baby and run as fast as you can. This place is potentially crawling with psychos."



Deontic shook her head. "We managed to live with each other for years without anyone fearing for their lives. Our place in the rankings, yes. A lot of other things, undoubtedly, but none of us feared for our lives. That we do now is the whole reason that we should stay."



Salvo pushed past them all, "Can a cot be organised for the baby please?" He walked down the corridor, though Chrissie started at it, then ran after him. "We\'ve got everything else." He opened a door and stepped inside, Chrissie following him.



Mello smirked. "Spot the domestic about to start. My money\'s on Salvo."



"You reckon?" Linda frowned. "Chrissie all the way."



"Depends on what it is." Century commented slowly from behind. "Chrissie 99% of the time. Salvo, when he really wants to win. A bit like you and Matt, I should imagine." He lifted his bag and drifted past. "I\'m going to unpack. It looks like we\'re staying."