the colors you thought were kings, at the turn of a card just disappear

[want_the_world]

Mello's put it off long enough, he just. Wanted a better handle on all this shit before he made the call. Does not want to talk to Matt half-loopy from the painkillers, but he's lost too much time already. So he punches in the numbers he's not bothered to enter into the contacts list, because he knows them by heart, and resists the urge to pace as

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[you_have_mail]

His eyes have been burning for like a half hour, screen too bright in the darkened room, but Matt has about eight minutes to finish what he's doing before the deadline hits, and he's really wishing right now that he decided against the whole element of procrastination thing.

He's already gotten three calls about it tonight, and he opted not to pick the third one up. He knows. Midnight or the money doesn't go in. Repeating something doesn't make it any more dire. He really wishes people would realize this shite.

And when it rings again, he stubs the cigarette out, shooting his cell a glare that probably would've broken it, if it could. And maybe it's stupid that he doesn't even bother to look at the number, see whether or not he recognizes it, because the chances of it being anyone else than the person who just called him three fucking times in less than two hours is slim to none, at this point.

Fingers rake through his hair, and he stops what he's doing -again- to flip his phone open, press it against his ear. Seven minutes now. If he misses it, it'll be their fucking fault.

"Yeah." Oh, he sounds pretty annoyed.

[want_the_world]

"Matt." There's a rasp in his voice, and he struggles to subdue it before he speaks again. He's forgotten what the hell alias Matt's currently using, but it's not important.

Mello hasn't exactly thought about what he would say, making the call mostly because, as these things do, once he decided he had to do it, it became imperative to do right this second. He does pace now, stalking barefoot over the grimy floor, making his steps a straight line with an effort.

"How soon can you get here?" He takes the answer to will you come? as a given, because he can't bear to do otherwise.

[you_have_mail]

Great.

"Tomorrow, give or take a few years."

Yeah, he notices how Mello's voice doesn't sound quite right, but he also knows that he hasn't seen the guy in a long time. Anything could account for it, and he's not really in the mood to play on-the-spot detective while he's got half of his attention on the screen, because despite the fact that something out of nowhere just came to slap him in the face, he still has a deadline.

He's been trying to slow down, but now definitely isn't the time, and so the phone is tucked between his shoulder and cheek, and another filter finds its way between his lips, the flick of a lighter following, then a deep inhale.

"Bad time, actually." And he's holding in the smoke as he speaks, only to let out an exceedingly long exhale afterwards. Oh. Headrush.

It's easier to concentrate on the smaller things.

[want_the_world]

Plowed as he is from the pain and the meds--he'll never take enough to truly dull it, only enough to take the edge off; he has to stay alert--Mello's still offended by that.

"Make it a not bad time."

He reaches the wall, wobbles on the spin to head back the way he came, and his irritation at that snaps out at Matt.

"And make it tomorrow. 's not like you don't know where I am." Did he slur on that? Fuck.

[you_have_mail]

Making it not a bad time would require him to finish this in-

Five minutes.

Yeah, this isn't looking good.

Another drag, another attempt at multitasking, and he hates the way the cell is prodding at his jaw with his shoulder lifted like this. The cigarette is laid down at an angle in the nearest can-turned-ashtray, and if he can just get through one more-

"Maybe if you're a little nicer about it." And he's murmuring, attention now almost completely on task in front of him. He knows this is important. Of course he does, but five minutes isn't going to kill Mello, while it just might fuck up Matt's reputation something horrible.

He can focus on this, in just a second.

And he's not denying that he knows where Mello is. That would be not only stupid, but an insult to his abilities.

But he does give a brief pause.

"You drunk?"

[want_the_world]

"No. Percocet."

More than most people would be able to handle and still be upright, he thinks, which gives him a nice flare of pride, but the reasons for his needing it in the first place are so-fucked up, it cancels it out.

"Fine. I need your help."

This is being nice, by Mello's standards. It's admitting a hell of a lot, in fact, and he thinks five years wouldn't have been enough to keep Matt from being able to translate that.

Ha, that's a laugh, isn't it? That they speak some language mere mortals can't decipher, with the meaning hidden in the spaces between words. And that's when Mello knows he really is fucked up, when he has to bite back an out-loud laugh at the idea, when he sways on his feet, even though the only task he's set for himself is to walk, not even fast, just right down the middle of that gritty board.

"And I need it in hours, not days."

[you_have_mail]

Four minutes.

If Matt ever gave an extremely exasperated exhale in Mello's direction, while he was present, it's now. He drops his hand from the keyboard, leans his head against the back of the chair, closes his eyes, and thinks about how nice the last few years have been.

Not the few before that, because those were absolute shite, but once he got out here, everything just kind of... evened out in his favor. Mello was always a blip on his radar, and for someone with the kind of education they've had, Mello isn't that good at covering his tracks completely from someone who knows him inside and out, or maybe he was just doing it on purpose. The fucked up thing is that Matt really doesn't know which one to believe.

"I've gotta book a flight." The smoke is retrieved from the soda can, placed back between his lips.

Three minutes.

"And you owe me eight grand."

A hell of a lot more than that, if it gets around that he threw a job.

[want_the_world]

"That's fine, too."

And Mello sits down in a hurry, not entirely intentionally, good thing he'd got to the chair. Eight grand's nothing to him, even now.

"Wasting your talents, Matty. Cranking out code for low-lifes. What're you doing now, busting down virtual doors?" He can tell he's beginning to ramble, and reins it in. "You know there's shit going down that moving around imaginary money can't fix.

"So do whatever you've got to, but get here."

And this counts as a please, if Matt can read the tone, which Mello's pretty sure he still can. Is there no word in Slovenian for 'please'? Matt asked him, once, and Mello flicked him off and said he'd never bothered to learn it.

Drifting. He's got to stop that shit before Matt gets here. Always a balancing act, these last few days, of how much pain is bearable. It seems to change hourly.

"I look a bit different now. Don't lose your shit when you see me." He hesitates for a split second, decides he can wait, preferably forever, to hear what Matt has to say to that, and cuts the connection.

[you_have_mail]

He's jamming the smoke into the corner of the can while he listens to the mini-rant, scoffing at the idea that Mello, of all people, is trying to lecture him on what he's doing with himself. He's doing just fine, thank you. He's got money and jobs lined up out of the arse, and nothing in his way, aside from ghosts from his childhood calling him up and fucking everything up.

Which is what just happened, of course.

And he doesn't waste words, only pauses at the mention of Mello looking different, but then again, it's probably nothing. M was always vain, so it wouldn't be surprising if he's making a big deal out of chopping off his hair, or something.

Or maybe he's walking around in dresses. A small chuckle as the phone is flipped shut in his hand, and when the clock hits the even hour, Matt can see himself on a train riding into hell, waving goodbye to eight thousand dollars and a decent night's sleep.

Mello wouldn't just call him for anything, and this either means that A. he's fucked, or B. they're both fucked.

Book the flight, then.

And when he's sitting on a plane under an alias of an alias, chin resting on his palm (he fucking hates window seats), eyes fixed on the clouds, Matt tries to focus on the fact that he's forty-thousand feet in the air, and not that it's probably way fucking better up here than it's gonna be down there.

[want_the_world]

Mello knows he has to grab sleep while he can, resists the urge to pop another pill. You get dependent on that shit, it'll own you forever, and normally he'd never think anything like that, would consider himself immune and above it all. But now, lightheaded from pain, knowing he has to wait, and hating it already, though he knows Matt's not even on the plane yet?

It's too fucking tempting.

He goes back to pacing, walking it off, zoning out. Needs to boot up the laptop, make sure the connection's secure; needs to find the likeliest person to see reason in the NPA.

Has the irrational fear that that'll light him up like a fucking Christmas tree for anyone sniffing around the net for him. Or anyone, really, who knows this building's supposed to be empty.

In the end, he does sleep, for maybe forty-five minutes, his phone in his hand, half-waking every time he shifts on the bed and the sheets--soft, not soft enough--scrape the raw edges of the burns. The pain's working its way in, as if his skin's just now realizing how very fucked it is, and that thought makes Mello laugh bitterly as he dozes.

Then he's awake again, staring at the ceiling, feeling the pain ebb and surge back, higher each time. He clutches the phone and counts the seconds until he can safely take another pill.

[you_have_mail]

The descent into the airport feels like it takes forever, longer than the entire flight, maybe, and Matt didn't think he'd dread it as much as he is. Occupying his mind only works for so long, before he realizes the reality of things, and how he knows that he can just do what he needs to do, pack up, and leave. But somehow, he feels like it won't work out that way. Mello always did have a way of dragging him into his personal bullshite.

He hasn't packed much: just a couple changes of clothes and the only laptop that he didn't wipe and dispose of. Best to travel light, because he doesn't know when he'll be moving on again.

Hopefully soon.

And the car waiting for him at the airport rubs it in his face that he won't be able to afford this shite, much longer. He's gotta save money, make sure that he can find a little time to work on his own. The problem with making a decent living is spending a decent amount.

He's sure that his last employer has already smeared his name all over the fucking place.

And when the engine starts, he dials, exhales, and tries to remember to drive on the right side of the road, all the while cursing life.

[want_the_world]

The phone vibrates, and Mello startles out of a daze. He took another pill, maybe two hours ago, and wishes now that he hadn't. It makes his head feel too muzzy, his thoughts too slow.

Damn it, Matt's the one person it's supposed to be easy with.

So he sounds pissed when he checks the number and flips the phone open. Hell, he is pissed, with the attitude Matt's been giving him all along. Grousing over pocket change, when the world's halfway to hell and not even trying to climb out of the handbasket. It thinks it's fucking cozy in there, most of it.

"'bout time. Where are you?"

[you_have_mail]

He glances at the GPS, noting that Mello, once again, sounds like he's downed a few. Matt can't knock him getting fucked up. Hell, he does it every now and then, though not as much as he once did. There was a patch where sober was a foreign word, until he botched a job fucked up on amphetamines. They were supposed to help him concentrate, but ended up having him concentrating on everything but the one thing he wanted to focus on.

"About five minutes." Flick, and there's an inhale. He wonders if his smokes even exist in the States, because fuck if he's gonna order them online. Too easy to trace, if anyone wanted to really look.

"You know that staying in an abandoned building is really fuckin' stupid, right?" He sets his seat back a little, cracking the window so he can flick the ashes into the wind, knee keeping the wheel steady. And before Mello even has the chance to answer: "But I'm gonna give you the benefit of the doubt and say that you're there for a reason."

[want_the_world]

"Oh, thanks very fucking much. 'course I'm here for a reason."

The actual ownership of the building is such a knot of permits and puppet corporations, fronts of fronts, that untangling it would take years, assuming anyone bothered. Mello's actually sort of proud of that bit of obfuscation; he knew a place like this would come in handy someday.

"Put your fucking cigarette out before you come in."

Part of that's Mello knowing Matt will expect him to be shirty about it.

A lot more of it is that he thinks the smell might be the thing that tips him from nauseated into actually puking.

[you_have_mail]

"If you think I'm goin' outside every time I want a smoke, you're out of your fuckin' mind." And with that, he's pulling up to the building, frowning at the lack of available parking, though he wouldn't want to park directly in front of an abandoned building, anyway. Just like he wouldn't want to be the occupant of the only occupied flat in the place, but whatever. He's not going to argue it. Not yet, anyway.

He drives a few blocks south, parks off of the main street, and with his backpack slung over his shoulder, 'on the way' cigarette plucked between his lips, Matt reaches the building in about another five.

It's been about thirteen minutes since he told Mello the initial five. Whoops. He lingers outside for a second, and no, there's no one behind him, no one around, even, and he takes the final drag, heads up the stairs (fuck you, busted lift), and finds himself on the right floor, the urge to stick another one in his mouth too strong, considering he'd just killed two.

Alright.

Two swift knocks on what is (should be) Mello's door, and he's got his goggles obscuring his eyes, which he's doing a fine job of keeping expressionless, even covered. He's practiced, a bit.

[want_the_world]

It occurs to Mello, as he opens up all the locks on the door, that Matt might be the most shocked by his shirt: loose, soft, and grey, grabbed out of donations left in front of Goodwill. Can't exactly shop when you look like this.

At least the swelling's easing off, and he's mostly stopped shivering. He's got everything wrapped in gauze for now, all the way down to his left wrist. Isn't all that eager to see if the burns look any worse under it.

Opening this damn door, though, should be nothing to hesitate over.

So he opens it, and scowls at Matt, as much as he still can.

"You're late."