#mihael reads

[hyzkoa]

i read guardians of the galaxy 2020 here’s my review no one asked for bc i lost access to the tumblr acct that was supposed to be the Talking one (not like ive been drawing a lot lately either way JDSKFHS)

1) crazy how for more than half of peter’s panel-time on this book he’s dressed like this. for no other reason other than he woke up one day and this was his vibe. i support him in his slut era

2) so like this is peter with his wife and husband in that one planet which name i obviously remember but i’m testing You. smth like planet beyond the sun or smth. i know it starts with M. mor-smth. it smth in another reality and the paneling in that issue is really really nice.

anyways this was him with his wife and husband. crazy. they had a son together and everything.

but then he’s back to 616 and this is the second to last panel of richard, gamora and peter together

al ewing + juan frigeri i see u... also peter’s got nice nails. 

honorary mention to all the gay shit happening in this book:

- peter saying “i love him too. you know that right?” to gamora about richard. gamora replying “i know. that makes it better” i know she’s then talking about family but like he also refers to his wife and husband from the other reality as his family so like. a family can be a throuple and their 467465 children (too many members in this team)

-hercules and marvel boy :) i wish we had gotten more content abt them as a couple. or idk if theres more content of them in other books... im on the hunt

- phyla and moondragon were really cute and i loved their arc...the trials and tribulations of being a superhero... the resolution to their conflict was nice. 

[rxvera]

I'm actually a bit surprised that there's no Howl's Moving Castle and Death Note crossovers on Ao3. Look at these dramatic af men with style.

[iheartmello]

He thought school was for one day only! He MAD!!

[cube-e-scape]

"I will love you as misfortune loves orphans, as fire loves innocence and as justice loves to sit and watch while everything goes wrong." - Lemony Snicket

[applestorms]

@jessaerys ok shit this took a while but WHATEVER. wammy's lore collection here we go :3c less analysis this time, this is mostly just to archive the main known details we have in canon about the house, and also the people from there more generally. however much you wanna accept all this/take it at face value is up to You, Dear Reader (and tbh y'all should just read all these if ur curious since they're all pretty short + have Interesting narrators. i'll include links to free versions). do whatever you want forever etc. etc. also, SPOILERS. obviously.

LABB: (listen here)

no this book isn't written by ohba. yes i'm including it. shush. anyways, most of the lore in this comes from mello's vague comments about beyond's backstory, but there's a Lot of interesting things established in this, so. here's a bunch of notable quotes. if you're not already familiar, please keep in mind that the narrator of this novel is mello, writing at some point shortly before his death.

"L. The century's greatest detective. In light of his staggering mental abilities, L died an unjust and untimely death. In the public record alone he solved over 3,500 difficult crimes, and sent three times that number of degenerates to prison. He wielded incredible power, was able to mobilize every investigative bureau in the entire world, and was applauded generously for his efforts. And during it all, he never showed his face." (pg. 10)

"So, what you're reading now are my notes about L. It's a dying message, not from me, and not directed at the world. The person who will most likely read this first will probably be that big-headed twit Near. But if that's the case, I will not tell him to shred or burn these pages. If it causes him pain to discover that I knew things about L that he did not, then that's fine." (pg. 10-11)

"I am one of the few people who ever met L as L. When and how I met him...this is the single most valuable memory I have, and I will not write it here, but on that occasion L related to me three stories of his exploits, and the episode involving Beyond Birthday was one of these." (pg. 11)

"Obviously, it never came to light that L--and more importantly, Wammy's House, which raised me until I was fifteen--was deeply connected to the matter, but in fact, they were. L, on principle, never got involved in a case unless there were more than ten victims or a million dollars at stake, and this is the real reason why he belatedly, but aggressively, involved himself in this little case, which only ever had three or four victims. I will explain further in the pages that follow, but for this reason, the case of the Los Angeles BB murders is a watershed event for L, for me, and even for Kira. It was a monumental event for all of us. Why? Because this is the case where L first introduced himself as Ryuzaki." (pg. 11)

"For any one else but those two [Near and Kira], my identity may be of no interest, but I am the old world's runner-up, the best dresser that died like a dog, Mihael Keehl. I once called myself Mello and was addressed by that name, but that was a long time ago. Good memories and nightmares." (pg. 12)

"She [Naomi Misora] briefly considered the idea that Raye Penber, or someone else, was playing a practical joke on her, but she found it hard to believe that anyone would be so bold to sign their name as such. L never revealed himself in public or in private, but Misora had heard several horror stories about what happened to detectives who tried passing themselves off as L. It was safe to say that no one would dare use his name, even in jest." (pg. 18)

"This was L, so he was undoubtedly solving several other difficult cases all at once. Cases all over the world. For him, this case was just one of many parallel investigations. How else could he maintain his reputation as the world's greatest detective? The century's greatest detective, L. The detective with no clients." (pg. 35)

"L had earned a certain degree of hostility from other detectives, and the jealous ones called him a hermit detective, or a computer detective, but neither of these is a particularly accurate representation of the truth. Naomi Misora had also tended to think of L as an armchair detective, but in fact, L was quite the opposite, a very active, aggressive individual. [swoon.] While he had absolutely no interest in social connections, he was certainly not the kind of detective to shut himself up in a dark room with the shades drawn and refuse to come out. It is now common knowledge that the three great post war detectives, L, Eraldo Coil and Danuve were all actually the same person. Certainly, anyone reading these notes is almost certain to know...though they may not know that L engaged in a war with the real Eraldo Coil, and the real Danuve, and emerged victorious, claiming their detective codes. The details of this detective war I will save for another occasion, but in addition to those three names, L possessed many other detective codes. I have no idea how many, but there were at least three digits' worth. And quite a number of those were fairly public detectives--just like, as anyone reading these notes must know, he appeared before Kira, calling himself Ryuzaki or Ryuga Hideki. Of course, Naomi Misora had no way of knowing this, but in my opinion, the name L was, for him, just one of many. He never had any direct connection to that identity, he never thought of himself as L--it was just the most famous and most powerful of the many detective codes he used during his life. The name had its uses, but lacked obscurity. L had a real name that nobody knew, and nobody will ever know, but a name which only he knew never defined him. I sometimes wonder if L himself ever knew exactly which name was written in the Death Note, which name it was that killed him. I wonder." (pg. 43-44)

"If we must discuss why L so adamantly refused to reveal himself, we can explain it very simply: doing so was dangerous. Very dangerous. While the world leaders should make efforts to ensure the safety of all the finest minds, not only for detectives, the fact is that the current societal systems do not allow for this, and L believed he had no choice but to protect his mind under his own power. By simple arithmetic, L's ability in 2002 was the equivalent of five ordinary investigative bureaus, and seven intelligence agencies (and by the time he faced off against Kira, those numbers had leapt upward several more notches). This is easy to think of as a reason to respect and admire someone, but let me say this as clearly as possible: that much ability in one human is extremely dangerous. Modern danger management techniques rely heavily on defusing risk, but his very existence was the exact opposite. In other words, if someone was planning to commit a crime, they would greatly increase their chances of getting away with it by simply killing L before they began. That was why L hid his identity. Not because he was shy, or because he never left the house. To ensure his own safety. For a detective of L's ability, self-preservation and the preservation of world peace were one and the same, and it would not be correct to describe his actions as cowardly or self-centered." (pg. 69 nice)

"So whenever L was working, he would usually have someone else as his public face--and in this particular case, the FBI agent Naomi Misora was filling that role." (pg. 70)

"Beyond Birthday had the eyes of a shinigami congenitally. It was not particularly difficult for him to track down people with the initials B.B. or find people who were fated to die on a certain day at a certain time." (pg. 94)

"Normally contact with a shinigami was a prerequisite for acquisition, but Beyond Birthday had traded nothing--he had seen through those eyes since before he could remember. He knew your name before you said it. He knew the time of death of every person he met." (pg. 94)

"You might think [the eyes] would hardly be useful without a Death Note, but that is simply not the case. The ability to see someone's remaining life is the ability to see death. Death, death, death. Beyond Birthday lived his life unceasingly reminded that all humans would eventually die. From the time he was born he knew the day his father would be attacked by a thug and die, knew the day his mother would die in a train crash. He had these eyes before he was born, which is why he called himself Beyond Birthday. Which is why a child as strange as he was taken in by our home, sweet home--Wammy's House. He was B. The second child in Wammy's House." (pg. 94-95)

"The competition between L and B. L and B's puzzle. 'If L's a genius, then B's an extreme genius. If L's a freak, then B's an extreme freak. Now it's time to get ready. There are things I must do before B can surpass L. Henh henh henh henh.' This thought was the only thing that made him laugh without needing to think about it. And those that know will recognize the laugh of the shinigami. Still grinning to himself, he faced the mirror, brushed his hair, and began applying his makeup. The reflection of himself in the mirror. Himself. As always, he could not see his own time of death. No more than he could see the death of the world." (pg. 96)

"We were raised at Wammy's House in England, in Winchester, as L's successors, as L's alternatives, but that does not mean we knew anything more about L than anyone else. Including myself, only a few of us ever met L as L, and even I knew nothing about L before he met Watari--Quillish Wammy, the genius inventor who founded Wammy's House. Nobody knows what's going on in L's head. But even so, I know how Watari felt. Looking at L's incredible talents from the perspective of an inventor--of course he wanted to make a copy, of course he wanted to create a backup. Anyone would feel the same. As I have already explained, L never appeared in public. L knew that his own death would increase the crime rate all over the world by a few dozen percentage points. But what if they could copy him? What if they could make a backup? That was us. L's children, gathered from all corners of the world.

"But even for a genius like Watari, creating a fake L was easier said than done. Even for Near and I, who were said to be the closest to L...the more we tried to be like him, the closer we got, the father away he was, like chasing a mirage. So I hardly need to tell you what it was like when Wammy's House was first founded, when he was still experimenting. The first child, A, was unable to handle the pressure of living up to L and took his own life, and the second child, Beyond Birthday, was brilliant and deviant. B stood for Backup.

"But B tried to surpass L, not become him...no, that might not be right. I have no way of knowing the inner workings of his mind. He...their generation was not like the fourth generation, with Near and I, all the children bound only to the code with the serial L. They were prototypes, never even given the L code, expected to fail. I prefer to refrain from idle speculation based on my own experiences, but, well, Beyond Birthday may have thought something like this: As long as there was L, B would never be L. As long as the original existed, the copy was always a copy." (pg. 104-105)

"The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases. L.A.B.B.--L is After Beyond Birthday. This reading is why I think this name is so much closer to the killer's intentions than the Wara Ningyo Murders, or the Los Angeles Serial Locked Room Killings. I wasn't talking about the names on a purely stylistic basis. Whether Beyond Birthday had put that much thought into it I have no idea, but if he had a specific reason for choosing to commit his murders in L.A., then that is probably why. I am sure he had a much more personal obsession with L as an individual than Near or I ever did. I can understand why someone would become a criminal in order to fight against a detective, which is why I can write something like this, but even so. What did he hope to accomplish by killing unrelated people? Or perhaps B simply wanted to meet L. Then he could use the eyes of the shinigami he'd been born with and see L's real name, see when L would die. He would be able to figure out who L was. Beyond Birthday had never told anyone that he had the eyes of a shinigami, and it would not surprise me at all if he believed himself to be some kind of shinigami." (pg. 105-106)

"Beyond Birthday challenged L. And L accepted the challenge. To put it bluntly, the Los Angeles BB Murder Cases were nothing but an internal struggle, a civil war within our home, sweet home-- Wammy's House. Unfortunate for the victims that got mixed up in it, but even if Beyond Birthday had not killed them, all those victims were fated to die that day, at that time, for some other reason, so logically and morally, their deaths were unavoidable. So in the strictest sense of the word, the only one who really got mixed up in their war was Naomi Misora." (pg. 106)

"L was said to never move on a case unless there were more than ten victims or a million dollars at stake. The only exceptions to this were cases at difficulty level L (extremely fitting), or when L had personal reasons compelling him to get involved. The Los Angeles BB Murders were both of these. I hardly need to point out the difficulty by this stage of the story, and L was essentially fighting his own dead copy. [harsh, dude.] The current head of Wammy's House had told Quillish Wammy/Watari, who had told L about B's disappearance in May, and ever since L had been looking for him even as he solved other cases. Wammy's House only knew him as B--they did not know his real name, Beyond Birthday, so this search was near impossible, but L knew who the killer was. He had not been looking for a killer so much as he was looking for a case. L had been waiting, expecting Beyond Birthday to do something to challenge him. L could move any policeman in the world, but in this case, he could not ask anyone for help except Naomi Misora...more than likely, for this reason. I don't think L really put that much stock in honor, but everyone is embarrassed by their own sins, and nobody wants those missteps to become public knowledge. L was the goal of everyone in Wammy's House. Every one of us wanted to surpass him. To step over him. To step on him. M did, N did, and B did. M as a challenger, N as a successor. B as a criminal." (pg. 116-117)

"No matter what she did, she had no way of knowing. That this killer, Beyond Birthday, could tell someone's name and time of death just by looking at their face, that he had been born with the eyes of a shinigami--she had no way of knowing that fake names were useless with him, completely and utterly pointless. How could she have known? Even Beyond Birthday himself could not explain how he had been born with the eyes of the shinigami, how he could use them with no payment, with no arrangement. Neither Misora nor L knew why, and, obviously, neither do I. The closest thing to an explanation I can offer is that there are shinigami stupid enough to drop their notebooks in our world, so there might well be shinigami stupid enough to drop their eyes." (pg. 193-140)

"'So, Naomi Misora...' said L, wrapping up. But Misora hastily stammered, 'Um, er, L...' but then she hesitated, not sure if she should ask this or not. 'You...know the killer, right?' 'Yes, as I said. He is B.' 'I don't mean like that...I mean, he's someone you know personally?' On the 16th, L had said that he had known the killer was B, and she had sort of known ever since, but two days before, L had said something that changed her guess to conviction. Whatever you do, please catch the killer. The century's greatest detective, L, would never say that about some ordinary indiscriminate serial killer. And the way his letter was just one letter long... 'Yes,' the synthetic voice agreed." (pg. 144-145)

"'I have nothing to do with him,' L said. 'To be completely accurate, I do not even know B. He is simply someone I am aware of. But none of this affects my judgement. Certainly, I was interested in this case, and began to investigate it because I knew who the killer was. But that did not alter the way I investigated it, or the manner in which my investigation proceeded. Naomi Misora, I cannot overlook evil. I cannot forgive it. It does not matter if I know the person who commits evil or not. I am only interested in justice.'" (pg. 145)

"My great and respected predecessor, the man whose actions were a strong influence on me personally, B, B.B., Beyond Birthday--obviously, I need hardly explain again that the murders themselves were not his purpose. So what was he doing? Again, I hardly need to explain--he was challenging the man he copied, the century's greatest detective L. A matter of winning or losing. A contest." (pg. 159)

"Since L could solve every case no matter how challenging, if he created a case so difficult that L as unable to solve it, B would have defeated L." (pg. 159)

"He knew that the moment he took action Wammy's House and Watari would alert L, so he did not even bother trying to stop them. He could only guess at which stage of his plan L would start to come after him, so he prepared things carefully, ready for L's entrance at any point." (pg. 159)

"B approached Naomi Misora, calling himself Rue Ryuzaki. Rue Ryuzaki--L.L. For anyone from Wammy's House, there could be no higher goal than identifying yourself with that letter--and Beyond Birthday seized this case as his chance. even Naomi Misora knew what had happened to detectives falsely identifying themselves as L, and B was from Wammy's House, so he knew this better than anyone--so this choice suggests the strength of his decision. He never once intended to survive--had had made up his mind. He was ready." (pg. 160) [trans. note: the name "Rue" in Japanese, ルエ (ru-e), is an anagram of エル (e-ru), which is how L is pronounced.]

"Naturally, his face and fingerprints would burn as well--he had always disguised himself with heavy makeup while he was with Misora, and he never left a picture behind, so even if someone directly affiliated with Wammy's House inspected the body, they would have no idea that Rue Ryuzaki/Beyond Birthday was B from Wammy's House. He had left nothing to connect Beyond Birthday to B." (pg. 162)

"B was presenting the Los Angeles BB Murder Cases to L as a case that could never be solved. That L could never solve. In other words, he had never prepared any clear solution to it--since the killer had committed suicide, disguised as the fourth victim, there was no longer a killer to catch, and no clues left to catch him with." (pg. 163)

"My poor, poor predecessor. Not only was he utterly and completely defeated, but he survived, driving home his embarrassment...he must have longed for death. Accept my condolences, B." (pg. 169-170)

"If I had space left over I had intended to carry right on into the other two stories I heard from L: the story of the detective war between the three greatest detectives, all solving that infamous bio-terror case, with guest appearances by the last of the alphabet, the first X to the first Z from Wammy's House; and the story of how the world's greatest inventor, Quillish Wammy, aka Watari, had first met L, then about eight year's old--the case that gave birth to the century's greatest detective, the Winchester Mad Bombings that occurred just after the third World War. But however objectively I look at things, I do not have the space or the time. Oh well." (pg. 170)

"She had spoken to L only once after the killer was arrested. He thanked her for helping to solve the case, and told her just a little about the background of the case. That B had been a candidate to succeed L, and that the pressure of that had driven him off track." (pg. 171)

"And a few years after his arrest, on January 21st, 2004, serving a life sentence in a California prison, Beyond Birthday died of a mysterious heart attack." (pg. 173)

C-KIRA: (read here)

near grief :pensive: pretty sure this was animated in the anime movie thing?? tbh i still need to watch that. Very interesting as some of the most recent post-main story lore we get about wammy's imo. less quotes now + more summarizing since these are just comics

near has apparently only "talked" to L once (in quotes since he didn't actually say anything, just sat in the back of the room doing a puzzle the entire time. real asf girl)

during this "conversation," roger or one of the orphanage heads set up the usual L screen + a camera/mic so that L could see all the kids and answer their questions.

notably, mello & near didn't ask any questions, just lurked in the back watching L with a "nasty look in [their] eyes," which near assumes is what made him pick them to be his top successors, considering the fact that he didn't actually look at any of their data. (somewhat seems to imply that L didn't actually give a shit about grades or anything like that when picking his main successors?)

while answering questions, near is caught off guard by one of L's answers. to transcribe it all directly here--

NEAR (NARRATING): At the time, I didn't think L would put it so bluntly. L: It's not a sense of justice. L: Figuring out difficult cases is my hobby. If you measured good and evil deeds by current laws, I would be responsible for many crimes. L: The same way you all like to solve mysteries and riddles, or clear video games more quickly... For me too, its simply prolonging something I enjoy doing. L: That's why I only take on cases that pique my interest. It's not justice at all. And if it means being able to clear a case, I don't play fair, I'm a dishonest, cheating human being, who hates losing...

not quite the monster speech, but fascinating all the same. near seems to imply that this answer sent some kids into a despair spiral, but it actually caused him to like L more and more, feeling that he was, "exactly the kind of person who wanted to achieve his own goals." kinda goes against the HTR13 ohba comment? shrug

The Wammy's House/L's One Day: (read here)

honestly i interpret these comics as like. canon crack fic. but anyways, here's the established L lore included in these two.

L was taken into wammy's as a nameless orphan at an unknown but likely quite young age

very soon after arriving he beats up all the other kids he meets--

he is "utterly incompatible," with all the other kids and monopolizes all the things he likes simply cause he's stronger than them and presumably could fight them for it-- naturally, he ends up usually just playing by himself

notably, this all establishes that L isn't the first kid at wammy's, that there was already at least one generation of older kids living there before he got there (and could eventually turn it into an L successor creating machine)

once watari realizes that L has some outstanding mental abilities, he gives him his own private room and a computer. afterwards, L spends most of his time sitting in front of the puter by himself

L requests that watari buy 1 million pounds with Japanese yen and tells him which stocks to buy, causing his assets to reach "almost 20,000 times the original amount," in two years. visually this is depicted as happening when L is still quite young

several years later, L stumbles across a serial murder case in the news, which is the first he solves, starting his new career path

-

L can stay awake for 100+ hours and then gets over it by sleeping for like 17 hours. pictures also may imply that he doesn't actually sleep in a bed, but just lies down sideways in his chair. RIP yotsuba light's perfectly designed sleep schedule

L also shits/pisses in the same position he usually sits in (frog-pose), facing the tank south park style

he is a big fan of cleanliness!! human washing machine etc. etc. honestly i think this is just another way for him to hold that same crouched position

text says he always has, "ten or so identical sets of clothes prepared for him," since he's picky about it, but the art itself shows way more than ten. also rare shirtless L moment?? (watari helps)

L does in fact go outside!! he likes roller coasters/theme parks, swinging, art galleries, live music, etc. though most of the time he just sits in his room thinking thru shit n solving cases.

[meandmypagancrew]

I mean, sure, it could be his clothes but I would start with the smiling and the fact that his eyes are happy because he has yet to learn his hero died and in fact the good guys do not always win and the world is cruel and unfair and he’s alone in it, but you’re the artist so you would know, I guess.

[wammypilled]

Sssooooo, there's this abomination I've been trying to write since last spring, that I really wanted to post for Mello’s birthday but honestly I think it needs some more time to marinate, just a wee bit, so I thought I'd at least post a little snippet today...

It's Wammy’s era and kinda wholesome, kinda fcked up, very silly and chaotic— so much so that I had a really hard time picking an ~excerpt. In the end I just chose this one bc I felt like it summarized the (insufferable) vibe at least somewhat decently.

Had to wait and wait and wait until I got so tired I wouldn't gaf anymore, bc this is my first time posting writing (or trying to really "write" at all) and it's so ☆nerve wracking☆ and I'm still trying so hard not to self-deprecate but honest to go— ahem, here it goes!

The city was a tragedy in three acts. Opening with the first victim: that poor van, dying on them some twenty times minimum. Second, enter the blondes’ paranoia about there being cops everywhere. And the grand finale: parking. So hard, apparently, that after two bumps, a glaze and countless reverses, Mello just made a brusque left, stopped by a tree in the middle of the bloody parking lot, pulled the handbrake and twisted the key out.

Linda relaxed so much she practically collapsed, “It’s over…”

“For you, yeah, it is…” He got out.

Without having to think about what Mello meant, Matt followed suit and hopped off. 

The asphalt was so still under his soles… solid… he almost bent down to touch it with his hand…

“Holy hell, it’s sunny!” Mello stretched, then closed the door in Near and Linda’s faces, “See you never, wankers!”

“What? Let us out! Matt, let us out!”

He also closed the door, making sure to talk loud enough for them to hear as he reasoned with his best friend, “It’s Folkestone and then on to Calais, no?”

“Ferry from Portsmouth. ‘S quicker.” Mello corrected, locking the van and then taking two fags and the zippo out of his coat pocket.

Like a moth to the light, Matt circled around the muzzle to light them on the same flame, while Linda yelped from the cabin.

“What the fuck else do you think I stole a bloody van for?” Mello’s upper lip twisted in question of her logic (as if there was anything sound about his), and Matt had to bite on the cardboard of the filter not to laugh.

“It’s nice and cosy in there, isn’t it? You’ve your snacks… Stay put.”

With the sweet, sweet buzz of bitter nicotine starting to wash over him, he found it in himself to gaze sympathetically at his girlfriend, “they’ll find you…” he assured, “eventually…”

She stared between the two of them (trying to see through the smoke?) while Near, unused to their modus operandi, twirled a white curl, gleefully interested in further developments, even though he’d very much be involved in them.

“Sorry guys, but you didn’t really think we’d tell you where we were headed, did you?”

“Matt, I swear to God!”

He quirked an eyebrow, “Babe, we’re both agnostic…”

Near actually chuckled. He was so weird, jeez…

Mello, in the meanwhile, had finally had it and turned his back on them.

Without another word, they made their merry way to the nearest entrance, their louche fairytale having them leave ashes in their wake…

For some reason he’d imagined the shopping centre would be a lot bigger, the architecture more geometric and satisfying, but now he realised that that had been a memory of a mall in Karachi, the one auntie used to take him to… which gave him a pretty clear idea of how Mello knew about that place, and also hurt to think about too hard— so, anyway, this mall here looked like a mess, straight lines and curves clashing instead of harmonising with each other. The sight didn’t make him feel cheery in the least, if anything it kind of looked like a gigantic pirate hat.

“Really, though, we could go anywhere we want, the world’s our oyster...”

“Mhm… with the lemons life gave us? Slurp!”

He could feel his fucking gums shrinking… “What is it with you and lemons today?”

“What? I love lemons!” He smirked, giving him a half-lidded, x-ray once over, “All kinds of lemons…” 

The images of Wammy x Ruvie old man smut that flooded his mind had Matt shuddering so hard he had to turn away and his ears filled with static—

“Aw, he’s just so sensitive!” Mello gave him a shove, which was promptly returned. 

A grin reflected off of Matt, easy, automatic, whole, and all the time he’d been deprived of those moments, of the pranks, their telepathy, his best friend’s touch, it hadn’t been at all.

Sunshine had never looked so pretty: squinty-eyed and toothy, the top layers of his bob flitting in the sea breeze like gold threads.

Matt inevitably felt his face warm, but didn’t look away. Mello did, slowing his pace. He’d change the subject now, Matt knew, no matter how he pleaded and yearned.

“What do we do with those cunts?”

Oh, right. 

“Linda’s probably breaking the window as we speak…”

Mello took one long last drag, and the time to smirk scornfully at his enjoyably-paced cigarette, and blew out the smoke to one side, “You shouldn’t have said that.”

Neither dared look back, but Matt tilted his head, smiling helplessly at his best friend until he rolled his eyes and pivoted on his tippy toes. 

He wondered how Mello felt, consciously falling for such a basic form of manipulation, but not for long, because that walk drove Matt fucking crazy; the moment that twat put some shoes on, one foot fell in front of the other just like a model's. Impossible not to see why he wanted to go shopping. He hoped he got to buy something cool to strut in…

[kiyomitakada]

Mello yanks the showering room's door open.

Oh. Oh, okay. He really is nude. Well obviously Mello had deduced that but it's still a bit of a shock.

"You're coming with me," he declares, resolutely dragging his gaze up to Teru Mikami's face.

"A taser?" Mikami's eyes flicker down to what Mello's holding, then back up. "That's hardly necessary."

Where the hell is he getting so much confidence from? He doesn't even have the notebook on him. "I beg to disagree," Mello says, and jabs him in the armpit.

Once Mikami has passed out and Mello's dressed and secured him appropriately, he picks him up — Jesus, he's heavy, Mello had come here expecting Mikami to be working at the gym because of his lack of muscles and incel-ness but nope, turns out he does have abs under that TV suit — and slings him over the shoulder. He heads out. Thankfully, Mikami has come at a frankly unbelievable time of day, so no one else is around except for the receptionist.

The receptionist raises an eyebrow.

"Guy's tuckered out," Mello lies. "He called me earlier. I'm taking him home."

"I was more curious about the ropes," the receptionist says.

"Hey, it isn't any of my business what he gets up to in the shower." Mello had only tied his hands together, anyway. The rest of the rope is wrapped messily around Mikami for now because it's hard doing bondage in a gym shower room.

The receptionist nods, slowly. "Haven't seen you around before."

Mello shrugs. "I moved back to the area recently."

"I see," the receptionist says, and smiles. "I never knew Mikami-san had a brother. He's lucky to have you."

Mello nearly spits blood. How the fuck could he ever be mistaken for this guy's brother? Mello's blonde, for god's sake! "Well we should be going," he says hurriedly, and starts walking briskly down to the locker room.

It's easy enough to press Mikami's gym wristband to the sensor; the machine beeps approvingly, and one of the larger lockers pops open.

…Teru Mikami has brought an honest-to-god suitcase to the gym.

Okay. Sure. Why not. This makes several things easier for Mello, actually. He pulls the suitcase out, sets Mikami unceremoniously down on the floor to check if there's anything else hidden in the locker — there isn't — and ducks back out, picking Mikami back up.

"Hrgh," Mikami mumbles.

"Hush now, brother," Mello mutters, then starts wheeling the suitcase out of the gym. He can check if there's a notebook in it later; he has a hotel reservation to get to.

---

a/n: before you say, "hey, what the FUCK kind of cursed AU is this," i am delighted to inform you that this is official death note canon(!) as of the death note german audio drama, which @mikami has kindly translated here (in reverse chronological order). that's right! there's an official licensed version of death note where mello canonically ties mikami up in a shower! isn't the world beautiful

[ @deathnotetober day 7: gym ]

[neallo]

august 18th, 2010 (two-hundred days)

rating: M | category: M/M | words: 1,650

Near is sitting in his office. He is sitting at his desk in his office, which is also Mello’s office, because they share one, now. Mello is under two meters away from him, sitting at his own desk and glaring at his backlit monitor like he wants to kill it. This has been their status quo for about seven months. Near knows the exact figure— two-hundred days— but he usually avoids acknowledging that he knows it, even in his own mind. Having this information on hand feels slightly illicit, because he knows the only reason he recalls the duration of their professional partnership with this degree of precision is because of what happened immediately before it began.

for day 2 of @nearsbday (prompt: memory)

note: mature fanfiction; minors, do not interact!

[delilahhyuuga]

"His stomach twisted into tense, nauseous knots within his center as he watched the corner of her upturned lips… One quick twitch downward of the muscles, a momentary slip of the smile from its previous immaculately fastened position… Just enough of a break in her façade to reveal everything to Mello before she could even mutter even a single word.

The world moved in slow motion as she reached for a paper held in a bundle in her folded arms, placing it face up on his desk. Penned on the top right corner of his page using the same deep, steel gray ink and circled so dramatically that no eye would be able to miss it was the damning number: 97

Three points short of a victory…

An entire universe short of perfection…"

(From Chasing Hues - Chapter 1 - @forbiddensoul562)

[keehlmyself]

one of those days. someone pass the squidish 2020 mello & near fic where they send eachother cat photos.

[bonezhead]

do not repost and she calls his name

it could be mine but i blew it in one day

[easy-revenge]

guess who never sat their ass down to properly read the death note manga and just skimmed through it after watching the anime so now they've spent almost two years theorizing and making headcanons about mello's past while there's been info about it collecting dust on their shelf. go on. guess.

[theoldworldsrunnerup]

Reading another note again

[meandmypagancrew]

Um… Mello having a Daddy/Silver Fox kink confirmed I.. I guess???? Happy pride to Mello, I GUESS?????

[quietbreeze97]

"The most intelligent people disguise the fact they are intelligent. Wise men do not wear nametags."

- Mello, Death Note Another Note