[Mello isn't expecting to see L again. They hadn't parted on the best of terms, last time they spoke, and Mello's been busy in the time since - busy mitigating his own emotions after Sharon's disappearance and return, busy fighting off the Null and keeping them both safe. Busy surviving, and that leaves little time to dwell on the past.
Surviving now, in this heat, looks on Mello like this: dressed in boots and cutoff jean shorts and a plain white shirt with the sleeves removed; hair pulled back out of his face and off his neck; slat-lens novelty glasses over his face and a makeshift sling made from a bedsheet to haul water jars tied around his shoulder. He's older than L will remember - five years in Kira's world, after L was killed, and another year and a half spent in this ruined city - and the burn scarring over half his face, peeking out around the shirt on his neck and shoulder, adds the illusion of further age. He's accompanied by a large grey wolf, who stops and stares tensely at L when he's still a few yards away. Mello murmurs something low and commanding at the wolf and places a hand on the back of his neck.]
He only bites if you're an asshole.
[Which is probably not true, but it's what Emily told him the first time he met the wolf, and anyway, it's a test. Will L recognize him? Does L remember the previous time spent in Hadriel?]
two.
Surviving now, in this heat, looks on Mello like this: dressed in boots and cutoff jean shorts and a plain white shirt with the sleeves removed; hair pulled back out of his face and off his neck; slat-lens novelty glasses over his face and a makeshift sling made from a bedsheet to haul water jars tied around his shoulder. He's older than L will remember - five years in Kira's world, after L was killed, and another year and a half spent in this ruined city - and the burn scarring over half his face, peeking out around the shirt on his neck and shoulder, adds the illusion of further age. He's accompanied by a large grey wolf, who stops and stares tensely at L when he's still a few yards away. Mello murmurs something low and commanding at the wolf and places a hand on the back of his neck.]
He only bites if you're an asshole.
[Which is probably not true, but it's what Emily told him the first time he met the wolf, and anyway, it's a test. Will L recognize him? Does L remember the previous time spent in Hadriel?]