Use

"Near, I’m not your tool to solve a puzzle."

- Mello

Use (使用, Shiyō) is the seventy-seventh chapter of Death Note.



Plot
As Mello enters the SPK HQ with a gun and Halle Lidner as a hostage, Anthony Rester and Stephen Gevanni draw their own guns and tell him to drop his. Near, however, tells everyone to put down their guns: shedding blood is unnecessary, especially since they all share the common goal of capturing Kira. The other three prudently lower their weapons.

Near then tells Mello that thanks to his actions—getting the Death Note and getting Kira to co-operate with the Kira Investigation Team—he has managed to make considerable progress in his own inquiry. Provoked, Mello angrily threatens to shoot Near, shouting that he is not a mere tool to solve a puzzle, and is again held in a stand-off with Rester and Gevanni.

Near calmly tells Mello that he can kill him if he wants to. Mello, now seriously tempted, pulls back the gun's trigger but Lidner then gets between him and Near. Lidner tells Mello that if he captures Kira in the future then killing Near now will make it a hollow victory since he will have nobody to match himself with. Furthermore, if Rester and Gevanni then kill him, it will only mean victory for Kira. Mello backs off.

Mello knows that Near has the only photo of him left in the world and asks for it—in case Kira uses it to identify him. Near returns the photo and assures him that he has made arrangements by which the other children at Wammy's House will not be contacted in order to be used by Kira to kill him. On the back of the photo, Near has written "Dear Mello".

In return, Mello tells him that the Death Note is a Shinigami notebook and people who touch it are able to see Shinigami. Near believes him since Mello could have used less outrageous and more believable lies. Mello also says that some of the rules in the Death Note are fake but will not specify which ones. He then leaves. The race is on to find Kira.

Meanwhile Light Yagami is determined to kill Near and Mello. As Kira, he contacts the new American President George Sairas and demands that he find and pass on any information on government agents, from groups like the FBI or CIA, who "disappeared" right before the creation of the SPK. Light hopes that this way he may find some of the living, current SPK members and get closer to Near. Sairas, fearful for his own life, agrees. Light then tells Misa Amane to contact Sakura TV.

Three days later, escorted by bodyguards, Sakura TV manager Hitoshi Demegawa appears on a new program, "Kira's Kingdom", and announces that he has been appointed by Kira as his spokesman—even boasting that he is risking his life since there are many who still oppose Kira. Demegawa announces that while some countries like the USA now accept Kira, there are still many who oppose him. The debates can continue and if public opinion turns against Kira then Kira will step down. However, people who hunt for Kira will not be tolerated and he urges Kira's followers to denounce and expose them.

Kira's word is now law. Demegawa calls on people to send details of criminals who will be investigated by him and his staff and passed on to Kira for judgment.

In Los Angeles, the Kira Investigation Team watch the program wondering if they can still hunt for him or if this makes them outlaws as well. Light for his part is satisfied with the way things are going. He has already decided to keep his colleagues in the team alive and only kill them when he is rid of Near and Mello and when L (Light) is exposed as being Kira.

The SPK has also been watching Demegawa's broadcast. Near is disgusted—just as he was with Sairas' acceptance of Kira—but thinks that such a public move indicates that Kira considers him and Mello as serious threats. He then wonders about the fake rules.

Conception
It is not entirely known what the chapters title "Use" may refer to. It likely relates to the question of whether Near is using Mello, or whether Light is using the investigation team as bait for Mello and Near, or even whether Demegawa is using Sakura TV to shift public opinion in favor of supporting Kira. It could even be about all of those aspects.