A/N: Gee wiz, man. A month later, I'm back on the fanfiction scene. I have no excuse for not updating other then the fact that I haven't felt like it lately.

This is my 3rd piece of fanfiction title after a Muse song.

Anyway, this new story deserves some warnings: Future smut/lemons, violence against gays, erm... Violence. Gayness. Mello's swearing. Yeah.

Resistance

Chapter 1: Secret

Mello looked around his shabby, unorganized apartment and wondered how the hell he had gotten here. Oh, but he knew. If he had kept his secret safe, he could be in some fancy-ass university right now. Fucking Yale or something. If his parents had not kicked him out of the house, had not despised him for who he was, he would have a decent, clean job. He wouldn't get home from work and have to fight back the extreme urge to blow all his money of booze, chocolate, and occasionally drugs.

If Mello had not come out of the closet, his very presence in downtown Manhattan would not be cause for his arrest.

But fuck danger. Danger was fun. Danger was Mello's life now, and he decided to embrace that. Sure, being homosexual meant being the vermin of society, but if Mello stuck to his own crowd he would be fine. Not like before.

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Mello was born an only child into a comfortable home in the Village. In his early years, his parents had spoiled him rotten. He would get perfect grades without having to crack open a book, and coasted through school with all As and occasional all A+ reports. However, when Mello entered junior high school, his life took a turn for the worse.

Mello's father had taken to drinking. When the got drunk he got mean, and when a bar kicked him out he would just go to the next on his pre-planned route. And when he got home, guess who he took out all the unresolved anger on? Yeah, Mello. He'd pin Mello down in his bed while he was still asleep and proceed to whip his son with is belt until he bled heavily.

Instead of combating her husband's problem with alcohol, Mello's mother, blond ditz that she was, signed her son up for martial arts. By the time Mello had been kicked out of the house, he was an official Kukkiwon approved 1st dan black belt in Taekwondo.

At school, Mello had begun to learn how to hide his sometimes still bleeding wounds. He learned to evade dodgy questions from his teachers, and to put on a fake mask of happiness. Not to mention his own troubles in school. They weren't academic, no, everything was fine in that area, and it was more so socially. His old friends had somehow drifted away, and before he had much experience in Taekwondo, every opportunity to beat Mello up in the gym locker room was taken.

For a while, Mello struggled to realize why this was happening. It was in seventh grade when it dawned on him. He was in the middle of an algebra exam, solving a compound inequality, when he realized how distinctly different he was from all the other boys. He had a budding chocolate fetish, wore tighter, more distinct clothing. His well kept blond bob of hair was girlish. He still didn't understand why everyone couldn't just accept him, though.

He learned, though. One year later he found out just why he didn't belong with those people. He had gotten in a mercifully sober fight with his dad, a sparring match of words only. They had said some nasty things to each other, and on impulse Mello had decided to leave. Just go. Walk around and blow steam.

Mello did, and as he brooded over his angry thoughts he proceeded to get lost. He had wandered far out of the Village, and was in some darker looking neighborhood he had never seen before.

Mello noticed this when he stopped at a corner, looked around, and muttered, "Where the hell am I?" under his breath. He turned on his heels, peered around at the streets joining the intersection he was at, and felt terribly hopeless. He crossed the street, looking for some place to go. On that street, he passed by a pair of women.

Wait. Those weren't women. Mello did a discreet double-take, realizing those were men. In women's clothing. He shuddered at the alien idea and was going to move on, hoping he wasn't noticed.

"What's a precious doll like you doing out alone?" The one on the right asked.

That was another 'what the hell' moment for Mello. Precious doll? Him? Who were those guys?

They introduced themselves as Mango and Peach. Mello wanted to throw up at such gaudy nicknames. At the time, Mello was still called by his real name.

After the introduction, Mango explained that he and Peach were gays, and that Mello was one, too. At first Mello denied it, but Mango and Peach were beyond persuasion. Despite Mello's protests, the two practically forced Mello to let them drive him home. And they did, with no incident. Mango did leave the address of his apartment, though, in case Mello wanted to, 'find out more of who he was'.

Confused, Mello let the two drive away. Yet at school the next day, Mello realized that if he didn't belong with the 'ordinary' crowd, he might as well find people who did accept him. Through Mango and Peach, Mello learned what being gay was: that you were a guy who was attracted to other guys. And Mello supposed he was attracted guys, once he thought about it. He was thankful that it was ok to be gay and not cross-dress like Mango and Peach did. He just wasn't into that stuff.

As time went on, Mello spent les time at his house and more time out with other homosexuals. A dime could get a guy a few kind words and a blowjob, and Mello was willing to pay. Once introduced to a world where he was accepted, Mello wanted it all. He wanted everything and anything, and he would do anything to get it. People were often surprised at how young he was, and at how much energy and vigor he had in bed.

It was a few months after he had been introduced to the exciting, if not dangerous, life as a homosexual that he was nicknamed Mello. It was kind of a joke, seeing as he was anything but mellow, but the name stuck.

To get as wide a variety of sex as possible, Mello had made it a point to have brief, one night stands as much as possible. They were blissful nights, that was for sure, but he often disappointed his lovers by leaving the next morning, practically vanishing in his black garb.

This habit had led Mello to have a brief affair with his cute red-head drug dealer, Matt. The sex had been great, although that partly could have been the excellent cocaine high, but it was none the less a great night. Mello had decided to make an exception for Matt and actually keep in contact with him. They weren't a couple, no, but they grew to be the best of friends. They knew each other inside out.

On the home front, things were trash. The more time Mello spent away from home, the more he despised it. He started to skip school, got suspended a couple times. By the time he was seventeen; Mello was disowned and thrown out. He crashed with Matt for a couple weeks until he got a job at an exclusive gay stripper club, and had enough money to rent out that shitty apartment he was living in today.

Despite all the downsides of his life, that he never finished high school, broke multiple laws each day, and was a sexual deviant, at the age of 20 Mello was doing just fine.

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Near was always an odd boy, but his mother loved him and never repressed any of his strange habits. When he was a small child, he had enjoyed wearing his mother's dresses. He grew out of that habit after a few years, but still had an effeminate touch. Near's mother believed this was because he was extremely studious, never rough-housed, and was fragile physically.

The amount that Near's mother adored him was limitless. She took every opportunity to brag about her son to anyone who would listen. His latest academic achievement. His one hundredth blank jigsaw puzzle completed. Anything, really. Her child was an angel, even in looks. At eighteen he still looked like a child.

One thing that really set Near apart was his taste in music. Opera was his favorite, beyond anything. The emotions that the vocalists put into their arias were so intense that it seemed to compensate for Near's own lack of emotions. Ever since his mom let him go on his own, Near spent all his pocket money for Met Opera tickets as often as he could.

What Near did not know was the pop-culture theory about men who went to the opera. When the curtains fall, so do the zippers of the peculiar men in the back of the theater. And on both sides, too.

So he went, unaware each time, of the longing stares that those sometimes gave him. He was a rosebud oblivious to his own pretty petals.

Near went through life differently then Mello. He was born into a middle class working family. His father died two years after Near's birth, leaving his mother to raise him in a world where women were just barely creeping into the workforce. Because of his mother's determination to provide a good life for her son, Near was taught the value of money, and the reward of saving it.

Unlike Mello, Near was home schooled. So unlike Mello again, Near did not face the oppression of his… unique personality. He didn't know what was in fashion, or what he needed to be like, because his mother was the only person in his life, and she adored him. If Near had gone to a school with other children, it would have been much different. Children would have cause to hate him simply for his existence. Not only was precocious, but he lacked any social skills what so ever, and didn't even dress normally.

Because his involvement with people only included his mother, Near went through eighteen years of life unaware of sexuality in general. He didn't see the need to look at neither men nor women, and didn't understand the concept of love, despite it being proclaimed in so many operas. It was until one night, savings blown on opera, that his eyes were opened to pleasures of those other then the mind.

The whole thing was unlikely, really. It's not as if Mello had ever imagined himself going to the Metropolitan Opera. He would rather be in a bar, flirting or something, living under the danger of a police raid. Not at some classy-ass shit like this where women wailed for hours about dead lovers or whatever the hell it was that they wailed about.

None the less, a year later Mello would appreciate Matt forcing him to go to the opera. It's not that he actually watched the performance, more so he spent the whole time staring at his future love, Near. Even from so far away, the subtlest of movements Mello had found entrancing. The way his pale, slender fingers played with the old fashioned opera glasses. Mello had imagined him playing with something else… But anyway. We'll get into that in the next chapter.

A/N: Ok, I know this chapter wasn't that great, or substantial, but this is sort of like an introductory chapter. Background information. Set the story for when it really starts. You know what I mean.

Anyway, this is the first time I've broken away from vampires in centuries past for months, so tell me how I'm doing.