A/N: I've been playing TWEWY a lot lately so I suppose this was only inevitable. It's not a time travel story or anything from my usual genre pool so please bear with me. Plus it's in third person... don't know why, it just is, I'm better with writing in first but for some unknown reason it just seemed to work better in third.
Those of you who've read my stories before might know that I suck at writing villains, this time I've got a bit of help from my boyfriend Blintz Neotech (which is obviously not his real name) with the bad guy, he hasn't shown up yet but still figured I'd go ahead and credit him at the beginning.

Naturally I do not own TWEWY, it belongs to... well other people. Thank you in advance for reading, and I ask that you please review.

...

It was a quiet night in Udagawa.

Months had already passed since Neku had found himself caught up in the game played between Shibuya's Conductor and Composer, and naturally things had calmed down considerably, his life had completely returned to normal. No more playing the reaper's game, no more fighting noise, no more threat of erasure, everything seemed to have become exactly as it should be.

Neku sat on the couch alone in his apartment. The ending credits of his favorite TV show were playing, he grabbed the remote and turned off the TV as he began to yawn.

He got up and began to walk to his room, planning to go to bed so he wouldn't be tired when he went to see Shiki for a date the next day. Then he heard a knock on the door, or really it was more like a loud thump from the general vicinity of the door.

He wasn't sure why anyone would be coming by so late at night but he went to answer the door regardless and was surprised to see Joshua (Yoshiya Kiriyu) leaning on the outside door frame clutching his side. Joshua started to fall through the door way, Neku managed to catch him and carried his old partner to the couch.

"What's going on..." Neku asked before realizing that Joshua had fallen unconscious. He moved his friend's hand and saw a large gash, Joshua was bleeding quite a bit. Neku couldn't help but wonder what could have injured him like this, after all Joshua was the composer... he was the most powerful person in all of Shibuya, the mere thought of someone powerful enough to injure him was enough to send a shiver down his spine.

Joshua began to stir a bit as Neku pressed a damp cloth against his wound. He wished that he could have just used a pin's psyche to heal him but of course that wouldn't work in the RG, instead he would have to settle for bandages like a normal person.

A few minutes after Neku had finally managed to at least stop the bleeding Joshua started to come to.

"Finally awake?" Neku asked, another yawn managing to escape Neku's mouth.

"You were worried about me? I must be dreaming," Joshua said as he sat up, he winced a bit which proved to Neku that the cut on his side was every bit as painful as it looked.

"This is no time for jokes! What the heck happened to you?!" Neku shouted. He hated how casual Joshua was about everything, he always seemed to have that same smile on his face regardless of the situation. Joshua's smile flickered just a bit, turning serious.

"Someone was trying to kill me, I had to escape to the RG to get away..." Joshua trailed off.

Even if Neku already suspected that Joshua's injury wasn't an accident it only worried Neku even more to hear. After all, not only was this person powerful enough to injure the composer, they made him retreat... this was sounding worse and worse. Neku couldn't keep a hint of panic out of his voice as he asked, "Who was trying to kill you?"

Joshua seemed hesitant to give the details, he sighed, "The composer of a neighboring district in the UG. He's trying to increase the area he has power over, if he killed me he would have become Shibuya's composer... that's his goal."

So it had been another composer, Neku could understand that, after all he knew that there were multiple sections in the UG so it only made sense that each section had it's own composer and reaper's game going on. It was only logical that at some point there would be an especially ambitious composer that would want to expand his territory if there could be composers like Joshua who would randomly decide they wanted to destroy their section of the UG.

"Don't worry," Joshua continued with a little laugh as though he still found the idea that Neku would worry about him amusing, "I made sure he wouldn't be able to follow me... and he shouldn't be able to recognize me how I look in the RG anyway. I'm not going to get you involved without asking first this time."

Neku was a bit surprised by Joshua's last statement, "What do you mean?"

"Last time I forced it on you..." He paused, "This time I'm asking you, please help me."

Neku wasn't sure what he was expected to say to something like that.

Joshua had killed Neku last time he needed his help, he'd gotten him caught up in a life or death game with what he valued most on the line as well as the entirety of Shibuya (though Neku hadn't known at the time that at the time). It hadn't been fun... but Neku was thankful for those three weeks, because they'd made him see the merit of being together with other people regardless of differences. If it hadn't been for Joshua, Neku probably would have never made any friends, at least he'd have never met Shiki, Beat, or Rhyme.

Neku paused for moment to think before saying anything, then he smiled, "You're my friend, I'm not sure what I could do to help, but count me in."

Joshua hesitated, which only served to worry Neku even more. In the time Neku had known him (though it was only a week) Joshua had always seemed to speak his mind, sure, Neku now knew that in all that time Joshua was probably just thinking about how to win his own game with Kitaniji Megumi and probably wasn't speaking his mind at all, but he at least had never looked so openly uncertain about anything as he did right now.

"What is it?" Neku asked, "What can I do to help you?"

Joshua looked directly into Neku's eye's for a moment before finally responding.

"I want you to kill me."

It took a second before Neku had fully processed what his old partner had just said, but once he had he couldn't quite contain himself, "What?! What good would that do?! That would just-"

"If you killed me you would be Shibuya's composer instead," Joshua interrupted, "If it's you, I don't think I'd mind dying."

"I'm not going to kill you! Why would I even want to be the composer after everything that's happened?" Neku replied, unable to stop himself from raising his voice.

Neku didn't understand, what point would there be? How would it be a help in any way for Neku to become the composer of Shibuya? Even if Joshua had been the one who'd killed him, even if it were for such a terrible reason as to fight the person who wanted to save Shibuya from destruction, but he'd never wanted revenge... Neku didn't want to kill Joshua.

"I know you don't want to. Don't you get it? That's why it should be you," Joshua responded, his expression was strange, he didn't seem like the same cocky kid who'd dragged him all around Shibuya and ultimately managed to turn his life around, he seemed worried and that worried Neku. It was obvious that Joshua was hiding something, "Just think about it okay...?"

"Yeah okay..." Neku said without much conviction, yawning again he added, "We can talk more in the morning."

"If you say so Neku," Joshua replied, Neku could tell he knew he had no intention of ever considering killing him, but he just casually went about getting himself into a more comfortable position to sleep on the couch.

Neku muttered 'goodnight' under his breath and went on to his room, he didn't ever bother to change into pajamas and just flopped onto his bed.