I... have no idea what this is. I was thinking of a sequel to Maybe Possible and Forever Tomorrow, and... somehow this happened. This is not complete, there will be more, but I honestly don't have a clue; all I know is that what I was writing was getting far too long for a oneshot, so I found the best point I could and split off a first chapter.

On that note though, since this will end up turning into something and I'm not sure what yet, what's everyone want to see? This did develop as a Maybe Possible and Forever Tomorrow sequel, so while it seems to be a bit of a different style, it is most likely staying in that continuity; not that that affects a whole lot. I am pretty open to suggestions though, so if you'd like to see something mention it; I can't promise I'll include it but I'll see what I can do. (Also, if you want to send me a PM, you can; they got disabled somehow but they're reenabled now.)

I don't know when this will be updated, but it will be eventually. I'm being forced to have an actual schedule now, so I should be more productive than I have been recently-sorry for the disappearance, on that note.

So. Matt, Mello, and now even I don't know where this is going. Enjoy!

Ashes, Two Ashes

When the Mafia hideout blew up, Matt sighed, pulled out a cigarette, smoked it, fondly and thoroughly cursed Mello out, and went to go rescue his best friend from death, the police, or zombies, whichever happened to be present.

He'd told Mello that Resident Evil wasn't wasting time. He just wondered whether he could get away with an "I told you so" or not.

Probably not.

Matt hadn't quite understood why amateur writers seemed to be so fond of the term "fond exasperation," but then once Mello had come back, he'd found he couldn't think of anything better to describe his opinion on Mello either.

Of course, he never claimed to be a writer. His job was with computers, thank you very much; he'd leave language to Mello-the-somehow-persuasive (seriously, precisely how could "fuck you" and "moron, get outta here before you fuck something up even worse that you normally do" be that persuasive?) and people who had the time to waste on recording every detail of their and several hundred other peoples' lives over and over until they convinced people they were good at it.

Still, though. Terminology seemed pretty irrelevant when Matt parked his car a few blocks away from Mello's hideout, jogged the rest of the way to it (which, dammit, was about as fast as he could go, at least without assistance in the form of vehicles or a pursuing, pissed-off Mello), and saw the disguised hideout in absolute ruins.

It hadn't looked nearly that bad on his computer. Matt was torn between panicking, and noting that he needed a better screen. Mello would probably hit him for the screen. Especially if he'd already used up an "I told you so," and he really wanted to use that.

...Not that he could see any zombies, but still. They were probably just hiding.

Unfortunately, the Japanese police were still there, looking through the rubble for their own people in a significantly more panicked manner than Matt would have expected from a professional group. And, unprofessional and foreign or not, they were probably perfectly able to arrest him and Mello if they felt like it.

Which, really, after having a building blown up on them, most people probably would.

Well, damn. Now he had to decide between getting Mello out quickly, and probably getting them both arrested but alive, and waiting for them to leave, in which case Mello would be less likely to be arrested, but more likely to die.

...Personally, Matt would go with arrested-but-alive. Mello, on the other hand, would probably pick dead-but-unarrested.

Idiot.

But Matt didn't really want to deal with a pissed off Mello, who would probably be just as dangerous when pissed off and injured as when pissed off and drunk, and possibly more easily pissed off as well. Plus, the police seemed to be finishing their search, and no matter how much of an idiot Mello could be, Matt believed he was at least smart enough to blow the building up in a way that wouldn't get him killed. Immediately.

On the other hand... Maybe...

Matt backed up a bit, pulled out a cigarette, smoked half of it, then strode around the corner, aimed as if at a nearby apartment building that he dearly hoped wasn't as abandoned as it looked. He "saw" the destruction, did a double take, dropped the cigarette and jogged over. "What happened? Do you need help? Sorry stupid question. What can I do?"

A strawberry-haired man looked up from sitting next to one of the bodies laid out with a distressed expression, and walked over. "We really don't want to bother you, thank you for the offer though. We don't expect to find anyone else alive, unfortunately, so we're just digging out bodies now."

"There might be someone!" The switch to Japanese was a bit of a shock to Matt's ears, but not so much he couldn't understand it as the youngest man, other than the one he was currently talking to, bounced over. It did help with the confused expression, though. "We need to look, at least!"

The strawberry head (and seriously, since when had Japan had redheads? Matt was going to make Mello take back everything he said about anime hair colors being unrealistic) sighed. "Matsuda-san, everyone but the blond was already dead before he blew up the building, and at this point it's highly unlikely that he's still alive either."

Okay, that was concerning. Matt shifted his confused expression back to Strawberry, and reminded himself that butting in to ask about what they'd said in a language he was pretending not to know would be suspicious enough even if he wasn't demanding information on a criminal. That probably ought to worry me.

"But we should at least look," the older youngest man repeated.

"Erm, excuse me...?" Matt cut in before Strawberry could say anything.

Strawberry turned back to Matt. "Ah. I apologize." He ran a hand through his hair. "Well, if you would like to help us search for bodies, it would be appreciated, but we don't really expect to find anyone alive."

Matt shook his head. "Damn. Well, oughta try at least, right? What should I do?"

"I'll show you!" Older Youngest was beginning to give Matt a clue of just why Mello forbid him from having chocolate. He followed Older Youngest as the man led him the short distance to the no-longer-smoking ruins, and helped shift stone, metal and bits of once-valuable furnishings out of the way. He helped find a few bodies, which were laid out with the others, only one of which-the one Strawberry was hovering over-was alive.

Matt refrained from commenting on how many seemed to have died from bullets before the building fell on them.

Older Youngest turned out to be named Matsuda, and babbled at Matt most of the time they were searching. Matt answered as well as he could; yes he was on his way home, no he didn't need to be anywhere, his work wasn't really important, well if you have to know he works at a fast food place, no it's not worth going to try, he really likes that local pizza place on Fourth Avenue better, sure go try it if you have time, he like pineapple with pepperoni normally but at that place the cheese is really the best, and pretty cheap too.

An ambulance arrived, along with police and rescue workers and probably other people, and the Japanese police left with a few of the police and the not-dead body to the hospital. He helped the rescue workers and remaining American police continue digging into the evening, finding more bodies-Matt pretended very, very hard that he didn't recognize any of them-and then finding that the digging was done and all the bodies were found and Mello was not there.

Well... shit.

Matt hung out just long enough to be dismissed by the rescue workers, give the police a phone number in case they needed any more information than he'd given when they pulled him away from digging through the rubble to get a statement, or because they'd noticed him coughing and waving it off as being from the dust, made sure it was in bad handwriting, not one he'd given out before, and not one that went to anywhere near where he lived or went. He then walked quickly back to his car, got in, and tried to figure out what the hell to do.

Going back to the apartment sounded good.

Mello wasn't there either.

Matt nearly hit himself when he realized he hadn't even tried calling Mello's cell phone. When Mello didn't answer, he hit the wall with his phone, swore for a few more minutes, and went to drive around the city in search of a reckless, dumbass, possibly half dead blond in leather.

Why was Matt even exasperatedly fond of Mello, again?

Oh, I almost forgot. Does anyone know approximately how long it was between Mello's blowing up the Mafia hideout and Mello kidnapping Takada? I'm sure I can look it all up, but I figured there'd be no harm in attempting the lazy route first.

Also, I have two story ideas; one new and one... erm, not new, but persistent. They're both in my profile near the bottom, so if anyone's curious, feel free to look and share any opinions.