Ohello. Just so you know, as of this moment, you're reading a slash story. If it isn't your cup of tea, acquire a taste, or go away {:

nny/squee ship being sailed. set 8 years after the comics. obviously nny and squee are going to be slightly OC, but! i see it as them being in character, just developed in different ways. oh, and for my benefit, i have squee as 18 and nny as 28. okay(:

DISCLAIMER: i do not own JTHM or Bright Eyes (and if anyone wants to know the songs i use in this, just review {: )

"…But I do what I do and at least I exist, what could mean more than this? What could mean more, mean more?" Music swelled in the buds of Johnny's ears, the voice of one Conor Oberst louder than the traffic on the street. Years ago, Nny would have laughed at the line of this song and had thoughts of how the singer wouldn't exist for much longer. Since that time, however, he'd grown, evolved, become someone almost entirely new.

Johnny hadn't been restored in sanity by any means, though. He might have learned to find enjoyment in the music of Conor Oberst and his strange creative force, but he still never found anything pleasing about the vile flesh force that was humanity. To this day, he would meticulously destroy those he thought really deserved it, but he no longer wasted his time on the minor details. He would spare the lives of the ones who weren't worth his time, even though they would probably be better off dead anyway.

Still, changes hovered around him. He blended into each day, whether he had a fitful sleep or not and with hardly any urges to kill. Nny spent more and more time painting and drawing; he didn't hear a single voice in his head. Not once. When he felt like killing someone, he carefully thought about it. It'd come to a milestone where he began separating people in terms of "worth the time" and "cutting too much into watching TV"; it worked for him. No one would find him, anyway.

Nny moved around a lot, now, too. Quite often, people he would occasionally spend time with would develop affections, or require too much attention from him. He hadn't been successful in becoming the emotionless being he been aiming for, but he could cut strings without a second thought. Like his distaste for sleep, he had better things to do than entertain people.

So that's what he was doing now, one hand holding an iPod he'd taken from a victim ages ago, the other holding a bag full of all his clothes. His car had long since been run down to the point of uselessness, and he found it easier to just rely on public transportation to get places. He hardly ever massacred all the passengers anymore, so it was an acceptable compromise to the freedom of solitude.

Croaking along, unheard by Nny, a bus pulled up to the designated stop, doors wooshing open for the dark-clad man. Nny's lip curled in aversion to the unappealing contraption, but ascended on and took a seat near the front, which was empty. The back was full of teenagers, presumably talking about bad music. Why did people always sit at the back of the bus? Johnny didn't understand that. It only made their trek away from the revolting place longer.

A clean, piano driven song came on Nny's shuffle, a raw voice singing about how existing for the next ten minutes would be fine. Nny tapped his leather boot to the beat and wondered briefly how the singer felt now. Would he still be fine with that?

Someone took the empty seat next to him, and Johnny felt himself edge away in revulsion, clutching his bag on his lap a little tighter. He hoped the person was observant enough to see that he had earphones in. He hated it when people tried to talk to him and he was forced to ignore them and the seemingly soundless shifting of their mouths. To save his peripheral vision from such a fate, he turned his head completely and stared at the monotone world fizzing by.

"I want a slurpee," he thought. Johnny cast a look at his iPod as a new song came on. "A Line Allows Progress, a Circle Does Not." The name made a hysterical kind of laughter build in his chest, and he felt a small one escape his lips. There he sat, on the way back to the town he'd left a murderous mark on. If the title was so correct, what the fuck was he doing?

X

A school bell clanged loudly, releasing rooms full of joyful students, including one Todd Casil. His feet walked slowly compared to the rampage around him. It was the last day of school for the year, and the last day of high school for Todd. He felt a small shimmer of success; he'd made it through senior year.

Sometimes it amazed him that he really had gotten this far. For the past eight years he'd been living with his cousin, Jill. She'd visited him on a day almost blurry to him now and taken him away. He couldn't recall details; all he could remember was the feeling of care when she picked him up and held him unlike anyone had ever done before. She had gone to visit his mother, who was dying from some sickness he couldn't remember, and had found him crying. He couldn't remember why he'd been crying either, but sometimes had vivid flashbacks of a man dressed in black with a sinister smile.

In fact, that was about the most vibrant memory of his childhood, until Jill came. His neighbor. Todd knew that he'd had a neighbor, remembered his face and his name; he just couldn't remember what happened to him. Upon seeing his old house, Todd knew Nny had moved, but didn't remember that ever happening and hadn't seen him since. So he had to have moved, right?

Todd thought about Nny sometimes, but not a lot. When he did, though, Todd always thought about how Nny was the first person who had ever cared about him enough to worry. Nny definitely had been there for him, and Todd knew it, but when he tried to reflect on it, he just remembered the scene of ripping flesh and then running. It went black after that. Todd just figured it didn't matter anymore.

Someone pushed him out of the way in a struggle to be free from the building, and Todd sighed under his breath, lacking the motivation to get angry about it. He would get out of the school when he did, the walls weren't holding him back anymore than anyone else. Jill was probably waiting out front for him, too, a big grin plastered on her face. The thought made him smile.

Jill had been better to him than anyone he'd ever known. She supported everything about him, and helped him through many battles. She'd been the perfect mom in every sense. She threw him birthday parties, spent afternoons tromping through the snow with him during winter, made hot cocoa for them and baked cookies for Santa on Christmas, and even helped him build a tree house when he was younger. To this day, he and his friends still went up there occasionally.

Even as Todd became an angsty adolescent, she still lavished him with love. She helped him with his homework, urged him to get good grades, and helped him pursue his goals. Most of all, she accepted his homosexuality and acted the way any mom would with her son's girlfriends when Todd brought a new boy home. She was just as overprotective, too, and almost killed Todd with embarrassment when they had "the talk."

Todd pushed through a heavy school door, once again questioning why they were so heavy. Really, what did it accomplish? What was wrong with a normally proportioned door? Sunlight hit his face and he put a hand up to shield his eyes, spotting Jill instantly, leaning against her car with that grin on her face, looking like she wanted to run to hug him, but knowing he would be slightly mortified at that.

He grinned back and walked over to her, adjusting the straps of his now-empty backpack and opened his mouth to greet her as she clapped and congratulated him. Todd was used to her making everything a big deal, but it made him feel so accomplished when she did, so he accepted it.

"How's it feel to be a graduate, Todd?" she asked him, the pride of a parent in her eyes. In one hand she held an envelope, and with the other she gave Todd a short half hug, which seemed to promise a much bigger hug when they got home.

"Victorious," he answered, breaking the embrace so the two of them could get in the car as she handed him the envelope. He didn't bother questioning its contents. Jill loved the mystery of a surprise and would never tell him.

"I'm so proud of you! Now open your present!" she squealed, almost bouncing in her seat as she drove in the direction of their home.

Todd looked at the envelope and turned it over in his hands for a few moments, then put it in his bag. "I will, but after the party. I want the full weight of this day to settle in."

Somehow, it didn't feel like the biggest part of the day had happened. Todd felt like he was still anticipating something, but he just couldn't figure out what.

hurray for chapter one! review, perhaps? :D