Nothing is as new as something which as been long forgotten.

- german proverb -

--

"Nny...You appear troubled. I know you feel. Care to divulge an elaboration on these feelings."

"No."

A tall, thin man with dark eyes turned his head away a glare set on his face in attempt to cover any vulnerable feelings. He hated a lot of things, but mostly he hated expressing himself through words. Nothing could justify anything, he couldn't for the life of him communicate the thoughts in his head or the emotions that passed over him.

"I don't want to talk about it Meat." He muttered moving toward a corner. At times like this he missed Bunny, some days he could distantly hear Bunny saying something, anything. But it wasn't often and that damned rabbit's head was the only thing he felt okay telling everything to.

"There's no one else here Johnny. Might as well tell it to me." The plastic Bub's burger boy smiled its malicious looking grin, a contradiction to his now benevolent state. "Who else is gonna know?"

"I'll know. And I hate you as I hate all the voices." Johnny seethed stuffing his hands into his pockets, trying desperately to rein himself in before he lost control. A battle he often lost.

Grinning the figure spoke without making a movement. "Well if you won't talk to me, what about that girl you love, I'm sure she'll listen. Oh wait, she won't, no one will listen to you. Nobody but me Johnny C. don't you understand? Now what was that girl's name? Devi?"

"Shut up! Shut up! SHUT UP!" Nny screamed grabbing at his hair and pulling frenetically. "I don't want to remember, Fuck this shit is all excess! I don't need to remember! Not Devi, not Bunny, not anything I've ever experienced in my life!! Nothing good nothing bad, I don't need memories, I don't want memories! FUCK!"

Reverend Meat stared at him. "Memories? What do you remember?"

Nny collapsed into the corner holding his head and hiding his face. "I don't want to. I don't want to remember my past; I've never really wanted to know. Fuck...if I'm this way now why would I ever want to know how I got this way." He whimpered. "Feelings of acceptance and of abandonment...I don't want to relive them."

"You're remembering yourself. What do you remember?"

Johnny turned a darkened glare at Meat. "High school."

At eighteen years old Johnny C was a tall young man with an unhealthy thin frame, he'd always been so unnaturally thin his entire high school year. He was in his senior year and preparing to graduate, unlike most of his peers he didn't know what he wanted.

Johnny was at the most six foot three and was quite intimidating, people stared and often made snide comments that they didn't think he could hear. He always heard them.

"Just a black coffee." The boy requested to the lackadaisical cashier at the coffee shop. The sixteen year old nodded and turned his back to make the coffee, slowly.

"Oh my God Steph stop staring." A perky skinny brunette chided her rather corpulent friend.

"Mmph?" The blond girl continued her entranced gaze, trained solely on the tall thin boy waiting for his coffee, much to her friend's disgust.

"Um ew, you still have a thing for him? Him?! Oh my God Steph intervention time, seriously. Like ugh how can you even like him? Ugh Noodle Boy? He's so..so...freaky!"

"I think he's just different." Steph interjected calmly her gaze never lifting.

"Different? More like crazy! I heard he killed his parents and ate his sister!" The girl shrieked.

"He never had a sister."

"That's because he ate her!" She replied. "God Steph, stop, you're mistreating yourself...he might just be gay too. Like Kevin said so, and you know a quarterback usually knows these things. Besides he's so freakish, probably insane." The brunette stated tossing her long hair over her shoulder.

Steph shook her head. "Brooke you're not being fair. We don't know him...maybe we should give him a chance."

Brooke crinkled her nose and then straightened her short pink skirt out. "No thanks, I'd rather keep all my limbs."

Johnny's anger set in and he turned a malicious grin on the girls, he was aware that the blonde one was staring at him lustfully, but his hatred wasn't aimed at her. The brunette who called herself Brooke let out a squeak. The cashier set the coffee on the counter and Johnny snatched it and dropped the necessary money on the table.

He then briskly made an obvious effort to leave the way by passing their table.

"Brooke huh?" He inquired in a dark voice that served as his daily tone. "Funny I only came here in favor of a little caffeine; I wasn't expecting to be a conversation item." He glanced at Steph and raised an eyebrow, then turned back spitefully at the brunette at hand.

"Brooke is it? Fitting." He announced. "Seeing as you sure as fuck babble like one. Here's a tip sweetheart, you want to keep those pretty limbs then shut your mouth." With that he walked away leaving the small coffee shop and his aggravation in a hurry.

Johnny hated making threats, mostly because he'd never actually hurt anyone in his life, he hated that image. People already thought he was a killer and he knew he only fed the beast by caving under their accusations. Sure he thought about killing these people and in terrible ways, but honestly what high schooler hasn't?

No Johnny didn't care much in the way for executing violence against other people. Although as the years passed, his hope that these people would redeem themselves seemed to slip farther away. But there were two people he knew that were worthy of being called humans and they were friends.

He liked that word in everyway, for a while he didn't understand it, much like he didn't understand family. But Ada and Mike were good friends of his even though he often told them he wasn't sure he was their friend. They'd always reassure him.

They were older than him, Mike was twenty and Ada nineteen, turning twenty in three months. As Johnny approached the Tattoo Pit he began to smile. It was strange how such good things could transpire from the dankest places in the city, the Tattoo Pit was putrid but that was where he met his friends.

Johnny regarded Ada as perfect in nearly every sense of the word, she always disregarded this was a quick 'I'm a horrible person, what are you talking about?' followed with a laugh. He knew she was serious when she told him that, but he couldn't help but continue to think she was perfect.

He enjoyed talking with her, she was intelligent with an intriguing philosophy about just about everything. Johnny entered the shop and saw Aubrey a dark-skinned girl boredly flipping through a magazine, she flashed Jonny a half smile and pointed to the back room.

He continued onward and went through the red curtain and saw Ada hunched over a sketch pad vigorously drawing. "Sit Nny...talk in a minute." She announced without ever looking up.

Nny he loved that nick-name, he didn't know where he came up with it or if he even did. All he knew was when she asked if she could call him John he declined and asked for Nny, which she loved even more.

He watched her, her pale skinny arm darting back and forth leading her thin hand that clutched the pencil. Her messy black and orange hair fell all around her head, she had it cut very short and very choppy, it was interesting when she spiked it. She wore long black boots over her dirty gray jeans and she wore a very tired looking black mid-drift tank top.

She almost always had some sort of gray or black shadow of makeup covering her eyes, mostly to hide the fact that she got such poor sleep and was a very tired and worn person for someone her age. Some days she'd have red lipstick other days she'd pass. Her skin was and had always been very pale, she joked that even if she tried to tan she'd probably just bleach.

"Ada...?"

"One moment Nny, please."

God he loved her voice, it was so different, it was like taking sugar and rubbing it between your fingers, grainy but sweet. He knew he had thoughts about her he shouldn't, they were friends and she was with Mike. But as much as he liked Mike he always felt that pang of jealousy whenever they were in close proximity. It was stinging, some days worse than others.

He knew Mike was working and would be for sometime, that guy never got a break, he needed to though and he was pretty prominent about that fact. He and Ada just barely got by every month so the more they each worked the better. He knew they'd go some days without eating, it was apparent especially in her. She was very thin, in a malnourished way, but then who was he to talk about nutrition and body mass, he wasn't all that healthy looking either.

"Alright what do you think?" She exclaimed holding the sketch book up to reveal an odd drawing.

"Terrifying."

She pouted. "You don't like it?"

"No, no it's not that." He shook his hands. "I mean it's terrifying but that's what you're trying to interpret, right?" She nodded smiling. "I really like it. Where do you come up for things like these?"

"You know as well as I do that you don't really like hearing where some of my inspiration comes from. Besides, you of all people should know that some twisted stuff can come out of the nicest people." She added.

Johnny smiled slightly. "Aw you're not talking about me, are you?"

She laughed. "You know I am, I adore your paintings, and they're so creative. Some of them scare the shit out of me and I love it."

"You should paint that." He suggested pointing to the sketch. "With a little color I'm sure that would really express the tone or even with deeper shades of grays, blacks, and whites."

"Oh Nny, you know I can't paint with anything but needles. That's sort of your thing anyway. I'm gonna put it on display though and see if anyone is brave enough to have it as a tat. Speaking of which you ever gonna get one?"

Nny shook his head and brought his knees up to his chin. "Nah, I admire your work, but I don't think I'd handle a tattoo well." He decided to end that there, not willing to disclose any of his thoughts that were now running rampant around his head.

A bell ringing echoed into the room they were in. "Ada!" Aubrey called.

"Hmm a customer? This early...aw well work is work. I'll see you Nny." She said he got the hint that she was resenting working.

"That's okay, I've got to study." He announced standing upright and grabbing his coffee from the floor.

She paused at the curtain and gave him a look. "Since when do you study?"

He smiled. "Never, but it makes for a good excuse, doesn't it?"

Yeah first time writing for this fandom, but I'm not at all new to the comic or any other Vasquez's stuff, it's rated M mostly because...damn you little children shouldn't really be reading this shit. And I own nothing this is to fill the void in my pathetic life not for profit blah blah blah. So with that enjoy.