Chapter Text
London was made of rubble. A dark sky above threatened rain but none fell. Not even nature wanted to touch the silent ruins. Nothing moved, nothing shifted, nothing breathed. There was no life among the stone and twisted metal. From the sky, ash drifted down.
A man appeared from nothing. He glanced around at the destruction, shaking his head as he stepped forward. Gravel crunched beneath his polished shoes as he walked down a wide road, avoiding the gaping holes that went much too far down, and the red streams that flowed like rivers through the cracked cement.
“I assume negotiations fell through,” the man said, stopping before another, far younger man. A wry smile flitted across the young man’s face.
“An understatement.”
“So I see,” the older man said looking around unimpressed.
“I tried, I really- they just wouldn’t- and then-” the young man’s face fell into his red stained hands, the words not coming to him. For a moment, the older man wondered if his words, like nature herself, were also afraid of him.
“I know,” he said, crouching down, his suit tails falling into a puddle of red without notice. “It was what needed to be done, a finale for your past. You can move on now.” Perhaps his words were not reassuring like he intended but they had the desired effect. The younger man looked up at him, a cautious look on his face so different from the confident and all together innocent expressions he once wore.
“The peaceful place you spoke of before...this,” he asked gesturing toward everything within eyesight.
“Peaceful only if you let it be. But yes,”
“Let it be?”
“Don’t play, you know exactly what I mean. No more raids, no more hunting, no more blood, no more death.”
“That’s funny coming from you.”
“I do what I have to, you do not have to do any of this.”
“No, old habits might be hard to stop though,” the young man looked up at him once again and the older man sighed at the pain so evident in his eyes. The way all his ghosts haunted him, even if he could no longer summon them. How he wished this wasn’t his friend’s fate, he’d never intended it to be, but reckless hatred could turn any down a road none should follow. Placing a bony hand on his shoulder, the old man smiled warmly at him.
“I am at your beck and call, to aid and assist however you wish, as I have always been since we met.”
“Thank you Death,” the younger man said a real smile on his dirtied, bloodied face. “I’ll be staying in this new place for a while won’t I?”
“If you allow it yes,”
“Then I guess I’ll need a new name.”
“It might be a bit strange to keep the name of a rather old pure-blood family. They keep meticulous records and would look at you with more...scrutiny I suppose. What would you like to be called?” Death asked, his friend looking up at the sky as he thought. With a quick flick the young man pulled out his wand, catching a piece of falling ash on the tip.
“Ash, my name will be Ash.”
“Do you not think it would be wiser to not keep a daily reminder of this-” Death waved his arms around “destruction and the memories it contains?”
“It’s not Ash for this city, it’s for the Ash of a Phoenix before it is reborn,” Ash smiled and Death grinned back.
“Then Ash, let us go,” Death held out a hand and helped Ash up from the bloody ground.
“To peace,” Ash said holding up an imaginary goblet.
“To peace,” Death agreed as the two left behind the broken streets of London and disappeared from that reality entirely.