Two Little Boys by Soryteller

Two Little Boys is sung by Rolf Harris and is copyrighted to him.

 

Two little boys had two little toys

Each had a wooden horse

Gaily they played each summer's day

Warriors both of course

One little chap then had a mishap

He broke off his horse's head

Went for his toy then cried with joy

As his young playmate said

Did you think I would leave you crying?

When there's room on my horse for two

Climb up here, Jack, and don't be crying

I can go just as fast with two

When we grow up we'll both be soldiers

And our horses will not be toys

And I wonder if we'll remember

When we were two little boys

The small little blond youth stared around in fascination. He'd never been to a circus before and the Bright Stars Circus was a whole new world awaiting his discovery. He peered around eagerly, absorbing every facet of the sensations that assaulted him from everywhere.

"Master Quatre! Matte!"

He didn't bother to wait for stupid slow servants. There were too many things to divert his attention and make him forget about his father. He dashed through the bodies clustering around him, heedless about the poor servants trying to catch up with him. All the better if they get lost, he decided with a slight sneer.

"Master Quatre! Chotto matte!" the servant shouted in alarm. Barely had his back turned when the little child escaped his grasp and melted into the crowds. He glanced at his companion who searched around frantically.

"Don't just stand there! Look for him!" his companion snapped.

"Hai!"

***

"Veritechs! Fly one today! 10 tokens per child." [1]

The blond hair-tousled boy looked up to read the brightly colored sign. He could read it and understood it well enough, something which would probably surprise his father very much, he thought rather bitterly. All his teachers ever say was that he was a sweet child but hardly ever applied himself to studies. If only they really knew....

Quatre dug in his pockets and withdrew the small round tokens the servant had handed him before he had run away. He carefully counted out ten pieces and counted it again to be sure. Standing guard over the machines was a very large dark-skinned man with a sneer on his face as he watched the young child amble over.

Steeling his instinctive flinch from the man that his heart insisted was bad, Quatre pointed at the robots then held out the tokens. The man sneered again and he caught a thread of his thought, "Easy game!"

"Ya can't go in, sonny," the man said casually. "Ya need an adult or 'nother guy to follow ya in."

Quatre glanced suspiciously at the man. He didn't trust him at all, not when every hair on him was raised in protest. But he did so want to play the Veritechs. He stared at the tokens in his hand, trying to make a decision.

"If ya give me twenty more of them shinies, I'll go in with ya," the man continued, a strange gleam in his eyes. Quatre shook his head. There was no way at all he'd go in with the man. He looked around the crowds in desperation, hoping that maybe he could ask someone else to follow him in.

His eyes alighted on another boy, just slightly taller than him with side-swept brown hair and shining green eyes, standing beside an ice-cream stall. He wore on old black tanktop and an equally old worn pair of trousers. His features were all the more eye-catching for it presented a vast contrast to the merry laughter and smiles around him. Sullen eyes scanned the crowd while an impassive mask warded off people and kept a small radius of cleared area around him. Perfect! He ran over to him and smiled.

"Hello," he greeted shyly. The boy barely spared him a glance. Unperturbed by the brush-off, Quatre continued on. "I want to play the Veritechs," and he pointed, "But I need someone to follow me in or the man won't let me play.

"Go away," the boy said softly. Quatre turned bewildered eyes on him.

"Are you busy or something? You're just standing here," he told, with all the straight-forwardness of a child. "Come and play with me, please."

The other boy finally turned to gaze at him. "I don't want to play. Leave me alone."

He may only be a child still, and a lonely at that, but Quatre knew when a silent plead for help and friendship was issued. The boy did want to play too, but he was holding back for fear of something. "My name is Quatre," the blond boy held out his hand. "I won't hurt you. Please, come and play with me."

The boy stared at the hand as if it was both lifeline and vicious cobra. Hesitation rocked him and it was plain he did not know what to do. "I..I can't. I'm suppose to stay here. I have to stay here."

"Just for awhile? Please? One game can hardly hurt much," Quatre wheedled, opening his eyes wide and letting his need show in it. The boy reached out and almost touched him when he drew back again.

"But...I can't pay for it...I don't have any tokens..."

Quatre took that as a yes. He grabbed the other boy's hand and smiled. "I got more than enough! Come one, let's play!"

And so he dragged the other boy back to the Veritechs, where the sour looking man glared at them. Quatre held out the tokens again but the man shook his head.

"Thirty more fer the other kiddo," he said flatly. Then a malicious grin crossed his face. "But if ya kick him away and let me follow ya, ya only have ta pay fifteen shinies."

A frown crossed the small Arabian child's face. "I'm going in with him, not you." Quatre dug in his pockets for more tokens, very sure he'd have more than enough. But a slim strong hand stopped him and he turned to see the other boy glare at the man.

"Twenty tokens for the both of us, no more no less," he said grimly. "And you stay away from us."

The man grew angry and frowned until furrow-like hills creased his forehead. "None of yer business, kiddo," he snarled. The boy reacted so fast that it took Quatre one long moment to realize that he had somehow drawn a small gun from somewhere and was aiming it right at the man, who shook visibly and trembled. But the boy had stepped much closer to the man so no one else in the crowds around them realized that something was amissed.

"Twenty tokens," the boy repeated.

"Twenty tokens!" the man agreed, shaking his head up and down rapidly.

"And you leave us alone."

"I ain't gonna touch no hair on you!" the man agreed, sweating heavily. The boy backed away slightly but still trained the gun on him. Quatre stepped forward and carefully placed the tokens in the man's pouch, since he did not seem capable of moving his hands from his crotch to accept the tokens. Interestingly enough, that was exactly where the boy was pointing the gun....

"Come on, let's go," the boy hid the gun in one smooth motion. Quatre nodded and apologized once to the cowering man before going after the boy who waited patiently some steps away.

"This one!" Quatre cried, pulling the unresisting boy to a Veritech painted white with yellow and black highlights and had a grinning skull painted on the side. He started going into the pilot's seat when he paused and looked back.

"Gunner or pilot?" he asked him. The boy's gaze went from the pilot's seat to the gunner's, obviously stuck between choices.

"Gunner," the boy replied finally and climbed into the co-pilot's seat. Quatre nodded and resumed his climb into the pilot's seat. Inside, on the old leather seat, a white and blue helmet rested with wires trailing from it into various ports inside the cockpit.

"Ready?" he asked as he squirmed around his seat to face the back. The other boy nodded and buckled himself in then slipped on a gray and black helmet.

Quatre hurriedly repeated the same process himself then pressed the button labeled with 'Start'. When he pulled the visor down a wash of white and blacks spots danced before his eyes before suddenly solidifying into a scene of a hanger bay. The masterful application of virtual reality to games, Quatre smiled.

He twisted back again and saw a grown-up version of the boy giving him the thumbs up sign. Same green eyes but seeming older and wiser, a more mature face without the baby fat that it had now and the same hairstyle he found fascinating was retained. He was dressed in a black with red striped flightsuit and looking back down on himself, he saw that he was clad in a white with golden highlights flightsuit.

Quatre grinned and turned back to his controls. Let the game begin! he exulted.

***

"We did it!" he laughed in delight. Together they had scored the highest points in the game and downed the biggest number of enemy crafts. He slung a friendly arm over the boy's shoulders and grinned at him. The boy smiled back slightly, a vast improvement from when they first met and he barely twitched a facial muscle.

"Come, I'm hungry!" Quatre dragged him away from the Veritechs and to a stall that sold hot pieces of chicken on a stick. The boy shyly accepted the treat of one stick and munched on it with evident enjoyment.

"Have you ridden a ferris wheel before?" Quatre asked once they had finished licking their fingers clean of crumbs and taste. The other boy, whose name he yet did not know and had not yet been volunteered, shook his head in the negative. Quatre grinned again and grabbed the boy's arm.

***

Two long hours later, two tired but very happy boys collapsed down with twin sighs of relief. Two whole hours of rides and snacks bore a deadly toll of laughter and fun and tokens. Quatre had started out feeling very heavy with the weight of all the tokens but now that it was all spent, he felt very much lighter, not to mention happier.

"Look! A shooting star!"

The other boy glanced up and watched it dance across the sky in a swift stately measure. "Make a wish and it'll come true," Quatre urged him with a smile. The other boy turned his head to set unreadable eyes on him.

"Will it really come true? Honto?"

"It will, if it's made with your heart," Quatre promised. The boy turned back to the star then closed his eyes, evidently making his wish. Quatre would love to make a wish too, but he didn't want the star to be too burdened and possibly forget the other boy's wish. Not when it seemed that he needed it much more.

So he waited politely for him to finish and when the boy raised his head again, he asked him a question. "Do you live around here?"

"No," he shook his head, staring rather wistfully at the bright and lively circus ground below them, an impressive view from the top of the hill where they were. "I live with..." he hesitated and closed his eyes.

"With?" Quatre prompted gently.

"Some other people," he continued hesitantly. "We travel a lot."

"Oh! You mean like gypsies?" the small blond boy exclaimed.

"Something like that," he hedged. Quatre smiled sadly and lay back down to look at the stars.

"That must be nice," he murmured. "To be with people who love you. My father hates me."

"No," the boy said forcefully. "Don't think that. You are his son. He loves you!" The brown-haired youth shook his head wearily. "I don't have any father. The ones I live with don't love me."

It was by far the longest piece of conversation he had said so far and now he lapsed into silence. Quatre didn't know how to respond to that and kept quiet as well. He enjoyed being able to simply sit there with him as a companion and friend.

"Nanashi!" the voice that snarled that was full of anger and violence. Quatre spun around in surprise, absently noting his friend flinching back from the harsh tones.

"You were not at your guardpost!" a tall man with a scar disfiguring his face stomped into view. Behind the man was a shorter but no less uglier man who seemed to have an evil sneer permanently displayed. "You have some things to answer for, Nanashi."

Nanashi? No name? Was that the boy's name? He couldn't have been born with that, Quatre thought, aghast. No parents would ever be that cruel to name their child so!

"Nanashi," the man snarled again. "Come here at once! Who is he?"

Quatre realized the menacing man was pointing at him. His friend, Nanashi had slowly stepped out closer to the man, his attitude and slouch somehow reminding the Arabian child of a man walking reluctantly to his death.

"Well?" the man was asking impatiently when no answer was forthcoming.

"He is a friend," Nanashi replied carefully. "A person of no consequences."

"Wait, he looks familiar," the man suddenly reached out and pulled Quatre closer. Quatre tried to breathe through the chokehold on his collar and the man's breath that smelt heavily of alcohol and something that was just plain smelly. Behind him the shorter man was chuckling in delight.

"Don't I know you, little brat?" the man scrutinized him closely. Quatre's heart beat with fear.

"Leave him alone, Rhiyo," Nanashi said uncaringly with a shrug. Quatre turned shocked eyes at him. "He's useless. I'm going back to the base."

Rhiyo moved as if he was going to release the youth but suddenly tightened his grip. "Why, Nanashi," he practically purred. "Since this little morsel is of no consequence, no one will miss him, right? I'm feeling rather lonely tonight, little one. And I'm sure Kitsu is feeling lonesome too."

Rhiyo rubbed his cheek against Quatre's. Quatre froze, a feeling of dread and fear forming in his stomach. No, No, No, No, No, No, the boy thought, frozen. A large, rough hand carressed him from behind; Kitsu had crept up behind him and was touching him now.

"Be a good little boy and I'll give you a toy to play with," Rhiyo laughed lowly. "Or would you prefer some sweet syrup? I and Kitsu got both."

Behind Rhiyo, Nanashi was stock-still. He knew this scene all too well, having being an unwilling participant all too often. Run away, hide, while he's forgotten about you! a part of him whispered. But yet another part protested loudly. He couldn't let the same thing happen to Quatre, the sweet golden haired boy who made him laugh for the first time in years. He didn't want to see his cheerful face in the grimace it was in now, the tears that streaked his cheek and the wide eyes that no longer reflected joy and warmth.

"Get away!" Quatre finally gasped, pushing away Rhiyo's groping hands. "Leave me alone!" And he struggled in the bigger man's grasp. One of his flailing limbs struck Rhiyo squarely on his cheek, causing the man to drop Quatre in surprise. The Arabian youth fell to the ground heavily and gasped in shock. Kitsu growled menacingly and held him so tightly he couldn't squirm anymore.

"Why you little scamp!" Rhiyo snarled darkly. "I'm gonna teach you a lesson you won't forget!"

"No!" Nanashi cried, dashing forward. Rhiyo feinted towards Quatre but turned and captured Nanashi as the other boy moved to free the golden-haired boy.

"Gotcha!" Rhiyo grinned. He held Nanashi tightly, with a grip so skillful and tight that Quatre realized, with a sickening feeling, that he and Nanashi had been manipulated into a trap. Rhiyo could have made sure he hadn't fought free in the first place.

"Always wanted to get my hands on you," Rhiyo remarked to Nanashi. "But for some damned reason you keep getting away. Not tonight, however! You're mine tonight." His chuckle sent a deep dread down Quatre's spine. Nanashi had froze, not moving at all in his captor's grasp. If he hadn't known better, Nanashi might as well have been just a remarkably life-like doll in Rhiyo's hands.

"But first, Kitsu will have his fun with your nice little friend here. He's been working so hard lately, this is just the thing he needs," Rhiyo laughed, running his tongue slowly over Nanashi's face. Nanashi's eyes had become pools of glass again, like when they had first met. Dead, uncaring, detached, empty eyes.

Kitsu pushed him to the ground roughly. Quatre tried to break free again but still the short man held a greater strength against him. Large, rough hands tore his fine clothing apart. The faint touches of the cold night air touched him, as did the moist grasses and earth. Horror descended on the Arabian child.

Quatre fought twice as hard to break free. Kitsu, finally irritated by the child's futile attempts to break free, slapped him hard. Spots danced before his eyes as Quatre sobbed and his senses detached themselves. That hurt.

"Tomodachi! Help!" Quatre pleaded, weeping as Kitsu lowered himself on him and began touching him in a way that hurt. This couldn't be happening, the small child wept.

***

"Tomodachi! Help!"

The whispered plea broke through his paralysis where nothing else had broken through before. Quatre was in trouble. All because of him. If he had not accepted the boy's offer of a game and fun this would not have happened. He got Quatre into this, now he had to break him free.

Rhiyo was still holding him, but he had loosened his grip when he had shown no signs of resisting. Rhiyo was enjoying himself now, touching himself as he rubbed against him. He did not seem to mind that Nanashi wasn't moving at all.

Slowly, carefully, his free hand crept to the gun he kept hidden on his person. The gun had a history of its own, and had killed its own share of people. Rhiyo and Kitsu will be the next two notches on the gun barrel, he promised himself.

The ugly large man had lowered his head to nuzzle at his throat while his heavily callused hands moved to take his clothes off. Trowa fell limp, allowing Rhiyo to do as he wished while carefully, covertly, he brought the gun out and readied it. "That's it," Rhiyo murmured when Trowa's shirt was finally off.

"Yes, it is," Trowa agreed, brought the muzzle of the gun up and fired.

 ***

"Are you all right?" Quatre whispered. He took a shuddering breath and wiped his eyes with his torn dirtied sleeve. Nanashi was on his knees, clothes torn, arms folded limply over his lap. The blond child crept closer to his friend and avoided going near the two dead bodies. He touched him gently. "Tomodachi?"

Nanashi did not reply. Quatre bit his lower lip and slowly, gently freed the gun from his grasp. He placed the gun away and took Nanashi's cold hands in his. He clasped it tightly and rubbed it, trying to make it warm, and wished he could do something to snap his friend out of the state of shock he was in.

"Tomodachi, thank you," the Arabian boy said sincerely. "Thank you for saving my life."

"But I didn't," he whispered so softly that Quatre almost didn't catch it. Nanashi raised his head and once again the sight of the dead, empty eyes chilled Quatre. "I got you in trouble. I shouldn't have left my post."

Quatre scowled. "If the people who made you stand there were like them, then you had all the right to desert it."

Nanashi did not reply. The blond child shook his head and hesitantly moved closer. He brushed his lips over his friend's cheeks. "Thank you. Honto ni."

Nanashi wonderingly touched his cheek and stared at his friend. A small, glimmering tear grew and gathered at the corner of his eye, Quatre smiled and gently reached out to brush it away.

"Quatre-sama!!"

Two heads jerked up at the sound, one blond, one brown, the one moment of magic and trust destroyed. Quatre blinked and stood up. Coming up the hill were the two servants who had taken him to the fair earlier.

"No," Quatre cried, dismayed as he glared at them. "Never on time, always when I don't need them and not when I do."

Quatre quickly turned his pockets inside out, searching for something, anything that he might give to his friend as a token. Nanashi had slowly risen to his feet beside him and he was cleaning the gun with Kitsu's shirt.

"Quatre-sama!!"

His fingers closed around something small and smooth. Quatre brought it out and smiled to see the small blue stone flecked with shining quartz and streaks of silver and gold. The stone was a pendant, one of the few his cherished mother owned.

"For you!" Quatre smiled and thrust the stone out at the other boy, who could only stare at it. The two servants were closer; their shouts were getting louder. Quatre took Nanashi's limp and cold hand, pried the hand open and gently closed the fingers over the stone. "Remember me, tomodachi."

"For... me?" Nanashi stared at the closed hand and brought it up to inspect the stone.

"Quatre-sama!" the servants had reached the hilltop and stared agape at the dead bodies lying there. They took in the blood and the torn clothes of the two boys standing there and finally the gun prominently displayed in the brown-haired boy's pants. One of them came forward and jerked the blond child back. "Stay away from him, Quatre-sama!"

Quatre was scowling at the servants and struggling to free himself from their grasp, but this time both the servants staunchly ignored his fists and kicks. Nanashi stared at them leaving and listened to Quatre's voice arguing with the servants over his disappearance, growing weaker as the distance increased.

"But it's not my fault you can't keep up with me!"

"You shouldn't have wandered away from us, Quatre-sama! Its dangerous!"

"I can take care of myself. Besides, you guys are soooo slow!"

His other hand crept to a pocket hidden on the inner side of his pants. A secret pocket, with a secret object he never let anyone see or touched. It was a shred of cloth, multi-colored and soft to the touch. Nanashi believed that it had been part of the wrappings that held him when he was a baby and had been separated from his parents. Though so small, the piece of cloth gave him courage and the strength to continue on. And suddenly, he wanted Quatre to have it.

"Quatre! Tomodachi!" He ran after them, as fast as his shorter legs could carry on after the servants' long-legged strides. They paused, Quatre now on the ground and walking instead of being hauled away on either one of the servants' backs.

"Tomodachi!" Quatre smiled back at him and waved. Nanashi ran up to him and pressed the cloth into the other child's hand. Quatre held it up and peered at it then looked back at him. "For me? I can't take this, tomodachi. It's very precious to you."

The blond child's eyes took on a strange faraway look. "And its all that remained of your mother, who loved you very much." Quatre blinked and shook his head. "I can't take this, tomodachi! It means too much to you."

"That's why I want you to have it." Nanashi stared steadily into Quatre's eyes and closed the other child's hands over the piece of cloth again. "Please."

Quatre nodded and impulsively hugged his friend. "Friends forever," he promised. And then the servants were tugging him away and Nanashi was left standing there, waving farewell, the stone pendant clutched tight in his fist.

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[1] ^_^ Grew up watching Robotech and later read the novels.  

Note: Any use of Japanese is thoroughly under doubt of proper usage. Be forewarned! Mwahahahah *choke*