Chapter 1-1865
Chris Larabee stood watch at the narrow mouth of the alley that he and his five friends had staked out as their territory. The others were sound asleep inside their makeshift home they had pieced together with wood scraps taken from abandoned buildings, and nails stolen from local stores. Chris fought his own exhaustion, as he watched a dark figure in a hooded cloak, carrying a large basket held in one hand, dart across the street in Chris's direction.
Chris faded back behind a pile of packing crates, alerting the rest of the gang members of possible trouble with a soft, low pitched whistle, then fell silent once again as he watched the unknown person approach his location.
The hooded figure paused in the mouth of the alleyway, glanced around again, before swinging an arm back to gain momentum and threw the basket onto the pile of garbage across from Chris's hiding place, then the figure dashed out of the alleyway and Chris emerged from his hiding place and went to investigate the basket. Chris gave another whistle, loud and clear.
The oldest member of the gang, Josiah Sanchez, was the first to emerge from within their home and moved to join Chris as he dragged the basket and its contents off the pile of trash and crouched down to look into it. One by one the other four boys, Nathan Jackson, Ezra Standish, Vin Tanner, and Buck Wilmington joined Chris.
"What did you find Chris?' Josiah asked as he crouched down beside Chris.
"I don't know." Chris said, and briefly explained to them what he had witnessed. "Whoever it was took off out of here as if the devil himself was after him."
"Sounds peculiar to me," a southern voice said from beside Josiah.
"What did ya find 'Siah?" asked six-year-old Vin, his Texas drawl prominent despite his young age.
Josiah pulled the youngest member of the gang onto his lap. "I didn't find it Vin, Chris did."
"Oh." Vin said. "Open it Chris."
Chris reached over to lift the blanket covering the contents of the basket, when something struck the side of it. He snatched his hand back as if it had been bitten, sending the rest of the gang members into peals of laughter. Chris turned to glare at each of them in turn, embarrassed at having been caught showing any kind of fear. Josiah, sensing Chris's embarrassment, gave a wave of his hand, and instantly the other boys stopped laughing.
"Go ahead, Chris. Lift the blanket off so we can see what's inside, "Josiah prodded the blonde boy.
"You do it Josiah." Chris replied.
The five younger members of the gang had appointed the tall, brawny youth to the position of leader two years earlier; because he was the oldest of the boys at seventeen, and logic suggested that he, therefore, lead the others. He had also risked his own life to save each one of them from certain death.
Josiah reached to lift the blanket off the top of the basket; only to have whatever had struck the basket before, strike it again, making him jerk his own hand back. A soft mewling sound followed the strike, but was practically drowned out by the other boys' laughter.
"One of you all open the dad-blame thing so we can see what's inside or I'm going back to sleep." Buck stated exasperatedly, stifling a yawn with one hand.
Josiah scowled at him for a moment, took a deep breath, and then reached out and grabbed hold of one end of the blanket and tugged it off the top of the basket. A collective gasp exited six sets of lips as six pairs of eyes gazed down at the contents of the basket. None of them could believe what they were seeing. A baby, not more than a few months old, with dark curls, lay asleep in the basket. As they watched the infant let out a low whimper, before lifting one tiny fist to it's mouth, and suckled.
Josiah was the first to recover from his surprise over their discovery. "Dear God, it's a baby."
"What devilish miscreant would deliberately throw anything as precious and innocent as a baby away?" Ezra stated once his own surprise had worn off.
Chris' voice held a steel edge to it as he said, "How could they throw any of us away? Except for Josiah and Nathan, all of us in one way or another have been cast out or discarded like garbage. Vin was left wandering the streets alone until he was brought to the orphanage; after our Mas' died, Buck and I were left alone to fend for ourselves, and you were shuffled from one terrible relative's house to another, so why would you think it couldn't happen to a baby, too?"
"I don't know," Ezra shrugged his shoulders, unable to deny the truth in Chris' words.
"Doesn't matter if they're rich or poor, old or young. They just get tired of having a baby and toss it out like trash," Buck said, "Ain't that right, Chris?"
"That's right." Chris agreed. "Ezra weren't you paying attention when Buck and I told you boys all those stories about what went on at the orphanage we were at?"
"I thought perhaps that you were intentionally telling falsehoods or exaggerating incidents to make them appear more frightening than they actually were. " Ezra admitted sheepishly.
"Huh?" Buck asked, gazing at the southern boy with a perplexed look upon his face.
"He thought you were making them up." Josiah supplied helpfully.
Chris's face darkened as he gazed at Ezra. "We didn't make them up. Did you make up what you've told us about the different relatives you lived with?"
"Certainly not!" Ezra declared indignantly.
"Neither did we," Buck told him. "At least us older kids had a chance to defend ourselves if need be…none of the little ones ever did, especially the babies. They disappeared onto the fourth floor and were never seen again. If it hadn't been for Chris and I sneaking out the night Vin was brought in, we'd never have known he was there. I think we were meant to find him."
"Divine intervention," Josiah interjected, running his hand through Vin's chestnut locks.
Vin snuggled back against Josiah's broad chest, yawning, content to let the older boy run his hand through his hair.
Chris smiled at the younger boy, his green eyes locking with Vin's deep blue ones. A moment passed between the two boys, and even though seven years existed between their ages, Chris knew that he was understood completely by Vin. From the moment Chris walked up to Vin as he sat outside old man Schwartz's office and opened his arms, and the younger boy had walked trustingly into them, the two had been especially close.
Vin smiled back at Chris, and then his eyes moved to settle onto the sleeping baby. Chris shifted his eyes onto the baby as well, and knew that Vin expected him to come up with something that would protect this baby as he had protected him over the past three years.
"We ain't taking him to no orphanage."