Disclaimer: I do not own, nor am I affiliated with anyone who owns or has any random connection to, SNK, Neo Geo, King of Fighters, or Alba or Soiree. This is a fanwork and I'm not making any profit off of this.
The box sat in Alba's closet for years. He didn't ever mention that he'd gone back to the orphanage after he'd turned eighteen and retrieved the stuff, so as far as he knew Soiree had no idea any of their stuff was here.
Alba finally decided to take the box out one day, and he sat on his bed and to go through the contents. There was a threadbare bunny rabbit, dressed in faded blue overalls with a carrot sticking out the pocket and no left ear. He remembered this rabbit—it was Soiree's, and his brother had hauled that thing around for years. If Alba remembered correctly, his had been a frog.
Gingerly, he sat the bunny on his bed and reached into the box again, smiling a little when the next thing he pulled out was the green frog. Since nobody was around to see him, he stroked it and gave it a little squeeze. It was as soft as he remembered.
He sat Frog down by Soiree's bunny, debating on whether or not he should separate them.
The rest of the box was mostly clothes and things they'd left behind when they ran away. It didn't hold any particular significance or importance to him.
There was also a videotape, which made Alba frown in curiosity and he got up to put it in. It was a home movie of two boys—Soiree and himself, he realized—maybe five months old and sitting waist-deep in the bathtub. They were splashing around, laughing and playing something like bumper boats.
Alba sat on the edge of his bed and watched the twins giggle. It was like watching someone else's life. And the voices he didn't remember, behind the camera—those must have been his parents.
"Hey Alba are we out of..."
He didn't even turn around to acknowledge his brother's comment, but Soiree didn't bother to finish, just sat down beside him. He touched the soft right ear of the bunny rabbit, his eyes fixed on the screen.
Baby Soiree threw his hands flat on the water, laughing, but the wave hit baby Alba in the face and he blinked for a couple of seconds, stunned, and then started wailing. Soiree jumped, and then started crying too, and the camera shut off.
"Well," Soiree said after a second, "I guess it's good for me that you weren't so badass back then, if I did that now I don't think you'd cry."
"No," Alba replied, and watched as Soiree stood up. He was thankful that Soiree didn't ask where the box came from.
