I am so, so, so, so ,so sorry to all the reviewers of my other fics that I haven't gotten around to replying to. I haven't been able to get on here for AGES and I take my replying/reviewing very seriously. I mean, if there's people out there who have taken the time to review a story, then the least I can do is write a simple 'thank you', right?

Right.

Anyway, I got this little two-shot for ya. Don't worry, this one won't be a super slow update like some of my other stuff. I totally know where I'm going with this. It's another little pointless snippet that I scribbled up as a way of passing the time, so don't expect it to be fabulous. I'm actually not that pleased with this one.

It's funny, I can never usually write at any other time than the early hours of the morning. I lay there, trying to sleep and my brain speaks up and says, "Hey, you know what, Jessie? You can forget about sleeping, you can sleep when you're dead. Get up off your but and use me, I have an idea. We don't get enough of those."

I never see enough Nile x Hikaru and maybe that's for a reason. Who knows, but I'll post a story for the pairing anyway.

"So you've never seen the ocean, Nile?"

Her question unnerved him but not for too long. Of course he'd never seen the ocean. What did she think? He'd spent his whole life between arid lands such as Africa and Egypt. Yes, he'd braved oceans of sand, but never oceans of water.

"Nope, never."

"Huh, how 'bout that. It's a pity, really. The ocean is beautiful."

'Like you,' he thought, but he dare not voice the words.

She smirked. "I guess you could say that the sea is really something you should see."

And with that, the once rather serene environment at the local park was shattered as the girl erupted with laughter at her own terrible pun. He found himself laughing along with her, but his source of entertainment stemmed from the comical sight of her slapping her knee and clapping her hands like a seal falling victim to a severe epileptic fit.

"Easy Hikaru," he said. "Don't bust a rib."

"Okay, okay, okay," she wheezed. "But in all seriousness, you've got to know what it's like."

He let his gaze fall to his tapping feet underneath the park bench they shared. "One day, I will."

Hikaru put a finger to her chin as she seemed to be pondering an elaborate plan in her head. Nile, being the natural observationist that he was, didn't miss that. It was a feminine gesture, something she didn't usually let escape her tomboyish make-up. Nile liked her go-getter, no nonsense attitude. Don't get him wrong. He liked a girl who he could blade with without the possible complaint of a broken nail. He liked a girl who could blade at all, in fact. But he also appreciated this particularly fragile and delicate piece of her personality. It made him all the more eager to protect and serve her.

Very suddenly, Hikaru grabbed Nile's wrist and pulled him up alongside her. "C'mon," she said as her eyes twinkled the way a person's do when a light bulb has just gone off in their head. "I wanna show you the waves."

She tugged him along, but he dug his heels into the ground bringing them both to a stop in classic Nile-esc stubbornness. He rubbed the back of his neck with his freehand. "What? We're in the middle of the city, there's no ocean here for miles."

"I'd walk for miles for one of Nile's smiles," she giggled earning a powdery blush from the same Nile in her second pun of the day.

"You're a natural poet," he joked.

"Tell me something I don't know. But no, we won't have to walk for miles. All we have to do is take the train to the shore. If we hurry, we can get there before sunset."

He was about to protest, thinking of all the training he needed to do in preparation for the battle he'd promised Kyoya the following morning. "Well…"

Hikaru wasn't about to let him be a wet blanket. "Oh, don't be so uptight. That's Tsubasa's thing!"

"Well, okay. If you're sure…"

"Yay, Nile!"

Nile sighed as he tried to deny the knowledge that was making itself ever more factual with every second that he let slip through his fingers. He couldn't deny it, though. He was hopelessly and unconditionally in love with Hikaru Hasama.

The train rocked him back and forth rhythmically, like a mother nursing her child into a deep slumber. The repetitive humming of the train tracks and the blurred scenery he could see outside of his window made him want to fall asleep right then and there. And he would have too, if Hikaru, who sat next to him, were not such a fascinating and intricate thing to look at. Though she hadn't spoken to him much while she rode the train with him, he believed that if he were to shut his eyes for more than the time required to blink, he would be missing out.

"Nile?" she asked tearing him from his thoughts.

"Hm?"

"What's it like living in Egypt?"

"Hot," he stated blankly.

"Well no duh, funny man. I mean, besides the heat. What do you do for fun?"

"Well, I'll be honest and say it's kind of dull. Rather than the more modernized areas of Egypt, I was raised in a desert colony. You'd think that living in such a hot place, I'd have learnt to deal with breaking a sweat every time I left my home. But I didn't"

The train came to a stop and the two watched as a young couple boarded the carriage with a pram. The baby was covered in a pink bunny rug, so they couldn't see the infant. The young man, noticing that there was only one vacant seat, opted to stand in order to let his girlfriend or wife sit down. Nile smiled at the gesture.

"What was your home like? What about your friends and family?"

Nile's content smile turned bittersweet. Hikaru thought she caught a glimpse of something like pain in his viridian eyes.

"Most of the houses in my town were underground. They've been like that since ancient times. They're that way because it's effective for keeping the heat out, and sandstorms become less of a problem. My friends, I mean if you could call them that, never really accepted me. I was always 'That Quiet Guy'. There was nothing in the way of privacy, either. It was such a small community that everyone knew everyone's business. If you so much as thought of a secret, somehow someone would find out."

"You're quite secretive, Nile. I can imagine how that would go down with you."

"Just one of the many reasons I kept to myself as much as possible. But it wasn't like there was anything good to talk about half the time, anyway. What makes for good small talk in the middle of the desert? 'Hey, nice sand we're having today.' 'Yep, how 'bout that blistering sunlight?' 'Did you hear about old Bobby-Joe? Went out to fetch his laundry and was mauled to death by a lion. Tragic, ain't it?'"

Hikaru's eyes widened in horror, "Did anyone really get eaten by a lion?"

"Nah, at least not that I knew of. Old Mrs. Mubarak actually kept one as a pet. She had that ingenious idea when she suspected that someone was stealing her knitting. Needless to say, she stopped complaining of her yarn going missing after that."

Hikaru laughed, nudging Nile in the shoulder roughly.

Nile didn't continue his story telling just yet. His attention was grasped by the couple again as he watched them in casual conversation. Though it took no visual form, he could see the simplistic devotion they had towards each other. It was like an aura wrapped them and their child in their own perfect little world. Such a display reminded him of his own parents and at once, he realized why something so beautiful made him feel so terribly sad.

It was as if it were 'hey, let's all shove painful memories down Nile's throat' day, an event that seemed to be growing more and more popular each year to the point where Nile contemplated marketing celebratory flags, because Hikaru voiced yet another statement.

"You still haven't said anything about your family. What were they like?"

"I don't really remember."

"Liar."

"What?"

"You heard me, I called you a liar."

"How come?"

She gave him a flat look, folding her arms. "Nile, you couldn't lie straight in bed. Look at you; you can't even meet my eyes."

Hikaru would be the first to receive one of Nile's flags, just for being so gosh-darn enthusiastic about the holiday.

He sighed. "Is it that obvious?"

She nodded, "stop changing the subject."

"I… I guess the problem here is that I remember things about them that I'd rather forget. They say you have to take the bad with the good but in this case, I'd rather not have any memories."

Her voice fell to a whisper, "Did they, did they hurt you?"

"No, not really," he collected himself before continuing, slumping his shoulders a bit. "When I was very young, I lived with my mother and father in Egypt. I don't think I can name anyone who was more in love than those two.

"I remember father would play wrestle with me indoors constantly. He would even teach me how to Blade in the living room, and he never shied away from a friendly game of kitchen soccer. He was only very young, and in a way he was still a kid himself. Mother would come in and yell at us about not destroying her furniture, and father would say 'Neferet, we're not raising furniture, we're raising a son'. She would pout about it, but eventually give in and end up building a fort or something for us to play in. Then, she'd read me stories about the ancient gods and pharaohs by candle light until I fell asleep. And when we got super bored on particularly lazy afternoons, mother and I would take advantage of the fact that father always slept on his stomach and draw faces on the back of his bald head."

"That doesn't sound so painful," Hikaru commented.

"It wasn't. It was the most perfect time in my life."

"Then, what happened?"

"One night, over dinner mother broke the news that she was pregnant with a little girl. I still smile about how excited father was. He threw me up and down so much that I threw up. After that, he sighed in relief and being the outspoken man that he was, he told mother that he was sorry for thinking that she merely put on weight.

"Everything was just peachy, until mother kept having to go to the hospital. Father told me that mother and the baby were simply just sick but that everything would be okay because the doctor's would fix things. The medical system back then in Egypt was still very underdeveloped, you see…

"So as the months went by, we saw less and less of mother until eventually, she became hospital bound. We would visit her often but I remember how afraid I felt towards the end of things. She started looking so ghostly, Hikaru. With each visit, her face thinned out more and more, her once golden skin took a sick, yellow color and her beautiful green eyes started to resemble murky swamp pools. She lost so much weight… she was just this skeleton-like form with a massive swollen stomach. She was unrecognizable to me, she looked like an alien. I expected a monster to break out of her skin at any moment, like it was using her body for a cocoon.

"Father's eyes were always red-raw from crying. I would lay awake at night, unable to sleep for his broken sobbing I could hear in the living room. The bins were always toppling over with alcohol bottles and father began to get nasty. He was too young for the pressure, he couldn't handle it. A few times, he came home from work so highly strung that he would lash out and hit me. He never really hurt me, more so he just took his frustration out on me. Then he would cradle me in his big, strong arms, rocking me back and forth repeating over and over how sorry he was...

"I am very positive, Hikaru, that my parents were kindred spirits. Because as mother began to deteriorate, so did he."

Nile stopped talking when he felt a small and comforting hand grasp his own. He looked down from the window and was met with two watery, violet eyes that seeped crystal tears of emotion onto soft, blush kissed cheeks. Hikaru's eyes brimmed with empathetic feelings so genuine and real, that he had to catch his breath as the sight of them cut him deep.

Now, Nile hastily repositioned his body to face her, taking her hand in both of his. "No, no, no. Please don't cry. I didn't mean to upset you."

She blinked, her thick lashes fanning away her tears,"She died?"

He hesitated, unsure if he should tell her the truth. How it pained him to see her cry.

"Please, continue… I want to know."

Nile nodded slowly."Yes, my sister too. We were at the hospital when the surgeon told us. He had tried his best to save her but the complications were far too severe. Father's reaction surprised me. He didn't cry anymore. He stopped instantly. At that moment, it was like something switched off inside of him, all life and soul vanished. He simply turned, left the hospital and never came back. I waited for him, but a nurse collected me and arranged for me to live with a foster family. I lived with this new family for a week, and they were very kind to me but I just wanted to be on my own. So, one night, I snuck out and went back to my old home. I slept in mother and father's bed, hoping that maybe father would come back. He didn't, and there were no signs to say that he'd been there, either. No note, no belongings taken. Mother's perfume was still on the pillow.

"I salvaged a few things and went down to the river. I sat there, just thinking for days until an elderly man on a raft came by. Concerned, he carried me onto his raft and nursed me back to health as I was rather tired and weak. He helped me get back on my feet and then, I just sort of made a new life for myself in solitude. I still don't know what happened to father. I don't even know if he's dead. He might be out there, somewhere. But I know he certainly isn't alive. Breathing, maybe, but alive? Not a chance."

Hikaru was silent. Then, "Nile, I didn't know."

He hushed her, stroking the back of her hand with his thumb.

"I-I'm so sorry."

"Don't be, it's in the past," though he didn't sound like he believed that statement himself.

She squeezed his hand. "I know what it feels like. I do."

He looked at her, puzzled.

"I'll tell you one day," she replied, finally looking away.

Nile decided not to push her, for who in this world could better understand the angst in recalling painful memories? He knew much of a challenge it was to keep those merciless demons at bay in the deepest waters of your soul. It was a constant inner battle every day, and the consequences of losing to those demons and allowing them to swim to the surface could break a person. Lethal things, memories like that. They would pull you under the water and use your lifeless body to stay afloat.

Nile redirected his attention to the blurred scenery outside the window. Beside him, he felt Hikaru inch closer to his person, wrap an arm around the front of his waist and snuggle her face into his shirt. He pat her hair with a touch as light as the force you would use to experience the texture of a perfectly blossomed rose. He felt the warm moisture of her tears seeps through his shirt, through his skin, past his bones and into his soul, drowning those evil ghosts once again.

So that's part 1. Part 2 is half written, almost finished. As I said, I don't know how well a Nile x Hikaru pairing will go down with you guys, but I myself have discovered a new love for Nile (he's my baby, I just wanna wrap him up in a blanket and squeeze him!) and there just aren't enough girls in this anime to work with! Not that I have anything against a boy on boy story, I just don't know how to go about writing them.

If you managed to get this far without dying of boredom, thank you a bunch. You guys are awesome.

Jessie :)