Four Years Old
Even though his parents were each holding onto a hand of his, Danny couldn't help but want just a bit more protection. He looked around, seeing octopus people everywhere. (Not to mention many with guns) He thought his ears weren't working, too, because all he heard was mumbo jumbo. It was like someone was talking so fast they made a new language.
The walls looked like they were made from shiny rock, and he figured he was in a castle like his, except creepier. He felt like he was being taken to a dungeon for time out.
"Mommy, why are we here?" Looking up at his mom, he couldn't help but hope this was just a bad dream. His mom gave him a reassuring smile when she saw his worried look.
"Danny, sweetie, remember your dad and I told you we were going to visit some old friends of ours. The ones we told you had a child around your age." He felt a bit better at remembering that, but he still felt like he ate too much candy and it was about to come back out.
"Oh, right. ...Then why are there octopus people here?" The question, as innocent as it seemed, made many of the 'octopus people' look over to the trio suspiciously. When Danny saw that, he moved closer to his dad.
"Because, sport, we're not in planet Earth anymore. Remember how we got in that space ship, and you saw us leaving the planet?" Well, Danny did remember getting on the space ship.
"No." But he fell asleep before the launch.
"But... Chris told me aliens don't exist, because no one can prove they exist. And in the movies they always attack us and want to kill us," he told his parents as he glanced over to a blue octopus person who had on him a large, -to his imagination- disintegrator. His parents glanced at each other.
"Well, remember we explained this to you. That's because normally people don't know aliens exist, because humans wouldn't accept them. The movies are examples of it, you see. People make those, because they don't trust the idea of someone that's not from our planet going and living there. Really though, aliens are usually just like us. They're nice and friendly, but they also have their problems like we do," his mom explained. Those were a lot of words, but Danny managed to get the basic point of it, so he nodded.
"So then why is it that we know they exist?" Their parents looked at each other once more, but his mom answered again, leaning over to him.
"You see, Mommy and Daddy have some pretty important jobs, like we've told you. But in these jobs, our bosses have let us to know that aliens are real," she told him. He nodded slowly.
"Are your friends octopus people, too?" He asked. At that, his parents both smiled and had a glimpse of each other.
"Well... Yes, but they're pretty talented, you see, sport. They can change their appearance so they look like humans, but they can still keep their alien powers," his dad told him. Danny's eyes widen, amazed at the thought of those octopus people turning into humans and sucking his brain out with their bare human hands. 'That sounds so cool... And creepy.'
Looking between his parents again, he began to think. 'I wonder how long we'll be here. I hope that kid mom told me about knows how to play sports or I'm really going to bored to death. ...Or hey! Maybe he has some really cool powers he could show me.'
A few more steps later, they stood in front of a big set of wooden double doors. Two of the 'octopus people' got each side of the door and opened it for them. The hallway they were in brightened, and Danny had to cover his eyes at first. When he was able to see inside, he saw that it was a really big room like the one they had back home that they used for -as he thought of them as- boring wannabe parties. And it reminded him of a movie that him and his friends had watched about a pretty girl and a really awesome animal-man that had danced in a room like this to a slow song.
There was only one long table set out, and three people were seated, waiting patiently. One of which stood out in the younger human's eyes. 'Aw, no!'
The young Rhapsodian looked up when she heard the doors being opened. After her mommy had helped her get ready, (And explained that they were going to meet with some of her parents' old friends with a kid her age who were humans) her parents and her went down to the ballroom. Since she was pretty tired and her parents had let her know they might be waiting for a while, she let herself use the table as a pillow. She'd quickly fallen asleep, imagining what the humans would be like.
The moment the big set of double doors had began to be opened, the little blonde woke up. She sat upright immediately as though she wasn't supposed to be sleeping, and her eyes trained on the spot in the center of the entrance as soon as she was up, which was the place where someone caught her eye. 'Aww... Guess my first human friend isn't going to be a girl.'
Danny couldn't believe his eyes. 'A girl! ...And she doesn't even look like Sam!'
He immediately turned to his mom so she could fix this huge problem, but before he knew it, she had ran off to go say hi to a tall woman with pretty hair that was longer than Danny had ever seen, with the lightest blue eyes he'd ever seen. 'Fine... I'll ask Dad.'
When he turned to his dad so he could fix this, he saw that his dad and him had already gone up to the man he'd seen earlier in the group. Danny looked up at him in astonishment. The man's eyes were the darkest blue the young Earthling had ever seen, so blue you could barely tell they weren't black, and he had a few light freckles, but his hair was green with strands of pink. 'His hair really doesn't look human...'
"Oh, this must be Cathy!" Danny turned to his mom -the one who said that- and he saw the girl from earlier jump out of her seat and run to his mom with a big smile on her face.
He could tell she was a bit shorter than him, but his eyes didn't miss the color of her hair or its short length, or that her eyes were (Though he'd never admit it) the best blue ever. 'She reminds me of my beautiful Wendy. Except uglier and more disappointing. Because she's not a boy.'
Cathy smiled more when the kind woman hugged her and picked her up. This was the first human she'd ever met, and this human was really nice to her, like her mom was. The only differences between them was that this woman's shiny hair was a chocolate brunette color in a ponytail, and she had pretty hazel eyes. But also her mom was a lot prettier.
"Hello. My name is Cathy!," she said cheerily. Her English had a thin accent, but the woman who was carrying her didn't seem to mind.
"It's very nice to meet you, Cathy. I'm a close friend of your mom's, so you can call me Aunt Daniella," she let her know. Cathy nodded, hugging the woman.
"Okay, Aunt Ella," Danny's mom just laughed, looking over to Cathy's mom as she hugged Cathy like, "Oh, she is so your daughter"
The man who was with her daddy and the young boy turned to them. "Oh so this is the immensely famous Catherine, huh?" The man asked her. His question just made her giggle a bit, but she glanced at the boy, and she gave him a smile.
She liked his spiky brunette hair and bright green eyes. They reminded her of the pictures she'd seen of Earth, but he just frowned at her and turned away. '….What's wrong with him?'
When she turned back to the man, thinking that the boy was really rude, she was given that feeling that she knew how her father and him were friends. The man's short red hair was rowdy, and his green eyes just screamed at her that this was a man who would spoil her like an awesome uncle and who liked to fool around. Probably like her daddy sometimes liked to do with her.
"Yep. This is our awesome Cath," her father boasted proudly. Danny looked between the adults, evermore disliking this 'Cathy' or 'Cath' who didn't get out of his mother's arms and who his father kept trying to get to laugh. 'Not that it's hard. She's laughing at everything. Why is she getting all the attention anyway? I don't see anything special in her. It must be because of her powers.'
"And this handsome young lad must be Daniel, right?" Danny turned to the pretty woman next to his mom, but he smiled and nodded, the smile telling them he loved the recognition. He walked up to her once she bent down so she could talk with him.
"It's really nice to meet you, Danny," she let him know. "You can call me Aunt Anneliese. I'm Cathy's mom," she told him, smiling like she was going to give him cookies and milk. His eyes widen when he suddenly felt himself being lifted off the ground, and the next thing he knew, he was taller than everyone else in the room.
"And I'm Dominic, kiddo. How old are you?" Danny looked down and saw it was the man with crazy hair who had asked the question.
"Um... Four, sir," he told the man. From where he was, though, he saw all of the adults smile at the same time and share a knowing look. He knew the girl saw it, too, because then they were the ones to share a look with each other. 'What was with that?'
"Oh, really? That's the same age our Cathy is. What a coincidence!" Cathy and Danny didn't understand where they were going with this, since their parents had told each of them they were around the same age way before. Then, they were both set back down on the ground, facing each other, in the middle of a semi-square their parents had formed. Neither liked where this was going.
"I bet you two could be best friends," Danny's dad told them. The two children looked at each other after looking at him, but they were both clearly unsure about that.
'She's so girly. I bet she's boring and can't do anything I'd want to do.'
'He's so conceited. And he's totally mad about something with me that I don't even know what it is I did... But I guess I could give him a second chance. Maybe he'll want to play dress-up with me.'
"How about you two play together while we catch up?" Danny's mom asked them. Her son immediately gave her a, "You don't really expect me to play with her" look. One which Cathy didn't miss.
'What's his problem? He doesn't even know me!'
"Cathy, honey, is there something you would like to do?" Her mom asked her when she noticed how her daughter was looking at the young boy. Danny and Cathy turned to her, but the young blonde thought about it.
"Can we go to the garden and catch some... some..." Since she was having trouble with the word, she pointed to a small opalite, silver, and amethyst butterfly necklace she had on.
"Oh, catch some butterflies. Yeah, that sounds fun. Doesn't it, sport?" Danny turned to his dad, but he just shrugged, not very interested.
"Hmm... How about you, Cath, catch them with your hands, and since these are Rhapsodian butterflies, you, Danny, catch them with some..." Dominic smiled, and Danny knew he was about to show him something. He also had the feeling Cathy's dad had a touch for the dramatic.
"Bow and arrows!" Danny's eyes widen as wide as they could be when suddenly the man took out a set of wooden bow and arrows just Danny's size. The tips had a red suction cup.
"Woah... This looks so cool..." Danny took them once he could, and he looked at the four-sided arrowheads. The bow was a deep ruby red. His favorite color, but that didn't make the gift any better. 'Mom and Dad must have told them they put me in archery classes and that I hate it...Maybe this trip is my punishment for something I did that I don't remember.'
"Thanks, Uncle Dominic." Danny looked back at the man, smiling wryly and trying to look thankful. "How'd you know I like this?"
The man laughed a bit and patted his head. "I had a feeling, kiddo." But then he pointed to a door on the opposite wall of the ballroom.
"The garden is over there," his now Aunt Anneliese explained for her husband.
"Why don't you kids go over and play with the butterflies? Just be careful, okay?" Even before Danny's mom had been done talking, the two had already started running for the door, neither really wanting to spend anymore time with the adults.
Danny's container strap of the arrows was already over his shoulder. The bow was ready to be used in his left hand. It was almost as though, even though he hated it, it came natural to him.
Cathy and Danny glanced at each other. There was a silent agreement for a race to the garden. As soon as they were both out of ballroom and into a path they figured would lead to the garden, both started running as fast as they could.
"You're going down, girl!" Danny told her, smiling widely and getting a bit ahead.
"Nuh-uh! You are you… you… boy!" After saying that, she ran faster and caught up to him. The whole fifteen seconds were spent trying to outrun each other, but they ended up tying. It wasn't that bad for their first seconds alone.
"I won!" Danny declared once they got to a circular place with a big fountain, after they'd gotten into a garden labyrinth. They were surrounded by hundreds of rainbow colored butterflies, but they didn't really care then. Both were trying to catch their breath and be the winner.
"No! I won!" Cathy said, crossing her arms. Before they could continue, a pair of butterflies passed in between them, each about four inches wide.
"Whoa…." Danny's eyes widen, and that was when he actually took in his surroundings.
"What? You've never seen a butterfly?" Cathy asked, running to catch the ones that passed them by. Danny saw how they were quick to avoid her, and almost all would fly ten feet over their heads except for a couple few.
"Of course! Just none like these," he told her, but he had his bow and arrow ready. "Either way, there's no way you can catch these! They're too high fo-" And that was when Danny saw her use her powers for the first time.
"I got one!"
"...That's not fair! I can't do that!"
"Well too bad! Use what Daddy gave you then, Little Human!" Cathy grinned, not really meaning it as an insult that much, but she was starting to like annoying him.
Danny growled a slightly, thinking about his this girl was getting on his nerves, but when he looked at the arrows, he felt like they were a sign of his weakness against her. Still, he knew there was no way he could catch the butterflies without them. 'No one said I couldn't do it my way...'
Cathy was too distracted catching more butterflies to notice her new companion climbing up the fountain that wasn't on. When Danny got to the top, some twenty feet off the ground, not scared of heights, he started to take off the suction cups from the arrows. "These would just slow me down..."
After some minutes, all of the cups on the bottom of the fountain, he turned to her. "How about we play a game?"
She turned to him and saw him standing on the fountain, his feet only having two feet of distance to stand on, but she ignored that. "What kind of game?"
"Let's see who can catch the most butterflies. You use your creepy powers, and I'll use these arrows. Whoever catches the most gets to boss the other for the rest of this boring trip." He'd forgotten how scared he'd been when it started.
Cathy did want to put him in his place, and it sounded fun, so she agreed.
The next ten minutes were spent gathering as many of the beautiful insects as possible. Danny wasn't even surprised when, whenever he'd hit a butterfly, instead of killing it his arrow just seemed to stun them. Cathy, since she wasn't hurting them, whenever she'd get one, she'd keep it in her hand and catch the next with her other. It all seemed pretty even, and many of the butterflies started to fled once they realized what was going on.
Many of them just flew higher, so they both reached higher. Up to that point, both had avoided going after one that was already being aimed at by the other. It was mostly on Danny's side, since he could see which Cathy was going after. Yet, when it came down to the last butterfly, neither cared.
Which was why Danny nor Cathy noticed the arrow headed right for her chest until the butterfly moved half a foot higher and avoided it, Cathy behind.
And that was when they both learned that wearing a metal butterfly necklace, having the strength of a kid, and Rhapsodian Cloud Grass in the end of spring were things to be thankful for.
2 Hours Later
Danny grumbled as the bubbly Cathy served him some tea.
A/N: So...Around the end was written today, and I'm not gonna check it since if I did, I really wouldn't be paying attention to it, and it'd be more like "I want to get this over with..." and yeah. Man, at first I was dying to write them as kids, and now I'm dying write the actual fic.
This is basically how it's going to go until we get to 17/18 years old.
DOES ANYONE WANT TO GUESS WHERE I GOT THE IDEA FOR THIS FIC? ^^ I mean, I gave tons of clues here, and in the next few years (Meaning as they grow) there'll be more. But yeah. =) Just for fun.
Sorry it's so long. Didn't think it'd turn out like this. Either way, I'm pretty sure the next years of their life won't be so written up like this. It'll just be moments of that time. And THEN the actual fic will start. Really this whole what-happened-before-thing is just to explain stuff. And it's a huge clue to where I got the idea from.
