Kisser's eyes opened slowly and she looked around the dark bunk room, wondering what woke her. She sat up and stared through the darkness to the window, hoping that the moonlight would help her see. A whimper sounded from down the row of beds and then a shuffle. Spot's little voice moaned, "Nooooooo, let me ouuuuut." She let her breath out and listened to him thrash for a few minutes, waiting for a sign that he woke himself up. He gasped loudly and gulped in air like he hadn't been able to take a breath while dreaming and then tried to lay still and quiet, covering his quiet sobs with his pillow. She sighed sadly, and began to sing "For the Beauty of the Earth," in a quiet alto. It was one of the few hymns she remembered, because it always seemed to make her feel better when things were at their worst. Listing off all of the beautiful things and thinking about them got her through nights standing alone on a stool in the middle of her dormitory while her roommates slept and days upon days locked in isolation. It seemed to have the same affect on Spot's battered heart. His whimpers died down as she sang and then hummed through the melody one more time.

He never talked about his life before he showed up outside of the distribution office. He told them his name and that he was five. He didn't seem to know when his birthday was and clammed up and shut down when pressed for anything else. He didn't let her console or cuddle him when he woke from the nightmares. Even when he was shaking and crying, he pushed her away. Her words of comfort meant nothing to him, but her singing every time he woke built a strong bridge of trust between them over time. He trusted her, even if he trusted no one else.

She went to roll over and go back to sleep when he called out again, "Kiss?"

"Mhmm?"

"Will you sing some more?" He sounded like an actual child for the first time in so long and she wondered if it was the dreams or the lack of other ears listening that allowed him to soften up.

She frowned, "That bad, huh?" He didn't answer beyond the rustle of blankets that she knew to be him covering his head. "You want the same one again?"

"The one with angels all night," he answered, his voice muffled.

She nodded, even though he couldn't see her and began to sing again, keeping her voice low so as not to disturb anyone else.

Sleep my child and peace attend thee / All Through the Night

Guardian Angels God will send thee / All Through the Night

Soft and drowsy hours are creeping / Hill and dale in slumber sleeping

I my loved ones' watch am keeping / All Through the Night

Angels watching e'er around thee / All Through the Night

Midnight slumber close around thee / All Through the Night

Soft and drowsy hours are creeping / Hill and dale in slumber sleeping

I my loved ones' watch am keeping / All Through the Night

Again, she hummed through the melody a few times and then fell silent, waiting to see if he would call out again, but the bunk room was silent except for quiet snores and the deep breathing of twenty sleeping boys.

"You're such a mush," a growling voice, rough from sleep said from the bunk above hers.

She smiled sleepily, "Don't tell anyone, I've got a rep to keep."

"Yeah, a rep of having a big old soft spot for the kid," he teased.

She suddenly needed to see him, needed to feel him. She needed to look into his eyes and look for what he wasn't telling her. If this was their last night together, she didn't want to spend it away from him. "Scat, will you come down?" She spent the last week confident that he would tell her that they were cashing in their pickle jars full of saved pennies, nickels and dimes for train tickets and heading out of New York, or that he would show up one night bloodied but triumphant but the week was almost up and he said nothing. He didn't even look worried. He was a good fighter after all, the best Brooklyn had even after all of the boys who got locked up during the leader war were released. He was broad and muscular, but not bulky or slow. He managed to move in a lithe way that always confused his opponents. He had a chance, but what she had on Dockside was too vague to give her confidence in his odds. He could end up like Chips, and she couldn't let that happen.

He was silent for a moment, but she heard his breath quicken at her request and watched his mattress shift above her. "You know we ain't supposed to, Noakes will throw you out if he catches us."

"Please? Just for a little while?" He climbed down and slipped into her bed, pulling her to him and placing a soft kiss in her hair. She shoved her face into the crook of his neck and breathed in the smell of him, the same sweat and soot, ink and soap smell, and now that he was older, a hint of aftershave leftover from the previous morning, that became the smell of comfort to her in dance halls and secret adventures when she was fourteen. He tucked one of his arms under his head and the other stayed on her hip, holding her close to him but trying to be as chaste as he could. Noakes allowed her to stay in the bunk room on the condition that there was no "hanky panky" going on, but her need to be close to Scatter in case he slipped out of her fingers far exceeded her need for a bed in that moment.

Her long, lean arms wrapped up and around his head, her nails raking against his scalp. As his dark hair moved back, a low growl rumbled in the back of his throat. "Kiss," he warned, his voice husky and thick. Despite her worries, the sound of his want brought a lustful smirk to her lips and she repeated the action, slowly and gently dragging her fingernails from his forehead to the nape of his neck while kissing just at the cut of his jaw and shivered at the moan that he answered with. "Quit it. Youse gonna get us in trouble."

"When has that ever stopped me?" she mumbled, tasting the salt on his skin as she kissed her way back down his neck.

He chuckled and she gently bit at his collarbone, pulling a shocked gasp from him. "Never once, it usually makes you want to do something more."

"Exactly," she purred. "So why bother bossing me around?"

"Someone's got to keep that pride of yours in check and save you from yourself. God knows, you don't need saving from no one else." She giggled and punched him playfully without ever removing her mouth from his skin.

"I make sense when we're together." Just hold me tonight so I can pretend you're not leaving, she pleaded in her head. She quickly busied herself, kissing behind his ear, nibbling his earlobe and letting her fingers toy with the knot in the piece of jute that held the key, so she didn't have to think those thoughts anymore.

"Wese together, Kiss. Always," he muttered, planting soft kisses on her face. "Remember? You always make sense with me." He shifted himself downward, putting their faces even and pressed his lips to hers. She greedily reciprocated, pulling his bottom lip into her mouth. Their legs intertwined and their hands frantically sought to touch every bit of skin between them, even though they were both still clad in their long underwear.

The sparks running through her veins and the pressure deep in the pit of her belly were doing an excellent job of keeping her mind off of her worries. She could finally let go and just act on instinct. Instincts that told her that she, in no uncertain terms, needed his shirt off his body. She groped at the hem, running her hands up his stomach. "Stop!" he suddenly gasped, pushing her against the wall and holding her at arms length. "We can't do this, not here, not now." His eyes were panicked and his breath came in pants.

The electricity of attraction left her body like a switch was flipped and she was left numb and cold. He finally said it, finally slipped up and let on that he was hiding something.

"Why not now? Why is now different?" He groaned, pulling her back in and fingered her hair while burying his face in her neck like a chastised child. "How long, Scat?" she whispered as they lay in the dark, holding each other tightly, feeling like if either one let go the other would be ripped away, never to return. She couldn't hold it in anymore, the question was eating away at her insides slowly but surely.

"How long what?" he asked the guilt weighing down the tone of his voice as he softly kissed her cheek.

"How much longer do I get before Dockside pulls you away, not to be seen or heard from again until they ditch your body on my doorstep?"

"What happened to Chips ain't gonna happen to me," he said, his normally jovial voice turning hard and cold and his body turning rigid in her arms. "Chips was a dumbass and a loner. He could barely hack being one of us; he was never gonna make it in the gangs."

Anger flushed her face and she pushed him away so hard that he slid off of the narrow bunk and to the floor. The boys began to shift and groan in their sleep as the thunk of their leader hitting the floorboard pulled them from their dreams. "And you will? You want this? Scat I just left the Convent a few years ago, I'm not going to go live under the thumb of some gang boss for the rest of my life."

He growled again, not the seductive, moaning growl from only moments before, but one of aggravation. He stood, yanking his pants off of his hook on the wall and began to put them on, never looking her way. He waved at her as he stalked to the window and she followed suit, pulling her pants on over her long underwear and heading outside. The grey light of dawn was just starting to warm the dark sky. They stood in the alley beside the building, glaring at each other in silence for awhile before Scatter snapped. "How do you even know about that?" He shoved his hair off his brow, leaving his hand on top of his head clenched full of deep, chocolate brown waves.

"How do you think?" she sassed.

"Spot."

"Among others. There's not a lot that goes on in this town that I don't know about Scatter. That's why we're strong, because I make it my business, and then your business, to know everything that I can about what goes on in these streets. I get the news and talk people down, stop the fights before they start and you fight the fights and make us likable. We're a team, but we can't be a team if we don't have trust. And we don't have trust if you're keeping secrets from me."

"We ain't got no trust if youse sending your little birds after me neither! You don't trust me to do whats best? You always did before!"

"You lied to me! I asked you what happened last week when you came home with all those bruises and you told me that you broke up the scuffle between Duke and Rustler over that floozy. But you didn't! The boys from Dockside did it and you didn't tell me. Spot told me about it and I checked with Rustler and Duke."

"I didn't want them knowing about you," he muttered. "I didn't want them coming after you too. Whether they keep me or not, I'll still get to see you."

"Yeah, if they let you live!"

"Kiss, I don't get a choice here! I got to show up when they collect me and fight my way out or say yes and keep my head down and hope that I can follow the rules better than Chips."

"Then we'll run! We'll get our train tickets and be gone before they can get you. We'll go pan for gold in Colorado or get a farm in Kansas. We can go anywhere and be anything, Ted! Don't you see? There's nothing holding us back but Brooklyn!" She threw her arms wide and swayed on her feet, the thought of all that freedom running away with her body until a flash of white on the fire escape caught her attention. "Spot!" she growled. The boy ducked back in the window. "Spot Conlon, I know you're there, now get down here." He stepped onto the fire escape, looking down at her with a scowl. The church bells were chiming five o'clock and Noakes would be up soon to wake the bunk room. He sauntered down with more swagger than any seven year old had any right to have and the arrogance of him, caught red handed spying on her private conversation flared her annoyance and she grabbed his arm more roughly than she meant to. "What are you doing here? Why aren't you in bed?"

"Where you and Scat going, Kiss?" he asked quietly, his voice surly and low. The little boy begging for one more song was gone, and in his place was a tiny person, too old, experienced and mistrusting to be a child, too small, fragile and sensitive to make it in the adult world alone.

"Nowhere, if I have any say!" she snapped, turning to send Scat a poisonous glare that he replied to by throwing his hands up in the air and turning his back on her. "Now what have I told you about listening in on me, huh? You have a whole borough you can listen to, but I told you to stop following me around and spying on me! This is between Scat and me. Its not your business."

"Youse gonna get on a train and leave?"

She let out an exasperated huff, "This is why I tell you not to listen to me! We're just talking!" The kid gave her a hurt glare and she softened up, like she always did where he was concerned. She squatted down in front of him and pressed her face in close next to his so that her words for only for his ears, her grip on his arm loosening. "If Scat and I ever buy train tickets, we'll buy three. Where I go, you two go. The three of us against the world, right kid? Don't worry, I ain't leaving you behind." She pulled away and gave him a long, serious look in his eyes, he searched her face, looking for the lie, but seemed convinced that she meant what she said. "Now please, go get ready to sell, and if you see me today while you're looking around, you stay away. Make sure you're looking and listening for all the good stuff that I miss, ok? I need those eyes and ears out there." He gave her another one of those searching looks, the ones that she knew were him looking for the lie, for the reason to stop trusting her, but seemed placated for the time being, and ran back up the fire escape. She turned back to Scat who still had his back turned. "Please," she whispered placing her hand on his shoulder blade. He shrugged it off and tensed his back for a moment before dropping the stance and letting his shoulders droop. "Please Teddy, I'd give up everything but the two of you."

He turned and smiled sadly, twice she called him his real name, and as he got older he found he liked to hear her say it. His hand reached out to push her wild hair back, but she ducked away, unwilling to accept affection until she had her answer. "We have the boys, they's our family and if I run, it puts them in danger and I can't have that on me conscience. They'll start taking the boys, the little ones like Spot if I run. Is that what you want?"

She froze, her arms wrapped tightly around her middle. "We really have no way out?"

"I got no way out, Marta. Me. You can do whatever you want. You're free. I made sure that you would be free. Stay here and run Brooklyn, go West and get your house and your grass or stay with me and be with me, no matter what I choose." Scat looked down at her, pleading with his deep, warm green eyes that she would understand, but she couldn't. He huffed and kicked a crate. "You don't get it because youse a girl and youse ain't been on the streets long enough, Kiss. All I got in this world is a reputation, a jar of pennies and a girl. I gotta protect what's mine."

"So do I," she snapped and stormed up the fire escape to get dressed.

OoOoOoO

A/N: Another flashback run amok, but really, who's going to say no to more sassy, street Marta and Baby Spot? The lullabies featured in this chapter are "For the Beauty of the Earth," music by Conrad Kocher and lyrics by Folliot S Pierpoint and "All Through the Night," music by Edward Jones and Lyrics by John Cieriog Hughes. I got some crazy bad news this week, and am using writing for some classic avoidance behavior, resulting in this lovely bit of fluff and fight. Spot Conlon is property of Disney.