Empty Promises

A/N: So? What do you think? *looks pathetically hopeful* And just as a reminder: NO YAOI, shamelessly A/U and shamelessly OOC.

DISCLAIMER: I own nobody.

LYRICS: Paper Tigers, Jaci Velasquez

Chapter 2

Rei: Running From Nothing

                "Well," Outsider said slowly. "When I was free, I lived on the streets. Well, not quite on the streets, but in an old burnt-out building. That building was the stopover point for a lot of broke travelers and drunkards, pimps, and every other kind of street trash. I mean, sure, some decent people came and went, but most of the time it was some pretty shady characters.

                "The earliest thing I ever remember is when I met the first boy who would join me in the upper-level apartment I managed to beat others to. We had both been about 7 at the time, I guess…"

Heart pounds

To the sound

Comin' after me

                Kai looked up from his spot, stretched out on top of the canopy of one of the peddlers in the market square. He was enjoying his nicked apple. It was perfect: shiny, round, red, juicy, yummy.

                A young boy about his age was running from something. He was dressed in bright blue pants, a white tunic and a wide yellow slip of material was wound around his waist as a makeshift belt. His jet-black hair was partly in a ponytail wound with white material and ending in a red band. The other part was flying over top of a strip of red material wound as a headband of sorts. He had on shoes, a rarity among street kids. All the clothes, and the boy, looked as if they'd been through rain, sun and mud.

                Jumping from the canopy to the eaves of the building nearby, Kai looked up past where the boy had been running from. Nobody seemed to be pursuing him.

Step back

What is that?

It's a mystery

Is it somethin'

Probably nothin'

Still I find a way to scare myself

                The strange boy stopped, looked back fearfully, then leaned over, trying to catch his breath.

                Kai jumped back down to the ground nimbly. Then he walked right up to the stranger. "Who's after you?"

                The boy jumped and then relaxed. "Nobody, I guess." He answered, looking up at Kai. Though he spoke in Commonire, the language spoken by most of the world's street rats, his voice was heavily accented with that of a native of Chynah, the neighbouring country to this one, Jepin.

                "So why are you running?" Kai asked logically.

                "Guess I got a little scared," the boy mumbled. "Some guy gave me the evil eye and called me a neko-ma. I don't know what that means, but it sounded threatening."

                Kai studied the boy for a second. "It's true, you do look sort of like one. But I think I know the guy you're talking about. He calls everybody some sort of demon."

                "He called me a demon?" the boy asked. "That's what neko-ma means?"

                "Actually, it means cat demon." Kai said. "Don't pay attention to him. Nobody else does. I'm Kai, by the way."

                "Rei." The boy responded.

'Til I remember

This all feels familiar

And I know better

                Rei refused to leave Kai alone for the rest of the day, and he was good at following. No matter how hard he tried, Kai could not shake him.

                "Will you leave me alone?!" Kai finally exclaimed as the sun was going down and he was heading back to the penthouse of the run-down building.

                "Well, see, I don't really… have a place to stay." Rei muttered. "And I'm not really… supposed to be here."

                "Your problem, not mine." Kai said easily and jumped a fencetop where a snarling dog lay in wait for a misstep. He made a face at the guard dog then jumped onto the rooftop of another house. All the while, Rei continued to follow him, after looking down at the dog, shuddering.

                "Please, Kai?" Rei begged. "If the police catch me, they'll hurt me and sell me into slavery. Or they'll boot me back to Chynah. I don't want to go back! Please, Kai? They won't bother me if I'm with you."

                Kai sighed. "Oh fine. But don't expect me to come looking for you if you get lost."

                "Thank you, Kai!" Rei said happily. "And don't worry. I've got a good memory."

                "And don't expect me to look after you." Kai continued, ignoring Rei's joyful response.

They are only paper tigers following me

In the wild imagination of the make-believe

And there's a fighter, a survivor arising in me

I'm not afraid of paper tigers

                "All right, why am I convinced you're one of those middle-class kids who run away from home just for something to do?" Kai asked as he dragged the startled Rei up the stairs.

                "No!" Rei insisted, shaking his head. "I swear I've lived on the streets my whole life!"

                "Your claim doesn't catch me," Kai told him.

Night brings

Creepy things

And I hide away

                Later that night, the familiar sounds of the police on their coal-black stallions clip-clopped through the streets and they yelled back and forth about who caught who doing what and who was being let go for doing this and that slowly lulled the two boys to sleep. There was still drunkards staggering into the building on the main level. Any courtesans and call girls who had been 'employed' for the night were all… busy. A small child wailed from somewhere down the road, in the more respectable housing.

                Rei, for all that he continued to swear he'd been living on the streets his whole life, had certainly been caught off-guard when Smooth, the resident pimp, had come swaggering up to him and started sweet-talking. Kai had been forced to tell Smooth off and drag Rei upstairs before anybody else took advantage of him.

False fears

Disappear

In the light of day

                Rei's eyes flew open as somebody, or something, swished past the window, making the blanket that passed as a door start moving.

                'Kai already thinks I'm a rich kid,' he told himself. 'But I'm not. I haven't even seen an entire dinea in my life. If I start showing that I'm scared of the wind, he'll be convinced and there goes Rei, booted back to Chynah.'

                He closed his eyes uneasily and turned his back to the wall, so that just in case they did come, he didn't have his back turned.

The sun is rising

I'm realizing

The only thing to fear is fear itself

                As the sun began to rise, Rei awoke to find Kai already starting to head out the window. "Um, Kai?"

                "Oh, you're up." Kai answered, turning around. "Good. Come with me."

                "Why are you going out the window?"

                "Because I don't want a repeat of yesterday night, now come on." Kai responded, then slipped out the window onto the eaves of the building. Rei followed along behind him.

                Rei looked around, but didn't see anybody he recognized. Maybe it was silly of him to assume that they would follow him all the way to Jepin.

Now I am certain

That my beast of burden

Isn't worth the worry

                In the next few weeks, Rei still hadn't seen hide nor hair of anybody from Chynah. Slowly, he relaxed and actually found himself enjoying the freedom of sorts that the streets of Jepin held. While back in Chynah, the police were apt to arrest you if you didn't have a job of some sort or weren't in a group who had a legal breadwinner, the Jepin police could care less. So long as they didn't see you taking stuff from the stalls, you were fairly free to do what you pleased.

They are only paper tigers following me

In the wild imagination of the make-believe

And there's a fighter, a survivor arising in me

I'm not afraid

And I won't run away from paper tigers