Eightyears previously a small, scrawny boy sat on a wooden crate outside his grandfather's small market. The boy twiddled his thumbs and hummed a nursery rhyme he'd learned in church. He had dark chesnut coloured hair and very bright blue eyes. He was very thin; almost too thin. His size-small clothing hanging off his limbs like wet noodles.

The boy sat for a long time. Waiting, humming, thumbing, waiting...

A small Pomeranian ran by, barking at somthing ahead. The little boy looked up. A smile parted his chapped lips. He got up off the crate and followed the dog, skipping and gradually taking off into a fully fledged run after the small, white animal.

He chased it down the street until it ducked betweentwo carriages and into an alleyway. The boy could go no further. He stopped and put his hands on his knee's to catch his breath. When he looked up, he realized that he didn't know where he was. He turned around and around but couldn't remember which way he'd come.

"Grampa!" He called. But it was useless. The bustling crowd of Manhattan paid no notice to a small lost boy. The boy shouted the names of his family members over and over until he couldn't anymore. He walked over to someone's stoop and sat and cried.

From within the crowd, two burly figures came towards him. They were older then him. Mid to late teens.

"Whuttsa matta?" One of them asked, poking the little boy in the shoulder.

"You lost kid?" The other said, a nasty sneer spreading across his jaw. The little boy had no time to respond... or run. The two older boys picked him up and carried him rougly back to a small derilict building.

"Lemme go!" the small boy cried. The taller of the two slapped him across the face.

"Go do somthing useful, switch the lanter onto 'high' will ya," he said. The boy clutched his cheek, which was turning a brilliant shade of red as he fumbled around towards a faint glow in a corner. He found the dial on the lantern and turned it as far as it would go.

He was kept in that small building for nearly three months. Whenever the older boys would take him out to steal for them they would turn the lantern down so not to attract attention and whenever they got back they would tell him; "Switch," and the small boy would run over and turn the dial. The little boy had since grown thinner and wiser in his time with the older boys. He learned that one of them was a heavy sleeper while the other was not.

One night, after the snoring began he crept over to the teenagers. The light sleeper, Patrick, laying still on his back. The little boy wadded up one of his socks and ever so carefully placed it over the boys mouth. He breathed deep, counted to three and shoved the sock as far down the boys throat as it would go. The boy woke choking and panicking, but the little one just pushed the sock down further, holding down on the older boys arms with his knee. Within a minute the boy had stopped breathing.

Shaking and stemming tears, the young boy looked over at the still-sleepingfigure a few feet away. The next morning he would wake to find his friend dead and his slave escaped. And that's exactly what he did.

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Switch woke in a cold sweat. He was shaking all over. He was sure the vibrations would wake the newsie sleeping below him so he quietly slid out of bed and into the next room. He leaned against the wall and let himself slide to a sitting position. The same dream again. He hit his head against the wall a few times, willing the images to leave him but it only made his head hurt. He looked up suddenly when a female figure walked through to doorway, past him and into the bunk room. He let out a breath. It was only Mouse. Not Star. Mouse. Star was still probably fast asleep, curled up in the bunk next to Mush's. He'd memorized how she slept. With one hand up by her face and the rest of her hidden under the covers. Somtimes he would sit up in bed and watch her when his eyes adjusted to the light. But he'd stopped doing that recentlyever sinceMush and Blink had come in late one night. Blink hadn't seen anything but Mush had noticed and had given Switch a warning look. As if to say 'Not on your life'. But that could work. It could be on his life. His miserable, content little life.

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