Chapter Text
Anya was no stranger to harshness.
She skipped to poverty striken places several times. She ventured streets after leaving the lab. She was housed in orphanages that didn't always have food or warm beds. She was even adopted into families that wouldn't treat her to three meals a day. So, she wasn't ignorant to what the world was really like outside the quiet and gentle walls of the Forger household.
That night, though, it seemed her powers didn't want her to enjoy the peace of her father's arms as they read a story together on the couch in the early evening, with the rain gracing them with its soothing sound. No, they wanted her to be troubled, as always.
From where her head was resting against Loid's shoulder, there was now the feeling of emptiness followed by the impact against hard pavement. If suddenly falling on a sidewalk wasn't bad enough, someone bumped hard on her and fell down not less gracefully. Ouch. Two sources of injuries weren't fun.
"What the...?! Where did you even come from?!" The boy asked angrily, but more than everything confusedly. What kind of trick was the sun playing on his eyes to not see a literal person in his way?
Anya looked around, getting a grasp of her surroundings in record time as her hability demanded. So it was a skip and they were now in broad daylight in a city. There were few people around but she was sure some of them were paying far too much attention on her arrival, so she needed to leave asap. The stranger was some several years older than her, wore rough and dirty clothes, plus a cap that hid most of his blonde hair falling on his eyes.
Anya blinked, realizing.
"...Advisor?"
The boy would probably widen his eyes at the familiar nickname if it wasn't the yelling old man coming at a scarily good speed a block from them.
"Thief! Catch the thief!"
He didn't have time for any talk, so he grabbed the loaf of bread from the ground (he actually dropped a handful of things in the impact), got up in a jump and ran as fast he could.
Anya panicked as the sight of her father grew smaller just as the yells of the old man grew louder. Getting up on shaky legs, she did what was the most reasonable: she ran after him.
Turned out, Anya couldn't compete with Twilight on a run. His legs were longer, he knew his way around better and he probably did that on a daily basis.
This is how she lost him after he entered what seemed a death end alley at first, but when she finally reached it, panting and gasping for air, there was no sight of the boy.
Anya assumed he would've climbed over the gigantic (for her size) brick wall and jumped over it. They had outran the old man a long time ago, at this point, so that was good news.
Anya was alone.
She looked back on her way as dread started to set on her. This was bad. She hated not being close to any known person during a skip. What if it wasn't a matter of an hour, but a whole day? She just missed Papa and had no idea where to find him. Were they even at his hometown? Could she try to find his house?
One step and she winced at the pain on her feet. She just had her socks on while running across streets and pebbles and everything that made a town's floor. After all, she was safe and sound at home with no need for shoes. Now her soles were dirtied, her socks were ruined and there were even spots of blood on it from the run. One more problem she had to deal with. Anya wanted to cry, but she would still try to be strong.
The girl made her way back quietly to the street she was dropped in, mostly because she didn't have any other place to go. At the same time, she tried to think about the possibilities of this time.
Papa was called a thief and he wasn't dressed neatly like that day with his friends. He actually looked more like the one sheltering himself from the rain in a wooden box. So, this Papa probably lived in the streets, as an orphan. This was the war.
She frowned when thinking about him taking the piece of bread and running. Anya knew stealing was wrong. She would never need to steal anything in her new comfortable life. And even if it was something very expensive, like the collectors' Bondman dolls set, Papa would never teach her to steal.
But this Papa was going through very rough times. She had met him fighting with thugs in an earlier skip for food. He was probably always hungry and that's why he was willing to be a thief. Not because he was a bad person.
Yet, she knew her young Papa could be quite a handful if she didn't play her cards right. She still hoped they could be friends as well this time.
That being, if she actually managed to find him again.
---
She couldn't do much besides hang around that part of town in hopes to see him again. She found his dropped slingshot on the spot when they bumped, taking it with her with the intent of giving it to him later. Her legs and feet hurt like hell from so much walking around.
People would also give her weird stares and she would speed her steps. It was probably her lack of shoes and ruffled appearance, which would always prompt shop owners to give her the cold stare when she stood too close to fruit stalls or the front door of restaurants. They wouldn't want a street urchin pestering their business.
She wasn't even hungry yet, but she feared when would that time come. It was closing three hours since she skipped and it made her wonder how long it would take.
Anya was no stranger to harshness. It didn't mean she was eager to trade her warm home for the streets of an unknown place. She missed Papa, her real one.
As she finished another walk around the first block, she spotted the familiar form of a blonde boy in cap checking the perimeters.
Anya couldn't hide her excitement as she called and ran over to meet him. Finally, she wouldn't be alone anymore.
"Advisor!"
- - -
To say convincing Twilight of letting her stick around was easy was an overstatement, because the boy was very reluctant on burden himself with the company of such an odd child. She reminded him of things he'd rather forget, anyway. How she spoke of Luwen, how they were apparently neighbors even if he didn't remember her, how she even knew his real name. Anya was odd, annoying and even a little creepy.
But after so much nagging, he couldn't bring himself to turn his back on her.
"I'll give your slingshot if you be my friend!" She said serious, but with a slight tinge of hesitancy in her eyes, afraid he would say 'no'.
Anya was way younger than him, and from what he guessed, she was an orphan as well. A pretty recent one, who had nowhere to go and decided to stick with him because it gave her a sense of familiarity. He wasn't in the mood to be a wholesome savior of any kind, but he knew that kids like her didn't survive the streets on their own.
So, he decided she could stay. Even if she was giving him extra work that he sure as hell didn't ask for.
"How do you even lose your shoes?" Twilight asks annoyed as he helps her cleaning her feet on the river. He had managed to find her a pair of (stolen) worn-out boots so she wouldn't be barefoot anymore. "They are supposed to be stuck to your feet."
"I don't know." She says with a shrug. Some things just didn't need an elaborate excuse.
Her soles were calloused and hurting and they definitely didn't stop doing so after she got her new boots. These were a little too big for her, anyway. She still understood Twilight had been through a lot of work to get them, so she smiled.
"Thanks, Advisor!"
He grimaced as he helped her get up. He hated the nickname, but it was still better than her blurting out his real name for everyone to hear.
"We need to go before it gets dark." He said starting to walk back to the bridge they crossed earlier.
"Go where?" Anya asked stumbling to follow him.
"Home." He answered without looking at her. "Rather, the latest place I found to sleep."
Anya nodded, wondering if it was a box big enough for the two of them. Her real Papa was too big for boxes, but Advisor and her were very small, so maybe it wouldn't be hard to find a spot.
She looked at the river by their side and stopped on her tracks.
"Wait!" She called and Advisor listened, turning to her with a frown.
Making an effort to cup some water in her small hands, she walked over to Advisor and... splashed the hell out of his face.
"What the-?!" He stepped away after the unexpected attack, but Anya looked unfazed. "Why would you do that?!"
"Your face is all dirty! And we don't have a shower!" She said serious. Bath time was a rule from Papa so, young Papa would have to accept as well. "You need to wash your face!"
"This is so stupid, no one cares about being dirty in the streets!" He argued, wiping his face with the back of his arm.
"Well, I care!" She was the one to cross her arms now. "You need to have even a little dig.. din-nity!"
Advisor rolled his eyes at that. To have someone that size talk to him about dignity was so ridiculous. There was nothing dignified about the way they led their lives. He realized times ago he was nothing but a rat until he got to be old enough to be in the army. So until then, why would he bother to do more than the bare minimum?
But there was the weird girl bothering him to wash his face that would surely be covering in dirt and coal all again the next day. Whatever.
He crouched down on the stream and cupped some water in his hands, splashing his face a second time that day and then making his best to dry it with his t-shirt. He looked at her with a stare that said "Happy now?"
As if reading his mind, she nodded satisfied.
"You're much prettier now!"
He tsked and resumed his walking. Anya caught up quickly, even if she needed to grab onto the sleeve of his jacket to keep up.
He wouldn't admit yet that he felt just a little bit more refreshed after that.
---
Advisor actually did have a box. A very big one, that could pass as a house.
It was actually an old train wagon, as they were in a sort of abandoned spot at the local station. Anya had seen many homeless people like them, looking wary and suspicious of everything, but not many kids. They also didn't share their wagon with anyone.
She needed some help to get into such a high wagon, but she managed with Advisor's help. It was all quite barren, with some boxes in the corner and a pile of old newspapers.
"Are you hungry?" He asked walked over to the far corner of their wagon, behind the boxes.
"Just a bit." She wasn't lying, but she also knew that food was hard to come across, so she didn't want to waste any precious resources on mild hunger.
The boy pulled a loose plank of the floor and from there he took a small thing wrapped in paper. He came back and sat in front of her, both of them on the floor in crossed legs.
She received the wrapping and opened it to find two slices of beef jerky.
"I usually don't keep food here. People can just come and go as they wish." He explained with a shrug. "If you can keep it on you at all time, it's better. But it's also a lot of weight to carry when running."
"...You run a lot, don't you, Advisor?" Anya asked before nibbling on the jerky. It was kinda salty.
"I need to." He answered as if it was obvious. "You should start to get better at this if you want to help around, too."
She nodded. She didn't know how long she would be in this skip, but she didn't want to be a burden to Papa more than she already is.
"...What happened with them?" He asked after some time. "Your parents, I mean."
Anya was already on the second jerky when that question hit. In his eyes, she was just an orphan like him. She should be just as devastated as every other child who missed their parents.
Well, she missed hers, but she knew they were fine somewhere.
"...I walked by myself and lost them, when we were leaving Luwen." She said it simply. "But I'll find them later."
He raised an eyebrow.
"How are you so sure?"
"I just know." She said with a small giggle. "I also have you to take care of me!"
The boy scoffed at that. Why would he expect a child to talk about something seriously?
After their dinner (Anya couldn't finish the second jerky, so it was the older's meal), there wasn't much to do besides lay down and call it a day.
The newspapers were their makeshift blanket and Anya would hug the older's arm for the lack of any plushie to keep her company. He found it obnoxious, but really wouldn't mind the extra warmth as long as she didn't use his dominant hand. After all, he needed that to hold the knife in case someone disturbed their sleep.
It was a tiring day, he got a brand new responsibility on his hand, but the young boy couldn't deny it was somehow pleasant to have someone wish him "good night" after so long.