Chapter 1 of the As of Yet Untitled Newsies!BTR AU (yes, you read that right)
Title: Tentatively "Ain't It a Fine Life (Gotta Be Either Dead or Dreaming)" but that's definitely not final or anything. If you have any suggestions, I'd love to hear them!
Author: Ellie (lyricsandhearts)
Disclaimer: I don't own Big Time Rush or Newsies. How sad.
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: In this chapter, Jack!Kendall/David!Logan and a little bit of Blink!James/Mush!Carlos.
Warnings: A curse word, slash, mild violence, possible anachronisms
Summary: In 1899, the newsies go on strike. In 1899, Kendall Knight meets Logan Mitchell. In 1899, everything changes.
Author's Notes: Basically, aldjksxhdiakxuckvnsayaisksk *facepalm*. I promised myself I wouldn't write this, but that didn't really work out so well. XD This is based pretty heavily on the Javid Spectrum, and was written for folkloric_feel for the Trick or Drabble event at bigtimerush. ♥
"Wake up! Wake up, you lazy bums!"
Mr. Garcia has every intention of waking all the boys up on time today, it seems, even if he has to drag them out of bed by their heels. Which he may have to, because they do not want to get out of bed.
"Up! Get up, boys, we've got work to do today!"
Half the room groans (the other half is already up and at 'em, damn early risers), but most of them eventually comply and begin to get up, one by one.
"Ugh," Kendall moans, eyes still closed, when Mr. Garcia starts hitting him on the arm. "What's wrong with you, I'm trying to sleep here!" But he's laughing and batting Mr. Garcia's hand away pitifully, and he slowly sits up as Mr. Garcia walks away, finally grinning, yelling, "All right boys, let's sell some papes, carry the banner, sell somethin', come on, come on!"
Then there's a lot of shouting and running and punching, like always, so Kendall has to maneuver his way to the mirror, narrowly avoiding getting smacked in the head with a bar of soap.
"Hey!" screams James to Strings from across the room. "You might wanna catch that!"
"Whatever," Strings says, glancing around vaguely as if a large, white, soapy bug might have just flown by.
James just rolls his eyes and runs over to the nearest sink (and it just so happens that Carlos, Mr. Garcia's son, is standing at it, which makes Kendall roll his eyes).
"What's goin' on over here?" he asks Carlos, who snorts and says, "I'm cleaning up. Y'know, personal hygiene? Maybe you should try it someday!"
James lunges at him, and they break into a fight (fourth one this week, but they're really not fights at all, more like petty, playful arguments with added fist), and Kendall shakes his head and goes back to shaving as Travis starts yelling, "All right, all right, break it up!" even though he should know they're both completely harmless by now.
"Uh, Kendall?"
He whips around (almost drops his razor on his foot, but catches it, thank goodness) to see crippled little Tyler, fumbling with his crutches and staring up at him like he's God.
"Yeah?" Kendall says, bending down to Tyler's level and grinning at him. Poor kid can't catch a break, but Kendall always tries to make it just a little easier on him.
"I..." Tyler stutters around, avoiding Kendall's eyes, until he finally manages to spit out, "d-doyouthinkIlookreallikereallyacripbecauseIdon'twanttoseemfakebuttherearesomanyfakesand--"
"Hey!" Kendall interrupts, furrowing his brow. Tyler's right, there are a lot of fake crips out there, but Tyler's definitely not one and Kendall hasn't really ever though that somebody could mistake him for one. He doesn't know how to respond at first, but takes a deep breath and smiles. "Tell you what, okay? Don't worry about it. If anybody tells you you're a fake, I'll take care of 'em for you. For now we need to find you a new sellin' spot, though. Sound good?"
Tyler laughs, and Kendall is relieved.
"Sounds good," he says, obviously feeling comforted, and Kendall ruffles his hair as he walks-- well, crutches-- away.
"Oh," Kendall calls after him, "don't forget: try the Harbor or Central Park. They're good sellin' spots for somebody like you."
"What about Bottle Alley?"
Startled, Kendall turns around and this time does drop his razor. It lands about an inch away from his foot.
He swears loudly.
"Stop doin' that, would you?" he sighs, finally realizing that it was Racetrack Baker who had scared him. He glares at her. "It's like you people want me to slice my own foot off, I swear!"
Racetrack snorts and says, "Who says we don't?" She grins and twirls over to where he's standing, grabbing him by the shoulders. "We could probably keep it cold and sell it for ten times more'n a normal paper."
Rolling his eyes, Kendall picks up his razor and sets it on the counter, giving up shaving for now because it really doesn't seem to be working out too well for him. "Don't wanna be twirling out on the streets," he mutters. "Nobody in their right mind'll buy papes from some twirlin' girl."
"Anyway," Racetrack continues, addressing Tyler and pointedly ignoring Kendall, "Bottle Alley is good. Lots of sympathetics over there, you'll get loads of sales, I promise."
"Hey now." Kendall walks over to Tyler and pretends to be astonished, putting a hand on his shoulder from dramatic emphasis. Tyler wobbles a little bit. "Ain't there a lot of unsavory folks over there? We wouldn't want Tyler here exposed to none of that crowd."
Racetrack shrugs and takes off her cap, shaking out her long, dark hair.
"He's gonna be a part of it sooner or later, ain't he, if he keeps bein' a newsie, right?" She quirks an eyebrow and glances around as if she expects someone to challenge her obviously infallible logic (actually, she, Kendall, and Tyler are the only three not already out on the street, and Kendall kind of wishes she'd hurry it up so they could get to selling). "We're not exactly the fanciest group in New York, if you hadn't noticed."
"We're plenty fancy," retorts Kendall. "We just ain't sophisticated."
"Oh, same thing!" she says. She suddenly pauses, looks around, and slowly makes her way over to the bunks. Before Kendall can ask what she's doing, she's already on the floor, digging under one of the beds.
"Uh, Race, what are--"
She abruptly slaps the ground, cursing loudly.
Kendall jumps and hurriedly cover's Tyler's ears.
"Not in front of the kid, will ya?!" he chides, eyes wide.
Racetrack glares daggers at him.
"Two things," she growls. "One, you're a filthy hypocrite. Two, somebody stole my effing cigars!"
Kendall bursts into laughter and finally lets go of Tyler, who rushes out of the room as fast as he can.
"That's all?" he asks incredulously, gasping for breath. "Somebody took your cigars? Well you should have been expecting that!"
"Shut your trap!" she says, crossing her arms huffily, which only succeeds in making Kendall laugh more.
"You left them in a room with a bunch of us! I mean, what did you expect, for them to be perfectly intact when you wanted 'em again? And besides, it's not like you didn't steal them yourself."
She mutters incomprehensibly under her breath, something about "boys" and "hidden" and "you'd think they'd keep away from them for a lady, at least."
Kendall stares.
"A lady?" he asks, aghast.
Race nods, appearing slightly affronted. "Why not? I'm a girl!"
"Yeah," Kendall says, scratching the back of his neck, searching for words, "but you're not a lady. Or maybe you are." He shrugs. "A news-sellin', cigar-smokin', cap-wearin' lady."
Racetrack marches right up, slaps him across the face, and walks right out the door, making positively sure to flounce. She grins back at him once before leaving.
He pinches the bridge of his nose.
"I deserved that," he says to no one in particular.
*
Kendall loves being out on the streets.
It isn't that he doesn't appreciate the room at the lodging house, he does, because he'd probably be dead if Carlos hadn't found him and took him back to his dad for a job a few years ago, it's just that he'd much rather be out, where he can see and hear and feel everything that's going on, where there are people other than the guys and Race, where he feels like he's actually alive and isn't just floating along, existing because he has to.
So he's off sliding on some railing with James, jumping off statues with Carlos, swinging on lamp posts, being generally not dignified, when this kid his own age and a little girl who has to be his sister walk by. The guy looks at him like he's crazy (or worse, somebody to be scared of) and grabs the girl's hand, mumbling, "Come on, Kate, the sooner we get there the sooner I can get you home."
The girl gives Kendall a sidelong look and an approving smile, and walks away with the guy, who holds tighter to her hand and nearly pulls her along.
"Logan," she sighs loudly, "he's just a newsboy."
"Logan" glances back at Kendall and continues to appear terrified, and then says something to "Kate" that Kendall can't hear.
He feels oddly accomplished.
While he's busy being proud of himself, he must be missing something, because suddenly he hears Race say, "Dear me, what an unpleasant aroma! I wonder whatever could be causing it! Perhaps the sewers have backed up?"
"Oh no," Kendall groans.
He runs towards the sound of the voices just in time to hear Jett Delancey say, "You're just lucky I wouldn't hit a girl."
"Hey, hey, what's goin' on?" he asks, laughing nervously. He turns to the Delanceys. "We got a problem, fellas?"
"Oh, we don't got no problem," Wayne Delancey spits at him furiously. "You got the problem, and her name is Baker!"
"That ain't your only problem either, ugly," Jett adds.
"Witty," says Racetrack, eyebrows raised.
Wayne honest-to-God growls at her, then, in an attempt to attack, pushes down a littler newsboy.
"Move it, shrimp!" he says, and Kendall shakes his head.
Racetrack, seeing this, begins to giggle hysterically.
"That wasn't very wise of you at all," she tells Wayne. "Eh," she shrugs, "not that I should have expected more out of you."
He grabs for her again, and she looks genuinely frightened for a moment, but several of the boys step inbetween them.
"Oh no you don't," James snarls at him, throwing a punch, and Kendall takes the opportunity of both Delanceys ducking to steal Jett's hat.
"Hey!" Jett cries. "Give it back, stupid!"
"Oh, sorry, was that meant to be an insult?" Kendall says, grinning. "What a coincidence, so is this!"
And he runs for it.
He manages to make it about thirty feet before Jett knows what's hit him, and thus has a great head-start to his advantage. He runs around the statue, around people and trees and actually rolls under a carriage and is pretty surprised that he's managed to not run into anything or get seriously hurt (he hears Race yell, "I got five bucks on Kendall, who's with me?") when he jinxes himself and runs smack into... Something.
Upon closer inspection, he realizes that it's a guy.
The same guy from earlier, in fact.
He stops for just a second, long enough to catch his breath, which the kid (Logan, isn't it?) finds to be an opportune moment to demand, "What do you think you're doing?"
They stare at each other for a moment, perplexed by one another, and Kendall finds that he can't seem to catch his breath, even though he's standing completely still. Logan is looking at him and nothing else, eyes wide and scared and calculating, one hand hanging oddly in midair like he was caught in the middle of waving hello. To Kendall, it seems that there's nothing else in the world besides them at that moment, even though it makes him feel incredibly self-conscious, and he catches himself smoothing back his hair. He jerks his hand back down to his side.
And then the Delanceys come barging in, ruining the moment-- or whatever it is, if it's a moment or a life-changing experience or if Kendall has just realized that he has serious hair problems and felt the need to fix them immediately-- and Kendall wants to kill them more than ever (even though he can't figure out why, but that might have something to do with the fact that his mind is running a mile a minute right now). He's still carrying Jett's hat, though, and he remembers what he's doing and why he's doing it, and it seems absolutely, perfectly hilarious at the moment, so he grins and says, "Runnin'!" and takes off again.
His head and heart are pounding and he still can't catch his breath, and it can't have anything to do with the running.
He doesn't know what just hit him.
He hates the feeling.
Chapter 2
Author: Ellie (lyricsandhearts)
Disclaimer: I don't own Big Time Rush or Newsies. How sad.
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: In this chapter, Jack!Kendall/David!Logan and a little bit of Blink!James/Mush!Carlos.
Warnings: A curse word, slash, mild violence, possible anachronisms
Summary: In 1899, the newsies go on strike. In 1899, Kendall Knight meets Logan Mitchell. In 1899, everything changes.
Author's Notes: Basically, aldjksxhdiakxuckvnsayaisksk *facepalm*. I promised myself I wouldn't write this, but that didn't really work out so well. XD This is based pretty heavily on the Javid Spectrum, and was written for folkloric_feel for the Trick or Drabble event at bigtimerush. ♥
"Wake up! Wake up, you lazy bums!"
Mr. Garcia has every intention of waking all the boys up on time today, it seems, even if he has to drag them out of bed by their heels. Which he may have to, because they do not want to get out of bed.
"Up! Get up, boys, we've got work to do today!"
Half the room groans (the other half is already up and at 'em, damn early risers), but most of them eventually comply and begin to get up, one by one.
"Ugh," Kendall moans, eyes still closed, when Mr. Garcia starts hitting him on the arm. "What's wrong with you, I'm trying to sleep here!" But he's laughing and batting Mr. Garcia's hand away pitifully, and he slowly sits up as Mr. Garcia walks away, finally grinning, yelling, "All right boys, let's sell some papes, carry the banner, sell somethin', come on, come on!"
Then there's a lot of shouting and running and punching, like always, so Kendall has to maneuver his way to the mirror, narrowly avoiding getting smacked in the head with a bar of soap.
"Hey!" screams James to Strings from across the room. "You might wanna catch that!"
"Whatever," Strings says, glancing around vaguely as if a large, white, soapy bug might have just flown by.
James just rolls his eyes and runs over to the nearest sink (and it just so happens that Carlos, Mr. Garcia's son, is standing at it, which makes Kendall roll his eyes).
"What's goin' on over here?" he asks Carlos, who snorts and says, "I'm cleaning up. Y'know, personal hygiene? Maybe you should try it someday!"
James lunges at him, and they break into a fight (fourth one this week, but they're really not fights at all, more like petty, playful arguments with added fist), and Kendall shakes his head and goes back to shaving as Travis starts yelling, "All right, all right, break it up!" even though he should know they're both completely harmless by now.
"Uh, Kendall?"
He whips around (almost drops his razor on his foot, but catches it, thank goodness) to see crippled little Tyler, fumbling with his crutches and staring up at him like he's God.
"Yeah?" Kendall says, bending down to Tyler's level and grinning at him. Poor kid can't catch a break, but Kendall always tries to make it just a little easier on him.
"I..." Tyler stutters around, avoiding Kendall's eyes, until he finally manages to spit out, "d-doyouthinkIlookreallikereallyacripbecauseIdon'twanttoseemfakebuttherearesomanyfakesand--"
"Hey!" Kendall interrupts, furrowing his brow. Tyler's right, there are a lot of fake crips out there, but Tyler's definitely not one and Kendall hasn't really ever though that somebody could mistake him for one. He doesn't know how to respond at first, but takes a deep breath and smiles. "Tell you what, okay? Don't worry about it. If anybody tells you you're a fake, I'll take care of 'em for you. For now we need to find you a new sellin' spot, though. Sound good?"
Tyler laughs, and Kendall is relieved.
"Sounds good," he says, obviously feeling comforted, and Kendall ruffles his hair as he walks-- well, crutches-- away.
"Oh," Kendall calls after him, "don't forget: try the Harbor or Central Park. They're good sellin' spots for somebody like you."
"What about Bottle Alley?"
Startled, Kendall turns around and this time does drop his razor. It lands about an inch away from his foot.
He swears loudly.
"Stop doin' that, would you?" he sighs, finally realizing that it was Racetrack Baker who had scared him. He glares at her. "It's like you people want me to slice my own foot off, I swear!"
Racetrack snorts and says, "Who says we don't?" She grins and twirls over to where he's standing, grabbing him by the shoulders. "We could probably keep it cold and sell it for ten times more'n a normal paper."
Rolling his eyes, Kendall picks up his razor and sets it on the counter, giving up shaving for now because it really doesn't seem to be working out too well for him. "Don't wanna be twirling out on the streets," he mutters. "Nobody in their right mind'll buy papes from some twirlin' girl."
"Anyway," Racetrack continues, addressing Tyler and pointedly ignoring Kendall, "Bottle Alley is good. Lots of sympathetics over there, you'll get loads of sales, I promise."
"Hey now." Kendall walks over to Tyler and pretends to be astonished, putting a hand on his shoulder from dramatic emphasis. Tyler wobbles a little bit. "Ain't there a lot of unsavory folks over there? We wouldn't want Tyler here exposed to none of that crowd."
Racetrack shrugs and takes off her cap, shaking out her long, dark hair.
"He's gonna be a part of it sooner or later, ain't he, if he keeps bein' a newsie, right?" She quirks an eyebrow and glances around as if she expects someone to challenge her obviously infallible logic (actually, she, Kendall, and Tyler are the only three not already out on the street, and Kendall kind of wishes she'd hurry it up so they could get to selling). "We're not exactly the fanciest group in New York, if you hadn't noticed."
"We're plenty fancy," retorts Kendall. "We just ain't sophisticated."
"Oh, same thing!" she says. She suddenly pauses, looks around, and slowly makes her way over to the bunks. Before Kendall can ask what she's doing, she's already on the floor, digging under one of the beds.
"Uh, Race, what are--"
She abruptly slaps the ground, cursing loudly.
Kendall jumps and hurriedly cover's Tyler's ears.
"Not in front of the kid, will ya?!" he chides, eyes wide.
Racetrack glares daggers at him.
"Two things," she growls. "One, you're a filthy hypocrite. Two, somebody stole my effing cigars!"
Kendall bursts into laughter and finally lets go of Tyler, who rushes out of the room as fast as he can.
"That's all?" he asks incredulously, gasping for breath. "Somebody took your cigars? Well you should have been expecting that!"
"Shut your trap!" she says, crossing her arms huffily, which only succeeds in making Kendall laugh more.
"You left them in a room with a bunch of us! I mean, what did you expect, for them to be perfectly intact when you wanted 'em again? And besides, it's not like you didn't steal them yourself."
She mutters incomprehensibly under her breath, something about "boys" and "hidden" and "you'd think they'd keep away from them for a lady, at least."
Kendall stares.
"A lady?" he asks, aghast.
Race nods, appearing slightly affronted. "Why not? I'm a girl!"
"Yeah," Kendall says, scratching the back of his neck, searching for words, "but you're not a lady. Or maybe you are." He shrugs. "A news-sellin', cigar-smokin', cap-wearin' lady."
Racetrack marches right up, slaps him across the face, and walks right out the door, making positively sure to flounce. She grins back at him once before leaving.
He pinches the bridge of his nose.
"I deserved that," he says to no one in particular.
*
Kendall loves being out on the streets.
It isn't that he doesn't appreciate the room at the lodging house, he does, because he'd probably be dead if Carlos hadn't found him and took him back to his dad for a job a few years ago, it's just that he'd much rather be out, where he can see and hear and feel everything that's going on, where there are people other than the guys and Race, where he feels like he's actually alive and isn't just floating along, existing because he has to.
So he's off sliding on some railing with James, jumping off statues with Carlos, swinging on lamp posts, being generally not dignified, when this kid his own age and a little girl who has to be his sister walk by. The guy looks at him like he's crazy (or worse, somebody to be scared of) and grabs the girl's hand, mumbling, "Come on, Kate, the sooner we get there the sooner I can get you home."
The girl gives Kendall a sidelong look and an approving smile, and walks away with the guy, who holds tighter to her hand and nearly pulls her along.
"Logan," she sighs loudly, "he's just a newsboy."
"Logan" glances back at Kendall and continues to appear terrified, and then says something to "Kate" that Kendall can't hear.
He feels oddly accomplished.
While he's busy being proud of himself, he must be missing something, because suddenly he hears Race say, "Dear me, what an unpleasant aroma! I wonder whatever could be causing it! Perhaps the sewers have backed up?"
"Oh no," Kendall groans.
He runs towards the sound of the voices just in time to hear Jett Delancey say, "You're just lucky I wouldn't hit a girl."
"Hey, hey, what's goin' on?" he asks, laughing nervously. He turns to the Delanceys. "We got a problem, fellas?"
"Oh, we don't got no problem," Wayne Delancey spits at him furiously. "You got the problem, and her name is Baker!"
"That ain't your only problem either, ugly," Jett adds.
"Witty," says Racetrack, eyebrows raised.
Wayne honest-to-God growls at her, then, in an attempt to attack, pushes down a littler newsboy.
"Move it, shrimp!" he says, and Kendall shakes his head.
Racetrack, seeing this, begins to giggle hysterically.
"That wasn't very wise of you at all," she tells Wayne. "Eh," she shrugs, "not that I should have expected more out of you."
He grabs for her again, and she looks genuinely frightened for a moment, but several of the boys step inbetween them.
"Oh no you don't," James snarls at him, throwing a punch, and Kendall takes the opportunity of both Delanceys ducking to steal Jett's hat.
"Hey!" Jett cries. "Give it back, stupid!"
"Oh, sorry, was that meant to be an insult?" Kendall says, grinning. "What a coincidence, so is this!"
And he runs for it.
He manages to make it about thirty feet before Jett knows what's hit him, and thus has a great head-start to his advantage. He runs around the statue, around people and trees and actually rolls under a carriage and is pretty surprised that he's managed to not run into anything or get seriously hurt (he hears Race yell, "I got five bucks on Kendall, who's with me?") when he jinxes himself and runs smack into... Something.
Upon closer inspection, he realizes that it's a guy.
The same guy from earlier, in fact.
He stops for just a second, long enough to catch his breath, which the kid (Logan, isn't it?) finds to be an opportune moment to demand, "What do you think you're doing?"
They stare at each other for a moment, perplexed by one another, and Kendall finds that he can't seem to catch his breath, even though he's standing completely still. Logan is looking at him and nothing else, eyes wide and scared and calculating, one hand hanging oddly in midair like he was caught in the middle of waving hello. To Kendall, it seems that there's nothing else in the world besides them at that moment, even though it makes him feel incredibly self-conscious, and he catches himself smoothing back his hair. He jerks his hand back down to his side.
And then the Delanceys come barging in, ruining the moment-- or whatever it is, if it's a moment or a life-changing experience or if Kendall has just realized that he has serious hair problems and felt the need to fix them immediately-- and Kendall wants to kill them more than ever (even though he can't figure out why, but that might have something to do with the fact that his mind is running a mile a minute right now). He's still carrying Jett's hat, though, and he remembers what he's doing and why he's doing it, and it seems absolutely, perfectly hilarious at the moment, so he grins and says, "Runnin'!" and takes off again.
His head and heart are pounding and he still can't catch his breath, and it can't have anything to do with the running.
He doesn't know what just hit him.
He hates the feeling.
Chapter 2