Chapter Text
“Billy..?”
Dakkar wakes up in a cold sweat, heart pounding, before he realises where he is. Aboard the Nautilus, fifty feet under the Arctic ice. And the boy’s face haunting his dream is no longer that of a boy, but a man. Yet a man whose eyes were the same large, blue ones that had once looked on him with such love and admiration... Seventeen years had passed by since that time - half their lives - when the boy’s love had been his greatest comfort, his very reason for waking in the morning. Looking into them again yesterday, that love had been replaced by hate, loathing even, as Billy spat out those words as if they were a curse. ‘I was of no consequence to you’. They still rang in Dakkar’s ears, filling him with disbelief, bewilderment, and the pain of an old wound reopened. How could he possibly think such a thing?! Yet, had he himself not felt the same way, all those years ago, when he had thought that Billy had left him, without so much as a goodbye?
1837
“Leave off, you hounds!”
The shout is dampened by the water in his ears, but he feels the grip on his head ease, and with the first lungful of air, wastes no time.
“So inbred and stupid…”
Dakkar remains superior and composed, as always, when he delivers this insult. As expected, this does not sit well with the Eton boys, who would rather he gave in, and showed them the respect they think owed. He disagrees. And apparently, so does the other boy, the one who has tried to save him, now laying on the ground with a cramped grip on his stomach.
Two outcasts, with no reason to find friendship in one another, except for this one, common denominator. Dakkar of Bundelkhand, a born raja, sent halfway across the world to receive his education with the English gentry, in a desperate hope to find that elusive middleground with the oppressors. William Millais, a poor scholarship boy from the East End, perhaps him being no less a victim to the relentless machine that is the British Empire. And in each their own, extraordinary circumstances, they find that despite everything else separating them, the common denominator unites them. In their shared exclusion from the camaraderie of the other boys, they find strength. Together. No longer alone.
Billy is calm, and kind, and unlike Dakkar, knows when to keep a low profile to stay out of trouble. He bears the insults with resignation, but with an air that says ‘Your opinion is worth nothing to me, why should I let it matter?’. This leaves the self-satisfied sons of the English gentry with little ammunition to go on in their torment, and at times, leaves them stunned. It is a different matter altogether when their target is Dakkar, for in those times, Billy will fight them tooth and nail to defend his only friend.
Dakkar, on the other hand, is fierce, with a natural superiority that vexes the other boys to no end. He will retort every insult with a worse one, and if it is mortifying enough for his adversary, be met with kicks and punches. Together, he and Billy make a good team, and in time, their classmates will learn to leave them alone.
They have much less power to control the way the beaks treat them, and some are just as conceited as the pupils. Although, there are some that find their quick wit and adamant resolution to go on undeterred refreshing, which earns them despising looks from the other boys. But why should they care what those insipid toffs think of them? They have each other.
1838
“Hell, I’d rather sleep outside than go back to the Long Chamber, Dakkar! It’s worse than back home! I never thought I’d say it, but at least it was warm, sleeping two in the same bed…”
Billy quieted suddenly, and they both looked away in discomfort.
“... I just mean you are lucky to be an Oppidan, is all,” he added mutteringly, running a hand through his black locks.
“Yes, it’s bad enough having to spend the day with the toffs, I suppose,” Dakkar said, trying to smooth over the uncomfortable silence, and to stave off the thoughts of how much he too should like to sleep two in the same bed. They were sat down by the Thames, under a willow tree swaying gently in the warm spring breeze, its hanging branches hiding them as many times before from unwelcome gazes. Twilight was approaching, and they should have both been back in their lodgings by now, but neither wished to part from one another. These moments alone together were their one respite from the ever ongoing battle with the rest of the world. Billy, being a Colleger, would undoubtedly get the short end of the stick if he was late, and they both knew it. He sighed, and arose.
“Well… I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said, his shoulders slumping with the weight of the imminent torment. As he started to walk away, Dakkar spoke up.
“Billy..!” he exclaimed, but stopped himself, feeling bashful and uncertain, as he only ever did in the face of those blue eyes that now turned back to him.
“Yes?” Billy answered, looking almost hopeful. Dakkar didn’t know what to say, and hesitated for a second.
“... Sleep well,” he managed to get out eventually, and they were perhaps both equally disappointed in this.