Hang you like a lullabye

Tucker follows along easily enough, glancing around to make sure they’re going the right way. And to check if there’s any creepy still following the kid.

He almost trips over his own feet when she says that. Eyes wide, he looks down at her, eyebrows shooting up. “Wait, Wash is your dad? Uh… yeah, I definitely know him. Never knew he had a kid though.”

“Daddy likes to make sure I’m safe, so he doesn’t tell many about me.” 

They cross the street and she’ll tug him along. Seems like the guy’s gone at least. 

“Uh… I think I might, yeah.” He rubbed at the back of his neck, brow furrowing. The kid was definitely unfamiliar, she seemed alright though. “Damn right she’s cool. Biggest badass I know.”

Tucker tipped his head to one side, curiosity taking over. “Who’s your dad, kid? If I know Tex, I might know him too.”

“I look up to Tex a lot.” She smiles as she looks ahead, pulling Tucker toward the cross walk and grinning at him.

He listens to her, eyes flitting across a datapad and reading the proceedings. The soldier in question referenced an imaginary foot chase, but that was of little consequence. What did matter, however, was that she was his way in.

“No one shops while there’s an active insurgency, ma'am. To be frank, if I may, I could simply detain you indefinitely under the current circumstances. I don’t care to, however, and so I’m looking to make a trade. Information for freedom.” He pauses, reaching down to take a long slug from his canteen as he detaches it from his webbing.

“I need a man- I.E.D maker, old man, balding. I have word he’s in one of the apartment blocks around here, but they’re too dangerous to search, and the residents generally don’t care to work for us. As such, I’m hoping you can help us. Where is Stanislav?”

She’s heard of the man, might know him even. But the way he carries himself just makes her shoulders bunch up. Leaning back against the chair, Amelia will lick her lips and let her eyes wander up to the florescent lights and think. 

“Yeah, cause innocents starving and kids getting sick should get in the way of your little spat with those who don’t want to live under military rule.” The ginger should bite her tongue, she should know better. Her father would probably be pulling his hair out if he knew.

“Works for me,” he says, offering a smile down at her. Tucker keeps his steps even, a little slower than usual to keep pace with the child.

Blinking, his eyebrows shoot up. “Aunt Tex? Uh… You don’t mean a scary blonde chick who wears a lot of black, do you?”

She has to mean a different Tex. There’s no way.

“Do you know Aunt Tex?” She looks a bit excited, probably squeezing his hand and turning to him more. Those little eyes sparkle and she is so, so cute. 

Amelia might giggle at his missteps but just reach out and take his hand. 

“If we hold hands, the man will stop following us.” She will follow him happily, quickening her step to fall in line with him. 

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. The job was supposed quick; they distract and she grabs the medicine and gets out. In the hectic first week no one went outside unless they were suicidal or had something to prove so in the apartment complexes people suffered. They would ration and trade food and goods, but medicine seemed to be in the shortest supply. So an excursion to steal from the local convenience store - the owner as tight as a stack of unmarked bills with a bomb on it - would never allow some teenagers to come buy cough medicine and Cheerios. 

So when the police came after them and they all scattered, the ginger had tried to get up a and over a fence through a junk yard. Just so happened that a trooper had been there investigating some thefts and she’d run right into him. Looking at the white walls, Amelia expected something worse; blood stains, a few bodies hell, even the gallows. But no, she was in this room with a two way mirror and a man who’d already been through hell. 

The teenager doesn’t look at her father, still covering her face with a hand from the blood that still pours from her nose. This was what, the fourth fight this week? 

Wash will press a kiss to her cheek before setting his daughter back down on the ground. He leans on the counter a little, reaching up to snag the cookies in question && handing them down to the little ginger. ❝ Not usually, no. ❞ He agrees. ❝ That doesn’t mean she can’t. Or that she’s any less because she does.❞

Amelia will slowly nibble at the cookies and huff just a little. 

"Why be pink OR purple when you can be BOTH?"

“…. if ya keep it a secret, ah’ll let ya watch it on Grif’s datapad.” Sarge no.