DOE THE FOUNDLING.

Interrupted, again. Justin sighed before he really even processed the voice, just thinking distantly how there were way too many people here, always tripping over each other. No real privacy at any time. Annoying. The glance he sends over his shoulder is more of a formality than any real curiosity, at least until he lays eyes on her. A brand new face, but not one that he hadn’t been expecting. At least for a few days. 

“…our resident ginger ghost kid, this is a surprise,” Justin drawls in monotone, repeating more or less the phrase he’d heard from those who had seen her first. Seemed like kind of a heavy phrase for such a small kid. People here had issues. She apologizes for knocking things over, to which he just shrugs curtly. “‘Not my shit.”

Which wasn’t to say he wasn’t annoyed at her presence here. Justin wasn’t a babysitter. And he’d been so on edge lately, even the thought of dredging through ‘normal’ politeness just to be nice to strange kids was totally unbearable. He frowned down into the group’s stash and continued rifling around, his search for relief more desperate now as he forced words of greeting out of his throat. 

“In a manner of speaking. Too bad there’s nothing,” he slaps the side of the plastic bin in irritation, satisfied by the sound of something being hit, “here to help with that.” 

Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he turns to look the young girl up and down. “’You know where the nuns keep their stuff?”

Our resident ginger ghost kid. Doe finds it easier to reign in her expressions, then. No matter where she went or who she spoke to, they always seemed to know something was off with Doe. Sure, she wasn’t helping herself by hiding but, seriously, it’s a cruel reaction she thinks. A mean-spirited thing.

Not my shit, he says. The curse flung out like it’s nothing. It is nothing, she supposes, even if the harshness keeps her on edge. Some swore like they were saying a word as commonplace as ‘and’ but in her experience, it meant they were angry. That there was a good reason people called it ‘bad language’. The man she was with before the nuns liked to curse. It got worse when he drank.

Doe knows she’s right about this stranger when he slaps the plastic bin in frustration. People hit things when they can’t hit their real problem. Next, they hit people. She watches him intently, especially when he turns around. In a manner of speaking means, he isn’t hurt. She knows about people taking medicine when they don’t need it, about being addicted to it. Like a man who ‘needs’ to drink or a man who ‘needs’ to smoke.

It was a mistake letting him see her. 

“No,” she lies. The nuns aren’t ‘her’ people so it’s not her things to share, at least that would be a less confrontational logic if caught out in her lie. She doesn’t think he’s hurt. 

“You don’t look hurt. Even in a manner of speaking sorta way.”

It had been a while since he’d done this. Last time was before anything was official, at least in his mind, back when the group were just bystanders to him, complications to how he imagined his and Eli’s reunion going. He didn’t have time to care about the group’s well-being over his own desires then, and Justin was starting to feel that disconnected again as he rifled through the group’s medical stash for purely selfish means.

They were good people, here. He could use that. No one would look twice at him because he was supposed to be part of them and no one knew how little that actually meant to Justin, honestly. They were good conversationalists. Good fighters, good in general. But it didn’t matter whose wounds might have been soothed in the future by this medicine if it meant he didn’t have to spend another painfully-dull hour sober. Only, no matter how aggressively he rifled through things, nothing good appeared that he could use. Justin clicked his tongue, irritated.

“Fucking useless,” he mumbled, furrowing his brow and starting to pick through individual pieces, trying to find something he might have missed.

Doe had to make herself ‘known’ to this group. She wanted to believe it was through her own choice, but angry brows and the sheer volume of the others meant she had to come out of her hiding spots before she looked suspicious to all of them. Or before Angry Brows went through with his threat. Doe kept her distance, though. In people’s eye line and making enough noise to be noticed but not enough to become a problem.

More of them than she realized were OK. It made her paranoid. Too kind and too nice given the state of the world. She thinks it may be because of the size of the group. Forced to behave properly because there are so many eyes on them. It’s why she’s so interested in this blonde man, the way he moves away and differently when he thinks he’s completely alone.

He left the group. Slipped away by himself and Doe followed. The man isn’t raiding the nun’s supplies but his own group’s things. So she steps closer, quiet as she can be, watching him rifle through things and reading all the labels. Whatever he’s looking for, he doesn’t find it and throws a tantrum. Swears are muttered out and he’s angry.

Doe decides to make some noise to get his attention, startle him before he has the chance to notice her hovering. She steps forward and ‘accidentaly’ kicks a chair. It drags loudly against the floor and then she pipes with a quick, “Sorry.”  

She doesn’t have to pretend to be nervous about him with the apology but it helps, she thinks. Some people find nervous kids comforting because they’re not the worst off in the room. It gives her a reason to look him up and down. He doesn’t seem injured at all. She doesn’t trust him.

“Are you... hurt?” she asks slowly, hoping she’s wrong and maybe she could tell one of the nuns and help the man out. Or she’s right and has another person to add to the list of suspicious adults. 

She’s a quiet thing, a little nervous, maybe. Sam tries not to actually fall into the role of intimidation with her, not something he’d like to do and when she asks the question, he just gives a small smile. It’s nothing he’s ashamed to admit, nothing he’ll snap at her about. 

“Got a little too close to one of those big beasts,” he tells her, unsure if she knows what the names of them actually are. Unsure if even he knows. He knew what a scarlet beast was, he’d thought. And that they’d seen the one that he and Eli had gone up against and his whole definition of the world and what the monsters looked like and acted like had changed. 

It was safe to admit that he didn’t know a whole lot about the world anymore. Trying to categorize what monsters fell into what niche was going to fail him, so he tried to keep it simple. Demons, revenants, vampires and everything else. Things he didn’t know how to categorize and didn’t think he needed to. All he needed to know was whether his gun was going to kill it or if it required a talent and an ability that he didn’t possess. 

“Brought a knife to a monster fight. Turned out it’s claws were bigger than my knife,” he kept the smile on his face, but he could remember the feel of that claw raking up his cheek. Could remember what happened afterwards too, when he was just seeing an ocean of red. How his brother had been there, how they’d gone through the air in a manner of milliseconds, stepping through shadows at his brother’s behest. 

He should have talked to Eli more about that. 

“I’m Sam, by the way. What’s your name?” he asks afterwards. 

“Wow,” she bites back on the immediate, vocal reaction to his words. Claws bigger than his knife. She tries to picture it, the stolen knife on her hip, and what size animal would have claws that big. 

She swallows at the thought. All the monsters were big to her but not to this man. Some were giant, literally giant, but Doe simply ran away from them. She didn’t think anyone could walk away alive from that sort of thing. Yet here is, with no reason to lie about the damaged eye. 

The man’s still smiling and Doe doesn’t know if she should try to do the same. She doesn’t. Just looks wide-eyed at him and stares a little less shamelessly at the ruined eye. She restrains herself from blinking one eye shut, curious how he now sees the world. Later when she’s alone she’ll try it out.

Wandering thoughts are pulled back as he shifts back to the proper way to start a conversation. Giving his name after telling her about a horrific injury. Something that sounds scary even for someone older.

“Sorry,” she says quickly, a natural reflex to apologize for the fact she skipped the proper format of talking to a new person. She should be nice to the man because he probably isn’t the sort who wants to play the hero like in games. People like that would’ve told the whole gruesome story in detail, made it sound cool. Not... sanitize it like that. 

Sam. That’s a good name. Nice and short, although it could be a nickname. Probably is. “Doe. Like the deer.”

That answers that.

She doesn’t respond when he asks about her parents, but after that comment, Niko doesn’t need her to. He doesn’t consider himself the smartest man in the room on any given day, but he doesn’t need it spelled out more clearly than that. They’re both orphans, never claimed by anyone. And it has her name settling in with a different kind of clarity, effort put into keeping his face neutral as he wonders if Doe ‘like the deer’ is more like Jane Doe, the unidentified. 

He doesn’t ask. There’s a stab of sympathy that won’t let him drop his gaze, old, familiar wounds feeling closer to the surface when it’s reflected on someone else. Someone still living through it, still a child, still lost. It almost makes it worse when she laughs at something as simple as a name, because she looks too much like a kid then. A happier one, like he imagines it’s supposed to be like. For a moment his teeth hook the corner of his lip, old habit even if there’s no hoop jammed through it anymore. 

“Don’t feel bad. Didn’t make a difference for me either.”

It’s an effort to keep his expression cheerful, or at least neutral, that new awareness of the kid in front of him settling in. And a quiet regret that he doesn’t know what to say that might be comforting, any advice that’ll sound hopeful or positive. 

“Yeah.” He nods in easy agreement, a quick smile that’s half grateful for something else to focus on. Even if he doesn’t have to wonder long why she’s so fascinated by that idea. Chances were, no one stuck around for her that long, and he understood it better than he wanted to. That belief was still there in the back of his mind, that no one stuck around. No one stayed. A shadow of a thought that haunted him more than he liked, even with that growing list of people trying to prove him wrong. Even Castor. “The whole year.” 

He shakes his head, because it’s his hopes resting on the place and fewer of hers. He was the one clinging to that belief that his coven was still standing, that the man he viewed as closer to a god wouldn’t let anything happen to the rest of their family. And they were in it together now, little thought that Alice wouldn’t find a place there too. 

And he wonders how strange it would be to offer the same to the kid in front of him, like he can pass on the gift he’d been given when Castor took him in and gave him a name. “Nah, it’s just my home, but she’s going with me. We’re friends now, so I keep her safe.” 

He confides in her that the smiling didn’t work but it sounds like he's assuring her. That confuses her because Niko called California home -- wouldn’t that mean someone did pick him? Or, Doe realizes, he could’ve aged out of the homes. Too old to legally have a family. It always confused her, ‘aging out’, other people weren’t suddenly family-less at the age of eighteen. 

She doesn’t like this. Seeing so many similarities between herself and this man. Similarities she has to push as far as she can out of mind because she was different. The reason she was never chosen was her own fault, some bad luck that trailed around behind her. A sullen girl who bought gloom into every household. 

Niko’s words are silently answered, though. Doe won’t dare say it out loud, but the thought pops up anyway, the smiling worked on her. It wasn’t just the smiles but they made a difference. She can only hope it’s not a bad thing, that she isn’t being tricked into liking the wrong person. Again. Doe only sorta-smiles, that awkward tight-lipped tensing of lips. The universal symbol for 'I’m uncomfortable but let’s both pretend it’s fine’.

There’s more important business at hand, though, and that’s this Alice. The fortune-telling unicorn. Well. That sounds stupid (andkindacool) but it’s not so literal, it’s only the way Doe labels her in her mind. When he tells her that it is not, in fact, Alice’s home either, she can’t hide the surprise. Doesn’t try to actually. Some of that permanent shield’s she’s built over the year begun lowering the longer Niko speaks with her.

We’re friends now, so I keep her safe.

Those words stop her in her tracks. That’s too good to be true. Too... lofty a thought or promise. Friends for such a short time and this Alice is, invited to his home, and then looked after? Paranoia and mistrust threaten to destroy the nobleness of the idea in Doe’s mind. Only threaten to. She wants to destroy the idea because there’s a BIG problem with this very simply stated fact.

That BIG problem is how nice it sounds. How comforting and steady a thought. This lanky funny-named smiley man who made a friend and stuck with her. It’s not exciting and that’s why she likes it. The boring bits that no-one ever writes about in stories except it’s the part everyone wants. 

Doe’s quiet for longer than she means to be, chewing over the thought.

It’s her fault for asking, for keeping this conversation going because now she’s only sad and a little jealous. A lot jealous. It seems she wasn’t chosen before everything went bad and now the worst has happened, her bad luck still sticks to her.

“Where’s her home?” she asks, finally.

She grins widely to herself at the way Doe plays with the idea, working within it to adjust it to her own needs instead of shunning it completely. And she thinks she can comply for now, as long as it suits her. “We have a deal.” The words are firm, frank, paired with a solemn nod to stand as proof of her sincerity. In her mind, she imagines putting ‘baby’ in a chest, locking it shut with a great big iron padlock. “I’ll call you Doe. Or Doe-like-the-deer. Or 007, sometimes, whenever you call me 008 and we’re being spies. But only then, I think.”

It’s hardly a finite list of names she might use for Doe, of course, but she can strike out the bad names as she goes. It does feel, sometimes, that getting to know the younger girl is simply a matter of chipping away everything that is not, in the hopes of unearthing what is. She hopes she has the stamina for it. It could be quite a process.

“We could drive very fast,” she says excitedly, building off the momentum of Doe’s words, “and even do doughnuts, if we ever drove in a big empty parking lot.” She nods, expression drawn in consideration. “We’ll find somebody to teach us. Or I’ll learn, like you said, and I can teach you. And we’ll be like Thelma and Louise. Or Bonnie and Clyde! Except for the endings, I think.”

She pauses for just a moment, as if still considering the notion, before offering one final, very firm nod, pleased with her assessment. But her eyes narrow in thought not a moment later at Doe’s quick answer. As sneaky as the girl is now, Tali was certain it’s a skill she spent her life cultivating, and what easier test subjects than parents? She hums, and glances down the hall toward the door. “If you’re very good at sneaking now, and I’m very clever, I think that we could get outside. But first.”

She faces Doe fully, straightens her shoulders, fists planted on her hips as her head tilts in thought. Yes, she thinks that she should say it.

“I thought you might have called me your friend before now.” If she’s meant to talk about it with a bit more decorum, the thought hardly occurs to her. It must have been a month ago now, when Doe finally crept her way out of the shadows, and Tali was sure they could be something close to partners-in-crime in this very quiet, very serious monastery. “And my Rule Number One is no take-backs. So this, right now, is your chance, for as long as we’re together.” She reaches forward and, in a rare show of true thoughtfulness, holds out a single pinky finger, rather than an open hand for a handshake. She knows plenty about Doe’s secret spikiness, the force field she tends to so carefully and the way it can be turned into a weapon, maybe, and she thinks that a little finger could be innocuous enough.

“We’ll be friends?”

Doe nods once, sharply, as Tali does. They’re like businessmen agreeing to a deal. The list of possible names are all good, and Doe’s smile only grows as they grow. Three possible names, a good number. “That makes sense,” she says with another little nod.

Even if Tali’s fishing for information could be annoying, the next tangent is exactly why Doe has grown to like her so much. She joins in picturing it, the pair of them in a big flashy car driving super fast and leaving smoke in their wake. Like in the movies. Or a comic, with sound effects and all. Doe frowns at the two pairs of characters listed. Thelma and Louise sound like old lady names, but she likes the sound of the other two.

Bonnie and Clyde. Bonnie Clyde could be a whole name with a nice ring to it.

“I don’t know who they are,” something that Doe wouldn’t usually admit, but she likes the name. Bonnie Clyde. Hm. “What happened to them?”

The possibility of adding two new options to her list of names is thrown for a loop when Tali points out something Doe herself hadn’t noticed. She’d dropped the ‘f’ word. And not the fuck one.

It’s less tense a thing than it would be with anyone else, Tali managing to sound both surprised and cool about it.  An odd mixture only Tali could master and be believable. And, of course, she continues past it in the Tali way and Doe smiles with relief and just a tiny bit of embarrassment. She ducks her head, watching her feet, and listening to the first rule of being Tali’s ‘friend’.

The shift of skin and a flash of color has Doe’s head darting up in a panic. It passes quickly as it’s only reflex action whenever she dares to look away from others around her. While not panicked, she’s confused. 

Doe stares at the pinky held up to her.

A small, innocuous thing to anyone else. The younger girl looks up to Tali with a look of... concern. Doe knows she’s weird, that this would be no cause for a struggle in anyone else, and Tali must know this. Except it dawns on her -- and for someone who reads so many books and sneaks around watching people she could kick herself for taking even a second to notice -- that it’s a small gesture for a reason.

Tali noticed the way Doe avoids people and even accidental contact. And this is a small gesture to others but a big one for Doe. She was noticed. 

Someone paid attention.

Doe tries to hide her beaming smile, that swell of some positive emotion she can’t name that borders on the edge of tears, it’s an overwhelming thing. She sticks out her pinky and locks it with Tali’s. 

“Friends. No take-backs.”

It’s the briefest moment of contact but when Doe takes her hand back she doesn’t immediately hide it, one hand crosses over, absently rubbing her pinky finger.

She’s a weird girl. But a realistic amount of weird, given what little he can glean from her. Alone. Slightly smart, at least to the point where she recognizes she needs to be making plays in order to survive. Not so good at carrying them out, though. Or, perhaps, not so willing to take big risks. He remembers being around her height, intimidated by his lack of inches and understanding. He remembers that kind of worthless, childish fear being drilled out of him by commands he couldn’t refuse. Until he learned properly how to bleed to live. A hard lesson to learn without guidance, probably.

Still, he can’t afford to pity her. She’s young, she’s alone, but so is everyone. It wasn’t an excuse. And it didn’t preclude her from being a liability, if not a threat. Bryce looked her over as critically as always, her much-improved absence of sass and nervous fidgeting, already thinking of what might be the best way to handle everything that had fallen into his plate.

I like to make my own judgments about people.

“Also difficult to accomplish hiding in a crawlspace,” he pointed out, “or whatever hole you found. Speaking of which, I want to know where it is. ‘Not interested in any of your stuff. Just the surroundings.” Every hole. Every blind spot. Every single potential chick in the armor. Nothing that threatened them could be allowed to find it first.

Bryce’s features constrict just a tad when she asks his name. But it’s a minor request. One of the few things he can give without cost, that might make it less challenging in the long run for her to believe that his people aren’t cannibals or, in general, interested in harming truly-innocent children. “Bryce Edwards.” He stuffs his hands in the pockets of his sweats, suddenly remembering he’s in them and not his usual slacks. Violet’s waiting somewhere, though hopefully not consciously. 

“You might want to consider making your presence actually known so you can start ‘judging’ us actively. Because I’ll be mentioning I saw you in the morning. As long as there’s no funny business, no stealing, no stabbing with that sock knife, no plotting against my people, all I’ll be saying is there’s another resident here. You change, that changes, and escaping into the woods won’t save you. Do you understand me?”

There he goes again: criticizing her. Doe tries to not let it show how exhausting it is to be talking to another one of those adults: the kind who didn't like her or even try to. Like the ones who left her with the placeholder name and, frankly, brought all the bad luck upon themselves. Sure Doe seemed to channel this bad luck but she never hurt anyone who hadn’t deserved it.

After that, he demands she shows him her hiding spots. Her 'things' don't matter at the end of the day, they're worthless and replaceable, but the hiding spots are neither of those. Doe is certain he understands this difference too. Looking up at him and that stupid cartoon frown, Doe finds enough anger to speak without flinching, “No.”

If the rest of them are anything like Bryce Edwards, Doe cannot wait for them to leave this place. Maybe she'll get to throw something his way before he leaves, a little bit of her bad luck that could trail after him every time he frowns or is mean to someone like Doe. Maybe she’ll make his eyebrows fall off, or slide away like fat caterpillars. She bites down on her lip to stop the smile showing. It’s easy to tamper down any sort of joy whilst he stands there.

Bryce Edwards. It sounds like two first names put together. She considers how much she likes it but when he continues speaking, Doe decides she doesn’t like him so she doesn’t like his name. He’s going to tell others about her, an odd threat that he says isn’t one. She supposes from his perspective it may make sense. Doesn’t mean she has to like it. 

Do you understand me?  “Yeah—Yes.”

Sock knife, it sounds funny and stupid when he says it like that. Doe's natural reaction is to reach for it, fiddling with the end of the makeshift guard, fabric pillowing the blade’s sharp end,  And, um, it’s only for emergencies.”

Doe looks up at him once and searches his expression more closely. Sometimes adults were rude to her because they liked kids too much. If she ever sees this Bryce Edwards drinking she'll know to make sure she's never alone with him again. In fact, she doesn't want to continue being around him at all.

 “Can I go now?”

If his rambling bothers her, she still shrugs off his apology easily and he accepts it as genuine. Her expressions so far reflect too much honesty, whether she means for them to or not, and he’d like to think he’d catch it if she were just being polite.

It’s not a question, just a comment on something he’s wholly aware of. That smile that lingers on his lips as if on cue, but he still answers it like she’s asked one. A slight shrug of his shoulders accompanying it, idle fingers finding the holes in his jeans to pick at. “People like you better if you smile. Most people anyway. And I really wanted them to like me. Probably too much.” 

It still matters to him, more than logic or self-respect swears that it should. Ingrained in him too early on, desperate for someone to take him in, some family to call his own. Even now with the words past his lips, his own name seems like some vain attempt to hold onto that kinder moment. An old woman smiling fondly at him, instead of all the ones that came after. Most with too many children beneath their roof grabbing him firmly by the arm and demanding he stop crying out so loudly every night.

“What else did they call me?” It’s a guess that’s the question she started to ask, but it seems a safe one. His smile only wanes slightly, a good dozen answers he could give her. Other children could be cruel, called freak enough times that it might as well have been his name. 

But it seems important to feign unbothered by it, even more than usual, because she is still a kid. In a harsher world than he had to grow up in, and it feels stupid he still can’t shake it when compared to that. He settles on the kinder answer with a quickly flashed grin. “Steven.”

It’d be easy to let himself sink into those memories, that old heartache somehow always too close at hand. No matter what else he’s been through. But he fixates less on his own history this time, watching her a little more closely just for the questions she’s asked. How little it phases her to think he’d been in some mixed family home. It says more about her than it might him, and Niko hesitates for a moment, that question he hadn’t wanted to voice seeming slowly more important. 

“Can I ask… you have parents somewhere? Or someone besides the nuns?” 

He strongly suspects he already knows. To the point where it’d surprise him if she had anyone to name at all. But he still laughs when she comments on just how far it was, willing to linger on that instead if she doesn’t want to answer him at all. “Yeah. It was a quicker trip on a plane.” 

“Alice, BFF, pretty, dark hair, fortune teller? Well… not right now. Nuns frown on that too. Met her right when all this started. Kills at mini golf, you’ll like her.” He says it with more confidence than it might warrant, but he’s blinded enough by the people he cares about that he can’t fathom someone not liking her. “California’s where I’m from. It’s where home is. People I wanna get back to. Also, it’s rad.”

It’s a startling honest answer to a question she never asked. In fact, it even feels like a confession. Worst of all she thinks she understands, wanting to be the kid chosen, wanting someone to love her or at the very least like her. Just a little bit. Just enough so she’d be chosen. It makes her sad, actually, a sudden little stab of it as she looks down at him and his smile.  It’s why Doe answers an unasked question about why she doesn’t smile as much, “’Never made a difference if I smiled or not.”

Then he’s picking up on the question she stopped too late and Doe braces herself for names similar to her own. Except that's not what she gets. Steven. The simplicity of it gets a sudden, quiet laugh from Doe, ducking her head and hiding the smile as she shakes her head, “That’s a terrible name.”

Doe takes too long to answer the question about parents or anyone else at all. She considers lying, maybe mention Tali and exaggerate their relationship. Niko’s already moving on as she fiddles with her jumper, still, hand hidden away as she considers if or how she’ll answer. They sound similar enough, Niko would understand. Doe can’t decide if she wants this stranger to understand her because he’s nice and friendly but that doesn’t change the fact he’ll go at some point too. A future disappointment.

Niko’s laughing, though, at her comments on how far away he’s going. Not that she feels silly for it, especially because he’s agreeing with her. Sort of. And Niko keeps talking and describes Alice. He talks like he’s younger and it has her watching him, actually looking him in the face without scrutinizing him or watching fearfully for some give away to what he’s thinking. Just. Watching the person she’s talking to. 

Pretty is a word that makes her nose wrinkle even if he’s only being nice about his friend. She can’t help it. Fortune-teller, though, does get her attention, and the rest after that. A friend made after everything happened... and they’re still going round together? Doe rarely accepts the judgments of others, but she’s curious, more than curious. It’s like... like finding a unicorn. 

She blazes past his enthusiasm for his home — a concept that holds no real meaning to her beyond something described in books — because she’s more stuck on the idea of making a friend last that long. A friend like that who didn’t die on each other with monsters around.

“You mean... you and Alice have been together this whole time? Like... like a whole year?” She searches his expression for the lie. “And she’s from California too? Or is she just going with you?”

There’s a quiet innocence to the girl in front of him and he can’t help but offer a polite, small smile at her nervousness. He notices the way she’s trying not to look at his eye and sometimes he forgets that it looks as bad as it does to someone who wasn’t used to being around him. They don’t meet many new people and when they do, he just figures they all have scars. 

“I’m usually awake at this hour,” he tells her gently. “I like to patrol, make sure everything’s okay while people get some rest.” It’s the truth. He had odd hours of sleeping and was usually up during the night unless he was charged with driving during the day. When they’d come to the monastery, they didn’t have to worry about the vehicles so much any more and Sam usually slept during the day and was awake at night, making sure God’s Will held out in keeping them safe. 

He’s quiet for another moment as he regards her and he can tell just his presence is making her nervous. He wonders if she’s one of the guests at this monastery and when she’d gotten here, how long she’d been her and if there was anything she could tell him about the place. But first and foremost, he didn’t want her to be afraid of him. So he thought maybe he should address the elephant in the room. 

“My brother said it’d make me look more intimidating,” he told her, waving a hand at his eye because he knew that she was trying not to stare at it. But he didn’t need people to ignore it, didn’t need them to pretend that there wasn’t scar on his face and he didn’t mind if people looked. It was a natural human reaction to something out of the ordinary and he understood that. “Guess he was right, huh?” 

Great. Her spying hadn't been as good as she thought. Doe put it down to too many people to keep track of and the fact she spent most of her time ducking out of sight or sleeping whilst they were awake. The reasonable explanation that doesn’t simply point out she’s a kid who doesn’t know what she’s doing. The man explains himself in that voice. The voice reserved for kids. Gentle, slower, and more thorough in his explanations.

She gets stuck on that word ‘patrol’ and casts another curious look up at the stranger. Patrol makes Doe think of a policeman or a soldier, maybe he was one of those. Or maybe one of those others who pretended they were big tough guys like in the movies because there were monsters to shoot at like they had in their games.

“Oh, okay.” A simple answer to tell him she’s listening. Maybe he’ll let more little facts slip through. 

The man even calls his scar intimidating, while he's self-aware that doesn't mean much. When he waves a hand at it, Doe takes that as an invitation to look. So she does. Doe tries to look for the eyeball, wondering if it’s still in their just disfigured. ‘My brother said it’d make me look more intimidating’.

Doe frowns at this brother’s words. She can’t respond to that properly. If she lies, he’ll assume she does find it intimidating but doesn’t want to say otherwise. If she does agree then that’s even worse, just admitting she’s scared of him. Doe doesn’t respond either way, let him assume what he will and it won’t have anything to do with her. Kinda.

He has a brother, patrols a lot, awake at weird hours, has one badly scarred eye, and is weirdly calm about being stared at. An odd combination of facts she doesn’t know what to do with yet. The last one though, she can do something about. The dumb thing maybe, but some adults snapped from even one question too many.

“What happened to it?”

There are worse things the sisters could be, worse people the girl in front of him could be staying with, but he’s still delighted at her answer. That quick flash of humor that keeps his smile firmly in place. Leaning forward slightly, voice lower like one of those nuns might walk around the corner at any second and catch him talking about them. 

“I mean, what do they even do for fun? Sit around and talk about all the things they can’t do?” Not that he’s all that attached to any of his vices, and it’s funnier to him that it’s those basic theological differences that have him on the outside looking in. Whatever’s out there, and he doesn’t pretend to know, he doesn’t think they’d approve much of what he could do. Not when most of the living don’t. “That’s good though. That they’re looking out for you. I keep waiting to do or say the wrong thing and get my wrists slapped.” 

Though the joke would likely be less funny if he had been raised by a ruler wielding nun. And he couldn’t be sure if simply wandering around didn’t fall under that category of ‘the wrong thing.’ His existence might be sin enough, that quiet hissing in his ear fighting to serve as a constant reminder of it.

His nose wrinkles at her question, more out of embarrassment than anything else. “Sorry. That was another Pokemon joke.” 

“So, there was this little Japanese grandma at one of the homes. Real cool old lady. She used to call me ‘nikoniko’ then laugh and pinch my cheeks. But uh… I liked that better than anything else they tried to call me, so I kept it. Mean’s ‘smiley.’ Or just smile. Something like that. I was never super sure if it was a good thing or if she was making fun of me, you know?” 

“King’s uh…” He stalls out briefly, and even if the meaning’s obvious, it’s always harder to try and explain the man he got it from. At least in any normal terms, because he wasn’t a father. If he had to put him in familial terms then older brother might be closer. None of it fit right. Castor was Castor, and in the end he just shrugs. Even if that feels too dismissive. “Man, that’s a long story and I’m already talking too much.”

Which he feels worse about by the second, watching the way she shrinks in front of him. He almost tells her it’s okay, she doesn’t have to fist bump either, but he gets a quick bump of knuckles against his before she’s pulling back. His smile flickers, an effort to keep it in place just watching her reaction, a thing he can’t help but feel guilty for.

She asks another question though, and he jumps on that chance to change the subject. Ankles crossing before he folds himself into a sitting position in front of her. If it’s not his height putting that uncomfortable look on her face, he can at least take that factor out of it. “Venice beach. Well, I am anyway. And Alice. Everyone else is just ‘oh, yeah, California’ but it works out.” Not that he cares, callous as it might sound even to himself. As long as he gets home, they can settle in anywhere they like. “You headed somewhere? Or you think you’ll stay here?”  

Niko leans in, speaking in a lower tone like he’s sharing a secret. Doe only smiles at that. Tali said similar things. Well. She said things that vaguely fit that idea but she said things in her own, special way. It’s told as a joke, the idea of the nuns scolding them physically. Doe purses her lips, a silent response she doesn’t dare so out loud: if they ever tried it they’d regret it.

Doe picks up every little detail she can: and Niko drops many of them. Each nugget of information adding up to a much clearer picture of him. An alarmingly similar picture. So similar she doesn’t really know how to respond. 

She listens to the story and she’s thrilled by it. A big part of her ( that she wishes were smaller ) is jealous. It paints a different experience than Doe in her various ‘homes’. There were never cute nicknames like that for her. She was often told to smile, not that she smiled too much. A sullen child who brought bad luck where ever she went. Niko questions if the old lady was making fun of him and she only shrugs her shoulders. Sounds like she was nice, Doe thinks it was probably a good thing.

“It’s fine,” she says at the mention of him talking too much. It happens often with Doe, some people would fill the long silences she left for them like it was their job. But she doesn’t press for the story of his surname because she knows sometimes that’s just a trick to get out of talking about something. “It suits you, I think... I mean, you have smiled a lot.” One conversation wasn’t enough to go on but for a first impression, it’s true.

Doe desperately tries to think of any nickname she was given that could’ve turned into a cool name. A cool name where she could throw out a little story like Niko every time. It’d be great, she thinks. It must feel great to have some history that someone could share and it’d make them happy too. Not look at them with pity.

“What else did they...” Doe begins to ask about the other names but swiftly decides against it. Maybe not everyone was as nice as that Japanese grandma. Doe shakes her head before quickly dismissing it entirely, “Nevermind.”

Doe startles again, a quick step back quickly as Niko’s moving. Gangly legs crossing over and he’s... sitting down. Just sits. Cross-legged on the floor and answering her question without pause. It’s weird. She eyes him out cautiously, confused why he decided to sit on the floor, but deciding it’s not a bad thing just a weird thing. Like nikoniko.

Doe doesn’t hide the wide-eyes at his answer because Venice Beach and California seem like a whole other world. She’d never even been out of this state. No, not even this city. “That’s super far.” Maybe that’s silly and it only seems so far because she’s a lot younger and smaller. The next question is one she should’ve expected. People would always ask and she’d usually have a quick answer or a lie. The real honest is that Doe was simply going to keep going. She tried to leave before things went bad and that had to be good enough. It made her last this long.

She fidgets more considering the thought, fist finally uncurling but still hidden in her sleeve, picking at the jumpers threads. It’s a relief to know this group will keep moving but it only makes her more aware of how little a plan she has for herself. A whole group of people, with one goal in mind? It sounds too good to be true.

“I dunno,” Doe shifts away from her quick answer immediately into her own questions, “ Why California? And who’s Alice?”  Two rapid-fire of questions was probably a good way to see if he’d keep up his smiles and patience with her. 

She doesn’t mention anyone else in her answer. Maybe she wouldn’t to a stranger, which seems like the safest, smartest route for someone who looks so young. But it still drives home the thought that she’s alone, and for a moment his lips press together, fighting to keep that smile on his lips, and hold back any more questions. He’s not prepared to deal with a kid with dead parents, especially when there’s the uncomfortable thought squirming through his brain that they could be any one of the ghosts trying to whisper so desperately to him now.

He keeps ignoring them, nodding his head at her answer instead. “Makes sense. The gates are why we’re in here too. One more pit stop on our cross country tour.” The thought’s barely past his lips before he focuses on her again. “They’re nice to you? Feed you and everything?“

The words that tumble over his have him laughing abruptly, probably louder than he should be in the dark of night. And it’s only the thought of nuns coming to chastise them both that has him tamping down on it quickly. Still, he’s left with a bright grin, rocking back on his heels. “Shit, you’re the first person that got that.” 

“Picked it out myself.” Which was close enough to the truth. King was Castor’s name, it was given to him like a gift. One of the most cherished things he’s ever received. "It used to be Nikoran, but I evolved.”

His hand hovers there, for long enough that he notices, but he isn’t offended when she waves him off. There’s no room to be, not when it’s simply habit he beat into himself. Shake hands, be polite, as if those things could compensate for everything else that was wrong with him. “No ‘sorry’s.’ What are you even sorry for?” 

His fingers curl into a fist instead, and he can’t pretend that part of it isn’t just him trying to find some way to put her at ease. “Fist bump?”

He's... nice.  Genuinely nice to the point Doe could very nearly be suspicious but he's the first to ask really about how she's looking after herself. The question is more like something that lady from the government with her clipboard and boxes to tick to make sure she was in a good home would ask Doe. Caring but indifferent. It was her job to care, after all. It’s not his.

Doe nods, “Yeah. They're nice to me. I mean, maybe a bit boring but..." It's a small thing, but she genuinely smiles at her own joke and glances up quickly to see if he'll find it funny too. Except he's already laughing and her Pokemon related yelling isn't met with annoyance much to her surprise. 

Niko’s smile is huge, apparently genuine delight that she got the Pokemon reference. That train of conversation, though, is quickly pushed aside because of his next sentence. A bombshell to Doe: He picked it out himself.  Doe feels like a connoisseur of names at that moment, appreciating it and looking at the man it belongs to. She decides it fits him perfectly. Niko. An odd sounding name but nice once you get used to it. Just like him, she thinks, but he’ll need more time to prove himself.

“It's a really good name. Does it mean anything? Nikoran, I mean. King’s... obvious,” and she smiles again, something small. That’d be a cool name too. Although Doe thinks King would be a good first name for someone other than herself.

Niko tells her off for apologizing and she can't help the reflex to duck her head in shame and wait for it to pass. He's not being mean, she knows that much, but he's trying to making her feel better in a way others have scolded her. Doe doesn't want to touch him. Or anyone for that matter but... Maybe it'll be ok? Nice was a relative term and often enough people proved they were only nice for so long. Or they were nice and died. Maybe it’s dark of her to hope Niko will fall into the second group. Nice but not for long.

She forms a loose fist with one hand, takes a steeling breath in before she does it. A barely there moment of contact and she hopes he'll be satisfied with that. Doe's immediately pulling into herself, sleeve up and over her hand still in a fist. She pushes past it and moves on quickly, “Um, you said cross-country? Earlier? Where are you going?”

That’s more like it, Bryce thinks, choosing not to think about how he ought to feel about this. His purpose here isn’t to scare a child, he reminds himself, but to glean any necessary information for his group’s survival, from any source. A little pressure wouldn’t kill the kid, and once she starts to spill, Bryce lets up. He doesn’t get harder or step closer, just listens, eyes darting around her expression in his continuous search for deception.

There’s truth there. She explains herself and Bryce is able to put himself in her shoes for just a moment, think how it made sense that any smart child on their own would be cautious. But she’s not as smart as she thinks she is, in his mind. Bryce stays quiet for a bit, digesting it all, and when he’s ready to speak he first relaxes his shoulders, breaking up the tension he’d placed there. You’ll catch more flies with honey than vinegar, he knows. It’s just of matter of when to use which tactic.

“Tough call. Monsters out there, unknowns in here.” 

He examines her close as she anxious turns that crank to keep the light on. Sighing at what a handful this was becoming, Bryce straightened his back and looked past the child in front of him, like that was a challenge. “That was a real good try, but your mistake was lingering. If you saw how many of us there were, we were bound to trip over you eventually.”

He knew the group’s standpoint on stragglers but usually the ones they came across didn’t have shelter like this already. Face relaxing, he steps back as many times as he’d come forward, endeavoring now to do something other than terrify the kid. 

“You can relax. No one in my group’s got any reason to hurt you. But I’m curious. The sisters sheltered us, same as you. You don’t trust their judgment?”

Tough call, he says. Doe nods in agreement and replies in a quiet, tired voice of understanding, “I know.”

Monsters outside tried to kill without hesitation. Monsters inside had to be more careful about things because they didn’t want things as simple as a dead body.  At least she could have a break with the monsters inside before things go bad. And right now, the going bad may be angry brows and his big group. Doe doesn’t know yet.

He watches her closely and she hates. Anxiously she continues to fiddle with the torch, not enough to make that awful loud noise but simply something to keep her hands busy. The man compliments then criticizes her. She ignores it. No use in explaining herself to him. Angry-brows seems like the sort of man who wouldn’t take kindly to her talking back despite offering his thoughts on Doe’s actions.

You can relax, he says. She does the exact opposite, her eyes narrow for a second. He changed so quickly but he’s only less overtly terrifying. Scary, sure, but now he's more like a puzzle. He’s weird. Bad weird. People don't need any reason to hurt others, sometimes they just do, and from what he said earlier about this being a ‘touch call’ he can’t expect her to believe that, right?

She doesn’t know what question she expects, but it’s something she could imagine he’d ask anyone, not just a kid. So she takes a second before she answers, proud of it because she can say she doesn’t trust his ‘you can relax’ whilst answering his question at the same time, “I like to make my own judgments on people.”

She's not big on the nuns but didn't think it was right to gossip about them. They're boring if anything and the place seems too good to last like most good things in Doe's life.

“Plus people act different with someone like me, you know,” she adds. He thinks he's so smart. That realization alone shatters the illusion a bit. ( A tiny bit cause he’s still scary and much bigger than her. ) But everyone no matter how tall has a weak spot and this is his. Thinking he’s smart and right and better than her. She tucks that thought away for later, something to keep in mind if he becomes a problem.

She offers a confused frown to the empty space ahead of her when Doe seems to resent the observation. Quickly, silently, she runs through a list of other words she could use in description. “You’re younger than me. You’re smaller than me.” Not by any dramatic amount, admittedly, but enough that it’s noticeable as she peers down at the girl. “It might be one of those unspoken rules, I think, that I can call you a baby. Even if you aren’t really.” She doesn’t mean it to be rude, nothing spiteful or derogatory to it. But she’s not entirely accustomed to considering other people’s feelings these days. There are too many other thoughts.

“I can’t.” She admits it freely, shamelessly, shrugging. “I could, I think. It doesn’t seem very hard. But I’ve never done it before.” Her parents were doting, bordering on overbearing, and always happy to drive her where she needed to go. And her teenage years were too busy anyway, her priorities elsewhere, to waste time on something as unimportant as learning how to drive.

But she frowns again, as they meander through the halls toward the exit. Or entrance. How subjective. “Mary Helen locks the doors.” In all her bold sense of purpose, and largely accustomed to getting her way, she’d forgotten to remember that. Her steps slow to a halt. “We could try to be very sneaky, I guess, if we want to see the cars still. Did you ever sneak out at night, when your parents were asleep?”

Her scowl stays in place but it’s more playful. Tali talks through why she called Doe a baby and, yeah, it makes sense but that doesn’t mean she has to like it. Especially because, technically, it’s her name. Legal name, that is. Doe wonders if this would count as correctly guessing her first name. If Tali knew she sure as would tell Doe it counts. The younger girl shakes her head at both Tali and her own thoughts. But she keeps the smile.

 “Let's make a new spoken rule, then,” Doe nods, very proud of her logic, “Rule Number One of being my friend is: You can’t call me baby.”

There’s no big reaction like Doe to ‘baby’ but Tali offers the little nugget of information freely. She can’t drive. Doe wonders if she’ll ever learn to drive. “Do you think someone could teach us? Or teach you then you teach me. I mean, it’s not like illegal now, is it? If we were to drive with no licenses or nothing.”

On a practical note, it’d be super useful. If Doe could drive... she wouldn’t have to rely on finding an adult all the time to stick with. It’s an idea tucked away for later. An idea that’s brushed aside more abruptly when Tali slows down then stops completely. Shoot. Doe had forgotten as well about the locked doors. 

“No,” she answers too quickly. Tali liked to do that, fish for information. It was frustrating yet understandable. Only understandable because that’s part of what Doe like about the older woman. She was curious about things, it’d just be super cool if those ‘things’ didn’t include Doe. But, Doe Bond? The spy? She has an answer: “Not then. I’m really good at it now, you know. Since the monsters and stuff came about I snuck around everything and everyone.”

It was late and it was quiet. As dark outside as it was inside, even with a few candles going to try and give them some sort of vision in a world without electricity. Sam had a flashlight with him, but for the time being, it was dark, down at his side as he slowly made his way through the hallways, letting the natural moonlight from outside and the dim candlelight when he got close to an occupied room light his way. 

Most of the others were sleeping and as much as Sam wished he could lay down and try to catch a few hours of sleep too, he’d found himself to be more restless here than in the past few places they’d stopped. Maybe because his patrols wouldn’t allow him to go outside of the walls. There was a lack of visibility of the enemy that he didn’t like and didn’t know how to get around. Not with the rules placed on them by the sisters who lived in this monastery. 

It was the light of a flashlight coming up the adjacent hall that caught his attention first. He stopped where he was and waited for the person to round the corner. When they did and he caught sight of who was behind the flashlight shone into his eyes, he realized it wasn’t someone he knew. Immediately, his hackles were risen and his shoulders tensed, but he kept a calm demeanor as to not frighten her. 

“No worries,” he told her, bowing his head slightly when she aimed the flashlight at his chest so she wouldn’t blind him. “Didn’t mean to startle you.” 

Doe didn’t hear him. In fact, it looks like he was just standing there. Or she’s over-thinking things and the fact his feet are stood pretty evenly apart in line means nothing and she’s grown too paranoid, trying to find meaning in every little detail she can parse out. 

He looks down at her, tells her not to worry and gives her a light apology of sorts. Nothing about him should be scary or intimidating but he is. Taller than her ( like everyone besides Tali ), broad and serious and. Oh. She can’t help the little gasp. Of course, Doe had ‘spied’ on this group. She’d seen something was up with this guy’s eye from afar but... up close? It’s super messed up.

Doe takes a step back and forces her attention more squarely on the other good eye. “Sorry,” she says again, voice more panicked than she means it to be. She stared at an adults scar once, an injury from a monster and she’d been yelled at. Told it was rude. Even before she’d once asked someone about a missing limb and was berated by her then fosters parents. Apparently, those things were supposed to be ignored out of politeness.

Even more worrying though could be he didn’t notice she was staring at that bad eye. That she only made things worse because she’d flashed a light in his eyes -- in his eye and he might’ve missed it. She absently chews on the inside of her cheek and continues, pulling something, anything out, “I, um, didn’t think anyone was awake.”

There’s enough relief that she’s not one of the sisters that Niko doesn’t mind the short answers, or even that trace of aggravation in her tone. Most of the time he’s oblivious to everything but blatant aggression anyway.

“Of course you’re not.” His cheerfulness doesn’t wane, even if it’s tempered. He doesn’t want her left with the impression that it’s her he’s laughing at. Only at how seriously she is when she corrects him, like he might really believe otherwise. As much as he believes in not judging anyone by appearances alone, the tiny, scrappy thing in front of him doesn’t look like she’s in line to take her vows any time soon.

“You just hang out with them?” It’s the closest he’ll come to asking if she has parents hiding out here too, when it’s an easy assumption that the answer’s probably no. Just about everyone’s lost someone. If she’s sneaking around here by herself, she’s probably alone.

Though it’s tempting to ask just which one of her parents came up with the name she gives him, a thing he keeps to himself. “Huh. That’s a cool name.” 

He offers his hand out as he introduces himself, a habit he’s never bothered to try and rid himself of. Runes still etched on the back of his hands in black sharpie, but it doesn’t occur to him to try and hide them from her. Maybe the nuns. It seems like something they might frown on.  “Niko King. Not like the pokemon.” 

He’s still friendly and cheerful despite Doe’s short answers. The tall man agrees she’s definitely not a nun, and it hits Doe that he was probably just joking with her. Definitely was joking and she’d gone and taken it too seriously. 

“Yeah. Just for now...” It’s enough of an answer, she thinks, that he may not pry beyond that. Or he will. Ask why it’s only ‘temporary’ or how long she’s been here. Doe decides to beat him to the punch, abruptly continuing to explain herself more, “There's more monsters than usual outside so I starting hanging out with them. ‘Cause of the gates. ” It was an odd way to think of it. Hanging out with nuns. It’s nearly a funny thought. 

There’s never any time to even smile, though, because he does say something about her name. It’s not a lot but she knows he might be fishing for more. So she nods with a barely audible ‘thanks’ and hopes they’ll move swiftly on

Doe’s grip tightens on the torch as he holds out a hand to greet her ‘properly’. Nikoking. She gasps in recognition. “Like the pokemon?” Doe blurts out the words, stumbling to an awkward stop as he’s saying practically the same sentence with one key addition: ‘not’.

“Oh. Sorry, it’s just... that’s cool, you know? Nikoking. Two names but it’s also one name combined? Like, you got a three-in-one,” Doe begins her ramble and only feels sillier by the second. Especially because now she’s completely ignored the offered hand and probably looks rude on top of it. “Um, sorry, I don’t like to...” she frees a hand only to wave at his outstretched hand. It’s then she looks at his hand properly and sees symbols drawn onto the back of his hand. She frowns and unthinkingly tilts her head to the side, trying to look at the back of the hand currently held out to her. “Sorry.”