ephemeraltea prompted: it takes a village to raise a child. but for Junior, the only one left is Carolina.
I feel like I'm being exceptionally mean to Carolina this time around in the War.
Red vs Blue and related properties © Rooster Teeth
story © RenaRoo
What's Next?
Once, as a joke, she and York had talked about children.
It was a joke in the most stretched definition of the word, one of drunken prattling and York incapable of taking the social cue to change subjects until it was nearly a fight. He might have thought the subject was worth joking about but Carolina didn't.
She never had any grandparents, and the constant moving not just between states but planets andsystems was enough to keep her parents from forming any social attachments let alone allow her.
By the time she was old enough to stand and comprehend what the letter in the uniformed man's hand meant, she was old enough to know what weight was behind her father's horrified stare as he looked at her and asked no one in particular, "What am I supposed to do?"
What indeed.
She stared at him.
Lavernius Tucker Junior had had an unusual childhood. He had traveled across planets and star systems, was held as an important figurehead for a religion beyond even Carolina's adult level of comprehension, and he liked to make lewd jokes in the language least spoken in whatever area he was standing.
He had a sharp right hook he had learned as a baby. He talked about wanting to visit Earth's moon to see all the three places that Caboose never shut up about. He had special ordered converses that were one of a kind that an entire troop of simulation soldiers pulled wages together to help buy. And he had cried for three days straight at the funerals.
And then he was there. Standing in the door with a tacky Blue Army jacket, those ratty sneakers, and a duffle bag slung around his shoulders. Only nine years old and he had lost everything but the things over his shoulder.
Well. And her.
Carolina had never had real parents. Not that she could remember – just two ghosts, one she barely understood as more than a fairy tale, the other not having the decency to leave his body like he so obviously wanted to each and every day.
So, for the first time in her life, she stood there in magnificent horror and felt a connection to her father she always feared.
"What am I supposed to do?" she asked, echoing from years past.
Junior's head dropped, his mandibles quivering.
She was not prepared for this, and if she was truthful with herself she knew that she was never going to be truly prepared for it, but this way? With this child?
For whatever faults she had seen in the troopers, her all-too-temporary family, she had known that they were special. That they were a unit, and in the way they took care of the alien child even from a distance that had never proved more true.
How was anyone supposed to go from that to having her, the poorest of all substitutes? Let alone achild.
When it was painfully obvious that neither of them had answers, Junior dropped his gaze and began sniffling. Maybe he was regretting leaving boarding school. Maybe he was regretting leaving Sanghelios.
Maybe Carolina was projecting.
But she knew one thing above all else: Tucker hadn't wanted him to stay there. He had wanted to take Junior home with all of them after everything was said and done.
Home. Whatever planet or system that happened to be.
Swallowing tightly, Carolina forced herself to walk forward, she took the bag's straps from around Junior's shoulders.
"Your father told me you played basketball," she said in the most even tone she could muster.
Junior looked at her before nodding.
"I played for five years," she said. "Longer if you counted playing in basic with the other soldiers. This ship… it has a very nice facility. We could check out the court."
The alien child stared at her before blinking through tears and turning away from her. He shook his head
"Okay, dumb plan," she said, feeling like she was drowning. She ran a hand through her hair and sighed heavily before looking back at Junior. "What do you want to do? Do you… Do nine year olds nap? Or…"
He sighed and came on in the rest of the way and made his way toward the couch of Carolina sweet. He sunk onto it and curled up, facing the back of the couch rather than her.
Carolina waited, stomach twisting, until it was obvious that there was nothing more coming of the situation. She went and she laid down on the bed nearby, staring up at the ceiling.
It was going to be a long trip to Earth. And she had no idea what they were going to do from there.
And though she would have never believed it was possible, she missed her friends even more.