A/N: Alan Jenkins, Pete Mitchell's former Social Services Case Worker, first appeared during a phone call made during part seven of Seeing a Trailer.

Bonus - Alan Jenkins, Fort Worth CPS Case Worker (He needs a raise.)

Saber

The file on his desk seemed to taunt him as he looked from it, to the eleven-year-old playing with a bracelet cuff and humming, and back down at the file again.

Reading a file and actually assessing a kid like this... two entirely different things and he knew it. It was one thing to say the kid was a problem that had gone through three different placements in a year, entirely another to have him sitting here, humming an off-beat tune to himself and not acting out. Did this one actually have a problem with authority figures, or was it something else?

"Hey, kid," he said, getting his attention. The kid jumped, startled and blinked up at him with suddenly-large green eyes. "Can I see that?"

"See what?"

"The bracelet, kid."

Slowly, as if he trusted no one, and probably he didn't, the kid handed it over and then glared at him. "It was Mom's."

Jenkins nodded and examined the silver cuff, noting that the bracelet cuff was too big for the kid's small wrist. The fact that the kid had an MIA bracelet which had belonged to his mother was indeed in the file, but... "Was this your father, Pete?" The words "Richard 'Duke' Mitchell, USN LCDR" glared up at him in a startling reminder of war far from home. He'd heard the stories, the rumors, of course, but that wasn't his concern right now.

"Yes."

Jenkins nodded again. "I'm sorry."

"Mom hated it when people asked," Pete told him, voice cracking with emotion, and Jenkins glanced at him, waiting for more. "Always sad after."

Carefully, he held it out and the kid took it back, snatched it quickly out of his hand. Possessively. Exactly what he'd expect, given the circumstances. "Well, it's a sad, hard thing, to lose someone and not know if they're alive or dead."

Pete nodded, sniffling. "Yeah."

Armor

Jenkins glanced down at the file, trying to glean something, anything, and his gaze landed on school performance. It made him pause, and then frown. 8th grade at eleven years old? "So... do you like school?"

Pete nodded. "Dad said I should always be eager to learn, if I wanted to fly like him."

"That so? Well, he's right." Good grades, a couple years ahead in school, in spite of personal trauma. He liked this kid already. "Favorite subject?" It was probably math, going by the file.

"Math," Pete told him, smiling. "I like numbers. They make more sense than English."

Jenkins chuckled and grabbed a piece of paper, wrote his home and office number on it, then handed that over. "I want you to memorize those."

Pete stared at the phone numbers, then frowned at him. "Why?"

"So you can call me if you need to."

Kneel

The rest of the assessment revealed that this kid, Peter Mitchell, did not actually have a problem with authority, or authority figures, but rather being personally attacked because of his family. Jenkins didn't like how the kid talked about being slighted, listening to how others slighted his missing father or talked about his recently-deceased mother. It, the behavior of others, had led to more than one altercation and removal from a foster placement, and also for his first case worker to get disgusted with the situation and ask for someone else to take him.

As Pete wound down from talking about incident after incident, Jenkins sighed. "Pete, can words hurt?" He nodded. "Can you do anything about the person that says them without thinking?"

The question made the kid pause and stare at him. "Yes?"

"Aside from react and cause a scene."

He thought about it. "No?"

"Exactly." He leaned as close as the desk would allow. "Sticks and stones. Do you know that rhyme?"

Pete nodded. "Yes, sir. Words can hurt, though."

"And they often do, but self-control is important if you want to fly like your father. Understood?" He waited for the realization to crawl across the kid's face, and then he was nodding. "Good."