One-Shot 3: The Lullaby

Travis Stoll made his way to the front steps of his house. It was three something A.M. and he had just come back from his job at the White House. The government computer system department (that would be him plus a bunch of other people.) had been busy all night trying to hack into North Korea's computer system. And to no avail, they still couldn't hack onto the database.

As he searched lazily for his key he thought about what his brother said. "Hey, at least you don't have to take pictures of bloody bodies," Connor mused a while back as he took a picture of his daughter, Jana. "Taking pictures of nice living things is nice once in a while." Connor worked as a NYC crime scene photographer person.

He found the house key and jabbed it into the door knob then he twisted and the door opened.

He entered the house. It was clean as usual, he smiled at the thought at Katie yelling at him for being disorganized and how she wasn't going to clean the house anymore. But yet she always did because she hated when she saw messy rooms as did their son Jacob.

He headed upstairs and was about to walk into his and Katie's room when he saw his small son sitting in the hallway looking at frog that he probably caught outside in the backyard. "Hey Kiddo," Travis yawned as he messed up his kid's hair which was already all messy probably from Hailey tugging at Jacob's hair all the time.

Jacob looked up with his big hazel eyes and blinked a few times before saying, "Hi dad, what are you doing home so late?"

Travis smiled, "Work," he replied.

Jacob let go of the frog for a moment but then re-caught it as it tried to hop away. "Oh," Jacob replied. Travis knew that Jacob wanted to ask more but he knew no matter how much he would ask about his father's job, his father wouldn't tell him. Part of some government thing where you couldn't tell anything about your job and such.

In which Hailey later in life said, "Wow, that's just a bunch of bullshit right there." And then that earned a 'HAILEY!' from their mother, a laugh from their father, a small smile from her brother, and a confused look from her little sister.

Jacob said goodbye and left his father to let the frog free. Travis made his way to his bedroom and swung open the door like he'd usually do to annoy Katie Stoll. He was going to annoy her awake but then he remembered that she gave birth just a few days ago.

He looked at his wife whose head was buried into his pillow. There were bags under her eyes and the whole time at the hospital she was freaking out about how they gods would curse their newly born daughter and if she was the actual one to be the host of Gaea.

He assured her not to worry until they grew up, which he thought would be a long time but little did he know how much he would miss them being small and how he'd think how fast the years gone by.

She opened one eye and gave him a dirty look. He just smiled and leaned over to kiss her cheek. She closed her eyes out of sleep and he went over to the drawer and pulled out a t-shirt and boxers and changed into them.

He glanced over to her and wondered how he got lucky in marrying somebody so beautiful and smart… the list could go on and on. He was about to get into bed until he heard the shrill cry of a baby.

Both parents of the crying child averted their attention to the crying and Katie started to get up zombie like. She let out a yelp as her husband shoved her back onto the bed. "You're not getting out of bed Gardner," he said sternly.

"But Travis you've—" but he didn't let her finish as he pushed her back onto the bed.

"You go to sleep; I didn't give birth to a baby, did I?" She gave him a look but tried to get up again.

"Yea, but still—"

"Sleep Gardner," he said firmly. But he didn't have to say anything because she was already passed out by the time he pushed her back to the bed.

He stumbled out of the bedroom and made his way to the room at the far left near the stairway. He creaked the door open and saw a moving figure in a crib. He let out a sigh walked into the room. He took the small a few day old baby out of the crib and held it close to him.

"You better not want milk because if you do, you're screwed Rose," he muttered as Rosie continued to cry. He lifted her up and put his finger against her puckered lips and shh-ed her.

But it still didn't succeed. He walked around the room muttering sweet nothings in her ear trying to get her to be quiet. He let out a groan when he realized he'd have to go his last resort that he didn't have to go to for Hailey and Jacob. The man was going to sing.

Now everybody at camp were decent singers (it was kinda of a given for half-bloods but an extra given to Apollo kids.) but it didn't mean that any of them liked singing unless you were an Apollo kid.

He sat at the window sill and stared outside at the night sky. The small girl looked out too with her mixed eyes of blue and green. (A/n: one of her eyes are green, one of her eyes are blue.) And that was when he started singing silently. It was so quiet that only he and Rose could hear.

She stopped crying and just stared at his lips which were slowly reciting a French lullaby. (A/n: I have no idea what Travis should be singing but just insert some sort of French lullaby in the context and you'd be good.) He made his way to the rocker and sat on it slowly rocking while still singing softly.

Rosalie made a few yawns before closing her eyes and falling to sleep. Travis was going to get up and put the baby back in the crib but his body decided he was too tired so his eyes shut and he fell asleep.

Katie Stoll woke up to find her husband not to be next to her. She rubbed her eyes and got out confused.

She passed Hailey's room and peered in. She saw a small lump under the covers of the bed and wavy brown hair sticking out of the entrance of the start of the blanket. She smiles and walks into the room and uncovers the six-year-olds head and kisses Hailey's forehead before moving on to check on Jacob.

Jacob was sprawled on the floor like a blonde cat under the window hugging a pillow. She silently laughed and lifted him onto his bed and left him to sleep.

Katie assumed that Travis was downstairs doing something like making coffee or doing something crazy like almost killing himself from doing something dangerous but which he claimed was the 'most awesomest thing ever'. She stopped at Rosalie's room and opened the door.

She was met by a grown man gently cradling a small child in his sleep. "Travis?" she asked. He opened one tired eye and smiled his crooked smile at her that all of their children, their children's children, and etc. would inherit. She let out a sound of awe thinking about what he had just done for her considering that he came home in the middle of the night and took care of a baby just for her.

"Hey Gardner," he replied as he got up and put the small baby into the crib. He walked up to her and kissed her softly before walking past her and back to their bedroom to pass out on the bed.

"How did you make her fall asleep?" Katie asked him, even though she thought she already knew the answer.

He kept walking without looking back at her. "I sang," he replied as it was no big deal.

Katie Gardner almost crashed into the wall. "YOU WHAT?" she shrieked in disbelief. He laughed at her reaction as he pulled at her arms to stop her from crashing.

"Ce n'est pas grand chose," Travis replied. (A/n: I know all of you will hate me for using French when I know no French but I just had to, DON'T YELL AT ME! I didn't use Google translate this time though… I USED REAL FRENCH SPEAKERS!) He stared at her blank look. "It means it's not a big deal. Gods Katie, aren't you supposed to be the smartass in this relationship?"

A look of irritation flashed in her eyes but she went back to, "You sang?" He let out a groan and grabbed her by her shoulders.

"Yes, Gardner, I sang. I sang to a freaking baby," he replied. "Now, will you shut up about it?" She didn't reply so he let go of her shoulders and walked to the bedroom.

Katie followed him and as she closed the door she said, "Oh, so I've known you for more than 10 years and Rose only has known you for a few days and you sing for her. Wow, so much love Travis, so much love."

He threw a pillow at her face to make her shut up.

This may have been a little OOC but oh well, it was as fluffy as I'm going to get. These series of one-shots are probably going to be all happy. The reason why is because if you've haven't read any of the books in the trilogy it gets pretty dark and depressing. I mean I don't blame you if you don't want to read a rated M story (because that's the first book in the trilogy… :P) but to sum it up the first book is ok and happyish. Then the second book is happyish in the beginning but then it turns bad and dark and not happy at all. Then the third book I'm still working on so I won't give any spoilers for that but so far it's tumbling into darkness. And I've already spoiled it for my trilogy readers by saying it was a trilogy… oh well.

And if you've haven't read any of the books in the trilogy then yes, Travis speaks French. Why you ask? Because he is Travis Fucking Stoll and he is amazing. :D

Also going back to the Trilogy I've never made my characters talk about Travis' job because at that time I had no idea what Travis should be so I just floated along never saying what he did. BUT NOW I HAVE AN EXCUSE HUZZAH! Hooray for figuring out things at the last moment!

And I just realized that this is the longest one-shot I wrote for you guys! Haha okay byeeee!