@catastrcphc liked for a multi-para.
It’s raining - dark dripping drops rattling across the battered roof of the orphanage. It’s an old, decrepit building in an even older, more run down part of of town & Brock wouldn’t have noticed if one of the resistance’s bomb hadn’t gotten off, taking down one of the courtyard walls. He can still see the scorch marks, the only real tell-tale marks now that the rest of the debris had been removed & the cosmetic damage repaired.
It’d happened about six months ago & he had signed up to help rebuild the wall. Really, he felt a bit obligated -- it was partially his fault no one had noticed the bomb until it detonated, & it had been his patrol responsible for keeping this small section of the city safe.
It wasn’t supposed to mean anything more than that, so naturally, that hadn’t been the end of it. Not by a long shot. He’s spent damn near every day there fixing things up & playing with the kids when he wasn’t on duty. Mostly one, the one he’s slowly realizing he’s attached to -- who has inquisitive eyes & reminds him of his little sister.
He steps inside, out of the downpour, & makes his way across the cracking marble floor to the first set of bedrooms. It’s overcrowded, he’d been told, facing shut down. The children would have to be relocated unless they can have some of them adopted out, ease the financial burden enough to make other significant repairs. He thinks about the papers he’d been able to have rushed through, thinks about the passport that’s being worked up now.
It’s his last week in Sokovia. At the end of the week he’ll leave to go home, & with some luck, a small someone will be with him. The matron knows, & watches as he comes over, kneeling down by the little girl’s bed, smiling as he takes out a small stuffed giraffe & hands it over, talking to her in stilted but understandable Sokovian.
❛ Hey there, little one. Are you ready to go home? ❜
