PERCY and TAHLIA
MESS HALL, N.A. FACILITY
“I’m not a creep for fuck’s sake!” Percy shouted, his volume raising over the chatter loud enough to turn some heads. He noticed that fairly quickly, his cheeks tinging red.
“I-I’m not a creep,” he repeated more quietly, but with just as much insistence,
“And I’m not even that old! Hell, I wasn’t even following her, I was just getting-”Tahlia gave a bit of a backhanded slap towards Percy’s chest, causing him to stop mid sentence.
"I get it," she replied, turning her gaze so that she could stare into his angered eyes,
"I know you’re not a creep, but that’s what it appeared like. Hell, the kid even looks like your one and you looked like you were going to give her a good old spanking before sending her to ‘er room."“‘Cause she’s acting like she’s hot shit,” Percy spat,
“I mean, I’m not actually going to put my hands on her - of course not -” The red-headed pilot allowed himself a deep breath in the hopes of calming down. It didn’t exactly work.
“Oohh, she’s a turd. She is the biggest turd child I have ever met. - if she was mine, I’d have grounded her for a week. No nothin’.”"But she’s not yours, is she?" Tahlia didn’t come to the Mess Hall initially to start a disagreement with a fellow pilot, but seeing the state that Percy was in and how he happened to cross paths with her at the time, there was no avoiding it. She did happen to push his buttons a bit, so a slight change in topic was probably needed.
"Now I’ll repeat… Who’s the shrimp? She’s a pilot isn’t she?"Percy huffed, not quite being able to believe Tahlia
completely tuned out Graham’s introduction of Ryn, then nodded,
“Yeah, she’s a pilot, because apparently putting nine year olds in giant robots is just fine, and said child killing people is-” the thirty-two year old pilot put on his
best teenage girl voice,
“-just, like, sooo totally cool, right?” He cut the mockery of all teenaged girls before continuing,
“Excuse me if I don’t get off on murder, for fuck’s sake.” Just after he said that, he realized how awful he was being. What grown ass man mocks and makes fun of a kid, even if said kid is
the most grating, aggravating, and sarcastic little turd? He turned to make sure Ryn wasn’t close enough to hear him being an immature manchild - thankfully she was sitting down a ways away - then looked back to Tahlia like he was definitely expecting to be smacked, if not flat-out punched, in the face.
Tahlia understood where Percy was coming from, knowing that not every person was excited about the prospect of taking another person’s life, but the world they lived in didn’t always offer that charm and many had to commit the evil deed just to simply survive.
"I was 14 when I entered my first NC. Wasn’t my choice either." Tahlia dropped the light bombshell onto Percy to mostly see what his reaction would be,
"Red Star orders. Either you served the corporation or you were told to fend for yourself. That one-" pointing her thumb over her shoulder in the direction of Ryn,
"-seems like she could beld be of the latter."Any anger that wasn’t gone when he realized he was being over-the-top disappeared when Tahlia brought up how old she had been when she started. His expression softened - humbling, even. When the brunette had gestured to Ryn, his eyes followed, then scanned over some of the people around the child. Only when Tahlia stopped speaking did he finally respond, concern in his voice,
“How many of the other pilots were kids that got forced into it, do you think?” "Who knows," Tahlia shrugged, somewhat relieved that Percy was talking like a normal adult again,
"I never ventured much out of my compound until recently so I can’t say."Percy’s brow furrowed slightly as he did the mental math - Tahlia said she was fourteen when she started, and she looked maybe twenty, now.
“So you’ve been doing the piloting thing for.. For six-ish years?” Again, he sounded concerned as more questions that Tahlia - or anyone, really - couldn’t answer popped into his mind. How many of his fellow pilots were kids when they started doing this? What about pilots in other places? How young were they when they started? What sick bastards were hiring and training child soldiers? Was there any
logical reason to it? Even if there was a logical reason, how could they put aside common morality to do such a horrible thing? All of these questions came to him in very quick succession, and he had difficulty forcing them to stop so he could actually hear Tahlia’s response.
"A lot fucking longer than that!" Tahlia roared into laughter, feeling as if it was somehow an unintended compliment on her appearance.
“I-it’s not a laughing matter,” Percy stuttered,
“I-I, I’m sorry that y-you even had to go through that! That-th- I can’t imagine doing this at fourteen, let alone nine, or-or younger, even, it’s..” he hesitated, uncertain if he should really complete his thought, based on how Tahlia was staring daggers into him. He continued on anyway,
“It’s fucked up. I’m sorry.” Tahlia felt a touch of annoyance from Percy’s last lot of words - it just rubbed her the wrong way how he was showing signs of compassion for someone who didn’t desire it,
"I don’t need your damn sympathy. I just need to know that if I’m about to get shot at, you’ll be there to take the fucken hit."“I’ll do my best.” was all Percy could manage to say as Tahlia about-faced and marched off to the cafeteria in order to get something to eat with what little time she had left.
Percy followed suit, sitting down with with his daughter.
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