The office was quiet when they brought him in.
Too quiet.
Female {{user}} sat behind her desk, boots still dusty from the debrief she’d skipped, sleeves rolled to her elbows as she scanned reports. She didn’t look up until she heard the uneven footsteps.
Not combat boots.
Small. Careful.
She lifted her head.
The boy stood between them—Soap on one side, Ghost on the other—no older than five. His hair was matted, face streaked with dirt that hadn’t been washed away properly. He clutched a piece of frayed string in his fist like it mattered.
Her stomach dropped.
“…Why is there a kid in my office?”
Price stood in the doorway, flanked by brass. Their expressions were neutral in that way that meant nothing good.
“Recovered from the AO,” one of the suits said. “Parents deceased. No local infrastructure to place him.”
She leaned back in her chair. “And?”
“You’ll take responsibility for him.”
She barked a laugh. “You’re joking.”
No one joined her.
“I’m SWAT,” she snapped. “I clear rooms and run warrants. I don’t—” she gestured sharply “—do kids.”
“This isn’t a request,” the brass replied. “Consider it corrective oversight.”
Punishment.
She saw it instantly.
She looked down at the boy again. He wouldn’t meet her eyes. Too trained already.
“Fine,” she said coldly. “Sit.”
He obeyed immediately.
She hated that more than anything.
He followed her like a ghost for two days.
Didn’t touch anything without asking. Didn’t raise his voice. Didn’t cry.
That silence chipped at her nerves.
On the third night, while she was buried in paperwork and he sat cross-legged on the floor with a cup of markers someone had handed him, he spoke.
“Can I have a Barbie?”
She froze.
Slowly, she looked at him. “A what?”
“A Barbie,” he said softly. “My sister had one.”
Her jaw tightened. She knew exactly what kind of place this was. Knew what the brass believed. Knew what they punished.
She looked at the pink marker in his hand. The way he was coloring carefully inside the lines like the world might shatter if he didn’t.
“…Fine,” she muttered. “One Barbie.”
She didn’t smile. He did.
That was enough to seal her fate.
They came for her that night.
No warning. No paperwork. Just hands on her arms, twisting them behind her back as they dragged her into a windowless room off the corridor.
They threw the evidence on the table like it was contraband.
The Barbie. The drawing. The pink marker.
“You think this is acceptable?” one of them sneered.
“He’s five,” she shot back.
“You undermined discipline.”
She tasted blood when the first punch landed.
Then another.
They expected her to curl in. To beg. To apologize.
She didn’t.
The third hit barely landed before she swung back.
Her fist connected with a nose. Bone cracked. Blood sprayed.
The room erupted.
Someone shouted. Someone else lunged.
She fought like she was back on a bad raid—elbows, knees, headbutts. She slammed one of them into the wall hard enough to leave a dent. Took a baton to the ribs and responded by ripping it out of his hands and smashing it across his jaw.
They wanted submission.
They got war.
By the time they finally dragged her off, everyone was bleeding.
She spat red onto the floor and grinned through split lips. “Do it again,” she rasped. “I dare you.”
Silence.
They left her bruised, shaking, but unbroken.
She stumbled back to her office hours later.
The boy was asleep on the couch, Barbie tucked under his chin, pink marker still uncapped on the desk. A drawing lay beside it.
Two stick figures. One tall. One small. Both bleeding red crayon. Still standing.
Her chest ached.
She sank into her chair, every muscle screaming, and stared at the door.
They could beat her. They could try to break her.
But they were never going to make her hand that kid back.
Not now. Not ever.