O'Brien chuckled again, "You are. What the hell happened?" The fucking apocalypse happened, that's what. Ruined everything. He pulled back to give his nephew a bit of a look over, bringing a hand up to give the younger man's shoulder a firmly affectionate squeeze. "Nineteen. Jesus." He gave Lucas a nod, smiling as he overheard Alana's added comment, "going on twenty-five," he repeated." How the hell had a young boy like Lucas survived? He didn't care. He was glad. Grateful. It was a miracle, really. He just hated that his nephew-- and anyone else as young as Lucas-- had to grow up in such an awful world, and see the things that they saw, and survive the way that they had to survive.
And hadn't the apocalypse made everyone look tired? And age like hell. He let his attention move back to his sister; he still was sort of at a loss for words-- intelligent words, anyway. He had so many thoughts and questions swirling around in his head it was making him crazy. "I'm glad," he gave another nod, his eyes going back to Luke, "I'm very glad you two have had each other. That you've been together. I... I don't know what to say." His brows pushed together when he looked back to Alana.
"I don't know what to say-- A-and I have so much to say." Brannon gave a chuckling scoff and dropped his gaze downward with a shake of his head, "I don't fucking know," he reached up to rub at his face before wiping at his eyes again and turning to carefully step back over to his sister and bring his arms back around her in a tight hug. "I went looking for you. For Mom, Dad-- Everyone. I got all the way to Missouri, and no one was there."