Re: The Lieutenant/The Daughter
He did deliberately omit his name. He had an alias, but he wasn't big on lying if he didn't have to, and he didn't really see a need to lie to a girl on a train. A woman. They were women, not girls, but he was young and he still wasn't in that mindset. She was just a girl to his thinking, and he was just a boy. Which was really fucked up, seeing as the military knocked the kid out of everyone in a hurry. The first time you stared a person down as they stared you down, both of you armed, was enough to make a person piss themselves and grow right up. And he was in deep now. Deep into the military, taking the jobs no one wanted. Jobs that no one who had anyone waiting back at home would ever take, but the money was good and he had responsibilities.
Those responsibilities led him to remove his hand from her back, in order to do what he was there to do. He could hear her moving back there, even though he told her not to. Not that he expected her to listen to him. She had seemed stubborn from the moment she collided with him in the hall, but it had been worth a try. He could do something to keep her back there. He was authorized to use whatever force was necessary to protect the payload, but he was tired of blood and underhanded moves. He'd joined the military for money, not out of any heroic need to save the world, but he'd honestly thought he was working for the good guys. He still thought he was, but he also knew it was a lot more complicated than he'd ever realized. He'd never be able to unravel it.
"I can hear you following me," he called out. He knew his voice would be a beacon, but if she was going to walk around in this chaotic dark then she might as well have sound to follow. "In case you thought I couldn't hear you." His voice was stationary now. He was near the left wall of the baggage car, where a small sliver of light would make its way in during daylight. Not daylight now, so he pulled a small and dim flashlight from his pocket. He held it in his mouth as he swung his bag to the ground and started working on a combination box that was sitting on the floor and looking insignificant. "Okay. Tell me." Which sounded more like owwkay tew muu with the flashlight in his mouth.