undergrounds | A bobcat and a squirrel walk into a house...

Feb 3rd; Hillingdon House
Daryl was a hunter. Daryl was a good hunter. He could set a snare and shoot a turkey between the eyes at a hundred paces. What Daryl was not was a trapper. Keeping the things he hunted alive usually went against his nature.

Today, just a few hours before stomping through Hillingdon's doors, that nature had been challenged and he, well...

"I need a trapper," he announced loudly and tersely, shoulders tense and eyes darting around to see if anyone understood what he was talking about. "Pest control, even. The kind that do humane trapping that don't kill or harm the rodents. Anyone know anyone?"

At worst, one of the mice or rat shifters might. Was better than nothing.

Feb 5th; A park (Dawn); Closed to first responder
Daryl had a trap. He had the kid's scent. And now he just had to find her and convince her the trap wasn't a trap and... hell, would she even understand what he was saying? He'd only managed to realize she was human in some sense when she'd decided shifting and kicking him in the head would do more to save her ass than squeaking loudly as his paws came down on her. Convincing her he wasn't out to eat her now might be impossible.

Which is why he had back up. Turning to his accomplice, he whispered, (not for the first time), "If I can't get her to come eat, you gotta do it for me. I can take watch."

Because having someone on watch was very important. Especially if she shifted again. Two grown adults chasing a naked 3 or 4 year old in a public park would look really, really, really bad. God help them if it took all day...

Feb 5th; Dinnertime; For Liadan
Daryl pounded on the door to Liadan's place. The day had been a very long and tiring one and he hadn't been able to get his daily nap in which meant he was cranky as all get out. The tiny squirrel squirming around in the bandana he held tightly shut was not doing anything to calm him down, either. He knew he needed to let the kid out, but he couldn't do it at his house (he'd tried, that was a disaster: see lack of nap). And Liadan had experience with some of the Clan's children, so it was to her he went.

Between Feb 8th to around Feb 20th; Hillingdon House
It wasn't the first time this sort of thing had happened in the back rooms of Hillingdon. Every so often one of the shifters tied to the clan couldn't get a sitter or didn't feel comfortable just yet with leaving their kid somewhere so they brought them to the house and set them off in one of the side rooms where they couldn't get into too much trouble. And every so often those kids would be small enough and just discovering their ability to shift that they ended up naked and running through the house. This was simply the first time Daryl had to deal with it and the kid wasn't even his. Well, technically. He was having no luck finding any info on Squirrel shifters that had lost a child in the last five years so chances were her parents were either out of the country, or dead.

Still, over the last few days, sight had become a regular one at the house. A small girl, maybe on the cusp of turning four, galloping through the non-public rooms giggling like a banshee and followed after by one Daryl Dixon, red as an apple, yelling at her to "GET BACK HERE AND PUT YOUR DAMN CLOTHES ON!".

After the 20th; Around London, but especially Richmond
It took almost three weeks to get the girl to listen to him and not try to shift in public and to keep her clothes on when she was human. A fair achievement for someone that had the literal attention span of a squirrel. Alert, but not necessarily focused. By then she was nearly attached to him by the hip and Daryl had started to take her out with him on his daily errands and even to work. He did his best to maintain her attention by talking to her in a quiet and constant string of explanations about what things were and what he was doing and that she really shouldn't try to touch that one thing there or put it in her mouth (oh dear lord not the anti-freeze!). Whether he'd intended to or not from the get go, he'd kind of adopted her and would need to put paperwork in soon with the right officials to try and make it, well, official.

That could probably wait until next month, though. For the moment, he was okay with carrying her on his hip or holding her hand and guiding her around while she stared at everything with wide eyes and wonder. Hopefully she'd start talking to him soon. He could only hope she was half understanding him as it was.

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"Good. You found her, you keep her." That was his black and white way of thinking. If Daryl hadn't wanted to deal with the repercussions of having a child around, he wouldn't have rescued her in the first place. It was going to take a lot of patience to get the girl back from the feral state she was currently in. For the first time in a very long while, Rorschach felt himself actually getting interested in something going on around him.

"Better than ending up in an orphanage." Did they still have orphanages in 2017? They had when Walter was a kid, seeing as how he'd been sent to a boy's home after social services finally intervened with his horrendous home life, but that had been a long time ago.

"I ain't never raised a kid. What kind of life could I give her?" The words left Daryl before the thought was even fully formed in his head. His grip on the girl loosened as his own words settled into his head. Anything beyond making sure she'd have some sort of registration or something if he couldn't find her family hadn't been given time to percolate.

Now dressed and with Daryl no longer holding her as firmly, Willow pushed herself up and turned around to start crawling up onto Daryl's shoulders. Ever the squirrel.

"Ain't never raised no one," he murmured again as the thought really started to settle that all his plans so far hadn't really accounted for finding someone else to care for her if he couldn't find her family. Daryl's eyes moved to Willow and he smiled at her when she got her knee onto the top of his head and tried to reach out for Rorschach once her perch was secured.

"Better than the one she had," Rorschach told him. Clearly, Daryl cared about the girl, and he was already doing a better job than what she had, instead of just leaving her in the park to fend for herself. "Just make sure she'll be loved. Kids need love." That was longer than anything he had said thus far and it showed that he meant it.

He reached a hand towards Willow, allowing it fade straight through her. She gave a little shiver at the cold feeling of the ghost's hand fading away and then reforming. Still, she didn't seem to be afraid of him, just a little shy the way any child was when faced with a new person.

Willow waited a few seconds before trying to reach out and touch Rorschach again. She got no where, of course. But by then she was half on Daryl's head and he was having to move to keep her balanced.

"Okay, kid, off," he grumbled half-heartedly as he picked her up and moved her to the floor. She immediately moved back to try and climb on him again, but he was standing at that point. This didn't deter her by any means, it just meant she had a harder time getting back to his shoulder.

Daryl moved his hands to grab hers and pull them off his clothes while turning to look at the ghost, "You ain't been around much lately. That changing?"

Rorschach watched the little squirrel girl climb the hunter like he was a tree in the park. Rorschach had never been one much for kids, either in wanting them himself or interacting with them. But he did hold a soft spot for their innocence. Despite having lived as a rodent most of her life, Willow didn't seemed to have come to much harm. He deliberately reached out and poked her, producing a little squeal as the cold sensation went through her again.

"Maybe," he answered, being infuriatingly vague on purpose. Rorschach had always been around the house, more of a piece of furniture than an actual person. Lately, perhaps comfortable enough to enjoy interacting with the members of Hillingdon, he'd been showing up more and more.

"Well, if you are, and she gets away from me," Daryl shifted and stood, settling Willow into his arms more properly while she giggled and tried to touch the ghost again, now treating the cold sensation like a game. "Could you keep an eye on her? Maybe come get me if she's getting into trouble?"

Rorschach considers the request. Well, it would give him something to do. It's not like he has a terribly busy schedule between being dead and being more dead. And he likes the little girl as much as he likes anyone else in the house. Finally, he nods. "Will do." He can keep an eye on one little squirrel girl. After all, how hard can it be?

A bobcat and a squirrel walk into a house...

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