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Part the first here- http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/1175491.html#cutid1

Second chapter of the sequel to Family Relations.

First cut goes to the story, second goes to any translations or notes.
Two


“Hello Uncle Baj. Conas...How are you today?” Pyro winced slightly as he almost slipped into asking how his uncle was doing in Irish and not English. Luckily Baj didn’t seem to notice it, but there was things he had hoped he hadn’t noticed it, but then it turned out he had. In particular, he needed to make damn sure that Baj knew that he had told ma about that nice little Catholic church that he had been to. And that he intended to go back to during this summer.

His uncle smiled back at him. “We’re okay, are your parents going to be along shortly?”

He grimaced for just a moment before he gathered himself to answer. “I don’t actually know. They get a bit er...oblivious...when they get like this. Though one of them will probably notice that I’m not there in about....a minute.” Just has he finished saying that, they all heard Lasairfhíona shout for Pyro. Well, for Pól, but the end result was the same.

“We’re down here, mamaí!” He said, waving towards where his parents were, looking around trying to figure out where he had gotten off to.

With that, his parents ran (or really, walked as fast as his mother was able to) over to where the four of them were standing.

“Ach, Pól! Don’t go scaring us like that! We were trying to decide something!”

Pyro rolled his eyes a bit at that, that was most certainly not what they had been arguing about. Thankfully, she didn’t seem to notice that he had done so. Or was pretending to not notice him. He suddenly wondered if mother’s old colleague was here again. That man had better not be. Course, since ma was with him this time, he could just tell her directly if he saw the man.

-----

“Le do thoil, mamaí. Don’t be like that, you were arguing.” He grimaced at her, letting her know exactly what he thought of their fighting. Her son had never liked it when they did that, the cold arguing, and she could not blame him at all for it.

She winced at him and mumbled. ”Not in front of your uncle, le do thoil1.” He was right, but now was not the best time. They were house sitting for his uncle’s neighbors, they could talk when they got settled in there, after all.

She turned and beamed at her brother-in-law with her very best ‘charm the Englishman’ smile. There was every certainty that it was not going to fool him one whit, but she could certainly try to be charming and polite to him, he had cared for her son, after all, even if he was English. And her son was half English. She shook her headly slightly to clear her thoughts.
Speaking of which, he seemed to be almost scrutinizing her as she spoke. She did suppose that she was doing the same back to him, but on an almost subconscious level. Most likely something to do with how long she had done that before, but it was still not the most comfortable of feelings, all told.

“Hello, I’m Lasairfhíona. And you must be my brother-in-law.” She smiled much more gently at her nephews. They were young, barely older than her son, and children were children, even if they were English. Though she was pretty sure that Tom had mentioned that one of them was Welsh, actually. But hadn’t Baj raised both of them? Eh, something to politely ask after at some point later. Much later. They had the entire summer, after all. Niggling thought in the back of her head said to stop analyzing people based on where they were from as she hated it when people did it to her, but it was an uphill fight.

“Ah, yes. I’m Baj, and these are my children Maxell and Nathan.” As he said their names, he indicated Millbee and Dinnerbone in turn. His sons smiled weakly at her, seeming to read the tension in the air.

-----

Tom sighed softly to himself as they loaded up the car and he watched his wife and son drive off with his brother and nephews. He, on the other hand, had to wait for the lieutenant here to come and bring him back to the base. He was in civilian clothes, but he had been told to wear that, so he hoped that everything was fine there.

“Hey-o, I don’t suppose you’d be Tom Smith, then?”

“Oh, and who would you be, hm?” He raised a slight eye at the man, for while he was certainly a lieutenant, there was no way to be completely certain it was the right lieutenant, after all. Well, actually…now that he looked around, there was waaaay less military here than there was back at the airport in Belfast. Huh. How odd.

“Oh, I’m Lieutenant Murphy, I was sent to pick you up and take you back to base, Smith.”

“Right you are. Well then, lead on.” He grinned slightly at the lieutenant, who only rolled his eyes in response.

“I assume your…wife and…son are safely on their way?” A short question as they walked out with Tom’s bags towards the military lorry that was waiting where the lieutenant had parked it.

“Yes, unless you’ve done something to make them unsafe?” He was only slightly joking at the question. He was pretty sure that Lasairfhíona could get in trouble remarkably quickly, but since there was like…no other military here than the two of them, she was probably not swearing at people just yet.

“Paranoid much, Corporal Smith?” Well, the lieutenant looked only slightly amused at it, instead of annoyed, at least.

“You do know where we just came from, right?” He may not like it, but truth be told, it did end up making you act in certain ways.

The lieutenant just sighed at Tom and shook his head.

“Yes, and that’s one of the reasons you were assigned here, so…have ‘fun’ at counseling, then.”
“Oh ho, I’m being sent for counseling?” No one liked counseling. Never met a single person who liked it, but…honestly, it was never that bad. He didn’t like it, but he didn’t loath it like many seemed to.

“No shit, of course you are. Seriously man, I’ve only met one other person as of late who was rotated out of ....there ‘recently’ and you sound almost as bad as him.” The lieutenant shook his head heavily at Tom, expressing his displeasure at having to deal with yet another person just fresh from the province.

“Don’t get many through here?” If you spent time in the military, you’d spend time in the province, unless you were supremely blessed. He didn’t see how they could avoid it here.

“Not really. We mostly coordinate for local region and the continent, not for Northern Ireland.” There was more to it than that, but it was the best explanation to give on short notice.

“Oh well, a nice change of pace, at least. Don’t suppose much happens around here, after all.” He sincerely hoped not a lot happened around here, that was one reason he had agreed to come here.

“Not…really. Well, we do need to talk about that, actually.”

“Erm…” He’d just left there, he didn’t want to start right in on it again, unless it was just about what went on there. The place was actually pretty nice…outside of the violence, which he couldn’t really fault it for.

“About the one other person here who recently came from the province. In basic terms, please for the love of god, if you meet a Sergeant by the name of BTC, just…go somewhere, anywhere else. Just excuse yourself from there and get the hell away from him. I really don’t want to deal with that yet. Maybe later but for the love of all, not now.” The lieutenant looked actively pained that he had to spell this entire thing out. He couldn’t really blame him, they were going to be stuck in this lorry for a while now.

“Uhhhh, if you say so, then…sure.” He had no idea why, but if this lieutenant wanted him to stay away from this sergeant, then he damn well would do so. Well, logic did say that this man was the one he meant had recently come from the same place he just had, but still. They probably hadn’t even served near each other at all.

“Do you want me to call myself something else, or anything?” They used call signs normally, and BTC was clearly the name that this man had chosen. He wondered if he’d need to change his own for the duration.

“Eh. I’d prefer you to not talk to him period, but if you must, just…not something Irish.”

“We…don’t use Irish call signs. That would waaaaaaaay bad…karma.” Perhaps not mention that his current call sign was simply Ledge, as Lasairfhíona said he should call himself “Legendary” since they had met up (the second time) in LondonDerry2.

“Well then. That’s good.” The lieutenant looked like he didn’t quite trust him, but oh well. He ought to know all good and well why they couldn’t use Irish call signs.





Translations, notes, etc

1 Le do thoil = please

2 The city of Derry (Londonderry) in Northern Ireland. Derry is the Irish name, Londonderry the English. Also known as Stroke City (London/Derry), the Maiden City (its walls were never breeched), and the only city where the first six letters are silent (a Irish Nationalist joke). You can also make the joke that it sounds like Ledgendary instead of Londonderry, which is what they’ve done here.



Part the third- http://mindcracklove.dreamwidth.org/1176264.html#cutid1

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