The White Dress ✅

The Embrace of Gods

The Embrace of Gods

Pictures used: 2(futuristic soldier), 3(they see me rollin' on Mars), 4(girl with teddy), 7(Futurama guys)

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In retrospect, accepting anything from Joey in Engineering was a stupid idea.

Then again, so was forgetting his daughter's birthday. And, since it was the early hours of the morning when Derek got off work, it wasn't feasible for him to go and get her anything nice. No, which was why he was currently lugging a large brown bear in an unsightly knitted smock as he clocked out.

It wasn't that Derek was a bad father but he was the type of person who committed himself to something and wouldn't stop until the goal was well within grasp. As one of the sector heads for the Interplanetary Committee against War and Injustice, he was having a hard time concentrating on anything other than the war on Atill. Not that he didn't love his daughter, he did, he just didn't know how to do the single father gig.

"Hey Derek, tell your little girl happy birthday from me, eh?" Joey had grinned, thrusting the toy towards him.

He'd wanted to argue because it was a month till Wendy's birthday but the engineer had gone as quickly as he'd arrived, back to working on the latest spaceship docked into their station and he knew better than to distract the man. Instead, he took the gift and decided to hide it for a month's time, if not forever as it was horrendous. What he hadn't anticipated was that Joey, who was admittedly smitten on his kid, – everyone in the sector was, it was an unofficial rule – was right.

"Daddy!" his daughter barrelled into his legs, "I stayed up for you!"

"That's my beautiful girl." He smiled, kneeling down to smooth her hair. "Guess what I have for you?"

She giggled, reaching around him. "I can see the bear from here!"

"Do you like him?"

"I like everything you bring me."

He remembered last year, coming in with the rain and an armful of candy hurriedly bought from the 24/7, and all he could see was her grin because, as she'd put it, 'he'd remembered' and that was worth more than any gift. Honestly, he didn't know how he'd managed to get such an adorable little angel, he definitely didn't deserve her.

Wendy was small for seven, an effect of the space radiation that was ever present on the sector, but she was clever and resourceful and she could cope when she was left alone. He left her alone far too often as he could only bring her to work so many days a month before he worried about severely stunting her growth. He needn't have worried, though, she seemed fine keeping herself amused and the toy certainly helped stave off boredom.

"Wendy, I'm home!"

They were an odd family of two, not keeping conventional hours, but they made it work.

"Hello, daddy." She came to the door, the teddy clutched to her chest.

"You've quite taken to that bear, haven't you?"

She smiled, leading him into the living room where the remnants of dinner lay on the carpet: two teacups, a teapot and some sweet biscuits she enjoyed. "His name is Ja'red, he was a Lord of the old Atillian regime before the war started."

He laughed. "Have you been in my papers again? You know you shouldn't look into them, they're classified."

"No." She insisted. "Ja'red told me everything!"

"Then he's a very wise bear."

"He wants to take me to Atill one day, he says that it's beautiful."