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The next thing that happened would have been perfectly normal if Noemi had not been Noemi, but Stormy instead.

A pair of big arms wrapped around her waist from behind, and the papers all tumbled to the ground. Tuck really hadn't thought that through, but it'd been a long ******** time since he'd seen his Stormygirl, and when he'd noticed her in the hall he'd given in to his first instinct.

Which was, predictably, to wrap his arms around her waist from behind so that he could squeeze her to his chest. He made 'nomnomnom' noises against her shoulder, pausing briefly to give a quick, "Stormygirl, how you doin', babydoll?"

Tuck damn near dropped the girl.

"Aw hell, aw -- I'm sorry, aw, s**t, I thought you was Stormy, ya'll look the same from the back, an' -- aw, s**t, let me help you pick all this up, I'm so sorry."

He gingerly set her down and immediately began shuffling up the papers she'd dropped courtesy of him.

"I'm Tuck, I knew that Stormygirl had a .. ******** .. a cousin on the island but I wasn't made aware that you two was clones, s**t."

Tuck made quick work of the papers around him, crawling around on his knees to gather up the rest. He could see she was skittish, and it kind of made his chest ache.

"Yeah, si, yeah, I'm Tuck. Ross. Tuck Ross. Evan talked about me?" He sounded a little too pleased. Tuck glanced over at the girl, his brow furrowing just a little.

"Hey, now, you ain't no bother. I'm the bother. I really shoulda noticed you wasn't Stormy. C'mon now. You Stormy's family, you my family. That's the way that shi-- stuff works. 'sides, it's my fault that these papers is all over the place. Least I can do is help you out, right?"

He had the tone of someone who was talking to a very small, very frightened puppy.

Aw, hell.

"Now, come on, you just call me Tuck. Same as everyone else. Only one we ever called Mr. Ross was my daddy."

He didn't say anything about the papers that she dropped. Instead, Tuck just picked them up, leaf by leaf, while trying to figure out what the ******** porky parachen amy easto meant.

"I damn near flunked out of spanish class back in high school, Noemi, so you gonna have to just be patient with me. Hey, hey, now." He tugged on the sleeve of her jacket, pausing briefly to shuffle the papers he'd gathered into the pile that was rapidly forming between them.

"We mostly all family here. You ain't bad with people. Stormy a real special girl, love her like I love my own damn sister. Take a breath, now, Noemi, hey."

He hated to see anyone so mortified, especially thanks to him.

"Now, we got these papers all stacked up. I'ma carry 'em for you. Where we headin, mm?"

"It's okay, Noemi," Tuck shuffled the rather massive stack of papers in his hands (how the ******** had she been carrying something this awkward on her own?!) and made sure to keep his stride short enough so that she wouldn't have any issue in keeping up with him. She was too goddamn cute, and too ******** shy. "Ain't a big deal. I just wanted to make sure you wasn't sayin' anything important that I oughta know."

He was silent for a while, taking a moment now and again to glance down at her.

"You should meet my girl Heidi. She out at an outpost now, but she gonna be back on Saturday. I ain't seen her in months. You'd like her, she's real nice. Her an' Evan an' Stormy are all real important people to me - an' I got a twin sister, too, but she stuck at some outpost too, has been for a real long time. She ever comes back, you should meet her, too."

It kind of killed him that she was so ******** skittish.

"I ain't upset," Tuck chuckled softly, glancing down at the girl as he shuffled the stack of papers in his hands. "Takes a lot to get me upset, sweetheart, so you ain't ever gotta worry about that, I promise. An' I think you just fine with people. S'okay to be nervous, people get nervous all the time. You doin' just fine."

Christ, Tuck just kind of wanted to swoop her up and tell her everything was going to be okay - and he kind of felt like Heidi would feel the same way. Something about the girl just brought out a more protective edge in him.

"She real nice. She's a moon, an' she's got the prettiest blue eyes you ever seen." He paused a little when she asked if he was going to marry Heidi. Truth was he'd never really thought about it. This was Deus, after all, and long-term seemed too scary to think about.

"I.. maybe if we wasn't on the island, I would. I think that it's good to have someone to care about, you know? Makes you do better at your job - an' my job is protectin' people, so I try and do my best. Evan's a Sun, so he's good at beatin' the s**t out of things. So, I mean, yeah, sometimes it's hard, but at the same time it just makes you wanna do your best. That make sense?"

He grinned at her.

"An' yeah, got a twin. Don't see her as often as I should, but it's nice knowin' she's close."

"We look after one another, don't worry 'bout us. You work in the infirmary, that's pretty damn cool. I ain't got a mind for all that s**t, so I'm always happy to meet someone who does. Sounds like you're a hard workin' girl, an' that's important, too."

He watched her flutter like a nervous little bird out of the corner of his eye. It was pretty ******** adorable, almost hurt him to talk to her.

"Naw, don't be sorry. My mom used to watch them shows, I ain't never been a fan. An' don't worry. You gonna get it all figured out soon enough."

It was a ******** shame, Tuck decided, that Deus seemed to collect these sweet and innocent little ******** civilians to do their dirty work for them. It was sad, really ******** sad.

"She's real ********' annoying. I dunno. I feel like I'd know if somethin' ever went wrong, wherever she is, you know what I mean? Like, if somethin' happened, I'd know. So yeah, I guess we do got one of them weird brain connection things."