Merle didn't think much of Angus McDonald when they first met.

They were on a mission, with a murder to solve, and at the time Angus had been just another NPC that would leave his life just as quickly as he had entered it. That was the nature of his job. Sure, there was a little bit of surprise that came with the ten-year-old kid calling them out on their bullshit, and there was a grudging amount of respect for his smarts and talent (though he'd never admit it out loud), because Pan knew there was no way that Merle and the two chucklefucks with him would've figured out that mystery on their own.

But after all was said and done, he pretty much just forgot about Angus.

Time passed, and Merle was busy. He nearly died, fought through a battle wagon race, and then watched two kids hopelessly in love sort-of die in each other's arms (damn shame). And he ran into a Red Robe, whatever the hell that was about. So he really wasn't expecting, upon meeting with the Director afterward, to find out that Angus McDonald, who he never thought he'd see again, had been hired by the Bureau of Balance.

He started feeling…off, after that.

A lump in his throat. A queasiness in his stomach. He couldn't pinpoint what the feeling was, at first, but it always struck him whenever he was around the boy detective.

He tried to keep his distance. Teasing the kid…helped. Grumbling and groaning at him, putting him down, it lightened those bad feelings just a little bit, and he didn't really question why. He tried not to be too cruel—he wasn't heartless—but he certainly didn't go out of his way to be too friendly. They were colleagues, and Merle would treat him with a minimum of professional respect, and that was it.

Then, one evening, he spotted Angus padding down the hall near the dorms wearing full-on footie pajamas, a something clutched in his arms. He was in a rush, not looking where he was going, and as a result he ran straight into Merle, bouncing off the solid dwarf and landing straight on his rear.

"Oh, I'm sorry, sir! I wasn't paying attention…" he broke off as he noticed Merle looking at the item he dropped and blushed. Sitting on the ground beside him was a small stuffed dog, grey fur matted with wear. "Oh, Magnus was, uh, cleaning out his closet, and he found this and gave it to me! I don't—I don't need it, but it was very thoughtful and it's rude to refuse a gift! A-and…"

"Just watch where you're going next time, kid," Merle said gruffly, continuing on his way without a single glance back. But he was shaken. Because Angus was Merle's coworker, and he was extremely competent at his job and probably smarter than most of the other people on the moon base but fuck, Merle realized, he really is just a kid.

A memory came to him, unbidden, of Mavis and Mookie wearing matching footie pajamas on Candlenights eve years earlier. They were cuddled on either side of him, listening intently to a story that he made up but for some reason seemed strangely familiar of a planet made up entirely of sentient animal societies. He finished and started to tuck them into bed flicking on Mavis's starry sky nightlight and snuggling Mookie's stuffed dragon in next to him as they begged him for one more story. He laughed and kissed their foreheads and told them the sooner you get to sleep, the sooner you'll get to open presents…

And Merle suddenly knew what the bad thing he'd been feeling for so long now was.

Guilt.

He hadn't seen his kids in almost two years. Two years since he left them without a word, without an excuse or explanation. And then this kid shows up in his life, just a couple years older than Mookie and a couple years younger than Mavis, and reminds him of what he left behind. Of course he couldn't be nice to Angus—how could he, when he abandoned his own kids? How could he betray them by caring about this little boy while they sat planetside and wondered where he was?

He saw so many traits of his own kids reflected in Angus. Mavis's intelligence. Mookie's curiosity. He saw these things and it hurt, except he didn't realize exactly what that pain was until now. How much had they grown, since he saw them last? How much did he miss?

He'd left them because he thought he'd been failing at everything. At being a husband. At being a father. Even at being a cleric. But he's been through so much since then, changed so much, and god he missed his kids.

The next morning, he made the toughest call on his stone of farspeech that he'd ever had to make in his life. Hecuba had screamed—a lot. He had to try to explain himself, and he didn't do a very good job of it, but by the end, he'd gotten what he wanted.

She was going to let him visit his kids.

...

The first visit happened in front of his old house.

Hecuba didn't actually want to see Merle, and he certainly didn't want to see her, but he begrudgingly understood that she'd want to keep an eye on the kids. From the kitchen window. Peeking behind a curtain. He made his way to the front door, paint worn down from salted sea air, and rapped his knuckles on it three times. He smoothed down the front of his shirt nervously—he'd made sure to wear the nicest, cleanest one he owned.

A commotion of noise from inside. Merle heard the rapid pattering of feet on bare wood, and then suddenly the front door was thrown open. Mookie stood at the door, and it only took an instant for his eyes to widen in shock as he recognized who was standing in front of him. Then Merle was tackled, arms suddenly full of little dwarven boy, and it was all he could do to not fall over from the force. He wrapped his arms around Mookie, burying his face in the boy's wild hair for a moment. "Hey there, Fireball."

"Mookie, you know you're not supposed to answer the door—Dad?"

Merle looked up. Mavis was standing in the doorway, looking as if she'd seen a ghost.

"Hi Mavis. Didn't your mom tell you I was comin'?"

"Y-yeah, but I didn't think…"

Merle stepped forward, Mookie balanced on one hip, to wrap her in a hug as well, but she stepped back reflexively. Merle froze. Mavis looked guarded.

He guessed it was only right he'd lost that privilege.

"Why don't—why don't we go for a walk?" he asked, "We have a lot to talk about."

And they did. A circuitous route not too far from the house that they walked through over and over again, just talking. Merle tried explaining himself again. Explained he had really screwed up, but he wanted to try to fix things. To do better. To be better. He couldn't tell them exactly what he was up to these days, as he didn't want them to have to deal with voidfish static, but he told them he was a kind of adventurer. That he went on missions for an organization to help people.

"Like a secret agent?" Mookie asked.

"Yeah. Like a secret agent," Merle confirmed. It was true enough. He explained that this job kept him very busy, but that he wanted to try to visit them a lot more often, if they wanted to see him.

"O'course we want to see ya!" Mookie said. Mavis's focus was on her feet, kicking a stray rock forward on the path a few feet at a time. She didn't say anything, and Merle didn't push her. He knew he'd lost her trust, and that he'd have to work hard to gain it back. That was okay.

Mookie then caught him up on everything he had missed, and even Mavis quietly pitched in a couple of details from her life—she had started fantasy middle school while he was gone. And then he brought them back to their front door, gave Mookie a hug, told them both that he loved them, and then he left.

…

Nothing really changed on the moonbase after he started visiting his kids. The guilt he felt in Angus's presence lessened somewhat, but always in the back of his mind he couldn't help but think about how, in total, he spent much more time near the boy detective than he did his own kids. He couldn't help it—it came with living and working together in the same few domes on the moon—but he still felt bad about it. So the teasing didn't really stop either.

He went down to see Mavis and Mookie whenever possible. Every time there was a lull in training, or day off, he would take leave planetside to go see them. Their fractured relationship, was slowly mending, though he knew it would never truly be the same as it was before.

Then the Crystal Kingdom happened.

He tried his damndest to give off the impression that his job was perfectly safe to Mavis and Mookie. He always took care to make sure any wounds he received on missions were completely healed before going to see them, even if it meant going to the shitty healers at the Bureau infirmary because he couldn't regain spell slots fast enough. But there was no way he could hide the fact that he'd gotten his arm cut off.

"Woah. Cooooool!" Mookie said, poking at the living wood. Mavis stood just behind him, wide eyes focused on his arm and an unreadable expression on her face. Merle forced out a chuckle.

"Isn't it? A gift straight from the gods, my boy," he bragged, and Mookie proceeded to try to arm wrestle with it.

The visit went pretty well, after that. He took them to the park, they got snow cones from a vendor, and they fed ducks by the lake. He brought them home gave Mookie his usual hug, and then went to say goodbye to Mavis when she suddenly flung herself into his arms.

Merle was thrown off—this was the first time she had hugged him since he'd started visiting. But then he felt his shirt starting to be wet with tears, and he quickly held her close.

"Hey now, what's wrong?"

"Don't-don't go!" she said through hiccupping sobs.

"You know I can't stay," Merle said gently, rubbing her back.

"B-but, I don't want you to die!"

Merle froze.

"Honey, I'm not gonna die," he reassured.

"You could! You lost your arm, a-and I know your work is dangerous, even if you won't tell us about it, and—"

Merle shushed her, then broke the hug so he could look into her eyes. "You're too smart for your own good, you know that?" he smiled proudly, "Yeah, sweetheart, my job is dangerous sometimes. But I got so many people lookin' out for me. Hell, I got a god lookin' out for me. I'm not gonna die. I promise, I'm never leaving you again. Okay?"

She stared back into his eyes for a long moment, then nodded and rubbed at her nose, "Okay."

He knew there was no way he could actually guarantee that. That he was technically lying to her again. But he'd be damned if he didn't try his hardest to live up to his promise.

…

Then Angus McDonald met his kids. Merle cursed him and his detective skills as the sight of him in the same space as Mavis and Mookie brought up all of his old guilt and insecurities. He didn't believe for a second that the kid would rat him out, but he had to make a big show of threatening him with the adamantium spanner, if only so that Mavis and Mookie could see that he didn't really care for the kid. Lied and made the kid correct him on his position, just so he could seem like he didn't know him that well. But then, of course, the kid had to get all sappy on him the moment Mavis and Mookie stepped away.

"I think you're…I think you're gonna be a good dad, from here on out."

And god, if Merle hadn't built up some kind of fondness for the kid over these past few months, no matter how hard he tried to deny it. He couldn't help it, when he went and said shit like that. But maybe…that was okay. He looked at Mookie, eyes pasted to the window of the candy shop while Mavis tried to drag him away. His kids were doing all right. He was doing all right. Maybe he could afford to open his heart a little.