Disclaimer: I own none of it, sadly.

Author Notes: Because I love how Eric is with Alice – she's the little kid who lives next door to him who featured in a couple of episodes of Time Force. Also features some Eric/Taylor. Hope you like.

BUT A CHILD

Eric didn't get a lot of visitors until he met Alice. His place was starting to reflect that.

A couple of her macaroni art pictures were stuck on his refrigerator, she'd put them there herself. Taylor had snickered when she'd seen them for the first time and had asked if he'd stolen some kid's homework when they didn't salute him in the street. He'd asked how leave from the Air Force was paying. The pictures had his name on them and at least one of them featured a dinosaur.

Her pink and blue blanket was folded up on his couch, for when she slept at his place while Cathy, her Mom, worked nights. That happened a lot. He'd endured worse company and at least the kid was smart.

Alice preferred to curl up in his leather jacket when she napped during the day, because she liked the smell. She insisted the birds stay with him sometimes. She said they missed him. They were good to have around when she wasn't.

Somewhere he still had the candle from the cupcake she'd brought over on his birthday and on his keyring was the red and black 'thank-you' bracelet she'd made him for a school project about the important people in her life.

Predictably, she adored Wes, and not just because he gave her presents on her birthday and Christmas. He taught her how to salute and took her for rides on his motorbike. He told her to look after Eric. Eric gave him an unimpressed look and asked about Wes's overdue paperwork.

She didn't like Taylor on sight, an opinion that Eric did nothing to change.

"Eric!" Alice clattered through the doorway with a frown. "There's someone here."

Taylor was sat in the garden, her hair loose and her mouth smirking. Alice stared at her suspiciously.

"She was rude," she announced. "She said I shouldn't be here."

"She's wrong," Eric joined in the glaring at Taylor, who started to glare back when she realised that Eric wasn't taking her side and she was being ganged up on.

Alice kept her arms crossed and her frown in place. Her Mom had told her to be wary of strangers. Smart move.

"Babysitting now?" Taylor's expression was back to smirking.

"Who are you?" Alice cut in before he could answer. Her distrustful gaze hadn't left Taylor.

Taylor got to her feet, her hands moving uncertainly. She looked like Eric had felt the first time he'd met Alice.

"Taylor."

"Eric's never talked about you."

Eric smirked at Taylor's glower. He smiled down at Alice; she had excellent instincts.

"C'mon, school project."

"And lunch!"

Taylor followed them without a word. Her brow stayed creased in amused confusion like she was about to say something but didn't. Alice ignored her, only saying goodbye to Eric when Cathy appeared at the fence, waving.

Taylor never stopped teasing him about babysitting, asking if it was part of the upstanding work the Silver Guardians did. Wes was even worse.

"You're almost human when Alice is around. Maybe I should put her on the payroll?

Alice asked about the other Rangers, the ones she'd seen on the news, wanting to know where they'd gone away to and why. Eric said he couldn't tell her. Alice mimed zipping her lips and smiled sweetly and expectantly. Eric rolled his eyes. The last time she'd tried that look, she'd wanted him to get a puppy.

"Forget it."

"But I'm really good at keeping secrets!"

He was her second emergency contact, right after Cathy, and she only called his cell phone when he wasn't home by a certain time they'd agreed on. Once he got back exhausted and pissed off after a botched training weekend (Orgs had turned up and he was covered in something oozing), to find Alice curled up on his couch, wrapped in his jacket. She was blinking awake as soon as his key hit the lock. Dammit, Wes had been right. He should have used that payphone.

She wasn't crying, but her voice was too quiet and edgy when she asked what had happened. Eric crouched down in front of her, swiping what gunk he could off his forehead. Damn stuff had gotten everywhere. Alice stared right back. He felt proud of her.

He produced his cell phone, gummed up with whatever goop was currently covering the rest of him. The Silver Guardians were going to pay for a new one. He'd let her programme her number in.

Alice grinned at his expression of distaste and told him he smelled really bad. Eric raised his sludgy fingers like a threat and smiled slightly as she scrambled away laughing. He needed a towel and a tall glass of water. If he'd been alone, it would have been a slug of the whiskey he kept locked up in his bedroom along with the throwing stars Wes had given him last Christmas ("for anger management, Eric, not for throwing at the new cadets. Just think of the paperwork, okay?").

Taylor hated him arranging their plans around time he'd promised to Alice. But he wasn't going to give the kid broken promises and despite whatever Taylor snarled at him, she always called him the next day dictating where they were going to go to make it up to her.

"Hey, Eric?"

It was a sunny day and Alice was playing just outside his door. He was reading up on new output from the Silver Guardians labs, a football game humming low on his TV. Wes tried to stop him taking work home, but his efforts were laughable.

"Do you think the other Rangers'll come back one day?"

She had her hair in twin braids again today, tied with faded blue ribbons tucked neatly into bows. It vaguely reminded Eric of a character from Taylor's book. He still had it, hidden in his bedroom. It drove Taylor crazy that she couldn't find it.

"I don't know," he replied into the sun.

"I hope they do."

Eric shrugged. Taylor and Wes would never hear it from him.

"Me too, kid."

-the end