Ticking noise

1st Step, Take the truck away from your mom

2nd get ready for a huge bill for all or any combo of the following

Camshaft, lifters, rockers, valves

Getting this fixed sooner than later is wise as flakes of metal may be cruising around the rest of the engine.

Do this first: Change the oil. I recommend Havoline, or Valvoline 10w30. Make sure to use a GOOD quality oil filter(WIX only). Then buy a can of "Seafoam". Follow the instructions exactly! After 500 miles, repeat the process(except for the "Seafoam"). The "Seafoam" should help to clean up any carbon or junk in the engine. When you change the oil again, add "LubeGuard Engine Treatment". This should help stave off the engine replacement blues.

It's probably just the injectors doing thier thing. Check the noise intensity against a couple of other ford engines of the same size. The injector ticking is common on all 5.4 litres.