•••

"She’s pregnant?” Xander screamed.

“Xander,” Wesley murmured. “Shh.”

Gunn just stared at Cordelia. /Pregnant?/ How the hell… The cave… “Holy fuck.”

Cordelia flopped bonelessly against Wil. “Oz?” She whimpered. “I want my alpha!” She cried, her eyes tearing. Oz stood quickly and reached for the distraught werewolf. As soon as Angel released her she launched at the man, rolling both of them on the ground. Oz held her tightly, watching Gunn as he comforted Cordelia. The young werewolf looked shell-shocked.

Wil and Angel backed out of the kitchen, into the hallway. All of this was more than they could handle. As they left, they snagged Xander and Wesley. “Come on,” Wil whispered to the two men.

“What?” Xander asked distractedly. “She’s pregnant!” He repeated.

“It’s a pack thing,” Will hissed. Wesley nodded and retreated with the vampires.

“Wil’s right, Xander. You can ask questions later.” The four men went back to the computer room, both to give the werewolves some privacy and to take some time to themselves. When they got there, Xander immediately turned around and went to the back door.

“I’m going out to the barn, ok?” He stated.

Wil and Angel glanced at Wesley. “Perhaps we should go up to our room,” Wil suggested. Wesley nodded and sat down at a computer.

“I need to do something with my hands right now,” He murmured, giving them permission to leave him alone.

•••

Gunn felt Fred sit down next to him, but he didn’t acknowledge her. His Delia was pregnant.

Pregnant.

He was going to be a father.

The werewolf shook his head slowly. This was not happening. Yeah, he and Cordelia had discussed children, in a very abstract way. She knew she’d want them eventually, some day in the distant future when they weren’t hiding and fighting all the time. Some day when they weren’t both young almost-adults with stakes in their back pockets and visions of Armageddon in their heads.

Well, at least they weren’t that young anymore.

But children? Their world was no place for a child. Connor had been proof enough of that. Gunn shuddered at the memories of Angel’s young son, dead, sacrificed as a pawn in some insane vengeance plot. How were they supposed to protect a child, an infant?

While Gunn was frightening himself into a panic attack, Oz was trying to calm Cordelia down. The seer had shifted from a hormone-driven, violent insanity to a hormone-driven, irrational anxiety. She was quivering and shaking, crying into his shoulder about how she wasn’t ready to be a mother, how she couldn’t believe this was happening, and where were they going to put a crib in this place? Was labor going to hurt? Who was going to help her burp the damned thing at two in the morning? Then she remembered that Gunn hadn’t wanted kids, at least not yet. He didn’t like the idea of kids when they were living such dangerous lives. How was she going to make it up to him? Would he ever forgive her?

“Gunn?” Fred murmured, placing one gentle hand on his shoulder. “Gunn?”

“Yeah?” Gunn replied absently.

“How’s Cordelia doing?” Fred inquired. Perhaps he’d actually look at his lover now.

Her question did the trick; Gunn came back to life and looked down at Cordelia. “Delia?” He murmured. “Come here, baby.” He reached for the werewolf, who moved cautiously into his arms.

“I’m sorry,” She chanted, burying herself in his arms. “I didn’t think, I didn’t know. I know you don’t want it. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Shh,” Gunn whispered. “Don’t say that, Delia. How can I not want it?”

She looked up at him, obviously surprised. “You said you didn’t want…”

“No, it’s not a very good time,” He admitted tentatively. “That doesn’t mean I never want kids. I…”

“You don’t want me to get rid of it…” She began when his voice trailed off. His expression alone answered her question.

“NO!” He growled. “Never! This is our kid, there’s no getting rid of it involved,” He insisted. “Don’t even think about it, Delia. It’s not going to happen.”

“Wouldn’t anyway,” Oz murmured from his spot on the floor. “Not a good idea for werewolves.”

Cordelia glanced at Oz. “Oh yeah, not human anymore. Is this gonna be a bad thing?” She asked. “More than it is already, I mean?”

Oz thought for a few minutes. “There’s a lot to think about. It’s not inherently dangerous.”

“But there aren’t a lot of werewolf ob/gyn’s around here, are there?” Fred asked quietly.

Oz shook his head. “No. Most take care of it themselves.”

“No doctor?” Cordelia whispered. “That’s not safe!”

“What would they tell you?” Fred inquired. “You’re not human.”

Cordelia nodded. “I’m sorry. I wish I’d…” Gunn held her tighter, rocking slightly.

“Nobody’s mad at you, Delia. And this is as much my fault as it is yours,” He said.

“They’re gonna be mad,” Cordelia insisted. “This messes up everything. Everything! How are we supposed to bring down Wolfram & Hart with baby formula on our shirts?”

“We aren’t mad,” Fred reminded her. “Yes, it’ll be hard, but what isn’t? You’re going to have the most spoiled child in the world,” She assured Cordelia. “Who in this house isn’t nuts about kids? Or have you forgotten…” She paused before mentioning Connor.

“Exactly,” Cordelia cried. “They’re going to think about him and-“

“Be happy you’ve got a kid,” Gunn finished. “Do you really think Angel or the others will begrudge you a child?”

Cordelia shrugged. “But he lost his,” She murmured.

“All the more reason to love yours,” Fred whispered. “Not everyone who can’t have children hates those who can, or their offspring,” She reminded Cordelia. The seer blanched, remembering that Wesley and Fred would never have children of their own-not without help, at least.

“It’s going to be ok,” Gunn whispered. “It has to be, because no kid of mine is going to not be ok.”

Oz nodded.

•••

Wil led Angel upstairs slowly, making sure the numb vampire didn’t trip on anything. The older man was sort of staring off into space, obviously thinking about Connor. After all, what else would be filling his mind at this time? “Angel,” Wil whispered, pulling his lover into their room. “Please, talk to me.”

“They’ll have a beautiful child,” Angel said brokenly. “Tiny, perfect baby.”

Wil shuddered and pulled Angel close. “They didn’t plan it.”

Angel glanced at his pale lover. “I’m not angry, Wil. I know they didn’t mean for this to happen. And I’m happy for them-very happy. Cordelia’s wanted a child for a long time, longer than she realizes. It’s just that…”

“I know,” Wil murmured. “I loved him every bit as much as you did.”

“You were his father,” Angel insisted. “Just as I was.” The two men had considered Connor theirs from the moment of his birth, although Angel often forgot Wil’s part in his son’s life when he sunk into his grief. “This will be very difficult.”

“It seems impossible,” Wil replied. He could envision hundreds of worst-case-scenarios. They had no choice but to continue their mission to destroy Wolfram & Hart, but now they would have to protect a child at the same time. A baby was just another target for the firm. Even with the time involved in their plans, Cordelia’s baby would still be a small child when it came time to return to Los Angeles.

Angel gathered Wil close. “Do you think we should… move the time frame?” Angel asked softly. “Just a little?”

Wil shrugged against Angel’s chest. “I’m not sure,” He replied. “We’ll have to see. If she stays this… unstable for the duration, yes.”

Angel chuckled. “She did seem a bit out of control today.”

Wil snorted. “She made Darla look like Oz.” Angel laughed outright at the comparison.

Eventually he sobered. “How will Gunn take it?”

“He loves children,” Wil reminded Angel. “And I think that once he gets over his shock, he’ll be an excellent father.”

“He has to marry her,” Angel insisted. “Soon. Now.”

Wil leaned back to study his lover. “Playing the protective father all of a sudden?”

Angel glared at Wil. “He. Will. Marry. Her.”

“And what if she doesn’t want to get married?” Wil asked, playing the devil’s advocate.

“The she should’ve thought about that before we went camping,” Angel shot back. “Because it’s a bit late now.”

“Old fashioned, are we?” Wil murmured.

“I’m more than 250 years old,” Angel reminded Wil. “And for that matter, you should be on my side in this.” After all, Wil had been brought up in Victorian England.

“Oh, I am,” He assured the dark vampire. “But I believe that they would rather us leave such things in their hands.”

“They’ll put it off,” Angel swore.

“”S not like they can make it legal,” Wil muttered.

“They’re both legally dead,” Angel countered. “Who cares?”

“Where are we going to find someone to not-legally-marry a couple of werewolves?” Wil asked.

“The internet?” Angel offered. For that remark he got a sharp rap to the head.

“I’d like to be there when you suggest that,” Wil muttered. “With body armor on, of course.”

“You have no faith in me,” Angel whined.

“I have enormous faith in you,” Wil protested. “Including a great deal of faith in your ability to get on Cordelia’s bad side.”

“I’ve never been on her bad side!” Angel said vehemently.

“Right,” Wil murmured, running a hand through Angel’s hair and over one earring. “I believe that.”

•••

Xander climbed up the rickety ladder to the hayloft, heading straight for his favorite bale of straw. He needed time alone—not just in another room, but really alone. His blocking abilities were such that he could’ve easily kept out all the roiling emotions in the house, but he desperately needed to be able to let go. When he was blocking that much, he didn’t have a lot of freedom to think about his own emotions.

Cordelia was pregnant. His ex-girlfriend and werewolf seer was pregnant. Knocked up. Stuffed full, with child, had a bun in the oven, one in the pot, preggers, was breeding, in the family way, gravid, expecting, parturient, gestating, increasing, up the duff. The rabbit died. Cordelia Chase was having a baby.

Xander leaned over suddenly and threw up.

After a moment, he recovered and sat back, none the worse for wear-besides the less-than-pleasant aftertaste of his stomach’s contents, which was mostly bile.

He was excited. Cordelia would make a great mother-she already had the take-care-of-people, nurturing thing down. Beneath the now-thin veneer of spoiled, greedy valley girl was a strong, smart woman who knew how to take care of herself. Any kid of hers would be a force to be reckoned with. And Gunn wasn’t anything to sniff at; he had morals and values as steady and deep as the mountains they lived in.

Xander was also scared out of his mind. How were they going to protect a kid? What happened when Wolfram & Hart took a shot at it? He wasn’t sure this group could handle the loss of another child. While it seemed like Angel, and Wil, had born the brunt of Connor’s death, the truth was that everyone suffered. Many a long night was spent crying over the babe’s death. Who wouldn’t? It had been tragic and wrong and violent and stupid. And Xander didn’t want to see it happen again.

“Why us? Why her? Do you have something against us being happy?” Xander shouted at the roof, aiming for The Powers That Be. “I mean, a kid? Now? That’s like directing a vanload of nuns to attend a Church of Satan meeting. Stupid and pointless and way below you.”

Xander paused, wondering if his bosses would send a really nasty vision to get back at him for being so nasty to them. Fortunately, they didn’t. “You’ve got to torture someone with having to worry about another life, so you pick Cordelia. You know she can’t stand loss like that!” Xander raged up at the sky, suddenly hating The Powers. “She cries when she loses a shoe. What’s gonna happen when some demon bites the kid’s head off, or kidnaps it?”

The sky was silent, as was the barn roof that blocked Xander’s view of the stars. He lay there on the straw, panicking and crying and laughing and wishing that Cordelia’d remembered her rubbers and that he could have kids, and that Fred and Wesley and Angel and Wil could have them too because all of them loved kids and wanted their own and Angel had had one but had lost it because life sucked that way. The Raphe didn’t remember falling asleep, but he did, dreaming of beautiful, brown-eyed babies with drop-dead gorgeous looks and acid tongues.

•••

“Perhaps the bank has updated their records,” Wesley murmured as he hacked into one of their target banks. He was pointedly avoiding thinking about the pack that currently inhabited the kitchen. If he did, he’d think about Fred, giving comfort to Cordelia and Gunn, sharing in and not sharing in the new life Cordelia held hidden inside her. He’d have to think about the fact that Fred was a fertile body and so was he, but together they were nothing.

Then he’d have to think about that sad look that Fred was sure to get in her eyes, even as she laughed and smiled at Cordelia’s baby. Wesley didn’t want to do that, didn’t want to consider how he was a failure and was sterile to his lover-and-someday-wife. Fred willingly bound herself to him, knowing that theirs would never be a normal relationship. Predator and prey, hunter and hunted. No child they raised would be wholly theirs. And, unlike Xander and Oz, or even Angel and Wil, they couldn’t comfort themselves in the fact that they shouldn’t ever be able to have children. No, only a cruel twist of demonic genetics stood between Wesley, Fred and an elusive, happy future. There was a someday in Wesley’s mind, a sometime after Wolfram & Hart were a memory, where he and Fred stood with two beautiful children between them.

It wasn’t a picture he liked looking at anymore. Now that he knew those children were either his or Fred’s, but not both. When he was younger, and human, he’d always derided those who wanted children with such a passion, for whom adoption wasn’t good enough. They wanted children of their own loins, who looked like them not out of coincidence or for the sake of a squinted and hopeful eye, but because genetics and gametes said that that child was theirs, by the gods, and no one else’s. He’d laughed and mocked.

Tonight he was not laughing.

“Ah, so they did,” He told himself, opening the bank’s records. He could at least be productive in some small way. Even if his comfort was cold and hard and not what he wanted.

It would have to suffice.