ic Expectations (IC)

[Gizmo]

Hours after word had reached Sanctuary from Earth-Prime of the Gorgon's defeat and the ended threat, the relocation of the evacuated populace was in full swing. It would take days to return everyone to their homes, but thanks to significant foresight and high spirits stemming from relief, thing were going as smoothly as could be hoped.

Overlooking the procession from hill nearby Stesha's cottage, Erik Espadas sat on the grass divested of his alter-ego's costume and generally trying to stay out of the way. While the world's greatest scientific minds and space-borne heroes had faced the planet-killer head on, the street level swordsman was forced to admit that the threat had been well out of his own weight class. Instead, he'd done what he could in keeping Willow away from the influence of her 'elder sister' after the controlled dryad's nearly disastrous rampage through the West End. Looking over to the slender, white haired woman, he was silent for a moment before beginning, "So. We should probably talk, huh?"

[April]

Willow kept busy and to herself after she was evacuated to Sanctuary to keep her away from the Gorgon's influence, a measure that the dryad didn't think was necessary (but that was an opinion she kept to herself) but one that she understood.

It took a considerable amount of willpower on her part to keep from throwing herself at Erik when he stepped through the portal though it hadn't been that long since they parted. It was a reunion that Willow had both anticipated and dreaded, she had a lot to answer for and he had a right to those answers.

The dryad broke from her reverie at the sound of her beloved's voice and nodded. "Where do you want to start?"

[Gizmo]

"Oh, well, I don't know," Erik replied breezily, looking back down the hill at the distant activity and gesturing nonchalantly with one hand while he rested the other arm over his knees. "We could chat about the weather, I guess, or go over the finer points of hockey again. Or, hey, maybe we could talk about you being pregnant and not telling me." The tightness in the fencer's voice suggested some barely contained emotion, but in truth he wasn't sure how to feel. 'Panic' seemed fairly likely but not very helpful; fortunately he had considerable experience in bottling up feelings and letting his mouth run independent from any capacity for coherent thought.

[April]

The faint, nervous, expression on her face vanished and her amber eyes, like pools of gold, widened in clear confusion. "Why does that matter?" she asked, tilting her head as she regarded the metamagi.

"My sisters; Karya, Morea, and the others are dead, Erik, and my only remaining family subverted my will and made me attack a people and city I came to care for." There was a touch of grief in the tone of her voice, but her eyes had narrowed. "And I did tell you, or at least I gave notice of my intentions. And if I was unclear, you know now."

[Gizmo]

If Willow's expression was one of confusion, the look Erik gave her was nothing short of flabbergasted. Placing the fingers of each hand on his temples, the young man took a deep breath before continuing. "Okay, I'm getting that this is apparently one of those 'hilarious cultural misunderstanding' things, only this is less of a 'don't sleep on park benches' thing and more of a 'what the sweet fluffy hell, Willow' thing." He was talking even more quickly than his usual rapid fire banter, edging on stream of consciousness as he let words out in a rush until he was forced to take another breath. "For reference, here, having a kid is generally considered a team sport these days. There is, ideally, some frank discussion involved." With a groan, the swashbuckler threw himself backward to lay on the grass of the hill, covering his eye with his palms. "I'm really trying to remain calm on account of your giant, space sister being a huge, awful cow and all, but I'm missing some pages in my Willow-to-Erik dictionary, here."

[April]

"I'm sorry, I did not intend to cause you trouble."

Whatever anger had been quietly simmering below the surface evaporated and though there was still a trace of confusion evident from her posture and expression, that was starting to fade.

The dryad stretched out a slender, copper toned arm, reaching toward the swordsman's hand but hesitated. "The first page," the white-haired woman started, "the most important page, simply reads as 'I love you.'."

"This is why I allowed this to happen, and why I wanted this to happen. Even then I wasn't sure if it would actually work, and though the Preservers have left my kind with a way to replenish our numbers I have never been a Mother."

[Gizmo]

There was a moment of still silence before Erik sighed and removed the hand closest to the dryad from his face, exposing one eye. "...yeah. Yeah, I know." Noticing her hand lain in the grass between them, he met it halfway, wrapping lean, athletic fingers around her knuckles. "I'm basically freaking out here, and I get that you don't get why, and I'll try to explain that later, I guess, but for now if you could just get that I am, that would be... yeah. Dios." Rubbing the bridge of his nose with the hand stiff on his face, he grimaced. "Okay, that thought kinda got away from me. So, uh. This is maybe beside the point, but when you say 'allowed'...?" His habit of more or less treating everything from aliens pirates to sentient zombies to giant, mutant bees as though they were human had actually served him pretty well, historically, but he realized he'd never really taken the time to clear up just how Willow's physiology differed, once the immediately relevant features had proven pleasantly familiar.

[April]

"I want to understand," the dryad murmured as she kissed the back of the fencer's hand, internally very pleased with even that small amount of contact. She had missed Erik, terribly, and though she didn't understand why her pregnancy bothered him she was keenly aware that it was causing him some distress. The ancient guardian worried her lip a little as she looked down at Erik, as she thought through his question.

"You have a sister," she started, picking her words carefully. Willow assumed her beloved understood the various aspects of human reproduction but since her last assumption is the cause of his current stress, she wasn't taking chances. "And you are aware that human females are fertile only some many days out of the month. That... is not so with my kind."

"You are very careful, dearest Heart, and though the material may have changed over the centuries the basic concept is sound, I recognized your efforts for what they were. But then as there is now, there is a chance of failure." She smiled faintly at Erik and kissed the back of his hand again. "That happened some months ago. As I mentioned a moment ago, my kind do not have a fertility cycle as a human. Such a cycle is not convenient for a Guardian, and so our reproductive organs are inactive until we choose to activate them."

[Gizmo]

Letting his free hand fall from his face to lay on the grass, Erik offered Willow an almost blank, dumbfounded look. "So... what? Your womb has play and pause controls?" Even the swordsman himself wasn't entirely sure if he was legitimately asking for clarification or just being generally incredulous. Part of him was relieved the hear that the entire thing wasn't the result of some colossal screw-up on his part, at least not entirely, but he was still having a lot of difficulty processing what the ancient guardian was telling him and adjusting his understanding of the situation accordingly. "I mean... months ago? But you're not, er... You... saved it?" The hand flew up to cover his eyes again, tearing up grass as it went and colliding with his face audibly. "Argh, I can't even have an adult discussion about bodily fluids, going to be the worst father ever, dammit."

[April]

The dryad tilted her head to the side as she considered what Erik was saying. "Yes. As I said, my sisters and I are--were--not like human females, a monthly cycle would be inconvenient, as would an unexpected pregnancy," Willow started to explain. "So Guardians such as I can store what we need, what we find suitable, for when we need it." White haired woman shrugged, and added, "Ants are similar. A Queen can remain fertilized for the entire length of her life, upwards of twenty years."

"But if you are worried that you would not be a suitable father, my beloved Heart, you need not involve yourself."

[Gizmo]

Erik opened his mouth to say something than closed it again almost immediately, muttering something unintelligible before attempting again. "I was about to make some remark about ants before I remembered we were on Giant Talking Bee World and got some perspective on relative weirdness," he admitted with a sigh. At he last remark, however, he turned to give her a baffled look, scrambling with a modicum of acrobatic grace to prop himself up on his elbows. "What? Dios Will, is that why you didn't bother telling me you were planning this?" he asked, his voice rising in pitch and his expression one of hurt. "After what I told you about my old man, do you really think I'd... I'd... That's a helluva thing." The last of the thought was largely directed at himself, unable to finish his sentence.

[April]

"Beloved, you already shoulder many burdens." The dryad's voice was tender as she changed position, stretching out next to Erik taking care to maintain the grip he had on her hand. "You have a team that needs you, a community that depends on your stewardship, and a family of your own to protect."

But Willow was twisted up inside; her words and her actions continued to cause Erik hurt, and nothing she was saying or doing was alleviating that pain. She was getting worried, and that worry was beginning to leak through her neutral expression. "Do not misunderstand my Heart, I want our daughter to know her father, she is to be a bridge between our worlds after all; but I will do what I must to keep the both of you safe."

[Gizmo]

"Daughter...? Ha, yeah, I mean, I guess she would be," Erik rambled absently in slowly dawning realization, the fencer's attention continuing to catch unexpectedly on individual words of the dryads attempts at assurance. "If you're set up to... 'replenish' then it would be a girl. Haha..." Sitting up enough on the hillside to lift his free arm and rest his face in it's hand, he chuckled, the sound quickly growing into the easy sort of laughter that came from pent up tension being released.

Eventually he calmed down enough to the concerned expression slipping onto Willow's face. His own features softened, and he squeezed the hand in his own gently. "Hey. Listen, I think I'm starting to get why you didn't... want to worry me with this, maybe?" he began slowly, catching her gaze and holding it. "But this kid? She is never going to have to wonder where her dad is or why he couldn't be there, okay? I don't know if I'll be a good father, but I'm going to be a father. That's how family works."

[April]

Willow said nothing for a few moments, silently appraising the swordsman. Then she smiled and, in a single motion, simultaneously brushed her nose against Erik's and closed the remaining distance between them. "You will be a great father Erik," the dryad quietly assured the metamagi.

"And I do want you there, for her sake and for my own. It is clear that I do not understand how families work, certainly you see them more than once every few centuries... and they don't slave your will to their own... but I want to learn."

[Gizmo]

Erik's feelings were still a chaotic mess, distracted from sorting them out by the enormity of the imminent changes in his life. On one hand, Willow had made decisions without consulting or even informing him, but on the other hand the swordsman was beginning to understand why that wouldn't have even occurred to the ancient guardian. The difficulty he had staying angry with a familiar, copper toned nose brushing against his face probably didn't hurt either. "I think we can call 'regular interaction' and 'no mind control' a solid rule one and two," he agreed with a faint smirk. Lying back down with a sigh, he looked up as the clouds in Sanctuary's sky passed by in the breeze. "So, anything else I should know about?"

[April]

There was a near uncomfortable length of silence as Willow thought about Erik's question. She considered, and then immediately dismissed, telling the swordsman what she had offered to the Gorgon, at least for the moment. The dryad still couldn't believe she made that offer--she felt it had something to do with the Gorgon's influence--but she knew now was not the time to broach that subject.

So she opted for something else. "I'm going to have to start eating," she murmured. "The power that sustains me... it is not sufficient for our daughter."

[Gizmo]

"Heh, is that your way of telling me that breakfast in bed should become a regular thing?" Erik asked with another, shorter laugh as he reflexively shifted to release Willow's hand so that he could wrap the freed arm around her shoulder and pull her against his side. "So I guess you're, what, eating for one now? I feel like we're going to making up a lot of this as we go. Which, y'know, business as usual." Turning from the clouds overhead to look over at the dryad. "Which is to say I think the food thing can be arranged."

[April]

"Good," Willow breathed, kissing Erik on his nose before she snuggled up against him. "I love to watch you work." An errant breeze washed over the couple, rustling the grass with a gentle whisper as the dryad lapsed into her peculiar still silence, her only motion being the occasional twitch of her ear in time with Erik's heartbeat.

"Speaking of," Willow said after a period of quiet, "you must take me into custody when we return to Prime. Your laws demand it, and I will not hold myself above them."

[Gizmo]

Usually a coil of barely contained dynamic movement that drew restless if it wasn't in action, Erik found it unusually easy to simply be still next to Willow's preternatural calm. Her latest statement jolted him back to full alertness, however, and he shifted to look at her directly. "What? Will, c'mon, that wasn't your..." It took only one glance at the slender woman's expression to tell how serious she was about her decision. "Okay. Alright, fine, but I'm not 'taking you into custody'. We'll go to the police together and explain what happened," he countered, pulling her back toward his side after sliding away a moment before. A low, soft rumble reverberated through his chest. "And in the interests of encouraging open, honest discussion in the future, you should know that I'm finding this streak of civic responsibility intensely attractive."

[April]

The dryad gave a faint, contented sigh as she relaxed against the metamagi, burying her face in Erik's neck. "If I am to do things right," she said quietly, "I must do right by all things. That means the laws of your city, my beloved." Willow kissed the swordsman's neck lightly before pulling back, a serious--but tender--expression on her face... and then she flashed an impish grin.

The plant controller had hooked a leg over the fencer's and as she rolled over onto her back that leg, with the assistance of the grassy carpet, pulled the senior member of the Interceptors on top of her. "But while we are in Sanctuary..." she murmured.

[Gizmo]

Laughing brashly as he rolled with the tumble of limbs with the graceful ease of his profession, Erik supported his weight on his hands and grinned broadly down at the the copper-toned woman. "Hah, I knew practicing those hand-to-hand skills was a good idea," he quipped in an appreciative growl before lowering himself down just enough to kiss her collarbone, drinking in the dryad's winey taste before abruptly stopping his trailing exploration to push off of the hillside and give Willow a frank look. "Look, I've got to ask: you can't get any more pregnant, right? That's not a thing for you? Double-pregnant?"

[April]

Willow's amber eyes flickered open at Erik's question and for just a moment her expression was unreadable--and then she started to laugh. It wasn't what one could call a loud laugh, Erik certainly heard louder laughter from the dryad earlier in the year, but it was certainly full bodied.

From his position, Erik could feel the laughter shaking the white haired woman. As the laughter subsided, Willow shook her head. "No, beloved heart," she murmured as she threaded one of her hands into the Swordmaster's hair. "That is not a thing for me."