Yay for Michael/Sara. Here's a oneshot of them, in the future. Enjoy!
"I'll always love you, Michael." Sara whispered in his ear. He nodded slightly as he hugged her tightly; his throat was too tight to allow him to speak.
"It's time." The guard said roughly, grabbing Michael's arm.
"Please, just one minute!" Sara pleaded. The guard reluctantly sighed. She looked down at her feet, then back up at Michael, eyes glistening, full of unshed tears. He kissed her passionately, knowing that this was his last chance to prove his love for her. They were forced apart as the guard yanked Michael away. He tossed an origami rose towards her, but the movement was unexpected, and Sara didn't catch it. She bent over, but the fact that she was eight months pregnant prevented her from being able to reach it. Instead, Lincoln stepped forwards, grabbed the rose, and handed it carefully to Sara, who clutched it to her chest as a tear traveled slowly down her cheek.
Michael watched all this as the guard dragged him across the room, over the infamous yellow line, and forced him into the chair. He sat numbly, not registering anything except how loud his heartbeat was. He could hear it, roaring in his ears. He wondered if the technician who was attaching the headpiece could hear it too.
The curtain fell away, revealing the viewing room. Lincoln was there; LJ on his left, Sara sitting on his right. His wife was crying freely now. Lincoln wrapped an arm protectively around her, his big brother manner shining through. In spite of the situation, Michael almost smiled. Lincoln would look after Sara, and their son, when he was born in a few weeks. Sara had told him that she was naming their son Michael. He had asked her not to, but she'd insisted, so Michael had made her promise not to call their son MJ; just Michael. Michael David Tancredi.
Suddenly, the technician slipped the black hood over his face. The last thing Michael saw was Sara burying her face in Lincoln's shoulder, sobbing hysterically. Michael's stomach lurched sharply as he realized that it was the last thing he would ever see. Fear coursed through him now. No, not fear. Fear was the feeling you get when you can't start the car in a shady neighborhood. This was sheer terror. He heard several buttons be pressed, a switch flicked. The monster machine began to hum, and just when it reached its loudest-
Michael screamed, sitting bolt upright in bed. He clenched his teeth, to avoid yelling again.
"Michael...?" She spoke his name softly, soothingly. Sara tenatively placed a hand on his shoulder. Michael breathed heavily for several minutes as he gradually became aware that he was not, indeed, at Fox River Penitentiary any more. Instead, he was in the bedroom of his and Sara's new house, located in a suburb of Chicago. Michael rested his elbows on his knees, running a hand anxiously through his hair as the details of his nightmare danced through his mind.
He shook his head slightly, as though to rid himself of the dream. Michael realized that he was drenched in cold sweat and that the pale sheets Sara had purchased a few weeks ago were tangled around his legs. He kicked his way out from under the covers, and stood up. Michael paced the bedroom a few times, aware that Sara was watching him, before muttering something about a glass of water and walking out of the room.
Michael made his way slowly to the kitchen, not bothering to turn on any lights. He knew where everything was; he had, after all, designed the house. The blueprints for the house had been his wedding gift to Sara, almost three years ago now. In the kitchen, Michael poured himself a glass of water from the sink. They had purchased one of those refrigerators with built-in ice and water dispensers with money from Michael's legal settlement for the time he spent in Fox River and as a fugitive, along with furnishing the rest of the house. They still had a large sum left; money wasn't an issue for them these days. Michael still preferred water out of the sink, though. He thought that the water from the refrigerator tasted funny for some reason, although everyone else said it was fine. Lincoln, too, had gotten a fairly hefty settlement, which he had used to buy a house and to save as LJ's college fund. His brother and nephew lived just a few minutes away from Michael and Sara.
Suddenly the lights in the kitchen turned on. Michael turned quickly, heart still racing from the intensity of his nightmare, and saw that it was just Sara. He looked back down at his glass. "I didn't mean to keep you up." Michael said.
"It wasn't just you. The baby wants chocolate milk again." Sara replied, opening the refrigerator. "Was it the one with Mahone or the one with the chair at Fox River?" She asked softly, as she poured a glass of chocolate milk.
"The one with the chair." Michael responded, tracing the rim of his glass.
"Ah." His wife said. "You haven't had that one in almost a month." Michael was silent; he'd had the same dream every night for the past week, except he hadn't woken her up by yelling in his sleep. There were other nightmares that he had, ones that ended with him waking up a split second before he would die: one in which Alexander Mahone was chasing him, ending with Michael against a tall brick wall with nowhere to go; another in which their house was set on fire by a federal agent, where Michael was trapped under part of a collapsed wall and eventually was consumed by the flame, not knowing if Sara was alive or not. The worst one by far, though, was the one with the electric chair.
"I still can't sleep without dreaming." Michael said finally.
"Call Dr. Henderson in the morning." Sara suggested.
"He doesn't know what the he... heck he's talking about." Michael replied angrily, changing what he'd been about to say. Sara was a firm believer that unborn children could hear everything going on in the world around them, so she didn't like any obscenities to be said in her presence. Michael thought that this protectiveness was charming, if unnecessary, so he put up with it. He sighed, and watched Sara pour herself a second glass of milk.
Michael smiled faintly, staring at her, determined to remember every detail about their time together. His smile grew as he noted that the over-sized T-shirt that Sara had started to wear as her pajamas when she was three months pregnant was now, at eight and a half months, stretched tightly across her belly. Michael slowly crossed the kitchen, and stood behind her, wrapping his arms around her middle. "You're beautiful." He murmured softly in her ear, kissing her neck lightly.
Sara laughed. "I look like a cow." She insisted.
"No you don't. You look gorgeous." Michael replied, rubbing his thumb in small circles on her hand.
"You're not buying into that 'pregnant glow' nonsense, are you?" Sara asked, leaning her head back to rest on his shoulder.
"I'm not buying in; it's just true." Michael said. "Dance with me?"
"I'm nine months pregnant and you want to dance?" Sara looked doubtful.
"Eight and a half." Michael reminded her with a grin. "And I always want to dance with you."
"There's no music." Sara pointed out.
"I can sing, if you like."
"Oh God, no."
"Dance with me?" Michael repeated.
"Well, if you insist..." Sara trailed off as Michael manuevered so that they were facing each other. He took her hand in his, and placed his other on the small of her back.
"I do." He said. Michael slowly led her around the kitchen, pausing every now and then to twirl Sara carefully.
"Michael?"
"Mmm?"
"I know that Dr. Henderson thinks that your nightmares are a result of psychological trauma that you sustained at Fox River and in the months after your escape, but what do you think they're from?" Sara asked.
Michael was silent for a moment, thinking. "Lately," He began slowly. "I think that I've just been worried that something's going to happen, that I'm not going to be here for the birth of our son, that I won't be around for him."
Sara looked up at him. "Do you want to be? Around, I mean. Do you want to be around?"
"Of course!" Michael replied immediately, a little hurt by her insinuation that he would abandon her and their son. He decided that it was probably just her hormones talking. "Of course I want to be here. I'm just concerned that something's going to come up, something I can't control, and..."
"Michael, those days are over now." Sara said, softly.
"Yeah." He agreed. "But I worry about it anyway."
"Don't." She urged him. "Just enjoy the here, and the now."
Michael grinned. "I'm enjoying the here and the now very much." He replied, moving closer to his wife.
"Me too." Both of them were silent for several minutes, savoring the quiet, which would be in short supply once the baby was born. Then, they faced weeks of sleepless nights, a constantly screaming infant, and undoubtably, some stress-induced arguments with each other.
Right now, Michael was looking forward to every minute of it.
There was a time, not that long ago, when he had thought that he would never have this. Before Michael was sent to Fox River, he'd only ever been serious about a handful of women, and of those, none of them were right for him in the end. He worked a lot in those days, leaving no time for a family anyway. It was somewhat ironic, now that he reflected on it, that going to prison had somehow given him everything: his brother, a wife, a house, and now, a child. So, at least for the first little bit, he would enjoy the torture that was being a new parent.
Suddenly Sara stiffened, a stricken expression on her face. "What's wrong?" Michael asked immediately, concerned.
Sara looked down. "My water just broke." Sara answered, voice full of surprise and awe.
Michael followed her gaze, and saw that there was indeed a wet spot on the shorts she slept in, as well as a small pool of... something on the floor. He jerked his eyes back to Sara's face. "But it's only been..." Michael paused, doing some math. "Thirty-four weeks, not nine months! It can't be time yet, we haven't-"
"I know it hasn't been nine full months, but... this is it."
Michael was just trying to remember to breathe. "But, we... we can't... it's just..."
"Michael!" Sara snapped sharply, to get him to stop babbling. "I am in labor. And I need you to calm down, because believe me, I'm scared enough for the both of us!"
Michael fell silent for a moment, staring at her. "You're in labor." He said finally, smiling. Sara nodded.
Twenty minutes later and a contraction later, they were at the hospital. "You ready for this?" Michael asked, as he brought the car to a slow, careful stop in front of the hospital.
Sara glanced in at the building. "I don't know." She replied, seeming very uncertain.
Michael perceived this, and placed his hands on one of hers. "Sara, we're having a baby. Today is the day we bring Michael David Tancredi into the world." He said, using the same tone that Sara had used earlier, when he was coming out of his nightmare. Sara looked at him for a moment, before nodding. "Okay. Good." Michael said as he opened his door. He helped Sara out of the car, and guided her towards into the hospital.
"Michael?"
"Hmm?"
"Looks like you're going to be here after all."