The Woes of Life

Viva la Viveca

Disclaimer: oh look... a cookie... -forgets to actually disclaim anything-

Ichigo: she doesn't own this -_-;;

Summary: Kenpachi comes to a realization about his life. Set in Sweet Dreams-verse. AU, yaoi, KenIchi, rated for language. No lemon. Mpreg.

AN: this takes place after Taste of Life. Basically this is the spoiler that nothing bad happens to the baby(ies).

Kenpachi Zaraki's life had been hell the past three weeks. His hair was combed but he didn't have the energy to put it up in its normal spikes, much less attach the fucking tiny bells he had always done for whatever fucked up reason he had come up with at the time. He was tired, it was apparent by the visible circles under his eyes, a difficult feat due to how tan his skin was. The only reason he was eating; he was basically sleeping in the dining room since it was the only room he wouldn't be bothered in. No one ever used it, and now he was thankful for that.

Why was Kenpachi so worn out and out-of-character?

"You are a fucking. Insensitive. Demon. Psychopathic. Bastard!"

Each word was punctuated by some object being thrown at Kenpachi's head. And all of them hitting. He cursed Ichigo's ability to aim. Ichigo stormed around there bedroom, seemingly looking for something sharp to throw at Kenpachi and hopefully maim him with. Maybe he would castrate the man! Yes, the idea was quite pleasant running through Ichigo's head.

"What the fuck did I do?!" Kenpachi shouted. He had been doing a lot of that lately, but he just couldn't keep his temper at bay anymore. He blamed it on being tired and having a splitting headache. His head might be hard, but hit it with enough heavy stuff and he eventually could get a headache, if he didn't get pissed and kill you first.

"Well here's a start: You were born!!" Ichigo was literally screaming, just aggravating Kenpachi's headache more. "Oh, and I know where it ends! You're. The. Fucker. Who. Got. Me. Pregnant!!!"

Each word brought a new object flying toward Kenpachi, and instead of trying to dodge this time, he tried catching them. Ah, yeah... that could be part of the problem, couldn't it? a little voice in the back of his head said. He growled and told it to fuck off. What he didn't realize is that he actually said it loud enough for Ichigo to hear him.

Ichigo's nose flared and Kenpachi could swore he saw Ichigo's eyes turn crimson just before he was attacked; by Ichigo with his sword. Kenpachi easily dodged and ran. He was unarmed and he couldn't lay a hand on his mate anyways. It was bad enough Ichigo shouldn't have been doing all the shit he was doing, what with him being just a couple weeks away from giving birth. Kenpachi cursed loudly and ran past Ikkaku.

"Kenpa-" Ikkaku watched as Kenpachi ran past, Ichigo chasing after him, murder written on his face. He smirked, giving a chuckle.

"What's all the yelling about?" Yumichika yawned, holding a baby who just looked up at him and then over to his father, blinking cutely.

"Ichigo's going to kill Kenpachi," Ikkaku said with a shrug, ushering his mate and child back into the kitchen to laugh at their lord and his mate.

"You're a fucking dead man, Kenpachi!" Ichigo chased him right outside, surprisingly agile for someone who was eight-months along with a baby.

"Ichi, I wasn't talking to you, I was-" talking to the voice in my head. Yeah, because that would really impress his mate. He sounded like the psychopath Ichigo had claimed him to be off-and-on the past few days.

He blinked when he saw someone up ahead. It was actually four someones- he had completely forgotten that Ichigo's family was coming today. Actually, he had remembered, that's what had prompted him to go to try and talk to Ichigo in the first place.

"Hey, Isshin," he called out as he headed toward the forest; he knew Ichigo would stop when seeing his family and hopefully be happy again.

"Kenpachi! I didn't expect a welcoming party!" Isshin blinked as he ran past, giving his wife a look before watching Ichigo run past with his sword raised high. "Uh-oh... looks like someone's in trouble..."

Karin followed. "I'm going to go watch the carnage!" she called out as she followed the two men.

Kenpachi's last refuge was the actual forest itself; Ichigo was forbidden from going in there without him, and while he was still technically there, Ichigo knew better than that. He wasn't holding much hope though. He knew he would eventually have to turn and face the orange-haired demon. He stopped before the tree line, not willing to risk Ichigo going in there without him as a bodyguard. He couldn't help but let out a little chuckle when he saw Ichigo's black-haired little sister following with a grin on her face. She had never hidden the fact she didn't like Kenpachi, especially with her brother.

Ichigo didn't expect Kenpachi to stop. Every other time Kenpachi just ran around until Ichigo got tired, refusing to fight the pregnant man for whatever reason his twisted mind came up with. It just made it even harder to take out his frustration on the man. If anything it caused more irritation. That's why he stopped when Kenpachi stopped, a bit shocked. Karin perched herself on a fallen tree, waiting for something violent to happen.

Eventually Ichigo got over his surprise and attacked Kenpachi, slashing at his chest. He knew it was ineffective; they had done a lot of training before Ichigo had gotten pregnant and he knew that Kenpachi was difficult to wound with just the amount of effect Ichigo was currently able to put forth. He wasn't weak; just a bit... awkward, what with his large stomach in his way. But he attacked again and again, working out three weeks of anger on the large man. It was this same man that caused all that frustration anyways, and finally Kenpachi was letting him beat on him to get it all out. If only he had done that in the first place.

Kenpachi stared down at him, realizing that Ichigo wasn't even putting full strength into the blows; maybe he'd be safe after all.

Finally, with a sigh, Ichigo stopped pummeling him and dropped his sword, a look of exhaustion on his face. Kenpachi had a small cut from where Ichigo had actually put power into his sword, but was otherwise unharmed. He could tell Ichigo was exhausted though, and he might have felt bad if not for his headache still pounding.

Karin gave a depressed sigh; Kenpachi was still alive. Nothing exciting had happened.

"Ichi... what did I do? All you do is throw shit at me and you haven't even told me what I did to deserve it in the first place!" Kenpachi looked down at him, reaching out to touch his cheek. Ichigo's lip quiver and he started crying. The demon king gave a quiet sigh; he was horrible when his mate started getting all emotional, even though he knew it was just hormones. That's what made it worse. Not comforting the orange-haired beauty just resulted in more pain for him. And less sex. He was fairly sure getting less sex was the worst of it.

Ichigo sniffled for a bit as Kenpachi thought for a moment and then wrapped his arms around him. Ichigo buried his face in Kenpachi's chest, crying until he couldn't really cry anymore. At least he felt a bit better now. He took another minute to collect himself so he could actually talk without another break down. He knew his mate hated when he cried.

"Ichigo?"

"You said I looked funny."

"What? When?" Kenpachi tried remembering when he had ever said something like that. He thought his mate was beautiful; why would he ever call him funny looking?

"You were talking in your sleep that night... You said I was fat and funny looking..." Ichigo sounded so sad it almost broke Kenpachi's heart. Now he tried remembering what he had been dreaming about that night, no easy feat when he barely ever remembered his dreams from the night before.

"Are you sure I was talking about you? I have some pretty obscure dreams, and you're not in most of them..." Kenpachi knew he was taking a risk by saying something stupid like that. He didn't know how Ichigo would take him not always dreaming of him, at least not in the emotional state he was in.

Ichigo blinked up at him. "Not... dreaming of me?"

The large man braced himself for more yelling. It never came. "So... you weren't calling me fat and funny looking?"

"Unless you're a five-foot-two five-hundred-pound circus clown... no," Kenpachi said as he remembered what he was dreaming of that night. It was one of his odder dreams. While Ichigo had been in it, he knew he hadn't called Ichigo fat, considering in the dream the fat clown was delivering the baby. Yes, his dreams were normally creepy like that.

Ichigo's mouth formed a perfect 'o' and he stood there thinking for a moment before he smirked. "You dream of fat circus clowns?" he chuckled.

"It was that fucking book I was reading to Yachiru. Me and clowns never did go well together... Well... except for Ikkaku, I can deal with him," he shrugged, dissing his best friend in the process. Ichigo grinned. "We good now? No more throwing stuff at me?"

"No more throwing stuff at you. Now, we better get back to the manor... I think I passed my parents by when I was chasing after you."

Kenpachi sighed, a quite large bruise where Ichigo had thrown a glass at his head slowly forming above his eye. While it hadn't cut, it was making a nice purple and black bruise. At least it didn't hurt much. He stood outside the door, waiting for any news. His mate had gone into labor a bit earlier than expected, something he wasn't quite comfortable with. A good percent of demons never made it out of the birthing, an even higher percent of the babies never made it past the first day. That was the way of the world.

"Ken-chan..." Yachiru tugged on his pants, looking up at him. She held a sandwich in her hand, offering it to him. "Yumi made it for you. Said you might be hungry."

Nel, the little girl Ichigo had saved from Hueco Mundo a while back, stood behind Yachiru, clinging to the back of Yachiru's dress. "Ist mama alwight?" she looked up at him with big eyes.

"I... don't know, Nel... why don't you two go play?" he took the food from Yachiru. "Tell Yumi I said thank you."

The two little girls ran off, leaving Kenpachi to lean against the wall, taking a bit of the sandwich and sighing.

"Kenpachi-sama..." Unohana, the manor's healer, came out of the room. She had a smile on her face. "Ichigo-sama would like to see you..."

Kenpachi shoved the rest of the sandwich in his mouth unceremonially and rushed into the room and over to the bed to check on his mate. Ichigo was a bit pale, but he looked otherwise fine and happy. There was a tiny bundle of pink blanket in his arms. "A girl." Kenpachi smiled.

"Not.. exactly..." Ichigo said, looking up at him sheepishly as Yuzu, dressed up in a cute nurse's outfit (she had demanded she be able to help), brought out another bundle of blanket, this one making whining sounds. Kenpachi's eyes got wide as she set it in Ichigo's other arm with a big grin, heading off to go find the rest of the family.

"Twins?"

"Hehe, yup," Ichigo's grin was beyond happy as he held the two newborns close. "Aren't they adorable?"

Oh, look. Now you have two more people to throw stuff at you! That annoying voice in the back of his head, that sounded strangely like Urahara Kisuke, exclaimed. He told it to shut the fuck up again, making sure to keep his actual mouth shut this time.

And even though he knew that the rest of his life was going to be even more of a living hell (he had no doubt there would be more children to add to these two and the two they had adopted), he knew that this fleeting moment of calm and happiness was completely worth it.

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AN: YAY KENICHI BABIES. I know. this is WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY ahead of the end of a Taste of Life, but dammit I got inspired to beat up Ken-chan. And I did. Sorta... not much Ichi can do when he's huge. And yes. Twins. There will be a one shot where they all argue about naming them. That said. I need name suggestions. I have a couple I like, but I want my fans to help in my choice. So, review to this with a couple name ideas for both boy and girl, then I'll have some voting (I'll sneak it into a chapter of ToL), and we'll go from there =3333