AN: This story was written early in season three, when Nadia was only a spoiler on the horizon, and we had no idea what kind of part she would end up playing in Rambaldi's endgame. I have a morbid streak, at times.
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"Do you know what it is like to be born to die?"
"We're all born to die."
"Not like me."
She shifts, cradling a bundle in her lap. "What are you thinking?"
You have a small photograph hidden in your wallet. Maudlin. Sentimental.
Quite like you, in a lot of ways, although few admit it.
"You've really grown."
She looks up at you, and through the sweep of her long hair you can see the glimmer of a small tear. "Yeah."
She shifts again. Stone is uncomfortable. The bundle tilts in her lap, and she strokes it gently, as if it were one of her old dolls.
"I'm so tired."
"It won't be long."
You make it a practice not to lie to her, if you can.
You almost wish you could lie to her, this time.
"Maybe you should sleep."
"And miss it?" She is irritated with you, slightly.
"It might be easier. Then you wouldn't have to think about it. Dread it."
"I couldn't sleep, now. Minutes slip through my fingers like stars. Why should I waste them now?"
She lifts a hand in front of her face as if to demonstrate, and then peers closer. "Have you ever looked at your hands? Closely?" she whispers. "So many lines. A web of experience."
She lifts one of your hands gently and holds it next to her own. She doesn't need to speak. In light of her words, the difference is almost obscene. She is young. You are old.
'Do you know what it is like to be born to die?'
You will hear that echo in your mind every day until you die. You harbor a savage hope that it will burn itself into your heart as a constant reminder. You want to live with this searing pain, forever.
Some wishes are easier to grant than others.
"I could give you a sedative."
It is your last gift to offer, and what a paltry one it is.
She slowly shakes her head, the skin of her arms suddenly pebbled with goose bumps. And you realize: she's scared.
She's shaking in her thin pajamas, tired and terrified. You pulled her from her bed five hours ago, her look like that of a sleepy toddler, and led her to this room to wait. She had been quiet, but in control.
Until now.
Perversely enough, you can't remember the last time she looked so much like her mother.
"Just a pill," you continue calmly, your hands beginning to sweat. "It doesn't have to be an injection… I know how you feel about needles." You add the last with a note of desperate humor. You want to hear her laugh again, while you still can.
She frets, the same way she did when she was six months and hungry. Now, she is muted.
"Fucking pills," she suddenly snarls, twisting her fingers. "Keep your fucking pills." She jostles the bundle slightly, but quickly rights it with a wild look in her eyes. "How long?"
You check your watch, and open your mouth to speak.
"No, don't tell me." She traces the hard edges of the bundle with a light touch. "Do you have to be here for this?"
"Yes."
"It's so undignified," she mutters. "I'd rather be alone."
She twists on the stone again, trying to find a comfortable spot. "I feel like a virgin sacrifice," she jokes lightly, and then freezes, her words catching up with her. "Well. Yes." Pause. "It's cold in here."
"I can't control that, now."
"I know." She is calm again, but you can see the glint of skittishness in her wide eyes. "Did you ever actually believe it would come this far?"
"It was a hope. A dark hope." She was your insurance, you remember. Because of her, you will be able to keep the person who is truly important to you.
"I hope you can be happy, later," she murmurs. "With her. I hope that this helps." Her hand clamps down upon the top of the bundle. She has secure, strong hands, like her mother. Like her sister.
You begin to wonder if your loyalties might have been displaced. How could you have ever thought that you could raise a child, only to sacrifice her for another- one that isn't even your own.
You wish, now, that the night of forbidden touch a quarter of a century ago had never happened. It hadn't even been that enjoyable- you had been thinking of what your wife would say. She had been thinking of what her husband would say. What her government would say.
It was a tactical error on both sides. You had both hoped to create a different woman of the prophecy, to deter the danger from the other girl. It is beginning to look like a mistake.
She laughs quietly, and it makes your skin crawl.
"It's warm," she says, choking on the words. "I never thought it would grow so warm." Her hands flex around the bundle. "It's moving."
"Nadia?"
"You never said it was alive, Daddy," she whispers in a panic. She hasn't called you 'Daddy' since she was ten. She looks as if she would pull her hands away, but they remain rooted where they rest. A small whimper escapes her. "It hurts," you barely hear.
She shudders noticeably. "I want my mother," she demands, stronger for the moment. "I want her. I want this to stop, why won't it stop, stop, stop."
It won't stop. Twenty-five years ago you unwillingly implanted your seed in an equally unwilling woman, and since then time has raced giddily ahead of you, arrowing towards this moment. You thought twenty-five years would never end. You were wrong.
Blood creeps from the corner of her mouth, dripping down her chin. You know too well the havoc the small bundle is wreaking upon her inner organs, and you suddenly wish that for once in your life you had ignored that path of research. There was no need for you to know. You and your weakness for knowledge. Pathetic.
"I never understood," she whispers, displaying the blood coating her teeth. "I never did, I think. Maybe if I had met her, I would know how my parents could discard one child in favor for another." The blood drips onto her white tank top, brilliant against the purity of the cloth.
"We do love you, Nadia," you protest uselessly.
"She must be wonderful," she continues, eyes half closed, beginning to slouch over as if protecting the bundle from harm.
You look away. How can you explain the situation in thirty seconds, and still let her know that you made a mistake?
You can't.
You turn back, intent on offering a last loving caress, although you do not know if she would be able to feel it with the way it is affecting her nervous system. She is curled in a fetal position around the bundle, her hands still clamped around the edges. Her skin is still warm to your touch, but the lock of hair hanging in front of her mouth in still. Even through cloth, the machine has done its work well.
You… you have killed your only child. Willingly.
And while your daughter's blood pools on this stone, your heart continues to beat steadily, unhindered by stress. Your body remains calm, while your mind is in shock.
Your heart will catch up eventually. It always does.
And you think, what the hell will you tell her mother?