Shadow Of Morbius
A/N: I just wanted to get this posted. It's likely, considering all I've got on my plate right now, fanfiction-wise, plus my university work, I won't be able to update this for awhile.
Nyssa awoke slowly, frowning slightly as she felt a hand drifting over her swollen stomach.
It had been seven and a half months since the attempted transfer of Omega, and the plot to implicate the Doctor in treason. Seven and a half months since she had said goodbye to her friends after Councillor Hedin's Ceremony of Passing.
So much had changed.
It had been over a year since she had been bound to the Castellan, a cold, rigidly disciplined man, or so she had thought.
Underneath had been a man capable of spontaneity, of passion, of fire and tenderness. A man she had grown to love so devotedly, her Eldred. And the father of her child.
The thought of that little life growing inside her, a true miracle on a planet where pregnancy was supposedly impossible, made her smile, as she shifted and turned over, the heavy swell of her stomach making her movements unwieldy.
She met Eldred's eyes, a hard silver grey which softened whenever he looked at her. Since the discovery of her pregnancy, he had become oddly gentle with her, possessive and overly protective as ever of course, something she had had to bear, but it was worth it. Their relationship was more open, although never overtly affectionate in public. Time Lord society was not conducive to public affection, but in the privacy of their own rooms, he could lower the walls he built around himself and just love her.
He had never mentioned the word love but Nyssa was certain he did. The doubts and the fears she had allowed to pain her before Otherstide were long dissipated, and if anything she was the one who had to soothe fears. After all, with naturally born children not seen for millenia, the skills of parenting were long disused on Gallifrey.
In truth, Nyssa herself was a little afraid of motherhood, but she at least had some memories of her father raising her, to help her. She would meet any challenge in their future with determination.
A sharp kick to her kidney made her wince. "Could you please tell your son to kindly stop kicking his mother, and would he like to be born quite soon?" she moaned, as her husband merely chuckled, and stroked back her hair from her face.
"I'm not sure he will listen," he replied. "He inherited your stubbornness."
"There's an old Earth saying Tegan taught me. Pot calling the kettle black," Nyssa grumbled archly, eying her reprobate husband as he glided his hand over the swell of her stomach. She felt a slight movement inside her, gentler this time, and smiled as a sense of warmth and apology filtered through her.
This pregnancy had, from the start, been difficult. Not unexpected when she was carrying a hybrid of Gallifreyan and Trakenite, but it seemed the child was already highly mentally developed, with telepathic powers of his own. From the fourth month Nyssa could feel his emotions, his thoughts with her own empathic and telepathic abilities, enough that both mother and father could communicate with their child.
She had suffered badly from nausea and fainting spells until the sixth month, when the med techs informed her she could use special pills to control the symptoms, now the child was more developed. He possessed a binary cardiovascular system like his father, but the mental development, the telepathic ability which was clearly instinctive suggested the true melding of Time Lord and Trakenite DNA.
The child had been seen as a miracle, yet another facet of the legend which was slowly surrounding Nyssa. Without any conscious desire, Nyssa had been thrust into the heart of Gallifreyan politics, but with Eldred's help, she had learned quickly how to navigate the dangerous waters of Time Lord society. Until she had been confined to her rooms by the med techs as a precaution, she had begun working with Thalia, Zorac and Borusa about lifting some of the more archaic laws still binding the Time Lords.
Rumour had it that Borusa would soon offer her a councillor's seat beside her husband, as a kind of diplomat and representative of and for relations with the rest of the Universe.
Leela, Thalia, Andred, Damon and K-9 always visited regularly, easing Nyssa's frustration that she was stuck in bed, not even allowed to go out into her garden. The whole thing felt ridiculous, and so she had become very impatient for the child to be born.
At that thought, Nyssa sighed, brought back out of the past few months by Eldred's hands gently stroking her body. That had been another side-effect of pregnancy; increased hormones had meant she craved her husband's touch even more than before, something which in the first few months he had been more than happy to accommodate once his work was completed for the day, but as her body had changed, they had resisted, not sure if intimate relations would be wise with such a developed child growing inside her.
"Nyssa?" her husband's gentle question broke the pattern of her thoughts while she smiled up at him. "Are you well?"
"Yes," she breathed. "Just very ready for our son to be born."
A wave of heat flashed through her, as his hands tightened on her, and Nyssa very much doubted it had come from the baby within her. One positive about lying in bed all day was that she'd had plenty of time to practice her mental abilities, sometimes taking wicked delight in surprising her husband in the middle of meetings, and then reaping her reward afterwards.
"I feel your impatience, Nyssa," he murmured, "And I would also appreciate it if you focussed your telepathy elsewhere today. We wouldn't want a repeat of two months ago, would we?"
Nyssa simultaneously blushed and laughed at the memory. She offered her lips, and he took gladly, as he always did, passionately so before sitting up in their bed.
"You have work to do," she murmured resignedly. How he found the self-discipline to pull back when they were together, she didn't know, because she certainly never could. "And I have 'rest' to take."
Eldred couldn't hold back a chuckle at the disgusted look on his wife's face as she uttered that last, stooping to press a kiss to her forehead.
"Soon, Nyssa, soon you'll be free to get up again, and we'll have much time to make up for when you are healed," he told her, making her blush again. It looked most becoming on her still sleep-warm skin, framed by soft brown curls.
"I haven't even given birth yet, and you're already planning how we may conceive the next," she mumbled laughingly, before turning over. Her sleeping robe had ridden down low over one pale shoulder, prompting him to lean over her and press his mouth to her skin, first on the rounded swell revealed by her robe, then her neck and temple. She moaned and shifted beneath his attentions. "If you actually plan on my getting any rest today, then I'd suggest you cease that."
Eldred took one last moment to savour the feel of his wife's skin, her alien heat and the thrumming wave of psychic energy which emanated both from her and the child she bore, before turning and leaving to dress and prepare for the day.
Nyssa smiled sleepily as she heard him leave, before slumber overtook her, and she snuggled down further into the pillows.
He watched the screen intently, waiting for the Castellan to emerge, and leave his wife unprotected. Oh, there were guards and security watching her rooms, but then, there was always ways around such impediments.
The conception of a natural-born child was providence itself. He could not have asked for a better opportunity. The Lady Nyssa might be loyal to her husband, but she would soon serve her purpose for the greater good.
Something he had been working towards for centuries. The Chronossian chapter would rise again, and their leader, the rightful leader of Gallifrey.
Morbius.
The Castellan swept from his chambers, robes pooling behind him, and he smiled.
The cameras went dark, and he picked up a communicator from his desk. "Take her now."