(((Dedication: to Dark*Irish*Princess—GOD, WOMAN, HOW MANY KIDS DO YOU NEED?!

Summary:

Niki and Jacob have their first child. Hopefully no one dies in the process.

Disclaimer: We don't own the Twilight fandom.

Fandoms: Twilight

Pairings: Jacob/Niki, Edward/Gracie

Warnings: sexual innuendo

Notes: More self-indulgence. :( But "Niki and Gracie Go to the Zoo" was a hit, so I figured another companion to "Silence in the Night" wouldn't be TOTALLY out of place. By this point, Jake and Niki have their own house in La Push.)))

Niki Gets Pregnant

By: Tjix and EverAfter-Silence

Chapter One

"Jacob!"

Werewolf pack leader Jacob Black groaned and rolled over in bed, trying to shut out the sharp voice. It's too early for this.

"JACOB!"

There simply was no blocking out that voice. "What, Niki?"

"Get your ass in here RIGHT NOW!"

Sighing in exasperation, Jacob sat up and rubbed his bleary eyes. He glanced over to where his tiny, barefoot wife stood in her underwear in the open door to the bathroom, glaring at him acidly.

"What's going on?" he murmured sleepily.

"I threw up."

"You what?" He was suddenly wide awake, swinging his legs out of bed and bounding to Niki's side. "Why? What happened?"

"I don't fuckin' know, dickhead. That's why I woke you up," she snarled, jerking away and crossing her arms over her chest. "I wasn't drunk last night, and I slept fine and all that shit. I just... ugh. Like, I don't even know."

He was confused by her bad temper. Niki wasn't a morning person, but she had never been downright aggressive to him before. Moving cautiously toward her again, he laid one hand on her shoulder. "I don't know either, babe. Maybe we should take you to a doctor."

She gave him a sardonic look. "Yeah. 'No, doc, nothing unusual here, just a four-foot-nine, one-hundred-two-degree, alcohol-swilling teenage werewolf with temper issues. Got a diagnosis yet?'"

Jacob rolled his eyes. "Maybe we should take you to see the bloodsucker doctor."

"Carlisle?" Niki genuinely considered the suggestion. "Yeah. Maybe. Or, you know what? Better yet, let's just get Gracie over here. Maybe she'll know something."

Jacob sighed. "Niki, as highly as you think of Gracie, she doesn't know everything. Why would she know anything about this?"

"God, Jacob, you're such a prick. Would you just fuckin' call her?"

Withdrawing into his confusion, Jacob surrendered. "Yeah. Okay."

"You're pregnant."

Niki fell off the bed, stunned. "I'm WHAT?!" she screeched. "What did you say?!"

Gracie, perched on the opposite side of the bed, lifted her eyebrows in mild amusement. "Relax, Niki. See, when a mommy werewolf and a daddy werewolf love each other very much..."

Tousled head popping back up over the other side of the bed, Niki narrowed her eyes at the redhead. "Now is not the time for your rarely-seen twisted sense of humor to emerge, Gracie," she hissed. "At least, not unless you're ready to tell me that you were kidding and I'm really just dying of some weird werewolf cancer."

"No joke. There's another little heartbeat underneath yours." Gracie rose and walked over to the other side of the bed to crouch by the other girl. "What's so bad about this? Didn't you tell me once that you wanted kids?"

Niki was leaning back against the bed, her knees drawn up to her chest and her arms wrapped around her knees, eyes wide. "I know, but..." she whispered. "But..."

Gracie sighed and folded her legs underneath her so that she was seated on the floor beside Niki. Putting her arm around the werewolf, Gracie asked, "What about this situation upsets you?"

"I don't know. Just the... everything. I mean, yeah, I wanted kids, but I wanted to be... you know... kind of grown up first. I wanted to be responsible and smart and all that good stuff. You know—a good old boring mom, not a freak-of-a-dam like I had. I wanted to be... well, someone like you." It took Niki a moment to realize what she'd said, and she frantically tried to backpedal. "I mean, it's not that you're boring. You're just responsible and all that, but not in a boring way. I mean, yeah, I guess being responsible is boring, but I just—oh, shit. Nevermind."

Gracie laughed and began stroking her friend's dark hair. "It's okay. Sometimes being responsible is boring. But, hey, that's why I have you, right?"

Niki chuckled darkly. "If there's one thing I will never be, it's boring."

"I'm sure your husband will vouch for that." There was a wicked smile hovering on Gracie's face.

Drawing away, Niki put a hand over her heart and pretended to gasp. "Gracie! You pervert!"

"Oh, I didn't say anything wrong," Gracie said lightly. "You just have a dirty mind."

Niki laughed a little, but then her smile faded. "Gracie," she whispered tremulously, suddenly gripped with a terrible fear. "What if... what if Jake isn't happy? What if he doesn't want the baby?"

"Bite your tongue, oh ye of little faith," Gracie said sharply. "This is Jacob we're talking about. Not your father."

Niki closed her eyes. "I know."

"Don't cry." Gracie's cold fingers were on her face, wiping away tears that she hadn't known were there. "Niki, I know you're emotional because of the pregnancy, but you know Jacob better than that."

"I know, Gracie, I know, but everything just feels like shit right now. Everything. Like my life is going to hell in a handbasket. I threw up this morning. I can still smell it, even though I brushed my teeth and flushed the toilet like three times. Jake asked me if I wanted something to eat, and I almost threw up again. The thought of eating anything makes me sick. I've had to pee every five minutes for three hours. And Jake—Jake is so worried, he thinks I'm sick with the flu or some shit like that. What is he going to think when I tell him I'm pregnant?" Niki covered her face. "And my emotions are all out of whack—one second I'm like, 'fuck the world,' and the next I'm like, 'oh, boo-hoo, I think I'm gonna go in my little emo corner and cut myself.' I mean, what is that?! What the hell is that?!"

"Come on," Gracie said when Niki paused for breath. "I'll take you downstairs and we'll tell Jacob together, okay?"

"Jake?"

Jacob stopped pacing and turned. "Niki," he said in relief, going to his mate and taking her by the shoulders. "Are you okay? What have you come up with?" He had been exiled from the bedroom when Gracie arrived, and so was oblivious to anything that they had discussed.

Niki glanced at Gracie, who nodded encouragingly. She bit her lip. "Uh... well. Um. I'm not sick."

His relief was palpable. He swept her up in a bear-hug. "Niki, that's great!"

"Uh... yeah. Put me down, Jake. In fact, pull up a chair. You won't want to be standing when I break this to you."

Confused, he put her down. "Niki?" he said cautiously. "What's going on?" He looked between her and Gracie, whose face revealed nothing.

"Jake." Niki took a deep breath, then let it out slowly and spoke in a small voice. "Jake, I'm pregnant."

He stared at her for a long moment, then turned slowly to look at Gracie. Gracie nodded slightly, confirming Niki's words. Jake looked back at his wife, all the blood having drained from his face. Gracie wisely pulled up a kitchen chair and he collapsed into it, his knees clearly too weak to hold him.

"You're sure?" he rasped.

"I can sense the child's heartbeat," Gracie reminded him gently.

Jacob stared at Niki in wonder. "A baby," he said, stunned. "A baby."

Niki moved forward. "Jake..." she said in trepidation.

"Niki. Niki." In one fluid motion, he was on his feet, lifting her into his arms and holding her more tightly than he ever had. "A baby! Can you believe this? You and me, we're gonna have a baby!"

"Well, it had better be yours and mine, at any rate," Niki said sharply. "We've already got vampires and werewolves. We don't need illegitimate DNA-cloned, beamed-into-my-body-by-magic, what-the-fuck-is-Niki-smoking aliens, too."

Jacob laughed, his usual good humor restored. He hugged her again, then set her on her feet, suddenly concerned. "Are you okay? I mean, how far along are you? And you throwing up, that was part of it, right? How long is that going to last?"

Gracie put up her hands. "Jacob, slow down," she said soothingly. "Niki doesn't know any more about this than you do, and I don't know much more than that. We really should as Carlisle about this."

"Well, call him!" Jacob couldn't take his eyes off of his wife.

Just then, there came a knock on the front door. Gracie vanished from the kitchen, then returned a moment later with Carlisle and Esme at her side.

"Alice said you were going to need us," Carlisle informed them with a smile, "so here we are. What's going on?"

"It's Niki," Jacob said excitedly, before either of the girls could speak. "She's pregnant!"

Esme gasped, one hand flying to her mouth. "Oh, Niki!" she cried, moving to embrace the young werewolf. "That's wonderful!" Holding Niki out at arm's length, Esme studied her and smiled warmly. "Your complexion is blooming."

"It is?" Niki put her hands on her cheeks. "I don't feel like blooming. I feel like shit." She gave Esme a startled, guilty look. "Sorry. I mean, I feel like crap."

Esme laughed. "Tell me everything. How far along are you?"

"Uh..." Niki glanced at Carlisle. "I don't know. I was kind of hoping you could tell me."

Carlisle lifted one eyebrow at her. "Well, when was the last time that you and Jacob…?"

"Um..." Niki and Jacob exchanged a mortified look. "Pretty recently."

"How recently?"

The werewolves' blushes deepened. Gracie was grinning. Esme smiled knowingly. Carlisle's expression was still one of pure clinical curiosity.

"Um... a couple nights ago."

Carlisle nodded. "I see."

Esme tilted her head to one side. "That can't have been it. It takes about eighteen days for the baby's heart to start beating, and I can hear it already."

"Well, I don't know," Gracie said thoughtfully. "Werewolves mature abnormally fast. Werewolf babies might do the same thing."

"That's an interesting point." Carlisle turned to Niki. "Tell me, have you had any symptoms?"

"Umm. I threw up this morning."

"Morning sickness," Carlisle commented thoughtfully. "That generally begins around seven weeks. Go on."

"I've been really tired. I've had a bad taste in my mouth, kind of metallic-ish. Um..."

"Mood swings," Jacob put in.

Niki glared at him. "Thanks, dear."

He grinned. "You're welcome."

"Anything else?" Carlisle wanted to know. "Don't be embarrassed, Niki. You're in front of two women, your husband, and a hundred-year-old doctor. You don't have to feel awkward."

Niki chewed her lip. "I have to pee, like, every five minutes," she divulged. "And... um... I think that's it, so far."

Carlisle nodded. "Well, I can make a few professional recommendations. When it comes to the morning sickness, your best bet is to avoid eating too much in one sitting. Eat small amounts regularly, and don't eat anything overly sweet, salty, spicy, etcetera. Drinks lots of fluids. Get lots of rest. Exercise can help, as well. I suggest that you drink something—like water or tea—before getting up, and maybe eat a little dry toast. As for the mood swings... there's not much that can be done in that area. It's the overactive hormones, and it should wear off shortly after giving birth. You have a similar problem when it comes to urinating—your uterus is expanding and pressing against your bladder, which gives you less room to store urine in your body. That won't change until after the baby is born. You may go on to have other symptoms, such as cramps, body aches, headaches, hemorrhoids, and other things. You shouldn't lift heavy objects, bend your back too much, wear high-heels, sit or sleep with your feet up, drink alcohol, or take un-prescribed medicine during your pregnancy. Okay?"

Niki shook her head in amazement. "Maybe you should go over that again. I'll take notes this time."

Carlisle laughed softly. "You can call me anytime with a question. I'll almost always be available, and if I'm not, I'll contact you as soon as I am. Don't be embarrassed to ask about anything that concerns you, alright?"

"Gotcha." Niki gave him a thumbs-up.

"I'd also like you to keep me updated. I want to know how fast this pregnancy progresses, in case Gracie is correct and your baby is maturing at a rapid rate."

"Yessir." Niki grinned. "I'll certainly let you know."