A.N. - It's been a while since I wrote a Trivate fic, so here is one I've been considering a little while and decided to test out in written form ^_^

A Proposal AU

Trixy carefully brushes the yellow floof on Elliot's head. His feathers are still a little damp, but are fluffed up from a thorough towel dry. She then wraps him up in a blanket and lays him in the crib and kisses his cheek.

"Sleep well, Li'l Lee. "

The little chick smiles and snuggles into his blanket burrito for his nap. Trixy waddles back over to her couch and flops down with a long sigh.

" I wonder where Private has been today..." She looks up at her ceiling. "I mean even if he had night watch last night, he always is present for Elliot's nap time."

Trixy then sits up with a gasp. "What if he was—Wait, no. " She sits back. "He was here this morning at breakfast. Maybe Skipper's training is letting him out late.

"No. That can't be it either, Skipper let them off today because he had something going on."

Trixy frowns and gets up. She waddles over to a wall and presses a button for it to flip. A map and several other papers are tacked up on it.

"Do reindeer make summer practice runs for Christmas?" She looks sad. "Is he seeing Cupid again secretly?"

She presses for the wall to flip once again and waddles back to the couch with her head down.

"I guess that would make sense... I haven't exactly been the way he dreamed. We aren't happily married in Nova Scotia with one little tike and another on the way. We have Elliot, but we aren't even married... I had thought we were kind of happy... But maybe he isn't."

She lays down and looks over towards Elliot with a sniff.

"I love my little Elliot, but if we split up, he'd have a better life with Private... He's better at parenting." She starts crying. "Maybe he'll still allow for visitation! Like Christmas, Cupid would be busy then anyway..."

Trixy then quickly dashes from the couch to the trashcan by the desk as she gets the sudden strong urge to throw up. She sits down sniffing beside it.

"Maybe I've been too overwhelming or domineering with him... Maybe he's gotten bored of me. When did our relationship change?" she sobs. "I don't want him to leave!"

Meanwhile, Private, Kowalski, and Johnson are in the lab. The door is locked. The air is uncomfortably tense. Private pokes at a pencil on the table and clears his throat.

"So... Um... I was... Um... Thinking..."

Johnson looks at him encouragingly. "Go on."

"I was thinking... Well... Trixy turns nineteen today... I was thinking about... Proposing. "

Kowalski looks at him. "Have you talked with your and her parents?"

Private shakes his head. "I doubt she has even told hers about Elliot."

"Oh... Yes, that could be a problem." Johnson says and looks at Kowalski.

"Why are you looking at me for? You're the counselor! " Kowalski exclaims.

Johnson rolls his eyes. He looks at Private. "Skype the parents; ask about marrying. Don't say anything about the chick. Ask Trixy if she has told them and leave that up to her. If her parents give their blessing, go ahead with your plans."

Private nods. "Thank you..." He taps his flipper tips together. "How do you suggest going about asking her parents? Her father isn't the most...Uhm..." He sighs. "He's a general!"

Kowalski looks at him. "Well, they know you, right? They obviously trusted you enough to let you go with their daughter to America."

"Yes...But that is different than asking for their daughter's flipper and leaving out the part where you and her... You know, and Elliot." He groans and leans his head in his flippers.

"We already said not to worry about that part. Just start off with light small talk and let it naturally find a spot to slip in." Johnson sighs. "You're not lying so it's okay. You're just...selectively giving them information. Perfectly fine."

Kowalski glances at him. "That would be a white lie, wouldn't it? Doesn't that go against your religion?"

Johnson looks over his glasses at him. "It is not. There is no lie. God withholds information all the time until his people are ready. I'm sure he'll understand." He shrugs.

"Oh really?" The scientist snorts in amusement. "Remind me to bring that to your attention the next time you go off on me about lab inventory."

"Hey now! That is different completely! When you withhold information for the sheer purpose of greedily hoarding chemicals you know I planned to use in an experiment, you are crossing over to lying and ruining my afternoon for avarice!" He grumbles and crosses his flippers. "Bet you don't withhold chemicals from Marissa..."

"What was that?" He narrows his eyes at him. Johnson just looks innocently away.

Private begins to get up and clears his throat. "Er, right, um, thank you." He nods to them and waddles out to leave them to their bickering. He glances at the time and gasps. "Oh dear, I missed Elliot's nap time..." He wonders if Trixy will be okay if he misses one for a good cause. "I'm sure she will understand..." He nods to himself. He then takes the elevator down to the video conference level of the HQ.

Trixy waddles back into the room from the bathroom. Her tears have dried, but her expression is now stunned and pale. She sits on the couch again and stares at the floor as she gets her thoughts in line. "Maybe he will be okay to wait another four or five months before leaving me for Cupid... Or, or should I not tell him?

"No, no, I have to tell him. He's my best friend, no matter if he leaves me or anything. He deserves to know."

Trixy lays down on the couch and watches Elliot sleep. Her flipper drifts down to rest on her tummy.

"He'll be a smashing big brother, no matter where or who they live with." She smiles to herself, feeling a little proud despite her anxiety.

"And who knows? Maybe Private has a really good excuse and isn't seeing Cupid again. Maybe the four of us will be able to be a nice little family together.

"But nevertheless, I should be ready for if he does decide he wants to leave.''

Elliot begins to make a whining noise. She gets up and waddles over to his cradle and rocks it. "Shh, shh, it's okay, baby. Mummy's just thinking out loud again. It's okay. Shh, shh. It's okay."

Hours later, Trixy watches from her bunk as Elliot and Atlas play together in the floor with a stuffed octopus that squeaks and a rattley pony.

The elevator comes up and Private steps out, glancing both ways.

"Ah! There you are! " Trixy exclaims.

The chicks pause to look at the teens before returning to their playing.

Private sheepishly smiles. "Sorry, I had a bunch of things to do today."

Trixy looks at him. She feels like crying, but she also feels like fish slapping him into next week. She tries to keep her face neutral. "What kind of things? I could have helped maybe?"

He shakes his head. "No, these were things that you couldn't help with."

"Oh... " A lump rises in her throat.

Private smiles at her. "Are you busy this evening?"

She shakes her head. "No more than the usual, you know, putting Elliot to bed."

He sighs and looks over at his son. "I know, I'm sorry, I got caught up in a conversation with Johnson and Kowalski and the time escaped me."

Trixy looks at him. "Oh?"

Private shrugs. "Just a small... Philosophical discussion."

"Oh. " She nods slowly. "Sounds interesting."

"It was very enlightening." He forces a smile. He hates that he is only giving her half truths, but he really hopes she will understand in the end and won't be too mad.

Trixy glances at the clock. "When were you wanting to do something?"

"Any time you'd like, Love."

Her eyes meander from the clock and meet his and she smiles a little softer. He always did know how to cool her temper. "We could go at dinner time. I'm sure Mari would be okay watching Elliot and Elliot would love to play more with Atlas."

Private now looks at the clock and pales a little. Dinner time is less than an hour away. "Of course! That sounds smashing!" he says while inside he is mentally panicking. Sure, he could easily scrap together a picnic in that time, but that wasn't just what he had planned. But how could she know what he had planned? She couldn't, of course.

He had already talked with Marlene about preparing a special spot out in the park. He had found a really nice pebble by the stream he was sure she would like. He had even scavenged around and found his old Mr. Tux bow tie to wear.

"Oh, and Trixy, if you could wear the bow I—" he paused as he realized most of the bows Trixy owned he had given to her over the years. "The blue shiny one?"

Trixy tilts her head. "The one I wore on our first date?"

"Yes! That one!" He nods excitedly.

"Might I ask why?"

Private shakes his head. "No, just trust me on this." He smiles cutely at her as he backs up to the ladder. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have one last thing to polish up before tonight."

Trixy nods and watches him go before looking back at the two little chicks. "He's in such an odd mood today...Maybe he's expecting too..." she murmurs to herself.

She then gets up from her bunk and knocks on the lab door. "Going down stairs, chicks are playing up here unsupervised!"

Marissa opens the door and shouts over her shoulder. "Kowalski, continue for me from step 97 on page 63. I have to watch the offsprings." She then shuts it behind herself with a nod to Trixy. "Got to get ready for your dinner with Private?"

"How did you know?" Trixy smiles.

Marissa shrugs. "Kowalski told me Private told him about it earlier."

"Did he say anything else?"

"Nothing I can pass on to you. I'm not going to be a date spoiler." She sticks her tongue out at her and waddles over to the chicks.

Trixy sighs a little disappointed and waddles to the elevator. She goes to her level and begins to search through her bows for that particular one. After throwing over half of them into a pile on the floor, she finally finds it near the bottom. She blows her bangs up from her eyes and waddles over to the mirror. She unties the ribbons from around her feathers and her neck. Then ties the blue ribbon around her neck and brushes out her feathers and curls them before doing her makeup.

Private nervously waits outside the habitat. He had expected Trixy to have been out long before now. Not that time is an issue for him really, but the longer he stands there waiting, the more anxious he becomes and the heavier the pebble feels in his feathers. He tries to ignore the little voice in his head. What if she had decided not to go out tonight? What if Elliot had gotten sick suddenly? What if she said no? What if she laughed?

"Well, that wouldn't be too bad actually." He murmurs. "She does sometimes chuckle when she's nervous..."

"Who sometimes chuckles when she's nervous?" Trixy asks, poking her head up from the hatch.

Private jumps and spins around. "Oh! No one!" He reaches down to help her up.

Trixy looks at him with a straight face, but on the inside she feels sad again. "I see..."

"Are you ready to go?" He smiles at her. She nods and he gently takes her flipper in his and leads her out towards the park. He can't help but feel excited and it takes every spare ounce of patience in him to keep himself from kneeling right then and there and proposing. He leans over and pecks her on the cheek. "Happy birthday by the way."

"Huh?" She looks at him and blinks. "Birth-day?"

Private looks at her with a tiny amused smile. "Trixy, today is your birthday, innit? Did you forget? Or...am I early?" He now looks confused at the ground.

"No...no, you're right. I just...I forgot my own birthday." Trixy chuckles. "Buckingham, I'm too young for memory problems."

"You've just been busy, Love. I wouldn't be worried." He says but chuckles as well.

Trixy sighs. "Of course." She leans her head on his shoulder, but a little hesitantly. She feels a little relieved when he leans his head on hers and pulls her closer with his flipper around her lower back. They waddle out a little ways until they come across a stump with a red table cloth and two small stools by it. A vase of roses sits on the center of the table. A little chain of colored paper lanterns hang above the table in the overhead branches of a nearby tree.

"Oh, Priv! It's so pretty!" Trixy gasps.

"You haven't even had dinner yet!" He chuckles and helps tuck in her stool with her on it to the stump.

Trixy looks at him. "Oh?"

"Sadly I didn't have the time...nor the culinary skills to really cook it myself, but I found he recipes!" He smiles at her.

Rico and Manfredi comes over from the shadows with little bow ties and their plates and a bottle of sparkling juice. Manfredi leans a little close to Skipper. "Nice try, but Skipper downgraded your order from wine. You know neither of ya are legal." He whispers.

Private smiles a little sheepishly. "Thank you anyway. I may have gotten a little carried away..."

Manfredi nods and pours the drinks. "Nah." He winks at him.

Rico waits til Manfredi has finished pouring before kissing his flipper and waiving it in a fancy way. "Yum yum."

"Right, bon appétit." Manfredi nods and then follows him back to the HQ.

Trixy smiles at him. "You planned all this?"

"I wanted it to be special." He smiles back at her.

"But it's just my birthday. " She says starting on the fish.

"No, Trixy, it's more than that. " He sighs. "You're more than that."

Trixy looks up at him.

"Trixy... " He gets her flipper. "We've known each other for essentially our entire lives. We grew up together in London. We were transferred to the searing desert in a foreign country for four years as children —"

"You mean when we lived in that zoo outside of Dallas, right? "

Private pouts. "Yes, but that doesn't sound quite as poetic."

"Sorry, sorry, go on. "

"As I was saying, we lived together for four years, estranged from our families—"

"Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing... "

" Trixy! You're killing me here! "

"Sorry!" she chuckles. "Please, do carry on."

Private sighs and looks at her. "Then we lost each other for five years when Lieutenant transferred us again against our will."

"Yes, your fabulous brother... "

"Trixy! "

"Well!"

He looks at her in excited frustration. "Anyway, we found each other again and have been together since then. You're the mother of my child. You're my best friend. And honestly, I could never think of having gone through all of this with anyone else. You drive me crazy some days, and others you scare the living daylights out of me. Trixy..." He kneels down with her flipper in his and takes out the box with the pebble. "Will you marry me?"

Trixy gasps and looks at him. "You mean you aren't leaving me for Cupid?!"

Private looks at her weirdly. "What? Why on Earth would you think I would do that?!" He slowly stands back up.

"It's just...You've been acting so strangely...I just assumed...Oh Buckingham! I had no idea!" Trixy starts to tear up.

"I had wanted it to be a surprise, of course you weren't supposed to have an idea of it!" he sighs and looks at her. "You know you still haven't given me an answer..."

"Oh, yes! Yes, yes, yes!" Trixy sniffs and hugs him. "Of course I'll marry you!"

Private smiles and hugs her close. His little tail wags. "Yay!"

Trixy smiles and softly kisses his beak. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

She smiles at him happily and then leans away so that she can inspect the pebble in the box. "Buckingham! It's so sparkly!"

"Yes, about that, um, you may want to keep it well away from Julian..."

Trixy chuckles and returns to her stool. "Of course."

Private also sits back down and smiles at her as he finally starts on his plate. Trixy also eats on hers but besides an occasional smile at Private, becomes distant in her thoughts until she has finished eating.

"Hey, Priv?"

He looks up at her. "Yes?"

Trixy pokes at the tail of the fish on her plate with her fork. "I kind of have a surprise for you, too."

Private looks at her, unsure of what to think. He feels a little worried. "You do?"

She nods and feels in her feathers and passes over her pregnancy test. "Just discovered this today...It may impact our wedding plans a little..."

He looks at the test with wide eyes and then at Trixy. "Have you ever even told your parents about Ethan?"

"Yes, they know about him. They don't know however about this one. No one does but you and me..."

Private looks at her softly before leaning over and kissing her cheek. "You know I'll be fine having the wedding whenever and with whoever you feel comfortable with inviting. It'll be fine."

Trixy sighs and nods, looking at her plate. "I know...I'm just nervous. What if we can't handle more than Elliot? We're teenagers, Private!"

"Hey, hey, Love, it's going to be okay." He gets up and waddles behind her and rubs her shoulders. "We can do it. And you know our teams will help us if we need it...Or if we absolutely need to, we can always all go back to London for our families to help."

"But, but what if Elliot gets jealous! Or, or what if he feels like we're replacing him!"

Private rubs her still. "He won't. He'll be happy and will enjoy being a big brother. He and Atlas will happily accept another playmate. There's nothing to worry so much about. It's going to be okay."

Trixy sniffs but does try to calm down. She turns and burrows her face in his feathers. "I hope so, Private, I really do."

"We'll let Marissa give you a check up and let the skippers know. It's going to be okay. And no matter what happens, I'm going to be here with you every step of the way, okay? That I promise you." He hugs her and rubs her back. "This is a happy thing, not something for you to panic over. It'll all work out."

"You're probably right..."

Private nods. "Why don't we go back? You've had a stressful day full of surprises. I'll put Elliot to bed." He kisses her cheek.

Trixy nods and gets up. He gently then swoops her up in his flippers and holds her close. She wraps her flippers around his neck and holds on without argument.

A few weeks later, Private stands by the lab bench Trixy lays on while Marissa sets up the ultrasound.

"It's still kind of early to see much, but you can see the basics," she says. "Like, making sure the egg is egg shaped and not like a ping pong ball."

"That's possible?" Private looks at her.

"Meh, probably not unless she's part sea turtle or the egg erred."

"Oh..."

Marissa pulls on some gloves and turns on a little monitor. "Let's see..."

Private and Trixy both watch the monitor nervously. Marissa glances at it every so often as she searches.

"Ah! There they are!"

"They?" Trixy looks at her.

Marissa nods and points at the screen at two small eggs. "As of now, there's two. Statistically speaking, one might not make it. But since in both of your breeds twins are not that uncommon, is hypothesize that they will both make it. You'll just have to make sure you eat enough and rest. You know, that jazz from before."

Private and Trixy look at each other with wide eyes. "Twins..." they repeat.

"Yes, twins. Can't tell their sexes yet, but there's two somethings there for sure."

Private nods slowly. "Eh...thank you," he says, watching as Marissa cleans Trixy off.

"Ah don't mention it. Just be careful and no heavy lifting. Leave that to the boys." She nods.

"Right...Right." She nods and Private helps her up. She still is in shock and lets her other flipper drift to her belly. "Twins...Buckingham."