Released from Solitary Confinement
Chapter 1
Between Seven and Six
It is for the want of an apple. That's all it is.
They're attacking the mountain, the natives from P3X-whatever, she ate a single apple and now they are attacking Cheyenne Mountain. Teams 1 through 15 are out exploring of course and she doesn't really know how many remaining teams there are. That's how she ends up waddling through the concrete corridors stained red with an alert that won't shut up, holding the bottom of her stomach and telling herself that she's not in labor, rather it's the cupcakes, those delightful little spiderweb cupcakes she hoarded the rest of and has been snacking on since Friday.
There are more tremors, more quaking and she wonders why the other teams haven't been called back. A terrible thought hits her, what if they've wrecked the stargate? What if they've disabled it because those horrible bramble throwing morons have tried to engage it. Another pain strikes through her stomach and she stops, her hand slapping the wall.
It's a bruise, just a bruise from where she hit the doorframe.
"Ms. Mal Doran," General Landry calls to her, and she's relieved because she was working her way down to the gate room where he would be situated if there was an attack. He hurries over to her, placing a hand on her back. "You alright?"
"I'm tired," she tries to grin at him, alluding back to their conversation not an hour ago, but when she tries to move off the wall, her breath hitches and her lungs don't expand.
His face is close to hers and rather craggy in the siren light. "Are you—"
"Just a cramp," she laughs it off, but it comes more out like a huff, and perhaps she should go to see Dr. Lam. "What's going on?"
"Natives from the Apple Planet—" the infamous Apple Planet as they've taken to calling it. Some of the other teams call her Eve until Mitchell coiled up on them. "—they're trying to enter through our Stargate."
"What about the other teams?" She lets him take her arm from the wall and walk with her, when they miss the turn to the gate room she assumes they're going to see Lam.
"We've diverted them to the Apple Planet." Walks calmly with her while soldiers jog by, guns drawn. The alarm finally stops blaring but the auxiliary generator hasn't clicked on to bring the lights back yet. "They can only hold a stargate open for 38 minutes, the second that's up they're going to get bombarded with fifteen teams."
"General." A man jogs towards them and gives her an expression like he knows she's Eve in this whole mess. It's Mitchell's fault if she thinks hard enough about it, he was too good at sex and this was bound to happen. "We need you, they've found a way to enable the stargate."
"You're kidding me."
"No Sir, Walter is matching them for now, but if they get in—"
"They're not getting in." His eyebrows and mouth falter as he turns to her because she's going to be abandoned again. "Can you get yourself to Carolyn?"
"Yes," she nods standing on her own, her hand rubbing the area on her stomach she smashed into the frame.
"Vala, if I hear you didn't—"
"It's nothing I haven't done before." Slaps her hand against his shoulder a few times as she continues her gait down the hall. Doesn't turn to wave them goodbye as they take off in the opposite direction.
She's going to murder Cameron. Bludgeon him in his handsome face because she told him this would happen, but he just had to get in one more exploration with the boys, and Samantha, before the baby comes. Does she get to go off-world and dig around in the sand for useless artifacts and pretty trinkets, no she gets to try and navigate a stairwell down two floors in almost pitch black because the elevators are out of commission.
Sidesteps her way down to the first landing, the building trembling as much as her bare feet relying on tactile instead of visual aid. At the first landing she inhales deeply setting off another the pain firing up her back and sides. As she's about to tell herself it's indigestion or another cramp, liquid drips from between her legs creating another obstacle for her to get through down one and a half more floors.
"Are you kidding me, baby?" Irate with a fetus and it sounds so stupid but Cameron's not here, the General's not here, and there's no one left to be upset with. "Do you want to be delivered or not because if I slip, we're both done for."
Another quake hits just as her foot touches down on the next level. She hugs the guardrail and slopes downward on the floor her knees landing a bit harshly. Bits of dust puff down from the ceiling and between bricks in the wall and the mountain might groan louder than her. She hasn't been timing the contractions, but it's only been about an hour since the attack began, so there must be plenty of time.
More soldiers run by the next floor door and she shambles over, opening it yelling after them, but they've disappeared like all of the men in her life, and Samantha. Doesn't want to do this alone again, cannot do this alone again without having the support she was relying on. They were supposed to do this as a team, he promised they'd do this as a team.
Picks the first step carefully estimating about ten before the landing and then ten more before Lam's level. She can make it, just a little jaunt, a tiny brisk walk to the park, like when Cameron took her to the park, the one with the large fountain and bought her ice cream, then let her eat his too.
He turned towards her on the bench, wearing a t-shirt and a pair of cargo shorts and rubbed her stomach through the sundress she wore, her one leg kept raising and tapping him on his knee until he took the hint and started to rub around her swollen ankles.
"What are you thinking?" He questioned watching all the other couples with children, running around sticking their hands into the fountain, screaming for ice cream, the parents chasing after them before they drown in a few inches of water for want of a shiny quarter.
"That I want more ice cream."
He quirked an eyebrow at her and chuckled but became quickly silent. "Ask me what I'm thinking."
"What are you—"
"I think we should get married."
Glanced at him over her sunglasses to gauge his seriousness and when he only grinned foolishly at her she sighed, "Cameron."
"I think this baby is the greatest thing that's ever happened to us." Her dress rumples around her stomach as he rubs and coos to their baby.
"I've been married four times before, and each time it ended with my husband trying to kill me."
Grasps her hand, sticky with melted ice cream and stares her in the eye, completely nonplussed by her amount of previous marriages. "I promise to never kill you."
"No, Cameron."
"Then just live with me, even if it's just for the first six weeks." He kisses off some of the vanilla ice cream from between her fingers. "So we can get this parenting thing down together."
"And what would Ariel have to say about this?"
"Oh Princess, I broke up with her the minute you started having fever dreams about cupcakes."
"Yeah?"
"Oh yeah," and he leans over to steal a kiss, and she lets him, sticky and wet and hot and she tastes vanilla when she licks his lips. He fixes one of her pigtails, and lets his hand linger on the side of her face. "I knew I needed that kind of crazy in my life."
At the second landing her knees give away. Partly because the contraction is stronger, ripping through her and making her muscles weak and partly because the tremor in the building is so grand that part of the wall caves in blocking a large portion of the stairs downward. If she wasn't pregnant with a very impudent child she would be able to squeeze through the rubble, but she's far to big now.
Staying on her hands and knees she pulls herself away from the guardrail, which threatens to collapse, and into the corner which appears, in the dim light, to still have most of the structural integrity.
"Alright you," she jabs at her stomach hoping to get the baby in on the plan as well. "I promise you all the breastmilk your little stomach can handle if you hold off until someone finds us."
As an answer she has another roaring contraction.
The pain is more excruciating than she remembers with Adria, but she had the Will of the Ori in her and they probably did some ancient voodoo to lessen her pain. She's crowning, she's brought a hand down to try and assess the situation the best she can without another set of eyes down there and knows that this child is intent on being born between level six and level seven.
The tremors and quakes stopped a few minutes ago, became less constant and then stopped all together, but she's too smart to hold out hope that someone might help her because she has the very best luck in the world unless it's her relationships or her children.
Another stab spikes in her side and up her back and she shouts out, bearing down with her body and panicking over how to cut the cord, she's not in her BDUs she doesn't have a field knife. The next contraction takes her mind off that worry and she's afraid she might pass out because she's getting lightheaded, and hot, and the air is very thin and dusty. She shouts through the pain and huffs back into the corner.
"Vala?" A voice calls to her through the dust curling around the emergency lights. The second shout of her name is more frantic. "Vala!"
"I'm here." Waves a hand through the dust clearing her vision a bit and listens to the beautiful melody of boots hitting the stairs with speed, they slip on the first landing and then she hears them start to skip steps.
And then he's right there, like he promised, a large gash in his cheek and far dirtier than her. "Oh Thank God." he slides on his knees across the landing.
"I'm going to kill you." It's not even a threat anymore. Her hand crunches against his shoulder as another contraction rakes through her.
"Are you okay? Is the baby?"
"You promised me, Cameron."
"What's going on down—" Peeks under the dress and then quickly lowers the hem back down. "Holy shit. Alright. Okay."
"You promised."
"I did, and I'm here." He rolls up the skirt of her dress resting it on her legs and situates his hands between her legs. "You've got the head out, you need to push, I'll guide the shoulder."
"Don't drop them."
"I'm not going to drop them."
"I didn't get this far for you to drop them."
"Just listen for once and push."
She'd argue more with him, but at that moment another contraction hits and she rides the wave of pain, pushing until she can't breathe, until she feels the pressure release from her pelvis, until she hears crying.