Disclaimer: See initial chapter.
A/N: I started writing this soon after I finished writing what I thought was a one-shot. Apparently the muse is not yet finished with this universe. Thanks to everyone who left a positive comment, and for those who asked for more. Hopefully you enjoy this. It is not nearly as cracky as it should be...Steve is being far too sentimental. He's a Papa. I suppose he's entitled.
There are several factors which point toward JM being at least part alien. In addition to having DNA from both Steve and Danny, Max had discovered some 'foreign' DNA which could not be classified by the usual means.
DNA which might account for how quickly little JM grows, and how quickly he seems to master the art of speaking, though Steve has it on very good authority (Danny's Ma) that that aspect of JM's growth might be related to Danny's DNA contribution, as opposed to whatever alien contributed to the makeup of their son. According to Clara, when Danny started speaking, he used full sentences, much like JM.
According to Danny's Ma, JM's propensity to climb trees, which Steve swears started before the little boy could actually walk, comes from Danny as well. Apparently there was a summer when Danny practically lived in the branches of trees. It would be funny were JM not inclined to do the same, and had Steve not spent an entire afternoon searching high and low for the little boy, before finding him sitting on a branch of a tree, legs swinging, a smile of absolute contentment on his face.
Danny thought it was cute until he was treated to the same thing one afternoon. They'd both talked to the little boy, who, at the age of three and a half, seemed to understand at a level he really shouldn't have at that age.
According to Max, the little boy is advanced for his age, and he and Danny ought to be taking advantage of it while they can by teaching him other languages, and enrolling him in different classes of interest, like giving him piano or violin lessons.
He's picking up pidgin and Filipino from the neighborhood kids, sometimes launching into whole speeches, complete with some of the same gestures that Danny uses when he speaks. It's both fascinating, and frustrating. Steve doesn't know if he can keep up with his three and a half year old son. Danny says that it's always that way. Kids supersede their parents.
Steve doubts that there's a tree climbing class out there, or a class that specializes in teaching children how to drive their parents out of their minds with worry. Not that he'd enroll JM in such a class if there was one. The kid needs no help with that. He's an expert at it. Danny assures Steve that every kid, Grace included, comes pre-equipped with the ability to drive their parents mad, though he admits to having hoped that, because they got JM by means that was not natural, their son would somehow be born without that particular trait.
Wishful thinking.
JM's love of the ocean, and everything related to it, borders on obsession, and it's of little consolation to Steve that he seems to take after him in that regard. He's fearless, and laughs when waves that are several times his size crash over him. It nearly gives Danny, and him, heart attacks when he's pulled under by a wave, only to come up several stopped heartbeats later, giggling, and smiling like he was merely riding a roller coaster.
Steve finally understands half of Danny's rants at him, as he watches their son wade out into deep water and tackle waves that are much bigger than he is, laughing and shrugging off his fathers' very real concerns with a nonchalance that borders on arrogance. It doesn't help, even though it should, that the little boy swims like a fish even without webbing, or any of the equipment that Danny tries, in vain, to get him to wear.
Kono's thrilled that he takes to surfing so well, and wants to enroll him in the circuit. Danny is far less thrilled, and Steve steers clear of the whole thing, wanting JM to be able to make that decision for himself when he's older. Like in his thirties, or forties.
JM may talk like he's a teenager at times, but he's still a toddler, and Steve hopes that he's got a long life ahead of him. He can't fathom anything else, and his chest gets tight just thinking about losing JM too soon. Too soon being anytime before Danny and Steve pass on in life.
"It's your fault he's a daredevil." Danny sidles up beside Steve, wraps an arm around his middle and rests his head against Steve's shoulder.
Steve drapes his arm over Danny's shoulders, and is amazed at how well they fit together. Almost like they were made for each other, like little JM was made for them, manufactured by aliens.
"That so?" Steve's eyes are on the little boy in question, making sure that he's safe where he's playing on the beach with Grace and Charlie. Their laughter is carried to Steve and Danny on the breeze coming off the ocean.
Danny nods, and presses a kiss to Steve's bicep. "Completely. He gives me almost heart attacks nearly as often as you do, which is to say, multiple times on a daily basis."
"Almost heart attacks?" Steve questions the odd wording.
"Yes, Steven, 'almost' heart attacks." Danny squeezes Steve's side and sighs. "If they were full blown heart attacks I'd be dead several times over. You'd be standing here with a ghost."
A shudder runs through Steve, and, though Danny's just joking, Steve's breathless thinking about losing Danny. He tightens his hold on Danny, proving to himself that Danny's real.
"Dada, Papa." JM runs to them, wrapping his arms as far around their legs as he can get them, burying his face into Steve's knees.
Danny kneels, dislodging their son's hold on him, knees creaking and popping. Steve pretends not to notice, doesn't want to bring any attention to the fact that both of them are aging, in some ways that are a little less graceful than others.
"What's wrong, sweetheart?" Danny asks.
He's running a hand over their son's back, assessing for injuries, using the back of his hand on the little boy's forehead to determine if he's got a fever or not. JM always runs a little hot, like Danny.
JM shrugs his shoulders, buries his face further into Steve's knees, nose tickling the hairs on Steve's legs. He takes a deep breath and releases Steve's legs, pushes away to face Danny and wrap his arms around his Dada's neck, kissing him on the cheek.
"I love you," he says, and then he turns to Steve, who kneels down beside the two people he loves most in the world (probably multiple worlds). Steve ignores the creaks and pops that his own knees make, the way that his lower back twinges.
"I love you, Papa," JM says, kissing Steve on the cheek and hugging him before he turns away from the both of them and runs back down to the beach to play with his half siblings.
"He's the best of both of us," Danny says, voice husky, eyes filled with love as he watches their son.
"He is, isn't he?" Steve's eyes are locked on Danny, though he can see their kids (Steve feels like Grace and Charlie are his, too) out of the corner of his eye. They look happy, and he knows they're safe. They've got two overprotective fathers looking out for them, and possibly an alien grandparent watching them from who knows where.
"You're being sappy again, aren't you?" Danny pokes him in the chest, and follows his action up with a kiss that leaves Steve's heart racing, and has him, hmming, in agreement before he can take any of it back.
