Author's Note: Oh hey guys. Thanks for the reviews, you're all so sweet and awesome. :D

Unbeta'd. All mistakes are mine.


baby – season 4 (pregnancy)

"She had a baby."

He whispers this to her one night in the darkness so quietly, and she so close to sleep, that she thinks she might've dreamed it. Her head raises slightly from where it lay on his chest. She squints.

"What?"

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, then tilts his chin up to stare at the ceiling. He's quite hesitant, she observes, and counts him start and stop three times before he finally speaks.

"She had a baby."

She frowns, turning over so she can see him better. He's still gazing at the ceiling. Her hand drifts unconsciously over her stomach.

"Who had a baby?"

He swallows deeply.

"She did."

"Peter – "

"Olivia," he says, at last turning to look at her. She inhales sharply. Even in the dark bedroom, the guilt, shame, and utter agony in his eyes are blaring.

And she realizes that his utterance of her name does not address her. It's an answer.

She's quiet.

"Olivia," he says again, running a hand over his face. He pulls at his skin. "In the original timeline. When…" He trails off, staring up at the ceiling again.

She wants to get up, but she's frozen.

"She got pregnant and she had a baby."

It's like she's encased in amber, and she wants to move so badly, but no limb will budge even a millimeter.

"I don't even know how it happened. There's no way it was nine months from the time she left to when I got in the machine. How many was it? I don't remember exactly. Three, I think. Or four. But not nine. Definitely not nine."

He's rambling now. Peter Bishop has two nervous habits: the trick with the coin, and words. When he's anxious, words flow from his tongue like water from a broken dam.

She can't move.

"But it happened, somehow. The Observer showed him to me when I went into his mind. When you were abducted by David Robert Jones. A little baby boy. He was wrong, of course. He wasn't supposed to happen. But he was alive."

She doesn't miss the adoration she hears in his voice. Not that she can blame him, she supposes. Sometimes we can't help who we love. And he is his child.

Though, not hers.

"God, 'Livia, please say something."

She wants to. She wants to open her mouth. She wants to scream. But she can't move.

He waits a few moments, and then sighs. She can almost feel the frustration and remorse radiating from his body as he laughs grimly.

"Not that it matters anymore. I killed him."

Her right index finger twitches.

"I went into the machine and I joined the two universes. And then I obliterated myself from existence. Which successfully cancelled him out too. I never even met him. Hell, I never even knew about him. I had a child. I had a son…But again, not that it matters. Because I killed him. I didn't even know him, and I still found a way to destroy him."

He pauses. She moves her finger back and forth.

He whispers, "I'm sorry."

As he moves to lie down, one of his silent tears falls on her shoulder. It's warm on her skin as it slides down, leaving a damp trail that leads to the crease of her elbow, where it settles and pools.

She begins to thaw.


Pain is a funny thing, she decides. How it can tear apart your life, make it nearly unlivable, and only days later, after a kiss or a cry or a long talk, be gone, its weak echo the only thing left to play in your heart and mind. How months, or even years, after it departs, it can come back with a vengeance. Old wounds are torn open, and as you lay injured and bleeding, you wonder how you even forgot about it in the first place.

This is what happens to her.

She feels like she's sitting on the floor in front of her washing machine again with damp, dark hair and a broken heart, his shirt in a ball next to her, realizing that she'd never had him, and maybe never would.

She feels her baby flutter inside her, and she wonders if she will take every first from her. If he is destined to be handed down to her only after others have stolen what should have been hers. Was it not their first date? Their first time? Their first child?

Peter Bishop has two nervous tics. Olivia Dunham has one: solitude. She does not talk to him for six days after he tells her. He does not push her, and she is grateful. She needs time to sort this out. He knows this. No matter how much he'd rather she wouldn't, when facing great pressure or emotional distress, Olivia resorted inside herself. It's who she is. It was who she'd become, after what happened to her as a child, after everyone betrayed her and she was the only one who could save herself. So he let her be, and kissed her goodnight every evening, telling her how much he loved her, how sorry he was, and waited patiently for the moment when she was ready to talk.

On day seven, she has an epiphany.

She's washing dishes by hand, and in the middle of the process of meticulously scrubbing a butter knife until it shines, she realizes that through everything, he is here. In her universe. In her apartment. Sitting at her table. Sharing her bed. With her.

He is still hers.

The baby moves as if in affirmation. His baby, growing inside of her. A child who he wants, a child who he knows, a child who he already loves.

They are both hers.

The past is the past. She cannot fix it. She cannot change it. Why dwell on it? She shouldn't linger on things that are over and done with, that technically never happened here in this timeline. Why nurse wounds that have already healed?

He is hers.

She puts down her butter knife, and walks over to the kitchen table, where he sits, filling out the crossword puzzle in the daily paper.

"Hey," she says.

He looks up immediately, his eyes wide and hopeful. She smiles at him.

"Hey yourself," he answers.

It's their first exchange in a week. As they stare at each other, he sighs sadly.

"Olivia…"

She shakes her head, leaning down and kissing him gently. Her lips say everything she needs him to hear - that he's completely forgiven, that she loves him, that he is hers and she is his and that's what matters.

When she pulls away, she gazes at him. He is smiling, but his eyes cannot hide from her the immense hurt he still feels.

She frowns. She supposes she's almost disregarding the fact that he lost a child. And that he thinks he is responsible. He isn't, and she almost says that, but it will only end in an argument that she doesn't want to have right now.

She presses her palm against the firm skin of her belly, where her child lives and grows, safe, strong, and healthy. She lets herself imagine - for one unbearable, terrifying moment - what it would feel like if something happened. If they were taken from her. If they were lost forever. And if it was even in the least bit her fault.

The pain is crippling. Oppressive. She wants to weep for the both of them, him and his baby.

Instead, she puts her hand on his face, tenderly stroking his cheek with her thumb.

She asks, "What was his name?"

He grins softly, as tears begin to fall from his blue eyes.

"Henry. His name was Henry."


A/N: I bet you thought that was going to be fluffy :P

I'm not sure how I feel about this one. Meh...