A/N: Thanks to all my readers and reviewers for being so patient!

Enjoy!


When she opened her eyes again, Steve was sleeping upright in what looked like the most uncomfortable chair in the entire B&B – the tall ladder-backed chair they sometimes pulled up to the dining room table when too many people were over for dinner. The seat was hard and shoved against all of one's bony protuberances, and the back was an argument against comfort or pleasure. She had no idea what it was doing in her room or why Steve, in his Buddhist wisdom, had chosen that to sit in, when there were two other, softer, kinder seating options in her room, and that was not including the part of the bed she wasn't occupying.

"Steve," she said, her voice raspy and weak.

His head continued to bob somewhat gently against his chest.

"Steve," she repeated, only marginally louder.

Nothing.

"Jinksy," she hissed, and she threw a pillow at him.

It whacked him across the face and he jumped, jerked upright in the chair, and looked around confusedly. "You… okay?" he mumbled, rubbing his face.

"No," Claudia replied. "I need to pee and I'm still hooked up to all this stuff like Frankenstein's monster."

"You know, most people don't remember that Frankenstein was the scientist," Steve said as he got up from the chair. "People always think it was the monster's name, but the monster was never…"

Claudia cut him off. "Just help me up. We can talk classic literature later."

Steve hurried forward as Claudia attempted to get out of bed on her own. "Stop, stop, you're going to strangle yourself on these tubes."

"I have to pee," she repeated fiercely, almost angry.

"And I'm helping you," Steve said patiently. "But you need to…"

"I need to what?" she barked at him.

"Calm down, Claudia, please," Steve said. His head was spinning; he'd been rudely awakened from a terrible nap and thrown without any preparation into a scene with another new Claudia.

He lunged forward and picked up the bag of IV fluids and the smaller bag of dark yellow IV medication, holding them up and away from Claudia's body as the redhead shoved herself out of bed. Her legs weak from the nap, she stumbled into him.

Steve let out an oof and caught her. "Hey! You okay?"

She bit her lip as though holding back a retort, and Steve quickly amended his question: "Beyond having to pee?"

"Yeah," Claudia said.

"Okay," Steve said. "Can you stand?"

Her head pressed against his sternum, she nodded.

"Okay," Steve said. "Let's… walk, okay? Easy does it."

Moving almost as one, they shuffled across the bedroom floor. Walking backwards, Steve reached out for the doorknob and managed to get it open.

"Steve…" Claudia whimpered.

"I know," Steve said. "We're almost there."

In a few more feet they were across the hall and into the bathroom. Steve carefully hung the bags of IV fluid onto the shower curtain rod and guided Claudia down onto the toilet. "Okay?"

"Okay," Claudia mumbled.

Steve hesitated there.

Claudia looked up at him. "What are you doing?"

"Uh…?"

"I think I can still do this part on my own," Claudia said.

Again Steve hesitated.

"And so…" Claudia said. "… you can leave."

"Oh," Steve said. "Of course."

"Will you go get me a glass of ice water?" she asked.

"Are you sure?" Steve asked, remembering the last time Claudia had even thought about food or drink.

"Steve. I need to pee, and I want some ice water," Claudia said. "What about this is difficult for you to understand?"

"Uh, okay," Steve said. "Just… holler when you're done."

But when she was done she awkwardly got to her feet, her clothes feeling tight and strained in a variety of places, and unhooked the bags from the shower curtain rod. Even the slight exertion of holding her arms up long enough to undo the clips made her feel woozy.

Claudia wasn't expecting it, which was why she didn't have time to brace her body as the floor came up to meet her. She landed with a thump and let out a whimper.

"Claud?" came Steve's voice from the hallway.

"Hmm?"

"You okay?"

"I'm on the floor," Claudia said, surprised. She hadn't felt herself falling, hadn't even considered it as a possibility.

"Is your IV okay?" Steve sounded panicked.

"I… think so." Claudia moved slightly. She'd managed to undo the bags from the shower curtain rod, so they'd fallen with her. And though many things hurt, the incision site in her chest only throbbed with the pain of recent surgery, not of trauma to the area.

"Can you get up?" Steve asked.

Claudia put her head on the cool tile floor. Nausea was sweeping over her again. "I could," she said.

"But…?"

Tears rushed to her eyes and all of a sudden Claudia felt empty, neglected and alone. "But what's the point?"

"Oh, Claud," Steve said from the hallway.

Claudia pushed herself up and half-crawled towards the toilet. Her stomach heaved horribly.

"Claud? Talk to me, or I'm going to get Doctor Vanessa," Steve said.

Claudia hunched herself in around her stomach, willing herself not to throw up. The wave of nausea passed, but her feeling of self-loathing didn't, and she burst into tears.

"I'm getting Doctor Vanessa," Steve said.

Don't leave! Claudia cried out mentally. But she was too weak, too empty, too fragile to speak, and it left her with nothing else to do but lay in a puddle of tears on the bathroom floor, wondering if the rest of her pregnancy was going to be so ridiculously horrible – and if it was worth it.


The Bureau's interpreter was a thin, mousy blond in her early thirties with thick glasses, a stern expression, and a penchant for an earth tone wardrobe.

"Shades of Artie," Pete whispered to Myka. "Brown, green – it's like they're trees. Annoying, know-it-all trees."

Myka rolled her eyes and strode over to the woman who was holding a sign with their names scrawled on it in thick black marker. "Katia Reynolds? I'm Myka Bering and this is Pete Lattimer."

"It's good to meet you," the woman said, dropping the sign to her side. "You're late."

"An earth toned straight shooter," Pete whispered.

Myka elbowed him. "There was turbulence over Minnesota. But we're here now."

"Yes. Yes, you are," Katia said. She checked her watch. "We have an appointment with the DJ, Anna Carrigan, at Bundel University in twenty minutes."

She looked up at the agents. "I'll drive."

The interpreter went around to the driver's side.

Pete turned to look at Myka.

"Open the trunk," Myka said. "Apparently she doesn't mess around. And we can appreciate that."

"Mykes, do we really need someone like her?" Pete asked as he opened the trunk and dumped in his suitcase.

Myka put her bag in next to Pete's. "We need someone who can sign, Pete."

"I can sign," Pete said.

"And we need the Bureau's oversight on this," Myka said. "For some reason they're watching us, and I don't want to give them any reason to start looking closer."

Pete closed the car trunk. "Why are they looking, Mykes?"

"I don't know. Got any vibes?"

Pete adjusted his sport coat. "Just that this meeting with the deaf DJ is not going to go well. It's just a feeling I'm getting from Frosty Goldilocks. Or, as I've now decided to call her, Frostylocks."

"Well, then it's different from my vibe," Myka said. "My gut tells me this has something to do with Claudia."

"Mykes," Pete said, "we just found out Claudia's pregnant. Unless the Regents are listening at the B&B…"

"… which sounds absolutely paranoid but could in fact be true," Myka murmured.

"… then this is something else," Pete said. "So, let's put on our big girl panties and solve the case so we can get back to South Dakota and be there for Claudia."

"'Get back to South Dakota,'" Myka said. "Like anyone's ever said that with such hope before."

The drive into Chapel Harris took less than ten minutes; the interpreter drove with brisk ferocity, avoiding all conversation with Pete and Myka. She parked the car in a lot outside one of the dorms on Bundel University's campus, and then turned to look at the agents in the backseat.

"So, listen, how's this going to go down?"

Pete and Myka exchanged glances.

"Yeah, I read the dossier," Katia said. "Apparently this girl was implicated in some sort of dance craze on campus – making people dance until they were exhausted. I ask you, isn't that what most DJs do?"

"Except that in this case, the people who attended the party were physically unable to stop dancing until given extreme medical interventions," Pete said. "We believe that this could indicate artifact use."

He opened the door and got out. "Just translate, okay? We'll be the ones to figure out what her deal is."

"Whatever you say, agent," the interpreter replied, her voice heavy with sarcasm.

"And there's the vibe," Pete muttered to Myka. "Score one for Frostylocks."


"Easy, easy," someone said. "Let's see what's going on."

There was movement around her, and then someone rolled her onto her back. A gasp, a soft murmur, and then cool hands touched her face. "Claudia? Can you hear me?"

"Go away," Claudia said miserably. She blinked; Vanessa's face loomed over her, and somewhere in the background she could see Steve's worried face, bobbing like a concerned balloon.

"Honey, can we take you back to bed?" Vanessa asked.

"No," Claudia said. "Just leave me here."

She closed her eyes. Nausea rippled through her body and everything ached. She could feel herself starting to cry again.

"Claud," Steve said, and his cool hand slipped into hers. "Claud, you can't lay here on the bathroom floor."

Claudia groaned.

"Sweetheart, you're sick, this can't be comfortable," Vanessa said. "And it's not exactly hygienic for that IV line in your chest to be on a bathroom floor."

"I don't care. I don't want to get up," Claudia grit out. "Just leave me here. Just leave me alone."

She brought her arm up and laid it over her closed eyes. She could sense that Steve and Vanessa were exchanging confused glances.

"Okay," Steve said at last. "We'll leave you alone for a bit."

The air in the room shifted as they left, and Claudia lay on the floor, arm over her eyes, absolutely lower than she'd ever been. She wished she could just melt into the tile, slide through the floor, and escape – but to where, she had no idea.

Some time later – it could have been hours, it could have been days – the door opened and careful footsteps crossed the floor.

"Go away," Claudia pleaded.

"Oh, Claudia," a soft British voice said. "I only want to help."

Claudia opened her eyes. HG was kneeling next to her, a concerned look on the Brit's face. "How are you, darling?"

"Sick. And worried," Claudia said, fresh tears springing to her eyes. "I'm doing everything wrong, HG."

"Shh, shh, darling," HG said, stroking Claudia's face. "No, you're not. You're doing the best you can, and we understand that."

"Artie doesn't," Claudia whimpered.

"Forget about him for now, my dear," HG said. "Focus on yourself, on getting well, on the things you can control."

She leaned down and carefully helped Claudia sit up, propping the redhead against the bathroom cabinet. "Something that helped me when I was pregnant with Christina," HG said, drawing a small bottle from her pocket. "Ginger. I made up a little extract for you."

Claudia looked over at the Brit, who had assumed a similar position beside her on the floor. "You're being so nice to me," Claudia whispered.

"Because I love you," HG said simply. "And I don't like to have anyone I love suffer."

She unscrewed the top of the little bottle and drew out a small dropper. "Here. Couple of drops of this on your tongue will help with the nausea."

Claudia obediently let HG drip the mixture onto her tongue, then she closed her mouth, savoring the sweet spicy taste.

"Now, darling," HG said as Claudia leaned against her, "just relax and keep breathing. Don't think about anything else for right now."

Claudia put her head onto HG's shoulder and closed her eyes.

HG picked up the book she'd set on the floor and opened it, starting to read. "Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect…"

As she was reading, HG looked over at Claudia. The redhead seemed to be relaxed, leaning on HG's shoulder. That wasn't what made the Brit smile, though; Claudia's hands were pressed against her belly. Though there was nothing there yet, Claudia's mind was clearly completely captivated by the potential she carried.

And that was how HG knew Claudia was going to be just fine.