Diagnosis
Supper was lighthearted and once the Doctor recovered a little after his encounter with River's grandfather, he had a lovely time. Both her grandparents were clever and quick-witted, though Sophie's humor was more involving obscure literary references and wit, while Tom's involved dry, dead-panned comments in the pauses in conversation that set them all into another loop of talk and laughter. They were right for River, these people. She scarcely mentioned her parents to him during the walk, but these people were exactly the sort of people he could see bringing her up. She had her grandmother's quick mind and her grandfather's dry sarcasm with the brilliance of both of them.
They practically raised her, he found himself thinking. How else could she be so similar to them? She must have spent a lot of time hereā¦he would have to ask her about it later.
The food was good, the conversation stimulating, and there was plum wine, red and sweet. River eyed it longingly; she loved a good wine. The Doctor enjoyed his, but drank very little, compared to her family members, who each had two or three glasses without appearing to be affected at all. Wine is commonplace here, he thought. His wife had told him a great deal about her childhood today, but he was stunned at the amount she hadn't told him. She had said nothing about how she lived at home, what her parents were like. It didn't even occur to him that she had left all this out until just then, as he was taking another sip of the plum wine.
His thoughts were interrupted by a,
"Right, Doctor?"
The table was looking expectedly at him and he blinked, realizing that he hadn't been listening.
"Sorry?"
"Superior concentration indeed," Tom remarked dryly and River chuckled.
"Are we laughing at my expense?" The Doctor asked his wife, lowering his voice slightly.
"Very much so."
"Excellent; we might as well continue. Did I ever tell you about the time I met Genghis Kahn?"
The conversation rolled on and he brushed away his previous musings, saving them for later. After they had finished dinner, there was dessert, chocolate strawberry pie. River enjoyed two slices of that, explaining to the pouting Doctor (she had stolen the last slice, which he wanted to have as his second slice) that since she didn't get any of the wine, it was only fair that she got the other piece of pie. He didn't like it much, but she allowed him one bite and he settled with that.
After supper was finished, Tom collected plates and Sophie loaded the dishes into the particle scrubber for cleaning. The floor was cleaned by a scooter-sucker-bot, affectionately called Benji. The kitchen was tidied and once all that was finished, Sophie lead the way back to her lab, River, the Doctor, and Tom trailing behind. The scanner spat out papers onto the desk as Sophie delicately typed commands into the keyboard. She peered at the lines and lines of what looked like gibberish, a mixture of confusion and amazement on her face. Finally, a piece of plastic slipped out of the machine and Sophie tapped it with a fingernail. The paper lit up.
"I've saved everything on a portable drive for you to take with you; I've kept a copy so that if you come back, I'll still have the data. Now, the fun part. This little blob right here is your baby."
They both leaned in rapidly, nearly bumping heads in the process. On the little glowing piece of plastic was a blob. It was the most beautiful blob that River had ever seen.
"You're actually about five and a half weeks pregnant, River," her grandmother said.
"Really?" It all seemed to be happening in a giant fuzzy cloud of happiness. Nothing could touch her here. This was her baby. Hers and the Doctor's baby, the best thing they had ever done by far.
"Isn't she brilliant?" her husband whispered, tracing the little blob with his fingertip, gently, as though not to break it.
"If you two are going to go all gooey and new-parents on me, I won't be able to tell you the rest of the lab results. You can be senseless and fawning in a minute." She plucked the sheet from their hands and showed them some printouts.
"Everything's developing on schedule for the baby. One brain, one heart, one spinal cord; it doesn't look like the time travel has done anything to it."
"One heart?" River asked, alarmed.
"We're not born with two, love." He was smiling when he said it, so Sophie chuckled along with him, but River merely looked at him, curious.
"I can explain the whole thing later if you like."
"River, what is all this nonsense?" Sophie asked in her typical no-fuss manner.
"He's got two hearts; it one of those things about being an alien."
"Well if they're not born with two, then your baby is right on schedule. It all looks very good right now. I'd advise a checkup in about a month; keep the papers and the data drive with you, and bring them the next time we meet. If we both keep data copies, I might end up with more information than you some of the time, and vice versa, so we should be able to share."
"Great," River sounded relieved and she inadvertently smoothed her flat stomach. She wondered how long it would take for their little baby to begin to make herself known, to round her smooth belly and to begin affecting moods, diet, and other things. The Doctor was looking at her belly too and she guessed that he was thinking the same thing.
"Well here are your papers and your drive and your picture."
"Thank you so much, grandma."
"Come back soon, lovely."
"I'll see you tomorrow, grandma. Or little-me will anyhow."
"I'm so proud of you, dear. You've found yourself a good man, and you look happy. Seeing you happy is all I ever asked for."
"Thanks, grandma."
There were hugs and farewells and the Doctor and River were somehow back in the Tardis, information in hand.
"Have you got any books on Time Lord biology and development?"
"In the library, yeah; do you want to see them?"
"No, I only asked for my health." He could see where she had gotten her dry wit.
"Well do you mind if we leave your grandparents' backyard first, or shall I drop everything to please her majesty?"
"Just don't take too long," River replied with an exaggerated sigh, "You know how tiring it is to watch you work."
The Doctor grinned, threw a few levers, hit a button or two, and used a rubber mallet to smack something into place. The Tardis took off, and he strode towards the library, his wife following behind. They had so much to learn about.
XXXXXXXXXXXX
River spent weeks reading through anything and everything she could get on Time Lord biology. Her Gallifreyan was getting much better; she could hold entirely intelligent conversations with him with very little bother. Her vocabulary was superb; she actually requested that he speak only in Gallifreyan so that she could learn quicker. High Gallifreyan was simple after that; it was really only a few new conjugations, a new way of saying a few things, the addition of totally unnecessary formalities. She supposed that's why it was High Gallifreyan instead of the usual kind. She gobbled books and made notes in another notebook, not her usual blue. This one was soft peachy-colored leather, held closed with a ribbon. Inside it went carefully-sketched diagrams, notes about normal development, and then in a different color, how she was developing. They were similar most of the time, and also similar to human development. She took great delight in telling the Doctor what the baby was growing that particular week.
She was a week and a half into the second trimester that things began to get tricky. And it all started with a very innocent spinach omelet with cheddar cheese.
