By the fifteenth week he and Reisi had felt the baby kick at the same time, while lying in bed one morning, and Saruhiko had been so relieved at the feeling that he had burst into tears.

They waited to get an ultrasound, not wanting to move Saruhiko around too much, and during the sixteenth week Reisi got permission from Saruhiko to announce both their relationship and his pregnancy to Scepter 4. The majority of the responses were confetti related congratulations, some of the staff getting hearts in their eyes and Awashima smirking the whole time because she already knew. Akiyama was the only one who took it rather sourly, banging his head once on the table and then asking if he could leave early. Reisi felt bad for him, but then relaxed when Awashima slipped him a note that said that Yata Misaki had a crush on him. Not sure how his mate would take the bit of gossip, he decided not to tell him.

By the seventeenth week Saruhiko had found himself a new craving of wasabi, which Reisi being the dutiful Alpha that he was bought seven jars of the stuff. Reisi had gotten used to finding the dishes no longer washed when he came home and started making his own meals again, seeing as Saruhiko was usually too tired to leave his bed unless he had to relive himself.

By the eighteenth week Misaki had started to visit every day instead of every Tuesday, and Reisi received a shrieking Saruhiko when he came home one night to find his lover freaking out over his friend's choice in crushes. His mood swings weren't as violent as Reisi had expected, he had a few temper tantrums but nothing too serious, and Saruhiko was usually crying. It broke Reisi's heart to see the boy cry, and every time he did Reisi feared he was regretting their copulation. He made pancakes for the boy whenever he cried, even when it was two in the morning on a Sunday and he had to be up for work at six.

By the nineteenth week Saruhiko came down with a cold, and Reisi came home and thought it was the apocalypse. He took off the week to take care of the poor boy, who got better after three days but then Reisi caught it and Saruhiko had to play nurse. Misaki refused to get sick so he pushed envelopes underneath the door.

Saruhiko was in the middle of his twentieth week when he realized he was pregnant with twins.

Everything was lovely, Reisi had even gotten over his guilt...a little bit-and he had already started planning the baby's room with Saruhiko. They had scheduled an appointment for an ultrasound, and Saruhiko seemed like he was glowing. Reisi moved out the room he used for a home office, because if he was brutally honest he went straight from work into Saruhiko's arms to sleep.

And then the ultrasound actually happened and everything changed.

Saruhiko lay on the examination table, shirt pushed up so the doctor could smear the gel on the boy's swollen belly. Reisi stood by Saruhiko's head, holding his lover's hand and gently thumbing over the top of his hand to comfort him. While Saruhiko had been ecstatic at home at the prospect of seeing their baby for the first time, in the waiting room he had bit his lip and asked if Reisi would still love him if the baby was broken. Reisi didn't understand where the question was coming from or what it really meant until Saruhiko started to run his fingers on the table covered in magazines that he figured it out.

Saruhiko was afraid their child would be schizophrenic as well.

While it was a trait that could be both genetic and hereditary, the statistic regarding them were fuzzy and never agreed upon. It was a tough subject to work on, to be sure, and to have it while expecting a child was even harder. Saruhiko had never voiced such a fear before, and now Reisi was left wondering if Saruhiko thought of such things often, if he wasn't as happy as he acted at their home.

Schizophrenia was something that couldn't possibly be diagnosed or was even touched upon during an ultrasound, but Saruhiko wasn't necessarily talking about the ultrasound but the baby in general. He feared that Reisi would leave him if their child had any mental problems or wasn't able to communicate well with his/her peers. The thought that Saruhiko could possibly think that Reisi would ever hate him at all stuck a cord in him and he stood up from his chair to gently embrace the nervous Omega. The younger boy relaxed instantly in his arms, sagging like a ragdoll, and then the doctor called them in.

As the doctor put the handheld device to Saruhiko's stomach to see their baby, the boy squeezed Reisi's hand in a death grip while staring intently at the flickering screen. Reisi gave a sympathetic squeeze with eyebrows drawn tight in concern before following his mate's intense gaze. The screen showed a grayscale image that to Reisi looked like nothing at all, just a bunch of circles and oblong figures. He turned his eyes to the doctor's face, narrowing his eyes when she frowned.

"So there's the baby's head...one moment..." Saruhiko's grip grew impossibly tighter on his hand, and he was sure if he wasn't a King it would have broken by then. Reisi, knowing his mate was severely distressed, leaned over to press a gentle kiss to the boy's forehead, smiling against the porcelain skin when he felt his Omega once again instantly relax. "Don't worry," said the blonde doctor, lips pulled back in a wide smile now, "actually you should be glad."

Reisi sent her a questioning glare but the woman didn't faze her smile in the slightest.

"You're having twins, congratulations!"

Reisi unlocked and opened the door to their dark apartment and flipped on the light switch. He stepped back to let Saruhiko shuffle inside, closing the umbrella as he followed behind. It was pouring outside and he promptly shut the door and locked it, the heavy pattering dulling to a soft but furious drum. The ultrasound photos in his back pocket felt like lead weights, and he watched Saruhiko pause in the middle of the room, between the kitchen and the living room, with wary eyes. He had been happy at the news, positively overjoyed, but Saruhiko face had gone pale and he had only offered a weak smile and a nod when Reisi asked if he was alright.

He set down the wet umbrella by the door and made a move towards his mate, knowing he had his hands over his stomach even though the male had his back to him. Was Saruhiko still worried that their children would have his same condition?

"Reisi I'm afraid they'll replace Mariko..."

Saruhiko turned his head towards him, letting him see the crystal tear tracks streaming down his face. Beautiful sapphire eyes were clouded with tears and his nose and cheeks were flushed red. His lower lip trembled as he spoke, and Reisi rushed to embrace him.

The tears grew heavier with the pounding rain as Saruhiko sobbed out his frustrations and pains into the crook of his mate's neck. Reisi embraced him from behind so they could be flush together, they fit together so perfectly they were like missing puzzle pieces that had found that they matched.

"Mariko started crying when the doctor said I was with twins...I'd recognize that cry anywhere...I thought I was going to vomit-the sound was just as heart-wrenching as it was six years ago. She doesn't want to be forgotten and I don't want to forget!"

The cracking voice was heart breaking, but to Reisi the fear was irrationally based. There was no way that Saruhiko could forget such a tragic incident, but that probably wasn't what the boy meant. He had felt love for that child born of rape, and if he was brutally honest their twins were no different. Saruhiko had gone and made a grave for the poor child he had lost, courtesy of his wretched parents, and his whole life he was weighed down by the crack in his abdomen and the accusing small voice that only he could see and hear.

"I need to visit her grave...I have to Reisi..."

"We'll go tommorow in the morning when it isn't raining."

"No, I need to go now."

"Saru-"

"I need to see her now!"

Reisi had never heard the boy scream, and the noise was horrible and blood curdling. Saruhiko was borderline hysterical, eyes streaming tears and teeth clenched so hard he could hear them straining. Omega mothers were said to be the most dangerous things when it came to their children, protective to the point of murdering people to save their children. In a matter of seconds though, he calmed down and the fire left his eyes, his shoulders slumping and the dark circles under his eyes that he hid with makeup had been revealed in the rain. He looked exhausted and once again Reisi felt the familiar pang of guilt of why he was feeling so tired.

Because I raped him during his heat and forced him with children.

"Alright we'll head out now, just let me grab the umbrella okay?"

The grass in the particular park that Saruhiko had made a pseudo grave six years ago was sparse and the rain had turned the dirt into mud that sucked at their shoes. The sky was dark gray and still pouring buckets, and Reisi absently wondered if the sky looked different when it was cloudy with rainclouds to Saruhiko. The boy was silent, his head down and body tucked tight against Reisi's side, his hand clutching at the older man's back. He had slipped a clear plastic raincoat on the boy before he had left, not caring about the light spray that had soaked through his own clothes.

There was so much about Saruhiko he loved, but also so much that he didn't understand. How did the boy think? Did he really forgive him for saddling him with children? How did he feel about his parents? The children inside him?

They stopped in front of a large oak tree, the bark and leaves dripping rainwater but allowing their umbrella slight reprieve from the onslaught of the rain. At their feet, lodged in the muddy ground, was a cemi circle of large stones that looked weathered with age. Was this the grave? It looked like it...

Saruhiko knelt on the ground, without a care for his pants that soaked through with mud and water. He made a move to put his hand on the other's shoulder, but the other's voice made him stop.

"Reisi...I need a minute to myself...can you wait for me back in the car?"

Reisi owned a silver Toyota, and drove on rare occasions when he was too tired from work to walk. Now he used it more often in Saruhiko's later stages of pregnancy and was glad he bought it in the first place. He nodded, allowing his Omega his privacy, and lifted the boy's plastic hood over his head before turning his back and trudging away. He told himself he wouldn't look behind him, no matter his curiosity and his concern it was not his right to look at such a private moment. The tree wasn't very far from the road, his silver car waiting patiently for him with the engine turned off.

Stepping onto the sidewalk he stared into the window of his car, the reflective glass mirroring back at him his weary face. He did not expect Saruhiko to take such a turn for the worst, and they just had their first 'fight', if it could even be called that. Reaching into his pocket to fetch the keys, a splash behind him made him turn around relflexively. Saruhiko stood there, looking almost relieved, and gave him a curt nod. It had been fast, almost ridiculously so, but he was in no place to judge.

They saddled back into the car and went back home in silence

Three in the morning Reisi was awoke by a gasping sob. Instantly he was aware of the way his mate trembled in his arms and his quickly hugged him tighter and pressed soothing kisses to the mop of soft black hair. Saruhiko occasionally had nightmares, of what he could only guess, and fell asleep rather quickly once Reisi calmed him down and then forgot what he had dreamt by morning.

"She said she loved me." Saruhiko gasped, tears in his voice. "Mariko said she loved me." Reisi just whispered sweet nothings into the boy's hair and gently squeezed his clammy hands. Saruhiko tipped back his head, teary sapphire eyes strangely filled with happiness tinged with sadness.

"The crack's healed now...everything will be alright from now on..."

Just came back from watching Godzilla...EVERYONE NEEDS TO WATCH THIS FUCKING MOVIE!