Author's Note:
So much confusion about the last chapter. It was meant to be disjointed, but all the information is there. Cyborg says it all. Let's have a look.
"They were takin' her eggs, they were harvestin' them. One to each jar…" then, "But… but… Compatibility… they had to alter…"
Still confused?
Remember, Dick and Starfire aren't fertile without help.
Still?
Then read on.
Chapter 28.
I think it's fairly safe to say I shut down then. I remember going sort of blank. Then nothing. Just darkness and emptiness and loss. I just checked out, left a sign up that said 'back in ten'.
How was the easy bit. Sperm, it can survive up to a week under the right conditions, and we'd made love the night before she was taken. They'd probably scanned her, found some viable trace to clone or use and… Human, Tamaranian hybrid. Galfore had said we'd be compatible, conception was more likely with a little bit of tweaking to Starfire's membranes. Everything about Tamaranians was a battle, Starfire's eggs hid behind a membrane which sperm had to breach before they could fertilise, human sperm had safety in numbers but not the strength to breach. The actual egg, sperm interaction was fine. That was the reason she was on birth control, there was that very slim possibility of breach. And I knew she would've told me if she'd forgotten to take her once a cycle hormone injection, she's always been very upfront about that.
It was more the why. Why would they do that? What did they have to gain from a human Tamaranian hybrid? Or many of them, judging by the number of vials. Did it even matter to them or was it just something else to experiment on?
Cyborg'd done the right thing, destroying everything. I think. It was hard to imagine that in one of those non broken vials could have been my child if Starfire hadn't reacted…
Any children I had, I wanted to be the one to raise them. I wanted to be involved. They had no right to take that from me, to take it from Starfire. And I certainly wasn't ready for them yet.
It was just the whole invasiveness of it all.
Starfire had been violated. They'd taken something from her. She'd had no choice in the matter. They'd taken something from me, something that was more than just Starfire.
I'd been staving off emotional breakdown for days, but this was just the last straw. There's only so much anyone can cope with.
I could hear Raven's voice, soft and droning, but I couldn't understand the words. They were jumbled, mixed up. I couldn't separate the meanings, the nuances of her tone.
I wanted to be alone. Just alone. Retreat to someplace safe, with no one watching and allow myself to crumble. I hadn't wanted that since my parents died and the weeks of grief that followed. I'd come close when Jason died, but Starfire gave me something to cling to. I had nothing now.
I needed to find Starfire. I'd much rather succumb to grief and angst with her. She understood. She knew. She was the only one allowed to see that side. The only one been through everything with me.
Silkie put several of his little legs on my knee, looking up at me and made an odd sort of comforting grunt. I flicked my eyes down to him. He wanted Starfire too, been so clingy since he'd been hurt and she'd been lost, always needing to be near, or at least in the T-Ship. He wanted his momma safe and warm and home.
She couldn't get here on her own. We had to go find her.
Putting my hand on the back of Silkie's little head, I built a wall. I took all the grief, all the pain, the anger, everything I was feeling and locked it all back up.
I didn't see or hear the others. Didn't want to listen to their words. Just me and Silkie.
She would have known we were coming. Sarah told her. She would have known we weren't far behind. Whatever made her react and destroy, she knew she'd need to stay close, stay in range so we could find her. So I could find her.
So where would she go to hide? Someplace big. Someplace with oxygen so she could sleep and Sarah could breathe. Someplace close enough that we'd be able to find her, but not easy enough so that the Psion'd find her first. Someplace with food.
A planet. Not a space station, because there's a chance she'd be recaptured there. Psions and bounty hunters, too risky. The planet, it would have a star so she could regenerate. Yellow sun because Tamaranians recharge better with yellow suns. A white one if she could manage it.
I'd been gathering data on the surrounding space to pass the time. I had all this data regarding the surrounding space. Let's see if anything matched parameters Starfire might've used to hide.
If the others noticed my sudden determination, the haste which I searched through the databanks, they didn't say anything. Or they did, and I just didn't hear or care. Fingers flying across the keyboard, I located at least a yellow star pretty close with numerous planets that could sustain life.
And a red giant. Big, bright, on the last of life. It had already eaten most of its own solar system. But there was a little planet, probably once a cold and barren landscape, frozen solid, now just showing the first stages of life. Water. Oxygen. Plant life.
Starfire hated red stars. She said their radiation hurt her skin, their sunlight was difficult to process and it tasted wrong. Most Tamaranians hated red stars, which is why she'd been surprised to see Ryand'r living near one. Even though she despised red stars, this one jumped out at me. She needed somewhere to hide, somewhere safe. Somewhere that the Psion wouldn't think she'd go. If they were desperate to find her, they'd go for the yellow stars first.
Most importantly about the red star, it didn't scream 'look at me, I'm a safe haven'. It seemed to repel more than invite. It looked dangerous, unstable. And it was back the way we'd come from.
I had two choices. I could wait and see when/if Sarah contacted us and get information out of her, or I could follow my instinct and check out the red star. I'm not one for sitting and waiting.
I seized control of the T-Ship, plotting a course to the star, increasing the speed we were travelling at. If they protested, I didn't hear it. I was too focussed. Had to be, the wall was fragile.
We made good time. I would have gone straight to a jump, but I wanted to run scans, just in case Starfire and Sarah hadn't made it there yet. In case they came to us. I had to make sure that other Psion ship hadn't seen us, but it didn't appear they were following us. I continued to run scans of the surrounding space as well, tracking star systems, just in case I was wrong.
It was a small planet, dwarfed by the red giant hovering on it shoulder. But it had life. Oxygen. Foliage to hide in.
Sarah appeared before Cyborg's pod, standing on the hull. She took a moment to look around and, seeing the red giant, she became so excited, she vanished in a wisp of smoke.
A few minutes later, a distress beacon flared from the little planet.
The excitement from the other three was tangible. Cyborg was suddenly working with me, all systems go for burn through atmosphere, pushing the straining engines harder.
The burn through the atmosphere took too long. As did the descent to the ground. As did the search through the leafy foliage to find the beacon. Very tall trees covered every inch of the surface, there was an abundance of animal life, little things, not much of a threat. We floated above the greenery, looking for a place to land.
I half expected Starfire to shoot from the foliage to come to us. To dart through the tree line and plant Sarah on Cyborg's pod and come to mine. I'd wrap my arms around her and tell her how much I loved her.
But she didn't.
There were no scorch marks in the trees. No sign that some sort of vessel crash landed on this planet, but then I didn't expect there to be. Starfire would have followed Sarah's escape pod, catching it and hiding it to keep them both safe. No beacons, nothing to show their presence until they were certain it was us coming for them.
There was a glint through the trees. A flash of metal. Cyborg's pod was open in an instant and he leapt from the T-Ship and down into the trees, Sarah's name erupting from his lips. Leaving me to land the T-Ship. Although, I suppose I could do the same thing and leave Raven and Beast Boy to land the damn thing.
Raven seemed to be of the same mind as I was. The window of my pod was suddenly lifting back as she disengaged the lock. "Go!" she mouthed at me through her pod.
Don't need to ask me twice. Of course, I couldn't crash through the trees like Cyborg had, I had to leapfrog down the branches. Twist and jump and reach for the branches. Swing down and land on the cushy jungle ground.
Sarah and Cyborg were hugging, Cyborg on his knees in front of her. Sarah looked exhausted, her hair was mattered with old blood, there were scabbed pinpricks and dried blood across her forehead. She was naked, not that I looked beyond a cursory sweep to see if she was injured. She was crying, Cyborg was crying and rocking her and crooning under his breath.
Behind Sarah was an open metallic sphere, the seat inside only big enough for one. Not too many controls either, just enough to survive until picked up by another ship. Thrusters for short range transport, Starfire would have had to push her to get her this far. The plants beneath it were crushed, but not blackened by jet flame, which told me Starfire landed the escape pod.
Where was Starfire? My eyes scanned the jungle of alien trees, but I couldn't see her. I didn't want to interrupt Sarah and Cyborg's reunion but I needed to know. My heart was pounding, my eyes desperately searching. "Star?"
Sarah lifted her head. "Oh," she whimpered, practically oozing pity. "Dick—"
"Where?" I blurted.
Sarah couldn't seem to find the words. "Star… she…"
"Just tell me where," I begged.
Sarah pointed. "Cave—"
I was off and pushing my way through the jungle, forcing my way through the rough foliage and undercover plants. I called her name, my tone desperate, but she didn't answer me. I wasn't sure why.
The cave was at the bottom overhanging rock which jutted through the foliage. You wouldn't have been able to find it unless you knew it was there. There was a tunnel at the base of the rock, just large enough crouch and crawl through. It seemed deep, descending into black and I cracked an emergency light stick as I hesitated at the entrance. "Star?"
There was a muffled sort of sound from within the cave. I stooped through the entrance, pleased to discover the hollow beyond it was big enough to stand. "Star?" I called again and raised the light stick.
She had her back to me, her hair mattered and tangled. Curled up in a ball on the ground, I could see her naked body shivering, tremors so strong she was practically jerking from it.
"Starfire, Starfire," I chanted her name, dropping to my knees beside her. My hands hesitated at her shoulder, brushed away her hair so I could see her face. She stared blankly, didn't seem to see me. Her hands were bound in metallic bracers, like I'd seen on her when she'd come to Earth that first time. Like I'd seen on the Psion ship.
Dropping the light stick, I reached for my lock picks, twisting so I was crouching in front of her. "Star? Star?" I asked, one hand brushed at her blank face, the other worked the lock. I ran my eyes over her form.
Her face was battered, bruised. There were track marks, needle indents on her upper arms. Blood coated the bracers, Psion blood, her face was splattered with it, her body too. There was dried blood on her feet, but I couldn't see if they were cut, more like stained from when she'd used them to kill the Psions that held her.
There was flowing blood on her belly, three circular wounds, like metal rods had been inserted. They were low, so low, over her womb.
The first set of bracers clicked, the ones over her hands preventing starbolts and I started working on the second set. Her fingers went limp. "It's okay," I murmured, both to her, and to myself. "I'm here, it's over, Star, it's over."
She shuddered violently and let out a low moan. Her shifting legs revealed blood staining her thighs. Dripped and pooled. I brushed my fingers over it, lifted them up to stare at the wetness on the tips. Was she bleeding internally?
The second set of bracers gone and I was able to lift her up a little so I could put my arms around her. She moaned again, her eyes rolling but she finally focused on me. "Dick?"
I tried to smile for her and failed. "I got you," I whispered, yanking off my mask so she could see my eyes. I sat down on the rock, heaving her up and onto my legs so I could hug her. She was so very limp, drained of energy. My arms around her chest, I buried my head in her neck and she just draped there, her arms dangling. "I got you."
"Could not wait," she whispered.
"It's okay. I found you."
"Could not allow them. Oh, X'hal. So many, so many… Forgive me, Dick. Forgive me."
I pulled back as she spoke, stroking her face, looking into her eyes. "Nothing to forgive," I told her. "Don't be silly." She'd had to kill to get out, I understood. She wasn't at fault. They'd sealed their own fate when they'd taken her.
She wasn't hearing me. Probably couldn't even see me anymore. "Could not save them. Only one. Only one."
"One what?" One Psion? Other experiments in that place? Sarah?
Her eyes were rolling, losing focus. "Eilace."
"Stay with me, baby, stay with me," I murmured, my finger taping at her face. "Stay here."
But she was gone. Sunk below the surface of consciousness, to where there was no pain and I was left clutching a ragdoll. She had a pulse. She was breathing, short and shallow. I pawed at her, begging her to wake, pleading with her to come back to me.
Rocks skittered at the entrance of the cave. "Dick? Star?"
I jerked my head up, wiping at my cheeks. "Raven? Help!" My voice cracked on the word, broke and shattered, a desperate cry.
She slid down into the entrance of the cave, pebbles crushed beneath her feet. "I'm coming." She gasped as she saw Starfire, scrambling the short distance between us, reaching out with glowing hand.
Beast Boy slid in behind Raven, then offered a hand to Sarah to help her in.
"We had to get out of the sun," Sarah explained, clutching Raven's cape tighter around her shoulders. "On top of everything else, I think it was hurting her."
I nodded vaguely, combing my fingers across Starfire's bangs, stroking her face.
"Man, I can't fit through the hole," Cyborg called. "She okay?"
"I don't know," I murmured.
Sarah shuddered. "It was horrible," she whispered. "What they put us through…"
"It's okay," I mumbled. "We saw. You don't need to tell us. Not yet."
"What were they?" Sarah asked. "Starfire… she spent most of the time drugged. … They were doing things to my brain. And now… if I close my eyes, I can find things I want, the T-Ship, my wedding ring, Vic… if I think about it hard enough, I can see around them. If I really concentrate, I can be there… that's how I found you."
Remote viewing, my brain supplied, and astral projection. Telekinesis too, judging by what she did to that Psion. Poor Sarah.
"They're called Psions," Beast Boy said. "Soulless, empathy less creatures who live to experiment on others. They've had Starfire before, that's how she got her starbolts."
Sarah covered her eyes. "God… they kept us together, they kept us together. Starfire… she swallowed her beacon before they caught us. But then they drugged her… they were… she coughed it up and gave it to me… I had hands, we could hide it better…" She shifted, drawing her knees up to her chest. "I thought… I knew you were coming. I thought if I left it, you wouldn't try and search the ship before it exploded. You'd go straight for the beacon. You'd find the note…"
"You did good, Sarah," Cyborg called. "We found it."
Sarah shivered, hugged her arms to her. "I didn't understand what they were saying. I couldn't understand, but Starfire knew. She told me to relax. It would hurt, but she'd get us out as soon as she could. She told me not to plead, not to beg, it makes them do more. She taunted them, I could tell by her tone. Made them focus on her… but they still did me… and then… I wasn't there anymore. I was with Vic and you guys and you were looking for me, but you couldn't see me…" Sarah let out a muffled sob and Beast Boy put his hand on her shoulder.
"It's okay," he said. "It's okay."
"I told her you were coming. I told her I'd seen you and you were so close… but they… the probes… Dick… they… she…"
"We saw," I said absently, still stroking at Starfire's face, trying to coax her awake. "They found some of my DNA. They were going to use and take her eggs to make hybrids…"
"When they brought me in, she was… just staring… she… saw me and… just snapped. I… was terrified… they couldn't hold her…" Sarah turned her head to the opening of the cave. "I got one, Vic. I didn't mean to, but I got one."
"I know, baby. Good job."
"Starfire… she got us out. She pushed herself so hard to get us free."
"And she got you free," I said. "That's what matters. You're free and you're safe and—"
Raven pulled her hand away from Starfire and sighed.
"What's wrong with her?" I blurted, frantic.
Raven's hands stroked Starfire's face, checked her eyes, hovered above her belly. "You're not going to like this."
"Tell me."
Raven pulled her hands away and sat back on her haunches. "Her body's rejecting it."
God, it was like pulling teeth, getting the answers from Raven when she wants to be cryptic. "Rejecting what?"
"The baby."
I gurgled. Stared at her, unable to believe it. "What?"
"Say what?" Cyborg said from the entrance of the cave, hunkering down so he could peer through.
"She was pregnant?" Beast Boy asked.
"No," Raven said, meaningfully. "But she is now. Growth appears to have been accelerated; it's about… eight weeks old. I sense it's growing naturally now."
"They… impregnated her?" Sarah whispered, her hands fluttering around her face. "Oh… no…"
I slumped. "Fucking hell... I thought… I thought…" I couldn't finish. I didn't know what I thought.
"Guys, can you leave please?" Raven asked of Beast Boy and Sarah. "I need to help Starfire. Cy, Sarah could use some clothes and food."
"Yeah," Cyborg called. "Sarah, baby, c'mon. I'm detectin' water not far from here, I'll run a scan on it, make sure there's no pathogens, but you could bathe. Then we'll get you some food, and clothes, how's that sound?"
Sarah nodded and crawled to the entrance.
"Rae," Beast Boy began, his hand on her shoulder.
"I won't hurt your baby, I promise," she said, patting his hand. "Please. I need the first aid kit and blanket for Starfire."
"Okay," Beast Boy replied. He kissed Raven's temple, gave me a sympathetic and rather frantic look before he headed out the cave entrance.
Raven waited while they all left before she looked at me. "Dick, I have to give Starfire some sort of healing, she'll… there's too much blood, if I don't act, it's possible we might lose her… but… I need to ask… "
Lose Starfire? After all this, to lose her now?
"Dick?"
I dragged my eyes from Starfire's still face to Raven.
She chewed her lip. "Considering how this baby was conceived, what do you want me to do?"
I stared at her, not really able to understand. Not really willing to understand. "What?"
Her eyes bored into me, searching the depths of my soul. "Do you want me to try and save the baby, or help her body reject it?"
Token protest, don't ask me to make this decision. "You're not supposed to be healing."
"Dick, my baby is protected, I promise. Starfire's isn't."
"But if her body's rejecting it, doesn't that mean there's something wrong with it?" I asked.
Raven shook her head. "Not that I can tell. It looks like they rushed the implanting and with her trying to escape… upset the balance. It's tremulous, at best. The baby is still alive, but at the rate she's bleeding… Really, I'd like her to be awake and make the decision herself, but there's no time."
"What if… what if we let nature take its course?" I asked. I was stalling, I was. Offering up reasonable responses so I wouldn't have to make this choice.
Raven sighed. "I don't know. It might live. It might not. Starfire might not. This sort of damage, letting nature take its course means I can't touch Starfire's injuries as well. There's no medical facility here, she could bleed to death before I have the tools to help. I don't even know if I can save the baby, but I have to give her some healing, one way or the other. What do you want me to do?"
I bowed my head, pressed my cheek to Starfire's. The answer I gave Raven was totally and utterly selfish.
Author's Note:
And everything falls apart...
Okay. Because I just know someone is going to scream at me. Let me knock this on its head before you do.
If you are not already aware, I am Australian. I've said it a hundred times. I am Australian.
Every single country has different laws, different opinions on the subject of birth control and abortions. Respect that.
Australia does not have Abortion Clinics. We have Women's health centres, where you can go for all sorts of problems, including pap smears, birth control, pregnancy tests and pregnancy checkups and, if you chose, an abortion and associated counselling (please note, there are laws and procedures for getting an abortion, you can't just have it at any stage of the pregnancy). There is absolutely no way you can tell who goes into the clinic for what. You can get an abortion at hospital if you wish. You can go to any old doctor and they'll organise one for you.
In Australia, there is little stigma about it. Most of us do not judge people who have had one, or are going to have one. I think there was a recent study that said one in six women have admitted to having an abortion at one point in their lives. There are no picket lines with 'Abortion is murder' signs outside clinics. There should be no one camping outside to prevent you from getting it (if there are, the health centre is within its rights to ask them to leave). If people want to protest, and they're quite welcome to, they do it at parliament house. We are neither pro-life nor pro-choice. We are… 'it's none of your bloody business'.
We do not teach our children abstinence is the only way. We are fully aware that teenagers go out and have sex. We teach them a variety of forms of birth control, and make it readily available (abortion is not a viable form of birth control). That being said, we also want our women who chose to have an abortion to do it safely and without judgment.
This is a cultural issue. There, now that's out of the way.
What Raven suggested was not technically an abortion. Any doctor would give exactly the same advice Raven gave considering the circumstances. Starfire was already in first stages of miscarriage. Raven was suggesting she could help that miscarriage along, attempt to stop it (key word, attempt), or let nature take its course, which would have resulted in miscarriage anyway. She gave Dick the choice of what to do, asked him what mind focus she should have when she goes to heal Starfire. Don't forget, Raven's also pregnant. Dick has to weight up the lives of two unborn children.
This is often the hardest decision a father will have to make. Pregnancy is threatening the health of his partner, doctors may advise termination. Save the life of his partner, or risk losing them both. This becomes personal opinion. I am not going to get into a debate on it, at all.
For the majority of fathers, the baby does not become 'real' until they either see it via ultrasound (sonogram) or hold the baby after birth. They have a hard time forming attachments to their child because they do not really know the child. They love the child, grieve its death, are in awe of it when they feel it move, and see that little foot make kicks across mummy's tummy, or feel that indent that is a butt, but it's not really real until they can hold that baby proudly and say 'this is my child' (Fathers, please, I am generalising). I have seen the moment the baby becomes real on my husband's face three times now, and I remain in awe of it. Mothers, we form bonds with them the moment we start to feel them move. We start to know them, their personalities, what music they like, what foods they don't like. All those things that Dad's never get to know.
Does this make the decision to have a termination easier? No.
Add to that, the circumstances of this pregnancy particular pregnancy. Not only was it unwanted, it was forced.
For the purposes of this story, Dick's opinion is the only one that matters. Not mine. Not yours. I know how I would react in this circumstance. I also know my husband would react in a very different way. I can theorise on what Dick, a man who lives and breathes control, would do.
Just so you know, if you are going to rant in a review about loss of innocent life, don't bother. I am not going to make an issue of this. It's a plot device. I will be ignoring my 'I reply to every review' status if you rant at me. For the purpose of this story, your opinion doesn't matter. Story, completely written, remember? You can't change the outcome.
My opinion on abortion for this story does not matter either, if fact, you will note I have deliberately avoided offering an opinion on abortion itself. If you really, really want to know, I can tell you as long as you respect that fact that it is an opinion, even if it different from yours. We are all entitled to our own opinions.
