When I opened my eyes, I was immediately on edge. I was dreaming, but I knew that I was dreaming, and I hadn't had that kind of awareness of my dreams in years - not since Neah had found a new host and left my body behind. So I was immensely concerned as to why I was having one now, especially since I hadn't been anywhere near the war in months.

The landscape around me was quite familiar. I was at the edge of a vast lake and surrounded by trees. The full moon hung eerily in the sky and reflected on the still waters in front of me. This was the same spot where all of my dreams about the Fourteenth had started. A morbid sense of curiosity told me to check my reflection in the lake, to see if it was still me or if it was the Fourteenth's shadow like it was in my previous dreams, but I was too scared. There were other things that that lake had shown me that I didn't want to see again.

But as I turned to look at the surrounding trees, I was suddenly struck by a way in which this dream was different from my old ones.

I was sitting on a simple stone bench. A bench that had never been there before. And while that was new and weird, it wasn't as significant as the fact that I was pregnant. Whatever was going on in this dream, I was just as pregnant as I was in real life, and that was somehow both terrifying and relieving.

Getting up and venturing into the forest was now out of the question - even dreaming, I was much too gravid for that - so I turned my attention back to the lake, trying to find some clue as to what was going on and why I was here. But as I did so, I suddenly noticed a figure approaching. Coming towards me was a man dressed in a long white cloak that masked his features, the raised fur hood completely hiding his face from view. The light of the moon gave him an eerie glow, which only enhanced the feeling of overwhelming power that flowed off of him. But despite our surroundings and the fact that I somehow knew that he could kill me without putting any effort into it, I wasn't scared. In fact, I was the opposite of scared. Whoever this man was, his presence was calming, and I felt safer the closer he got to me.

When he reached me, he placed his white gloved hands on my pregnant belly and bent down to kiss my forehead. His touch was sweet and tender, but more than anything, it was familiar. I gazed under his hood, hoping to see his face, but it was hidden by a silver and black mask. I recognized that mask in an instant, confirming my guess as to who this mysterious stranger was, but I was disappointed to not get to see his face.

He sat down on the bench beside me, his hands never leaving my belly, and I found myself leaning into him, caught up in the comfort and serenity he brought to me. But my confusion wouldn't be ignored, so I broke the silence around us, trying to satisfy my curiosity. "Crowned Clown? How are you here? This place is-"

"My domain." He laughed as he cut me off, and I was surprised to find that I recognized his voice; we may have never spoken like this before, but I knew his voice well and it was just as reassuring as his presence. "I have called you here to protect you many times before."

His explanation only confused me more. "But if this is your domain, why did I always see the Fourteenth here?"

Crowned Clown laughed again. "Because I was trying to show you that Neah wasn't a threat. But you were too scared to listen, and your fear morphed what was supposed to be a comforting dream into a nightmare."

The explanation made sense, but it didn't make me feel better. "Then why weren't you here? Why didn't you speak to me back then?"

His voice was gentle when he interrupted my questions. "I was here. But we weren't synchronized enough for you to be able to see me."

It was meant as a reassurance but it wasn't reassuring. I felt more confused than ever. "But I broke critical years ago. Back before I ever learned about the Fourteenth. Why-?"

"Because that's not enough, and you know that. The other generals can't speak with their Innocence. Yuu would have told you if he was speaking with Mugen, and believe me, Judgment tried to tell Cross the truth about you for years. Breaking critical is not enough. There's a love and trust that goes into it that goes beyond what happens out on the battlefield." His right hand moved from my belly to my scarred cheek as he welled up. "I am so happy to finally be able to talk with you like this."

I ignored his tears, trying to make sense of what was going on. "You mean that this is recent? But today was the first time I activated you in months. So how-"

His tears were gone and his voice was stern as he cut me off. "I just told you: this has nothing to do with fighting or the strength of your weapon, though that will be stronger because of this. It's a bond of love and acceptance."

I was still confused, but then his hand trailed along my pregnant belly, and that loving caress told me everything that I was missing. "Oh. This is about my pregnancy. We have a stronger bond because I've accepted the fact that you were the one who did this to me."

Crowned Clown was silent for a moment before he started babbling. "I thought I was doing what you wanted. You were so intrigued by the thought of having a baby that I figured you would be happy if I helped make it possible. I didn't expect-"

I cut him off quickly once I realized that he was scared of me and was trying to justify his actions. "I am thrilled to be pregnant. It's the thought that the changes you made to my body might be permanent that scares me. I don't know that I'm going to want to do this again."

That made him laugh. "I changed your body three years ago, Allen. You can't get pregnant unless I say so, and I'm not going to let it happen again unless you want it to happen again."

I was both relieved and confused at learning that. "Then why am I pregnant now? Why didn't you do this three years ago when it first came up?"

He laughed again and gently stroked my cheek with his thumb. "Because you, yourself, said that you didn't want to have a baby until you were an adult, and we had to respect your wishes on that. After that, it wasn't until we met Artemis and Apollo that we found Innocence willing to bond to the baby, so that's when-"

I had to stop him there. "Wait. You waited to get me pregnant until you found Innocence fragments for the babies? You mean my daughters are accommodators on purpose?!"

"Don't get mad, Allen. We had to do it this way."

The unknown, yet familiar, female voice startled me. I looked up to find that there was a woman standing next to the bench. She was dressed like a geisha, wearing an elegant kimono made up of several layers of dark blue silks accented with a subtle pink lotus blossom pattern. Her long dark hair was intricately pinned up and adorned with a decorative pair of chopsticks that matched the lotus blossoms on her gown. And though her face was painted white and heavily made up, the physical resemblance between her and my husband was unmistakable. This was Yuu's Innocence.

And just in case I wasn't sure of her identity, Crowned Clown's next words confirmed it for me. "I thought you were going to stay out of this, Mugen."

"I changed my mind." She clicked her tongue at him in the exact same way that Yuu did whenever he felt like a question had been especially stupid. Then she was kneeling in front of me and brushing her hand into my hair. "We knew before we decided to get you pregnant that we had to make sure that your baby was an accommodator. And you know exactly why we had to do that. Having an Innocence-compatible baby was the only way to guarantee that you would be allowed to keep it and raise it yourself."

Her words reminded me of how afraid I had been that Central would take my babies from me, and any anger I had left at them for intentionally making my babies accommodators was gone. Mugen suddenly tousled my hair, displaying yet another mannerism shared between her and my husband; this was an affectionate gesture that he usually only used when he was happy. "And now that that's out of the way, I want to thank you in person for everything you've done for my Yuu."

I turned beet red and hurried to stop her. "That's really not necessary."

Crowned Clown flicked my ear. "It absolutely is necessary. Accommodators don't normally reach this level of synchronization, so we don't often get to express our gratitude in person like this. Now shut up and let her talk."

The next few minutes were mortifying. I wasn't used receiving gratitude like that, and I didn't feel like I deserved her kind words, so it was incredibly awkward to sit there while my husband's Innocence thanked me for falling in love with him. So I focused on watching Crowned Clown and Mugen interact with each other. Because even though they were both praising me, they still paused occasionally to bicker with each other. The similarities between Mugen and Yuu were pretty clear cut, so it wasn't hard to infer that the familiar mannerisms that Crowned Clown displayed were familiar because they were my own. But if that really was true, he was acting the same way towards Mugen as I acted towards Yuu, and that was strange. It had actually made a lot of sense to learn that the Innocence was sentient, but observing those two in a relationship was weird.

In fact, it was so weird that I found myself asking about it the moment that they finally stopped trying to shower me with unwanted praise. "What's going on between you two? Can Innocence even be in a relationship? Because that's what it looks like to me, but that can't be right, so..."

Mugen sighed and shot an annoyed look at Crowned Clown. "It's complicated to explain, but in human terms, our relationship is the same as yours is with Yuu."

I found myself looking back and forth between the two of them, completely shocked by those words. "You're married?!"

Crowned Clown shrugged. "In human terms, yes."

When I didn't respond, Mugen jumped in. "That's why the two of you are so strong together. Exorcist pairs are stronger when the Innocence share a similar relationship to what their accommodators have. You and Lenalee are strong together because that guy and the Dark Boots are close friends." The hint of jealousy in her voice was the exact same as the jealousy in Yuu's voice when he complained about my friendship with Lenalee, and that almost made me laugh. "Yuu and Marie fight well together because they're the hosts for my brother and myself. And Artemis and Apollo are twins, so your twins will be stronger together than they would be apart."

I had so many questions after hearing that that they just started to pop out. "Artemis and Apollo? Can I meet them?"

Mugen just laughed. "You will someday, but not right now. They've bonded parasitically to your babies, so they'll be dormant until they're activated for the first time. We can talk to them, but they don't have enough spare energy to be able to talk to you yet."

There was more I wanted to say to them, but at that moment, a particularly strong contraction ripped through my belly, pulling me from the dream and waking me up.

.x.x.

I was immensely thankful that Allen was able to sleep through his contractions, but that was mostly because he was going to be even more of a pain in the ass to deal with than usual if he ended up having to give birth on little to no sleep. But while he was able to sleep through the contractions, I was not. Every time his body tensed up, it startled me from my dozing state and made me worry about him.

So I gave up on trying to sleep and instead focused on watching him sleep; this was probably my last chance to do so while he was pregnant. I rubbed his belly after his contractions and just reveled in how absolutely gorgeous he looked while carrying our children. And it was definitely amusing that he was talking in his sleep. It wasn't much, just a stray word here and there, but it was still entertaining.

His last contraction must have been especially painful, as he suddenly cried out and bolted awake. I rubbed his belly to help him calm down and collect himself, and I was rewarded with a breathtakingly beautiful, genuine smile. "What time is it?"

"A little after four. You managed to get quite a bit of sleep." He smiled again, clearly relieved that he'd managed to sleep for so long despite being in labor. "What were you dreaming about?"

The confusion that crossed his face was adorable. "Why?"

I tried to act nonchalant, even though I was practically bursting with curiosity. "I thought I heard you say 'Mugen' a few times, so I'm curious. Why were you dreaming about my Innocence?"

Allen didn't respond. He frowned in thought, but I had to wait for his next contraction to pass before he finally answered the question. "I wasn't dreaming. I was talking to them. I apparently reached a new level of synchronization, so they wanted to talk to me about it. Mugen was being embarrassing and kept trying to thank me for falling in love with you."

I had no clue what to make of that. Allen clearly believed that he truly had spoken with the Innocence, but it was too far-fetched to believe; it wasn't possible to just speak to the Innocence like that. But he was waiting for me to respond, so I had to say something. "That's weird, Moyashi."

Allen immediately teared up. "You don't believe me?"

I had to resist the urge to roll my eyes at how overly emotional he was. "No, it's not that, it's just... you realize that what you're claiming is really strange, right? I want to believe you, but it's hard to believe that you actually spoke to our Innocence. If only there was some way you could prove it."

The Moyashi was silent after that, but he didn't stay that way for long. "Mugen's a girl."

Those words made me freeze, putting me instantly on edge. That was one of those things that I knew, but I had no clue how I knew it, and hearing Allen say it aloud was alarming. "How do you know that?"

"Because I saw her, Bakanda." He laughed at whatever stunned look was on my face. "She could be your twin sister."

I was saved from having to acknowledge that by a contraction. Allen groaned and curled in on himself, struggling to breathe through the pain. After it passed, he just lay there for a moment. I thought that he was trying to collect himself, but his face was flushed with embarrassment and fear when he finally turned to look at me. "My water just broke."