So it was that they found themselves in an abandoned warehouse with no phones. The entire place had been soaked in gas and a timing device was ticking away. Liz's labor had progressed and she was leaning heavily on Ressler, panting as they walked as fast as they could out of the big room towards the smaller one, looking for a door.
The room they had just entered looked like it might once have been a shop, a giant worktable stood in the center and it had two big overhead doors next to the regular sized man door.
"Ah, there" said Ressler, pointing at the door as he tried to help hurry Liz along. "We gotta get out of here before this place blows."
"I can't" said Liz, panting. She dropped to a triangle stance, her hands on her knees and screamed for a minute. "I can't. I need to push."
"We can't stop now!" said Ressler. It was February and very bitterly cold, snowing outside, and here they were, 39 weeks pregnant with twins, in a building that could blow up at any time, killing them all. What was more was the impending birth was dangerous due to the size difference of Liz's tiny pelvis and Ressler's son's giant round heads, and they wanted to be under doctor's supervision for the birth. Ressler didn't know what to do, short of getting them the heck out of there and getting them all the help they needed.
"I know" said Liz, "but I - I can't. Ahhh" she cried out, squeezing his hand so hard he thought it might break as she leaned forward, her other hand on her knee, folding over her swollen belly as the contraction hit. "I need to push!" she said. Those two contractions had been nearly back to back. They were out of time.
"Okay, Okay!" said Ressler, clueless and feeling inadequate. He didn't think her body was lying to her. He just didn't like what it was saying. "Here" He helped lift her onto the work table, at about waist height and pull down the baggy sweats she was wearing. He was hoping against hope that he would see nothing and be able to tell her they had time to go. Unfortunately that was not to be. Her belly was hard, the muscles all pulled taught and even his untrained eye could tell she was fully dilated. His eyes also told him that his sons were really coming. He could see a decent patch of hair.
"They're coming Don" said Liz, contracting again. "They're really coming!" She cried out again and his heart broke at the sound.
"What do I - I don't know - what do I do?" he asked, terrified. He was clueless about how to help.
"I don't know" said Liz, "just help me!" She cried out in pain again and Ressler was spurred to action, not able to stand hearing her like that. It was his fault she was in this state, he needed to help.
He shrugged out of his coat and the flannel shirt he was wearing, leaving only his T-shirt on. Setting them on the table he removed Liz's sweats and grabbed her hands, both of hers in his left, leaving his dominant hand free.
"Okay!" he said ,"Push!" he encouraged when the next contraction hit. The doctors had warned them that the babies were big, huge for twins, maybe pushing eight pounds each. That was much larger than Agnes had been and there was two of them. They knew it would be a hard delivery.
Liz pushed and breathed and pushed again and he encouraged her through it. They both knew that they were on a very, very limited clock, but nature was only so fast. Those timing devices were never set immediately, but they also didn't have long.
Liz was exhausted, but it being her second pregnancy and the strain of the past month and that morning's activities on her uterus and pelvis and the influence of the situation, it progressed very fast.
It was hardly more then two minutes and she bore down and Ressler was telling her - excitedly - that he could see the head. He was no expert but even he could tell that the baby was too big for this design. Something was faulty here. He just prayed Liz was strong enough to survive it. With one thick finger he cleared aside the wet membrane that covered the baby's mouth and nose.
"He has red hair, Liz!' he cried, "my hair!"
The next push freed the wide shoulders, at the expense of Liz's private parts, and without thinking Ressler reached down with his good right hand and placed it under his son's head, trying not to focus on the fact that his wife was tearing before his eyes. Stealing his other hand away from Liz he placed a finger under his son's exposed armpit and brought him into the world. The baby screamed at the top of his lungs, his slippery body moving in his father's hands as he cradled him. The sticky thickness of the membrane surrounded his little body and mixed with the blood still slowly flowing from Ressler's wrists. His skin was flushed red as newborn's tended to be, but a quick glance assured his father that his son was all there.
Oversized head with wet deep red hair plastered to it, the darkest blue eyes he'd ever seen open just a bit, round nose, mouth open wide in a impossibly high pitched cry, fat shoulders, a round chest, flailing arms, flexed hands, an unporportionally large - and slightly swollen - scrotal sac and penis nestled between his fat thighs, long bent legs kicking as he mourned the loss of his comfortable home. Wrinkled and pink and covered in amniotic fluid and blood, the cord still connecting him to his mother, Donald Ressler was sure he'd never seen anything so beautiful as their son cradled awkwardly in his big hands.
Liz slumped back exhausted as for a second the entire world faded away, the baby Ressler had just delivered all they were aware of. Then Ressler hastily and awkwardly swaddled him in the flannel shirt he was just wearing, hoping it still held his body heat to help drive away the winter cold on the newborn's soaking body and laid him gently between Liz's legs.
Twins were usually a few minutes apart he knew, maybe they could get out of this place before the second one came. Thankfully he hadn't heard the pace of the ticking increase yet.
"Liz!" he said, then again in fear when she didn't respond "Liz!" But she didn't respond because she was laying flat. There would be no time, her body was preparing for round two.
"Can't" said Liz, and he could see and hear the weakness in her. "Can't" she panted and he knew what she meant. She couldn't leave, there was no chance. But she couldn't do it again either. The pain was unbearable and the baby too big and she couldn't. But she had too.
"Yes you can Liz!' he said, "you have to. I love you, I love you so much! You are the strongest person I know! You have to! For our son!" She looked up at him, tears streaming down both their faces and nodded briefly. For their son.
The first baby screamed, his lungs apparently healthy, but it was time to focus on his brother.
The head appeared and somehow, with superhuman strength, Liz found the ability to push once. It was enough to get the baby's head out but his fat shoulders, wider by two inches on both sides, stuck and Liz honestly wasn't capable of pushing again. The baby was pinned by the neck and Ressler was terrified. The skin of his face was darkening to purple and looked molted, his fat little full lips were turning blue. He wasn't getting oxygen, his trachea was crushed. Without thinking, Ressler forced his finger in, trying to ignore that fact that Liz was tearing even further because of it and must be in tremendous pain, under the baby's shoulder blade and hooked it. Mentally he was cursing the size of his own fingers. Why did they have to be goddamm thick? He forced the shoulder out, no idea what he was doing, but pure need taking over. It worked, the baby turned and Ressler found the other shoulder, the rest of its body slipping free.
It took a minute and they both waited without breathing, drawing air only when they heard the baby start to mewl. It got louder and stronger until he sounded like his brother and Ressler laid him down next to the first one. The blue receded from his face slowly until his skin was the same deep pink as his brother's. Wrapping them both in his coat, Ressler closed the bundle as securely as he could, only a tiny patch of their faces showing and laid it on Liz's chest.
"We need to go" he said, "we're out of time."
And they were. It had been probably 10 minutes since they had heard the vehicles pull away and they were past the detonation timeline. He could hear the ticking speed up somewhere behind him and he knew that they had to get away.
They couldn't wait on the placenta.
He risked a glance at Liz. She was bleeding. Probably too much. He didn't know. She had torn badly, very badly, but he didn't see any reason to mention that at the moment. She likely already knew.
"Can you hold them?" asked Ressler, crossing Liz's arms over their babies on her chest.
But as much as it killed her, she shook her head. The birth had taken all the strength she had and she was fighting a losing battle just to stay awake now. Ressler realized that if they were going to get out here, it would be up to him, so he leaned against Liz, setting the babies bundle where their bodies joined and placing his hands under Liz's back and knees. He scooped her into his arms and headed for the door, turning the knob in his hand and thanking God that it wasn't locked.
And then he was half-walking, half-running away from the warehouse, the burden of his family in his arms. They had entered the place only hours earlier, yet somehow they had come out with two more children then they had entered with. They had entered the world there, in depths that Ressler had hoped they'd never have to see.
Liz remembered leaving and the cold air hitting her and the feeling of Ressler's arms beneath her and the babies on her chest and then nothing.
He made it only a precious 100 feet and the entire warehouse went up in a ball of fire. He felt the waves of heat roll out and around them, but he never even noticed the flames lick the shirt from his back. Not when he carried his soul in his arms.
That fireball turned out to be their saving grace as well. It shot up above the surrounding buildings, plainly visible for miles, and alerted the firehouse down the street. They set out, not needing an alarm when it was plainly visible that help was needed.
The paramedics of D.C. ambo #56 were the first to see the man walking up the embankment and down the road.
He was stooped under the weight of the woman he carried, yet his step never faltered. His back was bare, the skin angry and red, recently burned, his torso naked in the cutting February chill but he hardly seemed to notice. The woman he carried was unresponsive, blood staining her naked legs, her hair flying in the wind, her one arm dangling at her side, the other tossed limply over a bundle on her chest. They were a block away from the clearly engulfed warehouse.
Only when they cut the engine and hopped out, running towards him, did their minds register the seperate cries of two newborn infants, only minutes old, and they knew without being told exactly what had taken place. Love really did conquer all.