Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any known characters from the HP universe. Those copyrights are credited to the wonderful J.K. Rowling.

Warnings: Slash, Mpreg, adult language, extremely AU.

A/N: This is the completely edited version of my story Werewolf Child. This is taking a completely different spin on it and as of right now, I like it better than the original. Reviews are very much appreciated.

Chapter Three: Welcome Home

Remus stared at the calendar in shock. He was due in a week!? That couldn't be right. There was no way it was already the end July? However, the heat in his apartment and the constantly beating sun would beg to differ with him. He remembered back in April—after the encounter with Greyback—how he wished and wished for the rain to stop, for it to just hurry up and be summer.

If there was one thing worse than summer heat, it was summer heat while pregnant. Nine months pregnant, to be specific. There was no hope for comfort, all Remus knew by this point in his life was varying degrees of discomfort. Wiping his brow and running a hand through his sweaty hair, Remus cast yet another cooling charm around the apartment, breathing a sigh of relief as the effects were instantaneous.

Cool enough for now, he managed to turn his attention back to the textbook that he was almost done writing. He always hated writing beginner dueling textbooks as they so rarely got into the practical uses; it was all theory and origins and stance and ugh. Despite his boredom during the writing, he was excited for it to be sent off to the editor and then the publishing company. He was thankful that dueling was one of the few subjects that one could do at the same time as Hogwarts course work. As such, he was able to graduate from Hogwarts with his dueling Mastery.

He would occasionally go and give dueling demonstrations to Auror courses—although he hadn't been able to do that since becoming pregnant—but his main source of income was his research in dueling techniques and the writing of his textbooks. And while it wasn't the most lucrative endeavor initially, Remus was finally starting to see some larger royalty checks and was able to initiate higher initial pay from his publisher.

He dotted the last period on his citations, bound up the manuscript, and summoned his owl. After lightening the load for the bird, he sent it off to the publishing company. He rubbed at his back, it had been hurting dreadfully all morning and he was sure sitting hunched over a desk for hours hadn't helped. No matter, the important thing was that the book was finished a month early and with that done, he had no other work until well after the baby came. That meant he could spend time taking care of and bonding with his son.

Rubbing his stomach with a smile, Remus now wondered what to do with the rest of his day as it was still early in the afternoon. He had just thought he would go for a walk when his fireplace flared green and he saw Lily's head appear in the flames. "Remus?"

"Hello, Lily!" he called out happily. He made his way to the fireplace. "Sorry I can't crouch down so you can see me."

"No need to apologize!" she waved him off. "I understand, remember?" Remus rolled his eyes at her joke. Of course, he remembered the huge favor she was doing for him. He would remember it for the rest of his life; he was eternally in Lily Potter's debt.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Poppy is mad at you; your appointment was hours ago. You were supposed to be there at ten in the morning."

"Shit!" Remus cast a quick Tempus charm and sure enough, he had absolutely lost track of time and missed—you forgot again, didn't you, Moony chimed in—his final appointment. It was now four o'clock in the afternoon. "Alright, alright…I'll figure out a way to get to Hogwarts since the portkey she sent must be inactive by now."

"Sirius should be on his way to get you with a new one. We're all already here so she'll be able to start as soon as you get here," Lily winked.

Remus nodded and then paused. "Wait…if my appointment was hours ago, why wasn't I called sooner?"

"You must have been working because the channel was blocked out," Lily shrugged.

Right, his Do-Not-Disturb charm on the floo. He had placed that when he first got the flat and was tired of his friends dropping in unannounced as he was trying to write. His memory was muddled as of late, although that was normal according to Poppy. Something she called "pregnancy brain" or something like that.

Lily disconnected the call and Remus stood in the middle of his flat, waiting for Sirius to arrive, desperately trying to rub out the knots in his throbbing back. He wasn't waiting long before a polite knock sounded and Sirius just barged in without waiting for a response. Remus noted absently that he looked upset about something. But he knew better to ask, he'd find out in a second anyway.

"I thought something happened to you again, you fucking git." Sirius seethed as he shut the door behind him. Sirius hadn't forgiven himself for what happened to Remus in April. Of all the days he had gotten called into the Auror office, of course it had to be the day Remus got ambushed. He felt like he had failed as a body guard, especially after he had watched the events later in Remus' Penseive.

"I was working, lost track of time…" Remus murmured distractedly. Merlin his back was sore. He'd have to ask Poppy if this was normal when they got to Hogwarts.

"Well, you need to have better time-management soon. You're going to have a baby depending on you; you can't get distracted by work when he needs you." Sirius sniffed as he held out a glove for Remus to take.

The lycan did so, glaring at Sirius for ever insinuating that he would neglect his cub because of work. Ignoring the glare, Sirius rolled his eyes and counted down. "Three…two…one…"

And they disappeared from Remus' home.

If Remus thought his back hurt before the portkey, he was in for quite the shock once his feet hit the ground of the Poppy's office. The force of the pain that crashed through him had him doubling over and gripping his stomach, hissing through gritted teeth. The office's occupants were around him instantly, bombarding him with questions as Poppy carefully marched him over to the examination bed.

He panted heavily as the pain finally passed. What was that? He thought to himself, shaking slightly. He half expected Moony to answer him cryptically, however the werewolf was mysteriously silent. "Remus," Poppy's voice was sharp and clinical. "How long have you been feeling pain like that?"

He took several deep breaths to calm his heart rate. He had assumed that the jolt of landing on solid ground had just caused the pain, he didn't understand why Poppy seemed so worked up.

"This morning."

"Yesterday morning."

Lily stared at him with a quirked eyebrow as she answered at the same time he did. Remus blinked, confused. Had his back been bothering him yesterday? A little more than usual, sure but he just thought he had slept on it wrong. No reason to get Poppy so worked up about it, Remus half-heartedly glared at Lily, sometimes he forgot she felt everything he did as part of their agreement. Mostly because to him, she still looked normal.

Poppy clucked her tongue and made an irritated flick with her wand toward Remus' abdomen. She waited with pursed lips as her wand tip flashed several colors before settling on a gold. With a noise of either frustration or excitement, Remus couldn't tell, she looked him square in the eye and stated "You're in labor."

"Oh…" was all Remus could say before chaos swarmed around him.

Labor wasn't anything like he had seen on Muggle television shows or films. It wasn't an immediate "Oh, no! My water broke! The baby is coming now!" sort of thing. Rather, it started with discomfort that progressively got worse and worse. He was hooked up to a monitor that would tell him the frequency and severity of his contractions. He didn't understand the point in making him suffer through the contractions like Poppy seemed to be doing; they had decided months ago that a caesarean section would be the best option for delivery. She could literally sedate him at any time, why wait?

She's probably getting back at me for being late to my appointment, Remus thought bitterly as he gritted his teeth through another contraction, trying to ignore Lily's grunt of pain.

"How are you handling it so well?" She gasped out. "I feel only a fraction of what you do and you're barely reacting."

He laid back on the bed panting, flexing his hands as they were sore from how hard he had gripped the bed's siderails. "This is nothing…compared to the transformations."

Eventually, they also had Lily lay down in a bed. As one contraction sent her down to the floor sobbing; Remus felt terrible for doing this to his friend. However, he felt worse for himself as he was the one actually going through the pain. James winced as Lily gripped his hand, writhing in agony on the bed as Remus hardly reacted beyond a grunt and gripping at his stomach.

Poppy finally deemed that enough time had passed and perhaps he had gone through enough labor for her to deem it safe to sedate him. With a wave of her wand, Remus' body from his abdomen down went completely numb. Next to him, Lily sighed in relief and sat up clutching James' hand in hers. Remus looked away, unable to stop the jealous feeling in his chest. He wanted Severus here so badly!

When a cold hand touched his he whipped his head to the side, half expecting the dark man to be standing there. Instead, it was Sirius smiling shyly and gripping his hand in support. "You got this, Remus." The lycan smiled weakly as Poppy erected a screen and she began to procedure that would bring his cub into his life.

With a howling cry, Shadow Remus Lupin entered the world at 10:07pm. There was a lot of charm work over the official birth certificate that would disguise the infant's true lineage, as well as Dumbledore being summoned in order to cast the glamour charms that would alter Shadow's appearance to those who were unaware of the truth. Dumbledore sent the magically altered birth certificate to the Ministry. The spells on the certificate were of a similar nature to the glamour charms that had been cast. As far as everyone else in the Wizarding World was concerned, this was the birth certificate for Harry James Potter. After all of this, Poppy set about checking the newborn and cleaning him up all under the watchful eye of the new, and rightfully exhausted, parent.

After far too long in Remus' opinion, he was finally given his son. He cradled him close to his chest, too scared to move out of fear that his son might break or disappear. As he gazed down at the small face the reality and responsibility hit him full force. This was a childhis child—that was solely dependent on him for his care and wellbeing. This knowledge left Remus breathless and dizzy as he ran a finger down the soft cheek.

He was so enraptured with this new life bundled in a blanket that he hadn't noticed his friends slipping out quietly, giving the new little family privacy. Poppy nodded to herself and also retired to her quarters that were attached to the private office. Should Remus or the baby need anything she would hear. For now, she knew what they needed was each other.

After what seemed like an eternity, Shadow's eyes fluttered. Remus' heart started pounding. What did he do? What if he started crying? Had the charm fully worn off? Would he be able to get up if he needed to get a bottle? Shitshitshitshit!

Small eyelids finally opened, blinking owlishly up at his parent. Remus' breath hitched in his throat as he stared into his baby's crystal blue eyes. The child certainly took after Severus if the thick tuft of black hair on his head was anything to go by. He was also fairly certain that as time went on, the blue eyes would darken. But that didn't matter to Remus; in his eyes his son was perfect.

"Hello, little one," Remus finally breathed out, voice hoarse. He cleared his throat a little and chuckled as Shadow yawned and clenched and unclenched his tiny hands. Remus offered a finger and smiled when Shadow gripped it as hard as he could. "I'm your…"

This caused Remus to pause. Never once throughout his entire pregnancy had he thought about what his son would call him. He had so much time to think about it, he had told himself. But…here he was, baby in his arms and he still was clueless as to what his child would know him as. Dad? Daddy? Papa? Those all felt…off. Wrong. He had carried this child inside of him. Wouldn't that make him the mother? But…he was a man. Could he have his child call him mum? Or Mama?

Why shouldn't you? You carried him and nurtured him inside of you. Moony's voice sounded tired but joyous, as well.

"Because I'm a man," Remus stated into the darkness, eyes not moving from his cub's face.

You are this child's mother. Man or woman. You were the pregnant one. A yawn punctuated the end of Moony's sentence, as if he was already bored with the conversation. Which, in all honesty was probably the case.

Try as he might, Remus couldn't really find any fault with Moony's logic. With a mental shrug, Remus started his introduction again. He ran a thumb gently over Shadow's soft cheek and across his pink lips. "Hello, little one. I'm your mama." With tears in his eyes, Remus pressed a soft kiss to the top of Shadow's head.

Yes, his cub was finally here. But that only meant the beginning of a far more difficult journey than his pregnancy had been. He was responsible for this sweet, innocent being for the rest of his life. And come hell or high water, Remus would not fail his cub.

As he felt his eyelids grow heavy, Remus pulled the hospital bassinette closer to his bed. As carefully as he could, Remus set Shadow inside. As he was about to drift off to sleep, he whispered one last thing to his sleeping baby. "Welcome home."

A/N: I was debating heavily on whether I should keep the original name I had chosen for "Harry" back in Werewolf Child V1. I was also heavily debating if Remus should still be "mama," but I feel that they were such important parts to the original story that I couldn't do away with them. Leave a review and let me know what you think.

Luv,

GoM