Crossing Shadow River 3, by dutchbuffy2305
Rating: R
Timeline: About ten years after season 5 of AtS; sequel of sorts to Crossing into UnchippedTerritory. You should read that if you want to know everything about how to cross dimensions, and how Buffy and Spike got to be together. If you insist in reading this first, this is the recap: Buffy met evil Spike when she accidentally fell in another dimension. Hijinks ensue. He returns souled Spike to her (I'm not telling how) and they lived happily ever after. I still think you should go read it first, my summary doesn't quite do it justice…
Author's note: Thanks to my dear betas, meko00, ayinhara & mommanerd. Thanks to the ladies from Tea at the Ford and Herself for some great pointers.
Author's website: http:home.planet.nl/dutchbuffy2305
Feedback: Yes, please, to dutchbuffy2305yahoo.co.uk
Buffy is on her knees in hot, earthy smelling soil, weeding around her pumpkin patch. It's hard to decide which is a weed and which is a pumpkin, not her expertise exactly. One of them starts to grow and grow and she scurries over hastily, pulling weeds, squashing slugs and watering like mad. It's bigger than her head, now a kangaroo ball, but then it explodes with a great wet splat, leaving her with nothing but seeds and sticky hands. She never knows beforehand if it's going to be a good one. She wishes she could ask her mother.
The next one starts swelling and history repeats itself. This one gives off a strong sweet odor, and Buffy is filled with hope this will be the one. It stops growing and when she carefully feels all over it to discover the reason, her hands disappear into a soft spot she didn't see. The pumpkin is all rotted inside, and she gags when the sweet stench of death hits her nostrils. Her hands are oozing black and purple when she pulls them out and no amount of washing can get them clean.
She's panicking now. Are none of her pumpkins gonna make it? There, at the far end is a big orange one. Please let this be the right one! It does seem to be doing very well, it's round and plump and shiny, with not a single slug track or caterpillar hole. She caresses it slowly, sliding her hands over the sun-warmed globe. Her hands touch other hands, big warm brown ones touching the pumpkin just like hers. Her gaze follows the arms the hands are attached to. There's a threadbare dun-colored shirt over broad shoulders. She can't see his face. A big straw sunhat is hiding his features from her. She stretches her body over the giant pumpkin to look under it, but the hands push her off and curl protectively around the big fruit.
Now she's getting angry. It's her pumpkin, dammit, and nobody's going to take it from her. She grabs the globe firmly and pulls. The unknown figure pulls back. There's a tense moment and then Buffy feels some give. She's going to win! But the pumpkin shatters in a shower of blood orange flesh and pulp, seeds spattering the earth like rain. Her hands and belly are empty, dripping with red fluid.
Buffy's heart's thumping like a drum and she's awash with sweat. Great. Another one of these scary birthing dreams. The midwife says they're perfectly normal. Which is good, because of they were Slayer dreams…The alarm shrills on. Why doesn't Spike turn it off? It's on his side of the bed. She wakes more fully and heaves herself over to the other side of the bed with a grunt. Not easy when you're shaped like a whale that just ate a platoon of giant squid.
She rolls to the side of the bed, lets her feet fall to the floor and pushes herself upright. Her mission becomes really urgent and she waddles to the bathroom as fast as she can. That's better. Now she'd like some breakfast. Faint sounds from below indicate that Spike is busy preparing it. She opens the blinds and looks out to the dark gray London morning. It won't be light for hours yet and it's cold with a nasty wet bite. She never would have thought she'd say it, but sometimes English weather is a blessing. For example when you're a pregnant Slayer who's always too hot. There's no one's there. Good.
Spike comes in bearing breakfast on a heavily laden tray.
Buffy plunks herself down in the pillows again and reaches greedily for her freshly pressed orange juice with one hand, croissant with the other.
"Thanks, sweetie. You take such good care of me."
Spike slides in next to her and fondles her belly proudly. "Tadpole looks hungry. Takes after her Dad, she does."
"We're not naming him Tadpole, just so you know, besotted father."
"Short for Thaddeus?"
"Ew, even if it was your dad. Chimera?"
"Please. Might as well go for Hippogriff or Manticore."
"As long as you haven't divulged your last name yet, William, we won't know if it's gonna be Wyvern X. Summers, or Unicorn Y. Summers, right?"
"Hey, you Googled! It's just not a name I want the world to know, Buffy. In the hands of Willow or Andrew it would lead to information about who I was, which is none of their business."
"I could know. It could be our secret?"
Spike kisses her forehead. "Just eat up, sweetheart, you need it."
"Um, Spike," she says through a full mouth, "when was that appointment again?"
"8:40, love, so you'd better hurry."
"Ungodly hour," she grumbles between a bite of egg and a slice of bacon.
"Only way I can be there, pumpkin," Spike says.
"Sorry, sweetie, I know." A feeling swells in her and pops open. "And don't call me pumpkin! It's bad enough being this bloated monster, you don't have to remind me."
Spike says nothing.
"Okay, sorry. What shall I wear? I have nothing to wear!"
Spike sips his blood in silence.
"Just so you know, this kid is going to be an only child, I don't like being pregnant."
"You don't say, love? And you so blooming and radiant!"
Is he being sarcastic? Well, yeah, of course, she gets the first part of what he said definitely is, but he said she looked like a goddess! A ripe glowing peach! Her lips wobble and Spike hands her a Kleenex without missing a sip. What really gets her is being this predictable, happy, hungry, cranky and teary in the space of five minutes, just like every other pregnant woman she's ever read about or saw portrayed in a cheesy movie. She'd figured she'd be unique, being the Slayer and all, that she'd have special hormones or something.
"Why didn't you ask Willow to get you twins if she was helping you with fertility charms anyway?"
"Gah," Buffy splutters. "Are you out of your mind?"
She looks down on her impressive bulge. "I'd have exploded already!"
God, she nearly choked to death when Spike mentioned Willow and enhanced fertility. If he knew what exactly Willow had done for her…Her mind zooms out to desolate shores and she pictures a lonely figure staring out over the darkling sea, waiting for her. For God's sake, he must have known she was never coming back. He won't be waiting. She'd better concentrate on getting enough food inside before they have to leave.
Later, when the midwife is asking Spike the questions she's answered a dozen times already, her attention wanders off again, as she keeps doing these days, and tries to imagine being the baby, all rolled up and wedged tightly within in her womb, hearing her heart beat like a giant drum hanging above her, slowly turning in hazy red-tinged light. What was it thinking? Lemme out, ma, lemme out? Or mmm, cozy, warm, stay here forever? Spike would have been of the last variety, she's sure. He has an infinite capacity to lounge in bed with her and never gets bored as long as he's touching her or looking at her.
"Father?"
"Dead."
"Deceased. At what age?"
"That would be, um, thirty three."
"Cause of death?"
"Dunno."
"Mother?"
"Dead."
"Deceased." The emphasis is a little more pronounced now. "At what age?"
"Fifty-four."
"Cause of death?"
"Um, consumption."
Buffy gives Spike's hand a quick squeeze.
"Siblings?"
"None."
"Are there any diseases in your family? Did your mother experience difficulties birthing you? Caesarian?"
"Er, dunno. Natural childbirth as far as I know. And, er, consumption?"
"Yeah," Buffy chimes in, "coz I've been thinking about that big head of his, you know. Will the baby have a bigger head than average too, and will it make the birth harder?"
The midwife smiles a professional, reassuring laugh. "Don't worry, dear. His mother managed just fine with him. Now about consumption, I assume you mean tuberculosis? That's not hereditary, but if you've been exposed to it, it might be wise to get tested."
Buffy looks at Spike to help him get away from this line of questioning and runs straight into the hot suspicion and awakening anger in his eyes. She swallows, willing down the hot tide of guilt that floods her throat. What did she say to make him angry? But there's no denying, even to herself, that she knows he's getting a clue, somehow.
They round off the anamnesis, and Buffy's stomach is measured, she's weighed, they take a blood sample for her iron, although the midwife has exclaimed three times over her Hb levels already. Urine sample she brought from home. Blood pressure. All through these procedures, she feels Spike's gaze resting on her like a yoke, bowing her shoulders, hunching in expectation of the outburst that is to come. He stands there, his arms folded and his teeth clenched, smoldering at her and keeping his anger tightly fisted, ready to break out when they are alone. He can't know. He can't be sure. He's just suspicious. She can still talk him out of it. And maybe he won't mind at all.
This is one of these moments where reasoning doesn't help at all and she has to suffer his silence all through the cab ride home. She loves London cabs and she rather likes London, but she can't help feeling that if they were in Florence this would all be less awful. The climate itself would calm him down; make him feel mild and warm and forgiving instead of cold, tight, and suspicious.
Buffy pays off the cab driver while Spike dashes inside under his giant umbrella. She walks slowly up the granite steps and pushes the door open. The stairs, taken slowly. She also takes her time about taking off her wool coat and scarf. She goes to the toilet. She wishes she could put this off, or roll back time. When she walks into the kitchen, Spike is sitting at the table with his head in his hands. Her big belly turns hard in a Braxton-Hicks contraction and she has to stand still and pant for a few minutes until the muscles relax. Stress or slaying will do that to her every time. She's stopped the slaying, reluctantly, but this is something she brought upon herself.
Slowly she lowers herself down in the high backed chair next to Spike. He looks up and again she's shocked to see his face. She hasn't seen him this angry in many years. Every tendon in his neck stands taut and he glowers at her from under his brows.
"Please explain, Buffy," he says curtly.
The civility hurts more than a slap in the face. There's still a chance he's mad at something else, isn't there, so she prevaricates.
"What do you mean, honey?"
"You're worried about the size of my noggin? You know what I think? You said you went to Willow that month to help you choose a donor, and enhance your fertility with spells. Well, we all know what Willow did to get Tara. I think you went to another dimension, where there was another Spike, who somehow got you pregnant. Well?"
Buffy can only stare at him and blink rapidly. Spike hates it when she cries to win an argument.
He slams his hand down on the kitchen table, and Buffy sees the sturdy oak crack. "Why did you have to do that? Couldn't you have asked me first? I would have let Willow do that mojo on me!"
He's almost right. Should she keep this last bit of truth to herself? Not anymore, that would only make things worse now. She might as well fess up.
"Willow tracked down a human Spike for me," she says, and hardly recognizes her own strangled voice.
Spike stares. "What? Human? What do you mean? My former self? Did you go back in time?"
Now it's Buffy's turn to gape. "Well, that's an idea. But no, there is a timeline where you were turned into a human being as a reward for being a Champion. Like Angel."
All the anger runs out of Spike. All that remains in his face is a bleakness that tears into Buffy with great big talons.
"I'd never make that choice. I didn't even seriously consider the bloody Shanshu. Ever."
He leans back in the chair and he presses his fingers in his eye sockets. "Buffy. Don't you remember how much I hated it that you slept with the unsouled Spike? You must have known I'd hate it if you were going to sleep, on purpose, with a human version of me. I'd rather you slept with Angel!"
"I didn't want brown eyes," Buffy wants to say but doesn't. "I though – I thought it would make you happy if the baby looked like you. I though it would make things easier, later on. I wanted you to be as much the real dad as possible. So you'd care."
"I care. I would have cared whatever the kid looked like, because it's yours. You know that."
"I know now. I'm sorry."
"No, you're not," Spike says and gets up. "You did this deliberately. You had to get your own way. You knew this was the last thing I wanted, don't bother denying it. The guilt's coming off you in waves."
He stands there for a few moments, looking around the kitchen, looking at her stomach. What's he going to do? He stalks out and she hears the front door slam. She tries to shoot upright and catch him but is too slow to even see him exit.
"Spike!" Buffy screams in the still winter morning.. "You can't leave me alone, I'm pregnant!"
She doesn't see him. Where did he go? It's daylight. She shuts the door and walks back to the kitchen. The baby kicks and she plays with it automatically, pushing back at the little foot or knee or whatever. Spike will be back. They love each other. There's never been anything they haven't gotten through together. Well, there was, but that was a long time ago. How bad can this be?
The coffee machine beeps. The smell of coffee makes her nauseous these days.
TBC