Darkness Falling

bohemianbabe

archiving welcome with my permission.

note: hopefully you are all enjoying this break from my normal stlye. as mxangel i wrote consistently j/l stories, but now i am trying to broden my scope. feedback is welcome in the form of praise or flames. the old mxangel stories will be reposted eventually, or at least most of them. i lost a few when i lost my old account. here is the next instalment to the story

Chapter 5.

The Next Day.

Shalimar walked into the kitchen to help Lexa prepare breakfast only to be greeted with an icy stare from the other woman. She knew that Lexa could hold a grudge, but had hoped that maybe the brunette's harsh words the day before had only been from the heat of the moment. Now, being bored through by the all-all-too-cool, cool blue eyes she knew that she had been wrong.

"I really am sorry about yesterday." She said as she walked over to the counter and started to measure up the coffee.

"You are sorry about yesterday! I think that's about the most irritating thing you've ever said to me since I got here!" Lexa shook her head. "For a group that has preached to me about trust you sure don't seem to practice it yourselves."

"I just was trying to find out if continuing the treatments would kill you, or possibly the baby if there was one. I did not go in there and tell him that you thought there was a possibility. That is something that you should tell him, not someone else; if it ever happened."

"So how exactly did it come to him searching me out and bombarding me with questions about how I felt about things? And he did ask me about everything, from kids to marriage."

"He came up with it on his own. All I did was answer him when he asked if you were scared because of the night before. I didn't even spell out what you were scared about. He's smart and he loves you."

"I told him and I'm telling you, that 'love' word is not something I ever want to hear. I've lived for as long as I have by breaking off all personal feelings, and the few I allowed myself to start feeling here have been the cause of a lot of pain lately. Maybe it's not the happiest way to live, but it is a lot easier."

"You can have the kitchen to yourself." Shalimar turned and walked out of the room. She was already stressed from the knowledge that maybe she had stepped over a few lines when she had talked to Jesse before, and arguing with Lexa was not going to do anything to help alleviate that stress.

Walking down the hall she inwardly cringed when she saw Jesse headed toward her. She knew that she had nowhere to hide, and therefore no way to get out of talking to him. It was a certainty that the man would want to talk to her, even if she did want to avoid that particular ritual for a while longer.

"Shal, have you got a few minutes?" Jesse asked when he reached her.

"Sure." She gave him her best fake smile and followed him over to the sofa. "What's on your mind?"

"I get the feeling you already half know so I'll just go straight to the point. I all but proposed to her last night and then she made it perfectly clear that she doesn't want a relationship."

"I don't think it was so much you as it was her angry with me. She thinks I went straight to you and told you everything she and I had talked about earlier."

"So that's why you were so selective in how you said things yesterday. You were trying to tell me with out telling me."

"I just wanted to make sure that your antidotes wouldn't kill her or the baby if there was one."

"She wouldn't have cared if the pregnancy had been terminated, only if her life had been put in danger and she might have been ok with that. She misses her brother."

"I know she misses him, but I also know you're wrong about something. Since I already told you most of it I may as well seal my fate. If she is pregnant she plans on keeping the baby. She said that she wouldn't have a baby with any other man, but with you it is different. Even though she won't say it, I think she really does love you."

"Lets not go there for now, at least not about me and Lexa. You and Bren have any plans for marriage or kids?"

"We've talked about it. He and I would both love to have kids, one day; and we would like to have those kids together. I guess time will tell how that all works out."

"He'll be good for you. Adam and I always saw it. We used to talk about it when I was helping him with the lab work. You know, looking back I wonder if he really needed the extra set of hands or if he knew that I'd eventually have to be the one in there."

"Maybe it was a little of both. I wish he was here so we could all stop living with a death sentence over our heads. I think that once Lexa can stop worrying about her life being on the line she can start learning to be in a relationship. Not to mention the fact that you could use the sleep and rest. You may not have to worry about your powers killing you, but you are going to kill yourself from exhaustion if you aren't careful."

"There will be plenty of time for me to rest after you three are stabilized. For now I get to enjoy what was always Adam's job, worrying about everyone."

"Just don't kill yourself before you save the rest of us."

"I won't." Jesse gave her a gentle smile and then stood up to leave. "I'll try to calm her down for you."

"Don't worry about it."

"Guys I've got something!" Brennan called as he ran into the room. "There was a message sent to our computer last night. It's from Adam."

"Let's go see what is in the message." Jesse said as he headed to the computers. He sat down and quickly pulled up the video message.

"Jesse, Brennan, Shalimar, and hopefully Lexa, I'm sending this message to you because there has been a slight break in the situation. I know that it has been a long time since the day that I was lead off by the Creator and the others with the Dominion, and I am hoping that you are all well. According to the original dates Lexa should have died a month ago, but I'm hoping that my capable student has found a way to at least prolong her life in his search for a cure. If he hasn't then I address you, Brennan and Shalimar, more than I address him.

"If Lexa is gone the only job I have for Jesse to do is decoding this message for the coordinates. I am giving you strict orders to let him grieve for her as long as he needs to. I know that when he lost Emma he never got the chance to grieve for her, and I do not want that building up to bring him to a breaking point. If this does not work he may be the only chance that new mutants have.

"Once you have the coordinates wait for my next message. It will tell you when to meet me, and it will be sent to you in two days. I know that this time frame will make preparations and Jesse's decoding that much more difficult but it is the only chance we may have at this working.

"The good news is that after this meeting takes place there will no longer be such a death sentence for new mutants. I am hoping that I have reached you before it is too late, but I am even more hoping that this wasn't necessary at all. I have all faith in the belief that Jesse could find the cure on his own; that is why I have been careful not to contact you until I was sure that our meeting would not be intercepted.

"I leave you all for now, and will hope to see you at the assigned place and time." The recording ended, leaving the three in silence.

"So I guess Jesse did his work pretty well since I'm still alive." Lexa said from the doorway. Seeing the tears that were starting to form in Jesse's eyes she walked over to him and gently pressed her lips to his. "I need to talk to him alone."

Shalimar and Brennan nodded and walked out of the room, leaving the two to themselves.

"I know that you and Shalimar talked again today." Lexa whispered as she slid onto his lap and put one arm around his back. "I just couldn't tell you the truth yet. Not with the knowledge that I was still living on borrowed time."

"So you thought it would be easier on me if you lied to me?" his tone was almost bitter, but more full of hurt.

Lexa reached up and gently brushed away the tears that had started to roll down his cheeks. "I just couldn't let myself love you until I knew that I wasn't going to die so quickly."

"You know that it would have hurt me more to have watched you dying and not know how you felt about me."

"I do." Lexa closed her eyes and willed back her own tears. "After this is over we can start trying to work at this. I love you, and I do agree that you deserve to have everything you want, even if that is having both me and kids of your own. It may be a while before I'm ready to officially start a family with you, but if we are pregnant now I will not do anything to kill our child."

"And if we aren't?"

"Then you'll just have to wait a little while before I'm ready to try for a baby. I've wanted kids with you ever since we started this undefined relationship with you. The majority of my hesitancy was the fact that I knew there was a strong chance of me dying during the pregnancy, but if Adam can stabilize us that changes a lot."

Jesse took a deep breath and pulled her close to him. "If you are or are not pregnant we are still going to take this slowly. I don't want to rush into anything, not until we have had sometime to develop as a couple. I love you too much to push you into anything."

"I love you too." Lexa whispered and then kissed him again, but more passionately this time.