A/N: Be forewarned, my dears! This chapter is sickeningly, hideously, evilly short. It's only two and a half pages on Word. I don't want this to end so fast! So sue me! lol no, not really...oh hell, I'm not good at author's notes! ::grins sheepishly:: just R&R and I'll be the happiest camper to ever have attempted to write fanfiction! Thanx a million and three, and I luv you all for sticking with me so long! And like I said at the end of the last chapter, the worst is still yet to come! ::laughs maniacally::

Chapter 40

I waited.

It felt like decades had passed in the time space of mere hours. What else could I do but wait? There was no way I'd be able to get myself out of here in time to keep them away from Fiyero. I'd Seen enough in that bubble of green glass to know that much. I wondered and worried and despaired over whether or not he'd live once they reopened the scar on his arm. Yet again I found I was telling myself that trying to use magic to do something about it was out of the question; with my menial skill I'd be more liable to hurt him rather than help. If he loses more blood now than he did when the scar was created there'd be no possible way for him to remain alive.

If he died, I'd have nothing to live for. Not even our children. There would be no conceivable way I'd be able to raise even one child, let alone twins, by myself. I hadn't a motherly bone in my body. If I couldn't forge my way through parenthood with Fiyero's help, there would no way I was going to give myself a chance to screw things a second time around. I would kill myself. I couldn't lose him again. His death would be my own, and that outweighed all my other concerns, I was sure of it.

::No, stop! Don't think...you can't let yourself think anymore...you'll only make yourself worse...he won't die, and neither will you! You'll get through this together, you'll have your children...oh who the hell am I kidding...:: I dropped my head into my hands, pressing my fingers to my closed eyes. I couldn't take much more of this...

I tried to sleep, get my mind away from everything, and succeeded for a short while, dozing fitfully for clipped stretches of time. I couldn't remember dreaming, but woke up terrified each time, startled out of sleep by some small noise or another. Each short length became more abbreviated as the noise outside the door increased with the onslaught of day. Soon I gave up and set myself to listening for any news that might be of value to me. Most was casual banter between the large number of Gale Forcers set to guard me traipsing about near my little cubicle of space; much of their conversations were aimed at ridiculing me. I paid it no heed; my one concern was news of Fiyero. What of my lover? I would practically leap at the chance to hear any tiniest bit of information...

After a long while of listening and hearing nothing of any value, I ended up dropping off into hazy half-thought, only maintaining barely a vague awareness of my surroundings; my body seemed to become numb except for the furious movement of the twins. It hurt terribly. Surprisingly, I hadn't noticed it for a while; the physical pain had been negated by my fear and the war zone my mind had become from my continuously tearing it apart.

::What did I tell you?:: my mind screamed at me, ::No thinking! Just accept it! There isn't going to be much you can do even if you hear something about Fiyero. You're all dead. If you let yourself dwell on these things you'll only make it harder for yourself!::

Eventually sleep came full-on and unavoidable, lending me a much-needed, if not welcome, respite from life and all it's miseries. My mind was wonderfully blank for a while -

:: - Until I was bombarded with the images from my visions; blood and pain, hopelessness and despair. The writhing of the twins was making me sick to my stomach as well as the nausea accompanying the scenes playing themselves out in vivid color in the black behind my eyelids. The sights and sensations continued for ever, a never-ending whirlwind of red and black and heat and hurt and brightness...

When abruptly every inch of my body felt as if plunged into ice, freezing and burning from the water melting against my skin. A violent shudder ran through me, and instantaneously the moisture evaporated along with all other sense of feeling. Everything was numb but my thoughts, which were what I'd wished the numbness had claimed. Even the twisting of the babies within me had been temporarily calmed. The only things I could physically feel were cold fingers stroking my forehead, but leaving trails of searing heat in their wake. For a while I could see nothing, feel nothing but those chilly fingers stroking across my skin. I wanted to shiver from cold, but couldn't. Instead, I lurched backward, closer to her, instead of convulsing away from the touch like I'd meant to.

"There, dearie, shhh. Still yourself."

It was that cracked old voice again. Her. I tried to reply, but, like every other action I'd tried to execute, I was unable to. And sight still eluded me, like the ability to do anything about the dream - or vision - or whatever it was. I slumped involuntarily backward into Yackle's decrepit old arms, repulsed by the feeling of her touch against my face, yet I was unable to twist myself away. I had no control over my muscles or any movement whatsoever, helpless and powerless at the mercy of a senile old bat I was neither able to trust nor abhor. After a bit more futile struggling I gave up the fight to regain movement, relinquishing myself for the moment. I was too scared about far more important things to be overly concerned about Yackle; besides, she was hardly strong enough to cause me any physical damage. Mentally...I was already so far gone in that respect that anything she could do would hardly change things there.

"That's right, it's no use fighting Old Yackle now. Yackle could be your last chance at life past tomorrow morning." I heard her say, still unable to see anything; it was still completely black behind my eyes. However, nausea and achiness began to seep back into me the longer her fingers traced themselves over my forehead. Even if I could've then controlled my muscles, I wouldn't have been able to for fatigue and throbbing in my limbs. I wished she would leave me alone. If there was anyone whose arm I desperately wanted to be encircling my back it was Fiyero's; my heart was giving its life up to fuel my worry, and I was beginning to doubt that I'd ever see him again.

Yackle started clicking her tongue against her teeth and tsk-ing at me before speaking again.

"Well, the poor dolly is sick, the poor dolly is tired."

She took her hand from my forehead and caressed my swollen stomach. I sensed her confirm that there was no damage to the twins - yet, and then there was her approval at how I'd been dealing so far with pregnancy. Then her hand pressed itself to my heart, and she sighed, losing some of that approval.

"Though intact, the poor dolly is in pain."

She brought her hand back to my forehead and her fingers probed over my temples, applying light pressure to them.

"The poor dolly is faint, the poor dolly is faltering." She paused, and I could feel her eyes searching my face, boring through my closed eyelids, rifling through my very thoughts...

"The poor poppet is failure itself."

::She's right...oh, sweet Oz, she's right...::

No, no she wasn't! Yes, I'd felt like a failure for most all of my life, yes, I'd labeled myself as one and believed it, but it was an entirely different matter hearing this woman, who knew either nothing or everything about me, say it to my face. There would be no more failure. I couldn't afford to let it happen again. Fiyero would live. I would live. We would have our children and not have to worry about our being hunted down by the Force, or having to fear for our lives and our twins' lives. No one else I loved would die. I wouldn't be a curse on their lives any longer.

I tensed up, wrenched away as hard as I could, clenching a hand tightly around the fringed scarf at my waist. My eyes were still filled with black and unable to see, but couldn't have cared less. I heard Yackle start to laugh loud and uncontrollably, fading slowly until I could hear it no longer, and sleep claimed a stronghold over my consciousness, beating it into submission until I'd lost all sense of wakefulness.::

I'd slept deeply, yet I woke with the mindset of having not closed my eyes at all. Even still, the fatigue that had been collecting in my limbs and clouding my head with worry for the past few days had all dissipated.

::I'll never feel rested again.:: I thought grimly, and that was the last thing I'd had the time to say to myself before a key turned in the steel door, the sound echoing menacingly off the stone walls.