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007. Hold

Rinoa blinked at Squall from where she sat, comfortably nestled into the armchair, smiling widely in the fluffy blanket wrapped around her.

Squall, arms folded and eyebrow raised on the other side of the room, sitting on the arm of their sofa, sighed. "I don't think you know how genetics work."

"Oh. That's nice." Rinoa declared derisively. "I do."

"And you think our baby might have green eyes - how?"

Rinoa rolled her eyes and huffed. "Because of Laguna!"

"Ah yes," he declared, voice dripping with mocking, "one recessive gene amongst a selection of four grandparents."

"Well, it could happen! It's more dominant than both blue and grey are!"

Squall nodded. On that probability, at least, she was correct, even if he knew it to be more complicated in actuality. It was easier to just agree. "Okay, fine, I concede."

"Good."

"But-"

"Well, that didn't last long."

"-I'm just saying, that since hair colour won't be much of a contest,"

"True"

"Then eye colour is the most surprising thing our son-"

"-daughter"

"-or daughter, has to show us."

Rinoa sighed, readjusting. She still hadn't got used to all the added weight and volume, even as she entered the last part of her eighth month. Even after already having one son. "I know."

A silence settled over their sitting room, up in the highest vestiges of Esthar Garden. They had a nice suite of apartments here - enough for the two of them, and their son, and the possibility of a third. Not quite yet though, Rinoa thought, wincing as her bladder was kicked. Again.

"I wonder if they'll look like Rio."

Squall smirked. "I hope so. He's handsome."

"Yeah, he is." Rinoa smiled. "You're welcome for those genes."

Squall scowled, falling to sit on the sofa itself, not the arm. "I'm pretty sure that Laguna claimed that he looked exactly like him as a baby."

"How would he even know?!"

"He's not that old, Rinoa. Photographs exist."

"Yes, I know." She sighed. And then she smiled. "I hope it's a girl."

Squall nodded. "Me too."

"A little girl with green eyes and brown hair." She cackled as Squall put a leather-gloved hand over his face and groaned.

In the end, neither of them were right. They had a daughter with black hair and crystalline blue eyes. And the thing they were more relieved for than anything: she was healthy. And as Squall held her for the first time, he didn't even care about their stupid argument over how she'd look, or what she'd be like: she was theirs, and they'd love her unconditionally, until the day they died.

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