It had been a short, tempestuous, hard fought battle, but it was drawing to a close. It wouldn't be long now.

The coolly dispassionate side of his brain could not help but be impressed. It truly was amazing how, even racked with suffering and sweating blood, a senshi could still keep her fight about her. As a warrior, he could respect that.

Her face was alternately grey-white with pain and flushed beet red as the tears slipped from pain-filled violet eyes and trickled down her cheeks to mat her raven mane. She was in agony.

"How could you?" she demanded furiously, her world narrowed to his face and his alone and the pain that swelled and ebbed like a bloody tide. She made a wild swing at him, shrieking, her voice hoarse and raspy from earlier cries, "This is all your fault, Jadeite!"

He expected she'd be screaming accusations at him until she died. A certain grim amusement at that fact had Jadeite's mouth twisting into a cynical parody of a smile as he blandly agreed with her. "Of course it is..."

That pissed her off even more and she swung again. "Damn you to the fiery Pit!"

That was Mars, alright. She never was one to go down alone if she could take someone else with her. He let out a bark of laughter as he dodged her blow, then reached for her. The pain knifed through her body and she let out a howl that made his ears ring.

"Kami how I hate you! Don't you touch me!" she panted furiously, writhing, but to no avail. His grip was as iron, not faltering, even when her nails bit deeply into his skin, gouging bloody crescent moons in the flesh. "They're coming for me!"

"They won't make it in time." He pulled out his dagger, holding it up to the light. The finely honed, razor edge of the blade gleamed wickedly, though not as wickedly as his smile, which was that of a fallen angel. "This has been amusing, but I believe it's time to finish this."

"Jadeite!"

She cried out his name in a wrenching scream as the knife lowered to end it all. And then, with one quick, final slice it was done.

When her appalled rescuers, Sailors Jupiter and Venus, arrived and forced open the doors, it was, they found, too late. She lay unnaturally quiet and still, her eyes closed, lashes like fans of raven feathers against her pale cheeks.

Beside her knelt the bloodied and battered, but triumphant king, wrapping something in his cape. His battle prize.

He turned slowly to face them and, as one they lunged forward and gasped.

"Boy or girl?"

A grin so wide it nearly sprained the Shitennou's cheeks spread across his face. He held out the cape-wrapped bundle so that they could see the little, red, wrinkled face nestled warm and snug within. A wild tuft of moist hair, the same ink dark shade as its mother's, was plastered against the babe's forehead, but the child's eyes burned with brilliant aquamarine fire.

"Girl. Ten perfect fingers. Ten perfect toes. And mother and baby are both doing fine."

From her spot on the floor, Rei groaned, rubbing her belly as her lashes finally fluttered open. The bruised-looking shadows beneath her eyes were almost as purple as her irises. She'd clearly been through a trauma and was exhausted. "Speak for yourself, Jadeite. Kami, but that hurt. No wonder it's called labor."

Venus and Jupiter let out cries of delight, dropped to their knees, and hugged one another, Jadeite, Rei, and the new heiress apparent to the Martian throne, cooing over the last, "She's so beautiful!"

"She's like her mother." Jadeite gave his spouse a tender look, brushing back her tangled, perspiration soaked, obsidian locks with one hand.

"She's going to be an only child," Rei swiped away his touch with an irritable snort, "because you're never touching me again, you randy goat!"

He burst out laughing at that and his wife's face went red as she heard the knowing titters around them. Proudly he announced, "I cut the cord."

"It looks like you did fine, papa," Jupiter announced, patting the man on the back. "I guess it's a good thing you read all those books on delivery and childbirth."

The pony-tailed brunette rose, grinning from ear to ear. "I'll spread the news. Serenity-sama's got to be on tenterhooks waiting for word."

"Take them both to the infirmary so that Lady Mercury can examine them. She's got the beds ready and waiting," Venus quickly ordered one of the gaggle of medical techs, who had been standing by. The white-clad man gave a brisk nod and began readying his stretcher for mother and child.

"Did you hear Jupiter call me papa?" Jadeite grinned goofily down at the infant in his arms, struck by the wonder of being a new father, then leaned over to buss his wife on the lips. "You did good, Firebird. We did good."

Rei smiled weakly, still feeling as if she'd been run over by a motor transport. "Maybe…but next time I give birth, I swear it's going to be with Ami attending and a whole glorious pharmacy of pain-relieving drugs at my disposal. Not stuck in some blasted palace elevator with you as the midwife from hell!"

"So you admit there's going to be a next time?" He gave her a cocky smirk, waggling his dark golden eyebrows in a comical fashion. There was also a decided swagger to his stride as he stepped back to allow the EMTs access to her. "I guess that means you've changed your mind and decided I will be allowed to touch you again."

As she was loaded onto the stretcher, Rei's only response was a single expressive but very un-Mars like hand gesture.

Her husband could only laugh at her rudeness. "Give yourself six weeks and a medical sign off from Ami, Red, and it's a date!"