Chapter 19

He didn't want to be here. He wanted to go home and comfort Buffy. When his mind cleared again, he realized Buffy was probably in one of the med-lab rooms as well. That realization really made him want to go to her. When he tried to move, though, a hand was on his forehead and someone was saying something calming to him.

He lay back down and let his mind clear a little. When he could see straight again, he looked around the room he was in. Will was sitting in a chair next to his bedside.

"Hey Peaches. Good to see you."

"Buffy?" He tried to get up again, and Will stood menacingly. Angel weighed his chances of taking him in a fight and leaned back again.

"Buffy's fine. While you were getting pumped full of antibiotics she was having an ultrasound. Gotta' tell you, Angel, that's one heck of a kid." Sitting back down, he crossed his arms and took stock of the bandages covering most of Angel's upper torso.

The doctors had said that the hell god's hands burned and injected a poison at the same time. If Angel had been anything other than a hybrid or perhaps a slayer, he would have been dead soon after Narsesim had touched him. The doctors said he would recover; his body had already produced antibodies to the poison.

Fear quickly played across his features, "What do you mean? What's wrong with my baby?"

"The baby healed. We think he was stabbed when Buffy was, but the knife was short. It hit mostly amniotic fluid. The baby healed, along with the sack-thing it's in, which I don't really understand. And, he helped Buffy heal too. She doesn't even have a mark."

Angel had leapt from the bed before Will could grab him and was out the door. His pants were still on, which was good because he hadn't really thought to check. When he got down the hall, he was greeted by Buffy sitting on the edge of a bed surrounded by the majority of their friends and adopted family.

She jumped to hug him, but her movements were hampered by the beach ball she carried on her stomach. She paused as she stepped towards him. He didn't look good. He was bandaged around his chest and shoulders. There were butterfly bandages on the cut above his eye and multiple cuts and bruises over the skin she could see.

All of her thoughts about the state of his health were pushed aside when he grabbed her arms and kissed her fiercely. She stopped herself from trying to wrap her arms around him and just kissed back. When he pulled away, she could see the relief washing over his features. Before he could speak, she held up a hand.

"Will knows the sex of the baby and I'm sure he told you. I still don't want to know."

Will had used the word 'he,' Angel finally realized. The knowledge that he was having a son sunk through into this brain, and he had to process that for a moment before he could speak again. "I won't. You're okay?"

"I'm okay. Baby's okay. You're…almost okay." She smiled and rubbed his arm, seeing the worry still apparent on his face.

Everyone else was quiet. Willow had been speechless when they had been told Buffy's baby had helped her heal. That was out of this world, she thought. Angel and Buffy had created a super-person that was saving lives before he had even been born.

The doctors had expressed their desire to do a battery of tests on the slayer and her unborn baby, but Buffy had flatly refused. She wasn't sure she wanted to know that anything could be strange about the baby she was carrying. Her child was a miracle, she thought. This baby was the miracle that had kept her alive. She didn't want to dissect how that had happened.

If her baby had some sort of special powers neither she nor Angel possessed, everyone would have to wait to find out. She was not going to be a vessel for some science project. The link she felt between her and the person inside her seemed to nudge at the edge of her consciousness. There was something different about her baby; she knew that. For the time being, though, she decided that would be between her and the child she carried.

Fred, Wesley and Allie were not present. They had gone home with the explicit directions to have Angel call them when he woke up. They wanted to talk about Connor, they said. Gunn had agreed with that idea one hundred percent.

Angel didn't know if he was up to talking about Connor. He hadn't slept in over thirty six hours and he felt like someone had dipped him in an active lava pit. He also accepted that he might not have a choice but to be confronted in a few hours.

He still had a disgusting green substance in his hair, he had never had a chance to shower, but now it was worsened with the blood of those demon followers, he was sure. His hands were still covered in dried blood, though it looked like the nurses had tried to clean him up.

He wanted to go home, peal his bandages off and get in the shower. And he wanted to stay in the shower for a few hours. He hadn't felt this grimy since the eighties. Expressing his willingness to talk about Connor after he had a chance to clean up, the group broke up. After a few blatant threats, the doctors moved out of his way and they were able to leave. There was no way he was going to stay there, he told himself.

Slipping a shirt on was going to be difficult, so he opted for a button down Will had retrieved from his closet in his office. The plan was made for everyone to go to their respective homes and get cleaned up and to meet in the morning, after they had slept and cleared their heads. Will had called Wesley to inform him of the plan.

Angel couldn't drive because he couldn't lift his arms enough to do so. Buffy couldn't move the seat far enough back to fit her belly in front of the steering wheel comfortably. Will agreed to drive them home. He politely refused the offer to clean up and use a guest room. He wanted to go home and crawl into his own bed.

Buffy and Angel dragged themselves upstairs. She helped him remove the bandages and winced at the charred flesh. It wasn't a burn in the true sense of the word; it was a blackening of the top few layers of skin. The doctors had called it a very dark colored second degree burn. It was odd, but the magic behind it wasn't really understood, so she accepted it for what it was.

He stayed in the shower a long time. There were bits of flesh and innards stuck under his nails, and he had to shampoo his hair three times to get all of the dried body fluids from his head. He stayed under the spray a few more minutes, until he thought he would fall asleep standing up, and then dragged himself out of the bathroom.

Buffy wasted no time getting in the shower. She had rinsed her belly before the ultrasound, but there was still dried blood in places. She wanted to forget that had ever happened. She wanted to give birth to her baby, to hold and sing to her child. She knew before she could fully move on, though, she had to understand Angel's first child.

Before anyone else arrived in the morning, they were going to have a long talk.