I couldn't leave it at one chapter. There might be more. Not certain.
Violent, and fluffy. No, I don't like John. You've been warned.
She should have expected their wedding day would not be dull.
She had expected his proposal, after all, though not a mere week after he'd seduced her so very thoroughly. She had even been certain yet of her pregnancy, though her original motivation for coming to him seemed pale in comparison to the safety and comfort she felt as she slept by his side and the ecstasy he brought her whenever, and wherever, he wanted. She'd never be able to work at the desk in her office again, or in the library, or find a snack in the kitchen, without memories of his hands stroking her, his lips loving her, his cock driving her to moan his name in a need so blatant she could not quite believe it.
In her long life, she'd tried most of the vices known to man, from drugs to sex to danger, and she'd been addicted to nothing but the thrill of discovery. Now, she could add Nikola Tesla to that short but exquisite list.
When he'd proposed, she had been boneless with sated pleasure, lounging on a pile of towels at the side of the pool, Nikola holding her in his arms as they lay looking at the waterfall and the stars visible through the skylight.
"There's a lovely tongue twister I've had the pleasure of practicing lately. I find that I quite enjoy the sounds of it. Marry me, Miss Magnus?" Nikola held up a lovely ring of braided silver, so unique that she knew he must have made it himself. He hated jewelry, had quite the phobia of it. "Too many hands had touched it." If he gave her a ring, she was sure he must have created it himself.
"Why yes, Mr. Tesla. I would love to. But I'm not taking your name."
He slid the ring on her finger and laughed into her hair. "I wouldn't dream of asking, my love. Such a silly English custom."
And so, four months later, she was dressing for her wedding and fighting a case of morning sickness, nibbling on toast and patting the small bump where the twins rested safe and sound. Yes, they had managed to create twins that night, for all the joke it had seemed. A boy and a girl, from the amniocentesis, both with mostly human genetics. As to the differences – she would discover what exactly they meant when they grew, just as she had with Ashley.
She looked at the photograph on her dressing table, at the smiling blue eyes of her daughter. Ashley would have been quite a remarkable big sister, and Helen would never forget her. But this time, through this pregnancy, she was not alone and scared. Nikola hovered over her protectively, making sure she ate well and got enough sleep, despite the time spent with his incessant, glorious worship of her body. He'd taken over any dangerous missions to recover abnormals, and though he hated paperwork and bureaucracy with unmitigated passion, he'd taken over quite a few of her duties with a smooth competence and deft hand that had made her break her office chair as she'd ridden him to screaming climax.
Blushing at the memory, she rose from her stool to don the blue silk dress she'd chosen to wear. It was sliding over her head the moment the crackle of static and the distinct pop of the hall light alerted her to yet another problem with the electrical system.
Oh damn, must the man fiddle with experiments even on his wedding day.
She slipped her feet in her shoes and opened the door, determined to find out what the problem was, but Kate met her in the hall with a steely eyed glint. "Oh no you don't, boss. We've got enough rotten luck floating about this place. You don't get to be seen by Magneto until you walk down the aisle. I'll go." Kate looked surprisingly feminine in her lavender sari, and Helen wondered who that would discombobulate more, Henry or Will. Helen had her bets on Will, but romance was never her strong suit. Although her record was certainly getting better by the minute.
"At least give me back my radio. This isolation is ridiculous!"
Kate sighed, and handed over the EM sealed radio that Nikola had built for each of them once his surges had begun. After Henry swearing and threatening murder, and Helen moaning one late night over the expense of replacing all the electronics and security systems for the third time, Nikola had finally relented in his resentment of Michael Faraday's technique and had built a system of shielded electronics that would withstand a nuclear bomb.
"Hey folks, looks like this was a bad one. The EM shield is down again. I'm working on it but…"
"Bloody hell! Henry, not today, please. Hurry! I don't want to have to deal with any unexpected visitations right now."
Her hand again drifted to her abdomen. She did not need a visit from John today. He did not know about her pregnancy or her relationship with Nikola, and he certainly did not need to know that she was getting married. It might push him over the fine edge that kept him from killing her, and she was certain that a now-vulnerable Nikola would be eviscerated again, this time for good.
"Five minutes, tops."
Nikola broke in, his voice ragged. "Better make it three, Tiny Tim, or I'll sabotage your precious PlayStation until all it will run are old episodes of Lassie."
"Niko? Are you all right?" Helen wanted to go to him, to check on his heart rate and blood pressure and see with her own eyes that this latest electrical surge hadn't harmed him. It was a quick step from magnetic fields to electrical fields again, and the man wouldn't leave well enough alone, constantly trying to explore the possibilities of his abilities.
"I'm fine my dear. Just frazzled nerves. I believe every groom is allowed some, yes?"
She giggled softly, "As long as you don't have cold feet."
"My feet are toasty, it's your feet that are like ice in bed. I swear you keep me around just to use as a heating pad."
"Oh, I'm certain you have more uses, Mr. Tesla. But that is rather high on my list."
"Look guys, this is all very cute and everything, but we've got guests coming in an hour and the Big Guy will be ticked if all his food is cold for the reception. So, get back in there at get dressed and let's get this show on the road!"
"Should I ask what you are wearing, my love?"
"Show up for our date, and you'll find out."
"I shiver with anticipation."
Just for that, she was wearing those garters she'd debated about. And she'd make sure he knew about them during the reception. The better to torture him with.
"Ok, shield's back up. We're safe from teleporting goons for the moment."
"Ok, wolf-boy. You've earned your keep for the moment. Now, come here and let me help you with your tie. I'm sure you've bungled it."
Helen handed the radio back to a laughing Kate and returned to her suite. She had to do something with her hair after all.
When the door closed, she paused for a moment, a subtle sensation tearing her away from any thought of her impending nuptials. Like fluttering bubbles in her stomach, the feeling made her grin broadly. The first kick! Was it Daniel or Sophia, or the both of them together? She was sure that by the time nine months was up, she'd be able to tell the two of them apart. She couldn't wait to tell Nikola, and she couldn't bloody see him until she got married. Bah.
Time to do her hair.
The entrance hall had been decorated, and a wide array of friends, humans and abnormals alike, had made the trip to Old City to witness Helen Magnus marry Nikola Tesla. More than Helen could have guessed. She didn't know how he'd known, but when she'd arrived in the hallway set up for her grand entrance, orange-flower bouquet in hand, Gregory Magnus had been waiting for her. She hugged her father and cried, and told him that he was going to once again be a grandfather.
"I always did like you with Nikola." He'd told her gruffly, trying to hold back tears.
She chuckled, "That's exactly what he told me you always thought."
"Smart man, that Serbian bloke."
"I'd best go marry him then."
Pachelbel's Canon in D played out and Helen drew in a deep breath for courage. She'd never actually gotten this far, and some of the butterflies in her stomach were not due to the kicking of her children.
The doors opened, and with her father holding her arm, a room full of people and creatures of every description was revealed, decorated in wedding finery. And at the opposite end of the room, Nikola stood in a perfect Armani tuxedo, his eyes glowing and his lips parted in something approaching shock.
"Breathe, Niko. I know I'm trying to."
As though receiving her message, his dumbstruck look changed to a broad smile and she took her first steps down the white runner toward her would-be husband.
Then, of course, all hell broke loose.
Nikola began to shake slightly, his hair standing on end and blue arcs of electricity simmering over his skin. Helen quickened her step, wanting to get closer to him, but her father held her back. The crowd began to murmur and then Nikola fell to the ground, contorting in a seizure as lightning began to crack through the room. The bulbs in the chandelier began to pop and the air fairly crackled, and the screams began to rise. Helen could see nothing but Nikola writhing in pain, and she wrenched her arm from Gregory's to run to Nikola. But before she could get to him, a familiar figure popped into existence in a red haze, all six foot five of him radiating menace.
"Well well, what do we have here. A wedding. And I wasn't even invited." John's eyes flickered over Nikola, who'd stopped writhing on the floor but was still unconscious.
"Bugger is stronger than he looks. It took the power grid of the entire city to overload the field he'd set up outside to stop me." He stepped toward him, his hands clenched, but Helen would not let anything happen to Nikola.
"What are you doing here, John." She let every ounce of coldness she felt into her voice. It may be some energy creature within him, but he'd let himself be corrupted by the power inside of him. He was not and would never be the man she'd thought she'd once loved. And her feelings for him were nothing to what she now felt for Nikola.
John Druitt turned toward her, his eyes inhumanly cold. "You are mine, Helen. I came to submit the obligatory objection at the proper point in the ceremony. Apparently I'm a bit premature."
"I'm not yours, John. Not for a very long time. I'm not certain I ever was, and I will never, ever be again. Leave now, or I will be forced to take drastic action." In truth, she'd never thought she could kill John Druitt, but the fact that he'd harmed Nikola, suddenly the world would seem a much better place if he was finally dead.
"You can't kill me, Helen. You still…"
A growl sounded out behind John. "She may not be able to, but I assure you, I can."
Nikola's voice was deeper, his height taller, his clothes in tatters around his enlarged and somewhat hairy frame. Helen gasped at the sight of his green-black eyes and elongated fangs.
"Nikola, what!"
"Not now dear. Let me take out the trash, and then we can get married."
"Over my dead body!" John shouted.
"That's the idea, Ripper. That's the bloody idea."
The two collided with a roar, and chairs were pushed back as guests scrambled to get away from the fight. Gregory dragged Helen back, and Kate jumped in front of her, her gun drawn and pointed straight at John and whatever Nikola had become. Helen had no idea where the girl had secreted a gun in her sari, but was still glad Kate had some protection. As for herself, she wanted to tear out and shove herself between the two miscreants, but she had more than her own life and health to consider. Once again, her hand drifted over her stomach.
"He's a HAP!" Henry cried, popping up at Kate's side holding a stunner. "How the hell did he become a HAP?"
Helen looked at Nikola not with the eyes of a lover, but with the eyes of an expert on abnormals. He wasn't a HAP, at least not fully a HAP like Henry, but he was certainly exhibiting traits remarkable like those of a werewolf. He still retained his speech, and his face was much more like his vampiric visage than the distinctive snout of a lycan, but the heavy musculature, the hair, the increased height….
John flew through the air, landing on top of a table full of a punch bowl and crystal cups. Apparently, Nikola had also developed considerable strength.
"What the hell are you now, you Serbian cur! No pure sanguinus vampirus now, are you?"
"I don't care about that rubbish. I can protect my wife and children, you insane barbarian. That's more than you ever could do!"
John's eyes flickered over to Helen and she narrowed her eyes at him, nodding her head and smiling smugly. John's nose flared wide, and the last traces of sanity left him. He barreled toward her, and Nikola launched at him, tearing at him with razor sharp claws.
"Move it, Tesla, let me get a shot in!" Kate screamed. Henry was already shifting, his clothes in shreds on the ground as he circled the fight, backing up the alpha with murder in his eyes for the intruder. Other abnormals, full of tooth and claw, fire and venom lent their cries of support. There was no way that John Druitt would leave this room alive.
But Nikola needed no help. With a slash of his claws across Druitt's throat, blood gushed out. The manic light died in Druitt's eyes, his lips stilled in a soundless scream. With a crackle, the energy being contained within him rose up, but there too, Tesla was merciless. The sharp tang of electricity seared the air as Nikola held out his hands, trapping the creature within a massive force field and crushing it smaller and smaller, until with a whine it simply popped out of existence with a sad sizzle.
Silence reigned for a long moment before Nikola collapsed to his knees, his body already shifting back to that of the man. Helen broke out of her ring of protection and ran to Nicola, holding him in her arms as he wept silently into her hair. She'd done all her crying over John Druitt, and an empty sadness filled her as she watched his remains crumble into singed dust before her eyes.
"Are you all right, Nikola?"
He drew in a breath through his teeth. "I'm sorry for alarming you, Helen. That was to be your wedding gift. A little bit of minor genetic manipulation. Managed to add on another hundred years at least, not to mention the useful capacity to protect you."
"Nikola…" she drew out his name in that distinct way that meant she wanted the whole story.
"Well, a bit of Henry's blood, a dash of some of the leftover genes from the amnio…"
"You used our children!"
"Hey!" Henry, currently wrapped in a tablecloth, "Thanks for not asking!"
Nikola only had eyes for Helen. "Leftover! Medical waste! I wouldn't endanger them…but they do have compatible Source blood to my own system, and with wolf-boy's…well, I suppose I shouldn't call him that anymore, he is sort of a brother now…"
"You…brother…dude, what the…"
"Not now, Henry!" Nikola and Helen bit out simultaneously.
"I believe that the lycans were created by vampires from modification on their own genetic structure, to try to create human companions and servants, of sort. Much simpler genetics to work with, and with an added boost from Daniel," he patted her belly, "Thank you, son!" This seemed the best solution to my weakened state. And really Helen, you know you always like a little beast in your men."
Helen opened and closed her mouth a few times, but the smug look of happiness on his face left her speechless.
"So, are we going to have a wedding, or a funereal?" Kate, her dress miraculous free from blood spatters, holstered her gun in the waistband of her skirt.
Will grumbled at her for her abruptness, but stepped forward to help Nikola and Helen rise to their feet. "Personally, I vote for a wedding. Much healthier way to end a traumatizing day."
"Uh,uh, the roof's clean, except for the pigeons. No bloodstains at least." The Big Guy had a point.
"You know I always like pigeons, Helen."
She rolled her eyes and smiled, looking one last time at the pile of ash that was left of John Druitt. Her heart clenched with pain, but she looked into the blue grey of Nikola's eyes and knew that her future, for at least the next century, was caught up with this man, and their children.
"Let me change. I do regret the Armani, but the St. Laurent will have to do."
Helen giggled.
And so, an hour and a flurry of activity later, Helen Magnus married Nikola Tesla on the roof of the Old City Sanctuary, a perfect red-gold sunset painting the sky a thousand shades.
And that night, Nikola Tesla had the joy of feeling his children move within their mother's womb.