(A/N: I'm beginning to think writing and posting this story is a bit of a shout into the void. This isn't receiving any reviews, though each chapter seems to gain a new follower or two or three. Have I lost you all somewhere? If continuing this story is worthwhile and you're enjoying it, please leave a review to let me know. I have a few other projects I'm working on and need to know how my extra time is best spent. Reviews from readers are what makes writing fan fic fun for me on the side when I'm not working on my original fiction, and it's the only "payment" any fan fic writer receives for the time we put into our stories. All of us greatly appreciate knowing readers are out there and enjoying what we're writing. :D )

Chapter 19 – A Bond Between

"Eleven. How did I not know this beforehand?" I asked Victoria whilst hailing a cab early Monday morning.

"Are we back to this again? Sherlock, I told you, you never asked for a genetic history on my family, and if we had discussed starting a family in-depth prior to this," she said, waving a hand over her lower abdomen," then perhaps the subject would have come up. Is it a problem?"

"No!" Holding the door open, I ushered her inside and gave the cabbie the address as I slid in beside her. "Absolutely not. I'm thrilled, just a tad overwhelmed by the unexpectedness of it. Had I known your family included eleven sets of twins, perhaps this would have been somewhat less unexpected. That's all I'm trying to say."

Laughing, she squeezed my hand. "Or you would have refused to ever have kids with me, living in perpetual fear of having one set of twins after another if we did."

"I would never—"

"Oh, come on, Sherlock. Eleven sets of twins across both my parents' families spanning only three generations, seven fraternal, four identical. … Even I admit that's pretty damned daunting statistically."

I resigned to losing that argument and nodded in agreement. "You did once mention your mother's twin sister, so I wasn't completely ignorant to the family history, though if you had made some mention of your father's twin sister, perhaps I would have better understood the gravity of the genetic influence at play."

She made a sour face and held her stomach, worrying me again. "Are you alright?" Shaking her head, she closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. "Nauseous again?" She nodded, and I rummaged through her bag in search of the Ritz crackers she'd begun keeping on hand at all times. They'd become the only thing to do the trick. "Here, darling. We're nearly there. I can see the hospital ahead."

"I'd rather walk. Being in the cab is making me sicker," she replied before quickly eating a cracker.

"If that's what you want, that's what we'll do. … Driver, pull over. Here's good." I gestured to nearest building.

"Here, sir?" It obviously wasn't the address I'd given.

"Yes." It was a demand, not a polite reply. "My fiancée is unwell. We need out immediately."

Quite soon, we were walking hand-in-hand down the pavement, an action that reminded me a good deal of our first date. However, it was daylight rather than dark, and my nerves regarding exploring a new venture in my life found me facing an entire other milestone, one I wouldn't have predicted to see so soon if someone had asked me what was to come after that night.

But I wouldn't have changed anything that happened even if I could.

"This looks—"

"Don't say it, Victoria. Only the best for you and our children. I know it looks expensive, but Dr. Sange is the best obstetrician in London, so I don't doubt it is."

Victoria glanced around the room, the décor of lush jewel-toned fabrics and teakwood furniture, settling a stern glare of suspicion upon me for a moment then approached the receptionist. I'd left unmentioned the how regarding my ability to secure an appointment so quickly with such a prestigious physician, and she'd left her likely accurate presumptions unspoken.

"Good morning, ma'am. You must be Mrs. Holmes." The receptionist was a cheerful, unmarried, blonde (dyed not natural) in her early twenties who owned a black poodle. "Dr. Sange is ready for you, right after you sign these forms."

Victoria hesitated for a moment, inhaling deeply, and took my hand. "I'm not Mrs. Holmes quite yet, we have a couple weeks until our wedding. It's still Victoria Taylor, technically Dr. Victoria Taylor, so technically soon-to-be Dr. Holmes." Oh, she was in a wonderfully feisty mood, possibly not good for me. "And don't I need to fill out paperwork, complete a medical history, give you my insurance information, all that?"

The woman shook her head, smiling. "Not at all. Everything's taken care of. The note here said your records are all to be under the name Holmes. We have Sherlock Holmes listed as the father, your husband/significant other, and emergency contact. Is that correct?" We both nodded. "Our office received copies of all medical records and information we need already, and the computer says you're a private pay client, care of a Mycroft Holmes." I quickly looked away from Victoria's shriveling gaze at those words and stared at a painting on the wall. "I just need you to sign here, here, and here, and the nurse will take you to a room right away."

Relatively soon after, we were in an exam room, and Victoria was changing from her clothes into a gown much like a standard hospital gown, though of better quality in my opinion. She'd opted to forgo the perfunctory meeting of the doctor in his formal office, stating we could just as easily get to know him while 'getting down to business' to save everyone time. In short order, the nurse had recorded her height, weight, blood pressure, drew standard blood samples, and collected a urine specimen prior to showing us to the exam room, and I felt Dr. Sange's office ran in a satisfyingly efficient manner expected of a physician arranged by Mycroft.

"I don't know what's on your mind, but you have that same smug look on your face as your brother," Victoria commented, whilst I had been thinking over my approval of everything to that point, and she was changing into the gown.

"What? I do not," I quickly protested. Mycroft and I were vastly differently, almost nothing alike at all.

"Psshh… If Lucas had offered to flip the bill for this, forget it. Your ego would have a hundred-page list of reasons that's a bad idea, but you knew what you wanted to do to provide the best of everything to ensure a healthy pregnancy, and you knew you couldn't do it alone. For that, you sacrifice your ego in a heartbeat to call Mycroft for help, because he's your brother, and you know you can trust him to be there when you call." She climbed up on the table to wait and smiled down at me where I sat in the nearby chair, watching her. "You should stop pretending there isn't a bond between you two. If all goes well, we'll be so lucky as to have children with sibling bonds like that to count on."

Of course, it was a complicated matter to discuss and one we didn't have time to get into before Dr. Sange knocked on the door and entered. "Dr. and Mr. Holmes, it's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Dr. Kumar Sange." He shook both our hands in turn, smiling warmly. "May I call you Victoria and Sherlock? Given the length and personal nature of pregnancy, I prefer to become well acquainted with my patients."

We agreed, and the doctor gave us a quick introduction of himself. An immigrant from India, married, five children, sole practitioner in the office, selective in taking new patients, attends to all deliveries personally, his particular clients' births take place at St. Mary's Hospital private Lindo Wing, all very posh. And he mentioned that he was well aware my brother had him fully vetted before procuring the appointment, also stating we were among those listed as highest priority clients, our privacy of greatest concern.

All that was well and good, but the actual exam made me nervous. Every time he touched her, anything he did, made me worry something would be wrong, though it seemed he barely did anything at all, and it was over.

"Alright. We're finished here," he said after doing nothing more than a simple breast exam, which had Victoria wincing due to how tender she'd become, and feeling around her abdomen.

"That's it?" I asked, unconvinced, and Victoria sighed, giving me a rather pointed glare.

"Her records state Victoria regularly receives routine gynecological and general physical health exams, so there's nothing more for me to examine this early. However, regular breast exams are an important part of women's health, and the severity of her tenderness is another sign of the possibility of a multiple pregnancy, along with the blood test results I received from the lab at St. Bart's." He made a few notes in the iPad used in place of a paper documentation system. "But we will be doing a trans-vaginal ultrasound, which will allow us to confirm the presence of multiples and let us see how many there are."

A moment later, there was a knock on the door, and the nurse entered with a machine on wheels, the ultrasound machine. A thrill surged through me at the prospect of seeing such viable proof of my children's existence for the first time.

"Based on the date of your last period, Victoria your due date is fifth March. According to the gestational calendar, we consider you to be in your fifth week of pregnancy, though the first two weeks a woman isn't pregnant and all, and the third week is the ovulation week, the week during which conception occurred." Dr Sange nodded to me. "I just want to be clear you understand the terminology we use and why the dating of weeks I'll use won't align with the date of conception you may very well know as fact."

Victoria laughed. "Always explain the science to Sherlock unless you want a thousand follow-up questions, and even then, I can't promise he won't ask five hundred."

"I promise. I'm really not that bad. I don't know why everyone thinks so."

Dr. Sange just smiled and set up the machine, within minutes, we were looking at what appeared to be a static-covered television monitor with two black blobbish things on it. I held Victoria's hand, trying to make sense of what I was seeing.

"They may not look like much this early, but those are your babies. Congratulations, Mummy and Daddy. You're having fraternal twins," he announced, but I barely paid him any mind. I was too busy staring at the screen then admiring Victoria's face, and turning back to stare wide-eyed at the screen again. "Knowing we're definitely dealing with twins, it's not realistic to expect that you'll carry a full forty weeks. Ideally, we hope for at least thirty-seven weeks, so we'll consider your due date closer to twelfth February, though anything beyond that would certainly be wonderful for the babies. … I'll just leave that image up on the monitor there and send some pictures to the printer. Let me go get them for you, and I'll give you two a few minutes alone then be back with those."

I didn't even realize I was crying until the view of the screen was blurry, and Victoria was wiping tears from my eyes. "Are you okay? This isn't too much is it?"

"No. No. No. No. … I mean, yes, I'm okay, but no, this isn't too much." Leaning down, I softly kissed her lips and ran my fingers through her loose hair. "Seeing this makes it all very real, not just the fact that you are indeed pregnant but how I feel about that, the fact that I want this. I want this life more than I ever imagined I would. Seeing it, feeling it, wanting it this way, it all makes me more afraid of losing it, of losing you…" I placed one hand over where I knew for a fact our children were nestled safely below. "… afraid of losing them."

"I'm not going anywhere, Sherlock." She put her hand over mine and smiled. "We're not going anywhere. The four of us are the new Holmes family. … Now calm down, and get the crackers out of my bag. The mini detectives are making me sick again."

"Mini detectives?" I questioned as I found the crackers. "What makes you call them that of all things?"

"Look at that monitor, Sherlock. They're all dark and mysterious, just like you with that hair and that damned coat." Victoria smirked, and I tried not to laugh at her comparison. "Daddy Detective and his mini detectives."

"Daddy Detective and my mini detectives? I believe I could somehow manage to find those monikers reasonably acceptable." Try as I might, I couldn't hide the smile emerging at the thought of my mini detectives. "Perhaps eventually, I might even grow fond of the idea."

Dr. Sange knocked and reentered, handing me the printed photos. "You're looking every bit the proud papa." I very much liked his bedside manner and felt he would be a good match for us as a doctor during what could be a highly stressful time in which I would certainly have many questions. "Schedule another appointment in two weeks. We should be able to hear the heartbeats by ultrasound then. With twins, I'll want to see you far more often than I would with a single pregnancy, Victoria, and I prefer that the father attend as many appointments as possible, Sherlock. I believe partnership during pregnancy and co-parenting after birth are key elements to a healthy family, and I counsel couples with this in mind."

"Absolutely. I can do that. I will do that." Holding Victoria's hand tightly, I assisted her in sitting up on the exam table. "Do you have any particular books you recommend? I've found a great number available and want to be sure I'm studying the best resources on the subject."

"In my personal opinion, save yourself the stress, and read one book: What to Expect When You're Expecting. You don't need books for moms, books for dads, books for pregnancy, and an entire library on the topic. Everything you need to know is in that book. The rest is unnecessary fluff and just overwhelming. In fact, I keep copies for all my first-time parents at the receptionist's desk, and she'll give you one when you make your next appointment on your way out." Yet another point in his favor, prepared with reading material beyond basic brochures of a typical physician's office. "If you like checklists on what to do later on in the pregnancy to prepare for the twins' arrival, there are many online resources for those, and you can find what best suits your preferences, or sign up now for one with weekly newsletters."

We left with an appointment for the afternoon of fifteenth July upon our return from marrying in Denby Dale. Dr. Sange assured us Aaron would be welcome to attend and see the babies on the ultrasound and witness their heartbeats for the first time since he would miss much of the pregnancy and might not be in country for their birth. Book tucked under my arm and busy on my phone, I barely noticed as we exited the building into the typically English overcast day.

"Sherlock?"

"Hm?"

"Sherlock."

"Just one moment. I found the top five websites for new parents and need to finish entering the necessary information on this one then I'll receive weekly newsletter updates via email from each of them. If I create a spreadsheet of all given information and delete duplications—"

"Sherlock!"

Startled by her harshness, I looked up and saw Mycroft, leaning on his umbrella in front of a black car. "I thought you might need a ride home," he stated, opening the door and gesturing for Victoria to enter, even offering her a hand.

I wanted to knock the boorishly smug expression off his face. Instead, I calmly replied, "Why would you think that?"

"Street surveillance cameras showed the two of you exiting the cab this morning a fair distance prior to your destination. One could surmise, given Victoria's appearance at the time, she felt ill, and perhaps would be more comfortable in something with a bit more privacy and luxury than a cab on the return trip." Mycroft gave a whole new meaning to the phrase 'big brother is always watching'. "And besides, given I'm paying for Dr. Sange's services, it seems asking how the appointment went is not unfair of me, don't you think?" He cocked his head, smirk firmly at the corner of his mouth.

"Fair enough, brother mine." I pocketed my phone and gave him a genuine smile for once. "Or should I say 'uncle of mine children' now?"

He hummed thoughtfully as he climbed into the car behind us. "I shan't object should you wish to do so."

And I had an idea that behind Victoria's grin were thoughts of sibling bonds and brotherly love with a dash of 'I told you so' that she'd never say aloud.

(A/N: If you are still following this story, let me know if you like the playlist for the story as a companion. I'm planning to move that to my profile rather than in the story chapters where it messes with things. Also, what would you think of a Pinterest board to go along with the story? Does anyone following this story like visual fun stuff like that? I have pictures I use while writing of things like Victoria's outfit from their first date, her engagement ring, and coming up, her wedding dress, plus the "dream cast" for the characters of Victoria, Lucas, etc. It's just an idea if you'd be interested in something like that.)