Baby Blues

The Storm Brigade soldiers standing guard outside the Kirlsa headquarters had seen it all.

They had bared witness to countless battles, where wild Aquarian magic raged and gigantic ships from other worlds ripped the sky apart with beams of light. So with that much experience tucked under their belts, they considered themselves to be shockproof. After all, what could their little planet possibly do to top that?

In fact, both men had lived in a perpetual state of boredom ever since the end of the war. They needed excitement, they needed action, they needed-

"Lord Albel!"

Both soldiers snapped to attention as they recognised the familiar shock of black and blonde braids stalking towards them. Since Albel was not one for pleasantries and small talk, and the more senior of the two guards valued his sanity and his manhood, he kept his mouth shut.

Smart boy.

Albel acknowledged their presence with a grunt, barely giving them a second glance from between the pages of his pregnancy book.

The younger guard blinked.

Pregnancy book…?

Albel the Wicked… was reading a book.

About having babies.

Albel heard the thud behind him and turned to frown irritably at the unconscious soldier. So much for battle-hardened warriors, he thought scornfully. Was it really so bizarre to see him to be reading this particular book? Was Woltar raising a bunch of pansies as soldiers?

The swordsman strongly suspected it was the latter.

He glared at the second guard, who was looking torn between blurting out some inane comment and pissing his pants. Albel silently dared him to make a smart-ass remark so he had an excuse to kick the crap out of him, but he wisely kept his mouth shut.

Pity.

Albel sighed in disappointment, sheathing his sword reluctantly. It had been so long since he had given anyone a decent ass kicking… ever since Fayt had decided that Albel was going to turn over a new leaf and be a "kind, decent man", his life had lost that special bit of sparkle. In the days of B.F (Before Fayt), dishing out punishment had always lifted his spirits, no matter how angst-ridden he was feeling.

But at least people still feared him. He could reduce the toughest of men to quivering wrecks when he felt like it, women fainted in his presence and children were emotionally scarred just by looking at him.

It was consolation enough.

He smiled suddenly at the guard, enjoying the look of terror that flitted across the man's face.

"Beautiful day, isn't it?"

The man gasped and promptly fainted.

Albel smirked.

A beautiful day indeed.

"Woltar."

"…"

"Woltar."

The older man continued to gape at him in silence, completely and utterly stupefied. Albel repeated his name louder and Woltar blinked, chuckling vaguely and rubbing his eyes. "Excuse me, Albel, I could've sworn you just told me you were pregnant."

"I did, old man. Are you deaf as well as senile?"

Woltar shook his head again. The cold weather was making him hallucinate, that was the only explanation… there was no way that Albel was standing in front of him, declaring that he was pregnant of all things.

"Did you hit your head, boy?" he asked incredulously. "Or did Zelpher finally make good on her threat and scramble your brains?"

"No, I drank a potion that allows a man to fall pregnant," Albel snapped, as if it was the most obvious thing in the whole world. "And then Fayt stuck his-"

Woltar wisely chose to cover his ears at this point.

"-I thought it would be too much of a tight fit, but Fayt is much stronger than he looks-"

And it got worse.

"-and I never knew he could do that trick with his tongue, the boy is a genius when he puts his mind to it. Well, I always knew he was smart, but I never knew he was so gifted-"

Woltar paled, clutching at his heart. Why was Albel giving an old man a blow-by-blow account about his sex-life?

"-I was surprised at how good it felt, because naturally I am the dominant one, but when Fayt rammed it in-"

Why?

For the love of Apris, why?

Woltar began to wheeze and flopped limply onto his chair. When Albel started lamenting the drawbacks of having an uke orgasm as opposed to his usual seme orgasm (because, apparently, there was a difference), the older captain started choking.

The noise distracted Albel from his story. "Listen, Woltar," he said coldly, "you could at least have the decency to listen to how your first grandchild was conceived."

He tapped his claw irritably on the desk, adding, "You may have to share it with him when he is old enough to hear of such things. I certainly won't, and Fayt would be too embarrassed, I know it."

Woltar was pushing seventy. He was a war veteran, the captain of an elite army. He was now traumatised beyond rational belief. Good lord, and Albel expected him to explain something like this to his grandchild?

"Albel, are you-" he swallowed hard. "Is this some kind of joke?"

Albel looked at him as if he was the one who was mad. "No. Why would it be? You were the one who told me to start making babies and I did. You get to be a grandfather, I can continue being gay, now stop complaining!"

Woltar put his head in his hands, before taking a deep breath and looking up. "This must be some kind of misunderstanding," he said calmly, ordering his thoughts into a logical explanation. "It is impossible for a man to bear children. Impossible!"

The swordsman rolled his eyes. "That's what you think," he mumbled.

"Albel," Woltar began carefully, "I can understand if you are trying to justify your relationship with Fayt to me by concocting a story about being pregnant…"

"And when have I ever needed to justify myself to you, old man?"

"I know that I have been pressuring you to marry and have children, but inventing such foolish stories is hardly the way for a man of your age and stature to behave. Really, Albel, I expected better of you. Your devotion to Fayt is admirable, but the fact remains that he is not able to produce an heir. Perhaps if you simply found the right woman…"

"There is no right woman, and there never will be. How many more times do I have to tell you that?"

"But Fayt will never give you a son!"

Albel gave him a smug look, patting his stomach fondly. "He already has."

Woltar was on the verge of smashing his head against the desk. Or crying. And quite possibly both. "You must have lost your mind," he protested weakly. "It is impossible for a man to fall pregnant, physically impossible. Men do not have wombs-"

There was a soft cough. "Except me."

"No!"

A tuft of white hair landed on the desk. Albel looked at it pityingly before looking at the distraught old man. "Oh, pull yourself together, Woltar," he said testily. "One would swear you were the one going to have a baby."

"But… but…"

Woltar was desperately trying to hold onto logic, but it was slipping away with every passing mention of Albel having babies. And gods above, Albel was adamant that he was pregnant. Was he mad? Was he delusional? Woltar suspected it was so: the lad had always been a tad unstable, even more so as an adult, but what if… what if he was actually telling the truth?

Could Albel honestly and truly be pregnant?

The swordsman watched passively as Woltar lapsed into a dazed silence. Several moments ticked by with no response from the poor Storm Brigade captain so Albel put his feet up on the desk and delved back into his baby book. Woltar was experiencing a personal crisis, so he would let him be. Besides, it was too troublesome to snap him out of this ridiculous stupor. It was much easier to read about breastfeeding.

Albel paused and gave his flat chest a cursory examination. Ah. Well.

Presumably they were going to grow sometime in the future.

Woltar, as expected, was indeed experiencing a personal crisis. No, this was a crisis that threatened the entire kingdom. What would the people say when they learnt that the captain of the illustrious Black Brigade, the pride of Airyglyph, was pregnant?

What would the king say?

"Glou must be turning in his grave," Woltar muttered to himself. "His only son, the heir to his house, thinks he is pregnant!"

Albel stared at him over the top of his book. "Actually, I think my father would be rather proud," he said offhandedly. "He always did approve of resourcefulness."

"I doubt his son's pregnancy was what he meant by resourcefulness."

"True, it would have been far more practical if Fayt was carrying the baby."

"That is not what I meant either! What I meant was… that is, what I mean to say is… oh, bloody hell." Woltar groaned, dropping his head onto his arms. "Boy, you will be the death of me."

Albel smiled. It was one of the closest things to outright, honest affection that the old man would ever say.

"Albel…" the older man seemed to regain most of his composure and he smoothed down his greying hair decisively. "I want you to tell me how this happened. I want you to tell me everything."

The swordsman smirked. "Everything?" he enquired innocently. "Why, Woltar, I already did. Unless you want to hear it again… in greater detail, of course…"

"For the sake of my heart, you had better stick to the facts. But perhaps I should be more specific." Woltar paused, eyes clouding in contemplation. "Perhaps you could tell me about this potion you took," he suggested. "The one that allowed you to… that allowed you to fall…"

"You can say it, Woltar. P-r-e-g-n-a-n-t. It's not hard. You know, when my egg and Fayt's sperm came together and-"

Woltar blanched at the thought of Albel having eggs.

"I know what it is, boy!" he interjected hastily, before Albel could go into greater detail about just how the egg and the sperm happened to be in the same place at the same time.

Albel sighed and set down his book. It was a boring tale, not nearly as exciting as his account of the baby's conception, but Woltar was being such an obstinate old stick. But he did look a tad pale… and the last thing he wanted was for his child's grandfather to keel over when his son was still the size of a grape.

"I sought out the inventors to create a means for Fayt to bear a child. But none of the maggots could do or think of anything vaguely useful, so I was forced to go to that idiot woman, Welch. Strangely enough, she had exactly what I needed… a male pregnancy potion… and she said she needed a test subject, so I got the damn thing for free. Then I slipped the potion into Fayt's drink, but the worm distracted me and switched the drinks so I drank it instead."

He sounded annoyed at the last part, but Woltar caught the admiring gleam in his red eyes and hid a knowing smile.

"So, how does this male pregnancy potion work?"

"The wench explained that the potion will eventually turn the drinker into a woman. But the most important change, the internal features, happen first and almost instantaneously – which is why I could fall pregnant so quickly. My outer appearance will only change as the baby grows. In nine months, I will be a complete woman."

Woltar choked back a snort of laughter. Albel, a woman? "Are you…are you serious?"

Albel grimaced. "Laugh all you want, old man. I don't care, as long as I get what I want."

"Yes, I suppose so," the older captain replied dryly. "And you will have to, once people start noticing your, uh, change of appearance."

"Oh, don't worry about them," Albel said indifferently, rising from his chair, Crimson Scourge in hand. "I know how to deal with people who insult me very well."

"That is what I worry about."

Albel smirked, raising a hand in farewell as he moved toward the door. "Well, I suppose we will be seeing you again rather soon, won't we, grandfather?"

Woltar smiled.

Grandfather… I could become accustomed to hearing that more often.

Fayt looked up expectantly as Albel banged open the door to their apartment and tossed his cloak onto the chair where the bluenette was seated.

"Well?" he asked, one brow raised. "How did he take it?"

Albel dropped a small tuft of white hair in front of his lover and smirked.

"Oh, I think he took it rather well."

TBC