"Yay!" Gabrielle said, clapping her hands in delight and scooping Cyrene up. "You can turn over now!"
"You gotta love those mortal milestones," Xena said as she nursed her son. "Watch it, Joxer. You've got teeth now."
"You have to admit," Gabrielle said, "this is turning out better than you thought it would. Cyrene's gift is perfectly harmless and Hercules has taken care of every fireball Joxer has managed to produce."
Xena adjusted her strap and gave a noncommittal grunt.
"You don't think it's going to last, do you?"
Xena pulled a bruised pointer finger out from Joxer's well-intentioned but herculean grasp. "No, I don't. And I don't feel like arguing about it." Knowing that it most likely wasn't going to stop Gabrielle from trying to prove her point, she continued, "And I'm going to take a walk. Do you think you can handle them while I'm gone?"
"Of course and Hercules may be taking a bath right now, but he is within hearing distance if I should need him."
"They'll probably be ready for a nap now that they've had their fill."
"Would you go? They're fine."
Xena went into the woods even though she still seemed a little hesitant.
"Can you believe your mother?" she asked the twins. "Like I can't handle children that aren't even half a year old yet." She stole a glance at the babies. Joxer had nodded off, but Cyrene was nowhere to be seen. She felt the spot where Cyrene had been only moments before. She even lifted the blanket up. There was nothing, no clues and no baby. Gabrielle started to panic and combed the camp area for signs of her.
"On second thought," Xena said as she came back into the clearing. "I'll wait for Hercules and Iolaus to come back. It's bad enough to leave you with twins, but twins who are also demigods that would be-where is Cyrene?" Xena cried in alarm.
"She was right here. I swear it. I know she moves a little bit now, but it's not like she was ready for the Olympics! What if Ares got her?" Gabrielle said, jumping to conclusions. "What if anybody got her? What are we going to do?"
"Shh," Xena said. She listened carefully for a few seconds and then she made a grab a foot away from the blanket that Cyrene and Joxer had been sharing. Cyrene became visible in Xena's hands. "Got you, you little minx. Your mother is a tough old bird to fool."
Cyrene giggled in response like it was a good game of peek-a-boo, which it was in Cyrene's mind.
"We can't go on like this," Xena decided. "I'm fooling myself to think I could handle them on my own, that any of us could."
"But you're Xena, Warrior Princess," Gabrielle said, trying to boost her spirits. "You can handle anything."
"This isn't a battle or a villain that I can just stop and be done with. I haven't had a lot of experience raising kids anyway, but to raise the twins of Ares, who've inherited a majority of his powers? And let's face it, when Ares gets a load of their powers, he's going to know who the real father is. It's time we call in Ares before something serious happens to the twins or someone else."
"Don't do it, Xena," Gabrielle pleaded. "I know I said Ares might be different now, but he's proven he can't change. He's tried to kill Hercules I don't know how many times and he didn't care that the babies were being put at risk when he came to kill Hercules during your labor."
"It will be different when he finds out he's the father. He won't put their lives at risk anymore."
"Just their capacity to be good," Gabrielle argued.
"It's a chance that will have to be taken, but as long as there is breath in my body, I will do everything in my power to make sure that doesn't happen. Ares!" Xena called out.