A/N: Thanks for the reviews. Here's chapter 5!

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The Moyashi smirked at my reaction, but didn't comment on the tears, something I was immensely grateful for. He leaned against my shoulder and sighed softly. "See? She's perfect. So what do you say, Yuu? Do you want to be a family with me and Adeline?"

"Adeline?" The name was hard to say without accidentally muddling it with my accent, much like the Moyashi's real name.

The Moyashi stiffened. "Do you not like it? We can come up with something else for her if you want."

His reaction made me laugh a little. "No, it's good. It fits her well. I'm just curious who she is, that's all."

"What do you mean?"

I wanted to ruffle his hair over his confused tone, but I couldn't with the baby in my arms, so I had to settle for nudging his shoulder. "You named her after someone, right? Who's the original Adeline?"

"Oh. Right." I couldn't see his face, but I could feel the heat from his embarrassed blush. "You'll probably think this is weird, but she was Miss Stella's mother. She died in childbirth, and that's what inspired Miss Stella to become a midwife. It seemed fitting that I name my inspiration for becoming a midwife after my teacher's."

His words made me tear my gaze from the baby to stare critically at him. "You actually liked being a midwife, didn't you?"

"Once I got over my initial issues, I did." He laughed briefly then sighed heavily. "As exorcists it seems like all we see is death and destruction. It felt good to be surrounded by life for a change."

Allen suddenly yawned and leaned back against the pillows. "There's a blanket under the bed, can you get it for me?"

I blinked at the unexpected subject change. "Sure..."

It took some awkward maneuvering, but I managed to hand the baby back to him without dropping her. The blanket was easy to find, and I quickly spread it over the bed, letting it fall completely over the Moyashi's head. I waited until he complained, a muttered, "bastard", before I fixed it.

When I uncovered the Moyashi's upper body, he was doing something strange. The top of his dress was unbuttoned, and the baby's face was against his bare chest. He smiled sheepishly at me. "Sorry you had to see this. It usually takes time for babies to get used to breastfeeding. I didn't expect her to latch on right away."

The thought of him breastfeeding was a little weird, so I chose to brush it aside. I snickered as I sat down in the chair. "She probably inherited your bottomless stomach."

The Moyashi laughed lightly at the joke, but then turned serious. "As long as it's not because she has a parasitic Innocence, then that's ok."

He looked down at the nursing baby. "Right, Addie? We don't want you to be an accommodator."

"Maybe we do."

"Why would you say that?!" It wasn't until Allen looked at me, his silver eyes wide with fear, that I realized I had spoken out loud.

I sighed and shared my thoughts. "Will we be allowed to keep the baby if she's not a future exorcist? I know that Komui won't care, but what about Central?"

"Oh. I hadn't thought about that." He sighed heavily and turned back to the baby. "In that case, Addie, we'll just have to play it by ear. I don't want you to be an exorcist, but your daddy's right. I'd rather have you be an accommodator than have to give you up because you're not."

She gurgled at him, and he leaned down and kissed her forehead. I had to interrupt the tender moment. "Stop calling me 'daddy'."

The teary look in Allen's eyes made it clear he misunderstood me. I couldn't help rolling my eyes as I clarified. "Use 'tou-san'. That's the Japanese word. Or use 'father' if you want to keep using English. But not 'daddy'. I don't want the Baka Usagi picking up on that."

He laughed, but it quickly turned into a yawn. When it passed, he smiled happily at me. "Thanks, Yuu. For everything. I never thought you would have stayed with me while I gave birth." He yawned again. "I need to get some sleep now. I don't know if you were planning to leave right away or not, but will you at least stay until morning? My room's the one at the top of the stairs. I'm sort of stuck here, so you can use it if you want."

"Of course I'll stay. I want to make sure that your mind doesn't change once you're no longer exhausted and hormonal. Plus I have a feeling that Cross would hurt me if I tried to leave." I stood from the chair and leaned over to kiss him. "Will you be ok here alone?"

He smiled gently at me. "I'm not alone; I've got Adeline with me, right Addie?"

We said goodnight, and I left the room, closing the door behind me. I began to walk away, but I stopped when I heard Allen start talking to the baby again. I probably would have rolled my eyes at the exhausted babbling and kept walking, but he was talking about me, and that made me stay and listen, not caring that I was eavesdropping on his private thoughts. "Well, Addie, can you believe that Kanda actually said that to me? And he said it four times, too! But I don't feel the same way. I want to, he's your father after all, and I kinda want to sleep with him again, but that's just physical attraction. I know I told him I'd accept his confession, but was that the right thing to do? Is it right to think that I'll learn to love him? Or would it have been better to tell him no? I don't know if I'll be able to handle it if we try to be a family and it falls apart. But on the other hand... You know, Addie, I've never really believed Lenalee when she talked about Kanda's soft side, but he showed me a side of himself today that I'd never seen before. He laughed and smiled, and even called me beautiful. And I want to get to know that Kanda. I..."

I couldn't take any more and had to walk away. So I was wrong, he didn't love me back, he just didn't hate me anymore. But he wanted to try. And honestly, that was still better than I could have hoped for. I had gotten him pregnant during a night of drunk sex, he was supposed to hate me more, not want to get to know me better. He'd also admitted to wanting to have sex again. So I was going to be selfish and take what he was willing to give me.

General Cross was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. He leaned against the banister with his arms crossed and scowled at me. "So?"

I knew what he was asking without him having to say the words. I didn't want to have this conversation, especially not with Cross, but everyone knew that despite his actions, he cared as much about Allen as Teidoll cared about me, so I supposed that I should just be grateful that he had respected my wishes and waited until we were alone to confront me. "The Moyashi said that he would accept my confession if I accept the baby. So that's what I'm going to do."

The redhead's glare hardened. "I've been waiting for eight months to get my hands on the bastard who knocked Allen up and then left him. You're going to have to do better than that."

His tone and his words pissed me off. "Che. You make it sound like I dumped him for getting pregnant. I didn't know until I got here that that was the case. We were never a couple either. It was just one night where we were both incredibly drunk."

It took explaining how we got drunk, but eventually Cross backed down. Despite it only being ten o'clock, I was completely exhausted, and I fell asleep the moment I laid down.

.x.x.

I didn't know what woke me up, just that I was awake and it wasn't because Adeline was crying. Only one night with her so far and I was already tired of the middle of the night feedings. She was perfect though, and I did not regret giving in to my desire to keep my baby.

Since I wasn't needed right away, I used the quiet moment to take stock of my body. There was still a lot of pain in my torso, but that was to be expected given how recently I'd given birth. The same thing applied to the aching hole between my legs; the birth canal would close once my womb was sufficiently healed, and in my opinion that couldn't happen soon enough. At least my belly was lighter; it was going to be so much easier to move around without a full term baby inside me.

It was then that I realized that Addie wasn't in the bed with me.

Oh god. Where is she? Did Cross take her? Or did she fall off the bed? Or worse, did I push her off in my sleep? Is she ok? Or is she lying on the ground hurt? Or-?

My eyes flew open in my panic, but before I could register what I was seeing, I heard an unfamiliar chuckle, followed by a very familiar voice saying, "Good morning, Moyashi."

"Kanda?" What's he doing here? ... Oh. Right. Kanda was here when I gave birth yesterday. I blinked rapidly and finally saw Kanda sitting in the chair beside the bed with Addie in his arms.

I relaxed at knowing where my baby was, but the look on Kanda's face was unsettling. I couldn't recall ever seeing him happy before. He smirked at the dumbfounded expression on my face. "I realize that you're exhausted, Moyashi, but you better not have forgotten what happened last night."

"Of course not!" It was only sort of a lie; my fuzzy brain just hadn't connected the dots yet. Last night... Kanda... "I remember... that you..."

"I confessed last night, Moyashi." His tone was impatient rather than angry; it was more like he was upset over how long it was taking me to remember than that he was upset because I couldn't remember.

The memory of that moment was surreal. The man I had spent the last three years fighting with had admitted to being in love with me. I knew I wasn't dreaming. I had been through many what-if scenarios in my head over the last eight months, and not a single one of them involved Kanda saying the words 'I love you' to me. A couple of my nicer fantasies had involved him ignoring me and his baby, but most had involved him physically hurting me when he found out about my pregnancy. I had never once imagined that he would want to be with me. His actions yesterday completely contradicted the way he'd acted towards me over the last three years, and I knew that it was because I was finally seeing who he really was underneath all of that anger and sarcasm. "Right. You kissed me and told me that you love me. And then I... I..."

I could not for the life of me remember how I had responded to his confession. And Kanda's answer certainly surprised me. "You said that if I want to be in a relationship with you then I have to be a father to my daughter."

Had I really told Kanda that I would date him? That didn't seem right. But it did explain why he was still here. And why he was holding Adeline. I sifted through my hazy memories and realized that yes, some time in the hour after giving birth, I had told Kanda that I wanted us to be a family.

As wrong as that seemed, it also sounded really good. I had spent the second half of my pregnancy wishing that I could keep my baby, yet knowing that it was impossible under the circumstances. But with Kanda wanting to date me, things were completely different, and not only would I be able to keep Addie, but I would be dating her father.

However, in the cold light of day, that didn't seem like a good enough reason for agreeing to go out with Kanda. So what had been my other reasons for saying yes? Why had I agreed to be in a romantic relationship with a man who had once stabbed me through the stomach?

I want to.

The thought startled me. But the strangest part was that it was as true now as it was last night. I wanted to date Kanda. I wanted him to kiss me and tell me I was beautiful again. I wanted to know what it was like to be that man's lover instead of his enemy.

I was jostled from my thoughts when Kanda sat down on the bed beside me. And when I looked up at him, he leaned down and kissed me. It was just a short peck, but it sparked so many feelings that I almost missed what he said afterwards. "Moyashi. If you've changed your mind about this then just say so."

Since when was Kanda patient and understanding like this? ... The whole time, if Lenalee's stories were trustworthy; I just never got to see this side of him before his feelings for me changed. "No. I still want this. I-"

"Before you finish that sentence, you should know that I heard you talking to Addie last night." I froze at his words, embarrassed that he had heard me babble my thoughts to our newborn daughter.

He chuckled and brushed the hand that wasn't supporting Adeline into my hair. I was expecting Kanda to laugh at me, and the affectionate reaction really threw me off. "I know you don't love me back, so don't say it unless you mean it. I don't expect you to feel the same way I do right away. It's more than good enough that you're willing to try, and hopefully some day down the road you will return my feelings. Understand?"

"I think so." I blinked at him and a couple tears fell. Having a baby had turned me into an emotional wreck.

Before I could wipe away the tears, Kanda's lips were on my cheek. He gently kissed my tears away and then kissed me on the lips. Unlike the one earlier, this kiss was deep and took my breath away. I blushed bright red, and that just made Kanda laugh.

He placed Adeline into my arms with a care I'd only ever seen him show towards his sword. It was shocking... but then again, Kanda had cried when he first held her. It wasn't much of a stretch to say that he already loved our daughter. That was almost weirder than him loving me; Kanda and babies didn't seem to go together. But I could ignore that. I wanted Kanda to love our baby.

No one could ever love Adeline more than I did though. I was her mother. Not her father, her mother. I had carried her inside my body for nine months and suffered through hours of labor to bring her into the word, I had earned the right to use that title. I didn't care if it was feminine.

Kanda didn't get up after giving Adeline to me. Instead, we just sat together and watched our sleeping baby. It was a beautifully perfect moment.