AN: Sorry for the wait. Still trigger warnings for pregnancy difficulties and discussions of miscarriage - especially the latter. Lexa has a minor (major) breakdown. Also, I experiment with writing from a child's perspective. Let me know how it went.
October 2000
Not even two hours after Todd had been released from the infirmary (and nowhere near long enough for Tabby to stop teasing and Kitty to stop cooing over him and Lucie), Lexa jolted to her feet and sprinted for the nearest elevator.
How she knew Pietro was about to wake up, Belladonna would never know, but all the same, she burst into the medical bay just as her fiancé's eyes jolted open.
Her sudden entrance just about gave Belladonna and Jubilee a heart attack, but Cindy, in her mother's arms, giggled and clapped.
Bella recovered quickly, clamping a hand down on his good shoulder to stop him moving.
"Evil child," Jubilee muttered, bouncing her daughter in an attempt to settle her.
"Must take after her father," Lexa quipped.
"Oh shut it," Jubilee retorted automatically, before looking down at her daughter. "Eh, you're probably right."
"Todd?" Pietro asked, still fighting to sit up.
"Good Lord, Quicksilver, stop moving!" Belladonna snapped. "Bobby's still unconscious, everyone else is fine."
"Do as you're told, honey," Lexa teased, her jocular tone at odds with the worry in her eyes.
His eyes landing on her, Pietro settled down. "Be honest, Lex, how bad do I look?"
"Oh, awful," she said dryly. "I'll have to put a paper bag over your head from now on."
"You're hilarious," Pietro muttered, closing his eyes as she bent to kiss his forehead. "Honest answer?"
"You look fine," Lexa said softly, while Bella checked him over. "Better than you did when you came in, anyway." She ran a gently finger across a burn on his cheek. "These seem to have healed."
Pietro caught her hand, his eyes searching hers. "Are you alright?"
"I'm fine," Lexa answered quietly. "Why wouldn't I be?"
"You went to visit your mother," Pietro said. "Willingly. You only talk to her because you feel like you should."
"So I wanted to talk to my mother," Lexa said, trying to keep her voice level. "Maybe I was having a moment."
"Lexa …" Pietro began.
"Alright young man," Belladonna interrupted, with a deceptively innocent expression. "Your powers have worked to your credit – you can leave now. I had to keep Todd in overnight."
"Lucky me," Pietro muttered, still frowning slightly. "Lexa, what's wrong?"
Lexa took a deep breath – and promptly chickened out. "Nothing," she lied. "Everything's fine."
One week later, the infirmary was quiet. It was late, and almost everyone in the mansion was sleeping.
Except one.
In the next bed over from Bobby, curled up in her mother's arms, Cynthia Drake lay awake, sucking her thumb, her dark eyes watching her father's motionless body.
It really wasn't fair.
She was wide awake and wanted to play, but her mama was sleeping. And Mama had been so tired lately – Cindy had tried to wake her, but it seemed that only crying was going to wake her tonight.
And Cindy wasn't frustrated enough to cry yet.
If only she could get to her Daddy – maybe he would play with her.
Cindy wiggled out of her mother's grip and crawled to the edge of the bed. The bed railings were up and in place to keep the almost-toddler from falling out, and she peered over the edge.
The floor seemed an awfully long way down.
Cindy sat back, sucking her thumb again, her lower lip beginning to quiver.
She wanted her Daddy and, as often happened with mutant children who wanted something, she found a way of getting it.
It started as a slow spread of ice along the bedspread under Cindy's knees. Then it began to creep through the air towards the other bed as the moisture gradually froze into an icy bridge.
Cindy patted the ice curiously. When it felt solid, she squealed with delight and set off, crawling across the ice and onto her father's chest.
"Dada, Dada, Dada, Dada!"
In the coming years, no matter how much Belladonna insisted that his brain activity had already been picking up and that he was probably about to wake anyway, Bobby would always insist that his daughter's voice was what had roused him from his deep coma.
When Jubilee awoke with a start five minutes later, her moment of blind panic at the absence of her daughter was swiftly settled when she saw not one but two pairs of eyes watching her from the other bed, her daughter pointing at a now-thawing ice bridge.
"What happened?" She asked, bewildered, her mind still cycling between Bobby awake Cindy moved ice bridge Bobby awake should really get up
Bobby beamed at her, kissing their daughter on the cheek. "That's my Icegirl."
November 2000
November brought another proposal.
On a seemingly random day, after dinner, Alex (who later admitted that the date held no real significance but the ring was burning a hole in his pocket) got down on one knee and asked Lorna to marry him.
Amidst the squeals and tears of their friends (mostly female, although Jamie was unashamedly using Paige's napkin to wipe his eyes as well), Lorna launched herself into his arms and kissed him soundly before, at the loud insistence of the audience, giving him her obvious 'yes', bringing the number of engaged couples at the mansion back up to three.
"Typical," Logan growled to Lexa, with no real fervour. "We were just one wedding down."
Lexa sniggered. "Anna and Remy got married in June; it's hardly a knee-jerk reaction. And at least you don't have to do anything at this one."
"True," Logan agreed. He had given Anna away at her wedding and had agreed to give Lexa away at hers – at least at Lorna and Jubilee's respective weddings, all he had to do was show up.
His eyes now on her, Lexa fidgeted. She had been somewhat avoiding Logan ever since Pietro woke up.
"Have you talked to him?"
And that was why.
"No," Lexa said quietly. "Not yet."
"Why not?" Logan asked.
Lexa gave him a look. "Do you really want this conversation?"
"No," Logan admitted. "But you need to have it with someone, X, or things are gonna go south."
As though he had been summoned, Pietro appeared at Lexa's side. "Lex, we need to talk. Now."
Lexa turned to Logan, a pleading look on her face, but he shook his head. "Sorry, kiddo. Go on."
She closed her eyes and turned back to Pietro with a forced smile. "Just let me go and congratulate them."
Pietro nodded, and she slipped through the crowd to where Lorna was surrounded by Taryn, Jean, Kitty and Amara, all of whom were gushing over her newly-acquired engagement ring.
"Hey, congratulations."
"Thanks, Lexa," Lorna said with a bright smile and a tight hug. "Are you coming to join us?"
"I'd love to," Lexa said, with more sincerity than she would normally have mustered. "But Pietro and I need to have a chat."
Lorna seemed to sense the brewing storm and gave her another tight hug; Kitty stepped closer.
"Does he know?"
"I haven't told him," Lexa said softly. "But I think he might."
Kitty hugged her as well, even tighter than Lorna had, and Lexa let her, breathing in the scent of baby powder that seemed to hang around the other woman, a scent that seemed to heal her heart and break it all at the same time.
"Good luck," Kitty whispered, releasing her and giving her a little push in Pietro's direction.
Pietro took her hand silently when she reached him and led her away from the break room and up the stairs to their bedroom.
"So," he said, when the door was closed, "I'm not stupid."
"I never said you were," Lexa said tiredly, leaning against the closed door.
"I know there's something wrong," Pietro continued, as though she hadn't spoken. "And whatever it is, you don't want to tell me. And there wasn't anything wrong before the accident. So something happened that morning, something that made you go to talk to your mother. Logan and Kitty both know and Belladonna and Dr McCoy are watching you like hawks so it must be something medical."
Lexa sighed, her heart in her throat. "It sounds like you already know what it is."
"Lex," Pietro whispered. "Are you pregnant?"
Lexa closed her eyes against the tears that threatened her composure and nodded. "About three and a half months."
"Lexa, why didn't you tell me?" He sounded more exasperated than angry or hurt, which was good, but it didn't make her feel any better.
"Because I don't know if it's still alive."
Her voice sounded flat and strange to her ears. The door was solid against her back, grounding her, but she felt as though she was floating.
"Bella can't find a heartbeat," she continued, still sounding like she was in a trance. "My regeneration wasn't supposed to let me get this far and there's no way of knowing if the baby's alive, because the lining's really thick or something, so until it moves or they find a heartbeat, I have to believe it's dead or it's going to kill me."
There was a quiet pause in which she didn't dare move, her eyes still shut tight against reality.
Then warm lips touched her forehead, his arms cradling her between his body and the wood. "Oh, baby … have you been dealing with this alone all this time?"
Lexa nodded against his chest, finally letting the tears fall. "It's been the longest three weeks of my life."
Her centre of gravity shifted and the wood behind her vanished, the only sign that he had moved them to the bed, curling up with her on the mattress.
"It's okay," he whispered, stroking her hair. "It's going to be okay."
His breath hitched treacherously, causing another little piece of her to shatter. "It's not okay," she sobbed. "My body killed my baby, what kind of a mother am I?!"
"You would make an amazing mom," Pietro said sharply, tilting her face up, forcing her to look at him. His eyes were bright with his own tears, but still he looked at her like she hung the moon. "You are already an amazing mom, Lex, or you wouldn't be so upset. This is not your fault. This is Hydra's fault, and if I could rip them all to pieces for taking this away from you, I would. And … you said they hadn't confirmed it yet, right?"
"They haven't," Lexa said, wiping her eyes. "But … Pietro … I can't … I just can't. I'd made peace with the fact I was going to lose it, and then I was further along than I should have been, and I let myself hope … and then there's no heartbeat and … I can't believe I can get that miracle."
"That's okay," Pietro said, his hand resting on her stomach, and there was quiet wonder in his eyes as he gazed down at it. "I can believe enough for the both of us."