A /N: Thanks Emily, and everybody else!

It was late when Leela awoke – though how late she couldn't have said. Natural daylight rarely filtered through to the sewer. The settlement was pitch black at night and a kind of greenish twilight at every other time of day. But she knew she'd stayed awake until the early hours of the morning organizing the mutant defense, and she could feel a heaviness in her limbs, a faint ache behind her eye that made her sure she'd slept a long time. Maybe an entire day. It was hard to say.

It was unusual. She hadn't slept this well in weeks. She had grown used to snatching catnaps during the day or falling asleep at odd moments, as her body tried to make up for another poor night's rest. At night her head was too full of plans and possibilities, she couldn't shut it off anymore. If it wasn't the mutant uprising occupying her thoughts, it was the thousand ways her baby could grow into a monster, or the myriad ways she could have prevented this. Like not sleeping with Fry, or not marrying Lars. Or never trying to convince herself she didn't love him in the first place. Maybe then none of this would have happened. What if she had said yes to one of those dates he'd asked her on? Or given him a chance after he wrote her that opera? What if she had woken up from that coma and kissed him til he could hardly breathe, because he was alive and she had never known how much that meant to her until he wasn't? What then? Would it have changed anything?

Maybe nothing would be different. Maybe everything would be. All Leela knew was that she lay awake at night turning the whole thing over in her mind, and never came up with any answers.

She shifted and suddenly became aware of a dip in the mattress beside her – a warm form snoring next to her. She rolled over to get a better look at him.

Lars.

"Oh, crud," Leela whispered.

It wasn't so surprising. Old habits died hard. She had spent two years married to Lars, so it didn't feel strange to fall asleep next to him, and she couldn't blame him for forgetting. But she should have stopped him. She was supposed to be setting boundaries between them – she couldn't afford to get tired and forget. That kind of weakness led to dangerous places, like screwing Fry on the floor of his apartment because it seemed better than screaming "I love you!" in his face. That kind of thinking led to insanity.

Leela sighed and eased herself out of bed, stretching when her feet hit the floor. She had slept in her clothes. They reeked of sweat and sewer muck, so she shed them and went for a shower. The water was cold and whatever passed for soap down here was made the old-fashioned way, from animal fat. It was thick and greasy and Leela could feel traces of it still stuck in her hair after she dried off, but didn't have the energy to get back in the tub again and rinse it off. So she left it and dressed instead. The stretch pants she had always favored still fit fine (the industrial-strength elastic waistband would probably see her through her entire pregnancy, come to think of it) but when she went to tuck in her tank top it stubbornly rode up again. Leela frowned and tried a second time. No luck. Even sucking in her breath didn't help. No matter what she did, that little crescent moon of exposed flesh poked out, insisting she notice it.

She pulled on one of Munda's lumpy knitted sweaters and determined to ignore it instead. She was hyper-sensitive, she reasoned. No-one else would notice her midriff was slightly less toned than it used to be. The only reason it stuck out to her was because she'd been working out since the age of fifteen and prided herself on her core strength.

Lars stirred behind her.

"Leela?" he mumbled. "Wha . . . oh no. Why am I here? What did I do?"

Leela pushed him down again.

"Relax," she said. "Nothing happened. You slept here, that's all. You forgot. You were tired, Lars. It happens."

"I'm sorry."

Lars grimaced and tried to get up again, but Leela quietly pushed him back down.

"You should rest," she said. "I'll send someone to look you over in a while. I don't want to find out you did any more damage last night. Lord knows things are bad enough as it is."

Lars frowned.

"They are? But we won, didn't we?"

"This time. If I know Nixon, he won't let this lie." Leela forced a smile. "Just rest. You need it."

"So do you," Lars objected. "Morris told me you're not sleeping."

Leela sighed.

"I'm not doing this right now," she said irritably. "I'm fine. I slept last night, didn't I?"

"Did you?"

Leela cursed herself.

"Yes, I did. So I'm fine, okay? Let it go." She adjusted the pillow behind his head, sighing again when Lars caught her elbow. "I have to go get something to eat. Can it wait?"

Lars smiled.

"You're not getting sick so much anymore," he said. "Is that a good thing?"

"I think so."

"Good. I'm glad." He rubbed his cheek, thinking. "Leela?"

"Mmm?"

"Does it help? Having me around, I mean. Or does it make it worse?" His hand dropped from her elbow to the fist she had wrapped around the bedstead. His thumb ran idly over her fingers. "It's just . . . I wanted to keep you safe, that's all I was thinking about. I don't want to hurt you."

Leela stared at him, confused.

"You're not," she said. "I don't know what you're talking about."

She watched her husband's brow furrow. He gestured at her stomach.

"Fry," he said, as if it was obvious.

"I don't think about Fry," Leela said automatically.

"You don't?"

"Hardly ever." The lie came just as smoothly as before. Leela had to wonder when she got so good at this. "I have so much else to do," she finished. "I really don't have time."

She was halfway to the door when she heard her husband's voice behind her.

"Morris says you don't sleep," he said quietly. "And he says you talk in your sleep when you do."

"Lots of people talk in their sleep."

"He said you say my name. Fry's name."

Leela huffed, blowing her bangs out.

"I probably say Bender's name," she said dismissively. "It doesn't mean anything."

She could feel his eyes on her from the other side of the room.

"No," he murmured. "You're probably right. I just thought I'd ask."

Leela shut the door with a quick 'click' and pressed her forehead momentarily against the cool wood. She sucked in a deep breath and swallowed it down, feeling it settle in the pit of her stomach.

Then she straightened up and strode off in the direction of the kitchen.

She found her mother sitting at the table, knitting what looked like a giant, yellow woolen condom.

"It's a sweater for Leg Mutant," she said cheerfully, pulling out a chair with her tail.

Leela sat down obligingly.

"It's nice."

"Thank you, sweetie. Are you hungry? I could fix you something. You must be hungry - you slept all day. What would you like?"

Leela found herself smiling. It was a fairly thin, anemic version of a smile, but at least it was genuine.

"I'd kill for some pancakes," she said.

The smile seemed to please her mother, so she kept it on as Munda busied herself at the stove. For a while the kitchen was filled with the bustling, concentrated warmth Munda brought to any space, no matter how small. It was a feeling Leela had used to dream about as a child. Comfort, but a special kind of comfort. The best word she could find was motherliness.

"I'm starting to show," she admitted.

Munda turned around.

"Is that a bad thing?"

"I thought I'd have more time."

One of Munda's tentacles snaked out and suckered onto her shoulder in a reassuring squeeze.

"I'll knit you some more sweaters," she said. "They say a sweater hides a multitude of sins."

I doubt it would hide a whole lovechild, Leela thought, but she kept this to herself. Her mother meant well, after all. And maybe she was right – maybe Fry would return before it became too obvious, and a well-placed sweater would hide the situation just fine in the meantime.

Munda set the plate of pancakes down in front of her. They were grayish, made with some fungus of indeterminate origin and speckled with dried parsley. Leela attacked them with her fork and fingers, hardly stopping to chew. She hadn't realized how hungry she was until she smelled the food.

Munda watched her eat, smiling indulgently.

"Oh my," she said. "I think he's going to have his father's appetite."

"Uh . . . he?" Leela asked, bewildered.

"Or she, of course. I suppose you don't have any idea yet. Though when I was pregnant with you I remember I had the strongest feeling you were a boy. Of course I was wrong about that."

Leela pushed her plate away, suddenly full. She wished people would stop talking about the baby. Sitting in the Turangas' warm and homely kitchen, watching her mother fuss over her, only served to remind her that this kind of thing didn't come naturally to her. Leela had never had a mother growing up; only the vague, distant care of Warden Vogel, and the taunts of the other orphans. She wasn't sure she knew how to be a child's mother, and deep down she was terrified of getting it wrong. She had seen a glimpse of it in herself the night before, during the battle. That little lizard-like girl had been there, scared stiff, and Lars had instinctively gone to comfort her. Leela, on the other hand, hadn't even noticed she was upset. It had never occurred to her to send the girl home, which seemed like an unnatural response for a mother-to-be.

She told herself she had looked after Nibbler successfully for years, but that wasn't the same. Her pet pretty much came and went as he pleased. She didn't even know where he was right now, if she was being honest. Then there was Fry, of course. Leela had successfully kept him alive for over ten years – no mean feat when weighed against his recklessness and abject stupidity. But keeping him safe wasn't the same as keeping him happy. Fry had never known how she felt about him. Her self-denial had made them both miserable, and when she had managed to give him some idea of how she really felt, she'd got it all wrong and wound up losing him. Would she really do any better with his child? Part of her was terrified she wouldn't.

Munda touched her arm gently.

"Penny for your thoughts, sugar pea."

Leela shook her head.

"It's nothing," she said. "Nothing at all."

"Are you sure? It doesn't look like nothing."

"It . . ." Leela changed her mind mid-sentence. "Mom, can I axe you something?"

"Anything, sweetie."

"How did you give me up?"

Munda blinked.

"Well, you know that, honey. You could never have a real life down here -"

"No." Leela took a deep breath, avoiding her mother's eye. "I don't mean why. I know why. I want to know how, Mom. How did you decide to give me up? How long did you keep me for, before you – before . . ." She trailed off. "You don't have to answer. I'd understand."

Munda drew back a little. There was a long silence.

"Three days," she said at last. "We kept you three days."

"It took you three days to decide?"

Leela swallowed. For three days she'd been a daughter. For three days her future could have been entirely different.

But Munda was shaking her head.

"No," she said sadly. "It took me three days to talk Morris round. I knew right away."

"What?"

"I knew the minute I saw you. Maybe the first time I held you, I don't know for sure. I was pretty woozy with the pain. But it was soon. You were so perfect, so beautiful, Leela . . . you didn't belong here." She sighed, gesturing at the candle on the table. "I used to sit like this for hours with you, staring. Just staring. Your toes, your hair . . . that big bright eye." She smiled fondly. "You had wonderful muscle control, even then. I thought you might grow up to be a dancer someday."

"I like dancing," Leela mumbled.

Fry had been a good dancer, she remembered suddenly. It was one of those strange idiosyncrasies he had. He was clumsy as hell but once you taught him to do something muscle memory seemed to keep a hold of it forever. It made him a good dancer, a good shot. A surprisingly good lover, under direction. Leela was half-convinced he'd be a good musician too, if he could get over his own conviction he needed super-powers to play properly.

She sighed, pushing him out of her mind again.

"I like dancing," she said again. "But you didn't send me away to become a dancer, Mom. You sent me away to be an orphan. To think I had no-one. Was it that easy? How could it be that easy?"

She stared at her mother; tried to imagine those tentacles caressing her cheek, those worn leather shoes walking away. How had she done it? Hadn't her conscience screamed at her with every step?

"It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do," Munda said. "And the easiest, all at the same time. It was right for you, sweetie. That was all I needed to know. I love you, Leela. I always have."

There was a long silence, as Munda began to tear up and Leela struggled to think of an appropriate response.

"Thank you," she said at last.

She didn't know what else to say so she let her mom embrace her and tell her she loved her again. Then she went and washed the dishes.

"It's the least I could do to pitch in," she said when Munda protested. But the truth was, she was glad of a chance to turn her back, so she could wrestle with her feelings unobserved.

Her parents were good people. Good, selfless people, who were obviously better than she would ever be. Which made it doubly awful that she was mad at them. They had given her up over thirty years ago, for good reasons. It wasn't fair to resent them for it. She'd had a good life, hadn't she?

Of course she had.

Still . . . how could it be that easy? How could you set your child down on some stranger's doorstep and walk away? How could you give her to people you knew wouldn't come running when she cried? Did good reasons cover that? Did good reasons stop you aching to hold her when you lay awake at night?

She watched her fingers wrinkle in the dirty dishwater.

Maybe they did. Maybe she was being unfair. Then again . . .

You had good reasons for sending Fry away, she told herself. You had good reasons for starting this war. Do they still seem good?

The fallen mutants were submerged the following morning. Their bodies were wrapped in old sacking and weighted with half-bricks; they sank into the smooth, glassy green surface of the lake with barely a ripple. A man Leela had never seen before – who had a fat, fleshy face, and over-sized spider legs sprouting from his abdomen – was chanting something slow and onerous that got a lot of nodding from the congregation.

" . . . may their spirits be lifted from this earthly residue and guided to the great sewer above . . ."

Leela tuned him out and stared instead at the memorial pictures of the dead, which had been erected behind him. There were six of them. Six dead mutants, killed in an uprising she had planned.

She stared at them for the rest of the service, and when prompted she stood up and gave a speech. Later on she wouldn't remember anything in it. She talked about their bravery, maybe, and the future they had given their lives for. When it was over she sat down and stared at the faces again. Six of them.

She didn't recognize a single one.

There were two surface officers who had been contaminated by mutagens from the lake before they died. Their bodies were so warped they had been left behind, and no-one really knew what to do with them. It fell to Leela to suggest burning them.

The flames that licked at each pyre had a blue-green cast and the smoke stung her eye, but Leela refused to look away. She watched flesh melt from bone, and felt the heat of the fire tan her face, and resolutely held down her lunch.

The cremations drew a small crowd, but no-one seemed confident enough to get close to the pyres. They mostly hung back in the shadows, watching. There was an atmosphere of some kind in the air, but Leela couldn't read it. She couldn't decide if the mutants were silent because they thought a funeral was too good for people who had killed their friends, or if they were simply shocked. These were probably the first surface people to die in the sewers in centuries Maybe they'd forgotten surface people bled the same way they did, without their fancy hospitals to patch them up again.

Lars broke the tension eventually by stepping forward to say some words. Most of his speech was a riff on what Leela herself had said to O'Mannaghan the night before.

The system was broken.

Their orders were bad.

It wasn't their fault they'd come down here to kill.

They just need to be taught that mutants aren't monsters.

(Lord. Had she really taken her husband's naivety for optimism, before? Had she really not known he was Fry? It was hard to believe, in hindsight.)

That little mutant girl was by his side again, helping him stay upright. She was wearing a baggy nurse's smock and her eyes were fixed on the ground. Clearly she didn't like being the center of attention, but was willing to endure it to help Lars.

Leela frowned. Did lonely people just gravitate to Fry? Was it genetic? Or was it just coincidence he seemed to make friends with every misfit he'd ever encountered?

He was gabbling some half-remembered surface prayers now. They sounded vaguely First Amalgamated. When he was done he made his way over to Leela.

"You wanna go?"

She shook her head.

"I'd rather stay." She nodded at the funeral pyres. "I want to see it finished."

Lars nodded.

"I understand." He looked at Skreem. "Could you leave us? You don't want to watch this."

"Okay." The girl bobbed her head. "That's a nice sweater, Miss Leela," she said shyly. She darted off before Leela had a chance to respond.

Lars shifted his weight awkwardly, trying to stop his crutches sinking into the mud.

"That is a nice sweater. You cold?"

Leela coughed.

"Something like that," she said. "You don't have to be here, you know."

"I know. I want to be. Anyway, you shouldn't be alone."

Leela laughed; a strange, distorted sound in the fog. She folded her arms, feeling for the lump under her sweater.

"I'm not."