"Care for a smoke?"
He looked up, squinting against the midday sun, a curse dying on his lips as he drew a breath through clenched teeth — gods, not this, not this now, not when—
"It's true what they say about Fiji." Alexis glanced around, black sunglasses shimmering in the sun. "It is breathtaking." He watched with a frown, as she put a cigarette in her mouth and lit it with a black zippo lighter that he could swear appeared in her hand out of nowhere. "And while I'm here… well, thought I'd check on how my lovebirds are doing. Not too well, apparently."
He exhaled slowly, thoughts storming through his head. How the fuck did she find them? Did she somehow managed to plant a tracker on him yesterday? It had been pretty crowded down at the casino. He ran his hands over his pants pockets — no, if that had been the case, she wouldn't have been able to fly out here sooner than tomorrow.
She teleported. Of course she did. There was no other way.
With no gods around anymore and his powers almost nonexistent, he'd long forgotten it was possible to teleport long-distance; the best he could do these days was a dozen-mile radius, and even that drained him quite a bit, with how weak he'd gotten over the years. If he'd been in his prime, his powers fuelled by legions of worshippers, it would've been a whole different story. Now the best he could do was hurl a fireball or two, which would likely do nothing to her, anyway.
He had to play it differently.
He just had no damn idea how. And trying to think about it now, when all he could think of was the woman in the hospital bed down the hall inside — he exhaled sharply, a realization hitting him — "Did you have anything to do with this?"
Alexis chuckled. "With our warrior princess' little accident? No, dear, this was all your doing." She let out a cloud of smoke with that obnoxious pout of hers that made him want to clasp his fingers around her neck till he heard it snap. "You might've been good at waging your little wars, Ares, but you definitely don't know how to handle women, any more than sticking your dick in them…"
He swallowed, his teeth gritting; he couldn't let her get to him, he knew better than that. But damn her, she was good at this.
"Otherwise, you would've known better than to piss the hell out of your pregnant girlfriend and leave her behind in such state. Mortal women get quite emotional and fragile when pregnant. But well, it's not the case anymore, is it? And you only got yourself to thank for that."
He swallowed, his lids falling shut hard, a sudden knot in his chest cutting his breath off like she just punched him. "You really don't know when to shut your fucking face, do you…"
"I think what you're supposed to say is — you're welcome."
He grimaced, his chest rising and falling.
"Who do you think saved your princess while you were busy fooling around with hookers?"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"She wasn't breathing when I found her. You're lucky I was able to fix that. I would've dropped her off to the ER myself, but when I sensed you near, I decided to let you be the hero. I heard men like that."
He blinked and exhaled. What the— she wasn't lying, though, he could see and feel it. But how did she— "How did you know she was here?"
"Oh, that… well, that was a little small talk I had with your pilot while you were chatting up that redhead on the rooftop. Quite a chatty little guy."
He glanced at the long-cold cigarette butt in his hand, his mind going blank. .
"Fun-fact — did you know that most people live with aneurysm never learning about it? The rupture is quite rare — so, whatever you did, you really had to drive her over the edge. You're lucky she survived the surgery. Though, you're not out of the woods yet — statistically 25% of patients die within 24 hours, and only 50% live past three months." She sighed deeply. "What? I was interested."
"What the fuck do you want?" he asked, willing his brain not to absorb anything of what she just said.
"The question is, what do you want?" She drew a hit of her cigarette and exhaled lazily, her eyes following the smoke. "What if you didn't have to look over your shoulder all the time? What if you could come back and live your boring little life in peace? Sounds tempting?"
"What are you rambling about?"
"What if I told you that I can make it happen?"
"Make it happen how? By not going public with her file?
Well, the bitch hadn't leaked anything yet; from what he checked just hours ago, Xena's record was still clean, nothing, not a trace. She hadn't been even remotely linked to Gareth's death.
"She hasn't. Not yet." Alexis smiled. "Makes you wonder why, though, doesn't it? How come all her DNA she'd smeared over the victim just evaporated, along with the blood-covered knife with her fingerprints on it?"
"Look at you, thought of everything, didn't you?"
"I even saved her from ending up on a missing-person posters — at work they believe she's away on a leave due to a sudden family emergency — so, as you see, all taken care of."
"That's all very moving, but it doesn't do much with MB's network in the background."
"Honey — I can erase federal databases — and people's memories — and make people disappear without a trace — you name it, you get it."
"In exchange for what?"
She grinned, then opened her mouth, casting her eyes down. "Your DNA."
He blinked, stunned. "What?"
"A child. You give me a child, I'll make it all go away."
He laughed. "Never took you for a motherly type."
She let out a low, raspy laugh. "It's just a little project I've been working on."
By the gods, she was serious. "I think I'll pass."
"I thought you'd say that. Well, in that case, maybe a little incentive would make you reconsider."
He pinned her with a glare, waiting for whatever was about to leave her mouth.
"Oh, honey… I'm not gonna tell you just yet… you'll see it when the time is right."
"If you as much as touch a hair on her head—"
"Oh, please… do you think I'm a monster? Believe it or not, when I saw her there, out cold — it did feel a bit — strange."
He exhaled rapidly, his eyes closing as the flashback hit him — him placing her in that ice-coffin on Mt. Etna and those frozen moments of just staring, paralyzed, unable to bring himself to close the lid, to face it that …the thought that it was the last time he was looking at her face—
"I can't force you to take the deal, naturally — but I know a little encouragement goes a long way — once you know someone's weakness, it's pretty easy to push one towards the right decision, isn't it? But from what I remember, you seem to have first-hand knowledge of that, don't you?" She laughed. "Remember that nice little stunt you pulled at that lava pit, when you made Xena sell herself to you in exchange for Gabrielle's life — I mean — she agreed to give up her own life for that blonde little pest — it's crazy, what love does to a brain, isn't it?"
He swallowed, fuming, the last of his self-control hanging by a thread. "You're gonna regret every single thing leaving that fucking mouth of yours."
Alexis snickered. "No offence, but — you're not exactly in a position to threaten me, darling."
"We'll see about that."
"I think I'm starting to understand what she sees in you." She flashed him a grin. "See you around, partner." She dematerialized, leaving him stunned and furious, staring blindly at the spot she was standing just seconds ago.
His pulse racing, he rushed back inside.
#
"What is — what's going on?" he asked, his gaze feverishly roaming over the noisy swarm of green-gown-clad men and women hovering around her bed.
"Sir, you can't be here — we're stabilizing her."
"What the fuck does that mean?" His heart went up his throat as his gaze fell on her lifeless face.
"You need to calm down, sir—"
"—I asked—what—the hell—does that mean?"
"…she's in a coma…" the doctor's faceless voice reached him.
"What?" He thought he'd— for a moment, it all switched off, he saw and heard absolutely nothing.
"We've put her in a coma — I'm sorry, sir, but your wife learned about the miscarriage and—"
"—you said you needed to wait—"
"—we didn't mean to tell her, but she asked and… I didn't even say a word, she just—" the man fumbled for words, "…just as we feared, the reaction was so strong it caused the brain to swell, we couldn't wait another minute."
A flash of white hot rage surged through him but faded as fast as it came. There was just heaviness, settling in his muscles, all over, weighing him down, pushing on his lungs and throat. He pressed his lids close, his shoulders slumping, voice breaking when he spoke. "What're her chances?"
"We've put her in a coma to stop the swelling. If it decreases over the next hours, there are big chances the brain will recover. She's under constant surveillance, you can rest assured. If anything happens, we'll act in a heartbeat."
"I wanna be alone with her."
"Of course."
It seemed his feet weighed a ton as he dragged them all the way to her bed. He took her hand in his; the hand that touched him just minutes ago, now lifeless in his grip. He brought it to his face, pressing her palm to his cheek, to his mouth, to his forehead, struggling to catch a breath, his mouth open, drying up on the inside.
"You promised…" he whispered, his jaw clenching. "I'm gonna stay here till you wake up, and then I'll kill you myself, I swear…" He exhaled and rubbed his nose against the back of her hand; and frowned, breathing through open mouth, because it was getting hard to breathe, because it now felt like a punch to the gut, knowing that she'd actually wanted and loved this child — his child— "We'll have another baby, we'll try again," he whispered against her knuckles, "…as many as you want… just please come back to me…" his voice broke, his throat closing up, a lone tear tickling the skin of his cheek; he wiped it off angrily. "I'll kill that fucking witch if it's the last thing I do, I promise you that."
He traced his knuckles along her cheekbone for another while, and, his forehead creasing in thought, he sank down to the floor, the back of his head pressing against the edge of the bed.
He reached to his chest, fingers tracing over the sturdy little pendant palpable through the thin cotton of his shirt.