Chapter 4: Birth of a Miracle.
“You ok,” Jared says soothingly as I continue to hurl; rubbing my back in soothing circles until I finish retching.
“God, I’m sorry,” I say as I wipe the mouth with the back of my hand.
“Don’t be.” I look up to see Olsson…Ty, looking solely at my stomach; an unreadable expression on his face.
“Take a picture; it’ll last longer,” I snap, bringing my hands up to hold my stomach protectively.
“Sorry, I just….This is kind of a shock…” I swallow thickly and nod. Another contraction hits me, stronger than the last one, and I hiss in pain. “Are you ok?” Ty asks worriedly, taking a step closer.
Once the contraction passes I look up at him. “Um…I’m kinda in labor and have a pretty bad concussion…”
His eyes widen and he comes all the way over to me; crouching down a couple feet in front of me. He leans forward to look into my eyes. “Shit.”
“Back of head hit with gun,” Jared says quietly, answering Ty’s unasked question. His eyes widen before looking down at my stomach for a moment.
“Hey, Jared; why don’t you get us some water and some smaller blankets. When Gen came to get me, I only had time to really grab my sweatshirt, a flashlight and the first aid kit,” Ty instructs.
Jared looks to me, silently asking me if I’m ok with being alone with the other man for a few minutes.
“I’ll be fine, go and get the stuff….hell, hang with your lady for a while.” A nervous smile makes its way up to his face. “This whole thing could take a while.”
He nods; squeezing my shoulder briefly before slithering out of his home.
“How many contractions have you had?” Ty asks, opening his first aid kit.
“I’m aware of two, but I could have had some while I was out.”
He nods his head and scoots closer to me. “Could I check out where you were hit?” he asks, and I shift around until my back is facing him. He cards his hands through my hair, and whistles. “Damn that’s a big bump.”
“Is there blood?”
“Yep; but it looks like it stopped a while ago.” He touches a tender area and I wince. “Sorry.” I shrug as he continues talking. “I’m going to disinfect it ok?”
“Go ahead.”
As I hear him rustle around in his first aid kit, I go over the last twenty or so minutes in my head. I’m in labor with a concussion, underground in some unknown village, with the father of my child. I mean, fuck, over the last several months I had imagined running into him, but never like this.
“What the hell did you get yourself into?” Ty asks, pulling me out of my thoughts as touches my head with something cold and wet. “I know that Jared went missing, and we have all been looking for him but…”
I sigh. “Let me introduce myself properly,” I say. When we met all those months ago at a bar, we decided to only introduce ourselves with last names. Why we did it, I don’t know; we were both kind of drunk and thought it was bad ass. “I’m Doctor Jensen Ackles and I work for the government at New Origins Corporation. It’s a secret government agency that deals with creatures that, to human knowledge, shouldn’t exist…” I trail off, and he makes a noise to cue me to keep going. “Jared got hurt about a month ago and was found by one of our scientists. He was brought to our facility and it was my job to take care of him and study him.”
“What?” he asks incredulously.
“Believe me, I hate this job, but I use it as a way to help the creatures and treat them like people instead of test subjects.”
“But how did you even get into it?”
I hiss as pressure is put onto the swollen area of my head, and he quickly apologizes. “They heard about my work and convinced me to sign a shit ton of legal documents and shipped me up here. Within the first hour on the job, I screamed, passed out, was threatened with prison and had a panic attack in the women’s bathroom.” He squeezes my shoulder to let me know he’s finished, and I scoot back until my back is propped up against the hard cave wall. “But now, I’ll go to prison because I decided to help Jared escape, and after I give birth I’ll probably never see my daughter again…” I trail off as my eyes begin to burn. I look up to see him swallow thickly; his eyes downcast.
“There are a lot of things I want to ask you right now…but I don’t want to upset you more than you already are.”
I shrug and wrap my arms around my stomach. “Might as well; might kill some time r--” I’m cut off by a tightness in my stomach. “Contraction.” I hiss out as the burning sensation wraps around my torso.
Ty looks at his digital watch. “I think it’s been about seven minutes since the last one.” He looks back at me as the contraction tapers off. “Did that hurt badly?”
“They’re not too bad yet.” He nods. “What did you want to ask?”
“Did you try contacting me once you knew that you were pregnant?”
“Of course I did; do you seriously think I would try to keep something like this a secret!?!” I snap just as Jared comes back.
“Ty, sssstop!” He quickly slithers over towards us and dumps his woven basket of items onto the ground in front of Ty. “What doing?”
“I---” he starts, but I cut him off.
“He didn’t do anything wrong; I’m just on edge right now.” I take a deep breath. “God I’m so fucking tired…” I trail off, bringing my right hand up to pinch the bridge of my nose. On top of everything else, I feel so fucking exhausted to the point of breaking down and crying my eyes out.
“Ssssleep.” Jared says in a soothing voice, realizing just how close to cracking I am.
“I can’t risk it.”
Ty gives me a worried look. “From what I could tell, where you were hit swelled completely outward; I think it would be ok if you get some sleep.” I look at him with tired eyes. “I’ll wake you up in two hours if the contractions don’t wake you up before then.” I look at him for a moment before nodding my head carefully, trying not to jerk it too much to make my headache worse. “Do you remember the bar’s name where we met?” he asks.
I narrow my eyes in confusion. “Marko’s; why?”
He gives me a small, tired, grin. “That’ll be the question I ask you when you wake up.” He pulls out a smartphone from the small bag next to him. “Sleep; I’m going to do some research about carrier births while you’re out.”
I nod my head once more. “Thanks.”
He shrugs. “You’re in labor; you’re going to need all the sleep you can get Ack..I mean Jensen.”
I force a small smile onto my face before I let my tiredness take control. Jared helps me lay down, and once my head hits something soft, I’m out like a light.
A powerful contraction forces me to wake up, causing me to sit up and fold myself over my stomach.
“Fuck!” I feel large hands grab onto my shoulders.
“Just breath through it, Jensen.” Ty’s voice whispers soothingly in my ear. As I take a breath, I feel a tearing sensation between my legs, along with a strong burst of fluid.
“Oh god….” I groan out as the contraction tappers off; embarrassed about what had just happened. “I’m so fucking sorry! You didn’t sign up for this bullshi--” he cuts me off.
“Hey, look at me.” I turn my head to see Ty staring at me with concerned filled eyes. “I’m going to be blunt here man: we’ve had sex before, yeah we were wasted but I remember the naked part clearly, nothing that happens in this place is going to faze me.” I look down at my lap, and wince at the spreading wetness. “Let’s get you standing so you can change.” He grabs onto my shoulders. “Jared!” He calls once I’m standing.
“You’re taking this all a lot better than before I fell asleep,” I say offhand.
He shrugs. “You’re going through hell right now; you don’t deserve me freaking out about all of this on top of that.”
Jared rushes through the fabric door like a bat out of hell. “What wrong?” he asks, then his gaze narrows in on my wet pants. “What that?” I sigh.
“His water just broke,” Ty answers, but that seems to confuse Jared even more.
“When women and male carriers give birth, the fluids surrounding the baby burst while they’re in labor.” He considers my words for a moment before nodding. I grab onto my maternity jeans. “Um…could you guys turn around?” Both Jared and Ty turn around and go over towards the makeshift bed to replace the blankets; giving me the privacy I need to get out of my pants and check the birth canal.
I slide out of my wet jeans and boxers, kicking them out of my way. I look over my shoulder to make sure both Jared and Ty are preoccupied before reaching my hand down to feel the dilated opening.
“Oh god, this is going too fast.” I breathe out as I remove a shaky hand from down under, grabbing a blanket and quickly wrapping it around my waist.
“What’s wrong?” Ty asks, turning around once I’m somewhat decent.
“I’m pretty sure I’m about six centimeters dilated.”
His eyes widen. “Shit….” He looks at the blanket wrapped around me. “Do you want to wear my pajama pants?” he asks, messing with the drawstring.
“I don’t think that would be-fuuuuck.” I groan as another contraction pounds into me; forcing me to grab onto the stone wall for support.
“I think the last contraction was about four minutes ago,” Ty says once the contraction wears off. He pulls at the drawstring of his pants and slides them off; leaving him in a sweatshirt and boxer-briefs. “Wear these; you look like you’re wearing a skirt or something.” He says, walking over to me to hand me the pants in question.
“Thanks…” I trail off as he turns around.
“Head better?” Jared asks as I carefully pull the pajama bottoms on; tightening the waist band bellow my swollen stomach.
“I still have a headache but I’m better than before.” I stand still for a few moments; noticing that the pressure in my back is more tolerable when standing.
“What doing?” Jared asks with his head cocked to the side in confusion; watching me begin to pace with my left hand cupped under my stomach for support.
“I feel better standing up,” I answer, and as I slowly turn around I see Ty watching me nervously.
“Shouldn’t you be resting?” he asks; wringing his hands.
“This will actually move things along faster.” He looks at me for a moment before nodding his head. “Can I have some water?” I ask, and Jared is quick to act; grabbing an obviously store bought bottle, and quickly slithering over to me. “Thanks.” I stop in my tracks to open the bottle, taking a couple little sips before handing it back to Jared.
“Aren’t you supposed to chew ice or something?” Ty asks once I resume my pacing, moving towards me.
“I thought you said you did research.” He shrugs.
“Yeah, I researched dilation, tearing and CPR; not active labor stuff,” he says sheepishly.
“They don’t usually want people drinking water once in active labor in case they need to perform a C-section.” He nods his head. I open my mouth to ask a question, but am caught off guard by a powerful contraction that causes my knees to give out. Ty catches me in a steady grip before I can hit the floor, keeping his hands in place until the contraction wears off.
“I’m an author, that’s why you couldn’t find a person by the name of Olsson in the area; my books are published under the name Benny Lafitte,” Ty says offhandedly as I begin my pacing again, this time with Ty’s hand steadily holding onto my arm. “I was in the middle of a rough patch and decided to move out here for some inspiration.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” I feel him shrug.
“You probably broke several laws telling me about your job; I might as well tell you a little bit about myself.”
“Well you already knew about Jared and his people so…” I trail off, looking over to see that Jared has left his home to give us some privacy. In any other situation, I would feel terrible for making Jared feel like he can’t be in his home after being away for so long…but I really don’t want him seeing me like this.
“I moved out here a little over two years ago. The book I was writing was based in a cabin in the woods so I thought moving out here would help me write.” I feel a contraction build up and stiffen in Ty’s hold. “Hey I’ve got ya,” Ty comforts softly as I breathe through the contraction. “I got a little drunk after a month of nothing and decided it would be a great idea to go on a drunken walk in the middle of an ice storm.”
“That was stupid,” I breathe out once the contraction passes, and he chuckles.
“Yeah; I kinda cringe thinking about it actually.” We start up our pacing again. “Anyway, the last thing I remembered was pain shooting through my leg, and then the next thing I knew there were these snake people surrounding me hissing at each other.” He gives me a sheepish look. “I may have screamed for a good twenty minutes,” he says with a laugh, and I can’t help but smile a little bit. “After I calmed down, I realized they had helped me, and well…there ya go.” He says, gesturing towards the lanterns he had obviously provided Jared with.
“So, that’s why you gave me the name Olsson; you didn’t want to get attached to me and risk me finding out about them?”
He nods. “After a while….Jared and the others kind of became my family; hell, they’ve adopted me into their village…I didn’t want to risk them becoming test subje--” he cuts himself off with a hiss and gives me a guilty look. “Sorry.”
I shake my head. “Hey I would have done the same thing.” We continue to pace, and after god only knows how many more laps around Jared’s home, and a million god damned contractions, Ty speaks.
“You know, I regretted just….leaving you alone the following morning,” he says as he helps me take off my sweatshirt, leaving me in a thin sleeveless t-shirt. “If I wasn’t trying to protect this village, I would have probably stayed and asked you out on a proper date.”
I stop in my tracks; letting Ty’s words fully sink in. He didn’t regret what had happened…he actually liked me….I open my mouth to reply, but a powerful contraction forces me to yell out. “AHH!” My legs give way, forcing Ty to hold me upright as I fold myself over my rock hard stomach.
“What…Jen!?!” I hear Jared behind me, and a moment later I feel another pair of arms around me.
“I…I need to sit down,” I pant out once the contraction is over.
“Baby come?” Jared asks nervously as they slowly guide me towards the mat, gently guiding my body downwards.
“I-I don’t know I…Ty you need to check,” I groan out, weakly reaching out towards one of the smaller blankets piled next to me and handing it to Ty. “I can’t….” Ty shushes me.
“I got it; just try to focus on your breathing.” He reaches forward, but hesitates. “Are you sure?” he asks nervously.
“I can’t do this alone,” I say, and he nods his head before untying the drawstring of my pants and pulling them down, quickly placing the blanket over my thighs to keep me covered.
“I think you’re almost there,” Ty says nervously before bringing the blanket down over my feet. “Are---”
“God!” I screech as pain digs into my stomach.
“Well, that answers my question ‘are the contractions getting worse,’” He states as the pain dies down. “That was about two minutes,” he says, looking at his watch hesitantly.
“What time is it?” I ask; completely out of breath.
“It’s about eight in the morning,” he states.
I nod, before turning towards Jared. “You won’t want to be here for this.”
He gives me a hard look before slithering closer to me. “You friend,” he states; reaching out to grab onto my hand. “You help me, I there for you.” He gives my hand a gentle squeeze. “Not have baby alone,” he states, and I can’t help but feel touched by his words.
“You remember that call with my brother?” I ask, and he nods.
“Don’t like when cry,” He says, and I sigh, squeezing his hand back.
“Just…promise me you won’t like…look down there or anything. It’s bad enough that Ty has to.”
Ty clears his throat. “Again; sex, remember?”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah; but there wasn’t an opening there at the time and there wasn’t stretching or gross fluids or a baby either.” He gives me a pointed look. “Ok so two of the th-Fuck!” The pain catches me off guard.
“Be ok,” Jared says soothingly; rubbing my arm gently as the contraction dies down.
“I think she shifted lower,” I groan out, trying to shift my body into a more comfortable position but failing. “I want to lie down.”
“On your side?” Ty asks, and I nod. “Ok, Jared grab some of those blankets so we can prop them under Jensen’s stomach.” Ty
orders as he leans forward to help me shift positions.
“Work?” Jared asks once I’m lying on my left side with my back facing the stone wall, a small blanket in his hands.
I nod and reach out for it; folding it over a few times before placing it under my stomach.
I lay in this position for a while, each contracting hitting me back to back that I can barely catch my breath anymore. Every time I swear, groan, scream or cry in pain, both Jared and Ty are there trying to calm me down. Even though I never expected to give birth this way…I’m thankful that I have them both here with me. I was going to do this alone: just me, the doctor and a few nurses; but now…I feel like I have emotional support while going through this.
And finally, after what seems like an eternity to my pain raddled brain, the unbearable urge to push comes over me.
“Help me!” I groan as I try to turn onto my back, flailing my right arm towards Ty for help.
“Ok, you’re ok,” Ty sooths as he gets me onto my back and positions himself at my feet; pushing the blanket up over my legs to have full view of my opening. “I don’t know if you’re fully dilated or not…” he trails off nervously as Jared helps me sit up, sitting behind me so that my shoulders are supported by his snake end.
“I don’t fucking care if I’m fucking fully dilated or not; I’m pushing!” I say as the contraction builds up, pushing as hard as I can while supporting myself up on two shaky arms as I lean forward.
“Good!” Ty practically yells as I drop back onto Jared, breathing heavily. Ty gives my left ankle a comforting squeeze before the next contraction hits.
Contraction after contraction, I push, Jared eventually pushing me upwards once I become too tired to sit up on my own. I lose time, too consumed by pain, screaming, crying and encouraging words to fully understand how long I push for.
“Come on, the head’s almost out!” Ty practically screams suddenly as the burning down below becomes too intense. “You can do this.”
“Doing good,” Jared whispers in my ear before pushing me upwards when he feels my body tense up.
“FUCK!” I scream as I bear down.
“It’s out! You’re almost done Jensen!” Ty practically cheers, and his words give me the strength to keep pushing until I feel her body exit mine, and I hear her beautiful cry.
“Oh god!” I cry out happily as I drop back onto Jared. “Oh my god, baby girl,” I whisper as Ty lays my wailing child onto my chest. I tiredly wrap my arms around her, tears streaming down my face as I look at her. “Hi, honey.”
“Jen…” Jared says in awe. “Beautiful.” His voice cracks, and I look over my shoulder to see tears streaming down his face.
“Thank you,” I breathe out; thank you for saving me, thank you for being there for me, thank you for being a friend.
“No thank; friend.” Jared says as Ty cuts the cord.
“Let’s get this after birth stuff out of the way so we can clean the little miss.” Ty says, and I look at him to see tears in his eyes as well.
“Ty…” I trail off, too in awe of this whole situation to properly form words.
“If you’re trying the thank me, then you’re wasting your time,” He says with a small smile as he instructs me to push out the placenta, my eyes never leaving the crying little girl in my arms.
“Hey, it’s ok sweetie,” I shush, cradling her in my arms.
“Can I take her?” Ty asks once the after birth is taken care of. “I want to clean her off and get her wrapped up…” he trails off.
I swallow nervously. “Be quick?” I ask hesitantly and he nods with a smile.
“Of course; I don’t want to take this little lady away from you for too long,” He says as I carefully transfer her into his hold. As he carefully stands up and walks towards the makeshift cleaning station, my head drops onto Jared’s stomach, my eyes closing against my will and everything around me goes black.
Onto Chapter 5:
http://2people2.livejournal.com/13188.html