You're What?: Chapter Forty-Five

[amberfocus]

                                                                                     banner by alizarin_skies


Title:  You're What? (45/?)
Author:  amberfocus
Characters/Pairings:  Nine/Rose, Jack Harkness, Jackie Tyler, Mickey Smith
Genre:  Baby!fic, Romance, Angst, Fluff, Smut, Hurt/Comfort
Rating:  Adult
Betas:  amyo67, jeprdyfrndly
Summary:  An unexpected pregnancy causes huge emotional upset in the lives of the Doctor and Rose.  With Jack the only voice of reason, will this child lead them to happily ever after or tear them apart forever?

Previous chapters:  http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/262898.html

Chapter Forty-Five: The More Things Change
 

“I still think you should get checked out by a human doctor, Rose,” Jackie said. It was two days before the wedding and Rose was really tired of fighting this battle with her mother. It had become a bone of contention between them in what had been an otherwise nice amount of mother/daughter bonding over the impending babe’s arrival.

“I can’t, Mum,” she repeated for what felt like the thousandth time. “A human doctor wouldn’t even know where to begin. He’d see all the umbilici on the sonogram and have a proper freak out.”

“Umbilici?” Jackie queried.

“Like an umbilical cord, only the placental sack attaches directly to all of my major organs. They wouldn’t know what to make of it. Besides, the Doctor and Jack are perfectly capable of delivering babies. They’ve both read everything the Doctor has on Gallifreyan births and Jack’s delivered a few human—and non-human— children in his time.”

“Isn’t that dangerous? Tying into your own body like that?” Jackie asked. Her eyes suddenly revealed horror. “He’s not going to have ten belly buttons, is he?”

“The Doctor’s only got the one, so I highly doubt it,” Rose said. “Besides only one umbilical cord attaches to the baby directly. The others attach to the placenta and then grow through the uterine wall and into the organs.”

“I can’t think that’s safe.”

“It’s very safe for the baby. He’s firmly lodged where he’s supposed to be.”

“I meant safe for you,” she said. “You’re human. Doesn’t that mess with your body?”

“It…alters things, a bit,” Rose said. “I’d never be able to conceive a fully human child after this. Just the Doctor’s children.”

“That’s…what if something happens to him and you want more kids some day?”

“Nothing’s going to happen to him,” Rose said confidently.

“You can’t be sure of that. You can’t be sure about anything. Especially what the end of this pregnancy is going to do to you with all these crazy cords attaching to everything like they are.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to me, either, Mum. They’ll start detaching as I get closer to my due date, probably any day now, and by the time I’m ready to deliver it’ll just be the one on his navel. I’ll be just fine and he’ll come out looking perfectly normal,” Rose reassured Jackie and then cocked her head to one side. “Well…except for the two penises,” she added.

“What?!” screeched Jackie.

“Well, you asked me once when I told you he had two hearts, if there was anything else the Doctor had two of,” Rose said with a perfectly straight face.

“Are you telling me that the Doctor has two—?” Her eyes were huge.

Rose lost it, bursting into laughter. “Oh, Mum, your face! Of course not. He looks pretty human.”

“You are a very evil child, Rose Tyler,” Jackie said sulkily at Rose’s giggling. She couldn’t stay mad at her daughter though and cracked an indulgent smile. “All right, all right, I get it,” she said against Rose’s howls. “I’m being an overprotective mother.”

Rose got herself under control. “Mum, it’s all going to be okay. Don’t worry so much.”

“Easier said than done,” Jackie said. “You’ll find out when that one’s born.” She nodded at Rose’s stomach. “The worry doesn’t stop just because you grow up, either.”

“I know,” Rose said quietly. “Mum, I’ve never meant to make you worry. You know that, right?”

“Of course, sweetheart.” Jackie rose from her chair and hugged her daughter tightly. “Now, Shireen called this morning and she wants to throw you a baby shower.” She bustled over to the sink with their dirty dishes before returning to the table to sit with her daughter.

Rose rolled her eyes. “No, thank you. Not after that bridal shower. It exhausted me.”

“Rose, sometimes these things are for your friends and family, not for you.”

“I’m…” Rose paused to calculate in her head. “I’m almost fourteen months pregnant. I do not need to do anything just for my friends and family. One party was more than enough. Besides, I don’t need anything. The Doctor and I have already bought everything Charlie could possibly use.”

“What if I tell her to wait until after the baby is born? Maybe then you won’t be so worn out,” Jackie suggested.

“You think I won’t be tired with a newborn?” Rose asked in surprise. “Have you forgotten what it’s like to have an infant around?”

“No, but you’ll have himself. And he doesn’t sleep much so he can mind the baby enough that you’ll be well-rested,” Jackie said. “And if you stay on Earth for the first month like the Doctor promised, you’ll have me, too. Plus, you have Jack.”

“Not sure for how much longer,” Rose said softly.

“You’re kidding, right?” Jackie exclaimed. “The man is devoted to you. To both of you.”

“Yeah, but…he’s in love with me,” Rose admitted slowly. “And he’s in love with the Doctor.” Jackie nodded. She had at least figured out that much. “How long’s he going to be willing to stay with us if we keep breaking his heart?”

“I think he’s bigger than that,” Jackie said.

“No one’s too big to have their heart broken. Sooner or later he’s going to want a life of his own. One where he can love somebody fully and they’ll love him back just as much. I mean, I love Jack to pieces, but I’m just not…with the Doctor around I can’t even think of…” Rose trailed off.

“Maybe you’re seeing Jack through your own rose-colored glasses. Maybe he’s not the sort to love just one person and settle down. He may not want that at all. He certainly gets his…um, needs met without that. Even you don’t truly want to settle down, despite wanting to pair with the Doctor permanently.”

“He’s just said some things that sometimes make me think so.”

Jackie’s hand covered Rose’s. “It’s okay, sweetheart.”

“He was going to take care of me, you know. Back when the Doctor wasn’t sure he could do this. Jack would have stayed by my side.”

“What? What a minute…what? What do you mean when the Doctor wasn’t sure he could do this?” Jackie demanded. Rose could have kicked herself. For a moment she had forgotten that her mother didn’t know that the Doctor had been such an idiot during the first trimester of her pregnancy. She looked away. “Rose Tyler, you answer me. What do you mean by that?”

“It was nothing, Mum,” she lied, not meeting Jackie’s eyes. “He was just scared. And Jack wasn’t. That’s all. The Doctor had a bit of a freak out and Jack…didn’t. He stayed by my side and kept me calm. He let me know I could do this even if...well, he believed in me.”

“And the Doctor didn’t?”

“The Doctor does,” she said. “Look, he’s had some things happen in the past that were just…”

“Are you trying to justify something? Because it sounds an awful lot like you are.”

“The Doctor believes in me just fine,” she said firmly. “He believes in us. I have absolutely no doubt in that.”

“Now.”

“Yeah,” she admitted.

“And Jack did right from the start.”

Rose nodded, her shoulders slumping. “The Doctor and I are okay now, but for a little while we weren’t and Jack was…he was amazing. I think I could have loved him, eventually. And I don’t know what to think about that, because my heart fully, totally, irrevocably belongs to one man.”

“So don’t think about it,” Jackie said simply.

“What?”

“There’s nothing you can do. Jack knows you care about him, but he also knows that the two of you don’t return his feelings in the same way. You made that clear when you left him here without a word. Yes, he was good to you and it’s good to be grateful for that, but any chance for more is over and he knows that and so do you. There’s no use dwelling on it,” Jackie said practically. “You’ve got a wedding in two days and a baby coming in five weeks. You should be concentrating on that.”

“I know, but…” Rose shook visibly as a contraction shuddered across her womb.

“You all right?” Jackie asked.

Rose took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. She didn’t answer until it was done. “Just another one of those Braxton Hicks things,” she told her mother unconvincingly.

“Are you sure about that?” Jackie asked. “That looked pretty painful.”

“I’ve got a little over a month to go,” Rose said. “The Doctor keeps checking me over. It’s not real labor. They’re just stronger because the baby’s half alien.”

Jackie watched her carefully. “Rose, if the Doctor isn’t sure about this baby—,” she began.

“He is,” Rose said firmly.

“Is he? Is he sure about you?”

“He’s putting up with all this wedding nonsense,” Rose said. “Believe me, he wouldn’t do that if he wasn’t. And…I know you don’t understand the bonding link we share, but…it’s the height of commitment. We will always have a piece of each other’s mind in our heads. We will always know our love for each other is real and how very strong it is.”

Jackie sighed. “Where is that Doctor of yours? He should have been back by now.”

“Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a ripe watermelon at this time of year?” Rose asked. “Especially since that trade Embargo with South America.”

“Why didn’t he just get into that box of his and go somewhere during growing season?” Jackie demanded.

“He doesn’t trust the TARDIS to get him back in time for the wedding, so meanwhile he and Jack are searching the markets to see if they can find me one.”

“You don’t even like watermelon,” Jackie pointed out.

“I do ever since I got pregnant.” A commotion at the front door turned their eyes in that direction and a moment later Jack and the Doctor entered the flat arguing loudly.

“And I still say that if she was going to offer herself to me like that it was only gentlemanly of me to lick the tequila right off her stomach.”

“Not in the middle of the liquor store with her boyfriend standing right there,” the Doctor said. “Surely even you must know enough about 21st century customs not to—.”

Two very wide pairs of eyes met theirs when the two men strolled into the kitchen. The Doctor set down an enormous watermelon in the middle of the table and went immediately to Rose, his hands moving over her stomach before he leant down and kissed her soundly on the mouth. Rose kissed him back and when she broke away she asked, “What were you and Jack doing in a liquor store?”

“Buying you a watermelon,” the Doctor said like it was the most perfectly natural thing on Earth. “It’s hothouse. Hope that’s all right, but I simply couldn’t find one anywhere else and Jack had heard a rumor from Shireen that the liquor store owner’s wife sidelined in selling vodka laced watermelons for parties. She has a greenhouse on the roof of their building. She was happy to provide one for us, sans alcohol.”

“What’s this about Jack and tequila and a woman’s stomach?” Jackie asked with interest.

“You don’t want to know. Just be glad Jack is going to be around to be my best man in two days and not cooling his heels in lock-up,” the Doctor said.

“Hey, she asked.”

“Can’t always take random humans at face value. Even I know that and I’m an alien.”

The Doctor had moved from Rose over to the counter and grabbed a large butcher knife and a cutting board. He moved the watermelon to the cutting board and neatly cut it apart, carving several small pieces and putting them on a plate which he then took to his wife. “It looks good,” he says. “Nice and red.”

Rose greedily grabbed one and scarfed it down. “Delicious,” she agreed when she’d finished the first piece. Thank y—oooou,” she said, taking a deep breath and trying to breathe through the pain.

“How long has this been going on?” the Doctor asked with concern.

“Pretty much since you left,” Jackie said. “I tried to get her to go to hospital but she refuses.”

“And wisely so. Rose can’t go to a human doctor,” he said absently, his focus firmly on Rose. “How far apart are they?”

“About fifteen minutes,” said Rose through clenched teeth.

“They were fifteen minutes,” inserted Jackie. “There was only five between the last two.”

“They are getting stronger,” Rose admitted.

“I think we best get you into the TARDIS and do a scan,” the Doctor said.

“All right,” Rose said. The Doctor took her hands and hauled her up. She swayed unsteadily against him. “I’m dizzy,” she said.

The Doctor looked worried. “You probably just got up too fast. Can you walk?”

“Yeah, of course,” Rose said, but when she took a step forward she felt something snap sharply inside her. She couldn’t help the cry of pain that escaped her lips.

Without further comment the Doctor swept her up into his arms. “Jack, if you’d get the doors between here and the TARDIS,” he said. Jack hurried ahead of them and cleared the way to the infirmary. Jackie trailed behind them.

The Doctor settled Rose onto the exam bed and got the equipment ready while Jack moved to the cabinet and took out a bottle of gel. The Doctor flipped up Rose’s maternity top and Jack squirted the gel onto her stomach. The Doctor moved the scanner across the taut skin and an image appeared on the monitor.

Jackie gasped at the true to life image that showed. “That’s really him,” she said in awe.

“State of the art equipment from my world,” the Doctor said distractedly, his eyes searching only for the source of Rose’s pain as she whimpered. He moved the scanner around some more. “There,” he said. “One of the umbilici has snapped.” He pointed to it and they could see the clearly severed end.

“I thought I had at least another week,” Rose said.

“Apparently not. Now that they’ve started disconnecting it’ll probably take roughly a day to finish the process. I’m putting you on bed rest until this is over,” he said.

“But…the wedding stuff. Mum and I still need to finish the favors and—.”

“Don’t you worry about that, Rose,” Jack said firmly. “I’ll help Jackie. Your number one job is to take care of the baby.”

Rose looked rebellious, but the Doctor said firmly, “Rose, if you don’t rest, you may not have the energy to walk down the aisle in two days and then we’ll have to put up with your mother’s complaining for the rest of our lives.”

“Standing right here,” said Jackie looking like she wanted to smack his arm.

“From everything I’ve read, the detaching of umbilici can be very draining and if we have to put up with your mum on top of that...”

“Standing right exactly here,” Jackie repeated, this time the smack to his arm more than a gleam in her eye.

“All right,” Rose said, but her voice was still mutinous.

“I’ll crawl into bed with you and keep you company,” he said, promise in his voice.

“Yeah?” Rose perked up.

“But no sex.”

“I am so out of here,” said Jackie.

Jack laughed and followed her out. “You did that on purpose,” Rose said.

“Yep. Didn’t want her in here nagging you all day. Now let’s get you tucked into bed.” He picked her up and without even bothering to ask stopped at the bathroom before helping her undress and getting her settled in bed. Then he stripped down to his boxer briefs and climbed in beside her. She settled into the crook of his shoulder.

Her body cringed as another wave of pain went through her. “I can ease that for you if you’ll let me into your mind.”

“Yes, please,” she said when she could speak. His free hand came up to stroke the hair away from her temple and then with the very light touch of two fingertips he dampened the pain center of her brain. With a sigh of relief Rose relaxed against him and closed her eyes, the murmur of his voice lulling her into a dreamlike state halfway between sleep and waking.

Ch. 46: http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/453796.html

Comments

[amberfocus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I feel for Jack a lot here. But he's a resiliant person, even in the worst of situations.