It Was Supposed To Be Happily Ever After...

[prydeful]

Labor is called, well, labor for a reason.

It involves work, which Kate can handle.

It involves pain, which Kate can handle.

But there's no enemy to focus on, nothing to defeat, and that--

That's what makes her scream, while she deals with the collar, with the migraine, with the fear.

She hears Piotr's voice, Hank's voice, Logan's voice--she thinks, she might be hallucinating--and she doesn't know what the hell to do.

Luckily, her body does.




Her name is Tatiana Mala Petravina Rasputina, and Kate is weary as the little girl with silver, metallic eyes. In that, she is most definitely her father's daughter.

She's kinda glad; in her opinion, the more their children take after Piotr, rather than her, the better. (And she doesn't realize she already is thinking about children, as in more than one child.)

(She and Piotr had spent days debating if they should choose to name her for Simon or Mal, as they both care for each man and both owe each man a great deal. But they agreed, finally, that Mala sounded better. And a name that means, "mighty in battle" is probably good for their daughter.)

But she has her daughter, and she has her maybe-will-be-husband, and she thinks it's going to turn out okay.





She should have known better. She never should have dared to even think that.

But for now, let's let her have indulge in her delusion. She just gave birth.

So if visions of outdoor weddings and blue wedding dress that's probably from the bridesmaid shelf, though she'd never admit to it, if images of her daughter going to preschool-kindergarten-college are dancing in her head, well--she is Dream's favorite niece. Let her dream, even during the day.

For today, let's let her believe it will be okay.

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[adamantiumloner]

Logan has been through a lot in his long life, but this last ordeal was a hard one.

Mostly because there was nothing he could do but be there, and that is never something that sits well with him.

Still, they'd made it through, and here was Kate, a brand new mother.

Stepping back into the room after having a much needed cigar outside, Logan casts a small smile at Kate.

"Congrats, kiddo."

[prydeful]

Her smile is sleepy, but definitely happy. "I make the best things, don't I?" she coos while leaning over Tanya.

And then her nose wrinkles.

"You really were dying from nicotine withdrawal if you've been smoking already, weren't you?"

[ooc: Asbestos and mold in apartment; spent five weeks in a hotel hunting for a new one, and one week in the hospital unable to breathe. Just able to type now. Tag!]

[adamantiumloner]

"Lucky for her it looks like she takes after you more than her dad," he joked, waggling a finger at the baby.

"It's a custom," he says about the cigars.

[prydeful]

"Well. She does have her daddy's eyes," she says wryly, looking down at the solid silver orbs. "But I'm willing to believe she looks more like me than her."

The collar that had been put back on for the delivery is only not giving her a headache thanks to a medication Hank developed that affects her nervous system, and God, is she glad for it.

But it has to come off soon, and then--

And then she has to give Tanya to Piotr and depend on Logan, her sensei, her (even if they don't say it) father of her heart, to go with her to...to wherever phasing entirely takes them.

You can't fight evolution forever. And she's been fighting against this next stage of evolving for far too long, so scared of what it mean.

(She remembers her student who had a power like phasing--maybe it was phasing, not just similar. She remembers him never having control over it. And she remembers him phasing away to nothing at the dock by the lake. She thought of him as dead. If this kills her, she won't even leave Piotr a widow, as he said they'd marry when she came back.)

"Eyes aside...she really is a Pryde, isn't she?" Kate murmurs, holding her babe close as she looks up at Logan.

[adamantiumloner]

Logan reaches forward, waggling a finger at the child, already feeling guilt knowing that after this he and Kate will be leaving her. The girl was born into a harsh world, and the road ahead isn't going to be easy.

It just seems wrong to kick it off like this, even if there is no helping that.

"She's made of good stuff," he says, giving Kate a nod.

[prydeful]

Kate nods in turn, staring down at those silver eyes. They aren't mirrors, exactly, due to being orbs, not even exactly reflecting things the way an actual metal orb would. (Then again, her eyes are made of living tissue that just happens to be metal. So how things should reflect from them is however they do.) But they do reflect colors somewhat, and the mix is beautiful and a little hypnotizing.

Tanya's eyes do have faint irises, though Kate suspects people who aren't both physically close to Tanya--she refuses to use Tatiana all the time, though Piotr can; they deliberately picked a Russian name with an English version for a reason--will be able to see that Tanya has them. She prays, a little--actually prays, to the God she isn't sure even exists (and, if He does, she doubts that He listens to prayers after the life she's led) that someday, someone loves her daughter enough to look at Tanya carefully enough to see the irises.

One of the few things she is grateful her mother told her, when Kate was growing up, was that if a man can't tell without looking at you what color your eyes are? He doesn't actually love you. (Granted, her own eyes change depending on what she wears--but Piotr knows, if she's wearing a blue shirt, what color her eyes are, and what color they are if she wears a red one, and everything else. And that still makes her feel like she did at 14, a little, the first time she saw him.)





"...Tomorrow. It's--we need to leave tomorrow, Logan." And then her voice lowers. "I have to leave her tomorrow." Without being sure she's coming back.





"Did I do the right thing? Trying for a baby? I don't regret it, I--look at her, Wolvie. How could I regret it? But...was I selfish? I feel like the worst mother ever."

To no one else but Piotr--Illyana if she were alive, Rachel, maybe, if she were around and they hadn't had the problems that developed when Piotr came back and Kate resumed her relationship with him--would she ever admit this.

[adamantiumloner]

"No, darlin'," he answers, quiet, but with the ferocity of conviction in those words. "You ain't selfish, and you sure as hell aren't the worst. I could name you a few, if you wanted me to."

He gives her a quick smirk, there and gone again and replaced by a stone cold stoicism; unflinching in the belief that Kate hasn't done the wrong thing here.

"If this little sprat turns out t'be half the woman her mother is this world is going to be much better for it."

[prydeful]

"Nah. All I need to do is think about the mothers poor Kurt has, and I know that I'm at least not the worst or the second-worst ever," she says, smile small and faint.

But there.

Then she laughs. "If she's half like me, the world won't be able to cope. I'm hoping she takes at least a little more after Piotr. I wouldn't mind a little Petra pureheart." Beat. "She's totally going to be karma sicking me in the ass, though, isn't she?"

[adamantiumloner]

"She better be. I've been lookin' forward to sittin' back and watching you get run ragged." Like kids have been doing to him all these years.

Tagging now, sorry sorry, I typed this comment before and it must not have gone through.

[prydeful]

"Careful, Logan. If she's like me, she's going to be doing the same thing to you, too. No sitting back and watching in your future. She'll help keep you young," she replies solemnly.

She looks down at her daughter for a moment and wants nothing more than to never, ever let her go. To take her with them when she phases.

She can't. It's not safe for Tanya--and it would be...

It's not just that it would be unfair to Piotr, who's fallen asleep after the stress of the delivery and the joy of seeing and holding their little girl.

It would be cruel. She's damn sure that he's going to be holding Tatiana more than the baby needs (and talking to her, and doing everything he can with her) until they come back.

Which. They will come back.

She just has to tell herself that and try and believe it.

"--If I can't make myself come back, Logan, I'm still making sure that you do," she says finally. "Piotr and Tanya will need you if that happens. And I owe you a ton." A small smile quirks her lips. "You owe me just as many, probably. But I'm not going to hold on to you just so I'm not alone."