Chicken or the Egg? (DC comics) Piper/Trickster
Title: Chicken or the egg? Author: Seftimiu aka Brain Freeze Rating: PG-13 Disclaimer: Don't own, don't make money off of it. Xenos and Dree are part of an RPG. Warning: MPREG don't like, don't read. Prompt/Challenge: The challenge? Is M-preg. Notes: Sequel to Even in Death, but it isn't necessary to read it first.
"I'm perfectly fine!" Trickster scoffed as he threw himself down on the couch. "So, I have no idea why you're insisting that we stay here." He was absolutely not pouting. Really. He wasn't. Okay. Maybe a little.
Xenos raised a brow and tilted his head. But said nothing. Dree translated for those not fluent in Xenosese. "You're fine, yes. But, you've only been alive for a couple of weeks. Just like if you were in a bad car accident and were in the hospital with a head injury? They'd still keep you a while to make sure you're not going to have a bad reaction to something. Well, if you had good insurance in the States, that is. If not, they'd probably put a band-aid on you and kick you out!"
"If there's any problems, we'll call you." Trickster told them, attempting to stand up only to be pulled down again by Piper.
"It won't hurt to stay another couple of weeks." Piper had his hand firmly knotted in Trickster's shirt. His knuckles almost white. "It's not that long in the scheme of things. And it would just make me feel better to know that nothing is going to go wrong. If it goes wrong here? They can fix it."
Dree nodded. "Come on, don't you trust your own dad?" He beamed at Trickster, smacking his own chest. "Haven't you ever heard the term 'Father knows Best?"
"You're taking way too much pleasure in calling yourself my dad. You know you're not, right?" James narrowed his eyes at him.
"I absolutely am!" Dree argued, still grinning at him. "Don't worry! I'm perfectly fine with ties on father's day. Now, you are staying here, for two more weeks. No arguments. It's either that, or... we go with you back to the States and hang out at your place. Eat all your fooooood. Chat up all your friends. Tell embarrassing pre-life stories. Like... remember that tiiiiiime when you were being shoved in the casket and your head fell off? Wasn't that just hilarious?"
"You're a psycho." James said after a moment.
"Thank you for noticing!" Dree grinned. "But that's so not the point. Either you stay here? Or... we go with you. I don't care which? But we did not spend all this time trying to get you back together in one piece for you to screw it up because you're stubborn and trying to be independent."
"If we went back to the United States." Piper started carefully, looking at Dree as he spoke. "And you went with us? If something did go wrong, could you still correct it? Away from your workroom?"
"Sortenly!" Dree nodded. "Of course! But I'd have to be within range of him. So yeah, doesn't matter if we're here or there, but for the next two weeks? I want to be within that range of him. Look, I have descendants, yeah. I love them. Yeah! But I only have three living children now. Him, and two others. And those other two? They're not even on this planet right now. My other children over the centuries have ascended to other realms and I'm no longer in contact with them. Can you honestly blame me for wanting to keep track of him and keep him alive?"
"You act like I'm a newborn." James said with a scowl. His arms crossed over his chest. "I assure you, I don't need my diaper changed, and I've been burping myself for years."
"You're my newborn. Well, so to speak." Dree argued. "True, you're not a baby. But you're still my son! For the last few months? I and Xenos have been putting all our work and focus into bringing you back into the world. My blood and semen went into creating you. What is the definition of a father, if not only genetic material, but actually caring about what happens to the end product that is a being? You, are, my son. And whether you like it or not? I care! I'm not going to throw away all the attention, power, and magic we put into this now. You're stuck with me."
"James." Piper took a deep breath. "The manor is falling apart, but is still livable. We stay there, and you can have privacy. And they're there if we need them. They keep to themselves, we keep to our part. It'll be like they're not even there!"
Dree clapped his hands together. "It's decided. I'lllll get the plane tickets."
"This place is a dump." Dree had declared the moment the door closed behind them.
"Thank you." Piper rolled his eyes and turned to flip the light switch. There was a desperate zzz zzz sound, and then a loud POP. He sighed and let his hands fall. "It needs a bit work. I've not felt like messing with it."
"Yeahhhh, we can tell." Dree nodded, rolling his own eyes. He unbuttoned his sleeves and slowly rolled each one up. "Okay, stand back."
"Why, what are you going to do?" Piper asked, even as he took a step back.
"Just get back." Dree gave him a look and then stepped forward.
Xenos leaned against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest before reaching out and pulling James back by the shirt. He didn't speak and just shook his head at any questions.
Dree didn't use magic words, or speaking backwards. Instead, he lifted his hands, closed his eyes and concentrated. It started with the space around him, and then spread.
"Cheater." Xenos pronounced minutes later when Dree was done. He flipped the now working switch and walked further into the pristine foyer. "Neat-freak." He added as well.
"I'm allergic to dust." Dree's mouth dropped open as he defended himself and stalked after his friend and partner in crime.
"OCD." Xenos pronounced. "Not allergic."
"I sneeze." Dree protested, as he followed Xenos up the steps.
"You go into spasms if people leave a paper in the middle of the floor and do not pick it up." Xenos said quietly, but in the cavernous hall, it echoed back to Piper and Trickster.
"Those are not spasms, they're... me... moving to pick it up because..."
"O. C. D." Xenos slammed the door shut, muting their voices and leaving Trickster and Piper alone.
"They, are so married." James shook his head as he headed for the kitchen, Piper on his heels.
"I'm not so sure. There's been times I've thought they were together, myself, and then times that... well they seem more like brothers or close friends." Piper opened a cabinet. "I only have canned goods. I was planning on being gone a while, after all. Trickster? You snacked the entire flight. And we stopped for burgers on the way home!"
"I'll take it! I'm starved!" Trickster said, almost desperately as he grabbed a can down and looked for the can opener. "I'll just be glad when they go away again."
He plugged the can opener in and shoved the can into it, clamping the contraption down on it using his upper wrist. You didn't need a hand to push a lever down.
"James? Why are you opening a can of Palm hearts?" Piper made a slight face as he watched Trickster remove the lid and toss it aside.
"Because I'm hungry." He insisted, rooting around for a fork.
"That, is so gross. I can't even begin to contemplate the level of grossness." Piper slowly pronounced as he watched James eat it from the can. "I hate those things. Mom... used them in salad." He frowned quietly as he thought back.
"Then you don't have to eat it. But I'm hungry." James leaned against the counter as he chewed his way through them.
Piper shuddered and shook his head. "I'm going out. I'll get some proper groceries. You can either come, or stay here with... your parents." He smirked the last part.
"I'm going with you. No way am I staying with Mr. Creepy and his partner Mr. McPsycho." James tossed the can in the garbage and threw the fork in the sink. "Besides, if I leave you to do all the shopping, you'll come home with nothing but stuff that's good for me."
"Yes. I'm just that cruel. I want you to be healthy." Piper said blandly as James bounded out without listening to him.
Which is how Piper found himself at the local market pushing an overloaded cart while James threw things in. "We need these." He insisted, placing them on top of the growing pile.
"No. We don't." Piper tried to put his foot down. "You're just hungry and everything looks good right now."
"No, well, yes. I am. But that's not the point." James insisted.
"We have more than enough food in the cart. We do not need Winnie the Pooh shaped frozen ravioli." Piper narrowed his eyes.
"How, can you deny Winnie the Pooh?" James asked, scandalized as he hugged the box against his chest with the arm that lacked a hand, for added 'pathetic'. "Look at him! He's stuffed with cheese!"
"Fine. We'll get Winnie the Pooh, but that's it. Because, I'm not even sure what we're going to do with all this food we got already. I was just planning on picking something up for supper and food for tomorrow. There's enough here for at least a month." He pushed the cart with a little difficulty around the corner, heading to the check out.
He was just unloading the cart on the belt when he heard the gasp. He'd been so focused on James, that he had blocked out almost all other voices and sounds.
James meanwhile hadn't heard or noticed yet as he was raiding the candy beside the check out, throwing various bars onto the conveyer belt. "Oh, and a diet soda." He pronounced with finality, grabbing it and putting it with the rest.
Piper was in mid-chuckle at James when they were very nearly tackled. "How? When... How did..." The voices were overlapping.
"Wow. I feel like a rock-star!" Trickster stated, trying to pull away from the strong hands holding his arms. "Hey? Starting to attract attention. You know?" He pointed to others watching them closely. "Nothing to see, people. Continue about your business. I just owe them money. You know how it is."
"You were dead." Wally's voice was lowered now while Linda stood just behind him.
"I got better." Trickster said with sincerity while the cashier hurriedly ran things over the scanner. "It's not exactly something we should talk about here, yanno?" He said, tilting his head toward the cashier. Piper was quickly putting bags in the cart as she finished scanning them and bagging them.
"Then we will just have to go somewhere we CAN talk." Wally told him, his voice serious and resolute. "Linda? Would you mind heading back alone while I talk with them?"
She shook her head, but there was a sense of 'here we go again' somewhere in her face.
Piper shook his head slowly and put the rest of the bags in the cart, before running a card through the reader. He took the slip, put it in his pocket and pushed the cart to the car. "We need spray paint." Trickster pronounced as Piper loaded the bags into the trunk. The speedster slid into the backseat while James got into the passenger side.
"We are not turning my car into the new Trickster-mobile." Piper told him severely.
"You have no sense of fun and adventure. What do you think? Yellow with blue stripes? Or orange with blue stripes?" James asked, looking over his shoulder at Wally. "Or should I just go crazy and go with polka dots?"
"How about you tell me how you're alive again?" Wally asked instead.
"Piper didn't give up on me." James half shrugged while he battled with his seat belt. Piper didn't move to help him, but cautiously watched from the side. As soon as he heard the snickt sound, he turned the key to the motor and started the car.
"He actually found a magician that would help him?" Wally asked. "I... I knew he was trying to. I wanted to talk him out of it, but he... disappeared on me. I was just worried. That's all. I know that those things could go wrong, and I didn't want him hurt."
"He..." James paused and thought about the answer very carefully. Dree had warned them that there were special circumstances to bringing someone back, and that it was pretty much considered 'illegal' even among magic users. That it didn't always work, and that the failures were higher than the accomplishments. And that sometimes? The failures were deadly for those involved, and not just for the dead guy.
"Risked his life to get me back." He told him. "You could say he went and got me. It wasn't a fun ride for him." Though inside, he was chuckling because there were so many jokes that could be made about that statement. And it was only half-truths anyway, because Trickster had fun!
"Not exactly something that I or anyone else could recommend for everyone." He clicked his tongue. "But I'm still glad he did it! And don't you go making him feel guilty!"
"I'm, I'm not going to try to make him feel guilty." Wally said weakly. "I was just worried about him. He was getting so, so obsessed with it. And I didn't know you would be able to come back like that! I was afraid he was setting himself up for a fall. I'm... I'm GLAD I was wrong."
"So, does this mean you're staying with Piper?" Wally asked, glancing at Piper for a second before looking back at Trickster.
"Yeah. Yeah I am." Trickster nodded after a moment. "I followed him home, and he gets to keep me! He's promised to take me for walkies, every day. And he feeds and waters me. He even bought me Disney food. Now that? That's love." He fluttered his eyelashes and leaned over to put his head on Piper's shoulder for a second.
"Seriously?" Wally asked, leaning forward and angling to try and get a look at James' face.
"Sitting right here." Piper sing-songed. He felt so ignored.
"Seriously." James nodded. "Is it that big a deal?"
"No." Wally answered. "Just a surprise, is all. Before you died? You were pretty vocal about how straight you were. Even I heard about it! I just, didn't think you'd... be... yeah."
"I doth protested too mucheth." James said in a very bad English accent. "Arrre we done catching up on this crap? Or can we please move on to better gossip? Liiiiike, am I cleared and no longer going to have to hide and run away from you?"
Wally shook his head adamantly. "No, no, nothing like that. You're not wanted. You both have been cleared, and I really really owe you a big apology. I'm sorry. I..." He sighed. "I'm sorry."
"Oooo, guilt. I hear guilt in his voice." James said, his voice sounding just a tad gleeful. "I thinnnk we can use this! How guilty do you feel?" He turned to look at Wally, and waved his handless arm at him, for emphasis.
"What are you wanting me to do?" Wally narrowed his eyes at him.
"Nothing, at the moment. I just want you to remember this guilty feeling later, if I need a favor." Trickster grinned. "Hey, I never said I wasn't opportunistic!"
"No, no one can ever say that." Wally sighed. "Piper? Do YOU need anything? I'm really--"
"No." Piper interrupted him, pulling to a stop.
"Are you sure--"
"No. We're fine."
Wally paused only a second and then nodded, looking down before letting himself out of the car and speeding away.
"You're still pissed at him." James said, sounding almost amused as well as amazed.
"Hm." Piper pulled away from the stop and continued back to the home he'd grown up in. For the rest of the ride, he refused to engage in any conversation.
James wasn't quite sure what was wrong as he entered the kitchen while Piper was putting the groceries away.
He'd been fine and then it was like all of a sudden, someone flipped a switch and he was bone tired. Sitting on a stool, he felt like he was about to nod off as one of Piper's rats scurried over the counter toward him. He watched it with a kind of vacant fascination as it bounded up to his wrist and then scurried up his arm.
"I think he likes you." Piper commented, watching from where he was putting things in the freezer.
"Huh. He's got taste." James declared vaguely.
"Are you all right?" Piper shut the freezer door and frowned.
He rubbed his eyes with his only hand and nodded. "Just fine. Tired. But fine. I think it's jetlag. I might just go take a nap." He stood as the rat balanced on his shoulder and nuzzled his ear.
"Not hungry anymore?" Piper asked, raising his brows.
James shook his head, feeling weary. He felt exhausted! "I'll eat when I get up. Just a bit of a nap, and I'll be good." He promised. He leaned in and kissed the side of Piper's head, passing an affectionate hand over his arm.
Piper frowned in confusion as he watched Trickster leave the room.
------------------------------------------
"Come on, kiddo. Time to wake up."
Trickster turned away from the light that was insistently trying to shine in his eyes. "Five more minutes." He muttered, grabbing for a pillow and trying to pull it over his head.
"Nope. We gave you five more minutes three days ago. Time to get up. You need to eat." Dree told him.
As soon as he heard the word eat, his stomach growled and he realized how starved he really was. He blearily opened an eye and glanced around the room.
Piper was kneeling on the bed beside him, one of his hands wrapped around his own, squeezing it. Xenos was standing at the foot of the bed, arms crossed over his chest and looking faintly amused.
Dree shined the pen light in his eyes a couple more times and then clicked it off before shoving it in his pocket. He reached out and rubbed under James ears, then further down on his throat. "I should have noticed how much you were eating." He shook his head to himself.
"You wouldn't, because you eat a lot yourself under normal circumstances." Xenos muttered from the bed.
"Something went wrong." Trickster stated instead of asked as he squeezed Piper's hand. For the first time, he felt a real flash of fear zip through him. He didn't think it could have happened. But apparently, it did.
"Nah. Not wrong, per se." Dree shook his head, smirking. "Just, hm." He ducked his head down and started laughing.
Just as Trickster was about to sit up and punch him, Xenos reached out and smacked the back of Dree's head. "Tell him, idiot!"
"Tell me what?" James demanded.
"Now, now, watch your temper. It's not good in your condition." Dree grinned, only to get smacked on the back of the head again by Xenos.
Trickster tightened his fist in Piper's hand and growled low in his throat.
"You have a little person inside you." Dree paraphrased House, pointing a finger at Trickster's stomach.
"What?" Trickster narrowed his eyes. "What did you do to me?" He sat up straighter, prepared to launch himself at Dree.
"Me? I didn't do anything to you! Piper on the other hand? You stud!" Dree smirked as he winked. He also took a few steps back. "You're pregnant."
"That's impossible." Trickster relaxed, rolling his eyes. Oh, a joke. Funny. Not. He'd come up with better pranks when he was a child.
"Not kidding here." Dree said, a bit more serious. "You're pregnant. You're with child. You've got a bun in your oven. Expecting! Up the duff." He stopped when Xenos popped him on the back of the head again.
Trickster shook his head and let go of Piper's hand, shifting so he could climb out of the bed. "Joke's over. Move." He ordered, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.
"I'm not jokinnnng." Dree insisted. "You're pregnant. Piper got you pregs. It's not my fault you two are like rabbits! I didn't give you the libido. Just the genetic make-up to make it possible."
"What the HELL are you talking about?" Trickster stood up and pushed past the two men, trailed by Piper who didn't seem to be able to meet his eyes. He was also twisting his fingers together, biting his lip.
Trickster was heading straight for the kitchen. He was half starved, and his stomach growled again. He felt like he could clean the kitchen out of food. "It is impossible for the male to become pregnant. We learn that when we're little kids."
"Annnnd yet..." Dree chuckled, following slowly behind them all. "Look, did you all miss the part where I keep telling you that I'm not human?"
"Did you miss the part, where I am?" James opened the freezer and took out two TV dinners and threw them both in the microwave. He grabbed a soda from the fridge and opened it while the food was radiated.
"Not anymore." Dree rolled his eyes. "It was my genetic material that went into the clay that covered your bones. I'm not human, therefore you are not human, because you're my kid. I can get pregnant, therefore you can. And you are." He explained slowly, enunciating every word carefully as though Trickster was a particularly slow-witted child.
"This isn't funny." A trickle of dread felt like ice water going down his spine.
"It's not meant to be." Dree said seriously. "You are pregnant. It's really not that bad, it's just that--"
Trickster held up a hand. "I don't have a uterus!" He insisted.
"Not in a traditional manner. But it doesn't matter, because, well... it's in an egg. There's little duct thing that's just off to the side, and it's... I could draw you pictures? But your insides are a lot like a bird's." Dree said it with such complete sincerity that James was left blinking in confusion. Unsure of what he'd just said.
"What?" He closed his eyes and then opened them again.
"Egg. See, it's well, it kinda starts out like um... soft shelled egg? And then it kind of hardens?" Dree pulled an egg out of the fridge and showed it to him. "Onllllly, it gets bigger before it hardens. Inside. You know?"
"You're trying to say I'm going to lay an egg?" Trickster felt his eye twitch.
"Wellllllllll..." Dree winced. "Yeah? My race was originally winged. Actually? I'm supposed to have wings."
"Why don't you have wings now?" Trickster felt inane, asking such a thing. But he was kind of in a numb shock.
"Because they cut them off when I got banished from my realm and stripped of my rank. See, I was kinda sorta a bad guy? And they don't take well to that kind of thing where I'm from. So, hello machete, goodbye wings." Dree shrugged a shoulder. "You don't have wings, simply because well, your skeleton didn't have wings to begin with. But your kid has a fifty fifty chance of having them, because Piper is human."
The food dinged and Trickster took it out. He couldn't taste it as he methodically and mechanically ate. This had to be a joke.
Piper hadn't spoken a word since he'd woken, and was still anxiously standing nearby, twisting his fingers together. "You believe this crap?"
"I didn't at first, but they... they started running tests. And they, came back positive. And, James? You slept for three days. In a hibernation! And I really really didn't know this could happen!" He said the last in a rush.
He could almost hear the words 'don't kill me' in the air.
"I need to be alone." James told them, throwing the remains of the trays away and stalking out the door. "Don't follow me. Just, leave me alone."
Piper winced and listened as the door slammed.
That went better than he thought it would.
Piper wasn't aware of how tense he was until he jumped when he heard the door slam again, heralding James' return. Without preamble, James asked. "How does this baby thing work? I mean, how does it last, how does it come out, and what the hell goes on?"
Dree paused in mid-bite and looked at him dumbfounded before slowly putting his spoon down and answering. "Well, for the first two or three months, you'll go back and forth between eating and extended periods of sleep. The egg will grow for seven months, during which time it will have a thick but soft shell. Then, for about two weeks after that, it goes from soft to hard, and that is when you'll uh... lay an egg, so to speak. It'll come out of your vent. Then you'll need to take care of said egg for two and a half months, keeping it warm while the baby finishes developing inside. Then, it hatches." He shrugged a shoulder and acted like this should be common knowledge.
"You couldn't have say, warned us, that I was not going to be normal?" James glared at Dree.
"Well, I kept telling you, you were my son. I kept telling you, I'm not human. You didn't want to hear it. Don't blame me for you being stubborn. And you wouldn't have believed me anyway. But I take it you're, you know..." He gestured vaguely at his stomach. "You know."
"Yeah, I'll you know." Trickster glared at him. "But if you think for a moment I'm not going to take advantage of this and make everyone my willing slave? You're kidding. In fact? I want a fluffy blanket and some tea, and I want to use the comfy chair!"
And with that, he stomped off into the living room leaving Piper in vague shock.
"This is going to be a very long nine or ten months." Piper sighed, and went to get the blanket, but as he turned away, he smiled. He'd been worried that Trickster would be dead-set against it. With that worry laid to rest, it was worth any and all lunacy.