Zoe Washburne (tuosheng) wrote in thedoorway, @ 2013-07-29 22:27:00 |
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It'd been a fairly easy delivery. Simon'd had the nerve to point that out when he hadn't been on the other end of it. Had she the energy to get up, she would have corrected that. Instead, Zoe had taken the bundle from the doctor helping out and set her eyes in a tired, steely glare until he got the hint, or more likely until Kaylee or the other doc got it for him. It was hard to mount actual annoyance at the moment, but she was practiced. it'd be nice to have a moment's peace that wasn't swearing or pushing. Zoe's right arm wrapped around the infant, swathed in a brown blanket and resting on her chest. Maybe it hadn't been so bad. Zoe'd like to think she'd had worse on the battlefield. Having a baby was nothing like getting shot, it was longer, and it wasn't the sort of wound you could just patch up, wince, and forget about. With the baby out, Zoe didn't quite feel herself. Sure, it had felt strange the gradual physical awareness of something alien growing inside her: kicking, moving, responding all these months, but now it felt even weirder: empty or as if some part of her'd been blasted off. She was sore as hell and cold too, breathing more deeply than she had in months. She was tired, but too awake to rest. Maybe in some ways it was kind of like being shot. It felt more like losing someone. That was a familiar feeling. Only the warm and moving weight between her chest and arms like a second heart was there to remind her she hadn't--not entirely. She'd lost a hell of a lot for this baby. The father twice, a good bit of her identity, space. But out that all, she'd had something special to show for it. Zoe's fingers idly brushed the sparse, dark hair of the infant. She'd wanted a boy, a boy like his father. bright and wild and strong. But this girl, she was beautiful. There was never a good time to have a baby. And maybe this was a terrible place for it. They'd go back, she'd cease to be. Zoe'd go back, and these feds would feed her their lies. But Zoe wanted to believe they'd stay, even without space or Serenity or Malcolm Reynolds. And she wanted to believe if she didn't, Lee and Kaylee would raise her right. Or Christopher. Or that Pepper'd do right by her. That maybe Wash's smile and her rare laugh might have a shot on Earth-that-Was, like she'd have back home. Zoe'd had names in mind--names Wash had shot down when he was here. They'd agreed nothing morbid. Then they'd agreed on a dead war buddy. Tracey worked for a boy or a girl. And didn't a kid like him deserve a second chance? Not as much as Hoban or Miranda, maybe, but the War'd claimed many not near as deserving. Still they say you never knew a baby's name until they're there and that was the case with this one. Earth-that-Was was awash with second chances. Folk could come back from the dead. They could come back when they'd been gone before. They could come back from the past or the future or even from movies and television waves. But for some folk, coming leaving meant they lost that chance. That they might come back and not find that hope or cure again or that love. And they deserved that chance more than Tracey. She was naming her Serra. |