Vow
by Alicia McKenzie
DISCLAIMER: The characters belong to Marvel, and are used without permission for entertainment purposes only. This could be read as a prequel/companion piece to Promise.
I can't do this without you.
It wasn't the first time I'd woken up to her voice in my mind. Bright Lady willing, it wouldn't be the last. But I'd never heard such fear along our link before, never felt terror like that in her. It didn't go away, even when I opened my eyes and saw her standing there at the tent door, staring out into the light of the sunrise. Even when she had to have known I was awake, and listening.
I might have called her name; I'm not sure.
It was when she turned that I knew, that the trembling hand pressed lightly to her abdomen and the tears pouring down her face told me all that I needed to know. Tears. It was the first time she'd cried since the morning I'd carried her out of that Canaanite bunker, wrapped in my cloak and clinging to me as if I were a rock in the sea.
I can't do this without you.
Six simple, desolate words, with a world of meaning inside them. Six words to tell me that the nightmare was complete, that there was a new life growing inside her, a child of the woman I love with all my heart and the madman I hate just as deeply. Six words to beg for help she didn't think I'd give. . .oath, I could see it in her eyes. The doubt. The dread that I'd leave her to deal with this alone.
I can still feel it now, nearly twenty hours later, like a ghost on the link as she sleeps in my arms and I try to keep her dreams away as my own tears fall.
Oh, Jen. As if I'd ever tell you no. I'll never stop hating him for what he did to you, but if I let that destroy us, then he wins.
And compared to your pain, my pride is worth less than dust.
I told you this morning, and this afternoon, and tonight. With and without words, when you were listening and when you weren't.
I'll be here, Aliya. If this is your choice, if you can find the strength to do this, to have and raise this child and put that night behind you, then I can do the same. . .have to do the same. Partners in everything, Jen. Forever.
I want so many things. To hold you as tightly as I dare, and take away your nightmares. To find Stryfe and toss every shred of humanity I possess to the winds so it won't get in the way of finding new and creative ways to make him suffer before I kill him.
More than anything, though, I want to see you smile again. I want to see you walk into a room with your head high and your shoulders straight. I want those shadows gone from your eyes. . .
If this is what it takes, if this is your act of defiance, your way of spitting in the face of that darkness, so be it.
And I love you for it. I may end up acting like the world's worst overprotective husband over the next nine months - try not to maim me too badly for it, Jen - but I'll be right there beside you all the way.
Love is stronger than hate, stronger than fear. Love is courage. . .but you already knew that, didn't you?
And love will be this child's - our child's - inheritance.
fin