D is for Daughter

[parallax23]

DAUGHTER

 

Karmic retribution.

That had to be it.

This was karmic retribution for every horrible thing he had ever done in his life. Rachel. All those one night stands, a hundred fake promises and a million other things Psy-Ops had wiped out of his head. Now it was time to pay the piper.

Everyone else in the infirmary waiting area had been beside themselves with glee, Logan especially. But all Alec could do was drop himself into a chair and hope that no one was watching his despair. He had thought he could deal with all of this until now. Did it have to be a girl?

It just figured. All of his bad ideas involved women, how was this any different?

Lola. Rachel. What’s her name with a V. Max.

Alec let out a sigh. She was his best friend. That was how he had been suckered into this twisted little arrangement. That was how he now had a daughter that wouldn’t be his daughter.

The idea hadn’t seemed so bad when Max and Logan first pitched it to him. They couldn’t have children of their own – genetic incompatibility, the doctor said. But they still wanted a family of their own.

It had started off as a joke in Command about Max and Alec being former breeding partners. That was what instigated this whole mess. They were so genetically compatible for one another that Manticore had tried to force them to procreate. It was Logan who asked Alec though, not Max. He had been so desperate but she was skeptical about the whole thing, fearing what it would do to her already complicated relationship with Alec. In the end, it became clear that either she would have to raise a pure X5 child with Alec’s DNA or a human child fathered by Logan and an unknown surrogate.

Alec wasn’t a family guy. In fact, he recalled being told that any child he ever fathered would be Manticore property. He had been willing to hand off his and Max’s first-born to Renfro to save his own ass. Handing the kid over to Max and Logan for them to raise in a loving and nurturing environment would be a piece of cake. Besides, he would get to play godfather with the kid. He would get to see it all the time and have none of the parental responsibility. It was a win-win situation all around.

Then why did it feel like he had lost everything the moment he laid eyes on her?

Max had thought it best for Alec to meet the baby alone before anyone else. The request had seemed odd and no one really understood why she wanted that. Logan was a bit taken aback by it, but it was what Max wanted. When Alec entered the room, he understood why.

He went over to the bed where Max was sitting, she looked like she’d crawled through a Phalanx attack alone and come back. She was smiling in a way Alec had never seen her do before. He sat next to her, his eyes transfixed on the tiny sleeping bundle in her arms. The only other baby he had ever seen was Gem’s daughter Meg. She cried a lot and occasionally smelled or puked, which was why Alec avoided her like the plague.

Somehow, he felt differently about this one. He could watch her for all eternity and not mind.

“She’s perfect,” Max declared.

“Of course she is. Did you expect any less from me?” Alec said with a wry grin. His large hand covered her whole head when he touched it. “She’s blonde. I was always a sucker for blondes.”

This caused Max to laugh. “Oh, that’s why you have such a hard time saying no to Logan?”

Alec scowled at her, but she ignored him.

“Do you want to hold her?” asked Max.

A look of genuine terror crossed his face. Hold it? What if he broke her? “I never held a baby before.”

“Here, I’ll show you,” she said and placed the dozing creature in his arms.

She weighed next to nothing and his heart rate accelerated. She was just so fragile. Max helped him adjust into the right position to support the baby’s head. As Alec held her, an unexpected feeling came over him. He hadn’t expected it to be so abrupt or so deep, he just knew she was his and that he didn’t want to give her up. Never let her go. Was this what Berrisford felt about Rachel? The thought made him feel a million times worse for what he had done. Oh, this was definitely karmic retribution.

“She’ll always be your daughter,” Max whispered in his ear. “You can come see her whenever you want.”

Alec nodded. “Even at 2am on a school night?”

“You better not be coming back from some cheap fling or a strip club, because then no way in hell. Otherwise if she’s got my nocturnal DNA, then yeah,” Max told him. "But if she’s got your penchant for sleeping through an earthquake, you can take her to school in the morning."

“I can live with that,” he said like it was nothing, but they both knew it meant everything to him. “And when those punks start lining up at the door to take her out, and that will be a long line, let them know it’s me and not Logan that they have to go through. No offense but Logan’s not intimidating enough for such a huge task.”

Max laughed. She was happy that he had taken such a vested interest in their little girl, not that Logan wouldn’t do a good job. Max had only just met her and couldn’t imagine life without her. But Alec had promised to give her up to make his friends happy. He deserved to have her all to himself for a brief moment, to know the joy that he was giving them.

“Don’t you even want to know her name?”

“You already picked one? Please tell me you didn’t name her anything ridiculous,” Alec pleaded. “I mean, Fixit?”

“Ralph?”

“Point taken,” he relented. “So what is it before I decide to exercise some parental rights?”

“Eva Rachel Guevara.”

Alec smiled, not smirked. “Perfect name for my perfect girl.”

He kissed the top of her head.

Definitely karmic retribution for his past sins.

He’d been forgiven.