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It was stupid o'clock in the morning in LA when Anders' phone rang; the little girl on the other end didn't understand things like 'timezones'. Of course, it wouldn't have mattered if she did. Carys had finally realized that neither of her parents were on the island and that was a problem because she was.

"Daddy! Daaaaadddyyyy. DaddyDaddyDaddy!" she chanted into the phone while it rang.

It had been a long but (ultimately) good night for Anders and Kathy, and t felt like they'd barely fallen asleep before Anders' phone started ringing. He rolled over and answered it one-handed.

"What?" he said, sleepy. "Who's this?"

When he was more awake he'd remember the day-after-prom principle.

"Daddyyyyy!" Carys was excited to be using the phone and her excitement carried through at a very high pitch. And volume. "Daddy, where are you? I'm here and you're not here! Mommy says I'm not s'posed to be wandering by myself yet because I'm too little! Where is Mommy, is she there with you?"

Kathy, for her part, was curled up in bed next to him, tugging a pillow over her head. She couldn't hear individual words coming from Anders' phone, just a stream of noise. "Tell whoever it is to go away and come back to sleep," she mumbled, tugging on his arm.

"Dear Maker," Anders murmured, pinching the bridge of his nose. He gave Kathy a rueful glance and poked her with his foot so she'd know to pay attention.

Their possible future daughter was adorable, but was showing up at the worst possible time.

"Mommy and I are in Los Angeles, Carys," he said, as evenly as he could manage. "Where are you? Are you in Fandom?"

"Where's Lost Angeles?" Carys asked. "Is it far away? Can I come there? I've never been to Lost Angeles before! And I'm with Uncle Dante! I went to your room to find you but you weren't there and I was sad but then Uncle Dante said I could have a strawberry sundae for breakfast!"

Well, he'd said she could have all the strawberry shit she wanted, but that included a sundae, right?

Kathy grumpily poked Anders back, still hiding under her pillow--at least until he said Carys, which had her throwing the pillow off to stare at him in surprise. Somehow the possibility of tiny potential children showing up to mess up all their plans had completely slipped from mind.

"He's grumpy in the mornings," Carys confided.

"Oh, you're with Dante," Anders said, stressing the name and raising his eyebrows at Kathy. There was no way he was a good influence, was there? "He does get a little grumpy, doesn't he? And Los Angeles is a little too far for you to come, but we'll be there just as soon as we can."

He said that 'we' without thinking.

"Are there other kids for you to play with while you're waiting?"

Kathy bolted upright in bed. Dante was not a suitable babysitter for their tiny, impressionable daughter, Anders! Especially considering he wasn't even talking to her right now.

"I dunno, some," Carys said. "Daddy, can I have a little brother or a sister? Then I'd always have someone to play with. My brothers from last year aren't here, but if I had one of my very own, then I wouldn't have to wait!"

...It made sense. To a five year old.

Anders choked on air.

"That'll be a really good question for your parents at home," he said. "Remember, we're a little younger than they are. They'd know better."

He finally remembered his phone had a speaker button, and hit it so Kathy could hear their daughter too.

"What's a really good question?" Kathy asked, pulling the sheets up higher over her shoulders. No, Carys couldn't see them, but it still felt weird, talking to their five year old while naked.

"Hi, Mommy!" Carys said, bouncing in her excitement. "Mommy, Mommy, hi! I was just asking Daddy if I could have a little brother or a sister! He said to ask at-home Mommy and Daddy cause they're older, but if I ask you, then you have more time, right?"

Now Kathy was also wheezing. And part of her wanted to check the condoms, just in case. "Uhhh, I don't think it works like that, sweetheart," she said.

"Why?"

"Because if we had a baby right now, it'd be older than you, not younger," Anders explained, once he was past the immediate urge to bury his head in his hands and pretend none of this was happening. "So we can't help you with a baby brother or sister, can we?"

He was already fumbling for his bag. The lazy morning he'd wanted clearly wasn't going to happen.

"Oh," Carys said, mulling that logic over in her mind. It seemed sound; she'd have to think about how much fun it would be to have a big sibling compared to a little one.

Maybe she should just ask for the mabari.

"Do you and Mommy love each other now?" she asked. "You didn't last year and I had two brothers. Now I don't have any."

Kathy was taking the low road. She was doing what Anders had not and buried her head back under the pillow. Maybe she could suffocate before Carys asked any more questions.

Anders looked at Kathy, panic in his eyes. They weren't exactly at the declaration-of-love-to-the-world stage yet. But if their five-year-old was asking...

"We, um ... yes. We do."

It felt like the safest answer -- and besides, it happened to be true.

"But it's a secret, okay? Don't tell anybody else."

KATHY WAS HIDING, SHE COULDN'T SEE YOUR PANIC!EYES, ANDERS!

...Okay, no, she was coming out from under the pillow to twine her fingers with his. For, umm, moral support. And because Kathy fully believed that when your five-year-old wanted to know if you loved each other, you said yes.

"We do," she agreed. "Saranghae forever, isn't that right?"

"Yay!" Carys cheered. She hadn't really understood what they'd meant last year (love was love, wasn't it? And they were her parents!) but they were saying yes this year, so it all worked out. "How come it's a secret? Is that why Uncle Dante's being so mean about Mommy?"

And back under the pillow Kathy went, groaning.

"Has anyone ever told you that you ask too many questions?" Anders returned. Because that was easier than trying to figure out how to explain 'no, Uncle Dante is mad because Mommy won't leave a zombie apocalypse' to a child.

He'd found his trousers and was yanking them on.

"Yes," Carys said. Because it was true. "But you say it's a sign that I'm a smart little girl. And Mommy says that you probably asked a millionty questions all the time when you were little like me."

So clearly this was your fault, Anders.

"Okay, Carys," Kathy said, finally setting the pillow aside for good and joining Anders on a hunt for clothing. "Your Daddy and I have to get situated here. Can you be good for, umm, Uncle Dante for a little while longer?"

"Yes!" Carys cheered. "We're having strawberry sundaes for breakfast!"

Kathy winced. Though, as far as breakfasts went, there were probably worse options. "You'll be having a lunch with lots of vegetables, then," she warned.

"Okay, Mommy," Carys said, giggling. The important thing was strawberry sundaes now.

"We'll be with you just as soon as we can," Anders said -- slightly muffled by the way he was yanking his shirt over his head. (Thankfully, he'd thought to pack something besides his tux.) "And leave some ice cream for the other kids, all right?"

She promised she would -- not sounding entirely as though she meant it -- and they said their "I love yous" and goodbyes, after which Anders flopped back down on the hotel bed. His socks and shoes weren't on yet, and his hair was a wreck.

"I guess we're going back to Fandom," he said, sounding resigned. "Little girl counting on us, all of that."

Edited 2016-04-17 18:02 (UTC)

"This was not at all how I was planning on spending the day," Kathy said, leaning over him to comb out the tangles in his hair with her fingers. "I'm not sure how we didn't think about it, though. It is the weekend after prom."

She wasn't addressing that 'we' yet. She had a lot to consider.

"I didn't know it could hit if we were off the island," Anders admitted. "... not that I was thinking about it."

Maker, he hoped Leo wasn't on the island and fatherless too.

"And it wasn't my plan either. We can't just leave her with Dante, though."

"No, no we can't," Kathy said, pinching the bridge of her nose. "He wouldn't be my first choice of baby-sitters even if he didn't hate me."

All she had here was her gi; the rest of her clothes were stashed close to her parents' apartment so she could change quickly before and after leaving. But that always happened at night; she wasn't prepared to have to run about in rainbows in the daylight.

"He doesn't hate you, he just can't stand the thought of losing you," Anders said more sharply. "Any more than I can."

Not that starting up that fight again was going to help. He sighed and held his hands up in a gesture of surrender.

"Anyhow. You're coming home now, right? So it doesn't matter."

"Anders..." Kathy pulled away, wrapping her arms around herself. "What are the odds that if I go home, I'll be able to come back?"

There were any number of people on the island willing to tie her down and throw her into a closet to keep her safe on the island.

"I'm not sure how much will be left for me to come back to."

Something shut off in Anders' face when he heard that. If a daughter, a man who she said she loved who loved her too, and the knowledge that this was a losing fight weren't enough to convince her to come back to safety, nothing would be.

In that moment, some part of Anders said goodbye to her.

"Fine," he said, and resumed the business of pulling on socks and pinning back hair. "I'm done fighting about it."

Edited 2016-04-17 20:30 (UTC)

Kathy would have liked to argue that Carys wasn't real; she was a future possibility brought to the present because the island had a weird sense of humor. But that wasn't an argument that carried much weight--for the weekend, she was real enough.

Looking at Anders' shuttered expression, she asked herself if this was all worth it. If being a hero was worth the damage--possibly irreparable--she was doing to the relationships that mattered most.

She didn't have time to figure out her answer. Someone was screaming in the hallway outside of their room and Kathy was dashing out to offer assistance before she a chance to think.

Or maybe that was the answer.

It seemed like a clear enough answer to Anders, yes. And as an answer, it made him furious. (And even if Carys was only a projection, she was still a little girl who wanted her mother.)

But the person who was screaming in the hall hadn't done anything wrong. He picked up his staff and followed her into the hall, uncertain he'd be able to catch up.

Turned out that Anders didn't need to worry about catching up, Kathy was bounding back, half-dragging a hysterical woman in a maid uniform with her. Of course, considering the amount of blood liberally soaking the woman, she probably had cause to be screaming. Kathy was trying very hard to ignore that the woman kept screaming a single name; she had a pretty decent idea where all the blood had come from.

"She's not bitten!" she called to Anders, "but we're about to have company!"

From the direction Kathy had come from, they could hear the dull clack-clack-clack of jaws being snapped shut over and over again. "I counted at least twelve--looks like they made their way here from somewhere else as a group and spotted the day shift arriving. Most of them are in the lobby right now." The clacking noise continued. "Or coming this way," she amended. "But that means any other staff or guests trying to get out are going to run smack into the bulk of them."

From now on, Kathy was only staying in hotel rooms above ground level.

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