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stripytightsTitle: Missing Piece of the Puzzle
Fandom: Supernatural RPF
Chapter 6/7
Pairing: Jared/Jensen/Gen and all combinations.
Word count: 5900
Warnings/Kinks dub-con, mpreg, dystopia, sort of slave fic
A/N: Sorry it took so long but on the bright side, almost finished! Thanks again to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tipsy_kitty for her assistance - as always any mistakes that remain are my own.
Previous Chapters found here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Brief catchup since it's been so long - Jensen knows what he is, that he's pregnant and Jared and Gen now know at least in part what they've done.
Summary: In a world where women can no longer have children, genetically engineered Omegas fill this function- if you can pay the price (and live with the consequences.) Jared and Gen are happily married, and buying Omega Jensen Ackles for the birth of their child seems like the perfect solution. The only downside is that Omegas can't survive the birth of a child- and that by design they degenerate after a certain age. Not that Omegas know this.
The rest of the night was one that Jared would never forget, no matter how long he lived. Most of it was dreamlike, not quite real as though he couldn't connect to it, but he remembered enough of it to torture him- rolling over to realize Gen's eyes were so sore and red from crying that she could barely blink anymore, the space stretching between them like neither of them could ask for comfort, neither of them able to accept anything, not for now. The sun rose and cast stark rays into the room and still neither of them moved, even though Jared had thought things couldn't possibly be worse in the morning. That wasn't something that was accurate though- the moment he sat up, he caught sight of himself in the mirror, so creased and worn it was like ten years had passed by in the night. Gen was on her side, curled up amongst the duvet and sheets, her fingers pressing so tightly into the cotton, he could see the strain in her hands from where he was standing. "I'm going to shower," he said abruptly, held out his hand, because whether they deserved comfort or not, he wasn't going to let this take everything from him. For a moment it looked like Gen was going to ignore him, but then she reached out her fingers and wound them around his tentatively, as though there was something wrong in easing themselves even a little.
Pressed up close to her in the shower, Jared let himself go again, lost in the water, clutching futilely at Gen, desperate for the comfort and obscurely comforted by the closeness, like two wrongs made a right when pressed together. The water couldn't wash away the events of the night but the slow beat of it off his face cleared his head a little, drove the worst of the nightmares from him, let him think that there must be something they could do. Something. Jared's strength had always been solution-finding, and Gen's had always been carrying out their joint projects. Together they would crack this.
When they finally made it downstairs, the first thing they noticed was the lack of coffee. Usually by this time Jensen would be up, making it briskly, getting the day set up and on the road. But there on the side was still the carafe from last night, left out, not washed or put in the cupboard, and the window was still blinded and shuttered against the glare of the sun. There was a silence, a blankness that suffused the entire place, that more than anything else let Jared know that something was wrong. The deadness of the air, the quietness of the network, everything about it, said that something had happened to Jensen. The same thought had occurred to Gen; she dashed up the stairs to Jensen's room, and as Jared had known, she found it empty. Methodically they searched the house, leaving until last, as though by some awful instinct, the garage.
When they went in, Jared's first sick thought was one of relief. There was no body- he hadn't realized until that second that he had expected Jensen to take the obvious way out- one of revenge and hate and sheer brutal necessity. What was there though was little better. On the side, near one of the stupid fucking machines Jared had thought was such a fantastic idea (make that last year of Jensen's life better!) was the collar, neatly cut through and left behind, the small tracking chip blinking uselessly at him. When they ran outside the house in bare feet, the car was gone as well, and Jared swore uselessly at the distance. Jensen had taken it and gone, and most of Jared was filled with sickly pulsing fear because of everything that Jensen didn't know. He wouldn't make it more than a few miles. Not when the car could be overridden from the house and ground to a halt, not when even if somehow that didn't work, Jensen knew nothing about surviving in the outside world. A few months ago, he'd never even been outside the facility. Never seen so much as a fertiliplant field.
Jared went straight to the central controls and punched in the numbers to access the car and bring it back home. A discreet denied sign flashed up, and with a deepening frown he pressed them in again and was greeted with the same message. Accessing the second layer of authentication he pressed his eye to the scanner and the system let him in as it was encoded to do. Even then, it politely refused to allow him to change the destination of the car, and Jared had to turn away in frustration. "He's done something," he told Gen, "we can't bring the car back." With an unwanted flicker of memory he saw Jensen in his mind’s eye, always deep in manuals, half in, half out of the wall, explaining, fixing, learning things, all of the time, all the times the power had shut off accidentally, and Jared had never even thought that he would do something like this - could do something like this.
When he ordered the computer to do a check, the answer was depressing and inevitable. Half of it had been overloaded, and the other half was on lockdown, and there was nothing they could do about it. Jared couldn't even quantify what he was feeling- anger was predominant, anger and fear because the only hope had been that they would be able to find Jensen first. If he got picked up by a cop or by the resident authority, they wouldn't return him to Jared and Gen, they'd send him straight to the farm. Jensen had disabled everything, even his palm device wasn't connecting; there was no way to get a call through, but there was nothing Jensen could’ve done about the car's inbuilt tracker. They watched helplessly as he headed towards the nearest city, over three hundred miles away.
The thing was, Jensen couldn't survive out there, even without his unwanted house guest. He didn't know anything, he'd never been anywhere. Only a few months before he was overcome at the sight of fields- a city was going to be more than he could comprehend. Jared and Gen's personal network might be badly secured but there was no way Jensen could access their far more heavily protected funds, and with no money, probably no clothes and not a clue how to survive, he'd be caught in minutes.
"It's not like it was," Gen said tensely and one of the perks of marriage is that he knew exactly what she meant. Jensen's only experience with the real world had been through books that were sometimes centuries out of date. Jared kind of doubted that in the limited time he'd had with the web, Jensen's first priority was seeing what had changed about the world, and more learning what he could, as fast as he could. He probably thought there were places where he could lose himself, where no one would ever find him, when the only places like that these days were also the places that would know what he was at a glance, would take him for everything that he had. And if they found out what he was, they would tear him apart for a baby that would be worth so much to a couple who had been turned down by any clinic. He was in more danger than ever.
“I know,” he said. “God Gen we have to think of something.” He was racking his own brains for a solution - how to get Jensen back without alerting anyone to the fact he’d gone missing in the first place - but nothing was springing to mind. It took staring at the contract, still up and minimized in a corner of his screen, for an idea to germinate. “Gen,” he said slowly. “Adrianne.”
“Of course,” Gen said and scooted closer. She lived in the city Jensen was heading for. If she could intercept him, she could explain why he needed to come back. “But Jared, Adrianne’s going to ask questions as well. Like why we need her to go and pick up an Omega without a collar and why we’re not doing it ourselves.”
“We’re just going to have to hope that she’s intrigued enough to hear the full story,” Jared said. He remembered that he’d asked Adrianne to look through Jensen’s contract for loopholes, and his stomach gave an uncomfortable lurch. Adrianne was smart as a whip, and it surely would be all too easy to piece together what had happened. They had to take the risk though.
Gen connected through and waited for Adrianne to pick up, fingers tapping against her earpiece, a worried jittery rhythm. “Hey Adrianne,” she said, and Jared could tell the effort it was taking to keep her voice light and breezy, when every bone of her body was rigid. Gen had keyed the call to the speakers so Jared could hear both sides of the conversation, and Adrianne’s reply sounded intrigued.
“Hey Gen. What do you need?”
This was the crux point. There were other people they could call, but nobody they were as close to as Adrianne. “Well, this really stupid chain of events happened. Jensen, you know Jensen, our Omega, he got this idea in his head that I really wanted something from the city. And well, you know what Omegas are like, always want to please. He didn’t know what a city was even, and we think he just got in the car and voice activated the controls to take himself there. Something’s gone wrong with the network though and we can’t bring the car back or get through to him,” as the lie went on, Gen became more confident, her grip on the chair relaxing a bit. “...so,” she concluded, “if you could grab him when he comes into the city, we’d appreciate it more than we could possibly say. We don’t want a lot of fuss and nonsense with police when really it’s just a huge misunderstanding.”
Adrianne had remained silent through the spiel, but her voice cut in now. “Gen,” she said, “I don’t need a video screen to tell when you’re lying you know. I’m a lawyer, we’re good at spotting things like that. And you always babble when you’re nervous. What’s actually going on?”
“We can’t tell you,” Gen said, and if Adrianne could detect lies, Jared thought, she must be able to pick up on the misery and exhaustion that came through now that Gen was no longer pretending to be cheerful. “I mean, we will, I promise. But we can’t yet. Please believe us. It’s nothing illegal, it’s just complicated.”
There was silence on the other end of the line for a long moment as though, like Jared had feared, Adrianne was putting all sorts of thoughts together – two plus two and maybe, terrifyingly, coming up with four. Then finally, “I will, but some day, when you can give them, I’m going to want answers you know.” It was a fair trade to make all things considered.
Now that was sorted, the rest would be simple hopefully. Jared informed Adrianne of the route that Jensen was taking and she agreed to take out her own car and intercept him along the way before he reached the city. She keyed her own earpiece to constant relay so she could keep them updated, and they could tell her if Jensen made any sudden changes in direction. He was about 50 miles from the outskirts of the city, and Adrianne was about 20 miles from him, when the tracker suddenly stopped moving, as though Jensen had decided to go the rest of the way on foot for some reason - or as though he’d been stopped.
Only minutes later, Adrianne confirmed that Jensen had been stopped and presumably taken into custody since he didn’t have an ID bracelet. What happened next caused Jared to thank any deity that existed that they’d chosen Adrianne to try and find him. Before they’d even booked Jensen, examined him or asked him any questions that could’ve revealed what Jensen was, Adrianne was there, every inch the angry lawyer defending her client and haranguing the police for taking ‘Jared’ into custody just because his ID bracelet was being renewed. To the only person who seemed astute enough to ask how she’d found them so fast, she’d loftily told them that ‘Jared’ had been meant to be meeting her for lunch. On the other side of the earpiece, Jared and Gen listened as she insinuated incompetency with cool ease, hinted at lawsuits for a waste of her and her client’s time, and hustled Jensen out of the door in what had to be a record time before they even had the chance to begin to think that ‘Jared’ might not be who he appeared to be. Since he hadn’t been booked there was no trace left.
Adrianne had offered to bring him home to them but Jensen had voluntarily locked in his destination in the car, and then disabled his access, a mute gesture of hopelessness, Jared thought as Adrianne described it. Seven hours later, Adrianne was back at work secured in a promise that when this was over, they’d tell her everything, and Jensen was back at the house, worn and tired, in Jared’s old clothes, and standing in front of them like he didn’t have the will to say or do anything.
Now that Jared looked closer, knowing what he was looking for and ignoring the looseness of the clothes Jensen usually wore, he could see the traces of Jensen's lies all over his body. He wasn't a few days along, perhaps not even a month or two, since there was, now that Jared was looking for it, a slight thickening of the waist. Nothing that he and Gen would have noticed probably, but close enough that soon they would have had to. He can’t remember all the details of all the sex they had had but he wondered if Jensen’s fondness of giving head had stemmed from that point. Now he understood how imperative it had been to Jensen to make his break at that point, before he and Gen realized all this. It also meant given the weekly testing that Jensen underwent that he'd known about this for longer than he’d let on, and Jared couldn't imagine what having that knowledge would have felt like, knowing that you were carrying your own death around with you and still you had to pretend like everything was normal and natural. In the end, he and Gen had trusted too much. Trusted in the promises of the clinic that Omegas couldn't, wouldn't lie, that Jensen liked his life with them, and they hadn't let any evidence to the contrary dissuade them.
Jensen didn't follow them up to bed, and although Jared felt like a heel, that still hurt a bit. Omegas wanted sex all the time, craved it even; they hadn't done anything wrong by taking advantage of that. He remembered every time Jensen had woken him up with a blowjob, or gone down on Gen so many times that she could barely moan, rubbing himself against the bedspread until he came just from that. Could he have faked that sort of enthusiasm, the gleefulness of the sex they'd had? He remembers Jensen's fingers fumbling at his belt the day everything went wrong and he didn't know what to think anymore, didn't want to put a name to the growing, sickening thoughts that were blossoming inside him. How much of the man (funny how he still stumbled over that nominative even in his head, even now after everything) before them had ever been the real Jensen? He wants to know but he's too scared of the answer to ask. Too scared of the sort of words, the names that could be attached to what they’d done to Jensen, even unknowingly.
The next day when they were at least a little refreshed from a night’s sleep, they gathered in the front room. Jensen was sitting hunched, his arms not crossed over his stomach, nothing protective about his posture, nothing of the Farm's promise of how much Omegas loved their children or had to be torn away from them sometimes. Of course, that was when they believed they were adding to a loved family, he guessed, and tore his eyes away from the now apparent slight curve of Jensen's stomach. Despite everything, he couldn't help a throb of sheer want in the pit of his gut, an almost painful urge to have their child in his arms, and he wondered if that would go on the list of his crimes, that after all this he could still think of how much he wanted their baby .
Gen came in, fingers clutched tight around her palm-piece, and sat cross-legged beside Jared, warm and comforting at his side. "There's nothing much out there," she said abruptly, something they all knew. "Just some stuff about how natural births are better."
"Natural births?" Jared asked.
"Without painkillers," she murmured, and the topic died on its feet. There was no way out of this for them; Jared had tried and tried to think of a solution but every one of them died on its feet. Jensen couldn't leave, there was no point in that; he'd either be rounded straight up and taken to the Farm or he'd just die alone in a few months, and his baby along with him. Maybe if they could get him out of the US, but the question then arose where. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to flee to, no hope at all, just sheer pointless bleakness stretching out ahead of them, more helpless than anything Jared could ever have imagined.
Gen's still tapping away at the palm-point she's holding, skimming her way through page after page of useless information. The net isn't exactly that useful and there's nothing turning up but the same bland baby tips, the same platitudes, the specially designed memorial stones for your garden that you can buy once your Omega had 'finished their employment.' It's hard to believe there's anyone out there who has ever felt the same way as them, but Jared knows Gen can't imagine that they're the first. She's looking for answers and hoping that they're out there. "How did you know?" she asked at last and someone who didn't know her as well as Jared would have thought the words cold and blunt. Jared caught every nuance behind them though, pressed her fingers in his for having the bravery to ask what he didn't dare.
Jensen wasn't interested in withholding the truth it seemed, not anymore, more hopeless now than he'd been on the night they'd found out that he was expecting, more hopeless than when they'd dragged him back to the house and he'd known for certain he couldn't escape. "It was the books," he began, and of course it was. What else could it have been? "You bought these books from some antiquer’s place," and Jared knew which ones he meant, the deadweight of them, nothing even Gen was interested in reading, old, pre-chemical war books, with pages that had been cleansed before being sold on. "There was a brochure in one of them folded up between the pages." He left for a second. When he returned he was carrying the same book as usual, but this time he removes the thin flexible sheet from it. The pictures are bright but tasteful, the text small and easy to size up. There were perhaps four models- it's one of the expensive mini farms, and there's a price listed beside each one that's pretty boggling.
"I couldn't understand what they were doing," Jensen said and there was a crack in his voice. "I mean I didn't even understand they were being sold, it's not like that's what they say right there on the brochure. But they were dressed the same as me and they looked the same” - there was a glassy perfection to each of the models on the sheet - “and the thought wouldn't leave me alone. So I read and read, and gradually I realized that those things you said in the past, about slavery, torture, people in camps - the things you told me were fiction and if not fiction then past? They're as real as anything else, not a lie at all. Not past either."
It took me a long time to figure it all out. But if there was one thing I thought I had it was time. It was pretty easy to find out what I was. What I was grown-n for." The stutter was barely noticeable but it was there. "That wasn't the hard part. The hard bit was finding out why. There's nothing out there. Nothing. It's all polite words for death and babies,” and still his hand didn't touch his stomach, no protectiveness in his posture or glance downwards, but Jared couldn't help flicking his own eyes down. "I pieced it together. Figured it out and had to start planning how to get out. First to get rid of the collar." The rest of it came out in a rush of words, garbled and messy as his plan had been. Getting clothes Jared didn't use anymore from his wardrobe, secreting them away, teaching himself as much as he could in the earliest of mornings and the latest of nights. The old broken palm-point without a password that he'd used for access, how he'd watched them type in the password for the main computer. Everything.
Gen and Jared sat in stunned silence, unsure of what to say. Jensen's plan had been messy in the extreme, so rough around the edges there had been no chance it could work – the sort of plan only someone desperate would think could work, but the hope behind it had kept him going. That he'd figure out how to get away before they decided it was time for children. When he’d realized that it was too late, when they’d found out, he’d tried to run anyway, for the hell of it. When he finally ran out of words, he just gazed at them numbly as though he couldn't care anymore. There was nothing now of the smile he always had lurking around the corner of his mouth, he looked older even. "I know what's going to happen," he said, quietly. "You're going to keep me here and then take me into the clinic at the end and you'll watch me die. I hope you remember it for the rest of your lives, I hope you remember what you did to me."
There was nothing that could be said and he stood up, left the room with a quiet tread, headed to the bedroom that had been so little used, there being a tacit understanding now that nothing could be what it had been. Jared would never know how he got up the courage to ask what he did before Jensen was out of sight. "Did you always hate us this much?" and his palms were damp with fear for the answer. He saw the hesitation before Jensen replied as though he was weighing his words, deciding whether to hurt them some more, cut them deep enough that they'd feel his pain.
"When I first came here, I didn't hate you," he said softly. "I didn't know any better. Then I did and I despised you. Now, I just pity you," and finally his hand slipped down to his stomach. "Is it worth it?" he asked, and the question wasn't rhetorical but neither Gen nor Jared had an answer for him. Then he was gone, melting into the darkness beyond the door, leaving them behind.
The next few months were hellish for all concerned. Jared didn't realize until Jensen stopped participating just how much of a part of their life he'd been, how integral he'd become to the household. He still helped out around the place, still performed the duties he'd set himself as though even now he had a sense of duty that could not to be overridden.
The big difference was that he never touched them, not even accidentally, not a brush of hands as he handed over the coffee or a nudge to the shoulder. Every action was impeccably correct and meaningless, and Jared couldn't even imagine how to begin to bridge that gap or even if he should. Their bed felt bigger and emptier now that Jensen never went into their room, and they both spent their time in oscillating ricocheting emotions. They had each other still but somewhere along the way Jensen had become part of their life together. It was just a precursor, Jared knew, to the longer, final separation that loomed before them. When pressed, Jensen had admitted that he was at least two and a half months along when he'd left, and now at almost six months there was no way he could pass for not being pregnant. It was already way past time for any of his checkups to have taken place but that's the one thing Jensen's asked of them, the one thing that they could give him - that he didn't have to go back there before his final visit, the one where he wouldn’t come back out again. It was little enough to ask for after everything that has happened, and they agreed despite the trouble it would cause. Sometimes Jared caught himself worrying over whether Jensen needed something else to keep him healthy, but Jensen didn't seem adversely affected by the changes happening, and he had got a large enough frame that sometimes Jared couldn't even see the bump when he was looking straight on.
Sometimes he caught Gen staring at Jensen as well, and he knew that she was thinking what he was thinking, that same sickening mixture of guilt and horror intertwined with the knowledge that despite everything there was a child coming to them. He couldn't even parse all the different emotions that came with that, except that he was excited, and that sometimes he wondered that if Jensen had never found out would they still have missed him. Watching Jensen, he knew the answer was yes but that didn’t make anything better.
The bracelet Jensen had redesigned over and over for Gen was left neglected and half finished, the setting for the small amethysts bent out of shape still, laid to one side but carefully as though there was something there still, and Jared felt stupid for taking any hope from it, but hope is never logical. Jensen still spent a little bit of time in the garage with the machines but Jared didn't drop by for chats anymore. If Jensen wanted to say anything to them that wasn’t good morning or ‘would you like a refill’ then that had to be his choice. They'd taken enough choices from him already, and even if he couldn't quite make himself understand that it was all over, it was.
Jensen's about seven months along when it went wrong, when he doubled over, retching and desperate. Without a second's thought Gen was at his side, hands on him for maybe the first time since they found out everything, and for a ghastly second it looked as though Jensen would throw her off him, but he didn't, too grimly intent, it seemed, on not actually vomiting on the floor. Gen looked up at Jared, bit her lip and said the last thing any of them wanted to hear. "We should contact the clinic."
Jensen spat out a denial, protested that he was fine, that there was nothing wrong with him that a rest wouldn't fix, the fear in his eyes palpable and overwhelming like he thought two extra months before he went in might provide an answer, might give him a way out, and Jared wanted to just leave him alone, let him do this, but he couldn't. Even after everything he couldn't. In a daze he called the clinic and they instructed him coldly to bring Jensen in on the double, censured him for his deceit and reminded him of the potential legal consequences of his actions if this all went wrong. He couldn't bring himself to give a shit though, he just needed to know that they could take the pain away from Jensen even if it hastened the inevitable.
Jensen fought them as they took him out to the car, but then he'd never really stopped fighting them in his own way, and Jared, who had never believed in any afterlife, thought that there might be a special hell waiting for them after this. They flicked the car to automatic and held Jensen between them, as though the predicament had temporarily lifted any barrier between them, and that he didn't fight as though this at last wasn't the worst thing that could happen, as though he’d take any comfort where he could get it. Towards the end he looked at them with fever-bright eyes and Jared reminded him not to say a word about what had happened. Jensen smiled at that, a twisted awful thing. “I fooled you didn't I?" he whispered, and it was like a mask had fallen over his face, everything he'd become disappearing until he was the Omega that they'd bought in the first place.
The air was tense and heavy as they made their way into the clinic, Jensen trailing behind by one step as though it offered even the most meagre amount of protection, already white and shaking, not just ill it seemed but heartsick to the core. Jared saw Gen drop back discreetly to lend an arm, though it off balanced them both; and Jensen didn't shrug her off but allowed it for the moment. Robin was at the front desk, and there were two presumable doctors at his side, in sterilized white coats and masks, who unhooked Jensen from Gen's arm and carried him off without any ado or discussion.
It turned out in the end that it was mild enough, could be fixed there and then. Robin who seemed to have appointed himself their sole connection with the clinic- there were no more little chats with Franzie - told them with no apparent disappointment that they'd had a choice to go ahead with the birth early anyway, but decided that full development was more important. "Of course that's good news for you guys," he added, "but that doesn't mean that you didn't do something very stupid. Denying Jensen appropriate medical care could have been lethal to the foetus.”
After he’d told them the good news, Robin took them to a small, comfortable room with only two chairs and propped himself up against the desk to stare at them thoughtfully. "I'm surprised that you of all people ignored the terms of our agreement," he said, as though turning a thought over slowly. There was nothing left of the affable, cheerful man who had guided them through this process, as though they had somehow qualified themselves to see behind that mask. "Why didn't you inform us of the pregnancy?"
Jared spoke up then because he could see Gen was caught in the glare of the obvious questions; he switched on whatever charm he had, and interlaced his hands together as though nervous (that at least he didn't need to fake). "It's a few things," he said carefully, gauging every flicker of reaction that passed across Robin's face. "I'm terrified of doctors." That was hardly an anomaly; weakness, death and age weren't spoken of without disgust, and those who chose to minister in such a capacity weren't mentioned. Most towns employed trained medics who could deal with accidents, broken limbs and the like, but with most illnesses wiped out long ago, the need for specialists had almost vanished. People unfortunate enough to require the services of a doctor kept that quiet. Doctors had contact with those who had rare diseases, the incurables with the vanishingly rare genetic disorders that hadn't been bred out or altered in gene therapy for whatever reason. Who would want to rub shoulders with people who spent their time like that?
Jared continued, every word calculated for maximum impact, but coming easier to him now. "My grandmother miscarried." That bit is the truth, his grandmother had been part of that final generation who carried their own children, though both Robin and Gen flinched a little at the sound of the word he’d used. "She was one of the last. I wanted to know everything was safe," it was coming so easily now he'd almost convinced himself that he wasn’t lying his ass off. He shrugged his shoulders ruefully and hoped that Robin wasn't going to call him out on the lies he was spinning. "We came as soon as we realized that Jensen needed care, and we're so sorry that we didn't come sooner. Don't blame Gen though, this is just one of my mistakes not hers," and it was that last bit that seemed to convince Robin. He relaxed himself, and unfolded from the desk.
"You behaved stupidly." The statement was matter of fact and Jared wondered if he was imagining the flat quality of the words as though there was some inflection of opinion that they'd missed. Regardless, Robin had clearly given them the benefit of the doubt- neurotic and stupid, he might be judging them, but not malicious and not knowing, and the tension in the room dissipated. “But no harm done in the end. Jensen’s supplements weren’t quite up to scratch it seems. The baby is healthy though, and we’ve scheduled Jensen to be induced in seven weeks time. That should give you adequate time to make all necessary arrangements.” He didn’t need to add anything else. Necessary arrangements - like buying a crib, notifying their friends and relatives of the happy event and acquiring a headstone for the garden.
Gen spoke up, recovered from her temporary discomposure. “Can we bury him at home?”
There was the faintest flicker of something in Robin’s eyes that Jared couldn’t quite interpret, whether it was shock at the bluntness of the words or that the question was even asked. “We covered that in the initial contract,” he said smoothly. “I’m afraid that after the event, Omegas remain at the farm for a number of reasons including safety, preventing distress of the owners, and of course the biohazard risk associated. You’ll be busy with the new addition to your family anyway.” He dug into a pocket and palmed Gen a e-card with a link to a baby store. “I recommend them,” he said easily, “they do some beautiful things.”
A few more meaningless instructions and a box of supplements later, the three of them were in the car, and Jared noticed Jensen scratching idly at the two separate and distinct needle marks in his skin, sore and angry looking against the tan of his arm, and bit his tongue rather than say anything. It was Gen again who spoke up, crashed through the walls they’d erected around the subject and changed the game plan.
“There’s something wrong with that place,” she said, “I mean on top of the wrongness of this whole situation. We need to find out what.”
The seventh and final chapter is here
Fandom: Supernatural RPF
Chapter 6/7
Pairing: Jared/Jensen/Gen and all combinations.
Word count: 5900
Warnings/Kinks dub-con, mpreg, dystopia, sort of slave fic
A/N: Sorry it took so long but on the bright side, almost finished! Thanks again to
tipsy_kitty for her assistance - as always any mistakes that remain are my own.Previous Chapters found here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Brief catchup since it's been so long - Jensen knows what he is, that he's pregnant and Jared and Gen now know at least in part what they've done.
Summary: In a world where women can no longer have children, genetically engineered Omegas fill this function- if you can pay the price (and live with the consequences.) Jared and Gen are happily married, and buying Omega Jensen Ackles for the birth of their child seems like the perfect solution. The only downside is that Omegas can't survive the birth of a child- and that by design they degenerate after a certain age. Not that Omegas know this.
The rest of the night was one that Jared would never forget, no matter how long he lived. Most of it was dreamlike, not quite real as though he couldn't connect to it, but he remembered enough of it to torture him- rolling over to realize Gen's eyes were so sore and red from crying that she could barely blink anymore, the space stretching between them like neither of them could ask for comfort, neither of them able to accept anything, not for now. The sun rose and cast stark rays into the room and still neither of them moved, even though Jared had thought things couldn't possibly be worse in the morning. That wasn't something that was accurate though- the moment he sat up, he caught sight of himself in the mirror, so creased and worn it was like ten years had passed by in the night. Gen was on her side, curled up amongst the duvet and sheets, her fingers pressing so tightly into the cotton, he could see the strain in her hands from where he was standing. "I'm going to shower," he said abruptly, held out his hand, because whether they deserved comfort or not, he wasn't going to let this take everything from him. For a moment it looked like Gen was going to ignore him, but then she reached out her fingers and wound them around his tentatively, as though there was something wrong in easing themselves even a little.
Pressed up close to her in the shower, Jared let himself go again, lost in the water, clutching futilely at Gen, desperate for the comfort and obscurely comforted by the closeness, like two wrongs made a right when pressed together. The water couldn't wash away the events of the night but the slow beat of it off his face cleared his head a little, drove the worst of the nightmares from him, let him think that there must be something they could do. Something. Jared's strength had always been solution-finding, and Gen's had always been carrying out their joint projects. Together they would crack this.
When they finally made it downstairs, the first thing they noticed was the lack of coffee. Usually by this time Jensen would be up, making it briskly, getting the day set up and on the road. But there on the side was still the carafe from last night, left out, not washed or put in the cupboard, and the window was still blinded and shuttered against the glare of the sun. There was a silence, a blankness that suffused the entire place, that more than anything else let Jared know that something was wrong. The deadness of the air, the quietness of the network, everything about it, said that something had happened to Jensen. The same thought had occurred to Gen; she dashed up the stairs to Jensen's room, and as Jared had known, she found it empty. Methodically they searched the house, leaving until last, as though by some awful instinct, the garage.
When they went in, Jared's first sick thought was one of relief. There was no body- he hadn't realized until that second that he had expected Jensen to take the obvious way out- one of revenge and hate and sheer brutal necessity. What was there though was little better. On the side, near one of the stupid fucking machines Jared had thought was such a fantastic idea (make that last year of Jensen's life better!) was the collar, neatly cut through and left behind, the small tracking chip blinking uselessly at him. When they ran outside the house in bare feet, the car was gone as well, and Jared swore uselessly at the distance. Jensen had taken it and gone, and most of Jared was filled with sickly pulsing fear because of everything that Jensen didn't know. He wouldn't make it more than a few miles. Not when the car could be overridden from the house and ground to a halt, not when even if somehow that didn't work, Jensen knew nothing about surviving in the outside world. A few months ago, he'd never even been outside the facility. Never seen so much as a fertiliplant field.
Jared went straight to the central controls and punched in the numbers to access the car and bring it back home. A discreet denied sign flashed up, and with a deepening frown he pressed them in again and was greeted with the same message. Accessing the second layer of authentication he pressed his eye to the scanner and the system let him in as it was encoded to do. Even then, it politely refused to allow him to change the destination of the car, and Jared had to turn away in frustration. "He's done something," he told Gen, "we can't bring the car back." With an unwanted flicker of memory he saw Jensen in his mind’s eye, always deep in manuals, half in, half out of the wall, explaining, fixing, learning things, all of the time, all the times the power had shut off accidentally, and Jared had never even thought that he would do something like this - could do something like this.
When he ordered the computer to do a check, the answer was depressing and inevitable. Half of it had been overloaded, and the other half was on lockdown, and there was nothing they could do about it. Jared couldn't even quantify what he was feeling- anger was predominant, anger and fear because the only hope had been that they would be able to find Jensen first. If he got picked up by a cop or by the resident authority, they wouldn't return him to Jared and Gen, they'd send him straight to the farm. Jensen had disabled everything, even his palm device wasn't connecting; there was no way to get a call through, but there was nothing Jensen could’ve done about the car's inbuilt tracker. They watched helplessly as he headed towards the nearest city, over three hundred miles away.
The thing was, Jensen couldn't survive out there, even without his unwanted house guest. He didn't know anything, he'd never been anywhere. Only a few months before he was overcome at the sight of fields- a city was going to be more than he could comprehend. Jared and Gen's personal network might be badly secured but there was no way Jensen could access their far more heavily protected funds, and with no money, probably no clothes and not a clue how to survive, he'd be caught in minutes.
"It's not like it was," Gen said tensely and one of the perks of marriage is that he knew exactly what she meant. Jensen's only experience with the real world had been through books that were sometimes centuries out of date. Jared kind of doubted that in the limited time he'd had with the web, Jensen's first priority was seeing what had changed about the world, and more learning what he could, as fast as he could. He probably thought there were places where he could lose himself, where no one would ever find him, when the only places like that these days were also the places that would know what he was at a glance, would take him for everything that he had. And if they found out what he was, they would tear him apart for a baby that would be worth so much to a couple who had been turned down by any clinic. He was in more danger than ever.
“I know,” he said. “God Gen we have to think of something.” He was racking his own brains for a solution - how to get Jensen back without alerting anyone to the fact he’d gone missing in the first place - but nothing was springing to mind. It took staring at the contract, still up and minimized in a corner of his screen, for an idea to germinate. “Gen,” he said slowly. “Adrianne.”
“Of course,” Gen said and scooted closer. She lived in the city Jensen was heading for. If she could intercept him, she could explain why he needed to come back. “But Jared, Adrianne’s going to ask questions as well. Like why we need her to go and pick up an Omega without a collar and why we’re not doing it ourselves.”
“We’re just going to have to hope that she’s intrigued enough to hear the full story,” Jared said. He remembered that he’d asked Adrianne to look through Jensen’s contract for loopholes, and his stomach gave an uncomfortable lurch. Adrianne was smart as a whip, and it surely would be all too easy to piece together what had happened. They had to take the risk though.
Gen connected through and waited for Adrianne to pick up, fingers tapping against her earpiece, a worried jittery rhythm. “Hey Adrianne,” she said, and Jared could tell the effort it was taking to keep her voice light and breezy, when every bone of her body was rigid. Gen had keyed the call to the speakers so Jared could hear both sides of the conversation, and Adrianne’s reply sounded intrigued.
“Hey Gen. What do you need?”
This was the crux point. There were other people they could call, but nobody they were as close to as Adrianne. “Well, this really stupid chain of events happened. Jensen, you know Jensen, our Omega, he got this idea in his head that I really wanted something from the city. And well, you know what Omegas are like, always want to please. He didn’t know what a city was even, and we think he just got in the car and voice activated the controls to take himself there. Something’s gone wrong with the network though and we can’t bring the car back or get through to him,” as the lie went on, Gen became more confident, her grip on the chair relaxing a bit. “...so,” she concluded, “if you could grab him when he comes into the city, we’d appreciate it more than we could possibly say. We don’t want a lot of fuss and nonsense with police when really it’s just a huge misunderstanding.”
Adrianne had remained silent through the spiel, but her voice cut in now. “Gen,” she said, “I don’t need a video screen to tell when you’re lying you know. I’m a lawyer, we’re good at spotting things like that. And you always babble when you’re nervous. What’s actually going on?”
“We can’t tell you,” Gen said, and if Adrianne could detect lies, Jared thought, she must be able to pick up on the misery and exhaustion that came through now that Gen was no longer pretending to be cheerful. “I mean, we will, I promise. But we can’t yet. Please believe us. It’s nothing illegal, it’s just complicated.”
There was silence on the other end of the line for a long moment as though, like Jared had feared, Adrianne was putting all sorts of thoughts together – two plus two and maybe, terrifyingly, coming up with four. Then finally, “I will, but some day, when you can give them, I’m going to want answers you know.” It was a fair trade to make all things considered.
Now that was sorted, the rest would be simple hopefully. Jared informed Adrianne of the route that Jensen was taking and she agreed to take out her own car and intercept him along the way before he reached the city. She keyed her own earpiece to constant relay so she could keep them updated, and they could tell her if Jensen made any sudden changes in direction. He was about 50 miles from the outskirts of the city, and Adrianne was about 20 miles from him, when the tracker suddenly stopped moving, as though Jensen had decided to go the rest of the way on foot for some reason - or as though he’d been stopped.
Only minutes later, Adrianne confirmed that Jensen had been stopped and presumably taken into custody since he didn’t have an ID bracelet. What happened next caused Jared to thank any deity that existed that they’d chosen Adrianne to try and find him. Before they’d even booked Jensen, examined him or asked him any questions that could’ve revealed what Jensen was, Adrianne was there, every inch the angry lawyer defending her client and haranguing the police for taking ‘Jared’ into custody just because his ID bracelet was being renewed. To the only person who seemed astute enough to ask how she’d found them so fast, she’d loftily told them that ‘Jared’ had been meant to be meeting her for lunch. On the other side of the earpiece, Jared and Gen listened as she insinuated incompetency with cool ease, hinted at lawsuits for a waste of her and her client’s time, and hustled Jensen out of the door in what had to be a record time before they even had the chance to begin to think that ‘Jared’ might not be who he appeared to be. Since he hadn’t been booked there was no trace left.
Adrianne had offered to bring him home to them but Jensen had voluntarily locked in his destination in the car, and then disabled his access, a mute gesture of hopelessness, Jared thought as Adrianne described it. Seven hours later, Adrianne was back at work secured in a promise that when this was over, they’d tell her everything, and Jensen was back at the house, worn and tired, in Jared’s old clothes, and standing in front of them like he didn’t have the will to say or do anything.
Now that Jared looked closer, knowing what he was looking for and ignoring the looseness of the clothes Jensen usually wore, he could see the traces of Jensen's lies all over his body. He wasn't a few days along, perhaps not even a month or two, since there was, now that Jared was looking for it, a slight thickening of the waist. Nothing that he and Gen would have noticed probably, but close enough that soon they would have had to. He can’t remember all the details of all the sex they had had but he wondered if Jensen’s fondness of giving head had stemmed from that point. Now he understood how imperative it had been to Jensen to make his break at that point, before he and Gen realized all this. It also meant given the weekly testing that Jensen underwent that he'd known about this for longer than he’d let on, and Jared couldn't imagine what having that knowledge would have felt like, knowing that you were carrying your own death around with you and still you had to pretend like everything was normal and natural. In the end, he and Gen had trusted too much. Trusted in the promises of the clinic that Omegas couldn't, wouldn't lie, that Jensen liked his life with them, and they hadn't let any evidence to the contrary dissuade them.
Jensen didn't follow them up to bed, and although Jared felt like a heel, that still hurt a bit. Omegas wanted sex all the time, craved it even; they hadn't done anything wrong by taking advantage of that. He remembered every time Jensen had woken him up with a blowjob, or gone down on Gen so many times that she could barely moan, rubbing himself against the bedspread until he came just from that. Could he have faked that sort of enthusiasm, the gleefulness of the sex they'd had? He remembers Jensen's fingers fumbling at his belt the day everything went wrong and he didn't know what to think anymore, didn't want to put a name to the growing, sickening thoughts that were blossoming inside him. How much of the man (funny how he still stumbled over that nominative even in his head, even now after everything) before them had ever been the real Jensen? He wants to know but he's too scared of the answer to ask. Too scared of the sort of words, the names that could be attached to what they’d done to Jensen, even unknowingly.
The next day when they were at least a little refreshed from a night’s sleep, they gathered in the front room. Jensen was sitting hunched, his arms not crossed over his stomach, nothing protective about his posture, nothing of the Farm's promise of how much Omegas loved their children or had to be torn away from them sometimes. Of course, that was when they believed they were adding to a loved family, he guessed, and tore his eyes away from the now apparent slight curve of Jensen's stomach. Despite everything, he couldn't help a throb of sheer want in the pit of his gut, an almost painful urge to have their child in his arms, and he wondered if that would go on the list of his crimes, that after all this he could still think of how much he wanted their baby .
Gen came in, fingers clutched tight around her palm-piece, and sat cross-legged beside Jared, warm and comforting at his side. "There's nothing much out there," she said abruptly, something they all knew. "Just some stuff about how natural births are better."
"Natural births?" Jared asked.
"Without painkillers," she murmured, and the topic died on its feet. There was no way out of this for them; Jared had tried and tried to think of a solution but every one of them died on its feet. Jensen couldn't leave, there was no point in that; he'd either be rounded straight up and taken to the Farm or he'd just die alone in a few months, and his baby along with him. Maybe if they could get him out of the US, but the question then arose where. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to flee to, no hope at all, just sheer pointless bleakness stretching out ahead of them, more helpless than anything Jared could ever have imagined.
Gen's still tapping away at the palm-point she's holding, skimming her way through page after page of useless information. The net isn't exactly that useful and there's nothing turning up but the same bland baby tips, the same platitudes, the specially designed memorial stones for your garden that you can buy once your Omega had 'finished their employment.' It's hard to believe there's anyone out there who has ever felt the same way as them, but Jared knows Gen can't imagine that they're the first. She's looking for answers and hoping that they're out there. "How did you know?" she asked at last and someone who didn't know her as well as Jared would have thought the words cold and blunt. Jared caught every nuance behind them though, pressed her fingers in his for having the bravery to ask what he didn't dare.
Jensen wasn't interested in withholding the truth it seemed, not anymore, more hopeless now than he'd been on the night they'd found out that he was expecting, more hopeless than when they'd dragged him back to the house and he'd known for certain he couldn't escape. "It was the books," he began, and of course it was. What else could it have been? "You bought these books from some antiquer’s place," and Jared knew which ones he meant, the deadweight of them, nothing even Gen was interested in reading, old, pre-chemical war books, with pages that had been cleansed before being sold on. "There was a brochure in one of them folded up between the pages." He left for a second. When he returned he was carrying the same book as usual, but this time he removes the thin flexible sheet from it. The pictures are bright but tasteful, the text small and easy to size up. There were perhaps four models- it's one of the expensive mini farms, and there's a price listed beside each one that's pretty boggling.
"I couldn't understand what they were doing," Jensen said and there was a crack in his voice. "I mean I didn't even understand they were being sold, it's not like that's what they say right there on the brochure. But they were dressed the same as me and they looked the same” - there was a glassy perfection to each of the models on the sheet - “and the thought wouldn't leave me alone. So I read and read, and gradually I realized that those things you said in the past, about slavery, torture, people in camps - the things you told me were fiction and if not fiction then past? They're as real as anything else, not a lie at all. Not past either."
It took me a long time to figure it all out. But if there was one thing I thought I had it was time. It was pretty easy to find out what I was. What I was grown-n for." The stutter was barely noticeable but it was there. "That wasn't the hard part. The hard bit was finding out why. There's nothing out there. Nothing. It's all polite words for death and babies,” and still his hand didn't touch his stomach, no protectiveness in his posture or glance downwards, but Jared couldn't help flicking his own eyes down. "I pieced it together. Figured it out and had to start planning how to get out. First to get rid of the collar." The rest of it came out in a rush of words, garbled and messy as his plan had been. Getting clothes Jared didn't use anymore from his wardrobe, secreting them away, teaching himself as much as he could in the earliest of mornings and the latest of nights. The old broken palm-point without a password that he'd used for access, how he'd watched them type in the password for the main computer. Everything.
Gen and Jared sat in stunned silence, unsure of what to say. Jensen's plan had been messy in the extreme, so rough around the edges there had been no chance it could work – the sort of plan only someone desperate would think could work, but the hope behind it had kept him going. That he'd figure out how to get away before they decided it was time for children. When he’d realized that it was too late, when they’d found out, he’d tried to run anyway, for the hell of it. When he finally ran out of words, he just gazed at them numbly as though he couldn't care anymore. There was nothing now of the smile he always had lurking around the corner of his mouth, he looked older even. "I know what's going to happen," he said, quietly. "You're going to keep me here and then take me into the clinic at the end and you'll watch me die. I hope you remember it for the rest of your lives, I hope you remember what you did to me."
There was nothing that could be said and he stood up, left the room with a quiet tread, headed to the bedroom that had been so little used, there being a tacit understanding now that nothing could be what it had been. Jared would never know how he got up the courage to ask what he did before Jensen was out of sight. "Did you always hate us this much?" and his palms were damp with fear for the answer. He saw the hesitation before Jensen replied as though he was weighing his words, deciding whether to hurt them some more, cut them deep enough that they'd feel his pain.
"When I first came here, I didn't hate you," he said softly. "I didn't know any better. Then I did and I despised you. Now, I just pity you," and finally his hand slipped down to his stomach. "Is it worth it?" he asked, and the question wasn't rhetorical but neither Gen nor Jared had an answer for him. Then he was gone, melting into the darkness beyond the door, leaving them behind.
The next few months were hellish for all concerned. Jared didn't realize until Jensen stopped participating just how much of a part of their life he'd been, how integral he'd become to the household. He still helped out around the place, still performed the duties he'd set himself as though even now he had a sense of duty that could not to be overridden.
The big difference was that he never touched them, not even accidentally, not a brush of hands as he handed over the coffee or a nudge to the shoulder. Every action was impeccably correct and meaningless, and Jared couldn't even imagine how to begin to bridge that gap or even if he should. Their bed felt bigger and emptier now that Jensen never went into their room, and they both spent their time in oscillating ricocheting emotions. They had each other still but somewhere along the way Jensen had become part of their life together. It was just a precursor, Jared knew, to the longer, final separation that loomed before them. When pressed, Jensen had admitted that he was at least two and a half months along when he'd left, and now at almost six months there was no way he could pass for not being pregnant. It was already way past time for any of his checkups to have taken place but that's the one thing Jensen's asked of them, the one thing that they could give him - that he didn't have to go back there before his final visit, the one where he wouldn’t come back out again. It was little enough to ask for after everything that has happened, and they agreed despite the trouble it would cause. Sometimes Jared caught himself worrying over whether Jensen needed something else to keep him healthy, but Jensen didn't seem adversely affected by the changes happening, and he had got a large enough frame that sometimes Jared couldn't even see the bump when he was looking straight on.
Sometimes he caught Gen staring at Jensen as well, and he knew that she was thinking what he was thinking, that same sickening mixture of guilt and horror intertwined with the knowledge that despite everything there was a child coming to them. He couldn't even parse all the different emotions that came with that, except that he was excited, and that sometimes he wondered that if Jensen had never found out would they still have missed him. Watching Jensen, he knew the answer was yes but that didn’t make anything better.
The bracelet Jensen had redesigned over and over for Gen was left neglected and half finished, the setting for the small amethysts bent out of shape still, laid to one side but carefully as though there was something there still, and Jared felt stupid for taking any hope from it, but hope is never logical. Jensen still spent a little bit of time in the garage with the machines but Jared didn't drop by for chats anymore. If Jensen wanted to say anything to them that wasn’t good morning or ‘would you like a refill’ then that had to be his choice. They'd taken enough choices from him already, and even if he couldn't quite make himself understand that it was all over, it was.
Jensen's about seven months along when it went wrong, when he doubled over, retching and desperate. Without a second's thought Gen was at his side, hands on him for maybe the first time since they found out everything, and for a ghastly second it looked as though Jensen would throw her off him, but he didn't, too grimly intent, it seemed, on not actually vomiting on the floor. Gen looked up at Jared, bit her lip and said the last thing any of them wanted to hear. "We should contact the clinic."
Jensen spat out a denial, protested that he was fine, that there was nothing wrong with him that a rest wouldn't fix, the fear in his eyes palpable and overwhelming like he thought two extra months before he went in might provide an answer, might give him a way out, and Jared wanted to just leave him alone, let him do this, but he couldn't. Even after everything he couldn't. In a daze he called the clinic and they instructed him coldly to bring Jensen in on the double, censured him for his deceit and reminded him of the potential legal consequences of his actions if this all went wrong. He couldn't bring himself to give a shit though, he just needed to know that they could take the pain away from Jensen even if it hastened the inevitable.
Jensen fought them as they took him out to the car, but then he'd never really stopped fighting them in his own way, and Jared, who had never believed in any afterlife, thought that there might be a special hell waiting for them after this. They flicked the car to automatic and held Jensen between them, as though the predicament had temporarily lifted any barrier between them, and that he didn't fight as though this at last wasn't the worst thing that could happen, as though he’d take any comfort where he could get it. Towards the end he looked at them with fever-bright eyes and Jared reminded him not to say a word about what had happened. Jensen smiled at that, a twisted awful thing. “I fooled you didn't I?" he whispered, and it was like a mask had fallen over his face, everything he'd become disappearing until he was the Omega that they'd bought in the first place.
The air was tense and heavy as they made their way into the clinic, Jensen trailing behind by one step as though it offered even the most meagre amount of protection, already white and shaking, not just ill it seemed but heartsick to the core. Jared saw Gen drop back discreetly to lend an arm, though it off balanced them both; and Jensen didn't shrug her off but allowed it for the moment. Robin was at the front desk, and there were two presumable doctors at his side, in sterilized white coats and masks, who unhooked Jensen from Gen's arm and carried him off without any ado or discussion.
It turned out in the end that it was mild enough, could be fixed there and then. Robin who seemed to have appointed himself their sole connection with the clinic- there were no more little chats with Franzie - told them with no apparent disappointment that they'd had a choice to go ahead with the birth early anyway, but decided that full development was more important. "Of course that's good news for you guys," he added, "but that doesn't mean that you didn't do something very stupid. Denying Jensen appropriate medical care could have been lethal to the foetus.”
After he’d told them the good news, Robin took them to a small, comfortable room with only two chairs and propped himself up against the desk to stare at them thoughtfully. "I'm surprised that you of all people ignored the terms of our agreement," he said, as though turning a thought over slowly. There was nothing left of the affable, cheerful man who had guided them through this process, as though they had somehow qualified themselves to see behind that mask. "Why didn't you inform us of the pregnancy?"
Jared spoke up then because he could see Gen was caught in the glare of the obvious questions; he switched on whatever charm he had, and interlaced his hands together as though nervous (that at least he didn't need to fake). "It's a few things," he said carefully, gauging every flicker of reaction that passed across Robin's face. "I'm terrified of doctors." That was hardly an anomaly; weakness, death and age weren't spoken of without disgust, and those who chose to minister in such a capacity weren't mentioned. Most towns employed trained medics who could deal with accidents, broken limbs and the like, but with most illnesses wiped out long ago, the need for specialists had almost vanished. People unfortunate enough to require the services of a doctor kept that quiet. Doctors had contact with those who had rare diseases, the incurables with the vanishingly rare genetic disorders that hadn't been bred out or altered in gene therapy for whatever reason. Who would want to rub shoulders with people who spent their time like that?
Jared continued, every word calculated for maximum impact, but coming easier to him now. "My grandmother miscarried." That bit is the truth, his grandmother had been part of that final generation who carried their own children, though both Robin and Gen flinched a little at the sound of the word he’d used. "She was one of the last. I wanted to know everything was safe," it was coming so easily now he'd almost convinced himself that he wasn’t lying his ass off. He shrugged his shoulders ruefully and hoped that Robin wasn't going to call him out on the lies he was spinning. "We came as soon as we realized that Jensen needed care, and we're so sorry that we didn't come sooner. Don't blame Gen though, this is just one of my mistakes not hers," and it was that last bit that seemed to convince Robin. He relaxed himself, and unfolded from the desk.
"You behaved stupidly." The statement was matter of fact and Jared wondered if he was imagining the flat quality of the words as though there was some inflection of opinion that they'd missed. Regardless, Robin had clearly given them the benefit of the doubt- neurotic and stupid, he might be judging them, but not malicious and not knowing, and the tension in the room dissipated. “But no harm done in the end. Jensen’s supplements weren’t quite up to scratch it seems. The baby is healthy though, and we’ve scheduled Jensen to be induced in seven weeks time. That should give you adequate time to make all necessary arrangements.” He didn’t need to add anything else. Necessary arrangements - like buying a crib, notifying their friends and relatives of the happy event and acquiring a headstone for the garden.
Gen spoke up, recovered from her temporary discomposure. “Can we bury him at home?”
There was the faintest flicker of something in Robin’s eyes that Jared couldn’t quite interpret, whether it was shock at the bluntness of the words or that the question was even asked. “We covered that in the initial contract,” he said smoothly. “I’m afraid that after the event, Omegas remain at the farm for a number of reasons including safety, preventing distress of the owners, and of course the biohazard risk associated. You’ll be busy with the new addition to your family anyway.” He dug into a pocket and palmed Gen a e-card with a link to a baby store. “I recommend them,” he said easily, “they do some beautiful things.”
A few more meaningless instructions and a box of supplements later, the three of them were in the car, and Jared noticed Jensen scratching idly at the two separate and distinct needle marks in his skin, sore and angry looking against the tan of his arm, and bit his tongue rather than say anything. It was Gen again who spoke up, crashed through the walls they’d erected around the subject and changed the game plan.
“There’s something wrong with that place,” she said, “I mean on top of the wrongness of this whole situation. We need to find out what.”
The seventh and final chapter is here
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Date: 2014-02-18 03:24 am (UTC)You are positively gutting me with this, but in all the best ways. Poor Jensen... I had no idea he knew about this for so long. I can't imagine what that would be like (though you've given us a pretty terrifying and realistic idea).
Gen is right - they need to find out what the heck is going on with that place. Those creepos are not on the up and up!!!
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Date: 2014-02-19 09:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-18 06:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-19 10:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-18 09:21 am (UTC)*squee!*
Still working for the Stripy Wet Wipes company it seems. :(
BUt thank you;loved this bit despite the all-pervading sadness.
Can't wait for more!
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Date: 2014-02-19 10:00 pm (UTC)I'm so glad you enjoyed, thanks for the comment!
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Date: 2014-02-18 03:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-19 10:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-02-18 10:10 pm (UTC)I love that Jensen did so much without them knowing! Ha, they are so blind for being so smart... I love Jared thinking 'oh, we'll, I'll just turn the car around.' HaHa we fooled you! He is smarter than the average bear!
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Date: 2014-02-19 10:03 pm (UTC)I'm especially glad you enjoyed Jensen finding ways to fight back against his situation also.
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Date: 2014-02-22 06:00 pm (UTC)So pleased to see an update!
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Date: 2014-02-26 04:43 am (UTC)