Insightful, a future fic (Part 1)

This child was a lot smaller than the ones Amanda liked dealing with, but she wasn’t going to turn down the idea of watching a close friend’s baby when it was presented to her in a way that her rejecting it was going to end badly. Sure, it was a lot of over-exaggeration and there wasn’t really any harm that would reach the baby if she was stuck with her parents, but the fact remained that it was incredibly easy to guilt Amanda into thinking there was, therefore putting the baby entirely under her control for one afternoon.

She had, of course, protested it and tried to tell them to find someone else, maybe one of their friends who had interest in children, to do the babysitting job, but her friends were insistent that it was her who watch their precious child. “I don’t even *like* kids,” she reminded them several times, not wanting to get into the specifics of why that was because she knew they were aware of why, yet her insistence fell on deaf ears. She was just going to have to spend that one day with Justine, and that was all that was asked of her, and she knew why that was and she couldn’t really tell them no and mean it.

Ultimately it didn’t go over too badly, just some crying and fussing that made her heart hurt because she didn’t know what to do to stop it (and it was driving her long-dormant motherly instincts up the wall); when the day was over and her parents were back to take her home she was honestly glad to see the baby leave but at the same time, she was waiting for the next chance she had to watch the girl. It was strange, her wanting to watch a kid that wasn’t even capable of holding their head up and doing anything of their own free will. She’d spent so much time of her life hating any kid too young to properly speak to her about things and now she’d gotten attached to a baby on her second or third meeting with her.

And she was going to make sure that she never let that attachment fade, even if it meant spending as much time as she possibly could with little Justine. It wasn’t hard to find her dads in a position of needing someone to watch the baby, not when the world around them was crumbling and they needed to take action and make preparations for whatever might go wrong next, and so she was able to slip right in whenever she wanted to and ask for another day with Justine, something they wouldn’t deny her. She could take this baby into her life whenever she wanted, and watch the little girl grow up for herself, almost as if she was the mother this girl didn’t have.

The thought of being someone’s mother never sat right with her, not when she knew it wasn’t physically possible for her to do so. She used to love children, she really had, but after that incident with the sword in her side when she was younger and the crippling realization that it had ruined any chance of her having a family of her own, she had grown to hate them because they were something she’d never have. Except with little Justine, it was almost as if she had a child of her own simply because she could get her almost whenever she wanted.

That kind of power was a bit too much for someone like Amanda to take control of, because as far as she was concerned, this was her one shot at pretending like she had a family of her own. Sure, she was married and could probably go the surrogate route, just like Kody had to end up with Justine, but she didn’t want to even bring that suggestion up. She’d accepted her fate as a barren woman, and now she was going to make use of her time with Justine in the best way she possibly could: she was going to coddle this child and raise her in all the time they had together, just like a mother would.

It wasn’t that she was going to start taking Justine from her fathers whenever she wanted, because the girl did deserve to be in their care every so often. It was more like she was going to start taking her for longer periods of time as she got older, especially when she stopped being so needy and so dependent on the person watching her actually doing everything for her. By the time Justine was able to move freely on her own via crawling, she was spending almost entire days with Amanda, unaware that she was with someone who wasn’t even a parent as she’d spend so much time with her.

Justine loved to climb and explore the world she was in, way too young to catch onto the fact that things around her weren’t exactly the best of conditions to be alive in, and Amanda loved being the one to be there beside her as she learned new things. Yes, she did feel a little bad that she was giving this child so much of her time when she could have been giving training and working on becoming a better healer and fighter, but Justine’s fathers needed to be able to make themselves better as well, and they wouldn’t have been able to do it with a child alongside them.

Well, they would have been able to, but it would have been putting their baby into danger and after what they’d gone through to get her Amanda was pretty certain they wouldn’t risk hurting a hair on Justine’s head. Some of the other people she knew that had young children of their own might have, but Kody and Chase would never take Justine out into danger if it meant her possibly leaving them. Of course, why this meant they’d risk their own lives on the practice field she wasn’t sure, but she was certain that she’d been put in charge of Justine time and time again only because they knew she wouldn’t endanger the girl.

But sometimes, when she’d have Justine with her all day, she’d go out into the town and let the girl see what more of the world was like. Going anywhere alone, especially unarmed, wasn’t exactly the safest decision anyone could make in an army-occupied city, but Amanda had very rarely actually adhered to the ideas of how to be safe, and it wasn’t like she looked like much of a threat when she was carrying a baby in her arms. She managed to go out a handful of times over the course of a couple months before she was told to stop doing it, to stop risking her life and Justine’s just to get to see the scenery.

“What if I make sure I’m not risking our lives, then?” she asked, an idea brewing in her mind as to how she could handle things. She’d always tied her weapons and staffs to her back whenever she’d gone into battle—why didn’t she use that knowledge to her advantage? “I can take her out and be armed, I know I can.” Concerns were raised to this, by every person who had an opinion to give on the matter. She wasn’t thinking of one-hand wielding a weapon while cradling Justine in the other, nor was she thinking of going out and buying a mass supply of throwing axes for protection, therefore raising the suspicion of her planning something dangerous. She wasn’t intending on taking on a new class that relied on magic or daggers, and she definitely wasn’t going to ask someone else to come with her, even though people did offer.

The next time she wanted to take Justine from her dads for a day, Amanda made sure to show them and her husband (who had been concerned about her going out on her own, Justine’s inclusion not even mattering) exactly what she had thought up to keep the girl safe while they were out alone. “Look, I just tie her up like this, and—“

“Amanda are you *crazy*?” Kody interrupted her explanation by reaching out to grab her wrist and pull her hand back, that hand gripping a piece of fabric that had already been wrapped around Justine several times, the girl being held as if she was hugging around Amanda’s neck, her lower body pressed against her chest. “You’re going to attract suspicion of smuggling something, you can’t do that. I won’t let you.”

“But it’ll allow me to hold and use a weapon if it comes down to it,” she retorted, yanking her hand away from Kody so that she could continue the demonstration. “Besides, it’s clearly obvious I’m holding a child and not anything illegal, no one’s going to get suspicious of what I’m doing. You’re just being a big worrywart.”

“I’d rather you not go out by yourself with her if it means having to do this, and since we all know that you’re going to, er, have to do this if you go out just to wield a weapon, you really shouldn’t do it.” He was still watching her tie his daughter up close to her, seeing the girl’s overjoyed reaction to be held so closely to one of her favorite people and finding it hard to continue trying to put an end to what was happening. “You’ll risk something that matters too much to us, you need to think this through better.”

Rolling her eyes, Amanda tied a knot in the fabric once she’d finished securing Justine to herself and pat the little girl on the back. “No way, this has been thought through perfectly enough. She’s safe right here, and look!” She mimed holding a weapon and swinging it, showing that her arms wouldn’t come anywhere close to knocking into the baby. “I can fight just fine with her right here, we’d be okay if we were out and something were to happen.”

“Yes, and that’s fine, but…” Silencing himself when he saw the pleading look Amanda gave him, Kody sighed. “You’re not going to back down on this, are you?”

“No way, no how. I’ve put enough thought into this to know that it’ll work out fine if you just give me the chance to try it.”

He pursed his lips together, looking towards the two other men that were present. First he glanced towards Chase, who was looking back at him, expecting him to give the final word because she *was* his child, ultimately, which wasn’t very assuring. Then it was a glance towards Green, who was covering his face in shame at what he’d just witnessed his wife doing. “Yeah, something tells me that no one here wants to see you try this,” Kody eventually said, gleaning that from the two reactions he’d seen. “Sorry, Amanda, but it’s for the best if you just keep Justine somewhere safe when you’re with her, where you don’t have to worry about getting into fights.”

“What about sunsets up on the rooftops? You’re not going to let me take her up to see those? Or long walks on overcast days? We can’t do those either?” Groaning loudly, Amanda started fiddling to undo the knot she’d tied so she could let Justine loose. “I was so looking forward to getting to show her some of my favorite things in life!”

“Maybe when you have your own children, you can do that with them.” The response felt much more biting than it must have been intended, and Amanda was left staring in disbelief at Kody for him having said that to her. She rushed getting Justine from in the makeshift carrier, nearly shoving her back at her fathers, before storming out of their home without another word to them, Green rushing an apology to the two of them for her behavior as he followed her outside.

“I can’t believe he said that,” Amanda said, once they were both outside and far away from the house. “He *knows* why I want to do these kinds of things with his child. They both know! Everyone I know knows! There’s no reason for someone to tell me that kind of thing and mean it!”

“He didn’t mean it, hush. He was just trying to get you to rethink what you were doing and chose a poorly-worded way to do it, but you know he didn’t mean it.” Even though it had just happened moments before, and there hadn’t been the time to get this kind of clarification, Green seemed to really believe in what he was saying, and his trust in his own words was almost enough to get Amanda to believe him as well. Almost.

“If he didn’t mean it, he wouldn’t have said it. He’s just being rude that I had a good idea that lets me do what I want with his child, he’ll come around to it when he realizes I’m not giving up on this!” Stomping her feet down like someone throwing a fit, Amanda looked to Green for reassurance that she was saying the right thing and saw him shaking his head at her. “W-what? I didn’t say anything wrong, did I?”

He offered her a hand so that they could walk together with fingers interlocked, so that he could have some kind of grip on her in case whatever he said offended her. Once she’d taken his hand into her own and fallen right into what he’d expected of her, he gave his response. “I wouldn’t say it was anything wrong, but you aren’t considering anyone but yourself in all of this. You need to focus on what Kody wants for Justine, not what you want.”

As expected, she tried getting away but he refused to let go of her hand. “How can you say that to me, you know that I’m thinking about what’s good for her. Do you really think leaving her in my care all the time, stuck in our house, is what she deserves? She needs adventures! We got to have those growing up, she should get to have them too!”

“We also didn’t grow up in a time where you can’t ever be sure if you’re safe walking around outside.” Green motioned towards the sword he had attached to him, in case something were to happen and they were put in a dangerous situation. “You thinking of a way to tie her to you is creative, but do you want to risk her seeing violence while so young?”

“We risk it every time we take her from her home!” Amanda looked back over her shoulder, towards the home they’d walked out of because she hadn’t gotten her way, and she sighed. “I guess I get what the issue here is though, none of you want me tying her to me and I’ll respect it. I can keep with holding her in my arms whenever we’re out walking like this, and I’ll try not to have to go out on my own when I’m with her.”

“You’re only conceding because you want to go back to get her, aren’t you?” How he was able to catch on to what she was doing, she wasn’t sure, but based on how he stopped walking and stared at her until she looked back she knew that he was following her exact train of thought. When she nodded, he laughed. “While I can’t be completely sure if I trust you on this, there’s no reason for me not to. But when we get back, you’re apologizing to Kody and Chase for what you did before you even get a hand on Justine, got it?”

Amanda waved her free hand. “Eh, I’ll consider it. Kody did say something insensitive to me, I’m not going to apologize for my behavior until he apologizes for that.”
“Then we’re not going back right now.”

“What do you mean, we’re not?” She was answered by him starting to walk in the direction of where they lived, dragging her along once he’d gotten far enough ahead. “Oh come on, you can’t do this to me! We were going to spend time with Justine today, and you’re going to ruin it just because I won’t back down on something?”

“I’m not the one who ruined things, don’t push your own mistake off on me. You chose to get offended when no one approved of your idea, you’re the one who stormed out, you made this decision and I’m holding you to it.” This was the issue of being someone so impulsive married to someone so level-headed and mindful, and this was the exact kind of thing that these two went through on a regular basis. So even if Amanda begged to be allowed to go back, even if she swore up and down that she’d apologize to get what she wanted, there was no way that Green was going to give in and let her do it. He was going to stand his ground and make her stick with what she had started.

But that was a temporary fix, and she was aware of it. There would always be another chance for her to go back and get Justine into her life again, it was just a matter of when it would happen. In the meantime, there were other things that she could spend her time on, like going out into the training field with her husband whenever he wanted to go, getting back into the swing of fighting for if she ever needed to get involved with combat again. Her abilities with her axes and hammers were a lot rustier than she remembered, which made her thankful that she had been talked out of taking Justine out while armed, because she would have been easy to disarm and hurt if she’d been trying to wield a weapon without all this practice.

Sometimes, things happened in certain ways to let them all work out in the end, and when she caught Green smiling at her after a long day of training, a day in which she’d finally told herself that tying Justine to herself was a bad idea after all, it felt like it was meant to happen like this. With all the training they’d now done together, she was more confident in being able to protect herself and anyone who was with her if needed, and she made sure to tell him this, because it was her way of telling him he was right all along. “You were only ever thinking of what you wanted, not what you could do,” he reminded her as they headed home after their training. “And while I still don’t think you should do it, and I’m sure Kody feels the same way, you’d stand a better chance at defending yourself now if something were to happen if you were out.”

“So you spend all that time talking me out of taking her out places, just to tell me now that I could if I wanted to?” Amanda gave him a confused look, to which he repeated the part about how he didn’t think she should do it. “Yes, I got that, you don’t want me to, but the possibility’s out there. I can if I want, I just shouldn’t.”

“That's not quite how you should be looking at this,” Green said, hoping she'd change her mind if he explained himself again, and so he stopped their progress to cover this, figuring this would be quick to settle. “You now can be certain to protect yourself if something were to happen while you're out, not that you need to be tempting fate to cause something to happen. That means no going out with Justine, although spending time with her is definitely on the table.”

He knew he was fighting a losing battle when he saw the shine in Amanda’s eyes, as she half-heartedly nodded at him. “Getting comfortable with my weapons has been all for me and for my safety, got it,” she replied, trying to mask the sarcasm in her voice by talking softly. “You're so focused on keeping me safe, you must really love me or something.”

“It’s not just you I'm trying to keep safe this time, but yes, I do really love you.” He looked at her, watching as she let her expression go love-struck as she stared at him. “Don't use our affections for each other as an excuse to do whatever you want, you still have to be responsible here.”

Responsibility was something that Amanda never shouldered well, even though she frequently found herself being the person in charge in situations. She tried dabbling in teaching young healers for a little while before giving up, finding it too hard to corral them long enough to make progress. She had a bit of battlefield experience, fighting alongside her husband and their friends on some great journey that ultimately ended in their home being invaded by a warring nation. And she had always played the role of the mom friend when it came to everyone she knew, but all that didn't mean that she was consciously able to be responsible at any given time. Having the life of a small child in her hands, like Justine’s, wasn't going to do much to break her of her habit of wrongly using her position of responsibility, even if it should have.
She wasn’t even sure how long she’d gotten lost in staring at him, honestly, until she noticed him looking exasperated with her. “I, uh, spaced out there for a minute, didn’t I?” she meekly asked, lowering her head to forcibly avert her eyes from getting lost once more. “I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t be doing that out here when we’re both armed and could be considered dangerous, we should—“

“Do us both a favor and don’t suggest what you’re thinking.” With a laugh, Green wrapped an arm around his wife, her looking back up at him as he did. “Let’s just go home and finish discussing this somewhere we know we won’t be attacked.”

“Even though being attacked would prove your point about why I shouldn’t even think about going out with Justine.” The look of realization that came across Amanda’s face as she came to that conclusion was one of beauty, and he laughed more as he saw her coming to terms with how right he had been. “H-hey, don’t laugh at me! Come on, you already said it, let’s just go home. Right now.”

And so they did, but any further discussions they had on the matter of taking a child out into the dangerous world were overshadowed by the complete inability for one of them to focus on the *words* coming out of the other’s mouth. By the time the night was over, absolutely zero progress had been made on convincing her it was a bad idea, but that didn’t mean the night was an overall waste. It just meant that there’d have to be more time spent on the topic, and even though making the same points over again was tedious, them having to be together for it was nothing they were going to complain about.

This, naturally, ended up with Amanda learning nothing in regards to the lesson she was supposed to be being taught, and so a few weeks later, the next time she went over to Kody and Chase’s to try and get Justine out of their hair for a moment she went with the mindset that she could go out with the girl if she wanted. She made sure not to mention this to either of them, because she didn’t want to be turned down before she got the chance to do as she wished. After long-awaited apologies were exchanged and Justine was placed in her arms, it took a lot to keep her from darting out of the house without another word. She needed to play it cool, get their trust, and then do whatever she wanted the moment she could.

“I’ve noticed that you came over here alone today,” Chase remarked after he and Kody exchanged a concerned look between them. “How are you planning on getting her back to your place? You’ll need someone to come with you if you want to keep her safe.”

“You weren’t planning on doing something we’ve told you not to do, were you?” Kody added, already looking like he was about to take the girl back from Amanda’s arms. She shook her head, turning her side to them to show a small hand axe attached to her hip, something that she would be able to use in an absolutely dire situation, and both men visibly relaxed. “Okay, that’s not exactly what I’d consider protection, but it’s a start I suppose. How were you allowed to get this far by yourself without something else?”

“It’s not like it’s constant danger out there, and what’s one healer who dropped battling entirely for a while going to do?” Amanda gave a loud laugh, startling Justine into looking at her with wide eyes. “Hey now, don’t be scared of me, I just found what your dad said funny.” The girl seemed to take the reassuring tone of the words to heart, smiling and burying herself into Amanda’s neck, which freed her from the distraction of the girl’s gaze so she could continue speaking. “Anyway, Green walked with me most of the way here, but we split paths when he headed out to train and I came over here. So I was protected by someone with a weapon I definitely wouldn’t want to meet in battle.”

Once again, Kody and Chase were looking between each other, trying to judge the other’s feelings on the matter before giving any response. “That doesn’t help with how you’re going to get home with Justine, small axe or not,” Kody told her, after seeing that Chase wasn’t fully on board with the idea being presented. “Why don’t you have one or both of us escort you home, that way we know Justine’s just as safe as you are?”

“What, are you two really scared that something’s going to happen to us out there?” She was given simultaneous nods. “I…okay, you know what, I’ll let you guys come with me if it makes you feel better. Have to keep your wishes in mind.” The last thing she wanted was to offend either of them to the point of them disallowing for Justine to come home with her, and she knew the best way to keep them happy was to let them do what they wanted.

In preparation for leaving, Kody went to grab some weapons for them to have with them just in case, which left Chase standing there with Amanda, eyeing her suspiciously. “You’re doing a lot of conceding points and agreeing in places you don’t normally. Is something going on that we should be aware of?” he asked, his gaze holding steady even as she shot dagger eyes at him. “It’s just a question, there’s no reason for you to be looking at me like that.”

“I don’t even know what I should answer that with, I just wanted to get to be with my Justine again and I knew the only way that’d happen is if I gave in to what you two want from me. If that’s apologies and buying into your worry, then so be it.” She gave a one-shouldered shrug, her other shoulder unable to move without disrupting how Justine was still positioned. “I’m the same me I’ve always been, nothing’s changed since the last time you saw me.”

Chase opened his mouth to say something else, but caught that he was still being glared at so he closed it back up, his eyes darting side to side as he thought of a different way to word his thought. “Yes, well, for as long as I’ve known you I don’t think I’ve ever heard you simply give in to what someone else wanted that easily. It’s just a little concerning. Is everything okay at home? Anything you’re neglecting to tell us?”

“If you’re implying that I’m trying to take your daughter home with me so that bad things don’t happen there, I never want you to speak to me again.” That shut Chase up rather quickly, even though it was obvious he wanted to say something in response, but Amanda wasn’t sure what he thought she was hiding and she didn’t want to listen to him possibly start throwing out hypotheticals that would make her or her husband look bad. “It’s been a *while* since I last had Justine at my place, I wanted to get to do this again. Simple as that. There’s nothing else going on here, she’s not some piece to some puzzle I’m trying to put together, don’t freak out over nothing.”

“I’ll believe you on this, but at the first sign of anything being amiss you can be assured I’ll be able to figure it out.” He sounded like he meant what he was saying, which was absolutely fine, as someone was always more than welcome to be confident in their own abilities, but she just didn’t get what he was talking about. So what if she’d come into his home to get his daughter and was conceding all points just to get to take her home with her? All that did was demonstrate how far she was willing to go to spend time with Justine. They knew she loved this girl like her own child, why was it so hard to understand that someone would make sacrifices in order to get what they wanted?

“Why does it look like the two of you are in here having a staredown?” Kody asked when he returned, weapons in hand. Neither of them wanted to give him an answer, and so after properly arming themselves they set out to cross town, finding no struggles or fights to deal with on the relatively short trip. The one thing that was amiss the entire time was how Chase was acting, as he kept glancing towards Amanda the entire time, trying to read her while they were on the move. Whatever it was that he was thinking, he wasn’t going to say anything about it unless he was asked, and she wasn’t going to bother with asking. He’d already implied something she didn’t like, she didn’t want to hear him jump to further conclusions about her home life.

When they got to her front door, the two men made sure that she and Justine were both safely inside before even discussing what they were going to do with their day, and as riveting of a conversation as that might have been, Amanda didn’t really care to listen to it. As long as she got to have Justine for herself, that was all that mattered, and she wasn’t going to let anything stop her now—especially not when the parting words she received from Kody amounted to “bring my daughter back to me in one piece”.

There wasn’t a time he specified on it, just that it had to happen. And the gears in Amanda’s head started turning with what she could do to manipulate those words, how she could benefit from the lack of specifics in what had been said. She was aware he most likely meant at the end of the day, after everyone was back in their homes, but what if she didn’t make any moves to take Justine home that night? What if she kept the girl with her for an overnight, something that she hadn’t ever done before? A million things could go wrong, but the experience of it would be worth it if it went right.

Having to explain to Green after he’d gotten home that they were keeping Justine with them for as long as they could was difficult, because he was finding it hard to believe that they’d been granted permission to borrow her for an extended period of time. “I fail to see how Kody would ever give her up for more than a day, knowing him he’ll be sneaking in to steal her back if she’s here a minute later than he likes,” he said, shaking his head at the huge grin on his wife’s face from having told him her plan. “We should take her back, and soon, before it’s too dark to be safe out there.”

“He didn’t tell me we had to take her back tonight, so I’m not going to. If he comes by in the morning I’ll just tell him that you weren’t home until after the sun was down and that we didn’t want to endanger Justine by being out then. He’ll eat it right up, because it means we considered his child’s life before our own, and isn’t that what you’re always telling me? Think of others?” Her grin wasn’t faltering, even if she felt he wasn’t going to agree with her; she really did not want to lose this opportunity she’d stumbled into.

He must have recognized how much she wanted to give this a shot, as he sighed after staring at her for a few moments. “What’s the harm in trying this, if what you say is correct and he didn’t actually give a time he wanted her back. He and Chase would appreciate us not taking her out after dark, I suppose.”

That was all she needed to hear to know that she was going to get her way this time, and that was more that enough to get her to almost start crying in her excitement. Those happy tears very nearly turned to ones of frustration multiple times throughout the night, however, as she realized how ill-prepared she was for watching a young child overnight. All the things she’d kept handy for watching Justine in the past were no longer usable, the girl having outgrown all the clothes and the collection of foods had long expired, which meant that she was having to get creative with keeping the girl fed and comfortable until morning.

When morning did come, the mostly-sleepless couple was greeted by none other than Kody and Chase, looking for where their daughter had spent the night simply because she’d never made it home. “It was dark when we could have taken her back, because I wasn’t going to take her home on my own before Green got back to come with me,” Amanda explained before loudly yawning, the lack of sleep she’d endured overnight catching up to her quickly. “I was sure you’d rather her stay somewhere safe than be taken outside like that.”

“I do like that you thought enough about what I’d want to consider keeping her with you overnight, but look at yourselves! You haven’t spent a night with a child in your lives and yet here you are, doing it to keep her safe.” Laughing, Kody took Justine into his own arms and let the girl reach back towards Amanda, who was yawning once more. “If you want to do this kind of thing again, please warn us beforehand. I can tell you that Chase and I must have gotten as little sleep as you two, and we weren’t the ones stuck awake with Justine.”

“What would you have wanted us to do, send one of us to go tell you we were keeping your daughter here overnight?” Green asked, watching as Kody nodded. “Okay, because that makes sense. I didn’t know she was still here when I came home, I wouldn’t have been able to go warn you what was going on until after I’d gotten back here, but by then it’d have made more sense for us to just take her there with us. After dark.”

Kody thought for a second, before giving another nod. “I see why you chose to do what you did, don’t worry. It just left us concerned that something might have happened. I got to hear some strange theories that Chase came up with regarding what could have been, he was quite concerned with all the possibilities.”

The soft “hey, don’t say that” that Chase said in response was enough to get everyone to laugh, but as they turned to leave, he made sure to repeat one of Kody’s points before he left: “If you didn’t get your fill of time with Justine after this, watching her for an extended period of time is allowed if you discuss it with us first. It’ll give us time to spend together that we don’t normally have, and maybe it’ll—”

The door was closed on them before Chase’s comment could be finished, the culprit looking towards her husband with a tired yet sneaky smile. “Oh no, don’t you even dare consider saying what I think you’re about to say. We just got out of that without issue, you are not suggesting we get ourselves into it again.” Green held up a finger that she shook a few times, trying to dissuade Amanda from whatever plan she’d just made. “It’s to bed for the both of us, and after we are discussing why doing this again is never going to happen.”

Like before, even when they’d had their discussions meant to make her stop wanting to do something, she only agreed with him long enough to get him to think she’d been convinced. So when he came home from training a few days later to see Justine in the house, with a bag of a few days’ worth of her belongings, it wasn’t actually a surprise that there’d been a bit of manipulation that had happened. He knew the kinds of games Amanda liked playing when it came to getting what she wanted, but he wasn’t going to put his foot down when what she was getting out of it was harmless.

At any rate, having the only young child they’d ever have in their house around was actually not that bad. She was a different kind of presence, something that any adult couldn’t replicate, and she tended to stay out of trouble. Complaining about her being around for days at a time would have just put an end to things, and he wasn’t entirely sure that was worth it.

The only time the visiting came to the point of reaching a nearly full week, it was ended in a way different than all times before it. In all those other times, one of two things had occurred: either Kody and Chase came to retrieve their child, or Amanda and Green took her back on their own, and everything had gone over smoothly and without issue. On the first truly extended visit, it was almost as if Amanda simply did not want to give Justine back, shrugging off all suggestions of when to take her home and actually asking her fathers the one time they came to get her if she could keep her a bit longer.

“You have to give her back sometime, she isn’t ours and we need to respect that,” Green told her, as she laid on the floor holding Justine up above her, the girl giggling loudly. “I understand that you’ve taken a real liking to her, but she has her own home she belongs at, and it’s time for her to go back.”

In a mocking tone, Amanda repeated exactly what he’d said back at him, which predictably frustrated him as he was trying to make a point that she was ignoring outright. Rather than talk things out, he saw it easier to just leave the situation, telling her that he was going to go train by himself and for her to not worry about him while he was gone. This was something that had happened a time or two before, but as she thought about it she realized that those other times had left her home by herself, not with a child in her possession. Those other times, she’d been able to follow him and fix things right away; this time, if she wanted to fix things she’d have to wait until he came home, whenever that was.

Unless, of course, she put an old idea of hers to use and went out right then, even with Justine with her. She hadn’t ever gotten rid of what she was planning on using as a makeshift carrier, and even though Justine was much bigger now than she had been when this had been tested out, she was pretty sure she could still make it work. All she needed to do was tie the girl to her, take one of her axes out as a defense tool, and go track her husband down and apologize for mocking him so that he wouldn’t come home upset with her, and then they could act like this hadn’t happened and never let Kody or Chase find out that she’d gone ahead and tied Justine to her anyway!

The plan wasn’t fool-proof, but it sounded like the best thing she was going to come up with in that moment, so she got herself ready and got Justine into position, carefully tying her so that she was being carried up against her chest. “You’re going to come out with me for a bit, don’t remember this and definitely don’t tell your dads I ever did this,” she whispered to the girl, before kissing the dark hair on the top of her head. “We’re going to go make sure I didn’t start a fight on accident, and then we’ll be right back for some more fun and games.”

Justine babbled something, the power of actual words beyond the very basics still too much for her barely-one mind, and her little addition to the conversation was enough to make Amanda smile. This girl didn’t know a damn thing that was going on, there wasn’t any way she’d rat her out for doing this, and obviously her and Green both weren’t going to say a word because they really liked their time with Justine. No one was going to find out about what was happening, and that was all that was needed for Amanda to feel confident in going through with things.

If only she had known that she’d become a moving target the moment she approached the training field that she knew Green was at, then maybe she wouldn’t have considered going out there at all. He hadn’t really changed where he’d gone to train ever, and so she knew the way there on her own simply because she’d gone alongside him so many times, but when she got to the edge of the field and heard no familiar sounds of swordplay, she first wondered if maybe he’d gone somewhere else for once. Tepidly, she raised the axe she had brought with her, making sure it stayed far away from Justine as she held it. “Something tells me we’re not in the right place,” she said, bringing her face low to the girl’s head. “I just hope nothing bad’s happened…”

That was when the first arrow came flying towards them, something Amanda noticed with just enough time to deflect it with her axe. She looked around frantically, trying to find where it had been shot at her from, and when she found nothing at all her heart began racing. What if she wasn’t hearing the typical training noises because of an ambush? What if she was walking into a live fighting zone, and she was going to end up getting herself and Justine killed? Any normal person would have turned tail and ran for the hills the moment they came under fire, but she was so concerned with making sure that her husband hadn’t been killed that she pressed on, despite the continued arrows being shot at her.

When she made it to the point on the field that she and Green normally did their training when they came together, she found it to be completely empty, still with no sounds of anyone doing any kind of practice nearby. “Wh…where is he?” she asked, dropping her axe to bring one hand to her face as she held Justine protectively with the other. “What’s going on here? Where did he *go*?”

An arrow was shot from behind her, grazing her shoulder and catching her attention only when it struck the ground in front of her. She spun around on her toes, expecting to see some invading attacker there to put an end to her as she’d disarmed herself, and she was right in that she was now directly facing an arrow, nocked and at the ready to be shot right into her face. Screaming, she recoiled, hoping that the shooter would see her and see that she had a child bound to her chest, and that they’d reconsider.

“You’re not an intruder,” the shooter said, lowering their bow. Their voice was familiar to Amanda’s ears, as if she’d heard them before, and if she hadn’t been terrified for her life the process of recognition might have been quicker. But as she came to realizing who it was that had been making a game out of shooting her, she saw them drop down from the perch they’d taken and throw their bow to the side. “In fact, you shouldn’t be here at all. What do you think you’re doing?”

This was not the person she’d expected to find out here, and now she needed to run. At least, she wanted to run, but she knew that by this point Kody had noticed that she’d tied Justine to herself and he was going to be out for her blood. “I’m out here to talk to someone, please don’t hurt me,” she told him, her voice shaking and showing how panicked she was, which was scaring Justine to the point that the little girl was whimpering in her carrier. “I-I have your daughter here, you wouldn’t hurt her, would you?”

“Why is she here? Why can’t you follow people’s wishes when they ask you not to do something?” He was stepping closer to her, as she was going backwards, trying to stay away in case he wasn’t going to be friendly once he was right next to her. She took one step too many and slipped on her axe, shrieking as her legs came out from underneath her and she started to fall. That was when he lunged towards her, trying to stop her from falling by grabbing her from the front, but he wasn’t close enough to do anything.

However, the two people that jumped out behind her were able to do the job well. “You know, it shouldn’t have been much of a surprise that you tried following me out here,” Green said, as he and Chase helped get her back to her feet. “Except the part where you weren’t supposed to take Justine out like this. That should have stopped you.”

“Looks like I know somewhere she’s never going again.” The moment he could, Kody got a hand on Justine and started trying to remove her from the carrier she was in, not caring about being careful as to not damage the fabric. “I thought we could trust you to not do something like this, but it turns out that you really do only think about yourself. Now,” he tried prying her arm from around Justine, as that was hindering his progress, “let go of my daughter so I can get her away from you and back somewhere safe!”

“She is somewhere safe, she’s with me! Don’t take her from me just because you started endangering her by shooting arrows at me!” Amanda wasn’t going to let go, not for anything; she recognized that she had done something wrong but it wasn’t her fault that Kody had started shooting at her. “She’s basically my child now, I’m not letting go of her!”

“Basically *your* child? You think that, just because we’ve trusted you with watching her, she’s suddenly become yours?” It was incredibly clear that Kody was offended at the comment, and he was trying harder to pry Justine out from where she was held captive. “You can’t take someone else’s kid and claim them as your own like this. There are ways to get kids from others, trust me, but this is not one of those ways! Now give her here!”

“It would be best if you did give her back, it’d probably allow you to get to see her again sometimes, and I know how much you’d love to get to do that.” Green was trying to nudge her in the right direction, and she knew she should listen to him, but part of her was still upset with him about how he’d walked out that morning and caused all this to happen, so she decided to just ignore him, keeping her arm wrapped tightly around Justine.

Chase saw this happen and, after side-eyeing them both, gave a single snort of laughter that broke the tension between everyone else there. “I don’t get why you’re so insistent on keeping our child for yourself when you’re going to, you know…” He trailed off as everyone’s eyes shifted towards him, the fighting stopping to allow for him to speak without interruption. With the newfound attention, he coughed to clear his throat before finishing what he was saying. “When you’re going to have a child of your own soon enough.”

The three all gave a flat “what”, followed by their own kind of response. Kody said something about how Chase shouldn’t have still been going on about that, Amanda sputtered out a reminder that she physically couldn’t have children, and Green was nodding very intently in agreement to what she was saying. “You have to believe me on this, I know a thing or two about this kind of stuff and I’ve been noticing some—“

“Don’t even finish that sentence, there’s no way. None. Zero. If you’re trying to get me to give Justine back with that kind of trick, you’re doing it all wrong.” Still though, Amanda had loosened her grip on the girl without realizing it, and Kody had managed to pull her out of the carrier and got her safely in his arms. “I cannot have children, and I mean it. You’re manipulating the wrong person on this one.”

“It’s not manipulation if it’s true! Just trust me, please!” He hadn’t meant for this to be the distraction they needed to get Justine back, yet Chase saw that Kody had the girl back in his arms and was grabbing his bow to get going. “If you don’t trust me right now, that’s understandable, but I’ll make sure you know I’m right by the end of the week!”

She remained unconvinced, which didn’t deter him from repeating his claim that he was speaking the truth. “No, see, there’s no way you’re right on this, I have been told so many times by so many different people that I am physically incapable of having children that I can’t believe you. You’re lying to yourself and to me about this.”

“I am not! Here, I’ll prove it to you tomorrow! If I’m wrong you can…” Chase looked to Kody and Justine, trying to come up with a good bribe for what he was trying to accomplish. “You can keep Justine for as long as you’d like if I’m wrong, how about that? And if I’m right, we keep away her from you until we’ve decided you’ve learned your lesson about endangering her.”

“That sounds like you’re trying to give your daughter away to us,” Green remarked, watching as Kody was now looking at Chase with anger in his eyes for the offer. “You might have wanted to discuss that bribe before you made it, doesn’t look like it’s going to end well.”

Chase had also noticed the anger in Kody’s eyes but wasn’t letting it faze him. “I know what I’m saying, everyone here just needs to have a little faith in what I’m saying right now. But if you don’t want to, well, when tomorrow comes I’ll prove that I was right.” With that, he went to stand by Kody’s side, and the two of them headed off towards home together, with Justine still in Kody’s arms.

“I guess we’re going to end up becoming Justine’s parents as of tomorrow,” Amanda said with a shrug, bending down to pick her axe back up off the ground. “That’s cool, I guess. Can’t believe Chase thinks he knows something that’s physically impossible, and he bet his own daughter on it.” Once she was back to standing, she looked to Green and smiled. “Sorry about all this, by the way. I wanted to get to apologize to you as quickly as I could and figured you’d be out here alone. Had no idea you were with friends.”

“Yeah, well,” Green motioned towards the now-empty training field, “they’re gone now and we’re both out here, armed and ready for a fight. Want to make use of this time to do what I came out here for?”

There was no reason for her to turn the offer down, and so they spent the day training together. Her blows and aiming were consistently off, something she attributed to the fact that her mind was racing as it tried accepting the reality that they’d be getting a child more or less to keep the following day, if only because someone had made an agreement that they really shouldn't have.

But when tomorrow came and Chase showed up at their front door, his arms laden with different tools and whatnot he’d collected from time spent working as a midwife. “A lot of these are things I’ve never had to use before, because all of the women I handled were entirely aware of their pregnant status, but I’ve had them around in case I was ever tasked with something like this.” He shoved what he was holding at Amanda, who looked annoyed that he was doing this to her. “Go on, find something you feel comfortable using and try it, I can assure you that whatever result you’re expecting will be dead wrong.”

“More like, I’ll get what I want and you’ll be forced to give me Justine as well.” Smirking, Amanda saw that he didn’t seem to be bothered by what she’d said, which only annoyed her further. “Come on, seriously? You’re going to just let us take your kid like this?”

“The deal was that if I was wrong, you’d get her for as long as you’d like. I’m still not wrong yet, don’t get so sure of yourself.” That was enough to get something happening, the next few minutes spent going through everything that he’d brought over just to decide which thing would be the least invasive and painful. Some of the devices required insertion into various parts of the body, some required long periods of time, and some just seemed like a lot of effort for what was inevitably going to be a negative result, and so a tome with the sole purpose of (as inscribed on its cover) reading blood hormone levels. Chase seemed particularly thrilled with the selection, telling the two people there in the room, “This might be the most accurate thing I brought with me, if what everyone’s told me is right. These kinds of tomes are infused with enough magic to accurately predict not just if someone’s pregnant, but how long they have been as well. Which that would be of good use for me, because of how long I’ve been suspecting this.”

“So it’s going to be hilarious when it comes out negative and makes you look stupid, isn’t it?” Amanda asked, before rather recklessly slicing her thumb open on a page of the book, drawing just enough blood to let it drip on the page. Chase yanked the book from her once the blood disappeared from the page, the magic taking it for itself to analyze, and she rolled her eyes as she saw him intently staring at what was happening in the book. “What, you want to hide the results for yourself? Come on, we know you’re wrong, you don’t have to—“

“Er, Amanda? Maybe it would be best if you stopped talking right now.” It wasn’t all the time that Green told her to be quiet, but when he did it was normally for good reason. He was looking towards Chase, seeing his reaction to what the book was saying, and there was something about the expression Chase was making that was unsettling to him, almost as if he was seeing exactly what he’d expected to. He hesitated for a second before saying anything else, but he knew he had something he needed to ask: “Has it done what you were expecting it to do?”

“Why don’t you two see this for yourselves,” Chase replied, putting the book back into Amanda’s possession so that they could look at it easily. “I don’t want to say I was right, but, as you can see, I was right.”

The tome had done exactly as Chase had said it would, listing off the varying hormone levels that were found in the blood that had been dropped on its page. It also mentioned, underneath its magical (and official) diagnosis, that it suspected the pregnancy to be roughly nine-to-ten weeks along. “This can't be possible,” Amanda said, tracing a finger along the words on the page. “Physically incapable of having kids. Not able. This is lying to us.”

“But what if it's not? I don't think we have any reason to distrust this, aside from what you've been told in the past. What if they were all wrong about you?” There was a slight hint of excitement in Green’s voice, masked by nervousness as he realized what this all meant. “We're having a child. Somehow. It's happening.”

Even with that, Amanda still wasn't going to believe a word of it, and she planned on using every page of that time to check and re-check to see if a different result came up. There was no way she could have a child, she didn't have the ability to do it, she wasn't going to be able to go through with this if it were really true. Yet...her finger traced the words on the page again, her mind wondering if maybe it *was* possible after all.

She'd gone into the day expecting to end up having someone else's child as her own, and now knew that she was having her own child. Her, an actual mother. It was impossible, but at the same time, it was going to be happening and there wasn't anything that could stop it.

==> PART 2A