Ashlandil

There was a tense air the entire time we were on the plane. Kenali sat away from me, as far as she could possibly get, not saying a word. She was curled up in a window seat, her eyes gazing out at the passing clouds, feet pulled beneath her. Her hand stayed protectively on her stomach.
I wanted to rip that damned thing from her womb.
I couldn’t figure out why she wanted it so badly.
It was just a fucking human, doomed to die a human life, doomed to suffer just as much as we did.
Shed pulled a slick one, telling the entire band she was pregnant before I could make her get rid of Iit. Now if anything happened to the bastard thing I would never hear the end of it from them.
My eyes flicked over to Andy.
I'd been able to smell his relief when I'd claimed his kid, and I had seen the expression on her face when she'd sensed it as well.
I almost felt bad for her.
I didn’t blame Andy, he was still young, had a lot going for him, a lot of women to sleep with before he was ready to settle down; if he had been a normal mortal, however, the fact he'd impregnanted her would have overjoyed him, because then he would get to be with her for a long time, her beauty and genuine kindness making her a perfect catch.
But Andy wasn’t a normal mortal.
He was just an asshole in human skin.
Disgusting, really.
God, what was I going to do?
I sighed, letting my hand drop into my hand where I propped it against the arm of the chair.
She just had to tell them about Kacy's child, didn’t she?
She was quickly learning how to be spiteful.
I wasn’t sure I liked it.
And I hated how right she was. It did upset me that I couldn’t get her pregnant, start a family with her. It just wasn’t possible for angels to procreate, which I had always thought was a good thing; who wanted more of our kind roaming the earth?
But that baby she carried, it would be an abomination.
It would be part angel, part human.
More angel, considering what Andy really was.
That baby would have more power and gifts then it should, and it worried me. I knew Cronus had heard the fight, so he had to know she was with child, which also meant he knew who it would belong too.
I didn’t trust him.
She was worried that I would harm the child, but she should be more worried about him.
He was the one who'd been running around with Raza and Theda for decades, there was no telling what had rubbed off on him.
He wasn’t trustworthy.
Not at all.
"More water, sir?"
I glanced up at the flight attendant, then shook my head, looking away. She was giving me the googly eyes and I didn’t feel the need to feed right now. Ihadnt felt the need in a while, oddly enough.
With Geneva gone again, everything still ached inside my chest. Kenali had forced me to come back, when I could have just slowly turned to ash, a peaceful way to go in my opinion.
She'd wanted me back, this was her fault.
She shouldn’t have been stupid enough to get pregnant.
She was still so fucking young!
God.
I rubbed my eyes again, remembering the last time we were on a plane, the fun we'd had in the bathroom.
Oh the fun we'd had....
Dammit.
I shifted, restlessly moving around in my seat.
This was the longest flight I'd ever been on.
None of the guys were talking, it was just silence.
CC and Jinxx, who I was assuming had been clued in, both had their headphones in. Jake was flicking through his tablet, probably working on more recordings for his studio.
Andy sat up front, his back to the rest of us, his seat directly across from Kenalis, as if he was trying to look after her but not bother her at the same time. I wasn’t sure what we were all going to do when we got off this plane, if we'd all go our separate ways home, or if they were going to gang up on me and mob me down for being so cruel to her.
And what was she going to do?
Was she going to leave me? Would she even come back to the apartment with me? I didn’t want to lose her forever, I really didn’t. I didn’t want her to just completely leave me by myself and disappear somewhere around the world.
But she would never forgive me if I harmed that spawn she carried.
So I would have to deal with it, wouldn’t I?
If she was so damned set on having it, there was nothing I could do short of physically ripping it out. And she would hate me forever and probably kill me if I did something like that, or do to me what she did to Seraphine when she lost control out of anger and grief.
Soooo ---- my best bet was just coaxing her around into forgiving me, getting her back to my apartment, and then somehow convince her that I wouldn’t harm the baby.
Maybe she would decide to just give it up for adoption.
She couldn’t seriously think she could keep it and protect it, did she?
At least not by herself.
She would need help.
And I couldn’t think of one angel in this world other then that asshat Iriel who would be willing to do something like that.
Which meant I was the only one left.
I scowled, and my gaze wavered on the back of her head.
Would she want my help, after the jackass I'd been to her the other day?
She hated me right now.
And I didn’t want her to hate me.
It made the ache in my selfish chest worse.
Ihadnt meant to lose my temper so badly yesterday, she'd just caught me off guard and it had escalated...
Motherfucker.
'I was gonna have to help her, wasn’t I?
I was going to have to help her keep that little bugger safe if I ever intended on seeing her again, which meant I was gonna have to play daddy to some little welp that wasn’t even mine.
Andy should be the one who had to suffer the consequences of his dick, not me.
Why was I still cleaning up his damned messes?
Disgruntled, I glanced up at him where he sat hunched, and I could hear his fingers moving acorss his phone screen.
He always came out of everything scott-free.
But then again, if Andiel was awake in there like he seemed to be, he knew that baby was his. He knew Kenali was carrying it, and he would want to be with her right now. Human Andy didn’t know jack, but Andiel did.
Which means...
If I got with Kenali, he would miss raising his actual, flesh-and-bone child. He wouldn’t get to see what raising his own spawn was like, not with the woman he actually loved so much he would attempt to disobey his orders from Him.
So being with Kenali, taking that precious little option away from him, was such a nice kick in the angelic balls.
I grinned just thinking about it,
He wouldn’t get to raise his child with the woman he loved, but I would. I would get to raise it, teach it the ways of life, both good and bad, show it how to survive this cursed world, and he would just have to watch from the sidelines.
It almost made it worth it.
My eyes roved back to the red-haired angel.
Fine.
Fine, I would do it.
I would take care of her and that baby, raise it the.... well, I woud raise it, whether it turned out good or bad wasn’t my fault; I had never been meant to be a father figure, and what if it was a boy? A girl?
Dammit.
Well I'd better get this over with.
I huffed, then slowly got to my feet, stepping out into the aisle and walking to where she sat.
This was the only chance I would have to convince her I was sincere without her having an option to run away. I could feel everyones eyes on me as I cautiously sat down beside her, and her entire body went rigid immediatley.
"I come in peace," I said lightly, keeping my voice soft so everyone else wouldn’t over hear. Her eyes went to mine warily, and her arms were abruptly wrapped around her middle, like she wanted to create a better barrier.
"What do you want?"
"I want too.... fuck, I'm sorry," I sighed, leaning back in the seat. "For how I acted. You just... surprised me."
She just glared at me.
"Kenali, I..." How could I make myself sound sincere? "I get it, you wanna keep it, I do. I get why, I get your reasons. I get your mothering instincts must have suddenly came out of nowhere and decided to protect the spawn. I just... I think it's a mistake."
"I don’t care what you think anymore, Ashlandil. You can go fuck yourself."
Well that was a little harsh.
She really was mad at me.
I hesitated, steepling my fingers together in front of me. "Kenali, I mean it. I'm sorry, okay? It just.... you're too young to get attached to a kid. You have an eternity you can spend here enjoying yourself, and having that thing is just going to bring a halt to all of it. And even when it's gone, you wont let it go. All of its descendents ---."
"Do you have a point or not?"
I glared at her. "Don’t become a bitch to me when I'm trying to apologize."
"It doenst sound like you're apologizing at all!"
"Goddammit, I'm trying to say I'll fucking help you if you'll shut the fuck up long enough for me too!" I hissed, and she winced, scooting a little farther away from me.
I flicked my eyes to the ceiling, trying to control my temper, then looked back at her.
"Look, you wanna keep it? Fine. But you can't do it yourself, Ken. You won't be able to protect the little devil twenty four seven, not when the others find out about it."
She wouldn’t look at me, staring intensely at the floor like I didn’t exist, but she knew I was right.
"Kenali, I... you know how I feel about you," I mumbled, my chest starting to ache. "And I, I don’t like doing shit that hurts you. i'm not perfect, not by far. I'm a fallen angel and I'm a monster. But I care about you," I reachec forward thoughtlessly, brushing her hair behind her ear. "I love you. And if you really want to have that baby, you'll need someone to protect you. Because I know you'll die trying to keep it safe, and I can't stand the thought of something like that happening to you."
I was being completely sincere.
And I know she could feel it, my fingers were still touching her skin, my hand brushing her cheek softly. She hesitated, and then her eyes swept to mine.
"But you don’t care about it, Ashlandil. You want rid of it. How do I know ---?"
"You just have to trust me," I shrugged, my hand dropping to the arm rest. "I know I've let you down, but I've always kept you safe; I would have died for you, you already know that. And that's still true. I still would. I'd rip my own heart out if I thought it would save your existence. I'd die for you, and right now, you'd die for that kid. So if it means losing you completely... I guess I'll have to die for it too, huh?"
And I meant it.
I wasn’t sure why, but I did. If she cared so much for that child, then I would die to keep it safe as well. I wanted her to love me as much as I did her, and maybe this way, she could find it somewhere in her heart to do that.
Maybe I could become a better being, someone worthy of her love again.
I wanted to be, so badly.
She bit her lip, her violet eyes meeting mine after a few seconds.
"I want to believe all that," she said after a moment. "I really do, Ashlandil."
I gave her a weak smile, and I closed my hand over hers, feeling how cold her fingers were; she hadnt been eating, which was bad for her and the spawn. She wouldn’t sleep with Andiel, not now, and she sure as hell wouldn’t sleep with me. Cronus, maybe, but she didn’t seem like she was content with him.
So we would have to find her a mortal; she could have as much fun as she wanted now, she was already pregnant, the worst had already happened.
Her hand was stiff beneath mine, but started to relax. She stared at our hands a moment, and then turned her palm upward, letting my fingers sink through hers.
"I cant do this by myself," she whispered after a moment, and I heard the tremor in her voice. "I don’t know what to do, Ashlan. I don’t know what to do."
"We'll figure it out, love," I murmured, feeling myself relax. I leaned over, pressing my lips against her forehead. "We always do."
"There's so many awful things that could happen," she muttered as I leaned away. "You want to kill it. The others will. I'm not strong enough to ---."
"Kenali, you weild hellfire on your off days," I shook my head. "You're one of the strongest there is if you can figure out how to control it without going supernova. Right now, of course, you probably shouldn’t try. We wouldn’t want the little devil to go all Hitler now, would we?"
She just looked at me blankly.
Right, she had no idea who that was.
"We wouldn’t want him to go bad," I amended, and she wrinkled her nose.
"I would love him regardless. Or her," she added quickly, flushing.
"Which do you want?"
"What?"
"Do you want a boy or a girl?" I asked, relaxing against the seat. I stretched my legs out in front of me, feeling a little cramped. I stayed tense so often it was starting to hurt my muscles.
"Oh, I don’t know," her brow furrowed. "It doesn’t matter, does it?"
"Not really," I shook my head, glancing over at Andy through my hair. He'd been staring us down the entire time, and I didn’t miss the look he had when he realized she was letting me hold her hand, touch her.
It meant we were getting back together, in his mind.
And it should.
He didn’t get to raise this child, this rare opportunity, but I did.
So fuck him and his messes.
He was a pompous prick anyway.
"What do you think it will be?" She asked after a moment, looking down at her flat stomach. She wouldn’t be showing for a long time yet, as early as she still was, and I could tell she wanted to be excited about it, she wanted to be able to enjoy being pregnant the way she'd seen so many mortal women be.
And I wanted her to be that way.
I suppose I couldn’t be a monster the entire time.
If she wanted to be excited about it, then so be it. She could play human for a while, maybe it would be good for her.
"You're the mother, you guess."
She wrinkled her nose. "But I haven't any idea."
"When you're far along enough, we can get it checked. They'll be able to tell you the sex of it. Then you can go on a spending rampage buying all the clothes you want for it."
"Really?" She frowned at me. "But, Ashlan, I don’t ---."
"It's my kid, isnt it?" I raised my brows at her, and she blinked at me, surprised. "Which means I gotta fork out all the cash for it. Means we'll have to get a bigger place, too," I sighed, knowing I was going to miss my one bedroom apartment like crazy. "Do you wanna go full happy suburbia or can we please just stay in the city? I really don’t like the suburbs, and I'll be mobbed by fangirls all the time. I don’t think I could handle that many."
Her lips twitched, just like I'd hoped they would.
"Are you... sure about this?" She asked after a moment, her hand tightening in mine. "Really, Ashlandil? Because if you're going to be here, be this with me, then it's... Iit's for the duration that I carry it. You can't, you can't bail on me halfway through."
"I'm not gonna bail," I rolled my eyes. "If I'm anything, it's consistent, you know that. When we get home, we'll relax for a while. You'll be fine in the apartment, and you can figure out how to Google all the questions you'll no doubt be having. I'll.... figure out what to do about the rest of it."
Like how this was going to fuck my human rockstar thing I had going on. While she was pregnant, it could still basically be normal, until it got out to the fans that I'd gotten her pregnant on tour and she was gonna pop my offspring out.
Technically Andy's, but those were just minor details.
It was mine, according to the human world.
PoorBryan Stars.
I remembered that interview when I'd announced she was my girlfriend, I could only imagine his face when I announced she was pregnant.
And then they would ask if we would be getting married ---.
Gods no.
She would never agree to that, because, despite it was a human thing, our sins wouldn’t allow us to be monogamous to one another. We would have to break our vows in order to even live, and I wasn’t sure that was something she could handle.
And until death do us part?
We wouldn’t die.
The entire thing would just be a joke.
So no marriage.
We would stay exactly as we were, playing house for a little while.
Ten years would go by before we would technically have to start aging, I suppose. Then we would probably need to get out of wherever we lived before someone noticed, and I would need to drop off the face of the planet with her so we could finish raising the devil without complications.
My hand tightened in hers.
This was going to be a disaster.
I don’t think I was ready for this kind of responsibility.
Fuck, I could barely take care of her, and she was so much like a child still.
What was I getting myself into?

Notes

So Ashlandil is stepping up, whoop whoop!
Yeah, it'll probably go south quick. do you think andy realizes its his? probably.

plus side, its my moms birthday tomorrow, and I'm going out (yes, with my godawful headcold and man voice) to get the supplies needed to make her some cupcakes and homemade icing --- please cross your fingers that the baking and icingmaking goes well and I dont accidently summon dead witches or something (I'm a terrible cook, but its the thought that counts, right?)

So that's my plans for the day. And it's the first time in a week that I've put on pants and brushed my hair (you wouldnt imagine the tangles i had to wash out of it), and I'm on a lot of cold meds, so I'll probably go sideways through the store parking lot and crawl into the baking section on my fingers.
hope you guys have a good day, though!
and I'm gonna try to keep updating frequently, though next week is iffy because I'm gonna have to get back to my actual life again since my cold is improving, but I'm gonna try regardless.

so yeah.
thanks for hanging around!