Ben sutured up his patient and sent the woman on to recovery. They still had about six days to go before they got to Toulon, but some surgeries were better performed now. Successive surgeries, surgeries to repair bleeds missed in the initial rush to save lives, and surgeries to repair incremental injuries were best performed now.

It wasn't like any of the surgeons were going anywhere.

He checked the time, checked his schedule and went ahead and scrubbed out. He didn't mind putting his instruments down now. He could keep going if he needed to, but growing a new person was hard work and he wouldn't mind resting. He didn't head back to his own cabin, though. He wasn't in the mood to hide away, but he wasn't in the mood for the mess hall either.

He headed over to Aziza's cabin instead. She was there, just as he'd expected. She had Khadijah on her belly on the little scrap of floor available, on top of her own blanket. "I don't mind telling you, I can't wait to get her some proper toys." Aziza gave him a little smile.

Khadijah banged her hand on the blanket and let out a squeal of delight.

"I think she's doing just fine," he promised. "How's her breathing? Lungs still recovering and everything?"

"You'd hardly know she'd been hurt." Aziza looked over at her daughter. "She's a good baby, you know. She hardly ever cries. When she does, it's because of something she needs. She doesn't cry just for the sake of crying." She hesitated. "My youngest, before, was colicky. It was a real challenge for all of us."

Ben winced. He hadn't even thought about colic or reflux in his baby. What if the baby had that? The poor thing would be miserable. "I can only imagine."

"We loved him, of course, but—" She stopped and looked away. "Well, it wasn't easy, but he grew out of it eventually." She smiled at Khadijah and picked her up. Khadijah kicked her tiny legs with glee before she settled into her new mother's arms. "How are you doing? Are you still feeling nauseous?"

Ben shook his head. "No. Not usually. Every once in a while a strong smell will set me off. It's like my olfactory nerve has been replaced by a dog's, you know?"

She laughed a little. "Oh, I know. They mention it 'may' happen in all of the textbooks, but they treat it like an old wives' tale they have to bring up because of anecdotal evidence. They just don't have a way to measure it. Many carriers—mostly women, but women have stronger olfactory senses than men in general—find their sense of smell gets sharper in pregnancy. It might have been beneficial back when we still lived in trees and scavenged food from predators, but now it's mostly a nuisance." She made a face. "I used to make my husband wash five times a day. The usual ablutions weren't enough—he had to take a full shower, washing everything. It was the only way I could cope."

Ben snickered. "Yeah, I can see that. Dave came up smelling like the bowels of the ship the other day—all engines, mold, and disinfectant. I had to make him shower. I just couldn't handle it."

"Ugh." Aziza laughed. "Other than that, you're okay? No unexplained bleeding, or swelling you weren't expecting?"

Ben shook his head and blushed. "I forget you were an OBGYN nurse before you came to Borderless."

"Well, they obviously don't have any OBGYN specialists on a Navy ship so I've been filling the gap where I can. Some of the patients who come in need care, exams and that kind of thing. Some of them are pregnant. You're not the only pregnant omega on board, for the record."

"Oh, geez. I can't imagine. Are they all okay? I have literally no OB experience with omegas, but if push came to shove I could probably figure something out."

"Did you mean to make a terrible pun just there or are you just too distracted by Khadijah's adorable little attempts to play with my headscarf?" Aziza grinned at him. "Here, do you want to hold her?"

Ben accepted the tiny baby, who went to him with glee. "Let's go with accidental pun." He looked down at the little girl. "I'd hate to make a bad impression on you."

"They all seem to be doing as well as can be expected." She shrugged. "They're recovering, which is all we can hope for. So we're settling in Virginia?"

"You're not obligated," he told her quickly. "If you'd rather go somewhere else, I'll still help you get set up and everything. I just kind of have to, because Dave is there and he can't leave, even if he wanted to." He bit the inside of his cheek. Did Aziza feel trapped or forced? It was the opposite of what he wanted her to feel.

She waved a hand. "It's as good a place as any, I guess. My mental image of America is New York City and Texas. I'm not sure where Virginia even is. It will be interesting to learn about it. I'd rather go someplace new and have some familiar faces around me, than land someplace completely strange with no one I know." She pursed her lips. "How does your Dave feel about it?"

"What, the baby or you living nearby?" Ben chuckled and gave Khadijah his finger to hold. She grabbed on and stuck it into her mouth, where he felt two little teeth trying to poke through her gums. "He's excited about the baby. He's fine with you living nearby. He initially thought I was trying to get you to move in with us, and he was a little freaked out by all that. But he's got no problem with you being part of our lives. He likes you." He looked down at Khadijah, who managed to look guilty about biting him. "And he adores you, of course. He's the one who brought you onto the ship, yes he is."

"And he's okay with you moving in together, just like that?" She rubbed at her forearm. Holding the baby was pleasant, but the baby got heavy quickly.

Ben licked his lips. "I'm not sure if ‘okay’ is the word here. We're still having some tension about it. He wants us all to live in his one-bedroom apartment. Which sure, we could probably do it if we had to, but we don't have to. We can afford to move into a more comfortable house, with privacy for this baby and any other kids we might have in the future." He blushed deeply when the words escaped his mouth.

"So you think this will last." Aziza's dark eyes twinkled merrily.

"I want it to. Isn't that natural? I love him, and we're having a baby together so we're going to be in each other's lives for a good long time. I'd like for us to still love each other for most of that time." He put his hand over his belly. There wasn't any outer sign of the little potential inside of him, growing into a person. He knew it was there, though.

"Of course." She picked up a little stuffed toy she'd fashioned out of socks and put it on the shelf. "Have you started looking for places to live?"

"I've looked around a little bit. Nothing serious. I'm kind of worried about what Dave's going to think about them. He's got his ideas, you know? And they're valid too. I don't want to just run rampant over them, because I've got the cash to do what I want. It's going to be our home, not just mine."

She gave him a little smile. "Ben, why don't you go sit down with him and look through some of the real estate listings. Get these issues settled and hash them out now, while you're still at sea and can recover. It can be a nice and fun way to spend an evening that doesn't threaten to warp the walls."

Ben's face burned. "Oh, my God. Really?" He looked over at the wall so he wouldn't have to try to meet her eyes. It was a mistake. "Er, I'll just get going then." He rose to his feet.

"Ben? I'll need the baby back." She took Khadijah from him. "Good luck."

Dave came and found Ben not long afterward. He broached the idea of looking at houses as they sat over their dinner in the mess hall, and while Dave hesitated, he agreed to do it. They retreated to Ben's cabin. Ben grabbed his tablet and pulled up the real estate website he'd been surfing, and he and Dave cuddled up together to search.

The problems started before they looked at a single house. Ben went to the "advanced search" section, so they could narrow down the thousands of available properties. "So I figure four bedrooms, two baths is a good place to start." It seemed reasonable to him.

Dave squawked. "Are you kidding? Who actually needs two baths? Are you renting out two of those bedrooms while I'm gone, babe? Because that I could see. I'm a little uncomfortable having strangers around the kid, but let's be real, it's not a bad way to make a few bucks."

Ben held his finger in place over the drop-down menu. "Um, honey. Two baths isn't exactly unreasonable. There are two of us, and we're about to be three. What if one of us is having a shower and the other one needs to use the bathroom?"

"Then the other one can wait." Dave shook his head. "It's wasteful. We don't need that stuff."

Ben opened his mouth. He shut it again. Was it really wasteful to have two bathrooms? It seemed perfectly reasonable to him. Everyone he'd known, everyone who came from a "normal" background, had a house with two bathrooms. "What if we've got guests staying with us? They're going to want their own bathroom, just for the sake of privacy."

"Who in the hell are we going to have staying with us? You don't hang around with your family, and I don't hang around with mine. Aziza's going to have a place of her own." Dave crossed his arms over his chest.

"Okay, but what if Adami's husband rightly kicks him out for being a dick? Or if Kelly's house catches fire and he needs a place to stay?" Ben pulled his finger away from the screen. "Look, it's not about being pampered. It's about being prepared for any situation. What if we have a problem in one bathroom? You want to have to run down to McDonalds every time you need to crap?"

"It worked before." Dave narrowed his eyes.

Ben heroically refrained from pointing out that it had not, in fact, worked before. "You want to bring our baby to McDonalds to crap? Every time? And you know damn well I've lived in some rough places myself. It's not about me being too soft to live in the 'real world'—"

Dave held up a hand. "I didn't say it was. Although now that you mention it, you always had the option to leave those places. The issue is that you want to get this giant house, with all these bathrooms and gizmos and whatnot, for essentially one and a half people. The baby's not going to know any different, and it's going to be a good while before it needs to worry about bathrooms. I'm deployed more often than not. I'm not even going to be in that house very often."

Ben sucked in his cheeks. "So you're saying I'm spending profligately for my own pleasure."

"Basically." Dave softened it with a little smile, but the words lost none of their bite. "I mean, I wish you wouldn't put it that way, but if that's how you want to hear it then that's how I guess I'm saying it. Yeah, you're spending too much on something that only really benefits you. I'm not going to be there all that often because my job takes me away from the home. It's going to be you and the baby—"

"And the nanny." Ben raised an eyebrow in challenge. If they were going to do this expectations thing, Ben was going to go all in.

"Wait, nanny? We never talked about a nanny." Dave sat up straighter, leaving cold air by Ben's side. "Oh, no. Hell no. I thought you said you didn't want your kid raised by nannies and boarding schools."

Ben stood up. "I don't. But unless you've got a better child care solution when I'm at work, we're going to need to bring in a nanny. It's not like I'm going to be taking off and filming on location for two straight years, but I'm going to have a job and do that job. Do you think a surgeon can do his job with a baby strapped to his back, Dave?"

"I figured you'd stay home with the kid until it was in school, honestly." Dave leaned back against the bulkhead. "You did say you didn't want the kid raised by nannies." He narrowed his eyes at Ben. "Those were your words."

"Parents who work aren't letting someone else raise their kids. They're working, contributing to society, and showing their kid the value of hard work. And I told you from the beginning that I'd be going back to work. Where did this whole 'quitting my job and devoting myself to changing diapers' thing come from?"

"It's our kid, Ben. It should be important enough for you to do the right thing and nurture it, keep it safe. You know damn well what can happen to it." Dave stood up now. "And yeah, you made some noise about going back to work, but I figured you'd get over that when you realized you were going to have a baby running around. Yeah, a lot of parents work, but they actually need the money. You don't. You'll fling money at frivolous crap like sixteen bathrooms but you won't do the right thing and just take care of your kid?"

"Well, if it's so important to you, how about if you stay home with the baby?" Ben choked out a laugh. "Oh, not so eager now, are you? You'll lecture me on 'doing the right thing' but when I reflect it back at you, not a peep. Funny how that works."

Dave's face twisted. "I'm serving my country. I'm keeping my whole country safe."

"And I save lives every goddamn day. You think I should stop working, give up my license, walk away, and let people die, because the condom broke? But you shouldn't have an equal responsibility to walk away? Screw that, David Hopper. Screw that right in its ear."

"Alphas don't stay home. You're the omega, the carrier. Isn't it like an instinct for you?"

"Take a goddamn science class before you start spouting off to an actual goddamn doctor about instincts!" Ben screamed. "There will be a nanny. I will be going back to work. The nanny will have their own bathroom, and their own bedroom. You're welcome to share this house with us or not, but so help me God I will not listen to half a second of this regressive bullshit."

Dave flinched. "We can talk about this when you're calmer," he suggested, and backed toward the door.

"Does thirty fucking fifteen sound good to you?"

Dave fled. Ben sat back down on the bed and looked up at the ceiling. "Well, that went well."

* * *

Dave fled Ben's cabin and headed back to the mess hall. He wasn't sure where else he was supposed to go. He could go to the gym, he supposed, and train, but that wasn't where his head was at. He didn't have a bunch of aggression to work off. He was sad.

He got himself a soda and sat in a corner. It wasn't long before Adami showed up. "Let me guess. Thin walls?" Dave asked. He managed a wry grin for his friend.

"Thin walls." Adami took the seat across from him. "Do you want to talk for a little bit?"

"I don't know. I'm not sure there's much to say." Dave rubbed at his temples. "It's like talking to a brick wall. I'm going to assume it's just pregnancy hormones. Right?"

"Er, do you remember back when you told me I was being a raging asshole about Colin, and how being my best friend gave you the right to let me know when I was being a raging asshole?" Adami scratched behind his ear.

"Yup." Dave nodded.

"Well, it goes both ways, you know? I didn't hear everything, but I heard enough to know you were definitely in the wrong there, bro. Stay with me and I'll explain." Adami stole Dave's soda and took a gulp of it.

Dave held up a hand. "Look. I know where you're going with this, okay? Colin was upset because he didn't want kids in the first place, and he was terrified of winding up poor again. That's not Ben's thing. That's more my thing, although we both absolutely want this baby. Ben's not worried about scraping together rent money if he doesn't work. He just wants to work to feed his ego, okay?"

"His ego, huh?" Adami raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips. "Guy had plenty of time to stroke his ego before he decided to go to medical school. I mean he's pretty enough to be a model, he's smart, he could have been an actor or a model, or whatever. He had the connections and the money to go anywhere and do anything. Instead he decided to be a trauma surgeon. Not just a trauma surgeon, either. When he lost his fiancé, he could have just hidden himself away and lived a life of comfort and ease. Instead, he threw himself into saving lives in some of the worst places on Earth, and he's studiously avoided having his name attached to anything. Yeah, it's all about ego."

Dave scoffed and took his drink back. "You know what I mean, Adami."

"Oh, I know exactly what you mean. You're not getting your way so you're lashing out." Adami leaned forward. "Look. We're not so different, you and me. Or Colin. We all grew up poor. Ben didn't. And that's okay. There are going to be some things that are screamingly different between you, okay? It sounds to me like he is, or was, willing to work with you."

"Come on, man. Nannies? Two bathrooms? Why not a butler, six maids, gardeners, and a pool boy too?" Dave threw his hands up in the air. "It's all ridiculous."

"So what? It ain't like you're going to be around it to see it. And hey—when you are around it, enjoy it. We're out there in the mud, sand, and shit every day. We put our bodies through hell for years to keep people safe. Honestly, I have to wonder if we're not all a little nuts, like the corpsmen think, because we volunteer for some crazy stuff. Some of us do snap, like Baudin. If someone wants to make us comfortable when we're home, and make us feel good, then why shouldn't we enjoy life for a little while? Come on. Two bathrooms, or even three? That's not anything compared to what the dude could be buying."

"That's just it. You heard him. He's going to buy a house, and it's going to have as many goddamn bathrooms as he wants even though he could buy three houses back in my hometown with that kind of money, and there's not a damn thing I can do about it." Dave shook his head. "He should be staying home with our kid, because parents should raise their own kid."

"Yeah, we've been over this." Adami rolled his eyes.

"We haven't, though. The guy literally told me he was raised by nannies and boarding schools. He doesn't talk directly to his mother. He communicates with her via her 'PR guy.' He hasn't visited with his dad since he was twelve, although I think they do email once in a while. He said he doesn't want that for our kid, but he's going to go out and get a nanny so he can go and do the same thing to our kid? People like us, Ed, they don't have nannies. Our sisters and our mothers, they are nannies."

Adami stroked his chin. "Okay. I think I'm getting it now. I'm not so sure I want it, but I'm getting it. We're looking at some serious class issues."

"Well yeah, Ed. Did you think I was really trying to regulate people's bathroom habits?"

Adami held up his hands. "Some guys get weird control issues in this business. I don't judge. Here's the thing, Dave. He's not the one with the class issues. You are."

Dave tilted his head and smirked. "He's the one getting nannies and all this household help, and you think I'm the one with class issues?"

"I think he's the one who's willing to sit here and discuss the issues with you. You're the one losing your shit because of a very simple child care solution that, to be honest, a lot of people with odd schedules make use of. You feel he shouldn't work because he doesn't need the money, but you're forgetting that he's worked damn hard to get to his position and the work he does is important. He deserves to do that work. It's a big part of who he is."

"Okay, but that job could go to someone else." Dave twisted up the wrapper from his straw between his fingers.

"It's not like they can just throw an out of work coal miner into that job, Dave. It's specialized work that he's uniquely trained to do. It's not just ego when he says he saves lives, every day. Yes, we're working our asses off to keep America safe. And he's working his ass off to save human lives. It's not trivial work."

"I know it's not." Dave threw the wrapper down. "I just—okay. He doesn't need me for the money. He obviously is going to do what he wants in terms of living arrangements and in terms of our baby. What exactly does he need me for again?" Dave fixed Adami with a pissy glare. "And if you say sex, I'll kick you in the balls so hard you get to Toulon on your own."

Adami snickered. "Well that's probably part of it. That's something you'd have to ask him, but man, he obviously needs you for something because he's working damn hard to keep you around."

"He said he'd talk to me in 3015." Dave tugged at his hair.

"Well, you pulled a bunch of crap out of my stellar performance with Colin and ran it through a 1950s filter, so yeah, he's pissed. But he's been trying to engage you and work with you to find a solution you can both live with. He hasn't been trying to ram anything down your throat. He's defended you and he's stood by you, man, and you can't sit there and pretend he hasn't. He does love you. If you're smart, you're not going to let that go because you've got some fears about money that only make sense inside your own head."

Dave ran his tongue along the back of his teeth. Adami was probably right. Dave still couldn't be comfortable with the amount of money Ben thought was appropriate to spend, and he hated the idea of household help. He hated the idea of losing Ben, and the baby, even more. "I'll give him a little time to cool down, and then I'll talk to him." He tapped his foot against the floor. "There's a lot I'm uncomfortable with, but you're right. He's trying. I'm not, not really. I can do better."

"Hey, your feelings are valid too." Adami shrugged. "It's worth making them known. The question is, when are those feelings just hangups and when are they reasonable concerns? And when are those hangups things we just can't get over, you know?" He chuckled. "I've still got a lot of hangups about things, but I'm working on them. Me and Colin, we both know I'll get there, but I don't mind admitting I had to have a big come-to-Jesus meeting with Chief before I could see clearly enough to get the help I needed."

Dave shuddered. "I don't want things to get that far, bro. I really, really don't."

"No one does. It wasn't fun. Not at all." Adami grimaced. "Give it some thought. I'm sure he'll come around, though."

The next day, Chief summoned Dave and Floyd back into the brig. Conley didn't look any better than he had the last time they'd spoken. If anything, he looked even grayer. "You've had a few days to think about your future, Conley." Chief smirked over at the criminal.

Conley might look frail and miserable, but he still managed to pull himself up and give Chief the finger. "My buddies aren't going to let anything happen to me. You're lying about any kind of congressional issue, and even if there were, so what? It's not a crime to be proud of who you are." He sneered. "Otherwise there wouldn't be a whole platoon of alpha SEALs, would there?"

"There's pride in oneself, and then there's going out and killing people you think don't measure up." Chief threw a bunch of pictures out onto the table. "Someone who's proud of who he is doesn't need to hurt folks who aren't like him. He doesn't feel threatened, for example, by the existence of mixed-race couples. Sure doesn't need to go out and shoot them. And good job, by the way, on getting the death penalty in Texas for that one. Is that how you rose so fast in the White Dawn ranks?"

"I am where I am in White Dawn because I'm goddamn good at what I do." Conley grinned. "And when I get out of here, your family's going to be first on the list. You think you're safe because you're in the States? I've got news for you, sugarplum. We're everywhere."

"Yeah, we noticed." Chief waved a hand. "You're like roaches that way." Dave had no idea how his CO could stay so calm in the face of threats to his family like that. If this maggot had said anything about Ben or their baby, his hands would have been around the bastard's throat faster than he could draw breath. "See, the thing about these congressmen, Conley, is that they're already talking. Chaos Tree was declared a terrorist group after Orlando. So when it was proven that they were members, well, there was only one way to save their necks. And that was to open their mouths.

"Whatever friends you think you have? They're not going to do you a damn bit of good. You can give us Wolf. That's a good start. But we want more. We want to know who's pulling those congressmen's strings."

Conley scoffed. "I'm sure you do. You may think we're like roaches, but really? It's the congressmen. They'll go wherever the money is. You know it as well as I do. There's not a member of Congress who's ever actually served the people. They like the lifestyle too much. They like the blood money. They don't care who gets hurt or what kind of foul interest groups are pouring money into their coffers as long as that spigot stays open. I've known congressmen who took money from drug dealers. Congressmen who took money from overseas dictators. Congressmen who would take money from the devil himself.

"Those eleven Congressmen ain't the only ones taking money from our friends. They're just the only ones who were dumb enough to be caught as part of our organization. Chaos Tree wasn't originally part of White Dawn. We found common cause relatively recently. A mutual friend put us in touch."

"Yeah, yeah. That ain't news. Who's that friend?" Chief yawned. "There's a gurney in Texas with your name right on it, pal. And it's getting cold."

Conley snorted. "That friend is someone I ain't about to cross. We both know the process in Texas will wind out for decades, even if I do land back there. Which isn't likely, let's face it. He's someone with deep pockets who has a commitment to renewing his people. That's all I'm going to say."

Chief stood up. "Boring. Hopefully those drugs in Texas don't expire before we get there." He leaned forward. "Speaking of things we both know, Texas will go ahead and use them anyway. I hear it burns. Kind of like the flames of Hell." He straightened up and walked toward the door. Dave and Floyd followed him.

Chief's facade didn't drop until they were on the upper deck. "That man's repulsive. One of the most repulsive men I've seen in a very long time. I will be happier than I can say when we're finally rid of him."

Dave nodded. He couldn't argue that point, and he didn't want to. "Do you think we should send a corpsman to him, Chief?" he asked anyway. "He's one of the most vile people we've come across, but he didn't look good when we got down there."

Floyd nodded. "I'd hate to have him die on us before he gets to Texas." He grinned.

Chief sighed and made a face. "I hate the thought of giving that bastard anything. But yeah, we probably should have him checked out. We're not complete savages. Hopper, go to the chief corpsman and have them send someone to the brig. If at all possible, that person should be someone who isn't white. I hate to put anyone through that son of a bitch's bullshit, but I'll be damned if I'm going to cater to his ridiculous ideas either."

"Yes, Chief." Dave turned and headed toward the reception area.

He caught sight of Ben out of the corner of his eye, but Ben didn't see him. He looked awful. Huge dark circles ringed his eyes, and his skin was pale. Obviously their fight was affecting him.

Dave wanted to go to him, put his arms around him and make everything all right again. He couldn't do that yet. Later, though. He promised himself he'd take care of it later.