“Come gather round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
Youll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you
Is worth savin
Then you better start swimmin
Or youll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin.”

• Bob Dylan

Kurt couldn't get himself out of bed, and not because he was sore from shooting off arrows for several hours in a row the day before (though he was), or because he felt nauseous from the meal Blaine had tried to make him the night before (despite Blaine's best efforts), but because of the tangle of arms and legs woven around him that were attached to a man who Kurt could easily best while conscious. Blaine was uncannily strong when he slept, and it ensured that Kurt stay snared by his warm, furry body even though he was wide awake and had long ago finished counting the tiles on the ceiling.

Still, he hadn't the heart to wake Blaine up, even with his morning breath cascading over Kurt's face in regular intervals as he let out his small, squeaky snores. Blaine was easier to manage when he was asleep. Kurt didn't have to worry about being tackled in a fit of arousal, nor did he have to answer the latest in a series of questions that were baby-related.

Which was the real problem.

If Kurt let his eyes drift away from the ceiling, he'd be forced to look upon the myriad of baby gear, attire, books, and supplies that Blaine and Kurt's mother had set about collecting. On Blaine's bedside table, there was a pile of books and sketched in notepads regarding names, some crossed off and others underlined as Blaine had concentrated his efforts on what he called “helping Kurt find the perfect name” - though aside from answering the questions about whether or not Kurt liked name X or name Y, Kurt really found he wasn't thinking about the name of the baby.

Nor was he worried about what kind of cloth to use for the baby's diapers like Blaine was, or that they'd have to find someone to donate breast milk because formula was a definite no-no according to Kurt's mother. Kurt didn't find himself frantic over ensuring there was enough blankets and clothing, as his mother had been seeing to that - with an ever growing pile of infant garments settled in their living room as testament to it. Kurt was also not thinking about how they could get their hands on vaccinations for the baby, as Blaine had been, out of worry that the baby might contract some otherwise forgotten human disease since he or she would be so much more human than Other.

No. Kurt hadn't been focused on any of that, because he had been given no opportunity to be.  With Elizabeth and Blaine so obsessed over the child, and bombarding him with worries and ideas left, right, and center, Kurt had barely had a moment to reflect on how he felt about any of it. He understood that he had fathered a child indirectly, and that the child would be in his care as soon as it was born. He knew that it was coming, and closer to happening with each passing day - but it still seemed wildly unreal, and with everything that Kurt had gone through in his lifetime, he half expected something to occur that would take the baby out of his life before it was in it.

So Kurt remained detached, despite Blaine's vocalized concerns that he “seemed disinterested” and his mother's urgencies about “getting emotionally prepared”. After all, the post-Tides attitude towards all things were to hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. Since the Tides, Kurt had heard that woman had been lost in childbirth like they had in times past, and had also seen the small grave markers with names that had lived for less than a year. Anything could happen to the little one before it reached him, and Kurt couldn't allow himself to get emotionally invested in case something did. He knew he'd have to be there to help his mother and husband who already talked about the baby like it was already there and they knew it.

“Do you know what the mother looks like?” Blaine had asked of Elizabeth.

“Dark blonde hair, almost brunette.  I didn't see what color her eyes were in the scan I had, but she's a good height and looked quite healthy,” Elizabeth had responded before both her and Blaine had looked Kurt's way thoughtfully.

“What?”

“Just imagining what the baby might look like when it's grown.”  Blaine uttered, Elizabeth nodding in agreement.

Kurt just rolled his eyes and turned his attentions back to trying to figure out that damned book. How Blaine could see tales of fantasy in it was beyond him still, and Kurt had even had Elizabeth read it and she had recited the procedure for a colon cleansing from the page he had held out to her. For him however, it was still disjointed nonsense.

Often he'd see the words strength and balance repeated, but with no context to give them any more meaning than what he already had in his head for definitions. There were also hearts scattered about the text, in much the same way an adolescent girl might doodle in her notebook, but again with nothing to give them any meaning.  

It was all anyone ever talked about around him too. Blaine discussed his ideas about the baby with his magicless Halfling fanclub while Kurt practiced and Midhir pushed Kurt to choose a name, insisting on one with two syllables which apparently made some kind of difference. Even Mab, who finally showed up at their door one afternoon, greeted Kurt by means of saying that she had heard about his happy news and that the whole town was excited to have a baby among them - apparently quite a rare thing.  

“Why can Blaine read stories in this damned book and my mom reads it like a medical textbook?” Kurt demanded when Mab asked for the book back.

“It tells you what you need to know… and for humans it gives them an insight into magic since they cannot wield it,” Mab said plainly, accepting the book into her hands and flipping it open.  “For me it speaks about soothing and calm… and my magic is based around manipulating emotion to a gentler state… balancing out hormones is what a human doctor would call it.”

“... and my mother is a healer… so it tells her about healing…” Kurt said softly as he looked down at the page in front of Mab. “It still doesn't tell me how to use my abilities.”

“Because you think of using them like a human uses a tool, but it is not a tool, it is a part of you. There are no instructions for one that will work the same for another. Like we are all constantly told, Other or human, we are each unique, and how we summon and control our abilities must be, too,” she huffed, seemingly affronted by Kurt's admission.

“I'm sorry you couldn't teach me,” Kurt offered.

“You should not be. You are too stubborn to teach.”

“There has to be something I could offer in terms of skill around here.”

It had become their argument of choice lately - how to occupy their existence in this world. Kurt was content to just enjoy their time together, even if it was absolutely mind numbing at the best of times, but Blaine was getting more and more insistent that he needed to be doing something to contribute in order to feel like he had a purpose.

“You can't. Everything here is magic.”

“But there are Halflings without magic who have jobs around here…”

“But you're a human.”

“Which just means I'm a shorter, magicless Halfling with round ears. Honestly Kurt - what can they do that I can't?”

Kurt wasn't able to answer that, and really had no real reason to keep Blaine at home other than that he worried. He worried someone else would find a reason to scar his husband. He worried that without Kurt around, someone might try to do something to Blaine. He worried that someone would say something insulting to Blaine. He worried.

“You'll have your hands full when the baby comes.”

“You say that like it doesn't have two parents.”

“Well considering how special everyone is making the baby out to be, maybe it will need two full time parents.”

“Kurt…”

Blaine's warning voice. The voice that meant Kurt was pushing too far. The voice that meant Blaine was done with the conversation because he presumed Kurt was being unreasonable in some way.

It was hardly the first time Kurt had heard it.

“Damn it, Blaine. I just want to enjoy not having to work all the damned time. I want to enjoy the fact that, against all odds, you're in my life and alive, and, damn it, that somehow we're going to have a kid of our own even though we shouldn't be.”

That was when Kurt got THAT look. The one where Blaine lifted his eyebrows just slightly and his eyes twinkled. The one where the corner of Blaine's mouth twitched up on the left side for just a nanosecond before his lips flattened out.  

The one where Blaine figured he knew something that Kurt didn't.

“One or both of us having some kind of job doesn't mean you can't enjoy that Kurt… if anything, it'll let us enjoy it all the more because it'll give us something to look forward to after we've finished working. Don't let our home life become the job because that's when it can become something we'd hate.”

“I can't use my magic Blaine… or control it at least… the jobs people have here are based around using magic…” Kurt grumbled in reply, turning away from Blaine's smug looking face to stare out the window.  

“They don't all have magic though, and they still work… there has to be options.”

“What if someone stabs you in the back again?”

Blaine sighed, and Kurt could almost see his eyes roll in the reflection of the window. “All the weapons here were magically crafted… which means your protection will be on me…”

“I hate that fucking thing on your back…” Kurt snarled, thinking about the unfading red scar. He couldn't bend Blaine over without a shirt covering it because nothing killed his erection faster than seeing it and remembering how close Blaine came to being killed by someone that Kurt should have killed years ago.

“Honestly… aside from the fact that it hurt when getting it - you have to give them credit for literally stabbing my back to spell out backstabber.”

Kurt didn't find it funny, scowling at his reflection and crossing his arms over his chest. He hated that they had did that to Blaine, and he hated that he couldn't take whatever spell he had over Blaine off of him for even a minute so his mother could heal the scars on his back. It was a constant reminder of how Kurt had failed his husband - first by letting Sebastian and his cronies survive, and then by leaving Blaine behind in the community when he should have known Blaine would have tried to find him. Like the dogs Blaine bred, he was nothing short of loyal, and that loyalty was tied to Kurt.

“Look… Kurt… we're going to end up driving one another crazy if all we do is hang out with one another. It doesn't mean I don't love you - far from it in fact… but I just get antsy sitting around all day. I need a purpose. I need to do my part. If this is where we're going to spend our days, then I need to feel a part of the community rather than separate from it.”

The problem was though, in Kurt's mind at least, that Blaine would always be separate. He was the only human there. Even the magicless Halflings had an innate ability to speak the language and understand the concepts behind magic. They fit in with their height and their ears. Blaine though… Blaine would always stick out.

“Maybe I can help the Berserkers… I did work as a veterinarian after all…”

Kurt winced. Berserkers could morph into animals, but they weren't animals, and certainly didn't need the care animals required. Plus they had a reputation as being temperamental and limited in humor - two things that could get Blaine in serious trouble.

“If I start off slowly, I could do some manual labor too… I was always pretty handy around the community…”

Except they had magical solutions and apparati in this place. Blaine wouldn't be able to fix anything if he tried, and everything they needed moved was done using magic.

“What about schooling? I certainly am the local specialist in human culture…”

“You need kids to have a school Blaine…” Kurt reminded him, bringing to light the fact that kids were few and far between in this world, such that Kurt had yet to see one. The only reason he knew there was any at all was because he had overheard a Berserker talking about his “pups” back in the forest.

“There would be no adults interested?”

“They go up to the surface when they're curious. Hell… some of the really old ones probably know human history better than either of us think we do because they actually lived it.”

“Well how about…”

And so it went on and on. Everything Blaine could think of and every reason Kurt could give to shut the ideas down. The more Blaine tried, the more convinced Kurt was that there was nothing for him down there.

Or for himself for that matter.

All that Kurt had was Blaine, and though there was the promise of a child, Kurt wasn't sure it would actually make it into his arms, and so he was willing to do and say anything to ensure that Blaine stayed with him, because Kurt was certain he couldn't lose Blaine again.

Twice was enough.

“Your grandfather is going to the surface.”

Kurt responded with a noncommittal hum of acknowledgement. Why his mother thought he would be concerned about that information was beyond him, but she seemed to believe that Finavar's comings and goings were of interest to Kurt so she gave him regular details on it.

“There's a gathering of Purebloods who want to make this peace last and representatives of human colonies that live along the west side of the Pacific Ocean.”

Again Kurt made a small grunt to verify that he was, indeed, taking in Elizabeth's words - though he was trying to figure out the baby sling Blaine had procured from a vendor in the town. Despite his best efforts though, he kept knotting it around his chest.

“Of particular interest to your grandfather is seeing how they determine who they submit to us as threats….”

Kurt's eyes lifted off the brightly colored fabric binding his ribs over his clothing, and from there they set upon Elizabeth, looking back at him patiently. The dots connected in his mind and he looked towards the window where, just outside, Blaine was showing some of his magicless Halfling friends how to make arrows, a skill he had become considerably better at in the years he had been with Kurt. “You think they'll admit to committing inhumane acts?”

“No, but we now know from both you and Blaine that the ones from the settlement Blaine was captured at were acting in self-interest and spite. An example will be set.”

Kurt glanced back towards Elizabeth. First towards her fingers, nimbly knitting yet another little hat for a baby to wear, and then up at her eyes which mirrored Kurt's perfectly. “You think that will really help the peace?”

“No. Nor do I think any of the Purebloods would have cared if it was just a case of mistreating their fellow humans.”

Kurt looked down at his lap, shaking his head slowly. “They're more upset about Sebastian trying to kill me.”

“The old saying… Blood is thicker than water? Water fuels our magic, but blood is what makes it. You are rare Kurt - you know that…”

Kurt drew out a long sigh, the fabric tied around him limiting how much air he could take back in. It wasn't right that his life was considered more valuable than Blaine's - but to convince them of that seemed impossible. “It won't help the peace they want to achieve.”

“I thought you would be happy to hear about those individuals getting their dues.”

Kurt pursed his lips, sliding them sideways into a crooked line. “I would rather be the one giving them their dues.”

“That's my boy.”

“Should we put the crib at the end of our bed or beside one of the walls? Do you think there's a difference? I read babies can identify their parents by their smells. What if it prefers one of our smells to the others and we put the crib on the wrong side of the bed and MPPHFF!”

Kurt had been trying to sleep, staring up at the ceiling which was now decorated with dabs of little glowing colors that kind of resembled a rainbow of stars overhead. Apparently it was to make the room more soothing, but soothing was hard to come by when one's husband never shut up about the baby that was getting closer and closer to becoming a reality, and the only way Kurt could think to shut Blaine up was to cover his mouth with his own.

“Kurt…!” Blaine gasped out when he had used up all his oxygen and needed to breath, pulling back just a bit from Blaine's lips as his body reacted, as it always seemed to, to the press of Blaine's flesh against his own.  

“Less talk,” was the breath-heavy response out of Kurt, whose eyes flickered over Blaine's face, rapidly hungered with desire for the man he had rolled upon to connect lips with.

Blaine, thankfully, didn't argue, instead reaching down to peel away the underwear that Kurt was wearing - the only thing he wore at night. The constant temperature in the city below the sea required no layers for sleeping comfort. It certainly made getting down to business easier when they didn't need to rip off several layers of leather and cotton to find one another, and sex was more for the pleasure than another means to keep warm.

“Guh… do you want… or me… or… OH… there…” Blaine stammered as Kurt rid him of his own underwear, tossing it to the floor, probably on top of some baby clothing that had overtaken the floor, and crawled backwards on his hands and knees to drop his head over Blaine's wonderfully heavy cock, which he curled his lips and tongue around snugly.  

Blaine's hands reached down, setting themselves gently on Kurt's hair and moving with the bob of his head, up and down, and twisting around to ensure each inch of skin was run over with the flat of his tongue. Instead of talk, Kurt got what he wanted - slow, gasping breaths and shuddering moans as Blaine arched his back up, losing his ability to think and speak coherently as Kurt focused his energy on finding the cure for sleeplessness inside of Blaine's throbbing dick.  

Blaine did try to warn him, whining out his name a couple times before realizing that Kurt wasn't going to slow down or stop before jerking his hips up on last time and spraying the inside of Kurt's mouth with his seed. To the best of his ability, Kurt lapped it up, but as he crawled back up the bed and Blaine turned his glassy eyes towards him, Kurt could see in the reflection of Blaine's eyes that he he had a bit of dribble on the corner of his mouth, a dribble that Blaine reached up to wipe off before leaning over to sweetly put his lips against Kurt's before laying back. “I love you.”

The corner of Kurt's mouth twitched up at that, and he gave Blaine a smile in response before laying his head back on the pillow, taking Blaine's hand in his own as it reached down to take his cock in hold. “I'm okay. Sleep.”

“You sure?” Blaine murmured, eyes glazing over as he wove their fingers together between their bodies.

“Very. I just watched your toes curl up. You'd be completely useless to me now.”

Blaine chuckled and rolled his head back on his pillow, muttering something about repaying the favor in the morning before dozing off, and for Kurt, sleep came swiftly once there was silence.

“We REALLY need to narrow down the names, Kurt. We have a couple weeks left until the due date,” Blaine insisted, pushing the notepad where he had listed off his top ten names for each sex along with the reasons behind them towards Kurt as they sat across from one another at the table one morning.

“Two weeks… already? Really?” There was not nearly enough caffeine in Kurt to handle that information. What he thought he had all the time in the world to put off, and what he thought for sure couldn't possibly be happening to him was, and soon. “I… don't know how to pick a name…”

Blaine sighed, his mouth quirking up into a lopsided smile as he looked over Kurt's face in a way that made Kurt look down at the notes before him to avoid that look of amusement his husband wore. “Just pick the ones that speak to you the most.”

“They're just names…”

“Is Blaine just a name for you?”

Kurt's eyes flicked back upwards, his head following as he looked across at his husband. No. Blaine was not just a name. It was a person who meant the world to him. It was a word that meant calm, serenity, and security. It was a promise and a memory. It was the world letting him know that not everything was as terrible and treacherous as he once thought. There was hope, there was peace, and there was love to be found.

His eyes flicked back to the papers set before him and he sighed, flipping the pages, hoping at least one of the names from each list would speak to him as Blaine suggested. All the reasons Blaine had listened below each one were good - the names of heroes and leaders with meanings as bright as their legacies, yet nothing seemed good enough. Not for their child at least.

“I wish it was your child. Not mine.”

“It will be.”

“You know what I mean.”

Blaine's leg bent under the table, his ankle bumping against Kurt's. “Why?”

“You have a better temperament… you're all human… and you have a nicer skin tone…”

Blaine chuckled at that, despite Kurt being quite serious about his reasoning. “The human part I can get. You never felt like you quite fit up in the community… and down here you don't feel like you fit either… though, if I'm being totally honest angel… that's more about your attitude than what your genetics dictate.”

“It's a lot of stress being the fucking Quarterling. They think I'm king shit up on turd mountain because twenty-five percent of my DNA comes from them.”

Again Blaine giggled, forcing Kurt to roll his eyes hard in order to stop himself from laughing along with him. “... and your temperament is probably more from the need to be tough rather than something that's determined by your genes. As for skin tone… I like your skin.”

“I burn too easily.”

“But you get the most adorable freckles when you do.”

Kurt scowled towards Blaine, who seemed to find the face amusing as he grinned toothily back at Kurt, though one of the teeth on upper side of his mouth was victim to Sebastian's and his goons, leaving a gap there when Blaine smiled.

Not that it mattered though. Blaine always looked delectable to Kurt.

“I really don't think I've come to terms with… this…” Kurt said as he waved a hand over the notebook.

“Well that much is obvious by the way you stare at the clothing and blankets and everything else your mom and I have found for the baby…” Blaine began, reaching across the table to take Kurt's hand in his and swipe his thumb gently over Kurt's. “... You look like you don't know what it is or how it got there.”

Kurt looked at their joined hands - his pale white skin in Blaine's naturally tan skin, like caramel and vanilla. There were days even still that he wasn't sure how to navigate the relationship he had with Blaine, and yet they were bringing a child into the mix. It was scary, and yet, for years before Blaine, it was something he had daydreamed about. How could something so entrenched in his dreams and wishes be so terrifying when it came to life?

“You know you're going to be the best dad right?”

Kurt looked up to Blaine's honey eyes, wondering how he could say such a thing with a straight face. There was no way Blaine could know that for sure, and given how sweet Blaine was with the children in the community, there was no way that he could ever hope to be more than second best with Blaine as his husband.

“The kids in our lives have always loved being with you, and you always knew what to do with them to make them happy even when no one else did,” Blaine continued, squeezing Kurt's hand.

Kurt sighed and looked back down at the table. That was true at least, but now that he knew about his abilities, he had to wonder if it was because of that magic he had, and not because of who he was without it. If he ever lost his magic, would kids still feel the same about him - particularly the kid about to invade his life as his own?

“Start by narrowing down the names... “ Blaine suggested, pointing with his nose towards the lists. “Work your way up to the big decisions.”

Big decisions… as if creating a child wasn't a big one to begin with.

“I wish we had more phones…” Kurt murmured as he slid his fingers over the buttons of the one Blaine had brought with him. They had found a Halfling with magic that could send a charge into electrical objects, allowing them to recharge the phone with visits to him.  

“Maybe we could see if anyone who goes up top could find us some…” Blaine suggested.

They were laying back on the bed, the phone sitting between them as it played music. It was the one thing Kurt was sure of when it came to the baby. He wanted the baby to have music in its life. They told stories of the hopes, dreams, and calamities of a time past, yet still resonated within people regardless of when they were listened to. Music was special, and all too rare up top, and even more so down below.

The time for their baby was drawing close, and any day could bring the arrival of the infant. Kurt's heart seemed to constantly beat rapidly, worried and anxious and a mess of emotions, while Blaine seemed to be breathless and on high alert - jumping at every little noise and movement.

Earlier in the day, Elizabeth had stopped by, and, in their states, they assumed she was there to tell them the baby had come. However, she was only there to tell them Finavar had gone up top for the meeting she had spoken of earlier - as if it mattered at all to them. Kurt had been short with her then, if only because she had gotten his hopes up only to have them plunge through his body and into his toes.  

“Be nice to your mom. I'm sure we'll want her to babysit when we get tired of baby.”

Kurt had looked at Blaine then like he was speaking in tongues. Of course his mother would be around, regardless of what Kurt said to her. She was much too excited about her impending grandmahood. On top of which, Kurt wasn't sure he wanted to let his kid out of his sight even though it hadn't come into it yet.

Perhaps it was because of the way his chest was already rattling with his heart stomping in it, or because he was already such a bundle of nerves that he felt overstimulated, but Kurt didn't notice how the bed and room shook until things started falling off the tables and crashing to the floor. Both he and Blaine jumped to their feet, looked at one another, and then opened the curtain to look outside.

“It felt like how Earthquakes are described in books…” Blaine said, mouth snapping shut as another wave passed under them, but also above them. The sky flickered, alternating between the set skyline that was always there and then casting them in darkness as that image failed.

There was another shaking, strong enough that their grip on the windowsill wasn't enough to keep them in place and they toppled together onto the bed which bounced across the floor of the bedroom with them on it, both trying to find their feet.

It was Kurt who got himself upright first, and then grabbed for Blaine in the dark that had settled over them, pulling him by the hands out of the bedroom, and then out of the building. The once endless daylight had been flooded with darkness, like a TV screen going black after broadcasting, and while there was glows from candles and lights around the town, the shadow that had cast itself over the town and surrounding lands seemed endless and all consuming.

“Kurt… what's… going on?”

Kurt clutched Blaine's hands tightly as another rumble rippled underneath them, again forcing them to the ground where Kurt pulled Blaine against him tightly so at least he knew where his husband was as his eyes adjusted to the dark.

“I have no idea.”

They were not the only ones confused though. They could hear screams and wails, and portals flickered open and shut in rapid succession from all around the town as Kurt assumed people were fleeing through them. However, not everyone had access to portals - which had to be connected to someone on the other side to be useful, and so the cries for help continued as the shakes continued at increasingly closer intervals.

“Kurt! Blaine! Where are you?” Elizabeth's voice cried out from somewhere in the darkness.

“Mom! What's happening?!” Kurt yelled out blindly, his arms curling around Blaine's just as his husband was doing to him. A small splatter on his cheek felt like rain, and Kurt shuddered as his memories of heavy rainfall that he had gotten stuck underneath came back to him, but there had never been rain down in this place before. Something was very wrong.

“The conference! They were attacked!” Her voice was closer, and Kurt reached out with one hand from where he and Blaine had sat themselves on the ground. Standing and staying standing was a near impossibility and Kurt didn't understand how his mother had gotten close to them without falling.

“What do you mean?” Blaine asked, and the pair of them finally were able to find Elizabeth in the pitch black, pulling her into them as more spits of rain trickled upon them.

“It was a trap! Renegades! My dad!” she choked out, holding onto both of them snugly.

“What does that have to do with this…” Blaine asked as the ground rattled below them and the sky above them started hissing like a hose with a leak.

“Finavar… he was the one who made this construct… he made the barrier…” Kurt said, looking up blackness above them and realizing he was looking at the ocean from below as it worked to break down whatever it was that kept them separate from the ocean.  

“Well, can't someone else put a new one up?!” Blaine demanded, the urgency and panic clear in his tone as his grip tightened around Kurt.

“There's only a few with the ability to make barriers…” Kurt repeated, forgetting where and from whom he had heard those words, but recalling them none-the-less. “... and the others aren't as strong or focused with their abilities as Finavar… “

“We're going to drown…?” Blaine choked out, more a statement than a question, and as Elizabeth let out a cry against them, Kurt couldn't stop looking up at the dripping darkness over him, wondering how he had let himself get so complacent in the most dangerous of places, and how he had let his beloved come down with him, thinking it would be safe.