What Am I Doing In The Uterus
Paris, France, 1890
Spike stormed up the street, away from the guilded flat, travel bag slung
over his shoulder. He was gone. No more would he put up with the brunette's crap
-- either of them. He was his own vampire. He didn't need his sire to make him
feel like something scraped off the bottom of a boot. He could feel like that on
his own!
The dishwater-blond vampire's step faltered. Somehow, in his mind, that last
bit didn't sound correct. Shaking his head, he continued down the oil-lamp lit
street. Dawn was approaching, and he needed to find a place to hole up for the
day. "Preferably somewhere as far away from that bloody pillock as I can get,"
he grumbled to himself.
The sharp squeal of a metal tire taking a corner too fast caught Spike's
attention, and he raised his down-turned eyes in time to see a carriage wobble
wildly on one wheel on the cobblestone street, before it tipped over onto its
side. The driver was thrown, and the horses bucked and whinnied in fright,
trying to break their restraints. The oil-lamp that had hung from the front of
the carriage had broken on the wood, and fire was starting to spread over the
cab.
Alone on the street, Spike was the only witness to the accident. He
approached the burning cab, thinking perhaps the screams of a burning passenger
would brighten his horrible night. On the far side of the cab, in the middle of
the street, the driver lay crumpled in an odd jumble of limbs, his eyes staring
sightlessly back at Spike.
"Oi! Buggery, bollocky hell!" came an angry female voice from inside the
burning cab. "This is just what I bloody needed!"
Intrigued, Spike stepped closer and was about to bend down to peer into the
back window when a head popped out of it. A tangled mop of dark brown hair
covered the woman's features as she struggled to crawl out the window. She blew
angrily at her hair, trying to get it out of her face, when she spotted him.
Mahogany eyes glared at him from between the tangles. "Are you just going to
stand there like a bleedin' tosser, or are you going to help me out?"
"I'm rather enjoying watching you crawl out of there yourself," Spike replied
with a wicked smile.
"A fellow countryman, how lovely," she said dryly. "Now, sod off."
Spike gave her a mock half-bow. "As the lady wishes." He started across the
street, away from the rapidly burning wreckage, a grin on his face at the most
unladylike curses he heard behind him. A strangled scream rang out, and he had
to look back to see if she'd caught on fire -- only to find she had escaped the
carriage and was presently on her hands and knees in the street, holding her
hugely rounded stomach.
"Christ on a cross!" the woman snarled. "I am going to kill the bloody
wanker!"
A memory pricked at Spike's conscience. The woman was in duress; either in
labor or hemorrhaging from the accident. If she was over seven months along, the
baby could survive outside of the womb. First, check for dilation, blood, or
other fluids leaking from the birth canal. Then, check the position of the child
and for any pain in the abdomen area. Next, decide if the mother-to-be requires
the child to be removed through the radical surgery of a cesarean section. He
was skilled enough in that area, having worked part-time at St. Bernadine's
Hospital in London for fifteen years...
Spike practically smacked his forehead in disgust when he realized what he'd
been thinking. He wasn't a bloody doctor anymore; he was a vampire! When he saw
blood, he wanted to drink it, not find where it was coming from and stop it. He
killed people, not healed them.
"Listen, you soddin' bastard," the woman hissed at him. "If you're not going
to bloody help me, then can you at least stop starin' at me like I was the main
attraction in a bleedin' peep show!"
Spike scowled at her. "Don't tell me what to do." He'd enough of that from
Angelus and Drusilla. He didn't need it from some bint about to give birth in
the middle of a Parisian street.
"I can tell you whatever I damn well please," the woman snapped. She screamed
again through clenched teeth, rocking on her knees, before adding, "You're the
one standing there like a useless sod with his thumb up his arse while I have a
baby in the bloody street."
Before Spike knew what he was doing, he was crouched beside her, his hand
pressing firmly against her lower back. "I am not useless," he growled. Angelus
called him useless on a nightly basis, and it was one of the reasons he was
leaving the bog-trotting ponce. "Now, lay on your back and spread your legs."
"I thought I told you I'm not part of the cabaret," the woman said, although
she slowly moved into the requested position.
"I'm going to see how far you're dilated, you daft woman," Spike said,
pushing his sleeves up. "If I wanted to fondle a carpet, I certainly wouldn't
choose you."
"I love you, too," she said sarcastically.
Spike flipped her dress up and set about removing her layers of
undergarments. "Let's see how you feel about me after I rip this baby from your
body, eh?"
"I'll most likely love you more."
He snorted. "Wouldn't the little man put up a protest?"
"He's the bastard who did this to me in the first place," she said. "I could
care less what he said."
"Quite a mouth you have there, pet," Spike said, looking between her
now-bared legs. The burning carriage provided enough light for him to see that
the woman was not hemorrhaging externally. "How you managed to get preggers with
a gob like that is amazing."
"It got your hand up me chuff, now, didn't it?" she said slyly.
Spike threw his head back and laughed. The woman was a riot. After the babe
was born, he might have to turn her instead of feasting on the child in front of
her and leaving her alive on the street. "All right, precious," he said, calming
down. He'd done his initial exam, and she seemed to simply be in labor rather
than something caused by the accident. "How many weeks are you?"
"Over thirty-five, at least," she replied, panting.
"Were you having contractions before the accident?"
"Yes, every few minutes. I was on my way to the hospital before the effin'
carriage flipped," she said.
"Well, you are certainly fully dilated," Spike told her. "I want you to take
a deep breath, then push like you were having a bowel movement on my word, all
right, luv?"
Mahogany eyes narrowed as the brunette propped herself up on her elbows. "For
a bloody rat bastard, you sound an awful lot like a doctor."
Spike winked. "That's cause I am, pet. Now, push."
With a minimum of fuss -- but a lot of cursing from the woman -- a new life
was born into the world just as Spike smelled the first rays of dawn about to
crest the horizon. He'd been so wrapped up in what he was doing and enjoying the
brunette's blunt conversation that he hadn't been paying attention to the time.
Cursing himself, Spike finished tying off the cord coming from the woman's
body, and pushed to his feet. She looked up at him in surprise, the newborn
wrapped in her petticoat and cradled in her arms, as he grabbed his coat and
bag. "What are you doing?" she asked.
"Time for me to go, ducks," Spike said, casting his eye around for a place to
hide from the coming daylight. "It's been a peach."
"Wait," she said quickly, as he was about to take off. "I didn't thank you. I
don't even know your name."
"It's Spike," he told her before darting up the street, and therefore, he
didn't hear her next words.
"Thank you, Doctor Spike," she said softly. She looked down at the fussing
infant in her arms. "Alexander Spike Harris says thank you, too."
End
