Chapter Text
When Buck wakes, his muscles are sore in that delicious way that screams of a hard day’s work, but all he did was cry for hours. He's curled on the softest mattress he's slept on in years, with an equally soft blanket bundled around him, and for a moment… he just lays there. Soaking in the quiet of the room, the hum of a fan, the thrum of nearby traffic, the scent of foods baking. Below him, the panadería is alive with the buzz of customers, and so, he forces himself upright.
He does notice fur on the blanket but just assumes it's from another shifter or maybe a pet. It never crosses his mind that it could be from him, because he’s never been able to shift before. Buck pulls clean clothes from the dresser and then makes sure his boxes are hidden in a section of his nest bowl before making his way downstairs.
Buck is greeted by Abuela who is smiling at him fondly. For some reason, he finds that smile familiar, the curve of fondness a gentle memory that tugs at his mind but slips just out of reach. So is the scent of baked goods, like all of those deserts his coworker brought to share before he fled Texas, but more potent. The scent has him palming at his belly, longing for the Alpha who has apparently knocked him up, though it's too early for him to tell so he doesn't want to get his hopes up.
Abuela shares no such hesitations.
“Buenos días, pan dulce,” she beams at him, one wrinkled hand cupping his cheek and the other patting his own hand where it's still resting on his belly. “You're just in time to help with breakfast. You're not hopeless,” she cuts off his protest before it can even fully form, “you just haven't been taught. We shall teach you. Come here,” she wraps her hand around his, pulling him into the kitchen.
It's massive.
Everything is shiny and new, all sparkling clean while still giving off a homey vibe. There are three tall standing ovens, and a cook line with fryers and flattop grills, and a huge stand mixer, and so much stuff that he doesn't know the names for. It's a bit overwhelming but Abuela seems to understand that, too. She steers him over to a butcher block counter, already set up with what looks like dough.
“Today, we are making conchas, a classic,” she gestures at him, urging him toward the sink to wash his hands.
And, so it goes.
Every day is full of so much–leaning to bake from Abuela, learning to cook from Pepa, being pampered and showered with affection from both of them and the customers that hang around–that Buck scarcely has time to think of his Alpha but those are the days. Each night, Buck curls alone in his nest and longs for the arms that had held him so, so tenderly. He thinks about driving back to El Paso but then… well. Alpha had been moving too, hadn't he? Alpha had to think of the child he already had.
No matter how much Isabel and Pepa try to talk him around, even after so much time, he can't be convinced that he won't ruin Alpha's life.
And it's been months now.
There's no denying the baby thriving in his womb; not when Buck can feel the stretch of skin over their growing limbs, not when he can see their tiny body rolling under his belly. And yeah, he's on insurance now so he can even see them on ultrasounds, though he refuses to find out the gender. He has a hunch, anyway, but some long dormant Omega instinct screams at him to wait. Surprises can be good, and he's still waiting for his Alpha, just like he promised. The baby is healthy, so Buck is happy.
He's gotten his GED now.
He's 18 and safe because he has a family now. Abuela is even teaching him to harness the wild magic they've inadvertently discovered he's capable of; courtesy of one very strange batch of orange-chocolate muffins. It's mostly food-related. Pepa says it's because he loves so much that it overflows into everything he touches, and he kind of likes that theory. Loves it, really. That even after everything, he can be good and kind and loving, when it would be so easy to stay a hermit forever.
Instead, they can't keep him out of the panadería. He's downstairs most hours of the day; cooking, baking, helping with customers. Even long after his belly grows and his hips widen, forcing him into an actual waddle, he's downstairs around people. He's been without that interaction for so long, he's starved for it. Leans into every single gentle touch, every kind word or teasing remark.
But maybe he does spend too much time working for a very pregnant male Omega so Isabel and Pepa had pretty much forced him from the panadería, saying he needed fresh air and more socialization. They'd each patted his cheek and made sure he'd had his new phone on him before ushering him out the door.
So now, he's waddling beneath the sunny sky beaming down on the pier as he walks, munching on some cotton candy with one hand on his belly as he wanders through the massive crowd of people there for the fair, when he sees him.
A child.
All alone.
Buck's inner Omega, no longer dormant, shrieks at him, has him rolling up the end of the bag of cotton candy and darting through the throng of people to get to the tiny little child. The child beams up at him, unafraid, when Buck gets to his side.
“Hi, sweetheart,” Buck croons, crouching down unsteadily to get on eye-level with him. His stomach makes it hard, he's eight months gone and his belly is massive. The kid is tottering on red crutches by the restrooms, with his red glasses sliding down his nose, held in place by a red chord. “Where's your parents, buddy?”
“I'm with Mommy today because it's our visit day! But the food made her sick,” here he frowns, glancing toward the restrooms. “And the ambulance took her away when she fell! They called Daddy but they didn't take me with them like he told them to! So, they left one of the firefighters with me but I don't know where he went!”
Anger boils up within him, not at the kid nor his mom, obviously, but at the firefighter who should be protecting this innocent pup. No child should be left unattended, especially not in such a busy place! It's dangerous. This kid is maybe five or six, too young to be alone on the pier.
“Okay, kiddo, how about we go wait over on one of those benches, and we can call your dad? Do you have his phone number?” Buck wobbles as he rises, one hand on his back and another on his belly to try to maintain his equilibrium but it's hard.
Adorably, the kid tries to help him, bracing one tiny hand to Buck's leg with a look of determination that Buck finds familiar. But truly, Buck finds hints of Alpha everywhere he goes, and this child looks more like Buck's than Alpha's with his golden curls and blue eyes.
“No but Daddy puts it on my crutches and my glasses, see?” He holds out a crutch so that Buck can see the number etched into the metal.
“Oh, that's so–” Buck freezes abruptly, cut off by the tightening of his belly and the ringing of his phone, at the same time. He fights through the uncomfortable feeling until he can fish out his phone, knowing before seeing that it'll be Isabel on the other end. “Abuela? Qué pasa?
“Buck, you must get off the pier, get Christopher off the pier!” That's Pepa, not Isabel, but Buck knows if they're warning him then they've seen something. “Now, now! Go!”
Buck doesn't hang up but he does shove the phone in his pocket before turning to the kid–to Christopher. “I'm going to pick you up, and we're getting off the pier,” he tells him, hoping the child can read the gravity of the situation through the shaking of his voice.
But Christopher isn't looking at him–no, he's looking wide-eyed and terrified behind Buck.
Buck sees the wave reflected in the lenses of his glasses much too late, but he's shifting before he even realizes that he can, grabbing the child's yellow-striped shirt with his teeth and yanking until the kid crawls up over his back, clinging to him. The kid holds on tight, crutches discarded, as Buck takes off running through the crowd mere seconds before klaxon sounds, far too late to make a difference.
The wave crashes half a heartbeat later, tearing through the pier and the people who hadn't had the chance to run.
Buck's much faster on four legs than two, long legs eating up the pavement as he runs for three lives, making the streets of Santa Monica before the water reaches them. He can't outrun a tsunami but he uses his newfound magic to locate a safe haven–a fire engine–and he shifts back just quickly enough to throw themselves atop it as the water hits.
It's the magic that saves them.
A bubble of blue-violet surrounds the truck, keeping it anchored in place as the world explodes into a watery hellscape, debris and people crashing into the bubble around them. He feels bad, bad enough that the bubble sucks the living inside with them, yanking them up and depositing them on the top of the engine as Buck curls around Christopher and gasps through another violent contraction.
It feels like decades spent there, hanging uncertainly in the balance of life and death, before the water settles around them and the bubble pops, taking Buck's energy with it as it fades. He slumps down, tugging Christopher up against him as the child peers out at the chaos around them. Buck can't have that; there's bound to be dead among the debris, and Buck doesn't want him to see that, to be traumatized by that.
“Christopher, right?” Buck croaks out, still shaking. His clothes are still on him so he starts fishing for his phone. It's in his pocket, thankfully dry, but there's no service, not that he'd expected any. “As soon as we get service, we're going to call your daddy, okay? I'm going to get you back to him,” he promises and, subdued but still cheerful, Christopher smiles at him.
Then, the little boy leans his head against Buck's contracting stomach and begins to sing a clumsy lullaby in Spanish. The baby seems to love it–the child singing, the lullaby itself, or the language of their father–and the contractions ease, though they do not stop.
The other survivors talk amongst themselves but not to Buck and Christopher. While being a shifter is fairly normal, the scale of magic that Buck pulled off to get them to safety is apparently not; something that he'll be talking to Isabel and Pepa about. They'd convinced him that his magic was just another part of his new normality but it clearly is a much bigger deal. He spares a thought to the labs that created him and then banishes it, refusing to think about that now.
Buck focuses on the child in front of him and the one within him, breathing forcefully easily through the contractions as Christopher sings to the baby. He cards his fingers through Christopher's curls and tries not to imagine the horror his parents must be feeling, especially his mother. He kind of hopes she's unconscious but healthy. It would be kinder than knowing your son is lost in a tsunami.
Somehow, the day passes. It had been morning when he'd left the panadería, but now night is fully upon them, sky dark and air chilly, and Buck's contractions are getting closer, more painful. It's becoming harder for him to focus on anything but the pain, and he begs the universe for help. He can't leave this sweet little boy alone, not after what happened with his mother. She'd apparently unknowingly developed a new allergy to shellfish, and Chris had been the one beside her when she'd fallen to the ground, choking as her throat closed up. Chris says she'd tried to take him with her but then she passed out, and the paramedics didn't want him in the ambulance.
That the firefighter had abandoned Chris after such a life-altering trauma makes Buck more furious than he'd been earlier but he quells that fury when Chris shrinks into him, uncertain.
“No, no, sweetie. I'm not mad at you. That firefighter had no right leaving you, that's who I'm mad–” Buck groans suddenly, interrupting himself as his water breaks.
“Bucky?” Christopher asks, losing his optimism for the first time all day when the pool of water below them grows warm from Buck's water. “Are you sick?”
Buck groans again, catching the attention of one of the others. “No-ooo,” he moans through the pain, actively feeling the baby lowering through his birth canal. He scrambles up, ending up grasping the back of the truck cab while crouching. “No, the,” he pauses, panting through another contraction. “The baby is coming but it's okay. It's going to be okay! Because male Omegas give birth all the time, right? And they've been doing so for centuries. We're all going to be just fine,” and then his voice cracks on a wail as the pain intensifies.
“Sir?” it's a man, slightly older than himself, that approaches them. There's blood dried over his eye, running down from a messily covered laceration on his scalp. His words come out thick and heavy. “My name is Ravi, I'm training to be a firefighter. Sorry I couldn't help sooner but–” he was unconscious, Buck nods his understanding after another contraction ends. “One of the others said you had a working phone, I'm going to try to call 911 while we get you through this, okay?”
Again, Buck nods but he's staring down at Christopher, who is sniffling quietly, and tells him, “I'm not leaving until we find your dad, okay? You won't be alone again, I promise,” and Chris nods, too.
And it's right then that they hear the sound of a motor approaching, a boat pushing slowly through the debris to reach them. There's a second boat right behind them. They're not even all the way to the fire engine when Buck hears a hoarse voice shouting out, “Christopher?” and the voice soothes every ache within him, has his Omega whining impatiently, almost has him forgetting the situation he's in.
Then, Christopher is screaming back, “Daddy! Daddy! You found us!”
He did, Alpha found them.
He smells him before he sees him, feels the bond curling through his soul before he can even lay eyes on him but all Alpha has eyes for is Christopher, which makes his Omega coo happily. Of course, Alpha is such a good dad. Buck expected no less.
Alpha pulls Chris up into his arms, rubbing his neck and wrist all over the boy, every bit he can reach, and while Chris seems happy with being covered in his dad's scent, he reaches out to Buck with a whine, clearly not wanting his scent covered up.
“Christopher?” Alpha–no, it's Eddie, Buck reminds himself, Edmundo Diaz–Eddie asks, unsure. Then… oh, god, then he inhales deeply and his head snaps down to Buck's, meeting his gaze for the second time since they'd met. “Omega?” His voice is hesitant, afraid, but Buck feels the bond wavering between them: sure, ready to snap into place.
Buck is ready now, too.
He reaches out a hand, wailing out, “Alpha,” right as their child starts to force themselves out of him.
Suddenly, Christopher is gone, handed off to Ravi who is holding him at the back of the engine, all the others in the boats and heading away. There are three new firefighters on board with them but they smell so firmly of pack that Buck's Omega doesn't mind their presence. If anything, he feels even safer. Safe enough to let Eddie crowd in front of him and brace him, safe enough to let the nice paramedics reach down to help. Just behind, an older male Omega is talking quietly to Chris and Ravi, likely reassuring them.
“Such a strong Omega,” his Alpha croons, pressing his forehead to Buck's, as he continues, “you kept our pups safe all day, you're so strong, and brave–”
Buck whines, shaking his head, refusing the compliment as he's split wider than he'd ever been before. He chokes on a scream even as he's reminded to breathe, and breathes.
“You-ah! You trying breathing when a-a massive baby is–” Buck's hands clench around Alpha's shirt, nails half-shifting to dig through the fabric. He smells the blood, whining and trying to pull away but Alpha won't let him go.
“It's okay,” Alpha reassures him, so it must be true.
He stops trying to get away and lets his Omega take over, lets his body push their baby from him, relaxes into Alpha as their baby takes their first breath and immediately begins squalling.
The most beautiful sign of life.
The firefighters get him sorted and then there's another boat, and he's being laid back against his Alpha's chest while Chris curls into their sides. One of the paramedics lays their baby on his chest and he's gone, that's all the energy he has. Buck can hear the others talking over him, is vaguely aware of Chris idly playing with the baby's teeny foot, is keenly aware of his Alpha speaking deep but gently into his ear but he can do nothing but sigh, exhaustion and pain dragging him under a tidal wave of unconsciousness.
Buck wakes many times throughout the night. At each whimper from the baby, at each terrified whine from Christopher, each reassuring murmur from his Alpha to each of them has him rising from the gentle pool of oblivion he's been floating in. The scents are slightly off around him but he's not in a hospital… he would know. He would feel it, even asleep.
No, they're somewhere safe.
And he's in his nest. It's not the nest bowl at his little apartment but a much larger one, filled with his and Alpha's and Christopher's things, as well as those of Isabel and Pepa, if he can trust his nose. But this one is better because this one is home. This one is the one he's been trying to build but failing because it was missing Eddie and Chris.
“Buenos días, guapo,” Eddie's voice rumbles under his ear and Buck hums, too tired to open his eyes. Alpha seems to understand because he doesn't move other than to tighten his arms around Buck, holding him close. “We brought you to our house. Abuela said you wouldn't like the hospital or doctors, and I'm a medic and Hen and Chim are paramedics, and Chim's wife is a nurse and Michael's husband is a doctor, so we thought you'd feel safer here,” Alpha explains, despite Buck being unable to ask. His heart melts into a gooey mess, already so desperately in love. “And Christopher didn't want to let you out of his sight.”
Buck hums again then… bashfully, “Just Christopher?” and he's clearly fishing so he expects the quiet huff of laughter blowing through his hair.
“No, Buck, not just Christopher. Honestly,” he pauses, manhandling him until they're both on their sides, facing each other so that Buck can see the determination on his face, the seriousness of his words, “I don't want to ever let you out of my sight again.”
Buck flushes with shame, attempting to hide his face against Eddie's chest. The baby shifts in the room, and they both fall still and silent, waiting to see if she'll awake this time. When she doesn't, Eddie brushes a kiss across Buck's birthmark, then his cheek, then his lips. He's careful, so tender with Buck, as if he knows how fragile he's been.
“Baby, I understand, okay? You don't have to feel bad for doing what you think best for yourself,” and Buck is shaking his head, because he knew that leaving Alpha, leaving Eddie wasn't what was best for him. Not now that he can scent, now that he knows Eddie isn't just his Alpha but his true mate. “What? I don't understand, sweetheart.”
“I was wrong,” Buck blurts out. “I heard you on the call and I knew that if you were in a custody battle with your parents that having an underage infertile mate would look so bad for you. I didn't know I could get pregnant, Alpha, I didn't, I'd never even had a heat before that one! I'm sorry, I lied to you and I left and it was all for–”
Eddie presses his lips to Buck's, cutting off the spiral before it can really begin. It starts as a sweet, tender thing before shifting, and Buck is hours out from giving birth but he'd gladly ruin his body just to feel Eddie in him again. Clearly, Eddie knows it, because he eases it back into the sweet little kiss before pulling away.
“I'm not upset you lied about waiting. Because you did, just not where I was expecting. Buck, you kept both of our children safe during a tsunami. You'd depleted your magic stores completely by saving them and those others on the fire engine. They're so grateful to you and so I am. I'm grateful you took care of yourself, so damn thankful that my Abuela found you and helped you both thrive while I couldn't,” another kiss, this time to the corner of his leaking eye. “Buck, we're true mates. I'm just glad we didn't have to wait so long to find each other again. Eight and a half months was too long.”
Nodding against Eddie's chest, Buck forces out through the tears, “I'm so happy you found us before I had her. I knew I wouldn't be alone but Eddie, I was so scared of doing this without you.”
Eddie inhales sharply, his eyes flaring red, and before Buck can think, Buck is burying his teeth in the scent gland on Eddie's neck. Eddie returns the favor immediately, teeth digging in deep, spreading the claiming venom through his veins. Normally, the bond would require knotting to take but Buck feels it snap immediately into place. That's how strong their bond is, how firmly they're meant to be together.
They don't get time to savor the feeling because that's when the baby wakes up, crying out for food or a change or a cuddle, and Eddie releases him reluctantly to gently scoop her up and bring her back to the nest. Buck makes grabby hands, eagerly taking his tiny pup who he hasn't been able to properly cuddle yet. She snuggles in close, huffing at his scent gland, cooing at the mingled scents of her parents.
“Buenos días, Nohelia,” Buck coos down at her, ignoring Eddie's choked laugh at his horrible accent. It's often led to playful teasing at the panadería, his awful accent, but he tries. And now, he knows why it was so important for him to learn, why Isabel and Pepa were so sure he'd need to know how to speak Spanish.
“Nohelia?”
Buck flushes at the reverence in Eddie's voice, crimson burning all the way up his ears. “Is that okay?”
Eddie slips back into the nest, sliding his left leg behind and around Buck before curling his arms around his waist. “Baby, it's perfect. She's perfect, you're perfect–” he punctuates each word with a kiss.
“Christopher is perfect,” Buck says right as Eddie does, “God, Eddie, he's so smart, and brave, and funny! He kept laughing and joking the whole time, until my water broke. You've done so good with him, you and Shann–oh! Ohmygod! Is Shannon okay?” Buck half-twists, seeing that same expression on Eddie's face as before, surprised but besotted, utterly enchanted.
“She had an allergic reaction and thankfully slept through the whole tsunami. She can't wait to meet you, though. She's at home with her Alpha and Christopher is with them until you woke up, so I could focus on you two.”
“She probably needs him, after all of that, but so do you,” Buck knows he sounds distraught, because the baby starts crying, and Eddie shushes them both, rocking his body side-to-side and bringing Buck's with him.
“Christopher and I talked about it, Buck, and it was his choice. We've had some calls already but you needed the focus, you and the–Nohelia. Christopher has mostly been sleeping in between teaching his moms the new fun facts his best friend taught him today, and I couldn't have helped him, too. Ana and Abuela and some others have been going between houses to help. Please think of yourself, too, Omega,” Eddie noses at the back of his neck, and Buck sighs, nodding as he relaxes.
So does Nohelia.
The sudden quiet leaves them time to stare down at their baby. Her eyes are closed but Buck's done enough research to know they'll probably be brown like Eddie's, same as her dark hair. At least the strands are curly like his.
“Almost nine months and she looks just like you,” Buck laughs as a thought crosses his mind, causing Eddie to hum questioningly. “It's just that… we soulmated so hard that Christopher looks like me but Nohelia looks more like yours and Shannon's!”
Eddie chokes on his own laughter, burying his face in Buck's neck as his body shakes, and it's not that funny. It's really not. But he's laughing too, disturbing the poor baby's rest as they laugh. It must be all the tension, maybe. Or the release of it. But sitting there, bathed in the gentle lamplight inside the nest that his mate made for him before he'd even found him… Buck can't believe how far he's come in just a few short months.
No longer terrified, no longer twitching and looking over his shoulder.
Happy. Healthy.
Buck sighs, scent giving away the pleased contentment he's feeling, as he rests his cheek against Eddie's. He's already drowsy again, body aching in unimaginable ways but he wouldn't change any of what he's gone through to get to this point. Not for anything.