Again, the two men exchanged panicked glances.
“Will you stop it!” she snapped irritably.
Reluctantly, Reuel set her on her feet. Grasping her stomach, Dalia managed a half a dozen shuffling steps before she bent double. “Son of a bitch!” she yelped.
Pierce caught hold of Reuel’s wrist, tightening his grip when Reuel would have pulled free. “We’ll make a chair for you, baby. Put one arm around his neck and one around mine.”
Dalia nodded, hobbling over to them and sitting carefully on their joined arms.
“Better?”
Gritting her teeth, she nodded. She didn’t have the heart to tell him that sitting up only made her belly hurt much, much worse. She dropped her head on Pierce’s shoulder, trying to concentrate on filtering out the pain. She could handle it. She knew she could.
She had to. If she scared either one of them any worse, they were liable to drop her and flee.
Once they reached the edge of the city, they gathered a crowd. “What is it? What’s wrong with her?” someone questioned them sharply.
“She’s having a baby,” Pierce snapped.
“What?”
“She is the one?”
“Get the hell out of the way,” Reuel growled.
“She is having a baby? It cannot be a baby, can it?”
“Of course it’s a baby! What the hell else would it be?”
“Cyborg?”
“It is still a baby, fool!”
Dalia’s head swam. “Go away,” she said faintly.
They didn’t. The growing crowd followed them every step of the way until the threesome reached the med center. The word apparently having spread, more rushed up as they went until they had to fight their way through the gathering throng.
At long last, they reached the med center. Reuel grabbed Dalia from Pierce and rushed inside, Pierce on his heels. The moment Pierce cleared the door, he slammed it shut and locked it.
There were five techs in the waiting and treatment area. They stopped, lifting their heads like deer that had caught the scent of the hunter. Five pairs of eyes zeroed in on her bulging belly.
“She needs ... something,” Reuel growled. “The baby is coming.”
The med techs merely stared at him blankly. “You mean birth?” one of them finally said.
“Yes!” Pierce snapped. “Birth. Now!”
“But ... she is not supposed to now. They told me it would be months.”
Dalia groaned, demanding to be put down and Reuel set her carefully on her feet, supporting her with an arm around her waist. Her feet had no sooner touched the tile floor than something hot and wet rushed between her thighs, running down her legs and forming a puddle on the floor. Dalia gasped fearfully. “What is that? What’s happening?”
“Urine?” the med tech nearest her guessed.
Dalia glared at him and slapped him square across the jaw. “It’ssomethingfrom the baby!”
Abruptly, all five med techs sprang into action, launching themselves in five different directions at once. Unfortunately, their paths converged. They slammed together with a noise like a clap of thunder. One of the females bounced backward, slammed into the wall and then hit the floor on her hands and knees. Before she could gain her feet, two of the other three fell over her.
“You were supposed to be ready!” Reuel roared furiously.
