Chapter Text
Karen's blood was still splattered on my face as I stood above my daughter's crib, looking down at the innocent, sleeping contents contained within.
My life as I knew it, everything I had known to be real or myth, was over.
I could hear the man, Rufus he'd called himself, cleaning up the mess that was left of Karen. It was still hard to comprehend, my sweet loving Karen turning into that... monster. I had watched my own hand in disbelief as I'd buried that kitchen knife in her chest in a desperate attempt to save myself and our daughter, but still, she had come at me trying to get to the hallway that led to the Nursery. At that moment there had been no Karen, just the mutating monster in front of me, and I knew I had to stop her before she got to Anne-Marie. So I had attacked my wife again with every intention of doing whatever I had to do to protect my little girl, even as Karen had thrown me across the kitchen, turning on me with a savage snarl to finish me off. The front of her nightgown slick and shiny with her blood, her face twisting into something inhuman, and in that moment she was something from my worst nightmares. Nothing of my wife had been in those feral eyes as she had flown at me. And then Rufus had kicked in the door.
A single gunshot and Karen crumpled to the old kitchen linoleum, still and lifeless, in almost the exact same spot my father had died, a lifetime ago. I sat there, watching her blood slowly pool on the yellow flower pattern, and tried to comprehend what had just happened.
My wife was dead, and she had been going after our one-month-old infant.
Karen had been one week shy of exactly nine months pregnant when we'd been jumped outside of the local diner, which I found out later had been the thing responsible for the drastic turn my life took that night.
It had been past midnight, but it was too hot that late August night for Karen to sleep in her condition, so we had been going out for a late night milkshake. We'd been a sappy expectant couple, her sipping the sweet vanilla treat while I felt the baby shift around in her stomach. She had been smiling at my amazed expression then as I'd felt our child move, almost like the kid was doing a happy dance. The life that was growing inside her never ceased to amaze me, because it was like magic being a part of this.
A kid had never been in my plans and I was scared shitless at the prospect of being a father, but Karen had soothed my fears. When she had announced that she was pregnant my mind had spun, immediately bringing to the forefront my childhood. My blood had turned to ice at the memory of the kind of man my father had been, and the potential that I carried that within myself as well. She'd been able to read my mind, and had finally convinced me that no, I would never be my father, that I was a good man. When I had tried to argue with her she'd pointed out how much I had doted on her with a laugh. She had been more worried about me spoiling the kid to death than any of the bullshit I had running around in my brain and had told me that every single time my fears had assaulted me. The way she described how she saw me though, well, let's just say I was desperate to be that man for her and our kid.
After she had been done with the shake we'd been walking back to the car when a guy had lurched out of the shadows at us, thankfully going after me and not Karen. I'd tried to fight him off, but he had been inhumanly strong, tossing me around as if I was nothing. Even pregnant, Karen hadn't abandoned me and had grabbed at the man as he had grappled with me, screaming for help. The crazy guy had bitten her arm, not severely but just enough to bleed, in retaliation before he'd fled into the darkness, thankfully not hurting her any further. I would have chased after him, but the excitement caused Karen's water to break right there on the sidewalk.
We'd rushed off to the hospital. The bite had been cleaned and treated and a police report taken between contractions, and my heart had been in my throat in fear for every second of it. I hadn't let go of her hand even once the whole time until the nurse had stepped over to me with a smile in the delivery room. Instinctively I had reached out as the beaming woman handed me a small bundle wrapped in a soft green blanket. I was not ashamed to admit that I had cried as I had the precious little squalling thing in my arms, forgetting about the attack in the face of the miracle I held. They had held them for observation for a few days, but within 72 hours we had been on the way home, as a family.
Even though it was a little early, she had given birth to a healthy baby girl. Anne-Marie Singer had ten perfect fingers, and ten perfect toes, a mop of dark hair, and alert dark little eyes that took in everything, and she was my world.
Now? As I stood over the crib that I had laid my daughter down in just a few hours ago and stared at what it contained, I didn't know what to do. The man, Rufus, came into the room behind me and glanced over my shoulder at the contents of the crib before he swore. I tensed, not knowing what he was going to do, but knowing I wasn't about to let him hurt my little girl, no matter what she had become.
He didn't move for a moment as he hovered in the silence behind me, just standing there before he finally spoke, "Well, shit, that's a new one."