Isabel awakened to the ringing of the phone. The archaic device was one the masters kept in use simply out of curiosity at small human marvels. It didn't ring in the Evans home very often.

"Hello?" she said groggily, rubbing her eyes.

"Isabel Evans?"

"Yes, this is she. Who's calling?" she asked, automatically reverting to phone etiquette from her younger days.

"This is Farmington Freeham," the voice said. "You may know me as Nasedo."

Isabel sat up, instantly awake. "What do you want?"

"You want to see the boy?"

"Alex?"

"Yes, Alex Whitman, now known as..." Isabel could hear paper ruffling in the background. "Now known as Geoffrey # 6745."

"Oh, God, they didn't send him to one of the camps!" Isabel wailed in a voice sure to wake her daughter.

"It seems as though that's where he went. Camp #45, Colorado Springs, Colorado. Wasn't that what you expected, Ms. Evans?"

"No! No! I made a deal! They lied to me, goddamn them!"

Nasedo was silent. "What did you expect them to do to the mother of a mongrel?"

"Mommy?" Isabel looked up from the phone to see her daughter in the darkened doorway.

"Please, baby, just go away. Go back to sleep, Mommy's on the phone."

****

2002 "You're what!" Isabel heard her mother screech.

Isabel hadn't been able to say it to her mother's face. She had prepared in front of the mirror a thousand times, rehearsing each line carefully. *Mom, I'm pregnant. I'm so sorry. I want to keep my baby.*

But in the end it hadn't come down to that. Isabel simply could not tell her mother. She thought of asking Alex, but Alex was waiting until she told her parents to tell his. He didn't seem overly concerned at the prospect of being a father at nineteen, and sometimes that worried her. But Alex was easygoing; it was his nature.

In the end, she went to Alex's house for the night. She sat by his side for a few hours, building the courage, and then she reached for the phone with one hand and his hand with the other.

Her mother was understandably upset. It was the middle of June, and Isabel hadn't begun to show yet. She hadn't even gained a lot of weight, so her mother had not suspected a thing.

Isabel had already taken the risk of going to a doctor. After all, her pregnancy test had turned out normally, so who was to say her pregnancy would not do the same?

The obstetrician had performed another test, and then an ultrasound, where she declared the tiny lump in the screen to be Isabel's baby. Isabel figured one visit would be enough to distract her mother from the whole concept of medical attention for a while. She had even gotten a due date from the obstetrician: February 7th. February 7th, 2003, Isabel would officially be a mother.

Her twentieth birthday would come several months after.

"Mom, calm down. It's going to be fine. I've...who's the father? Who do you think?...Mom, he's not a slimeball. He's a wonderful man and I'm proud to be carrying his child..." Alex smiled faintly at her and squeezed her hand. "He's sitting right here...no, Mom, he's holding my hand. ... No, I don't think talking to him would be the greatest idea right now. ... Why not? Because you'll scream at him for knocking up your baby girl, that's why!...Mom, calm down. Mom, I'm going to hang up if you don't stop yelling. ...Goodbye, Mom. I'll talk to you later. Goodbye."

Isabel hung up the phone, trying to control her anger. Alex watched her. "Well, that went well. My turn now, huh?"

****

2010

"Nasedo, please...what's the real reason you called me?"

"Well, it seems your request has been...considered by a higher power. A power considerably higher than myself."

Isabel had never heard of anyone higher than Nasedo. Why, he had been instrumental in the takeover... "Who is that?"

"Well, Isabel, it's your father. Your real father, not your human father."

Isabel sucked in a breath. "My father...but he rejected me! He told me he never wanted to see me again."

"Apparently he's reconsidered. Your request was processed by his office and he overruled the council's decision. You'll be allowed to see Geoffrey #6745 sometime within the next few weeks."

****

2002

It was all decided; Isabel was going to Grinnell with Alex. She didn't know what she was going to major in, but she was sure she could find something.

The college had accepted her late after one look at her transcript and test scores. It also had a lot of benefits. For instance, they offered a child-care service for young parents during the day.

They left a month before classes began to settle into life in a new place. Alex got his dorm deposit back and they searched out an apartment, finally finding a two-bedroom one at a reasonable price.

They'd be needing that second bedroom soon. Isabel had begun to show, the baby a tiny bulge in her stomach. In a few months Isabel was certain that she would look like a cow.

When she voiced that opinion to Alex in bed one morning, he snorted. "Never, Isabel. You could never look like a cow."

"But I will!" Isabel cried.

"No way," he said. "You're much too beautiful for that. And if anything, you're more lovely since you got pregnant. You just...you radiate life. I can't think of any other way to explain it."

Isabel smiled reluctantly. She'd never met anyone so genuinely sweet before. She leaned over and kissed him. He put his hand on the new curve of her belly. "And I'm sure she'll be just as beautiful as you," he whispered into her ear.

"What makes you so sure it's a girl?"

"I just know. I don't know how. But it's a girl. Have you thought about names at all?"

Isabel shrugged. "No, not really. I was a little distracted."

"Well, you've only got about six months left. Knowing you, you'll decide in the middle of labor."

Isabel yanked a pillow from under her head and smacked him. "Funny, Mr. Whitman. Very funny." She started to smack him over the head with her pillow. He couldn't even fight back.

"I give up, I give up! Surrender! Uncle! Uncle!" Isabel stopped, barely able to breathe from laughter.

Alex took advantage of her pause to grab her arms and pin them over her head.

"Who's in control now?"

"You are," Isabel said demurely. He leaned down and kissed her again, his tongue nudging her lips apart. Isabel felt herself grow wet immediately, the way she always did when he kissed her.

"What do you say we christen this new bed?"

Isabel looked at the disheveled bedsheets and laughed. "I think we did that last night, hon."

"No, not really. We didn't officially christen it." "Okay, so how do you christen a bed?"

Alex grinned. "You'll see." And he started to kiss her again, his body sliding between her thighs. He pushed her robe aside and thrust into her in one smooth stroke. Her body arched off the bed.

"Alex, that's so good...Alex, don't stop..."

He brought her close to climax, and then leaned down to whisper in her ear, "Repeat after me the following oath."

"Oh God...Alex...I don't know if I can think for that long..."

"Just repeat after me," he said, without breaking his rhythm. "I, Isabel Evans..."

"I...Isabel Evans...oh..."

"Do solemnly swear..."

"Do...solemnly swear..."

"On an oath of blood..."

"What?"

"C'mon, Isabel, just go with it," he said, teasingly touching her clit.

"Okay! Okay! On an oath of blood..."

"To honor and cherish this bed..."

"To honor and cherish this bed...oh my God Alex, do that again..."

"And to seduce Alex Whitman in it whenever possible." "And to seduce Alex Whitman in it whenever possible! Please, Alex!"

"Just a sec," he said, kissing her. "I, Alex Whitman, do solemnly swear on an oath of blood, to honor and cherish this bed and to seduce Isabel Evans in it whenever possible. Okay. It's christened now."

He reached down and began to rub her clit roughly, the way she liked it best. "Oh, thank God..." she moaned as she came. He followed soon after.

After their hearts had stopped racing quite so fast, Isabel reached up and smacked Alex. "Alex, you're just evil sometimes!"