Chapter 62: Chapter 62: Private conversation
Back to the other world...
The atmospheric stillness crystallizes like amber after Carlton’s revelation, freezing Alaric and Tristan in cognitive paralysis as they attempt to process the implications.
The diplomatic stillness shatters beneath three sharp knocks—percussive intrusions that snap both men from their existential contemplation. Tristan mechanically navigates to the entrance, pulling the door open to reveal Lucas hovering uncertainly at the threshold, medical satchel clutched in white-knuckled hands.
The royal physician freezes mid-step upon spotting Alaric and Carlton, his eyebrows achieving altitudes previously unexplored by facial musculature. His gaze performs rapid triangulation between them, mental calculations visible behind his spectacles as he recalibrates expectations. Clearly, the physician had anticipated finding Tristan or an empty study room rather than a fully-clothed imperial couple engaged in conversation rather than carnal athletics.
Blood rushes to Lucas’ face with such speed that the physician appears to have developed spontaneous sunburn. His bow drops lower than court protocol requires—less formal genuflection, more desperate attempt to hide his crimson complexion.
"Your Highness Crown Prince, Your Grace..." The physician executes a bow so deeply deferential it suggests he’s attempting to fold himself completely out of existence. His voice emerges strained through vocal cords tightened by mortification. "Rowan and Kastiel said you two took a drug that caused you to do... do..." His hands perform vague illustrative gestures in the air before abandoning the attempt entirely. "...for three days."
Lucas’ medical vocabulary—extensive enough to precisely name every bone, organ and bodily fluid—apparently contains no professional terminology capable of addressing royal intercourse. He swallows audibly, Adam’s apple bouncing like a nervous courtier receiving unexpected throne room summons.
"Do you wish for me to examine both of your bodies?" Medical professionalism wrestles briefly with personal discomfort and emerges victorious, though visibly winded. "Moreover, Your Grace..." His eyes flicker briefly toward Carlton’s midsection, voice dropping to a reverent whisper. "You... you are pregnant..."
The final word escapes with the exhausted relief of a marathon runner crossing the finish line. Lucas’ posture suggests a man who has expended approximately three days’ worth of emotional energy in constructing a single medically accurate sentence. His medical training—firmly rooted in biological impossibilities that exclude male pregnancy—visibly grapples with empirical evidence suggesting otherwise. His eyes contain the particular glazed quality of someone whose entire professional framework has been fundamentally reconstructed around royal reproductive anomalies.
Carlton’s hand instinctively migrates to his abdomen—flat terrain that apparently harbors royal progeny despite anatomical impossibility. Whatever complex theories Carlton had been constructing instantly dissolve, relegated to peripheral processing as pregnancy protocols take command central priority in his cognitive hierarchy. His expression shifts subtly—the focused concentration of an administrator mentally reorganizing their priority ledger.
His gaze meets Alaric’s briefly, a silent communication establishing that their conversation regarding earlier conversation requires private continuation, away from physicians struggling with basic reproductive recalibration.
Carlton then extends his arms in the universal gesture of medical surrender, permitting Lucas to proceed with examination while simultaneously delivering information with the casual nonchalance of discussing weather patterns.
"Actually, you needn’t worry excessively," he remarks, absentmindedly patting his flat abdomen with proprietary pride. "During my previous pregnancy, I body-slammed a charging rhinoceros and retained the fetus without incident."
Alaric lunges forward with imperial reflexes—hand shooting toward Carlton’s mouth in a desperate censorship attempt—but the intervention arrives milliseconds too late. The duke’s biological impossibility bulletin completes its journey into audible existence before imperial damage control can intercept.
The room crystallizes into a tableau of progressive horror—four men united in stunned silence but separated by vastly different internal responses to Carlton’s rhinoceros-wrestling pregnancy anecdote.
Lucas remains partially stooped in examination posture, medical instrument suspended in mid-air like a conductor whose orchestra has spontaneously combusted. The physician’s face performs an impressive series of expressions—cycling through disbelief, professional recalibration, existential doubt, and finally settling on muted despair. His medical education—comprehensive enough to detail every aspect of human reproduction—offers no framework for processing male pregnancy, let alone pregnancy robust enough to withstand megafauna combat.
Three days prior, Lucas experienced the initial fracturing of his medical worldview upon discovering Carlton’s pregnancy. The subsequent forty-eight hours forced him to lie to the Emperor about an imaginary infectious disease while pretending not to hear imperial coitus echoing through the palace walls. Now, Carlton casually references previous male pregnancies with a tone one might use to discuss breakfast preferences.
Since when can Duke Carlton conceive children?!
Lucas’s internal monologue spirals through increasingly desperate iterations.
Since when do men become pregnant at all? Did my instructors simply skip this fundamental biological Chapter? Is this phenomenon exclusive to Duke Carlton’s anatomy? Has medical science somehow overlooked an entire category of male reproduction?!
Before Lucas can reconstruct the shattered remnants of his medical education, Carlton delivers the coup de grâce with bureaucratic efficiency:
"I believe Kastiel warrants examination tomorrow or perhaps the day after," he states, the administrative tone suggesting he’s merely scheduling routine palace maintenance rather than announcing another biological impossibility. "There’s significant probability he’ll be pregnant soon."
Lucas’s medical satchel slips from nerveless fingers, hitting the marble floor with a percussion of rattling instruments. His spectacles slide incrementally down his nose as his facial muscles surrender to gravitational forces.
"Kastiel will—" the physician croaks, voice cracking like ancient parchment. "Another pregnant man?!"
The physician’s complexion achieves a pallor previously observed only in centuries-old marble statues. His entire medical paradigm—constructed through years of rigorous study and clinical observation—collapses into conceptual rubble, forcing him to contemplate a universe where male pregnancy appears to be spreading through the imperial palace like a fashionable court trend.
Lucas sways precipitously—his body initiating a graceful descent toward unconsciousness—before his professional training seizes emergency control of his motor functions. The physician’s spine snaps vertical with military precision, though his eyes maintain the unfocused gaze of someone witnessing their entire academic foundation spontaneously combust.
...Rhino?
His brain stutters.
In our kingdom? The closest megafauna habitat is three countries away across a mountain range!
The physician’s thoughts accelerate into increasingly hysterical territory.
And "slammed" one? While pregnant? Is this some undocumented royal blood sport? Was the rhino attempting to overthrow the monarchy? Should I have been prescribing different prenatal care protocols this entire time?
His fingertips unconsciously perform the precise movements of turning pages in an imaginary medical text that fails to materialize.
Tristan, meanwhile, absorbs Carlton’s casual rhinoceros-combat revelation with all the grace of someone taking a surprise uppercut to the intellectual framework. His face contorts through expressions that suggest his consciousness might be attempting to escape his body through his eye sockets. Previously considering the pregnancy discussion an elaborate court jest, he now finds himself forcibly relocated to a reality where pregnant men apparently engage in combat with megafauna as casual exercise.
Tristan’s face bears the double imprint of inadvertent physical impact and metaphysical shock—a facial arrangement suggesting someone who has been simultaneously slapped by reality and punched by impossibility. His expression achieves a perfect alchemical blend of horror, confusion, and existential recalibration.
So the pregnancy discussions weren’t elaborate court humor...
His thoughts spiral like autumn leaves caught in a cyclone.
This imposing nobleman before me—with shoulders broad enough to support imperial architecture and a jawline that could cut diplomatic ties—has carried life within him. Multiple times.
For the dozenth occasion today, Tristan’s consciousness seems to partially depart his physical form—his awareness hovering somewhere between present reality and whichever parallel dimension might offer coherent explanations. Externally, his face maintains the serene neutrality of a palace portrait, while internally his thoughts perform gymnastics that would impress the imperial acrobatic troupe.
Previous pregnancy?! Where’s this child now? Is it Prince Alaric’s offspring? Has the imperial succession been quietly incorporating male-pregnancy lineages while court scholars remained oblivious?
His placid expression—reminiscent of an elderly matriarch benevolently observing young descendants at play—belies the Category 5 mental hurricane devastating his cognitive landscape.
Wait—did he just—SLAMMING A RHINOCEROS?!
The words detonate in Tristan’s mind like verbal explosives.
A creature weighing between 600 and 4,000 kilograms?! HOW?! What physiological capabilities does Duke Carlton possess that medical science has failed to document? Was the fetus he carried somehow divine in nature? Do male pregnancies produce superhuman offspring with rhinoceros-combating gestational abilities?
The tension in the room stretches like overtaxed silk fabric—threatening to tear open the very fabric of shared reality. Lucas’ medical instruments remain suspended in trembling hands while his eyes dart between Carlton’s flat abdomen and his own medical bag, silently calculating whether his tools are adequate for examining a man who apparently engages in combat with endangered species while gestating royal heirs.
As Lucas advances toward Carlton with the cautious determination of a scholar approaching an unclassified magical creature, Tristan’s delayed neural processing finally completes its laborious calculation. The information—previously hovering in cognitive limbo—crashes into his consciousness with catastrophic force.
"KASTIEL WILL ALSO GET PREGNANT?!?!" The question explodes from him with enough acoustic energy to rattle the room’s ornamental vases. His voice ascends to registers typically reserved for sopranos experiencing foot injuries. "HOW CAN THAT BE POSSIBLE?! IS HE PLANNING TO CONCEIVE ROWAN’S CHILD, LOCATE A WILD BUFFALO DURING GESTATION, AND BODY-SLAM IT INTO SUBMISSION LIKE DUKE CARLTON’S PREVIOUS PREGNANCY?!"
The rhetorical outburst detonates in the room’s atmosphere, transforming already strained social dynamics into a diplomatic disaster zone. Lucas freezes mid-step, medical instruments clutched to his chest like talismans against the absurdity tsunami sweeping through the chamber.
Alaric massages his temples—the gesture of a man experiencing his thousandth stress headache in recent memory. The Crown Prince’s royal composure fractures slightly as he contemplates this new information: Carlton—his apparent future spouse who will eventually bear seven imperial heirs—apparently engaged in extreme wildlife wrestling matches while pregnant. The royal migraine intensifies, now accompanied by sympathetic abdominal distress as Alaric contemplates what other reproductive surprises might await revelation.
The Crown Prince’s gaze shifts toward Carlton—a complex cocktail of exasperation, concern, and something indefinably intense simmering beneath. The look contains multitudes: imperial authority, protective instinct, and a flash of something decidedly less administrative.
Carlton’s cognitive functions temporarily short-circuit under the heat of Alaric’s stare. His previous strategic calculations and interdimensional concerns evaporate like morning dew in summer sun, replaced by a single enthusiastic thought: My husband is DEVASTATINGLY attractive when he’s concerned about our unborn child!
Carlton’s eyes transform into metaphorical hearts, his expression shifting from administrative efficiency to unmistakable seduction. His eyelashes perform a fluttering dance that suggests romantic intentions rather than ocular distress. One eyebrow arches with suggestive precision while his lips curve into the smile of someone mentally revisiting activities from the previous three days.
Alaric abruptly redirects his attention elsewhere, a visible shudder traversing his royal shoulders. He addresses Lucas with the clipped precision of someone desperately attempting to restore professional decorum to proceedings.
"Lucas, examine the fetus in Duke Carlton’s abdomen," he commands, voice strained but determined.
The physician nods with such vigorous enthusiasm that his spectacles nearly dislodge, grateful for the anchor of medical procedure amidst biological chaos. He approaches Carlton—mentally noting that the Duke’s physical dimensions significantly exceed his own—and gestures toward a nearby chair.
"Please be seated, Your Grace," Lucas requests, medical bag clutched like a shield against further reproductive revelations. "I’ll need to perform a thorough examination to assess fetal development and, er... rhinoceros-impact resilience."
Carlton settles into the chair with aristocratic poise while Lucas initiates examination procedures with the focused concentration of a bomb technician handling volatile explosives. The physician’s hands move with practiced precision despite the occasional tremor when contemplating male reproductive impossibilities.
Alaric materializes beside the chair like a protective shadow, his imperial presence simultaneously comforting and intimidating. He inclines his torso with precise calculation—close enough for private communication while maintaining a proximity that appears professionally appropriate to observers. His breath creates microscopic warmth patterns against Carlton’s ear as he delivers words meant exclusively for his best friend or apparent future spouse.
"When Lucas concludes his examination," Alaric begins, his words measured and deliberate, "retire to my private chamber... I require private discourse with these two before our... more substantial conversation. We have considerable ground to cover, don’t we, Carlton?"
