He'd been in denial, at first. Denial at the way his stomach swelled, the flutter inside of him. It’s not that he hasn’t been here before – he remembers too well how it had been with Sleaze, the strangeness of it, his body shifting in ways he had not known it could shift.
He should have expected it. Why else would the dark god had come to him, all stars and savagery, if not to sow his seed in whatever magical ways granted to him?
(And it’s not that Garbage had been unwilling. No, he had gone to him, enchanted, and he did not ask if Carnage recognized him as his disgraced son’s consort, for that was very long ago.)
(Messed up. It’s all so fucking messed up. But he had wanted it. He’d wanted to taste magic again.)
Denial was long gone, now, stomach stretched to the point of pain and the movement within him incessant. He knows it will be soon, but is still surprised when the cramps take him. The pain is unique in the way it grips at his insides, twists, but Garbage is silent for it.
Pain is familiar. Pain can be weathered.
Still, it takes him to his knees, then to his side. The contractions increase, and then something within him gives, and then there is a child. Another son, black like Sleaze had been, but he looks as if he has been dipped in stars. Garbage is awestruck, for a moment, taking him in.
The child – his son – turns his face toward him, and when he opens his eyes, Garbage feels another twist.
Orange, like his.
He’s sorry for it.
Something ripples across the boy, and for a moment his features change, something strange and canine – something wrong - about them, and then it’s back to normal.
This is bad, Garbage thinks, and it is the first word he associates with his son - Bad.
Not that he believes the child is wicked. No, he loves him, he can already feel it, overwhelming and consuming. He touches his muzzle to the boy, cleans what he can from him, and he loves him, and he doesn’t know where to go from here.
