Chapter Text
Tanaka Shimizu’s room was a spotless utopia of a variety of peaches and cream shades. The lights were dimmed so the fluorescence wasn’t abrasive and the atmosphere was wonderfully calm. A sound machine was plugged into an outlet in the corner and filled the room with the softest rumbles of thunder that even tempted Daichi in his tense state to close his eyes and give himself away to the sweet embrace of sleep. He was good at resisting temptation though. After all, Daichi had gone his entire three years of high school without making a move on his now husband despite the man being the most beautiful person he had ever laid eyes on. So his eyes remained open, and his gaze quickly found Shimizu adorned in a lavender hospital gown. She was smiling despite her hair being tussled into a hapless side bun, which settled Daichi’s worries ever so slightly. She wasn’t afraid, he had known her long enough to be able to see past her glasses and into her eyes to find her true emotions.
Shimizu used indifference as a defense, but Daichi specialized in defense.
“How are you feeling?” Daichi asked, taking a step away from Koushi and bypassing the doctor entirely. The man dressed in green scrubs may be the person he should be talking to right now, given there was apparently a complication hindering the delivery of his child, but Daichi’s thoughts were only centered around his friend.
“I’m okay Daichi,” Shimizu sighed. She was at least amused by him, leaning back into her bed while she rolled her eyes at him giving her and the monitors a once over as if he could somehow decipher what they said. He was a smart man, smarter than most people gave him credit for, but he had no training in the medical field so his studying of the screens surrounding her did very little. “Dr. Yoshida said this is normal and easily treated.”
Dark blue eyes stayed steady as they met Daichi’s own cautious brown ones. Shimizu was a decent liar, she was good at keeping a straight face at almost any moment, but even she couldn’t look Daichi dead in the face and lie to him.
“Speaking of this being normal and treatable,” Koushi’s voice cut in, pulling Daichi away from the steadfast glance he and Shimizu had been sharing. “What exactly is this ?” There were times that Daichi found himself calling his husband a gremlin. Something he deemed fair given Suga was known to be a Lord of Chaos whenever he was with the right people, or just plain bored and in need of something to do. However, when the chips were down, Daichi could always count on the pale blonde teacher to take that pesky piece of himself and swap it out with the mature and responsible adult that was needed. “What type of complication is it and what is the treatment? What is the back up plan in case the treatment doesn’t work?”
“What are the risks to Shimizu and the baby?” Daichi found himself adding. All of this was a lot, he knew that, but he also knew that the only thing that would fully ease his mind was having all the information possible. He hated being helpless, and not knowing vital information would leave him utterly helpless. He would be about as useful as a lifeguard that forgot to learn how to swim.
Out of the corner of his eye, Daichi saw Tanaka coming up to stand next to his wife. The young man didn’t look as easy-going and happy-go-lucky as he had been in the parking lot. He was still smiling, but the wide grin that had been pressing laugh lines firmly into his eyes was gone. This was a man who was performing for the sake of his wife. His lips could curl up into a kind smile but it wouldn’t be the same as before. How could it be? The woman he loved, the woman he pledged his life to in just his first year of high school in the most ridiculous way, was about to deliver a child that was not his and there was a chance, even if it was minor, that she could be hurt in the process. If Daichi was scared, poor Tanaka must have been terrified.
The sound of a throat clearing pulled Daichi’s attention back to the doctor. He didn’t recognize the guy from any of their prior check ups, of which there were dozens, so his only thought was that this must be the on-call doctor for the night. It was just their luck that their baby decided not to be born during reasonable work hours.The man wasn’t particularly tall, he stood at about the same height as Koushi and he had an average build. His hair was tucked away under some sort of medical hat that matched his scrubs, but Daichi could make out some wild bright orange hair peeking through.
For a moment the officer found himself wondering if this is what Hinata would look like if he had decided to go into medicine instead of pursuing a career in volleyball. Their little number ten had such a big heart, helping bring new families into the world would definitely have suited him. Then again, the memory of the grades Hinata had pulled during school quickly chased that thought away. His former kouhai chose the right path to walk down, even if it had led him to travel so far away all the time. First to Brazil to hone his skills, and then finally returning to Japan to play on the professional level. A warm swell of pride burned in Daichi’s stomach. He would need to video chat with Hinata again after all this was over and the baby was born. Hopefully Kageyama wouldn’t be too far away and he could kill two birds with one stone, although Daichi imagined that Suga would probably demand to be the one to talk to his precious Tobio first.
“First of all, I want to say that Mom and baby are just fine.” Dr. Yoshida said. His voice was steady and he made sure to put an emphasis on the words ‘just fine’ in an attempt to calm the steadily increasing heart rates of all the other men in the room. Despite his own nerves, Daichi couldn’t help but smirk when Tanaka released an audible ‘phew’.
“Aunt,” Shimizu corrected from her bed. She looked down at her belly, smiling as she rubbed a small circle on her bump before looking back up at the doctor. “I’m the baby’s aunt.”
That had been a topic of discussion a couple of months back. What was the baby supposed to call Shimizu in the future? Or what the doctors were to refer to her by? Surrogate or genetic donor sounded too cold and dismissive for any of their liking. Biologically Shimizu was the baby’s mother and both Daichi and Suga were adamant that their child would be raised knowing about the gift the Tanaka’s had given them; but none of the adults wanted their children to be confused. After a few sakes, Ryūnosuke sighed into his glass. His shoulders were slumped and his head was bowed as he finally asked if they could just still be Auntie and Uncle Tanaka until the kids were even old enough to comprehend the concept of surrogacy, and once that happened they could cross the ever-complicated bridge of family ties.
It was a fair deal to all those who were concerned, and Daichi decided to seal it with another round of drinks. Unfortunately for him, that ended up in him being required to give a piggyback home to the lightweight personal trainer because poor Shimizu didn’t trust her ability to support her husband’s wishy-washy walking pattern. The officer ended up carrying Tanaka all the way to his bed before ungracefully flopping the man down onto his sheets. Before he left he had given Shimizu a peck on the cheek goodnight, an action that didn’t go unnoticed by the jealous husband that demanded he get an equal amount of captain kisses and moved so his cheek was also ready to receive a smooch of his own.
That had been a good night for the four of them, one of the best nights actually.
“Right, sorry,” the doctor apologized before turning to look back at the Sugawara men. “Aunt and baby are going to be just fine. What’s happening is known as a failure to progress in labor. Essentially, Tanaka-san’s cervix hasn’t dilated to the point we would normally expect or prefer for where she is at in the labor process.”
Daichi found himself nodding along with the explanation, at least somewhat eased by now knowing what was going on and hearing again that Kiyoko and their child were going to be okay. Still, he found himself pulling both his husband and daughter towards his chest as if he could protect them from the world and this news if they were close enough to feel his breathing. “Is there a way to speed it up safely?” Daichi asked.
It was a stupid question, he knew that. The doctor wouldn’t be so calm right now if there wasn’t a safe solution, but it was still something that he needed to ask. The words had built up inside of him, they were vibrating under the pressure of the situation and if Daichi didn’t give voice to them then he was bound to explode. Swelling up with the unsaid and unexpressed until the point of no return was reached and he combusted.
“Yes,” Dr. Yoshida assured. “We are going to start the process of augmentation. Because the water has already been broken, we are going to administer a drug to Tanaka-san called oxytocin. This will increase the strength and frequency of contractions, which will move her along in labor. I’m going to start out by giving her a smaller dose, but we can increase the dosage every couple of hours should there be a need for it.” The man paused for a moment, taking the time to look at each of them to make sure there weren’t any more questions. Seeing no questions but three anxious men and two women that looked like they were more interested in sleeping, he decided to move on with his speech. “I don’t want any of you to be alarmed so I’m warning you in advance that there will be different nurses or myself coming in every once and a while to check how labor is progressing. We will make sure to keep all of you up to date if the situation changes, but for now I see nothing to be too worried about. Everyone should just try to get some rest while they can.”
There was nothing to be too worried about. Daichi couldn’t fight off the relieved exhale that was pulled through his chest as his face collapsed into Miyu’s soft little locks. “Thank the gods,” he said. A strong hand grasped onto now sagged shoulders and out of the corner of Daichi’s eyes he could see Koushi standing there looking equally as reassured by the news.
His husband’s normally playful amber eyes squeezed up into a tired but happy smile. Koushi had done a better job of disguising his own anxiety concerning the situation, but his general demeanor now was a dead give away that he had been having an eternal struggle weighing down on him just as hard. “We can relax for a little bit now,” Koushi sighed. “We might as well get comfortable because it sounds like we might be here for a while. Our little one apparently wants to be fashionably late.”
“They get that from you,” Daichi scoffed.
“Not all of us can emotionally handle the philosophy that five minutes early is actually late,” was Suga’s wisecrack response. “Now give me Miyu, you have been hogging all the sleeping time cuddles and that is no fair.” Two arms were outstretched rather quickly and a grabby hand protocol was set until Daichi finally gave in and transferred their darling bundle into Koushi’s hold. “Good boy,” the teacher quipped, dropping a teasing peck onto Daichi’s stubbly cheek. He was going to shave that morning but in the mad dash to the hospital, there didn’t seem to be the time to try and make himself 100% presentable. Their baby would just have to forgive him that the first kiss he gave him or her would be slightly itchy.
Luckily, they wouldn’t remember it enough to complain in the future.
Without Miyu’s familiar and grounding weight against his chest, Daichi felt himself starting to fidget. First, he paced a little bit, walking around the room and scrutinizing a bit more than he had when he originally entered. The bathroom was large, big enough to fit a patient in a wheelchair and a team of nurses to assist them. There was also a decent-sized shower in a little nook of the room, tucked away but still convenient for anyone visiting. Maybe he would text his mother later and ask her to stop by his and Koushi’s place to grab his razor. He might not have to greet his new child looking like a sailor that had too late a night out at sea.
“The place seems nice,” Daichi said while coming out of the bathroom. Tanaka had wormed his way onto the end of his wife’s bed and was playing with her swollen feet under the covers. The action earned him a slight kick but Shimizu was also giggling, so her husband wasn’t discouraged.
“Yeah, there were chocolates on her pillow and everything.” The youngest of the adults snipped with a laugh. “A real five-star joint they got here.”
“Ryu,” Shimizu chided. “Don’t be rude.”
“It wasn’t rude,” Tanaka whined, popping up off his spot and looking straight at Daichi. “Right boss man, tell her it wasn’t rude!”
It was good to see that no matter the stress this little family seemed to be under, there would always be time for teasing and general tomfoolery. Daichi found it almost as comforting as the clinical reassurance of the doctor that their current situation, while something to keep note of, was by far not the emergency Daichi had believed it to be when Koushi had found him in the hallway just minutes ago. “I don’t take anything Tanaka says as rude anymore,” Daichi smiled down at his former kouhai who had collapsed back onto his spot on the bed in victory. “He is too simple-minded to be offensive.”
“Hey!” the man squawked.
“I’m going to try and locate some coffee.” Daichi said. His face took back on its determined features. This was a task he could certainly accomplish, and one that would be extremely helpful to several members of the group. “I’ll text you when I find it so you can send me your orders. Although at this hour your orders may be just if you want some generic cream and sugar in it or not.”
“Don’t care,” Koushi groaned from his spot on one of the hospital chairs. He had curled his body up onto the padded areas of the chair and around their daughter. “Just give me an IV of the stuff if you can.”
Daichi chuckled at the antics. Before leaving he walked over to Shimizu, who was still lying there patiently and graceful as ever, and kissed the open space of her forehead. “You’re in charge while I’m gone.”
“Why am I never the one left in charge?” the miffed blonde whined. “I’m actually the oldest, I should always be in charge.”
Daichi and Shimizu didn’t even dignify the argument with an answer. Koushi knew very well why he could never be left in charge: it meant Daichi and the others couldn’t tease him. Ever since their first year, it was always Sugawara that had the best banter or jokes he could make at the other’s expense. The only thing that the three other classmates had to throw back was that Suga was too rabid to be left in command despite him technically being the senior of their grade. As they all got older, Koushi learned how to read the moments he needed to mellow out significantly. It meant that he very easily could be left to care for the Karasuno Alumni group whenever they found their way to each other, but it was just too fun to continually deny him the opportunity.
Being in charge would be Suga’s white whale.
Daichi would see to it.
********
"What are you doing awake right now? You are meant to be on vacation." Daichi huffed as he brought his cell phone to his ear. He was exhausted as he was still without a single cup of coffee in spite of the search he had been conducting all around the delivery ward, and without the soothing heaviness of his daughter’s tiny frame, he was irritating a bit easier. He understood why Koushi asked for her, she was a reminder of what they were going through all this worry for.
A family.
"Good morning to you too," Asahi chuckled on the other side of the line. "I would have thought you would be more cheerful given you are about to become a dad again." Daichi had been over the moon when Miyu's adoption was finalized and she had actually come home. The lack of sleep hadn't meant a thing to him then, he was a ball of excited energy that was buzzing about with a wide smile plastered across his face for about three straight months. "Something wrong?" His friend asked, a slight twinge of anxiety in his voice.
The urge to just unleash the river of pent up fear and frustration was tugging in Daichi's stomach. "N-no," he lied. No matter how much he wanted to fall apart, he didn't have a choice but to stay together. Everyone he had left behind in that hospital room were staring down the face of the problem and keeping their knees steady, so he couldn’t fumble now. "Just tired."
"I don't believe you," Asahi said. "Which is why I'm currently packing and Yuu is booking us on the first flight home."
"What?!"
"We are coming home." Asahi said again. "I knew planning a vacation so close to the due date was just inviting an early delivery."
Daichi stood there in the middle of the hallway, heart warmed but head buzzing like he had just woken up after a night of trying to keep up with Takeda-sensei and Tanaka Saeko in a drinking competition. "You...you don't have to...it's, it's your...your anniversary!" He finally came up with it. It meant everything that Asahi and Noya wanted to be here, it was actually one of the highest compliments that could ever be extended. Daichi knew his best friends would do anything for him and his family, but he never would have expected them to cancel the vacation they spent the last couple months planning.
He heard a huff over the phone. "Yuu and I will have another anniversary next year. My niece or nephew being born is far more important, so don't try to argue with me anymore. We are coming, that's final."
A stern Asahi wasn’t something that Daichi was used to, but it wasn’t unwelcome at the moment. “When did you get so confident? Talking to me like that.”
“I’ve told you, when you freak out I feel steady.” That was an annoyingly true quote from where Daichi was standing. The ball of nervous energy all tied up in a man bun was perfectly dependable whenever the former captain found himself wavering.
“Yeah yeah yeah,” Daichi leaned against a nearby pillar, body slowly sagging down the gray beam until he was on the floor in an empty hall. “Koushi will kill me for letting you come. He spent hours trying to find a place that met all your safety qualifications for swimming with dolphins but also met Noya’s crazy need for adventure. Spreadsheets were made Asahi, many, many spreadsheets.”
The spreadsheets were actually calming for a person like Suga. He was still the same kid that did his math homework as a way to keep calm, so when the opportunity presented itself for him to help organize a trip instead of thinking about which color to paint a nursery when they were firmly set on being surprised by the baby’s gender, he jumped at the chance. This was both helpful and unappreciated because while it did calm Suga down it also meant that Daichi was the one left to paint the night sky background in their former study. Lucky for him, stencils existed, so artistic talent wasn’t entirely required. He just needed to be dedicated to a couple of hours of hard work. Something Sugawara Daichi was more than capable of.
There was a giggle on the other side of the phone, it sounded further away than Asahi did so it must have been Noya. “Tell your fiancé to shut up,” Daichi jabbed. That only earned another set of giggles, this time accompanied by a harmony from Asahi as well. “I hate you both.”
“No you don’t!” They sang back smug and amused.
“Well I do hate that you’re right.” Daichi agreed as he rested his head in his hand. “Just one question before we hang up and I continue my search for coffee.”
“Not one question, multiple questions because you have one and then I have my original one that you lied to me about; but you can go first.” Asahi’s ability to manage could be unnerving at times. If only the man wasn’t used to juggling a team of other junior designers, then there was a chance that Daichi’s little lie would have slipped on by without notice.
Small footsteps could be heard off in the distance, but a glance down the hallway showed that he was still left relatively alone. The late night hour did offer a nice level of seclusion for a phone call. “I would prefer to keep it to one question but something tells me you are going to be a pain in my side until it is two questions.” The snickered yes was not the answer he wanted but he also knew it would come true. “How did you find out Shimizu was in labor? We texted our parents but no one else, and Mama definitely isn’t awake yet to call your mom for your mom to call you and tell you the news.”
“Oh, that’s easy!” He heard Noya yell. “I went to pee and I saw that Ryu sent me a youtube link, so I opened it of course and it was the music video for You’re Having My Baby . I woke Asahi up and now we are packing!”
That was so brilliant and idiotic that Daichi was actually almost as impressed as he was exasperated with his friend. “Of course he did,” the man laughed as he pushed himself up from his spot on the floor. “I’m gonna knock him upside the head for that. We all agreed not to kick up a face if it was an early morning labor.”
“Give him a break, Daichi.” Asahi’s calming voice overtook the still snickering Noya. “He was just excited and thought of something clever. He had no way of knowing that Nishi was going to see anything right now.” That was true, it wasn’t like Tanaka was planning on Noya needing to wake up and use the restroom, and the idea was rather funny. Maybe he was overreacting...god he hated it whenever Asahi was clearly right and he was wrong. It was a script that he did not enjoy being flipped. “Okay, your question was answered so fair is fair. Is something wrong?”
Conflicting feelings were battling in Daichi’s brain. On one hand, he didn’t want anyone else to be needlessly fretting over Shimizu’s health whenever they weren’t in a position to help or be of use. Asahi and Noya would likely only be even more frantic in their need to end their vacation and fly back home as soon as possible. Hell, Daichi wouldn’t be surprised if Noya decided that a flight was taking too long and just decided to bungie their suitcases onto two stolen jet skis and come home that way. On the other hand, there wasn’t really any use in hiding the truth. They were going to find out one way or the other, and given Noya had found out about Shimizu’s labor via Tanaka anyway, there was a good chance if Daichi didn’t crack they would just go somewhere else.
“There is a slight problem,” Daichi heaved out. He really didn’t enjoy being the harbinger of bad news but this was pretty much unavoidable at this point. “Shimizu isn’t dilated as much as they think she should be, so the baby may have some trouble coming out I guess. But the on-call doctor has already been in to see her and said that they just need to give her this drug to help speed everything up. I forget what it is called, but he said that it should work and things should be okay.”
The line was silent and for a moment Daichi had thought the call somehow dropped. That would have been a hell of a time to do something so inconvenient, but luckily sound did start to come from the other side again. “Okay...yeah, alright.” Asahi was clearly still processing the information. “Alright, well it sounds like the doctor knows what he is doing and that this isn’t anything major.”
“Yeah,” Daichi agreed. “It definitely could be worse.”
“How is Shimizu doing?” His friend asked. There was a faster shuffling in the background than before and a sound of a zipper being done up rather quickly.
So they were a little panicked.
“She’s good,” he tried to reassure. “She doesn’t seem worried in the slightest, just a little tired from the early wake-up call; but she is scolding Tanaka like normal, so I think she is doing okay.”
Asahi was a good listener, a trait that Daichi had always admired. He was a very talented designer but he also had a knack for picking up what was said but not spoken. “And how are you?” He asked without hesitation. “Are you okay?”
Daichi peaked down the hall and was happy to see that he was still by his lonesome. He was never the type to conceal his emotions for the sake of appearances but Daichi did like to have some privacy when he was anxious. He didn’t care about looking cool for the people he was around, he just never wanted his own feelings to be contagious whenever they were negative. He wanted to hide away right now, which is why he left to get some coffee. The journey was not just for the coveted caffeine to help him through this long process, but it was also to help him regain control over his own brain. The doctor said there was nothing to worry about, so he needed to get reign in that very worry before he roped Koushi in with him.
“I’m…” he examined the speckled tile floor he was standing on. It was clean but there were still scuff marks from the sheer amount of travel that was done in just a day. He wasn’t the only person in the hospital, not the only man trying to fight his inner thoughts and remain calm. He wasn’t alone in all this. “I’m scared.” He settled on. “I know I shouldn’t be, but I am, Asahi. I keep telling myself to accept what I’ve been told, and for a few minutes I think I can and then I spiral again.” The pure honesty of it all felt good and so did the burning sting of the tears in his brown eyes. All of these emotions had been building up and then pushed down because it wasn’t the right moment.
It still wasn’t the right moment, but it was the one that Daichi was going to have to take. “I’m just so scared because this baby is a gift. Shimizu and Ryu, they didn’t...they didn’t have to do this for us. So if something goes wrong, if we lose the baby or god ,” Daichi choked at the very thought. “If we lose Shimizu, it will be, it will be because Koushi and I were too selfish to say no and𑁋”
“Daichi, Daichi! Hey man, stop for a second!” Asahi cut him off. “First of all, I don’t ever want to hear you call yourself and Koushi selfish simply because you want to bring a new life into the world and love it with everything you have. That isn’t selfish, that is called being an amazing parent.” There was another zipper sound and a heavy door opening on the other side. “Second, it’s okay to be afraid. No one expects you to be this pillar of strength every second of the day. You are exhausted and went from being very excited about something that is meant to be one of the most joyous days of your life to being given news that would unsettle anyone. You aren’t weak or bad just because you are scared.”
The officer’s lips were pressing together as hard as they could be at that moment as he was stifling a sob back into his lungs. His eyes were already burning with tears that were starting to slip over, the last thing he needed was to alert Asahi to the sobbing that was inevitably about to happen.
“It’s okay to be afraid right now,” Asahi’s gentle voice lulled Daichi back to reality. “You love your child and you love Shimizu. You love them so much that the thought of anything happening to them is unbearable for you. That isn’t a bad thing Dai. It actually just shows how big your heart really is.”
“I want to be strong for them, Asahi,” Daichi whispered painfully into the phone. He sniffed and batted at his eyes with his free hand as his face collapsed closer to his chest. “I feel like I’m letting them down.”
“You aren’t.”
“But𑁋”
“You.” Asahi’s voice was stern. “Aren’t. Do you understand me?”
It had been awhile since Daichi had been scolded like this. Most of the time he was the one to act as the sturdy and sometimes foreboding presence that reminded his friends and family of their potential; but it was good to know that he had people to keep him in line when he slipped up as well. “Yeah,” Daichi sniffed again. “I understand.”
“Good,” Asahi’s voice carried a knowing smile. “Get yourself some coffee if you aren’t going to sleep. Then find Koushi and my precious niece and give them both some hugs, that always calms you down when you’re stressed. Plus, they probably need it just as much as you do.”
“Yes, sir,” Daichi mocked. He was finally starting to feel like himself again. Maybe a short cry and some honesty really were what he needed just then. “Then what?”
“When it is a reasonable hour, call your mom.” His friend instructed. “She had five babies and was a midwife for a while there, I’m sure she has seen something similar or went through something like this and can put your mind at ease.”
That did make sense. His mother had a wealth of knowledge on the subject matter, something Daichi was now kicking himself for not asking her more about. There was a week or so that they had actually considered having his mother deliver the baby, but they ultimately decided against it because his mom had been out of practice for the last six years or so after her carpal tunnel started acting up at more frequent intervals.
“You’re right,” Daichi said, nodding his head as he walked. “Thank you, Asahi. You really are the best friend a guy could have. I’m...I’m glad Noya saw Tanaka’s message and that you called. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”
“Probably have a panic attack on the hospital floor.”
“Yuu!”
A burst of springing laughter ripped its way out of Daichi and the tears that had once been burning with sadness and fear were now coming out with unabashed amusement. Nishinoya Yuu and Azumane Asahi were truly meant for one another. They carried with them an inviting and grandiose aura around them and Daichi considered it a privilege that they chose to stick around in his and Koushi’s lives after graduation. He definitely would have been lost without them.
“Actually,” Daichi smiled up at the ceiling for the first time that night. “Noya is probably right. Thanks again big guy, I’ll see you both soon.”
“You will.” Asahi said. “Give Shimizu our love.”
“Will do. Be safe.” He hung up the phone after that, feeling much more at ease than before.
With all that settled there was one more thing to do: coffee.
As luck would have it the fateful and familiar hiss and clug of a machine traveled down the hall along with a seductive aroma of wakefulness. With his shoulders set, Daichi made his way to the destination with a newfound sense of purpose. He was still afraid, there were far too many variables bouncing about in his mind for him to be comfortable, but he no longer felt captured and isolated by that fear.