Chapter 18 : Production Prep—Are You Planning on a Second Child? p2
Back in the hotel room, they ate all the food. They were exhausted from walking all day. Blueberry and Blackbrow were also curled up with their baby, asleep on the sofa.
The two of them slept together again. Xue Yu was so tired she could barely keep her eyes open and fell asleep the moment her head hit the pillow. In a daze, she felt Zhou Siyan take her hand. She thought he wanted her to place it on his stomach to soothe the baby, but he just held it, making no other move.
..
Time was tight. As out-of-town patients, they could only stay in the South Continent for seven days. They had already used one day traveling from the checkpoint to the city, so now they only had six days left. They had to hurry and find a doctor to figure out how to perform the surgery and deliver the baby.
Guan Xun had referred them to an underground hospital. It was literally an underground hospital; to avoid government inspections, these black clinics were mostly built in basements.
Xue Yu and Zhou Siyan followed a narrow alley. Led by a “fixer,” they entered a moldy opening, which led down to a pitch-black, damp, and unlit tunnel. The fixer was a sixteen or seventeen-year-old girl. Her spirit body was a beautiful parrot, perched on her shoulder. The girl was cheerful. She turned on a flashlight and said, “Don’t worry, the entrance may be rundown, but the medical facilities inside are great! Just hang in there, there’s light at the end of the tunnel! Once we get through this passage, it’ll open up, and you’ll be amazed!”
Before setting out, Xue Yu and Zhou Siyan had both retracted their spirit bodies into their spiritual landscapes. However, they couldn’t retract the baby. The little seahorse’s master was the baby in Zhou Siyan’s stomach, and that baby couldn’t control a spirit body yet. Xue Yu had to carry the little seahorse in her pocket. Fortunately, it was well-behaved, snoring softly and not making a fuss.
The tunnel was slippery, humid, and hot, its walls covered in moss and mold. Xue Yu felt a mix of emotions, a pang of guilt. She felt she was doing Zhou Siyan and the baby a great disservice by bringing them to such a shady place to give birth.
Fortunately, just as the girl had said, after the long, narrow tunnel, they entered another world. The lights were bright, and the floor was polished metal, so clean you could see your reflection. It didn’t look like a black clinic at all; the equipment was modern and complete. The doctors and nurses bustling about were all in uniform, looking very professional.
The girl led them to the obstetrics department, collected her commission from the doctor, and left happily.
The doctor was a woman in her late twenties, surnamed Lin. She had a good attitude and seemed very experienced. She showed no surprise at the fact that Zhou Siyan, a man, was pregnant. She simply asked a few questions about the circumstances and then arranged for him to have an examination. The service was good, but expensive. Xue Yu rushed around paying the fees and accompanying Zhou Siyan for X-rays and blood tests.
After the tests were done, they returned to Dr. Lin’s office with the results. Dr. Lin studied the scans for a while and said, “If you want to keep the child, you can. But the patient is male and has no birth canal, so it will have to be a C-section. Are you okay with that?”
Zhou Siyan nodded. “Yes.”
Dr. Lin tapped on the touchscreen embedded in her desk. “The entire procedure will cost eight hundred and twenty thousand Continent Dollars. We don’t accept White Tower’s New Dollars here, only South Continent’s Continent Dollars, and it has to be in cash.”
“If you choose to have an abortion, the cost is much lower, only fifty thousand Continent Dollars. You should think it over carefully.”
Xue Yu had no money, and the baby wasn’t in her stomach. She left the decision entirely up to Zhou Siyan.
Without any hesitation, he said, “We’ll do the C-section.”
Dr. Lin nodded and typed some code into the screen. “By the way,” she asked, “are you planning on a second child?”
Zhou Siyan, who was usually so calm and composed, glanced at Xue Yu, an undeniable look of embarrassment and confusion on his face.
Xue Yu, clutching her backpack, scooted her chair forward. “Dr. Lin, what do you mean by that?”
Dr. Lin considered for a moment. “Well, the baby in his stomach is yours, right?”
“Yes,” Xue Yu replied.
“So… are you two a couple?”
Xue Yu, thinking that as a conservative, Zhou Siyan would not want to have an open, intimate relationship with her, said, “We’re classmates. From the same class.”
Dr. Lin was very considerate of her patient’s feelings. She patiently explained to Zhou Siyan, “It’s like this. Your classmate’s spirit body is a seahorse, which possesses extraordinary reproductive abilities. You probably already know that when seahorses reproduce, the female releases her eggs into the male’s brood pouch, where the male incubates and gives birth to the offspring.”
She pointed to the ultrasound scan on the table. “Although you’ve been sterilized, your classmate has not. Her eggs are very powerful and can pass through the pores of your skin and enter your body. When you and your classmate have intercourse, this egg will cause your body to form a brood pouch. The fetus develops in this pouch inside your body.”
Xue Yu didn’t quite understand. “So what does this have to do with a second child?”
Dr. Lin drew a circle on the ultrasound scan with a pen. “The brood pouch is a vital place for fetal development. If you and your classmate are not planning on a second child, I will remove the brood pouch for you during the surgery. If you do want a second child, I will only take out the baby and leave the brood pouch in the pregnant father’s body.”
Zhou Siyan hesitated for a moment. “If the brood pouch is removed, does that mean we can never have a second child?”
“That’s right,” Dr. Lin said. “Once the brood pouch is removed, it’s very difficult for it to grow back. My recommendation is to have it removed. Childbirth is an extremely risky business. I may be a black doctor, but I have a conscience. I generally don’t advise people to have children.”
Zhou Siyan looked at Xue Yu, his eyes dark and his expression subtle, as if waiting for her encouragement.
Xue Yu looked into his eyes. “We should definitely have it removed. Just having one child will mean we have to walk on thin ice from now on. How could we have the energy for a second? Besides, the brood pouch is an extra organ that formed later in life. It can’t be good to leave it in your body.”
Zhou Siyan squeezed her hand and turned to the doctor. “Will the brood pouch have any effect on my body?”
Dr. Lin maintained a professional smile. “No.”
Seeing their differing opinions, she stood up. “Why don’t you two discuss it in the hallway? I’m going to do my rounds. I’ll be back in ten minutes. Give me a definitive answer then.”
Xue Yu helped Zhou Siyan to a bench in the hallway. He placed his hands on his stomach and was silent for a long time. Xue Yu looked down at the lines on her fingernails. She had no right to rush him. She was just the baby’s mother, not his wife. His body was his own; she couldn’t interfere.
“Xue Yu, I’ve made up my mind,” Zhou Siyan finally broke the silence.
She looked at him. “What did you decide?”
He spoke slowly, as if he had given it a lot of thought. “I want to keep the brood pouch.”
Xue Yu’s feelings were complicated. She didn’t recommend he keep it; the risks were too great. But then she thought, he was an extreme sexual conservative now. He would never have sex again, so leaving the brood pouch in probably wouldn’t make much of a difference. “It’s up to you,” she said. “Your body, your choice.”
He turned to her. “You’re not happy?”
Xue Yu didn’t want to make the atmosphere so heavy. She clapped her hands and smiled. “It’s great! I think keeping the brood pouch is a great idea! Think about it. With a brood pouch, you could have a second child. To avoid that, you’ll have to remain chaste and strictly follow the rules of the extreme conservatives. In the White Tower, the more celibate you are, the faster you get promoted. This brood pouch will be your supervision tool, making sure you stay celibate and motivating you to strive for a higher military rank!”
Zhou Siyan almost rolled his eyes. “What nonsense. I’m keeping the brood pouch because I’m thinking of giving the baby a little brother or sister.”
Xue Yu was stunned. She took a deep breath and shifted awkwardly in her seat. “Uh, Little Zhou, there’s an old saying in my hometown: Plant more trees, have fewer children. I think there’s a lot of truth to that.”
He stood up. “I haven’t even had the first one, and you’re already saying things like that.”
It was important to be sensitive to the pregnant man’s feelings. Xue Yu quickly stood up to comfort him. “That’s not what I meant. I’m not an irresponsible person. As long as it’s my kid, I’ll raise it, even if I have to grit my teeth.”
Seeing her look of grim determination, Zhou Siyan couldn’t help but smile. He was a little worried. Could Xue Yu really accept the role of a mother? In his eyes, she was a bit more childish than many of their peers in the White Tower, a bit of a silly goose.
After a while, Dr. Lin returned from her rounds. “Dr. Lin,” Zhou Siyan said, “we’ve decided. We want to keep the brood pouch.”
Xue Yu, on the other hand, asked worriedly, “Doctor, is there an extra fee for keeping the brood pouch?”
“No,” Dr. Lin replied. “Just have the eight hundred and twenty thousand Continent Dollars ready, and I’ll arrange a full-service package for you.”
Zhou Siyan nodded. “Can we do the surgery now? We don’t have much time.”
Dr. Lin, who had been writing in a notebook, looked up and frowned, staring at them as if they were idiots. “You’re planning on having the baby right now?”
Her look made Xue Yu’s stomach churn. “Is that not possible? Is there something wrong with my classmate’s body?”
Dr. Lin sighed heavily. “You two came here to have a baby with empty hands?”
Xue Yu scratched her head. “We have the surgery fee ready.”
Dr. Lin tapped her pen heavily on the notebook. “I told you you weren’t fit to have children, but you insisted.” With that, she walked back into her office.
Xue Yu and Zhou Siyan were baffled. They followed her inside. “Doctor, we don’t understand,” Xue Yu said anxiously. “Could you please explain it to us?”
Dr. Lin was rummaging through a filing cabinet. “Do you think giving birth is like going to the market to buy vegetables?” she said, exasperated. “You just have the surgery and carry the baby out in a basket?” She found a list of supplies for expectant mothers and threw it at Xue Yu. “Baby clothes, blankets, diapers, formula… have you prepared any of this? You came here to have a baby without preparing anything?”
The two new parents looked at each other, guilt written all over their faces.
Xue Yu tried to smooth things over with a smile. “We knew. We just heard that you offer a full-service package here, so we thought we could buy these things at the hospital and came directly.”
“According to the ultrasound, it’s a girl,” Dr. Lin said. “Go and prepare the baby supplies today. Come back tomorrow afternoon, and I’ll perform the surgery.”
Xue Yu held the list. “Okay, thank you, Dr. Lin. We appreciate your help.” Dr. Lin gave her number to Xue Yu and told her to call if she needed anything.
…