Maya looked up unseeingly at the portrait of Richard Koenig in the waiting-room. Jenna Silberstein was sitting beside her, but the two old women didn't have much to say to each other. Remembering her own labour, Maya was very concerned for Hester's health, but she knew her concern was probably nothing compared to Jenna's. Hester was Jenna's baby, and Maya had a feeling nothing she could say would alleviate Jenna's concern. So she said nothing.

Not that there was any reason for either of the future grandmothers to be concerned. Hester's pregnancy had proceeded normally by the standards of human pregnancies, and she had gone into labour that morning, just two days overdue. The couple had assiduously attended Astrid's weekly ante-natal classes; according to Halima, the Lamaze breathing exercises combined with Hester's favourite music and Salvatore's constant presence would ensure a relaxed, rapid and relatively painless delivery for their baby. Most of the other women at Dover had gone through exactly the same process and Maya had heard nothing but praise for the maternity staff.

However, it had been several hours since Salvatore and Hester had gone onto the Maternity ward, and Maya was starting to become apprehensive. She was becoming very attached to her quiet, timid daughter-in-law, and was worried by the idea of Hester being in pain or risking her life. To a lesser extent, Maya was also concerned about Salvatore's reaction to what his wife might be going through; he was still only a young man, and probably wasn't prepared for the possible side-effects of human childbirth. Maya wondered again how a species that delivered its young with such routine difficulty could still reproduce at such an exponential rate.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Astrid's twelve-year-old niece Thi Hoa came out of the main entrance to the medical wards. Thi Hoa was a striking-looking little girl with slanting eyes inherited from her Vietnamese grandmother, and dead straight hair which had been golden in her childhood, but was now turning a dull ash blond as she entered puberty. Although Karim's concerns about clogging up the job market meant that Thi Hoa would continue her regular schooling until she was at least fourteen, her aunt was already encouraging her to help out in the Medical Centre. Astrid had once told Maya that they needed an extra "dogsbody" as well as the three doctors and five nurses.

"Doctor told me to tell you the baby has arrived," said Thi Hoa with a big smile. "If you'll come with me."

Maya exchanged a relieved smile with Jenna and the two women followed Thi Hoa into the Maternity ward. The young girl was evidently not supposed to go into the delivery room; she left Maya and Jenna before they entered.

The room was surprisingly dark, with the lights turned down to a comfortable twilight level. Like any other part of the Medical Centre, there was a bed and a wall full of instruments, but none of the instruments appeared to be connected to Hester herself. Some kind of old human music was playing, its pleasant tones a strange change from the mechanical beeping Maya had expected.

Halima was clearing up a tarpaulin that covered the floor, while Astrid, herself not more than a couple of months away from her confinement, was taking Hester's blood pressure. Hester was lying on the bed, holding a small bundle wrapped in a blanket, while Salvatore stood beside the bed and admired the bundle.

"Mama!" exclaimed Hester when she saw Jenna and Maya enter.

"Oh, baby, how are you?" asked Jenna, hurrying over to her daughter's bedside. "Are you tired?"

"Exhausted. Hello Maya," said Hester as Maya also joined them. The young woman did look tired; her sallow cheeks were unnaturally red and the skin under her eyes was darkened.

Maya leaned over Salvatore's arm to look at the baby. It looked very small and its face was grey mottled with red and purple patches.

"We decided to have a daughter with polka dots," said Salvatore, evidently guessing what Maya had noticed. He looked pretty tired too, and Maya wondered why.

"Oh, I knew you'd say that," said Hester, shaking her head and looking down lovingly at her child. "That's the first thing he said when he saw her."

"Hey, I have no objections to having a fashion-conscious daughter," laughed Salvatore. "I'm sure polka dots will make a big comeback as soon as someone can be bothered to print patterns on shermeen cloth."

Also leaning forward to see the child, Jenna didn't seem amused by Salvatore's witticisms. "She's beautiful. It looks as if she had inherited your father's red hair, Hester."

"Or her grandmother's red hair," said Hester, glancing at Maya.

"That's true," agreed Jenna, also looking at Maya. "You used to have beautiful red hair, didn't you, Maya? I hope she takes after you, and doesn't get those dreadful freckles Mary has... Have you both decided on a name yet?"

Hester looked at Salvatore, who took the cue. "Well... since it's a girl, we're going to call her Solvikt. It was my grandmother's name."

Maya had known, of course, that Solvikt was one of the names that Hester and Salvatore were considering and it felt good to know that the name of her mother would be passed on to a new generation. But as she looked at the little mottled baby in Hester's arms, Maya couldn't help remembering her own daughter Solvikt, torn from her and torn from life by overcrowding and well-meaning but inadequate medical care.

"And she's healthy?" asked Maya.

"She's in perfect health," intervened Halima, who had evidently finished clearing the room. "In fact, now that everyone has met her and given her a name, I need to do some routine tests over here." Halima indicated a number of contraptions in a corner of the room. "Do you mind if I turn the lights on again? It would help if I could see clearly."

Hester smiled and nodded. She reluctantly handed Halima the baby, though Maya noticed that both of the new parents kept an eye on all the tests while the conversation continued. Hester blinked as the lights came back to full luminosity. Salvatore took his glasses off and wiped them on his shirt before putting them back on.

"Why were the lights so low anyway?" asked Jenna.

"Astrid thought it would help Hester relax," explained Salvatore. "And it worked, didn't it, baby?"

Hester nodded vigorously and leaned her head on Salvatore's shoulder. "Absolutely. Nothing was happening for hours, I mean, I was actually in labour, but no baby. I was getting really tired and tense, you know. I'd have a contraction, and then nothing. There was another woman having a baby in the other room, so Halima went to take care of her, and then Astrid, Sal and I were just sitting in here waiting and listening to music while my body did this ineffectual pushing. Then Astrid suggested we should turn the lights down and I could try and have a rest, just relax and see if anything happened. The baby was fine and in the right position, but my body was just taking its time. Halima came back and said that if nothing happened in the next half hour or so on, she'd hook me up to the machines and give me some drugs for the pain and to speed things along. But just at that point, I was feeling okay and thought that would all be a waste of resources. To be honest, I was comfortable where I was, and the idea of getting up out of Sal's arms to go anywhere sounded like too much work. So I said I was fine. We waited another hour with the lights down and then it all really started happening."

"That was pretty funny," said Salvatore with a grin. "I was behind Hester to hold her up, but we were having this discussion about Napoleon Bonaparte. Well, Astrid and I were, at least; I don't think Hester was saying much. She was really getting tired and leaning heavily on me..."

"Giving you a taste of the weight *I* had to carry around all the time."

"...But then she suddenly squealed and said 'It's coming!'. It was pretty funny."

"Funny for you, maybe," said Hester, making a face at him. "I had all this crap and a whole melon trying to get out of me! I wasn't laughing. I spent about an hour just crouching on the flour there, leaning on Sal and praying for the baby to come soon. But actually, it was funny, you know, because I was hearing the music and every now and then, my mind would sort of wander and I'd start nearly singing along. And then I was just there thinking 'my God, this is painful!' and having wishful thoughts about Halima's drugs and then Salvatore said 'hey, we have a little girl'. And I kind of opened my eyes and looked down, and there she was in Halima's arms! It was all over and I'd been so preoccupied with the pain at that point that I barely noticed!" She looked up at Salvatore and smiled brightly. "But it was worth the effort. We're doing this again."

"Definitely," agreed her husband. "Mind you, it's easy for me to say. All I did was sit on the floor feeling queasy. I had no idea so much other stuff came out with the baby."

"What good are my ante-natal courses if you don't listen?" asked Astrid, shaking her head. "Halima, I'm going to check up on Louisa." The doctor, who was still running tests on Solvikt, acknowledged this with a nod as Astrid left.

"I wish I'd had music when I had you and your sisters," said Jenna wistfully. "But they didn't have those kinds of facilities on Alpha at the time, and I was hooked up to so many machines I couldn't move. I guess I was too old for them to just trust Nature."

"Humans never trust Nature," said Maya without thinking.

"Yes we do... sometimes," said Halima, returning to join them. She handed the baby back to Hester, but Salvatore intercepted her and took Solvikt instead. He smiled proudly at his little daughter, positively beaming with delight.

"Nature is our best ally in childbirth," continued Halima. "But you're right, I wouldn't allow a high risk delivery to go ahead the way Hester's did. We were monitoring her blood pressure and the baby's heartbeat throughout. The slightest cause for concern, and we would have had her on the bed and let all this technology help. But when there's nothing wrong, I believe it's far more pleasant for the mother and the baby to have the delivery in a relaxed, comfortable atmosphere. It depends on the person, of course. Some women prefer to use all the technology available, but I like to give them a choice. Hester thought this method sounded good."

"It definitely was," agreed Hester. "I'll never hear Simon and Garfunkel again without thinking about today. It was wonderful. Not at all as frightening or even as painful as I thought it would be. I mean, it was painful, but bearable, and not at all frightening."

"I've always personally found that the breathing exercises are a great help for the pain," said Halima with a smile. She had had five children -- including a set of triplets -- so Maya trusted her opinion. "Your baby is fine, by the way. Good hearing, good reflexes, 3.758 kilograms and we already know that the genetic screening came back negative for any obvious defects . Astrid will be taking care of you for the post-natal phase, though you'll have to see Benito when Astrid starts preparing for her own delivery. Okay, well, we'll let you rest in here for a while, Hester, and then we'll move you to a ward overnight. I have to go and see how Louisa is doing. I'll be back to see you later," she added as she left.

"Isn't she absolutely lovely?" said Salvatore, still staring at Solvikt as Halima left. He was holding the baby in the crook of his arm and gently stroking her tiny cheek with his free hand. "Just perfect. And she doesn't even have any streaks that I can see."

"Maybe they'll show up later," said Hester. She seemed disappointed.

"How many children are you planning to have?" asked Jenna. "You said you were thinking about three, didn't you?"

Hester laughed. "Well, to be quite honest, a couple of hours ago, I wasn't even sure that one was such a good idea! But I think I can face giving birth another couple of times if it goes like this one. We'll see what we want to do afterwards."

"Afterwards?" repeated Jenna, a frown creasing her wrinkled forehead. "You want more than three children?"

Hester half shrugged and looked up at Salvatore, though he was too engrossed in Solvikt to notice. "I don't know. It wouldn't be difficult to do. Everything is geared towards people having large families; there are even some apartments at Verdeschi which are specially designed for families with six children. They have really big windows with a beautiful view over the Verdeschi bay."

"Not to mention that there are plenty of facilities to look after the children so that we don't get too tired," added Salvatore. "But I think we'll see how well we cope with sleepless nights and nappies before making any decisions about future children. At least we now know that Hester didn't find the actual birth too traumatic, so if she's happy to go through it again, I'm not in a position to object."

Maya was proud to hear her son speaking so reasonably. He had changed a lot over the last two years, and Maya believed that the improvements were largely due to Hester's influence, combined with the fact that Salvatore finally seemed to have overcome the obsessions which had plagued him since Tony's death. Even his paintings had become less disturbing, verging on the boring even, though they remained enigmatic.

"Here, Mamma," said Salvatore, perhaps noticing that Maya wasn't participating in the conversation. "Say hello to your first grandchild."

He handed her the baby and Maya looked down into the little wrinkled face of her granddaughter. She was so proud she felt like crying. Little Solvikt had no visible marks of her Psychon heritage, but Maya was touched to think that this tiny baby would carry a little of herself and of Tony into a new generation of Alphans.

"Hey, it's okay, don't cry," she heard Salvatore say as he embraced her. He sounded so like Tony that the tears which had started to flow against her will flowed even more freely.

"Oh, Salvatore, I just wish your father was here," she said softly. "he would have been so proud."