OutlawQueen One Shots

Puppies and babies

This prompt started from Roland and Robin bringing home five puppies, then mixed in with Regina's confession of being infertile, then ended with an OQ pregnancy. I don't know what happened 🤷🏻‍♀️

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Five puppies. His son made him come with five puppies. If Robin ever had a problem with something, it was saying "no" to Roland. However, his unfortunate inability to refuse his son was just about to bite him in the ass - quite harshly. They were on their weekly hike in the forest when the child spotted a cardboard box, and the rest is history. Huge, begging puppy eyes, literally and figuratively, about a thousand pleas and promises ultimately made Robin agree to fostering the five puppies until they found them a home. The next problem, however, was sneaking them inside Regina's pristine home without her noticing. Although her obsession with cleanliness had ameliorated since Roland and Robin moved in with her and Henry, she still insisted on certain rules. So, hiding five animals inside her house could turn out to be quite a challenge.

Robin and Roland went for the garage, it was warm enough and Regina almost never went there, so that was the first place where they stopped when the hike ended. The puppies were quickly transferred from the box to the large cage David gave them from the animal shelter, so Robin sent his son to retrieve some blankets from his bedroom. He would have to explain their disappearance to Regina later on, but Robin chose to deal with one problem at a time. Soon, the dogs were lounging on top of three fluffy blankets, and were surrounded by the various toys Roland had offered. Two bowls were then set to the side, one with fresh water and the other one with the dog food they picked up on the way home.

Father and son spent a few more hours in the garage, playing with the small puppies and trying to figure out a way to keep at least one, but soon realised that they should get back inside before Regina became suspicious. When the two of them stepped inside the house, Regina instantly smelled the animal scent on their clothes. They brushed it off by saying they played with a couple of dogs on their way home. Minutes later, however, Regina was ushering Robin towards the shower while she prepared a bath for Roland. Apparently, her acceptance towards dirt and bad smells had its own limits.

The whole ordeal lasted for a few days, until Regina was the first one to get home from work. Even though she had thoroughly washed the clothes her boys wore on their hike, the dog scent still seemed to linger in the house. At first, she thought she was crazy and relapsing into her maddening cleaning routines, but a clear whimper convinced her that she was either right about the stubborn smell, or starting to hear things she should not hear. The sound was followed by similar ones, and then by a small bark. If anyone were to see the way Regina Mills stopped dead in her tracks, with her eyes opened comically wide and her lips parted in shock, she would have incinerated them on the spot.

It took her a grand total of two minutes to fall in love with the puppies once she found them. They were clearly hidden from her, the wide cage being stashed away between random boxes, and that upset her more than it should have. Thinking that Robin considered the five lives he was sheltering inside their house was not something he could share with her left a bitter taste in Regina's mouth, even though she had never stated her wish of having pets around the house. She spent hours playing with the puppies and it turned out that they loved her the most, which would eventually turn out to be completely unsurprising to the three men Regina lived with.

When Robin entered the house and found his wife in the middle of their dinning room, surrounded by five squirming puppies, he realised that he could indeed love her even more than before. Her elegant work attire was covered in wrinkles and black fur from the dogs, the heels she wore that day were unceremoniously discarded next to one puppy who seemed insistent on chewing them, but the smile on Regina's face made Robin understand that he should not have kept them a secret. Watching Regina play with the small animals warmed up Robin's heart, and seeing the way she rolled her body from side to side so she could avoid being tickled by the small monsters made him imagine something he had not thought about before.

How would she look like with a baby of their own? Would she be nurturing and gentle, playful and encouraging or protective and always there for her child? Somehow, Robin knew that she would tick everything on that list. They had not talked about having more children before, they always thought that Henry and Roland would be everything they got, but that seemed to change when Robin saw his soulmate play with a bunch of puppies. The mere idea of seeing her eyes sparkle with joy upon seeing the positive pregnancy test, then watching her wardrobe become less imposing as her baby bump made itself known to the world and finally having a new baby to hold in their arms quickly became rooted in Robin's heart.

Later that night, when Robin brought up the idea of having more children, Regina broke down and ultimately confessed her darkest secret. When his wife told him that she might not be able to carry their baby, Robin's world seemed to stop, the light coming from the moon seemed slightly duller and the sounds around them were muffled. What pulled Robin out of that state was seeing her breathing become shuddered, rapidly spiralling towards the familiar self-loathing. Regina then told him there might be a way to undo the curse she put herself under, using water from a lake Robin had never heard of, and a spark of hope managed to crawl its way up their spine.

A few weeks later, the doctor Regina seemed to hate with all her might, some guy named after a whale, gave them the news. Although Regina's curse was powerful, the connection between two soulmates was meant to heal and nurture both people, and somehow managed to erase any trace of the curse from her body. After a few months, Robin's gaze was lingering on the way the two dogs they ended up keeping slept with their heads propped up on Regina's baby bump, protecting their two younger sisters.