Bo: Aside from her and your uncle, no one else knew why your mom was there. The official story to anyone who asked was a nasty case of pneumonia. That's what she wanted us to say.
Buster: But why? Why would she care if people knew?
Bo: Imagine being an expectant parent, making preparations for a new child, choosing a name, planning for the future. Then imagine having that taken from you in an instant. It's not easy to talk about, and it's probably hardest for the mother.
Shepard: It doesn't have to happen like this. I can understand wanting to cure the genophage-
Weyrloc Clanspeaker: No, human, you understand NOTHING! You have not seen the piles of children that never lived!
"Do you know why they call me a witch? At nineteen, I was with child by a man who swore he'd marry me. When my baby died inside me, rumors spread it was the Devil's work. The righteous came to cast the Devil out."
— Mechtild, Ophelia
My son is dead, she thought as Jhiqui left the tent. She had known somehow. She had known since she woke the first time to Jhiqui's tears. No, she had known before she woke. Her dream came back to her, sudden and vivid, and she remembered the tall man with the copper skin and long silver-gold braid, bursting into flame. She should weep, she knew, yet her eyes were dry as ash. She had wept in her dream, and the tears had turned to steam on her cheeks. All the grief has been burned out of me, she told herself. She felt sad, and yet...she could feel Rhaego receding from her, as if he had never been.
— Daenerys Targaryen, A Song of Ice and Fire, A Game of Thrones
But this Pack won't always be easy. There will be problems, and dangers, and some other dogs will distrust your litter-brothers, even though they've never hurt anyone, just because of who their Father-Dog is. And I'm... glad that you won't have to know what that's like. I wish you had stayed. I wish that you'll know how loved you were. Your Mother-Dog and I are sorry we'll never see you grow. We— we know you would have been a good dog.
— Arrow, Survivor Dogs
I was only six months along, we had a room all ready for a baby to come, then I got very ill. I was in a Healer's clinic for almost three weeks... they told me it was just a small stomach illness, no one expected what would happen. I woke up in the middle of the night, screaming in pain. The Healer's rushed in and I was suddenly in surgery. Eight hours... the baby wrapped the umbilical cord around their neck on accident... the baby didn't make it and it was the reason I was sick, the baby was rotting in the womb. I... I never really felt that attached towards people, but... seeing the dead decomposing body of what was going to be my third child... something inside me just broke.
— Odalia Blight, The Princess and the Runaways
"Oh, daughter of mine. Stillborn babe, conceived in the vortex of vile misfortune, taken before you could even raise your birthing cry.
"If you’ll forgive my one request, do not be born again to a father like this. If there is a next time, choose not a devil.
"For a time, I had the gall to try to be a father—and I thought up many a name for you. Dreamed of all the things I’d like to do for you. Imagined myself walking hand in hand with you as you grew up strong and healthy. Wondered how you’d smile. How your eyes would see me. How I’d feel as I looked back at you.
"None of that was to be. You slipped through my fingers before a single one came to pass. Thus—it is all stuck here. All those bountiful emotions your sad excuse for a father would have lavished upon you. All as they were when I waited for your birth, afire with nerves and apprehension. They’ve become a bonfire, burning on within me.
"I promise you this. Until my dying breath, they’ll be with me. My heart will always be with you; I shall ever seek to atone, your curse shall ever be upon me. I don’t imagine that will make amends. And yet—if my desperate struggles prove some small solace to you, that will be my salvation.
"…And sometime, someday…in the distant future, that may or may not ever be.
"Perhaps our souls will come back around, as soulology suggests they might.
"I’ll fight for that day. So that when you’re granted life again, it may be under a better father. So that you may smile for him, the smile I never got to see.
"And in the hopes that the world you find yourself in is just a little nicer than this one!"
"If you’ll forgive my one request, do not be born again to a father like this. If there is a next time, choose not a devil.
"For a time, I had the gall to try to be a father—and I thought up many a name for you. Dreamed of all the things I’d like to do for you. Imagined myself walking hand in hand with you as you grew up strong and healthy. Wondered how you’d smile. How your eyes would see me. How I’d feel as I looked back at you.
"None of that was to be. You slipped through my fingers before a single one came to pass. Thus—it is all stuck here. All those bountiful emotions your sad excuse for a father would have lavished upon you. All as they were when I waited for your birth, afire with nerves and apprehension. They’ve become a bonfire, burning on within me.
"I promise you this. Until my dying breath, they’ll be with me. My heart will always be with you; I shall ever seek to atone, your curse shall ever be upon me. I don’t imagine that will make amends. And yet—if my desperate struggles prove some small solace to you, that will be my salvation.
"…And sometime, someday…in the distant future, that may or may not ever be.
"Perhaps our souls will come back around, as soulology suggests they might.
"I’ll fight for that day. So that when you’re granted life again, it may be under a better father. So that you may smile for him, the smile I never got to see.
"And in the hopes that the world you find yourself in is just a little nicer than this one!"
— Oliver Horn, Reign of the Seven Spellblades Volume 10
