Ersatz (Part 9) (Patreon)

Tyler

After the torture session that was lunch, the quartet was put down for a nap. They had little choice. Whatever was in that milk was stronger than whiskey and put even the most miserable and petulant amongst them into a kind of weary haze, sapping them of their will.  

Tyler found himself lowered into a gigantic crib and one of the other babies- or rather one of Granny’s earlier victims;Tyler wanted to say it was ‘Peter’- was lifted out in his place. Laying down and passing out had been too easy.  He’d stayed awake just long enough to see Chrissy switched out with Wendy and then faded away just as Chrissy tried to ask him “Is it true?”.

Drug induced sleep was a welcome trap door to escape questions about Tyler’s feelings and fidelity.  He hadn’t cheated on his wife; just had some dirty thoughts. He couldn’t control his dreams could he? If not, then why did he feel so guilty about it?

The black void of unconsciousness was a welcome reprieve from dreams of one of his oldest friends shitting her pants and loving it.  Maybe the dream wouldn’t come back now that terrible fantasy had bled into reality.  Hard to say. Hard to say if he wanted it to fade or not. At the very least in the dream all his friends were happy instead of suffering.

The silence persisted after they regained consciousness. None of them talked to one another.   No one was stupid enough to think that Granny wasn’t listening in on them. Granny was always listening. Always. The baby monitor was both out of reach and in plain sight.

She was magic like that. Like that fucking cartoon. Like the baby shark one that took over their bodies  Like that terrifying clown cartoon that hijacked their memories. They were fucked and deep down, Tyler knew it.  The swollen state of his diaper when he woke up was a testament to that fact.  The fact that it was feeling oddly familiar and comfortable was icing on that terrible cake.

They were changed again, and the rest of that afternoon and into the night, the quartet played on the floor like good little babies. They’d had to. Granny was watching. Granny was always watching, it seemed. She never stayed still for very long.  Checking and changing diapers; cooing and tickling; handing out bottles; playing games or insisting others keep busy.  Stacking blocks on a foam padded floor. might as well have been breaking rocks in a prison yard.

“You’re playing so well, Tyler! That’s an excellent block stack!”

“Have another ba-ba Brittney! Why don’t you come sit on Granny’s lap?”

“Chrissy’s a little wet, but she doesn’t need changing quite yet. Keep coloring, dearie.”

“Here, Drew. Bite on this cold plastic ring, it’ll make your gums feel better.”

The other babies were surprisingly well behaved, too. Not at all the toothless feral monsters they seemed to be upon impressions. No true socializing occurred, but they were possessed of a certain calm.

“Uh oh! Wendy made poopies! Let’s get you changed!”

“Oh look at Michael in that bouncer!  Bounce Mikey bounce”

“Peter loves his play gym! Smack that star! That one on the right! Good baby!”

“How about I read a story for little Jon-Jon?”

It was pure parallel play all around.  Eight different people stuck inside themselves. Four of them completely unable to communicate, the other four afraid to. Granny’s eternal vigilance had created a panopticon effect.  She might be watching at any given time, regardless of proximity, so she was effectively always watching.

Tyler remained quiet.  It can be easy to be quiet when your mind is permanently stuck on overdrive and faster than the words coming out of your mouth.  It’s even easier when you’re emotionally overwhelmed.

Where to begin?

First, there was the fact that his body was betraying him. He was wetting his pants uncontrollably, even while awake. He would feel a kind of warm hot flash centered on his penis only for it to quickly fade.  He’d write it off as hallucinatory or anxiety induced until it happened again.  And again.

“Do you feel that?” he asked Chrissy.  

“Feel what?” she asked, somewhat coldly.  Oh yeah. They were still fighting.

“Nevermind.”

“Okay…”

He didn’t fully make the connection until his diaper started swelling and sagging enough for him to feel the difference beneath his snap crotch shortalls. They’d started out baggy enough to hide the bulge and bulk of his diaper. Then not so much.  He’d started to notice weight that hadn’t been there before; felt soft plastic brush against his inner thighs and swing slightly from leg to leg.  Looking at the state of the other’s clothing, he knew he wasn’t the only one.
Practically nobody knew when they were filling their pants. The one exception was Brittney.  Everytime she wet or messed, she would devolve into a screaming, quivering, orgasmic pile of goo on the floor for a few minutes.  After the third time, she started popping her thumb into her mouth and sucking on it to mute hurtself.  Tyler hoped it was to mute herself…

Whenever Brittney was changed, Granny smeared this pea green cream all over her genitals and between her cheeks.  Tyler braced himself for his change, but none of the stuff touched him or his other companions. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what was causing Brittney’s condition.  

Was it wrong that Tyler was disappointed no such aphrodisiac was applied to him?  On some level it would have been nice to have the excuse.

Of particular cognitive dissonance was Drew.  Tyler’s best guy friend had lost his beard and his teeth. His fucking teeth!  At any given moment, Tyler was staring at Drew, tight lipped, yet said lips seeming looser and less defined; a traveling lump like a circling shark as his tongue kept obsessively probing the modified landscape of his mouth. When he wasn’t staring, he was purposefully trying not to stare, which felt a whole lot like staring.

Whenever he wasn’t staring at one of the crawling toothless babblers, trying to tune out Brittney moaning and trying not to hump a teddy bear, or not stare at his deformed friend, Tyler was looking over his shoulder to see his wife glancing at him.  He was so not ready for any kind of talk right now.

“Good baby,” Granny interrupted his train of thought and gave him a pat on the top of the head and one to his crinkly bottom.  

Panopticon.  Granny was always watching.  

“Remember boys and girls,” a woman from the television said to a small group of attentive children. She was dressed as a police officer. Beside her was an archetypal firefighter and an EMT.  “9-1-1 is only used for emergencies!”

Tyler shook his head slightly to himself. The fuck! They even had 9-1-1 here. So similar and yet…

“Ladies and gentlemen of the press! Monkeez has an important announcement!” It was that same diaper commercial. The one with the real babies on it, the thing that had given the game away and exposed the truth about the giant woman’s lie.

Granny switched the television off. “I think that’s enough of that old commercial,” she said. “I swear I hear that one so much it’s in my dreams.”

The fully regressed baby girl started crying. Evidently she’d been watching it.  “Awww, it’s okay Wendy,” Granny said, picking her up.  “Your Daddy will be here soon to take you home. It’s okay.”  She bounced the girl in her arms and patted her back as tenderly and affectionately as one would any real baby.

Real baby.  If not for that commercial, Tyler would have thought that poor girl- that poor woman- was a real baby on this world. More than likely Wendy and the others were all poor damned souls that had ended up here just like Tyler and his friends.  That commercial showed them the truth.  They weren’t real babies they were -

“Ersatz…”  The word came out of Tyler’s mouth before he could think it through.

“What was that, sweetie?” Granny asked.  “Did you need something?”

Tyler closed his mouth and shook his head. That was good enough for the old giantess.

Ersatz: something that is made or used as a substitute for something else; usually inferior.  Splenda could be considered an ersatz sugar.  Great Value was an ersatz version of a name brand.  Sugar and lemon mixed with restaurant ice water was just ersatz lemonade.

That’s why they were all so well behaved. The babblers, the fellow lost travelers, had all been modified and traumatized to the point where it was all they could or dared to do.  No teeth. No walking. No talking. But they still likely understood enough to be afraid.  And if they didn’t, they’d been conditioned to display the most tame and pleasant parts of early childhood.

No kicking or hitting or tantruming. No biting or ripping or throwing of toys.  No rebellion. At most they would cry pathetically, something that could be pacified or soothed with ease. They weren’t real babies, but a sub-incredible facsimile of the real thing. They were all ersatz babies; and Tyler and his friends were next on some kind of assembly line.

Then despite himself, one important question sounded off in his head.  

Why?

Some sort of child shortage? Were the giants sterile and dying out? Were the babies in that old commercial all adults now, unable to conceive?  Or was it something else?  Forcing people from outside this world to be babies didn’t make much sense if that was the case.  If you break someone’s mind and disable them, it’s not as if you can repair and rebuild them.  It’s not as if Peter, Jon, Michael, and Wendy were ever going to grow up.  They were humans, not giants. They were done growing up.

Then why alter them so? Why make them useless pants pooping dependents incapable of talking?  Was it a status thing? Like being able to afford a really expensive but useless pet? What parts of this world’s culture or history- one that on the surface seemed so similar to their world- was Tyler missing?

The thought kept him occupied all the way until after the giants returned and picked their ersatz children up, straight through dinner, until bedtime.  

They were put to bed without being given the magnificent milk that caused them to peacefully doze while robbing them of their continence. “I think you can go one night without a bath,” Granny told them, dressing them all in footed pajamas that covered their fingers and toes.  “You’re all a bunch of Little stinkers, but I don’t think you’re that stinky right now.”

“Ffffuck you.” Drew slurred.

There were four cribs in that particular room.  Two were up against the left wall. One was along the far wall.  The fourth was along the right wall with another changing table taking up the rest of the wall space.

Granny remained tight-lipped and glowered down at Drew in his crib along the far wall.  Someone needs some special milk,” Granny glowered down at him in his crib.  “But first…” she plucked Brittney out of her crib.  “Baby Drew seems to have leaked through his diaper and stained his bedsheets. I just didn’t notice it till just now.”  

Brittney came rocketing down into Tyler’s crib..  “Can’t have him sleeping on a dirty mattress,” she said.  Britney and he made eye contact and both of their faces went red for disturbingly similar yet completely different reasons.  Granny had yet to let up on the cream.  “Can’t have the babies pretending to be married again either, though…”

Chrissy tried to volunteer. “She can sleep with me,” she cried out from her crib next to the changing table.  “We used to share beds back when we-” Her words were cut off with a pacifier and the hissing sound of a gag inflating.

“That’s enough out of you Little miss,” Granny said, picking Drew back up. “Now let’s get Mister Fussy Gums here something to help him sleep.”  She stepped over the baby gate, taking Drew with her.

It was terribly quiet for a moment.  The remaining three strained their ears for the sound of crying or pain. If Drew was making any such noises, it wasn’t loud enough to travel all the way back to their cells.

Brittney’s tormented moaning did. This was torture, Tyler realized. Psychological if not entirely physical.  Brittney was artificially horny as hell.  Tyler’s crush had been uncovered, and Chrissy was in the crib across from them, forced to watch but unable to speak.

“Hey,” Tyler said, sheepishly.  He pressed himself back against the crib’s headboard. There was more than enough room for the two of them in that crib, but the walls felt like they were closing in.  “You okay, Britt?”

Brittney did the same, and scooted to the back end of the same crib.  “No,” she shuddered. “No I’m not.”  Her hands kept fidgeting, unsure of where to put them.  She rested them on her thighs. Then the mattress.  Then behind her. Then across her chest.  “I’m…tired…I keep…you know…I’m…I’m…”

“Horny?” Tyler offered.

Brittney looked like she was about to sob.  “Yeah…”

“MMMMPH! MMMMPH!:” Came the noise from across the room.

A sharp pang of guilt pierced Tyler’s throat.  “Don’t worry, honey. We’re not gonna do anything.”  He was still too far in his right mind and deep in his conscience to even consider that.  

“Wha-?” Brittney said, one step behind the conversation. She gasped. “Oh no,” she called through the bar. “Chrissy! No! I’d never do tha- Oh GOD!” She fell over onto her side.  One mittened hand jammed itself into her mouth, the other started rubbing between her legs as if trying to start a fire.

Tyler was horrified and stared while she writhed and crinkled on the mattress they shared. “Brittney?”

“Give me a pillow!” She yelped. “NOW!”

Tyler did so, tossing it to her.  She wasted no time in straddling, mounting and then humping the ever loving stuffing out of it.  “Need…to…get…” her voice stopped and she collapsed and fell over rocking herself in the fetal position, panting and crying lightly in frustration.

Liberace was wrong. Too much of a good thing was not, in fact, wonderful.

Granny’s intrusion almost gave Tyler whiplash. “Ride ‘em cowgirl!” She chuckled. “Brittney loves her diapers. Don’t you Britt?”  Still in the fetal position, Brittney clutched the body sized pillow like it was a life raft and nodded silently, burying her face into it and avoiding any and all eye contact.

In Granny’s arms, Drew laid cradled and unconscious. His eyes closed, his chest rising and following peacefully. Little flecks of white liquid remained on his chin, his mouth laid open flashing nothing but gums.

If Tyler hadn’t known any better.

“That’ll get him through the night,” Granny clucked, lowering him down into the empty crib next to Tyler.  She walked to the door and turned the lights out.  “Ni-ni, Little babies,” she taunted them. “Sleep tight.”

Easier said than done. The other three hadn’t been given any of that special milk. They’d had to try to find unconsciousness the old fashioned way. Awfully difficult to do while gagged, guilty, or impossibly horny.  To make matters worse, the rest of the baby treatment was having longer lasting effects. Throughout the night, Tyler noticed his diaper swelling and getting squishier.  All the incontinence without the benefit of a full night’s sleep.

It was a long night. The kind that stretches out forever. Sleep only came in bits and bursts. Less a proper slumber and just lapses of time.  Chrissy kept whining pathetically from behind her pacifier, tossing and turning, uncomfortable with the intruding object and the fear that Brittney would do something unforgivable.  Brittney kept humping their crib’s single pillow.  She would doze like a lizard on a rock and then start groaning and gyrating hard enough to make the mattress shake.

The few times Tyler realized he’d been asleep was when Brittney woke him up beating herself off.  It was hard to tell in the darkness, but Tyler suspected she was doing it in her sleep now. She was having a more than literal wet dream.

Drew? Drew slept like a baby.  Fucker snored.

When Tyler wasn’t grasping for sleep his mind was racing on overdrive. What was he missing? He felt a rock in his gut, grunted, and pushed without thought, relieving the pressure. A warm solid mass spread his cheeks and then vanished; almost like a fart.

Almost.

Analyze the pieces. Make the connections others don’t see.

An otherwise modern world, but with plastic backed diapers instead of the kind with the velcro. Made it so that babies couldn’t take them off. Because babies wouldn’t want to wear them and would have the wherewithal to remove them otherwise. Cuz they weren’t really babies.

Diaper commercials with actual children. So they existed here.  The only media with babified adults represented were in private DVDs like the Baby Shark.

Coded comments about training.  A private at home daycare that was actually used for conditioning. Sadistic gags and alteration tools disguised as common baby items and products. This entire world was something monstrous wrapped in a veneer of pleasantry.

But why?

Another solid fart and Tyler realized he’d actually been pooping his pants without giving it too much thought.  He quietly groaned and laid his head back down on the mattress, finally passing out.

**************************************************************************************

“I’m a big kid, I do the potty dance.
I don’t pee-pee in my pants!”


It was early that next morning.  All but Drew had been wide awake by the time Granny put them in their highchairs and fed them breakfast.  No one complained about the pureed mush or the bottles. No one commented or complained about their matching sailor rompers, blue trim for the boys and pink for the girls. No one insisted that they were adults as Granny wiped their asses and changed their soggy and messy diapers.  There would have been no point.

The closest to it was a pathetic, quiet, whining, “Nooooooooo,” from Brittney when Granny refreshed the orgasmic rash cream yet again.  “Please don’t.”

“It’s okay dear,” Granny smiled. “You’re allowed to enjoy your diapers as much as you want. No one will mind.  Get aaaaall the humpies out of your system until you can’t do it anymore. Then we’ll let one of your friends have a turn.  Now drink your milk. I don’t want you to get dehydrated.”  

Multiple sources of addiction and despair collaborated to coerce her into accepting the rubber nipple then and there, or so Tyler reckoned.

“Mommy yay!
I’ll be big someday!”

Tyler stared through the mesh of the playpen at the pull-ups commercial. Just like with the diaper commercial, the actors looked the appropriate age for such a product.  “There aren’t any babies like us on T.V.”

“Thash cush we’re not babies,” Drew growled, bitterly.  The good nights’ sleep had given him some of his spirit back.

“We’re ersatz,” Tyler said, pointing downwards in self-pity. “Poor substitutes.”

“We should be illegal,” Chrissy whispered quietly. “This is so wrong.”

Tyler’s head jerked up. Eureka!  “Maybe we are...”

“What are you talking about?” an haggard looking Brittney whispered.

Tyler stood up on tip toes so he could check on the kitchen. Granny was feeding the other four.  No need for them to help babysit. No need to justify the quartet watching a hypnotic cartoon. They could just be forced if she wanted to.

“What if we are illegal?” Tyler asked.

“She doesn’t think we’re aliens,” Chrissy spat. “She wants to make us babies.”

Tyler rolled his eyes. “I know that. But that doesn’t mean that she’s not afraid of the police.  Think of everything we know.  She doesn’t want us escaping.  She doesn’t take care of any real babies. There aren’t babies like us on T.V.  There isn’t any signs saying this is a daycare; it just looks like a house.  Maybe we’re still a type of human trafficking?  Maybe we’re like…tiny padded gimps to them. Living sex toys.”

“Please…” Brittney huffed. “Don’t…say that.”

“I’m just saying…” Tyler hunkered down and lowered his voice even softer. “What if not all the giants are like this?”

“We can’t get out,” Chrissy said. “I don’t even remember what we tried the first time.” They exchanged regretful nods, confirming their short term memory had all been equally wiped.  Tyler expected as much but…

“Maybe we don’t need to get out,” he said. “Maybe we just need to get somebody else in!  Send an email. Call 9-1-1.”

“They might not even have 9-1-1 here,” Chrissy said.

Drew covered his mouth to hide his gums. “They do. Shaw it on Tee Fee.”

“How do we…how do we…get…” Brittney huffed and centered herself- that or came- “How do we get to a phone?”  So bizarre. Nine out of ten times, Brittney was the one with the plan. Tyler was the idea guy, Brittney made the plans, Drew saw it through, and Chrissy was the wild card and emotional support.  That might have just been for outings, but it was also the making of a really good heist team.  Too bad their planner was severely handicapped.

Tyler took a deep breath and pretended not to notice the faint smell of baby powder and urine emanating from all of them.  “Leave it to me.”


***************************************************************************************

It was a painful four hours, playing on the floor, pretending to be compliant. Tyler almost despaired when he was put into a baby bouncer, afraid he would be left there.  Then he broke out into a cold sweat when Granny pulled him into her lap and popped a bottle in his mouth, afraid he’d be drugged out of his mind. He was so happy when the artificial cherry flavor hit his tongue that he didn’t mind so much that he was peeing his pants simultaneously.

When his diaper was changed just before lunch, he feared that he’d be creamed like Brittney and rendered almost useless.  None of that came to pass.

It turned out that Granny was a creature of habit. She fed the brain drained babies their lunch first, and left the television to babysit the other four.  The terrible rendition of Baby Shark made Tyler feel like strings had been tied to his brain and puppetted him around helplessly, forcing him to giggle and drool.  

“Crawl around, doo doo doo doo doo doo

Crawl around, doo doo doo doo doo doo

Crawl around, doo doo doo doo doo doo

Crawl!”

The only command Tyler hadn’t obeyed was ‘Wet your pants’. He lacked the control to force that.

It was a small Mercy that the hypnotic programming ran its course before Granny was done feeding the others.  It was an even bigger one that it didn’t have an auto replay feature.  Once the video was over, the four mentally and physically exhausted friends were placed back into their playpen, so that Granny could hustle back into the kitchen with a playful but exasperated “I’m coming I’m coming!”

This was good. Granny had habits and security. That meant that her control over them wasn’t absolute.  They were prisoners, but she was weary of them.  Now they just needed to wait for the right time.

It came at the end of the other group’s lunch.  Granny walked by carrying Jon, transporting him to the room with all the cribs.  She already had one leg over the baby gate blocking travel deeper into the house and Jon started grunting.

“Really?” she grinned and shook her head. “Couldn’t have done that in the kitchen? Had to wait until I was halfway over the gate?” She threw a look towards the changing table in the living room and shrugged.  “I’ll change you in the other room,” she sighed.

A diaper change AND putting him down for a nap! Optimal! “Boost me over the top!” Tyler said.  “Then send Chrissy.”

Drew cupped his hands and the girls spotted. He mouthed the words “One…two…three!”  

Tyler practically flipped over the top rail, thankful for once that the majority of the floor, as well as his underwear was padded. Tyler would have groaned or said something if not for the need for stealth.  Granny had big steps. It wouldn’t take ten seconds for her to cross her own house in a rush.  Tyler instead, settled for breaking his wife’s fall.

“Do your best to keep quiet,” he whispered through the mesh to Brittney.  “Try not to draw too much attention. Just start…I dunno stealth humping each other.”  He didn’t tell them that it might be their last opportunity to do so.

He grabbed Chrissy by the hand and they dashed as much as their not-quite-fresh diapers allowed them.  

“Gaba gaaa!” The girl in the towering highchair shrieked.

“Shhhhhhhhhhhh!: Chrissy put her finger to her lips.  Remarkably, the other captives quieted.

Tyler scanned the kitchen countertops, a difficult task considering the bad angle they were at..  “Come on…where’s the phone?  What kitchen doesn’t have a phone?”

“Ah-Ah!”  Michael pointed straight across from his spot.

“I see it!” Chrissy said.

Tyler dashed across the kitchen floor. “Help me move one of the chairs!”  They grabbed a leg and shoved the closest chair, groaning and grinding till it was up against the kitchen counter close to the refrigerator.

“Should have got…Drew…” Chirssy panted.

“I wanted you,” Tyler said. While not as athletic, adrenaline and a ticking clock helped him climb up to the seat.  

“Why?”

“Because I want to do this together.”  That was Tyler-ese for wanting to put her at ease and so he’d feel less guilty. If this worked, it’d be their accomplishment together.  He was also pretty sure that they could still escape through the garage attached to the kitchen together if worse came to worse.  

Unless that was their failed first attempt…

He scrambled onto the counter and  grabbed the receiver off the wall with both hands and cradled it like a baby.  “Nine…one…one…” he whispered. “Please let this work, please let this work.”

The phone rang once. Twice.  Why wasn’t anyone picking up? Three ti-  “Hello Nine-one-one what is your emergency?”  

“Hello?” Tyler could barely hear his own voice over his racing pulse. “Hello?”

“Yes, sir, this nine-one-one, what is your emergency?”

Sir! To be called sir! Yes! This was the right call.

Tyler’s mouth leapt into action.  “My family and I are being kept prisoner against our will. I don’t know the address but if you can trace this number maybe you can figure out where-”

“Where is the address?” The operator, a woman by the sound of it, asked.

“I don’t know,” Tyler repeated. “I didn’t see the address. I don’t even know what city I’m in.  I’ve been kidnapped. Can you trace this number?”  It was difficult to use the phone .Tyler kept having to pivot his head from the ear piece to the microphone again and again so that he could hear and be heard in turn.

There was a pause. Tyler thought hadn’t readjusted the phone in time.  Tyler turned his head and looked fearfully out of the kitchen. His audience of brain drained big babies peered with quiet curiosity.  

“Is your diaper wet or dry, Little boy?” the woman on the other end of the phone asked, a sudden playful menace in her voice.

Tyler swallowed and dread washed over him. “Diaper?  How did you-?”

“Hang up now, Little boy.  This line is only for emergencies and a naughty Little trying to pretend to be a grown-up is not an emergency.”

“Lady, I have no idea what you’re talking about!  I’m not a baby! There’s just this crazy person who is treating me like one!”

Another pause.  “Please stay on the line, sir. I’ll transfer you right away.”

Tyler held the phone up to his ear, waiting for instructions.

“BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!”

Rusty nails scratched against Tyler’s brain. Hot red pinballs surged in his head and rattled everything around.  Tyler dropped the phone and gripped his ears. He shut his eyes and screamed in agony till his throat rattled just to block out the pain he was experiencing.

Raucous laughter from the highchairs and a smattering of giggling applause contrasted.
“TYLER!”  Chrissy screamed up at him.  “TYLER WHAT’S GOING ON? ARE YOU OKAY? TYLER?! TYLER! SAY SOMETHING!”

The pain faded as fast as it had come and Tyler found himself in control once more.  “I’m okay. It didn’t work. But I’m okay” They were screwed. Even the cops were in on this. No help would be coming. THey’d have  He rolled back down to the chair, and scooted off it back onto the floor.

“Come on,” Tyler said. “Let’s try the garage. Maybe we can-”

The look on Chrissy’s face was one of disbelief and dread.  “Tyler?” she interrupted him.

“What?”

“Tyler? Can you understand me?”

Tyler frowned. “Of course I can. What are you talking about?”

Chrissy gripped him by the shoulder.  “Tyler? Do you recognize me? It’s me, Chrissy! Your wife!”  She looked like she was about to start sobbing.  

“Of course I-”. Tyler stopped and listened, really listened, to himself.  “Gagagaga?”  He hadn’t been speaking English at all.  “Bata bama?!”  Every single syllable out of his mouth was pure gibberish.  Simple baby babble with no discernable rhyme or reason.

Chrissy pulled him in tight and wrapped her arms around him and squeezing him tight.  “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry, baby! Please come back to me! Please come back!”

A thousand thoughts powered through Tyler’s skull.  Stupid mistake. Not enough information. Too many assumptions.  Still mentally cognizant, but no way to verbally communicate.  And the dumb bitch was accidentally pinning his arms. “MAAAAAAAA!” He screamed and pushed her way.  Come on! He pointed towards the garage. “GA! PUH PUH!”

The three in the highchair laughed.

“What?” Chrissy stammered. “What is it? What do you want? What do we do?”

Let’s run away and get out of here!  Just us!  That’s what Tyler had intended to say.  His mind already ran laps around his mouth, but now his mouth was a veritable paraplegic. “Papapapapapapapapa!”

“You want your Papa?” Chrissy asked. “What does that mean?”

The other ersatz babies went silent.  A shadow fell over the pair.  “It doesn’t mean a thing, baby girl.”  Granny said. “Sometimes baby boys just babble.”  She reached down and snatched Tyler up by the armpits.  “They chatter and chatter and chatter, but got nothing to say,” she looked Tyler in the eye. “Don’t they?”

Tyler shut his mouth and bit down his tongue.  Chrissy broke down and sobbed. Tyler was set down on the counter long enough for Granny to hang up the phone.  It rang immediately, and Granny picked it up.  “Thank you very much.  Yes, I apologize. New Little. Very Naughty.  I’ll make sure to correct it.  Okay. Have a nice day,” and then she hung up.

“Wamawamawama?”  What was going to happen now?

“Good effort,” Granny said. “Very clever.  I think all four of you earned some more cartoon time with Uncle Klownso!”  She picked Tyler up and whispered into his ear.  “And after that, I think I’ll give you some of my special diaper cream.  Doesn’t that sound nice?"