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Lily (Chapter 26 up...and complete)


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  • 3 weeks later...

Chapter 23

Why

Why you always kick me when I'm

High

Knock me down till we see eye to

Eye

Figured her out

I know she may not be Miss Right

She'll do right now

She'll do right now

- SR71; "Right Now"

Lily had never had a gun held to her head before. Still, the feeling of the cold hard muzzle pressed to the back of her head.  “Hands up. Get off.”  The voice was Daphne’s.  Not nearly as nice, friendly, or sympathetic as it had been even a few hours ago.  “Now.”  Even with the glass breaking and the door being busted down, Daphne managed to get the drop on her. 

Figured: She wasn’t crinkling anymore.

Lily gave one last squeeze to Darling’s windpipe, hoping she’d done enough damage.  Lifting her hands up, she slowly rolled off of Darling’s form.  Damn she wished it hadn’t been so dark.  She couldn’t admire her handiwork, or tell if the woman was breathing again.  Damn. 

Part of Lily wanted to ignore Daphne, to just keep choking the life out of her captor until Daphne put a bullet in her.  Lights out.  Death. That would have been a kind escape in a way.  More importantly, it was what she deserved. 

Calm and rationale, Lily knew she should feel guilty; not for what she did to Darling, but what she did to Trinh.  Strangling, Darling had been easy after betraying the first real friend she’d made since she came out of the womb a second time. 

Darling was icing on the cake.  One way or another, Lily decided in the ball pit, she was getting out tonight.  And if it was because of a bullet in her brain, that would have been deserved.  She should feel guilty.  She was guilty.  But no guilt came. Lily was bothered that she wasn’t bothered.

“Found my note?” Lily asked.

“Everyone did.”  Daphne was all business.  “That’s why we’re going.”

A tiny, angry smile in the darkness.  “Gonna kill me?  For what I did out there?”

“Thinkin’ about it.”

Lily couldn’t see anyways, but she could feel the hot tears dripping down her cheeks. She heard the gun cock. All the same, her voice was disturbingly steady.  “No you’re not. You’re trying to salvage this shit show and I’m your only hope.”  On her knees she turned around, her eyes finally adjusting to the darkness.

“You’re a murderer,”  Daphne said.  Her silhouette didn’t look nearly as cute without the lace and frills.  Bulkier too.  Bitch was wearing a vest, no doubt.

“Mommy had it coming…”  Fuck.  She hadn’t meant to call Darling ‘Mommy’.

“I’m not talking about her.”

“Daphne!  Get her and let’s go!”  It was her Daddy calling from the front.


“Trinh will be well taken care of; even if we don’t get away.  I made sure of that.”

“DAPHNE! LET’S GO!”

She wasn’t going to shoot Lily.   Call it a sixth-sense or a finely tuned death wish or whatever, but the ex-art history major could tell.  “You’re a monster.”

Hypocrite.  Fucking hypocrite.  These two were only rescuing her because they had to rescue SOMEBODY and she’d cut out their only other option.  Daphne wasn’t a hero. Just someone doing a job.  She was a professional kidnapper.  That was all.  “It’s easy to be an angel when you haven’t spent a year in Hell.”

“DAPHNE!  MOVE YOUR ASS!”

Finally...Daphne clicked the safety on and holstered her weapon. Music wasn’t playing anywhere, but Lily imagined it was.  With a thousand lies and a good disguise, hit ‘em right between the eyes.  You’re gonna go far kid.

“Listen to your Daddy, sugar tits,” Lily said. “Emergency meetings can run late but don’t last forever.” Adrenaline lowering a smidge, there was room for common sense.  For the first time in her life, it was time for Lily to take complete control of the situation.  “I’ll go to jail.  I’ll die in prison.  Deal.  But I want my bars to be iron and a wheelchair instead of a stroller.  I want to rot and die as an adult.”

That sealed the deal.  She was on Daphne’s hip a moment later, being carried out of the room.  “I’ve got the diaper bag.”  Charlie said.  He looked at Lily.  “We’ll have to stock up on Depends down the road.”

Lily pointed to a hook by the door.  “Her keys are there.”  The professional kidnappers paused.  “Darling is still a big wig and everybody knows she’s not at the meeting.  Easier to drive past the gatehouse in her car.”  Lily’s car seat was also in there.

“Bitch has a point.” Charlie muttered.  Damn, it felt good to be insulted like an adult again… “You’ve thought this through.”

“I’ve had time.” Another easy lie.  Life wasn’t chess, Lily had decided.  It was poker. Not so much looking across the board at a clever player and seeing their pieces and anticipating their moves.  It was all about bluffing and pressuring and knowing that someone was gonna get the other guy out of the game before you and folding and driving up the ante until it was time to cash out.

It’d taken a while but she finally had a winning hand, and she’d played it very well.

“When this is over,” Daphne said, “I promise you you’ll wish that you’d saved one of those booster shots for yourself.”

 

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  • Personalias changed the title to Lily (Chapter 23 up)

While Lily's motivations are wholly understandable, her actions might have jeopardised the whole escape. 

As I understood it, the plan was to escape with Trihn as discreetly as possible and use her testimony to get the whole place shut down. They can still do that with Lily but now there's an even bigger ruckus with Trihn's regression. Lily's attack on Darling will make things worse as well. I doubt she's dead and she knows Lily is still Lily. Everyone involved might end up screwed.

Great chapter!

I was just wondering when this would be updated!

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Chapter 24
 

Ol' Smokey's got them ears on

He's hot on your trail

And he aint gonna rest 'til you're in jail

So you got to dodge 'im and you got to duck 'im

You got to keep that diesel truckin'

Just put that hammer down and give it hell
Jerry Reed; “East Bound and Down”

It was three hours two minutes and forty-eight seconds until Lily spoke again. Daphne was remarkably grateful for that.  Bitch was crazy and Daphne was glad not to hit a peep out of her. She hadn’t said anything when Daphne had pulled out of the complex and been waved through by the tired and underpaid security guard.  She hadn’t said anything when they got out of the backroads and out towards the interstate.

Lily hadn’t even said anything when Daphne had pulled over on some unlit road, gloved up and changed her diaper while Charlie searched the car for tracking devices and fiddled with the license plates.  The change had nothing to do with kindness or even hygiene; these adult baby fetish diapers were arguably better than the regular ones in terms of containment and odor reduction. Lily got changed simply because it made for a more thorough strip search.

After what happened a few hours prior, this loon could have anything, including more overdoses of that brain damaging drug.  Daphne had been tempted to just put the old wet diaper back on after she confirmed that Lily was indeed unarmed, but found that while she could be cautious and worry about her security, she couldn’t be needlessly cruel.

Not wiping Lily hadn’t been needlessly cruel.  A diaper rash was at least as much as that monster deserved.

All through the darkness, the trio drove in silence.  Charlie and Daphne didn’t talk to each other.  They already knew the plan. Lily, being both their charge and their hostage depending on the point of view didn’t need to know any of the particulars.  Better that way if she decided to turn traitor on them. She’d been blindfolded and a bag put over her head so she couldn’t tell time or see what roads they were traveling by. 

Charlie had gone so far as to shut the radio off, just in case station identification gave away where in the state they were: No mentions of Miami’s Classic Rock, Tampa Bay’s Country Hits, Orlando’s Oldies but Goodies, or Tallahassee's New Rock Alternative.

Besides the car seat and diaper bag, most of it was standard procedure for the pair.  Part of rescuing people from cults was treating it like a standard kidnapping until they’d been turned over to the right authorities and/or deprogrammed.  

The fact that Lily didn’t need to be gagged to ensure her cooperation and silence was unnerving.  Charlie was business as usual, but even he was shook, and it had nothing to do with hiding in the trunk on the way out so security didn’t see an overweight Daddy in the passenger seat.

Daphne just kept thinking about Melissa Darling, lying their on the bed, her body unconscious and gasping for air.  The look on Lily’s face had absolutely shook Daphne, though she dared not.  Daphne had seen that look in a lot of people’s eyes; the look of a murderer; but she’d never thought she’d see it on Lily’s.

In the space of a few hours her perception of Lily had gone from seeing her as a victim, to a survivor, to an asset, to a casualty of some fucked up shadow war; and now the girl seemed more dangerous than any of the others in that freaky cult.  The utter silence wasn’t helping.

Charlie and her had played this whole hand wrong.  This job had been fucked from the word ‘go’. Never should have taken it; not even with how much money was being thrown at them. 

They should have just lied to Lily and not given her a reason to do what she did.  But how were they supposed to know she was going to go that far off the reservation?  She could have been a legitimate asset and they could have gotten her out...eventually.

They should have just taken Lily and Trinh.  It would have saved them both.  But they weren’t prepared to do that.  Too much risk for the reward, and Daphne didn’t want to end up permanently forced to poop her pants.  They’d probably just put a bullet in Charlie’s head for being too big to play dress up with.

They should have just taken Lily and told some authority or another that she was kidnapped instead of suckered into a twisted form of slavery….but Charlie and her had already figured out why that wouldn’ have worked.  This still wasn’t going to work.  Not really.  If this cult was as well funded as their own contacts and financier had told Charlie, they might be better off just ditching the nutter by the side of the road and hoping the tabloids picked up on it.

The odds of this getting to any non-corrupt court or judge or cop was increasingly slim.  Cell phones, emails, and APB’s still traveled faster than burning rubber. This wasn’t a cult ,but a full on shadow organization; or so Daphne feared.  They’d have had better luck fucking around with the Sea Org.

There had to have been a better way for this to go down, but for the timeframe, finances and information provided, and risk involved, Daphne couldn’t for the life of her figure out how.

Worse than pondering what signs there were- what red flags she’d missed and how she and Charlie could do the right thing AND get paid, there was the nagging question that Daphne couldn’t let go:  Had she pushed the woman in the backseat to this? Was their not-so-precious cargo just someone who snapped?  Had Daphne and Charlie created a monster through compromise, strategic thinking, and just negligence?  There orders had been to extract Lily. Had they done the wrong thing by trying to do the right thing?  By trying to hit that sweet spot of rescuing Darling’s personal baby slave AND find a witness that would collapse the Rebirther’s tentful of crazy, had they just made everything worse? The more and more she thought about it, Daphne thought the answer might be ‘yes’.

This was just the kind of fucked up shit show that she’d hoped to avoid.  Worse than the dinosaur cult. This was gonna be her last job.  With Charlie.  Freelance.  Anybody.  There had to be a better way to pay the bills.

“Can I ask a question?”  Three hours two minute and forty eight seconds.  Fuck. There went the vain hope for a completely silent ride.

Charlie answered for Daphne.  “Nope.”

“Where are we going?”  Goddamnit. 

“I know you don’t have to go to the bathroom, so don’t try that excuse.”  Smart, Charlie.  Change the subject. Rattle her.  Take control of the conversation and nip stuff in the bud.

“I won’t, Mister.” Lily said from underneath the bag.  “I’ll be a good girl.”  She sounded meek.  Compliant.  Broken.  Even through the bag, Daphne swore she could see the mocking smirk. 

“A good girl,” Charlie harumphed.  “You got a fucked up definition of good, kid.”

There was a pause, perhaps a moment of introspection. Maybe just maybe the diapered woman had been shut up.  “I tried being Melissa Darling’s version of good, didn’t I?  How’d that work out for me?  Then I tried your version.  How was that gonna work out?  Good and bad are just standards set by whoever is in charge.”

“Charlie…”  Daphne threw a warning glance at her ex.  “Don’t.”

Her ex ignored her.  “Is that what you think?  You think you’re in charge right now? “  Shit like this is why they were exes.

“I’m the one you took with me, aren’t I?”  Lily’s voice was flat.  All emotion drained from her voice.  All affectation of giving a damn evaporated.

“And all you had to do to force our hand was murder another inmate.”  It was Daphne who said it, despite herself.

Lily didn’t disagree or argue the semantics of killing the mind versus stopping the heart.  What she did say was.  “Yup.”

“Damn kid,” Charlie shook his head.  “That’s cold.”

“I spent three months naked in a biological sensory deprivation tank, carried around and fed intravenously by a drugged up lush,” Lily said. “I’ve had perfectly healthy teeth yanked out of my mouth, bones broken, and nerves deadened.  I’m never going to walk independently ever again, and will likely be incontinent for the rest of my life. I’ve had my consent and agency ignored for well over a year.”  She paused.   “And I’ve had to pretend to be not only okay with it but completely unaware of it the entire time just to remain a person on the inside.”

Fuck.  Crazy bitch had a point.  “You’re not a person on the inside,” Charlie said.  “And to us you’re just a job.  That’s the one reason you’re in the backseat right now.”

“Daphne,” Lily ignored Charlie.  “When you’re forced to wear what I wear and it’s not cosplay or playing spy, and your Daddy is a negligent drunk that doesn’t want to fuck your brains, then you can feel free to get all the way back on that high horse of yours and ride off into the sunset.”

No one said anything for another fifteen minutes.  That’s when the red and blue lights started flashing in the distance.

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck!” Charlie started swearing.  “Fuck!”  There weren’t enough people on the interstate this time of night for this to be a coincidence.  They’d been spotted.  Made.  Fingered.  Fucked.

Daphne floored it.  “I thought you said you searched this thing for a tracer!”

“Of course I did!”  Charlie scowled, climbing into the backseat alongside Lily.  He reached down and dug out the dirty old duffle bag they’d brought just in case.  “I thought you stripped searched her?”

“I did!”  She peeled off the nearest exit, not even to a city proper by an exit to a glorified gas station rest stop.  “I thought you changed the license plates!”

Charlie didn’t reply.  Of course he had.  They were just grasping at straws as to why they were getting the fuzzy end of the lollipop.  He unzipped the duffle bag. The crazy bitch in the diaper was mercifully quiet just then.  No stupid questions like ‘what’s going on’?  Having cargo that didn’t have much to lose didn’t ask too many questions when shit hit the fan.

Good thing too, because neither of them had time to answer stupid questions.  Charlie was too busy trying to find a stupid solution.  “Maybe she’s got some kind of tracker inside her?”

That made Lily startle.  It was something none of them had considered until just now.  She’d already been altered in so many ways.  Why not chip her like a dog?

The sound of clinking metal as bullets whizzed by and hit the bumper and ripped through the trunk .  “At least they’re not going for headshots!” Charlie shouted out.

“Must mean they want us alive!” Daphne called back.

“Probably not,” Charlie said.  He opened the passenger side door.  “Just her.”

“Aren’t they supposed to tell us to surrender?” Daphne asked.  The cruiser’s lights and siren were off, but they were still pursuing.  Daphne swerved onto a dirt road just off the highway.  This was gonna be one of those things that officially didn’t happen in any police report.  Including a pair of corpses.

Charlie opened the door and dumped the contents out.This was a dumb idea.  Stupid idea.  Something out of bad television.  But the Boondock Saints had an interesting point.  Professionals had professional expectations.  Best way to catch them off guard was to act unprofessionally.

The caltrops spilled out of the bag and took up the dirt road, glistening in the moonlight.  It was a trick straight out of a Bond flick.  The gym bag delivery system was totally amateur.  And the cops didn’t see it coming for a second.

Bumpy riding turned into grinding and swerving.  Country bumpkin cops on the take didn’t have run flat tires. 

“Holy shit!” Charlie shouted.  “It wor-!” Charlie was caught off their own flat.  There’s a reason Bond’s booby traps came out of the back of the car instead of the side. 

“Shit shit shit shit shit shit!”  Daphne braced for impact as the car fishtailed out of control.  Air bags deployed and the world shook as they crashed into a treeline in the undeveloped road.  They had a little over a hundred yards between them and the. 

“We’re fucked.”  It was Lily who said it.  Her voice was pained and moaning.  The car seat she was riding in was top of the line.  Still didn’t make it any more pleasant in a crash.

But no.  That wasn’t quite true. It was Charlie who said what Daphne was thinking.  “Not us, kid.  Just you.”

“What?” The first actually panicked note.  “You’re not gonna just leave me here are you?”

They didn’t hear the question.  The two would-be detectives were already running through the dark.  Breaking line of sight.  Trudging through the swampy forests of Florida.  There’d be an APB out for them.  Likely with their names and descriptions.  The dirty nature of this operation still meant that they’d get away with this if they could cross state lines, maybe a warrant that only had jurisdiction in Florida (with bullshit charges that wouldn’t stick in any real court to boot).

That was fine.  With both of them.  They’d been in scrapes like this.  Most cop bullets could knock them down, but their vests would save them.  Leaving Lily behind would slow them down too. 

Fuck it.  They’d already been paid a good amount up front.  Who needed to come back to Florida, anyways?

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

“Guys?  Guys?!” The bag came off of Lily’s head.  The world was still ringing in her ears and her.  A not so fun side effect of them crashing.

“She’s in here!” The police officer called beyond the car window.  “Found her!”

Lily looked up at the figure approaching her, arms crossed.  She’d recognize that silhouette anywhere.  Somehow the woman seemed taller.  Even in the moonlight, Lily could make out the silk scarf around her neck, worn to hide bruises.  “Hi, Mommy…”  She forced a smile.

Melissa Darling didn’t smile back. “Lily…”

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  • Personalias changed the title to Lily (Chapter 24 up)

? No going to lie... I genuinely hoped she'd get away... The only thing that's going to save her from an immediate booster shot is wanting to know who those guys were. Somehow I don't think that's going to last for long!

Can't believe they didn't switch cars first... putting her in some sort of faraday cage would have been smart too...

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Funny, I just recently bumped into this story (I already knew your work from the classic Dante’s Infanzia, which is by far one of the best ABDL stories out there), and started reading "Lily", and I was totally hooked up, I just gobble up chapter after chapter, eventually reaching chapter 22 one or two days ago, and I was about to comment here talking about how much I appreciate your story, and now I noticed you posted 2 new chapters. I guess it's my lucky day :)

Anyway, from the bottom of my heart thank you very much for all your good work, your stories all those things, and, if possible, if you allow me this little suggestion, put more scenes of adult baby  girls wearing tights in your stories  XD

sending virtual hug.gif

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Capter 25  Just Enough Rope

Buzzing!  Buzz buzz buzzing!  The entirety of the Revenge Room was buzzing!  Burner phones were ringing!  Stereos were blaring static.  For some damn reason, all of his lap tops and desk tops and towers were all making the grating modem dial up sound!  And none of them were plugged in…

Jack had known that things had gone sideways when his people didn’t call in.  Correction: When the RIGHT people hadn’t called in.  Jack had gotten calls.  His moles in the local police departments told him about the APB going out; and based on the car’s description it sounded like Melissa’s car.

Sure enough, Jack had tried to text them, to warn them, to advise alternate routes.  To tell them to ditch the car and get another, steal it if they had to.  But none of the texts sent through.  Instead, an auto reply came:

“i’LL rElAtE tHiS LiTtLe BiT
iT hApPenS mOrE tHaN i’D LiKe To AdMiT”

He had sent it again.  Some kind of glitch.

“LaTe At NiGhT sHe kNoCks On My DoOr
ShE’s DrUnK aGaIn AnD lOoKiN tO sCore”

Again!

“I kNoW i ShOuLd SaY nO,
BuT iT’s KiNd Of HaRd WhEn sHe’S rEaDy To Go”

He gave up and tried calling them. Different burner, too.

Instead of a ring-tone he got “I may be dumb, but I’m not a dweeb! I’m just a sucker with no self-esteem!”

Jack hung up.  He tried another phone.

“Take me for a ride

I'm the one you pushed aside

But it's coming back to you

Yeah it's coming back to you, hey!”

And another.

“Run to the sound

Take it back and double down

'Cause it's coming back to you

Yeah it's coming back to you.”

And another.


“Well
Ah-ah-ah!

 

Well we're pouring gasoline

So dance around the fire that we once believed in.”

He went on the computer to see if there was a way he could get a message across that way.  Before he could type a single keystroke, his screen was flooded with music videos of some punk rock band whose singer had a voice that could be most charitably described as someone needing a bucket over his head.

 

“Until the break of dawn

Life, Life, and I quote by the letter

Time, Time, Prozac can make it better

Noise, Noise, any kind will do

Can you feel it slip away, well it's all on you”

Some kind of virus.  He’d been hacked. Traced!  Someone was fucking with him.

He unplugged everything.  Turned all the phones off. 

That’s when they started ringing and chirping and groaning and moaning.

Buzzing! Buzz buzz buzzing in his ears like a million gnats.

Music too.  The same band.  All different songs.

“You may push me around

But you cannot win-”

“Give it to me baby!  Uh-huh Uh-huh!”

“Na-na-why don’t you get a job?”

“Man she’s got issues and I’m gonna pay!”

“Well no, hell no

What you gonna do?

When they keep coming for you!”

Jack turned on the computer, the one that was still plugged in.  Surely, not all of his stuff could have been hacked.  He’d been so careful.  So so careful.  He’d spent more time and money on this setup than his own personal health and hygeine.

Amidst the impossible racket, Jack’s screen booted up.  There was no band or music on this one. 

But there were images.

Horrible images. 

Disgusting images.

The kind of images that if they were found on a man’s harddrive he’d go to prison for a long long time.

Then a map popped up.  His street.  His house. 

And where the police were in relation to it, as well as a copy of the search warrant that had just been approved.

The impossible blaring built to a crescendo as Jack turned around and ran.  The door was locked.  Impossible but true.

They’d be here for him.  Any minute now.

Had that noose always been there?  The one in the middle of the room?  Right above his swivel chair?

Maybe it had and maybe he hadn’t.


Only one way out now…

“Time rolls on

Wipe these eyes

Yesterday laughs

Tomorrow cries”
 

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? I thought it had taken a dark turn before...

 

(You must be on a real roll writing wise right now! Thanks for helping break up my boredom of not having much to read this weekend!)

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  • Personalias changed the title to Lily (Chapter 25 up)

Every time I think I know where this story is going you throw about six curve balls in a row, that's why I love your stories.

For the longest time I assumed Levi was just someone Lily invented to keep herself from going insane, then he showed up and made a deal with Ms. Darling. Is he the one screwing with Jack?

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Chapter 26

People cry and people moan

Look for a dry place to call their home

Try to find some place to rest their bones

While the angels and the devils try to make them their own
The Meat Puppets; “Lake of Fire”

 

Lily didn’t sleep that night.  No rest was offered and unconsciousness would not come on its own. Fear had nothing to do with why Lily didn’t sleep, however.  She wasn’t afraid; not really. She’d been living in fear of being boostered and brain drained for so long that she’d become almost numb to it; almost relieved now that it was finally going to happen. Like a cancer patient released to hospice.

The young woman did not fail to sleep out of fear of her oncoming doom.  That was assured.  Either a booster or a bullet would end her, guaranteed. One way or another she was going to rest forever.  So why rest now? Might as well get all the conscious input she was going to get.

Other than identifying her, Mrs. Darling hadn’t spoken to Lily.  Two cops on the take, a man and a woman, looked her over and transported her car seat over to a squad car. Darling got into a different vehicle and left Lily alone with her armed escort and her thoughts.

She was hopeless.  Utterly hopeless, and felt freer for it.  Hope had been shut up inside Pandora’s box with all the other terrible things in the world.  Hope is what had made Lily go astray to begin with.  “Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter” hadn’t been an admonition at the gates of Hell, it had been the most helpful advice Lily would ever receive. 

Shame she hadn’t followed it.  Oh well.

 

 No one talked to her, and that was good.  No one admonished her or spoke to her like she was a child.  Likely because these people were just crooked and not cultists; a real “the less we know the better” scenario.  It made Lily feel better, too.  She’d go to her cradle or her grave knowing that the Rebirthers had to stretch and get outside help to drag her back down.

At least she had made them work for it.  It was a hollow victory, the kind of thing a bratty kid might think to themselves as they were escorted into the principal’s office.  But just like a brat, Lily was finding that negative attention was preferable to no attention.  Scorn was better than neglect.  Getting one last rise out of Darling had been better than being written off.

They’d fucked up.  At least she could make them admit that, if only to themselves.

She’d been changed once, but there was none of the cooing or fawning over her that had become routine in of itself. No baby powder either. Other than the cartoon decorations on the plastic backing, the random person who changed her was more akin to a nurse than a nursery worker.  All business. 

How sad.  How fucking sad that being treated like a diapered adult was the brass ring she’d been jumping for.  She sat in a wheelchair, handcuffed to a table in a police interrogation room.  Considering how nice and outwardly pleasant the community was, Lily was willing to bet this was the first time the room had been used.

First to fake being regressed.  First to regress another prisoner.  First to attempt murder.  First to get caught and brought back.  First to be properly interrogated.  Lily had become quite the trailblazer in the last twenty-four hours.

A soft hiss, like a snake alerted Lily to movement. The girl jumped a bit when she realized that it wasn’t a reptile, but just air rushing in to fill a vacuum as the door clicked open.  It had happened so damn quick, though.  Kind of like a jack in the box effect: Stillness and then something finally popped up.  No music though.  Lily’s Jack had been wound just that tight.

Mrs. Darling walked in wearing a new outfit.  She still had the same scarf around her neck from before, though.  It was Florida.  Darling probably only had the one.  The outfit was considerably dressed down, though.  Jeans and a t-shirt.  The thin sweater tied around her hips and the sunglasses perched on top of her head still gave major ‘soccer mom’ vibes.  Bougie still, but soccer mom bougie was a step down from cocktail tea party and mimosa brunch bougie. 

The older lady sat down on the other side of the table across from Lily. She folded her hands together, but otherwise said nothing.  She stared, almost placidly.  There was no anger or hate; hot or cold; that Lily could detect.  None at all.  More like she was staring at Lily for the first time.

In a way she was, Lily supposed. It was she who finally broke the silence.  “Here to do it?”  

 

The woman who had  kept her captive for over a year and hadn’t shut up about it didn’t have much to say at the moment. Darling just shook her head.  “No.”  She came out quietly.  She sounded reserved.  Sad.  Like something was going on in her own head.

“Just to watch then?”  Lily spat.  Fuck this bitch.  She wasn’t getting to act all heart broken.  “Should I keep my eyes open so you can see me check out for good or are you just gonna look away and pretend?”  Some eager, spiteful part of Lily considered slamming her eyes shut, just to deny her the satisfaction.  Either that, or scream ‘look at me!’; whichever one made her more uncomfortable.

She did look uncomfortable, Lily thought.  But it wasn’t enough.  She didn’t seem like the right kind of uncomfortable.  She didn’t look like someone whose fantasy had just been shattered.  She looked uncomfortable but she was drawing a kind of strength from that discomfort.

“I’m sorry.” The words rang out louder than any gun Lily had imagined.  They pierced and stung more than a needle.  “I’m sorry...for everything up until this point.”

Lily froze.  A giant 404 error came to her mind.  Did this bag of drunken crazy just apologize to her?  Even more strange, Lily kind of believed Darling.  She wanted to believe Darling.  She had to fight the urge to ask ‘for what?”. 

This was going to be her defiant last stand. Darling wanted to be asked a question.  She wanted to talk.  Like any dimestore supervillain she had the insatiable need to have her particular evil understood.

Instead of asking anything, Lily opted for a good ol’ fashioned guttural.  “Bullshit.”  Straight.  Simple.  Truthful.

Darling sniffed dryly.  “I deserve that,” she replied.  “I tricked you into undergoing an unethical procedure, and then held you against your will; all so that I could be a mother.  It was completely and utterly selfish of me.  I acted like the opposite of a mother.  You didn’t deserve that.”

Lily mumbled something faster than she could think of it.  It was like a belch or a twitch, but they were actual words, even if Lily didn’t want to admit it right away.  She’d held so much in for so long, it was becoming near impossible to hold her own inner monologue inside.

  She’d become word incontinent.

Mrs. Darling looked concerned. “What did you say?” 

“I said you’re goddamn right I didn’t.”  Lily’s face sank.  She was saying everything she’d ever felt and wanted to say.  Why then, did she feel so bad saying it?  “You’re a fucking monster!”  She wanted to be lashing out emotionally, but felt more like she

Darling’s top lip disappeared under her bottom one.  She nodded.  “You’re right.  I have been. I am.”  She unwrapped the scarf from around her neck.  “I deserved this.  I earned it.  Frankly, I’m lucky that you didn’t do this earlier.  You could have and.”  She broke off eye contact from Lily.  “I’m guessing it’s because you didn’t have a ride out of town.”

Lily felt her anger sinking a bit.  A small but growing part was becoming appreciative of this.  This was the first real conversation she’d had with someone in a long time. No one was haunting her dreams. No one was cooing at her like she didn’t know what was going on.  No one was telling her what to do or what she had to sacrifice so that someone else could get a taste of freedom.

 

It was...nice.

Lily felt hope.  Said hope was like an alcoholic tasting a swig of rum.  She was addicted, and each taste of the stuff was going to be the last drop.  She wouldn’t be hopeful.  She wouldn’t let Darling or the cops on the other side of the mirror see that hope. She wouldn’t.

She wouldn’t.

Just this one last time...

“The party,” Darling said.  “The birth…” she stopped and corrected herself.  “The anniversary party.  When you started crying.  That wasn’t just you being fussy.”  It wasn’t a question.  “That was you mourning and being plain overwhelmed.”

Darling’s eyes started to cloud over and shimmer with tears, like she was just realizing this extra bit of awful she’d shoveled onto the poor girl.  “You were grieving and angry and upset at your lost independence.  You’ve had a lot taken from you.  Independence.  Respect.  Companionship. I can’t imagine any of your little friends are all that stimulating to you.”

Lily didn’t blink.  She didn’t cry.  She didn’t look away.  But Hell help her, she wanted to.

“And all because you were in debt,” Melissa finished. “I took advantage of you and you’ve been too terrified to really act out.”

Strange.  Lily had predicted a monologue.  She’d been right.  Melissa Darling was talking, and at great length.  Just not about herself.  Lily had known in her heart of hearts that Darling wanted...no needed to be vindicated and understood.  Classic supervillain.  So why was she talking almost exclusively about understanding Lily? 

Fuck that, why was Lily feeling understood?

Darling blinked slowly, fluttering her eyes.  She wiped away a single tear before continuing.  “It’s been exhausting, hasn’t it?  You’ve been acting this entire time. On guard every second of every day.  Trying to act childish but not too childish.  Looking at the other Reborns and mimicking them while still trying to get what you want.”  The older woman inhaled sharply.  “And all this time I just thought you were particularly smart as a baby.”

The anger that had been subsiding spiked up.  How dare she! How dare this woman so succinctly summarize what Lily had been going through! How dare she try to relate to her! She didn’t have the right!  


“You’re a bad mother.”  It was the most hateful thing Lily could think of.  Acid dripped from every syllable.


Darling didn’t so much as flinch.  “You’re right.  Absolutely right.”. 

“All you do is get drunk and ignore me unless somebody else is watching.”

“That’s true.”  It was like Darling was ready for it.

“You assume you know everything there is to know about me, and so you never even try to dig deeper.  Even real mothers take time with their kids to get to know them and figure the kid out while they’re figuring themselves out!”

Another tear.  Just one.  “You’re absolutely right.”

“You treated me like a cookie cutter copy of every fucking stereotype!  A toy!  One of those yappy dogs that people carry around in their purses!”

“I did.”  More tears started dotting the woman’s cheeks. No move was made to wipe them.

“That daycare sucks!  It’s not for socialization or stimulation or...or...anything! It’s just so you don’t have to think about me!”  If this was going to be her last will and testament, Lily was going to lay it all out there.

“That’s not…” Darling stopped herself.  “...go on.”

“It’s not even a real daycare!  It’s a rainbow colored dementia ward!”


Darling frowned but in that grimace Lily saw a bit of tension release.  She seemed...thoughtful?  “Huh. I hadn’t thought of it that way...”  


“All of you fuckin’ crazies like the idea= the appearance of being mothers- but you don’t put in any of the work.  Do you know how many people I’ve saved from injuring themselves because you and your stupid socialite friends were too busy gabbing to actually fucking pay attention?!” Lily would have been screaming if her throat weren’t so damn dry.  “You’re no better than the kid who wants a puppy and gets bored after just an hour, leaving it with your parents. But there’s no parents here! You’re supposed to be the grown-up!”

A long slow nod from her tormentor.  “You’re right.  You’re absolutely right and I’ve been awful to you.  I-...”

 

“SHUT! THE HELL! UP! QUIT MAKING THIS ABOUT YOU! I HATE YOU!”  Her fists rattled against the table.  The chains holding her there clinked louder than any crinkle.  Oh to fall out of the chair.  Oh to manage one last leap of strength and lunch across the table so that she could sink her teeth into the bitch’s jugular.

Then Mrs. Darling’s face stiffened.   “I know.  And you’re right to.  I’ve done everything wrong up until now.”

Up?  Until? Now?

A long silence followed.  Full reset as if neither had spoken to each other in the first place.  They stared at each other like two generals across a battlefield, even though the battle- make that the whole damn war-had been fought and lost on Lily’s end.  It was more like a snake finally cornering a mouse.  That ‘up until now’ told Lily enough about her future.

 

Mrs. Darling at long last spoke up.  “I have some questions.”  Lily made no reply.  She had a terrible remark.  “Why Trinh?”

“I wanted out,” Lily admitted.  “I got desperate.  I got stupid.”  She was going to get a lot more stupid, Lily reckoned. “I wanted to be their only choice to get out of here.”

More nodding from Melissa Darling.  “Fair enough.” She hardly sounded surprised.  “Willpower is like any muscle.  Strain it too long.

“What was I supposed to do?”

“I’m not sure,” Mrs. Darling admitted.  “I thought we were happy.”

“Fuck you.”  It felt better than saying. ‘We weren’t”

“Fair enough.”  She opened her purse and pulled out a pink vial that was so bright it was practically glowing.  “Do you know what this is?”

Lily did, but didn’t respond.  Her silence was enough, it seemed.

“You lied to me.  Ran away.  Tried to murder me.  Effectively murdered someone else.”

The fact that so much of it was a gigantic case of a pot calling a kettle round didn’t matter to Lily.  “Yeah?”

“If our positions were reversed, what would you do?”

Blurred vision.  Pulse in her ears. Fingernails scraping and digging into her own palms.  Lump in her throat.  “I...don’t know!  I’m not like you!  I’m not you!”  The answer seemed to satisfy Lily’s self-proclaimed ‘Mommy’. “What’s going to happen to me?”

“That’s up to you.” Melissa said.  She slid the vile across to Lily.  Lily slammed her hands down onto the arms of her wheelchair.  No needle.  No way to weaponize it.   “Take this vial, right here and right now, and you’ll be just like Trinh.  You’ll be Athena.  No more big girl thoughts.  Everything will be over.  Just like I thought it was, just like you’ve been pretending.”

No.  No, no, no!   No, no, no, no, no!   “Or?”

“Or don’t.” the grown-up said. “Either way you’re staying here.  With me.”

Lily bit down with her few remaining teeth.  “But, I tried to kill you.”

“You did.”

“I could do it again.”

“You could.  You really could.”

Lily?  Lily didn’t know what to think. “Then...why?”

Mrs. Darling closed her eyes. “I thought I’d been loving Athena. Turns out I’ve been loving Lily all along.  So I don’t want Athena anymore.  I want Lily.  I want you.  That clever, perceptive girl that was never given a chance. I want you to be like you’ve always been.  You just won’t need to hide it.  And Trinh could use someone to look out for her...”

That last part was like a rock in her stomach.  “Why?”  Lily needed to know.  Why was she being offered this?  Why wasn’t someone just sticking her in the rump and calling it a day?

“Because I think there’s a lot that we can learn from each other.  And I’m a bad woman.  But I want to be a good mother.  That means giving you something of a choice.”

“I could kill you,” Lily repeated.

Darling nodded.  “You could.”  It sounded like Darling didn’t think Lily would.

“But what if I do?”

“You’ll be punished.”

“How?”  Lily asked.

A pause.  “I’m not sure.  But it won’t be by booster.  Not if you don’t want it.”

“What if I try to escape again?”

“Same result.  You can end it at any time.  You could kill yourself or booster yourself at any time.  Or,” she offered.  “You can be Lily.  Let me really love you.  Let me give you what you were never given.”

“Why?”  Lily asked.  “Why give me the choice?”

Darling drummed her fingers on the table for a moment.  “Because going over it again and again in my mind, I don’t think it’s being a baby that bothers you.  You’re a very good baby when you want to be.  I think it’s the...the...disregard and neglect that bothers you most.”

Lily’s upper lip curled in disgust. “What do you think being a baby is?!”

Something, some form of madness or divinest sense lurked behind the surprisingly sober eyes of Melissa Darling.  “What’s your choice, baby girl?”

The babied woman had many choices she knew.  She could down the mind killing substance.  She could self-harm until they were forced to either restrain her or end her.  She could yell and shout and scream obscenities until the sun went back down.

That wouldn’t fix Trinh though.  That wouldn’t bring the infiltrators back.  That wouldn’t get her out of diapers and big baby clothes.  Nothing would.  She was too far gone.

Choice.

Hope.

The naive and hopeful girl who had gone into Melissa Darling’s artificial womb died there.  Now there was only self-preservation.  She could end herself.  She could have ended herself so many times.

Hope.

Choice.

She couldn’t end herself.  She just couldn’t do it.  Even if she was never escaping, death of the self terrified her.  And there was always hope...even if it was the hope that things could get better, if not good.

It was no happy ending.  It didn’t matter that she hadn’t committed any crimes before being broken and sent here.  She’d done enough to not deserve a true happy ending.  That...and the knowledge that deep down she’d probably have done it all again.

The real nature of the deal was suddenly very clear:  “No, Lily Darling,” Levi had whispered to her in her dreams,  “I don’t want your afterlife.  I want your soul.”

She would get to keep her marbles...her sense of self...her consciousness.  But she’d lose everything that she was before she’d re-emerged as Athena Darling.  In a way, she was being Reborn a second time.  Now she well and truly was Lily Darling.  She’d kept her consciousness, but in the process, had lost her conscience.

And in a way, she didn’t care.
Time to make the most of it.

Time to get what was coming to her.

“I’m sorry, Mommy.” Lily lied.  “I didn’t mean to be naughty.  I love you.”

“No,” Mommy said. “You don’t.  But give it time, and maybe we can learn again.”

And in the back of Lily’s head, she heard a voice:  “A deal’s a deal”.

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

Three months later…

“Heeeere comes the choo-choo! Chugga-chugga-chugga-woooo!”

Trinh giggled and clapped as Mommy Melissa spooned another heap of applesauce into her toothless mouth.  “Such a good baby!”  She gave the girl a bottle.  “Drink up sweetie!”

Her body on a kind of auto-pilot, Trinh did.  Some part of her ‘knew’ that Melissa was Mommy and that she had to do whatever Mommy told her.  That’s just how it went with her new mind.  One might have wondered if Trinh remembered her abuse at the hands of her last Mommy, were one capable of wondering.

“And how is my Lily liking her chicken nuggies in sweet tai chili sauce?” Melissa said to the girl in the second highchair.  “Does she like it?”

Lily blushed, munching on a dinosaur shaped piece of processed chicken.   “Yesh, Mommy.”   The sauce really made it.  So much better than just plain old ketchup.  Something Lily had pointed to during their last grocery outing, and Melissa had indulged her.

Both Reborns were naked save for their diapers.  Neither one cared. Lily was completely desensitized to it all, and Trinh was senseless.  Both squished happily in soggy diapers that were due for a change after they finished their lunch.

They were ‘sisters’ now.  Mommy Melissa had adopted Trinh.  For her negligence, (and perhaps a bit of politicking on Melissa’s part.)  Tammy had been stripped of her parenting privileges, as well as her adulting capabilities.

She’d been boostered all to hell, just like Trinh.  The fist time Lily saw her in the daycare, baby Tammy had cried her head off.  It could have been the few remaining parts of Tammy’s memory were in a state of shock and grieving now that she was the one in the stroller.  Maybe she recognized Lily and Trinh and had entered a panic at a final realization about her fate.
Or she could have just been fussy.  It was hard to tell with babies.

Knowing what had happened to Tammy made Lily feel a little better about what she’d done to Trinh.  Only a little.  Trinh was in a much better situation now by all accounts, and Tammy’s old crew were coming around Melissa’s and Lily’s way of thinking.

Not that Lily felt guilty.  It was getting harder and harder to feel guilt.  Guilt wasn’t something that came easily to babies.

“Ba-ba-ba-ba!”  Trinh gurgled, breast milk dripping down her mouth.

“Ooopsie!”  Mommy grabbed a napkin and dabbed at Trinh’s chin.  “Though I don’t know why I try,” she laughed.  “You’re just gonna get it all over yourself.  Not like Lily!”

  The smarter of the two flashed a big toothy grin and Melissa all but melted.  It was getting easier and easier to call her ‘Mommy’ and mean it.  The dental implants were a sign of good faith.

Lily hadn’t even asked for them.  Melissa had offered and Lily had accepted. Trinh, on the other hand wasn’t asked. It was almost as if the girls had switched mouths.  The smaller baby didn’t need teeth anyways. 

The smile was a precursor to other things.  “I know that look,” Mommy teased.  Lily had developed the habit of gritting her teeth and smiling whenever she was making a bowel movement.  It had started out as an ironic smile.  Now she just wanted the excuse.

“Sorry, Mommy…” Lily lied.  “I made a poopie.”  She shifted her weight forward and enjoyed the warm mush between her cheeks.  Oddly enough, it was easier to enjoy such odd sensory input when she wasn’t worrying about whether she should be disgusted or not. 

She still playacted and put on childish affectations, but it was more manipulation than stealth at this point.  Did that make her more babyish?

“It’s okay, Lily,” Mommy said.  “No need to be ashamed. Just finish your lunch.”

“Yes, Mommy.” 

Three months.  Melissa had been sober for three whole months.  And while Lily was loathe to admit it, the woman was developing a talent for actual mothering.  From the moment Lily was taken out of her crib, to the moment she was put back in there, Lily was attended to and smothered with love.  It was almost the kind of thing that Lily had wished she’d gotten the first time around with her real parents.

She could literally shit herself and somehow feel approved of.

Just because Melissa had been sober didn’t mean Lily was, though.  Melissa had started a pill regimen of the same trippy drugs Melissa had taken during her ‘pregnancy’.  Needless to say, that wasn’t cow milk that Trinh was gulping down.

“You’re resistant to them, Lily” Mommy promised.  “You won’t regress unless it’s a full booster.”

She was right.  When it was Lily’s turn to breastfeed she didn’t get drunk; just a pleasant buzz like a mild shot of ecstacy.  Fuzzy things felt fuzzier.  Soft things felt softer. And all of her emotions swung wildly around but generally stayed pleasant.

Oddly enough, the creepy dreams had ceased.  Now they were only happy dreams.  Happy dreams and happy memories replacing all the empty inside.  No more man in snakeskin boots unless she counted Dr. Anguis.

 

Playfully, Melissa took a stegosaurus off of Lily’s tray and bit its head off.  “Mommy-saurus Rex!”  Trinh laughed at the tone alone, and dribbled expressed breast-milk out of the corner of her mouth.  Good thing it was a bath night.

Lily actually snorted and rolled her eyes. More the reaction of a good natured teenager than a proper baby, but it was real   And for some reason that was infinitely more gratifying than any of the fake laughs and faux giggles she had mastered in captivity.

Some days were still better than others.  It was a process.  For both of them.  Some days meant outings and double stroller rides in the park.  Some days were giving Trinh something to teeth on while Melissa watched The View with Lily’s head in her lap. 

Some days Lily felt incredibly guilty.  Some days Lily thought about finishing what she’d started.  She never got out of her crib though.  She didn’t check to see if the nursery door was locked from the outside.  It was something she didn’t want to know, to be honest.  It entertained her, the thought that she could sneak into Mommy’s bedroom again and choke the life out of her, if she’d wanted.

She didn’t want to, though...

She could also kill Trinh.  End her suffering if she wanted.  But no.  She’d done enough to the poor girl.  A muted, stupid kind of happiness was better than non-existence.

And selfishly, like a two-year-old, Lily also knew that hurting Trinh further would get her in trouble.  Why risk trouble when she was just really getting used to things as they stood?.

This?  It wasn’t the best life, but Lily felt something close to happiness.

And all it cost her was compromising everything she’d thought about herself as a person.

All it cost her was her soul.

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

Elsewhere…

A hospital of sorts…

A place of darkness despite buzzing fluorescent lights that never turn off..

A place where cries of pain, and cries of rebirth are one and the same.

The head nurse; a woman with uncanny beauty and symmetry; not unlike a Barbie doll; wandered the caughts, checking diapers and feeding bottles full of more than just milk.  The poor souls, naked save for their diapers, bodies atrophied from disuse and abused by medical implements, cried out.

Some cried out from hunger.  Others from common discomfort; too hot or too cold, too wet or too dry. Still some cried out because of real pain.

One such little girl, her Megamax sopping wet, dripped fresh tears down her face.  Her gumless mouth frowned as a pitiful moan ruptured out from her.  “Pweeeeash!” She begged.  Her voice was still weak.  “Gemme outta here.”

“Oh?” Nurse Lucy said.  “You can still talk.  That’s nice.”  She took a bottle off of her cart and fed it to the infatilized woman.  “I’m sorry to tell you this, Rachel, but there’s no going back for you.  Only going down.  Do you want to go down?  I can help with that.”

The girl, Rachel apparently, shook her shaved head as she nursed.  She was otherwise too weak to reply.

“Kill me,” a voice from behind the nurse rasped.  “Please...kill me.”  From the timbre, it was a man; or at least he used to be.  ‘Boy’ would be a better descriptor here.

The nurse ignored the pleas until the first baby was done drinking.  Another nurse would be along later to change her.  “You want me to kill you, sweety?”  She asked.  “Make all the pain go away?”

Weakly, the boy nodded.  “Pleeeeeeease…”  Shame.  He still had some of his teeth left. Now that the new system was being implemented, the boys who didn’t regress fully were more likely to accept the booster than the girls.  Part of the nurse wondered if that made them stronger or weaker than the little girls? 

Oh well.  Such curiosities didn’t stop her from untaping the little boy’s diaper and jabbing a needle right into his buttocks.  “Bye bye, big boy,” she cooed gently to him as the light faded from his eyes.  “You’ll be much happier like this, I’m sure.”


THUNK-THUNK-THUNK.

A knock on the nursery observation window.  Nurse Lucy looked up and saw the aged physician, technically her employer wave to her from the other side of the glass.  She held up her index finger and finished diapering up the boy.  A baby Neoborn named Kieth, according to the chart. 

The quiet of the hallway was both shocking and refreshing,  Soundproofing the nursery had been a solid investment. “Ready for the reports on the Florida settlement?”  Nurse Lucy asked.

Still clad in his scrubs from another successful implantation, Dr. Anguis nodded.  The Nurse reached into a back pocket that may or may not have been there before and handed him a phone, a spreadsheet and document already pulled up.

The good doctor scrolled down the screen, taking the readout in the same way that an art critic might take in a painting; or the way a sommelier might sample wine.  Even through the glare reflected in his glasses, there was a look of intense concentration.  They weren’t just medical reports, but strange statistics.

Happiness.

Fear.

Mental vs. Emotional Regression.

Psychological degradation.

Love.

Innocence.

Things that even a doctor of psychology, which Dr. Anguis did not purport to be, could possibly be put into quantifiable and reliable numbers.  The way they were arranged and recorded made no sense, either.  To most this would just look like a random spreadsheet of arbitrary letters and numbers, not all of them English or Arabic.  Some of them were not in any written language in recorded history.

To most anyone else it would seem the gibberish of a damned madman. It was either in a very special code, not unlike what the Aryan Brotherhood used to pass messages from prison to prison, or it had meaning no sane human mind could truly comprehend.

“Interesting…”  Dr. Anguis said.  “Very interesting.”  He looked to his lieutenant.  “This is accurate?”

“As far as we can tell.” the nurse said.  “The ‘Lily’ incident has shaped the community in a positive direction.  Actual childcare resources are being invested into the curriculum.  Parental involvement has spiked through the roof.  Many of the parents are researching deeper into neural-divergent and dementia care as well as early childhood development resources.  They’re literally mixing adult psychology with infant care.”


The Doctor smiled more with his eyes than with his mouth, and looked down at his prized boots.  “It’s funny,” he smiled.  Some private armies rent out sniper schools and commando camps?  Ours is raiding colleges and nursing schools. How much of this is us?” 

“Almost none,” the nurse answered.  “They’ve become more self-directed, less self-involved.  More child-oriented.  Recreational drug use has all but flatlined.”

The Doctor thought about it for a second.  His gaze settled on the cart back in the Neoborn unit.  He’d seen the nurse permanently shut down that young man’s, and seemed to radiate disapproval.  Not at the action itself, but the need for such action. “How many booster shots?”

“To the Reborns after leaving the hospital?”  Nurse Lucy replied.  “None.”  The doctor stood up a little bit straighter.  Was that pride?  That was surprising. “To the adults and staff found to be neglectful?,” she continued,  “Three so far have found happier homes and happier lives on the other side of the playpen.”

“Interesting.  Very interesting.” He leaned forward and peered out into the myriad cots.  Some of the new adult infants squirmed because that’s what adult infants did.  Some did because they were still struggling with the reality of their new situation; those that still had the capacity for  existential crises anyways.

The nurse roused him from his own contemplation.  “What do we do, Doctor?” 

“What do we do?” Dr. Anguis asked.  “Nothing.  Smarter babies are easier to care for.  Less self-injurious. Competitive parents make for good parents if their competition is nudged under the right rules.  Fear of losing parenthood sounds like a good motivator.  Fear of losing adulthood is even better.”

“Aren’t you afraid of having more intelligent Reborns crawling around? Rebellion?  Escape?  I thought we were aiming for regression.”

“Why?” Dr. Anguis asked.  “We’ve had the one and shown we’re capable of containment and conditioning.  And more intelligent doesn’t mean less regressed.  I think Lily is proof of that.”

“I thought you wanted innocence, though.”  The nurse seemed confused.  Wasn’t that what this was all about?  Or was the doctor a hypocrite that really didn’t believe in The Mission.

“Innocence doesn’t mean moral,” Dr. Anguis reminded her.  “Innocence means not really knowing the difference between good and evil.  And I think we’re very close…”

“Then what do we do with this next batch?”  Nurse Lucy jerked her head towards the giant bawling babs. When the mental regression rate was once nearly one-hundred percent Even something as high as sixty to seventy percent feels like failure.   “Or the next?  Or the next?”

Dr. Anguis handed the phone back. “The ones who have a strong reaction to the cocktails will come out as full Neoborns and not require a booster shot.”

“And the ones with a resistance?”

  “Let me handle that, my dear Nurse Lucy.”

***************************************************************************************
Elsewhere...

Brennan was alone.  Trapped in darkness.  Unable to scream because of the liquid oxygen filling up his lungs.  That crazy bitch Mrs. Donnovan had tricked him.  Lured him into some weird ass body horror cult.  Now he was unnaturally curled up and numbed all to hell.

He could have been in the darkness for a day, or a month or a year.  Time had lost all meaning to him.  This was worse than solitary! 

It was a solitary he was terrified to leave.  He’d seen the people in that room.  Lying and wailing and crying, like giant newborns.  Sucking their thumbs while nurses came and changed their shitty diapers.  Swaddling them.  Breastfeeding them.

That’s what Mrs. Donnovan had meant when she talked about getting him “a fresh start”.  He just hadn’t realized how fresh she meant until he was on the operating table.  Fuck that!  He’d show her!  He wasn’t going to turn into some freak show.  He just didn’t know how…

His lips came across toothless gum.  He already looked like a freakshow.  The only mercy they’d given him was not showing him a mirror before he’d gotten shoved into this sack and stitched into Mrs. Donnovan.

“Oh, baby, let the bad times roll

Oh, oh, oh, oh

Oh, baby, let the bad times roll

Oh, oh, oh”

The fuck?  What was he hearing?  Was that...was that The fucking Offspring?

“Hey Brennan,” a voice in the darkness reached out.  “Seems like you’re in a bad spot.  About to lose it my friend.  Let’s you and me have a chat.  Maybe we can make a deal.”


(The End)

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  • Personalias changed the title to Lily (Chapter 26 up...and complete)

Hmm... I confess this isn't where I thought it would go in any way!

That being said it's a mostly satisfying ending with Lily at least having a chance at... something? It does seem just that she would be stuck being reminded of what she did to Trinh after everything... It was the right move at the time, but definitely not a 'right' move. 

Congrats on finishing this lengthy work! 

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Wasn't completely expecting this ending. I expected Lily to wind up back with Darling. Levi's involvement with Darling made that clear, but that she would actually try to give Lily some degree of say in her fate was a surprise. Its also good to know that Trihn is in something of a better place. 

I'm curious to know more about what this organization is about. What's Levi's stake in this as well?

Seriously, good read!

Edited by TerranV
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What an epic story. Wow, I didn't expect it - amazing. Hopefully Lily can find some peace in the brutally powerful cult.

Thanks so much for sharing it.

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Darling's ex was receiving real time updates from local law enforcement during the escape?  So it turns out that the existence of this cult wasn't a well kept secret.  Looks like there's a story taking place inside this story that we never got to see ... the power brokers in the shadows, and those who oppose them.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Personalias, you have been one of my favorite authors for several years and this story is just another example of why. The character work, worldbuilding and fetish elements of your work comes together beautifully in every story. I especially love the stories that seem to operate in a shared universe (with themes of innocence, afterlife, faustian bargains, etc. prevalent throughout). You put an absurd amount of time and effort into your craft, and it shows. It's a pleasure to read your work. Thank you for writing.

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6 hours ago, CapitalM said:

Personalias, you have been one of my favorite authors for several years and this story is just another example of why. The character work, worldbuilding and fetish elements of your work comes together beautifully in every story. I especially love the stories that seem to operate in a shared universe (with themes of innocence, afterlife, faustian bargains, etc. prevalent throughout). You put an absurd amount of time and effort into your craft, and it shows. It's a pleasure to read your work. Thank you for writing.

I needed that today.

  • Thanks 1
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