Hiking to a New Life (Chapter 39 posted 4-27-24)

[Kat5]

Chapter Twenty Six

 

Amanda held John long after he passed out nursing. The only movement she risked was to straighten up her bra and get herself adjusted in the cups. Every moment with him was precious, and the snuggles were the icing on the cake.

 

After more than half an hour of cuddles in the rocking chair, she glanced at the clock. Time to get him tucked in bed and then get some work done. And also answer that very awkward text message. This was going to be interesting.

 

Gently sliding the blanket down, she stood up and carried her sleeping little to his room. Once he was in bed, she made sure his stuffie was in the crib pressed up against his side, and the pacifier was in his mouth. Stopping to get in a big stretch for herself she remembered the pillow, so she put it into the crib between him and the back mesh wall.

 

Wandering into the kitchen to make sure that everything was cleaned up, she grabbed a couple of raw carrots to snack on while she worked and made her way to her desk. Tapping the power button, she pulled her shirt back on before logging in to her work account.

 

Grumbling to herself “Oof. Four articles, updating all my notes, and communicating with the research team. This is going to take a few hours.”

 

With a deep breath she opened the first article and sighed in relief when she saw that it was going to be pretty simple to edit and insert links. So she spent half an hour getting that ready, inserting links to all references and even fixed a typo in the authors own name. You would think that would be the one part they would spell correctly.

 

After submitting it to the publisher, she finally opened her notes and updated it with every event from her day, complete with time stamps. She tried very hard to be as neutral as she could about the events in the shower. Only once her notes were fully up to date did she open the message from her contact with the research team.

 

She stared at the words for a moment.

 

They read “Sizable spike in heart rate and physical activity lasting several minutes starting at 2308 hours. Is everything okay?”

 

With a deep breath, she sent back the words “So about that …”

 

What followed was, she hoped, a frank and factual recounting of what happened. Writing it was a bit awkward.

 

By the time that she was finished with her second article, which took more work on her part because the author had referenced materials but had completely forgotten to submit any clues to what they were, she had a reply from her contact with the research team.

 

She laughed as she read it.

 

“Oh yeah, rift and portal littles often still have their sex drive. Don’t worry, that is both normal and healthy. Part of this study will involve knowing if being here without any forced regression changes that. Thank you for your complete records, and if you need to speak with a fellow mother of a male little, just send me a message and we can speak about it off of the record. They come with their own challenges!”

 

It took several minutes, and she had to walk away to get some water while she thought of a reply. It was a very reassuring message. Awkward, but reassuring.

 

But she had to send back “I think that I have to learn as I go with him, but I thank you for the encouraging words. Will I need to include every time that he needs to do that in my usual reports/”

 

While she was working on her third article, one that was written by a truly brilliant individual with no idea of how to convey their thoughts effectively, she noticed a little alert in the bottom corner of her screen. Once she was done editing the article, and sending it back for review instead of submitting it directly, she clicked on the icon.

 

“You don’t have to include that in the reports. The wrist band will know what he’s doing from now on, and we’ll make sure not to alert you. He’ll never know that we know what he’s doing, so he won’t be embarrassed about it. Besides, this will give us a baseline for telling parents how often their littles might need an outlet for that type of energy.”

 

Immediately, she responded back by typing out “That’s a relief! And I’m glad that he will feel like he has privacy about the matter. For the moment, at least, he is understandably shy about this sort of thing. Thank you for your help with this, and I hope that you have a great night!”

 

There. And now only one article left to do now, and She can log in to catch up like usual tomorrow, and then get more done while John naps. Honestly dividing her work up into manageable pieces instead of grinding it all out was starting to grow on her.

 

And then she opened the article and started reading who wrote it, and where it was to be published.

 

She groaned “Okay, this one won’t be fast.”

 

She took a moment to check the weather for tomorrow and then snack on a carrot while she read through the article the first time.

 

 

-----------------

 

 

John woke up with a great big stretch on top of something large and fluffy. It was nice to be able to wake up slowly instead of waking up to an alarm blaring to tell you that you had to hurry up and get dressed for work. With a long yawn, he rolled off of the pillow.

 

But he did not roll off it gracefully. In fact he rolled the wrong way and got himself wedged between the back of the crib and the pillow with his arms and legs up.

 

He groaned. He tried rolling around. He groaned again. Then he tried shimmying himself down toward his feet, but his feet touched the end of the crib before he could go around the pillow. So instead of going the other way he simply went limp.

 

“Unnnnnn” was all he really verbalized. Every morning he woke up as mentally functional as a frozen meal. It always took immense effort to get up and make himself coffee, and then he had to lay back down while it brewed.

 

He must have dozed back off until he heard the side of the gate click and instead of swinging open, it slid down like the side wall of a regular crib.

 

He looked over to see a smiling Amanda pulling the blanket he abandoned off to one side. Her smile was so genuine that he could tell that she was fully awake.

 

“Unnnn. No awake.” he said while trying to grab the pillow and pull it over him.

 

He was not destined to win as the pillow slid away from him.

 

She sounded so happy as she said “But sweety, you have to awake. It’s morning. And morning means awake!” and he rolled back over away from her.

 

“No morning.”

 

She just took the chance to check his diaper, since he had pointed it at her.

 

“Ooooo, you know, I think that you’re not THAT bad, you could have coffee milk, and after that wakes you up, we could get some food into you.”

 

He laid there while his brain chugged along slowly. Ugh. Morning people.

 

John prepared himself to answer in a clear and coherent way, despite his state of unawakeness.

 

“Coffee?” he asked.

 

Genius. He got out an entire word.

 

Feeling himself being lifted and shuffled around, he wasn’t even being carried on a shoulder or against a chest. He was being carried back down like a newborn. Had he been more awake he would have looked more indignant.

 

Smiling down at him as she deposited him on the couch, she said “Don’t worry, I know just how to wake my baby up without even having to tickle him.”

 

Doubtful. He tried to fall back asleep in the little bit of time he had until she returned. But he was not fated to succeed as she came back and sat on the couch, pulling him up next to her.

 

The nipple of a bottle was pressed against his lips. Begrudgingly, he opened his mouth and let it in. He tried to fall asleep instead of actually drinking anything, but eventually he gave up and started drinking it.

 

By the time he was halfway through the bottle of coffee milk, he started to feel more awake, and even slightly alive.

 

With his left eye still closed, he started to push against Amanda to get himself sitting upright on his own, and then was able to sit there finishing off his coffee milk.

 

There was a scratching sensation on his back. It felt nice.

 

So as he finished the bottle he flopped back against his new Mom’s side and leaned there looking around.

 

“Are you feeling more awake now?”

 

With a yawn and a stretch, he finally managed an entire thought. “Yeah. More awake now.”

 

She patted him on the head as she said “I’m very glad to hear that. We’ll get you changed and feed you breakfast. All of our plans today are canceled, unless your Aunt Cat still wants to come out here in the rain.”

 

Now he looked out of the windows to see a dark sky and a dreary landscape where everything further than twenty feet into the rain disappeared into a haze.

 

Looking up, he asked “We don’t get to work in the garden today?”

 

He got a gentle, one armed hug “No sweety, we don’t get to work in the garden today. And possibly not tomorrow either.”

 

“Awwww.”

 

That got him some ruffled hair. “I’m sorry sweety, but we can’t control the weather. Tell you what, we have to go to the grocery store tomorrow anyway, We’ll get you some strawberries to snack on then.”

 

Finally she picked up and, done with what he realized was her trying out a different way of waking him up, she carried him to the changing table and got him cleaned up.

 

Feeling grateful that he at least got coffee first, he rubbed his eyes before laying his arms down and letting the wrist straps grab them on his own. The diaper was opened and he was wiped down. When the word “Up” came out, he happily participated by lifting. When the word “Down” came he flopped.

 

John was absolutely certain that this was taking her longer than if she just did it herself, but the only sensible explanation was that she was letting him be involved to be nice to him. Small consolation while trapped in diapers, but any consideration was better than no consideration.

 

After he was in a fresh diaper and a clean onesie, he was sent on his way with a pat on the bottom and a “March.”

 

Laughing a bit, he walked out to the living room. On a whim he dragged his step stool over to the window and climbed up it to look out at the rain. As he stood there with his arms on the window sill, he took a deep breath and sighed longingly looking outside at the garden that he couldn’t go out to.

 

“John.” he heard from off to his right.

 

So he turned to look and Amanda was waving him over “Stop sulking, come eat!”

 

In a huff he hopped down from the stool and strolled over to the table, where he was lifted up and deposited into the booster seat. As the chair was slid forward, he found himself looking at two steaming eggs and some toast.

 

Never a bad breakfast, it at least brought a smile to his face. For some reason he stared at it remembering the scrambled eggs from the first day he woke up here.

 

Curiously, John picked up the fork and poked the large egg over the middle and was rewarded with a thick golden liquid running out.

 

“Oh hohoho, yes!” John said to himself as he grabbed the toast with both hands and dipped it into the yolk. With no consideration to the fact that the toast was too large to go into his mouth, he simply ate, dipped, and ate some more. And when he ran out of yolk from both eggs he tried to use the fork to put the white part of the egg still spotted with yolk up onto the bread.

 

Eventually he gave up all pretense of proper table manners an used his hand to shove the egg onto the toast where the small child sized fork was simply no help.

 

And now he had a nearly ten inch wide piece of toast with an egg on top. He did his best to eat the whole thing, but halfway through he lost the fight and put it back down. It wasn’t until after his egg induced frenzy was over that he looked at his hands and realized he’d been a bit messy.

 

Stretching up and looking around for a napkin, Amanda stepped over from the bar where she had stood the entire time sipping her coffee quietly and tried to quickly wipe his face clean. When that failed she unbuckled him and he just went along with it as she picked him up carried him to the kitchen sink to wipe his face with a wet rag.

 

“You sure to get enthusiastic with breakfast foods.”

 

With a full belly and a now mostly awake brain, John quipped out an honest “Well, I haven’t gotten much home made food since moving out on my own. And I’ve been skipping breakfast for years. I’m sorry if I got too carried away.”

 

He was lifted higher and got a kiss on his left temple. “Sweety, you can be as excited as you want, as often as you want, and for any reason that you want. I think it’s cute, and it also lets me know what you like and don’t like. So just be yourself!”

 

And with that he was put down onto the kitchen floor and got a swat on the bottom “Now go do whatever you want while I clean up and top off my coffee and fix you a sippy cup of water.”

 

So he wandered back to the living room and looked outside forlornly once again. After a minute he felt a poke on his shoulder.

 

Turning around, a sippy cup was waggled at him “Hey, come back to me. It’s raining outside, not inside. We can find things for you to do. Or do I have to tell Xerxes to fetch you to snap you out of it?”

 

With a deep breath and a sigh he took the sippy cup and took a few pulls. The cold, refreshing water did help a bit, at the very least.

 

Looking up he said “Okay. I’ll stop moping. Can I go … umm… Maybe sit on the porch and draw?”

 

She reached down and ruffled his hair. “It’s a bit cold outside for that. Why don’t you try coloring or playing on your tablet. I don’t have any books for you, would you like us to change that in the future?”

 

He thought about it before saying “I never really had much time to read, but maybe I could give it a try? Do you have fantasy novels here? Maybe Sci fi?”

 

He could see her thinking as she tapped her chin “You know, I know that there are books just for littles, but I might just order a variety, from littles to young adult. Then we’ll just see what you like. In fact, I have a message to send about that very topic. Give it a week or so and we’ll have you some books.”

 

While she went and booted up her computer, John decided to go grab a random coloring book and his pencils and bring them to the living room. Flipping through his rather generous stack of coloring books, he wound up just grabbing the book with robots on the front and started on his merry way to find something to prop up on in the living room.

 

No sooner did he pass between the couch an Amanda’s chair that he had a moment of warning as the coffee milk made its effects known. It was four seconds of warning that his eyes went wide and then he, along with the items he was holding, was on the floor panting.

 

He looked up as he saw the office chair swivel around and saw her check the clock and then reached down to rub his back gently.

 

“Twenty four minutes. I know it’s bad, but I promise that we’ll figure this out. If you insist on drinking coffee milk, we’ll find a good time where it kicks in when you need to go anyway.”

 

“Uhh.” was all he managed as he stayed there on all fours while one more cramp hit him.

 

He felt himself being lifted up and carried against a giant chest back into his room. The hand gently rubbing his lower back felt nice. Probably the strangest concept to him was that this moment started to feel pretty routine.

 

With a firm rub of his back, she whispered “I know you don’t want to hear this, but give it a push to make sure it’s all out, so you don’t wind up in a messy diaper again in a few minutes.”

 

John stared up at her like a deer caught in headlights. “Uhhhhhh”

 

“Do you want to be in a messy diaper again soon?”

 

He just shook his head.

 

Amanda plowed on with her disturbing practicality “Then this is your chance. Do you need me to put you down so you can push?”

 

John felt like his face was on fire as he bit the insides of his cheeks. As gross as this was, he definitely didn’t want to be in a messy one again soon. And she was right.

 

“Ugh. Fine.” was all he said as he took a deep breath, tensed up, and pushed with all his might. And much to his shame, a bit more came out, along with more pee.

 

He felt a kiss on top of his head and the praise “You did very good, and I’m very proud of you. I know that wasn’t an easy thing to do. Now let’s get you changed and we can have a nice quiet day.”

 

And true to his expectations, she laid him on the changing table, the bars flopped across his chest pinning him into place, and she got right to work. It still didn’t feel normal, but after several dozen changes, it was at least starting to feel routine.

 

Legs up. Wiped. Lift butt. Flop butt. Bit of rash cream. Bit of powder. Tapes. Picked up. Hug and a kiss on the left temple. Down. Step into shorts. Swat on booty. Waddle/walk out the door.

 

As he picked up his coloring book and pencils, he looked around to decide where to sit. Ultimately he used his stool to climb onto the couch and settle in to one side and started to consider that this was his normal now. There was no way to change it, but at least he didn’t wind up in some alternate dimension where he was eaten by a fox or something. Or a dimension of dinosaurs. Which would have been cool, but only briefly.

 

And so little John sat comfortably propped up on the couch and started to color in the robot on the first page. It was a big robot helping to build a house. Seemed cute and innocent, with no hard angular lines. In fact, the rounded edges were kind of tricky with the 3D pencils.

 

The day started to just sort of fade away into routine. A sippy cup of water showed up by his side, so he just idly drank from it. He finished the entire robot and house and started filling in the background and the landscape. The thought of levitating bushes amused him, but he just barely resisted the urge to make them look like green floating sheep and do them up silly. Eventually he noticed that there was a full sippy cup full of cold liquid leaning against his side again.

 

This time it wasn’t water, it was that plapple juice. That cup didn’t last long at all, as he drank it all down while staring glumly out the window across the room. He usually loved drawing. But now he couldn’t go outside and that was all that he wanted to do.

 

Rubbing his eyes tiredly, he flipped over to a new page and started doodling in the corner, the first thing that came to his head was a robotic sheep terrorizing a carrot patch. Apparently the idea he had with the bushes simply would not go away until he was done scribbling in a little speech bubble reading “Baaa-haa-haa” over the pile of destroyed carrots.

 

When you’re grumpy on a rainy day and you draw for six hours, sometimes you don’t notice that you’ve started yawning. And sometimes your adopted Mommy sitting in an office chair doing work from home across the room DOES notice.

 

Eventually John was leaning his head back against the couch as Amanda poked his lips with a pacifier. Out of growing habit, he just opened his mouth and let it in. Something fluffy was pushed against his chest, and he wrapped his arms around Rupert. Rupert was surprisingly warm, like he had just spent a few minutes in the dryer.

 

Finally as he was slowly cradled by two giant arms and lowered onto a folded up blanket and leaned back against a big fluffy dog that immediately started to smell his face loudly.

 

Finally catching on to what was happening, John looked up and protested “Not Thweepy yet” around the pacy in his mouth.

 

He could see Amanda kneel down and she kissed him on the forehead gently before saying “I know you’re not thweepy yet, but poor Xerxes has been staring at you for an hour wanting his snuggle partner.”

 

John reached up and scratched the big dog on the side of the neck and then gave in as part of the comforter he was folded over him.

 

“Okay, if it'th fow xewxeth.” was all he got as he shimmied back against his big furry buddy and closed his eyes.

 

And so John drifted off to sleep on his first dreary and boring day in this new world. He thought briefly about his old life where he struggled to pay bills every single day. At least here he got to snuggle a big fluffy dog, eat amazing food, and help with a garden.

 

With these warm thoughts in mind, he drifted off to sleep, daydreaming about driving a giant robot sheep through the clearing by the river, able to ignore the fact that it was raining and wander off to …

 

 

-------------

 

Two hours later John woke up with a start as he heard a loud knock on the door and sat up as quickly as he could manage to see Amanda opening the door.

 

John could just make out half of a man in a parka through the half of the doorway he could see past.

 

“Miss Taylor?”

 

He could see her nodding “Yes Sir, how can I help you?”

 

Then he heard “I’m Agent Praefectus with the ABI. Are you the woman that found a little that came through a previously undocumented rift?”

 

Amanda quickly nodded and looked over to John. The man in the white parka leaned in and peeked at John. He felt very sheepish sitting there back against the dog, pacy in his mouth and Ruperts head sticking up out of the blankie he was still halfway wrapped in.

 

The man looked back to Amanda now and stated matter of factly “I need a few minutes of your time.”

[christi]

Run John, run!  Being eaten by a giant fox is better than anything the ABI will do to you!!!  <grins>  Kat, thanks for sharing.

[Kat5]

12 minutes ago, christi said:

Run John, run!

Waddle for his life?

Maybe he's being investigated for smuggling illegal levels of cuteness and cuddles across dimensions without a license?

Maybe they saw the video of him feeding a squirrel and want to recruit him to raise an UNSTOPPABLE ARMY OF STEVES!!!!

[Guilend]

2 hours ago, Kat5 said:

Waddle for his life?

Maybe he's being investigated for smuggling illegal levels of cuteness and cuddles across dimensions without a license?

Maybe they saw the video of him feeding a squirrel and want to recruit him to raise an UNSTOPPABLE ARMY OF STEVES!!!!

They think he's an interdimental spy come to spur on a squirrel uprising. Or he's trying to recruit the squirrels to become spies or they're needed for espionage. 

[SGTbaby]

Glad this is back! I love him fighting the sleep as all kiddos do. Very cute. The new character seems interesting and potentially problematic maybe? 

[Kat5]

31 minutes ago, Guilend said:

Or he's trying to recruit the squirrels to become spies or they're needed for espionage. 

I mean ...NOW he is!!

2 minutes ago, SGTbaby said:

The new character seems interesting and potentially problematic maybe? 

I'm absolutely certain that it's maybe probably fine. Potentially.

6 minutes ago, SGTbaby said:

Glad this is back!

Also, I'm glad to be able to post a chapter. I'm still waiting to heal, so it's not going to be fast. But I'm happy to be able to see to type a bit here and there.

[CDfm]

I hadn’t realized how long it’s been since this has been updated.  I really missed it and was very excited to see a new chapter. John actually is adapting very well to his new life.  I know there are still some things that will take more time but even dirty diaper changes aren’t such a big thing anymore.  Plus he has Xerxes to keep him warm, comfortable, and safe.  I really want to see how Xerxes reacts to this ABI guy.  Dogs seem to know and he is very protective of John.  
I also have to say that I liked how Amanda and the research team handled John’s need to release a little of that extra energy. 
I am certainly looking forward to seeing more of the story. 

[sklawlor]

glad to see this one has returned. looking forward to the next update.

[Kat5]

1 hour ago, sklawlor said:

glad to see this one has returned.

I had a slight health challenge that put me out of commission for a while, so I can't say how long they will take me for the short term. But I've absolutely enjoyed sharing this and will keep writing as much as I can as my health allows.

2 hours ago, CDfm said:

I am certainly looking forward to seeing more of the story. 

I've been waiting eagerly to finish this chapter, chipping at it here and there as I could. I look forward to seeing you here after I'm done with the next one!

[babygamerboy]

Great chapter. Have a feeling we hear more from the researcher with the male little. Especially if Amanda walks into a naughty little John in his crib, or ends up being sensitive during a diaper change. Though we might find Mike weighting in as well if asked or also walks into the "act" now. As for Mr.ABI popping in, I think we see an embarrassing situation or two happen next chapter and maybe ask to head to their headquarters later on for a through interview and examination but don't think we will see them try to drag him off now. Though I could see an embarrassing misunderstanding by John cause a cute scene happen, you know how little can be. Also waiting on John next trip to town when they head to the store. Curious if he will have some more panic attacks on seeing other littles being forced to be babies and all. Maybe see an adult little get adopted by someone during his time at the store and all. 

[Kat5]

2 hours ago, babygamerboy said:

As for Mr.ABI popping in

For the moment, I'm sticking to my "Unstoppable army of squirrels" cover story.

Thank you for reading, and for the comment. I have very much enjoyed sharing this story and gabbing with y'all in here is a blast!

(Also I have 20 foot tall sheep robot stuck in my head now, and I have no idea what to do with this.)

[Kat5]

Chapter Twenty Seven

 

 

John sat up on the floor next to Xerxes, still halfway wrapped up in his comforter. This man that was almost as tall as Mike was now shaking his parka off just outside the door to keep from dripping water on the floor. As the agent stepped in, he could see that he was wearing black slacks, a black shirt, and had on a belt with a holster for his handgun, one for some handcuffs, and a flashlight easily half as tall as John himself.

 

Amanda didn’t even hesitate “It’s a bit cold outside, would you like a cup of coffee to warm you up?”

 

Finally sure that his boots were dry as well, the agent smiled at her and nodded “Yes Ma’am, that would be great.”

 

While she happily hummed to herself on her way to the kitchen, the officer pulled out his phone and held it up between himself an John, peeking up and down as if comparing a person to a photo.

 

He asked simply “John?”

 

All John could do was nod silently.

 

The agent simply walked over toward him, standing in front of him. Immediately he was aware that with him sitting down on the floor, he didn’t come up to the guys knee. He felt tiny, and it was not a good feeling.

 

John scooted his butt back against Xerxes and unconsciously pulled Rupert up against his stomach.

 

After a moment of watching him closely, the man smiled slightly and knelt down closer and offered a smile.

 

With a little laugh he held up a hand “Relax, you’re not in trouble. I just need to ask a few questions.”

 

John relaxed … a little.

 

Just then Amanda came back with a blue mug and offered it to the ABI agent.

 

He accepted it gratefully and thanked her for it, taking a sip gave him a pause “Woah. You like it with a kick!”

 

She shrugged “I have been told that my coffee could melt a spoon once or twice. But it’s really just one extra scoop per pot.”

 

Turning back to John, Agent Praefectus looked down at John, this time a with a serious look on his face.

 

“So just to repeat myself, you aren’t in any trouble. Unless you’ve been doing something shady like training an army of wild squirrels. Then we would have to take you in.” He finished with a smirk.

 

John tried to stand up, but couldn’t get untangled from the blanket and he settled for staring at Amanda and saying a lot more loudly than he really meant to “HOW MANY PEOPLE DID YOU SHOW THAT VIDEO TO!?!?”

 

Now both of the bigs were having a good laugh, but the Agent interjected first “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Director Kassia thought it was cute and she put it in her report to us about an undocumented rift. None of us have ever seen a little feed a squirrel, but we also live in the city. You’re novel.”

 

After a few moments of John sulking while the giants were talking among themselves, he finally looked back up and tuned in to what they were talking about.

 

Amanda was talking “… Well, he definitely came from north of here, along the river. I can’t leave him in here alone, but if you need to come back when it’s not raining, we can go together and I can show you where Xerxes found him.”

 

The man simply shook his head “That’s too long, and we can’t take the chance.” and then he looked down to John. “Young man, I need to ask a few questions about when you came to our dimension.”

 

John simply nodded and said “Yes Sir.”

 

Agent Praetectus continued “Do you have any idea how far you walked before you got to where you were found?”

 

John just shook his head no.

 

“Okay, do you remember where the sun was when you came through the rift?”

 

John thought for a moment “Ummm… it was … it was evening in my world, and when I came back through it was before noon?”

 

The man nodded “Tell you what, can you stand up for a moment?”

 

Pulling back the comforter it took him a moment to stand up, and he was embarrassed to find that his diaper had swollen significantly since he fell asleep. And thanks to the extra stiff backing of the diaper, his knees wouldn’t go anywhere near touching each other. And if he was honest with himself, there might have been a bit of something else in there, too.

 

The ABI agent waiting patiently for him to get standing did not seem phased in the slightest.

 

He continued “Okay, so the river is over there at your back, that runs north/south. Let’s rotate you …” the man gently lifted and rotated John so that he would be facing south.

 

“Okay, can you point close to where the sun was when you came through?”

 

Immediately he looked up and raised his left arm and pointed almost straight up, but about a couple of feet to the left along the ceiling above him.

 

The agent now nodded “And when you stopped to rest, where was the sun?”

 

As John dropped his left arm and pointed far off to the right with his other arm, the agent whistled.

 

“Oof. Even if you’re close, that’s over twelve hours of walking after all the walking you did before finding the rift.”

 

All John could really do was shrug.

 

“Next question, before you came through the rift, do you know how far you could walk in a day?”

 

John beamed with pride as he answered “About 12 miles on a good day!”

 

The agent simply nodded and then looked over him at Amanda “Do you know roughly how much he shrunk as he came through?”

 

Amanda rocked her head side to side “Near as we can guess, just under a foot and a half.”

 

He winced now “Double oof. That must be one unstable rift. It's probably just wandering around on their side.”

 

All John could really do was just stand there awkwardly.

 

The man reached down and patted him on the head “Don’t worry little guy. I know this is all going to be a bit rough. The briefing I got before being sent here mentioned that when a little comes through an unstable rift, it removes some sort of plasma from your original dimension and converts it into energy. So you can’t go back, but it looks like you wound up in a pretty good situation.”

 

Again, all John could do was nod.

 

Agent Preafectus held out a giant meaty paw and John reached up to accept the handshake.

 

Standing back fully upright, the man looked over him to Amanda “Ma’am, I’ll need to leave my vehicle here, but I have orders to plant smart motion detectors as close as I can manage to the rift, so that if any other littles come through we will get a notification and can come and save them before they freeze, starve, or get eaten by wildlife.”

 

John could see Amanda nodding enthusiastically “I was actually worried about that. I don’t want to think about if any littles have come through years past…”

 

Officer Preafectus held up a hand “Ma’am, you weren’t here then. You are here now. And thanks to that, you saved this ones life, and we can set things in place to protect any more that come through. That’s the best that any of us can do.”

 

John couldn’t really read the expression on Amanda's face as she nodded. Not quite sad, but sort of resigned.

 

From there it was all talking over his head very briefly as the agent explained his reasoning to her for hiking about seven and a half miles and then dropping sensors every quarter of a mile for two miles. He explained to her that they would pick up littles, but ignore bigs or wildlife.

 

The man nodded to John and said a quick “Thank you for your help, Young Man” as he put his parka back on and made his way back out into the rain.

 

As the door shut, Amanda turned and quickly walked over to John and picked him up into a big solid hug, one arm under his butt and the other turned up along his torso and holding his back firmly.

 

Without really any idea what to do, all John could fathom was to just hug her back around her neck.

 

After a moment she kissed him on his right temple and whispered “I’m SO glad you didn’t come through on a rainy day like today and get lost going a different direction.”

 

After a moment of thought, he admitted quietly into her ear “I am, too.”

 

The moment lasted a few moments longer before he felt the arm under his butt shift around a bit, and then he was being carried toward his room.

 

Yeah. She had noticed. It was pretty obvious since the ‘Rough Pups’ seemed, from his perspective, to be made so that instead of sagging they made it so he couldn’t walk when they were wet. They always seemed to expand out more than down.

 

As he was laid on the changing table, he grimaced a bit as a bit of mess got squished under him. Unphased, Amanda laid him back, pulled his shorts off, and unsnapped his onesie and pulled it up. Having dodged the wrist cuffs this time, John just sort of drummed his fingers on the padded foam bar that held him down and pretended nothing was unusual.

 

Until the diaper was opened up and he heard a little whistle.

 

He looked up and asked “What?”

 

She smirked “Well, the skin under your … hair down there is getting a bit of a rash. I think we’re going to have to do something about that. Don’t worry, there’s a cream for that.”

 

Somehow he wasn’t super reassured by that answer, but there wasn’t much he could say in way of protest. And he definitely winced and bit the inside of his lip as she wiped him clean. It burned a bit.

 

He could hear a drawer opening and closing before “Okay, hold still. This will only sting for a moment.”

 

Not that he had much choice, but he held still and then winced a bit as some cold goop was smeared on him. It was a sort of a cold stinging sensation, but after a moment she wiped him clean again and then he was powdered very thoroughly and padded right back up into a fresh diaper.

 

As usual he felt the table bumped with her knee and the bars went up. She stood him up on the table this time and snapped his onesie back closed and pulled his shorts back up before looking him up and down.

 

A finger went up and down his cheek and she ‘hmm’d’

 

“You’re getting a little scruffy. Do you usually stay clean shaven?”

 

He just nodded “Facial hair gets really itchy”

 

She pulled him into a hug and patted him on the back before sliding him down onto the floor “We’ll tend to that next time you get a shower. Now scoot, I have to call your Aunt Cat.”

 

As he passed by the couch, John immediately got a face full of cold nose from suddenly hyperactive Collie. So he had the brilliant idea of grabbing a dog toy and, instead of throwing it, running with it. It occurred to him that the dog would just happily chase after him. But the toy waving over his head as he ran laps around the couch was even better bait.

 

John had made it around the couch four times before he realized that Amanda was on the phone, so he threw the toy and for the first time remembered to take a big step to the side to avoid getting bowled over. He stopped running so that he wouldn’t be making noise, and as Xerxes brought the stuffed bone back to him, he could hear one side of the end of the conversation.

 

“Yeah, go ahead and come by and I’ll just turn the leftovers into a big pan of chicken and rice casserole. Okay, see you in about forty minutes?” then she chuckled and said “Love you too, goofy.”

 

He was scratching a giant dogs neck when she came over to him and looked down to ask “I guess you heard all of that?”

 

He just shook his head “No Ma’am, I just stopped running when I realized you were on the phone. Sorry if I made too much noise.”

 

She patted him on the head “Well, don’t worry about the noise, it’s good to have a distraction for Xerxes. Anyway, the Cat’s will be coming over soon. The rain has slacked off, but it’s still a drizzle so you two won’t be able to go play outside.”

 

He just shrugged at her “I’m sure we’ll be fine. We’re adults, we can handle it.”

 

She nodded down at him “I’m going to hurry and make a casserole out of leftovers. Since I have to rip up roast chicken, I need you to keep Xerxes out of the kitchen. I don’t care if you have to lay on top of him. He’ll get a chunk of it to chew on out on the porch when I’m done, so buy me ten minutes.”

 

So John turned to look at the big dog behind him and picked up the toy again and started making laps around the couch. He managed to keep Xerxes distracted for five whole minutes before his nose started twitching. Then he wound up holding onto a tail and sliding across the floor of the living room.

 

“Xerxes, sit! Xerxes down! Xerxes nap! Xerxes I need a hug!” He tried everything he could think to blurt out. None of it worked.

 

Finally, as the dog dragged him around the counter he let go of the tail and let his arms flop out to his sides, looking up to see Amanda with her phone out, recording it.

 

Indignantly, he admitted out loud “You’ve gotten quick at recording these things.”

 

She gave him a wide smile as she held up the central part of a leftover chicken with some bits of meat still clinging on here and there “You did really good! I’m going to put this outside on a pan for him to chew on.”

 

John just lay there on floor looking up while he heard the child gate open, then the main door. Then the squeak of the storm door. Tail thumping into the door frame. Storm door latching, and then footsteps back to the sink and the sound of washing hands. And finally the sound of a chair being carried and set down in front of the sink.

 

Then a smiling face was looking down at him and she asked “Do you want to help?”

 

“Sure! But I seem to have fallen and I can’t g…” John stopped as a couple of fingers made a line for his ribs. He rolled over quickly, and scrambled to his feet “I’m healed!”

 

With a laugh, Amanda picked him up around the ribs and stood him on the chair in front of the sink.

 

“Okay!” she began “A lot of people don’t realize that some rice can be rinsed and then soaked before you cook it, and then it won’t get mushy. Since we’re in a big hurry, I need you to pour five cups of rice into this bowl, swing the faucet over to fill it halfway, stir it up and drain off some of the water and then let it soak. When that’s done I need someone with small hands to carefully drain it as much as possible.”

 

John mostly followed along and since he couldn’t reach the soap, he cooperated with her thoroughly washing and drying his hands before leaving him to his task. Left with a large container full of rice and a small (to her) two cup measuring cup, he looked at the big bowl in the sink and started by filling the cup twice and then halfway a second time.

 

 

Rinsing rice was simple, but while he waited a few minutes, he leaned down and drew a smiley face in the rice. Then shook the bowl to flatten it back out. Then he drew a dog.

 

Meanwhile he glanced over to his right and could see the flash of a chefs knife as long as his forearm dicing through celery and onions and garlic so fast he could barely follow it with his eyes. It was mesmerizing, but as she picked up the cutting board and scraped it into a skillet, he went back to what he was supposed to be doing and used one hand to tilt the bowl and slowly drain it.

 

As he finished draining it as well as he could, he felt a kiss on his left temple, an arm around him and then he and the entire chair were slide four feet to his left. He found himself looking at a big glass pan and a large stick of butter in the wrapper.

 

His instructions came over his shoulder “Okay, now I need you to unwrap one end of that and make sure to rub it all over the entire pan.”

 

So John just nodded and picked up the stick of butter and rolled his eyes.

 

Of -course- it’s twice the size of a normal stick of butter.

 

So he unwrapped the paper from one end of it and tried to wield it with one hand but finally gave up and started holding it with both hands and rubbing it all over the inside of the pan, careful to meticulously cover it all.

 

By the time he was done, so was Amanda. The woman was QUICK.

 

“Okay John! Now it’s time to tell you one of my secrets.”

 

He looked up, both hands still grasping the stick of butter and said “You’re actually have super powers that only work in the kitchen?”

 

That won him an eye roll, so he counted it as a win.

 

“No goofy. Most people use spray in the pan because it’s easy. But the rice soaks up the flavor from the garlic and butter. So instead of using ten cups of water, I use nine and a half cups of water and just cut up what’s left of the stick of butter. Just mix everything in with the rice, spread it out, butter, water, cover, oven. Easy.”

 

She said it so fast that Johns eyes kind of glazed over, so he just watched as she picked the large mixing bowl out of the sink and he suddenly understood why she’d used such a large bowl when she dropped in all the sauteed veggies and the chicken she’d diced up and stirred it before sliding it into the pan. The longest part of the entire process was her staring patiently as the water from the faucet went into the measuring cup. Then once it was in there was the unique sound of aluminum foil being pulled and ripped off. And just like that the pan was in the oven and she was holding up a hand for a high five.

 

Obviously he reached up and returned the high five enthusiastically.

 

With a smile she told him “You actually made that take less than half of the usual time. I didn’t have to fend of a dog, and rinsing the rice and buttering the pan always just takes as long as it takes. You make a great helper!”

 

He was slid, chair and all, back to the sink and they both washed their hands together. Despite the fact that he felt like a toddler helping Mom in the kitchen, it felt really good to participate instead of just watch the bigs work.

 

When their hands were clean and dry, she picked him up and shuffled him to a hip and used her free hand to carry the chair back to the table. After that she carried him to the living room and gave him a big hug.

 

With a cheek nuzzle, Amanda said “Okay. I think I should finish a bit of work, and you should find something to occupy your time. By the time they get here the casserole should be almost done.”

 

So as he was deposited on the couch he looked over at his tablet on the arm of the couch and picked it up.

 

The moment he touched his finger to the corner to turn it on, it popped up briefly with his name, which he knew he’d never typed in. He had only said it out loud. As the screen loaded, he noticed that in addition to the pipe game, there was a little folder looking icon named “Books” and an icon that looked like a wheel of colors labeled “Triad Puzzles.”

 

Mumbling “Uhhh… okay.” he poked the new puzzle game.

 

What popped up on the screen was pretty interesting, it showed a simple color wheel with twelve colors and a little triangle in the middle of it. He found that he could rotate the triangle, and as he turned it some text showed up explaining to him about how complimentary colors worked. On the right side of the screen some boxes popped up with an explanation that he was to drag sets of three complimentary colors to each of four rows.

 

Furrowing his eyebrows a bit, he looked at the triangle and the explanation for a couple of minutes before he tentatively dragged the yellow wedge, the red wedge, and the blue wedge to one row. He was rewarded with a little ‘ding’ and a check mark on that row.

 

Quickly rotating the triangle to the next set of colors, he started dragging those over as well. When he’d repeated this until the entire color chart was gone, a little burst of confetti covered the screen and the same thing popped up again, but this time the wheel was rotated a different way, and there was no triangle.

 

Musing to himself “That seems easy” he dragged all of the same combinations to one side in the same order. He was again rewarded with confetti and a little fanfare before the screen came back to him with a color wheel with twice as many colors, but the triangle was back.

 

Once he was done with that part of the puzzle, he had to do it again, but this time without the triangle. The process kept going getting more and more complex. He wasn’t very quick at it, but he was able to do it.

 

And then the game threw him a curve ball. It had one extra color outside of the wheel that looked sort of like a combination of the colors it was just outside of.

 

The only prompt that he got was “Pinch to combine colors.”

 

“Uhhh…” it took him a bit to put thumb and forefinger on colors and squish them together. He was rewarded with a new color on the outside of the wheel. So he did the same thing again and dragged those three colors to one side. He heard a little ‘ding’ and got a check mark.

 

And this trend continued, but got one step more complicated each time. He was really starting to struggle with the color combinations when he heard a quick knock and the storm door opened to reveal Aunt Cat in a poncho carrying Kate under it, and a grocery bag. Xerxes slipped back into the house by her leg, and tried to smell the grocery bag before it could be put onto the counter.

 

A blonde little in a light purple onesie and matching plaid skirt was slid down out of the poncho and immediately got a face full of licks from Xerxes.

 

There was something reassuring about not being the only little squealing and flailing.

 

While John was watching Kate get attacked by the dog, he suddenly found himself scooped up in a spinning hug attack from Aunt Cat. He got three quick kisses all over his face before he was held out at arms length, his legs dangling in the air.

 

With a very stern face, Aunt Cat asked “Young man, have you been mischievous to keep your Mommy on her toes?”

 

Not really sure how to respond, John shook his head and answered “No Ma’am”

 

Looking disappointed, she said “Hmmph. Well, I forgive you, but you need to try harder.”

 

He got one more big hug and was deposited back on the floor as Aunt Cat told him “I know your Mommy told me not to get anything, but I got grapes and juice for you two to snack on anyway.”

 

And with that, he was given a swat on his padded but and told “Go say hi to Kate, she’s been excited to come visit.”

 

Not that he needed any instructions, since he’d been looking forward to Kate coming back over anyway. John plodded back toward the kitchen to Kate and stood there waiting quietly for her to turn to him. He felt his cheeks get warm when she smiled at him.

 

Her blonde hair was in twin braids going down her shoulders, and when she started talking to him she started fidgeting with one of her braids.

 

She started the conversation “Hi! Umm… Did you make it through the doctors visit better than I did when I went? How was the store, was it too scary?”

 

So as John told her about the last couple of days in great detail, they walked over and wound up in front of the couch leaning back against Xerxe’s belly, having to speak loudly to talk over the sound of an excited tail thumping up and down against the floor. Xerxes was obviously happy to have two littles to watch over.

 

As he explained things, she gave him advice here and there.

 

As he started about the doctor, she said “Yeah, that’s almost as bad as my visit. I got so stressed out that I threw up on the nurse.”

 

He explained about the pacy with the medicine on it and she held up the pacy dangling on the strap from her onesie. “Yeah, it really does help with stress. When you go to stores, if you have your pacy in your mouth, no one expects you to talk to them. Then you can just nod along and everyone just assumes you’re nervous or nonverbal.”

 

John was quiet for a moment as he considered that, but eventually resumed the story of his last few days.

 

As he mentioned the outrageous colors of the furniture she rolled her eyes and explained “I don’t know what it is, but lots of bigs are absolutely obsessed with extremes. And that means extremely babying their littles.”

 

They both shuddered in unison at that. It took a minute longer before he finished explaining how he now has a bedroom set and a desk with two chairs, and a bunch of coloring books. They were sitting cross legged lost in conversation as he mentioned the incident from yesterday with him saying a swear word and training pacifier.

 

When he paused she said “Wow. You got off easy, I got a spank, time out, and then when Mommy took me with her to work I had the training pacy in my mouth for a week. As long as I didn’t say anything bad or try to be loud or yell it didn’t inflate, but only she could take it out.”

 

He looked at her a bit shocked “Isn’t that a bit harsh?”

 

She just shook her head “At first I thought it was, but after meeting so many littles with those horrible inflated pacies I feel super fortunate. I eventually realized that Mommy was helping me learn, because if I’d have acted out in front of some of her clients then THEY would have spanked me into yet another dimension. And it was only in my mouth when we went into the places, so just an hour at a time. I’m actually pretty grateful for it, given that she always takes me with her to work now.”

 

That took him a minute or two to process. He finally asked “So the training pacy helped you?”

 

She just picked up the pacifier on her pacy strap again and dangled it at him “Still have it.”

 

His eyebrows went up as he asked “You aren’t afraid of it inflating?”

 

She just shook her head “I set it off a few times during the first month and each time had to suck on it longer for it to deflate. But I haven’t set this off on accident in over a month.”

 

Looking at her a bit sideways he asked “That sounds like you set it off on purpose?”

 

With an adorable bright laugh she explained “I sure did. Some horrible lady was telling Mommy that she wasn’t doing this or that with me strictly enough and I was about to snap. Mommy gave me a glance that let me know I needed to stay out of trouble, so I put it into my mouth and mumbled the S word. It took an hour to get it to deflate, but it kept Mommy and I both out of trouble.”

 

“Huh. I would not have thought of that.” he admitted quietly.

 

Kate finally leaned in and gave him a hug “This isn’t our world. And it’s not going to be fair to us. But we have Mommy’s that will keep us safe and help.”

 

The conversation slowed down after a bit, but they wound up leaning back against Xerxes, their sides and hips pressed together, with the tablet between them.

 

Kate complained “You need a bean bag.”

 

Smugly, John responded with “I don’t need a bean bag, I have a dog.”

 

She rolled her eyes at him as he showed her the color puzzle and before he could even admit that it was getting hard, or even how it worked she said “Oh neat! Can I try?”

 

With a shrug, he slid the the tablet from his thigh over to hers. The moment she touched it however, the screen went back to the home page.

 

John pointed to the corner and said “Try touching it here.”

 

Sure enough, the instant she touched the corner, it popped up with the prompt “Say your name”

 

Kate said “Kate Onasis” slowly and clearly and then it processed for a moment and popped up to a home screen showing the same icons, but where his background had been a dark blue, hers was a sort of lighter teal color. He could only guess as to what that meant.

 

Regardless, Kate already had the color puzzle done and she didn’t even spend a couple of minutes figuring out the instructions like he had. She just plowed through matching colors and throwing them across the screen. The little triangle guide was meaningless to her. Within four minutes she was where he had taken twenty minutes to get to.

 

John was mostly impressed with how quick she was. But also a little defeated at how slow he had been at the same task.

 

They were interrupted by “All littles to the dinner table! I repeat! All littles to the Dinner table!” and then a mumbled “You’re such a goober.” and it was easy to guess which voice was which person without bothering to look up.

 

John was the first one up and then he held out a hand for Kate. She seemed happy to take it and she put the tablet on the couch as the walked past it. When they got to their chairs, Aunt Cat was waiting for them and she bent down to scoop them both up in a bit hug before spinning them around and depositing them into their booster seats and buckling them in.

 

No sooner did their seats get pushed forward did Amanda set plates down in front of them. They both looked down at the plates.

 

The casserole looked great!

 

He looked at the carrots and grimaced.

 

She looked at the peas and grimaced.

 

They look at each other and nodded.

 

At first they tried to scoot their chairs closer to one another, but the chairs were too heavy. So while the two bigs talked to each other, they each at one bite of casserole, then reached across each other and he took peas off of her plate as she took carrots off of his plate. They alternated dropping bits of chicken between their chairs. The meat never hit the floor.

 

This went on with them eating in silence, feeding the dog, and trying to get away with it until after a few minutes Amanda got up and walked around the table behind the two of them with her arms crossed. They both turned to look over their shoulder at her like they were afraid they were in trouble.

 

After a moment of standing there she sighed and said “I’m not even going to fight this battle.” and she reached out and grabbed their chairs and pulled them together right up next to each other, and scooted them just a bit closer to the table.

 

As she walked back around to her own seat, the two littles shrugged and pulled their plates closer. John being left handed gave him easy access to her plate, and her bring right handed gave her easy access to his. The only downside is that they couldn’t keep trying to be sneaky about feeding Xerxes.

 

Eventually they were both stuffed and leaning back in their seats drinking down their sippy cups, their adopted Mommy’s came and wiped them down, they were unbuckled, put down, and sent about their way.

 

As they went back to the living room, John got the tablet off of the couch and by the time he made it in front of the fireplace, Kate was already reclined against Xerxes in his usual spot, and she had a full sippy cup waiting on either side of her.

 

Moving his blue cup off to one side, he sat down and scooted over until he was next to Kate. He propped the tablet back up on his thighs and poked the screen. He slid it a bit toward her to offer it up.

 

Suggesting “Here, try the pipe game. I know it’s not as hard as the color game, but I liked it.” as she slid it on top of her thighs.

 

As the tablet moved in front of her, despite no one touching the corner, the background went from blue to teal all on its own.

 

So she opened up the pipe game and it took her a moment to figure it out but she got the hang of it. It seemed to John like she was going slow, so he figured that she was just being meticulous.

 

That is, until after about ten minutes she slid the tablet over to him and said “Here, can you do this one?”

 

He just nodded, but as he took it back it flipped immediately to where he left off with eight pipes, two layers, and specific spots for each pipe to stop on its way. So naturally he took a moment to look at it and started from the simplest pipe run out.

 

After he did two of them, Kate stopped him and asked “How do you do that so fast?”

 

He had to do a double take and asked “What do you mean, I can’t do anything as fast as you were doing the color puzzles.”

 

They started arguing, and spent a few minutes arguing about who was better at what before Aunt Cat came over and interrupted them.

 

“Children!” Aunt Cat said firmly.

 

Suddenly realizing they’re not alone, they looked up at her.

 

“You’re both good at different things.” She scolded them, if a bit more gently now.

 

Both John and Kate looked down at their hands at the same time.

 

Kate spoke first “Yes Ma’am, You’re right.”

 

John nodded along in agreement “Yes Ma’am.”

 

With her hands on her hips now, Aunt Cat smirked and said “Now, do I have to make you two kiss and make up?”

 

John felt his face turn red immediately. He didn’t dare look over at Kate, but from his peripheral vision it looked like she was biting her lip.

 

Aunt Cat looked like she was shaking bodily trying to hold in her laughter, but finally Amanda chimed in.

 

“Cat! Would you stop teasing them and let them go back to playing? They’re both blushing!”

 

Aunt Cat lost it then and had a good laugh. It was a full minute before she regained her composure and knelt down to kiss both of them on the forehead.

 

“I’m sorry” she apologized “It was just too easy. You two either keep playing or go color or something. No more arguing.”

 

After she walked away they sat quietly for a moment before John poked the folder marked “Books” just to see what was in it, while sliding it halfway onto each of their laps.

 

What they found waiting for them were more folders, with categories ranging from “Toddler” to “Teen” and at the bottom of the screen it read “More will be added as you read, to attain your reading level”

 

While they were talking together and discussing which folder to open, there was a knock on the door.

 

Amanda was at the door in seconds and she pulled it open to be met with Agent Praefectus.

 

“Sir, were you able to …” and then John could see her look at something in his hand.

 

He shook his head “Ma’am, I made the call, we have some more agents on the way to help search. We will need to use your driveway as a staging area. They’ll be here within the hour.”

 

John saw Amanda turn her back to the agent and walk to the utility room and almost immediately come back out with a clear poncho and a flashlight. As she was pulling it on, she called across the room “You two get up, your puppy couch is coming with me.”

 

As they got up Amanda held out her hand and said “Let me see that.”

 

He handed it over almost instantly and she barked out an order “Xerxes: Heel.” and the dog immediately sprung up and ran to over by her side. This did not sound anything like the usual Amanda. Not one bit.

 

Then John caught a glimpse of what was in her hand. A shoe. More specifically a wet, muddy shoe that looked the right size for a little. She held it out for Xerxes and he smelled it.

 

She then looked at Agent Praefectus and said point blank “We won’t be waiting an hour. We’re going now. Xerxes: Fetch.”

 

And with that she was out the door behind the dog, shouting back inside “Cat, you’ve got the kids.”

 

And in a flurry of sounds, from Amanda stepping into her rubber boots to the agent running to keep up with her, then they were gone.

 

The two littles were left standing there in a state of shock and kept looking back and forth between each other and the door.

 

Kate was the first one to make a sound, but all that she got out was “Ummm… did … was that …”

 

John just nodded and said “Shoe.”

 

Aunt Cat came over and sat down on the floor and pulled them both into her lap and gave them one big hug before reassuring them.

 

“Hey, don’t worry. Your Aunt Cat called me after the nice man came by earlier. She said she wanted me here just in case she needed to help. We were going to stay the night anyway, because I don’t have any appointments tomorrow. So you two are safe and sound, and Aunt Amanda” She turned to add for Johns benefit “That is Mommy, is just going to go lend a helping hand. No one knows this land like she does, and you two both know how good Xerxes is at fetching.”

 

Kate and John simply sat there staring at each other, completely lost for words.

 

Aunt Cat, for her part, sat there hugging them both and waited several minutes before breaking the silence “Come on, you two can have some hot chocolate. That will help calm your nerves.”

[Guilend]

Oh no, I hope they find the Little and save them. 😢 

[SGTbaby]

New Little sounds interesting and a great new twist!  Hope you are healing well.

[christi]

Neat change up, Kat.  I have to say I hope the little isn't found or is someone who is mentally capable of enjoying their fate in this world.

Also, I love this bit "I'm healed!" when Amanda went to tickle John. You do write very well and all the little things like that make a HUGE difference.

And one last thing.  I have no idea about the technical end of it but I'm glad you addressed John's shrinking.  Amazons being big is one thing but his shrinking always kind of bugged me as being rather random.  Again, well done.

 

[Kat5]

9 minutes ago, christi said:

Again, well done.

Thank you very kindly! I enjoy sharing the story with y'all!

12 minutes ago, christi said:

I'm glad you addressed John's shrinking.

I brushed on it with the bath time science lesson as well, so if you read this and then scoot back and read that maybe it'll help? I'm not a bathportalscienceologist.

2 hours ago, SGTbaby said:

Hope you are healing well.

It's still a bit blurry, but It's healing up!

7 hours ago, Guilend said:

Oh no, I hope they find the Little and save them. 😢 

Xerxes is very good at fetching littles!

[CCApril]

I hope the little goes to a good home! (I'm just going to assume Xerxes finds an extremely muddy, scared little but not too terribly hurt.)   I don't know if either of them are up for a second little.

It is a great visualization of John running around the couch with the dog chasing him.

[Kat5]

37 minutes ago, CCApril said:

I'm just going to assume Xerxes finds an extremely muddy, scared little but not too terribly hurt

I almost got cold feet as I wrote my way up to this plot point, but I'm staying true to my outline. I'm not trying to drum up drama or anything. But there are some loose ends that seemed important for me to tie up.

[Pierry Louys]

Great chapter !  Curious to see what gonna happen next !

 

ps I think the date of the chapter is wrong ! It’s say 2023 

[Kat5]

13 minutes ago, Pierry Louys said:

It’s say 2023

Thank you kindly, I'll let the author know so that they can fix their oopsie!

[Guilend]

8 minutes ago, Kat5 said:

Thank you kindly, I'll let the author know so that they can fix their oopsie!

Should change the year to sometime before 2020 so we all can pretend 2020 didn't happen 😂

[Kat5]

14 minutes ago, Guilend said:

sometime before 2020

Say no more, I think I'm picking up what you're asking for.

[christi]

Kat, I found the reference to shrinkage.  Page 1 of this forum/story, chapter 7.  You did a good job with the explanation, I just didn't remember it since it was almost 4 whole months ago.

[Kat5]

18 minutes ago, christi said:

it was almost 4 whole months ago.

It can't have been that long, I've just been writing this for ...

Oh.

[Guilend]

10 minutes ago, Kat5 said:

It can't have been that long, I've just been writing this for ...

Oh.

😂

Well done on the year. Sadly I had to go look it up to find it's significance lol. History wasn't my strong point when I was in school and that was 20 years ago lol