Room 218, Tuesday Afternoon

[glacial_queen]

Karla's half of the room was blessedly, blessedly silent. Wee Baby Merlin was sleeping (finally, thank the Darkness!) soundly on her bed, surrounded on all sides by pillows to make sure he didn't shift in his sleep and start to roll off. Of course, Karla was checking him every few moments just to make sure that he hadn't rolled into the pillows and began to suffocate or something equally horrible. All the books she'd read on the subject had stressed a crib free of pillows and soft mattresses, but it wasn't like she'd had a crib handy. And the idea of putting him in a drawer had just seemed...wrong, somehow.

She had never truly understood the word 'paranoid' in all of its delightful complexities until this assignment.

Still, for all the silence, her room was actually rather busy. Three potions (and a baby bottle) were simmering in bowls of water heated by small tongues of witchfire over on her desk. Balls of colored witchlight were dancing over Wee Baby Merlin's head, so when he did wake up, he'd have something to attract his attention. All of her books had said that colors and patterns were extremely important at this stage for proper cognitive growth. And on her bedside table, a knife was cutting off slices of an apple which were then being floated over for Karla to quietly munch on.

As for Karla herself, she was curled up next to Wee Baby Merlin, reading one of the books Tony had lent her, a graphic novel called Blood Price. She was almost finished with it (and had long since finished the others) and was wondering if Tony had more or if she was going to have to head to Amazon and pay for expedited shipping.

Or both.

[Door cracked, post open, but wake the baby and Karla will murder you.]

Comments

[future_sandworm]

It had been a while since he had spoken to Karla, and Leto was happy to find her in her room. He knocked lightly on the open door to announce his presence.

"Karla?"

[glacial_queen]

It had been far too long. "Leto!" Karla glanced up and waved. Her greeting wasn't as effusive as normal, in deference to the sleeping baby, but hopefully her smile made up for it. "Kiss kiss. Come in--but don't wake the baby!"

Words to live by, man. Words to live by.

[future_sandworm]

"The baby?" Then he noticed the droid baby and recalled that people had been carrying them around lately. "So, how are you enjoying motherhood?" He grinned as he entered the room and took a seat next to Karla.

[glacial_queen]

"He is a perfectly charming baby when he is asleep," Karla admitted. "But not really, no. There's so damn much to worry about!" She raked her hand through her hair, shaking her head with a kind of weary disbelief. "I don't understand how Francine--Wee Baby Merlin's other mother--can enjoy it so much. I don't think I'm cut out for maternal bliss."

[future_sandworm]

Merlin? Well, he wasn't going to question the choice of name given to a droid baby. "Just wait until real children show up," Leto said cheerfully, nudging Karla.

Not that he had actually minded. They had all been adorable, even the one whose other father he didn't want to think about.

[glacial_queen]

"Oh, I doubt I'll be visited by many," Karla explained. "Witches aren't very fertile, especially darker-Jeweled ones. Craft puts too much stress on the body. If I do manage to have a child, it's doubtful I'll have more than one." Someone was cheerfully ignoring the fact that Fandom didn't play by the rules.

"Besides, aren't most of them older when they show up? Not babes in arms? That would probably make a big difference. Children sleep through the night, don't they? And can tell you when they're hungry versus when they're overtired, which means so much less crying."

Karla didn't have any much experience with children, no.

[future_sandworm]

"They also wake early and can be hyperactive." Especially if their mother was Dinah Lance. "And unfortunately they might come from different futures, some of which you might not think very likely." Because men did not have children together. And he would certainly never get close enough to Merlin for that.

[glacial_queen]

Karla frowned at that. She was pretty sure her Healers back home would frown upon giving her children sleeping draughts. "Perhaps their other parents will enjoy children and will want the children to sleep with them?" she suggested hopefully. "I don't mind playing with them in the daytime. Or giving them Craft lessons."

She tilted her head and looked at Leto. "How did you enjoy your own children?"

[future_sandworm]

"After the initial shock, I enjoyed their visit very much." He smiled at the memory. "Most of them will never be part of my future, but I'm still thankful for being allowed to meet them."

"Craft lessons?" he added. "Are you sure?" He had had a daughter who was fond of playing with magic after all.

[momslilassassin]

Ben poked his head into the room and grinned, then waved.

[glacial_queen]

Karla felt a familiar presence and glanced up with a smile, waving him inside. "Careful," she threatened in a low voice. "Since pursuing vengeance against your grandfather is both stupid and impossible, I might decide to go after the nearest Skywalker instead. Which would involve roping you into baby-sitting." She gestured towards the baby. "And if I find out you helped Anakin make any of these, I'm buying up all the ice cream on the island and refusing to share."

[momslilassassin]

"Oh, these were all my grandfather," Ben said with a grin. "Way beyond what I can tinker together."

That wasn't entirely true, but Ben wasn't going to see how the baby had been put together just out of curiosity. He liked being alive too much.

"Does the baby have a name?" he asked.

[glacial_queen]

"Merlin," Karla said, with just a hint of 'showing off the baby' pride. "We usually call him Wee Baby Merlin, though, so no one gets confused."

And because saying things like, 'I have to change Merlin's diapers' just felt wrong.

"Francine named him." Karla'd wanted to name him 'Saetan.'

[momslilassassin]

"And much nicer than 'Droid Merlin'," Ben added sensitively.

[glacial_queen]

"I think it bothered Francine any time I called him 'it' or pointed out he wasn't a real baby," Karla said, a little shame-faced. Making Francine upset was like kicking kittens in the head. "She also doesn't like it when I point out he's ugly."

Which, in all fairness to Karla, he was.

[momslilassassin]

"Yeah, he kind of is," Ben said in an undertone. "Think he looks like Granddad did as a kid?"

[glacial_queen]

She just smirked at Ben. "Some kind of family resemblance, you mean?" she asked, all innocence and light. "I can see it."

[bitten_notshy]

After class, Jack ran back to the dorms to get ready for play practice and passed by Karla's open door along the way.

"Would you like an escort on the walk to rehearsal?" he asked from the doorway.

[glacial_queen]

Karla glanced up at Jack and smiled. "I don't know," she teased, pretending to think about it. "A walk with one of my more handsome and charming friends? What a hardship." She dimpled and waved him in. "I suppose the real question would be if you minded escorting me and a baby. Wee Baby Merlin might be a bit cranky when I wake him up."

[bitten_notshy]

"You too?" Jack asked, shaking his head. "I think half my friends are stuck with children this week. No, he's no hardship, though I am sad they don't have batteries we can remove."

He glanced to the child speculatively. "... would he be named after his father?"

[glacial_queen]

"Me too," Karla sighed, shaking her head. "One would think a Healer would know all about the unintended consequences of sexual desire, but Professor Skywalker still thought I could use a reminder." She frowned. While she was growing moderately fond of the baby, it was a fondness frequently tested when he cried in the night and woke her up.

"For a father-figure, at least," she answered. "Francine's his other mother and we agreed upon Merlin after she told me the baby would get made fun of if we named him Saetan after my best friend's guardian."

Which was just silly. Saetan was a good, strong name. This world's religion was just silly.

Of course, since she thought there was only the one, Karla might not be an expert on the subject.

[bitten_notshy]

If Jack had anything in his mouth, he would have choked. "... like the prince of Hell? I agree, it's not the best name."

[glacial_queen]

"High Lord of Hell," Karla corrected. "I mean, yes, he is the Warlord Prince of Hell, but since Hell is a Realm, not a Territory, High Lord is a better title." That made lots of sense, very good, Karla. "He's a very good male! He was here for Parent's Weekend and everything. I think if more people had a chance to meet him, they'd realize how very different he is than your stories paint him!"

Earnest Karla was earnest.

[bitten_notshy]

Jack pondered this for a long moment before deciding it was a thing he was not meant to understand. He nodded as if that made perfect sense.

"I see. And how is young Merlin sleeping through the night?"

[glacial_queen]

It was probably for the best, all things considered.

"Not. At. All," Karla said, giving the sleeping baby a slight glare. "He wakes up at least three times a night, and that's just to eat. If he needs to burp or to be changed, or something wakes him up, it can be as many as five or six times." Karla had just taken to putting up aural shields around the bed. She preferred to envy Gabrielle's uninterrupted sleep than feel guilty about it being ruined.

"I don't think I'm cut out for motherhood," she added ruefully.