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the one with babies;
She's so small.
Truly, it's frightening: she's small enough to more or less fit in the palm of his hand, and such a tiny creature seems immeasurably fragile. Surely she cannot survive a day in this world, and yet both Rosalind and Robert seem to find nothing wrong. Indeed, in the aftermath, Robert tells him the baby is actually larger than most human infants, which might account for all the screams that had been torn from their Rosalind's throat.
Large for her age or not, she is small. Small, but no less perfect for it. She has his ears, two little nubs of things that flicker curiously this way and that even as she sleeps. Her eyes and hair color remain a mystery; their kit is entirely bald, a hairless little thing that refuses to open her eyes. That too is normal, Rosalind says, and adds that anyway, even if she did open her eyes, it wouldn't answer their question. Human infants have blue eyes upon birth; whether or not they change is based on genetics.
He wonders if demon kits are the same. He wonders why they seem to have so many rules.
**
She's a very lazy thing, their kit. A month and a half in, and all she seems to ever want to do is eat and lay against one of them. Robert delights in it, of course: he radiates as she lies atop him, her eyes half closed, her fingers making wrinkles in his crisp Oxford shirt. Even Rosalind doesn't seem to mind it, especially at the end of the night. He's caught them like that once or twice, her fingers stroking the infant's back as she dozes upon her mother.
For his part, Youko has no time for such things. But if she is pressed upon him, what else is he to do with her? Rosalind hands her off one day, claiming exhaustion, and far be it for him to refuse her.
So he takes her. This is not the first time he's had her, of course, but it is the first time he's done so alone. Rosalind is asleep within moments of entering the bedroom, her breath slow and steady, and Robert is out finding them food.
But he is a thousand years old. If he cannot handle his own kit, what use is he?
So he settles in a chair and waits to see what might happen next.
She seems to have no real abilities. He thought that might have been a false impression, born from simply observing and never handling, but no: it's as he suspected. She's terribly useless, their kit. She can barely move her limbs, flailing them at random as he braces his hands beneath her arms and holds her up before him. Her eyes can focus on him, but all she seems is mildly bewildered. Not upset, but aware enough to know the man holding is neither Robert nor Rosalind.
He shifts her, leaning her against his shoulder. One hand is cupped beneath her. That seems to be enough, right up until she unexpectedly throws herself backwards. The movement is both erratic and just powerful enough to have her falling back; it's only thanks to his lightning quick reflexes he manages to catch her at all. Youko hisses softly, glaring down at the baby in his hands. Does she have no survival instincts?
Apparently not. Apparently she has no idea of the danger she was just saved from, because she simply stares up at him. She's still bewildered, but offers him a smile after a moment, sticky and wet.
With a little sigh, he hoists her back up, pressing a cautionary hand against her back as he does. She sighs happily and curls around him. Pathetic, he thinks, utterly weak, and yet he declines Robert when he returns home and approaches, his arms held in open offer. No matter how pathetic their kit is, she is theirs. Besides: he has been tasked to this. He will not have Rosalind waking to find he shirked his duty.
And anyway, she's fallen asleep. Moving her now would only wake her.
**
She wishes to chew on him.
A correction: she wishes to chew on everything. When he happens to be the one holding her, he becomes the thing she wishes to chew on. He shares this honorable position with a number of plastic toys, her own fist, and, on one memorable occasion, the leg of a chair.
It hardly seems to matter what bit of him she's near, either: his shoulder, his neck, his fingers . . . he has to be careful she doesn't go near his claws, but she doesn't mind the slight rerouting. She simply gnaws away, her golden eyes intent on his face.
It quickly becomes a very wet affair, but oddly enough, he doesn't seem to mind. He's content to let her enjoy herself as she sees fit, and so they pass hours that way. Occasionally he can feel the scrape of a fang, and when he does, he bares his own in an approving grin. Good. She will gain some defenses soon.
**
The smells, when they occur, are intense, both positively and negatively. The child herself smells pleasant enough, soft in a flowery way that reminds him of Rosalind, and he quite enjoys the process of acquainting himself with her scent. He does it as both man and fox, the latter snuffling the top of her head for a particularly long time before licking her in approval. There, he tells them both later. Now she'll be hard-tasked to ever escape my notice.
**
She babbles now. Not proper words, no, but nonsensical little shouts. They're simple syllables, nothing more, and yet she gets her point across emphatically well. She's a bossy thing, their kit, babbling imperiously up at them as she wanders about her territory. She's learned to pull herself up on every stable surface she can find, and the discovery of this ability has made her hopelessly arrogant.
You there, she seems to say, shouting neh up at him again and again. Come admire me, for I have conquered this couch!
She expects praise for the least little thing, and what's worse: he is inclined to give it to her. They all are, and what is this little creature, that it has such effortless sway over them all?
**
She has a tendency to be wet. The amount of drool she outputs is truly stunning, and more than once he's pulled her away only to discover a long string of it still connecting them, his shirt lightly pasted to his chest.
**
The fourth time she begins wailing, he's too exhausted. He simply cannot deal with this any longer. He knows what he's supposed to do, because both Robert and Rosalind had told him so repeated, but to hell with that. He's too tired, and anyway, when has Youko Kurama ever obeyed anyone's rules?
He had woken in his fox form, which is just as well. He trots into their kit's bedroom, his ears flat against his skull. Instinct would have him flee that awful screaming, but he ignores the urge and leaps into the crib instead. Dodging her flailing fists, he noses at her, licking and nuzzling along her chest, her cheek, her chin. It's the right move: the second she notices someone is paying her mind, the sceams end. She relaxes back against the mattress. Youko regards her for a long moment, then licks the tears off her cheeks and noses at her torso, shoving her until she's lying on her belly.
He could stay until she falls asleep, of course, but that wouldn't solve the real problem. She'd simply wake up again in an hour, and so would he, and the whole wreched cycle would begin again. So what Youko does is this: he bites down carefully on the back of her ridiculous nightclothes and, his movements tentative and slow, lifts her up.
No screams. She swings from his grip, perfectly secure, just as a proper kit might. Good. Satisfied she's safe, Youko pads back into his bedroom and leaps onto the bed.
Gently, he sets her down at Rosalind's side. Both she and Robert are awake, of course: drowsedly, but it's hard not to wake up at least a little when she screams. Robert makes some sort of grumbling noise, displeased at Youko's rule breaking, but he's far too tired to want to bother with it now.
His tails whip through the air, and Youko stretched out on the bed, smugly satisfied at his own cleverness. Now they'll all be able to sleep for the rest of the night, and it'll be thanks to him. Rosalind will smile at him, and Robert will grumble but secretly know how well he's done, and all will be as it ought to.
He settles back down on his side of the bed. A small crackle of force and lighting, and he is his other self once again, which really is much more comfortable when lying like this.
All is quiet.
Except.
His eyes open again, narrowing as they focus on the lump that is his kit. She isn't crying, no, but nor is she asleep. She's making little noises, wet burbles and one-syllable words, ba and ma and da, over and over. And she isn't even lying flat, as she ought to be, but rather rolling around.
Well. Trying to roll around. She isn't very good at movement yet. She isn't very good at anything yet, and it's been a whole six months since she's been born. Possibly she is defective, though even Youko knows better than to mention that out loud (yet).
It's pathetic to watch, but he does for a fair bit anyway. She keeps getting stuck on her arm, but to her credit, that doesn't deter her. She just keeps wiggling, fat legs kicking aimlessly, her fingers grasping and loosening around the sheets. And so in that way she twists and flails, expending a lot of effort without actually moving an inch. He can't tell if she's trying to get closer to Rosalind or himself. Perhaps it doesn't matter which, so long as she keeps someone from sleeping.
He lets her struggle for a full five minutes before relenting and tugging her over. Her little nose wrinkles again and again, and he laughs silently: she's scenting him, or trying to. There seems to be some confusion, but there are three other bodies in this bed. All those scents clashing together has to be confusing.
Or overwhelming. She soon starts fussing, whimpering up at him, and that won't do. Youko leans over, nosing at her, filling her world with just one scent. Hush, he tells her psychically, so as not to disturb the other two. Smell. You know who I am.
She cannot speak to him, of course. She has no concept of words at this age. But she knows how to respond, and so what he gets back is a feeling: warmth, soft and pink, a silent coo of affection. Yes, she knows who he is, but still she snuffles at him, bumping their noses together. A silver thread of curiosity sparks, and with a silent sigh he shifts again. Leaning back on his elbow, he offers her his other hand.
Dinner, he explains, knowing full well as he does that it's a useless thing to do. You smell not only me, but the prey I hunted tonight.
That is, he has to admit, vaguely well done. She recognized that not only did he have someone else's scent on him, but that it was one she wasn't familiar with. Not her mother, not her other father, but something new. A mystery to solve.
She noses at his hand, her little fat ones coming forward to grip his fingers tightly, as if he might suddenly yank it away. The silver thread of curiosity hums between them, and Youko watches, vaguely amused by her efforts.
His hand has to be sniffed again and again, her little button nose sliding against his palm. Occasionally she'll lift or pull his fingers this way and that, as if to better examine the details. Every once in a great while, she'll tip her head back just far enough to catch his eye, presumably to make sure he's still watching her. Then it's back to smelling once more. The cycle repeats seemingly endlessly, until abruptly she releases his hand with a satisfied grunt.
The thread turns gold, then, soft with relief. There. That's that scent squared away. Well done, she thinks, a feeling of emerald fire, hot smug satisfaction radiating between them. That's a particularly familiar feeling, because it's the very same one he'd felt earlier tonight, when he'd triumphantly brought her to their bed.
Now sleep, he tells her, and shoves her back gently until she's lying on her belly once more. You're tired. Go to sleep.
But she doesn't. She remains on her belly, yes, but stares up at him, unblinking. He frowns.
Sleep, he emphasizes, as if saying the word a touch more assertively will do the trick. Rest. You're tired, he adds, in case she's forgotten.
She stares at him for a few long seconds. And then, drifting scarlet up the line: a firm feeling of disagreement. No.
"What do you mean, no?" He actually says that out loud, too affronted to remember he's supposed to be quiet. Rosalind murmurs something and rolls on her side, facing him. For a moment he tenses, but her eyes remain closed, and he relaxes once again.
Yes, he tells his baby, and glares down at her. In truth, he isn't sure what else he ought to say: he can't very well threaten her, not only because it would terrify her but because it would be an empty threat, and he loathes making those. Nor can he cajole her; right now, there's nothing she wants more than what she has already.
But she must sleep. And so he is faced with a conundrum.
Why, he eventually tries, and ducks down, nosing gently against the top of her head. He tries to fill her mind with all the joys sleeping brings. What, he suggests, would be better than sleep? There isn't anything to play with here. There's nothing for her to see or do. She hasn't any toys nor food. She is tired, he knows she is, so why not sleep?
No, she replies insistently, and slaps his cheek with one of her hands. Purple-yellow lightning sparks between them, and she wiggles in excitement. No no no no, over and over, and she throws herself forward and mashes her face against his.
Her next thought isn't a proper thought at all. It certainly isn't an explanation. It's just feelings, really, all the things she's feeling blasted out at anyone who might be around to hear. Excitement and joy swirl together and are mentally shrieked out, because it's belatedly dawning on her that she's surrounded by all three of them. That alone isn't such a rare thing, but it never happens when it's dark. How wonderful, to have them all suddenly around her!
Curiosity, too, flashes a fin, because she isn't familiar with this environment. She suspects she knows it (of course she does, the little lump, she was born in this bed), but she isn't certain. So there's a mystery to solve, and she's with her favorite people in the world, and she's safe and loved and in a new place, and how can she possibly think of sleeping when there's so much to discover?
"Ah," Youko says out loud. Perhaps this plan of his was not well thought out.
But he is a thousand years old, and he won't be beaten in a contest of wills by a kit who can't even roll herself over. That being said: nor is he stupid. He won't win this by insisting outright she simply ignore her instincts and close her eyes.
He'll have to exhaust her, he decides. He'll trick her into sleeping, by overloading her with so much excitement that she'll simply faint dead away. Yes, he thinks, that's the perfect plan, that's absolutely it--
"What are you doing?"
Oh.
Rosalind is awake.
She doesn't look particularly angry about that fact, though, which is a blessing. Another blessing: she contributes perfectly to his overexcitement plan, because the second the baby sees her mother is awake, she begins wriggling around in delight. All four of her limbs flail uselessly, thrashing again and again against the mattress, and she vocalizes softly, trying to get Rosalind to look down at her.
"Hallo," Rosalind adds, glancing down at her daughter. For a moment she smiles, soft and fond, and Youko thinks that even if this all ends poorly, at least he has that to savor.
"She refuses to sleep," Youko offers. Rosalind mms in response, then carefully shifts, pushing the baby towards him and scooting over to follow, until they're lying together with only the lump forcing a gap between them. She finds this new position perfectly pleasing, and coos softly as she flips and presses her face firmly against her mother's chest.
"And so you brought her here." It isn't a scolding statement. Rosalind yawns and wraps one hand around the back of the baby's head, her fingers idly stroking through the wisps of red hair there. (She hasn't even got much hair. Really, sometimes Youko despairs). "Did you guess that refusal? Or did she tell you?"
Both Lutece twins are fascinated with the way he can speak to their daughter. Youko can hardly blame them: it is interesting, and all the more surprising that they can't hear a thing from her themselves. And it isn't that he wouldn't allow them in on that connection if he could, but as he can't . . . well. It's rather a nice thing, to have something that he and the baby alone share.
"She told me, of course." Between them, the baby grunts. Whether it's in affirmation or simply a noise of pure joy is up for debate, but it serves well as emphasis. "Repeatedly."
Rosalind huffs a laugh. "And you listened. You're getting to be as soft as Robert."
Which is just rude, and also massively incorrect. He didn't bring her in here because he'd bent to her will, nor because he'd pitied her. He'd brought her in because he'd been utterly clever and figured out how to keep her quiet for the rest of the night. Youko Kurama does not bend to anyone's will, never mind some tiny chit that can't even move--
But as he opens his mouth to say all that, he's promptly shushed. Rosalind nods her head down meaningfully, towards where the baby is now snoring away, her jaw slack and her cheek happily mushed against her mother. Already a small puddle of drool is forming, though Rosalind doesn't seem to mind.
So that's what it takes, is it? Good, Youko thinks, and relaxes back, sliding beneath the covers once more. Good. Now they have a strategy in place for next time. Rosalind is attempting to work her way out from beneath the baby, a slow and careful process that turns out to be entirely unnecessary: their daughter doesn't stir for a moment as she's moved, and simply slumps back down on the mattress when she's laid there.
Well done, Youko, he thinks to himself, emerald fire crackling through his mind. It was a joint effort, of course, he wouldn't have been able to execute the latter half of this plan without Rosalind, but still: well done, Youko. He's getting better and better at this parenting business, and beneath the covers, his tail whips once or twice in self-satisfied pleasure.
Truly, it's frightening: she's small enough to more or less fit in the palm of his hand, and such a tiny creature seems immeasurably fragile. Surely she cannot survive a day in this world, and yet both Rosalind and Robert seem to find nothing wrong. Indeed, in the aftermath, Robert tells him the baby is actually larger than most human infants, which might account for all the screams that had been torn from their Rosalind's throat.
Large for her age or not, she is small. Small, but no less perfect for it. She has his ears, two little nubs of things that flicker curiously this way and that even as she sleeps. Her eyes and hair color remain a mystery; their kit is entirely bald, a hairless little thing that refuses to open her eyes. That too is normal, Rosalind says, and adds that anyway, even if she did open her eyes, it wouldn't answer their question. Human infants have blue eyes upon birth; whether or not they change is based on genetics.
He wonders if demon kits are the same. He wonders why they seem to have so many rules.
**
She's a very lazy thing, their kit. A month and a half in, and all she seems to ever want to do is eat and lay against one of them. Robert delights in it, of course: he radiates as she lies atop him, her eyes half closed, her fingers making wrinkles in his crisp Oxford shirt. Even Rosalind doesn't seem to mind it, especially at the end of the night. He's caught them like that once or twice, her fingers stroking the infant's back as she dozes upon her mother.
For his part, Youko has no time for such things. But if she is pressed upon him, what else is he to do with her? Rosalind hands her off one day, claiming exhaustion, and far be it for him to refuse her.
So he takes her. This is not the first time he's had her, of course, but it is the first time he's done so alone. Rosalind is asleep within moments of entering the bedroom, her breath slow and steady, and Robert is out finding them food.
But he is a thousand years old. If he cannot handle his own kit, what use is he?
So he settles in a chair and waits to see what might happen next.
She seems to have no real abilities. He thought that might have been a false impression, born from simply observing and never handling, but no: it's as he suspected. She's terribly useless, their kit. She can barely move her limbs, flailing them at random as he braces his hands beneath her arms and holds her up before him. Her eyes can focus on him, but all she seems is mildly bewildered. Not upset, but aware enough to know the man holding is neither Robert nor Rosalind.
He shifts her, leaning her against his shoulder. One hand is cupped beneath her. That seems to be enough, right up until she unexpectedly throws herself backwards. The movement is both erratic and just powerful enough to have her falling back; it's only thanks to his lightning quick reflexes he manages to catch her at all. Youko hisses softly, glaring down at the baby in his hands. Does she have no survival instincts?
Apparently not. Apparently she has no idea of the danger she was just saved from, because she simply stares up at him. She's still bewildered, but offers him a smile after a moment, sticky and wet.
With a little sigh, he hoists her back up, pressing a cautionary hand against her back as he does. She sighs happily and curls around him. Pathetic, he thinks, utterly weak, and yet he declines Robert when he returns home and approaches, his arms held in open offer. No matter how pathetic their kit is, she is theirs. Besides: he has been tasked to this. He will not have Rosalind waking to find he shirked his duty.
And anyway, she's fallen asleep. Moving her now would only wake her.
**
She wishes to chew on him.
A correction: she wishes to chew on everything. When he happens to be the one holding her, he becomes the thing she wishes to chew on. He shares this honorable position with a number of plastic toys, her own fist, and, on one memorable occasion, the leg of a chair.
It hardly seems to matter what bit of him she's near, either: his shoulder, his neck, his fingers . . . he has to be careful she doesn't go near his claws, but she doesn't mind the slight rerouting. She simply gnaws away, her golden eyes intent on his face.
It quickly becomes a very wet affair, but oddly enough, he doesn't seem to mind. He's content to let her enjoy herself as she sees fit, and so they pass hours that way. Occasionally he can feel the scrape of a fang, and when he does, he bares his own in an approving grin. Good. She will gain some defenses soon.
**
The smells, when they occur, are intense, both positively and negatively. The child herself smells pleasant enough, soft in a flowery way that reminds him of Rosalind, and he quite enjoys the process of acquainting himself with her scent. He does it as both man and fox, the latter snuffling the top of her head for a particularly long time before licking her in approval. There, he tells them both later. Now she'll be hard-tasked to ever escape my notice.
**
She babbles now. Not proper words, no, but nonsensical little shouts. They're simple syllables, nothing more, and yet she gets her point across emphatically well. She's a bossy thing, their kit, babbling imperiously up at them as she wanders about her territory. She's learned to pull herself up on every stable surface she can find, and the discovery of this ability has made her hopelessly arrogant.
You there, she seems to say, shouting neh up at him again and again. Come admire me, for I have conquered this couch!
She expects praise for the least little thing, and what's worse: he is inclined to give it to her. They all are, and what is this little creature, that it has such effortless sway over them all?
**
She has a tendency to be wet. The amount of drool she outputs is truly stunning, and more than once he's pulled her away only to discover a long string of it still connecting them, his shirt lightly pasted to his chest.
**
The fourth time she begins wailing, he's too exhausted. He simply cannot deal with this any longer. He knows what he's supposed to do, because both Robert and Rosalind had told him so repeated, but to hell with that. He's too tired, and anyway, when has Youko Kurama ever obeyed anyone's rules?
He had woken in his fox form, which is just as well. He trots into their kit's bedroom, his ears flat against his skull. Instinct would have him flee that awful screaming, but he ignores the urge and leaps into the crib instead. Dodging her flailing fists, he noses at her, licking and nuzzling along her chest, her cheek, her chin. It's the right move: the second she notices someone is paying her mind, the sceams end. She relaxes back against the mattress. Youko regards her for a long moment, then licks the tears off her cheeks and noses at her torso, shoving her until she's lying on her belly.
He could stay until she falls asleep, of course, but that wouldn't solve the real problem. She'd simply wake up again in an hour, and so would he, and the whole wreched cycle would begin again. So what Youko does is this: he bites down carefully on the back of her ridiculous nightclothes and, his movements tentative and slow, lifts her up.
No screams. She swings from his grip, perfectly secure, just as a proper kit might. Good. Satisfied she's safe, Youko pads back into his bedroom and leaps onto the bed.
Gently, he sets her down at Rosalind's side. Both she and Robert are awake, of course: drowsedly, but it's hard not to wake up at least a little when she screams. Robert makes some sort of grumbling noise, displeased at Youko's rule breaking, but he's far too tired to want to bother with it now.
His tails whip through the air, and Youko stretched out on the bed, smugly satisfied at his own cleverness. Now they'll all be able to sleep for the rest of the night, and it'll be thanks to him. Rosalind will smile at him, and Robert will grumble but secretly know how well he's done, and all will be as it ought to.
He settles back down on his side of the bed. A small crackle of force and lighting, and he is his other self once again, which really is much more comfortable when lying like this.
All is quiet.
Except.
His eyes open again, narrowing as they focus on the lump that is his kit. She isn't crying, no, but nor is she asleep. She's making little noises, wet burbles and one-syllable words, ba and ma and da, over and over. And she isn't even lying flat, as she ought to be, but rather rolling around.
Well. Trying to roll around. She isn't very good at movement yet. She isn't very good at anything yet, and it's been a whole six months since she's been born. Possibly she is defective, though even Youko knows better than to mention that out loud (yet).
It's pathetic to watch, but he does for a fair bit anyway. She keeps getting stuck on her arm, but to her credit, that doesn't deter her. She just keeps wiggling, fat legs kicking aimlessly, her fingers grasping and loosening around the sheets. And so in that way she twists and flails, expending a lot of effort without actually moving an inch. He can't tell if she's trying to get closer to Rosalind or himself. Perhaps it doesn't matter which, so long as she keeps someone from sleeping.
He lets her struggle for a full five minutes before relenting and tugging her over. Her little nose wrinkles again and again, and he laughs silently: she's scenting him, or trying to. There seems to be some confusion, but there are three other bodies in this bed. All those scents clashing together has to be confusing.
Or overwhelming. She soon starts fussing, whimpering up at him, and that won't do. Youko leans over, nosing at her, filling her world with just one scent. Hush, he tells her psychically, so as not to disturb the other two. Smell. You know who I am.
She cannot speak to him, of course. She has no concept of words at this age. But she knows how to respond, and so what he gets back is a feeling: warmth, soft and pink, a silent coo of affection. Yes, she knows who he is, but still she snuffles at him, bumping their noses together. A silver thread of curiosity sparks, and with a silent sigh he shifts again. Leaning back on his elbow, he offers her his other hand.
Dinner, he explains, knowing full well as he does that it's a useless thing to do. You smell not only me, but the prey I hunted tonight.
That is, he has to admit, vaguely well done. She recognized that not only did he have someone else's scent on him, but that it was one she wasn't familiar with. Not her mother, not her other father, but something new. A mystery to solve.
She noses at his hand, her little fat ones coming forward to grip his fingers tightly, as if he might suddenly yank it away. The silver thread of curiosity hums between them, and Youko watches, vaguely amused by her efforts.
His hand has to be sniffed again and again, her little button nose sliding against his palm. Occasionally she'll lift or pull his fingers this way and that, as if to better examine the details. Every once in a great while, she'll tip her head back just far enough to catch his eye, presumably to make sure he's still watching her. Then it's back to smelling once more. The cycle repeats seemingly endlessly, until abruptly she releases his hand with a satisfied grunt.
The thread turns gold, then, soft with relief. There. That's that scent squared away. Well done, she thinks, a feeling of emerald fire, hot smug satisfaction radiating between them. That's a particularly familiar feeling, because it's the very same one he'd felt earlier tonight, when he'd triumphantly brought her to their bed.
Now sleep, he tells her, and shoves her back gently until she's lying on her belly once more. You're tired. Go to sleep.
But she doesn't. She remains on her belly, yes, but stares up at him, unblinking. He frowns.
Sleep, he emphasizes, as if saying the word a touch more assertively will do the trick. Rest. You're tired, he adds, in case she's forgotten.
She stares at him for a few long seconds. And then, drifting scarlet up the line: a firm feeling of disagreement. No.
"What do you mean, no?" He actually says that out loud, too affronted to remember he's supposed to be quiet. Rosalind murmurs something and rolls on her side, facing him. For a moment he tenses, but her eyes remain closed, and he relaxes once again.
Yes, he tells his baby, and glares down at her. In truth, he isn't sure what else he ought to say: he can't very well threaten her, not only because it would terrify her but because it would be an empty threat, and he loathes making those. Nor can he cajole her; right now, there's nothing she wants more than what she has already.
But she must sleep. And so he is faced with a conundrum.
Why, he eventually tries, and ducks down, nosing gently against the top of her head. He tries to fill her mind with all the joys sleeping brings. What, he suggests, would be better than sleep? There isn't anything to play with here. There's nothing for her to see or do. She hasn't any toys nor food. She is tired, he knows she is, so why not sleep?
No, she replies insistently, and slaps his cheek with one of her hands. Purple-yellow lightning sparks between them, and she wiggles in excitement. No no no no, over and over, and she throws herself forward and mashes her face against his.
Her next thought isn't a proper thought at all. It certainly isn't an explanation. It's just feelings, really, all the things she's feeling blasted out at anyone who might be around to hear. Excitement and joy swirl together and are mentally shrieked out, because it's belatedly dawning on her that she's surrounded by all three of them. That alone isn't such a rare thing, but it never happens when it's dark. How wonderful, to have them all suddenly around her!
Curiosity, too, flashes a fin, because she isn't familiar with this environment. She suspects she knows it (of course she does, the little lump, she was born in this bed), but she isn't certain. So there's a mystery to solve, and she's with her favorite people in the world, and she's safe and loved and in a new place, and how can she possibly think of sleeping when there's so much to discover?
"Ah," Youko says out loud. Perhaps this plan of his was not well thought out.
But he is a thousand years old, and he won't be beaten in a contest of wills by a kit who can't even roll herself over. That being said: nor is he stupid. He won't win this by insisting outright she simply ignore her instincts and close her eyes.
He'll have to exhaust her, he decides. He'll trick her into sleeping, by overloading her with so much excitement that she'll simply faint dead away. Yes, he thinks, that's the perfect plan, that's absolutely it--
"What are you doing?"
Oh.
Rosalind is awake.
She doesn't look particularly angry about that fact, though, which is a blessing. Another blessing: she contributes perfectly to his overexcitement plan, because the second the baby sees her mother is awake, she begins wriggling around in delight. All four of her limbs flail uselessly, thrashing again and again against the mattress, and she vocalizes softly, trying to get Rosalind to look down at her.
"Hallo," Rosalind adds, glancing down at her daughter. For a moment she smiles, soft and fond, and Youko thinks that even if this all ends poorly, at least he has that to savor.
"She refuses to sleep," Youko offers. Rosalind mms in response, then carefully shifts, pushing the baby towards him and scooting over to follow, until they're lying together with only the lump forcing a gap between them. She finds this new position perfectly pleasing, and coos softly as she flips and presses her face firmly against her mother's chest.
"And so you brought her here." It isn't a scolding statement. Rosalind yawns and wraps one hand around the back of the baby's head, her fingers idly stroking through the wisps of red hair there. (She hasn't even got much hair. Really, sometimes Youko despairs). "Did you guess that refusal? Or did she tell you?"
Both Lutece twins are fascinated with the way he can speak to their daughter. Youko can hardly blame them: it is interesting, and all the more surprising that they can't hear a thing from her themselves. And it isn't that he wouldn't allow them in on that connection if he could, but as he can't . . . well. It's rather a nice thing, to have something that he and the baby alone share.
"She told me, of course." Between them, the baby grunts. Whether it's in affirmation or simply a noise of pure joy is up for debate, but it serves well as emphasis. "Repeatedly."
Rosalind huffs a laugh. "And you listened. You're getting to be as soft as Robert."
Which is just rude, and also massively incorrect. He didn't bring her in here because he'd bent to her will, nor because he'd pitied her. He'd brought her in because he'd been utterly clever and figured out how to keep her quiet for the rest of the night. Youko Kurama does not bend to anyone's will, never mind some tiny chit that can't even move--
But as he opens his mouth to say all that, he's promptly shushed. Rosalind nods her head down meaningfully, towards where the baby is now snoring away, her jaw slack and her cheek happily mushed against her mother. Already a small puddle of drool is forming, though Rosalind doesn't seem to mind.
So that's what it takes, is it? Good, Youko thinks, and relaxes back, sliding beneath the covers once more. Good. Now they have a strategy in place for next time. Rosalind is attempting to work her way out from beneath the baby, a slow and careful process that turns out to be entirely unnecessary: their daughter doesn't stir for a moment as she's moved, and simply slumps back down on the mattress when she's laid there.
Well done, Youko, he thinks to himself, emerald fire crackling through his mind. It was a joint effort, of course, he wouldn't have been able to execute the latter half of this plan without Rosalind, but still: well done, Youko. He's getting better and better at this parenting business, and beneath the covers, his tail whips once or twice in self-satisfied pleasure.