My fear was confirmed a few minutes later, after mom had stopped yelling, as the big-toothed monster came in and kissed her on the mouth - an impressive feat, considering the teeth. I just wished they were more considerate about their unwilling witness; even closing my eyes didn't make the sound go away!
They spoke for a while longer afterward, but by that time I was starting to get sleepy again. At least he hadn't eaten me.... yet.
----------------------------------------
Over the next few days I built a much clearer picture of the world around me… or, at least, of the house around me. It was a wood and stone building that seemed pretty sturdy. They used candles and lamps for light after it got dark, so I assumed there was no electricity. At that point, I was rather certain this had to be another world - why the hell would people with crazy body mods live in a rustic cabin, without electricity? And could you even buy jaw implants like that?!
I really wanted to see what I looked like, but I still hadn’t figured out the trick to getting my arms to move how I wanted them to. Granted, I still spent most of my time asleep, so I’d only been trying for a relatively short time.
As far as I could tell my body felt pretty normal, well… for being stuck in the body of a baby. I could more or less tell that I had four limbs, two eyes, and maybe even fingers. But that was about all I had to work with at the time. Oh yeah, and I could poop like a champ.
----------------------------------------
I had seen Big-Jaw (dad) a few more times over the last few days, and the interactions between him and Purple-Hair (mom) were starting to get a bit less scary. More than half the time she starts off yelling, but I had no idea why. She was always calm by the time he left, and always smiling and happy when she looked at me.
He didn't always pick me up, but he often stood over me looking down... and his fangs did NOT make for a reassuring smile. I was just glad he didn't drool (that’s my job).
When he did pick me up he did it a lot slower than he did the first time, which I was grateful for. He also had massive hands, at least three times the size of mom’s, and I literally fit in the palm of his hand. I had no idea if I was a super small baby with a tiny mom, or if he was just an oversized giant.
So far, I had still really only seen this one room in our house, and I wanted to see more so I hoped that mom would take me for a walk sometime soon. My vision is slowly getting better, so I might even be able to make out more details! Then again, I was probably only a week or so old, so maybe they figured it was too early to take me out of the nursery.
----------------------------------------
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
I finally saw a bunch more of our house a few days later, and it was pretty neat looking. Everything was tidy and clean, while the furniture looked well-made and expensive… or, rather than expensive, everything here looked like it came straight out of an antique store.
Since everything was hand-crafted and we don't have electricity, I figured it was a pretty safe bet that the local tech level was a lot lower than back on Earth. This worried me quite a lot, as I was already missing the internet (and my family, cough cough) during my few free minutes alone and awake.
Mom was constantly spending time with me, and essentially any time she noticed I was awake she would stay with me until I fell asleep, so I had heard her talk a lot... but, of course, I still had no clue what she was saying. The language sounded more Gaelic than anything else I could think of (not that I was an expert, by any means), with a musical, lilting quality that made it quite easy to on the ears. She didn’t seem to be expecting me to reply, so I was happy to just listen and just look around.
Actually, I'd bet that if I had replied she would freak out and run screaming from the house. Which may seem funny at first… and then really, really terrible.
I decided that even if I did learn the language quickly, I should probably try and play dumb for a while so as to not freak anyone out. I mean, smart kids were great and all, but nobody should be capable of conversation by 8 weeks old.
----------------------------------------
Green. GREEN! My skin was turning green!
Both mom and dad had a kind of light golden tanned complexion (with mom's skin being noticeably fairer), kind of like a typical outdoorsy Caucasian person might have. And while mom had purple hair and pointy ears, and dad had a crazy jawline (and the teeth, my god, the teeth!), both of them were otherwise pretty darn human looking. Dad had a messy mop of brown hair on his head, and mom's teeth were so straight and white that it made me wonder if this world had dentists.
So why the heck was I turning green? There were patterns along my hands and arms that were barely noticeable at first, but whenever I saw my skin they seemed to have spread. Not only that, but when I look closer I swear I can see tiny scales. It was crazy… and I couldn't understand why Purple-Hair and Jaws were okay with this! Was I even their kid? I'd have thought it was a disease of some kind, but neither of them seemed to be worried in the slightest.
The whole experience of being reborn had been one big shock after another, and I couldn't help but wonder what was next - was I going to grow a tail, or a pair of wings? Did I have to learn how to fly (actually that would be awesome)? Was I gonna be fed bugs and flies (not so awesome) when I finished breastfeeding?
When I first noticed the green on my arms I yelled (or 'cried' in baby-speak) loud enough that my purple-haired mom came running, but all she did was change my diaper and try to feed me, then talk to me for a while. As far as I could tell she didn't even look at my arms, let alone express concern about the rapidly spreading green scales!
I did my best to calm down and think about the situation... First thing first; was I still a mammal? I was pretty sure lizards didn't drink milk, though wasn't completely certain, and baby birds were fed worms or something, so that didn't match up either.
Stupid Google, where were you in my time of need?! I also didn't think that I hatched from an egg, as the immensely painful crushing experience more or less ruled that out. Also, since Purple-Hair is lactating, that likely means she just gave birth, and I'm the only baby around... so I felt pretty confident that the 'egg theory' could be ruled out, and I was most likely a mammal.
A green mammal, with scales.
Dammit...