12. Children
Another day, another mooshy-gooshy promptfic. =7= I swear, Gil, you're too soft for your own good sometimes. I have a feeling that players of more "traditional" Gilberts will want to utterly destroy me for how he behaves in this fic, but it can't be helped; my Gil has a huuuuuuge paternal streak. So too bad. =3=
Gilbert is sitting on a park bench and staring into the sky when he hears feet rushing towards him, rustling the grass, and a boy's high, clear voice calls out to someone.
"Dad!"
When Gilbert looks down in front of him, he finds that the source of the sounds is right there, looking right into his eyes, his clothes scuffed with patches of dirt and a ball at his feet. Soon he realizes that the boy in front of him has white hair and red eyes to match his own, but before he can say anything to the young doppelgänger, two more voices ring out, one after the other. Both are much higher than the voice of the boy currently by him, with the first voice being higher still than the second.
"Daddy!"
"Daddy!"
A little boy and a little girl flock to his left and right sides respectively. The boy is yet another tiny doppelgänger, carrying a toy shovel and a bucket full of dirt that apparently didn't want to stay there, if the numerous smudges on his clothes, in his hair, and on his face are any indication.
The girl, however, is rather clean by comparison, save some dirt smears on the bottom of her dress (red and white, like many other objects in this picture) and on her bare feet and legs. Not even her hair, pulled into two tufty little white pigtails with red bows just a bit above the sides of her head, is too messy. Yet another set of crimson eyes gleams mischievously back at Gilbert before the bearer of those eyes giggles and shoots her hand forward to deposit a big, juicy worm in his lap.
While the other two children were distracting Gilbert, the first one left and came back. When Gilbert looks forward again, the older boy is now holding the hand of a fourth child, just barely a toddler. What sets this little one apart from the others is that he appears to be Ludwig's miniature instead of Gilbert's. The littlest boy's hand is released, and he wobbles over to Gilbert on unsteady legs. Stubby little baby hands reach forward so that the boy can lean against Gilbert's legs for support. However, one hand happens to land on the (still very much alive and wriggling) worm, and he pulls it back with an alarmed squeal, much to the delight of all the giggling children around him.
As for Gilbert himself, he feels like his face would snap clean in two if his smile was any bigger. Happiness just bubbles up more and more inside of him with each glance at the young faces before him. These are all his children. His eyes go from the oldest boy to the dirty one to his left, then to the playful little girl on his right, then at last to the tiny Ludwig in front of him, now in full pouting mode and looking surprisingly peeved for such a young child. All of these wonderful children are his, and that's all he can think about.
Everything around him contributes to pure happiness (even the worm on his lap), and it just keeps building inside him till he can't hold it on anymore. He erupts into loud, jovial laughter that seems to well up endlessly from within and spreads his arms to encircle all of his children. The oldest son needs to move in a little, but soon all of the eagle's chicks are safe in the nest of his arms.
The joy is so great that Gilbert is still laughing when he wakes up.
* * *
Later, when the brothers are eating breakfast (simply a normal breakfast of cereal and orange juice; no gorging on pancakes and syrup today), Gilbert pretends to read the paper but is really still thinking about his children. It doesn't matter that they only appeared in a dream; he still considers them his children. The more he thinks about them, the more some strange feeling, maybe frustration, builds up. Soon, he can't take it anymore, and he finally ditches the paper and asks the question that's been on his mind all morning.
"Hey, West. What do you think would happen if I had kids?"
Ludwig heard the question quite well, but his eyes widen in disbelief anyway. "What?" he says, setting his spoon down with a clank that implies he dropped it instead.
"You heard me. What do you think would happen if I had kids?" Gilbert stares Ludwig down till he gets his answer.
"Well, for one thing, we'd be broke," Ludwig replies, eyes now scrutinizing Gilbert to see if there's anything visibly wrong with him.
Gilbert knows that Ludwig's first assumption is that something's wrong, and he sighs in exasperation before he speaks. "Stop that. Answer me seriously," he grunts, keeping direct eye contact with his brother, as if he can drill through his head to get the answers with his eyes.
"I'm sorry. It's just a strange idea. Think about it: you, Mr. 'I'll-never-get-married-ever-and-Brandenburg-didn't-count,' having children? It sounds bizarre to me." Seeing that Gilbert just keeps staring and probing for more with his gaze, Ludwig continues, albeit with a little hesitation as he gravitates dangerously close to a soft spot. "Well, you raised me. I don't see why, if the conditions were right, you couldn't repeat the act. It just surprises me that you’d want to." When that answer still doesn't satisfy Gilbert, it's Ludwig's turn to get exasperated. "Why are you pushing this question so much, anyway?"
Finally, Gilbert's expression changes from the probing stare. The fond memories make him smile softly as he says, "I had a dream last night, and my kids were in it."
That alone is enough to wipe away Ludwig's grumbles. He knows that Gilbert has dreams vivid enough for him to want to ask about them the next day. "You should have just said that in the first place." While Ludwig isn’t typically one to care about dreams, this instance just seems so different from what’s expected from his brother that he simply has to investigate. It then occurs to him that Gilbert said "kids." Plural. "How many did you have?" he asks, a bit afraid of what the answer might be.
"Four!" Gilbert declares with nearly excessive pride and volume, and Ludwig's eyes nearly bug out of his head. That poor, poor mother. Furthermore, how would Gilbert ever have the stamina for four children? Two, maybe, but four would probably kill him. That's twice the mouths to feed, twice the expenses, and twice the stress, but of course Ludwig would brood over the practical aspects first.
Gilbert notices the consternation in his brother's eyes and pokes at it, a devious smirk on his face all the while. "Yeah, you heard me right. Four. A boy, then a girl, then another little boy, and then..." His expression softens as he hits the next part. "Then another little boy. But the funny thing is, this one looked a lot like you. He even freaked out when he touched a dirty worm!" Ludwig cringes briefly at the mention of touching worms, and that sends Gilbert into a fit of laughter. "See?! Maybe he was your kid, and I was just babysitting!" Ludwig's apparent shock at having even one child only makes him laugh more.
Eventually, Gilbert settles down, though a goofy smile remains on his face as he goes on about his children. "Yeah, well, the others were all little clones of me. Except the girl, of course, but damned if she wasn't a chip off the old block! She was the one who brought the worm, you know?"
“Oh.” That’s all Ludwig can say in reply. He’ll the first to admit that the idea of many extra tiny Gilberts running around worries him. Gilbert makes a face that can only mean that he’s displeased with the (lack of) reaction, so Ludwig quickly throws out another question to defuse him. “What were their names?”
The trick works, and Gilbert promptly settles down. “Well, I didn’t know their names in the dream, but I’ve been thinking about what to name them ever since I woke up.” He’s almost beaming with pride as he says each child’s name. “That first one, the oldest boy, he’d be Frederick, of course! That would make the girl Frederike. Or maybe Ilse. I don’t know. But the next boy would have to be Otto. Yes, definitely!” When it’s time for the last name, however, he gets stuck, taking a lengthy pause to think and cupping his chin in one hand. “I don’t know what I’d name mini-you, either. Maybe he is yours, after all.” He stares at Ludwig expectantly. “C’mon, West! Think of a name!”
The question catches Ludwig off guard. He fishes around in his head, but none of the names that come up are ones that he’d like to stick his hypothetical child with. “I can’t think of one either,” he says far too quickly. Whatever. He has better things to do than name an imaginary child. Gilbert’s face fades to disappointment, and Ludwig takes the opportunity to distract him with the question that he’s really been waiting to ask. “By the way, do you know who the mother was?”
“Huh?” Now it’s Gilbert’s turn to be caught off guard. “Nope. Why do you ask?” Suddenly, a devilish smirk crosses his face. “Maybe I was responsible for all of it. Y’know, the whole ‘process.’ Do you know what I mean?”
Ludwig stares at him baffled, then gradually turns pale when he gets Gilbert’s little joke, which only makes Gilbert laugh hysterically. Eventually, he manages to calm himself to divert Ludwig’s train of thought. “But seriously, if all the little conditions were juuuust right, wouldn’t it be nice…?”
The smile Ludwig gives in return is a soft, faint one. “I guess so.”
“It’d be just like when I was taking care of you, only four times more! And with some other things changed around,” Gilbert says, sounding almost a little too happy with the idea. “Speaking of you being an uncle,” never mind that such a topic was never brought up in the first place, “You’d definitely have to help. You’d have to help me make these kids smart. Like I said, times have changed. Being smart wasn’t so important back when I was a kid, or even when you were a kid, so I’m no good with that. You, on the other hand… I lucked out with you. You got smart long before it was popular. So you’d have to do your part!”
“I would,” Ludwig says simply. “But you do realize this is all hypothetical, right? That you don’t have children, and you’re not likely to have any any time soon?” He receives no response. “Gilbert?”
It’s no use. The notion of Ludwig being an uncle to his four little chicks is enough to send Gilbert daydreaming, imagining the whole happy family together, his first generation supporting his second. Ludwig can’t help but chuckle when he sees that blissful smile on his big brother’s face as he clears the bowls and glasses away.
Gilbert is sitting on a park bench and staring into the sky when he hears feet rushing towards him, rustling the grass, and a boy's high, clear voice calls out to someone.
"Dad!"
When Gilbert looks down in front of him, he finds that the source of the sounds is right there, looking right into his eyes, his clothes scuffed with patches of dirt and a ball at his feet. Soon he realizes that the boy in front of him has white hair and red eyes to match his own, but before he can say anything to the young doppelgänger, two more voices ring out, one after the other. Both are much higher than the voice of the boy currently by him, with the first voice being higher still than the second.
"Daddy!"
"Daddy!"
A little boy and a little girl flock to his left and right sides respectively. The boy is yet another tiny doppelgänger, carrying a toy shovel and a bucket full of dirt that apparently didn't want to stay there, if the numerous smudges on his clothes, in his hair, and on his face are any indication.
The girl, however, is rather clean by comparison, save some dirt smears on the bottom of her dress (red and white, like many other objects in this picture) and on her bare feet and legs. Not even her hair, pulled into two tufty little white pigtails with red bows just a bit above the sides of her head, is too messy. Yet another set of crimson eyes gleams mischievously back at Gilbert before the bearer of those eyes giggles and shoots her hand forward to deposit a big, juicy worm in his lap.
While the other two children were distracting Gilbert, the first one left and came back. When Gilbert looks forward again, the older boy is now holding the hand of a fourth child, just barely a toddler. What sets this little one apart from the others is that he appears to be Ludwig's miniature instead of Gilbert's. The littlest boy's hand is released, and he wobbles over to Gilbert on unsteady legs. Stubby little baby hands reach forward so that the boy can lean against Gilbert's legs for support. However, one hand happens to land on the (still very much alive and wriggling) worm, and he pulls it back with an alarmed squeal, much to the delight of all the giggling children around him.
As for Gilbert himself, he feels like his face would snap clean in two if his smile was any bigger. Happiness just bubbles up more and more inside of him with each glance at the young faces before him. These are all his children. His eyes go from the oldest boy to the dirty one to his left, then to the playful little girl on his right, then at last to the tiny Ludwig in front of him, now in full pouting mode and looking surprisingly peeved for such a young child. All of these wonderful children are his, and that's all he can think about.
Everything around him contributes to pure happiness (even the worm on his lap), and it just keeps building inside him till he can't hold it on anymore. He erupts into loud, jovial laughter that seems to well up endlessly from within and spreads his arms to encircle all of his children. The oldest son needs to move in a little, but soon all of the eagle's chicks are safe in the nest of his arms.
The joy is so great that Gilbert is still laughing when he wakes up.
* * *
Later, when the brothers are eating breakfast (simply a normal breakfast of cereal and orange juice; no gorging on pancakes and syrup today), Gilbert pretends to read the paper but is really still thinking about his children. It doesn't matter that they only appeared in a dream; he still considers them his children. The more he thinks about them, the more some strange feeling, maybe frustration, builds up. Soon, he can't take it anymore, and he finally ditches the paper and asks the question that's been on his mind all morning.
"Hey, West. What do you think would happen if I had kids?"
Ludwig heard the question quite well, but his eyes widen in disbelief anyway. "What?" he says, setting his spoon down with a clank that implies he dropped it instead.
"You heard me. What do you think would happen if I had kids?" Gilbert stares Ludwig down till he gets his answer.
"Well, for one thing, we'd be broke," Ludwig replies, eyes now scrutinizing Gilbert to see if there's anything visibly wrong with him.
Gilbert knows that Ludwig's first assumption is that something's wrong, and he sighs in exasperation before he speaks. "Stop that. Answer me seriously," he grunts, keeping direct eye contact with his brother, as if he can drill through his head to get the answers with his eyes.
"I'm sorry. It's just a strange idea. Think about it: you, Mr. 'I'll-never-get-married-ever-and-Brandenburg-didn't-count,' having children? It sounds bizarre to me." Seeing that Gilbert just keeps staring and probing for more with his gaze, Ludwig continues, albeit with a little hesitation as he gravitates dangerously close to a soft spot. "Well, you raised me. I don't see why, if the conditions were right, you couldn't repeat the act. It just surprises me that you’d want to." When that answer still doesn't satisfy Gilbert, it's Ludwig's turn to get exasperated. "Why are you pushing this question so much, anyway?"
Finally, Gilbert's expression changes from the probing stare. The fond memories make him smile softly as he says, "I had a dream last night, and my kids were in it."
That alone is enough to wipe away Ludwig's grumbles. He knows that Gilbert has dreams vivid enough for him to want to ask about them the next day. "You should have just said that in the first place." While Ludwig isn’t typically one to care about dreams, this instance just seems so different from what’s expected from his brother that he simply has to investigate. It then occurs to him that Gilbert said "kids." Plural. "How many did you have?" he asks, a bit afraid of what the answer might be.
"Four!" Gilbert declares with nearly excessive pride and volume, and Ludwig's eyes nearly bug out of his head. That poor, poor mother. Furthermore, how would Gilbert ever have the stamina for four children? Two, maybe, but four would probably kill him. That's twice the mouths to feed, twice the expenses, and twice the stress, but of course Ludwig would brood over the practical aspects first.
Gilbert notices the consternation in his brother's eyes and pokes at it, a devious smirk on his face all the while. "Yeah, you heard me right. Four. A boy, then a girl, then another little boy, and then..." His expression softens as he hits the next part. "Then another little boy. But the funny thing is, this one looked a lot like you. He even freaked out when he touched a dirty worm!" Ludwig cringes briefly at the mention of touching worms, and that sends Gilbert into a fit of laughter. "See?! Maybe he was your kid, and I was just babysitting!" Ludwig's apparent shock at having even one child only makes him laugh more.
Eventually, Gilbert settles down, though a goofy smile remains on his face as he goes on about his children. "Yeah, well, the others were all little clones of me. Except the girl, of course, but damned if she wasn't a chip off the old block! She was the one who brought the worm, you know?"
“Oh.” That’s all Ludwig can say in reply. He’ll the first to admit that the idea of many extra tiny Gilberts running around worries him. Gilbert makes a face that can only mean that he’s displeased with the (lack of) reaction, so Ludwig quickly throws out another question to defuse him. “What were their names?”
The trick works, and Gilbert promptly settles down. “Well, I didn’t know their names in the dream, but I’ve been thinking about what to name them ever since I woke up.” He’s almost beaming with pride as he says each child’s name. “That first one, the oldest boy, he’d be Frederick, of course! That would make the girl Frederike. Or maybe Ilse. I don’t know. But the next boy would have to be Otto. Yes, definitely!” When it’s time for the last name, however, he gets stuck, taking a lengthy pause to think and cupping his chin in one hand. “I don’t know what I’d name mini-you, either. Maybe he is yours, after all.” He stares at Ludwig expectantly. “C’mon, West! Think of a name!”
The question catches Ludwig off guard. He fishes around in his head, but none of the names that come up are ones that he’d like to stick his hypothetical child with. “I can’t think of one either,” he says far too quickly. Whatever. He has better things to do than name an imaginary child. Gilbert’s face fades to disappointment, and Ludwig takes the opportunity to distract him with the question that he’s really been waiting to ask. “By the way, do you know who the mother was?”
“Huh?” Now it’s Gilbert’s turn to be caught off guard. “Nope. Why do you ask?” Suddenly, a devilish smirk crosses his face. “Maybe I was responsible for all of it. Y’know, the whole ‘process.’ Do you know what I mean?”
Ludwig stares at him baffled, then gradually turns pale when he gets Gilbert’s little joke, which only makes Gilbert laugh hysterically. Eventually, he manages to calm himself to divert Ludwig’s train of thought. “But seriously, if all the little conditions were juuuust right, wouldn’t it be nice…?”
The smile Ludwig gives in return is a soft, faint one. “I guess so.”
“It’d be just like when I was taking care of you, only four times more! And with some other things changed around,” Gilbert says, sounding almost a little too happy with the idea. “Speaking of you being an uncle,” never mind that such a topic was never brought up in the first place, “You’d definitely have to help. You’d have to help me make these kids smart. Like I said, times have changed. Being smart wasn’t so important back when I was a kid, or even when you were a kid, so I’m no good with that. You, on the other hand… I lucked out with you. You got smart long before it was popular. So you’d have to do your part!”
“I would,” Ludwig says simply. “But you do realize this is all hypothetical, right? That you don’t have children, and you’re not likely to have any any time soon?” He receives no response. “Gilbert?”
It’s no use. The notion of Ludwig being an uncle to his four little chicks is enough to send Gilbert daydreaming, imagining the whole happy family together, his first generation supporting his second. Ludwig can’t help but chuckle when he sees that blissful smile on his big brother’s face as he clears the bowls and glasses away.