Peek-a-Boo

The 5th Time Stacker Read Aloud

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Potential dialogue; (8 months) – Stacker finds himself on babysitting duty while the Marshal and her husband are exiled from the Shatterdome out on a date. Nang gives him a specific set of instructions, and after being interrogated by the `Dome AI, makes up the sofa-bed in the Marshal`s quarters (as per Nang's orders) and attempts to read to Fei Yen.

Stacker hasn’t been a Ranger for over a month and, apparently, has been getting underfoot for long enough.

“Have a baby,” says Acting Marshal Lo, depositing Fei Yen in his arms.

Fei Yen gurgles happily and grabs at his nose.

Stacker deftly dodges the attack. 「What?」

Fei Yen giggles, tries again.

“Your Japanese is getting better!” Tugs a keycard attached to the snuggy. “Combination to the Marshal’s quarters–” Stacker lifts his head out of range, thinks ‘Cantonese’. 「What?」

“Still Japanese.” Nang sneaks out from under the shoulder strap. “–and diaper bag.”

Doesn’t stop Fei Yen from trying.

“Marshal and her hubby are on date, and now you can put Fei Yen to bed. She likes cloth books at the beginning so she can make blankets out of them, and finish with a board book. 3 max.” Nang stoops to Fei Yen level (which didn’t require much stooping), smiles more genuinely. “You don’t like books sitting down, do you?”

Fei Yen burbles.

Nang straightens. “So be sure to lie down before you start or she’ll wail.”

Fei Yen tries chewing Stacker’s thumb.

Stacker adjusts his arms.

“Bedtime’s 1930. Snacks are in the fridge; help yourself. Her bottle’s in there, too; get it to temperature in boiling water. Microwave it and I’ll drip water in your ears. Marshal should be back around 2100. Bye now!” Nang closes the door to LOCCENT in his face.

Stacker blinks.

Fei Yen boops herself in the nose with her foot.

“Onward, I guess.” He wanders down to the Marshal’s quarters, unlocks the door, and steps inside.

This’s weird.

Stacker pries an arm away from Fei Yen (she’s in a snuggie, she won’t fall), takes off his boots. “Shall we get something to read?”

Fei Yen’s trying to eat her fist.

“Okay.” Stacker tiptoes deeper into the suite.

Fei Yen’s door’s painted like a stylized city map, complete with 2D buildings. Flat Jaeger magnets patrol the wide streets with butterflies, cars, the odd constellations–and there, flanked by Gemini, a collection of stars he doesn’t recognize, and the hanzi for 'dog’, is /Coyote /Tango.

Stacker swallows, slides open the door.

The lights flick on; Fei Yen makes grabby hands for the lower shelves of her bookcase.

“"Ranger Pentecost.”“

Stacker totally doesn’t almost drop Fei Yen but he does put her down gently. "AGNIS?”

Fei Yen scoots over alarmingly fast and gleefully yanks out books.

“"Why are you here with Mx Xiong?”“

"I’m babysitting?”

“"Officer Lo is babysitting.”“

"Officer Lo stuck me with F–Mx Xiong? About ten minutes ago? In LOCCENT?”

“"Confirming.”“

Stacker sighs, 'okay, then’, folds himself down beside Fei Yen.

She beams, vocalizes 'happy’ (or 'you’re here!’, he’s not sure), and waves a book in his general direction.

”“The modification to the duty roster has been noted. Good evening, Ranger.”“

Stacker looks at Fei Yen, points to himself. "Night, AGNIS.”

A closing chime.

Fei Yen drops the book in his lap.

Stacker clears his throat. “Thank you.”

Fei Yen smiles a gap-toothed smile, pats a pile of more books.

“All of these?”

Fei Yen tilts her head.

“All of these.” Stacker pushes them into a stack, rolls Fei Yen on top, and scoops the lot up. “And you like to read lying down.”

Fei Yen giggles against his chest.

Stacker pokes his head into the Marshal’s room.

This is really weird.

Stacker leaves quickly. “Couch it is.”

Fei Yen giggles harder.

Stacker arranges the throw pillow and lies down.

Slightly less weird, but this still feels overwhelmingly like creeping around his friend’s parent’s bedroom.

Fei Yen thumps his chest, squawks a sound starting with something 'N’ ish.

“Not 'down’ enough?”

Another squawk.

“Up we go.” He sits, shuffles over a cushion, pulls it of with his free hand. A sofa bed.

Fiiiine.

Fei Yen and books on an easy chair, Fei Yen beside the books on an easy chair, sofa bed into a ... bed sofa. “Better?”

Fei Yen waves her legs.

Stacker picks her up, deposits her in the middle of the bed sofa, much to her delight, gathers the books, and lies down. “Let’s see, what’ve we got ...” Shuffles the pile. “Cloth books ... 'Peek-a-Boo’–it has puppets!” Looks at Fei Yen. “Can I read this one?”

After one page, she takes the book away and gives him another. He reads a page of it, she replaces it. One of the triplets shows up. Stacker gets through the first page of the third book and Fei Yen gives him back the first book. A second triplet wanders in. Stacker reads the second page, Fei Yen offers the first book, and Miss Mori and Max ask to join them. Stacker reads from the first book, Fei Yen gives him the third book, and a third triplet appears. Stacker picks up from where he left off in the third book, Fei Yen gives him the second book, and Ducky storms in but Max won`t leave so Ducky grudgingly makes himself comfortable. Stacker and Fei Yen’s ‘game’ continues until two of the books are finished at which point it’s time for Fei Yen’s bottle which Stacker was going to prepare but Cheung’s already got it perfect. Tamsin appears. Stacker reads the third book while Fei Yen’s feeding and then she falls asleep and he doesn’t want to wake her by moving, and then he realizes pretty much everyone’s fallen asleep.

The Marshal and her husband return an hour later to find two adults, one infant, one dog, two preteens, and one triplet asleep on the sofa bed and another two triplets asleep in the easy chairs.

“This is our life now,” sighs Xiong.

Mr Xiong squeezes her hand. “At least they’re cute,” he offers, going in search of blankets.

Xiong concedes.

They each tuck in a triplet, and then Xiong gathers Fei Yen, Mr Xiong floats a blanket down on the sofa bed, and then they head to bed.

Analysis
The onset of reduplicated babbling typically occurs when the infant is about 6 months old. (Stark, 1980). The hallmark of this stage is a long string of nigh-uniform consonant-vowel syllables whose timing bears a much greater resemblance to adult speech than the infant`s productions thus far (Stark, 1980). Her use of velar stops has decreased considerably—they may disappear from her production repitoire completely for some time--and she produces consonant-like sounds at the front of her mouth, such as /m, n, p, or /d/ (Hoff, 2013). Her vocalizations show the first signs of language-specific characteristics, though at this point, the effect is only obvious to phoneticians as only vowels and suprasegmental factors are affected, though by the time an infant is 8 months, a typical adult may be able to distinguish two infants babbling in different target languages (Goodluck, 2001).

Between seven and eight months, children begin to grasp the concept of a dialogue by playing “games of exchange” (Clark, 2009); an infant will give an object to a playmate and then replace it with another.)