Funnybunny Kids, cause I said so

Family Planning

There were very limited options for babysitters in the Digital Circus.

Even with minimal options, Pomni had a tough time deciding who should watch over the girls. Since Emma and Emily couldn't join everyone in the adventures, and they were too young to be wandering around in a dangerous place on their own, Pomni had to decide who would stay behind and watch the twins.

Naturally, she would have picked herself. A good excuse to stay out of the adventures and spend time with her kids? It sounded like a dream come true! Of course, Jax had to point out that since she was their mother she already took care of them enough to Caine, ruining her chance of an easy escape.

She got back at him by pointing out the same flaw to the AI, and now Jax couldn't use the kids as an escape route either.

So that only left the other trapped humans here. Ragatha, Gangle, Kinger, and Zooble.

Only half of them she could trust to keep her kids safe, while the other half was... interesting at best.

Ragatha was sweet and caring towards the twins. A little nervous around Emma ever since she displayed a mischief streak that could rival Jax's, but otherwise a good choice to watch over the girls. They behaved well enough for her, although she had to wrangle Emma to do something if the toddler was being stubborn. At least Emily was an angel to the doll.

Gangle was almost like a sister to the twins. She played with them, drew with them, told stories to them. She honestly took to the twins the most, even if Emma sometimes tied her up in ribbons and wore her like a bow in her hair. She really needed to talk to Jax about his influence on their daughters.

Kinger... well, he was Kinger. Good old, bug-crazy Kinger. He seemed to be Emma's favorite target, knocking down his 'impenetrable fortress', releasing his bug collection, and giving the old chess piece a heart attack whenever she could. Poor Emily got frightened easily by his screaming.

And Zooble... well, she wasn't sure.

Zooble didn't hate the twins. They were mostly indifferent to them like they were to everyone else. And surprisingly enough, Zooble was the only person Emma didn't prank. In fact, she seemed terrified of the mix-and-match being, hiding behind Pomni whenever they came close, ducking behind objects and peeking her red and yellow pinwheel eyes out at them.

Pomni was almost sure that Emma would love to torment Zooble, but it seemed that her eldest daughter somehow found Zooble scary than a pranking target.

At least Emily wasn't scared of them. She was actually quite brave around Zooble, though still a little shy. And Zooble didn't mind watching the twins.

But it left Pomni with little options when it was time to pick who would watch over the twins. And the twins won't stay young forever.

"Knock knock."

"Jax."

"Heh. Some way to greet someone."

Pomni hummed, keeping her focus on the list. Jax rolled his eyes, closing the door behind him and walked over to the bed. He spared a glance at the crib, his face shifting to a small fond smile at the sight of the sleeping twins inside before he quickly covered it with his usual smug grin, plopping down next to Pomni.

"Whatcha got going there, Pommy?" He peeked over her shoulder, seeing a list of names of everyone trapped in the Digital Circus scrawled over the page with some sort of time schedule.

"I'm trying to figure out who should watch the twins for tomorrow's adventure. I'm... having a bit of trouble though." She showed the list to Jax. "I want to give everyone a chance to watch the twins so they can skip out on the adventure, but I really want them to take care of the twins as well. B-but I keep picking Ragatha a-and Gangle an-and that's not fair to the others but Kinger would just scream and scare Emily and Zooble will hardly care if they wander off b-but they'd be angry with me if I don't choose them and–"

"And yoink."

"H-hey!" Pomni covered her mouth, glancing towards the twins' crib. Once she was sure they were still sleeping soundly, she glared at Jax. "You could have asked."

"But I didn't." Jax smirked, looking over the list. "Sheesh Pomni, are you trying to list everything that can go wrong?"

"I... I thought I would be able to choose better if I judged who had the worst experience from the last adventure. Give them a chance to have a small break. But..."

"Buuut ya can't because basically, everyone has a hard time with these adventures." Jax finished for her, handing her the list back with a shake of his head. "Silly Pomni. What were you thinking?"

"I don't know." Pomni groaned, flopping on the bed and tossing the list away. "And no matter who I choose, everyone else will either bag on me for not choosing them, or make me feel guilty in some way that I have to choose them next time."

"So I've noticed." Jax smiled, but it quickly turned into a frown when Pomni let out a groan. He let out a sigh, laying down next to Pomni and fiddled with the end of her hat. She still flinched from physical contact, but she didn't pull away from his touch. She still didn't like being touched, even after they started dating, but she allowed small physical contact from time to time.

The pair laid there, listening to the twins' easy breathing as they slept, having a small moment of peace that would soon be taken away by tomorrow's adventure.

"... you know what? I think we should have a family day tomorrow."

"What?" Pomni glanced over at Jax, wondering if she heard right.

"A family day." Jax repeated, grinning at Pomni. "You, me, and the twins. A nice little family get-together for the whole day."

"Jax, that's... why are you suggesting that? You hardly spend time with the twins."

"You don't want me to?"

"I didn't say that." Jax chuckled.

"Well, guess you can say I'm using it as an excuse to get out of the adventure." He slid an arm around Pomni, pulling her close to his side as he smiled. "Or it's me being sentimental and wanting to spend actual time with my family. Kids aren't going to stay little forever, and I at least want to give them a good impression that I can be a good dad."

"Uh-huh. Sure." Pomni rolled her eyes, yet there was a playful almost hopeful look in them as she rolled up onto his chest and looked him in the eye. "We... we might need to convince Caine somehow though. I doubt he'll just let us go wandering just because we want to have some family time with the twins. And... and everyone else might..."

"Might what? Be jealous? Don't worry, Pom-Pom. We'll just convince Caine that it's our own little special adventure. A family adventure. And everyone else? Eh. Their loss."

"Jax."

"Don't worry about it, Poms." Jax wrapped his arms around the jester, hugging her close. "Just focus on having fun with the twins tomorrow and worry about stuff later, k?" He looked at her with a rare softness, making her blush as he spoke. "I miss spending time with you."

Pomni's blush marks grew a deep red, coughing into her hand. "W-Well when you put it that way, I guess we could try? I doubt it'll convince Caine, but it's worth a shot."

"Atta girl." Jax chuckled, placing a kiss on Pomni's cheek that turned her face bright red.