Young children didn’t know how to be gentle, or even what gentleness was. Like everything else, they had to be taught the words and what they meant. They had to learn that living creatures had feelings too, that being rough with them caused them discomfort, even pain and physical damage. It was a good thing the Flufflets were more resilient than kittens or puppies, and were able to make themselves scarce if their young charges were getting to be to much for them. Not that they hid very often, they loved the twins and took their roles as companions and teachers seriously, but Ianto didn’t blame them when they did decide to be elsewhere. There were times he wanted to escape too.

Meriel had proven very easy to educate in every way, but looking back, Ianto suspected that was because Nosy had been there, and already a fully mature Fluff, before she was born. Without ever having to be told, it knew how to guide and correct Jack and Ianto’s firstborn, gently but firmly. On top of that, Meriel had always been a sweet little girl. She’d been born with a gentle, generous, sensitive nature, and had remained that way even through the terrible twos. On one memorable occasion, in mid tantrum over something she was told she couldn’t have, she’d accidentally kicked Nosy, and had immediately thrown herself on top of her friend, hugging it, and saying ‘Sorry!’ over and over again, devastated over having hurt her best friend.

Unfortunately for everyone, Fluffs and humans alike, the twins did not share Meriel’s gentle nature. Even Jenna, who was a girl, at least in theory, acted more life a feral animal than a human child. Ianto suspected Nosy had certain regrets about not making Flufflets for them until the two demonic entities its friends had created were becoming mobile. Squiggle and Spot had been thrown in at the deep end, newly budded, still learning the ins and outs of being independent Flufflets, while also being expected, by their parent, to control and educate two small monsters.

Not that Jack and Ianto left everything up to their Fluff and its Flufflets. Far from it. They were very hands-on as parents, and Nosy also did its best to teach not only its own offspring, but the youngest human family members. It was just that the twins’ default setting seemed to be getting into as much trouble as they possibly could, while fighting each other tooth and nail over everything, or nothing at all.

It was no wonder Jack’s second pregnancy had been so uncomfortable. Not only was he carrying two babies at once, but ninety percent of the time they simply could not get along. They were fierce rivals in everything; whenever one twin had something, the other would immediately want it, even if it was something they’d never shown the slightest interest in up to that moment. They fought constantly, when they were both awake, and almost from the start, they’d slept in shifts, perhaps as a way of getting a bit of peace from each other.

Nosy could usually get them to behave for short periods, and the twins’ parents quickly learned to be stern and uncompromising, because babies needed structure in their lives, rules and boundaries, guidance and education, routines and familiarity. The Flufflets were learning to enforce the humans’ rules, but the twins didn’t make anything easy. The aliens had good reason to be glad they were practically indestructible, since because of their relatively small size, their disapproval didn’t carry the same weight as Nosy’s. Their size had other disadvantages as well.

“No, Jenna!” Ianto said firmly, charging to Spot’s rescue. His two-year-old daughter had grabbed her Flufflet by the tail end and was swinging the poor alien around. “We don’t do that!” He prised the little girl’s fingers off the Flufflet, who lay on the floor, eyes slightly crossed, getting its breath back. “Spot doesn’t like that. You have to be gentle. Stroke it like this.” He guided her hand to smooth the Flufflet’s ruffled fur. “No, you don’t grab or squeeze. It hurts, like when you shut your fingers in the door. I know you remember how that felt. You don’t want to make Spot unhappy.”

Ianto thought he might actually be making some progress with his youngest daughter’s behaviour, but then Gareth wandered over to see what was going on, dragging Squiggle by the tail, as if it was nothing more than one of his stuffed toys. The Flufflet had a resigned, long-suffering expression on its face. Being dragged wouldn’t harm it, Fluffs slunk around on the floor anyway, but it could only go where Gareth went; it didn’t have the slightest choice in the matter, since it couldn’t pull its tail free from the toddler’s fierce grip. It was strong for its size, but having no arms or legs, only a long, furry, snake-like body, it couldn’t get the necessary leverage.

Ianto sighed. “Gareth, put Squiggle down. It doesn’t want to be dragged!”

“Humm,” Squiggle agreed, twisting round to goggle at the boy. Gareth just dragged it closer, then used it to hit his sister.

“Gareth! Stop that right now! We don’t hit people with other people! We don’t hit other people at all!” Ianto really wished Nosy hadn’t gone to the Hub with Jack this morning. The Fluff would have soon set both twins straight. Five metres of furry green alien registering disapproval was a highly effective deterrent to antisocial behaviour. The two metre long, and much thinner, Flufflets had considerable growing to do before they’d be able to compel small humans to obey them with nothing more than a glare and a stern hum.

Gareth pouted, exactly like a miniature version of his father.

“Fluffs are people!” Ianto repeated. “Just like you, and me, and Daddy, and Meriel, and Jenna. We don’t hurt the people we love.”

The little boy gave that some thought, dropped squiggle’s tail, picked up a teddy bear, and hit Jenna with that instead.

It was an improvement, sort of, but still not something Ianto wanted to encourage, even though he knew he was going to laugh about his son’s problem solving abilities later, when he told Jack. “Don’t hit your sister!”

The pout came back, bottom lip wobbling. Gareth was hamming it up almost as well as Jack did. Like father, like son.

“It’s mean to hit people,” Ianto told his son. “Nice little boys don’t do that.”

Then Jenna bit Ianto’s finger.

“Ow! That hurt me, Jenna!”

She laughed. Ianto was clearly father to a pair of budding psychopaths; it wasn’t a comforting thought.

“No, Jenna, that wasn’t funny! It was very naughty.”

Meriel must have claimed all the niceness from both of her parents, and the twins had got all their worst qualities. Maybe they were changelings. But that wouldn’t explain their resemblance to their parents. He might have to accept that really were his own flesh and blood. That was sobering.

Ianto could only hope in time, the twins might grow into civilised human beings, but on days like this, he had his doubts.

“You just wait until Nosy gets home. It’s not going to be pleased with either of you, not when you’re being so naughty all the time.” It was no good threatening them with their father’s disapproval, because the twins were at the stage where they were determined to do things their way, but Nosy, being empathic, was able to make them feel the effects of what they did to other people, which was a far more effective deterrent to bad behaviour, even if it was a lesson they had to be taught almost every day. One of these days it would stick. Or so Ianto hoped.

In the meantime, the entire family would simply have to do their best to weather the storm of toddler tantrums. Hopefully they’d all survive that long.


The End