Bring (Baby) Me Back

When the guys arrived at Alex’s apartment the next morning, he was feeding baby Jack some baby food.

“Good morning!” Rian cheerfully exclaimed. “How’s your new life as a father going?”

“Haha, very funny.” Alex said, rolling his eyes. “It’s going well, actually. Jack is a calm baby, that when he’s not busy scaring the living shit out of me, that is.”

Zack muttered “Language” under his breath, and continued louder: “What happened?”

“I was on the kitchen making breakfast earlier, and when I realized it Jack was nowhere to be seen. I freaked out and called him, but I got no answer. Ten minutes later I found him, playing with my guitar.”

Rian chuckled, ruffling Jack’s hair. “Maybe we should put a rattle on him so we know where he is all the time.”

As if he had understood Rian, Jack made a scandalized face, making everyone laugh.

Alex finished feeding Jack while Rian and Zack sat on the couch, chatting.

“What are we gonna do today?” Rian asked Alex, who was gently rocking the baby.

“We’re going out. We need to find the man who turned Jack into a baby, and we’re not gonna do it sitting at home.”

“Sounds like a plan.” Zack replied. “Where do we start?”

They were interrupted by a big burp coming from Jack that made the guys snicker.

“Good to see some things never change.” Rian snorted.

“Anyway,” Alex continued, trying to shuffle his giggles, “we’re gonna start on the same street we first saw him. Lemme just change Jack’s clothes and we can go.”

“Wait, he’s coming with us?”

“No, I’m gonna leave him alone on the house. Of course he’s coming with us!”

“And how exactly are you planning on taking him? We don’t have a stroller.”

Alex froze as he realized his friend was right. 'Great, now what do we do?'

Zack gave the answer, smirking.

“Oh, I have an idea.”

--------------------------

“Really, Zack? This?”

They were back on the street they first saw the stranger on, looking around. Alex was wearing one of those baby pouches on his torso, Zack’s idea.

“What? It was the only option you had!”

“I look ridiculous…” Alex pouted.

Rian rolled his eyes. “No you don’t, shut up.”

Soon the weird group drew attention from the people passing by, who were mostly enchanted by baby Jack.

“Oh, he’s so adorable!” they exclaimed. “Is he your son?”

“No, he’s my best friend who was turned into a baby.” Alex deadpanned every single time.

Generally, he would receive three reactions to his reply. First, the people who gave him a weird look and walked away. Second, the ones who thought he was joking and laughed, only to also give him a weird look when they found out he wasn’t kidding. And third, the ones who were offended and insulted him before walking away.

Jack found the last one to be especially hilarious, and laughed every time Alex was insulted in any way.

Alex sighed; the things he had to go through for his best friend…

After two hours of walking in circles, the group was ready to give up and go home.
But suddenly Rian stopped, looking at a crowd.

“I see him.”

Alex and Zack immediately looked in that direction, at first not seeing anything in the mess of people.
But then they saw him, wearing some weird bright clothes. He was giving something wrapped to a woman, and they were sure it was a burrito.

They walked to him, faking an educated smile.

“Steve, long time no see!” Rian exclaimed, hugging the confused man. Alex and Zack stood on either side of him, leaving no room to escape.

“How about we go for a little walk?” Alex asked, and the man knew it wasn’t a request.

He smirked, playing along. “Sure, it’ll be fun to remember the good old times!”

They walked to a narrow alley, and after making sure no one was watching, Rian pinned the stranger against the wall.

“Okay, speak. What did you do to Jack?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, dude.”

“You don’t know.” Alex repeated, angrily chuckling. “Then let me refresh your memory. You walked to us yesterday and offered Jack a burrito that he ate and turned him into a baby. Remember that?”

The man had the cold blood to grin. “Oh yeah, I remember. It was a nice spell.”

Rian had to control himself not to punch this pretentious asshole in the face. Alex felt the same way, but was having more trouble to control himself.

Zack was the one who fully recorded what the man said.

“Wait, a spell? What the hell are you talking about?”

“It’s what I do! You know, in this modern world you don’t have much ways to practice your spells without drawing attention on you, so I do these things.”

“What, you put spells on burritos and then you give them?”

“Sort of. It’s not only burritos, it can be any food. On your friend’s case, I used a burrito ‘cause it was the thing he was craving the most.”

Jack whimpered, drawing the stranger’s attention.

“Aw, what a cute baby your friend is! Guess I found the perfect spell for him!”

“You son of a…” Alex growled, trying to run to the man but being held by Zack, who was starting to get worried.

“Dude, we don’t want to do anything to you. We’re just asking you to turn Jack back to his normal self, just that.”

The stranger looked at each man individually, and then sighed.

“Guys, I really want to do that. Seriously, you seem like nice guys, I shouldn’t have messed with you. But that’s the problem; that spell can’t be turned back. It’s permanent, the moment he ate that burrito the spell was permanently activated.”

There was silence for a minute, letting it sink in.

“…You’re saying Jack is going to be a baby for the rest of his life?” Alex muttered.

“Yes, basically. I’m sorry man, I didn’t-”

He was interrupted by Alex’s fist colliding with his face, and fell to the ground with his hand on his nose.

“You’re gonna pay for this, you fucking bastard!” Alex screamed, walking out of the alley in a rush.

Zack and Rian followed after a moment of hesitation; when Alex is this pissed off, it’s better to leave him alone.

“Do you think he was telling the truth?” Zack muttered, and Rian shook his head.

“I don’t want to believe him, but why would he lie? He has no reason to. And besides we know literally nothing about spells.”

The duo walked slowly behind Alex, who was muttering to himself. Or to Jack, it was hard to know since they couldn’t hear him.

“We have to do something. Jack can’t stay like this forever, we have to turn him back.”

“How?”

Zack looked down, defeated. He had no idea how to do it, and he hated it, he wanted to help his best friend.
Rian glanced at Zack, hating to see him so down, and wrapped an arm around his shoulders.

“Hey, we’ll bring him back to normal, okay? We’ll find a way.”

------------------------------------

Back at the house, everything was silent. No one spoke because no one knew what to say, no one could think of any idea to help fix this situation.
Alex had gone back to his room immediately after getting home, leaving Jack with his friends.
He needed to be alone, he was so pissed off he felt like he could snap if he wasn’t alone in his bedroom.

He should have prevented that, he shouldn’t have taken his eyes off Jack after they met that weirdo, if he did they wouldn’t be in this situation right now.

Jack wasn’t feeling good either; after the man said that he turned completely silent, he didn’t laugh, didn’t cry, nothing at all.
Alex had realized that Jack still understood everything that was said, he just couldn’t speak. He knew Jack felt responsible for this situation, and he couldn’t really blame him; if it had happened to him he’d feel the exact same way.

He didn’t exactly knew how, but at one point Alex picked up his acoustic guitar and just played random notes, not really thinking about it.

He didn’t notice Jack sitting on the rug at the front of the bed, listening to him in silence.
He had managed to escape Rian and Zack’s vigilance and crawled to the bedroom, wanting to be near Alex.

Two hours passed before Alex got too tired to continue, and he got up to put the guitar on its place.

And that’s when he noticed Jack on the rug, curled up and sleeping with a finger in his mouth.
He sighed and carefully picked him up, putting him on his bed and placing a warm blanket on top of him.

When he went to the living room, wondering why Rian and Zack didn’t notice Jack missing, he found them asleep on the couch, Zack with his head pressed on Rian’s shoulder and Rian’s arm loosely wrapped around his back.

Alex smiled, watching them; he was sure they didn’t have any sleep last night, too worried about his best friend.

“Well, I’m not waking them up, they need the rest.” Alex muttered to himself. “They look pretty adorable like that, too.”

He put a blanket over them and turned the tv off, turning the apartment in complete silence.

“Sleep well, guys.”