Chapter 6: Sleeping Habits

The door of the housing unit shared by Noire and Neptune opened as two people came through it with faces that could tell that they had a rough day.

"Oh, Histoire, my neck hurts from all that looking over to see if everyone was doing their work correctly. This pain is only dwarfed by my aching wrist from signing all those papers," said the twin-tailed goddess of Nepstation.

"I know how you feel. My mind is drained from all the people I had to help and instruct today," said a tired Histoire.

"Hmm, it can't be helped. This is the duty of every CPU to endure hard workdays like these. It wasn't the staff's fault that this workload demanded a delicate hand from all the others. I do want to thank you for taking some of the paperwork though."

"Nonsense, Noire. You would have still been hard at work long into the night if that was the case," said Histoire.

"You're not lying." Noire peered into the dimly lit hallway that its light source came from the living room. She was unable to hear any type of noise that could indicate activity from the living room. "I wonder if Neptune and Euri are still up."

They moved forward, and their eyes landed on a sleeping purple-haired girl that had her daughter sleeping on her chest. They were both on the couch with pillows lined up at the edge of the couch and on the floor also.

"They must have been waiting for us," spoke Noire with sadness that she couldn't make it on time.

"That Neptune... it's quite dangerous for a baby to be sleeping on top of her mother who's prone to shifting her body sideways," said Histoire.

On those exact words, Euri was the one who started to shift her small and blue pajama covered body sideways.

"Kyaa!" Noire disregarded her aching joints and dived forward.

Euri did a free fall that was intercepted by Noire, causing them both to hit the pillow covered floor.

"Is the baby okay?!" Cried the tome oracle.

"Yeah... I broke her fall, and the pillows broke mine," replied the twin-tailed CPU with a happy sigh.

"Nnn... no... my pudding you bad dogoo," sleepily moaned the purple-haired girl.

"I guess Euri is a bed shifter like Neptune," joked Histoire.

Noire inspected her daughter's sleeping face that remained unaffected by the sudden eventful free fall. Noire picked herself off the ground and flicked her index finger toward the nose of her wife.

"Ah!" Neptune jolted from her peaceful slumber with wide eyes that searched around. "Noire...? Ouch, why did you have to hit the nep awakening button like that?" She tiredly joked while she rubbed her nose.

"Why did you have Euri sleeping on your chest? She could have fallen from that angle, and we're lucky that I got here right away."

Neptune knew she was at fault after being told that. She shyly rubbed the back of her head. "Sorry, about that. Euri and I were watching some cartoons while we waited for you two to get back. I felt like I was drifting off, and I formed a protective pillow flooring just in case."

"Neptune! While it's fantastic that you thought through your little idea, it was in no way one that was necessary. Why didn't you send her off to bed and hit the sheets yourself?"

"Well, we both wanted to wait for you. Every time I said, 'let's wait for daddy Noire to get here,' she would happily giggle."

"S-she did?"

"You betcha! Our little bun bun is getting pretty knowledgeable about her surroundings and people talking to her."

Noire cradled her sleeping daughter with a smiling face. After that, she narrowed her eyes at Neptune, expressing to her that this wasn't over.

Several minutes later, Noire had returned her daughter to her crib and made her way to the bedroom.

"So… how was work?" Neptune swung back and forth by the balls of her feet that made her look like a pendulum. Her peculiar idle animation was one of nervousness as she could sense that her wife had been holding back her stern lecture until this very moment.

Noire rubbed the back of her neck to ease her soreness, then she stared daggers at her wife. "It was brutal. We had delicate paperwork that was so sensitive, Histoire and I had to oversee every document to make sure the information was accurate."

"I see, I see. I feel so bad that I couldn't lend a hand for that workload," said Neptune as she slowly inched closer to her wife and the bed. Her actions were similar to that of someone trying to pet a wild animal that might end up knocking them out.

"You had to stay home to take care of Euri, Neptune," stated Noire without knowledge of Neptune getting closer.

Neptune had reached the bed and had lined up her hands to her wife's neck for a massage. She heard her black-haired wife grunt in mild pain, then it turned to a soft moan of relaxation. "That's a serious pickle that we find ourselves in Noire; trying to balance work, Euri, and our lives in general," said Neptune.

"Hey, work needs to be done. We can't allow shares to tank. Do you really want Euri to own a sinking nation from us when she's ready?"

Neptune's face grew sour. "let me think about that… first, she's not owning any nation yet until long into the foreseeable future. Second, she's our little girl that shouldn't even worry about that."

"I feel the same way, but we need to always keep that perspective in mind because if we slack off thinking that it's a long way away- it's going to get here quicker."

"Always the prepared parent, Nowa. Then I'm going to work hard so that day doesn't come," happily cried the purple-haired girl.

Noire pouted and turned her head. "That's what I've been saying! We literally talked in circles, Neptune! And don't think that your relaxing massage is going to get you off the hook about Euri's near accident."

Neptune sadly lowered her hands from her wife's neck.

Noire, who had her eyes closed from the relaxing massage, opened one eye toward her wife. "I didn't say to stop," she said with a bossy tone.

Neptune perked up when she saw through her wife's serious face to tell her that she was offering forgiveness with the inclusion of a continued massage. "No problem, honey. I'll rub your neck so hard, that it's going to be hanging off the side," she joked with a rubbing of the hands together.

Noire opened both eyes with a scared expression of such a reality. "Hey, let's not crank that up too high. A simple massage would suffice."

They were both halted from their conversation when the baby monitor went off with loud wails.

"Oh, Euri woke up!?" They both shouted at the same time.

They both sprinted to their baby's room without stopping. Once they got there, they gazed upon their daughter who was in a seating position in her crib with her eyes filled with tears.

"My little girl had a nightmare," sweetly spoke Neptune with her protective motherly instincts kicking in. She picked her up and rocked her gently in the hopes that she would go to sleep. That did not prevent Euri from cranking up the volume with her lungs.

"It must have been one nightmare if she's balling her eyes out like this- huh?" Noire stopped in her tracks when she noticed that her pink-haired daughter started to reduce her crying to a whimper once she caught sight of the former Lastation CPU.

"Yeah, I think she wants you, Noire." Neptune handed Euri to Noire. Once that happened, Euri ceased all forms of discontent, and her red eyes were filled with energetic joy. Neptune placed her hands on her hips in an 'I told you so', kind of way. "She truly is aware of her surroundings. Especially who her daddy is."

"N-Neptune, please stop teasing me like that. The daddy joke has run its course at this point, and I don't want our daughter's first word being papa or daddy- especially daddy!"

"But Noire… I was the one that got pregnant, so technically you are the..."

"You finish that sentence and I'm going to throttle you!" Shouted the twin-tailed CPU. She heard a small rumbling that made her look around for the source. It took her less than ten seconds to realize that the rumbling was coming from her baby.

"Sounds like her tummy is all knotted up, must be something that we ate during dinner," said Neptune.

Noire's eyes turned fearful with a frown. "D-did you pat her on the back after you fed her?"

"Umm… I can't remember, there was a fun little cartoon show that really sucked the both of us in after we finished eating."

Noire's intuition had her on the right track, unfortunately, it was too late.

Euri's face expressed nausea and discomfort like a pocket of gas was fighting its way through her and toward her mouth. Without any more warning and hardly any more time, Euri burped softly. That was only the harbinger of the little pink-haired CPU-to-be as she produced a fine amount of vomit that hit Noire's shoulder and collarbone.

"Yikes! I think maybe that was the reason she was crying her little face off." Neptune had casually picked up a camera that rested near the window. Her subtlety was unrefined when she snapped a picture of the vomit related event to forever cement it as a quirky family moment.

Noire's eyebrows twitched angrily toward her goofy wife. "You've been too relaxed with her, and I'm the one paying for it. Next time, make sure she passes her gas, and then put her to bed!"

"Ah, it was an honest mistake, Noire!" Pleaded Neptune as she knew that an extended massage was going to be needed to get out of this one.

This chapter was short and mostly done to get an Author's note out. I know that I've been slacking on the updates, and I aim to change that with frequent updates that I have planned. During my break from this story, I had time to reflect on a definitive course to take for this story as there were a lot of unformed routes to take that made me tread cautiously. I now know where I'm taking this story. I don't want to say too much other than that the next chapters will be Euri related chapters featuring other characters like Uni, Nepgear, Rom, Ram, Vert, and Blanc. I have a phase two for this story, and I want to dedicate chapters with other characters before I move the main plot along.