CHUCKIE GETS TRAPPED
( Buh-buhhhhhh! :)
by WileE2005
DISCLAIMER: Rugrats are created by Klasky-Csupo and owned by Paramount Global. This is based off an episode pitched for the second season of the original show but rejected due to its' premise, and is simply a work of fanfiction, taking place before Dil was born.
Our story opens on a shiny metallic surface. We see Chas Finster's face come into view, appearing distorted. The metal surface wobbles around a bit, making Chas's face appear wiggly. We then see that Chas is holding and looking at a hand saw…
Chas Finster was checking out some of the tools that Betty DeVille had brought over to his house. Betty was making sure she brought everything in her toolbox.
"I want to thank you for coming over to help me with that dresser drawer, Betty," Chas told her. "You know you're a much better handyperson than I am."
"Ah, no sweat, Chas," Betty said. "That's what friends are for! Besides, I'm always doing the handy work for Howard, and since he's out doing the grocery shopping, I figured now was the perfect time. Plus, I figured the Chuckster could use the company of the twins. Like I say, the more the merrier!"
Meanwhile, in the living room playpen, little Chuckie Finster was already sitting and hanging out with his friends Tommy Pickles and the twins Phil and Lil DeVille. Didi had dropped Tommy off at the Finster house earlier when she and Stu were going out to do errands, and Betty had brought her twins over so they could be with their playmates while their mother helped out Chas.
"…so I got my own Jelly Bear now!" Chuckie was telling his friends. "He's joined my other Dummi Bears."
"Neat!" Phil and Lil exclaimed in unison.
"Show him to us, Chuckie," Tommy said.
"Well, I would," Chuckie explained, "but right now he's in my room."
"No problem," Tommy said as he pulled his plastic toy screwdriver from his diaper and made his way to the playpen latch.
"I don't know, Tommy," Chuckie said. "My daddy wants us to stay here right now."
"Aw, come on, Chuckie!" Tommy insisted. "This is a perfect chance for us to go 'sploring' on our way to your room."
And so, Tommy opened the playpen, and the four trekked into the living room. They looked around a bit, pretending to be explorers, until they heard someone coming down the stairs.
"Tommy!" Chuckie cried out.
The four babies scuttled into the nearby closet and peeked through the partly open door as Chas and Betty walked past, going straight from the foyer to the kitchen. Fortunately, the living room was not in their route.
"Yeah, we've been working for a while," Betty was saying. "We could use a java break!"
"I think you'll like my coffee machine, Betty," Chas replied. "It's made by the same manufacturer as yours…"
The tots sighed with relief and made their way to the stairs.
"We gotta climb Mount 'Eberest' if we're going to save Jelly Bear!" Tommy proclaimed.
"Oh no," Chuckie warned his best friend. "Why does everything have to become an adventure?"
"Aw, come on," Tommy assured him. "Don't be a baby. Besides, it's just the stairs in your house. What could go wrong?"
Chuckie gulped and got on his hands and knees with the rest of the kids to start crawling up the stairs.
As they were halfway up, Chuckie heard his father's footsteps and needed to see if he was approaching their way. But he couldn't get a good look through the banister poles. Without thinking clearly, he struggled to push his head through the poles and get a better look. To Chuckie's relief, Chas was just returning from the bathroom.
"Ahh," Chas sighed. "Now my bladder will be ready for the coffee…"
Chuckie sighed with relief and started to pull his head back. But he couldn't fit it through the banister. He strained and struggled a bit, trying to rotate his head in different directions, but it wasn't working.
"Hey, you guys?" Chuckie called to his friends. When he didn't hear them coming, he shrieked, "YOU GUYS! HEEEELLLLP!"
That got Tommy and the twins to turn around and make their way back to Chuckie.
"What happened, Chuckie?" Tommy asked.
"I'm stuck!" Chuckie cried out.
"How'd you get in there?" Phil asked.
"I thought my daddy was coming up and wanted to make sure," Chuckie explained, a subtle hint of fear in his voice, as usual.
"Try turning your head in different directions," Lil suggested.
"I tried," Chuckie said, "but it's not working!" He demonstrated for his friends, once again having no success in getting through the banister. "See?"
Tommy thought and said, "I 'gots' an idea! Let's grab Chuckie's legs and pull him out from behind, like in that story about the bear."
Phil and Lil each grabbed a leg, while Tommy grasped both of Chuckie's ankles.
"Ready?" Tommy asked his friends.
"Ready!" Phil and Lil said in unison.
"Ohhh, I'm ready," Chuckie whimpered.
"OK, one, two, three!" The three babies started pulling on Chuckie's legs. "Heave! Ho! Heave! Ho! Heave! Ho!"
"Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow!" Chuckie cried out. "You guys, that really hurts! And I'm not moving!" His voice was increasing in panic.
"Wow, you really are stuck," Phil observed.
"I'll be here forever!" Chuckie said, tears starting to come to his eyes.
"Not on my watch!" Tommy exclaimed. "You're my best friend, Chuckie, and there's no way I'm gonna 'lets' you stay there forever."
Feeling reassured, Chuckie said, "Thanks, Tommy. But what are we gonna do?!"
Lil asked, "Can you try to climb out forwards?"
"And land on the floor?!" Chuckie replied. "I'll break my neck!"
"We gotcha covered," Phil said as he and his twin sister scrambled back downstairs. Chuckie could partly see the twins go to the living room sofa, where they pulled the cushions and pillows off the seat and pushed them all next to the stairs, placing them underneath where Chuckie was stuck.
"OK," Lil called up. "Now you can try!"
Chuckie started straining and struggling to move forward through the banister, with Tommy helping push from behind. But his shoulders prevented him from going any further.
"It's not working!" Chuckie cried.
"Maybe if we 'turneded' you sideways," Tommy thought out loud. He began rotating Chuckie's body 90 degrees as Chuckie let out brief yelps of pain, then he tried pushing again, but they only succeeded in getting past Chuckie's shoulders a little.
"It's no use!" Chuckie moaned, wiggling his shoulders back and getting back on his knees. "What are we gonna dooooooo?" He sniffled and sobbed a bit.
"Hey," Phil said as he got an idea. "Remember when we saw our mommy cooking and she put butter in the pan?"
"Oh yeah!" Lil realized. "The butter slid all around the pan as she moved it!"
"So maybe if we put butter on Chuckie's head…" Phil started.
"Chuckie will slide right out!" Lil exclaimed with glee.
"You guys…" Chuckie started, but Phil and Lil began scrambling off.
"What is it, Chuckie?" Tommy asked.
"My daddy and their mommy is in the kitchen!" Chuckie explained.
They waited a bit, with Chuckie making nervous moans and grunts throughout. But then the twins returned to the foyer and started crawling up the stairs.
"Good news, Chuckie!" Lil announced. "We 'gots' the butter!" She held up a plastic tub of butter.
"Yeah, your daddy and our mommy were in the backyard," Phil added.
Chuckie let out an uncertain moan. "Well, if it'll get me out… I guess I have no choice!"
And so Tommy, Phil and Lil opened the tub and began smearing butter around Chuckie's cheeks and ears with their hands. Then they started spreading the butter all across Chuckie's hair.
"YUCK!" Chuckie screamed. He shivered and groaned, now feeling sick.
After they covered a good chunk of Chuckie's red hair in butter, Tommy said, "OK, Chuckie, now let's try!"
So once again, Tommy and the twins took their places around Chuckie's legs and started to pull as Chuckie strained to pull his head through the banister. But after some grunting and yelping, Chuckie said "It's not working! GET ME OUT OF HERE!"
"I know!" Phil said. "Let's get our mommy's saw!" He and Lil started crawling up the stairs to where Betty and Chas had been working.
"HEEEEELLLLLLLLLP!" Chuckie yelled.
"Come on, Chuckie," Tommy tried assuring his friend. "We're just gonna cut down the poles around your head."
"But we're too little to be using real saws!" Chuckie explained hysterically.
"Then what do we do?" Tommy asked.
"There's only one thing we can do," Chuckie said in a mopey tone. And with that, he started bawling at the top of his lungs. "wwwWWWAAAAAAAA-HAA-HAA-HAA-HAA-HAA-HAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
A few seconds later, Tommy started crying as well. "WAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAH! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
Phil and Lil heard the wailing and scrambled down the steps over towards their friends, and they started bawling as well.
Sure enough, Chas and Betty heard the crying among reentering the house and hurried over to the playpen. They gasped among seeing it open and followed the sounds of the wailing over to the stairs. Among seeing Chuckie's buttered-up head trapped in the banister, Chas let out a high, girlish shriek. "AAAAAAAH!"
"Oh no!" Betty groaned. "I told you to invest in baby gates for your stairs!"
It was now Chas's turn to feel sick, seeing the predicament his son got himself into.
"I'll go get the saw," Betty told Chas. "You stay with Chuckie and try to comfort him."
As Betty jogged up to the second floor, Chas made his way to Chuckie. The babies stopped crying loudly among seeing him right next to them.
"Chuckie, how'd you get butter all over you?" Chas asked. "Pretty disgusting, isn't it?"
Chuckie whimpered a bit and nodded in agreement.
Chas then glanced at Tommy, Phil and Lil, and noticed their sorry-looking expressions. "Oh, did your friends try to use the butter to slide you through the railings?" He let out a snorty chuckle. "That's pretty clever! But it wasn't smart to stick your head through the banister."
Chuckie let out a sad moan in agreement and nodded again.
Chas couldn't help but smile. "It looks like you've all learned your lesson from what happened."
As he said that, Betty came back with the saw. "All right, first I'll get the top of the railing off." She started sawing the top of the railing to Chuckie's right, and within seconds she freed the top. "Now, Chas, you lift up Chuckie while I saw the bottom."
Chas lifted up Chuckie high enough so Betty could safely saw without the toddler being dangerously close. Then she pulled the banister railing and was able to safely slide it out.
"There ya go," Betty said. "You're free!"
Chuckie pulled his head back in and couldn't help but laugh, knowing he was safe again, and hugged his father.
Betty asked, "Now, why do you suppose they were on the stairs in the first place?"
Chas realized something. "Ohh, maybe he wanted to show his new Jelly Bear to his little friends. Well, come on. Let's get all of Chuckie's Dummi Bears from his room and bring them down into the playpen."
A minute later, Chas and Betty placed the kids and the stuffed Dummi Bears back into the playpen and closed the latch.
"Betty, I'm going to take your advice and buy a baby gate for the stairs," Chas announced.
"Atta boy, Chas," Betty said as she gently slapped Chas's back. "Maybe you should consider also getting a new playpen, since they managed to slip out of this one."
"Good idea," Chas agreed. Then he turned to his son and said, "And don't worry, Chuckie. Later I'll give you a bath and get that yucky butter out of your hair."
After he and Betty left to continue working on the dresser, Chuckie hugged his stuffed Jelly Bear and said, "See, Tommy? I told you leaving the playpen wasn't such a good idea!"
"Gee, I never thought just a house could be dangerous," Tommy admitted. "I guess we 'gots' to be more careful after all."
"Yeah," Chuckie agreed. "But even if I was stuck, I'm glad you was there for me, Tommy."
"Thanks, Chuckie," Tommy replied, and he and Chuckie hugged each other, with the stuffed bear wrapped around as if it were hugging them as well.
END