Diaper U, Chapter 10

A month into his enrollment at Alphabeta University, Daniel had a realization.

He’d grown…used to things.

His study group was friendly. He’d shown himself to be a remarkable student and excelled in his classwork. A few occasional trips to see his ghostly companion, Ismella, had cemented her as a person he could consider a friend. Even the skirts and the diapers, while still a nuisance that set him apart from the student body, were no longer horrendous.

Only one aspect of his enrollment still stung, and refused to get better no matter how long he was there.

“Bottoms up, Spark,” Rachel said, smirking as she leaned against the wall of his room.

Though responsible for his diaper changes, his prefect would never stoop so low as to actually get her hands dirty. She stood back, using Daniel’s own wand to cast the necessary spells. And yet, despite her aloof demeanor, she always managed to make it so distinctly humiliating.

Maybe it was her inevitable snicker every time she undid his diaper, or the way she flicked the wand around while using far too many frigid wipes on him. It could be the fact that she’d picked the most strongly perfumed baby powder Daniel had ever smelled, which made his room perpetually smell like Baby. Perhaps it was the combination of all of it, along with her bemused smirk every time he blushed.

But whatever it was, Rachel deposited another dirty diaper into the pail by his crib. “Well, call me when you have another accident, tinkles,” she sneered.

“Thirty days,” Daniel replied, wishing his cheeks wouldn’t glow so brightly red.

She paused. “Hmm?”

“Thirty days left in my detention, then I’ll be allowed to do this myself,” he said, sitting up and pulling down his skirt–as though she didn’t see his diaper or she’d forget about the smelly one she’d just taken off him. “And I’m not any closer to dropping out than I was on day one. Are you getting nervous?”

“I get nervous about stuff that actually matters,” she said. “How much control you have over piddling in your pants doesn’t matter.”

“So much for ‘making me drop out,’ then,” Daniel retorted.

He knew he shouldn’t prod his tormentor, but this was the only way he could think to reclaim a bit of dignity. It was hard to stand up to someone who’d just wiped his naked privates while actively giggling, but he didn’t want her to think he’d just capitulated to her bullying.

“We’ll see,” she said, leaving the room and shutting his door behind her.

The way she could always get in the last word wasn’t fair either–he couldn’t leave, she could.

“Yeah, well–” he started, raising his voice, but there was no point. He slumped back onto his cot–the crib bars only came up at night–and groaned.

The tedium was the real killer. He had studying he could be doing, but cooped up in his room–his nursery, really–made him stir crazy.

That’s why it almost came as a relief when he heard the alarms.

Alphabeta wasn’t so crude or simplistic as to use simple wailing klaxons in case of emergency. Instead, they employed something far more jarring; a polite voice in his ear.

“Emergency,” the spectral voice explained, completely out of nowhere. Daniel jumped out of his not-a-crib so fast he nearly hit his head on the ceiling, and he completely missed the next words to come out of her mouth.

“What the hell?” he blurted.

Luckily, the words repeated a moment later. “Emergency. Please make your way to the Grand Hall. Emergency. Please make your way to the Grand Hall.”

“Okay,” Daniel said. “I get it!”

“Emergency,” the voice replied. “Please make your way to the Grand Hall.”

“Not much of a conversationalist,” he muttered. He half-expected his door to still seal him in, but the handle turned when he tried it, allowing him out into the hallway.

Prefects who looked just as confused as him were stepping out together, all looking around. In case someone didn’t know the way to the place they went three times a day for food, the floor had a glow to it with large, easy-to-follow arrows that pulsed in the right direction.

Someone asked, “What’s going on?”

Someone else said, “How the hell would I know?”

At a loss, Daniel started walking. He didn’t rush–if it was a fire or a disaster, he imagined the warning would be more specific. Instead, he just stayed with the crowd, walking in the direction of the Grand Hall.

As they left the prefect’s dorm area, the mass of students only grew thicker. The warning had gone to the whole school, it seemed, and well over a thousand women were walking down the hall, all asking the same questions.

Daniel gave no stock to the whispered rumors he heard. Unless someone had actually seen the cause of the emergency–and if they had, he doubted they’d be in the crowd here–they only had the same information as everyone else. There was an Emergency. They were supposed to go to the Grand Hall.

No monsters rampaged in the hallways, no fires were spreading. He made it to the Grand Hall and, once inside, the voice in his ear finally shut up.

Now, though…he didn’t know what to do.

At a loss, he found a seat at one of the long tables. Some of the girls were doing the same. Others preferred to stand, clogging the space by the doors, anxious that they’d need to evacuate.

Again and again, he heard variations on the one question. “Does anyone know what’s going on?”

And, just as insistently, no answers came. Just whispers and rumors.

Daniel didn’t bother asking anyone, he just applied logic to the problem, running it in his head.

First, some gimmes: It wouldn’t be a mundane, obvious problem. The school had enough magic running through it to deal with issues like that. Fires were counterspelled before they could so much as burn. Earthquakes were countered by geomancy. No normal crisis he could imagine would be a problem.

So…abnormal problems, then. A magic fire. Maybe something had gone wrong in one of the alchemy labs and they were dealing with Hellfire. Except…classes were done for the day, and even if there were students staying late, they’d have to be under the supervision of a teacher. Nobody was allowed unrestricted lab access, and the teachers at Alphabeta were supposed to be the best.

That ruled out something caused by a student.

He thought about the situation outside of school, the general unrest, but those problems were whole continents away, separated from the school by mountain ranges and mystical wards.

Which left…

“These fools have no idea what they’ve built,” the remembered voice echoed in his mind. “If they did, they’d have never let these children toy around such power.”

He got to his feet. It didn’t matter if he’d been ignored before–if the crisis came from the same person who’d spoken those words, he needed to act. Walking to the door–

“Hold it, Spark,” Rachel snapped, catching him by the collar and dragging him back. “Where do you think you’re going?”

No obvious excuses came to mind. Bathroom, no. His room, also no–what would he say, he needed study material?

“Nowhere,” he lied, spinning to face her. “Just walking around.”

“Right,” she said, clearly disbelieving the fiction. “Well, here’s the thing–don’t think your detention is over just because there’s a safety drill.”

Daniel shook his head. “It’s not a dri–”

“Well,” she smirked. “All the same. Let’s find someplace for you to deal with your punishment, shall we?”

“There’s a crisis going on,” he protested, wondering if he could pass along a message to someone–Jen, maybe?–if Rachel didn’t let him leave. “Are you seriously worried about this right now?”

“If the crisis shows up in the Grand Hall, we can reconsider,” she replied, taking him by the ear and pulling him to the edge of the room. “Now…you’re normally grounded to your room, but let’s see, there’s less space here. Perhaps the corner–”

“Hey,” someone said. A stranger to Daniel–just some random girl. “What are you doing?”

“Enforcing discipline,” Rachel replied. “This student is grounded.”

“Are you serious?” the girl snapped. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

They were starting to attract eyes. Someone else asked, “What did he do?”

“I just enrolled,” Daniel said, loudly. “They gave me detention because I enrolled.”

More whispers.

Some of the girls seemed to think that was fair–like Rachel, they didn’t want him here. But then a voice spoke up, and this time it was from someone he knew.

“That’s ridiculous,” Manju said. “If they’re mad about you being a student, they can figure that out on their own time.”

Daniel let out a sigh of relief. He had support. Heck, he had friends.

Then he felt Rachel’s hand on his shoulder, and he realized his mistake. Rachel didn’t care about being popular with random students. She cared about making his life miserable, and her authority had just been publicly challenged.

“If anyone wants to interfere with student discipline,” she said. “I’m happy to make sure you can experience it along with him. Otherwise, get out of my way.”

Seizing Daniel by the ear this time, she continued to pull him away from the girls, towards the far corner of the room. Daniel didn’t resist–even if he pulled away, it’d accomplish nothing. It was better to go with her and try to keep the pressure off his ear.

Arriving at the corner, she pulled his head up, until his nose was right against two walls. “Here,” she said, grabbing one of his wrists. “This is your room now.” Twisting his arm, she put one hand behind his head. “You move, you step out of the corner, you so much as scratch your nose, I’m counting that as a breach of your detention. Got it?”

He nodded.

“No talking to anyone except me or a teacher,” she continued, putting his other hand behind his head. “Heck, no talking period unless you’re asked a question. One more smart comment, your ass is mine.”

Again, Daniel nodded.

Finally, in case his punishment wasn’t enough, Rachel grabbed the back of his skirt, lifted it, and tucked it into the waistband of his diaper, showing off the fluffy, plastic-backed padding to the whole room.

Finally, she leaned in to whisper, “Are you getting nervous?”

He swallowed, and told himself, (Just thirty more days, then this is over. You can make it thirty days.)