Going to Extremes

Chapter 1
Going to Extremes

Going to extremes

By Groblek

Hello, can I help you? I’m afraid I’m expecting a guest, so I don’t have time for a sales pitch.

Oh, you’re Becky? I’m sorry, I didn’t recognize you from the photo you sent. Come on in and sit down, it’s great to finally meet you in person.

So, you’re writing an article about the extremes of life with the AR virus? Well, I’ve got one for you all right, and it’s a doozy.

It started when my husband Frank and I had been retired for a decade or so, about five years after the initial outbreak. We were in our late seventies and feeling our bodies slowly fall apart. We used to joke that we didn’t see why everyone was so upset about this virus. Getting a bit younger seemed like a great idea at the time.

A week after my annual physical, my doctor called me up to tell me that I was positive for the AR virus. She emphasized that I shouldn’t worry yet, just come back for another test to make sure. I laughed so hard that I just about dropped the phone, and finally told her that worry was the last thing I’d be doing. So, I went in for the test, and found that I was indeed infected.

Frank and I celebrated as though I’d just won the lottery, which in a way, I had. Oh, we had both heard the horror stories of people who bounce as infants and get stuck there. Honestly, even that doesn’t seem too bad when you’re old enough to start worrying about dying in a nursing home. And plenty of people who get the virus bounce somewhere in their adult years, so it really didn’t seem like such a problem.

I guess we’re another one of those horror stories now, though I’m happy enough with the way things turned out. You’ll have to wait until Frank wakes up to ask him what he thinks.

Oh yes, we can still talk. Well, communicate, anyway. He can’t really talk at his age. But we’ve worked something out.

Anyway, I regressed at the usual rate. Unless you’ve been there, you have no idea just how gratifying it is for an older woman to find her hair color returning, and the wrinkles melting away. Frank certainly appreciated my new look, and the libido that came with it. About three months later, I got my period back, which wasn’t fun at all. My monthly visitor was about the only part of my youth I’d been glad to leave behind.

Right around then, Frank discovered that he’d caught the virus from me. It seems that sex with someone who’s regressing is a pretty reliable way to catch the virus. We celebrated again, though I don’t think we would have had we known just how far back he’d go.

For several months, thing were great. I finally bounced somewhere in my early twenties, and seem to have stuck there. It’s been six years now, and I still look the same as I did when I finished regressing.

Well, OK, mostly the same. I wasn’t pregnant back then, but that’s the only thing that’s changed. Yes, I do know how lucky I am. Frank’s regression makes sure I never forget, not that I really needed the reminder.

When Frank got close to my age, we decided to go on a second honeymoon, traveling to all the exotic places we’d wanted to go the first time. It was one of the best times of my life, but by the end of it, I was starting to get concerned about Frank.

His regression didn’t seem to be slowing down the way mine had, and I tried to convince him to go see our doctor. That man always did prefer to stubborn things out himself, and this was no exception. It wasn’t until sex became a problem that Frank finally went in, only to discover that his body was going backwards through puberty.

That was the point where our relationship really started to change. I couldn’t very well keep sleeping with a child, no matter how long we’d been married. So I fixed up the spare room for Frank. And I started attending a support group for virus survivors at the local hospital.

That support group is where I met Gwen. She had just bounced at around my age, and like me, she was trying to adjust to her new life. Unlike me, she didn’t have anyone else tying her down. We became close friends fairly quickly, and Frank liked her at first.

Once she started spending nights in my bed, that changed. Really, did he expect me to put my sex life on hold while he grew back up from toddlerhood? He started throwing tantrums whenever she came over, accusing Gwen of stealing his wife. In fairness, I guess she did, but I can’t say I’m sorry about it. He really wasn’t much of a husband anymore, much as I still love him.

After a week of that, Gwen took him into his room and gave him such a spanking that he couldn’t sit down for a day. I guess we may have overreacted a little, but he’d earned it. That was the point where Gwen and I started making him call us “Mommy”. Since he was acting like a child, we decided to play up our new roles. We started pretending he really was our kid, and would go for days at a time without acknowledging who he really was. After two months, he finally apologized for his treatment of Gwen, and we tried to cut back on the Mommy act.

Frank hated the clothes we made him wear during that period. But really, he looked so cute in those outfits, and he was acting more and more like a kid anyway. Oh, I knew the man I married was still in that head. He still is, even now. But I’m sure you know how much the physical brain affects how we act.

Two months later, Frank became a lot more impulsive and clingy as he re-entered toddlerhood. Gwen and I couldn’t help falling back into the roles we’d played earlier, but he didn’t seem to mind so much this time. I think it actually comforted him to have two loving Mommies with him as the world turned big and scary.

The tests suggested that Frank would go all the way back to infancy before he bounced. He hated the idea of drinking from a bottle, so Gwen and I both started taking drugs to begin lactating. Even though he still had his teeth, we made him start to drink our breast milk as soon as it came in. It hurts to be full of milk, so we weren’t putting ourselves through that if he wasn’t going to drink it.

The funny part is that he didn’t mind, and I think that was when he really accepted Gwen into our lives. Frank always was a breast man, and I think he liked hers even more than mine. I can’t blame him really, Gwen’s a knockout. I like her breasts better too.

Things got bad a month later, when Frank started losing his bladder control. He was mortified, but there really wasn’t anything to do about it other than to put him back in diapers. He fought that as badly as he had Gwen’s arrival, but he finally gave in after spending an entire weekend in messy pants.

Changing his diapers sucked, but it’s amazing what you get used to after a while. Gwen rolled up her sleeves and pitched right in. I found out later that she’d spent years as a nanny, back during her first youth. She seemed to become more comfortable with Frank the younger he got, and I came home one day to find him strapped into a sling on her front, fast asleep.

I started to worry when Frank lost the ability to crawl and began having trouble keeping down anything but breast milk. I didn’t mind breastfeeding him, but I hadn’t expected Gwen and I to end up as his sole source of meals. The next visit to the doctor brought even worse news. Frank was going to get younger than they’d thought. A lot younger.

I really should have told Frank then, but I didn’t want to worry him. So Gwen and I left him with the nurse while the doctor laid out our options. She made us plan what we’d do if things came down to the worst-case scenario. The choices she offered were really no choice at all. I’d sworn to care for Frank through sickness and health, and I take my vows seriously. So I left the hospital with some new prescriptions, and tried not to let Frank see how worried I was as he just kept getting younger.

Frank didn’t suspect anything until his umbilical began to grow out, and by that time, we were too busy rushing to the hospital to reassure him. It wasn’t until his placenta had implanted inside me that Gwen and I told him what was happening and where he was going.

He screamed and kicked at me, but his newborn body tired quickly. After that, he got very clingy, especially to me. I thought that was rather silly, after all, I wasn’t going to be leaving him. Quite the opposite, really.

But Gwen and I understood his need for comfort in a scary time. It really wasn’t very nice of us to keep things a secret, but I just hadn’t wanted to deal with another one of his tantrums. It wasn’t as though screaming at me would change anything, after all. At least this way, he got it all out of his system once, and didn’t have time to think about it again before we’d finished his transition.

The three of us cuddled together until my first contractions summoned the midwife. Gwen sat next to me, Frank cradled against her breasts, while I labored to open up for him. I lost track of time, but I know it took a while for my body to get ready.

Frank had actually fallen into an exhausted sleep by the time I was fully dilated. He didn’t wake up until the midwife started pushing his toes into me. Panicking, he struggled as he awoke, but by then my body had a firm grip on him. I really can’t describe what it was like to pull Frank inside myself. It hurt, that’s for sure, but there were a lot of emotions mixed in there too. It’s hard to describe, but knowing that I was going to be his entire world made me feel more powerful than I’ve ever felt.

I don’t think the pain was worse than giving birth, but I’m not really sure what that’s like. It didn’t last long though, and a few minutes later, I blew my husband a last kiss before he disappeared inside me.

The reverse birth was really the worst part of Frank’s regression. I was sore for a long time afterwards. Gwen stayed with us in the hospital for a week, until the doctors finally let us go home. After that, I went in for weekly checkups for the next two months, until they were satisfied that his regression had finally stopped.

Yes, like me, Frank’s not aging back. We didn’t know it at the time, but that’s probably my fault. Frank wasn’t the first person to regress back to the womb, but he is the first one to get stuck there. Now that it’s happened a few more times, they’ve discovered that if the woman becoming pregnant is age-locked, her new baby is likely to get stuck somewhere around in the third trimester.

Oh, you knew about that? You’re right, the idea is pretty horrific. So is what this virus has done to half the planet. And being a permanent fetus is better than just regressing out of existence.

No, I’ve never heard of that happening either. But with everything else this virus has done to people, I won’t rule it out. I know of one case where the baby planned on getting stuck this way because he was so afraid of going all the way back.

Oh, you’ve already talked to the Lewises? No, I can’t really blame him for making that choice either. As it was, I had nightmares about Frank dwindling away inside me for weeks after I got pregnant with him. Every so often, I still wake up sweating after one of those.

Yes, it’s pretty clear that being unborn does stop the regression sooner than it would have otherwise. Look, that’s really something you should ask a doctor about. I’m just a woman who’s done a lot of reading on the subject since becoming the textbook case.

Anyway, at the time, all we knew was that Frank wasn’t getting any older, and so I was going to be pregnant with him for a while.

Hmm? How did he take it? Well... Oh! He’s waking up. You should ask him. I’ll have to translate, since you don’t know the shorthand we use to talk.

Oh, I didn’t explain before? Frank and I worked out a heavily modified version of Morse Code, since he used to be into Ham radio. If you put your hand on my belly, you can feel his responses as he taps them out. It felt a bit odd at first, but I’m used to it now.

Yes, just like that. Pretty wild, isn’t it?

Hey in there, honey. I’m here with someone who wants to ask you a few questions. OK, go ahead.

She wants to know what it’s like in there. Hey, I’m giving you as much room as I can. Well, I should hope so!

Oh, sorry. He says it’s cramped and rather loud inside me. But he’s gotten pretty comfortable in there.

I’ll say you have, Frank, you spend most of the time sleeping. Yes, baby, I know there’s not much else to do in there. No, Gwen’s at work right now.

Frank! You’re shameless!

No, I won’t translate that. I am not sharing details of my sex life with a reporter, even a nice one like you.

Well, OK, let’s just say that Frank really likes it when I have sex. I think some of the endorphins cross over to him. And Gwen turned out to really like me pregnant.

Yes, I suppose that does work out well for us. Life would be rather awkward if Frank objected, because there’s no way I’m giving up sex until he gets out. But it’s still really strange to have my baby encouraging me from in there.

Well, I guess I do think of Frank as my baby most of the time. It’s not that strange, really. He hasn’t been an adult for almost six years, and he’s been inside my womb for five of them. He’s a talkative baby, and he’s still got all his memories. But he’s got the body of a baby, and even that mind of his is filtered through a baby’s brain. So it’s hard to think of him as the man I married fifty years ago.

No, I don’t miss the man he used to be, not anymore. Frank’s still with me, after all, and I’m not lacking in adult company. We just have a different relationship than when we were married.

Gwen and I have been married for three years now. And as much as I still love Frank, she’s a much better partner than he was. The sex is a lot better, too.

Now Frank, you know I’m right. No, I don’t regret our time together either. But I’m happy like this. And you don’t seem to mind too much, do you?

I know you’d rather be an adult again, but we weren’t given that option. I could have the doctors get you out of there, but you’d still be stuck as a helpless infant. You hated diapers the first time, do you really want to spend decades wearing them? I didn’t think so.

No, they’re sure you won’t grow up again if I let you out, not until someone figures out how to unstick our ages. I promise that I’ll let you out when that happens, baby.

Hmm? I suppose that does sound well-practiced. We talk about letting him out nearly every month, but he always chooses to stay. I don’t think Frank’s really aware how long he’s been inside me. His sense of time seems to have gone a bit fuzzy.

Of course I meant it when I offered to let him out! Do you really think I’d keep him trapped inside me against his will?

Well, I’ll admit that I’d try and change his mind if he ever decided to take his chances outside of me. It’s a lot easier to stay pregnant than to have a permanent newborn around the house. I really don’t know how some people manage, and I know that many families don’t manage at all when a loved one goes that far back.

Actually, I do think we’re happier like this than if Frank had been locked as a newborn. I… I’m not sure I’d have been able to cope with that long-term. Though Gwen’s help might be enough to get us through it, I’m glad Frank doesn’t push the issue of getting out.

Well, yes, sometimes the Mommy doesn’t listen to her baby’s wishes. Two of the women in the support group I run have babies who really don’t want to be in their mommies’ wombs anymore.

Look… I’m not going to judge them too harshly. In both cases, their babies are quite a bit younger than Frank. If they survived the birth, they’d just be trading life in the womb for life in an incubator. I like to think I provide a better environment than a machine.

I’m glad you agree, Frank. I love you too, baby.

No, I won’t tell you their names. You’ll have to track them down yourself if you want to pester them. I maintain strict confidentiality within the support circle.

Actually, it’s perfectly legal. Regressed individuals are considered minors once they’ve gone back past puberty, after all. With the risk involved in being born that young, you won’t find a single judge who’d order a birth against the mother’s will. Honestly, I think birthing them would be the more irresponsible decision. But I couldn’t stand to be a walking prison either, so if it were me, I’d take the risk and let them out. But only if I couldn’t talk them into staying.

You’re getting awfully worked up about this. Look, I like you, but if you can’t calm down, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. If you haven’t been through this, you’re in no position to judge those of us who have.

Oh! I’m so sorry, I had no idea. No wonder you’re getting so upset. I thought you were just after a controversial story. Come here and let me give you a hug.

There, it’s going to be OK. How long do you have? Nine months?

I agree, no amount of time is enough to get ready, not for this.

Yes, they’ve learned a lot since the early days. If Doc Brown says that you’re going back to the womb, that’s what’s going to happen. I’m sorry that I can’t offer any comfort there.

Go ahead, cry on my shoulder if you need to. It’s going to be tough, but you’ll get through this. Do you have a surrogate picked out? You’ll want someone you can trust to take care of you.

No? Well, I don’t blame your friends, it is a huge commitment. I can put you in touch with some women who are professional surrogates. They’ll take good care of you, I promise. And at least you can be sure that you’ll come back out again. How young do they think you’ll get?

Oh, oh my. Really? First trimester? The doc’s sure of that? I see. I didn’t know anyone could get that young. That’s... That’s really tough.

Yes, I see why you asked about stopping it early. You’re right, that doesn’t happen unless the woman’s already bounced herself.

Yes, I’m afraid that does mean ending up like Frank.

I agree, there’s not going to be much left of you if you go that far back. I’m pretty sure a body that young won’t be able to hold your memories.

There there, let it all out. Mommy can take a few more tears. You’re not really researching a story, are you? Well, not for the paper, anyway. You just needed to find out what it was going to be like, didn’t you?

No, I don’t mind. But really, you could have just told me up front what was really going on. I do run a support group for people like us, after all. It’s not like I’d have said no.

Frank wants to assure you that you’ll still be yourself, even inside your new Mommy. And that it’s not too bad being back in a womb.

In your place, what would he choose? He says that he’d want to bounce early and get stuck. But he’s a bit biased, since that’s what he’s done already.

Yes, I’d choose the same, honestly.

Look, why don’t you stay for dinner and meet Gwen. I think you should talk to her too. She’s been there for Frank and I the whole way.

No, she won’t mind. We’ll be glad to help you through this, and I might know someone who’d be glad to have you for their baby. I’ll need to get to know you a little better, to find out who will be a good fit for you. This is going to be a bigger commitment than just being your surrogate for a few months.

The bathroom? It’s just down the hall on the left. No problem.

You’re right, Frank, she’s got it rough with that diagnosis. She really doesn’t have any more choice than you did, she just knows more about what’s going to happen.

Yes, I like her too. Why do you ask?

You’d like some company in there? I’m not sure that’s a good idea.

I owe you for this? Well, I guess I can see why you feel that way. But I’m still not sure, and then there’s Gwen’s reaction to consider.

OK, Gwen probably would like me even bigger. And I suppose I wouldn’t really mind. But I don’t think it’s possible to get her in there with you. I’m all closed up around you, baby.

Oh, I’d forgotten about the Reynolds case. I guess it can happen. I’m surprised you remember that one.

You’ve been thinking about this for how long, Frank? You really should have told me sooner.

Fine, I’ll make the offer.

Oh, you’re back! Frank and I were just talking, and he thinks he knows a good Mommy for you.

Me, actually. Apparently Frank has been wanting company for a while now, and he likes you. I think I like you too.

You don’t have to decide now.

Yes, we’re on a time limit, but we can still take a couple of weeks to get to know each other better before making any final decisions. We’ll be together for a long time, after all. And I still need to introduce you to Gwen.

Of course I’ll give you another hug. You can relax, baby. Mommy’s here now, and she’s going to make everything better.

 

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