Story Notes:

            Type: Kidfic, humor

            Rating: G

            Word Count: 900 words

            A/N: Special thanks to Anne for her help with the German

No More Monkeys

Daniel is not happy.  As Teal’c and I haul in the groceries, I can hear him fussing as Carter bounces him and tries to soothe him with the soft, hushing sounds that babies everywhere love to hear.

That, you see, is the problem.  After an accident on an alien planet, Daniel is a baby.  Granted, he’s usually pretty content for a baby.  Thrilled with exploring his toes.  Fascinated with the mobile above his crib.  Happy to chew books and various other objects. 

Fraiser is sure Daniel’s brain regressed along with his body.  But sometimes I have to wonder.  Maybe he knows something is wrong.  Different.  Maybe, somewhere in the back of that brain, he still remembers what it was like to talk and walk and generally be an independent adult.  Now, though, he’s barely able to crawl.  His words consist of babble, coos, and gurgles.  And let’s not discuss the diapers.  So when the kid gets a little fussy, I can’t really blame him.

“Carter, you know the monkey rhyme?” I call out from the kitchen as I stack jars of baby food in a cupboard.  “The one about monkeys jumping on the bed and one falls off and they call a doctor?”

She enters the kitchen, still bouncing Daniel even though it’s not working.  “Yes,” she admits hesitantly with a question in her tone that wonders if I’ve finally lost it.

“Tell it to Daniel.  He likes that one.”  When she gazes at me skeptically, I shake my head at her.  “Oh, ye of little faith.  Try it.”

She sits beside the table, with Daniel in her lap, and recites, “Five little monkeys jumping on the bed.  One fell off and bumped his head.  Momma called the doctor, and the doctor said, ‘No more monkeys jumping on the bed.’  Four little monkeys…”

I tune her out as she continues down to three monkeys and then two.  Daniel listens for a while, examining her face as if she’s a precious artifact, but she’s not doing the rhyme quite right, not the way he likes it, so at two monkeys, he begins to fuss again.  Carter sighs.  The grocery shopping had taken me and Teal’c all afternoon, and if Daniel had been like this the entire time we were gone, she’s probably tired of dealing with him.

Teal’c must’ve had the same thought because he reaches for Daniel.  “Allow me, Major Carter.”

He settles Daniel into his arms and recites the monkey rhyme.  Since Teal’c has a deeper voice with just enough “alien” in his inflections, it looks like it’s working.  But on the last line, Teal’c leans forward until he’s almost nose to nose with Daniel and booms it out in a command that would have made Apophis proud.

“No more monkeys jumping on the bed!”

Daniel stares, wide-eyed, for a startled moment.  Then his face contorts, and he wails.

I can’t help it.  I laugh.

“Here, give him to me.  Watch a pro handle this.”

Disgruntled at Daniel’s reception to his performance, Teal’c plops Daniel into my arms.

“Hey, you.”  I jiggle him into a more comfortable position.  We’ve done this a lot since the accident.  “Let’s show these two how it’s done.  What shall we start with, hmm?  German?  You wanna do German?”

Daniel blinks up at me.

“Okay.  Here we go.  We start with fünf, right?  Fünf little monkeys.”  Other than the German word for “five” at the beginning, I recite the rest of the rhyme in English.  But when I’m at the last line, I switch back to German, “Kein Affe springt mehr auf dem Bett!”

Carter’s jaw drops.  Daniel waves two pudgy hands toward my face.

“What?  Vier now?  Are you sure?  Oh, that’s right.  One fell off, so now there are vier.  Here we go.  Vier little monkeys…”

I go through the whole rhyme, counting the number of monkeys downward in German until we’re down to the last monkey.  When I say the last “no more monkeys jumping on the bed” in German, Daniel babbles as if he’s saying the words along with me.

Carter’s mouth is still open.  She snaps it closed when I grin at her.

“What was that?” she demands.

“German.  My accent’s awful, I know.  You should hear me mangle Russian.”

“But where--?  How--?  Why--?”  She stutters to a stop and glares at me as if it’s my fault she can’t come up with a full question.

“Multilingual nursery rhymes,” I say as Daniel coos happily in my lap.  “They work every time.”

Teal’c frowns.  “You are not multilingual, O’Neill.”

“I am, actually.  I can say one through five and ‘no more monkeys jumping on the bed’ in six different languages.  I’m surprised you guys haven’t heard anyone from the language department complain about how much I’ve been hanging around there lately.  Right now, I’m learning ‘Jack, be nimble, Jack, be quick, Jack, jump over the candlestick’ in French.  It seemed appropriate.”

Daniel bats at me with an arm.

I look down at him.  “What?  Right now?  I’m not that good at it yet.  I don’t want any snide comments if I get the words wrong.”

Daniel agrees with a burble.

“All right then.  Here goes.  ‘Jack soit agile, Jack soit rapide…’”