Chapter Text
Airy stood thigh-deep in the pond's teal waters, plucking the seed heads off of the stalks of cattails (or reeds, as the lantern referred to them as) and placing them into his handcrafted basket, the dried plant stalks putting it together pressed against his body as he worked. He needed to restuff his bed because he'd put his mattress through so much use via resting that the miscellaneous bits of wood chips, pebbles, and hardened plant matter began to dig into his back, acting like tiny, annoying daggers.
Fortunately for Airy, these stalks had grown many nice, bulky seed heads for him to pick, certainly enough for stuffing. He decided that it was a good idea to pick more than he thought he needed, because if it turned out that he didn't have enough, he didn't want to take the risk of having to cross the little wooden bridge again. It had been a rather rainy day yesterday, and the bridge was much more slippery than usual. He didn't want to potentially slip off of it and injure himself on the stalagmite below. The woods were experiencing a gentle breeze at the moment, the rustling of leaves producing a calm symphony for, sadly, only him to listen to.
While he tactically removed and placed each head into his basket, he felt as though he was on autopilot, as he was currently lost in thought. He had finally started up a new season of his competition, ONE, for the first time in.... a decade? The concept of time slowly stopped having any sort of value to Airy after spending so long in this dimension, completely isolated from any real contact from another living object. Anyways, it didn't matter how long it had been since his first eventual failure of a competition, he had prepared for his second season for so long, and now that it was coming to fruition, he was confident he'd do a good job hosting and felt incredibly proud of himself.
After finishing his first challenge,
Charlie and Liam (or Tomato and Backpack, which were the names Airy assigned them with for his competition) were the two who had lost. It was an easy decision for Airy on who to eliminate; he liked Liam more than Charlie. Besides, he needed to make Liam a cast first, as he'd broken his leg earlier. He was partially done with it already, and he was planning on finishing it once he got back from collecting stuffing for his bed.
Speaking of which, he noticed that he had just finished filling up his basket with seed heads. Feeling satisfied with the amount he'd collected, Airy turned around and began making his way back to his cave.
-Timeskip-
"Is the cast done yet?" asked Amelia, a hint of concern for Liam in her voice.
"Yeah... just need to attach the wooden plank." Airy responded in his usual monotone voice. He was multitasking by finishing up Liam's cast while simultaneously typing in the code into his computer that would send Charlie back. However, while he was typing in the command, he had misclicked on the dropbox that let him select where the contestant would be sent to. Thanks to him putting a little more focus into putting the cast together, he didn't notice his error and entered the code in. Wherever the infant was at right now, he definitely wasn't home with his mother.
"What kind of cast are you making??" Charlotte questioned.
"Hold on... before I give Backpack the cast, I'm gonna have to straighten out his leg." Airy stated in his iconic dull voice. Given what he said he was about to do, Liam started to panic somewhat. He spewed out a bunch of pleas stating that he didn't need his leg straightened, but to no avail, as Airy wasn't listening. He put in the code that let him swiftly manipulate his leg into a straight line before placing it into the home-made cast he'd prepared.
Airy sat there in his chair, glad that he had helped out Liam with his leg before something caught his attention. Outside of the aboad that was his cave, he could faintly hear strange noises. Confused, he decided to investigate. He was so familiar with his little dimension that he called home that he knew nothing outside should be able to make sounds like that. To him, the noises seemed to sound like... gibberish? That sounded about right to him.
Pushing back the overgrown vines which acted as a door to him, he treaded around the area which was the exterior to his cave, stepping in the lush, soft, green grass as he traveled around. After a bit of searching, he found the unexpected source of noise, Charlie, who was casually sitting in the grass. Genuinely baffled, Airy just stared at the infant child in front of him, whom was spitting out random baby sounds without a care on his little baby face. Eventually, the small boy turned his attention towards the big bronze lantern man awkwardly looming over him. He began to giggle, finding Airy's appearance rather goofy.
Airy, after getting over his initial shock, knelt down onto the ground close to Charlie before carefully scooping him up into his arms.
"How did you.. get here," he asked Charlie, as if this baby who hadn't even spoken his first word yet could give him an answer, "I might've messed up the code... lemme get you back." With that said, he promptly walked back over to his cave, now with a baby in tow.
Airy plopped down onto his chair with Charlie in his arms and immediately started typing in the command that would send him back. He realized that he had forgotten to mute the contestants', and he could hear them being concerned about the whereabouts of the baby and demanding Airy for answers. He would tell them that he was eliminated after he was done entering the code. That plan, however, was abruptly canceled once the screen displayed an error stating that he had typed in an invalid command due to the lack of a valid person ID being typed. Assuming he'd just made a typo, he tried again, being more meticulous about his spelling this time, but he still received the same error once again. This didn't make any sense to him, he'd been able to send living beings to and from many other dimensions before, why wouldn't the computer recognize Charlie while he was here? At that moment, it hit him: he'd never attempted to send someone to another dimension from his current dimension before, as he'd been the only one living there the entire time he'd been there. Despite the assumption stating otherwise that, until now, had lived in the back of his head, it might not be possible to use the computer to move living beings out of his dimension, or it may at least require the use of a different command that he was yet to learn.
Regardless of which option was true, Charlie would be stuck here until Airy figured something out, if he ever did. Wondering what to do, he gazed down at the little one he had been carrying in his arms this whole time, who still remained carefree and happy, not at all aware of how dramatically the course of his life had shifted. His arms were stretching outwards towards his left, trying to grab one of the lantern's handlebars, but failing miserably due to them being out of his reach.
As he continued to watch the infant he was holding, he remembered how the gameshows he used to watch back on Earth tended to include a secondary host in addition to the main host. They were called co-hosts. At that moment, he felt his burner automatically flare up for a brief moment, acting like a spin-off of the cliché lightbulb-turning-on-over-someone's-head symbol for when one had a great idea. Airy turned his head over to face Charlie, who currently had his own hand in his mouth.
"Tomato... do you wanna be my co-host?" Airy asked the little one, a slight hint of excitement in his otherwise unenthusiastic-sounding voice. Charlie looked up at him, his attention being caught after hearing his voice. Upon seeing Airy's full head from under his smoke dome, the child began laughing due to how unexpectedly long it was to him. He found it really silly. Airy cracked a faint smile, taking the little guy's response as a yes.
Now that he had a new co-host with him, he grabbed his microphone to announce him to the contestants.
"Hey guys-" Airy started before getting cut off by Bryce.
"Where's Tomato?!" he questioned in a shout, almost interrogating the lantern.
"... I'd like to introduce you guys to my.. uh.. new co-host." Airy continued, before holding the baby up to the microphone, as though to somehow allow Charlie to introduce himself. Being suddenly placed in front of this foreign object from the child's perspective, he began babbling to himself in awe, allowing the rest of the contestants to realize where he had went.
Outraged cries ensued from the Plane, all absolutely pissed that he was essentially holding the poor baby hostage from his family even after he promised to send eliminated contestants back home.
"I sent him to me on accident when I.. um.. tried to eliminate him... he got the most votes. I don't know how to send him back to.. Earth from here." he explained. He could hear chatter from the contestants about his response, some questioning why he'd even have Charlie as a co-host, considering how he was a baby, others complaining about his incompetence. Right then, he remembered the other important announcement he had about the competition.
"By the way, I'm adding more contestants."
-Timeskip-
The second competition had just ended, and he stated to everyone that Magazine, Subway Seat, and Contact Lense were up for elimination this round. Elated with himself that he'd successfully finished a second challenge without accidentally sending everyone on the Plane to an early grave, he turned to Charlie to let him know that the challenge ended, only to be surprised to find that the little one was fast asleep in his arms. Wondering how he didn't notice him napping sooner, he began swaying him back and forth in his arms at a slow, relaxing pace.
Feeling physical touch like this from another object after being alone for so long felt very strange to the lantern, but also... really nice, comforting even. He didn't realize just how much he missed contact until now. He enjoyed the company of his new co-host, he found him to be rather endearing. He could definitely get used to having the little one around.
Gradually lifting himself off his chair, he ambled towards his little wood cabin until he went through the entrance. He kneeled onto the floor, stationing his right side near his basket of seed heads, all the whilst shifting Charlie into the crook of his left arm, holding him close to him. He fumbled around with the sides of his bed mattress randomly until he finally found the hole he had cut into it in order to have a spot to put the stuffing into. He grabbed each seed head one at a time, pushed the fluff off of the center of the head, and shoved the fluff into the bed. He rinsed and repeated this process, occasionally checking on Charlie to make sure he hadn't woken up yet, until he'd finally gotten through the basket. Satisfied with his refilling work, he placed the little co-host on top of his bed, allowing him a proper place to rest. Airy sat by the side of the bed, staying near the baby. Feelings of pride for his new addition to ONE started flooding into his mind, as well as this other emotion. A strange, new emotion. He couldn't think of a word for it, but it made him have this sudden, strong desire to watch his little co-host grow, learn new things, and he wanted to be the cause of his development. Perhaps, he wanted to raise him.... eh, the lantern would unpack that later.
" 'Night, Tomato..." Airy murmured to the lightly snoring infant in front of him.