Chapter 7: Shaky

Austria, October 12th 1788

4:32 PM

Lukas right now was laying on a couch with his face buried in it. There was a quill and some sheets of paper beside him, but he didn't seem to care about it.

A stuffed moan could be heard coming from the baby in pain.

'This hurts so much!!! Why's this happen?!'

Lukas was having a lot of cramps, they had started a while ago and they seemed to just get worse and worse. And Lukas couldn't figure out for sure whether they were natural or if something truly was wrong with his body.

'Everyone in the mansion did notice that I've been much less active than I used to be, however, they didn't even seem to care at all! Even Mama doesn't give a damn! She notices but she does nothing to help me out! I wonder if I just have to wait for this to end?'

Lukas let out a sigh.

'Better said than done.'

Lukas started hitting the couch lightly in an attempt to ward off his pain, although it somehow helped, his pain naturally didn't fade away completely.

Olivia walked into the room where Lukas was and sighed. She sat beside him and started lulling him.

"There, there, you're having your baby cramps aren't you, honey? Olivia is here."

'Yes, I am, Olivi- wait! It means that this is just natural?! What a relief! I swear, my pain even seems less intense now!'

Lukas couldn't be more relieved right then, the pain actually didn't bother him that much, what really bothered him was the unsureness of whether or not it could be harmful to him.

Now that he felt a bit better, he decided to ask Olivia to put him down. It was no big deal, he just had to look down and try to reach out to the coach.

As soon as Olivia saw Lukas doing that movement, she frowned.

"Oh, you are feeling good already, young master? That's what I call a fast recovering."

'Yeah, yeah, Olivia, whatever, put me down.'

Lukas wasn't worried that Olivia would suspect him, it was nearly impossible that she would realize the true reason for Lukas feeling better all of a sudden. It was easier for her to think that Lukas only wanted some cuddles.

As soon as Olivia put Lukas down, he reached out to the sheets of paper and checked his drawings. Despite his cramps having hindered him, Lukas had improved quite a lot, however, he expected that he would already be on the next stage at this point, but it turns out that it was quite difficult to make his drawings completely stop being shaky.

'I am starting to wonder if even adults can draw it without being shaky, this is surprisingly difficult.'

Lukas sighed internally.

'Snap out of it! You're just a baby, you'll eventually be able to do it!'

-----

Austria, November 14th 1788

5:27 PM

Elias was sitting at a desk in an office which seemed to be his. He spent most of his time there, he didn't seem to interact much with Frida, the servants of the mansion and even with his brother.

He suddenly heard a knock on the door, which was followed by his sigh.

"Come in!"

However, nobody did and the knock on the door continued. Elias sighed annoyed and opened the door. He came across a baby sitting on the floor with an innocent expression.

'Hey, daddy!'

Elias raised his brow.

"What are you doing? Were you truly knocking on the door to call my attention, you brat?"

'Don't talk to me like that! I'll get sad!'

Lukas looked up to his father and made a cute expression. That would've made anyone in the mansion completely melted... but Elias and Karl, of course.

Elias sighed and rolled his eyes.

He crouched and picked him up. Lukas let him do it since he didn't mind being picked up by people who usually don't anymore.

'I am not immature anymore.'

Lukas smiled confidently and nodded in approval.

"I'll get you to Olivia. Don't bother me anymore."

'Whatever.'

What was the reason for Lukas being doing this? Basically, he was procrastinating. His drawing sessions had become really tiresome, he drew the same things lots of times every single day and still, the progress seemed really slow, it would be exhaustive for an adult, imagine for a baby.

'It's been over one month since I learned about my cramps and two weeks since I learned to crawl properly, it's still a bit tiresome, not to mention painful due to the cramps. I guess I'm getting used to the pain though, very slowly, but I am.

What's bugging me is my slow progression, I've checked the drawings from 3 days ago and today's are still the same! I used to progress much quicker, I don't know what happened!'

Actually, Lukas did know what had happened, his goals were really difficult to achieve. Some servants drew with him and even their drawings were a bit shaky, honestly, there were even some that were shakier than Lukas's, which almost made Lukas burst out in laughter.

'Hehe, what an idiot that guy was.'

Elias walked through the aisle to a room where Olivia was.

"Olivia, Lukas was wandering around, can't you even do your job properly? Just keep watch on a baby for a few hours! Is it really that difficult?!"

Olivia could only clench her fist, her blood was boiling, she hated Elias and the Hügel house with all her strength.

"I-I'm sorry, Mr. Hügel, I promise this won't happen again."

"Tsk."

Elias handed Lukas to Olivia and went back to his office without saying anything else. Lukas contemplated Olivia's anger with curiosity, she was always calm, but when she saw Karl or Elias, she would become a completely different person.

Actually, there was always an awkward atmosphere when members of the Von Neumann and Hügel houses were in the same room. They didn't seem to comfortable with each other's company at all.

'Why did Mama even have a child with him if nobody here likes the Hügel house? Another thing I'll have to ask later. How many are there already? About 300, right?'

------

Austria, November 24th 1788

4:55 PM

Lukas looked at a sheet of paper dumbfounded. He couldn't believe it. His drawings were stopping being shaky. He had made it! Lukas still drew another shape to confirm it and it was confirmed!

He had managed to draw something without making it look shaky at all. It looked absolutely straight, despite his sight being bad, it wasn't tricking him.

'F*ck yeah! Take this, Universe! I am the boss here!'

Despite Lukas having just screamed mentally, it had still demanded a lot of effort, so he tool a deep breath and then cleared his throat.

'Okay, Lukas, get a hold of yourself. You still have to be able to do it with your right hand. Yes, there's no time to waste'

Lukas closed his eyes in order to try to calm down but he opened them quickly again with a smirk on his face.

'F*ck it! This adrenaline rush doesn't go away, oh my God! This work finally paid off! I'm glad I didn't give up! I did procrastinate quite a lot, but it still worked!'

Lukas took a deep breath once again and this time, he took the quill with his right hand started drawing the geometric shapes with it. Those were still a bit shaky after all.

Despite Lukas being very happy, he still wondered how adults couldn't draw perfect geometric shapes. They must have drawn much more than Lukas after all.

'Well, I can think about two hypotheses, either this absolute immersion in drawing all day, every day paid off or maybe me having started to draw very, very, ridiculously, absurdly early paid off... or maybe both, yeah, that's more likely.'

Lukas nodded in satisfaction with the conclusion he had come up with. It seemed very consistent to him, so he would just take it as the absolute truth from now on, or at least until a better hypothesis came up.

Lukas was more relieved now, it was like a huge weight had lifted off his back, he was really worried that it could be impossible to make his drawings to completely stop being shaky, but you just had to be more stubborn than your instincts of hand shaking.

-----

Austria, November 28th 1788

3:57 PM

Lukas laid on the couch with his face buried in it, this time, it wasn't pain, even though it still bothered him. He was just lazing around, he didn't want to do anything today, however, the mansion was pretty noisy, they were apparently getting ready for something called "Christmas".

Lukas rolled over and looked at the ceiling with a bored expression.

''Christmas'? Don't tell me it's another baptism thing, I am not putting my hopes high, I don't wanna get disappointed like before. At least, I hope there's a party this time!'

Lukas raised his right hand, he moved the fingers of his right hand for a bit and then sighed. He was very impatient, he wanted to go to the next stage at once! However, his right hand was still a bit shaky. Lukas knew this was just temporary, but he didn't know for how much longer.

'Whatever, it doesn't matter how long it will take. My guess is of three to five days, but even if it doesn't work within that time, I'll still keep practicing.'

Lukas sighed.

'Of course, better said than done. This eagerness of mine is so inconvenient!'

Lukas closed his eyes for a moment as he pondered a bit.

After a while, he opened his eyes with determination.

'No! If my guess is of three to five days, then I'll make it two! Let's break all the f*cking records, here!'

Lukas had been overusing swearwords quite a lot lately, he was afraid that he would be saying it when he got older, but he believed he could control it, so it didn't bother him so much.

'Actually, if there are words that aren't supposed to be said... why were they even invented?! Crimes are one thing, they're done for either necessity or for pleasure and they end up causing people's suffering, but... swears?! Are you serious?!

I bet the dude who invented them had this exact intention! What a smartass! He would make everyone be afraid of saying these words without them even knowing why! What a genius! I love them already!'

When Lukas heard people cursing for the first time, he didn't understand well why the servant was nagged by the other about the baby being there and that it might affect him in a bad way.

When Lukas listened to it he couldn't more confused. What? Some words would cause affect him in a bad way?! When he didn't even know what those words meant?! At least say something concrete! Don't speak with riddles!

'I wanted to speak with riddles when I grew up first! Not fair!'

Well, anyway, he was sure that the only answer he would get was something along the lines of:

"You shouldn't say that because God will punish you!"

"God only knows what will happen to you."

Lukas sighed.

'Dude, I already said it! It's ME who will speak through riddles! ME! Not you! ME!'

After all that zoning out, Lukas even had forgotten what he was doing. Lukas looked around and pondered for a while.

'Oh! Oh, right, right, right! Drawing not shaky stuff with your right hand within two days, alright, let's do it!'

The moment he was going to start drawing, Frida had entered the room where Lukas was.

"Hello, my baby!"

'Sh*t! Today's not my day, huh?'

Despite Lukas looking pissed, deep inside, he was happy to see Frida. She picked him up and started to speaking softly with him.

"Is my little boy drawing? My baby draws so beautiful things!"

'I don't know what you're talking about, it's just random stuff.'

Lukas was just being sarcastic at this point, he knew that what he was doing was frighteningly impressive, he was even surprised nobody noticed that he had reached such point in drawing.

Anyone would think it was pretty gradual, but no, this wasn't gradual at all. He had gone from doodling to drawing perfect geometric shapes in about two months. This was not gradual, this was absurdly fast!

Lukas sighed internally.

'Anyway, I'm glad they didn't notice, or perhaps they did notice but they are already tired of getting impressed over me.'

Lukas actually found this reason pretty acceptable, but he didn't want like the idea of his whole attention going away. Lukas didn't want to admit it, but he loved attention, he loved to feel flattered and superior to everyone.

Frida suddenly started smelling something.

"Oh, Lukas! You dirtied your diaper! I'll call Olivia right away!"

'Well, I guess I still have much to improve.'

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