Author's Note: I've been meaning to release this story since January of this year, when the idea originally came to me, inspired by how my 2-year-old nephew was acting around Christmas time at the end of last year, and obviously, life got in the way, delaying the release of this story. However, I'm finally going to sit down, and get this story released, and I do hope you enjoy it! Oh, and there may be points throughout this story where Tommy and other characters might act out of character at points, just a warning is all. With that said, let's move on, to the first chapter!

Bedtime Banishment

Summary: When two-year-old Tommy Pickles sleeps over at Zack's apartment for the very first time, he's convinced that a bedtime routine isn't necessary. Post going home, he challenges this rule, amongst others, seeing he's now two, and entering the phase of the Terrible Twos, but he'll eventually learn the hard way, that sleep is important.

Disclaimer: I do not own the original Rugrats characters, they're the property of their original creaters. I do own the OC's of Zack and his Aunty Celeste, while Jesse and his family are owned by Jesse Barrow Stories DEAD, and Peter is owned by TCKing12.

Chapter 1, Heading to the Sleepover

An empty passenger train, being pulled by a blue steam locomotive was heading down the track towards a roundhouse in the distance, just as the sun was setting in the sky. Inside the steam locomotive, was two-year-old Tommy, dressed in a train engineer's outfit, complete with the official hat worn on top of his dark purple hair that had started growing in post his second birthday, as he made his way towards the train yard. Meanwhile, in another section of the large layout of train tracks, Dil and Zack, wearing construction uniforms with hard hats on top of their toddler sized heads, were packing up their tools, and making their way over to where Tommy was wrapping up his rounds of train runs for the day. As they made their way over the deserted train tracks they had recently laid down, they saw several street lamps illuminating the area, as they approached the train yard, where Tommy had gotten out of his locomotive car and was undoing the cuffling bolts of each of the train cars, storing them in the train yard, before pulling his locomotive into the roundhouse for the night. Dil approached the caboose and grabbed at it, just as Tommy was undoing it from the cuffling bolt.

"That's my train!" Dil yelled out in his tiny baby voice.

Engineer Tommy turned towards his railroad construction working younger brother.

"No Dil, that's my train, and it's about time we finish up for the night. You and Zack did a good job on building the tracks though. Now, help me push this locomotive into the roundhouse." Ingeneer Tommy instructed, as he, Dil, and Zack tied some rope to one end of the locomotive, and the three of them, pushed it into the roundhouse, before the three of them came out, and Tommy closed the door behind him.

No sooner were the three of them standing in the train yard, admiring the work they had done, when two much taller ladies came out from behind a field of trees off to the side, stepping into the light illuminated by some lights on the front of the roundhouse. The figures appeared to be Tommy and Dil's mom Didi, and Zack's aunt Celeste.

"Time to get ready to go Tommy." Didi called.

At that moment, the darkened train yard transformed back into Tommy and Dil's bedroom, where sitting on the floor was a massive Brio train layout, complete with several mazes of tracks going in every which direction around the bedroom, two drawbridges, an extension bridge, and two tunnels, one of which was made from a mountain, and a toy roundhouse, and several toy trains made out of wood with metal wheels were on the tracks. Tommy, now back in his normal clothes, consisting of his light blue signature t-shirt and a pair of dark blue shorts, with no hat on his head was sitting on the floor next to the roundhouse, where he had just placed one of the locomotives inside, while Zack and Dil, now back in their regular attire, were sitting slightly further away, back in their regular clothes, Zack with his light blond hair, wearing a dark blue t-shirt and a diaper, and Dil, with a small tuff of strawberry red hair on his head now, wearing a green and yellow striped t-shirt and a diaper, sat on the floor of the bedroom, each holding some pieces of train track in their hands. Upon hearing Didi enter the room, the three toddlers looked up from their playing of trains, to find Didi and Celeste standing in the doorway, Celeste, holding Zack's diaper bag. This told Zack that his aunt had gotten off of work, and judging by looking out the window and seeing the sun setting in the sky, he knew it was time to head home. However, everybody had gotten so lost in their afternoon train adventure, that they forgot what was happening tonight. It had been two weeks since Tommy's second birthday party, and the end of the Gray Plague incident, and on this particular night, Tommy would be sleeping over at Zack's place for the very first time. Didi came over to her oldest child, ruffled his dark purple hair, making him giggle, as Tommy stood up next to the toy roundhouse, smiled up at his mother and giggled.

"I think somebody's excited about tonight." Didi commented with a smile.

Tommy then remembered what tonight was, and remembering this, he grew very excited, as it had been a very long time since he had gone to a sleepover at anybody's house, and to one by himself for that matter. Didi went over and picked up the large plastic box that held the train tracks inside of it, and everybody went around and started taking track apart, and putting the trains away. Normally, this part was a bit disheartening, but in actuality, this was one thing Tommy and Zack didn't mind picking up, as this only meant they could build an entirely new train layout to ride the rails on the following day, or the next time they played together. Everybody thought the Brio trains was something Tommy received for his second birthday, but Zack knew where it really came from, it was only a matter of time, before everybody else found out the truth. Of course, as with most things Tommy wanted to do, Chuckie was against them, and preferred playing with trains that went around a simple circular track, like the electric train they're seen playing with at the beginning of Hand-Me-Downs, and Murmer on the Ornery Express, but once Zack introduced Tommy to the Brio trains one rainy day within the last two weeks, when they couldn't go outside, prompting a new way to go on an imaginary adventure, Chuckie reluctantly went along with the idea of having train tracks go in all sorts of different directions, complete with bridges, tunnels, and so on, over the boring circle that Tommy had long since outgrown once introduced to the Brio stuff. Of course, he'd then complain about how when trying to build tracks, he'd try to connect the bumps together or the wholes together on two tracks, which didn't work, needing help from his sister Kimi, or Tommy and Zack to show him how the bumps went in the wholes, and often, because the redhead wouldn't move his fingers out of the way, he pinched his fingers when building the tracks. And of course, Phil and Lil would argue over how a bridge was suppose to go, or who should ride the train, whether it be Reptar, or a frait train full of mud and worms, and there was even the ocasional arguments over Reptar being too big to ride a train, arguing over how the characters of Tiny Buddy and Dawn from Dinosaur Train would ride trains, so why not Reptar too. Of course, the best part of all was that there was finally one toy that Angelica could care less for, because trains didn't interest her in the least, keeping her away while she watched TV or colored in the coloring book she brought with her to play with. However, on this particular day, only Zack showed up to play, but while they had fun together, Dil, who wasn't quite one-years-old yet, still had some social tendancies to work out, still grabbing at Tommy's trains, almost breaking the wheels off of a couple, and not sharing very well, demoting him to railroad construction, and on this particular day, Tommy decided to be the driver while Dil and Zack built track together. Sometimes, they'd play in this fashion, while other times, they'd pretend to be the train cars themselves, doing their own spoof on Thomas and Friends, obviously, Tommy was the number one engine, and because he went by Tommy, over his full name of Thomas most of the time, when pretending to be one of the locomotives, he'd call himself, Tommy the Tank Engine.

However, not only was it time for Zack to head home, but Tommy would be going with him, as he'd be sleeping over at his apartment, for the very first time! After all of the train tracks and trains were picked up, as the track, along with the bridges and tunnels were stored away in a large oversized plastic box, the train cars lived in a plastic bucket with Reptar on it, and the roundhouse was placed on top of the closed box of track. Once it was all picked up, Didi ran around and got Tommy's overnight bag packed, put him into a fresh diaper, and gave him a hug and a kiss, Dil crawling over and doing the same, before Celeste, now carrying Tommy's overnight bag over her shoulder, holding Zack's hand with one hand, with Tommy leading the way, all headed downstairs, where Stu met them at the bottom.

"Have fun tonight Champ." Stu said, patting Tommy on the head and giving him a hug and kiss.

"Thank you for letting Zack stay over today while I went to work." Celeste said, walking towards the door where she grabbed her white cane that she had stashed in the corner.

"No problem. Tommy and Dil love having Zack over to play." Stu said with a smile, seeing Celeste, Tommy, and Zack out the door, as they headed down the sidewalk to the driveway where Celeste's purple driverless van was parked.

"We'll see you tomorrow!" Celeste called in the direction of Tommy's house, as she strapped Tommy and Zack into two car seats she had in the middle seat of the van, then went around to the driver's side door and got in herself.

"Goodbye Celeste, goodbye Tommy." Stu called from the front door, waving goodbye, as he then closed it behind him.

Soon, Celeste was in the car, starting it up and putting the coordinates into the on board GPS computer, insuring that it drove everybody back to her apartment. Once the car was backing out of Tommy's driveway, Zack turned to Tommy, a sleepy look in his eyes.

"I'm excited about tonight, how about you Tommy?" Zack asked.

Tommy turned to Zack and smiled.

"Me too! I've never slept over before, and I think it will be lots of fun!" Tommy replied happily.

Just then, Zack let out a huge yawn, as he closed his eyes and drifted off for a short nap, seeing the movement of the car often made him sleepy. This would sometimes be the case for Tommy too, but not quite like with Zack. Tommy would be more likely to get sleepy when returning from an exciting adventure. However, he was too excited to sleep, as he turned and looked out the window, seeing all of the street lights, houses, and other buildings wiz by, as he thought back to the last time he slept away from home by himself with only one of his other friends. It then hit him that the last time he recalled this to be true, was when he slept over at Chuckie's, after he got his big boy bed, and he thought there was a monster under his bed, and Tommy helped convince his best pal to stand up to the monster. He couldn't believe that it had been that long, as most of the sleepovers since then took place at his house, and most of them consisted of Chuckie, Phil and Lil, like that time they saved grandpa Lou from the monster in the matress, or the time Tommy wished for an airplane, and they awoke the following morning to find his house soaring through the clouds. In fact, the last time he recalled it being just him and Chuckie was a sleepover at his house, when they were worried the sandman would come to get them, and in the end, Chuckie's daddy showed up and rescued them from the sandman, after destroying him with buckets of water they threw at him when he got inside the basement. However, after that, Dil was born, and a time after that, they all went to Paris, and Chuckie got a little sister Kimi. Gone were the days when the dynamic duo would ever be alone together for a sleepover, wherever it took place, so this was kind of a special treat for Tommy, even though he'd miss his little brother, Dil had to make do without him when he was in the hospital with the Gray Plague, surely he'd be fine for just one night. And while they had all slept over at Angelica's one night, when they told that ghost story of finding the light in the attic, realizing that tonight was Tommy's first sleepover at Zack's made him think back to the first time he ever slept over at Chuckie's.

His mommy and daddy were going away for a long weekend, and in Tommy's memory, it was the longest time he had ever been away from home, even though prior to this, he had spent a long weekend at his maternal grandparents, and he and Angelica discovered the toys hidden in their attic, that one more or less, slipped his mind, because he was with family members the entire time, while when he slept at Chuckie's, nobody in his family was there. However, while he figured it would all be fun and games with his best friend, who had slept at Tommy's house several times prior to this, like when he thought his daddy was a robot and when Chuckie was getting potty trained to name a couple of them, Tommy had only been over there for a few hours to play at most, so he wasn't around to go through the strict routines Chuckie had in place of having to pick up his toys at the end of the day, or go right to sleep at night post lights out. Nor was Tommy ever over for breakfast prior, thus, getting some unpleasant experiences of trying Dummi Bears Sugar Lumps for the first time, and having to watch the most boring TV show on earth, Space Trek Babies. However, in the end, he learned a valuable lesson that everybody does things in their homes differently, and not only was he looking forward to spending the night at Zack's, he was going to try to do his best, to respect how things were done in his home, as best as possible.

"As long as I don't gotta eat that yucky Dummi Bears cereal, or watch Space Trek Babies, I'm ready for anything." Tommy thought to himself, just as Zack's aunt's driverless van turned into the parking lot of their apartment complex.

And this, ends the first chapter. So, how will the sleepover go? Find out, come the next chapter!

Author's Note: My nephew has become a big fan of trains, and got a bunch of Brio stuff last Christmas, which helped to prompt this idea, and while the Rugrats were never as big into trains, I always imagined how things might go if they ever did have access to a massive toy train layout like the Brio type stuff. I also made reference to several Rugrats episodes, those being, Hand-Me-Downs, Murmer on the Ornery Express, The Matress, Send in the Clouds, Sleep Trouble, Real or Robots, Chuckie vs. the Potty, Ghost Story, Toys in the Attic, Under Chuckie's Bed, and The Odd Couple, where while it's never exactly mentioned that it was Tommy's first time sleeping over at Chuckie's house in The Odd Couple episode, just by much of the dialogue, in particular, Tommy's lines in the episode, it's pretty obvious that he's never slept over at Chuckie's house prior to this episode, and seeing that in production order and airing order, it airs before Under Chuckie's Bed, and in episodes before The Odd Couple, Chuckie slept at Tommy's, but not the other way around, this is most likely true, assuming all of the episodes, minus holiday specials, actually took place in the order they aired where real time is concerned. Also, most of the sleepovers post Dil's birth and the trip to Paris were at Tommy's, not Chuckie's, which was another thing I sort of made reference to, with Tommy thinking it had been a very long time since he had last slept over at anybody else's house, and certainly just him and one of his friends, now that he and Chuckie both had siblings, but because Zack is an only child, that obviously, wouldn't be the case this time, unless Tommy and Dil had both gone to the sleepover, which as seen, only Tommy is attending. And yes, this story takes place not long post the events of Rugrats and the Gray Plague. Anyway, hope you all enjoyed the first chapter, and, I should hopefully, have chapter two up soon, and before Rugrats airs for two hours beginning at midnight on The Splat! Perhaps they'll replay The Odd Couple tonight too, and anybody who's read this chapter by then and is rewatching the episode can now see why I'm pretty sure that episode was in fact, Tommy's first sleepover at Chuckie's, even if it's not stated as an actual fact, context clues in the episode itself give it away. I also cleared up the continuity error presented, where Tommy mentions it's the longest he's ever been away from home, figuring he meant the longest he's ever been away from home without any family members around, as technically, he was with his cousin and maternal grandparents in Toys in the Attic prior, so while that was being away from home for a long weekend without his parents, it wouldn't count since he was still with family members, but this was the first time he was without any family members at all come The Odd Couple.