The Star - Part 5 (Patreon)

The effect was almost instant; Mika had proudly recorded the first airing of the commercial, forcing Sakura to watch it with her and her parents after picking her up from daycare that afternoon, not even letting her change out of her diaper first. Thankfully, while her parents had agreed that she ought to attend the daycare, they hadn't yet caved in to Mika's suggestions to keep her diapered all the time, although, any time she suggested it, Sakura could see them get a little closer, and watching the commercial seemed to help...

What it helped more, however, was enrollment at the daycare. The very next day, there were noticeably more young adults, even by the time Sakura was dropped off, and the numbers kept climbing with each passing day. Just like her first time there, whenever she walked in now, she felt like everyone was staring at her, including the students who had been there before her, making her certain they'd seen the commercial, too.

The newbies definitely had. Almost the first thing one of the new kids - a tiny, blond girl named Amy - did was bounce over to her, beaming. "It's you!" she exclaimed.

Sakura wasn't particularly scared of her, since, of the people here at the daycare, she was one of the few smaller than her, though she still wasn't sure how to answer, other than a confused, "Umm..."

"Thank you so much!" Amy threw her arms around Sakura. "I never would have known about this place without you! And you look even cuter in real life!" she giggled.

Sakura blushed, both from the compliment, and the realization that, apparently, this new girl liked it here, had come here voluntarily. She couldn't imagine that at all... "Do you want to play?" Amy asked, after a few awkward moments of silence. 

"Uh, not right now," Sakura shook her head. Amy took the news well enough, at least that time... It took a few more rejections for her to figure out Sakura didn't want to hang out with her at all, which wound up being a bigger problem for Sakura than Amy. 

It was getting harder to find quiet places to sit by herself - and even harder to keep her mind occupied as she did so - but she was doing her best, wanting to avoid everyone else as much as possible. She got some more curious stares, though nobody else that approached her until a few days later.

She was on her way back to the spot she'd claimed for the day, after a change, when a hand closed around her arm, halting her in her tracks. "Hey, aren't you the girl from the commercials?" another girl - Nikki, she'd find out later - asked.

"N-No," Sakura shook her head, lowering her blushing face as she tried to pull free.

"Yeah, you are," Nikki countered, reaching up to pet the pink streak in the other girl's hair. "Either that, or you're some kind of fangirl... I'm not sure which is worse." Sakura squirmed futilely in her grip, looking at the workers, at the cameras, waiting for someone to intervene. She couldn't help thinking that, if Amy were there, she could at least go for help, even if she was too little to do much herself.

"I'm stuck in here because of you," Nikki scowled. "My mom thinks this place can turn me into a stupid little baby like you from the commercial, but I think you were always like that, weren't you? I bet you never even got out of diapers in the first place..."

"Yes, I did!" Sakura protested, face red. "And I still am, when I'm not in this place!"

"Oh, you are?" Nikki smirked. "So this is just for show? No wonder you get to wear those tiny things." Even though she was getting to wear them under an overall dress, it was clear Nikki's diapers - like most everyone else's here - were far bulkier than Sakura's, big, pink things that forced them all to waddle. Of course, since they were mostly all bigger than Sakura, that advantage wouldn't help much, if she were trying to get away from them...  

"Look, it's not my fault!" Sakura pouted. "My sister tricked me into doing the commercial, I didn't know what it was for, and then..."

"How much older is your sister than you?" Nikki asked. "You're old enough, you shouldn't have fallen... Oh, my God." She giggled, watching Sakura squirm, seeing the expression on her face. "She's younger than you, isn't she? That's so sad... I guess you deserve to be here... But you still need to be taught a lesson, for dragging the rest of us along with you."