This chapter is dedicated to LunarFairyPrincess1989 for adding this story to her favourite story list!! It made my day!!! Thanks!!

Chapter 4—An Announcement, Troublesome News & Secret Snacks

Everyone sat around the breakfast table, sans Adam, and enjoyed the large variety of food to eat; Kat, as usual, was wearing a fair amount of her food.

Emma shoveled more scrambled eggs onto her plate and drowned them in ketchup, "Jeez, Em, save some for the rest of us," Brennan said as he wrinkled his nose.

"Sorry, but they're so delicious!!!"

"Dishes," Kat said, solemnly nodding her head in agreement, even though she didn't have any eggs on her plate yet.

"Slow down, Babe, you're going to choke," Jesse advised.

"No, I'm not!" she uncharacteristically yelled around a mouthful of eggs.

Shalimar sat back in her chair, absently holding Kat's cup of juice while everyone looked at the red haired beauty.

"Chill out, Emma," Brennan laughed uneasily; trying to diffuse the situation until she gave him a deadly look and he snapped his mouth shut.

"Hey, Em?"

She swallowed a mouthful of eggs, "What?"

"Come with me for a sec."

"Whatever you have to say, you can say it here."

"It'll just take a second," she said as she looked pointedly towards the hallway.

"Just say it, Shalimar!"

"Okay. When was the last time you had your period?" the feral bluntly inquired.

Emma froze with her fork halfway to her mouth and Shalimar was pretty sure Jesse wasn't breathing anymore, "I'm not pregnant! Jeez! A girl gets an odd craving and suddenly everyone thinks she's pregnant! No one would be batting an eyelash if it was Jesse or Brennan! Besides, it's only been…" she counted in her head, "Five weeks, but I've always had an irregular cycle and we've been careful. Besides, I would know if I was pregnant."

"Emma, I didn't realize I was pregnant until I was a week and a half along and I'm a feral. We know these things a lot sooner than everyone else…almost instantly."

"This is ridiculous!" She looked over at her ashen husband, "Deep breathing, Jess," she reminded him.

"Well, there's one way to know for sure…" Shalimar hinted.

Emma dropped her fork in exasperation, "Fine! I'll get Adam to run a pregnancy test!" Her chair screeched on the tiled floor as she hastily stood up and left the room.

Jesse sat there for a moment looking completely and utterly shocked, "Jess? You should probably go with Emma," Brennan said, trying to contain his laughter.

"What?"

"Go with Emma!" Brennan commanded.

"What? Oh yeah! I'm going!" He called over his shoulder as he dashed from the kitchen.

"Pass me the eggs, please," Shalimar requested nonchalantly as Brennan burst out laughing.

Shalimar joined in as she shook her head. Brennan's hysterical laughter made her giggle even harder and before they knew it, Brennan had his head in his hands; wiping away the tears as Shalimar held her stomach and Kat laughed at her parents' silly behaviour.

~*~The Lab~*~

"Adam!" Emma nearly shouted as she marched into the room defiantly with Jesse following on her heels.

"Huh?" he minimized what he was working on and focused on the young husband and wife in front of him; noticing for the first time the looks on their faces, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong!" Emma snapped before sensing everyone else feeling anger. She had unwittingly projected her anger onto them. Taking a calming breath and starting much calmer she said, "I need you to run a test for me."

Adam's entire expression became full of concern as his eyes intensely searched the psyonic for any signs of what could be wrong, "What kind of test, Emma? Are you feeling okay?"

"I'm fine!" she growled.

"Okay, then what…?"

"We need you to run a pregnancy test," Jesse said although his voice sounded like a mix of excitement and apprehension.

"Oh," The older man looked at the pair in front of him and nodded thoughtfully, "I didn't realize you two were trying for a baby."

"We weren't…but still…"

"Okay, Emma, take a seat on the chair and we'll have the results of the scan in a minute."

Emma complied with the request and as the yellow light washed over her body she silently seethed; she wasn't mad at anyone other than herself. She should have asked Adam to run a test as soon as she was late for her period. She felt like the world's biggest idiot.

The scan ended and Adam turned to the nearest computer monitor and read the results while Jesse held Emma's hand and watched as her expression changed from angry to thoughtful.

Adam turned to his surrogate children and grinned at them, "Congratulations! You're four weeks pregnant, Emma!"

Emma swallowed and tried to decipher the emotions she was feeling before feeling the explosion of exquisite bliss radiating from him; she looked at Jesse's face and knew that everything was right in her world; he had a big, goofy grin on his face and a dreamy expression in his eyes.

"Em," he said, his voice much huskier than it had been a minute ago, "We're going to have a baby. I'm going to be a dad!"

"I can't believe it," she whispered as a tear slid from her eye and her free hand caressed her toned stomach. She grabbed her husband and gave him a bone crushing hug before kissing him passionately.

Once the kiss had been broken Adam cleared his throat, "I hate to break this up, but there are a few things you need to know. Emma, as of right now, you're no longer in active duty; you can help the team from Sanctuary. You're going to need weekly check ups to ensure that both you and the baby are healthy and that there aren't any complications from the merging of your DNA and Jesse's DNA since two different classes of mutations are present. I'm going to have you start a new vitamin regiment and I need you to take care of yourself even more than you were before, okay?"

"Absolutely," Emma agreed.

"For sure," echoed her husband.

Adam smiled at the shocked and elated couple for a moment; remembering this image for the darker times that were just beyond the horizon. He made sure they weren't watching him before quickly transferring the files he has previously been working on to his room before exiting all relevant programs and silently vanishing from the room.

~*~Kitchen~*~

Jesse and Emma walked back into the kitchen. One look at them and Brennan whooped in excitement while rushing to shake Jess's hand. Shalimar hugged her friend and whispered in her ear, "Congratulations, Em. I know you and Jesse are going to be amazing parents!"

"Thanks," she whispered back before holding Shalimar at arm's length, "How did you know, Shal?"

Shalimar smirked, "I had a hunch and it paid off, that's all."

"You're lying," Emma observed.

"I'll forgive you for reading me without my permission this time, Em."

"Spill the beans!"

"There were subtle changes that I started noticing a couple weeks ago. At first it was nothing big: not as much energy, craving certain foods; things like that. Then you started having a harder time controlling your emotions and keeping your walls up in situations that would normally not have ruffled even one of your pretty little feathers. "

"Uh huh…"

"Then you started to look slightly…off. I don't know how to explain it. It's like something shifted and was slightly off but I couldn't put my finger on it until I was sitting beside you earlier. You…smelled differently."

"She smells like she always does," Jesse defended.

"That's not what I mean, Jess. Animals have an exceedingly heightened sense of smell; they can tell when someone else has been in their territory, if food is good to eat, when a female is in heat and even when a female is pregnant." She saw their faces and raised her hands in defense, "All I'm saying is that you smell differently today than you did every other day since I met you all those years ago. I only put two and two together. It doesn't take a rocket scientist."

~*~Adam's Room~*~

He reread the screen for the millionth time and growled in frustration, massaging his temples; trying to get rid of the migraine that had been plaguing him for the past few days.

There has to be something here that I'm just not seeing! There has to be a way to figure this out! If only there was another geneticist I could trust with this information so I could get a second opinion!

His fist slammed down on his desk in sheer aggravation. He rubbed his hand thoughtfully and sighed before reading the screen one more time; praying that an answer would suddenly pop into his mind.

Kathleen's mutations were growing so rapidly that he feared they were going to spin out of control. If that happened and her feral side was dominant at the time she would seclude herself from the others and become extremely violent if approached. She would be completely feral in every sense of the word and unable to reason with; resulting in her hurting or killing herself or the others. If her elemental side was dominant then she wouldn't be able to stop the discharge of energy coming from her body until it killed her.

Either way, his granddaughter was in grave danger and he had no idea how it fix it. The regular 'tune ups' that he preformed on the adults seemed to be only mildly effective, but they were losing their effectiveness with each passing check up.

Adam rose to his feet; exhausted from not sleeping and began his nightly trek to the lab to try and create a way to save the young child's life.

~*~Kathleen's Room~*~

She woke from her sleep and panicked when she didn't recognize where she was until she remembered. She let her eyes glow in the dark as she began to distinguish the new objects in her big girl room. She rose from the bed and exited her room, using the door that connected with the hallway and not the one that would take her to her parent's room.

Once in the hallway she heard the distant, muted sounds of computers blipping and keyboards clacking so she followed the noises to find her grandfather's lab. She stealthily walked into the room and silently jumped from the floor to the med bed; watching the older man work.

"Grandpa, what you doing?"

Adam jumped and spun around, "Kathleen? What are you doing awake?"

"Not sleepy! What you doing?" she asked again.

"I'm doing grown up work, honey."

"Oh." She sat there for a moment, thinking. "Me help?"

Adam began to shake his head no, but decided to use the child's willingness to help in his favour, "Okay."

"How, Grandpa?" she eagerly asked.

"I need to run a scan of you."

"Again?"

"Yes, again."

She frowned, "No! Me no like 'cans!"

"I'll make a deal with you. If I can run a scan of you then I'll let you do a scan of me, okay?"

The child's eyes grew to the size of saucers, "Yes!!"

"Good girl. Lay still for Grandpa."

Kathleen complied and Adam preformed the scan, saving the results before lifting her and lying down on the med bed. Kat jumped from the chair and onto the floor with the amazing grace that never failed to amaze and terrify him at the same time. "When you're ready to start the scan all you have to do is say 'start scan'."

Kathleen nodded solemnly before standing up straight, "Start 'can!" she commanded.

Adam pressed a button on the remote control in his hand while maintaining a meticulously straight face as the scan began. When it finished he scooped up his granddaughter and carried her over to the computer to view his scan, "Hmm…what do we have here?"

The little girl frowned at the image on the screen, "Don't know…" she sighed with her hands in the air.

Adam had to contain his laughter so he pointed to the screen, "This is my heart."

"Heart," she repeated.

"These are my lungs."

"Lungs," she nodded.

"These are my intestines."

"'Testins."

"And this here is my stomach."

"Tummy?"

"Yes, that's my tummy," he chuckled as his stomach growled.

"Tummy hungry!" Kathleen giggled as she poked him in the stomach.

"Yes, it is," he agreed. "Do you want me to make you our secret snack?"

The petite feral leaned in close, "Secret snack!" she whispered, excitingly licking her lips, "Yes, please!"

"Okay," Adam whispered back, "We have to be really quiet on our way to the kitchen! Quieter than a mouse!"

"Grandpa?"

"Yes, honey?"

She leaned even closer and in a very soft voice informed him, "Mouses aren't quiet. I hear them and Mama can too."

"That's because you have special hearing, Kathleen. But a mouse is a lot quieter than an elephant, right?"

She giggled at the absurd comparison, "Yes! 'Course, Grandpa!"

"Come here and give me a kiss. I need a kiss," he told her as he picked her up and kissed her.

Kat rained wet kisses all over his face before giving him a big hug, "Better?"

"Much better! Now let's be very, very quiet," he whispered as they left the lab, with Adam over exaggerating his tip toeing and Kat clapping two hands over her mouth to stifle her laughter.

Once they were in the kitchen, Adam put Kat down and began to retrieve the items he was going to need. He lifted Kathleen up and sat her on the large island with the food items, "You need to pass me the crackers, okay?"

"'Kay," she agreed as she began to hand her grandfather crackers while he spread peanut butter on them. After they had a bunch of crackers covered in peanut butter Adam put them on a plate and gave Kat a bottle of maple syrup, "You get to do the fun part!"

"Whoa!" she exclaimed as she poured syrup all over their 'secret snack'.

"That's good, Kat!" he praised as he took the syrup bottle away from to child. He gave one syrup drenched cracker to Kat and took one for himself as they began to munch on their snack.

When they were on their third crackers Kat suddenly stilled and cocked her head to the side, "What is it?" Adam inquired.

"Mama!" she gasped as she shoved her cracker into her mouth.

Moments later the older feral sauntered into the room, looking like she had just woken up, "Well, well, well, what do we have here?"

Kat shot Adam a panicked look, "Tell Mama?"

"Sure," he smiled.

"Secret snack, Mama!" she announced as she proudly offered mother a cracker while syrup slowly rolled down her chubby arm.

Shalimar took the cracker and eyed it carefully before taking a bite and chewing slowly; eventually making a face, "Ugh! Adam! What are you feeding my daughter?"

"Kat caught me eating these one night when she couldn't sleep and it's been our secret snack ever since."

"Why would you put these things together? It's an abomination!"

"Hey! I used to make these all the time while I was at school since I couldn't cook much back then. Besides, peanut butter has a lot of nutritional benefits!"

Shalimar gave her half eaten cracker a distasteful look, "Do you want the rest of this, baby?" Kathleen snatched the cracker from her mother and shoved it into her mouth without a word, munching happily, "She is definitely Brennan's child."

"Shalimar," Adam began in a grave voice, "I need you to promise me something."

Shalimar's face instantly became full of concern, "What it is?"

Adam looked at Kathleen for a moment before turning back to Shalimar, whose face had drained of all colour, and he changed his mind, "You have to promise me you won't tell anyone about the secret snack. You have to swear to keep it a secret, no matter what!"

"Secret, Mama! No telling!" Kathleen clarified around her last cracker.

She gave a mock salute before placing her hand over her heart, "I promise I will never tell anyone about your secret snack," she vowed.

The young feral nodded seriously before Adam picked her up and held her at arms length, "I'll get her cleaned up and put her back to bed."

"I would expect nothing less," Shalimar chuckled before kissing her daughter on the forehead and licking the syrup from her lips, "Sweet dreams, my love"

"Night night, Mama!" she waved a tiny hand, covered in cracker crumbs, syrup and peanut butter.

Adam bathed Kathleen before dressing her in a clean set of pajamas. He placed her in her bed and tucked her in, giving her a kiss, "Goodnight, honey."

"Grandpa?" came a small voice in the nearly dark room.

"Yes?"

"Stay," she commanded, "…Please?"

"Okay, move over," he said as he lay down in the bed with his granddaughter. A few minutes later her breathing steadied and he knew she was asleep. He quietly got out of the bed and closed her door; returning once again to his lab.

Please R&R!! I've only gotten one review as of last chapter and I think that I may not continue to write because I write stories for your reviews…

~*~FiestyFeral~*~