A/N: I just wanted you all to know that I was serious about continuing this story so here is another chapter. Uploads will be slow, but I WILL continue to upload for this story until it is finished.

The weeks dragged on as their building was renovated and made usable. Miranda and Leenalee tried to make time to go by everyday just to see it but only managed every other day or a few times a week. They got their candidates together during this time. After all of the initial work was done the women sat down to build a theme for their daycare. They asked the kids what they would like to see in the classrooms, what kind of games they should have, toys, the color of rooms, what they should call each age group; essentially, all the fun stuff.

The boys talked all over each other and jumped up and down in their excitement. Road laughed at their silliness. Boys get excited over the strangest things. Miranda suggested they draw pictures for the flyers and to decorate the walls.

"Do you feel like doing something, Cross?" Leenalee called to him. "You've been laying down since you got here."

"You keep trying to drag me into this but it was your idea," he said as he sat up.

"It won't take much to put together a few flyers and print them out," Miranda said.

"Daddy says everyone should help each other," Road said. "He said that I should should help too."

"That's right Road," Leenalee replied. "It's gonna take some teamwork to get everything done. We could send you out to do some footwork and hand out the flyers instead of just making them."

"Alright, alright, I'll make the flyers." Cross sat in front of a laptop and sighed. "Did you two see the other daycare about a block from here, opposite the park you always take the brats to?"

"I saw that place too!" Alma shouted. "It's got puppies on it and balloons! I wish I could go see what it looks like inside."

Kanda looked up at him. "It doesn't matter because our daycare is better. You can go to that daycare if you want but if you did I couldn't be bothered with you anymore."

Alma plopped down next to him and lowered his head apologetically. "I was just saying it'd be cool to see what it looked like inside, geez, Kanda, you're so mean sometimes."

Kanda ignored him and went back to his drawing. Next to him Allen's drawing was...almost decipherable. Kanda stared for a time, trying to figure out what it was. There were squares. Rectangles, or they looked like rectangles. Circles were all around the rectangles and there were stars on top of the squares. Uneven lines connected all of the rectangles and squares and he was coloring it in now.

Little Allen noticed Kanda looking angry at his drawing when he went to look for a new crayon. ""Uh, Kanda, what's wrong?" he asked, leaning over his drawing and tilting his head to look at his face.

Kanda blinked. "What are you drawing?" He knew he couldn't just say anything to the younger boy so he confined himself to that.

"Oh! It's a castle! I think that the daycare will be like a huge castle with lots of stuff and we'll be able to fit lots of people inside of it," he replied happily. "It's gonna be awesome, right?"

"Uh, yeah," Kanda said, looking back to his own drawing. "But that looks more like one of those weird jumping things."

Miranda moved next to Allen and looked at his drawing. "Oh, how cute, a bounce house."

"No, a castle," he said.

"Oh, I'm sorry Allen." She squinted and tilted her head. "Oh! I see now."

"It looks like a bounce house," Kanda said.

"It's a castle," Allen repeated with a pout.

"Whatever, beansprout."

"There are castle bounce houses," Miranda said.

"No, it's just a castle!" Allen shouted angrily. "Not a bouncy house!"

"Okay, okay," Miranda said, massaging his little shoulders. "It's a castle. You drew it so if you say it's a castle, it's a castle. Right Kanda?"

He looked at her with the most straightest face and said, "I know what it's supposed to be but I can't unsee the bounce house."

Miranda gave him the look and he returned to his own drawing. She took Allen to the kitchen for a lollipop. They had stocked up on treats for around the house- not just sweets mind you! The boys were a handful as it was. But things like popcorn kernels and the popcorn machine, chips, microwavable foods and the like. Things they could grab for themselves to munch on when the ladies were busy. Kanda and Alma were old enough to help with the microwave so there was no worrying.

Leenalee scanned off finished drawing and left the making of the actual flyers to Cross. She plopped down on the couch and sighed heavily. "I think I'm gonna pull a Cross and sleep a couple of hours while you two take of things," she announced.

Before Miranda could protest a knock startled her from her thought. "Please," she said to Leenalee as she went to the door. She tilted her head at Reever then stepped back to let him in. "This is a surprise. Is everything okay Reever?"

"Reever!" the boys shouted, running up to him. Allen hugged his leg and Reever picked him up. He pat the older boys' heads.

"Do I have to have a reason to visit?" he asked.

Leenalee sat up. "No, but, it's just so odd. You haven't come to visit us in years. Is everything okay?"

Reever shrugged. "I actually came over to ask for your help. Johnny's mother wanted me to see if you would mind helping plan a birthday party."

The ladies gasped and Cross knew exactly what he was going to be doing for the next few days.

"Of course we will!" Leenalee replied, clapping her hands together. "It should be less stressful than planning the layout for an entire building."

"We'd be more than happy to help," Miranda said. "Right?"

The kids cheered. Reever laughed and sat down on the floor with them. "She said that she has the money to do it as big as she had ever wanted to for years, but she doesn't have the time to actually get everything together. She said we know him well enough to come up with something good. So, she trusts us."

Miranda and Leenalee's minds were already working over ideas. The printer whirred as it began to print of flyers. Cross left it to it's job and sat back on the couch. "This sounds like a huge headache, but I can feel those huge eyes of yours staring at me so of course I'm going to help." He looked down at Allen who was staring very intently at him. "When do we need to have all of this done by?"

Reever looked away from Road, whom of which had been staring at him since he got there and had been poking him since he sat on the floor. "His birthday's this was hoping to have it at the park but if we couldn't manage it then it could be at their apartment."

"We will definitely be having it at the park no matter what," Leenalee declared. "What kind of theme do you think Johnny would really like?"

"He seems to like building and making things," Reever said. 'Like the little toy you saw last time you were there."

Allen shivered at the memory of it. The thought of more things like that running around made him want to hide in his bed under the covers.

"A costume party then?" Miranda asked. "A robot themed party? Would that be hard to do in a few days?"

"It's Tuesday," Cross said. "Everything should be ready before Saturday. Early Saturday we would have to set up."

"Are you actually going to do something besides the heavy lifting?" Leenalee asked.

Cross gave her a look of utter disinterest. "Planning kid's parties is not on my list of talents."

"I'm surprised you would even have a list called talents," Miranda thought aloud then quickly covered her mouth.

Cross shook his head. "I'm going to ignore that because you need my help and you damned goodie-two-shoes are rubbing off on me."

They agreed that it should have something to do with building and some mechanical elements to it. With that in mind they started to brainstorm because it was almost time for Road to go home. They gathered the printed flyers to pass out when they went to the store. After Sheryl took Road home they went on the hunt for anything that looked like it could have been used at a robot party. They also grabbed some miscellaneous items like face paint, glow sticks and lots of DIY type things. This was goin to get crazy.

Reever called Komui to let him know what they were planning on doing. He threw some ideas their way as well. Firstly, they had to build a robot. The sooner they started on this, the more time they had to fix anything they didn't like. Reever wanted to use pieces of scrap metal to build one so they gathered that as well. Leenalee and Miranda wanted to make one of cardboard so the boys could help too. They drew out diagrams first but nothing ever turns out the way you plan it so they spent all night putting it together and taking it apart.

Reever left his supplies with them so there was no chance of Johnny accidentally finding it. Once they managed to piece together their robot they had to paint it. They put newspaper down everywhere and taped it up on the walls. They covered everything else in white sheet they could bleach. While Road was there she helped draw and cut out gears to hang from the ceilings and tape up wherever they could. They did they painfully patient task of making a birthday banner out of gears.

Cross was in charge of moving the furniture about so they would have space to do all of this. By Friday they had a box full of handmade and store bought decorations and costumes. They went out that morning to figure out the set up. There was plenty of space, that was for sure. They took pictures to keep it in mind. They took the boys there often, but the excitement might make them forget what the park looked like.

While out, they walked by the building to see how things were coming along. It seemed well put together on the outside but there was a lot of noise coming from inside. Perhaps the construction would be done sometime next week and they could in there and start painting. For the time being they returned home to make lunch for the boys. Everything was going to be prefect; they kept in contact with Johnny's mom and she loved their idea. There were rumors of fireworks at the party but no one was really sure about it's authenticity.

When the day finally dawned on them, everyone was at the park about nine getting everything. Komui would be bringing the birthday boy and his mom around one. Reever set out to retrieve the the food once everything was set up. Sheryl would be bringing Road to the party a little later. While they waited Miranda tried her hand at painting the boys' faces like robots.

"How hard could it be?" was what she said. She had a picture to go on, but it just didn't turn out quite right. Their faces had to be salvaged but it was alright for her first time doing face paint.

They also had to get into costume. They had decided to dress up like robot maids for the party. Yeah, they got pretty intense for this one. They even got Cross into one of those box robot costumes. Finding a box to cover his height was no easy task. A couple minutes after one, when everyone was in place and in costume, they spotted Komui's station wagon pulling into the parking lot.

His mom was in tears when she saw what they had done. Johnny ran about looking at and touching everything. He marveled at the robot Reever had put together and even at Miranda's costume.

"This is awesome!" he shouted.

"Happy Birthday Johnny," they chorused.

The festivities commenced. They ate, talked, the kids ran all over the park and other kids who came to the park were invited to join them too. It was just a time to have fun, no worries. Sheryl and Road joined the fray and things got worse, er, better. Where she had heard of birthday licks was anyone's guess. Once the sun began to go down they set off a few small fireworks and light some sparklers. Johnny's mom approached Miranda and Leenalee while the children played.

"Thank you so much," she said. "You did a wonderful job putting this together- and your costumes, my goodness! I really appreciate your help today."

"It's our pleasure to help when we can," Miranda said.

"Speaking of which, we are opening a daycare center soon," Leenalee said. "We'd be happy to watch Johnny for you during the day."

"I''m not sure I want to do daycare, honestly," she said, "I've just heard so many bad things about what happens in daycares...but I'm sure Komui wouldn't mind it, huh?"

"Komui enjoys Johnny's company, I'm sure of that. He looks up to him and Reever. We won't take that away from either of you, but just remember that we are the ones in charge and Cross will be there as well."

"Thank you. I will think about."

They sat down with a drinks and watched the children with their fireworks.

"I really like seeing them so happy," Miranda said. "It makes me feel better about everything. Watching them run around like this makes me feel good, even though I'm tired."

"You did a very good job ladies," Komui said. "Enjoy the victory while it's here."

They did enjoy it. Every laughing, screaming, running and jumping moment like it was their last. At one point they joined in, laughing and jumping with the children under the moonlight.