And in following of my usual habit of updating, I give you another chapter of this story ^^

Enjoy :)

Disclaimer: Still not mine.

Disclaimer2: Mentioning Penny's family again. Thanks TerribleWaitress


The present – 4 years and 6 months old:

"Dad?" Leonard repeated, shocked at seeing his father standing in front of the door.

"Son, you look like you have seen a ghost." Phillip chuckled. "Can I come in?"

"Sure, sure." Leonard nodded, stepping aside. "When did you get back?"

"Last week. Since then we had meetings, debriefings et cetera. I wanted to call but they had misplaced our stuff and your number isn't listed, so I couldn't use another phone."

"How did it go?"

"Well, living for four and a half years as a tribesman was truly a remarkable experience. I ate things I never thought could be considered food."

"Like what?"

"Spiders, insects, certain roots. Pretty interesting diet."

"What else?"

"The rites of these people are quite interesting as well. They have dances for pretty much everything and I could have sworn that it started raining after we danced the rain dance."

"I think that might have been because of monsoon season." Leonard chuckled.

"So, what's up with you?" Phillip asked. "Where are my beautiful daughter-in-law and my grandson?"

"Dad, you should know that..."

"Phillip, what a surprise?" Penny interrupted them, seeing Leonard's father sitting on the couch as she came down the stairs.

"Ah, Penny. You're still as beautiful as ever." Phillip smiled. "And you're practically glowing."

"Thank you." Penny giggled. "How was your expedition?"

"In a word, amazing. It took a few weeks but at some point, we didn't miss modern appliances anymore." Phillip told her.

"And what will you do now?"

"Well, now it's debriefings, evaluations of the recordings from the hidden cameras and so on. That will take months to do."

"Are you doing it here in California?"

"No, it's in New York. I actually shouldn't even be here but I just had to see you." Phillip sighed. "I would have loved to contact you during the expedition."

"At least you had a good excuse for not calling." Penny said. "But Chris is now four and a half years old and Beverly has never even called, neither have Leonard's brother and sister."

"That's the thing I wanted to talk to you about when I called you before I left for my expedition." Phillip said.

"What was it?" Leonard asked.

"Leonard, haven't you ever wondered why you're the only one in our family with lactose intolerance? Or why your brother is so much taller than you?"

"Yeah." Leonard hesitated.

"The thing is, well... your mother... isn't really your mother." Phillip revealed.

"Eh... what?" Leonard asked shocked.

"You probably know by now that your moth... Beverly isn't the most passionate woman. Especially when it came to... uh... sex."

"Yeah, she told me once that she did it only to procreate." Penny interjected.

"Correct." Phillip nodded. "And as you know, our marriage ended when she discovered the affair I had with Pattie. But that... wasn't my first infidelity."

"It wasn't?"

"No." Phillip sighed. "A few years after your sister was born, I met a stunning young woman, who came to me for advice on her thesis. We hit it off and... well, one thing led to another and she found out later that she was pregnant. Her name was Stephanie and she was lactose intolerant."

"I see." Leonard said slowly, trying to process that information.

"Unfortunately, she died shortly after giving birth." Phillip said quietly, his anguish apparent in his voice. "That's why I took you home to Beverly. And that's why she treated you like she did."

"Why?"

"She accepted you in our home because it was, what she coined, the social convention. Since your birth mother had died, I was your only parent left and Stephanie's family couldn't take care of you, even if I had agreed to let you go."

"Which means, Beverly is basically still his mother, just not by blood." Penny mused.

"Kind of. Kind of like an adoptive parent." Phillip nodded.

"Who had the idea of treating me like a lab rat to be studied and controlled instead of nurtured." Leonard said morose.

"Yeah. And that's my fault as well, I was never around enough to give you the parental love you deserved."

"That's a lot to take in." Leonard groaned, rubbing his eyes.

"Where is my grandson by the way?" Phillip asked. "We weren't allowed to take anything with us but the tribal chief gave me a gift for him when I told him that I had a grandson I haven't seen yet."

"Oh, what is it?" Penny wanted to know.

"A blowpipe." Phillip presented one from his bag. "Not one of those made for merchandising purposes but a real one, hand made by the chief's son himself."

"Oh, cool, I'll get him."

"The least I can do. Doesn't matter that I love all my children equally but you, Leonard, have become my favorite just for finally giving me my first and only grandchild."

"Not your only grandchild anymore." Leonard smiled.

"What do you mean?" Phillip asked.

"Follow us." Penny smiled as well and got up, slowly walking upstairs with Phillip behind her and Leonard at the end.

They walked across the soft carpet of the upper floor, past Chris' room and Leonard's home office towards their master bedroom. Though they would have their daughters sleep in their own room soon, they wanted to keep her in their bedroom for the first few nights. Penny quietly opened the door and led them inside, using the dimmer to turn on the lights with low enough illumination that it shouldn't wake up the babies but make them visible.

"Oh my god." Phillip breathed. "Are those...?"

"Yeah, twins." Penny nodded, getting emotional simply by looking at her girls. They were born this morning."

"Uh, should you be home already?" Phillip asked worried.

"I feel fine." Penny nodded.

"What are their names?"

"That one is Diana." Penny pointed to the left girl. "And the other is Selene."

"The other way around, actually." Leonard chuckled.

"Dammit." Penny grumbled, keeping her voice low. "Well, it's dark in here."

"Can I hold them?"

"If you stay a bit longer until they wake up hungry, then of course." Penny nodded.

"If you will have me, I stay the night."

"Gladly." Leonard agreed. "Now lets go see your grandson."

"Alright." Phillip said and the three left the bedroom.

"Chris?" Leonard got his son's attention after opening the door to his room.

"Yes, dad?"

"There's someone here to meet you." Leonard pointed to his father.

"Grandpa!" Chris said excited.

"There's my favorite grandson." Phillip laughed, hugging Chris.

"Funny, since I'm your only one." Chris returned, hugging him back.

"How do you know he's your grandpa?" Penny asked. "He left for his expedition before you were born."

"I saw pictures." Chris shrugged.

"Wow, you have grown." Phillip said.

"Yeah, lets see how much I will continue to grow, given my dad." Chris giggled.

"Hey!" Leonard moped.

"Chris, I have something for you." Phillip presented the pipe. "A blowpipe made by the son of the chief of the tribe I spent the last four and a half years with."

"Wow, cool. Thanks, grandpa." Chris smiled and took the pipe. "Daddy, I have finished my paper, what do we do now?"

"Well, I will proofread it one more time and then we will send it to several science journals where they evaluate it and if they find it free of errors, they should publish it. I know a few of the people at some of these journals, people we can trust."

"Why several?" Penny asked.

"The last thing we want is someone reading Chris' paper and publishing it under his own name." Leonard explained. "By sending it to more than one, we make sure that none will steal it because if someone would, the others would jump all over him."

"We could also bring a copy to the bank, have it officially time-stamped there and put it into a safe deposit box until it's published." Penny suggested. "That way we could prove that it's Chris' work."

"That's a great idea, Penny." Phillip said impressed.

"We could go tomorrow, Chris." Leonard said. "I'll read it tonight."

"Thanks, daddy."

"Wait a second." Phillip interrupted, finally coming to grips what the other three were talking about. "Your not yet five year old son wrote a scientific paper?"

"He did." Leonard nodded proudly.

"How? And about what?"

"Chris is a genius. Penny told him. "His IQ is two hundred and sixteen."

"And the paper is about synthesizing a stable super-heavy element." Chris finished. "And it works."

"It does?" Phillip asked, shocked. "That could revolutionize industries. Think of the applications."

"It works at least in simulations." Leonard brought them back to reality. "Once it is published, some lab has to actually try it."

"Chris, how did you get this idea?" Phillip asked.

"Uncle Sheldon tried it once and failed, then he gave me his paper as a birthday gift. I took his idea and fixed it."

"Did you acknowledge that in your paper?"

"Yes, I did in the footnotes and addendum."

"That should stop him from officially complain." Leonard nodded.

"He could do that?" Penny asked.

"Yes." Phillip told her. "If a scientist publishes a paper based on an idea of another, he needs to acknowledge it, otherwise the other person could complain. And since Sheldon already had a paper out, even though it was disproved, he could cause trouble."

"Alright." Penny nodded. "But for you, it's time for bed."

"Yes, mommy." Chris followed her order and disappeared into his en suite bathroom.

"Wow, you raised him well. No complaining, no claiming he wasn't tired." Phillip said impressed. "And two hundred and sixteen IQ, holy hell."

"Penny is an amazing mother." Leonard said proudly.

"And Leonard is also an amazing father." Penny added, smiling at her husband.

"Which I am very amazed by given his role models." Phillip chuckled a bit self degrading.

"If you keep up your efforts, I will revise my opinion of you." Penny winked at him.

They retreated back downstairs, talking for hours about Phillip's expedition, learning a lot about tribal life in the jungle. Penny couldn't fathom living years without modern appliances but gained a healthy respect for both the tribal people and Leonard's father and his team, who chose to live like that for several years.

As Leonard and Phillip talked, Penny went upstairs to feed her daughters when they woke up and started crying, reminiscing about Beverly and how that woman never contacted them once. Knowing now that she wasn't Leonard's mother by birth, her behavior got clearer but even if she wasn't Leonard's birth mother, she still had three grandchildren now who she never bothered to visit, even though two and three were only alive for a day now.

She fought with herself if she should make an effort to contact her, deciding, after changing the diapers and putting her girls back to sleep, to take a picture of their sleeping forms and send it to Beverly. She hoped that the woman would at least react in some way, congratulating them by phone or email. Something to show Penny that she valued her family.

With a sigh, she went back downstairs to bid her husband and father-in-law good night, her tiredness after this long day finally catching up with her.


The past – 3,5 months ago:

"Who's the cutest baby?" Penny cooed, gently moving the baby's arm, even though it was still too young to actually see her. "Who's the cutest baby until my girls are born?"

"Hey!" Bridget huffed.

"Just kidding." Penny grinned at her sister. "So, how does it feel to be a mother again? And how does the hubby deal with it?"

"God, it's so great. Josh is over the moon." Bridget smiled. "Though some nights I really want to kill that man for giving me his sperm that turned my egg into that milk hoover."

"Eh... what?"

"My boy is always so hungry, I swear my left breast has gotten smaller than my right one."

"Hyperbole much?" Penny laughed. "Why not use a bottle?"

"I think I will switch to one from time to time. But the thing is, he consumes so much, he craps a lot. Never had to change so many diapers in one day."

"Then here's hoping you bought the washable kind." Penny winked.

"Of course. I can't afford to buy a box of diapers every day."

"By the way, where is Josh?" Penny asked.

"Working." Bridget sighed. "As a restaurant manager, you have to work even on holidays."

"I thought business closes on the fourth of July." Penny wondered.

"Not as many as you think. Restaurants stay open, at least until later afternoon because most people barbecue anyway in the evening, like we are doing. I hope he'll come here later after he's done."

"Should we wait then with eating?"

"I don't think dad wants to wait too long. He put the meat into the smoker this morning." Bridget mused. "Also, I'm getting hungry."

"I hope dad remembered to put some pork into the smoker as well." Penny fidgeted, just thinking about meat making her mouth water again.

"I don't think so. I'm pretty sure he forgot about your cravings."

"Well, then he will have to remedy that situation later. I'm sure he doesn't want to have to deal with his six month pregnant daughter who craves pork like a drug addict who needs his next shot."

"Didn't you use to be a vegetarian?"

"I know!" Penny wailed, causing the baby to start crying. "Oh, I'm sorry, Justin, don't cry." she quickly added, picking up the baby and rocking it on her arm.

"Dinner is ready." Leonard announced.

"You, come here!" Bridget ordered, causing Leonard to take a step back at first before hesitatingly closing on them.

"What did I do?" Leonard wanted to know but was surprised when Bridget hugged him.

"I said it before but thank you again for getting Josh to propose to me." Bridget said, holding Leonard tight and making it look a little awkward because she was somewhat taller than him.

"That's quite enough Bridget." Penny admonished. "Stop pushing your breasts against my husband's body."

"Very funny." Bridget chuckled and took her son from Penny. "Now lets go eat."

"Alright, dig in." Wyatt said to his family, pointing at the mountain of meat in the middle of the table.

"Daddy, did you smoke an entire cow?" Bridget asked.

"Pretty much." Wyatt shrugged.

"Leonard made dumplings." Meryl told them, placing several bowls with self-made dumplings on the table.

"Oh, gimme gimme." Bridget giggled, pouring a dozen onto her plate before taking a huge piece of meat.

"No pork?" Penny asked, getting teary and cursing her hormones.

"I'm sorry, I forgot." Wyatt apologized.

"Well, luckily I didn't." Leonard grinned and placed a plate of pork meat next to Penny's plate. "I put it into the smoker this morning."

"So that's why I found you standing next to it." Wyatt nodded. "You're smart."

"God, I love you so much." Penny moaned and started eating.

"I love you too." Leonard smiled, causing Penny to look at him.

"Oh yeah, you too." she said with her mouth full.

"You were talking to the meat, weren't you?"

"No?"

"Was that a question or a statement?"

"Yes?"

"Never mind, lets eat." Leonard sighed in mock frustration and sat down between Penny and Chris.

He put some smaller pieces on Chris' plate and added a few dumplings, Meryl pouring some gravy on top of it. Chris began eating as well, digging into the dumplings with more fervor than Bridget, consuming them faster than his aunt did, who watched and didn't want to be upstaged, so she too began inhaling the dumplings, the two of them emptying an entire bowl in less than ten minutes, much to the mirth of the others.

Penny ate her pork, moaning at the taste and also helped herself to a healthy amount of dumplings, her husband having a great ability to make them tasty. She looked around, momentarily sad that her brother was in jail again but here, being with her family, was something she always cherished. And in three months, her girls would be born which would turn her world upside down once more but she would welcome it.

And woe to anyone interfering with her family. Especially Sheldon.


The present – 4 years and 6 months old:

"Good morning dad." Leonard greeted his father as the latter stumbled into the kitchen, placing his travel bag next to the door.

"Morning, grandpa." Chris smiled at the older man, who grunted a greeting before sitting down.

"Something wrong?" Penny asked.

"It's nothing." Phillip told them. "It's just... I'm still getting used to sleeping in real beds again. The cots made of leaves and animal hide were functional but lacked in comfort. And I miss my morning shot."

"Morning shot?" Leonard asked.

"Yeah, they had some form of bean that was like Guarana, only a lot stronger." Phillip explained as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. "Imagine eating a single bean with the effect of three double espressos."

"That's... really strong." Penny nodded, taking a sip of her own coffee. "Oh man, I missed that."

"The first day I ate them, I was jumping around the jungle like a rubber ball. Couldn't sit still." Phillip chuckled. "Got used to them after a while. They were great though. One bean in the morning and you never even yawned for twelve hours. Though you crashed pretty hard in the evening and slept like a stone."

"Was it dangerous?" Leonard wanted to know.

"Well, yes. I mean, snakes, spiders, some insects who can kill you if they bite you or crawl into you when you're sleeping. The tribesmen and -women wore those, what I would call amulets, and in there they had a spicy concoction that warded off most insects and spiders. Not snakes though."

"What was that concoction?"

"I have no idea, the chief didn't allow that information to be divulged. But one thing I can confirm, you shouldn't taste it. It burns through your throat like hot lava and exits the other side the same way." Phillip shuddered to the laughter of the others.

"What's the most disgusting thing you ate?" Chris asked while eating his cereal.

"I can't really answer that." Phillip shrugged. "It depends on what you deem disgusting. If I say I ate slugs, some people would almost throw up while others shrug and ask if they can have any."

"I don't know if I could eat insects." Penny shuddered.

"Insects have one of the best contents of protein in the animal world. They are actually a dietary staple in a lot of countries."

"Still." Penny groaned and heard one of the girls crying, followed by the next. "And our girls are hungry again."

"I get the bottles." Leonard said, getting the two prepared bottles with formula.

Penny went upstairs and came back down with the two girls in their portable carriers, Leonard taking Selene from her carrier and holding her in the crook of his left arm and taking one of the bottles with his right to feed her. Penny copied his action with Diana, both sitting at the table, feeding their daughters with smiles on their faces as the girls greedily sucked the white liquid out of the bottles.

"I remember when I had you on my arm like that, feeding you." Phillip reminisced. "I did it way too rarely though, always too busy with my research."

"Why didn't you make more time for your son?" Penny asked accusingly.

"I can't say. If Beverly were here, she would probably say that I did that because you reminded me of the woman who gave birth to you. And she might even be right." Phillip sighed, holding back tears. "You have no idea how it feels like when you sit in a hospital room, your newborn son in a bassinet next to you while his mother is saying goodbye to you because she feels her life slipping away, only to close her eyes forever a few seconds later."

"Oh, dad." Leonard sobbed, going over to his father to hug him, a bit awkwardly because of Selene between them.

"I'm so sorry, son."

Penny held back tears as well, the emotional display in front of her too much while Diana sucked the bottle dry. She used the distraction and burped her before placing her into the carrier, then took Selene from Leonard to burp her as well and let Leonard and Phillip really hug. As she put Selene into her carrier, she watched the two men reconcile and felt blessed that she always got along with her family, even her brother who was either in jail or rehab most of the time.

"Alright." Leonard composed herself. "I'll take you to the airport and then me and Chris will head to the post office to send the copies of his paper to the journals."

"Good luck, sweetie." Penny said, kissing Leonard then went on to hug Phillip. "Nice to have you back, daddy-in-law."

"Thank you for giving me granddaughters." Phillips returned the hug. "I promise that I will try my hardest to visit them as often as possible."

"I will hold you to that." Penny smiled and let him go, watching her husband, son and father-in-law leave. "Well, the house belongs to us girls now."

She took her phone again and snapped several more pictures of her girls, sending them to her parents, her sister, her brother and her friends. She was especially curious about her parents' reaction, since they now had five grandchildren, counting Henry, the firstborn of Bridget that she had to give away. But right now, she needed to wipe the milk away that Selene had just spit out again.


Done. Hope you enjoyed ^^

Review please :)