"Wow, you certainly have a very large house."
"My superiors pay their diplomats and explorers well, and I do not believe in skimping out on creature comforts."
"I see."
Adoption, contrary to what they show on television, is not a quick process. There are tons of forms to fill out, and besides that, someone actually needs to be sure that your house is actually suitable for a child.
Fortunately, this was a problem that was relatively trivial for me to solve. I'd decided to go build a façade house for her to examine (my tower would look rather absurd, and she'd probably ask too many questions that I couldn't answer). I'd made sure to add plenty of beds, lots of bathrooms, more than one dining room, and other creature comforts. I'd had to make the façade a rather large home, because space is really important with children. Finally, to make sure that Patricia believed that the children wouldn't grow up in a vacuum, I made a holographic disguise system that would let my creations disguise themselves as humans. I'd had to modify it a few times before the results became suitable indistinguishable from a baseline human. Still, the results were impressive.
Of course, I still had one ace up my sleeve.
"Is everything satisfactory, Ms. Kent?"
"At the moment, though I-"
"Hi."
Surprised, Patricia turned toward the source of the voice and found herself staring at Rory. We'd been walking past 'his' room in this house, so I thought it'd be prudent to introduce the two. Granted, Rory already knew that she was visiting, but he still wanted to meet her. Something I was perfectly willing to let happen. After all, the fact that I had raised Rory well spoke volumes of my parenting skills.
"Who are you?"
"I'm Rory."
"...okay. What are you doing here in the Commanders home?"
"...he's my dad."
"...he is?"
"Yes. He's really nice."
"I see...Um, where is your mother?"
At that, I started to get worried. I really hadn't thought up an excuse for that.
To my surprise, though, after a moment of surprise, Rory turned his head to his feat and darkened his expression, pulling off a convincing look of sorrow.
"Well...I don't really know. She left dad when I was three, and she's never sent me anything for my birthday. Or even talked to dad."
Patricia went really quiet at this. I did too, while also forcing a sad expression onto my face. Better play along with this. Also, wow, Rory was good at acting.
"...I see...Um, do you know why I am here?"
"My dad wanted to adopt those kids he found a while ago?'
"...Yes, actually. How-"
"He told me. He said I should know. Plus he thought it was rather lonely in this house, and I'm with him there."
Patricia went quiet again, before turning to me.
"I think I've seen enough. I'll talk with my coworkers, see what they think. Though, I must ask you one last question."
"Shoot."
"Why didn't you decorate the children's rooms?"
"I don't know what they like. They should have the chance to decorate their room however they see fit."
"Very well. Thank you for your time."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Of course, there was one other thing we had to attend to after that: showing her the children. Patricia did need to be sure they were okay.
I'd set up a mini-hospital nearby the façade house, where the children were being kept. The fact that they were still unconscious four days after I'd rescued them was worrying, but they were still relatively healthy, barring some minor undernourishment. I assured Ms. Kent that they were being cared for by the finest doctors 'my people' had available (which was true, even if said doctors weren't human), which seemed to assuage her concerns. Following that, she bid me farewell, as we returned to her orphanage.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
With her gone, I went back to my tower and pulled out some soda to drink. That soda was still made this far in the future was something I'd found very interesting. I'd never had the chance to try alcohol before I became a Commander, and while I cold have some now, it would probably look bad on me to drink now when I was very likely to become the adoptive father of ten children.
Plus, I wanted to talk to Rory, and I wasn't putting alcohol in reach of him.
Once he arrived, I filled tow cups with the sugary drink, then offered one to Rory. I also pulled out two straws and, after scrunching up the wrappers, gave one to Rory.
"...Thanks for helping me out there."
"You're welcome, dad. Do you think that nice lady will let those kids stay with us?"
"Probably...why did you claim that your 'mom' left us?"
"I look enough like you that most people would assume I'm your son by blood, so someone will ask if I have a mom. Plus you needed to look responsible. Wouldn't you look more responsible if your had a wife that abandoned you and her child, forcing you to raise me on your own?"
"True...you know, you're a lot wiser than I thought."
"I'm part computer. I learn fast."
"Indeed...hey, wanna see something cool?"
"...okay."
Oh, how I had want to do this.
Sticking my straw into my drink, I put my finger over the top and lifted it lout, trapping some of the sugary fluid in the straw. I brought this over the scrunched up wrapper of my straw.
"Here's how to make a inch-worm out of a straw wrapper."
Carefully, I slightly loosed my index finger, causing a drop of soda to fall out of the straw and onto the wrapper. The instant the fluid hit it, the straw began to expand, as if it was an inch-worm, trying to crawl away.
Rory's eyes were practically glittering at the sight. When he finally stopped staring, I passed him the other straw wrapper.
"Your turn."
Eager to repeat my little trick, Rory began trying to trap some of his drink in his straw. It took him three tries to remove the fluid without it slipping back into the cup, but after that, he was quick to repeat my trick.
His reaction was just too adorable.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Once we'd finished our drinks, I quickly began modifying my tower some more, adding in a few more bedrooms for the children I planned to adopt. All other amenities were already taken care of, including companionship, as the Wolf Beetles had begun breeding.
I was about to do more when my base on Chiron alerted me to the approach of a group of drones, flying up to the edge of my defense grid before dropping off three strange objects and flying away. Sending a CNDR to examine them, I discovered the objects were biological containers of some sort, containing, respectively, a shrimp of some sort, flies of some kind, and a type of moss-oh.
Carefully, I moved all of the organisms through a portal into my hubworld, then moved them to a lab to begin cultivation. When their numbers became sufficiently large, I'd combine some of them with the worms to get the projected chasis construction. Never hurts to make your workers (fabbers, in my case) faster.
XXXXXXXXXX
The next day, I received a reply from Patricia: I had been approved to adopt the children. Now all I needed to do was introduce them to their new home and see if they liked it.
Of course, for that to happen, they'd need to wake up. Hopefully, that would be soon.
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
AN: Read and Review! This is Flameal15k, signing off!