Upside Down

I suppose one of the most important things to tell you is Genelife Corp knows about me and my nanites, but they know nothing about Mama or Chinatsu, which is a huge relief for me. I can see why Genelife is so interested in them. In case you don"t know, Genelife is a Chinese corporation, and China is the only nation in the world with a different male to female ratio. j.a.pan is 1 to 2.1, the USA is 1 to 1.7, and most other developed nations have similar ratios. China"s is 1.8 to 1, the complete opposite of the rest of the world. Well, if you think about it, you"ll know why. So, them taking boys and changing them means little as far as they"re concerned. Although, I imagine there will still be a lot of outrage, since, in China, boys are still far more valued than girls.

Anyway, their men were the ones that followed us at the minigolf course. Dad told me they gave up a huge amount of information about their activities here, and they rolled up over a hundred people that work for them, and they are still rounding them up. As for why they were following us, they were planning on grabbing me and taking some of my blood. True, it wouldn"t do them any good, but they don"t know that. Regardless, we"re still forbidden to take public transportation for the foreseeable future. Truthfully, at this point, I don"t really care.

Also, we now have a live in "maid," who isn"t a maid at all, actually she"s Mama"s security. She lives in the room beside Mama and Daddy. Her name is Chiaki Minami.

Dad is still looking for another girl to be Chinatsu"s security, but he"s having some issues finding someone who can blend in with us like Honoka does. He said he will be reaching out to some other contacts he has to find someone. Hopefully, he can find someone soon. The thought of Chinatsu being hurt or taken scares me witless.

Okay, on to the biggest issue for me out of all of this, Ryu"s father. Dad, Ryu, and I went over to his house to talk to him. I won"t go into all the details, but suffice it to say, when I finally snapped and yelled at him, "You are doing the same thing that your father did to you to Ryu!" It stopped him dead in his tracks. His astonished expression quickly turned into an embarra.s.sed and upset one. It was our turn to be astounded when he told Ryu, "I swore I"d never treat my children the way my father did me and look at me. Ryu, I apologize. Come home. You do what you want with your life. I"ll find someone to take over after me if you still don"t want to, but I hope you keep up your training and still help out with the younger students now and again."

In the end, it all worked out and, of course, Ryu will still be training and teaching part time, simply not to the extent that he was before all of this happened.

He took me to show me his room and well, you know how it is, we spent about fifteen minutes making out. My G.o.d, I love kissing him, and the way he makes me feel when he touches me. While it"s true I wanted to rip his pants off and jump him by the end of our make out session, I was able to restrain the impulse. After all, I promised Mama, and I don"t break promises. Thankfully, I"m getting much better at controlling that side of me.

However, thanks to me, I think he"ll have some explaining to do Monday when he goes back to school. Without even thinking about it, I gave him one h.e.l.l of a kiss mark on his neck. It"s very prominent and totally obvious, even after he b.u.t.tons up his collar. What can I say? He got me very wound up. Thank G.o.d for pantyliners since I hate the way damp panties feel. Nonetheless, I apologized, but he waved it off with a chuckle, saying, "Who cares what they think."

Ryu"s family came over Wednesday evening for dinner. It was a little tense at first, but after seeing how Ryu and Ryo dote on us girls, their mother"s and father"s att.i.tude softened. Their mother spent quite a bit of time talking to the two of us and in the end, I heard her quietly tell the boys, "I approve," with a huge grin. Thereafter, she spent the rest of the evening talking to Mama and Dad. Their dad never said all that much to us. It"s possible he"s still embarra.s.sed about my outburst.

Sat.u.r.day, we went on a date to see a movie, then to an arcade, and we all ate dinner here at the house. Ryu and Ryo were amazed when I made dinner for everyone. We went on another date Sunday to go rollerskating and then we ate lunch. Both dates were a lot of fun.

As a side story to all of this, I"m sure you remember I told Ryu I"m a genius. Ends up, at their mother"s request, I"ll be helping Ryu and Ryo study as well. Adding two more in the mix isn"t going to hurt anything.

Next item: Nanites. It took a little longer than they thought to produce the two batches for me, but they did get them complete and Hestia sent me a notification late Friday afternoon. I immediately contacted Mayumi, and we set it up where Monday, after my appointments, we"ll be going to the lab to administer them to her and Honoka. I"ve already told them that we"ll have to go back in a week to see if it worked.

It"s taken a little longer than we, Mirai, Hiro and I, thought it would, but for the most part the Nanotech Division is pretty much back up and running. We have sixty-nine researchers and three hundred twenty-seven research a.s.sistants for them. We haven"t started recruiting the top people in the field as yet, since I decided to let things settle into place with what we have for the moment. I haven"t given up on the idea though.

[Sat.u.r.day, July 4th]

As is normal for me, I wake up before the sun rises. Glancing at my clock, it"s 5:40. Kissing Chinatsu to wake her, we dress, collect Honoka, and head down to bathe.

As you know, this is our normal checkup day, but following that, we"re going shopping for more "going out" dresses and heels for Honoka. Her hair has also grown out enough to put it up in different styles, so we"ll be buying more hair accessories for her as well. She"s really taken a liking to dresses and skirts and, from what I"ve seen, Mitty loves seeing her in them as well.

After we"ve bathed and dressed, we head to the kitchen to make breakfast for everyone. I seriously hope Dad can find some land to build our new house on soon, because with the way our household is growing, we are fast approaching the saturation point for our kitchen here.

We find Chiaki already at the table drinking some tea.

"Good morning, Chiaki." I say as I breeze through the dining room.

She looks over her shoulder and smiles as she tells us, "Good morning everyone."

Honoka asks her, "What are you doing up so early?"

"I could ask the same thing, but I"m used to being up this early, so…" She replies.

Honoka nods. "In our case, this is our normal routine since we make everyone breakfast. We also have a doctor"s appointment later this morning. You should already know that from Mom"s schedule."

Now, I ought to mention Chiaki has only been here a day and knows very little about the situation. She"s worked with Honoka though, and she knows very well that our parents aren"t really Honoka"s, so her confused question is understandable. "Why do you call Haruka Mom?"

Chinatsu and I giggle in the kitchen, while Honoka smiles and replies, "Simple, I"ve been adopted into the family, so they are my mom and my dad."

"You already had a family, why would you agree to be adopted by the Kobayashis"?"

"Honestly, I"m happy they did, but to answer your question, because it"s easier for me to be their sister as a cover than a friend or whatever. I"m quite happy with the situation, and I believe my sisters are as well." Chiaki looks at us for confirmation, and we nod. "Excuse me, we need to start breakfast since Mom and Dad will be up soon."

When Mama and Daddy come into the dining room a few minutes later, Chinatsu serves them some tea while Honoka and I finish up breakfast.

Mama is now close to four months along, and her baby b.u.mp is quite easy to see. Honoka and I have pretty much taken over cooking when we"re here at the house. Mama complains of the lack of things for her to do around the house since we girls leave her very little to do anymore. I know she appreciates the help, but I think the she"s too used to doing everything around the house from doing it for so many years. I"d much rather her take it easy and let us girls take care of things. I doubt her cooking and cleaning would present much of an issue since she has nanites as well, but why take a chance in my opinion.

Anyway, after we eat and clean up, Mama and I head to her room so she can help me put up my hair while Chinatsu and Honoka head upstairs to finish what they have to do. Today, Mama is putting it up in a "folded ponytail." It"s not that I really need her help to do this hairstyle, but Mama loves it when I ask for her help, so here we are. In case you"re curious, there are many ways to do a folded ponytail, but in this instance, it"s nothing more than a high ponytail where you fold the hair in half and clip or pin it in place. We"re using my b.u.t.terfly hairclip to hold this is place. It"s not only quick and easy, but it"s cute. The huge thing for me is with my hair like this it"s short enough I don"t sit on it.

After I give Mama a hug and a kiss as thanks for helping, I head up to do my makeup while Mama dresses.

◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇

After the nurses do their normal poking and prodding, we wait for Dr. Sato, which thankfully, for once, isn"t the normal long wait.

Smile and nodding to us as he enters, he says, "Good morning everyone."

Everyone tells him good morning and he continues, "Well, as you already expect, you ladies are in perfect health. Honestly, I don"t see the need to keep you coming in every week at this point. How would you feel about coming in on a monthly basis?"

Mama tells him, "That would be fine. I a.s.sume I"ll still be seeing Dr. Kato on a regular basis though?"

"Certainly, we definitely want to keep a close eye on your pregnancy since it"s the first of its kind. Even so, it"ll still be every couple of weeks, unless there"s a problem."

Mama smiles. "I don"t really see how there could be considering, but I"d rather not take any chances. We"ve wanted these little ones for far too long," she says while placing a hand on her baby b.u.mp.

He nods. "Well Mrs. Kobayashi, I feel the same way, there are too many things we don"t know about what the nanites are supposed to do. If some of the doctors here had their way about it, Sora would"ve never been allowed to leave the hospital. The same with Chinatsu and you now." He shakes his head. "I don"t really understand people like that. All they can see is a chance to get published, even though they should know better."

Mama gives him a wry smile and says, "With the government involved in all of this, they still think they would be allowed to do that? These aren"t going to be coming to light anytime soon."

"Oh, I agree. The fact they heal you three and we have no real idea of how long you"ll live ought to be enough to tell them that." He turns to look at me, "Sora, I was told you restarted the Nanotech Division over at TGR. Are you going to have them study your nanites?"

I shake my head. "No, not right now. There are too many other things that need to happen before any of that. Getting approval to release my parents other cure to the public is my foremost concern. There"s also a lot of research that was shelved when Mr. Akiyama shut it down. A lot of it would be very beneficial to the public at large, not to mention make huge sums of money. We"ll just have to see how it goes."

"Makes sense to me. Oh, by the way, thank you. I own some TGR common stock. Since you took over the stock price has jumped considerably."

I smile. "I had no idea, but then again, I"ve been fairly busy with everything. I"m happy it"s recovering, because that tells me that confidence in TGR is coming back."

"Don"t stretch yourself too thin Sora. I don"t want to see you back in here because you overdid things."

"Don"t worry. I hate hospitals, so I have no want to come here. I"m busy, but I don"t think I"m overdoing things. I see Airi twice a week, PT three times a week, ninety minutes of self-defense training three days a week, go to work two or three days a week for a few hours, help around the house, tutor Chinatsu, our friends and boyfriends, and even manage to go on dates here and there. See, not too bad, right?" I tell him with a mischievous grin.

He laughs and shakes his head. "I won"t say too much Sora. You know better than anyone else what your limits are. Do me a favor though, don"t push them too much. Physically, I"m very sure you"ll be fine, but think about mental exhaustion too, okay?"

"Alright, I"ll do that. Although, even if I didn"t, my sisters," I gesture to Chinatsu and Honoka, "would remind me. Dr. Sato?"

"Yes?"

"I don"t think I"ve ever said it, so thank you for taking care of me during all of this."

He smiles. "You"re more than welcome Sora. I wish all my patients were as good natured as you are. Anyway, I"ll see you ladies back here on the 1st of August. Take care."

We all tell him, "Good bye." and head out to the car. First order is business is dropping off Mama and Chiaki, then, as I said, we"re going shopping and to lunch.