Just a bump for now, but we will be back to add more to this story soon-ish!

Just something silly ...


"Vicki, put that camera away! I'm trying to shave!"

He rose from the chair in search of towels and diapers and other such baby things. Thankfully, Libby had thought of everything.

"Start as we mean to go on," she agreed, carefully shifting her position so they could lay out the various things they would need to give the twins a quick once over clean and cover them up properly.

There was no point in swapping babies, since they each had one already, though Michael thought Leo might be the more challenging of the pair, considering his anatomy. It really came down to which was the wigglier of the two though, and for the moment, that seemed to be Kara.

"Oh, you're going to be a handful, aren't you?" Elena informed their newest daughter, though thankfully neither twin was protesting too loudly at the indignity of being stripped and washed gently.

"They're going to want to eat sooner or later, but Libby left bottles, too," he said, though Libby had already told them both that. "Are you okay?" he asked, once he was almost finished bathing and diapering Leo.

"Who, me?" Elena threw him a smile, wrestling Kara's flailing feet into a onesie and ignoring the threatening scream in the process. "I feel good. Tired, but not in pain, not aching. Magic is never going to cease to amaze me. What about you?"

"I'm okay. Just concerned about you," he confessed, as he wrapped the wriggling baby into a blanket before he could protest. Despite calling Rhy'Din home for many years now, he didn't think he'd ever get entirely used to magic either.

"I'm good," she promised him, carefully lifting the mewling Kara up onto her shoulder. Within seconds, the baby girl had calmed down, proving that her objection had been purely about being put down. Wriggling to the edge of the bed, Elena leaned over to kiss Michael's cheek. "I love you, Mischa, you know?"

Michael smiled at the show of affection from his wife. He had fought long and hard for her love, and now that he had it, he had no intentions of ever letting her go. "Love you, too, El," he murmured back, returning her kiss with one of his own, but this time finding her lips.

She smiled into his kiss, knowing she had made him work for her, though without truly knowing he was fighting that battle for much of that time. She had every intention of making sure he knew he was loved for the rest of his life. "So when can we expect your little Greek hanger-on to pop in and give these two something inappropriate to play with?" she asked teasingly.

He chuckled at her reference to his muse - literally. "I'd like to think she'd give us a little privacy before popping in unannounced," he said, though he could never be too sure where Calliope was concerned.

"She seems to wait until I'm asleep to pop in," Elena pointed out with a chuckle, stroking one hand over Kara's hot little head as the newborn bumped her forehead into her mother's throat.

"Maybe she's jealous," Michael remarked, though he doubted that. If Calliope had wanted to make him one of her lovers, she would have said so a long time ago. "I, uh ... finished the book," he told her, sounding just a little bit shy about it. The book was one he'd been working on for years and one he had promised his muse he would write.

Her eyes lit up. "Oh, that's wonderful! When did you finish up?" She knew this particular book had been a labor of love for several years, since Michela had been born, and had not asked to read any of it because of that. She hoped Calliope appreciated the effort.

"A few nights ago. I'm just doing a final edit," he said, though he had yet to let Calliope read it. It was really up to her whether it was finished to her liking or not.

"Perfect timing, as always," his wife assured him fondly. "She'd better appreciate all the work you put into it. I'm really eager to read this thing!"

"Better let her read it first," he murmured. As much as he trusted his wife's judgment, he couldn't afford to piss his muse off, or he might find himself without any inspiration at all.

Elena chuckled softly. "I'm not going to steal her thunder on this one," she promised him. "Besides, she's been involved all the way from the start. She should be the first one to read it now it's done."

"I just hope she likes it," he said, sounding just a little bit worried, but he was his own worst enemy when it came to criticism. If she didn't like it, that meant years worth of work wasted.

"She let you write it," Elena pointed out. "She wouldn't have done that if she didn't believe you could do her life justice." She reached out, drawing her fingers tenderly against his cheek. "You worry too much."

"Let me?" Michael echoed with a chuckle. "More like forced me," he corrected, though that wasn't entirely true. She had given him a choice, after all. "Think she'll be jealous we didn't name one of the girls after her?" he asked, only partly joking, even as he turned his cheek into her touch.

"We didn't pick second names yet," was her impish answer, complete with cheeky wink. "She can't complain until their names are absolutely set in stone, and even then, I'll wallop her with that stuffed minotaur if she does."

"I'm not sure that's such a good idea," Michael chuckled. He didn't doubt his wife would do just that. If anyone wasn't afraid of his muse, it was his wife. "What do you say we get these two settled and eat something before Mica gets here?" he suggested.

She chuckled with him. There was a reason Calliope avoided interacting with Elena, after all. His suggestion, however, brightened her eyes once again. "That is a genius idea."

"Well, I do have an above average IQ," he said with a grin and a shrug. Above average, but not quite genius level, though he had been something of a prodigy where writing was concerned.

"You're the brains in this outfit," she agreed, stretching to pull the double bassinet over to where they were sitting. It was only marginally bigger than the usual bassinets, but apparently twins were clingy. Who knew?

"Stop. Let me do it," he told her, moving over to help with the bassinet, one arm still cradling little Leo. She might be magically healed, but that didn't erase the fact that she'd just given birth.

"I hope so!" he replied, with a chuckle. "They're not as much fun as Ploppo, but I think she'll be pleased." Admittedly, the puppy didn't belong to them anyway, but the twins were theirs to keep.

"They'll grow on her," Elena predicted. "She's old enough to be able to help out with them, too. Kinda glad we decided to wait more than two years before popping out more."

"Yeah, but what we need to decide now is what to name them," he pointed out, as they hadn't really made a final decision before the pair had decided it was time to be born.

"I thought it was Leo and Kara?" she asked innocently, smiling back at him. A knock on the door announced the arrival of the orderly, putting the conversation on hold for the few short minutes it took to get the Donnellys downstairs and into a private room, where they could finally, blessedly, relax.

Michael kept his thoughts to himself until they were alone again and Elena was once again settled. He claimed a chair for himself near her bed, close enough for her to admire the little bundles in his arms. "What do you think?" he asked, addressing his question to the newborns. "Are you a Leo and a Kara?"

Leo opened his eyes, wriggling a little in his blanket for a moment before peering around with newborn eyes. Who knew what he actually saw or what he thought of it, but he closed his eyes pretty fast afterward. Elena chuckled. "Well, at least one of them responded."

"Not really a yes or a no though, is it?" he said with a grin, not really expecting either newborn to answer. "What do you think?" he asked, turning his attention back to Elena. Once they signed the birth certificates, there would be no changing their minds.

"I like them," she said. "Not just saying that. There's a reason they were on the list to begin with. Little love and little lion? I think that's perfect for a terrifying twosome who will be completely under the thumb of a big sister with way too many creative ideas."

Michael chuckled again. "We should probably give that big sister a call and let her know her new brother and sister have arrived," he suggested. He couldn't argue with Elena's reasoning. The more he thought about it, the more he liked the names they'd chosen for the twins. "Pick one," he told her, needing at least one hand free to make the phone call.

She chuckled, shifting to reach over and take the twin from his right arm so he could fish around for his phone and make the call with his dominant hand. "It's early enough that Tony could bring her in to meet them before she has to go to bed," she pointed out, hugging Kara affectionately in her arms as the sleepier twin stretched.

Michael arched a brow at his wife's suggestion. "Are you sure you're up to that? It won't hurt to have her wait one more day," he pointed out. She had said she was tired, after all.

"But she'll sleep better with hugs from Mom and Dad," Elena pointed out. "Last thing we need is for all of us to be sleep-deprived when we get home tomorrow."

"That's true," he replied, given her reasoning. "You realize Sofia is going to want to come along," he said, though Tony might be able to convince his own daughter to wait a day or two before inundating them with visitors.

"Pretty sure Tony can convince her only one person under ten is allowed in at a time," Elena said, confident in her brother's ability to keep his own daughter at home. "Or Anya will have something up her sleeve. They should store up goodwill for when Anya pops in a few months."

"It's about time they had another," Michael said, not for the first time. Why should they have all the fun? Nonna De Luca was in her glory. That said, he scrolled through his contacts with his thumb and hit the call icon next to Tony's name, all one-handed.

The voice that answered, though, was not Tony. "Daddy? Daddy, is it you? Un'ca Tony said it's you, an' there's babies, an' is it you?"

"Yes, sweetheart, it's me!" Michael replied, looking to Elena. "It's Mica," he whispered to his wife, though that much was probably obvious. "Are you being good?"

Over the sound of his wife laughing at the knowledge their daughter had managed to answer Tony's phone, Mica very happily replied. "I am bein' very good, an' we made cookies, an' Auntie Anya says we can have sketti tonight!"

"Oh, that's exciting!" he said, pausing a moment to touch the icon that would put her on speaker. "Say hi to Mama! She can hear you, too, now," he told her. "They made cookies and they're having pus-ketti for dinner," he whispered for Elena's sake.

"'lo, Mumma! Did you has the babies? Can they hear me? Hello babies!"

Elena laughed again at the excited voice booming from the phone. "Well, hello," she answered, sharing a bright grin with Michael. "Yes, and yes, and they're sleeping right now."

"Would you like to come see them tonight?" he asked, despite the fact that he hadn't asked Tony yet. He had a feeling Elena's big brother might just jump at the chance to be the first to see the newest members of the family anyway.

There was an audible gasp of delight from the other end of the phone. "Oooh, can I really? An' see you, an' Mumma, an' have cuddles?"

"For a little bit, but Mummy and the babies have to stay overnight at the hospital so we can make sure they're all better, okay?" he told his daughter, hoping she'd be okay with that, given the fact she could come visit for a while.

"But I can still come and see?" Mica asked hopefully.

Elena grinned over at Michael; their little girl was never going to admit that what she really wanted was to see her parents, rather than just the new babies.

"Why don't you let me talk to Uncle Tony and I'll ask him if it's okay," Michael suggested, though he doubted his brother-in-law would say no.

"Okay! I'll bring cookies!" There was a thump as Mica put the phone down on the table a little too heavily, and then yelled for her uncle. "Unca Tony! Daddy wants you!"